With the recent trend towards reducing hospital stay, it has become increasingly important to ensure that early patient discharge after total hip replacement is a safe practice. We evaluated complications and length of hospital stay associated with primary unilateral hip arthroplasty in 47 patients undergoing a new early discharge protocol consisting of at home based specialized care after hospital discharge. The mean length of stay (and standard deviation) in hospital was 4.59 ± 0.68. The mean length of stay of home-based hospitalization was 3.7 ± 1. The prevalence of postoperative complications was 12.8% and the readmission rate was 6.4%. We saw a reduction of hospital stay with no difference in outcomes in comparison with previous data. On the basis of our findings we recommend the use of the early discharge protocol following elective primary total hip replacement and ongoing evaluation of the process.


A two-dimensional shadow may encompass more information than its corresponding three-dimensional object. If we rotate the object, we achieve a pool of observed shadows from different angulations, gradients, shapes and variable length contours that make it possible for us to increase our available information. Starting from this simple observation, we show how informational entropies might turn out to be useful in the evaluation of scale-free dynamics in the brain. Indeed, brain activity exhibits a scale-free distribution, which appears as a straight line when plotted in a log power versus log frequency plot. A variation in the scale-free exponent and in the line scaling slope may occur during different functional neurophysiological states. Here we show that modifications in scaling slope are associated with variations in Rényi entropy, a generalization of Shannon informational entropy. From a three-dimensional object's perspective, by changing its orientation (standing for the cortical scale-free exponent), we detect different two-dimensional shadows from different perception angles (standing for Rènyi entropy in different brain areas). We perform simulations showing how, starting from known values of Rènyi entropy (easily detectable in brain fMRIs or EEG traces), it is feasible to calculate the scaling slope in a given moment and a given brain area. Because changes in scale-free cortical dynamics modify brain activity, suggests the possibility of novel insights in mind reading and description of the forces required for transcranial stimulation.


A method of storing data in a flash memory data storage device that includes a plurality of memory chips is disclosed. The method includes determining a number of memory chips in the data storage device, defining, via a host coupled to the data storage device, a first partition of the data storage device, where the first partition includes a first subset of the plurality of memory chips and defining a second partition of the data storage device via a host coupled to the data storage device, where the second partition includes a second subset of the plurality of memory chips. First data is written to the first partition while reading data from the second partition, and first data is written to the second partition while reading data from the first partition.


Over the years, traffic safety has been taught and has become a common subject in Vietnamese primary schools. Educational activities take place in both formal and extra-curricular educational activities. However, traffic safety education and management of traffic safety education in schools have not received adequate attention. Implementation activities are still formal, have not shown continuity, long-term and drastic; the coordination with other educational forces is not synchronized, etc. Therefore, the effect achieved in traffic safety education in schools is not high. Aware of the importance of this activity, based on the actual survey in 04 selected primary schools, with 84 people being administrators and teachers; The study focuses on analyzing the current situation, necessity, and problems posed in traffic safety education management activities in primary schools.


This publication argues that "gender" is a fundamental battleground on which Al Qaeda, the Taliban and their types have to be defeated. Issues of regressive radicalism, literalism, militancy and terrorism can only be solved through people-centred interventions. Therefore, relevant governments and civil society should promote an alternative culture of growth, self-expression and actualization for Muslim men. To achieve sustainable counterterrorism results, Aslam recommends underlining masculinities in Muslim contexts and expanding the scope of required interventions beyond those confined to Islam(ism), the opposing sects and ideological movements of which rarely agree. This book also includes empirical data from a pilot study conducted on Pakistani Muslim masculinities.


In view of the heavy workload and possible intervention to the normal traffic flow during the performance testing of road traffic signs, this paper is designed to present a system that can be installed in an automobile and automatically track and analyze the performance of traffic signs. The system consists of a carrying vehicle, GPS, IMU, area-array cameras, frame grabbers, data acquisition software and data analysis software. Based on close-range photogrammetry technology, the system is designed with a set of effective road traffic signs automatic detection algorithms, which can automatically measure and analyze the properties of road traffic signs, such as dimensions, headroom and verticality of the column, etc.


The advent of widespread distributed computing environment, such as information systems and computational grids computing has enabled a new generation of applications that are based on seamless access, aggregation and interaction. The dramatic side of the story is a strong presence of the plea that those decentralized Grids are potentially affected by a number of primitives derived from their anatomy, in that, they are inherently large, complex, heterogeneous and dynamic, globally aggregating a large number of independent computing and communication resources. This has clearly exposed an essential exigency for a vital change to how these applications are developed and managed, which has motivated researchers to consider other techniques used by biological systems to deal with such problems. This is referred to as autonomic computing, which is defined by Ganek and Corbi[1] "… as a collection and integration of technologies that enable the creation of an information technology computing infrastructure for the next era of computing—e-business on demand …". This study presents a computational model to support just-in-time and on-demand services for autonomic computing. Service reservation and job schedule systems are employed in this model to estimate the required services in advanced. Intelligent classification is utilized to cluster consumers into groups sharing the same behaviour and hence offer the required services for each consumer in advance, according to the group's usage pattern of application services. To this end, a machine learning middleware service based on Self-Organizing Maps (SOM) is designed, developed and implemented to carry out the intelligent classification for the autonomic computing. A case-study scenario of intelligent connected homes is demonstrated in this study to show the usability of such system.


The genus Paraboea Ridl. (Gesneriaceae) is revised. It is found in Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burma, Cambodia, southern China, India (Assam), Indonesia (Sumatra, Java, Borneo, Sulawesi), Laos, Malaysia (Peninsular and Borneo), Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, mostly from limestone habitats. Eighty-nine species and five varieties are recognised. Four new species and one new variety are described: Paraboea apiensis Z.R.Xu, Paraboea argentea Z.R.Xu, Paraboea graniticola Z.R.Xu, Paraboea paraprimuloides Z.R.Xu and Paraboea harroviana var. ovata Z.R.Xu. In addition two taxa are highlighted as possible new species but are not described here due to insufficient material. The treatment includes one new combination for a species, Paraboea harroviana (Craib) Z.R.Xu, one new combination for a variety, Paraboea schefferi var. ambigua (C.B.Clarke) Z.R.Xu, one new status for a variety, Paraboea rufescens var. tomentosa (Barnett) Z.R.Xu, and one new name, Paraboea primuloides Z.R.Xu. Fifty-one line drawings are included. A key is presented and all taxa are described. Preliminary conservation assessments are given.


Abstract The research developed has the purpose of analyzing the potential utilization of sugarcane bagasse ash and tire residue in the construction of pavers in replacement of the small aggregate, the natural sand. In order to achieve this objective, the methodology adopted includes steps such as: characterization of the residues to be used, preparation of pavers with different contents of partial replacement of small aggregates, determination of the main pavers characteristics (compressive strength, water absorption, abrasion resistance) . The results proved the viability of the substitution, and the optimum content for the manufacturing of the parts is 27%, being 25% of BCC and 2% of tires. The contribution of the research is focused on reducing the consumption of natural resources and the correct disposal of the residues studied.


The goal of the paper is to show that some types of L evy processes such as the hyperbolic motion and the CGMY are particularly suitable for asset price modelling and option pricing. We wish to review some fundamental mathematic properties of L evy distributions, such as the one of infinite divisibility, and how they translate observed features of asset price returns. We explain how these processes are related to Brownian motion, the central process in finance, through stochastic time changes which can in turn be interpreted as a measure of the economic activity. Lastly, we focus on two particular classes of pure jump L evy processes, the generalized hyperbolic model and the CGMY models, and report on the goodness of fit obtained both on stock prices and option prices. 2002 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. JEL classification: G12; G13


Before the First World War, various policy entrepreneurs unsuccessfully advocated productivist scientific afforestation in Britain. During the war, timber imports were constrained by submarine blockade. The Government set up the Forestry Commission to deliver coniferous afforestation for strategic self-sufficiency. This policy was resistant to changes in geopolitical, economic and social conditions. It produced forests ill-equipped to provide for the needs of later society. The research considers whether, in hindsight, the actors could have applied greater forethought, developed better foresight, and ended the programme earlier. Eclectic mixed methods were used to explore this policy inertia. Quantitative content analysis of newly digitised archival and parliamentary material provided statistical trends. Political responsibility was explored by interview and email including from former forestry ministers. Personal autoethnographic witness from a complete member researcher was brought to bear. A range of change conditions set within policy approaches, including the Advocacy Coalition Framework, were used to assess the conditions for policy change or inertia. The evidence suggests that previous actors were largely prisoners of the mindsets and frames of their times, and subject to powerful institutional inertia. There were few alternative voices or discourses which could challenge the power of the Forestry Commission as an institution. Former forestry policy-makers can therefore be largely absolved of blame for failure to better predict the future needs of society. If it is manifestly difficulty to develop foresight, then other strategies are required. The creation of adaptable forests is therefore a priority.


Here we present 1701 light curves of 1550 unique, spectroscopically confirmed Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) that will be used to infer cosmological parameters as part of the Pantheon+ SN analysis and the Supernovae and H 0 for the Equation of State of dark energy distance-ladder analysis. This effort is one part of a series of works that perform an extensive review of redshifts, peculiar velocities, photometric calibration, and intrinsic-scatter models of SNe Ia. The total number of light curves, which are compiled across 18 different surveys, is a significant increase from the first Pantheon analysis (1048 SNe), particularly at low redshift (z). Furthermore, unlike in the Pantheon analysis, we include light curves for SNe with z < 0.01 such that SN systematic covariance can be included in a joint measurement of the Hubble constant (H 0) and the dark energy equation-of-state parameter (w). We use the large sample to compare properties of 151 SNe Ia observed by multiple surveys and 12 pairs/triplets of "SN siblings"—SNe found in the same host galaxy. Distance measurements, application of bias corrections, and inference of cosmological parameters are discussed in the companion paper by Brout et al., and the determination of H 0 is discussed by Riess et al. These analyses will measure w with ∼3% precision and H 0 with ∼1 km s−1 Mpc−1 precision.


A new family of integer lattices built from Construction A and non-binary low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes has been proposed by the authors in 2012. Lattices in this family are referred to as LDA lattices. Previous experimental results revealed excellent performance which clearly single out LDA lattices among the strongest candidates for potential applications in digital communications and networks, such as network coding and information theoretic security at the physical layer level. In this paper, we show that replacing random codes by LDPC codes in Construction A does not induce any structural loss. More precisely, our main theorem states that LDA lattices can achieve Poltyrev capacity limit on an additive white Gaussian noise channel. We present here the detailed proof and its consequences on the lattice dimension, the finite field size, and the parameters of the LDPC ensemble. The latter has a row weight that increases logarithmically in the code length. In a more recent work, it is proved that the Poltyrev limit is attained by a different LDA ensemble having a small constant row weight.


This paper describes the interdisciplinary joint project Senseparation [1] that focuses on the cross-border networking of people between virtual and real space. We set up an encounter between two persons located at different places to encourage people to think critically about today's online communication. In our experiment, one person in a virtual reality (VR) installation (CAVE) [11] or wearing Oculus Rift glasses is able to interact with another person located in a dark room wearing a vest with vibration motors, compass and controller. The person in real space is represented as an avatar in the VR environment. The one in the real space is able to perceive the person in the VR environment with tactile and auditory senses. Spatial audio in the dark room supports the representation of the proximity of the two people. The person connected to the VR environment can interact with the avatar and touch it by means of a 6 degree of freedom input device. Touching the avatar gives also visual feedback on the avatar. We separated tactile, visual and auditory feedback for this encounter in order to increase the intensity of the distant encounter.


Design and development of a portable and self-contained vaginal probe, consisting of an acetone-filled silver cylinder attached to a pressure gauge, is described. Qualitative changes in vaginal thermal conductance were inferred from rates of thermal expansion of precooled acetone measured as a pressure rise. Administration of 10 mg estradiol-17 beta i.v. to ovariectomized heifers resulted in significant increases in rate of thermal expansion.


Luminescence sensing is commonly based on the change of emission intensity, lifetime, and/or quantum yield of luminescent materials. Wavelength-based luminescence sensing has been comparatively rarely documented. Flexible metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) with rich fluorophores are promising sensory materials due to their unique stimuli-responsive luminescence. However, it is still challenging to construct such materials with high hydrolytic stability, which would allow them to be utilized in water systems. Here, we present two isoreticular flexible MOFs synthesized by carbazole-derived ligands, which show high porosity and excellent stability in aqueous solutions with a wide range of pH values. Interestingly, both MOFs show a structural breathing behavior with variation of the guest molecules inside their pores due to the topologically allowed flexibility. With their frameworks breathing, sensitive fluorescence changes in the wavelength of the maximum emission have been observed. Remarkably, the wavelengths of the maximum emission are well dependent on the pH values (1 to 8) of the aqueous solution in a linear relationship, suggesting a new means of accomplishing pH sensing based on emission wavelength instead of intensity. Wavelength-based fluorescence sensing thus offers an alternative way of achieving pH indication, free from some of the drawbacks associated with intensity-based fluorescence sensing, which should be fundamentally important for the development of new pH sensors in environmental and life sciences.


Since last century, the exhausts of fossil fuel energy, excessive gas emission and global warming have been calling for the alternative methods to generate energy for vehicles urgently. The hybrid electrical vehicle (HEV), which is considered as a potential solution to solve this problem, has draw researchers' attention. This paper mainly discusses the control strategy of HEV based on fuzzy logic. By using this control strategy, the work space and work efficiency of engine are optimized, which play a vital role on improvement of the operation performance of HEV. Meanwhile, the strategy has been applied to optimize the power balance of battery, which includes the characteristics of battery in the controller. Though the model based on Matlab/Simulink, the simulation results confirmed the excellent effectiveness of our control strategies, which optimized the fuel consumption of engine and the power balance of battery successfully.


Thirteen benthic rocky intertidal communities were quantitatively assessed on Maui, Moloka'i, O'ahu, and Hawai'i Island between the years 2004 and 2007. Our goals were to test for differences in invertebrate and macroalgal abundance and composition to understand how these tropical communities are organized. Percentage cover surveys revealed a diverse intertidal system with 49 macroalgal, 1 cyanobacterial, and 31 invertebrate taxa. Shores were frequently dominated by a few macroalgae and mollusks, and at two sites these organisms were distributed in discrete vertical bands. Common intertidal taxa included the introduced alga Acanthophora spicifera; species in the macroalgal genera Padina, Sargassum, and Laurencia; turf forms of algae; and the mollusks Siphonaria normalis, Nerita picea, and species of littorine snails. Multivariate statistics found community structure to vary among sites and years, but there was lack of evidence for island-specific or substratum-specific assemblages. SIMPROF analysis revealed support for 11 different types of structure. This first description of community-level patterns at multiple intertidal sites along the Main Hawaiian Islands documents substantial spatial variation both among and within shores, as well as substantial temporal variation for select sites. These findings are in contrast to the characterization of a homogeneous tropical system and thus suggest that biotic and abiotic factors in the Main Hawaiian Islands act on a local scale to drive structure.


Coupled U-Pb ages and Hf isotopic ratios in zircons from Proterozoic basement and three siliciclastic cover sequences in southern California provide important insights into the formation of the southern Mojave crustal province and its incorporation into southwestern Laurentia. Hafnium isotopic ratios measured in >800 zircons, coupled with new and previously reported U-Pb ages, suggest that the crystalline basement of the Mojave crustal province formed from four main components: 1) mantle components ranging from depleted to moderately enriched; 2) metasedimentary framework rocks derived from 2.6 to 2.4 Ga and 2.0 to 1.8 Ga crust; 3) 1.79 to 1.64 Ga intrusive rocks that reflect mixing of mantle-derived melts and crust; and 4) Mesoproterozoic (1.4 to 1.2 Ga) anorthosite and granitic to syenitic intrusive rocks. Initial Hf isotopic ratios of detrital zircons in siliciclastic cover sequences suggest varying degrees of insularity of the Mojave province during assembly of southwestern Laurentia. The Mesoproterozoic Pinto Mountain Group appears entirely derived from Mojave province basement. In contrast, Neoproterozoic quartzites of the Big Bear Group had a distal provenance, either an unexposed, older, western subprovince of the Mojave crustal province lacking ca. 1.7 Ga magmatic rocks or from a distinctive Paleo- and Mesoproterozoic basement province far to the east within Laurentia. Zircons in latest Neoproterozoic to Cambrian quartzites reflect provenance from an integrated transcontinental drainage network delivering sediment to the craton edge and westward into the Cordilleran miogeocline.


Introduction GoSAMTs play a role in the methylation of polysaccharides synthesized by the Golgi. Pectin homogalacturonan (HG) methyl-esterification is essential for the proper function of this polysaccharide in cell walls. In order to better understand the role of GoSAMTs in HG biosynthesis, we analyzed mucilage methyl-esterification in gosamt mutants. Methods To determine the function of GoSAMT1 and GoSAMT2 in HG methyl-esterification we utilized epidermal cells of seed coats, as these structures produce mucilage, which is a pectic matrix. We evaluated differences in seed surface morphology and quantified mucilage release. We measured methanol release, and used antibodies and confocal microscopy to analyze HG methyl-esterification in mucilage. Results We observed morphological differences on the seed surface and delayed, uneven mucilage release in gosamt1-1gosamt2-1 double mutants. We also found changes in the distal wall length indicating abnormal cell wall breakage in this double mutant. Using methanol release and immunolabeling, we confirmed that GoSAMT1 and GoSAMT2 are involved in HG methyl-esterification in mucilage. However, we did not find evidence of decreasing HG in the gosamt mutants. Confocal microscopy analyses detected different patterns in the adherent mucilage and a greater number of low-methyl-esterified domains near the seed coat surface, which correlates with a greater number of "egg-box" structures in this region. We also detected a shift in the partitioning between the Rhamnogalacturonan-I soluble and adherent layers of the double mutant, which correlated with increased amounts of arabinose and arabinogalactan-protein in the adherent mucilage. Discussion The results show that the HG synthesized in gosamt mutant plants is less methyl esterified, resulting in more egg-box structures, which stiffen the cell walls in epidermal cells and change the rheological properties of the seed surface. The increased amounts of arabinose and arabinogalactan-protein in adherent mucilage, also suggests that compensation mechanisms were triggered in the gosamt mutants.


Objective: This study aims to evaluate the association of neurotic personality traits and coping styles with depression amongst first year medical and dental students. Methods: A total of 167 students consisting of 133 medical and 34 dental students in their first year were recruited. All the subjects were assessed using BDI, NEO PI-R (N) and Brief COPE for depression, neurotic personality traits and coping styles respectively. Result: First year dental students were 3 times more likely to have depression than first year medical students. Students who scored high and very high on the total Neuroticism factor and the Depression facet of NEO PI-R (N) were 3.6 times and 7 times more likely to have depression than students who scored very low, low or average for the above scales. All coping styles and other socio-demographic factors showed no association with depression. Conclusion: Neurotic personality traits are significantly associated with depression. NEO PI-R (N) proved to be a useful tool to evaluate the neurotic traits among medical and dental students allowing early interventional measures to those who need it.


Finding k Nearest Neighbors in one category of POIs (point of interests) belongs to the most frequently issued queries in the navigating systems or online maps. This problem can be formulated as given a graph G(V, E), a vertex u and S ⊆ V, finding k nearest neighbors of u in S. Classic Dijkstra's algorithm offers an optimal solution if S = V holds, but the performance deteriorates as S is of smaller size. Other approaches such as pre-computing and storing all the shortest distances require too much storage, thus suffer from drawbacks of scalability.
 To address these problems, we propose TIkNN (stands for Tree decomposition-based Indexing for kNN), an indexing and query processing scheme for kNN query answering. TIkNN is based on the tree decomposition methodology. The graph is first decomposed into a tree in which each node (a.k.a. bag) contains more than one vertex from graph. The shortest paths are stored in such bags and these local paths together with the tree are the components of the index of the graph. Based on this index, step-wise query processing over the tree can be executed to find the nearest neighbors.
 Our experimental results show that TIkNN offers orders-of-magnitude performance improvement over Dijkstra's algorithm on query answering, while the storage requirement for the index structure is relatively small.


In this thesis, a transmission frequency rendezvous approach for secondary users deployed in decentralized dynamic spectrum access networks is proposed. Frequency rendezvous is a critical step in bootstrapping a wireless network that does not possess centralized control. Current techniques for enabling frequency rendezvous in decentralized dynamic spectrum access networks either require pre-existing infrastructure or use one of several simplifying assumptions regarding the architecture, such as the use of regularly spaced frequency channels for communications. Our proposed approach is designed to be operated in a strictly decentralized wireless networking environment, where no centralized control is present and the spectrum does not possess pre-defined channels. In our proposed rendezvous algorithm, the most important step is pilot tone detection and receiver query. In order to realize a shortest search time for the target receiver, an efficient scanning rule should be employed. In this thesis, three scanning rules are proposed and evaluated, namely: frequency sequence scanning, pilot tone strength scanning, and cluster scanning. To validate our result, we test our scanning rules with actual paging band spectrum measurements. Previous research on security of network coding focuses on the protection of data dissemination procedures and the detection of malicious activities such as pollusion attacks. The capabilities of network coding to detect other attacks has not been fully explored. In this thesis, a new mechanism based on physical layer network coding to detect wormhole attacks is proposed. When two signal sequences collide at the receiver, the difference between the two received sequences is determined by its distances to the senders. Therefore, by comparing the differences between the received sequences at two nodes, we can estimate the distance between them and detect those fake neighbor connections through wormholes. While the basic idea is clear, we design many schemes at both physical and network layers to turn the idea into a practical approach. Simulations using BPSK modulation at the physical layer show that the wireless nodes can effectively detect fake neighbor connections without the adoption of any special hardware on them.


This paper is concerned with the problem of computing a discrete-coefficient approximation to a digital filter. In contrast to earlier works that have approached this problem using standard combinatorial optimization tools, we take a geometric approach. We define a Riemannian manifold, arising from the difference in frequency response between the two systems of interest, on which we design efficient algorithms for sampling and approximation. This additional structure enables us to tame the computational complexity of the native combinatorial optimization problem. We illustrate the benefits of this approach with design examples involving IIR and FIR filters.


5-fluorouracil (5-FU), a fluoropyrimidine antimetabolite, is widely used in the treatment of cancers of the digestive tract and breast. The clinical cardiotoxicity of 5-FU was first reported in 1975. Adverse cardiac effects include coronary disorders, heart failure and sudden death of suspected cardiac origin. Six new cases are reported, including 5 cases of angina and one of heart failure. The patients, 4 males and 2 females, were 26 to 71 years of age (mean: 56.2). They had no medical history of heart failure, myocardial ischemia or electrocardiographic anomalies prior to 5-FU treatment. Three patients had hypertension of whom one had had type-II diabetes mellitus for the past 20 years. Clinical symptoms included chest pain in 4 patients and heart failure in one, whereas the last patient had ECG changes with no associated clinical symptoms. Clinical symptoms of angina totally disappeared after the cessation of 5-FU administration, but heart failure was alleviated only after the introduction of digitalis, a converting-enzyme inhibitor and a diuretic. It has been estimated that 1.6% of patients treated with 5-FU develop adverse cardiac effects. Patients at greater risk are those with a history of ischemic cardiac disease, thoracic radiotherapy or high-dose 5-FU therapy. The mechanism involved is not clearly elucidated. Spasms of the coronary arteries or toxic inflammation of the myocardium have been suspected. These 6 new cases confirm the potential for cardiotoxicity of 5-FU and the need for careful cardiac monitoring of treated patients.


Objectives: The objective of this case series was to describe the experience of the use of infrared thermography to evaluate the effects of acupuncture on cutaneous microcirculation of cancer patients. Methods: The method is a cross-sectional survey, descriptive of a series of cases of a sample for convenience. The data collection procedure had a total duration of 30 minutes, being captured images at different times during the procedure: before the needling (T0); first minute (T0a); second minute (T0b); third minute (T0c); forth minute (T0d); fifth minute (T1); tenth minute (T2); and after 15 minutes (T3) of needling. Body temperature was evaluated by infrared camera, brand FLIR, series A. The FLIR Tools software version 5.9 was used to perform the calculation of the temperatures with subsequent descriptive analysis of the data. The choice of the PC6, BP10, R6, and B62 bilateral acupoints was because of the anatomic location and energetic actions on the blood circulation. The PC6 acupoint (Neiguan) is located in the meridian of the pericardium, lies on the anterior face of the forearm approximately 2 cm (0.79 inches) below the wrist and between the flexor tendons. This acupoint is responsible for sending signals to the central nervous system, which results in the reduction of sympathetic activity. Results: According to the ANOVA test, considering P value less than or equal to .05, there were statistically significant differences in the time intervals evaluated, with P value of .004. There was a 1.7% increase in the mean temperature of the interval between T3 and T0 in the sample, that is, between the time before and after 15 minutes of needling. Conclusion: This series of cases showed the viability of the method of evaluating the effects of acupuncture on cutaneous microcirculation by infrared thermography in the rehabilitation of cancer patients. The results showed statistically significant differences in the time intervals evaluated, demonstrating the importance of the evaluation at 15 minutes after needling to accurately verify the variation of cutaneous temperature by thermography in the acupoints. It was noticed that the increase of the cutaneous temperature occurred, mainly, in the first 5 minutes after the needling, with a reduction after this time interval.


The main arguments used to support the concept that komatiites form by melting of hydrous mantle are as follows: (1) Water reduces liquidus temperatures from extreme values to lower, more "normal" temperatures. (2) Some komatiites are pyroclastic and some contain vesicles, features that have been attributed to magmatic volatiles. (3) It is claimed from experimental studies of peridotite melting that the chemical composition of komatiite requires the presence of water, as does their characteristic spinifex textures. Counterarguments are the following: (1) Loss of volatiles as hydrous komatiite approaches the surface should produce degassing textures and structures, which, though not unknown, are rare in komatiites. Degassing should produce a highly supercooled liquid that partially crystallizes to porphyritic magma; komatiites commonly erupt as phenocryst-poor, highly magnesian lavas. (2) Chemical and isotopic compositions of most komatiites indicate that their mantle source became depleted in incompatible elements soon before magma formation. Such depletion removes water, leaving a dry source. (3) The experimental data are at best ambiguous; neither the chemical composition of komatiites, nor the crystallization of spinifex, requires the presence of water. We conclude that although some rare komatiites may be hydrous, most are dry.


This paper proposes an accurate and computationally efficient time-domain implementation of the IEEE Standard 1459-2010 for power measurements. The most important parts are adaptive low- and bandpass finite-impulse-response (FIR) filters that extract dc and fundamental components, respectively. In addition, coefficient sensitivity problems of the large-order FIR comb cascade structure are overridden by using a multirate (decimation) digital signal processing technique. Even more, by using decimation antialiasing filters, the parameter estimation accuracy is improved. The symmetrical components are estimated through adaptive transformation matrix of phase shifters. The algorithm convergence provided a fast response and adaptability. The effectiveness of the proposed technique is demonstrated by simulation results. The algorithm shows a very high level of robustness and high measurement accuracy over a wide range of frequency changes.


Business survey laboratory of Gaidar Institute for Economic Policy conducted on-line computation of uncertainty indicators for the Russian industrial sector. As it appears from this computation, in 2020 the peak of uncertainty in projections for demand, output, and employment accounted for May. If in the wake of April lockdown and related economic shock the majority of enterprises held together in their negative projections, then from May the situation commenced to change for the better.


Chemical doping and other surface modifications have been used to engineer the bulk properties of materials, but their influence on the surface structure and consequently the surface chemistry are often unknown. Previous work has been successful in fluorinating anatase TiO2 with charge balance achieved via the introduction of Ti vacancies rather than the reduction of Ti. Our work here investigates the interface between this fluorinated titanate with cationic vacancies and a monolayer of water via density functional theory based molecular dynamics. We compute the projected density of states for only those atoms at the interface and for those states that fall within 1 eV of the Fermi level for various steps throughout the simulation, and we determine that the variation in this visualization of the density of states serves as a reasonable tool to anticipate where surfaces are most likely to be reactive. In particular, we conclude that water dissociation at the surface is the main mechanism that influences the anatase (001) surface whereas the change in the density of states at the surface of the fluorinated structure is influenced primarily through the adsorption of water molecules.


Most research studies of women in the college and university advancement profession measure the number of women in advancement positions, report their corresponding salaries and reflect on the differences between male and female employees in the same position. Little research explores how women achieve high ranking advancement positions and very few provide an analysis of the characteristics, influences and careers of successful female advancement professionals. This dissertation describes the life and work of Virginia Carter Smith, founding editor of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education's award winning publication CURRENTS.

The career and contributions of Virginia Carter Smith are relevant and helpful to advancement professionals in colleges, universities and K-12 institutions. This study explores Smith's formative years as a child, describes her educational and extra-curricular preparation and identifies individuals who influenced her life and provided direction for her future. It also examines Smith's role in the formation and direction of CASE and CURRENTS. Smith successfully launched CURRENTS in 1975 when few women held senior-level positions in advancement-related fields. With Smith's contributions, CASE became the dominate professional organization for advancement professionals working in educational institutions, and CURRENTS continues to be an exemplary professional development periodical for individuals working in advancement.

This study also examines how Smith promoted qualified individuals, particularly women, to senior-level positions in colleges and university advancement offices. Hundreds of women and men in the profession claim that Smith's served as a role model or mentor to them. Smith contributed to the increase of women in advancement offices nationally over the last twenty years. Her high standards for herself and for other development officers helped professionalize the field for everyone.


3D braided group theory is dissertated. The analysis procedure is described from the existing braided geometry structure to the braided space group; 3D braided geometrical structures are finally described by means of group theory. Some of novel 3D braided structures are deduced from the braided space groups. By describing the 3D braided materials with braided space point and braided space groups, the braided space groups are not always the same as symmetry groups of crystallographic because novel lattices can be produced and the reflection operation cannot exist in braided space point groups. Braided point and space groups are theoretical basis for deriving the novel braided geometry structure.


Non-state actors can contribute to shaping customary law indirectly, through inspiration and pressure, or formally when so empowered by States. Decisions on granting non-state actors customary law-making capacities must be critically decided on a case-by-case basis, in light of the legal interests at stake, risks of making regulation subservient to their interests, and legitimacy and effectiveness considerations. Since non-state involvement in the formation or change of customary law is not limited to direct law-making capacities, different strategies can be used to both receive their input and promote their acceptance of and respect of customary law. Internal and international democratization of State decisions and collective law-making are essential if the (currently) mostly-State-centric system of custom determination is to be fair. This demands a duty to examine non-state proposals in good faith.


The Second International Symposium on Computing and Networking (CANDAR 2014) was held in Shizuoka, Japan, from December 10th to 12th, 2014. The organizers of the CANDAR 2014 invited authors to submit the extended version of the presented papers. As a result, 14 articles have been submitted to this special issue. This issue includes the extended version of 7 papers that have been accepted. This issue owes a great deal to a number of people who devoted their time and expertise to handle the submitted papers. In particular, I would like to thank the guest editors for the excellent review process: Professor Shuichi Ichikawa, Professor Katsunobu Imai, Professor Hidetsugu Irie, Professor Yoshiaki Kakuda, Professor Susumu Matsumae, Professor Toru Nakanishi, Professor Hiroyuki Sato, Professor Chisa Takano, and Professor Takashi Yokota. Words of gratitude are also due to the anonymous reviewers who carefully read the papers and provided detailed comments and suggestions to improve the quality of the submitted papers. This special issue would not have been without their efforts.


Children presenting to an emergency care provider, such as an out-of-hours GP or Emergency Department, frequently have minor, self-limiting infections. However, a few will have a serious infection or complication, requiring urgent investigation and treatment to reduce the risk of long-term disability or death. Vital signs can be measured quickly and non-invasively on these children. However, no single sign is sufficiently predictive to accurately identify the children at risk. This is because signs may be physiologically coupled (e.g. heart rate and temperature), and also because the normal range of some signs, such as the breathing rate and heart rate, change with the age of the child. We propose a data fusion technique to identify children with serious illness from a combination of non-invasive vital signs and the age of the child. The technique has been applied to a dataset collected in primary care situations, and has shown that sensitivities and specificities of over 70% can be achieved.


Differential games with simple motion in a game space with nonunique shortest geodesic line have complicated structure of singular surfaces. The successful solution of such games on a family of two-dimensional cones was based to the large extent on the parameter analysis of the problem. Simultaneous consideration of the games for all possible parameters was very useful for the determination of the bifurcation points where the structure of optimal phase portraits changes. In the present paper the results of pursuit game on a cone of one nappe are extended to the game on the full cone of two nappes. The latter surface is included in one-parametric family of rotation surfaces (each of which is characterized by two more parameters), and the game on it is considered as the generating problem for the analysis of the games on the perturbed surfaces.


After nearly 15 years of research into the risk and harm of the internet for children and young people, research attention is beginning to turn towards investigating the social and emotional skills children and young people need to successfully engage in the digital world. This turn, from a protectionist-only approach to a more nuanced research agenda, examines the positive and negative implications of minors' internet use, including all the protective factors children need to engage effectively and safely online. This change in research agenda will go some way towards helping children develop the skills they need to participate and navigate in a networked world. This paper analyses qualitative, exploratory research, which focussed on children and teenagers' experiences and parental concerns about internet usage, finding that children and teenagers' social and emotional maturity (along with well-developed digital skills) is a key element in their thoughtful and constructive use of the internet. It explores links between social and emotional literacies and digital literacies, and their influence on children and young people's ability to use the internet in beneficial and safe ways. Along with a call for further research in this area, the paper also discusses how it makes good sense to include a 'risk and resilience' approach to internet safety. Online resilience (like offline resilience) can be developed through exploration and some experience with risk.


Spinosad (Success7), chlorfenapyr (Alert7), DPX-MP062 (DuPont), thiodicarb (Larvin7), and cryolite (Kryocide7) progressively reduced the total number of Plutella xylostella (diamondback moth, DBM) following each of three applications. Success treated cabbage had the fewest number of small-sized DBM larvae after the first application and maintained very low numbers following subsequent applications. Relative performance of the insecticides based on efficacy indicated by a seasonal average of total DBM larvae showed that Success was highly effective followed by methomyl (Lannate) and Larvin. Emamectin-benzoate (Proclaim7), Alert, and DPX-MP062 performed comparably and tebufenozide (Confirm7) and Kryocide were less effective.


Activated ozone as the carrier,crylic acid as the monomer and glutaraldehyde as the cross-linking agent were used to research the immobilization of transglutaminase on polypropylene microporous membranes. The effect of ozone activation time,grafting time,grafting temperature,monomer concentration and ammonium ferrous sulfate concentration on grafting degree were studied, the Immobilization conditions were also studied. We found the optimal reaction conditions as following: consistency of hexamethylendiamine was 15%,at 50°C for 120min and consistency,at 30°C for 45minites,consistency of enzyme was 15mg/mL at 4°C. So the immobilized amount of protein could come to 30.23mg/g membrane and the activity of immobilized MTG come to 16.9U/g membrane.


A 72-year old lady suffering from coronary heart disease was admitted with acute abdominal pain. Laparoscopy was performed and revealed perforation of a duodenal ulcer. The surgeon decided to suture the perforation via laparoscope. After an uncomplicated start he had to finish the laparoscopic procedure because of a massive hypercapnia and a developing subcutaneous emphysema. Laparotomy showed an iatrogenic perforation of the right diaphragm. A chest drain was inserted; after suturing of the perforated ulcer the abdomen was closed. The further hospital stay was uneventful. The possible causes for the increasing hypercapnia are discussed. We suggest close monitoring of patients during laparoscopy including capnometry and the anaesthesist should be aware of rare complications.


Follitropin (FSH) has been shown in previous studies to stimulate the induction of the LH/CG receptor (LHR) and LHR mRNA in the granulosa cells of diethylstilbesterol-primed immature rats. The present studies were undertaken to identify the mechanisms underlying the hormone-dependent induction of the LHR in rat granulosa cells. The effect of FSH on LHR mRNA stability was determined by measuring the decay of LHR mRNA after removal of FSH under conditions where transcription was inhibited. Under these conditions, readdition of FSH had little effect on mRNA stability. However, inhibitors of transcription themselves were found to have a marked effect on stabilizing the LHR mRNA, thus potentially masking an effect of FSH. These results suggest that there is a labile destabilizing factor that constitutively degrades LHR mRNA. At present, it cannot be ascertained whether FSH has any effect on this destabilizing factor. Transcriptional activity of the LHR gene was examined using nuclear run-on assays. It was found that 1) in the absence of FSH, LHR-binding activity and mRNA levels were negligible, but the LHR gene was transcriptionally active in granulosa cells of immature rats; 2) incubations of granulosa cells with FSH or 8-bromo-cAMP significantly increased endogenous LHR gene transcription (approximately 10-fold) under conditions where increases in LHR mRNA were observed; 3) the continuous presence of FSH or 8-bromo-cAMP was required to maintain elevated levels of LHR gene transcription and LHR mRNA; and 4) exogenous estradiol alone had no effect on transcription of the LHR gene although it was able to synergistically enhance FSH-induced LHR expression. These experiments suggest that while the effects of estradiol on LHR induction do not appear to be mediated by an increase in LHR gene transcription, the effects of FSH (or cAMP) on LHR induction are clearly mediated, at least in part, by significant increases in the rate of LHR gene transcription.


BACKGROUND
In most countries, suicide is second or third leading cause of death in youth. Suicidal tendencies among youth have been the subject of extensive research. Reports of increased rate of suicide attempts in the past few decades indicate that this phenomenon has not been fully understood.

AIM
The aim of this study was to better understand the phenomenon of adolescent suicide behavior by defining some specific psychological characteristics of adolescents who were hospitalized at the psychiatric ward because of the suicide attempt.

METHODS
62 participants were assigned to two groups: clinical (adolescents who were hospitalized after a suicide attempt) and non-clinical (adolescents without psychiatric symptoms). They filled in a series of instruments: a questionnaire examining adolescents' demographic characteristics, Rosenberg's Self-Esteem Scale, Youth Self Report.

RESULTS
Compared to the non-clinical populaton adolescents attempting suicide had significantly more frequent suicidal thoughts (χ2 = 18.627, df = 1, p < .01), higher incidence of earlier attempts (χ2 = 10.008, df = 1, p < .01), they abused substances more often (χ2 = 7.398, df=1, p < .01), had higher incidence of fathers' psychopathology (χ2 = 11.77, df = 1, p < .01), lower level of self-esteem (t = 4.23, p < .01), and more significant expression of internalized (F/1.60/ = 19.02; p < .01) as well as externalized problems (F/1.60/ = 4.41; p < .05).

CONCLUSIONS
This study point to some of the characteristics of adolescents who were hospitalized after a suicide attempt.


Clonazepam, which is a benzodiazepine structurally related to chlordiazepoxide hydrochloride, diazepam and nitrazepam, has been available for the treatment of seizure disorders in the USA since 1976 and in Japan since 1981. Increasingly, clonazepam has been used in the treatment of a variety of psychiatric disorders. The effect of clonazepam on depression was first reported by Jones and Chouinard in 1985. Since their report, many investigators have reported on the antidepressive properties of clonazepam. A daily dose of at least 3.0 mg clonazepam in augmentation of ongoing antidepressant treatment should be considered in depression. Regarding clonazepam augmentation therapy, if a patient does not show improvement by the end of four weeks, the treatment regimen should be altered. Age at onset of the first depressive episode and a history of family psychiatric illness should be considered the predictor of prognosis. The author discusses specific guidelines for the use of clonazepam in depression.


Background Evidence has shown that psoriasis is closely associated with infection; however, the mechanism of this association remains unclear. In mammalian cells, viral or bacterial infection is accompanied by the release of cytosolic DNA, which in turn triggers the production of type-I interferons (IFNs). Type I IFNs and their associated genes are significantly upregulated in psoriatic lesions. RIG-I is also highly upregulated in psoriatic lesions and is responsible for IFN production. However, RIG-I mediated regulatory signaling in psoriasis is poorly understood. Methods We screened a cDNA library and identified potential RIG-I interacting partners that may play a role in psoriasis. Results We found that serine/arginine-rich splicing factor 1 (SRSF1) could specifically interact with RIG-I to facilitate RIG-I mediated production of type-I IFN that is triggered by cytosolic DNA. We found SRSF1 associates with RNA polymerase III and RIG-I in a DNA-dependent manner. In addition, treatment with a TNFα inhibitor downregulated SRSF1 expression in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from psoriasis vulgaris patients. Discussion Based on the abundance of pathogenic cytosolic DNA that is detected in psoriatic lesions, our finding that RIG-I interacts with SRSF1 to regulate type-I IFN production reveals a critical link regarding how cytosolic DNA specifically activates aberrant IFN expression. These data may provide new therapeutic targets for the treatment of psoriasis.


Classification Appeals Officer 6/15/99 Date ii As provided in section 511.612 of title 5, Code of Federal Regulations, this decision constitutes a certificate that is mandatory and binding on all administrative, certifying, payroll, disbursing, and accounting officials of the government. The agency is responsible for reviewing its classification decisions for identical, similar, or related positions to ensure consistency with this decision. There is no right of further appeal. This decision is subject to discretionary review only under conditions and time limits specified in the Introduction to the Position Classification Standards, appendix 4, section G (address provided in appendix 4, section H).


This paper presents a review of the current status of chemical sensing as a sensory modality for mobile robots. Of the numerous techniques that are available for detecting chemicals, only a few have so far proved suitable for robotics applications. These are described and evaluated. To infer useful information from readings of chemical concentration, attention must be paid to the control and/or measurement of airflow close to the sensor. Experiments that incorporate aspects of airflow control and/or measurement are outlined. The information about chemical concentration is then used to control the motion of a robot. There follows a description of the reactive, often biologically inspired, control algorithms that have been used for this purpose. In conclusion, the present state of development of robotic chemical sensing is assessed.


The research explores 'community' as perceived and experienced by academics associated with one higher education institution. Focusing on the meaning and experience of community, the research reveals living academic identities wrought by the concrete reality of experiencing community in its various forms. 'Authentic voices' in this context means voices that are firmly rooted in day-‐to-‐day lived experience and not abstract or institutionalised. The imperative for the research lies in the quest to break free from the constraints of the calculative thinking that pervades higher education. The dominant tone of the literature on academic community is disconsolate but not despairing. The dominant language is that of professional practice and values. The empirical dimensions of the research comprises a series of extended conversations and focus groups with twelve academics and a heuristic analysis, channelled through five themes, seeking the individual's idea and experience of community and its orientation to their status, their academic practice and their institution and environment. The original contribution to knowledge is the revelation of the significance of value and values in the meaning and experience of community and how these may be applied in a theoretical and practical context when constructing and understanding community both as a concept, and as lived experience. Value and values are brought together in a suggested new model (called the 'infinity model'), a relational construct that signifies the formation and experience of community through a continual or infinite dynamic between 'value and validity' (centred on status and institution), and 'values and virtue' (centred on practice and elements of community), realised through the nexus of individual or collective agency. The new model has research and agentic potential as a framework for both investigating and realising the social relations of the intellectual field.


This article shows that the inability to use monetary policy for macroeconomic stabilization leaves a government more vulnerable to a rollover crisis. We study a sovereign default model with self-fulfilling rollover crises, foreign currency debt, and nominal rigidities. When the government lacks monetary independence, lenders anticipate that the government would face a severe recession in the event of a liquidity crisis and are therefore more prone to run on government bonds. In a quantitative application to the Eurozone debt crisis, we find that the lack of monetary autonomy played a central role in making Spain vulnerable to a rollover crisis. Finally, we argue that a lender of last resort can go a long way toward reducing the costs of giving up monetary independence.


The sensitivity of Bayesian pattern recognition models to multiplicative deviations in the prior and conditional probabilities is investigated for the two-class case. Explicit formulas are obtained for the factor K by which the computed posterior probabilities should be divided in order to eliminate the deviation effect. Numerical results for the case of binary features indicate that the Bayesian model tolerates large deviations in the prior and conditional probabilities. In fact, the a priori ratio and the likelihood ratio may deviate within a range of 65-135 percent and still produce posterior probabilities in accurate proximity of at most ±0.10. The main implication is that Bayesian systems which are based on limited data or subjective probabilities are expected to have a high percentage of correct classification despite the fact that the prior and conditional probabilities they use may deviate rather significantly from the true values.


This paper proposes a multilevel coding scheme with linear mapping for intersymbol interference (ISI) channels and derives a low-complexity receiver structure that can achieve the ISI channel capacity. The transmitter superimposes many layers of independent binary antipodal streams to generate a quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) or Gaussian-like channel input. The receiver performs multistage decoding with decision feedback and interference cancellation. Within each stage is a linear minimum mean-square-error (MMSE) equalizer followed by an error-correcting decoder. The complexity scales linearly with the channel length and the number of layers, and the process is shown to be asymptotically information lossless if a fixed input power is properly distributed over a sufficiently large number of layers. This framework is then extended to achieve the capacity of the ISI channel using a transmitter-side spectral shaping filter that converts a Gaussian input sequence with a white spectrum to one with a water-filling spectrum.


Cells regulate their volume in response to changes in the osmolarity of both their extracellular and their intracellular environments. We investigated the ability of the human airway epithelial cell line Calu-3 to respond to changes in extracellular osmolarity. Although switching Calu-3 cells from an isosmotic to a hyperosmotic environment resulted in cell shrinkage, there was no compensatory mechanism for the cells to return to their original volume. In contrast, switching to a hyposmotic environment resulted in an initial cell swelling response, followed by a regulatory volume decrease (RVD). Pharmacologic studies demonstrate that the voltage-activated K+ channels Kv4.1 and (or) Kv4.3 play a crucial role in mediating this RVD response, and we demonstrated expression of these channel types at the mRNA and protein levels. Furthermore, inhibition of the large- and intermediate-conductance Ca2+-activated K+ channels KCa1.1 (maxi-K) and KCa3.1 (hIK) also implicated these channels as playing a role in volume recovery in Calu-3 cells. This report describes the nature of volume regulation in the widely used model cell line Calu-3.


MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are integral to the gene regulatory network. A single miRNA is capable of controlling the expression of hundreds of protein coding genes and modulate a wide spectrum of biological functions, such as proliferation, differentiation, stress responses, DNA repair, cell adhesion, motility, inflammation, cell survival, senescence and apoptosis, all of which are fundamental to tumorigenesis. Overexpression, genetic amplification, and gain-of-function mutation of oncogenic miRNAs (''onco-miRs'') as well as genetic deletion and loss-of-function mutation of tumor suppressor miRNAs (''suppressor-miRs'') are linked to human cancer. In addition to the dysregulation of a specific onco-miR or suppressor-miRs, changes in global miRNA levels resulting from a defective miRNA biogenesis pathway play a role in tumorigenesis. The function of individual onco-miRs and suppressor-miRs and their target genes in cancer has been described in many different articles elsewhere. In this review, we primarily focus on the recent development regarding the dysregulation of the miRNA biogenesis pathway and its contribution to cancer.


In this paper, we address the problem of learning discriminative part detectors from image sets with category labels. We propose a novel latent SVM model regularized by group sparsity to learn these part detectors. Starting from a large set of initial parts, the group sparsity regularizer forces the model to jointly select and optimize a set of discriminative part detectors in a max-margin framework. We propose a stochastic version of a proximal algorithm to solve the corresponding optimization problem. We apply the proposed method to image classification and co segmentation, and quantitative experiments with standard benchmarks show that it matches or improves upon the state of the art.


We consider, for the first time, the stability of the non-Newtonian boundary layer flow over a flat plate. Shear-thinning and shear-thickening flows are modelled using a Carreau constitutive viscosity relationship. The boundary layer equations are solved in a self-similar fashion. A linear asymptotic stability analysis, that concerns the lower-branch structure of the neutral curve, is presented in the limit of large Reynolds number. It is shown that the lower-branch mode is destabilised and stabilised for shear-thinning and shear-thickening fluids, respectively. Favourable agreement is obtained between these asymptotic predictions and numerical results obtained from an equivalent Orr-Sommerfeld type analysis. Our results indicate that an increase in shear-thinning has the effect of significantly reducing the value of the critical Reynolds number, this suggests that the onset of instability will be significantly advanced in this case. This postulation, that shear-thinning destabilises the boundary layer flow, is further supported by our calculations regarding the development of the streamwise eigenfunctions and the relative magnitude of the temporal growth rates.


This study examines the J-curve phenomenon for the U.S. agricultural trade and compares the effect on agricultural trade relative to the U.S. non-agricultural trade. For this purpose, the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model is adopted to estimate bilateral trade data between the U.S. and her three major trading partners ¦i Japan, Canada and Mexico. We find little evidence of the J-curve for the U.S. agricultural trade with Japan, Canada and Mexico. For the non-agricultural trade, on the other hand, the behavior of the U.S. trade with industrialized economies such as Japan and Canada follows the J-curve, but not with developing economies such as Mexico.


Today's engineering companies are facing unprecedented competition in a global market place. There is now a knowledge intensive shift towards whole product lifecycle support, and collaborative environments. It has become particularly important to capture information, knowledge and experiences about previous design and following stages during their product lifecycle, so as to retrieve and reuse such information in new and follow-on designs activities. Recently, with the rapid development and adoption of digital technologies, annotation and markup are becoming important tools for information communication, retrieval and management. Such techniques are being increasingly applied to an array of applications and different digital items, such as text documents, 2D images and 3D models. This paper presents a state-of-the-art review of recent research in markup for engineering design, including a number of core markup languages and main markup strategies. Their applications and future utilization in engineering design, including multi-viewpoint of product models, capture of information and rationale across the whole product lifecycle, integration of engineering design processes, and engineering document management, are comprehensively discussed.


Hierarchical SDF models are not compositional: a composite SDF actor cannot be represented as an atomic SDF actor without loss of information that can lead to rate inconsistency or deadlock. Motivated by the need for incremental and modular code generation from hierarchical SDF models, we introduce in this paper DSSF profiles. DSSF (Deterministic SDF with Shared FIFOs) forms a compositional abstraction of composite actors that can be used for modular compilation. We provide algorithms for automatic synthesis of non-monolithic DSSF profiles of composite actors given DSSF profiles of their sub-actors. We show how different trade-offs can be explored when synthesizing such profiles, in terms of compactness (keeping the size of the generated DSSF profile small) versus reusability (maintaining necessary information to preserve rate consistency and deadlock-absence) as well as algorithmic complexity. We show that our method guarantees maximal reusability and report on a prototype implementation.


Local solid concentration profiles were investigated in a contoured bottom cylindrical reactor, mechanically stirred by a 45° pitched blade turbine and equipped with four baffles. The solid-liquid system consisted of a suspension of spherical glass beads or alumina grains in water. The effects of the stirring rate and of the size and density of the solid particles were examined. To interpret the solid distribution profiles in the vessel, a one-dimensional sedimentation dispersion model was employed. The description was based on the continuity equation and made use of the experimental knowledge of the flow velocity distribution of the liquid phase and of the calculated terminal velocity in a still medium of the solid particles.


ABSTRACT As US deportations and repatriations climbed to unprecedented levels, half of Mexican immigrants deported have at least one family member who is a US citizen, and one in five have at least one child who is a US citizen. This paper applies the analytic of forced transnationality, extending its scope beyond one person's deportation to reveal cascading effects of travel and trauma for families remaking lives across the US-Mexico border. To do so, our research draws on interviews with mixed-status families, where transnational children have legal permission to reside in the US (including citizenship) and live with caregivers (like parents) who do not. In the wake of the rupture of prolonged detention and deportation, families seek to suture themselves as a collective social subject that is reshaped by forced transnationality.


The objective of this study was to determine whether AMES (Assisted Movement with Enhanced Sensation), a novel therapeutic intervention that addresses impairments, rather than function, can reduce impairment and restore lost function in persons with a severely disabled hand. Forty-three participants with stroke (>1 yr post-injury) were provided with thirty 30-min AMES treatments over 10 weeks. Of these participants, 24 had no baseline active extension of any finger of the affected hand. Participants were randomized to 1 of 2 treatment groups differentiated by the kind of biofeedback (active torque or EMG) associated with the AMES intervention. During treatment, a robotic device cyclically opened and closed the hand (5 deg/s, ±15 deg) while the participant assisted this movement using visual biofeedback, and while vibration (60 pulses/s, 2 mm) was applied to the lengthening muscles. Participants were evaluated twice, before and after the treatment period, with the Fugl-Meyer Assessment (FMA-UE), Stroke Impact Scale (SIS), and Box-and-Block Test. In addition, during each treatment session, the AMES robot tested each participant's strength of thumb-and-finger flexion and extension. Both torque and EMG were recorded during this Strength Test in participants assigned to the EMG-biofeedback group. The results showed overall a significant increase in the FMA-UE score (t-test, p<0.001), SIS score (t-test, p<0.05), and Box-and-Block Test score (Wilcoxon, p<0.005), without any difference between the 2 treatment groups. Four of the 24 initially plegic participants recovered the ability to move one or more blocks; however, all participants showing improvement in the Box-and-Block Test had a baseline FMA score of ≥17. Analysis of EMG during the hand-opening part of the Strength Test showed that AMES treatment of the EMG-biofeedback group significantly increased the amplitude of extensor activity (t-test, p<0.001) and decreased flexor co-contraction (t-test, p<0.05). We conclude that AMES coupled with either type of biofeedback may be effective at reducing impairment and increasing function in the severely impaired hand following stroke.


Several studies have demonstrated an order-of-entry effect on market share, suggesting that pioneers outperform later entrants. However, other research has pointed out the limitations of these studies and found evidence that many pioneers fail or have low market share. Given this background, the purpose of this research is to understand the conditions under which pioneers are more likely and also less likely to have an advantage. We propose a game-theoretic model that includes important sources of pioneer advantages as well as disadvantages. Specifically, we incorporate a pioneer advantage due to preemption in markets with heterogeneous tastes. In addition, we incorporate a potential pioneer disadvantage due to technology vintage effects, where later entrants utilizing improved technology can have lower costs and higher quality. The model allows us to evaluate the extent of vintage effects necessary to overcome a pioneer's advantage. Key relationships are found between the magnitude of the pioneer advantage or disadvantage and consumer valuations of product attributes (e.g., variety and quality). We empirically validate the model with vintage effect data in 36 product categories, and measures of consumer valuations of product variety and quality for 12 of these 36 categories. The results show that pioneers do better in product categories wherevariety is more important and worse in categories where productquality is more important. Pioneers in categories with high vintage effects are shown to have lower market shares and higher failure rates. Similar results appear when analyzing persistence of market leadership over time, further validating our model's major implications. We also present two case studies that illustrate key elements of the model.


According to E. Lim (1975), in a letter dated 15 August 1899, John Madden (1844–1918), Chancellor of the University of Melbourne wrote to the Agent General (in London) for the Colony of Victoria, asking him to invite applications for a new Chair in Geology and Mineralogy. This was necessitated by both the death of the previous holder of the Chair of Natural History (from 1854–1899), Professor Sir Frederick McCoy (1817–1899), and the creation of separate Chairs of both Chemistry and Biology, subjects that had previously been included in Natural History (Selleck 2003). This left geology teaching and research, including palaeontology, in abeyance. The emphasis was to be on 'mineralogy so that the new Department may be brought into line with any future extensions of Mining and Engineering.' The advertisement was placed in Nature on 28 September and applications had to be received in London by 20 October 1899.

The London appointing committee consisted of four FRS's: A. Geikie, Director General of the Geological Survey of Great Britain and Ireland, J. W. Judd, Dean of the Royal College of Science, John Edward Marr (1857–1933) Woodwardian Professor of Geology at Cambridge, and Charles Lapworth (1842–1920), Professor of Geology at Birmingham. Gregory, who had (on 3 October 1899) asked for, and received from, Geikie a fine testimonial for the post, wrote to Geikie on 5 October stating that given that Geikie would be on the appointing committee in London, he would not submit the testimonial (Edinburgh University, Geikie Archives). The following day, 6 October he wrote to Lapworth asking if he would give him a testimonial, perhaps in place of Geikie's, presumably because he did not realize Lapworth was also on the committee (Lapworth archives, H22).

The committee considered 'the claims of Dr Gregory are so far above those of any of …


The Cretaceous Parana-Etendeka flood basalt magmatism of South America and " Africa was accompanied by intense intrusive activity. This study examines the geochemistry and petrogenesis of dykes from two regions of southern Brazil.

Dykes from the Ponta Grossa region of Parana. State fed the basalt lava flows of the northern Parana. The dolerites underwent extensive crystal fractionation at pressures of less . than about 5kb, but do not represent parental magmas to the associated rhyolites. The dolerites have received a contribution from a LREE enriched source with time-integrated high RblSr relative to the bulk earth, and yield model Nd and 207PbjlO6Pb ages which are similar to ages obtained from the basement rocks of southern Brazil. This suggests that the distinctive trace element and isotope signature of these dolerites was derived from a source in the subcontinental mantle.

The-dolerites of Sao Paulo State are divisible into three magma types, which cannot be related either to one another, or to the flood basalts to the west by any simple petrogenetic process. The geochemical variation within dolerites of the Paraiba and Ubatuba magma types was controlled by assimilation fractional crystallisation and magma mixing processes at shallow levels in the crust In contrast, the basanites of the Sao Sebastiao magma type underwent limited crystal fractionation of olivine and clinopyroxene at pressures of >4 kb. Much of the geochemical variation within this group of rocks is related to variations in the degree of partial melting (estinlated to be 0.1-5%) of a spinel bearing source. The Sao Sebastiao basanites have very similar trace element and isotope compositions to Recent basanites erupted on the South Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha, and are interpreted as the expression of the Tristan plume at 80 Ma.

Selected whole rock samples and mineral separates have been dated by the laser ablation Ar-Ar technique. The Ponta Grossa dolerites yield isochron ages of 130.5±2.9- -134.1±1.3 Ma. The Paraiba and Ubatuba magma types were intruded at between 129.4±O.6 and 135.8±1.1 Ma. A biotite separate from a sample of the Sao Sebastiao magma type yielded a much younger age of 80.1±O.4 Ma, which suggests that these may be related to the alkalic intrusive complexes of Sao Paulo State.

These ages imply that the Parana magmatism ocC1Jl'Ied within about 3 Ma at 131-134 Ma, although there is evidence that plagioclase alteration may be responsible for some of the apparent age range. The data suggest that the flood basalt magmatism occurred contemporaneously with continental rifting in the South Atlantic, and are consistent with a model in which the Parana-Etendeka flood basalts represent decompression melts generated during continental rifting above the abnormally hot mantle associated with the Tristan da Cunha mantle plume. This model can also account for the observed volume of magma. A comparison of the major element compositions of flood basalts from various CFB provinces with the predicted composition of decompression melts, suggests that many of these basalts have inherited a distinctive major element signature from the subcontinental lithospheric mantle.


TRADITIONALLY, the treatment of choice for severely disturbed and hard-to-manage psychotic children has involved institutional placement. Because such children exhibit behavior which is threatening to family, school, and community, in-hospital care has seemed most advisable from the community's point of view. However, clinical observation suggests that institutionalization frequently has a disruptive effect on children's emotional and intellectual development if they are not provided with an appropriate degree of specific professional attention, available only at specialized intensive residential treatment centers. Since the cost of such residential treatment is prohibitive for most parents, and since the number of such centers is extremely limited, alternative methods of treatment are urgently needed. Moreover, with the development of the community mental health movement, child psychiatrists and child development experts have become concerned about the implications of removing children from their homes. To this group it seems contrary


The effects of Tri-V-Plus preparation in experimental rats with echinococcal pathology have been studied by monitoring the indices of free-radical oxidation of lipids, oxidative degradation of proteins, and variation of the content of nitric oxide during experimental echinococcosis and upon the introduction of Tri-V-Plus as a therapeutic agent.


The linearity of the traveling-wave tube is a very important characteristic for a modern communication system. To improve the linearity of the traveling-wave tube at no expense of the saturated output power and overall efficiency, a modified pitch profile combined with a small adjustment of operating parameters is proposed. The optimal design of the helix circuit is evaluated theoretically by a large signal analysis, and the experimental test is also carried out to make a comparison of performance between the novel and original designed traveling-wave tubes. The experiments show that the saturated output powers and efficiencies of these two tubes are close to each other, while the linearity of the traveling-wave tube is obviously improved. The total phase shift and AM/PM conversion at saturation of the novel tube, averaged over the operating band, are only 30.6°/d B and 2.5°/d B, respectively, which are 20.1°/d B and 1.6°/d B lower than those of the original tube, respectively. Moreover, the third-order intermodulation of the novel tube is up to 2.2 d Bc lower than that of the original tube.


[1] The formation of the ice phase in tropical altocumulus has been studied with multiwavelength aerosol-cloud Raman lidar, wind Doppler lidar, and radiosonde, providing information on geometrical and optical properties, cloud phase, cloud top temperature, updraft and downdraft velocity, and fall speed of ice crystals. The observations were conducted at Praia (15°N, 23.5°W), Cape Verde, in the tropical North Atlantic in the framework of the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment (SAMUM) project in January and February 2008. More than 200 different altocumulus layers were analyzed. The coldest liquid cloud had a temperature of −36°C and appeared at a height of 9800 m. Tropical altocumulus is found to be geometrically (262 ± 137 m) and optically thin (0.69 ± 0.61), mostly short-lived, and horizontally small with extents of less than 50 km in 80% of the cases. A clear relationship between the occurrence of the ice phase in altocumulus and cloud top temperature is observed, even more clear after the removal of effects of cloud seeding, which is found to be an important process of ice production in lower layers of multilayer altocumulus systems. Because almost all altocumulus layers (99%) showed a liquid cloud top (region in which ice nucleation begins), we conclude that deposition and condensation ice nucleation are unimportant processes during the initial phase of altocumulus glaciation. A pronounced impact of aerosols such as mineral particles known to be favorable ice nuclei is not found in this region with strong dust-smoke outbreaks from Africa. The different phases of an almost complete life cycle of an altocumulus were monitored over 5 hours. The observed processes of droplet and ice formation are discussed based on height-resolved depolarization-ratio (cloud phase) and vertical-velocity time series.


Many physical, chemical, and biological systems exhibit traveling waves as a result of either an oscillatory instability or excitability. In the latter case a large multiplicity of stable spatially localized wavetrains consisting of different numbers of traveling pulses may be present. The existence of these states is related here to the presence of homoclinic snaking in the vicinity of a subcritical, finite wavenumber Hopf bifurcation. The pulses are organized in a slanted snaking structure resulting from the presence of a heteroclinic cycle between small and large amplitude traveling waves. Connections of this type require a multivalued dispersion relation. This dispersion relation is computed numerically and used to interpret the profile of the pulse group. The different spatially localized pulse trains can be accessed by appropriately customized initial stimuli, thereby blurring the traditional distinction between oscillatory and excitable systems. The results reveal a new class of phenomena relevant to spatiotemporal dynamics of excitable media, particularly in chemical and biological systems with multiple activators and inhibitors.


Summary
1Hydraulic redistribution may have important consequences for ecosystem water balance where plant root systems span large gradients in soil water potential. To assess seasonal patterns of hydraulic redistribution, we measured the direction and rate of sap flow in tap-roots, lateral roots and main stems of three mature Prosopis velutina Woot. trees occurring on a floodplain terrace in semiarid south-eastern Arizona, USA. Sap-flow measurements on two of the trees were initiated before the end of the winter dormancy period, prior to leaf flush.
2Despite the absence of crown transpiration during the dormant season, sap flow was detected in lateral roots and tap-roots of P. velutina. Reverse flow (away from the stem) in the lateral root and positive flow (towards the stem) in the tap-root was observed in one tree, indicating the presence of hydraulic lift. Conversely, reverse flow in the tap-root and positive flow in the lateral root was observed in the second tree, indicating hydraulic descent.
3Hydraulic descent was induced in the roots of the former tree by wetting the rooting zone in the upper 70 cm of the soil surface with 50 mm of irrigation.
4Patterns and rates of nocturnal sap flow in roots of a third tree measured during the growing season were similar to those observed during the dormant season. Nocturnal reverse flow in the lateral root and positive flow in the tap-root was observed prior to the onset of the summer monsoon. Hydraulic descent commenced immediately following the first large monsoon rain event, and continued after subsequent rain events. After adjusting for differences in sapwood area, maximum diurnal rates of hydraulic descent in the tap-roots of trees instrumented during the dormant season were 73 and 69% of the maximum night-time rate of hydraulic descent observed during the growing season.
5Despite very limited potential for direct infiltration, volumetric soil moisture content in deep soil layers (1·5–9·5 m) increased 2–8% by the end of the monsoon (late September), indicating that plant roots were redistributing non-trivial amounts of water to deep soil layers.
6Roots of P. velutina apparently redistribute significant amounts of soil water during the growing season, but also during periods of crown dormancy in winter. In arid regions dormant-season hydraulic descent may buffer plants from water and nutrient deficits during initial stages of the growing season by transferring soil water derived from winter precipitation to deep soil layers and away from zones of evaporation in surface layers and shallow-rooted herbaceous plants.


This work proposes a thermophysical model for realistic surface layers on airless small bodies (RSTPM) for the use of interpreting their multiepoch thermal light curves (e.g., WISE/NEOWISE). RSTPM considers the real orbital cycle, rotation cycle, rough surface, temperature-dependent thermal parameters, as well as contributions of sunlight reflection to observations. It is thus able to produce a precise temperature distribution and thermal emission of airless small bodies regarding the variations on orbital timescales. Details of the physics, mathematics, and numerical algorithms of RSTPM are presented. When used to interpret multiepoch thermal light curves by WISE/NEOWISE, RSTPM can give constraints on the spin orientation and surface physical properties, such as the mean thermal inertia or the mean size of dust grains, the roughness fraction, and the albedo via a radiometric procedure. As an application example, we apply this model to the main-belt object (24) Themis, the largest object of the Themis family, which is believed to be the source region of many main-belt comets. We find multiepoch (2010, 2014–2018) observations of Themis by WISE/NEOWISE, yielding 18 thermal light curves. By fitting these data with RSTPM, the best-fit spin orientation of Themis is derived to be (λ = 137°, β = 59°) in ecliptic coordinates, and the mean radius of dust grains on the surface is estimated to be b˜=140−114+500(6∼640) μm, indicating that the surface thermal inertia varies from ∼3 Jm−2 s−0.5 K−1 to ∼60 Jm−2 s −0.5 K−1 due to seasonal temperature variation. A more detailed analysis found that the thermal light curves of Themis show a weak feature that depends on the rotation phase, which is indicative of heterogeneous thermal properties or imperfections of the light-curve inversion shape model.


Understanding the pathophysiology of Alzheimer disease has relied upon the use of amyloid peptides from a variety of sources, but most predominantly synthetic peptides produced using t-butyloxycarbonyl (Boc) or 9-fluorenylmethoxycarbonyl (Fmoc) chemistry. These synthetic methods can lead to minor impurities which can have profound effects on the biological activity of amyloid peptides. Here we used a combination of cytotoxicity assays, fibrillation assays and high resolution mass spectrometry (MS) to identify impurities in synthetic amyloid preparations that inhibit both cytotoxicity and aggregation. We identify the Aβ42Δ39 species as the major peptide contaminant responsible for limiting both cytotoxicity and fibrillation of the amyloid peptide. In addition, we demonstrate that the presence of this minor impurity inhibits the formation of a stable Aβ42 dimer observable by MS in very pure peptide samples. These results highlight the critical importance of purity and provenance of amyloid peptides in Alzheimer's research in particular, and biological research in general.


In this note some of the interesting work on the synthesis problem of electrical network theory is translated into ordinary algebraic language. A function f(z) of a complex variable z is positive real in the sense of Brune if f(z) is a rational function with real coefficients such that Re f(z) _ 0 for Re z _0. (PR is an abbreviation for positive real.) Starting with PR functions it is obvious that the following operations lead to new PR functions: (a) Multiplication by a positive constant or zero, cf(z); (b) Forming the inverse, l/f(z); (c) Addition, f,(z) +f2(z). The zero function is PR and operation (b) is excluded in this case. Starting with the PR functions 1 and z as a basis, it follows that the operations (a), (b), and (c) generate a subclass of the PR class. It is a consequence of a synthesis method given by Bott and Duffin [1 ] that actually any PR function can be so generated. This observation is due to Brockway McMillan. In this note it is shown that the class of positive real matrices may be generated in an analogous fashion. A positive real matrix function F(z) is defined as follows: I. F is an n by n symmetric matrix. II. The matrix elements F1k are rational functions of z with real coefficients. III. For any choice of complex numbers cl, c2, ,n


Granuloma faciale (GF) is a rare cutaneous condition of unknown origin, that usually presents as one or more brown-purple papules, plaques and/or nodules, localized mostly on the face, although extrafacial lesions can also occur. Eosinophilic angiocentric fibrosis (EAF) is regarded as the mucosal counterpart of GF. Histologically, it has been described as a persistent leukocytoclastic vasculitis, with a dense polymorphous inflammatory infiltrate in the superficial and mid dermis, typically sparing the subpapillary dermis, the so called grenz zone. The presence of eosinophils is considered a characteristic feature of the disease. All the cases of GF seen at the Dermatology Unit from 2002 to 2013 were considered and reviewed, both clinically and histopathologically. Only cases with consistent clinical findings of GF, and accurate patient's history were considered. Ten cases of GF were reviewed for both histological specificity and clinico-pathological correlation. Two patients presented extrafacial lesions. One patient had involvement of nasal mucosa. Two patients suffered from associated rheumatological diseases. The most frequent histopathologic features were the presence of a grenz zone and eosinophils in the infiltrate, but also adnexal involvement was often present; vascular changes were constant, yet leukocytoclastic vasculitis could be recorded only in four cases. Fibrosis or sclerosis were always absent. Clinical pictures of the patients treated demonstrated a complete remission of the lesions, without scarring. However, a complete enduring healing was observed only in two patients, and relapse or incomplete remission of the disease was the rule. In conclusion a review of clinicopathological findings of ten patients affected by GF was made and new details of the disease presented.


This paper starts with a sketch of the origins of Interactional Sociolinguistics (IS) in Gumperz and Hymes' early efforts to develop a general theory of language and society. Characterising the key features of Gumperzian IS, it emphasises the notions of 'inference' and 'contextualisation' as well as the (counter-hegemonic) centrality of intensive analyses of recorded interaction. It then turns to IS's close relationship with Linguistic Anthropology and Conversation Analysis, considering the challenges presented by IS's insistent interdisciplinarity and its relative lack of formalisation, following this with a brief discussion of how IS seeks to intervene in non-academic activity. Concurring with Auer & Roberts' view that Gumperz was the first to develop a sociolinguistics capable of handling globalised superdiversity, the paper then describes the ways in which his work on code-switching and intercultural communication has been updated in, respectively, studies of stylisation and asylum procedures. Finally, it suggests that in future work, IS should examine the interface between face-to-face and digital interaction together with the implications of new forms of surveillance, capitalising on the anti-structuralist rigour that IS can bring to the study of Foucauldian 'governmentality'.


We are reporting the core-shell structured iron/graphite nanoparticles formed by annealing of a nanopowder. The original Fe-C-N based nanopowder has been synthesized by the laser pyrolysis of gas phase reactants. TEM, XRD, Raman spectroscopy, Mössbauer spectroscopy and magnetic measurements were used for its characterization. Nanopowder was heated up to 800°C at ~ 1 Pa vacuum. Presence of iron nanoparticles with the mean diameter of 40 nm in the annealed state of the nanopowder was confirmed from the width of α-Fe X-ray diffraction lines and their core-shell structure was observed under TEM.


Abstract Transitional cell carcinoma (TCC) of the ovary is a rare subtype of epithelial ovarian tumours defined as a tumour composed of epithelial elements, histologically resembling urothelium and its neoplasms. Ovarian metastases from primary urinary tract carcinomas are rare. The differential diagnosis of primary TCC of the ovary versus metastatic bladder TCC is challenging because of histological similarity. We present the case of a 49-year-old premenopausal woman who was initially diagnosed with non-invasive papillary urothelial carcinoma of bladder (NIPUC) and after 2 years with a synchronous TCC of the ovary while being investigated for suspected relapse. She underwent a radical cystectomy, total hysterectomy, bilateral salpingo-oopharectomy, and pelvic lymph node dissection. The final diagnosis of synchronous NIPUC of the bladder and TCC of the ovary was made by histopathology and immunohistochemical studies.


Autophagy is a cell biological pathway affecting immune responses. In vitro, autophagy acts as a cell-autonomous defense against Mycobacterium tuberculosis, but its role in vivo is unknown. Here we show that autophagy plays a dual role against tuberculosis: antibacterial and anti-inflammatory. M. tuberculosis infection of Atg5fl/fl LysM-Cre+ mice relative to autophagy-proficient littermates resulted in increased bacillary burden and excessive pulmonary inflammation characterized by neutrophil infiltration and IL-17 response with increased IL-1α levels. Macrophages from uninfected Atg5fl/fl LysM-Cre+ mice displayed a cell-autonomous IL-1α hypersecretion phenotype, whereas T cells showed propensity toward IL-17 polarization during nonspecific activation or upon restimulation with mycobacterial antigens. Thus, autophagy acts in vivo by suppressing both M. tuberculosis growth and damaging inflammation.


Background Congenital deletions affecting 3q11q23 have rarely been reported and only five cases have been molecularly characterised. Genotype—phenotype correlation has been hampered by the variable sizes and breakpoints of the deletions. In this study, 14 novel patients with deletions in 3q11q23 were investigated and compared with 13 previously reported patients. Methods Clinical data were collected from 14 novel patients that had been investigated by high resolution microarray techniques. Molecular investigation and updated clinical information of one cytogenetically previously reported patient were also included. Results The molecular investigation identified deletions in the region 3q12.3q21.3 with different boundaries and variable sizes. The smallest studied deletion was 580 kb, located in 3q13.31. Genotype—phenotype comparison in 24 patients sharing this shortest region of overlapping deletion revealed several common major characteristics including significant developmental delay, muscular hypotonia, a high arched palate, and recognisable facial features including a short philtrum and protruding lips. Abnormal genitalia were found in the majority of males, several having micropenis. Finally, a postnatal growth pattern above the mean was apparent. The 580 kb deleted region includes five RefSeq genes and two of them are strong candidate genes for the developmental delay: DRD3 and ZBTB20. Conclusion A newly recognised 3q13.31 microdeletion syndrome is delineated which is of diagnostic and prognostic value. Furthermore, two genes are suggested to be responsible for the main phenotype.


Aim of the newborn screening model programme implemented in Bavaria, Germany, in 1999 was earliest possible and complete detection of all children with treatable severe inborn errors of metabolism. This was to be achievedby the introduction of new laboratory methods (expanded disease coverage, earlier blood take) and of a tracking system to ensure complete access for all newborns and complete requested repeat testing. Long-term prognosis of the newly screened disorders is to be investigated. The model programme "newborn hearing screening in Bavaria" started in 2003 in the administrative district Oberpfalz aims at testing, whether tracking is also suitable to achieve early detection of all children with inborn severe hearing defects. Methods: To attain these goals a central state screening centre was established. Demographic tracking coordinated by this centre is achieved by matching screening notifications with all birth notifications on name on a regional basis and individual contacts with parents of children with missing screening notification. In addition, all pending recalls are consequently tracked by case-specific contacts. This system was initially introduced for metabolism screening and is currently being implemented also for hearing screening of newborns. Both screening programmes are being scientifically evaluated. Children with disorders detected by screening are followed up in a long-term study by the screening centre. Written consent by the parents is requested yearly at the childs birthday regarding medical care, knowledge of the disease und health development of the child. Results: 470,247 newborns were tested for treatable inborn errors of metabolism from 1999 to 2002. With the introduction of tracking, the documented participation rate increased from previously < 80 to 98.5%. Due to tracking 99.2% of requested recalls could be achieved. In 14 cases diagnosis was made, respectively therapy was initiated first after intervention by the screening centre. Altogether 368 children affected by the target disorders of the programme were detected. 332 children could be included in the long-term follow up study. Besides encouraging results, this study reveals deficits in parental information, provision with emergency cards, expert medical consultation, and sometimes treatment not according to the guidelines. Corresponding data from the hearing screening programme are not yet available. Conclusion: The establishment of an independent state screening centre has proved very valuable. It enables comprehensive state-wide demographic tracking despite several laboratories engaged in screening for inborn errors of metabolism. A long-term follow-up study has proved to be effective in this setting.