This study analyses the interaction between inter-industry wage differentials and the gender wage gap in six European countries using a unique harmonised matched employer-employee data set, the 1995 European Structure of Earnings Survey. Findings show the existence of significant inter-industry wage differentials in all countries for both sexes. While their structure is quite similar for men and women and across countries, their dispersion is significantly larger in countries with decentralised bargaining. These differentials are significantly and positively correlated with industry profitability. The magnitude of this correlation, however, is lower in countries with centralised and coordinated collective bargaining. Further results show that in all countries more than 80% of the gender wage gaps within industries are statistically significant. Yet, industries having the highest and the lowest gender wage gaps vary substantially across European countries. Finally, results indicate that industry effects explain between 0 and 29% of the overall gender wage gap.


Visualization techniques used in science and the arts for the advanced analysis of information and theories can and should be similarly used in the humanities. Within the discipline of philosophy there are both the possibility and the necessity to examine and present ideas using visualization techniques. The author created a CD-ROM entitled Blinded in an attempt to use visualization techniques to analyze and represent a metaphysical action proposed by the French philosopher George Bataille. He discusses the creation of that work and the theories involved in the conjunction of philosophy and visualization.


One of the major issues for assessment of the long-term sustainability of urban areas is related to the concept of \imported sustainability". In order to produce such an assessment for a given territory, one must rst identify and quantify the types of materials used, and the impacts associated to these uses. Material Flow Analysis (MFA) is directly related to how the material circulates and how it is transformed within a territory. In most cases this analysis is performed at national and regional levels, where the statistical data is available. The challenge is to establish such an analysis at smaller scales, e.g. in the case of France, at the department or city level. Currently, few studies are done at these scales and when they exist, they are based on the extrapolation of data at the country or the region levels. In this thesis, the possibility of applying data analysis at the regional level by generating a mathematical model that can t well the data at regional scale and estimate well the departmental one is explored. The downscaling procedure relies on the assumption that the obtained model at level 'n' (for example region) will be also true at level 'n+1' (for example department), such that it could properly estimate the unknown data based on a set of chosen drivers. The tests show that it is very important to choose the proper drivers and the class of model.


Interdisciplinary cooperation and collaboration have proven to be desirable yet difficult goals to achieve in social science research. The nuanced differences among the domains, frameworks, assumptions, and methods of the various fields of study that comprise such research often hinder attempts to engage in interdisciplinary dialogue that is both meaningful and productive. We show that demography, economics, political science, and sociology are a few of the fields at the vanguard of the interdisciplinary frontier that emerged following the Second World War. In light of the challenges that these fields (along with the natural sciences) face in initiating and sustaining interdisciplinary dialogue, we aim to accomplish several tasks. First, we seek to describe the theoretical and epistemological linkages among the cores of these four social-science disciplines. Second, we explore systems theory as a potential foundation for interdisciplinary unity. Third, we extrapolate the implications of the systems approach to encompass the study of human populations from multiple disciplinary perspectives. In this vein, we also seek to characterize key features of human populations, parse their functions in various disciplinary contexts, and prospectively identify challenges in data interpretation and analysis that will likely emerge in practice. The ultimate goals of this study are to delineate a set of methodological standards with which to guide interdisciplinary inquiry in the social and natural sciences, and consider how we might implement these standards in the construction of a world-historical data archive.


Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a major cause of bronchiolitis and viral pneumonia in young children and a serious health risk in immunocompromised individuals and the elderly. Immunity to RSV is not completely understood. In this work, we established a method for monitoring RSV infection by real-time PCR and applied this method for analysis of RSV replication in vivo in the cotton rat model in naı¨ve animals and in animals rendered immune to RSV by prior RSV infection. We found that even though no virus could be isolated from the lungs of RSV-challenged immune animals, RSV infection in fact took place and an accumulation of viral RNA transcripts was observed. This type of replication, therefore, can be termed "abortive," as RSV is capable of entering the cells in the lungs of immune animals, yet the production of progeny viruses is impaired. Similar patterns of RSV gene expression gradient were observed between naı¨ve and reinfected animals, indicating that the skewing of mRNA gradient of viral gene expression, a mechanism documented during latent infection by other viruses, is not likely to be responsible for abortive replication of RSV during reinfection. We found that passive administration of antibodies to RSV prevents productive infection normally accompanied by viral release in the lung, but it does not prevent abortive replication of the virus. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first evidence of abortive replication of RSV in vivo.


The continued emergence of human illness caused by avian influenza viruses (AIVs) demonstrates the threat of strains such as H5N1, H7N9, H10N8 and now H10N3. The genetic and biological properties of H10N3 viruses are not fully understood. In this study, three H10N3 strains isolated from live poultry markets (LPMs) were systematically studied. Genome sequencing showed that the poultry-origin viruses are highly homologous to the human H10N3 isolate. The three avian strains were A/chicken/Jiangsu/0146/2021(abbreviated as JS146, H10N3), A/chicken/Jiangsu/0169/2021 (JS169, H10N3) and A/chicken/Jiangsu/0189/2021(JS189, H10N3). Animal studies indicated that all three viruses are highly pathogenic to mice, and that all could replicate efficiently in mouse nasal turbinate and lungs despite maintaining their avian receptor binding affinity. We also found that these viruses replicated efficiently in A549 cells and chicken embryos. The strain JS146 had sensitivity to the neuraminidase-targeting drugs oseltamivir and zanamivir, whereas JS169 and JS189 were more resistant; genetic comparison implied that a substitution at NA position 368 conferred drug resistance. Importantly, several key molecular markers associated with mammalian adaptation had been detected in both avian and human-isolated H10N3 influenza viruses in the HA (G228S), PB2 (I292V and A588V), PB1 (M317V and I368V) and PA (A343S, K356R and S409N) protein. The above work contributes new insight into the biology of this potentially zoonotic subtype and provides evidence supporting the continued epidemiological monitoring of human infections caused by AIV subtype H10N3. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.


This paper describes the design and implementation of an augmented reality (AR) piano learning tool that uses a Microsoft HoloLens and a MIDI-over-Bluetooth-enabled electric piano. The tool presents a unique visual interface—a "mirror key overlay" approach—fitted for the AR environment, and opens up the possibility of on-instrument learning experiences. The curriculum focuses on teaching improvisation in blues, rock, jazz and classical genres. Users at the piano engage with interactive lessons, watch virtual hand demonstrations, see and hear example improvisations, and play their own solos and accompaniment along with AR-projected virtual musicians. The tool aims to be entertaining yet also effective in teaching core musical concepts.


Voltage‐gated proton channels (Hv1/VSOP) are expressed in various cells types, including phagocytes, and are involved in diverse physiological processes. Although hvcn1, the gene encoding Hv1, has been identified across a wide range of species, most of the knowledge about its physiological function and expression profile is limited to mammals. In this study, we investigated the basic properties of DrHv1, the Hv1 ortholog in zebrafish (Danio rerio) which is an excellent animal model owing to the transparency, as well as its functional expression in native cells. Electrophysiological analysis using a heterologous expression system confirmed the properties of a voltage‐gated proton channel are conserved in DrHv1 with differences in threshold and activation kinetics as compared to mouse (Mus musculus) Hv1 (mHv1). RT‐PCR analysis revealed that hvcn1 is expressed in zebrafish neutrophils, as is the case in mammals. Subsequent electrophysiological analysis confirmed the functional expression of DrHv1 in zebrafish neutrophils, which suggests Hv1 function in phagocytes is conserved among vertebrates. We also found that DrHv1 is comparatively resistant to extracellular Zn2+, which is a potent inhibitor of mammalian Hv1, and this phenomenon appears to reflect variation in the Zn2+‐coordinating residue (histidine) within the extracellular linker region in mammalian Hv1. Notably, the serum Zn2+ concentration is much higher in zebrafish than in mouse, raising the possibility that Zn2+ sensitivity was acquired in accordance with a change in the serum Zn2+ concentration. This study highlights the biological variation and importance of Hv1 in different animal species.


This paper gives an outline of the steering assistance system (hereinafter, SAS) and a description of its key technology: the lane recognition algorithm. To accommodate a variety of driving styles, the SAS is equipped with a lane keeping assistance mode (LKA mode) and a lane departure warning mode (LDW mode) that can be selectively set by the driver. The former mode works in combination with adaptive cruise control (ACC) and carries the advantage of relieving the driving load that is placed on the driver. The latter mode has the benefit of reducing the danger of lane departure accidents caused by the driver dozing off and taking his eyes off the road. The newly developed lane recognition ECU has a simple hardware set-up of two 32-bit microcomputers. The lane recognition algorithm was constructed on the basis of a logic process that analyzes pattern edge points and selects a set of edge points that most closely resemble lanemarks. As a result, it is able to recognize lanemarks precisely at complex lanemarks, such as multiple lanemarks and interchange (IC) and service area (SA) branch roads. This allowed us to achieve an extremely high rate of lane recognition.


In this paper, we present a new solution for the problem of tracking the 3D pose of a hand held camera using particle filtering framework. The proposed approach utilizes a 3D straight-line based model of a structured environment. The principal novelty is in the use of the 2D edges from the image and the 3D lines from the input model within the particle filter, especially to design the likelihood function of the filter observation model. Results from real data are presented, demonstrating the efficiency and robustness of the proposed method.


In this paper the model presented in the companion paper, Wright and Parker (2005) is applied to a generic river reach typical of a large, sand-bed river flowing into the ocean in order to investigate the mechanisms controlling longitudinal profile development and downstream fining. Three mechanisms which drive downstream fining are studied: a delta prograding into standing water, sea-level rise, and tectonic subsidence. Various rates of sea-level rise (typical of the late Holocene) and tectonic subsidence are modeled in order to quantify their effects on the degree of profile concavity and downstream fining. Also, several other physical mechanisms which may affect fining are studied, including the relative importance of the suspended versus bed load, the effect of the loss of sediment overbank, and the influence of the delta bottom slope. Finally, sensitivity analysis is used to show that the grain-size distribution at the interface between the active layer and substrate has a significant effect on downstream fining.


For a long time cardiologists have not been able to explain why the problem of cardiac arrhythmia in a heart transplant recipient practically disappears. In fact, this issue has never been raised for discussion. At the same time, my new theory of arrhythmias (NTA) has been discussed at conferences and in mass media for the last 4 years. The core proposition of NTA is as follows: the generation of extrasystoles and tachycardia in most cases occurs not due to bioelectric reentry, but owing to the action of mechanical pulse waves. A pathological pulse wave can travel to large veins along the walls of the arteriovenous anastomoses (AVA) and excite cardiomyocytes. The developer of NTA has studied some peculiarities of the cardiac rhythm patterns which occur after heart transplantation and presents herein convincing evidence in favor of his new theory.


In this paper I show that discretionary policymaking can be superior to timeless perspective policymaking and identify model features that make this outcome more likely. Developing a measure of conditional loss that treats the auxiliary state variables that characterize the timeless perspective equilibrium appropriately, I use a New Keynesian DSGE model to show that discretion can dominate timeless perspective policymaking when the Phillips curve is relatively flat, due, perhaps, to firm-specific capital (or labor) and/or Kimball (1995) aggregation in combination with nominal price rigidity. These results suggest that studies applying the timeless perspective might also usefully compare its performance to discretion, paying careful attention to how policy performance is evaluated.


1. Crop raiding by African elephants Loxodonta africana erodes local tolerance for elephants and thereby impedes conservation efforts, so solutions are urgently required. Within conflict zones, crop raiding is not distributed equally amongst farms, which may be a result of variation in local physical or geographical factors, or in farmers' efforts to defend their fields. Understanding the efficacy of local conflict mitigation methods is important, but few quantitative evaluations exist. 2. Using a comparative survey of raided and non-raided farms in Transmara District, Kenya, and multivariate logistic and linear regression analyses, we explored a range of factors affecting (i) the susceptibility of farms to elephant crop raiding and (ii) the amount of crop damage once elephants had entered a field. 3. The results revealed that farms that had been habitually raided in the past were more likely to be raided during the study period, as were those that were larger and bordered by hedges or fences. Greater guarding effort increased the likelihood that elephants were detected prior to entry and decreased the likelihood of successful crop raiding, as did the use of fire and noise. 4. However, there was an interaction between physical and human factors; larger farms used more advanced barrier methods at the expense of guarding effort. Farmers' efforts did not appear to diminish the damage inflicted once elephants had entered a field. 5. A subsequent experimental test confirmed these results; the application of enhanced early warning and guarding effort on previously raided farms reduced incidents of crop raiding by 89.6% over 2 years in comparison with a control group of farms. 6. Synthesis and applications. These results suggest that early detection of elephants approaching fields, increased guarding effort, and the use of active deterrents could form the basis of an effective mitigation strategy regardless of location and the physical attributes of a farm. Validating the results of predictive models through participatory mitigation trials serves to demonstrate effective solutions to farmers themselves. Researchers and practitioners should be encouraged to replicate such field trials over broader spatial and temporal scales and to find means to encourage farmers to take up appropriate solutions.


Objective Studies using Electronic Health Record data incorporate custom aggregations of billing codes. One such grouping is the phecode system, which was developed for phenome-wide association studies (PheWAS). Phecodes were built upon the International Classification of Diseases, version 9, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM). However, healthcare systems have transitioned to ICD-10/ICD-10-CM. Here we present our work on the development and validation of the mappings for ICD-10/ICD-10-CM to phecodes. Materials and Methods We mapped ICD-10/ICD-10-CM codes to phecodes by matching code descriptions and using ICD-10/ICD-10-CM to SNOMED CT maps, general equivalence maps to ICD-9-CM, and a ICD-9-CM to phecode map. We assessed the coverage of the maps in two databases: Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) using ICD-10-CM and the UK Biobank (UKBB) using ICD-10. We evaluated the validity of the ICD-10-CM map by comparing phecode prevalence between ICD-9-CM and ICD-10-CM derived phecodes at VUMC and with a PheWAS. Results We mapped >75% of ICD-10-CM and ICD-10 codes to phecodes. Of the unique codes observed in the VUMC (ICD-10-CM) and UKBB (ICD-10) cohorts, >90% were mapped to phecodes. Among the top ten phecodes in the cohorts, essential hypertension and hyperlipidemia overlapped. With regression analysis, we found that the ICD-10-CM map was comparable to the ICD-9-CM to phecode map. An initial PheWAS with a lipoprotein(a) (LPA) genetic variant using ICD-9-CM and ICD-10-CM maps yielded similar genotype-phenotype associations. Conclusions This study introduces initial maps of ICD-10/ICD-10-CM codes to phecodes, which will enable researchers to leverage accumulated ICD-10/ICD-10-CM data for high-throughput clinical and genetic research.


Abstract

This paper studies dishonest sellers in the e-commerce market, specifically their impact on the market under different conditions. We consider the role of consumers' social and individual learning and social network branches on the market. We rely on a quality uncertainty market model (Izquierdo et al., 2007) and a trust game model (Wierzbicki et al., 2014) to establish an agent-based model. Our approach considers the proportion of honest and dishonest sellers, the reputation of sellers, and the expectation of quality among consumers after purchasing the goods. The results of the study reveal that when dishonest sellers appear in a market with a high degree of quality uncertainty, there is a negative impact on the market, including a decline in consumer expected quality of products in the market, a decrease in commodity transaction volume and market price, and a decrease in seller income. The impact is more pronounced in markets with a higher proportion of dishonest sellers.

JEL classification numbers: C15, C63, D21, B82, B83.
Keywords: Agent-Based modeling, E-commerce market, Dishonest sellers, Trust game, Reputation of sellers.


With the heightened pressure on car manufacturers to increase the efficiency and reduce the carbon emissions of their fleets, more challenging engine operation has become a viable option. Highly dilute, boosted, and stratified charge, among others, promise engine efficiency gains and emissions reductions. At such demanding engine conditions, the spark-ignition process is a key factor for the flame initiation propagation and the combustion event. From a computational standpoint, there exists multiple spark-ignition models that perform well under conventional conditions but are not truly predictive under strenuous engine operation modes, where the underlying physics needs to be expanded. In this paper, a hybrid Lagrangian-Eulerian spark-ignition (LESI) model is coupled with different turbulence models, grid sizes, and combustion models. The ignition model, previously developed, relies on coupling Eulerian energy deposition with a Lagrangian particle evolution of the spark channel, at every time-step. The spark channel is attached to the electrodes and allowed to elongate at a speed derived from the flow velocity. The LESI model is used to simulate spark ignition in a non-quiescent crossflow environment at engine-like conditions, using CONVERGE commercial CFD solver. The results highlight the consistency, robustness, and versatility of the model in a range of engine-like setups, from typical with RANS and a larger grid size to high fidelity with LES and a finer grid size. The flame kernel growth is then evaluated against schlieren images from an optical constant volume ignition chamber with a focus on the performance of flame propagation models, such as G-equation and thickened flame model, versus the baseline well-stirred reactor model. Finally, future development details are discussed.


This paper reports the test results of our own carbon-fiber cathodes made by using the technique of liquid infiltration in vacuum. The technique is completely different from the conventional adhering techniques that were employed previously in constructing carbon-fiber cathodes. Our technique could be used to precisely control the distribution and pointing direction of the carbon-fiber tips on the cathode surface. In our technique, the carbon-fiber material and the base material (which is usually the metal that we use in making the cathodes) can be well compounded to become a novel composite material. Compared with frequently used metal cathodes, the voltage and current waveforms of our carbon-fiber cathodes were more stable and smooth, their turn-on times were shorter, and their durations were longer. These advantages were especially obvious for generating high-quality electron beams using long-pulse-driven devices. Experiments for producing high-power microwaves have also been done on the reflex triode virtual cathode oscillator using our carbon-fiber cathodes. The peak power of the microwave that was generated using our carbon-fiber cathode was increased by a factor of about 2-3 over the case of a stainless steel cathode under the same experimental conditions.


In this paper, the enhanced collision resolution algorithm, referred as high priority binary exponential backoff (h-BEB) is analyzed. Such algorithm provides high priority traffic separation, enabling the support of real-time communication in shared Ethernet networks. It allows multiple Ethernet standard devices to coexist in the same network segment with one h-BEB enhanced station, imposing higher priority for the transfer of h-BEB related traffic. The simulation analysis shows that the h-BEB algorithm guarantees values for both the average access delay and the related standard deviation, that are significantly smaller for the h-BEB station than for the BEB stations.


At present, the history of education is experiencing a paradox: research in the history of education is flourishing, but the history of education as a study subject is losing its relevance in university curricula. The present research aims at examining the potential of education history in student-centred and research-based study process while addressing the experience in teaching education history in master's study programmes at the University of Latvia from 1920 to 2020. The article comprises three sections: the first section offers an overview of the evolvement of the history of education as a study subject in Europe and Latvia; the second section, based on the experience of teaching the history of education and research in history didactics, reveals three possible approaches to the study course in the history of education; the third section foregrounds the integration of digitized historical sources in the delivery of student-centred and research-based education history courses. The research demonstrates that each of the three approaches ("acts-and-facts history," "problem-oriented history of education," and "edutainment") has student-centred potential in shaping historical thinking. The student-centred study process in a modern university is closely related to research-based studies, which in the study course of education history means independent research of history aligned with students' individual interests in the field of education.


The prolongational component in A Generative Theory of Tonal Music assigns tensing and relaxing patterns to tonal sequences but does not adequately describe degrees of harmonic and melodic tension. This paper offers solutions to the problem, first by adapting the distance algorithm from the theory of tonal pitch space for the purpose of quantifying sequential and hierarchical harmonic tension. The method is illustrated for the beginning of the Mozart Sonata, K. 282, with emphasis on the hierarchical approach. The paper then turns to melodic tension in the context of the anchoring of dissonance. Interrelated attraction algorithms are proposed that incorporate the factors of stability, proximity, and directed motion. A distinction is developed between the tension of distance and the tension of attraction. The attraction and distance algorithms are combined in a view of harmony as voice leading, leading to a second analysis of the opening phrase of the Mozart in terms of voiceleading motion. Connections with recent theoretical and psychological work are discussed.


In this paper we investigate the influence of two factors on the risk taking behaviour of hedge fund managers. The first factor is the past performance of the fund relative to the performance of each fund's peer. The second is the option-like features of the typical hedge fund manager's compensation structure. We aim to answer questions of the following kind: do those funds that find that their incentive option is out of the money increase risk or vice-versa? We then attempt to reconcile these results with the theoretical frameworks proposed. We believe these questions to be of critical importance given the recent performance of the hedge fund industry. Based upon their performance in 2008, it is clear that many hedge funds will find themselves considerably below their high water marks and with significantly less assets under management as we move into 2009. Our work here may help to throw some light on the likely response of hedge fund managers to this current crisis.


Sir .—In their letter "Neonatal Fracture and Cesarean Section" (Journal1982;136:865), Clarke and Young state that they are unaware of studies in the medical literature on the incidence of fracture of the femur during cesarean section, and they expressed an interest in the experience of others. Fracture of an infant's femur during delivery via cesarean section is not new. In 1922, Ehrenfest 1 described his experience as follows: Only recently I personally experienced how easily a femur might be fractured... the median incision in the anterior uterine wall was made too short on account of a fibroid unexpectedly encountered in the lower portion of the wall. The right leg of the large child was readily lifted out and during the somewhat difficult extraction of the breech, a distant snap or crack was felt, the left femur, still within the uterus, had been fractured approximately in its middle. I have no


The purpose of the present study was to develop and validate a self‐report instrument that measures the nature of the coach–athlete relationship. Jowett et al.'s ( Jowett & Meek, 2000; Jowett, in press ) qualitative case studies and relevant literature were used to generate items for an instrument that measures affective, cognitive, and behavioral aspects of the coach–athlete relationship. Two studies were carried out in an attempt to assess content, predictive, and construct validity, as well as internal consistency, of the Coach–Athlete Relationship Questionnaire (CART‐Q), using two independent British samples. Principal component analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were used to reduce the number of items, identify principal components, and confirm the latent structure of the CART‐Q. Results supported the multidimensional nature of the coach–athlete relationship. The latent structure of the CART‐Q was underlined by the latent variables of coaches' and athletes' Closeness (emotions), Commitment (cognitions), and Complementarity (behaviors).


This research explores the online distance learning experiences of students studying health professional courses in the Australian higher education sector. Policies and technological advances have led to diverse student populations choosing flexible study options, while managing complex lives juggling work, home and study demands. This thesis investigates student engagement with orientation resources and advances theoretical understanding about student transition to online distance learning. Educational design research (EDR), a pragmatic research approach, provided the research framework. Design principles informed by social-constructivist and distance learning perspectives supported the creation of online orientation resources. These were then implemented with postgraduate health science students at one university, and later re-contextualised for development at a second university with undergraduate nursing students. A conjecture mapping process aligned to the three phases of EDR (analysis and exploration, design and construction, and evaluation and reflection) informed the research process. This enabled the key design features and intended outcomes to be identified and directed the analytical process. Mixed methods data sources, including learnin management system tracking statistics that captured student engagement with the resources, and other survey and interview data, assisted with the interpretation of meanings about how the students transitioned to online distance learning. Comparative analysis of the research conducted at the two universities led to both practical and theoretical outcomes. Six refined design principles provided evidence-based guidelines for educational designers developing orientation resources; suggesting that universities need flexible and varied approaches to support online distance learners. Transition was conceived as a multilayered concept, involving students adjusting to being a university student, managing the distance and online environment and re-positioning their occupational mindset, enabled by self-regulatory behaviours. The research also strengthened the iterative EDR framework. Conjecture mapping ensured the research process was responsive to new theoretical perspectives, changes in the university environments studied, and unanticipated research outcomes that emerged during the extended research project. The result was a robust systematic inquiry producing research outcomes that can be transferred to new contexts.


In the context of exacerbation of environmental problems that are global in nature, it is necessary to assess the opportunities and development prospects of environmental policy not only at the international level, but also at the regional European level. In this regard, the focus of our article is to consider the problem of protecting groundwater as a strategic natural resource and to analyze the practice of applying European directives on water quality and protection of groundwater in EU countries. In the EU, the basic legal framework for water protection is defined in the Water Framework Directive that determines the need to develop monitoring programs and basin water management plans to improve the quality of water in the EU by the member states. However, taking into account the fact that groundwater, especially drinking artesian water, is vulnerable to pollution, improvement of the legal groundwater protection system and the search for rational groundwater protection practices implemented in the EU countries are vitally necessary. Therefore, the paper aims to explore the ways of EU legislation development in the field of water resources protection, identifying the main areas of groundwater protection and analyzing the legal means used in certain EU countries, in particular, Austria, Germany, as well as identifying priorities and objectives for Ukraine on the way to integration into the system of European water legislation. Keywords: EU legislation, groundwater, groundwater pollution, groundwater use, water management, water protection.


RACNet is a sensor network that monitors a data center's environmental conditions at high temporal and spatial resolutions. The data RACNet collects can improve the energy efficiency of data centers, currently one of the fastest growing energy consumers in the U.S. RACNet overcomes the challenge of reliable and low-latency data gathering from dense networks deployed in harsh RF environments through rDCP, a novel network protocol that decouples data collection from topology control. Furthermore, rDCP automatically partitions the network to multiple routing trees, each operating at a different frequency channel. The combination of these features enables rDCP to scale up while maintaining high data yields. Preliminary results from a production deployment of 694 sensors (including 174 wireless nodes) show that rDCP achieves a data yield of 99%, while delivering 90% of the measurements in less than 30 seconds.


BACKGROUND
Little is known about the mechanisms of arsenic-related urothelial cancer (AsUC). The aim of this study was to reveal the differential expression of molecular markers between AsUC and non-arsenic-related UC (non-AsUC).

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Tissues of AsUC (n=33), non-AsUC (n=20) and normal bladder urothelia from patients with benign diseases (n=4) were examined for multiple selected molecular markers responsible for various cellular functions, includingglutathione, GST-pi, Bcl-2, p53 and c-Fos.

RESULTS
The mean cellular glutathione content of normal mucosal samples (33.4 +/- 7.2 microM/mg protein) was significantly higher than either non-AsUC (22.8 +/- 1.8, p = 0.04) or AsUC (16.4 +/- 1.6, p = 0.002). The glutathione content of non-AsUC was higher than that of AsUC (p = 0.012). The expressions of Bcl-2 and c-Fos in AsUC were significantly higher than those in non-AsUC (p = 0.004 and p = 0.02, respectively).

CONCLUSION
The carcinogenic pathway for AsUC is different, in part, from that of non-AsUC. Cellular glutathione contents may be down-regulated during urothelial carcinogenesis. Bcl-2 and c-Fos may play important roles in arsenic-mediated carcinogenesis of the urothelium.


Driven by differing statutory mandates and programmatic separation of regulatory responsibilities between federal, state, and tribal agencies, distinct chemical and radiation risk management strategies have evolved. In the field this separation poses real challenges since many of the major environmental risk management decisions we face today require the evaluation of both types of risks. Over the last decade, federal, state, and tribal agencies have continued to discuss their different approaches and explore areas where their activities could be harmonized. The current framework for managing public exposures to chemical carcinogens has been referred to as a 'bottom up approach.' Risk between 10−4 and 10−6 is established as an upper bound goal. In contrast, a 'top down' approach that sets an upper bound dose limit and couples with site specific As Low As Reasonably Achievable Principle (ALARA), is in place to manage individual exposure to radiation. While radiation risk are typically managed on a cumulative basis, exposure to chemicals is generally managed on a chemical‐by‐chemical, medium‐by‐medium basis. There are also differences in the nature and size of sites where chemical and radiation contamination is found. Such differences result in divergent management concerns. In spite of these differences, there are several common and practical concerns among radiation and chemical risk managers. They include 1) the issue of cost for site redevelopment and long‐term stewardship, 2) public acceptance and involvement, and 3) the need for flexible risk management framework to address the first two issues. This article attempts to synthesize key differences, opportunities for harmonization, and challenges ahead.


PURPOSE
To report on the clinical findings of a case of late opacification of the hydrophobic acrylic intraocular lens (IOLs) in both eyes after cataract surgery.

METHODS
A 79-year-old man with a history of decreased visual acuity and complaints of glare and blurred vision in both eyes over the past 3 years. He had received an uneventful phacoemulsification combined with posterior chamber IOL implantation for senile cataract in both eyes 13 years ago, and had undergone neodymium:YAG(Nd:YAG) laser posterior capsulotomy on both eyes 6 years ago, for posterior capsular opacification (PCO). The optical portion of the IOLs showed uniform gray haze. Binocular posterior capsular laser holes were clearly noted.

RESULTS
IOL exchange was performed by the same surgeon on both eyes, three days apart. Postoperatively, the patient's visual acuity was elevated to 6/12 (OD) and 6/9 (OS) at 6 months, and intraocular pressure (IOP) reached 16.8 mmHg (OD) and 18.4 mmHg (OS). Neither glare or blurred vision were observed in either eye.

CONCLUSION
IOL exchange can be used to effectively manage clinically significant optic opacification.


True to the spirit of a social-democratic State, India had originally evolved her power development policy, and shouldered that responsibility, in line with the State's professed commitment to honouring and ensuring social security equations. Though the State Electricity Boards (SEBs) were statutorily required to function as autonomous service-cum-commercial corporations, they became in effect agents of the Governments to subserve the socio-economic policies of the State, and hence never felt the requirement to break even or to contribute to capacity expansion programs. This unaccountability culture in turn led to gross inefficiency at all levels - technical, institutional and organizational, as well as financial. And the cost escalation from such pampered inefficiency remained above the revenue realized from an irrational subsidized pricing practice. With losses mounting up, the field was getting cleared for some new entrants of ideas and practices, that the so-called `fiscal crisis' at the turn of the nineties ushered in subsequently. Thus has commenced an era of reforms and restructuring of power sector in India, at the initiation of the World Bank that has also lit up an informed atmosphere of debates and discourses. However, little light has been thrown on the significant aspects of inefficiency costs involved in the SEBs' forced functioning that allegedly finally warranted the reforms. The present study is a modest attempt at this. Here, inter alia, we have estimated, on some very plausible assumptions, the avoidable cost of inefficiency at a few amenable levels and found it to represent about one-third of the reported cost of electricity supply in India in 1997-98! And this is regardless of a number of other possible inefficiency sources at all levels of performance.


This manuscript provides a general review of the contemporary literature on e-commerce logistics. The review is carried out systematically on the articles published in academic journals from 2015 up to 2018. A total of 77 manuscripts were reviewed and analyzed using this method regarding the journals, level of analysis, and scientific methods used. Moreover, coding of the findings of the papers was carried out to identify the research themes in contemporary e-commerce logistics literature. As a result, six themes were identified; namely, Distribution, Channel Design, Sustainability, Performance, Pricing, and Innovation. The results show a shift of scholarly focus over the past years.


OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of pinosylvin (PIN) and pterostilbene (PTE), natural substances from the stilbenoid group, on the development of adjuvant arthritis in rats.

METHODS
Adjuvant arthritis (AA) was induced by a single intradermal injection of Mycobacterium butyricum in incomplete Freund's adjuvant in male Lewis rats. Our experiments included healthy intact animals as reference controls, arthritic animals without any drug administration, and arthritic animals with administration of PIN and PTE in the oral daily dose of 30 mg/kg b.w. The treatment involved administration of the substances tested from day 0, i.e. the day of immunization, to the experimental day 28. The following parameters were monitored: change of the hind paw volume (HPV) on day 14, 21 and 28, luminol-enhanced chemiluminescence (CL) of the joint and myeloperoxidase (MPO) activity in hind paw joint homogenates (day 28).

RESULTS
Arthritic animals treated with PIN showed a decrease in HPV, significantly on days 14 and 28. PIN decreased CL of the joint as well as MPO activity of the joint homogenate, in comparison with untreated animals. PTE had no effect on HPV and MPO activity in hind paw joint homogenates and exerted only a partial effect on luminol-enhanced CL.

CONCLUSIONS
On the basis of our results we conclude that the effect of PTE on CL was only partial. PIN, on the other hand, had a beneficial anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effect on oxidative stress induced biochemical changes occurring in AA, as determined by all three functional parameters.


Cold air inflow has significant effect on a natural draft air cooled heat exchanger (NDACHE) chimney. To study the mechanism for the prevention of cold inflow into NDACHE chimney's, in total seven configuration of experiments were carried out In the prototype models for different heat loads at approximately 0.7SkW to 1.25kW. The effect of wire mesh screen on the chimney performance had also determined. Temperature and air velocity were measured for the configurations and heat loads. It was found that the top only, Top and Middle and Middle only installations were able to maintain draft velocity to within 3.0% of , the control experiment draft velocity in spite of the resistance of the mesh. It was also found that configurations utilizing mesh at the bottom had experienced a drop is draft velocity by
up to 50% from the control. The smoke flow visualization tests clearly proved that cold air inflow phenomenon exits and can be countered with the installation of wire mesh at the top of the model. In the second phase of the project, the wire mesh of 3 different apertures and two chimney height were tested. Large aperture tended to allow more cold inflow and draft was directly proportional to chimney height. CFD runs were also done for the prototypes to explain the cause of wire mesh serving as repellent of cold inflow.


We examine the issue of mining association rules among items in a large database of sales transactions. Mining association rules means that, given a database of sales transactions, to discover all associations among items such that the presence of some items in a transaction will imply the presence of other items in the same transaction. The mining of association rules can be mapped into the problem of discovering large itemsets where a large itemset is a group of items that appear in a sufficient number of transactions. The problem of discovering large itemsets can be solved by constructing a candidate set of itemsets first, and then, identifying, within this candidate set, these itemsets that meet the large itemset requirement. Generally, this is done iteratively for each large k-itemset in increasing order of k, where a large k-itemset is a large itemset with k items. To determine large itemsets from a huge number of candidate sets in early iterations is usually the dominating factor for the overall data mining performance. To address this issue, we develop an effective algorithm for the candidate set generation. It is a hash-based algorithm and is especially effective for the generation of a candidate set for large 2-itemsets. Explicitly, the number of candidate 2-itemsets generated by the proposed algorithm is, in orders of magnitude, smaller than that by previous methods, thus resolving the performance bottleneck. Note that the generation of smaller candidate sets enables us to effectively trim the transaction database size at a much earlier stage of the iterations, thereby reducing the computational cost for later iterations significantly. The advantage of the proposed algorithm also provides us the opportunity of reducing the amount of disk I/O required. An extensive simulation study is conducted to evaluate performance of the proposed algorithm.


Cellular cannibalism is a tumor activity where a cell is engulfed by another cell. This process promotes tumor cell survival under unfavorable conditions. The current report describes an extremely rare case of thrombocytopenia resulting from cellular cannibalism in a patient with bone marrow metastasis due to malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM). A 77-year-old male presented with hemothorax and thrombocytopenia. He was diagnosed with MPM of the sarcomatoid cell type. However, his disease progressed rapidly and he died 11 days after admission. Bone marrow aspiration revealed metastatic MPM cells that had engulfed other blood cells. Accordingly, the observed thrombocytopenia was attributed to cellular cannibalism by metastatic MPM tumor cells. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first reported case of thrombocytopenia due to cellular cannibalism in a patient with this type of malignancy (MPM). The results suggested that although MPM rarely metastasizes to the bone marrow, bone marrow aspiration could be useful in such cases.


Diffusion in the interface regions of lightweight heatproof quality titanium and titanium/aluminum alloys was investigated. We studied the diffusion of aluminum from intermetallide to titanium alloy. The concentration of other chemical elements and microhardness has been measured in diffusion region formed in the solid titanium alloy. The interface region includes a transition zone from the initially solid Ti-alloy and the molten TiAl-Nb intermetallic substrate. The width of the interface region after diffusion bonding is 45-60 µm. The titanium content decreases and aluminum content increases starting from surface up to 120-150 µm in depth in solid titanium alloy. As a result of diffusion, the intermetallic Ti3Al thin layer was formed in the transition zone in the Ti-alloy substrate. The microporosity was also formed in the interface region.


We describe computation migration, a new technique that is based on compile-time program transformations, for accesing remote data in a distributed-memory parallel system. In contrast with RPC-style access, where the access is performed remotely, and with data migration, where the data is moved so that it is local, computation migration moves part of the current thread to the processor where the data resides. The access is performed at the remote processor, and the migrated thread portion continues to run on that same processor; this makes subsequent accesses in the thread portion local.
We describe an implementation of computation migration that consists of two parts: an implementation that migrates single activation frames, and a high-level language annotation that allows a programmer to express when migration is desired. We performed experiments using two applications; these experiments demonstrate that computation migration is a valuable alternative to RPC and data migration.


The narrow-angle camera (NAC) of the lunar reconnaissance orbiter camera (LROC) uses a pair of closely attached pushbroom sensors to obtain a large swath of coverage while providing high-resolution imaging. However, the two image sensors do not share the same lenses and cannot be modelled geometrically with a single physical model. The irregular image network leads to difficulties in conducting the block adjustment to remove inconsistencies between the NAC images in both intraand inter-track cases. In addition, the special image network requires two to four stereo models, each with an irregular overlapping region of varying size. The stereo configuration of NAC images also creates severe problems for the state-of-the-art image matching methods. With the aim of using NAC stereo pairs for precision 3D topographic mapping, this paper presents a novel approach to the block adjustment and coupled epipolar rectification of NAC stereo images. This approach removes the internal inconsistencies in a single block adjustment and merges the image pair in the disparity space, thus requiring estimation of only one stereo model. Semi-global matching is used to generate a disparity map for the stereo pair; each correspondence is transformed back to the source image, and 3D points are derived via photogrammetric space intersection. The experimental results reveal that the proposed approach is able to reduce the gaps and inconsistencies caused by the inaccurate boresight offsets between the two NAC cameras and the irregular overlapping regions and to finally generate precise and consistent 3D topographic models from the NAC stereo images.


The efficient markets hypothesis (EMH) maintains that market prices fully reflect all available information. Developed independently by Paul A. Samuelson and Eugene F. Fama in the 1960s, this idea has been applied extensively to theoretical models and empirical studies of financial securities prices, generating considerable controversy as well as fundamental insights into the price-discovery process. The most enduring critique comes from psychologists and behavioural economists who argue that the EMH is based on counterfactual assumptions regarding human behaviour, that is, rationality. Recent advances in evolutionary psychology and the cognitive neurosciences may be able to reconcile the EMH with behavioural anomalies.


This work is about the implementation of a MPEG-4 decoder for subdivision surfaces, which are powerful 3D paradigms allowing to compactly represent piecewise smooth surfaces. This 'study' will take place in the framework of MPEG-4 AFX, the extension of the MPEG-4 standard including the subdivision surfaces. This document will introduce, with some details, the 'theory' of subdivision surfaces in the two forms present in MPEG-4: 'plain' and detailed/ wavelet subdivision surfaces. It will particularly concentrate on wavelet subdivision surfaces, which permit progressive 3D mesh compression.


ABSTRACT Examination of 325 bottom samples taken at 68 stations off the southeast coast of the United States by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service revealed the common occurrence of glauconite in foraminiferal sands. The glauconite is variable in color and in morphology, ranging from dark greenish-black to greenish-white. The dark green glauconite generally occurs in the smooth, bulbous pellet form, whereas the lighter green glauconite commonly occurs as rough, porous pellets in the form of internal molds of microorganisms. However, in some internal mold pellets, dark green and light green glauconite occur together. Magnetic fractions were taken from all samples. The samples composed primarily of foraminiferal tests yielded a glauconite-rich sparate. In the magnetic separates occurred many intact shells of foraminifers which, upon solution in acid, generally yielded internal molds of the light-colored glauconite. Analysis by x-ray diffraction of single pellets and of composite samples of hand-picked grains revealed the glauconite to be essentially a mica-type clay varying in degree of hydration and disorder. Examination of oriented slides of the composite samples following vapor glycol treatment showed that the dark-green glauconite was unaffected, but that the pale green glauconite was expandable. Debye-Scherrer films of single pellets of the light green glauconite showed the presence of kaolinite which was not found in the darker green glauconite. A decrease in sharpness and a shift of the basal mica diffraction line to higher "d" values as well as a decrease in the potassium content and an increase in the water content were directly related to the color change of the glauconite from dark green to pale green. The glauconite in these foraminiferal sands is interpreted as representing various stages of "glauconitization" of clay material which was originally enclosed within the tests of microorganisms.


AIM
This paper examines the complex issues of measuring the patient experience and evaluating the quality of health care. It discusses the use of surveys, patient stories and narrative methods of data collection in an attempt to define quality and how it should be measured.

BACKGROUND
A recent Department of Health (DH) document insists that patients will be at the heart of decision making in the NHS by having greater control in informing strategic commissioning decisions (DH 2010c). The government aims to improve patient experience, enabling patients to rate services according to the quality of care they receive. This will be carried out using information generated by patients.

REVIEW METHODS
This paper discusses the advantages and disadvantages of using surveys in gathering patient satisfaction data. It considers the value of surveys in measuring quality of care and appraises their usefulness in strengthening patients' collective voice.

DISCUSSION
The paper investigates the use of another source of feedback - it examines the design of qualitative data collection methods as a means of gaining feedback from service users in encouraging providers of health care to be more responsive to their needs. Too often, patients are expected to fit the services, rather than services meeting the patients' needs.

CONCLUSION
The most effective way of exploring and representing the patient's experience is by using a mixed-method approach. In other words, an integrated approach with the use of surveys and more narrative methods, such as patient stories, will effectively define quality and how it should be measured, ensuring that the focus is always on what matters most to patients.


The olivine-type LiFePO4 powder was prepared by a chemical method using the synthesized FePO4⋅2H2O, LiOH and glucose as raw materials. The synthesized FePO4⋅2H2O powder was obtained by co-precipitation method. FePO4⋅2H2O and LiFePO4 powders were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The results showed the synthesized FePO4⋅2H2O powder at pH of 2.05 was in a single phase and nearly spherical in shape. Using the synthesized powders to prepared LiFePO4 at 600 °C in vacuum for 2 h was nearly spherical in shape and whose size was in the range of 0.1-0.5μm.


Boron mud haydite adsorbent which was made of boron mud, bentonite, flyash, saw dust, was applied in treatment of high turbidity wastewater. The removal rate of turbidity was used as the index, and the pH the value, the flow, the filler height, the saw dust content, the size and the processing time were studied. The results showed that the removal rate of turbidity which raw turbidity was 795~820NTU could reach 94% when the pH was 12, the flow was 1200s•L-1, the filler height was 50cm, the size was 4mm, the saw dust content was 40g, and the processing time was 60min.The study provided a new way in the preparation of adsorbent and an application of high turbidimetric wastewater treatment.


Between 7-18 million Americans suffer from sleep disordered breathing (SDB), including those who suffer from obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Despite this high prevalence and burden of OSA, existing diagnostic techniques remain impractical for widespread screening. In this study, we introduce a new model for OSA screening and describe an at-home wearable sleep mask (named ARAM) that can robustly track the wearers' sleep patterns. This monitoring is achieved using select sensors that enable screening and monitoring in a form-factor that can be easily self-instrumented. Based on feedback from sleep doctors and technicians, we incorporate the most valuable sensors for OSA diagnosis, while maintaining ease-of-use and comfort for the patient. We discuss the results of preliminary field trials, where both our sleep mask and a commercially available device were worn simultaneously to evaluate our device's robustness. Based on these results, we discuss next steps for the design of the screening system, including analyses techniques that would provide more efficient screening than existing systems.


In this paper, we critically review the literature on environmental regulation and competitiveness at a national level. The concept of international competitiveness (in relation to environmental regulation) is assessed in two broad schools of thought: neoclassical economics and the competitiveness school to which the Porter hypothesis belongs. We identify the pollution haven hypothesis (PHH) as the least common denominator for empirical evaluation of the main themes of these two competing schools of thought. As a minimum, one would need to find evidence on PHH to question the validity of the Porter hypothesis. A fully legitimate test of the Porter hypothesis should, inter alia, have a particular emphasis on the impact of well-designed environmental policies on high-value sectors of an economy. Examining the recent empirical literature on the PHH we find that the evidence remains inconclusive. This leaves the Porter hypothesis largely unscathed and challenges the widely-held view of the existence of a trade-off between economic performance and environmental quality.


Sports taxonomies typically classify specific motor skills and types of sport based on the functional demands of the particular movement task. The aim of this paper is therefore to develop a differentiated taxonomy for sports with regard to their specific visual-spatial demands. Fundamental to the reasonable progression of this taxonomy is the established interaction of motor and cognitive and in particular motor and visual-spatial abilities. Based on an up-to-date theoretically motivated typology, which categorizes visual-spatial abilities in extrinsic-static, extrinsic-dynamic, intrinsic-static and intrinsicdynamic abilities, a visual-spatial classification of sports is presented. Subsequently, different tests for the acquisition of visual-spatial abilities and thus a possibility to match types of sport to the taxonomy are presented. Finally an overview of various forms of visual-spatial training provides an insight into the benefit of such a classification system in sports practice.


This paper describes archaeological excavations in 1972 at a walled hilltop-site near Estcourt (Natal). The site consists of a walled citadel covered with terraces, and extending northward from it along a ridge a large outer area with a circuit wall which was not completed along the steepest side. Some of the terraces were open courts and others house-sites. The houses have been reconstructed as of primitive rectangular type. Much plain pottery, terracotta figurines of cows, grindstones and a little iron were found. Three radiocarbon-dates are of the eleventh to thirteenth centuries A.D. The site seems to be one of the first settlements of a group of Early Iron Age people (probably Bantu-speaking but not identifiable with any modern Bantu tribe) who came over the Drakensberg into upper Natal. Apparently the citadel hill was first occupied; but the surrounding walls and much of the upper terracing were built at a rather later stage, without necessarily any break in occupation. The site was abandoned without destruction. To cite this article: Davies, O. 1974. Excavations at the walled Early Iron-Age site in Moor Park near Estcourt, Natal. Annals of the Natal Museum 22 (1): 289-323.


A Patient Instructor (PI) program designed to improve students' data-gathering and interpersonal skills is evaluated. Each student in two consecutive classes of third-year students (class of 1996, n = 60; class of 1997, n = 72) interviewed four patient instructors (PIs) during a three-hour rotation. Each PI portrayed one of six scenarios. PIs assessed students using content checklists and an abbreviated Arizona Clinical Interview Rating Scale (ACIR). After the interview, each PI gave student constructive feedback regarding interpersonal behavior and ability to identify salient content items from the patient's history. Significant improvement was observed on content checklists (p < 0.01) between the first and second rounds. Significant improvement was also noted on the ACIR (p < 0.01) between rounds one, two and three. The results indicate that data-gathering and interpersonal skills can be enhanced by using patient instructors. Student evaluation of the program was positive.


Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a nightly respiratory condition, is characterized by recurrent upper airway collapse causing intermittent hypoxia (IH) resembling ischemia and reperfusion (I/R). Consequently, blood oxygenation levels are cyclically reduced; sleep fragmentation and sympathetic activation develop, thus invoking oxidative stress and inflammation. OSA is a major risk factor for cardio-/ cerebrovascular morbidity and mortality. However, not all OSA patients develop cardio-/cerebrovascular disease, even if suffering from similar OSA severity. Possibly, this results from interindividual differences in responses to a given hypoxic stimulus involving gene polymorphism in oxygen-regulated transcription factors and downstream genes. The current review is aimed at highlighting potentially protective mechanisms induced by IH and OSA, rather than its well-estab-lished deleterious effects, while focusing on acute coronary syndromes. Therefore, protective mechanisms revealed in I/R biology and exhibited in vitro and in animal models utilizing IH followed by a severe ischemia are discussed and linked to acute myocardial infarction patients with concomitant OSA. The roles of endothelial progenitor cells, their proliferative and angiogenic properties, and collateral formation are emphasized in the clinical setting, as well as heterogenic interindividual responses to identical hypoxic stimuli. These findings might represent potential predictors to cardio-/cerebrovascular health, by identifying patients at higher or lower cardiovascular risk.


Balanus >·ejlexus n. sp., geologically the earliest member of the B. amphitrite Darwin complex in the New World, Cuncavus crassostricula Zullo, a species originally described from the early Miocene (Aquitanian) of North Carolina, and "Solidobalanus ., sp. indet., apparently related to the middle Eocene through early Oligocene "Solidobalanus" antiquus (Meyer-) complex of the Gulf Coastal Plain, occur in the early Miocene (Aquitanian) Parachucla and laterally equivalent Penney Farms Formations in Columbia and Hamilton Counties, northern Florida. These species, together with Actinabalanus .f7oridanus Zullo and Perreault from the late early Miocene (Burdigalian) Chi pol a Formation of the Florida Panhandle, and Balanus humilus Conrad, a nomen dubium purportedly from the Tampa Limestone and Hawthorne Formation, comprise the known Miocene cirriped fauna of Florida.


The notion of the information technology (IT) artifact has received a great deal of attention, particularly since Benbasat and Zmud's (2003) call for it to be the core of the information systems discipline. Yet, little work has focused on defining and discussing the IT artifact in a way that can facilitate consistent treatment across studies. In this paper, we develop a taxonomy of the IT artifact. The taxonomy is derived from literature on general systems theory and Akerman and Tyree's (2006) architectural ontology. We provide a preliminary explication of the taxonomy using four different systems as examples. We also discuss the iterative approach we will take to develop the taxonomy more completely. Our objective is to develop a taxonomy that will provide a language for IS researchers to use when discussing the IT artifact.


Acclaimed by "Ebony" magazine as 'one of those rare publishing events that generate as much excitement in the cloistered confines of the academy as they do in the general public', "The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr." chronicles one of the twentieth century's most dynamic personalities and one of the nation's greatest social struggles. King's call for racial justice and his faith in the power of nonviolence to engender a major transformation of American society is movingly conveyed in this authoritative multivolume series. In "Volume IV", with the Montgomery bus boycott at an end, King confronts the sudden demands of celebrity while trying to identify the next steps in the burgeoning struggle for equality. Anxious to duplicate the success of the boycott, he spends much of 1957 and 1958 establishing the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. But advancing the movement in the face of dogged resistance, he finds that it is easier to inspire supporters with his potent oratory than to organize a mass movement for social change. Yet King remains committed: 'The vast possibilities of a nonviolent, non-cooperative approach to the solution of the race problem are still challenging indeed. I would like to remain a part of the unfolding development of this approach for a few more years'. King's budding international prestige is affirmed in March 1957, when he attends the independence ceremonies in Ghana, West Africa. Two months later his first national address, at the 'Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom', is widely praised, and in June 1958, King's increasing prominence is recognized with a long-overdue White House meeting. During this period King also cultivates alliances with the labor and pacifist movements, and international anticolonial organizations. As "Volume IV" closes, King is enjoying the acclaim that has greeted his first book, Stride Toward Freedom, only to suffer a near-fatal stabbing in New York City.


Ants of the ponerine genus Odontomachus use a trap jaw mechanism when hunting fast prey. When particular trigger hairs, located on the inner edge of the mandibles, are touched by prey, the jaws close extremely rapidly and trap the target. This trap jaw response lasts only 0.33 to 1 millisecond. Electrophysiological recordings demonstrated that the trigger hairs function as mechanoreceptors. Associated with each trigger hair are large sensory cells, the sensory axons of which measure 15 to 20 micrometers in diameter. These are among the largest sensory neurons, and their size implies that these axons conduct information very rapidly.


For at least two decades the career of Edward Said has defined what it means to be a public intellectual today. Although attacked as a terrorist and derided as a fraud for his work on behalf of his fellow Palestinians, Said's importance extends far beyond his political activism. In this volume a distinguished group of scholars assesses nearly every aspect of Said's work—his contributions to postcolonial theory, his work on racism and ethnicity, his aesthetics and his resistance to the aestheticization of politics, his concepts of figuration, his assessment of the role of the exile in a metropolitan culture, and his work on music and the visual arts.

In two separate interviews, Said himself comments on a variety of topics, among them the response of the American Jewish community to his political efforts in the Middle East. Yet even as the Palestinian struggle finds a central place in his work, it is essential—as the contributors demonstrate—to see that this struggle rests on and gives power to his general "critique of colonizers" and is not simply the outgrowth of a local nationalism. Perhaps more than any other person in the United States, Said has changed how the U.S. media and American intellectuals must think about and represent Palestinians, Islam, and the Middle East. Most importantly, this change arises not as a result of political action but out of a potent humanism—a breadth of knowledge and insight that has nourished many fields of inquiry. Originally a special issue of boundary 2 , the book includes new articles on minority culture and on orientalism in music, as well as an interview with Said by Jacqueline Rose.

Supporting the claim that the last third of the twentieth century can be called the "Age of Said," this collection will enlighten and engage students in virtually any field of humanistic study.

Contributors . Jonathan Arac, Paul A. Bove, Terry Cochran, Barbara Harlow, Kojin Karatani, Rashid I. Khalidi, Sabu Kohsu, Ralph Locke, Mustapha Marrouchi, Jim Merod, W. J. T. Mitchell, Aamir R. Mufti, Jacqueline Rose, Edward W. Said, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Lindsay Waters


There is no gainsaying that technology has drastically reduced incidences of electoral malpractices such as: ballot stuffing, result sheet mutilation, manipulations, over voting, alteration of result sheets and hijacking of ballot boxes in the history of Nigeria elections. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has employed a number of innovative approaches to improve the management and conduct of elections in the country. As years pass by, INEC gets more sophisticated with its technologies in order to meet up with international standard. Therefore, this paper examines the impact of these technologies and the effect they have on election activities in Nigeria from 1999 general election to 2017. Results show that the introduction of these technologies: Electronic Voters Register(EVR), Automatic Fingerprints Identification System (AFIS) and Smart Card Reader (SCR) have reduced the incidence of multiple registration and multiple voting to the barest minimum while the development of e-collation support platform has drastically reduced incidence of result manipulation at collation centres. Hence, it is believed that the incorporation of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in Nigeria electoral process has reduced excessive electoral fraud to the barest minimum and foster credible elections.


Gluteal tendinopathy is a common source of impairment in adults due to degenerative changes in the gluteus medius tendon. We identified patients with gluteal tendinopathy who underwent surgery with a minimum six-month follow up. Radiographs, magnetic resonance images, demographic data, Hip Outcome Score (HOS), Veterans Rand 12-item health survey (VR-12), and a patient survey were reviewed. The cohort consisted of seventeen complete tears and thirty-one partial tears of the gluteal medius tendon (n = 48). Of patients, 72.9% reported satisfaction with surgery and noted 95.5% improvement in symptoms. Patients with partial tears demonstrated 90.0% improvement, while patients with complete tears noted 85% (p = 0.983). The median percent improvement for satisfied patients was 95.00 (85-100) and was significantly different from non-satisfied patients (p < 0.0001). Surgical repair resulted in higher HOS, activities of daily living (ADL), and HOS Sports scores. The majority of patients were satisfied with surgical treatment at follow up, noting near complete resolution in preoperative symptoms. (Journal of Surgical Orthopaedic Advances 32(2):075-082, 2023).


Clinical and experimental evidence confirms that delivery of nutrients via the gastrointestinal tract reduces septic morbidity in critically injured patients. Early enteral feeding seems to maintain mucosal integrity and to support the gut as an important immunologic organ that may affect other areas of the body. There is increasing evidence to suggest that specific nutrients are especially beneficial in maintaining intestinal host-defense function in times of critical illness and injury.


This literature review discusses the impact and nature of traumatic experiences of first responders, focusing on their ability to cope with the cognitive and behavioural symptoms associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). First responders are defined as police, fire, ambulance, military, public health service workers, and state, local, and volunteer agencies, who protect and safeguard communities. First responders disproportionately suffer from PTSD; symptoms often lead to inability to continue their duties. Individuals and organisations should consider how individuals recover from PTSD. This paper reviews literature on PTSD interventions and recommends Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing (EMDR) Therapy for treatment of PTSD in first responders. The literature review explored effective treatment options for overcoming PTSD and found an embedded culture in first responder organisations of cognitive avoidance, which results in reduced help seeking behaviours. Poor help-seeking behaviours correlate with high levels of PTSD and psychological distress, low levels of mental health literacy, and career issues. This paper discusses how EMDR is a potential and effective therapy to reduce symptoms of PTSD in first responders. Evidence reviewed in this paper suggests EMDR should be used as a treatment option for first responders to help reformulate negative thoughts/beliefs associated with exposure to traumatic events.


Malaria is one of the main health problems facing most developing countries having a hot climate. It is a problem in Turkmenistan. The country is situated in Central Asia, north of the Kopetdag mountains, between the Caspian Sea to the west and the Amu-Darya river to the east. Turkmenistan stretches for a distance of 1,100 km from west to east and 650 km from north to south. It borders Kazakhstan in the north, Uzbekistan in the east and north-east, Iran in the south, and Afghanistan in the south-east. Seven malaria vector species are found in Turkmenistan, the main ones being Anopheles superpictus, An. pulcherrimus, and An. martinius. The potentially endemic area consists of the floodplains of the Tejen and Murgab rivers, with a long chain of reservoirs built along them. In 1980 most cases of imported malaria were recorded in military personnel who had returned from service in Afghanistan. In the past years, only tertian (Plasmodium vivax) malaria has been recorded and there have been no death from malaria over that period. In the Serkhetabad (Gushgi) district there are currently 5 active foci of malaria infection, with a population of 22,000 people. In 1999, forty nine cases of P. vivax malaria were recorded in Turkmenistan. Of them, 36 cases, including 4 children under 14 years were diagnosed for the first time while 13 were relapses. There were 88 fewer cases than those in the previous year (by a factor of 2.8). There were 17 more cases of imported malaria than those in 1998 (by a factor of 1.7), most of which occurred in the foci of malaria infection (Serkhetabad, Tagtabazar, and Kerki districts), in the city of Ashkhabat and in Lebap, Dashkhovuz and Akhal Regions. The emergence of indigenous malaria in the border areas was due to the importation of the disease at intervals by infected mosquitoes flying in from neighbouring countries (e.g. Afghanistan), the lack of drugs to treat the first cases and the lack of alternative insecticides. Most patients suffer from tertian malaria, which is the most dangerous from the epidemiological point of view since the main vectors in Turkmenistan, are highly susceptible to P. vivax infection. The particular dangerous phenomenon is the higher incidence of imported tertian malaria in rural areas where sick people and those who carry the parasite come into close contact with highly susceptible vectors. Thus, the risk that new malaria outbreaks will occur and the disease will become reestablished in the country is very high. It is also influenced by major changes in water use in the country, which have aggravated the mosquito situation. In the area around the Karakum canal and river basins, 17 large reservoirs have been constructed, with very extensive filtration ponds around them, which have become breeding ground's for malaria mosquitoes. There are 1219 water areas without any economic significance in the country, covering a total area of 1054 ha, which require regular treatment with insecticides. With assistance from the WHO European Regional Office, Dr. Guido Sabatinelli in particular, Turkmenistan has developed a plan for preventive malaria control measures for 1999-2001, which has been approved in a decree issued by the Ministry of Health and Medical Industry. The material support received has made it possible to provide large-scale prophylaxis for people who suffered from malaria in 1997-1999, seasonal treatment for people living near the active foci of the disease and interseasonal prophylaxis for people visiting these areas. Seasonal treatment with Dellaguil was made in 4,590 people living in the active foci of malaria infection, and 2,281 fixed-term military personnel belonging to the units stationed in the active foci of malaria infection. In all foci of infection, every person with malaria or carrying the parasite underwent epidemiological investigation and all cases were entered in health clinic records. In 1999, four seminars were held to train 75 specialists from all administrative areas in ways of improving senior staff's skills in the laboratory diagnosis of malaria. The laboratory equipment which the country has received makes it possible to train high-level specialists and to equip its main malaria diagnosis centers with microscopes and reagents. The received insecticides and sprayers enable mosquitoes to be eliminated in an area of 960,000 sq. km (240 foci of infection): for this, our sincere thanks and gratitude are due to Dr. Guido Sabatinelli. Specialists teams have been created in each region by a decree of the Ministry of Health and Medical Industry to conduct mosquito elimination activities, with personal responsibility for their progress. Three-day vector control seminars have been held for disinfectors in all regions. We should stress that 5 extra posts have been created in the parasitology department of the Central Laboratory of Hygiene and Epidemiology, State Epidemiological Surveillance Service in order to strengthen preventive malaria control activities in Turkmenistan (organizational and methodological support for health facilities, staff training, etc.). To prevent the emergence of new breeding grounds for malaria vectors, the state system of health surveillance over the hygiene and technical status of water facilities and the rules governing their work have been reinforced. Local executive authorities do every effort to eliminate small, economically unprofitable water areas by draining, filling in or cleaning them. All existing and potential mosquito breeding grounds within a three-kilometer radius of any community were identified. These water areas were certified and their previous certifications analyzed, taking into account any changes and additional information which has become available about the area. Seasonal variations in the number of larvae and imagoes were monitored in the specimen areas of water and daytime resting sites. The existing vector species were identified and a list of the main species in all areas was prepared. Water areas were treated in accordance with epidemiological instructions. These activities yielded positive results: only 10 cases of locally transmitted malaria were recorded throughout the country in 1999. To interrupt the endemic process of malaria in Turkmenistan, the following plan for 1999-2001 has been adopted. To improve the equipment and material base of a sanitary and epidemiological surveillance service and malaria diagnosis laboratories (vehicles, sprayers, microscopes, chemical reagents, etc.). To continue effort to recruit staff to fill vacancies for parasitologists, entomologists, and parasitology laboratory physicians in the sanitary and epidemiological surveillance service at regional, subregional, and district level. In April 2000, two six-day seminars were held for epidemiologists, parasitologists, and entomologists, organized jointly with WHO representatives at the Central Laboratory for Hygiene and Epidemiology. Two seminars on the laboratory diagnosis of malaria for laboratory physicians were also intended to be held in April 2000. To continue to treat malaria patients and parasite carriers throughout the year to prevent relapses. To continue activities to eliminate mosquitoes, to monitor seasonal variations in the number of vector larvae and imagoes in the specimen areas of water and daytime resting sites mosquito habitats, to identify the existing vector species, and to prepare a list of main species in all areas. To strengthen preventive health monitoring. To provide effective support of health care service by the state border guard service of Turkmenistan by supplying drugs for curative and preventive treatment of its staff. To provide the quantities of insecticides required for mosquito elimination and support staff training. To improve malaria control activities by reporting all cases of malaria promptly, conducting a high-quality epidemiological investigation of every case and a prompt laboratory diagnosis, and providing the parasitology departments of sanitary and epidemiological surveillance service at all levels with all-terrain vehicles, microscopes, and effective communication systems which they require. We are very happy to be cooperating with WHO and grateful for the help it has provided.


PurposeAs a remedy to usually voluminous, complicated and not easily readable construction contracts, smart contracts can be considered as an effective and alternative solution. However, the construction industry is merely known as a frontrunner for fast adoption of recent technological advancements. Numerous administrative risks challenge construction companies to implement smart contracts. To highlight this issue, this study aims to assess the administrative risks of smart contract adoption in construction projects.Design/methodology/approachA literature survey is conducted to specify administrative risks of smart contracts followed by a pilot study to ensure that the framework is suitable to the research question. The criteria weights are calculated through the fuzzy analytical hierarchy process method, followed by a sensitivity analysis based on degree of fuzziness, which supports the robustness of the developed hierarchy and stability of the results. Then, a focus group discussion (FGD) is performed to discuss the mitigation strategies for the top-level risks in each risk category.FindingsThe final framework consists of 27 sub-criteria, which are categorized under five main criteria, namely, contractual, cultural, managerial, planning and relational. The findings show that (1) regulation change, (2) lack of a driving force, (3) works not accounted in planning, (4) shortcomings of current legal arrangements and (5) lack of dispute resolution mechanism are the top five risks challenging the adoption of smart contracts in construction projects. Risk mitigation strategies based on FGD show that improvements for the semi-automated smart contract drafting are considered more practicable compared to full automation.Originality/valueThe literature is limited in terms of the adoption of smart contracts, while the topic is receiving more attention recently. To support easy prevalence of smart contracts, this study attempts the most challenging aspects of smart contract adoption.


The effect of nickel concentration has been investigated in ZnO/NiO nanocomposites synthesized using the co-precipitation method. The X-ray diffraction and TEM measurements confirm the distinct phase of NiO in the ZnO/NiO samples. Furthermore, the Raman study shows the sharp modes at 99 cm−1 and 438 cm−1 corresponding to E(low)2, E(high)2 of hexagonal wurtzite ZnO structure and, 1080 cm−1 associated to the two-phonon (2P) mode of NiO, respectively. We also compared the effect of Ni concentration on the formation of ZnO/NiO by analyzing Ehigh2 Raman mode of ZnO with the help of spatial correlation model. The correlation lengths, broadening and asymmetry ratio obtained from the fitting showed good agreement with the experimental results.


The construction industry is evolving. The traditional focus on lowest price is no longer sufficient, because this leads to an adverse relation between client and contractor and to a low profitability for the contractor. Best Value is an emerging method where the focus is not on lowest price, but on the best price-value ratio. It is a procurement, project management, and risk management approach, based on the concepts of win-win, less management, direction and control, and transparency. The approach consists of three phases: selection, clarification, and execution.
The goal of the selection phase is to select the expert contractor with a high value for a low price. While traditional procurement is based on comprehensive tenders, the Best Value approach requires suppliers to deliver three two-page submittals, namely a project capability submittal, risk assessment plan, and a value-added plan. After that, interviews are held with key personnel of the suppliers, to find out whether they can manage the project and identify risks upfront. In both the submittals and the interviews, suppliers can use verifiable performance information to support their claims in a short and clear way. Moreover, they can propose performance indicators for the execution phase, in order to show how they measure the claims during the project. The selection phase ends with a prioritised list of suppliers. The submittals and interviews count for 75% and the price for only 25%.
The best-prioritised supplier proceeds to the pre-award clarification phase. In this phase, the prospective contractor pre-plans the project, aligns the expectations with the client, develops risk mitigation measures for all project risks, and develops a set of performance indicators, if not done in the selection phase. When the clarification phase is run successfully by the prospective contractor, the contract is awarded.
During the execution phase, no management, direction and control has to be used by the client, since the selected contractor is the expert. To keep the client updated, the contractor has to send a Weekly Risk Report to the client each week. The performance indicators, as determined in the clarification phase and as measured by the contractor, are communicated by means of this report. If needed, risk mitigation measures have to be developed. The indicators provide transparency about the performance on project goals, about the allocation of risks, and they are the base of learning and improvement for both client and contractor. The performance information can be used by the contractor in a next tender. From the perspective of the Information Measurement Theory, the theory behind the Best Value approach, performance indicators are a form of so-called dominant information: they are non-disputable, verifiable, and accurate. They mitigate risk by transparency and enable experts to explain complex situations in a simple way to non-experts. From the perspective of New Institutional Economics, performance indicators in Best Value projects reduce uncertainty, take bounded rationality into account, and reduce the tendency to opportunistic behaviour. Rijkswaterstaat, the executive body of the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment, uses Best Value since 2010, when it was used to approach 16 road-widening projects of the Spoedaanpak programme. Because these pilot projects were a success, Rijkswaterstaat decided to implement Best Value in other projects. Performance indicators were not used in the first projects, but contractors are now obliged to develop and use performance indicators. However, Rijkswaterstaat and the contractors find it hard to develop and use performance indicators. To find out what problems are encountered, interviews are held with project team members of both Rijkswaterstaat and contractors. The encountered problems relate to (1) the introduction of performance indicators, (2) the awareness of both client and contractor of the goals of measuring causing a lack of motivation, (3) the lack of knowledge regarding the development and use, and (4) the availability of data and benchmarks. Furthermore, a quantitative analysis showed that more than 98% of risks in earlier Best Value projects are owned by the client, while most projects interviewed mainly measure the contractor. This research focuses on the lack of knowledge regarding the development and use, because most problems related to this subject.
First, theory on performance indicators in general, but especially in the construction sector is studied. This study shows that there is a wide range of performance indicators and characteristics for indicators. An analysis on these performance indicators and characteristics led to a set of characteristics for the development and use of performance indicators that is useful in Rijkswaterstaat's Best Value projects.


Mitotic figure (MF) counting is important in the evaluation of many tumor types. Inadequate fixation, crush artefacts, the presence of many apoptoses, or the rarity of MFs in a given lesion can make the determination of the mitotic index a very time-consuming or even impossible task, especially for novices. We evaluated the potential of the two commercially available mitotic markers MPM-2 and Phospho-Histone H3 Ser28 (PHH3) for improving mitotic counting. Formalin-fixed tissue of 1 lymphoma, 19 epithelial, 25 mesenchymal, and 10 melanocytic tumors was immunohistochemically stained with both antibodies. Mitotic counts of each tumor sample were determined by a pathologist and three residents in the hematoxylin and eosin and in both immunohistochemical stainings. Because of the higher sensitivity of the immunohistochemical stainings for MFs, average mitotic counts per 10 HPF were higher with MPM-2 (11.0) and PHH3 (10.1) than with hematoxylin and eosin (5.9) staining. The precise distinction of MFs from apoptoses and the visualization of the distribution of MFs uncovering mitotic hotspots, even at low magnification, turned out to be major advantages of both mitotic markers. In addition, the average time needed to establish the mitotic count was reduced by 40.3% with MPM-2 and by 50.4% with PHH3. MPM-2 and PHH3 were subjectively rated by all pathologists involved in this study to be very helpful in mitotic counting, especially in melanocytic and mesenchymal lesions but less so in epithelial tumors. Both markers have hence been successfully introduced in our laboratory for the routine assessment of MFs in melanocytic and mesenchymal tumors.


In this study, the measurement and correlation of the solubility of the rhodamine B in supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) with or without a cosolvent were determined. The results were obtained using a flow-type apparatus, at 308.15 and 318.15 K, in a pressure range 8.0 - 24.0 MPa. The results show that, at a fixed temperature, the solubility of the dye in scCO2 fluids increases with increasing pressure. In the presence of 5 mol% methanol as a cosolvent, the solubility of dyes increased significantly. The experimental data correlated with the Chrastil and Sovova equations.


This essay examines and critiques the federal antitrust treatment of state legislation that unreasonably restrains interstate commerce, building upon important work on the subject by Herbert Hovenkamp. Such restraints take three forms: (1) legislation authorizing parties to enter unreasonable restraints; (2) legislation compelling conduct that restrains trade; and (3) legislation banning private, wealth-creating conduct that would be lawful under the Sherman Act. The Sherman Act condemns restraints in the first category, unless states "actively supervise" resulting prices and output. However, beginning with Parker v. Brown, 317 U.S. 341 (1943), which scrutinized state-imposed output restrictions, the Supreme Court has repeatedly and unanimously held that the Sherman Act does not preempt state-imposed restraints in the second and third categories. Invoking principles of federalism and state sovereignty, the Court has held that Congress never intended the Sherman Act to preempt such state regulations of economic activity, including those that destroy wealth and injure consumers in other states.As Professor Hovenkamp has previously explained, Parker and its progeny rest upon a "fictional reading of the legislative history of the antitrust laws," given the dual federalism in place in 1890. This essay elaborates on this assertion, showing that the constitutional landscape extant when Congress passed the Sherman Act excluded the sort of overlapping regulatory authority that gives rise to the possibility of preemption. More precisely, the Supreme Court placed strict limits on the affirmative scope of Congress's commerce power and employed the negative or dormant implication of the Commerce Clause to invalidate state restraints of the relatively small category of interstate commerce. Such restraints also contravened the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, which the Court and state courts read to ban unreasonable state restrictions on economic liberty. Because state and federal regulatory authority over public and private trade restraints was mutually exclusive, Congress could not have contemplating state-imposed restraints.Of course, the constitutional framework in place in 1890 collapsed in 1937, when the Supreme Court abandoned liberty of contract and ceased placing meaningful limits on the commerce power. At the same time, the Court "unshackled" the states, weakening the Dormant Commerce Clause and empowering states to impose restraints on interstate commerce that pre-1937 case law would have condemned. The Court also expanded the scope of the Sherman Act to reach purely local restraints with tangential connections to interstate commerce. The result was vast overlapping regulatory authority, opening the door to Sherman Act preemption of state restraints of the now-expansive category of interstate commerce. This overlap raised an interpretive question the Court did not face before 1937, namely, whether the Sherman Act preempts unreasonable state restraints of interstate commerce despite the lack of any conscious decision by Congress regarding the treatment of such restraints. This essay briefly reviews the case for and against such preemption and concludes that the case for such preemption is stronger than many have supposed. Nonetheless, the paper offers a two-part alternative to such preemption. First, the Court should restrict the scope of the Sherman Act to reach only those restraints imposing distinct harm on consumers in more than one state. Reducing the reach of the Sherman Act would minimize the sort of federal-state friction that drives the federalism concerns militating against preemption. Second, the Court should revisit its decisions relaxing dormant commerce clause scrutiny of state-imposed restraints. In particular, the Court should repudiate Parker's less famous holding that a pro-rate scheme imposing nearly all of its costs on consumers in other states is nonetheless consistent with the Dormant Commerce Clause. Such revitalization of the Dormant Commerce Clause would discourage wealth-destroying regulation and enhance price flexibility, thereby facilitating recovery from macroeconomic downturns. The approach just sketched would largely replicate the institutional framework that Congress believed it was supporting when it passed the Sherman Act in 1890.


OBJECTIVE
To use decision and sensitivity analysis to examine the delivery of health care on US dairy farms as measured by correction of left displaced abomasum (LDA).

SAMPLE POPULATION
5 journal articles evaluating outcomes from veterinarian- or herd personnel-delivered correction of LDA via laparotomy or a roll-and-toggle procedure.

DESIGN
Economic analysis.

PROCEDURES
A decision tree was constructed on the basis of published outcome data for correction of LDAs performed by veterinarians and herd personnel. Sensitivity of the model to changing input assumptions was evaluated via an indifference curve and tornado graph.

RESULTS
Decision tree analysis revealed that correction of an LDA provided by herd personnel had an expected economic advantage of $76, compared with correction provided by a veterinarian. Sensitivity of this analysis to variations in inputs indicated that changes of 2 input levels would shift the advantage to veterinarian-provided correction: a reduction (from 0.74 to 0.62) in the probability of success for correction provided by herd personnel or an increase (from 0.78 to 0.87) in the probability of success for correction provided by a veterinarian.

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE
In this model, LDA correction by herd personnel had a significant economic advantage, compared with veterinarian-provided correction. Continued absorption of traditional veterinary tasks by unlicensed herd personnel may threaten the veterinarian-client-patient relationship (VCPR), which could have profound economic and regulatory impacts. Food animal veterinarians need to evaluate their business model to ensure they continue to provide relevant, sustainable services to their clients within the context of a valid VCPR.


Tumour lysis syndrome is an oncological emergency and non-Hodgkin lymphoma is one of the high risk groups to develop this complication before or during chemotherapy. This article provides an overview and evaluates the role of urate oxidase in management of this condition. Retrospective review of fortyfour cases in our hospital showed that four patients (9%) developed grade 3 to grade 4 tumour lysis syndrome and two of them required renal replacement therapy. All of them recovered from this acute complication after vigorous supportive therapy. Burkitt's lymphoma with intra-abdominal presentation and huge tumour load with multiple sites involvement are the main risk factors for development of tumour lysis syndrome.


As a policy research organisation, the International Institute for Environment and Development has evolved key concepts, theories and ways of working in sustainable development since 1973. The big idea we explore here is banking on biodiversity. This approach rests on the fact that much rural poverty is concentrated in the world's biodiversity hotspots. By supporting these communities' long-term stewardship of land and sea, we can tackle two urgent global issues — extreme poverty and biodiversity loss — together.