Noise modifies the behavior of chaotic systems in both quantitative and qualitative ways. To study these modifications, the present work compares the topological structure of the deterministic Lorenz (1963) attractor with its stochastically perturbed version. The deterministic attractor is well known to be "strange" but it is frozen in time. When driven by multiplicative noise, the Lorenz model's random attractor (LORA) evolves in time. Algebraic topology sheds light on the most striking effects involved in such an evolution. In order to examine the topological structure of the snapshots that approximate LORA, we use branched manifold analysis through homologies-a technique originally introduced to characterize the topological structure of deterministically chaotic flows-which is being extended herein to nonlinear noise-driven systems. The analysis is performed for a fixed realization of the driving noise at different time instants in time. The results suggest that LORA's evolution includes sharp transitions that appear as topological tipping points.


The sphenopalatine artery (SPA) is a well-known vessel to otolaryngologists, deemed the artery of epistaxis. Epistaxis is among the most common ear, nose, and throat related emergency, and roughly 60% of the population will experience epistaxis sometime during their life. Most epistaxis cases are anterior bleeds and occur at the Keisselbach's plexus. In the rare case of posterior epistaxis, the SPA or branch of the SPA is likely responsible. It presents a challenge when treating as the vessel is hard to visualize and presents with profound bleeding. The sphenopalatine artery predominantly branches into two major vessels, the septal artery, and posterior-lateral nasal artery, however numerous additional branches may be present along with a highly variable course within the nasal cavity. Knowledge of the anatomical variations of the sphenopalatine artery and the surrounding structures is crucial to controlling posterior epistaxis that is unresponsive to conservative measures.


Violent conduct by youths ranks among the types of inappropriate behavior generally originating in difficult family and social contexts. A proper understanding of the development of violent conduct must consider the situation taken as a whole. This article documents the results of a qualitative study which aimed to determine the psychosocial profiles and needs of youths with serious behavior problems and a family history of physical, psychological or sexual abuse. The results are based on the review of clinical files of 12 boys and 11 girls between the ages of 9 and 17, who were under child protection. The 23 files were analyzed to document the simultaneous evolution of behavior problems, abuse, family and school context, and the intervention of child protection services (reporting, evaluation, measures taken, foster care). The qualitative analysis followed the chronology and life history of each youth, resulting in the emergence of three generic profiles: the Undesirable, the Explosive, and the Delinquent. Each of the profiles is described and placed in perspective using the attachment, trauma and socialization theories respectively. The study concludes with proposals of distinct intervention models to be applied to these youths in the school environment.


For the design of SFRC members, the most fundamental material property is its post cracking residual tensile strength. When relying on physical models to describe structural behaviour under load, the material laws must first be accurately established. If the material laws either significantly over- or under-estimate the residual tensile capacity of the SFRC, an accurate physical model for the determination of its strength is not possible. However, in production control and materials specification, direct tensile testing is costly in time and difficult in that it requires specialised testing equipment. To this end, testing of prisms in bending is often substituted for uniaxial tension testing, and empirical design models are developed based on the results. Several attempts have been undertaken to provide an inverse analysis from prism data to establish the σ-w relationship but no direct test verification of the approaches have, to date, been established. This paper compares the results for σ-w relationship obtained from a direct tension test with those obtained using prism tests combined with an inverse analysis. Finally, a model is proposed that can be used for control testing with designs established using physically based models for strength limit states.


In real life, people communicate using both speech and non-verbal signals such as gestures, face expression or body pose. Non-verbal signals impact the meaning of the spoken utterance in an abundance of ways. An absence of non-verbal signals impoverishes the process of communication. Yet, when users are represented as avatars, it is difficult to translate non-verbal signals along with the speech into the virtual world without specialized motion-capture hardware. In this paper, we propose a novel, data-driven technique for generating gestures directly from speech. Our approach is based on the application of Generative Adversarial Neural Networks (GANs) to model the correlation rather than causation between speech and gestures. This approach approximates neuroscience findings on how non-verbal communication and speech are correlated. We create a large dataset which consists of speech and corresponding gestures in a 3D human pose format from which our model learns the speaker-specific correlation. We evaluate the proposed technique in a user study that is inspired by the Turing test. For the study, we animate the generated gestures on a virtual character. We find that users are not able to distinguish between the generated and the recorded gestures. Moreover, users are able to identify our synthesized gestures as related or not related to a given utterance.


Masahiko Aoki and Ronald Dore have edited an authoritative account of the Japanese firm and the sources of its success, including contributions from some of the best, and best known, scholars in the field. The book represents an attempt to explain and understand aspects of the firm in the Japanese economic system, and to explain the corporate success of Japan. It is interdisciplinary in approach, containing both theoretical and empirical work, and has contributions from the fields of labour economics, comparative institutional analysis, information economics, finance, organizational theory, economic history, political science, and sociology. Chapters range from contemporary descriptions--of training (in overseas subsidiaries as well as Japan), of R&D structures, of product development practices, of finance and corporate governance, of trading relations, especially between small and large firms--to an historical overview of the evolution of Japanese management in the wartime planned economy. The book also situates Japan in the literature of economic analysis and in the on-going debate about trade-offs between equality and efficiency. The contemporary media would have us believe that the Japanese system of management--characterized by lifetime employment, emphasis on long-term, slow consensual decision-making, heavy investments in training, R&D, and quality, close inter-enterprise ties, and short rations for shareholders--is in crisis and about to change fundamentally. This book will enable the reader to decide just how solid the foundations of the Japanese enterprise system are, and to identify the rationale that lies behind it.


: Seventy-three patients with acute cholecystitis were subjected to laparoscopic drainage of the gallbladder during treatment. The endoscopic operations produced a good clinical effect in all of them. The results of the study showed that the changes of the function of the liver and the disorders of homeostasis processes occurring in acute cholecystitis regress quite rapidly under the effect of laparoscopic drainage of the gallbladder. Restoration of hepatic function and normalization of the main homeostasis parameters were used for determining the optimal terms for conducting radical operation.


1. Both solutions of Ringer plus fifteen times the normal K content, and solutions of Ringer plus fifteen times the normal Ca content markedly hasten the adaptation of single freely branching axon endings in frog's skin to repetitive air puff stimuli. 2. The K effect is produced more rapidly than is that of Ca. The K effect is reversible by washing with Ringer's solution, while the Ca effect is not. The Ca inhibition can, however, be reversed and recovery effected by washing with K rich solutions. 3. Evidence is discussed which indicates that Ca probably plays no role in normal adaptation, and the experiments are interpreted as substantiating the hypothesis of adaptation due to K.


Within the past 20 years, a growing number of methods for the analysis of masonry vaults have been developed. However, most methods idealize the vaults as a system of many arches. This oversimplification could be admissible for barrel vaults and spherical domes under simple gravitational loads, but it cannot do justice to the three-dimensional effects developing in other types of vaults, especially in complex vaults without smooth and continuous surface. Moreover, although the results could be conservative for uniform load distributions, this model limits substantially the set of loading conditions that can be analyzed and hence provide an accurate assessment of vaults performance. To clear this limitation, this article proposes a tool for three-dimensional analysis of masonry vaults. Using the lower bound approach and taking into account the friction among block interfaces, the proposed analytical method may give a good indication of the actual surface of thrust within the framework of limit state analysis. Therefore, limit state analysis with finite friction is able to provide the crack pattern, the stress resultants and the horizontal thrust at the supports, important elements with regard to strengthening interventions. To show its simplicity and rigor, the procedure has been applied to pavilion vaults. The results obtained are validated by comparison with nonlinear finite element analysis and an application to a real case study is presented.


Lithium has been used for many years in the treatment and prophylaxis of affective disorders. Since 1969, evidence has been accumulating in relation to its effectiveness in the control of aggressive behaviour. This review summarizes the published evidence.


In this study, we investigate the problem of reconstruction of a stationary temperature field from given temperature and heat flux on a part of the boundary of a semi-infinite region containing an inclusion. This situation can be modelled as a Cauchy problem for the Laplace operator and it is an ill-posed problem in the sense of Hadamard. We propose and investigate a Landweber-Fridman type iterative method, which preserve the (stationary) heat operator, for the stable reconstruction of the temperature field on the boundary of the inclusion. In each iteration step, mixed boundary value problems for the Laplace operator are solved in the semi-infinite region. Well-posedness of these problems is investigated and convergence of the procedures is discussed. For the numerical implementation of these mixed problems an efficient boundary integral method is proposed which is based on the indirect variant of the boundary integral approach. Using this approach the mixed problems are reduced to integral equations over the (bounded) boundary of the inclusion. Numerical examples are included showing that stable and accurate reconstructions of the temperature field on the boundary of the inclusion can be obtained also in the case of noisy data. These results are compared with those obtained with the alternating iterative method.


Sexual harassment is against the law and can place health care facilities at substantial risk in lawsuits as well as disrupt their caring and professional atmosphere. In some cases, health care facilities are held responsible for nonemployees' harassment of employees, as well as for harassment by employees. In addition, if an employee receives benefits such as a promotion in exchange for sexual favors, the organization may be liable for discrimination against persons who did not receive such benefits. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has established guidelines for identifying and redressing instances of sexual harassment. They instruct health care facilities to issue a policy statement explaining to employees the institution's opposition to sexual harassment and outlining procedures for lodging a complaint. It is strongly recommended that health care facilities: Investigate complaints thoroughly, tactfully, and evenhandedly. Establish a progressive discipline schedule and administer it consistently to all employees. Document the investigatory and decision making process.


The services that the aircraft supply has to satisfy increases with increase in size of the aircrafts. Most aircrafts use 120V, 400Hz AC supply, but the aircrafts may have multiple voltage requirements in order to power various components in aircrafts. Usually transformers, rectifiers and inverters are used to modify the supply voltage according to the requirement. The main objective of implementing the power electronic transformer (PET) is to replace the ordinary low frequency transformers as it offers several benefits like reduction in size and weight. So that only less energy needs to be stored in the transformer core per cycle, so the core can be made smaller. Reduction in size is always ideal for aircrafts considering safer operation of aircrafts. Implementation of PETs for inertial measurements of civil aircrafts helps in solving low power factor problems and size reduction. In this paper, the practical design and application of a power electronic transformer for inertial measurement of civil aircrafts is done.


This work shows how to develop distributed versions of block blind estimation techniques that have been proposed before for batch processing. Using diffusion adaptation techniques, data are accumulated at the nodes to form estimates of the auto-correlation matrices and to carry out local SVD and/or Cholesky decomposition steps. Local estimates at neighborhoods are then aggregated to provide online streaming estimates of the parameters of interest. Simulation results illustrate the performance of the algorithms.


The paper shows how 'the magic of the mask' is an important and dynamic narrative strengthening the vitality of rituals and the attention of the public. In the example of the Tschaggatta, carnival masks from the Lotschental region in the Canton of Valais in Switzerland, the paper points to the importance of scientific interpretations for popular discourses on the magic of masks, but also for the formulation of local discourses on the valley and for tourist and self-representative images today. Masks as 'relics from the old days' are highly valued objects for fragile community identities in an alpine region.


Finland launched a new Government Decree, the so-called MARA-regulation, on the utilization of certain wastes in earth construction on 1.1.2018. This statutory regulation sets limit values for the solubility of heavy metals (Sb, As, Ba, Cd, Cr, Cu, Pb, Mo, Ni, Se, Zn, V, Hg), chloride, sulphate, fluoride and dissolved organic carbon, as well as for organic substance (petroleum hydrocarbons, benzene, naphthalene, TEX (toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene), PAH-, phenolic- and PCB-compounds). In this case study, the concentrations of these harmful substances in the used traction sand collected in the city of Kemi, Northern Finland, were lower than their limit values set in the MARA-regulation. Therefore, this residue is a potential material to be used at earth construction sites such as in roads and roadways, in field and embankment structures, as well as in floor structures of industrial or storage buildings. However, if the used traction sand is to be utilized for these kinds of civil engineering purposes, an environmental permit is still needed because this material is not yet included in the scope of the MARA-regulation. This paper also gives an overview of the relevant Finnish environmental legislation on the utilization of wastes as an earth construction material.


This paper develops and illustrates the application of a procedure to evaluate and compare the cost effectiveness of alternative crop insurance products for cotton in terms of their effect on expected producer net returns and the variation of net returns. Farm unit-level cotton yields and state-level price distributions are estimated by a multivariate nonnormal parametric modeling procedure and used to simulate the net returns to alternative crop insurance products over a 10-year planning horizon. The ranking of alternative insurance products using third-degree stochastic dominance is presented for Texas cotton producers.


The purpose of this study is to evaluate outcomes of Arthroscopic Bankart Repair (ABR) using double loaded All suture anchor technique, in young patients with posttraumatic Anterior Shoulder Instability (ASI). Method: 24 patients were recruited who had traumatic anterior shoulder dislocation and underwent Arthroscopic Bankart Repair (ABR), with at least 2 years follow-up and minimum of 03 months of physiotherapy postoperatively. Recurrent instability, postoperative glenohumeral osteoarthritis, post-surgical complications and subjective scores (Simple Shoulder Test [SST], American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeon [ASES] and Rowe scores) were evaluated. Results: Among the 24 participants, 03 patients (12.5%) experienced at least one episode of redislocation, two patients (08%) had signs and symptoms of glenohumeral osteoarthritis. The overall satisfaction rate was 80% with ASES, SST and Rowe scores of 82%, 9% and 79% respectively. One patient (04%) had wound infection. Conclusion: Arthroscopic Bankart Repair (ABR) using double loaded all- suture anchor fixation for anterior shoulder instability followed by physiotherapy has excellent short-term outcome in term of low post-surgical complication rate, high patient satisfaction, ability to join work back and improved subjective scores.


Despite much research on the ecological impacts of urbanization, we still do not know what development patterns are most effective in supporting ecological function. In particular, it is as yet unclear if compact urban forms are ecologically more favourable than dispersed forms. Using historical data from the city of Geneva in Switzerland, we present results on its growth from 1841 to 2005, or for 165 years. We first show that the main street orientations have been maintained since the initiation of the city, which implies that the Shannon-Gibbs orientation entropy has been essentially constant during this period. We also show that the length-size distributions of the streets follow power laws and that the length entropy has, in contrast to the orientation entropy, gradually increased during the 165-year evolution of the city. This means that the maximum length and the average length of the street network has increased as the network has expanded. This study suggests that the city of Geneva has grown through two processes: expansion and densification. In Geneva, expansion has dominated during the entire period, but there has also been densification, particularly in the second half of the period. City expansion means that the land used for human activities increases over time. The urban area covered by Geneva increased from about 0.6 km2 in 1841 to about 16 km2 today, so that the area covered by fields and woodlands and available to plants and animals has reduced by more than 15 km2 during this period. Similarly, densification normally (but not always) implies that the green areas available for plants and animal inside the city reduce in size. Densification results in less average human-travel distances, less fuel consumption for transportation, and less land being urbanized; it is also favourable to certain aspects of the ecosystem. Densification may thus be a viable planning scenario for the future growth of many cities, in Switzerland and elsewhere. However, expansion appears to favour other aspects of the ecosystem, and further studies are needed to assess ecologically the overall pros and cons of city densification versus expansion.


From September 1998 a new Criminal Procedure Code is in force in Poland. Evidence collection is newly regulated in the Code among other issues. Although the institute of expert was not essentially reorganised, many of its amendments and corrections have emerged in relation to the changes of the arguing process and to the new possibilities of examination. Expert serves the participants in the procedure by applying his special knowledge. The law provides certain rights and duties of the expert. The article outlines common rights and duties of the expert and their scientific evaluation. The Expert has a right to provide an opinion (draw a conclusion) on the issues a body of the procedure is in interest. An opinion may be provided in writing or in oral, according to the request. In certain cases, due to objective or subjective reasons, an expert may refuse to provide an opinion. The Law extended rights of the expert to become acquainted with the case material, with the exception of this right restriction in certain cases. The expert is allowed to participate in the Meetings of hearings of the court or in other actions of the procedure and to state his/her opinion. The expert has a right to choose the methods of research, a right to get proper payment for his work and reimbursement of other expenses related to the investigation. The new Criminal Procedure Code of Poland enhanced legal protection of all participants of the procedure including the experts. Scientists proposed to step one step further and establish an institute of expert undercover for certain categories of cases. The expert's duties and the conditions for their implementation are also analysed. General duties of the expert are defined in the chapter 22 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Poland, which deals with experts, specialists and interpreters. In addition, other norms of the Code, which provide general duties of the procedure bodies are obligatory for the experts. When called to execute the duty (not only to carry out examinations but also to participate in the procedural actions, to consult) the expert must accept the call, carry out the assignment and present the conclusion. During the implementation of the functions, the expert must carry out investigations conscientiously and impartially. The law provides up to three years imprisonment for a deliberate presentation of the wrong conclusion. Duties of the expert indicate that he/she must not announce any knowledge gained in the process of the duties execution. Moreover, the expert is obliged to report about any such crime, inform and if necessary call the other expert to solve any questions in dispute, establish degree of reliability, etc.


Foxes are a member of Canidae family belonging to carnivora order. There are a lot of fox species all around the world. Human population growth, anthropogenic landscape changes, ameliorated vaccine protocols, laws against hunting, the increasing interest towards wildlife and wild animals resulted in augmented fox population and human-fox interaction. These all have important biologic consequences such as prevention and treatment of zoonotic diseases and endangered species protection. Both sarcoptic mange and coccidiois are two important parasitary diseases seen in foxes. In this case, a young female fox suffering sarcoptic mange and coccidiosis is presented. Haemogram and biochemistry measurements of the patient were between normal intervals except values pointing out a slight anemia. This anemia was thought to be due to parasitary infestations. A therapy schedule including ivermectin, trimetoprim/sulfa, vitamin-B was applied according to the literature and the treatment was judged as successful. Important conclusions gained from this report have been shared in the result of the case report.


This work was conducted to synthesize whey protein nanoparticles (WPNPs) for the coating of zinc citrate (Zn CITR) at three levels and to study their protective role against CCl4 -induced kidney damage and inflammatory gene expression disorder in rats. Seventy male Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into seven groups and treated orally for 4 weeks as follows; the control group, the group treated twice a week with CCl4 (5 mL/kg b.w), the groups received CCl4 plus WPNPs (300 mg/kg b.w); the group received 50 mg/kg b.w of Zn CITR or the three formulas of Zn CITR-WPNPs at low, medium and high doses (LD, MD, and HD). Blood and kidney samples were collected for different assays and histological analyses. The fabricated particles were semispherical, with an average size of 160 ± 2.7, 180 ± 3.1, and 200 ± 2.6 nm and ζ potential of -126, -93, and -84 mV for ZN CITR-WPNPs (LD), Zn CITR-WPNPs (MD), and ZN CITR-WPNPs (HD), respectively. CCl4 significantly increased (p ≤ 0.05) kidney function indices, oxidative stress markers, messenger RNA expression of transforming growth factor-β1, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-10, IL-6, inducible nitric oxide synthase, and tumor necrosis factor-α and significantly decreased (p ≤ 0.05) renal superoxide dismutase, catalase, and glutathione peroxidase along with the histological changes in the kidney tissues. WPNPs, Zn CITR, and Zn CITR loaded WPNPS showed a protective effect against these complications and Zn CITR-WPNPs (LD) was more effective. WPNPs can be used effectively for coating Zn CITR at a level of 7 mg/g WPNPs to be used as a supplement for the protection of the kidney against different toxicants to enhance immunity and avoid harm of excess Zn.


The chloride diffusion coefficient of concrete is time dependent. The high performance concrete (HPC) was prepared and the specimens were tested by ASTM C1202 and the durability of HPC in long period is analyzed with the time dependency of diffusion in this paper. The results show that the chloride diffusion coefficients of the HPC with only fly ash are large than those of the HPC with multi-admixtures, but the attenuation of the chloride diffusion coefficients of the formers are faster than the latters. The analysis results show that the chloride concentrations in concrete is over estimated when time-dependence of chloride diffusion is not considered, and the durability of concrete in long period is determined by both chloride diffusion coefficient and age factor.


BACKGROUND
Microtubule dynamics plays a vital role in regulating crucial cellular functions and is one of the most attractive anticancer drug targets. Microtubule targeting agents (MTAs) such as the vinca alkaloids or taxanes, although are effective for cancer therapy, have adverse side effects. Another hindrance in their development is multiple drug resistance in tumor cells. These drawbacks have urged the need to develop novel MTAs from alternative sources, with better therapeutic efficacy. Recently, MTAs from marine sources have grabbed much attention due to unique tubulin binding features and remarkable ability to reduce tumor progression.

OBJECTIVE
The emphasis of the article is to provide an overview of some of the most promising marine derived MTAs and highlight their major characteristics in brief.

METHOD
Patent databases such as USPTO, Espacenet and WIPO were searched systematically for recent patents published from 2006 up to 2016. Numerous data retrieved was analyzed critically, and only those patents focusing on the chemical synthesis and/or modifications of marine derived MTAs along with a significant demonstration of their in vitro and/or in vivo activity are summarized here.

RESULTS
Some of the marine derived MTAs have significant antiproliferative potency against a wide array of cancers and are also able to overcome multidrug resistance.

CONCLUSION
The marine derived MTAs hold great potential in the field of cancer therapeutics and are gradually advancing in the clinical set up. A deeper understanding of the molecular mechanisms combined with innovative therapeutic regimen would lead to major advances in the field.


Fangzi, a century town, born because of the jiaoji railway, shows modern buildings and the unique historical and cultural landscape as a industrial town along the jiaoji railway. It preserved basic integrity of the modern German-style architecture. This paper based on the site visiting at modern German-style architectures in Fangzi, review the historical background of the Fangzi region, in order to tease out the main features of modern German-style architecture in Fangzi.


Objective: To observe influences of the traditional Chinese auricular point therapy combined with relaxation training on patients with primary hypertension and anxiety.
Method: Conduct random allocation on 86 inpatients with primary hypertension and anxiety according to Pocock and Simon's minimization method; 43 patients in the observation group were treated with routine nursing, ear acupoint application therapy combined with regular relaxation training (2 times/d, 30 min/time, 2 weeks of continuous training); 43 patients in the control group were only treated with routine nursing. The SAS was adopted during admission and after 2 weeks of intervention to conduct effect evaluation and record blood pressure changes.
Results: The antihypertensive efficiency in the observation group was obviously higher than that of the control group. The difference had statistical significance (p<0.05). The blood pressure, total SAS score, psychogenic and somatic anxiety scores got improved obviously after intervention. The difference had statistical significance (P<0.01). Insomnia and mood of anxiety in somatic anxiety factors were improved obviously (P<0.05); the cardiovascular, respiratory and sensory systems in psychogenic factors were improved obviously (P<0.05).
Conclusion: The traditional Chinese auricular point therapy can lower blood pressure and improve anxiety.


Objective. —To determine the association of various antigen-independent factors with long-term cadaveric kidney transplant failure. Design. —Cohort analytic study. Setting. —Kidney transplant centers (N=131) in the United States. Patients. —A total of 31 515 patients who received cadaveric kidney transplants between October 1987 and December 1991. Patients with unknown or uninterpretable vital status or graft survival time (n=264 [0.8%]) were excluded. Main Outcome Measure. —Graft failure, estimated at 2 extremes, depending on whether the death of a patient with a functioning graft was censored ("censored graft failure") or not ("uncensored graft failure"). Results. —During the 62-month study period, 5883 patients required the reinstitution of dialysis because of graft failure, 2404 patients died with graft failure, and 2041 patients died with a functioning graft. The relative risks of censored and uncensored graft failure were significantly associated with donor age, sex, and race and recipient body surface area, after adjusting for recipient age, sex, race, diabetes, cold ischemia time, panel cross-reactivity, pretransplant blood transfusions, previous renal transplantation, functional status, and HLA antigen mismatch. Conclusions. —In cadaveric kidney transplantation, selected demographic and anthropometric factors are significantly related to long-term graft outcomes, even after adjusting for well-known antigen-dependent risk factors. These results support the hypothesis that the supply of viable donor nephrons and the physiologic demands of the transplant recipient are important determinants of long-term graft failure. Antigen-independent factors such as donor age should be incorporated into organ allocation algorithms to optimize equity and efficiency.


. The scientific goal of the SACY (Search for Associations Containing Young-stars) project is to identify eventual associations of stars younger than the Local Association, spread among the optical counterparts of the ROSAT X-ray bright sources. High-resolution spectra for possible optical counterpart later than G0 belonging to HIPPARCOS and/or TYCHO-2 catalogues were obtained in order to assess both the youth and the spatial motion of each target. The newly identified young stars present a patchy distribution in UVW space and in the sky as well revealing the existence of huge nearby young associations. Here we present the associations identified in the present sample.


Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) is an interconnection of a large number of nodes deployed for monitoring the system by means of measurement of its parameters. Recent research in wireless sensor networks has led to various new protocols which are particularly designed for sensor networks. To design these networks, the factors needed to be considered are the coverage area, mobility, power consumption, communication capabilities etc. In this paper a survey is given regarding the architecture design issues, classification of protocols. The paper explores with research issues for the realization of networks


Land-cover classification on very high resolution data (decimetre-level) is a well-studied yet challenging problem in remote sensing data processing. Most of the existing works focus on using images with orthographic view or orthophotos with the associated digital surface models (DSMs). However, the use of the nowadays widely-available oblique images to support such a task is not sufficiently investigated. In the effort of identifying different land-cover classes, it is intuitive that information of side-views obtained from the oblique can be of great help, yet how this can be technically achieved is challenging due to the complex geometric association between the side and top views. We aim to address these challenges in this paper by proposing a framework with enhanced classification results, leveraging the use of orthophoto, digital surface models and oblique images. The proposed method contains a classic two-step of (1) feature extraction and (2) a classification approach, in which the key contribution is a feature extraction algorithm that performs simplified geometric association between top-view segments (from orthophoto) and side-view planes (from projected oblique images), and joint statistical feature extraction. Our experiment on five test sites showed that the side-view information could steadily improve the classification accuracy with both kinds of training samples (1.1% and 5.6% for evenly distributed and non-evenly distributed samples, separately). Additionally, by testing the classifier at a large and untrained site, adding side-view information showed a total of 26.2% accuracy improvement of the above-ground objects, which demonstrates the strong generalization ability of the side-view features.


Abstract. To comprehensively evaluate the effects of the recent 2+26 regional strategy for air quality improvement, we compared the variations in PM2.5 concentrations in Beijing during four pollution episodes with different emission-reduction strategies. The 2+26 strategy implemented in March 2018 led to a mean PM2.5 concentrations of 16.43 % lower than that during the pollution episode in March 2013, when no specific emission-reduction measures were in place. The same 2+26 strategy implemented in November 2017 led to a mean PM2.5 concentrations of 32.70 % lower than that during the pollution episode in November 2016, when local emission-reduction measures were implemented. The results suggested that the effects of the 2+26 regional emission-reduction measures on PM2.5 reductions were influenced by a diversity of factors and could differ significantly during specific pollution episodes. Furthermore, we found the proportions of sulfate ions decreased significantly and nitrate ions were the dominant PM2.5 components during the two 2+26 orange alert periods. Meanwhile, the relative contributions of coal combustion to PM2.5 concentrations in Beijing during the pollution episodes in March 2013, November 2016, November 2017 and March 2018 was 40 %, 34 %, 28 % and 11 % respectively, indicating that the recent Coal to Gas project and the contingent 2+26 strategy led to a dramatic decrease in coal combustion in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region. On the other hand, the relative contribution of vehicle exhaust during the 2+26 orange alert periods in November 2017 and March 2018 reached 40 % and 54 % respectively. The relative contribution of local emission to PM2.5 concentrations in Beijing also varied significantly and ranged from 49.46 % to 89.35 % during the four pollution episodes. These results suggested that the 2+26 regional emission-reduction strategy should be implemented with red air pollution alerts during heavy pollution episodes to intendedly reduce the dominant contribution of vehicle exhausts to PM2.5 concentrations in Beijing, while specific emission-reduction measures should be implemented accordingly for different cities within the 2+26 framework.


The mineral ikaite (CaCO 3 ⋅ 6H 2 O), not previously observed in lake environments, precipitates seasonally along the shore of Mono Lake, California, where Ca-HCO 3 spring water mixes with cold Na-CO 3 lake water. During the winter, cold water temperatures and high concentrations of PO 4 3- and organic carbon inhibit calcite precipitation, allowing the metastable ikaite to form. During the spring warming, however, ikaite decomposes to form calcium carbonate and water, occasionally leaving pseudomorphs of the primary precipitate. The identification of modern ikaite suggests that both Pleistocene and Holocene tufas in the Mono basin originally precipitated as ikaite. This mineral may also form in other lake environments, but rapid recrystallization after warming destroys the physical, chemical, and isotopic evidence of formation, and alters the geochemical record.


While views may differ on the factors that made the 2011 Egyptian revolution possible, the role of mass media will remain undisputable. The Internet-based social networks caught the Mubarak regime by surprise, and the popular disillusionment with the 'national' media led the public to turn to private newspapers and satellite channels for keeping pace with the events.
This paper examines the role of specific media during the 18 days of the 2011 Egyptian revolution – from 25 January to 11 February, 2011 – which we have divided into four parts. It discusses how these media contributed to the unfolding of events, conceptualized the protests and the demands of the public, and presented the actors that participated in or opposed the revolution. These points are addressed by discussing the content of the Facebook pages of the Sixth of April Movement and We Are All Khalid Said, as well as that of a private Egyptian newspaper, al-Shuruq, and the state-run newspaper al-Ahram.1

1 This paper was presented in the conference Covering the Arab Spring, Middle East in the Media –
Media in the Middle East at the University of Copenhagen on 1-2 September, 2011. We would like
to thank the conference organizers, Ehab Galal and Riem Spielhaus, as well as the two reviewers of
Global Media Journal (German Edition) for their useful comments and suggestions.


Neural crest cells, a population of proliferative, migratory, tissue-invasive stem cells, are a defining feature of vertebrate embryos. These cells arise at the neural plate border during a time in development when precursors of the central nervous system and the epidermis are responding to the extracellular signals that will ultimately dictate their fates. Neural crest progenitors, by contrast, must be maintained in a multipotent state until after neural tube closure. Although the molecular mechanisms governing this process have yet to be fully elucidated, recent work has suggested that Myc functions to prevent premature cell fate decisions in neural crest forming regions of the early ectoderm. Here, we show that the small HLH protein Id3 is a Myc target that plays an essential role in the formation and maintenance of neural crest stem cells. A morpholino-mediated `knockdown' of Id3 protein results in embryos that lack neural crest. Moreover, forced expression of Id3 maintains the expression of markers of the neural crest progenitor state beyond the time when they would normally be downregulated and blocks the differentiation of neural crest derivatives. These results shed new light on the mechanisms governing the formation and maintenance of a developmentally and clinically important cell population.


In 2015, Singaporeans voted in parliamentary elections. The incumbent People's Action Party won a landslide victory, in contrast with its performance in the 2011 elections, which had been the worst since Singapore gained independence. The party successfully reinvented itself as a more left-leaning and responsive party in government. Its public image improved by its association with Lee Kuan Yew, who passed away in this jubilee year.


Abstract In this paper, I present evidence for framing climate change education around social justice. More specifically, I provide empirical support for framing climate change education around intragenerational climate justice, and argue that this frame can influence youth in industrialized, wealthy nations to become mobilized, climate-engaged individuals. To do so, I apply critical qualitative analysis to narratives from American youth who participated in a global climate change education program in Bangladesh. My findings include the importance of contextualizing climate justice, framing climate change around humans, implicating ourselves in the problem and recognizing our own obligations in mitigation, seeing climate change as real and tangible, being in a place impacted by climate change, feeling solidarity with those impacted, and recognizing social injustice and power disparities within climate change impacts. Based on these findings, I recommend an approach that provides context, nuance, and personal connection to an otherwise abstract global problem.


The focus of this study is the use and role of digital marketing communications (DMC) among B2B SMEs in the oil and gas industry. In order to understand the role of DMC, which is described as the use of DMC channels, such as website, social media, e-mail and mobile marketing, a comprehensive review is undertaken into SMEs and B2B marketing theory to identify the nature of their marketing practices. The conceptual framework of critical success factors (CSFs) for DMC is developed to assess the use and role among B2B SMEs. The digital marketing theory is still emerging and at the same time there are calls for more research into B2B and SMEs marketing, and thus this study combines these calls and investigates B2B SMEs and their DMC practices. The study consists of qualitative case study research, which uses three phases of data collection that were undertaken in light of realism research paradigm. The first phase includes a longitudinal systematic observation of oil and gas SMEs and their DMC practices. The second phase includes interviews with marketing agencies to provide a macro view on the oil and gas industry and its marketing practices. The final phase includes interviews with managers from oil and gas B2B SMEs, aiming to gain the internal views and insights on the use and role of DMC. This study contributes to digital marketing theory by investigating five groups of factors affecting DMC strategy for B2B SMEs: internal, external, marketing strategy, website and DMC channels. Empirical data suggests that the two main groups of factors influencing DMC strategy are internal and external factors, putting B2B SMEs in a complex situation, as they are internally dealing with limited resources and operating in the industrial context externally. The study also shows that among B2B SMEs, DMC plays only a supportive role, while the focus remains on traditional communication techniques such as personal face-to-face sales communications.


Abstract This provocation argues that the COVID‐19 pandemic has exposed deep labour market inequalities. Partially underpinning these inequalities are human resource management (HRM) theories and practices which encourage and legitimise the commodification of labour. Workers whose jobs have been commodified have suffered disproportionately during the pandemic. While HRM is not wholly responsible for this suffering it is important for those of us involved in researching, teaching and practicing HRM to reflect on the ways in which what we do has made a bad situation worse so that we can do better in the future.


Progradation of the northern Gulf of Mexico slope differentially loaded a stretching allochthonous salt sheet at least 80 km long. Loading segmented the landward margin of the allochthon into smaller salt structures: (1) irregular, rootless salt massifs separated by ovoid intrasalt basins; (2) rootless salt stocks within a linear basin; and (3) isolated remnant salt rollers overlying a discontinuity marking the level from which the allochthon was displaced. During partitioning, salt migrated basinward to feed the leading edge of the allochthon. Most salt structures on the upper continental slope are thought to have formed by segmentation of much larger allochthonous sheets.


Physiological differences between the male and female brain are explored. Research which suggests this reality and recognition of these differences are in their infancy. The implications for the adult educator remain a challenge and full appreciation of the subject is left open for debate. As andragogy and pedagogy continue to merge yet differentiate, any issue of diversity, including brain sex differences, deserves the attention of the adult educator. Introduction Recent research has made it compelling to recognize that the brain develops differentially in direct response to the presence of estrogen or testosterone as determined by the presence of the XX or XY sex chromosomes at conception. These inner differences are as striking and exciting as the differences that are obvious on the outside. As these distinctions are explored, the adult educator is challenged to acknowledge "Brain Sex" as well as socio-cultural gender expectations between the sexes. With this knowledge, learning strategies can be put to work that maximize each individual's potential. Theory or Fact About twenty years ago Ann Moir, then a doctoral student, became interested in exploring the possibility that men and women are different and the difference goes beyond the procreational functions and the anatomically obvious. If there were clinically describable and scientific distinctions between the brains of men and women, she felt it was intellectually dishonest to deny these differences (Moir 1992). Collaborating with Jessel, Moir wrote a controversial best seller, Brain Sex: The Real Difference Between men and Women. Within their book, is a stylized version of brain research that opens electrifying new possibilities about the differences between men and women and yet leaves some crucial questions unanswered. Sex or Gender Sex or gender are two terms that are frequently used to refer to male or female differences. The term gender has been further extended to include role and identity. "Sex is used to indicate physiological differentiation between males and females (Huyck, 1990, n 124). Gender role includes the social prescriptions or stereotypes associated with each sex, to which an individual may or may not conform, and gender identity includes the introspective part of gender role, such as the gender-linked qualities that one sees as part of the self." Genetically Determined The sexes are different because their brains are different (Moir, 1992; Witelson, 1991). In the developing nervous system there is a small window of time that the growing brain responds to levels of testosterone or to levels of estrogen. These steroid hormones create a sex-specific blueprint. Research finds that the actions of gonadal hormones upon the developing nervous system are organizational and permanent (Kandel 1991). Hormones have been found to have two periods of influence on the brain. During very early development of the brain, the hormones dictate neural patterns and routes. Then, during puberty these same hormones return to the brain to nudge the same pathways or networks which they had laid down earlier. Moir (1992) likens this revisiting to a photographic negative that has been made very early, and the full development comes later. The interplay between the hormones and the brain guides the differences in human behavior and gaining knowledge. Both learning and behavior have strong biological support. Gazzaniga (1992) supports the biological basis for learning by saying "learning may be nothing more than the time needed for an organism to sort out its built-in systems in order to accomplish its goals" (p.76). Moir (1992) supports the notion that maturation of the processes required for organization of neural patterns takes time. Future research could establish a direct relationship between brain structure and behavior, and conversely, between behavior and structure. If this can be authenticated, then there would be indisputable linkages between sex, hormones, brains, learning and behavior as well as environmental influences. …


A set of modified marine corrosion simulation test device was designed in this study according to the characteristics of the natural marine environment, in order to study the corrosion behavior of steel materials. The natural corrosive marine environment could be simulated indoors by the device, which had advantages such as sea water self-circulation, stable wave, multi-level adjustable amplitude and frequency and so on. Components modeling, overall assembly and motion simulation were carried out by UG program, and the interference among the various components, limit position of movement and motion parameters were analyzed, effectively avoiding the problems that may arise during processing, manufacturing and assembly process.


An increasing number of large wind turbines with a variable-speed variable pitch control mechanism are developed to improve the response speed of wind turbines and get maximum active power .Designing a reasonable pitch control system requires both a good control scheme and a more accurate wind turbine model. Base on the analysis of wind turbines' principle, a local linearization model of wind turbine is built by using linearization method of small deviation in this paper. The model's inputs are the data of wind speed and pitch angle, and the output is the active power. The accuracy of the model is verified by studying the active power output of wind turbine under different circumstances in which the pitch angle changes with a constant wind speed and the wind speed changes with a constant pitch angle. At the same time, this paper provides pitch control program based on internal model control after analyzing the disadvantages of PID pitch controller. When the wind speed is beyond the rating, the active power can be limited reasonably around the power rating of wind turbines by adjusting the pitch angle.


In this paper we deal with nonsmooth optimal control problems in the case when the control is allowed to be a discontinuous function. We analyse smoothness assumptions on an adjoint process in deterministic and stochastic cases. Possibilities of steep generalized space-gradients of the adjoint function imply the necessity of an approximation of the Hamiltonian. The key question of such an approximation is a relationship between the control and the value function. Under quite general assumptions it is proved that the performance measure for the original process is determined by the control function with possible discontinuities.


Purpose of review Healthcare-associated pneumonia (HCAP) was introduced in 2005 by American Thoracic Society/Infectious Diseases Society of America guidelines as a new entity of pneumonia, resembling nosocomial pneumonia rather than community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) in terms of frequency of multidrug-resistant (MDR) pathogens and outcomes, thus requiring broad spectrum initial antimicrobial coverage in order to prevent inadequate treatment and, as a consequence, excess mortality. This concept continues to be a subject of controversy. Main concerns relate to the definition of HCAP, the true frequency of MDR pathogens, and the impact of MDR pathogens on outcomes. Recent findings Definitions of HCAP and the relative frequencies of HCAP defining subgroups were highly variable. All studies demonstrated an increased severity of pneumonia at presentation and an excess mortality from HCAP as compared to CAP. The incidence of MDR pathogens in different observational studies was slightly increased but generally low in most studies originating from Europe, South Korea, Canada, and Japan. However, the data do not support a causal relationship of MDR incidence and excess mortality. Instead, after adjustment for confounders, mortality might be related to hidden or documented treatment restrictions in elderly and severely disabled patients. Accordingly, HCAP guideline concordant antimicrobial treatment did not improve outcomes. Summary The HCAP concept is based on varying definitions poorly predictive of MDR pathogens. The incidence of MDR pathogens is far lower than supposed in the original guideline document, and MDR pathogens do not seem to be the main cause of excess mortality. Broad antimicrobial coverage does not alter outcomes. As the HCAP concept results in a tremendous overtreatment without any evidence for improved outcomes, it should not be implemented in clinical practice prior to clear evidence that it is superior to a careful assessment of individual risk factors for MDR pathogens.


The study helps to improve the scope of IoT in Healthcare with a diverse range of enhancements. The study proposes Textile-based Wearable System Technology, Unobtrusive Biosensors, Intelligent Medical Boxes, and a Cloud Computing Architectural Framework amongst other technologies and advancement that would propel the HealthCare Industry to unparalleled heights in terms of efficiency and Patient Comfort. The paper proposes to revolutionise the industry by real time exchange of data to seamlessly and proactively offer prediction, diagnosis and remedies. The framework this paper proposes is aptly called the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) which opens a whole new avenue for the Patient-HealthCare provider Interface (PHI) and Wearable Health Technology (WHT).


Trends in regional trade in agricultural products are reviewed. The chapter includes discussion of the theory of the modern drivers of the evolution of agricultural comparative advantage as economies grow. It asks: to what extent are the actual trade patterns in East Asia consistent with that theory? The actual trade patterns are somewhat inconsistent with the theory, which is because trade-related policies have restricted agricultural trade of East Asian economies in various ways. In particular, several countries have restricted their exports of key farm products while their incomes were low, which implies the imposition of a tax on agriculture. Other countries have gradually raised barriers to agricultural imports as the international competitiveness of their farmers declined in the course of economic growth and industrialisation. A 'tradition' of gradually moving away from taxing and toward protecting farmers relative to producers in non-farm sectors is identified. But this process should not be taken as given. Some richer countries are reducing their agricultural protection, following the agricultural reforms of West European countries. Also there are new and cheaper means of achieving the policy objectives of agricultural policies, even in the region's poorer countries, which allow countries to move away from less-efficient price- and trade-distorting policy instruments to more efficient ones for redistributing the benefits of economic growth and integration. While switching to these new measures is not a trivial task, doing so would help integrate regional trade in these products and provide better options for responding to supply shocks such as the COVID-19 epidemic and local events associated with climate change. © The Editors and Contributors Severally 2021.


In developing rice varieties resistant to brown planthopper (BPH), information on responses of the BPH to the rice plants were needed. The aim of the research was to study the biological responses of BPH on biochemical factors of some rice varieties. The study was conducted on June 2010 to April 2012 in Muara Research Station, of the Indonesian Center for Rice Research (ICRR) and at Laboratory of Physiology and Toxicology, Plant Protection Department, Bogor Agriculture University. The biological responses of the BPH to rice varieties were studied in terms of adult settling preference, feeding activity using the honeydew test, and life table analysis. The biochemical factors of the rice varieties, namely sucrose and oxalic acid contents were analyzed. Rice varieties TN1 (no resistance gene), IR26 (Bph1), IR42 (bph2), IR64 (Bph1+), IR74 (Bph3), PTB33 (bph2+Bph3), and Inpari13 (unknown resistance gene) were used in this study. The BPH showed similar non-preference reactions to the resistant varieties and Inpari13 for settling. Feeding activity of the adult female BPH was the highest on the susceptible variety TN1 and the lowest on the resistant variety PTB33. The highest mortality of BPH occurred at larval stages, especially in the first and second instars. The intrinsic rate of increase (rm) and net reproductive rate (Ro) of the BPH were higher on the susceptible variety TN1, but the doubling time (DT) was shorter than those on the resistant varieties. The resistant variety PTB33 contained high oxalic acid and low sucrose. On the contrary, the susceptible variety TN1 contained low oxalic acid and high sucrose. These biochemical factors contributed in rice plant resistance to BPH.


RELATIONAL AGGRESSION AND FRIENDSHIP QUALITY IN LATE ADOLESCENCE Carol-Anne Hendry Advisor: University of Guelph, 2012 Professor Karl Hennig The main objective of the present research was to contribute to the literature by examining relational aggression and friendship quality in a late adolescent sample. Specifically, these two studies sought to determine whether relationally aggressive behaviour is associated with both costs and benefits with respect to friendship quality for an older sample of adolescents. In the first study, a total of 1600 university students (74.7% female) responded to an online survey assessing their perceived friendship quality (comprised of positive and negative features) and their level of self-disclosure (i.e., intimacy) with a close same-sex friend. In addition, each participant rated their experience and use of relational aggression, in general (i.e., relational perpetration), within the friendship (i.e., relational victimization), and directed towards others outside of the friendship (i.e., dyadic aggression). Results indicated that both relational perpetration and relational victimization were predictive of negative outcomes for the friendship. A unique pattern for dyadic aggression was demonstrated in that it was associated with positive outcomes for the friendship. Self-disclosure moderated the relation between relational aggression variables and friendship features. The second study sought to investigate and identify associations between the same relational aggression variables, friendship quality, self-disclosure, and an additional measure of satisfaction in the close same sex friendships of 242 older female adolescents using a dyadic approach to account for interdependence in friendships. In contrast to Study 1, the results of the second study highlighted more costs than benefits when relational aggression is used within the friendship context. Specifically, for 121 female friendship dyads, the three forms of relational aggression were typically associated with poor outcomes for friendship quality. Analysis of similarities between friends demonstrated that dissimilar ratings of relational aggression resulted in better outcomes for the friendship. Dyads who reported greater similarities in self-disclosure were more satisfied, yet also rated their friendships as higher in negative features. These findings partially support conceptions of relational aggression as having both adaptive and maladaptive functions at the relational level for older adolescents and point to the importance of addressing issues of interdependence within friendships.


In this investigation, shear-thinning and shear-thickening inelastic fluids through a contraction channel are presented based on a power-law inelastic model. In this regard, Navier–Stokes partial differential equations are used to describe the motion of fluids. These equations include a time-dependent continuity equation for the conservation of mass and time-dependent equations for the conservation of momentum. Numerically, a time-stepping Taylor Galerkin-pressure correction finite element method is used to treat the governing equations. A start-up of Poiseuille flow through axisymmetric 4:1 contraction channel for inelastic fluid are taken into consideration as instances to satisfy the method analysis. Here, the impacts of different parameters, such as Reynolds number (Re), the consistency parameter (k), and the power-law index (n), are examined. Mainly, the effect of these parameters on the convergence levels of solution components considering it the most important point of view. The findings demonstrate that the inelastic parameters have a significant influence on the rates of velocity and pressure temporal convergence, and this effect is observed significantly. Fundamentally, the rate of convergence for shear-thickening flow is found to be greater than of the convergence for shear-thinning flow. In addition, the critical level of Reynolds number is also determined for shear-thinning and shear-thickening situations. In this context, we captured that the critical level of Re for shear-thickening case is much higher than that found for shear-thinning case.


SUMMARY This cross-sectional study determined the prevalence and distribution of schistosome and soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections among 1,308 children aged 10–18 years in 34 primary schools in 8 informal urban settlements in Kisumu City, western Kenya. Stool samples were collected and examined for eggs of Schistosoma mansoni and STH (Hookworms, Ascaris lumbricoides and Trichuris trichiura) using the Kato-Katz technique. Haematuria was used as a proxy indicator of urinary schistosomiasis. Schools and water bodies were mapped using a geographical information system. Overall, 34% of children were infected with one or more helminth species whereas 16·2% of children were infected with one or more STH species. Schools in closest proximity to Lake Victoria and River Nyamasaria had the highest S. mansoni prevalence while schools with STH were more homogenously distributed. Mean school prevalence of S. mansoni infection was 21% (range=0–69·7%), S. haematobium 3·6% (range=0–12%), hookworms 6·1% (range=0–20%), A. lumbricoides 4·9% (range=0–18·4%), and T. trichiura 7·7% (range=0–18·6%). Helminth-related morbidities were not associated with infection. Our study demonstrates that schistosomiasis and STH are important health priorities among schools in informal settlements of Kisumu City, and highlights the need for routine deworming in similar settings.


CONTEXT
The explanation for the excess risk for diabetic renal disease in blacks is uncertain.

OBJECTIVES
To compare the incidence of early renal function decline in black and white adults with diabetes and to examine possible explanatory factors for racial differences.

DESIGN
Prospective cohort study.

SETTING
Four US communities participating in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study.

PARTICIPANTS
Community-based sample of 1434 diabetic adults aged 45 to 64 years.

MEASUREMENTS
Detailed baseline assessment using structured interview, results of physical examination, and laboratory measurements.

MAIN OUTCOME
Development of early renal function decline defined by an increase in serum creatinine of at least 35.4 micromol/L (0.4 mg/dL) during 3 years of follow-up.

RESULTS
During 3 years of follow-up, early renal function decline developed in 45 blacks (28.4 per 1000 person-years [PY]) and 25 whites (9.6 per 1000 PY). After adjustment for age, sex, and baseline serum creatinine level, early renal function decline was more than 3 times as likely to develop in blacks than whites (odds ratio, 3.15; 95% confidence interval, 1.86-5.33). Additional adjustment for education, household income, health insurance, fasting glucose level, mean systolic blood pressure, smoking history, and physical activity level reduced the relative odds in blacks to 1.38 (95% confidence interval, 0.71-2.69), corresponding to a 82% reduction in excess risk.

CONCLUSIONS
These data suggest that early renal function decline is 3 times more likely to develop in blacks than whites and that potentially modifiable factors, including lower socioeconomic status, suboptimal health behaviors, and suboptimal control of glucose level and blood pressure, account for more than 80% of this disparity.


The article presents the evolution of the principles that have structured the management of the risk associated with ionising radiation. It explains how a prudent approach has been adopted to deal with the uncertainties attached to the risk linked to low exposures. It particularly addresses the way in which a dose-risk relationship and a philosophy of action have been gradually developed so that risk-taking is organised in a responsible manner. Finally, the way expertise has been structured in the framework of a cautious approach is underlined.


Drawing on findings from an original national survey experiment, we unpack Americans' views on the employment of mothers and fathers with young children. This study provides a fuller account of contemporary attitudes than is available from surveys such as the General Social Survey. After seeing vignettes that vary the circumstances in which married mothers, single mothers, and married fathers make decisions about paid work and caregiving, the respondents' views swing from strong support to deep skepticism about a parent's work participation, depending on the parent's specific job conditions and family circumstances. When a mother, whether married or single, is satisfied with her job and her family depends on her income, respondents overwhelmingly support the option to work. Conversely, when a father is dissatisfied with his job and the family does not depend on his income, respondents generally support the option to stay home. These findings provide insight regarding the "gender stall" thesis by showing that Americans' views depend heavily on the circumstances they believe parents are facing. This more nuanced view highlights the importance of social context in the allocation of paid work and caregiving for both mothers and fathers.


Observational studies have suggested an inverse relationship between dietary or serum lutein and risk for age-related macular degeneration and cataracts. This evidence has stimulated interest in the biological and other characteristics of lutein, and also zeaxanthin, a structurally similar carotenoid; together, they comprise the macular pigment. Accurate interpretation of data linking dietary intake or serum concentrations of lutein and zeaxanthin and risk for eye disease in epidemiologic and clinical studies requires knowledge of biological and nondietary factors influencing these intake data or concentrations. The primary aims of this study were to identify the correlates of dietary lutein + zeaxanthin intake and the determinants of serum lutein and zeaxanthin concentrations in a heterogeneous community-based sample of adults aged 18-92 y, recruited and examined at three U.S. sites (n = 2786). An additional aim was to identify the determinants of change in serum lutein concentration from baseline to 1 y in a subset of 1368 study participants followed prospectively. Demographic characteristics (age, sex, race/ethnicity, education), body mass index and lifestyle factors (exercise, sun exposure, smoking, alcohol consumption) were significantly (P < 0.05) associated with dietary lutein + zeaxanthin intake. Demographic characteristics, dietary intake, serum cholesterol concentration, body mass index and smoking explained 24% of the variance in serum lutein concentration. Race/ethnicity, education level and smoking had the strongest associations with serum lutein concentration. Every 10% increase in dietary lutein + zeaxanthin intake was associated with a 2.4% increase in serum lutein concentration. Notably, however, the amount of variance in serum concentration that is explained by demographic characteristics, health-related behaviors and lifestyle factors remains substantial.


Abstract The Himalaya-Tibet and Caledonide orogens are comparable in scale and are similar in various aspects. Regional suture zones are recognizable in both, although their identification is more problematic in the deeply eroded Caledonide orogen. Crustal-scale thrust belts, regional Barrovian metamorphism characterized by clockwise P–T paths, and migmatitic cores with crustally-derived leucogranite complexes are the dominant structural feature of both orogens. Both orogens also record calc-alkaline magmatism attributed to subduction activity prior to collision. Syn-orogenic extension accompanied crustal thickening in both orogens, however, the Caledonides also have a protracted record of late- to post-orogenic extension that is attributed to lithospheric delamination in combination with oblique plate divergence. The oblique nature of the Caledonian collision is also reflected in the development of regionally significant sinistral strike-slip faults and shear zones, whereas such structures are apparently not as significant within the Himalayan orogen. The major difference between the two orogens relates to their contrasting gross structure: the Caledonides has bivergent geometry with thrust belts developed in the pro- and retro-wedges, whereas the Himalaya has a thrust belt located only in the pro-wedge segment. These differing geometries are probably explicable with reference to pre-collision contrasts in rheology and/or inherited structures. As such, there is no reason to suggest that either example should be viewed as being a 'typical' product of collisional orogenesis – they likely represent end-members of a range of possible orogenic profiles.


The potential for investment by nonfarm investors in US farm equity is estimated by applying a micro-model of the nonfarm equity market to USDA's Farm Costs and Returns Survey. The analysis indicates a potential market from farm operators of approximately $9 billion. Establishment of real estate investment trusts (REIT's) is discussed as a possible institution to unite farmers and investors.


Background The homeostatic control of emotions and metabolism is disturbed early in Huntington's disease (HD), which may be due to changes in hypothalamic function. Previous studies have identified a loss of orexin (hypocretin) neurons in the lateral hypothalamus in HD patients. There has been only limited assessment of other hypothalamic regions in HD. Aims The aim of the study was to assess the neuropeptide expressing hypothalamic neurons known to regulate metabolism and emotion in HD patients compared with healthy controls. Methods Hypothalamic serial sections from HD (n=6) and controls (n=4) cases were processed for cresyl violet, Luxol fast blue and immunohistochemistry. Quantification of total cell numbers was performed using unbiased stereology. Results Substantial differences exist in peptide expression of different neuronal populations in HD hypothalamus compared with controls. In addition to loss of orexin expressing neurons, both oxytocin and vasopressin expressing neurons were decreased. The number of cocaine and amphetamine regulated transcript (CART) expressing neurons was increased. The increased expression of CART in the hypothalamus is consistent with a previous study showing increased CART levels in CSF from HD patients. There was no difference in the numbers of neuropeptide Y expressing neurons. Conclusions These results show significant and specific alterations in the peptide expression of hypothalamic neurons known to regulate metabolism and emotion. These changes may be important for the development of the psychiatric symptoms and metabolic disturbances characterising HD, and may provide potential targets for therapeutic interventions.


This paper describes the results of an experiment designed to investigate the effects of furrow microrelief on the soil hyperspectral directional reflectance collected at various illumination and observation conditions. The reflectance of four soil surfaces formed by the same sandy material, one smooth and the others with furrows of different depth, were measured by a laboratory prototype goniometric spectral device. The most notable effects of the furrows on the hyperspectral bidirectional reflectance factor of the surfaces were observed along the vertical plane perpendicular to their furrows at high view zenith angles (as degrees from the nadir), particularly if the light-source zenith angle θs is extremely high, and its beams reach the furrows at the horizontal angle of 90°. It was also found that the absorption features of the soil material used in the experiment, located at around 1420 nm, become less visible with the increase of the θs, independent of the shape of the surfaces.


Purpose: So far there is little evidence on peripherally inserted central venous catheter (PICC) in radiation oncology patients maintaining the access during the periods of ambulatory and hospital treatment. Methods: A total of 522 PICC placements in 484 patients were performed between 11/2011 and 07/2016 at the Department of Radiation Oncology and analysed retrospectively for complications and treatment- and patient-related factors during ambulatory and hospital inpatient use. On initial hospitalization, all patients received a multimodal radio-oncological treatment consisting of radiation and intravenous therapy administered via the PICC. Results: A total of 18,292 catheter days were documented. Median follow-up from catheter insertion to their removal was 37 days (197). The overall complication rate was 4.1 per 1000 catheter days (n = 75, 14.4%). Complications were similar between the cohort of outpatient 3.6 per 1000 catheter days and the cohort of inpatient 4.8 per 1000 catheter days (OR 0.976; 95% CI [0.598; 1.619]; p = 0.924). Severe bloodstream infections occurred at a rate of 0.60 per 1000 catheter days (n = 11, 2.1%), deep vein thrombosis at a rate of 0.82 per 1.000 catheter days (n = 15, 2.9%) and local inflammation at a rate of 1.26 per 1.000 catheter days (n = 23, 4.4%). Only immunotherapy could be identified as an independent risk factor for complications (OR 5.6; 95% CI [2.4; 13.1]; p < 0.001). Conclusion: Using PICC in outpatients is not associated with an elevated risk of complications. Particular attention should be payed to early identification of PICC associated bloodstream infections. Immunotherapy is an independent risk factor for local skin complication.


At the application time of sugarcane ripeners, most times, morning glory plants, that have escaped, survived or emerged, are entwined on sugarcane stalks and these plants are at this time in different reproductive stages (and it becomes more difficult to control) causing a mechanical and crop yield damage. The main aim of this research was to evaluate sugarcane crop ripeners effect on the seeds germination, seedling development and the abscission of the reproductive structures of morning glory. The treatments consist of five ripeners: ethyl-trinexapac (300 ga.i.ha-1), glyphosate (216 ga.i.ha-1), fluazifop-p-butyl (75 ga.i.ha-1), sulfometuron-methyl (15 ga.i.ha-1), ethephon (480 ga.i.ha-1) and one control plot (without ripener application). They were applied during the reproductive stages of morning glory. The experimental design used was completely randomized design with four replications and six treatments, to a total of 24 plots. After ripeners application, abscised reproductive structures were counted to determine the percentage of abscission. The seeds of each phenological stage were collected when it reached the point of physiological maturity and it was set to germinate in Petri dishes to evaluate the germination rate, germination mean time, germination velocity, initial growth and dry mass weight. Trinexapac-ethyl, glyphosate and fluazifop-P-butyl application when plants are with open flowers can reduce seed viability. Glyphosate showed the smallest length value and it can affect seedling growth. Glyphosate and ethephon caused the highest percentages of abscission of morning glory reproductive structures and they can contribute to reduce the seeds inflow to the soils.

 Key words: Abscission, Ipomoea hederifolia, plant growth regulator, reproductive structure


The effect of improper heat treatment progress on the structure and properties of P91 steel was studied. Results showed that under aircooling conditions, although the normalization temperature is beyond conventional range, the hardness meets the requirements of ASME standard, and the microstructure appear a gradual transition from equiaxed ferrite with carbide precipitates to tempered martensite. In addition ,when normalization temperature was as high as 1150°C and 1250°C, there is an characteristic morphology of coarse martensite laths and some of them are orthogonal to each other. When normalization cooling rate is slowly at 1°C/min, the hardness dropped under the lower limit at reduced normalization temperatures and the microstructure consist of polygonized ferrite and carbide precipitates. SEM and TEM observation indicated that with the increasing normalization temperature the ferrite morphology transforms from coarse polygonized to finer equiaxed, and carbide precipitates not only along boundaries but also within the grain, at the same tine rod shape carbides formed at 1000°C normalization.


Acknowledgments ix Introduction: Jane Caplan and John Torpey 1 PART ONE: CREATING APPARATUSES OF IDENTIFICATION 13 1. Describing the Person, Reading the Signs in Late Medieval and Renaissance Europe: Identity Papers, Veste Figures, and the Limits of Identification, 1400-1600 by Valentin Groebner 15 2. The Identification of the Citizen: The Birth of Republican Civil Status in France by Gerard Noiriel 28 3. "This or That Particular Person": Protocols of Identification in Nineteenth-Century Europe by Jane Caplan 49 4. Making Social Groups, One Person at a Time: The Identification of Individuals by Estate, Religious Confession, an Ethnicity in Late Imperial Russia by Charles Steinwedel 67 5. Colonizing the Subject: The Genealogy an Legacy of the Soviet Internal Passport by Marc Garcelon 83 6. Modern Horrors: British Identity and Identity Cards by Jon Agar 101 PART TWO: IDENTIFICATION RACTICES AND POLICING 121 7. Republican Identity: Bertillonage as Government Technique by Martine Kaluszynski 123 8. The Standardize Gaze: The Standardization of the Search Warrant in Nineteenth-Century Germany by Peter Becker 139 9. Anthropometry, the Police Expert, an the Deptford Murders: The Contested Introduction of Fingerprinting for the Identification of Criminals in Late Victorian an Edwardian Britain by Anne M. Joseph 164 10. Fingerprinting an the Argentine lan for Universal Identification in the Late Nineteenth an Early Twentieth Centuries by Kristin Ruggiero 184 PART THREE: IDENTIFICATION AND CONTROL OF MOVEMENT 197 11. Domenica Saba Takes to the Road: Origins an Development of a Modern Passport System in Lombardy-Veneto by Andrea Geselle 199 12. Governments and Forgers: Passports in Nineteenth-Century Europe by Andreas Fahrmeir 218 13. A Many-Headed Monster: The Evolution of the Passport System in the Netherlands an Germany in the Long Nineteenth Century by Leo Lucassen 235 14. The Great War an the Birth of the Modern Passport System by John Torpey 256 PART FOUR: CONTEMPORARY ISSUES IN IDENTIFICATION 271 15. DNA-Typing: Galton's Eugenic Dream Realized? by Pamela Sankar 273 16. Under My Skin: From Identification Papers to Body Surveillance by David Lyon 291 17. Identity an Anonymity: Some Conceptual Distinctions and Issues for Research by Gary T. Marx 311 18. Identifiying Unauthorize Foreign Workers in the German Labor Market by Dita Vogel 328 19. Identity Cards, Ethnic Self-Perception, and Genocide in Rwanda by Timothy Longman 345 Bibliography 359 Notes on Contributors 397 Index 403


In a ward discussion of pyloric stenosis and pylorospasm in infancy, the question was raised as to the results of operation or nonoperation upon gastric function and motility later on in life. Despite the voluminous literature on the subject of pyloric obstruction from both the medical and surgical standpoints, we were unable to find any data relating to this point, except the statement, which coincided with our own observation, that children who recovered from pyloric stenosis—either with or without operative intervention—seemed to develop normally and to have no ill effects from the early disorder and malnutrition. In order to obtain some definite data we determined to hunt up some old medical and surgical cases which had been treated in the past at the St. Louis Children's Hospital and make studies of the gastrointestinal motility, and enlisted the services of Dr. Mills of the department of roentgenology to carry out


Between 1969 and 1999, the New York-New Jersey region experienced a steeper drop in manufacturing employment than any other area of the United States. Much of the unusually sharp job decline can be attributed to the geographic dispersion of manufacturing - that is, the gradual movement of manufacturing activity from the more urbanized and industry-intensive states of the Northeast to the less industrially developed states of the South and West.


We present the compatible CO2 emissions from fossil fuel (FF) burning and industry, calculated from the historical and Shared Socioeconomic Pathway (SSP) experiments of nine Earth system models (ESMs) participating in phase 6 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6). The multimodel mean FF emissions match the historical record well and are close to the data-based estimate of cumulative emissions (394 ± 59 GtC vs 400 ± 20 GtC, respectively). Only two models fall inside the observed uncertainty range; while two exceed the upper bound, five fall slightly below the lower bound, due primarily to the plateau in CO2 concentration in the 1940s. The ESMs' diagnosed FF emission rates are consistent with those generated by the integrated assessment models (IAMs) from which the SSPs' CO2 concentration pathways were constructed; the simpler IAMs' emissions lie within the ESMs' spread for seven of the eight SSP experiments, the other being only marginally lower, providing confidence in the relationship between the IAMs' FF emission rates and concentration pathways. The ESMs require fossil fuel emissions to reduce to zero and subsequently become negative in SSP1-1.9, SSP1-2.6, SSP4-3.4, and SSP5-3.4over. We also present the ocean and land carbon cycle responses of the ESMs in the historical and SSP scenarios. The models' ocean carbon cycle responses are in close agreement, but there is considerable spread in their land carbon cycle responses. Land-use and land-cover change emissions have a strong influence over the magnitude of diagnosed fossil fuel emissions, with the suggestion of an inverse relationship between the two.


ABSTRACT
 The lacustrine deposits of the Jiufotang Formation, Liaoning Province, China have yielded a diverse avifauna representing a wide spectrum of basal lineages. Here we add to this diversity by describing the longirostrine enantiornithean taxon Rapaxavis pani gen. et sp. nov. The specimen possesses the following autapomorphies: (1) caudoateral processes of the sternum with two prominent branches and a smaller third branch, (2) paired triangular thoracic elements of unknown homology, and (3) the combination of six sacral vertebrae and six free caudal vertebrae. Otherwise, this genus is closely allied with the Yixian Formation species Longirostravis hani, sharing elongate, curving rostrum with teeth restricted to the premaxilla and rostral-most dentary, and a derived manus lacking unguals. The holotype of Rapaxavis is exquisitely preserved, with such details as distal tarsals, keratinous sheaths of the pedal unguals and some three-dimensional features of the bones intact. The holotype appears to lack a fused tibiotarsus and a fused carpometacarpus. These features may indicate that the specimen is not yet fully grown, though the life stages of members of the Enantiornithes will not be clear until a complete ontogenetic series can be constructed. A comparison of the proportions of the pedal phalanges of Rapaxavis to modern birds shows Rapaxavis to be highly adapted to a grasping, arboreal lifestyle. The combination of strongly arboreal pedal adaptations and the probing adaptations in the rostrum is here confirmed in a member of the Enantiornithes for the first time in the literature, adding to their already impressive known functional diversity.


Abstract A database that tracked information requests from University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) distance students using the Elmer E. Rasmuson Library's Off-Campus Services (OCS) indicated that, beginning in 2001, students became more self-reliant searchers. Reasons for this trend included: increased number of licensed online resources from which to choose; improved Internet connectivity for remote Alaskan communities; increased familiarity with e-mail and online searching; increased options for delivering material; and ongoing user education via the OCS office. As both UAF on-campus and distance students become more reliant on the library's online resources, services to both groups have begun to overlap and have become similar.


The agents of my team are constructed of two layers; Reactive and Behavior Layer. Reactive Layer produces basic functions as an agent, that is, a world model, a perception and an actuator. Behavior Layer makes it easy for a designer to make a rational agent program. This paper especially foucuses on the Behavior Layer.


An energy model for Western Europe has been constructed based on the MARKAL model to analyze future development of CO2 emissions from Western Europe and the possibilities to limit these emissions with technological measures. This report describes two baseline scenarios for Western Europe for the period 1990 to 2050 which have clear differences in orientation of economic production and assumptions with respect to criteria for making energy investment decisions. The differences in points of departure result in distinctly different base levels of CO2 emissions ranging from almost stable CO2 emissions to a continuous growth. Several cases with a range of CO2 emission taxes have also been calculated to identify cost-effective strategies for CO2 emission reduction and to assess the potential contribution of energy technologies and sectors to CO2 reduction. It appears that energy efficiency improvements have the highest potential to contribute to CO2 emission reduction. Fossil fuel switching and nuclear energy are relatively cost-effective ways to reduce CO2 emissions. The contribution of renewables to CO2 reduction is relatively small with low CO2 taxes but it is substantial with high CO2 tax levels.


Aggressive scaling of MOS devices requires use of ultra-thin gate oxides to maintain a reasonable short channel effect and to take the advantage of higher density, high speed, lower cost etc. Such thin oxides give rise to high electric fields, resulting in considerable gate tunneling current through gate oxide in nano regime. Consequently, accurate analysis of gate tunneling current is very important especially in context of low power application. In this paper, a simple and efficient analytical model has been developed for channel and source/drain overlap region gate tunneling current through ultra thin gate oxide n-channel MOSFET with inevitable deep submicron effect (DSME).The results obtained have been verified with simulated and reported experimental results for the purpose of validation. It is shown that the calculated tunnel current is well fitted to the measured one over the entire oxide thickness range. The proposed model is suitable enough to be used in circuit simulator due to its simplicity. It is observed that neglecting deep sub-micron effect may lead to large error in the calculated gate tunneling current. It is found that temperature has almost negligible effect on gate tunneling current. It is also reported that gate tunneling current reduces with the increase of gate oxide thickness. The impact of source/drain overlap length is also assessed on gate tunneling current. Keywords—Gate tunneling current, analytical model, gate dielectrics, non uniform poly gate doping, MOSFET, fringing field effect and image charges.


This paper contributes to the analysis of several firm performance indicators for estimating market selection forces on the industrial level by using econometric estimation method. For the comparison we employ data on Russian manufacturing firms for the period from 2006 to 2017. The sample contains more than 79 thousand enterprises for a period of 2 to 12 years. This research is focused on such performance indicators as labor productivity, total factor productivity (TFP) and profit per employee. We compare results of the econometrical examination of the link between each of them and the firm growth. The main result implies that the bulk of the impact of productivity variables relates to efficiency changes more than to absolute differences of productivity levels across firms. Comparing three performance indicators we see that the median values of total explanatory ability are close for the labor productivity and total factor productivity. This holds true also on the level of individual industries. The results for profit per employee provide slightly higher median estimate. The research shows that such indicator as profit of the firm can well substitute labor productivity indicator in the market selection and competition research.


X-linked adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD) caused by the ABCD1 mutation, is the most common inherited peroxisomal disease. It is characterized by three phenotypes: inflammatory cerebral demyelination, progressive myelopathy, and adrenal insufficiency, but there is no genotype-phenotype correlation. Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation can only be used in a few patients in the early phase of cerebral inflammation; therefore, most affected patients have no curative option. Previously, we reported the generation of an ALD patient-derived iPSC model and its differentiation to oligodendrocytes. In this study, we have performed the first genome editing of ALD patient-derived iPSCs using homology-directed repair (HDR). The mutation site, c.1534G>A [GenBank: NM_000033.4], was corrected by introducing ssODN and the CRISPR/Cas9 system. The cell line exhibited normal ALD protein expression following genome editing. We differentiated the intermediate oligodendrocytes from mutation-corrected iPSCs and the metabolic derangement of ALD tended to correct but was not statistically significant. Mutation-corrected iPSCs from ALD patient can be used in research into the pathophysiology of and therapeutics for ALD.


In this article we propose a new method for automatic seismic zonation based on focal mechanisms. The technique searches for the areas where the homogeneity of the stress field is maximized. The problem is posed as one of optimal partitioning of the graph corresponding to the Delaunay triangulation of the available epicenters. Two alternative techniques are used: the first one limits the search to the partitions of the Euclidean minimum spanning tree (emst) of the triangulation; the other one uses a number of spanning trees that are variations of the emst. The optimization is performed using a genetic algorithm. The technique is applied to seismic zonation in northeastern Italy by using a set of 219 focal mechanisms. The results are compared with those of a nonautomatic zonation used to investigate the distribution of the stress and strain fields and performed taking into account tectonic structures, faulting patterns, spatial distribution of seismicity, and other geophysical data. The proposed method is shown to be effective in finding areas of homogeneous stress and providing evidence for critical zones of complex behavior.


On September 18, 2000, a coalition of consumer and environmental groups detected DNA fragments from StarLink corn in Taco Bell taco shells sold in grocery stores. StarLink corn, a genetically modified (GM) variety of corn, had only been approved for use as animal feed, and not for human consumption. Overnight, this GMO became a Frankenfood posterchild - the incarnation of a genetic engineering critics' worst nightmares. By November of 2000, the FDA exercised its enforcement authority to recall nearly three hundred types of adulterated snack chips, corn flour, and other corn foods. The ensuing crisis paralyzed an entire sector of American agriculture and food production, and badly shook consumer confidence. One company, with one genetically engineered crop, managed to contaminate food for millions of households and brought an international commodities market to a standstill. This Article explores the StarLink crisis in some detail to understand how things went so disastrously awry. After a detailed analysis of the regulatory approval process that vetted StarLink corn, the paper uses StarLink corn to explore the structural flaws in this process and to draw lessons about how market forces can support or undercut regulatory regimes. Ultimately, the paper suggests that the deficiencies highlighted by the StarLink fiasco are part of a broader ideological struggle over the proper role of government in the marketplace. Claiming that StarLink corn experience undermined a cornerstone assumption of the United States' regulatory strategy: that voluntary self-policing can be a viable, long-term strategy for managing this revolution in agriculture, the paper proposes a new regulatory approach for agricultural biotechnology, one grounded in both science and in the realities of a market economy. This new approach is aimed at providing the regulatory oversight needed to ensure public health and safety, while still permitting an exploration of biotechnology's promise.


A comparison of the 1S-2S transitions of hydrogen and antihydrogen will yield a stringent test of CPT conservation. Necessarily, the antihydrogen atoms need to be trapped to perform high precision spectroscopy measurements. Therefore, an approximately 0.75 T deep neutral atom trap, equivalent to about 0.5 K for ground state (anti)hydrogen atoms, has been superimposed on a Penning-Malmberg trap in which the anti-atoms are formed. The antihydrogen atoms are produced following a number of steps. A bunch of antiprotons from the CERN Antiproton Decelerator is caught in a Penning-Malmberg trap and subsequently sympathetically cooled and then compressed using rotating wall electric fields. A positron plasma, formed in a separate accumulator, is transported to the main system and also compressed. Antihydrogen atoms are then formed by mixing the antiprotons and positrons. The velocity of the anti-atoms, and their binding energies, will strongly depend on the initial conditions of the constituent particles, for example their temperatures and densities, and on the details of the mixing process. In this paper the complete lifecycle of antihydrogen atoms will be presented, starting with the production of the constituent antiparticles and the description of the manipulations necessary to prepare them appropriately for antihydrogen formation. The latter will also be described, as will the possible fates of the anti-atoms.


Unconditional measures can incorrectly measure alpha and beta when portfolio managers engage in dynamic trading strategies or change their alphas and betas in response to publicly available information about the economy. The authors advocate continual performance evaluation (CPE) to measure dynamic alphas and betas. Comparing a sample of 261 manager portfolios over 1980–1996 to the Russell 3000, they find that a portfolio of the top quintile of CAPM alphas outperforms the bottom quintile by 1.45% annualized, while the spread for quintiles of CPE alphas is 4.00%. When style indexes are used to compute alphas, the spread between top and bottom quintiles of CAPM alphas becomes a erverse-2.41% annualized. On the other hand, the top quintile also outperforms the average manager by 1.70% and the Russell 3000 by 2.42% annualized. While higher CPE alphas do not guarantee superior returns, they are more likely to successfully forecast returns than CAPM alphas.


Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) are integral membrane proteins and prototypic members of the ligand‐gated ion‐channel superfamily, which has precursors in the prokaryotic world. They are formed by the assembly of five transmembrane subunits, selected from a pool of 17 homologous polypeptides (α1–10, β1–4, γ, δ, and ε). There are many nAChR subtypes, each consisting of a specific combination of subunits, which mediate diverse physiological functions. They are widely expressed in the central nervous system, while, in the periphery, they mediate synaptic transmission at the neuromuscular junction and ganglia. nAChRs are also found in non‐neuronal/nonmuscle cells (keratinocytes, epithelia, macrophages, etc.). Extensive research has determined the specific function of several nAChR subtypes. nAChRs are now important therapeutic targets for various diseases, including myasthenia gravis, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, and schizophrenia, as well as for the cessation of smoking. However, knowledge is still incomplete, largely because of a lack of high‐resolution X‐ray structures for these molecules. Nevertheless, electron microscopy studies on 2D crystals of nAChR from fish electric organs and the determination of the high‐resolution X‐ray structure of the acetylcholine binding protein (AChBP) from snails, a homolog of the extracellular domain of the nAChR, have been major steps forward and the data obtained have important implications for the design of subtype‐specific drugs. Here, we review some of the latest advances in our understanding of nAChRs and their involvement in physiology and pathology.