We present Bubble, a pneumatically actuated wearable device that enables people with hand disabilities to use their own hands to grasp objects without fully bending their fingers. Bubble offers a novel approach to grasping, where slim, ultra-lightweight silicone actuators are attached to the fingers. When the user wishes to grasp an object, the silicone units inflate pneumatically to fill the available space around the object. The inflatable units are interchangeable, can be independently inflated, and can be positioned anywhere on the fingers in any orientation, thereby enabling a wide variety of grasping gestures including the palmar grasp, pinch, etc. In this paper, we describe the implementation of our current prototype, the fabrication process of the soft inflatable units, as well as our preliminary study to evaluate our system's grasping capability.


THE CONTROL of portal hypertension and associated bleeding esophageal and gastric varices continues to be a major problem in emergency situations. Experience with the pharmacologic control of portal hypertension has been an outgrowth of the authors' interest in the preoperative arteriographic demonstration of intraluminal gastrointestinal bleeding1-4and the diagnosis of advanced cirrhosis with portal hypertension and varices by selective mesenteric arteriography. Selective infusions of a variety of pharmacologic agents were made into the superior mesenteric artery in a series of dogs with experimentally constructed portal hypertension.5These previously reported experimental infusions utilized doses of epinephrine, norepinephrine, angiotensin amide, vasopressin, and vasopressin derivatives at a much lower level than can be employed systemically to produce pharmacologic effects. Epinephrine, norepinephrine, and angiotensin amide caused a significant decrease in the flow in the superior mesenteric artery and thus decreased portal inflow, but the production of a concomitant portal venous outflow block


The levels of some heavy metals such as; Mn, Cr, Cd, As, Ni, and Pb were analysed in coal and sediment samples from River Ekulu in Enugu, Coal City using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometer (AAS) model Spectra-AA-10 variant. Mean concentrations of Mn (0.256-0.389mg/kg) and Cr (0.214-0.267 mg/kg) are high relative to concentrations of Cd (0.036-0.043 mg/kg), As (0.016-0.018 mg/kg), Ni, (0.064-0.067 mg/kg) and Pb (0.013-0.017 mg/kg). Except for Mn, there is a steady decrease in the concentration of all metals from November to March corresponding to decreasing run-off. Metal concentrations are generally higher in the coal samples than in the sediments. Selectiveleaching of these metals is suspected from the trends of their concentration. Seasonal fluctuations are higher in the sediments than the coal samples. Correlation coefficients show that all the metals are positively correlated with each other implying that they are from the same source or origin. The presence of toxic metals in the area is established, calling for the assessment of their impact on the health of human and aquatic lives around the area Journal of Applied Sciences and Environmental Management Vol. 9(3) 2005: 5-8


In this paper, land use and land cover change detection of some selected stations in Anambra state for three (3) periods of twenty-nine (29) years was conducted. This was done by using three satellite images of different dates (1986, 2000 and 2013) which were interpreted and analyzed to extract the detailed information for identification of the changes. To obtain the changes in the land use/land cover, the traditional approach of post classification comparison was followed. The satellite images, submaps created were georeferenced and classified by the method of unsupervised classification based on the following classification scheme: water bodies, vegetation, gully areas, built-up areas and bare surfaces. The results showed significant rapid growth in built-up areas while the vegetation and gully areas were annually decreasing. Also, there was little or no appreciable change in water bodies. This study will guide policy makers and urban planners in the administration of land use development of the study area.

 Key words: Land use, classification, change detection, built up areas, vegetation.


The present work is concerned with the characterization of liquid spray impact onto walls and films. Empirical studies on spray impact rely almost solely on the phase Doppler instrument for obtaining quantitative data about drop size and velocity distributions. The thesis begins therefore with a careful examination of applying the phase Doppler instrument to new-wall measurements beneath a spray. This includes consideration of the influence of the measurement volume height above the rigid wall, the input laser power and the spatial location of the detection volume on the measured characteristics of the impinging and secondary spray. This knowledge is then used for all subsequent measurements made within the framework of this investigation. After a qualitative and quantitative characterization of the resulting secondary spray and the accumulated wall film, a set of empirical models is presented for prediction of the characteristics of the secondary spray generated due to a liquid spray impact onto a rigid wall. In the models, characterization of the secondary spray has been formulated in terms of correlations for the velocity and trajectory of secondary droplets and the mass and number ratio of the secondary spray. The novel aspect of the model is that the correlations are based on the mean statistics over many events in the spray and not on the outcome of single drop impact experiments. Another interesting feature of the experiments is the rather large range of oblique impact angles captured, due to the different drop trajectories exiting from the spray. A phase Doppler instrument has been used to measure drop size and two components of velocity directly above the target. A high-speed CCD camera has been used to measure the average film thickness formed due to spray impact. In a second step, a theoretical model to predict the average film thickness formed due to a liquid spray impinging onto a flat and rigid wall is presented. This model takes into account the characteristics of the impinging spray, e.g. flux density of impacting droplets, hydrodynamic pressure of the impinging spray and viscosity of the impacting liquid droplets. It considers the mass and momentum balance of the film, including viscosity effect and neglecting the Laplace pressure. A second simplified model for predicting the average film thickness as a function of mean Reynolds number and flux density of the impacting droplets and the average drop diameter is presented based on dimensional analysis. Both theoretical derivations for the average film thickness show good agreement with most of the measurements. This thesis also provides an experimental comparison of the splashing phenomenon for single drops and for drops in a spray, followed by a derived theoretical model. Such a comparison can be very valuable for future modelling of spray impact. The last section of this thesis presents an experimental study for different aspects of liquid spray impact onto a deep liquid layer under well controlled experimental conditions; deformation of the air-liquid film interface due to the hydrodynamic pressure exerted by the impacting drops, the generation of a secondary spray, and the air bubble entrainment into the liquid film. A high-speed CCD camera has been used to measure the deformation of the air-liquid film interface and the distribution of the air bubbles inside the deep liquid film. Two different configurations of a phase Doppler instrument have been used to measure drop size and two components of velocity directly above the film as well as the size and two components of velocity of the air bubbles inside the deep pool.


Abstract Flesh-footed shearwater (Ardenna carneipes) is recognized as vulnerable seabird species in Western Australia and New South Wales, Australia, and its genetic variability and a well-resolved phylogeny is imperative for the species' conservation. Here, we report the first sequenced mitogenome of the Australian A. carneipes. The mitogenome of A. carneipes was 16,370 bp in total length and encompassed 13 protein-coding genes, two ribosomal RNAs, 22 transfer RNAs, and one non-coding region (D-loop). All of the genes were encoded on the H-strand with the exception of ND6 and eight tRNAs, which is a conserved pattern of the mitogenome for other vertebrates. The mitogenome of A. carneipes was dominated by higher AT (56.5%) than GC (43.5%) content. In the resulting phylogenetic tree using complete mitogenome sequences, flesh-footed shearwater and gray petrel (Procellaria cinerea) grouped together despite the high genetic distance (11.0%) between them, belonging to family Procellariidae. However, the phylogenetic tree was consistent with a previous study using partial nucleotide sequences of the cytochrome b gene. These results highlight that further mitogenome sequences will be required from the closely related species under the genus Ardenna to delineate well-resolved phylogenetic classification at the genus and or species level. The present study provides a reference mitochondrial genome of flesh-footed shearwater for further molecular studies.


In both, newly built and renovated buildings the building air-tightness has to be ensured. With a tight building envelope comes a low infiltration air-exchange. A minimum outdoor air exchange to ensure acceptable moisture and indoor air quality levels must be maintained. A model is introduced, that couples hygrothermal whole building simulation with a multi-zone air-flow simulation. This coupling allows assessing the combined effects of air-flow on building energy use, comfort conditions, air quality and possible hygric issues. An application example shows the use of the software for a low rise residential building. In a first step the parameterization of the air-flow network is checked by computing the resulting infiltration air-flow with closed windows. The maximum achievable natural air exchange for different window types and openings, like pivothung windows, windows opened with a small parallel gap around and side-hung windows is assessed. Based on these numbers it is assessed if any of the above mentioned opening options alone with a certain opening duration is able to achieve good indoor air quality and acceptable indoor moisture levels to avoid any hygric problems or if a combination of some of the measures is required. The presented dynamic hygrothermal whole building simulation coupled with a multi-zone air-flow model is capable of simulating the effects of different window opening options and strategies on building energy demand, indoor comfort conditions and air quality and on the hygrothermal building component performance. It is shown, that a sufficient air exchange can be realized even with a parallel-action window with small opening gaps which can be run with motor drives. Especially demand controlled opening strategies can be developed that ensure high indoor air quality and comfort conditions while also controlling humidity indoors to avoid moisture damage. Also an improvement for summer conditions can be achieved by ventilative cooling with this type of window opening.


Author(s): Ross, Hannah E; Dixon, Keri L; Ghara, Raghunath; Iliev, Ilian T; Mellema, Garrelt | Abstract: The upcoming radio interferometer Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is expected to directly detect the redshifted 21-cm signal from the neutral hydrogen present during the Cosmic Dawn. Temperature fluctuations from X-ray heating of the neutral intergalactic medium can dominate the fluctuations in the 21-cm signal from this time. This heating depends on the abundance, clustering, and properties of the X-ray sources present, which remain highly uncertain. We present a suite of three new large-volume, 349\,Mpc a side, fully numerical radiative transfer simulations including QSO-like sources, extending the work previously presented in Ross et al. (2017). The results show that our QSOs have a modest contribution to the heating budget, yet significantly impact the 21-cm signal. Initially, the power spectrum is boosted on large scales by heating from the biased QSO-like sources, before decreasing on all scales. Fluctuations from images of the 21-cm signal with resolutions corresponding to SKA1-Low at the appropriate redshifts are well above the expected noise for deep integrations, indicating that imaging could be feasible for all the X-ray source models considered. The most notable contribution of the QSOs is a dramatic increase in non-Gaussianity of the signal, as measured by the skewness and kurtosis of the 21-cm probability distribution functions. However, in the case of late Lyman-$\alpha$ saturation, this non-Gaussianity could be dramatically decreased particularly when heating occurs earlier. We conclude that increased non-Gaussianity is a promising signature of rare X-ray sources at this time, provided that Lyman-$\alpha$ saturation occurs before heating dominates the 21-cm signal.


Previous studies have concluded that southern ocean islands are anomalous because past glacial extent and current temperature apparently explain most variance in their species richness. Here, the relationships between physical variables and species richness of vascular plants, insects, land and seabirds, and mammals were reexamined for these islands. Indigenous and introduced species were distinguished, and relationships between the latter and human occupancy variables were investigated. Most variance in indigenous species richness was explained by combinations of area and temperature (56%)—vascular plants; distance (nearest continent) and vascular plant species richness (75%)—insects; area and chlorophyll concentration (65%)—seabirds; and indigenous insect species richness and age (73%)—land birds. Indigenous insects and plants, along with distance (closest continent), explained most variance (70%) in introduced land bird species richness. A combination of area and temperature explained most variance in species richness of introduced vascular plants (73%), insects (69%), and mammals (69%). However, there was a strong relationship between area and number of human occupants. This suggested that larger islands attract more human occupants, increasing the risk of propagule transfer, while temperature increases the chance of propagule establishment. Consequently, human activities on these islands should be regulated more tightly.


A potentially serious problem for high‐speed ground transportation vehicles is the aerodynamic self‐noise generated simply by the vehicular movement through the air. This noise constitutes the floor to the total noise produced by the vehicle regardless of the method of propulsion. Several methods of calculating the sound pressure levels of this aerodynamic noise are developed based on the interaction of turbulent boundary layer flows with solid surfaces. These calculations are applied to a model for a high‐speed train. Calculated noise levels compare favorably with the levels measured for unpowered vehicles operating at typical high speeds. [Work partially supported by United Technologies Corporation.]


Rubber bearings used in bridges are generally exposed to various environment conditions. It is usually known that the sunlight attacks rubber material, and causes it to entirely lose its elasticity and become sticky. In order to obtain the knowledge of the long-term performance of the ultraviolet exposed rubber products, the effect of ultraviolet irradiation on surface rubber of bridge bearing has been examined through accelerated aging tests. Four kinds rubber materials normally used in bridge rubber bearings were subjected to ultraviolet irradiation for a period up to 2 months. The changes in mechanical properties were investigated at different pre-strains. Besides, the influences of the amount of carbon black on the ultraviolet stability of natural rubber (NR) were evaluated. Finally, the long-term performance of surface rubber was estimated in consideration of the location.


The creation of a sense of place has emerged as a goal of many community development initiatives. However, little thought has been given to the role of physical spaces in the shaping of possible senses of place. This article examines three Canadian examples of community sustainable development initiatives to demonstrate that sense of place can be shaped and constrained by the geographical and environmental features of the physical space a community occupies. This finding suggests that a 'one-size-fits-all' approach to community sustainable development is unlikely to be successful; a community's sustainable development ethic will be informed by geography. However, there is some evidence that a strong individual sense of place shaped by local space may act as a barrier to the acceptance of new people and ideas. Conversely, a strong sense of place can result in mobilization for sustainable development initiatives.


Foreign exchange rates have been highly volatile since the abandonment of the fixed exchange rate system in 1973. The volatility of the exchange rate is the source of exchange rate risk and this has certain implications on the economic growth of a country. This is because a rise in exchange rate volatility is said to deters multinational companies and foreign investors from engaging in international activities. When currency appreciates, the sales and profits of exporters will decline and stock prices will drop due to the fact that exporters lose their international competitiveness. On the other hand, importers' competitiveness in domestic market will increase which would lead to the increase in profit and stock prises. The scenarios would be opposite in the case of currency depreciation. Equity markets and foreign exchange markets have been regarded as sensitive segments of the financial market due to the impact of any policy changes gets quickly reflected in both markets. The issue of inter-relation between stock returns and exchange rates has often been discussed by economists since they both play important roles in influencing the development of a country's economy. Changes in stock prices may influence the movements in the exchange rate, via firm's portfolio adjustments [1]. Due to this dynamic interrelationship between the two markets has prompted researchers, policy makers and analysts to carry out detailed analyses of this relationship.


ABSTRACT Rationalizing production more effectively, technological developments and innovations also have effects on, for example, skills, knowledge and social relations, that connect the specific technique to large processes and rationalities. In the conflict between user rights and ownership rights in northern Sweden, the introduction of new techniques within reindeer husbandry is studied on a local and embodied level. Through observations and interviews, the tension between empowerment and control in their implementation is further explored by utilizing a labor process theoretical framework. The results illustrate a shift in the definition of skills and knowledge, in relation to the use of GPS and GIS, that reshape, reorganize, restructure and embody the labor process of reindeer husbandry and spatial, temporal and ecological relations. Through its production of subjective conditions and dependence, the disciplinary logic of these techniques contributes to shape and enact governable spaces and subjects within the context. Operating as technologies of government, the techniques emphasize the responsibilities of the reindeer herding community and shape their participation, by reinforcing the demand for certain kind of subjectivities and accountability – governmental rationales that contribute to a technologicalization and depoliticizing of policy and conflict managing.


MODi () is a powerful and convenient web service that facilitates the interpretation of tandem mass spectra for identifying post-translational modifications (PTMs) in a peptide. It is powerful in that it can interpret a tandem mass spectrum even when hundreds of modification types are considered and the number of potential PTMs in a peptide is large, in contrast to most of the methods currently available for spectra interpretation that limit the number of PTM sites and types being used for PTM analysis. For example, using MODi, one can consider for analysis both the entire PTM list published on the unimod webpage () and user-defined PTMs simultaneously, and one can also identify multiple PTM sites in a spectrum. MODi is convenient in that it can take various input file formats such as .mzXML, .dta, .pkl and .mgf files, and it is equipped with a graphical tool called MassPective developed to display MODi's output in a user-friendly manner and helps users understand MODi's output quickly. In addition, one can perform manual de novo sequencing using MassPective.


EZER WEIZMAN is President of the State of Israel. The day on which Israel's independence was proclaimed found me at an air force base in Ceske Budjovice, Czechoslovakia. On that day, May 15, 1948, I was dressed in a German Air Force flight suit, with German flight equipment and training to fly Messerschmidt planes meant for the air force to be founded in Israel. After a short stay in Czechoslovakia, I returned to Israel and immediately participated in the battles of the Israeli War of Independence. One thing I did not think of then, as I sat in the cockpit of the fighter plane, was that 50 years later I would be president of the prosperous and thriving State of Israel. The fight for independence was a struggle that symbolized the importance of the region to the various powers and to the international community as a whole. Israel fought its War of Independence with Czech weapons. These arms were supplied to us by Czechoslovakia with the blessing of the Soviet Union, which thought that this action would help draw the state-to-be toward it. Later, we were equipped with French weapons, and since the Yom Kippur War in 1973, the United States has provided the most modern weapons in the world. Although we did not receive arms from the United States during the first years of statehood, the United States nevertheless had its eyes on the region from the very beginning: President Truman surprised the world when he hurriedly recognized the State of Israel several minutes after the Declaration of Independence took effect on May 15, 1948. I obtained my flying experience in the Royal Air Force (RAF), which I joined in 1942. During my five years with the RAF, I served in the Middle and Far East. Upon my return to Israel in 1947, I was one of the pilots who helped to form the Israeli Air Force. On November 29 of that year, the United Nations decided to partition the country. I danced all night together with everyone else in the country, and the following morning we awoke to fight the Arab enemies which had invaded us. Israel was then a small country with a population of 600,000 Jews, consisting of both those like me who were born in the country and others who arrived as penniless refugees after having survived the horrors of the Holocaust. Today, six million people live here, 4.7 million of whom are Jews. The day is not far off when the majority of Jews in the world will live in Israel. In 1948, I could not imagine what the country then being established would look like in 50 years. …


Miniaturization of the solid-state imaging device, and reducing the cost. The semiconductor substrate 10, having an imaging area 14, the arranging a plurality of light sensors to a surface, on the surface, the transparent plate 6 of the same shape and the same size as seen from the semiconductor substrate 10 and the plane It is attached. A semiconductor substrate surface of the surrounding image sensing area side is formed with a bonding pad 16, the semiconductor substrate 10 has through-holes 26 up to the back 24 of the semiconductor substrate 10 from the lower surface of the bonding pad is formed . The through-hole 26 the inner surface, the insulating film 28 is deposited, if the 24 of the semiconductor substrate 10, there is an insulating film 30 is deposited. The through-hole 26 has a copper wiring 34 are electrically connected to the the flexible circuit board (8) bonded to the conductive material 38 is filled, the bonding pad 16, and a back (24). The transparent plate, the through-hole, and sealing material, the bonding pad, the flexible circuit


This dissertation is a tour through a series of biopolitical sites where the production of power and knowledge of and about bodies is viewed through a molecular lens. Biopolitics, as described by Michel Foucault, combines the surveillance, normalization and classification of individuals, with a view of bodies as instances of a species and constituents of a population governed so as to encourage health and productivity as defined by the truth discourses of biology and public health. Framing DNA as a mode of translation from and ascription to the body it is extracted from, the author examines the ways in which genetic data is used as a form of visibility to segment, categorize and ultimately mitigate social, economic and political uncertainty through the production of knowable populations. This dissertation is primarily concerned with subjectification in what has been termed the "postgenomic" era, the time since the sequencing of the human genome. The particular nexus the author aims to investigate, in her artistic and scholarly work, concerns surveillance, forensics, race and social justice in relation to human genomics today. Along the way the author has interwoven a narrative describing her own artistic practice, which attempts to reveal and problematize the often obscure and naturalized knowledge production characterizing these sites. The author designates the term "biopolitical art" to describe work utilizing techniques of public amateurism, critical engineering and speculative design to pose a subversive epistemic challenge to the biopolitical status quo.


The propagation of coherent light through a heterogeneous medium is an often-encountered problem in optics. Analytical solutions, found by solving the appropriate differential equations, usually only exist for simplified and idealized situations limiting their accuracy and applicability. A widely used approach is the Beam Propagation Method in which the electric field is determined by solving the wave equation numerically, making the method time-consuming, a drawback exacerbated by the heterogeneity of the medium. In this work we propose an alternative approach which combines, in an iterative way, optical ray-tracing simulation in the software ASAP™ with numerical simulations in Matlab in order to model the change in light distribution in a medium with anisotropic absorption, exposed to partially coherent light with high irradiance. The medium under study is a photosensitive polymer in which photochemical reactions cause the local absorption to change as a function of the local light fluence. Under continuous illumination, this results in time-varying light distributions throughout the irradiance process. In our model the fluence-absorption interaction is modelled by splitting up each iteration step into two parts. In the first part the optical ray-tracing software determines the new light distribution in the medium using the absorption from the previous iteration step. In the second part, using the new light distribution, the new absorption coefficients are calculated and expressed as a set of polynomials. The evolution of the light distribution and absorption is presented and the change in total transmission is compared with experiments.


Abstract Objective Low satisfaction with normative life domains might be an important factor in the persistence of anorexia nervosa (AN). Initial evidence in non‐clinical samples showed that lower satisfaction with normative life domains was related to more intense eating disorder symptoms. As a critical next step, the current study examined satisfaction with normative life domains in a clinical sample. Specifically, the present study tested whether adolescents with AN reported lower satisfaction with normative life domains than adolescents without an eating disorder. Method Adolescents with AN (n = 69) and adolescents without an eating disorder matched on age, gender and educational level (n = 69) completed the Brief Multidimensional Students' Life Satisfaction Scale to assess satisfaction with five life domains (family, friendships, school, self and living location) and life in general. Results Adolescents with AN reported significantly lower satisfaction with normative life domains than the comparison group. Subsequent analyses showed that this overall group difference was primarily driven by adolescents with AN reporting lower satisfaction with the self, school experience and life in general. Conclusions Findings supported the hypothesis that adolescents with AN show relatively low satisfaction with meaningful, non‐AN‐related life domains. This points to the potential relevance of enhancing satisfaction with specific life domains to optimize treatment effectiveness.


The transformation of tempering for quenched steel corresponded to complicated process of phase transformation, and mechanical properties of quenched-and-tempered steel were related to the phase transformation. In practice, hardness test was adopted to judge whether the properties of tempered-parts qualified because of its facility. Numerous researches indicated that, there existed correlativity expressed by different function forms between tempering hardness of quenched-steel and its tempering parameters. However, considering physical metallurgy of tempering process, the adoption of double-exponential function would help to describe regularity of hardness changing more exactly for quenched-steel during tempering process. Additionally, results of hardness tests for isothermal tempering and molding/simulation researches have shown that, the model of double-exponential function, which can reflect decline law of tempering hardness for quenched-steel, would provide basis for optimization design of tempering parameters, performance prediction of tempered-parts, and energy-saving heat-treatment on tempering process.


A system (Integrated Multisensor Imaging and Processing System - IMIPS) is described which consists of techniques and protocols which have been implemented in Geneva to combine (through registration, visualization, navigation and processing) various multidimensional biomedical imaging sensors, including Electro-Magnetic Tomography (EMT), for studying, assessing, and localizing neurological (dys-)function for both clinical and research applications. The already well described interest for this combination stems from the broad variety of complementary information brought out by modern biomedical imaging modalities. In this context, the input of volumetric EMT permits direct sighting, in near real-time, of any EM (dys- )funcfional behavior. Besides allowing morphology, metabolism and function to be studied simultaneously and from different points of view, the global combination permitted by IMIPS is expected to show its best value when studying pathologies reflected by metabolic or electrophysiologic dysfunctions.


In feature selection, redundancy is one of the major concerns since the removal of redundancy in data is connected with dimensionality reduction. Despite the evidence of such a connection, few works present theoretical studies regarding redundancy. In this work, we analyze the effect of redundant features on the performance of classification models. We can summarize the contribution of this work as follows: (i) develop a theoretical framework to analyze feature construction and selection, (ii) show that certain properly defined features are redundant but make the data linearly separable, and (iii) propose a formal criterion to validate feature construction methods. The results of experiments suggest that a large number of redundant features can reduce the classification error. The results imply that it is not enough to analyze features solely using criteria that measure the amount of information provided by such features.


Tunnelling of a two-level atom is investigated in the two-photon mazer when the atom is initially prepared in a coherent superposition state and the cavity in various quantum states. For a strong coherent field, the tunnelling exhibits more regular oscillations but less remarkable switch effect than that in the one-photon mazer. It is discovered that in the presence of atomic coherence, the transmission probabilities in the ultracold regime are significantly different when the cavity field is initially in coherent, squeezed vacuum, even cat and odd cat states, respectively.


A new woodceramics was developed by furane resin and wood powder. Microstructures of woodceramics were performed by scanning electron microscopy(SEM). The effect of content of furane resin on carbon yield ratio,dimension shrinkage,apparent density,comprehensive strength and volume electrical resistivity of woodceramics were investigated. The results show that the woodceramics is a kind of carbon/carbon composite composed by wood charcoal and glassy carbon, the content of furane resin has a significant effect on the microstructure of woodceramics. With the increase of furane resin, generated glassy carbon increases and the connection between wood charcoal and glassy carbon will be strengthened. Carbon yield ratio, apparent density and comprehensive strength increase, and dimension shrinkage and volume electrical resistivity decrease as the content of furane resin increases.


This article examines the confluence of the U.S. military and digital capitalism in Medal of Honor: Operation Anaconda (MOHOA), a U.S. war-on-Afghanistan game released for play to the world in 2010. MOHOA's convergent support for the DOD and digital capitalism's interests are analyzed in two contexts: industry (ownership, development and marketing) and interactive narrative/play (the game's war simulation, story and interactive play experience). Following a brief discussion of the military-industrial-communications-entertainment complex and video games, I analyze MOHOA as digital militainment that supports digital capitalism's profit-interests and DOD promotional goals. The first section claims MOHOA is a digital militainment commodity forged by the DOD-digital games complex and shows how the game's ownership, development and advertisements support a symbiotic cross-promotional relationship between Electronic Arts (EA) and the DOD. The second section analyzes how MOHOA's single player mode simulates the "reality" of Operation Anaconda and immerses "virtual-citizen-soldiers" in an interactive story about warfare.


Feminist sport psychologists agree that the playing field is not level regarding gender issues in and out of sport and that sexism is alive and well. Ironically, the myth persists that race and racism are not prevalent in sport. Like any aspect of culture, sport is influenced by societal norms. Thus, for women of color, race and gender are accompanied by racism and sexism within and outside of athletics. The purpose of this paper is to briefly examine the experiences of women of color within sport and the feminist sport psychology community in particular. The feminist preoccupation with gender frequently ignores or minimizes race and cultural differences between women and the racism that can emerge in cross-racial interactions. The result is the marginalization of women of color.


The behaviour of silica during the carbothermal reduction nitriding process at temperatures between 1300-1500°C was studied by means of X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscope analysis. The experimental runs were allowed to proceed up to 1 h in presence of nitrogen flow. The following mechanism of reduction nitriding of silica which was based on the experimental observation was proposed. Initially the impurity of the starting material is reduced before 1300°C. SiO2 was reduced into SiO gas phase by active carbon and it was vaporised out of the mixture. The nucleation of α-Si3N4 was formed vapour-gas reaction took place and deposited on the surface of the mixture as well as around the reaction crucible. In the third stage, α-Si3N4 transforms to one dimensional direction which was β-Si3N4 particle. This was followed by the formation of SiC at temperature above 1450°C.


In 1978, James Kitching discovered two dinosaur embryos in a road-cut talus at Roodraai (Red Bend) in Golden Gate Highlands National Park, South Africa. Kitching assigned the fossilized embryos to the species of long necked herbivores Massospondylus carinatus [6] (longer vertebra) from the Early Jurassic period, between 200 and 183 million years ago. The embryos were partially visible but surrounded by eggshell and rock, called matrix. Kitching said that the eggs were too delicate to remove from the matrix without damage. Twenty-seven years later in 2005, Diane Scott, a member of a team led by Robert Reisz from the University of Toronto in Toronto, Canada, uncovered the two almost complete, well-articulated embryos. Scientists have inferred information from the embryos about Massospondylus dinosaurs' growth, development, and behaviors including parental care, gait, and locomotion.


This paper considers UK government policy making in the so-called 'global knowledge economy'. Britain's engagement is seen as crucial to its future success in the global market place (Alexander, 2001a). Individuals and organisations are urged to change their way of working, learning and living in this 'new economy'. High value is being placed on those with ICT skills and the UK government recognises the need to ensure society has the necessary skills to take part.
At the same time there is a heightened awareness of a growing digital divide in British Society between the 'have-nets' and have-nots. Issues of gender differences in access and the use of technology are one of the features of this divide (Alexander, 2001b). In their efforts to reverse what they refer to as the 'challenge of women's participation in ICT' (Alexander, 2001b), the UK government propose a number of initiatives (DfEE 2001). The aim is to get women to engage in technology and gain access to IT in education, work and in their social lives. With the use of role models they wish to improve the image of IT. In education they will encourage girls to be to be enthusiastic about the technologies and gain confidence to compete with the boys in what is recognised as male domination in ICT's in the classroom. They suggest career paths that are relevant to women and have working conditions to support women and their needs. They promote changing business attitudes to employing women and encouraging flexible working conditions for parents.


Groundwater has been overpumped for fish-farming and results in serious problems of land subsidence in the coastal areas of Yunlin county, Taiwan. A three-dimensional Galerkin finite element model, which coupled equations of force balance and subsurface flow, was utilized to simulate the land displacements occurring in those areas. The field simulations for parameter calibrations and predictions of land displacements were performed by the proposed model through the trial-and-error procedure. The isotropic/anisotropic properties of permeability and elasticity were taken into consideration in the simulation. The maximum cumulative subsidence was found to be 54.7 cm within the years of 1981 to 1989 when the contours of water levels by simulation matched those of the observation ones. The maximum horizontal displacements were found to be 10.5 m and 13.4 m, respectively, in the x and y directions in these years. Apparently, the magnitudes of displacements in horizontal directions were significantly larger than the one in vertical direction. These horizontal displacements were induced as a result of significant hydraulic gradients due to the heavy pumpage. It is likely that the heavy pumpage in the pumped region may be one of the major factors which cause the landward withdrawal of the Yunlin coastline.


Behavioral beliefs—perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use—have been identified as the most influential antecedents of individuals' information systems use intentions and behaviors within the technology acceptance model. However, little research has been aimed at investigating the implicit (automatic or unconscious) determinants of such cognitive beliefs, and more importantly, the potential nonlinear relationships of such antecedents with explicit (perceptual) ones. As such, this paper theorizes that implicit neurophysiological states—memory load and distraction— and explicit—engagement and frustration—antecedents interact in the formation of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use. To test the study's hypotheses, we conducted an experiment that measured neurophysiological states while individuals worked on instrumental and hedonic tasks using technology. The results show that, as theorized, implicit and explicit constructs interact together, and thus have a nonlinear effect on behavioral beliefs. Specifically, when engagement is high, neurophysiological distraction does not statistically significantly affect perceived usefulness, whereas when engagement is low, neurophysiological distraction has a negative and significant effect on usefulness. The results also show that when frustration is high, neurophysiological memory load has a negative effect on perceived ease of use, whereas when it is low, neurophysiological memory load has a positive effect on perceived ease of use. This study makes several contributions to acceptance research and the emerging field of NeuroIS, including demonstration of the importance of emotional perceptions for moderating the effects of neurophysiological states on behavioral beliefs.


Medical research, teaching and health assistance have looked at women "as if they were men" and have not seen their specific problems and illnesses, nor understood their complaint, their lack of wellbeing and their pain. Women's health has been studied and valued only as reproductive health and this focus has prevented women's health from being approached from a perspective of wholeness. There still exists a great lack of knowledge, through a lack of research and information, of the illnesses that women suffer, their causes and the way to prevent them. Medical training has not indicated that there could be differences in the way that women and men become ill, that diagnostic methods could be different, or that therapies and pharmaceuticals might have different ways of acting upon women and men.


In the summer of 2013, Brazil experienced a period of conflict triggered by a series of protests. While the popular press covered the events, little empirical work has investigated how first-hand reporting of the protests occurred and evolved over social media and how such exposure in turn impacted the demonstrations themselves. In this study we examine over 42 million tweets shared during the three months of conflict in order to uncover patterns in online and offline protest-related activity as well as to explore relationships between language-use in tweets and the emotions and underlying motivations of protesters. Our findings show that peaks in Twitter activity coincide with days in which heavy protesting took place, that the words in tweets reflect emotional characteristics of protest-related events, and less expectedly, that these emotions convey both positive as well as negative sentiment.


In this Letter, we report the observation of the correlation between two modes of microwave radiation resulting from the amplification of quantum noise by the Josephson parametric converter. This process, seen from the pump, can be viewed as parametric down-conversion. The correlation is measured by an interference experiment displaying a contrast better than 99% with a number of photons per mode greater than 250,000. Dispersive measurements of mesoscopic systems and quantum encryption can benefit from this development.


This thesis surveys linearisation techniques for implementing monolithic MOS active resistors and transconductors, and investigates the design of linear tunable resistors and transconductors. Improving linearity and tunability in the presence of non-ideal factors such as bulk modulation, mobility-degradation effects and mismatch of transistors is a principal objective. A family of new non-saturation-mode resistors and two novel saturation-mode transconductors are developed. Where possible, approximate analytical expressions are derived to explain the principles of operation. Performance comparisons of the new structures are made with other well-known circuits and their relative advantages and disadvantages evaluated. Experimental and simulation results are presented which validate the proposed linearisation techniques. It is shown that the proposed family of resistors offers improved linearity whilst the transconductors combine extended tunability with low distortion. Continuous-time filter examples are given to demonstrate the potential of these circuits for application in analogue signal-processing tasks.


Simulations of irregular geometries using non-orthogonal transformation is widely used in grid based methodology such as computational fluid dynamics. However, this approach is not utilized for particle based models. In this paper we introduce non-orthogonal transformation to simulate fluid flow in irregular geometry using dissipative particle dynamics (DPD). Applying boundary condition is not trivial in DPD methodology and problem becomes more complicated for irregular boundary. In the present work, irregular (physical) domain is transformed into a rectangular domain and boundary particles are frozen along the wall. Transformation for position and velocity is used to relate physical and computational domains. As particle's position and velocity change with time, transformation matrices are determined for each DPD particle at every time step. In DPD, forces are function of actual distance between the particles and acts within a cutoff radius, which change in transformed domain at every location. To solve this problem, firstly, interacting particles are identified in the physical domain and then forces are calculated in the transformed domain. This approach is described by simulating fluid flow inside a convergent-divergent nozzle, whose geometry is controlled by the contraction ratio (CR) in the middle of the nozzle. The DPD results were validated against in-house computational fluid dynamic (CFD) finite volume code based on the stream function vorticity approach. The range of Reynolds number and CR, under study here, is Re = 10–200 and CR = 0.8 and 0.6, respectively. The results revealed an excellent agreement between the DPD and CFD. The maximum deviation between the DPD and CFD results is within 2%. It is found that using large values of dissipative force parameter velocity fluctuations are less.Copyright © 2010 by ASME


Political philosophy should focus not on uplifting ideals, but rather, so I argue, on minimizing serious suffering. This is so not because other things do not ultimately matter (they do), but rather because in the political context, the stakes in terms of suffering are usually extremely high, so that any other considerations are almost always outweighed. Put in moderately deontological terms: the high stakes carry most political decisions across the thresholds of the relevant deontological constraints. While the argument is substantive rather than exegetical, I engage in detail Judith Shklar's "Liberalism of Fear". I share with Shklar her pessimistic starting point, but I also show how a focus on suffering (rather than cruelty and fear) is what plausibly follows from such a starting point. I then pursue the implications of this difference—they are theoretically profound, but perhaps less significant practically.


Tuberculosis is a serious health problem not only in Indonesia, but worldwide. Each year, it occurs in nearly 9.7 million people and claims about 2 million lives worldwide. Pancreatic tuberculosis is a rare type of extra pulmonary tuberculosis that only occur less than 4.7% worldwide. The most common symptoms is abdominal pain and most of the patients shows abdominal tenderness on palpation. Diagnosis of pancreatic tuberculosis consist of tuberculin skin test, ultrasonography, computed tomography-scan, magnetic resonance imaging and biopsy. Diagnosing pancreatic tuberculosis is a challenge because of its rarity and it has similar symptoms as more common pancreatic condition such as pancreatic malignancy. Understanding of pancreatic tuberculosis will increased the clinical awareness that may guide clinicians to avoid unnecessary diagnostic or therapeutic procedures and early diagnosis.


Palladium nanoparticles (NPs) were applied for the hydrodechlorination of chlorophenols in contaminated water using H2 as a clean and sustainable reductant. In this study, a high-efficiency Pd-based catalyst (Pd/Fe3O4@C) was facilely synthesized and applied for the reduction of 4-nitrophenol and hydrodechlorination of 4-chlorophenol in an aqueous solution. Compared with most Pd-based catalysts, the Pd/Fe3O4@C nanocatalyst exhibits a higher catalytic performance. The well-dispersed Pd NPs were modified on the spherical carbon surface through coordination chemical bond. The superparamagnetic character of the Fe3O4 core enabled the Pd/Fe3O4@C nanocatalyst to be very easily separated and recovered from the reaction mixture. Thus, the nanocatalyst can be repeatedly used without significant weight loss. The high catalytic activity of the Pd/Fe3O4@C nanocatalyst indicates that noble metal nanoparticles supported on magnetic carbon sphere materials could act as promising catalysts and have potential applications in numerous Pd-based catalytic reactions.


Abstract. In this study, we apply the double-difference tomography to investigate the detailed 3-D structure within and around the Nový Kostel Seismic Zone, an area in the Czech Republic known for frequent occurrences of earthquake swarms. We use data from the 2008 swarm since it has already been analysed in terms of earthquake focal mechanisms, principal faults, tectonic stress and foci migration. We selected about 500 microearthquakes recorded at 22 local seismic stations of the West Bohemia seismic monitoring network (WEBNET). Applying double-difference tomography, combined with weighted average model (WAM) post-processing to correct for parameter dependence effects, we produce and interpret 3-D models of the Vp-to-Vs ratio (Vp/Vs) in and around the focal zone. The modelled Vp/Vs ratio shows several distinct structures, namely an area of high Vp/Vs ratio correlating with the foci of the microearthquakes, and a layer of low values directly above it. These structures may reflect changes in lithology and/or fluid concentration. The overlaying low Vp/Vs ratio layer coincides with the base of the Fichtelgebirge (Smrciny) granitic intrusion. It is possible that the base of the layer acts as a fluid trap and an upper limit to the seismicity, resulting in observed periodic swarms.


scenario studies could help explore the needed systems' transformations. This requires a clear definition of the "target space." The 169 targets and 232 indicators used for monitoring SDG implementation cannot be used for this; they are too many, too broad, unstructured, and sometimes not formulated quanti-tatively. Here, we propose a streamlined set of science-based indicators and associated target values that are quantifiable and actionable to make scenario analysis meaningful, relevant, and simple enough to be transparent and communicable. The 36 targets are based on the SDGs, existing multilateral agreements, literature, and expert assessment. They include 2050 as a longer-term reference point. This target space can guide researchers in developing new sustainable development pathways.


Recipient country ownership has been seen by many aid experts, to be an important way to improve the effectiveness of aid delivery. Technical assistance projects consume 25% of worldwide ODA,¹ and have been criticised by many aid experts for being ineffective.  The Solomon Islands Government (SIG) has received a large amount of technical assistance over the last ten years and therefore makes it a useful government to use as a case study to answer the main question of this thesis: Is the transfer of ownership in technical assistance projects shifting from the donor to the SIG?  The research has found that the SIG has more ownership of their technical assistance projects at the management level than at the operational level. The main constraints to SIG having more ownership at the management level were in the areas of technical advisor (TA) recruitment and performance management processes, and some areas of aid funding.  At the operational level of technical assistance projects, the amount of SIG ownership was significantly less. Many of the restraints in the transfer of ownership to the SIG counterparts were at the individual TA level, and were largely related to poor working relationships between individual TAs and counterparts caused by shortcomings in TAs' capacity building and people management skills and TAs' lack of knowledge of the SIG working style and environment.  More ownership needs to be transferred at the operational level for the SIG to have 'real' ownership of their technical assistance projects.  ¹ OECD, Perspective Note: Technical Co-operation for Capacity Development, OECD, (2011), pg 4.


Genome editing achieves a greater precision in genetic modification of living organisms while minimizing the unintended consequences and opposition to products developed through Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) technologies [1]. These technologies are powerful and versatile tools and have revolutionized methods of modifying living organisms for many intended purposes. Targeted genome editing using specialized nucleases offers methods with increased accuracy by introducing deletions, insertions, and replacement to site-specific genomic locations. Examples include the use of Zinc Finger Nuleases, CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats), Oligonucleotide-directed mutagenesis, RNA-dependent DNA methylation, and precision breeding for crop plant improvement [2,3]. The CRISPR/Cas9 was first discovered in the mid-1980s, in bacteria as a part of their immune system against viruses. The Cas9 nuclease target specific genomic sites with the help of a single guide RNA (sgRNA). Each sgRNA (targeting molecule) is composed of a 20-nucleotide spacer immediately upstream of a Proto-spacer Adjacent Motif (PAMs). The sequence of spacer and PAM must be complementary to a specific genomic location, allowing targeted mutagenesis of genes.


A new method for laser milling of Al2O3 ceramic based on deteriorative layer controlled is presented in which no assistant gas was used during the laser milling. The new milling technology is developed by means of laser scanning of ceramic surface and forming a deteriorative layer directly. Laser milling parameters are determined through crystal phase's analysis of the deteriorative layer. The laser milling depth, surface quality, and milling mechanism with different milling parameters were studied systematically on an Nd: YAG CNC laser and multi-layer laser milling experiments were also conducted with optimized processes on the surface of Al2O3 ceramic workpiece. Therefore, the practical experimental results are that each depth of layer milling is between 0.35-0.5 mm and the surface roughness of laser milling reaches to Ra 2-3.2μm. The experimental study has thus provided deeper understanding on laser milling technology for Al2O3 ceramic both in theory and application.


With serious energy crisis and high demand for Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), natural ventilation has taken more and more attention, which is recognized to be an effective and economic method to decrease the risk of Sick Building Syndrome (SBS), as well as reducing air-conditioning opening time, and thus saving energy. In view of window's characteristics having a great effect on ventilation, the paper discussed the influence of air inlet window type and area ratio of open window to floor on indoor steady-state contamination of CO 2 and steady-state time. In addition, for tilt, hopper or grille window, the larger opening angle, the better ventilation performance, yet once over 30deg, its influence on steady-state contamination became unobvious, so, the paper only discussed the situation with opening angle 30deg, inside. And to calculate more accurately and quickly, as well as conveniently and cost effectively, CFD model was used, which was firstly validated by experiment, good agreement in between, with absolute error in simulation 9.2%. Then, combined with the measured outdoor weather data in Tianjin, the results were obtained, push-pull window was the preferred window type, lower indoor average steady-state contamination of CO 2 and shorter steady-state time, 550 ppm and 6.5 min, with area ratio of open window to floor beta 5%. Moreover, on this basis, the optimal area ratio of open window to floor beta for push-pull window was studied, which was proposed to be or larger than 10%.


We present polynomial-time approximation algorithms for some degree-bounded directed network design problems. Our main result is for intersecting supermodular connectivity requirements with degree bounds: given a directed graph $G=(V,E)$ with nonnegative edge-costs, a connectivity requirement specified by an intersecting supermodular function $f$, and upper bounds $\{a_v,b_v\}_{v\in V}$ on in-degrees and out-degrees of vertices, find a minimum-cost $f$-connected subgraph of $G$ that satisfies the degree bounds. We give a bicriteria approximation algorithm for this problem using the natural LP relaxation and show that our guarantee is the best possible relative to this LP relaxation. We also obtain similar results for the (more general) class of crossing supermodular requirements. In the absence of edge-costs, our result gives the first additive $O(1)$-approximation guarantee for degree-bounded intersecting/crossing supermodular connectivity problems. We also consider the minimum crossing spanning tree problem: Given an undirected edge-weighted graph $G$, edge-subsets $\{E_i\}_{i=1}^k$, and nonnegative integers $\{b_i\}_{i=1}^k$, find a minimum-cost spanning tree (if it exists) in $G$ that contains at most $b_i$ edges from each set $E_i$. We obtain a $+(r-1)$ additive approximation for this problem, when each edge lies in at most $r$ sets. A special case of this problem is the degree-bounded minimum spanning tree, and our techniques give a substantially shorter proof of the recent $+1$ approximation of Singh and Lau [in Proceedings of the 40th Annual ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing, 2007, pp. 661-670].


Distracted driving has long been acknowledged as one of the main contributors to crashes in the US. According to past studies, driving behavior proved to be influenced by the socioeconomic characteristics of drivers. However, only few studies attempted to quantify that influence. The study proposed a Crash Risk Index to estimate the crash risk associated with the socioeconomic characteristics of drivers and their tendency to experience distracted driving. The analysis is conducted using data from the SHRP 2 Naturalistic Driving Study (NDS). The proposed Crash Risk Index (CRI) is developed based on a grading system of three measures: the crash risk associated with performing secondary tasks during driving, the effect of socioeconomic attributes (e.g. Age) on the likelihood of engagement in secondary tasks, and the effect of specific categories within each socioeconomic attribute (e.g. Age>60) on the likelihood of engagement in secondary tasks. Logistic Regression analysis was performed on the secondary tasks, socioeconomic attributes, and the specific socioeconomic characteristics. The results identified the significant secondary tasks with high crash risk and the socioeconomic characteristics with significant effect on determining drivers' involvement in secondary tasks among each tested parameter. These results were used to quantify the grading system measures and hence estimate the proposed CRI. This index indicates the relative crash risk associated with the socioeconomic characteristics of drivers and considering the possibility of engagement in secondary tasks. The proposed CRI and the associated grading system are plausible methods for estimating auto insurance premiums.


Fluorinated dendritic or hyperbranched polymers are demonstrated for the first time to be potentially useful for optical waveguide applications, for example in telecommunications. The required materials properties include the control of the refractive index over a wide range and UV-crosslinking for ease of processing and stable long-term mechanical properties. The authors report the synthesis of suitable functionalized fluorinated hyperbranched polymers and how the above requirements can be met by functionalization at the periphery of the polymers.


The roles which energy plays in the life of a nation as well as between nations have increased manifold in the twentieth century. Countries which are generously endowed with energy resources are considered stronger, both economically and politically. The only source of energy which is significantly available in Pakistan vis-a-vis her requirements is natural gas. Its use in indus:trial, commercial and domestic spheres of the economy is gaining increasing popularity. Its demand is rising day by day because of its low price, continuous flow and other advantages which it has over other types of fuels. This paper attempts to look at demand characteristics in the domestic sector of the gas market. This analysis pertains to the Punjab and the NWFPprovinees where the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Ltd. is the sole distributor of gas to domestic consumers.


The insulin‐like growth factors (IGFs) are potent mitogens for malignant cell proliferation. The majority of secreted IGFs are bound to specific IGF‐binding proteins (IGFBPs) that are secreted by a large number of cells. These proteins may either inhibit or enhance IGF actions. Breast carcinoma cells secrete a variety of IGFBPs. We have previously demonstrated that retinoic acid (RA) inhibition of IGF‐l– stimulated MCF‐7 cell proliferation is associated with increased IGFBP‐3 levels in the conditioned media. We therefore investigated the effect of recombinant IGFBP‐3 as well as IGFBP‐2, ‐4 and ‐5 on IGF‐l stimulation of DNA synthesis and IGF‐I binding in the MCF‐7 human breast carcinoma cell line. IGFBP‐2 and ‐3 enhanced IGF‐l stimulation of DNA synthesis in MCF‐7 cells while IGFBP‐4 and ‐5 had no effect. Transfection of MCF‐7 cells with an IGFBP‐3 expression vector resulted in the enhanced secretion of IGFBP‐3 with an accompanying increase in IGF‐l binding as well as increased cell proliferation upon treatment of the cells with IGF‐l. IGF‐l preincubation of MCF‐7 cells transfected with control pSVneo plasmids results in cells refractory to further IGF‐l stimulation of thymidine incorporation while IGF‐l continues to stimulate [3H]‐thymidine incorporation in IGFBP‐3–transfected MCF‐7 cells, suggesting that IGFBP‐3 protects the cells from IGF‐l–mediated down regulation of its receptor. Therefore, IGFBP‐3 secreted by MCF‐7 cells can enhance IGF‐l stimulation of DNA synthesis, increase IGF‐l binding to these cells, and prevent IGF‐l–induced desensitization of its own receptor, suggesting that IGFBP‐3 plays a significant role in IGF‐l–mediated breast carcinoma proliferation. © 1994 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


ABSTRACT The Integrated Capacitance Resistive Model (ICRM), a linearized form of Capacitance Resistive Models (CRM), has been commonly used to match liquid production history and estimate interwell connectivity (IWC) in waterflooded reservoirs. Although this model fits cumulative production data accurately, it usually fails to estimate correct values of total production, where backward subtraction of cumulative production delivers highly overestimated or underestimated total production rates. To address this issue, a modified optimization approach is presented to minimize the error between both cumulative and total production data through two consecutive constrained objective functions. This paper validates the modified ICRM in homogeneous synthetic examples with vertical wells to show how the new approach can successfully characterize the waterflooded reservoirs. The model was also tested in damaged formations to detect its impact on the communication between wells. Finally, a correlation is proposed to explain the mathematical and physical relationship between formation damage (skin factor) and IWC of the damaged well. Abbreviations BHP: bottom-hole pressure; CMG: computer modeling group Ltd.; COF: Consecutive objective function; CRM: capacitance-resistive model or capacitance-resistance model; CWI: cumulative water injection; ICRM: integrated capacitance-resistance model; IMEX: Implicit-explicit black oil simulator


OBJECTIVE
To determine whether information processing speed is influenced by change in plasma cobalamin status in human immunodeficiency virus type 1 disease.

DESIGN
A longitudinal study, using autoregression, to evaluate the relationship between plasma cobalamin status and change in information processing speed assessed by Posner Letter Matching, Sternberg Short-Term Memory Search, Figure Visual Scanning and Discrimination of Pictures, and continuous paired associates learning tasks.

SETTING
University of Miami (Fla) School of Medicine from fall 1987 through summer 1991.

PARTICIPANTS
Eighty-four human immunodeficiency virus type 1-infected homosexual men aged 20 to 55 years. None of the subjects displayed acquired immunodeficiency syndrome-defining symptoms at baseline; over the course of the study, 9.5% progressed to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Biochemical measurement of plasma cobalamin; performance on information processing speed tasks.

RESULTS
Significant improvement in the Posner Letter Matching NI-PI (Name Identity minus Physical Identity) differential was associated with becoming cobalamin adequate or remaining adequate. Becoming cobalamin deficient, in contrast, was associated with a significant decline in the speed of accessing overlearned name codes.

CONCLUSION
Normalization of plasma cobalamin inadequacy in human immunodeficiency virus type 1 disease may provide significant improvement in the speed of retrieving overlearned information from long-term memory.


The primitive germ-cells in this species originate in the ectoderm of the stalk of the gonophore bud and migrate from that position along the ectoderm to the tip of the bud where they
pass through the mesogloea into the bell-rudiment. During the growth of the oocyte the surrounding cells are at first annexed, but later the process is one of digestion. Fertilization has not been observed. The early cleavage stages show a good deal of variation ranging from a perfectly regular type which results in the formation of a regular, hollow blastula to an extremely irregular type in which a blastocoele is never formed. The blastula is followed by a stage in which the embryo consists of a solid mass of cells. This stage arises by a process of modified multipolar budding from the walls of the blastula. The ectoderm is now formed by a process of delamination. The coelenteron appears and the mesogloea is formed between ectoderm and endoderm. The embryo is now saucer-shaped and the solid aboral tentacles are now formed in a ring around its edge. A layer of mesogloea appears across the base of each tentacle. A solid circular rim of endoderm is formed at the bases of the tentacles, and this again is separated from the endoderm lining the coelenteron by another layer of mesogloea. Meanwhile a gradual differentiation has taken place in the ectoderm, giving rise to nematocysts and fixation cells. The embryo now becomes greatly elongated so that its long axis lies between the oral and aboral poles. Five short oral tentacles are now formed, and the mouth breaks through in the middle of the circle. Having reached this stage the embryo is ready to be set free.


The "epidemiology of knowledge" underlying clinical decision making related to antibiotic therapy is one of the most important determinants of how such therapy is used, misused, or not used. A growing literature describes how prescribers and patients acquire the information that influences them in their utilization of these agents. The quality and content of this information ultimately determine whether a given microorganism will ever meet a particular drug. Most evidence indicates that there is considerable room for improvement in such decision making. Research data, including those from randomized controlled trials, have been used to compare the efficacy of several methods of improving the flow of information about proper antibiotic use. While traditional passive forms of education are not powerful means of changing prescribing behavior, innovative approaches, including person-to-person tutorials, can improve the quality of antibiotic prescribing. Benefit-cost analysis documents that these programs can save more than they cost. Additional research on these questions will be a powerful way of maximizing both effectiveness and efficiency in the treatment of infectious diseases.


The Human Sum. Edited by C. H. Rolph. Preface by Lord Simon of Wythenshawe. Illustrations designed by Alfred G. Wurmser and a cartoon by Vicky. (Pp. 232+vi; illustrated. 18s.) London, Melbourne, Toronto: Heinemann. 1957. Published for the Family Planning Association to commemorate its 25th anniversary, this fascinating book consists of eleven essays by eminent writers on population, extending downwards from the world as a whole to the family and the individuals composing it. After a preface by Lord Simon of Wythenshawe, C. H. Rolph ably introduces the subject and each of the writers. Julian Huxley surveys the world scene with first-hand observations made during a recent world tour, and concludes that, in addition to a vast increase in the exploitation of the world's resources, population limitation by the underdeveloped countries is essential. This theme is reiterated by Bertrand Russell, who considers that " nothing is more likely to lead to an H-bomb war than the threat of universal destitution through over-population." The paper by A. S. Parkes is concerned with what the medical scientist, having been responsible for explosive population growth through effective death control, must now do to counterbalance it with equally effective birth control. Mary Stocks describes the history of family planning in Great Britain. C. H. Rolph contrives to infuse the Law's regard for the family with immense hilarity. Jacquetta Hawkes puts the case for intelligent family planning as against a constant succession of unwanted pregnancies. Michael Young and Peter Willmott contrast the horrors of the working-class families in East London 40 or more years ago with the encouraging enlightenment of the present day. Edward Blishen writes from his personal knowledge as a schoolmaster of the effects of parental attitudes-especially in regard to family planning-on the character of the boys he has to teach in a working-class district school. J. M. Mackintosh discusses changing attitudes within the family. James Lansdale Hodson gives a lurid account of induced abortion, with a plea for a more lenient attitude towards it on the part of the Law. Finally, the Reverend Sherwin Bailey discusses some theological considerations of marriage and the family; certain of his metaphysics read rather strangely after the factual accounts in the earlier parts of the book, but he concludes that the time has come for the Church to revise some of its ideas of sex. The book is liberally illustrated with amusing line drawings by Alfred Wurmser and a cartoon by Vicky. Without doubt this book is an important social document, and the Family Planning Association is to be congratulated for having sponsored it. G. I. M. SWYER.


Most volumes in the environmental economics literature consider the environment to be a public good and hence write out a role for the private sector in a source of supply. Yet there is ample evidence of the private sector being involved, driven both by profit and altruism. This book provides the necessary conceptual base for the inclusion of the private sector in the environmental protection supply equation and deliver an extensive set of examples in a wide range of contexts. In an economic climate where governments are attempting to reduce expenditures, the increased role for the private sector will be readily embraced by policy makers. The aim of the book is to establish the principles of markets in the provision of environmental protection and to provide an extensive experience-based set of contexts in which the private sector has acted to enhance the supply of environmental goods and services. These contexts include both pure-private sector initiatives in terrestrial, aquatic and marine ecosystems and public-private sector 'joint initiatives' such as payment for environmental services (PES) schemes.


We introduce virtual blue noise lighting, a rendering pipeline for estimating indirect illumination with a blue noise distribution of virtual lights. Our pipeline is designed for virtual lights with non-uniform emission profiles that are more expensive to store, but required for properly and efficiently handling specular transport. Unlike the typical virtual light placement approaches that traverse light paths from the original light sources, we generate them starting from the camera. This avoids two important problems: wasted memory and computation with fully-occluded virtual lights, and excessive virtual light density around high-probability light paths. In addition, we introduce a parallel and adaptive sample elimination strategy to achieve a blue noise distribution of virtual lights with varying density. This addresses the third problem of virtual light placement by ensuring that they are not placed too close to each other, providing better coverage of the (indirectly) visible surfaces and further improving the quality of the final lighting estimation. For computing the virtual light emission profiles, we present a photon splitting technique that allows efficiently using a large number of photons, as it does not require storing them. During lighting estimation, our method allows using both global power-based and local BSDF important sampling techniques, combined via multiple importance sampling. In addition, we present an adaptive path extension method that avoids sampling nearby virtual lights for reducing the estimation error. We show that our method significantly outperforms path tracing and prior work in virtual lights in terms of both performance and image quality, producing a fast but biased estimate of global illumination.


Hyperhomocysteinemia, either fasting or after methionine loading, may contribute to the increased incidence of cardiovascular disease events experienced by renal transplant recipients. Limited data are available on fasting homocysteine (Hcy) levels, and none on postmethionine-loading Hcy levels, in these patients. We assessed the prevalence and potential determinants of fasting and postmethionine-loading hyperhomocysteinemia in 29 stable renal transplant recipients and 58 age- and sex-matched, population-based controls free of renal disease with serum creatinine levels of 1.5 mg/dL or less. Total (t) plasma Hcy was determined fasting and 2 hours after methionine loading, along with fasting determinations of the B-vitamin cofactors/substrates for Hcy metabolism, ie, pyridoxal 5'-phosphate, B-12, and folate and serum creatinine. Geometric mean fasting (18.1 versus 9.8 microM, P < .001) and postmethionine-loading increase (22.0 versus 15.2, P = .001) in tHcy levels were significantly greater in the renal transplant recipients, as were the prevalence odds (with 95% confidence intervals) for fasting [14.8 (3.4-64.7)], postmethionine loading [6.9 (1.5-32.8)], combined fasting and postmethionine-loading [18.0 (2.3-142.1)] hyperhomocysteinemia, and inadequate circulating folate [4.2 (1.1-16.5)] or pyridoxal 5'-phosphate [3.2 (0.9-11.0) status. Correlation analyses suggested important potential relationships between creatinine and both fasting (+0.64, P < .001) and postmethionine-load increase (+0.38, P = .045) in tHcy, folate and fasting (-0.41, P = .025) tHcy, and pyridoxal 5'-phosphate and postmethionine-loading increase (-0.33, P = .091) in tHcy. We conclude that there is an excess prevalence of fasting and postmethionine-loading hyperhomocysteinemia in stable renal transplant recipients. Renal function is related to both fasting and postmethionine loading-hyperhomocysteinemia, inadequate folate status is associated with fasting hyperhomocysteinemia, and inadequate vitamin B-6 status may be related to postmethionine-loading hyperhomocysteinemia in this patient population.


The idea that we have direct and infallible knowledge of appearances is still deeply entrenched; and even scholars who reject this idea often still presume that our normal awareness of the shape and size of objects includes awareness of something like the shape and size of the image it projects onto the retina. I show here how these ideas are undermined by some new empirical evidence regarding these features, as well as by some observations concerning the phenomenology of size, the familiar moon illusion, and the persistence of illusions more generally. These considerations further suggest a path for dealing with the phenomenology of appearance more broadly.


UNLABELLED
Background Sexual behaviour and HIV prevention needs of men who have sex with men (MSM) attending suburban Sex on Premises Venues (SOPVs) are understudied.

METHODS
A cross-sectional survey examining sexual activity, health services utilisation, sexual health services needs and STI knowledge was conducted among MSM over 18 years old attending a SOPV in Western Sydney between June and July 2013.

RESULTS
A total of 213 MSM were sampled; approximately half of the respondents (51%) reported that they only had sex with other men, and 46% had sex with both men and women. Condom use varied considerably, with ~50% of responders not using condoms consistently during anal sex. Consistent condom usage was not associated with having regular, casual or a mix of regular and casual partners during anal sex (P=0.09). The majority (59.5%) obtained sexual health screening services from general practitioners; only 15.0% sought services from a local sexual health clinic. Over half of respondents (57.7%) believed that SOPVs should offer on-site and free testing services. Those with the highest level of previous STI diagnoses were gay men (41%), those who only had casual partners (38%) and those who did not complete high school (65%).

CONCLUSIONS
Sexual health services and non-government organisations should consider targeting bisexual men with rapid HIV testing and condom usage campaigns. Low cost or free on-site HIV and STI testing at SOPVs and stronger partnerships between general practitioners and sexual health services are needed.


In January, 2005, a group of analysts and activists met in Gujarat at the invitation of SEWA to discuss papers presented at a conference on Membership Based Organizations of the Poor. The details of the conference are available at http://wiego.org/ahmedabad/. Somewhat unusually for academic conferences of this type, the discussions were preceded by an exposure to the lives of individual women members of SEWA who are themselves involved in the organizing activities of this membership based organization of the poor. The technical papers presented at the conference are available on the conference website, and will be published in due course in an academic press volume in the usual way. However, participants were also asked to record their reflections on the exposure. This compendium brings together these reflections, a rich and wide ranging set of responses to a brief glimpse into the reality of the lives of working poor women.


Evidence suggests that the core cognitive features of schizophrenia (SZ) include impairments in auditory and visual memory systems and that each of these deficits individually correlates with functional impairment. However, recent basic research suggests that numerous levels of cognitive processing, from perception to learning, optimally function under multisensory conditions, i.e., with multiple sensory modalities engaged at the same time by the same stimulus. Growing evidence points to the possibility that multisensory learning facilitates neuroplasticity beyond what is possible in unisensory modalities, and, what is more, multisensory information has increasingly been found to rely upon neural communication both within specific cortical modules and also across broad neural networks. In the area of SZ research, recent formulations of the disorder suggest that it is precisely in the domain of neural communication, or connectivity and plasticity, that patients are characteristically impaired. Yet, in the extant literature, one finds very few investigations of memory or other processes in which the more ecologically valid, multisensory stimuli were employed. Furthermore, while the dysconnection model of SZ is promising theoretically and supported by neurological data, very few studies seek instantiations of these effects behaviorally or the emergent properties of their biomarkers. The current study examined SZ patients' capacity to benefit from multisensory encoding of auditory memoranda relative to healthy controls. It further sought to delineate the electrophysiological substrates predictive of behavioral performance within the framework of a neuroconnectivity-based model of episodic memory function. In addition to replicating pilot data findings of benefits to auditory recognition from multisensory encoding in controls, the data also demonstrated a capacity for SZ patients to capitalize upon this same process for improvement of auditory memory deficits. In keeping with the theoretical model, results revealed that recognition of unisensory-encoded sounds were predicted by low frequency connectivity across a broad, hippocampally-centered network. Auditory memory deficits in patients were statistically mediated by impairments in the operation of this system and several measures of SZ symptomatology were associated with those same biomarkers. Increases in memory for multisensory-encoded sounds appeared to be predicted by both low- and high-frequency posterior connectivity for which no group differences were found.


"Lens of War" grew out of an invitation to leading historians of the Civil War to select and reflect upon a single photograph. Each could choose any image and interpret it in personal and scholarly terms. The result is a remarkable set of essays by twenty-seven scholars whose numerous volumes on the Civil War have explored military, cultural, political, African American, women s, and environmental history. The essays describe a wide array of photographs and present an eclectic approach to the assignment, organized by topic: Leaders, Soldiers, Civilians, Victims, and Places. Readers will rediscover familiar photographs and figures examined in unfamiliar ways, as well as discover little-known photographs that afford intriguing perspectives. All the images are reproduced with exquisite care. Readers fascinated by the Civil War will want this unique book on their shelves, and lovers of photography will value the images and the creative, evocative reflections offered in these essays. Contributors: Stephen Berry, William A. Blair, Stephen Cushman, Gary W. Gallagher, J. Matthew Gallman, Judith A. Giesberg, Joseph T. Glatthaar, Thavolia Glymph, Earl J. Hess, Harold Holzer, Caroline E. Janney, James Marten, Kathryn Shively Meier, Megan Kate Nelson, Susan Eva O Donovan, T. Michael Parrish, Ethan S. Rafuse, Carol Reardon, James I. Robertson Jr., Jane E. Schultz, Aaron Sheehan-Dean, Brooks D. Simpson, Daniel E. Sutherland, Emory M. Thomas, Elizabeth R. Varon, Joan Waugh, Steven E. Woodworth."


Subfamily ABCC contains thirteen members and nine of these transporters are referred to as the Multidrug Resistance Proteins (MRPs). The MRP proteins are found throughout nature and they mediate many important functions. They are known to be involved in ion transport, toxin secretion, and signal transduction [7, 2].


Decision-making in industry can be focused on different types of problems. Classification and prediction of decision problems can be solved with the use of a decision tree, which is a graph-based method of machine learning. In the presented approach, attribute-value system and quality function deployment (QFD) were used for decision problem analysis and training dataset preparation. A decision tree was applied for generating decision rules.


The ability to measure the development of epistemological beliefs of 235 college students during their firstsemester in college was investigated by comparing the results obtained using five different methodological approaches to measuring change. These approaches included the use of the two-wave difference score, the residual change score, the cross-time correlation matrix, repeated measures analysis of variance, and individual growth modeling. A cubic individual growth model was found to be superior to other methods in describing intraindividual differences in dualistic epistemological orientation during the transition to college. An investigation of the existence of systematic interindividual differences in growth as a function of anxiety, mood, tolerance of ambiguity, and various demographic characteristics failed to find any significant differences among four identified patterns of linear and cubic change in dualism: no change, fluctuating increase, straight increase, fluctuating decrease, and straight decrease. Suggestions are given for both future empirical investigations of epistemological development in college students and the measurement of longitudinal change in psychological constructs.


Continual Learning (CL) has achieved rapid progress in recent years. However, it is still largely unknown how to determine whether a CL model is trustworthy and how to foster its trustworthiness. This work focuses on evaluating and improving the robustness to corruptions of existing CL models. Our empirical evaluation results show that existing state-of-the-art (SOTA) CL models are particularly vulnerable to various data corruptions during testing. To make them trustworthy and robust to corruptions deployed in safety-critical scenarios, we propose a meta-learning framework of self-adaptive data augmentation to tackle the corruption robustness in CL. The proposed framework, MetaMix, learns to augment and mix data, automatically transforming the new task data or memory data. It directly optimizes the generalization performance against data corruptions during training. To evaluate the corruption robustness of our proposed approach, we construct several CL corruption datasets with different levels of severity. We perform comprehensive experiments on both task- and class-continual learning. Extensive experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed method compared to SOTA baselines.


Architectural  photographs were circulated extensively  in  professional networks and the  printed  press during  the  interwar  period to  disseminate  the  latest news about modern architecture. In addition to contributing to the accumulation of pictorial information about buildings, these images were substitutes for travel while also stimulating the desire to explore. Ter es Forma (Space and Form), a leading architectural periodical, publicised international  modern architecture in interwar Hungary, and was under the editorship of the architect Virgil Bierbauer between 1928  and 1942.  Bierbauer established a continuously growing international  network of connections that facilitated the distribution  of his own works in the international  architectural press as well as the acquisition of information  about the activities of his contemporaries. Although he never managed to go overseas, Bierbauer was an avid traveller and his network covered not only Europe but also the United States and Japan. He took study trips in order to visit particular buildings, urban ensembles and exhibitions as well as to  participate  in  congresses. He  also  took   the opportunity   to  study   the  built environment  during his holidays. Although he was an amateur  photographer himself, he preferred to publish images by professional photographers in his journal. I argue that  by facilitating the flow of information, architectural photographs served as substitutes for travel. Thus, I place the notion of travel as an analogy for both the transfer and the reception of modern architecture via photographic images in the magazine Teres  Forma. In addition, I trace Bierbauer's attitude towards actual travel and the notion  of travel with  different case studies and how his approach permeated the  printed  page. I also analyse  Bierbauer's own travels  and  how  his experiences affected his editorial activities in terms of layout and content.


This article presents the results of the occlusal molar microwear texture analysis of 32 adult Upper Paleolithic modern humans from a total of 21 European sites dating to marine isotope stages 3 and 2. The occlusal molar microwear textures of these specimens were analyzed with the aim of examining the effects of the climatic, as well as the cultural, changes on the diets of the Upper Paleolithic modern humans. The results of this analysis do not reveal any environmentally driven dietary shifts for the Upper Paleolithic hominins indicating that the climatic and their associated paleoecological changes did not force these humans to significantly alter their diets in order to survive. However, the microwear texture analysis does detect culturally related changes in the Upper Paleolithic humans' diets. Specifically, significant differences in diet were found between the earlier Upper Paleolithic individuals, i.e., those belonging to the Aurignacian and Gravettian contexts, and the later Magdalenian ones, such that the diet of the latter group was more varied and included more abrasive foods compared with those of the former.


Groundnut is the most important rich source of protein, minerals and vitamin. Pre -harvest contamination is influenced by soil moisture and temperature. Field experiments were conducted in northern Ethiopia, at two locations to determine the effect of soil solarization on yield and yield components of groundnut varieties, and to determine Aspergillus spp. inoculum in the soil. Soil samples were taken in three rounds and analysed for aflatoxigenic population. Soil solarization reduced fungal inoculum and increased groundnut yields. Individual and total cfu g -1 of soil was determined before, after solarization and at harvest. Four Aspergillus species namely, A. flavus, A. parasiticus, A. niger and A. terreus were identified and their densities were significantl y (P<0.05) reduced at after solarization. In the solarized plots, A. flavus and A. parasiticus were found reduced by 53.8 and 45% cfu g -1 at Ramma and 36.4 and 44% cfu g -1 at 5 and 10 cm soil depths at Mayweyni, respectively, after soil solarization in the solarized plots than the nonsolarized plots. At harvest, Fusarium spp., A. flavus and A. terreus were detected. Pod yields were found increased by 265.6 kg ha -1 and 182.22 kg ha -1 on solarized plots at Mayweyni and Ramma respectively. Increase in yield related parameters (14.8% increase in number of seed per plant and 7.4% increase in number of pods per plant) were found from early planting dates as compared to later planting time at Mayweyni. Generally, yields varied across locations; mean pod yield in Mayweyni was 360.9 kg ha -1 higher than the yield in Ramma.


Quantitative structure-activity relationships (QSAR) have been applied for decades in the development of relationships between physicochemical properties of chemical substances and their biological activities to obtain a reliable statistical model for prediction of the activities of new chemical entities. The fundamental principle underlying the formalism is that the difference in structural properties is responsible for the variations in biological activities of the compounds. In the classical QSAR studies, affinities of ligands to their binding sites, inhibition constants, rate constants, and other biological end points, with atomic, group or molecular properties such as lipophilicity, polarizability, electronic and steric properties (Hansch analysis) or with certain structural features (Free-Wilson analysis) have been correlated. However such an approach has only a limited utility for designing a new molecule due to the lack of consideration of the 3D structure of the molecules. 3D-QSAR has emerged as a natural extension to the classical Hansch and Free-Wilson approaches, which exploits the three-dimensional properties of the ligands to predict their biological activities using robust chemometric techniques such as PLS, G/PLS, ANN etc. It has served as a valuable predictive tool in the design of pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals. Although the trial and error factor involved in the development of a new drug cannot be ignored completely, QSAR certainly decreases the number of compounds to be synthesized by facilitating the selection of the most promising candidates. Several success stories of QSAR have attracted the medicinal chemists to investigate the relationships of structural properties with biological activity. This review seeks to provide a bird's eye view of the different 3D-QSAR approaches employed within the current drug discovery community to construct predictive structure-activity relationships and also discusses the limitations that are fundamental to these approaches, as well as those that might be overcome with the improved strategies. The components involved in building a useful 3D-QSAR model are discussed, including the validation techniques available for this purpose.


Several Markov chain methods are available for sampling from a posterior distribution. Two important examples are the Gibbs sampler and the Metropolis algorithm. In addition, several strategies are available for constructing hybrid algorithms. This paper outlines some of the basic methods and strategies and discusses some related theoretical and practical issues. On the theoretical side, results from the theory of general state space Markov chains can be used to obtain convergence rates, laws of large numbers and central limit theorems for estimates obtained from Markov chain methods. These theoretical results can be used to guide the construction of more efficient algorithms. For the practical use of Markov chain methods, standard simulation methodology provides several variance reduction techniques and also gives guidance on the choice of sample size and allocation


The head piece separated from the A-ATP synthase of Halobacterium halobium hydrolyses ATP. This A1-ATPase is inhibited by nitrate but not by other chaotropic anions. The nitrate inhibition is noncompetitive with respect to ATP, reversible, and partially protected by chloride. In contrast, ATP synthase in situ (A1Ao-ATPase) is not inhibited by nitrate but apparently is inhibited by stronger chaotropic reagents, such as thiocyanate and trichloroacetate, which make the vesicle membrane permeable to protons. The mode of action of nitrate and chaotropic anions seems to differentiate A-ATPases from V-ATPases. Other strains of Halobacterium, Haloferax, Haloarcula, Halococcus and Natronobacterium, contain at least two polypeptides immunochemically similar to the two major subunits, (&agr;) (86x10(3 )Mr on SDS-PAGE) and &bgr; (64x10(3 )Mr), of the A-ATPase of Halobacterium halobium. When solubilized, membrane vesicles of these halobacteria hydrolyse ATP. Their ATPases are commonly sensitive to nitrate. They require high concentrations of the supporting salt but depend differently on chloride or sulfate/sulfite. The A-ATPases of Halobacteriaceae appear to diverge with respect to salt preference.


In United States v. Newman the Second Circuit overturned the insider trading convictions of two hedge fund managers who received material nonpublic information from public companies via an extended tipping chain. The Newman court interpreted the Supreme Court's decision in Dirks v. SEC as requiring that the government prove: 1) that the tippee knew that the tipper was disclosing the information in exchange for a personal benefit; and 2) that if the personal benefit does not involve a quid pro quo to the tipper, that the disclosure arise from a "meaningfully close personal relationship" with the recipient of the information. The U.S. Attorney and the SEC reacted sharply to Newman, decrying it as a departure from Dirks. This essay traces the "judicial history" of Dirks' personal benefit requirement. Based on that history, I conclude that Newman's knowledge standard is the correct reading of Dirks, and that its requirement of a "meaningfully close personal relationship" is consistent with, if not compelled by, the rule laid down in Dirks.