Children less than five years of age are at a risk of growth failure worldwide. The
South African National Food Consumption Survey (NFCS) of 1999 showed that
25.5% of children aged 1 - 3 years were stunted. Poor growth of young children in
developing countries (South Africa included) has been associated with multiple
micronutrient deficiencies because of the use of starchy plant-based complementary
foods with little variety, especially among resource poor households. Dietary
diversification through the use of crop and livestock production has been
recommended as a strategy to improve the micronutrient intake and food security of
households in resource poor settings.
This study was a cross sectional secondary analysis of the South African NFCS of
1999 data, designed to investigate the impact of crop and livestock production on
nutrient intake, dietary diversity, intake of selected food groups, hunger perceptions
and anthropometric status of children aged 1 - 3 years in South Africa. Children
from households producing crops only (n=211), crops and livestock (n=110),
livestock only (n=93) and non-producers were compared at the national, in rural
areas and among households with a total income of less than R12 000.00 per
household per year.
In rural areas and among households with a total income of less than R12 000.00 per
household per year, children in the crops and livestock group had higher nutrient
intakes for energy, vitamin 86, calcium and folate than the other groups (p<0.05),
while the crops only group had higher nutrient intakes for vitamin A and vitamin C.
The majority of children in all the four study groups had less than 67% of the RDAs
for vitamin A, vitamin C, folate, calcium, iron and zinc. In addition , children in all the
groups had a median dietary diversity score of four out of 13 food groups. In rural
areas and among low income households, higher percentages (over 60%) of children
in the crops only group consumed vegetables while the non-producers group was the
lowest (47.7%). The non-producers group had the highest percentages of children
consuming meat and meat products and the crops and livestock and livestock only
groups had the lowest percentages. In both rural areas and among households withlow income, the majority of the households in all the study groups were experiencing
hunger. In rural areas, one in five households were food secure.
Crop and livestock production improved the nutrient intake and the intake of
vegetables of children in rural and poor households. However, nutrient intakes were
not adequate to meet the recommended nutrient levels. The high levels of food
insecurity require support of these households to increase crop and livestock
production and, integration of nutrition education to increase the consumption of the
produced products.


'In an old house in Paris that was covered in vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines...' Pepito lives next door to Madeline and her friends. When he moves to London, he pines for the twelve little girls terribly. So Mis Clavel and her charges pay him a visit in London...and come home with a new friend! The small but feisty heroine, Madeline, and her charming Parisian world have been loved by children and adults alike for over sevnty years.


Robustness is a key property for critical systems that run in uncertain environments, to ensure that small input perturbations can cause only small output changes. Current critical systems often involve lots of floating-point computations which are inexact. Robustness analysis of floating-point programs needs to consider both the uncertain inputs and the inexact computation. In this paper, we propose to leverage the idea of self-composition to transform the robustness
analysis problem into a reachability problem, which enables the use of standard reachability analysis techniques such as software model checking and symbolic
execution for robustness analysis. To handle floating-point arithmetic, we employ an abstraction that encompasses the effect of rounding and that can encompass
all rounding modes. It converts floating-point expressions into linear expressions with interval coefficients in exact real arithmetic. On this basis, we employ interval
linear programming to compute the maximum output change or maximum allowed input perturbation for the abstracted programs. Preliminary experimental
results of our prototype implementation are encouraging.


Following India's independence, it was widely recognized and accepted that agriculture remains the backbone of the economy. Mainly two types of innovations came into prominence to develop agriculture sector- one, institutional changes and at the second place technological innovations. Among the institutional changes "land to the tiller" was the avowed objective and this led to abolition of Zamindari system in various states, launching of Bhoodan Movement and promoting cooperative farming. This was also supplemented with technological innovations- starting of multipurpose hydropower projects and later on 'Green Revolution' with four major components. The present paper has attempted to estimate marginal productivity of labour and capital for agro based central public sector enterprises in Indian industry for the period 2002-2007, and the results are quite mixed. The empirical evidence of the present paper has established the fact that elasticity as well as marginal productivity of labour was highly insignificant in case of public sector agro enterprises.


Latency of pseudorabies virus (PRV) was established in 8 of 9 pigs born to 2 vaccinated sows. Pigs had high, low, or no maternal antibody titers at the time of the initial inoculation. At postinoculation months 3 to 4, latent PRV could be reactivated in vivo by the administration of large doses of corticosteroids. In most pigs, the stress-simulating treatment resulted in recrudescence of virus shedding after lag periods of 4 to 11 days. In 3 pigs, virus shedding was without clinical signs of disease, whereas clinical signs that developed in 4 pigs appeared to be due to the corticosteroid treatment, rather than to the reactivation of PRV. Pigs with a log10 neutralizing antibody titer of less than or equal to 2.55 at the onset of corticosteroid treatment had a booster response. Reactivated PRV spread to sentinel pigs housed with the inoculated pigs. Reactivation of PRV was also demonstrated in vitro. Explant cultures of trigeminal ganglia from pigs killed between postinoculation months 4 to 5 produced infectious virus. Restriction endonuclease analysis indicated that the reactivated PRV was indistinguishable from virus isolated shortly after the primary infection. Seemingly, pigs with maternal antibodies can become latently infected and therefore may be regarded as potential sources of dissemination of PRV.


This paper describes the design and control of a novel hand exoskeleton. A subcategory of upper extremity exoskeletons, hand exoskeletons have promising applications in healthcare services, industrial workplaces, virtual reality, and military. Although much progress has been made in this field, most of the existing systems are position controlled and face several design challenges, including achieving minimal size and weight, difficulty enforcing natural grasping motions, exerting sufficient grip strength, ensuring the safety of the users hand, and maintaining overall user friendliness. To address these issues, this paper proposes a novel, slim, lightweight linkage mechanism design for a hand exoskeleton with a force control paradigm enabled via a compact series elastic actuator. A detailed design overview of the proposed mechanism is provided, along with kinematic and static analyses. To validate the overall proposed hand exoskeleton system, a fully integrated prototype is developed and tested in a series of experimental trials.


There are many earthquake catalogs covering California, but none includes everything one would like to have for constructing and testing hypotheses of earthquake occurrence. Perhaps it is most obvious that focal mechanism estimates are needed in many phases of earthquake forecasting and evaluation. They are needed for estimating the stress increments from past earthquakes, for identifying those earthquakes that have been encouraged by known previous earthquakes, and for testing models that forecast focal mechanisms as well as location and magnitude. Focal mechanisms are available for recent, instrumentally recorded earthquakes, but they are not yet uniformly available for all relevant quakes, and there are often alternate solutions for recent events. Some focal mechanisms are available for large historic (that is, pre-instrumental) earthquakes, but these estimates are generally scattered through the literature rather than systematically cataloged. Instrumentally determined focal mechanisms are clearly best, but estimated ones can still be useful. Measured focal mechanisms show some degree of regularity that can be exploited to estimate unmeasured ones from nearby measured values.

Some earthquake forecasts explicitly apply to mainshocks as well as aftershocks, while others, like the source model for the 2002 National Seismic Hazard Map, are meant to apply to mainshocks only. For those reasons it would be convenient to have a catalog in which all known events are included, but which labels aftershocks in a way that they can be removed or down-weighted as needed.

Earthquake catalog data, like any other results, are subject to errors. Location errors for historic earthquakes and magnitude errors for all events could well affect the assessment of an earthquake forecast. Statistical tests can and should account for the uncertainties in catalog data. To date, such tests have not been employed for earthquake forecasts, in part because the uncertainties are poorly understood. It is well known that …


A descriptive survey was carried out with the aim of determining the health related quality of life (HRQOL) of hospitalised children with chronic illness. Data was collected from 148 children with chronic illness admitted in selected paediatric wards of tertiary care hospitals and their parents. The results showed that 51 percent of the children scored below the median of total HRQOL score. Children with cancer 34 (91.9%) and thalassemia 33 (89.2%) reported a low HRQOL. Children with chronic illness especially cancer and thalassemia had significantly low HRQOL compared to children with other illnesses. Gender, diagnosis, frequency of hospitalisation, duration of illness and type of treatment received were the predictive of HRQOL of these children.


Two studies, in vitro and in the green house, were conducted to determine the efficacy of some Saudi Trichoderma isolates against Meloidogyne javanica. The isolates included: Trichoderma hamatum (one isolate), T. viride (one isolate), T. asperellum (three isolates), T. atroviride (one isolate) and T. harzianum (two isolates). In vitro , results showed that all eight tested isolates and their culture filtrates were effective at different levels, in egg hatch inhibition and mortality of juvenile (J 2 ). The mortality of J 2 and un-hatching of eggs increased as the concentrations of the culture filtrates increased. In general, T. harzianum (isolate No.27), T. hamatum (isolate No.5) and T. viride (isolate No.8) were the most effective among all tested isolates. Therefore, these three isolates were further evaluated in the greenhouse test on tomato against M. javanica . The three tested isolates inhibited the reproduction, root galling and number of juveniles of M. javanica. The T. harzianum (isolate No.27) was the most effective isolate.


ETS domain-containing protein-1 (ELK1) is a transcriptional repressor important in regulating αvβ6 integrin expression. αvβ6 integrins activate the profibrotic cytokine Transforming Growth Factor β1 (TGFβ1) and are increased in the alveolar epithelium in Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF). IPF is a disease associated with ageing and therefore we hypothesised that aged animals lacking Elk1 globally would develop spontaneous fibrosis in organs where αvβ6-mediated TGFβ activation has been implicated. Here we identify that Elk1-knockout (Elk1-/0) mice aged to one year developed spontaneous fibrosis in the absence of injury in both the lung and the liver but not in the heart or kidneys. The lungs of Elk1-/0 aged mice demonstrated increased collagen deposition, in particular collagen 3α1, located in small fibrotic foci and thickened alveolar walls. Despite the liver having relatively low global levels of ELK1 expression, Elk1-/0 animals developed hepatosteatosis and fibrosis. The loss of Elk1 also had differential effects on Itgb1, Itgb5 and Itgb6 genes expression in the four organs potentially explaining the phenotypic differences in these organs. To understand the potential causes of reduced ELK1 in human disease we exposed human cells and murine lung slices to cigarette smoke extract which lead to reduced ELK1 expression which may explain the loss of ELK1 in human disease. These data support a fundamental role for ELK1 in protecting against the development of progressive fibrosis via transcriptional regulation of beta integrin subunit genes, and demonstrate that loss of ELK1 can be caused by cigarette smoke.


Prostate cancer (PCa) displays infrequent point mutations, whereas genomic rearrangements are highly prevalent. In eukaryotes, the genome is compartmentalized into chromatin loop domains by the attachment to the nuclear matrix (NM), and it has been demonstrated that several recombination hot spots are situated at the base of loops. Here, we have characterized the binding between NM proteins and matrix attachment regions (MARs) in PCa. Nontumor and 44 PCa tissues were analyzed. More aggressive tumors were characterized by an increase in the complexity of the NM protein patterns that was synchronous with a decrease in the number of proteins binding the MAR sequences. PARP‐1 was the protein that showed the most evident changes. The expression of the PARP‐1 associated with NM increased and it was dependent on tumor aggressiveness. Immunohistochemical analysis showed that the protein was significantly overexpressed in tumor cells. To explore the role of PARP‐1 in PCa progression, PCa cells were treated with the PARP inhibitor, ABT‐888. In androgen‐independent PC3 cells, PARP inhibition significantly decreased cell viability, migration, invasion, chromatin loop dimensions and histone acetylation. Collectively, our study provides evidence that MAR‐binding proteins are involved in the development and progression of PCa. PARP could play a key role in the compartmentalization of chromatin and in the development of the more aggressive phenotype. Thus, PARP can no longer be viewed only as an enzyme involved in DNA repair, but that its role in chromatin modulation could provide the basis for a new therapeutic approach to the treatment of PCa.


This article uses a contemporary and revelatory case study to explore the relationship between three conversations in the innovation literature: Design Thinking, creativity in strategy, and the emerging area of Art Thinking. Businesses are increasingly operating in a VUCA environment where they need to design better experiences for their customers and better outcomes for their firm and the Arts are no exception. Innovation, or more correctly, growth through innovation, is a top priority for business and although there is no single, unifying blueprint for success at innovation, Design Thinking is the process that is receiving most attention and getting most traction. We review the literature on Design Thinking, showing how it teaches businesses to think with the creativity and intuition of a designer to show a deep understanding of, and have empathy with, the user. However, Design Thinking has limitations. By placing the consumer at the very heart of the innovation process, Design Thinking can often lead to more incremental, rather than radical, ideas. Now there is a new perspective emerging, Art Thinking, in which the objective is not to design a journey from the current scenario, A, to an improved position, A+. Art Thinking requires the creation of an optimal position B, and spends more time in the open-ended problem space, staking out possibilities and looking for uncontested space. This paper offers a single case study of a national arts organisation in Dublin facing an existential crisis, which used an Art Thinking approach successfully to give a much-needed shot in the arm to its commercial innovation activities.


Pericardial drainage is generally required for diagnosis and treatment of patients with pericardial effusion, and often for associated cardiac tamponade. Various effective techniques of drainage are available, each with different advantages and disadvantages; no single technique is optimal for all patients and circumstances. Pericardiocentesis or percutaneous tube drainage may be useful for patients with acute tamponade, although these carry significant risks and are safest when done under controlled conditions in the catheterization laboratory. Our preferred method of pericardial drainage in the majority of patients is the subxiphoid approach. This technique allows rapid access to the pericardium and is associated with low morbidity and excellent long-term results. Patients with infectious pericarditis should be monitored closely following pericardial drainage, and early pericardiectomy may be required, especially in children with H. influenzae. Extensive pericardiectomy by either sternotomy or thoracotomy should be reserved for patients with pericardial constriction or failures of pericardial window.


Lumbricus rubellus is one of earthworm species that has been cultivated because its utility as feed for livestock and fish. The culture media for earthworms are mainly manure and compost. The purpose of this research was to observe the performance of Lumbricus rubellus given eggshell powder in different types and levels. This study used commercial eggshell flour and homemade eggshell flour with different levels (10%, 20%, 30%) mixed with cow dung as a medium. The results of the study showed that the addition of eggshell flour (commercial and homemade) as much as 10% showed a higher earthworm weight gain than other treatments but the cocoon production of the treatment was lower than the control (0% eggshell flour).


A paradox, it is claimed, is a radical form of contradiction, one that produces gaps in meaning. In order to approach this idea, two senses of "separation" are distinguished: separation by something and separation by nothing. The latter does not refer to nothing in an ordinary sense, however, since in that sense what's intended is actually less than nothing. Numerous ordinary nothings in philosophy as well as in other fields are surveyed so as to clarify the contrast. Then follows the suggestion that philosophies which one would expect to have room for paradoxes actually tend either to exclude them altogether or to dull them. There is a clear alternative, however, one that fully recognizes paradoxes and yet also strives to overcome them.


The Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) program implemented by the Rajiv Gandhi Mahila Vikas Pariyojana (RGMVP) was implemented in 2012 to empower women by organizing them into microcredit-linked self-help groups (SHGs) to increase the demand for toilet construction and therefor increase positive WASH outcomes. The program was designed to impact an estimated 21000 households across 80 villages in two districts (Sultanpur and Amethi) in the state of Uttar Pradesh. ICRW conducted both a qualitative situational analysis and a quantitative baseline study to assess the socioeconomic parameters of the project area as well as to understand the sanitation and menstrual hygiene practices of those in Sultanpur and Amethi. This process documentation outlines the project's design its necessity its operating structure and the program's impact. The document explores the challenges to implementing comprehensive WASH projects and provides recommendations for how programs can improve future WASH projects.


Congestion avoidance on today's Internet is mainly provided by the combination of the TCP protocol and Active Queue Management (AQM) schemes such as the de facto standard RED (Random Early Detection). When used with ECN (Explicit Congestion Notification), these algorithms can be modeled as a feedback control system in which the feedback information is carried on a single bit. A modification of this scheme called MECN was proposed, where the marking information is carried using 2 bits. MECN conveys more accurate feedback about the network congestion to the source than the current 1-bit ECN. The TCP source reaction was modified so that it takes advantage of the extra information about congestion and adapts faster to the changing congestion scenario leading to a smoother decrease in the sending rates of the sources upon congestion detection and consequently resulting in an increase in the router's throughput. A linearized fluid flow model already developed for ECN is extended to our case. Using control theoretic tools we justify the performance obtained in using the MECN scheme and give guidelines for optimizing its parameters. We use ns simulations to illustrate the performance improvement from the point of better throughput and low level of oscillations in the queue.


In order to facilitate a unique georectification approach implemented for Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) data, specific calibration datasets need to be derived during flight. In the case of the spaceborne MISR instrument, with its unique configuration of nine fixed pushbroom cameras, continuous and autonomous coregistration and geolocation of image data are required prior to the application of scientific retrieval algorithms. In-flight-generated calibration datasets are required to (a) assure accuracy, (b) reduce processing load, and (c) support autonomous aspects of the processing algorithm. This paper describes the in-flight geometric calibration approach with the focus on the first year of activities and the georectification performance achieved.


What we see in Russia today is a dual media system, with independent and critical newspapers on one side vs. controlled and censored television channels on the other. The independent media are facing severe difficulties, and the accountability of the elected are nearly non-existing. The weaknesses of the judicial system allowing arbitrary exercising of the legislation against journalists, the increased control of media outlets both regional and federal, among television channels, newspapers and online media, lack of access to information, all are preventing the development of the media as the fourth estate providing a check on those in power. Journalistic practises, the heritage from the Soviet era and not at least the ownership structures are contributing to the development of a media system in favour of authoritarianism. Globalization has only a minor effect on freedom of speech due to increased control of the internet, and the capacities the authorities have shown to use globalization to their own advantage. The Russian media today are far more contributing to uphold an authoritarian regime than contributing to increased democracy.


The ENDORSE project is co-funded by the FP7 programme of the European Commission, from 2011 to 2013. It exploits the atmosphere service MACC of the European GMES programme (Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) together with other Earth Observation (EO) data and modelling. It aims at providing public authorities and private investors with accurate evaluation and forecasts of renewable resources. The focus is on the devel-opment of downstream services that create added-value information. We present here the achievements of the first period. A very accurate though fast algorithm describing the position of the sun in the sky has been developed. A series of recommendations for quality control of meteorological data have been issued. All algorithms are available as code sources and are being implemented as Web processing services (WPS). Support vector machine techniques prove successful to map the air temperature at 2-m height from satellite images and a few measurements at ground level. The next development of ENDORSE is a portfolio of pre-market downstream services, serving as precursors and examples of best practices for similar services. The resulting services will be described using the INSPIRE metadata and declared in an existing Catalog Service for the Web (CSW) dedicated to energy. Finally, we discuss the mutual benefits between GEOSS (Global Earth Observation System of Systems) and ENDORSE.


In considering the nexus between law, religion, and settler colonialism I consider a case in which an Indigenous freedom of religion claim under section 2(a) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was ruled by the majority of Supreme Court of Canada as not being a valid freedom of religion claim. In examining this decision, I will construct an analytical framework by which I will examine the decision in a way that considers the legal system in which it occurs, that legal system's culture, and the relevance of land in this case. Using this analytical framework, I will tease out why the Ktunaxa decision occurred in the way that it did, drawing on the discourse of both the majority and concurring arguments. I argue that the Court restricting what may validly be claimed as an infringement on the Charter's guarantee to freedom of religion is an example of continuing settler colonialism that occurs within a political culture that, superficially, places great emphasis on reconciliation with the Indigenous peoples that reside within its political-geographical confines.


This book takes the reader on a delightful journey into Africa and into the world of a little girl called Tippi who tells her unforgettable story on her return from Africa to France at the age of ten. Tippi is no ordinary child. She believes that she has the gift of talking to animals and that they are like brothers to her. Her world is filled with characters like Leon the Chameleon, Abu the elephant whom she calls ?my brother?, and leopards, snakes, baboons, lions and ostriches ? ?I speak to them with my mind, or through my eyes, my heart or my soul, and I see that they understand and answer me.?
My Book of Africa contains the words of a little girl who has the gift of reaching out and touching the people and animals of Africa. It s beautifully illustrated with over 100 magical photographs taken by her parents, French filmmakers and photographers, Sylvie Robert and Alain Degre.


Summary Scientific posters tend to be brief, unstructured, and generally unsuitable for communication beyond a poster session. This paper describes EXPLANe, a framework for annotating posters using optical text recognition and web services on mobile devices. EXPLANe is demonstrated through an interface to the MyVariant.info variant annotation web services, and provides users a list of biological information linked with genetic variants (as found via extracted RSIDs from annotated posters). This paper delineates the architecture of the application, and includes results of a five-part evaluation we conducted. Researchers and developers can use the existing codebase as a foundation from which to generate their own annotation tabs when analyzing and annotating posters. Availability Alpha EXPLANe software is available as an open source application at https://github.com/ngopal/EXPLANe Contact Sean D. Mooney (email@example.com)


In contrast to discourses of "successful aging" which pathologize and individualize change in later life, this case study of a retired Mexican couple highlights the pleasurable, political, and collective aspects of aging.  Here, I analyze the narratives of a couple who found aging "well" fulfilling in part because it served as an intervention into societal-level problems.  I argue that their activist form of aging was enabled by local cultural understandings of the Mexican populace as a biologically and socially interrelated whole. They hoped that the Mexican social body would follow a particular life course – of maturing toward modernity – and they sought to model and promote such maturation in their own later lives.  This included promoting a health "culture of prevention," living out self-consciously modern forms of gender and family, and active community participation.  I assert that their happiness in older age, including their ability to cope with local crises of violence and corruption, stemmed partly from their belief that the attributes and activities which enhanced their own lives simultaneously served as activist interventions into the broader populace's ills.  This discussion of the context-specific ways one Mexican couple saw their efforts to live good later lives as contributing meaningfully to societal change over time highlights the need to understand aging and later life as political arenas with collective rather than merely individual import.


For conventional RF power amplifier (PA), the power efficiency depends on the peak to average power ratio (PAPR) of the input signal, or more precisely on the statistical distribution of the input signal amplitude. In this paper we show that, in a similar way, the power efficiency of switching mode PA driven by ΣΔ or PWM signals depends on the statistical distribution of input signal the states and on a parameter equal to the Peak to Average Duration Ratio. This parameter is related to the PAPR in a way depending on the type of encoding of PA input signals.


This study analyzes the profit efficiency and its determinants in groundnut production, applying a stochastic profit frontier model on survey data collected from 400 groundnut growing households in Malawi. The result indicated that the inefficiencies in groundnut production hindered profitability in the sector. The profit efficiency ranged from 1% to 89% (with a mean of 45%). Significant association was observed between efficiency and both farm specific and institutional factors. Efficiency appeared to be significantly and positively associated with access to extension service (p<0.05), household size (p<0.05) and, soil quality (p<0.000). Distance to the local market from the homestead (p<0.000), and land size (p<0.000) allocated to groundnut production were found to reduce the profit efficiency. Male-headed households, on the average were six percent more efficient compared to female headed households. The study indicated potential for increasing groundnut profitability by 55% by improving the access to extension services and markets, which underscores the need for increased resource allocation to support the delivery of extension services and to the improvement of market infrastructure for the enhancement of groundnut profitability.

 Key words: Groundnut production, profit efficiency, agricultural productivity, extension, Malawi.


Children with clubfoot often present after the walking age, especially in low- and
 middle-income countries where approximately 80% of children with clubfoot are born.
 With advancing age, there is increased stiffness of the soft tissue structures and
 decreased remodeling potential of the bones of the foot. Not all clubfeet in older
 children are rigid—some are flexible and amenable to stretching and conservative treatment.
 Hence, the initial evaluation of the deformity must include an assessment of correctability.
 The treatment of clubfoot in the older child is challenging and was traditionally
 performed using complex soft tissue and bony surgeries, often with poor outcomes in
 the long term. Recent literature has focused on the role of conservative treatment
 utilizing Ponseti principles of serial manipulation and casting, combined with limited
 surgery. The purpose of this review is to report the changing trends in the management
 of clubfoot in the walking child, to review the current literature regarding various
 treatment modalities, and to recommend a practical approach to treatment based upon
 age, inherent flexibility of the foot, available resources, and contextual factors.

 How to cite this article Penny N, Aroojis A, Mehtani A, et al. Clubfoot Correction in Walking-age Children: A Review. J Foot Ankle Surg (Asia Pacific)
 2021;8(3):102–109.


Abstract. A new species of gopher, Gregorymys mixtecorum n. sp., is described from the Arikareean 1 (early Oligocene) of Oaxaca, southern Mexico. Phylogenetic analysis indicates that it is the sister species of G. veloxikua, which was also recently described from southern Mexico. Both species were collected from sediments of the Chilapa Formation that crop out in northwestern Oaxaca. Gregorymys mixtecorum n. sp. and G. veloxikua show differences in size and proportions that possibly reduced competition for resources, exploiting different microhabitats. Both Mexican species represent the oldest and the most southern records of Gregorymys in North America. The Mexican record of Gregorymys suggests that at least some entoptychine rodents diversified in southern Mexico or Central America, and that Geomyidae has had a wide geographic distribution in North America since the early Oligocene.


The pancreatic hormone amylin is co‐secreted with insulin by β‐cells in response to nutrient intake. Studies performed in experimental animals have provided evidence that amylin may have several effects associated with carbohydrate metabolism. Amylin is a potent inhibitor of gastric emptying. This effect appears to require an intact vagus nerve and it is over‐ridden by hypoglycaemia. These observations, coupled with the identification of putative amylin receptors in the area postrema of the hindbrain (a region implicated in the regulation of gastric motility) suggest that the effects of amylin on gastric emptying are mediated, at least in part, by the central nervous system. There is also evidence that amylin acts to inhibit food intake, an action which is distinct from its effects on gastric emptying. In addition, amylin has been shown to inhibit amino acid‐stimulated glucagon secretion, suggesting that it may reduce endogenous glucose production in the postprandial period. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Household data are used in this study to assess the transaction costs of obtaining credit from formal and semiformal institutions in rural Iran. A survey was employed to gather the data needed to determine the transaction costs that must be borne by the borrower in each step of the credit procurement process. Data were collected from a random sample of 459 households, including 272 borrower households. OLS regression and F-test (in view of the authors, OLS is not regression but a method of estimating a regression. F-test is not an econometric method but perhaps a statistical one and still it is a key statistics toll of either ANOVA or a regression. So these cannot be employed to investigate something. On the other hand, regressions have been estimated below, and surely one should be able to assign names of them) were employed to analyse the transaction cost factors affecting the procurement of credit facilities. Similar to many financial institutions operating in other developing countries, access to a loan in Iran imposes high transaction costs upon mostly poor rural households. The results reveal that the transaction costs of receiving a loan are on the average equivalent to nine percent of the total loan size. Formal and semiformal institutions impose significantly different costs upon the rural loan applicants. Results reveal that contractual form, loan size, how far the borrower being away from the financial centre along with other borrower peculiarities are important determinants of transactions' costs.


Background: Thoracic paravertebral block (TPVB) is a high-quality analgesic technique used for many types of surgery, trauma, and chronic pain. Aim: The aim of this study is to assess safety and efficacy of adding dexmedetomidine to levobupivacaine in TPVB for postoperative analgesia after unilateral laparoscopic thoracic sympathectomy. Patients and Methods: Sixty adult patients of the American Society of Anesthesiologists physical status classes I and II, aged 20–45 years, of either sex, submitted for unilateral laparoscopic thoracic sympathectomy under general anesthesia at Mansoura University Hospital. Patients were classified into two groups such as levobupivacaine (GL): patients received isobaric 0.5% levobupivacaine 1 mg/kg in 20-ml volume for TPVB and levobupivacaine–dexmedetomidine (GLD): patients received isobaric 0.5% levobupivacaine 1 mg/kg and 10-μg dexmedetomidine in 20 ml volume for TPVB. Statistical Analysis: Data were first tested for normality by Kolmogorov–Smirnov test. Normally distributed continuous data were analyzed using unpaired Student's t-test. Nonnormally distributed continuous and ordinal data were analyzed using Mann–Whitney U-test. Categorical data were analyzed by Chi-square test or Fisher's exact test as appropriate. Results: A faster onset and longer duration of sensory blockade was significantly higher in group GLD with mean ± standard deviation (SD) (8.57 ± 7.22 min and 11.98 ± 1.42 h) than in group GL (15.21 ± 4.35 min and 9.75 ± 3.29 h). Sensory block regression time was significantly longer in group GLD with mean ± SD (10.8 ± 2.31 h) compared to group GL (8.82 ± 1.71 h). Furthermore, a significant reduction in visual analog scale occurred in group GLD compared with the GL group up to 24 h postoperatively (P < 0.05). No significant difference in Ramsay Sedation Scale (RSS) between both groups. The number of patients asked for postoperative analgesia was significantly fewer in group GLD compared with group GL (14 compared to 21)*. The time (hours) of first request for analgesia was significantly longer in group GLD compared with GL group (7.8 ± 3.22 compared to 9.7 ± 2.51*). The total postoperative fentanyl requirements in 24 h (in micrograms) was significantly less in GLD group compared to GL group (320 ± 110 compared to 190 ± 120*). Conclusion: The addition of dexmedetomidine as adjuvant to levobupivacaine in TPVB for elective unilateral laparoscopic thoracic sympathectomy can markedly improve the postoperative analgesia with lower pain scores and a marked reduction of the postoperative analgesic requirements and low side effect profile.


: The study used bioptic sampling material from 64 patients with invasive squamous cell cancer of the larynx, aged 34-77 (mean age--56 +/- 1.2), receiving combined treatment at the Center's Clinic, Obninsk. Ki-67 and p53 levels were assayed vs. such clinico-anatomical parameters as tumor size, cell differentiation grade and presence of regional metastasis. The study revealed a significant direct correlation between Ki-67 index, on the one hand, and tumor size, tumor cell differentiation and relapse, on the other. p53 expression in tumor tissue was associated with a relatively high incidence of relapse (p = 0.01). Both markers may be used as prognosticators of survival in laryngeal cancer.


The hemodynamic behavior of Hb SS erythrocytes introduced into the microcirculation of cremaster muscle (rat and mouse) was studied by intravital microscopy. Simultaneous measurements of intravascular pressure, pressure drop, red cell velocity, hematocrit and oxygen tensions were made to evaluate both regional resistance (arteriovenous) from 2nd order arterioles to venules, as well as the resistance to blood flow in single unbranched arterioles. Following the isovolemic exchange of 2 to 3 blood volumes with SS cells at 25% hematocrit, regional resistance remained within 20% of its control value due to compensatory vasodilation and shunting of blood through pathways parallel to capillaries occluded by sickled red cells. Prolonged exposure to circulating SS cells resulted in a degradation of microvascular function with an attendant four-fold rise in regional resistance. Transient resistance measurements during the passage of a bolus of SS cells through the cremasteric network demonstrated a 100% increase in regional resistance, which was rapidly abated by the subsequent SS cell washout and capillary recruitment. Computations of apparent viscosity in single unbranched arterioles (nominal diameter of 45 micrometer) revealed a four-fold rise in viscosity following the reduction in intravascular oxygen tension (PO2) from 40 mm HG to 7 mm Hg. Observations on the transient increase in viscosity concomitant with a rapid decrease in PO2, demonstrated a lag time of 2 to 3 s before the elevation of viscosity. To enhance the visualization of these processes, techniques for the fluorescent labelling of Hb SS cells with fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) were applied. Visual observations of the movement of SS-FITC red cells by fluorescence microscopy readily revealed the sequestration of sickled cells at the junction between 10 micrometer transverse arterioles and the smaller true capillaries, and the shunting of labelled cells around obstructed capillaries.


Subventricular zone (SVZ) neurogenesis continuously provides new GABA- and dopamine (DA)-containing interneurons for the olfactory bulb (OB) in most adult mammals. DAergic interneurons are located in the glomerular layer (GL) where they participate in the processing of sensory inputs. To examine whether adult neurogenesis might contribute to regeneration after circuit injury in mice, we induce DAergic neuronal loss by injecting 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA) in the dorsal GL or in the right substantia nigra pars compacta. We found that a 6-OHDA treatment of the OB produces olfactory deficits and local inflammation and partially decreases the number of neurons expressing the enzyme tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) near the injected site. Blockade of inflammation by minocycline treatment immediately after the 6-OHDA administration rescued neither TH+ interneuron number nor the olfactory deficits, suggesting that the olfactory impairments are most likely linked to TH+ cell death and not to microglial activation. TH+ interneuron number was restored 1 month later. This rescue resulted at least in part from enhanced recruitment of immature neurons targeting the lesioned GL area. Seven days after 6-OHDA lesion in the OB, we found that the integration of lentivirus-labeled adult-born neurons was biased: newly formed neurons were preferentially incorporated into glomerular circuits of the lesioned area. Behavioral rehabilitation occurs 2 months after lesion. This study establishes a new model into which loss of DAergic cells could be compensated by recruiting newly formed neurons. We propose that adult neurogenesis not only replenishes the population of DAergic bulbar neurons but that it also restores olfactory sensory processing.


Abstract. The Northeast Greenland Ice Stream (NEGIS) currently drains more than 10 % of the Greenland Ice Sheet area and has recently undergone significant dynamic changes. It is therefore critical to accurately represent this feature when assessing the future contribution of Greenland to sea level rise. At present, NEGIS is reproduced in ice sheet models by inferring basal conditions using observed surface velocities. This approach helps estimate conditions at the base of the ice sheet but cannot be used to estimate the evolution of basal drag in time, so it is not a good representation of the evolution of the ice sheet in future climate warming scenarios. NEGIS is suggested to be initiated by a geothermal heat flux anomaly close to the ice divide, left behind by the movement of Greenland over the Icelandic plume. However, the heat flux underneath the ice sheet is largely unknown, except for a few direct measurements from deep ice core drill sites. Using the Ice Sheet System Model (ISSM), with ice dynamics coupled to a subglacial hydrology model, we investigate the possibility of initiating NEGIS by inserting heat flux anomalies with various locations and intensities. In our model experiment, a minimum heat flux value of 970 mW m−2 located close to the East Greenland Ice-core Project (EGRIP) is required locally to reproduce the observed NEGIS velocities, giving basal melt rates consistent with previous estimates. The value cannot be attributed to geothermal heat flux alone and we suggest hydrothermal circulation as a potential explanation for the high local heat flux. By including high heat flux and the effect of water on sliding, we successfully reproduce the main characteristics of NEGIS in an ice sheet model without using data assimilation.


This paper introduces a MATLAB toolbox for fixed order, mixed-norm control synthesis. The Mixed-Norm Toolbox contains a complete set of routines for both continuous and discrete-time systems. The problem addressed by the toolbox is that of finding a compensator which minimizes the H/sub 2/ norm of a transfer function, while constraining any combination of H/sub /spl infin// and/or l/sub 1/ (L/sub 1/) norms of possibly dissimilar transfer functions to be below specified levels. Within reason, any number or combination of constraints can be added to the problem, and the method constrains the norms directly without reliance on upper bounds. The primary contribution of the Mixed-Norm Toolbox is a modular collection of norm and gradient algorithms which can be used with almost any non-linear, constrained optimization solver. While global convergence is not guaranteed for the resulting non-convex problem, the toolbox has been successfully used to show portions of Pareto optimal curves and surfaces for a wide variety of problems. The Mixed-Norm Toolbox is being made available free of charge to the controls community.


Spinoza viewed the book of Ecclesiastes, in its original Hebrew and thus cleared of the interpretations imposed upon it in the guise of translation, as a powerful critique of the two most important variants of the superstition that taught human beings to regard both nature and themselves as degraded expressions of an unattainable perfection. The first was organized around the concept of miracle, the divine suspension of the actual concatenation of things, as if God were an earthly sovereign declaring a state of exception. The second was the apparent opposite of this first, the idea that the concatenation of things has an origin and an end, that is, an order decreed by God. Spinoza reads Ecclesiastes through the lens of Epicurus and Lucretius, as if it were an attempt in the Hebrew idiom, an idiom in certain ways perhaps better suited for this task than either Greek or Latin, to shatter the decrees of destiny and to regard with pleasure those singular things (both human and non-human) that cannot and need not be made straight.


Using a sample of European commercial banks over the period 1993-2006, we show that market discipline significantly and positively affects banks' capital buffer. By distinguishing junior from senior debt holders, we find that both types of investors exert a pressure on banks to hold more capital but that the pressure exerted by junior debt holders is higher. Furthermore, junior debt holders exert a pressure on banks whatever the importance of their non-traditional activities. By contrast, we find that senior debt holders exert a pressure only on banks that are heavily involved in non-traditional activities that are badly taken into account in the current bank capital regulation framework. These results might help us to better understand the role of market discipline as a complement to capital regulation.


Cryptdin mRNA codes for the apparent precursor to a corticostatin/defensin-related peptide that accumulates to high levels in mouse intestinal crypt epithelium during postnatal development. The primary structure, intestinal cell distribution, and developmental appearance of cryptdin mRNA have been determined. Cryptdin mRNA is 450- 480 nucleotides long. Translation of the partial cryptdin cDNA sequence reveals a 70-amino acid open reading frame that includes 32 carboxy- terminal residues that align with those in the consensus sequence, C.CR...C....ER..G.C....CCR, which is a common feature of leukocyte defensins and lung corticostatins (Selsted, M. E., D. M. Brown, R. J. DeLange, S. S. L. Harwig, and R. I. Lehrer. 1985. J. Biol. Chem. 260:4579-4584; Zhu, Q., J. Hu, S. Mulay, F. Esch, S. Shimasaki, and S. Solomon. 1988. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 85:592-596). In situ hybridization of cryptdin cDNA to paraformaldehyde-fixed, frozen sections of adult jejunum and ileum showed intense and specific labeling of epithelial cells in the base of all crypts. Analysis of sections from suckling mice showed that cryptdin mRNA is detectable in 10-20% of crypts in 10-d-old mice, in approximately 80% of crypts in 16- d-old mice, and in all crypts of mice 20 d and older. During the fourth week, the sequence accumulates in crypts to the maximal adult level. Cryptdin mRNA content in adult small intestine is independent both of T cell involvement and luminal bacteria. The role of cryptdin in small bowel physiology remains to be determined: cryptdin may inhibit bacterial translocation, modulate intestinal hormone synthesis, influence hormonal sensitivity of the intestinal epithelium, or exhibit a multiplicity of related activities.


Most practical multi-objective optimization problems are often characterized by two or more expensive and conflicting objectives which require time-consuming simulations. Commonly used algorithms construct a surrogate model of each objective function from a few high-fidelity solutions. In order to further decrease the computational burden, adaptive infilling strategies for multi-objective problems are developed to guide the next infilling design for expensive evaluation and update the surrogate model as well as Pareto front in an iterative manner. In this paper, a multi-objective infilling strategy integrating the Kriging model with a two-stage infilling framework is proposed, terms as ATKIS. This method allows exploitation and exploration alternately to pinpoint the infilling solution for improving the Pareto set and avoiding local over-exploitation simultaneously. At the local exploitation stage, Kriging-based prediction and uncertainty estimation are combined with Non-dominant Ranking and Minimum Relative Distance theories for a new design solution. At the global exploration stage, Voronoi tessellation theory is employed to search for the sparsest position in the design space for a new evaluation. The proposed method is compared with five recent infilling strategies to investigate the performance of infilling ability using several numerical benchmarks. In addition, a lightweight optimization design of hoist sheaves shows that the proposed method can deal with real engineering problems, while significantly reducing the computational time and the number of expensive simulations of samples.


The unique tomographic imaging method based on refractive effects that was recently developed by Maksimenko et al. [Appl. Phys. Lett. 86, 124105 (2005)] exhibits an excellent imaging property in the hard-x-ray region for phase objects such as soft materials and biological samples. However, there seems to have been little consideration of the physical aspects of the underlying imaging principles. Also, as the method is similar to diffraction-enhanced-imaging (DEI)-based computed tomography (CT), the difference between these two methodologies has not been made clear. We theoretically consider the imaging principles starting from the measurement process to the reconstruction procedures from the viewpoint of geometrical optics and then clarify their difference in relationship to the physical quantities to be depicted. The major feature of this novel method is the in-plane two-dimensional vector-field reconstruction of the refractive-index gradient in an object, while DEI CT obtains the out-of-plane scalar-field gradient component. In other words, the novel method and DEI CT present the transverse and the longitudinal components, respectively, of the three-dimensional vector fields of the gradient refractive index. Therefore they can be considered complementary to each other.


Deposition of thin films via hydrothermal method has various advantages: low deposition temperature, high purity, deposition on a three-dimensional structure,and a large thickness. Although an epitaxial lead zirconate titanate (PZT) thin-film deposition has been reported, the ferroelectric measurement has not been conducted due to the peel-off morphology of the film. The current paper investigates the improvement of an epitaxial PZT thin film deposited via a hydrothermal method. By adjusting the position at which the substrate was suspended in the solution, smooth morphology surface was successfully obtained. As a bottom electrode, a 200-nm SrRuO_3 thin film was deposited on SrTiO_3 single crystals, and the PZT thin film was deposited on SrRuO_3. The remanent polarization 2 Pr and coercive electric field for PZT on SrRuO_3/SrTiO_3 (001) were 17.1 μC/cm^2 and 36 kV/cm, respectively, and those of PZT on SrRuO_3/SrTiO_3 (111) were 32.7 μC/cm^2 and 59 kV/cm, respectively. The reason for large imprint electrical field, 91 kV/cm and 40 kV/cm for each film, was unclear at this stage, although it is associated with self–alignment poling direction. This self–alignment poling direction was confirmed via scanning nonlinear dielectric microscopy and is thought to have been related to the deposition mechanisms.


The Global report on urban health: equitable, healthier cities for sustainable development, 2016 presents new data on the health of urban residents from nearly 100 countries, updating the first joint WHO-UN Habitat global report on urban health titled Hidden cities: unmasking and overcoming health inequities in urban settings. The new Global Report deconstructs the complex challenges of health and health inequity in cities everywhere. It presents a special analysis on the impact of persistent urban health inequities on achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. It sets a baseline for the new global health and development agenda in the Sustainable Development Goals and Universal Health Coverage. It also presents evidence that in cities, progress in health depends not only on the strength of health systems, but also on shaping healthier urban environments. This Global Report presents practical, proven solutions for working across sectors to tackle these 21st century health challenges. It presents examples of effective actions by cities and nations around the world and the successes that have been achieved.


Gravitational waves are produced by orbiting massive binary objects, such as black holes and neutron stars, and propagate as ripples in the very fabric of space-time. As the waves carry off orbital energy, the two bodies spiral into each other and eventually merge. They are described by Einstein's equations of general relativity. For the early phase of the orbit, called the inspiral, Einstein equations can be linearised and solved through analytical approximations, while for the late phase, near the merger, we need to solve the fully nonlinear Einstein's equations on supercomputers. In order to recover the gravitational wave for the entire evolution of the binary, a match is required between the inspiral and the merger waveforms. Our objectives are to establish an educational oriented toy model for a streamlined matching method, that will allow an analytical calculation of the complete gravitational waveform, while developing a gravitational wave modelling tutorial for undergraduate physics students. We use post-Newtonian (PN) theory for the inspiral phase, which offers an excellent training ground for students, and rely on Mathematica for our calculations, a tool easily accessible to undergraduates. For the merger phase we bypass Einstein's equations by using a simple analytic toy model named the implicit rotating source. After building the inspiral and merger waveforms, we construct our matching method and validate it by comparing our results with the waveforms for the first detection, GW150914, available as open source. Several future projects can be developed based from this project: building complete waveforms for all the detected signals, extending the PN model to take into account non-zero eccentricity, employing and testing a more realistic analytic model for the merger, building a separate model for the ringdown, and optimising the matching technique.


Antibody–drug conjugates (ADC) represent a promising therapeutic modality for the clinical management of cancer. We sought to develop a novel ADC that targets 5T4, an oncofetal antigen expressed on tumorinitiating cells (TIC), which comprise the most aggressive cell population in the tumor. We optimized an anti5T4ADC (A1mcMMAF) by sulfydryl-based conjugation of the humanizedA1 antibody to the tubulin inhibitor monomethylauristatin F (MMAF) via a maleimidocaproyl linker. A1mcMMAF exhibited potent in vivo antitumor activity in a variety of tumor models and induced long-term regressions for up to 100 days after the last dose. Strikingly, animals showedpathologic complete response in eachmodelwithdoses as lowas 3mg antibody/kgdosed every 4days. In anon–small cell lung cancerpatient-derivedxenograftmodel, inwhich 5T4 is preferentially expressed on the less differentiated tumor cells, A1mcMMAF treatment resulted in sustained tumor regressions and reduced TIC frequency. These results highlight the potential of ADCs that target the most aggressive cell populations within tumors, such as TICs. In exploratory safety studies, A1mcMMAF exhibited no overt toxicities when administered to cynomolgus monkeys at doses up to 10 mg antibody/kg/ cycle 2 and displayed a half-life of 5 days. The preclinical efficacy and safety data established a promising therapeutic index that supports clinical testing of A1mcMMAF. Mol Cancer Ther; 12(1); 38–47. 2012 AACR.


"African ryhthm" was invented in the 1950s when, thanks to pioneering research by the Reverend A. M. Jones, Alan Merriam, Gilbert Rouget, Erich von Hornbostel, and John Blacking, among others, "African music" was construed as an essentially rhythmic phenomenon. Three decades and a sizable body of empirical research later, it is easy to see that an overriding ideology of difference (between "Africa" and the "West") motivated these early efforts. This essay reinvents "African rhythm" not by denying its own ideological construction but by engaging in an imaginary dialogue with earlier researchers in an effort to concretize that which was missing from their representations. In it, I develop a view of African rhythm in which its mechanical aspects (grouping, accents, periodicity) are shown to reside in broader patterns of temporal signification (movement, language and gesture). Although this is a less elegant proposition (in the mathematical sense), it is phenomenologically truer to the African experience. The latter, in turn, is not a mystified precolonial essence but the more "contaminated" and inherently contradictory condition of postcoloniality itself. "African music" in this construction is not synonymous with "African rhythm," although the latter9s apparent complexity, explicitly thematized in earlier writings, reemerges against a richer conceptual background.


The study of tri-trophic interactions is a vast field of basic ecological studies which are also of paramount importance for the development of environment-friendly methods of pest management. Within the Diptera, the Tephritidae family represents an interesting model for such studies because of the variable host-specificity of species in this group, and the important role that some natural enemies may play in the regulation of their populations. Furthermore, the great economic importance of many species in this family offers a large array of applications to research results. La Reunion, a French island situated in the south-west of the Indian Ocean, is a favourable area for studying such interactions, because of the number of tephritid species present in the island, and the great variability of its climatic conditions. On fruit crops, a complex of three polyphagous species of tephritids cause considerable damage: the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata, the Natal fruit fly, Ceratitis rosa, and the Peach fruit fly, Bactrocera zonata. In addition, another complex of Dacini is harmful to cucurbit crops: the Melon fly, Bactrocera cucurbitae, the Ethiopian cucurbit fly, Dacus ciliatus, and the Indian Ocean cucurbit fly, Dacus demmerezi. Conversely, on Solanaceous crops such as tomato, the Tomato fruit fly Neoceratitis cyanescens, is the only species of economic importance. Over the last twenty years, many field studies allowed us to specify the host-range and relative importance of the different species on cultivated crops. Of particular interest are some host preferences observed in the field in some otherwise very polyphagous species, such as C. capitata. Detailed studies (lab, wind tunnel and field cages) were also devoted to the host location behaviour of stenophagous species, taking as a model the tomato fruit fly, N. cyanescens. Other behavioural studies also highlighted the preferences of the different species for particular host-plants during foraging or egg-laying behaviour. More recently, studies were focused on the quality of various host or non-host fruits for the pre-imaginal development of the different species, and its influence on their fitness. Though some indigenous parasitoids of the Mediterranean fruit fly have been recorded in the island, most of the natural regulation by parasitoids is due to exotic species imported through classical biological control programmes. This is particularly the case with two species imported from Hawaii, in collaboration with USDA Hawaii and the University of Hawaii: Psyttalia fletcheri, a larvo-pupal parasitoid of the Melon fly, and, more recently, Fopius arisanus, an egg-pupal parasitoid of some Bactrocera spp. Following the acclimatization of these two species, field studies allowed us to evaluate their host range, favourite habitats, and impact on host species populations. In addition, laboratory, field-cage and wind tunnel studies improved our knowledge of the stimuli involved in host habitat and host selection behaviours. Results of these studies are summarized and discussed in relation to the current state of knowledge of insect-plant and host-parasitoid interactions in tephritids, and to their possible applications in pest management. (Texte integral)


Purpose: The spinal epidural angiolipomas are rare expansive processes made of mature lipomatous and angiomatous elements. They often have a benign character. Their etiology, pathogenesis remains uncertain, and it is a cause of spinal cord compression. The magnetic resonance imaging is the most important neuroradiological examination. Histological examination is the only examination to confirm the diagnosis. Surgery is the treatment of choice. Methods: A retrospective study of all patients operated on for a spinal epidural angiolipoma at the Department of Neurosurgery at the National Institute of Neurology of Tunis between January 2000 and December 2014 (15 years) was performed. The aim of this study is to describe the clinical, radiological, histological characteristics and the treatment of this tumor. Results: A total of nine patients were operated from January 01, 2000 to November 30, 2014. The average age of our patients was 51 years with ages that ranged from 29 to 65 with a male predominance. The period between onset of symptoms and diagnosis ranged from 24 months with an average 12 months. Posterior localization of the tumor was seen in all patients. Surgical resection was performed for all cases. The postoperative course has been satisfactory, with a complete recovery of neurological functions in all patients. Conclusions: The spinal epidural angiolipomas is rare expansive process causing spinal cord compression. Treatment is exclusively surgical resection. The functional outcome of spinal epidural angiolipomas is particularly favorable with a complete neurological recovery is if the patient was quickly operated.


Exemplar based image inpainting is a combine effect of texture and structure syntheses. This technique can be applicable by applying Basic traditional method (Criminisi algorithm) Patch shifting scheme, Search region prior method. Criminsi'algorithm is based upon isophote-driven image sampling process, gives better image quality but require more time to inpaint damage region. Sarawut's patch shifting scheme, shift the target patch towards source region having more information related to missed region, PSNR improved but time requirement is more than criminsi's method. After analyzing, both above given method, proposed method based on K-means clustering reduced time complexity and improve image quality also


This paper is a general discussion of earth resources information systems which utilize airborne and spaceborne sensors. It points out that information may be derived by sensing and analyzing the spectral, spatial and temporal variations of electromagnetic fields emanating from the earth surface. After giving an overview system organization, the two broad categories of system types are discussed. These are systems in which high quality imagery is essential and those more numerically oriented. Sensors are also discussed with this categorization of systems in mind. The multispectral approach and pattern recognition are described as an example data analysis procedure for numerically-oriented systems. The steps necessary in using a pattern recognition scheme are described and illustrated with data obtained from aircraft and the Earth Resources Technology Satellite (ERTS-1).


The "Green Lighting" research project, initiated at the Solar Energy and Building Physics Laboratory (LESO-PB) of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL), is aiming at an energy efficient integration of advanced daylighting and electric lighting systems. This communication presents the latest developments within this project and discusses possible consequences for offices in tropical climates. A computer model of a Singapore office room equipped with an Anidolic Integrated Ceiling, for which daylight autonomies have recently been calculated at National University of Singapore, has been developed using the RELUX Vision lighting software. An appropriate complementary electric lighting system for this office room is suggested and its performance in terms of visual comfort is discussed. It is shown that this electric lighting system would lead to a lighting power density lower than 5 W/m² and would consume less than 1 kWh of electricity per day.


Abstract We examined the effects of trichotomous achievement goals on performance, enjoyment, and practice of a golf-putting task. Male (n = 39) and female (n = 63) undergraduate students participated in the experiment in exchange for course credit. Participants were assigned to a mastery, performance-approach, or performance-avoidance goal condition and completed seven blocks of 10 trials (one for baseline, four for the experimental phase, and two for the transfer phase) of a golf-putting task. Distance from the target was measured and performance measures of accuracy and consistency were calculated. Self-reported enjoyment during the baseline and experimental phases and practice during a 5-min period before and following the experimental task were also assessed. Performance accuracy and consistency improved similarly among the three groups. Individuals in all three conditions reported enjoying the task to the same extent. Mastery participants practiced for longer than performance-approach participants during the practice period. Performance-avoidance participants did not differ significantly from the other two groups. The three goals were equally effective in promoting performance and enjoyment of the golf-putting task. The differential practice results for the two performance goals suggest that they should be considered separately.


We develop a model of commodity money and use it to analyze the following two questions motivated by issues in monetary history: What are the conditions under which Gresham's Law holds? And, what are the mechanics of a debasement (lowering the metallic content of coins)? The model contains light and heavy coins, imperfect information, and prices determined via bilateral bargaining. There are equilibria with neither, both, or only one type of coin in circulation. When both circulate, coins may trade by weight or by tale. We discuss the extent to which Gresham's Law holds in the various cases. Following a debasement, the quantity of reminting depends on the incentives oAered by the sovereign. Equilibria exist with positive seigniorage and a mixture of old and new coins in circulation.


The study assessed the Philippine-endemic and Mindanao-endemic bird communities of two mountains in Agusan del Norte – Canticol, Tubay and Mt. Hilong-hilong, Remedios T. Romualdes (RTR) from September to November, 2008 using eight-minute fixed-radius point counts. Habitat variables included vegetation structure, elevation, slope and incidence of anthropogenic disturbance. Non-linear regression analysis and AICc model selection were used to determine the habitat variables that influence the richness and abundance of endemics in the two sites. Canticol had lower mean density of large and medium trees and higher degree of anthropogenic disturbance than Mt. Hilong-hilong. There were 31 Philippineendemic birds (four threatened) and three Mindanao-endemics (one threatened) on Canticol while there were 39 Philippine-endemics (seven threatened) and six Mindanao-endemics (three threatened) on Mt. Hilong-hilong. The diversity of endemics was significantly higher on Mt. Hilong-hilong (H'=2.31). The study suggests that the two sites need conservation attention to prevent forest loss and endangerment of the threatened endemics. Vegetation structure and elevation had the greatest influence on the endemic bird communities in the two sites. Adequate regeneration of the disturbed sites in the region must also be prioritized as part of a long-term management strategy. Keywords - diversity, richness, abundance, habitat, threatened, avian communities


In order to enhance the software quality, control and improve software testing process, the software testing process needs to be effectively measured. This paper presents a goal-driven measurement model for software testing process (MM4STP). Based on MM4STP, software organizations can deduce the appropriate measurement process according to the process's goals they determine. At the same time, they also can get the direction of testing process, which will provide an effective support for making the correct decision to better the testing process.


Ever since China has carried out the Land Use Right Tendering, Auction and Listing Policy (Zhao, Pai, Gua ) in 2002, controversies on whether competitions introduced by the new policy would lead to rapid increase in land transaction price has never stopped, along with concerns that higher land price would in turn be an incentive of increasing housing price. In this paper, the effects of land use right transaction approaches are tested through Hedonic Pricing model based on residential land use right price, property price and other influential factors such as accessibility, environment and location of main urban areas in Beijing. Results show a slightly correlation between transaction approaches and residential land use right price while a significant relationship between previous residential housing price and land use right price.


Isothiocyanates from cruciferous vegetables are known for their potential anti-carcinogenic activities. These isothiocyanates are frequently consumed together as part of a regular diet, but their combined effects on carcinogenesis have not been well studied. Herein, we tested the hypothesis that combination of two isothiocyanates, i.e. allyl isothiocyanate and sulforaphane, produced a synergy in inhibiting the growth of A549 lung cancer cells. Our results showed that the combination treatment led to a stronger growth inhibition than the singular treatment. Isobologram analysis proved that the enhanced inhibitory effect of the combination treatment was synergistic. Flow cytometry demonstrated that the combination treatment caused more extensive cell cycle arrest and apoptosis than the singular treatment with modified expression of key proteins regulating these cellular processes. The combined treatment resulted in the production of intracellular reactive oxygen species, which might contribute to the inhibitory effects on cancer cells. Moreover, a synergy between allyl isothiocyanate and sulforaphane was also observed in anti-cell migration. Collectively, our results have demonstrated the potential of different isothiocyanates used in combination to produce enhanced protective effects against carcinogenesis.


The advancement of significant web is speedy as appear differently in relation to surface web, so there has been extended excitement for frameworks which can profitably isolate significant web interfaces. In any case, in light of the huge measure of benefits in web with their dynamic nature, removing capable site pages through significant web grow multifaceted nature. We propose a structure with two-stage, to be particular SmartCrawler, which capably look for significant web interfaces. In the primary stage, SmartCrawler refuse passing by considerable number of pages, arrange incredibly pertinent webpage pages to get accurate results and performs site based examining for website pages with the help of web records. In the second stage, SmartCrawler finishes snappy in-site unearthing so as to look for most noteworthy associations with an adaptable association situating. To discard slant on setting off to some significantly essential associations in covered web registries, we arrange an association tree data structure to achieve more broad extension for a website. Our test results on a course of action of specialist's spaces exhibit the preparation and accuracy of our proposed crawler framework, which successfully recuperates significant web interfaces from considerable scale regions and fulfills higher harvest rates than various crawlers. KEYWORDSSmart Crawler, Deep web, two-stage crawler, Reverse Searching, Site Locating, ranking, adaptive learning, Site Prioritizing.


A parametric mutual certainty measure is introduced, which is closely related to entropy. By relating mutual certainty to the structure of decision trees as well as to the Bayesian probability of error, a hierachical classification algorithm is developed, which can be used for the classification of digital imagery on the basis of their feature domain. By means of the parameter values the characteristics of the decision tree can be influenced. Furthermore, in the case of some stopping criterion the partitioning until then guarantees a minimization of the probability of error on the average. The algorithm can be used in itself or in combination with other algorithms, e.g. local refined boundaries in the case of application of 'box'-classifiers. Furthermore, by taking the inverse of the decision criterion, an algorithm is obtained which is useful for gray level thresholding of digital imagery. Attention is paid to the observed duality of classification in the feature space and gray level thresholding of histograms.


This article takes the waved-edge milling insert (the rake face is curve plane) developed by Harbin University of Science and Technology as an example, as the goal of minimal impact disrepair, the optimization object function of the milling insert grooves is studied. Based on the force density function of the 3D complex groove milling insert, we have the finite element analysis on the stress fields of different cutting parameters, and have fuzzy synthetical judgement on the stress fields with fuzzy mathematic theory. We build the object function relation between the fuzzy synthetical judgement results and cutting parameters of the impact disrepair, so to have groove design optimization. All these studies provide the theoretic basis for the groove exploitation and the cutter disrepair which is the key problem in the automatization production and groove optimization.


We investigate the task of 2D articulated human pose estimation in unconstrained still images. This is extremely challenging because of variation in pose, anatomy, clothing, and imaging conditions. Current methods use simple models of body part appearance and plausible configurations due to limitations of available training data and constraints on computational expense. We show that such models severely limit accuracy. Building on the successful pictorial structure model (PSM) we propose richer models of both appearance and pose, using state-of-the-art discriminative classifiers without introducing unacceptable computational expense. We introduce a new annotated database of challenging consumer images, an order of magnitude larger than currently available datasets, and demonstrate over 50% relative improvement in pose estimation accuracy over a stateof-the-art method.


ABSTRACT People depend on functioning ecosystems, which provide benefits that support human existence and wellbeing. The relationship between people and nature has been experienced and conceptualized in multiple ways. Recently, ecosystem services (ES) concepts have permeated science, government policies, multi-national environmental agreements, and science–policy interfaces. In 2017, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) introduced a new and closely related concept – Nature's Contributions to People (NCP). The introduction of NCP has sparked some lively discussion and confusion about the distinguishing characteristics between ES and NCP. In order to clarify their conceptual relation, we identify eleven specific claims about novel elements from the latest NCP literature and analyze how far ES research has already contributed to these corresponding conceptual claims in the existing ES literature. We find a mixed-picture, where on six specific conceptual claims (culture, social sciences and humanities, indigenous and local knowledge, negative contributions of nature, generalizing perspective, non-instrumental values and valuation) NCP does not differ greatly from past ES research, but we also find five conceptual claims (diverse worldviews, context-specific perspective, relational values, fuzzy and fluid reporting categories and groups, inclusive language and framing) where NCP provides novel conceptualizations of people and nature relations.


Hurricane Harvey brought to the Texas coast possibly the heaviest rain ever recorded in US history, which then caused flooding at unprecedented levels. Previous studies have shown that large arrays of hypothetical offshore wind farms can extract kinetic energy from a hurricane and thus reduce the wind and storm surge. This study quantitatively tests whether the hypothetical offshore turbines may also affect precipitation patterns. The Weather Research Forecast model is employed to model Harvey and the offshore wind farms are parameterized as elevated drag and turbulent kinetic energy sources. Model results indicate that the offshore wind farms have a strong impact on the distribution of accumulated precipitation, with an obvious decrease onshore downstream of the wind farms, and an increase in offshore areas, upstream of or within the wind farms. Compared with the control case with no wind turbines, increased horizontal wind divergence and lower vertical velocity are found where precipitation is reduced onshore, whereas increased horizontal wind convergence and higher vertical velocity occur upstream of or within the offshore wind farms. The sensitivity to the size of the offshore array, inter-turbine spacing, and the details of the wind farm parameterization are assessed. The results suggest that large arrays of offshore wind turbines can effectively protect the coast from heavy rain during hurricanes and that smart layouts with fewer turbines over smaller areas can be almost as effective as those with more turbines over larger areas.


: Impaction denotes a tooth failing to attain its normal position to reach the occlusal table with third molars impaction being common in the mandible. The conventional radiographic views such as peri-apical, panoramic radiograph are two dimensional representations of three dimensional structure. Absence of information on relation of vital anatomical structures to impacted teeth, bone quality is a drawback for the operating surgeon which could lead to pre or post operative complications. CBCT imaging fills the lacunae of two dimensional imaging and holds a key role in impaction assessment.A retrospective analysis of 45 patients who underwent CBCT imaging prior to extraction of impacted third molars were included in the study and the data was analysed using SPSS.Among the 45 patients, 20 were males (44.4%) and 25 were females (55.5%) and the age group commonly affected with impaction was between 25-30 years (35.5%).The frequency of impacted third molars was more in mandible (80.0%) compared to maxilla (20%).There was significant correlation between nerve involvement and angulation of impacted third molars.CBCT imaging modality provides a three dimensional view to help in better treatment planning, anticipating possible complications post surgery. CBCT must be recommended as the only imaging modality in impaction assessment. CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: CBCT imaging provides superior images for diagnosis and treatment planning.


This paper deals with the continuing development of a multistage aerodynamic delivery systems safety tool currently being used in conjunction with aerodynamic deceleration payload delivery systems testing at the U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground. This tool was created to assist test planning officers with safety related concerns involving air delivery tests and was introduced at the previous Aerodynamic Decelerator Systems (ADS) conference. Present paper presents the latest version of this tool incorporating multiple airdrops per pass, elevation data and more accurate models of the payload delivery systems accounting for their weight and the altitude of a drop zone.


Post-translational modification is one of the bio-molecular mechanisms in
living organisms, which incorporate functional diversity in proteins as well as regulate cellular
processes. Transformation of arginine residue to citrulline in protein is such a modification.

Our objective is to identify citrullinated arginine residue sites quickly and accurately.

In this study, a novel computational tool, abbreviated as predCitru-Site, has been
developed to predict citrullination sites. This technique effectively has incorporated the sequencecoupling
effect of surrounding amino acids of arginine residues as well as optimizes skewed
training citrullination dataset for prediction quality improvement. The performance of predCitru-
Site has been measured from the average of 5 complete runs of the 10-fold cross-validation test to
comply with existing tools.

 predCitru-Site has achieved 97.6% sensitivity, 98.9% specificity, and
overall accuracy of 98.5%. With Matthew's correlation coefficient of 0.967, it has also shown an
area under the receiver operator characteristics curve of 0.997. Compared with existing tools,
predCitru-Site significantly outperforms on the same benchmark dataset. It also shows significant
improvement in the case of independent tests in all performance metrics (around 50% higher in
AUC). These results suggest that our method is promising and can be used as a complementary
technique for fast exploration of citrullination in arginine residue. A user-friendly web server has
also been deployed at http://research.ru.ac.bd/predCitru-Site/ for the convenience of experimental
scientists.


Eight children of a previously reported series of 30 with optic neuritis of unknown cause were found to have developed multiple sclerosis in variable periods after the episode of visual failure. The clinical findings are reported here in detail. There were no distinctive characteristics of the ocular findings to indicate those who would eventually show evidence of multiple sclerosis, although simultaneous bilateral involvement and papillitis would appear to be seen more frequently in the children than in the adults who later developed multiple sclerosis. Six of the eight children developed evidence of dissemination within a 2½-year period. In the other two, dissemination did not occur until 12 and 16 years later.


We report the synthesis of four different RGD peptide derivatives which spontaneously self-assemble into nanoscale architectures. Depending on the information programmed into the molecular-scale building blocks by organic synthesis, these compounds assemble into different nanoscale morphologies. This process can be fully understood using multiscale modelling which provides predictive insight into subtle differences, such as whether the compounds form spherical micelles, rod-like cylinders or tubular assemblies, and predicts experimentally observed critical aggregation concentrations (CACs). We then probe the multivalent binding of these assemblies to integrin proteins and demonstrate that the spherical micellar assemblies perform well in our solution-phase integrin binding assay as a consequence of self-assembled multivalency, with the CAC switching-on the binding. Conversely, the cylindrical assemblies do not work in this assay. As such, the nanoscale morphology controls the apparent ability to perform as a self-assembled multivalent ligand array.


A systematic homogenization treatment on Al-Li-Cu-Mg-Mn-Zr alloy, within the temperature range from 500C to 540C for 24h or 36h was conducted. Microstructure and alloying elements distribution before and after homogenization treatment were studied by optical microscope, SEM, EDS and XRD. The results showed that in the as-cast condition Cu segregated at grain boundary and formed θ(Al2Cu) phase. With the homogenization temperature increased and time prolonged, the amount of the remained particles at grain boundaries decreased, and the alloying elements distribution became more homogeneous. It has been found that the homogenization temperature has more obvious effects on the microstructure and mechanical properties than time. However, the alloy homogenized at temperatures above 540C was overheated. Furnace cooling generates large amounts of precipitates in the matrix. The best homogenization parameter of the Al-Li-Cu-Mg-Mn-Zr alloy was determined as 530C for 24 h followed by air cooling.


Thorough coverage of development in SharePoint 2013A team of well-known Microsoft MVPs joins forces in this fully updated resource, providing you with in-depth coverage of development tools in the latest iteration of the immensely popular SharePoint. From building solutions to building custom workflow and content management applications, this book shares field-tested best practices on all aspect of SharePoint 2013 development. Offers a thorough look at Windows Azure and SharePoint 2013Includes new chapters on Application Life Cycle Management, developing apps in SharePoint, and building PerformancePoint Dashboards in SharePointProfessional SharePoint 2013 Development is an essential SharePoint developer title.


A translatory MOEMS actuator with extraordinary large stroke — especially developed for fast optical path length modulation in miniaturized FTIR-spectrometers — is presented for the first time. A precise translational out-of-plane oscillation at 500 Hz with large stroke of up to 1 mm is realized by means of a new suspension design of the comparative large mirror plate with 19.6 mm² aperture using four pantographs. The MOEMS device is driven electrostatically resonant and is manufactured in a CMOS compatible SOI process. Up to ± 500 Hz amplitude has been measured in vacuum of 50 Pa and 90 V driving voltage.


CCNP BCMSN Official Exam Certification GuideFourth Edition Master all 642-812 exam topics with the official study guide Assess your knowledge with chapter-opening quizzes Review key concepts with foundation summaries Practice with hundreds of exam questions on the CD-ROMDavid Hucaby, CCIE® No. 4594CCNP BCMSN Official Exam Certification Guide, Fourth Edition, is a best of breed Cisco® exam study guide that focuses specifically on the objectives for the BCMSN exam. Successfully passing the BCMSN 642-812 exam certifies that you have knowledge and skills necessary to implement scalable multilayer switched networks.CCNP BCMSN Official Exam Certification Guide, Fourth Edition, follows a logical organization of the BCMSN exam objectives. Material is presented in a concise manner, focusing on increasing readers' retention and recall of exam topics. Lead network engineer and consultant David Hucaby shares preparation hints and test-taking tips, helping you identify areas of weakness and improve your switching knowledge through the use of the consistent features in each chapter. "Do I Know This Already?" quizzes open each chapter and allow you to decide how much time you need to spend on each section. Exam topic lists and Foundation Summary tables make referencing easy and give you a quick refresher whenever you need it. Scenario-based exercises help you think about exam objectives in real-world situations, thus increasing recall during exam time. Challenging chapter-ending review questions help you assess your knowledge and reinforce key concepts.The companion CD-ROM contains a powerful testing engine that enables you to focus on individual topic areas or take complete, timed exams. The assessment engine also tracks your performance and provides feedback on a module-by-module basis, presenting question-by-question remediation to the text.Well regarded for its level of detail, assessment features, and challenging review questions and exercises, this book helps you master the concepts and techniques that will enable you to succeed on the exam the first time.David Hucaby, CCIE® No. 4594, is a lead network engineer for a large medical environment using Cisco multilayer switching and security products. He also is an independent networking consultant focusing on Cisco-based solutions for healthcare and banking clients.The official study guide helps you master all the topics on the BCMSN exam, including Spanning Tree Protocol concepts Virtual LAN (VLAN), VLAN trunking, and inter-VLAN routing Gateway redundancy technologies and protocols Wireless LAN topologies, components, connectivity, and standards Implementing a Cisco Unified Wireless Network Wireless client access Access layer voice concepts Preventing and mitigating attacks against switched network securityCompanion CD-ROMThe CD-ROM contains an electronic copy of the book and more than 200 practice questions for the BCMSN exam, including simulation-based questions, all available in study mode, test mode, and flash card format.This volume is part of the Exam Certification Guide Series from Cisco Press®. Books in this series provide officially developed exam preparation materials that offer assessment, review, and practice to help Cisco Career Certification candidates identify weaknesses, concentrate their study efforts, and enhance their confidence as exam day nears.Category: Cisco CertificationCovers: BCMSN Exam 642-812$59.99 USA / $74.99 CAN


Report of a case of aggressive musculo-aponeurotic fibromatosis in a 14-year-old girl with transformation into fibrosarcoma, 10 years later. The tumoral mass initiated its growth in the nucal region but finally invaded both the cervical and the right retroscapular region. Evidence for muscular, osseous and neurological invasion and destruction was found. The tumor could be controlled neither by surgery, nor by radiotherapy and chimiotherapy. This case report is studied in the light of cases reported in the literature.


This paper examines the linkages between physical education, sociology, and sociology of sport in North America. Physical education and sociology in North America have had numerous mutual ties since the beginnings of both fields. In the first section of the paper, I describe the rise of sociology and physical education in North America, emphasizing the linkages that initially existed between physical education and sociology, and then the separation that transpired between the disciplines. The second section examines the connections between social theory and physical education before the sociology of sport was formally developed. The final section details the rise of sociology of sport, with the main focus on the role of physical educators (a.k.a. sociocultural kinesiologists, sport studies scholars, human kinetics scholars) in the development of sociology of sport. This section concludes with a discussion of the linkages of social theory, critical pedagogy in physical education, and sport sociology in phy...


The application of an innovative design of a miniaturized and extremely robust gas sensor based on cavity enhanced Raman spectrometry is introduced. The versatility of the new sensor allows online, simultaneous identification and quantification of various biogenic gases and volatiles in a wide range of concentrations and without cross-sensitivity. The different experiments in which this instrument has been applied demonstrate its stability for a range of important environmental research questions. In particular, the ability to simultaneously measure O2 and N2 besides other gases like CO2 and the ability of real-time, in-situ measurements using isotope labels with a comparable inexpensive sensor is unique. The application of stable isotope tracers, such as used in the examples with 13C, provides a powerful tool for understanding metabolic pathways, using low flow rates and small sample volumes in closed systems. All this is possible because Raman spectra are based on the characteristic inherent molecular vibrations of the measured gases such that the measurement does not influence or disturb the experimental site by the consumption of gases, labels or transducers. Fast analysis of gas exchange processes is possible, since time consuming sampling and sample preparation steps are not necessary. Also long-term gas observations can be performed due to stable linear calibration with no saturation and aging effects. It was shown that Raman gas spectrometry provides versatility, while at the same time portability is maintained by miniaturized instrument components and low power consumption. The comparably simple calibration and the straightforward handling allow focusing on the actual experiment rather than on the gas quantification. The experiments demonstrated that Raman spectrometry enables the simultaneous investigation of various gases produced and/or consumed by plants and microbes in controlled laboratory studies and in complex ecosystems. Miniaturization and low power consumption constitute a high potential for on-field measurement campaigns. This method is urgently needed and will contribute in the future to the elucidation of complex and strongly interdependent environmental processes.


Chronic constipation (CC) and irritable bowel syndrome with constipation (IBS-C) are two functional gastrointestinal disorders that are associated with constipation. CC and IBS-C affect approximately 20% of the general population including the elderly, impairing quality of life. Patients not responding to over-the-counter treatments require effective and safe long-term therapies. Some treatments introduced in the last decade have been associated with side effects that led to withdrawal from the US market (e.g., tegaserod) or intolerance to treatment (e.g., nausea in patients treated with lubiprostone). Linaclotide is a novel drug, with a unique mechanism of action, low bioavailability and local action in the intestinal epithelial cells. It is currently being developed for patients with CC and IBS-C. From animal studies to human pharmacodynamic Phase Ib trials, and a comprehensive program of Phase IIb and III trials in health and disease, linaclotide demonstrates long-term efficacy and safety in CC and IBS-C.


Although there are many statistics on low-income students, most focus on deficits. This study is designed to concentrate on strengths, by exploring the role of self-compassion in the academic achievement of low-income community college students. This research, based broadly on resiliency theory, specifically encompasses the Buddhist psychology perspective on the meaning of suffering and self-reflection, in explaining how self-compassion may develop over a period of difficulty, and contributes positively to academic success. Further, this framework is placed within the context of Bronfenbrenner's ecological theory, to differentiate the influence of internal versus external resources, as well as to highlight the role of the chronosystem and its relevance to persistent poverty. Participants were 410 low-income community college students in southwestern Pennsylvania who responded to multiple objective measures to gain insight into academic success despite adversity. An exploratory factor analysis on the Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) was completed with regard to the use of this measure with a low-income population, as well as correlational studies, and a series of multiple regression analyses, to predict academic achievement in low-income community college students. Findings indicate that older students, African American students, students who are parents, and students who have fewer social supports reported more self-compassion. Further, self-compassion acted as a moderating mediator between income and academic success in students who report a pattern of persistent poverty. This subset of students reported more self-compassion and greater academic success in college.


Reliable efficiency calculation of high-subsonic and transonic compressor stages requires a
detailed and accurate prediction of the flow field within these stages. Despite the tremendous
progress in turbomachinery computational fluid mechanics, the compressor designer still
uses different loss correlations to estimate the total pressure losses and thus the efficiency of
the compressor stage. A new loss model is presented in this article. Special attention is paid
to the shock and profile losses, since they contribute significantly to the total pressure loss
balance, specifically for transonic compressor stages. A new shock loss model is presented
that calculates the shock position and the shock total pressure losses. The available experimental
data were used to establish new loss correlations that account for experimental
findings.