Based on the reform movements over the past two decades, it is evident that while effective teachers are critical to student learning, not all teachers are coming to the profession highly qualified. Policy and research continue to highlight the need to reorganize and refocus teacher preparation programs to produce higher quality teachers ready to meet the demands of the classroom from day one of employment. This study focuses on the enhancement of traditional preparation programs in public Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) as this continues to be the context for which most teacher candidates come to the profession. Using a six-group, four measure mixed-methods design, the objective of the study is to determine the impact California Teaching Fellows Foundation (CTFF), a pre-service teaching and learning opportunity for future teacher candidates, has on developing higher caliber teachers prepared in a traditional University-based teacher preparation setting. Through the use of an online survey, interviews, and focus groups, the relationship of CTFF participation to teacher efficacy before, during, and after traditional preparation participation is examined and explored from the perspective of teacher and supervisor. Unexpected findings show that CTFF participation has a relationship to decreased Teacher Efficacy for teacher candidates and CTFF is not creating a significant pipeline to teaching as proposed, leading to questions for further study.


Single fibres were dissected from the dorsal spinal roots of the nerves serving the brachial plexus in African green monkeys. The dermatomal organization of these spinal nerves was deduced from data concerning the receptive fields of 2834 single afferent fibres. These data were collected in an attempt to reconcile some of the discrepancies that exist in published descriptions of the dermatomes in primates; our results and the literature reviewed suggest that the cutaneous region served by one spinal nerve is actually much wider and much more variable in location than is generally recognized. This makes any summary diagram a misleading indicator of the true complexity of the spinal innervation of the upper limb. In spite of this variability among individuals, within any specific individual there is a regular and orderly progression of innervation which allows prediction of the region served by a particular spinal nerve when information concerning the site of innervation of adjacent nerves is available. The territory of each myotome tended to be larger than the dermatome of the same spinal nerve. Most muscles of the limb received afferent innervation from three to four different spinal nerves. Further, the territory of the myotome did not of necessity coincide with the dermatome of the same spinal nerve. Even those nerves innervating the hand still innervated axial muscles. These observations have important implications for the diagnosis of spinal nerve injuries.


Infections with a range of common community viruses remain a major cause of mortality and morbidity after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. T cells specific for cytomegalovirus (CMV), Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and adenoviruses can safely prevent and infections with these three most common culprits, but the manufacture of individual T cell lines for each virus would be prohibitive in terms of time and cost. We have demonstrated that T cells specific for all three viruses can be manufactured in a single culture using monocytes and EBV-transformed B lymphoblastoid cell lines (LCLs), both transduced with an adenovirus vector expressing pp65 of CMV, as antigen-presenting cells. Trivirus-specific T cell lines produced from healthy stem cell donors could prevent and treat infections with all three viruses, not only in the designated recipient, but in unrelated, partially-HLA-matched third party recipients. We now provide the details and logistics of T cell manufacture.


A tumour is a heterogeneous material. A mathematical model of a tumour helps to make predictions about its growth and effects of drugs faster than real-time experiments. Construction of a good model that can accurately mimic tumour growth is a multi-step process. Tumour growth, like any biological phenomenon, is an extremely complicated event where hundreds of proteins, growth-regulating agents, and chemical signalling mechanisms are involved. A direct study of all these contributing factors might consume an unreasonable amount of time. Therefore, the first step in modelling tumour growth is to understand the tumour in a simple basic form. Fundamentally, a tumour can be conceived as a mixture of tumour cells and a nutrient-rich fluid that fills the void between the cells. The second step is to translate the interactions between the cells and the fluid into mathematical equations. The final model obtained from the second step is too complex to be exactly solved, and gaining insights into its solutions requires the usage of computer-based simulations, based on algorithms that, in mathematics, we call numerical methods. Designing numerical methods that capture the physical and biological properties of this heterogeneous model and justifying them mathematically is the third challenge. The project also consists of developing an optimised algorithm that can be programmed on a computer. This optimisation is crucial as it enables efficient and fast computation of approximate solutions, which contain information about the growing tumour. In future, more complexities, like the impact, on the model, of therapy, can be added to this basic model in a step-by-step manner.


Background. Despite the high prevalence of osteoarthritis and the prominence of primary care in managing this condition, there is no systematic summary of quality indicators applicable for osteoarthritis care in primary care settings. Objectives. This systematic review aimed to identify evidence-based quality indicators for monitoring, evaluating and improving the quality of care for adults with osteoarthritis in primary care settings. Methods. Ovid MEDLINE and Ovid EMBASE databases and grey literature, including relevant organizational websites, were searched from 2000 to 2015. Two reviewers independently selected studies if (i) the study methodology combined a systematic literature search with assessment of quality indicators by an expert panel and (ii) quality indicators were applicable to assessment of care for adults with osteoarthritis in primary care settings. Included studies were appraised using the Appraisal of Indicators through Research and Evaluation (AIRE) instrument. A narrative synthesis was used to combine the indicators within themes. Applicable quality indicators were categorized according to Donabedian's 'structure-process-outcome' framework. Results. The search revealed 4526 studies, of which 32 studies were reviewed in detail and 4 studies met the inclusion criteria. According to the AIRE domains, all studies were clear on purpose and stakeholder involvement, while formal endorsement and use of indicators in practice were scarcely described. A total of 20 quality indicators were identified from the included studies, many of which overlapped conceptually or in content. Conclusions. The process of developing quality indicators was methodologically suboptimal in most cases. There is a need to develop specific process, structure and outcome measures for adults with osteoarthritis using appropriate methodology.


We investigated new interface technologies to ease astronaut's work under altered gravity. By bridging the gap between the physical reality and digital information, Augmented Reality keeps the focus on the task to fulfill. It is important that the operation of such Augmented Reality supported assistant systems is adequate preserved in weightlessness. By distinguishing the interface alignment to the body and outside of the body this paper presents a user study conducted to quantify and qualify the impact of altered gravity on sensorimotor hand-eye coordination related to the human body frame of reference. Taking the advantages of parabolic flights, we compared the performance of this alignment methods under normo- and altered gravity. Beside of verified effects of altered gravity on aimed pointing movements, the study showed a higher efficiency and decreased workload for the body aligned condition.


Background Infant medication administration is a major public health challenge, especially in rural or low-resource areas. The JustMilk Nipple Shield Delivery System (NSDS) is a novel method of infant medication delivery designed to address some of these challenges. Objective The purpose of this study was to explore the acceptability of the JustMilk NSDS in selected communities in the Vhembe District of Limpopo, South Africa. Methods Data was collected through 39 semi-structured interviews with infant caretakers and health workers in the Vhembe District. Interviews were transcribed and coded into themes, which were verified by an independent coder. Results Four themes arose around acceptability of the JustMilk NSDS: input on device design, perceived benefits of the device, perceived barriers to community acceptance, and suggested device applications. Participants expressed positivity about the NSDS concept. Potential for increased dosing accuracy was stated as the main positive attribute of the NSDS. Potential stigma was noted, and the need for an education program about the device was discussed. No major community barriers to NSDS use were noted. Acetaminophen and de-worming agents were suggested as potential applications for the device. Conclusion Participants were enthusiastic about the potential benefits of the NSDS and were interested in using the device to deliver medication to infants. Design suggestions, especially to combat potential stigma of device use, will be thoroughly considered by the researchers. This study was a positive step forward in developing the NSDS as a novel method of medication delivery to breastfeeding infants, particularly in rural or low-resource areas.


High-efficiency transformation of the autogamous diploid legume Lotus japonicus by means of Agrobacterium rhizogenes was used to develop plant lines expressing a promoter-less gusA gene in a nodulation- or lateral root-associated manner. The approach exploits the putatively preferential integration of T-DNA into actively transcribed regions, thereby providing an enrichment for gene tagging events associated with the quickly assayable activation of a gusA promoter-less construct. Taking advantage of this enrichment and selection strategy, a T-DNA tagging program was initiated and screening for β-glucuronidase (GUS) activity was performed on root clones isolated after transformation with a gusA-promoter-less binary vector. The aim of this approach is the identification of genes involved in nodule formation induced by Mesorhizobium loti, lateral root organogenesis, and the eventual isolation of corresponding mutants. A large collection (220) of GUS-positive transformants showing a variety of expression patte...


Urbanization is an index of transformation from traditional rural economies to modern industrial one. It is a progressive concentration of population in urban unit. At the moment, India is one among the country of low level of urbanization. In the last fifty years the population of India has grown two-and-a-half times, but urban India has grown nearly five times. In 2001, 306.9 million Indians (30.5%) were living in nearly 3700 towns and cities spread across the country, and it is expected to increase to over 400 million and 533 million by 2011 and 2021 respectively. At the moment, India is among the counties of low level of urbanization. As a result, most urban settlements are characterized by shortfalls in housing and water supply, urban encroachments in fringe area, inadequate sewerage, traffic congestion, pollution, poverty and social unrest making urban governance a difficult task. The high rate of urban population growth is a cause of concern among India's urban and town planners for efficient urban planning. For this, the government of India has taken an important initiative to strengthen municipal governance, is the enactment of the Constitution (74 th Amendment) Act (CAA), 1992. Through this initiative, an attempt is being made to improve the performance ability of municipalities/urban local bodies, so that they would be able to discharge their duties efficiently in the planning and development of urban areas. However, most studies undertaken to assess the functioning of municipalities in India, point out that the municipalities are confronted with a number of problems, such as non-availability of data, ineffective participation in the decision-making process despite adoption of the policy of reservation, delays in the transfer of funds to the municipalities despite constitution of State Finance Commissions, poor recovery from various tax and non-tax sources despite devolution of power etc. Therefore, there is an urgent need to adopt modern technology of remote sensing which includes both aerial as well as satellite based systems, allow us to collect lot of physical data rather easily, with speed and on repetitive basis, and together with GIS helps us to analyze the data spatially, offering possibilities of generating various options (modeling), thereby optimizing the whole planning process. These information systems also offer interpretation of physical (spatial) data with other socioeconomic data, and thereby provide an important linkage in the total planning process and making it more effective and meaningful.


Even though there exists no formal minimum requirements for tenure track faculty, the generally accepted basic credentials are a PhD and a track record of contributions within a given field of expertise. To become tenured, faculty must demonstrate a high level of performance in each of teaching, research and service. In turn, the quality of an engineering department is dependent on faculty achieving excellence in all three aspects of the faculty position. While a PhD and a strong academic background are excellent preparation for research, they don't prepare well for contributions in service. Engineering departments are in continual need to bring the know-how that exists in industry into the classroom, to develop stronger connections with industry, and to conduct research that can contribute directly to industry. This paper investigates the role of professional registration among engineering faculty. Does professional registration among engineering faculty members increase their success as faculty? Would engineering departments be better if faculty were required to be professionally registered? Professional registration may be the catalyst to strengthen the bonds between industry, education and research. A survey was conducted to investigate the levels of quality, communication and success among engineering departments with and without professionally registered faculty. Results are presented and conclusions drawn which indicate a role for professional registration in engineering academia.


This study examined the extent to which issues related to internationalization were considered in institutional policy development at universities, along with the underlying reasons why such issues were considered. A written and telephone survey was conducted with trustees from seven state-supported universities in four states. Two state legislators from each state with an interest in higher education were also interviewed. The results indicated that little actual trustee business time was spent on policy-making related to internationalization. However, five of the seven trustees interviewed indicated that they spent a moderate to greater than moderate amount of time discussing institutional globalization outside of board meetings. All eight state legislators indicated that economic development interests were a primary rationale for internationalization. However, six of the legislators indicated that while universities had been quite effective in connecting globalization endeavors to economic development initiatives, they had been significantly less effective in demonstrating the benefits of internationalization for intellectual or cultural benefit. Suggestions for universities on how to educate policymakers about the benefits of internationalization are included. (Contains 21 references.) (MDM) ******************************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * ******************************************************************************** The Challenges of Globalizing Higher Education in a Parochial Policy-Making Environment


Asymmetric distribution of an aggregated protein controls yeast cell aging Is aging ineluctable, or are there genetic programs of aging that could be manipulated to extend life span? Research over the past two decades has provided powerful evidence that aging is indeed regulated by genes that control highly conserved pathways (1). For example, mutations in single genes in model organisms like flies and worms not only allow these animals to live longer, but rejuvenate them as well (2). Even the single-celled budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae ages, and specific genes likewise control this process (1). Indeed, one of the most powerful genetic manipulations to extend life span was discovered in yeast. The histone deacetylase silent information regulator 2 (Sir2) is required for repressing the transcription of certain mating-type loci, telomeres, and ribosomal DNA (3–5). The latter had been linked to aging in yeast, inspiring studies that revealed Sir2's importance for this process (6). Subsequent work in yeast and animal models established that changes in Sir2 activity are responsible for much of the life span–extending effects of caloric restriction (7). On page 1184 of this issue, Schlissel et al. (8) report that a particular facet of aging, which had long been attributed to age-dependent changes in Sir2 function, is caused by a new mechanism.


This paper deals with a central challenge in organization and management research: to predict the evolution of an organization's adaptive capability. We address both theoretical and methodological gaps in existing research. First, focusing on the largely overlooked external constraints on adaptive capability, we model how ties between an organization and its market audiences curtail adaptive capability as market tenure increases. Second, we address the methodological weakness of conceptualizing the content of organizational change in prior research with a novel approach. Our distance-based approach sees adap- tation as change in an organization's position in a cognitive market space. With position defined, one can measure the speed of movement in that space. An analysis of the UK motorcycle market serves as an empirical illustration for our theoretical prediction and proposed measure.


Astronomers have little confidence in orbital forcing calculations on time scales beyond ten million years. They are confident that the fundamental frequencies of the planetary orbits remain nearly constant on time scales of hundreds of millions of years. Small variations in these frequencies and chaotic behavior of certain resonance relationships, however, can introduce large uncertainty regarding the exact orientation of planetary orbits on time scales of tens to hundreds of millions of years. We introduce a simple trigonometric series expression for eccentricity in order to evaluate effects that arise from imposing specified displacements in orientation of planetary orbits. The resulting changes in the character of the calculated eccentricity time series should be a guide to stratigraphers seeking to relate orbital forcing to stratigraphic time series throughout the Phanerozoic. This geologic calibration of eccentricity time series in relatively old stratigraphic sequences may provide astronomers with clues to further refinement of their calculations.


With strongly bound and stable excitons at room temperature, single-layer, two-dimensional organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites are viable semiconductors for light-emitting quantum optoelectronics applications. In such a technological context, it is imperative to comprehensively explore all the factors --- chemical, electronic and structural --- that govern strong multi-exciton correlations. Here, by means of two-dimensional coherent spectroscopy, we examine excitonic many-body effects in pure, single-layer (PEA)$_2$PbI$_4$ (PEA = phenylethylammonium). We determine the binding energy of biexcitons --- correlated two-electron, two-hole quasiparticles --- to be $44 \pm 5$\,meV at room temperature. The extraordinarily high values are similar to those reported in other strongly excitonic two-dimensional materials such as transition-metal dichalchogenides. Importantly, we show that this binding energy increases by $\sim25$\% upon cooling to 5\,K. Our work highlights the importance of multi-exciton correlations in this class of technologically promising, solution-processable materials, in spite of the strong effects of lattice fluctuations and dynamic disorder.


Pressure tanks with the enamel surfaces play an important role mainly in the food industry and pharmacy. As the best advantage of these enamels there is very good resistance against aggressive environment at keeping the required mechanical properties of low-alloyed steels which are used for these applications. Enameling is generally applied as several particular layers whereas every of these layers has to undergo the pre-defined temperature cycle. Because of increasing device service life there is very often applied repeated enameling. The paper deals with the monitoring influence of the temperature exposition on the change of mechanical properties and structure of the basic material P265GH regarding its initial properties. The aim was to identify whether and eventually how these repeated emailing can influence the basic material degradation and based upon this to determinate their possible maximal number.


Author(s): Bainbridge, Katie | Advisor(s): Mayer, Richard E | Abstract: Brain-training games are largely ineffective at improving player performance on cognitive measures, whereas action video games are largely effective at doing so, despite not being designed for that purpose. This dissertation draws upon the schema induction literature to propose that greater variety during the training phase is responsible for this discrepancy. Three studies training three different cognitive domains (mental rotation, working memory, and visual attention) were conducted comparing a condition that trained with relatively low variety of stimuli or environments to a condition that trained with relatively high variety. In Experiment I a group that trained mental rotation using three categories of shapes was compared to three groups that trained mental rotation with just one of the shape types on near, medium, and far transfer measures of mental rotation and spatial visualization. No difference was found between the low variety groups and the high variety groups on any of the cognitive posttest measures. In Experiment II a group that trained with an n-back using just letter stimuli was compared to a group that trained with an n-back using 6 types of stimuli and an inactive control group on near, medium and far transfer measures of working memory and fluid intelligence. The high variety group did not improve relative to the low variety group, and in some cases the low variety group improved more than the high variety group. In Experiment III participants with minimal prior experience with video games were assigned to play Call of Duty in a high variety condition, a low variety condition, or an inactive control condition. These groups were compared on their improvement on three measures of visual attention skill. In no case did the high variety group improve more than the low variety group. When the active groups were combined they did not improve more than the inactive control group. Across all three studies no benefit was found for the high variety condition relative to the low variety condition on related transfer measures of the respective cognitive skills. It is concluded that variety is not a useful addition to training interventions if the goal is to increase low-road transfer ofcognitive skills.


During the crisis that followed Hurricane Katrina, many Americans expressed surprise at the dramatic levels of racial inequality captured in the images of large numbers of poor Black people left behind in devastated New Orleans. In this article we argue that, to better understand both the parameters of contemporary racial inequality reflected in the hurricane's aftermath and why so many were surprised about the social realities of racial inequality that social scientists have known about for decades, it is essential to recognize the shifting nature of Whites' racial attitudes and understandings. There is widespread evidence that in the post-civil rights era the expression of White racial prejudice has changed. In fact, during the post-civil rights era subtle and indirect forms of prejudice have become more central to the sustenance and perpetuation of racial inequality than are overt forms of prejudice. We draw on both survey and qualitative data to investigate current manifestations of White racial attitudes and prejudices. Our results indicate that racial apathy, indifference towards racial and ethnic inequality, is a relatively new but expanding form of racial prejudice. We further show that Whites' systematic "not knowing" about racial inequality (White ignorance), which was manifest in the reaction to the crises after Hurricane Katrina, is related to this racial indifference. Racial apathy and White ignorance (i.e., not caring and not knowing) are extensions of hegemonic color-blind discourses (i.e., not seeing race). These phenomena serve as pillars of contemporary racial inequality that have until now received little attention. We conclude with a discussion of the theoretical and the practical implications of our results for understanding racial dynamics in the post-Katrina United States.


Based on the analysis of six egg variables and incubation temperature of 65 temperate freshwater fish species, the possible relationships between oocyte diameter, incubation time and incubation temperature were reassessed and compared to the results obtained from marine fishes. Most freshwater species have eggs (mean +/-s.d. 2.19 +/- 1.52 mm) larger than marine species, that are chiefly demersal and develop stuck to various substrata, such as plants or rocks. A strong negative relationship was found between incubation time (t, days) and incubation temperature (T, degrees C): t = 186.23e(-0.197T) (r(2)= 0.87). A strong dependence of incubation time on oocyte diameter (Ø, mm) and incubation temperature was also found and was defined as: log(10)t= 3.002 + 0.599 log(10)Ø - 1.91 log(10) (T + 2), which explained 92% of the variance of the data set. Five major groups of species were defined based on the principal component analysis (PCA) of four quantitative variables. There were two distinct groups of salmonids, displaying demersal and non-adhesive eggs with a long incubation time at low temperature, the eggs of which required a high number of degree-days. There was a large group of species possessing small, mostly demersal and adhesive eggs developing at high temperature during a short period of time, and requiring a low number of degree-days. Between these two extremes, there was a fourth group displaying intermediate values and a fifth group including three species with large, adhesive and demersal eggs incubating at high temperatures during a short period of time. The burbot Lota lota displayed an unusual combination of variables compared to the remaining species in the data set.


As a consequence of the rapid expansion of higher education in Taiwan over the past decades, the enrolment of females in higher education has grown considerably. However, this article reports that in terms of institutional difference, access to advanced study, and differing subject preferences, the barriers to women's participation in higher education remain. Thus, the findings drawn from this article lead to the conclusion that females still suffer disadvantages in access to higher education, although the expansion of higher education in Taiwan has substantially benefited females over the past few decades.


One examines putative corrections to the Bell operator due to the noncommutativity in the phase-space. Starting from a Gaussian squeezed envelop whose time evolution is driven by commutative (standard quantum mechanics) and noncommutative dynamics respectively, one concludes that, although the time evolving covariance matrix in the noncommutative case is different from the standard case, the squeezing parameter dominates and there are no noticeable noncommutative corrections to the Bell operator. This indicates that, at least for squeezed states, the privileged states to test Bell correlations, noncommutativity versions of quantum mechnics remains as non-local as quantum mechanics itself.


Rochester Institute of Technology is currently implementing a college-wide initiative to incorporate multi-disciplinary design as a central theme for all students in the capstone design sequence. For several years, the Kate Gleason College of Engineering has supported a number of multi-disciplinary design teams. Each year, a limited number of multi-disciplinary teams would be formed, typically under the leadership of a strong faculty proponent. During the current academic year, RIT is incorporating lessons learned to institutionalize a multi-disciplinary capstone design experience for all students in the college. This paper will focus on educating the project managers and its content. A primary observation, based on the personal experiences of faculty members teaching design projects, and reflections of other faculty in the literature, indicates that most engineering students do not understand how to work collaboratively on multi-disciplinary teams. Many engineering students have no formal training in technical project management. During the Fall quarter of 2002, RIT introduced an advanced undergraduate course entitled "Design Project Management." During this course, students from mechanical engineering, industrial and systems engineering, and electrical engineering participated in a series of learning exercises specifically directed towards helping each student become a more effective team leader, when they assume responsibility for leading a design project team. Each student in the class will become a team leader of a multi-disciplinary team that will convene in the winter quarter, and work through the spring quarter to deliver a design project for a client. In this article, we will review the course learning objectives, daily topical coverage, and provide an in-depth review of weekly team-training exercises that the student engaged in. Within the design project management class, the student leaders formed sub-groups to apply formal techniques of product development and design to a classroom example. Every student in the class, except one, had completed a freshman "hammer building" exercise in the college machine shop. We used that common baseline of experience as a touchstone throughout the quarter. Students could then use a familiar project, and a challenge of "designing a better hammer" to learn about the contributions of each discipline, apply the fundamental principles of product development, and practice the management skills that they were learning. The article will conclude with an assessment of the course outcomes, and provide feedback gained from the students via an in-depth survey conducted at the end of the project management course. In addition, while the design teams themselves will proceed past the paper


This article contributes methodologically and theoretically to Christine Hine's call for a mobilities oriented internet ethnography. First, a 'media go-along', combining interviews and observations of a personal communication service at hand, is developed. Research participants give verbal and visual tours, framed by the researcher's discursively constituted invitations for orientation. Then, a theoretical framework integrating an analysis of media environment mobilities is developed. From research material on hook-up and dating apps targeting non-heterosexual men, it is shown how 1) research participants' navigation is materially contingent upon the medium and subject to momentary purposes and styles, 2) researcher presence and access must regularly be re-inscribed discursively, and 3) mobile media analysis, based on the media go-along's representations of verbal, material, affective, and kinetic aspects of social interaction, is useful in the analysis of socially-conditioned access to, and production of, single media practice and experience.


Transaction-level modeling (TLM) is the most promising technique to deal with the increasing complexity of modern embedded systems. However, modeling a complex system completely at transaction level could be inconvenient when IP cores are available on the market, since they are usually modeled at register transfer level (RTL). In this context, modeling and verification methodologies based on transactors allow designers to reuse RTL IPs into TLM-RTL mixed designs, thus guaranteeing a considerable saving of time. Practical advantages of such an approach are evident, but mixed TLM-RTL designs cannot completely provide the well-known effectiveness in terms of simulation speed provided by TLM. This paper presents a methodology to automatically abstract RTL IPs into equivalent TLM descriptions. To do that, the paper first proposes a formal definition of equivalence based on events, showing how such a definition can be applied to prove the correctness of a code manipulation methodology, such as code abstraction. Then, the paper proposes a technique to automatically abstract RTL IPs into TLM descriptions. Finally, the paper shows that the TLM descriptions obtained by applying the proposed technique are correct by construction, relying on the given definition of event-based equivalence. A set of experimental results is reported to confirm the effectiveness of the methodology.


Starting with L as an enriched cl-premonoid, in this paper, we explore some categorical connections between L-valued topological groups and Kent convergence groups, where it is shown that every L-valued topological group determines a well-known Kent convergence group, and conversely, every Kent convergence group induces an L-valued topological group. Considering an L-valued subgroup of a group, we show that the category of L-valued groups, L-GRP has initial structure. Furthermore, we consider a category L-CLS of L-valued closure spaces, obtaining its relation with L-valued Moore closure, and provide examples in relation to L-valued subgroups that produce Moore collection. Here we look at a category of L-valued closure groups, L-CLGRP proving that it is a topological category. Finally, we obtain a relationship between L-GRP and L-TransTOLGRP, the category of L-transitive tolerance groups besides adding some properties of L-valued closures of L-valued subgroups on L-valued topological groups.


Guidelines for the management of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) recommend the use of risk stratification models to identify patients most likely to benefit from cholesterol-lowering and other therapies. These models have differential performance across race and gender groups with inconsistent behavior across studies, potentially resulting in an inequitable distribution of beneficial therapy. In this work, we leverage adversarial learning and a large observational cohort extracted from electronic health records (EHRs) to develop a "fair" ASCVD risk prediction model with reduced variability in error rates across groups. We empirically demonstrate that our approach is capable of aligning the distribution of risk predictions conditioned on the outcome across several groups simultaneously for models built from high-dimensional EHR data. We also discuss the relevance of these results in the context of the empirical trade-off between fairness and model performance.


Garlic has long been used medicinally for many diseases, including cancer. One of the active garlic components is diallyl sulfide (DAS), which prevents carcinogenesis and reduces the incidence rate of several cancers. In this study, non-cancerous MCF-10A cells were used as a model to investigate the effect of DAS on Benzo (a)pyrene (BaP)-induced cellular carcinogenesis. The cells were evaluated based on changes in proliferation, cell cycle arrest, the formation of peroxides, 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) levels, the generation of DNA strand breaks, and DNA Polymerase β (Pol β) expression. The results obtained indicate that when co-treated with BaP, DAS inhibited BaP-induced cell proliferation (p < 0.05) to levels similar to the negative control. BaP treatment results in a two-fold increase in the accumulation of cells in the G2/M-phase of the cell cycle, which is restored to baseline levels, similar to untreated cells and vehicle-treated cells, when pretreated with 6 μM and 60 μM DAS, respectively. Co-treatment with DAS (60 μM and 600 μM) inhibited BaP-induced reactive oxygen species (ROS) formation by 132% and 133%, respectively, as determined by the accumulation of H2O2 in the extracellular medium and an increase in 8-OHdG levels of treated cells. All DAS concentrations inhibited BaP-induced DNA strand breaks through co-treatment and pre-treatment methods at all time points evaluated. Co-Treatment with 60 μM DAS increased DNA Pol β expression in response to BaP-induced lipid peroxidation and oxidative DNA damage. These results indicate that DAS effectively inhibited BaP-induced cell proliferation, cell cycle transitions, ROS, and DNA damage in an MCF-10A cell line. These results provide more experimental evidence for garlic's antitumor abilities and corroborate many epidemiological studies regarding the association between the increased intake of garlic and the reduced risk of several types of cancer.


On The Road To Virtue is a research project consisting of a thirty-minute documentary film and this supporting thesis paper. The entire project is built on the archival documentation of Meyer Brownstone from his visits to the Salvadoran refugee camps in Honduras in the 1980s. Through a cinematic examination of the visual and audio evidence, as well as Brownstone's commenting on it, we consider his memory of interacting with the refugees and contemplate their own efforts to retain agency in their lives. The film uses three primary vehicles — archival documentation, personal interviews, and enactments —to create a storytelling structure which encourages reflection on the direct testimony of the Salvadoran refugees and on Brownstone's images, while assessing his evidentiary accounting of life in the refugee camps. The supporting paper and the film both reflect on his commitment to promoting human development in the camps and elsewhere, through the establishment of participatory democracy structures, the maintenance of sustainable living practices, and the insistence on free speech and movement. The film also conveys the fluid relationship between historical events and their contemporary remembrance while this thesis paper critically reflects on the implications of these ideas and the related artistic approaches used to present them in the film.


This book is a comprehensive text covering most of the field of trauma. There are 23 chapters by 39 different authors that cover many historical aspects of trauma management and include subject matter from the initial evaluation and treatment of the injured patient, shock, and resuscitation to wound sepsis and mass casualty management. There are individual chapters on injuries of the central nervous system, eyes, abdomen, genitourinary system, soft tissues, and hand. Peripheral vascular injuries and pediatric trauma are presented in other individual chapters. The management of fractures is covered in three chapters: one limited to the upper limb, one the lower limb, and the other on the spine and pelvis. The chapters on pathophysiology of trauma and shock, maxillofacial injuries, thoracic injuries, and burns are particularly outstanding. The former covers the local and systemic effects of trauma. It provides a comprehensive review of shock, including specific sections on the


Background: Severe anaemia requiring urgent blood transfusion is a major cause of morbidity and mortality among children in the developing world. This often tasks the blood transfusion services of any typical tropical leading to transfusion of blood obtained from private laboratories whose services are often questionable. Under these circumstances the children are exposed to an increased risk of HIV and other blood borne infections. Aims and Objective: To determine the clinical and sociodemographic characteristics of children who receive urgent blood transfusion in Orli, Imo State, Nigeria. Methodology: This is a retrospective review of records of 53 children who received emergency blood transfusion during the period 1st June 2006, to December 31st 2007 at the Children's emergencyward of the Imo State UniversityTeaching Hospital, Orlu,Nigeria. Results: Out of the 63 patients who were admitted within the period under review, 53(8.4%) received urgent blood transfusion. More than 80% of these patients were below 5 years old. There was no sex predilection. The patients from the medium social class presented with severe anaemia more frequently than other social classes. The need for urgent blood transfusion correlated significantly with medium social class. Malaria was the commonest case of severe anaemia requiring urgent blood transfusion either singly (52.8%) or in combination with other disease conditions (24.5%). Conclusion: Severe anaemia associated with acute malaria is a major cause ofmorbidity and mortality in children especially in those less than 5 years old. The need for urgent blood transfusion correlated significantly with being from a medium social class family. Niger Med J. Vol. 49, No.3, July– Sept, 2008: 67 – 69. Keywords : Severe anaemia, emergency blood transfusion, children.


A correct first assessment of a skin burn depth is essential as it determines a correct first burn treatment provided to the patients. The objective of this paper is to conduct a comparative study of the different segmentation algorithms for the classification of different burn depths. Eight different hybrid segmentation algorithms were studied on a skin burn dataset comprising skin burn images categorized into three burn classes by medical experts; superficial partial thickness burn (SPTB), deep partial thickness burn (DPTB) and full thickness burn (FTB). Different sequences of the algorithm were experimented as each algorithm was able to segment differently, leading to different segmentation in the final output. The performance of the segmentation algorithms was evaluated by calculating the number of correctly segmented images for each burn depth. The empirical results showed that the segmentation algorithm that was able to segment most of the burn depths had achieved 40.24%, 60.42% and 6.25% of correctly segmented image for SPTB, DPTB and FTB respectively. Most of the segmentation algorithms could not segment well for FTB images because of the different nature of the burn wounds as some of the FTB images contained dark brown and black colors. It can be concluded that a good segmentation algorithm is required to ensure that the representative features of each burn depth can be extracted to contribute to higher accuracy of classification of skin burn depth.


This article analyses the role of central editors in constructing a national debate in the Norwegian media after the 2011 Oslo terror attacks. A broad literature has documented that after crisis, mainstream media move away from their everyday critical function to a ritual type of journalism that fosters adherence to shared values and support for national authorities. Based on in-depth interviews with debate editors, this article analyses how this type of national crisis discourse is substantiated and guarded through editorial decisions and policies. Second, it gives insights into how changes in the perceived climate of opinion and increasingly vocal critical voices gradually affect editorial practices and challenge consensus. Theoretically, the article combines perspectives from a critical approach (the media as channels for political authorities during crisis) and a cultural approach (the media as constitutive for resilience and recovery) to contribute to the understanding of crisis journalism in a multi-platform, multi-directional media landscape.


Received Mar. 11, 2014 Aevised Mar. 18, 2014 Accepted Mar. 18, 2014 Contrast enhanced ultrasonography (CEUS) using microbubble ultrasonography agent is able to show the vascular structure and enhancement patterns of lesions, so it has an worth in the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) which is a typical cancer that has a characteristic neovascularization. CEUS shows 3 phase vascular pattern like computer tomography (CT) typical arterial enhancement and portal or late wash out in HCC. CEUS can show a enhancement pattern of HCC in a real time and it has no nephrotoxicity or radiation hazard. Beyond the diagnosis, CEUS has also shown usefulness in the guidance of locoregional treatment and estimation of treatment response of HCC. In addition, recently, a few data which show a usefulness of CEUS in the early estimation of response after target therapy in the advanced HCC, also have been reported. However, CEUS has limitations in clinical practice yet and more wide investigation is needed for the validation of usefulness and wide application in clinical practice. However, CEUS also has many advantages in the field of the diagnosis and management of HCC, so in in this review, we are going to introduce CEUS and overview its clinical usefulness briefly. (J Liver Cancer 2014;14:7-13)


1 Invasive species usually exhibit different spatial population dynamics in their native and invaded range. This is often attributed to demographic differences, but may be due to differences in dispersal as well. 2 Regardless of how these dispersal and demographic differences from the native range arose, studying how they contributed to increases in population spread rates will increase our understanding of what has made these species invasive. Here we investigate which vital rates and dispersal parameters of the invasive thistle Carduus nutans drive the increases in spread rate in different invaded ranges compared to that in the native range in Eurasia. 3 We construct and analyse spatial integrodifference models that combine structured, local population models with mechanistic (WALD) models of seed dispersal by wind across a homogeneous landscape. Published and new demographic and dispersal data for single populations from the native (France) and invaded (Australia, New Zealand, Kansas and Pennsylvania) ranges were used for the parameterization. 4 We developed a variance decomposition method (c*‐LTRE) to analyse the contributions of the changes in the vital rates and dispersal parameters to the increases in the invasion wave speed (c*) estimates for the different invaded ranges compared to that for the native range. 5 The c*‐LTRE analysis showed that the net contribution of the dispersal parameters to c* increases varied among the populations from 51% (Australia), to 79% (Kansas), to 80% (New Zealand) and to 85% (Pennsylvanian experiment). Escape from natural enemies that reduce seed set by floral herbivory was important in all invaded ranges. Large positive contributions were also made by increases in rapid growth of seedlings and small rosettes, increases in flowering probabilities and potential seed production, as well as by increased plant height and lower falling velocities of the plumed seeds. 6 Synthesis. By incorporating a mechanistic dispersal model with a structured population model, and by linking this joint model to field data from several continents, we demonstrate the relative importance of dispersal and demography to invasion success. This approach can be used to analyse which aspects of an invader's life history have changed most importantly from the native range.


Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer in men worldwide. Although the aetiology of this disease remains largely unclear, several lines of evidence suggest that oxidative stress plays a role in prostate carcinogenesis. The antioxidant enzyme glutathione peroxidase 1 (GPX1) is part of the enzymatic antioxidant defence, preventing oxidative damage to DNA, proteins and lipids by detoxifying hydrogen and lipid peroxides that may contribute to prostate cancer development. Some studies indicate an association between GPX1 Pro198Leu polymorphism and an increased risk of cancer. The purpose of the present study was to determine the possible association of GPX1 Pro198Leu polymorphism and erythrocyte GPX activity with the risk of developing prostate cancer and to clarify whether erythrocyte GPX activity levels were correlated with the GPX1 Pro198Leu genotype in the Turkish population. The GPX1 Pro198Leu genotype was determined in 33 prostate cancer patients and 91 control individuals. As evident from our results, there was no difference between genotype and/or allele frequencies in prostate cancer patients and controls. No significant difference was found in GPX1 genotype or allele frequency between aggressive and non-aggressive prostate cancer patients. It can be suggested with these findings that individual susceptibility of prostate cancer may be modulated by GPX1 polymorphism, but it needs further studies.


We numerically investigate the efficiency of surface-plasmon-polariton (SPP) focusing by curved chains of gold (silver) nanoparticles located on a gold (silver) surface. The employed model is based on the Green's function formalism and the dipole approximation for field scattering by nanoparticles. The SPP focusing is considered for two cases of semicircle and parabolic chains of nanoparticles. We demonstrate that the efficiency of the SPP focusing is nonmonotonically dependent on the wavelength of an external light beam exciting the SPPs. Namely, the position of the intensity maximum at the focal point on the wavelength scale is determined by ohmic loss in the metal and scattering cross sections of individual nanoparticles in the chains. The dependence of the SPP focusing on the shape of the nanoparticle chains is also discussed.


Ontologies are ways of representing aspects of the world in terms of uniquely defined classes of 'entities' and relationships between them. They are widely used in biological science, data science and commerce because they provide clarity, consistency, and the ability to link information and data from different sources. Ontologies offer great promise as representational systems in behavioural science and could revolutionise descriptions of studies and findings, and the expression of models and theories. This paper discusses issues that have been raised about using ontologies in behavioural science and how these can be addressed. The issues arise partly from the way that ontologies represent information, which can be perceived as reductionist or simplistic, and partly from issues to do with their implementation. However, despite the simplicity of their structure, ontologies can represent complex entities that change over time, as well as their inter-relationships and highly nuanced information about them. Nevertheless, ontologies are only one of many ways of representing information and it is important to recognise when other forms are more efficient. With regard to implementation, it is important to build ontologies with involvement from the communities who will be using them. Far from constraining intellectual creativity, ontologies that are broadly-based


Interannual variability of the Northern Hemisphere (NH) wave energy is diagnosed using 30-year reanalysis data. Particular attention is paid to a relationship between the stationary and transient wave energy in the extratropics. In the NH, the stationary wave energy is negatively correlated with the transient wave energy on interannual timescales. The correlation coefficient is significantly high during mid-winter and spring between the sub- tropics and midlatitudes. Throughout the year, negative correlation is also found between NH-mean generation rates of the sta- tionary and transient wave energy, which results from the upward Eliassen-Palm flux. This suggests an essential role of the poleward eddy heat flux in the negative correlation of the wave energy. Standard deviation analysis shows that, in the NH, the interannual variability of the total wave energy is primarily explained by the stationary component. These facts provide a useful implication for understanding future projections of the NH extratropical wave activity.


The effects of using Moringa leaf powder (MLP) as feed additive on the differential cholesterol profile of broiler chickens at finisher phase was investigated in view of the scientific urge to find means of reducing fatty compounds in common meat products. One hundred and twenty,4-weeks old Abor acre broilers were used for this experiment and allotted to four different treatment groups (T1-T4). The control group; T1 was without MLP inclusion, T2 with 0.40% (of the total diet on dry matter basis) MLP inclusion, T3 with 0.80% MLP inclusion and T4 with 0.40% Liver fit powder (LVP-commercial product). Each group had three replicates with 10 chickens in a completely randomized design. The experiment lasted four weeks at the end of which blood samples were collected for the serum lipid fractions analysis. Parameters investigated were Total Cholesterol (TC), Triglycerides (TG), Low Density Lipoprotein (LDL), Very Low Density Lipoprotein (VLDL) and High Density Lipoprotein (HDL). Data generated were subjected to statistical analysis of variance. The results revealed that TC, TG, LDL and VLDL fractions of the serum cholesterol got reduced significantly (p<0.05) in birds on T3 and T4 while HDL got increased significantly with inclusion of MLP. These results suggest that MLP is hypocholesterolemic in nature.  Consequently, MLP inclusions compared favorably well with LVP and therefore can be used for reducing bad lipid fractions of serum of broilers at finisher phase to reduce the risk of high fat related diseases among the consumers.

 Keywords: Broilers, cholesterol, fatty meat, moringa leaf powder.


The management and intensive care of neonates is inherently prone to adverse events, particularly as such management often involves pre-term neonates in distress – this means they have been born too early and their frail bodies require external support in order to survive. In the Western Cape high-risk neonates who are being referred from one neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) to another such unit or from primary and secondary hospitals to NICU are transported by ALS providers. However, there is a paucity of evidence relating to the preparedness of these ALS providers for the management and continuum care of these critically ill neonates. This study showed the general lack of neonatal exposure as the clinical management of critically ill neonates ranged from once in six months (n = 17, 11.7%) to a group of 6.9% (n = 6) who indicated that they had never managed critically ill neonates. The lack of frequency of employing the critical ALS skills of neonatal intubation (n = 62, 42.8%) and neonatal CPR (n = 49, 33.8%) cited, reflected the lack of opportunity to use such skills frequently in the pre- hospital environment. Only 9.7% (n = 14) of the respondents indicated they had the necessary specialised monitoring equipment to safely transfer neonates and only 14.5% (n = 21) of the respondents felt "well-prepared" to manage critically ill neonates. There is an urgent need to standardise both the theory and the practicum components for all ALS provider neonatal training programmes. The ideal would be the establishment of a mentorship programme, supervised by neonatologists. Additional neonatal short course/refresher training is also needed which includes the design of Continued Professional Development (CPD) accredited activities. In order to improve patient safety, the procurement of sufficient specialised neonatal intensive care equipment and disposables, especially for the rural ALS providers, should be prioritised. Elements before, during and after the inter-facility transfer of a critically ill neonate by ALS providers were explored. This study suggests that these factors may impact on the emotional and mental preparedness of the ALS providers, possibly hampering their ability to provide optimum care.


Background Despite the numerous murine models of SLE, models that accurately reflect the central features of CLE are much more limited. The MRL/lpr line is commonly studied in this context, but the onset of cutaneous disease in MRL/lpr mice is highly variable, colony dependent, and takes 6 months or more to develop. Endosomal TLRs play a key role in the development of murine models of SLE and mice lacking all endosomal TLR function have markedly attenuated disease. However autoimmune-prone mice deficient for only TLR9 invariably develop more severe SLE. Materials and methods We have generated TLR9WT and TLR9KO mice that express a membrane-bound OVA fusion protein on MHC class II+ cells under the control of a doxycycline (DOX) inducible promoter. These mice were given DOX chow, sublethally irradiated and injected with activated OVA-specific DO11 T cells and then monitored for indications of systemic autoimmune disease. Results 3–4 weeks following T cell transfer, the TLR9KO recipients develop cutaneous manifestation of SLE characterised by a mononuclear interface dermatitis associated with mucin deposition, absence of skin-associated Tregs, accumulation of IFNγ-producing DO11 T cells, elevated MHC class II expression by LCs and keratinocytes, and excessive keratinocyte death. Many more DO11 T cells are found in the epidermis of the TLR9KO recipients compared to the TLR9WT recipients, and the TLR9WT recipients have a higher frequency of DO11 Tregs. Importantly, the TLR9KO recipients have more germinal centre B cells in the spleen and more ELIspot+ cells in the bone marrow, and make autoantibodies specific for Ro52, a self-reactivity commonly detected in human CLE patients. An additional key feature of the model is our ability to turn disease on and then off, simply by providing, or not providing, DOX. In mice on DOX for 4 wks and then off DOX for 2 wks, autoantibody titers markedly decrease and skin lesions resolve with minimal if any residual scarring. Subsequent DOX re-administration, without the transfer of additional T cells or any additional irradiation, leads to the rapid recurrence of autoantibody production and skin disease, thereby recapitulating lupus flares. Conclusions We have now leveraged the hyperactivity of TLR9-deficient mice to develop a novel T cell dependent model of cutaneous inflammation that is strikingly similar to human CLE. This model provides a means for characterising both T and B cell memory responses elicited by autoantigens, and determining to what extent the primary vs secondary responses can be limited by TLR antagonists.


TILLING (Targeting Induced Local Lesions IN Genomes) is a reverse genetic method that can be employed to generate allelic series of induced mutations in targeted genes for functional analyses. To date, TILLING resources in Arabidopsis thaliana are only available in accessions Columbia and Landsberg erecta. Here, we extended the Arabidopsis TILLING resources by developing a new population of ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS)-induced mutant lines in another commonly used A. thaliana accession C24. A permanent collection of 3,509 independent EMS mutagenized M2 lines was developed in A. thaliana accession C24, and designated C24TILL. Using the TILLING method to search C24TILL for mutations in four selected genes identified a total of 73 mutations, comprising 69.6% missense, 29.0% sense, and 1.4% nonsense mutations. Consistent with the propensity of EMS to induce guanine alkylation, 98.4% of the observed mutations were G/C to A/T transitions. Based on the mutations identified in the four target genes, the overall mutation density in the C24TILL collection was estimated to be 1/345 kb. TILLING the DUO POLLEN 1 (DUO1) gene from the C24TILL collection identified a truncation mutation leading to a deficiency in sperm cell differentiation. Taken together, a new TILLING resource, the C24TILL collection, was generated for A. thaliana accession C24. The C24TILL collection provides an allelic series of induced point mutations that will serve as a useful alternative reverse genetic resource for functional genetic studies in A. thaliana.


Lystrosaurus was one of the few tetrapods to survive the Permo-Triassic mass extinction, the most profound biotic crisis in Earth's history. The wide paleolatitudinal range and high abundance of Lystrosaurus during the Early Triassic provide a unique opportunity to investigate changes in growth dynamics and longevity following the mass extinction, yet most studies have focused only on species that lived in the southern hemisphere. Here, we present the long bone histology from twenty Lystrosaurus skeletal elements spanning a range of sizes that were collected in the Jiucaiyuan Formation of northwestern China. In addition, we compare the average body size of northern and southern Pangean Triassic-aged species and conduct cranial geometric morphometric analyses of southern and northern taxa to begin investigating whether specimens from China are likely to be taxonomically distinct from South African specimens. We demonstrate that Lystrosaurus from China have larger average body sizes than their southern Pangean relatives and that their cranial morphologies are distinctive. The osteohistological examination revealed sustained, rapid osteogenesis punctuated by growth marks in some, but not all, immature individuals from China. We find that the osteohistology of Chinese Lystrosaurus shares a similar growth pattern with South African species that show sustained growth until death. However, bone growth arrests more frequently in the Chinese sample. Nevertheless, none of the long bones sampled here indicate that maximum or asymptotic size was reached, suggesting that the maximum size of Lystrosaurus from the Jiucaiyuan Formation remains unknown.


The ovary, uterus or ovary and uterus were autotransplanted to the neck of the ewe. The success rate in transplanting the ovary alone (17/22) or the ovary with the uterus (7/9) was much higher than transplantation of the uterus alone (3/8). Angiographic evidence was obtained for the patency of the uterine and ovarian arteries anastomosed to the carotid artery and utero-ovarian vein anastomosed to the jugular vein in ewes with all three types of autotransplants. Ewes with utero-ovarian autotransplants showed regular oestrous cycles and had normal luteal phases, as judged by the pattern of progesterone concentration in peripheral jugular venous plasma. However, ewes with ovarian autotransplants failed to show oestrus due to maintenance of the corpus luteum as indicated by the fact that the concentration of progesterone remained elevated for up to 220 days. The relatively high success rate in this series indicates that more extensive use could be made of these techniques.


BACKGROUND
Although good medical records have been associated with good care, there is considerable room for their improvement in general practice.

AIM
To improve the quality of general practice medical records at minimal cost.

METHOD
A total of 150 randomly sampled general practitioners (GPs) in suburban Brisbane, Australia, were randomized in a controlled trial to receive or not receive an intervention. The intervention consisted of 6 to 12 one-hour monthly meetings when the pairs of GPs assessed samples of each other's medical records using a 12-item instrument. This was developed previously by a process of consensus of general practice teachers. Mean scores of 10 medical records selected at random from before the intervention started and one year later were compared.

RESULTS
After the intervention, the increase in the total score (for which the maximum possible was 18) for the intervention GPs (from a baseline of 11.5 to 12.3) was not significantly greater than for the controls (from 11.4 to 11.7). Legibility and being able to determine the doctor's assessment of the consultation were significantly improved. The post-intervention increase of 1.06 (9.3%) of the total scores of the 47% of intervention GPs who complied with the intervention was significantly greater than that for the controls.

CONCLUSION
The quality assurance activity improved some components of the quality of GPs' clinical records. However, the improvement was small, and the search for activities for Australian GPs that demonstrate an improvement in the quality of their practice must continue.


More than half a century after Brown v. the Board of Education and the Civil Rights Movement, the cities at the heart of America's racial conflict with itself have changed socioeconomically, culturally, and politically. While many of these changes resulted in quality of life improvements for racial minorities, there are some questions about lingering bastions of segregation in the South. Using a critical race theory (CRT) lens, in this paper we investigate four cities that were important to the Civil Rights Movement – Greensboro, North Carolina, Little Rock, Arkansas, Memphis, Tennessee, and Montgomery, Alabama – to examine demographic, economic, and sociocultural trends and how they affect racial minority groups. We find that, despite considerable improvement in terms of poverty rate, unemployment, and income, Blacks continue to remain substantially behind Whites in these cities, indicating that desegregation and access to opportunity has done little to close the black-white opportunity gap.


Criteria for distillability, and the property of having a positive partial transpose, are introduced for states of general bipartite quantum systems. The framework is sufficiently general to include systems with an infinite number of degrees of freedom, including quantum fields. We show that a large number of states in relativistic quantum field theory, including the vacuum state and thermal equilibrium states, are distillable over subsystems separated by arbitrary spacelike distances. These results apply to any quantum field model. It will also be shown that these results can be generalized to quantum fields in curved spacetime, leading to the conclusion that there is a large number of quantum field states which are distillable over subsystems separated by an event horizon.


IN any analysis of United States policy in Latin America, the first question which should be considered is: What priority is attached to Latin America in the whole spectrum of our foreign-policy considerations? Once the relative importance or unimportance of hemispheric problems is established, one can then move on to consider the question of basic U.S. policy in Latin America. Having delineated the fundamental lines of policy, one can consider finally the effective means of implement ing it. On these three questions I shall focus my discussion. On numerous occasions President Kennedy indicated the priority he placed on Latin America in the total spectrum of foreign-policy considerations by describing it as "the most criti cal area in the world." But two decades of constant preoccupa tion with Europe and Asia have left an imbalance in our global commitments that has not yet been wholly rectified. Although the United States must continue to be concerned with develop ments in many parts of the world, it is no longer either necessary or possible for the United States to become deeply involved in every area of the world and to undertake the massive political, military and economic commitments that such involvement en tails. The break-up of the bipolar world of the postwar era and the emergence of independent centers of power in the non-Com munist world should in the decade ahead allow the United States greater freedom to concentrate its resources in areas of primary concern to our national interest. Europe remains of crucial importance in our foreign policy considerations and will retain this status for the foreseeable future. But while the internal political, social and economic patterns of Europe are well determined by now, this is not the case with Latin America. The future structure of society and the external policy of Latin nations remain unanswered ques tions. Marxism as a guide to social development is a spent force in most European countries, but it remains a lively alternative in Latin America today. The example of Cuba suggests both the immediacy of the Marxist threat to U.S. interests and the nature of the problems which we face when Marxism is accepted as a guide to the development of a Latin American society.


Through the history of Nordic and Norwegian, the infinitive marker has undergone several syntactic and phonological changes. This article discusses the syntactic changes in terms of functionalist and generativist grammaticalization theory. The article starts with a brief review of the origin and use of the infinitive marker in Germanic, followed by a presentation of the syntactic characteristics of infinitive constructions in Old Norse, where the author offers arguments in support of analyzing the infinitive marker as a complementizer word. In Middle and Early Modern Norwegian, the infinitive marker is reanalyzed as a clitic adjoined to the verb. A later reanalysis in Modern Norwegian has resulted in the infinitive marker once again occupying the complementizer position. The history of the Norwegian infinitive marker thus exhibits different types of grammaticalization (lexical word > grammatical word, and word > clitic), degrammaticalization (clitic > word), and different kinds of realization of a functional category.


Reliability evaluation of an entire power system provides a set of indices which a system planner can use to balance the investments in different segments of the system in order to provide acceptable load point reliability. Evaluating an entire power system as a single entity is a difficult task. This paper presents a network reliability equivalent technique for evaluating the reliability of an entire power system. The procedure is illustrated by application to a practical test system.


Large intra-season differences in mixing ratios of CO and O3 were detected at Miyun, a rural site north of Bei- jing, in summer 2006. Despite an increase in mean daytime mixing ratio of CO from 500 ppbv in June to 700 ppbv in July, mean daytime O3 dropped from 67 ppbv in June to 50 ppbv in July and August. The observed changes in CO and O3 are attributed to the influence of the summer monsoonal circulation that develops over the North China Plain in July. Photochemical production of O3 is reduced as a consequence of increased cloudiness during July and August, as indicated by the strong negative correlation observed between O3 and satellite observations of cloud optical depth, with cloudiness having little effect on CO. The analysis suggests a strategy for emission controls that could be implemented in an eco- nomically efficient manner to minimize the frequency of high levels of O3 during summer in Beijing.


Aims Profile the relationship and differences in bust size, position and shape in a sample of UK bra consumers using 3D anthropometric body scan data. Evaluate the presentation of bra sizing by retailers and identify areas of miss communication to characterize effective application to the bra market. Collate and validate criteria for achieving adequate bra fit and quantify the physical impact on the bust size, shape and position.
Methods
Three quantitative methods were applied rich data to achieve the research aims. Profiling the variation in bust size shape and positioning within a bank of 3D Body scanning data into Bust height, Breast size, Bust Spread, Breast Drop and Breast Symmetry using the 30th and 70th percentiles as category dividers. Evaluating variation found in bra sizing and fit information provided by retailers and the deviation from the British Standard guidelines and Laboratory fit trials to assess the application of retailer bra fit criteria with grades in four categories; Underband, Cup Volume, Underwire and Bra Strap to a sample of UK bra consumers.
Findings
The findings from this research indicate potential for 3D Body Scanning Technology as a tool to quantify the relationships and differences in five bust characteristics. The technology is applicable in profiling the relationship between the bust and the body. The research presents a new method for measuring breast size which accounts for the prominence independently from the circumferential measurements. . Variation is found among retailers and researchers in bra sizing strategies in the baseline for the size range and the inclusion or exclusion of 'FF' causes greater variance above an F cup. The application of a bra fit criteria has a medium to large statistically significant impact reducing the areas where the fit is too big or small and increasing the cases where the bra fit is adequate. Post Hoc analysis revealed a medium to large negative affect on the bra fit small and bra fit too big classifications and a large positive effect on the bra fit adequate score when tested. Underband category findings are consistent with current research which suggests consumers are more likely to wear a bra which is too big in the underband.
Recommendations
The research built on previous findings while identifying gaps in the field of research. Further research is recommended into the variation in bra sizing which has been highlighted by this research. A recommendation is to link bra pattern cutting and grading to bra size communication to customers. This is seen as key to reducing communication of sizing to the consumer. Current bra fit advise is inadequate in assisting the consumer in selecting adequate support from a bra. Professional fitting is recommended to support this. A key recommendation from this work is that future Bra fit criteria applied to research should include a Bra cup neck edge category. Bra styling should also be considered as the correct size is not sufficient to achieve adequate fit.


Herein, recent experiments on the spectroscopy and chemical reactions of molecules and complexes embedded in helium droplets are reviewed. In the droplets, a high spectroscopic resolution, which is comparable to the gas phase is achieved, while an isothermal low-temperature environment is maintained by evaporative cooling at T =0.37 K (4He droplets) or 0.15 K (3He droplets), lower than possible in most solid matrices. Thus the helium-droplet technique combines the benefits of both the gas phase and the classical matrix-isolation techniques. Most important, the superfluid helium facilitates binary encounters, and absorbs the released binding energy upon recombination. Thus the droplet can be viewed as an isothermal nanoscopic reactor, which isolates single molecules, clusters, or even a single reactive encounter at ultralow temperatures.


: A generally applicable mathematical model, tailored for use on a Personal Computer, as the design tool to simulate unsteady flood flow in a network of interconnected rivers has been developed and applied to the Sham Chun River along the border between Hong Kong and the People's Republic of China. The effect on the improved Sham Chun River due to the proposed river training in the River Indus, one of its tributaries, is evaluated. The one-dimensional unsteady flow model itself is broadly applicable to a wide range of hydrologic conditions and varying field situations. It incorporates real hydraulic features including branched channels and 'tidal flats' flooding and drying. The time history of water stages and discharges are computed at any desired location throughout the connected essentially one-dimensional channel network subject to initial and boundary conditions. Details are given of techniques adapted in using the computational scheme to quantify the unsteady flow condition and the means to assure an efficient numerical solution as well as to verify the accuracy of the computed outputs by subjection to carefully selected schematic simplified test cases and real prototype cases with numerical solution method is a useful predictive engineering tool in river design.


understand the differences between such spouses. Using the Medical Expenditures Panel Survey 2016 Experiences with Cancer Supplement, spousal dyads in which one spouse had cancer were identified (n=670). Cancer survivors reported which family members or friends, if any, provided care during or after their cancer treatment. Survivor and spouse sociodemographic characteristics and spouse psychosocial characteristics including depression (Patient Health Questionnaire-2), distress (Kessler-6), and self-rated health were self-reported in the survey. The proportion of spouses identified as caregivers was calculated and compared with those not identified as caregivers on dyadic characteristics. Multivariable logistic regressions compared spouses' depression, distress, and self-rated health by identification as a caregiver. All analyses employed survey weighting. Most married cancer survivors reported that their spouse was a caregiver (32%) or that they did not have a caregiver (65%); very few did not list their spouse as a caregiver (3%). Survivors who were white (non-Hispanic) or off treatment were less likely to report that their spouse was a caregiver (30% vs. 46%, p0.10; 9.6% vs 11.1%, p>0.10; and 46% vs 50%, p>0.10, respectively). The findings suggest that spouses' experiences may be similar regardless of whether they are considered a caregiver, with implications for research and service delivery.


The overall objectives of this study were to 1) evaluate the impact of including crossbred relative records on estimated breeding value selection accuracy for crossbred performance and to 2) estimate the subsequent extent of animal re-ranking and differences in selection decisions. Number born alive (NBA) and litters per sow per year (LSY) records were obtained from a large swine breeding company which maintains a database consisting of nucleus, multiplier, commercial, and rotational cross herds. The dataset included 187,674 litters from 46,749 Landrace (LR); 117,782 litters from 31,665 Large White (LW); and 295,163 litters from 76,925 LR × LW (F1) females, respectively. Variance components for each breed were calculated in REMLF90 using bivariate models with one purebred trait and the respective F1 trait. Number born alive and LSY crossbred breeding values and accuracies were estimated for purebred sows separately with purebred information only (EBVPLS) and with combined crossbred and purebred information (EBVCCPS) in BLUPF90. Purebred sow contemporary groups with >10 sows each were obtained according to herd weaning schedule from the most recent six months of data from each herd. Sows were ranked within contemporary groups for EBVPLS and EBVCCPS. Spearman rank correlations between EBV rankings and selection decision differences were calculated for each contemporary group, boars used for artificial insemination, and a multiplier herd (HP) with seven commercial herds which contained F1 progeny with > 98% pedigree information. Selection accuracy increases, contemporary group Spearman rank correlations, and percentages of change in selection decisions were evaluated separately for NBA and LSY EBV using mixed model equations. Including crossbred relative records in crossbred EBV calculations improved selection accuracy for boars and sows from all herd types. Sow re-ranking and differences in selection


Current GPU tools and performance models provide some common architectural insights that guide the programmers to write optimal code. We challenge and complement these performance models and tools, by modeling and analyzing a lesser known, but very severe performance pitfall, called Partition Camping, in NVIDIA GPUs. Partition Camping is caused by memory accesses that are skewed towards a subset of the available memory partitions, which may degrade the performance of GPU kernels by up to seven-fold. There is no existing tool that can detect the partition camping effect in GPU kernels.
 Unlike the traditional performance modeling approaches, we predict a performance range that bounds the partition camping effect in the GPU kernel. Our idea of predicting a performance range, instead of the exact performance, is more realistic due to the large performance variations induced by partition camping. We design and develop the prediction model by first characterizing the effects of partition camping with an indigenous suite of micro-benchmarks. We then apply rigorous statistical regression techniques over the micro-benchmark data to predict the performance bounds of real GPU kernels, with and without the partition camping effect. We test the accuracy of our performance model by analyzing three real applications with known memory access patterns and partition camping effects. Our results show that the geometric mean of errors in our performance range prediction model is within 12% of the actual execution times.
 We also develop and present a very easy-to-use spreadsheet based tool called CampProf, which is a visual front-end to our performance range prediction model and can be used to gain insights into the degree of partition camping in GPU kernels. Lastly, we demonstrate how CampProf can be used to visually monitor the performance improvements in the kernels, as the partition camping effect is being removed.


A shrimp farmer in Taiwan practices innovation through trial-and-error for better income and a better environment, but such farmer-based innovation sometimes fails because the biological mechanism is unclear. Systematic field experimentation and laboratory research are often too costly, and simulating ground conditions is often too challenging. To solve this dilemma, we propose a decision support framework that explicitly utilizes farmer experiential knowledge through a participatory approach to alternatively estimate prospective change in shrimp farming productivity, and to co-design options for improvement. Data obtained from the farmer enable us to quantitatively analyze the production cost and greenhouse gas (GHG) emission with a life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology. We used semi-quantitative graphical representations of indifference curves and mixing triangles to compare and show better options for the farmer. Our results empower the farmer to make decisions more systematically and reliably based on the frequency of heterotrophic bacteria application and the revision of feed input. We argue that experiential knowledge may be less accurate due to its dependence on varying levels of farmer experience, but this knowledge is a reasonable alternative for immediate decision-making. More importantly, our developed framework advances the scope of LCA application to support practically important yet scientifically uncertain cases.


Several architectural patterns have been proposed for the purpose of modeling autonomous robots. They do, however, lack support on anticipatory behavior. Anticipatory systems typically consist of hierarchical levels of units with similar structures but with different semantics. Close mapping between units of a reference system and components of software models put high demands on component independency, with respect to hierarchy. A concept of hierarchical modeling is proposed to provide support on anticipatory modeling and fills the gap on these matters. The concept has been developed in a context of industrial automation software and successful experiments have been based on a Java‐based framework.


Purpose Muscarinic receptors are known to regulate several important physiologic processes in the eye. Antagonists to these receptors such as atropine and pirenzepine are effective at stopping the excessive ocular growth that results in myopia. However, their site of action is unknown. This study details ocular muscarinic subtype expression within a well documented model of eye growth and investigates their expression during early stages of myopia induction. Methods Total RNA was isolated from tree shrew corneal, iris/ciliary body, retinal, choroidal, and scleral tissue samples and was reverse transcribed. Using tree shrew-specific primers to the five muscarinic acetylcholine receptor subtypes (CHRM1-CHRM5), products were amplified using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and their identity confirmed using automated sequencing. The expression of the receptor proteins (M1-M5) were also explored in the retina, choroid, and sclera using immunohistochemistry. Myopia was induced in the tree shrew for one or five days using monocular deprivation of pattern vision, and the expression of the receptor subtypes was assessed in the retina, choroid, and sclera using real-time PCR. Results All five muscarinic receptor subtypes were expressed in the iris/ciliary body, retina, choroid, and sclera while gene products corresponding to CHRM1, CHRM3, CHRM4, and CHRM5 were present in the corneal samples. The gene expression data were confirmed by immunohistochemistry with the M1-M5 proteins detected in the retina, choroid, and sclera. After one or five days of myopia development, muscarinic receptor gene expression remained unaltered in the retinal, choroidal, and scleral tissue samples. Conclusions This study provides a comprehensive profile of muscarinic receptor gene and protein expression in tree shrew ocular tissues with all receptor subtypes found in tissues implicated in the control of eye growth. Despite the efficacy of muscarinic antagonists at inhibiting myopia development, the genes of the muscarinic receptor subtypes are neither regulated early in myopia (before measurable axial elongation) nor after significant structural change.


The integration of improved environmental or sustainable aspects in forest management is often affiliated with the rise of market-driven governance systems, such as forest certification. In terms of forest resource peripheries, like North-Karelia, Finland, these are often attributed to environmental business and consumer demands from the green Central European markets. While acknowledging these aspects related to the supply chains of wood-based products, this study evaluates the actual perceptions about environmental forest governance and its spaces in the resource peripheries themselves. It displays the perceived changes and practices in forestry by comparing private and corporate ownership and their governance networks. This is accomplished by a qualitative, interview based case study of North Karelian and Finnish forestry actors. Transnational forest governance is hereby treated as a relational space, with forest certification systems as possible technologies used to achieve improved, sustainable forest management. Utilizing the North-Karelian forestry sector, the varying positionalities of actors and institutions within such a relational space shape the knowledge networks, perceptions and decision-making. The study evaluates how these local-global positionalities of actors and individuals shapes their understanding, and guide the direction of sustainable forest management in Finland while it (re-)produces opposing regimes of practice. With the discourse on forest certification being twofold, a more complex picture emerges if aspects of even- versus uneven-aged forest management in Finland are integrated. Shaped by the actor's positionalities and related knowledge networks, perceptions regarding the quality of forest management practices and technologies used to achieve sustainability differ and thereby shape governance processes. The green markets are not perceived as the main driving force and a strong governmental influence, particularly related to private ownership aspects, is noted in the Finnish case. Forest certification systems, and other political technologies for sustainable forest management, are embedded in or strongly restricted by these aspects.


Affine rank minimization algorithms typically rely on calculating the gradient of a data error followed by a singular value decomposition at every iteration. Because these two steps are expensive, heuristic approximations are often used to reduce computational burden. To this end, we propose a recovery scheme that merges the two steps with randomized approximations, and as a result, operates on space proportional to the degrees of freedom in the problem. We theoretically establish the estimation guarantees of the algorithm as a function of approximation tolerance. While the theoretical approximation requirements are overly pessimistic, we demonstrate that in practice the algorithm performs well on the quantum tomography recovery problem.


Introduction: Lyme borreliosis is an infectious disease, caused by bacteria called Borrelia burgdorferi. The disease is spread to humans by infected ticks and around one sixth develop Lyme neuroborreliosis. It is a condition which is difficult to diagnose. For the correct diagnosis a lumbar puncture needs to be performed. A diagnose based only on the clinical picture and serology could end up in unnecessarily prescribed antibiotics. Excessive use of antibiotics leads to antibiotic resistance which is a growing global threat. Aim: The aim is to investigate in what extent the national recommendations are being followed when patients are diagnosed with neuroborreliosis and to investigate where within the healthcare the diagnose has been determined. This is of interest since Strama would like to identify which improvement oppurtunities there are for a more effective usage of antibiotics.Materials and Methods: Data of patients visiting the open care and the inpatient care, being registrated with the diagnosis code; A692, Infection caused by Borrelia Burgdoferi during January – Decemeber 2014 were collected from the country council's output device. From the the medical records of every patient visting the healthcare, it was possible to identify how patients were being diagnosed and treated in this retrospective study. Results: Out of all 84 patients registrated with A692 in the open care, 88% of the patients were handled incorrectly and were prescribed antibiotics. In the inpatient care, 61% of the patients were handled incorrectly. The majority were prescribed antibiotics without lumbar puncture. Conclusions: This study shows that the national recommendations are not being followed and that the majority of the patients being treated for Lyme neuroborreliosis do not go through a lumbar puncture. Being prescribed antibiotics without performing this, can result in an incorrect diagnose and give rise to increased antibiotic resistance.


New Jersey started enforcing a graduated driver license (GDL) system on January 1, 2001. The system requires a three-step process for full licensing: learner's permit at 16 years of age at the earliest; provisional license at 17; and, a basic license at 18. This report is the first phase of an evaluation of the New Jersey GDL system. The number and types of traffic crashes, traffic violations, and license suspensions in New Jersey by age for the years immediately before 2001 were analyzed. The second phase will look at the same type of data after 2001 and will compare the results to the pre 2001 analysis to determine what the impact of GDL has been. The analysis of the pre-2001 data shows that 17 year olds have substantially more crashes and violations per 10,000 people compared to other drivers. A higher percentage of their crashes are single vehicle crashes. In addition, a much higher percent of their crashes are due to unsafe speed, and a higher percent of their crashes are due to inattention, and a failure to obey traffic control devices or yield right of way, compared to middle aged drivers. A higher percent of their violations are due to speeding than any other group, and a higher percent are due to careless driving than for middle aged drivers.


Scaffolds laden with stem cells are a promising approach for articular cartilage repair. Investigations have shown that implantation of artificial matrices, growth factors or chondrocytes can stimulate cartilage formation, but no existing strategies apply mechanical stimulation on stratified scaffolds to mimic the cartilage environment. The purpose of this study was to adapt a spraying method for stratified cartilage engineering and to stimulate the biosubstitute. Human mesenchymal stem cells from bone marrow were seeded in an alginate (Alg)/hyaluronic acid (HA) or Alg/hydroxyapatite (Hap) gel to direct cartilage and hypertrophic cartilage/subchondral bone differentiation, respectively, in different layers within a single scaffold. Homogeneous or composite stratified scaffolds were cultured for 28 days and cell viability and differentiation were assessed. The heterogeneous scaffold was stimulated daily. The mechanical behaviour of the stratified scaffolds were investigated by plane–strain compression tests. Results showed that the spraying process did not affect cell viability. Moreover, cell differentiation driven by the microenvironment was increased with loading: in the layer with Alg/HA, a specific extracellular matrix of cartilage, composed of glycosaminoglycans and type II collagen was observed, and in the Alg/Hap layer more collagen X was detected. Hap seemed to drive cells to a hypertrophic chondrocytic phenotype and increased mechanical resistance of the scaffold. In conclusion, mechanical stimulations will allow for the production of a stratified biosubstitute, laden with human mesenchymal stem cells from bone marrow, which is capable in vivo to mimic all depths of chondral defects, thanks to an efficient combination of stem cells, biomaterial compositions and mechanical loading.


For the clear and precise vision, it is necessary that the light way in your eyes to be transparent and the cornea and lens focus light on the retina correctly. In cataract, less light passes through the lens as a result of blurring of the lens. The ability of lens adaptation reduces with time. As a result, the sensitivity of subtraction will go away. The aim of this study was to try to make a rapid cataract in rabbits by injection of sodium selenite. For this purpose, 12 rabbits were kept for two weeks prior to injection for assuring of being clinically healthy and their eyes were examined for being free of cataract and other disorders by means of ophthalmoscopy, slit lamp biomicroscopy and ultrasonography.Rapid cataract was induced by subcutaneous injection of 1 mg/kg bw of sodium selenite and repeated two more times with 2 days interval (3 mg/kg bw totally). All rabbits were examined by ophthalmoscopy and B-mode ultrasonography daily and slit lamp biomicroscopy with three days interval until cataract was developed at day 9. At this time, Linear Cortical and posterior subcapsular cataract were observed in all rabbits.4 rabbits were euthanized at day 23 for histological examination of the lenses and Induction of cataract was confirmed histology.


Oral Lichen Planus (OLP) is a chronic inflammatory dermatological disease of a relatively common autoimmune nature, yet of unknown etiology, which affects mostly women. Its clinical diagnosis is possible through the way it presents itself. However, the histopathological study is responsible for the laboratory diagnosis, which can exclude or not the possibility of dysplasia and/or neoplasia. Researches try to find an association between psychological states and OLP. Its potential for malignancy is not yet well understood. The treatment consists of topical and systemic corticosteroids. This study aims to report a clinical case of OLP associated with psychological states.


Arterial thrombosis after total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is a rare but limb-threatening complication, and early diagnosis and intervention are critical. However, delayed diagnosis is not uncommon, even in high-volume joint replacement centers. Some studies have indicated that patients with preexisting vascular disease have an increased risk of vascular injury during TKA. Thus, we report two cases from our center, which were treated during a 4-month period, that developed acute popliteal artery thrombosis immediately after TKA, despite the absence of preoperative vascular abnormalities in the affected lower limbs. In both cases, absence of a foot pulse was detected in time to successfully manage the complication using endovascular stent deployment, rather than open surgery. After the second case, the complications were attributed to improper use of single-pronged retractors, which were applied to the posterior surface of the tibial plateau. No other cases with similar complications have occurred. Thus, these cases indicate that direct instrument-related blunt injury can cause popliteal arterial thrombosis after TKA, and that the thrombosis can be successfully treated using the endovascular approach.


The purpose of this paper is to explore the factors that affect higher education student satisfaction and future employment and their use of career and other support services while attending an institution. The descriptive results of this study suggest that while student satisfaction may be relatively similar for all academic programs, students utilize career and other support services very little. Most notably, the results also indicate students' expectations for employment was not related to their experience issuing these services. On the contrary, they were mostly satisfied with their academic and personal development. In essence, students felt prepared for the workplace based on their academic experiences rather than through other supports offered by the institution. This paper suggests that institutions efforts are best placed on the academic and learning experience available to their students versus career and support services.