This thesis provides insights into refugee-background Somali women's active productions of belonging in New Zealand, after resettlement in Wellington communities. It explores how Somali women actively negotiate belonging between three key processes: place, identity and acceptance. It does this by situating their resettlement in the context of the Somali civil conflict. I argue that home in New Zealand is based on emotional and physical attachments to multiple locales across space and time, as enacted and embodied through performances of 'Somali woman' identities across social fields. I show how intersectional differences produce diverse experiences of re-imagining home, and the ways that a 'Somali woman' identity is changing through the actions of 'edgewalking' participants. It also explores how belonging is a two-sided process that is affected by discourses of tolerance in New Zealand. This thesis is structured through both anthropological and feminist frameworks and thus emphasises the voices and positions of the participants at all times. The understandings presented here unfolded from interviews with eight participants, four Somali women and four non-Somalis who had extensive connections with the Somali community. Using the stories from these eight participants, this thesis demonstrates the importance of the homeland, Somaliness and tolerance in creating a sense of belonging in Wellington communities after resettlement processes.


This article investigates the relationship between class origin, educational attainment, and the capabilities of agency and voice. The main objectives are to investigate how class origin and educational attainment interact and to consider whether higher education reduces any structural inequalities in the social aspects of life. A longitudinal approach is applied, using a national survey of 1058 Swedish young people, controlling for baseline values of agency and voice. The empirical analysis reveals an association between class origin and agency and voice. University education proves to be of central importance for the capabilities of agency and voice; however, this varied for young people with different class origin. Young people from manual working-class backgrounds benefit from higher education, while no significant result was found for young people with white-collar parents. The results indicate that higher education reduces structural differences in capabilities central for social participation.


Polymorphism at six microsatellite loci was used to study genetic variability and population structure in six geographically distant natural populations of European hake (Merluccius merluccius L.). Four hundred and eighty‐three individuals were sampled from Trondheimsfjord in Norway, the Celtic Sea, the southern Bay of Biscay, Faro off Portugal, the Mediterranean Sea north of the coast of Tunisia and the Adriatic Sea. Population subdivision was found between Mediterranean and Atlantic samples, θ = 0.029 (P < 0.001). No substructuring was found between samples within the Mediterranean Sea, θ = 0.003 and RST = 0.007 (P > 0.05). The Atlantic population structure appears to be more complex than previously suggested by the placement of stock boundaries by the International Council for the Exploration of the Seas (ICES). Analyses based on various models of microsatellite evolution all suggest that differentiation exists between Bay of Biscay and Portugese samples, θ = 0.013 (P < 0.001), RST = 0.036 (P < 0.001) which are currently managed as one stock. By contrast, fixation indices indicated no differentiation between southern Bay of Biscay samples and Celtic Sea samples, θ = 0.003 (P = 0.02), φST = 0.007 (P = 0.10) which are managed as separate stocks. These results suggest that if the observed trends are stable through time, current management policy of European hake may need revision.


In recent years, tissue engineering has been utilized as an alternative approach to organ transplantation. Success rate of tissue regeneration influenced by the biomaterials, cell sources, growth factors and scaffold fabrication. Design and precise fabrication of scaffolds are required to support cells to expand and migrate to 3D environment. Common scaffold fabrication techniques use heat, adhesives, molds or light. In this research, "inverse-photolithography" which is a light based fabrication technique was used to generate the scaffolds. In order to control the interior architecture of the scaffold "a single vertical strut" and "a y-shape" were fabricated with the 3D printer by using the dissolvable filament. Then, the strut and the y-shape were immersed into the photo-curable solution which is poly(ethylene glycol) diacrylate (PEGDA) and photo-initiator mixture. UV light with the 365nm wavelength was placed up-side down under the solution. Photo-curable mixture was exposed to the UV light for 3 minutes to cure the entire scaffold. Solidified scaffold with the strut and y-shape inside was kept in the limonene solution. Limonene penetrated through the open ended strut and y-shape and it dissolved the 3D printed strut and y-shape away leaving the fabricated PEGDA based scaffolds. This preliminary research showcases, the 3D scaffolds with the controlled interior design, can be fabricated with the "inverse-photolithography" technique.


I. INTRODUCTION: FINANCE, FINANCIAL MODELING, AND THE LAW The close relationship between law and economics has been recognized for more than four decades. Starting with the work of the British economist and 1991 Nobel prize winner Ronald Harry Coase, in his article The Problem of Social Cost, (1) and current Judge Guido Calabresi of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, in Some Thoughts on Risk Distribution and the Law of Torts, (2) this relationship became formalized into the field of Law and Economics. (3) Today, there are centers of Law and Economics (4) throughout the legal academy both in the United States and throughout the world, and at least ten journals are dedicated to the subject. Now, with Law and Economics as a mature discipline, accepted as a regular part of the law school curriculum, attention is focusing on the relationship between law and the related--but different--field of Finance, and how constructs from that field have important relevance to the law. Finance, originally a subfield of Economics, has grown exponentially, and, since the 1970s, has become increasingly sophisticated so that it has become differentiated from economics in general, and, academically, has moved from the Economics departments of universities to play a significant role as a distinct, independent field of study in business schools. Today, Finance, with its foundation in mathematical and statistical modeling, has taken on special prominence, particularly with respect to issues of asset valuation. The field of Finance as a whole is not easily defined. A careful analysis, however, will lead to the realization that almost all significant activity in the field is driven by one encompassing goal: to find an efficient, accurate, and palatable way to evaluate what an asset is worth at a given time, a task that requires one to grapple with serious limitations and to operate within an array of questionable assumptions. Finance professionals have long struggled with the problem of evaluating an asset in a way that accounts for the uncertainty arising from the risk inherent in the asset's performance, the overall market conditions, and their performance interrelationship within the parameters of an assumed or assumable time-period. The core of the analytic task--and the reason the field of Finance has become so mathematically sophisticated--lies in the development and application of financial models of general applicability. Two such financial models, the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) (5) and the Black Scholes Option Pricing Model (BSOPM), (6) were the basis for Nobel prizes awarded to their creators (7), and are now the most well-known and established asset valuation models, at least in part because of their extreme efficiency of use notwithstanding some theoretical limitations. Innovations such as these in the development of asset valuation models, that at the time were a dramatic departure from accepted valuation principles, had an enormous impact on the development of the field of Finance. These constructs, whether causatively or correlatively, coincided with the recognition of Finance as a field independent of Economics and of particular importance to business and business schools, and the prominence of Finance in the business curriculum over the last quarter of a century. Prior to the prevalence of these more sophisticated constructs, finance researchers were grappling with different approaches to the problem of evaluating an asset in a way that accounted for its various inherit risks, and quantified it originally as the standard variation of assets' returns, also known as volatility. Originally, the main concept and the initial basic building block of asset valuation was the concept of Present Value; central to this analysis is the realization that the asset value changes over time, and that change is driven by different factors. What earlier models failed to do is to evaluate how that particular change is correlated to the asset's risk and the market's risk in which this asset is traded; and integrate into their analysis the quantified risk ("volatility") in a way more comprehensive and realistic than simply consideration of statistical standard deviations. …


INTRODUCTION: Due to the significant decrease in fertility in recent decades and the important role of health workers and health-care providers in providing healthy reproductive counseling, their training is necessary using effective educational methods. Webinar and group discussion (GD) are effective in this regard. This study was conducted to determine the most effective method and with the aim of comparing the effect of two training methods (webinar and GD) on the attitude and performance of health workers in providing counseling with fertility promotion approach in comprehensive health centers in Mashhad. METHODS: In this randomized trial study with a control group, 108 health workers working in health centers no. 2–3 and 5 of Mashhad entered the study and were randomly divided into three groups of training by webinar, GD, and control. Intervention groups received healthy fertility counseling skills in three training sessions. Research tools were demographic information questionnaires, fertility attitudes, and performance measurement checklists for fertility counseling. The questionnaires were completed in three groups at the beginning and after the completion of the interventions. Data analysis was performed by Chi-square test and one-way analysis of variance using SPSS software version 16. RESULTS: The analysis of variance test showed that before the intervention, there was no statistically significant difference between the three groups in terms of average scores of fertility attitude and performance scores of fertility counseling. After the interventions, the difference between the fertility attitude scores (P < 0.001) and the performance scores of fertility counseling (P < 0.001) was significant in the three groups. There was no significant relationship between demographic characteristics and attitude and performance. CONCLUSION: Teaching by webinar and GD promotes the attitude and performance of health workers in providing counseling with a fertility promotion approach. Therefore, it is recommended to use new educational methods such as webinar and GD to promote childbearing counseling, which has been emphasized in the country's population policies. Since the mean score difference for the webinar training method was the highest due to the mean scores, this method could be more effective than the GD method.


The national database of the German Collaborative Arthritis Centres is a well-established tool for the observation and assessment of health care delivery to patients with rheumatic diseases in Germany. The discussion of variations in treatment practices contributes to the internal quality assessment in the participating arthritis centres. This documentation has shown deficits in primary health care including late referral to a rheumatologist, undertreatment with disease-modifying drugs and complementary therapies. In rheumatology, there is a trend towards early, intensive medical treatment including combination therapy. The frequency and length of inpatient hospital and rehabilitation treatments is decreasing, while active physiotherapy in outpatient care has been increased. Specific deficits have been identified concerning the provision of occupational therapy services and patient education.


In this research, we sought to better understand important trends and developments in the teaching of quantitative and research methods courses in graduate public affairs programs. We were specifically interested in the following areas related to the teaching of quantitative and research methods: the impact of new technologies on curriculum delivery; the content of courses related to statistical analysis and research design; and the importance of numeracy, ethics, and data visualization. We surveyed quantitative and research methods instructors in graduate public affairs programs using the same survey instrument at two intervals eight years apart and analyzed results from each period side-by-side. Findings indicate some stark differences in the content and delivery of these courses. Given the timing of the second survey – Spring 2021 – findings are considered within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.


Summary Smoking behavior involves not only a biological addiction, but also psycho-cognitive components. This runs from smoking initiation, through to maintaining, attempts at quitting, and relapse. This perspective is an important element in studying and intervening in smoking behaviors. The main aim of this narrative review is to explore tobacco cigarette smoking behavior, considering the pivotal role of cognitive mechanisms embedded in decision-making and in risk judgment, with particular attention to the so-called Optimistic Bias (OB). The mechanisms through which this fallacy supports smoking initiation and continuance are explored, considering the transition from young to adult smokers and the case of light and intermittent smokers. Furthermore, additional cognitive mechanisms associated with the OB, which sustain smoking behavior and prevent the efficacy of smoking cessation, are described. Finally, a stimulus for reflection and for discussion about how the impact of the cognitive bias perspective in tobacco cigarette smoking is provided, focusing on how it could support tailored interventions, both in smoking initiation prevention in adolescents and young adults, as well as in smoking cessation in high-risk categories.


The recognition that stroke and other ischemic events are manifestations of chronic progressive inflammation has had a great impact on the development of prevention strategies. The most recent American Heart Association guidelines recommend combination aspirin and extended-release dipyridamole over aspirin alone for patients with prior ischemic stroke or transient ischemic attack. Although aspirin and extended-release dipyridamole have long been recognized for their antiplatelet activities, there is now evidence that these drugs also have complementary antiinflammatory properties that contribute to improved outcomes when used to prevent secondary stroke. In the Second European Stroke Prevention Study (ESPS-2), the addition of extended-release dipyridamole to low-dose aspirin significantly reduced the risk of recurrent ischemic stroke without significantly increasing bleeding. Also, in the recent European/Australasian Stroke Prevention in Reversible Ischaemia Trial (ESPRIT), a combination of aspirin and extended-release dipyridamole was superior to aspirin alone for reducing the occurrence of the primary combined end point of vascular death, nonfatal stroke, nonfatal myocardial infarction, and major bleeding complications. The added benefit without worsening bleeding may be attributable, in part, to the antiinflammatory actions of this combination therapy.


REPORT OF A CASE A 73-year-old white woman was referred with nonhealing leg ulcers. Six years before presentation, she noted shoulder pain, dry eyes, dry mouth, and ''hands turning white.'' At that time, she was diagnosed as having rheumatoid arthritis and was intermittently treated with methotrexate and prednisone. Over the past several months, methotrexate therapy was tapered and discontinued. Six weeks before referral, she noted dusky purple leg lesions that became painful and ulcerated. Her medical history was significant for a positive VDRL, for which she reportedly had received a full course of treatment, and a short-term memory deficit of unknown duration. Examination revealed purplish discoloration of the distal third of all finger tips, becoming more intense in the proximal nailbeds ( Figure 1 ). The fingers and toes were cold to the touch and demonstrated decreased capillary refill. Overlying the right lateral maleolus was a 10-cm purulent ulcer with a base


We investigated the usefulness of 12-lead electrocardiogram and simultaneous single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) with 123I-beta-methyl iodophenyl-pentadecanoic acid (BMIPP) and thallium-201 (201Tl) for detecting coronary artery disease (CAD) in 54 consecutive patients with unstable angina. Discordant BMIPP uptake was defined as less 123I-BMIPP uptake than 201Tl uptake in 123I-BMIPP/201Tl dual SPECT. In the detection of CAD, ischemic electrocardiographic change during anginal attack had high sensitivity and low specificity, while discordant BMIPP finding had low sensitivity and high specificity. In patients showing ST depression during anginal attack, discordant BMIPP uptake showed high sensitivity and high specificity for detecting CAD. In conclusion, both 12-lead electrocardiogram during anginal attack and discordant BMIPP uptake are useful in detecting CAD in patients with unstable angina.


the practice context, constructing new theory in case study, defining means and ends interactively as problematic situations are formed, and building implementations into theory. Weinstein has picked up on both Scott and Hart's and Schon's propositions. Weinstein, in a clear and organized way, has brought the theory and practice of pharmacy ethics to a new level of understanding. He has framed issues that have not previously seen the light of day in pharmacy literature into one reasonably priced textbook of study and application for pharmacy practitioners and students. There are two final points that I want to make one comes from the head and one from the heart: (I) I was impressed with the way the chapters blended together, despite the number and diversity of contributors. My head missed the absence of a concluding or summary chapter. I was left with a taste of "drug research with human subjects" (the title of the last chapter) rather than a great summation of the ethical issues in pharmacy. I was left wondering, just what are Weinstein's reflections on what his colleagues have written? (2) On the issue of abortifacient drug dispensing, the conclusion was drawn that "from a moral perspective, the answer posed to this question ... depends upon the model of the professional-patient relationship one holds." My heart says that it depends not on the model of my professional-patient relationship, but on my relationship with God. This perspective still allows me to place trust in a key role in my ideal, virtuous, professional practice of pharmacy.


Although common in sheep-breeding communities, hydatid disease is actually found worldwide. Man is an occasional intermediate host in whom the disease is manifested by the presence of one or more hydatid cysts, usually located in the liver or lung and rarely at other sites such as the breast, as in our patient. A case of an isolated breast involvement that was diagnosed during surgery is presented and is followed by a brief discussion on the topic.


These data are part of the Gulf Watch Alaska (GWA) long term monitoring program, nearshore monitoring component. The dataset is a series of comma separated files exported from a survey software program (DLog, Ford Consulting, Portland, OR). The data consists of date, time, latitude, longitude, species abbreviation, count, and behavior. Each year the observers attempt to sample the same set of transects although weather, tide state and other factors can interfere with this goal. Transects are in Alaska and include locations in Katmai National Park and Preserve and Kenai Fjords National Park. Other researchers conduct similar surveys in Prince William Sound. The time interval includes 2012-2016.


Several European governments have pointed out corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a deliberate strategic area with potential to enhance the national competitiveness on sustainable terms. CSR can be understood as a contribution by the private sector to sustainable development. In this paper, CSR will be referred to as social responsibility when small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are in focus of the discussion, since the word "corporate" often is associated with larger companies. From a national as well as an international perspective, it is crucial to include SMEs in the expanding work with CSR to ensure that it spreads among all sections in business, which is likely to lead to positive effects on society. Each government has an opportunity to influence the country's future direction of CSR through political means of control and the work on developing effective support measures.
 This paper contributes to the understanding of how the CSR message is handled and communicated by governments in different countries due to the complexity and the politics involved. It provides an overall picture of Sweden's and the Untied Kingdom's governmental support for social responsibility in SMEs and put them into comparison.
 Two opposite trends can explain the practical differences, but also points of similarities, that exist in European countries. One trend is the national context that sets the preconditions for each country's work on CSR and is counteracting the other trend which is the creation of an international framework for CSR that aims to harmonize the countries' procedures. The main findings are that CSR appears to be managed more strategically within the UK government compared to the Swedish government and that it has a profound effect on the way that the support measures for SMEs are designed. The United Kingdom offers a holistic approach to the CSR concept to a greater extent than Sweden where it is more common to focus on specific areas within CSR. Sweden primary focus on sustainable development in all parts of society whereas the United Kingdom points out the potential of business' voluntary activities as a major contribution to sustainable development. One explanation for this can be found in the fact that the UK government relies on the private and voluntary sector to a greater extent than the Swedish government.


Abstract Rabbit antithymocyte globulin (rATG) is known to yield false-positive Histoplasma antigenemia. The fourth generation MiraVista Histoplasma antigen assay was modified to block this effect (MiraVista Diagnostics, Indianapolis, Indiana). We report a case of rATG-induced false-positive Blastomyces and Histoplasma antigenemia in a lung transplant recipient despite modifications of these antigen assays.


The diet of Plectropomus leopardus (Serranidae, Lacepede 1802) was examined on two pairs of reefs in the Cairns Section of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, Australia. For both pairs, one reef was open to fishing and the other had been closed to fishing for eight years; however zoning appeared to be ineffective as there was no difference in the size structure of leopard coral grouper populations on either open or closed reefs. Two fishing methods were used to sample reefs concurrently, and the size structure and diet of P. leopardus that were speared randomly (n=587) were compared to samples caught by line (n=85). Adult P. leopardus were highly piscivorous (96% of prey was fish by number), and two families of fishes, Pomacentridae and Labridae, composed approximately half of their diet (index of relative importance= 48.4%). Numerical composition of fish in the diet varied significantly among reefs, but there were no patterns related to reef closures when fish prey were classified by taxa or by their habitat. Fishes categorized as living in the demersal reef habitat were the dominant prey consumed, followed by midwater fishes. When the data from reefs were pooled, the abundance of families in the diet differed between locations (north and south) but not between fishing zones. Dietary overlap was high between the different fishing zones and was very high in relation to naturally occurring spatial and temporal variability in the diet of P. leopardus found in other studies. With line fishing larger and hungry fish are caught, and the few data on natural prey suggest tentatively that line catches are biased toward P. leopardus feeding on pelagic fishes. The coral reefs and surrounding waters provide the major food source of P. leopardus, whereas sandy areas are much less important. Our data suggest that the coral trout fishery is resilient to changes in abundances of particular prey species because the diet of P. leopardus is broad and because the two major prey families are diverse and abundant on coral reefs.


This paper presents an RF microelectromechanical system switched-capacitor suitable for tunable filters and reconfigurable networks. The switched-capacitor results in a digital capacitance ratio of 5 and an analog capacitance ratio of 5-9. The analog tuning of the down-state capacitance is enhanced by a positive vertical stress gradient in the the beam, making it ideal for applications that require precision tuning. A thick electroplated beam (4-4.5 μm) results in Q greater than 100 at C-X-band frequencies, switching times of 30-50 μs, and power handling of 0.6-1.1 W. The design also minimizes charging in the dielectric, resulting in excellent reliability performance even under hot-switched and high-power (1 W) conditions.


In this paper a pure rotational Raman lidar (PRR) was established for the atmospheric temperature measurements from 5 km to 40 km over Wuhan, China (30.5°N, 114.5°E). To extract the expected PRR signals and simultaneously suppress the elastically backscattered light, a high-spectral resolution polychromator for light splitting and filtering was designed. Observational results revealed that the temperature difference measured by PRR lidar and the local radiosonde below 30 km was less than 3.0 K. The good agreement validated the reliability of the PRR lidar. With the 1-h integration and 150-m spatial resolution, the statistical temperature error for PRR lidar increases from 0.4 K at 10 km up to 4 K at altitudes of about 30 km. In addition, the whole night temperature profiles were obtained for study of the long-term observation of atmospheric fluctuations.


A pilot study was conducted to gather holistic data points on female sonographers who executed neonatal neurosonography over four portable scanning sessions. The hypothesis was that specific risk factors contributed to work-related musculoskeletal distress in the hand and wrist as a result of neonatal neurosonography. A preexperimental pre-post research design was used to gather data on work demands, self-rated physical and mental health, posture/position during scanning, physiologic change, and pain scores. No statistically significant changes were detected between pre-post measures for work demands, physical and mental health, or pain scores as a result of portable scanning sessions. The physiologic changes, between scanning sessions, were recorded with the use of a hand-carried sonographic unit. Sonographic measures were less than the published criteria for carpal tunnel syndrome with a proximal cross-sectional area ≥10 mm 2 and an anterior bulge of the retinaculum of >4 mm. Sonography documented a statistically significant cross-sectional area change, within the median nerve, at the distal radius only after the first scanning session. Power and spectral Doppler was used to document perineural vascular flow within the median nerve, but it was not consistently obtained to allow for a rigorous comparison between pre- and postscanning sessions. This is the first pilot study to explore using a hand-carried sonographic unit to document change in the median nerve for an isolated sonographic examination. The results are only reflective of these particular participants, but much larger N and shorter scanning sessions are needed to confirm the hypothesis proposed.


Open relation extraction (OpenRE) aims to extract relational facts from the open-domain corpus. To this end, it discovers relation patterns between named entities and then clusters those semantically equivalent patterns into a united relation cluster. Most OpenRE methods typically confine themselves to unsupervised paradigms, without taking advantage of existing relational facts in knowledge bases (KBs) and their high-quality labeled instances. To address this issue, we propose Relational Siamese Networks (RSNs) to learn similarity metrics of relations from labeled data of pre-defined relations, and then transfer the relational knowledge to identify novel relations in unlabeled data. Experiment results on two real-world datasets show that our framework can achieve significant improvements as compared with other state-of-the-art methods. Our code is available at https://github.com/thunlp/RSN.


This research is motivated by the existence of education that is intended for all children, including children with special needs. Children with special needs have different characters, especially Slow Learners in learning are still experiencing difficulties. Therefore, special mentor teachers are needed to help them provide a better education according to their character. The formulation of the problem of this research is how the role of a special supervisor teacher for Slow Learners at SDN Cimone 7. The purpose of this study is to determine the role of a special supervising teacher for Slow Learners at SDN Cimone 7. This type of research is qualitative research. Data collection techniques used are observation, interviews, documentation and triangulation of sources. The results of this study indicate that the role of special supervising teachers includes: designing and implementing specific programs, identifying, assessing and compiling individual learning programs, modifying teaching materials, conducting evaluations, and making reports on programs and the development of children with special needs. With these roles, most children with special needs in public elementary schools can provide good services. Suggestions for this research are the supervising teachers always encourage students to study hard at home and at school, and provide learning facilities that support the educational development of their students


This opinion piece puts forward a critique of the policy and regulatory frameworks governing vaccines, understood as tools to confront pandemic and epidemic diseases (PEDs). Vaccines being the universally recognised prime method of prevention, immunisation campaigns and vaccine research and development (R&D) could reasonably be expected to feature prominently in any policy and/or strategic document addressing emerging health threats. Yet, vaccination occupies a relatively subsidiary role, with a prevalent focus on risk management mechanisms. This piece outlines the main characteristics of preparedness frameworks and looks at vaccine development in the course of PED outbreaks in the recent past, concluding that the COVID-19 pandemic calls for a paradigm shift in vaccine R&D, which should become integral to public health preparedness.


The frequency of coastal floods around the United States has risen sharply over the last few decades, and rising seas point to further future acceleration. Residents of low-lying affordable housing, who tend to be low-income persons living in old and poor quality structures, are especially vulnerable. To elucidate the equity implications of sea level rise (SLR), we provide the first nationwide assessment of recent and future risks to affordable housing from SLR and coastal flooding in the United States. By using high-resolution building footprints and probability distributions for both local flood heights and SLR, we identify the coastal states and cities where affordable housing—both subsidized and market-driven—is most at risk of flooding. We provide estimates of both the expected number of affordable housing units exposed to extreme coastal water levels and of how often those units may be at risk of flooding. The number of affordable units exposed in the United States is projected to more than triple by 2050. New Jersey, New York, and Massachusetts have the largest number of units exposed to extreme water levels both in absolute terms and as a share of their affordable housing stock. Some top-ranked cities could experience numerous coastal floods reaching higher than affordable housing sites each year. As the top 20 cities account for 75% of overall exposure, limited, strategic and city-level efforts may be able to address most of the challenge of preserving coastal-area affordable housing stock.


Nowadays, zero-emission electric vehicles become more and more attractive personnel transport vehicles for mining industry. Owing to the special working environment and complex road conditions, a robust controller needs to be designed to achieve a stable and reliable vehicle system for underground mining electric vehicles (UMEVs). This paper first presents the UMEV model with system uncertainties. Then, a new controller based on the sliding mode control (SMC) is designed for UMEVs to track the longitudinal velocity while maintaining longitudinal slip ratio in a desired linear region in the presence of the bounded system uncertainties. The comparison of the simulation results for both the proposed SMC controller and a traditional SMC controller shows that the proposed SMC controller has a better performance for the long-distance up/down slopes with varying rolling resistance coefficients.


Full wave expressions for the singly and the doubly scattered electromagnetic fields from one-dimensional rough surfaces are computed. The singly scattered like- and cross-polarized fields are expressed in terms of one-dimensional integrals. However, the doubly scattered full wave solutions are expressed in terms of two- and three-dimensional integrals. To compute the like- and the cross-polarized multiple scattered fields a supercomputer must be used. The results indicate that double scatter in the backward direction is significant for near normal incidence when the mean square slopes of the highly conducting rough surfaces are larger than unity. >


No hint of the existence of this poet was evident until Menahem Zulay discovered his poetry some forty years ago among remnants of the Cairo Geniza MSS. Because his work consists of weekly liturgical compositions written in accordance with the triennial cycle followed in Palestine in ancient times and because Byzantium is the ruling government mentioned in his poetry, Zulay considered him to be Yannai's "mate." As shown in this study Simeon must indeed have known Yannai's work and even followed his example. However, Simeon himself introduced some structural developments in the form of the 'Amidah composition known as Qedushta. Most interesting is the fifth poem in his Qedushta to Gen. 44:18 on the theme of Joseph and his brothers. In his dramatic exposition he even outdoes that of Yannai, his master, intended for the same week. A full critical edition of Simeon's poetry based on about fifty Geniza MSS which is now in print (Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities) will be of importance for a better understanding of ancient Palestinian poetry and spiritual life. His poems are of great significance also in that they contain the oldest known parallels to ancient Palestinian midrash literature.


A method of testing for noninferiority followed by testing for superiority in an adaptive group sequential design is presented. The method permits a data‐dependent increase in sample size without any inflation of type‐1 error. Closed‐form expressions for computing conditional power and the sample size required to achieve any desired conditional power are derived. A new statistical method for performing inference on the primary efficacy parameter is derived. The method is used to obtain the p‐value, median‐unbiased point estimate and confidence interval for the efficacy parameter. For normal endpoints with known variance, the coverage of the confidence interval is exact. In other settings, the coverage is exact for large samples. An illustrative example is provided in which the methods of testing and estimation are applied to an actual clinical trial of acute bacterial skin and skin‐structure infection. The operating characteristics of the trial are obtained by simulation and demonstrate that the type‐1 error is preserved, the point estimate is median unbiased, and the confidence interval provides exact coverage up to Monte Carlo accuracy.


Nine malignant salivary gland tumours in children, reported to the Swedish Cancer Registry between 1958 to 1980, are reviewed. All tumours appeared in the parotid gland. Five cases were muco-epidermoid carcinoma of low-grade malignancy. All patients but one were treated with surgery. The postoperative follow-up period is 1 to 21 years. Three children have died, 2 of tumour disease, 1 and 18 years respectively after diagnosis. In the other children there are no signs of recurrence. Salivary gland tumours in children must be treated according to the same principles generally accepted for adult salivary gland neoplasias.


Multi-agent pathfinding is a challenging combinatorial problem that involves multiple agents moving on a graph from a set of initial nodes to a set of desired goals without inter-agent collisions. Searching the composite space of all agents has exponential complexity and does not scale well. Decoupled methods are more efficient but are generally incomplete. There are, however, polynomial time algorithms, which utilize single or few-agents primitives with completeness guarantees. One limitation of these alternatives is that the resulting solution is sequential, where only one agent moves at a time. Such solutions are of low quality when compared to methods where multiple agents can move simultaneously. This work proposes an algorithm for multi-agent pathfinding that utilizes similar single-agent primitives but allows all agents to move in parallel. The paper describes the algorithm and its properties. Experimental comparisons suggest that the resulting paths are considerably better than sequential ones, even after a post-processing, parallelization step, as well as solutions returned by decoupled and coupled alternatives. The experiments also suggest good scalability and competitive computational performance.


The time trends in incidence and mortality from cervical cancer and breast cancer in Iceland, from 1955 to 1989, were analyzed by fitting curvilinear regressions to the age‐standardized rates. The effect of the screening was evaluated by comparing the curvature of the fitted regression lines and changes in screening activity. The incidence and mortality rates for both cancer types were predicted up to the year 2000. At the commencement of cervical cancer screening in 1964, both the incidence and mortality rates were on the increase. After 1970, both rates decreased significantly. Assuming that regular attendance at screening will be 85%, It is predicted that the incidence and mortality rates will level out at about 7.5 and 2 cases per 100,000 women per year, respectively, by the year 1995 and remain at that level. The incidence of breast cancer has increased steadily since 1955. A sharp rise has been observed since 1987, due to screening with mammography. The mortality rate has shown small but significant fluctuations with time. The incidence rate is predicted to increase at the same rate as before 1987 (i.e. at 1.1 cases per 100,000 women per year), but at a slightly higher level and is predicted to reach 84 cases per 100,000 women per year by the year 2000. Breast cancer mortality is predicted to decrease to about 17 cases per 100,000 women per year by 1995 and to remain at that level.


Due to global environmental concerns related to climate change, the need to improve the service life of structures and infrastructures is imminently urgent. Structural elements typically suffer service life reductions, leading to poor environmental sustainability and high maintenance costs. Graphene oxide nanosheets (GONSs) effectively dispersed in a cement matrix can promote hydration, refine the microstructure and improve interfacial bonding, leading to enhanced building materials' performance, including mechanical strength and transport properties. Cement-based nanocomposites engineered with GONSs were obtained using two commercial nanofillers, a GO water suspension and a free-flowing GO nanopowder, characterized by fully comparable morphology, size and aspect ratio and different oxidation degrees (i.e., oxygen-to-carbon molar ratio), 0.55 and 0.45, respectively. The dosage of the 2D-nanofiller ranged between 0.01% and 0.2% by weight of cement. The electrical and thermal properties were assessed through electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and a heat flow meter, respectively. The results were discussed and linked to micrometric porosity investigated by micro-computed tomography (μ-CT) and transport properties as determined by initial surface absorption test (ISAT), boil-water saturation method (BWS) and chloride ion penetration test. Extra-low dosage mortars, especially those loaded with a lower oxidation degree (i.e., 0.45GO), showed decreased permeability and improved barrier to chloride ion transport combined with enhanced thermal and electrical conductivity with respect to that of the control samples.


This paper presents a novel approach to vehicle positioning that operates without reliance on the global navigation satellite system (GNSS). Traditional GNSS approaches are vulnerable to interference in certain environments, rendering them unreliable in situations such as urban canyons, under flyovers, or in low reception areas. This study proposes a vehicle positioning method based on learning the road signature from accelerometer and gyroscope measurements obtained by an inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensor. In our approach, the route is divided into segments, each with a distinct signature that the IMU can detect through the vibrations of a vehicle in response to subtle changes in the road surface. The study presents two different data-driven methods for learning the road segment from IMU measurements. One method is based on convolutional neural networks and the other on ensemble random forest applied to handcrafted features. Additionally, the authors present an algorithm to deduce the position of a vehicle in real-time using the learned road segment. The approach was applied in two positioning tasks: (i) a car along a 6[km] route in a dense urban area; (ii) an e-scooter on a 1[km] route that combined road and pavement surfaces. The mean error between the proposed method's position and the ground truth was approximately 50[m] for the car and 30[m] for the e-scooter. Compared to a solution based on time integration of the IMU measurements, the proposed approach has a mean error of more than 5 times better for e-scooters and 20 times better for cars.


An attempt to construct a traditional Hubble diagram using objects other than supernovae, namely the infra-red (K-band) magnitudes of 3CR radio galaxies, assuming that these are giant ellipticals undergoing passive stellar evolution with respect to luminosity. Such an approach is degenerate with respect to choice of cosmological and evolutionary parameters. Uses the K-band Hubble diagram in combination with K-band differential number counts. The latter are similarly degenerate but in a different fashion; together the two data sets remove the degeneracy. MNRAS is a leading international journal, impact factor 5.057.


The character of joint destruction caused by disease, injury, or altered mechanics is frequently difficult to differentiate, as similar changes are produced by each. The patient's complaints and the physical findings are more important in evaluating the condition of the joint than are the x-ray studies of it. It is not unusual to find evidence of extensive arthritic change in a joint that is without symptoms. Continued use of any mechanical apparatus produces signs of wear in time, and skeletal joints are no exception. Many of the osteoarthritic changes noted in joints, particularly in the weight-bearing ones, are due to such a process. Gradual degenerative change occurs in the life span, and this is accelerated by disease, injury, and poor body mechanics. Loss of muscle tone, with adaptive ligamentous changes, and consequent altered weight bearing, leading to gradual break down of the elastic shock-absorbing mechanism of the musculo-skeletal apparatus, are


The advertisement call of the Caucasian parsley frog, Pelodytes caucasicus, from the northern Black Sea region in Turkey, is described for the first time using quantitative temporal and spectral analyses. The call is composed of three notes, categorized according to duration and amplitude. The three notes typically occur in a fixed sequence. The first two notes are distinguished by their longer duration and amplitude. The last note is a pulse-train, with regular intervals, shorter in duration and lower in amplitude at the beginning and end. The composition of the advertisement call of P. caucasicus is specific to this species and differs from those of the closely related species P. punctatus and P. ibericus.


The corneal epithelium sloughs cells directly into the pre-corneal tears. By irrigating tears from the surface of the cornea under different circumstances it is possible to compare the rates at which cells are sloughed. In this experiment the rate of appearance of cells following one drop of topical anesthetic was compared with the same eye without the drop. Initially the anesthetized cornea sloughed less, but later more cells were sloughed. This effect lasted for at least 6 hours, and showed that the return of normal sensation is only the initial part of a recovery process which takes much longer.


Abstract. Greater investments and improvements in primary health care (PHC) can provide benefits in reducing the high costs of hospital admissions. Potentially preventable hospitalisations (PPH) are a health system performance indicator used to evaluate access to and effectiveness of community-based health services. The Western Australia Department of Health obtained detailed primary health care data, for the first time at the postcode level scale, and analysed its associations with PPH information for selected conditions. PHC data obtained from the Commonwealth Department of Health for the financial year 2013/14 was Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS) and Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) records at postcode level. In this paper we explore the sensitivity of various benchmarks of spatial zonings for comparison of diabetes-related primary health care utilisation and potentially preventable hospitalisations and then examine the relationship between them among the various spatial zonings. From the geospatial visualisation and analysis undertaken, conclusions are drawn about the patterns and relationships between diabetes-related primary health care utilisation and potentially preventable hospitalisations. The scale of spatial zonings used for comparison is important as too large or too small areas may mask out the relative geospatial variation of diabetes-related PHC utilisation and PPH evident among postcode areas.


Experimental particle physics demands a sophisticated trigger and acquisition system capable to efficiently retain the collisions of interest for further investigation. Heterogeneous computing with the employment of FPGA cards may emerge as a trending technology for the triggering strategy of the upcoming high-luminosity program of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. In this context, we present two machine-learning algorithms for selecting events where neutral long-lived particles decay within the detector volume studying their accuracy and inference time when accelerated on commercially available Xilinx FPGA accelerator cards. The inference time is also confronted with a CPU- and GPU-based hardware setup. The proposed new algorithms are proven efficient for the considered benchmark physics scenario and their accuracy is found to not degrade when accelerated on the FPGA cards. The results indicate that all tested architectures fit within the latency requirements of a second-level trigger farm and that exploiting accelerator technologies for realtime processing of particle-physics collisions is a promising research field that deserves additional investigations, in particular with machine-learning models with a large number of trainable parameters.


The article deals with the problem of functional peculiarities of the modal verb "would" in narrative texts. The analysed corpus comprises those meanings of "would" that render temporal aspects of the semantics of the following simple infinitive. The various meanings of modal constructions are considered in terms of the relative frequency of their usage in written texts as well as of their dependence on the broader lexical and pragmatic context. The present article also studies cognitive nuances of creating and perceiving "would + simple infinitive" phrases including their referential characteristics. At the end of the paper we attempt to build a cognitive model of the narrative discourse functioning of "would"-constructions, which takes into account the addressor's presuppositions at the input and the implications at the output as inferred by the addressee.


Abstract Background: Given the inconsistency of previous studies and the newly emerging evidence, we decided to conduct a meta-analysis. Methods: The meta-analysis included 2 randomized controlled trials and 13 observational studies 742 patients in total. Qualified studies were properly searched from databases . Data were analyzed by the RevMan 5.3 software. Results were demonstrated as WMD , SMD and RR with 95% CIs, I2 and P value. Results: we observed that a remarkable increase of complement C3 in the rituximab group than placebo group (WMDfixed= 7.67mg/dL, 95%CIs=−0.16~15.50, I2=0%, P=0.05). A significant increase of complement C4 was observed in the rituximab group than placebo group (WMDfixed=3.14mg/dL, 95%CIs=1.06~5.22, I2=0%, P=0.003). Notably decreased peripheral CD19+B cells in rituximab group than placebo group (WMDfixed=−117.93n/µl, 95%CIs=−172.94~−62.91, I2=0%, P<0.0001) in RCTs. Patients with severe or refractory SLE got more satisfactory efficacy results after receiving rituximab in observational studies, such as British Isles Lupus Assessment Group index score, SLE Disease Activity Index score, complement C3/C4, anti-dsDNA antibodies, peripheral CD19+B cells and so on. Safety profiles were no difference between rituximab and placebo groups. Conclusion: although the efficacy of rituximab is highly controversial for SLE, our study shows that rituximab presents a satisfying efficacy and safety for SLE.


Chinese scholars are exploring the model of corporate governance to committ to the shareholding companies born by the ownership reorganization of the state-owned enterprises. The debate which echoes the principal-agent approach, does not add a lot to the concerned literature, rather it represents a pale translation of it. The context, however, suggests very interesting considerations: on the chinese scene, in fact, the shareholders are not scattered, weak and unable to watch on their interests. In the newly instituted corporations, the former owner is the majority shareholder and state-owned banks, trade and manufacturing firms control the remaining shares. Chinese economists' genuine interest in working up a model of balanced governance for the enterprises could seem groundless. However, both the fading of the planning instruments, until now utilized by the state to control the behaviour of the top management and the growing involvment of the chinese large corporations in the international market legitimize the need to clarify the authority and responsabilities inside the enterprises.


In countries around the world, a dietary shift is observed in which the consumption of highly processed foods increases over unprocessed or minimally processed foods. The objective of this study was to observe the proportion of processed foods in the diet of school-aged children and to assess how this relates to sex, weight status and school meal consumption. The aim was to assess the impact of processed foods on overall diet quality in terms of ultra-processed foods contribution to total daily energy intake. Dietary intake was observed from dietary records for three non-consecutive days of 168 children (50.6% boys) aged 8.3 ± 0.5 years. All foods and beverages were classified into four groups according to NOVA food classification system. The contribution of each NOVA food group to total daily energy intake was calculated and the mean nutrient intake of children divided into terciles according to total daily energy intake from ultra-processed foods was compared. Anthropometric measurements were performed according to standard protocols, while sex and age z-scores were obtained using AnthroPlus software. Results show that unprocessed or minimally processed foods (38.1% kcal) and ultra-processed foods (38.1% kcal) had the highest proportion of dietary intake. There was no difference in NOVA food groups intake by sex or weight status, while number of school meals may contribute to the intake of processed culinary ingredients. Children who had higher energy intake from ultra-processed foods had lower intake of animal proteins (p=0.009), polyunsaturated fatty acids (p=0.014), vitamin A (p=0.027) and most minerals, but higher intake of carbohydrates (p=0.014) and copper (p=0.014) compared to children with lower energy intake from ultra-processed foods. In conclusion, school-aged children had equal share of energy from unprocessed or minimally processed foods and from ultra-processed foods. Higher share of energy from ultra-process foods may contribute to poor overall nutrition.


Spectrophotometry was employed to study the effect of radiographic contrast agents (iopanoic acid, bilimin, bilignost, endobil, biligram, verografin, iodamide) on bilirubin absorption by rat liver sections. It was discovered that lopanoic acid, bilignost, endobil, biligram, iodamide and verografin inhibit bilirubin absorption by rat liver sections by the competitiveless while bilimin by the noncompetitive mechanism.


We present modeling research work of the winds and circumstellar environments of prototypical hot and cool massive stars using advanced radiative transfer (RT) calculations. This research aims at unraveling the detailed physics of various mass-loss mechanisms of luminous stars in the upper H-R diagram. Very recent 3-D RT calculations, combined with hydrodynamic simulations, show that radiatively-driven winds of OB supergiants are structured due to large-scale density- and velocity-fields caused by rotating bright spots. The mass-loss rates computed from matching DACs in HD 64760 (B Ib) do not reveal appreciable changes from the rates of smooth wind models. Intermediate yellow supergiants (such as Rho Cas, F-G Ia0), on the other hand, show prominent spectroscopic signatures of strongly increased mass-loss rates during episodic outbursts. Long-term spectroscopic monitoring of hypergiants near the Yellow Evolutionary Void reveals that their mass-loss rates and wind-structure are dominated by photospheric eruptions and large-amplitude pulsations that impart mechanical momentum to the circumstellar environment by propagating shock waves. In massive red supergiants, however, clear evidence for mechanical wave propagation from the sub-photospheric convection zones is lacking. Recent spatially resolved HST-STIS observations inside Betelgeuse's (M Iab) very extended chromosphere and dust envelope show evidence of warm chromospheric gas far beyond the dust condensation radius of RT models. Models for these long-term spectroscopic observations demonstrate that the chromospheric pulsations are not spherically symmetric. The STIS observations point to the importance of mechanical wave propagation for heating and sustaining chromospheric conditions in the extended winds of red supergiants.


Although a wide range of therapeutic options are available for relapsing–remitting multiple sclerosis (MS), the therapeutic landscape for progressive forms of the disease is highly unsatisfactory. Therefore, the identification of effective therapies for progressive MS (PMS) is a highly relevant challenge for the global MS medical community. To achieve this, a better understanding of the mechanisms involved in PMS is required through novel clinical trial designs, new drug repurposing strategies and new methods of collaboration in identifying effective therapies. In this review, we discuss the first compounds already available for PMS as well as other therapies currently undergoing phase II and III clinical trials.


This study analyses ways of using violence in the classroom by teachers to students (VPA) and students to teachers (VAP), according to the students` perception of secondary obligatory education (ESO). The sample is composed of 4943 adolescents whose ages range from 12 to 17 years old. The questionnaire of school violence (CUVE3-ESO) used in our study has a Cronbach`s alpha of .90 (high reliability), and the split-halves method has an alpha of .82 (items VPA) and .84 (items VAP), confirming that the instrument has high reliability. From factorial analysis was extracted two factors (F1 : VPA; F2 : VAP) that explain 44.8% of the variance. The results show a similar percentage of violent behavior in both directions (VPA: 18.9%; VAP: 15.9%), being the conducts most used by teachers: the use of ratings as pressure behavior (31%) and preference for certain type of students (29.5%). And being the conducts most used by students: to speak during the class (46.6%) and inadequate behavior (39%).


In this case report, an incidental postoperative diagnosis of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) calcification, associated with calcification of posterior cruciate ligament (PCL) and lateral meniscus insertions, was made using micro-computed tomography (μCT) technology in a knee specimen obtained during a total knee replacement (TKR) surgery due to painful tri-compartmental osteoarthritis (OA) with chondrocalcinosis signs at preoperative X-ray. Anterior cruciate ligament calcification is an uncommon finding, and conventional X-ray and MRI are not so helpful in its identification. μCT scan, in contrast, is of interest because it provides highly spatial three-dimensional information with excellent visualization of bones and calcifications. The μCT technology used in this case report allowed us to perform a detailed analysis and a 3-D reconstruction of the calcium pyrophosphate dihydrate (CPPD) crystal deposition about the knee without the need to section the specimens into slice as performed in previous studies. The 3-D model obtained with μCT scan permits to gain more insight into the shape of the calcification within the fibers of the ligamentous structures of the joint.


[1] Laboratory experiments and numerical calculations are used to study how a laminar thermal plume deforms and penetrates a buoyant and viscous layer, which serves as an analog for continental lithosphere. The viscosity contrast between the two liquids and the buoyancy ratio B (the ratio between the intrinsic chemical density contrast and the thermal density contrast due to temperature differences) are varied by 3 orders of magnitude and 1 order of magnitude, respectively. The manner of plume-lithosphere interaction is not sensitive to the viscosity contrast, which sets the timescale for displacement of the interface, and depends mostly on the B value, which sets the magnitude and shape of interface deformation. Heating of the upper layer by plume material plays an important role. For B > 0.6, plume material spreads beneath the interface and applies a buoyancy force which deforms the interface. For B < 0.6, true plume penetration into the upper layer occurs with a significant vertical velocity component. With time, the upper layer may become unstable and develop an active upwelling which entrains material from the lower layer. Approximate scaling laws allow prediction of interface displacement as a function of time for the whole parameter range studied. Applied to the continental lithosphere, these results show that true plume penetration through Archean lithosphere requires thermal anomalies larger than 300 K corresponding to buoyancy fluxes in excess of those determined today for the Hawaiian plume. Mantle plumes have different effects on lithospheres of different ages and composition, which precludes diagnosis of a single "typical" plume signature.


Facial Expression Recognition (FER) has grown in popularity as a result of the recent advancement and use of humancomputer interface technologies. Because the images can vary in brightness, backdrop, position, etc. it is challenging for current machine learning and deep learning models to identify facial expression. If the database is small, it doesn't operate well. Feature extraction is crucial for FER, and if the derived characteristics can be separated, even a straightforward approach can help tremendously. Deep learning techniques and automated feature extraction, allow some irrelevant features to conflict with important features. In this paper, we deal with limited data and simply extract useful features from images. To make data more numerous and allow for the extraction of just important facial features, we suggest innovative face cropping, rotation, and simplification procedures and advocate using the Transfer Learning technique to construct DCNN for building a very accurate FER system. By replacing the dense top layer(s) with FER, a pretrained DCNN model is adopted, and the model is then modified with facial expression data. The training of the dense layer(s) is followed by adjusting each of the pre-trained DCNN blocks in turn. This new pipeline technique has gradually increased the accuracy of FER to a higher degree. On the CK+ and JAFFE datasets, experiments were run to assess the suggested methodology. For 7-class studies on the CK+ and JAFFE databases, high average accuracy in recognition of 99.49% and 98.58% were acquired.


The microfluidic device (MFD) with a glass–PDMS–glass (G-P-G) structure is of interest for a wide range of applications. However, G-P-G MFD fabrication with an ultra-thin PDMS film (especially thickness less than 200 μm) is still a big challenge because the ultra-thin PDMS film is easily deformed, curled, and damaged during demolding and transferring. This study aimed to report a thickness-controllable and low-cost fabrication process of the G-P-G MFD with an ultra-thin PDMS film based on a flexible mold peel-off process. A patterned photoresist layer was deposited on a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film to fabricate a flexible mold that could be demolded softly to achieve a rigid structure of the glass–PDMS film. The thickness of ultra-thin patterned PDMS could reach less than 50 μm without damage to the PDMS film. The MFD showcased the excellent property of water evaporation inhibition (water loss < 10%) during PCR thermal cycling because of the ultra-thin PDMS film. Its low-cost fabrication process and excellent water evaporation inhibition present extremely high prospects for digital PCR application.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the treatment safety and efficacy of iodine 125 (I125) seeds implantation in patients with bone metastases and assess the availability of quality of life (QOL) as an index for efficacy evaluation.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
The study enrolled 98 patients with 133 bone metastases from July 2010 to January 2016, who had undergone computed tomography-guided brachytherapy with I125 seeds. Brief pain inventory was administered to assess the degree of pain at the preoperative (W0) and postoperative 2 weeks, 4 weeks, 8 weeks, 12 weeks, and 24 weeks (W2, W4, W8, W12, and W24). Drug use, QOL score, and complications were also assessed.

RESULTS
Postoperative pain scores were significantly decreased and maintained for a long term. Numerical rating scale score at W0 was 7.3 ± 1.6, which was decreased to 4.5 ± 1.7 (P < 0.01), 3.7 ± 1.3 (P < 0.01), 2.5 ± 1.1 (P < 0.01), 1.9 ± 0.9 (P < 0.01), and 1.3 ± 0.5 (P < 0.01) at W2, W4, W8, W12, and W24, respectively. After standardized transformation, the dose of morphine for patients at W0 was 175.2 ± 24.5 mg, which was decreased to 91.2 ± 21.7 mg (P < 0.01), 89.4 ± 24.6 mg (P < 0.01), 89.4 ± 24.6 mg (P < 0.01), 72.8 ± 14.8 mg (P < 0.01), and 56.7 ± 11.3 mg (P < 0.01) at W2, W4, W8, W12, and W24, respectively. The efficiency reached 65.3%, 85.1%, 91.2%, 95.2%, and 92.7% at postoperative W2, W4, W8, W12, and W24, respectively. QOL score at W0 was 17.4 ± 3.3, which increased to 23.2 ± 4.5 (P < 0.01), 28.6 ± 7.6 (P < 0.01), 43.2 ± 9.1 (P < 0.01), 45.6 ± 10.3 (P < 0.01), and 47.6 ± 9.8 (P < 0.01) at W2, W4, W8, W12, and W24, respectively.

CONCLUSION
Brachytherapy with I125 seeds was safe and effective for treating bone metastases, offering a potential alternative to external-beam radiotherapy. QOL could be applied to evaluate the efficacy of I125 seeds implantation for treating bone metastases.


Cloud-based communications system is now widely used in many application fields such as medicine, security, environment protection, etc. Its use is being extended to the most demanding services like multimedia delivery. However, there are a lot of constraints when cloud-based sensor networks use the standard IEEE 802.15.3 or IEEE 802.15.4 technologies. This paper proposes a channel characterization scheme combined to a cross-layer admission control in dynamic cloud-based multimedia sensor networks to share the network resources among any two nodes. The analysis shows the behavior of two nodes using different network access technologies and the channel effects for each technology. Moreover, the existence of optimal node arrival rates in order to improve the usage of dynamic admission control when network resources are used is also shown. An extensive simulation study was performed to evaluate and validate the efficiency of the proposed dynamic admission control for cloud-based multimedia sensor networks.


This paper is concerned with some aspects of uncertainty evaluations in multicriteria decision making (MCDM) in the framework of e-commerce website recommendation. The emphasis is on the interest of handling uncertainty with possibility distributions in the MCDM process where evaluations coming from the users present variability. Thus, the authors consider the propagation of possibility distributions through the multicriteria aggregation made by a Choquet integral that takes into account the interactions between the decision-making criteria. To support the recommendation process, location and uncertainty indicators of possibility distributions are defined, as well as their marginal contributions to the aggregated result. The proposed approach is applied here to the problem of the choice of an e-commerce website for purchase purposes, but it can also be used for dealing with uncertainty in other complex problems


In this paper, we propose a scalable and adaptive multicast forwarding mechanism based on explicit multicast (Xcast). This mechanism optimizes the allocation of forwarding states in routers and can be used to improve the scalability of traditional IP multicast and source-specific multicast. Compared with previous work, our mechanism needs fewer routers in a multicast tree to store forwarding states and therefore leads to a more balanced distribution of forwarding states among routers. We focus on two problems and formulate each of them as an optimization problem. The first problem, referred to as minstate, minimizes the total number of routers that store forwarding states in a multicast tree. The second problem, referred to as balancestate, minimizes the maximum number of forwarding states stored in a router for all multicast groups, which is proved to be an NP-hard problem. We design a distributed algorithm that obtains the optimal solution to the first problem and propose an approximation algorithm for the second problem. We also prove that the approach adopted by most existing works to allocate forwarding states in the branching routers of a multicast tree is a special case of our mechanism. The simulation results show that the forwarding state allocation provided by previous work is concentrated on the backbone routers in the Internet, which may cause the scalability problem. In contrast, our mechanism can balance forwarding states stored among routers and reduce the number of routers that store the forwarding states for a multicast tree.


Inter-block-interference (IBI) caused in the pursuit of spectral efficiency can deteriorate channel estimation performance. For this problem, previously-proposed chained turbo estimation performs IBI cancelation by using the soft replica of the transmitted signal. The IBI cancelation technique can, however, suffer from a mean squared error (MSE) floor problem, since the soft replica is unavailable at the first turbo iteration. The IBI problem can be avoided by using channel impulse response length constraint. Nevertheless, as shown in this paper, the IBI avoidance approach is difficult to perform independently since it requires unbiased second-order statistics. This paper proposes, therefore, a new conditional  $\ell 1$  regularized minimum mean square error channel estimation algorithm by jointly utilizing the IBI avoidance/cancelation and subspace techniques. Simulation results verify that the proposed algorithm solves the MSE floor problem, and, hence, improves the bit error rate convergence performance in realistic IBI channels including the effect of pulse shaping filters.


The risk of acute intracranial complication after minor head injury (MHI) is low. Despite this, a computed tomography (CT) scan is generally recommended for all patients following MHI. Admission for clinical observation is a secondary management option when a CT scan is unavailable or is judged inappropriate. Both alternatives are associated with disadvantages and several attempts at refining existing guidelines for MHI management have been proposed as a means of reducing CT and/or admission. However, they are based on potentially unreliable patient history and clinical examination and, furthermore, may be compromised by patient factors such as intoxication. Clinical studies from several research groups have shown the potential of brain biomarker S100B in this patient category. The specificity of S100B is poor, but a high sensitivity for brain damage effectively rules out relevant complications after MHI. Used in conjunction with existing guidelines, serum levels of S100B can accurately identify patients who do not need a CT scan after MHI. Based on 6 prospective studies comprising almost 2,000 patients with MHI, the sensitivity and negative predictive value of S100B for CT findings were 98.2 % and 99.5 %, respectively, and for clinically relevant intracranial complications 100 % and 100 %, respectively. Integration of S100B within existing management routines can reduce the need for CT scans by 30 %, resulting in improved and more efficient patient care.


This paper provides some first steps in developing empirical process theory for functions taking values in a vector space. Our main results provide bounds on the entropy of classes of smooth functions taking values in a Hilbert space, by leveraging theory from differential calculus of vector-valued functions and fractal dimension theory of metric spaces. We demonstrate how these entropy bounds can be used to show the uniform law of large numbers and asymptotic equicontinuity of the function classes, and also apply it to statistical learning theory in which the output space is a Hilbert space. We conclude with a discussion on the extension of Rademacher complexities to vector-valued function classes.


During mitosis in higher eukaryotic cells, nuclear envelope breakdown (NEBD) occurs and leads to the disassembly of the nuclear membrane and nuclear pore complexes (NPC). This brings about a mixing of nuclear and cytoplasmic macromolecules (open mitosis). On the other hand, in many fungi, mitosis occurs without NEBD (closed mitosis). In a recent study, we reported a novel phenomenon in a closed mitosis organism, Schizosaccharomyces pombe: mixing of nuclear and cytoplasmic proteins occurred in meiosis without breakdown of the nuclear membrane or disassembly of nuclear pore complexes. We designated this event virtual nuclear envelope breakdown (V-NEBD). The key event in V-NEBD is nuclear translocation of Rna1, a RanGAP1 homolog in S. pombe. This leads to collapse of the Ran-GTP gradient across the nuclear envelope (NE) and occurs coincidently with V-NEBD. Thus, the barrier function of the NE can be abated without its physical breakdown through modulation of the Ran-GTP gradient.


BackgroundThere has, in recent years been much discussion in administrative data research about communicating with the public about the research undertaken, listening to the public and trying to understand public views and questioning whether the public have trust in the work undertaken using publicly collected administrative data.
ObjectivesTo explore the role of public engagement in dialogue with attendees to try and address whether we are missing the point and value of public engagement. The views of publics are not homogenous, static and also respond to news headlines and data breaches and we can never know the views of 65 million people across the UK, so why do we worry so much about the views of the public and how can we ever know what publics think?
FindingsSummarising work undertaken in examining public attitudes and reflections on five years of working in public engagement in administrative data research will explore key questions with the audience including. Is there value in considering the views of the public, and if so what is the value? How is the public constituted in its relationships with academia and do the public play a key position in the role of universities within our society?


Although interorganizational information system can facilitate supply chain integration and supply chain agility, unintended outcomes may occur if partners possess distinct knowledge about the use of IOS. Based on Foucault's theory of power/knowledge, institutional theory and resource dependence theory, we analyze how various power relations work together to facilitate the institutionalization of IT-enabled supply chain integration. Institutional pressures are posited to increase legitimacy of IT-enabled supply chain integration, which can fix firms' disposition to use IOS for supply chain process integration. Yet, local factors still may hinder firms from doing so. We thus suggest that IT infrastructure integration for SCM can serve as a disciplinary practice for achieving this end since adopting firms tend to be selfdisciplined and act according to the legitimized use of IOS. Based on a sample of 167 manufacturing firms, ten out of the eleven hypotheses receive empirical support using PLS analysis. This paper contributes to the literature by demonstrating empirically the importance of the legitimate discourse (i.e., legitimacy of IT-enabled supply chain integration) and the disciplinary practice (i.e., IT infrastructure integration for SCM) in institutionalizing an IOS-based organizing practice (i.e., supply chain process integration).


Abstract : An account is given of the appropriateness conditions for definite reference, in terms of the operations of inference and implicature. It is shown how a number of problematic cases noticed by Hawkins can be explained in this framework. In addition, the use of unresolvable definite noun phrases as a literary device and definite noun phrases with nonrestrictive material can be explained within the same framework.


The hydrology of the near-stream riparian zone in upland humid catchments is poorly understood. We examined the spatial and temporal aspects of riparian flowpaths during snowmelt in a headwater catchment within the Sleepers River catchment in northern Vermont. A transect of 15 piezometers was sampled for Ca, Si, DOC, other major cations, and d O. Daily piezometric head values reflected variations in the stream hydrograph induced by melt and rainfall. The riparian zone exhibited strong upward discharge gradients. An impeding layer was identified between the till and surficial organic soil. Water solute concentrations increased toward the stream throughout the melt. Ca concentrations increased with depth and DOC concentrations decreased with depth. The concentrations of Ca in all piezometers were lower during active snowmelt than during post-melt low flow. Ca data suggest snowmelt infiltration to depth; however, only upslope piezometers exhibited snowmelt infiltration and consequent lowd O values, whiled O values varied less than 0.5‰ in the deep riparian piezometers throughout the study period. Ca andd O values in upslope piezometers during low streamflow were comparable to Ca and d O in riparian piezometers during high streamflow. The upland water Ca and d O may explain the deep riparian Ca dilution and consistent d O composition. The temporal pattern in Ca and d O indicate that upland water moves to the stream via a lateral displacement mechanism that is enhanced by the presence of distinct soil/textural layers. Snowmelt thus initiates the flux of pre-melt, low Ca upland water to depth in the riparian zone, but itself does not appear at depth in the riparian zone during spring melt. This is despite the coincident response of upland groundwater and stream discharge. q 1999 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.


Genome-wide association studies have identified over one hundred common genetic risk variants associated with type 2 diabetes (T2D). However, most of the heritability of T2D has not been accounted for. In this study, we investigated the contribution of rare and common variants to T2D susceptibility by analyzing exome array data in 1,908 Han Chinese genotyped with Affymetrix Axiom® Exome Genotyping Arrays. Based on the joint common and rare variants analysis of 57,704 autosomal SNPs within 12,244 genes using Sequence Kernel Association Tests (SKAT), we identified significant associations between T2D and 25 variants (9 rare and 16 common) in MUC5B, p-value 1.01×10−14. This finding was replicated (p = 0.0463) in an independent sample that included 10,401 unrelated individuals. Sixty-six of 1,553 possible haplotypes based on 25 SNPs within MUC5B showed significant association with T2D (Bonferroni corrected p values < 3.2×10−5). The expression level of MUC5B is significantly higher in pancreatic tissues of persons with T2D compared to those without T2D (p-value = 5×10−5). Our findings suggest that dysregulated MUC5B expression may be involved in the pathogenesis of T2D. As a strong candidate gene for T2D, MUC5B may play an important role in the mechanisms underlying T2D etiology and its complications.


High-speed counter-current chromatography (HSCCC) was successively applied to the separation of three sulfur-containing diketopiperazines (DKPs) (including two new compounds cladosporin A (1) and cladosporin B (3), and a known compound haematocin (2)) from a marine fungus Cladosporium sp. The two-phase solvent system composed of n-hexane-ethyl acetate-methanol-water at (1:1:1:1, v/v) and (2:1:2:1, v/v), in stepwise elution mode, was used for HSCCC. The preparative HSCCC separation was performed on 300 mg of crude sample yielding 26.7 mg of compound 3 at a purity of over 95%, 53.6 mg of a mixture of compounds 1 and 2, which was further separated by preparative-HPLC yielding 14.3 mg of compound 1 and 25.4 mg of compound 2 each at a purity of over 95%. Their structures were established by spectroscopic methods. The sulfur-containing DKPs suppressed the proliferation of hepatocellular carcinoma cell line HepG2. The present work represents the first application of HSCCC in the efficient preparation of marine fungal natural products.


Expanding and improving basic education in developing countries requires, at a minimum, teachers who are present in the classroom and motivated to teach, but this essential input is often missing. This paper describes the findings of a series of recent World Bank and other studies on teacher absence and incentives for performance. Surprise school visits reveal that teachers are absent at high rates in countries such as India, Indonesia, Uganda, Ecuador, and Zambia, reducing the quality of schooling for children, especially in rural, remote, and poor areas. More broadly, poor teacher management and low levels of teacher accountability afflict many developing-country education systems. The paper presents evidence on these shortcomings, but also on the types of incentives, management, and support structures that can improve motivation and performance and reduce avoidable absenteeism. It concludes with policy options for developing countries to explore as they work to meet Education for All goals and improve quality.


— This project mainly discusses about the design of controller for a nonlinear system like rotary inverted pendulum. This system is under actuated and well-suited for verification and practice of ideas emerging in control theory. Nonlinear systems exhibit instability, making the design of controllers for balancing in the stable position, a challenging problem. The dynamic model of the rotary inverted pendulum is identified first and the state space representation of the system is obtained. The controller is designed by using the pole placement technique and Linear Quadratic Regulator technique in MATLAB software package. The regulatory problem and the servo problem of rotary inverted pendulum system is solved with these controllers designed. The different controller design is implemented in simulation and their performances are compared. Simulation results onto a nonlinear system are given to illustrate the effectiveness of the developed strategies.


The aim of this thesis is to model the discursive construction of identity in a way that retains its multifaceted dynamics within a coherent framework. It focuses on a key aspect of the linguistic construction of collective identity known as identity icons, and proposes a model of iconography for the study of the mechanisms underlying the discursive tropes in identity discourses. The study seeks to map out the potential space of this iconography, drawing on both the identity theories in social sciences and the analytical tools developed in linguistic frameworks. The data is drawn from a well established tradition of discourse on Japanese identity known as Nihonjinron, and four representative texts from different phases of its development are selected for analysis in this exploratory study. The thesis takes the social construction of national identity (Anderson 2006 [1983]; Hall 1997) as its point of departure, and is informed by critical readings of Nihonjinron (Dale 1986; Yoshino 1992; Befu 1992; Aoki 1999). The present study contributes to the current debates in identity research by providing a detailed, empirical account of the process of identity construction in actual texts, to make a case for bringing concepts even as seemingly slippery and intractable as identity into a rational and systematic linguistic inquiry. The present study draws on the framework of discourse analysis developed within Systemic Functional Linguistics (Martin 1992; Martina and Rose 2003; Martin and White 2005) and the methodology of Membership Categorization Analysis (Jayyusi 1984; Antaki and Widdicombe 1998) for the analysis of the data. It is part of the growing interest in identity and bonding icons within SFL, and has been developed to bring these two current threads of research together. The proposed iconography therefore represents an initial step in mapping out this space, by building on some of the latest research in SFL, including bonding icons (Martin and Stenglin 2006; Maton 2008), legitimation (van Leeuwen 2007) and commitment theory (Hood 2008), and provides an integrated model for further linguistic research into identity. This thesis also addresses the methodological problems that discourse analysis must face to engage responsibly with identity as an object of study, and provides a rigorous linguistic approach that both acknowledges and is informed by the insights gained from the debates within identity studies. It thereby contributes to the development of the Systemic theory by engaging it in dialogue with the current understanding in the field of identity research.


ABSTRACT Air and ground temperature data collected at Canadian Forces Station Alert, Nunavut, Canada, have been analyzed to investigate the potential role that air temperature inversions play in influencing the spatial variation of permafrost thermal conditions in coastal areas of the High Arctic. Frequent, persistent air temperature inversions have been documented using a series of weather stations deployed along an elevation gradient inland from the coast. During inversion periods, which may last several days, air temperatures in valley bottoms can be up to 10 °C lower than adjacent stations located at elevations 47 to 130 m higher. The occurrence of air temperature inversions during the winter combined with thin snow cover suggest a mechanism explaining the observation of lower winter ground-surface temperatures and colder permafrost conditions in valley bottoms compared to higher elevations.


This text explores the history of the Eastern Church, spreading from Byzantium to the Orthodox Churches of the Balkans and Russia. It also examines the native Eastern Churches of Egypt, Ethiopia, Syria, Armenia and Georgia, and in the process exposes the many factors which contributed to the Christian disunity in the Middle Ages. The book also treats the impact on the East of such movements as the revolutionary Reform Papacy, the crusades, scolasticism and concilarism.


The physical model and experimental data support the beneficial technology of graded proppant injection into naturally fractured reservoirs to stimulate natural fracture permeability. Injection of particles with increasing size, at poroelastic and hydraulic fracturing conditions, yield deeper penetration and gradual filling of natural fractures with a resulting increase in permeability. This work expands on the concepts and outlines steps to maximize the benefit of graded proppant injection to enhance coal seam gas stimulation by focusing on the effect of the chemistry of injected fluid on the overall performance and the use in conjunction with hydraulic fracturing. Low productivity indices can be observed in many moderate- to low-permeability coal bed methane (CSG) reservoirs due to low aperture and poor connectivity of natural cleats. Graded proppant injection in CSG environments can: stimulate a stress sensitive cleat system below the fracturing pressure as well as enhance a fracturing treatment by invading cleats, lowering fluid leakoff, and maintaining aperture during production. Further, periodic or remedial treatments could to counter effective stress on the cleats improving production by maintaining cleat aperture. Laboratory tests on coal core flooding by water under increasing pore pressure with proppant injection at the maximum pressure have been carried out under different salinities of the injected water. Proppantproppant and proppant-coal Derjaguin-Landau-Verwey-Overbeek (DLVO) total interaction energies were calculated to optimise the condition for successful proppant placement. Results on the DLVO total energy of interaction showed that conditions favourable for successful proppant placement in coal cleats are suspension ionic strengths between 0.05 M and 0.1 M NaCl. At these conditions no proppant agglomeration and proppant-coal attachment are observed, allowing deeper penetration of proppant into the natural coal cleat system. Lower suspension ionic strengths can lead to natural coal fines migration, cleat plugging and coal permeability reduction. Based on the experimental results and previously developed model a case study has been conducted to evaluate the productivity enhancement using this technique. The results show about four-fold increase in well productivity index at injections below fracturing pressures and may further improve the stimulated reservoir volume when used in conjunction with low permeability coal hydraulic fracturing treatments.


Recently there has been an increase in allergic responses to vaccination in horses. Since many viral vaccines share contaminating non-target proteins that can act as an antigen to elicit IgE, we compared T regulatory cell % and IgE levels pre and post vaccination. We hypothesize: high IgE responding horses to BSA have low levels of specific T regulatory cells. Furthermore high IgE responders produce IL-4, IL-10 and TGF-β, which stimulate a T helper 2 response and inhibit a T helper 1 response; a strong IFN-γ response, which stimulates a T helper 1 response and inhibits a T helper 2 response, occurs in non IgE responders. Sixteen horses were evaluated pre vaccination, and 7 days post for T regulatory cell production and specific IgE. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells isolated pre and post vaccination analyzed for expression of CD4 and CD25, and intracellular Foxp3 with multicolor flow cytometry. IgE was evaluated by ELISA. A T regulatory cell recall response was examined by in vitro lymphocyte stimulation one-month post vaccination to re-stimulate T regulatory cells. Supernatant was analyzed for cytokine levels. Levels of IL-4, were higher in horses with high IgE as compared to horses with low IgE; while IFN-γ was higher in horses with low IgE responses as compared to horses with high IgE responses. In conclusion horses with high IL-4, and low IFN-γ have less T cell down-regulation and produce a T helper 2 response leading to high IgE production and allergic reactions.


We verified the profitability improvement effect of a lumber company (large-scale sawmill) in Japan establishing a feed-in tariff (FIT) biomass power generation business using its own sawmill residues. Various profitability indexes were compared between the following two scenarios: Scenario 1, the lumber company sells byproducts such as chips, sawdust, and shavings to other paper companies or stockbreeding companies; and Scenario 2, the lumber company establishes a power generation company based on FIT near the sawmill and sells its byproducts to own power generation company. In Scenario 2, the calculated IRR and NPV of the power generation company were low because the investment cost of the project was high, and it takes more time to recover the cost of the investment. However, it is guaranteed that the generated electricity will be purchased at a fixed price under FIT for 20 years. In the case of an only 3% reduction in the sales unit sales price of sawmill products, the profits were greatly reduced in Scenario 1, whereas all the evaluation indexes were better in Scenario 2.


Background
Ralstonia Pickettii biofilms are associated with pocket infections following breast implant surgeries. Biofilm protects bacteria most topically applied antimicrobial irrigations.

Objectives
To evaluate the effectiveness of four antimicrobial solutions on the planktonic form and established biofilm of Ralstonia Pickettii grown on 3 different types of silicone breast implants.

Methods
Time kill assays at clinical concentrations of chlorhexidine gluconate, povidone iodine, triple-antibiotic solution, and a 0.025% hypochlorous acid solution stabilized in amber glass were evaluated. Normal saline was the control. Three types of silicone implants, two with a textured surface and one smooth surface, were selected. Planktonic assays were performed after implants were soaked for one, five, 30, and 120 minute time points. Biofilm assays were performed after 5 and 120 minutes of implant soak time. Both tests evaluated cell-forming units (CFU/mL).

Results
Triple antibiotic solution had no effect on R. pickettii and was dropped from the study. Remaining solutions showed total kill of planktonic bacteria at one minute. Saline control showed no significant effect on biofilm as anticipated. Stabilized hypochlorous acid was the only solution tested capable of eradicating R. pickettii biofilm on all implant surfaces tested within the first five minute soak time.

Conclusions
Noncytotoxic, 0.025% hypochlorous acid in normal saline, stabilized in amber glass, successfully eradicated Ralstonia pickettii in planktonic and mature biofilm on three types of silicone implants during initial five minute soak time and may be the preferred antimicrobial solution for pocket lavage. This preliminary study requires further investigation. Leaching and implant compatibility testing is currently in progress.


We study the problem of computing and learning non-anonymous reserve prices to maximize revenue. We first define the Maximizing Multiple Reserves (MMR) problem in single-parameter matroid environments, where the input is m valuation profiles v1,…,vm, indexed by the same n bidders, and the goal is to compute the vector r of (non-anonymous) reserve prices that maximizes the total revenue obtained on these profiles by the VCG mechanism with reserves r. We prove that the problem is APX-hard, even in the special case of single-item environments, and give a polynomial-time 1/2-approximation algorithm for it in arbitrary matroid environments. We then consider the online no-regret learning problem and show how to exploit the special structure of the MMR problem to translate our offline approximation algorithm into an online learning algorithm that achieves asymptotically time-averaged revenue at least 1/2 times that of the best fixed reserve prices in hindsight. On the negative side, we show that, quite generally, computational hardness for the offline optimization problem translates to computational hardness for obtaining vanishing time-averaged regret. Thus, our hardness result for the MMR problem implies that computationally efficient online learning requires approximation, even in the special case of single-item auction environments.


In bipolar disorder the discontinuation of lithium prophylaxis is associated with early episode precipitation. Is this `rebound' phenomenon peculiar to lithium? This naturalistic retrospective case note review investigated the frequency of immediate recurrence after discontinuation of any prophylactic treatment. Bipolar patients who stopped at least one medication after at least 6 months of remission were studied. A total of 310 case notes were examined in a systematic search. A total of 53 cases of discontinuation in 48 subjects were found. Discontinued medications included lithium, valproate, carbamazepine, typical and atypical antipsychotics and antidepressants. Recurrence occurred within 3 months of medication withdrawal in 39 cases (74%). Over half of the discontinuation episodes involved lithium: recurrence occurred in 86% of these cases. In the groups stopping other prophylactic agents, a majority of subjects suffered recurrence: anticonvulsants (89%), antipsychotics (64%) and antidepressants (58%). However, these groups were small and the clarity of the data was undermined by the simultaneous withdrawal of other agents. Manic and hypomanic episodes were the most common form of recurrences. Depressive episodes occurred proportionately most frequently following antidepressant withdrawal. More than half of recurrences required hospital admission. This study provides preliminary naturalistic evidence that early episode recurrence in bipolar disorder is not peculiar to lithium withdrawal but may occur following withdrawal of medication from all classes recommended in prophylaxis. These findings, if replicated, have important implications for clinical practice and for research.


Open or hidden violence tends to be ubiquitous in the psychiatric hospital. It causes tensions, anxiousness, burnout, and much human suffering. Especially exposed are psychiatric nurses. In the present paper observations and experiences with violence are presented: dealing with disruptive patients needs intensive and periodical training although violence should not be accepted as a common daily phenomenon. Over-stimulation by crowded wards and noise, but also lack of occupation are important triggers. Victims should be given solidarity by peers and superiours, whereas analyses of the events tend to cause further trauma. Finally it should be kept in mind that victims often suffer from posttraumatic stress disorders.


Using 3D direct numerical simulations of the Navier--Stokes equations, we study the effect of wall roughness on the onset of turbulence in channel flow. The dependence of the friction factor on the Reynolds number, $\mathrm{Re}$, is found to follow a generalized Forchheimer law, which interpolates between the laminar and inertial asymptotes. The transition between these two asymptotes occurs at a first critical $\mathrm{Re}$, $\mathrm{Re}_{\mathrm{c}}$, that depends nontrivially on the roughness amplitude. We identify the transition from subcritical to supercritical onset by looking at the dependence of the velocity fluctuations on Re for different roughness amplitudes. We find that this second critical $\mathrm{Re}$ is comparable in magnitude to $\mathrm{Re}_{\mathrm{c}}$, implying that transitional flow is an integral part of flow in open fractures when $\mathrm{Re}$ and the roughness amplitude are sufficiently high.