Comparison of emergent trauma laparotomy mortality by individual surgeon. BACKGROUND Multiple quality indicators are used by trauma programs to decrease variation and improve outcomes. However, little if any provider level outcomes related to surgical procedures are reviewed. Emergent trauma laparotomy (ETL) is arguably the signature case that trauma surgeons perform on a regular basis, but few data exist to facilitate benchmarking of individual surgeon outcomes. As part of our comprehensive performance improvement program, we examined outcomes by surgeon for those who routinely perform ETL. METHODS A retrospective cohort study of patients undergoing ETL directly from the trauma bay by trauma faculty from December 2019 to February 2021 was conducted. Patients were excluded from mortality analysis if they required resuscitative thoracotomy for arrest before ETL. Surgeons were compared by rates of damage control and mortality at multiple time points. RESULTS There were 242 ETL (7–32 ETLs per surgeon) performed by 14 faculties. Resuscitative thoracotomy was performed in 7.0% (n = 17) before ETL. Six patients without resuscitative thoracotomy died intraoperatively and damage-control laparotomy was performed on 31.9% (n = 72 of 226 patients). Mortality was 4.0% (n = 9) at 24 hours and 7.1% (n = 16) overall. Median Injury Severity Score (p = 0.21), new injury severity score (p = 0.21), and time in emergency department were similar overall among surgeons (p = 0.15), while operative time varied significantly (40–469 minutes; p = 0.005). There were significant differences between rates of individual surgeon's mortality (range [hospital mortality], 0–25%) and damage-control laparotomy (range, 14–63%) in ETL. CONCLUSION Significant differences exist in outcomes by surgeon after ETL. Benchmarking surgeon level performance is a necessary natural progression of quality assurance programs for individual trauma centers. Additional data from multiple centers will be vital to allow for development of more granular quality metrics to foster introspective case review and quality improvement. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE Therapeutic/care management, level III.


Blood flow in micro-channel capillary using non-newtonian viscosity: a numerical study Ming Liu Significant achievements have been made in the area of lab-on-a-chip devices for biomedical analysis. The recent development of microfluidics has further promoted the successful development of lab-on-a-chip devices by enabling researchers to use numerical methods to improve device performance. In this work, by using the Volume of Fluid (VOF) model, we studied the non-Newtonian shear-thinning viscosity of blood capillary flow in microchannels with diameters under 100 μm. The blood penetration, withdrawal and final equilibrium are observed. The effects of the size of the microchannels and the concentration of red blood cells (RBCs) in blood on filling distance are also determined. It is found that the blood with 65% RBC concentration withdraws more than those with lower RBC concentrations in the same microchannel. For the blood with lower RBC concentration, increasing the microchannel diameter results in a significant increase in filling distance. This effect was less pronounced for blood with higher RBC concentration. The demonstrated results can be used to improve the design and efficiency of lab-on-a-chip devices that use sample transport by capillary forces.


Medical image segmentation often requires segmenting multiple elliptical objects on a single image. This includes, among other tasks, segmenting vessels such as the aorta in axial CTA slices. In this paper, we present a general approach to improving the semantic segmentation performance of neural networks in these tasks and validate our approach on the task of aorta segmentation. We use a cascade of two neural networks, where one performs a rough segmentation based on the U-Net architecture and the other performs the final segmentation on polar image transformations of the input. Connected component analysis of the rough segmentation is used to construct the polar transformations, and predictions on multiple transformations of the same image are fused using hysteresis thresholding. We show that this method improves aorta segmentation performance without requiring complex neural network architectures. In addition, we show that our approach improves robustness and pixel-level recall while achieving segmentation performance in line with the state of the art.


INTRODUCTION
Hypoxia induces an inflammatory response, which is enhanced by exercise. High altitude (HA) leads to endothelial activation and may be proinflammatory. The relationship between endothelial activation, inflammation, and acute mountain sickness (AMS) and its severity has never been examined.

METHODS
Forty-eight trekkers were studied during a progressive trek at 3833, 4450, and 5129 m at rest postascent (exercise), and then again at rest 24 hours later. Twenty of the subjects were also tested at rest pre- and postexercise at sea level (SL) at 6 weeks preascent. We examined plasma levels of the interleukin 6 (IL-6), 17a (IL-17a), and endothelin-1 (ET-1) along with oxygen saturation (SpO2) and Lake Louise scores (LLS).

RESULTS
ET-1 (5.7 ± 2.1 vs. 4.3 ± 1.9 pg/mL; p < 0.001), IL-6 (3.3 ± 3.3 vs. 2.4 ± 2.3 pg/mL; p = 0.007), and IL-17a (1.3 ± 3.0 vs. 0.46 ± 0.4 pg/mL; p < 0.001) were all overall significantly higher at HA versus SL. There was a paired increase in ET-1 and IL-6 with exercise versus rest at SL, 3833, 4450, and 5129 m (p < 0.05). There was a negative correlation between LLS and SpO2 (r = -0.32; 95% confidence interval [CI] -0.21 to -0.42; p < 0.001) and a positive correlation between LLS and IL-6 (r = 0.16; 0.0-0.27; p = 0.007) and ET-1 levels (r = 0.29; 0.18-0.39; p < 0.001. Altitude, ET-1, IL-6, and SpO2 were all univariate predictors of AMS. On multivariate analysis, ET-1 (p = 0.002) and reducing SpO2 (p = 0.02) remained as the only independent predictors (overall r(2) = 0.16; p < 0.001) of AMS. ET-1 (p = 03) and SpO2 were (p = 0.01) also independent predictors of severe AMS (overall r(2) = 0.19; p < 0.001).

CONCLUSIONS
HA leads to endothelial activation and an inflammatory response. The rise in ET-1 and IL-6 is heavily influenced by the degree of exercise and hypoxia. ET-1 is an independent predictor of both AMS and its severity.


This work examined the influence of oral temperature on oral perception of temperature in liquids and semisolids. A panel of 20 adults assessed the temperature of water, custard dessert and mayonnaise. Oral temperatures were manipulated by 5-s mouth rinses of 10, 35 and 55 degrees C performed prior to assessments, which resulted in oral temperatures of 27, 35 and 43 degrees C, respectively. The products were evaluated at 10, 22 and 35 degrees C. Results show that subjects were able to differentiate between the product temperatures. A large effect of type of product was seen on perceived temperature, where water was, overall, perceived as significantly colder than custard dessert and mayonnaise. The range of perceived thermal ratings was widest for custard dessert, followed by water and mayonnaise. This might be due to differences in composition and structure of the products. Even though oral temperature was varied considerably in the present study, this did not exert large effects on perceived temperature.


Today, electric vehicles, especially lightweight, become more and more widespread. Environmental factors force governments to introduce more strict regulations on emissions and, accordingly, support electric transport and decline conventional petrol and diesel-driven vehicles. Observing existing electric installation structures and grids, the street illumination grid looks very suitable also for electrical vehicle charging. The article uncovers such possibility from an engineers point of view - pros and cons - as a response to questions from municipal authorities.


A palladium-catalyzed tandem Suzuki/C-H arylation reaction of N-aryltrifluoroacetimidoyl chlorides with arylboronic acids has been developed. A variety of 6-(trifluoromethyl)phenanthridines were prepared in moderate to excellent yields from N-(2-bromophenyl)trifluoroacetimidoyl chlorides which can be conveniently prepared from 2-bromoaniline derivatives.


The measured masses and strong decays of $\Lambda_b(6146)^0$ and $\Lambda_b(6152)^0$ made us decode them as the 1$D$ excited states with $J^P=3/2^+$ and $J^P=5/2^+$, respectively. Under the suggested assignment, the masses and total decay widths of $\Lambda_b(6146)^0$ and $\Lambda_b(6152)^0$ can be explained. As a $J^P=3/2^+$ state, the $\Lambda_b(6146)^0$ should mainly decay into $\Sigma_b(5815)\pi$. However, this theoretical result is in contradiction to the measurement since no significant $\Lambda_b(6146)^0\rightarrow\Sigma_b(5815)^\pm\pi^\mp$ signals were observed by the LHCb. The possible explanations to this difficulty are mentioned. For completeness, we present the prediction of masses and decay widths of other unseen 1$D$ bottom baryons in this work. Our result could provide some important clues for the coming experiments to find them.


Hierarchical Scaling is one of the Architectural Engineering principles. this principle isdetermined by the apparent scales within the basic elements of architectural design and the nature of thehierarchy in its dimensions. This principle was discussed in previous studies in terms of its relation tonature, its types in different levels of architecture and city.The property of the hierarchical scale wasdiscussed in the previous knowledge in terms of its relation to nature, its types and its general bases at thelevel of architecture and city. Therefore, the need to study this principle appeared at the level of house layoutthrough studying its space syntax in different time periods and its reflection on several aspects.Thus, theresearch problem was determined by "the need to explore the levels of the hierarchical scale within thespace syntax of the houses especially Mosulian house, and its variation within different time periods."The research adopted the quantitative approach consisting of three steps, after introducing generalknowledge base of the concept of the hierarchical scale and the studies that dealt with it in architecture, first:building a theoretical framework on the vocabulary associated with measuring the spatial hierarchical scalewithin the space syntax, second: conducting a practical study on an elected group of Mosulian houses withinfour periods, (20 houses distributed through, traditional, traditional-heritage, transitional andcontemporary),third: analysis of results and identification of conclusions.The research found that theMosulian houses within (the traditional -heritage period) was distinguished by its having a deep spatialhierarchical scale, unlike the Mosulian houses (with a transitional period) that entails many indicators at thelevel of the social dimension in achieving social isolation.


In the lm Batman Begins (2005) an evil organisation (the League of Shadows) successfully  attempt to retrieve an experimental microwave emitter from Wayne Enterprises. This emitter is said to be used to vapourise large bodies of water using only microwaves, and the League of Shadows plan on vapourising Gotham's water supply. Here we discuss the energy and power required vapourise Gotham's water supply; 1.18 petajoules and 13.7 gigawatts respectively, as well as the isotropic electric and magnetic elds produced; 3.96*10^9 NC^-1 and 13.1 T respectively.


Abstract It has been shown recently that ice streams are fed by fast-flowing tributaries occupying well-defined subglacial troughs and with shared source areas. Here, ice-penetrating radio-echo sounding (RES) data are analyzed in conjunction with ice surface velocities derived from interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), to determine the englacial properties of tributaries feeding Ice Stream D, West Antarctica. All of Ice Stream D's tributaries are coincident with "buckled" internal ice-sheet layers, most probably deformed by the processes responsible for enhanced ice flow. Between the tributaries well-preserved internal layers occur. The data reveal that no lateral migration of the ice-stream tributaries has occurred recently. This is consistent with thermomechanical ice-flow modelling, which indicates that the flow of Ice Stream D is controlled by a subglacial trough and is unaffected by changes to the flow of neighbouring Ice Stream C.


. The approach, referred to as "monodromy transform", provides some gen- eral base for solution of all known integrable space - time symmetry reductions of Einstein equations for the case of pure vacuum gravitational fields, in the presence of gravitationally interacting massless fields, as well as for some string theory induced gravity models. In this communication we present the key points of this approach, applied to Einstein equations for vacuum and to Einstein - Maxwell equations for electrovacuum fields in the cases, reducible to the known Ernst equations. Definition of the monodromy data, formulation and solution of the direct and inverse problems of the monodromy transform, a proof of existence and uniqueness of their solutions, the structure of the basic linear singular integral equations and their regularizations, which lead to the equations of (quasi-)Fredholm type are also discussed. A construction of general local solution of these equations is given in terms of homogeneously convergent functional series.


January and February 1992 were marked by exceptional heat-waves in Botswana, especially in the southern parts. At the headquarters of the Botswana Meteorological Services in the Village, Gaborone, daily maximum temperatures exceeding 4Oi?½C were recorded on three occasions and only a few short intervals of relatively cooler weather interrupted this apparently perpetual hot spell. Generally conditions of severe heat are assessed using discomfort indices. Although conditions were indeed extreme for Botswana, top of the scale discomfort indices were never attained. In this paper I look at the temperature distribution during the above-mentioned period. A discomfort index is used to illustrate the degree of discomfort as caused by the excessive summer heat. The 1991/92 summer temperatures are then compared to conditions that were obtained during the last three decades.


Global suicide rates are steadily increasing, and suicide completions in Asia outnumber those in Western countries. Young females are especially at risk, with higher rates of completion and lack of suicide support because of familial and cultural stigma and constraints. Lack of infrastructure to systematically record suicide deaths and attempts makes studying suicide in low- and middle-income countries challenging. Given the critical public health need for suicide intervention and prevention, research on suicide is crucial. The present study adds to the lack of information regarding suicide in Cambodia by exploring reports of attempted suicide by women from a nationally representative sample of Cambodian women (N = 1813). In a series of logistic regression models, findings indicate that a culturally salient measure of Cambodian syndromes, symptoms of depression, and posttraumatic stress disorder contributed to increased odds of attempting to commit suicide. Implications for policymakers and interventionists within Cambodia and Asian contexts are discussed.


In this letter, we propose a joint resource allocation algorithm for an OFDM-based multi-user system assisted by an improved Decode-and-Forward (DF) relay. We aim at maximizing the sum rate of the system by jointly optimizing subcarrier pairing, subcarrier pair-user assignment, and power allocation in such a single DF relay system. When the relay does not perform any transmission on some subcarriers in the second phase, we further allow the source to transmit new symbols on these inactive subcarriers. We effectively solve the formulated mixed integer programming problem by using continuous relaxation and dual minimization methods. Numerical results verify the theoretical analysis, and illustrate the remarkable gains resulted from the extra direct-link transmissions.


PURPOSE
To examine the association of blood antioxidants with cataract.

METHODS
Cross-sectional study of people aged >or=50 years identified from a household enumeration of 11 randomly sampled villages in North India. Participants were interviewed for putative risk factors (tobacco, alcohol, biomass fuel use, sunlight exposure, and socioeconomic status) and underwent lens photography and blood sampling. Lens photographs (nuclear, cortical, and posterior subcapsular) were graded according to the Lens Opacities Classification System (LOCS II). Cataract was defined as LOCS II grade >or=2 for any opacity or ungradable, because of dense opacification or history of cataract surgery. People without cataract were defined as LOCS II <2 on all three types of opacity, with absence of previous surgery.

RESULTS
Of 1443 people aged >or=50 years, 94% were interviewed, 87% attended an eye examination, and 78% gave a blood sample; 1112 (77%) were included in the analyses. Compared with levels in Western populations, antioxidants were low, especially vitamin C. Vitamin C was inversely associated with cataract. Odds ratios (OR) for the highest (>or=15 micromol/L) compared with the lowest (<or=6.3 micromol/L) tertile were 0.64, (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.48-0.85; P < 0.01). Tertiles of zeaxanthin (P < 0.03), alpha-carotene (P < 0.05), and retinol (P < 0.02) were associated with decreased odds of cataract. In analysis of continuous data, significant inverse associations were found for vitamin C, zeaxanthin, lutein, lycopene, alpha- and beta-carotene, and beta-cryptoxanthin, but not for alpha- or gamma-tocopherol.

CONCLUSIONS
Inverse associations were found between cataract and blood antioxidants in an antioxidant-depleted study sample.


Modifications of flow and composition of bile have been studied in the guinea pig with ligated ureters after injection of hypertonic solutions of two nonmetabolizable substances, mannitol and xylose (1.66 m), into the jugular vein. A distinct and persistent decrease in biliary flow always occurs. Analysis of this anticholeresis showed a parallel decrease in the flow of water and electrolytes, while the flow of bilirubin and bile acids is not modified. There are, then, two different types of mechanisms in the formation of bile: the osmotic mechanisms which control the quantity of water and electrolytes; and the active secretory mechanisms, independent of the first, for specific substances such as bilirubin and bile salts. Ultrafiltration does not occur in quantitative formation of bile, but the bile/blood osmotic gradient plays an important role.


As China's capital market has become more and more developed, listed companies have begun to establish some anti-takeover provisions to protect their controlling right. Existing studies have examined the consequences of the establishment of such provisions. However, few studies have explored how these provisions affect corporate strategic change. Based on agency theory and prospect theory, this paper proposes two channels through which one of the anti-takeover provisions, staggered board provision, impacts strategic change. Using the data of China's listed companies which issue A-shares in Shenzhen and Shanghai stock exchanges from 2007 to 2014, these two channels are tested. We find that the existence of a staggered board provision negatively affects the extent of strategic change. In addition, if governance mechanisms restrict directors' power, the relationship between staggered board provision and strategic change will be weakened, which supports the agency theory. If the listed company is faced with a more dynamic external environment, the relationship between staggered board provision and strategic change will be stronger, which supports the prospect theory. These results are robust after we use a different method to measure strategic change. Our conclusions not only enrich literature about strategic change and anti-takeover provisions, but also are helpful for improving corporate governance in China and other developing countries.


ABSTRACT Cryptosporidiosis is a significant cause of food-borne and waterborne outbreaks of diarrheal diseases. To better understand the route of transmission of Cryptosporidium parasites, a number of genotyping techniques have been developed, based on PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism or sequencing analysis of antigen, structural, and housekeeping genes. In this study, a real-time assay for the detection of Cryptosporidium oocysts is described. This technique had a detection limit of five oocysts. By melting curve analysis of PCR products with fluorescence-labeled hybridization probes, this technique was able to differentiate five common Cryptosporidium parasites that are pathogenic for humans in a single PCR. We evaluated and validated the test using samples from presently known Cryptosporidium parasites that are pathogenic for humans. This technique provides an alternative molecular tool in epidemiologic studies of human cryptosporidiosis.


The consequences of the unitarity inequalities are studied. It is shown that, contrary to the unitary amplitudes, the body of differential cross sections consistent with a truncated series of unitary partial waves is not convex. As a consequence, the angular distributions consistent with a given set of error-affected experimental data are generally split into several disconnected bunches. This leads to a second type of discrete partial-wave ambiguities supplementing those already present in the case of continuously given angular distributions.


We consider collision resolution protocols for a random access collision channel with multiplicity feedback. By using Markov decision processes, we provide performance bounds for such systems in terms of the mean number of slots required to resolve a collision of a given multiplicity. We show that recursive binary splitting is strictly suboptimal for all collisions of size n>3, and we find the optimal protocol for the case n=4.


Abstract The role of calcium in mediating resistance to several auxinic herbicides (i.e., 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, [4-chloro-2-methylphenoxy] acetic acid, (±)-2-(4-chloro-2-methylphenoxy) propanoic acid [mecoprop], 3,6-dichloro-2-methoxy-benzoic acid [dicamba], or 4-amino-3, 5,6-trichloro-2-pyridinecarboxylic acid [picloram]) was investigated by modulating calcium dynamics of a susceptible (S) and resistant (R) biotype of wild mustard. The inhibitory effects of the auxinic herbicides on root length of the S seedlings were significantly reduced upon pretreatment with calcium in the presence of the calcium ionophore A23187. Conversely, the addition of verapamil, a calcium channel blocker, to the R seedlings increased their sensitivity to the auxinic herbicides. Valinomycin, a potassium channel ionophore, did not ameliorate the effect of the auxinic herbicides on both biotypes of wild mustard, thus indicating that the observed effects were specific for calcium. These results demonstrate that calcium plays a crucial role in the resistance of wild mustard to auxinic herbicides at the level of intact seedlings, thereby supporting our previous results using intact protoplasts. Nomenclature:2,4-D; dicamba; MCPA; MCPP; picloram; wild mustard, Sinapis arvensis L. SINAR.


I begin this article by developing an argument that disability arts can only be understood in the context of the wider disabled people's movement, as part of the ongoing struggle by disabled people for equality and inclusion. I suggest that disability arts is characterised by the principles of transgression, resistance and affirmation and is properly regarded as a conversation between disabled people involved in critiquing the oppression required by normalcy. In the second part of the article I explain and outline the affirmative model, a recently-developed theoretical tool rooted in perspectives developed within the disability arts movement.


It seems common sense that "policy matters" in setting up e-government interoperability, mainly because collaboration should be guided by dedicated integration objectives and implementation rules. However, this is not always the case: this paper focuses on Egypt implementing technology and systems based on service-oriented architecture, largely without the expected organizational readiness regarding the interoperability effort. Does this mean that the current initiative is bound to fail? Or is the Egyptian approach maybe an appropriate strategy for countries which do not want to repeat painful non-interoperability experiences of their developed peers? This case study research seeks to provide evidence to what extent the Egyptian experience indicates a model for e-government adopters how to best develop interoperability. The paper concludes that a technology-first approach indeed can be held accountable for waste of time and resources due to delays in inevitable collaborative organizational learning. But if the latter is impaired for other reasons then choosing and implementing the "right" technology upfront is likely to have a positive impact on streamlining the organizational discourse and on pursuing a consistent e-government interoperability strategy.


Forest fires are a major environmental issue, creating economical and ecological damage while dangering human lives. The investigation and survey for forest fire had been done in Aek Godang, Northern Sumatera, Indonesia. There is 26 hotspot in 2017 close to Aek Godang, North Sumatera, Indonesia. In this study, we use a data mining approach to train and test the data of forest fire and the Fire Weather Index (FWI) from meteorological data. The aim of this study to predict the burned area and identify the forest fire in Aek Godang areas, North Sumatera. The result of this study indicated that Fire fighting and prevention activity may be one reason for the observed lack of correlation. The fact that this dataset exists indicates that there is already some effort going into fire prevention.


Only a few months before his death, Wittgenstein
invited us to imagine "that some propositions, of the form
of empirical propositions, were hardened and functioned
as channels for such empirical propositions as were not
hardened but fluid�; nevertheless he warned "this relation
altered with time, in that fluid propositions hardened, and
hard ones became fluid� (OC 96). Those hardened
propositions provide a certainty which is "like a mighty
force whose point of application does not move, and so no
work is accomplished by it� (Z 402). There are many things
that seem to be fixed, things which are removed from the
traffic: they are "so to speak shunted onto an unused
siding� (OC 210). Those things just give "our way of
looking at things, and our researches, their form� (OC
211). Maybe they were once disputed; but perhaps, for
unthinkable ages, they have belonged to the scaffolding of
our thoughts.


(1) We evaluated efficacy of several treatments for HTLV-I-associated myelopathy (HAM) on the basis of our study on 254 HAM patients and of literature review. Improvement of motor disability more than fair response was obtained as follows: 82% in prednisolone, 69% in interferon-alpha, 92% in fosfomycin, 82% in high-dose vitamin C, 72% in blood purification therapy, 70% in heparin, 59% in salazosulfapyridine, 56% in thyrotropin-releasing hormone, 55% in erythromycin, 50% in mizoribine. (2) In the absence of clear guideline, the efficacy of zidovudine in the AIDS dementia complex has been demonstrated. There are also efficacy of amytriptylinein controlling HIV headache, corticosteroid in mononeuritis multiple and inflammatory myositis, hydrocortisone in autonomic neuropathy and plasmapheresis in distal sensory neuropathy respectively. Otherwise, it is emphasized that ddI, ddC and d4T have peripheral neuropathy as major, dose related side effect.


Objective: Phenylethanolamine-N-methyltransferase (Pnmt) is required for the conversion of norepinephrine to epinephrine. Bao et al (2007) described that Pnmt-knockout (Pnmt-KO) mice have an increased ratio of left ventricular (LV) posterior wall thickness to internal dimensions (LVPW/LVID) but not overall cardiac hypertrophy. Pnmt-KO mice showed normal resting blood pressure (BP) but became hypertensive during treadmill exercise. The aim of this study was to evaluate cardiac morphological and functional alterations after chronic exercise in Pnmt-KO mice. Design and method: PCR-based genotyping was performed at the Pnmt locus of 10-week-old Pnmt-KO (Pnmt-/-) and WT mice (129x1/SvJ). Epinephrine and norepinephrine were quantified by RP-HPLC-ED in adrenal glands. Animals were submitted to a 6-week exercise training program. BP was measured by a photoelectric pulse detector. Mice were anesthetized (sevoflurane, 8%) and cardiac morphology and function were evaluated by echocardiography followed by morphometric analysis. Results: Epinephrine levels were vestigial in Pnmt-KO compared with WT mice. There were no differences in systolic and diastolic BP between untrained Pnmt-KO and WT mice. However, trained Pnmt-KO mice showed a significant increase in systolic BP when compared to trained WT mice. Our findings also showed that the ratios between heart weight (HW/BW) and LV weight (LVW/BW) and body weight (BW) were significantly increased in trained compared to untrained Pnmt-KO mice. Trained Pnmt-KO mice presented higher HW/BW than trained WT mice. Untrained Pnmt-KO mice display echocardiographic results similar to those reported by Bao et al (2007) while LVPW and IVS thicknesses, LV end-diastolic internal dimension (LVIDd) and LV mass indexed for body surface area (LVMi) were significantly increased in trained Pnmt-KO mice, indicating overall LV hypertrophic changes. Indexed LV end-diastolic volume (LVEDVi), indexed stroke volume (SVi) and cardiac index (CI) were significantly higher in trained Pnmt-KO than untrained Pnmt-KO mice. Conclusions: In conclusion, the increased BP in Pnmt-KO mice in response to exercise appears to be associated with an increase in LV wall thickness and chamber volume suggesting hypertrophic remodelling of the LV in Pnmt-KO mice. Epinephrine appears to be essential for maintaining normal BP, probably through &bgr;2-adrenoceptors-induced vessel relaxation, and preventing LV hypertrophy in chronic exercise.


This community service activities aim to: 1) increase the creativity and innovation of members to make processed coconut products; 2) increase partner understanding of Virgin Coconut Oil (VCO) processing that is able to provide economic and health impacts; 3) increase the ability of members in designing the packaging for coconut products. This community service implementation method is an empowerment model for partners, namely PKK RT 02 RW 07 Demaan group, Jepara sub-district, with the following steps: 1) Preparation Stage; 2) Assessment Phase; 3) Stage of Alternative Planning Programs or Activities; 4) Formulation Phase of the Action Plan; 5) Stage of Implementation (Implementation) of Programs or Activities; 6) Evaluation Phase. The results obtained from this activity include: 1) Partners have creativity in running the PKK group program; 2) partners have the ability to process VC) as a means of improving the quality of the PKK program; 3) Partners in the process of producing VCO; 4) Partners understand the benefits of VCO for economic and health;


An increase in leprosy among HIV patients, similar to that observed in patients with TB, was expected approximately 20 years ago. Studies conducted in the 1990s together with those reported recently seemed to indicate that a coinfection with HIV did not alter the incidence and the clinical spectrum of leprosy and that each disease progressed as a single infection. By contrast, in countries with a high seroprevalence of HIV, TB was noted to increase. Explanations may be provided by the differences in the incubation time, the biology and toxicity of Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium tuberculosis. After the introduction of HAART the leprosy–HIV coinfection manifested itself as an immune reconstitution inflammatory syndrome (IRIS), typically as paucibacillary leprosy with type 1 leprosy reaction. The incidence of leprosy in HIV-infected patients has never been properly investigated. IRIS-leprosy is probably underestimated and recent data showed that the incidence of leprosy in HIV patients under HAART was higher than previously thought.


We numerically simulated quantum turbulence in superfluid $^4$He to investigate the emission of vortex rings from a localized vortex tangle. Turbulence is characterized by some universal statistical laws. Although there are a lot of studies on statistical laws in bulk quantum turbulence, studies in inhomogeneous or localized turbulence is scarce. We first investigate the statistical laws of localized quantum turbulence, referring to two statistical laws deduced from the vibrating wire experiments in [Yano $et$ $al.$, J. Low Temp. Phys. $\bf{196}$, $184\ (2019)$]. The first law is the Poisson process for the detection of vortex rings; the vortex tangle emits vortex rings with frequencies depending on their sizes. The second law is the power law between the frequency and the size of the emitted vortex rings, showing the self-similarity of the tangle. To study these statistical laws numerically, we developed a system similar to experiments. First, we generate a localized statistically steady vortex tangle by injecting vortex rings from two opposite sides and causing collisions. We investigated the conditions that aid the formation of the tangles and the anisotropy of the emission of vortex rings from the tangle. Second, from the data on emitted rings, we reconstruct the two statistical laws. Results from our numerical investigations are consistent with the known self-similarity of emitted vortex rings and localized tangles.


Research into therapeutic built environments and Evidence Based Design (EBD) has increased during the past three decades and the concept more readily adopted in practice. However, some practitioners believe that, as with any approach that builds on previous experiences to develop standards and guidelines, EBD could limit creativity. Given that creativity is often regarded as a major source of competitive advantage for a design, if EBD is seen as a barrier to creativity this may hinder its acceptance and application. The extent to which EBD could limit creativity during the design process is explored through a literature review. The findings suggest that only a smaller segment of evidence-based information, which relates to concept development, would affect creativity. Such information could foster information-driven design strategy and result in a lower level of creativity. However, properly implemented EBD strategies should not limit creativity since expert designers in EBD would use their knowledge (of therapeutic evidence) and expertness in the design process and need not follow and information driven strategy.


In Reply. —Thank you very much for sending us the letter from Pecero and Martinez commenting on our article published in the September 1989 issue of theArchives. 1 First of all, we would like to comment briefly on the two cases presented by Pecero and Martinez. The death of the first patient has been attributed to general anesthesia, which would have caused compression of the right ventricular outflow tract. Unfortunately, their data do not supply enough evidence to support their statement that a "severe hemodynamic compromise" might be encountered in those patients with anterior mediastinal mass compressing the right ventricular outflow tract. (Continued on p 2213.) (Continued from p 2212.) Moreover, we cannot agree with their operational conclusion that "RVOT obstruction and/or PS allows us to select the patient at severe vital risk" and that it "proscribes general anesthesia for aggressive pathological diagnostic approach." In fact, the main issues


In this study, the effect of circulation on the critical submergence of an intake pipe is presented. Experiments were conducted on a vertically flowing downward intake pipe in a circulation imposed still-water reservoir. The circulation imposed on the flow causes an outward centrifugal force component in radial direction which increases the critical submergence considerably. For a given flow and geometry, the vane setting angle has a certain value which causes the same critical submergence as in the case of no-vanes (unsteady vortex in no-circulation imposed flow). As the vane setting angle gets larger than its certain value, the critical submergence becomes larger than that in the no-circulation imposed flow (no-vanes). The smaller the vane setting angle, the smaller is the critical submergence. The critical submergence attains its minimum value when the vane setting angle is zero (vanes are set radially). Flow visualization for an intake pipe in a still-water reservoir has indicated that a spherical volume of fluid bounded by a stream surface of a sphere (SSS) develops. This spherical volume, hence SSS, shrinks radially and rotates about its vertical axis. The air-entraining vortex occurs as the SSS collapses. The SSS is a useful concept for the physical explanation of occurrence of the air-entraining vortex.


The Academic Clinical Oncology and Radiobiology Research Network (ACORRN) was set up to support research and development in radiotherapy in the UK. This innovative networking initiative was launched initially by the National Cancer Research Institute in 2005 to harness the power of the radiation research base in the UK. Through an interactive website a co-ordinated network of multidisciplinary radiation researchers has been established. The network has developed to a stage where it can be self-funding and dedicated to improving radiotherapy for cancer. A patient interactive section and extended support for service development will ensure that anyone treated in the UK will have immediate access to the best knowledge in the country. This provides a solution for cost-effectiveness and future improvement of cancer care and is seen as a new model to support healthcare development and delivery. The charity ACORRN - Action Radiotherapy aims to support radiotherapy research and development and was launched in the House of Lords in July 2010.


BACKGROUND
Various articles in the literature point out the higher risk of venous thrombosis in patients taking antipsychotic drugs. However, to our knowledge, an association with central retinal vein occlusion (CRVO) has not been reported before.

METHODS
We describe the clinical and angiographic findings of a patient with CRVO that may have been related to his antipsychotic medication.

RESULTS
A 19-year-old patient had been taking risperidone and fluoxetine for the last 7 months. He presented with atypical nonischemic CRVO with atypical deep intraretinal hemorrhages, a swollen optic disk, dilatation and engorgement of retinal veins, and optic disk capillaries. Despite a detailed workup, no systemic or ocular risk factors for a thromboembolic event were found. He had hyperprolactinemia resulting from his medication.

CONCLUSION
The use of risperidone may be a risk factor for CRVO.


- Introduction: The relative age effect is prevalent in different elite team sports. However, little is known about this phenomenon in high-level adult male futsal players. Aim: The present study aimed to investigate the prevalence of relative age effect in Brazilian male elite futsal players, and its relationship with playing position and goals scored on Brazil National Futsal Leagues (BNFL) from 2016 to 2020. Methods: The distribution of birth dates, playing positions, and goals scored by male participants of the Brazil National Futsal Leagues were analyzed. Chi-squared tests were used to analyze the birth dates distribution based on quarters and semesters of the year, according to playing position (defender, winger, pivot, and goalkeeper) and scoring performance (high and low). Results: The overall analysis indicated that the relative age effect is prevalent on the pool of athletes analyzed. However, this effect was position-dependent, since relatively older athletes were overrepresented only in wingers and defenders playing positions. On the other hand, scoring performance was not associated with the relative age effect, since this effect was found in both performance levels. Conclusion: Relative age effects are prevalent in Brazilian male elite futsal athletes, especially for defenders and wingers. Considering the high level of competitiveness for spots in elite futsal teams, coaches and sports administrators must be educated about the prevalence of the relative age effect in this sporting context. This is necessary in order to reduce the inequalities generated by age categories based on arbitrary cut-off dates, which may reduce potential talent loss.


The impact of gate leakage current on MOSFET performance is examined and limits on gate oxide thickness for static and dynamic logic are determined. Leakage current has been found to be a greater problem for static logic than for dynamic logic circuits. Gate leakage current limits the minimum oxide thickness to approximately 2 nm for static logic configurations, and to approximately 3 nm in dynamic logic circuits. A poor drain design can become a limiting factor for dynamic logic circuits and raise the minimum oxide thickness required. Switching delay of static logic is relatively immune to the effects of leakage current. A MISFET with a 2.6 nm thick gate insulator of Si/sub 3/N/sub 4/ has been fabricated showing typical drain current characteristics, but with a large amount of gate leakage current. >


We take initial steps in studying PAC-MDP algorithms with limited adaptivity, that is, algorithms that change its exploration policy as infrequently as possible during regret minimization. This is motivated by the difficulty of running fully adaptive algorithms in real-world applications (such as medical domains), and we propose to quantify adaptivity using the notion of local switching cost. Our main contribution, Q-Learning with UCB2 exploration, is a model-free algorithm for H-step episodic MDP that achieves sublinear regret whose local switching cost in K episodes is $O(H^3SA\log K)$, and we provide a lower bound of $\Omega(HSA)$ on the local switching cost for any no-regret algorithm. Our algorithm can be naturally adapted to the concurrent setting, which yields nontrivial results that improve upon prior work in certain aspects.


The integration of the world into one huge market has increased market for businesses all over the world. Besides, it has opened the developing economies to attacks from the developed and emerging economies. Small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) in Nigeria have been confronted with an increasingly competitive environment due to globalization and liberalisation. This paper examines the impact of trade liberalisation on innovative performance of SMEs in South-Western Nigeria. Both primary and secondary data were employed. The primary data were derived from the survey carried out on 996 selected SMEs in the South-Western region of Nigeria, while the secondary data were obtained from government agencies/establishments. The data collected were analyzed using appropriate descriptive statistics and inferential techniques. The study revealed that bulk of the selected SMEs was involved in the incremental product innovations while few that were engaged in product innovation were medium businesses. The study also showed that after trade liberalization, the growth rate of production and the value of exports of Nigerian SMEs have decreased. The paper concluded that on the overall, the impact of trade liberalisation on the innovative performance of Nigerian SMEs is negative.


Introduction To explore changes in footwear adherence following provision of custom-made indoor footwear in people with diabetes at high risk for plantar foot ulceration and in possession of regular custom-made footwear. Research design and methods Adherence indoors and outdoors was assessed objectively as percentage of steps custom-made footwear was worn, at baseline (in regular custom-made footwear), and at 1 and 12 months after providing custom-made indoor footwear (in both indoor and regular footwear). Primary group: participants with low (<80%) baseline indoor adherence; secondary group: participants with high (≥80%) baseline indoor adherence. Peak plantar pressures of the indoor footwear were compared with the regular custom-made footwear. Footwear usability was evaluated at 3 months via a questionnaire. At 12 months, ulcer recurrence was assessed through participant/prescriber reporting. Results Of 31 participants, 23 had low baseline indoor adherence (<80%). Overall adherence in this group increased statistically significant from median 65% (IQR: 56%–72%) at baseline to 77% (60%–89%) at 1 month (p=0.002) and 87% (60%–93%) at 12 months (p<0.001). This was due to a significant increase in adherence indoors: baseline: 48% (21%–63%); 1 month: 71% (50%–83%) (p=0.001); and 12 months: 77% (40%–91%) (p<0.001). Mean peak plantar pressures were comparable between the indoor and regular custom-made footwear. Participants were positive about usability. One-year ulcer recurrence rate was 26%. Conclusions Footwear adherence increased in the short-term and long-term after provision of custom-made indoor footwear in people at high risk of diabetic foot ulceration with low baseline adherence, because they actively wore their newly provided indoor footwear inside their house. Footwear adherence may be helped by using both regular and indoor custom-made footwear in clinical practice; the effect on ulcer recurrence should be investigated in future trials.


Hybrid quantum-classical workflows have become standard methods for executing variational algorithms and other quantum simulation techniques, which are key applications for noisy intermediate scale quantum (NISQ) computers. Validating these simulations is an important task which helps gauge the progress of quantum computer development, and classical simulation can serve as a tool to this end. Both exact and more scalable approximate methods with quantifiable error bounds can be used in validation tasks where the applicable metrics include the distance from a calculable ground truth, the quality of an error model fit to data, etc. Here we present a library extension that includes methods for validation of quantum simulations based on scalable hybrid workflows executable on high performance computers. We provide examples that use approximate methods based on tensor networks and stabilizer simulators to bound the error of quantum simulations on NISQ hardware.


A thin wire-based finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) model for a simple analysis of insulated and resistively loaded cylindrical antennas fed by coaxial lines is proposed. The resistive loading and the coaxial feed line are approximated to equivalent resistors along the antenna axis and the equivalent source over the infinitesimal feed gap, respectively. The effects of the insulation are corrected by employing thin-wire approximation and the boundary condition. A full coarse-grid FDTD algorithm is then implemented without additional grid refinements for the insulation, the resistive loading and the feed line. As a function of insulation properties and resistive loading profiles, the transient reflected feed voltage and the input impedance of antennas are calculated numerically. The validity of the proposed model is proved by comparing it with the results of the full fine-grid FDTD.


Phason sinks of radiation defects in quasicrystals are considered as partial point defects. The kinetics of point defect absorption by single phasons is studied. A model of the dislocation loop with the phason fault under irradiation is developed. The capture efficiency of the dislocation loop for point defects is derived. The dependence of the dislocation loop bias on the loop radius is obtained. It is shown that the phason defects decrease the total bias in a quasicrystal as compared to an ordinary crystal.


Anchored in the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model, this study investigated the remote and hybrid teaching experiences of seven early childhood teachers (teaching preschool-1st grade) during the 2020-2021 school year amidst COVID-19 in the United States. They were all female (Age = 33-54 years, M = 44 years). Each teacher was interviewed for 30-60 min (M = 40 min) virtually via Zoom. Thematic analysis of the data revealed three main themes linked to teaching demands: (1) the challenge of implementing developmentally appropriate practice effectively, (2) the difficulty of managing the increased teaching workload, and (3) the barriers to promoting student engagement. It also highlighted two salient themes related to teaching resources: (1) institutional support, and (2) emotional support from the students' parents. Embedded within institutional support, there were two distinct types: (1) vertical support, referring to the professional and emotional support from education leaders, and (2) horizontal support, referring to the instrumental and emotional support from fellow teachers.


Nowadays, enterprises have high expectations on Cloud systems to achieve their Business-Level Objectives (BLOs). However, those systems are becoming very complex, thus leading to critical management issues. For these reasons, new self-management strategies of virtualized entities driven by business interests have to be explored. In this paper, we present a business-driven self-management optimization loop, which can firmly contribute to fulfill business strategies of Cloud providers. In this sense, a Business-Driven IT Management (BDIM) model is aimed to assess the impact of IT-related events on business-level metrics. Thereupon those high-level impacts are consumed by a policy management frame-work able to autonomously determine the most suitable IT-level management actions in terms of provider's BLOs compliance. Furthermore, we show the benefits achieved by a Platform as a Service (PaaS) provider when adopting such business-driven management. The results obtained through experimen-tation demonstrate that it is able to maximize, individually and simultaneously, two high-level objectives, in this case economical profit and ecological efficiency.


Both prokaryotes and eukaryotes express a set of highly conserved proteins in response to external and internal stress. The stressors include tissue trauma,anoxia, heavy metal toxicity, infection, changed salinity, and the mmost characterized, heat shock. The result is an expression of stress proteins or heat shock proteins (HSP's) which lead to protection of protein integrity, and also to tolerance under continued heat stress conditions. The Australian backflip abalone ( Haliotis rubra ) is found principally in southern coastal water and also in estuarine/bay environments. Esturaine/bay environments have greater fluctuations in environmental conditions, especially those of salinity and water temperature, than they are found along oceanic coasts. Abalone from esturaine/bay and oceanic coastal environments were subjected to either increased temperature (2° C/day for a total of 10°C) or hyposalinity (80% seawater). Esturaine/bay abolone were less affectes than the oceanic animals by temperature increase and also demonstrated the ability to volume regualte 3 h after the initial salinity shock. SDS-PAGE and Western blotting techniques, together with dot blots of total protein, using HSP70 specific antibodies, were used to detect HSP70s in the foot muscle of the animals and indicated an expression of HSP70 in response to heat shock in abalone, but not following hyposalinity shock. RT-PCR yeilded a partial cDNA clone of HSP70 from the foot muscle.


An approach to stereo based local path planning in unstructured environments is presented. The approach differs from previous stereo based and image based planning systems (e.g. top-down occupancy grid planners, autonomous highway driving algorithms, and view-sequenced route representation), in that it uses specialized cost functions to find paths through an occupancy grid representation of the world directly in the image plane and forgoes a projection of cost information from the image plane down onto a top-down 2D Cartesian cost map. We discuss three cost metrics for path selection in image space. We present a basic image based planning system, discuss its susceptibility to rotational and translational oscillation, and present and implement two extensions to the basic system that overcome these limitations - a cylindrical based image system and a hierarchical planning system. All three systems are implemented in an autonomous robot and are tested against a standard top-down 2D Cartesian planning system on three outdoor courses of varying difficulty. We find that the basic image based planning system fails under certain conditions; however, the cylindrical based system is well suited to the task of local path planning and for use as a high resolution local planning component of a hierarchical planning system.


Performance evaluation is an important part of the enterprises' strategic management. The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) can provide an analytical means to determine the importance of the identified factors. The AHP method assumes that the factors presented in the hierarchical structure are independent; however, this assumes that may be inappropriate in light of certain internal and external environment effects. Therefore, it is necessary to employ of analytic network Process (ANP) method. The traditional financial method cannot fully reflect the performance of enterprises, as a result of which the balanced scorecard (BSC) method was developed. However, BSC also some disadvantages. By giving power weights on indicators, ANP method can make up those disadvantages. The objective of this study is to construct an approach based on the ANP and balanced BSC for creating a method of enterprises' performance evaluation.


Data on depth distribution and 14C content of soil organic carbon, and on soil CO2 production in forest ecosystems are presented and discussed. Downward movement and turnover of soil organic matter is estimated from a box chain model. The downward transfer velocity of soil organic material depends on the litter material composition and on the annual rate of microbial decomposition. Depth distribution of 210Pb and 137Cs was measured. The identical transfer velocity of 210Pb and soil organic material suggests that lead transport is due to movement of the organic material itself. Lead in organic-rich soils obviously is bound rather tightly to the organic carrier by ion exchange or organic complexing. 137Cs migration depends on the turnover and downward movement of soil organic material. Results suggest that cesium is not transported only by the downward movement of solid organic matter, but, due to chemical exchange between the organic and hydrous phases, travels faster than organic matter.


Two fluorescent covalent organic frameworks (COFs) which bear two kinds of pores with different sizes and shapes have been synthesized. The heteropore COFs exhibit spectroscopic and color changes to 2,4,6-trinitrophenol (TNP) with extremely high selectivity and sensitivity, which makes them excellent macroscopic chemosensors for the selective detection of TNP.

publisher-specific, author manuscript: http://rsc.li/journals-terms-of-use


Today, two-dimensional mass spectrometry analysis of biological tissues by means of a technique called mass imaging, mass spectrometry imaging (MSI), or imaging mass spectrometry (IMS) has found application in investigating the distribution of moleculesMSI with matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI) and secondary ion MS (SIMS). However, the size of the matrix crystal and the migration of analytes can decrease the spatial resolution in MALDI, and SIMS can only ionize compounds with relatively low molecular weights. To overcome these problems, we developed a nanoparticle-assisted laser desorption/ionization (nano-PALDI)-based MSI. We used nano-PALDI MSI to visualize lipids and peptides at a resolution of 15 microm in mammalian tissues.


In this article we propose building general-purpose function approximators on top of Haar Scattering Networks. We advocate that this architecture enables a better comprehension of feature extraction, in addition to its implementation simplicity and low computational costs. We show its approximation and feature extraction capabilities in a wide range of different problems, which can be applied on several phenomena in signal processing, system identification, econometrics and other potential fields.


Based on their shift and scale orthogonality properties, scaling and wavelet functions may be used as signaling functions having good frequency localization as determined by the fractional-out-of-band power (FOOBP). In this paper, application of Daubechies' wavelet and scaling functions as baseband signaling functions is described, with a focus on finding discretely realizable pulse-shaping transfer function circuits whose outputs approximate scaling and wavelet functions when driven by more conventional digital signaling waveforms. It is also shown that the intersymbol interference (ISI) introduced by the approximation has negligible effect on the performance in terms of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Moreover, the approximations are often more bandwidth efficient than the original wavelet functions. These waveforms thus illustrate an example solution of a tradeoff between residual ISI and bandwidth efficiency as a signal design problem.


In the early 1990s, El Camino Hospital (ECH) streamlined its operations in order to remain competitive. In 1992, the hospital's District Board voted to turn the hospital's management over to a nonprofit company and it became an integrated delivery system (IDS). Hospital employees continued to suffer as their work and work schedules changed in ongoing efforts by the new administration to streamline. Finally, in early 1997, the IDS, Camino Healthcare, was dissolved. The director of radiology and radiation oncology services became aware of increasing employee problems, from high turnover rates and increased absenteeism, to morale and productivity issues. Employees also worried about job redesign, re-engineering and a lack of clear direction and expectations from department leadership. The director of the department created a task force to respond to the needs of staff members. With so much anger directed at department leadership, supervisory staff were not included in the task force. The task force worked first to identify rumors and innuendos and followed with a plan to resolve such issues. The second step was to agree to focus on issues that they could change and to let go of those they couldn't. They selected five priority issues or concerns. The group met weekly and made progress by replacing negative talk and attitudes with positive ones. Meanwhile, the director researched employee satisfaction issues so she would be prepared to discuss such issues and concerns with employees. She focused on a common theme, of having a personal mission or goal for one's self. She encouraged staff members to be aware of their own behavior when communicating with others. Although several informal surveys proved there was still much work to be done, there was positive response--a light at the end of the long tunnel.


We report the effects of gate bias sweep rate on the electronic characteristics of ZnO nanowire field-effect transistors (FETs) under different environments. As the device was swept at slower gate bias sweep rates, the current decreased and threshold voltage shifted to a positive gate bias direction. These phenomena are attributed to increased adsorption of oxygen on the nanowire surface by the longer gate biasing time. Adsorbed oxygens capture electrons and cause a surface depletion in the nanowire channel. Different electrical trends were observed for ZnO nanowire FETs under different oxygen environments of ambient air, N2, and passivation.


Azotobacter was selectively isolated and purified from the soil samples of Xinjiang Salt Lake Scenic spot, the fermentation technology of exopolysaccharides (EPS) by Azotobacter was optimized, and the antioxidant activity of exopolysaccharides (EPS) was studied. The bacteria were isolated and purified from the soil samples by the scribing method and the 16SrRNA gene was used for molecular identification. The carbon source, fermentation time, inoculation amount and pH of target bacteria in the exopolysaccharides (EPS) fermentation process were optimized through single-factor experiments and their antioxidant activity was measured. Eight types of Azotobacter were isolated and purified from the soil samples of Salt Lake scenic spot. Among them, As101, which showed 99.58% homology with Azotobacter salinestris, was selected as the target strain. Through single-factor experiments which used exopolysaccharides (EPS) yield and exopolysaccharides content as indexes, the optimal conditions for the As101 fermentation process were determined as follows: fermentation temperature 35, fermentation time 96h, pH 7 and mannitol as carbon source. Exopolysaccharides content from Azotobacter salinestris was 61.35% and the yield was 6.34 g/L. The results of the exopolysaccharides (EPS) antioxidant activity experiment under optimal conditions showed that As101 EPS had excellent scavenging ability against DPPH free radical, ABTS free radical and hydroxyl free radical, with IC50 values of 6.11 mg/ml, 2.42 mg/ml and 9.57 mg/ml, respectively. As101 with high yield and high exopolysaccharides content was isolated from saline soil in a special environment of Xinjiang, and the EPS obtained showed excellent antioxidant activity. The Azotobacter found in this study would provide the material basis for further opening up the adsorption of exopolysaccharides on heavy metals and the improvement of saline-alkali soil and contribute to further understanding of the structure and other activities of exopolysaccharides derived from Azotobacter.


The problem of improved robust �� ∞ filtering for a class of uncertain linear continuous-time systems is studied. By applying the idea of delay decomposition, a new Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional is constructed. And based on an integral inequality, an �� ∞ performance analysis criterion for the filtering error system is firstly derived. Then by using a linearsiation technique, the filter synthesis is developed. It is shown that the filter gains can be obtained by solving a set of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs). Moreover, immediate extensions of the results are made to systems with polytopic uncertainties. Finally, two examples are given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.


Asthma is an inflammatory disease caused by repeated immediate phase hypersensitivity and late-phase allergic reactions in the lungs. Resp-Aid is a formula composed of 9 medicinal herbs that supports in the resolution of respiratory disorders (Coltsfoot, Marshamallow, Plantain, Mullein, Horehound, Licorice, Lobelia, Ginger, and Myrrh). These herbs, alone, have shown positive effects in reducing symptoms associated with asthma. However, the effects of the combination of these herbs on asthma is not well understood. Therefore, we conducted a series of studies to explore the mechanism of action of Resp-Aid.

 C57Bl/6 male mice (n = 7 each group) were challenged with or without ovalbumin (OVA). After the challenge, they were divided into 4 groups where 2 groups received 1 drop of Resp-Aid twice daily for 7 days and 2 groups acted as control. On day 5 of the treatment with Resp-Aid the airway hyperresponsiveness (AHR) was measured. After the treatment with Resp-Aid, lungs and bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid were collected and the cytokines (IL-4, IL-5, IL-13, IL-17a, IFNy), MPO and EPO were quantified.

 All OVA-challenged mice had increased AHR, leukocytes and cytokine levels compared to their respective controls showing the development of an asthmatic response. The Resp-Aid asthmatic groups had decreased AHR, IL-13, neutrophils and EPO levels compared to asthmatic mice.

 This data show that Resp-Aid changed the immune response related to asthma, and it may be a potential target for therapeutic intervention in allergic lung disease or asthma.


The low flowback efficiency of fracturing fluid would severely increase water saturation in a near-fracture formation and limit gas transport capacity in the matrix of a shale gas reservoir. Formation heat treatment (FHT) is a state-of-the-art technology to prevent water blocking induced by fracturing fluid retention and accelerate gas desorption and diffusion in the matrix. A comprehensive understanding of its formation damage removal mechanisms and determination of production improvement is conducive to enhancing shale gas recovery. In this research, the FHT simulation experiment was launched to investigate the effect of FHT on gas transport capacity, the multi-field coupling model was established to determine the effective depth of FHT, and the numerical simulation model of the shale reservoir was established to analyze the feasibility of FHT. Experimental results show that the shale permeability and porosity were rising overall during the FHT, the L-1 permeability increased by 30- 40 times, the L-2 permeability increased by more than 100 times. The Langmuir pressure increased by 1.68 times and the Langmuir volume decreased by 26%, which means the methane desorption efficiency increased. Results of the simulation demonstrate that the FHT process can practically improve the effect of hydraulic fracturing and significantly increase the well production capacity. The stimulation mechanisms of the FHT include thermal stress cracking, organic matter structure changing, and aqueous phase removal. Furthermore, the special characteristics of the supercritical water such as the strong oxidation, can not be ignored, due to the FHT can assist the retained hydraulic fracturing fluid to reach the critical temperature and pressure of water and transform to the supercritical state. The FHT can not only alleviate the formation damage induced by the fracturing fluid, but also make good use of the retained fracturing fluid to enhance the permeability of a shale gas reservoir, which is an innovative method to dramatically enhance gas transport capacity in shale matrix.


Soluble Extracellular Polymeric Substances (sEPS) are a mixture of microbial soluble polymers produced during aerobic or anaerobic treatment of wastewater. Gel layers mainly consisting of sEPS are usually present in the fouling layers of membrane bioreactors (MBRs) and in the dynamic membranes (DMs) of dynamic membrane bioreactors (DMBRs), and their properties have not been thoroughly investigated over the years. In this study, sEPS fractions recovered from aerobic and anaerobic reactors were analyzed and tested to build-up EPS gel layers on a 0.2 µm pore size polycarbonate carrier. Dead-end filtration experiments showed that anaerobic sEPS layers, which have a low polysaccharide:protein (PS:PN) ratio, had a lower hydraulic resistance than the aerobic sEPS gel layers, which show a high PS:PN ratio. Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) and Confocal Laser Scanning Microscopy (CLSM) analyses highlighted that both layers had similar thicknesses and 3D structural organizations. Fluorescent staining of organics and biovolume analysis revealed that for the anaerobic sEPS (low PS:PN), the abundance of proteins appears to destabilize the polysaccharide network increasing the water permeability through the layer. Additionally, the polysaccharides present in the anaerobic sEPS were mainly of the α-linked type, contributing to a more open crosslinked network within the layer, resulting in the low filtration resistance measured. The filtration characteristics observed in this study for the sEPS layers from anaerobic mixed cultures are of interest for possible future application of those layers as dynamic membranes within anaerobic reactors.


Analytical scanning electron microscopy has been used to determine the major element compositions of some natural and artificial silicate glasses and their microcrystalline equivalents derived by the frictional melting of intermediate to acid protoliths. The data show that the matrices of the friction melts (which cool to form pseudotachylytes) are relatively basic and hydrous, even when their protoliths are intermediate to acid. This is because frictional fusion involves the selective comminution and nonequilibrium melting of minerals based on their individual mechanical properties and melting points, not the formation of minimum melts through equilibrium mineral interaction. This means that hydrous ferromagnesian minerals (e.g., micas and amphiboles) melt preferentially to form the liquid matrix, while feldspars and especially quartz more readily survive as clasts. Pseudotachylytes generated by frictional melting are therefore not bulk melts, and as clast-melt suspensions, they cannot be considered as simple Newtonian fluids. The calculated viscosities of the friction melts are low. For example, at 1200°C, most friction melts possess zero-shear suspension viscosities of 102–104 dPa s (1 dPa s = 1 P). This is equivalent to the viscosities of tholeiitic and alkaline basaltic magmas at the same temperature. These viscosities are maximum determinations because, as clast-melt suspensions, friction melts may undergo shear thinning and exhibit pseudoplasticity at high shear rates (i.e., during slip on a fault surface). Contrary to earlier suggestions, where the bulk melting of intermediate to acid protoliths was believed to result in the generation of viscous friction melts that could act to inhibit continued sliding, this work shows that most pseudotachylytes are partial melts possessing low viscosities. The formation of highly fluid suspensions during slip may have profound effects on the dissipation of stored strain energy in the rocks surrounding a fault. Interface lubrication could facilitate an increase in the slip rate and the rate of energy dissipation. This would be manifest as an increase in high-frequency seismic wave radiation and vibrational.


Coconut fiber, one of many types of natural fibers, is an agricultural waste which is left unutilized after the coconut fruits and juice are extracted. In this research, the effect of the different chemical treatments on the morphological, chemical and physical properties of coconut fiber and its influence on the properties of the modified bitumen were studied. The mercerization effectively altered the surface morphology and reduced the diameter of the coconut fiber. The waxy layer present on the surface of
the coconut fiber was significantly reduced after mercerization. Acetylation reported minor reduction on the waxy layer and did not cause any significant changes on the diameter of the coconut fiber. The chemical characterization reported that the hemicelluloses were present only on the surface of the natural coconut fiber whereas the peak of Fourier Transform Infrared spectra associated with the presence of waxes was observed for natural and chemically treated coconut fibers. The bitumen modified with chemically treated coconut fibers exhibited lower penetration values and higher softening point. From the analyses of
penetration value, softening point and penetration index, the bitumen modified with 10% NaOH and 50% CH3COOH treated
coconut fibers resulted in enhanced properties for paving binders to be used in warmer region.


Background and Objectives: Enlargement of the thyroid gland is called goiter. The aim of this study is to investigate the prevalence of the goiter and thyroid dysfunction in healthy children aged 7-18 years in Bojnurd city. Materials & Methods: This cross-sectional study was carried out on 176,7-18 years old students in Bojnurd. The demographic and anthropometric data were collected with questionnaires. Physical examination was performed by endocrinologist in order to staging of goiter. Fasting blood sample was obtained to measure the level of thyroid hormones and TSH. The data were analyzed using SPSS software and presented with chi-square, fisher test and logistic regression Results: According to the results 28.4 % of students had goiter including 26.1% grade 1 and 3.2% grade 2. Thyroid function tests revealed 38 students (21.6 %) had subclinical hypothyroidism. A meaningful subclinical hypothyroidism was observed in 26% of girls and 18.2 % of boys (p=0.021). Conclusions: Given that to our results the prevalence of the goiter in Bojnurd was moderate more attention to this would be necessary.


Microfluidic technology offers vast promise for implementing biochemistry-on-chip with diverse applications to clinical diagnosis, genome analysis, drug design, and point-of-care testing. Among various types of fluid-chips, droplet-based digital microfluidic biochips (DMFBs), which consist of a patterned array of controllable electrodes, provide the advantage of programmability, ease of fluidic operations, and versatile droplet mobility. However, because of manufacturing or field defects, electrode degradation, or dielectric breakdown, these chips may suffer from incorrect fluidic behavior. Reliability of fluidic operations is of utmost concern in DMFBs that are used to perform safety-critical bio-protocols. Various methods are deployed to test these devices, either offline or being overlapped with bioassay operations (termed as concurrent or in-field testing). The main challenge of in-field testing lies in the fact that the test must run concurrently with the execution of the normal assay without hampering the correctness of the latter. In prior work, optimal testing for droplet mobility over all electrodes was formulated in terms of finding either a Hamiltonian path or a Eulerian path in an undirected graph that represents the electrode-adjacency structure. Although these models have been studied for offline testing, no such effort was made in the area of concurrent testing. In this work, we propose, for in-field application, an SAT-based modeling and solution approach to find an optimal test plan that can be used to check droplet movement across the boundary between every pair of adjacent electrodes, which is visited by the droplets of the ongoing assay. The proposed method is robust and determines a test solution successfully regardless of the cover assay that is being executed concurrently. Experiments on several real-life assays and other test cases demonstrate the effectiveness of the method with respect to test completion time.


A full-rate multiplexer (MUX) with a multiphase clock architecture for over 40 Gbit/s optical communication systems is presented. The 4:1 MUX is comprised of a re-timer based on a D-type flip-flop (DFF) and a clock tree system that uses EXOR-type delay buffers to match its skews well to those of the data. The supply voltage is reduced to -1.5 V by analyzing the voltage allocation. Fabricated in a 0.13-mum InP HEMT technology, a DFF test circuit achieved 75-Gbit/s operation and exhibited performance sufficient to re-time 50-Gbit/s serialized data. The 4:1 MUX measurement results demonstrate successful 50-Gbit/s operation at room temperature, and 40-Gbit/s operation, which has 10-11 error free for 231 - 1 pseudorandom bit stream (PRBS) data, up to an ambient temperature of 90 degrees or down to - 1.24 V of supply voltage. The circuit consumes 450 mW at a - 1.5-V supply and exhibits an output jitter of 283 fs rms at 50-Gbit/s operation. We also propose a multiphase clock generator for a MUX that has a serialization of more than four channels.


Vocabulary is very important in language. Without vocabulary people cannot develop the language skills namely, listening, speaking, reading and writing. One of the difficulties of students in English learning activity was vocabulary. The students" vocabulary mastery in SMPN 24 Bandar Lampung was still low. The objective of this research was to know whether there was an influence of using crossword puzzle towards students" vocabulary mastery at the second semester of the seventh grade of SMPN 24 Bandar Lampung in the academic year of 2017/2018.
The methodology of this research was quasi experimental design with the treatment held in five meetings for each class and it consisted of one meeting for pretest, three meetings for treatment and one meeting for posttest. In the experimental class the researcher applied Crossword puzzle as treatment and in control class, the researcher applied Bingo game. The population of this research was seventh grade students of SMPN 24 Bandar Lampung. In collecting the data, the researcher used test. the researcher took the sample by using cluster random technique and the reseacher determind that VII A as the experimental class and VII B as the control class. the researcher used instruments, pre-test and post-test. The instrument of this research was vocabulary test. After giving the post-test, the research analyzed the data by using SPSS to compute independent sample t-test.
After the researcher analyzed the data by using independent sample t-test, it was found that the result of Sig. (2-tailed) of the equal variance was 0.000 < a = 0.05. It means that H0 is rejected and Ha is accepted. Based on the computation, it can be concluded that there was influence of using crossword puzzle towards students" vocabulary mastery at the second semester of the seventh grade of SMPN 24 Bandar Lampung in the academic year of 2017/2018.


FLASH (Free electron LASer in Hamburg) is the first facility based on the 1.3GHz superconducting cavity technology. It is a test bed for this technology to prepare future accelerators like the XFEL and the ILC. Since 2005 FLASH runs as a reliable FEL source for user experiments. The control system DOOCS (Distributed Object-Oriented Control System) provides the required full bunch resolution of the diagnostics. A fast DAQ (Data AQuisition system) has successfully been integrated to support slow feedback, diagnostics and data recording for both, the linac operation and the user experiments. The control system will be slowly upgraded to implement the further requirements for the XFEL.


Numerous international studies have demonstrated a relationship between HIV/AIDS and auditory function. The aim of this study was to explore this relationship in a group of adults infected with HIV/AIDS attending an outpatient clinic in a hospital located in Gauteng, South Africa. The prevalence of hearing loss; the type, degree and configuration of the hearing loss; the relationship between the hearing symptoms and the progressive stages of the disease, and the type of onset of hearing problems were examined. The results of the study indicated a prevalence rate of hearing loss which was as high as 23% in the sample surveyed. The types of hearing loss included conductive and sensorineural, while the degree of severity ranged from slight to profound in nature. The configuration of the hearing loss was not frequency-range-specific, and the degree of severity did not seem to worsen with the progression of the HIV/AIDS disease. However, there did seem to be an increase in the occurrence of sensorineural hearing loss with the deterioration of patients' immunological status. Analysis of patients' audiological results along with their case history data suggested that their hearing loss may have been caused by opportunistic infections and/or their treatments. These results are discussed in terms of their implications for the clinical management of patients with HIV/AIDS; education of team members; and policy formulation.


This article directly responds to an article authored by Iacono and Brown published in Dance Research (2016), and considers issues emerging since its publication. The core topic is the UNESCO Convention from 2003, and in our view, criticism in the 2016 article is based on misinterpretation. We address the claims that the Convention is marked by binarism and provide in-depth background for the concept of intangible cultural heritage. We also caution against using the biomorphic term 'living cultural heritage' as its application stands in an ambiguous relation toward essentialist, organicist and totalitarian ideologies. We end with a discussion on attitudes toward globalisation and the concept of innovation. These, we argue, have profound implications for recent discussions on decolonisation.


The ability to cope with threats is crucial in today's troubling times, especially for young people who are still developing coping mechanisms. Psychopathology and the development of anxiety disorders can be viewed as a failure to adapt to changing demands. We draw on a study by Klein et al. (Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 2023), which showed that anxious youths exhibited stronger conditioned fear responses and, during delayed extinction learning, greater electrocortical differences between threat and safety stimuli. Interestingly, these signatures of learning processes were also associated with treatment outcomes. We argue for developmentally sensitive research: Individual learning and associated cognitive-affective changes are strongly age-dependent and represent the key mechanism for both anxiety development and treatment. They also interact with social and environmental factors. Based on the call for age- and context-sensitive research, future research should focus on establishing reliable risk profiles that consider a variety of factors to enable evidence-based, individualized treatment decisions.


This paper focuses on the consumer imagination and, more specifically, on the imaginary shopping spaces which women's magazines create. It addresses the anticipatory, imaginary and experiential consumption which this medium invites. The paper explores how women's magazines function as 'dreamworlds' of shopping; and how contemporary readers consume these imaginaryshoppingspaces.Inordertoillustratewhattheauthorstermthe'shoppingimaginary', they draw on findings from a study of women's experiential consumption of magazines, which show the multifaceted ways around which imaginary consumption is explored and enjoyed by women. The study suggests that women's magazines, like department stores, are spaces that facilitate and celebrate just looking and browsing, and, above all, they are shopping spaces that address the power of the imagination within them. Copyright # 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


The long-term preservation of anaerobic ammonium oxidation (anammox) microorganisms via vacuum lyophilization process would help commercialize the technique. In this study, vacuum lyophilization was evaluated for the cost-effective long-term preservation of such microorganisms. Skim milk was found to be the most effective cryoprotectant for maintaining the physiological properties (heme c, EPS, and the PN/PS ratio) of anammox microorganisms. Conversely, the vacuum lyophilization technique was shown to cause serious damage to the quorum sensing (QS) system of anammox, so that anammox activity was not adequately recovered afterwards. To overcome this limitation, activation of the AHL-mediated QS system were applied to the vacuum lyophilization process. Endogenous (i.e., fresh anammox sludge of 10%) and exogenous (i.e., C6-HSL of 60 mg/L) QS autoinducers significantly increased anammox activity to 88.2 ± 12.2 and 130.0 ± 12.2 mgTN/gVSS/d, respectively, after 56 d of reactivation. In addition, nitrogen removal potentials were estimated to be 123.5 and 87.5 gTN/m3/d, respectively. The effect of the exogenous QS autoinducer on anammox reactivation was reconfirmed through the comparison experiment. The results of this study will be greatly significant to this field since they improve the feasibility of the once-underestimated vacuum lyophilization technique.


Abstract Question: The use of expert-based indicator values to estimate abiotic conditions from vegetation is widespread. However, recent research has shown that expert judgement may contain considerable bias and thereby introduces a large amount of uncertainty. Could expert based indicator values be replaced by indicator values based on field measurements? Location: Europe. Methods: We developed a method to estimate species response based on measured physical data, and a method to predict abiotic conditions from the vegetation composition using these responses. This method was tested for soil pH. Results: We were able to estimate the pH response of 556 species of the Dutch flora. Ca. 20% of the responses were, at least, bimodal and many responses had a very wide range. The simplest method ('raw mean') yielded the best prediction of pH; the indicator value of a species is the mean of the soil pH values of the sites where it was observed. A list of all raw-mean estimates per species is given. The predicted pH of a new site is the mean of the indicator values of the present species. The estimated species responses were validated on independent Dutch and European data sets. Older successional stages seem to be predicted better than younger stages. Conclusions: Our method performed better than the popular Ellenberg indicator system for the Dutch data set, while being just as easy to use, because it only needs a single value per species. We foresee that, when more data become available, our method has the potential to replace the Ellenberg system. Abbreviation: RMSEP = Root mean squared error prediction.


In Reply.— We agree that a dispassionate examination of the health effects of marijuana is much needed. This examination must begin by making the important distinction between "marijuana" and Δ 9 -tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in marijuana now being assessed as a possible antiemetic agent and for use in treating glaucoma. At this time, it is THC in liquid oral dosage form that is being evaluated by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and scores of physicians nationwide. It appears to be an effective antiemetic for cancer patients receiving certain powerful chemotherapy agents, with the exception of pediatric or geriatric patients who do not tolerate well the psychotropic effects. The THC is manufactured with careful quality control so that the quality and quantity of the drug may be relied on by physicians and patients. Although shortages have resulted from the government's underestimation of demand, the drug has, nonetheless, been widely


Almost all applications using interactive graphics contain important structures and concepts which are deeper than the geometres used to display them to the user. One of the major tasks of the system implementer is to cause the user interface to reflect this deeper structure accurately so that it may be directly manipulated by the user. The authors describe a tool, the Higgens user interface management system (UIMS), which can automate much of this task for a wide class of systems using interactive graphics. It is able to generate graphical user interfaces automatically from a high-level interface specification. These specifications are primarily nonprocedural in nature. They describe how graphical images can be automatically derived and updated based on applications entities, and how graphical inputs can be translated back into terms which are appropriate to the application. >


Creative Commons Atribuição 4.0 Internacional. ABSTRACT The common notion of artifacts characterizes them as the products of successful activities of their makers, guided by intentions that such objects would instantiate certain features, such as their specific functions. Many counterexamples, however, reveal the unsuitability of the common notion. In the face of this acknowledgment, the paper explores the possibility that features of artifacts, and more specifically, the possession of their functions, may arise, at least partially, from collective assignments. In order to achieve the mentioned goal, the paper critically examines some notions and theses put forward by John Searle (1996; 2010) and others. Its main result, however, consists in offering and elucidating an original thesis, namely, that the functions of many artifacts would be maintained, partially, by forms of continuous collective intentionality, which can involve conscious or unconscious, active or inactive collective intentional states.


Simulation is a tool required in any process of technical and organizational design. Depending on project goals, simulation may have different levels of realism, involve more or less resources (technical, time, economic, etc.), multiple goals (quality, safety, training, etc.) and can be used in a wide range of sectors and areas of design (architectural, computer, industrial, purely organizational, etc.). However, the whole range of simulation methods could be described according to different models. In this presentation we will describe two of those models of simulation processes used in the design of high-risk environments.


Arizona's population is growing, its urban areas and its communities in rural areas are rapidly expanding, and people are building more homes in what was once natural forest, grass and brush lands. Thus, it is important people know how to correctly landscape their property to reduce wildfire hazards. Improper landscaping can greatly increase the risk of structure and property damage from wildfire. It is a question of when, not if, a wildfire will strike any particular area.


1. The pattern of nervous discharge from tympanal organs and abdominal hair sensillae resulting from stimulation by natural and imitation stridulation has been studied in four species of Acrididae, namely Stenobothrus tineatus, Omocestus viridulus, Chorthippus parallelus and C. brunneus . 2. Experiments with tympanal organs stimulated repeatedly with identical sound pulses show that the resultant volleys of spikes, although synchronous with the pulse frequency of the stimulus, were variable in themselves, and that this variability was random, bearing no simple relationship to any quality of the stimulus. This variability in the structure of the impulse bursts was manifested with both natural and imitation stridulation. 3. The response of abdominal hair sensillae showed them to be capable of signalling the duration of supra-liminal stimuli, and responses signalling pulse repetition frequencies were limited to cases where the pulse rates did not exceed 5 per second. In the present species, this meant that only the normal songs of C. brunneus and C. parallelus would produce impulse bursts in tergal nerves synchronous with the pulse frequency of the stimulus. 4. On the basis of this evidence it is adduced that the characteristic of stridulation which enables inter-specific recognition to be effected is the pulse repetition rate of the songs. 5. Comparative data from the four species show that the auditory receptors throughout are very similar, and thus the pattern of nervous discharge will be, in its essential element of the rate of impulse burst, the same for all species when exposed to the same stimulus. The discrimination process must thus be a central one, and it is suggested that this problem might be examined in relation to the 'Reafferenzprincip' of von Hoist & Mittelstaedt (1950).


The recent article by Drs Fisher and Chin which described a considerable reduction in postoperative vomiting in patients who had previously suffered severe vomiting after general anaesthesia (Anaesthesia 1984; 39 279-81) was interesting. The salient features of their technique are the use of promethazine as a premedicant, and droperidol. Peroutka and Snyder' have described studies showing that the chemoreceptor trigger zone has a high density of dopamine (D,) receptors, the vomiting centre has a high density of histamine (H,) receptors in the nucleus tractus solitarius and muscarinic cholinergic receptors are found in high density in the dorsal motor nucleus of the vagus and the nucleus ambiguus which initiate the motor components of vomiting. The affinity ofantiemetics for these receptors has been studied. Promethazine has high potency at H , and muscarinic cholinergic receptors, but relatively poor affinity at Dz receptors. Droperidol has high potency at D, receptors but poor affinity at H, and muscarinic cholinergic receptors. Hence Peroutka and Snyder advocated that, until the development of a single agent acting at all receptors, combinations of antiemetics might prove efficacious. Anaesthetists probably tend to underrate the distress of postoperative vomiting, yet at pre-operative visits patients often stress their concern about vomiting, having experienced it after previous anaesthetics. A study by Cronin, Redfern and Utting2 of one hundred patients having various procedures found that 44 were troubled by postoperative vomiting and for seven it was 'the worst thing about their visit to the operating theatre'. Purkis3 found that patients with a history of postoperative vomiting had a much higher incidence of vomiting after subsequent operations than did patients who had not vomited after previous operations. lnconclusion I would stress thedesirabilityofalleviatingvomitingin patients whoare predisposed toit. Fisher and Chin's results show the usefulness of a polypharmaceutical approach. Shackleton Department of Anaesthetics, Southampton General Hospital. Shirley, Southampton SO9 4XY W.V. HOWARD


The invention concerns a dynamic display system based on a backlit box (1, 1', 1'') provided with at least one front opening (10), support means (16) for supporting a poster frame (3), with a backlighting system for the poster. A removable digitally controlled display device (2) in inserted in the opening (10) left free by the poster. The removable device (2) comprises a front part formed by a flat display screen (200) mounted in a frame (20), and a controlling and managing rear part fixed on the back of the front part. The removable device (2) comprises an electrical and mechanical interface to set up a connection with an electric power supply and maintain the device in the opening (10).


Let X be a
topological vector space and let S be a locally compact space. Let us consider the function space of all
continuous functions , vanishing outside a compact set of S, equipped with an appropriate topology. In
this work we will be concerned with the relationship between bounded operators , and X-valued integrals on . When X is a Banach space, such relation has been
completely achieved via Bochner integral in [1]. In
this paper we investigate the context of locally convex spaces and we will focus
attention on weak integrals, namely the Pettis integrals. Some
results in this direction have been obtained, under some special conditions on
the structure of X and
its topological dual X*. In this work we consider the case of a semi reflexive locally convex space and prove that each Pettis integral with respect to a signed
measure μ, on S gives rise to a unique bounded operator , which has the given Pettis integral form.


East Java province is one of the most populated provinces of older persons in Indonesia, and Kota Batu District occupied most of the older persons in the province. Most of older persons in Indonesia, including those who are residing in Kota Batu District, are poor. Kota Batu District is one of the districts that have a large number of older persons in Indonesia. Thus far not many research related to older persons has been conducted in the area. Although in recent years quality of life of the population has become a popular topic of discussion among academicians in Indonesia, quality of life of older persons has been a neglected area of study. Research on demography in Indonesia is still concentrated on younger population. Therefore, this paper is aimed at examining the level of quality of life of older persons aged 60 years and older. In particular, this study is aimed at exploring whether the level of quality of life is difference in terms of sex differences of older persons. Using a simple random sampling technique, a total of 300 older persons aged 60 years and older was selected. Data were gathered through face-to-face interviews using a questionnaire form, and analyzed descriptively. Result of the study show the majority of older persons in study area has a moderate level of quality of life, and there was no significant difference exist in the level of quality of life of old persons in terms of sex differences. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n3s2p313


This paper surveys the "neurally" inspired problem-solving approaches to the traveling salesman problem, namely, the Hopfield-Tank network, the elastic net, and the self-organizing map. The latest achievements in the neural network domain are reported and numerical comparisons are provided with the classical solution approaches of operations research. An extensive bibliography with more than one hundred references is also included. INFORMS Journal on Computing , ISSN 1091-9856, was published as ORSA Journal on Computing from 1989 to 1995 under ISSN 0899-1499.


This report is a technical verification and validation of ADS-B (Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast) over VDL Mode 4 (Very High Frequency Data Link Mode 4) for the use in the surveillance element of an A-SMGCS (Advanced Surface Movement Guidance and Control System). The main objective of this report is to examine if ADS-B/VDL Mode 4 fulfils the technical requirements for an implementation at Arlanda airport, Stockholm Sweden. The report also includes a FMECA (Failure Mode, Effects and Criticality Analysis), a theoretical background and methods for monitoring. The process of making this report can be divided into three phases: 1. Preliminary Study. In this phase the requirements were examined and structured. 2. Verification. In this phase the system performance has been verified both theoretically and by several tests at Arlanda Airport. Simulation results have also been used. 3. Validation and documentation. The tests and verifications that were performed in phase 2 were validated in the third phase of the project. The final project document was also written in this phase. The main conclusion from this analysis is that ADS-B/VDL Mode 4 is well suited for surveillance. ADS-B/VDL Mode 4 has the possibility to fulfil all considered requirements, apart from detecting all obstacles. But if all the requirements are going to be fulfilled depends both on the implementation and the operational environment. The results from this verification and validation should be used as the technical subset in a future safety case, both in Sweden and internationally.