Robotics and related technologies are central to the ongoing digitization and advancement of manufacturing. In recent years, a variety of strategic initiatives around the world including "Industry 4.0", introduced in Germany in 2011 have aimed to improve and connect manufacturing technologies in order to optimize production processes. In this work, we study the changing technological landscape of robotics and "internet-of-things" (IoT)-based connective technologies over the last 7-10 years in the wake of Industry 4.0. We interviewed key players within the European robotics ecosystem, including robotics manufacturers and integrators, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), and applied industrial research institutions and synthesize our findings in this paper. We first detail the state-of-the-art robotics and IoT technologies we observed and that the companies discussed during our interviews. We then describe the processes the companies follow when deciding whether and how to integrate new technologies, the challenges they face when integrating these technologies, and some immediate future technological avenues they are exploring in robotics and IoT. Finally, based on our findings, we highlight key research directions for the robotics community that can enable improved capabilities in the context of manufacturing.


The subcutaneous intercellular glucose concentration was measured with a microdialysis method in 14 healthy volunteers and compared with that in venous blood. Under steady-state fasting conditions the intercellular glucose concentration was similar to that in the blood. During an oral glucose tolerance test the absorption phase was slightly delayed (approximately 2 min) in the intercellular space compared with the blood. However, the kinetics for the decline in glucose was similar in the two compartments. The interstitial glucose concentration was similar to that in venous blood during both a eu- and a hyperglycemic clamp. However, a rapid change from euglycemia to hyperglycemia was associated with a significant delay (approximately 8 min) in the intercellular glucose. The data demonstrate that the subcutaneous tissue glucose concentration under non-steady-state conditions closely resembles that in venous blood.


'No, Groucho is not my real name, I'm just breaking it in for a friend'. Presenting the greatest and most hilarious examples of Groucho, one of the most influential and well-loved figures in the long and glittering history of comedy. From early scripts to complete screenplays, from magazine funnies to fascinating personal correspondence, via books, greedy banks, even greedier lawyers and the coming of television, Kanfer's collection captures the essence of Groucho's inimitable comic genius. 'I never forget a face, but in your case I'll make an exception'.


Background: Thymosin α1 (Tα1), a synthetic version of a thymic-derived biological response modifier was the first of the thymosins in clinical use. Tα1 is approved in over 35 countries for the treatment of hepatitis B and C, and as an immune stimulant and adjuvant. Tα1 is also in late-stage clinical testing in the United States and Europe for hepatitis C and stage IV melanoma. Objective/methods: Novel applications and other recently completed trials point to much broader clinical applications of Tα1 in the treatment of life-threatening and chronic diseases, and are the subject of this review. Result/conclusions: The most recent reports of clinical trials with Tα1 are pointing to important, hitherto unrecognized, applications in a number of diseases and disorders, including septic shock, acute respiratory distress syndrome, peritonitis, acute cytomegalovirus infection, TB, severe acute respiratory syndrome, and lung infections in critically ill patients. It is also emerging as a promising chemoprotection agent in patients undergoing chemotherapy.


There are many studies discussing female mate choice in Poecilia reticulata, however, male guppy sexual selection is far less studied. Due to research from many sources, we already knew that male guppies preferred females of warmer colors with larger wavelengths. However, we were curious as to how the body width of these female guppies affected the male's courtship behavior. We hypothesized that the males would gravitate toward the wider model because of offspring producing ability. Following procedures given by French in the Biology 1114 manual, we used two orange models (one being wider than the other) to determine the attractiveness to the wider fish. Our results supported our hypothesis as the male guppy spent 191 more seconds on the side of the wider model. This is important to future studies because it helps to understand male mate choice.


Abstract Background This study investigates the association of clinical and demographic predictors with abdominal fat gain, measured using waist circumference (WC) and self-reported abdominal size. Methods We analyzed data from ACTG A5257, a clinical trial that randomized treatment-naïve HIV-infected participants to 1 of 3 antiretroviral regimens: raltegravir (RAL) or the protease inhibitors (PIs) atazanavir/ritonavir (ATV/r) or darunavir/ritonavir (DRV/r), each in combination with tenofovir disoproxil fumarate/emtricitabine. Associations of treatment and baseline/demographic characteristics with 96-week WC change were assessed using repeated-measures models. Ordinal logistic regression was used to examine the associations of predictors with week 96 self-reported abdominal changes. Results The study population (n = 1809) was 76.0% male and predominantly black non-Hispanic (41.9%) and white non-Hispanic (34.1%). Mean baseline WC was 90.6 cm, with an average 96-week increase of 3.4 cm. WC increases were higher in the RAL arm compared with DRV/r (P = .0130). Females experienced greater increases in WC on RAL vs ATV/r than males (P = .0065). Similarly, a larger difference in WC change was found for RAL vs DRV/r for black vs nonblack individuals (P = .0043). A separate multivariable model found that in addition to the treatment regimen, higher baseline viral load and lower CD4+ were also associated with WC increases. Conclusions With antiretroviral therapy initiation, higher WC increases in the RAL arm compared with PIs were more pronounced in female and black participants, and a more advanced baseline HIV disease state was a strong predictor of larger abdominal increases. Understanding factors predisposing individuals to abdominal fat gain could inform health management after therapy initiation.


In the present study serum concentrations of T3, T4, TSH were measured in 140 goitrous school children, aged 6-12 yrs of both sexes from Siddhartnagar, located in sub-Himalayan tarai region of Eastern Uttar Pradesh where endemic goiter and iodine deficiency are prevalent. The results show that overall 10.0% studied population (12.9% boys and 7.7% girls) has TSH level above 6.1μIU/ml indicating that they had biochemical hypothyroidism and all the hypothyroid children are subclinically hypothyroid and none of them are overt hypothyroid as their T4 level is within normal range. The serum levels of T4, T3 were in the normal range in children with different grades of goiter. The findings of present study suggest that serum thyroid hormone and thyrotropin levels are relatively less sensitive marker for iodine deficiency.


The author examines the population size dynamics natural increase and income of what is described as the Pan Asian population of the United States. "This population is extremely diverse giving rise to the term Pan Asian which encompasses immigrants from Asian and Pacific Island countries and native-born citizens descended from those ethnic groups." Data are from official U.S. sources including the census and current population surveys. (EXCERPT)


In this paper I suggest a technique which uses the familiar Parker Brother's game Monopoly to introduce core concepts of race and ethnic relations. I offer anecdotes from my classes where an abbreviated version of the game is used as an analog to highlight the sociological concepts of direct institutional discrimination, the legacy of discrimination, colorblind racism, affirmative action, and reparations. I describe how, after playing the game, the participants spend a short amount of time debriefing in order to express their emotions and examine their motivations. Later, in a broader class discussion, I invite both participants and observers to explain the motivations, attitudes, and behaviors of all players and connect these explanations to theoretical concepts in sociology. After debriefing and discussion, I refer to the shared experiences of the students from the game in subsequent lectures and readings.


The German Aerospace Center (DLR) implemented an experimental GBAS test bed with three ground reference receivers at Braunschweig-Wolfsburg research airport. Its compliancy with respect to accuracy, integrity, and availability requirements of CAT-I precision approach has been demonstrated in several flight trials in 2009. The research ground station consists of three Topcon Net G3 dual frequency GNSS receivers with multipath suppressing choke ring antennas, which deliver corrections for navigation at a rate of 2Hz. However, in the current stage only range and carrier data from the aeronautically protected L1-band is used .Stations are separated by baselines between 740 and 770 meters. Due to its high modularity, the station is fully accessible and can be easily reconfigured for research purposes. Currently, reconfiguration to an enhanced infrastructure is taking place to comply with the more stringent requirements of CAT-III / GAST-D approaches.

In preparation for this reconfiguration, we post-processed the data collected during the 30 approaches of the 2009 flight trials (flown with DLR´s VFW614 aircraft) with respect to the GAST-D parameters and requirements defined in the ICAO draft SARPS and RTCA DO-253C. In addition to the CAT-I / GAST-C processing which is based on 100s carrier smoothed code pseudoranges, these requirements now include a second smoothing filter and pseudorange correction processing with 30s smoothing time on both, ground and aircraft subsystem. Moreover, a battery of new monitors on the airborne side is required to ensure a sufficient level of integrity. They include a dual solution ionospheric monitoring architecture (DSIGMA), differential correction magnitude check, bias approach monitor, reference receiver fault monitor and fault detection and exclusion. The dual solution ionospheric monitor architecture compares the position solution with 30s smoothed and corrected pseudoranges with the one obtained using the 100s Hatch filter. If the difference exceeds 2 meters, an ionosphere anomaly is considered present and the approach service is degraded to GAST-C. The differential correction magnitude check makes sure the broadcast differential corrections do not exceed 200 meters. The bias approach monitor compares the vertical projection of the 66% position uncertainty with the final approach segment vertical alert limit when entering the precision approach region. The reference receiver fault monitor once more checks the broadcast B values to identify faulty ground receivers. Fault detection and exclusion is performed by a weighted RAIM algorithm. We show the outputs of these monitors during the flight trials and evaluate their performance with the ones expected theoretically. The output of the DSIGMA monitor was analyzed and overbounded in order to obtain inflated parameters sigma_v=0.21944m and sigma_l=0.12046m, which are then used in the reference receiver fault monitor.

Additionally, we assessed the ground station performance for the 30s smoothing filter. We confirm that the performance gain of a 100s filter time constant with respect to the 30s one falls much below the expected value of 1.8 since a correlated low frequency error is still present in the data. With respect to the accuracy improvement, the results suggest a re-siting of the ground station antennae to a lower height and away from metallic structures to improve ground station performance.

We furthermore evaluated the integrity, availability and continuity performance during the flight trials. For this we used a dual frequency (L1-L2 semi-codeless) carrier phase positioning post-processed solution as a truth reference. No misleading information or hazardously misleading information occurred and the service was never interrupted or unavailable during any of the approaches. Position accuracy was always below 1.86m vertical and 0.91 m lateral (one standard deviation) at all times within the GBAS service area.

Moreover, we have optimized the location of ground station antennae to fulfil the ICAO requirement of detecting absolute slant ionospheric gradients above 300mm/km with the double difference carrier phase monitoring architectures (as currently being discussed at the ICAO NSP panel) under the assumption of a worst case placement of the reference station 5 km away from the threshold. The optimized configuration for four receivers is linearly distributed along the runway with a maximum baseline of 220m and allows an increase of allowable carrier phase noise by 20% to a standard deviation of 8mm compared to an optimal architecture using three receivers.


Radar targets can be identified by either forming images with sufficient resolution to be recognized by the human observer or by forming signatures or representations of the target for automated machine recognition. Tomographic microwave diversity imaging techniques that combine angular (aspect), spectral, and polarization degrees of freedom have been shown, as summarized in the first part of this paper, to be capable of producing images of the scattering centers of a target with near optical resolution. In the second part of the paper the author shows that collective nonlinear signal processing based on models of neural networks combined with the use of suitable target signatures (here sinogram representations) offer the promise of robust super-resolved target identification from partial information. Results presented are of numerical simulations for a neuromorphic processor where the neural net performs simultaneously the functions of data storage, processing, and recognition by automatically generating an identifying object label, and fast optoelectronic architectures and hardware implementations are briefly mentioned. Practical considerations and extensions to real systems are briefly discussed. >


The composition of bacterial communities associated with waters of one thermal and three sulfurous lukewarm wells of cavernous limestone aquifers in the Southwestern part of Hungary was studied in 2007 and 2008 by microscopy and culture-independent clone library analysis targeting the 16S rRNA gene. The presence of Thiothrix-like filamentous bacteria was observed by microscopy in the lukewarm samples. From the clone libraries, a high proportion of phylotypes belonging to Proteobacteria (Rhodobacter, Sphingopyxis, Phenylobacterium, Ochrobactrum, Methylobacterium, Sulfuritalea, Thiobacillus, Limnobacter, Acidovorax, Xanthomonadaceae, Thiothrix, Lysobacter, Pseudoxanthomonas, Desulfopila, Desulfocapsa, Desulforhopalus, Sulfuricurvum, Sulfurimonas, Sulfurospirillum) was revealed. In addition, phylotypes of Acidobacteria, Chloroflexi, Sphingobacteria, Clostridia, Aquificae, Deferribacteres and Chlorobi were detected. On the basis of their habitat preference 21 out of a total of 39 different phylotypes represented mesophilic and thermophilic sulfur bacteria. From the lukewarm samples large numbers of clones were affiliated with uncultured Epsilonproteobacteria clones common in sulfurous hydrothermal vents. From the thermal sample, several clones were in the closest relationship to the Sulfuritalea hydrogenivorans, a novel sulfur-oxidizing Betaproteobacterium.


The Development and Preliminary Evidence of Validity and Reliability of a Spanish Static and Dynamic Assessment of Decoding Kayla Brooke Ditty Department of Communication Disorders, BYU Master of Science The purpose of the current study was to develop and administer a Spanish static and dynamic assessment of decoding and other important reading measures. Using the best available resources regarding Spanish literacy acquisition and Spanish language development, a preliminary Spanish dynamic and static screener was developed. The resulting test was named the Spanish Dynamic Decoding Measure (S-DDM) and is a counterpart to the original DDM available in English. This test contains three subtests: decoding, phonemic awareness, and word identification. The S-DDM was administered to eight bilingual Spanish-English speaking students with varying levels of Spanish language ability and reading proficiency in grades ranging from second to fourth grade. The results from all three subtests of the S-DDM were analyzed to report the levels of validity, reliability, and variance observed in the administration of the test and performance of the participants. There was a wide range of performance on the pretest sections of the dynamic assessment decoding subtest, and performance at or near ceiling on the posttest sounds sections. Modifiability scores were strong for the students who were not receiving special education services while the two participants receiving special education both received weaker modifiability ratings. There was a wide range of variance observed on all subtests of both the phonemic awareness and word identification subtests, with the exception of the phoneme blending target of the phonemic awareness subtest. Interrater reliability and administration fidelity were found to be within acceptable measures. Results indicated that the test is sensitive to varying degrees of Spanish reading proficiency and reading ability. Future research is needed to determine the effectiveness of this screener in identifying Spanish-speaking students who are at-risk for reading difficulties.


This paper analyzes factors that influence the employment of older people in Japan and South Korea, specifically, the similarities and differences in both countries. The dataset for this study was compiled from two surveys administered by each country. Heckman (2SLS) estimation model was used in order to resolve sample selection bias and the results indicate that pension and non-pension income have negative effects on employment of older people in both countries. Older people have a low probability of employment if they are of poor health or are women, and the probability of employment declines every year in Japan but increases in South Korea. Furthermore, the effects of family variables on employment of older people are different in both countries. By comparing these variables, this paper shows the factors affecting employment of the elderly and the strategies governments should employ towards the employment of this age group in both countries.


In recent years, there has been increasing interest in transparency in Deep Neural Networks. Most of the works on transparency have been done for image classification. In this paper, we report on work of transparency in Deep Reinforcement Learning Networks (DRLNs). Such networks have been extremely successful in learning action control in Atari games. In this paper, we focus on generating verbal (natural language) descriptions and explanations of deep reinforcement learning policies. Successful generation of verbal explanations would allow better understanding by people (e.g., users, debuggers) of the inner workings of DRLNs which could ultimately increase trust in these systems. We present a generation model which consists of three parts: an encoder on feature extraction, an attention structure on selecting features from the output of the encoder, and a decoder on generating the explanation in natural language. Four variants of the attention structure full attention, global attention, adaptive attention and object attention - are designed and compared. The adaptive attention structure performs the best among all the variants, even though the object attention structure is given additional information on object locations. Additionally, our experiment results showed that the proposed encoder outperforms two baseline encoders (Resnet and VGG) on the capability of distinguishing the game state images.


Appropriate vaccine selection is crucial in the control of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD). Vaccination can prevent clinical disease and reduces viral shedding, but there is a lack of cross-protection between the seven serotypes and their sublineages, making the selection of an adequately protective vaccine difficult. Since the exact composition of their vaccines is not consistently disclosed by all manufacturers, incompatibility of the strains used for vaccination with regionally circulating strains can cause vaccination campaigns to fail. Here, we present a deep sequencing approach for polyvalent inactivated FMD vaccines that can identify all component strains by their genome sequences. The genomes of all strains of a commercial pentavalent FMD vaccine were de novo assembled and the vaccine composition determined semi-quantitatively. The genome assembly required high stringency parameters to prevent misassemblies caused by conserved regions of the genome shared by related strains. In contrast, reference-guided assembly is only recommended in cases where the number of strains is previously known and appropriate reference sequences are available. The presented approach can be applied not only to any inactivated whole-virus FMD vaccine but also to vaccine quality testing in general and allows for better decision-making for vaccines with an unknown composition.


Electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) techniques have been used to measure the dislocation density tensor for various materials. Orientation data are typically obtained over a planar array of measurement positions and the minimum dislocation content required to produce the observed lattice curvature is calculated as the geometrically necessary (or excess) dislocation density. The present work shows a comparison of measurements in two-dimensions and three-dimensions using a dual beam instrument (focused ion beam, electron beam) to obtain the data. The two-dimensional estimate is obviously lower than that obtained from three-dimensional data since the 2D analysis necessarily assumes that the third dimension has no curvature in the lattice. Effects of the free-surface on EBSD measurements are discussed in conjunction with comparisons against X-ray microdiffraction experiments and a discrete dislocation dynamics model. It is observed that the EBSD measurements are sensitive to free-surface effects that may yield dislocation density observations that are not consistent with that of the bulk material.


Computerized adaptive testing (CAT) is an active current research field in psychometrics and educational measurement. However, there is very little software available to handle such adaptive tasks. The R package catR was developed to perform adaptive testing with as much flexibility as possible, in an attempt to provide a developmental and testing platform to the interested user. Several item-selection rules and ability estimators are implemented. The item bank can be provided by the user or randomly generated from parent distributions of item parameters. Three stopping rules are available. The output can be graphically displayed.


ment (SEE) is a system of software dedicated to aiding the understanding of space mission operations. The SEE can integrate disparate sets of data with analytical capabilities, geometric models of spacecraft, and a visualization environment (see figure), all contributing to the creation of an interactive simulation of spacecraft. Initially designed to satisfy needs pertaining to the International Space Station, the SEE has been broadened in scope to include spacecraft ranging from those in low orbit around the Earth to those on deep-space missions. The SEE includes analytical capabilities in rigid-body dynamics, kinematics, orbital mechanics, and payload operations. These capabilities enable a user to perform real-time interactive engineering analyses focusing on diverse aspects of operations, including flight attitudes and maneuvers, docking of visiting spacecraft, robotic operations, impingement of spacecraft-engine exhaust plumes, obscuration of instrumentation fields of view, communications, and alternative assembly configurations. The SEE continues to undergo development at Langley Research Center. This program was written by Jonathan Cruz of Langley Research Center and Scott Angster of Analytical Mechanics Associates, Inc. Further information is contained in a TSP (see page 1). LAR-16842-1


We review the EfficientQA competition from NeurIPS 2020. The competition focused on open-domain question answering (QA), where systems take natural language questions as input and return natural language answers. The aim of the competition was to build systems that can predict correct answers while also satisfying strict on-disk memory budgets. These memory budgets were designed to encourage contestants to explore the trade-off between storing retrieval corpora or the parameters of learned models. In this report, we describe the motivation and organization of the competition, review the best submissions, and analyze system predictions to inform a discussion of evaluation for open-domain QA.


The chapter deals with the role of creativity in public relations. Creativity is usually associated with marketing and design, while public relations is associated with information and communication management, respectively, as the information and educational component, but often as persuasion. However, in modern conditions in which there is a kind of inflation of content transmitted by public relations experts to the media and the public, it is very difficult to fight for media attention and public attention. Therefore, the public relations professional is forced to bring creativity to the way of communicating, presenting key messages, and achieving communication goals. For that reason, creativity is becoming an essential strategic and tactical tool for public relations professionals to shift the task to a higher level. The authors present a case study of the leading Croatian insurance company—Croatia osiguranje, which had the challenging task of using the anniversary to communicate its own identity and values, strengthen its image, and attract new clients. The project "Croatia je Hrvatska" has received a number of national and international awards and can serve as an excellent example of synergy between communication management and creativity in achieving communication and business goals.


The Ashgate Research Companion to Sociocultural Studies of the Paranormal is a collection of new original essays on the socio-cultural of the paranormal from international scholars across social sciences and humanities disciplines.
This work will develop current academic/ non-academic understandings of the socio cultural dimensions of contemporary engagements with the paranormal and its histories, taking the field in new directions. The main objective is to investigate the processes of every day life practices and discourses as well as textual engagements that have a relation to the discourse of the paranormal. This includes forays into how people relate to the paranormal as well as the paranormal's metaphorical role in media and literature and its use as a trope for critiques of normative politics of rationality. Taking seriously questions of how and why people seek meaning in the realm of the paranormal and how the notion of the paranormal is used to make meaning of emotional, ideological and epistemological realities, this book will be a valuable resource for cultural studies, humanities and sociological approaches to the recent upsurge in cultural engagements with paranormal discourse that has been a growing research focus since the 1990s.


Global financial crisis 2008 has severely impacted on banks and their risk profile. Huge losses were incurred due to systematic risk factors. However severity of these losses differs from one region to another region and from one country to another country. In Pakistan, consumer banking is the most affected banking business that has faced considerable losses during and after the financial crisis of 2008, because of the unexpected rise in the nonperforming loans. This study explores the factors of market risk, especially systematic part. It is noticed through studying the literature review that in 2008, when the financial crisis started influencing the banking system in Pakistan, the SBP had substantially increased the interest rate to control the hyperinflation in the country. Literature also indicates that financial crisis of 2008 has also impacted the GDP growth rate of Pakistan. Unemployment rate is another relevant variable in this context. This study assesses the significance of the market risk factors for the consumer banking in Pakistan, which was identified from the literature review viz. GDP Growth Rate, Inflation Rate and Interest Rate Volatility. Opinions of the banking professionals about the significance of the market risk factors were obtained through close-end questionnaire with 5 points likert scale for the study. Judgemental sampling was used in order to include experienced and seasoned consumer bankers. Professionals were selected from fourteen commercial banks of Pakistan. Secondary data of macroeconomic indicators were also used to augment and verify the findings of the study. T test is applied to check the significance of the risk factors.The results of our study indicate that all three market risk factors namely GDP Growth Rate, Inflation Rate and Interest Rate Volatility were found significant for the success or failure of consumer banking in Pakistan. Descriptive measure of mean was used for the ranking of market risk factor. Interest rate volatility is ranked the highest by the respondents, followed by inflation and GDP growth rate. This study concludes that financial crisis have impacted on the consumer banking in Pakistan and market risk factors played significant role in this episode of crises. This study creates value for the policy makers of banking institutions to develop risk management framework in the context of consumer banking.


Abstract The growth-promoting effect of dietary polyunsaturated fat is reported for six transplantable rat and mouse mammary adenocarcinomas which have different origins and characteristics. All six adenocarcinomas developed a significantly greater mass when implanted in animals receiving a 15% corn oil-containing diet than in animals receiving a fat-free diet. In the case of the two tumors implanted in BALB/c mice, addition of as little as 0.1% pure cis,cis-linoleic acid to a fat-free diet was as effective as 15% corn oil. However, in two tumors implanted in C3H mice, and in the rat tumor, 0.1% linoleic acid did not increase tumor weight. As little as 0.06% 5,8,11,14-eicosatetraynoic acid and 0.004% indomethacin, inhibitors of prostaglandin synthesis, in the diet prevented the tumor growth-promoting effect of polyunsaturated fat in BALB/c mice. The observed difference in tumor mass due to dietary fat could not be accounted for by differences in the duration of the latent growth period following tumor implantation. The neoplasms taken from animals fed either fat-free or corn oil-containing diets were analyzed for DNA, protein, total lipids, phospholipids, and cholesterol. There were no differences in the chemical composition which could account for the difference in tumor weight observed. The size of the proliferative cell population in tumors implanted in either BALB/c or C3H mice was not changed by dietary fat. Splenomegaly was observed in host BALB/c mice in direct proportion to the increase in tumor mass. Our results suggest that the growth-enhancing effect of dietary fat on transplantable mammary tumors (a) is caused by cis,cis-linoleate, (b) varies quantitatively with species and strain of animals, (c) cannot be accounted for by an increased neoplastic cell proliferation, and, therefore, (d) may be mediated through the cellular immune system with the possible involvement of prostaglandins in this process.


The Kano model is a technique for a better understanding of the customers' requirements, thus increasing the customers' satisfaction. The process of identifying the customers' requirements and increasing the customers' satisfaction, by improving the offerings, is costly for the companies. In order not to waste resources, companies should firstly identify who their target audience is, through a market research. When companies understand who their target audience is, they are able to identify their requirements, in order to try to meet them, and increase customers' satisfaction. The process of segmentation and targeting, helps companies to save time, money and effort, since the messages are directly delivered to those who are their target audience, and are really interested. Moreover, the companies using the focus groups and in-depth interviews can collect target audience' requirements, in order to later on meet those requirements and increase the customers' satisfaction. Furthermore, the findings revealed that for the companies in the online payment industry it is crucial to have a good reputation and be trustworthy.


Neurite outgrowth from PC12 pheochromocytoma cells, as well as from peripheral and central nervous system neurons in vitro, is mediated by the extracellular matrix molecule, laminin. We have recently shown that mesenchymal cell spreading and migration on laminin is mediated, in part, by the cell surface enzyme, beta 1,4 galactosyltransferase (GalTase). GalTase is localized on lamellipodia of migrating cells where it functions as a laminin receptor by binding to specific N- linked oligosaccharides in laminin (Runyan et al., 1988; Eckstein and Shur, 1989). In the present study, we examined whether GalTase functions similarly during neutrite outgrowth on laminin using biochemical and immunological analyses. PC12 neurite outgrowth was inhibited by reagents that perturb cell surface GalTase activity, including anti-GalTase IgG and Fab fragments, as well as the GalTase modifier protein alpha-lactalbumin. Control reagents had no effect on neurite outgrowth. Furthermore, blocking GalTase substrates on laminin matrices by earlier galactosyltion or enzymatic removal of GalTase substrates also inhibited neurite outgrowth. Conversely, neurite outgrowth was enhanced by the addition of UDP-galactose, which completes the GalTase enzymatic reaction, while inappropriate sugar nucleotides had no effect. The effects of all these treatments were dose and/or time dependent. Surface GalTase was shown to function during both neurite initiation and elongation, although the effects of GalTase perturbation were most striking during the initiation stages of neurite formation. Consistent with this, surface GalTase was localized by indirect immunofluorescence to the growth cone and developing neurite. Collectively, these results demonstrate that GalTase mediates the initiation of neurite outgrowth on laminin, and to a lesser extent, neurite elongation. Furthermore, this study demonstrates that process extension from both mesenchymal cells and neuronal cells is partly dependent upon specific oligosaccharide residues in laminin.


This study analyzes financial performance in firms that employ maquiladora production, a manufacturing arrangement utilizing Mexican labor. We argue that although accountants can readily identify and value the obvious benefits of labor savings, they have more difficulty identifying and valuing incremental costs from any frictions encountered. The result is that this offshore labor strategy may not be as cost-effective as it would initially appear. We cannot explicitly measure the costs associated with these frictions; we therefore compare performance of a sample of firms that implemented maquiladora production (treatment firms) with performance of similar firms (control firms), examining median return on assets (ROAs) during periods before and after implementation. Results for the median difference tests suggest that although treatment firms benefit from lower committed costs and lower labor costs, there is no corresponding increase in ROA. Results from the regression models are similar and indicate no differences in ROA after implementation, and no differences in committed costs and labor costs. To identify those firms that could have more difficulty estimating costs and benefits, we partition the maquiladora firms on variance of profits, assuming that high-variance firms may be more cautious in their decision making. We find that compared with the low-variance sample firms, high-variance firms experience increases in ROA after implementing maquiladora production. The production process is another firm characteristic that could influence maquiladora success. As expected, when we partition the maquiladora firms on production technology, we find that maquiladora implementation leads to higher ROAs for low-production technology firms.


The research presented in this manuscript describes the development of photosensitized inexpensive catalysts based on readily available materials. The investigation covers synthesis and characterization of photosensitizers based on porphyrins, mechanical and thermal coating of solid support with semiconducting transition metal oxides, photosensitization of the semiconducting layer, and characterization of the photoelectrochemical properties displayed by the new materials. The process of water oxidation is of primary interest here, with little emphasis put on reduction of protons to gaseous hydrogen. Photoelectrochemically produced protons serve as a probe of effectiveness of the catalysts. Several systems are described, and two catalysts are identified as the most efficient.


The forestry-livestock waste materials represent a serious ecological problem if they are not handled properly in agricultural activities. Vermicomposting is a biotechnological process with potential to transform such materials into products that can be safely used as soil enhancers. The objective of this study was to evaluate the nutritional characteristics of organic fertilizers obtained from forestry-livestock organic waste materials when they are processed through vermicomposting using "Red Californian Earthworm" (Eisenia fetida). A completely randomized experimental design with four treatments and eight replicates was performed. Treatments (mixtures) included: leaf litter + sawdust (LS), bovine manure + sawdust (BS), rabbit manure + sawdust (RS), and ovine manure + sawdust (OS). Total nitrogen, pH, carbon/nitrogen ratio, organic carbon and nitrates from vermicompost samples were measured and statistically analyzed using SAS v8.2. At the end of the study, all mixtures showed similar characteristics according to the analyzed variables. Carbon/nitrogen ratios decreased in three mixtures to values considered as within the vermicompost maturity stage. Contents of nitrates and total nitrogen were


antipsychotics and also considered the most commonly used individual drugs. All of the most commonly diagnosed neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and learning disability, were considered. The researchers controlled for a broad range of demographic, treatment, and lifestyle covariates. They found that 90% of the antipsychotic drug exposures in the cohorts were to atypicals, with quetiapine the most commonly prescribed. By age 8, children's rates of any neurodevelopmental disorder were greater for antipsychotic-exposed children than unexposed children in both the publicly and privately insured groups. However, in adjusted analyses there was no substantially increased risk of neurodevelopmental disorders associated with antipsychotic exposure in the second half of pregnancy, though there was some increased risk in children exposed to aripiprazole. There was no evidence of an association between days' supply of antipsychotics and neurodevelopmental disorders. "These findings provide much needed clarity regarding [neurodevelopmental disorder] risk and may help to inform treatment decision-making in pregnancy, which is a sophisticated trade-off between benefits and risks," the study's authors wrote. [Straub L, et al. JAMA Intern Med 2022; published online Mar 28; doi: 10.1001/ jamainternmed.2022.0375] ▪


The composition of human milk is the main base for the development of infant formulas concerning its macronutrients and micronutrients contents and bioactive compounds. Technological advances in the composition of human milk have identified a great number of bioactive compounds such as prebiotics which are responsible for immunological protection and the prevention of different pathologies. In order to achieve similar benefits, they are part of the contents of infant formulas.


■ Abstract The evolution of a synthetic (zero-net mass flux) jet and the flow mechanisms of its interaction with a cross flow are reviewed. An isolated synthetic jet is produced by the interactions of a train of vortices that are typically formed by alternating momentary ejection and suction of fluid across an orifice such that the net mass flux is zero. A unique feature of these jets is that they are formed entirely from the working fluid of the flow system in which they are deployed and, thus, can transfer linear momentum to the flow system without net mass injection across the flow boundary. Synthetic jets can be produced over a broad range of length and timescale, and their unique attributes make them attractive fluidic actuators for a number of flow control applications. The interaction of synthetic jets with an external cross flow over the surface in which they are mounted can displace the local streamlines and induce an apparent or virtual change in the shape of the surface, thereby effecting flow changes on length scales that are one to two orders of magnitude larger than the characteristic scale of the jets. This control approach emphasizes an actuation frequency that is high enough so that the interaction domain between the actuator and the cross flow is virtually invariant on the global timescale of the flow, and therefore, global effects such as changes in aerodynamic forces are effectively decoupled from the operating frequency of the actuators.


The basis set convergence of explicitly correlated ab initio methods, when applied to noncovalent interactions, has been considered in the presence (and absence) of Boys-Bernardi counterpoise corrections, as well as using "half-counterpoise" (the average of raw and counterpoise-corrected values) as recently advocated in this journal [Burns, L. A.; Marshall, M. S.; Sherrill, C. D. J. Chem. Theory Comput. 2014, 10, 49-57]. Reference results were obtained using basis sets so large that BSSE (basis set superposition error) can be shown to be negligible. For the HF+CABS component, full counterpoise unequivocally exhibits the fastest basis set convergence. However, at the MP2-F12 and CCSD(T*)-F12b levels, surprisingly good uncorrected results can be obtained with small basis sets like cc-pVDZ-F12, owing to error compensation between basis set superposition error (which overbinds) and intrinsic basis set insufficiency (which underbinds). For intermediate sets like cc-pVTZ-F12, "half-half" averages work best, while for large basis sets like cc-pVQZ-F12, full counterpoise may be preferred but BSSE in uncorrected values is tolerably small for most purposes. A composite scheme in which CCSD(T)-MP2 "high level corrections" obtained at the CCSD(T*)-F12b/cc-pVDZ-F12 level are combined with "half-counterpoise" MP2-F12/cc-pVTZ-F12 interaction energies yields surprisingly good performance for standard benchmark sets like S22 and S66.

acs-specific: authorchoice/editors choice usage agreement


Teegi is an anthropomorphic and tangible avatar exposing a users' brain activity in real time. It is connected to a device sensing the brain by means of electroencephalography (EEG). Teegi moves its hands and feet and closes its eyes along with the person being monitored. It also displays on its scalp the associated EEG signals, thanks to a semi-spherical display made of LEDs. Attendees can interact directly with Teegi -- e.g. move its limbs -- to discover by themselves the underlying brain processes. Teegi can be used for scientific outreach to introduce neurotechnologies in general and brain-computer interfaces (BCI) in particular.


We assessed the concordance, in terms of PD-L1 expression, between primary and metastatic non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) of different histotypes using validated SP263 clone. A few samples of local recurrences have also been analyzed. Whole sections of consecutive cases of primary NSCLC and paired relapses undergone surgical resection have been stained with PD-L1 clone SP263; for scoring purposes, a three-tiered system was applied using the following thresholds: <1%, 1–49% and ≥50%. Eighty-four cases of paired primary and relapsed tumors from 83 patients were analyzed, including 75 metastases and 9 local recurrences. Regarding metastases, when considering a cutoff of 1%, discrepancy in PD-L1 expression occurred in 9/75 (12%) paired samples (kappa value = 0.75); at 50% cutoff, discrepancy in PD-L1 expression was detected in 7/75 (9.3%) of paired samples (kappa value = 0.61). Regarding recurrences, at 1% cutoff, the discrepancy in PD-L1 expression was seen in 3/9 (33%) paired samples and in all cases there was a gained PD-L1 expression; at 50% cutoff, 1/9 (11%) paired samples showed gained PD-L1 expression. Our data provide important information regarding the concordance between primary and relapsed NSCLC and the degree of reliability of metastatic sites in terms of PD-L1 expression evaluation.


This research analyses retrospectively a population of 24 psychotic patients, hospitalized in a maximum security institution for the criminality insane and who have committed or attempted to commit murder. The main focus is on finding the clinical elements which are associated with increased homicidal risk, in the short term. With that aim in mind, nine patients that were in contact with a mental health professional, during the month preceding the homicide, were studied more specifically. It seems that in addition to the elements usually described in the literature, the association of depressive and paranoid features in the psychotic is a risk factor for homicide in the short term.


We provide here a quantum mechanical investigation of the resonance states found in a study of conically intersecting electronic surfaces. The dynamical system under investigation consists of a bound electronic state having a conical intersection with a dissociative electronic state. Quantum mechanical resonances arise from the predissociation of vibrational states of the bound potential surface via the nonadiabatic coupling to the dissociative potential surface. Resonance energies and wave functions are computed using the complex coordinate method, and the resonances are characterized in terms of contributions from states of the uncoupled potential surfaces. Key results found in this study include the following: (i) there is no correlation between resonance positions and widths in that when the resonances are ordered by their positions, the corresponding widths (and lifetimes) fluctuate irregularly; (ii) the resonance energetically below the conical intersection cannot be identified as a tunneling resonance of the lowest adiabatic potential surface since its resonance lifetime is orders of magnitude larger than the tunneling lifetime; (iii) the resonance states (even those whose positions are energetically much higher than the conical intersection) are found to arise from a small number of vibrational states of the bound diabat coupling to each other via the continuum of the dissociative diabat; and (iv) none of the resonance states emanate from a bound state of the upper adiabatic cone-shaped potential surface. We also briefly investigate the resonance energies as a function of the nonadiabatic coupling strength; the irregular behavior of the resonance lifetimes with the coupling strength is a fingerprint of the conical intersection. Furthermore, we have performed a symmetry analysis of the resonances and introduced an effective Hamiltonian which, with the aid of a simple model, yields results in agreement with numerically exact results.


Since 1995, information and communication technologies (ICTs) have driven productivity gains and growth in the EU[1]. Over the past three decades, technological 'convergence' has been blurring the boundaries between telecommunications, broadcasting and IT. The Commission launched the digital single market in 2015 to deliver the main legislative proposals, such as boosting e-commerce, copyright, ePrivacy, harmonisation of digital rights, harmonised VAT rules and cybersecurity.


Activation of the transcription factor nuclear factor (NF)-kappaB by proinflammatory stimuli leads to increased expression of genes involved in inflammation. Activation of NF-kappaB requires the activity of an inhibitor of kappaB (IkappaB)-kinase (IKK) complex containing two kinases (IKKalpha and IKKbeta) and the regulatory protein NEMO (NF-kappaB essential modifier). An amino-terminal alpha-helical region of NEMO associated with a carboxyl-terminal segment of IKKalpha and IKKbeta that we term the NEMO-binding domain (NBD). A cell-permeable NBD peptide blocked association of NEMO with the IKK complex and inhibited cytokine-induced NF-kappaB activation and NF-kappaB-dependent gene expression. The peptide also ameliorated inflammatory responses in two experimental mouse models of acute inflammation. The NBD provides a target for the development of drugs that would block proinflammatory activation of the IKK complex without inhibiting basal NF-kappaB activity.


Administration of interleukin-1 beta (IL-1 beta) before a lethal irradiation with or without allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (BMT) protects greater than 90% of the irradiated mice. To approach the mechanisms responsible for the radioprotective effect of IL-1, we examined the effects of IL-1 pretreatment on engraftment and kinetics of peripheral blood, spleen, and marrow cell reconstitution after irradiation and BMT. Although the BMT was not necessary for the survival of the IL-1-pretreated lethally irradiated mice, allogeneic marrow did engraft in these mice as evaluated in the spleen and marrow 2 months after BMT. IL-1 pretreatment significantly accelerated hematopoietic recovery versus transplanted saline-treated controls with a pronounced enhancement of peripheral leukocyte, platelet, and erythrocyte recovery. Leukocyte recovery in IL-1-pretreated mice was unique in that IL-1 first induced an early transient (maximum at day 7) increase of peripheral granulocytes before accelerating leukocyte recovery after day 11. IL-1 pretreatment also significantly enhanced marrow cell recovery after allogeneic BMT with an eightfold increase in marrow cellularity from day 4 to 11 versus control transplanted mice. When lethal irradiation was not followed by allogeneic BMT. IL-1 pretreatment also affected the peripheral reconstitution of leukocytes, platelets, and erythrocytes. Interestingly, in the absence of BMT, IL-1 also induced an early circulation of peripheral granulocytes. Overall, our data demonstrate that a single administration of IL-1 before lethal irradiation and allogeneic BMT can induce an early transient increase of circulating granulocytes, followed by an accelerated multilineage recovery and long-term allogeneic engraftment.


The yield of physical qubits fabricated in the laboratory is much lower than that of classical transistors in production semiconductor fabrication. Actual implementations of quantum computers will be susceptible to loss in the form of physically faulty qubits. Though these physical faults must negatively affect the computation, we can deal with them by adapting error-correction schemes. In this paper we have simulated statically placed single-fault lattices and lattices with randomly placed faults at functional qubit yields of 80%, 90%, and 95%, showing practical performance of a defective surface code by employing actual circuit constructions and realistic errors on every gate, including identity gates. We extend Stace et al's superplaquettes solution against dynamic losses for the surface code to handle static losses such as physically faulty qubits []. The single-fault analysis shows that a static loss at the periphery of the lattice has less negative effect than a static loss at the center. The randomly faulty analysis shows that 95% yield is good enough to build a large-scale quantum computer. The local gate error rate threshold is ∼ 0.3 % , and a code distance of seven suppresses the residual error rate below the original error rate at p = 0.1 % . 90% yield is also good enough when we discard badly fabricated quantum computation chips, while 80% yield does not show enough error suppression even when discarding 90% of the chips. We evaluated several metrics for predicting chip performance, and found that the average of the product of the number of data qubits and the cycle time of a stabilizer measurement of stabilizers gave the strongest correlation with logical error rates. Our analysis will help with selecting usable quantum computation chips from among the pool of all fabricated chips.


The genetic variation of Najdi, Harri and Awassi breeds of Saudi sheep prevailing in Raniah province of Makka district were assessed and compared to Sudanese Desert sheep using random amplified polymorphic DNA polymerase cahin reaction (RAPD-PCR) technique. Five primers successfully amplified distinguishable 40  bands with an average of 96% polymorphism revealing that Saudi sheep breeds possess the needed genetic variation required for further genetic improvement. The resulted dendrogram showed that, there are two main separate clades. The Desert sheep is genetically distant and appeared as out-group from the Saudi sheep breeds. The first main clade included all of the Najdi individuals and only two individuals from Harri breed. While, the second main clade comprised two subgroups, the first one included individuals from Harri breed and the second included both Harri and Awassi individuals. The cluster analysis shows that Najdi breed is  genetically different from both Harri and Awassi and that some Harri individuals showed genetic closeness to Awassi. The present study will help to clarify the image of the genetic diversity of these local Saudi sheep breeds in Raniah province and should be followed by further studies using advanced DNA markers and all  available breeds in the kingdom to get the precise estimation of the phylogeny of these local genetic resources. Key words: Dendrogram, biodiversity, Sudanese sheep, random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD), Saudi sheep.


Urban agriculture offers the opportunity to provide fresh, local food to urban communities. However, urban agriculture can only be successfully embedded in urban areas if consumers perceive urban farming positively and accept urban farms in their community. Success of urban agriculture is rooted in positive perception of those living close by, and the perception strongly affects acceptance of farming within individuals' direct proximity. This research investigates perception and acceptance of urban agriculture through a qualitative, exploratory field study with N = 19 residents from a major metropolitan area in the southwest U.S. Specifically, in this exploratory research we implement the method of concept mapping testing its use in the field of Agroecology and Ecosystem Services. In the concept mapping procedure, respondents are free to write down all the associations that come to mind when presented with a stimulus, such as, "urban farming." When applying concept mapping, participants are asked to recall associations and then directly link them to each other displaying their knowledge structure, i.e., perception. Data were analyzed using content analysis and semantic network analysis. Consumers' perception of urban farming is related to the following categories: environment, society, economy, and food and attributes. The number of positive associations is much higher than the number of negative associations signaling that consumers would be likely to accept farming close to where they live. Furthermore, our findings show that individuals' perceptions can differ greatly in terms of what they associate with urban farming and how they evaluate it. While some only think of a few things, others have well-developed knowledge structures. Overall, investigating consumers' perception helps designing strategies for the successful adoption of urban farming.


: The clinical course of implanted intraocular lenses is frequently complicated by the formation of deposits or "precipitates" on the lens surfaces. These lesions are related to the amount of inflammation in the eye, the use of pilocarpine, and the presence of lens cortex in extracapsular procedures. Corticosteroids cause the lesions to diminish or disappear. Similar lesions seen in the course of lens implantation in laboratory animals are found on histologic examination to be accumulations of inflammatory cells. In the chronic state the cells are macrophages, epithelioid cells, and giant cells, accompanied in the early stages by acute inflammatory leukocytes. The relationships between these cells, inflammation, the presence of the foreign body, and the chemistry of methacrylate are difficult to sort out.


: Descriptive anatomy teaches us that the lymphatic drainage of the bladder converges directly on to the middle and internal chains of the external iliac nodes, but never on to the external chain, sometimes on a sacral common iliac node and widely on internal iliac nodes. Surgical observations confirm this: no lymph node metastasis in the external chain of external iliac nodes is noticed, nor common iliac adenopathy without upstream invasion. On the basis of these descriptions, lymphadenectomy was performed from inguinal ligament to iliac bifurcation. Anatomical data largely explain pelvic recurrences due to the existence of unremoved common iliac nodes or unrecognized hypogastric nodes because of difficult access without sacrificing efferent branches of internal iliac artery.


Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), a major factor in tumor-host interactions, plays a critical role in the aberrant hematopoiesis observed in cancer-bearing hosts. To dissect the roles of VEGF receptor (VEGFR)-1 and VEGFR-2 in cancer-associated hematopoiesis in vivo, we selectively stimulated VEGFR-1 and VEGFR-2 by continuous infusion of receptor-specific ligands or selective blockade with VEGF receptor-specific antibodies in mice infused with recombinant VEGF at levels observed in tumor-bearing animals. We found that the effect of VEGF on the accumulation of Gr1(+)CD11b(+) cells is mediated by VEGFR-2, but that the 2 receptors have opposite effects on lymphocyte development. Pathophysiologic levels of VEGF strongly inhibit T-cell development via VEGFR-2, whereas VEGFR-1 signaling decreases this inhibition. VEGFR-1, and not VEGFR-2, signaling is responsible for the observed increase of splenic B cells. Both receptors are capable of inhibiting dendritic cell function. These data suggest that most of observed aberrant hematopoiesis caused by excess tumor-derived VEGF is mediated by VEGFR-2, and VEGFR-1 alone has very limited independent effects but clearly both positively and negatively modulates the effects of VEGFR-2. Our findings suggest that selective blockade of VEGFR-2 rather than of both receptors may optimally overcome the adverse hematologic consequences of elevated VEGF levels found in malignancy.


Tripterygium wilfordii Hook.f and Tripterygium hypoglaucum (H.Lév.) Hutch is effective herbs to prevent aggravation of Rheumatoid arthritis (RA). However, both of them show severe side effects in the reproductive system and other systems. Kunxian Capsule (KX), a Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) patent prescription, comprised of 4 herbs, including H.Lév. Hutch, is reported to be an available prescription in treating RA with fewer side effects as compares to Tripterygium tablets. To reveal the pharmacological mechanism of KX in RA treatment and side effect alleviation, we collected related information of KX from open-access databases and performed various analyses. 1354 targets were identified in KX. These targets were enriched in the calcium signaling pathway, cAMP signaling pathway, cGMP-PKG signaling pathway and PI3K-AKT signaling pathway, forming biological functions, such as cofactor binding, coenzyme binding, etc. These pathways or functions mostly affect cell cycle, differentiation, and maturation of Th17 cells, macrophage, and synovial fibroblast. These targets also act on the IL-17 signaling pathway, Th17 cell differentiation signaling pathway and TNF signaling pathway, which is related to inflammation response inhibition. Next, a disease network was constructed, which indicated IMPDH2, MTHFD1 are the key genes answering for the side effects of H.Lév. Hutch. The side effect–related genes lead to the negative regulation of nucleic acid, which could be restored by the rest 3 herbs through some positive amino acid metabolism. In conclusion, KX is a relatively safe alternative approach in RA intervention.


Background: Negative outcomes related to prematurity may lead to maternal distress. Mothers of premature/low birth-weight infants report increased posttraumatic stress (50%) and depressive symptoms (63%) compared with mothers of full-term infants. Low-income, minority mothers with greater posttraumatic stress and depression have an increased risk for premature/low birth-weight delivery compared with their white counterparts. Variations in the neuropeptide oxytocin are implicated in lactation, perinatal depression, and maternal behavior. Purpose: To examine the associations among posttraumatic stress, depressive symptoms, and oxytocin in a pilot sample of minority mothers with premature/low birth-weight infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Methods: This study employed a descriptive, correlational pilot design of 8 minority, low-income mothers with premature/low birth-weight infants. Participants answered questionnaires pertaining to posttraumatic stress, depression, lactation, and demographics and oxytocin was measured. This is a substudy that added oxytocin values. Results: Four participants had elevated depressive symptoms and 5 supplied their own milk. Women who provided their own milk had lower depressive (t = 3.03, P = .023) and posttraumatic stress (t = 3.39, P = .015) symptoms compared with women not supplying their own milk. Women with elevated posttraumatic stress had higher levels of depressive symptoms (r(8) = 0.8, P = .006) and lower levels of oxytocin (r(8) = 0.77, P = .026). Implications for Practice: These results are congruent with previous literature on providing human milk and maternal mental health. In addition, we found a possible relationship between postpartum posttraumatic stress and oxytocin in minority women with premature/low birth-weight infants. NICU nurses should encourage lactation and assess mothers for posttraumatic stress and depressive symptoms. Implications for Research: Research is needed to identify the biologic milieu associated with posttraumatic stress and depression in at-risk mothers.


Background As part of the 'Jimma Exchange Scheme', staff from Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust travelled to Jimma, Ethiopia to observe working practices in the Obstetrics department of the University Hospital in November 2009. Objectives To provide skills training for residents, midwives and medical students and to audit the unit's obstetric outcomes for the preceding 6 months. Methods Skills training was performed with small groups of participants of mixed skill levels, focusing on emergencies including neonatal resuscitation, breech delivery, postpartum haemorrhage and shoulder dystocia. Audit was performed by retrospective data collection from the theatre records and maternity unit discharge book with difficulty due to large amounts of missing data. Audit results 1019 women delivered 1027 babies over 6 months. 14 maternal deaths occurred (1374 per 100 000 maternities). 117 fetal deaths (11.4% of births). 68 peripartum hysterectomies (6.7% of women). 390 caesarean sections (38%). Birthweight <2.5 kg 7%. Birthweight >4.0 kg 2.2%. Recommendations Development of guidelines to improve practice. Change in working practices to allow greater supervision of trainees and involvement of midwifery staff, allowing better interdisciplinary working. Improvements in documentation of outcomes, facilitating further audit, establishing whether changes have improved outcomes. Conclusions The Nottingham visitors had a wonderful and productive visit. They received a great welcome and generous hospitality. There were many positives in the visit and at the top of that list were the enthusiasm, knowledge and clinical skill of the junior doctors. We have made suggestions for future collaboration and improvement in care for pregnant women and their babies.


Rudolph's Fundamentals of Pediatrics Rudolph, Kamei Pub: Appleton & Lange 748pps ISBN 0-8385-8236-2 £26.95 It is difficult to define the readership for the current edition of Rudolph's Fundamentals of Paediatrics. While (in the absence of a system for prioritisation of information, as is the case with this text) it is far too detailed for the undergraduate medical student the claim that it can be 'relied upon by pediatric....residents ' is also difficult to support. One important reason for its relative unsuitability as a postgraduate paediatric textbook is its inadequate treatment of the pathophysiological basis of childhood disease (I was surprised to find 'emphasis on pathophysiology' listed as an important feature of this book). The clinical problem-solving approach, however, does make it a useful reference handbook for the ward library. S. Mukhopadhyay


Interdependence among States in an era of globalization exacerbates the increasing emphasis on competing claims of national interest in the global arena. Rising nationalism is a symptom of the weakness of conception of transnational governance that insufficiently coordinates public and private interactions across multiple systems of governance which overlap on matters of common interest such as labour standards. The State-centric system of world governance lacks effective structures to bridge the gap between transnational labour governance ('TLG') and national, interstate, and international governance. However, emerging evidence suggests that the State is capable of facilitating inclusive and consensual action with non-state bodies of collective interest at national and transnational levels that helps connect TLG with national and international governance. This review compares differing degrees and methods of State action in selected TLG prototypes and their outcomes relevant to public and private policy choices affecting decent work and equal opportunity for well-being. Particular focus is placed on the State's role in attributing private authority to non-state bodies of collective interest, facilitating consensual decision-making and regulatory action, aligning TLG with international norms and relevant national law and institutions, and cooperating in TLG with other States, including with or through international organizations. Challenges to effective TLG, such as opting-out, competing structures, and difficulty in leveraging short-term initiatives for longer-term capacity, are examined within the context of the legitimacy and coherence of TLG systems and across phases of governance, including agenda setting, norm development, implementation, oversight, evaluation, correction and revision. Preliminary conclusions call for further theoretical and empirical research to evaluate factors that influence such innovations and the extent to which they lead to durable and effective TLG within and across States that advances decent work and equal opportunity for well-being in globalized markets.


This paper reports the results of a survey of 56 United States (U.S.) and 25 international construction project managers. Project management areas and related tools important to international construction project management success are identified and analyzed. The results show that significant gaps exist between the existing body of knowledge and the practice of international project management in relation to variables that are relevant to construction project management success. Also reported are the differences between U.S. construction project managers and their international counterparts concerning the art and practice of project management. The implications of the findings of this study to business organizations and institutions of higher learning are examined in the context of a conceptual research framework.


Inverters used as the interface for a distributed generator in a three-phase four-wire system sometimes operate with a large neutral current because of unbalanced loads and single-phase (possibly nonlinear) loads. Voltage balance within the dc-link of the inverter is important for proper operation of the inverter, and the neutral current is a significant disturbance to this. It is preferable to use fast acting control rather than dissipative balancing or large-valued capacitors. This paper develops a linear model of an actively balanced split dc-link and applies Hinfin control design to provide high-bandwidth robust control. The approach is developed for a conventional two-level inverter, but it remains valid (without change) for a three-level neutral-point clamped inverter. The controller achieves very small deviations of the neutral point (better than 0.5 in 800 V) from the midpoint of the dc source despite the large neutral current (32 ARMS). The controller design is described and verified first in a PSCAD simulation and second in experimental testing of a 30-kW 415-V (line) inverter


Acinetobacter baumannii is a Gram-negative organism reported worldwide as a cause of health-care-associated infections, particularly in intensive care units (ICUs). The aim of this study is to describe the emergence and spread of carbapenem-resistant A. baumannii (CRAB) isolates in hospitalized patients. From March to November 2009, multidrug-resistant CRAB isolates were obtained from 21 patients hospitalized in different wards (mostly ICUs). Antimicrobial susceptibility was determined by using the Etest method. Carbapenem and aminoglycoside resistance determinants were studied by PCR and sequencing. Genetic relatedness was investigated by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis and multiplex PCR identification of sequence groups. Clinical records of patients were examined retrospectively. CRAB isolates were consistently resistant to multiple drugs including fluoroquinolones and aminoglycosides, whereas they retained a susceptibility to colistin. Molecular analysis revealed that 19 of the 21 CRAB isolates belonged to a single clone producing both the carbapenemase OXA-23 and the 16S rRNA methylase ArmA. Based on clinical data, the patients included in the study were classified as infected (n=13) or colonized (n=8). Colistin alone or in combination with ampicillin-sulbactam was administered to 11 of the 13 infected patients. A complete or partial response was obtained in eight cases, whereas a failure to respond was observed in one patient and a relapse was observed in two patients. An A. baumannii clone producing both OXA-23 and ArmA has been identified as an emerging and rapidly spreading pathogen. To our knowledge, this is the first report of the ArmA enzyme in A. baumannii in Italy and is the first report of hospital dissemination of A. baumannii carrying both bla(OXA-23) and armA genes.


The research sought to objectively evaluate the effectiveness of Texas standard AP open-enrollment charter school campuses and to discover independent variables that may be utilized to predict effective charter school campuses. The literature review was designed to enhance the current understanding of charter schools and therefore facilitate a more effective evaluation of them. A basic knowledge and understanding of the origins, characteristics and purposes of charters allow for a more objective analysis. The literature review covered the history of charters including their founders, characteristics, and growth patterns. The data items used in the analyses were downloaded from the 2007-2008 Academic Excellence Indicator System (AEIS), which contains a variety of data from all Texas public schools. Multiple statistical analyses were utilized including chi-square, ANOVA, multiple regression and discriminate analysis. In order to evaluate Texas standard AP open enrollment charter campuses, their accountability ratings were compared with those of standard AP traditional public school campuses. The research evaluated twelve independent variables for charter schools to determine their relationship to accountability ratings, thereby providing charter operators indicators or predictors of accountability ratings to facilitate better academic quality. By analyzing the same variables for traditional public schools as charter schools, a baseline model was developed to compare the similarities and differences with the results of the charter school analyses.


Vicat softening temperature (VST) is one of the most important parameters to evaluate heat resistance of thermoplastic materials. However, the initial test temperature is difficult to control, which may reduce the testing efficiency and the precision of VST. Moreover, according to the procedure of GB/T 1633-2000, the specimen should be placed horizontally under the indenting tip of unloaded rod for 5min. After that, add a sufficient weight to the weight-carrying plate, and then set the penetration indicator to zero to start the experiment. However, the waiting period between adding the extra mass and starting the test may be different during the real operation. Such longer or shorter waiting periods can also influence the tested VST. In this paper, ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) was used to discuss the influence of initial temperature and waiting period on its final VST. The results show that, in order to satisfy the practices of standard GB/T 1633-2000, the initial temperature and the waiting period should not exceed 40°C and 25min, respectively.


Big data is the new oil – but who has the right to own it? Is the owner the creator of the individual data or the owners of data processing systems which add value to the mass of data – or should the information be shared for free with state institutions, for example, with the goal of limiting the amounts of traffic accidents in the city? This is one of the debates of our time. However, it seems that current frameworks, whether regarding ip law or trade secrets regulations, do not provide sufficient answers. Problems also arise with the offer of contractual relationships or licensing. That initiates the thought that a new type of regulation might be needed.


Abstract. Urbanization has a profound influence on regional meteorology and air quality
in megapolitan Southern California. The influence of urbanization on
meteorology is driven by changes in land surface physical properties and land
surface processes. These changes in meteorology in turn influence air quality
by changing temperature-dependent chemical reactions and emissions,
gas–particle phase partitioning, and ventilation of pollutants. In this study
we characterize the influence of land surface changes via historical
urbanization from before human settlement to the present day on meteorology and
air quality in Southern California using the Weather Research and Forecasting
Model coupled to chemistry and the single-layer urban canopy model
(WRF–UCM–Chem). We assume identical anthropogenic emissions for the
simulations carried out and thus focus on the effect of changes in land
surface physical properties and land surface processes on air quality.
Historical urbanization has led to daytime air temperature decreases of up to
1.4 K and evening temperature increases of up to 1.7 K. Ventilation of air
in the LA basin has decreased up to 36.6 % during daytime and increased
up to 27.0 % during nighttime. These changes in meteorology are mainly
attributable to higher evaporative fluxes and thermal inertia of soil from
irrigation and increased surface roughness and thermal inertia from
buildings. Changes in ventilation drive changes in hourly
NOx concentrations with increases of up to 2.7 ppb during
daytime and decreases of up to 4.7 ppb at night. Hourly O3
concentrations decrease by up to 0.94 ppb in the morning and increase by up
to 5.6 ppb at other times of day. Changes in O3 concentrations are
driven by the competing effects of changes in ventilation and precursor
NOx concentrations. PM2.5 concentrations show slight
increases during the day and decreases of up to 2.5 µg m−3
at night. Process drivers for changes in PM2.5 include modifications
to atmospheric ventilation and temperature, which impact gas–particle phase
partitioning for semi-volatile compounds and chemical reactions.
Understanding process drivers related to how land surface changes effect
regional meteorology and air quality is crucial for decision-making on urban
planning in megapolitan Southern California to achieve regional climate
adaptation and air quality improvements.


Context-free grammars are suitable for formalizing the syntax of programming languages concisely and declaratively. Thus, such grammars are often found in reference manuals of programming languages, and used in language workbenches for language prototyping. However, the natural and concise way of writing a context-free grammar is often ambiguous. Safe and complete declarative disambiguation of operator precedence and associativity conflicts guarantees that all ambiguities arising from combining the operators of the language are resolved. Ambiguities can occur due to shallow conflicts, which can be captured by one-level tree patterns, and deep conflicts, which require more elaborate techniques. Approaches to solve deep priority conflicts include grammar transformations, which may result in large unambiguous grammars, or may require adapted parser technologies to include data-dependency tracking at parse time. In this paper we study deep priority conflicts "in the wild". We investigate the efficiency of grammar transformations to solve deep priority conflicts by using a lazy parse table generation technique. On top of lazily-generated parse tables, we define metrics, aiming to answer how often deep priority conflicts occur in real-world programs and to what extent programmers explicitly disambiguate programs themselves. By applying our metrics to a small corpus of popular open-source repositories we found that in OCaml, up to 17% of the source files contain deep priority conflicts.


AmpC ?-lactamases hydrolyze penicillins, cephalosporins and cephamycins and resist inhibition by clavulanate, sulbactam, and tazobactam. Strains with AmpC genes are inherently resistant to multiple agents, making the selection of an effective antibiotic difficult. This present work sought to investigate the occurrence of AmpC beta-lactamases-producing phenotypes in E. coli and K. pneumoniae and their antimicrobial sensitivity profile. Four hundred K. pneumoniae and E. coli non-duplicate isolates were collected and their antibiotic sensitivity testing for cefoxitin and other 16 antibiotics were determined using Vitek 2 Compact System (bioMerieux, Marcy I'Etoile, France).  The isolates resistant to cefoxitin were confirmed as AmpC beta-lactamases-producing phenotypes with disk synergy testing (DST) using cefotaxime or ceftazidime with or without boronic acid. An increase in zone diameter of ?5mm in the presence of boronic acid indicates the presence of AmpC beta-lactamases in the test organism. The results showed that of the 50 cefoxitin resistant isolates screened from 400 bacterial isolates, 5(10%) were AmpC beta-lactamase-producers with 60%, 60%, 60%, 80% and 100% multiply antibiotic resistance in gentamicin, ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin, trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole and tetracycline respectively. Nitrofurantoin which indicated 100% susceptibility with MIC 90 of 32µg/ml may be a therapeutic option especially for non-life-threatening urinary tract infection. Imipenem was the antibiotic of choice with 100% susceptibility rates (MIC 90 of ?1µg/ml). Though the insignificant (p>0.05) levels of AmpC beta-lactamase phenotypes may not require routine detection in health facilities, there is the need to implement evolutionary antibiotic administration policies and pragmatic infection control measures in the hospitals.      Keywords : AmpC beta-lactamase, Cefoxitin, ?-lactams, E. coli , K. pneumoniae


Crystal structure and microwave dielectric properties of (Ca1-xPrx) [(Li1/3Nb2/3)0.95Zr0.15]3+δ (0.0≤x≤0.2, CPLNZ) ceramics were investigated. A single phase with orthorhombic perovskite structure was obtained at x=0.0~0.08. With an increase of Pr3+ content, the quality factor value firstly increased, and then began to decrease at x=0.06 due to a decrease of the degree of B-site 1:2 ordering. The variation of τf with tolerance factor was discussed. When x=0.06, the optimum microwave dielectric properties: the permittivity is 33.2, the quality factor is 17120 GHz,and the temperature coefficient of resonator frequency is −5.7×10−6/°C.


Response of demand, distributed generation and electricity storage (e.g. vehicle to grid) will be crucial for power systems management in the future smart electricity grid. In this paper, we describe recent results using PowerMatcher a smart grid technology that integrates demand and supply flexibility in the operation of the electricity system through the use of dynamic pricing. Over the last few years, this technology has been researched and developed into a market-ready system, and has been used in a number of successful field deployments. Recent field experiences and simulation studies show the potential of the technology for network operations (e.g. congestion management and black-start support), for market operations (e.g. virtual power plant operations), and integration of large-scale wind power generation. The scalability of the technology, i.e. the ability to perform well under mass-application circumstances, has been demonstrated in a targeted field experiment. This paper gives an overview of the results of two field deployments and three large simulation studies. In these deployments and simulations, demand and supply response from real and simulated electrical vehicles, household appliances and heating systems (heat pumps and micro co-generation) has been successfully coordinated to reach specific smart grid goals.


Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) are widely used in vehicle navigation applications. GNSS mostly suffer from atmospheric conditions and urban buildings. Due to urban buildings, GNSS signals are blocked and it is likely that the number of available satellites is insufficient to compute position fix. Classical integrity concepts do not regard local cases which appears a likely case in the vehicle navigation domain. Recent studies discuss about local integrity concept to overcome this problem in urban locations. However technical applicability using feasible resources is low. In this paper, we present a local integrity heat map that indicates possible urban canyons and estimate positioning error given the location and time of the measurement. Local integrity heat map is designed as a digital map attribute which will be used as other sensor information at the time of position sensor fusion to enhance localization and map matching. Real world field tests show that local integrity heat map is a good indicator of position fix error.


Matched mask bone elimination (MMBE) is a technique for the automatic removal of bone pixels from CT angiography data sets. We describe the use of this technique in two patients with the clinical suspicion of dural sinus thrombosis. We conclude that multisection CT venography with MMBE is a useful adjunct for the visualization of the intracranial venous circulation by removing bone from the image. In contrast to techniques described previously, MMBE is fully automated and operator independent.


We determine the spectral dimensions of a variety of ensembles of infinite trees. Common to the ensembles considered is that sample trees have a distinguished infinite spine at whose vertices branches can be attached according to some probability distribution. In particular, we consider a family of ensembles of $\textit{combs}$, whose branches are linear chains, with spectral dimensions varying continuously between $1$ and $3/2$. We also introduce a class of ensembles of infinite trees, called $\textit{generic random trees}$, which are obtained as limits of ensembles of finite trees conditioned to have fixed size $N$, as $N \to \infty$. Among these ensembles is the so-called uniform random tree. We show that generic random trees have spectral dimension $d_s=4/3$.


The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act provided the most comprehensive update to the tax code in two decades. Born of it was the federal opportunity zone legislation that facilitates economic development in historically distressed areas by offering tax incentives. But does this "catalyst of economic growth" provide the needed relief and opportunity to the communities which it's aimed to serve? This piece is an analysis of opportunity zones—the good, the bad, and the yet to be defined and their effect on actually curbing (or accelerating) gentrification. By considering the TCJA in general, this work evaluates stipulations regarding "Opportunity Zones," and the concept of geographically-targeted tax policy. First, an analogization of supply-side tax policy and place-based incentivization programs; following the analysis of supply-side economics and its influence on a rising inequality; and a two-fold assessment of the factors most germane to this analysis: a historical overview of the ideological, legislative, and social factors most pivotal to the passage of TCJA, reforms are shown to have culminated not only in sky-high levels of wealth and income inequality in the U.S., but also an increasing distance and isolation between the wealthy 'investor class' targeted by 'Opportunity Zone' legislation, and the economically-distressed communities which such tax-based legislative incentives were designed to bring relief. Notably, this work will consider the impact of such legislation upon poor areas, both in terms of the apparent impact it has had upon local development and with respect to the phenomenon known as gentrification. After examining the shortfalls of the legislation, this paper offers recommendations on a robust, comprehensive response toward equitable growth for the communities intended to be served.


The presence of fillets, rounds, chamfers and grooves is typical of many real-world mechanical components. Such features introduce in the model various topological and geometrical modifications, which may alter the correct understanding of its main features. Another drawback which hinders the correct engineering evaluation of a part is that its geometrical and topological representation is not unique, since it depends either on the different procedures used to generate CAD models or on the different internal representation of the geometric kernels used by CAD packages. The overall aim of this work is to define an intermediate representation scheme, which incorporates information about minor features such as chamfers, fillets, rounds and grooves into a graph based representation and overcomes the problem of non-uniqueness in the geometric representation. The representation scheme discussed here takes as input a solid model in B-rep form, and provides a description of a part at a higher level of abstraction in comparison with the raw B-rep description. A procedure for secondary features recognition is also described in this paper. The proposed algorithm consists of two steps where both topological/geometrical properties and dimensional attributes are investigated in order to fulfill a correct recognition. The recognized secondary features are then inserted into the model as labels, which qualify the relationships between the faces of the graph representation. The resulting modeling scheme can be conveniently used for primary feature recognition as well as for other engineering analysis/simulation purposes.


Understanding the patterns and relationships between vegetation productivity and climatic conditions is essential for predicting the future impacts of climate change. Climate change is altering precipitation patterns and increasing temperatures in the Southwest United States. The large-scale and long-term effects of these changes on vegetation productivity are not well understood. This study investigates the patterns and relationships between seasonal vegetation productivity, represented by Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and the Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) across the Mojave, Sonoran, and Chihuahuan Deserts and the Apache Highlands of the Southwest United States over 16 years from 2000 to 2015. To examine the spatiotemporal gradient and response of vegetation productivity to dry and wet conditions, we evaluated the linear trend of different SPEI timescales and correlations between NDVI and SPEI. We found that all four ecoregions are experiencing more frequent and severe drought conditions in recent years as measured by negative SPEI trends and severe negative SPEI values. We found that changes in NDVI were more strongly correlated with winter rather than summer water availability. Investigating correlations by vegetation type across all four ecoregions, we found that grassland and shrubland productivity were more dependent on summer water availability whereas sparse vegetation and forest productivity were more dependent on winter water availability. Our results can inform resource management and enhance our understanding of vegetation vulnerability to climate change.


The evaluation of finite strain in naturally deformed rocks is restricted by the limited occurrence of good natural strain indicators which are also homogeneous with respect to the matrix. This problem is overcome by establishing the relation between measured finite strain and those physical behaviour characteristics of rocks that are dependent upon the anisotropy resulting from deformation. Accordingly, the strain measured from natural indicators is calibrated against ( degree of preferred orientation, (b) magnetic susceptibility anisotropy, and (r) seismic anisotropy. This _ will permit three approaches to be used independently for the evaluation of strain, provided that a minimal number of actual strains are available. The relation between measured strain and the degree of preferred orientation of layer silicates as revealed by X-ray transmission goniometry is established for a group of fine grained tectonites of dominantly planar fabric which have an average deformation ellipsoid of form 1.6:1 :,0.26. The strains measured from the degree of preferred orientation are in remarkable agreement with those measured from natural strain indicators. The measured deformation ellipsoids for a wide range of strains are also compared to the correlative ellipsoids of magnetic susceptibility anisotropy. The axes of both sets of ellipsoids are coincidental and the shape relationship between deformation and magnetic susceptibility ellipsoids is established by linear regression. Finally, the anisotropy of seismic velocities is determined by measuring the pseudocompressional velocity and two orthogonally polarized pseudo shear wave velocities for each of a minimum of nine non-coplanar directions. The velocity surfaces thus obtained define an elastic or seismic velocity anisotropy ellipsoid, the axes of which are also precisely coincidental with those of the finite deformation ellipsoid. The influence of rock fabric upon seismic velocities is such that for a rock which has undergone a principal finite extension of 135 % and a finite shortening of 65 %, the difference of compressional and shear wave velocities between these two directions is in the ratio 1.26:1 for P waves and 1.33:1 for S waves.


The preparation of this dissertation was mainly motivated by the desire to provide an overview of study on common defects in the resort. The study has specific aim and objectives. The primary aim of this study is to determine the common defects on the selected area. The second objective is to identify the satisfaction level of the occupants and users in the resort. Third objective is identifying the area of the resort and their facilities and also to define the construction method of the resort and last objective is to give recommendations on the methods and techniques for the remedies. This dissertation includes the outlines of the introduction to the subjects and each sub topic, and also explained elaborate about the resort, characteristic of resort and the design of the resort. Research methodology which had been applied in the three case studies is through by making a questionnaire to the building user include everyone. From the analysis it can be found that the defects on the building at three case studies are not harmful to the management of the resort and also to the guest, and also to the building structure itself. The major problem on those three case study building which is level of maintenance, several defect on structure and the user satisfaction of the building facilities and conditions that overall are in good condition. Finally, conclusion from the research findings and development of recommendations for future improvement on government building selected and other building related.


Measuring grating profiles is very helpful for the analysis of specifications of gratings and improvement of grating fabrication techniques. We analyzed grating grooves by digitizing the scanning-electron microscope (SEM) images. Some kinds of filter and arithmetic were developed to extract the contour line of grating profile. In order to analyze the diffraction efficiency affected by the shape of grating profile, the calculated diffraction efficiency based on the SEM image and measured diffraction efficiency based on experiment was compared and analyzed.


This paper addresses a reduced complexity one-dimensional loop filter to simultaneously reduce blocking and ringing artifacts of H.26L video coder. A new one-dimensional regularized smoothing functional is defined and the regularization parameters controlling the degree of smoothness to two neighboring directions are determined by coded block pattern and quantization step size which are available both in the encoder and decoder. Therefore, no information is necessary to obtain the recovered image from the compressed video. The experimental results show the capability of the proposed algorithm.


Abstract Morali, Akkopru, and Kurbas Rivers are rivers flowing into Van Lake passing through the highly populated Van City, Turkey. They carry domestic and industrial wastewater to Van Lake. For assessment of the environmental load from these rivers to the lake, a sampling investigation from October 2019 to September 2020 was carried out. Chemical oxygen demand, biochemical oxygen demand, and nitrogenous compound levels were also examined. Linear alkylbenzene sulfonates ranged up to 0.40 mg L−1 (Kurubas River), the mean phosphate was 0.96 mg L−1, and the mean boron 1.2 mg L−1. According to Turkish surface water quality regulations, while Morali and Akkopru Rivers were determined as class II (less contaminated), Kurubas River was found as class III (polluted).


Deep neural networks (DNNs) are continuously expanding their application to various domains due to their high performance. Nevertheless, a well-trained DNN after deployment could oftentimes raise errors during practical use in the operational environment due to the mismatching between distributions of the training dataset and the potential unknown noise factors in the operational environment, e.g., weather, blur, noise, etc. Hence, it poses a rather important problem for the DNNs' real-world applications: how to repair the deployed DNNs for correcting the failure samples under the deployed operational environment while not harming their capability of handling normal or clean data with limited failure samples we can collect. In this article, we propose a style-guided data augmentation for repairing DNN in the operational environment, which learns and introduces the unknown failure patterns within the failure samples into the training data via the style transfer. Moreover, we further propose the clustering-based failure data generation for much more effective style-guided data augmentation. We conduct a large-scale evaluation with 15 degradation factors that may happen in the real world and compare with four state-of-the-art data augmentation methods and two DNN repairing methods. Our technique successfully repairs three convolutional neural networks and two recurrent neural networks with averaging 62.88% and 39.02% accuracy enhancements on the 15 failure patterns, respectively, achieving higher repairing performance than state-of-the-art repairing methods on the most failure patterns with even better accuracy on clean datasets.