In many fields of economics, and also in other disciplines, it is hard to justify the assumption that the random error terms in regression models are uncorrelated. It seems more plausible to assume that they are correlated within clusters, such as geographical areas or time periods, but uncorrelated across clusters. It has therefore become very popular to use clustered standard errors, which are robust against arbitrary patterns of within-cluster variation and covariation. Conventional methods for inference using clustered standard errors work very well when the model is correct and the data satisfy certain conditions, but they can produce very misleading results in other cases. This paper discusses some of the issues that users of these methods need to be aware of.


Spoken queries are a natural medium for searching the Web in settings where typing on a keyboard is not practical. This paper describes a speech interface to the Google search engine. We present experiments with various statistical language models, concluding that a unigram model with collocations provides the best combination of broad coverage, predictive power, and real-time performance. We also report accuracy results of the prototype system.


ABSTRACT Her2-neu overexpression has a pathogenetic, therapeutic and a controversial prognostic role in gastric cancer. p-53 mutation status and Ki-67 proliferation index are established prognostic markers in many tumors. In this study we evaluated p-53 and Ki-67 in relation to Her2-neu positive and negative gastric adenocarcinoma (GA). This cross-sectional study was carried out at King Fahd Hospital of Imam Abdulrahman bin Faisal University. Fifty cases of GA were retrieved from pathology archives. Clinico-pathological parameters were evaluated. Immunohistochemical protein analysis for Her2-neu, Ki-67 and p-53 was carried out. Fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) analysis was done for Her2-neu positive cases showing 2+ immunoexpression. Frequency of Ki-67 and p-53 positivity in Her2-neu positive cases was calculated and compared with those in Her2-neu negative cases. Correlation of clinicopatological parameters with Her2 positive and negative cases, p-53 mutation status and Ki-67 proliferation index was carried out. Her2-neu overexpression was present in 12% (n = 6) cases. A high Ki-67 was seen predominantly in Her2-neu positive cases (83%, n = 5). Her2-neu negative cases (n = 44) showed moderate (31.88%, n = 14) to low (34%, n = 15) Ki-67. Diffuse p-53 positivity was seen predominantly in Her2-neu positive cases (33.33%, n = 2). Focal p-53 was seen mainly in Her2-neu negative cases 56.8% (n = 25). Negative p-53 was seen to be independent of Her2-neu status. Her2-neu positivity is strongly associated with diffuse p-53 mutation status and high Ki-67 proliferation. Her 2-neu negative status is associated with focal p-53 positivity and low to moderate Ki-67 proliferation index. Such stratifications in prognostic markers could not only be predictive in patient's prognostics but could also form a basis of molecular classification of gastric cancer.


A dynamic stochastic model of native chicken production system under coconut-based farming system was built using STELLA 4.0. Primary and secondary data from the real system was obtained and used in model building. Starting flock consisted of 1 rooster and 5 hens. Results showed that in the base situation, the number of hen per year remains stable during the simulated period of five years. This indicates that the model reflects the behavior of relatively stable poultry flock. The total number of chicken sold during the simulated period was distributed as 34.1 cockerels, 32.4 pullets and 4:2 hens. Two ready-to-lay pullets were purchased at the start of dry season (November) following NCD outbreak, which occurred on the 2nd and 4th years of production. The model was sensitive to changes in hen mortality, selling rate of hen, clutch sizes, selection rate, and household chicken consumption. The model was used to assess the effect of vaccination and time of confinement of brooding hens on the population dynamics. All interventions tested increased the number of growers produced and sold. Highest number of grower produced was noted when vaccination and artificial brooding of chicks were practiced. Economic analysis revealed that vaccination and complete confinement of brooding hen during the dry season was economically most effective. The model can be a part of research and development approaches to test possibilities of interventions in native chicken production system.


The language in textbooks should comply with the standard language norm more strictly, which results from the requirement to respect functional and stylistic features of textbook style, which is a substyle of scientific functional style, and from laws and bylaws regulating the requirements and standards for the development of textbooks as teaching resources. Different reasons, however, sometimes lead to different, yet normatively allowed linguistic and spelling solutions, that is, there is a possibility of choice. This paper discusses such, normatively allowed choices, which have been confirmed in contemporary Croatian language textbooks, developed according to the new curriculum since 2019. We tried to determine which certified grammar and spelling choices were confirmed in the textbooks and how much they follow the normative recommendations found in the grammar and spelling manuals published by the Institute of Croatian Language and Linguistics, given that these manuals were approved for school use. Attention is paid to the use of movable/optional vowel ('navezak') in the declension of adjectival words (words functioning as adjectives), the use of enclitics ju/je, non-contracted and contracted forms of possessive pronouns and the reflexive-possessive pronoun, the declension of the numbers dva, tri and četiri, the position of enclitics in a sentence, writing the diphthong after a consonant group ending in r ('pokriveno r'), writing nouns ending in dac, -dak, -tac, -tak, -tka and writing the negative particle ne with the enclitic form of the verb htjeti, Although the analyzed textbooks, as expected, to a large extent include the recommended choices complying with the norm, there are still differences in the consistency of the application of the rules, even within the same textbook, with occasional deviations from the prescribed norm. This points to the need for a more careful design of textbook language layer, especially if considering that the language of textbooks also contributes to the adoption of the standard and the acquisition and development of the student's linguistic culture.


Context: The dental universities were shut or partially operating amidst the lockdown imposed by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Dental interns because of reduced opportunities for clinical training and recruitment for COVID-19 containment activities can be faced with many challenges. Aims: To assess the various challenges faced by the dental interns during the COVID-19 pandemic and to evaluate their psychological health. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted using an online questionnaire among dental interns of ten randomly selected dental colleges in Kerala. The questionnaire comprised of questions about demographic information, questions to assess various challenges the interns faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a Patient Health Questionnaire-4 tool to screen for anxiety and depression. Statistical Analysis Used: The data were analyzed using SPSS 21 software; descriptive statistics were used to describe the demographic characteristics and challenges faced by interns. The Chi-square test was used to analyze the association of psychological health with different parameters. Results: A total of 283 interns, 154 (54.4%) from private colleges and 129 (45.6%) from government colleges completed the questionnaire. About 86% of the interns opined that they did not receive the expected clinical training and 71.7% of interns were not confident to practice with the training they received. Almost 58% of the respondents were frontline workers in managing the pandemic with a majority of them being from government colleges. A high prevalence of psychological distress (73.1%), depression (36%), and anxiety (28%) was observed among interns. The lack of adequate training influenced the psychological health of interns significantly. Conclusions: The dental interns did not receive adequate clinical training during the pandemic; this had severely affected their confidence to practice and mental health. Measures should be implemented by institutions and governing bodies to address these problems immediately.


Smale's α-theory uses estimates related to the convergence of Newton's method to certify that Newton iterations will converge quadratically to solutions to a square polynomial system. The program alphaCertified implements algorithms based on α-theory to certify solutions of polynomial systems using both exact rational arithmetic and arbitrary precision floating point arithmetic. It also implements algorithms that certify whether a given point corresponds to a real solution, and algorithms to heuristically validate solutions to overdetermined systems. Examples are presented to demonstrate the algorithms.


A central focus of ecology and biogeography is to determine the factors that govern spatial variation in biodiversity. Here, we examined patterns of ant diversity along climatic gradients in three temperate montane systems: Great Smoky Mountains National Park (USA), Chiricahua Mountains (USA), and Vorarlberg (Austria). To identify the factors which potentially shape these elevational diversity gradients, we analyzed patterns of community phylogenetic structure (i.e. the evolutionary relationships among species coexisting in local communities). We found that species at low-elevation sites tended to be evenly dispersed across phylogeny, suggesting that these communities are structured by interspecific competition. In contrast, species occurring at high-elevation sites tended to be more closely related than expected by chance, implying that these communities are structured primarily by environmental filtering caused by low temperatures. Taken together, the results of our study highlight the potential role of niche constraints, environmental temperature, and competition in shaping broad-scale diversity gradients. We conclude that phylogenetic structure indeed accounts for some variation in species density, yet it does not entirely explain why temperature and species density are correlated.


The loss and degeneration of spinal cord motor neurons result in muscle denervation in spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), but whether there are primary pathogenetic abnormalities of muscle in SMA is not known. We previously detected increased DNA fragmentation and downregulation of Bcl-2 and Bcl-XL expression but no morphological changes in spinal motor neurons of SMA fetuses. Here, we performed histological and morphometric analysis of myotubes and assessed DNA fragmentation and Bcl2/Bcl-XL expression in skeletal muscle from fetuses with type I SMA (at ∼12 and 15 weeks' gestational ages, n = 4) and controls (at ∼10-15 weeks' gestational ages, n = 7). Myotubes were smaller in the SMA than in control samples at all agesanalyzed (p< 0.001) and were often arranged in clusters close toisolated and larger myotubes. Numbers of terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end labeling-positive cells in control and SMA fetuses were similar, and no differences in Bcl-2 or Bcl-XL immunostaining between control and SMA muscle were identified. Areas with smaller myotubes and the morphometric analysis suggested a delay in growth and maturation in SMA muscle. These results suggest that spinal motor neurons and skeletal muscle undergodifferent pathogenetic processes in SMA during development; they imply that muscle as well as motor neurons may be targets for early therapeutic intervention in SMA.


BACKGROUND
The aim of this study was to assess the prevalence, extent, and severity of clinical attachment loss (CAL) and to investigate the association of demographic, socioeconomic, and behavioral risk indicators with CAL in an untreated isolated population in Brazil.

METHODS
All subjects aged > or =12 years were identified by a census. Participants were submitted to a full-mouth clinical examination of six sites per tooth and were interviewed using a structured, written questionnaire.

RESULTS
Among the 214 subjects who were interviewed and examined clinically, CAL > or =5 mm in at least one site was observed in 8% of the 12- to 19-year-olds and in all dentate subjects > or =50 years of age; the age-dependent prevalence of CAL > or =7 mm in at least one site ranged from 5% among 12- to 19-year-olds to 83% among subjects > or =50 years old. Multivariate analysis identified plaque (odds ratio [OR] = 2.8), supragingival calculus (OR = 2.9 to 10.6), age > or =30 years (OR = 11.4), and smoking (OR = 2.4) as risk indicators for CAL > or =5 mm and smoking (OR = 8.2) as a risk indicator for CAL > or =7 mm.

CONCLUSIONS
CAL is highly prevalent in this isolated population. The high occurrence of CAL in young age groups and the confirmation of traditional risk indicators for CAL in this study suggest that other factors, such as host susceptibility, may be needed to explain the high levels of CAL found. Age and behavioral factors were risk indicators associated significantly with the CAL found in this population and may be useful indicators of high-risk subjects for periodontal diseases.


Bulgarian Georgi Dimitrov, Stalin's close confidant and trusted ally, served as secretary general of the Communist International (Comintern) from 1934 to its dissolution in 1943. In this revealing collection of more than fifty top-secret letters, the real workings of the Comintern emerge clearly for the first time. Drawn from classified Soviet archives only recently opened to Russian and American scholars, these letters offer unique insights into Soviet foreign policy and Stalin's attitudes and intentions while the Great Terror of the 1930s was in progress and in the years leading up to the Second World War. Annotated by the editors to provide the historical context in which these letters were written, the collection is vivid and startlingly significant. The letters confirm the complete dependence of the Comintern on the Kremlin, while also exposing bureaucratic manoeuvering, backbiting, and jockeying for influence. These messages cast much new light on the Soviet confusion about policies toward foreign Communist parties, and they uncover the extent to which Stalin shaped the Comintern. Stalin's perspectives on America, French communism, and the Spanish Civil War are recorded, as are his differences with Mao Zedong and with Marshal Tito at important turning points. With the publication of these letters, the history of twentieth-century communism gains authentic new evidence about a critical decade.


To determine the socioeconomic and demographic factors associated with the influence of the nutritional traffic light (NTL) on the decision to purchase processed foods using information from the National Health and Nutrition Survey (ENSANUT) 2018 of Ecuador, a cross-sectional and analytical study based on a secondary analysis of the information from the ENSANUT 2018 was performed. We collected data from 25,932 participants 18 years of age or older who knew or had seen the NTL, and for whom complete information on the variables of interest for the study was available. The "Influence of the NTL on the purchase decision of processed foods" was the outcome variable of the study. Generalized linear models of the Poisson family, with log link, were used to assess the association between socioeconomic factors and outcome, using crude (PR) and adjusted (aPR) prevalence ratios, with 95% confidence intervals (CI) and a p-value < 0.05. Participants who understood the NTL (aPR: 2.49; 95% CI: 2.19–2.83), with a higher educational level (aPR: 1.33; 95% CI: 1.09–1.61), women (aPR 1.06; 95% CI: 1.01–1.10), and who had a partner (aPR 1.09; 95% CI: 1.04–1.14) were more likely to be influenced by the NTL when deciding to purchase processed foods, compared to people who did not understand the NTL, who had no educational level or who only attended a literacy center, were men, and those without a partner. The inhabitants of the coastal region (aPR: 0.92; 95% CI: 0.88–0.97), the Amazon (aPR 0.93; 95% CI: 0.88–0.98), and the insular region (aPR 0.76; 95% CI: 0.68–0.84) had few probabilities of being influenced by the NTL in the decision to purchase processed foods, in comparison with the residents of the highlands. Similarly, compared to non-poor people, poor people had a lower probability of being influenced by the NTL (aPR 0.89; 95% CI: 0.82–0.97). Factors associated with the influence of NTL on the decision to purchase processed foods were identified. It is recommended to reformulate and focus awareness strategies for using the NTL to purchase processed foods by taking into account the associated factors.


The present study was carried out to determine the fatty acid composition of the black cumin (Nigella sativa L.) samples obtained from total ten different regions of Turkey, Iran and Syria and the comparison of variations in species. The fatty acid compositions of black cumin samples were determined by gas chromatography (GC). The main fatty acids of the fixed oil were linoleic acid, oleic acid and palmitic acid. The lowest linoleic acid content (54.32%) is found to be in Kutahya Tavsanli. Additionally, the highest linoleic acid content (70.81%) is found to be in Iran. Palmitic acid is mostly found in samples obtained from Konya Karakaya and Konya Seydisehir and the palmitic acid, contributing approximately 8.23 to 13.34% to the total palmitic acid content. According to the results, fatty acid composition of the black cumin is significantly varied depending on each species. Black cumin oil or extract has protective and curative actions. Black cumin oil is considered as one among newer sources of edible oils, thanks to its important role in human nutrition and health. In this study, terms of fatty acids from some of the local varieties has come to the fore. For example, omega-6 Iran (70.81%), Omega-9 and palmitic acid Karakaya of Konya, saturated fatty acid (� SFA); 27.87% for Tavsanli of Kutahya local varieties can be considered. These results indicated that the black cumin oil is a functional food because of the high unsaturated fatty acid values and could be used as natural agents in animal and human nutrition.


Plant cells orchestrate an array of molecular mechanisms for maintaining plasmatic concentrations of essential heavy metal (HM) ions, for example, iron, zinc and copper, within the optimal functional range. In parallel, concentrations of non-essential HMs and metalloids, for example, cadmium, mercury and arsenic, should be kept below their toxicity threshold levels. Vacuolar compartmentalization is central to HM homeostasis. It depends on two vacuolar pumps (V-ATPase and V-PPase) and a set of tonoplast transporters, which are directly driven by proton motive force, and primary ATP-dependent pumps. While HM non-hyperaccumulator plants largely sequester toxic HMs in root vacuoles, HM hyperaccumulators usually sequester them in leaf cell vacuoles following efficient long-distance translocation. The distinct strategies evolved as a consequence of organ-specific differences particularly in vacuolar transporters and in addition to distinct features in long-distance transport. Recent molecular and functional characterization of tonoplast HM transporters has advanced our understanding of their contribution to HM homeostasis, tolerance and hyperaccumulation. Another important part of the dynamic vacuolar sequestration syndrome involves enhanced vacuolation. It involves vesicular trafficking in HM detoxification. The present review provides an updated account of molecular aspects that contribute to the vacuolar compartmentalization of HMs.


Circuit nonlinearity and LO harmonics can cause large interferers to translate on to the same intermediate frequency as the desired channel. The mechanisms responsible for spurious mixing, which are distinct from intermodulation distortion, are analyzed and catalogued. The analysis leads to an optimal choice of IF for a fully integrated 900 MHz GSM receiver that resists all blockers.


The paper examines the role of earliest communicative interactions in the development of social-cognitive functions through a communication-theoretical interpretation of Hoffmeyer's notion "semiotic scaffolding". Drawing on Bateson's notion of metacommunication and Vygotskian perspectives on cognitive-semiotic development, it argues that the primary semiotic achievement of human evolution and development is the differentiation of meaning into inter-referential layers that are communicatively established, which in turn provides an ecological foundation for multilevel and multimodal semiosis. Ontogenetically regarded, differentiation of levels of communication is argued to be an intersubjectively achieved process of semiotic scaffolding. Semiotic scaffolds are conceived as hierarchically organized, temporary or enduring semiotic controls on action, which can be formed in phylogeny or ontogeny. The timescale in which semiotic scaffolds change narrows down from phylogenic history to lived time to the extent that development is mediated by culture. The increasing plasticity of semiotic scaffolds brings about a novel, transformative mode of communication that is partly efficacious on phylogenetic scaffolding and responsible for the emergence of higher order scaffolds within ontogenetic time. Transformative communication is the process whereby higher-order semiotic scaffolds of (inter)action are intersubjectively formed by effectuating a top-down social modification on the psycho-somatic level of scaffolding. Its phylogenetically prior and more pervasive correlative, coordinative communication, is the mode in which stably scaffolded semiotic activities of individuals are coordinated. This argument is concretized through examining some landmark cognitive-semiotic activities such as imitation, cooperative role-taking and symbolic play, interpreted as communicative interactions with particular focus on their role in layering sign-processes. Through these interactions the child develops skills for differential attention to sign-object-interpretant and coordination of alternative interpretants.


Abstract. For gas analysis systems based on terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS), relatively complex systems have been proposed to enhance the sensitivity to measure small amounts of gas. This paper proposes a simple system comprising a hollow optical fiber with an inner dielectric layer as a low-volume and long-path gas cell THz-TDS-based gas analysis system. The inner dielectric layer of the fiber not only reduces the transmission loss for THz waves, but also protects the metal layer of the fiber from reactive gases. The proposed dielectric-loaded fiber is fabricated by depositing a metal thin film on a polymer film tube. In a gas analysis experiment conducted using the fiber with a THz-TDS system, separating the absorption peaks of NH3 gas and water vapor initially proved to be difficult, although NH3 gas was successfully detected. However, by improving the frequency resolution via Fourier transform and introducing a longer hollow optical fiber, the two peaks were successfully separated and the system sensitivity improved.


We report the genome size and the GC content, and perform a phylogenetic analysis on Botryococcus braunii Kütz., a green, colony‐forming, hydrocarbon‐rich alga that is an attractive source for biopetroleum. While the chemistry of the hydrocarbons produced by the B race of B. braunii has been studied for many years, there is a deficiency of information concerning the molecular biology of this alga. In addition, there has been some discrepancy as to the phylogenetic placement of the Berkeley (or Showa) strain of the B race. To clarify its classification, we isolated the Berkeley strain nuclear SSU (18S) rRNA gene and β‐actin cDNA and used these sequences for phylogenetic analysis to determine that the Berkeley strain belongs to the Trebouxiophyceae class. This finding is in agreement with other B races of B. braunii, indicating the Berkeley strain is a true B race of B. braunii. To better understand molecular aspects of B. braunii, we obtained the Berkeley strain genome size as a first step in genome sequencing. Using flow cytometry, we determined the B. braunii Berkeley genome size to be 166.2 ± 2.2 Mb. We also estimated the GC content of the Berkeley strain as 54.4 ± 1.2% for expressed gene sequences.


This paper introduces a new structured model for learning anaphoricity detection and coreference resolution in a joint fashion. Specifically,we use a latent tree to represent the full coreference and anaphoric structure of a document at a global level, and we jointly learn the parameters of the two models using a version of the structured perceptron algorithm. Our joint structured model is further refined by the use of pairwise constraints which help the model to capture accurately certain patterns of coreference. Our experiments on the CoNLL-2012 English datasets show large improvements in both coreference resolution and anaphoricity detection, compared to various competing architectures. Our best coreference system obtains a CoNLL score of 81.97 on gold mentions, which is to date the best score reported on this setting.


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Introduction The spleen plays a role in the immune and coagulative responses, yet a splenectomy may be required during ovarian cancer surgery to achieve complete cytoreduction. The aim of the study was to correlate hematologic changes with the development of infection and venous thromboembolism in patients undergoing splenectomy. Methods This single-institution retrospective review includes all patients undergoing splenectomy during cytoreductive surgery for advanced ovarian cancer, March 2001 to December 2016. We compared postoperative hematologic changes (evaluated daily before discharge) in patients developing infection within 30 days' post-surgery (Infection group) with those who did not (No-Infection group). We also compared patients developing venous thromboembolism with those without. Results A total of 265 patients underwent splenectomy. Median age was 64 years (range 22–88): 146 (55%) patients had stage IIIC and 114 (43%) patients had stage IV. The majority, 201 (76%) patients underwent splenectomy during primary debulking. A total of 132 (50%) patients comprised the Infection group (most common: urinary tract infection, 54%). Median time from surgery to infection was 8 days (range, 0–29). After initial rise in white blood cell count in both groups, the Infection group had a second peak on postoperative day 10 (median 16.6K/mcL, IQR 12.5–21.2) not seen in the No-Infection group (median 12K/mcL, IQR 9.3–16.3). A total of 40 (15%) patients developed venous thromboembolism, median time of 6.5 days (range, 1–43). All patients demonstrated a continuous rise in platelets during postoperative days 0–15. Thrombocytosis was present in 38/40 (95%) patients with venous thromboembolism vs 183/225 (81%) patients without (P=0.036). Median days with thrombocytosis was higher in venous thromboembolism (8 days, range 1–15) vs non groups (6 days, range 1–16, P=0.049). Conclusion We identified initial leukocytosis after splenectomy in all patients. The Infection group had a second peak in white blood cell count on postoperative day 10, not present in the No-Infection group. Among patients with venous thromboembolism, thrombocytosis was more frequent and of longer duration.


Multi-FPGA (field-programmable gate arrays) systems are used as custom computing machines to solve compute-intensive problems and also in the verification and prototyping of large circuits. In this paper, we address the problem of routing multiterminal nets in a multi-FPGA system that uses partial crossbars as interconnect structures. First, we model the multiterminal routing problem as a partitioned bin-packing problem and formulate it as an integer linear programming problem where the number of variables is exponential. A fast heuristic is applied to compute an upper bound on the routing solution. Then, a column generation technique is used to solve the linear relaxation of the initial master problem in order to obtain a lower bound on the routing solution. This is followed by an iterative branch-and-price procedure that attempts to find a routing solution somewhere between the two established bounds. In this regard, the proposed algorithm guarantees an exact-routing solution by searching a branch-and-price tree. Due to the tightness of the bounds, the branch-and-price tree is small resulting in shorter execution times. Experimental results are provided for different netlists and board configurations in order to demonstrate the algorithms performance. The obtained results show that the algorithm finds an exact routing solution in a very short time.


Vegetarian
diets are becoming increasingly popular as meat prices as well as health concerns
rise. Many people are cutting down or cutting out meat in favor of a full vegetarian
diet. In present study, the applicability of different vegetables for producing
ready-to-use and ready-to-eat chickpea-based ovo-vegetarian diets (OVDs) was investigated.
Herein, six different vegetables (cauliflower, taro, green zucchini, pea, bean and
spinach) were formulated with 25% chickpea and additional edible ingredients to
produce ready-to-use OVDs. Subsequently, chemical composition, minerals content,
bioactive compounds and antioxidant activity of those OVDs were investigated. However,
ready-to-eat OVDs were organoleptically evaluated after frying as common cooking
method. Results of composite analysis indicated 67.73% to 73.17%, 23.20% to 37.12%,
1.86% to 2.63%, 7.63% to 9.53%, 9.06% to 9.82% and 39.24% to 55.28% for moisture,
crude protein, lipids, ash, fiber, and carbohydrates contents in ready-to-use OVDs,
respectively. After frying, lipid content was increased in fried diets which changed
the chemical composition and caloric value. Significant differences (p < 0.05) were found between macro- and
micro-nutrients content of ready- to-use and ready-to-eat OVDs. The ready-to-use
OVDs exhibit appropriate content of ascorbic acid, chlorophylls, carotenoids, flavonoids,
and flavonols which basically depends on their ingredients. Frying process dramatically
affected the ascorbic acid, chlorophylls, flavonoids, flavonols, and carotenoids
contents. High organoleptic acceptability of ready-to-eat OVDs was recorded to confirm
theconsumer attractiveness further. In conclusion,
the possibility of producing healthy ready-to-eatand ready-to-use OVDs incorporated
with common consumed vegetables could provide a promising approach for improving
human health and dietary pattern as well as for selecting the optimum processing
conditions for innovative OVDs.


Background : The possibility that childhood obesity is a chronic disease in adulthood becomes enormous. The incidence and spread of obesity has increased substantially over the past two decades. The importance of personal health and quality of life has prompted researchers to study in this field. The aim of this study was to investigate the changes of serum levels of leptin, insulin, lipid profile, and body mass index after a period of sprint interval training in obese children. Methods: In this study, 30 obese children aged 9 to 11 years were randomly targeted placed in two groups (Training and control group). Sprint interval training was conducted for 8 weeks. Before and after training, measurements of leptin, insulin, lipid profile, and body mass index were measured. Data were analyzed using independent t-test (p<0.05). Results: Data analysis showed that after training, leptin, insulin and cholesterol levels were significantly reduced (p=0.001). Also, a significant decrease in BMI was seen (p=0.01). Conclusion : Sprint interval training on leptin, insulin and cholesterol in obese children has a significant impact and this exercise improve body mass index in these individuals.


We developed a methodology to optimize exponential damping functions to account for charge penetration effects when computing molecular electrostatic properties using the multicentered multipolar expansion method (MME). This methodology is based in the optimization of a damping parameter set using a two-step fast local fitting procedure and the ab initio (Hartree-Fock/6-31G** and 6-31G**+) electrostatic potential calculated in a set of concentric grid of points as reference. The principal aspect of the methodology is a first local fitting step which generates a focused initial guess to improve the performance of a simplex method avoiding the use of multiple runs and the choice of initial guesses. Three different strategies for the determination of optimized damping parameters were tested in the following studies: (1) investigation of the error in the calculation of the electrostatic interaction energy for five hydrogen-bonded dimers at standard and nonstandard hydrogen-bonded geometries and at nonequilibrium geometries; (2) calculation of the electrostatic molecular properties (potential and electric field) for eight small molecular systems (methanol, ammonia, water, formamide, dichloromethane, acetone, dimethyl sulfoxide, and acetonitrile) and for the 20 amino acids. Our results show that the methodology performs well not only for small molecules but also for relatively larger molecular systems. The analysis of the distinct parameter sets associated with different optimization strategies show that (i) a specific parameter set is more suitable and more general for electrostatic interaction energy calculations, with an average absolute error of 0.46 kcal/mol at hydrogen-bond geometries; (ii) a second parameter set is more suitable for electrostatic potential and electric field calculations at and outside the van der Waals (vdW) envelope, with an average error decrease >72% at the vdW surface. A more general amino acid damping parameter set was constructed from the original damping parameters derived for the small fragments and for the amino acids. This damping set is more insensitive to protein backbone and residue side-chain conformational changes and can be very useful for future docking and molecular dynamics protein simulations using ab initio based polarizable classical methods.


This guide provides background information and resources to help the LCC community learn about race, racism, and how to get involved in the struggle for racial justice in the United States of America.


Background Human rhinoviruses are known to predispose infants to asthma development during childhood and are often associated with exacerbations in asthma patients. MYADM epithelial expression has been shown to associate with asthma severity. The goal of this study was to determine if MYADM expression patterns were altered in asthma and/or rhinovirus infection and if increased MYADM expression is associated with increased asthma-associated factors. Methods Utilizing H1HeLa cells and differentiated primary human airway epithelial cells (AECs), we measured the expression of MYADM and inflammatory genes by qRT-PCR in the presence or absence of RV-1B infection or poly I:C treatment and with siRNA knockdown of MYADM. Expression of MYADM in the asthmatic lung was determined in the ovalbumin (ova)-challenged murine model. Results MYADM expression was upregulated in the lungs from ova-treated mice and in particular on the subsurface vesicle membrane in airway epithelial cells. Upon infection with RV-1B, human AECs grown at an air–liquid interface had increased the MYADM expression predominantly detected in ciliated cells. We found that the presence of MYADM was required for expression of several inflammatory genes both in a resting state and after RV-1B or poly I:C treatments. Conclusions Our studies show that in a mouse model of asthma and during RV-1B infection of primary human AECs, increased MYADM expression is observed. In the mouse model of asthma, MYADM expression was predominantly on the luminal side of airway epithelial cells. Additionally, MYADM expression was strongly associated with increases in inflammatory genes, which may contribute to more severe asthma and RV-linked asthma exacerbations.


The present study aims to analyze relationship between Citations Normalized Score (NCS) of scientific publications and Article Processing Charges (APCs) amounts of Gold Open access publications. To do so, we use APCs information provided by OpenAPC database and citations scores of publications in the Web of Science database (WoS). Database covers the period from 2006 to 2019 with 83,752 articles published in 4751 journals belonging to 267 distinct publishers. Results show that contrary to this belief, paying dearly does not necessarily increase the impact of publications. First, large publishers with high impact are not the most expensive. Second, publishers with the highest APCs are not necessarily the best in terms of impact. Correlation between APCs and impact is moderate. Otherwise, in the econometric analysis we have shown that publication quality is strongly determined by journal quality in which it is published. International collaboration also plays an important role in citations score.


Epidemiologic studies since the early 1990s have suggested that exposure to various classes of pesticides increases the risk of developing Parkinson's disease (PD). Animal studies have backed up that link, revealing how pesticides may target the dopaminergic system, which is damaged in PD. New data from the Parkinson's Environment and Genes Study show that residents of California's Central Valley who over many years drank well water that was probably highly contaminated with certain pesticides were more likely to have PD or PD symptoms than residents who didn't drink contaminated well water [EHP 117:1912–1918; Gatto et al.].

Private wells are at risk of pesticide contamination because pesticides can drift several hundred meters from application sites and travel through the soil. Moreover, many of the private wells studied were less than 15–20 yd deep, lessening the likelihood that pesticides will have degraded by the time they reach the water supply. Unlike municipal water supplies, private well water is not required to be monitored for contamination.

The researchers analyzed long-term data on pesticide application rates near the homes of the study participants, who included 368 people clinically confirmed to have possible or probable PD and 341 controls. The authors had access to 26 years' worth of data collected under California's mandated pesticide use reports program on the commercial application of pesticides, including where the pesticides were applied, on what date, and in what quantities. They studied 26 pesticides that were potential groundwater contaminants or that had been previously linked to PD.

The researchers combined those data with land-use maps, which the California Department of Water Resources updates every 7–10 years, to pinpoint more precisely where pesticides had been applied. Using geographic information system software, they were able to merge historical data on home addresses, land use, and pesticide applications. The result was a prediction of amounts of pesticides applied per acre per year within 500 m of the study participants' homes.

People with PD were more likely to get their water from private wells and to have drunk well water longer than controls. Whereas people with exposure to ambient pesticides—essentially, proximity to sites where pesticides were applied—were 15–57% more likely to be classified as having PD than people without ambient exposure, those with combined ambient exposure and exposure via well water potentially contaminated with methomyl, chlorpyrifos, or propargite were 67%, 87%, or 92% more likely to be cases. The odds of PD also increased as the number of different pesticides that potentially contaminated a subject's drinking water increased.

Unlike previous research on the link between PD and pesticide exposures, this study used a semiquantitative approach to estimating pesticide exposure and did not rely on study subjects' recall. Also, all PD cases were clinically confirmed by a movement disorder specialist. The results therefore considerably strengthen the evidence that exposure to pesticides in well water may contribute to PD.


PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES
To identify and describe independent nursing actions in cooperative care.

DESIGN
Qualitative, descriptive, inductive study.

SETTING
The Nebraska Medical Center's Lied Transplant Center in Omaha, where lay care partners assume responsibility for acute care of transplant recipients in partnership with nurses.

SAMPLE
12 cooperative care nurses.

METHODS
Two focus groups, 59 narrative logs, and three follow-up interviews were tape recorded, transcribed, and content analyzed.

MAIN RESEARCH VARIABLE
Independent nursing actions in cooperative care.

FINDINGS
Independent nursing actions included surveillance, teaching, coaching, fostering partnerships, providing psychosocial support, rescuing, and coordinating. Surveillance leads to problem identification that, in turn, triggers other actions. Because all nursing actions occur in the context of nurse, dyad, and healthcare team relationships, coordinating is the category of nursing action used to manage all aspects of care.

CONCLUSIONS
The nurses integrated specialized knowledge and expertise while dynamically using surveillance to identify problems that trigger nursing actions to manage signs and symptoms. Cooperative care is an example of apprenticeship or guided participation in which a community of experts (nurses) guides, supports, and challenges novices (lay individuals) to participate in skilled activities until the responsibility for the activities can be transferred to the novice.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING
Independent nursing actions identified in this study are the first step in formulating an instrument to measure "doses" (frequency and intensity) of nursing actions in cooperative care. Such an instrument is needed to evaluate interventions designed to prepare and support lay care partners.


The experiment was conducted at Bangladesh Agricultural University Dairy Farm to study the effect of fish meal (FM) on growth and reproductive performances of crossbred heifers. The experiment was designed into four treatment (T0=0% FM; T1=5% FM; T2=7.5% FM and T3 =10% FM) groups having initial weight 231.33 ± 32.39, 241.00 ± 46.29, 198.66 ±58.53 and 236.66 ± 31.64 kg, respectively. The average age of the animal is 2 years 9 month. Results of the experiment revealed that there was a significant difference of FM on daily DMI (kg/d). In 90 days period, FM with rice straw based diet had significant effect on daily weight gain (kg/d) of crossbred heifers. DM, CP and CF digestibility (%) differ significantly (p<0.05) among the group. But, the EE, Ash and NFE do not differ significantly. However, there is a tendency to increase digestibility when increase the FM among the Treatment group. Among this group T3 and T1 treatment showed 100% and T0 treatment 66% estrus and T1 did not showed estrus. Based on above findings, it may be concluded that supplementation of FM with Rice straw based diet can be the best options for feeding crossbred heifers to obtain better performances in terms of dry matter intake, digestibility, daily weight gain and reproductive performance especially estrus.


ABSTRACT This paper documents for the first time, an occurrence of a specific type of sediment gravity flow called fine-grained debris flow (Hampton, 1975). Fine-grained debris flows are those in which maximum grain size does not exceed that of pebbles (64 mm). The pebbly-lime mudstones of the Whitesburg Formation (Middle Ordovician) at Nina in east Tennessee have been interpreted as fine-grained carbonate debris-flow deposits based on evidence for (1) laminar and plug flow transport, (2) deposition by 'freezing', and (3) flow strength provided by muddy matrix. Planar-clast fabric with inverse grading, fragile fossils and shale clasts, projected clasts on bedding surfaces, and lack of scour marks imply laminar-flow transport. Massive internal structures, random orientation of clasts, and poor sorting are suggestive of plug-flow transport. Floating of large clasts in a muddy matrix (unsupported framework) implies flow strength as well as deposition by 'freezing'. Multiple episodes of debris flows occurred locally in a basin-margin sedimentary setting. Speculations are that these episodic debris flows correspond with tectonic pulses associated with basin subsidence.


Background and Objectives The stem rust of wheat (Puccinia graminis f.sp. tritici) is one of the most important diseases of wheat in Iran causing severe yield loss in some years in the case of favourable condition for disease epidemic. In the recent years, a new race of stem rust (Ug99) and its new variants have been emerged, which are virulent on most resistance genes, such as Sr31, Sr38, etc., and have potential to spread rapidly and cause severe yield loss. The Ug99 race was first reported in 2009 from Lorestan and Hamadan provinces of Iran.Materials and MethodsResults of a recent study conducted during 2011-2013 in Iran showed virulence on Sr36, Sr38, SrMcN and SrTmp genes and since, these genes have been used widely in genotypes resistant to Ug 99, there is a possibility of breakdown of these genes in Iran. Therefore, genetic variability of pathogen should be continuously investigated and resistance sources should be developed based on this information. For achieving this aim, 56 stem rust differential cultivars/lines obtained from the Cereal Research Center, Manitoba State, in Canada were planted in Ardabil Province, northwestern Iran under natural field conditions. The seeds of each cultivar/line were planted in two rows with 1 m of length and were irrigated every 10 days to promote disease development. Disease severity and type of infection of each cultivar/line were recorded based on the standard protocol at late flowering stage.Results and DiscussionIn the first year, the disease was developed only in Ardabil region. The SrMcN gene was the most susceptible gene, however, there was no virulence on Sr5, Sr21, Sr9e, Sr7b, Sr11, Sr6, Sr36, Sr9b, Sr30, Sr9a, Sr9d, Sr24, Sr31, Sr38, Sr8b, Sr9h, Sr12, Sr16, Sr19, Sr20, Sr22, Sr26, Sr27, Sr28, Sr32, Sr37, Sr39, Sr40, Sr41, Sr42, Sr43, Sr44, Sr45, Sr47, Sr50 ,and Sr53 genes. Other genes were moderately susceptible to virulence. In the second year, the disease was also developed.  SrMcN, Sr9h, and Sr42 genes were the most susceptible genes. However, no virulence was observed on Sr24 and Sr47 genes. The genes of Sr31 and Sr36 were resistant and susceptible, respectively. It seems that Sr36 and Sr38 genes have no potential to be used in breeding for achieving resistance against stem rust disease in Iran. However, Sr24 and Sr47 genes, which were resistant in the study area, are recommended to be incorporated in breeding wheat for obtaining resistance against stem rust disease. In addition, Sr31, Sr26, Sr27, and Sr28 genes, which were relatively resistant in most areas, were found to have potential to be combined with Sr24 and Sr47 genes in wheat breeding programs.


Background. Takayasu arteritis (TA) is a rare disease, lacking convenient and feasible biomarkers to identify disease activity. We aimed to evaluate the value of complements in distinguishing active TA. Methods. Consecutive patients were enrolled from the prospective East China TA cohort from April 2008 to June 2019. Patients were divided into two groups according to their baseline Kerr score. The value of complements and other biomarkers in identifying disease activity were analysed. An independent group of patients from July 2019 to December 2019 were employed to validate the results.Results. Of the enrolled 519 patients, 406 (72.2%) cases were identified as active disease. Higher erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and complement 3 (C3) levels were observed in the active group. Elevated C3 (≥1.085 g/L) had a high value to identify active TA with a sensitivity of 69.9%, specificity of 66.7% and AUC of 0.715. Combining the CRP (≥10.65 g/L; sensitivity, 50.7%; specificity, 82.4%) and C3, the sensitivity could be improved to 85.1% in parallel test and the specificity could be improved to 94.1% in serial test. Validation was further performed to confirm the value of C3 for disease activity assessment. The accuracy of the parallel test of CRP and C3 in external validation with independent 53 TA cases was 72.73% with the AUC of 0.721. Conclusion. Elevated C3 could effectively monitor the disease activity of TA, and C3 combining with CRP could further improve the disease activity evaluation.


The paper considers the significance of the problem of policymaker ignorance for political efforts to limit human suffering due to the COVID-19 pandemic. To the extent that policymakers are ignorant of knowledge required to deliberately realize this goal, it can be realized only if luck, fortune, or other spontaneous forces intervene to mitigate the effects of policymaker ignorance. We discuss the nature of the knowledge that policymakers require to deliberately realize the goal of limiting suffering due to the virus and the nature of the spontaneous forces that might assist to realize this goal. We also consider the effects that ignorance has on policymakers' motivations and incentives to pursue the relevant goal and conclude, rather dispiritingly, that policymakers may not be earnestly pursuing the goal of limiting suffering due to the novel coronavirus.


Self-disclosures on online social networks have received increased attention in the last two decades. Researchers from different disciplines investigated manifold influencing variables, and studies applied different theories to explain why many users share very sensitive and personal information despite potential risks and negative consequences, whereas others do not. Oftentimes, it is argued that self-disclosure decisions result from a kind of rational "calculus" of risks and benefits. However, such an assumption of rationality can and has been criticized. Nevertheless, fundamental cognitive and affective mechanisms that underlie self-disclosure decision making on social networks are still under-explored. By building upon previous self-disclosure theories and models, dual-and tripartite-system perspectives of decision making, and former empirical findings, we propose a Tripartite Self-Disclosure Decision (TSDD) model that conceptualizes inner processes of online self-disclosure decision making. Central to this model is the proposed interaction of three neural and cognitive/affective systems: a reflective, an impulsive, and an interoceptive system. We further highlight individual and environmental features, which can impact individuals' online self-disclosure decisions by (interactively) influencing the proposed inner decision-making processes targeting the aforementioned three systems. Possible short- and long-term consequences are also discussed, which in turn can affect certain model components in subsequent self-disclosure decision situations. By taking such a neurocognitive perspective, we expand current research and models, which helps to better understand potentially risky information sharing on online social networks and can support attempts to prevent users from incautious self-disclosures.


Bounds on the end-to-end delay, jitter and service lead/lag for all statically-provisioned multimedia traffic flows routed through any network of Input-Queued (IQ) switches are presented. A Recursive Fair Stochastic Matrix Decomposition (RFSMD) algorithm is used to determine near-optimal transmission schedules for each switch, where the jitter and service lead/lag of all flows are simultaneously bounded by K · IIDT time-slots for small constant K, where IIDT denotes the Ideal Inter-Departure Time for each flow. It is established that: (a) the number of buffered cells per flow per switch is near-minimal and bounded by O(K) cells, (b) the end-to-end queueing delay along an H-hop path is near-minimal and bounded by O(KH · IIDT ) time-slots, (c) the end-to-end jitter and service lead/lag are near-minimal and bounded byO(K · IIDT ) time-slots (the jitter is not cumulative), and (d) all network-introduced jitter can be provably removed using small playback buffers with O(K) cells. It follows that all statically-provisioned traffic flows, including VOIP, IPTV and Video-on-Demand traffic, can be delivered with essentially-perfect QoS even at 100% loads, thereby achieving the optimal statistical multiplexing gain. The bounds also apply when the crossbar switches use a combination of IQs and crosspoint queues. These theories explain several exhaustive results which have recently been presented in the literature.


Vocational and Professional Education and Training (VPET) has been highlighted in recent years as one of the diversified pathways in post-secondary education. The current curriculum in Hong Kong also mentions a component named Vocational English (VE) which has been included in the VPET pathway since 2018. It is supported by a novel VE programme launched by the Education Bureau (EDB) to enhance students' English proficiency for vocational education and work. It also marks an attempt at the vocationalization of the English curriculum to prepare students for a smooth school-to-work transition. To provide sustainable articulation for students with an interest in and aptitude for the VPET pathway, Applied Learning (ApL) (Vocational English) was newly proposed in 2020 as an elective subject at the senior secondary level to prepare students for further studies or career pursuits. However, judging from the domain of English for Specific Purposes (ESP), successful VE should develop learners' disciplinary language, content knowledge and specialized task discourse for vocational purposes (Widodo, 2015). Therefore, this paper aims to investigate whether the suggested design and planning of the vocationalization of the English programme is effective, and to discuss whether it could better facilitate students' English learning for their development in the VPET pathway. Individual interviews and focus groups were conducted with students and teachers at the secondary and the post-secondary levels to consolidate their views on and perceptions of the VE programme. Findings of the current study indicate that the progress of vocationalization of English remains relatively stigmatized for both groups of interviewees owing to the low recognition level and the long-standing stereotype of vocational education in Hong Kong. The paper concludes with a concrete suggestion regarding the needed improvement for better implementation of the vocationalization of English through the VE program, which is crucial for facilitating the overall VPET development in Hong Kong.


Home energy management systems have become more widely available due to the continued emphasis on environmental consciousness, the increased implementations of smart grids/smart meters, and the desire to have more control over one's home. A key challenge in designing effective home energy management systems is understanding the underlying causes that impact home energy consumption. To address this challenge, in this paper, we present results from an interview-based study of 22 households in Baltimore City, Maryland, across a wide range of income groups, occupant types (age, number of home occupants, and occupation), and house types (rentals and user-owned). Using a semi-structured interviewing process, we present several insights regarding home energy consumption that impact the usage and effectiveness of current and future systems. As an example, we find that non-human occupants, such as pets, significantly influence home energy consumption. Additionally, household dynamics and hierarchy, as well as routine behavior and individual habits, produce significant decision making challenges for an energy management system. Finally, problems with home insulation and appliance age are seen as fiscally insurmountable, suggesting that newer, cheaper, and readily available retrofit solutions would be beneficial.


Based on the reanalysis data from NCEP/NCAR and other observational data, interannual variability of the Mascarene high (MH) and Australian high (AH) during boreal summer from 1970 to 1999 is examined. It is shown that interannual variability of MH is dominated by the Antarctic oscillation (AAO), and MH tends to be intensified with the development of the circumpolar lows in high southern latitudes. On the other hand, AH is correlated with AAO as well as El Niño and Southern Oscillation (ENSO), and tends to be intensified when El Niño occurs. Since AH, especially MH, is positively correlated with AAO, composite analysis on the difference between the positive and negative MH is performed to reveal the physical mechanism responsible for the East Asian summer monsoon anomalies associated with AAO. The result shows that, with the intensification of MH, the Somali jet, and Indian monsoon westerlies, tend to be strengthened. Accordingly, AH and the associated cross-equatorial flow, become stronger whereas the trade wind over the tropical western and middle Pacific become weaker. In association with the above changes, convective activities near the Philippine Sea are largely suppressed, as a consequence, exciting a negative convection anomaly, and a Rossby wave train from East Asia via the North Pacific to the western coast of North America (a negative Pacific-Japan pattern). Corresponding to the negative Pacific-Japan pattern, an anomalous rainfall pattern appears in East Asia. Correlation analysis between AAO and sea level pressure, 500 hPa geopotential height further indicates that AAO is a strong signal influencing the climate anomaly in both hemispheres, including East Asia. Due to the seasonal persistence, AAO and the related MH and AH in boreal spring, may provide some useful information for the East Asian summer monsoon prediction. With the intensification of MH during boreal spring through summer, the Meiyu/Baiu rainfall from the Yangtze River valley to the Japan Islands tends to increase, while less rainfall is found outside of this region. In contrast with MH, the effect of AH on summer rainfall is confined to southern China.


Background: Noise has been related to several cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) such as coronary heart disease and to their risk factors such as hypertension, but associations with stroke remain under-researched, even if CVD likely share similar pathophysiologic mechanisms. Aim: The objective of the study was to examine the association between long-term residential exposure to total environmental noise and stroke incidence in Montreal, Canada. Materials and Methods: We created an open cohort of adults aged ≥45years, free of stroke before entering the cohort for the years 2000 to 2014 with health administrative data. Residential total environmental noise levels were estimated with land use regression (LUR) models. Incident stroke was based on hospital admissions. Cox hazard models with age as the time axis and time-varying exposures were used to estimate associations, which were adjusted for material deprivation, year, nitrogen dioxide, stratified for sex, and indirectly adjusted for smoking. Results: There were 9,072,492 person-years of follow-up with 47% men; 26,741 developed stroke (21,402 ischemic; 4947 hemorrhagic; 392 had both). LUR total noise level acoustic equivalent for 24 hours (LAeq24h) ranged 44 to 79 dBA. The adjusted hazard ratio (HR) for stroke (all types), for a 10-dBA increase in LAeq24h, was 1.06 [95% confidence interval (CI): 1.03–1.09]. The LAeq24h was associated with ischemic (HR per 10 dBA: 1.08; 95% CI: 1.04–1.12) but not hemorrhagic stroke (HR per 10 dBA: 0.97; 95% CI: 0.90–1.04). Conclusion: The results suggest that total environmental noise is associated with incident stroke, which is consistent with studies on transportation noise and other CVD.


Automakers, including Toyota and General Motors, were recently caught by the U.S. regulator for deliberately hiding product defects in an attempt to avoid massive recalls. Interestingly, regulators in the United States and United Kingdom employ different policies in informing consumers about potential defects: the U.S. regulator publicly announces all ongoing investigations of potential defects to provide consumers with early information, whereas the UK regulator does not. To understand how these different announcement policies may affect cover-up decisions of automakers, we model the strategic interaction between a manufacturer and a regulator. We find that, under both countries' policies, the manufacturer has an incentive to cover up a potential defect when there is a high chance that the defect indeed exists and it may inflict only moderate harm. However, if there is only a moderate chance that the defect exists, only under the U.S. policy does the manufacturer have an incentive to cover up a potential defect with significant harm. We show that the U.S. policy generates higher social welfare only for very serious issues for which both the expected harm and recall cost are very high and the defect is likely to exist. We make four policy recommendations that could help mitigate manufacturers' cover-ups, including a hybrid policy in which the regulator conducts a confidential investigation of a potential defect only when it may inflict significant harm. This paper was accepted by Vishal Gaur, operations management.


This paper presents the advantages of using Boundary Element Method (BEM) as a numerical technique, compared with the other numerical methods such as a Finite Element Method (FEM), to analyze three dimensional problems such as bridges. The mathematical formulation of the boundary element equation is also presented. Analyzing the bridge deck by BEM would be more efficient than by FEM, where only the boundaries along the bridge deck have to be discretized into one-dimensional elements .Therefore, the dimensions of the analysis are reduced, and consequently the input data is significantly reduced. For bridges subjected to moving loads, it is necessary to subdivide the bridge deck into a number of finer meshes in FEM, thus it leads to huge number of simultaneous equations and large band width. In addition to that the mesh needs to be changed as the truck loads are moving along the bridge deck, while in BEM the moving loads do not affect the size of the mesh and the mesh does not require any change. A very important application of the BEM is that there is no interpolation of the solution within the domain, and for a given solution on the surface, the results at interior points involve no approximations. Two numerical examples were presented to demonstrate the accuracy and the advantages of using BEM over the other numerical methods in the bridge analysis


Abstract The design and building of accurately scaled aeroelastic wind-tunnel models is difficult, time consuming and very costly. With the increasing usefulness of computational methods for predicting aeroelastic phenomena, few complex models have been built in recent years. New fighter aircraft projects are also becoming more and more scarce, and transport aircraft have essentially the same configuration since half a decade. This also significantly reduces the need for aeroelastic wind-tunnel models. However, there still is an interest in the results from aeroelastic testing. In some cases new and radical configurations may warrant wind-tunnel testing and in other cases complex phenomena arising in fight testing may need carefully performed experiments to resolve problems. However, there is definitely a trend towards building models and performing testing in the support of the development of computational methods. The developments in computer technology do not only improve the computational methods for aeroelasticity. Modern Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing techniques can significantly improve the quality and efficiency of the design and build process for aeroelastic models. There have also been some recent improvements in measurement techniques which have proven very useful for testing of aeroelastic wind-tunnel models. The paper will present some new design and build techniques developed for the manufacturing of a large scale wind-tunnel model of a canard delta wing fighter aircraft configuration. In the build process fiber-reinforced composites will be used, hence, challenges and possible solutions concerning the ability to produce a model with well defined material properties and fiber angles will be discussed. Further challenges arise when both measurement equipment and adjustable control surfaces should be attached inside the model using techniques that are possible to describe with computational methods. In addition, equipment, such as pressure taps, and control surface mechanics need to fit and function in a flexible structure. As a result, the above requirements will lead to necessary compromises in the design, hence, the paper will present the choices taken during the build process and for which reasons. The use of an optical positioning measurement system will also be discussed for both the validation of model properties and non-contact measurement of model deformations during wind-tunnel testing.


Political actors play an increasingly important role in the dissemination of political information on social media. However, relatively little is known about the mechanisms why specific news items are shared with the support base instead of others. For a timespan between December 2017 and the end of 2018, we combine the analysis of Facebook content from 1,022 politicians associated with 20 political parties from Germany, Spain, and the UK, with an automated content analysis of media coverage from 22 major online news outlets, and survey data in a multilevel binomial regression approach. By comparing news items that have been shared by one or several political parties with news items that have not been shared by any of them, we overcome the selection biases of previous studies in the field of news dissemination. Findings show that a news item's likelihood to be shared by a politician increases (1) if that politician's party is mentioned in the news item, (2) the more salient their party's owned issues are in the news item, and (3) the more party supporters tend to read the news outlet in which the news item is published. We contextualize these findings in light of political actors' multi-faceted motivations for news sharing on social media and discuss how this process potentially reinforces an information bias that may contribute to the polarization and fragmentation of audiences.


Video restoration, which aims to restore clear frames from degraded videos, has numerous important applications. The key to video restoration depends on utilizing inter-frame information. However, existing deep learning methods often rely on complicated network architectures, such as optical flow estimation, deformable convo-lution, and cross-frame self-attention layers, resulting in high computational costs. In this study, we propose a sim-ple yet effective framework for video restoration. Our approach is based on grouped spatial-temporal shift, which is a lightweight and straightforward technique that can implicitly capture inter-frame correspondences for multi-frame aggregation. By introducing grouped spatial shift, we attain expansive effective receptive fields. Combined with basic 2D convolution, this simple framework can effectively aggregate inter-frame information. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our framework outperforms the previous state-of-the-art method, while using less than a quarter of its computational cost, on both video deblurring and video denoising tasks. These results indicate the potential for our approach to significantly reduce computational overhead while maintaining high-quality results. Code is avaliable at https://github.com/dasonglil/Shift-Net.


This creative thesis consists of six short stories with different lengths and styles. For the introduction, I discuss how my work is influenced by various aspects of cultural background, with examples including writers from Zitkala-Ša and Richard Wright to Celeste Ng. Cultural background is the key to understand most of the characters in the different stories. After the critical introduction, readers will have a general idea of my stories with a sense of how the relationship between different groups of people shape them to act and live under the influence of their cultural backgrounds and environment they were brought up in. Each story has its own focus on different types of relationships. I use those stories to make an effort to discuss people's actions and reactions in life when they encounter various people in their life and how they react due to their personalities and backgrounds.


The issue of violence against women is considered a grave violation of human rights that occurs across race, age, culture, and religion worldwide. It includes any act or conduct that may cause death or physical, psychological, or sexual harm to women – whether in the public or private sphere – that is done solely based on gender. The issue of violence against women has been discussed, debated, lobbied, and fought for in recent decades; and much research on the incidence, reporting, and implications of such violence against women has also been conducted in many regions and countries. These concerted activist efforts led to the first declaration that recognized the need to provide women the rights to equality, security, liberty, integrity, and dignity of all human beings. Even with such global efforts, and despite the existence of laws that punish men who perpetrate violence against women, the problem continues to persist worldwide. Academics thus deem it necessary to determine the underlying causes and motivations for such heinous acts in order to attack the problem at its roots.


Growth of mangosteen essentially depends on its root system.  Therefore, it needs technology to obtain stringer mangosteen root system.  The use of Agrobacterium rhizogenes bacterium is an alternative.  The objectives of this experiment were : 1) to find the effective strain of A. rhizogenes bacterium for inoculation of mangosteen seedling root, 2) to find the best inoculation method for inducing mangosteen seedling root.  The materials used in this experiment were ; mangosteen fruit and A. rhizogenes collection from Puslit Biotechnology LIPI Cibinong-Bogor.  The experiment was arranged in completely randomized design with two factorial treatments.  The first factor : 11 strains A. rhizogenes (ATCC-15834, ATCC-8196, R-1000, 07-20001, A4, A4-J, 509, 510, 511, MAFF 01-1724, and control), the second factor : 2 inoculation methods (cutting and dipping).  The results showed that A. rhizogenes  of ATCC-15834, 509, 07-20001, A4, and R-1000 increased stem diameter, plant height, leaf number, lateral and tertiary root number, better than ATCC-8196, MAFF 01-1724, 510, 511, A4-J, and control.  Cutting root method of inoculation resulted in higher live plant percentage compared to dipping root method. Key words : Agrobacterium rhizogenes , Garcinia mangostana , inoculation


Transmit/Receive Module (T/R Module) is one of the most essential blocks for Phased Array Radio Detection and Ranging (RADAR) system; due to being very influential on system level performance. To achieve high performance specifications, T/R Module structures are constructed with using III-V devices, which has some significant disadvantages; they are costly, and also consume too much area and power. As a result, application area of T/R Module is mainly restricted with the military and dedicated applications. In recent years, SiGe BiCMOS technology has started to be an emerging competitor to III-V devices, with the help of bandgap engineering. SiGe BiCMOS based T/R Module structures are facilitating similar or better performance parameters with a much lower cost, which gives a chance to T/R Module not only used for military purposes, but also for commercial applications. For this reason, this thesis has focused on SiGe BiCMOS based X-Band T/R Module, specifically on its two significant blocks; Low Noise Amplifier (LNA), and Phase Shifter. Low Noise Amplifier is the first block of the receiver chain of the T/R Module; as a result its performance is very influential on the metrics of receiver, such as Noise Figure (NF), and gain. In this thesis, designing procedures for three different high dynamic range LNA structures are described, using 0.13μm SiGe IHP-Microelectronics and 0.13μm SiGe IBM technology. To achieve a high dynamic range, three different methodologies implemented and compared; single-stage cascode LNA, telescopic LNA, and two-stage cascode LNA. Among these, two-stage cascode LNA achieved better performance metrics of -3.72dBm level for input-compression point, total gain exceeding 20.5dB, a NF performance of about 2dB, and a power consumption of 115.8mW. Phase Shifter is used both in receiver and transmitting chain, as a result it is also crucial for the performance of the T/R Module. The design, implemented in 0.13μm SiGe IBM technology, had aimed to combine advantages of different topologies, such as passive phase shifter and vector modulator, to achieve a high phase resolution in wide bandwidth, and high linearity. The designed hybrid Phase Shifter achieves 6-Bit operation with 6.75GHz of bandwidth and 15dBm of input-P1dB. Moreover, design can be switched to 7-Bit phase shifter with 4.5GHz, without requiring any additional circuitry.


Human judgment is an integral part of the teleoperation process that is often heavily influenced by a single video feed returned from the remote environment. Poor camera placement, narrow field of view, and other camera properties can significantly impair the operator's perceptual link to the environment, inviting cognitive mistakes and general disorientation. These faults may be enhanced or muted, depending on the camera mountings and control opportunities that are at the disposal of the operator. These issues form the basis for two user studies that assess the effectiveness of existing and potential teleoperation controls. Findings suggest that providing a camera that is controlled independently from the orientation of the vehicle may yield significant benefits. Moreover, there is evidence to support the use of separate cameras for different navigational subtasks. Third, the use of multiple cameras can also be used to provide assistance without encroaching on the operator's desired threshold for control.


The interest in predictive control approach and multiphase drives has been steadily growing during the last decade. Predictive control techniques have been recently introduced as a viable alternative to conventional PI controllers with carrier-based or space vector PWM techniques in the current regulation of multiphase power converters and drives. The developed schemes have demonstrated a good performance at the expense of a high computational cost, an unknown switching frequency, and the appearance of large undesirable stator current harmonic components. In this paper, an enhanced predictive current control technique with fixed switching frequency is introduced for an asymmetrical dual three-phase ac drive. Fast torque and current responses are achieved while favoring stator current harmonic suppression. The experimental results are provided to verify the benefits of the proposed control method when compared to the other existing predictive control methods.


Casting is one of the earliest metal-shaping methods known to human being. It generally means pouring molten metal into a refractory mold with a cavity of the shape to be made, and allowing it to solidify. When solidified , the desired metal object is taken out from the refractory mold either by breaking the mold or by taking mold apart. This process is also called founding. A pattern is a replica of the object to be made by the casting process, with some modifications. The main modifications are addition of pattern allowances like shrinkage allowance, machining allowance, draft allowance etc., the provision of core prints and elimination of fine details. Loose piece pattern is used when the contour of the part is such that withdrawing the pattern from the mold is not possible. Hence during molding, the obstructing part of the contour is held as a loos piece by a wire. After molding is over, first the main pattern is removed and then the loose pieces are recovered through the gap generated by the main pattern. A safety valve which is generally manufactured by complex forging method , can be easily manufactured by sand casting method which is more economical the forging method. In the sand casting method, the two wedge shaped portions of the safety valve create problem during removal of pattern, so these two portions are taken as loose pieces and held as loose pieces by a wire or pin. Once the main pattern body is removed, these loose pieces are recovered through the space vacated by main pattern body. So this project work deals with manufacturing of safety valve using sand casting with split pattern which consists of multi loose pieces (combined loose piece) and its advantages over complex forging method


We demonstrate CHISSL a scalable client-server system for real-time interactive machine learning. Our system is capable of incorporating user feedback incrementally and immediately without a pre-defined prediction task. Computation is partitioned between a lightweight web-client and a heavyweight server. The server relies on representation learning and off-the-shelf agglomerative clustering to find a dendrogram, which we use to quickly approximate distances in the representation space. The client, using only this dendrogram, incorporates user feedback via transduction. Distances and predictions for each unlabeled instance are updated incrementally and deterministically, with O(n) space and time complexity. Our algorithm is implemented in a functional prototype, designed to be easy to use by non-experts. The prototype organizes the large amounts of data into recommendations. This allows the user to interact with actual instances by dragging and dropping to provide feedback in an intuitive manner. We applied CHISSL to several domains including cyber, social media, and geo-temporal analysis.


For many years, microbial enzymes are commercially used as biocatalysts and efficiently catalyze various processes in industries. Biocatalysts are less corrosive to industrial processing equipment and due to their substrate specificity, they produced less toxic wastes which promotes environmental sustainability. At present, thermostable and alkali tolerant lignocellulolytic enzymes have gain enormous attention to be used as biocatalyst due their stability and robustness at high temperature and alkaline milieu. In this review, the characteristic of the several thermo–alkali-stable lignocellulolytic enzymes such as thermo–alkali-stable cellulases, thermo–alkali-stable xylanases and thermo–alkali-stable laccases as biobleaching agents in Kraft-pulp industry are described. This article discusses the characteristics of these enzymes such as their molecular weight, thermo-stability, pH tolerance, solvents compatibility and their stability towards the presence of metal ions and other chemicals. This review also discusses the development of fermentation process for the production of thermo–alkali-stable lignocellulolytic enzymes focusing on microorganisms (i.e. strain selection and strains improvement via mutation and recombinant techniques), culture medium optimization (i.e carbon, nitrogen and minerals) and other fermentation parameters (i.e. inoculums size, temperature, pH, agitation rate, aeration rate, and dissolved oxygen tension). The performances of strain producers in bioreactors and different mode of operation (i.e submerged and solid state fermentation) are also compared and discussed in this paper.


In this paper we introduce a new objective function for the minimax location problem. Every demand point generates demand for service with a given probability (during a given period of time) and the objective is to minimize the expected maximum distance. The planar problem is proven to be convex and thus standard solution techniques such as using the Solver in Excel can be applied for its solution. Properties for the problem on the network are proven and an efficient algorithm proposed for its solution. Copyright Blackwell Publishing, Inc. 2003


The North-East Region (NER) of India which comprises of eight states, namely Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura shares most of its boundary with China, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Myanmar. The NER accounts for about eight per cent of the country's geographical area and about four per cent of population. Tribals account for more than 30 per cent of the total population of NER. Inadequate and poor infrastructure, inhospitable terrain and a com¬paratively late start in the development process are some of the reasons for economic back¬wardness of the region. However, the NER has certain strengths in different angles to achieve economic development in easy way. From the geo-political angle, the NER is located in a strategic location as it is bounded by these several foreign countries. Naturally it has got both advantages and disadvantages due to its location. So far advantages are concerned it is connected with the South-East Asian countries mainly China, Myanmar, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, Cambodia and Indonesia etc where almost half of the world's population live. There is no doubt that this vast population could have great advantage for establishing any kind of trade and commerce. But the vary geographical condition basically the rivers and mountains of the country stand as a barrier and create geo–political tensions which ultimately act as most disadvantages factors in creating a conducive atmosphere in the path of developing trade relation among those countries.


This paper introduces a new variant implementation of Latency-Insensitive Design elements. It optimizes area footprint of so-called Shell-Wrappers being partially fused with their input Relay-Stations. The modified Relay-Station is called a Retry Relay-Station. We show correctness of this implementation and provide comparative results between a regular implementation and our new one on both FPGA and ASIC.


This paper uses insights from contemporary neuroscience and attachment theory to explore the profound dissociative defences associated with trauma. I discuss the effects of trauma on the emotional, intellectual and imaginative life of the individual and on the development of the self. Based on work with three patients with very different experiences of trauma, the paper offers clinical illustration of 'right brain to right brain' Jungian analysis. I argue that through repeated transference and countertransference experiences dissociative defences may be undone and change brought about.


Abdominal pregnancy is such an unusual occurrence, especially when both mother and child survive, that a report of such a case is warranted. Schumann4 calculated that ectopic pregnancy of all types occurred once in 303 pregnancies in Philadelphia during the year 1918 and once in 268 pregnancies in New York Lying-in Hospital. Mall3 directed particular attention to the fact that the fetus while still in the tube is particularly apt to develop abnormally. In 117 specimens, he found only 16 normal embryos and considered that less than 1 per cent of all extra-uterine pregnancies could reach full term. In their comprehensive review of literature of abdominal pregnancy, Cornell and Lash' reported that in 86 cases in which the baby was born after the 6th month of gestation, the infant mortality was 22 per cent, whereas in 60 cases in which the baby was born alive in the 8th and 9th months of pregnancy, it was about 35 per cent. The maternal mortality was 14.3 per cent (34 cases) in 236 cases recorded at Cook County Hospital. Hellman and Simon2 had collected from the literature 316 reports of living child being delivered. This does not mean that the child was truly viable in each case. Therefore, they adopted an arbitrary standard to indicate true viability of the fetus. A period of eight days or longer was considered a sufficient test of viability. Of these 316 cases, in 158 (one-half) the fetus was viable. Of these 316 mothers, 212 lived and 101 died, the outcome of three being unknown. In their whole series there were only 80 cases in which both mother and child survived, and the authors stated that "Of the 80 cases probably mother and child were not entirely well in more than 50 cases." The present report of another case of abdominal pregnancy from the Orient therefore appears timely.


This paper describes a 1996 study that compared the student teaching experiences of a traditional and a nontraditional student to ascertain what differences in their experiences might imply about teacher preparation. The two students kept journals that could be written in at any time of the day. They recorded their impressions of their situation and their reactions to events. They also reflected at the close of each day. The students met with the researcher once a week for discussion. The researcher periodically visited with the cooperating teachers and college supervisor to gain anecdotal evidence. At the end of the semester, the cooperating teachers completed interviews. A list of categories emerged from the conversations and journals, including paranoia about succeeding (the unrealistic fear of failure), perception of differing relationships with cooperating teachers and staff, the adaptation from student to teacher, and the relationship to the content. Results indicated that there were marginal differences between the two. The nontraditional student had an easier time establishing relationships with the cooperating teacher and other school faculty. Cooperating teachers agreed that they more easily built relationships with student teachers who were closer to their age. The traditional student was more confident about obtaining certification. Both students conveyed exhaustion and amazement with how their cooperating teachers kept up with so much information. (SM) ******************************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * ******************************************************************************** The Student Teaching Experience: A Comparative Study


This paper presents the results of a preliminary investigation into the effect of installing an ejector in an ammonia-water mixture turbine cycle, also called a Kalina cycle. To enhance the availability of the cycle, we focus on the pressure difference in the cycle. The temperature difference between the heat source and sink enhances the efficiency of the thermodynamic cycle, as does the pressure difference in the cycle. To improve the heat recovery in the cycle, other heat exchangers are required, and to utilize the pressure difference in the cycle, an ejector is a reasonable choice. From the viewpoint of the impact on the initial cost of the plant, the heat exchanger option is more costly than the ejector option. The authors investigated a simple AWM turbine cycle with an ejector driven by the high-pressure solution stream to vacuum the turbine exhaust. Simulations of several AWM turbine cycle configurations, with or without heat recovery exchangers and ejectors were performed. The specific power, which is the output power per unit mass flow rate of the heat source, of the proposed cycle EJT34 was 103% that of the WMTS. The thermal conductance is only about 24% of that of the WMTS, which is almost the same as the value of the KCS34. The results shows that the EJT34 produced as much power as that from the WMTS with 24% of the heat transfer area.© 2005 ASME


The expression of heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) is regulated by E1 and E2 enhancers, both of which contain multiple Maf recognition elements (MAREs). In living cells, MAREs are bound by Bach1/MafK heterodimers, hence maintaining a quiescent state of the HO-1 gene (hmox-1). However, in transient transfection assays, they act as transcriptional enhancers. Therefore MAREs may manifest their function only in a chromatin environment. By using NIH3T3 cell pools stably transfected with EGFP reporter genes driven by the wild-type or mutated E2 enhancer, we demonstrate that the E2 MAREs function as transcriptional silencers depending on the binding of Bach1/MafK heterodimer in vivo only in a chromatin environment. After cadmium treatment, they switched into transcriptional enhancers. Surprisingly, single MARE site did not exhibit such function. Furthermore, by using DNase I hypersensitivity assay, we demonstrate that simple chromatin condensations were not involved in the Bach1-mediated repression. We conclude that, in a chromatin environment, the E2 MAREs function as transcriptional silencers depending on binding of Bach1/MafK heterodimer.


While neural networks have advanced the frontiers in many applications, they often come at a high computational cost. Reducing the power and latency of neural network inference is key if we want to integrate modern networks into edge devices with strict power and compute requirements. Neural network quantization is one of the most effective ways of achieving these savings but the additional noise it induces can lead to accuracy degradation. In this white paper, we introduce state-of-the-art algorithms for mitigating the impact of quantization noise on the network's performance while maintaining low-bit weights and activations. We start with a hardware motivated introduction to quantization and then consider two main classes of algorithms: Post-Training Quantization (PTQ) and Quantization-Aware-Training (QAT). PTQ requires no re-training or labelled data and is thus a lightweight push-button approach to quantization. In most cases, PTQ is sufficient for achieving 8-bit quantization with close to floating-point accuracy. QAT requires fine-tuning and access to labeled training data but enables lower bit quantization with competitive results. For both solutions, we provide tested pipelines based on existing literature and extensive experimentation that lead to state-of-the-art performance for common deep learning models and tasks.


OLIVER PHILLIPS, Zimbabwean Law and the Production of a White Man's Disease In Zimbabwe, many claims have been made that homosexuality is alien to local culture and has been imported by white settlers. This article argues that what was imported was not homosexuality but homophobia through the sexual erethism of colonizers imbued with Victorian incitement and missionary zeal. The article also considers why most of the reported trials for 'unnatural acts' in the last 30 years involve white men, and what effect this has on this discourse of homosexuality as a white man's disease. LEO FLYNN, 'Cherishing All Her Children Equally': The Law and Politics of Irish Lesbian and Gay Citizenship Lesbians and gay men present a challenge to Ireland's traditional social order as a result of their distance from that order and their simultaneous proximity to it. This state of affairs presented a major challenge to those seeking to reform law relating to sexual orientation. In less than a decade the Irish legal system has been transformed for lesbians and gay men. This article examines the terms of this transformation. In particular it analyses the accounts of identity which were mobilized during the process of reform and argues that these changes need to be considered in the context of changes to the wider Irish identity. It concludes with a consideration of the significance of the Irish experience for other disadvantaged groups within Ireland and other lesbian and gay communities outside Ireland who are currently engaged in campaigns for law reform. ELIZABETH A. STANKO AND PAUL CURRY, Homophobic Violence and the Self 'At Risk': Interrogating the Boundaries The purpose of this article is to explore the contradictions and tensions for antiviolence projects' engagement with the police. Applying the victimization survey and its criminological discourse to the politics of awareness, we argue, has a profound impact on the way we conceptualize 'true victims' of violence. The discourse of 'the responsible homosexual' merges with the discourse of crime avoidance. The crime frame, one which necessarily arises in the conceptualization of homophobic violence as criminal violence, is consequential, we argue, for searching for 'dangerous gayness'; in many of the negotiations about safety, it renders 'women' lesbians, bisexuals, and transsexuals invisible. Finally, the article considers the consequences of imposed 'identities' for those who have been caught up in policing. LAURA DOAN, 'Gross Indecency between Women': Policing Lesbians or Policing Lesbian Police? The subject of criminalizing lesbianism actually entered the official record of parliamentary proceedings earlier than 1921, when in 1920 a London magistrate requested


The changing relationship between stimuli and responses after prolonged receptor stimulation is a general feature of hormonal signaling systems, termed desensitization. This phenomenon has been best exemplified in the covalent modification of the G protein-linked catecholamine receptors. However, other components within this signaling pathway can be involved in desensitization. Here we present evidence that desensitization occurs at the level of the effector enzyme itself through phosphorylation. Type V adenylyl cyclase (AC) is the major isoform expressed in the heart. Using purified enzymes, we demonstrate that protein kinase A (PKA) directly phosphorylates and thereby inhibits type V AC catalytic activity. This inhibition was negated in the presence of PKA inhibitor. Analysis of enzyme kinetics revealed that this inhibition was due to a decrease in the catalytic rate, not to a decrease in the affinity for the substrate ATP. Our results indicate that AC catalytic activity can be regulated through PKA-mediated phosphorylation, suggesting another mechanism of desensitization for receptor pathways which signal via increases in intracellular cAMP.


Mechanical properties, functional capabilities, and internal structure have all been investigated in tendons. The patellar tendon, specifically, is commonly used for replacing damaged or torn anterior cruciate ligaments (ACL). Many areas of engineering and research seek to determine aspects of biological tissues that can be modeled and mimicked in making artificial constructs. A proper and adequate understanding of the macro and micro-composition and structure-property relationship is essential to computational modeling of the tissue. The behavior of the tendon as a whole is dependent on the mechanics of the individual sublevels of hierarchy in combination.Copyright © 2009 by ASME


BACKGROUND Tumor necrosis factor alpha as a central mediator of the inflammation cascade is correlated to sepsis outcome. Tumor necrosis factor beta (LT-alpha) binds the same cell receptor and polymorphisms in both genes have been described. To evaluate the importance of the LT-alpha (+250 G/A) polymorphism for the clinical outcome of patients developing postsurgical sepsis, 85 patients were consecutively included into this study. METHODS Blood samples were obtained for analysis of the biallelic LT-alpha (+250 G/A) polymorphism and for determination of serum levels of sTNF-R1, TNF-alpha, IL-6, IL-8, IL-10, procalcitonin, and neopterin. Cytokine levels were measured repeatedly until the patients' discharge from the ICU. RESULTS The allele frequency was 0.28 for TNFB1 and 0.72 for TNFB2. The genotype distribution was TNFB1 homozygotes 4/79 (5.1%), TNFB1/TNFB2 heterozygotes 37/79 (46.8%), and TNFB2 homozygotes 38/79 (48.1%). Fifty-four out of 80 (67.5%) fulfilled the criteria for severe sepsis; 36/80 (45.0%) developed septic shock. Multiple organ failure occurred in 60/80 patients (75.0%), and the overall mortality was 26/80 (32.5%). Concerning the LT-alpha-genotypes, there was no difference in the frequency of severe sepsis or shock or in the development of multi-organ failure or death between the three subgroups. The peak plasma TNF-alpha levels were similar for all genotype subgroups. CONCLUSIONS There was no correlation between the biallelic LT-alpha (+250 G/A) polymorphism and the outcome of critically ill patients. Genotyping this locus does not seem to be useful in predicting sepsis outcome.