At present, 56 types of human adenovirus (HAdVs) have been identified and found to be associated with a variety of clinical features in the respiratory tract, eye, gastrointestinal tract, and other organs. In additions, HAdVs are able to establish persistent and latent infections in humans. Most of the work which has been carried out recently is related to adenovirus vectors and little has been done in other areas such as the nature and mechanisms of adenovirus persistence and latency in human tissues. Another area needing more investigation is the stability of the adenovirus genome which is useful for the development of adenovirus vectors and vaccines and for better understanding of adenovirus evolution especially with conflicting views about this issue.Recombination between two types of adenovirus can happen when the hexon epitope from one type and the fibre epitope from another type are found (intermediate strains). These recombinants can be detected by the conflicting results for serum neutralization (SN) and haemagglutination inhibition (HI) tests or by sequencing and phylogenetic analysis of the hexon and fibre regions of the adenovirus genome. The first part of this study is related to the stability and evolution of different adenovirus species. A total of 31 clinical isolates from AIDS patients previously typed in the hexon L2 region and the fibre knob region were analysed. These isolates were found to be from species D adenovirus (HAdV-D) and 28 of them had contradictory typing results in these two regions so they are clearly intermediate strains. Two isolates appear to be completely new and one isolate (Aids32) was typed as HAdV-D23 variant in both hexon L2 and fibre knob regions. Sequencing and phylogenetic analysis of the hexon L1, fibre shaft and penton regions of these adenoviruses revealed that no intragene recombination events occurred between the hexon L1 and L2 regions or between the fibre knob and fibre shaft regions. Sequencing and phylogenetic analysis of the penton showed that some of the intermediate strains had sequences from a third type of adenovirus in these regions. The penton analysis showed also that intragene recombination between penton HVR and RGD loop regions was common. New types of adenovirus were detected and sequential infection with different adenovirus variants was observed in some patients which indicates that the genome of HAdV-D from AIDS patients are not stable. Full genome sequencing and analysis was carried out for three isolates, two of them appeared to be new types of HAdV-D and the result of multi-recombination events and the third isolate appeared to be a variant of HAdV-D23.The stability of species B adenovirus (HAdV-B) was also analysed. A total of 96 isolates collected from the Manchester area typed previously by serum neutralization (SN) were analysed in five genome regions. Most of these isolates were HAdV-B3 and HAdV-B7 collected during a 15 months outbreak. The rest of the isolates were HAdV-B types 3 and 7 collected in different years following the outbreak in addition to other adenovirus types isolated from different years. The phylogenetic analysis results of all the isolates in the structural regions: hexon L2, penton and fibre knob were found to be consistent and no mismatches (hexon from one type and fiber from another type) were observed. Most of the isolates in the DNA polymerase and E1A regions had the same clustering patterns as the structural regions. However, one HAdV-B7 and one HAdV-B11 isolate changed their clustering patterns in the DNA polymerase region. In addition, HAdV-B16 isolates changed their clustering patterns in both DNA polymerase and E1A regions. The changes of the clustering patterns of some isolates is more likely related to natural variations rather than recombination which indicate that species B adenovirus genome is stable in general. The last part of this study is investigating adenovirus persistence and latency in human tissues. Tonsils and adenoids (106 right and left tonsils and 10 adenoids) were obtained from 57 patients who underwent routine tonsillectomies and/or adenoidectomies. Eighty four (72.41%) tonsils and adenoids samples were positive for HAdV by real-time PCR. The viral load was not the same in the right and left tonsils in most of the cases and ranged from 280 to more than 2.6 x 106 copies/107 cells. Seventy eight of 84 positive samples could be typed by sequencing of the hexon L1 region. Species C types were detected in 82% of the samples followed by species B (7.7%), HAdV-E4 (7.7%) and HAdV-F41 (2.56%). No DNA methylation was detected in the major late promoter (MLP) and E1A promoter regions of six tonsils and adenoids samples and two clinical isolates.


The world of computing is changing enormously. The new generation computing like green, cloud, grid has taken the place of conventional computing. The latest generation gadgets i-pad, i-pod, i-phone are making the life smooth and affordable. Most of these devices are controlled by the human being with some physical movement. Think of the situation when the futuristic devices will move with the power of thoughts and speed of emotions. The present paper is a core idea of i-Thoun (an electronic gadget Intelligent based Thought network), a new generation computing device which will run with the speed of thoughts. The network, system connectivity and data transfer all will be available with a high definition speed and with enormous security. The present paper will give the technocrats a new vision and direction of the futuristic computing devices.


Background: In HER2 over-expressing breast cancer cells, the HER2 protein can be cleaved by a metalloproteinase, ADAM10. While the extracellular domain (ECD) of HER2 is released into the serum, the truncated HER2 receptor fragment, termed p95, remains in the tumor cell membrane as a constitutively active receptor tyrosine kinase. Previous studies have shown that the presence of p95 in tumor cells is associated with poor clinical outcomes in patients with metastatic HER2 positive breast cancer and it was recently shown that patients with p95+ HER2 positive breast cancer are resistant to trastuzumab-based therapy. Therefore, inhibition of HER2 cleavage by the ADAM10/ADAM17 inhibitor, INCB7839, which reduces the formation of soluble HER2 ECD as well as p95 levels in the tumor, may enhance the clinical efficacy of trastuzumab in HER2+ breast cancer patients. Materials and Methods: This study is a single arm modified dose escalation open label trial of INCB7839 + trastuzumab in women with HER2+ metastatic breast cancer, naive to chemotherapy. Three doses of INCB7839 were studied (100 mg, 200 mg, 300 mg BID) with 6 patients/cohort and an expansion arm at the 300mg BID dose. Herceptin was administered on a Q3 week schedule. Pharmacokinetics, plasma HER2 ECD levels and p95 expression in tumor tissue were assessed in addition to clinical response and safety. Results: 39 patients have been enrolled in the study and assessment of HER2 ECD levels, p95 status and best clinical response completed on 30 patients. INCB7839 administration results in a dose-dependent reduction in the elevated levels of circulating HER2 ECD with a mean of ∼80% inhibition achieved at the highest dose tested (300 mg BID). At the 300mg BID dose, the current overall response rate is 40% (6/15 evaluable patients) with a higher response rate (6/11 or 55%) observed in patients with average plasma concentrations of INCB7839 above the IC50 for reduction of ECD levels, 320nM. Importantly, INCB7839 increases the clinical response rate in p95+ patients, with equivalent responses observed in the p95+ and p95- patients treated with INCB7839 + trastuzumab. The combination has been generally safe and well tolerated. Discussion: Proteolytic cleavage of the HER2 receptor by ADAM proteases results in the formation of a cytoplasmic fragment (p95) that possesses constitutive kinase activity with the release of ECD. Importantly, elevated levels of ECD and/or p95 have been associated with poor prognosis and clinical data suggest that p95 affords resistance to trastuzumab. Biomarker and clinical data from this trial demonstrate that INCB7839 can markedly reduce HER2 cleavage in patients with HER2+ breast cancer, and suggests that INCB7839, by inhibiting the HER2 shedding process, can render a subpopulation of HER2+ patients (as defined by the presence of p95) that would be predicted to be trastuzumab resistant clinically responsive to trastuzumab therapy. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2009;69(24 Suppl):Abstract nr 5056.


France is often considered as a country that leads the way as an "exemplary country" in cultural policy. Scholars also talk about a specific "French Ministry of Culture Model". In this article I discuss several characteristics of French cultural policy given by cultural policy researchers. Are these characteristics scientifically fruitful and/or valid? I have focused upon the following questions: (1) Is it true that France was the first country in Europe that established a ministry of culture; (2) how centralized is French cultural policy in reality; (3) how well founded is the conception that French cultural life is predominantly controlled by the Ministry of Culture, without any arm's length between politics and the arts; (4) how powerful is the minister of culture personally, and is it still fruitful to talk about a "monarchistic" French cultural policy; (5) is it true that France has given high priority to culture in its government budgets since the establishment of a Ministry of Culture (1959), and that the cultural budget nearly doubled in 1982; (6) has French cultural policy generally disapproved of the "extended concept of culture", and finally (7) was Andre Malraux really a great minister of culture? In the article I describe and discuss the development of French cultural policy historically, keeping the abovementioned questions in mind. I draw lines back to the 19th and early 20th century, but I focus particularly upon the period between 1945 and 1990. The article concludes that several more or less taken-for-granted characteristics of French cultural policy are debatable and ready for modification.


ABSTRACT Limits of intelligence services in identifying opportunities for preventive diplomacy are identified. These limits are then used to suggest an open source preventive diplomacy wiki strategy for armed conflict prevention. A complexity theory analysis lays a foundation for arguing that a good theory of preventive diplomacy is less useful than a good meta theory. In a complex world of diplomacy it is wrong to argue that there is nothing as practical as a good theory; but a good meta theory may be a practical path to saving lives. A responsive theory of peacebuilding is proposed that layers and sequences preventive strategies.


: For the general Bayesian model uncertainty framework, the focus of this paper is on the development of model space priors which can compensate for redundancy between model classes, the so-called dilution priors proposed in George (1999). Several distinct approaches for dilution prior construction are suggested. One is based on tessellation determined neighborhoods, another on collinearity adjustments, and a third on pairwise distances between models.


Introduction: The use of the Internet is becoming increasingly important in enabling children and adults to fully participate in society, whether it is learning new skills or connecting with friends and family. Consequently, children's opportunities are increasingly dependent on the Internet. The advance of technological innovations has resulted in more and more ICT devices being available to children, contributing to the deterioration of children and adolescents' health.
Methods: The study was designed as an epidemiological, cross-sectional, descriptive-analytical, comparative study. The study was conducted from October 18, 2021, to January 16, 2022, using an online questionnaire accessible through the Microsoft Forms platform. Respondents were able to access the questionnaire via a link or QR code located on the child's consent form for participation in the study, which was previously signed by a parent/guardian.
Results: The results of the study showed that school-age children were the most frequent users of smartphones and watches TV, with male respondents spending more time using almost all ICT devices, with the exception of tablets, which were used more frequently by female respondents. The analysis of pain intensity in the use of information and communication technologies revealed that respondents most frequently experienced mild pain, especially in the neck/shoulders and lower extremities. The frequency of eye problems after using ICT devices was found to be occasional, with the most pronounced symptoms being fatigue, tearing, and eyestrain, as well as headaches in one in five respondents.
Conclusion: Increasing frequency of ICT device use was associated with higher pain intensity in all anatomic regions. A 1-hour increase in weekly ICT device use also increased the likelihood of pain intensity in all anatomic regions, including eye symptoms and headaches. High exposure to ICT is of concern because it leads to adverse health outcomes for children.


: As known, the concentration of salts in potable water determines water intake in a certain degree. Water with marginal concentrations of salts brings about increased water consumption. This causes tension in the renal and extrarenal excretory mechanisms and, as a result, leads to unjustified (from the point of view of expedient behavior) energy expenditures that are not induced by environmental factors. The optimal variant is water with a salt concentration of 500 mg/l and 250 mg/l. Tap water as well as water with a salt concentration of 100 mg/lg occupy an intermediate position between desirable and undesirable waters but lie closer to the optimal variant.


The progression of the digital connectivity trend has been disruptive in manipulating the emerging needs of consumers. Through equipping consumers with greater societal control and empowering them to strive for self-development, the classification of consumers as 'individuals' showcases the complexity of their purchasing preferences within contemporary society. These needs expose a shift away from materialism, as consumers are spending more time and money on experiences than on material possessions in order to express their individuality. This article explores the current value that possessions and experiences have in the life of individuals, and identifies the role that experience engagement has in influencing the societal shift away from materialism. Investigation into individuals' materialistic values provides key approaches for businesses to capitalise on such complexities, in order to successfully operate within the competitive Experience Economy. The article contributes to the existing body of research on material culture and experience engagement by focusing on the values and motivations of millennials. Research is based upon a mixed method approach, utilising a vast range of both quantitative and qualitative methods including; surveys, interviews, online and offline observations and an extensive case study analysis. Findings conclude that although the desire for experiences over possessions is apparent, millennials affiliation with material culture is still evident due to the role possessions play in allowing experiences to shape identity. Consequently, it is anticipated that alongside material culture exists an experience culture, now identifying individuals by their experiences, rather than by their possessions. In studying the intrinsic role experiences play in fuelling individualism, it details the key attributes of the experiences millennials value the most when contributing to their identity. The article also considers how these characteristics are being challenged by society today, and the issues the delivery of experiences may face in the future.


More and more people are getting tattoos these days. Whether these are complex traditional symbols or uniquely significant words, tattoos are an expression of the wearer's feelings and desires. As the tattoo profession grows, tattoo artists are perfecting their art, and attracting the attention of an increasing amount of dedicated enthusiasts. In this rising trend, Asian tattoo art, especially that of China and Japan, has gained admirers around the world. Through interviews with artists and the presentation of their work, "Oriental Tattoo Art" puts the charm of contemporary oriental tattoo art on full display. In addition, "Oriental Tattoo Art" contains an appendix with nearly 150 traditional oriental symbols and written characters with clear explanations of their unique cultural meanings for the appreciation and use of the reader. Let us pierce the veil of this ancient and alluring profession and learn about the spiritual and artistic worlds of contemporary tattoo artists in China and Japan.


Recent high-profile incidents involving racism at hockey's highest levels have cast serious concerns regarding the prevalence of racism in the sport. However, limited scholarly literature has examined the prevalence of racism in Canadian hockey across the lesser-known competitive developmental levels (e.g., junior, collegiate, and minor-professional). Employing a critical race framework, we interviewed Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) regarding their experiences with racism in Canadian hockey. The findings reveal that actions that keep BIPOC players on the outside looking in exist at even the sport's youngest levels. The findings also indicate that governing bodies often fail to protect BIPOC players when racist incidents occur. Further research regarding racism in hockey is needed to more fully understand the deleterious impact of racist behavior on the sport and those who play it, and to identify strategies that can promote a more egalitarian opportunity structure than currently exists.


This article presents the methodology adopted for transcribing and quantifying temporal fluency phenomena in a spoken L2 corpus (L2 English, French, and Italian by learners of different proficiency levels). The CHILDES suite is being used for transcription and analysis, and we have adapted the CHAT format in order to code disfluencies as precisely as possible. We briefly present findings for two extreme subgroups in the corpus--our most hesitant and least hesitant learners--and compare the major differences in the temporal structure of the speech of these two learner groups with a native-speaker control group. Implications of these findings for the automatic assessment of spoken fluency will be discussed.


This paper attempts to redress the current preoccupation with the idea of difference for structuring art curricula by reclaiming connectivity for realising value and strategic intelligence in art. In doing so, it makes use of the diverse role narrative plays in culture to establish a rationale for future art curricula, so that myth and mythic artistic methods that reconcile us to the world are given priority over the more recent preference for art to be subversive, like parable. This more complex analysis of the way story informs cultural activity is used to contrast with Efland, Freedman and Stuhr's oversimplified use of narrative that neglects the importance of myth and its equivalent in procedural knowledge for understanding and making durable art. An alternative approach to structuring the art curriculum is mapped out that gives priority to connectivity (myth) over difference (parable) by drawing on meta-narratives over-looked in postmodern thought.


The action of subtoxic doses of armine and nibufin administered alone and combined with steroid drugs on the rat reproductive function and uterine tissue RNA content was studied experimentally. The subtoxic doses of the drugs increased sharply the luteinizing hormone releasing factor content in the hypothalamus, as well as the synthesis and excretion of luteinizing and follicle-stimulating hormones and RNA content in the uterine tissue. Estrogen-progestin drugs, particularly infecundin, exerted a protective action in armine- and nibufin-produced abnormalities of the reproductive function.


The environment of urban wetlands is affected by both human activities and climate changes. The spatio temporal transformation and seasonal inundation determine the structure and functions of tropical wetland ecosystems. Information on the spatial and temporal changeability of inundation is necessary to understand and manage these ecosystems. The western region of Sri Lanka represents one of the most emerging growth centers in the country and there is an extreme pressure on the natural environment and wetland ecosystems. A combination of methods of environmental history, urban ecology and wetland science based on geographical information system (GIS) and remote sensing (RS) have been applied to the research. Moreover, this research focuses on understanding and assessing the current potential spatial stress on a regional wetland ecosystem due to human interference. This study uses remote sensing images of two time periods (during 2001-2016) to interpret the chronological spatial data of the wetland landscape changes over the 215 years time span. The result shows that the wetland system in this study area presents a trend of widely extent urban-rural situation with rapid land use changes, urban expansion, wetland degradation, and rapid urban built-up land. The different driving forces make complicated patterns of this wetland ecosystem.


Much has been written on Dreyer's cinematicvisual order and how his meticulously constructed sequences form from various elements an ordered whole. Edvin Kau, for instance, notes that 'his films are a treasure house to explore for those who wish to learn about how meaning is articulated through the materials of the film medium' and asserts how Dreyer's 'visual style' comprises 'cinematic spaces […] consciously formed' to demonstrate the 'psychological struggle' taking place in characters such as Joan of Arc, in the 1928 La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc (Kau 2010, 1). These statements are never explained substantially enough for me. What meaning is this, within the context of a filmic medium? How precisely does this become psychological? Why should any of this matter enough to be termed a Dreyerian 'visual style'? More needs to be said on what sort of compositional significance Dreyer masters, and what this can mean for the audience encountering his films.


We propose an efficient way of increasing the entropy of mixing in high-entropy-alloy-type compounds, which can be achieved by multi-site alloying. As an example of this concept, we report the synthesis and observation of polycrystalline samples of new high-entropy-alloy-type metal chalcogenides (Ag,In,Pb,Bi)Te1-xSex (x = 0.0, 0.25, and 0.5) with a NaCl-type structure. The samples were synthesized using high pressure synthesis. Superconductivity with transition temperatures of 2.7, 2.5, and 2.0 K was observed with x = 0.0, 0.25, and 0.5, respectively. To investigate the multi-site alloying effect on the entropy of mixing (ΔSmix) for the examined samples, we calculated the total ΔSmix for two crystallographic sites. For the samples with x = 0.25 and 0.5, ΔSmix reaches 1.89R and 2.00R, respectively, which exceed the ΔSmix of 1.79R for a simple (single-site) high-entropy alloy containing six different elements.


Abstract Semiarid grasslands accumulate soil beneath plant "islands" that are raised above bare interspaces. This fine-scale variation in microtopographic relief is plant-induced and is increased with shrub establishment. Research found that fire-induced water repellency enhanced local-scale soil erosion that reduced variation in microtopographic relief, suggesting that fire may counteract vegetation-driven, fine-scale spatial soil heterogeneity. This article analyzes longer-term measurements (up to 9 yr) of soil microtopography to evaluate the hypothesis that fire in semiarid grasslands results in more homogenous soil microtopographic relief. Changes in soil microtopographic relief were measured prior to and following a total of five fires at three semiarid grasslands within central New Mexico, United States. The fires included three cool-season prescribed fires, a warm-season prescribed fire, and a warm-season wildfire. Four of the five fires resulted in significantly lower soil microtopographic variation that persisted for up to 4 yr. The duration and magnitude of the soil leveling effect was lowest in the grassland with clay-rich soils, indicating a possible soil texture interaction. Although two grasslands had net soil loss following fires, no net erosion occurred at the third grassland, indicating that redistribution of soils can occur without net erosion. These results show that management with prescribed fire reduces biotic-driven variation in soil microtopographic relief in semiarid grasslands that may help limit the transition to shrubland ecosystems in this region.


The Epstein-Barr virus latent membrane protein 1 (LMP-1) is essential for virus-induced B cell immortalization and can protect B lymphoma cell lines from apoptosis signals in vitro via induction of cellular Bcl-2 expression. However, we have reported that high-level expression of LMP-1 in epithelial cells (RHEK-1 cells) itself induces apoptosis. This apoptotic event occurs in the absence of detectable Bcl-2 expression in the LMP-1-transfected epithelial cells. In this study, we transfected the bcl-2 gene into the LMP-1-containing cells and examined the effect of Bcl-2 upon LMP-1-mediated apoptosis, and upon the growth phenotype of the transfected cells. The results show that ectopic expression of Bcl-2 specifically blocks apoptotic death induced by LMP-1. This was observed from cell culture viability and from gel electrophoresis and flow cytometric assays of the degree of DNA fragmentation in cultured cells. Furthermore, co-expression of LMP-1 and Bcl-2 in RHEK-1 cells enabled the cells to grow under low-serum conditions and to form colonies in semi-soft agar medium. These results suggest, therefore, that these two proteins play important complementary roles in the process of EBV-associated epithelial cell transformation. It appears significant, therefore, that LMP-1 and Bcl-2 are frequently co-expressed in the malignant cells of an EBV-positive epithelial tumour, nasopharyngeal carcinoma.


OBJECTIVE
To assess the effects of soy isoflavone (SIF) on improving insulin reistance (IR) status in IR rats induced by high-fat and high-sugar diet and explore the possible mechanisms.

METHODS
IR rats were randomly divided into four groups according to their insulin resistance indices (IRI). The rats in one model control group and three SIF groups were fed via gavage with water solutions containing SIF at doses of 0 mg/ kg x bw, 50 mg/kg x bw, 150 mg/kg x bw, and 450 mg/kg x bw, respectively. After one month, fasting glucose, fasting insulin, resistin in serum, and resistin mRNA in adipocyte around kidney were detected by enzymologic method, radioimmunoassay, enzyme linked immunosorbent assay, and real time RT-PCR, respectively.

RESULTS
Comparison between the model control group and the other groups revealed that serum resistin and resistin mRNA expression levels were lower in the 450 mg/kg x bw group, that insulin and IRI levels were lower in the 150 mg/ kg x bw group and 450 mg/kg x bw group, and that no differences in plasma glucose levels existed among the 4 groups. A positive correlation between IRI and serum resistin level (r = 0.355, P < 0.05) was observed.

CONCLUSION
These results suggest that soy isoflavone may down-regulate resistin mRNA expression, decrease serum resistin level and enhance insulin sensitivity.


This research aims at investigating the proportion of several types of tree foliages leaves as animal feed in different locations and altitudes in Malang Raya. The case study was conducted in five districts of Malang Raya where were assumed as the centre of goat farms. The results showed that there were 30 types of forage used as goat feeds, both leaves of tree foliages and shrubs, or grasses, crop residues and others. Most forages (73%) were leaves of tree foliages and shrubs, both legumes, and non-legumes. Tree foliage leaves were more used as goat feeds in the study area with higher altitude, whereas in the area with lower altitude, farmers also utilized grasses and crop residues. The leaves of tree foliages were Paraserianthes falcataria, Gliricidia sepium, Artocarpus heterophyllus, Leucaena leucocephala and Calliandra calothyrsus . Paraserianthes falcataria was most widely used in Klampok-Singosari (88.3%). The proportion of Calliandra calothyrsus ranged from 32 to 98%, while Gliricidia sepium was 58-98%, both were most widely used in Argoyuwono-Ampelgading. Artocarpus heterophyllus was most widely used in Wajak (90.3%), whereas Leucaena leucocephala leaf was used by all respondents (100%) in Sumberdem-Wonosari. It is necessary to evaluate the quality of these tree foliage leaves to provide a better animal feed through supplementation technology. Keyword : altitudes, foliages, leave, location


Abstract. The Covid-19 outbreak has not only precipitated a health emergency, but also an economic crisis, unparalleled in modern history.  For New Zealand to emerge from that crisis in a relatively healthy state, the Labour government will need to provide a clear framework for recovery, implementing policies which clearly prioritize those most affected by the societal and economic lockdown necessitated by the outbreak. To date, such prioritization has been lacking, with the Wage Subsidy Scheme unfairly advantaging big business and the professional elite, at the cost of money and resources which could have been better directed towards assisting the newly unemployed – namely workers, their families, and small business owners. Ultimately, poorly targeted support in the form of helicopter payments, wage subsidies, or broad-based tax cuts (such as a moratorium on GST) is wasteful, and will only serve to entrench inequalities that existed prior to the pandemic.  Equally, the time and costs inherent in planning large-scale new infrastructure projects – and the fact that they offer little practical help to the majority of workers who require help now – means that they should not be regarded as a panacea, aiding economic recovery. Instead, clear, innovative policies, which not only prioritize those most in need, but which also lay the groundwork for further social and economic reform in the medium to long term, are required.  For workers and their families, support can be offered via the mechanism of special risk accounts, tailored to meet their individual needs.  For small business, help can be provided by facilitating conversations between businesses, landlords, and banks, as well as providing – upon the provision of an approved business plan – forgivable government loans. Finally, to help manage the recovery, and ensure our younger generations are not saddled with debt, the government must also identify, and eliminate, unnecessary spending, privilege, and waste.  It can find an extra $15 billion per annum by doing so, contributing to the recovery in the short term, and – more generally – to implementing wider scale reform once the immediate crisis has been put behind it. Keywords. Covid-19, New Zealand economy. JEL. I12, J13, Z12, D13.


This article shows the development of a support system for the movement of people with visual impairments using a near field communication system, based on magnetic coils. The structure of the system consists of an embedded system attached to a smart cane, which allows the detection of a set of transmitting coils placed at the intersections of the tactile paving that people with visual impairments use to move in public places. When the smart cane detects an intersection it informs the user about the places that can be reached by following each one of the possible directions, using voice commands. This article propertly describes the overal function of the system, as well as the design and implementation of the transmitting and receiving coils, including the mathematical model of the magnetic coils, which is used to calculate the communication range. Finally some experimental results are presented.


3-methyl-1-oxo-1-H-2-benzopyran-4-carboxylic acid was synthesized in excellent yields by the reaction of homophthalic anhydride with acetyl chloride using pyridine as a catalyst, followed by rearrangement of 4-acetyl- 1H-2-benzopyran-1,3(4H)-dione with Conc. Sulphuric acid. Further 3-methyl-1-oxo-1H-2-benzopyran-4-carboxylic acid was derrivatised to various isoquinolones using ammonia and respective primary amines. It was also inferred the isoquinolones obtained were same when ammonia and other primary amines were treated with 3-methyl-1-oxo- 1-H-2-benzopyran-4-carboxylic acid, 4-acetyl-1H-2-benzopyran-1,3(4H)-dione, or 3-methyl-1H-2-benzopyran-1- one.


The deterioration of living conditions in Venezuela has triggered an unprecedented migratory crisis. More than seven million Venezuelans have fled the country. While a continental refugee crisis and an emergent diaspora have received attention, the local impact of emigration remains unexplored. Locally, emigration manifests itself as an ever-growing and unique vacancy. In Caracas, migrants' left-behind domestic spaces are managed through relational, trust-based, and dynamic practices that revolve around their preservation and reinvention, implicating local actors in the migration process and creating new forms of transnational cooperation. This article examines emergent practices of care in Caracas. It presents an overview of the Venezuelan crisis and the disciplinary frameworks for examining the impact of emigration on urban development. Through interviews and photography, the research offers accounts of cuidadores and highlights their role in protecting and reinventing migrants' domestic spaces. Preliminary findings show the important role that local actors play in supporting migration and the use of vacant spaces to satisfy local needs. These findings also suggest potential spatial and urban transformations taking place through practices of care and cooperation in a context of emigration and collapse.


A nine-octave multirate filter with one-third-octave band gain control is presented. The filter, developed as a DSP (digital signal processing) application, produces a random-noise spectrum from 10 Hz to 5 kHz with a controllable level in one-third-octave bands. Nine FIR (finite impulse response) bandpass filters processed at different sample rates and eight FIR low-pass interpolation filters provide shaped pseudorandom noise. Equipment includes the TI TMS320C25-based software development system and the TLC32041 analog interface chip. The design offers a significant saving in both data memory storage and processing time. The multirate filter program uses 1368 words of data memory, whereas an equivalent single rate would occupy 41 K words of data memory.<<ETX>>


Objectives: High-grade soft-tissue sarcoma (STS) has a poor prognosis. The goal of this study was to review treatment outcomes of patients with high-grade STS treated with interdigitated neoadjuvant chemotherapy (CT) and radiation at our institution. Materials and Methods: Patients with high-grade STS (1997 to 2010) were planned for treatment with 3 cycles of neoadjuvant CT, interdigitated preoperative radiation therapy (44 Gy administered in split courses with a potential 16 Gy postoperative boost), and 3 cycles of postoperative CT. Cancer control outcomes at 3 years were analyzed. Results: Sixteen patients with high-grade STS were evaluated. Median age was 53 years, the median longest tumor diameter was 14.6 cm, and median follow-up was 33 months. All 16 patients received 2 or 3 cycles of neoadjuvant CT and all patients completed neoadjuvant RT. The estimated 3-year rate for local control was 100%, disease-free survival 62.5%, and overall survival 73.4%. Conclusions: Patients with high-grade STS treated with interdigitated neoadjuvant CT and radiation before surgical resection had excellent rates of local control, along with disease-free survival and overall survival similar to previously published reports. This combined-modality approach continues to have a role in the treatment of patients with high-grade STS.


Whether or not it is true, as Vaclav Havel famously claimed, that NATO's attack on Yugoslavia represents the first war to be waged "in the name of principles and values," the first "ethical war," it might well be the case that it is the first act of armed aggression against a sovereign state whose popular legitimation relied almost wholly upon an alleged historical analogy. NATO spokespersons and apologists could not allude often enough to the Second World War, Hitler, and the Nazi regime's persecution of the Jews. They did this in lieu of providing reasoned justification for NATO's action, perhaps because under existing international law there was surely no such justification to be found. The NATO attack had to be presented as morally urgent, since it was manifestly illegal. For this purpose, allusion to the "Holocaust" and, in Daniel Jonah Goldhagen's words, the "absolute evil" of its perpetrators, was the most obvious and effective instrument. This article can also be found at the Monthly Review website , where most recent articles are published in full. Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.


A probabilistic model is presented that demonstrates the optimal number of software test cases required in situations where the following can be estimated as independent parameters: (1) the cost per test; (2) the cost per error if undetected until field implementation; (3) the number of software executions over its lifetime; (4) the number of possible different executions; and (5) the number of faults embedded in the software. A formula is derived by the use of calculus and is solved by approximation techniques. Tables of the optimal number of tests over a range of parameter values are presented to illustrate the results. The model serves as a basis for further research efforts to improve the accuracy of input variable estimation. >


The article elaborates the development of Chinese democracy and governance in theory and practice since the
market-orientation. It compares the similarities and differences between the traditional view of democracy and the
reformist one, and between the official and the academic one. The article generalizes the practice and theories of
democracy and governance in China as Incremental Democracy. First this means that the previous centralist
system has been collapsed and a pluralization of political life is emerging. However, the political pluralization is
conditional: China's politics is in transition from the traditional totalism into a conditional democracy. Second, in
comparison to economic liberalization, the extent and degree of political liberalization is much lower. In this paper,
the author tries to develop a new theory and assessment criteria to explain and evaluate the recent changes in
democracy and governance taking place in a context of economic and social reforms


Modern society has become more and more dependent on information services, transferred in both public and private network, than ever before. The use of integration of computers with telecommunications has created a so-called "Information Age". The advent of high capacity digital telecommunication facilities has made it possible for the huge amount of traffic to be carried in an economical and efficient method, in recent years. These facilities, which are used to carry much higher capacities than the traditional ones, also result in the network's vulnerability to the failure of network facilities, i.e. a single link failure.

This thesis is concerned with the technology by which the spare capacity on the link of mesh networks is placed in order to protect the active traffic from network failure with a minimal cost. Although there have been many works to address the issue all of these works have been developed based on the assumption that the link cost with its capacity is linear. In fact, the linear cost functions does not reflect the reality that optic fiber cables with the specific amount of capacities are only available, in other words, the link cost function is stepwise rather than linear. Therefore, all existing algorithms developed for the linear assumption may not be applicable properly for the stepwise case.

A novel heuristic algorithm is proposed to solve the problem in this thesis. The algorithm is composed of two parts as follows. In part one, a maximum flow algorithm is employed to work out the maximal amount of feasible spare paths consisting of spare capacities in the network to re-route the disrupted traffic at the event of network failure. In part two, a newly proposed algorithm is used to find an alternative path on which to place the non-rerouted traffic on the failed link with the minimum network cost increment. The superiority of the algorithm is presented over other algorithms published in this area.


The search for renewable resources as a feedstock in the polyol production inspired polyol makers to expand their focus on vegetable-based feedstock rather than just concentrating on petroleum-based feedstock only. Currently, there are a few comprehensive studies on polyol production from palm oil as a feedstock. Palm-based polyol has been proven to have similar or even better characteristic and performance than petroleum-based polyol by several polyol manufacturers. This study is intended to evaluate and identify the environmental impacts from the production of palm-based polyol carried out in MPOB Polyol Pilot Plant through four different scenarios studies. The outcome from this study is important to support the use of renewable raw material in the production of bio-based polyol, and hence will further boost the application of palm oil and its derivatives. The 'cradle-to-gate' system boundary utilizing the LCA methodology for the production of palm-based polyol shows that the most significant impact from the production comes from the energy use at the polyol plant. This impact is mainly contributed by the use of electricity and productions of hydrogen peroxide. There are also impact contribution from palm-based products which were used as a feedstock during the production. The result obtained from the alternative scenario (Scenario 2), indicated a reduction of around 63-65% of the GHG emissions produced from the overall palm-based polyol production. There is not much difference on impacts and GHG values if glycerol is use to replace diol during the alcoholysis stage as in Scenario 3. However, the results at the pilot plant study will be more interesting if future work can be carried out at a commercial plant with larger scale production.


This paper analyses the development of child justice during three main periods in Nigeria. From 1914-1943, juvenile delinquency emerged as a distinct social problem; specific laws were enacted relating to children and Reformatory and Industrial Schools were established across the country. From 1943-2003, the colonial masters enacted the Children and Young Persons Ordinance for the treatment of young offenders. After independence in 1960, this remained the law regulating juvenile justice. However, most juvenile offenders were not granted bail by the police and the juvenile court structure and procedure were not protective. Offenders were sent to institutions but extensive research carried out across the country shows that the facilities for rehabilitation were non-existent at such institutions. This paper argues that the period, 2003-2014, has recorded positive improvement. The Child Rights Act 2003 introduces key reforms such as codified legal rights for children, diversion, Centralised Children Police Unit, Family Courts and two novel non-custodial disposition methods. The author recommends the implementation of the Committee on the Rights of the Child Observations to fully protect child offenders in Nigeria.


SOCIAL-CONTEXT MIDDLEWARE FOR AT-RISK VETERANS Nadiyah Johnson Marquette University, 2016 Many veterans undergo challenges when reintegrating into civilian society. These challenges include readapting to their communities and families. During the reintegration process veterans have difficulties finding employment, education or resources that aid veteran health. Research suggests that these challenges often result in veterans encountering serious mental illness. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a common mental disease that veterans often develop. This disease impacts between 15-20% of veterans. PTSD increases the likelihood of veterans engaging in high risk behaviors which may consist of impulsivity, substance abuse, and angry outbursts. These behaviors raise the veterans' risk of becoming violent and lashing out at others around them. In more recent studies the VA has started to define PTSD by its association to specific high risk behaviors rather than defining PTSD based on a combination of psychiatric symptoms. Some researchers have suggested that high risk behaviors -extreme anger (i.e., rage or angry outbursts) is particularly problematic within the context of military PTSD. Comparatively little research has been done linking sensor based systems to identify these angry episodes in the daily lives of military veterans or others with similar issues. This thesis presents a middleware solution for systems that work to detect, and with additional work possibly prevent, angry outbursts (also described in psychological literature as "rage") using physiological sensor data and context-aware technology. This paper will cover a range of topics from methods for collecting system requirements for a subject group to the development of a social-context aware middleware. In doing such, the goal is to present a system that can be constructed and used in an in lab environment to further the research of building real-world systems that predict crisis events, setting the state for early intervention methods based on this approach.


I Orton DI, Gruzelier JH. Adverse changes in mood and cognitive performance of house officers after night duty. Br Med J 1989;298:21-3. (7 January.) 2 Spurgeon A, Sims J. Lack of sleep in junior doctors. Br Medl 1989;298:381-2. (11 February.) 3 Cashman JN, Jones H, Skelly AM. Lack of sleep in junior doctors. BrMedJ 1989;298:381. (11 February.) 4 Horne JA. Restitution and human sleep: a critical review. Physiol Psychol 1979;7:115-25. 5 Gruzelier J, Brow T, Perry A, Rhonder J, Thomas M. Hypnotic susceptibility: a lateral predisposition and altered cerebral asymmetry under hypnosis. Intl Psychophysiol 1984;2:131-9. 6 Cikurel K, Gruzelier JH. The effect of an active-alert hypnotic induction on lateral asymmetry in haptic processing. BrJ Exp Clin Hypnosis (in press).


With his purchase of Aston Villa Football Club (AVFC) in 2006, Randy Lerner joined the growing ranks of foreign—and specifically American—owners in Barclays Premier League. During a year-long investigation spanning the 2008–2009 season, we conducted extensive participant observation among fans, interviews with a variety of sources (including club officials, journalists, and fans), and fan Web-site monitoring to understand the broader implications of Lerner's takeover. A consistently recurring theme during initial data analysis was the role of public relations in creating positive perceptions of Lerner as an owner. This ran contrary to the experiences of his American counterparts at other clubs. The British press, as well as academic researchers of sport globalization, has warned against the loss of localized rituals and institutions in the wake of the "foreign invasion" (Osborne & Coombs, 2009). Critics fear that foreign ownership of culturally rooted institutions such as English football clubs will create schisms between supporters' fan identities and their national or local identities. This article uses AVFC to examine the real-world context for two public relations theories—relationship management and excellence theory—to demonstrate that well-managed public relations may allow fans to maintain their commitment to their club while embracing globalization.


Atmospheric nitrogen deposition and other sources of environmental eutrophication have increased substantially over the past century worldwide, notwithstanding the recent declining trends in Europe. Despite the recognized susceptibility of plants to eutrophication, few studies evaluated how impacts propagate to consumers, such as pollinators. Here we aim to test if soil eutrophication contributes to the temporal dynamics of pollinators and their larval resources. We used a temporally and spatially explicit historical dataset with information on species occurrences to test if soil eutrophication, and more specifically nitrogen deposition, contributes to the patterns of change of plant and pollinator richness in the Netherlands over an 80 yr period. We focus on bees and butterflies, two groups for which we have good knowledge of larval resources that allowed us to define groups of species with different nitrogen related diet preferences. For each group we estimated richness changes between different 20-yr periods at local, regional and national scale, using analytical methods developed for analyzing richness changes based on collection data. Our findings suggest that the impacts of soil eutrophication on plant communities propagate to higher trophic levels, but with a time-lag. Pollinators with nitrogen-related diet preferences were particularly affected, in turn potentially impairing the performance of pollinator-dependent plants. Pollinator declines continued even after their focal plants started to recover. In addition, our results suggest that current levels of nitrogen deposition still have a negative impact on most groups here analyzed, constraining richness recoveries and accentuating declines. Our results indicate that the global increase in nitrogen availability plays an important role in the ongoing pollinator decline. Consequently, species tolerances to soil nitrogen levels should be considered across all trophic levels in management plans that aim to halt biodiversity loss and enhance ecosystems services worldwide.


Devaluation is the instrument of monetary policy which has been used very often during the 20th century. In recent time of globalization, the many limited factors (openness of the economy, capital movements, currency substitution, money illusion) significantly reduce or completely make impossible the devaluation implementation as the measure for foreign trade deficit or recession overcoming in many countries. This paper discusses on positive and negative effects of devaluation in the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina economy.


Policy discourses on education in all countries are historically shaped by a range of regional, national, and global factors and dynamics. In the Indian context, ideological and structural contexts have influenced the policy visions and practices of gender and schooling, particularly in relation to the education of girls. Mapping historical shifts over the colonial and post-colonial periods up to the present, the early 21st century, reveals the intersections of ideologies and structures associated with both gender as a social category and education as a state project. Such a discursive cartography reveals certain key moments that point to how these intersections have impacted practices and processes within school education. From the early 2000s, the intensification of neoliberal economic reforms has been marked by an ideological shift that sees education as a private good and the operation of discourses of school choice. The ascendance of majoritarian nationalism and its presence in state power has also seen an undermining of the gains in women's education. At the same time, India passed a historic legislation, the Right to Education Act (2009), making education a fundamental right of all children. These somewhat contradictory and competing discourses and practices have had critical implications for the education of children of marginalized communities like the lower and former untouchable castes (Dalits), marginalized ethnicities like the Indigenous communities (Adivasis), and a marginalized religious minority community (Muslims). Within an intersectional perspective, it emerges that girls belonging to these communities face the greatest challenges in accessing and participating fully in schooling, even as recent policy initiatives are silent on many of the critical issues relating to promoting gender equality within the education system as a whole.


Molecular systems are quantum systems, but the complete characterization of molecular motions within a fully quantum framework might appear to be an unfeasible task because it would require that the actual nuclear positions are established at any time. One would like to use a quantum molecular trajectory that defines the instantaneous nuclear positions and satisfies the predictions of quantum mechanics in terms of its statistical properties. Even though it can be proven that the single Bohm trajectory provides a representation of the quantum molecular trajectory, this solves the issue only on a theoretical ground: exact solutions of the Schrödinger-Bohm dynamical system are extremely computationally demanding. Therefore, we derive a stochastic equation of Smoluchowski type from the Schrödinger-Bohm dynamics, through projection operator techniques, in order to characterize the molecular motions of open quantum systems. The main quantum features of the motions emerge from the equilibrium distribution, i.e., the wave function's squared modulus integrated on the environment degrees of freedom. Furthermore, we verify the accuracy of the stochastic equation by comparing its predictions with those of the deterministic dynamics for a model system of six interacting harmonic oscillators. The indisputable advantage of this full quantum mechanical approach is that of representing the molecular dynamics, which controls important phenomena like vibrational relaxation, conformational transitions and activated processes, in a self consistent way and at the low computational cost of solving simple stochastic equations.

publisher-specific, author manuscript: http://rsc.li/journals-terms-of-use


I the context of medieval mentalities, as we tend to imagine them, any kind of religious dissent seemed apt to create an unbridgeable chasm between people. This vision is nevertheless not entirely correct. The difference of credo never prevented medieval people from some sort of intercultural exchange. Especially the culture of chivalry, created by the knighthood as a class opposed to the clergy and to a certain degree less attentive to the subtleties of credos, was paradoxically open and receptive in its contacts with the Other, even if these contacts consisted essentially of military encounters. Nevertheless, in the context of this cultural formation, fighting was a primary form of recognition of the adversary. No wonder that, if we consider the Crusades and the Reconquista from the perspective of the knightly culture, particularly of its games and entertainments, we see a landscape which seems far enough from any idea of a "civilization clash."1 The wars between Christians and Muslims created opportunities for cross-cultural hunting encounters, exchange of knowledge and zoological species, such as mammals and birds trained to hunt. The animal on which the European devotees of hunting undoubtedly could cast covetous eyes was the cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus). The tradition of taming and training it probably originated in India, but it was also largely practiced by the Arabs since the beginning of the Islamic era. This beautiful animal


Accurate segmentation of volumetric scans like MRI and CT scans is highly demanded for surgery planning in clinical practice, quantitative analysis, and identification of disease. However, accurate segmentation is challenging because of the irregular shape of given organ and large variation in appearances across the slices. In such problems, 3D features are desired in nature which can be extracted using 3D convolutional neural network (CNN). However, 3D CNN is compute and memory intensive to implement due to large number of parameters and can easily over fit, especially in medical imaging where training data is limited. In order to address these problems, we propose a distillation-based depth shift module (Distill DSM). It is designed to enable 2D convolutions to make use of information from neighbouring frames more efficiently. Specifically, in each layer of the network, Distill DSM learns to extract information from a part of the channels and shares it with neighbouring slices, thus facilitating information exchange among neighbouring slices. This approach can be incorporated with any 2D CNN model to enable it to use information across the slices with introducing very few extra learn-able parameters. We have evaluated our model on BRATS 2020, heart, hippocampus, pancreas and prostate dataset. Our model achieves better performance than 3D CNN for heart and prostate datasets and comparable performance on BRATS 2020, pancreas and hippocampus dataset with simply 28% of parameters compared to 3D CNN model.


This paper presents a new lane-based signal merge (LBSM) control system for freeway work zone operations. The proposed system applies the signal control concept to regulate the vehicles passing the work zone area at a lane-by-lane basis and offers an effective way to maximize the operational efficiency as well as safety. Introduction of the preliminary configuration and principal components associated with the proposed LBSM control contribute the core of this study. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed system, this study has also conducted extensive simulation experiments, based on a freeway simulator calibrated with real-world work zone data. The experimental results show that under heavily congested traffic conditions the LBSM can outperform all existing control strategies with respect to the work zone throughput, the average vehicle delay, the average stop delay, and the average number of stops. This study has also investigated critical traffic flow related factors that may impact on the performance of such a system.


Virtual reality is an immersive, interactive medium that manipulates the senses in order provide users with simulated experiences in computer-generated worlds. The visual design of virtual reality is an important issue, but literature has tended to stress the medium's instructional potential rather than setting forth a protocol for designing virtual environments. Furthermore, virtual reality is often considered a solution in search of a problem instead of a viable instructional tool. To counteract this notion, a study of teLhnology designers, media experts, and instructional designers was conducted to share ideas and generate data regarding what constitutes an Instructional Virtual Environment (IVE), when one should be used, how best to design one, who should be involved in the design process, and how to evaluate one. Three rounds of Delphi surveys were administered by electronic mail, resulting in expert consensus on several points. Virtual reality (VR) is defined by the computer-mediated experiences it provides, and while it must be interactive, it does not require full immersion. VR should be used in educational situations requiring experience in particular settings, especially to present spatial or abstract information because of the advantages of sensorial feedback. The design of IVEs should consider constructivist learning principles, require a high level of user interaction, and support mastery learning. The design process should involve multi-disciplinary teams, including instructional designers, subject matter experts, end users, computer experts, ergonomic specialists, and artists. Finally, evaluators should study IVEs very thoroughly, examining all aspects of th e. environment and using many different methods. Qualitative data, focus groups, and comparative analysis are recommended directions for future study. (Contains 29


We have developed novel SQUID current sensors consisting of a sensitive 16-SQUID input stage followed by an output stage of 40, 160, or 640 low-inductance SQUIDs. A highly gradiometric design of the individual SQUIDs with ap 5 mum maximum linewidth makes the devices insensitive to external magnetic noise and allows cool-down and operation in the Earth magnetic field. Output current feedback (OCF) is used to increase the linear signal range. When driving a terminated 50 Omega coaxial cable, the sensor with 160 output SQUIDs exhibits a signal range of one flux quantum Phi0 at a power dissipation of about 100 nW. At 10 MHz and 4.2 K, a total flux noise level of 0.34 muPhi0/radic(Hz) is achieved corresponding to a dynamic range of plusmn 1.5 times 106 radic(Hz). At higher frequencies, interaction of preamplifier voltage noise with the output cable impedance increases the sensor noise (a general problem in high-speed SQUID systems). The small-signal bandwidth is >200 MHz. A very high slew rate of > 50 Phi0/mus is achieved allowing one to use the full signal range at frequencies up to 16 MHz with a total harmonic distortion below ap1%.


The goal of learning is to increase innovation, effectiveness and performance. A learning organization is a nonthreatening, empowering culture where leadership and the workforce focus on continually developing organizational competence through systematic learning. We all have a role to play in sustaining our reputation for excellence as a learning institution. It is the employee's responsibility to identify his/her learning interests and make the most of the many learning opportunities available at the University. This is done through reflection and by having a dialogue with your supervisor regarding your individual developmental needs as well as the skills and knowledge that are likely to become more important in your role. It is the supervisor's responsibility to support employee development by both encouraging and supporting opportunities to learn, grow, and advance their career in ways that support the organization. It is Learning & Development's mission to identify learning needs and provide opportunities and mechanisms for learning which will help develop individual and organizational capacity. We are all partners in learning.


Background and Purpose— With the changes in management of atrial fibrillation (AF) over time, it is possible that the time trends of post-AF stroke incidence and mortality have changed. We sought to determine whether the incidence and survival of ischemic stroke after AF diagnosis have improved. Methods— We identified the Olmsted County, Minn, residents who developed first AF from 1980 to 2000 and followed them in medical records to 2004. The outcomes were first ischemic stroke and death. Results— Of the 4117 subjects diagnosed with first AF and without previous stroke, 446 (11%) sustained a first ischemic stroke during a mean follow-up time of 5.5±5.0 years. The age- and sex-adjusted incidence of stroke decreased, on average, by 3.4% per year (P=0.0001), concurrent with an increase in warfarin and aspirin use (both P<0.0001) and reduction of systolic blood pressure (P<0.001). The age-adjusted ischemic stroke incidence was higher in women (P=0.039), but not after adjusting for systolic blood pressure (P=0.41). Compared with the general Minnesota white population, the relative mortality hazard ratio was 1.88 for men and 1.84 for women without stroke and 3.03 for men and 3.80 for women (P<0.05) with stroke. The relative mortality hazard did not vary by age or calendar year of AF diagnosis. Conclusions— Post-AF ischemic stroke incidence decreased significantly from 1980 to 2000, during which time a substantial increase in the use of antithrombotic therapy and reduction of systolic blood pressure was evident. The relative mortality risk of stroke, however, had not improved over time.


Brain 1988;111:928-39. 9 Hawkins CP, Munro PMG, Mackenzie F, et al. Duration and selectisitv of blood-brain barrier breakdown in chronic relapsing experimental allergic encephalomvelitis studied by gadolinium-DTPA and protein markers. Brain 1990;113: 365-78. 10 Kappos L, Stadt D, Rohrbach E, et al. Gadolinium-DTPAenhanced magnetic resonance imaging in the evaluation of different disease courses and disease activity in MS. Neurologv 1988;38(suppl 1):255.


: Although conventional biotechnology used for the synthesis of antibiotics, vitamins, amino acids, nucleotides, enzyme inhibitors and immunomodulating compounds has still a major impact in the production of pharmaceutical compounds, the importance of the new biotechnology is increasing. Whereas in conventional biotechnology naturally occurring strains are screened for production of pharmacologically active compounds, in new biotechnology known organisms are programmed by genetic engineering to produce a distinct protein or glycoprotein of human origin for substitution therapy. Such complex compounds from new biotechnology can be divided into products which might replace compounds which are already on the market by safer recombinant products such as human insulin, human growth hormone, urokinase, factor VIII and products which are new on the market such as interferons, lymphokines, tissue plasminogen activator, oligonucleotide probes, monoclonal antibodies and subunit vaccines. However, only a few of these recombinant products have reached the market such as human insulin, interferon alpha, interferon beta, human growth hormone and recombivax HB. In most cases, depending on the difficulties in demonstrating clinical efficacy, the investigated drugs have reached the marketing phase much faster than conventional chemical drugs. Return on investment of biotechnical produced pharmaceutics mainly depends on the issues of whether the product has to compete with chemically synthesized drugs, whether it is totally new but competes with other bioproducts, whether it is exceptional but the proof of clinical efficacy is difficult, or whether it is totally new and clinical studies are promising.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


Image Fusion is a process of combining the relevant information from a set of images into a single image, where the resultant fused image will be more informative and complete than any of the input images. The goal of image fusion (IF) is to integrate complementary multisensory, multitemporal and/or multiview information into one new image containing information the quality of which cannot be achieved otherwise. It has been found that the standard fusion methods perform well spatially but usually introduce spectral distortion, Image fusion techniques can improve the quality and increase the application of these data. In this paper we use various image fusion techniques using discrete wavelet transform and discrete cosine transform and it is proposed to analyze the fused image, after that by using various quality assessment factors it is proposed to analyze subject images and will draw a conclusion. In this results of several applications and comparisons between different fusion schemes and rules are addressed.


Pervious concrete was introduced in America in 2003, popularized by Dan Brown and used as a rigid pavement in the open parking lot. Rigid pavement using pervious concrete can absorb water in the surface to go straight through the concrete to the ground below.This water flow is one of the benefit of using the pervious concrete. Using of wastes such as broken roof and ceramics tiles are not commonly used in Indonesia. Utilization these kind of wastes is predicted lower the compressive strength of pervious concrete as they are used as a substitute for coarse aggregate.In this research, pervious concrete is made using a mixture of the fragment of ceramics and roof tiles.This research using broken ceramics and roof tiles with a grain size that loose from 38 mm sieve, retained on 19 mm sieve and the coarse aggregate from crushed stone that loose 12.5 mm sieve, retained on 9.5 mm sieve. The water cement ratio is 0.3 and to assist the mixing process, the addition of addictive in pervious concrete is used.The size of coarse aggregate used in the mixture affects the strength of pervious concrete. The larger the size of aggregate, the obtained compressive strength becomes smaller. It also affects the density of pervious concrete. The using of mixture of ceramics and roof tiles only reduce 2 MPa of pervious concrete compressive strength so this mixture can be used as a substitute for coarse aggregate with a maximum portion of 30 %. The high porosity of the specimens causes the reduction of pervious concrete density that affect the compressive strength. This high level of porosity can be seen from the high level of water absorption that exceed the required limit of water infiltration.


This paper proposed an improved thermal-electric-displacement FEM model for spark plasma sintering (SPS), which fully considered the variations of therma-electrical material parameters, contact resistances and contact boundaries due to the densification process. The simulation shows that such an alterable boundary condition builds a remarkable temperature gradient in the axial direction along the inner wall of the die, and the local change of the temperature at the contact interfaces can be described more exactly. The experiment and the simulation are in a great agreement. The developed SPS model can be used as an aiding tool to optimize the SPS process parameters of metal powders.


We investigated the nature of the information stored in visuo-spatial short-term memory in two experiments. In the first experiment, a spatial localization task was performed simultaneously with articulatory suppression and arithmetical subtraction tasks. The articulatory suppression has a negative effect on the performance with letters, but not with visual patterns. Despite that, the recall of the letters is better than the recall of the visual patterns. This result suggests that the storage of the visual patterns does not use the phonological loop, and that the articulatory suppression, even if it inhibits the use of the phonological loop, cannot inhibit the access to the semantic information. In the second experiment we established the effect of the visual similarity on the capacity of memory for the spatial position. The results confirm the use of visual codes and suggest that the storage capacity of the visual stimuli is limited, but not restricted to the recency items.


In our complex world today almost all critical infrastructures are interdependent and thus vulnerable to many different external and internal risks. To protect them against the greatest risks, a well-functioning risk management process is required to develop appropriate safety and security strategies. There are many wellestablished risk analysis methods existing. They predominantly apply empirical models and statistical data to quantify the risks. Within the realms of natural or aleatory risks this approach is considered suitable and functional. However, it could be a fatal flaw to apply such conventional, history-orientated models in order to assess risks that arise from intelligent adversaries such as terrorists, criminals or competitors. Approaches of classic risk analysis generally describe adversaries' choices as random variables, thus excluding the adversaries' behaviour and ability to adapt to security strategies. One possibility for considering human behaviour when analysing risks is the recourse to game theory. Game theory is the paradigmatic framework for strategic decision-making when two or more rational decision-makers (intelligent adversaries) are involved in cooperative or conflictive decision situations. In our study we propose an approach for combining a classic risk analysis method with a game-theoretic approach. Using a defenderoffender game as a basis, we simulate, exemplary for a terrorist attack against public transport, the behaviour and reactions (to applied security strategies of the defender) of a rational player acting as an adversary. Although risk analysis and game theory are very different methodologies, we show that linking them can significantly improve the quality of forecasts and risk assessments. If the behaviour and reactions of intelligent adversaries need to be considered, our approach contributes to enhance security through improving the allocation of scarce financial resources.


The experimental program was undertaken to investigate the performance of different geopolymer bricks (GB) made with different amounts of industrial waste materials by Taguchi method. Taguchi approach (with L16 orthogonal array) was used to design the experimental plan to reduce the number of experiments as well as to analysis the results. Recycled concrete aggregates (RCA), dust marble powder (MP) and dust lime stone powder (LP) were considered as the main variables (control factors) to develop the sustainable geopolymer concrete designated for building bricks. Four responses which the density, mechanical properties (compressive and flexural strengths) at 28 days and the percentage of water absorption were conducted. The test results revealed that combining an eminently RAC, MP and LP can produce GB with 28 days compressive strength of about 36-58 MPa with ambient temperature. The RCA was the most influential factors on the performance of GB due to its performance contribution.
Furthermore, the GB containing RCA is suitable for environment friendly construction and is comparable to a normal GB made with natural aggregate


Abstract Objective: To compare obese and non-obese adolescents in terms of their salivary cortisol response to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). Methods: This is a cross-sectional study involving 41 healthy adolescents aged 12–14 years in the city of Shenyang, China. The TSST response was determined using salivary cortisol measurements, and measurements were repeated after the test period. Repeated-measures ANOVA was performed to compare salivary cortisol levels between groups. Results: The male group comprised 16 individuals (10 obese and 6 non-obese), and the female group comprised 25 individuals (13 obese and 12 non-obese). ANOVA with repeated measures demonstrated that weight status (obese or non-obese) had a significant main effect on the measures of salivary cortisol levels during the TSST among females but not males. Conclusions: The finding suggested that weight status is associated with cortisol response to psychological stress among Chinese adolescent girls.


Plant growth regulators were used in an attempt to directly induce adventitious shoots in 15 carnation (Dianthus caryophyllus L.; Caryophyllaceae) cultivars: 'Orange Sherbert', 'Avalanche', 'Magenta', 'La France', 'Stripe Red', 'Marie', 'Concerto PVP', 'Snap', 'Lucky Pierot', 'Cinnamon Tea', 'White Love', 'Siberia', 'Magesta', 'Spark Bruno', and 'Honono no Estejo'. After sowing seeds on top of autoclaved moistened filter paper, internodes between nodes 1 to 4 from the apical meristem were surface sterilized and induced to form shoots in the presence of 1 mg L –1 thidiazuron (TDZ) and 1 mg L –1 α-naphthaleneacetic acid (NAA) on basal Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium. Shoots were excised from mother explants and subcultured on Hyponex® (N-P-K = 6.5-6-19) medium containing 30% (w/v) sucrose to establish in vitro stock cultures, which was possible for all 15 cultivars. After two sub-cultures to eliminate the possible influence of seed-derived heterogeneity, internodes, transversal thin cell layers (tTCLs) from internode tissue, nodes and leaves from nodes 1 to 4 of one-month-old stock plantlets were excised and placed on MS basal medium containing 0, 1, 2, 4 or 8 g L –1 2,4-D, TDZ, kinetin (Kin) or 6-benzyladenine (BA), together with 0, 0.5, or 1.0 mg L –1 NAA. Shoots formed best in the presence of 1 mg L –1 TDZ and 0.5 mg L –1 NAA from all cultivars. Callus, which was induced in the presence of BA, Kin and 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, was not quantified. Results from all 15 cultivars were pooled: the largest number of shoots formed from nodes (4.85 per explant), although many more shoot initials formed. Internode tissue and tTCLs performed poorly. Individual shoots one-cm long excised from explants rooted easily (100%) in Hyponex® medium. This study provides a relatively effective and almost genotype-independent protocol for the establishment of carnation in vitro cultures.


Social animals have to coordinate joint movements to maintain group cohesion, but the latter is often compromised by diverging individual interests. A widespread behavioral mechanism to achieve coordination relies on shared or unshared consensus decision-making. If consensus costs are high, group fission represents an alternative tactic. Exploring determinants and outcomes of spontaneous group decisions and coordination of free-ranging animals is methodologically challenging. We therefore conducted a foraging experiment with a group of wild redfronted lemurs (Eulemur rufifrons) to study decision outcomes, coordination of movements, individual foraging benefits and social interactions in response to the presentation of drinking platforms with varying baiting patterns. Behavioral observations were complemented with data from recordings of motion detector cameras installed at the platforms. The animal's behavior in the experimental conditions was compared to natural group movements. We could not determine the type of consensus decision-making because the group visited platforms randomly. The group fissioned during 23.3% of platform visits, and fissioning resulted in more individuals drinking simultaneously. As under natural conditions, adult females initiated most group movements, but overtaking by individuals of different age and sex classes occurred in 67% of movements to platforms, compared to only 18% during other movements. As a result, individual resource intake at the platforms did not depend on departure position, age or sex, but on arrival order. Aggression at the platforms did not affect resource intake, presumably due to low supplanting rates. Our findings highlight the diversity of coordination processes and related consequences for individual foraging benefits in a primate group living under natural conditions.


In this paper, we investigate the role of financial acceleration phenomena in France over the period 1987-2013. Constructing a threshold-VAR model allowing for two credit regimes, we formally test for the presence of a financial acceleration and present generalized impulse response functions. Using the volatility of the French stock index CAC40 and the lending spread between small and large firms as credit stress indicators, we show weak evidence of the existence of a global financial accelerator in France and also provide a simple method for computing contributions in threshold-VAR. We insist on the difficulty to construct stable financial sphere - real economy interactions models for France or to identify adequate credit stress indicators.


We describe a novel platform for acoustic sample preparation in microchannels and microplates. The utilized method is based on generating a multitude of acoustic resonances at a set of different frequencies in microstructures, in order to accurately control the migration and positioning of particles and cells suspended in fluid channels and chambers. The actuation frequencies range from 30 kHz to 7 MHz, which are applied simultaneously and/or in sweeps. We present two devices: A closed microfluidic chip designed for pre-alignment, size-based separation, isolation, up-concentration and lysis of cells, and an open multi-well microplate designed for parallel aggregation and positioning of cells. Both devices in the platform are compatible with high-resolution live-cell microscopy, which is used for fluorescence-based optical characterization. Two bioapplications are demonstrated for each of the devices: The first device is used for size-selective cell isolation and lysis for DNA-based diagnostics, and the second device is used for quantifying the heterogeneity in cytotoxic response of natural killer cells interacting with cancer cells.


A BSTRACT Drawing upon mainly qualitative inquiry with political, associative and economic actors over a two-decade long period, the article seeks to provide answers to a key conundrum that challenges, in different ways, territorial politics scholars, as well as those working primarily on France. What are the conditions for a successful form of regional advocacy in a unitary state? The French region of Brittany has a speci fi c mode of operation, one based on mixing identity and instrumental claims, and accessing a repertoire of responses that are not naturally open to other French regions. A related question follows logically from the fi rst: Can a speci fi c territorial model developed in one set of conditions adapt when circumstances change? The Breton case demonstrates limited evidence of endogenous change (a central tenet of discursive institutional-ism), though it does admit a continuing capacity to fi lter external pressures in a way that makes sense to regional actors. Analytically, the article develops territorial political capacity as a part material, part constructed framework that can be used for comparing regions at a particular point in time, as well as for capturing the evolution over time of a speci fi c region.


The audience response system (ARS) has increasingly been used to engage students by eliciting and analyzing responses to questions posed by instructors. The authors discuss how they used the system to facilitate pit market trading in a microeconomics class, report the efficacy of the approach and provide suggestions extending the use of ARS to other experiments. Using the ARS to facilitate active learning by engaging students in economics experiments has pedagogical advantages over both the labor-intensive approach of pencil-and-paper and the capital-intensive route of relying on networked or on-line computer labs which oftentimes preclude or restrict face-to-face student interactions. Thus, the new method represents an added advantage on top of such conventional functions as taking attendance and administering quizzes of this increasingly popular classroom technology.


Hydatid disease (HD) continues to be a significant health problem in areas where animal husbandry is common but no proper veterinary control exists. The involvement of the spleen in HD is rare, and isolated splenic involvement is even less common. In this case report, we present isolated splenic HD in a 26-year-old female with complaint of abdominal pain, and we discuss some of the clinical aspects of HD. Evaluation of the patient with ultrasonography, computed tomography, and magnetic resonance imaging revealed the presence of an isolated splenic HD as a multivesicular cystic mass located near splenic hilus, measuring 12 × 11 cm. No other organ or system involvement could be demonstrated.


This article is a comparative study of Dutch and German housing markets. Until the early 1990s, the two housing markets shared many commonalities, both in terms of their specific characteristics and the larger political, economic, and institutional contexts in which they were embedded. Since the 1990s, in contrast, the two housing markets have diverged significantly; with home ownership, mortgage debt and housing prices much higher in the Netherlands than Germany. We explain this divergence, first, by pointing out the more extensive turn to neoliberalism in housing policy in the Netherlands than in Germany. Second, we look at the differences in the treatment of private renting versus not-for-profit social housing by governments in each country. Third, we draw attention to mortgage liberalisation after 1993 in the Netherlands, which did not happen in Germany, and the treatment of fiscal subsidies for home ownership. This paper contributes to the debate on varieties of residential capitalism and stresses that housing patterns diverge even among countries with the same welfare state typologies and similar rental markets.


It has been found that anthocyanins were accumulated in Arabidopsis under drought or salt stress. In this study, such accumulation was found to be inhibited by external applied probenazole (3-allyloxy-1, 2-benzisothiazole-1,1-dioxide, PBZ), which is the active ingredient in oryzemate used for the protection of rice from Magnaporthe grisea (blast fungus). Microarray analysis indicated that expression of nine key genes in anthocyanins synthesis pathway was significantly repressed to about 4 folds lower by PBZ treatment. In transgenic Arabidopsis plants with a β-glucuronidase (GUS) reporter gene driven by a CaMV35S mini promoter combined with four salicylic acid-responsive elements, PBZ treatment resulted in increased expression of the GUS gene. When a salicylic acid (SA) synthesis mutant, sid2-2, and a SA signal transduction pathway mutant, npr-1, were treated with PBZ under the same drought condition, inhibition of anthocyanin accumulation was not observed. In addition, over-expression of NPR1 by CaMV35S promoter resulted in more inhibition on anthocyanins accumulation. Taken together, these results indicated that inhibition of anthocyanins accumulation by PBZ treatment is through SA and NPR1 signaling pathway in Arabidopsis . Key words: Probenazole, anthocyanins biosynthesis, isochorismate synthase 1, nonexpressor of pathogenesis-related genes 1.


Background : Vaginal discharge syndrome is a clinical condition characterized by leucorrhea, which can be caused by reproductive tract infections (RTIs). Three RTIs are referred to as vaginal infections: bacterial vaginosis (BV), trichomoniasis (TV), and vulvovaginal candidiasis (VVC). Vaginal infections are known to increase susceptibility to sexually transmitted infections, including HIV, and to be associated with low birth weight and premature birth. The prevalence and incidence of and risk factors for vaginal infections are not well-studied in many settings. Further, the aforementioned consequences of these infections are highly prevalent in many low-income settings, providing ample justification for additional inquiry into the diagnosis and risk factors of these vaginal infections. Methods : The Prerana dataset was collected as part of a prospective cohort study of 898 non-pregnant, reproductive-aged women living in and around Mysore, India between 2005 and 2006. The primary study objective was to evaluate the relationship between abnormal vaginal flora and the incidence of Herpes Simplex Virus - type 2 infection. Participants completed three study visits - conducted at baseline, and at three and six months - each of which involved an interviewer-administered questionnaire in Urdu or Kannada; a pelvic examination; and collection of vaginal and blood specimens for laboratory testing for reproductive tract infections.Analyses investigating separate research aims will be conducted over three papers, as follows: Paper 1: Bacterial vaginosis and risk of Trichomonas vaginalis infection, Paper 2: Epidemiologic features of vulvovaginal candidiasis, and Paper 3: Syndromic diagnosis of vaginal infections using logic regression. Discussion and significance : The Prerana cohort dataset is well-suited to filling in multiple gaps in the research literature. The analyses are among the first to test (or re-test) specific hypotheses concerning vaginal infection using a community-based sample based in a low-income setting. Paper 1 estimates the risk of Trichomonas vaginalis infection associated with the presence of bacterial vaginosis, which fills a conspicuous gap in the research literature. If susceptibility to Trichomonas vaginalis infection is found to be heightened among women with bacterial vaginosis, the burden of sexually transmitted infections attributable to bacterial vaginosis will increase dramatically, given that both conditions are highly prevalent. Next, paper 2 identifies factors associated with increased prevalence of vulvovaginal candidiasis, particularly with respect to the presence of vaginal Lactobacillus. If vulvovaginal candidiasis is associated with decreased presence of Lactobacillus, there will be support for identifying interventions to enhance the presence of Lactobacillus, such as with probiotics, after women are treated with antibiotics. Finally, paper 3 examines the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value of vaginal infections in this population using a World Health Organization diagnosis algorithm. Separate syndromic diagnosis models for vaginal infections are developed using logic regression, a machine-learning procedure; the models are evaluated for their diagnostic performance against laboratory-confirmed diagnoses of vaginal infections. Logic regression models offer the potential to improve upon the performance of the WHO algorithm, using parsimonious models which are easy to develop, comprehend, and implement in clinical facilities in low-income settings.


Linear induction motor (LIM) drives have been investigated vastly for the past several decades. Attractive features, such as simple structure and easy maintenance, have made this family of machines utilized broadly in military, transportation, and aerospace, to name a few. Up to nowadays, vector control is a dominant control strategy for LIM based on the assumption that this family of machines portray inherent similarities with their rotary counterparts. However, due to existence of end effects and magnetic asymmetry effects, conventional vector control can not provide its expected functionality for LIM. Therefore, a novel control strategy, dynamic maximum force control, is invented and presented in this paper. Compared with conventional vector control, the excitation frequencies are calculated through field reconstruction (FR) in the proposed control method. In addition, the amplitude of phase current is regulated indirectly through controlling the square of current amplitude. As a result, at any instant, maximum force production is guaranteed. The dynamic maximum force control has been validated by simulation study.


This paper investigates how the possibility of affecting group composition combined with the possibility of repeated interaction impacts cooperation within groups and surplus distribution. We developed and tested experimentally a Surplus Allocation Game where cooperation of four agents is needed to produce surplus, but only two have the power to allocate it among the group members. Three matching procedures (corresponding to three separate experimental treatments) were used to test the impact of the variables of interest. A total of 400 subjects participated in our research, which was computer-based and conducted in a laboratory. Our results show that allowing for repeated interaction with the same partners leads to a self-selection of agents into groups with different life spans, whose duration is correlated with the behavior of both distributors and receivers. While behavior at the group level is diverse for surplus allocation and amount of cooperation, aggregate behavior is instead similar when repeated interaction is allowed or not allowed. We developed a behavioral model that captures the dynamics observed in the experimental data and sheds light into the rationales that drive the agents' individual behavior, suggesting that the most generous distributors are those acting for fear of rejection, not for true generosity, while the groups lasting the longest are those composed by this type of distributors and "undemanding" receivers.


This paper reports on a technique for specihing concurrent systems by wing a formal specification language with reflective computation mechanism. W e call the specifications written by a reflective language re-dective specifications. Our reflective language is an enhanced version of LOTOS (Language of Temporal Ordering Specification). We embedded reflection or reflective computation. facilities to behaviour specification part of LOTOS in order to define complex behaviour in simple and natural way. Reflection in a program is a mechanism to access and modifg its execution states which its ezecutor has. Our enhanced version of LOTOS is called RLOTOS, and has two level architecture object level and meta level. The processes in the meta level, called nieta processes, have the computational information and interpret the behaviour ezpressiow of their object level processes. W e can define meta processes in the same manner a8 LO-TOS processes to control the behaviour of the object level processes. In this paper, uie present a case study of specifying an operating system by using RLOTOS. Furthermore we discuss the method to construct comprehensive formal specij$cation,p by uring reflective languages and explore the applicability of the reflective language to formal specification. The essential point of comprehensiveness is that the meta properties of the system such as control characteristics can be specified separately from the object level properties.


These three scholars met during the First International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry (QI) in 2005 when they were put on a panel together for autoethnography. They understand QI as a space of compassionate scholarship. In their text, they allude to Norman Denzin's performance of compassion and his intellectual dream that, accurately, has generated not only the beginning but, more importantly, the continuation and development of such a space. The authors understand their work at QI as personally and politically transformational, allowing a continual critical engagement of how meaning is made in contexts with others. Using their own journeys at QI as the theorizing tool, they conceptualize QI as a radicalizing space of pedagogy and scholarship.


This paper studies mortgage contract choices in US history using a first-of-its-kind sample of residential loans from 1930 and 1940, linked to the decennial censuses. Contract choices reflected borrowers' reactions to the risks posed by different contracts. The majority of borrowers chose contracts with the longest available terms, despite required frequent amortization, likely in order to avoid refinancing risk and to maximize leverage. In contrast, the most creditworthy borrowers with high socioeconomic status preferred short-term contracts, confident that they could refinance at will. The combination of short terms and frequent amortization was unpopular, used disproportionately by the least creditworthy. Between 1930 and 1940, contract use shifted toward longer term contracts, reflecting the advent of federal involvement in the residential mortgage market.


Paracetamol is the most widely drug involved in accidental paediatric exposures and deliberate self-poisoning cases because of its availability. N-acetyl cystein is the main treatment for this poisoning. We report a case of a 24-year-old Arab female who has deliberately ingested 100 tablets of 500 mg paracetamol each (50g). Her first examination was normal. She has received oral N-acetyl cystein (NAC) 6 hours after the ingestion. Serum paracetamol level done 18 hours post ingestion was 900 mg/l. On review the next days, she did not develop any symptoms of liver failure. However, due to the massive paracetamol ingestion associated with high serum paracetamol levels, oral NAC was continued for 3 days. The patient was discharged well on the fifth day of hospitalization. Our patient has ingested one of the highest paracetamol overdose (50g) with the highest paracetamol blood levels ever reported in medical literature. She was treated, six hours after ingestion, with oral NAC for 3 days without any side effects.


Various means such as throttles, flow regulators, variable displacement hydraulic machines, etc. are used for the flow regulation and control in the complex hydraulic systems. One of the functions, which often fall on a hydraulic drive, is speed stabilization of operating parts at variable load. For this purpose flow regulators or hydraulic drives with variable displacement pumps and hydraulic motors may be used. This study deals with a task concerning the regulatory control of the hydraulic motor speed by using a positive displacement flow divider with variable displacement sections. Two different ways used for the connection of the flow divider into the hydraulic system and the possible methods for the control of the variable displacement of its sections have been considered and the control algorithms and operating factors have been developed.


Background. Delay to timely healthcare contributes to high maternal mortality and morbidity in developing countries. The so-called 'Three delays' model has been used extensively to investigate factors relating to maternal mortality.  Objective. To investigate factors associated with delayed emergency obstetric care in Arsi Zone, Ethiopia.  Methods. A cross-sectional study was conducted across 10 public health facilities in Arsi Zone, Ethiopia. The required sample size was calculated as 847, with the number of participants required at each facility determined proportionally.  Results. Data from 775 respondents were used in the analysis. Approximately a quarter of respondents ( n =203; 26.2%) reported a delayed decision to seek emergency obstetric care. The mean time for delay was 90 minutes (range 30 minutes - 18 hours). Maternal age, educational level, monthly household income and antenatal visits were significant predictors of this first maternal delay. Close to a third of the respondents ( n =234; 30.2%) reported a transport-related delay in reaching a healthcare facility; some respondents walked at least 30 minutes to reach the facility. Approximately a quarter of respondents ( n =198; 25.5%) reported that they did not receive timely care after arriving at the healthcare facility. The mean delay was 42.3 minutes.  Conclusion. The most common delay was related to difficulty in reaching the healthcare facility. In approximately half of the cases, the woman's husband took the decision to access medical care. This suggests limited independent decision-making power of women in this context. Such factors should be considered in efforts to reduce maternal morbidity and mortality.