Trauma resuscitations (TRs) can be improved with ongoing videotape review. Unrecognized errors, delays, and system problems can be identified and corrected. Previous studies have demonstrated the importance of a short TR on survival and that videotape education can shorten TR time. Trauma resuscitation efficiency depends on details of TR including timing, organization, and appropriateness of care. Videotape education review monitors TR detail and improves TR efficiency by eliminating wasted time and treatment errors. Eight hundred eighty-three patients were evaluated. Group I included a control group prior to the incorporation of an ATLS based videotape review process. Group II included patients who were resuscitated after the educational review process was established. Subgroups based on ISS, direct OR transfer, DPL, and CT scan were also compared. Time and outcome were compared. Videotape educational review based on ATLS guidelines has improved TR efficiency. The benefits of ongoing videotape review include more efficient time utilization, correction of conceptual and technical errors, elimination of "wasted time," and improved survival.


Globally, 2.3 million women were diagnosed with breast cancer, with 6,85000 mortalities in year 2021; making it the world's most prevalent cancer. This growing global burden necessitates a new treatment option, and plant-based medicines offers a promising alternative to conventional cancer treatment. In this work, screening of phytoconstituents of an indigenous therapeutic plant, Bauhinia variegata carried out for potential regulator of tumor suppressor protein p53. Here, an in-silico analysis was employed to develop more effective, pharmaceutically potent small drug-like compounds that target tumor suppressor protein p53. The methanol and aqueous powdered extracts of Bauhinia variegata were prepared and phytochemically evaluated along with antioxidant property evaluation. The LC50 of methanol (325.33 µg/ml) and aqueous extract (361.15 µg/ml) showed their cytotoxic characteristics. Further, GCMS analysis of both the extracts reveals total 57 secondary metabolites. Among these, four lead compounds; compound 1, compound 2, compound 3 and compound 4 were found to have the highest binding ability (-8.15 to -5.40 kcal/mol) with p53. MD simulation and binding free energy validates these findings with highest binding free energy (-67.09 ± 4.87 kcal/mol) towards p53 by the lead phytocompound 2. Selected compounds exhibit excellent pharmacokinetic features and drug-like characteristics. The acute toxicity (LD50) values of the lead phytocompounds ranges from 670 mg/kg to 3100 mg/kg, with toxicity classes of IV and V. As a result, these druggable phytochemicals could serve as potential lead applicants for triple negative breast cancer treatment. However, more in vitro and in vivo research is planned to produce future breast cancer medicine. HIGHLIGHTSScreening of phytoconstituents of an indigenous therapeutic plant, Bauhinia variegata, for potential regulator of tumor suppressor protein p53.The LC50 of methanol (325.33µg/ml) and aqueous extract (361.15µg/ml) showed their cytotoxic characteristics.GCMS analysis of both the extracts reveals total 57 secondary metabolites. Among these, four lead compounds were found to have the highest binding affinity (-8.153 to -5.401 kcal/mol) with tumor suppressor protein p53.MD simulation along with the Prime MM/GBSA binding free energy validates this discovery with highest binding free energy (-67.09 ± 4.87 kcal/mol) towards p53 by the lead compound 2.The acute toxicity (LD50) values of the lead phytocompounds ranges from 670 mg/kg to 3100 mg/kg, with toxicity classes of IV and V.As a result, these druggable phytochemicals could serve as potential lead applicants for triple negative breast cancer treatment.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.


Language learning is a continuous process that takes place not only in the classroom but also beyond the walls of the classroom with the help of technological tools. One of such tools includes the use of blog as an easily accessible gadget that can facilitate learners' language learning and improve their autonomous learning. The present study explores how the use of language learning materials and interaction in the Learning Management Blog (LMB) contribute to the language learning process. The samples of the study consisted of 14 ESL students studying at a local university in Malaysia. The researchers used the Response Analysis Tool (REAT) as a research instrument and data were analysed qualitatively through content analysis. The results of the study showed that the ESL students made use of meaningful interaction among them in LMB forum and improved their language learning. In addition, the findings of the study revealed that the students were eager to get involved in online interactions and develop different language skills and language patterns as well.


Purpose: To compare the diagnostic efficacy of fast spin-echo (FSE) T2-weighted MR imaging with and with-out fat suppression. Materials and Methods: Twelve patients (7 men and 5 women; mean age, 48 years) with pathologically proven cancer of the tongue were included in this study. In all of these, FSE T2-weighted MR images with and without fat suppression were obtained in the same imaging planes before surgery or biopsy. Two radiologists visually compared the images thus obtained in terms of detection, extent, and conspicuity of the tumor, and the con-trast-to-noise ratio (CNR) of each tumor was also calculated. Results: In all patients, both imaging modalities were equal in terms of tumor detection. In 4 of 12(33%), the extent of the tumor was greater with fat suppression, while in eight (67%), it was almost the same both with and without. In ten patients (83%), the tumor was more conspicuous with fat suppression, and percentage CNRs were significantly higher with fat suppression than without (180 70% and 113 61%, respectively; p = 0.02). Conclusion: For the evaluation of patients with tongue cancer, fat-suppressed FSE T2-weighted MR imaging is superior to its conventional equivalent.


The analytical approaches for nonlinear tearing mode have been reviewed. It is shown that Rutherford's model has triggered numerous studies on the nonlinear tearing mode. Its physical picture is clear meanwhile its mathematical method is ingenious but still puzzling to understand. It is trying to find how the 'nonlinear behavior' resulted from the linear equation by a nonlinear transform. It is indicated that Li's model for the tearing mode includes the linear growth, Rutherford's behavior and the new behavior. It was found that the quasilinear modification of magnetic field provided a new damping mechanism for nonlinear growth. The new behavior becomes dominant if the mode is weakly unstable. It is shown that many analytical methods have been developed to calculate the criterion parameter of the tearing mode. Li's instability criterion can cover the previous results in the limit cases.


In an open prospective study, we have tested clinical efficacy and tolerance of two antigonadotropic drugs, that is danazol (D) and cyproterone-acetate (CA). This study was performed in 11 female patients ranging in age from 19 to 47 years, who suffered from midly-active SLE, during 12 therapeutic periods on the whole (that is 6 for each drug), the minimum period of which was one year. Because of side-effects, D had to be early withdrawn in 2 patients, whereas (the) AC appeared to be well-tolerated in all of them. On the whole, 16 clinical exacerbations of DLE were observed during the 12 months pre-treatment period, versus 9 exacerbations during the 12 months treatment period (p less than 0.05, Wilcoxon test), whereas the average dose of prednisone was reduced from 9.6 to 3.5 mg/day. A dramatic improvement was then observed in 3 patients suffering from mucous ulcerations. Increased plasma testosterone level without any change in estradiol level was observed in patients treated with D. Conversely, plasma estradiol decreased without any change in testosterone level in patients treated with CA. Both drugs induced reduction in plasma sex-hormone binding protein. These preliminary results suggest that D and CA may both reduce lupus disease activity, in parallel with an hormonal environment modification, towards a lower estrogen-androgen balance, along with a better tolerance as for CA.


ABSTRACT Gastric cancer (GC) is one of the most common malignant tumors globally. About 20–30% of patients with gastric cancer show peritoneal implantation metastasis at the first diagnosis. Peritoneal metastasis is responsible for 70% of deaths of patients with advanced gastric cancer. Although there are many ways to treat advanced gastric cancer, the prognosis of patients with recurrence is unsatisfactory. An auxiliary treatment with hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC), is an internationally recognized recommended treatment for advanced gastric cancer. A series of clinical trials have shown that HIPEC significantly improves the overall survival of patients with cancer. Compared with the cytoreductive surgery (CRS) alone, HIPEC combined with CRS markedly reduced the rate of peritoneal metastasis in patients with ovarian cancer and colorectal cancer. It has been demonstrated that HIPEC alters transcription of many genes by affecting non-coding RNAs, which may contribute to the suppressive effect of HIPEC on the synthesis of nucleic acids and proteins in cancer cells. This paper reviews the recent advances in understanding the role of non-coding RNAs in tumor invasion and metastasis of advanced gastric cancer. We also consider changes in noncoding RNA levels and other molecules in advanced gastric cancer cases treated with HIPEC. We hope that our review will provide a reference for future research on molecular epidemiology and etiology of advanced gastric cancer and promote precise treatment of this malignancy using HIPEC.


Background: Postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV) persist as one of the most common adverse effects experienced by patients undergoing general anesthesia, as it can prolong a patient's stay in the hospital, increase hospital costs, and lead to further complications delaying the recovery process. Despite prophylactic treatment with a combination of drugs, some patients still experience PONV. Despite its adverse side effects, Promethazine is still utilized as a rescue drug for PONV after failed prophylaxis. Objective: This quality improvement project aims to increase anesthesia providers' knowledge of the current literature on Amisulpride's efficacy and safety profile for treating PONV after failed prophylaxis compared to Promethazine. Methods: An in-depth analysis was conducted by using CINAHL, PubMed, Google Scholar, and the Cochrane Library database to obtain research studies discussing the use of Amisulpride and Promethazine as rescue treatments for failed PONV prophylaxis. CRNAs were invited to participate by completing an online pre-test survey, followed by viewing an online educational module, and a post-survey questionnaire to assess their acquired knowledge. Results: There was an increase in knowledge among anesthesia providers on using Amisulpride as a rescue treatment for failed prevention of PONV compared to Promethazine. Amisulpride has a safer profile and is less likely to cause any side effects, unlike Promethazine, which has the potential for multiple adverse effects. Discussion: Data collected from the surveys showed that anesthesia providers had increased their knowledge of the use, mechanism of action, and minimal potential for side effects of Amisulpride when used to treat PONV. A small sample size of 7 people and the online distribution were limitations for this project. Conclusion: Evidence-based research shows Amisulpride has a safer profile for treating PONV when prophylaxis fails compared to Promethazine. Results from this quality improvement project showed an increase in anesthesia providers' knowledge regarding the benefits and adverse effects of both antiemetics. Introduction of Amisulpride to clinical practice can lead to improvements in patient outcomes by decreasing the occurrence of PONV and further complications.


Objective: The main objective of the study is to identify which social media is being mostly used by the medical professionals as an informative platform and to enhance their profession in a better way.
Study design: Researcher embarked upon adopting an 'Expost - Facto' - Research Design, a non-experimental research design, extensively explored in social-science research, mostly relying on survey procedures.
Method: To answer the research questions and to understand those intricacies, the researchers developed an attitude scale so as to measure those factors which are taken for the study. The researchers used gender, age, experience and education as independent variables and usage of social media as a dependent variable and selected medical professionals as samples from the state of Tamil Nadu which is the southern part of India with various levels of experience. After removing all incomplete samples, the final tally of respondents included in the study is 312.
Results: The results of t-test reveals there is no difference between male and female respondents in terms of sharing information. The results of ANOVA reveals: There is a significant difference in sharing information on social media, discussing clinical issues, giving medical advice, monitoring the patients' health and according to making friends there no significant difference with patients and Tukey HSD results revealed that there is no significant difference pair wise mean scores for all the networks regarding making patients' as friends.
Conclusion: The overall results of the study reveals there is a significant usage in sharing information, discussing clinical issues, giving medical advice to patients and monitoring them in emergency or critical situation through social media.

Key words:  E-Health, New Media, Information Communication Technology, Medical Professionals, Mobile Phones Applications, Internet


Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) is the most aggressive form of invasive breast cancer. The disease is associated with extensive local disease at the time of initial diagnosis requiring multidisciplinary treatment including neoadjuvant systemic therapy, surgery and comprehensive locoregional therapy. The clinical and pathological response to induction chemotherapy represents an important prognostic factor. IBC is otherwise associated with a high incidence of locoregional recurrence suggesting a critical role also for local modalities, particularly radiotherapy. The use of different schedules of treatment and possible combination approaches are reviewed and discussed.


Gestational diabetes mellitus is a common disorder which is defined as any degree of glucose intolerance with onset at, or first recognized during pregnancy. Women with gestational diabetes are at greater risk for many adverse pregnancy outcomes and maternal or fetal mortality. We tried to conduct the cumulative experience regarding the management of the disease, especially emphasizing the novel therapeutic approaches like new types of insulin preparations, oral hypoglycemic agents and herbal drugs or supplements. In this review important recent patents are also discussed.


Question: Do abiotic constraints maintain monospecific woodlands of Juniperus thurifera? What is the role of biotic (livestock) versus abiotic (climate) drivers in the recruitment and growth of the different tree species? Location: Cabrejas range, Soria, north-central Spain, 1200 m altitude. Methods: Stand history was reconstructed using dendroecology and spatial pattern analysis, combined with historical data of livestock abundances and climatic records. Results: J. thurifera establishment occurred in two distinct pulses, with a tree component establishing in the late 1800s to early 1900s. Quercus ilex and Pinus sylvestris establishment was evident only from the late 1970s onward. Recruitment events were related to reductions in livestock browsing. J. thurifera spatial structure was clumped and Q. ilex showed a short-scale aggregation to J. thurifera trees and saplings. Radial growth trends of J. thurifera saplings, Q. ilex and P. sylvestris were negatively related to livestock density. Summer drought limited the radial growth of all the study species, and P. sylvestris and Q. ilex grew faster than J. thurifera even after considering an age effect. Conclusions: The differences in radial growth patterns and recruitment pulses between species indicate that livestock browsing and not abiotic factors is the main factor controlling plant succession and structural development. In this process, J. thurifera acts as a nurse plant, facilitating the establishment of other tree species. Under the current low pressure from herbivores, formerly pure J. thurifera woodlands will change towards dense stands of mixed species composition.


This paper studies the number of voice users (user capacity) supported on the uplink of a single-macrocell/single-microcell code-division multiple-access system. A "hotspot" microcell is embedded within a larger macrocell and operates over the same bandwidth as the larger cell. Analytic methods are presented for computing user capacity which account for propagation loss, multiple-access interference, power control, and random locations of user terminals, as well as two distinct methods by which users select base stations (tiers). Along with the exact user capacity, a technique for making accurate approximations is also presented. Simulation results verify both the exact and approximate analytical methods. This simulation is also employed to study the capacity gains of a third, more optimal, tier-selection scheme. These results point to differences in capacity performance based on the tier-selection method, as well as on the traffic density within the hotspot region.


Strong phenological shifts in response to changes in climatic conditions have been reported for many species, including amphibians, which are expected to breed earlier. Phenological shifts in breeding are observed in a wide number of amphibian populations, but less is known about populations living at high elevations, which are predicted to be more sensitive to climate change than lowland populations. The goal of this study is to assess the main factors determining the timing of breeding in an alpine population of the common toad (Bufo bufo) and to describe the observed shifts in its breeding phenology. We modelled the effect of environmental variables on the start and peak dates of the breeding season using 39 years of individual-based data. In addition, we investigated the effect of the lunar cycle, as well as the individual variation in breeding phenology. Finally, to assess the individual heterogeneity in the timing of breeding, we calculated the repeatability of the timing of arrival at the breeding site. Breeding advanced to earlier dates in the first years of the study but the trend continued only until the mid 1990s, and stabilised afterwards. Overall, toads are now breeding on average around 30 days earlier than at the start of the study period. High temperatures and low snow cover in winter and spring, as well as reduced spring precipitation were all associated with earlier breeding. Additionally, we found evidence of males arriving on average before females at the breeding site but no clear and strong effect of the lunar cycle. We only found weak evidence of among-individual variation in shifts in the breeding phenology, as well as a low repeatability of arrival timing. Our findings show that the observed changes in breeding phenology are strongly associated with the environmental conditions. These results contribute to filling a knowledge gap on the effects ssof climate change on alpine amphibian populations. Moreover, we show that changes in phenology, especially in the mountains, can be hard to predict as local microclimatic conditions do not necessarily reflect the observed global climatic trends.


The transport of electrons through topologically complex two-dimensional Au nanoparticle networks has been investigated using a combination of low temperature (4.5 K) direct current I(V) measurements and numerical simulations. Intricate, spatially correlated nanostructured networks were formed via spin-casting. The topological complexity of the nanoparticle assemblies produces I(V) curves associated with nonlinearity exponents, zeta approximately 4.0. Simulations based on tunneling transport in sparse and inhomogeneous planar networks are used to elucidate the influence of topology on the value of zeta.


Computer science and telecommunications are increasingly important in society and this leads also public administrations to take advantage of ICT, in order to communicate with citizens in a more rapid and simpler way than the complex and paper-based bureaucracy of the past. While on the one hand the use of these technologies responds to the duty of any public institution to involve the largest number of addressees, on the other hand, society must also consider the limitations of these technologies. Firstly not everybody is so familiar in their use. Moreover, the digital administration thus becomes virtual, accessible only through technological devices and not present in a physical location, and is therefore essential to ensure full coverage of the territory, which is currently not always possible. The main novelty of this paper is the implementation of an automated system capable of adapting different types of government services to multiple communication media. The joint exploitation of multiple technologies allows to use the strengths of one of them when are found the limits of another, making this multichannel modality the solution to the requirement of ICT in public administration.


Power-to-X is one of the most attention-grabbing topics in the energy sector. Researchers are exploring the potential of harnessing power from renewable technologies and converting it into fuels used in various industries and the transportation sector. With the current market and research emphasis on Power-to-X and the accompanying substantial investments, a review of Power-to-X is becoming essential. Optimization will be a crucial aspect of managing an energy portfolio that includes Power-to-X and electrolysis systems, as the electrolyzer can participate in multiple markets. Based on the current literature and published reviews, none of them adequately showcase the state-of-the-art optimization algorithms for energy portfolios focusing on Power-to-X. Therefore, this paper provides an in-depth review of the optimization algorithms applied to energy portfolios with a specific emphasis on Power-to-X, aiming to uncover the current state-of-the-art in the field.


--In users of vitamin K-antagonists (VKA), antibiotics can lead to excessive anticoagulation. --It is unclear what the optimal policy is for prevention of an excessive anticoagulant effect during use of antibiotics. --This article describes the increased sensitivity to VKA during use of antibiotics, and also provides a practical recommendation for the correct method for use of antibiotics in combination with VKA treatment. --During use of antibiotics for more than one day, the prothrombin time-'international normalized ratio' (PTT-INR) must be checked both after 3 and after 7 days, and the dose of VKA must be adapted if necessary. --Use of co-trimoxazole for more than one day should, if possible, be avoided.


Suppose we have an n-qubit system, and we are given a collection of local density matrices rho_1,...,rho_m, where each rho_i describes some subset of the qubits. We say that rho_1,...,rho_m are "consistent" if there exists a global state sigma (on all n qubits) whose reduced density matrices match rho_1,...,rho_m.
We prove the following result: if rho_1,...,rho_m are consistent with some state sigma > 0, then they are also consistent with a state sigma' of the form sigma' = (1/Z) exp(M_1+...+M_m), where each M_i is a Hermitian matrix acting on the same qubits as rho_i, and Z is a normalizing factor. (This is known as a Gibbs state.) Actually, we show a more general result, on the consistency of a set of expectation values ,..., , where the observables T_1,...,T_r need not commute. This result was previously proved by Jaynes (1957) in the context of the maximum-entropy principle; here we provide a somewhat different proof, using properties of the partition function.


CTP:phosphocholine cytidylyltransferase (CT) catalyzes a rate limiting reaction in the synthesis of phosphatidylcholine in higher eucaryotes. CT is subject to regulation by interconversion between an inactive cytosolic form and an active membrane bound form. This translocation is controlled by lipid activators and phosphorylation. At present, only the sequence of the rat liver CT cDNA and the yeast CT gene (Saccharomyces cerivisiae) have been reported. Comparison of the primary amino acid sequence shows a significant homology only in the central domain of the two proteins (64%). Since the study of CT has mainly focused on the mammalian enzyme, we have cloned and sequenced the CT cDNAs from a mouse hemopoeitic cell line. The strategy for isolating the mouse CT cDNA clone employed the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in three sets of reactions. The initial set of reactions utilized two degenerate primers whose sequence was derived from the central conserved region of rat CT. A 224 bp fragment of the mouse cDNA was amplified, cloned and sequenced. In the next two sets of reactions, oligonucleotide primers specific for this 224 bp region of the mouse CT were used in conjunction with (1) the forward or (2) the reverse sequencing primer of the vector. These reactions, (1) and (2), amplified DNA fragments corresponding to the 5' and the 3' ends of the mouse CT cDNA, respectively. These two overlapping clones encoded a 1101 bp open reading frame. To check for PCRincorporated errors in the nucleotide sequence, a third set of reactions was performed using two mouse specific primers corresponding to the 5' and 3' untranslated regions. The amplified DNA (1281 bps) was cloned and sequenced. The sequences of 3 complete mouse clones were compared to determine the final mouse CT sequence. The human CT cDNA was cloned and sequenced using an identical approach. Comparison of the mouse, human and rat CT protein sequences demonstrated a high degree of conservation among these mammalian enzymes. When compared to rat CT, 4


When a single crystal is used in an x‐ray spectrometer to display the continuous spectrum of an x‐ray tube by Bragg diffraction, absorption edges characteristic of the atomic species in the crystal may be observed. The change in diffracted power across an edge is fundamentally due to a change in the atomic scattering, especially the imaginary part of the scattering, of the species whose edge it is. This produces a sharp anomaly in both the structure factor and the absorption factor of the reflection being used. The explicit effect of the absorption is a function of the perfection of the crystal face; the change in the structure factor depends uniquely on (hkl) for noncentrosymmetric crystals. Thus, the absorption edges may be used as a tool to study perfection of crystal faces and polarity of polar axes. The K edges of Ga and As seen in reflection from (111) and (111) faces of perfect and mosaic crystals of GaAs are discussed both theoretically and experimentally in some detail. The linear absorption coefficient of GaAs and Ge have been measured in the course of the work.


Boron (B) is an essential micronutrient for plant growth and development of sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.). Most sunflowers growing areas in Thailand are in coarse texture soils with low B availability. The objectives of this experiment were (1) to evaluate the response of sunflower to B applications and (2) to determine the optimum B levels for sunflower under field conditions in sandy loam soil. This experiment was conducted at Suranaree University of Technology, Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand, in January 2011. Two varieties of sunflower, "S473" and "Pacific 77", were grown in sandy loam soil with available B of 0.14 ppm. Five levels of B (0, 3.13, 6.25, 9.38 and 12.50 kg B ha-1) were applied as borax (Na2B4O7.10H2O). The data was recorded for leaf B concentration, B uptake, pollen viability and seed set. They were highly correlated between pollen viability and seed set. Pollen viability and seed set of both varieties responded to B application, but pollen viability was more responsive. In addition, variety "S473" responded to B application more than "Pacific 77". Regression analysis showed that the levels of B application produced maximum pollen viability ranged between 5.6 and 11.3 kg B ha-1, but B application at higher rates tended to decrease pollen viability and seed set.

 Key words: Helianthus annuus L., borax, pollen viability, seed set, 2,3,5-triphenyltetrazolium chloride.


Drs. Hartmut Döhner, Michael J. Keating, Kanti R. Rai and Emili Montserrat form the panel to review chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) while focusing on the clinical features of a particular patient. The pace of progress in CLL has accelerated in the past decade. The pathophysiological nature of this disease, as had been known in the past, was based largely on the intuitive and empiric notions of two leaders in hematology, William Dameshek and David Galton. Now the works of a new generation of leaders are providing us with the scientific explanations of why CLL is a heterogeneous disease, perhaps consisting of at least two separate entities. In one form of CLL, the leukemic lymphocytes have a surface immunoglobulin (Ig) variable region gene that has undergone somatic mutations, with tell-tale markers suggesting that these cells had previously traversed the germinal centers. Such patients have a distinctly superior prognosis than their counterparts whose leukemic lymphocytes IgV genes have no mutations (these are indeed immunologically naive cells), who have a worse prognosis. The introduction of fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) technique has provided us with new insights into the diverse chromosomal abnormalities that can occur in CLL, and which have significant impact on the clinical behavior and prognosis of patients with this disease. Major advances in therapeutics of CLL also have occurred during the past decade. Two monoclonal antibodies, Campath-1H (anti-CD52) and rituximab (anti-CD20), and one nucleoside analogue, fludarabine, have emerged as three agents of most promise in the front-line treatment of this disease. Studies currently in progress reflect our attempts to find the most effective manner of combining these agents to improve the overall survival statistics for CLL patients. As in many other hematological malignancies, high dose chemotherapy followed by autologous or HLA-compatible allogeneic stem cells rescue strategies are under study as a salvage treatment for a relatively younger age group of CLL patients with poor prognosis characteristics.


DURING the past winter an infectious disease of the nasal and lower air-passages, and designated influenza or la grippe, spread from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The infection was not confined to any one specific organism, nor was the Pfeiffer bacillus found in our few cases. The pathology of so-called la grippe, we believe, varies in individuals, though general symptoms are much alike. The mucous membrane of the nose, throat, ear, and lower airpassages was more or less involved, and the sinuses of the nose more often than the middle ear or mastoid process. During epidemics of this character the local and general symptoms are more pronounced than in seasons when isolated cases are observed. Pus apparently does not always form in the sinuses. Local symptoms, however, are quite the same. The character of the exudation found in the sinuses during epidemics of influenza may vary, and may be a clear mucus, muco-pus, or pus. In a few cases the sinus may apparently contain no secretion, and we have a negative pressure which is as acutely painful as though pus were present. Mucous discharge from the nose, as a rule, contains bacteria the same as pus. In a few cases it will be almost impossible, however, to isolate the bacteria, and one will try day after day to discover the organism.


The landward termination of Walvis Ridge consists of two east-trending basement ridges of probable basaltic composition enclosing a relatively important sedimentary basin. East of long. 10° E., the southern ridge disappears under the sediments of the continental margin. The trends of the basement ridges are in good agreement with the inferred direction of initial opening. Since its formation, the Walvis Ridge has probably dammed sediment coming from the south. The proposed identification of layer A, a very strong horizon over which the reflectors are nearly undisturbed, may indicate that no major tectonic phase has affected this area since the shift of the pole of opening for the south Atlantic in Late Cretaceous-early Tertiary time. [NOT CONTROLLED OCR]


This digital electronics text focuses on "how to" design, build, operate and adapt data acquisition systems. The material begins with basic logic gates and ends with a 40 KHz voltage measurer. The approach aims to cover a minimal number of topics in detail.The data acquisition circuits described communicate with a host computer through parallel I/O ports. The fundamental idea of the book is that parallel I/O ports (available for all popular computers) offer a superior balance of simplicity, low cost, speed, flexibility and adaptability. All circuits and software are thoroughly tested. Construction details and troubleshooting guidelines are included. This book is intended to serve people who teach or study one of the following: digital electronics, circuit design, software that interacts outside hardware, the process of computer based acquisition, and the design, adaptation, construction and testing of measurement systems.


Recent advances in interference cancellation and signal-processing techniques can enable full-duplex radios and multipacket reception (MPR), which will have significant impact on medium access control (MAC) schemes. In this paper, we propose a MAC scheme in unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) ad-hoc networks with full-duplex radios and MPR. To efficiently handle the highly mobile environment of a UAV ad-hoc network, a token-based technique is used to update information in the network as well. The MAC schemes in the presence of perfect and imperfect channel state information (CSI) are formulated as a combinatorial optimization problem and a discrete stochastic optimization problem, respectively. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed MAC.


: Luminescent nanocrystals embedded into silica microspheres were shown to be useful for silica labeling for biological applications, ensuring mechanical and chemical stability, nontoxicity, biocompatibility and optical properties. We used sol–gel technology to prepare silica nanospheres embedded with fluorescent and magnetic Eu 3+ (1 mol%)-doped CeO 2 nanocrystals. The X-ray diffraction pattern analysis and transmission electron microscopy investigations showed CeO 2 :Eu 3+ (1 mol%) nanocrystals of about 9 nm size and Ce 3+ ions substitution by the Eu 3+ ions; the nanocrystals dispersed inside the nanosized silica spheres of about 400 nm diameters. The photoluminescence spectra recorded under UV-light excitation showed Eu 3+ ions luminescence peaks ( 5 D 0 - 7 F J , J = 0–4) accompanied by a weaker 425 nm luminescence due to the silica matrix; the quantum yield was 0.14. The weak hysteresis loop and magnetization curves recorded up to 20,000 Oe showed dominantly paramagnetic behavior associated with the silica matrix; a slight opening of the hysteresis loop to a very small magnetic field (about 0.005 Oe) was due to the presence of the two rare earth ions. The photonic crystal properties of SiO 2 -CeO 2 :Eu 3+ (1 mol%) silica nanospheres deposited as films on quartz plates were revealed by the two weak attenuation peaks at 420 and 500 nm and were associated with the reflection from different planes. The SiO 2 -CeO 2 :Eu 3+ (1 mol%) nanospheres are attractive potential candidates for photonics-related applications or for multifunctional bio-labels by combining the luminescence and magnetic properties of the nanocrystals.


ABSTRACT The glucosamine-1-phosphate acetyltransferase activity but not the uridyltransferase activity of the bifunctional GlmU enzyme fromEscherichia coli was lost when GlmU was stored in the absence of β-mercaptoethanol or incubated with thiol-specific reagents. The enzyme was protected from inactivation in the presence of its substrate acetyl coenzyme A (acetyl-CoA), suggesting the presence of an essential cysteine residue in or near the active site of the acetyltransferase domain. To ascertain the role of cysteines in the structure and function of the enzyme, site-directed mutagenesis was performed to change each of the four cysteines to alanine, and plasmids were constructed for high-level overproduction and one-step purification of histidine-tagged proteins. Whereas the kinetic parameters of the bifunctional enzyme appeared unaffected by the C296A and C385A mutations, 1,350- and 8-fold decreases of acetyltransferase activity resulted from the C307A and C324A mutations, respectively. TheKm values for acetyl-CoA and GlcN-1-P of mutant proteins were not modified, suggesting that none of the cysteines was involved in substrate binding. The uridyltransferase activities of wild-type and mutant GlmU proteins were similar. From these studies, the two cysteines Cys307 and Cys324 appeared important for acetyltransferase activity and seemed to be located in or near the active site.


In the increasing discussion about electronic assistive technology, the most emotive reactions are provoked when it is suggested that technology is used to monitor older people with dementia. The words associated with monitoring are rather negative ‐ surveillance, 'big brother', intrusive, controlling.For the past two years care practitioners in local authorities and NHS mental health trusts have been using the Just Checking activity monitoring system to assess people with dementia, living alone in their own homes. Small, wireless movement sensors placed in the key rooms of the house, are triggered as the person goes about their daily life, and the data are represented as a line on a 24‐hour chart. There are no cameras. The chart is accessed via a password controlled website.The charts give care professionals and family carers a much clearer 'picture' of how a person with dementia is acting in their own home. The information is used to devise a care package that is appropriate, and will support them to continue to live independently.Case study names have been changed.


Objectives The aim of the study was to compare retained surgical item (RSI) rates for 137 Veterans Health Administration Surgery Programs with and without surgical count technology and the root cause analysis (RCA) for soft good RSI events between October 1, 2009 and December 31, 2016. A 2017 survey identified 46 programs to have independently acquired surgical count technology. Methods Retained surgical item rates were calculated by the sum of events (sharp, soft good, instrument) divided by the total procedures performed. The RCAs for RSI events were analyzed using codebooks for procedure type/location and root cause characterization. Results One hundred twenty-four RSI events occurred in 2,964,472 procedures for an overall RSI rate of 1/23,908 procedures. The RSI rates for 46 programs with surgical count technology were significantly higher in comparison with 91 programs without a surgical count technology system (1/18,221 versus 1/30,593, P = 0.0026). The RSI rates before and after acquiring the surgical count technology were not significantly different (1/17,508 versus 1/18,673, P = 0.8015). Root cause analyses for 42 soft good RSI events identified multiple associated disciplines (general surgery 26, urology 5, cardiac 4, neurosurgery 3, vascular 2, thoracic 1, gynecology 1) and locations (abdomen 26, thorax 7, retroperitoneal 4, paraspinal 2, extremity 1, pelvis 1, and head/neck 1). Human factors (n = 24), failure of policy/procedure (n = 21), and communication (n = 19) accounted for 64 (65%) of the 98 root causes identified. Conclusions Acquisition of surgical count technology did not significantly improve RSI rates. Soft good RSI events are associated with multiple disciplines and locations and the following dominant root causes: human factors, failure to follow policy/procedure, and communication.


Under the impact of global climate changes and human activities, harmful algae blooms in surface waters have become a growing concern due to negative impacts on water related industries. Therefore, reliable and cost effective methods of quantifying the type and concentration of threshold levels of algae cells has become critical for ensuring successful water management. In this work, we present SAMSON, an innovative system to automatically classify multiple types of algae from different phyla groups by combining standard morphological features with their multi-wavelength signals. Two phyla with focused investigation in this study are the Cyanophyta phylum (blue-green algae), and the Chlorophyta phylum (green algae). We use a custom-designed microscopy imaging system which is configured to image water samples at two fluorescent wavelengths and seven absorption wavelengths using discrete-wavelength high-powered light emitting diodes (LEDs). Powered by computer vision and machine learning, we investigate the possibility and effectiveness of automatic classification using a deep residual convolutional neural network. More specifically, a classification accuracy of 96% was achieved in an experiment conducted with six different algae types. This high level of accuracy was achieved using a deep residual convolutional neural network that learns the optimal combination of spectral and morphological features. These findings elude to the possibility of leveraging a unique fingerprint of algae cell (i.e. spectral wavelengths and morphological features) to automatically distinguish different algae types. Our work herein demonstrates that, when coupled with multi-band fluorescence microscopy, machine learning algorithms can potentially be used as a robust and cost-effective tool for identifying and enumerating algae cells.


This research is motivated by Ibn Khaldun's thoughts on taxes. According to Ibn Khaldun, if the tax is too low, the government cannot carry out its function, if the tax is too high, the fiscal pressure becomes too strong, so the profits of traders and producers decrease and their incentives to work are lost. The purpose of this study is to find out the concept of tax management that is fair to Ibn Khaldun's perspective in order to build a modern economy that is just and to know how the relevance of taxes according to Ibn Khaldun with today's modern economy. This research method uses library research methods with a type of descriptive qualitative research. The data source consists of the Muqaddimah as a primary source, work or theory that discusses primary material as a secondary and complementary material from primary and secondary materials as tertiary materials. The approach in this study is a historical and philosophical approach. The method of data collection uses existing literature and analysis of data used by analysis and hermeneutical content. This study concludes that the concept of a fair tax perspective Ibn Khaldun is a tax drawn from taxpayers in accordance with the ability of taxpayers to pay it and tax withdrawal money must be used properly and fairly, according to Ibnu Khaldun when the tax burden is light, people have incentives to try to be more active. Therefore, the business world is developing, which leads to greater satisfaction among the people because of the low tax burden, while tax revenues will also increase, judging from the overall source of tax land, Ibn Khaldun's thinking about taxes is very relevant when applied to modern economic conditions nowadays, where the economic conditions are less stable, the condition of society is increasingly difficult, the prices of expensive necessities of life add to the difficulties of people's lives.


Experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of screw speed and screw feeder inclination on the residence time distribution (RTD) of particles in a screw feeder via a pulse stimulus response technique. Two models based on Markov chains were developed to simulate particle flows within and between pitches. In upward and horizontal screw feeder inclination cases, a three-parameter two-dimensional Markov chain model consisting of parallel active and stagnant zones fitted well with the experimental RTD data, with correlation coefficients (R-2) higher than 0.98, and gave a clear physical meaning for the parameters introduced. In these cases, a high screw speed or a horizontal inclination induced a high probability of forward movement from a pitch to the next pitch (f) during each rotation period of the screw, and a low ratio of stagnant zone to active zone (r) in a pitch. The upward screw feeder inclination yielded a higher diffusion probability from stagnant zone to active zone (d). In the downward screw feeder inclination case, a one-dimensional Markov chain model without a stagnant zone was in agreement with the corresponding experimental data. The analysis showed that during each rotation period of the screw, the particles in a pitch could be transferred not only to the next pitch but also to the following two pitches.


Objective: To investigate the influence of postoperative infection on average hospitalization days and medical costs in patients with nervous system tumor. Methods: The tumor patients treated in neurosurgery ward from July 1, 2015 to June 30, 2017 were included in the study. The patients with and without postoperative infections were divided into a case group and a control group, respectively (1 ∶ 1 ratio), matched by admission time (±3 months), age (±5 years) and surgical site. Average hospitalization days and medical costs between the two groups were analyzed. Results: The incidence of postoperative infection was 5.66%, the surgical site infection and lower respiratory tract infection accounted for 54.72% and 31.32% of the total, respectively. The median of hospitalization days in the case group was 20.5, 8.5 days longer than that in the control group (Z=-10.618, P<0.001). The median of total medical costs in the case group was 91 573.42 yuan, higher than that of the control group by 30 518.17 yuan (Z=-9.988, P<0.001). The average costs of surgical and lower respiratory tract infection were 84 888.50 yuan and 110 442.64 yuan, respectively. Among them, surgical site infection or lower respiratory tract infection caused the extra cost of 23 627.49 yuan (Z=-6.627, P<0.001) and 43 631.36 yuan (Z=-4.954, P<0.001), respectively. Conclusions: Postoperative infection greatly increased the patient's financial burden, prolonged the hospitalization duration and resulted in unnecessary use of health resources. It is necessary to pay close attention to postoperative infection.


The radiotelephone communication system that links the 5 major islands of Hawaii and some of the engineering problems involved in developing it form the subject matter of this paper. This system, which has been in successful operation for more than 3 years, operates on frequencies between 30 and 60 megacycles per second, although in April 1935, an experimental circuit operating on 220/230 megacycles was placed in service. The successful operation of this system has shown that ultra-high frequencies are well suited to short quasi-optical ranges and that reliable semi-nonattended radiotelephone services are practicable.


Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a chronic inflammation associated with skin hypersensitivity caused by environmental factors. The objent of this study was to assess the hot water extracts of Sargassum horneri (SHHWE) on AD. AD was induced by spreading 2,4-dinitrochlorobenzene (DNCB) on the BALB/c mice. The efficacy of SHHWE was tested by observing the immunoglobulin E (IgE), cytokine, skin clinical severity score and cytokine secretions in concanavalin A (Con A)-stimulated splenocytes. The levels of interleukine (IL)-4, IL-5 and IgE, the pro-inflammatory cytokines that are closely related, were notably suppressed in a does-dependent manner by SHHWE, whereas the level of interferon γ (IFN-γ), the atopy-related Th1 cytokine inhibiting the production of Th2 cytokines, was increased. Therefore, these results show that SHHWE has a potent anti-inhibitory effect on AD and is highly valuable for cosmetic development.


The theory and practice of local economic development has been increasing in significance in the last two decades. This paper offers a critique of the current discourse on local economic development (LED) drawing on the body of knowledge related to complex adaptive systems (CAS) and their properties. Furthermore, it develops on previous research on a proposed institutional framework for LED, resulting in a generalized model referred to as the nexus model, applicable to multistakeholder settings that span a variety of domains and geography for working with complexity at multiple scales and levels. The model is useful in the LED context for nurturing processes of social dialogue, and the creation of economic and social value. The application of the model is itself a demonstration of some of the principles of CAS including emergence, sensitive dependence on initial conditions and self-organization, albeit at a meta-level and in the realm of concepts. Within LED, the nexus model may now be applied not only at district and municipal level, but also at all geographic, administrative, economic and sectoral levels and scales.


Human papillomaviruses (HPVs) are associated with a broad spectrum of cutaneous and mucosal lesions. Until now, more than 120 genotypes have been identified. Most HPVs are associated with benign lesions. Nevertheless certain HPV types are frequently found in carcinomas. For instance, HPV 16 and 18 which are frequently associated with cervical cancer, are capable of immortalizing and transforming primary keratinocytes. The mechanism of transformation is linked to the viral genome integration into the cell's DNA, accompanied by an overexpression of the E6 and E7 genes. The viral gene products interact with cellular proteins that regulate the cycle progression. In particular, the E6 protein binds to the p53 and the E7 protein binds to the p105(Rb). The inactivation of both cellular proteins distorts the cell cycle and results in genetic instability and cellular gene alterations. This article reviews the role of the viruses in the carcinogenesis, the genome structure and the gene expression of HPVs. It also addresses the cell cycle regulation with a focus on the role of HPVs in cell transformation.


Purpose:To determine: 1) The proportion of women in British Columbia (BC) who have a pre-operative diagnosis of breast cancer by image-guided core biopsy; 2) Whether women who have a pre-operative radiological diagnosis of breast cancer with core biopsy have fewer breast surgeries as part of their initial therapy; 3) Whether local/ locoregional relapse is lower in women who have had a pre-operative diagnosis of breast cancer with a core biopsy versus an open biopsy; 4) Whether there is regional variation in the use of pre-operative core biopsies versus open biopsies in the diagnosis of breast cancer in B.C. 5) Whether the risk of pN0i+ on sentinel node biopsy (SNB) is reduced when the initial diagnosis of breast cancer is made on core biopsy versus open biopsy. Methods: All B.C residents diagnosed with breast cancer in 2006 were reviewed. The women were divided into groups according to the method of diagnosis- pre-operative core needle biopsy, operative biopsy (open biopsy or other surgery), versus other diagnosis. Core biopsies were further divided into image-guided versus clinically-directed core. Women with denovo metastatic disease, locally advanced disease, prior or synchronous invasive or insitu breast cancer, Paget9s, alone or with insitu disease, patients with surgical procedures performed out of province, patients diagnosed on death certificate/ autopsy only, and cases without pathology were all excluded. Results: 3130 patients diagnosed in 2006 were identified in the BC Cancer Agency Registry. After exclusions, 2589 patients were included in the study cohort. 32% of patients had diagnosis made on an open surgical procedure, and 68% were diagnosed on a non-open biopsy, of which, 80% were image-guided core biopsies. Seventy-five percent of women with an image-guided core had one or less surgical procedure compared to only 26% of women whose diagnosis was made by surgery, despite the image-guided core biopsy group having larger, more invasive tumors and increased nodal positivity. The type of biopsy did not impact the prevalence of pN0i+ on SNB, or local and locoregional relapse rate. Regionally, Vancouver Coastal and Vancouver Island Health Authority, which are more densely populated urban centres, had the highest proportion of patients diagnosed by core biopsy, 70.3% and 75.4% respectively, and the sparsely populated Northern Health Authority had the lowest proportion at 46.7%. Conclusions: Core biopsies for breast cancer diagnosis are under-utilized in British Columbia and show significant regional variation. Although core biopsy diagnosis does not impact rate of pN0i+ on nodal biopsy or locoregional relapse rates, it is associated with substantially fewer breast/nodal surgeries. More resources are required to promote the use of CNB to providers and patients. Citation Format: Kristy KM Cho, Christine Wilson, Scott Tyldesley, Caroline Speers. Core biopsy in breast cancer diagnosis: The provincial evaluation of utilization and relationship with treatment outcomes. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference on Advances in Breast Cancer Research: Genetics, Biology, and Clinical Applications; Oct 3-6, 2013; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Mol Cancer Res 2013;11(10 Suppl):Abstract nr B114.


Formal thought disorder is among the pathognomonic symptoms of schizophrenia, presenting as irregularities in the structure of speech that result in disorganized or incoherent discourse. Evidence from neuroimaging and behavioural research indicates abnormalities in semantic, linguistic and executive processing all contribute to the expression of this symptom. Additionally, changes in grey matter volume in regions of cortex supporting these functions, particularly the left posterior superior temporal lobe, correlate with the severity of thought disorder. The program of study this thesis represents was broadly focused, with the goal of increasing our understanding of the neurocognitive basis of this symptom. Thought disorder has the curious quality of displaying severe dysfunction in one language modality, expression, while function in another, reception, is intact. The first study used functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate the source of this disparity, by assessing brain activation during listening to speech. The second study expanded on the first, incorporating structural magnetic resonance imaging data into a mediation analysis with the functional and symptom data, to test whether increased activation mediates the association between reduced cortical grey matter volume and severity of thought disorder. As evidence increasingly indicates impaired context processing in thought disorder, the third study investigated the impact of symptom severity on the context-dependant automatic and controlled processes contributing to word recognition. Finally, the fourth study assessed sub clinical thought disorder in a high schizotypy sample, to determine if speech disorder is among the cognitive variables in this population that exhibit continuity with schizophrenia. The results indicate that increased cortical activation in the left posterior temporal lobe may underlie preserved receptive language function in thought disorder. A proof-of-principle mediation analysis demonstrated that functional and structural brain abnormalities are interdependent and should be considered as such when investigating the neurophysiology of symptom expression. Deficient processing of linguistic context results in failures in both controlled and automatic processes contributing to word recognition. Finally, the speech abnormalities characterizing thought disorder are not associated with normal variation in schizotypy, indicating they may be predictive of transition to psychotic illness in high risk individuals.


The formation of magnetic islands with mode numbers (m>1,n⩾1) apparently triggered by sawtooth crashes has for a long time been a concern in JET discharges with auxiliary heating as it affects the peak performance, in terms of stored energy or of neutron yield (in DT experiments). The phenomenological association of the sawtooth crash with the onset of resistive modes is particularly relevant in the context of neo-classical tearing modes (NTM) theory that requires the formation of a `seed' island above a critical value. Relying on observations and on an understanding of the role of the collapse phase of the (m = 1,n = 1) instability, we propose as physical mechanism of destabilization of the metastable NTM a forced reconnection process due to electro-dynamic mode coupling. For a definite mode-number congruence and frequency matching conditions a bifurcation pattern appears in the behaviour of the driven mode. Modelling of a JET discharge shows that for perfect frequency matching conditions the triggering of the (m = 3,n = 2) NTM could be due to either two-mode toroidal coupling or three-mode non-linear coupling. The observed mode frequencies in the cases examined, suggest non-linear coupling, with the (m = 3,n = 2) mode being driven by (m = 1,n = 1) and (m = 4,n = 3) modes, the (m = 1,n = 1) being provided either by the sawtooth precursor or by fishbones.


Interferometry in the time domain has proven valuable for matter-wave based measurements. This concept has recently been generalized to cold molecular clusters using short-pulse standing light waves which realized photo-depletion gratings, arranged in a time-domain Talbot–Lau interferometer (OTIMA). Here we extend this idea further to large organic molecules and demonstrate a new scheme to scan the emerging molecular interferogram in position space. The capability of analyzing different isotopes of the same monomer under identical conditions opens perspectives for studying the interference fringe shift as a function of time in gravitational free fall. The universality of OTIMA interferometry allows one to handle a large variety of particles. In our present work, quasi-continuous laser evaporation allows transferring fragile organic molecules into the gas phase, covering more than an order of magnitude in mass between 614 amu and 6509 amu, i.e. 300% more massive than in previous OTIMA experiments. For all masses, we find about 30% fringe visibility.


Chronic opioid treatment is a highly effective method to treat chronic pain; however, the prevalence of abuse of opioids can make treating patients with these agents difficult for clinicians. The objective of this study was to describe rates of inappropriate utilization, abuse, and diversion in a population of patients who were prescribed chronic opioids, as measured by urine drug testing in the clinical setting. A retrospective analysis was conducted of results from all urine drug tests conducted by Ameritox, Ltd. between January 2006 and January 2009, for patients whose physicians ordered the test in order to screen for noncompliance. Data from 938,586 patient test samples showed that 75% of patients were unlikely to be taking their medications in a manner consistent with their prescribed pain regimen. Thirty-eight percent of patients were found to have no detectable level of their prescribed medication, 29% had a nonprescribed medication present, 27% had a drug level higher than expected, 15% had a drug level lower than expected, and 11% had illicit drugs detected in their urine. Note that all categories add to a total greater than 100% as each category is not mutually exclusive, and a single patient could fall into multiple categories. The high observed rate of noncompliance demonstrates a significant clinical concern and confirms the importance of periodic urine drug screening for the population prescribed long-term opioid therapy.


The recycling of vulcanizates based on EPDM roofing membrane rubber using a new ultrasonic devulcanization reactor with a grooved barrel was carried out. This reactor provided continuous devulcanization at an output as high as 2.52 g/s. Die pressure and ultrasonic power consumption were measured as a function of processing conditions. The mechanical properties of virgin vulcanized and revulcanized roofing membranes were measured. Tensile strength of the revulcanized rubber was found to be similar to that of the virgin vulcanizate. Gel fraction, crosslink density, and dynamic properties of the virgin vulcanizate, the ultrasonically devulcanized rubber, and the revulcanized rubber were determined. Also, dynamic properties and the cure behavior of the virgin compound and of the devulcanized roofing membrane were investigated. All these properties were found to be dependent on processing conditions during devulcanization. The thermal stability of the virgin compound, virgin vulcanizate, and devulcanized and revulcanized rubbers were studied by means of TGA. It was found that the thermal stability of all the vulcanizates in air and nitrogen environments remained practically intact, while that of devulcanized rubber in air environment was a function of processing conditions.


Fluent reading is a skill in which an individual increases his/her information process speed through the use of elements related to reading. He/she also can use reading-comprehension strategies more effectively while increasing the speed of information process. In this study, the reading-comprehension levels of the students in terms of the fluent reading abilities of the students were analyzed. To do that, 131 primary school 6 th grade students formed the study sample. The reading levels of the students were determined by a multi-dimensional fluent reading scale followed by tests on reading-comprehension strategies. Data were represented through percentages, averages, berivate correlations, one-way variant analysis, t-test and LSD techniques. Finally, the readingcomprehension strategies usage levels of the students were determined in relation to their sex and fluent reading levels. Within the frame of the findings, some suggestions were made on learners' reading-comprehension processes.


PT. XXX is one of the companies in Indonesia engaged in the one stop logistics field which has been working for more than 30 years and located in South Jakarta. The current conditions at that company do not have a good Information Systems strategy, less use of Information Systems use and the company only makes a work plan based on the project plan to be taken. Therefore, PT. XXX requires an IS Strategic Planning using Enterprise Architecture. Before implementing the warehouse management system at company, first analyze the readiness of the implementation of the warehouse management system by distributing questionnaires to 200 employee respondents. The model used for this study uses Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) Theory. The purpose of this study is look for indicators, and new factors which will later be used to build a new model based on the results of the respondent questionnaire. from the theory model developed into a new model that will form new factors and indicators. From the some factors used then the data the results of the questionnaire processed using factor analysis resulted in 5 new factors, namely, after obtaining 5 new factors, then processed into a new model that has been analyzed using linear regression.


Escherichia albertii is a recently recognized human enteropathogen that is closely related to Escherichia coli. As E. albertii sometimes causes outbreaks of gastroenteritis, rapid strain typing systems, such as the O- and H-serotyping systems widely used for E. coli, will be useful for outbreak investigation and surveillance. Although an O-genotyping system has recently been developed, the diversity of E. albertii H-antigens (flagellins) encoded by fliC genes remains to be systematically investigated, and no H-serotyping or genotyping system is currently available. Here, we analyzed the fliC genes of 243 genome-sequenced E. albertii strains and identified 73 sequence types, which were grouped into four clearly distinguishable types designated E. albertii H-genotypes 1–4 (EAHg1–EAHg4). Although there was a clear sign of intraspecies transfer of fliC genes in E. albertii, none of the four E. albertii H-genotypes (EAHgs) were closely related to any of the 53 known E. coli H-antigens, indicating the absence or rare occurrence of interspecies transfer of fliC genes between the two species. Although the analysis of more E. albertii strains will be required to confirm the low level of variation in their fliC genes, this finding suggests that E. albertii may exist in limited natural hosts or environments and/or that the flagella of E. albertii may function in a limited stage(s) in their life cycle. Based on the fliC sequences of the four EAHgs, we developed a multiplex PCR-based H-genotyping system for E. albertii (EAH-genotyping PCR), which will be useful for epidemiological studies of E. albertii infections.


Models of the human respiratory tract developed in the past were based on measurements made on human tracheobronchial airways of healthy subjects. With the exception of a few morphometric characteristics such as the bronchial wall thickness (WT), very little has been published concerning the effects of disease on the tree structure and geometrical features. In this study, a commercial software package was used to segment the airway tree of seven healthy and six moderately persistent asthmatic patients from high resolution computed tomography images. The process was assessed with regards to the treatment of the images of the asthmatic group. The in vivo results for the bronchial length, diameter, WT, branching, and rotation angles are reported and compared per generation for different lobes. Furthermore, some popular mathematical relationships between these morphometric characteristics were examined in order to verify their validity for both groups. Our results suggest that, even though some relationships agree very well with previously published data, the compartmentalization of airways into lobes and the presence of disease may significantly affect the tree geometry, while the tree structure and airway connectivity is only slightly affected by the disease. Anat Rec, 296:852–866, 2013. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


The equilibrium structure and orientations of solid fluorine are calculated at zero temperature and pressure by completely optimizing a general monoclinic lattice with two molecules per unit cell. In addition to the lattice parameters and orientations, the molar volume, sublimation energy, and gas phase second virial coefficients are calculated. The k = 0 libron and phonon frequencies are calculated using a lattice dynamics procedure, based upon the optimized structure. Both the proposed C2/c and C2/m structures are found for which nearly identical sublimation energies are calculated. Consequently, we are unable to resolve the controversy concerning which structure should be physically realized, although the C2/c structure gives slightly better overall agreement with experiment. The predicted results are found to be very sensitive to the magnitude of the quadrupole moment theta, which is taken to be 0.65 x 10/sup -26/ esu cm/sup 2/ in this work.


Objective: to describe characteristics of central serous chorioretinophaty (CSC) patients in Sanglah General Hospital, correlation between visual acuity and foveal thickness before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy, the differences of visual acuity and foveal thickness of CSC's patients before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy. Methods : This study is a descriptive study, than followed by cross sectional study. Data were collected retrospectively from medical report of CSC patients who came to Sanglah General Hospital during period Januari 1 st 2010 until December 31 st 2011. Results : Central serous chorioretinopathy were found in 22 patients (22 eyes), male predominance (72.7%), majority were in age group 30-40 years (54.55%), and all of cases were unilateral. Most of CSC patients worked as private employees (77.3%). Mean onset patients presented to the hospital was 14.64±5.68 days, with the most common symptom was decreasing vision (86.4%). Mean of follow ups in CSC patients were 64.11±6.15 days. There was correlation between visual acuity and foveal thickness before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy, respectively r=0.76; p=0.001 and r=0.73; p=0.001 (Spearman test). The differences between visual acuity of CSC patients before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy was significant (0.55±0.26 logMAR vs 0.11±0.12 logMAR; p=0.001; Wilcoxon test). The differences between foveal thickness of CSC patients before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy  was also significant (484.23±6.42 vs 258.41±4.21; p=0.001; Wilcoxon test). Conclusions : CSC patients was male predominance, majority in decade 3-4, all of cases were unilateral and most of the patients worked as private employees. There is a strong correlation between visual acuity and foveal thickness before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy. A significant differences found in visual acuity and foveal thickness of CSC's patients before and after oral acetazolamide theraphy. In this study, the role of oral acetazolamide in clinical resolution improvement of CSC'patients can not be concluded. Further study with control group needed to find it's role.


The publication on Disaster Risk Reduction in Myanmar by Smith and Chan concluded that although Myanmar's Action Plan for Disaster Risk Reduction addressed multiple stages of disaster development and has made progress toward national projects, it has struggled to implement community-based preparedness and response initiatives. In fact, as a tropical country in Indochina, Myanmar is located in an area that is prone to several natural disasters. Every year, there are many monsoons followed by local floods. Our experiences in disaster management emphasize that both the lack of essential public health infrastructure and unstable political and social protections contribute greatly to the mismanagement of the disasters, especially resulting in a delayed response without the benefit of otherwise effective preventive action. For example, in Thailand, despite a continued history of large flood disasters, there is still no good preparedness planning against future flooding among local health centers. This is just one more example of the importance of recognizing the entire disaster cycle with emphasis on prevention and preparedness, not just the response phase alone. About the Authors


Bill C-36, the omnibus anti-terrorism legislation enacted in response to the events of September 11, 2001, came into force in December 2001. The sections of the bill that attracted the greatest public attention were the new terrorism offenses and the new investigative procedures the bill created. But the bill also amended the Canada Evidence Act to alter the regime for determining claims of public interest immunity that fall under federal jurisdiction. In this article, I briefly describe these amendments, and then I raise several questions about them: what is the effect of the new regime on practice issues such as the Crown's disclosure obligations? How does the new regime interact with the duties of fairness owed by members of the executive to persons affected by executive decisions? Is the new regime consistent with the rule of law values that are mentioned in the preamble to the Charter and are, according to the Secession Reference, part of the unwritten Constitution?


Slowly developing immune-mediated diabetes, often called latent autoimmune diabetes in adults, is characterized by the presence of autoantibodies (ATs) to glutamic acid decarboxylase (GADA), the patient's age at the onset over 35 years, and the absence of the need for insulin therapy for 6-12 months to 6 years from the moment of diagnosis, according to the WHO classification of 2019, refers to hybrid forms of diabetes mellitus (DM). In this article, we present a case history of slowly developing immune-mediated diabetes in a 14-year-old boy who was transferred from metformin monotherapy and a diet with restriction of digestible carbohydrates to the intensified insulin therapy only 4 years after the onset of diabetes mellitus with a glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) level of less than 6.5% throughout the disease. As a result of the studies, the patient was found to have a homozygous genotype highly predisposing to the development of Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus (T1DM), as well as increased levels of ATs to GADA and tyrosine phosphatase (IA-2A). The initially preserved level of basal C-peptide and the clinical course of the disease in this patient do not allow us to classify this case as a classic variant of the course of Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus.


We compared the mechanistic and kinetic properties of murine leukemia virus (MuLV) and human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) reverse transcriptases (RTs) during RNA-dependent DNA polymerization and mutation synthesis using pre-steady-state kinetic analysis. First, MuLV RT showed 6.5–121.6-fold lower binding affinity (Kd) to deoxynucleotide triphosphate (dNTP) substrates than HIV-1 RT, although the two RTs have similar incorporation rates (kpol). Second, compared with HIV-1 RT, MuLV RT showed dramatic reduction during multiple dNTP incorporations at low dNTP concentrations. Presumably, due to its low dNTP binding affinity, the dNTP binding step becomes rate-limiting in the multiple rounds of the dNTP incorporation by MuLV RT, especially at low dNTP concentrations. Third, similar fold differences between MuLV and HIV-1 RTs in the Kd and kpol values to correct and incorrect dNTPs were observed. This indicates that these two RT proteins have similar misinsertion fidelities. Fourth, these two RT proteins have different mechanistic capabilities regarding mismatch extension. MuLV RT has a 3.1-fold lower mismatch extension fidelity, compared with HIV-1 RT. Finally, MuLV RT has a 3.8-fold lower binding affinity to mismatched template/primer (T/P) substrate compared with HIV-1 RT. Our data suggest that the active site of MuLV RT has an intrinsically low dNTP binding affinity, compared with HIV-1 RT. In addition, instead of the misinsertion step, the mismatch extension step, which varies between MuLV and HIV-1 RTs, contributes to their fidelity differences. The implications of these kinetic differences between MuLV and HIV-1 RTs on viral cell type specificity and mutagenesis are discussed.


The goal of neuropsychological tests is to identify the neuropsychological dysfunction in psychiatric disorders such as organic mental disorders and schizophrenia, to develop the exe-cutive and monitor treatment plan and to make a cognitive rehabilitation program. Also, it will provide a more useful information that neurpsychological tests will be applied to neurotic out-patients in combination with conventional psychological test. However, many researches should be performed to further clarify the usefulness of neuropsychological test in neurosis.


This paper develops a simple modeling tool for designer green buildings. The designer can explore the nature of building, shape, fenestration, orientation and fabric thermal properties to minimize a buildings' environmental effect. Aspects of heating, lighting, natural and mechanical ventilation with heat recovery systems can also be investigated. The model is best used to check that buildings will observe with the regulations or used as an early design aid rather than a detailed design simulator of building performance. The program should therefore be of particular interest to architects, building surveyors and building controllers rather than building service engineers. A project pilot program in Algeria has been lunched based on low energy consumption. It has been increasingly realized that the preservation of the environment is a guarantee of durability and stability of the process of economic and social development. Daily life in domestic buildings (heating, air conditioning) is responsible for more than 30% of emissions of greenhouse effect gases. It also appears that a suitable building construction and an adequate implementation can both reduce energy bills and household expenditure. Acting on buildings and environment, is to give all Algerians possibilities to live in an ecological habitat. That is why measures will be implemented which affects both existing buildings (over 7 million homes on 1 January 2007) during their rehabilitation and the new buildings as well. A large number of residential constructions do not seem responding to thermal comfort and energy savings needs. This can be explained by the absence of specific thermal regulations and, also, by the lack of know-how and an insufficient knowledge on the topic by the builders. A thermal calculation method has been developed taking into account the new HPE 'High Performance Energy' a voluntary process, which promotes high quality research in a sustainable development perspective. It is also essentially based on a new way of behaving in an indoor environment comfort, in order to reduce to the minimum the cost of energy used to heat the new or existing buildings. The recommendations of the centre of thermal regulations developed for the Algerian climate are taken as references in the choice of the computer model elaborated in our study as a tool. A personal program, named "EnergyArch" that models both outside and inside parameters acting on the building, using the thermal simulation of the architectural parameters and the climatic factors of the region. This program has reached an energy saving of about 20% by households depending on the construction materials used


The embedded-block coding with optimized truncation (EBCOT), which consists of a bit-plane coder (BPC) and a binary arithmetic coder (BAC), is the bottleneck in realizing a high-performance JPEG2000 encoding system due to its characteristics of bit-wise processing. Although efficient architectures for BPCs have been presented, the performance of EBCOT is mainly restricted by BAC because of its sequential processing nature. In this paper, we propose a novel architecture for BAC which is based on our optimization technique named as trace pipelining. It enables parallel processing of the usual byte-out cases in BAC, and can achieve a throughput of 534 M symbols/sec, which is the highest compared to those of the previous BAC architectures.


Since Clusius first documented floral heteromorphy in Primula in the 16th century, the genus has been a model system for those studying the development of different floral morphs on plants of the same species. Over the centuries, eminent botanist and geneticists, including Darwin, Hildebrand and Ernst, have furthered our understanding of the phenomenon in a number of species. In Primula vulgaris (Common Primrose), in which flowers take either a long styled (Pin) or short-styled (Thrum) form, heteromorphy is linked to a sporophytic self-incompatibility system, with both mechanisms under the control of the highly conserved, diallelic Self-Incompatibility (S) locus.
Whilst classical genetic approaches have identified basic functions of the S locus, as well as the order of the loci controlling these features within the locus, the molecular structure of this important region of the genome remains unknown. Recently, a number of molecular S-linked markers have been characterised, providing an opportunity to begin molecular characterisation of the locus as well as its immediate surroundings.
Using these markers as a guide, a single contiguous sequence has been assembled to join three of these markers together, spanning the region in which the mechanisms preventing recombination within the locus breaks down. Within this region, 51 genes have been identified and annotated. Homologues of these genes have been identified in Solanum lycopersicum, Oryza sativa and Arabidopsis thaliana, providing an insight into the convergence and divergence of genes between the four species.


The three main approaches in fluid dynamics are actual experiments, numerical simulations, and theoretical solutions. Numerical simulations and theoretical solutions are based on the continuity equation and Navier-Stokes equations (NSE) that govern experimental observations of fluid dynamics.Theoretical solutions can offer huge advantages over numerical solutions and experiments in the understanding of fluid flows and design. These advantages are in terms of cost and time consumption. However, theoretical solutions have been limited by the prized NSE problem that seeks a physically consistent solution than what classical potential theory (CPT) offers. Therefore, the current author refined CPT. He introduced refined potential theory (RPT) that provides a viscous potential/stream function as a physically consistent solution to the NSE problem. This function captures observable unsteady flow features including separation, wake, vortex shedding, compressibility, turbulence, and Reynolds-number-dependence. It appropriately combines the properties of a three-dimensional potential function that satisfy the inertia terms of NSE and the features of a stream function that satisfy the continuity equation, the viscous vorticity equation, and the viscous terms of NSE. RPT has been verified and validated against experimental and numerical results of incompressible unsteady sub-critical Reynolds number flows on stationary finite circular cylinder, sphere, and spheroid.


This paper employs the 2017 game NieR: Automata as a case study to explore how Russian Formalist poetics, particularly the concept of "defamiliarization," can operate as a mode of subversion in games. By focusing on the technical devices available to the genre, and the unique ways those devices can be manipulated and subverted for "poetic" effect, this paper also demonstrates how defamiliarization challenges the boundaries that attempt to define the genre's textual and narrative capabilities, and in doing so, promotes its ongoing evolution. As such, this framework is innately useful to the field of digital game study, as it diverges from the common practice of searching for concrete definitions of the genre, and instead focuses on the generative analysis of its formal elements, and the mutable potential of what games


The relationships between body weight, testicular weight, age and the scrotal circumference were analysed in 62 bucks made up of the Sahel (S), Red Sokoto (RS) and West African Dwarf (WAD) breeds and aged three to nine months. Scrotal circumference increased with age; ranging from 9.87 to 13.35 cm. The effects of breed, season, parity and litter size were significant (p 0.05). At these ages, S and RS had similar scrotal circumference, though, both were superior to WAD. Heritability and repeatability estimates were moderate to high. Genotypic and phenotypic correlations of scrotal circumference with body weight and testicular weight were generally high and positive. However, the scrotal circumference had higher correlation with testicular weight than body weight. Based on the genetic parameters, scrotal circumference can be improved by direct selection with a correlated response from testicular weight and body weight. Keywords: Goats, testicular weight, scrotal circumference, bucks, Nigeria


The use of extended nasolabial flap in reconstruction of head and neck defects has proved to be efficacious and reliable.The versatility of this flap has been attributed to the fact that there is often abundant non-hair bearing skin in this well vascularised region. Flap elevation is quick and simple, with minimal donor site deformity and rapid post-operative rehabilitation. Also the proximity to the defect and achievement of good cosmetic result with preservation of function and least distortion of anatomy makes it the flap of choice. The aim of treating oral submucous fibrosis is to provide relief to the patient from the limitations of mouth opening and burning sensation. Numerous treatment modalities (both medical and surgical) have been employed for the treatment of OSMF. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the role of extended nasolabial flaps for reconstruction of buccal mucosal defects after surgical excision of fibrous bands in patients with oral submucous fibrosis.


BACKGROUND
To understand the shared genetic basis between colorectal cancer (CRC) and other cancers and identify potential pleiotropic loci for compensating the missing genetic heritability of CRC.

METHODS
We conducted a systematic genome-wide pleiotropy scan to appraise associations between cancer-related genetic variants and CRC risk among European populations. SNP-set analysis was performed using data from the UK Biobank and the Study of Colorectal Cancer in Scotland (10 039 CRC cases and 30 277 controls) to evaluate the overlapped genetic regions for susceptibility of CRC and other cancers. The variant-level pleiotropic associations between CRC and other cancers were examined by CRC GWAS meta-analysis and the PLACO pleiotropy test. Gene-based, co-expression, and pathway enrichment analyses were performed to explore potential shared biological pathways. Interaction between novel genetic variants and common environmental factors was further examined for their effects on CRC.

RESULTS
Genome-wide pleiotropic analysis identified three novel SNPs (rs2230469, rs9277378, rs143190905) and three mapped genes (PIP4K2A, HLA-DPB1, RTEL1) to be associated with CRC. These genetic variants were significant eQTL in colon tissue, influencing the expression of their mapped genes. Significant interactions of PIP4K2A and HLA-DPB1 with environmental factors, including smoking and alcohol drinking, were observed. All mapped genes and their co-expressed genes were significantly enriched in pathways involved in carcinogenesis.

CONCLUSION
Our findings provide an important insight into the shared genetic basis between CRC and other cancers. We revealed several novel CRC susceptibility loci to help understand the genetic architecture of CRC.


Objective To explore the effect of combined treatment of PD-1 inhibitor and chemotherapy on the level of peripheral blood T lymphocytes in non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients and its relationship with prognosis. Methods Retrospective analysis was conducted on 150 NSCLC patients treated in Guangxi Medical University Affiliated Tumor Hospital from June 2018 to September 2020, including 77 patients treated with PD-1 inhibitor combined with chemotherapy as the observation group (OG) and 73 patients with chemotherapy alone as the control group (CG). Therapeutic efficacy, immune function indexes, serum tumor markers, incidence of adverse reactions during hospitalization, 1-year survival rate, and life quality after 6 months of treatment were observed and compared between two groups. Results Compared to the CG, the therapeutic effect of OG was evidently better. Six months after treatment, levels of CD4+/CD8+, NK cells, and CD4 + in two groups were elevated markedly, and indexes of OG were notably and comparatively higher than those in the other group. After treatment, OG was observed with a marked decline regarding levels of CYFRA21-1, CEA, and CA125 compared to those in the CG; and there was no notable difference in terms of adverse reaction occurrence between two groups, but the 1-year survival rate and 6-month life quality in OG over ranked those in CG. Conclusion For NSCLC patients, the PD-1 inhibitor given on the basis of chemotherapy can further improve the clinical efficacy and improve immune function and long-term survival rate of patients on the premise of ensuring the safety of treatment, which is worth promoting in clinical practice.


Aging causes a decrease in renal blood flow velocity and clearance values related to renal filtration function. A decrease in kidney filtration function results in a decrease in the ability of drug elimination so that the drug and its metabolites tend to accumulate in the blood. The dose of certain antibiotics must be adjusted to the patient's kidney function. Clinical estimates of kidney filtration function are expressed in terms of creatinine clearance (CrCl). This study aims to determine the percentage of suitability of the dose and interval of antibiotic administration with the CrCl value of elderly patients and to see description of the side effects arising from the administration of antibiotics.
This research was observational with data retrospective retrieval of medical records. The subjects of the study were elderly patients who were hospitalized in the ward ward in dr. Moewardi Solo Hospital in the period January - May 2019 , ≥ 60 years aged with a diagnosis of Pneumonia, Urinary Tract Infection (UTI), Cellulitis and sepsis with complete medical record data. The antibiotics evaluated are all antibiotics given to the patient while being treated.
The results showed the suitability of the dose and interval of antibiotic administration with the CrCl value of elderly patients hospitalized in the disease ward in RSUD Dr. Moewardi Solo for the period January-May 2019 was 63.35%, the incidence of side effects arising from the administration of antibiotics was nausea and vomiting (10 patients ) and diarrhea (4 patients).


Carbon dioxide capture and transformation are of great importance to make cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. Nanometal-organic frameworks (NMOFs) could serve as ideal fillers for polymer membranes owing to their structural diversity and regulable microenvironment of the nanocage. Herein, a bifunctional, robust, and chemically cross-linked NMOF-based membrane was successfully constructed by the postsynthetic polymerization of imidazolium-based ionic liquid (IL)-decorated UiO-66 type nanoparticles (NPs) and the isocyanate-terminated polyurethane oligomer under mild conditions. The IL-modified MOF-polymer membranes exhibit a highly selective adsorption for CO2 over N2 and CH4. In addition, the obtained membrane can also be a highly active heterogeneous catalyst for CO2 transformation by cycloaddition with epoxide under an ambient pressure.


(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)1. INTRODUCTIONNatural disasters are now better known. They are well investigated and mapped both locally and global scale. Natural disasters are liable to cause serious economic and social disruption. The immediate damage is decrease production, expenditures and the number of hours worked. According to the data reported by EM-DAT, Americas suffered in 2014 from 76 natural disasters and the damage reached US$ 25.8 billion. On the other side, Africa suffered from 39 natural disasters, a number far below its 2004-2013 annual average. According to EM-DAT (2014), the damages from natural disasters in European countries represent approximately US$ 7.8 billion.The occurrence of natural disasters such as earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, storms and volcanic eruptions have negative effects on the electrical system operation. The earthquakes that have hit several countries such as China, Italy, Japan and the United States have severe impact economic, environmental and human. In addition, they destroyed their power system equipment.The response of the authorities has led in practice by the implementation of prevention and risk management systems evolving since the 1980s, resulting in an abundance of tools and acronyms that thwarts their ownership all players. In the period immediately following the event, reconstruction efforts are offset these losses and, paradoxically, create a net stimulatory effect on economic growth. To achieve this objective, it is necessary to measure or estimate economic costs of such disasters. In this sense, many studies have examined the debate in a macro-economic perspective by exploring how disasters affect real GDP per capita.In general, economic effects due to disasters can be classified into two categories: direct damage and indirect damage. The main findings shown that the direct effects of natural disasters depend on the level of development of the affected countries (Kahn, 2005).Most empirical studies have shown that natural disasters have a negative indirect damage in short-term, such as effects on economic growth (Noy, 2009; Fomby et al., 2013). Although long-term studies are still relatively rare and yet failed to provide consistent results (Skidmore and Toya, 2002; Noy and Nualsri, 2007; Jaramillo, 2009.).The contribution of this article is to assess the effects of natural disaster on economic growth, physical capital, labor and electricity. Furthermore, our study of literature suggests that few studies have examined the impact of natural disaster on the electricity. For this purpose, we use a Panel data and Granger causality-VECM model, including four types of disasters (earthquakes, storms, floods and droughts) in about 41 countries over the period 1990 to 2014.The sections of this paper presented as follows. The literature review section presents a brief literature review. The data section details the data used in the empirical part. The descriptive statistics and correlation matrix section summarizes the key statistics and correlation of the total variables. The model specification section describes the econometric method. The estimation methods and empirical results section discusses the empirical findings. Finally, conclusion and policy implications section.2. REVIEW OF THE RELEVANT LITERATURE2.1.Natural Disaster and Economic GrowthThere is a considerable attention in literature about the impact of natural disaster on economic growth. For instance, Albala-Bertrand (1993) investigated the effects of natural disaster on the economy and society in developing countries. He concluded that in reality disasters do not represent a problem for development. Benson (1997a, b, and c), Benson and Clay (1998, 2001) evaluated the impact of natural disasters on economic growth in some countries such as Fiji, Vietnam, Philippines, and Dominica. The findings showed that disasters shocks have a severe negative short-run economic consequence, with increase of property, and worsening inequalities. …


Numerical modeling of the behavior of geotechnical structures subjected to cyclic loading requires the consideration of two main aspects: the constitutive relationship and numerical strategy. The constitutive model has to be representative of the clay behavior, whereas the numerical strategy should be efficient in order to reduce the computation time. To simulate undrained triaxial cyclic tests on clay, a method of time homogenization is applied to a bounding surface plasticity model. This method of homogenization is based upon splitting time into two separate scales. The first scale relates to the period of cyclic loading and the second to the characteristic time of the material. Simulations of undrained triaxial cyclic tests on normally consolidated clay under one-way cyclic loading are carried out. The performance of time homogenization is numerically validated. The sensitivity of the time increment is also investigated.


More than 783 million people worldwide are currently without access to clean and safe water. Approximately 1 in 5 cases of mortality due to waterborne diseases involve children, and over 1.5 million cases of waterborne disease occur every year. In the developing world, this makes waterborne diseases the second highest cause of mortality. Such cases of waterborne disease are thought to be caused by poor sanitation, water infrastructure, public knowledge, and lack of suitable water monitoring systems. Conventional laboratory-based techniques are inadequate for effective on-site water quality monitoring purposes. This is due to their need for excessive equipment, operational complexity, lack of affordability, and long sample collection to data analysis times. In this review, we discuss the conventional techniques used in modern-day water quality testing. We discuss the future challenges of water quality testing in the developing world and how conventional techniques fall short of these challenges. Finally, we discuss the development of electrochemical biosensors and current research on the integration of these devices with microfluidic components to develop truly integrated, portable, simple to use and cost-effective devices for use by local environmental agencies, NGOs, and local communities in low-resource settings.


During cardiopulmonary bypass surgery without coronary perfusion, most myocardial cells show ischemic lesions of the mitochondria but all other cell organelles remain unchanged. Ischemic damage to the myocardial cells caused by cardiopulmonary bypass surgery for a period of 47 minutes is reversible, since, after 20 minutes of reperfusion of the heart, the first signs of mitochondrial recovery can be observed. Bypass times exceeding 50 minutes cause severe irreversible damage to many myocardial cells.


Multiphase nanowires composed of Cu3Ge, GeOx, and CuGeO3, obtained through the thermochemical reduction of CuGeO3, are investigated as anode materials for lithium-ion batteries. Initially, CuGeO3 nanowires are prepared by using a facile hydrothermal process without the use of any templates or surfactants. The as-prepared CuGeO3 nanowires are demonstrated to be single-crystalline with a diameter of around 70 nm and a length of 0.5–2 μm. Subsequently, multiphase Cu3Ge/GeOx/CuGeO3 nanowires are prepared through the controlled thermochemical reduction of the as-prepared CuGeO3 nanowires under a H2 atmosphere at 250 °C. Upon thermochemical reduction, the wire-shaped morphology is retained, but the phase partially transforms to a mixture of crystalline Cu3Ge nano-domains (<10 nm) with high electronic conductivity and amorphous GeOx. The newly generated multiphase nanowires exhibit enhanced cycle stability with high lithium-storage capability compared to that of the as-prepared CuGeO3 nanowires.