The overall purpose of this study is to explore secondary school students' images of scientists. In addition to this comprehensive purpose, it is also investigated that if these students' current images of scientists and those in which they see themselves as a scientist in the near future are consistent or not. The study was designed in line with the case study research in a qualitatively manner. The working group is of totally 175 (95 boys, 81 girls) secondary school students enrolled in the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth grade of a public school located in the province of Adiyaman. Data were collected through drawings during the drawing activity and interviews conducted with the selected drawings' owners in order to explore images of scientists. Elements take place in the drawings which are investigated by two of science education expert and one of art expert were analyzed in accordance with certain categories appearing in the related literature. Furthermore, fifteen pictures among others were randomly selected and their owners were asked to imagine themselves as a scientist in the near future and consequently depict and draw on a paper their imagination. For further information, interviews were carried out to determine the differences between the first drawings and the second ones. It is concluded that 68% of secondary school students draw a natural scientist or scientists, 2,28% of those draw a social scientist or scientists and finally the rest draw no scientist. The rate of drawings including only one scientist is %66,85 while the rate of drawings possess more than two scientists %4,57. On the other hand, the rest of the drawings are without any scientist. There is no obvious difference in all categories selected in the context of the study according to grade level and gender. The study revealed the possibility of the fact that secondary school students' images of scientist are substantially formed by the content of prevailing mainbooks and workbooks including activities in the classrooms. When talking about scientists, the majority of the students depict a naturel scientist who works more often in the laboratory, especially male and bespectacled. In addition, students mostly consider people as a scientist who work in the field of natural sciences. Consequently, doing science is an individual effort in an indoor environment rather than a set of group activity. Finally, data from interviews show that most of the students have a dream of being scientist in their future careers.


Racial-ethnic identity is a fundamental aspect of an early adolescent's identity. This article, based on data from Maori adolescents in Auckland, shows that racial-ethnic identity is important for Maori adolescents because it frames who they are, how they belong and their achievement aspirations. It concludes that, although negative stereotypes are prevalent and powerful in the lives of Maori adolescents, a strong racial-ethnic identity may enhance their resilience, providing them with the capacity to prevent negative pressures from interfering with their educational engagement.


This study investigated the effects of Cymbopogon flexuosus and Lippia rotundifolia microencapsulated essential oils on broiler performance and carcass yield. One hundred and fifty mixed-sex Cobb broiler chicks were used, from one day up to 42 days of age, in a completely randomized design, with five treatments and three replicates of ten birds each. The treatments were: negative control (basal diet), positive control (diet with enramycin and salinomycin), and three diets with microencapsulated essential oils from lemongrass, L. rotundifolia, and combination with 50% of both. The performance and carcass yield were not affected by the treatments. The intestine absolute weight was lower in the combination treatment compared with the negative control treatment and the lemongrass essential oil. The intestine relative weight was higher in the treatments with lemongrass and L. rotundifolia essential oils in relation to the combination. The liver relative weight was lower with the lemongrass essential oil and the combination compared with the treatment with the L. rotundifolia essential oil. The trial could not find results enough to recommend the use of the lemongrass and L. rotundifolia essential oils as an additive in broiler diets.


The Living Community Challenge (LCC) is a green certification program that, unlike most certification programs, is geared toward whole neighborhoods as opposed to singular buildings. Unfortunately, no existing communities have achieved Living Community Challenge certification. Still, there are many neighborhoods utilizing the ideals – known as petals – of the LCC in attempts to become more sustainable. The Living Building Challenge (LBC), the parent certification for the LCC, has seen more success than the LCC and will provide further research on the implications of its criterion. This paper will look at the hypothetical variables of the LCC, the communities trying to achieve these variables, and how elements of it could be used in relation to impoverished communities. Through case studies on groups and individuals attempting LCC and LBC certification, specifically Bend, Oregon and the BLOCK Project, the potential of the research becomes evident. This paper seeks to demonstrate how the LCC could be applied specifically in low-income areas in Gainesville, FL without achieving all the requirements of each petal.


Empirical evidence shows that massive data sets have rarely (if ever) a stationary underlying distribution. To obtain meaningful classification models, partitioning data into different concepts is required as an inherent part of learning. However, existing state-of-the-art approaches to concept drift detection work only sequentially (i.e. in a non-parallel fashion) which is a serious scalability limitation. To address this issue, we extend one of the sequential approaches to work in parallel and propose an Online Map-Reduce Drift Detection Method (OMR-DDM). It uses the combined online error rate of the parallel classification algorithms to identify changes in the underlying concept. For reasons of algorithmic efficiency it is built on a modified version of the popular Map-Reduce paradigm which permits for using preliminary results within mappers. An experimental evaluation shows that the proposed method can accurately detect concept drift while exploiting parallel processing. This paves the way to obtaining classification models which consider concept drift on massive data.


Abstract Question: Does the upward shift of species and accompanied increase in species richness, induced by climate change, lead to homogenization of Alpine summit vegetation? Location: Bernina region of the Swiss Alps. Methods: Based on a data set from previous literature we expand the analysis from species richness to beta-diversity and spatial heterogeneity. Species compositions of mountain summits are compared using a two-component heterogeneity concept including the mean and the variance of Sørensen similarities calculated between the summits. Non-metric multidimensional scaling is applied to explore developments of single summits in detail. Results: Both heterogeneity components (mean dissimilarity and variance) decrease over time, indicating a trend towards more homogeneous vegetation among Alpine summits. However, the development on single summits is not strictly unidirectional. Conclusions: The upward shift of plant species leads to homogenization of alpine summit regions. Thus, increasing alpha-diversity is accompanied by decreasing beta-diversity. Beta-diversity demands higher recognition by scientists as well as nature conservationists as it detects changes which cannot be described using species richness alone.


The oceans offer a considerable sustainable energy resource in the form of wave, marine currents and thermal energy and provide a potential alternative to fossil fuels. Marine current, or tidal, energy can be harnessed using horizontal axis marine current turbines (HAMCTs). In this work, the performance of a 2-bladed HAMCT was extensively investigated using experimental, theoretical and numerical models under different flow conditions. The motivation behind the study was to assess the influence of various parameters, associated with an evaluation method and those involved in the environment of a deployment site, on turbine performance. The employed evaluation methods were compared to find the best practice for performance assessment in various operational conditions.
For this purpose, two physical scale models with diameters of 500 mm and 800 mm were tested in the Australian Maritime College Towing Tank and Circulating Water Channel (CWC). Towing tank results from the United States Naval Academy were also employed for facility comparison as well as CFD model verification. The experimental results provide the hydrodynamic characteristics of the turbine under the different inflow conditions in each facility. The difference between the performances of the two scale models was found to be mainly due to the effect of Reynolds number and possibly attributed to the blockage effect. To predict the performance of a full-scale turbine, experiments on a scale model in conditions with Reynolds number independency, in this study Re > 2×10\(^5\), in a facility with little blockage is suggested. Unlike the towing tanks, the CWC did not have a uniform inflow. Using the equivalent flow velocity, obtained from kinetic energy flux over the rotor swept area, in dimensional analysis of the CWC data resulted in a better correlation with the towing tank results. It shows that although the shear flow profile practically has little effect on the mean power output per se, selecting the flow velocity by which the performance is analysed is essential in scale model tests. The impact of facility bias on the performance assessment appeared to be induced mainly from blockage and partially from the flow velocity profile.
An experimentally validated Blade Element Momentum (BEM) model was modified to consider shear flow profile and Reynolds number in the performance calculations. In addition, QBlade software was employed as a tool to investigate the effect of using local Reynolds number over the blade span. No significant changes were seen in the BEM model results by incorporating the shear flow in the code. Comparing the QBlade and BEM model results showed that using local sectional Reynolds numbers in the prediction may be not worth the effort to achieve results that were slightly more accurate than the model with a single reference Reynolds number. BEM theory provides reasonable performance predictions for turbines in steady flow conditions.
To establish detailed hydrodynamic characteristics of the turbine in ideal flow conditions, an experimentally validated numerical model using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) was developed. Different CFD approaches were applied to the model to find the best numerical practice for the performance evaluation of HAMCTs. The CFD model was modified to account for sheared inflow and surface waves using volume of fluid (VOF) and single-phase methods. A steady moving reference frame (MRF) simulation of the whole turbine model using the k-ω SST turbulence model with the wall-function model was found to be the best approach for the performance prediction of HAMCTs under steady inflow conditions in a balance between simulation time and result accuracy. Conversely, a transient solution with the sliding mesh method provided a better fit to the experimental results for turbine under waves and sheared inflow velocity profiles. The CFD simulations showed that a sheared inflow velocity profile had a cyclic effect on the blade loadings and almost no significant effect on the mean power production of the turbine. The effect of turbine depth and waves on the mean power yield was also negligible when the tip immersion depth of the turbine was more than half the turbine radius. Since both wave and sheared flow velocity affect the quality of power output even in deeper positions, they should be considered during the turbine design stage. Regardless the angular position of the blades, the maximum values of C\(_P\) and C\(_T\) occurred at the passing wave peaks and the minimum values at the troughs.
This study comprehensively evaluated the methods available to predict the performance of HAMCTs and provided a detailed discussion of the different parameters that affect both turbine and model performance. Overall, the BEM model provided accurate performance results in the steady flow condition, though it was unable to capture the effect of shear velocity on the turbine hydrodynamics. The QBlade model yielded similar results to the BEM model with the possibility of investigating Reynolds number effect; a user-friendly tool for quick performance prediction of a full-scale turbine. The CFD approach provided detailed information about the turbine hydrodynamics in both steady and unsteady conditions; however, an extensive verification and validation of the model is essential to achieve trustworthy results. The scale model tests were found to be a reliable way for performance assessment of HAMCTs. However, it is important to know how to account for blockage, inflow velocity profile and model scale effects when extrapolating the results to the full-scale turbine.


A novel approach to ultra-wideband (UWB) antenna design is presented which is based on a general description for the geometry of monopole antennas. This general description is capable of producing almost all possible shapes for monopole antennas and it is compatible with different optimization methods. The general description is used for the optimization of rotationally-symmetric monopole antenna with finite ground plane. The optimization of antennas is performed by applying a hybrid procedure, which begins with a global search and completes with a local optimization. The optimization procedure aims at minimizing the reflection from antennas while reducing the distortion of radiated pulses. In some cases, the reduction of variations in the energy pattern is also considered. The numerical results show the reliability and effectiveness of the whole process and considerable improvement in comparison with similar antennas reported in the literature.


JOPERD • Volume 82 No. 5 • May/June 2011 P hysical education can be a personally rewarding experience for children and adolescents. It also has the potential to help students acquire the skills, knowledge, and values to achieve and maintain a healthy lifestyle by regularly participating in physical activity. However, not all students enjoy physical education, and motivation to learn in class tends to wane as children reach adolescence (Mowling, Brock, Eiler, & Rudisill, 2004). Students who lack motivation or whose motives are maladapted to desired program outcomes are more likely to feel unsatisfied with their learning experiences, be disengaged in class, and be truant from class (Ntoumanis, Pensgaard, Martin, & Pipe, 2004). For these students, physical education falls short of meeting its potential. The problem of unmotivated students in physical education is not new, and substantial research has been done to try to find a solution. Recently, this research has drawn on self-determination theory (SDT; Deci & Ryan, 1985) to tease out variables related to motivation. Studies within this theoretical frame have clearly demonstrated that student motivation is influenced by the extent to which autonomous learning is supported in class (Ntoumanis, 2001, 2005; Vallerand & Losier, 1999). Autonomy support is a powerful mechanism in student motivation because it facilitates self-determination, which, as will be discussed, has more staying power than other behavioral regulators. Self-determined students are motivated to learn because they possess an internalized desire to do so, not because they feel pressure from external sources, such as guilt, threats, tangible rewards, or other extrinsic incentives. External motivators can be effective in the short term as long as they are present, but they lose their effect once removed or when the goal is long-term maintenance of a behavior. Given the overarching goal of physical education to foster lifelong participation in physical activity, it is essential for teachers to understand self-determined motivation and to explore pedagogical strategies for enhancing autonomous learning.


Modeling natural phenomena is a problem that has been studied for a long time in Computer Graphics. A problem that currently arises is how to render and animate realistically natural phenomena in real-time. This paper presents a technique to model underbrush with fast and realistic animation. Pre-computations and a simplified physically based model were developed to achieve the work's proposal.


A greenhouse experiment was conducted to evaluate the interactive effects of different Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. vasinfectum isolates at increasing inoculum densities with Meloidogyne incognita on partially resistant (Stoneville (ST) 4554B2RF) and susceptible (FiberMAX (FM) 9058F) cotton cultivars. Disease incidence and area under the disease progress curve (AUDPC) were significantly higher for FM 9058F compared to ST 4554B2F for all the Fov isolates, densities and M. incognita combinations. Differences in pathogenicity were observed among the Fov isolates tested, suggesting that variability in aggressiveness may exist in populations of the fungus, though all isolates were within the same Race grouping (Race 1). A total of four isolates showed significantly higher AUDPC in the absence of M. incognita at higher inoculum densities of Fov; while two isolates had significantly higher AUDPC in the presence of M. incognita at low inoculum densities. Plant growth differed between cultivars where FM 9058F plants were shorter, and had decreased root, shoot, and total plant weights compared to ST 4554B2RF. Plants inoculated with M. incognita had root galls and were stunted with reduced shoot weight and total plant weight. Management of Fusarium wilt can be substantially improved by using partially resistant cultivars or reducing the inoculum density of root-knot nematode.


Three-phase transformer less inverter is widely used in lowpower photovoltaic (PV) grid-connected systems due to its small size, high efficiency and low cost. When no transformer is used in a grid connected photovoltaic (PV) system, a galvanic connection between the grid and PV array exists. In these conditions, dangerous leakage currents (common-mode currents) can appear through the stray capacitance between the PV array and the ground. The former, in order to create a galvanic isolation between the input and the output include a transformer (mandatory in some countries) that limits the whole system performances in terms of efficiency, weight, size and cost. On the contrary, transformerless inverters do not present any isolation and are characterized by little size, lower cost and higher efficiency (more than 2% higher). Nevertheless, the lack of transformers leads to leakage currents that can be harmful to the human body, as well as for the whole conversion system integrity. In order to minimize the ground leakage current and improve the efficiency of the converter system, transformerless PV inverters utilizing unipolar PWM control. In this paper it presents a highreliability three-phase transformer less grid-connected inverter that operate super junction MOSFETs to accomplish high efficiency for photovoltaic applications. In this paper single phase transformer less inverter with PMSM drive and three phase transformer less inverter.


Failure Analysis labs involved in customer returns always face a greater challenge, demand from customer for a faster turnaround time to identify the root cause of the failure. Unfortunately, root cause identification in failure analysis is often performed incompletely or rushing into destructive techniques, leading to poor understanding of the failure mechanism and root-cause, customer dissatisfaction. Scanning Acoustic Tomography (SAT), also called Scanning Acoustic Microscope (SAM) has been adopted by several Failure Analysis labs because it provides reliable non-destructive imaging of package cracks and delamination. The SAM is a vital tool in the effort to analyze molded packages. This paper provides a review of non-destructive testing method used to evaluate Integrated Circuit (IC) package. The case studies discussed in this paper identifies different types of defects and the capabilities of B-Scan (cross-sectional tomography) method employed for defect detection beyond delamination.


A measurement study of residential magnetic fields and brain tumors in children that was added onto an ongoing case-control interview study in Los Angeles County, California, included 298 children under age 20 years with a primary brain tumor diagnosed from 1984 to 1991 and 298 control children identified by random digit dialing. Magnetic fields were determined for all Los Angeles homes where these 596 children lived from conception to diagnosis (1,131 homes) by mapping and coding the wiring configurations outside the home and by taking a series of exterior spot and profile measurements. In addition, for a subset of subjects (35%; 211 homes) 24-hour measurements were taken in the child's room and one other room. Although measured fields are consistently highest in the highest of the five wire code categories, fields in homes in this category are much lower in Los Angeles than in Denver, where the code originated. Brain tumor risk appears not to relate to measured fields inside (p for trend for child's room = 0.98) or outside (p for trend for front wall = 0.82) the home. An apparent increase in risk among children living at diagnosis in homes with underground wiring appears to be an artifact introduced by using current controls for historical cases because this apparent excess risk disappeared in an analysis restricted to the later years of the study when cases and controls were accrued concurrently. Our study does not show an overall association of pediatric brain tumors with measured fields, with "very high" wiring configurations, or with any of several other potential sources of exposure, such as use of various electrical appliances, but the prevalence of high fields (>2 mG) and very high fields (>3 mG) in Los Angeles homes was too low to detect a moderate effect of the magnitude reported in other studies. Am J Epidemiol 1996; 143:105-19.


Clay fraction contents distribution in the Senegal River estuary after the building of the anti-salt Diama dam has shown that upstream sediments are very muddy. Clay fraction content is as high as 60 % of sediments in the middle of the channel with a pronounced downstream decreasing trend on the banks comparing to the contents in the middle of the channel. Towards the river mouth, the fine fraction tends to disappear leading to a shelly sand sediment type essentially. During low water period, clay fraction contents increase particularly at the vicinity of the dam reservoir. In the estuarine reach, downstream the dam, this increasing trend during the low water stage is particularly marked in the middle of the channel. The clay mineral assemblage shows that kaolinite and smectite are the main components, whereas interlayered illite-smectite and illite are minor constituents. The upstream-downstream profile shows a decrease in kaolinite content although it remains the dominant constituent. Floating clay minerals (smectite and illite-smectite) concentrate rather in the middle of the channel and on the right bank where the water depth is higher. According to seasonal variations, the distribution of these clay minerals often follows the concentration of the entire clay fraction; their contents increase during low water stage period. This hydrodynamics sorting of floating minerals, evident in the up-dam zone, tends to disappear in the eastern reach between Diama dam and the mouth. Clay minerals assemblage shows, through the time, a rather homogeneous composition which does not seem to be altered by the seasonal fluctuations.


This paper is intended to give a contribution to the debate on the functional relationship between the museum and the local territory; more specifically, the aim of this study is to understand the role of a museum location in attracting visitors and influencing their processes of choice and satisfaction. The study follows, in particular, a previous study conducted by Mariani and Mussini (2013) based on Fondazione di Venezia data, with a view to better contextualization level. Previous studies have examined the role of museums in enhancing the image of a destination and in attracting and conveying additional tourists' fluxes, arguing that although not all museums are a destination of choice for visitors, a great museum or a strong exhibition program still does represent a national and international attraction. This paper overturns this argument investigating whereas an appealing location (such as a tourist destination) can influence prospective visitors about the level of attractiveness of a pay cultural event taking place therein. A questionnaire was developed and data were collected at the Palazzo Ducale in Venice, Italy, in 2007, during the art exhibition "Venezia e l'Islam 829-1797", via 501 face-to-face visitors interviews. The research model analyzes data through the conjoint analysis and the descriptive statistics. Results show that the exhibition location has been a relevant factor in influencing the visitors' decision process linked to the attendance of the event. Data show that, for the majority of visitors, the exhibition had been located elsewhere, they would not have visited it. Thus, an appealing location or a structured tourist destination may function as an attractive platform that may contribute to enforce the overall visitor's satisfaction with regard to his or her attendance to a cultural event. Furthermore, such a fact depends on specific objective variables (e.g., level of education, age), although no significant differences were reported between segments based on other socio-demographic characteristics such as sex. To conclude, arts and cultural managers should market and position cultural events in locations that can function as attractive, thus as emotionally driven experience consumption sites. Furthermore, they should consider both the cognitive and the emotional aspects of visitor's experience when designing and planning their events, as well as when assessing visitor's satisfaction. Cognitive and emotional aspects should be considered simultaneously when measuring visitors' satisfaction. In shaping visitors' satisfaction, emotions, such as the pleasure to be in a particular location, are more significant than cognitive aspects, such as the theme of the exhibition.


We have succeeded in determining the polarity of InN by atomic hydrogen (H*) irradiation for the first time. The surface of N- and In-polar InN films was exposed to H* at nominal temperatures between 200 and 500 °C for 30 to 90 min. After H* irradiation, indium (In) droplets appeared on the surface of N-polar InN, whereas they did not appear on In-polar InN. As the sample temperature was raised, the size of the In droplets on N-polar InN became bigger; furthermore the thickness of the remaining InN layers decreased. On the contrary, the thickness of In-polar InN layers remained unchanged. The mechanisms for these polarity-dependent surface behaviors are discussed. We propose H* irradiation as one of the promising methods for the polarity determination of InN.


This paper presents a novel test solution directly embedded inside CMOS Image Sensors (CIS) to sort out PASS and FAIL dies during production test. The solution aims at reducing test time, which can represent up to 30% of the final product cost. By simplifying the way optical tests are usually applied with an ATE, the proposed Built-In Self-Test (BIST) solution overcomes the drawbacks of long test time and huge amount of test data storage. We experimented our solution by considering that roughly half of the tests usually performed with an ATE can be embedded and applied using the proposed fast and low cost BIST engine. Results obtained on more than 2,400 sensors have shown that our solution reduces test time by about 30% without impacting the defect coverage. The area cost of our solution is about 1% of the digital part of the sensor, i.e., approximately 0.25% of the total sensor area. The proposed embedded CIS test solution outperforms existing solutions in terms of area overhead and test time saving, thus encouraging its future implementation in an industrial production flow.


The thesis discusses research on analysis of cylindrical metal clad nano-lasers.
Numerical modelling of cylindrical semiconductor nano-lasers has been undertaken
accommodating local gain variations in the active region of the device. Analysis is
performed using the cylindrical transfer matrix method (cTMM) and the Finite
Element Method (FEM). Calculations have thereby been performed of the modal gain
and the lasing condition for the device supporting TE guided mode and TM Surface
Plasmon Polariton (SPP) modes. For representative structures it is shown that TE and
TM mode lasing can be supported in devices having cavity lengths on the order of
1μm and 60μm respectively. The methodology adopted offers means to analyse
candidate semiconductor lasers.
Attention is also given on structures having GaN as the material platform and utilising
silver for the metal cladding. The lasing characteristics of such structures are
explored for wide range of operating wavelengths and metal – cladding thicknesses.
It is found that for lower order TE and TM mode lasing can be supported in devices
having cavity lengths of the order of 2μm and 18μm respectively.
The response of metal clad nano-lasers to direct current modulation has also been
analysed in both the small signal and large signal regimes. Calculations have been
performed using rate equations which include the Purcell cavity enhanced
spontaneous emission factor, F, and the spontaneous emission coupling factor β. It is
observed that in general increased F and β reduce the 3dB direct current modulation
bandwidth. Conditions are identified where the peak modulation response occurs at
frequencies 40GHz and 30 GHz can be achieved. For both small and large signal
regimes modulation bandwidth of approximately 60GHz can be achieved.


A consultant with McKinsey & Company surveys the international aluminum industry and asks why its various activities are divided among firms in the way that they are. These components include the minding of bauxite, its refining into alumina, aluminum smelting, fabrication, and manufacture of the final product. What is it about this industry that encourages joint ventures in some cases, long-term contracts in others, and vertical integration and merger in still others?The author identifies and analyzes the factors which motivate firms to adopt one or another of these patterns of doing business. He draws on and extends recent developments in theory relating to the operation of markets and organizations, and tests the power of theories to explain what is observed in the industry. He has assembled a great deal of empirical evidence, focusing on the United States, Japan, and Australia. The book should become the standard study of the aluminum industry.


We describe the case of an adolescent who was admitted to the hospital because of sudden occurrence of chest pain, dyspnea and subcutaneous emphysema. On admission, physical examination revealed subcutaneous crepitations in the superior part of the rib cage, and auscultation of the chest showed widespread wheezing. The radiological assessment confirmed the diagnosis of pneumomediastinum and pneumothorax. A follow-up CT scan performed one week after the admission showed almost complete resolution of the radiological alterations. At the following visits, the patient was asymptomatic, but reported to have suffered from frequent episodes of rhinorrea, sneezing, nasal blockage, and sometimes, chest tightness, especially during exposure to pets and/or windy weather. Skin prick testing showed sensitivities to dermatophagoides pteronyssinus and farinae, grass pollen and dog dander. Spirometry documented significant improvement in lung function after short-acting bronchodilator, allowing for the diagnosis of asthma to be made. Although pneumomediastinum may be a complication of various respiratory diseases, including asthma, it has never been reported as the first presentation of underlying bronchial asthma. Herein, the physiopathological mechanisms, the diagnostic procedures and treatment of pneumomediastinum in asthma are discussed. We suggest that the diagnosis of asthma should be considered in the differential diagnosis of pneumomediastinum in adolescence.


Piroxicam is a widely used potent non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug, with due potential for dermal delivery.  Permeation of piroxicam from proniosome based reservoir type transdermal gel formulation across excised rat abdominal skin was investigated using Keshery Chein diffusion cell. There was considerable improvement in flux over the control gel formulation. The lipid vesicles were evaluated for entrapment efficiency and vesicle size of niosomes formed. It was observed that Span 60 based formulations produced vesicles of smallest size and higher entrapment efficiency while those of Span 80 produced vesicles of least entrapment efficiency. Incorporation of lecithin further enhanced entrapment efficiency. Proniosomes were prepared by conventional technique and employing maltodextrin and sorbitol as base. The morphology of the proniosomes was studied by scanning electron microscopy. Maximum flux achieved was 35.61 μg/cm2/h, an enhancement of 7.39 times was achieved for transdermal system based on proniosomal gel as compared to control gel. Anti-inflammatory studies revealed that proniosome based transdermal drug delivery system of piroxicam were promising carriers for delivery of piroxicam. There was significant reduction in carrageenan induced rat paw inflammation compared to control.

 Key words: Piroxicam, niosomes, permeation enhancement, dermal delivery.


In the absence of external rewards, agents can still learn useful behaviors by identifying and mastering a set of diverse skills within their environment. Existing skill learning methods use mutual information objectives to incentivize each skill to be diverse and distinguishable from the rest. However, if care is not taken to constrain the ways in which the skills are diverse, trivially diverse skill sets can arise. To ensure useful skill diversity, we propose a novel skill learning objective, Relative Variational Intrinsic Control (RVIC), which incentivizes learning skills that are distinguishable in how they change the agent's relationship to its environment. The resulting set of skills tiles the space of affordances available to the agent. We qualitatively analyze skill behaviors on multiple environments and show how RVIC skills are more useful than skills discovered by existing methods in hierarchical reinforcement learning.


Ag-presenting molecule CD1 and CD1-restricted NKT cells are known to contribute to defense against a range of infectious pathogens, including some viruses. CD1-restricted NKT cells, a distinct subpopulation of T cells, have striking and rapid effector functions that contribute to host defense, including rapid production of IFN-gamma and IL-4, and activation of NK cells. Consideration of the important contributions of innate and adaptive immunity to clearance of HSV prompted us to investigate the role of CD1 and of NKT cells expressing the V alpha 14-J alpha 281 TCR in the pathogenesis of HSV infection. To address this issue, we compared infection in wild-type mice with that in CD1 gene knockout (GKO) and J alpha 281 GKO mice. In this study, we report impaired clearance of virus and viral Ags, and more florid acute infection in mice lacking CD1 (and by inference, CD1-restricted T cells), in comparison with parental C57BL6 mice. In J alpha 281 GKO mice there was also impairment of virus clearance, resembling that seen in CD1 GKO mice. These results imply roles for the V alpha 14-J alpha 281 subset of NKT cells and for CD1d in control of HSV infection.


"Listen to Hip Hop! Exploring a Musical Genre provides an overview of hip-hop music for scholars and fans of the genre, with a focus on 50 defining artists, songs, and albums.
 Listen to Hip Hop! Exploring a Musical Genre explores non-rap hip hop music, and as such it serves as a compliment to Listen to Rap! Exploring a Musical Genre (Greenwood Press, Anthony J. Fonseca, 2019), which discussed at length 50 must-hear rap artists, albums, and songs. This book aims to provide a close listening/reading of a diverse set of songs and lyrics by a variety of artists who represent different styles outside of rap music.
 Most entries focus on specific songs, carefully analyzing and deconstructing musical elements, discussing their sound, and paying close attention to instrumentation and production values—including sampling, a staple of rap and an element used in some hip hop dance songs. Though some of the artists included may be normally associated with other musical genres and use hip hop elements sparingly, those in this book have achieved iconic status. Finally, sections on the background and history of hip hop, hip hop's impact on popular culture, and the legacy of hip hop provide context through which readers can approach the entries."


As the phylogenetic organization of mammalian polyomaviruses is complex and currently incompletely resolved, we aimed at a deeper insight into their evolution by identifying polyomaviruses in host orders and families that have either rarely or not been studied. Sixteen unknown and two known polyomaviruses were identified in animals that belong to 5 orders, 16 genera, and 16 species. From 11 novel polyomaviruses, full genomes could be determined. Splice sites were predicted for large and small T antigen (LTAg, STAg) coding sequences (CDS) and examined experimentally in transfected cell culture. In addition, splice sites of seven published polyomaviruses were analyzed. Based on these data, LTAg and STAg annotations were corrected for 10/86 and 74/86 published polyomaviruses, respectively. For 25 polyomaviruses, a spliced middle T CDS was observed or predicted. Splice sites that likely indicate expression of additional, alternative T antigens, were experimentally detected for six polyomaviruses. In contrast to all other mammalian polyomaviruses, three closely related cetartiodactyl polyomaviruses display two introns within their LTAg CDS. In addition, the VP2 of Glis glis (edible dormouse) polyomavirus 1 was observed to be encoded by a spliced transcript, a unique experimental finding within the Polyomaviridae family. Co-phylogenetic analyses based on LTAg CDS revealed a measurable signal of codivergence when considering all mammalian polyomaviruses, most likely driven by relatively recent codivergence events. Lineage duplication was the only other process whose influence on polyomavirus evolution was unambiguous. Finally, our analyses suggest that an update of the taxonomy of the family is required, including the creation of novel genera of mammalian and non-mammalian polyomaviruses.


The main objective of this paper is to detect the existence of financial contagion between the North American and European markets during the recent crises. To accomplish this, the relationships between the US and the Euro zone stock markets are considered, taking the daily equity prices of the Standard and Poor's 500 as representative of the United States market and for the European market, the five most representative indexes. Time Series Factor Analysis (TSFA) procedure has allowed concentrating the information of the European indexes into a unique factor, which captures the underlying structure of the European return series. The relationship between the European factor and the US stock return series has been analyzed by means of the dynamic conditional correlation model (DCC). Once the DCC is estimated, the contagion between both markets is analyzed. Finally, in order to explain the sudden changes in dynamic US-EU correlation, a Markov switching model is fitted, using as input variables the macroeconomic ones associated with the monetary policies of the US as well as those related to uncertainty in the markets. The results show that there was contagion between the United States and European markets in the Subprime and Global Financial crises. The two-regime Markov switching model has helped to explain the variability of the pair-wise correlation. The first regime contains mostly the financially stable periods, and the dynamic correlations in this regime are explained by macroeconomic variables and other related with monetary policies in Europe and US. The second regime is explained mainly by the Federal Funds rate and the evolution of the Euro/US Exchange rate.


The ventral visual pathway is directly involved in the perception and recognition of objects. However, the extent to which the neural representation of objects in this region reflects low‐level or high‐level properties remains unresolved. A problem in resolving this issue is that only a small proportion of the objects experienced during natural viewing can be shown during a typical experiment. This can lead to an uneven sampling of objects that biases our understanding of how they are represented. To address this issue, we developed a data‐driven approach to stimulus selection that involved describing a large number objects in terms of their image properties. In the first experiment, clusters of objects were evenly selected from this multi‐dimensional image space. Although the clusters did not have any consistent semantic features, each elicited a distinct pattern of neural response. In the second experiment, we asked whether high‐level, category‐selective patterns of response could be elicited by objects from other categories, but with similar image properties. Object clusters were selected based on the similarity of their image properties to objects from five different categories (bottle, chair, face, house, and shoe). The pattern of response to each metameric object cluster was similar to the pattern elicited by objects from the corresponding category. For example, the pattern for bottles was similar to the pattern for objects with similar image properties to bottles. In both experiments, the patterns of response were consistent across participants providing evidence for common organising principles. This study provides a more ecological approach to understanding the perceptual representations of objects and reveals the importance of image properties.


Post-traumatic stress disorder, a psychiatric disorder, arises following exposure to perceived life-threatening trauma. Its symptoms can mimic those of anxiety or depressive disorders, but with appropriate screening, the diagnosis is easily made. Current treatment strategies combine patient education; pharmacologic interventions, such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, trazodone and clonidine; and psychotherapy. As soon after the trauma as possible, techniques to prevent the development of post-traumatic stress disorder, such as structured stress debriefings, should be administered. A high index of suspicion for post-traumatic stress disorder is needed in patients with a history of significant trauma.


Many investigators wanting to apply knowledge-based systems (KBSs) as consultants for cancer diagnosis have turned to tools running on personal computers. While some of these tools serve well for small tasks, they lack the power available with such high-end KBS tools as KEE (Knowledge Engineering Environment) and ART (Automated Reasoning Tool). These tools were originally developed on Lisp machines and have the full functionality of the Lisp language as well as many additional features. They provide a rich and highly productive environment for the software developer. This paper illustrates the capability of one of these high-end tools. First, a table showing the classification of benign soft tissue tumors was converted into a KEE knowledge base. The tools available in KEE were then used to identify the tumor type for a hypothetical patient.


In 2010, Australia introduced the Australian Consumer Law by its Trade Practices Amendment (Australian Consumer Law) Act (No. 2). The standard of consumer protection in the provision of financial services is considered in relation to this new legislation and also the further Australian federal legislation: the Australian Securities and Investment Commission Act and the Corporations Act. It is then compared with the consumer protection standards of the common law. The new standards are further tested, firstly, against a new 'product' advertised by the Bendigo Bank in 2010, called the Homesafe Debt Free Equity Release, and secondly, against reform proposals which would prohibit the receipt of commissions by financial service providers. The new Bendigo Bank 'product' raises new implications for the finance industry and for consumer protection. The question is posed: is the ultimate consumer protection in the finance industry a duty of care, owed by the profession of financial services providers, to produce optimum wealth for Australians through a sound and reliable financial system for the consumer?


Objective: Saponin compounds, including Glycyrrhizin, can enhance immune responses. The current investigation was conducted to study the effects of alum and Glycyrrhizin Liposomes (GL) as adjuvants on the humoral and cellular responses of the immune system in mice immunized with ovalbumin (OVA). Materials and Methods: Male Balb/c mice were immunized with OVA adjuvant with alum, GL, or alum-GL combination twice at two-week intervals. Two weeks after the last immunization, the specific immune responses against OVA were assessed. Results: The adjuvant formulated with alum and GL induced a Th1 cytokine pattern against OVA, while alum alone induced a Th2 cytokine pattern. The combined adjuvant increased the potential of OVA to induce a delayed-type hypersensitivity reaction and IgG2a antibody titer compared to other groups (p<0.05). OVA-specific lymphocyte proliferation did not show significant differences among the three groups receiving adjuvant (p=0.11). Conclusion: Unlike alum, the combination of alum and GL synergistically increased the cellular and humoral immune responses after immunization with an antigen and therefore had the ability to be used as an adjuvant to induce cellular immune responses.


Existing text recognition methods usually need large-scale training data. Most of them rely on synthetic training data due to the lack of annotated real images. However, there is a domain gap between the synthetic data and real data, which limits the performance of the text recognition models. Recent self-supervised text recognition methods attempted to utilize unlabeled real images by introducing contrastive learning, which mainly learns the discrimination of the text images. Inspired by the observation that humans learn to recognize the texts through both reading and writing, we propose to learn discrimination and generation by integrating contrastive learning and masked image modeling in our self-supervised method. The contrastive learning branch is adopted to learn the discrimination of text images, which imitates the reading behavior of humans. Meanwhile, masked image modeling is firstly introduced for text recognition to learn the context generation of the text images, which is similar to the writing behavior. The experimental results show that our method outperforms previous self-supervised text recognition methods by 10.2%-20.2% on irregular scene text recognition datasets. Moreover, our proposed text recognizer exceeds previous state-of-the-art text recognition methods by averagely 5.3% on 11benchmarks, with similar model size. We also demonstrate that our pre-trained model can be easily applied to other text-related tasks with obvious performance gain.


The Moroccan agricultural cooperative sector is a key player in self-employment and income generation through territorial anchoring. The government's "MOURAFAKA" program offers support for newly created cooperatives, including strategic diagnosis and training. This paper analyzes the impact of the MOURAFAKA program on the sustainability of agricultural cooperatives in Morocco. Using original data from a survey of 232 cooperatives and a second database of 1131 cooperatives, the study employs a methodology based on survival function analysis and Cox regression. The results show that the MOURAFAKA program improves the sustainability of agricultural cooperatives by strengthening their management, governance, and market access capabilities. The study also highlights the importance of internal factors such as management skills, leadership style, and cooperative size, as well as external factors such as strategic adaptability, in determining the sustainability of agricultural cooperatives. The policy implications of these findings suggest that upstream literacy programs and capacity-building initiatives for cooperative leaders, as well as downstream access to financing, marketing, and practical training, are crucial for ensuring the sustainability of cooperatives.


PURPOSE
To describe the prevalence and the 5-year incidence of retinal central and branch vein occlusion and associated risk factors.

METHODS
The Beaver Dam Eye Study (n = 4,926) is a population-based study in which retinal vein occlusions were detected at baseline (1988-1990) and at a 5-year follow-up examination (1993-1995) by grading of 30 degrees color fundus photographs.

RESULTS
The prevalence and 5-year incidence of retinal branch vein occlusion were each 0.6%. The prevalence of retinal central vein occlusion was 0.1%, and the 5-year incidence was 0.2%. While adjusting for age, the prevalence of branch vein occlusion was associated with hypertension (odds ratio [OR] 5.42, 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.18, 13.47), diabetes mellitus (OR 2.43, 95% CI 1.04, 5.70), pulse pressure (OR 1.24 for 10 mm Hg, 95% CI 1.03, 1.48), ocular perfusion pressure (OR 2.09 for 10 mm Hg, 95% CI 1.45, 3.01), arteriovenous nicking (OR 16.75, 95% CI 7.33, 38.24), and focal arteriolar narrowing (OR 22.86, 95% CI 8.43, 62.03). The age-adjusted incidence of retinal branch vein occlusion was associated with current smoking (OR 4.43 95%, CI 1.53, 12.84) compared with nonsmokers and to focal arteriolar narrowing (OR 5.24, 95% CI 1.97, 13.94) at baseline. While controlling for age, the incidence of branch vein occlusion was not associated with serum lipid levels, body mass index, white blood cell count, alcohol consumption, aspirin use, glaucoma, intraocular pressure, or ocular hypertension.

CONCLUSIONS
Retinal vein occlusion is infrequent in the population. These data suggest a strong association between retinal branch vein occlusion and retinal arteriolar changes. Data from larger populations are needed to further assess associations between risk factors and the incidence of retinal vein occlusions.


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The purpose of this paper is to examine in detail the existing literature addressing the history of Western women in the workplace, the importance of first impressions, gender discrimination and stereotypes in the workplace, and the cognitive and behavioural effects of clothing on both wearers and perceivers. These topics will be analyzed across various fields of study, such as economics, psychology, sociology and gender studies. This review focuses on women as they relate to appearance and professional settings because many of the issues faced by women in professional settings are unique. It would not, therefore, be appropriate to address these issues as they relate to both men and women within the same framework; women's experiences in regards to these notions deserve special attention. Once these theories are explored and analyzed, they will be expanded upon using ideas of executive presence and how it affects these particular areas of study, as well as how it can be used by women to overcome many of these issues.


Orchis anatolica Boiss. is a plant species that grows in the Mediterranean region and assumed to have an aphrodisiac property. This study investigates the effects of ingestion of dried O. anatolica root on the sexual behavior and weights of reproductive organs in adult male rats. Sexually active male rats were divided into two groups (control and experimental). O. anatolica root powder was orally administered to the experimental group in a daily dose of 1g/kg for thirty days. The sexual behavior was then monitored and compared between O. anatolica treated rats and control rats. Weights of reproductive organs and testosterone serum levels were, also, measured for both treated and control rats. O. anatolica root ingestion significantly reduced the mount, intromission, and ejaculation latencies. Also, a significant increase in the copulatory efficacy was reported. Weights of reproductive organs and testosterone serum levels were significantly increased in O. anatolica treated rats compared to controls. The present study concludes that continuous ingestion of O. anatolica root over a period of thirty days can improve the sexual motivation and performance in adult male rats. This effect can be ascribed to increased testosterone level.


Although there are a significant number of advantages associated with cloud computing, there is less clarity of what are the key management determinants for cloud computing adoption. This research aims to evaluate the significance of various factors that influence the adoption decision of cloud computing services by organisations within the United Kingdom (UK). The 'Technology-Organisation-Environment' (TOE) adoption framework was used to develop eight hypotheses which allowed data collection through a self-created questionnaire based survey that was completed by 257 mid-to-senior level decision making business and IT professionals from a range of UK end-user organisations. The derived hypotheses were tested using various data analysis techniques including factor analysis and logistic regression. The results show that four of the eight factors examined have a significant influence on the adoption decision of cloud computing services in the UK. Those key factors are competitive pressure, complexity, technology readiness and trading partner pressure. The latter predictor; trading partner pressure, had the highest level of significance on the adoption decision of cloud services. The findings reveal how important the environmental context surrounding both the competitive pressure and more importantly trading partner pressure is on cloud adoption. This enables end-user organisations to better evaluate the cloud and vendors the opportunity of improving their offerings.


PURPOSE
To compare the effects of conventional amplification (CA) and digital frequency compression (DFC) amplification on the speech recognition abilities of candidates for a partial-insertion cochlear implant, that is, candidates for combined electric and acoustic stimulation (EAS).

METHOD
The participants were 6 patients whose audiometric thresholds at 500 Hz and below were <or=60 dB HL and whose thresholds at 2000 Hz and above were >or=80 dB HL. Six tests of speech understanding were administered with CA and DFC. The Abbreviated Profile of Hearing Aid Benefit (APHAB) was also administered following use of CA and DFC.

RESULTS
Group mean scores were not statistically different in the CA and DFC conditions. However, 2 patients received substantial benefit in DFC conditions. APHAB scores suggested increased ease of communication, but also increased aversive sound quality.

CONCLUSION
Results suggest that a relatively small proportion of individuals who meet EAS candidacy will receive substantial benefit from a DFC hearing aid and that a larger proportion will receive at least a small benefit when speech is presented against a background of noise. This benefit, however, comes at a cost-aversive sound quality.


Here I analyze the brush-fire cycle behind the brushy frontier of a grassland, seeking evolutionary feedback loops for large grazing animals and their hominin predators. Several months after a lightning strike, the burn scar grows enough new grass to expand the carrying capacity for grass-specialized herbivores,which evolved from mixed feeders in Africa during the early Pleistocene. The frontier subpopulation of grazers that discovers the auxiliary grassland quickly multiplies,creating a secondary boom for its hominin predators as well. Following this boom, a bust occurs several decades later when the brush returns; it squeezes both prey and predator populations back into the core grassland. This creates a feedback loop that can repeatedly shift the core's gene frequencies toward those of the frontier subpopulation until fixation occurs. Any brush-relevant allele could benefit from this amplifying feedback loop, so long as its phenotypes concentrate near where fresh resources can suddenly open up, back in the brush. Thus, traits concentrated in the frontier fringe can hitchhike; improved survival is not needed. This is natural selection but utilizin selective reproductive opportunity instead of the usual selective survival. Cooperative nurseries in the brush's shade should concentrate the alleles favoring eusociality, repeatedly increasing their proportion via trait hitchhiking in the feedback loop.


This paper explores how ancillary benefits of carbon mitigation may affect the cost effectiveness of Annex-1 emissions trading. We find that emissions trading could lead to cost-savings for both the Annex-1 countries as a whole and for the individual countries, as compared with the case of no-trading. The sum of the compliance costs is minimized under the cost-effective condition where marginal costs of domestic abatement are equalized across the Annex-1 countries. However, such a condition of cost effectiveness in emissions trading does not imply cost effectiveness in terms of the compliance of individual countries. The buyers of emission allowances, consisting of the European Union, the United States and Japan, could have even lower costs of compliance in the trading case where the ancillary benefits are taken into consideration. This result supports the intervention that takes account of the ancillary benefit in designing national carbon mitigation policies. To achieve the cost effectiveness in national carbon abatement, there should be regulatory interventions so that the price of carbon emission allowances can reflect the ancillary benefits.


Abstract Logic programs under the stable model semantics, or answer-set programs, provide an expressive rule-based knowledge representation framework, featuring a formal, declarative and well-understood semantics. However, handling the evolution of rule bases is still a largely open problem. The Alchourrón, Gärdenfors and Makinson (AGM) framework for belief change was shown to give inappropriate results when directly applied to logic programs under a non-monotonic semantics such as the stable models. The approaches to address this issue, developed so far, proposed update semantics based on manipulating the syntactic structure of programs and rules. More recently, AGM revision has been successfully applied to a significantly more expressive semantic characterisation of logic programs based on SE-models. This is an important step, as it changes the focus from the evolution of a syntactic representation of a rule base to the evolution of its semantic content. In this paper, we borrow results from the area of belief update to tackle the problem of updating (instead of revising) answer-set programs. We prove a representation theorem which makes it possible to constructively define any operator satisfying a set of postulates derived from Katsuno and Mendelzon's postulates for belief update. We define a specific operator based on this theorem, examine its computational complexity and compare the behaviour of this operator with syntactic rule update semantics from the literature. Perhaps surprisingly, we uncover a serious drawback of all rule update operators based on Katsuno and Mendelzon's approach to update and on SE-models.


This chapter examines the law on collective dismissals, which involves the large-scale lay-off of labour by an employer. It first considers the meaning of 'collective redundancies' and discusses the basic obligations of the employer, namely the provisions of information, consultation and notification. It then turns to the detail of Chapter II of Part IV of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (TULRCA); the nature and extent of the employer's obligations; and the consequences when the employer fails to comply with the statutory information and consultation procedures in section 188 of TULRCA.


Abstract We present the first direct observation of high-coordinated Si and Al occurring together in a series of high-pressure sodium aluminosilicate glasses, quenched from melts at 6 GPa. Using 29Si MAS NMR, we observe that a small amount of Al does not have a significant effect on the amount of VSi or VISi generated, but that larger Al concentrations lead to a gradual decrease in both these species. 27Al MAS NMR spectra show that samples with small amounts of Al have extremely high mean Al coordination values of up to 5.49, but that larger Al concentrations cause a gradual decrease in both VAl and VIAl. Although mean Al and Si coordination numbers both decrease with increasing Al contents, the weighted combined (Al+Si) coordination number increases. Silicon and Al resonances shift in frequency with increasing pressure or changing Al concentration, indicating additional structural changes, including compression of network bond angles. Increases in the 23Na isotropic chemical shifts indicate decreases in the mean Na-O bond lengths with increasing pressure, which are more dramatic at higher Al contents. Recovered glass densities are about 10 to 15% greater than those of similar ambient pressure samples. However, the density increases due to the combined coordination changes of Al and Si are estimated to total only about 1 to 2%, and are roughly constant with composition despite the large effects of Al content on the individual coordinations of the two cations. Thus, effects of other structural changes must be significant to the overall densification. Apparent equilibrium constants for reactions involving the generation of high-coordinated species show systematic behavior, which suggests an internal consistency to the observed Si and Al coordination number shifts.


This paper discusses a professional practical project that dealt with the collections care undertaken for one instance of found-in-collections material. Consisting of 336 four-by-five and five-by-seven gelatin glass plate negatives by American travel and wildlife filmmakers Martin and Osa Johnson, the material had been cared for in the vaults of the permanent collection at the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film for many years without the establishment of official acquisition or public accessibility. The project discussed in this paper involved the trajectory of care required to make the Johnson material available, including provenance research, official acquisition, registration documentation, cataloguing, and housing improvements. The paper discusses this process, analyzing decisions made from issues of arrangement to culturally-sensitive description in associated cataloguing records. Finally, this paper suggests avenues for potential use of the Johnson material, arguing for the possibilities afforded by accessibility.


Abstract : The advantages of lithium-based batteries over lead acid batteries have created great interest in developing safe and cost effective drop-in replacements. To achieve the required cost effectiveness and safety of the battery, Battery Management Systems (BMS) are critical to avoid over-charging, over-discharging, and continuously and accurately determining the State of Charge (SOC), State of Health (SOH), and State of Life (SOL) of the battery. In a program funded through a U.S. Army--TARDEC SBIR, the authors developed and tested a military-grade BMS that includes: (1) a Kalman Filter-based SOC estimation algorithm with better than 5% accuracy; (2) continuous cell monitoring to avoid over-charging or over-discharging; (3) active and passive cell balancing; (4) an innovative, low cost, and high-accuracy current sensing method; and (5) vehicle-level communication capability. Our BMS uses a modular, universal architecture that supports any lithium-based chemistry, pack size, or configuration. This is particularly important when multiple packs are series connected to achieve high voltage. This paper presents our design approach, test data which validate performance expectations, and our plans for integrating this BMS with an emerging class of 6T format batteries for U.S. Army tactical vehicle starting and Silent Watch energy storage needs.


The goal of this study is to test the role of mitochondria and of mitochondrial metabolism in determining the processes that influence aging of female and male Drosophila. We observe that Drosophila simulans females tended to have shorter lifespan, higher levels of hydrogen peroxide production and significantly lower levels of catalase but not superoxide dismutase compared to males. In contrast, mammalian females tend to be longer lived, have lower rates of reactive oxygen species production and higher antioxidant activity. In both Drosophila and mammals, mitochondria extracted from females consume a higher quantity of oxygen when provided with adenosine diphosphate and have a greater mtDNA copy number than males. Combined, these data illustrate important similarities between the parameters that influence aging and mitochondrial metabolism in Drosophila and in mammals but also show surprising differences.


A method for optimizing the geometrical layout for a façade-mounted solar photovoltaic array is presented. Unlike conventional studies, this work takes into account the finite height of the façade, which is more realistic. The proposed analytical relationships and optimization routine evaluate the best tilt angle and the number of panels such that the whole layout receives the maximum solar radiation, year-round. This is achieved while ensuring that the panels are at a safe minimum distance to avoid mutual shading issues. Validation was performed by simulating the scenarios and comparing the results with manual measurements taken in a three-dimensional drafting program. The method was then used to evaluate designs for facades with a variety of orientations, hypothetically located in Auckland, New Zealand. For this case study, the per-panel and total year-round energy accumulation associated with the number of panels were determined. The results showed that more panels can be integrated into constrained fields by sacrificing the year-round best value of the tilt angle. Therefore, increasing the number of panels may decrease the energy accumulation performance.


The eukaryotic homologues of the Escherichia coli RecQ DNA helicase play conserved roles in the maintenance of genome stability. Results obtained in yeast and mammalian systems are beginning to form a coherent picture about what these helicases do to ensure normal cell division and why humans who lack these enzymes are cancer prone. Recent data suggest that the yeast enzyme Sgs1p, as well as two human homologues, which are encoded by the Bloom's and Werner's syndrome genes, function during DNA replication and possibly in a replication checkpoint specific to S phase.


We present a new set of electrical field effect measurements on granular aluminium insulating thin films. We have explored how the conductance relaxations induced by gate voltage changes depend on the age of the system, namely the time elapsed since its quench at low temperature. A clear age dependence of the relaxations is seen, qualitatively similar to ageing effects seen in other well studied glassy systems such as spin glasses or polymers. We explain how our results differ from the previous ones obtained with different protocols in indium oxide and granular aluminium thin films. Our experimental findings bring new information on the dynamics of the system and put new constraints on the theoretical models that may explain slow conductance relaxations in disordered insulators.


One of the most important effects of digitalisation in the field of labor law is that it eliminates the obligation to do the job in a specific physical space. Many jobs can now be done anywhere, thanks to virtual platforms or environments created over the internet. Although there are positive aspects of working in the virtual workplace, it causes problems that are difficult to overcome, especially in the field of labor law. New ways of working such as crowdwork and crowdsourcing, which emerged as a result of technological developments in the field of telecommunications, virtualized the workplace and caused many regulations established on the classical workplace concept in labor laws to become inapplicable. It is not possible for labor law, whose main purpose is to create an equitable environment between the employee and the employer, to ignore this development and to remain indifferent to the use of the change in the concept of the workplace in a way that will abolish the rights of the employees.


We describe an approach that uses causal and geometric reasoning to construct explanations for the purposes of the geometric features on the parts of a mechanical device. To identify the purpose of a feature, the device is simulated with and without the feature. The simulations are then translated into a "causal-process" representation, which allows qualitatively important differences to be identified. These differences reveal the behaviors caused and prevented by the feature and thus provide useful cues about the feature's purpose. A clear understanding of the feature's purpose, however, requires a detailed analysis of the causal connections between the caused and prevented behaviors. This presents a significant challenge because one has to understand how a behavior that normally takes place affects (or is affected by) another behavior that is normally absent. This article describes techniques for identifying such elusive relationships. These techniques employ a set of rules that can determine if one behavior enables or disables another that is spatially and temporally far away. They do so by geometrically examining the traces of the causal processes in the device's configuration space. Using the results of this analysis, our program can automatically generate text output describing how the feature performs its function.


BACKGROUND: Laparoscopic cholecystectomy is the standard of care for the treatment of symptomatic gallbladder disease and one of the most common procedures being performed by the general surgeons all over the world. With more and more endeavors being made in the field of laparoscopy, more and more complicated cases which were relatively contraindicated a few years ago, are now being tackled laparoscopically. AIM: Aims of this study is assessment of risk factors, diagnostic approach and management of cases undergoing difficult cholecystectomies on basis of clinical, USG, preoperative, intra operative findings, duration of surgery, rate of conversion, post op complications and duration of stay in hospital. MATERIAL & METHODS: Prospective study done from June 2012 to Nov. 2014, 192 cases undergoing laproscopic cholecystectomy included in study at tertiary care hospital. RESULT: Cholecystitis or pancreatitis and thickened GB wall, PREOP ERCP are found to be significantly associated with increased risk of conversion. Obesity (BMI≥30 kg/m) was significantly associated with difficulty in access to the peritoneal cavity. Various factors. CONCLUSION: clinical factors like male sex, previous acute cholecystitis or pancreatitis and ultrasonographic finding of gall bladder wall thickness ≥4 mm can help to predict difficult laparoscopic cholecystectomy and likelihood of conversion of laparoscopic cholecystectomy to open cholecystectomy.


Historians have long been intrigued by Japan's static national population during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, when the output of the economy was almost certainly growing. Was population held in check by high mortality or low fertility, or by some combination of the two? The author of this monograph suggests an answer through analysis of the population and tax registers of the village of Nakahara between 1717 and 1830. He finds that both mortality and registered fertility in Nakahara were strikingly low by comparison to eighteenth-century European communities. The causes of low mortality are uncertain, but low registered fertility was mainly the result of infanticide. The author shows, surprisingly, that infanticide was not primarily a function of poverty or the desperation of the moment but was practiced as a form of family planning, resulting from a clear understanding of the relationship between farming efficiency and family size and composition in an intensely competitive agrarian economy. The final chapter discusses the extent to which Nakahara may have been representative of rural Japan.


Mytilus edulis lysozyme responded differently from hen egg-white (HEW) lysozyme to sodium chloride when assayed by an agar-diffusion (lysoplate) technique with Micrococcus luteus as substrate. However at 1% (w/v) NaCl both enzymes gave similar dose response curves and this concentration was used in all lysoplate assays. The distribution of lysozyme in Mytilus edulis and other bivalves was investigated. In Mytilus the hipest concentrations were found in structures associated with digestion, particularly in the style and digestive gland. Similar distributions were found in Modiolus modiolus, Chlamys opercularis and Tellina tenuis. However, in Mya arenaria, highest concentrations were found in gill and digestive gland which may reflect differences in the choice of food particle if lysozyme is related to the proportion of bacteria utilized from the food. Lysozyme was purified from crystalline styles of Mytilus edulis by chromatography on Amberlite CG-50 carboxymethyl cellulose. The product was 90% pure, with a specific activity of 16,200 enzyme units per mg of protein, representing a 216-fold purification from crystalline style and purification compared to homogenates of whole animals (less shells). Collagenase and beta-glucuronidase activities, which were found in style homogenates were not detected in purified lysozyme. The enzyme satisfied Salton's criteria for lysozyme, lysing bacterial cells and reducing the turbidity of cell wall suspensions with the liberation of reducing groups and an amino sugar complex. The enzyme cleaved the beta1-4 glycosidic linkage between N-acetylmuramic acid and N-acetylglucosamine in the bacterial cell wall and thus was a mucopeptide N-acetylmuramylhydrolase (E.C.22.214.171.124). By sodium dodecyl sulphate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, the molecular weight was approximately 18,000 daltons and on isoelectric focusing the isoelectric point was 9.2. On polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis in acid gels Mytilus lysozyme migrated more slowly than HEW lysozyme. Both Mytilus and HEW lysozymes were eluted from Bio-Gel P-60 later than expected from their molecular weights. Also, there was a low recovery of the applied Mytilus lysozyme, possihly due to electrostatic interaction with the gel matrix. Purified Mytilus lysozyme was heat stable in the presence of gelatin and sodium chloride hut was inactivated at room temperature in solution in distilled water. At 100


A simple extended orthogonal space-frequency coded multiple input single output (MISO) orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transmitter diversity technique for wireless communications over frequency selective fading channels is presented. The proposed technique utilizes OFDM to transform frequency selective fading channels into multiple flat fading sub-channels on which space-frequency coding is applied. A four-branch transmitter diversity system is implemented without bandwidth expansion and with only one receive antenna. The associated simulations verify that the four-branch transmitter diversity scheme achieves a significant improvement in average bit-error rate (BER) performance. The proposed scheme also outperforms the previously reported scheme due to Yu et. al. with only single phase feedback, and that improvement is retained with quantized feedback. Since the angle feedback is on a per tone basis, the feedback information would be too large for any practical OFDM system. However, we adopt a method which exploits the correlation among the feedback terms for the subcarriers, i.e. a group based quantization technique to reduce the feedback overhead significantly, rendering this scheme attractive to broadband wireless access systems.


In this thesis work, we analyze the performance of a low - cost router which uses a Linux open source distribution optimized for routing, called Bifrost. The development of Bifrost started about ten years ago in the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU). The open source community is huge and within the community exists many useful open source tools that can be integrated and used in open source community. Instead of using only commercial and proprietary equipment, which is a safe but unfortunately expensive solution, it can be a matter of great advantage to use open source technology to a large extent.For the thesis project, we install and configure the Bifrost open source software based router, on a standard desktop computer with three LAN cards and we tested its functionality and evaluated its performance. The Bifrost based router basic features analyzed are two routing protocols (BGP and OSPF) and Inter-VLAN routing. The performance of the Bifrost open source software based router is evaluated in terms of its packet forwarding throughput. The results obtained from the experiment setup for the performance analysis are discussed and compared with a commercial proprietary solution (in our case, a Cisco router of similar calibre). This is important, since the open source distributions also must offer a performance that is comparable or good enough compared with the proprietary solutions.


The aim of this thesis is to enhance the management of supply systems in construction industry using lean principles. This study is an attempt to identify what kind of activities causes' construction process delay and how to perform lean concept into supply chain in practice. The objective is to assure on-time delivery of information and materials to construction sites at lowest cost and maximum value for the customer. These study problems have been analysed from a lean construction supply chain perspective, concentrating on decreasing and eliminating non-value adding activities in order to maximum the value for the customer. Supply complexity in construction in order to better understand which sections are easy to generate non-value adding activities.In the thesis, literature review is the main research method to support analysing and finding, including Ohno Taiichi identified seven wastes from Toyota Production System; five lean principles described by Womack and Jonas; Theory of constraint illustrated from Goldratt Eliyahu M.


The da Vinci Surgical System is an advanced minimally invasive surgical technique that has been widely applied in many fields of surgery. It was adopted relatively late in China, and its use in thoracic surgery is still growing. In this paper, we summarized its present applications in thoracic surgery. We also objectively evaluated its advantages and disadvantages in comparison with traditional open chest surgery and video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS). We believe that this technology has the potential to markedly change general thoracic surgery.


Character education is an effort to educate children in order to make decisions and practice them in their daily lives. Researchers are observing at TK B Puspa Melati Jember Odd semester year lesson 2019-2020 and obtained data about 46% or nearly half of the existing learners experiencing a level of low self-reliance. This research aims to improve the character's self-reliant through the game people's crank. The type of research used is research into class action (PTK). The procedure used is a cycle model. Based on the research results, the I cycle of students still has no independent attitude. Cycle II students have developed as expected (BSH), there are even some that are developing very well (BSB). It can be concluded that the people's games can improve the students ' independent character.
 Keywords: Independent Characters, the People's Game Crank


In postsocialist and postwar Bosnia-Herzegovina, popular dervish cults are re-emerging after several decades of (semi)clandestine existence due to official bans and repression imposed by the Yugoslav state socialist governmentality. This article explores how an absence of divine knowledge ensuing from this disruptive history—strongly felt among various Bosnian dervishes today—is transformed into spiritual creativity and an improvisatory dynamic mediated by charismatic sheikhs. It traces "creative moments" leading toward the formation of a Bosnian dervish cult and its realignment with translocal networks of dervish lodges to explore the dynamics of divine knowledge and its creation inside these networks. The ethnography presented here suggests that we move a step beyond mere sociological descriptions of how translocal cults are organized across distance to explore in a more nuanced way the historicity and the dynamics of how divine knowledge is (re)created and idiosyncratically appropriated within these networks.


The envisioned key role of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in assisting the upcoming mobile networks calls for addressing the challenge of their secure and safe integration in the airspace. The GPS spoofing is a prominent security threat of UAVs. In this paper, we propose a 5G-assisted UAV position monitoring and anti-GPS spoofing system that allows live detection of GPS spoofing by leveraging Uplink received signal strength (RSS) measurements to cross-check the position validity. We introduce the Adaptive Trustable Residence Area (ATRA); a novel strategy to determine the trust area within which the UAV's GPS position should be located in order to be considered as non-spoofed. The performance evaluation shows that the proposed solution can successfully detect spoofed GPS positions with a rate of above 95%.


We present and analyze a vector-borne disease model with two gamma distributed delays representing the incubation periods of the disease in the vector and hosts. The model assumes a logistic growth for both the host and vector populations and includes a density-dependent biting rate. We start by highlighting the role of density dependency in the vector's population by fitting the vector' model to data on tsetse flies. Our fitting routine uses Bayesian based Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods and statistics comparison tests. Then we proceed with our mathematical analysis by investigating the impact of both (distributed) delays on the model's equilibria and their stability properties. This leads to the derivation of an explicit conditions for the occurrence of backward bifurcation, showing in the process the role of nonlinearity in the bitting rate in shaping the model's bifurcation behavior. Finally, a sensitivity analysis is performed by means of the forward sensitivity index of the basic reproductive number to compare the effect of the mean and shape parameters of the delay on the initial disease transmission.


In a murine model of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) induced lung injury, it has previously been demonstrated that in the absence of T cells there is a delay in neutrophil recruitment and resolution of injury. Regulatory T cells (Tregs) interact with other lymphocytes including T cells and NK cells and have the ability to minimise inflammatory damage to the host cells. We hypothesised that Tregs suppress the production of IL-17 by lymphocytes, thus regulating the recruitment of neutrophils into the lung. We have utilised a human in vivo model of LPS induced acute lung injury (ALI) and have demonstrated that LPS inhalation results in an elevation of IL-17 in their bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF); we have also detected high levels of IL-17 in the BALF of ALI patients. Using a murine model of aerosolised intra-tracheal LPS delivery we have shown a rapid influx of Tregs into the lung by flow cytometry, as well as an increase in IL-17 in the BALF detected by ELISA. Elevation in IL-17 is accompanied by lung neutrophil recruitment and elevated levels of myeloperoxidase (MPO); the role of IL-17 in the initiation of the inflammatory process within the lung has also been demonstrated using IL-17 KO mice. Furthermore, when we depleted Tregs, prior to LPS administration, an increase in IL-17 is observed. Our data suggests that IL-17-producing lymphocytes are under the control of Tregs. This work opens up new avenues of exploration for therapeutic strategies to regulate immune responses in lung injury.


Targeted delivery of nanomedicine/nanoparticles (NM/NPs) to the site of disease (e.g., the tumor or lung injury) is of vital importance for improved therapeutic efficacy. Multimodal imaging platforms provide powerful tools for monitoring delivery and tissue distribution of drugs and NM/NPs. This study introduces a preclinical imaging platform combining X-ray (two modes) and fluorescence imaging (three modes) techniques for time-resolved in vivo and spatially resolved ex vivo visualization of mouse lungs during pulmonary NP delivery. Liquid mixtures of iodine (contrast agent for X-ray) and/or (nano)particles (X-ray absorbing and/or fluorescent) are delivered to different regions of the lung via intratracheal instillation, nasal aspiration, and ventilator-assisted aerosol inhalation. It is demonstrated that in vivo propagation-based phase-contrast X-ray imaging elucidates the dynamic process of pulmonary NP delivery, while ex vivo fluorescence imaging (e.g., tissue-cleared light sheet fluorescence microscopy) reveals the quantitative 3D drug/particle distribution throughout the entire lung with cellular resolution. The novel and complementary information from this imaging platform unveils the dynamics and mechanisms of pulmonary NM/NP delivery and deposition for each of the delivery routes, which provides guidance on optimizing pulmonary delivery techniques and novel-designed NM for targeting and efficacy.


The feasibility of a sea-level canal between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans is under consideration by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as the agent for a five-man Interoceanic Canal Commission appointed by President Johnson. This paper describes the tidal and hydrologic studies made for the feasibility study. The study estimates tidal currents and evaluates their impact on the canal and the potential shipping. Considerable variation in character and range of tides is experienced. Currents in a sea-level canal were based on a mathematical model utilizing an explicit finite difference method. The current varies with tidal range and phasing and canal characteristics; cross-sectional width and depth, length, and roughness. Currents caused by the flow of fresh water during flood times are also considered. A method of reducing tidal currents is described.


Vitex pubescens Vahl is one of the many types of wood that grows in West Kalimantan. Vitex pubescens Vahl grow well in primary and secondary forests and on open lands burnt. People use Vitex pubescens Vahl for energy wood. The study of mycorrhizal fungi asosiation in Vitex pubescens Vahl aim to get the types of mycorrhizal and mycorrhizal density in Vitex pubescens Vahl stands. This research uses descriptive method by taking soil samples in the  rhizosfere some level Vitex pubescens Vahl tree poles and trees. At each stage of growth Vitex pubescens Vahl each taken 3 plants. The results obtained in the Vitex pubescens Vahl stands found that eight  morphotife. Obtain research results that the residual laban found eight CMA morfotipe spores which are all included in the genus Glomus. AMF spore density in stands of depth small trees   (0-10 cm) with a spore density of 28-78 with a mean of 40 the number of spores and depth (10-20 cm) with a spore density of 35-75 with a mean of 54 the number of spores at a level depth tree (0-10 cm) with a spore density of 25-65 with a mean of 54 the number of spores and depth (10-20 cm) with a spore density of 26-51 with a mean of 32 number of spores. Key word: Vitex pubescens Vahl, assosiation,  mycorrhizal, rhizosfere, glomus


Sales work is a key feature of the contemporary service economy which
has prompted considerable academic debate. This has centred on the
processes of standardization exemplified by sales routines and scripts. It
is frequently suggested that these management devices are
unproblematically embraced by workers who share a mutual interest
with management in controlling customer behaviour and masking the
contradictions of simultaneously displaying empathy while 'closing the
deal'. In these accounts, sales workers are denied agency. This paper
questions this assumption by presenting empirical evidence from a case
study of sales advisors in a large chain of private fitness clubs whose job
is to sell annual memberships. The research involved eight interviews
with trainers and managers at head office. We were also able to tape
record and participate in a five day training course that all newly
appointed sales advisors have to attend. We carried out interviews with
all eight trainees a couple of months after the end of the course. This
allowed us to follow the path of newly appointed sales advisors by
hearing, seeing and experiencing the training they receive, and then
gathering data on the extent to which the training is followed on the
ground. The data show that although the training course placed strong
emphasis on routines designed to control customers and maximize the
commission received by sales advisors, once back on 'home' territory
advisors often chose to approach customers with less instrumentality.
This contrast is explained by reference to the advisors' past dispositions
and experiences, and to the specific local conditions in which sales take
place.


Biofuel cells implanted in living clams and producing sustainable electrical power in vivo were integrated in batteries. The "electrified" clams, being biotechnological living "devices", were able to generate electrical power using physiologically produced glucose as the fuel. The activity of the living batteries was dependent on the environmental conditions which are affecting physiological processes in clams. The living batteries generated open circuitry voltage (Voc), short circuitry current (Isc) and maximum power (Pmax) of ca. 800 mV, 25 μA, 5.2 μW and ca. 360 mV, 300 μA, 37 μW for the serial and parallel connections of 3 "electrified" clams, respectively. A clam-battery was connected to a capacitor which was charged up to 240 mV providing accumulation of electrical energy up to 28.8 mJ. Discharging the capacitor on an electrical motor resulted in the motor rotation. The "electrified" clams integrated in batteries demonstrated the possibility of activating electrical/electronic devices using energy produced in vivo.


Evidence of a linkage between developmental stuttering and insomnia has been suggested in earlier studies. This study explores the prevalence of four symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) in individuals with and without stuttering.

 Frequency of snoring/stoppage of breath, sleep fragmentation, difficulty concentrating, and fatigue were analyzed using data from The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health), a nationally representative survey study following 13,564 U.S. respondents over 20 years. Binary and multinomial logistic regressions were used to assess the relationship between stuttering and all four OSA symptoms, controlling for sex, age, race, ethnicity, body mass index, and potentially confounding conditions. To account for the occurrence of multiple symptoms, a structural equation framework modeled the relationships between the symptoms, the control variables, and stuttering simultaneously.

 The sample included 261 participants (1.7% of the total respondents) who identified themselves as people who stutter, composed of 169 men and 92 women. Compared with their fluent counterparts, individuals who stutter report that they snore or stop breathing during sleep (odds ratio [
 OR
 ] = 1.41), experience sleep fragmentation (
 OR
 = 1.33), have difficulty concentrating (
 OR
 = 1.85), and experience fatigue (
 OR
 = 1.04). The structural equation framework indicated that snoring/stoppage of breath, sleep fragmentation, and difficulty concentrating are significantly and positively related to one another and to stuttering.

 Speech-language pathologists should be aware of these symptoms among young adults who stutter and consider that they are suggestive of OSA. Additional research is needed to fully assess the directionality of influence in the relationship of stuttering and symptoms of OSA.


Particleboards bonded with urea formaldehyde (UF) and a combination of UF and methylene diphenyl diisocyanate (MDI) resins were manufactured using wheat straws modified through different steam explosion treatments. The effect of steam explosion treatment, resin system, and mixing ratios of wood and straw materials on the panel properties was investigated. Generally, with steam explosion treatment of straw fibers, panel properties in bending and internal bond (IB) strength increased, thickness swelling (TS) and water absorption (WA) decreased. The bending properties for the panels made from the straws pretreated with 12 h water-soaking were significantly improved at the UF/MDI content level of 5%/1%. The IB strength dramatically increased, while TS and WA decreased with the use of dual resins. With increased weight ratio of wheat straw to wood particles, the bending properties, IB strength, TS and WA deteriorated. Pure wheat straw boards had the lowest properties. Wood particles in substitution for part of straw materials helped improve the panel properties. The results demonstrated that steam explosion modification and/or its combination with UF/MDI dual resin system can be a feasible approach to improve the bonding strength for wheat straw based particleboards.


The propagation of light guided in optical fibers is affected in different ways by bending or twisting. Here we treat the polarization properties of twisted six-fold symmetric photonic crystal fibers. Using a coordinate frame that follows the twisting structure, we show that the governing equation for the fiber modes resembles the Pauli equation for electrons in weak magnetic fields. This implies index splitting between left and right circularly polarized modes, which are degenerate in the untwisted fiber. We develop a theoretical model, based on perturbation theory and symmetry properties, to predict the observable circular birefringence (i.e., optical activity) associated with this splitting. Our overall conclusion is that optical activity requires the rotational symmetry to be broken so as to allow coupling between different total angular momentum states.


Aging management of the existing fleet of nuclear power plants is becoming an increasingly important topic, especially as many units are approaching their design lifetimes or are entering long-term operation. As these plants continue to age, there is an increased probability for the need of repairs due to extended exposure to a harsh environment. It is paramount that qualified and validated solutions are readily available.
 A repair method for a postulated through cladding crack into the low alloy steel of a nuclear power plant's reactor pressure vessel has been investigated in this study. This paper is part of larger study that evaluates the current possibilities of such repair welds. The present paper documents the weld-trials and method selection. A parallel paper describes numerical simulations and optimization of weld parameters. The presented weld-trial represents a case where a postulated crack has been excavated and repaired using a nickel base Alloy 52M filler metal by gas metal arc welding-cold metal transfer with a robotic arm. A SA235 structural steel has been used as a base material in this weld-trial. No pre-heating or post-weld heat treatment will be applied, as it would be nearly impossible to apply these treatments in a reactor pressure vessel repair situation.
 While Alloy 52M presents good material properties, in terms of resistance to environmentally assisted degradation mechanisms, such as primary water stress corrosion cracking, it is notoriously difficult to weld. Some difficulties and challenges during welding include a sluggish weld puddle, formation of titanium and/or aluminium oxides and its susceptibility to lack of fusion defects and weld metal cracking, such as ductility dip cracking and solidification cracking. Moreover, gas metal arc welding-cold metal transfer is not traditionally used in the nuclear industry. Nonetheless, it presents some interesting advantages, specifically concerning heat input requirements and automation possibilities, as compared to traditional welding methods.
 The mechanical properties, in terms of indentation hardness, and microstructure of a weld-trial sample have been evaluated in this study. The fusion boundary and heat affected zone were the main areas of focus when evaluating the mechanical and microstructural properties. Detailed microstructural characterization using electron backscatter diffraction and nanoindentation were performed across the weld interface. Based on these results, the gas metal arc welding cold metal transfer is seen as a potential high-quality weld method for reactor pressure vessel repair cases.