Abstract Purpose This article examines if longer posterior spinal fusions with instrumentation (PSFI) into the lumbar spine (L3/4) alter spinopelvic parameters compared with selective fusions to T12/L1/L2 in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) patients. Methods We analysed radiographs of 84 AIS patients, 58 (69%) females and 26 (31%) males, who underwent PSFI at an mean age of 15 years ± 2.5 years, range 10 years to 21 years, between 1st January 2007 and 31st December 2014. Radiographic parameters were measured pre- and post-operatively at most recent follow-up (range 2 years to 8.2 years): pelvic incidence (PI), lumbar lordosis (LL, L1–S1 and L4–S1), sagittal vertical alignment (SVA), scoliosis angle and proximal junctional kyphosis (PJK). PI–LL was calculated. Data was analysed using t-tests or Wilcoxon rank-sum tests. Results In total, 32 patients underwent a selective fusion with lowest instrumented vertebra (LIV) T12–L2, and 52 patients underwent a fusion with LIV L3–L4. In both groups, scoliosis angle was significantly corrected at follow-up (p < 0.005). Pre-operatively, both groups had similar LL (L1–S1) and PI–LL. Post-operatively, LL increased in the L3–4 fusion group (p < 0.005) but did not change in the selective fusion group (p = 0.116). This change in LL in the L3–4 fusion group affected the post-operative PI–LL (T12–L2 fusion -4.9° versus L3–4 fusion -13.6°, p = 0.002). No differences were seen in PI, SVA or LL L4–S1 between groups. Radiographic PJK occurred in seven of the L3–4 patients with and without PJK (noPJK –8.8° versus PJK –25.8°, p = 0.026). Conclusions In patients who underwent a fusion ending at L3 or L4, LL was increased. This altered the PI–LL relationship, and appeared to increase the risk of PJK. Level of evidence III


A novel approach to symbol spaced adaptive multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) equalization is proposed. Different functionalities are defined for static versus adaptive equalizers, to minimize noise enhancement. Static equalizers are used for anti-aliasing filtering and bulk CD compensation, and a newly proposed modified-LMS-based adaptive MIMO equalizer is used to compensate for fiber random impairments such as residual CD and PMD. In addition, the proposed technique enables the use of low-cost reduced bandwidth components in both transmit and receive sides, and supports aggressive in-line optical filtering in the existing WDM network. Moreover, the proposed technique perfectly suits coherent metro applications, allowing significant power savings in application specific integrated circuit implementation.


A 2001 IBM manifesto observed that a looming software complexity crisis -caused by applications and environments that number into the tens of millions of lines of code - threatened to halt progress in computing. The manifesto noted the almost impossible difficulty of managing current and planned computing systems, which require integrating several heterogeneous environments into corporate-wide computing systems that extend into the Internet. Autonomic computing, perhaps the most attractive approach to solving this problem, creates systems that can manage themselves when given high-level objectives from administrators. Systems manage themselves according to an administrator's goals. New components integrate as effortlessly as a new cell establishes itself in the human body. These ideas are not science fiction, but elements of the grand challenge to create self-managing computing systems.


&NA; Date Presented 4/1/2017 This phenomenological qualitative study addressed best presentation of intervention materials for older adults with low vision. Practitioners can incorporate participant feedback from this study when developing or implementing intervention plans to benefit as many clients as possible. Primary Author and Speaker: Sarah Blaylock Contributing Authors: Laura Vogtle, Mary Warren


A new kind of exhaust after-treatment system having Diesel Particulate Filter, Three Way Catalytic (TWC) converter (in substitution of SCR & Oxidation catalyst) with new kind of DEF/Ad Blue-Dosing Module with Manual Control, Supply Line strategy and Supply module, is prepared in order to Finding the scope for increasing the efficiency of a Urea-SCR system. The results show that there is a 95% reduction in the CO and HC emissions after arranging the setup. It is also found that on an average there is a 75% reduction in the NOx.


In this report, we present preliminary experiments towards automatic inference and evaluation of pronunciation models based on multiple utterances of each lexicon word and their given baseline pronunciation model (baseform phonetic transcription). In the present system, the pronunciation models are extracted by decoding each of the training utterances through a series of hidden Markov models (HMM), first initialized to only allow the generation of the baseline transcription but iteratively relaxed to converge to a truly ergodic HMM. Each of the generated pronunciation models are then evaluated based on their confidence measure and their Levenshtein distance with the baseform model. The goal of this study is twofold. First, we show that this approach is appropriate to generate robust pronunciation variants. Second, we intend to use this approach to optimize these pronunciation models, by modifying/extending the acoustic features, to increase their confidence scores. In other words, while classical pronunciation modeling approaches usually attempt to make the models more and more complex to capture the pronunciation variability, we intend to fix the pronunciation models and optimize the acoustic parameters to maximize their matching and discriminant properties.


Given the importance of developing accurate models of any complex system, the modeling process often seeks to be comprehensive by including experts and community members. While many qualitative modeling processes can produce models in the form of maps (e.g., cognitive/concept mapping, causal loop diagrams), they are generally conducted with a facilitator. The limited capacity of the facilitators limits the number of participants. The need to be either physically present (for face-to-face sessions) or at least in a compatible time zone (for phone interviews) also limits the geographical diversity of participants. In addition, participants may not openly express their beliefs (e.g., weight discrimination, political views) when perceiving that they may not be well received by a facilitator or others in the room. In contrast, the naturally occurring exchange of perspectives on social media provides an unobtrusive approach to collecting beliefs on causes and consequences of such complex systems. Mining social media also supports a scalable approach and a geographically diverse sample. While obtaining a conceptual model via social media can inform policymakers about popular support for possible policies, the model may stand in stark contrast with an expert-based model. Identifying and reconciling these differences is an important step to integrate social computing with policy making. The pipeline to automatically validate large conceptual models, here of obesity and politics using large text data-set (academic reports or social media like Twitter) comprise technical innovation of applying machine learning approaches. This is achieved by generating relevant keywords using wordnet interface from NLTK, articulating topic modelling using gensim LDA model, entity recognition using Google Cloud Natural language processing API and categorizing themes by count vectorizer and tf-idf transformer using scikit-learn library. Once the pipeline validates the model, it is further suggested for extension by mining literature or Twitter conversations and using Granger causality tests on the time series gained from respective sources of data. Later we realize the impact of the shift in public opinion on Twitter, which can alter the results of validation and extension of conceptual models while using our computational methods. So we finally compare the sentiment analysis and sarcasm detection results on these conceptual models. Analyzing these results we discuss whether the confirmed and extended associations in our conceptual model are an artifact of our method or an accurate reflection of events related to that complex conceptual model. The combination of these machine


A third of global fish stocks are overexploited and many are economically underperforming, resulting in potential unrealized net economic benefits of USD 51 to 83 billion annually. However, this aggregate view, while useful for global policy discussion, may obscure the view for those actors who engage at a regional level. Therefore, we develop a method to associate large companies with their fishing operations and evaluate the biological sustainability of these operations. We link current fish biomass levels and landings to the revenue streams of the companies under study to compute potentially unrealized fisheries revenues and profits at the level of individual firms. We illustrate our method using two case studies: anchoveta (Engraulis ringens; Engraulidae) in Peru and menhaden in the USA (Brevoortia patronus and B. tyrannus; Clupeidae). We demonstrate that both these fisheries could potentially increase their revenues compared to the current levels of exploitation. We estimate the net but unrealized fishery benefits for the companies under question. This information could be useful to investors and business owners who might want to be aware of the actual fisheries performance options of the companies they invest in.


Transcript profiling is crucial to study biological systems, and various platforms have been implemented to survey mRNAs at the genome scale. We have assessed the performance of the CATMA microarray designed for Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) transcriptome analysis and compared it with the Agilent and Affymetrix commercial platforms. The CATMA array consists of gene-specific sequence tags of 150 to 500 bp, the Agilent (Arabidopsis 2) array of 60mer oligonucleotides, and the Affymetrix gene chip (ATH1) of 25mer oligonucleotide sets. We have matched each probe repertoire with the Arabidopsis genome annotation (The Institute for Genomic Research release 5.0) and determined the correspondence between them. Array performance was analyzed by hybridization with labeled targets derived from eight RNA samples made of shoot total RNA spiked with a calibrated series of 14 control transcripts. CATMA arrays showed the largest dynamic range extending over three to four logs. Agilent and Affymetrix arrays displayed a narrower range, presumably because signal saturation occurred for transcripts at concentrations beyond 1,000 copies per cell. Sensitivity was comparable for all three platforms. For Affymetrix GeneChip data, the RMA software package outperformed Microarray Suite 5.0 for all investigated criteria, confirming that the information provided by the mismatch oligonucleotides has no added value. In addition, taking advantage of replicates in our dataset, we conducted a robust statistical analysis of the platform propensity to yield false positive and false negative differentially expressed genes, and all gave satisfactory results. The results establish the CATMA array as a mature alternative to the Affymetrix and Agilent platforms.


MicroRNA (miRNA) processing begins with Drosha cleavage, the fidelity of which is critical for downstream processing and mature miRNA target specificity. To understand how pri-miRNA sequence and structure influence Drosha cleavage, we studied the maturation of three pri-miR-9 paralogs, which encode the same mature miRNA but differ in the surrounding scaffold. We show that pri-miR-9-1 has a unique Drosha cleavage profile due to its distorted and flexible stem structure. Cleavage of pri-miR-9-1, but not pri-miR-9-2 or pri-miR-9-3, generates an alternative-miR-9 with a shifted seed sequence that expands the scope of its target RNAs. Analyses of low grade glioma patient samples indicate that the alternative-miR-9 plays a distinct role in preventing tumor progression. To generalize our model, we provide evidence that distortion of pri-miRNA stems correlates with Drosha cleavage at non-canonical sites. Our studies reveal that pri-miRNA paralogs can have distinct functions via differential Drosha processing.


SARS coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) of the family Coronaviridae is an enveloped, positive-sense, single-stranded RNA betacoronavirus encoding a SARS-COV-2 Main protease PDB:6LU7 with Unliganded Active Site (2019-NCOV, Coronavirus Disease 2019, that infect humans historically. Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), an antimalarial has been proposed as possible treatment for coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). Ischemic heart disease (IHD) is the leading cause of death and a major economic burden worldwide. It is the cause of over 30% of total annual deaths and constitutes 17% of overall national health expenditure in the United States (U.S.) The single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) NOS3 894GT located in exon 7 (also known as Glu298Asp, rs1799983) is a genetic marker that has been specifically linked to an increased risk of IHD, hypertension, coronary spasms, and stent re-stenosis. Quantum mechanics, molecular mechanics, molecular dynamics (MD), and combinations have shown superior performance to other drug design approaches providing an unprecedented opportunity in the rational drug development fields and for the developing of innovative drug repositioning methods. The availability of newer modeling techniques with integration of the state of art deep learning algorithm can be modeled as a recommendation system that recommends novel treatments based on known drug-disease powerful computational resources. The formulation under this drug repositioning recommendation system could provide us with a deep learning model and generate the target-focused de novo libraries for the generations of a generate good-quality data and reliable predictions for new chemical entities, impurities, monoclonal antibodies, chemicals, natural products, and a lot of other substances fuelling further development and growth of the field to balance the trade-off between the molecular complexity and the quality of such predictions assuming that the hidden factors that cannot be obtained by any other method where new drug-disease associations having not been validated can now be screened. Drug repurposing offers a promising alternative by integrating related data sources to dramatically shorten the process of traditional de novo development of a drug. We here present an approach of a fast Singular Constructed Classification and Regression NOS3 894GT –SARS-COV2-ORF-1a Model which could be subsequently used for virtual screening against the generated de novo cluster of COVID19 libraries and diverse FDA chemical libraries. QMMM Quantum Deep Learning functional Value Thresholding (SVT) algorithm to prioritize drug combinations in high-throughput screens and to stratify synergistic responses on SARS-COV-2 Main protease PDB:6LU7 With Unliganded Active Site (2019-NCOV, Coronavirus Disease 2019, by co-targeting the NOS3 894GT mutation for medications to treat COVID-19. At the core of our approach is the observation that the likelihood of synergy increases when screening small molecule, anti-viral compounds and other FDAs with either strong functional pharmacophoric similarity or dissimilarity. In this research paper, we estimated the druggable similarity by applying an inverse docking multitask machine learning approach to basal gene expression in acute respiratory distress syndrome and response to single drugs. We tested 18 small molecules and predicted their synergies in COVID19 SARS-COV-2 main protease PDB:6LU7 with unliganded active site (2019-NCOV), which is associated with 1,000,000 deaths worldwide, to devise therapeutic strategies, repurpose existing ones in order to counteract highly pathogenic SARS-CoV-2 infection and the associated NOS3-COVID-19 pathology. We anticipate that our approaches can be used for prioritization of drug combinations in large scale screenings, and to maximize the efficacy of the Colchicine, Baricitinib, Efornithine, Umifenofir, Hydroxychloroquine, Azathioprine, Cycloserine, Cobicistat and Linoleic acid drugs already known to induce synergy, ultimately enabling COVID19 hypoxic patient stratification.


We discuss possible modulation schemes to implement BB84 and B92 quantum key distribution protocols using frequency-coding method. We derive time evolution of quantum states of light in a Mach-Zehnder interferometer based optical intensity modulator. We then show that phase modulator-phase modulator (PM-PM) combination can be used to implement the B92 protocol and intensity modulator-intensity modulator (IM-IM) combination can be used to implement the BB84 protocol. However, the combinations-PM-IM or IM-PM-cannot be used to implement BB84 and B92 protocols using frequency-coding method. Finally, we discuss the security of frequency-coded implementation of B92 protocol.


This case explains marketing process for follow-on equity offerings, the direct and indirect costs of issue, and the long-run performance of equity issuers. Students use analysts' projections from which to estimate the intrinsic value of the company's share -- including the cost savings from the VEBA and financial improvements over the next several years. It is appropriate for use in corporate finance courses covering the topics of capital raising, equity financing, capital structure, costs of financing, funding alternatives, investment banking, and valuation. It presents the classic profile on an equity issuer -- a firm whose stock price has risen to new heights in recent months. Will the issue lead to additional value that creates opportunities for shareholders, or is it a sign the firm is overvalued? The case explores the thinking of a prominent investment manager who had accumulated a large stake in Goodyear and who did not see the need for Goodyear to make an equity issue at this time. The company's position was that the high stock would allow it to further strengthen its balance sheet and pursue international growth opportunities. Students are asked to decide what the investor should do with respect to the current offer -- buy, sell, or hold.


'Doubting Christianity; the Church and Doubt' is the theme of the fifty-second volume of Studies in Church History. Under the presidency of Professor Frances Andrews, historians explored the myriad ways in which doubt has tested and informed Christianity and the life of individual Christians. Men and women have always had doubts about ideas, or individual doctrines, if not faith itself; they have also doubted how truth can be authenticated. The means and the implications of expressing either kind of doubt are shaped by historical circumstance. Led by scholars including Kirstie Blair (Stirling), Matteo Duni (Syracuse University at Florence), Ian Forrest (Oxford), Janet Nelson (King's College, London), Charles Stang (Harvard), and Rowan Williams (Cambridge), the papers in this volume explore doubt from the Early Church to the contemporary world. They investigate a whole range of questions, from the familiar 'doubting Thomas', and the more surprising 'doubting John', through the pressing concerns of the Middle Ages (were relics authentic? how did bishops ensure that the information reaching them was not to be doubted?), to the competing ideological and confessional perspectives of the modern world. After the Enlightenment, scientific discoveries and the emphasis on rationalism further encouraged the academic scrutiny of the Bible and its providential message, while doubts about authority and truth grew louder. These questions persist into our own age. Can doubt and certainty co-exist? What is the place of scepticism? This fascinating collection of essays offers an introduction to the complex relationship between doubt, faith and the Christian churches.


Debugging is difficult and costly, especially for failures that occur after deployment. In prior work, we developed a suite of instrumentation and analysis tools, collectively titled the Crash Scene Investigation toolkit (CSI). These tools aid developers by providing additional information about failing program executions using latent data in post-failure memory dumps. While we showed that our technique is effective in reducing execution ambiguity, it lacked a proper user interface for developers. In this paper, we present CSIclipse, a work-in-progress plugin for the Eclipse integrated development environment (IDE) that brings our analyses directly to the user. The goal of our plugin is to ease the burden of debugging production failures by conveniently presenting CSI trace and analysis data with intuitive source code overlays and powerful data exploration mechanisms. While designed for our CSI data, our plugin is likely general enough to support trace data from a variety of program analyses.


Setting aside a few junk bands in the spectrum for unlicensed use was a radically deregulatory policy that combined free market principles with shared access to a ubiquitous, essential resource. Correcting a 100-year old public policy mistake unleashed a torrent of entrepreneurial activity, innovation and investment. Allowing the public to use the radio spectrum on an unlicensed basis removed the biggest barrier to entry into wireless communications. The unlicensed model succeeded because a new and much wider group of entrepreneurs had the opportunity to develop products and services servicer that consumers value and are willing to pay for. Once the barrier to access to an essential input was removed, equipment manufactures can develop devise, network operators deploy infrastructure and applications developers provide services. The unlicensed model succeeded because removing the spectrum barrier to entry decentralized decision making, deconcentrated investment, promoted an end-user focus, allowed user innovation and lowered transaction costs. Ironically, the FCC, which fathered this remarkable success, has never studied it in detail. Predictably, the advocates of exclusive licenses have never come to grips with the remarkable success of the unlicensed model. Unfortunately, these gaps in knowledge now pose a threat to the future of mobile data communications. Without a proper appreciation for the vital importance of unlicensed to the success of wireless broadband communications, some policy makers are proposing a short-sighted spectrum policy that would strangle the future growth of the unlicensed model. This paper shows that by every measure of economic performance – device shipments, users, usage, efficiency, value and innovation – the unlicensed model has equaled or exceeded the exclusive licensed model in the past decade. Simply put, without access to unlicensed spectrum, wireless broadband service would be much more costly and far less valuable. Consumers would buy less of it resulting in fewer jobs and less tax revenue.By the end of 2010 there were thousands more devices certified for use in the unlicensed spectrum than in licensed spectrum. The number of users of unlicensed spectrum in the United States exceeded the number of users of exclusive licensed spectrum for broadband data purposes by 30 percent. The dramatic growth is even stronger in business applications, where intensive intra-firm communications improve the efficiency of health care delivery, the electricity grid, inventory management and fleet monitoring. Cellular broadband providers were offloading over one-third of their traffic into the unlicensed spectrum, with the expectation that that figure would grow dramatically. Avoiding the construction of over 100,000 cell sites, they avoided incurring annual capital and operating costs of over $25 billion. Instead the initial hop to the Internet was provided by Wi-Fi networks at less than one-tenth the cost. Counting standards, network technologies, devices and applications, there was substantially more innovation in the unlicensed space than the exclusive licensed. Valuing users and uses at market prices puts the annual value of activity in the unlicensed space at over $50 billion, at least as high as the value of activity in the exclusive licensed space. The challenges of continued expansion of mobile communications involve not only increasing quantities of data traffic, but also increasing diversity in the needs of different types of communications. The prospects for unlicensed spectrum to continue to play a critical and expanding role are great. Making additional high-quality spectrum available for unlicensed use will grow the sector because the complementary relationship between unlicensed and licensed increases the value of licenses. The much larger wireless data sector that results will generate more economic activity and more general revenues.


The banking industry is financial institution that developed quite well in Indonesia. Basically the function of a bank is a financial institution that connects between the parties require funds to parties who have surplus funds , or can be said to be a collector of funds from surplus units and channeling funds to deficit units ( financial intermediary ) . According to the Financial Stability Review , the financial institution with the highest number is BPR . BPR growth must be balanced with a more healthy condition BPR anyway , in order to provide maximum service to the community and maintain the existence of the BPR . This study aims to determine how the soundness of the Bank in the period 2011 – 2015. This type of research is descriptive research with quantitative approach. The variables used were risk profile as measured by the ratio of NPL, LDR and BOPO, good corporate governance is measured through self- assessment results, profitability as measured by ROA and ROE, and Capital as measured by the ratio of CAR. The results showed that during the period 2011 to 2015 the Bank always obtain a rating of 1 or very healthy. NPL ratio calculation and LDR describe the bank has to manage risks properly. GCG assessment indicates corporate governance has done well. The calculation of ROA and NIM shows the bank's ability to achieve high profits. CAR calculation is always above the minimum limit Bank Indonesia is considered able to manage its capital. However, in the study the author also explains that the method of RGEC is not fully suitable to be applied in the BPR due to the method of GCG demanding opponess can not be met, because the data of the method of CGC is not publishhed in Bank Indonesia. As well as fully into the secret of the company.


Transformation of C3H10T1/2 cells by exposure to ultraviolet (UV) irradiation followed by tetradecanoyl phorbol acetate (TPA) has been used as a model of two-stage carcinogenesis. However, cells cloned from UV-TPA-induced foci (UV-TDTx cells) had a unique phenotype. Cloned UV-TDTx cells appeared transformed in pure culture but were unable to form foci when cocultured with C3H10T1/2 cells. However, in the presence of TPA, UV-TDTx cells form foci in mixed culture with C3H10T1/2 cells. This phenotype was the only one observed for UV-TPA transformants. These data suggest that communal suppression of cell division is a discrete phenomenon that must be overcome as one step in the multistage process of transformation, and this protocol permits the routine isolation of transformed cells responsive to density-dependent growth suppression.


Silica/titania composite particles were prepared by co-oxidation of titanium-tetra-isopropoxide and hexamethyldisiloxane in a co-flow diffusion flame reactor. The influence of precursor composition on product powder characteristics was studied by x-ray diffraction, nitrogen adsorption, electron microscopy, elemental mapping, and energy-dispersive x-ray analysis. The flame temperature was measured by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. The evolution of composite particle morphology from ramified agglomerates to spot- or fully coated particles was investigated by thermophoretic sampling and transmission/scanning electron microscopy. At 40–60 wt% TiO_2, particles with segregated regions of silica and titania were formed, while at 80 wt% TiO_2 rough silica coatings were obtained. Rapid flame-quenching with a critical flow nozzle at 5 cm above the burner nearly halved the product particle size, changed its crystallinity from pure anatase to mostly rutile and resulted in smooth silica coatings on particles containing 80 wt% TiO_2.


In this seminar, I will present our recent work on the growth and electrochemical properties of single crystalline vanadium pentoxide (V2O5) nanorod and Ni-V2O5·nH2O nanocable arrays. These nanostructures were prepared by solution synthesis and template-based electrodeposition. Processing, morphology, structure and electrochemical properties of these nanostructures will be discussed. These nanostructured electrodes of vanadium pentoxide demonstrate significantly enhanced intercalation capcity and charge/discharge rate compared to the plain film electrodes, due to the high surface area and short diffusion distance offered by nanostructure.


namely teletext, videotext, on-line databases and computer-aided publishing. The four categories into which electronic materials (type of information being published electronically) may be divided are discussed. These are journal and newspaper related, book and directory related, in-house technical documentation, and information in electronic form only. The areas of corporate electronic publishing, micropublishing, and standardisation, currently generating interest either as a result of their promise or their problems, are examined. Finally, the impact and acceptance of electronic publishing systems for the four main user groups of librarians, professional users, corporate users and domestic users are outlined.


This study looks at the vulnerable population of refugees, specifically refugee youth. Specific attention is paid to mental health issues, notions of belonging, adapting, and acculturation, and the potential role that career guidance education can play in positively impacting the mental health and long-term resettlement success of refugee youth. Results from a search of published literature and interviews with local resettlement organizations in Pittsburgh, PA are summarized. The findings show that the experiences of traumatic events in their country of origin and that life conditions in countries of resettlement, significantly impact the mental health and development of refugee health. Mental health conditions noted in refugee populations include post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression. Evident in the literature is the hope that the role of education holds for refugee youth and the positive gains that a sense of school belonging has on their depression levels. Career guidance education curricula for general student populations in the United States, has multiple social, educational, and economic benefits. This study suggests that career guidance education curricula targeted to resettled refugee youth, could increase their sense of self-agency, self-efficacy, and empowerment thereby increasing feelings of overall well being and leading to long-term resettlement success. The issue of the status of refugee youths' mental health and the potential role that career guidance education can have in helping them understand, think about, and plan for their future is extremely salient to the field of public health. However, it is unknown whether or not career guidance education curricula would be relevant to refugee youth due to differing cultural models dictating career choice and expectations. Recommendations for future research and program development addressing the health and well-being of refugee youth in the Pittsburgh area are provided.


This essay offers a micro-historical reconstruction of a fateful choice made by the United States. Satisfactory reconstructions of this kind are rare. When it comes to historical episodes of import, even those that have been extensively written about and researched, it is often difficult to identify when the critical choices actually occurred. It is even more difficult to reconstruct, with a policymaker's eye, the information available at the time, the institutional context, and the plausibly available alternative courses of action.


In this study, the effects of progestagen and different doses of PMSG (250 I.U and 400 I.U) treatment on pregnancy, lambing and multiple birth rates in Border Leicester x Booroola (Ff) x Merinos and Border Lecister x Booroola (ff) x Merinos ewes in the anoestrus cycle were examined. It was found that in ewes with Ff genotype, 250 I.U PMSG dose had a positive but non- significant effect on the pregnancy rate and it was significant (p<0.01) on lambing and twinning rate. On the other hand, in ewes with ff genotype, it was found that the effect of progestagen + 400 I.U PMSG treatment on the same traits was significant (p<0.01). It was determined that the pregnancy, lambing and multiple birth rates in ewes with Ff and ff genotypes which werereated with exo- gen hormone were higher (p<0.01) than ewes with ff genotype which wereot treated with exogen hormone.


John William Colenso (1814–83) was appointed the first Bishop of Natal in 1853 and settled there in 1855. He devoted great energy to developing the diocese, overseeing the completion of the cathedral in Pietermaritzburg, the building of churches in Durban and Richmond and the establishment of mission stations. He also learned Zulu and set up a printing press. He published a Zulu grammar in 1855, within months of his arrival, and translated the New Testament into Zulu. This substantial Zulu–English dictionary appeared in 1861, with financial support from the colonial legislature. It contains over 10,000 entries, many with examples of usage, and includes loan words from European languages. The Preface provides brief notes on phonology, and explains Colenso's orthographic principles, criteria for selection, and the structure of the entries. The dictionary remained a standard work even after Colenso's death, and a fourth revised edition was published in 1905.


Alpha-smooth muscle actin (SMA), an actin isoform that contributes to cell-generated mechanical tension, is normally restricted to cells of vascular smooth muscle, but SMA can also be expressed in certain non-muscle cells, most notably myofibroblasts. These cells are present in healing wounds, scars, and fibrocontractive lesions where they contribute to fibrosis. In myofibroblasts, cell-generated traction forces associated with SMA contribute to matrix remodeling, but exogenous mechanical forces can also increase SMA expression. Force-induced SMA utilizes a feed-forward amplification loop involving a priori SMA in focal adhesions, the binding of the p38 MAP kinase to SMA filaments, activation of Rho and binding of serum response factor to the CArG-B box of the SMA promoter. Thus, in addition to its importance as a structural protein in tissue remodeling and contraction, SMA may serve as a mechanotransducer, based on its ability to physically link mechanosensory elements and to enhance its own, force-induced expression.


High-contrast coronagraphic imaging of the immediate surrounding of stars requires exquisite control of low-order wave-front aberrations, such as tip–tilt (pointing) and focus. We propose an accurate, efficient, and easy to implement technique to measure such aberrations in coronagraphs which use a focal plane mask to block starlight. The coronagraphic low-order wave-front sensor (CLOWFS) produces a defocused image of a reflective focal plane ring to measure low-order aberrations. Even for small levels of wave-front aberration, the proposed scheme produces large intensity signals which can easily be measured, and therefore does not require highly accurate calibration of either the detector or optical elements. The CLOWFS achieves nearly optimal sensitivity and is immune from noncommon path errors. This technique is especially well suited for high-performance low inner working angle coronagraphs. On phase-induced amplitude apodization (PIAA)-type coronagraphs, it can unambiguously recover aberrations which originate from either side of the beam shaping introduced by the PIAA optics. We show that the proposed CLOWFS can measure sub-milliarcsecond telescope pointing errors several orders of magnitude faster than would be possible in the coronagraphic science focal plane alone, and can also accurately calibrate residual coronagraphic leaks due to residual low-order aberrations. We have demonstrated ≈10−3λ/D pointing stability in a laboratory demonstration of the CLOWFS on a PIAA-type coronagraph.


The purpose of this paper is to analytically describe the national fishing activity, differentiating the various practices applied based on the published literature on each. To effect of analyze was chosen fisheries subsistence, sport, artisanal and industrial, not choosing to address more specific branches like fishing ornamental species, even this represents great resource for certain regions. Was found in the study that there are still several areas where the lack of resources and the precarious quality of life people to venture into rivers, lakes and swamp to remove their livelihoods, in counterpart, in the other places, the presence of man reduces the performance condition in fishing, forcing the readjust of activity and get fishing areas more distant from the mainland, making it impossible, for example, for small-scale fishing. By contrast, industrial fishing when used has a much greater ability to capture, thus reducing some populations. In the case of sport fishing, there is also the advent of economic, for as well as encouraging visits of people from all over the world, is still a source of creation and jobs, direct and indirect, and income for the areas when the sport exist. Keywords : Fishing, artisanal, subsistence, sport, industrial


Several mines operating in the Bulli seam of the Sydney Basin in NSW, Australia are experiencing difficulties in reducing gas content within the available drainage lead time in various sections of the coal deposit. Increased density of drainage boreholes has proven to be ineffective, particularly in sections of the coal seam rich in CO2. Plus with the increasing worldwide concern on green house gas reduction and clean energy utilisation, significant attention is paid to develop a more practical and economical method of enhancing the gas recovery from coal seams. A technology based on N2 injection was proposed to flush the Coal Seam Gas (CSG) out of coal and enhance the gas drainage process. In this study, laboratory tests on CO2 and CH4 gas recovery from coal by N2 injection are described and results show that N2 flushing has a significant impact on the CO2 and CH4 desorption and removal from coal. During the flushing stage, it was found that N2 flushing plays a more effective role in reducing adsorbed CH4 than CO2. Comparatively, during the desorption stage, the study shows gas desorption after N2 flushing plays a more effective role in reducing adsorbed CO2 than CH4.


Objective: To characterize at the municipal level the productivity of the bovine-milk sector in the state of Campeche, Mexico; to determine the profitability of the sector and to propose improvement schemes in order to add value to the commercialization of the product.
Design/Methodology/Approach: From the Agricultural and Fisheries Information System, the following variables were obtained: Production (thousands of L), Price ($ L-1) and Value of Production (thousands of $) from 2006 to 2018. Through multivariate statistics and analyses, the profitability of the bovine-milk sector from 2013-2018 compared to 2007-2012 was determined. The analyses were completed by an interview with 12 milk producers who gave added value through the manufacture of cheeses.
Results: A drop in profitability (-8.8%) was found in the sector from 2013-2018 compared to 2007-2012, despite the increase in production of 6.2% that did not compensate for the fall in prices (-14.2%). The regions with the highest productivity were located from the center to the south of the state: Champotón (24.62%), Escárcega (17.36%), and Campeche (16.63%).
Study Limitations/Implications: Adding value to the milk commodity is a priority need in the short term, to avoid abandoning the activity, which could compromise the economy of rural producers.
Findings/Conclusions: The Mennonite settlements in Campeche have managed to add value to the bovine-milk sector through the manufacture and sale of artisan cheeses. However, the great challenge of the sector is the revaluation of artisan cheeses with market strategies that encourage the consumption of local resources in a context of globalization.


Rural communities in the Upper Midwest continue to experience economic restructuring, caused not only by area agricultural changes, but also by mining and local manufacturing shutdowns. Focusing on two states, Minnesota and North Dakota, this study details the repercussions, and response, of five rural communities to the downsizing or closure of a major employer. The five community case studies represent a range of industries in which there were employment losses, diversity in community size, proximity to other labor markets, as well as multiple and varied use of adjustment techniques local leaders used in their response to community job loss. The communities studied were selected from more than 40 communities in the two states that had experienced a closure or downsizing that produced significant job loss between July of 1994 and January of 1998. The five communities were treated as case studies, and a number of local leaders were identified, and participated in in-depth interviews. Additional information about each community was obtained through a random sample of respondents who completed a mailed questionnaire. The questionnaire focused on the respondent's views of the impact of job loss for the community, and their perceptions of leadership to resolve the crisis. The communities ranged in size from less than 400 to 10,000 residents. All five communities had low levels of unemployment, and at the time of the survey data analysis, Minnesota and North Dakota were ranked as having the lowest unemployment rates in the country. Case study communities in this study tended to make a "better" adjustment when there was/were: an economic development organization (regional, if not local) in place prior to the closure; cohesion of community and agency leaders who were not concerned with "turf" issues; a focus on both assisting displaced workers and promoting economic development; a breadth of contact and networking with State agencies, consultants, and community leaders from other communities which had already weathered a dislocation and made a good adjustment; substantial lead time prior to closure/downsizing; an understanding that the adjustment period from downturn to upturn was not overnight, but might take months, or even years, but a "Can Do" attitude prevailed throughout; a closure/downsizing that was not the sole or dominant employer; some displaced workers who were not local residents, but were commuters; and a range of alternative re-use options for the closed facility, rather than a single restrictive use-option.


Coresets are one of the central methods to facilitate the analysis of large data sets. We continue a recent line of research applying the theory of coresets to logistic regression. First, we show a negative result, namely, that no strongly sublinear sized coresets exist for logistic regression. To deal with intractable worst-case instances we introduce a complexity measure $\mu(X)$, which quantifies the hardness of compressing a data set for logistic regression. $\mu(X)$ has an intuitive statistical interpretation that may be of independent interest. For data sets with bounded $\mu(X)$-complexity, we show that a novel sensitivity sampling scheme produces the first provably sublinear $(1\pm\varepsilon)$-coreset. We illustrate the performance of our method by comparing to uniform sampling as well as to state of the art methods in the area. The experiments are conducted on real world benchmark data for logistic regression.


Corona virus infection (COVID-19) is still an unsolved problem in Indonesia until this year. Apart from Java, other islands, including Sulawesi, were also badly affected. The very high mortality rate in Central Sulawesi (3.36%) poses a challenge for health workers; therefore, they should be well informed and with up-to-date information about correct therapeutic decisions. One of the most common comorbidities that often occurs with the severity and mortality of COVID-19 is hypertension. This study aims to determine the clinical characteristics and severity profile and their relationship with the mortality rate of COVID-19 patients with hypertension in Palu, Central Sulawesi. A total of 185 data on COVID-19 patients undergoing treatment at the Palu City Hospital during 2021 and meeting the criteria were recruited as research samples. Patients were divided into two categories, hypertensive (43%) and non-hypertensive (57%). The results showed that the age group, comorbid diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular, blood pressure, and blood glucose levels showed a significant relationship between the two groups (p < 0.05). The median length of stay was 12 days, with conditions leading to discharge (83%) and death (17%); patients who died were hospitalized in moderate and severe clinical conditions. Age group, liver function, and kidney function were positively correlated with severity and mortality. However, hypertension did not show a significant relationship with the severity and mortality of COVID-19 patients.


This study aims to examine the relationship between talent management factors
(skill development and perceived organizational support) and organizational
citizenship behaviour at the Private Higher Learning Institution in Kota Kinabalu,
Sabah. Through this paper also, both academic researcher and organization may be
able to discover the significant effect of talent management factors (skill
development and perceived organizational support) and organizational citizenship
behaviour in order to improve the performance of the organization and thus survive
in the competitive market. There are 128 respondents who have given cooperation in
providing the data needed by the researcher to accomplish this study. Then, the data
have been analyzed by using SPSS program such as reliability analysis, multiple
regression and etc. Through the analysis result, the hypotheses testing, which
involved the relationship between skill development and organizational citizenship
behaviour and also perceived organizational support and organizational citizenship
behaviour are significant. The study suggests that the employers need to highly
emphasize on the skill development and organization support to promote
organizational citizenship behaviour in the organization to achieve their vision and
mission.


Abstract. The monitoring of paintings, both on canvas and wooden support, is a crucial issue for the preservation and conservation of this kind of artworks. Many environmental factors (e.g. humidity, temperature, illumination, etc.), as well as bad conservation practices (e.g. wrong restorations, inappropriate locations, etc.), can compromise the material conditions over time and deteriorate an artwork. The article presents an on-going project realized by a multidisciplinary team composed by the ENEA UTICT 3D GraphLab, the 3D Optical Metrology Unit of the Bruno Kessler Foundation and the Soprintendenza per i Beni Storico Artistici ed Etnoantropologici of Bologna (Italy). The goal of the project is the multi-temporal 3D documentation and monitoring of paintings – at the moment in bad conservation's situation - and the provision of some metrics to quantify the deformations and damages.


In this paper we apply network analysis to the study of literature. At the first stage of our investigation we automatically extract networks (graphs) of characters for each part of Leo Tolstoy's novel War and peace using two different techniques for network creation. Then we evaluate these two techniques against a set of manually created gold standard networks. Finally, we use the method that demonstrated better performance in our evaluation to test a literary hypothesis about Tolstoy's novel. The hypotheses we intended to prove was that the parts of the novel describing war (i.e. those where the battlefield or military units are the primary settings), have statistically lower density of interaction between characters, resulting in lower network density, higher network diameters and lesser average node degrees. By showing this correlation we mean to demonstrate the applicability of network analysis to computational research of fictional narrative (e.g. detection of tension changes in the plot).


INTRODUCTION: New approaches are needed to safely reduce emergency admissions to hospital by targeting interventions effectively in primary care. A predictive risk stratification tool (PRISM) identifies each registered patient's risk of an emergency admission in the following year, allowing practitioners to identify and manage those at higher risk. We evaluated the introduction of PRISM in primary care in one area of the United Kingdom, assessing its impact on emergency admissions and other service use. METHODS: We conducted a randomized stepped wedge trial with cluster-defined control and intervention phases, and participant-level anonymized linked outcomes. PRISM was implemented in eleven primary care practice clusters (total thirty-two practices) over a year from March 2013. We analyzed routine linked data outcomes for 18 months. RESULTS: We included outcomes for 230,099 registered patients, assigned to ranked risk groups. Overall, the rate of emergency admissions was higher in the intervention phase than in the control phase: adjusted difference in number of emergency admissions per participant per year at risk, delta = .011 (95 percent Confidence Interval, CI .010, .013). Patients in the intervention phase spent more days in hospital per year: adjusted delta = .029 (95 percent CI .026, .031). Both effects were consistent across risk groups. Primary care activity increased in the intervention phase overall delta = .011 (95 percent CI .007, .014), except for the two highest risk groups which showed a decrease in the number of days with recorded activity. CONCLUSIONS: Introduction of a predictive risk model in primary care was associated with increased emergency episodes across the general practice population and at each risk level, in contrast to the intended purpose of the model. Future evaluation work could assess the impact of targeting of different services to patients across different levels of risk, rather than the current policy focus on those at highest risk.


Despite the significant impacts on human health caused by neurodegeneration, our understanding of the degeneration process is incomplete. The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans is emerging as a genetic model organism well suited for identification of conserved cellular mechanisms and molecular pathways of neurodegeneration. Studies in the worm have identified factors that contribute to neurodegeneration, including excitotoxicity and stress due to reactive oxygen species (ROS). Disruption of the gene unc-68, which encodes the ryanodine receptor, abolishes excitotoxic cell death, indicating a role for calcium (Ca2+) signaling in neurodegeneration. We tested the requirement for unc-68 in ROS-mediated neurodegeneration using the genetically encoded photosensitizer KillerRed. Upon illumination of KillerRed expressing animals to produce ROS, we observed similar levels of degeneration in wild-type and unc-68 mutant strains. Our results indicate that ROS-mediated cell death is independent of unc-68 and suggest multiple molecular pathways of neurodegeneration.


The Yamama Formation includes important carbonates reservoir that belongs to the Lower Cretaceous sequence in Southern Iraq. This study covers two oil fields (Sindbad and Siba) that are distributed Southeastern Basrah Governorate, South of Iraq. Yamama reservoir units were determined based on the study of cores, well logs, and petrographic examination of thin sections that required a detailed integration of geological data and petrophysical properties. These parameters were integrated in order to divide the Yamama Formation into six reservoir units (YA0, YA1, YA2, YB1, YB2 and YC), located between five cap rock units. The best facies association and petrophysical properties were found in the shoal environment, where the most common porosity types were the primary (interparticle) and secondary (moldic and vugs) . The main diagenetic process that occurred in YA0, YA2, and YB1 is cementation, which led to the filling of pore spaces by cement and subsequently decreased the reservoir quality (porosity and permeability). Based on the results of the final digital  computer interpretation and processing (CPI) performed by using the Techlog software, the units YA1 and YB2 have the best reservoir properties. The unit YB2 is characterized by a good effective porosity average, low water saturation, good permeability, and large thickness that distinguish it from other reservoir units.


Since 2007 the HIGS facility has been operated to produce both linearly and circularly polarized gamma-ray beams using two FELs, the planar OK-4 FEL and helical OK-5 FEL. Presently, with the OK-5 FEL operating at 192 nm, we can produce circularly-polarized gamma-ray beams between 1 and 100 MeV for user applications. Gamma-ray production between 80 and 100 MeV required an extension of the OK-5 wiggler operation beyond the designed current limit of 3.0 kA. In 2009, we upgraded cooling and machine protection systems to successfully extend OK-5 operation to 3.5 kA. To realize HIGS gamma-ray operation beyond 100 MeV and ultimately toward 150 MeV (the pion-threshold energy), with various limitations of the VUV mirror technology, the OK-5 wigglers will need to be operated at an even higher current, between 3.6 and 4.0 kA. In this paper we present our technical solution to further extend the operation range of the OK-5 wigglers, and report our preliminary results with high-current wiggler operation.


In years to come, the European Union (EU) will significantly increase its gas consumption. Current estimates predict the EU will need to import up to 80% of the gas it will consume in 2030.Already there is a strong concern about its reliance on Russian gas, especially in Eastern European countries. This article gives a novel insight on the different options the EU has to reduce its dependency on Russia while ensuring energy supply. We evaluate different alternatives including exploring shale gas, increasing imports of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and diversifying suppliers. Our aim is to explain why despite the various options, EU main priority seems to be investing in the Southern Gas Corridor. In this scenario, Turkey maintains its geostrategic importance to the EU due to its ability to serve as a hub country while maintaining strong relationships with supplying regions.


The objective of this study was to obtain single oral dose toxicity information for concentrated and lyophilized powder of blue honeysuckle ( Lonicera caerulea L., Caprifoliaceae; BHcL) in female and male ICR mice to aid in the process of developing natural origin medicinal ingredients or foods following proximate analysis and phytochemical profile measurement. The proximate analysis revealed that BHcL had an energy value of 3.80 kcal/g and contained 0.93 g/g of carbohydrate, 0.41 g/g of sugar, 0.02 g/g of protein, and 0.20 mg/g of sodium. BHcL did not contain lipids, including saturated lipids, trans fats, or cholesterols. Further, BHcL contained 4.54% of betaine, 210.63 mg/g of total phenols, 159.30 mg/g of total flavonoids, and 133.57 mg/g of total anthocyanins. Following administration of a single oral BHcL treatment, there were no treatment-related mortalities, changes in body weight (bw) or organ weight, clinical signs, necropsy or histopathological findings up to 2,000 mg/kg bw, the limited dosage for rodents of both sexes. We concluded that BHcL is a practically non-toxic material in toxicity potency.


Low rate of thrombinogenesis, its gradual and prolonged development in animal circulation after small-scale surgical operations was accompanied by a compensatory increase in the activity of antithrombin III. After surgical operations of lung in children thrombinoformation at the high rate led to distinct short-term consumption and to decrease in activity of the inhibitor during the operation period and within 2-3 days after the operation simultaneously with activation of enzymatic and nonenzymatic fibrinolysis. At the same time, any postoperational thrombotic complications were not observed in the children.


Background: The key element for the success of construction projects in the era of technology and information is knowledge. Knowledge management in the construction sector has become a necessary and vital matter, starting with the planning stage, designing, implementing and ending with operation and maintenance stage. One of the most prominent features of knowledge in the construction sector is the building knowledge modeling (BKM). Problem: Although the design stage is considered one of the most important stages of the construction project in terms of eliciting the knowledge element, designers suffer from poor knowledge management, as well as their inability to exploit the capabilities and benefits of building information modeling (BIM), especially knowledge management. Objective: The main aim of this study is to present a conceptual model that integrates the basic principles of knowledge management with contemporary principles of BIM in the design stage and has the ability to store, classify and share the knowledge generated from past designs into future projects. Methodology: The research methodology is constructed on reviewing the pillars of the proposed conceptual model, namely: BKM parameters, BKM library, and BKM clash detection system, then a hypothetical case to prove the validity of the proposed conceptual model using Basmaya residential complex project in the Republic of Iraq is presented as a case study. Results: New four definitions  are introduced: client knowledge, context knowledge, standards knowledge and technical knowledge. The conceptual model proposed in this study has shown great ability and high efficiency in improving and developing knowledge management in the design stage of buildings and projects. In addition, the knowledge stored in the BKM library can be reused in designing new projects in the future. Novelty: The conceptual model has the ability to update constantly itself over time by sharing the knowledge of designers, suppliers and other stakeholders.


ABSTRACT The arts therapies are becoming more commonplace as psychotherapeutic interventions for young people with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties (SEBD) and associated mental health conditions in educational settings and are now used in many educational provisions. The justification for their use would seem to be largely based on the subjective experience of education managers and anecdotal evidence as empirical evidence for their effectiveness with this client group is scarce. This research article is an attempt to fill that gap. A sample of 52 young people receiving an arts therapy and a control sample of 29 young people on a waiting list for an arts therapy were assessed over a year-long period in two SEBD schools in London using staff-rated Goodman's Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaires (SDQ) and a self-rated scoring system. SDQ results showed a significant difference in improvement of levels of SEBD compared to the control group across all measures with emotional and conduct difficulties showing a large effect. Three out of four self-rated score categories also showed significant difference in improvement compared to the control group. The quantitative data were supplemented with qualitative data obtained via interviews with six young people who had received an arts therapy. The data were analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). Themes emerging from this data suggested that young people felt that the arts brought various benefits to their therapy that augmented the verbal side and helped them to engage in therapy.


Incubations of bovine ileal mucosa were used to identify the amino acid transport systems responsible for methionine and lysine uptake in cattle small intestine. Uptake was expressed as micromole per milliliter of cell water. Lysine uptake was shown to be sodium (Na) independent. Specific transport components of lysine uptake were estimated to be: 63% occurring through the cationic (Y+) system, 17% via the neutral alanine (A) and alanine, serine, cysteine (ASC) amino acid transport systems, and 20% through nonsaturable processes. Physiological concentrations of competitive inhibitors altered (P less than .05) lysine uptake. Methionine uptake was shown to occur by both Na-independent and Na-dependent transport systems. The specific transport components of methionine uptake were estimated as 54% occurring through the neutral branched chain leucine (L) systems, 28% through the ASC system, 15% through the A system and 25% through nonsaturable processes. Physiological concentrations of competitive inhibitors did not inhibit (P greater than .05) methionine uptake.


Food price volatility is at the core of many changes in people's livelihoods. Burkina Faso is one of the poorest countries in the world, and as such its population is hard hit by fluctuations in food prices. During our research in Kaya and Nessemtenga, northeast Burkina Faso, we found that in recent years people's food habits and way of life have changed. Notably, we observed an increase in the consumption of foods outside the home, which we see as a change in cultural habits resulting from the recurring increase in the price of basic goods.


The 5-year doubling of the NIH budget represents a bold policy decision to reset the level of public investment in biomedical research. The
 authors
 propose 6 principles to guide NIH spending in coming years that would protect that investment by balancing support for new research with respect for prior commitments and national research capacity. The goal is a sustainable biomedical research enterprise that avoids destabilizing, counterproductive gyrations in funding. Modeling of NIH budget scenarios reflecting these principles indicates that growth rates below the historic average of the past 4 decades would quickly negate the advantages achieved by the doubling initiative.


We demonstrate a generic approach for the synthesis of single-crystal complex oxide nanostructures of various structure types, such as perovskites, spinels, monoclinic, corundum, CaF(2) structured, tetragonal, and even metal hydroxides. The method is based on a reaction between a metallic salt and a metallic oxide in a solution of composite-hydroxide eutectic at approximately 200 degrees C and normal atmosphere without using an organic dispersant or capping agent. The synthesis technique is cost-effective, one-step, easy to control, and is performed at low temperature and normal atomospheric pressure. The technique can be expanded to many material systems, and it provides a general, simple, convenient, and innovative strategy for the synthesis of nanostructures of complex oxides with important scientific and technological applications in ferroelectricity, ferromagnetism, colossal magnetoresistance, fuel cell, optics, and more.


The future potential of LNG as a bunker fuel in the Southeast Asian market is huge, although it is still immature. An emerging market for LNG-propulsion in the region creates a business opportunity for Norwegian companies delivering relevant products and services. This is a summary of the strategy that will yield the highest return on a foreign market entry with focus on export of LNG-technology in the Southeast Asian region. This thesis has assessed the gas producing and consuming countries, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Singapore and Vietnam, hereby referred to as the ASEAN-countries. Successful internationalization demands resource commitment and good timing, and therefore we recommend entering two countries with the purpose of exporting LNG-propulsion technology: Singapore and Indonesia. All countries can potentially adapt technology for using LNG as a marine fuel, but Singapore and Indonesia are most likely to develop small-scale LNG first. Singapore has one of the busiest ports in the world with a 20 per cent global market share for bunkering. It is a technological frontrunner in the region, and the government has taken initiatives towards establishing standards for bunkering and operations with LNG as a bunker fuel. Companies are invited to attend Joint Industry Projects on technical and commercial aspects concerning LNG-propulsion, and this is an opportunity to change the context and affect how the market will evolve. Moreover, Singapore has one of the best business environments in the world and it is easy but expensive to establish with an entity in the country. In total, Singapore is most likely to adapt LNG as a bunker fuel and consequently LNG-sponsors should be present in the country. Indonesia is the Southeast Asian region's largest country in terms of population, area and economy. Combined with an ideal topography for small-scale LNG, Indonesia is the potentially largest market for LNG-technology in the region. LNG as marine fuel can become a reality, especially in Eastern parts of Indonesia, quite fast. The challenge in Indonesia is a complicated business environment with poor property rights as foreigners cannot have a majority share post in a local company, the red tape is extensive and corruption is a problem. However, it is possible to do ethical business in the country and at the same time succeed, but it takes adaption of strategy. Traditional Western-style strategy will not work. Long-term relations, trust and efficient alliances with local companies are required to capitalize from the Indonesian market for LNG-technology and other products and services. The figure at the right demonstrates the two most decisive variables that will determine the evolvement of the LNG bunker fuel market in Southeast Asia: • The oil-gas differential: If the price difference increase in favor of LNG, it is very stimulating • Degree of standard agreements in the LNG-technology: Ship owners rely on standards for bunkering and operations for LNG


We introduce two natural types of asymmetric single-peaked preferences, which we name biased-above and biased-below, depending on whether the asymmetry (or preference-bias) favors alternatives above or below the peak. We define a rich family of utility functions, the generalized distance-metric utility functions, that can represent preferences biased-above or biased-below, besides accommodating any degree of asymmetry. We also identify restrictions on differentiable utility representations that guarantee the underlying preferences to be biased-above or below, and allow to compare degrees of asymmetry. Finally, we consider a specific application -agents preferences over government size- to illustrate the role of factors such as risk aversion and tax distortions in shaping asymmetric preferences.


We, the undersigned legal scholars and educators with expertise in employment discrimination law, seek to offer a new vision and agenda for eliminating sexual harassment and advancing workplace equality. We are inspired by the #MeToo movement: The courage and sheer number of people who have come forward to report harassment and abuse, the cross-race, cross-class solidarity among activists, the media's in-depth and sustained coverage, and the public's willingness to hear and believe so many victims all suggest this is a watershed moment for change.
Inspired by recent events and renewed activism, we wish to contribute to the current momentum by broadening the conversation about the law. We know that law alone cannot create change. Yet we know also that change rarely occurs without the law. For over forty years, employees, activists, educators, and policymakers have looked to the legal system to address sexual harassment in the workplace. These efforts have produced important theories and information, steps forward and setbacks, that yield important lessons for the future. Title VII and other existing laws against discrimination provide an important tool in the fight against sexual harassment, one that will require continued leadership from enforcement agencies. But broader reforms are needed to address the conditions in which harassment flourishes and to make the legal system more responsive to employees. To reduce sexual harassment and move toward a fairer, more inclusive workplace and society for people of all sexes and genders, we offer the following principles and proposals for reform gained from years of working for change within the law.


A tone deaf will never be able to appreciate the music of maestros. Only a seasoned jeweller would know that all that glitters is not real? And, only those who can recognise the worth of a diamond can value it, for others it's just a stone! Talent is doing easily what others fine difficult (The Hindu 2004). As South Africa embarks on its journey into the second decade of democracy, major strides have been made on the political, economic, social and legislative spheres. A plethora of legislation and policy directions count as the most progressive in the world. However, many challenges remain. One of these is the shortage of professional and managerial skills and the imbalances at these levels. In any organisation, there is nothing more crucial than fitting the right people in the right position.
Talent management is difficult to define but it is a complex undertaking that operates within the strategic human resource framework. Talent management is increasingly gaining momentum in the public sector. The trend is to move towards the retention of talented and skilled employees who bring significant value to the work place. There has to be a paradigm shift towards a talent mindset with a view to identifying the high and low achievers, reinforcing good performance and addressing bad performance. The new managerial approach is to view talent management as an innovative tool that must be embedded into the work culture and ethos in the public sector.
This paper examines the concept and constructs of talent management as an all embracing tool to retain talented human resources in the public sector. Furthermore, a robust and integrated talent management strategy would be proposed to enhance service excellence.


Studding foreign languages at academic level, in technical universities means not just improving your students' vocabulary. The main target should be to develop all their language skills, but from the perspective of their future professional life. This is quite a difficult task because foreign languages, in Technical University of Civil Engineering, are part of the first two years curricula, a period when students are not familiar with their future profession and as a consequence they are not mastering professional vocabulary in their native language. . As many pedagogical approaches are underlining an adequate context through which new words are introduced is always of great help. That statement leads to the question of creating that context and here I may say virtual reality that can be imagined on the digital support is of great help
The research main question refers to the advantages of using virtual reality, simulation if necessary, to improve students' language abilities, to help them to learn faster and easier. Secondary research questions refer to the efficiency of this pedagogical approach and to the time management (can it be improved? Is it a time consuming method?). As this type of research refers to different case studies, the methodological approach, generally used for such research was implemented. This paper presents the results of suggested experiment which has been developed for two academic years (2009-2011) at the Faculty of Technological Equipment and Building Equipment (TUCE) and was extended to other foreign languages such as German and Spanish. Although they are not distance learning students, best practices of that type of learning methodology are often used. Its efficiency was measured through different types of tests.


1.Two barnacle geese ( Branta leucopsis ) were successfully imprinted on a human and encouraged to fly behind an open-topped truck containing the foster parent. A two channel radio-transmitter was implanted into these geese so that heart rate and respiratory frequency could be recorded before, during and after flights of relatively long duration. The resting value for heart rate was 72 ± 4 (10) beats min −1 and for respiratory frequency, 8.5 ± 0.6 (10) breaths min −1 . 2. Five flights of a mean duration of 14.4 ± 1.3 (5) min and at a mean air velocity of 18.7 ± 0.3 (54) m s −1 were performed. Both heart rate and respiratory frequency increased before the birds began to flap their wings for take off. Mean heart rate during flight was 512 ± 4 (54) beats min −1 (7.24 × resting). At take off, wing beat frequency was 356±7 (4) beats min −1 and respiratory frequency was 121 ± 10 (5) breaths min −1 . Both of these variables then declined and reached average flight values of 287 ± 3 (37) beats min −1 and 99±2 (54) breaths min −1 (11.7 × resting) respectively. There was no relationship between any of the measured variables and flight velocity. There was however, a 3:1 correspondence between wing beat frequency and respiratory frequency and a tight phase locking between the two. The wings were fully elevated at 6.0 ± 1.1(20)%, 40.5 ± 1.1(20)% and 74.0±1.1(20)% the respiratory cycle. On two occasions the birds slope soared on the air rising over the top of the cab for a mean duration of 52 s and at a mean air velocity of 14.2 ± 0.5 (4) m s −1 . Heart rate was 261 ± 18 (4) beats min −1 and respiratory frequency was 68 ± 5 (4) breaths min −1 . 3. Upon landing, heart rate returned to its preflight value within 3 min. Respiratory frequency, however, increased as the birds began to pant and reached a maximum value of 255±11 (5) breaths min −1 4 min after landing.


Environmental awareness, current trends in the power market, the quest for energy efficiency, and the progressive transformation of electricity consumers to prosumers are the primary drives for the gradual shift from the old power grids into the smart grids. The deployment of renewable dispersed generation systems and energy storage units uncovered the need for smart metering to oversee and control those generation systems. This chapter presents the design and development of a robust, efficient, multi-functional, and low-cost smart meter. The proposed metering system has added features that enabled the utilities to recover the meter energy measurement data remotely. The system allows monitoring and transmission of energy consumed in real-time. It considers using a microcontroller board as the controlling unit to execute control and monitor activities. A liquid crystal display displays standard electrical measurements such as current, voltage, power, and energy consumption. The external communication device is required in the unit's actualization, in conjunction with the control unit based on the existing mobile technology. It stands as the intermediary between the nearby available utility station and consumers or end-users. In conclusion, liquid crystal display displays real-time based data for the end-user to visualize. The usage data billing is done within thirty seconds, stored, and trans-received the process for data collection, keeping, and billing generation.


Relevance determined by the need to reorient the management system of vocational educational institutions on a project basis in order to ensure the quality of educational services, sustainable development of educational institutions and its social transformation by forming a project mental model of subjectsof vocational education. Purpose: to describe the essence of the management of the vocational educational institution as a projectoriented organization and to reveal the characteristics of the process of using knowledge management technology for the staff professional development. Methods: to determine and summarize the results of scientific research and formulate the essence of the main study definitions of the analysis theoretical methods, synthesis, classification and systematization are used. Results: the essence of management of vocational educational institution as a project-oriented organization is substantiated. The content of management of such an institution is determined through the description of the set of management functions from the standpoint of project management. The organization of the process of providing educational services through the implementation of short– and long-term projects is described, it will contribute to the formation of the project mental model of its participants. It is revealed that the management processes of a modern vocational educational institution are based on the concept of human capital development as the main resource that provides it with the necessary competitive advantages in the markets of educational services and labor and, in general, ensures the success of its life. It was found that the usage of knowledge management technology, which is based on the essence of the definition of "knowledge of the organization", is effective for the development of educational staff. Conclusions: it is proved that the management of vocational educational institution as a project-oriented organization will meet the needs of the state economy in skilled and competitive workers, which will contribute to the development of human capital.


SUMMARY Normal blood serum from many animal species was found to exert in vitro a lethal effect upon ascites cells of Sarcoma 37 and of several other mouse tumors. This activity of serum on the tumor cells was manifested by: failure to proliferate in a susceptible host; altered permeability to eosin; morphologic changes; and cessation of glycolytic activity. The system in serum responsible for the cytocidal effect consisted of a natural antibody and complement. This antibody had specificity for an antigen present in tumors and lymphoid tissue of mice.


Here we present a detailed taxonomic study of Alveolina assemblages from the Hormak section, northern Zahedan, Iran. The Alveolina specimens have been recovered from a 16 meters thick shallow-water Eocene succession cropping out in an area of limited extent. Sixteen species have been identified including Alveolina cf. oblonga, A. ruetimeyeri, A. minuta, A. cf. cosigena, A. sp. cf. A. schwageri, A. sp. aff. A. azzarolii, A. haymanaensis, A. canavarii, A. canavarii karsakensis, A. coudurensis, A. histrica histrica, A. bayburtensis, A. cf. azzarolii, A. stercusmuris, A. kieli and A. elliptica nuttalli. The record of Alveolina species spans from SBZ10 (early Cuisian) to SBZ13 (early Lutetian). The systematic study provides new insight on the paleobiogeographic dispersal among the Sistan Ocean zone (central Tethys region) and may permit to make projections for future studies on neighboring Tethyan regions.


The investigation was undertaken in an attempt to provide a more simple animal model for studying renal hypertension in the rat. Rats were surgically altered by two procedures, single nephrectomy and single nephrectomy plus encapsulation, the latter completed in a common operation. Systolic blood pressure was observed at various intervals of 14, 30, and 60 days. Systolic blood pressure was also observed at an 80 day interval in a control group. The results are as follows: Untreated Control - Systolic blood pressure was not significantly altered over an 80 day interval; Single Nephrectomy - Systolic blood pressure was not significantly altered at the 14, 30, or 60 day intervals (one animal died in this group immediately after surgery); Single Nephrectomy and Encapsulation - Of the 18 animals in this group 5 had significantly elevated systolic blood pressure by the 14 day interval, 1 became hypertensive by the 60 day interval, 6 showed no significant effect on systolic blood pressure, and 6 animals succumbed. Necropsies on the 6 animals which had no effect showed that the encapsulation procedure had failed.


Erosive wear of WC based alloys with different cobalt content or Vickers hardness (Hv) was investigated by blasting SiC particles on specimen surface of the alloys. The erosive wear volumes were measured by the weight variation of the specimen and the profile of erosive wear scar obtained by surface profilemeter, which were expressed as Vd and Vp, respectively. V d of the alloys was also compared with that of commercial ceramics.The results obtained were as follows: (1) The value of V d which decreased with the decrease of cobalt content in the alloys was nearly equal to that of V p. (2) V d decreased with the increase of Hv. Namely, Vd was estimated as a secondray function of Hv. (3) Vd of the alloys with low cobalt content of 0-2mass%, however, was smaller than that of B4C and SiC ceramics having nearly the same hardness.


Domain generalization (DG) aims to train a model to perform well in unseen domains under different distributions. This paper considers a more realistic yet more challenging scenario, namely Single Domain Generalization (Single-DG), where only a single source domain is available for training. To tackle this challenge, we first try to understand when neural networks fail to generalize? We empirically ascertain a property of a model that correlates strongly with its generalization that we coin as "model sensitivity". Based on our analysis, we propose a novel strategy of Spectral Adversarial Data Augmentation (SADA) to generate augmented images targeted at the highly sensitive frequencies. Models trained with these hard-to-learn samples can effectively suppress the sensitivity in the frequency space, which leads to improved generalization performance. Extensive experiments on multiple public datasets demonstrate the superiority of our approach, which surpasses the state-of-the-art single-DG methods by up to 2.55%. The source code is available at https://github.com/DIAL-RPI/Spectral-Adversarial-Data-Augmentation.


The aim of this paper is 1) to use empirical evidence to make predictions about the impact of the Covid-19 shock on firm entry, its composition, and its short- and long-run impact on employment; and 2) to provide guidance on which policy tool would be more effective to counteract the negative impact of the shock on this margin. The Covid-19 shock caused a large GDP contraction and our predictions suggest that this would cause a reduction in firm entry that ranges from 60% in Germany to 80% in Spain. Moreover, if this collapse of GDP is also accompanied by an even moderate increase in financial frictions, this shock also reduces the share of high-growth firms among the new startups, implying substantially larger negative long-term consequences for the employment generated by the entering cohort. Our estimates for Spain predict employment losses of the entering cohort of nearly 80,000 jobs for 2021, which increase up to almost 115,000 in 2029. Finally, using a simple partial equilibrium model calibrated to match the empirical evidence, we show that a subsidy to initial financing costs is more effective to increase aggregate employment of the entering cohort in the long run than a wage subsidy, which is more effective in the short run only.


Background: Few studies have examined the relationship between lifestyle activity engagement and cognitive trajectories among individuals who were cognitively normal at baseline. Objective: To examine the relationship of current engagement in lifestyle activities to previous cognitive performance among individuals who were cognitively normal at baseline, and whether this relationship differed for individuals who subsequently developed mild cognitive impairment (MCI), or by APOE-4 genotype, age, and level of cognitive reserve. Methods: Participants (N=189) were primarily middle-aged (M=56.6 y) at baseline and have been prospectively followed with annual assessments (M follow-up=14.3 y). Engagement in physical, cognitive, and social activities was measured by the CHAMPS activity questionnaire. Longitudinal cognitive performance was measured by a global composite score. Results: Among individuals who progressed to MCI (n=27), higher lifestyle activity engagement was associated with less decline in prior cognitive performance. In contrast, among individuals who remained cognitively normal, lifestyle activity engagement was not associated with prior cognitive trajectories. These effects were largely independent of APOE-4 genotype, age, and cognitive reserve. Conclusions: Greater engagement in lifestyle activities may modify the rate of cognitive decline among those who develop symptoms of MCI, but these findings need to be confirmed in prospective studies.


Background: Anal cancer is uncommon. Although uncommon, the incidence of anal cancer has increased among the general population of the United States and other countries over the past 30 years. We evaluated anal cytology in women with the history of abnormal pap smear, cervical intraepithelial neoplasia, cervical cancer and high risk HPV for anogenital dysplasia. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 153 patients over the age of 21 years, referred to Imam Hossein Hospital in 1395-1396 who were being monitored due to abnormal pap smear, cervical cancer, CIN and high risk HPV, were evaluated with anal cytology for anogenital dysplasia. Results: 153 patients were enrolled in four main groups. Among those with a history of abnormal pap smear (39 patients), only 25% of the patients with HSIL had abnormal anal pap smear, and the rest of them had negative anal smear. Among those with a history of CIN (61 patients), patients with CIN III, 30.8% had abnormal anal smear, while the rest had a negative anal smear. Among those with a high risk of HPV (23 patients), 50% of the patients with concurrent positive HPV 16 and 18 had anal abnormal smear. Patients with a history of cervical cancer (30 patients) who had radiotherapy with or without surgery showed a negative anal smear. The ratio of anal SIL positive of individuals with a sexual partner was only 1.9%, while this ratio was 27.3% for those with more than one partner and this difference was statistically significant (P <0.0001). 15.4% of smokers had positive anal SIL test result, while, only 2.9% non-smokers had the same result, and this difference was statistically significant (P = 0.03). 20% of the patients who had anal intercourse showed a positive anal SIL score result, compared to 1% for those who did not. This difference was statistically significant (P <0.0001). Conclusion: Among people with a history of abnormal cervical pap smear, CIN, cervical cancer and high-risk HPV during the last 6 months, abnormal anal tests are most commonly seen in patients who had risk factors such as anal sex, cigarette, multi partner etc. with high grade interepithelial squamous cervix such as HSIL, CIN III, HPV 16 and 18; more studies in larger sample size are needed to have the better conclusion.


Motion dazzle describes high-contrast patterns (e.g. zigzags on snakes and dazzle paint on World War I ships) that do not conceal an object, but inhibit an observer's perception of its motion. However, there is limited evidence for this phenomenon. Locusts have a pair of descending contralateral movement detector (DCMD) neurons which respond to predator-like looming objects and trigger escape responses. Within the network providing input to a DCMD, separate channels are excited when moving edges cause areas of the visual field to brighten or darken, respectively, and these stimuli interact antagonistically. When a looming square has an upper half and lower half that are both darker than background, it elicits a stronger DCMD response than the upper half does alone. However, when a looming square has a darker-than-background upper half and a brighter-than-background lower half, it elicits a weaker DCMD response than its upper half does alone. This effect allows high-contrast patterns to weaken and delay DCMD response parameters implicated in escape decisions, and is analogous to motion dazzle. However, the motion dazzle effect does not provide the best means of motion camouflage, because uniform bright squares, or low-contrast squares, elicit weaker DCMD responses than high-contrast, half dark, half bright squares.


We have studied the characteristics of bone ingrowth of a new porous tantalum biomaterial in a simple transcortical canine model using cylindrical implants 5 x 10 mm in size. The material was 75% to 80% porous by volume and had a repeating arrangement of slender interconnecting struts which formed a regular array of dodecahedron-shaped pores. We performed histological studies on two types of material, one with a smaller pore size averaging 430 microm at 4, 16 and 52 weeks and the other with a larger pore size averaging 650 microm at 2, 3, 4, 16 and 52 weeks. Mechanical push-out tests at 4 and 16 weeks were used to assess the shear strength of the bone-implant interface on implants of the smaller pore size. The extent of filling of the pores of the tantalum material with new bone increased from 13% at two weeks to between 42% and 53% at four weeks. By 16 and 52 weeks the average extent of bone ingrowth ranged from 63% to 80%. The tissue response to the small and large pore sizes was similar, with regions of contact between bone and implant increasing with time and with evidence of Haversian remodelling within the pores at later periods. Mechanical tests at four weeks indicated a minimum shear fixation strength of 18.5 MPa, substantially higher than has been obtained with other porous materials with less volumetric porosity. This porous tantalum biomaterial has desirable characteristics for bone ingrowth; further studies are warranted to ascertain its potential for clinical reconstructive orthopaedics.


The subject of this paper is estimation of the maximum values of the heat flux at steady-state nominal operating conditions in the Belgian Material Test Reactor (BR2) at SCK-CEN in Mol. A strong variation of the fuel depletion and the heat flux with the azimuthal direction and dependence on the orientation of the fuel element in the core are obtained. The full-scale three-dimensional (3-D) MCNP & ORIGEN-S heterogeneous geometry model of BR2 with a detailed 3-D isotopic fuel depletion profile, including a detailed azimuthal fuel modeling in the annular concentric plate fuel elements, is used to evaluate the variation of the heat flux with the azimuthal direction in the hot plane. The relative azimuthal power distribution is calculated with MCNP and introduced into ORIGEN-S to evaluate the azimuthal isotopic fuel profile. The applied detailed azimuthal fuel modeling is compared with homogeneous fuel depletion in the hot plane. An increase of the maximum value of the heat flux of 5% for low burnt fuel and 20% for highly burnt fuel due to the azimuthal modeling of the fuel depletion is obtained. A strong variation of the heat flux with the orientation of the fuel element in the core, modeled with the azimuthal fuel profile, is observed. Perturbation effects in the maximum value of the heat flux of 10% for low burnt fuel and up to 40% for highly burnt fuel, correlated to different orientations of the fuel element in the core, are obtained.


The Shelf Sea Biogeochemistry research programme directly relates to the delivery of the NERC Earth system science theme and aims to provide evidence that supports a number of marine policy areas and statutory requirements, such as the Marine Strategy Framework Directive and Marine and Climate Acts.
The shelf seas are highly productive compared to the open ocean, a productivity that underpins more than 90 per cent of global fisheries. Their importance to society extends beyond food production to include issues of biodiversity, carbon cycling and storage, waste disposal, nutrient cycling, recreation and renewable energy resources.
The shelf seas have been estimated to be the most valuable biome on Earth, but they are under considerable stress, as a result of anthropogenic nutrient loading, overfishing, habitat disturbance, climate change and other impacts.
However, even within the relatively well-studied European shelf seas, fundamental biogeochemical processes are poorly understood. For example: the role of shelf seas in carbon storage; in the global cycles of key nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus, silicon and iron); and in determining primary and secondary production, and thereby underpinning the future delivery of many other ecosystem services.
Improved knowledge of such factors is not only required by marine policymakers; it also has the potential to increase the quality and cost-effectiveness of management decisions at the local, national and international levels under conditions of climate change.
The Shelf Sea Biogeochemistry research programme will take a holistic approach to the cycling of nutrients and carbon and the controls on primary and secondary production in UK and European shelf seas, to increase understanding of these processes and their role in wider biogeochemical cycles. It will thereby significantly improve predictive marine biogeochemical and ecosystem models over a range of scales.
The scope of the programme includes exchanges with the open ocean (transport on and off the shelf to a depth of around 500m), together with cycling, storage and release processes on the shelf slope, and air-sea exchange of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide).
The DY021 cruise is the first of the 2015 Benthic SSB cruises to investigate the 4 main 'representative' sites in the Celtic Sea that will represent all the various sediment types found in the whole area, these being Mud, San, Sandy-Mud and Muddy-Sand. The cruise will also carry out complimentary sampling at the Pelagic SSB programme main site called CANDYFLOSS in the central Shelf area in order to better link the Benthic and Pelagic programmes.


It is emphasized that a decision for or against surgical intervention in the management of residual spaces, irrespective of cause, will not be required for several months after their occurrence in most cases. The stresses associated with the critical period of disability occasioned by a prolonged air leak, even if not voluminous, may preclude premature surgical intervention. The indications for initial surgical resection and the diseases for which it was required often are sufficiently debilitating to the patient to produce a protracted period of convalescence, necessitating prolonged observation before a decision for aggressive surgical therapy is mandated or indicated. In our experience, these pleural spaces are not a major threat to the health of the patient. In many cases, the concern over them and the fear that more egregious postoperative problems will ensue have resulted in premature and overzealous treatment that may lead to iatrogenic complications. If, instead, they are left alone and followed with judicious observation based on appropriate clinical, physiologic, and radiologic criteria, a more favorable outcome will result. Haste in arriving at a decision to intervene surgically therefore is not warranted. Many factors must be taken into account before surgical treatment is considered. The age of the patient, his or her ventilatory status, condition of the underlying lung, prospect for physical activity with gainful employment and accompanying quality of life, underlying disease (tuberculosis or cancer) for which even a curative resection may have been done, problems in maintaining drainage (including convenience or discomfort), or adverse metabolic effects of chronic infection are just a few considerations. More recently, economic factors attendant upon managed care programs mandate cost-effective therapies to reduce duration of hospital stay and to decrease resource utilization associated with repetitive surgical procedures and returns to the operating room, protracted use of expensive antimicrobial drugs, and increased outpatient visits and home services. Certainly, prevention of and avoidance of unwarranted interventions for intrathoracic spaces will assist in accomplishing these goals. Finally, it is apparent that patients can live in relatively good health for long periods of time with persisting vented or unvented spaces in association with air leak from alveolar seepage sources, and even with the presence of well-drained and controlled empyemas. The most important aspect of management is delineation of spaces that can be observed safely versus those that require surgical intervention. This discussion provides a basis for making that distinction. The algorithm illustrated in Figure 13 summarizes this management.


The role of APX (ascorbate peroxidase) in protection against oxidative stress was examined using transgenic tobacco plants. The full length cDNA, coding Arabidopsis thaliana L. APX fused downstream to the chloroplast transit sequence from A. thaliana glutathione reductase, was cloned into appropriate binary vector and mobilized into Agrobacterium tumefaciens C58C2. Leaf discs were infected with the Agrobacterium and cultured on medium supplied with kanamycin. The incorporation of the gene in tobacco genome was confirmed by Southern dot blot hybridization. Transgenic lines were generated, and the line Chl-APX5 shown to have 3.8-fold the level of APX activity in the wild-type plants. The isolated chloroplasts from this line showed higher APX activity. During early investigation, this line showed enhanced tolerance to the active oxygen-generating paraquat and sodium sulphite. The first generation of this line, also, showed enhanced tolerance to salt, PEG and water stresses, as determined by net photosynthesis. The present data indicate that overproducing the cytosolic APX in tobacco chloroplasts reduces the toxicity of H(2)O(2).