We often are unable to reduce wildlife damage because of our inability to apply a repellent directly to the plant, animal, or item that needs protection. Conditioned food aversions based on deception (CFABD) is one method that can be used to extend protection to these items (hereafter called models). In CFABD, the model is not treated; instead mimics of the model are created and then treated with a chemical that will sicken, but not kill, the animal consuming them. This approach is a reverse form of Batesian mimicry; normally the models are poisonous and the mimics are innocuous. Yet, the behavioral and ecological principles governing Batesian mimicry should also apply to CFABD. For instance, in both Batesian mimicry and CFABD, models and mimics must be indistinguishable to the predator before it will generalize an aversion from poisonous to palatable prey. Unfortunately, mimics have not been similar to models in many attempts to use CFABD, and, not surprisingly, the results have been negative. Based on our knowledge of Batesian mimicry, I hypothesize that if mimics and models are indistinguishable, animals will stop consuming models when the costs (in terms of illness) of making a mistake and consuming a poisonous mimic outweigh the nutritional benefits of consuming a model. This implies that key variables affecting the success of CFABD include illness severity, nutritional value of the model, ratio of mimics to models, and alternate sources of nutrients.


How is life in a criminalized ecology in the Andean-Amazonian foothills of southwestern Colombia? In what way does antinarcotics policy that aims to eradicate la mata que mata (the plant that kills) pursue peace through poison? Relatedly, how do people keep on cultivating a garden, caring for forest, or growing food when at any moment a crop-duster plane may pass overhead, indiscriminately spraying herbicides over entire landscapes? Since 2000, the U.S.–Colombian War on Drugs has relied on the militarized aerial fumigation of coca plants, coupled with alternative development interventions that aim to forcibly eradicate illicit livelihoods. Through ethnographic engagement with small farmers in the frontier department of Putumayo, the gateway to the country's Amazon and a region that has been the focus of counternarcotic operations, this article explores the different possibilities and foreclosures for life and death that emerge in a tropical forest ecology under military duress. By following farmers, their material practices, and their life philosophies, I trace the ways in which human-soil relations come to potentiate forms of resistance to the violence and criminalization produced by militarized, growth-oriented development. Rather than productivity—one of the central elements of modern capitalist growth—the regenerative capacity of these ecologies relies on organic decay, impermanence, decomposition, and even fragility that complicates modernist bifurcations of living and dying, allowing, I argue, for ecological imaginaries and life processes that do not rely on productivity or growth to strive into existence.


Aiming at a comparison of microstructure and paramagnetic properties of mesoporous TiO(2) nanoparticle networks, we subjected entirely different TiO(2-x) precursor structures to vacuum annealing. The transformation of an amorphous TiO(2-x) gel--obtained by sol-gel processing of an ethylene glycol-modified titanium precursor--into a network of interconnected anatase nanocrystals was explored by means of X-ray diffraction, nitrogen sorption, and electron microscopy. Crystalline junctions between the particles emerge from temperature treatment. This process of particle network formation is different from that related to the vapor phase grown anatase nanocrystals where particle-particle interface formation is induced by contact with water. It was found that, after annealing up to 873 K and controlled sample purification in oxygen atmosphere, both types of samples exhibit high concentrations of particle-particle interfaces and comparable properties in terms of surface area, porosity, and microstructure. With electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) we observed on nonstoichiometric TiO(2-x) networks an identical type of subsurface defect which is related to the presence of solid-solid interfaces.


Introduction: Studies have shown that half of the mothers complain labor pain. Because of the side effects of pharmacological pain killers on mothers and neonates, those medications are used lower than nonpharmacological methods in these days. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of lavender essence inhalation on labor pain in nulliparous women. Materials & methods: In this randomized clinical trial study, 120 pregnant women were selected by convenient sampling method and divided to case and control groups equally. The severity of the basal pain was measured at the beginning of active phase (4-5 cm cervical dilation) based on Visual Analogue Scale (VAS).Then, the case group received 2 drops of Lavandula oil inhaled at three stages ) 4-5, 6-7, 8-9 cm cervical dilation( and severity of the labor pain was measured before and after intervention. Analytical statistics such as ttest and χ2 were used. Findings: The results showed that difference in the labor pain before and after intervention in two groups was significant (P=0). But there was no difference in mean duration of the active phase and second stage of labor between the two groups . Discussion & Conclusions: The results indicated that lavender essence can reduce labor pain. Therefore, the results of this study can be used to make the process enjoyable and also reduce the cesarean section because of the fear of vaginal delivery. Besides, one can reduce the patients' need to sedative drugs and their side effects.


The Texas Transportation Energy Data Book is a statistical data base which contains information regarding the transportation energy characteristics of Texas. This volume is divided into five chapters. Chapter 1 compares energy related transportation statistics of Texas with seven other comparable states. Chapter 2 provides a snapshot of the Texas transportation energy picture. Energy characteristics of the highway and non-highway modes are found in chapters 3 and 4, respectively. Chapter 5 concludes this volume and furnishes information about alternative fuels and new energy saving technology.


Festulolium [Festulolium loliaceum (Hudson) P.V. Fournier] is a hybrid between meadow fescue (Festuca pratensis Huds.) and Italian ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum Lam.) or perennial ryegrass (L. perenne L.). The ryegrass parentage gives festulolium cultivars marginal winterhardiness in regions with severely cold winters. The objective of this research was to determine if natural selection for field survival resulted in a genetic improvement in freezing tolerance, forage yield, or persistence in northcentral and northeastern USA environments. The component strains of 'Spring Green' festulolium were compared with their unselected parents in a controlled-environment freezing test. The component strains of Spring Green had 186% greater plant survival and 34% greater tiller survival than their unselected parents. Spring Green was compared with its two commercially available parents in a 13-location field test. Spring Green averaged 5.0% higher in 2-yr forage yield than 'Kemal', but was similar in forage yield to 'Tandem' in a 13-location test ranging from Minnesota to Virginia. Spring Green averaged 30% more ground cover than its unselected parents at the six locations within USDA hardiness zones 2 through 4, but was generally similar to its parents outside of these severe hardiness zones. The increased freezing tolerance of Spring Green, obtained by phenotypic selection for field survival at several locations, appears to have resulted in increased adaptation to northern USA forage production environments.


This paper presents design and implementation of a CMOS fully balanced realization of the four-terminal floating nullor (FTFN). The proposed fully balanced FTFN (FBFTFN) is an essential building block for implementing fully balanced architectures of both voltage and current-mode analog CMOS integrated circuits (ICs). A low-power class AB CMOS realization of the proposed circuit is fabricated in a 1.2-/spl mu/m technology. The proposed circuit has numerous applications. Several applications including fully balanced amplifiers, filters, and sinusoidal oscillators are presented. All proposed design techniques and circuits are experimentally verified.


Small and medium sized enterprises' (SMEs) environmental performance and action have been often of great concern toward sustainability although they are playing a
critically important role in economic and industrial development. Among lots of initiatives to engage SMEs into sustainability framework, environmental supply chain
management (ESCM) of large companies has a great potential to persuade SMEs to undertake environmentally improved activities. ESCM approaches have been increasingly popular in today's large companies' businesses for their competitiveness, compliance with regulation and social responsibility. SMEs may be confronted with these environmental pressures as suppliers to large companies in the market.

This research investigated the relations and dynamics between the ESCM approaches of large companies and the environmental activities of SMEs in the Korean electronics
industry. A methodological triangulation approach adopting postal questionnaire survey and interview was used to describe these phenomena and to explore to the reasons,
obstacles to implement ESCM approaches, and identify key critical factors in ESCM approaches and SMEs beyond ESCM pressures.

This study found that ESCM approaches of large companies have positive impacts on SMEs' environmental activity, and the collaborative approach was more effective than
the arm's-length approach. Furthermore, when ESCM approaches fitted the internal conditions of an SME, the conduct of its environmental activities improved.
Appropriate compensations and the environmental awareness of a CEO could make the SMEs undertake environmental activities by going beyond the criteria suggested by
customers.


Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia are more likely to experience transport disadvantage, which contributes to observed health disparities. Transport disadvantage has been attributed to low rates of licensed drivers in Aboriginal communities; to address this the Driving Change program was developed to support Aboriginal communities in New South Wales (NSW) to facilitate equitable access to licensing. This article presents the protocol for the Driving Change process evaluation and outlines the application of a context-informed approach. The process evaluation triangulates program data, stakeholder interviews and discussion groups. Descriptive and regression analyses of quantitative data (demographics, interaction with the program, service delivery and outcomes) will review reach, fidelity and dosage. Framework analysis of qualitative data will seek to uncover a richer understanding of context including barriers and facilitators to implementation. Community engagement and acceptability will be explored to determine the program's responsiveness to community and cultural needs. Understanding community and cultural context is crucial to evaluation in complex multisite interventions. Using a context-informed approach, the Driving Change process evaluation will provide valuable insight into implementation and evaluation of multi-site programs in Aboriginal communities. We encourage evaluators to consider context at all stages of evaluation, particularly for complex and multi-site community interventions.


This paper is not devoted to European citizenship, but rather to the ways we study it. The paper is based on a sample of recent literature on EU citizenship and is developed as follows. Firstly, seven divergent thematizations (the ways EU citizenship is identified and framed) are introduced and analyzed with regard to the problems they show. Then five conceptualizations are presented that come from the same sources, and that should be considered to overcome criticalities. There follows the introduction of a conceptual framework regarding democratic citizenship as an empirical phenomenon. This framework allows the identification of a paradigm that has shaped national citizenship and that is experiencing deep crisis and transformation. European citizenship, from this perspective, can be viewed as anomaly of the paradigm and then appropriately studied.


This project has been proposed from my teacher in order to provide a really state of the art solution in the fields of Telecommunications. We studied about Network Function Virtualization and we found that a part of the Resource Allocation (many have involved in this subject) can be tackled with an algorithm that was first invented to solve graphical problems (such as the Travel Salesman Problem [TSP]) the Ant Colony Optimization. We have analyzed one of the three phases of the Resource Allocation, and we have decided to tackle the second one. To be more precise, this part takes for granted the other two phases, and it tries to find which combination between links and nodes is the best according to the cost function that someone defines. Our scope was to set as cost functions the minimization of the delay. The results of this project are more than desirable. This is because we have used a metaheuristic algorithm that can find about 90% of the optimal solution without searching the hole environment.


The specific gravity and elastic modulus of magnesium alloys are similar to that of human bone. Magnesium is one of the most important elements in the human body and plays a key role in the metabolic process. But the application of magnesium is seriously limited as a biomaterial since it corrodes easily in the physiological environment of the body. In order to reduce the corrosion, we developed protective films using rare earth (RE) conversion processing. The surface of magnesium samples was modified by contact with different rare-earth salt solutions; then the samples were dipped in SBF to test their corrosion resistance. The change of mass and the pH of the solutions were measured continuously using an electronic scale and a pH micrometer. The surface microstructure of the samples was observed by XRD and metallomicroscope. Corrosion rates of the samples in SBF were determined using Taffier curve. The preliminary results show that the conversion treatment with CeCl3 or Y(NO3)3 can improve the corrosion resistance of magnesium in SBF. The relationship of the RE salts concentration and the corrosion properties were studied,the best combination of parameters was determined, and the formation mechanism of rare-earth conversion film has been also elaborated.


Although peridotite xenoliths are common in alkaline basalts, it is still unclear whether the chemical compositions of their host rocks have been affected by these mantle fragments and, if so, what processes are involved in this alteration of the host basalts. Here, we document a kind of xenolith‐rich alkaline basalts from the Nanjing basaltic field, eastern China. These basalts contain lower concentrations of CaO (4.1–7.8 wt %) and Sc (3.3–17.8 ppm) and have lower Ca/Al (0.3–0.6) and higher Na/Ti ratios (2.8–11.2) than other Cenozoic basalts in this area. These xenolith‐rich basalts show good correlations between elemental ratios (e.g., Lu/Hf and Ca/Al) and εHf values, which are indicative of mixing of two distinct components during the genesis of the magmas that formed these basalts: a high‐εHf end‐member (with low Lu/Hf and Ca/Al ratios) and the primitive melt‐related low‐εHf end‐member. In addition, peridotite xenoliths hosted in these basalts have distinct core‐mantle textures, with the margins having higher modal olivine abundances (70%) than the xenolith cores (52%). Within the xenolith margins, some orthopyroxenes are enclosed in the olivines, and all clinopyroxenes are sponge textured. These sponge‐textured clinopyroxenes have higher CaO and Sc concentrations, higher Ca/Al ratios, and lower Na/Ti ratios than clinopyroxenes within the cores of the xenoliths, suggesting that the xenoliths underwent low‐pressure melting within the host magma. This indicates that xenolith‐rich magmas within the study area were contaminated during ascent by melts derived from mantle xenoliths within the magmas, transforming the magmas into the low‐Ca alkaline basalts.


Finding an acceptable and workable balance between paid work and family commitments "has been, and will continue to be, one of the central tasks for employment law." For women, finding this balance is also fundamental to the quest for gender equality in work. In this paper, prompted by a number of recent cases, we examine how two alternative regulatory approaches in employment law can be - and have been - used in Australia to enforce or encourage work practices that are family-friendly and hence assist in achieving the two related goals of a more acceptable work-family balance and gender equality in work. On the one hand are public equality laws, and on the other private contract law. The claimants in the cases we consider used these two approaches to make claims for particular family-friendly provisions, specifically unpaid maternity leave and the right to work part-time hours after maternity leave. These are only two particular benefits, but we consider these as examples of family-friendly practices more generally and attempt to draw implications for a wider range of practices. While Australian anti-discrimination legislation is primarily reactive and does not impose any positive duty on employers, by characterising practices that are contrary to work-family balance as discriminatory (on the basis of sex or pregnancy), workers in these cases had some success in compelling family-friendly practices. Further the cases show that human resource policies and manuals that express aspirations about commitments to work-life balance and family-friendly practices can be contractually enforceable in Australia.


BACKGROUND
  Adolescents in the Looked After Care (LAC) system demonstrate high rates of psychiatric disorder and self-harm; however, there is little evidence for therapies reducing self-harm in this population.

METHOD
  An open evaluation of DBT for adolescents with repeated serious self-harm in the LAC system was undertaken.

RESULTS
  An intention-to-treat (ITT) analysis showed that DBT was successful at reducing the core elements of depression, hopelessness and self-harm; however, 35% (7/20) failed to engage.

CONCLUSION
  DBT is a useful treatment option; the failure, however, of some adolescents to engage in therapy may be due to their higher initial rates of depression and hopelessness.


The concept of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) had been used as a patient reported outcome measure in healthcare settings. It has been conceptualised and measured using validated instruments in the Western scientific community. However, in the Saudi literature, the true meaning of this concept is still lacking. The aim of this study is to explore the gap in literature and define the concept of HRQoL, identify its key domains and conceptualise it as perceived specifically by patients with renal failure and undergoing haemodialysis in Saudi Arabia.This PhD included two strands, an empirical qualitative study and a critical analysis of the HRQoL concept and its measurement in the Western as well as the Saudi literature. Using qualitative research methods, the empirical study was conducted in one centre in the Eastern Region of Saudi Arabia. Twenty two In-depth qualitative interviews were conducted in the Arabic language, recorded, transcribed and translated into English. Thematic analysis was performed to analyse the data as the transcripts were coded, the categories identified and the themes generated. The conceptual analysis of HRQoL was carried out after the review of the Western literature on the quality of life (QoL) conceptual models and the measuring instruments used in renal literature. Systematic review of the Saudi HRQoL literature was performed as well to understand the meaning and methods of measurement of the concept of HRQoL. The conceptual analysis of HRQoL revealed that the concept is poorly defined in the Saudi literature; its measurement was based on instruments that are not culturally-adapted. Hence the findings are subjected to questions of validity and reliability. The QoL conceptual models have been developing in the Western literature as well as measuring instruments for patients with renal failure. However, the adoption of these models or instruments is critical due to social, cultural and religious variations between Saudi Arabia and the Western societies.Seven themes defining HRQoL emerged from the qualitative data; these reflected the subjectivity of the concept. The domains of HRQoL were the physiological, social, psychological, religious and vocational domains. Each of those domains was defined by determinants that affect other domains and the overall HRQoL. These were synthesised into a single definition, which incorporated all five domains. A model of HRQoL of patients undergoing haemodialysis in Saudi Arabia was developed explaining the relationship between the key domains and HRQoL. Healthcare services were discussed as a factor that affects the health status of patients and plays an indirect role in the life quality of this patient group. Hence it was considered as a factor rather than a domain.This study, including the conceptual analysis and the empirical study, illustrates that the concept of HRQoL is highly individual and is affected by the views of individuals living in a specific culture. Additionally, it is affected by the social, cultural and religious backgrounds of those individuals. The conceptualisation of HRQoL in this study was almost similar to the Western conceptualisation, however, the relationships between the key domains of HRQoL and their determinants differed. The social and religious domains were highly influenced by the Arabic culture and the Islamic religion. HRQoL in patients with ESRD in the Eastern Region of Saudi Arabia has a different meaning and conceptualisation from that seen in comparable Western literature. The assessment of HRQoL of patients with renal failure and on haemodialysis in Saudi Arabia requires a culturally-adapted instrument. This would ensure valid and reliable results that could be used in decision-making and the planning of care.


In present days, car theft has become a major threat to the common man, with 1 car being stolen every 6.5 minutes in India. Though most of the car manufacturers flaunt of deploying immobilizers, still the number of cars being stolen is on the rise. With the invention of new and sophisticated way of stealing, every now and then car security has been threatened immensely. Not only India, "GRAND THEFT AUTO" seems to have become the most common game on the European and American streets too. Approximately 1 million vehicles are stolen each year in the US, which averages out to about 2,500 a day. Frankfurt remains Germany"s car theft capital where Polish gangs operate a highly productive empire. Thorough research work and after going through various case studies made it possible to deduce that most car thefts are of the petty variety, rarely involving assault. The thief doesn"t want confrontation. In this paper an attempt as been made to prevent potential car theft using ANTI-THEFT SYSTEM, designed with efficient wireless and wired circuitry.


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Fear of falling is more common and pronounced in people with Parkinson's disease than in controls. We conducted a series of studies that used multivariable regression analyses to identify explanatory factors of fear of falling in people with Parkinson's disease. Three independent samples were used. The first study (n=154) was a postal survey study that used well-established self-rating scales. The second study replicated the first one by using a clinical sample (n=104) and added unexplored motor aspects (e.g., gait speed, functional balance performance) as well as global cognition. The third clinical study (n=241) included independent variables that focused on personal (e.g. general self-efficacy) and environmental factors as well as Parkinson-related disabilities. In all three studies, walking difficulties was the strongest explanatory (60–68%) factor. The results imply that walking difficulties in daily life should be the primary target in order to reduce fear of falling in people with Parkinson's disease. (Less)


This study aims to analyze and decompose the gap between White and non-White students' test scores observed in the Brazilian National Evaluation System of Basic Education (SAEB)—2015. To do so, proficiency equations were estimated for each student race group (White, Brown, Black, and Indigenous) using the recentered influence function method, which generalizes the Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition to any point in the grade distribution. The proficiency of White students is higher than the other groups of students, and this difference increases throughout the distribution. Black students exhibit the lowest average test score, behind the Indigenous and then the Brown students. At the lower and middle levels of the math test score distribution, the racial gap is mainly due to the characteristics effect, which represents the part of the proficiency differential that is explained by the differences in observable characteristics of students. However, the gap at the upper level of grade distribution is mainly due the structural effect, which results from non-observable issues, such as discrimination and stereotype threats.


Introduction: Unexplained iron deficiency anaemia in adult population is thought to be due to occult blood loss in the gastrointestinal tract. Aim: To prospectively study the gastrointestinal lesions associated with IDA. Materials and methods: We prospectively studied 118 consecutive patients with unexplained IDA during the study period with upper GI endoscopy. Colonoscopy was done in patients with negative findings in endoscopy. In patients were both failed to show lesions, video capsule endoscopy was done to evaluate small bowel. A questionnaire was used to study the associated GI symptoms. Results: Upper GI endoscopy, colonoscopy and video capsule endoscopy detected lesions in 63.6 %, 11.9 % and 7.6 % patients respectively. No cause was det patients. Upper GI symptoms (48.3 %) were more commonly seen than the lower (15.3 %), with heartburn and dysphagia predominating. The sensitivity and specificity of upper GI symptoms was 60 % and 72 % and 31 % and 87 % for lower GI sympt Conclusion: Patients with unexplained IDA should be screened with upper GI endoscopy despite the absence of GI symptoms. IDA serves as a marker to detect newer GI malignancies.


Subspace optimization methods have the attractive property of reducing large-scale optimization problems to a sequence of low-dimensional subspace optimization problems. However, existing subspace optimization frameworks adopt a fixed update policy of the subspace and therefore appear to be sub-optimal. In this paper, we propose a new \emph{Meta Subspace Optimization} (MSO) framework for large-scale optimization problems, which allows to determine the subspace matrix at each optimization iteration. In order to remain invariant to the optimization problem's dimension, we design an \emph{efficient} meta optimizer based on very low-dimensional subspace optimization coefficients, inducing a rule-based method that can significantly improve performance. Finally, we design and analyze a reinforcement learning (RL) procedure based on the subspace optimization dynamics whose learnt policies outperform existing subspace optimization methods.


This study examined the relationship between love attitude and marital adjustment across five stages of the marital life-cycle in Nigerian society. The subjects for this study were 202 volunteers from six protestant churches representing six cities in the southern part of Nigeria. An average of 20 couples were representatives of each of the five marital life-cycles. Each of the subjects completed the Love Attitude Inventory (LAI), and the Marital Adjustment Test (short form) (MAT). Wilk's multivariate analysis revealed no significant differences between husbands' and wives' love attitude and marital adjustment across the five stages of the marital life cycle. Multivariate analysis split-plot 5.2 with repeated measures revealed no significant difference for the total sample among the groups, but indicated a significant difference between love attitude and marital adjustment for the total sample using sex as a factor. A univariate test of the MAT and LAI indicated that the MAT accounted for the difference. A canonical correlation indicated a significant positive relationship between husbands1 and wives' marital adjustment and love attitude within each of the five groups. The findings suggest that husbands and wives included in this study have a good understanding of their roles in the marriage relationship and that the partners have general agreement regarding those roles. The marriage partners apparently have strong influences on each other's perceptions of love attitude and marital adjustment.


Previously, we showed that antenatal micronutrient supplementation increases birth weight in a malnourished rural South Asian setting, but the long-term effects are unknown. Between 1999 and 2001, pregnant women were sector-randomized to receive from early pregnancy through 3 mo postpartum daily micronutrient supplements containing either vitamin A alone as the control or with folic acid; folic acid+iron; folic acid+iron+zinc; or a multiple micronutrient supplement that included the above nutrients plus 11 others. From 2006 to 2008, 3524 children (93% of surviving children) were revisited between the ages of 6 and 8 y. Blood pressure, BMI, waist circumference, glycated hemoglobin, cholesterol, triglycerides, glucose, insulin, and the urinary microalbumin:creatinine ratio were assessed among children. Insulin resistance was estimated using the homeostasis model assessment (HOMA) and metabolic syndrome was defined using a modified National Cholesterol Education Program definition. None of the micronutrient supplement combinations affected blood pressure, cholesterol, triglycerides, glucose, insulin, or HOMA. There was a reduced risk of microalbuminuria (> or =3.40 mg/mmol creatinine) in the folic acid [odds ratio (OR), 0.56; 95%CI, 0.33-0.93; P = 0.02) and folic acid+iron+zinc (OR, 0.53; CI, 0.32-0.89; P = 0.02) groups and a reduced risk of metabolic syndrome in the folic acid group (OR, 0.63; CI, 0.41-0.97; P = 0.03). Maternal supplementation with folic acid or folic acid+iron+zinc reduced the risk of kidney dysfunction and, to some extent, metabolic syndrome among children at 6-8 y of age. Supplementation with multiple micronutrients had no such affect. Future follow-up studies are needed to examine long-term supplementation effects on risk of chronic diseases in adults.


The purpose of this study is to analyze various studies on adaptive educational hypermedia environments, regarded as a new field of research and application, in a comprehensive way. To this end, all postgraduate thesis studies conducted in Turkey, articles in the journals whose scope covers educational sciences and which published in Turkey, and articles with Turkey address in the international journals indexed in SSCI were reviewed and content analysis was employed. The study will present current situation of this field and also, inform those who are interested in adaptive educational hypermedia environments concerning deficiencies in the field in the light of similar studies conducted abroad.


RATIONALE
The ELAN Ecuadorian Study of Hospital Malnutrition returned a malnutrition rate of 37.1% in public hospitals of Ecuador [Gallegos Espinosa S, Nicolalde Cifuentes M, Santana Porbén S; para el Grupo Ecuatoriano de Estudio de la Desnutrición Hospitalaria. State of malnutrition in hospitals of Ecuador. Nutr Hosp (España) 2014;30:425-35]. Hospital malnutrition could be the result of institutional cultural practices affecting the patient's nutritional status.

OBJECTIVES
To present the current state of food and nutritional care provided to patients assisted in public hospitals of Ecuador.

MATERIAL AND METHOD
The state of food and nutritional care provided to 5,355 patients assisted in 36 hospitals of 23 provinces of the country was documented by means of the Hospital Nutrition Survey (HNS), conducted as part of the ELAN Study. HNS recorded the completion of nutritional assessment exercises, the use of food-bymouth, fasting, use of oral nutritional supplements, and implementation and conduction of Artificial nutritional schemes (Enteral/Parenteral); respectively.

RESULTS
Less than 0.1% of clinical charts had a diagnosis of malnutrition included in the list of the patient's health problems. Less than half of the patients had been measured and weighted on admission. Serum Albumin values and Total Lymphocytes Counts were annotated on admission in only 13.5% and 59.2% of the instances, respectively. Current weight value was registered in only 59.4% of the patients with length of stay ³ 15 days. An oral nutritional supplement was prescribed in just 3.5% of non-malnourished patients in which significant metabolic stress and/or reduced food intakes concurred. Although up to 10 different indications for use of Artificial nutrition were identified in the sample study, any of these techniques was administered to just 2.5% (median of observed percentages; range: 1.3 - 11.9%) of surveyed patients.

CONCLUSIONS
Currently, nutritional status of hospitalized patient is not included within therapeutic goals, nutritional assessment exercises are incomplete, and Artificial nutrition is not considered a therapeutic option. From these findings it can only be concluded that the nutritionist still has no place within medical care teams. Adoption of required measures in order to introduce "Food and Nutrition Good Practices" into the medical care in public hospitals of Ecuador is urgently needed.


B133 Epidemiologic studies, in-vitro and animal studies indicate that vitamin D3 may have anti-cancer benefits. The evidence that higher vitamin D levels through increased sunlight exposure or dietary or supplement intake inhibit colorectal carcinogenesis is substantial. And vitamin D3 and its analogues induce cell cycle arrest and apoptosis, so it potentially could be used for cancer prevention. VDR gene, which encodes a nuclear receptor that mediates the effects of vitamin D3 and has potential tumor-suppressive activity. Through our study on the identification of the transcriptional targets of p53, we found that expression of the VDR gene is directly up-regulated by p53. Because both p53 and vitamin D3 have antitumor activity, we further investigated the functional relation of p53 and VDR in cancer cells. First, we confirmed VDR expression was induced by p53 and p53 family genes in variety cancer cell lines. ChIP assays showed that candidate p53-binding sequences located in the VDR first intron could directly interact with the p53 protein in vivo, and Luciferase assays confirmed the p53-response sequence was functional. Overexpression of VDR increased the sensitivity to vitamin D3 treatment, and suppressed colony growth of colorectal cancer cells. We observed several p53 target genes were up-regulated by vitamin D3 treatment under VDR overexpression condition. Expression of VDR and its target genes by p53, p63, and p73 was enhanced by the addition of vitamin D3, so VDR enhances the transcriptional activation of TP53 downstream genes. Furthermore down-regulation of VDR decreased the transcriptional activation of a subset of p53 target genes and decreased the numbers of apoptotic cells induced by Ad-p53 or Ad-p63. These data suggest that VDR plays a novel role in the p53 signaling pathways. p53 might sensitize cells to the anti-proliferative actions of vitamin D3 by increasing VDR levels. Some studies show that VDR is downregulation in high-grade carcinomas and the efficacy of therapy with vitamin D3 analogues is lost at late steps of tumour progression. So the alteration of p53 may be one of the causes of this VDR dysregulation and it may thus be used as an indicator of patients who are unlikely to respond to this therapy.


As mobile devices are becoming ubiquitous nowadays, the geographical activities and interactions of human beings can be easily recorded and accessed. Each mobile individual can belong to an online social network. Unfortunately, the underlying online social relationships are hidden and only available to service providers. Acquiring the social network of mobile users would enrich lots of mobile applications, such as friend recommendation and energy-saving mobile database management. In this work, we propose to infer online social ties using purely offline geographical activities of users, such as check-in records and spatial meeting events. To tackle the problem, we devise a novel inference framework, O2O-Inf, which consists of two components, Feature Modeling and Link Inference. Feature modeling is to characterize both direct and indirect geographical interactions between nodes from co-location and graph features. Link inference aims to infer the social ties based on a small set of observed social links, and the idea is that pairs of nodes sharing similar geographical behaviors have the same tendency of linkage (i.e., either being friends or non-friends). Experiments conducted on a Gowalla location-based social network and a Meetup event-based social network exhibit a satisfying performance in comparison to state-of-the-art prediction methods under the settings of offline-to-online network inference and geo-link prediction.


ABSTRACT A quantified petrographic analysis of a McKenzie core from Wayne County defined a suite of environments from shelf-edge to lagoonal to peritidal. Q-mode cluster analysis of 34 variables for 80 thin sections generated ten clusters which were then characterized on the basis of mean variable abundance. These characterized clusters represent deposition in nine different environments. Near the base of the McKenzie, rocks of a bioherm core arc characterized by crinoids and Cladopora. As the mound grew above wave base, stromatoporoids and Favosites in a micrite matrix capped the bioherm. A marine regression combined with upward growth of the mound established a littoral environment, and sandy dolomite formed within tidal channels. The transition to an oolite shoal indicates a slight rise of sea level. Oolitic dolomite represents the seaward slope and crest of the shoal whereas oolitic limestone (ooids and pellets) was deposited on the backslope. The overlying subtidal lagoonal sediments include pelletal and ostracode limestone. The remainder of the formation was laid down in a peritidal environment, indicating continued regression. Pelletal dolomite for ed on a lower intertidal mud flat, and pyritiferous dolomite is of an intertidal/supratidal origin. R-mode cluster analysis grouped the 34 variables into five genetic associations: (1) transported minerals such as quartz, tourmaline, and zircon; (2) secondary minerals--dolomite and pyrite; (3) tidal-flat components--gypsum, anhydrite, oncolites, and intraclasts; (4) elements of low-energy, high-diversity environments--eleven fossil taxa plus micrite and clay minerals; and (5) elements of high-energy, low-diversity environments, like ooids, calcite cement, ostracodes, and gastropods.


Storage of personal information by service providers risks privacy loss from data breaches. Our prior work on minimal disclosure credentials presented a mechanism to limit the amount of personal information provided. In that work, personal data was broken into individual claims, which can be released in arbitrary subsets while still being cryptographically verifiable. In applying that work, we encountered the problem of connections between claims, which manifest as disclosure dependencies. In further prior work, we provide an efficient way to provide minimal disclosure, but with cryptographic enforcement of dependencies between claims, as specified by the claims certifier. Now, this work provides security proofs showing that the scheme is secure against forgery and the violation of dependencies in the random oracle model. Additional motivation is provided for a preservation of privacy and security in the standard model.


INTRODUCTION
Anorectal diseases, among the most common surgical conditions, are underrepresented in medical training. The Fundamentals of Anorectal Technical Skills course was developed to provide cost-effective formal training in diagnosis of common anorectal conditions and in commonly performed anorectal procedures using the theories of deliberative practice and perceptual and adaptive learning.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
First- through third-year general surgery and internal medicine residents and third- and fourth-year medical students participated in a course consisting of didactic instruction and hands on skills stations. The course covered common anorectal conditions, including internal and external hemorrhoids, fissures, condylomata, abscesses, fistula-in-ano, rectal prolapse, pilonidal disease, pruritis ani, and anal and rectal cancer, as well as common procedures such as anoscopy, excision of thrombosed external hemorrhoids, banding of internal hemorrhoids, rigid proctoscopy, incision and drainage of an abscess, administration of local anesthesia, and reduction of rectal prolapse. Before the course, participants completed a questionnaire consisting of demographics; previous anorectal experience, as measured by procedural case volume; confidence diagnosing and treating anorectal conditions; and a clinical knowledge multiple-choice quiz. Immediately following the course, participants took an additional survey reassessing their confidence and testing their clinical knowledge. This study was granted an educational exception by the Institutional Review Board at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.

RESULTS
Forty-three learners participated in this course. Forty-six percent of participants had not participated in any anorectal cases, 26% had participated in 1 to 5 cases, 17% had participated in 6 to 10 cases, 6% had been involved with 11 to15 cases, and 6% had been involved with more than 15 cases. For learners who had no prior experience, 1 to 5 prior cases, or 6 to 10 cases, there were statistically and educationally significant increases in confidence for all diagnoses and procedures. Additionally, there were statistically and educationally significant increases between pre-course and post-course quiz scores for learners who had no prior experience (7.8 ± 2.0 vs. 11.8 ± 2.5, P < 0.01, Cohen's d = 1.8) and for those who had only participated in 1 to 5 cases (11.0 ± 3.7 vs. 14.2 ± 2.0, P = 0.04, Cohen's d = 1.1). The changes in quiz scores for learners who previously had been involved with six or more cases were not statistically significant.

CONCLUSION
This course provides a cost-effective training that significantly boosts learners' confidence in diagnosis of common anorectal procedures and confidence in performance of common anorectal procedures, in addition to improving objectively measured anorectal clinical knowledge.


The dopamine (DA) system is known to be involved in the reward and dependence mechanisms of addiction. However, modifications in dopaminergic neurotransmission associated with long‐term tobacco and cannabis use have been poorly documented in vivo. In order to assess striatal and extrastriatal dopamine transporter (DAT) availability in tobacco and cannabis addiction, three groups of male age‐matched subjects were compared: 11 healthy non‐smoker subjects, 14 tobacco‐dependent smokers (17.6 ± 5.3 cigarettes/day for 12.1 ± 8.5 years) and 13 cannabis and tobacco smokers (CTS) (4.8 ± 5.3 cannabis joints/day for 8.7 ± 3.9 years). DAT availability was examined in positron emission tomography (HRRT) with a high resolution research tomograph after injection of [11C]PE2I, a selective DAT radioligand. Region of interest and voxel‐by‐voxel approaches using a simplified reference tissue model were performed for the between‐group comparison of DAT availability. Measurements in the dorsal striatum from both analyses were concordant and showed a mean 20% lower DAT availability in drug users compared with controls. Whole‐brain analysis also revealed lower DAT availability in the ventral striatum, the midbrain, the middle cingulate and the thalamus (ranging from −15 to −30%). The DAT availability was slightly lower in all regions in CTS than in subjects who smoke tobacco only, but the difference does not reach a significant level. These results support the existence of a decrease in DAT availability associated with tobacco and cannabis addictions involving all dopaminergic brain circuits. These findings are consistent with the idea of a global decrease in cerebral DA activity in dependent subjects.


CONTEXT
Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is a common endocrine disorder that is believed to have a genetic basis. However, no specific susceptibility gene or region has been conclusively identified.

OBJECTIVE
The objective of this study was to duplicate a previous study that localized a PCOS susceptibility region to chromosome 19p13.2 and to narrow the susceptibility region.

DESIGN
This study was designed to test for genetic linkage and association between PCOS and short tandem repeat polymorphisms in 367 families, by analysis of linkage and family-based association.

SETTING
The study was conducted at academic medical centers.

PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS
We studied 367 families of predominantly European origin with at least one PCOS patient. Families included 107 affected sibling (sister) pairs (ASPs) in 83 families, and 390 trios with both parents and an affected daughter. The data set comprises two independent groups. Set 1 consists of 44 ASPs and 163 trios. Set 2 consists of 63 ASPs and 227 trios.

INTERVENTION(S)
The intervention was the drawing of blood for DNA extraction.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE
We employed measures of evidence for linkage and association between PCOS and 19 STRs.

RESULTS
Linkage with PCOS was observed over a broad region of chromosome 19p13.2. The strongest evidence for association was observed with D19S884 (chi2 = 11.85; nominal P < 0.0006; permutation P = 0.034) and duplicated our earlier findings.

CONCLUSIONS
The present analysis suggests that a PCOS susceptibility locus maps very close to D19S884. Additional studies that systematically characterize DNA sequence variation in the immediate area of D19S884 are required to identify the PCOS susceptibility variant.


We have studied the feasibility and scientific potential of zenith observing liquid-mirror telescopes having 20-100 m diameters located on the Moon. They would carry out deep infrared surveys to study the distant universe and follow up discoveries made with the 6 m James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), with more detailed images and spectroscopic studies. They could detect objects 100 times fainter than JWST, observing the first high-redshift stars in the early universe and their assembly into galaxies. We explored the scientific opportunities, key technologies, and optimum location of such telescopes. We have demonstrated critical technologies. For example, the primary mirror would necessitate a high-reflectivity liquid that does not evaporate in the lunar vacuum and remains liquid at less than 100 K. We have made a crucial demonstration by successfully coating an ionic liquid that has negligible vapor pressure. We also successfully experimented with a liquid mirror spinning on a superconducting bearing, as will be needed for the cryogenic, vacuum environment of the telescope. We have investigated issues related to lunar locations, concluding that locations within a few kilometers of a pole are ideal for deep sky cover and long integration times. We have located ridges and crater rims within 0.5° of the north pole that are illuminated for at least some sun angles during lunar winter, providing power and temperature control. We also have identified potential problems, like lunar dust. Issues raised by our preliminary study demand additional in-depth analyses. These issues must be fully examined as part of a scientific debate that we hope to start with the present article.


A new source coding technique called MODULO-PCM (MPCM) is presented and it shown that this new scheme has essentially the same performance as linear predictive coding or transform coding. In contrast with the conventional schemes, MPCM employs a simple memoryless encoder and a moderately complex decoder incorporating the Viterbi algorithm. Bounds for distortion in MPCM systems fora first-order Gauss-Markov process are numerically calculated.


[Excerpt] "The legal profession remains markedly out of sync with the changing demographics of the country, where the population is projected to be over 50 percent minority by 2050. Against this trend, law school enrollment hovers around 20 percent minority, including over 7 percent Asian students. Enrollment of some minority groups shows a decline rather than improvement. These numbers will remain static or continue to decline if the profession does not pay far more serious attention to the current leaks and gaps along the educational pipeline, far before students seek admission at the law school gates."


There is growing recognition in Canada around the role of intergenerational trauma in shaping physical and mental health inequities among Aboriginal youth. We examined recommendations on best practices for addressing intergenerational trauma in interventions for Aboriginal youth. Academic-community partnerships were formed to guide this scoping literature review. Peer-reviewed academic literature and "grey" sources were searched. Of 3,135 citations uncovered from databases, 16 documents met inclusion criteria. The search gathered articles and reports published in English from 2001-2011, documenting interventions for Indigenous youth (ages 12-29 years) in Canada, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. The literature was sorted and mapped, and stakeholder input was sought through consultation with community organizations in the Calgary, Canada area. Recommendations in the literature include the need to: integrate Aboriginal worldviews into interventions; strengthen cultural identity as a healing tool and a tool against stigma; build autonomous and self-determining Aboriginal healing organizations; and, integrate interventions into mainstream health services, with education of mainstream professionals about intergenerational trauma and issues in Aboriginal health and well-being. We identified a paucity of reports on interventions and a need to improve evaluation techniques useful to all stakeholders (including organizations, funders, and program participants). Most interventions targeted individual-level factors (e.g., coping skills), rather than systemic factors (e.g., stressors in the social environment). By addressing upstream drivers of Aboriginal health, interventions that incorporate an understanding of intergenerational trauma are more likely to be effective in fostering resilience, in promoting healing, and in primary prevention. Minimal published research on evidence-based practices exists, though we noted some promising practices.


Wireless access technologies are being embedded in utility meters, health devices, public safety systems, among others. These devices have low processing power and communicate at low data rates. New communication standards are being developed to support these machine-type communications (MTC), such as Cellular Internet of Things (CIoT), which is being developed by the third generation partnership project (3GPP). CIoT introduces cooperative ultra-narrow band (C-UNB) communications. It supports ad-hoc uplink transmissions, delay-tolerant downlink transmissions, and a simple authentication scheme. The C-UNB approach is proposed for Mobile Autonomous Reporting (MAR) applications, but it is not clear if it can be used for smart grid systems, such as sensors and smart meters in the Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI). In this paper, the authors review the C-UNB approach, study its performance in terms of collision rate and throughput, and discuss its potential for smart grid reporting applications.


Amazon is integrated into the national economy so that capital takes advantage of trade asymmetries not loyal and unequal. The exploitation of resources is being more intense, degrading the environment and worsening social problems. The imposition of the capital established relations, although it transformed the family agricultural production, and have not eliminated it, and this presents different forms of production and different social relations. Starting from this premise, this paper sought to understand the production strategies that constitute the family agricultural production in Southwestern area of Para. The study was carried out in three municipalities: Pacaja, Ancient Settlement area; Anapu, PDS (Sustainable Development Project) area; and Senador Jose Porfirio, the project area of Conventional Settlement of Incra (National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform). One hundred and fifty (150) families were researched during the 2007-2008 agricultural cycle. Qualitative parameters (observation in loco) and quantitative (statistical analysis) were used as methodological procedures, which can elucidate a mosaic (trajectories, perspectives and trends) that comprises the diversity of family agricultural production that results of the different materials bases in which families have to establish their medium and long-term projects.


Selective assembly is a cost-effective approach for reducing the overall variation and thus improving the quality of an assembled product. In this process, components of a mating pair are measured and grouped into several classes (bins) as they are manufactured. The final product is assembled by selecting the components of each pair from appropriate bins to meet the required specifications as closely as possible. This approach is often less costly than tolerance design using tighter specifications on individual components. It leads to high-quality assembly using relatively inexpensive components. In this article we describe the statistical formulation of the problem and develop optimal binning strategies under several loss functions and distributional assumptions. Optimal schemes under absolute and squared error loss are studied in detail. The results are compared with two commonly used heuristic schemes. We consider situations in which only one component of the mating pair is binned, as well as cases in which both components are binned.


This paper gives a new approach for encrypting different types of files like text, image, audio, video etc. The file is considered as a binary string. It is first broken into blocks of equal sizes. Each block is then represented as a square matrix. Helical transposition is applied first, and then columnar transposition is done on the basis of session key. Session key is a 24 bit sequence which is used to generate decimal number sequence and accordingly columnar transposition is done. For decryption Session key and anti-helical algorithm both are required.


Institutional repository (IR) is the channel through which an academic institution showcases her research power to the world. To this, academic libraries are under obligation to provide access to both print and electronic resources especially those generated within the university in order to increase access to information resources and visibility of their institutions as a measure of prestige and recognition internationally. It is in view of the above that this study on 'the current state and building of institutional repository in the library of Alex Ekwueme Federal University Ikwo, Nigeria' is carried out. The study investigated the state of the IR; the content; the software in use in managing the IR and the digital preservation strategies. The study also identified certain challenges that have hindered the building of the university's IR. Tables, figures and percentages were employed in analyzing both quantitative and qualitative data collected.


The one-step, continuous formation of mosaic hydrogel sheets is presented. A microfluidic device allows controllable incorporation of secondary biopolymers within a flowing biopolymer sheet followed by a cross-linking step that retains the microscale composition. Information is encoded; mosaic stiffness and diffusivity patterns are created; tessellations are populated with biomolecules, microparticles and viable primary cells; and 3D soft material assemblies are demonstrated.


Dielectric elastomer (DE) actuators exploit electrically induced deformations of insulating rubbery materials, as a means to transduce electrical energy into mechanical work. To enable large deformations, recent studies have demonstrated the advantage of either using elastomers that suppress pull-in electromechanical instability or driving the actuator at the verge of instability while still preventing it. Whenever these strategies are not applicable, softening the material remains the mechanical approach of choice to enable large deformations at relatively low electric fields. As the most common approach to lower the elastic modulus of an elastomer is the use of plasticizers, understanding their effects also on other properties of the elastomer is important, especially to actuator designers. Aimed at gaining insights in this respect, this paper presents an extensive chemical–physical, dielectric, mechanical and electromechanical characterization, for different amounts of a plasticizer, of one of the softest commercial silicones demonstrated for DE actuation (elastic modulus of the order of 100 kPa). The results showed the interplaying effects of a variable addition of the plasticizer, elucidating key features that could thus serve as a guide to the design of actuators for specific needs.


The availability of training data for supervision is a frequently encountered bottleneck of medical image analysis methods. While typically established by a clinical expert rater, the increase in acquired imaging data renders traditional pixel-wise segmentations less feasible. In this paper, we examine the use of a crowdsourcing platform for the distribution of super-pixel weak annotation tasks and collect such annotations from a crowd of non-expert raters. The crowd annotations are subsequently used for training a fully convolutional neural network to address the problem of fetal brain segmentation in T2-weighted MR images. Using this approach we report encouraging results compared to highly targeted, fully supervised methods and potentially address a frequent problem impeding image analysis research.


This study examines the relationship between patterns of reciprocal and asymmetrical intergenerational aid and the parent's rating of the quality of their relationships with adult children, posing two questions: Is there an identifiable pattern of specific substantive exchanges that contributes most to high relationship ratings? And is this distinctive locus of reciprocity different in blue-collar and white-collar families? Using a large, representative sample of U.S. parents with adult children, we examine these issues by testing competing models of reciprocal and asymmetrical exchanges between parent and child. Findings indicate that white-collar families are somewhat more involved in all types of exchanges, including instrumental assistance, and that the link between reciprocity and positive relationship ratings is stronger in these families than among blue-collar families. Asymmetrical instrumental assistance from parent to child is associated with lower ratings among blue-collar families, and financial assistance from parent to child appears to lower relationship ratings in white-collar families.


In this paper, we address a variant of the marketing mix optimization (MMO) problem which is commonly encountered in many industries, e.g., retail and consumer packaged goods (CPG) industries. This problem requires the spend for each marketing activity, if adjusted, be changed by a non-negligible degree (minimum change) and also the total number of activities with spend change be limited (maximum number of changes). With these two additional practical requirements, the original resource allocation problem is formulated as a mixed integer nonlinear program (MINLP). Given the size of a realistic problem in the industrial setting, the state-of-the-art integer programming solvers may not be able to solve the problem to optimality in a straightforward way within a reasonable amount of time. Hence, we propose a systematic reformulation to ease the computational burden. Computational tests show significant improvements in the solution process.


We developed a method of rigorous solution of the Onsager's flow equations using moments of the interdiffusion-parameter integrands for the determination of average ternary interdiffusion coefficients. The analysis developed by Dayananda and Sohn [1] is the basis for this refined approach. Average main and cross interdiffusion coefficients are determined over selected regions in the diffusion zone using the diffusion-distance moments of the interdiffusion flux flow equations. Thermodynamic stability of solid solutions in the light of interdiffusion phenomenon is taken as validation criteria to identify accurate and reliable values of the ternary interdiffusion coefficients. Regulations are proposed for successful application of the analysis method to various ternary diffusion couples in Ni- and Fe-based intermetallics.


Individuals within the European Union, regardless of immigration status, should be afforded the protections of both EU law and the European Convention on Human Rights. There is a large body of law in Europe that exists to protect individuals from racial and religious discrimination. However, the law has been applied unevenly, which has, subsequently, caused gaps in many crucial areas. As a result, migrants who are now seeking asylum face discrimination when they should be protected.Most applicants applying for asylum within the European Union are non-Caucasian and non-Christian. This paper will examine the current state of the law in Europe to evaluate the degree of protection from racial and religious discrimination asylum seekers can expect. First, this paper will examine the legal framework within the European Union. Next, this paper will examine the implementation of refugee law in three EU counties, recent developments in the region, and recent EU case law. Then, this paper will examine Council of Europe law, including treaty law and case law, since EU countries are also state parties to the European Convention on Human Rights. Finally, this paper will make policy recommendations to ensure that the EU is not discriminating against asylum seekers and that every state participates in aiding refugees.


Introduction Carotid stenosis is a prevalent cause of ischemic cerebrovascular disease. Carotid endarterectomy and carotid artery stenting (CAS) have both been shown to provide effective and durable reductions in the risk of neurological morbidity and mortality for patients with carotid stenosis. Cerebral embolic protection devices (EPD) reduce the rate of periprocedural thromboembolic complications and are currently used in all CAS procedures. However, tortuous vascular anatomy of the internal carotid artery (ICA) may prevent navigation of distal EPDs thereby leading to inadequate cerebral protection. Methods We present a case in which significant tortuosity of the ICA distal to the stenotic lesion precluded navigation of currently available distal EPDs. Results An 80 year-old female presented with severe, symptomatic right-sided carotid stenosis. The patient elected to undergo CAS. A 6 French Envoy catheter was navigated into the right common carotid artery (CCA). Diagnostic angiography of the right CCA demonstrated 73% stenosis of the proximal ICA, 3 mm in length, with a severe inferior bend in the ICA just distal to the cervical segment. A Transend microguidewire was placed through an Angioguard distal protection device to bypass the stenotic lesion in the ICA. However, the Angioguard device could not be navigated past the tortuous bend in the ICA. A second attempt to pass through the tortuous ICA segment with a Spider distal protection device was also unsuccessful. The navigation of both EPDs past the tortuous ICA bend was prohibited due to kinking of their delivery catheters. In order to overcome the limitations imposed by the vascular tortuosity of the distal cervical ICA, a novel rapid exchange catheter system (RECS) was created to provide additional support for the EPD. A braided DAC 038 catheter was converted into a RECS by introducing two small bores with a 19-gauge needle. The Spider device and Transend guidewire were back-loaded into the DAC 038 catheter which was able to be navigated past the tortuous bend in the ICA. The Spider device could then be safely deployed in the cervical ICA allowing subsequent completion of the stenting procedure. Following deployment of the Spider device, a 4 × 20 mm TREK coronary balloon was used to angioplasty the ICA at the level of the stenosis prior to deploying an 8 × 30 mm Precise stent across the lesion. Post-stent angiography performed through the Envoy catheter in the right CCA showed significant improvement in the diameter of the proximal ICA lumen with an appropriately positioned stent spanning from the distal CCA to the proximal cervical ICA. Postprocedural carotid Doppler ultrasonography demonstrated minimal to mild residual stenosis of the right ICA measuring 0–39% with appropriate stent patency. The patient's postprocedural course was uneventful, and she remained neurologically intact at follow-up one month after CAS. Conclusions We demonstrate that modification of currently available devices can, in select cases, effectively address cases of significant vascular tortuosity which limit the use of conventional distal EPDs. Disclosures D. Ding: None. R. Starke: None. A. Evans: None.


Lawang city has many interesting sights, one of which is the source Polaman Baths, located in Sumber Polaman. In the Village of Polaman there are some cultural activities that make up the cultural space. Local communities do village ritual ceremonies to honor ancestors founders of the village as well as a petition to God for the prosperity of rural communities Polaman. The cultural activities are known as cultural ritual barikan. Time and Barikan ritual space in the traditional settlement pattern forming Polaman rural communities. The research method in this study is descriptive-qualitative method with an etnographic approach. This study aims to identify patterns formed by the settlement of the cultural activities that make up the cultural space. By knowing the settlement pattern is formed it will be determined the shape of preservation suitable for spaces used settlements and cultural preservation barikan itself. Keywords: cultural space, barikan traditional ceremonies, village Source Polaman


Common bean productivity is greatly influenced by soil fertility especially phosphorous because it appears essential for both nodulation and N 2 fixation. It is also the basis for the formation of useful energy, which is essential for sugar formation and translocation. In this context, a field experiment was conducted during 2015/16 cropping season at Buge of Damot Gale district  in southern Ethiopia with objective of determining optimum rate of P fertilizer for common bean varieties. Treatments consisted in three common bean varieties (Awassa Dume, Ibado and Nasir) and six P rates (0, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 Kg/ha) were combined in factorial and laid out in a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. Phenological, growth, yield components and yield reacted to varieties, P rates and their interactions differently. Variety Nasir took the longest days to flowering and physiological maturity whereas Awassa Dume took the shortest days to flowering and physiological maturity. In line with this, the highest plant height was obtained from variety Nasir while the shortest plant heights were seen for variety Awassa Dume. Significantly the highest number of pods per plant and seeds per pod were recorded for variety Awassa Dume  at P rate of 20 kg/ha and 30 kg/ha, respectively. Biomass and grain yield were significantly differed where both parameters were highest for variety Awassa Dume at P rate of 20 kg/ha. Agronomic efficiency and economic analysis also confirmed that application of 20 kg/ha P fertilizers gave the optimum efficiency and net benefit. Keywords : Common bean, Phosphorus, Varieties, Phaseolus vulgaris L.


This article focuses on the implementation of social and emotional training into the modern educational environment. One of the key factors in increasing learning productivity is a properly designed educational process. The research results point out that there are the most important research problems concerns to the new model development of an educational process management that includes the issues of shaping a human being as a person. To improve the effectiveness of the educational process management, the urgency of introducing social-emotional learning to the educational process is emphasized in the article. The value and impact of social and emotional learning on each level of education, their interrelation and necessity degree are evaluated in the article. In order to understand how to form the modern educational process is analyzed, and the main features of the concepts such as: social and emotional are defined and highlighted. The research results point out that there are four components of the emotional intelligence. According to the CASEL report, the researches result shows that there are skills that are the most in demand among society today: innovation, complex problem solving, critical thinking and analysis, active learning. This article focuses on the most important recommendations for introducing social and emotional learning in the modern educational process.


Ubiquitin-mediated proteolysis by the proteasome is a critical regulatory mechanism controlling many biological processes. In particular, SKP1, cullin/CDC53, F-box protein (SCF) complexes play important roles in selecting substrates for proteolysis by facilitating the ligation of ubiquitin to specific proteins. In plants, SCF complexes have been found to regulate auxin responses and jasmonate signaling and may be involved in several other processes, such as flower development, circadian clock, and gibberellin signaling. Although 21 Skp1-related genes, called Arabidopsis-SKP1-like (ASK), have been uncovered in the Arabidopsis genome, ASK1 is the only gene that has been analyzed genetically. As a first step toward understanding their functions, we tested for expression of 20 ASK genes using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction experiments. Also, we examined the expression patterns of 11 ASK genes by in situ hybridizations. The ASK genes exhibit a spectrum of expression levels and patterns, with a large subset showing expression in the flower and/or fruit. In addition, the ASK genes that have similar sequences tend to have similar expression patterns. On the basis of the expression results, we selectively suppressed the expression of a few ASK genes using RNA interference. Compared with the ask1 mutant, the strong ASK1 RNA interference (RNAi) line exhibited similar or enhanced phenotypes in both vegetative and floral development, whereas ASK11 RNAi plants had normal vegetative growth but mild defects in flower development. The diverse expression patterns and distinct defects observed in RNAi plants suggest that the ASK gene family may collectively perform a range of functions and may regulate different developmental and physiological processes.


To improve the performance of remote sensing images multiclass classification we propose two greedy algorithms of feature selection. The discriminant analysis criterion and regression coefficients are used as the measure of feature subset effectiveness in the first and second methods respectively. The main benefit of the built algorithms is that they estimate not the individual criterion for each feature, but the general effectiveness of the feature subset. As there is a big limitation on the number of real remote sensing images, available for the analysis, we apply the Markov random model to enlarge the image dataset. As the pattern for image modelling, a random image belonging to one of the 7 classes from the UC Merced Land-Use dataset has been used. Features have been extracted with help of MaZda software. As the result, the largest fraction of correctly classified images accounts for 95%. Dimension of the initial feature space consisting of 218 features has been reduced to 15 features, using the greedy strategy of removing a feature, based on the linear regression model.


Individual bus operators specify vehicles in line with their own unique requirements. Collectively, diversity across vehicle specifications increases costs and lead time and decreases quality in local bus manufacture, paradoxically having negative consequences for the very function that specifications were intended to improve. The vehicle specifications are driven by functional requirements and are therefore difficult to reconcile with manufacturing by simply reducing them. This research set out to develop bus designs balancing user and manufacturer needs. Investigation found that specification diversity results from bus operators determining designs to meet their requirements – resulting in a raft of solutions to the same or similar problems. Two interventions to this situation were formulated; that a higher-specification product could offer equal or better function to bus operators while being of standardised manufacture; and that a system of modular design could be implemented where specification differences were functionally justified. These approaches were tested in the design, manufacture and implementation of a new driver's area for route buses. It was found to meet the functional requirements of several Australian bus operators while streamlining manufacture. It resulted in a definitive design strategy for the development of better public transport vehicles.


The "Decision-Risk" dynamic programming method is a mathematical tool designed to complement the simulation method in order to compare the relative priorities involved in the various uses made of a reservoir. The use of "money" as a common unit for measuring all the advantages and disadvantages related to reservoir exploitation requires that economic functions be established in relation to each of the various uses made of the reservoir (fig. 1 and 2). These functions make allowance not only for the advantages gained by programmed exploitation but also for the cost of failing to meet requirements. Since it is difficult to estimate these costs directly, it is often preferable to take a "permissible probability of failure" into consideration and to adjust the failure penalty introduced into the calculation in such a manner that the exploitation results respect this probability. In the case of the Jatiluhur Dam, in Indonesia, it was necessary to determine the power output guaranteed nine years out of ten and the reservoir operating procedure, so that the monthly deficit of irrigation water, did not exceed 10 % of the requirements except during one year in ten. The failure penalties were determined by successive approximation, complementing the operating procedure optimisation model with an operation simulation model based on this procedure. The same method was used to specify the program for equipping the hydroelectric plant of the Selingue dam in Mali, so that the power house can meet the country's electricity requirements up to 1990 whilst at the same time keeping within the limitations imposed by controlled discharge release related to irrigation and shipping needs. The model which combines the determination of optimum exploitation procedure according to the "Decision-Risk" process and the simulation of the procedures obtained, is just one necessary part of an overall planning study. The model is designed mainly to specify the performance of a multi-purpose dam for a given set of characteristics and targets. Due to the fact that the calculation response is very rapid and that the results are presented in a very comprehensive form (statistical distribution of reservoir levels throughout the year, failure probabilities with respect to each target, expectation of the overall benefit) a model of this type plays a very important synthesising role in multi-disciplinary studies.


Multi-stage serverless applications, i.e., workflows with many computation and I/O stages, are becoming increasingly representative of FaaS platforms. Despite their advantages in terms of fine-grained scalability and modular development, these applications are subject to suboptimal performance, resource inefficiency, and high costs to a larger degree than previous simple serverless functions. We present Aquatope, a QoS-and-uncertainty-aware resource scheduler for end-to-end serverless workflows that takes into account the inherent uncertainty present in FaaS platforms, and improves performance predictability and resource efficiency. Aquatope uses a set of scalable and validated Bayesian models to create pre-warmed containers ahead of function invocations, and to allocate appropriate resources at function granularity to meet a complex workflow's end-to-end QoS, while minimizing resource cost. Across a diverse set of analytics and interactive multi-stage serverless workloads, Aquatope significantly outperforms prior systems, reducing QoS violations by 5X, and cost by 34% on average and up to 52% compared to other QoS-meeting methods.


We investigate the utilisation of primary and secondary public healthcare services and the consequent public costs, using data from the British Understanding Society household panel. We use a sample of 2,314 adults who, at baseline in 2010/11, reported no history of diagnosed long-lasting health conditions and for whom a set of objective biomarkers were observed. Five years later, their utilisation of GP and hospital outpatient and inpatient services was observed. We develop an econometric technique for count data observed within ranges and a method of combining NHS episode cost data with Understanding Society data without exact individual-level matching. This allows us to estimate the impact of differences in personal characteristics and socio-economic status (SES) on cost outcomes. We find that a composite biomarker index approximating allostatic load is a powerful predictor of realised costs: among the group who are at least 1 standard deviation (SD) above mean allostatic load, we estimate that a reduction of 1 SD at baseline reduces GP, outpatient and inpatient cost outcomes by around 18%. In addition to the expected strong effect of ageing on cost, we also find a large gender difference: on average women experience costs at least 20% higher than comparable men, because of their greater utilisation of GP and outpatient services. There is a strong SES gradient in healthcare costs: the average impact of moving from no educational qualifications to intermediate or from intermediate to degree level is approximately 16%. Income differences, on the other hand, have negligible impact on future costs.


We generated constitutive knockout mouse models for the α9 and α10 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) subunits by derivation from conditional knockouts by breeding with CRE deleter mice. We then backcrossed them onto a C57BL/6J genetic background. In this manuscript, we report the generation of the strains and an auditory phenotypic characterization of the constitutive α9 and α10 knockouts and a double α9α10 constitutive knockout. Although the α9 and α10 nAChR subunits are relevant to a number of physiological measures, we chose to characterize the mouse with auditory studies to compare them to existing but different α9 and α10 nAChR knockouts (KOs). Auditory brainstem response (ABR) measurements and distortion product otoacoustic emissions (DPOAEs) showed that all constitutive mouse strains had normal hearing. DPOAEs with contralateral noise (efferent adaptation measurements), however, showed that efferent strength was significantly reduced after deletion of both the α9 and α10 subunits, in comparison to wildtype controls. Animals tested were 3–8 weeks of age and efferent strength was not correlated with age. Confocal studies of single and double constitutive KOs showed that all KOs had abnormal efferent innervation of cochlear hair cells. The morphological results are similar to those obtained in other strains using constitutive deletion of exon 4 of α9 or α10 nAChR. The results of our physiological studies, however, differ from previous auditory studies using a α9 KO generated by deletion of the exon 4 region and backcrossed onto a mixed CBA/CaJ X 129Sv background.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the effect of exposure to environmental mycobacteria on results of 2 commercial ELISAs for paratuberculosis in cattle.

DESIGN
Experimental trial.

ANIMALS
19 weaned crossbred beef calves.

PROCEDURES
Calves were inoculated SC with 1 of 5 mycobacterial isolates (3 calves/isolate) derived from herds with high proportions of false-positive serologic reactions for paratuberculosis, Mycobacterium avium subsp paratuberculosis (MAP; positive control inoculum; 2 calves), or mineral oil (negative control inoculum; 2 calves). Sera were assessed at intervals by use of 2 ELISAs (A and B) for paratuberculosis in cattle, and all calves underwent tuberculosis testing at the end of the study.

RESULTS
Neither mineral oil-inoculated calf had positive results with either ELISA during the study. Both MAP-inoculated calves were identified as seropositive via ELISA-A, and 1 calf was identified as seropositive via ELISA-B. By use of ELISA-A, > or = 1 false-positive reaction over time was detected in 2, 3, 3, and 1 of the 3 calves injected with Mycobacterium avium, Mycobacterium intracellulare, Mycobacterium scrofulaceum, or Mycobacterium terrae, respectively. By use of ELISA-B, only M scrofulaceum induced false-positive reactions (2/3 calves). Calves that had at least 1 positive ELISA-A result were more likely to be classified as suspect reactors via the caudal fold tuberculosis test.

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE
False-positive serologic reactions may occur during use of commercially available ELISAs for paratuberculosis in calves experimentally exposed to environmental mycobacteria; naturally occurring exposures with these mycobacteria may represent a cause for high proportions of false-positive serologic reactions for paratuberculosis in some cattle herds.


This study focuses on translation of the English phrasal verbs (PVs) into Persian as to determine the frequency and usage percentage of the eleven translation procedures, which Persian translators preferred to use; that is to determine which procedure was the most favored among Persian translators in rendering PVs into Persian in as far as textual and contextual parameters are concerned. The typological syntactic and semantic features marking English PVs are not normatively present in the Persian language, which belongs to a different branch of IndoEuropean family. That makes translation of these units a somewhat burdensome task for the Persian translators. Three available Persian translations of Dan Brown's Inferno (2013) serve the corpus for this product-oriented analysis, which builds upon Baker's (2011) taxonomy of translation strategies (here referred to as procedures) for non-equivalence at word level. That has not of course been without adding a few more procedures to itforming a mixed model as to capture more of the morpho-syntactic peculiarities between the two languagesto achieve the aims of this study. Having extracted 401 PVs from 34 chapters of the novel and analyzed their translations, we made it clear that equivalence procedure has the highest frequency among all other procedures. Moreover, frequency and percentage of all other procedures were calculated and discussed.


This paper reports a visible and thermal drone monitoring system that integrates deep-learning-based detection and tracking modules. The biggest challenge in adopting deep learning methods for drone detection is the paucity of training drone images especially thermal drone images. To address this issue, we develop two data augmentation techniques. One is a model-based drone augmentation technique that automatically generates visible drone images with a bounding box label on the drone's location. The other is exploiting an adversarial data augmentation methodology to create thermal drone images. To track a small flying drone, we utilize the residual information between consecutive image frames. Finally, we present an integrated detection and tracking system that outperforms the performance of each individual module containing detection or tracking only. The experiments show that, even being trained on synthetic data, the proposed system performs well on real-world drone images with complex background. The USC drone detection and tracking dataset with user labeled bounding boxes is available to the public.


Flexible, deployable phased arrays enable novel and diverse applications but necessitate similarly flexible radiators. Here we present a light and flexible 10GHz dipole antenna, which is co-cured to a glass-fiber composite and suited for flexible phased arrays. The antennas are designed to dynamically conform to new array shapes and be flexible enough to fold completely flat and pop back up upon deployment. We employ a pop-up dipole with a capacitive fingers feed for impedance matching that is highly robust against manufacturing errors. Upon deployment, the antennas exhibit a −10 dB-bandwidth >1.5 GHz and >110° half-power beam width single lobe pattern suitable for beamforming.


Damage to the vestibular labyrinth leads to profound nystagmus and vertigo. Over time, the vestibular-ocular system recovers in a process called vestibular compensation leading to reduced nystagmus and vertigo provided visual signals are available. Our study was directed at identifying sources of visual information that could play a role in vestibular compensation. Specifically, we investigated the role of the pretectal nucleus of the optic tract (NOT) in vestibular compensation after hemilabyrinthectomy (HL) in rhesus monkeys. We chose the NOT because this structure provides critical visual motion information for adaptive modification of the vestibular ocular reflex (VOR). We produced bilateral NOT lesions by injecting the excitotoxin ibotenic acid. We compared vestibular compensation after HL in NOT-lesioned and control animals with intact NOTs. We measured eye movements with an electromagnetic method employing scleral search coils. Measurements included slow-phase eye velocity during spontaneous nystagmus, per- and postrotatory nystagmus and the horizontal VOR (hVOR) gain (eye-velocity/head velocity) associated with per- and postrotatory and sinusoidal (0.2-2.0 Hz; 30-90 degrees/s) whole body oscillation around the earth-vertical axis. VOR gain was low (<0.5) for rotation toward the HL side. Our control animal evinced significant vestibular compensation with VOR gains approaching unity by 100 days post HL. In contrast, monkeys with bilateral lesions of the NOT never obtained this significant recovery with hVOR gains well below unity at 100 days and beyond. Therefore our studies demonstrate that the NOT is an essential source of visual signals for the process of vestibular compensation after HL.


The flow of microbubbles in millichannels with typical dimensions in the range of few millimeters offers a reduced pressure loss with simultaneous large specific contact surface. By flowing through micro orifices, the transformation of pressure into kinetic energy creates a desired secondary flow pattern, which results in continuous dispersion. Differences in velocity and pressure act on the phase boundary of the bubbles and lead to deformations and break-up.In this work, bubble dispersion and bubbly flow in different orifices and channel modules with widths up to 7 mm are studied experimentally and by CFD simulations. The effect of the orifice dimensions on bubble sizes are evaluated for hydraulic diameters of 0.25 to 0.5 mm with different aspect ratios. Several channel structures are analyzed to offer less coalescence and larger residence times. The modules are arranged in a holder and are fixed under a view glass for optical characterization via high-speed camera. Volume flow rates of 10 to 250 mL/min are studied with various phase ratios.Bubble diameters are generated in the range of less than 0.1 to 0.7 mm with narrow size distributions depending on the entire flow rate through the device. The first break-up point is shifted closer to the outlet of the orifices for increasing velocities and smaller hydraulic diameters, but the whole break-up region stays nearly constant for each orifice indicating stronger velocity oscillations acting on the bubble surface. Generally, a linear relation of smaller bubble diameters with larger energy input was identified.Opening angles of the orifices above 6° resulted in flow detachments and recirculation zones around the effluent jet. Independence of the Reynolds number was determined contrary to existing literature models. Flow detachment and coalescence in curves was avoided by an additional bend within the curve based on systematically varied geometrical dimensions.Copyright © 2015 by ASME


Nowadays, isolation of useful natural products from plant callus culture has been used as a modern biotechnological technique to obtain those useful chemicals. Apium graveolens (Apiaceae) is a well known edible herb was known to produce a variety of plant secondary metabolites such as flavonoids and coumarins. In this study, we focused on induction of callus tissue of the plant seedling that may be used as a source of different metabolites. The seeds of the plants after sterilling were cultured in a petri dishes line with MS medium. After emergence of seedling, epicotyl segments were transferred to another MS cultures with contain different combination of plant hormones, kin and 2,4-D. The petri dished incubated in a growth chamber at 25oC and certain photoperiod Weight of produced callusweremeasured for all treatments. On the other hand, n-hexan extract of dried callus was obtained by a soxhelet apparatus and were analyzed using thin layer chromatography technique (TLC) to afford a colorless oily substance. The structure of isolated compound was elucidated by spectroscopic methods such as IR, UV, Mass and 13C and 1H NMR. Our results indicated that although callus induction take place inMSmedium without phyto hormones, maximum callus production induced at MS mediumwith 2, 4-D (4mg/L) and kinetin (2mg/L). The structure of isolated natural product from the callus was determined as cyclodecane. It was be concluded that callus tissue of Apium graveolens can be source for production of cyclodecane.


This paper follows the approach assumed by a text linguistics inherited from Coseriu (2007) and framed, from the theoretical and epistemological points of view, within the scope of the Socio- Discursive Interactionism (Bronckart 1997). Considering this, texts are understood as constrained (at the supra level) by the social activities in which they are produced; on the other hand, they are shaped by the linguistic resources they put in place. The main goal here is to discuss the applicability of linguistic descriptions based on a strict differentiation of some fields of study – in particular, semantics and pragmatics. By using an example of analysis that stands for a descending methodological approach we highlight the need of entailing a collaborative manipulation of different contributions established from the description of the linguistic system – bearing in mind that this manipulation accounts for the activity of language as a creative activity, which is itself of a complex nature.


High mountain areas are experiencing some of the earliest and greatest impacts of climate change. However, knowledge on how climate change impacts multiple ecosystem services that benefit different stakeholder groups remains scattered in the literature. This article presents a review of the literature on climate change impacts on ecosystem services benefiting local communities and tourists in high mountain areas. Results show a lack of studies focused on the global South, especially where there are tropical glaciers, which are likely to be the first to disappear. Climate change impacts can be classified as impacts on food and feed, water availability, natural hazards regulation, spirituality and cultural identity, aesthetics, and recreation. In turn, climate change impacts on infrastructure and accessibility also affect ecosystem services. Several of these impacts are a direct threat to the lives of mountain peoples, their livelihoods and their culture. Mountain tourism is experiencing abrupt changes too. The magnitude of impacts make it necessary to strengthen measures to adapt to climate change in high mountain areas.


The economical, rapid, and non-destructive method using reflectance Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (NIRS) technique were designed and developed for oil palm fruit (Elaeis Guineensis) freshness prediction. The ripe maturity oil palm freshness of Tenera variety was used for this study by two consecutive days. The measurement of spectral value was obtained with a linear array sensor. The Artificial Neural Network (ANN) was trained with Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm by using half of the data sets, quarter for validation and the rest quarter for test purpose. The performance of the oil palm fruit freshness prediction system was evaluated. Results indicate that the ANN with 6 hidden neurons achieved the best prediction accuracy with root mean squared error (RMSE) and the correlation coefficient (R) were 6.8449 hours and 0.8418 respectively. This suggests that the proposed method is promising to be further developed to automate oil palm freshness inspection.


Anti-Mullerian Hormone (AMH) is a glycoprotein produced by the granulosa ovarian cells with respect to the regulation of the follicular growth and development. Serum AMH levels are significantly elevated in Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) women compared to normal controls. In 22 oligo-ovulation PCOS women and 12 anovulation PCOS women. Serum AMH, FSH, E2, LH, T, P, PRL, FINS, FBG, HOMA-IR concentrations were measured at baseline, and the hormone changes including serum E2, LH, FSH,T concentrations and follicular development were measured at the appropriate time in relation to the diameter of the follicle. The Ovary Volume (OV) (ml) and Antral Follicle Count (AFC) in anovulation group were higher compared to the oligo-ovulation group (P<0.001 and P<0.002, respectively). In the anovulation group, antral follicles had not been activated and serum T and LH concentrations maintained higher levels. AMH concentrations were constant during the growth and development of antral follicles in oligo-ovulation PCOS women, whereas they remained elevated in anovulation PCOS women during the menstrual cycle (P<0.05). In the two groups, there was a positive correlation between AMH and AFC (P=0.000 and P=0.01, respectively), as well as OV (P=0.013 and P=0.016, respectively) and T (P=0.002 and P=0.028, respectively). Constant AMH concentrations during the spontaneous initiation of follicular in oligo-ovulation PCOS women and higher serum AMH concentrations in the anovulation PCOS women suggested that AMH may be used as a marker in the diagnosis or as a predictor of ovulation in PCOS women with oligomenorrhea.


It is today more important than ever for revolutionary leftists to confront both the possibilities posed by the Revolution of 1917 and the ways in which its outcomes seem to have soured the meaning of socialism in the mouths of those with an appetite for a politics of emancipatory transformation. On the one hand, our times cry out for the need to transcend capitalist oppression, exploitation, and degradation. Those same needs galvanized the pre-First World War revolutionary left in Russia and elsewhere, and structured the early years of the Bolshevik Revolution. On the other hand, Revolution's current capacities and claims, associated with 1917 being overtaken by a Thermidorian Stalinization, have seldom been held in disregard by so many, including a considerable section of the ostensible left. In the pages that follow we address the heritage of 1917 and its broadened understanding of revolution, exploring themes such as women's liberation, sexuality, reproduction, and the family, as well as campaigns for racial equality, class mobilizations, and the complex representation of resistance and struggle in various artistic and literary genres. While not everything we discuss bears the direct and unmediated imprint of 1917, it is difficult to imagine the range of resistance and the richness of varied developments without appreciating the heritage of revolution. We explore such themes in specific historical periods where the impact of 1917 registered in different ways. Whatever the peculiarities of these local manifestations, however, our outline could well be generalized to other national and regional contexts. As co-authors we actually disagree on important aspects of what might fall under the discussion of 1917's meanings,5 but in such contention lies the real political scene of the current left; our differences are an acknowledgement of the theoretical and practical divisions that plague socialists serious about the project of replacing capitalism with a realizable social order that can deliver the necessary utopian promise of revolution.