This thesis reports photometric and spectroscopic studies of three close binary systems; BP Velorum, V392 Carinae and V752 Centauri. BP Velorum, a W UMa-type binary, was observed photometrically in February 2007. The light curves in four filters were fitted simultaneously with a model generated in the eclipsing binary modeling software package PHOEBE. The best model was one with a cool star spot on the secondary larger component. The light curves showed additional cycle-tocycle variations near the times of maximum light which may indicate the presence of star spots that vary in strength and/or location on a time scale comparable with the orbital period, (P = 0.265). The system was confirmed to belong to the W-type subgroup of W UMa binaries for which the deeper primary minimum is due to an occultation. V392 Carinae, a detached binary with an orbital period of 3.147, was observed photometrically by Michael Snowden in 1997. These observations were reduced and combined with the published light curve from Debernardi and North (2001). High resolution spectroscopic images were taken using the University of Canterbury's HERCULES spectrograph. The radial velocities measured from these observations were combined with velocities from Debernardi and North (2001). The radial velocity and light curves were fit simultaneously, confirming that V392 Car is a detached system of two main sequence A stars with a mass-ratio of 0.95. The derived systematic velocity is consistent with V392 Car being a member of the open cluster NGC 2516. The W UMa-type binary V752 Centauri was observed photometrically and spectroscopically during 2007. The high resolution spectra displayed weak sharp lined features superimposed over the strong broad lined spectrum expected from the 0.370 contact binary. Fourier methods were used to separate the broad and sharp spectral features and radial velocities for each were measured by cross-correlation. A fit to the photometry and radial velocities for the contact binary implied a system of two late F stars with a mass-ratio of 3.38 in an over-contact configuration. The derived systematic velocity (−13.8kms−1), has changed significantly from the 1972 value (29.2kms). The third (sharp lined) component's radial velocities were measured and found to have a period of 5.147, semi-amplitude of 43.4kms and systematic velocity of −7.3kms−1. The likely configuration of the entire system is that of a contact binary in a long period orbit about a lower mass detached binary. V752 Cen is thus a triple lined spectroscopic quadruple.


THE APPLICATION of recent advances in laboratory methods to the study of individual intraocular structures has greatly enhanced our ability to evaluate their function in health and disease. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the investigation of the retinal pigment epithelium where the utilization of light and electron microscopy coupled with histochemistry and autoradiography has recently revealed unsuspected functions. Long associated with the storage of vitamin A and its conversion to a form that can be utilized by the photoreceptors for the synthesis of rhodopsin, the retinal pigment epithelium has now been found to play an important role in the phagocytosis and digestion of the rod outer segment discs as well as other retinal substances. In addition, the ability of the pigment epithelium to produce and excrete a portion of the mucoprotein which surrounds the outer segments of the photoreceptors is now generally accepted. The ultrastructural pathways for the


Highly optimised reconfigurable hardware architecture is proposed of 64 bit block ciphers MISTY1 and KASUMI for wide-area cryptographic applications. The reconfigurable hardware architecture is comprised of reconfigurable components consisting of FL function, FO/FI function and XOR function designed to perform MISTY1 and KASUMI algorithms round transformation functions. In addition, reconfigurable FO/FI function is adequate to generate MISTY1 extended keys for onward use in MISTY1 round transformation function. The substitution functions S9 and S7 for MISTY1 and KASUMI algorithms are optimised for area and throughput. Common sub-expression elimination for AND-XOR logic combined with permutation/combination technique for AND gates reduces the area considerably, whereas parallel execution improves the throughput. With this design approach, application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) implementations using Synopsys Design Complier, SMIC 0.18 µm at 1.8 V achieved an area of 3481 NAND gates having throughput of 130.2 and 154.56 Mbits/s for MISTY1 and KASUMI, respectively. Synthesised FPGA implementation using Xilinx Artix 7 FPGA yielded an area of 487 configurable logic block (CLB) Slices having throughput of 209.43 and 248.7 Mbits/s for MISTY1 and KASUMI, respectively. Detailed design and performance analysis of reconfigurable hardware architecture of 64 bit block ciphers MISTY1 and KASUMI for ASIC implementations is described.


In consideration of the particle features and behaviors, the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)-Discrete Element Method (DEM) coupled method has been applied to simulate the liquid-solid flows in the centrifugal pump with crystallization phenomenon. The crystal particles tend to distribute more uniformly in the inlet section and enter the impeller along the pressure sides of the blades with a moderate rise in velocity. Particle number density is different at different regions in the impeller passages with the characteristics of small density near suction sides and large density near pressure sides. In addition, large crystal particles are mainly located near the pressure sides and small crystal particles predominantly appear in the region near suction sides. The relative velocity magnitude of flow near the impeller inlet tends to be higher than that of crystal particles, while the velocities of the solid particles are substantially higher than liquid phase at the outlet.


We report the detection of the first circumbinary planet (CBP) found by Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). The target, a known eclipsing binary, was observed in sectors 1 through 12 at 30 minute cadence and in sectors 4 through 12 at 2 minute cadence. It consists of two stars with masses of 1.1 M⊙ and 0.3 M⊙ on a slightly eccentric (0.16), 14.6 day orbit, producing prominent primary eclipses and shallow secondary eclipses. The planet has a radius of ∼6.9 R⊕ and was observed to make three transits across the primary star of roughly equal depths (∼0.2%) but different durations—a common signature of transiting CBPs. Its orbit is nearly circular (e ≈ 0.09) with an orbital period of 95.2 days. The orbital planes of the binary and the planet are aligned to within ∼1°. To obtain a complete solution for the system, we combined the TESS photometry with existing ground-based radial-velocity observations in a numerical photometric-dynamical model. The system demonstrates the discovery potential of TESS for CBPs and provides further understanding of the formation and evolution of planets orbiting close binary stars.


Initial treatment of locally advanced esophageal and gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) malignancies for selected patients at some institutions has recently changed from surgical resection to neoadjuvant therapy. The aim of this study is to evaluate the impact of this change in treatment strategy on both the overall disease profile and locoregional endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) staging accuracy for a cohort of patients managed with primary surgical resection over a 10-year period at our institution. All subjects at our institution who underwent primary esophagectomy from 1993 to 2002 following preoperative EUS for known or suspected esophageal and/or GEJ cancers were identified. Patients with dysplasia alone, prior upper gastrointestinal tract surgery, preoperative neoadjuvant therapy, cancer of the gastric cardia or recurrent malignancy were excluded. EUS findings and staging results were compared to surgical pathology following resection. The impact of the gradually increased use of primary chemoradiation during the second half of the study was assessed. Of the 286 operations performed, 184 subjects were excluded. The remaining 102 underwent primary surgical resection a median of 18 days following EUS staging for adenocarcinoma (88%) or squamous cell carcinoma (12%) of the esophagus (69%) or GEJ (31%). Overall EUS locoregional T and N staging accuracy was 72% and 75% respectively; accuracy for T1, T2, T3 and T4 cancer was 42%, 50%, 88% and 50% respectively. Despite an increased frequency of pathologically confirmed T1 and T2 cancers (P = 0.005) and an insignificant trend toward increased N0 malignancy (P = 0.05) during the second half of the study period, no statistically significant changes in T (P = 0.07) or N (P = 0.82) staging accuracies for EUS or disease characteristics were noted between the first and second half of the study period. Despite both inaccurate radial EUS staging and increased relative use of primary surgery for early cancers, recent increased use of primary neoadjuvant therapy did not change overall disease characteristics and accuracy of locoregional EUS staging of esophageal and GEJ cancers managed with primary surgical resection.


The image alignment problem has as input a set of different images from a single object or several identical objects. One instance of the object in each image is misaligned relatively to the other in a given image, that is, the objects lie in different positions and orientations. Thus, the problem consists in finding the homogeneous planar transforms for each of those instances. The process is not simple in the case of noisy images. Nevertheless, it is possible to tackle some cases of the image alignment problem using template matching. This work describes two methodologies that were developed to align noisy images of protein quaternary structures obtained by Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM). These structures can be geometrically described by regular prisms and polyhedra. One of the methods uses the traditional approach for this problem-exploring image similarities. The second one explores the geometric simplicity of the objects being imaged by using template matching in order to solve the problem. The results show that there are cases where the template matching method achieves higher precision and computational efficiency to align that kind of image when compared to traditional ones.


Multiobjective evolutionary algorithms (MOEAs) have been the subject of numerous studies over the past 20 years. Recent work has highlighted the use of an active archive of elite, nondominated solutions to improve the optimization speed of these algorithms. However, preserving all elite individuals is costly in time (due to the linear comparison with all archived solutions needed before a new solution can be inserted into the archive). Maintaining an elite population of a fixed maximum size (by clustering or other means) alleviates this problem, but can cause retreating (or oscillitory) and shrinking estimated Pareto fronts - which can affect the efficiency of the search process. New data structures are introduced to facilitate the use of an unconstrained elite archive, without the need for a linear comparison to the elite set for every new individual inserted. The general applicability of these data structures is shown by their use in an evolution-strategy-based MOEA and a genetic-algorithm-based MOEA. It is demonstrated that MOEAs using the new data structures run significantly faster than standard, unconstrained archive MOEAs, and result in estimated Pareto fronts significantly ahead of MOEAs using a constrained archive. It is also shown that the use of an unconstrained elite archive permits robust criteria for algorithm termination to be used, and that the use of the data structure can also be used to increase the speed of algorithms using /spl epsi/-dominance methods.


Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) are cation-selective ligand-gated ion channels exhibiting variable Ca2+ permeability depending on their subunit composition. The Ca2+ permeability is a crucial functional parameter to understand the physiological role of nAChRs, in particular considering their ability to modulate Ca2+-dependent processes such as neurotransmitter release. The rings of extracellular and intracellular charged amino acid residues adjacent to the pore-lining TM2 transmembrane segment have been shown to play a key role in the cation selectivity of these receptor channels, but to date a quantitative relationship between these structural determinants and the Ca2+ permeability of nAChRs is lacking. In the last years the Ca2+ permeability of several nAChR subtypes has been experimentally evaluated, in terms of fractional Ca2+ current (Pf, i.e., the percentage of the total current carried by Ca2+ ions). In the present study, the available Pf-values of nAChRs are used to build a simplified modular model describing the contribution of the charged residues in defined regions flanking TM2 to the selectivity filter controlling Ca2+ influx. This model allows to predict the currently unknown Pf-values of existing nAChRs, as well as the hypothetical Ca2+ permeability of subunit combinations not able to assemble into functional receptors. In particular, basing on the amino acid sequences, a Pf > 50% would be associated with homomeric nAChRs composed by different α subunits, excluding α7, α9, and α10. Furthermore, according to the model, human α7β2 receptors should have Pf-values ranging from 3.6% (4:1 ratio) to 0.1% (1:4 ratio), much lower than the 11.4% of homomeric α7 nAChR. These results help to understand the evolution and the function of the large diversity of the nicotinic receptor family.


In ICD-10 or DSM IV, the Wernicke-Korsakow Syndrome (WKS) is mentioned among the criteria for the alcohol amnestic disorder. Rarely seen in clinical practice, the Wernicke-Korsakow Syndrome is important in differential diagnosis of amnestic syndromes, because life-threatening conditions can occur. A specific treatment is available for the acute form of Wernicke encephalopathy, in many cases a Wernicke encephalopathy shows a progression to the Korsakow-Syndrome, which is the chronic form of this disease. The aim of this article is to review recent developments in clinical, etiological and pathophysiological research of WKS. The role of thiamin-dependent enzymes like transketolase and the importance of the NMDA (N-Methyl-D-Aspartate) System is discussed. New trends in diagnostics are shown, as are differential diagnosis and epidemiology. Finally, the rarely investigated drug therapy of the Korsakow syndrome with clonidine and fluvoxamine is reviewed.


Quantum correlation between two particles and among three particles show nonclassic properties that can be used for providing secure transmission of information. In this paper, we propose two quantum key distribution schemes for quantum cryptographic network, which use the correlation properties of two and three particles. One is implemented by the Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger state, and another is implemented by the Bell states. These schemes need a trusted information center like that in the classic cryptography. The optimal efficiency of the proposed protocols are higher than that in the previous schemes.


The CMS Tracker was repaired, recalibrated and commissioned successfully for the second run of Large Hadron Collider. In 2015 the Tracker performed well with improved hit efficiency and spatial resolution compared to Run I and operated smoothly at lower temperatures after the successful recommissioning of the cooling system. This year the detector is expected to withstand luminosities that are beyond its design limits and will need a combined effort of both online and offline team to yield the high quality data that is required to reach our physics goals. We present the experience gained during the second run of the LHC and show the latest performance results of the CMS Tracker.


This paper presents empirical evidence on the extent to which FTAs are "contagious", using empirical techniques inspired by the study of contagion in exchange rate crises. Using different econometric techniques, it tests the null hypothesis that the signing of an FTA between one nation's trade partners has no affect on the probability of the nation signing a new FTA. The hypothesis is tested against other political, economical and geographical determinants of the FTA formation previously stated in the literature, finding evidence that the contagion phenomenon is present in different specifications and samples.


Introduction Long-term glucocorticoid therapy is the leading cause of secondary osteoporosis. The management of glucocorticoid-induced osteoporosis (GIOP) seems to be inadequate in many European countries. Objective To evaluate the rate of screening and treatment of GIOP. Design Information was collected from a national public health-insurance database in our geographic area of Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur and in Corsica, from September 2009 through August 2011. Patients We identified participants aged 15 years and over starting glucocorticoid therapy (≥7.5 mg of prednisone equivalent per day during at least 90 days consecutive). This cohort was compared with an age-matched and sex-matched population that did not receive glucocorticoids. Main outcome measures Bone mass, prescription of bone antiresorptive medication and use of calcium and/or vitamin D treatment. Results We identified 32 812 patients who were prescribed glucocorticoid therapy, yielding 1% prevalence. Incidence of glucocorticoid therapy was 2.8/1000 inhabitants/year. Males represented 44%, the mean age was 58 years. The median prednisone-equivalent dose was 11 mg/day (IQR 9–18 mg/day). 8% underwent bone mass measurement. Calcium and/or vitamin D, and bisphosphonates were prescribed in 18% and 12%, respectively. Results were lower for the control population: 3% underwent bone mass measurement and 3% received bisphosphonate therapy. The rates of osteodensitometry and treatments were higher in women over 55 years of age than in men and women 55 years of age and younger, and also when glucocorticoid therapy was initiated by a rheumatologist versus other physician specialty. Conclusions The management of GIOP remains very inadequate, despite the availability of a statutory health insurance system. Targeted interventions are needed to improve the management of GIOP.


The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was used for bringing together two DNA fragments present in two different plasmids. This helped avoiding the difficulties of two successive subcloning in the same plasmid and uncertainities of obtaining rightly oriented constructs. Two different fragments of DNA present in different plasmid were digested with the same enzyme and then ligated. The ligation mixture was used for the PCR using two oligo primers; one was specific for the 5' end of the other fragment and the other one was for the 3' end of the other fragment. The desired amplified fragment was separated by gel electrophoresis, eluted and was cloned in plasmid pBluescript KS(+). The same procedure is also applicable for one step cloning of more than two fragments in desired orientation.


This is my first review of the manuscript by Tourmoulin et al., titled "Evolution of continental temperature seasonality from the Eocene greenhouse to the Oligocene icehouse A model-data comparison". The authors use a series of model simulations to investigate changes in seasonality (Mean Annual Temperature Range, MATR) across the Eocene-Oligocene transition (EOT). They also compile published estimates of temperature seasonality proxies and compare those to their model simulations. I think the manuscript provides a significant contribution providing a new view on the changes taking place across the EOT. The manuscript is also well written, mostly easy to read, and contains a wealth of background information. My main critique concerns the presentation of the results, as I think the authors could make their arguments stronger with a bit more analysis and/or by better acknowledging the limitations of their study. I suggest a major revision, but they should be quite straightforward to do. After a revision, I believe the manuscript would be worthy of prompt publication in the Climate of the Past. Please find my detailed comments below:


This study talks about the renewal of Muslim thought, especially in the study of Islamic sciences. In this book titled Dirasat Islamiyah, Hanafi tried to give the understanding of the renewal of thinking Muslims to Islam that is in modern times. It can be acknowledged that this Hanafi thought has an impact on the change of mind, especially in looking at the comparisons of Islamic thought in the East and other Islamic countries, especially those directly related to the occurrence of oxidalism (how Islam understands the concept of Western culture, thought and development.) This paper concludes Hanafi in reconstructing the minds of Muslims among others is to create a framework of the concept of thinking that is responsive to the development of the era.In addition, Hanafi also illustrates that Muslims do not think with conservative reasoning in seeing and answering the phenomenon that bind the Ummah. Muslims according to him, must be smart and courageous in taking steps and attitudes that would all be able to restore the glories of Islam that had lost by other thought and culture. He further illustrated the need for a reexamination of classical Islamic texts, as reference and references so that Muslims can formulate a responsive new Islamic concept, both in the form of Islamic thought and practice. The method used in this paper is the study of literature, by making direct source from Dirasat Islamiyah book and other sources related to the theme and the content of the writing.


Soybean agglutinin (SBA) (Glycine max), which is a tetrameric GalNAc/Gal-specific lectin, has recently been reported to form unique, highly organized cross-linked complexes with a series of naturally occurring and synthetic multiantennary carbohydrates with terminal GalNAc or Gal residues [Gupta, D., Bhattacharyya, L., Fant, J., Macaluso, F., Sabesan, S., & Brewer, C. F. (1994) Biochemistry 33, 7495-7504]. In order to elucidate the nature of these complexes, the X-ray crystallographic structure of SBA cross-linked with a biantennary analog of the blood group I carbohydrate antigen is reported. The structure reveals that lattice formation is promoted uniquely by the bridging action of the bivalent pentasaccharide (beta-LacNAc)2Gal-beta-R, where R is -O(CH2)5COOCH3 and the beta-LacNAc moieties are linked to the 2 and 6 positions of the core Gal. The structure of SBA complexed with the synthetic biantennary pentasaccharide has thus been determined by molecular replacement techniques and refined at 2.6 A resolution to an R value of 20.1%. The crystals are hexagonal with a P6(4)22 space group, which differs significantly from that of crystals of the free protein. In the structure, each monomeric asymmetric unit contains a Man9 oligomannose-type chain at Asn 75, with only the first two GlcNAc residues visible. The overall tertiary structure of the SBA subunit is similar to that of other legume lectins as well as certain animal lectins. However, the dimer interface in the SBA tetramer is unusual in that only one complete peptide chain is sterically permitted, thus requiring juxtapositioning of one C-terminal fragmented subunit together with an intact subunit. Association between SBA tetramers involves binding of the terminal Gal residues of the pentasaccharide at identical sites in each monomer, with the sugar cross-linking to a symmetry-related neighbor molecule. The cross-linking pentasaccharide is in a conformation that possesses a pseudo-2-fold axis of symmetry which lies on a crystallographic 2-fold axis of symmetry of the lattice. Hence, the symmetry properties of the bivalent oligosaccharide as well as the lectin are structural determinants of the lattice. The results are discussed in terms of multidimensional carbohydrate-lectin cross-linked complexes, as well as the signal transduction properties of multivalent lectins.


Though competitive analysis is often a very good tool for the analysis of online algorithms, sometimes it does not give any insight and sometimes it gives counter-intuitive results. Much work has gone into exploring other performance measures, in particular targeted at what seems to be the core problem with competitive analysis: the comparison of the performance of an online algorithm is made to a too powerful adversary. We consider a new approach to restricting the power of the adversary, by requiring that when judging a given online algorithm, the optimal offline algorithm must perform as well as the online algorithm, not just on the entire final request sequence, but also on any prefix of that sequence. This is limiting the adversary's usual advantage of being able to exploit that it knows the sequence is continuing beyond the current request. Through a collection of online problems, including machine scheduling, bin packing, dual bin packing, and seat reservation, we investigate the significance of this particular offline advantage.


Deeply studying vibration and seismic response characteristics of Beijing Yin-tai Center provided information reflecting its anti-seismic performance based on which seismic response observation array was to be deployed. Time-historic analytical methods on the basis of modal analysis were applied to carry out structural seismic response. Two load cases were mentioned including the responses under minor earthquakes and moderate earthquakes. El-Centro wave, Northridge wave and synthetized time-histories were adopted with contrast analysis under Beijing Hotel time-history recorded in Tangshan Earthquake. Peak inter-story shift ratios and peak accelerations are obtained and analyzed. The inter-story shift ratio determines elastic state of structure under minor earthquakes and elastic-plastic state under moderate earthquakes. Predominant inter-story displacement and acceleration response provides the floors with more remarkable seismic response, which are vulnerable floors for monitoring in earthquakes.


Background Women with preeclampsia (PE) are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) in later life. We aimed to ascertain the prevalence of markers of CVD in a cohort of women recently delivered for PE. Methods Over 18 months all women delivered for PE (sustained blood pressure (BP) ≥140/90 mm Hg + proteinuria (PCR ≥30 or ≥0.3 g/24 h)) were offered postnatal review incorporating CVD risk assessment involving measurement of BP, proteinuria, fasting lipids and 10 year cumulative risk of CVD event (based on QRISK2). QRISK2 scores were compared to population scores (QRISK2/population risk) to give relative risk (RR) Findings 53 of 78 women offered an appointment attended 8–10 weeks after delivery. Mean (SD) age was 30.9 (5.6) years; 70% were primigravida, 87% white, 36% delivered preterm, 60% had family history of CVD (first degree relative), 66% had body mass index >25 and none were current smokers. 32 (60%) had a raised total cholesterol (≥5.0 mmol/l), 21 (40%) had a raised TCl/HDL ratio (≥4.0 mmol/l) and 9 (17%) had raised triglycerides (≥1.7 mmol/l). 14 (26%) screened positive for proteinuria, of these median PCR was 11.5 mg/dl (IQR 7.75–21.25). Median QRISK2 score was 0.4% (IQR 0.20–0.95). Median RR was 1.25 (IQR 1.0–3.0) compared to age-matched population risk. Interpretation A high proportion of women screened 8–10 weeks after PE have risk factors for CVD. Based on the QRISK2 CVD prediction model a significant number of this group of women have at least a 3-fold higher than expected risk of developing CVD in the next 10 years.


Within the shifting context of universities towards the third mission, establishing rich understanding of how the key actors, academics, manage the two conflicting demands of commercialisation and science requires deeper investigation of their contributing to this shift. Drawing on theories of ambidexterity, role identity, the boundary work, and self-efficacy, this study examines how academics make sense of different tensions resulting from performing commercialisation activities alongside traditional academic ones, and how the negotiate the boundaries and their role identities to manage simultaneously the two activities. To answer these questions, this research explores the experiences of academics in a UK university through conducting in-depth interviews with 14 academics with various involvement in commercialisation; ranging from zero to high involvements in several forms of commercialisation. Interviews were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA). The research suggests the following findings: First, the current experience of academics follows the logic of path-dependency in the sense that individuals seek to apply a previous pattern of behaviour; Second, this research reveals various identity negotiation and boundary work amongst academics confronting the commercialisation agenda. While academics with commercial involvement seek to converge between academia and commercial world and thus exhibiting a hybrid role identity, academics with no commercial involvement seek to diverge between the two worlds and exhibit a single identity, core academic identity. Whether they involve in commercialisation or not, academics take active steps to preserve their academic role identity; Third, academics involved in commercialisation engage in a cognitive process composed of building compromises, establishing synergies between academia and commercialisation, and building hierarchy between conflicting role identities. The findings clarify the socio-cognitive process, explain the behavioural mechanisms underlying academics' involvement in commercialisation activities, and offer fresh insights to research on ambidexterity at the individual level, and on ambidexterity within university context.


The jQuery Mobile First Look is a perfect reference to keep on your desk for finding out the capabilities of the jQuery Mobile framework and how you can put it to good use. This book will show you how to enjoy your programming by letting a simple yet effective JavaScript library handle the hassles you would encounter otherwise. It will quickly take you through the entire framework and cover every level of specification you need to know to kick-start your mobile web development. This is a First Look book that allows existing jQuery users to get a look at the features of jQuery mobile. It is targeted at jQuery users who want to enter the exciting world of mobile web development. All you need is the basics of jQuery and an interest to get involved with mobile development and you can use this book as a launch-pad for your future ventures in mobile web development with jQuery Mobile framework.


The role in which adversity plays in shaping ones character, resilience and endurance is one that society shuns and often neglects. It has been a norm with the increase of motivational talks, inspirational quotes of digital media and life coaching of the new age to suppress the feeling in pursuit of joy and happiness. This has seen an increase in depression and suicides across the globe. The embracing of adverse situations continues to be an interpretation of weakness and an embrace of negativity. This chapter will explore how the avoidance of adversity prevents humanity the pleasures of gaining rich roots of character and the gaining of virtues that encompass courage, grace and resilience. The chapter will conclude by emphasising that the absence of adversity or the suppression of it thereof minimises spiritual, emotional and psychological growth.


Holey cheese, it was strange! Rodents kept telling me I'd done things I had no memory of. Was I going crazy? Had the cheese finally slipped off my cracker? No, I soon discovered the truth: There was a Geronimo lookalike going around, pretending to be me! Worst of all, he was trying to take over The Rodent's Gazette! I had to get that greedy imposter's paws off my newspaper - but how?


To prevent extreme damage caused by climate change, the EU put forward a target of a maximum temperature rise of 2°C. As a consequence, the global greenhouse gas emissions should be cut by 15 to 50% by 2050. However, eventually every Member State has to be given a specific emission reduction target. Since carbon emissions have a cost, a protectionist reflex in burden sharing negotiations can be expected. Therefore, as with Triptych in 1997, a scientific model-based proposition will probably be generated, prior to political discussions. To be acceptable, this model must be transparent. A crucial aspect is how to deal with local conditions: Are degree-days to be incorporated? Should countries be compensated for phasing out nuclear energy? A case study was carried out applying the Triptych model to the situation in Flanders. The Triptych approach is a sector specific approach distinguishing three groups of economic sectors: the energy-intensive industry, the powerproducing industry and the domestic sectors. Two variants of the model were used: an improved version of the original European model and a global version. In the former, specific CO2 emissions from the energy-intensive industry are expected to be reduced by 1.5% per year. In the power-producing sector the energy efficiency is improved by 1% each year. The domestic sectors take into account convergence of 1990 per capita emission levels to equal per capita allowances in 2030. In the Global Triptych approach, convergence is applied to all three sectors. The outcome of the model was compared to projected energy use in Flanders until 2020. The comparison shows a gap between the results of the Triptych exercise and what may be expected in a business-as-usual scenario.


Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is common among patients with opioid dependence syndrome. The aim of this study was to find the prevalence of PTSD in patients with opioid dependence and to examine the relationship of PTSD with the severity of dependence on opioids in patients attending an outpatient clinic for drug treatment services. An interview using the Maudsley Addiction Profile, the Severity of Dependence Scale, the Impact of Events Scale, and ICD-10 clinical criteria was conducted in a large urban center for addiction treatment in the central United Kingdom. Seventy patients with opioid dependence syndrome were interviewed. On interview, 30% of the patients met ICD-10 criteria for PTSD. Clinically significant levels of intrusive (45.7%) and avoidant (65.7%) symptoms were reported. Participants with PTSD reported higher perceived rate of childhood threat to life including sexual abuse, physical abuse, and witnessing physical fights between parents. In adulthood, the main traumatic events were physical injuries and rape. One-third of this sample of opioid-dependent patients receiving methadone treatment met criteria for a diagnosis of PTSD, with clinically significant self-reported symptoms of intrusion and avoidance. As in other samples, the co-morbidity of PTSD and opioid use is much more common and warrants further study in the area of etiology and management.


Many psychiatric drugs act on the receptors or transporters of certain neurotransmitters in the brain. However, there is a great need for alternatives, and research is looking at other targets along the brain's metabolic pathways. Lack of glycine betaine contributes to brain pathology in schizophrenia, and new research from the RIKEN Center for Brain Science (CBS) shows that betaine supplementation can counteract psychiatric symptoms in mice.


Waterlogging is a widespread problem and one of the major yield-limiting factors of wheat in some parts of the coastal plains of Turkey. The object of this study was to identify waterlogging-tolerant cultivars in bread wheat. Twenty-four bread-wheat genotypes were tested under aerobic and anaerobic conditions to determine shoot dry weight gain, root dry weight gain, total dry weight gain, dry leaf weight, specific dry leaf weight, chlorophyll content, carotenoid content, transpiration and photosynthesis rates, and their tolerance indices. A complete randomized block design with three replications was conducted for both aerobic and anaerobic conditions. The current study clearly demonstrated that wheat seedlings growing under anaerobic conditions had significantly lower shoot dry weight, root dry weight, total dry biomass weight, leaf dry weight, specific leaf dry weight, chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, chlorophyll a + b, and carotenoid content, and photosynthesis and transpiration rates. There were significant correlations between total dry weight gain and shoot dry weight gain and between chlorophyll a and specific leaf dry weight. Wheat cultivars had different tolerance indices for the investigated plant parameters. Further studies are needed to confirm which tolerance index is significantly correlated with seed yield and which one could be used as a selection criterion under field conditions.


Vertebrate Tas2r taste receptors bind to bitter compounds, which are typically poisonous, to elicit bitter sensation to prevent the ingestion of toxins. Previous studies noted a marked variation in the number of Tas2r genes among species, but the underlying cause is unclear. To address this question, we compile the Tas2r gene repertoires from 41 mammals, 4 birds, 2 reptiles, 1 amphibian, and 6 fishes. The number of intact Tas2r genes varies from 0 in the bottlenose dolphin to 51 in the Western clawed frog, with numerous expansions and contractions of the gene family throughout vertebrates, especially among tetrapods. The Tas2r gene number in a species correlates with the fraction of plants in its diet. Because plant tissues contain more toxic compounds than animal tissues do, our observation supports the hypothesis that dietary toxins are a major selective force shaping the diversity of the Tas2r repertoire.


Abstract Mobilising knowledges across a geography creates opportunities for transitions to smart systems. Publics in a geography are consequently able to form their perspectives around a system and align potential benefits with their needs. Intelligent transport systems are an example of smart living and EVs are cited as an alternative technology that are key to their application. This conceptual paper uses EVs as an example to demonstrate how knowledge mobilisation relating to such technologies can better cater to a geography's needs. Unfortunately, current EV studies focus on a rural-urban binary. Thus, this conceptual contribution reflects on a study in Cornwall, UK, to reveal the heterogeneous influences on rural EV-related perspectives. This heterogeneity manifests both in particular locations and across cases. Overall a suite of transferrable participatory methods to improve rural knowledge mobilisation is outlined.


A co-precipitation method for synthesizing Gd2O2S:(Yb3+,Er3+) nano-particles was developed, using the commercially available Gd2O3, Er2O3, Yb2O3, H2SO4 and NaOH as the starting materials. XRD analysis shows that the precursor can be transformed into single phase Gd2O2S nano-particles by calcining at 900 °C for 1 hour in hydrogen atmosphere. TEM observation shows that the Gd2O2S particles are quasi-spherical in shape and well dispersed, with a mean particle size of about 20-30 nm. Under 980nm infrared light excitation, the strongest emission bands of Gd2O2S:Er3+ nano-particles located at green region centered at 525 nm and 550 nm, attributing to the 2H11/2→4I15/2 and 4S3/2→4I15/2 transitions of Er3+ ions, respectively. The quenching concentration of Er3+ ions is 5 mol%. The up-conversion luminescent intensity increases obviously for Yb3+ and Er3+ co-doped Gd2O2S:(Yb3+,Er3+) nano-particles.


Next generation wireless systems will use a combination of large system bandwidths and multiple antennas (MIMO) to deliver very high data rate services. The efficient detection of MIMO signals at the receiver can be a challenging task. Zero-Forcing (ZF) and Minimum Mean Square Error (MMSE) detection schemes are simple and effective techniques for retrieving multiple transmitted data streams at the receiver. This paper compares the performance of various MIMO detectors for LTE and WLAN systems with linear detector such as ZF and MMSE in spatial multiplexing environment. Optimal MMSE receiver is shown to outperform low complexity ZF receiver for lower modulation schemes. For higher modulation schemes, performance of ZF and MMSE is also compared and analyzed.


Recalling my residency training at the University of Massachusetts in the early 1970s, I was impressed with the attention to clinical diagnostic and management skills. It was assumed that we acquired the didactic database. Most impressive was the faculty's coverage of the emergency room, so that we residents could attend conferences. Nothing other than quality performance was acceptable. I do have a concern that priorities in some programs have changed to emphasize didactics, solely for the purpose of Board passage. The American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) examination has undergone significant modification over the ensuing years, responsive to the challenges of the times. One such challenge follows. Asked the eponym for the malady affecting a patient he had just examined, a Board candidate gave an impolitic response and received a failing grade for the examination. Perhaps, the politic approach would have been to look at the examiner's name and ascribed


Basaltic to andesitic monogenic scoria cones from the southern Cascades exhibit large chemical variations within the products of single eruptions. Two types of chemical variations occur within cones. First, there are several instances where the chemistry of the late-stage lava flow is significantly different from that of the scoria. The two magma types cannot be related to each other by fractional crystallization, and instead seem to be derived from different sources. Second, chemical variations occur within the scoria, most easily recognized in ratios of large ion lithophile elements to high field strength elements. Repeatedly, an ocean-island basalt–like component has erupted contemporaneously with the dominant calc-alkaline compositions, requiring two distinct mantle sources (one ocean-island basalt source and one mid-ocean-ridge basalt source) as well as the variable addition of slab-derived fluids. Such variations within the scoria suggest that either magma chambers do not exist and the melt migrates from the source through dike-like structures without homogenization, or that magma chambers are inefficient in their ability to mix liquids. Small volumes of basalt, which may normally be thermally challenged to reach the surface, might ascend through the crust through pathways recently traveled by previous melt batches, causing pairs of magmas to erupt at each vent.


Virtually any individual, when required to assume the role of a patient, prefers home care to institutional care of any kind not only for reasons of personal comfort but because even at their best, hospitals are foreign and inimicable environments. Institutional care is associated with a loss of autonomy and control. This is dramatically highlighted by the legal considerations presently taking place over the use of feeding tubes in terminally ill individuals where even a person's right to stop a procedure that invades the body is in question in the institutional setting. The home, in striking contrast, is recognized by both patient and physician as the patient's "turf."1,2It is clear that there are many varieties of home care delineated by both patient need and reimbursement policy. Some home care is clearly "substitutional" in character; under these circumstances home care obviates the need for acute hospital care or custodial


The E-Rate, created by Congress as part of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (Public Law 104-104), is a federal program that seeks to bridge this digital divide by supporting broader public access to the new digital technology at public and private nonprofit educational institutions. The availability of such public access points has been found to reduce economic and racial disparities, and some research suggests that when used by trained and well-supported teachers, technology can improve learning, especially for disadvantaged children. This study focuses on two main questions: (1) To what extent is the E-Rate helping to equalize access to the types of digital technology eligible for program discounts? (2) Are schools and teachers able to use the technology that E-Rate supports? How is it being used in the classroom?


The increase of transgender visibility and politics correlates with a renowned interest in gender equity in schools. The diversity of trans* and gender-expansive social identities, along with divergent conceptualizations of the meaning transing/trans*ing, ontology, identity, and embodiment, produces a wide range of ideal and pragmatic approaches to gender equity and justice in education. Fields and analytical frameworks that emerge from Decolonial Feminism, Queer Indigenous Studies, Queer of Color Critique in education, Jotería studies, and transgender studies in the United States have unique definitions, political commitments, and epistemological articulations to the meaning and purpose of transing/trans*ing. These divergent articulations of trans*ing often make projects of transgender equity and justice incommensurable to each other, or they converge at the various scalar aspects of equity design and implementation. By historicizing, or re-membering the rich body of decolonial modes of trans*ing bodies, knowledge, and selves, trans* of color critique in education research makes trans* justice possible by disrupting white-centric approaches to transgender inclusion that may fall short in the conceptualization of trans* justice and what makes a trans* livable life for queer and trans people of color.


In the last decade biodiversity loss and persistent poverty in developing countries have been recognised as major international problems that require urgent attention. However, the nature and scale of the links between these two problems, and between efforts to address them, has been the subject of much heated debate. Understanding the different elements of this debate is critical for the move towards constructive solutions. This Reader provides a guide to, and commentary on, the different strands of the urrent conservation-poverty debate through a selection of key readings from both the conservation and development literature including policy documents, journal articles and reports.


You've gotten results from corn stalk nitrate samples collected this fall. (Corn stalk nitrate analysis form.) Now, what do the results mean? The stalk nitrate test is based on the concentration of nitrate-N in the lower corn stalk (8 inch segment from 6 to 14 inches above the ground) when the plant reaches maturity (See Cornstalk testing to evaluate nitrogen management, PM 1584). In general, a larger amount of plant-available N in the soil during the time period before plant maturity results in a greater concentration of nitrate in the lower stalk. However, the stalk nitrate-N concentration can be greatly influenced by other external and internal plant factors.


Acinetobacter baumannii is a ubiquitous Gram-negative bacillus bacterium that is frequently found in the nosocomial infections. Regard to the rapid development of resistance against various antimicrobial agents due to the high ability of natural genetic transformation, A. baumannii is resistance to many of the antibiotics. Toxin-antitoxin system is one of the virulence agents in A. baumannii that can be involved in the emergence of drug resistance. HicB as a toxin system is an ideal target for the design of new classes of antimicrobial agents against A. baumannii. The goals of this work was to model the complete tridimensional structure of the HicB protein using computational methods and to assess structural and functional of it. The consistency of modeled structure was confirmed by different servers to high accuracy for modeling and dynamics simulation. The molecular dynamic simulation and virtual screening results indicate that HicB is a stable protein from A. baumannii. These results provide new insights for the molecular understanding and development of new antibacterial drugs against toxin system involved in A. baumannii pathogenesis.


To determine the long-term effect of exercise training on glucose control, 13 subjects with type I diabetes and 7 control subjects performed 45 min of cycle exercise three times per wk for 12 wk. The acute blood glucose response, the long-term effect on glucose control (glycosylated hemoglobin and fasting plasma glucose), and changes in nutrient intake were assessed. Fitness as measured by VO2 MAX increased in both control (33.8 ± 1.7 to 43.2 ± 3.5 ml/min/kg) and diabetic (38.7 ± 3.3 to 46.5 ± 3.6 ml/min/kg) (P < 0.05) subjects although body weight remained unchanged. In the diabetic subjects, an acute glucose-lowering effect occurred with each exercise session throughout the 12-wk training period (225.8 ± 16.1 to 148.5 ± 16.8 mg/dl, P < 0.001). However, fasting plasma glucose and glycosylated hemoglobin remained essentially unchanged (pretraining, 193.7 ± 27.5 mg/dl and 10.7 ± 0.3%; 6-wk training, 192.5 ± 27.1 mg/dl and 10.7 ± 0.03%; 12-wk training, 202 ± 30.1 mg/dl and 10.3 ± 0.8%). Total caloric intake as assessed by diet history increased significantly on exercising days (2569–2849 kcal, P < 0.05). Although plasma glucose decreases acutely with exercise, increased caloric intake on exercising days obviates a long-term effect of training on glucose control. More precise guidelines and recommendations as to exercise timing and nutrient intake, likely based on self-monitoring of blood glucose, are required to achieve a beneficial effect of exercise training on metabolic control in type I diabetes.


It is nearly a century since Sir James Paget first described the eczematoid lesion of the skin that bears his name.' This is found most often on the nipple and areola of the breast, but has also been described on the penis,1 anus,2 vulva,3 axilla,4 and eyelid,5 and in the mucosa of the oesophagus and larynx.6 Histologically there is an infiltration of large, round Paget cells, singly or in groups, throughout the lower part of the epidermis. These have a pale, clear cytoplasm and a large vesicular nucleus, in which there may be a prominent nucleolus. Histochemical stains sometimes show much mucopolysaccharide in the cytoplasm, especially in lesions of the anus2 7 and vulva, but this is not the rule with mammary Paget's disease.7 In most cases affecting the breast there is an underlying carcinoma, usually affecting the superficial ducts and contiguous with the skin lesion-though sometimes it is deep-seated and quite separate. Most cases of perianal Paget's disease are also associated with an underlying adenocarcinoma, probably arising from neighbouring apocrine glands.2 But in Paget's disease of the skin in other sites no underlying malignancy can usually be found. M. E. Fenn and her colleagues have recently reported seven cases of Paget's disease of the vulva.8 In all of them the Paget cells, which were rich in mucopolysaccharide, were found in neighbouring pilosebaceous structures as well as in the epidermis, and in two cases the sweat ducts were also involved. In no instance was there an underlying invasive carcinoma, but three patients had a primary cancer elsewhere in the body, either at the time of treatment or previously. One patient had had four primary malignant tumours in addition to Paget's disease over the previous 24 years. The pathogenesis of Paget's disease has occasioned much controversy. The original view was that it represented an intraepithelial invasion of cancer cells from an underlying carcinoma of a breast duct or an adnexal apocrine gland. Nevertheless, the distance of this tumour from the skin in some cases and its absence in others make this hypothesis frequently unacceptable. There is now a growing consensus of opinion that Paget cells arise in the actual epithelium, and that Paget's disease itself is a type of intraepithelial cancer. In some instances a transition to Bowen's disease (intraepidermal carcinoma) is evident,9 as in two of the patients described by Fenn and her colleagues.8 Thus while intraepithelial spread might account for a few of those cases of Paget's disease with an underlying carcinoma, more probably these lesions represent a multifocal primary cancer arising in an extensive field of neoplasia. In all cases of Paget's disease it is important to exclude invasive cancer, not only in the vicinity of the lesion but also elsewhere in the body.


Background: The diaphragm is the main respiratory muscle; the diaphragm can rupture in the field of blunt trauma, penetrating trauma or occur following medical procedures. Approximately 0.8 to 1.6% of patients with blunt trauma are suspected to have a rupture of the diaphragm. As diaphragmatic rupture is a rare clinical condition, so it may be undiagnosed and associated with complications and high mortality and morbidity. Case report: In this study we report a 53-year-old man, with history of blunt trauma five years ago, but during this period, remained undiagnosed. For shortness of breath, he visits physicians frequently and just receives medical treatment during these years. Finally, requested abdominal X-ray showed diaphragmatic rupture and herniation of the left side of the colon into the thoracic area. Conclusion: Having a strong clinical suspicion, taking a thorough history of the patient, performing an accurate physical examination and doing an essential diagnostic procedures should all be considered to help confirm the diagnosis.


High-frequency (2-24 mc) airborne direction-finding antennas are, in general, limited in accuracy, due to the undesired coupling between the antenna and the airframe which is electrically resonant in this frequency range. This paper describes the results of laboratory and flight test studies of antennas designed to eliminate such coupling and to achieve the necessary direction-finding accuracy. The radiation patterns of one particular antenna design-the wing H-Adcock-are discussed. It is concluded that hf airborne direction-finding is not feasible except in very restricted circumstances over narrow portions of the hf band.


The field of neuroscience has, after a long period of looking the other way, again embraced emotion as an important research area. Much of the progress has come from studies of fear, and especially fear conditioning. This work has pin- pointed the amygdala as an important component of the system involved in the acqui- sition, storage, and expression of fear memory and has elucidated in detail how stimuli enter, travel through, and exit the amygdala. Some progress has also been made in understanding the cellular and molecular mechanisms that underlie fear conditioning, and recent studies have also shown that the findings from experimental animals apply to the human brain. It is important to remember why this work on emotion succeeded where past efforts failed. It focused on a psychologically well-defined aspect of emo- tion, avoided vague and poorly defined concepts such as "affect," "hedonic tone," or "emotional feelings," and used a simple and straightforward experimental approach. With so much research being done in this area today, it is important that the mistakes of the past not be made again. It is also time to expand from this foundation into broader aspects of mind and behavior


Background: Adolescent girls and young women (AGYW) in sub-Saharan Africa have high HIV prevalence and incidence. We sought to understand which HIV risk factors individually and in combination contribute to risk, and whether these factors are associated with HIV worry and risk perception. Setting: This study is ongoing at 4 public health centers in Lilongwe, Malawi (2016–2017). Methods: AGYW of 15–24 years old were recruited to participate in a study assessing 4 models of service delivery. At each health center, participants completed a baseline survey assessing socioeconomic, behavioral, biomedical, and partnership characteristics; self-reported HIV status; and, if HIV-uninfected, HIV risk perception (high versus low or none) and HIV worry (any versus none). We analyzed associations between baseline characteristics and HIV prevalence, risk perception, and worry. Results: Among 1000 AGYW, median age was 19 years (IQR: 17–21). Thirty-three participants reported being HIV-infected. Fifteen characteristics were associated with HIV infection. Having more risk factors was associated with higher HIV prevalence (⩽4 factors, 0.5%; 5–8 factors, 6%; >8 factors, 21%). Having more risk factors was also associated with higher risk perception (P < 0.001) and higher worry (P < 0.001). However, among those with ≥8 risk factors, 52% did not consider themselves to be at high risk and 21% did not report any HIV worry. Conclusions: Most AGYW perceive little risk of HIV acquisition, even those at highest risk. As a critical gap in the HIV prevention cascade, accurate risk perception is needed to tailor effective and sustained combination prevention strategies for this vulnerable population.


The method of defining the power, consumed by a planetary vibroexciter, allowing with the help of three-dimensional diagrams, to select basic parameters of elliptic planetary vibroexciter by a rational way at the stage of its design has been presented. This can provide the increase of effectiveness and substantial reduction of energy capacity. To build up-to-date highways it is necessary to have road-making machines, which differ from the traditional ones with not only their design and comfort, but also having innovating mechanisms and working in accord with new technologies. Road vibrating rollers are related to such machines. They use planetary vibroexciters in their construction for sealing road-building materials. Planetary vibroexciters with elliptic toe cams, generating excitement of centrifugal along with Coriolis forces, combined effect of which provides several increase of integral force of directed driving force relate to the new developments, providing substantial intensification of the toe cam process. Method of determining and analysis of critical angles of slipping of inertial runner on the surface of elliptic inner race with the help of three-dimensional diagrams built with MathCAD software.


We investigated consumer psychology, perception, and aesthetics in relation to sports shoe colors in Taiwan. Semantic differential rating (three emotional adjective pairs) and preference rating questionnaires were distributed among 512 university students to investigate whether their responses to various sports shoe colors differed. The results show that black is one of the most popular colors for sports shoes. The participants preferred designs that incorporated white as the secondary color and disliked those that featured green as the main and secondary colors. In addition, designs incorporating black or red as the main color with a bright color as the secondary color were considered modern. Black and white designs were perceived to be more suited to formal occasions. Furthermore, when the area of the main color exceeded that of the secondary color, the participants perceived a strong sense of simplicity, unless the colors were blue and green. The participants preferred two-color over one-color designs, and three-color designs had a higher correlation with participant preferences. Women required more time than men to evaluate a sample. The men typically examined the samples from a frontal angle, whereas the women focused on the sides of the sample. The scoring scale was polarized (e.g., highest score for modern was −10 and 10 for retro), rendering the values of the Pearson correlation coefficient analysis comparatively low, resulting in weak correlations between variables. However, the relative differences of these values retained referential value regarding objective quantification. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 40, 178–193, 2015


The drive to reduce fuel consumption of vehicles equipped with internal combustion engines leads to an increasing share of hybrid drives used in various means of transport. Such hybrid vehicles, thanks to the use of diesel-electric drive systems, allow for a fuel consumption reduction, and thus to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions. This fuel consumption reduction results from a specifically selected energy flow strategy in hybrid systems. This strategy was the focus of the research performed in order to identify the energy flow conditions in a hybrid drive system in driving conditions corresponding to the RDE test. A Lexus LS 500h vehicle was tested in two drive modes, while determining the related energy flow conditions, including the operating conditions of: electric motors, internal combustion engine and battery. Energy balance was determined taking into account the high voltage battery discharge and charging energy as well as the energy recovered during regenerative braking. It was found that in the RDE test conditions the vehicle is in electric mode for over 30% of the distance and 35% of the drive time, with the energy balance of the vehicle being positive (SOCend > SOCstart). Additionally, it was pointed out that the time spent in the electric mode when driving in urban conditions is about 50% and decreases to about 15% for highway conditions.


Abstract:Euthanasia for psychiatric conditions is currently legal in Belgium and the Netherlands. It is also highly controversial, as illustrated by some recent, high-profile cases. In this paper, I show how a better understanding of the associated phenomenology can inform debate in this area. I focus on how phenomenological changes that occur in psychiatric illness can erode the ability to experience and entertain certain types of possibility, making some scenarios seem inevitable and others impossible. Although strong convictions that originate in competent decisions differ from verbal and non-verbal behaviors stemming from losses of possibility, detecting the difference is by no means straightforward. I add that a sense of the possible can be sustained, enhanced, or diminished by ways of experiencing and relating to other people. Consequently, the extent to which decision-making capacity is impaired in a given case may vary with interpersonal context. I consider the implications of these points for evaluating euthanasia as a response to mental suffering.


Abstract. Atmosphere models with resolutions of several tens of kilometres take subgrid-scale variability in the total specific humidity qt into account by using a uniform probability density function (PDF) to predict fractional cloud cover. However, usually only mean relative humidity, RH, or mean clear-sky relative humidity, RHcls, is used to compute hygroscopic growth of soluble aerosol particles. While previous studies based on limited-area models and also a global model suggest that subgrid-scale variability in RH should be taken into account for estimating radiative forcing due to aerosol–radiation interactions (RFari), here we present the first estimate of RFari using a global atmospheric model with a parameterization for subgrid-scale variability in RH that is consistent with the assumptions in the model. For this, we sample the subsaturated part of the uniform RH-PDF from the cloud cover scheme for its application in the hygroscopic growth parameterization in the ECHAM6-HAM2 atmosphere model. Due to the non-linear dependence of the hygroscopic growth on RH, this causes an increase in aerosol hygroscopic growth. Aerosol optical depth (AOD) increases by a global mean of 0.009 ( ∼ 7.8 % in comparison to the control run). Especially over the tropics AOD is enhanced with a mean of about 0.013. Due to the increase in AOD, net top of the atmosphere clear-sky solar radiation, SWnet, cls, decreases by −0.22 W m−2 ( ∼ −0.08 %). Finally, the RFari changes from −0.15 to −0.19 W m−2  by about 31 %. The reason for this very disproportionate effect is that anthropogenic aerosols are disproportionally hygroscopic.


Beneath the hilarity of Taika Waititi's Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016) emerges a telling commentary on the increasingly normalised presence of paramilitarism in aspects of Aotearoa New Zealand's society. In this essay, I use Waititi's Hunt for the Wilderpeople as a lens through which to discuss the on-going nature of colonial violence directed towards the Ngāi Tūhoe people, exemplified in the 2007 'anti-terror' raids codenamed 'Operation 8', and the more recent (but less well known) raids that have targeted Tūhoe since 2007. I stipulate that such raids demonstrate a return to sites of 'originary violence' (as per Irene Watson's thesis (2009)), where Crown sovereignty is violently reinscribed upon the frontier to reinforce the supremacy of the state. This discussion continues Vijay Devadas' argument that Operation 8 reflected a '…racialised sovereignty the very foundation [of] which the legitimacy and power of state sovereignty is constituted in Aotearoa' (2008, 124).


The petroleum ether extract, methanolic extracts and isolated compounds of B. diffusa and A. lanata were subjected to pharmacological screening on mice models. All the extracts obtained showed hepatoprotective activity in albino rats where the hepatotoxicity was induced by administering CCl4. Animals treated with doses of 100, 200 and 300mg/kg, of plant extracts, it showed a significant protection of liver histologically and serum tests after the last doses of CCl4. Thus the current study reveals that plant extracts from the plants B. diffusa and A. lanata have significant hepatoprotective property.


This article concerns employment officers' assessments of persons with physical disabilities. The aim was to investigate the assessments made by employment officers of the motivation and ability to obtain, keep, and successfully perform a job, when young women and men, of Swedish and foreign country of birth, seek employment. The study is qualitative and data were collected via interviews supported by the vignette method. The respondents were eight employment officers working in employment offices in a large and a medium-sized municipality in Sweden. The results show that the employment officers assess the job seekers born in a foreign country (Iran) as less motivated to find a job and less motivated to work compared to those born in Sweden. The results also show that the applicants born in a foreign country are recommended to seek less-qualified jobs, and that women born in Sweden are recommended for more professional assistance and support to further education than other applicants. The study reveals the existence of negative ethnic discrimination in employment officers' assessments of employment prospects for persons with physical disabilities and indicates that improvements may be needed in the officers' understanding of how unconscious stereotypical expectations concerning disabilities, gender and ethnicity can affect their assessments and decisions. It is suggested that careful consideration should be given to whether pedagogic models that have been used in other contexts, for instance education, could be used as a complement in the management of cases in order to detect biases in assessments.


1Pharmacy Jesús C. Gómez Martínez, Barcelona 08041, Spain; 2Department of Engineering, Area of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Technologies, Miguel Hernández University, Alicante 03550, Spain; 3Department of Public Health, History of Science and Gynecology, Miguel Hernández University, CIBER in Epidemiology and Public Health, Alicante 03550, Spain Purpose: The aim of this study was to evaluate the provision of a professional pharmaceutical patient-centered model in a weight management program and optimization of the medication in a Spanish community pharmacy. Patients and Methods: This was a single-group intervention study with a mean follow-up period of 8.2 months (sd 2.3). Patients ≥18 years old seeking to lose weight or improve eating habits were recruited. On the first visit, the pharmacist collected patients' sociodemographic and anthropometric variables, dietary history and lifestyle habits, biochemical measurements and other clinical and therapeutic data. The intervention was based on the Spanish Society of Community Pharmacy recommendations for diet and exercise and for pharmacotherapy management. The follow-up included a two-month visit and a final visit. Results: A total of 330 patients were included (80% women; mean age 51.3 years old (sd 15.3)). A statistically significant reduction in anthropometric measurements (weight, BMI, and waist circumference) and a statistically significant increase in the number of patients with normal cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol (p<0.001) were observed at two-month visit compared with first visit (p<0.001). The number of patients with normal triglyceride levels at final visit compared with first visit also increased significantly (p=0.04). A total of 186 (56.4%) patients had drugrelated problems at first visit and 31 (9.4%) patients at two-month visit. Conclusion: The implementation of a patient-centered weight management model had a positive impact on the improvement of anthropometric, clinical and therapeutic parameters.


The greatest division in our field between a more scientific anthropology and a humanistic one lies largely along theoretical lines. However, the debate over the use and value of etic data, observer-oriented objective data measured from the outside for explanation, and emic data, actor-oriented subjective data from the inside for interpretation, has also been vehement. Here, a case study comparing violence among the Ju/'hoansi (!Kung) Bushmen of the Kalahari and Enga of Papua New Guinea is used to show (1) how cultural institutions structure aggression and violence, for better or for worse, and (2) how the complementary use of data from the inside and outside is essential for understanding cultural institutions and their effect on cognition, motives, emotions, and corresponding actions and social selection pressures. A challenge for anthropology will be to work out how to collect and apply data from the inside so that it can be used systematically to help interpret and contextualize data collected by external observers. Such efforts will require understanding of how knowledge is generated, distributed, exchanged, and controlled.


Railway systems in metropolitan areas support a high density of daily traffic that is exposed to different types of disturbances in the service. An interesting topic in the literature is to obtain action protocols in the presence of contingencies which can affect the system operation, avoiding the propagation of perturbation and minimizing its negative consequences. Assume that, with a small margin of time (e.g. one day), the decision-maker of the transportation network is knowing that a part of the train fleet will become inoperative temporarily along a specific transit line and none additional vehicle will be able to restore the affected services. The decision to be taken in consequence will require to reschedule the existing services by possibly reducing the number of expeditions (line runs). This will affect travellers who regularly use the transit system to get around. Consider that the decision-maker aims to lose the least number of passengers as a consequence of having introduced changes into the transit line. A strategy that could be applied in this context is to remove those line runs which are historically less used by travellers without affecting the remaining services. Another alternative strategy might be to reschedule the timetables of the available units, taking into account the pattern of arrivals of users to the boarding stations and the user behavior during waiting times (announced in situ). The aim of this work consists of assessing the strategy of train rescheduling along the current transportation line when the supply must be reduced in order to reinforce the service of another line, exploited by the same public operator, which has suffered an incidence or emergency.


Abstract This article is an attempt to provide a corrective to a marked Sinocentrism in contemporary debates on regional integration in Asia. In order to do so, firstly, as a heuristic device, a crucial distinction is made between 'regionalization', as involving multifaceted integrative socio-economic processes, and 'regionalism', defined as a form of identity construction akin to nationalism. Secondly, a degree of historical depth is proposed to better explain recent developments. Finally, throughout the article, an interdisciplinary approach is taken involving employing realist, historical/sociological institutionalist and constructivist perspectives in the area of international relations. The first two East Asian summits are contextualized in relation to various conceptualizations of an Asian Community over the last century or so. Particular attention is given to the 1955 Asian-African Conference in Bandung as a watershed in this evolution. Varying conceptions of East Asia as part of a larger, transpacific regional entity (APEC) and in, and of, itself (East Asian Economic Group/ASEAN +3) are examined. In situating the first two East Asian summits five developments of significance are examined. These are: a continuing Japanese role in setting the regional agenda; the ambivalence of China's positioning vis-à-vis neighbouring countries; the re-entry of Central Asia in the Asian regional equation; India's 'return to Asia'; and efforts to maintain ASEAN's centrality in regional construction. These factors, it is argued, are militating towards a return to the Sino-Indic Asia of Bandung. It is thus suggested that notions of an Asian Community involving only Northeast and Southeast Asia are now rejoined by a concept of a Greater Asia. While the historical roots of this conception partly explain its salience, it nevertheless competes with other complementary – and antagonistic – definitions of an Asian Community of more recent lineage.


This paper provides an Integrative Social Contract Theory analysis of the ethics of institutional brokerage commission rebates - soft dollars and directed brokerage - focused on transaction cost economics. Brokerage commission rebates are a form of vertical arrangement subject to the same economic analysis scholars and courts have used in the Antitrust setting to find that consumers often benefit from vertical arrangements. My analysis shows that institutional brokerage rebates, often condemned as kickbacks, payola, or commercial bribery, likely benefit mutual fund investors once the problem of brokerage quality assurance is recognized. According to Integrative Social Contract Theory they appear to be ethical forms of economic organization.


: Fluoxetine prevents the loss of 5-hydroxytryptamine (5HT) uptake in synaptosomes of cerebral cortex after intraperitoneally administered p-chloroamphetamine (p-CA) with an ED50 of 3.8 mg/kg i.p. in rats. However, at 50 mg/kg, it does not prevent the loss of norepinephrine (NE) uptake in synaptosomes of hypothalamus after intraventricularly administered 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA). Nisoxetine, on the other hand, centrally protects NE uptake from the neurotoxic effect of 6-OHDA with an ED50 value of 5 mg/kg i.p. At 50 mg/kg, it gives only 35% protection of 5HT uptake from the neurotoxic effect of p-CA. In comparison with the ED50 values of tricyclic antidepressants, both fluoxetine and nisoxetine are more potent and selective blockers of neurotoxicity resulting from the central actions of p-CA and 6-OHDA, respectively, in vivo.


A 53 year old woman presented, one month after an anicteric leptospirosis, an acute, asymmetrical, sensorimotor polyneuropathy involving the lower limbs. Electrophysiological study showed evidence of severe denervation, with normal motor nerve conduction velocities, indicating an axonal degeneration. Neuro-muscular biopsy showed signs of wallerian degeneration and perivascular infiltrates of epineural vessels. She received a corticosteroid therapy during 6 months and there was a nearly complete clinical recovery.


The often so gaudy coloured Palaearctic representatives of the family Glyphipterigidae are receiving renewed attention after a neglect of many years. In the USSR several genera of the Choreutinae have been revised (the late A. S. Danilevsky, 1964; A. S. Danilevsky & V. I. Kuznetsov, 1973) and a survey of the family in Japan has been initiated by revisions and descriptions of species of Glyphipterix Hubner, Brenthia Clemens, Tebenna Billberg, Choreutis Hubner, etc. (S. Moriuti & T. Saito, 1964; Y. Arita, 1971, 1971a, 1975, 1976). The first author of the present paper is preparing a revision of the Palaearctic Glyphipterigidae, while J. B. Heppner (University of Florida), is working on the Nearctic fauna of these insects. Descriptions of four new species of Hilarographa Zeller and of seven new species of Glyphipterix Hubner from Japan and the Far East, and of a new Digitivalva species from Japan are presented below. The greater part of the material at hand has been collected by the second author, who is the specialist of the group in Japan. The first author studied the important Issiki Collection in the Washington Museum, made the descriptions and is responsible for the figures which were made by the artist and amateur entomologist, Mr, A. C. M. van Dijk of The Hague, Netherlands, and a few by himself. The types will be deposited in the collections of the following institutions, as indicated in the text: Zoological Institute of the Academy of Sciences, Leningrad, USSR (ZIAS); National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., USA (NMNH); Zoological Laboratory, Faculty of Agriculture, Meijo University, Nagoya, Japan (ZLMU); Zoological Laboratory, Hokkaido University, Hokkaido, Japan (ZLHU); and Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie, Leiden, the Netherlands (RMNH).


A quality of service (QoS) scheme for multimedia multicast communications in wireless mesh networks (WMNs) is proposed in this study. It uses a new bandwidth calculation scheme to provide rate-adaptive admission control. It relies on information it receives from the network and application layers to calculate the network bandwidth consumption and operates independently of the media access control (MAC) layer. Using the proposed QoS scheme, the network layer provides feedback on network congestion to the application layer. The multimedia multicast sender adapts the real-time data transmission rate based on the network congestion feedback it receives. In this study, the authors describe the detailed architecture of the proposed QoS scheme. Furthermore, the authors have implemented the QoS scheme in our previously developed uni-directional link aware multicast extension to AODV (UDL-MAODV) routing protocol. The authors present validation tests to ensure the correct functionality of the QoS algorithm using our SwanMesh WMN testbed. The authors have also performed simulation tests to evaluate the performance of the proposed scheme. The simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed QoS scheme.


The purpose of this study was to investigate interactional patterns in the context of a fifth grade class in Sweden. It was also to investigate whether the interactional patterns of the class and their teacher was subject to any change dependent on the lesson subject, specifically mathmatics and science. The study was conducted through observations and interviews. The results of the study varied somewhat from the results of earlier studies within the same field of research. The girls of this class was more likely than the boys to initiate interaction with the teacher or other pupils. Although the real differences exist within groups of the same gender, not between them. The lesson subject did not have a big impact on the interactional patterns of the class as a whole but depending on the subjects different individuals seemed likely to initiate interaction.


The corrosion casting technique using acrylic resins in the scanning electron microscope (SEM), was originally developed to investigate renal microvascular structure and is now also successfully used in studies on various other organs. However, in the last two decades nearly 100 papers have been published on the renal vascular anatomy of various taxa of vertebrates or on pathomorphological structures of kidneys, using this technique. Analyzing these works, trends and developments in this field can be summed up as follows: The majority of studies are anatomical works on the vascular system of kidneys from all vertebrate classes. In addition, experimental pathological investigations, mostly done using rodents, and documentation of pathologically altered renal structure form another large part of the publications covered in this review. Perspectives for future research on renal systems using this versatile method may be derived from this survey.


We report on recent advances in liquid phase epitaxial (LPE) conversion of a bulk Si wafer into self standing 3C-SiC. This includes the role of the stress control within the (100) oriented "crucibles", the elaboration of crack-free (111) "crucibles" and the successful conversion of (100) and (111) oriented Si wafer. To date up to 100µm thick 3C-SiC(100) as well as 30µm thick crack-free 3C-SiC (111) materials have been obtained. The growth rate ranges from 20 to 100µm/h and locally can even reach ~1mm/h. In this work we focus on the structural, morphological and optical properties of the LPE-grown material.


Gypsum areas are stressful environments inhabited by gypsophytes, plants that are exclusive for such habitats, and by plants that grow on gypsum but also on other soil types, the so-called gypsovags. To investigate possible differences between gypsovags and gypsophytes with respect to basic stress response mechanisms, two common osmolytes, glycine betaine and total soluble sugars, as well as monovalent (Na + and K + ) and bivalent (Ca 2+ and Mg 2+ ) cations, were quantified, under field conditions, in two Iberian endemic gypsophytes ( Gypsophila struthium subsp. hispanica and Ononis tridentata ) and two common Mediterranean gypsovags ( Rosmarinus officinalis and Helianthemum syriacum ). Their spatial variation according to a topographic gradient and their temporal variation over a period of three successive seasons were correlated with climatic data and soil characteristics. This analysis confirmed that water stress is the main environmental stress factor in gypsum habitats, whereas the percentage of gypsum in the soil does not seem to play any relevant role in the activation of stress responses in plants. Glycine betaine may contribute to stress tolerance in the gypsophytes, but not in the gypsovags, according to the close correlation found between the level of this osmolyte and the gypsophily of the investigated taxa. Cation contents in the plants did not correlate with those present in the soil, but the gypsophytes have higher levels of Ca 2+ and Mg 2+ than the gypsovags, under all environmental conditions, which may represent an adaptation mechanism to their specific habitat.


Berberine, as an allelochemical extracted from golden thread (Coptis chinensis), inhibits the growth of Microcystis aeruginosa significantly. To assess berberine-induced damage on the algal photosynthetic apparatus, the effects of berberine on the algal photosynthetic pigments compositions and ultrastructure were investigated. The results showed that the relative chlorophyll a content of M. aeruginosa decreased with the increasing concentrations of berberine and the prolongation of exposure time. The relative contents of phycocyanin, allophycocyanin and phycoerythrin of M. aeruginosa transitioned from a decrease to an increase in the early phase of the experiment, and then decreased sharply to the end at low concentrations. However, when berberine concentration raised to 20.0 mg·L-1, all the relative phycobilins contents of M. aeruginosa had been decreasing with the prolongation of exposure time. Of the three phycobilins of M. aeruginosa, phycocyanin was affected most severely by berberine. TEM photographs showed that the ultrastructures of the multiple-layered cell wall, cell membrane and thylakoid lamella of M. aeruginosa were destroyed severely under the stress of berberine with the occurrence of cyanophycin granules. It was concluded that decreases in the photosynthetic pigments and destruction of the algal cells ultrastructures might be involved in berberine-caused antialgal mechanism.


The Japanese sword is produced from a special kind of steel called tamahagane, using a forge-fold operation repeated several times. The purpose of this study is to clarify the development of microstructures with successive forge-fold operations using tamahagane. Specimens under several stages of sword making have been investigated with optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy and electron probe micro analysis methods. Microstructures have been found to be a combination of ferrite and pearlite with a lot of nonmetallic inclusions. The ferrite bands become finer and among other inclusions Fe2SiO4 takes a spherical shape with increasing recurrence of forge-fold operations.


In the recent years, neural networks are considered as the best candidate for fast approximation with arbitrary accuracy in the time consuming problems. Dynamic analysis of structures against earthquake has the time consuming process. We employed two kinds of neural networks: Generalized Regression neural network (GR) and Back-Propagation Wavenet neural network (BPW), for approximating of dynamic time history response of frame structures. GR is a traditional radial basis function neural network while BPW categorized as a wavelet neural network. In BPW, sigmoid activation functions of hidden layer neurons are substituted with wavelets and weights training are achieved using Scaled Conjugate Gradient (SCG) algorithm. Comparison the results of BPW with those of GR in the dynamic analysis of eight story steel frame indicates that accuracy of the properly trained BPW was better than that of GR and therefore, BPW can be efficiently used for approximate dynamic analysis of structures.


Fiber lasers are displaying an increasing demand and a presence in the laser market since their power levels and robustness reached the performance of solid state lasers. This was made possible by using the latest optical fiber related developments like photonic crystal fibers and also by making careful system designs using the large variety of the fiber technology. The simulation of these systems is therefore indispensable to further optimize their performance and to maximize the required output parameters for certain applications. In Furukawa Electric Technológiai Intézet Kft., Budapest, Hungary (FETI), we can calculate continuous waves (CW) as well as pulsed fiber oscillators and amplifiers and our calculations are capable of using brute force, or simplex methods to optimize the system with an adequately defined merit function. Through the chromatic dispersion, we can calculate, the nonlinearity, the loss and the gain related effects. We combine the nonlinear Schrödinger equation and the rate equations in many different kind of solvers to obtain the pulse propagation in rare-earth doped optical fibers. Our algorithms make possible to satisfy the individual boundary conditions of linear or ring fiber oscillators and also of power amplifiers. In this paper, we present our models to achieve this task in different subsystems and also the calculation results which can pave the way for the design of more robust, ultra-high power fiber laser systems. ABSTRACT


Nanothermodynamics extends standard thermodynamics to facilitate finite-size effects on the scale of nanometers. A key ingredient is Hill's subdivision potential that accommodates the non-extensive energy of independent small systems, similar to how Gibbs' chemical potential accommodates distinct particles. Nanothermodynamics is essential for characterizing the thermal equilibrium distribution of independently relaxing regions inside bulk samples, as is found for the primary response of most materials using various experimental techniques. The subdivision potential ensures strict adherence to the laws of thermodynamics: total energy is conserved by including an instantaneous contribution from the entropy of local configurations, and total entropy remains maximized by coupling to a thermal bath. A unique feature of nanothermodynamics is the completely-open nanocanonical ensemble. Another feature is that particles within each region become statistically indistinguishable, which avoids non-extensive entropy, and mimics quantum-mechanical behavior. Applied to mean-field theory, nanothermodynamics gives a heterogeneous distribution of regions that yields stretched-exponential relaxation and super-Arrhenius activation. Applied to Monte Carlo simulations, there is a nonlinear correction to Boltzmann's factor that improves agreement between the Ising model and measured non-classical critical scaling in magnetic materials. Nanothermodynamics also provides a fundamental mechanism for the 1/f noise found in many materials.


Loudspeaker cabinets should not contribute at all to the total sound radiation, but aim instead to be a perfectly rigid box which encloses the drive units. To achieve this goal, state of the art FEM software packages and Doppler vibrometers are the tools at our disposal. The modelling steps covered in the paper are: measuring and fitting orthotropic material properties, including damping; 3D mechanical modelling with a curvilinear coordinates system and thin elastic layers to represent glue joints; scanning laser Doppler measurements and single point vibration measurements with an accelerometer. Additionally a numerically efficient post-processing approach used to extract the total radiated acoustic power and an example of what kind of improvement can be expected from a typical design optimization are presented.


This paper seeks to report the findings of a cultural studies project conducted in an upperclassman, undergraduate, teacher preparation course. With this paper, I explore the implications of a white savior mentality through the lens of three different, yet over-lapping, personal and social media: my own story as a beginning, white teacher in racially diverse school settings; popular texts that romanticize white teachers who come in to "save the day"; and the experiences of future teachers with whom I have worked to interrogate a White Savior Industrial Complex (WSIC). With this paper, then, I work to investigate the social institutions that animate the WSIC, which I position as a detrimental extension of a superhero teacher that perpetuates inequalities in schools if left unexamined. More specifically, to combat the structures of inequality that exist in our schools, I argue for critical race theory and critical whiteness studies courses as a potential space for white teachers to dialogue and come to terms with their understandings of white supremacy.


DNA polymorphisms are the markers of choice for the identification and characterization of plants. They are an integral part of the plant and they are not subject to environmental modification. There are relatively reliable, generally applicable methods to obtain large samples of markers from any species of plant. However, each marker system samples a different fraction of the genome and therefore has a different resolving power, range of applicability and probability of homology. Standard measures (e.g. genetic distance) are dependent on the marker system and on the group under study. Taxa of similar rank may differ greatly in the variability of molecular marker systems. This is illustrated with examples from the genus Allium. At the IPK, a unique living collection of about 300 species of the genus, many collected at type localities, and a large collection of accessions of the cultivated species has been studied with a range of molecular markers: isozymes, RAPDs, ITS-sequences, PCR-RFLPs of variable regions of chloroplast DNA, and genome in situ hybridization (GISH). Molecular marker studies have necessitated changes in the subgeneric classification of the genus but have confirmed the monophyly of most sections within subgenera. The origin of various cultivated groups has been elucidated, especially where material of native origin was available, since garden-grown Allium are very liable to genetic introgression. Introgression in nature between species from various sections has been demonstrated. Microsatellite primers have been developed for the characterization of individual accessions of Allium cepa and for molecular genetic mapping experiments.


The engine cylinder is one of the major I C engine components, which is subjected to high temperature variations and thermal stresses. To cool the cylinder, fins are provided on the surface of the cylinder to increase the rate of heat transfer. By doing thermal analysis on the engine cylinder fins, it is helpful to know the heat dissipation inside the cylinder. The main aim of the paper is to increase the heat dissipation rate by using the invisible working fluid of air. It is observed that, by increasing the surface area the heat dissipation rate increases, further the main purpose of using these cooling fins is to cool the engine cylinder by air. This paper presents a review to increase heat transfer rate in a four stroke S I engine by using geometrically modified fins Keyword: Thermal Analysis, Fins Geometry, Material, Velocity Variation and CFD.


With the requirement for increasing efficiency of wireless spectrum usage, the cognitive radio technique has been emerging as an important solution. Passive monitoring over wireless channels in cognitive radio is an innovative approach in which the system attempts to locate channels with the highest activity over time. A huge amount of work has been contributed to this field when the reward of each channel is identical to observers. However, when the reward is different over observers, these algorithms perform poorly. In this thesis, we challenge this problem by considering this correlation as part of the reward. We develop one optimal online learning algorithm when a switching cost exists in the system. We also propose three approximation algorithms with competitive computation complexity but still guarantee to obtain a constant amount of reward compared to the optimal case. Theoretical analysis and simulation are conducted to prove the effectiveness of these approaches.


We contribute to advancing the understanding of Riemannian accelerated gradient methods. In particular, we revisit Accelerated Hybrid Proximal Extragradient(A-HPE), a powerful framework for obtaining Euclidean accelerated methods \citep{monteiro2013accelerated}. Building on A-HPE, we then propose and analyze Riemannian A-HPE. The core of our analysis consists of two key components: (i) a set of new insights into Euclidean A-HPE itself; and (ii) a careful control of metric distortion caused by Riemannian geometry. We illustrate our framework by obtaining a few existing and new Riemannian accelerated gradient methods as special cases, while characterizing their acceleration as corollaries of our main results.


A group of 13 successfully treated hydrocephalic children living a normal social life according to their ages has been examined to evaluate the possible correlation between their brain size, intellectual development and physical disability. The brain size was assesed by ventriculography prior to initial surgery and by computer tomography (CT-scanning) at the time of investigation 6--11 years after operation. The intellectural development was evaluated by psychological investigation of the children and by evaluation of their social adaptation. The physical disability was investigated by neurological examination. Significant improvement in ventricular size was demonstrated from pneumoencephalographic examinations prior to surgery and to the CT investigations. No prediction of the intellectual development could be based on the ventriculographies prior to initial surgery. In spite of positive trends, correlation trends, correlation between the ventricular size as determined by CT-scans and the IQ was not significant, possibly due to the small number of cases available for study.


A novel composite membrane (CM) was prepared by coating choline chloride (ChCl) blended cellulose acetate (CA) on fly-ash based ceramic substrate for phenol removal. Different amount (0-1 g) of ChCl was blended with CA to synthesize various CMs. Amount of ChCl in CA increases the contact angle, average pore radius, permeability of CM from 55.15° to 71.55°, 1.6 to 6.83 nm and 0.0057 to 0.0152 L·m−2·h−1·kPa−1, respectively. Phenol rejection increased from 56 to 93 % while increasing ChCl amount in CA. Phenol removal decreased from 94.26-64.23 % and 91.09-78.62 % with increase in applied pressure (69-483 kPa) and feed concentration (50-200 mg·L−1). However, removal rate increased from 80.46-92.47 % with increase in pH 2-12. Among all CMs, CC5 is identified as best CM with maximum phenol removal efficiency (92.7 %) and flux (1.86 L·m−2·h−1) at 207 kPa applied pressure and 100 mg·L−1 of feed phenol concentration. The obtained results reveal that blending of 0.9 % ChCl with CA can significantly enhances the phenol removal efficiency and this could be used as potential CM for treatment of phenol bearing wastewater.


This paper proposes a conceptualization of factors that influence the ability of individuals to reduce their personal unsecured debt levels, especially credit card debt. As such the paper's conceptualization offers relationship lessons for bank marketers in the USA and the UK, where bank credit cards are a key element of many bank marketing programs. A key contribution is the paper's focus on customer compliance behavior in a personal unsecured debt management program. Factors discussed within our conceptualization are behavioral variables and psychological variables. Also examined is the role of geographic and demographic explanatory variables in personal debt management program success.