The present study aimed to validate a control method on the gas chromatography system (GC) based on the experimental design strategy, to examine the changes and correlation between the fermentation process and the quality of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beer product, especially the formation of diacetyl. On the other hand, spectrophotometric methods were applied to the determination of polyphenols content and the potential antioxidant activity of beer during different fermentation processes. with this aim, three modes of barley fermentation were used, specifically classical fermentation, stopped fermentation and thermal process. The results showed that the different fermentation modes had a major impact on diacetyl production. The highest concentration was obtained using stopped fermentation 0.36 mg/L, the lowest concentration value 0.07 mg/L was detected using the thermal process. Monitoring the increase of oxygen concentration between fermentation, filtration, and filling of the final product (32, 107, 130 ppm, respectively) has a significant impact on the concentration of diacetyl. The obtained results of spectrophotometric analysis showed that the total antioxidant activity changed during beer fermentation process and demonstrate that the extend of the antioxidant activity was very much dependent on the total polyphenolic content with a higher value in Hopped wort (13.41%, 65 mg GAE 100 mL−1, 28 mg CE 100 mL−1) for antioxidant potential, total phenolic content, and total flavonoids content, respectively, whereas the lowest values was detected in Non-alcoholic beer using thermal process (7.24%, 35 mg GAE 100 mL−1, 10 mg CE 100 mL−1) for antioxidant potential, total phenolic contents, and total flavonoids contents, respectively. Based on the results achieved, we reveal the impact of the fermentation process on the nutritional value of the final product.


A study was made of the immunogenetic parameters--the physicochemical properties of the circulating immune complexes (CIC) and their interrelation with HLA antigens--in 70 children aged 1 to 15 years with primary acquired glomerulonephritis (PGN). It has been demonstrated that the active period of PGN is characterized by high conceptration of the CIC of medium size (molecular mass) in children with HLA antigens. This characterizes the predisposition of the persons with the established phenotype to PGN as well as evidences that CIC play an undoubtful role in the pathogenesis of autosensitization in PGN.


The mechanical properties of spruce were studied at various temperatures ranging from-190 C to + 250 C. Diagrams are presented to show how maximum tensile stress, strain. modulus of elasticity. and work-to-maximum load changes as a function of temperature. The fracture energy reaches a maximum value around-40 C and is reduced to a low level at 150 C and over. Tensile stress increases in a linear manner with a decrease in temperature reaching a theoretical maximum at zero Kelvin degree.


Sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) gas has a quite high global warming potential and hence it is required that applying any substitute for SF6 gas. Much interest in fluorine-containing compounds appears due to their widespread use as gaseous candidate of SF6 in fault current interruption process considering its relatively high performance of dielectric insulation and arc quenching. The critical reduced electric field strengths of hot CF4 gas corresponding to the dielectric recovery phase of a high voltage circuit breaker are calculated in the temperature range from 300 to 3500 K. The equilibrium compositions of hot CF4 gas at various pressures were determined based on Gibbs free energy minimization. Additionally, adopting full sets of improved cross sections, the critical reduced electric field strength of this derived composition was obtained by a balancing electron generation and loss modeled by the interactions between electrons and the dissociated species of hot gas evaluated by the electron energy distribution function (EEDF) derived from the Boltzmann transport equation. In order to confirm the validity of the present calculation, the predicted result for hot CF4 gas was compared with experimental results and previous calculations and there exists a generally good agreement. We have presented that the dielectric strength of hot CF4 gas experiences a fast reduction as the continuous dissociation occurs with increasing temperature. Comparison with dielectric properties of hot SF6, regardless of reduced dielectric properties in the low temperature range, replacing SF6 with CF4 brings an increase of the critical reduced electric field strength for temperatures above 2200 K, indicating possible theoretical verification of the practical applications that CF4 is an admixture to SF6 gas as the arc extinguishing and insulation medium in high voltage circuit breakers.


The paper aims at designing a scheme for automatic identification of a species from its genome sequence. A set of 64 three-tuple keywords is first generated using the four types of bases: A, T, C and G. These keywords are searched on N randomly sampled genome sequences, each of a given length (10,000 elements) and the frequency count for each of the 43=64 keywords is performed to obtain a DNA-descriptor for each sample. Principal Component analysis is then employed on the DNA-descriptors for N sampled instances. The principal component analysis yields a unique feature descriptor for identifying the species from its genome sequence. The variance of the descriptors for a given genome sequence being negligible, the proposed scheme finds extensive applications in automatic species identification. Next, a computational map is trained by the Self-Organizing Feature Map algorithm using the DNAdescriptors from different species as the training inputs. The map is shown to provide an easier technique for recognition and classification of a species based on its genomic data.


The informal tank institution seems to have functioned relatively well in Tamil Nadu, India, at least until the early 1970s. The institution had been supported by three layers of irrigation functionaries at village level. Especially important was the role of the lower irrigation functionaries such as the water-turner (Neerkatti ( ), who had been conducting important tasks such as sluice operation, field water management and others. Based on the authors' recent field survey in seven tank-benefitted villages in Madurai District of Tamil Nadu, especially interviews with 31 Neerkatti families, after discussing physical and socioeconomic factors which caused the deterioration of tank irrigation and the village-level informal tank institution, the paper focuses on the current status of institution, including how rules and regulations, and the sanction system on violators and related systems are functioning, and analyzes the current socioeconomic status and perceptions of the Neerkattis. It emphasizes the contradiction between the traditional caste-based society, which governs the informal tank institution, and the recent rapid economic development in India.


With more than 500 contributions from over 240 specialists, this volume provides lively and clearly written expositions of those figures who have done most to shape our views in the period since 1914. Music, cinema, drama, art, fiction, poetry, philosophy, sociology and anthropology are just some of the fields covered in this indispensable volume. Figures covered include: Malinowski, Kafka, George Orwell, Lenin, Gaudi, Gramsci, Freud, Malcolm X, Henry Miller, Miles Davis, James Joyce, Ravel, Veblen and Edward Sapir.


The 10th World Conference of Science Journalists (San Francisco, U.S.A., 26–30 October 2017) was the most successful to date in terms of participants and probably the one with the largest presence of journalists from the developing world among its attendees and speakers. In agreement with the times, its themes were marked by ethical dilemmas in the communication of science, fake news and climate change, among others. Abstract


The clinical, genetic, and pathologic findings, and the pertinent case histories in two families with idiopathic hemochromatosis are presented. These studies support the view that idiopathic hemochromatosis is a disease inherited in at least two ways. In one of these families, inheritance appeared to occur in an autosomal recessive manner, whereas in the other, autosomal dominant expression seemed evident. Evidence that an inability of the reticuloendothelial cells to handle iron may play a major role in the pathogenesis of hemochromatosis is presented. The early age of onset and poorer prognosis associated with the recessive inheritance suggest that the defect in reticuloendothelial cell function present in such cases is different from or more severe than those associated with dominant inheritance.


Edward Englehardt Giberson, the proprietor, is a skilled glassblower whose business is on the verge of bankruptcy. He works in his studio almost every day, and his products sell reasonably well. On average, he has at least a two-week backlog of orders. He realizes his prices are too low, yet the artistic nature of his products makes it difficult to set prices based on any systematic assessment of demand or comparison with similar products. In desperation, he turns to the consulting club of a nearby graduate business school for help in establishing both a pricing policy and a production policy that he hopes will lead to profitable operations and a positive cash flow. Clearly, continuing business as usual is not an option for Giberson.


Synopsis Tensile deformation behavior at very low temperatures near absolute zero has been investigated mainly for an Fe-42%Ni steel to prove the applicability of the computer simulation method presented previously by the authors and to clarify the effects of several testing conditions on serration. The amount of the elongation accompanied with each load drop in serration increased with increasing deformation rate and also for shorter gage length. Hourglass type specimens also showed a similar serration to the specimens with a smoothed and reduced section. Serration was smaller in liquid He(II) than in liquid He(I). All these characteristics of serration observed experimentally were reproduced with computer simulation. The computer simulation clarified that the high thermal conductivity and difusivity led to a decreased amount of elongation accompanied with each load drop. The simulation also showed that work hardening played an important role for deformation behavior at very low temperatures. Serration, however, arose by the calculation even in the absent of work hardening, whereas the specimen deformed only at the center in this case. Deformation behavior observed experimentally was discussed in terms of the results obtained by the simulation.


The transmission of multimedia data over wireless systems generally require network devices designed with a high communication bandwidth, power, and processing resources. To deal with these bottlenecks commonly associated with multimedia transmission, various diversity coding schemes have been proposed. We have previously shown that wireless OFDM systems based on space-time block-coding with adaptive beamforming (STBC-OFDM-AB) are well suited to multimedia communication. Recent studies have shown further performance gains in systems utilizing space-time-frequency (STF) coding. In this paper, we introduce a transmission system which combines STF coding with adaptive beamforming (STF-OFDM-AB). Simulation results based on the transmission of compressed images showed that the performance improvements introduced by STF-OFDM-AB can be readily observed


Neurodegeneration with brain iron accumulation (NBIA) is a complex group of hereditary progressive neurodegenerative diseases characterized by deposition of iron in the basal ganglia. Twelve genetic forms of this disorder have been identified in previous studies. Though they have different inheritance mechanisms all are usually associated with abnormal brain MRI findings. One of NBIA types is an X-linked disorder known as Beta-propeller Protein Associated Neurodegeneration (BPAN). Herein we describe the case of a 4-year-old girl with 2 episodes of febrile seizures, a brain MRI showing nonspecific hyperintense signal in the dentate nucleus area, and delays in language and communication development. Her diagnosis was made based on a genetic evaluation where exome sequencing revealed a mutation in the position chrX:48.933.022 region of the WDR45 gene. The literature describes different clinical presentations for BPAN, each with a different prognosis, suggesting a wide range of possible symptoms of BPAN, including mild cognitive delay and even epileptic encephalopathy (EE).


Female administrators in comprehensive research universities were surveyed to gain their perceptions on their mentoring experiences. The females affirmed they had informal mentors in roles of sponsor, counselor, coach, and teacher, and they are also mentoring others. The findings both confirmed and contradicted former studies on females in higher education.


Source Address Validation (SAV) is a standard aimed at discarding packets with spoofed source IP addresses. The absence of SAV for outgoing traffic has been known as a root cause of Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks and received widespread attention. While less obvious, the absence of inbound filtering enables an attacker to appear as an internal host of a network and may reveal valuable information about the network infrastructure. Inbound IP spoofing may amplify other attack vectors such as DNS cache poisoning or the recently discovered NXNSAttack. In this paper, we present the preliminary results of the Closed Resolver Project that aims at mitigating the problem of inbound IP spoofing. We perform the first Internet-wide active measurement study to enumerate networks that filter or do not filter incoming packets by their source address, for both the IPv4 and IPv6 address spaces. To achieve this, we identify closed and open DNS resolvers that accept spoofed requests coming from the outside of their network. The proposed method provides the most complete picture of inbound SAV deployment by network providers. Our measurements cover over 55 % IPv4 and 27 % IPv6 Autonomous Systems (AS) and reveal that the great majority of them are fully or partially vulnerable to inbound spoofing. By identifying dual-stacked DNS resolvers, we additionally show that inbound filtering is less often deployed for IPv6 than it is for IPv4. Overall, we discover 13.9 K IPv6 open resolvers that can be exploited for amplification DDoS attacks - 13 times more than previous work. Furthermore, we enumerate uncover 4.25 M IPv4 and 103 K IPv6 vulnerable closed resolvers that could only be detected thanks to our spoofing technique, and that pose a significant threat when combined with the NXNSAttack.


We demonstrate the importance of measuring the mechanical properties of biological tissue in vivo by quantifying the mechanical properties of bovine vitreous both in its native state and upon removal from the eye. The mechanical properties are determined by the cavitation rheology technique developed in our labs to determine the linear modulus. This technique involves inducing a cavitation event at the tip of a syringe that is located at an arbitrary location within the vitreous sample. The pressure at which the cavitation event occurs can be directly related to the modulus. We show that the modulus decreases upon removal of the vitreous from the ocular cavity and decreases still further when the vitreous cortex, the thin membrane that surrounds the vitreous, is removed. This study has important implications for both diagnostic science of diseased tissue and developmental biology in studying tissue properties with age.


In tumors of the soft parts of the hip area, sonography can contribute decisively to clarify the diagnosis by using the 5 mHz sound head for exploration. In the case reported here it was possible to correct the wrong diagnosis of femoral hernia and to establish the diagnosis of a cystic tumour communicating with the hip joint (iliopectineal bursitis). The diagnosis was confirmed both by operation and by histological examination.


Predicted transmitting abilities (PTA) for somatic cell scores (SCS) have been calculated and released to the US dairy industry since 1994. Phenotypically, SCS appear to be decreasing on a population basis, but genetic trends are small. Genetic trends among bulls sampled by artificial-insemination (AI) organizations also are small. Correlations of sire PTA for SCS and PTA for yield traits were near 0, but correlations of PTA for SCS with PTA for productive life were near !.30 for Holsteins.


alpha-Melanocyte-stimulating hormone (alpha-MSH) is a hypothalamic neuropeptide proposed to play a key role in energy homeostasis. To investigate the behavioral, metabolic, and hypothalamic responses to chronic central alpha-MSH administration, alpha-MSH was infused continuously into the third cerebral ventricle of rats for 6 days. Chronic alpha-MSH infusion reduced cumulative food intake by 10.7% (P < 0.05 vs. saline) and body weight by 4.3% (P < 0.01 vs. saline), which in turn lowered plasma insulin levels by 29.3% (P < 0.05 vs. saline). However, alpha-MSH did not cause adipose-specific wasting nor did it alter hypothalamic neuropeptide mRNA levels. Central alpha-MSH infusion acutely activated neurons in forebrain areas such as the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus, as measured by a 254% increase in c-Fos-like immunoreactivity (P < 0.01 vs. saline), as well as satiety pathways in the hindbrain. Our findings suggest that, although an increase of central melanocortin receptor signaling acutely reduces food intake and body weight, its anorectic potency wanes during chronic infusion and causes only a modest decrease of body weight.


The purpose of this causal comparative study is to test the theory of no significant difference that compares preand post-test assessment scores, controlling for the instructional delivery model of online and face-to-face students at a Mid-Atlantic university. Online education and virtual distance learning programs have increased in popularity and enrollment since their inception. Students tend to enroll in online courses for their flexibility and convenience and find online courses to be just as challenging as face-to-face courses (Pastore & Carr-Chellman, 2009). Russell (1999) conducted a metaanalysis which found that there were no significant differences between the modes of class delivery on student achievement and learning. Current research supports this analysis; it has been shown that students and instructors perceive online learning to be just as effective as face-to-face (Liaw, Huang, & Chen, 2007). Bloom's Taxonomy has been used to structure the thinking process in education. Elevating an awareness of pedagogical shifting across delivery models will likely lead to more effective university teaching in both face-to-face and distance programs (Girod & Wojcikiewicz, 2009). Utilizing an ANCOVA, research was conducted pre and post instruction that determined differences existed based on the instructional delivery model in a remedial English course favoring face-to-face instruction. Further, regarding the occurrence of higher order thinking skills, statistical analysis based on a t-test indicated that online students more frequently exhibit this skill versus students enrolled in face-to-face instruction.


Industrial sensors play a fundamental role in distributed control systems, and their increase in number and quantity of parameters involved in industrial processes, makes it necessary for these elements to evolve towards intelligent entities, which in addition to fulfilling more complex tasks, have a certain autonomy, which allows reducing the load on the control equipment, increasing the overall performance of the system. This research work proposes an intelligent sensor architecture, based on the BDI methodology, aimed at controlling the filtering system in a water treatment plant, for level and flow variables. The system design was projected using UML tools, and for the modeling of the smart sensor, Petri nets were used, which allowed the simulation, validation and verification of the system. The Modbus protocol for communications was adopted, and for the implementation the ATmega2560 microcontroller was used, which allowed to test experimentally the behavior of the intelligent sensor; response times and the values of the measured variables. The proposed Architecture allowed to develop an adaptable and flexible intelligent sensor in the industrial environment, with adequate performance and behavior, generating values and response times, in many cases better than other works found in the scientific literature.


Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) increases protein synthesis and induces hypertrophy in renal tubular epithelial cells (Senthil, D., Choudhury, G. G., McLaurin, C., and Kasinath, B. S. (2003) Kidney Int. 64, 468-479). We examined the role of Erk1/2 MAP kinase in protein synthesis induced by VEGF. VEGF stimulated Erk phosphorylation that was required for induction of protein synthesis. VEGF-induced Erk activation was not dependent on phosphoinositide (PI) 3-kinase activation but required sequential phosphorylation of type 2 VEGF receptor, PLCgamma and c-Src, as demonstrated by inhibitors SU1498, U73122, and PP1, respectively. c-Src phosphorylation was inhibited by U73122, indicating it was downstream of phospholipase (PL)Cgamma. Studies with PP1/2 showed that phosphorylation of c-Src was required for tyrosine phosphorylation of Raf-1, an upstream regulator of Erk. VEGF also stimulated phosphorylation of Pyk-2; VEGF-induced phosphorylation of Pyk2, c-Src and Raf-1 could be abolished by BAPTA/AM, demonstrating requirement for induction of intracellular calcium currents. We examined the downstream events following the phosphorylation of Erk. VEGF stimulated phosphorylation of Mnk1 and eIF4E and induced Mnk1 to shift from the cytoplasm to the nucleus upon phosphorylation. VEGF-induced phosphorylation of Mnk1 and eIF4E required phosphorylation of PLCgamma, c-Src, and Erk. Expression of dominant negative Mnk1 abrogated eIF4E phosphorylation and protein synthesis induced by VEGF. VEGF-stimulated protein synthesis could be blocked by inhibition of PLCgamma by a chemical inhibitor or expression of a dominant negative construct. Our data demonstrate that VEGF-stimulated protein synthesis is Erk-dependent and requires the activation of VEGF receptor 2, PLCgamma, c-Src, Raf, and Erk pathway. VEGF also stimulates Erk-dependent phosphorylation of Mnk1 and eIF4E, crucial events in the initiation phase of protein translation.


A review of recent developments in the study of giant resonances in free atoms and in clusters is presented, with particular emphasis on the transition from free atoms to atoms in the condensed phase. Giant resonances in alkali and related metallic clusters due to the excitation of closed shells of delocalized electrons are also reviewed and the relation between different types of collective oscillations is discussed.


Abstract:The conservative shift taken by Russian authorities forced members of the Russian extreme right to seek shelter online. Nevertheless, they fell under censorship restrictions. The objective of this study is to reveal the distinguishing features of extreme right online groups and their participants' activity under conditions of censorship. The groups studied were identified by means of linguistic markers of extreme right sentiments and attitudes. The metrics of social network analysis were used to analyze interconnections between the groups and the internal migrations of closed communities. The study revealed that (1) extreme right online communities use the tactic of creating mirror Internet sites in case the main group is blocked; (2) blocking of the most extreme oppositional extreme right online groups induces the remaining ones to imitate obedience to law, using "softer forms" of extremist rhetoric; (3) the audience of the blocked groups continues spreading extremist ideas through channels related to other subjects. The study's authors conclude that prohibiting extreme right discourse promotes the proliferation of extreme right ideas and sentiments.


The issuance of consumption coupons during the epidemic period to stimulate the economy must take full account of the level of probabilistic consumption and inventory optimization. In this paper, an improved minimum-cost maximum-flow model is constructed to dynamically adjust the inventory capacity of node enterprises with the change of probabilistic consumption level, and three scenarios are simulated by numerical assumptions. The results show that: (1) The model can better solve the problem of consumption coupons, probabilistic consumption and inventory optimization; (2) Consumer welfare remains unchanged, the largest number of government consumption coupons is issued, and the number of enterprise inventories reaches the lowest; (3) Enterprise inventories are minimized with different decisions on consumer probability consumption, and the government's issuance of consumption coupons and the satisfaction of consumer demand have reached a dynamic balance. Corresponding suggestions are put forward, hoping to better help the government to implement the consumption coupons policy to stimulate the economy.


In this paper, we describe the approach and results for our participation in the task 1 (multilingual information extraction) of the CLEF eHealth 2018 challenge. We addressed the task of automatically assigning ICD-10 codes to French death certificates. We used a dictionary-based approach using materials provided by the task organizers. The terms of the ICD-10 terminology were normalized, tokenized and stored in a tree data structure. The Levenshtein distance was used to detect typos. Frequent abbreviations were detected by manually creating a small set of them. Our system achieved an F-score of 0.786 (precision: 0.794, recall: 0.779). These scores were substantially higher than the average score of the systems that participated in the challenge.


Abstract An 8-week growth trial was conducted to evaluate the effects of dietary arginine (Arg) levels on growth, gut morphology, oxidation resistance and immunity of hybrid grouper (Epinephelus fuscoguttatus♀×Epinephelus lanceolatus♂) juveniles. Seven isoenergetic (1465 kJ (350 kcal)/100-g DM), isoproteic (53·5 % of DM) and isolipidic (7 % of DM) experimental diets were formulated to contain graded Arg levels ranging from 1·9 to 4·7 % (dry weight) at approximately 0·5 % increments. Each diet was randomly assigned to triplicate groups of 16 juvenile fish (average initial body weight: 11·7 (sd 0·1) g) and was administered twice daily (08.00 and 16.00 hours). After the growth trial, all remaining fish were fed their prescribed diets for 2 d and then exposed to 4·5 mg Cu2+/l water for 36 h. Results showed that growth performance and feed utilisation of experimental fish were significantly affected by different dietary Arg levels. Weight gain % (WG%) of fish was increased as dietary Arg increased, reaching a peak value at 3·8 % dietary Arg level, and when dietary Arg level increased to 4·7 % WG% was reduced. Fish fed 1·9 and 2·2 % dietary Arg levels had higher daily feed intake compared with fish fed other dietary Arg levels. Feed conversion ratios in fish fed 1·9, 2·2, 2·7 and 4·7 % dietary Arg levels were higher than those in fish fed 3·1, 3·8 and 4·1 % dietary Arg levels. Protein efficiency ratio and protein productive value (PPV) increased with an increase in dietary Arg, up to a peak value at 3·8 % dietary Arg level, above which these parameters declined. On the basis of quadratic regression analysis of weight gain % (WG%) or PPV against dietary Arg levels, the optimal dietary Arg requirement for hybrid grouper was estimated to be 3·65 %. Fish fed 3·8 % dietary Arg had higher whole-body and muscle protein contents compared with fish fed other dietary Arg levels. Fish fed 3·8 and 4·1 % dietary Arg levels had higher levels of mRNA for insulin-like growth factor-I and target of rapamycin in the liver compared with fish fed other dietary Arg levels. Hepatic S6 kinase 1 mRNA expression in fish fed 3·8 % dietary Arg level was higher than that in fish fed any of the other dietary Arg levels. Gut morphology, hepatic antioxidant indices and immune indices in serum and head kidney were significantly influenced by dietary Arg levels. In conclusion, the optimal dietary Arg requirement for hybrid grouper was estimated to be 3·65 %, and suitable dietary Arg supplementations improved gut morphology and oxidation resistance of hybrid grouper.


The purpose of this study was to determine if morphine programines implemented in the city of Naples between 1980 and 1985 might have contributed to the low HIV prevalence rate detected among injecting drug users (IDU's). A case-control study was condusted, comparing 69 HIV-positive and 266 HIV-negative IDU's attending a large drug treatment centre in Naples in the period 1980-84. Cases were less likely than HIV-negative controls to have been prescribed morphine, though the difference was only marginally significant (odds ratio = 0.57; 0.20-1.35). The results suggest that HIV infection tended to be less common among those prescribed morphine. These findings are somewhat unexpected considering that the alternative treatment was represented by methadone provided orally. However, methadone was often given at low, insufficient doses, and was associated with persistent unsafe drug infection. Persons prescribed morphine were able to visit pharmacies every day where they were also able to purchase sterile inject...


Light‐absorbing impurities in snow reduce snow albedo, producing a positive radiative forcing, warming the surface air and snowpack, and accelerating snow melt. As the snow melts, black carbon (BC) and other insoluble light‐absorbing particulate impurities (ILAP) are retained at the snow surface because their scavenging efficiency with meltwater is <100%, so concentrations of ILAP in surface snow increase with snow melt, further reducing snow albedo. The magnitude of this positive feedback depends on the scavenging efficiency of BC and other ILAP with snow meltwater. We present results from field measurements of the vertical distribution of BC and other ILAP in snow near Barrow (Alaska), the Dye‐2 station in Greenland and Tromsø (Norway) during the melt season. Amplification factors due to melt are calculated for the concentrations in surface snow of BC and all ILAP. At Barrow and Dye‐2, melt scavenging rates are estimated. Melt amplification appears generally to be confined to the top few centimeters of the snowpack, where it increases concentrations of BC and other ILAP by up to a factor of about five. Scavenging fractions of ILAP due to percolation of meltwater are estimated at 10–30%, with the rates for BC being comparable or a few percent lower. The lack of distinction may result from the particles in snow being internal mixtures of both BC and other ILAP, so that scavenging efficiencies for these internally mixed particles are determined by the total particle size and hydrophobicity rather than being different for individual particle components.


Abstract This article is about territorial claims, authority and rights in an urban settlement or 'bosti' in central Dhaka. It highlights the drama of a violent encounter between a police officer and a young man, unfolding how the social ordering of urban space is (re)produced in and through authority and violence. It illustrates how situated practices of authority define who can access institutions of rights and justice, and who cannot. It concludes that claims for rights and remedies are not easy to act out when the collusion of state and non-state authority negate voice and agency and leave negotiation and equitable justice reserved for those recognised within a structure of resolution, illuminating how intimacies of violence interlink with wider political configurations and economic conditions.


We extend the single-stage stellarator coil design approach for quasi-symmetry on axis from (Giuliani et al 2020) to additionally take into account coil manufacturing errors. By modeling coil errors independently from the coil discretization, we have the flexibility to consider realistic forms of coil errors. The corresponding stochastic optimization problems are formulated using a risk-neutral approach and risk-averse approaches. We present an efficient, gradient-based descent algorithm which relies on analytical derivatives to solve these problems. In a comprehensive numerical study, we compare the coil designs resulting from deterministic and risk-neutral stochastic optimization and find that the risk-neutral formulation results in more robust configurations and reduces the number of local minima of the optimization problem. We also compare deterministic and risk-neutral approaches in terms of quasi-symmetry on and away from the magnetic axis, and in terms of the confinement of particles released close to the axis. Finally, we show that for the optimization problems we consider, a risk-averse objective using the conditional value-at-risk leads to results which are similar to the risk-neutral objective.


We introduce a new class of upper bounds on the log partition function of a Markov random field (MRF). This quantity plays an important role in various contexts, including approximating marginal distributions, parameter estimation, combinatorial enumeration, statistical decision theory, and large-deviations bounds. Our derivation is based on concepts from convex duality and information geometry: in particular, it exploits mixtures of distributions in the exponential domain, and the Legendre mapping between exponential and mean parameters. In the special case of convex combinations of tree-structured distributions, we obtain a family of variational problems, similar to the Bethe variational problem, but distinguished by the following desirable properties: i) they are convex, and have a unique global optimum; and ii) the optimum gives an upper bound on the log partition function. This optimum is defined by stationary conditions very similar to those defining fixed points of the sum-product algorithm, or more generally, any local optimum of the Bethe variational problem. As with sum-product fixed points, the elements of the optimizing argument can be used as approximations to the marginals of the original model. The analysis extends naturally to convex combinations of hypertree-structured distributions, thereby establishing links to Kikuchi approximations and variants.


Background Tibetans have lived at high altitudes for thousands of years, and they have unique physiological traits that enable them to tolerate this hypoxic environment. However, the genetic basis of these traits is still unknown. As a sensitive and highly efficient technique, RT-qPCR is widely used in gene expression analyses to provide insight into the molecular mechanisms underlying environmental changes. However, the quantitative analysis of gene expression in blood is limited by a shortage of stable reference genes for the normalization of mRNA levels. Thus, systematic approaches were used to identify potential reference genes. Results The expression levels of eight candidate human reference genes (GAPDH, ACTB, 18S RNA, β2-MG, PPIA, RPL13A, TBP and SDHA) were assessed in blood from hypoxic environments. The expression stability of these selected reference genes was evaluated using the geNorm, NormFinder and BestKeeper programs. Interestingly, RPL13A was identified as the ideal reference gene for normalizing target gene expression in human blood before and after exposure to high-altitude conditions. Conclusion These results indicate that different reference genes should be selected for the normalization of gene expression in blood from different environmental settings.


The interworking of the LTE system and WLAN technologies has drawn much attention lately, due to the growing demands for various multimedia services and large data traffic in hotspot areas. Existing research studies have mostly investigated the coupling architectures for these two wireless communication standards at the network layer. However, in the current architectures, many important coordination functions and joint optimizations cannot be accomplished efficiently. To tackle this problem, a new CBS solution is proposed, which integrates different RATs at layer 2 in the true sense of convergence. We design a unified protocol stack that includes all the original functions of both LTE and WLAN systems. Then we propose a convergence architecture, the RMC sublayer, for joint management of these two RATs. The proposed CBS solution can support seamless offloading through soft handover, guaranteed QoS, forwarding management by a single IP address, and customized bandwidth aggregation service. Finally, our simulation and initial experiment results demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of the CBS solution in future mobile converged networks.


Abstract In automobile exhaust systems, catalytic converters have become essential in reducing environmental pollution. However, the main components of catalytic converters produce large pressure drops in exhaust systems, which decrease engine power and increase fuel consumption. In addition to the need to reduce pressure loss, the flow passing through the catalytic substrate strate should be as uniform as possible, which provides a uniform thermal distribution and high catalytic conversion efficiency. The goal of the present study is simultaneously to reduce the pressure loss and to improve the flow distribution under spatial constraints. The authors herein propose new types of device and investigate their performances experimentally. Specifically, the possibilities of two types of flow deflector with a shell structure, which are placed inside the diffuser part of the catalytic converter in order to reduce flow separation, were investigated. In addition, using the particle image velocimetry technique and Pitot tube velocimetry, flow features such as the velocity profiles were elucidated. The tested converter has a standard cylindrical ceramic monolith substrate with channels of square cross-section. As a result, the two flow deflectors can reduce the pressure loss by 17 per cent and 22 per cent, compared with a no-deflector converter and can effectively improve the velocity profile.


Stylometry is the statistical analyses of variationsin the author's literary style. The technique has been used inmany linguistic analysis applications, such as, author profiling, authorship identification, and authorship verification. Over thepast two decades, authorship identification has been extensivelystudied by researchers in the area of natural language processing. However, these studies are generally limited to (i) a small number of candidate authors, and (ii) documents with similar lengths. In this paper, we propose a novel solution by modeling authorship attribution as a set similarity problem to overcome the two stated limitations. We conducted extensive experimental studies on a real dataset collected from an online book archive, Project Gutenberg. Experimental results show that in comparison to existing stylometry studies, our proposed solution can handlea larger number of documents of different lengths written by alarger pool of candidate authors with a high accuracy.


Due to the fast development in computer science new modules and specializations have to be developed, and the Computer Science (CS) curriculum needs to be reshaped in order to include 21st century skills such as problem-solving, creativity, innovation, communication and collaboration. This paper proposes a generic model for designing learning experiences for CS curriculum. The model builds on existing credit systems such as European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS), to determine if a CS programme can be reshaped to a given period of time. Furthermore the model is capable of determining the student workload distribution across the different types of learning activities for a module. The distribution is computed based on information such as the number of credits for the module, the number of weeks in a semester, as well as the percentage hours of lectures, labs, independent study and other learning activities. Preliminary data collection and analysis was conducted in order to determine the percentages on 75 computer science modules taught at 14 universities from Ireland and UK.


This paper presents and analyses the implementation of a novel active queue management (AQM) named FavorQueue that aims to improve delay transfer of short lived TCP flows over best-effort networks. The idea is to dequeue packets that do not belong to a flow previously enqueued first. The rationale is to mitigate the delay induced by long-lived TCP flows over the pace of short TCP data requests and to prevent dropped packets at the beginning of a connection and during recovery period. Although the main target of this AQM is to accelerate short TCP traffic, we show that FavorQueue does not only improve the performance of short TCP traffic but also improves the performance of all TCP traffic in terms of drop ratio and latency whatever the flow size. In particular, we demonstrate that FavorQueue reduces the loss of a retransmitted packet, decreases the number of dropped packets recovered by RTO and improves the latency up to 30% compared to DropTail. Finally, we show that this scheme remains compliant with recent TCP updates such as the increase of the initial slow-start value.


172 In this study we have examined the interaction of CD44 [a major hyaluronan (HA) receptor] with a RhoA-specific guanine nucleotide exchange factor (LARG, Leukemia-Associated RhoGEF) in human Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma cells (HNSCC-HSC-3 cell line). Immunoprecipitation and immunoblot analyses indicate that CD44 and the LARG protein are expressed in HSC-3 cells; and that these two proteins are physically associated as a complex in vivo . HA-CD44 binding induces LARG-specific RhoA signaling and PLCe activity. In particular, the activation of RhoA-PLCe by HA stimulates IP 3 production, intracellular Ca 2+ mobilization and the upregulation of Ca 2+ /calmodulin-dependent kinaseII (CaMKII) leading to phosphorylation of the cytoskeletal protein, filamin. Phosphorylated filamin then modifies its interaction with filamentous actin resulting in tumor cell migration. The CD44-LARG complex also interacts with the EGF receptor (EGFR). Most importantly, the binding of HA to the CD44-LARG-EGFR complex activates the EGFR receptor kinase which, in turn, promotes Ras-mediated stimulation of a downstream kinase cascade including the Raf-1 and ERK pathways leading to HNSCC cell growth. Using a recombinant fragment of LARG (the LARG-PDZ domain) and in vitro binding assays, we have determined that the LARG-PDZ domain serves as a direct linker between CD44 and EGFR. Transfection of the HSC-3 cells with LARG-PDZcDNA significantly reduces LARG association with CD44 and EGFR. Overexpression of the LARG-PDZ domain also functions as a dominant-negative mutant (similar to the PLC/CaMKII and EGFR/MAPK inhibitor effects) to block HA/CD44-mediated signaling events (e.g. EGFR kinase activation, Ras/RhoA co-activation, Raf-ERK signaling, PLCe-mediated IP 3 production, intracellular Ca 2+ mobilization, CaMKII activity, filamin phosphorylation and filamin-actin binding) and to abrogate tumor cell growth/migration. Taken together, we believe that CD44 interaction with LARG and EGFR plays a pivotal role in Rho/Ras co-activation, PLCe-Ca 2+ signaling and Raf/ERK upregulation required for CaMKinaseII-mediated cytoskeleton function, and in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma progression.


A novel and flexible framework for investigating the roles of actors within a network is introduced. Particular interest is in roles as defined by local network connectivity patterns, identified using the ego-networks extracted from the network. A mixture of Exponential-family Random Graph Models is developed for these ego-networks in order to cluster the nodes into roles. We refer to this model as the ego-ERGM. An Expectation-Maximization algorithm is developed to infer the unobserved cluster assignments and to estimate the mixture model parameters using a maximum pseudo-likelihood approximation. The flexibility and utility of the method are demonstrated on examples of simulated and real networks.


Minor head trauma precipitated oculomotor nerve palsies in two patients who subsequently were discovered to have ipsilateral posterior communicating artery aneurysms. A history of minor trauma should not dissuade investigation for underlying causes of oculomotor nerve palsy, including intracranial aneurysm.


We report on a co-crystal of acetaminophen (APAP) and 2,4-pyridinedicarboxylic acid (PDA). The co-crystal was discovered by screening using the solution-mediated phase transformation (SMPT) technique. Despite the bulk solids of each component being white in color, the new co-crystal phase exhibited a red color. The new phase was analyzed using single-crystal X-ray diffraction and identified as (APAP).(PDA).(1). Structural analysis revealed PDA to exist in a hitherto unreported zwitterionic form in the co-crystal. A structural analysis of pure PDA revealed the presence of the zwitterion form in (PDA).(H(2)O) (2), as well. The components of 1 self-assemble as a three-dimensional (3D) hydrogen-bonded network with a pronounced 2D structure. The origin of the red color was investigated using density functional theory calculations, which demonstrate a decreasing pi-pi(*) separation involving the components of the solid.


The aim of this study was to characterize autonomic lesions in participants with spinal cord injury (SCI; n = 10) using an autonomic reflex screen, incorporating sudomotor, cardiovagal, and sympathetic adrenergic tests, as well as hemodynamic responses to head-up tilt (HUT). Hemodynamic responses were compared to healthy controls (n = 20) and previously published normative cutoffs in order better identify autonomic impairments. Sympathetic skin responses (SSRs), heart rate response to deep breathing (HRDB), and heart rate and beat-to-beat blood pressure responses to Valsalva maneuver (VM) and HUT were measured. SCI participants demonstrated impairment in at least one domain, with 7 of 10 demonstrating autonomic impairment across all domains. No single test was concordant with orthostatic hypotension on HUT, in all participants. Measures of cardiovagal function, including HRDB (SCI = 7.7 ± 3.8 beats/min vs. controls = 17.6 ± 8.1 beats/min) and Valsalva ratio (SCI = 1.53 ± 0.29 vs. controls = 1.85 ± 0.37), were significantly reduced in SCI participants, compared to controls (p < 0.05). These findings suggest that an autonomic reflex screen, which includes standardized testing protocol and normative data for comparison, is useful for determining the autonomic domains affected by the neurological injury in SCI. We also demonstrated significant cardiovagal impairment in SCI participants compared to controls, which warrants further investigation to determine whether cardiovagal dysfunction is associated with the negative cardiovascular outcomes, which are known to occur in SCI.


The assessment of socio-economic effects of marine protected areas on fishing activity points out some methodological difficulties. As a methodology we propose a selection of two components: the fishing unit profitability and the fishery household income distribution and a comparison between a marine protected area versus an "unprotected zone". The methodology has been applied on a case study: the Chumphon National Park versus the Chumphon Province (Gulf of Thailand). Three phases have been implemented: a bibliographical analysis, the carrying out of village monographs, the carrying out of a sample-based survey. The sample-based survey results are presented as follows : the characterization of categories of the variable "marine protected area" by quantitative variables, a multivariate analysis, the performance of Chi-square tests on the relationship between a "profit per fishing day" variable divided into two categories ("in or around MPA" and "remote from the MPA", the measurement of the concentration of income or operating profit per fishery household and the Lorenz curves.


Tourette's syndrome (TS) is a neuropsychiatric disorder characterized by the presence of involuntary motor and phonic tics. Phonic tics can mimic respiratory system disorders such as asthma, and upper and lower respiratory system infections. We report on twins with chronic persistent cough (CPC): one of whom was followed as an asthmatic for a year and the other was diagnosed with recurrent respiratory tract infection. A careful history and neurologic assessment suggested that TS might be responsible for the first twin's symptoms but that the second one was probably in early TS. All the symptoms of the first patient diagnosed as TS showed a complete improvement with pharmacological treatment in two weeks. Since the history of CPC may in reality be TS, we recommend that TS should be considered in the differential diagnosis of pediatric CPC.


ABSTRACT A 10-week double-blind, placebo-controlled design was employed to investigate the effectiveness of clomipramine (CMI) versus placebo in 16 outpatients (ages 10-18 years) with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). While a trend favoring clomipramine was observed, the difference in efficacy between clomipramine (N=8) and placebo (N=8) did not reach statistical significance, partly due to small sample size (N = 6,8). Post-hoc exclusion of two clomipramine-resistant subjects with subtle neurological impairments did, however, yield a statistically significant improvement with drug treatment. Neurological impairments are commonly seen in children with OCD, and may be a risk factor for the disorder during childhood. Speculatively, subtle neurological impairments may also predict resistance to CMI therapy in some patients, and influence the outcome of clinical and research medication trials, depending on differences in neurological inclusion and exclusion criteria.


In recent years the expected environmental consequences of nuclear war have been expanded to include the global impact of injection of huge quantities of smoke and dust into the atmosphere. Solar heating could cause this smoke cloud to rise to stratospheric heights, increasing local temperatures as much as 100 K. The lofting of carbonaceous soot particles into the stratosphere could cause the total ozone column to be reduced due to: (1) increases in catalytic destruction of ozone; (2) transport of ozone-rich, stratospheric air to regions where it is more quickly photolyzed as the ozone-poor, tropospheric air associated with the smoke cloud pushes into the stratosphere; and, (3) direct reactions of ozone with the carbon aerosols. Ozone reacts with carbon black surfaces to produce an oxygen molecule for every ozone lost. Removal of surface oxides formed in the reaction is the rate-limiting step for further reactions of ozone with the surface. Soot surfaces also react with ozone. This reaction is found to ha...


The power of wireless sensor networks (WSN) lies in the ability to deploy large numbers of tiny nodes that assemble and configure themselves. Usage scenarios for these devices range from real-time tracking, to monitoring of environmental conditions, to Military applications, to monitoring of the health of structures or equipment. There is extensive research in the development of new algorithms for data aggregation ,ad hoc routing, and distributed signal processing in the context of wireless sensor networks. As the algorithms and protocols for wireless sensor network are developed, they must be supported by a low-power, efficient and flexible hardware platform. This book describes systematic performance study of two state-of-the-art dynamic routing protocols for WSN, the Dynamic Source Routing protocol (DSR) and the Ad Hoc On-Demand DistanceVector protocol (AODV).


In response to the American military's perceived inability to handle sexual assault cases, the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) is undergoing its most significant restructuring since it went into effect in 1951. In March, 2014, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand nearly succeeded in her effort to end the commander's ability to decide whether these cases go to trial. Behind this criticism is an assumption that there is something about commanders and those who run the military justice system that causes them to perceive these cases differently than the general public. This article tests that assumption. This study finds that those in the military that are charged with solving these cases endorse traditional gender role beliefs and conservatism to a higher degree than the general population. For example, 60% of an elite military sample (those that exercise the prosecutorial discretion) agreed that mothers should be encouraged to stay at home while only 35% of the general public sample agreed. Further, 67% of that elite military sample identified themselves as being conservative, while only 43% of the general public sample did. This study finds that those who endorse those beliefs or label themselves as conservative are 50-100% more likely to endorse certain inaccurate rape schemas and resolve legal elements and outcome judgments in favor of the man. One regression model predicts that in a test case, 54% of the general public would find the man guilty while only 41% of the elite military would. This suggests that at the macro-level, those who run the UCMJ are honestly committed to resourcing the fight against sexual assault and to finding a solution to the problem. But at the micro-level, when looking at a particular case, they have an unconscious cognitive process that interferes with their ability to accurately solve it. The solution to that problem is to give these cases to people who are not influenced by inaccurate rape schemas, either by changing the system and having independent prosecutors handle these cases, or by maintaining the system but requiring that commanders be trained and certified before they can handle these cases.


This paper relates human rights to public health ethics and policies by discussing the nature and moral justification of human rights generally, and the right to health in particular. Which features of humanity ground human rights? To answer this question, as an alternative to agency and capabilities approaches, the paper offers the "fundamental conditions approach," according to which human rights protect the fundamental conditions for pursuing a good life. The fundamental conditions approach identifies "basic health"—the adequate functioning of the various parts of our organism needed for the development and exercise of the fundamental capacities—as the object of a human right. A human right to basic health entails human rights to the essential resources for promoting and maintaining basic health, including adequate nutrition, basic health care, and basic education. Duty bearers include every able person in appropriate circumstances, as well as governments and government agencies, private philanthropic foundations, and transnational corporations.


Fractional control techniques provide an effective way to control dynamic behaviours, using fractional differential equations. This can include the control of fractional plants, the control of a plant using a fractional controller, or the control of a plant so that the controlled system will have a fractional behaviour to achieve a performance that would otherwise be hard to come by. An Introduction to Fractional Control outlines the theory, techniques and applications of fractional control. After an initial introduction to fractional calculus, the book explores many fractional control systems including fractional lead control, fractional lag control, first, second and third generation Crone control, fractional PID, PI and PD control, fractional sliding mode control, logarithmic phase Crone control, fractional reset control, fractional H2 and H∞ control, fractional predictive control, and fractional time-varying control. Each chapter contains solved examples and references for further reading. Common definitions and proofs are included, along with a discussion of how MATLAB can be used to assist in the design and implementation of fractional control. This book is an essential guide for researchers and advanced students of control engineering in academia and industry.


Literature on Local Economic Development has been growing tremendous in the last few years. Various methods has been established and exercised in the creation of local competitive advantage. Local Competitive Advantage (LoCA) is another name for Participatory Appraisal of Competitive Advantage (PACA. It is meant as breakthrough to start Local Economic Development. This book analyses how LoCA, which was regarded as an external factor in stakeholder integration and trust building, facilitates the creation of trusts among local economic stakeholders, types of trust being established and the dynamics of Local Economic Development based on case study in Srilanka. Student in Local or Urban Economic Development will find this book useful in understanding the contested idea of the corellation between trust and Local Economic Development performance. Further, the unique emprical case study presented in the book should shed a light for professionals to understand more the debate whether small striving efforts at grass root level for Local Economic Development is a way to achieve competitive advantage or it is more a strategy of poverty alleviation.


The thinking of many physicians around the country, and unfortunately their advisers as well, is that there is little risk of a physician losing personal assets in a malpractice claim, especially with typical dollars 1-3 million malpractice insurance coverage. This article dispels that myth and shows that the benefit in engaging in asset protection planning far outweighs the cost.


theories of democratic politics prize congruence between citizens' preferences and their elected representatives' actions in office. elections are a critical means for achieving such policy congruence, providing voters the opportunity to chasten representatives who are out of step with constituent preferences and to reward the faithful. do voters act this way? recent studies based on observational data find they do, but these data are somewhat limited. We employ a survey experiment to estimate the extent to which information about policy congruence affects voters' evaluations of representatives. We informed some subjects how often their member of Congress's voting decisions match their own stated preferences on the same policies. We find that information about congruence enhances accountability by affecting constituent evaluations of representatives and may also affect citizens' propensity to participate in upcoming elections.


List of Contributors. Books by Mary Henkel. Preface I. BLEIKLIE. Introduction I. BLEIKLIE et al. PART I - IDENTITIES. Being an Academic in a Time-Impoverished Age R.BARNETT. Student Identities in Mass Higher Education J. BRENNAN, K. PATEL. Emerging Academic Identities: A New Research and Policy Agenda E. EL-KHAWAS. PART II - ACADEMIC WORK. Towards a Sociology of Academic Work C. MUSSELIN. The University as Enterprise and Academic Co-determination I.BLEIKLIE, S. MICHELSON. PART III - POLICY AND GOVERNANCE. Transforming Higher Education A. AMARAL. The Modernisation of European Higher Education. National Policy Dynamics P. MAASSEN. On Striking the Right Notes: Shifts in Governance and the Organisational Transformation of Universities J. ENDERS et al. Transforming a Centralised Higher Education System: Reform and Academic Resistance in Italy R. MOSCATI. PART IV - METHODS. On the Comparative Research in Higher Education J. VALIMAA. Index.


Porous materials with super-wetting surfaces (superhydrophilic/underwater superoleophobic) are ideal for oil/water separation. However, the inability to monitor the pollution degree and self-cleaning during the separation process limits their application in industrial production. In this study, a porous metal-based hydrogel is proposed, inspired by the porous structure of wood. Porous copper foam with nano-Cu(OH)2 is used as the skeleton, and its surface is coated with a polyvinyl alcohol, tannic acid, and multiwalled carbon nanotube cross-linked hydrogel coating. The hydrogel has superhydrophilicity and excellent oil/water separation efficiency (>99%) and can adapt to various environments. This approach can also realize hydrogel pollution degree self-detection according to the change in the electrical signal generated during the oil/water separation process, and the hydrogel can also be recovered by soaking to realize self-cleaning. This study will provide new insights into the application of oil/water separation materials in practical industrial manufacturing.


In the materials of the publication, the authors evaluated the implementation of the youth policy of Novotitarovsky rural settlement. Determined the outcome of the contribution of youth in socio-economic, sociopolitical and cultural development of the area, the directions of the youth policy, implemented by the youth Council in the rural settlement Novotitarovskoy MO Dinskoy district; the analysis of financial resources allocated for the implementation of the Program "Youth" for youth policy development; the proposed activities in the framework of the "Youth" the following actions are assumed. The authors, after analyzing the implementation of youth policy I propose the following: to consider youth policy as a contribution to the future generation; municipal authorities suggested that the structure of the Administration, "Department of youth", and to implement a set of measures for implementation of the directions of formation and development of youth policy, improving the efficiency of existing activities aimed at youth development in the municipality.There is no conflict of interests.


Optical fiber sensors can offer robust and miniaturized detection of wideband ultrasound, yielding high sensitivity and immunity to electromagnetic interference. However, the lack of cost‐effective manufacturing methods prevents the disseminated use of these sensors in biomedical applications. In this study, we developed and optimized a simple method to create optical cavities with high‐quality mirrors for acoustic sensing based on micro‐manipulation of UV‐curable optical adhesives and electroless chemical silver deposition. This approach enables the manufacturing of ultrasound sensors based on Fabry‐Pérot interferometers on optical fiber tips with minimal production costs. Characterization and high‐resolution optoacoustic imaging experiments show that the manufacturing process yielded a fiber sensor with a small NEP ( 11mPa/Hz ) over a broad detection bandwidth (25 MHz), generally outperforming conventional piezoelectric based transducers. We discuss how the new manufacturing process leads to a high‐performance acoustic detector that, due to low cost, can be used as a disposable sensor.


Businesses entering early into new markets are believed to attain crucial competitive advantages over later entrants. However, this contention receives only mixed support in the empirical literature, in part because performance is measured in different ways. We reexamine the performance difference between early movers and followers entering new geographical markets based on a sample of foreign entrants in Poland, Hungary and Lithuania. We contrast market share with two other measures of firm performance that are based on the managers' perception of their own performance relative to own prior expectations and relative to industry standards. We find that market share is strongly related to order of entry, but we did not find a positive relationship between order of entry and perceived performance. We found general support for early mover advantages in Hungary and Poland but a strongly negative relationship for Lithuania suggesting that early entry is a trade off between risk and return.


Background and Objectives: Few data are available on the level and sources of stress among law students in the Middle East generally and in Egypt specifically. We conducted this study to identify the prevalence and predictors of perceived stress among law students in Mansoura University, Egypt.
Subjects and Methods: A cross-sectional study covered 426 law students selected through a stratified cluster sampling method. The questionnaire covered four categories, including 15 items on sources of stress (stressors). Perceived stress scale and Hospital anxiety and depression scale were used to measure stress, anxiety and depression.
Results: A high level of perceived stress, anxiety and depression were reported by 42.2%, 59.2% and 18.2%, respectively. On the scale for sources of stress, 80% experienced personal troubles and two thirds of the sample had relationship, academic and environmental problems.
Conclusions: It appears that the law students have a high level of perceived stress and majority of it is generated from personal factors and less from the academic or environmental factors. Additional studies are needed to improve our understanding of the causes and consequences of law students' stress.


Abstract Objectives Neonatal diabetes mellitus (NDM) is a rare form of monogenic diabetes present within the first six months of life. NDM can be transient (TNdM) or permanent (PNDM). About 70% of TNDM cases have abnormalities in the imprinted region of chromosome 6q24. In TNDM, diabetes remits at infancy whilst may relapse later in life. Chromosome 6q24 related TNDM usually relapses at the pubertal period, while in some cases, relapse occurs earlier. It has been reported that these cases can respond to sulfonylurea treatment, while more evidence and experience are needed. Case presentation Herein, we reported relapse of diabetes at prepubertal age and its response to sulphonylurea therapy in a case with TNDM due to a homozygous c.7734C>T (p.R228C) variant in the ZFP57 gene. Conclusions A response to the sulphonylurea monotherapy seems not optimal for relapsed TNDM due to chromosome 6q24 abnormalities.


According to the United States Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, registered nurses (RN) are the largest healthcare workforce. Nurses therefore play an important role in providing healthcare and specifically during disasters. Emergency Medical Services (EMS) provides pre-hospital care to the public during emergencies. The delivery of EMS, however, varies greatly all over the world. In Spain, for example, there are no paramedics in EMS. Advanced life support is provided by a team of physicians, nurses and emergency medical technicians. In the United States, nurses do not provide emergency prehospital care setting. Due to the role nurses play in the Spanish EMS system, there was great interest from the nursing students and professionals to learn more how the role of paramedics operate. Specifically, nurses wanted to see how EMS functions and how the paramedic competencies compare to what nurses do in Spain. Therefore, the author designed and piloted a program in which nurses can spend time in New York City to see how EMS operates. The nurses were able to ride on basic and advanced life support ambulances in the New York City 911 system for a month. The nurses also participated in rotations in the adult and pediatric emergency departments. The nurses also participated in disaster management lectures and drills at the hospital. The author will share the process of creating and implementing this educational opportunity for nurses and will discuss feedback from several participants. Such educational opportunities should be duplicated in other cities and countries in order to allow healthcare professionals to enhance their knowledge and experiences in order to improve patient care and outcomes. Academic and industry stakeholders need to take specific measures to collaborate in order to better prepare nurses all over the world.


BACKGROUND
In humans, endothelin (ET)-1 could be implicated in the pathophysiology of several cardiovascular diseases, including essential hypertension. We therefore evaluated the role of ET-1 in control of vascular tone in essential hypertension.

METHODS AND RESULTS
We used strain-gauge venous plethysmography to test changes in forearm blood flow induced by intrabrachial infusion of TAK-044 (10, 30, and 100 microgram. 100 mL(-1). min(-1)), an ET(A)/ET(B) receptor antagonist, or sodium nitroprusside (1 and 2 microgram. 100 mL(-1). min(-1)), a vasodilator that acts on smooth muscle cells, in hypertensive patients and healthy controls (n=10 in each group). The NO pathway was also evaluated by infusion of N(G)-monomethyl-L-arginine, (L-NMMA; 10, 30, and 100 microgram. 100 mL(-1). min(-1)), an NO synthase inhibitor, and norepinephrine (3, 9, and 30 ng. 100 mL(-1). min(-1)) as control. Immunoreactive plasma ET-1 was measured by radioimmunoassay. In hypertensive patients, TAK-044 caused a vasodilation that was significantly (P<0.01) increased compared with normotensive subjects. Moreover, vasoconstriction to L-NMMA was significantly (P<0.01) decreased in hypertensive patients compared with controls. In contrast, the vascular responses to sodium nitroprusside and norepinephrine, as well as levels of immunoreactive plasma ET-1, were similar in hypertensive patients and controls. In the study population, vasodilation to TAK-044 and vasoconstriction to L-NMMA showed an inverse correlation (r=-0.56, P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONS
These results indicate that TAK-044 caused a greater degree of vasodilation in the forearm vessels of essential hypertensive patients compared with normotensive subjects, an alteration associated with decreased tonic NO release.


Abstract In this article, we first presented a new identity concerning differentiable mappings defined on m-invex set via k-fractional integrals. By using the notion of generalized relative semi-(r;m,p,q,h1,h2)-preinvexity and the obtained identity as an auxiliary result, some new estimates with respect to Hermite-Hadamard type inequalities via k-fractional integrals are established. It is pointed out that some new special cases can be deduced from main results of the article.


Background: Aspartate aminotransferase (AST) is pivotal in amino acid metabolism. However, the serum activity of AST, which leaks from multiple organs, including liver and skeletal muscle, is unknown in older underweight people, who are at high risk of skeletal muscle mass loss. Therefore, we measured the serum activities of AST and alanine aminotransferase (ALT), a liver-specific transaminase, in a large, community-based cross-sectional study. Methods: Clinical parameters and lifestyles were characterized in 892,692 Japanese people with a wide range of body mass indexes (BMIs; 13–39.9 kg/m2), aged 40–74 years old, who were undergoing a medical checkup. A general linear model was used to calculate the estimated mean of serum AST (EM-AST) in each BMI category after adjustment for confounding factors, including past history of cardiovascular disease and waist circumference. Results: Severe underweight (BMI 13–14.9 kg/m2) was present in 910 subjects (0.1%). Raw serum AST showed a J-shaped relationship with BMI, which was blunted in older subjects (60–74 years), and similar, but less curved relationships were identified for raw serum ALT and gamma-glutamyl transferase. These J-shaped relationships in serum AST were not altered when subjects were classified by sex, past history of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and habitual exercise. EM-AST showed a U-shaped relationship, with a minimum at BMI 21–22.9 kg/m2, regardless of age and waist circumference. Conclusions: High serum AST but normal serum ALT is highly prevalent in older underweight people and might reflect skeletal muscle pathology.


Motivating from biological visual cues in the cortex, by simulating visual information processing and transmission mechanism in the human brain, and using Bayesian network to design object perception model in the visual cortex, this paper proposed an object perception model based on Bayesian network. First, extracted shape feature, color feature, texture feature of the given images; Second, normalized these features and inputed them all to Bayesian network for inference and learning; Third, carried out two experiments to test the validity and reliability of the proposed model. Experiment results shown that the proposed model is reasonable and robust, can integrate all possible information and combine varieties of evidence to implement uncertainty inference, can solve problems with uncertainty and incomplete effectively. The proposed model achieved better recognition performance on the given experimental image datasets, obtained a higher recognition accuracy compared with other methods, and better solved various of recognition difficulties in visual object recognition.


Peripheral myelin protein‐22 (PMP22) is expressed in myelinating Schwann cells and shows significant homology to murine growth arest‐specific gene gas3. Charcot‐Marie‐Tooth disease type 1a (CMT1a) is a common hereditary demyelinating neuropathy. Recently it was demonstrated that the gene for PMP22 is duplicated in CMT1a patients. A gene dosage mechanism has been postulated to cause CMT1a. According to this hypothesis, the increase in copy number of PMP22 gene would lead to an elevated expression of PMP22 and thereby cause the demyelinating phenotype of CMT1a. In the present communication we analyzed PMP22 mRNA and protein expression in sural nerve biopsies from CMT1a patients and normal controls. We show that PMP22 mRNA expression in CMT1a is not uniform. We found both elevated as well as normal PMP22 mRNA levels in patients. Interestingly, the highest PMP22 mRNA level was found in the least affected patient. In contrast to the mRNA levels, PMP22 was clearly reduced in all CMT1a patients as shown by immunohistochemistry. Thus the CMT1a phenotype may not be strictly correlated with increased PMP22 mRNA and protein expression. Possible roles of PMP22 in the pathogenesis of CMT1a are discussed. © 1994 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Record sections of long-period seismograms from shallow-focus events at distances between 80° and 120° commonly display significant amounts of spatially coherent energy between the arrivals of P and PP. While individual quality varies, the majority of observations share two characteristics: coherent arrivals have apparent ray parameters and amplitude attenuation rates more comparable to P than PP. The ray-kinematic restraints imposed by these statements suggest wave interactions in the upper mantle near the source or receiver. The dynamics of these phases are investigated by construction of synthetic seismograms for radially symmetric media by contour integration in the complex ray-parameter plane. The generated records containing contributions from waves reflected or converted at upper mantle discontinuities are found to be compatible with observations. The largest of these coda phases on vertical records are near-source-shear converted compressional waves of the types sdP and sdpP. Conjugate near-receiver phases are of less importance than near-source phases on vertical records but they can be expected to dominate on the horizontal component. The effect of transition zone thickness on these phases is determined by direct integration of the equations of motion. For a 10-km-thick transition, reflected amplitudes become negligibly small for waves with periods less than 3 sec. Transmitted converted waves, on the other hand, have significant amplitudes to periods as small as 1 sec. In the long-period passband, peaked near 15 sec, the transition behaves as a sharp interface. These signals are found to be highly sensitive to localized upper mantle structure. Further observations of these phases will provide a direct means of assessing the physical and regional extent of the discontinuities throughout the Earth.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate the effect of U14 vaccine transfected with the B7 gene in inducing antitumor immune response to murine cervical carcinoma in Chinese 615-strain mice.

METHODS
A recombinant retroviral plasmid vector expressing mouse B7-1 gene (pLNSX-mB7) was transfected into 615-strain mouse cervical carcinoma cell line No. 14 (U14) by electroporation to set up a highly-expressed mB7-1 U14 cell clonal strain (B7+ U14). In vivo experiments: (1) B7+ U14 vaccine was primed to protect the 615-strain mice against U14 re-challenge. (2) B7+ U14 vaccine was injected into tumor-bearing mice with different tumor sizes. Lifetimes and tumor sizes were recorded. In vitro cytotoxicity assay: Mice were immunized with B7+ U14 or U14 vaccine and 2 weeks later, spleen cells of those mice were cultured for 2 days. The cytotoxicity of these cells against U14 was detected by 5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide assay.

RESULTS
We obtained several B7-1 high expression clonal U14 lines. In vivo experiment, we did not find tumor growing in 3 of the 6 mice primed by B7+ U14 vaccine during their entire life after re-challenge with U14. The other 3 mice developed tumors and their average survival time was longer than that of the control group (P < 0.01). All 6 mice grew tumors in the control group. When the transplanted tumors became palpable, the mice were randomly divided into 3 groups to be injected with B7+ U14 vaccine. It was effective for tumor-bearing mice only when the tumor diameters were < 3 mm. When the diameters were > or = 3 mm, it was not efficacious to inject B7+ U14 vaccine (P < 0.05). In vitro cytotoxicity assay, cytotoxic T lymphocytes induced by B7+ U14 vaccine had a higher cytotoxicity against U14 than that induced by U14 vaccine (F = 310.8, P < 0.001).

CONCLUSIONS
Vaccines of cervical cancer cells transfected with the costimulatory molecule B7 gene can induce antitumor immune protection in host mice against U14 re-challenge. This treatment may cure part of the tumor-bearing mice but be restricted by tumor size. The results suggest that transfecting the B7 gene into cervical cancer as a cell vaccine may be an efficient supplementary method to treat cervical cancer after operation.


Some stereo matching algorithms based on deep learning have been proposed and achieved state-of-the-art performances since some public large-scale datasets were put online. However, the disparity in smooth regions and detailed regions is still difficult to accurately estimate simultaneously. This paper proposes a novel stereo matching method called WaveletStereo, which learns the wavelet coefficients of the disparity rather than the disparity itself. The WaveletStereo consists of several sub-modules, where the low-frequency sub-module generates the low-frequency wavelet coefficients, which aims at learning global context information and well handling the low-frequency regions such as textureless surfaces, and the others focus on the details. In addition, a densely connected atrous spatial pyramid block is introduced for better learning the multi-scale image features. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method, which achieves state-of-the-art performance on the large-scale test dataset Scene Flow.


Drinking water wells require continuous monitoring to prevent groundwater-related issues such as pollution, clogging and overdrafting. In this research, optical fibers with fiber Bragg grating sensors were placed in an aquifer to explore their potential use in long-term well monitoring. Fiber Bragg grating sensors were simultaneously sensitive to consolidation strain and temperature, and these two responses were separated by creating autoregressive consolidation models. Consolidation responses from these multiple sensors were rescaled to obtain pressure distribution along the depth. Pressure and temperature data showed impermeable soil layers and locations where groundwater accumulated. Time development of temperature along the fiber revealed oxidation of minerals and soil layers with varying permeability. Fiber Bragg grating sensors are useful tools to examine subsurface processes near wells and they can show the first signs of clogging.


The 194Pt(n,e-)195Pt reaction was studied to determine transition multipolarities and mixing ratios in 195Pt in order to provide more sensitive tests of the predictions of multi-j U(6/12) supersymmetries in this nucleus. The E2 parts in transitions of most possible mixed multipolarities were found to be small and dominated by M1 components. Indeed, for all transitions that are forbidden by the E2 selection rules of the U(6/12) scheme, the data are consistent with pure M1 multipolarities. The limits on E2/M1 mixing ratios provide information useful for resolving ambiguities in delta values in recent Coulomb excitation experiments.


The study determined the profitability and technical efficiency of Sasakawa Global (SG-2000) maize technology in Lere Agricultural Zone, Kaduna State, Nigeria. A total of 146 respondents were selected through a multi-stage sampling technique. Data were collected through structured questionnaire administered to the sampled respondents and complemented with interview schedule. Analysis of the data collected was done using descriptive statistics, farm budgeting technique and stochastic frontier function. Results showed that the mean age of SG-2000 adopters was 45years old, 73% of them were males and 81% were married. The mean farming experience of the adopters was 15 years, household size of 8 persons and farm size of 2.26ha respectively. Also, majority of the farmers were members of farmers' cooperative society and had access to extension services. The farm budgeting technique revealed maize production was profitable in the area with gross margin and net farm income of ₦99,407.76/ha and ₦96,700.80/ha respectively. The maize farmers were not technically efficient with a mean efficiency score of 0.8181. The farm size at p<0.10, seed at p<0.01, fertilizer at p<0.01, capital input at p<0.01 probability levels respectively were efficiency factors, while the sex of farmer at p<0.10, marital status at p<0.10, farming experience at p<0.05 and access to credit at p<0.01 probability levels respectively were the inefficiency factors. It is recommended that other farmers in the study area should adopt the SG-2000 maize technology to improve their level of profitability and technical efficiency.
Keywords: Profitability, Technical efficiency, SG-2000 maize technology, Farmers and Kaduna State


A prospective, randomized study of 158 patients undergoing in-vitro fertilization (IVF) and embryo transfer was conducted to evaluate whether a shortened exposure of oocytes to spermatozoa enhances oocyte development, and subsequently influences the IVF outcome. A comparison was made between conventional treatment time and shorter exposure of retrieved oocytes to spermatozoa. Fertilization and cleavage rates, embryo quality, implantation and pregnancy rates in the study group (short exposure) versus controls (standard IVF procedure) were evaluated. Fertilization (56 versus 61%) and cleavage rates (96 versus 92%) were similar in the two groups respectively. However, embryo quality was significantly higher in the study group (P < 0.05). Moreover, the pregnancy and implantation rates were significantly increased (42.4 versus 26% per embryo transfer, and 16 versus 10% respectively; P < 0.05). Our results demonstrated that shorter exposure of oocytes to spermatozoa is superior to the standard time in IVF and may have a favourable effect on implantation rates by improving embryo quality.


The plasma pharmacokinetics of adriamycin has been studied in 21 cancer patients (31-85 years old) without liver tumours after short (3.00 min) and prolonged (45 min-16 h) i.v. infusions. The area under the plasma concentration-time curve and the maximum plasma concentration compensated for dose variation showed a more than 3-fold individual variation. The pharmacokinetics of adriamycin was linear. There was no pharmacokinetic rational for variation of the dose with the age of the patients. There was good agreement between the measured plasma concentration-time curves for prolonged infusions and curves predicted from pharmacokinetic data from short term infusions.


In this work some recent results on the linearization and passivity-based control of mechanical systems are reviewed from a unified perspective. This is established by adopting a generalization of the Poisson bracket formalism to more general structures than smooth functions. In this manner, the corresponding geometric structures as well as their respective energy terms are all expressed by simple, identifiable terms. More precisely, the objective consists in illustrating that the proposed framework captures the essential terms involved in the conditions of the literature, reveals the connection between the results in linearization and stabilization, and reduces the cumbersome calculations. In this direction, the generalized Poisson bracket is shown to be an effective tool that leads to (i) the refinement of well-known results on interconnection and damping assignment passivity-based control (IDA-PBC), (ii) the derivation of a new set of simplified conditions for partial linearization via a change of coordinates, and (iii) the identification of certain relationships connecting the Hamiltonian with the Euler-Lagrange description.


Dipivefrin (DPE) is the first prodrug in general use in ophthalmology. We will discuss the metabolism of DPE to epinephrine within the eye, and the efficacy and safety of DPE in the treatment of elevated intraocular pressure. In addition, we will address the incidence of adverse systemic effects, ocular tolerance and allergy, and the ocular hypotensive efficacy when DPE is used alone or in combination with other antiglaucoma medications.


The present paper deals with common fixed point theorem in Fuzzy metric space by employing the notion of occasionally weakly compatible mappings. Our result generalizes the recent result of  Singh et. al. [17].Keywords: Common fixed points, Fuzzy metric space, compatible maps, occasionally weakly compatible mappings and weak compatible mappings.


This paper investigates the effect of line reclosing on transient stability assessment (TSA) for multi-machine power systems. The critical clearing time (CCT) is selected as the key parameter to estimate the TSA. Line reclosing has a direct effect on increasing the critical clearing time (i.e. improving the relative transient stability) for two-machine equivalent system (using the equal area criterion). However, the effect is not straightforward for a multi-machine system. A three-machine nine-bus system is used to investigate the effect of line reclosing on critical clearing time. The classical model of generators has been used in this study. The characteristics of line reclosure time versus critical clearing time have been studied for 3-phase faults at each end of each line in the power system sample used. The effect is compared with that when line reclosing is not applied. The results show that in some cases, faster line reclosing improves the relative transient stability (increases CCT). However, in some other cases, faster line reclosing may not improve the relative transient stability (decreases CCT) and leaving the line without reclosing may be better than reclosing it at some reclosing times. These cases should be considered in line reclosure time selection. Some explanations for the results are introduced using stability regions and transient energy function method.


Vicia angustifolia L. is native plant of winter annual leguminous weed in Korea. Objective of this research was to investigate the effects of V. angustifolia as green manure for rice production in sustainable agriculture. Seed size of V. angustifolia was smaller than that hairy vetch as control plant, while seed number in same amount was approximately 1.4-fold higher. V. angustifolia started stem elongation in early April. In addition, flowering and dead-ripe stages of the plant reached at May 5 th and June 1st, respectively. Growth of V. angustifolia-barley mixed cropping system in upland was promoted up to 101 cm of plant length compared to 46.6 to 60.9 cm that grown in paddy. Biomass yield of V. angustifolia was 14.5 kg ha -1 in single cropping system of paddy soil, and the amount of nitrogen was 65 kg ha -1 . Moreover, self-reseedling of fallen seed from V. angustifolia grown in previous year in paddy soil was significantly higher than that hairy vetch plant. These results suggested that V. angustifolia can be uses as green manure in addition to reducing the mineral fertilizer application in rice production for sustainable agriculture.


In this work we present a simple pathway to obtain large single-crystal graphene on copper (Cu) foils with high growth rates using a commercially available cold-wall chemical vapour deposition (CVD) reactor. We show that graphene nucleation density is drastically reduced and crystal growth is accelerated when: (i) using ex situ oxidized foils; (ii) performing annealing in an inert atmosphere prior to growth; (iii) enclosing the foils to lower the precursor impingement flux during growth. Growth rates as high as 14.7 and 17.5 μm min−1 are obtained on flat and folded foils, respectively. Thus, single-crystal grains with lateral size of about 1 mm can be obtained in just 1 h. The samples are characterized by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy as well as selected area electron diffraction and low-energy electron diffraction, which confirm the high quality and homogeneity of the films. The development of a process for the quick production of large grain graphene in a commonly used commercial CVD reactor is a significant step towards an increased accessibility to millimetre-sized graphene crystals.


A modified Hamming neural network and its integrated circuit model are presented, in which different thresholds and multi-valued weights are introduced. The network consists of a template matching circuit and a "winner-take-all" (WTA) circuit. Simulation shows that it has high precision, high speed and low power dissipation. It can be used to recognize handwritten digits.


Recent fuel cell research has focused on systems for passenger vehicles, commercial buildings, and small handheld devices. These applications typically require power outputs that are either greater than 100 kW or less than 20 W, and a gap remains in developing viable fuel cell systems for applications requiring between 100 W and 100 kW. An integrated reformer fuel cell system has been developed for these medium power applications that utilizes a propane catalytic partial oxidation reformer coupled with a polybenzimidazole-based high-temperature proton exchange membrane fuel cell. After investigation into the requirements of military unmanned aerial systems (UASs), a system was designed to produce a net power of 250 W with a total mass of 2.23 kg and potential for 200-hour lifetime. The proposed design offers advantages over current UAS propulsion technologies because it is both quiet and capable of long duration flights, and also has advantages over other fuel cell systems as it is fueled with commonly available propane instead of high purity hydrogen.


The myocardium is composed of various cell types including cardiomyocytes, fibroblasts, endothelial cells, and leukocytes. Although cardiomyocytes count for up to 85% of a heart's volume, the actual cell number of cardiomyocytes account for just 30–40% of all cardiac cells. Non-cardiomyocytes constitute 60–70% of a cardiac cell and approximately 90% of these non-cardiomyocytes represent fibroblasts (1,2). Previously, the function and viability of cardiomyocytes have been treated as a primary research interest area, while fibrosis was considered as a secondary effect from the changes in cardiomyocytes. However, recent studies have suggested an influence of fibroblasts over cardiomyocytes (3,4).


Due to many factors, the electrical explosion spraying process is not stable, which directly causes unstable coating quality and structure. Electron beam treatment may be used to improve the surface and modified structure of coatings sprayed by electrical explosions. In this study, a new TiB2–Ag metal matrix composite coating was deposited by electrical explosion spraying and modified by electron beam treatment. The prepared coatings were characterized by surface macro- and microanalysis, XDR, cross-section SEM, and TEM. The composition of the spray-coating phase differs from sample to sample. The electron beam treatment normalized the phase composition. Ag TiB2 B2O became the main phase in the modified coating. Increasing the pulse energy density and duration leads to a reduction in the low-melting Ag phase and the formation of copper contact phases due to heating and melting of the copper substrate by excess electron beam energy. The coating structure consists of a silver matrix and TiB2 inclusions. The electron beam treatment did not affect the structure; however, the microstructure of the coating transformed into a cellular crystallization structure. The silver matrix nanostructure was transformed into a nanocrystalline structure with an average crystal size ranging from tens to hundreds of nanometers.


The development of information society, which has led to an impressive increase in the volume of information, mainly economic, circulated in computer networks, accelerated the development and mostly the use of modern cryptography tools. In the last years, researchers have pointed out that there is a possible similarity between chaos and cryptography, many of the properties of chaotic dynamic systems having correlation among the cryptographic systems that are based on computational methods.
Studies carried out on chaotic dynamic systems usage in digital crypto-systems have determined the occurrence of similar to classic techniques, but also of some specific techniques and methods that have been analyzed and evaluated. The attempts to develop new encryption ?lgorithms based on chaos theory have evolved gradually from simple solutions, which suppose the iteration of a din?mic system to obtain binary sequence used for text masking, to methods that imply coupled din?mic systems and hybrid techniques that would combine the chaos advantages with classical methods.
In this article there are presented 3 encryption algorithms based on chaos theory: RC4, Fractal Encryption and Cellular Automata, implemented in a system of encryption and operation mode analysis for each algorithm separately.


Domestic violence is the intentional and persistent abuse of anyone in the home in a way that causes pain, distress or injury. This research examined the impact of domestic violence on secondary school children with specific interest in the learning processes and outcome. Using the survey research design, questionnaires were distributed to 200 respondents cutting across 4 secondary schools in Egor Local Government Area of Edo State. Responses from 174 students were analysed with simple percentage using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences 20.0 and the Chi-square test. Results showed that secondary school children are exposed to significantly high levels of various forms of domestic violence. Domestic violence was found to have a significant adverse impact on the learning outcomes of secondary school students. As such, it was recommended that all stakeholders (parents, guardians, teachers and school administrations) should be made aware of the impact of domestic violence on children. Also, mental and psychological help or services should be provided for children who have been victimized from episodes of domestic violence. Finally, funding from central and local governments as well as non-governmental organizations should be re-addressed as financial resources is crucial in order implement all other recommendations.


Background: Today, the most common method for kidney stone therapy is extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy. Current research is a numerical simulation of kidney stone fragmentation via ultrasonic shock waves. Most numerical studies in lithotripsy have been carried out using the elasticity or energy method and neglected the dissipation phenomenon. In the current study, it is solved by not only the linear acoustics equation, but also the Westervelt acoustics equation which nonlinearity and dissipation are involved. Objective: This study is to compare two methods for simulation of shock wave lithotripsy, clarifying the effect of shock wave profiles and stones' material, and investigating side effects on surrounding tissues Material and Methods: Computational study is done using COMSOL Multiphysics, commercial software based on the finite element method. Nonlinear governing equations of acoustics, elasticity and bioheat-transfer are coupled and solved. Results: A decrease in the rise time of shock wave leads to increase the produced acoustic pressure and enlarge focus region. The shock wave damages kidney tissues in both linear and nonlinear simulation but the damage due to high temperature is very negligible compared to the High Intensity Focused Ultrasound (HIFU). Conclusion: Disaffiliation of wave nonlinearity causes a high incompatibility with reality. Stone's material is an important factor, affecting the fragmentation