Erosion and transport of juvenile benthic invertebrates, including bivalves, has the potential to alter patterns of distribution and abundance during the early postsettlement period. Field observations indicate that there is often great spatial variability in rates of transport of juvenile bivalves. Differences in transport among sites may arise from both physical and biological causes, including variation in water flow, sediment grain size, and the local biological community. In this study, an experiment was conducted in a laboratory flume to examine the effect of sediment source (4 subtidal sites in the Navesink River estuary, New Jersey, USA) and flow velocity on rates of trans- port of juvenile Mya arenaria and Gemma gemma. Rates of erosion of M. arenaria were significantly related to sediment volume eroded, suggesting that dispersal at high flow speeds is linked to bedload transport. Sediment erosion and clam transport was lower for sediment cores from the 2 sites where the sediment was covered by a mat of amphipod Ampelisca abdita tubes. Reduction of the tube mat resulted in a small but significant increase in sediment erosion. The results of this study and compar- ison of shear velocities between the laboratory and the field suggest that both the presence of an amphipod mat and low shear velocities will result in low rates of transport of sediment and juvenile clams in the field.


Abstract. The goal of this paper is to extract automatically the building contours regardless of shape. By extracting these contours, detection results will be more accurate, giving useful information about urban area, which is important for many tasks, like map updating and disaster management. First, we extract local feature points from the image, based on a modification of Harris detector's saliency function, which can represent urban area and building effectively. This point set is then used to define the main orientation of the buildings, which characterizes well an urban region and helps to define directions, where object contours have to be searched. Second, we applied shearlet approach to extract edges in the defined directions. This results in an edge map, which helps us to determine point subsets belonging to the same building. Convex hulls of the point subsets is used for contour initialization, then region based Chan-Vese Active Contour method is applied to extract the accurate building outlines.


There is a common perception of reciprocity as a concept that is opposed to the communitarian interests that characterise contemporary international law, or merely a way of denoting reactions to unfriendly or wrongful conduct. This book disputes this approach, and highlights how reciprocity is instead linked to the structural characteristic of sovereign equality of States in international law. This book carries out an in-depth analysis of the concept of reciprocity and the elements that characterise it, before examining the various roles and articulations of reciprocity in a number of fields of public international law: the law of treaties, the treatment of individuals, the execution of international law, and the jurisdiction of international courts and tribunals. In all these areas, it analyses both more traditional and more contemporary examples, to demonstrate how reciprocity is closely linked to the very structure of public international law.


The influence of pH on the myocardial disposition of propafenone was studied in isolated perfused rabbit hearts. Five pH groups were evaluated: pH 7.0, 7.2, 7.4, 7.6, and 7.8. Hearts were perfused with a modified Krebs-Henseleit buffer containing approximately 100 ng/ml propafenone. Myocardial propafenone accumulation was determined from differences in the aortic perfusate and coronary sinus effluent propafenone concentrations. The myocardial accumulation of propafenone was significantly pH dependent. The steady-state propafenone concentration increased from 5.9 ± 1.3μg/g at pH 7.0 to 13.2 ± 3.8 μg/g at pH 7.4 and 24.2 ± 3.5 μg/g at pH 7.6. The time to reach steady-state myocardial propafenone levels increased proportionately with the increased propafenone levels. Steady-state was not reached by 150 min at pH of 7.6 or 7.8. Percent change in QRS duration was measured to monitor the electrophysiologic effect of propafenone. The relationship between the myocardial drug concentration and the measured changes in QRS also was evaluated. The myocardial concentration–effect relationships were linear over the observed myocardial concentration range. The slopes of these concentration–effect relationships were similar for three groups (pH 7.0, 7.2, and 7.4). Over the pH range 7.0–7.4, the steady-state effect increased as a function of pH and correlated with the differences in propafenone steady-state myocardial concentrations. However, at alkalotic pH. the concentration–effect relationship was shifted to the right; less effect was observed than might be predicted for the myocardial propafenone concentration. Thus, small changes in pH may significantly alter the myocardial distribution and pharmacodynamics of propafenone.


thoroughness and loving care, making use of both printed sources and of oral information. The fame of dGe-'dun-c'os-'p'el, already widespread during his lifetime, has increased greatly after his death. And yet, I cannot avoid the feeling that a book of nearly 400 pages, with all the devoted work and effort it implies, is more than this colourful and sad figure deserved; in spite of his learning, open mindedness and strength of character, he can hardly be said to have played an effective role in the tense years that preceded the downfall of traditional Tibet. Some minor points are open to objections. P. 33 and p. 41. To maintain that Tibetan Buddhism was the official religion of the Manchu empire is an overstatement; the personal leanings and tastes of the first four emperors and of their families had little or nothing to do with the state ideology and ritualism. P. 112. The avaddna are legends of the previous births of the historical Buddha, not parables illustrating the sutra. P. 311, n. 17. Dandin, the famous author of the Kavyadarsa, was certainly not a Buddhist.


Two of the most prominent phenomena in the study of social determinants of health, the socio-economic gradient in health and the income inequality–health association, have both been suggested to be explainable by the mechanism of status comparisons. This, however, has rarely ever been tested in a direct fashion. In this article, we explicate and test this mechanism by assessing the role of social comparison orientation. Research has shown that individuals vary in their propensity to engage in social comparisons, and those with a higher propensity are also more likely to be affected by the outcomes of such comparisons. In our analysis, we check whether the tendency to compare one's income to that of others can contribute to explaining socio-economic disparities in health. Using individual-level data (N = 18,356) from 23 European countries on self-rated overall health and psychological well-being, we show that a high-income comparison orientation neither moderates the negative effect of income inequality on health nor the health differences by relative income. Our findings cast doubt on the crucial role that researchers such as Wilkinson and Pickett (2010) have attributed to the mechanism of status differentiation as the link between social stratification and health outcomes.


Chronic pain represents a disorder of high unmet medical need. It can be a pain so excruciating that words fail to describe it and doctors cannot explain it, leading some patients to consider committing suicide. It can be described as a malfunction in the central nervous system (CNS), usually following injury to the peripheral nerves or to the CNS. This injury can result from direct damage to the nerves, for instance through amputation, or be triggered by medical conditions such as diabetic neuropathy, AIDS-related neuropathy, degenerative spinal disease and multiple sclerosis. It is a condition that is thought to effect over 25 million people worldwide, with a considerable associated cost to healthcare providers. In the past couple of decades, an important focus of research has been the study of novel pain mechanisms, particularly the biological pathways that lead to the abnormal sensitivity known as spontaneous pain and hyperalgesia. This symposium brings together experts from industry and academia from the U.K., the U.S. and Europe. Speakers covered the latest advances in understanding of new biological pathways, as well as findings from recent drug discovery programs.


Back propagation (BP) neural network model was established, using the corrosion data of five kinds of recently developed bainite weathering steel and the commercial weathering steel 09CuPCrNi exposed in the offshore platform in Wanning. The influences of elements P, Cu, C and Cr on the corrosion behavior of weathering steel were studied according to the model. The experimental results indicate that the corrosion depth of bainite weathering steel corroded for 1 year could decline owing to the increasing contents of P, Cu and Cr in steel while C has little effect on the variation of the corrosion depth.


Background: Intestinal parasitic infections are a major public health problem in developing countries where majority of the affected persons are children. This study is aimed at determining the prevalence of intestinal parasitic infections and the effect of socio-demography in some rural primary schools in Ovia Northeast Local Government Area (LGA), Edo State, Nigeria. Materials and Methods : A total of 675 school children from rural settings were recruited. The faecal samples were processed using standard technique. Results: A total of 96 (14.2%) out of the 675 children had asymptomatic intestinal parasitic infection. Male gender and walking barefooted were significantly associated with asymptomatic intestinal parasitic infection (P<0.0001). Children within the ages of 14 – 16 years (P=0.0008), defaecate in nearby bushes (P=0.042), that use well/rain water (P<0.0001), don't wash their hands (P<0.0001) and children whose fathers were bricklayers (P<0.0001) have higher prevalence of asymptomatic intestinal parasitic infections. The parasites recovered were E. histolytica, A. lumbricoides, T. trichiura, hookworm and Taenia species. A. lumbricoides had the highest prevalence (69.2%). A. lumbricoides was the most prevalent parasitic agent recovered in all age groups and the only parasitic agent that was significantly associated with gender, particularly the male gender. Conclusion: Effective treatment of infected school children as well as improved sanitary habits for prevention of soil pollution and contamination is advocated. Keywords: Intestinal parasites, primary school children Running title: Intestinal parasites in Primary School children


This work presents the design and the realization of a flexible front-end circuitry for electrochemical sensing with wearable devices. The hardware combines readout circuitry for amperometric and Open Circuit Potential (OCP) measurements. The sensing platforms are dedicated to lactate and lithium detection in sweat, hence allowing the monitoring of athletes under physical effort. The wearability of the system is ensured by the flexibility of the electronic substrate, its small dimensions that fit an armband case, and the wireless transmission through a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) module. The power consumption of the system has been evaluated to be 200mW, with 3.6V on board power supply.


The behavior near the gelation threshold of trifunctional randomly branched polycyanurates is studied by static and dynamic light scattering. By static measurements the critical exponents y, σ and v were obtained, which describe the divergence of the weight average (Mw) and the characteristic (M.) molecular weights and the radius of gyration (R g ) respectively. All these independently measured exponents together with τ, describing the power law behavior of the molecular weight distribution and measured by size exclusion chromatography coupled with light scattering, confirm the predictions of the three-dimensional percolation theory. Furthermore, it was shown by dynamic light scattering that the power law behavior over some decades in time of the time autocorrelation function and the divergence of the mean relaxation time are characteristics of the gelpoint. The development with increasing reaction time of the time correlation function of the gelling system from the pregel through the gel-point into the gel state was analyzed quantitatively by a hybride of a stretched exponential and a power law function. It was shown that the basic relations between γ, σ, v and τ are fulfilled and should be universally valid. On the other side, the relations, which link the characteristic exponents of the time correlation function at the gelpoint to the basic exponents, gave incoherent predictions. In that way, one can assume that their universal validity is limited, since some additional assumptions on the local dynamics are needed


Objective: Recently, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with esophageal adenocarcinoma (EAC) and Barrett's esophagus (BE) were identified; rs10419226 (CRTC1), rs11789015 (BARX1), rs2687201 (FOXP1), rs2178146 (FOXF1), rs3111601 (FOXF1), and rs9936833 (FOXF1). These findings indicate that genetic susceptibility could play a role in the initiation of EAC in BE patients. The aim of this study was to validate the association between these previously identified SNPs and the risk of EAC in an independent and large case–control study. Design: Six SNPs found to be associated with EAC and BE were genotyped by a multiplex SNaPshot analysis in 1071 EAC patients diagnosed and treated in the Netherlands. Allele frequencies were compared to a control group derived from the Rotterdam Study, a population-based prospective cohort study (n = 6206). Logistic regression analysis and meta-analysis were performed to calculate odds ratios (OR). Results: Rs10419226 (CRTC1) showed a significantly increased EAC risk for the minor allele (OR = 1.17, P = 0.001), and rs11789015 (BARX1) showed a significantly decreased risk for the minor allele (OR = 0.85, P = 0.004) in the logistic regression analysis. The meta-analysis of the original GWAS and the current study revealed an improved level of significance for rs10419226 (CRTC1) (OR = 1.18, P = 6.66 × 10–10) and rs11789015 (BARX1) (OR = 0.83, P = 1.13 × 10–8). Conclusions: This independent and large Dutch case–control study confirms the association of rs10419226 (CRTC1) and rs11789015 (BARX1) with the risk of EAC. These findings suggest a contribution of the patient genetic make-up to the development of EAC and might contribute to gain more insight in the etiology of this cancer.


Abstract Movements of wolves (Canis lupus) during summer 2003 and 2004 in the Superior National Forest were based around homesites but included extensive use of territories. Away from homesites, wolves used different areas daily, exhibiting rotational use. Mean daily range overlap was 22% (SE = 0.02) and that of breeding wolves was significantly greater than for nonbreeders (x̄ = 25% and 16%, respectively). Rotational use may improve hunting success. Managers seeking to remove entire packs must maintain control long enough to ensure that all pack members are targeted.


Connectivity is an important property for QoS support in mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs). Recently, there has been a big effort in exploring the critical transmission range (CTR) analytically, based on different network models. While most of these studies rely on a geometric model and come up with asymptotic bounds, their significance regarding finite 802.11 based MANETs is unclear. In this paper, we investigate connectivity in MANETs from a layered perspective. We first point out how the transmission range affects the end-to-end connection probability in a log-normal shadowing model and compare the results to theoretical bounds and measurements in the path loss model. We then show how connectivity issues behave in 802.11 and IP based networks if the fading effect increases. The paper concludes with an analytical model for the link probability in log-normal shadowing environments as a function of the number of nodes, network area, transmission range, path loss exponent and shadowing deviation.


The E2/M1 multipole mixing ratio δ_{1→2} of the 1_{sc}^{+}→2_{1}^{+} γ-ray decay in ^{156}Gd and hence the isovector E2 transition rate of the scissors mode of a well-deformed rotational nucleus has been measured for the first time. It has been obtained from the angular distribution of an artificial quasimonochromatic linearly polarized γ-ray beam of energy 3.07(6) MeV scattered inelastically off an isotopically highly enriched ^{156}Gd target. The data yield first direct support for the deformation dependence of effective proton and neutron quadrupole boson charges in the framework of algebraic nuclear models. First evidence for a low-lying J^{π}=2^{+} member of the rotational band of states on top of the 1^{+} band head is obtained, too, indicating a significant signature splitting in the K=1 scissors mode rotational band.


The continuously increasing number of applications for contactless smartcard systems also led to an increase of the amount of data that is transmitted from RFID tags to reader devices. This also requires high transmission speeds beyond one Mbit/s. Recently a prototype transmitting at $6.78$Mbits/s was proposed. When transmitting data from an RFID tag to an RFID reader at such high transmission speeds the transmission suffers from inter-symbol interference. Contrary to standard communication scenarios this inter-symbol interference (ISI) is not caused by linear time invariant systems.Instead the transmission by load modulation can be interpreted as transmission through a non-linear system. For counteracting the intersymbol interference we propose a least squares (LS) equalization method. This method does not rely on the assumption that ISI is caused by a linear system but only constructs a linear system to correct ISI. We discuss the application of LS equalization for tag to reader communication by load modulation.We show how an LS equalizer can be incorporated in a RFID receiver and show by simulation that least squares equalization represents a feasible method for counteracting ISI in RFID systems. In addition simulation results concerning the effect of the training sequence length on the equalizer's performance are shown.


Decision support system is defined as a system that supports the work of a manager or a group of managers in solving semi-structured problems by providing information or suggestions towards certain decisions. The design of this system used the R & D (Research And Development) method approach according to Borg & Gall (1983:775) and the Simple Additive Weighting (SAW) method as the calculation method, while what was taken into account were the criteria, where the criteria were: the number of consumers, center of crowd, access road, security, development potential. This application is made using the PHP programming language, MySql as the database, and the software used are: Adobe Dreamweaver and Apache. The choice of location for the construction of the right service center location is a problem that is being faced by PT. Eltra Various Techniques Semarang. Leaders feel confused in determining the right location for the construction of a service center because there are many things that must be considered so that the construction is not in vain and can overcome company problems. This decision support system is able to provide convenience for company leaders in determining the right service center location, through appropriate calculation processes and an integrated system with Geographic Information System (GIS) that can point to locations directly online. The results obtained are Tunjungan Elektronik Center with a value of 97.00, ITC Mega Wholesale with a value of 87.00, Galaxy Mall with a value of 86.00, Delta Plaza with a value of 85.00, Hi-tech Mall with a value of 84.00, Citra Wold Surabaya with a score of 83.00 so that the alternative chosen is Tunjungan Elektronik Center with the highest score of 97.00.


The pollution generated by
human activities in the area "Vridi canal-Grand Bassam" puts more at risk the
quaternary groundwater that supplies water to a large part of the population of
the southern part of Abidjan city. This paper deals with the combined approach
of geographic information systems and multicriteria analysis to delineate areas
at risk of pollution of groundwater in the study area. The multicriteria
analysis also incorporated the statistical and geostatistical techniques for
defining the factor ratings and weightings of all the parameters under a GIS
environment. The criterion for these factor
ratings and weightings was the correlation
coefficient of each parameter with the nitrates concentration in groundwater. Two indicators were
combined for creating situations of pollution risks according to their
importance: the intrinsic vulnerability indicators which combined the depth to
groundwater, the net recharge, the slope, the soil media, the unsaturated
hydraulic conductivity and extrinsic vulnerability characterized by the land
use. The results showed that all to the site presents nitrate pollution risks
with 50.7% of moderate risk, and 49.3% of high and very high risks. The areas
which present the highest risks of pollution are the densely urbanized communes
of Treichville, Marcory, Koumasi, Port-Bouet and Grand-Bassam. The sensitivity
analysis indicates that parameters causing high sensitivity on the nitrate
pollution risks map are the depth to groundwater and the recharge. The errors
committed on the maps establishment are ±0.15%, ±0.40% and ±6% respectively for IV map, EV map and pollution risk map.


Encryption is an art of protecting data that win wars, protect properties and personal information if performed properly. It ensures that the appropriate data is exchanged between the intended persons only; even if the eavesdroppers get the content of the data they should not be able to understand it. Chakra Algorithm is a symmetric key encryption technique. It is a process of encrypting the data with the concepts of Cartesian Co-ordinate Geometry andcircle generation. The process considers the translation and rotation of axis when the data is grouped into circles each circle holds the portion of data. The Cartesian axis will be migrated to the respective centerscircles and rotated by certain angle. The collection of angle with which each individual circle is rotated; the co-ordinates to which it is swapped, the size of the square grid the radius of the circle hold the symmetric key. Unlike the other current algorithms, in Chakra Algorithm we will not directly change the data instead location of data.


BACKGROUND
Esophageal atresia with or without tracheoesophageal fistula (EA/TEF) and congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) are severe congenital anomalies. Their etiologies are mostly unknown and are thought to be multifactorial. No specific environmental factors have consistently been described as risk factors.

METHODS
In a study conducted during the years 2000 to 2004 in a pediatric surgical referral center in the Netherlands, parents of children with EA/TEF or with CDH of the Bochdalek type and parents of a group of children without major birth defects filled out a questionnaire about possible exposure to environmental risk factors during the period from 1 month before conception to the end of the first trimester of pregnancy. Children with chromosomal anomalies were excluded.

RESULTS
Questionnaires were returned for 47 out of 64 cases (73%) with EA/TEF, for 63 out of 77 cases (82%) with CDH, and for 202 out of 243 controls (83%). In EA/TEF, maternal age was borderline significantly higher than in controls (32.2 vs. 30.6 years, p = .05). Contact with herbicides or insecticides was associated with EA/TEF in univariate analysis (OR 2.0; 95% CI: 1.0-4.1) and in multivariate analysis, although of borderline significance. In univariate analysis, CDH was significantly associated with maternal use of alcohol (OR 2.9; 95% CI: 1.6-5.2).

CONCLUSIONS
We found a significant association between maternal alcohol use around the time of conception and CDH. A possible explanation might be the effect of alcohol on the retinoic acid pathway. An association was found between contact with herbicides or insecticides and EA/TEF.


Abalone aquaculture is a small but growing industry in Thailand and is based on both the exotic Haliotis diversicolor supertexta and the native H. asinina. Withering syndrome (WS) in abalone is caused by an infection with the Rickettsia-like organism (RLO) 'Candidatus Xenohaliotis californiensis' and has been spread to many countries globally. The present study reports the first observation of the WS-RLO agent in the small abalone, H. diversicolor supertexta in Thailand, Taiwan (ROC) and the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under light microscopy, the RLO was observed as intracytoplasmic inclusions within epithelial cells lining the post-esophagus and, to a minor extent, the intestine of H. diversicolor. Under transmission electron microscopy, inclusions were characterized as colonies of rod-shaped bacteria, 200 x 1800 nm in size, within a vesicle in the cytoplasm of the infected cell. The RLO from the small abalone bound with WS-RLO-specific in situ hybridization probes and was amplified by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), using primers designed from the 16S rDNA sequence of the original WS-RLO from California, USA. The PCR product of RLO samples from both the PRC and Thailand showed extremely high identity with the California WS-RLO (100 and 99%, respectively). These data combined with the history of abalone movements for aquaculture purposes indicate that RLOs observed in Thailand, Taiwan and the PRC are the WS-RLO that originated from California.


For the proper interpretation of ultrasonic measurement results from a side-drilled hole (SDH) using a rectangular transducer, it is very helpful to have a complete ultrasonic measurement model. A highly efficient ultrasonic beam model of a rectangular transducer and an accurate scattering model of a SDH are currently available. However, to develop such a complete measurement model, a reference model for the system efficiency factor is also needed. In this study a reference model suitable for a rectangular transducer is given and combined with existing models to develop a complete ultrasonic measurement model that can the predict ultrasonic signals from a SDH. Based on this model, we have calculated the ultrasonic signals from a SDH at different transducer orientations and compared the model-based predictions with experiments.


We prepared silver-containing hydroxyapatite (Ag-HAp) powders by an ultrasonic spray-pyrolysis (USSP) technique and evaluated their antibacterial activity.  Ag-HAp powders with Ag contents of 0, 1, 2, 5, and 20 mol% as nominal composition were prepared by the above USSP technique. The droplets of starting solutions were dried at 300 °C and then pyrolyzed at 850 °C to prepare the Ag-HAp powders. Ag-HAp powders showed a HAp single phase and were composed of spherical particles with a diameter of 0.5 - 3.0 μm. To evaluate the antibacterial activity of resulting powders, colony count method was performed using Staphylococcus aureus. Ag-HAp powders with the contents of Ag more than 5 mol% showed good antibacterial activity.


Complex orthogonal designs (CODs) have been successfully implemented in wireless systems as complex orthogonal space-time block codes (COSTBCs). Certain properties of the underlying CODs affect the performance of the codes. In addition to the main properties of a COD's rate and decoding delay, a third consideration is whether the COD can achieve transceiver signal linearization, a property that facilitates practical implementation by, for example, significantly simplifying the receiver structure for iterative decoding. It has been shown that a COD can achieve this transceiver signal linearization if the nonzero entries in any given row of the matrix are either all conjugated or all nonconjugated. This paper determines the conditions under which maximum rate CODs can achieve this desirable property. For an odd number of transmit antennas, it is shown that maximum rate CODs that achieve the lower bound on decoding delay can also achieve transceiver signal linearization. In contrast, for an even number of transmit antennas, maximum rate CODs that achieve the lower bound on delay cannot achieve this linearization. In this latter case, linearization is possible only if the COD achieves at least twice the lower bound on delay. This work highlights the tradeoffs among these three important properties.


We present a novel technique for jointly predicting semantic arguments for lexical predicates. The task is to find the best matching between semantic roles and sentential spans, subject to structural constraints that come from expert linguistic knowledge (e.g., in the FrameNet lexicon). We formulate this task as an integer linear program (ILP); instead of using an off-the-shelf tool to solve the ILP, we employ a dual decomposition algorithm, which we adapt for exact decoding via a branch-and-bound technique. Compared to a baseline that makes local predictions, we achieve better argument identification scores and avoid all structural violations. Runtime is nine times faster than a proprietary ILP solver.


Abstract Biodiversity studies traditionally use species as their analysis unit. However, observed biodiversity is not necessarily an indicator of significant biodiversity and therefore, should not be used alone, particularly when the results will be employed for conservation planning. Here, we examine pteridophyte diversity in Tuscany using 4668 geo-referenced pteridophyte records stored in Wikiplantbase #Toscana and calculating standard richness measures and phylogenetic indices; in addition, we assessed the environmental predictors of each diversity metric. Finally, we identified which areas hosting significantly high diversity are not adequately covered by protected areas or intersected by human activities. Although considerable diversity is distributed along Tuscany within areas traditionally recognised as biodiversity hotspots, important areas of diversity are identified only after the application of randomisation tests and through the phylogenetic metrics. Topographic ruggedness resulted the single most important variable predicting high value of all indices; temperature seasonality and temperature continentality resulted the secondary explanatory variables with a significant negative effect on most diversity indices.


Sodium fluoride (5 mg/kg of body weight) was fed for 20 months to horses with hereditary multiple exostoses (HME), a skeletal disorder that primarily affects endochondral bones during skeletal development. Rib biopsies were performed on both HME horses not fed fluoride (control) and HME horses that were fed fluoride to obtain comparable specimens for chemical analyses and x-ray diffraction. Fluoride content of the rib from a horse fed fluoride for 20 months was approximately 20 to 30 times higher than that from a control horse. Fluoride content of the bone tumors was higher than those of normal bones in both control and fluoride-fed horses. The effect of fluoride uptake on the Ca/P ratio was slight. The Ca/P ratios did not differ significantly between tumorous and normal ribs. X-ray diffraction studies showed that the crystallinity (ie, crystal size/perfection) of the mineral apatite in tumor of the rib from the control horse was lower than that of normal bone from the same rib. Fluoride, however, induced a marked change in the crystallinity at both the tumorous and the normal bone sites. The crystallinity of the tumor apatite in the fluoride-fed horse exceeded that of normal bone in the control horse. Otherwise, there were not demonstrable fluoride-induced gross or radiographic changes in the bone tumors.


PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES
To examine oncology nurses' attitudes toward and reported use of the Edmonton Symptom Assessment System (ESAS) and to determine whether the length of work experience and presence of oncology certification are associated with their attitudes and reported usage.
.

DESIGN
Exploratory, mixed-methods study employing a questionnaire approach.
.

SETTING
14 regional cancer centers (RCCs) in Ontario, Canada.
.

SAMPLE
Oncology nurses who took part in a larger province-wide study that surveyed 960 interdisciplinary providers in oncology care settings at all of Ontario's 14 RCCs.
.

METHODS
Oncology nurses' attitudes and use of ESAS were measured using a 21-item investigator-developed questionnaire. Descriptive statistics and Kendall's tau-b or tau-c test were used for data analyses. Qualitative responses were analyzed using content analysis.
.

MAIN RESEARCH VARIABLES
Attitudes toward and self-reported use of standardized symptom screening and ESAS.
.

FINDINGS
More than half of the participants agreed that ESAS improves symptom screening, most said they would encourage their patients to complete ESAS, and most felt that managing symptoms is within their scope of practice and clinical responsibilities. Qualitative comments provided additional information elucidating the quantitative responses. Statistical analyses revealed that oncology nurses who have 10 years or less of work experience were more likely to agree that the use of standardized, valid instruments to screen for and assess symptoms should be considered best practice, ESAS improves symptom screening, and ESAS enables them to better manage patients' symptoms. No statistically significant difference was found between oncology-certified RNs and noncertified RNs on attitudes or reported use of ESAS.
.

CONCLUSIONS
Implementing a population-based symptom screening approach is a major undertaking. The current study found that oncology nurses recognize the value of standardized screening, as demonstrated by their attitudes toward ESAS.
.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING
Oncology nurses are integral to providing high-quality person-centered care. Using standardized approaches that enable patients to self-report symptoms and understanding barriers and enablers to optimal use of patient-reported outcome tools can improve the quality of patient care.


"What we have learned from Saussure" affirms Merleau-Ponty "is that, taken singly, signs do not signify anything, and that each one of them does not so much express a meaning as mark a divergence of meaning between itself and other signs." While it has often been stressed that Merleau-Ponty was arguably among the earliest philosophical readers of Saussure, the real impact of this reading on Merleau-Ponty's thinking has rarely been assessed in detail. By focusing on the middle period - the years between the publication of the Phenomenology of Perception and the abandonment of the book project The Prose of the World - a special interest in language and its ideality becomes all the more evident. Now this period is crucial for understanding the turn of the later years: similarly to Saussure, who shifted the problem of meaning from a problem of referentiality to an issue of self-differentiation of the linguistic field, Merleau-Ponty shifts his account of perception from a relationship based on sensory subjects and perceived objects to an immanent differentiation of the sensible world. The genesis ofan articulated world can be conceptualized with the experience of children's language acquisition and the phenomenon of "deflation." At a certain point in her development, the child interrupts her incessant babbling and learns to shape pauses and silences, which are the precondition for meaningful sounds. Learning how to speak - as it were - would thus be learning how not to speak. The child may only enter a specific language by means of a phonematic restriction; to become a member of a language community is to lose the capacity to speak all languages.


A complete family history was obtained for 501 patients with Wilms' tumor, treated in departments of pediatric oncology in whole France. The information was collected by self-questionnaire and/or by interview of parents. The proportion of bilateral cases is 4.6% and there are 12 patients (2.4%) with a positive family history of Wilms' tumor. The affected relatives are most often distant and no first degree relative was affected. Apart from the well-known associations with aniridia, hemihypertrophy, genitourinary anomalies, Beckwith-Wiedeemann, and Drash syndromes, there is also a significant excess of congenital heart defects (P = .008) which remains to be explained. Several findings support the bimutational hypothesis such as earlier diagnosis and increased parental age in bilateral cases. No particular anomalies and no increased frequency of childhood cancer were found in patients' relatives. The frequency of Wilms' tumor in relatives was estimated to be less than 0.4% in sibs, 0.06% in uncles and aunts, and 0.04% in first cousins. These figures are very different from those found in retinoblastoma and suggest that the mechanism may be more complex in Wilms' tumor. This conclusion is in agreement with molecular biology studies in tumors and linkage analysis in multiple case families which suggest that more than one locus is involved.


We review the development trends and state-of-the-art technologies of large-port-count optical switches over the past decade. Practical implementation of optical switch fabrics is discussed in terms of optical switch architectures, optical configurations, port counts, switch elements, and so on. We describe compact and stable optical crossconnect three-dimensional microelectromechanical systems (3-D-MEMS) switches that are a key technology in recent photonic networks. To show how these enable simple, fast, and flexible wavelength applications in the photonic layer, we discuss the fast and stable MEMS switching by novel comb actuator and V-shaped torsion bar, compact optical configuration with roof-type mirror, stable switch housing with cubic structure, packaging techniques by tolerance expansion and simple procedures of the component assembly, MEMS mirror controller with fast and low power digital notch circuit, reliability by shock absorption, and field trials. In addition, we discuss the impact of these switches on system integration for recent metropolitan area networks and enterprise networks.


Existing Human NeRF methods for reconstructing 3D humans typically rely on multiple 2D images from multi-view cameras or monocular videos captured from fixed camera views. However, in real-world scenarios, human images are often captured from random camera angles, presenting challenges for high-quality 3D human reconstruction. In this paper, we propose SHERF, the first generalizable Human NeRF model for recovering animatable 3D humans from a single input image. SHERF extracts and encodes 3D human representations in canonical space, enabling rendering and animation from free views and poses. To achieve high-fidelity novel view and pose synthesis, the encoded 3D human representations should capture both global appearance and local fine-grained textures. To this end, we propose a bank of 3D-aware hierarchical features, including global, point-level, and pixel-aligned features, to facilitate informative encoding. Global features enhance the information extracted from the single input image and complement the information missing from the partial 2D observation. Point-level features provide strong clues of 3D human structure, while pixel-aligned features preserve more fine-grained details. To effectively integrate the 3D-aware hierarchical feature bank, we design a feature fusion transformer. Extensive experiments on THuman, RenderPeople, ZJU_MoCap, and HuMMan datasets demonstrate that SHERF achieves state-of-the-art performance, with better generalizability for novel view and pose synthesis.


Between the years 1968-85, 1,177 patients started treatment for Hodgkins disease at the Norwegian Radium Hospital. In this unselected material from Norway the age distribution was bimodal with the highest incidence between 20-40 years of age. Survival is dependent on age, stage and histology, and was better between the years 1980-85 as compared with the period 1974-79. During the last ten years, treatment has been decentralized in Norway, and all centres cooperate by using the same protocol for staging and treatment. The article summarizes the results of the treatment, and related complications.


ABSTRACT In this paper, a modified empirical large-territorial-scale procedure to assess the seismic vulnerability of aggregate buildings in urban areas located within a highly seismic context is proposed. The methodology is applied to a group of unreinforced masonry (URM) aggregates located in the Yungay's historic center in downtown Santiago, Chile. This assessment was carried out by modifying and integrating a vulnerability-index-based procedure, a specific existing approach called first level macro-seismic method used to predict seismic damage and loss scenarios through fragility curves of structural components. The procedure was calibrated using the observed damage after the 2010 Chile earthquake in 292 URM structural units. The results of this new damage index for URM aggregate buildings are used to derive Probability Mass Functions (PMFs) of the different damage states and preliminary Empirical Fragility Functions (EFFs). To the best of the authors' knowledge, these EFFs are the first publicly available for aggregate Chilean URM buildings. This research and its results are the starting point for a more comprehensive study for assessing damage scenarios and vulnerabilities of aggregate URM buildings in historic centers of older Chilean cities. These functions may be used in risk assessment, and are useful to prioritize possible future damage mitigation strategies and other processes involving this historical heritage. We foresee that these results could be at least partially applied to other historical urban areas in Chile, and perhaps other old Latin American cities located along the subduction convergence region between the Pacific and Continental plates, which were founded similarly.


Composites of hydroxyapatite (HAp) are widely employed in biomedical applications due to their biocompatibility, bioactivity and osteoconductivity properties. In fact, the development of industrially scalable hybrids at low cost and high efficiency has a great impact, for example, on bone tissue engineering applications and even as drug delivery systems. New nanocomposites constituted by HAp nanoparticles and synthetic or natural polymers with biodegradable and biocompatible characteristics have constantly been developed and extensive works have been published concerning their applications. The present review is mainly focused on both the capability of HAp nanoparticles to encapsulate diverse compounds as well as the preparation methods of scaffolds incorporating HAp. Attention has also been paid to the recent developments on antimicrobial scaffolds, bioactive membranes, magnetic scaffolds, in vivo imaging systems, hydrogels and coatings that made use of HAp nanoparticles.


Tnhe consequences of an inadvertent gastroileostomy are discouraging to all concerned. Although the wasting and physical deterioration which such patients usually experience are impressive, fortunately the condition can be corrected surgically and seldom has proved fatal. However, because death is the inevitable result of gastroileostomy if the presence of the stoma goes unrecognized and because the clinical picture resulting from this surgical error at times may be atypical, it is well for all physicians to be acquainted not only with the usual clinical manifestations but also with the clinical variants. As nearly as can be determined, surgical correction of a gastroileal anastomosis was first carried out at the Mayo Clinic in 1912 by Judd,* and repair in another case was performed only seven weeks later by W. J. Mayo (Case 2 reported by Smith and


This article introduces two analytical methods that aim at investigating the effect of the urban environment on seismic motions. We regard cities as a periodic distribution of simple oscillators. The response to a vertical incident SH wave is analyzed by considering the city with a macroscopic point of view. As a first approach, the effect of buildings is described by a mean impedance on the soil–city interface. This enables us to identify a mechanical soil–city coupling parameter that governs the magnitude of the interaction and to determine a characteristic time of the soil–city response. A second, more refined model based on approximated wave fields radiated by each building leads to introducing a boundary layer to describe the multiple interactions effect. This provides an assessment of both free soil motion and building basement motion. Applications are given for monofrequency and multifrequency cities in the case of homogeneous and stratified substratums.


Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) are systems that use real-time analysis of neuroimaging data to determine the mental state of their user for purposes such as providing neurofeedback. Here, we investigate the feasibility of a BCI based on speech perception. Multivariate pattern classification methods were applied to single-trial EEG data collected during speech perception by native and non-native speakers. Two principal questions were asked: 1) Can differences in the perceived categories of pairs of phonemes be decoded at the single-trial level? 2) Can these same categorical differences be decoded across participants, within or between native-language groups? Results indicated that classification performance progressively increased with respect to the categorical status (within, boundary or across) of the stimulus contrast, and was also influenced by the native language of individual participants. Classifier performance showed strong relationships with traditional event-related potential measures and behavioral responses. The results of the cross-participant analysis indicated an overall increase in average classifier performance when trained on data from all participants (native and non-native). A second cross-participant classifier trained only on data from native speakers led to an overall improvement in performance for native speakers, but a reduction in performance for non-native speakers. We also found that the native language of a given participant could be decoded on the basis of EEG data with accuracy above 80%. These results indicate that electrophysiological responses underlying speech perception can be decoded at the single-trial level, and that decoding performance systematically reflects graded changes in the responses related to the phonological status of the stimuli. This approach could be used in extensions of the BCI paradigm to support perceptual learning during second language acquisition.


We present DIVERSE, a highly modular collection of complimentary software packages designed to facilitate the creation of device-independent virtual environments and distributed asynchronous simulations. DIVERSE is free/open source software, containing both end-user programs and C++ application programming interfaces (APIs). DPF is the DIVERSE graphics interface to OpenGL Performer. A program using the DPF API can run without modification on platforms ranging from fully immersive systems such as CAVEs to generic desktop workstations. The DIVERSE toolkit (DTK) contains all the nongraphical components of DIVERSE, such as networking utilities, hardware device access, and navigational techniques. It introduces a software implementation of networks of replicated noncoherent shared memory. It also introduces a method that seamlessly extends hardware drivers into interprocess and Internet hardware services. We will describe the design of DIVERSE and present a specific example of how it is being used to aid researchers.


Serious concerns have been raised about stealthy disclosures of private user data in smartphone apps, and recent research efforts in mobile security have studied various mechanisms to detect privacy disclosures. However, existing approaches are not effective in informing users and security analysts about potential privacy leakage threats. This is because these methods largely fail to 1) provide highly accurate and inclusive detection of privacy disclosures, and 2) filter out legitimate privacy disclosures that usually dominate detection results and in turn obscure true threats. In this paper, we propose AAPL, an automated system that detects privacy leaks (i.e., truly suspicious privacy disclosures) in Android apps. AAPL is based on multiple special static analysis techniques that we've developed for Android apps, including conditional flow identification and joint flow tracking. Furthermore, AAPL employs a new approach called peer voting to filter out most of the legitimate privacy disclosures from the results, purifying the detection results for automatic and easy interpretation. We implemented AAPL and evaluated it over 40, 456 apps. The results indicate that, on average, AAPL achieves an accuracy of 88.7%. For particular disclosures (e.g., contacts), the accuracy is up to 94.6%. Using AAPL, we successfully revealed a collection of unknown privacy leaks. The throughput of our privacy disclosure analysis module is 4.5 apps per minute on a threemachine cluster.


A Way of Reaching out to the Community for a Swiss Reformed State Church Richard Stern Doctor of Ministry School of Theology, Fuller Theological Seminary 2014 The Church often neglects reaching out because "mission" for her ended at the time of the apostles and has received a negative connotation. Part One of this doctoral project presents the development in one parish, as well as some of the relevant demographic realities in and around Kirchberg/BE. Cultural changes will be discussed as well, such as the change from farmer community to sleeping community, the development of a shoppingmile, the distance between the people and the Church. Then, the parish of Kirchberg is presented, looking back on thirty years. Numbers show that more and more people are leaving the church; baptisms, confirmations, and the total number of members have been on the decline. Theological reflections in Part Two will review an essay, "Reformation Views of the Church," by Paul Basden and David S. Dockery; a book, Church in the Power of the Spirit, by Jürgen Moltmann; and a report by the General Synod of the Church of England, Mission-Shaped Church. The state parish system will be discussed and the relation of mission and Church is examined. Mission is shown as flowing from God and therefore essential to the Church. Mission is relational and Jesus' life proves that reality, as evident in Matthew 16:13-20: in a heathen setting the Church is built. Finally, this section will examine what is indispensible for Jesus and therefore for the Church. In Part Three, an art project and a theme for the year is described. Detailed planning and evaluation is set out to help the whole church and every subgroup in it to reach out into the community. All of this has started on the basis of relationships and friendships that are still growing, which should be the basis for any outreach. They point beyond, to the essence of God's perfect relationship in the Trinity. Theological Mentor: Kurt Fredrickson, PhD


It is well known that self-generated stimuli are processed differently from externally generated stimuli. For example, many people have noticed since childhood that it is very difficult to make a self-tickling. In the auditory domain, self-generated sounds elicit smaller brain responses as compared to externally generated sounds, known as the sensory attenuation (SA) effect. SA is manifested in reduced amplitudes of evoked responses as measured through MEEG, decreased firing rates of neurons and a lower level of perceived loudness for self-generated sounds.

The predominant explanation for SA is based on the idea that self-generated stimuli are predicted (e.g., the forward model account). It is the nature of their predictability that is crucial for SA. On the contrary, the sensory gating account emphasizes a general suppressive effect of actions on sensory processing, regardless of the predictability of the stimuli. Both accounts have received empirical support, which suggests that both mechanisms may exist.

In chapter 2, three behavioural studies concerning the influence of motor activation on auditory perception were presented. Study 1 compared the effect of SA and attention in an auditory detection task and showed that SA was present even when substantial attention was paid to unpredictable stimuli. Study 2 compared the loudness perception of tones generated by others between Chinese and British participants. Compared to externally generated tones, a decrease in perceived loudness for others generated tones was found among Chinese but not among the British. In study 3, partial evidence was found that even when reading words that are related to action, auditory detection performance was impaired.

In chapter 3, the classic SA effect of M100 suppression was replicated with MEG in study 4. With time-frequency analysis, a potential neural information processing sequence was found in auditory cortex. Prior to the onset of self-generated tones, there was an increase of oscillatory power in the alpha band. After the stimulus onset, reduced gamma power and alpha/beta phase locking were found. The three temporally segregated oscillatory events correlated with each other and with SA effect, which may be the underlying neural implementation of SA.

In chapter 4, a TMS-MEG study was presented investigating the role of the cerebellum in adapting to delayed presentation of self-generated tones (study 5). It demonstrated that in sham stimulation condition, the brain can adapt to the delay (about 100 ms) within 300 trials of learning by showing a significant increase of SA effect in the suppression of M100, but not M200 component. Whereas after stimulating the cerebellum with a suppressive TMS protocol, the adaptation in M100 suppression disappeared and the pattern of M200 suppression reversed to M200 enhancement.

These data support the idea that the suppressive effect of actions on auditory processing is a consequence of both motor driven sensory predictions and general sensory gating. The results also demonstrate the importance of neural oscillations in implementing SA effect and the critical role of the cerebellum in learning sensory predictions under sensory perturbation.


BACKGROUND
Androgenetic alopecia is a common cosmetic hair disorder, resulting from interplay of genetic, endocrine, and aging factors leading to a patterned follicular miniaturization. Microinflammation seems to be a potential active player in this process.

AIMS
To study the histopathological and ultrastructural changes occurring in male androgenetic alopecia (AGA). Patients/methods Fifty-five subjects were included in this study (40 with AGA and 15 as normal age-matched controls). Skin biopsies from frontal bald area and occipital hairy area were subjected to histopathological examination, immunohistochemical staining for collagen I and ultrastructural study.

RESULTS
The frontal bald area of patients showed highly significant increase in telogen hairs and decrease in anagen/telogen ratio and terminal/vellus hair ratio (P < 0.001). Perifollicular inflammation was almost a constant feature in early cases and showed a significant inverse correlation with perifollicular fibrosis (P = 0.048), which was more marked with thickening of the follicular sheath in advanced cases.

CONCLUSION
Follicular microinflammation plays an integral role in the pathogenesis of AGA in early cases. Over time, thickening of perifollicular sheath takes place due to increased deposition of collagen, resulting in marked perifollicular fibrosis, and sometimes ends by complete destruction of the affected follicles in advanced cases.


We investigate in detail the phase diagrams of the p-body ±J Ising model with and without random fields on random graphs with fixed connectivity. One of our most interesting findings is that a thermodynamic spin-glass phase is present in the three-body purely ferromagnetic model in random fields, unlike for the canonical two-body interaction random-field Ising model. We also discuss the location of the phase boundary between the paramagnetic and spin-glass phases that does not depend on the change of the ferromagnetic bias. The independence of the ferromagnetic bias has also been observed from the perspective of the distribution of the partition function zeros on the complex field plane. This behavior is explained by a gauge transformation, which shows that gauge-invariant properties generically do not depend on the strength of the ferromagnetic bias for the ±J Ising model on regular random graphs.


Health monitoring is one of the emerging areas for computing technologies. Health monitoring via mobile is using the application of mobile computing technologies for amending communication between doctors and patients. As mobile devices have efficaciously become part of our life it can incorporate health care more seamlessly to our everyday life. There have been many recent advances in sensor technologies which enable us to integrate low- power, low-cost devices with emerging intelligent health monitoring systems.. Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) have attracted much attention in recent years. The applications of Wireless Sensor Network are immense. Applications of Wireless sensor network in healthcare leads to an area called Body Area Network (BAN) or Body sensor Networks. Here we are building a wireless sensor network for health monitoring in hospitals with the use of mobile application. So in the proposed system a central server will be able to read patient"s incoming data from the sensors and send it to the mobile application and it will also send alert SMS in case of emergency.


The quality of software gets more and more important as software is introduced to systems that are important to the infrastructure of modern society. This thesis studies one such code base developed at Ericsson AB, that is a vital piece of software for our infrastructure. With an increased need for quality in software, it is important that we have quantifiable metrics that can be used to steer the development of software in a direction that leads to fewer faults. We look at the software metrics cyclomatic complexity and variations of code coverageand analyse how these metrics correlate to faults in the code. We find that code coverage has a weak negative correlation at best, but can have a weak positive correlation at worst (such that faults increase as coverage increases). The cyclomatic complexity metric has not been found to have any correlation at all to software faults.


In achieving good performance in a company, people have a verystrategic position for man know inputs that need to be taken out of the environment, howto get and capture these inputs using technology, able to manage and transform inputsinto outputs which meet the public. Performance is often defined as the achievement oftasks, of which the performance is necessary to indicate the degree of success or failureof organization in achieving the organization's vision, mission, and goals, so to know theresults that have been achieved in the framework of the process towards establishedgoals. To achieve this leadership role to improve and provide motivation is veryimportant. Therefore, this study aimed to analyze the influence of ability and motivationon teacher performance at SMK Palapa Semarang. The population in this study was theoverall 45 people are teachers, and the entire population was sampled. The analyticaltool used in this study was multiple linear regression. The results showed that based onhypothesis testing motivation and ability simultaneously had a significant effect on theteacher's performance of SMK Palapa Semarang. The magnitude influence of ability andmotivation was 19.334 with a 3.219 or F table value F count = 19.334> F table 3.219.Partially, motivation was the most dominant factor affecting the teacher's performance atSMK Palapa Semarang as motivation was enough to determine the tasks of the employeeso optimize the performance, it needs motivation of the employer. Keywords: Performance, Abilities and Motivation


An autoadaptive neuro-fuzzy segmentation and edge detection architecture is presented. The system consist of a multilayer perceptron (MLP)-like network that performs image segmentation by adaptive thresholding of the input image using labels automatically preselected by a fuzzy clustering technique. The proposed architecture is feedforward, but unlike the conventional MLP the learning is unsupervised. The output status of the network is described as a fuzzy set. Fuzzy entropy is used as a measure of the error of the segmentation system as well as a criterion for determining potential edge pixels. The proposed system is capable to perform automatic multilevel segmentation of images, based solely on information contained by the image itself. No a priori assumptions whatsoever are made about the image (type, features, contents, stochastic model, etc.). Such an "universal" algorithm is most useful for applications that are supposed to work with different (and possibly initially unknown) types of images. The proposed system can be readily employed, "as is," or as a basic building block by a more sophisticated and/or application-specific image segmentation algorithm. By monitoring the fuzzy entropy relaxation process, the system is able to detect edge pixels.


The entire genomic RNA of a Spanish isolate of pepper mild mottle virus (PMMV-S), a resistance-breaking virus in pepper, was cloned and sequenced and shown to be similar to other tobamoviruses in its genomic organization. It consisted of 6357 nucleotides (nt) and contained four open reading frames (ORFs) which encode a 126K protein and a readthrough 183K protein (nt 70 to 4908), a 28K protein (nt 4909 to 5682) and a 17.5K coat protein (nt 5685 to 6158). This is the first tobamovirus in which none of the ORFs overlap. Both its nucleic acid and predicted protein sequences were compared with the previously determined sequences of other tobamoviruses. The variations and similarities found and their relationship with the pathogenicity of this virus are discussed.


Of many polymeric biomaterials, hydrogels are of special importance because of their favorable biocompatibility and pertinence in delivering delicate bioactive agents such as proteins. Physical hydrogels have attracted much attention for controlled drug delivery because of the mild and aqueous conditions involved in trapping bioactive agents. This paper reviews our recent progress on developing a new class of physical hydrogels based on the supramolecular self-assembly between cyclodextrins and bioabsorbable poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) or its copolymers. Being thixotropic, the hydrogels can be injected through needles and applied as injectable drug delivery systems. The properties of the hydrogels also can be fine-tuned with triblock copolymers where PEO segments flank hydrophobic or biodegradable segments in the middle.


Heat exchangers employing falling films are relevant to a multitude of industrial applications using water-based liquids. In the present study, periodic, two-dimensional waves are imposed by excitation on a vertically falling film of water, which is then heated by a uniform heat flux, within the laminar and transitional flow range (39<Re<200). Liquid-film thickness is measured by confocal chromatic imaging and surface temperature is measured by high-speed IR thermography. As the 2D waves travel downstream they destabilize in the spanwise direction and evolve 3D structures (bumps). Further wave destabilization, under relatively low heating, was observed to coincide with the appearance of local thermal flows ("hot streaks"), though no deformation of the liquid surface could be measured. These flows are understood to be induced by thermo-capillary forces, which in extreme cases are known to lead to the formation of rivulets, film rupture and heater burnout. Understanding these initial stages of thermo-capillary flow is crucial to its suppression.Analysis of the thermal images reveals several significant streamwise length scales: a thermal inlet length based on the emergence of the thermal boundary layer (Lt), a thermal inlet length based on reaching thermally developed conditions (Lh), and the length at which "hot-streaks" first appear (Ls). In addition the dominant (most unstable) spanwise wavelength of the hot streaks, Lz, was identified through FFT analysis of the thermal profile beyond Ls. First the independence of the thermal inlet lengths from the heat-flux was established. Next, the influence of the nominal flow conditions (Reynolds number and excitation frequency) on Lt, Lh and Lz was examined — thereby extending the range of previous studies to higher Reynolds numbers. The thermal inlet lengths Lt and Lh were found to increase with flow rate, whereas they had opposing trends with regard to frequency. Lz consistently decreased with an increase of the flow rate, as smaller (turbulent) scales became more dominant, and it was found to be indifferent to excitation frequency over a wide range. Some future directions and methods of hot streak suppression are discussed, as well.© 2013 ASME


Extraverts are often characterized as highly social individuals who are highly invested in their interpersonal interactions. We propose that extraverts' interaction partners hold a different view—that extraverts are highly social, but not highly invested. Across six studies (five preregistered; N = 2,456), we find that interaction partners consistently judge more extraverted individuals to be worse listeners than less extraverted individuals. Furthermore, interaction partners assume that extraversion is positively associated with a greater ability to modify one's self-presentation. This behavioral malleability (i.e., the "acting" component of self-monitoring) may account for the unfavorable lay belief that extraverts are not listening.


: The efficiency coefficient of muscular work in 120 kg standard physical load, mean skin temperature, the ear canal's temperature, sweating, heart rate and oxygen consumption were measured in swimmers and field athletes as well as in control subjects not involved in sports. The coefficient was 25.2 +/- 0.7% in swimmers, 27.8 +/- 0.8% in field athletes, and 14.5 +/- 0.6% in control subjects. The efficiency coefficient can be used for estimation of training condition in sportsmen.


Abstract. Magnetic interference source identification is a critical preparation step
for magnetometer-mounted unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) used for
high-sensitivity geomagnetic surveying. A magnetic field scanner was built
for mapping the low-frequency interference that is produced by a UAS. It was
used to compare four types of electric-powered UAS capable of carrying an
alkali-vapour magnetometer: (1) a single-motor fixed-wing, (2) a
single-rotor helicopter, (3) a quad-rotor helicopter, and (4) a hexa-rotor
helicopter. The scanner's error was estimated by calculating the
root-mean-square deviation of the background total magnetic intensity over
the mapping duration; averaged values ranged between 3.1 and 7.4 nT. Each
mapping was performed above the UAS with the motor(s) engaged and with the
UAS facing in two orthogonal directions; peak interference intensities
ranged between 21.4 and 574.2 nT. For each system, the interference is a
combination of both ferromagnetic and electrical current sources. Major
sources of interference were identified such as servo(s) and the cables
carrying direct current between the motor battery and the electronic speed
controller. Magnetic intensity profiles were measured at various motor
current draws for each UAS, and a change in intensity was observed for
currents as low as 1 A.


A novel filter media-grain slag as filter media for the removal of phosphorous studied in the paper. The characteristics of grain-slag and haydite such as total porosity, total surface area, pore size distribution, apparent and bulk density, crystal structures and chemical composition were evaluated for the two materials firstly. The data of pore characteristics and surface morphology of filter materials showed grain-slags were superior to haydites in many ways, including higher total porosity, larger total surface area and lower density. These characteristics were essential for filter materials. Subsequently, the pH of solution and contact time was evaluated in batch phosphate sorption experiments for the two materials. The results showed the phosphate removal rate of grain-slag was higher than haydite. The phosphate removal of the grain-slag tended to decrease with increasing initial pH above neutral. Therefore, grain-slag application, as a novel process of treating phosphorus with wastes, provided a promising way in grain slag utilization.


There are always frustrations for drivers in finding parking space and parking is costly in almost every major city in the world. In this paper, we propose a crowdsourcing solution by exploiting sensors in the smartphone to collect real-time parking availability information. In particular, we utilise a pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR) system to track the driver's trajectory to detect when he is about to leave his parking space. However, the effectiveness of a PDR system lies in its success in accurately estimating the user's moving distance and direction. In this work, we implement a waist-mounted-based PDR method on a smartphone that can measure the user's moving distance with a high accuracy. Furthermore, we design a map-matching algorithm to calibrate the direction errors from the gyro using building floor plans. The results of our experiment show that we can achieve about 98% accuracy in estimating the user's walking distance, with an overall location error of about 0.48 m.


Pilot cars are used in one-lane two-way work zones to guide traffic and keep their speeds within posted limits. While many studies have examined the effectiveness of measures to reduce vehicle speeds in work zones, little is known about the reductions achievable through the use of pilot cars. This paper examines the effectiveness of a pilot car in reducing travel speeds in a rural highway work zone in Queensland, Australia. Analysis of speed data covering a period of five days showed that a pilot car reduced average speeds at the treatment location, but not downstream. The proportion of vehicles speeding through the activity area was also reduced, particularly those traveling at 10 km/h or more above the posted limit. Motorists were more likely to speed during the day, under a 40 kh/h limit, when traffic volumes were higher and when there were fewer vehicles in the traffic stream. Medium vehicles were less likely to speed in the presence of a pilot car than light vehicles. To maximize these benefits, it is necessary to ensure that the pilot car itself is not speeding.


Persistent luminescence without excitation light and tissue autofluorescence interference holds great promise for in vivo imaging and sensing. However, the availability of persistence luminescence materials is largely limited by potential toxicity, instability, short-wavelength emissions, and poor clinical potential for currently available ones. Here we report a series of porphyrin derivatives with near-infrared (NIR) persistence luminescence for image-guided cancer surgery and drug screening. These porphyrin derivatives showed NIR persistence luminescence over 760 nm after cessation of excitation light or upon interaction with peroxynitrite (ONOO-), and a plausible mechanism of ordered oxidation of vinylene bond is proposed. Through molecular engineering with adaptive peptides bearing the functions of β-sheet-formatting and cancer cell targeting, the resultant Ppa-FFGYSA supermolecular probe showed enhanced photoacoustic and persistence luminescence signals, facilitating preoperative photoacoustic tumor identification and intraoperative persistence luminescence image-guided tumor resection with outperformed signal-to-background ratio. In addition, the activated persistence luminescence in recognition of ONOO- also permits the specific monitoring of neutrophil infiltration and screening of immunogenic cell death (ICD) drugs with high sensitivity and specificity.


We summarise the scientific and technological aspects of the SAGAS (Search for Anomalous Gravitation using Atomic Sensors) project, submitted to ESA in June 2007 in response to the Cosmic Vision 2015-2025 call for proposals. The proposed mission aims at flying highly sensitive atomic sensors (optical clock, cold atom accelerometer, optical link) on a Solar System escape trajectory in the 2020 to 2030 timeframe. SAGAS has numerous science objectives in fundamental physics and Solar System science, for example numerous tests of general relativity and the exploration of the Kuiper belt. The combination of highly sensitive atomic sensors and of the laser link well adapted for large distances will allow measurements with unprecedented accuracy and on scales never reached before. We present the proposed mission in some detail, with particular emphasis on the science goals and associated measurements.


Financial crisis originated in developed countries in 2008 and has affected M&A activi- ties worldwide. This impact may have irreversible results in emerging market economies. This study aims to examine the spillover effects of 2008 economic crisis, started in developed countries, in emerging markets. In this manner, we have analyzed M&A activities from the acquirer firms ' side in BRICS-T countries (namely, Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and Turkey) for banking industries in pre-and postcrisis periods so that effects of economic crisis can be captured. Significant transactions over $100 million are included in the analysis. Event study methodology, which uses daily market index returns, daily stock returns, and M&A announcement dates to calculate abnormal returns, is employed for the analysis. The cumulative abnormal returns (CARs) are calculated for September 2003 – November 2008 (precrisis period) and November 2008 – December 2013 (postcrisis) periods. In conclusion there are negative mean CARs in Brazil, India, and Russia, while there are positive mean CARs in China, South Africa, and Turkey in precrisis period. In addition, there are negative mean CARs in South Africa, Brazil, and China, while there are positive mean CARs in Russia, Turkey, and India in postcrisis period.


Rapid regional warming at an increasing pace ever since the end of the Little Ice Age (c. AD 1900) causes significant change in the coastal marine environments of the West Antarctic Peninsula and beyond. A comprehensive set of hydroacoustic ground-discrimination data (RoxAnn GDX) was gathered to develop a high resolution characterization of the seafloor habitats in the Potter Cove, King George Island, a small fjord with a retreating former tidewater glacier at its head. Sediment samples and underwater video footage are used for ground truthing. Seven habitat zones are distinguished. These include the shallow high-energy wave zone exposing unvegetated rocks to the low-energy deeper basins characterized by muddy sediments and the typical biota including ophiuroids, ascidians, sponges, sea pens. The results allow to subdivide the Potter Cove into a "dynamic zone" (DZ) with rocks and mixed fine sediments covering the inner cove, a large transition zone that we call the "subrecent zone" (SZ) buried under fine meltwater sediments and the "quasi persistent zone" (QPZ) that reveals more mature conditions in many aspects further downfjord. These zones represent development stages resulting from the increasing distance to and decreasing influence of the glacier front. The DZ is trailing directly behind the retreating glacier front. As long as there is strong discharge of sediment-loaded meltwater the DZ transitions into the SZ after a period of time (under recent conditions: decades) which itself transitions into the QPZ after centuries. We assume that during the Medieval Warm Period (c. AD 800-1350) the glacier terminus was at or even behind its present position. Until the maximum of the Little Ice Age the glacier advanced to form a prominent moraine complex. Ever since the glacier retreated at increasing speed to its recent position. If the warming trend continues the glacier will retreat further away from the fjord head and the QPZ will likely cover the entire fjord after several centuries.


Background Alkylphenols varying in their side-chain lengths [ethyl-, propyl-, octyl-, and nonylphenol (EP, PP, OP, and NP, respectively)] and bisphenol A (BPA) represent a large group of structurally related xenoestrogens that have endocrine-disruptive effects. Their rapid nongenomic effects that depend on structure for cell signaling and resulting functions are unknown. Objectives We compared nongenomic estrogenic activities of alkylphenols with BPA and 17β-estradiol (E2) in membrane estrogen receptor-α–enriched GH3/B6/F10 pituitary tumor cells. These actions included calcium (Ca) signaling, prolactin (PRL) release, extracellular-regulated kinase (ERK) phosphorylation, and cell proliferation. Methods We imaged Ca using fura-2, measured PRL release via radioimmunoassay, detected ERK phosphorylation by fixed cell immunoassay, and estimated cell number using the crystal violet assay. Results All compounds caused increases in Ca oscillation frequency and intracellular Ca volume at 100 fM to 1 nM concentrations, although long-chain alkylphenols were most effective. All estrogens caused rapid PRL release at concentrations as low as 1 fM to 10 pM; the potency of EP, PP, and NP exceeded that of E2. All compounds at 1 nM produced similar increases in ERK phosphorylation, causing rapid peaks at 2.5–5 min, followed by inactivation and additional 60-min peaks (except for BPA). Dose–response patterns of ERK activation at 5 min were similar for E2, BPA, and PP, whereas EP caused larger effects. Only E2 and NP increased cell number. Some rapid estrogenic responses showed correlations with the hydrophobicity of estrogenic molecules; the more hydrophobic OP and NP were superior at Ca and cell proliferation responses, whereas the less hydrophobic EP and PP were better at ERK activations. Conclusions Alkylphenols are potent estrogens in evoking these nongenomic responses contributing to complex functions; their hydrophobicity can largely predict these behaviors.


An important goal of seismic processing is to shape reflection events so that the final seismic section can be interpreted easily and unambiguously. The manipulation of seismic data to achieve this goal is generally called wavelet processing. Typically, some form of deconvolution is used to perform the desired shaping of the wavelets in a seismic dataset. Many different deconvolution algorithms have been developed for processing of seismic data. They all have one thing in common: their derivation are based on mathematical assumptions about the seismic trace. The most important assumptions are: the autocorrelation of the trace is a scaled version of the seismic wavelet and the seismic wavelet is minimum-phase, In these conditions we want to estimate the minimum-phase wavelet.


Background: The bioaccumulation and toxicity of Gold Nanoparticles (GNPs) in several organs of rats becomes of more necessity prior to using them in drug delivery, diagnostics, and treatment. The GNPs levels in several rat organs in vivo have not been previously documented. This study was aimed to evaluate the influence of size and exposure duration of GNPs on the GNPs levels in several organs of rats in vivo.

Methods: Thirty rats were divided into a control group (NG: n = 10), group 1 (G1A: infusion of 10 nm GNPs for 3 days; n = 5; G1B: 10 nm GNPs for 7 days; n = 5) and group 2 (G2A: 50 nm GNPs for 3 days; n = 5; G2B: 50 nm GNPs for 7 days; n = 5). 50 μl of GNPs dissolved in aqueous solution were administered intraperitoneally every day for 3 and 7 days.

Results: The GNPs levels were evaluated in several rat organs by Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectroscopy (ICP-MS) and Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS). In comparison with the control group, the GNPs levels increased in all the examined organs with G1A, G1B, G2A and G2B. The highest percentage normalized increase in the liver and lung organs were 468.6% and 273.4%, respectively with 10 nm GNPs after administration period of 7 days. The highest percentage normalized increase in the kidney and heart organs were 258.7% and 242.6%, respectively with 10 nm GNPs for administration period of 3 days.

Conclusions: Our results might indicate that GNPs are mostly taken up and accumulate in organs, suggesting the toxic effects induced by the smaller GNPs. These conclusions are further supported by histological investigation suggesting that the highest toxic effects were induced by the smaller GNPs and related to the time exposure of GNPs.


Efficient and effective management of medical patients poses a major challenge to clinicians, administrators and policy makers. Significant achievements in efficiency have largely absorbed the impact of population ageing over the past two decades, but an emphasis on efficiency might compromise functional outcomes and increase readmission rates in this vulnerable patient group. AIMS: The aim of this research was to improve understanding of the characteristics and outcomes of general medical patients, to inform improvements in care. Specific aims were to:  describe the characteristics and outcomes of a large, representative cohort of general medical patients;  measure the impact of an interdisciplinary care model on outcomes, with a focus on length of stay, functional outcomes, and readmissions;  determine whether beneficial outcomes were confined to particular patient subgroups; and  investigate risk factors for adverse functional outcomes and readmissions. METHODS: The principal study was a pseudo-randomised controlled trial of interdisciplinary care for general medical patients, enrolling all consecutive general medical patients over 24 weeks. The intervention included greater allied health staffing, consistent interdisciplinary care teams, consistent team communication and explicit discharge planning. Control patients received usual care from a consistent medical team with allied health referral. Baseline data were collected prospectively at admission from nursing and medical assessments. Length of stay, discharge destination and diagnosis were collected at the time of discharge. Functional status was obtained from nursing reports of preadmission, admission and baseline dependency in six activities of daily living. Readmissions and cost-weight (a severity surrogate) were obtained from the hospital information systems. Mortality at 6 months was obtained from the state-wide death registry. Characteristics and outcomes were described for all patients. Outcomes were compared between the intervention and control groups. Subgroup analyses explored the impact of age, frailty and residential aged care. Findings regarding functional status and readmissions were then examined in greater detail using multivariate analyses, adjusting for recognised confounders identified through systematic literature reviews. RESULTS: 1538 patients were enrolled, 746 in the control and 792 in the intervention group. Two thirds were aged over 65 years, of whom 19% came from residential aged care (RAC) and 65% met frailty criteria. Mean length of stay was 7.5 days, 5% of patients died in hospital, 15% died within 6 months of discharge and 30% were readmitted to hospital. Nearly 30% had pre-existing impairments in one or more activity of daily living, 42% had new functional deficits at the time of admission, 5% had new or further decline in hospital, and 23% still had greater functional impairments than usual at the time of hospital discharge. The intervention arm demonstrated a trend to reduction in length of stay (0.5 days; 95% CI -0.2, 3.2; p=0.18) and a significant reduction in in-hospital functional decline (3.2% versus 5.5%; p=0.04), consistent with previous studies. Unexpected findings were a reduction in in-hospital mortality (3.9% versus 6.4%; p=0.03) and a low rate of in-hospital decline. Older age, frailty markers and RAC origin were strongly associated with poorer outcomes. Marked mortality benefits from the intervention were seen in the RAC subgroup. Amongst patients aged over 65, we observed a high rate of functional decline occurring before hospital admission (pre-hospital decline) and a low rate of in-hospital decline. Predictors of pre-hospital in-hospital and post-hospital functional changes differed. In order to promote improved functional recovery in older patients, the interdisciplinary care model was refined to include a more pro-active approach to early functional rehabilitation. This functional independence model was implemented in a pilot controlled trial, and demonstrated greater functional improvement in the intervention group (median increase in modified Barthel index 8.5 versus 3.5 in the control group, p=0.025). Using confounders identified in a systematic literature search, multivariate techniques were used to explore predictors of hospital readmissions and examine alternative approaches to dealing with deaths in readmission analysis. This analysis confirmed a previous hospital admission as a powerful predictor of future readmission. A prospective observational study of 142 older medical patients who had already had two recent hospital admissions revealed that chronic diseases, malnutrition and depression were significant predictors of further readmission. This may inform future post-hospital interventions. CONCLUSIONS: These studies advance our understanding of the complex interplay between characteristics, care models and outcomes in medical patients. They highlight some of the methodological challenges involved in health services research, including the potential interactions between outcomes, which may influence study results and interpretation. They contribute to design of future studies by defining risk factors to consider as confounders and/or potential intervention targets. Importantly, the principal study has resulted in a major permanent change in clinical practice at the RBWH, has informed the design of other general medical services and has improved research capacity. Our ongoing multidisciplinary research program will continue to improve the quality of care for a large and vulnerable group of patients.


questions. The main emphasis of the paper is on the third option, the search-operator option. Recursion without (or with) search operator is called prime computability (PC) (or search computability (SC) respectively). Unfortunately there are no illustrative examples of the difference between PC and SC. Analogues of some well-known theorems (normal form, recur sion, negation) for usual recursion are proved for SC. The remainder of the paper is concerned with the abstract analogue of hyperarithmeticalness. Much of the theory of hyperarithmetical sets is worked out in the abstract situation.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate whether antikeratin antibodies (AKA) could be useful in the differential diagnosis of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) compared to patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) associated polyarthritis, who are seropositive for rheumatoid factor (RF).

METHODS
AKA were assayed in 3 different groups of patients; all were RF seropositive: Group 1: 25 patients with HCV associated polyarthralgia or arthritis. Group 2: 33 patients with RA. Group 3: 13 patients with autoimmune disorders other than RA. Fifteen healthy individuals served as controls.

RESULTS
AKA were detected in 20/33 patients with RA (60.6%) compared to only 2/25 patients (8%) with HCV associated arthritis (p < 0.0001). AKA were observed in 2/13 patients of Group 3 (15.3%). These results were also statistically different from those of patients with RA (p = 0.008). AKA were not found in the sera of the healthy controls.

CONCLUSION
AKA is a useful marker to differentiate patients with RA from those with hepatitis C arthritis.


Jus cogens is receiving renewed interest both in legal practice and academia. A number of recent books approach the subject from different angles, attributable to different strands of the debate. Some approaches are predominantly technical and cannot adequately address the symbolic value of jus cogens . Others argue that considerable legal effects derive from the value dimension of jus cogens but risk skipping over technical niceties. Reading several works that represent these tendencies together points to an insurmountable tension between value orientation and formalism that is indicative of the current state of jus cogens in international law. In this review essay, I discuss a legal technique approach, a value approach relying on social contract theory and a practice-oriented approach to the study of jus cogens , represented by the three books under review. On the basis of the current state of case law and research, I also identify the most pressing challenges for our understanding of jus cogens and reflect on the relation of scholarship and the parallel work of the International Law Commission and, more generally, on the performative force of theories. I conclude that jus cogens as a manifestation of 'value formalism' in international


As part of an ongoing study of age-related variation in fetal cleft lip and palate nasal capsule morphology, anterior paraseptal cartilage development was examined histologically in a sample of nine complete cleft lip and palate human fetuses, and 20 without clefts ranging in age from 8 to 21 weeks. A computer reconstruction technique was used to quantify lengths, volumes, and generate growth curves from various regression equations. Anterior paraseptal cartilage length was seen to change in a sigmoidal fashion while volume changes were best described by a logarithmic curve for both groups, with the steepest increases from 15 to 21 weeks. Cleft specimens exhibited significantly different growth rates (line slopes) for both length and volume dimensions compared with the normal specimens. The larger, for age, cartilages were associated with an enlarged, inferior border of the nasal septal cartilage and vomer in the cleft sample. These results are consonant with previous findings in this cleft fetal sample of other enlarged midline structures (i.e., nasal septal cartilage and vomer). Results suggest that growth abnormalities in one or all of these structures may be yet another mechanism for early nasal airway impingement and reduction in cleft lip and palate neonates.


Distributed massive MIMO systems, which have high bandwidth efficiency and can accommodate a tremendous amount of traffic using algorithms such as zero-forcing beamforming (ZFBF), may be deployed in large public venues with the antennas mounted under-floor. In this case the channel gain matrix H can be modeled as a multi-banded matrix, in which off-diagonal entries decay both exponentially due to heavy human penetration loss and polynomially due to free space propagation loss. To enable practical implementation of such systems, we present a multi-banded matrix inversion algorithm that substantially reduces the complexity of ZFBF by keeping the most significant entries in H and the preceding matrix W. We introduce a parameter p to control the sparsity of H and W and thus achieve the tradeoff between the computational complexity and the system throughput. The proposed algorithm includes dense and sparse preceding versions, providing quadratic and linear complexity, respectively, relative to the number of antennas. We present analysis and numerical evaluations to show that the signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) increases linearly with p in dense precoding. In sparse preceding, we demonstrate the necessity of using directional antennas by both analysis and simulations. When the directional antenna gain increases, the resulting SIR increment in sparse precoding increases linearly with p, while the SIR of dense precoding is much less sensitive to changes in p.


The first book devoted exclusively to quantitative graph theory, Quantitative Graph Theory: Mathematical Foundations and Applications presents and demonstrates existing and novel methods for analyzing graphs quantitatively. Incorporating interdisciplinary knowledge from graph theory, information theory, measurement theory, and statistical techniques, this book covers a wide range of quantitative-graph theoretical concepts and methods, including those pertaining to real and random graphs such as:
Comparative approaches (graph similarity or distance)
Graph measures to characterize graphs quantitatively
Applications of graph measures in social network analysis and other disciplines
Metrical properties of graphs and measures
Mathematical properties of quantitative methods or measures in graph theory
Network complexity measures and other topological indices
Quantitative approaches to graphs using machine learning (e.g., clustering)
Graph measures and statistics
Information-theoretic methods to analyze graphs quantitatively (e.g., entropy)
Through its broad coverage, Quantitative Graph Theory: Mathematical Foundations and Applications fills a gap in the contemporary literature of discrete and applied mathematics, computer science, systems biology, and related disciplines. It is intended for researchers as well as graduate and advanced undergraduate students in the fields of mathematics, computer science, mathematical chemistry, cheminformatics, physics, bioinformatics, and systems biology.


Colonic perforation is an uncommon but severe complication of colonoscopy. We present a case of a 10 -year-old girl who was treated conservatively for inflammatory bowel disease for 6 years. She underwent a diagnostic colonoscopy after which she developed acute respiratory failure. Urgent bedside imaging series revealed pneumothorax, pneumomediastinum and pneumoperitoneum. A chest tube was immediately inserted, and then she was intubated and ventilated. Laparotomy revealed a 1 cm wide perforation of the transverse colon. The rupture was closed and a terminal ileostomy was performed. The postoperative course was uneventful. To best of our knowledge no other case of pneumothorax, pneumomediastinum and pneumoperitoneum after colonoscopy in children has been reported so far in literature.


Objectives: Twin–twin transfusion syndrome (TTTS) results in significantly altered cardiovascular loading conditions, which may affect both donor and recipient myocardial properties. Myocardial deformation analysis using Vector Velocity Imaging (VVI, Siemens) is an angle independent, speckle-tracking technique used to assess regional cardiac mechanics, which may provide insight into our understanding of myocardial dysfunction in TTTS. Methods: Digital dynamic, two-dimensional four chamber views were interrogated off-line using VVI software. Global longitudinal strain (S%) systolic strain rate (SRs) and diastolic strain rate (SRd) were measured in the left (LV) and right (RV) ventricles of 22 fetal pairs with TTTS and compared to 25 gestational age-matched normal controls. Pulsatility indices (PI) for umbilical (UA) and middle cerebral artery (MCA) were calculated. Results: Gestational age at evaluation was 20.5 ± 1.3 weeks. Donor LV-SRs was higher, while donor RV-SRd was significantly lower than controls (Table 1). Recipient S%, SRs and SRd were significantly lower for both LV and RV in comparison to controls. Donor UA PI was higher than controls (1.93 ± 0.48 vs. 1.41 ± 0.25, P < 0.001) while donor MCA PI was lower (1.47 ± 0.29 vs. 1.87 ± 0.21). Recipient UA and MCA PI were no different than controls. Conclusions: In TTTS, donor mechanics reflect loading conditions. Donor LV systolic function is hyperdynamic, due to hypovolemia and ejection into a low resistance cerebrovascular circuit while the RV ejects into a high resistance placental circuit. Recipient RV and LV are both globally depressed with systolic and diastolic dysfunction despite normal vascular resistances and presumed volume overload, suggesting intrinsic acquired cardiomyopathy.


Raynaud's phenomenon (RP) is characterised by recurrent transient peripheral vasospasm and lower nitric oxide (NO) bioavailability in the cold. We investigated the effect of nitrate-rich beetroot juice (BJ) supplementation on i) NO-mediated vasodilation, ii) cutaneous vascular conductance (CVC) and skin temperature (Tsk) following local cooling and iii) systemic anti-inflammatory status. Following baseline testing, twenty-three individuals with RP attended four times, in a double-blind, randomized crossover design, following acute and chronic (14 days) BJ and nitrate-depleted beetroot juice (NDBJ) supplementation. Peripheral Tsk and CVC were measured during and after mild hand and foot cooling, and during transdermal delivery of acetylcholine and sodium nitroprusside. Markers of anti-inflammatory status were also measured. Plasma [nitrite] was increased in the BJ conditions (P < 0.001). Compared to the baseline visit, thumb CVC was greater following chronic-BJ (Δ2.0 flux·mmHg-1, P = 0.02) and chronic-NDBJ (Δ1.45 flux·mmHg-1, P = 0.01) supplementation; however, no changes in Tsk were observed (P > 0.05). Plasma [interleukin-10] was greater, pan endothelin and systolic and diastolic blood pressure (BP) were reduced, and forearm endothelial function was improved ,by both BR and NDBJ supplementation (P < 0.05). Acute and chronic BJ and NDBJ supplementation improved anti-inflammatory status, endothelial function and BP. CVC following cooling increased post chronic-BJ and chronic-NDBJ supplementation, but no effect on Tsk was observed.