INTRODUCTION On Mother's Day, May 9, 1999, another substance abuse tragedy occurred in the workplace. On this occasion, the workplace was a bus owned by Custom Bus Charters with 43 passengers on their way to a Mother's Day gambling excursion at a Mississippi casino. Twenty-two of the passengers were killed when the bus plunged down an embankment. After the accident, the drug tests administered to the driver came back positive for marijuana. The debate surrounding the prevention of tragedies like this one continues with employers still searching for ways to prevent them. A common stereotype is that drug users were male, black, and homeless. Consequently, businesses did not have to be concerned about substance abuse. In fact, 74 percent of drug users are employed outside the home, and eleven percent of employed adults are current illicit drug users. Since many substance abusers are in the workforce, businesses are affected. Therefore, this serious societal problem becomes a workplace problem (Overman, 1999). As workplace substance abuse incidents become more frequent, the impact of these events has been chronicled. In the workplace itself, the abuse of drugs and alcohol affect the financial bottom-line. Substance abuse exacerbates absenteeism, turnover, employee theft, accidents, product defects, productivity, crime, and violence. The following statistics report the seriousness of the impact of substance abuse for employers: * U.S. Department of Labor estimates that workplace drug use costs employers $75 to $100 billion annually in lost time, accidents, health care, and workers' compensation costs. * Sixty-five percent of all accidents on the job are directly related to drugs or alcohol. * Substance abusers are absent three times more often and use 16 times as many health care benefits as non-abusers. * Substance abusers are six times more likely than their co-workers to file a workers' compensation claim (Bahls, 1998). The National Institutes of Health estimate that a drug abuser costs an employer approximately $7,000 annually (Overman, 1999). The purpose of this paper is to examine current substance abuse issues of which management should be cognizant and to provide the most recent policy and practice suggestions to manage the problems created by workplace substance abuse. The issues to be examined include economic and hidden costs, legal, and employee relations. Practical suggestions for employers to deal with substance abuse are a zero tolerance policy, educational training, and employee assistance programs (EAPs). Other related policy issues are tips on how to deal with employees who report to work unfit, what to do if illegal drugs are found at work, and how to deal with serious drug problems. WORKPLACE SUBSTANCE-ABUSE ISSUES The issues of which employers should be aware are categorized as cost, legal, and employee relations. A discussion of each issue category follows. Cost The economic costs associated with drugs and alcohol from accidents, health care, and workers' compensation have been increasing. A study by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism verify the increased economic costs from 1992 to 1995. The total economic costs of both alcohol and drugs increased approximately 12 percent in this three year period. Not only did the total costs associated with alcohol and drug abuse increase, but the costs also increased in each impact area (see Table 1). Some of the costs associated with drug and alcohol abuse are more visible and measurable than others. The U.S. Department of Labor developed a list of hidden costs that employers may not normally address (see Table 2). The assessment process for costs is a difficult and complex task for most organizations. However, monitoring and analyzing these costs over time may be a critical part of developing a substance abuse program in the workplace and of evaluating the effectiveness of the program. …


—After a machine failure, batch schedulers typically re-schedule the job that failed with a high priority. This is fair for the failed job but still requires that job to re-enter the submission queue and to wait for enough resources to become available. The waiting time can be very long when the job is large and the platform highly loaded, as is the case with typical HPC platforms. We propose another strategy: when a job J fails, if no platform node is available, we steal one node from another job J (cid:48) , and use it to continue the execution of J despite the failure. In this work, we give a detailed assessment of this node stealing strategy using traces from the Mira supercomputer at Argonne National Laboratory. The main conclusion is that node stealing improves the utilization of the platform and dramatically reduces the flow of large jobs, at the price of a slight increases the flow of small jobs. Index Terms —Batch scheduler, parallel jobs, failures, resilient schedule, node stealing, maximum flow, mean flow.


Objectives: To check the feasibility of using mobile phone-based microscopy for various types of human histopathological sample investigations. Methodology: A feasibility study was performed by imaging several histopathological samples with one novel type of microscope "Foldscope" and image compared with a conventional microscope in the laboratory facility. The image acquired from both sources were edited further and put together for comparison. Results: Mobile phone- based microscope acquired images were observed and compared with a conventional microscope and found morphology of the tissue sections were significantly similar as of conventional light microscope images. Conclusion: By comparing the image of some non-human histopathological sample, it could be stated that this method is also feasible for human histopathological sample investigations, especially in the low resource area or in case of emergency situations.
Keywords: Mobile phone-based microscopy; Histopathology; Microscopy; Imaging.


The cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) response plays a key role in controlling viral infection, but only a few epitopes within the HTNV glycoprotein (GP) that are recognized by CTLs have been reported. In this study, we identified one murine HTNV GP-derived H2-Kb-restricted CTL epitope in C57BL/6 mice, which could be used to design preclinical studies of vaccines for HTNV infection. First, 15 8-mer peptides were selected from the HTNV GP amino acid sequence based on a percentile rank of <=1% by IEDB which is the most comprehensive collection of epitope prediction and analysis tool. A lower percentile rank indicates higher affinity and higher immune response. In the case of the consensus method, we also evaluated the binding score of peptide-binding affinity by the BIMAS software to confirm that all peptides were able to bind H2-Kb. Second, one novel GP-derived CTL epitope, GP6 aa456-aa463 (ITSLFSLL), was identified in the splenocytes of HTNV-infected mice using the IFN-γ ELISPOT assay. Third, a single peptide vaccine was administered to C57BL/6 mice to evaluate the immunogenic potential of the identified peptides. ELISPOT and cell-mediated cytotoxicity assays showed that this peptide vaccine induced a strong IFN-γ response and potent cytotoxicity in immunized mice. Last, we demonstrated that the peptide-vaccinated mice had partial protection from challenge with HTNV. In conclusion, we identified an H2-Kb-restricted CTL epitope with involvement in the host immune response to HTNV infection.


This paper studies online nonstochastic control problems with adversarial and static constraints. We propose online nonstochastic control algorithms that achieve both sublinear regret and sublinear adversarial constraint violation while keeping static constraint violation minimal against the optimal constrained linear control policy in hindsight. To establish the results, we introduce an online convex optimization with memory framework under adversarial and static constraints, which serves as a subroutine for the constrained online nonstochastic control algorithms. This subroutine also achieves the state-of-the-art regret and constraint violation bounds for constrained online convex optimization problems, which is of independent interest. Our experiments demonstrate the proposed control algorithms are adaptive to adversarial constraints and achieve smaller cumulative costs and violations. Moreover, our algorithms are less conservative and achieve significantly smaller cumulative costs than the state-of-the-art algorithm.


: Landslides have multidimensional effects on the socioeconomic as well as environmental conditions of the impacted areas. The aim of this study is the spatial prediction of landslide using hybrid machine learning models including bagging (BA), random subspace (RS) and rotation forest (RF) with alternating decision tree (ADTree) as base classifier in the northern part of the Pithoragarh district, Uttarakhand, Himalaya, India. To construct the database, ten conditioning factors and a total of 103 landslide locations with a ratio of 70/30 were used. The significant factors were determined by chi-square attribute evaluation (CSEA) technique. The validity of the hybrid models was assessed by true positive rate (TP Rate), false positive rate (FP Rate), recall (sensitivity), precision, F-measure and area under the receiver operatic characteristic curve (AUC). Results concluded that land cover was the most important factor while curvature had no effect on landslide occurrence in the study area and it was removed from the modelling process. Additionally, results indicated that although all ensemble models enhanced the power prediction of the ADTree classifier (AUCtraining = 0.859; AUCvalidation = 0.813); however, the RS ensemble model (AUCtraining = 0.883; AUCvalidation = 0.842) outperformed and outclassed the RF (AUCtraining = 0.871; AUCvalidation = 0.840), and the BA (AUCtraining = 0.865; AUCvalidation = 0.836) ensemble model. The obtained results would be helpful for recognizing the landslide prone areas in future to better manage and decrease the damage and negative impacts on the environment.


ABSTRACT Since the notion of funds of identity was first proposed, a large number of related works have followed, most of which have been reviewed recently by Hogg and Volman (2020). This special issue is a step forward both in the conceptualization of the construct, and in its educational applications. Three developments in particular are considered. The first deals with the directive and prospective nature of funds of identity, linked to the higher psychological processes, such as imagination, agency or creativity. Second, there is the idea of establishing identity work as a curricular subject in itself, and as a vehicle for the critical understanding/transformation of oneself and of one's surrounding reality. Third, the range of methodological resources and educational practices that are used to identify, generate and exploit funds of identity is increasingly. The notion of funds of identity is furthermore re-conceptualized in two ways: first as an ongoing, subjective, social and cultural, generative-directive process, grounded in our embodied experience of the world and in social interactions, and second, as symbolic resources that are used to give meaning to oneself and help to project, plan and organize life projects, and a critical understanding of reality.


How private firms can overcome their unique governance challenges remains an important but understudied topic. Using novel data on more than 28,000 private firms in India from 1988 to 2017, we examine whether private firms can improve their survival prospects by having board interlocks with public firms and, specifically, interlocks whereby a public firm director subsequently joins the private firm's board. In our data, we found a U-shaped relationship between the number of incoming board interlocks and the probability of private firm exit. We also found that board interlocks formed by public firm directors of public firms audited by Big Four companies improve private firms' survival more than other interlocks, consistent with the notion that such interlocks improve monitoring at private firms. Overall, our study points toward the importance of considering the role of incoming board interlocks when explaining private firm survival.


We have developed several deep cases based on actual and hypothetical built environments and have used these in a strongly student-centred instructional style. On reflection, our approach seems qualitatively different from norms in architecture schools and from other case-based learning practices. We introduce it here under the rubric of the Leitmotif Case, explain its structure and compare it with other approaches.


This paper is a continuation of the companion paper [14], in which it was proved that the standard model of self-avoiding walk in five or more dimensions has the same critical behaviour as the simple random walk, assuming convergence of the lace expansion. In this paper we prove the convergence of the lace expansion, an upper and lower infrared bound, and a number of other estimates that were used in the companion paper. The proof requires a good upper bound on the critical point (or equivalently a lower bound on the connective constant). In an appendix, new upper bounds on the critical point in dimensions higher than two are obtained, using elementary methods which are independent of the lace expansion. The proof of convergence of the lace expansion is computer assisted. Numerical aspects of the proof, including methods for the numerical evaluation of simple random walk quantities such as the two-point function (or lattice Green function), are treated in an appendix.


All spaces considered in this paper are assumed to be metrizable. A compactum is a compact space. A continuum is a connected compactum, and a mapping is a continuous function. For a space X we denote by C(X) the space of all real-valued mappings on X with the topology of uniform convergence. Then by Milutin's interesting work [8], we have known that for each pair of uncountable compacta X and Y, C{X) is linearly isomorphic to C(Y) (see [12] for the detailsand generalizations). On the other hand, for space X we denote by CP(X) the space of all real-valued mappings on X with the topology of pointwise convergence. Spaces X and Y are said to be l-equivalent[1] provided that CP(X) is linearly isomorphic to CP(Y), written CP(X) = CP(Y). Recently, Pavlovskii [11] showed the following.


Genetic and biochemical evidence suggest that conserved region 3 (CR3) of the adenovirus Ela polypeptide can provide two distinct and separable functions: an N-terminal transcriptional activation region and a C-terminal promoter targeting region. It is thought that the promoter targeting region of Ela CR3 interacts with promoter-specific transcription factors, thereby bringing the activation region of Ela CR3 in proximity of the promoter. Here we report that CBF, a CCAAT-box-binding factor that regulates hsp70 gene expression and mediates Ela trans-activation in vivo, interacts with the promoter targeting region of Ela CR3 in vitro. Point mutations in Ela CR3 that are defective in stimulating transcription from the hsp70 promoter are also defective in stimulating transcription directed by a synthetic activator, GAL-CBF, composed of the DNA-binding domain of yeast GAL4 fused to CBF. These mutations fall into two classes with respect to their abilities to interact with CBF in vitro. Mutations in the transcriptional activation region of Ela CR3 do not affect binding to CBF, but mutation of the promoter targeting region of Ela CR3 prevents association with CBF in vitro.


Abstract Congenital generalized lipodystrophy (CGL), also known as Berardinelli-Seip syndrome (BSS), is a rare autosomal recessive disease characterized by near total absence of adipose tissue and muscular hypertrophy. Additional common clinical signs are acanthosis nigricans, acromegaloid features, hepatomegaly, hyperandrogenism, altered glucose intolerance, cardiomyopathy and hypertriglyceridemia. An 11-year-old girl was admitted to our Clinic presenting with hyperandrogenic features, generalized lack of adipose tissue, generalized muscular hypertrophy and brownish colored skin on the neck, axillas and inguinal folds associated with impaired glucose tolerance and hypertension. A clinical diagnosis of congenital generalized lipodystrophy was made.


Abstract Bereavement photography has been recognized as an important tool to create memories and as a support service for parents experiencing perinatal loss. This paper explores the impact of volunteering on posttraumatic growth among photographers working with parents impacted by stillbirth. Using a mixed-methods design, 141 Australian and New Zealand volunteer bereavement photographers were recruited. Higher number of losses experienced by photographers were correlated with a higher level of posttraumatic growth. Volunteering was associated with an enhanced understanding of loss, increased empathy for bereaved parents, developing effective coping skills and a renewed appreciation of photography. Implications of the findings are discussed.


Seven unusual new ene-yne hydroquinones (1-3, 5-8), including three rare glycosylated derivatives named pestalotioquinosides A-C (6-8), were obtained from the marine-derived strain SCSIO41403 of the fungus Pestalotiopsis neglecta. Their structures including absolute configurations were elucidated by spectroscopic analysis and induced electronic circular dichroism experiments. In silico molecular docking and in vitro surface plasmon resonance studies showed that pestalotioquinoside C (8) could act as a liver X receptor alpha (LXRα) modulator. Further study showed that LXR target gene ABCA1 was significantly upregulated by 8, which revealed 8 as a potential LXRα agonist.


Carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC)-assisted refining was shown, by means of tests with a PFI mill, to have potential to save energy compared with conventional refining techniques. Previously it was thought that the energy-saving effect of CMC-assisted refining was caused by resultant lubrication that reduced friction. In this work, the refined fiber of eucalyptus alkaline peroxide mechanical pulp was analyzed. The mechanism of CMC-assisted refining is that the cell wall is fibrillated to peel and weaken cell wall strength. Then CMC permeates into the cell wall and swells it, and the fiber becomes more pliable. CMC-assisted refining is helpful in maintaining fiber length through resultant hydration to avoid more fiber cutting. In this work, fiber morphological changes in the course of PFI refining for different numbers of revolutions were shown in relation to CMC-assisted refining. The purpose of the research was to determine whether energy savings could be achieved by CMC-assisted refining and to study its influence on fiber morphological development. The study showed a linear relationship between fiber length and energy consumption, as well as an exponential relationship between fines and fiber length. These results are helpful for obtaining ideal fiber morphology in pulp and paper making, man-made board, natural nano-fibers and specialty fibers, and the food industry.


Abstract: Specifications of security mechanisms often lack explicit descriptions of the envisioned security goals and the underlying assumptions. This makes it difficult for developers and customers to understand the level of security provided by the systems. Moreover, this omission has repeatedly resulted in practical attacks that violate the implicit security assumptions of the specifications. In this work, we illustrate this effect on the example of the ZigBee Light Link (ZLL) profile, currently one of the most popular standards for smart lighting in domestic environments. We first provide a concise description of ZLL commissioning procedure for initiating and extending a network of smart bulbs, extracted directly from the specification. We then discuss how the commissioning protocol can be transformed into a formal security model, but also highlight where this is subject to interpretations because of the unclear implicit security assumptions. The proposed security model is flexible, i.e., it can be extended to capture further security requirements or attacker classes, and hence provides a solid foundation for rigorous security analyses of ZLL and other ZigBee profiles.


UNLABELLED: To establish the real nature of 201Tl defects in the assessment of myocardial viability (e.g., fixed versus reversible), 201Tl reinjection was evaluated in a multicenter trial involving 402 consecutive patients with ischemic heart disease and exercise 201Tl defects. METHODS: Twelve hospitals, using the same type of gamma camera and computer software, adopted one of the two most widely used reinjection protocols. In 230 patients (Group A), reinjection was performed immediately after stress-redistribution planar imaging; in 172 patients (Group B), reinjection was performed on a separate day and followed by rest-redistribution imaging. The images were interpreted by three blinded observers in a core laboratory on a five-point qualitative scale; the reproducibility in visual scoring was excellent. RESULTS: Groups A and B had a similar prevalence of myocardial segments with abnormal uptake at stress (39%, 40%), as well as with reversible (16%, 17%), partially reversible (21%, 19%) and irreversible (63%, 64%) defects at redistribution. After reinjection, 201Tl uptake improved in 27% and 36% of both partially reversible and irreversible defects in Groups A and B. No differences were found when comparing early and delayed reinjection imaging in Group B. CONCLUSION: This study confirms the validity of 201Tl reinjection in a large, unselected population, but the discordance with stress/redistribution is less than has been previously reported for both 201Tl reinjection protocols, the prevalence of improved segments after reinjection was higher with the separate day approach.


In this article, we present a local observer based on infinitesimal observability along trajectories. The gain of this observer derives from a dynamical Lyapunov equation. The inputs for which the observer converges are those which render the system observable at each point of the Ω-limit of the unknown trajectory (infinitesimal observability at infinity along trajectories). The performance of the proposed observer is illustrated with an application to DC machine.


KIDS REALLY do say the darndest things. Thank goodness, because someone needs to. I recently listened as high school students from all kinds of Pennsylvania communities expressed their views on whether they were ready for life after high school. In the more than three hours they spent taping a program for public broadcasting, they were both apprehensive and hopeful. They blamed state policies for unequal resources that put many of them at a disadvantage. After long discussions about work-force skills and the "soft skills" young people need to compete for the same jobs, one young woman from Philadelphia remarked, "We've been talking about all of us needing these soft skills. I think our legislators could use some, like teamwork and critical thinking." Her remark brought home the fact that, while policy makers fret over an illogical accountability system under the No Child Left Behind act, a lot of issues that are important for students and schools are being neglected. Issues like adequate resources. Issues like what is happening to motivated, highly competent students in the frenzied push to bring up those with lower scores. And issues like admitting that children and young people need their communities, as well as their schools, to be accountable. Our youngest citizens are paying a price for this neglect. Two-thirds are in jeopardy of not being successful adults, if you buy into the criteria developed by America's Promise, the youth development initiative launched by Gen. Colin Powell before he became secretary of state for President Bush. The initiative framed five promises to young People--caring adults, safe places, a healthy start, effective education, and opportunities to help others. Young people receiving four of the five promises, according to the group's research, are twice as likely as others to make top grades and to avoid violent behavior. Having the promises met also eliminates disparities in attendance and drug use between white students and minority students. Do you wonder what it must feel like to be among the 21% of school-age children who can count on only one of the promises--or even none--being kept in their lives? That's what the first national research report from America's Promise concludes: only 31% of young people have received either four or five of the promises. These findings link to a revealing article in the November 26 issue of the New York Times Magazine that questioned the claims being made by the Bush Administration for No Child Left Behind. Paul Tough, one of the magazine's editors, cited other research that tells how very deeply the causes of the academic disparities we measure are embedded in American society. More important than family income are the use of language and the habits of behavior within families, including conformity to school norms, that give middle-class children advantages that lower-income families do not provide their children. The schools that seem consistently to "beat the odds" for low-income, minority children tend to be charter schools that provide more than any other public school offers these children. The KIPP academies and similar networks focus heavily on basic skills, supplemented by advantages available to more affluent students, such as music, foreign languages, trips, and about 60% more time in school than most public school students. Teachers work much longer hours than the average for public schools. It is the psychological base of these schools, however, that makes them stand out. The mottos, traditions, and values of these schools stress self-discipline. Attitude is as important as ability. (Do I hear "soft skills"? …


Up to 15% of AA patients (pts) treated conservatively with immunosuppression will evolve to myeloid neoplasia (MN), either MDS or AML, over a median time of 10 years regardless of response (0-18 years; n=238). The pathogenesis of MN secondary to AA is diverse and will often include antecedent clonal facilitating events that herald progression. Minor clones have been described in AA, some of which are not contributory to later evolution while other may result in subsequent progression. MDS evolution in inherited bone marrow failure (BMF) syndromes suggests that germ line (GL) alterations can be predisposing. In addition, progression to MN may reflect immune escape due to selection pressure e.g., through acquisition of HLA mutations. Here, we studied the molecular landscape of MN arising from AA, to better understand its pathogenesis and ultimately to develop measures of early detection, prevention, and therapeutic strategies.
 Among 350 pts diagnosed with AA and PNH, 38 (11%) developed a secondary MN (sMN). Median age at AA/PNH diagnosis was 61 years (15-76). Almost all of pts who underwent transformation (89%) received a 1st line treatment consisting of ATG+CsA in 85% of cases (ORR 59%; 21% CR and 38% PR) and 47% received more than one form of treatment, suggesting a lack/incomplete response or relapse. MDS was the most frequent diagnosis at evolution (77%), followed by AML (21%) and MPN (2%). Myeloid evolution was less common in pts with moderate AA (7% vs 14% in severe) or in the presence of a PNH clone (21% vs. 52% in non-progressors, p=.0003).
 First we investigated GL alterations classified as Tier1 (9/38 pts) and Tier2 (11/38) based on their pathophysiological impact. Tier1 variants included NF1, CBLC, SBDS (n=2), and SAMD9L and overall were more frequently detected in del(7q) pts (76%, p=.0001). Tier2 included FA variants (BRCA2, FANCI, FANCD2; n=3). Of note, in sMN Tier1 variants were detected in 24% vs. 8% in non-evolved cases (p=.008) and none had concomitant Tier1/Tier2 configuration (0% vs. 9% in non-progressors, p=.05) or GATA2 variants.
 Cytogenetic abnormalities were most frequent at the time of MN progression in 83% of cases, with chr. 7 alterations present in 47% of cases (-7, 35%; del(7q),12%), followed by complex karyotype (CK, 13%), involving chr.7 in 75% of cases. By comparison, -7/del(7q) are present in 7.5% of cases of our internal cohort of primary MN (p=.0001), but no differences in -7 and del7q distribution were seen.
 A total of 148 somatic variants (myeloid and HLA panels) were found at the time of evolution in 34/38 sMN pts, with an average of 4.4 mutations/patient. ASXL1 (29% vs 14%, p=.02) and SETBP1 (15% vs 3%, p=.005) hits were more frequent in evolved cases while TET2 and TP53 mutations were less common as compared with pMN. Of note, sMN pts with CK harbored ASXL1 and TP53 mutations in 50% of cases. In a cross-sectional analysis of evolved cases studied at AA onset (n=17) and at myeloid evolution (n=35), somatic lesions in TET2, DNMT3A and ASXL1 genes were found in 5, 1 and 3 pts at baseline, respectively. If variants in TET2 and DNMT3A likely reflect antecedent CHIP, ASXL1 variants may have a role in driving myeloid progression as shown by the higher mutation rate in post AA cases. This hypothesis is further supported by the acquisition of subclonal chr7 abnormalities and by the overall higher clonal burden at sMN onset (median VAF 24% vs 43% respectively, p=.0001). When comparing pts with chr7 abnormalities with de novo counterpart, in sMN genes appeared most commonly mutated in ASXL1 (p=.02), SETBP1 (p=.0007), ETV6 (p=.02) and NF1 (p=.02), while TP53 mutations were less common.The intrinsic peculiarity of this -7/del(7q) sMN subset is also underlined by a different median survival time (12 vs 48 months in sMN vs pMN, respectively, p=.0002). The HLA mutational analysis available for 10 sMN cases showed the presence of somatic class I/II loci variants in 4/10 of progressors, including pts with chr7 abnormalities in 3/4 of cases. Of note, all class I HLA mutations were found in locus C. By comparison, in non-progressing AA pts HLA class I/II variants were found in 13% of pts.
 Our results demonstrate that AA progression to MN has distinct molecular characteristics. The presence of HLA mutations suggests that immune escape or immune selection may play a role, while the presence of GL predisposition variants shows that they not only may facilitate AA but also clonal evolution as described from classic congenital BMF.

 Patel: Alexion: Other: educational speaker. Voso:Bristol Myers Squibb: Honoraria, Membership on an entity's Board of Directors or advisory committees, Research Funding. Carraway:Takeda: Other: Independent Advisory Committe (IRC); ASTEX: Other: Independent Advisory Committe (IRC); Novartis: Consultancy, Speakers Bureau; Abbvie: Other: Independent Advisory Committe (IRC); BMS: Consultancy, Other: Research support, Speakers Bureau; Jazz: Consultancy, Speakers Bureau; Stemline: Consultancy, Speakers Bureau. Maciejewski:Alexion, BMS: Speakers Bureau; Novartis, Roche: Consultancy, Honoraria.


BACKGROUND AND AIM
Liver IR is a frequent clinical complication with high morbidity and mortality. The present study evaluated the possible protective effect of sodium hydrosulfide (NaHS), a H2S donor, in IR-induced hepatic injury and explored the mechanisms of actions of the investigated drug.

METHODS
Male albino rats (200-230 g) were divided into the following groups: group 1:Sham-operated non treated rats, group 2: IR non treated rats, group 3: L-NNA + IR rats, group 4: NaHS + IR rats, group 5: L-NNA + NaHS + IR rats. Blood samples were collected for ALT determination. Liver tissue samples were used for the assessment of GPx, catalase, SOD, MDA, total nitrites and TNF-α. Parts from the liver were fixed in 10% formalin solution for histopathological examination and immunohistochemical examination of iNOS, eNOS and caspase-3.

RESULTS
NaHS protected the liver against IR. This hepatoprotection was associated with normalization of antioxidant enzyme activity and decrease in hepatic MDA, TNF-α and expression of caspase-3 and iNOS.

CONCLUSION
NaHS is hepatoprotective in IR injury. The hepatoprotective effects of NaHS are associated with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and antiapoptotic effects. These effects are probably mediated via NO modulation.


Abstract After over two decades of planning and five years of conserving, packing, and moving, the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture has finished the first two phases of the largest move of archaeological artifacts in the museum's history and quite possibly in the American Southwest. Framed within the historical background of evolving collection storage over many decades, the Archaeological Research Collections were moved from the Laboratory of Anthropology and another off-site storage location to a new state of the art off-site facility at the Center for New Mexico Archaeology (CNMA). Decisions that eased the overall move, including issues resulting from the move and how they were remedied, are discussed. Overall, this particular collections move demonstrates the capabilities that a small staff can have if given enough time, volunteers, and grant resources.


Nowadays, infrared thermography technique is widely use in an engineering study to inspect various types of problem. In this experiment, active infrared thermography method is applied to overcome the constraint locating pitted inside pipe. The main purpose of this experiment is to examine the location of pitted occur in the stainless steel 304 and at the same time to identify the transient effect on the pipe against the duration of time radiation exposed. This experiment uses two unit of spotlight as sources of heat to emit radiation energy to the surface of the pipe. A FLIR T640 thermography camera was used to record the thermal contrast of the pipe in real time using FLIR Tools+ software installs in the laptop. This experiment was tested at normal surrounding temperature. All of the temperature data is then interpreted into contour graph by using Microsoft Excel to see the defect area based on temperature distribution. Based on the result, the most significant temperature drops within highest gradient observed at cooling phase are within 7s, 2s and 1s interval for 10s, 20s and 30s of radiation exposure respectively. The time of the pitted to appear is related to the exposure time of the radiation. The finding of this experiment shows that short duration time of radiation exposure will give the longer time interval of significant gradient to appear. Therefore, this experiment proves that infrared thermography is one of the non- destructive testing methods that can be used in inspecting the pipeline.


Euscaphic acid, a triterpene acid, exists ubiquitously in medicinal plants and demonstrates various pharmacological activities. This active compound is often used as a marker compound for quality control. Hitherto, the pharmacokinetic (PK) information is relatively scarce; therefore, it remains open to question whether the euscaphic acid reaches the target sites in the body at concentrations high enough for the claimed biological effects. A robust analytical method is prerequisite for obtaining enough PK information of euscaphic acid, which is useful for interpreting its pharmacological effects. In this study, we developed and validated a rapid liquid chromatographic tandem mass spectrometric (LC-MS/MS) method for the measurement of euscaphic acid in rat plasma. The rat plasma samples were precipitated with acetonitrile and the resulting supernatants were separated by a 4 min pulse gradient method on a Synergi Fusion-RP C18 column (4 μm, 2.0 mm i.d. × 50 mm). Ursolic acid was used as an internal standard for quantification of euscaphic acid. Deprotonated euscaphic acid and its internal standard were generated in negative electrospray ionization (ESI) mode and their precursor-to-product ion pairs (m/z 487.4→469.3 and 455.5→455.4, respectively) were used for measurement. Notably, the commonly used concentration of formic acid (HCOOH; 1‰ and 5‰, v/v) in the mobile phase seriously suppressed the signal intensity, but this mobile phase additive at a much lower concentration level (0.1‰ and 0.2‰) could overcome the matrix effects and therefore increase the sensitivity of MS detection of euscaphic acid. The newly developed bioanalytical assay possessed favorable accuracy and precision with a lower limit of quantification of 2.0 ng mL−1 and was successfully applied to PK studies in rats. The experimental strategies presented herein may be helpful for measurement of other triterpene acids in biological matrices.


Metoprolol is used for phenotyping of cytochrome P450 (CYP) 2D6, a CYP isoform considered not to be inducible by inducers of the CYP2C, CYP2B, and CYP3A families such as rifampicin. While assessing CYP2D6 activity under basal conditions and after pre-treatment with rifampicin in vivo, we surprisingly observed a drop in the metoprolol/α-OH-metoprolol clearance ratio, suggesting CYP2D6 induction. To study this problem, we performed in vitro investigations using HepaRG cells and primary human hepatocytes (before and after treatment with 20 μM rifampicin), human liver microsomes, and CYP3A4-overexpressing supersomes. While mRNA expression levels of CYP3A4 showed a 15- to 30-fold increase in both cell models, mRNA of CYP2D6 was not affected by rifampicin. 1′-OH-midazolam formation (reflecting CYP3A4 activity) increased by a factor of 5–8 in both cell models, while the formation of α-OH-metoprolol increased by a factor of 6 in HepaRG cells and of 1.4 in primary human hepatocytes. Inhibition studies using human liver microsomes showed that CYP3A4, 2B6, and 2C9 together contributed 19.0 ± 2.6% (mean ± 95%CI) to O-demethylation, 4.0 ± 0.7% to α-hydroxylation, and 7.6 ± 1.7% to N-dealkylation of metoprolol. In supersomes overexpressing CYP3A4, metoprolol was α-hydroxylated in a reaction inhibited by the CYP3A4-specific inhibitor ketoconazole, but not by the CYP2D6-specific inhibitor quinidine. We conclude that metoprolol is not exclusively metabolized by CYP2D6. CYP3A4, 2B6, and 2C9, which are inducible by rifampicin, contribute to α-hydroxylation, O-demethylation, and N-dealkylation of metoprolol. This contribution is larger after CYP induction by rifampicin but is too small to compromise the usability of metoprolol α-hydroxylation for CYP2D6 phenotyping.


Parsonage-Turner syndrome (PTS) is a distinct clinical syndrome, characterized by acute and severe (mostly) unilateral shoulder pain, followed by paresis and atrophy of the shoulder girdle, while the pain decreases. Most authors consider it as an immune-mediated disorder. PTS is notoriously unrecognised and is usually diagnosed with delay. A PTS may also occur following a surgical procedure. Postsurgical PTS is an under-recognised and challenging clinical entity, as illustrated in the case reported here of a 59-year-old man, 4 weeks after anterior discectomy and fusion C5C7. In such cases, the differential diagnosis must be made with a complication of surgery, such as postoperative C5 palsy due for instance to a migrated bone graft. Arguments for PTS are: a certain delay between surgery and symptoms, intolerable pain followed by weakness and improvement of pain complaints, divergent distribution of weakness, sensory deficit and pain, which may be confirmed by electrodiagnosis. Early recognition of postsurgical PTS may avoid unnecessary investigations or surgical exploration. It allows to treat the patient properly, leading to greater satisfaction of both surgeon and patient; pain management, physical therapy and reassurance are the cornerstones.


History.-Mother states that clubbing of fingers was first noticed when patient was a baby. Otherwise he was in good health until age of 7 years, when he gradually became cvanosed and short of breath. On Examination: Weight, 45 lb. (underweight for age). Obviously cyanosed, even veins of conjunctive being congested. Well marked clubbing of fingers. Heart not enlarged, and heart sounds normal. Blood-pressure: 108 systolic, 80 diastolic. Nothing abnormal found on general examination. Spleen not palpable. Special Investigations.-Skiagram of chest confirms normal size of heart; the electro-cardiogram normal. Blood-count shows red corpuscles 7,584,000, haemoglobin 140%, colour-index 0 9, white cells 12,500; differential count normal. Wassermann reaction negative. The most likely explanation of the symptoms is some congenital abnormality of the heart or main vessels, although there are no signs of cardiac disease. Patency of the interventricular septum is sometimes found after death when physical signs of the condition have not been present during life, and I suggest that some such lesion accounts for the present case.


The purpose of this paper is to test for tax enforcement spillovers within economic and spatial networks. Using the population of corporate tax returns for the years 2009 to 2015, we can show that tax audits exert a positive and significant effect on the tax liability of non-targeted neighboring firms. Quantitatively, the results suggest that the audit of a close geographic neighbor increases corporate tax reporting by 0.7 percent. While the observed spillover effect decline in distance to the audited entity and are short run in nature, the implied aggregate revenue gains are non-negligible. Additional analyses show that the effect is driven by audit cases, where audited firms do not experience an upward revision in their tax owed in the course of the audit. This suggests that the observed effect is rooted in communication among taxpayers and is not driven by audit-related cost shocks of competitors or business partners.


Vehicle re-identification (re-ID) matches images of the same vehicle across different cameras. It is fundamentally challenging because the dramatically different appearance caused by different viewpoints would make the framework fail to match two vehicles of the same identity. Most existing works solved the problem by extracting viewpoint-aware feature via spatial attention mechanism, which, yet, usually suffers from noisy generated attention map or otherwise requires expensive keypoint labels to improve the quality. In this work, we propose Viewpoint-aware Channel-wise Attention Mechanism (VCAM) by observing the attention mechanism from a different aspect. Our VCAM enables the feature learning framework channel-wisely reweighing the importance of each feature maps according to the "viewpoint" of input vehicle. Extensive experiments validate the effectiveness of the proposed method and show that we perform favorably against state-of-the-arts methods on the public VeRi-776 dataset and obtain promising results on the 2020 AI City Challenge. We also conduct other experiments to demonstrate the interpretability of how our VCAM practically assists the learning framework.


On the far side of World War II, America commenced a revolution in land use. Between 1945 and 1960, something in the order of ten million single-family homes were constructed in suburban subdivisions on land at the urban fringe and in rural areas that was unincorporated prior to, if not after, its development. If counties had exercised stronger land use control over these areas, might our development patterns have turned out differently? What do we know of land use planning by counties, and what role did that legal development play in twentieth-century urban sprawl?Our information about county land use planning is limited, but based on available research, this Essay argues that counties played an important role in passively enabling, if not actively courting, suburban development on greenfield sites. Counties were, in short, sprawl's shepherd. Other factors — like housing need, housing costs, consumer preferences, racial discrimination, lending practices, and government subsidization of mortgages and transportation networks — generated suburban development proposals, but the nature of county land use authority and engagement led those projects to rural pastures.This Essay uses the occasion of the one-hundredth anniversary of the California Law Review to consider these questions. It uses a 1938 article published in the journal to glimpse early ideas on rural and county land use control and to provide an initial assessment of how far county land use planning has come, or failed to come, in the decades since.


Single-event transients (SETs) are modeled in a SiGe voltage reference using compact model and full 3-D mixed-mode TCAD simulations. The effect of bias dependence and circuit loading on device-level transients is examined with regard to the voltage reference circuit. The circuit SET simulation approaches are benchmarked against measured data to assess their effectiveness in accurate modeling of SET in SiGe analog circuits. The mechanisms driving the SET of this voltage reference are then identified for the first time and traced back to the original device transients. These results enable the differences between the simulation results to be explained, providing new insight into best practices for the modeling circuit SET in different circuit topologies and device technologies.


This diary study examined the proposal that satisfaction of two psychological needs, competence and autonomy, leads to daily well-being. Between-subjects analyses indicated that participants higher in trait competence and trait autonomy tended to have "better" days on average. Independently, within-subject analyses showed that good days were those in which participants felt more competent and autonomous in their daily activities, relative to their own baselines. Other predictors of daily well-being included gender, whether the day fell on a weekend, and the amount of negative affect and physical symptomatology felt the day before. Although past diary studies have tended to focus on threats to daily well-being, the authors suggest that psychological need concepts offer promise for understanding its positive sources.


Experimental studies in vitro suggest that cytokines are important mediators in the pathogenesis of autoimmune insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM). However, there is little evidence for the role of cytokines in vivo, either in humans or in the spontaneous animal models of IDDM such as the NOD mouse or BB rat. To address this question, we used the model of cyclophosphamide (CYP)-induced autoimmune diabetes in the NOD/Wehi mouse to examine for (a) the production of IFN-gamma and IL-6 from isolated islets, and (b) the effect of anti IFN-gamma or anti IL-6 monoclonal antibodies on the development of diabetes. After cyclophosphamide, the majority of these mice develop of mononuclear cell infiltrate (insulitis) which by 10-14 d is associated with beta cell destruction. IFN-gamma activity at low levels (2.7 +/- 0.3 U/ml) could be detected only in culture supernatants from islets isolated at day 7 post-cyclophosphamide. In contrast, IL-6 activity progressively increased from 457 +/- 44 U/ml at day 0 to 6,020 +/- 777 U/ml at day 10. Culture of islets with anti-CD3 monoclonal antibody resulted in a significant increase in IFN-gamma activity from 41 +/- 7 U/ml at day 0 to 812 +/- 156 U/ml at day 10. Mice given either anti-IFN-gamma or anti-IL-6 antibody had a significantly reduced (P less than 0.001) incidence of diabetes and especially with IFN-gamma, decreased severity of insulitis. We conclude that IFN-gamma and IL-6 have essential roles in the pathogenesis of pancreatic islet beta cell destruction in this model.


Article Info ABSTRACT Article history: Received July 9, 2021 Revised August 20, 2021 Accepted Sept 11, 2021 The transformational leadership style in higher education has four indicators carried out by the rector. These indicators include exemplary attitudes, inspiring motivation, intellectual stimulation and the rector's consideration for lecturers. Practically, the purpose of this article is to find out how the rector provides examples, inspires motivation and individual considerations in improving the performance of lecturers at Muhammadiyah universities. The operational research method uses a qualitative approach with a phenomenological case study design. Data collection activities were carried out by means of observation, interviews with informants, and extracting information from documents. To ensure the validity of the research data, several methods are used, namely credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability. The results of the study explain that transformative leadership in Muhammadiyah universities objectively has provided an example with several things that are applied in attitudes, ideas, behavior and performance. While motivation is carried out by the Chancellor of the lecturers in several ways, namely through behavior, technical ability, supervision and policy. In stimulating the intellectuals of lecturers in several ways, namely to think modern and relevant, think forward and continue to make changes as well as productive, innovative, creative in carrying out tasks and performance. In individual consideration, the Chancellor is more humane towards lecturers, both in the work environment and in the community.


This paper will present at a conceptual level the parallels that appear between organisational systems and non-linear dynamic systems in nature. If these parallels can be modelled in an effective manner it would appear possible to provide a predictive formulation of organisations at the statistical level. Given that it is impossible to provide a deterministic prediction this would be a significant development.


In this paper, we have theoretically and experimentally demonstrated a novel large-mode-area multi-resonant all-solid photonic bandgap fiber (AS-PBGF). Based on the combination of the multi-resonant structure and leakage channel, the structural parameters are specifically designed for conventional applications of fiber lasers around 1 μm wavelength. Through the stack and draw technique, the fiber is fabricated successfully and the hexagon core is measured to be 46 μm in the corner-to-corner direction. The transmission spectrum exhibits a broad bandwidth from 970 nm to 1180 nm in the 3rd photonic bandgap (PBG). Bending loss lower than 0.1 dB/m with a 5-m-length fiber is obtained in the case of bending radius R > 25 cm. By employing the spatially and spectrally resolved imaging (S2) method, robust single-mode (SM) operation of the fiber is verified within the whole PBG. In addition, we also report a phenomenon about the abnormal variation of M2 within the low loss region of the 3rd PBG. The evolution of beam quality within the 3rd PBG appears as a U-shaped curve rather than a constant. Based on the measured M2 and S2 results, a preliminary conclusion about the relationship between the beam quality and SM characteristics in AS-PBGF, which is quite different from that in conventional SIFs, is demonstrated experimentally for the first time.


The aim of the paper was to obtain a stable micellar emulsion of potent photosensitizer (PS) – O -propyloxime- N -propoxybacteriopurpurinimide methyl ester absorbing light in long-wave region of the spectrum (λ max = 800±2 нм). Solubilizates of the dye based on different surfactants (Kolliphor ELP, Poloxamer 407, Emuxol 268) were obtained. Taking into account the physical and chemical parameters, the most potent micellar emulsion for injection was selected and characterized. The emulsion based on Kolliphor ELP remains stable for 4 months, with no changes in the fluorescence spectrum and absorption, as well as the particle diameter.


OBJECTIVE
To estimate the potential benefit of increasing bicycle helmet use among children and adolescents in the United States.

DESIGN
All bicycle-related deaths (Multiple Cause-of-Death Public Use Data Tapes, 1989 through 1992) and bicycle-related injuries treated in sampled emergency departments (National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, 1989 through 1993) were used to calculate traumatic brain injury-associated death and head injury rates per 1,000,000 US residents. Preventable injuries and deaths were estimated by calculating the population-attributable risk of head injury due to nonuse of bicycle helmets.

PATIENTS
US residents aged 0 through 19 years who were injured or who died as a result of a bicycle crash.

RESULTS
An average of 247 traumatic brain injury deaths and 140,000 head injuries among children and adolescents younger than 20 years were related to bicycle crashes each year in the United States. As many as 184 deaths and 116,000 head injuries might have been prevented annually if these riders had worn helmets. An additional 19,000 mouth and chin injuries were treated each year. The youngest age groups had the highest proportions of both head and mouth injuries.

CONCLUSION
There continues to be a need to advocate for greater use of bicycle helmets, particularly among young children. Helmet design changes should be considered to prevent mouth injuries.


Introduction: The six-minute walk test (6MWT) is widely used in evaluating patients with interstitial lung diseases (ILD). However studies relating 6MWT and pulmonary function tests (PFT) of these patients are scarce.

Aim: To evaluate the relation between walk distance (6MWTD), oxygen desaturation (ΔSO2) and breathlessness perception during 6MWT and PFT in ILD patients.

Methods: Seventy ILD patients were included (mostly idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis). Forced vital capacity (FVC), forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1), total lung capacity (TLC), diffusion capacity for carbon monoxide (DLCO) and carbon monoxide transfer coefficient (KCO) were measured and expressed as percent predicted. A 6MWT was performed in accordance with international recommendations. The 6MWTD, ΔSO2 and Borg Dyspnea Index (BDI) were recorded. Means with standard deviations were calculated for the PFT and 6MWT indices. Pearson's correlation coefficient was applied. Values of p<0.05 were considered significant.

Results: The mean 6MWTD was 448 meters (±90). Mean baseline oxygen saturation was 96% and mean ΔSO2 was 7.7% (±6.3). We found a correlation between the 6MWTD and DLCO (r=0.24; p=0.04) and between ΔSO2 and FVC, FEV1, TLC, DLCO and KCO (r=-0.47, -0.46, -0.45, -0.59, -0.44, respectively; p=0.00). A correlation was evident between post 6MWT BDI and DLCO (r=-0.25; p=0.04) and KCO (r=-0.32; p=0.01).

Conclusion: We found a stronger correlation between ΔSO2 and DLCO. The other correlations found were also significant and support the 6MWT as a tool for the functional and clinical assessment of ILD patients.


The current research is unclear regarding the sensitivity of the output of a magnetic flowmeter analysis to the fidelity of the simulated flow field. This study evaluates the effects of higher fidelity models on magnetic flowmeter analysis. An eddy viscosity model, second‐moment closure model, and a Large‐Eddy simulation were compared to laboratory velocity profile data 0.67D downstream of a 1.58D elbow at a Reynolds number of 34,000. The Large‐Eddy simulation results matched the laboratory velocity profile data best. The authors conclude that the fidelity of the flow field model does cause differences in the analysis of the flowmeter voltage output.


Following the Industry 4.0 vision of a full digitization of the industry, time-critical services and applications, allowing network infrastructures to deliver information with determinism and reliability, are becoming more and more relevant for a set of vertical sectors. As a consequence, deterministic network solutions are progressively emerging, albeit they are still bounded to specific technological domains. Even considering the existence of interconnected deterministic networks, the provision of an end-to-end (E2E) deterministic service over them must rely on a specific control plane architecture, capable of seamlessly integrate and control the underlying multi-technology data plane. In this work, we envision such a control plane solution, extending previous works and exploiting several innovations and novel architectural concepts. The proposed control architecture is service-centric, in order to provide the necessary flexibility, scalability, and modularity to deal with a heterogenous data plane. The architecture is hierarchical and encompasses a set of management platforms to interact with specific network technologies overarched by an E2E platform for the management, monitoring, and control of E2E deterministic services. Furthermore, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Digital Twinning are used to enable network predictability and automation, as well as smart resource allocation, to ensure service reliability in dynamic scenarios where existing services may terminate and new ones may need to be deployed.


Three patients suffering from acquired pulmonary stenosis are described resulting from compression of the main pulmonary artery by anterior mediastinal teratoma, Hodgkin's disease, and aneurysm of the ascending aorta, respectively; also four others who had compression of the right or left primary branch of the pulmonary artery. The pulmonary artery compression was demonstrated angiographically in every case, and in the patient with right and left pulmonary artery compression the main pulmonary artery pressure tracing was characteristic of bilateral pulmonary artery stenosis. Cardiac catheterization and selective angiography are indicated in patients who have evidence of right ventricular outflow obstruction to determine the site and severity of the obstruction and to differentiate between extrinsic compression and intrinsic stenosis.


Acral erythema is a localized chemotherapy-induced cutaneous response that has been observed in patients with either hematologic malignancies or solid tumors. An illustrative case of acral erythema in a woman with acute myelogenous leukemia is reported. The patient initially presented in blast crisis with concurrent cutaneous lesions of Sweet's syndrome. She subsequently showed acral erythema after being treated with cytosine arabinoside and idarubicin (an analogue of doxorubicin). The pathogenesis and treatment of acral erythema are reviewed.


Background Due to increased aged population, the number of the worlds people older than 60 years will rise to 2 billion in 2050 and improved health of this group (Life expectancy at age 65 and 75 year old increased from 16.4 and 10.4 in 1980 to 19.1 and 12.1 in 2010), surgeons are carrying out surgical procedures on more and more elderly patients including solid organ transplantation. In the field of liver transplantation, demand of grafts for elderly increases. Methods Data from all consecutive liver transplantation patients from January 1990 to December 2016 were collected from a dedicated monocentric database. The present retrospective study relies on data prospectively collected and updated. Patients who underwent auxiliary liver transplantation were excluded. Two cohorts of patients further subdivided into elderly and young groups were studied: First cohort included all liver transplant recipient between 18-65 vs >65 years old and the second cohort included liver transplant recipient between 50-65 vs > 65 years old. Overall survival (OS) and graft survival (GS) were explored in both comparative groups. Young liver transplant recipients were compared to elderly, after using a propensity score matching (PSM) method. The propensity score for an individual was calculated given the covariates of donor age and gender, cause of donor death ICU donor stay (days), recipient gender, recipient medical condition, indication for liver transplantation, child and cardiovascular risk factors. A 1:1 nearest neighbor matching was performed without replacement to minimize conditional bias. For each liver transplant performed in young group, a patient in elderly group with a minimum tested in distance of propensity score was matched. Results Among 1126 patients, multiple caliper widths were tested. A caliper width of 0.01 resulted in the best trade-off between homogeneity and retained sample size. In the first cohort, after PSM, 208 patients were matched and an association between recipient age and graft and patient survival was found (p = 0.010). Regarding long-term outcomes analysis in the second cohort (n = 206), 5 and 10-year OS rates were 63% and 52% vs 64% and 45% (p = 0. 50) in young vs elderly recipients, respectively. Five and 10-year GS rates were 62% and 52% vs 62% and 44% (p = 0.50) in young vs elderly recipients, respectively. (p = 0.42). Conclusions Elderly age has an impact on long-term outcomes in liver transplant. Advanced age alone should not exclude a patient from LT but a meticulous preoperative evaluation and careful follow-up is imperative.


Chromium oxynitride Cr(N,O) thin films were prepared by pulsed laser deposition in a highly reactive atmosphere, which consisted of pure oxygen gas and nitrogen plasma from a radio-frequency radical source. In order to control the oxygen content in the thin films, oxygen partial pressure (PO2) in the chamber was varied from 5 to 10 © 10 ¹5 Pa under a fixed total pressure of 1.5 © 10 ¹2 Pa. The thin films were then characterized by X-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy, electron energy loss spectroscopy and nano-indentation testing. It was found that the oxygen content of the thin films changed from 0 to 62mol% with increasing PO2. The thin films with only the NaCl-type (B1) Cr(N,O) phase were prepared under PO2 < 7.5 © 10 ¹5 Pa. The chromium content of the B1 phase decreased from 47mol%, which was close to the stoichiometric composition of CrN, to 40mol% when the oxygen content was increased. The hardness increased up to 32GPa with increasing PO2 up to 7.5 © 10 ¹5 Pa. [doi:10.2320/matertrans.M2013047]


STY3178 is a yfdX protein from Salmonella Typhi. yfdX proteins occur ubiquitously in a number of virulent bacteria but their cellular localization is unknown. Our earlier studies have shown that STY3178 is a trimer and can be a periplasmic chaperone protein. In the present study we show the stability of STY3178 in the presence of the bio-mimetic anionic surfactant sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS). With increasing concentrations of SDS we observe monomeric STY3178 which reversibly forms the trimer upon decreasing the surfactant concentration. Protein tertiary structure is not perturbed in the presence of SDS. We show using molecular dynamics simulation and conformational thermodynamics data that SDS induces stability of the monomer compared to an isolated monomer of STY3178. This supports our experimental observations.


Natural and supernatural explanations are used to interpret the same events in a number of predictable and universal ways. Yet little is known about how variation in diverse cultural ecologies influences how people integrate natural and supernatural explanations. Here, we examine explanatory coexistence in three existentially arousing domains of human thought: illness, death, and human origins using qualitative data from interviews conducted in Tanna, Vanuatu. Vanuatu, a Melanesian archipelago, provides a cultural context ideal for examining variation in explanatory coexistence due to the lack of industrialization and the relatively recent introduction of Christianity and Western education. We argue for the integration of interdisciplinary methodologies from cognitive science and anthropology to inform research on explanatory coexistence.


The purpose of the paper is to understand the impact of the pandemic on the labour market, as well as the measures taken by the Government to address the challenges of the pandemic in the labour market in Kosovo. In that respect, the paper provides experiences from other countries regarding the measures taken by the state administration to maintain the level of employment through support for employers to keep their employees, as well as through support for the employees who have lost their jobs. The paper also provides detailed information about the statistical and administrative data on the key labour market indicators in Kosovo, as well as information about two packages approved by the Government, the fiscal package and the package for economic recovery. Several conclusions have been made: the pandemic has had a significant impact on the labour market in Kosovo; the Government of Kosovo has drafted and approved two packages in order to support employment; however, the number of people who have benefited from these measures is small compared to the needs.


The pollution of coastal waters around cities is largely due to unregulated discharge of industrial, agricultural and domestic wastes. Mumbai City has a large dairy industry which processes raw milk into several food products and in the process, large amounts of water effluents containing dissolved sugars, proteins and fats are produced. These effluents are released into the marine waters after a meagre preliminary treatment. Thus, the marine environment is adversely affected and marine life gets depleted. The health of a water body is defined by physicochemical parameters like BOD, COD, DO and pH. Dairy waste is rich in microorganisms which help in its biodegradation by wet oxidation. The carbonaceous organic matter in dairy waste is oxidized in the presence of microorganisms: Carbon in organic matter + O2 -------> CO2 + H2O + Biomass. The kinetics of biodegradation of dairy waste by wet oxidation has been studied in detail with particular reference to the effects of i) salinity [(Cl-)= 0 to 20000 mg per litre] and ii) temperature on the rate of biodegradation. The biodegradation follows first order kinetics and the oxidation rate was monitored by estimating the dissolved oxygen present initially and at regular time intervals during the reaction using the Alsteberg azide modification of the Winkler method. The study confirmed the negative impact of salinity on the rate of biodegradation of dairy waste. Thermodynamics plays an important role in chemical reactions occurring in the oceans during degradation of organic wastes. The effect of temperature (20 and 27 degrees Celsius) on the rate of degradation of dairy waste was studied and the energy of activation and other thermodynamic activation parameters like enthalpy of activation, free energy of activation and entropy of activation were evaluated using the Arrhenius equation, and correlated with the reaction mechanism of the biodegradation reaction. From the dissolved oxygen values obtained, the BOD values were calculated at different salinities and temperatures and correlated with the rates of biodegradation of the organic wastes under study. The kinetics of biodegradation of a synthetic sample, Lactose-Peptone was also studied.


Fixed-basis and variable-basis approximation schemes are compared for the problems of function approximation and functional optimization (also known as infinite programming). Classes of problems are investigated for which variable-basis schemes with sigmoidal computational units perform better than fixed-basis ones, in terms of the minimum number of computational units needed to achieve a desired error in function approximation or approximate optimization. Previously known bounds on the accuracy are extended, with better rates, to families of d-variable functions whose actual dependence is on a subset of d′≪d variables, where the indices of these d′ variables are not known a priori.


ABSTRACT Australian universities are sites of growing cultural diversity, with large numbers of international students joining domestic students, many of whom come from migrant backgrounds. The literature indicates that the opportunities this creates for cross-cultural mixing and intercultural learning are often not embraced. This paper reports results of a study of orientations to cross-cultural interaction and learning among first year students, focussing on the relationship between such orientations and cultural self-identification. The findings indicate some ambivalence among the students, including a widespread general positivity towards the idea of cross-cultural interaction, but reticence to make personal efforts to take up these opportunities. Cultural self-identification was related to students' openness to diversity. Students who identified as Australian tended to be less interested in engaging across cultures, whereas those with culturally different (migrant), and more complex 'Australian + other' identifications, appeared more open. Implications for studies of cross-cultural mixing, and for higher education institutions, are discussed.


Physicians and other health care workers who care for patients who have sustained human bite marks need a working protocol to ensure that these patients receive proper care. This protocol involves taking a thorough history and performing a physical examination, approximately determining the bite mark age, and administering proper therapy. The history will help to determine whether a criminal act has been committed and which agencies need to be notified. The American Board of Forensic Odontology published criteria for bite mark analysis in 1984 that included a description of the bite mark including its size, shape, and color, along with techniques for collection of evidence from both the victim and suspect. To determine bite mark age, tissue response to injury (inflammation, granulation tissue formation, and matrix formation and remodeling) is reviewed. Finally, the bacteria that are found in these wounds and the proper use of antimicrobial agents are expanded upon.


Unilateral midshaft tibial osteotomies in rabbits were fixed with 6-hole steel plates. In half the animals, no additional fixation was used, whereas in the other half, a plaster bandage from the toes to the midthigh was applied. At 6 weeks all the osteotomies had healed radiographically with little or no periosteal callus. The median strength of bones without plaster was 107 per cent of the normal value compared with 55 per cent in the plaster group. The results indicated a severely adverse effect of plaster immobilization on the healing of plate-fixed osteotomies.


It is investigated to verify the scalability aspects of the distributed engineering computation on the cloud computing. In the study, a parallel virtual machine program distributed over a network of cloud computers is used in solving a finite difference version of a typical complicated engineering differential equation. It is found that there exist a pseudo-optimal number of virtual machines, which does not necessarily coincide with the number of tasks and the pseudo-optimal number depends on various overheads over the network of virtual machines. Increasing the number of machines in the cloud beyond certain threshold one does not improve computing performance due to the communication overhead between the task processes distributed over the network.


This paper investigates the reactive power as well as the harmonic conditions on both the valve and the AC-network sides of a HVDC converter station. The effect of the AC filter circuits is accurately modeled. The program is then augmented by adding an optimization routine. It can identify the optimal filter configuration, yielding the minimum current distortion factor at the AC network terminals for a pre-specified fundamental reactive power to be provided by the filter. Several parameter studies were also conducted to illustrate the effect of accidental or intentional deletion of one of the filter branches.


Granuloma annulare (GA) is a benign inflammatory and granulomatous skin disease that usually persists for up to 25 years. Rate of recurrence is about 40%. It is a cosmetic problem in the hands and face. Pathologically, it is characterized by small necrobiotic foci, degenerated collagen bundles surrounded by histiocytes in palisade pattern. Although spontaneous remission of GA is not uncommon in some cases, most cases are chronic and resistant to different lines of treatment, eg, surgical excision, cryotherapy, electrodesication, intradermal injection of low-dose of heparin, intralesional and topical occlusive steroids, antimalarial drugs, oral chlorambucil, potassium iodide, dapsone tablets, etc. All these lines failed to give complete cure or prevent recurrences, and they were not free from complications or side effects. Ten cases of localized granuloma annulare were investigated. The common age incidence was between 40 and 50 years in five cases, while three cases were 15-38 years old, and there were two children 3-4 years old. We tried vitamin E as a topical painting in granuloma annulare, and we got complete resolution within 1-3 weeks. No recurrence was recorded after 1 year. Further studies are needed to explain the role of local vitamin E in collagen degeneration.


The recent development of innovative organic materials with intriguing features such as their flexibility, lightness, low cost and easy manufacturability, has driven researchers to develop innovative smart applications based on such kind of materials. In this work, all-organic electromechanical transducers, with both sensing and acting capabilities are proposed. The actuator and sensor models have been identified by using a grey box approach, as a function of membrane geometric parameters. The obtained models have been validated through comparison among estimated and experimental data.


Background: Nicotinic acid adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NAADP) is a potent endogenous Ca2+ mobilizing second messenger that is known to release Ca2+ from the acidic endolysosomal vesicles. Our previous work showed that intracellular application of NAADP led to the increase in contractions of electrically stimulated guinea pig ventricular cardiomyocytes. These observations were accompanied by an increase in sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) Ca2+ load. Previously, it has been reported that beta-adrenergic activation increases the level of NAADP in guinea pig whole heart experiments, and we therefore hypothesized that the inotropic effect of beta-adrenergic activation is partly mediated by NAADP. This study aims to test this possibility and subsequently dissect the related pathway.

Methods and results: Two-pore channel 2 (Tpc2) is the most widely discussed channel, which mediates NAADP-regulated endolysosomal calcium release. Using a genetic modification approach, we showed that intracellular application of NAADP on electrically stimulated ventricular myocytes significantly increased calcium transient amplitude in wild type but not Tpc2 knock out mice (16±5%, -6±4%; p<0.05). Strikingly, Tpc2 KO mouse ventricular cardiomyocytes also showed a reduced isoprenaline-induced increase in contraction and calcium transient amplitudes compared to wild type mice (124±23%, 57±17%; p<0.05), establishing the contribution of NAADP to the beta-adrenergic pathway-regulated inotropic effect. In order to dissect the downstream mechanism, we showed that preincubation of the Ca2+ /calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II (CaMKII) inhibitor, KN93 in electrically stimulated mouse ventricular cardiomyocytes abolished the NAADP-induced increase in calcium transient amplitude (-6±3%). This is consistent with CaMKII acting as a downstream effector of beta-adrenergic activation that amplifies SR calcium uptake. With the patch-clamp technique, we presented further data showing there is no significant difference in L-type calcium current amplitude between wild type and Tpc2KO mice upon beta-adrenergic activation, showing that an augmented calcium uptake but not calcium influx is responsible for the investigated pathway.

Conclusion: We report here that the NAADP signaling cascade is a novel downstream pathway of beta-adrenergic activation in mouse ventricular cardiomyocytes. This pathway requires functional Tpc2 channels and is partly if not entirely mediated through the activation of CaMKII by the NAADP-released Ca2+, which subsequently enhances SR calcium uptake, contributing to the inotropic effect of cardiac beta-adrenergic activation.


We have been making spectral measurements in the extreme ultraviolet (EUV) from different laboratory sources in order to investigate the electron density dependence of various astrophysically important emission lines and to test the atomic models underlying the diagnostic line ratios. The measurement are being performed at the Livermore EBIT-I electron beam ion trap, the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) at Princeton, and the Alcator C-Mod tokamak at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which together span an electron density of four orders of magnitude and which allow us to test the various models at high and low density limits. Here we present measurements of Fe XXII and Ar XIV, which include new data from an ultra high resolution (λ/Δλ >4000) spectrometer at the EBIT-I facility. We found good agreement between the measurements and modeling calculations for Fe XXII, but poorer agreement for Ar XIV.


The Treaty of Trianon was the peace settlement that the victors of World War I imposed on Hungary after the war. The treaty's severity was unprecedented in modern European history. By dismembering the multi-ethnic "historic Kingdom of Hungary" the treaty left Hungarians less than a third of their former territory and transferred 3.3 million of them to neighboring states. Not surprisingly, Trianon came as a shock to the Hungarian people and constituted an enduring blow to the Magyar national psyche. During the next quarter century, Hungarians were obsessed with the idea of reversing this dictum and the primary objective of their foreign policies was the creation of international conditions in which the revision of Trianon could become possible. For this purpose the regime in Budapest sought allies, as this aim could be attained only with outside help. By the first half of 1941 this search had led to Hungary's entanglement in an alliance with Nazi Germany. Once Hungary became a partner in the Nazi war, the ...


Asphalt concrete has the advantageous ability to heal. During rest periods, damage present in the material is restored to a certain extent. Healing of the material can be observed in its regaining of strength and stiffness after rest periods. In this paper, a new test method is presented. It was developed to increase the understanding of the healing phenomenon. The test method focused on asphalt as it was assumed to be the driver of the healing performance. The test method assessed the healing performance of asphalt in stiffness and strength by testing the bond strength in tensile mode of two pieces of asphalt that were assembled under controlled temperature and stress conditions. With the test method, healing tests were performed on one type of binder; the load level during healing and the healing time were varied. The test results showed that after a short healing time of only 6 min, a significant amount of healing could be detected. That finding indicates the importance of adhesion between two crack surfaces when the healing capacity is assessed. It was also found that the maximum tensile stress reached a plateau value after 24 h of healing; the finding indicates that full healing can be realized in short time periods for pure, unaged, soft binders. It was also shown that the load level perpendicular to the damage during healing had a significant effect on the observed healing.


The historical arsenic and gold-ore operation at the Zloty Stok mine generated around 1 500 000 tonnes of wastes. The gold-bearing post-flotation tailing dumps, waste slag heaps, mined rock and arsenic roasting spoils (cinders) from mining of metamorphogenic, hydrothermal As-Au deposits have been examined to evaluate their gold grade. The waste material is dominated by calc-silicate skarn, dolomitic marbles, serpentinites and As-Au ore fragments. Sulfides are mainly loellingite, arsenopyrite and pyrrothite with some pyrite, chalcopyrite, sphalerite and galena. In oxidized material, sulfides are rare or absent. Over 1000 samples of post-flotation waste muds and three bulk samples of mined rock spoils were analyzed. Only tailings show high concentrations of Au (0.8-20.1 ppm) and As (1.0-2.6 wt.%). An average contents of other metals (in ppm) are: Cu -- 177.5; Pb -- 212.2; Zn -- 127.5; Ag -- 0.38; Pt -- 0.006; Pd -0.001. Analytical results indicate that concentrations of these elements are very low along profiles, with no obvious relationship between content and depth. Average gold content of 0.3 ppm in waste slags disqualifies this material as a source of gold. The remaining resources of gold in the flotation tailings and waste heaps are estimated at as high as 2370 kg. The main pollutant is As with contents exceeding 52 100 ppm in the mined rock spoils.


The preparation and control of cold molecules are advancing rapidly, motivated by many exciting applications, ranging from tests of fundamental physics to quantum information processing. Here, we proposed a trapping scheme to create high-density cold molecular samples using a combination of electric and magnetic fields. In our theoretical analysis and numerical calculations, a typical alkaline-earth monofluoride, MgF, is used to test the feasibility of our proposal. A cold MgF molecular beam is firstly produced via an electrostatic Stark decelerator and then loaded into the proposed electromagnetic trap, which is composed of an anti-Helmholtz coil, an octupole, and two disk electrodes. Following that, a huge magnetic force is applied to the molecular sample at an appropriate time, which enables further compressing of the spatial distribution of the cold sample. Molecular samples with both higher number density and smaller volume are quite suitable for the next step of laser confinement and other molecular experiments such as cold collisions.


Social networks (SNs), such as Facebook, Twitter and WeChat have emerged and tightly connected web clients all over the world. By analyzing and mining social networks, we could assemble information on the comments made by people with respect to a particular product. Analysis of such comments shows its value for the design of marketing and advertising campaigns. The typical examples are viral marketing, influential bloggers finding, social advertising, social healthcare, expert finding, personalized commendation, citation networks, and so on. Social media includes interactive applications and proposals for creation, sharing and replacing client-produced matters. The earlier period of few years have brought vast escalation in social media, particularly social networking services, and it's varying our systems to systematize and correspond. It aggregates judgments and sentiments of various clusters of group at low price. Mining the characteristics and matters of social media provides us a prospect to find out social organization attributes, to evaluate action prototypes qualitatively and quantitatively, and rarely calculate upcoming human correlated occasions. In this research paper, we firstly review the areas which could be calculated with existing social media platforms, then draw general idea about obtainable predictors and systems of prediction, and to end with discuss problems and probable potential research scopes.


This study was conducted to investigate the effects of the replacement of drinking water by herb infusions on the performance, relative weight of internal organs, hematocrit and immune response to Newcastle disease virus of broiler chickens. A total of 540 male broiler chicks (Ross 308) were divided into five groups, corresponding to four different treatments and one control group. Treatments were replicated eight times, and the control group four times. Experimental treatments included infusions (5 grams per liter) of cinnamon, thyme and turmeric in equal ratios in replacement of drinking water. Experimental period lasted 21 days and all chicks were fed with a corn-soybean based diet. Results showed that all herbs infusions caused significant (p<0.05) decrease in live body weight compared with the control group at 21 days of age. Mix treatment significantly decreased relative carcass weight relative to the control group (p<0.05). Herbs infusions increased the relative weight of some organs. None of herb additives affected hematocrit in comparison to control group. Cinnamon and herb mix infusion significantly improved bird immune response to the NDV vaccine in comparison to the control group and those that received only turmeric infusion. When all in-water additives were compare to each other, the birds supplemented with turmeric infusion showed the worst performance and immunity. The results of this experiment suggest that these herbs infusions did not favor the performance of broiler chickens.


Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are the primary pathogenic molecules produced in viral lung infections. We previously reported on the use of a recombinant human serum albumin (HSA)–thioredoxin 1 (Trx) fusion protein (HSA–Trx) for extending the half-life Trx, an endogenous protein with anti-oxidant properties. As a result, it was possible to overcome the unfavorable pharmacokinetic and short pharmacological properties of Trx. We hypothesized that HSA–Trx would attenuate the enhanced ROS production of species such as hydroxyl radicals by neutrophils during an influenza viral infection. The levels of 8-hydroxy-2′-deoxyguanosine and 3-nitrotyrosine were used as indices of the anti-oxidant activity of HSA–Trx. In addition, the cytoprotective effects of HSA–Trx were examined in PR8 (H1N1) influenza virus-induced lung injured mice. The findings show that HSA–Trx reduced the number of total cells, neutrophils, and total protein in BALF of influenza virus-induced lung injured mice. The HSA–Trx treatment significantly decreased the level of 8-hydroxy-2′-deoxyguanosine and 3-nitrotyrosine, but failed to inhibit inducible nitric oxide synthase expression, in the lungs of the virus-infected mice. On the other hand, Tamiflu® treatment also significantly suppressed the production of inflammatory cells and neutrophil infiltration, as well as the protein level in BALF and lung histopathological alterations caused by the influenza virus. The suppressive effect of Tamiflu® was slightly stronger than that of HSA–Trx. Interestingly, Tamiflu® significantly decreased virus proliferation, while HSA–Trx had no effect. These results indicate that HSA–Trx may be of therapeutic value for the treatment of various acute inflammatory disorders such as influenza-virus-induced pneumonia, by inhibiting inflammatory-cell responses and suppressing the overproduction of NO in the lung.


The purpose of this study was to reveal influential journals used by life scientists; journals not currently included in BIOSIS Previews, but included in either PubMed or Science Citation Index Expanded. These 252 journals were revealed by the Eigenfactor, an iterative ranking scheme which quantitatively measures the scientific influence of academic publications based upon their usage by scholars. This method has allowed us to determine which journals not covered by BIOSIS Previews have a notable impact in biology. Such an analysis is important for individual scientists, libraries, professional societies and funding organizations. This analysis illustrates the benefit of searching multiple databases for more accurate article retrieval in biology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]


Data center today challenges is not only serve the users, in same time need to establish scalable resources. Data Center manage the resources such as processor, storage, network, and memory in appropriate way to handle to load. In the big data era, load will increase and come in rapid way with large volume data, many type of data, can be stream and batch data, and unknown sources. Resources need to manage with comprehensive strategies to face the characteristic of big data load. Data Center have capabilties on allocate the reosource in dynamic and dedicated ways. The research investigate in the performance of dedycated and dynamic resource allocation to define the reliable strategies on Data Center. The research work on XenServer platform as Data Center. The research define 18 Virtual Machiens both on dedicated and dynamic strategies, use the shared storage mechanism, and resource pools. The research analyze on CPU performances on XenServer1 and XenServer2 that design as cluster Data Center.The test has run on XenServer and resulting the 2 phase of process when Data Center allocate the resources, there are intiation phase and process phase. The research shown that in the intiation phase both dynamic and dedicated strategies still not running, and use the initial resources to establish Data Center. The process phase shown that dynamic and dedicated strategies run and generating the load process. In the process phase it shown the use of memory and CPU Performance stream line into the balance positions. The research result can use for allocating resources is need to define different strategies in initition and process phase.


Density functional theory calculations were used to study the vacancy and hydrogen interaction behavior in nickel, through calculation of the energetics and electronic interactions. Divacancy interactions in the nickel bulk depend on the position of the vacancies, where 1NN sites have an attractive interaction, 2NN sites have a repulsive interaction and 3NN sites have almost no interaction. Hydrogen-vacancy interactions have binding energies of 0.51 eV and 0.41 eV for a hydrogen atom at the shared octahedral 'Os' site of a 2NN divacancy and 1NN divacancy, respectively. The calculated energy is in good agreement with previous observations. A monovacancy in nickel can trap up to six hydrogen atoms at the nearest octahedral site. However, a divacancy can accommodate almost four times as many hydrogen atoms as a monovacancy. 1NN octahedral sites can strongly bond with the hydrogen atoms, while hydrogen atoms at 2NN octahedral sites show a noticeably decreased segregation energy; however, the structures are still stable. A vacancy can significantly modify the charge density of the lattice. Hydrogen atoms at octahedral sites receive electrons from the NN metal atoms, forming bonds. As more hydrogen atoms are added, the isosurface is reduced, and there are fewer available optimal-density sites to accommodate additional hydrogen. Hydrogen at the 'Os' site of a 2NN divacancy receives more electrons from the nearest metal atoms, and as a result, a strong interaction occurs. A divacancy can trap almost four times as many hydrogen atoms as a monovacancy, leading to an increase in the hydrogen content in the metal.


State-of-the-art phase-domain all-digital phase-locked loops (ADPLLs) require a retimed reference clock to synchronize the digitally controlled oscillator (DCO) output frequency and the reference clock frequency. Therefore, the entire digital logic is operated with a periodically nonuniform clock. Due to on-chip coupling effects, the DCO output frequency is pulled with the edges of the retimed reference clock, producing undesired spurs in the phase noise power spectrum. In this brief, we analyze and classify the spur generation from a signal processing point of view and propose an alternative ADPLL implementation that abandons the retiming mechanism. Thus, the entire ADPLL can be clocked with a uniform reference clock, and consequently, side spurs are avoided. Behavioral simulations verify the spur analysis and emphasize the improved behavior of the proposed synchronous reference architecture.


On the basis of educational activities in the Irkutsk State Medical University, an assessment of directions and intensity of labor migration of medical graduates, started their professional activities in 2013-2017. The originally developed statistical tool was applied in scientific analysis of various educational and professional trajectories of graduates, from admission to the university to professional employment. It is established that only 34.9% of graduated physicians returned to their area of residence after completion of education, while 65.1% of graduates changed their place of residence after completion of education. These facts make it possible to consider higher medical education as a powerful mobilization factor for young specialists. The main direction of labor migration of University graduates of in 2013-2017 was Irkutsk (21.8%). The migration of graduated physicians reflects impact of urbanization processes. The directions and intensity of labor migration of young specialists graduated from University in the context of municipal formations of the Irkutsk region made it possible to obtain detailed information concerning the role of particular territories of the Oblast in development of human resources potential of the regional health care system.


This article presents the latest status and achievements of the IEEE Communication Society (ComSoc) Standards for Dynamic Spectrum Access Networks (DYSPAN), formerly IEEE Standards Coordinating Committee 41, that develops standards in the areas of dynamic spectrum access, cognitive radio, interference management, coordination of wireless systems, advanced spectrum management, and policy languages for next generation radio systems under the sponsorship of the IEEE communications society. The article also envisions future directions for the DYSPAN Committee. This paper represents the personal opinion of the authors, not the official opinion of the IEEE ComSoc DYSPAN standards committee.


ASHRAE Standard 140, "Method of Test for Evaluating Building Performance Simulation Software" provides test suites that allow software developers and users to evaluate the capabilities of a Building Performance Software (BPS) program versus analytical standards and/or other software programs. The standard has proven through the years to be a good tool for identifying weaknesses in BPS both in individual programs and in the software programs in general. Up to this point, it was assumed in the test cases that the programs could properly read standard weather files and process this information for the simulations. A new test suite is being developed to test this assumption. In this test suite, BPS programs are run with different weather files and the outputs are compared to the values in the files and against the output from the other programs. Statistical analyses are performed on the results to determine the level of agreement between the programs and the data file and between each other.


Commonly suggested public health strategies to combat adolescent obesity are encouraging daily physical activity, limiting television viewing, replacing sweetened beverage consumption with water, and increasing fruit and vegetable intake. This study examined the extent to which selected social cognitive theory constructs can predict these four behaviors among preadolescents in India. A 55-item valid and reliable scale was administered to 324 fifth graders. The significant predictor of physical activity was number of times taught at school (p < 0.008). None of the Social Cognitive theory variables were found to be significant predictors for numbers of hours of watching TV or drinking water instead of sweetened beverages. In the case of fruit and vegetable consumption, the significant predictor was self-efficacy to eat five or more servings of fruits and vegetables (p < 0.0001). The study discusses ways Social Cognitive theory can be bolstered to influence adolescent obesity behaviors in India.