The US Bureau of Mines (USBM) MULSIM/ML modeling technique has been used to analyze anticipated stress distributions for a proposed alternative longwall gate road design for a western Colorado coal mine. The model analyses indicated that the alternative gate road design would reduce stresses in the headgate entry. To test the validity of the alternative gate road design under actual mining conditions, a test section of the alternative system was incorporated into a subsequent set of gate roads developed at the mine. The alternative gate road test section was instrumented with borehole pressure cells, as part of an ongoing USBM research project to monitor ground pressure changes as longwall mining progressed. During the excavation of the adjacent longwall panels, the behavior of the alternative gate road system was monitored continuously using the USBM computer-assisted Ground Control Management System. During these field tests, the alternative gate road system was first monitored and evaluated as a headgate, and later monitored and evaluated as a tailgate. The results of the field tests confirmed the validity of using the MULSIM/NL modeling technique to evaluate mine designs.


We have developed a new methodology that determines protein structures using Small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) data. The current bottlenecks in determining the protein structures require a new strategy using the simple design of an experiment, and SAXS is suitable for this purpose in spite of its low information content. For nine proteins taking different folds, we performed structure calculations using the SAXS constraints combined with the various type of structural information from NMR. The results show that the SAXS constraints complemented the tertiary-structural information for all the proteins, and furthermore, a coarse-grained protein model at amino acid residue resolution can be constructed only from SAXS constraints and secondary-structural information.


: Stroke is a frequent and severe disorder. Most strokes are ischemic in nature and 20% are due to atherosclerosis of the cerebral arteries. Sonographic examination plays a key role in the diagnosis and management of patients with cerebrovascular disease. However, shortcomings can be encountered in the ultrasound evaluation of cervical and intracranial arteries. Contrast agents are known to improve the signal / noise ratio and they can therefore compensate for these shortcomings in most cases. They have proved to be helpful in unfavorable examinations in daily practice. Moreover, their use increases the accuracy and the potential of the technique especially in the intra-cranial examination, increasing the role of ultrasound techniques.


Many human diseases are the result of inappropriate changes in gene expression resulting in deleterious phenotypes of specific cells. For example, loss of expression of tumour suppressors and/or ectopic expression of oncogenes underlie many cancers, a switch from an adult to a fetal gene-expression profile in cardiac myocytes results in cardiac hypertrophy and changes in the expression of many ion channel genes leads to a phenotypic switch from contractile to proliferative smooth muscle cells in vascular diseases such as neointimal hyperplasia and atherosclerosis. Understanding the molecular mechanisms responsible for these changes in gene expression is a major goal, in order to identify novel therapeutic targets.


Polypeptide 14C-aspartyl glutamate, a chemical analogue of a natural modified of a lethal effect of radiation, has been synthesized. The modifier was shown to react readily with nucleic acids and proteins of non-irradiated cells: the reaction was considerably enhanced when the modifier was administered simultaneously with radiation of cells. As is known from the literature, a molar concentration of the incorporated polypeptide is considerably lower than the intracellular molar concentration of an active radiosensitizer, BUdr, which produces an effect on mammalian cells comparable with that of polypeptide.


Some implications of theory are easily maintained in econometric estimation, but computational costs of maintaining curvature properties (sufficient for existence of an optimal solution) have often proved prohibitive. They also have been violated frequently by unrestricted econometric estimates. A computationally manageable procedure for maintaining and testing curvature is used here to obtain estimates of product supplies and input demands for Texas field crops consistent with the theory of the competitive industry. The curvature properties are tested along with several technology restrictions.


With the traditional interactive method of virtual scene, when users observe art design works of virtual scene environment, they usually cannot understand where they are at the moment and feel lost. Therefore, a new interactive method of virtual scene in environment art design is proposed. The design model of the environment scene is introduced. The design process of the interactive module is introduced, and the location of the user in the three-dimensional scene is determined. The realization process of the interactive communication module is analyzed, and the implementation mechanism and process of virtual scene interaction are introduced. In the two-dimensional map, the plane coordinates are transmitted to the virtual scene, then using the relocation function to get the coordinates in the virtual scene, and display virtual scenes centered on this coordinates to achieve the purpose of interactive virtual scene. Experimental results show that the proposed method can effectively realize virtual scene interaction without loss of memory, and the hardware consumption and real-time testing can meet the requirements of user vision and interactive experience, strong robustness, high degree of user interest.


Statistical modelling can be used to relate biological survey data to environmental factors, thereby providing a basis for predictive mapping of species or communities. Although environmental variables vary and influence biota at different scales, models are often fitted without discussion of how scale dependency influences the results. In this study, we analysed the relative importance of environmental factors for the distribution of aquatic species as a function of extent, using data on the cover of five common benthic species (four macrophytes and one animal), from 1731 sites along the Swedish Baltic Sea coast. We modelled the cover and distribution of the five species in relation to salinity, depth, slope, wave exposure and substrate in scale steps from 25 to 1500 km, and analysed the relative contribution of the environmental variables to each species model. The average total deviance explained by the models was generally quite high, and decreased with increasing scale for all macrophyte species, while it increased for the animal, the Baltic Sea blue mussel Mytilus edulis. The relative contribution of different environmental variables changed with scale, and responses also differed between species. The average contribution of salinity increased for all species when moving from local to Baltic Sea scale, and for the Baltic Sea blue mussel it was the single most important factor at the Baltic Sea scale. The average contribution of depth decreased with increasing scale for all species. However, regardless of scale, depth was the most important environmental factor to explain the distribution of all but one of the investigated macrophyte species. This shows that fine scale predictor variables can be of major importance also for species distribution models covering large areas.


Twelve roofing membranes, including poly [vinyl chloride], asphalt glass-felt built-up, thermoplastic polyolefin, atactic polypropylene polymer modified asphalt, styrene-butadiene-styrene block copolymer modified asphalt, and ethylene-propylene-diene rubber membranes were exposed to oven heat, ultra-violet and condensing humidity environment, and two and four-year outdoor exposure at United States Department of Defense sites in Phoenix, Arizona (hot and dry climate); Key West, Florida (hot and moist climate); and Champaign, Illinois (moderate mid-continent climate). Selected mechanical properties were measured before and after each exposure. Each membrane was rated before and after exposure and the membranes were ranked as to relative performance in these physical tests. The physical tests performed include load-strain, dynamic impact resistance, moisture absorption, and glass transition temperature. Identical test methods were used for each membrane to make the physical properties directly comparable. With the exception of the TPO (thermoplastic polyolefin) membrane samples, the mean changes in the load to first peak of the membranes at each site had a 0.994 correlation with the before exposure, after oven heat aging, and after condensing ultra violet exposures. The TPO membrane load to first peak more than doubled after two years of exposure and then dropped dramatically after four years of exposure. The over all results show that testing membrane samples before and after oven heat aging and condensing ultra violet exposures do not accurately predict the final ratings of a dissimilar group of membranes exposed outdoors in a broad variety of climates. These accelerated aging techniques have shown to often be valuable when used to evaluate similar membranes. The single parameter that seems most useful in tracking weathering is the water absorption test. The average percent water absorbed by the membranes increase in direct proportion to exposure time with a linear coefficient of 0.999. We hope to be able to conclude this six-year study as soon as the samples finish weathering and report our results to interested parties.


In this paper, results of a Monte Carlo simulation of the effect of noise on the relationship between the microwave emissivity of soil and its moisture content are presented. It is found that whenever the magnitude of the noise for the independent variable, in this case the soil moisture, is increased, both the slope of the regression and the correlation coefficient decrease. In párticular, when the noise has a magnitude equivalent to a coefficient of variation of 0.25, the slope and correlation coefficient are in good agreement with those obtained from the data of a 21-cm airborne microwave radiometer which was flown over a test site in Hand County, South Dakota. The comparison was made using a linear relationship to determine the estimated emissivity from the ground measurements of soil moisture. The linear relationship was derived from a radiative transfer model calculation of the microwave emissivities using realistic soil-moisture profiles. The effect of surface roughness was included in the relationship, and the variability of the surface roughness was also simulated by a Monte Carlo technique.


s IPRED 2010 s49 Results: The results revealed that hospital personnel during the Israel-Gaza armed conflict did not differ in stress symptoms as measured by the IES-R (/ = 0.105,/> = 0.916), and depressive symptoms as measured by die (CES-D) (/ = -0.588, p = 0.557) from hospital personnel during die second Lebanese war. Further analysis using multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA), showed a significant effect of gender: women had higher stress scores than men as measured by the IES-R (Fl,144 = 5.677, p <0.05)—and profession: physicians had lower stress scores than nurses as measured by the IES-R (F1.144 = 6.868,/> = 0.01). Conclusions: Exposure of hospital personnel to different armed conflicts revealed a similar pattern as showed in this study. The main implication for this study in clinical terms is preparing an intervention to women and nurses who are more vulnerable during war time. Other explanations also are discussed.


Background: The researchers believe in the power of intelligence to improve the clinical performance of nursing students at Fakeeh College for Medical Sciences. The clinical competency shown of every nursing student is not exactly like the other. The impact of these differences may deliver unharmonious and differentiated outcomes in the clinical performance of the students in achieving the goals of care. Objective: The study aims to identify the relevance of the level of intelligence manifested by the Arab student nurses with respect to interpersonal and intrapersonal and their level of clinical performance in achieving the goal of care. Methods: This study used a quantitative descriptive. The design was utilized to describe the interpersonal and intrapersonal intelligence of nursing students. Results: The findings of the study revealed that the majority of Arab nursing student respondents demonstrated a high level of intrapersonal intelligence (xI… =1.76, SD ± 0.41). Meanwhile, Arab nursing students demonstrated a very high level of intelligence in only 3 of the intrapersonal intelligence skills, namely: self-therapeutic (xI… =2.00, SD ± 0.00), ethicomoral- legal responsibilities (xI… =1.85, SD ± 0.35), and evidenced-based nursing care (xI… =1.81, SD ± 0.40). Conclusion: The study concludes that Arab nursing student respondents have a high and very high level of intrapersonal and interpersonal intelligence, respectively. Also, the study concludes that there is a statistically significant relationship between interpersonal skills and clinical performance but there was no statistically significant relationship between intrapersonal skills and clinical performance among Arab nursing students.


Any graph with maximum degree ∆ admits a proper vertex coloring with ∆+1 colors that can be found via a simple sequential greedy algorithm in linear time and space. But can one find such a coloring via a sublinear algorithm? We answer this fundamental question in the affirmative for several canonical classes of sublinear algorithms including graph streaming, sublinear time, and massively parallel computation (MPC) algorithms. In particular, we design: • A single-pass semi-streaming algorithm in dynamic streams using Õ(n) space. The only known semi-streaming algorithm prior to our work was a folklore O(log n)-pass algorithm obtained by simulating classical distributed algorithms in the streaming model. • A sublinear-time algorithm in the standard query model that allows neighbor queries and pair queries using Õ(n √ n) time. We further show that any algorithm that outputs a valid coloring with sufficiently large constant probability requires Ω(n √ n) time. No non-trivial sublinear time algorithms were known prior to our work. • A parallel algorithm in the massively parallel computation (MPC) model using Õ(n) memory per machine and O(1) MPC rounds. Our number of rounds significantly improves upon the recent O(log log∆ · log∗ (n))-round algorithm of Parter [ICALP 2018]. At the core of our results is a remarkably simple meta-algorithm for the (∆ + 1) coloring problem: Sample O(log n) colors for each vertex independently and uniformly at random from the ∆+ 1 colors; find a proper coloring of the graph using only the sampled colors of each vertex. As our main result, we prove that the sampled set of colors with high probability ∗A full version of the paper is available on arXiv [9]. †Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Pennsylvania. Supported in part by the National Science Foundation grant CCF-1617851. Email: {sassadi,chenyu2,email@example.com. contains a proper coloring of the input graph. The sublinear algorithms are then obtained by designing efficient algorithms for finding a proper coloring of the graph from the sampled colors in each model. We note that all our upper bound results for (∆ + 1) coloring are either optimal or close to best possible in each model studied. We also establish new lower bounds that rule out the possibility of achieving similar results in these models for the closely related problems of maximal independent set and maximal matching. Collectively, our results highlight a sharp contrast between the complexity of (∆+1) coloring vs maximal independent set and maximal matching in various models of sublinear computation even though all three problems are solvable by a simple greedy algorithm in the classical setting.


This study focuses on nursing students' internships and how the students are handling the tension created by expectations and dilemmas when using medical records (MRs) in practice. The overall aim of this study is to develop knowledge about what is required by nursing students in order to coordinate and sustain knowledge through the use of MRs. The theoretical approach to learning that has been adopted implies that learning takes place in social activities, and empirically this means that the study of learning and professional knowledge is a matter of studying activities where, for example, technologies are put into practical use, where experience and knowledge are brought to life. The data consists of observations of five nursing students during their second year in nursing school, interviews and ten video-recordings from shift reports. The result shows that nursing students regularly use MRs as a source of information and that they are struggling with transforming that information into action-oriented knowledge. The conclusion is that information systems such as MRs need to be understood and defined by teachers as materials and devices created or adapted to solving practical problems, and should be treated thereafter. Providers of education need to take into account the different types of intellectual or practical knowledge that professionals like nurses are expected to have, where the use of technology cannot be separated from, but need to be integrated into other aspects of knowledge.


Introduction Catheter ablation has emerged as effective therapy for AF. Ablation of AF is often a complex and long procedure requiring long fluoroscopy time. An important complication of AF ablation is the delayed effect of the radiation received by the patients and operator. Objective We conducted this prospective observational cohort to study factors associated with long fluoroscopy time during catheter ablation of AF. Patients and Method This is a prospective observational cohort study, conducted between January 2013 and January 2014 in Critical Care Medicine Department – Cairo University. Patients with symptomatic, drug refractory AF were enrolled. All patients underwent pulmonary vein isolation ± left atrial ablation according to AF type. All operators performed at least 50 previous AF ablation procedures. Clinical (AF type and LA geometry and diameter), and technical (Mapping system and catheters) variables were recorded for each patient. The primary endpoint was to identify variables associated with long fluoroscopy time. Secondary endpoints included identification of complications. Results Thirty-one patients with paroxysmal (n=25) and persistent (n=6) AF were enrolled. Pulmonary vein isolation was achieved in all patients. Average fluoroscopy time was 54.2 ± 31.7 mins. We found that the use of CARTO3® system was associated with significantly shorter fluoroscopy time compared to NavX EnSite Velocity® system (48 ± 29.8 vs. 78 ± 27.9 mins, P = 0.02). Using 20-pole circular mapping catheter was also associated with shorter fluoroscopy time as opposed to 10-pole one (47.6 ± 23.2 vs. 98.8 ± 48.4 mins, P = 0.03). Only two patients (6.4%) suffered major complications; major groin bleeding and pericardial tamponade. Conclusion The use of CARTO3® navigation system and 20-pole circular mapping catheter seems seems to be associated with shorter fluoroscopy time than EnSite Velocity® navigation system and 10-pole circular mapping catheter.


Dynamic resistance occurs when HTS (high-temperature superconductor) coated conductors carry dc current under ac magnetic field. This dissipative effect can play a critical role in many HTS applications. Here, we report on dynamic resistance measurements of a four-tape YBCO stack comprising 4-mm-wide coated conductors, which experience an applied ac perpendicular magnetic field with an amplitude of up to 100 mT. Each tape within the stack carries the same dc current. The magnetic field amplitude, the frequency of the magnetic field, and the dc current magnitude are varied to investigate the influence of these parameters on the dynamic resistance. We find that the threshold field of the stack is significantly larger than that of a single tape when dc current is small, which we attribute to coherent shielding effects from circulating currents present in each wire in the stack.


The Nb-1%Zr-0.1%C (wt%) alloy is one of the most promising refractory metal alloys having an excellent combination of high temperature properties. Such a combination of properties makes it suitable for several structural applications in the Compact High Temperature Reactor (CHTR). In order to produce the alloy in different shape and sizes a new thermo-mechanical route has been established. The central idea behind the development of such thermo-mechanical route is to reduce the working temperature and provide suitable intermediate annealing treatments to develop desired microstructures. The present paper reports about the application of orientation imaging microscopy in optimizing annealing parameters like temperature and time as a function of the extent of deformation. Samples were also characterized by optical microscopy and transmission electron microscopy techniques. It has been shown that a heat treatment of 1300°C for 3 hour could produce nearly full-recrystallized microstructure. This paper also discusses about the carbide precipitation, their morphologies, chemical compositions and orientations with the matrix phase.


Adaptive modulation exploits the time-variant channel capacity fluctuation of fading channels using a range of different modem modes. Specifically, no information is transmitted when the instantaneous channel signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is low, and, hence, during this period the data must be buffered, which results in delay or latency, When the instantaneous channel quality improves, 2-, 4-, 16-, and 64-level modem modes are invoked, which allows the transmission buffer to be emptied. It is shown that channel capacity gains are achieved at the cost of some latency penalty. The latency is quantified in this treatise and mitigated by frequency hopping or statistical multiplexing. The latency is increased when either the mobile speed or the channel SNR are reduced, since both of these result in prolonged low instantaneous SNR intervals. It is demonstrated that as a result of the proposed measures, typically more than 4-dB SNR reduction is achieved by the proposed adaptive modems in comparison to the conventional benchmark modems employed.


Health promotion is far from straightforward. Unless public health practitioners explore and understand the theory underpinning health promotion, there is a real risk of, at best, establishing ineffective interventions and, at worst, antagonising and even harming the very people you are seeking to help. This book will guide you through the philosophical, methodological, theoretical, ethical and political underpinnings of health promotion to enable you to be a more effective practitioner. Although the book explores these various aspects, it is focused on assisting you in applying the ideas and concepts to practical implementation. To illustrate good practice and provide evidence of what works, examples are drawn from several countries, representing different cultural backgrounds. Contributors include: Maggie Davies, Nick Fahy, Jeff French, Mike Kelly, Jessica Kepford, Paul Lincoln, Anthony Morgan, Don Nutbeam, Jaume Ribera, Magdalene Rosenmoller, Marc Sachon, and, Viv Speller.


Optical absorption in the IR region has been recorded and first-principles computations have been done for some Fe contining perovskites. The IR absorption reveals a broad peak at about 11000 cm−1. First principles computations established that BaFe1/2 Nb1/2O3 is not ferroelectric, but PbFe1/2Nb1/2O3 does have a ferroelectric instability. These data confirm that the large dielectric permittivity found in BaFe1/2Nb1/2O3 is not due to a ferroelectric phase transition but rather because of extrinsic effects.


A new polymer, poly(imino isophthaloyl imino (2,4,8,10-tetraoksoaspiro [5,5] undekan-3,9-dipropylene)) [poly(IPIT)] was synthesized by an interfacial polycondensation reaction. The characterization of poly(IPIT) was conducted by using FT-IR, 13C-NMR, TG and DTA techniques. The kinetics of the thermal degradation of poly(IPIT) was investigated by thermogravimetric analysis at different heating rates. TG curves showed that the thermal decomposition of poly(IPIT) occurred in three stages. The apparent activation energies of thermal decomposition for poly(IPIT), as determined by the Tang method (TM), the Flynn-Wall-Ozawa method (FWO) and the Kissinger-Akahira-Sunose method (KAS) are 58.09, 57.7 and 61.0 kJ/mol for the first stage decomposition, 106.1, 105.6 and 109.8 kJ/mol for the second stage decomposition, and 138.1, 137.5 and 141.4 kJ/mol for the third stage decomposition, respectively.


This article aims at analyzing the historic development of infrastructure asset management (IAM) resulting from the increase of challenges over time. Furthermore, it aims at suggesting the corresponding requirements for the enrichment of educational programs to provide the decision makers of tomorrow with the right competences. The evolution of IAM is here described as characterized by three periods introducing an increased complexity of analysis and thereby, a more powerful system for urban water management: (a) Data collection and development of computerized information systems including statistical methods for information management; (b) application of risk analysis including sources of hazards and their consequences; and (c) introduction of a holistic sustainable perspective including governance, social and economic aspects (circular economy), environmental impacts, and the condition of physical assets including digital systems. A variety of competencies are needed to obtain the safe management of urban water systems, in particular for the provision of water services in medium- and large-scale cities. Similar competencies are needed for other infrastructures, like buildings, roads and railroads, and IT systems. The elements of sustainability including risk assessment and digitalization should be incorporated in master programs for civil engineering world-wide. This paper is not designed as a scientific paper, but as inspirational for IAM practitioners and for the development of enriched educational programs of technical universities.


In a landscape of fear, humans are altering key behaviours of wild-living animals, including those related to foraging, reproduction, and survival. When exposed to potentially lethal human actions, such as hunting or fishing, fish, and wildlife are expected to behaviourally respond by becoming shyer and learning when to be cautious. Using a rich dataset collected in temperate rocky reefs, we provide evidence of spearfishing-induced behavioural changes in five coastal fish taxa, exposed to different levels of spearfishing exploitation, by using flight initiation distance (FID) as a proxy of predator avoidance. We detected a significant increase of mean and size effects of FID when the observer was equipped with a speargun. Such effects were more evident outside marine protected areas where spearfishing was allowed and was commensurate to the historically spearfishing pressure of each investigated taxon. Our results demonstrate the ability of fish to develop fine-tuned antipredator responses and to recognize the risks posed by spearfishers as human predators. This capacity is likely acquired by learning, but harvest-induced truncation of the behavioural diversity and fisheries-induced evolution may also play a role and help to explain the increased timidity shown by the exploited fishes in our study.


Use of a Thermodynamic Engine Cycle Simulation to Study a Turbocharged Sparkignition Engine. (December 2009) Vaibhav J. Lawand, B.E. Mechanical Engineering, Mumbai University, India. Chair of Advisory Committee: Dr. Jerald A. Caton The second law analysis is a powerful tool for assessing the performance of engines and has been employed for few decades now. Turbocharged diesel engines have been explored in much detail with the help of second law analyses. There is also a need to examine the turbocharged spark-ignition engines in greater detail using second law analyses as they are gaining popularity in high performance and conventional automobiles as well. A thermodynamic simulation was developed in order to investigate the effects of turbocharging on spark-ignition engines from second law perspective. The exergy values associated with the components of the turbocharger along with the engine components were quantified as a percentage of fuel exergy. The exergy balance values indicated that turbocharger does not add considerably to the overall irreversibilities and combustion irreversibility is still the major source of exergy destruction. A comprehensive parametric investigation was also performed to investigate the effects of compression ratio, intercooler effectiveness, etc. for the turbocharged spark-ignition engine over the entire load and speed range. The simulation studies helped in understanding the behavior of turbocharged sparkignition engine with these parameters. A simulation study was also performed to compare the turbocharged engine with the naturally aspirated spark-ignition engine. This study examined the engines for operating parameters like bmep and bsfc over the entire speed range and revealed that turbocharging offers higher bmep and lower bsfc values for most of the operating range. In an additional study, these engines were analyzed for the brake thermal


It is well known that Wheeler proposed several delayed choice experiments in order to show the impossibility to speak of the way a quantum system behaves before being detected. In a double-slit experiment, when do photons decide to travel by one way or by two ways? Delayed choice experiments seem to indicate that, strangely, it is possible to change the decision of the photons until the very last moment before they are detected. This led Wheeler to his famous sentence: No elementary quantum phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is a registered phenomenon, brought to a close by an irreversible act of amplification. Nevertheless some authors wrote that backward in time effects were needed to explain these results. I will show that in delayed choice experiments involving only one particle, a simple explanation is possible without invoking any backward in time effect. Delayed choice experiments involving entangled particles such as the so called quantum eraser can also be explained without invoking any backward in time effect but I will argue that these experiments cannot be accounted for so simply because they rise the whole problem of knowing what a measurement and a collapse are. A previously presented interpretation, Convivial Solipsism, is a natural framework for giving a simple explanation of these delayed choice experiments with entangled particles. In this paper, I show how Convivial Solipsism helps clarifying the puzzling questions raised by the collapse of the wave function of entangled systems.


BACKGROUND
Health care workers bear the risk of both contracting influenza from patients and transmitting it to them. Although influenza vaccine is the most effective and safest public health measure against influenza and its complications, and despite recommendations that HCWs be vaccinated, influenza vaccination coverage among them remains low.

OBJECTIVES
To characterize influenza vaccination coverage and its determinants among employees in an Arab hospital in Israel.

METHODS
An anonymous self-administered questionnaire was distributed among employees involved in patient care in the winter of 2004-2005 at Nazareth Hospital in Israel. The questionnaire included items related to health demographic characteristics, health behaviors and attitudes, knowledge and attitude concerning influenza vaccination, and whether the respondent had received the flu shot during the previous winter or any other winter.

RESULTS
The overall rate of questionnaire return was 66%; 256 employees participated in the study. The immunization coverage rate was 16.4%, similar to that reported for other hospitals in Israel. Logistic regression analysis demonstrated that influenza vaccination coverage was significantly and solely associated with the presence of chronic illness and influenza vaccination.

CONCLUSIONS
Influenza vaccination coverage among Nazareth Hospital health care workers was low. They did not view themselves as different from the general population with regard to vaccination. Three years after the study, an intervention program was launched with the aim of increasing knowledge on the efficacy and safety of the vaccine; it stressed the importance of vaccinating HCWs and administering the vaccine at the workplace. The program led to a 50% increase in vaccination coverage.


Background and purpose: No reports are found on biological activities of Nonea lutea (boraginaceae). The aim of this study was to investigate the antioxidant and antibacterial activities of this plant. Materials and methods: The aerial parts were extracted by three different methods, i.e. meceration (MA), ultrasonic assisted (US), and soxhlet assisted (SO) extractions with methanol. Antioxidative capacity was assessed by utilizing four methods: DPPH and nitric oxide (NO) free radicals scavenging, reducing power and iron chelating activity. The total phenolic and flavonoid contents were also determined. Antibacterial activities were evaluated by disc diffusion method against four bacteria. Results: The highest amount of total phenolic and flavonoid contents were found in SO and US extracts, respectively. In DPPH radical scavenging activity, SO extract (IC50 = 99.14 ± 0.3 μg ml-1) had a higher activity which was significantly different from that of other extracts (P< 0.01). In reducing power, the extracts showed similar activities (P>0.05). The extracts showed weak iron chelating and nitric oxide radical scavenging activities indicating no significant differences (P> 0.05). Findings showed that all extracts had the highest activity against B. subtilis and the least activity against S. aureus. SO extract showed the highest activity against B. subtilis, US extract showed the highest activity against E coli and P. aeruginosa, and MA extract showed the highest activity against S. aureus. Conclusion: The results indicated that extraction methods significantly affect antioxidant and antibacterial capacities and total phenolic and flavonoid contents. For this plant, SO extraction method was found to be more efficient.


The COMPUGIRLS: Culturally relevant technology program for adolescent girls was developed to promote underrepresented girls' future possible selves and career pathways in computer-related technology fields. We hypothesized that the COMPUGIRLS would promote academic possible selves and self-regulation to achieve these possible selves. We compared the growth trajectories of academic possible selves and self-regulation between the program participants and a comparison group using latent growth modeling for two semesters. There was no significant group difference in the growth trajectories of academic possible selves. The findings support that the COMPUGIRLS did not accelerate the program participants' academic possible selves. However, the program participants had a significantly higher growth rate in self-regulation than the comparison group. We argue that the higher growth rate of self-regulation could help the program participants achieve academic possible selves which is important for choosing technology career pathways.


Practising clinical medicine comes with its challenges, especially in settings of limited resources and infrastructure, excessive working hours, and relatively low income. On encountering some of these as an intern in a Nigerian teaching hospital, I wondered how much I could take.

A study in JAMA found that 24 hours without sleep results in psychomotor impairment similar to someone with a blood alcohol concentration over the legal driving limit (2005;29:1104-6). Imagine what that implies for someone who has been at it for a whole month. When I started as a house officer in surgery, I worked in the paediatric surgery unit for a month, which meant that I was on call everyday for a month not having a regular place to sleep. Efficiency is not easy in such conditions. I remember dozing off on one occasion while taking a history from a patient.

Where most facilities are lacking, improvisation becomes the norm to get the job done. Don't worry if you don't find a tourniquet, a drip set will do just fine. If you can't find an inhaler spacer device, look for a cut plastic bottle or if you can't find a gastrostomy tube, a Foley's catheter might just help you out. …


The privatization of electricity distribution companies in the state monopoly has increased signicantly in recent years. Privatization is expected to improve the quality of services in the electric distribution sector and to provide additional income to the state. In this paper the privatization revenues of the 18 electricity distribution companies in Turkey are calculated through regression equations. The privatization revenues of the electricity distribution companies are identied by 5 models containing microeconomic and macroeconomic variables (parameters). The study indicates a correlation between the considered variables and the privatization revenues of the electricity distribution companies and useful parametric formulations are proposed. The proposed models and regression equations obtained can be employed for future predictions of privatization contributions after making the necessary adjustments by considering the real exchange rates, which is helpful in determining tender offer prices.


Terminalia arjuna (Roxb.) Wight & Arn., a widely growing plant in India, possesses different medicinal properties and its bark is well known for their bone remineralization properties. The objective of present study was to evaluate antiosteoporotic activity of ethanol extract of T. arjuna (EET) on ovariectomized female Sprague Dawley model rats, divided into six groups. Sham operated control group received vehicle, standard group received estrogen (0.0563 mg/kg) and the remaining ovariectomized groups were orally administered with EET at 100, 300 and 500 mg/kg body weight, respectively for 42 days. The findings were assessed by uterine weight, bone loss determined by CT-scanning of femur, ash content, biomechanical, biochemical and histopathological parameters. Ethanol extract showed significant increase in uterine weight and femoral bone length, weight, density and significant increase of ash weight, ash percentage, ash calcium and hardness in lumbar vertebrae as compared to control group. EET treated groups also showed significant decrease level of creatinine, calcium and phosphorus (p<0.01 to p<0.001) as compared to control group. Histopathological studies further supported protective effect of the extract. These findings suggest a potential protective role of EET against estrogen deficient osteoporosis in ovariectomized rats.


Abstract Thermoelectric power generators (TEGs) have received considerable attention in the vehicular waste heat recovery. Large temperature difference between hot-side end and cold-side end of TE modules should be maintained to keep large power generation. However, the scaling-up problem of inevitably temperature drop of exhaust gas along the flow direction of vehicles is introduced when multiple TE modules are assembled. In this work, a three-dimensional fluid–thermal–electric multiphysics model with equivalent properties of TE modules is established. The influencing mechanism of longitudinal vortex generator (LVG) pair number and distribution in the hot-side heat exchanger on the local power generation performance of the TEGs is examined. It is found that the extent of the local power generation enhancement gets smaller or even deteriorates at the downstream TE modules by uniformly increasing the LVG pair number along the flow direction. Hence, to make the heat flux efficiently utilized, a nonuniform segmented enhancement method is used for the hot-side heat exchanger. The results show that compared with the TEG with a uniform heat exchanger or a downstream-denser heat exchanger, the total Seebeck voltage generated by the TEG with an upstream-denser heat exchanger is 28% higher, and its output power is 64.4% higher at the matched load resistance. The TEG with the upstream-denser heat exchanger significantly improves the overall power generation performance without additional pumping power.


Java cardamom is an important commodity that produces secondary metabolite. Secondary metabolites of Java cardamom are utilized as an anti-inflammatory, antibacterial and anticancer. Improve secondary metabolite through colchicine-induced mutation are necessary to get polyploid. It has been reported that polyploid produces higher secondary metabolites. This research aimed to describe Java cardamom's phenotypes resulting from colchicine treatment and identify ploidy levels through flow cytometry. This research was conducted from July 2021 to January 2022 at the Leuwikopo Experimental Field, Faculty of Agriculture IPB using a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. The buds were soaked in different concentrations of colchicine (0, 0.05, 0.10, and 0.15%) with a shaker at 100 rpm for 6 hours. Plant height, number of leaves, number of tillers, leaf length and width, pseudostem diameter, number of stomata, greeny leaf score, and ploidy levels are observed. The result showed that 0.10% colchicine caused leaf malformation and chimera. Colchicine treatment could inhibit plant growth. Colchicine treatment produced lower plant height during 16 weeks of observation, fewer leaves at 10-18 WAP, and fewer tillers at 14-18 WAP. However, the colchicine treatment did not produce polyploids.
Keywords: flow cytometry, phenotype, ploidy levels


Severe space weather is a global threat that requires a coordinated global response. In this Commentary, we review some previous successful actions supporting international coordination between member states in the United Nations (UN) context and make recommendations for a future approach. Member states of the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) recently approved new guidelines related to space weather under actions for the long‐term sustainability of outer space activities. This is to be followed by UN Conference on the Exploration and Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UNISPACE)+50, which will take place in June 2018 on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the first UNISPACE I held in Vienna in 1968. Expanded international coordination has been proposed within COPUOS under the UNISPACE+50 process, where priorities for 2018–2030 are to be defined under Thematic Priority 4: Framework for International Space Weather Services. The COPUOS expert group for space weather has proposed the creation of a new International Coordination Group for Space Weather be implemented as part of this thematic priority. This coordination group would lead international coordination between member states and across international stakeholders, monitor progress against implementation of guidelines and best practices, and promote coordinated global efforts in the space weather ecosystem spanning observations, research, modeling, and validation, with the goal of improved space weather services. We argue that such improved coordination at the international policy level is essential for increasing global resiliency against the threats arising from severe space weather.


Concomitant activation of the PI3K and MAP kinase pathways is a hallmark of aggressive prostate cancer. Here, we describe a series of new genetically engineered mouse models of prostate cancer in which PI3K-Akt-mTOR signaling is activated through inducible deletion of PTEN, while MAP kinase signaling is activated through inducible expression of oncogenic mutants of either BRAF or KRAS oncogenes [BRAFV600E (NPB mice) and KRASG12D (NPK mice), respectively]. Activation of PI3K-Akt-mTOR and MAPK signaling pathways in NPB mice results in the formation of lethal prostate tumors that are inherently resistant to castration. These tumors bypass cellular senescence and disseminate to lymph nodes, bone marrow, and lungs where they form overt metastases in approximately 30% of the cases. Molecularly, tumors in the NPB mice cooperate to up-regulate c-MYC oncogene and accordingly, therapeutic treatments with an mTOR inhibitor (rapamycin) and the MEK1/2 inhibitor (PD0325901) results in attenuation of c-MYC levels and reduction primary tumor and metastatic burden. These findings suggest a generalized therapeutic approach to target c-MYC activation in prostate cancer by combinatorial targeting of the PI3K-Akt-mTOR and ERK1/2 MAPK signaling pathways. On the other hand, activation of PI3K-Akt-mTOR and MAP kinase signaling pathways in the NPK mice, results in prostate tumors that are also inherently castration resistant and metastasize to distant organs with 100% penetrance. Our studies show that in the NPK mice, dissemination is an early event in tumorigenesis although overt metastatic growth only occurs in late stage tumors coinciding with the upregulation of the ETS family member ETV4 in the primary tumor. Functional studies have shown that silencing of Etv4 in a metastatic cell line derived from this mouse model (NPK mice) abrogates the metastatic phenotype but does not affect tumor growth. These findings indicate that ETV4 promotes metastasis in prostate tumors that have activation of PI3-kinase and Ras signaling, and therefore, ETV4 represents a potential target of therapeutic intervention for metastatic prostate cancer. Taken together, our analysis of the molecular mechanisms involved in the distinct metastatic potential of these two new mouse models provides us with clinically relevant tools to conduct preclinical studies. Citation Format: Jingqiang Wang, Alvaro Aytes, Cory Abate-Shen. Combinatorial activation of PI3-kinase and Ras-Raf signaling in mouse models of advanced prostate cancer. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference: The Translational Impact of Model Organisms in Cancer; Nov 5-8, 2013; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Mol Cancer Res 2014;12(11 Suppl):Abstract nr B45.


Sufism as a spiritual life was frequently to be a return place for the tired man because of his life journey and an escape place for the pressed man. Beside that, actually sufism can strengthen the week individuals missing his self-existance. By sufism, they found the real meaning of life. In the teachings of sufi order, the seeker (salik) has to pass through spiritual path (thariqah) in order to know Allah as the Final Goal by passing a long journey and spiritual stations (maqamat) to improve their bad characteristics. This is significant to do for salikin, especially to make his inner empty, and then adorn and decorate it with all of good characteristics to reach higher and higher stations (maqamat). In the other hand, they found a religious-psycological experiences which is called ahwal to achive the spiritual experiences with Divine Reality (Haqiqah).


Social media platforms, such as Twitter, provide a suitable avenue for users (people or patients) concerned on health questions to discuss and share information with each other. In December 2019, a few coronavirus disease cases were first reported in China. Soon after, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a state of emergency due to the rapid spread of the virus in other parts of the world. In this work, we used automated extraction of COVID-19 discussion from Twitter and a natural language processing (NLP) method based on topic modeling to discover the main questions related to COVID-19 from tweets. Moreover, we created a Named Entity Recognition (NER) model to identify the main entities of four different categories: disease, drug, person, and organization. Our findings can help policy makers and health care organizations to understand the issues of people on COVID-19 and it can be used to address them appropriately.


Resolved debris disk features (e.g., warps, offsets, edges and gaps, azimuthal asymmetries, radially thickened rings, scale heights) contain valuable information about the underlying planetary systems, such as the posited planet's mass, semimajor axis, and other orbital parameters. Most existing models assume a single planet is sculpting the disk feature, but recent observations of mature planetary systems (e.g., by radial velocity surveys or Kepler) have revealed that many planets reside in multiplanet systems. Here we investigate if/how planet properties inferred from single-planet models are compromised when multiple planets reside in the system. For each disk feature, we build a two-planet model that includes a planet b with fixed parameters and a planet c with a full range of possible parameters. We investigate these two-planet systems and summarize the configurations for which assuming a single planet (i.e., planet b) leads to significantly flawed inferences of that planet's properties. We find that although disk features are usually primarily dominated by a single planet, when using single-planet models, we are at risk of misinterpreting planet properties by orders of magnitude in extreme cases. Specifically, we are at high risk of misinterpreting planet properties from disk warps; at moderate risk from disk edges and gaps, radially thickened rings, and scale height features; and at low risk from host star–disk center offsets and azimuthal asymmetries. We summarize situations where we can infer the need to use a multiplanet model instead of a single-planet one from disk morphology dissimilarities.


Purpose: To explore the mechanism of You-Gui-Wan (YGW) in improving endometrial receptivity in mouse model of controlled ovarian hyperstimulation (COH). Methods: Sixty female mice with two consecutive oestrous cycles were randomly divided into COH model group (n = 50) and normal control group (n = 10). The COH model was created by using GnRH-a + PMSG + HCG and further randomly divided into 5 subgroups of simple model, YGW high-dose, YGW medium-dose, YGW low-dose and aspirin control, 10 in each subgroup. YGW or aspirin or saline was administrated to the mice by gavage once a day for 11 days. Afterwards, blood and uterine samples were collected for examination of serum levels of estradiol (E2) and progesterone (P4), endometrial thickness and number of blood vessels as well as expressions of angiogenic factors of VEGF, Ang-1, Ang-2 and Tie-2 at transcription and translation levels by using H& E staining, ELISA, real-time qRT-PCR, and immunohistochemistry, respectively. Results: COH per se increased the serum concentrations of E2 and P4i¼Œbut decreased the number of endometrial blood vessels and the protein expressions of the angiogenic factors when compared to the normal control group (P< 0.05 or 0.01). YGW increased the mRNA expressions of all angiogenic factors and restored the effect of COH on number of endometrial blood vessels (P< 0.01), and the protein expressions of the angiogenic factors when compared to the COH simple model group (P< 0.05 or 0.01). In comparison, aspirin could only restore the number of endometrial blood vessels and the protein expressions of Ang-2 and Tie-2 (P< 0.05 or 0.01). Conclusions: YGW can restore the side effect of COH on number of endometrial blood vessels and the expressions of angiogenic factors, thus improve endometrial receptivity in COH mice


Background: Coxsackievirus A21 (CVA21) is a novel bio-selected oncolytic, immunotherapeutic agent. Intratumoral (i.t.) CVA21 injection can induce selective tumor-cell infection, immune-cell infiltration, IFN-γ response gene up-regulation, increased PD-L1 expression, tumor cell lysis and systemic anti-tumor immune responses. Preclinical studies in an immune-competent mouse model of melanoma have revealed that combinations of i.t. CVA21 and anti-PD-1 blockade mediate significantly greater antitumor activity compared to use of either agent alone. A clinical trial evaluating combination CVA21 and pembrolizumab in patients with melanoma was initiated and preliminary data on a pre-established futility endpoint are presented here. Materials and Methods: This is a single-arm, multi-institutional open-label phase Ib clinical trial of i.t. CVA21 and i.v. pembrolizumab for treated or untreated unresectable Stage IIIC-IVM1c melanoma. Subjects with injectable disease receive up to 3 x 10 8 TCID 50 CVA21 i.t. on Days 1, 3, 5, 8, and then every 3 weeks for up to 19 injections. Subjects also receive pembrolizumab (2mg/kg) i.v. every 3 weeks starting on Day 8. The primary endpoint is safety/tolerability by incidence of dose-limiting toxicity. Secondary endpoints include best ORR by immune-related response criteria, progression-free survival, overall survival, quality of life, changes in melanoma-specific T cells, PD-L1 expression and Th1/Th2 gene expression profiles. The protocol included a futility analysis after the first 12 patients. Results : To date, 14 subjects have started on protocol therapy. Overall, the adverse events have been low-grade constitutional symptoms related to CVA21 and expected pembrolizumab-related side effects. No DLT's have been reported. Currently, 11 patients are evaluable for investigator response assessment, not including 2 subjects who have not yet reached their first assessment and 1 subject who left the study early due to an unrelated adverse event. Among the evaluable subjects, the ORR was 73% (8/11). The DCR (CR+PR+SD) is currently 91% (10/11). In subjects with stage IVM1c disease, the ORR and the DCR is 100% (5/5). The study has met its primary statistical futility endpoint of achieving ≥2 confirmed objective responses (CR or PR) in the first 12 patients enrolled. Currently, the median time to response is 1.6 months. One of the 8 responders displayed early pseudo-progression and later developed a partial response. Conclusions: At a pre-specified futility analysis, combination CVA21 and pembrolizumab appears to be well-tolerated. Early tumor monitoring has identified encouraging reductions in a number of injected and non-injected lesions. Based on these initial results, the sample size has now been expanded to enroll up to 50 patients. Combination therapy of CVA21 and pembrolizumab may represent a new approach for the treatment of patients with injectable advanced melanoma. Citation Format: Ann W. Silk, Howard Kaufman, Nashat Gabrail, Janice Mehnert, Jennifer Bryan, Jacqueline Norrell, Daniel Medina, Praveen Bommareddy, Darren Shafren, Mark Grose, Andrew Zloza. Phase 1b study of intratumoral Coxsackievirus A21 ( C V A 21) and systemic p emb r olizumab in a dvanced melanoma patients: Interim results of the CAPRA clinical trial [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr CT026. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-CT026


Introduction: Diseases of the prostate gland occupy one of the main places in the structure of urological diseases and acquire ever increasing social significance. They are the most common diseases associated with aging in men. In conservative treatment of patients with diseases of the prostate gland, considering pathogenetic mechanisms, medicines of different directionalities are used, eliminating infectious agents, correcting the immune status, contributing to the regression of the inflammatory process and restoring the functional activity of the prostate. Materials and Methods: Indole-3-carbinol (Sigma-Aldrich Co., USA) and meloxicam (Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, Germany) were chosen as the study objects. Studies of the active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) solubility were made, their crystallographic and thermogravimetric analyses. Results and Discussion: In the work, it has been substantiated the composition of rectal suppositories for the treatment of benign prostatic diseases using a combination of indole-3-carbinol and meloxicam, which possess anti-inflammatory, analgesic, and antibacterial properties and also contribute to the restoration of the hormonal background of men with age-related changes and activation of regeneration processes of the injured organ. A microscopic and thermogravimetric analysis of selected APIs was carried out, and their solubility in aqueous and non-aqueous solvents was investigated. Conclusions: Based on research results, the optimal auxiliary substances were selected for rational introduction of substances into the suppository base – polyethylene oxide-400, Tween-80. The results of thermogravimetric analysis have proven the thermostability of the investigated APIs in the temperature range the suppository bases melting.


Reconstituted nanostructured partially stabilized zirconia (PSZ) feedstock powders were laser sintered under a range of laser processing parameters. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was applied to analyze the microstructure of the powders and sintered bulk. Microhardness of the samples was also tested by Vickers Microhardness tester. These results demonstrated that the microstructure of the samples exhibits a bimodal distribution which comprises molten and non-molten feedstock particles. It was found that feedstock maintained some of its nanostructure during laser sintering with relatively low laser power; whereas feedstock lost most of its initial characters with high laser power. It was also observed that Microhardness values have respect to the proportion of non-molten feedstock in those samples.


Our study aimed at using PCR to identify the incidence of Bartonella spp. in blood of dogs. Altogether 286 dogs of 92 breeds aged 3 month to 17 years were tested from October 2008 to December 2009. Healthy dogs as well as dogs with various clinical symptoms of disease were included in the group. Samples were tested by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) specific for the presence of Bartonella spp. Following the DNA examination in 286 dogs by PCR and subsequent sequencing, two samples were identified as Bartonella henselae (0.7%). Other species of Bartonella were not found. It was the first time in the Czech Republic when incidence of Bartonella spp. was determined in dogs. Vector born disease, zoonosis, infection, PCR diagnostics, cat scratch disease, B. henselae


We present a novel application of knowledge discovery technology to a developing and challenging application area such as bioinformatics. This methodology allows the identification of relationships between low-magnitude similarity (LMS) sequence patterns and other well-contrasted protein characteristics, such as those described by database annotations. We start with the identification of these signals inside protein sequences by exhaustive database searching and automatic pattern recognition strategies. In a second step we address the discovering of association rules that will allow tagging sequences that hold LMS signals with consequent functional keywords. We have designed our own algorithm for discovering association rules, meeting the special necessities of bioinformatics problems, where the patterns we search lie in sparse datasets and are uncommon and thus difficult to locate. Computational efficiency has been verified both with synthetic and real biological data showing that the algorithm is well suited to this application area compared to state of the art algorithms. The usefulness of the method is confirmed by its ability to produce previously unknown and useful knowledge in the area of biological sequence analysis. In addition, we introduce a new and promising application of the rule extraction algorithm on gene expression databases. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


A general model shows how the long-term growth rate of a population can be partitioned into components representing various mechanisms of maintenance of species diversity. One component summarises the effects of fluctuation-independent mechanisms, which include classical resource partitioning and frequency-dependent herbivory. Two other components represent fluctuation-dependent mechanisms, the storage effect and relative nonlinearity of competition.

The general model shows how a community will track an equilibrium set by fluctuation-independent mechanisms and the environmental state when community dynamics are faster than the rate of environmental change. Fluctuation-dependent mechanisms can be important for diversity maintenance with or without such tracking, but on long timescales their effects are indistinguishable from those of fluctuation-independent mechanisms.

These considerations lead to a hierarchical view of mechanisms of diversity maintenance where the effects of different timescales are partitioned or merged depending on the timescale of observation. These issues are illustrated with model examples involving various combinations of resource partitioning, fluctuations in recruitment rates, variation in the timing of germination, and seasonality. The very long timescales associated with climate change contain many complexities but nevertheless many ideas applicable to shorter timescales may be useful in a modified form.


The heat treatment cycles that are currently applied to semi-solid processed components are mostly those that are in use for dendritic casting alloys. These heat treatments are not necessarily the optimum treatments for non-dendritic microstructures. For rheocast alloy A356, it is shown that natural aging prior to artificial aging causes the time-to-peak-hardness to be longer compared to the time when only artificial aging is used. Furthermore, a hardness plateau is maintained during artificial aging at 180oC between 1 and 5 hours without any prior natural aging. A natural aging period as short as 1 hour results in a hardness peak (rather than a plateau) to be reached during artificial aging after 4 hours at 180oC.


In recent years, machine learning methods have found numerous applications in power systems for load forecasting, voltage control, power quality monitoring, anomaly detection, etc. Distributed learning is a subfield of machine learning and a descendant of the multi-agent systems field. Distributed learning is a collaboratively decentralized machine learning algorithm designed to handle large data sizes, solve complex learning problems, and increase privacy. Moreover, it can reduce the risk of a single point of failure compared to fully centralized approaches and lower the bandwidth and central storage requirements. This paper introduces three existing distributed learning frameworks and reviews the applications that have been proposed for them in power systems so far. It summarizes the methods, benefits, and challenges of distributed learning frameworks in power systems and identifies the gaps in the literature for future studies.


The impact that wind turbines have on the environment, particularly with respect to wildlife such as bat species, has generated increasing concern over the last decade. Although the harnessing of wind power is becoming much more widespread as a clean, renewable energy resource, the increasing global turbine mortality rates for bats are thought to be significantly detrimental to susceptible species. Much research is still needed to fully understand the ways in which turbines affect bats, since they rely on echolocation and audible cues to hunt and navigate, therefore having a unique acoustic perspective of objects in their vicinity. Here we present an overview of what is currently known regarding ultrasonic emissions from operational wind turbine structures, including noise generated from the gearing mechanism, rotor, or through blade defects, and how such noise may be perceptible to some bat species in the local turbine habitat.


P195

 Clomethiazole (CMZ; 'Zendra') is a neuroprotective drug that enhances GABA-A receptor activity. Two clinical trials in stroke patients (pts) were performed: 92CM01 (n=17) and CLASS (CLomethiazole Acute Stroke Study; n=678 on CMZ). In CLASS, a post-hoc analysis showed that CMZ appeared to improve outcome in pts with clinical signs suggestive of a large stroke. Dosing for the pivotal trial, CLASS-I, was based on information from these previous studies. In 92CM01, a loading dose of 6 mg/kg given over 15 min followed by a maintenance dose of 69 mg/kg to 24 h was the maximum CMZ dose that could be given without excessive sedation. In this study, plasma sampling from each pt allowed for individual kinetic modelling. In CLASS, the same dose regimen was used. One sample for drug analysis was taken from each pt at the end of the 24-h infusion. In total, 619 CLASS pts were eligible for a population kinetic evaluation. The clearance estimates in both studies were in the same range. Therefore, the pharmacokinetic parameter estimates from study 92CM01 could be used to simulate the plasma concentrations according to a 2-compartment model for different dosing regimens. According to the protocols, CMZ infusion should be temporarily interrupted if pts become excessively sedated. In CLASS, there were 218 infusion interruptions in 158 pts. CMZ kinetics did not differ between pts who had interruptions and those who did not. There was a delay in the occurrence of excessive sedation, with the majority of interruptions seen between 10 and 24 h. Pts with clinical signs suggesting a large stroke were particularly susceptible to sedation in CLASS, a new dose regimen was needed to reduce excessive sedation in these pts. For CLASS-I the adjusted dosage regimen was calculated as a total CMZ dose of 68 mg/kg, given as a 15 min loading dose, followed by two maintenance doses over 7.75 and 16 h respectively. This should avoid high plasma concentrations during the second half of the infusion period. Taking into account treatment interruptions, CLASS-I pts are predicted to receive an average dose of 63 mg/kg, the same as was actually received by such pts in CLASS.
 'Zendra' is a trademark, the property of the AstraZeneca group of companies


The article is devoted to two classical combinatorial problems on multisets, which in the existing literature are given unjustifiably little space. Namely, the calculation of the number of all submultisets of power m for an arbitrary multiset and the number of m-permutations of such multisets. The first problem is closely related to the width of a partially ordered set of all submultisets of a multiset with the inclusion ⊆. The article contains some important classes of multisets. Combinatorial proofs of problems on the number of m-submultisets and m-permutations of multiset elements are considered. In the article, on the basis of the generatrix method, thrifty algorithms for calculating m-submultisets and m-permutations of multiset elements are constructed. The paper also provides a brief overview of the results that are related to this area of research.


This multiple case study explores the experiences that four Indigenous students have with academic writing as an important step toward addressing the pervasive gap in postsecondary achievement rates between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students in Canada. This study draws on an Indigenous-based research approach, as well as critical and social approaches to academic writing, to explore students' experiences with academic writing. Interview questions, sketches, and samples of students' writing were used to elicit accounts of experiences. These experiences point to a perceived distance between the writing the students produce and the writing they feel they ought to produce. Students' accounts suggest that in spite of their location in a Eurocentric and predominately White institution, Indigenous students can appropriate academic writing for their own purposes and use it as a form of resistance. Implications for pedagogy include the need to create transformative spaces for the negotiation of, and talk about, academic writing.


Our primary goal was to determine whether detection of Rhizopogon internal transcribed spacer (ITS) groups is affected by the pine species used in seedling bioassays. Our secondary goal was to investigate composition of Rhizopogon spore banks in the Eastern Sierra Nevada of California, a previously unsampled region. We used seedlings of Pinus contorta, Pinus jeffreyi, Pinus lambertiana, and Pinus muricata as bioassay plants and identified the Rhizopogon retrieved by internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequence analysis. We found that each of the pine species retrieved all of the abundant Rhizopogon ITS groups, but there were significant differences among pines in the richness of Rhizopogon ITS groups recovered. Pinus muricata recovered all ITS groups found in this study and was significantly better than P. lambertiana. Rhizopogon communities from the five sampled sites contained six to eight ITS groups per site, with two unique sequence groups and a higher abundance of the Rhizopogon ellenae and Rhizopogon arctostaphyli groups than at previously sampled sites. These results show high cross-receptivity between Rhizopogon and pine species, and regional patterns in spore bank composition.


For carbon steels immersed in CO2 saturated solutions at different temperatures, the structure and the composition of corrosion product film formed on the steel surface were studied by scanning electron microscope (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The corrosion rate of the steel was evaluated by potentiodynamic polarization, and the relation between the corrosion rate and the film property was discussed. The corrosion rate of the steel was very closely associated with the structure and the composition of corrosion product film, which were affected significantly by the solution temperature. From 30 to 60 °C, the corrosion product film composed of FeCO3 was porous and poorly adherent, and the corrosion rate increased with the rise of temperature. At 70 and 80 °C, the corrosion product film was also composed of FeCO3 and presented a compact and dense cubic crystal structure, resulting in the decrease on the corrosion rate. The corrosion rate increased once again when the temperature was up to 90 °C, which was attributed to the negative effect of high temperature water vapor corrosion on the grain coarsening and the part exfoliation for the FeCO3 film.


Introduction Amputation of the thumb is not a common injury. Over a period of five years, from Jan. 1, 1952, to Dec. 31, 1956, we have had 15 cases of thumb amputation in the Arabian American Oil Company hospitals. These cases occurred among 581 hospital admissions for injuries to the hand, not including the many more cases treated in the outpatient department. As compared with amputations of the rest of the fingers, the thumb amputations comprise 13.7%, a total of 109 traumatic finger amputations having been seen in 70 patients. The thumb injuries, in general, numbered 61 cases, or 10% of the total injuries for which patients were admitted. Of the 15 cases of amputated thumb, 3 only were serious enough to require reconstructive surgery, that is, 0.5% of the total admissions for hand injuries (Table). The rest of the injuries were at a more distal level. This small number


This paper considers some key impacts of public sector neoliberalisation and austerity measures for everyday geographies of childhood and youth in England. The paper develops three claims, with reference to qualitative research conducted at a youth group in 2007, 2009 and 2013. First, I outline a range of ways in which long-run processes of public sector neoliberalisation, and more abrupt cuts to public sector expenditure 'in the current climate' of austerity politics, have substantially transformed geographies of childhood and youth in many minority world contexts. However, I argue that extant research on these transformations has tended to reproduce some rather partial understandings of impacts of service withdrawal, which I critique via a reading of recent geographical work on anticipatory politics. Second, I evidence how political-economic contexts of neoliberalisation and austerity have constituted a particular atmosphere and sense of the future, tangibly affecting everyday relationships, spaces and the efficacy of service provision at the case study youth group. In particular, I emphasise the significance of anticipated futures, noting that the anticipation of funding cuts is having manifold everyday, lived consequences that are arguably more wide-ranging, intractable and troubling than the impacts of funding cuts themselves. Third, in particular, I argue that spaces of anticipated funding cuts and service withdrawal are frequently characterised by an intensification of anxieties about, and hopes for, young people's futures. I note that young people are diversely affected by, and engaged in, the circulation of these anxieties and hopes – but also recognise that young people's geographies go on, and sometimes offer hopeful ways on, 'in the current climate'.


Ephedrae herba has been used in traditional Chinese and Japanese (Kampo) medicine from ancient times, with the primary resource being in China. In the present study, a field survey as well as molecular and chemical assessments were conducted on Ephedra plants in Mongolia to clarify whether they could be an alternative resource of the Ephedrae herba used in Japanese Kampo medicine. Ephedra sinica, E. equisetina, E. przewalskii, E. regeliana, E. monosperma and an unknown taxon (ESP) collected in Mongolia were divided into 9 genotypes on the basis of nucleotide sequences of 18S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) gene and trnK gene. E. sinica, E. equisetina, and E. monosperma presented completely identical sequences to the corresponding species from China. The sequences of trnK gene and 18S rRNA gene provide a useful index for identification and taxonomic classification of Mongolian Ephedra plants. Quantitative analysis of 5 ephedrine alkaloids revealed that almost all Mongolian Ephedra plants contained high amounts of total ephedrine alkaloids (TAs, 1.86-4.90%) and a high percentage of pseudoephedrine in TAs differed obviously from the Chinese. E. sinica and E. equisetina found in eastern and central Mongolia, showing total contents of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine higher than 1.43%, were potential new resources of Japanese Pharmacopoeia grade Ephedrae herba.


The study investigated the relationship between coping strategies and psychological well-being among parents with Down syndrome children. The sample comprised of 120 parents (60 fathers, 60 mothers of diagnosed 60 children with Down syndrome) collected through purposive sampling. The study was an exploratory study and used co-relational research design. The study planned to investigate all possible relationships among variables and demographic variables. Results showed significant correlations between psychological well-being and coping strategies. Those parents who relied more on active avoidance coping, reported lower levels of psychological well-being as compared to those who relied on problem-focused coping strategies. Fathers scored significantly high on psychological well-being than mothers. Data analysis suggested significant differences in parental psychological well-being and coping strategies with the increasing age of the children. Gender differences were also explored which suggested that parents with girl-child had comparatively higher levels of psychological wellbeing than parents with boy-child.


Ceramide levels are increased in blood and brain tissue of Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients. Since the ceramide transporter protein (CERT) is the only known protein able to mediate non-vesicular transfer of ceramide between organelle membranes, the modulation of CERT function may impact on ceramide accumulation. The competitive CERT inhibitor N-(3-hydroxy-1-hydroxymethyl-3-phenylpropyl) dodecanamide (HPA-12) interferes with ceramide trafficking. To understand the role of ceramide/CERT in AD, HPA-12 can be a useful tool to modulate ceramide trafficking. Here we first report the synthesis and in vitro properties of HPA-12 radiolabeled with fluorine-18 and present preliminary in vitro and in vivo positron emission tomography (PET) imaging and biodistribution data. In vitro results demonstrated that the fluorination did not alter the biological properties of HPA-12 since the [fluorine-19]HPA-12, interferes with 5-DMB-ceramide trafficking in HeLa cells. Radiolabeled HPA-12, [fluorine-18]HPA-12, was obtained with a radiochemical yield of 90% and a specific activity of 73 MBq/μmol. PET imaging on wild-type mice showed hepatobiliary clearance and a brain uptake on the order of 0.3 standard uptake value (SUV) one hour post injection. Furthermore, the biodistribution data showed that after removal of the blood by intracardial perfusion, radioactivity was still measurable in the brain demonstrating that the [fluorine-18]HPA-12 crosses the blood brain barrier and is retained in the brain.


Abstract Many citizens are sceptical of policies implemented to mitigate climate change. Existing research shows that citizens' populist beliefs are significant determinants of climate scepticism. However, little is known about the underlying factors driving populist opposition to climate policies. To address this gap in the literature, this study develops structural equation models with new ideological measures using a high-quality probability sample of Dutch citizens (2019). The findings show that the relationship between populist attitudes and climate policy opposition is mediated through two anti-elite dispositions: the idea that climate science is unreliable and the belief that politicians exploit climate change for political gain. This relationship holds for left- and right-wing individuals alike. Moreover, a replication of a recent study shows that these findings hold alongside mechanisms rooted in institutional trust. These findings provide important evidence that populists' opposition to climate policy is principally rooted in distrust in political and scientific elites.


Introduction to the Fourth Edition, Michael E. Zimmerman. I. ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS. Introduction, J. Baird Callicott. Is There a Need for a New, an Environmental, Ethic? Richard Sylvan (Routley). All Animals Are Equal, Peter Singer. Animal Rights, Human Wrongs, Tom Regan. On Being Morally Considerable, Kenneth E. Goodpaster. The Ethics of Respect for Nature, Paul W. Taylor. Challenges in Environmental Ethics, Holmes Rolston III. The Land Ethic, Aldo Leopold. Holistic Environmental Ethics and the Problem of Ecofascism, J. Baird Callicott. Animal Rights and Environmental Ethics: Back Together Again, J. Baird Callicott. II. ECOFEMINISM AND SOCIAL JUSTICE. Introduction, Karen J. Warren. Ecofeminism: Toward Global Justice and Planetary Health, Greta Gaard and Lori Gruen. The Impoverishment of the Environment: Women and Children Last, Vandana Shiva. Ethics and the Eco/Feminist Self, Chris Cuomo. Ecofeminism and Environmental Ethics: A Materialist Ecofeminist Perspective, Mary Mellor. Naturalizing Race: Indigenous Women and White Goddesses, Noel Sturgeon. The Power and the Promise of Ecofeminism Revisited, Karen J. Warren. III. ENVIRONMENTAL CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY. Introduction, Irene Klaver. Nature as Origin and Difference, Steven Vogel. What is Ecophenomenology? David Wood. Naturalizing Phenomenology, Ted Toadvine. A Sense of the Whole: Toward an Understanding of Acid Mine Drainage in the West, Robert Frodeman. Stone Worlds: Phenomenology on the Rocks, Irene Klaver. IV. POLITICAL ECOLOGY. Introduction, John Clark. Ecofascism: An Enduring Temptation, Michael E. Zimmerman. Free Market vs. Political Environmentalism, Terry Anderson and Donald R. Leal. A Declaration of Sustainability, Paul Hawken. With Liberty for Some: A Liberal Critique of Libertarian Environmental Policy, Ernest Partridge. Socialism and Ecology, Jim O'Connor. What Is Social Ecology? Murray Bookchin. Against the Megamachine: Empire and the Earth, David Watson.


East-West Variations of Mixing Ratios at Constant Altitudes: The SPIRIT instrument was deployed during the GLAM (Gradient in Longitude of Atmospheric constituents above the Mediterranean basin) campaign, as part of the CHARMEX project, in August 2014 from Toulouse to Larnaca onboard the Falcon-20 SAFIRE aircraft. The study presents in-situ measurements of CO, CO 2 , CH 4 and N 2 O during the west-east transect at 5000-5500m altitude on 6-7 August (Fig. A) and during the east-west transect at 9000-9800m altitude for the flight back on 10 August (Fig. B). 1 SPIRIT Instrumentation: SPIRIT (Spectrometre InfraRouge In situ Toute altitude) is an airborne infrared absorption spectrometer for the simultaneous measurements of several trace gases. It uses three continuous wave distributed-feedback room-temperature quantum cascade lasers (CW-DFB-RT-QCL) cooled by Peltier effect and exhibiting an excellent single-mode behaviour. In addition, CW operating mode lasers provide easy, high precision for concentration retrieval, large selectivity and sensitivity because of their reduced line width (< 3 MHz or 10-4 cm-1) and enhanced line intensity. Thanks to the home-made QCL emission controller, the lasers work sequentially, triggered and synchronized by the data acquisition system, with sampling at 0.7 Hz. The optical system of SPIRIT consists of a patented non-resonant multipass cell (Robert, 2007). The path length can be varied from 20 to 200 m by the rotation of one half of the broad band spherical mirrors of the optical cell, providing high versatility as regard to the type and the concentration range of species to be measured. In the present study, SPIRIT has been used with L=83.88 m path length and with 3 QCLs emitting at 2179.772, 1249.627, 1249.668, and 2307.513 cm-1 for the detection of CO, CH 4 , N 2 O, and CO 2 (12 C 16 O 18 O isotopomer), respectively. SPIRIT has been integrated in the Falcon-20 SAFIRE aircraft. The experimental optical transmission T as a function of the wavenumber is retrieved by dividing the experimental signals by the associated baseline. The concentration retrieval is based on the Beer-Lambert law. The principle of the retrieval is to fit the natural logarithm of the transmission ln[T] with the simulated one, C.S.g(ν-ν 0).L, by adjusting the concentration C in molecule cm-3 (with g(ν-ν 0) the absorption profile in cm, S the molecular line intensity in cm molecule-1 , and L the path length in cm). S includes the molecular partition functions and the lower-state energy of the transition E " , and is assumed to be a Voigt or a Galatry line profile including the air collisional broadening and the Doppler broadening half-widths and their temperature dependence coefficients, all calculated from the Hitran 2012 database (Rothman et al., 2013).


Abstract. Understanding the processes that underlie forest resilience is of increasing importance as climate change and shifting disturbance regimes continue to impact western forests. Forest research and management efforts within the low-diversity conifer forests of the U.S. Rocky Mountains have typically focused on relatively monotypic stands dominated by a single cohort, but mixed-conifer stands, such as those codominated by Abies lasiocarpa and Pinus contorta have been less widely studied. The presence of A. lasiocarpa may enhance resilience to fire- and mountain pine beetle–induced mortality and depends on successful A. lasiocarpa recruitment under a range of environmental conditions. The purpose of this study was to quantify the effects of key forest structural characteristics and environmental conditions on recruitment of A. lasiocarpa in a midelevation mixed-conifer forest in the central Rocky Mountains. To address this aim, A. lasiocarpa seedling density, light availability, neighborhood basal area, and soil fertility were measured across 24 plots, and the relative effects of each measured variable, temperature, and precipitation on seedling density were quantified within a Bayesian multilevel regression model. Model results showed nonsignificant effects of climate, light availability, and neighborhood index on seedling density; a significant positive association between seedling density and the interaction between soil fertility and neighborhood index; and a strong negative relationship between seedling density and soil fertility. We posit that the negative association with soil fertility in these nutrient-poor forests reflects an underlying gradient in soil moisture availability that corresponds with water flux pathways. Ultimately, much of the variance in seedling densities was explained by latent plot and year effects, indicating that A. lasiocarpa establishment in this mixed-conifer forest is likely governed by a complex suite of environmental factors that vary across fine spatiotemporal scales.


Abstraction, a unique aspect of human reasoning, is affected by TBI. Lack of sensitive metrics to characterize abstraction in TBI recovery may impede detection of cognitive deficits and impact daily function. Recent findings found lower performance in abstracting meaning from complex information, referred to as gist reasoning, in adults with TBI. This study extends those findings to (a) compare abstract thinking between adults with TBI and controls on gist reasoning, similarities, and proverbs and (b) examine and compare sensitivity and specificity of abstraction measures. Participants included adults with moderate to severe chronic TBI (n = 30) and controls (n = 40), all between 25 and 55 years. ANOVA examined group differences on abstract thinking performance. A 10-fold cross-validation analysis examined sensitivity and specificity of each measure, and all possible combinations of measures. The TBI group performed significantly lower on gist reasoning and similarities. Results demonstrated higher sensitivity of gist reasoning (84.7%) as compared to similarities and proverbs. Specificity of gist reasoning (71.1%) was second highest, with proverbs multiple choice being the highest (85.2%). Combination of measures did not yield significant gains in sensitivity beyond gist reasoning alone. Gist reasoning could provide an additional diagnostic tool to detect impaired abstraction deficits in adults with chronic TBI. Furthermore, gist reasoning performance has implications to guide cognitive training.


The Stackelberg security game is played between a defender and an attacker, where the defender needs to allocate a limited amount of resources to multiple targets in order to minimize the loss due to adversarial attack by the attacker. While allowing targets to have different values, classic settings often assume uniform requirements to defend the targets. This enables existing results that study mixed strategies (randomized allocation algorithms) to adopt a compact representation of the mixed strategies.

In this work, we initiate the study of mixed strategies for the security games in which the targets can have different defending requirements. In contrast to the case of uniform defending requirement, for which an optimal mixed strategy can be computed efficiently, we show that computing the optimal mixed strategy is NP-hard for the general defending requirements setting. However, we show that strong upper and lower bounds for the optimal mixed strategy defending result can be derived. We propose an efficient close-to-optimal Patching algorithm that computes mixed strategies that use only few pure strategies. We also study the setting when the game is played on a network and resource sharing is enabled between neighboring targets. Our experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of our algorithm in several large real-world datasets.


•This article describes the thinking behind and the implementation of the Design Your Own Park (DYOP) Competition, a collaborative project of a university, a city, and a fund-raising organization to empower neighborhoods and restore outdoor play citywide in Binghamton, New York. The city makes vacant lots and other neglected spaces available for neighborhoods to turn into parks that residents design and build with the assistance of faculty and students from Binghamton University's Binghamton Neighborhood Project. The United Way of Broome County assists with funding required for implementation. Neighborhood groups help maintain their parks, which increases ongoing interactions among neighbors and reduces city maintenance costs. While it is too early to access the DYOP Competition fully, it provides a science-based model for other cities seeking to


Hydrogen-fired gas turbines can play an important role in carbon-neutral energy and industry sectors. However, the required demand-oriented supply of CO2-neutral hydrogen is technically and economically challenging. These challenges arise due to interdependencies between the volatility of renewable power generation, available hydrogen production capacities, available hydrogen storage capacities and the operational demands to be met by gas turbines. The present study aims to quantify these interdependencies by conducting a model-based analysis of an exemplary CHP system featuring a hydrogen-fired industrial gas turbine with on-site hydrogen production via electrolysis and on-site hydrogen storage. To identify the sought-after interdependencies, simulations featuring various system parameterizations are analyzed. If only local power surpluses are utilized for the operation of electrolyzers, the results show a nonlinear impact of both the hydrogen production capacity and the hydrogen storage capacity on the hydrogen-based gas turbine operation. Furthermore, the results indicate that an exclusive utilization of local power surpluses leads to limited periods of hydrogen-based gas turbine operation and low utilization rates of the hydrogen production and storage capacities. If additional power for the operation of electrolyzers is supplied by the grid, increased utilization rates and prolonged periods of hydrogen-based gas turbine operation can be achieved. However, to realize an overall reduction of CO2 emissions, this mode of operation requires the supply of large quantities of renewable power by the grid. The results of an additional economic assessment reveal that both investigated operational modes are not economically viable within the considered economic framework.


In the LMM for hyperspectral images, all the image spectra lie on a high-dimensional simplex with corners called endmembers. Given a set of endmembers, the standard calculation of fractional abundances with constrained least squares typically identifies the spectra as combinations of most, if not all, endmembers. We assume instead that pixels are combinations of only a few endmembers, yielding abundance vectors that are sparse. We introduce sparse demixing (SD), which is a method that is similar to orthogonal matching pursuit, for calculating these sparse abundances. We demonstrate that SD outperforms an existing L1 demixing algorithm, which we prove to depend adversely on the angles between endmembers. We combine SD with dictionary learning methods to calculate automatically endmembers for a provided set of spectra. Applying it to an airborne visible/infrared imaging spectrometer image of Cuprite, NV, yields endmembers that compare favorably with signatures from the USGS spectral library.


In Pakistan, maize is the fourth largest grown crop after wheat, cotton, rice and is considered as fodder for livestock as well. There are various reasons for low productivity of this crop which includes low soil organic matter (O.M). Chemical fertilizers indiscriminate utilization disturbs the soil tithe and its chemical composition which caused in reduction plant yield. Hence to overcome the problem of this low fertility, humic acid is strongly recommended throughout the world. Hence and research experiment was conduct as student's Agronomy experimental farm, at Sindh Agriculture University Tandojam, Pakistan during the year 2017 on humic acid levels effect on fodder production of maize (Zea Mays). The experiment was designed by following the randomize complete block design (RCBD) with net plot size 3 by 4 m (12 m.seq). The experiment comprises of the recommended dose of NPK and various levels of humic acid such as HA1 = Untreated, HA2 = 2 kg ha-1, HA3 = 3 kg ha-1 and HA4 = 4 kg ha-1. The results of our study showed that significant effect on different levels of humic acid on the different varieties of maize crop. The results revealed that the application of humic acid @4Kgha-1 gave maximum yield and better growth of maize varieties as compared to lower levels of humic acid application where as in varieties Akbar and Sadaf produced maximum fodder yield than variety Neelum in response to humic acid application.


The Raman shift of water vapor is 3657 lTEXg$cm^{-1}$l/TEXg, and this Raman signal can be easily separated from other Raman signals or elastic signals. However, it is difficult to make simultaneous Raman measurements on the three phases of water, namely, ice water, liquid water, and water vapor. This is because we must consider the overlap between their Raman spectra. Therefore, very few groups have attempted to make Raman simultaneous measurements even on two elements (water vapor and liquid water, or water vapor and ice water). We have made an effort to find three characteristic Raman wavelengths that correspond to the three phases of water after measuring full Raman spectra of water on particular days that are rainy, snowy or clear. Finally, we have found that the 401-nm, 404-nm, and 408-nm wavelengths are the most characteristic Raman wavelengths that are representative of the water phases when we are using the 355-nm laser wavelength for making measurements.


Proper chromosome condensation requires the phosphorylation of histone and nonhistone chromatin proteins. We have used an in vitro chromosome assembly system based on Xenopus egg cytoplasmic extracts to study mitotic histone H3 phosphorylation. We identified a histone H3 Ser10 kinase activity associated with isolated mitotic chromosomes. The histone H3 kinase was not affected by inhibitors of cyclin-dependent kinases, DNA-dependent protein kinase, p90 rsk , or cAMP-dependent protein kinase. The activity could be selectively eluted from mitotic chromosomes and immunoprecipitated by specific anti-X aurora-B/AIRK2 antibodies. This activity was regulated by phosphorylation. Treatment of X aurora-B immunoprecipitates with recombinant protein phosphatase 1 (PP1) inhibited kinase activity. The presence of PP1 on chromatin suggested that PP1 might directly regulate the X aurora-B associated kinase activity. Indeed, incubation of isolated interphase chromatin with the PP1-specific inhibitor I2 and ATP generated an H3 kinase activity that was also specifically immunoprecipitated by anti-X aurora-B antibodies. Nonetheless, we found that stimulation of histone H3 phosphorylation in interphase cytosol does not drive chromosome condensation or targeting of 13 S condensin to chromatin. In summary, the chromosome-associated mitotic histone H3 Ser10 kinase is associated with X aurora-B and is inhibited directly in interphase chromatin by PP1.


Diffraction is known to have a major influence on the propagation performance of a wireless communications link especially in lower frequency bands and hence the diffraction in millimetre wave band needs to be emphasized. In this paper, we propose a single material characterisation measurement in a controlled indoor environment at the centre frequency of 40GHz. In addition, measurement results are presented in three distinct regions, line of sight (LOS), penumbra and umbra for a more comprehensible observation. Different materials with approximately same dimension are tested. The movement of the material under test through a direct ray path is investigated. Analysis shows that concrete experiences the greatest attenuation compared to other materials under test. The proposed results show significant agreement with the Knife Edge Diffraction theory. It also can be concluded that there is a significant diffracted field in umbra regions.


Solving transport problems, i.e. finding a map transporting one given distribution to another, has numerous applications in machine learning. Novel mass transport methods motivated by generative modeling have recently been proposed, e.g. Denoising Diffusion Models (DDMs) and Flow Matching Models (FMMs) implement such a transport through a Stochastic Differential Equation (SDE) or an Ordinary Differential Equation (ODE). However, while it is desirable in many applications to approximate the deterministic dynamic Optimal Transport (OT) map which admits attractive properties, DDMs and FMMs are not guaranteed to provide transports close to the OT map. In contrast, Schr\"odinger bridges (SBs) compute stochastic dynamic mappings which recover entropy-regularized versions of OT. Unfortunately, existing numerical methods approximating SBs either scale poorly with dimension or accumulate errors across iterations. In this work, we introduce Iterative Markovian Fitting (IMF), a new methodology for solving SB problems, and Diffusion Schr\"odinger Bridge Matching (DSBM), a novel numerical algorithm for computing IMF iterates. DSBM significantly improves over previous SB numerics and recovers as special/limiting cases various recent transport methods. We demonstrate the performance of DSBM on a variety of problems.