Tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) are recently developed targeted anticancer agents that target molecular abnormalities which are unique to cancer cells and, hence, provide an anticancer therapy that is potentially less toxic to healthy cells. Currently, eleven TKIs have been approved for use in several types of cancer. However, considerable inter-individual variability in safety and efficacy has been observed for TKIs. Therefore, there is an urgent need to gain insight into factors that are involved in this large inter-individual variability for optimal use of these important novel drugs. One of the most important determinants for safety and efficacy of TKIs may be drug exposure (pharmacokinetics). To be able to study the pharmacokinetics of TKIs, methods for quantitative analysis of TKIs and their metabolites in plasma, sweat and tumor tissue were developed. Subsequently, these methods were used to support clinical studies to provide insights in pharmacological aspects of TKIs in various circumstances as for instance in case of specific toxicities, in daily practice and during PK guided dosing regimens.

Despite the fact that TKIs are targeted against tumor cells, toxicity of healthy cells during TKI treatment has shown to be inevitable. Moreover, severe toxicities may lead to unavoidable dose modifications or dose interruptions, which have a negative impact on treatment efficacy. To increase knowledge on the development of skin toxicities during therapy with TKI sunitinib, occurrence of hand foot syndrome (HFS) during different seasons was investigated and sunitinib secretion in sweat of patients was measured. This generated the hypothesis that aggravation of HFS is caused by the secretion of sunitinib in sweat and that HFS could possibly be limited by preventive measures for hyperhydrosis in future.

In an unselected outpatient population almost half of the trough plasma concentrations appeared to be subtherapeutic with a risk of treatment failure or development of drug resistance. It was not possible to predict which patients were at risk of subtherapeutic plasma concentrations based on patient- or medication related factors. This indicated that therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) is paramount and should be fully implemented in routine cancer care to identify patients that are in need of individual adjusted dosages.

As a proof of concept for TDM of sunitinib, a pilot study was performed to investigate the safety and feasibility of the pharmacokinetically guided dosing strategy. At the standard dose, more than half of the patients did not reach target plasma concentrations of sunitinib after 14 days of treatment and, therefore, needed pharmacokinetically guided dose adjustments to increase the probability of a therapeutic effect. Ultimately, a third of the patients that did not reach target sunitinib concentrations at standard doses, did potentially benefit from the implemented dose escalations without causing additional toxicities. This implies that pharmacokinetically guided sunitinib dose escalations rather than fixed doses would contribute to optimization of therapy in a considerable part of the patients.

The insights and hypotheses generated in this thesis could be used as starting point for further research on the pharmacological aspects of TKIs and to further optimize TKI treatment.


OBJECTIVE
To examine the association between residential remoteness and stage of cancer at diagnosis, treatment uptake, and survival within the Australian Indigenous population.

DESIGN
Systematic review and matched retrospective cohort study.

SETTING
Australia.

PARTICIPANTS
Systematic review: published papers that included a comparison of cancer stage at diagnosis, treatment uptake, mortality and/or survival for Indigenous people across remoteness categories were identified (n = 181). Fifteen papers (13 studies) were included in the review. Original analyses: new analyses were conducted using data from the Queensland Indigenous Cancer Study (QICS) comparing cancer stage at diagnosis, treatment uptake, and survival for Indigenous cancer patients living in rural/remote areas (n = 627, 66%) and urban areas (n = 329, 34%).

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Systematic review: Papers were included if there were related to stage of disease at diagnosis, treatment, mortality and survival of cancer. Restrictions were not placed on the outcome measures reported (e.g. standardised mortality ratios versus crude mortality rates). Original analyses: Odds ratios (OR, 95%CI) were used to compare stage of disease and treatment uptake between the two remoteness groups. Treatment uptake (treated/not treated) was analysed using logistic regression analysis. Survival was analysed using Cox proportional hazards regression. The final multivariate models included stage of cancer at diagnosis and area-level socioeconomic status (SEIFA).

RESULTS
Existing evidence of variation in cancer outcomes for Indigenous people in remote compared with metropolitan areas is limited. While no previous studies have reported on differences in cancer stage and treatment uptake by remoteness within the Indigenous population, the available evidence suggests Indigenous cancer patients are less likely to survive their cancer the further they live from urban centres. New analysis of QICS data indicates that Indigenous cancer patients in rural/remote Queensland were less likely to be diagnosed with localised disease and less likely to receive treatment for their cancer compared to their urban counterparts.

CONCLUSION
More research is needed to fully understand geographic differentials in cancer outcomes within the Indigenous population. Knowing how geographical location interacts with Indigenous status can help to identify ways of improving cancer outcomes for Indigenous Australians.


Federal Cloud Computing: The Definitive Guide for Cloud Service Providers offers an in-depth look at topics surrounding federal cloud computing within the federal government, including the Federal Cloud Computing Strategy, Cloud Computing Standards, Security and Privacy, and Security Automation.

You will learn the basics of the NIST risk management framework (RMF) with a specific focus on cloud computing environments, all aspects of the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) process, and steps for cost-effectively implementing the Assessment and Authorization (A&A) process, as well as strategies for implementing Continuous Monitoring, enabling the Cloud Service Provider to address the FedRAMP requirement on an ongoing basis.

Provides a common understanding of the federal requirements as they apply to cloud computing
Provides a targeted and cost-effective approach for applying the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Risk Management Framework (RMF)
Provides both technical and non-technical perspectives of the Federal Assessment and Authorization (A&A) process that speaks across the organization

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 - Introduction to the Federal Cloud Computing Strategy

Chapter 2 - Cloud Computing Standards

Chapter 3 - A Case for Open Source

Chapter 4 - Security and Privacy in Public Cloud Computing

Chapter 5 - Applying the NIST Risk Management Framework

Chapter 6 - Risk Management

Chapter 7 - Comparison of FISMA with Other Security Compliance Standards

Chapter 8 - FedRAMP Primer

Chapter 9 - The FedRAMP Cloud Computing Security Requirements

Chapter 10 - Security Assessment and Authorization: Governance, Preparation, and Execution

Chapter 11 - Strategies for Continuous Monitoring

Chapter 12 - Cost-Effective Compliance using Security Automation

Chapter 13 - A Case Study for Cloud Service Providers


Objective: Percutaneous ethanol sclerotherapy has shown to be efficient in treating venous malformations of the head and neck. Our aim was to assess the safety and efficacy of percutaneous ethanol sclerotherapy in treating venous malformations of the oral cavity and the oropharynx. Materials and Methods: From 2007 to 2015, 57 percutaneous procedures using ethanol were performed in 13 patients. Medical records of these patients were retrospectively analyzed. One patient was male and 12 were females. The patients' age ranged from 8 to 65 years (mean age, 30 years). The mean follow-up was 11 months. The volume of ethanol used per session ranged from 0.4 to 14 mL (mean volume, 6 mL) in 12 patients, except the syndromic patient. Results: In 7 out of 13 patients (53.4%), the lesions were resolved completely. In 3 patients (23%), sclerotherapy alleviated the symptoms. In 2 patients (15.3%), the lesions did not sufficiently respond to the therapy. In 1 patient (7.6%), sclerotherapy failed due to misdiagnosis. No major complications were encountered. All the patients experienced pain to a tolerable degree. Swelling, induration, and darkening of the lesion occurred following injections. In 1 patient, ulceration and cleavage on the tongue was resolved within 15 days after emergence. Conclusion: Percutaneous ethanol sclerotherapy is a reliable and efficacious method of treating venous malformations of the oral cavity and oropharynx.


NGOs comprise over half the cumulative number of delegates attending the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Conference of the Parties (COP) for the 1995–2009 period. These NGOs represent a wide array of issues, including sustainable development, business, and higher education, to name just a few. Based on UNFCCC publicly available participation statistics, this article analyzes NGO participation from a quantitative issue-based perspective, and compares the results with the relevant conclusions drawn by the other contributors to this special issue. The findings of this analysis confirm informed expectations about issue-driven NGO participation. In particular, three main findings are that: (1) environment and conservation, academic, business, and energy NGOs dominate civil society participation in the UNFCCC; (2) UNFCCC constituencies do not adequately capture the range of issues addressed by observer NGOs; and (3) since 2007, NGO participation has sig-nificantly increased and diversified.


The following chapter aims at giving an overview of the use of numerical simulation in the field of laser processing. Indeed, the past two decades saw an increasing demand for lasers in various areas such as healthcare, microelectronics, cartography, optoelec‐ tronics, aeronautics, etc. Thus, the comprehension of the laser-material interaction and the removal mechanism became primordial to predict and improve the efficiency of a process. After a nonexhaustive literature review, two simulation approaches (Finite Element and Design Of Experiment, DOE) will be presented to demonstrate the importance of numerical simulation in laser applications.


According to the survey and study on geological condition, the genetic mechanism and evolving process of the reservoir landslide were analyzed at first that the landslide experienced two large slides. The first slide occurred in the J2S2 formation, it's a collapse slide with small thickness sliding mass, but made the slope on the back edge of the landslide became steeper, which created the conditions for the second slide. The second slide mainly occurred in the J2S1 formation, it's a slide that cut layer of rock stratum, which formed present landside. Then, the influencing factors on the stability of reservoir landslide were analyzed, and finite element models were created to calculate and analyze the stability of reservoir landslide under multiple-factors action. The results shows that the landslide is stable in natural conditions, and the safety factor of landslide decreases after the normal storage of reservoir, which doesn't meet the specification requirements; when considering the sudden drop in reservoir level, rainfall infiltration and other factors, the safety factor of landslide decreases further, reaching the critical stable state, and landslides may be unstable when considering earthquake. Therefore, cutting slope and reducing load were suggested, and the calculations show that the landslide trends toward stable under action of multiple-factors after treatment, which means the research achievement has a great reference value to guide engineering design and construction.


We compared data acquired on an LTQ-Orbitrap MS used in a typical shotgun proteomics setting (optimized for protein identification) with data from a quadrupole ion trap MS operated in the MRM mode. Six relative abundant proteins were quantified in identical sets of serum and CSF samples by the following methods: a qual/quant method with and without use of internal standards and a quantitative method (MRM with use of internal standards). Comparison of these methods with an antibody-based method in CSF samples showed good linearity for both methods (R(2) of 0.961 and 0.971 for the qual/quant method with use of internal standards and the quantitative method, respectively). Besides its better linearity, the quantitative method was also more reproducible with lower CVs for all samples. Next to these comparisons we also explored why a qual/quant approach had typically a lower reproducibility compared to MRM analyses. We observed that modified peptides, or peptides with a cysteine or a methionine, yielded a significant increase in CV. Furthermore, a positive correlation was found between the length of the peptide and the CV. We conclude that qual/quant is an alternative for the quantification of abundant proteins and that the use of internal standards in qual/quant could be advantageous. Furthermore, the ongoing development in MS techniques increases the possibilities of qual/quant in protein quantification.


The two-fold singularity has played a significant role in our understanding of uniqueness and stability in piecewise smooth dynamical systems. When a vector field is discontinuous at some hypersurface, it can become tangent to that surface from one side or the other, and tangency from both sides creates a two-fold singularity. The local flow bears a superficial resemblance to so-called {\it folded singularities} in (smooth) slow-fast systems, which arise at the intersection of attractive and repelling branches of slow invariant manifolds, important in the local study of canards and mixed mode oscillations. Here we show that these two singularities are intimately related. When the discontinuity in a piecewise smooth system is regularized (smoothed out) at a two-fold singularity, the resulting system can be mapped onto a folded singularity. The result is not obvious since it requires the presence of nonlinear or `hidden' terms at the discontinuity, which turn out to be necessary for structural stability of the regularization (or smoothing) of the discontinuity, and necessary for mapping to the folded singularity.


OBJECTIVE
Systems for direct retransfusion of blood salvaged from the surgical field and in drainage systems (direct autotransfusion) have been in use for many years. The quality of the blood obtained with such systems, however, has not been systemically assessed in a comparative manner. The aim of our study was the analysis of the quality of the blood, obtained with three commercially available direct autotransfusion systems (drainage systems with filters).

METHODS
With ethics committee approval and informed consent, 30 patients receiving knee arthroplasty were randomly allocated to three groups. Each group of 10 patients received treatment with one drainage system (Consta Vac, Solcotrans, Haem-o-Trans). In the salvaged blood, we measured cellular elements, variables of coagulation and fibrinolysis, complement activation and cellular elements, both before and after passage of the autotransfusion system.

RESULTS
Analysis revealed a low haematokrit (< 30%) and platelet count (< 80 Gpt/l). The salvaged blood proved uncoagulable and defibrinised with no measurable clotting and fibrinogen; clotting activity, fibrinolysis and complement reaction were grossly induced (TAT, PAP and FDP high, C3 low). The blood was contaminated with cellular debris reflected by concentration of enzymes usually confined to the intracellular space (LDH, elastase, beta-thromboglobulin).

CONCLUSION
The systems/filters assessed in this study do not improve quality of blood drained from the surgical field. Retransfusion of such blood can not be recommended.


Recent studies of naturalistic face-to-face communication have demonstrated temporal coordination patterns such as the synchronization of verbal and non-verbal behavior, which provides evidence for the proposal that verbal and non-verbal communicative control derives from one system. In this study, we argue that the observed relationship between verbal and non-verbal behaviors depends on the level of analysis. In a re-analysis of a corpus of naturalistic multimodal communication (Louwerse et al., 2012), we focus on measuring the temporal patterns of specific communicative behaviors in terms of their burstiness. We examined burstiness estimates across different roles of the speaker and different communicative channels. We observed more burstiness for verbal versus non-verbal channels, and for more versus less informative language sub-channels. These findings demonstrate a new method for analyzing temporal patterns in communicative behaviors, and they suggest a more complex relationship between verbal and non-verbal channels than suggested by prior studies.


Governments enact laws and regulations to safeguard the security and privacy of their citizens. In response, requirements engineers must specify compliant system requirements to satisfy applicable legal security and privacy obligations. Specifying legally compliant requirements is challenging because legal texts are complex and ambiguous by nature. In this paper, we discuss our evaluation of the requirements for iTrust, an open-source Electronic Health Records system, for compliance with legal requirements governing security and privacy in the healthcare domain. We begin with an overview of the method we developed, using existing requirements engineering techniques, and then summarize our experiences in applying our method to the iTrust system. We illustrate some of the challenges that practitioners face when specifying requirements for a system that must comply with law and close with a discussion of needed future research focusing on security and privacy requirements.


Domestic violence is a major public health issue that influences all aspects of affected women's lives and has far reaching impacts across all levels of society (Fraser, 2003). The impact of domestic violence on women's health is said to be devastating and is believed to result in poor general, reproductive and psychological health (Parker & Lee, 2002). There is also evidence that the negative impact on women's health is long term and continues even after the violence has ended.

Women who are subjected to domestic violence seek help from a wide range of professionals within health and social care sectors, and evidence suggests that their experiences tend to be negative.

This study explored the health issues and healthcare encounters of women who lived with domestic violence. The purpose of the research was to seek information about the healthcare of women who are subjected to or who have been subjected to domestic violence perpetrated by intimate male partners, and to use this information to inform healthcare practitioners. A postmodern and feminist lens was applied to the study. The framework for the study was interpretive interactionism (Denzin, 2001). Data were generated from in-depth interviews undertaken with women who had lived with domestic violence and with nurses employed in Emergency Department and Community Health settings often accessed by women affected by domestic violence. Documents tracing central policy development in relation to health and human services' responses to domestic violence were also examined. Narrative analytic techniques were employed to interpret the storied accounts told by women affected by violence and nurses.

Findings from the study revealed much information about health and healthcare as it is experienced by women affected by domestic violence and by health professionals (in this case nurses) who care for them. Healthcare responses to women affected by domestic violence are currently enacted under policy that de-genders this form of violence and fragments responses to women's needs. It is clear that biomedical discourse is the dominant lens informing health service and health professionals' practice. Within healthcare settings trajectories for women's care and treatment are apparent that are outcome focussed and embrace therapeutic values of diagnosis, treatment and cure. However, this response fails to acknowledge the complexity and needs of women affected by domestic violence. Further the findings demonstrate that the approach also has negative impacts on the health and wellbeing of women who present for healthcare.

A new lens is provided here, from which to view women's health issues and through which to understand the impact of current healthcare and also through which alternative trajectories of care may be proposed. Biographical disruption (Bury 1982) is a framework which highlights how, as a result of living with domestic violence, women experience significant fracturing of their sense of self and attempt to traverse a liminal space in which their personal biographies and identities are shaped not only by their experiences of living in violent relationships and their emerging health issues, but also by the healthcare service that responds to their issues. There are critical points at which health professionals can support women, particularly on presentation.

This study has added to the growing body of knowledge that seeks to inform healthcare services and practitioners who practice within these services about the needs of women affected by domestic violence. The notion of health as a 'given' has been challenged and health as a process of disruption, re-evaluation and re-construction of sense of self has been conceptualised.


We describe a technique for examining unidirectional ion move- ments in suspensions ofenzymatically disaggregated smooth muscle cells derived from stomach muscle of the toad. This technique has been used to analyze the movement of 42K across these cells. This analysis was greatly simplified by the finding that the cells were in a steady state with respect to K § distribution after isolation. The potassium contents of the isolated cells were identical to those of intact smooth muscle (131 mM/liter intracellular fluid) and stable for over 4 h; moreover, the unidirectional influx and efflux rates were equal. An additional simplification was provided by the finding that virtually all the K § exchanges in a manner predicted for a simple two-compartment system consisting of an extracellular and an intracellular space. Transmembrane K + flux in these cells averaged 1.2 pmol.cm-2.s -1 at room temperature. A large portion ("80%) of 42K influx appeared to be mediated by a saturable transport system with an apparent Km of 0.6 mM and an apparent Vra~ of 1.3 pmol.cm-2.s -1. The calculated resting membrane permeability to K + in these isolated smooth muscle cells, assuming a membrane potential of-50 mV, was 2.9  10 -a cm/s. The calculated g~§ was 2.7 #mho/cm 2 constituting only a small fraction of the total membrane conductance as measured electrophysiologically. The latter finding suggests that the resting membrane potential in the isolated cells must be determined by ions in addition to K § We propose that these methods for studying ion movements in smooth muscle should aid in unraveling the mech- anisms responsible for controlling the distribution of ions both at rest, as in the present study, as well as in response to neurotransmitters.


SYNOPSIS: We examine whether dividend paying status is associated with the quality of earnings. We find dividend paying status is associated with (1) lower absolute values of discretionary accruals; (2) lower standard deviation and absolute magnitude of the errors associated with the mapping of accruals into cash flows; and (3) more value relevant earnings. We also find evidence that the positive association between dividend paying status and earnings quality is stronger (weaker) when the size of dividend payouts is larger (smaller). Overall, our results suggest dividend paying status is indicative of firms' earnings quality.


Taiping pluton is an N-S elongated pluton located in the Bintang batholith. This batholith together with Main Range batholith, represent most of the granitoid within the Main Range granite province of Peninsular Malaysia. The Taiping amphibole-bearing melagranite, also known as the Buloh Pelang granite was briefly studied before. It is only recently, ultrapotassic "durbachite" type characteristics are found in these rocks. Taiping melagranite can be described as K-Mg rich, megacrystic to porphyritic, coarse grained, dark colored granite. Petrographic examination shows the rocks contain granite felsic mineral proportion with high amount of biotite, amphiboles (actinolite) with pyroxene relics and traces of pyroxene. The melagranite also contain mutliple mafic microgranular enclaves of various sizes. Most melagranite samples are ultrapotassic and intermediate in SiO2 composition while showing high MgO and Cr. They are also high in certain incompatible elements (Ba, Zr, Rb, Th) and LREE. In general, the melagranite geochemistry is comparable to the Central European durbachite suite. The "durbachite" type melagranite petrogenesis is believed to be complex, requiring a crustal component and enriched lithospheric mantle source. The enrichment process could have been contributed by a previous subduction event. The Taiping pluton itself is located in the Sibumasu plate (which subducted under the Indochina plate before the collision) and U-Pb zircon dating results (218 ± 1.3 Ma) indicate that they are emplaced during the Triassic Sibumasu-Indochina collision (200 – 220 Ma), when most of the Main Range granite province are emplaced. To fit into the current tectonic model, I believe a minor episode of extension could have occurred during early contraction. As the plates continue to converge, compressive tectonic regime was re-established.


: We describe new remains ofUrumaquia robusta Carlini, Brandoni Sänchez, 2006, which significantly improve the knowledge of the species and allow a more precise discussion about the relationships with the rest of the South American Megatheriinae. The new remains (ulna, phalanx, femora, patella, tibia, astragalus, navicular, metatarsals IV–V) described here suggest close affinities of this taxon with the species ofPyramiodontherium and withMegatheriops rectidens, based on morphological similarities of the ulna (length, gracility), femur (general morphology, shape of the medial margin), and astragalus (angle between the discoidal and odontoid facets). In fact, the shape of femoral medial margin is a shared derived character amongUrumaquia, Pyramiodontherium andMegatheriops. However, and despite the increasing information concerning Tertiary species, their phylogenetic relationships are only partially understood.


We aimed to evaluate the prognostic value of the combination of three serum tumor markers (LDH, beta2-M and CA 125) in patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL). Clinical and pathological variables including the levels of these markers were measured in 415 NHL patients. Statistical analysis showed that increased levels of all three markers were associated with stage, B symptoms, effusions, bone marrow involvement, and International Prognostic Index (IPI) in NHL patients (p<0.05). Overall survival and event-free survival rates were associated not only with LDH but also with beta2-M and CA125 (p<0.001). Response to treatment and overall survival rates were different in three groups with elevated LDH; in particular, the combination of three or two elevated markers seemed to identify a group of patients at higher risk of treatment failure and/or relapse than the group with a high LDH level only. Furthermore, multiple Cox regression analysis showed that IPI score complemented by the additional serum markers beta2-M and CA125 was a better prognosticator of overall and event-free survival than LDH alone. This result suggests that if the combination of three elevated serum tumor markers is included as a parameter in the IPI instead of LDH alone, the prognostic value of IPI can be improved.


The Karakoram fault is a major NW–SE-aligned dextral strike-slip fault that has accommodated minor extrusion of thickened Tibetan crust since the Mid-Miocene. Controversy exists as to whether the fault is lithospheric in scale, resulting in synkinematic metamorphism and granite melting, or whether it is an upper crustal fault cutting through earlier metamorphic and granitic rocks. Structural, metamorphic and geochronological data from the Karakoram fault show that: (1) metamorphism and granite genesis occurred prior to strike-slip shearing, meaning that U–Pb zircon and monazite ages from deformed granites cannot be used as proxies for dating strike-slip shearing, only as a maximum age constraint on initiation of ductile shearing; (2) sheared Miocene leucogranites along the fault are equivalent to the Baltoro granite batholith, offset 40–150 km along the fault, and show a strain gradient from high ductile strain to undeformed away from the fault; (3) 40Ar/39Ar and fission-track ages of K2 orthogneisses and Gasherbrum diorite show that rocks adjacent to the fault cooled during Cretaceous to mid-Tertiary time, and were not reset during shearing, indicating that shear heating was not important; (4) the Gasherbrum diorite, adjacent to the fault, has never been at depths greater than 6 km since the early Cretaceous and less than 3 km of material has been eroded off since then. We conclude that the Karakoram fault has had no significant influence on regional metamorphism or melting, at least at levels exposed today, and is restricted to the upper–middle crust.


In this paper, we define a new type of M(G)-group action , called M(G)-group soft union(SU) action and M(G)-ideal soft union(SU) action on a soft set. This new concept illustrates how a soft set effects on an M(G)-group in the mean of union and inclusion of sets and its function as bridge among soft set theory, set theory and M(G)-group theory. We also obtain some analog of classical M(G)- group theoretic concepts for M(G)-group SU-action. Finally, we give the application of SU-actions on M(G)-group to M(G)-group theory.


The present study sought to (1) determine whether Barrett's counterintuitiveness coding and quantifying scheme (CI-Scheme) could be applied to cultural materials with sufficient intercoder reliability, (2) provide evidence concerning just how counterintuitive is too counterintuitive for a concept to be a recurrent cultural idea, and (3) test whether counterintuitive intentional agent concepts are more common in folktales than other classes of counterintuitive concepts. Seventy-three folktales from around the world were sampled from larger collections. Using Barrett's CI-Scheme, two independent coders identified 116 counterintuitive objects and scored them for degree of counterintuitiveness with very high inter-rater concordance. Of folktales, 79% had one or two counterintuitive objects. Of the counterintuitive objects 93% had a counterintuitiveness score of only one. Of counterintuitive objects, 98% were agents. Results suggest the CI-Scheme may have utility for analyzing cultural materials, that the cognitive optimum for cultural transmission falls around one counterintuitive feature, and that counterintuitive agents are more common than other types of counterintuitive objects in folktales.


Capuchin monkeys are known to exhibit sporadic bipedalism while performing specific tasks, such as cracking nuts. The bipedal posture and locomotion cause an increase in the metabolic cost and therefore increased blood supply to lower limbs is necessary. Here, we present a detailed anatomical description of the capuchin arteries and veins of the pelvic limb of Sapajus libidinosus in comparison with other primates. The arterial pattern of the bearded capuchin hind limb is more similar to other quadrupedal Cebus species. Similarities were also found to the pattern observed in the quadruped Papio, which is probably due to a comparable pelvis and the presence of the tail. Sapajus' traits show fewer similarities when compared to great apes and modern humans. Moreover, the bearded capuchin showed unique patterns for the femoral and the short saphenous veins. Although this species switches easily from quadrupedal to bipedal postures, our results indicate that the bearded capuchin has no specific or differential features that support extended bipedal posture and locomotion. Thus, the explanation for the behavioral differences found among capuchin genera probably includes other aspects of their physiology.


Trans fats became part of the American food system due to a complex interplay among activism, industrial technology, and nutritional science. Some manufacturers began using partially hydrogenated oils, which contain trans fats, in the early twentieth century. Medical authorities began framing saturated fats as unhealthy in the 1950s. In the 1980s, activist organizations, including the Center for Science in the Public Interest, condemned food corporations' use of saturated fats and endorsed trans fats as an acceptable alternative. Nearly all targeted corporations responded by replacing saturated fats with trans fats, which fit easily into their existing products. Trans fats thus became the perfect solution to the political problem of saturated fats and to the technical problem of what to use in their place. Activists helped precipitate technological change, but by 1994, trans fats were no longer regarded as a solution. Instead, they became regarded as a new nutritional problem.


This study examines risk perceptions and evacuation planning for those residents affected by Hurricane Laura–the first major hurricane evacuation during the COVID-19 pandemic–and Hurricane Sally, prior to the widespread availability of vaccines. Research on hurricane evacuation behavior and risk perceptions during a pandemic is critical for quantifying the intersect of these compounding threats. Analyses captured how people perceive public shelters and whether evacuation choices changed in light of the pandemic. Many study participants considered themselves vulnerable to COVID-19 (39.4%) and two-thirds believed it would be "very serious" if they or their loved ones contracted COVID-19, but this had no impact on their actual evacuation decision-making. Approximately 75% of the sample stayed at home during Hurricanes Laura or Sally, and of these, just over 80% indicated that COVID-19 was a somewhat important deciding factor. This reflects the partial role that COVID-19 played in balancing individual and household protective action decision-making during complex disasters. Whereas 15.5% wanted to evacuate but waited until it was too late. For those who evacuated to a hotel, many found that staff and guests wore masks and socially distanced in common spaces. Of particular interest is that individuals have a continued negative perception of public shelters' ability to safeguard against COVID-19 which was coupled with a significant decrease in the number of respondents that would potentially use shelters in 2020 compared to before the COVID-19 pandemic. These results have and will inform future hazard mitigation planning during the current or future pandemic, or infectious disease outbreaks.


The EPA has a cornucopia of cleanup and reuse programs ranging from the Superfund Program which addresses sites posing imminent danger and many of the most hazardous sites nationwide, to the Brownfields Program which addresses lower risk sites. These programs provide a common set of primary benefits: reductions in health risks and ecosystem damages, and improvements in amenity values. Indirect benefits include changes in factor, especially land, productivity. A different indirect benefit stems from better information in land markets compared to when land is contaminated, a situation that seems marked by asymmetric information and that might depress the frequency of land transactions. Both indirect benefit categories are a result of the primary benefits and would not be added to them. Cleaning up and reusing urban contaminated sites might generate two additional types of benefits: preservation of green space, and agglomeration benefits. Limited empirical work has addressed each of these benefit categories. Taken as a whole, the literature providing information on the social benefits of cleanup and reuse is spotty and incomplete and perhaps raises more questions than it answers. Would a comprehensive study of the benefits of all cleanup programs, or even of all aspects of one program, do better to focus on primary effects or property value changes? What is the appropriate baseline for hedonic studies? Under what conditions does reusing contaminated land deter greenfield development on the urban periphery?


Robotic manipulators are reaching a state where we could see them in household environments in the following decade. Nevertheless, such robots need to be easy to instruct by lay people. This is why kinesthetic teaching has become very popular in recent years, in which the robot is taught a motion that is encoded as a parametric function - usually a Movement Primitive (MP)-. This approach produces trajectories that are usually suboptimal, and the robot needs to be able to improve them through trial-and-error. Such optimization is often done with Policy Search (PS) reinforcement learning, using a given reward function. PS algorithms can be classified as model-free, where neither the environment nor the reward function are modelled, or model-based, which can use a surrogate model of the reward function and/or a model for the dynamics of the task.However, MPs can become very high-dimensional in terms of parameters, which constitute the search space, so their optimization often requires too many samples. In this paper, we assume we have a robot motion task characterized with an MP of which we cannot model the dynamics. We build a surrogate model for the reward function, that maps an MP parameter latent space (obtained through a Mutual-information-weighted Gaussian Process Latent Variable Model) into a reward. While we do not model the task dynamics, using mutual information to shrink the task space makes it more consistent with the reward and so the policy improvement is faster in terms of sample efficiency.


Nearly one-fifth of Americans have some form of disability, and accessibility guidelines and standards that apply to libraries are complicated, unclear, and difficult to achieve. Understanding how persons with disabilities access Web-based content is critical to accessible design. Recent research supports the use of a database-driven model for library Web development. Existing technologies offer a variety of tools to meet disabled patrons' needs, and resources exist to assist library professionals in obtaining and evaluating product accessibility information from vendors. Librarians in charge of technology can best serve these patrons by proactively updating and adapting services as assistive technologies improve.


Blockchain technology provides us a new tool to solve the product traceability problem in supply chain. This in-progress paper focus on the cross-border e-commerce context, to develop blockchain-based information models for products and transactions. A general blockchain-based product information traceability framework is introduced. The framework is applied in cross-border e-commerce context. We also designed a multiple chain structure and the data management model following the framework. In the future works, we will develop the key distribution, anti-counterfeiting and other approaches following this framework, and also verify them with real data and simulation.


We consider here several properties of phonological stress systems, including the midpoint pathology, an unattested pattern in which stress is confined to a word-medial syllable in short words but reverts to an edge-based window in longer words. Previous attempts have been made to rule out midpoint systems by eliminating the phonological constraints that yield them, or by alluding to difficulties in learning them. We suggest that a preference for representing word edges in memory and limits on subitization—evolutionarily older "fossil" abilities which are neither specific to humans nor to language—are sufficient to rule out the midpoint pathology. We take the same approach to motivate accentual window size and some left-right asymmetries observed in the typology of attested stress systems. This approach highlights the relevance of descent in accounting for human cognition, as well as the benefits that evolutionary thinking can bring to the study of language.


It has been reported that non-expert users have difficulties in finding reusable software components in large object-oriented programming systems and there is a need for help tools. The research reported in this thesis addresses this issue. Described in this thesis is the design of a tool called BRRR, which aims to help non-expert users overcome such difficulties. It is developed for Smalltalk-80, the target system of this research. BRRR is a query tool with a browsing capacity. It allows users to find necessary components by query. Its design is based on the 'retrieval by reformulation' paradigm (Williams, 1984) which was originally used in the domain of information retrieval. This paradigm allows users to incrementally specify a query by reformulation. When users specify an initial query, BRRR presents the users with an example component which satisfies the query. The users can then construct further queries by using the information presented by the system. In this way, users who are not familiar with the system or who do not know exactly what they want can be guided towards the appropriate information. During this research, two versions of BRRR were developed: BRRRl and BRRR2. BRRRl was developed initially, based on the 'retrieval by reformulation' principle. After its implementation, a formative, empirical evaluation was conducted on it with a group of users. Based on the findings of the evaluation, BRRR2, an improved version of BRRR1 was developed. BRRR2 incorporates enhanced classification methods and explanation facilities. This new version of the tool was then evaluated empirically with a group of ten users. The empirical evaluation of BRRR2 showed encouraging results. It demonstrates that the 'retrieval by reformulation' approach used in this research could be used successfully in helping users find reusable software components in object-oriented programming systems.


Code division multiple access (CDMA) has become a widely adopted technology for wireless communications, particularly in mobile third generation systems (3G) and global positional system (GPS). In CDMA, a particular class of pseudonoise (PN) spreading codes yields a code-set Grammian with only two distinct eigenvalues. For these spreading codes, we propose a computationally efficient method for signal detection using Wiener filtering. Our approach relies on a matrix inversion step, where we gain in computational efficiency by using the Sherman-Morrison-Woodbury formula. The resulting approach involves significantly less computational load compared to popular approaches like Conjugate Gradient (CG) method and the (traditional) Cholesky decomposition.


Information sharing has been extensively studied as a key enabler for coordination and integration in supply chains. However, exactly how the shared information is utilized for decision making has only received limited scientific attention in the research literature. The aim of this study is to identify the characteristics of information sharing, and conceptualize how to move from information sharing to information utilization in food supply chains. Using a case study methodology together with a review of the existing literature the authors describe the main facets of shared information - which influence the information utilization in a supply chain - and propose a mapping notation for how these facets can be visualized together with a supply chain operations reference (SCOR) model. Information utilization is especially important because more information sharing does not necessarily result in a better supply chain performance unless the shared information is effectively used in the relevant processes in the chain and well-aligned with the requirements for those processes. The proposed notation provides a systematic structure for mapping the information flows, their specific facets, and helps clarify what information is available and how this information can be utilized in different supply chain processes. Four facets of information sharing are identified and elaborated for food supply chains, together with a mapping tool that emphasizes the information flows and the utilization of information in supply chains.


Concussions represent a growing health concern that are challenging to diagnose and manage. Roughly four million concussions are diagnosed every year in the United States. While research in machine learning applications for concussions has focused on using advanced metrics such neuroimaging techniques and blood biomarkers, these metrics are yet to be implemented at a clinical level due to cost and reliability concerns. Therefore, concussion diagnosis is still reliant on clinical evaluations of symptoms, balance, and neurocognitive status and function. The lack of a universal threshold on these assessments makes the diagnosis process reliant on a physician's interpretation of these assessment scores. This study aims to explore the use of machine learning techniques to aid the concussion diagnosis process. These models could provide an automated means to flag concussed patients even before being seen by a doctor as well as expand the scope of concussion diagnosis to remote locations and areas with limited access to doctors.


Research shows that L1 as well as L2 and L3 students in Danish tertiary education struggle with acquiring the necessary academic language skills for studying in Danish. Research also shows a tendency for educators in the Danish setting to treat academic language norms as implicit norms, making it much harder for students to grasp the language-related demands of academia. This article argues that in order to make the demands and norms of academic language explicit to the students, irrespective of linguistic background, we need more research-based knowledge about Danish academic language. Furthermore, focussing on one particular aspect of academic language, namely academic vocabulary, can be a step towards more explicit approaches to academic language norms. Academic vocabulary is here defined as a non-technical, general purpose vocabulary with distinct academic functions used across a range of academic disciplines. To come nearer an understanding of how we can make the academic language norms more tangible and accessible to both students and staff, the article begins with a review of existing research on Danish academic language and academic vocabulary with a particular focus on Danish SLA research. This is followed by an analysis of Danish guidance literature on academic writing for students. The article concludes with suggestions for further research in relation to teaching Danish academic vocabulary.


A method for computing the wake of a pedalling cyclist is detailed and assessed through comparison with experimental studies. The large-scale time-dependent turbulent flow is simulated using the Scale Adaptive Simulation approach based on the Shear Stress Transport Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes model. Importantly, the motion of the legs is modelled by joining the model at the hips and knees and imposing solid body rotation and translation to the lower and upper legs. Rapid distortion of the cyclist geometry during pedalling requires frequent interpolation of the flow solution onto new meshes. The impact of numerical errors, that are inherent to this remeshing technique, on the computed aerodynamic drag force is assessed. The dynamic leg simulation was successful in reproducing the oscillation in the drag force experienced by a rider over the pedalling cycle that results from variations in the large-scale wake flow structure. Aerodynamic drag and streamwise vorticity fields obtained for both static and dynamic leg simulations are compared with similar experimental results across the crank cycle. The new technique presented here for simulating pedalling leg cycling flows offers one pathway for improving the assessment of cycling aerodynamic performance compared to using isolated static leg simulations alone, a practice common in optimising the aerodynamics of cyclists through computational fluid dynamics.


Atrial fibrillation is the most common clinically relevant arrhythmia. Anesthesiologists will be faced with atrial fibrillation of new or undetermined onset at their preoperative evaluation of patients as well as during intra- and post operative care. Because of fast electrophysical and structural remodeling, atrial fibrillation tends to persist and reoccur after successful conversion with increasing time of duration. Therefore, atrial fibrillation with an onset of less than 48 hours should be attempt to convert as soon as diagnostic work up has been made and possible causes have been corrected. New developments of electrophysiological and pharmacological treatment have improved the short term success rate of cardioversion. Further developments might give even more specific treatment options for the individual patient. In contrast, for treatment of chronic atrial fibrillation rate control therapy and thromboembolic prophylaxes seems to be more advisable with a lower risk of drug side effects and stroke. Anticoagulation should be initiated not later than 48 hours after the onset of atrial fibrillation. Finally, the development of implantable devices for the treatment of atrial fibrillation seem to be a promising therapeutic option for patients in end-stage heart diseases.


The role of reflection as means of improving practice has been advocated by many authors (Dewy, 1933, Schőn, 1987) and actively promoted within many aspects of education.

While an array of methods of reflection are used in education, a critical analysis of the methods used suggests that the use of predominantly process-based models such as the ones advocated by Kolb (1984), Gibbs (1988), etc. are at odds with how people think and learn and how the one-size-fits-all approach to reflection could prove counter-productive in some instances (Bolton, 2010, Bulman and Schutz, 2006)

To help counter the criticisms of current reflection practices, Baud and Walker (1998) identify how the use of 'coaching' style of reflection would be more productive, particularly in relation to the role of metaphors which Mahlios, Massengill-Shaw and Barry (2010) suggest are representative of the constructs which individuals use to organise their thinking and plan their actions (Cook-Sather, 2003).

Hence it is proposed a study aimed at exploring the use of the 'Clean Language' model (which specifically explores metaphors) as a method of encouraging HE lecturers to reflect on their practice, may help to determine if the model helps individuals to more effectively reflect on their practice and counter the criticism of existing models of reflection


Many telecommunication networks use the open shortest path first (OSPF) protocol for the routing of traffic. In such networks, each router sends the traffic on the shortest paths to the destination, with respect to the link weights assigned. An interesting question is whether or not a set of desired routing patterns can be obtained in an OSPF network by assigning appropriate weights. If not, we wish to find the source of the infeasibility. We study these issues by formulating a mathematical model and investigating its feasibility. A certain structure, called valid cycle, is found to be present in most infeasible instances. This yields new necessary conditions, stronger than those previously known, for the existence of weights yielding a set of given desired shortest path graphs. A valid cycle indicates which parts of the routing patterns are in conflict and can be used for changing the routing patterns to make the problem feasible. A polynomial algorithm for finding valid cycles is presented, the method is illustrated by a numerical example, and computational tests are reported. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. NETWORKS, 2008


Background The incidence of skin cancer has increased over the past few years, owing to excessive exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation. Over the past decade, protection against solar radiation has been highly encouraged in numerous public health education campaigns. The adopted sun protection practices include avoiding exposure to the sun, using protective clothing, and applying sunscreen. The aim of this paper was to analyze the awareness and attitudes towards sun protection practices in some regions of the Arabian Peninsula. Objective The main objective of this study is to estimate the level of sun protection practices and determine the factors that have a significant impact on the level of adoption of sun protection practices by residents in the Arabian Peninsula. Methods A 35-question self‐reporting online questionnaire to evaluate the sun protection measures adopted by the residents was distributed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and Kingdom of Bahrain. The survey was conducted from January 2018 to May 2019, and a total 830 responses were collected for analysis. The data were analyzed using the statistical software SPSS. The chi-squared test and Spearman's correlation were performed to determine the association of the sun protection level with factors concerning the socio-demographic characteristics, sun sensitivity, health-conscious lifestyle, adopted sun protection measures, and general awareness about the UV index, skin cancer, and vitamin D. Logistic regression classification was applied in developing the empirical model to predict the sun protection level of the residents. Results Based on the analysis, only 34% of the total 830 respondents use sunscreen and most of the sunscreen users are female. The three most popular sun protection practices are: 1) avoiding exposure to the sun during peak hours, 2) using protective clothing, and 3) using sunglasses. The results indicate that 22% of respondents use a low level of sun protection, 53% use a medium level of protection, while 25% of respondents use a high level of sun protection. Many of the respondents understand that exposure to the sun can cause skin cancer and skin aging, while 54% of the respondents still believe that a suntan can be healthy if sunburn is avoided. Thirty percent of the participants of this study are aware of the UV index, and only 20% of all respondents know the correct meaning of the UV index. The overall predictive accuracy of the constructed logistic regression model is 67%. Based on the results of the logistic regression model, the five most significant factors of the sun protection level are: 1) perception that the sun can cause skin aging, or not, 2) age, 3) awareness of the dangerous effects of sun exposure, 4) income with respect to expenses, and 5) taking the UV index into consideration during exposure to the sun. Conclusion Most of the respondents are aware about sun protection. However, the sun protection level of the residents is still inadequate. An efficient strategy of increasing the awareness of the effective use of sun protection systems must be established based on the significant factors to prevent skin cancer.


In this paper we study the problem of joint design of routing and resource allocation in cognitive radio based wireless mesh networks. Our study focuses on a cognitive system model in which secondary nodes have delay sensitive traffic with packet delivery deadline, which limits the packet lifetime inside the network. The network is analyzed from a queuing theory perspective, and the joint routing and resource allocation problem is formulated as a non-linear integer programming problem. The objective is to optimize the overall packet dropping probability. We then present an efficient solution method based on the relaxation of the integer valued constraints. Numerical results demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed joint design and the solution procedure.


A major signaling pathway that regulates platelet shape change and reorganization of the cytoskeleton involves the Rho family of GTPases; CDC42 (fillapodia), Rac1 (lamellapodia) and RhoA (focal adhesions). These GTPases are converted from their inactive or GDP-loaded state to the active or GTP-loaded state by a class of enzymes called Guanine Exchange Factors (GEFs). GEFs are a family of multi-domain proteins that contain a GDP-GTP exchange domain (DH-PH) as well as other protein interacting domains that are regulated by the activation of receptors present on the platelet surface. We used an affinity binding technique followed by mass spectroscopy to identify novel Rho family binding GEFs in platelet lysates. Recombinant GST-Rho fusion proteins bound to agarose beads were prepared in the GTP, GDP and nucleotide-free states and incubated with clarified human platelet lysates. Platelet lysate proteins associated with the different GST-Rho preparations were eluted and run on SDS-PAGE. Gel slices were then cut out, trypsin digested and analyzed by Mass Spectroscopy. Platelet GEFs were identified by the presence of a DH-PH domain. Using this technique we found Cool-1 and Cool-2, two closely related GEFs that regulate Rac1 and CDC42 activation in nucleated cells. Cool-1 has not been previously described in platelets. Homodimeric Cool-1 specifically activates CDC42, whereas Cool-2 is capable of activating Rac1 as a homodimer or CDC42 as a monomer. The substrate specificity of Cool-2 is regulated by complex interactions with p21-activated kinases (PAK) and Gb/g proteins. In nucleated cells, Cool-1 and Cool-2 are localized to focal adhesions by the GPCR-kinase-interacting proteins 1 and 2 (GIT1 and GIT2). GIT binding to the Cool proteins has been shown to inhibit their GEF activity. Here we show that Cool-1 is present only in the membrane fraction of resting platelet lysates while Cool-2 is present in both the membrane and cytoplasmic fractions. Upon activation with thrombin, about half the membrane bound Cool-1 and all the membrane bound Cool- 2 migrate to the cytoplasm. Precipitation experiments in thrombin activated platelets with anti-GIT1 and anti-GIT2 antibodies show GIT-1 avidly binds Cool-2 whereas GIT2 binds a small amount of Cool-1. These data suggest a complex mechanism of CDC42 and Rac1 activation in platelets by the Cool proteins. Based on our findings and the current understanding of the regulation of Cool proteins in nucleated cells, we hypothesize that early after thrombin activation, the CDC42 and Rac1 GEF activities of Cool-1 and Cool-2 result in fillapodia (CDC42) and lamellapodia (Rac1) formation. As integrant mediated focal adhesions are formed, the GEF activities of Cool-1 and Cool-2 are inhibited by the scaffolding proteins GIT2 and GIT1, respectively. In this manner, Rac1 and CDC42 mediated fillapodia and lamellapodia formation may be regulated by the extent of integrin engagement and platelet spreading.


This study seeks to evaluate Pentecostal interpretations of Matthew 25:14-30 in the light of Reformed hermeneutics. This research interest is informed by a combination of two main assumptions, namely: (1) That in interpreting Scriptures, most Pentecostals seek for the immediate meaning(s) of the text, and do so in such a way that it ts their experience and serves their pragmatic agendas. This is counterbalanced with Reformed approach to Scripture, which in recent times is said to combine a number of diachronic and synchronic approaches to generate meaning of biblical passages and therefore believes that although its interpretation is not infallible, it is nonetheless as close as possible to the communicative intent of the text and is therefore reliable. (2) That in the history of interpretation of the Gospel parables in general, they are understood di erently; that Matthew 25:14-30 in particular is interpreted variously, mostly without recourse to its literary or cultural context; and that the concepts in the parable are interpreted anachronistically. The study therefore proceeds with the central theoretical argument that when viewed in the light of Reformed hermeneutics, some Pentecostal interpretations of Matthew 25:14-30 are unacceptable and therefore implausible. Chapter 2 shows that parables constitute a distinct genre in the Synoptic Gospels and are central in Jesus' teaching. "Parable" in the New Testament traces its roots to transliterated "mashal") in the Hebrew Bible and παραβoλή (transliterated "parabolē?") in the Septuagint. Parables are extended gures of speech whose narrative claim(s) is (are) ctional but verisimilar in the narrated world, and whose truthsigni cance is realistic in the referenced world. They elucidate, metaphorically transfer meaning from one domain of understanding (usually the natural world) to another domain (usually the religious world), prophetically call God's people to change their ways and return to God, and sometimes function as weapons of con ict. They presuppose the kingdom of God, seek to explain di erent motifs of the kingdom, and in fact make sense only against the backdrop of the message of the kingdom. Chapter 3 treats the theory of "biblical hermeneutics" in general and of "Pentecostal hermeneutics" in particular. On the assumption that the Bible lends itself to human interpretation but also demands correct interpretation, it understands biblical hermeneutics as the discipline that harnesses all necessary tools to validly and e ectively interpret biblical texts. On the other hand, it sees Pentecostal hermeneutics as an experienceoriented, narrative-oriented, and praxis-oriented practice of biblical interpretation that emphasises the active role of the Holy Spirit in generating meaning from the canonical texts, and in such a way that promotes the identity and meets the needs of the Pentecostal community. Pentecostal hermeneutics emphasises the immanence of God, the narrativity of the Scriptures, the role of the charismatic community, and the role of the Holy Spirit. In addition to the authority of Scripture, Pentecostals have regard for personal experience. A major hermeneutical approach among Pentecostals is "Bible Reading Method", an inductive reading that partly involves a synchronic strategy and partly involves a modi ed proof-text approach. Chapter 4 examines forty (40) sample Pentecostal interpretations (SPIs) of Matthew 25:14-30 randomly picked from various sample source types (STs). In consideration of the context of interpretation (CoI) and the actual interpretation of each of them, the SPIs are found to diverge widely, with 17 samples (42.5%) apparently focusing on nance/success/wealth, 6 samples (15.0%) on Christ's second coming, and the rest on a variety of other interests. Chapter 5 attempts a Reformed interpretation (RI) of Matthew 25:14-30, comprehensively and critically combining both synchronic and diachronic tools. Among other factors, the text and its context are primarily determinative of meaning. Being a parable, such Reformed principles as its theological signi cance, its meaning in historical and literary contexts, as well as its meaning in relation to its frames and other neighbouring parables, are explored for generating its meaning. The conclusion reached is that Matthew 25:14-30 is a parable about the parousia of Christ and of βασιλεία τ ν ο ραν ν [= "the kingdom of heaven"], and that it seeks to call the disciples of Christ to be vigilant/watchful/ready for the parousia, in view of the fact that the exact time of its advent is not known by any man. It also concludes that these disciples need to serve Christ faithfully and pro tably while waiting for this event. In the light of the conclusion of Chapter 5, Chapter 6 seeks to know if the SPIs focused on the motif of vigilance for the parousia of βασιλεία τ ν ο ραν ν. This is done by comparing and contrasting the conclusions of the SPIs with the conclusion of the RI. In the end, it is found that none of the 40 SPIs addresses the motif of the parousia of βασιλεία τ ν ο ραν ν but rather focus on a variety of other subjects that neither the text nor its context suggests. The investigation also makes clear that the methods used by these Pentecostals are anachronistic, allegorical, as well as a good deal of eisegesis. Chapter 6 therefore reaches a conclusion that con rms the central theoretical argument of this research, namely, that some Pentecostal interpretations of Matthew 25:14-30, when examined in the light of Reformed hermeneutics, produce questionable results and are therefore implausible. Finally, Chapter 7 summarises the arguments that lead up to the conclusion that the SPIs of Matthew 25:14-30 investigated in this study are unacceptable, insofar as they do not focus on the eschatological βασιλεία τ ν ο ραν ν. It therefore recommends that while it is needful to do further Reformed study on Matthew 25:14-30, as well as to investigate more Pentecostal interpretations of the passage, the available evidence simply indicates that Pentecostals need to stop and re-assess their hermeneutical methods. They need to learn from the insights of Reformed principles for interpreting parables in particular, as well as from general Reformed hermeneutical procedures that Chapter 5 of this study clearly highlights. These recommendations are motivated by, inter alia, the warning of Paul to Timothy to do everything within his power to "correctly [handle] the word of truth" (2 Tim. 2:15). Evaluation of Pentecostal interpretations of Matthew 25: 14-30 in the light of Reformed


Online communities bring together people with varied access to and understanding of the work at hand, who must collaborate through documents of various kinds. We develop a framework articulating the characteristics of documents supporting collaborators with asymmetric access to knowledge versus those with symmetric knowledge. Drawing on theories about document genre, boundary objects and provenance, we hypothesize that documents supporting asymmetric groups are likely to articulate or prescribe their own 1) purpose, 2) context of use, 3) content and form and 4) provenance in greater detail than documents used by people with symmetric access to knowledge. We are testing these hypotheses through content analysis of documents and instructions from a variety of free/libre open source projects. We present preliminary findings consistent with the hypotheses developed. The completed study will suggest new directions for research on communications in online communities, as well as advice for those supporting such communities.


Online Multi-Object Tracking (MOT) has wide applications in time-critical video analysis scenarios, such as robot navigation and autonomous driving. In tracking-by-detection, a major challenge of online MOT is how to robustly associate noisy object detections on a new video frame with previously tracked objects. In this work, we formulate the online MOT problem as decision making in Markov Decision Processes (MDPs), where the lifetime of an object is modeled with a MDP. Learning a similarity function for data association is equivalent to learning a policy for the MDP, and the policy learning is approached in a reinforcement learning fashion which benefits from both advantages of offline-learning and online-learning for data association. Moreover, our framework can naturally handle the birth/death and appearance/disappearance of targets by treating them as state transitions in the MDP while leveraging existing online single object tracking methods. We conduct experiments on the MOT Benchmark [24] to verify the effectiveness of our method.


We present here an open-source Julia library for the topological identification of crystalline materials, with algorithmic and computational improvements over the previously available software in the field, resulting in a speed increase of one order of magnitude. This new algorithm and implementation can therefore be used at large scale in high-throughput screening methodologies. We have validated and benchmarked CrystalNets.jl against a diverse set of crystal databases, covering in particular metal--organic frameworks, aluminophosphates, zeolites, and other inorganic compounds.


This study contained two experimental examinations of the cognitive activities such as visual attention and memory in viewing stereoscopic (3D) images. For this study, partially converted 3D images were used with binocular parallax added to a specific region of the image. In Experiment 1, change blindness was used as a presented stimulus. The visual attention and impact on memory were investigated by measuring the response time to accomplish the given task. In the change blindness task, an 80 ms blank was intersected between the original and altered images, and the two images were presented alternatingly for 240 ms each. Subjects were asked to temporarily memorize the two switching images and to compare them, visually recognizing the difference between the two. The stimuli for four conditions (2D, 3D, Partially converted 3D, distracted partially converted 3D) were randomly displayed for 20 subjects. The results of Experiment 1 showed that partially converted 3D images tend to attract visual attention and are prone to remain in viewer's memory in the area where moderate negative parallax has been added. In order to examine the impact of a dynamic binocular disparity on partially converted 3D images, an evaluation experiment was conducted that applied learning, distraction, and recognition tasks for 33 subjects. The learning task involved memorizing the location of cells in a 5 × 5 matrix pattern using two different colors. Two cells were positioned with alternating colors, and one of the gray cells was moved up, down, left, or right by one cell width. Experimental conditions was set as a partially converted 3D condition in which a gray cell moved diagonally for a certain period of time with a dynamic binocular disparity added, a 3D condition in which binocular disparity was added to all gray cells, and a 2D condition. The correct response rates for recognition of each task after the distraction task were compared. The results of Experiment 2 showed that the correct response rate in the partial 3D condition was significantly higher with the recognition task than in the other conditions. These results showed that partially converted 3D images tended to have a visual attraction and affect viewer's memory.


1,2,4-Triazole-3-one (3) obtained from tryptamine was transformed to the corresponding carbox(
thio)amides via several steps (6a-d). Their reaction with sodium hydroxide performed the 1,2,4-
triazole derivatives (7a-d). Compounds 7a-d treatment by 2-bromo-1-(4-chlorophenyl)ethanoneain an
ambiance with sodium ethoxide afforded the compounds (8a-d). The reduction reaction of 8a-d afforded
1,2,4-triazoles (9a-d). The synthesis of (10a-d), (11a-d) and (12a-d) was afforded treatment of
products 9a-d with 4-chlorobenzyl chloride (for 10a-d) or 2,6-dichlorobenzyl chloride (for 11a-d) or
2,4-dichlorobenzyl chloride (for 12a-d). Besides the improved of entirely novel agents having various
chemical features than those of the existing ones, another aim is to combined two or more groups into a
single hybrid compound. For this reason, a single compound containing more than one group, each
with various modes of effect, could be helpful for the cure of bacterial infections. Microwave-assisted
and conventional techniques were utilized for the syntheses. The structures of recently obtained molecules
were elucidated on the foundation of 1H NMR, 13C NMR, FT IR, EI MS methods and elemental
analysis. All novel synthesized molecules were investigated for their antimicrobial activity using MIC
(minimum inhibitory concentration) method. The aminoalkylation of triazoles (7a-d) formed products
8a-d which have excellent activity against testing bacteria with values between 0.24 and 125 μg/mL.
Especially compounds 8a and 8d exhibited much better activity against E. coli than ampicillin used as
standard drug. The microwave process ensured a more efficient road to the creation of desired molecules.
The antibacterial examination demonstrated that after the carbonyl group is increased the antibacterial
activity of the compounds is greatly increased. That's why molecules formed as a result of the
alkylation reactions of triazoles has high activity.


Abstract Meteorites may have contributed amino acids to the prebiotic Earth, affecting the global ratio of right-handed to left-handed (D/L) molecules. We calculate D/L ratios for seven biological, α-hydrogen, protein amino acids over a variety of plausible parent body thermal histories, based on meteorite evidence and asteroid modeling. We show that amino acids in meteorites do not necessarily undergo complete racemization by the time they are recovered on Earth. If the mechanism of amino acid formation imposes some enantiomeric preference on the amino acids, a chiral signature can be retained through the entire history of the meteorite. Original enantiomeric excesses in meteorites such as Murchison, which have undergone apparently short and cool alteration scenarios, should have persisted to the present time. Of the seven amino acids for which relevant data are available, we expect glutamic acid, isoleucine, and valine, respectively, to be the most likely to retain an initial enantiomeric excess, and phenylalanine, aspartic acid, and alanine the least. Were the D/L ratio initially identical in each amino acid, final D/L ratios could be used to constrain the initial ratio and the thermal history experienced by the whole suite.


Landscape genomics studies focus on identifying candidate genes under selection via spatial variation in abiotic environmental variables, but rarely by biotic factors such as disease. The Tasmanian devil (Sarcophilus harrisii) is found only on the environmentally heterogeneous island of Tasmania and is threatened with extinction by a nearly 100% fatal, transmissible cancer, devil facial tumor disease (DFTD). Devils persist in regions of long-term infection despite epidemiological model predictions of species' extinction, suggesting possible adaptation to DFTD. Here, we test the extent to which spatial variation and genetic diversity are associated with the abiotic environment and/or by DFTD. We employ genetic-environment association (GEAs) analyses using a RAD-capture panel consisting of 6,886 SNPs from 3,286 individuals sampled pre- and post-disease arrival. Pre-disease, we find significant correlations of allele frequencies with environmental variables, including 349 unique loci linked to 64 genes, suggesting local adaptation to abiotic environment. Following DFTD arrival, however, we detected few of the pre-disease candidate loci, but instead frequencies of candidate loci linked to 14 genes correlated with disease prevalence. Loss of apparent signal of abiotic local adaptation following disease arrival suggests swamping by the strong selection imposed by DFTD. Further support for this result comes from the fact that post-disease candidate loci are in linkage disequilibrium with genes putatively involved in immune response, tumor suppression and apoptosis. This suggests the strength GEA associations of loci with the abiotic environment are swamped resulting from the rapid onset of a biotic selective pressure.


Medication Errors (MEs) are a common cause for iatrogenic adverse events. A systematic review of MEs in prescribing, transcribing, dispensing, administration and documentation in adults and children was done. We included all types of studies that reported the incidence of medication errors or identified the causes of MEs, either in adults or children. All healthcare professionals have a responsibility in identifying contributing factors to medication errors and to use that information to further reduce their occurrence. Developing countries urgently need to introduce professional programmes to improve prescribing skills and knowledge of prescribers, and to encourage nurses to improve their quality of drug administration.


Gender inequality is a widespread organizational challenge, however, research on gender in the workplace suffers from stagnation in mainstream management research. A positive work and organizations perspective has the capacity to augment problem‐focused gender research with new approaches to boosting gender equity. Yet, contributions that utilize such a perspective are sparsely spread across nearly two decades' time and dozens of journals with differing disciplinary foci. This paper aims to reinvigorate gender research in management research by consolidating insights that have emerged through the application of a positive perspective. Therefore, we systematically review articles published in 21 management and psychological journals between 2001 and 2016. Four main themes emerged as drivers of gender research from a positive perspective: performance, social integration, well‐being, and justice/moral matters. The contributions within these themes highlight pathways to organizational flourishing through positive diversity and inclusion behaviors and practices. Thus, this paper provides a conceptual map for navigating and planning further research.


This paper investigates the cracking phenomena of fiber-reinforced concrete in steel and concrete composite beam systems. Various parameters contribute to the crack development and weakening of the composite system, while the concrete slab is bonded to the steel beam. The weakening can result from the longitudinal shear stress that causes cracking from shear connectors, cracking from tensile forces, crushing due to compressive forces and also cracking from concrete shrinkage. These cracks can contribute to premature failure of the composite beam. This paper investigates fiber reinforcement as a solution to decrease the amount of cracking in composite beams. The presented methodology includes experimental studies to evaluate cracking characteristics and strength of fiber-reinforced composite beams. Parameters of the study included spacing between studs, application of welded wire reinforcement, and fiber reinforcement. Results indicate the effectiveness of fiber-reinforcement in reducing crack widths and number of cracks, even though, spacing between studs and presence of welded wire were essential in crack control. Further, fiber-reinforced specimens showed higher compressive and tensile strength by 30% and 70% respectively. The deflection at the peak load also showed a 23% decrease for the specimen with hybrid fiber-wire reinforcement in comparison with the specimen reinforced with welded wire only.


The moisture contained in conventionally extracted red crab shell samples was lower than than in samples extracted using high pressure. In contrast, ash content increased as the extraction time increased and displayed no significant variation in high pressure extraction. Extraction time was influential, with lower lightness (L-value) being obtained in samples extracted at high pressure as compared to traditional extraction. However, large variation in a- and b-values resulted from traditional extraction. For both traditional and high pressure extraction increases in pH, salinity and saccharide content were noted with increasing extraction time, but these parameters did not vary substantially in red crab shell extracted at high pressure. The mineral content in samples extracted by high pressure was higher than in traditionally extracted samples. The mineral content increased with time, with marginally higher contents of essential amino acids and flavor enhancing amino acids noted following high pressure extraction. The contents of the flavor enhancing amino acids increased from 30?60 min, thereafter decreasing. Assessment of consumer acceptance revealed that, while traditionally manufactured red crab sauce was popular, sauce manufactured using a 60 min high pressure extraction was preferred. Extending the high pressure extraction time to 75 min produced a less sensory acceptable product, due to higher mineral and protein levels.


Supramolecular organic electronics rests on the use of bottom-up chemical self-assembly phenomena in order to design conducting components on the 5–100 nm scale. The challenges to take up in this field are both the construction of 1D-nanostructures displaying optimized charge transport properties and their insertion in optoelectronic devices. This chapter describes the supramolecular structures and transport properties of various conducting self-assemblies based on the nature of their molecular constituents. In addition, it describes several processing strategies to engineer and integrate them in (opto)electronic devices such as field effect transistors, light emitting diodes, and organic solar cells. These functional materials open new doors for further fundamental investigations on charge transport phenomena and for technological applications in which bottom-up fabrication processes can overlap with pre-patterned top-down circuitries for improved miniaturization and efficiency.


There is currently no information regarding the role that whole mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathways play in counteracting environmental stress in photosynthetic organisms. To address this gap, we exposed Ulva compressa to chronic levels of copper (10 µM) specific inhibitors of Extracellular Signal Regulated Kinases (ERK), c-Jun N-terminal Kinases (JNK), and Cytokinin Specific Binding Protein (p38) MAPKs alone or in combination. Intracellular copper accumulation and photosynthetic activity (in vivo chlorophyll a fluorescence) were measured after 6 h, 24 h, 48 h, and 6 days of exposure. By day 6, when one (except JNK) or more of the MAPK pathways were inhibited under copper stress, there was a decrease in copper accumulation compared with algae exposed to copper alone. When at least two MAPKs were blocked, there was a decrease in photosynthetic activity expressed in lower productivity (ETRmax), efficiency (αETR), and saturation of irradiance (EkETR), accompanied by higher non-photochemical quenching (NPQmax), compared to both the control and copper-only treatments. In terms of accumulation, once the MAPK pathways were partially or completely blocked under copper, there was crosstalk between these and other signaling mechanisms to enhance metal extrusion/exclusion from cells. Crosstalk occurred among MAPK pathways to maintain photosynthesis homeostasis, demonstrating the importance of the signaling pathways for physiological performance. This study is complemented by a parallel/complementary article Rodríguez-Rojas et al. on the role of MAPKs in copper-detoxification.


In this paper, the dark current-voltage characteristics of p-n junction of silicon solar cells are analysed, with different nickel film thicknesses of 200nm, 400nm and 600nm. The formation of nickel silicide is obtained after the thermal annealing process for 1min, 5min and 10min. The dark current-voltage curves obtained by three kinds of annealing temperature as a function of time are achieved in experiment. The improvement of series resistance extracted from the dark current-voltage curve in the upper voltage range is observed. The influence of nickel film thicknesses on dark current-voltage characteristics of silicon solar cells is confirmed.


This paper surveyed the herp species traded in secret bush meat markets of Cross River State, with the view of assessing their conservation status and uses they are put to. The study mainly focused on six selected communities in Akamkpa Local Government Area (LGA) of Cross Rivers State, Nigeria – the host LGA of Oban section of the Cross River National Park. Data for the study were collected through Reconnaissance survey, Observation, and In - depth interviews. Through reconnaissance survey and personal interaction with local people who have good knowledge of Cross River State, secret bushmeat markets were identified and visited for familiarity. Data obtained were analysed using descriptive statistics in form of frequency of counts and tables. Results showed that about nine herp species of international ecological concern in Cross River State as listed by CITES in either appendix I or II were secretly but continuously sold in Akamkpa LGA and neighbouring communities. Different categories of people including native doctors buy these species for both consumptive and non consumptive purposes. Among the traded endangered species in the study area were Bufo supereilliaris, Varanus niloticus, Kinixys erosa, Kinixys homeana, Python sebae, Calabaria reinhardtii, Crocodylus niloticus, Crocodylus cataphractus and Osteolaemus tetraspis. The fact that both Bitis gabonica and Python sabae were found in all the surveyed bushmeat markets in relatively high respective numbers of 31 and 22 is an indication that the species would soon go on local extinction if conservation laws are not effectively enforced. These also show that other endangered none herp species are being secretly traded on in the study area.


We consider the problem of ranking n items from stochastically sampled pairwise preferences. It was shown recently that when the underlying pairwise preferences are acyclic, several algorithms including the Rank Centrality algorithm, the Matrix Borda algorithm, and the SVM-Rank Aggregation algorithm succeed in recovering a ranking that minimizes a global pairwise disagreement error (Rajkumar and Agarwal, 2014). In this paper, we consider settings where pairwise preferences can contain cycles. In such settings, one may still like to be able to recover 'good' items at the top of the ranking. For example, if a Condorcet winner exists that beats every other item, it is natural to ask that this be ranked at the top. More generally, several tournament solution concepts such as the top cycle, Copeland set, Markov set and others have been proposed in the social choice literature for choosing a set of winners in the presence of cycles. We show that existing algorithms can fail to perform well in terms of ranking Condorcet winners and various natural tournament solution sets at the top. We then give alternative ranking algorithms that provably rank Condorcet winners, top cycles, and other tournament solution sets of interest at the top. In all cases, we give finite sample complexity bounds for our algorithms to recover such winners. As a by-product of our analysis, we also obtain an improved sample complexity bound for the Rank Centrality algorithm to recover an optimal ranking under a Bradley-Terry-Luce (BTL) condition, which answers an open question of Rajkumar and Agarwal (2014).


: Phosphoglycerate mutase 1 (PGAM1) is an important enzyme that catalyzes the reversible conversion of 3-phosphoglycerate and 2-phosphoglycerate during the process of glycolysis. Increasing evidence suggests that PGAM1 is widely overexpressed in various cancer tissues and plays a signi fi cant role in promoting cancer progression and metastasis. Although PGAM1 is a potential target in cancer therapy, the speci fi c mechanisms of action remain unknown. This review introduces the basic structure and functions of PGAM1 and its family members and summarizes recent advances in the role of PGAM1 and various inhibitors of cancer cell proliferation and metastasis from a glycolytic and non-glycolytic perspective. Recent studies have highlighted a correlation between PGAM1 and clinical features and prognosis of cancer as well as the development of target drugs for PGAM1. The integrated information in this review will help better understand the speci fi c roles of PGAM1 in cancer progression. Furthermore, the information highlights the non-glycolytic functions of PGAM1 in tumor metastasis, providing an innovative basis and direction for clinical drug research.


Energy beets (Beta vulgaris L.) meet the requirements for advanced biofuel feedstocks under the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. A mixed-integer programming model was constructed to determine the breakeven price of ethanol from energy beets, and to determine the optimal size and biorefinery location. The model, based on limited field data, evaluates Southern Plains beet production in a 3-year crop rotation, and beet harvest, transportation and processing. The optimal strategy depends critically on several assumptions including a just-in-time harvest and delivery system that remains to be tested in field trials. Based on a conversion rate of 26 gallons per wet ton and capital cost of $128 million for a 40,000,000 gallons per year biorefinery, the estimated breakeven ethanol price is $2.63 per gallon. The estimated beet delivered cost of $1.31 per gallon compares with the net corn feedstock cost ($1.17 to $1.74 per gallon in 2014). If for a mature industry, the cost to process beets was equal to the cost to process corn, the beet breakeven ethanol price would be $1.96 per gallon ($2.97 per gallon gasoline equivalent).


Nowadays, Smartphones supports a vast range of applications but in return demands a very high computational power increasing with time. But as we know Smartphone's computation power, memory, storage, and energy are limited solution to this problem can be Cloud Computing that offers a very wide computational power, memory, storage and energy. Hence, Researches are aiming to get Cloud Computing for smartphones to fulfil its requirements. But the traditional Smartphone application models not supporting the cloud computing features and requires specialized mobile cloud application models has became a challenge for the researchers. This article covers mobile cloud architecture, decision affecting entities on offloading, classification of application models, the latest mobile cloud application models and their critical analysis.


Aims: This experiment aimed to determine whether the soil application of organic fertilizers can help the establishment of cacao and whether shade alters its response to fertilizers.
Study Design: The 1.6 ha experiment was conducted over a period of one crop year (between April 2007 and March 2008) at the Cocoa Research Institute of Ghana. It involved four cacao genotypes (T 79/501, PA 150, P 30 [POS] and SCA 6), three shade levels ('light', 'medium' and 'heavy') and two fertilizer treatments ('no fertilizer', and '140 kg/ha of cacao pod husk ash (CPHA) plus poultry manure at 1,800 kg/ha). The experiment was designed as a split-plot with the cacao genotypes as the main plot factor and shade x fertilizer combinations as the sub-plots.
Methodology: Gliricidia sepium and plantains (Musa sapientum) were planted in different arrangements to create the three temporary shade regimes for the cacao. Data were collected on temperature and relative humidity of the shade environments, initial soil nutrients, soil moisture, leaf N, P and K+ contents, survival, photo synthesis and growth of test plants.
Results: The genotypes P 30 [POS] and SCA 6 showed lower stomatal conductance under non-limiting conditions. In the rainy seasons, plants under light shade had the highest CO2 assimilation rates. However, in the dry season, plants under increased shade recorded greater photosynthetic rates (P = .03). A significant shade x fertilizer interaction (P = .001) on photosynthesis in the dry season showed that heavier shade increases the benefits that young cacao gets from fertilizer application in that season. Conversely, shade should be reduced during the wet seasons to minimize light limitation to assimilation.
Conclusion: Under ideal weather conditions young cacao exhibits genetic variability on stomatal conductance. Also, to optimize plant response to fertilizer application shade must be adjusted taking the prevailing weather condition into account.


Background: One of the most remarkable applications of deep learning emerges in medical diagnosis. New improvements in this field have shown that with large enough datasets and the right methods, one can achieve results as reliable as diagnoses made by experienced doctors. One of such developments is MURA, which is a dataset of musculoskeletal radiographs consisting of 14863 studies from 12173 patients, resulting in 40561 multi-view radiograph images. Each one of these studies concerns one of the seven standard upper extremity radiographic study types, namely finger, forearm, elbow, hand, shoulder, homeruns, and wrist. Each study was categorized as normal or abnormal by board-certified radiologists in the diagnostic radiology environment between 2001 and 2012. Abnormality detection in muscular radiography is of great clinical application. This gains more importance in cases in which abnormality detection is difficult for physicians. If the proposed model can help us in detection, the process of treatment will precipitate. This model is termed Inception-v3. Methods: In this study, we evaluated the MURA dataset through Dense NET and inception-v3 methods. Results: The results indicated that the former had better performance and we added a pre-processing module to it to improve the accuracy of the DenseNet method in detecting the abnormality. In this context, we trained the machine to be sensitive to the presence of external objects to be distinguished from actual abnormality such as bone fraction. We achieved this condition by many various radiographs as machine inputs. By this strategy, both techniques (DenseNet and Inception-v3) showed improvements in accuracy. Thus, we sub-grouped abnormality into with or without the presence of external objects. Conclusion: Although the average opinion of radiologists still shows better results, in images with delicate fracture detection, such as finger fracture, the proposed model worked more accurately, and it could be a decision support assistant for physicians in the final detection of fracture. The precision of the proposed model will enhance if the image is separated from normal images using Platinum, a new class is made, and pre-processing is done. Therefore, the model can automatically detect abnormality by identifying that part of the image that is detected to be abnormal. An efficient model can interpret images more efficiently, can reduce errors, and can enhance quality. More studies are needed to evaluate the integration of this model with other models of deep learning in clinical settings.


Richard P. Feynman's Lectures on Physics has been known worldwide as a classic resource for students and professionals. Drawn from the source material from which the Lectures on Physics were transcribed, Basic Books is releasing Feynman's original recordings. These CDs are a library of essential physics by a scientific legend.


The nature of numerous strategies of firms is often discrete or countable. This adds difficulty to measuring and testing for the existence of complementarities among several strategies. This paper introduces a generalized multivariate count data model that allow estimating correlations of any sign among the pricing decisions of competing firms in a manner that is robust to the existence of unobserved heterogeneity leading to either over- and underdispersion of the distribution of counts. Thus, it is possible to overcome a major challenge in testing whether two decisions are strategic complements or substitutes, namely, dealing with the effect of unobserved heterogeneity. I study how firms actually compete in nonlinear tariffs by analyzing the interrelation between the incumbent and entrant's decisions to offer a given number of tariff options. Results document the existence of complementarity among tariff options regardless of whether they are dominated or not. This result supports the view that the implementation of nonlinear tariffs by means of a menu of self-selecting two-part tariffs has some strategic competitive value.


We investigate the efficiency potential of organic-inorganic halide perovskite/crystalline silicon tandem solar cells, a new class of photovoltaic devices targeting long-term cost reductions by ultrahigh conversion efficiencies. Methyl ammonium lead triiodide perovskite solar cells are particularly interesting as the top cell in Si-based tandem devices due to their suitable band gap, high photovoltage, and low sub-bandgap absorption. We derive optical models for a perovskite/Si tandem cell with Lambertian light trapping in the perovskite top cell, as well as for a top cell in the single pass limit. We find that unlike for other thin-film device architectures, light trapping is not required for the triiodide perovskite/Si tandem to reach matched top and bottom cell currents. While a Lambertian top cell could be employed in a four-terminal tandem, a top cell in the single pass limit enables a current-matched monolithic device with realistic top cell thicknesses. We calculate a limiting efficiency of 35.67% for an ideal (no parasitic absorption, ideal contacts) monolithic tandem, assuming a top cell open-circuit voltage of 1100 mV.