In recent years, two inextricably connected issues have received a great deal of attention in both United States political discourse and in the legal academic literature. One issue of intense legal debate and frustration has been that of judicial recusal, including an examination of the appropriate standards that should necessarily apply to judges that seem conflicted or biased in their role as neutral arbiter. A second issue that has spawned heated commentary and great dispute over the past decade is that of campaign finance law, including examination of the role that powerful and wealthy benefactors play in American electioneering. Both issues came to a head in the past year as the United States Supreme Court decided two landmark cases that will have far-reaching implications and consequences, Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal and Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The moment that these decisions were announced, their connection undoubtedly crystallized for many observers. As Caperton and Citizens United shed new light on judicial recusal and campaign finance in an interconnected manner, Professor Michael LeRoy delivers an important empirical study, "Partisan Election of Judges: Equal Justice?" that provides evidence that we as a nation have reason to fear this potentially pernicious interconnectedness. In a confluence of circumstance, what has been historically controversial, now puts in present peril the concept of "justice" and whether it can be "equal" in United States courts. Citizens United, Caperton v. Massey and "Partisan Election of Judges: Equal Justice?" together pose a troubling question: will judges who are elected in a partisan manner, where corporations can now more directly influence the result of judicial elections by contributing large cash electioneering outflows, manufacture outcomes that are biased toward those contributing corporations? The early returns are not good. That is to say, contemporary empirical evidence suggests that the answer to the inquiry posed above is "yes." Apparently partisan elected judges are unable to sit neutrally when large corporate expenditure ushered them to the bench. Or stated differently, when corporations are able to manipulate the judicial election process through significant cash disbursement, a judge that is unfriendly, if not hostile, to employee rights will be the likely result. The Supreme Court's decisions in Citizens United and Caperton stand poised to exacerbate this disheartening empirical implication.This Essay seeks to make sense of this confluence of Supreme Court decision making and recent empirical evidence. In examining this intermingling and its potential repercussions, Part II briefly considers several of the more disquieting of Professor LeRoy's findings in Partisan Election of Judges: Equal Justice? Part III reviews the holding of the controversial Citizens United in light of LeRoy's empirical report. Part IV examines the Caperton v. Massey decision, and queries whether it will have any protective influence in connection with corporate influence over the partisan judicial election process. Part V interrogates the consequences of LeRoy's study, Citizens United and Caperton, viewing each through a corporate law prism and seeks to offer forward looking conclusions and recommendations.


Business ethicists have written much about ethical issues in employment. Except for a handful of articles on the very high pay of chief executive officers and the very low pay of workers in overseas sweatshops, however, little has been written about the ethics of compensation. This is prima facie strange. Workers care about their pay, and they think about it in normative terms. This article's purpose is to consider whether business ethicists' neglect of the normative aspects of compensation is justified. I examine several possible justifications for neglecting compensation and show that they fail. What remains is a case for thinking that it is worthy of normative analysis.


University students are experiencing a mental health crisis across the world. COVID-19 has exacerbated this situation. We have conducted a survey among university students in two universities in Lebanon to gauge mental health challenges experienced by students. We constructed a machine learning approach to predict anxiety symptoms among the sample of 329 respondents based on student survey items including demographics and self-rated health. Five algorithms including logistic regression, multi-layer perceptron (MLP) neural network, support vector machine (SVM), random forest (RF) and XGBoost were used to predict anxiety. Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) provided the highest performing model AUC score (AUC=80.70%) and self-rated health was found to be the top ranked feature to predict anxiety. Future work will focus on using data augmentation approaches and extending to multi-class anxiety predictions. Multidisciplinary research is crucial in this emerging field.


This paper develops a new error concealment algorithm for the whole-frame losses in wireless video transmission based on H.264/AVC. At first, we propose a forward motion vector extrapolation algorithm based on variable-size block motion vector estimation to obtain the motion vector field of the loss frame without yielding the hole problems. Then, we partition the missing frame into several object regions by clustering the motion vectors, furthermore, we apply median filter to reconstruct the motion vectors for hole areas based on the reliabilities of neighboring motion vectors. Finally, all macroblocks in the lost frame are estimated by using the extrapolated motion vectors. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithm provides better image quality than conventional methods both objectively and subjectively.


A spherical polyhedron constructed from open surface polygons is an electromagnetic wave resonator that can be excited by an external plane wave. The resonant frequencies of the porous sphere depend on the radius of the sphere and the area of the openings in the surface of the sphere. The strength of the internal electric fields varies with the width of the conducting edges that comprise the polyhedron frame. At the optimum edge width, the external EM wave field excites the strongest internal field amplitudes. The WIPL-D EM simulation model is used to determine the optimum porous resonator for polyhedrons with 180 and 960 vertices. All of the cavity modes for a solid spherical cavity resonator can be excited in the porous spherical cavity resonator (PSCR). With a high resonator Q, an EM plane-wave of 1 V/m can excite an internal electric field of over 1000 V/m that takes finite time for fields to build up. The spherical cavity modes provide a variety of electric field distributions at the interior of the PSCR. The PSCR may be used to greatly increase the electric fields of a high power radio beam in order to produce isolated plasma clouds by neutral gas breakdown.


Mithraism and Zoroastrianism, the ancient Iranian religions, are rooted in the culture of this country; consequently, their reflections are vividly evident in Persian literature. The prominent Iranian poet Nizami Ganjavi utilized these cults allegorically and symbolically in his two prominent versified stories of Haft Paikar, and Khosro and Shirin. This paper aims at discussing the primary samples of allegorical and symbolic uses in Nizami's Haft Paikar, a number of which are as follows: Bahram in his multiple aspects as the name of a deity in Mithraism and a king in Zoroastrianism; the frequent use of Gonbad standing for the fire temple in the story; Seven Palaces for seven Princesses; seven as a significant number in Mithraism and Zoroastrianism; the comparison of the seven princesses' portraits on the Khovarnagh palace ceiling with the seven stars on Mithraic temples; and finally an analogy between Bahram's passage from the first Gonbad to the seventh in Nizami's story with the initiation rituals of going through seven steps in Mithraic tradition


This work deals with the creation of a sinkholes database for the Jordanian coast of the Dead Sea, Ghor Al Haditha area. Ground collapses inventories were carried out between 1991 and 2012. The lineament is replaced and analyzed in its structural setting at regional and local scales. Its direction (N 24 E) is sub-parallel to the ones displayed by most published focal mechanisms in that zone especially the one associated to the 23rd April 1979 earthquake (Mb = 5.1; N 20 E - 5 deg, Arieh et al 1982), which is representative of all focal mechanisms calculated on a fault plane compatible with the general direction of the Jordan - Dead Sea Transform fault system for the east coast of the Dead Sea area.
The alignment of sinkholes is constituted by thirteen minor linear segments separated by as many empty spaces. Their organization suggests the existence of a rotational effect caused by stress between two parallel strike-slip faults. Four minor linear units present an en-echelon arrangement from which one can deduce the presence of a local extensional stress field. In this context, sinkholes locations provide information of subsurface discontinuities interpreted as hidden fractures.


Many types of paper documentation are employed on the flight-deck. They range from a simple checklist card to a bulky Aircraft Flight Manual (AFM). Some of these documentations have typographical and graphical deficiencies; yet, many cockpit tasks such as conducting checklists, way-point entry, limitations and performance calculations, and many more, require the use of these documents. Moreover, during emergency and abnormal situations, the flight crews' effectiveness in combating the situation is highly dependent on such documentation; accessing and reading procedures has a significant impact on flight safety. Although flight-deck documentation are an important (and sometimes critical) form of display in the modern cockpit, there is a dearth of information on how to effectively design these displays. The object of this report is to provide a summary of the available literature regarding the design and typographical aspects of printed matter. The report attempts 'to bridge' the gap between basic research about typography, and the kind of information needed by designers of flight-deck documentation. The report focuses on typographical factors such as type-faces, character height, use of lower- and upper-case characters, line length, and spacing. Some graphical aspects such as layout, color coding, fonts, and character contrast are also discussed. In addition, several aspects of cockpit reading conditions such as glare, angular alignment, and paper quality are addressed. Finally, a list of recommendations for the graphical design of flight-deck documentation is provided.


The RNA binding protein Arid5a augments both mRNA stability and translation to promote cellular responses to IL-17. Stabilizing the IL-17 response The inflammatory cytokine IL-17 can stimulate both antifungal host defense and autoimmunity by promoting the stability of target mRNAs (see the Focus by Puel and Casanova). Amatya et al. found that IL-17 increased the abundance of the RNA binding protein Arid5a in mouse cells. Loss of Arid5a decreased the cellular response to IL-17 by reducing the mRNA stability of a selection of IL-17–stimulated transcripts. For others, Arid5a instead interacted with the translation initiation factor eIF4G to augment their translation. Thus, Arid5a uses multiple posttranscriptional mechanisms to enhance IL-17 signaling. Interleukin-17A (IL-17A) not only stimulates immunity to fungal pathogens but also contributes to autoimmune pathology. IL-17 is only a modest activator of transcription in experimental tissue culture settings. However, IL-17 controls posttranscriptional events that enhance the expression of target mRNAs. Here, we showed that the RNA binding protein (RBP) Arid5a (AT-rich interactive domain-containing protein 5a) integrated multiple IL-17–driven signaling pathways through posttranscriptional control of mRNA. IL-17 induced expression of Arid5a, which was recruited to the adaptor TRAF2. Arid5a stabilized IL-17–induced cytokine transcripts by binding to their 3′ untranslated regions and also counteracted mRNA degradation mediated by the endoribonuclease MCPIP1 (Regnase-1). Arid5a inducibly associated with the eukaryotic translation initiation complex and facilitated the translation of the transcription factors (TFs) IκBζ (Nfkbiz ) and C/EBPβ (Cebpb). These TFs in turn transactivated IL-17–dependent promoters. Together, these data indicated that Arid5a orchestrates a feed-forward amplification loop, which promoted IL-17 signaling by controlling mRNA stability and translation.


Attalea speciosa Mart. ex Spreng (baba?u) is a palm tree of considerable economic
importance in Brazil, especially in the northeast portion of the country. The
myxobiota of baba?u was studied by examining living and dead trunks, leaves,
inflorescences and fallen fruits on the ground during the wet season at the
Teresina Park, Piaui State, Brazil. Taxonomic diversity, species diversity,
frequency of occurrence, abundance and constancy of each species were
determined in two areas of deciduous mixed forest. The taxonomic diversity of
the myxobiota was similar, with values of 1.5 and 1.6 for the two areas. The
highest frequency of occurrence value was recorded for the spathe (50% -54%),
followed by the petiole (18% -19%) and leaf sheath (4% -19%).
Myxomycetes were absent on fallen fruits and rare on the leaf blade (6%) and
dead (9%) or living (2%) trunks. Hemitrichia serpula (Scop.) Rostaf. ex Lister, Perichaena depressa Lib., Arcyria cinerea (Bull.) Pers. and H. calyculata (Speg.) M. L. Farr were the species characterized by the highest levels of constancy,
abundance and frequency. Cribraria
microcarpa (Schrad.) Pers. and Stemonitopsis
typhina (F. H. Wigg.) Nann.-Bremek. were occasionally present. Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa (Mull.) T.
Macbr., Clastoderma debaryanum A.
Blytt, Craterium aureum (Schumach.)
Rostaf. and Physarum melleum (Berk.
& Broome) Massee were infrequently encountered. Other species recorded were Arcyria denudata (L.) Wettst., Cribraria cancellata (Batsch.)
Nann.-Bremek., C. violacea Rex, Lycogala exiguum Morgan, Metatrichia vesparia (Batsch) Nann.-Bremek.
ex G. W. Martin, Physarum bogoriense Racib., P. nucleatum Rex, P. pusillum (Berk. & M. A. Curtis)
G. Lister and Stemonitis axifera (Bull.) T. Macbr. The myxobiota of the shaded study area was characterized by a
higher diversity (6.10) than the unshaded area (2.10), and the incidence of
myxomycetes on the A. speciosa trees
selected for study was appreciably higher (100% and 40%, respectively).


Regulatory T cells (Tregs) are important for the attenuation of immune reactions. During viral CNS infections, however, an indiscriminate maintenance of CNS immune privilege through Treg-mediated negative regulation could prevent autoimmune sequelae but impair the control of viral replication. We analyzed in this study the impact of Tregs on the development of acute viral encephalomyelitis, T cell-mediated antiviral protection, and prevention of CNS autoimmunity following intranasal infection with the gliatropic mouse hepatitis virus strain A59. To assess the contribution of Tregs in vivo, we specifically depleted CD4+Foxp3+ T cells in a diphtheria toxin-dependent manner. We found that depletion of Tregs had no impact on viral distribution and clearance and did not significantly alter virus-specific CD4+ and CD8+ T cell responses. However, Treg depletion led to a more severe CNS inflammation associated with neuronal damage. Dissection of the underlying immunopathological mechanisms revealed the elaborate Treg-dependent regulation of self-reactive CD4+ T cell proliferation within the CNS-draining lymph node and downtuning of CXCR3 expression on T cells. Taken together, these results suggest that Tregs preserve CNS immune privilege through selective control of CNS-specific Th cells while keeping protective antiviral immunity fully operative.


In recent years, numerous reports have described the diverse roles of the CD40-CD40 ligand receptor-ligand pair. The interaction of these two cell-surface molecules regulates both humoral and cell-mediated immune functions. Because the CD40 ligand is known to be highly expressed on the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients, and because activated helper T cells expressing CD40 ligand have been found in the brain sections of MS patients, but not in those of normal controls, the protein is believed to be involved in MS development. We studied the influence of a polymorphic dinucleotide-repeat marker located in the 3' untranslated region of the X-linked gene encoding CD40 ligand (CD40LG) on susceptibility to and disease severity in MS. From a total cohort of 771 Nordic definite-MS patients, the most (n = 92) and least (n = 90) disabled octiles, as well as random samples of intermediately disabled males (n = 119) and females (n = 121), were genotyped; 135 ethnically matched healthy subjects were used as controls. In addition, the effect of the polymorphism on CD40 ligand mRNA expression was assessed using PBMC from 54 MS patients and 22 controls. The phenotype frequencies for the CD40LG marker did not differ significantly between gender-conditioned intermediate-MS subgroups and controls, or between gender-conditioned disability octiles. Nor did the polymorphism appear to exert any significant effect on mRNA expression in either patients or controls.


Every conflict brings its refugees, but the wars of the twentieth century produced population movements on a new scale. The peace of these wars was almost as bad as the fighting: for every border re-drawn, every treaty signed, millions shifted. They shift still. Traumatic testimony has long been the life-writing genre of choice for those wanting to give voice to the dispossessed. But can trauma really capture the complexity of this territorial violence? There are many ways of moving across a border, or, as is the case for millions today, living on a border. In his 1976 essay, 'The Borderline Concept', the psychoanalyst, André Green wrote: 'I can be a citizen or heimatlos (homeless), but to "be" borderline – that is difficult for me to imagine'. This article takes Green's writing on the borderline as a starting point for reflecting on the condition of statelessness. For Green, to think seriously about the borderline is to risk an imagination adequate to its shifting geographies – frequently, he compares the task of imagining borderline states to the writing and reading of poetry. How might we describe a poetry of the borderline? And how might such descriptions help us think again about the geographies of modern writing? The second part of this article turns to two poets from different ends of the same history of exile and displacement: Auden, whose voluntary 1939 departure from England coincided with the first convulsions of national frontiers in Europe, its colonies, protectorates and mandates, and the Oxford-based Palestinian, Yousif M. Qasmiyeh, whose writing captures the reality of borderline existence with a particular clarity.


The principal characteristics of the investigations into the mechanisms of gunshot injuries are considered. The general and peculiar features of gunshot fractures and the pathological processes underlying them are discussed. The theory of bullet impact effect put forward by the Russian surgeons in the late XIXth century is verified. The explanation is proposed for the physical nature of direct and side impacts and the phenomenon of a temporary oscillating cavity from the standpoint of the theory of bullet impact effect. The new forensic medical criteria for the gunshot origin of an injury have been developed that allow the gunshot distance and the geometric characteristics of the bullet to be determined. A methodological basis for the determination of the long-range gunshot distance has been created. The results of the present study may be of interest for criminal lawyers and military specialists.


This paper proposes a signal classification technique that is able to differentiate between TV signals and other secondary signals that might be using the licensed TV channels. The main contribution of this work is to combine the results of two, existing, sensing algorithms, Energy Detection Method and Correlation Based Method using a Fuzzy Inference Fusion system to decide whether the sensed signal-if any-is a licensed (TV) signal or an unlicensed signal. This work shows capability of signal classification in case of analog TV signal (PAL) and digital TV signal (DVB-T). Performance evaluation of the proposed approach using MATLAB has proven accurate classification capability at relatively low Signal to Noise Ratio.


Even if from King Abdullah on down, Jordanian officials pride themselves on a better human rights record than their neighbours, the kingdom has barely advanced rights protections over the past decade, and their issue continues to be a matter of concern for many in and outside of the country. This work represents the culmination of a research project aiming to provide instruments which allow for the evaluation of the actions undertaken in Jordan, in order to promote human rights respect and, then, human development. In the course of fieldwork in Jordan, information was collected by interviewing, in each Jordanian governorate, international and local organizations engaged in different fields of human rights; afterwards, the data were processed so to obtain synthetic measures. The result was a set of six meaningful indicators (pertaining to the human rights dimensions of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, electoral self determination, freedom of movement, freedom of association and workers' rights), aggregated into a final composite index. Such multidimensional indicators – inspired by the CIRI Empowerment Rights Index -allow for a comparison among the levels of fulfilment of human rights achieved by different geographic areas in the country and facilitate the suggestion of public policies useful for the complementary promotion of human rights and human development in the country.


This report suggests a replacement of the existing Ad-hoc On Demand Distance
 Vector routing protocol on the SunSPOT (v. 4 Blue release) with
 an improved protocol, suitable for a dynamic wireless sensor network. One
 of the characteristic features in the improved protocol is the possibility for
 multipathing. This enables a message to be sent over more than one route
 to a sink. Furthermore, this feature will eliminate the necessity for acknowledgements
 in a network, which will reduce the traffic in the network
 tremendously. Also noticable, is the fact that a single node in the network
 has no longer knowledge of the rest of the network, but only of its own
 neighbours. This protocol is especially well suited for the purpose described
 in this project, namely sending data from multiple sources to a single sink.
 Besides the protocol, an intelligent application has been developed for each
 SunSPOT, making it capable of compressing data when necessary. Additionally,
 the data can be sent as serialized objects, which makes the handling
 of data much easier.
 An initial consideration upon a service oriented architecture approach has
 been made, and some services have been developed.
 A GUI has been developed to make the user able to monitor and control the
 network and the received data. It is also possible to analyse the received
 data.
 The usability of the protocol and the application has been thoroughly tested
 on the SunSPOTs, both with and without the use of GUI.
 A future use of this application could be for monitoring animals and their
 behaviour, since this would be a dynamic network where a sink might not
 always be accessible and data may have to be compressed or routed in an
 intelligent way.


Background Studies suggest that the most common type of nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is WHO-3, which is strongly associated with Epstein-Barr virus (EBV).
Objective To assess NPC patient characteristics in a national general referral hospital in Indonesia, with regards to EBV DNA load and treatment response.
Methods Twenty-three pediatric patients diagnosed with NPC were included in the study. Data collected were history, physical examination, tissue biopsy, CT scan, staging and EBV DNA load from nasopharyngeal (NP) brushing as well as blood specimens. The NP brushing, blood specimens and CT scan evaluations were done two months post-treatment.
Results Pediatric patients with symptoms such as  blood tinged secretion, lymph node enlargement, and nasal congestion were more likely to have higher EBV DNA loads in their NP brushings (P<0.05) (including T3 and higher). Despite significant reduction of EBV DNA load in NP brushing post-treatment, it was not associated with treatment response, as evaluated by CT scan.
Conclusion Higher DNA load from NP brushings is associated with a higher tumor stage. Larger sample size and follow-up data are needed to assess the usefulness of EBV DNA load assessment in pediatric patients.


In this monograph the properties of the anaphoric expressions found in Peranakan (ethnically Chinese) Javanese as spoken in the city of Semarang are examined. This is the first detailed study of Peranakan Javanese and the first monograph-length examination of anaphora in an Indonesian language. Three types of anaphoric expressions in Peranakan are discussed, true reflexives "pseudo-reflexives" and pronouns. It is shown that the distribution of true reflexives and pronouns conforms to Conditions A and B of the Binding Theory (Chomsky 1981). The third type of anaphoric expression, the pseudo-reflexive, however, appears to constitute a problematic case for the Binding Theory. Various analyses to account for the peculiar distribution of pseudo-reflexives in Peranakan are considered and it is concluded that pseudoreflexives are anaphoric forms that are neither pronouns nor reflexives. The distribution of anaphoric expressions in passives, ditransitives, and the sing-construction (relative clauses) is then examined, and analyses for various complications in the binding properties exhibited in these constructions are proposed. Although a semantically-based analysis appears on initial examination to account for the puzzling behavior of anaphoric expressions in the three constructions, it is shown that such an analysis is less adequate than an analysis based on a combination of c-command and semantics. In addition, the use of anaphoric expressions for non-local coreference is examined. The final chapter of the monograph is devoted to comparing anaphoric expressions used in Peranakan and those used in the Javanese variety spoken by Pribumi (ethnically Javanese) speakers. A markedly different anaphoric system is found in the language of Pribumi speakers.


The applications of the stereology in Neuroscience have been improved by the recent advances in the precision of stereological estimates. Here we make a comparision between two methods of estimating the coefficients of error. The new formula described by Cruz-Orive (1999) incorporate the local or "nugget" effect in addition to the error due to the sections. The estimations derived from this formula are more precise in comparision with the previous formula described by Gundersen and Jensen (1987).


Extraction of rutin from Ruta graveolens L. leaves was performed in choline chloride based deep eutectic solvents (DESs). Firstly, rutin extraction was performed in five different DESs ; pure DESs and with different amounts of water added (25% and 50% v/v), for different times (1h, 3h and 6h) in order to find the best DES for further optimization. Choline chloride plus citric acid (1:1) was shown to be best DES and optimization of rutin extraction was performed using response surface methodology (RSM) based on the selected solvent and applying different extraction parameters: extraction time, temperature and water content. The rutin content was determined by HPLC and varied from 0.55 g/100 g of plant to 1.81 g/100 g of plant depending on the applied conditions. The best conditions for rutin extraction were found to be: a temperature of 70°C, an extraction time of 52 min and a water content of 27% for the extraction of 1.88g /100 g plant.


Social networking sites are extremely popular online destinations that offer users easy ways to build and maintain relationships with each other, and to disseminate information in an activity referred to as social networking. Students, lecturers, teachers, parents and businesses, in increasing numbers, use tools available on social networking sites to communicate with each other in a fast and cost-effective manner. The use of social networking sites to support educational initiatives has received much attention. However, the full potential of social network sites has yet to be achieved as users continue to strive for optimal ways of using these sites, as well as battle to overcome the negative characteristics (for example, privacy, security, governance, user behaviour, information quality) of these sites. This paper proposes factors for successful use of social networking sites in higher educational institutions. These success factors need to be adopted by users in order to develop the positive aspects of social networking, while at the same time mitigating the negative characteristics. An initial set of factors for successful use of social networking sites, as well as measures to test successful use of social networking sites were derived from the literature. These factors were tested by means of an online survey of students at a university, the results of which informed the final factors for successful use of social networking sites. The factors enable users to overcome the negative characteristics associated with social networking sites. If used successfully, social networking sites can offer lecturers and students a useful tool with which to develop their relationship and contribute to their learning experience.


In this paper, we propose an approach to real-time haptic interaction based on the concept of simulating the constraining propertes of space. Research on haptic interaction has been conducted from the points of view of both surface and volume rendering. Most approaches to surface renderingsuch as the constraint-based god-object method, the point-based approach, and the virtual proxy approachhave dealt only with the interaction with an object surface. Whereas, in volume rendering approaches, algorithms for representing volume data through interactions in space have been investigated. Our approach provides a framework for the representation of haptic interaction with both surface and space. We discretize the space using a tetrahedral cell mesh and associate a constraining property with each cell. The interaction of the haptic interface points with a volume is simulated using the constraining properties of the cells occupied by this volume. We implemented a fast computation algorithm that works at a haptic rate. The algorithm is robust in that any sudden or quick motion of the user does not disturb the computation, and the computation time for each cycle is independent of the complexity of the model as a whole. To demonstrate the performance of the proposed method, we present experimental results on the interaction with models of varying complexity. Also, we discuss some problems that need to be solved in future work.


The aim of this work is to explain how to apply perceptual concepts to define a perceptual pre-quantizer and to improve JPEG2000 compressor.The approach consists in quantizing wavelet transform coefficients using some of the human visual system behavior properties. Noise is fatal to image compression performance, because it can be both annoying for the observer and consumes excessive bandwidth when the imagery is transmitted. Perceptual prequantization reduces unperceivable details and thus improve both visual impression and transmission properties. The comparison between JPEG2000 without and with perceptual pre-quantization shows that the latter is not favorable in PSNR, but the recovered image is more compressed at the same or even better visual quality measured with a weighted PSNR. Perceptual criteria were taken from the CIWaM (Chromatic Induction Wavelet Model).


The intraerythrocytic malaria parasite constructs an intracellular haem crystal, called haemozoin, within an acidic digestive vacuole where haemoglobin is degraded. Haem crystallization is the target of the widely used antimalarial quinoline drugs. The intracellular mechanism of molecular initiation of haem crystallization, whether by proteins, polar membrane lipids or by neutral lipids, has not been fully substantiated. In the present study, we show neutral lipid predominant nanospheres, which envelop haemozoin inside Plasmodium falciparum digestive vacuoles. Subcellular fractionation of parasite-derived haemozoin through a dense 1.7 M sucrose cushion identifies monoacylglycerol and diacylglycerol neutral lipids as well as some polar lipids in close association with the purified haemozoin. Global MS lipidomics detects monopalmitic glycerol and monostearic glycerol, but not mono-oleic glycerol, closely associated with haemozoin. The complex neutral lipid mixture rapidly initiates haem crystallization, with reversible pH-dependent quinoline inhibition associated with quinoline entry into the neutral lipid microenvironment. Neutral lipid nanospheres both enable haem crystallization in the presence of high globin concentrations and protect haem from H2O2 degradation. Conceptually, the present study shifts the intracellular microenvironment of haem crystallization and quinoline inhibition from a polar aqueous location to a non-polar neutral lipid nanosphere able to exclude water for efficient haem crystallization.


The increasingly widespread use of the Global Positioning System (GPS) in determining the location of vehicles raises the possibility of using the information provided by GPS for vehicle control purposes. The use of a multi-antenna GPS system provides the ability to measure not only position and velocity, but vehicle heading and sideslip as well. This paper presents a validation of a GPS based system with an automotive grade two-axis optical sensor. The results show excellent agreement between the two sensor systems, confirming the accuracy of the GPS based system even in highly dynamic situations. Although any GPS based system is subject to dropouts from driving under trees and bridges, cornering stiffness estimates obtained when GPS is available enable construction of a vehicle state observer for use in the absence of GPS.© 2005 ASME


Online accountability is increasingly becoming a critical issue in contemporary debates over creating more open and transparent organizations. Broadly defined, online accountability refers to the extent that an organization discloses financial and performance data on the organization's Website, and the level of stakeholder interaction supported by the organization's Website. Online accountability is positively correlated with outcome metrics such as organizational success, increased charitable contributions, and enhanced public trust. However, our understanding of the determinants of online accountability is limited. Informed by organizational ecology theory, this research-in-progress seeks to enhance our understanding of this key issue by developing and testing a model of the determinants of online accountability. Our preliminary analysis of secondary data on a regional population of 653 organizations in the Northeast United States revealed that only 12.09% of the organizations have implemented online accountability. We argue that organizations that fail to implement online accountability measures can negatively impact their chances of survival in complex and uncertain environments.


PURPOSE
Studies of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) often involve persons with both choroidal neovascularization and geographic atrophy (GA), but few genome-wide scans (GWSs) have discriminated between these two outcomes.

METHODS
To comprehend the role of pigmentary abnormalities (PA) and GA in AMD, the authors analyzed the data from a previous GWS on AMD (FARMS [Family Age-Related Maculopathy Study]sample of 34 extended families) looking only at PA. Presented are new GWS data from the full Beaver Dam Eye Study (BDES) family cohort, including longitudinal data at baseline and 5- and 10-year follow-up. A linkage analysis for PA/GA was performed on both samples for 338 markers covering all autosomes. Another linkage analysis using the rate of change along the PA/GA scale was performed with the BDES sample.

RESULTS
Analysis of the FARMS sample provided evidence for linkage with P < 0.01 in the 1q25, 5p13, 6q21-23, and 11q14 regions. The most significant peak was found on chromosome 1, near complement factor H (CFH), with P= 6.20 x 10(-4). Analysis using the rate of change in BDES replicated the peaks in 5p13 and 6q21-23, suggesting that these loci may contribute to the rate of progression of PA/GA. Association analysis of CFH polymorphisms suggest that CFH may play a role in the development of pigmentary abnormalities and may modify the progression along the PA/GA scale.

CONCLUSIONS
These findings suggest a complex, heterogeneous model for PA/GA.


The Arab Spring was a period of great transition in the Middle East and North Africa, when people in many nations united in protest against their oppressive and tyrannical governments. In February 2011, the Libyan people filled their city streets in peaceful demonstrations against Muammar Gaddafi's regime. Attempting to quell the dissent, the Gaddafi regime allegedly engaged in a systematic campaign of violence against the dissidents. These attacks escalated into a full-fledged civil war, triggering United Nations intervention to protect civilians. In response to the Gaddafi regime's attacks on civilians, the UN Security Council passed a resolution referring the alleged human rights abuses to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for prosecution. This Comment explores the effect of the warrant, the ICC's complementary jurisdiction over the matter, and argues that both Libyan and ICC officials should be instrumental in trying the accused members of the Gaddafi regime.


Nationwide, over seven million students are chronically absent from school each year, impacting academic success and future job earnings. Latinx high school students have among the highest absentee rates across all racial groups. Using critical sensemaking theory, this qualitative case study examines how school, district, and community leaders make sense of chronic absenteeism in their diversifying local high school. This study is situated in Hensonville Secondary School (a pseudonym), a small, rural high school in Iowa serving a predominantly Latinx student body. Findings reveal that persistent deficit narratives placed upon Latinx and/or low-income students drive the perception of absentee students as "others" that do not fit the expectations of the educational leaders or of the broader community. Power and privilege in the district were evident as white educational leaders blamed Latinx students and those from low-income backgrounds for chronic absenteeism while minimizing the institutional and contextual factors that may be contributing to low student attendance. Collaborative partnerships are increasingly being used to address chronic absenteeism, and we also investigate these efforts in Hensonville. white educational leaders in diversifying rural communities, and the leadership preparation programs educating these future leaders, must rely on culturally relevant/responsive strategies in order to best support their students and reduce chronic absenteeism.


Multiple Additive Regression Trees (MART), an ensemble model of boosted regression trees, is known to deliver high prediction accuracy for diverse tasks, and it is widely used in practice. However, it suffers an issue which we call over-specialization, wherein trees added at later iterations tend to impact the prediction of only a few instances, and make negligible contribution towards the remaining instances. This negatively affects the performance of the model on unseen data, and also makes the model over-sensitive to the contributions of the few, initially added tress. We show that the commonly used tool to address this issue, that of shrinkage, alleviates the problem only to a certain extent and the fundamental issue of over-specialization still remains. In this work, we explore a different approach to address the problem that of employing dropouts, a tool that has been recently proposed in the context of learning deep neural networks. We propose a novel way of employing dropouts in MART, resulting in the DART algorithm. We evaluate DART on ranking, regression and classification tasks, using large scale, publicly available datasets, and show that DART outperforms MART in each of the tasks, with a significant margin. We also show that DART overcomes the issue of over-specialization to a considerable extent.


P++ is a programming language that supports the GenVoca model, a particular style of software design that is intended for building software system generators. P++ is an enhanced version of C++: it offers linguistic extensions for component encapsulation, abstraction, parameterization, and inheritance, where a component is a suite of interrelated classes and functions. This paper describes the motivations for P++, the ideas which underlie its design, the syntax and features of the language, and related areas of research.


Analysis of the data returned from the three Rice lunar surface Suprathermal Ion Detector Experiments (Side) has shown that the boundary layer and plasma mantle observed near the earth extend to the lunar orbit as an extensive region of antisunward plasma flow occupying a major portion of the lobes of the geomagnetic tail. At lunar distances we call this the lobe plasma. The lobe plasma appears as a narrow peak in the ion energy spectrum usually around 100 eV. More recent analysis of Side data has revealed the occasional occurrence of a second peak in the ion spectrum during geomagnetically active periods. This peak is similar to a secondary peak reported by Frank et al. [1977] in the boundary layer energy spectrum. This secondary peak occurs at higher energy than the principal peak, generally in the range 1–2.75 keV. Both spectra are narrow, the upper peak frequently being seen in one or two channels of the analyzer. The inferred temperature for both peaks is usually less than kTi ∼ 10 eV in the look direction of the instrument. The differential ion flux for the secondary peak is estimated to be generally less than 3% of that for the primary peak. On the assumption that both peaks arise from flowing protons we find that the ratio of the bulk velocity of the secondary peak to that of the primary peak ranges between 4.4 and 5.4. We suggest two hypotheses for the origin of these ions. Either (1) they consist of two streams of protons traveling with different bulk velocities and therefore originating from two different source regions, or (2) they are two streams traveling with approximately the same bulk velocity but with the primary peak composed of protons and the secondary peak composed of more massive ions. By using the second hypothesis (same bulk velocity) the Side data can be fitted well if a lunar surface potential between +35 and +91 V is assumed and if the secondary peak ions have a mass of 14 or 16 and unit charge. The most likely candidate is ionospheric O+. On the assumption that the the secondary peak is O+, by fitting to a convected Maxwellian we obtain ion number densities between 5 × 10−5 and 10−3/cm³. These numbers should be treated with caution because of the narrowness of the ion angular and energy distribution. In both hypotheses an ionospheric source is postulated, and an energization process is needed to account for the observed ions.


This study is aimed at evaluating the effect of placing the top soil cover areas, such as tailings degraded by tin mining, in the Amazon rainforest in Brazil. The evaluations of the planting sites occurred in areas where tin mining was carried out, basically planting native trees over a period of seven years. This work did not come from a pre-decreed methodology of experimental design, and data was collected only seven years after planting. Thus, it was not possible to identify all variables that contributed to a better recovery of the areas. Sampling was done about seven years after placing the "top soil" and is determined: pH, organic matter content, P, K, Ca, Mg, Al, cation exchange capacity (T), base saturation (V%), B, Fe, Zn, Cu and Mn. The native forest species existing at the site were evaluated in relation to height (in meters) and diameter of the base. For all sites where the surface layer of soil was applied, there were significant differences in the growth of native species. A fundamental aspect in the rehabilitation of areas degraded by mining, in general, is the knowledge about the soil where that recovery must be conducted. The specific procedures in the rehabilitation of those areas depend essentially on the physical, chemical, biological and mineralogical properties of the soil, which must present conditions for the adequate development of the plants. The initial idea of implanting a project of recovery of soils degraded by mining in the Amazon Forest emerged from a first visit to the field, carried out in 1998. The conditions of the already mined areas, in comparison to the exuberant forest of the surroundings caught our attention. The mining company that acts in


Coppice management of forests in Tuscany, and particularly in the province of Florence, has had a chequered history, which has set the stage for the present problems of forestry policy. In Italy, the period between 1955 and 1975 saw a marked reduction in use of firewood in the home and its virtual elimination from the industrial context, leading to progressive abandonment of coppice management. Since 1975, wood-cutting has once again become an increasingly frequent practice, mainly in beech and deciduous oak forests, to the point that this phenomenon has been defined as a veritable revival of coppice management. This change is due partly to a rise in firewood prices but also to the greater yield obtainable from processing activities, although the observed increase is to be attributed not so much to technological progress (only a few enterprises have adequate equipment), as to the mass accumulated during the period of non-harvesting. Basing our opinion on these considerations we realized a project for assessing the "actual" economic, occupational and environmental potential of coppice management in the province of Florence for biomass production as an energy source. To this end, our work has tried to identify the new potential market area, the enterprises typology, and analyse the social and environmental impact. Moreover, we have evaluated economic efficiency and have taken into consideration the public intervention needed to develop new markets. We have seen that at the moment the possible market areas are tied not only to the traditional markets for house heating by traditional stove with low performance, but also to a new market tied to the most recent developments in heating technologies for dwelling places and small environments, that have allowed considerable technological improvement in heating systems using wood biomasses, which are now more economical and easier to use, have lower gas emission levels and offer greater safety. Another potential market is tied to the electric power production, through the transformation from energy produced by combustion of wood biomass into electric power energy, that we can use in times of peak power consumption in the area studied. The results of this study shows that use of wood biomasses in the energy sector is competitive with oil and gas fired systems, and that biomass production as an energy source is not only environmentally sustainable but also economically feasible and capable of creating job opportunities. Moreover, the possibility for development of two new market areas exists: the first is tied to production of heating energy with new technology plants that use a wood biomass, and result in a high performance; the second is the possibility to develop the electric energy market with the use of gasification or cogeneration plants. In both cases it is possible to create new activities for installation, maintenance and fueling of heating plants, for maintenance and fueling electric generator plants, which will be complementary to harvesting activity


The main aim of this work is to improve the functionality of Nigella sativa protein concentrate (NSPC) films by using grape juice (GJ). The film's mechanical, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activities were evaluated. The obtained results showed, for the first time, that GJ at concentrations of 2%–10% (v/v) are able to act as plasticizer for the NSPC films with promising film properties. The results showed that the tensile strength and Young's modulus of NSPC films were reduced significantly when the GJ increased. However, the NSPC films prepared with 6% GJ observed a higher elongation at break compared with other films. Moreover, the obtained films showed very interesting and promising results for their antioxidant and antimicrobial properties compared with the control films. The sweet cherries wrapped with NSPC film showed that the TSS (Brix) was significantly lower compared to the control, after 10 days of storage. However, the titratable acidity, pH value, and L* of all cherries, either wrapped or not, was not significantly different in all storage times. On the other hand, hue angle was significantly lower after 10 days of storage at −18 °C compared with control films. GJ has a multi-functional effect for protein-based films as plasticizer, antioxidant, and antimicrobial function.


Eight male javelin throwers were filmed while throwing new-rules javelins during competition at five meets over a 2-year period. Body segment kinematics and javelin release parameters were assessed relative to their contribution to throwing performance. The data suggest that successful throws, as judged by distance thrown, are characterized by higher release speeds, longer last-step lengths, less flexion of the front-leg knee during the final plant phase, and an orderly progression of peak speeds at the hip, shoulder, and elbow from the onset of double leg support until release. Individual variability in performance was associated with differences measured between several throwing variables. Limitations inherent to two-dimensional analysis were identified that highlighted the need for three-dimensional investigation of the javelin throw.


The synthesis of haem has been postulated to be a key regulatory step in muscle mitochondrial biogenesis. We examined the expression of delta-aminolaevulinate synthase (ALAs), the regulatory enzyme of haem metabolism, in 10 Hz electrically stimulated and non-stimulated control rat tibialis anterior (TA) muscle. ALAs activity and mRNA levels were measured at 0, 18 and 48 h of recovery after 3 h of acute stimulation, or after 7 days of stimulation (3 h/day). ALAs activity in control muscles averaged 7.8 +/- 0.8 nmol/h per g (n = 30). After 3 h of stimulation and during recovery, no change in ALAs activity occurred. ALAs mRNA during the same time was unchanged except at 48 h of recovery, when it increased 1.3-fold above control (P < 0.05). After 7 days of stimulation, ALAs activity was unchanged at 0 h, but increased at 18 and 48 h of recovery to 2.0- and 1.8-fold above control (P < 0.05). ALAs mRNA was also increased, but to a level averaging 1.6-fold above control (P < 0.05) at all times, indicating an increased mRNA stability or synthesis. No change in the haem-containing enzyme cytochrome c oxidase (CYTOX) activity occurred after 3 h of stimulation in the red section of the TA. After 7 days of stimulation, the increase in CYTOX activity averaged 1.7-fold above control (P < 0.05) at all times. Thus the induction of ALAs during recovery after 7 days was regulated by factors which not only change ALAs mRNA content, but which also affect ALAs mRNA at translational or post-translational steps. This induction occurred despite a 1.7-fold increase in CYTOX, implying that a precursor-product relationship does not always exist.


The author presents a methodology, for use early in the system design cycle, that improves yields and reduces time until volume production. It identifies simultaneous, mutually consistent, and properly nested electrical requirements at the system, circuit module, and component device levels. The proposed approach involves a checklist framework for the test compatibility methodology and a graph that helps to identify a confidence level for individual tests. The checklist identifies six lo/hi limit pairs based on different test levels that are directly comparable with each other and that are concise enough to fit into a table. The graph clearly shows the need for more than 3-sigma confidence levels. Over four independent 3-sigma tests in a module test result in more than 1% dropout.<<ETX>>


Background. Limited research addresses interventions to increase physical activity among American Indian and Hispanic preschool-aged children living in rural areas. We examined the impact of a Head Start-based intervention (Child Health Initiative for Lifelong Eating and Exercise [CHILE]) on physical activity at home. Method. Sixteen Head Start centers in predominantly Hispanic or American Indian communities were group randomized to the six-component intervention or a comparison group for 2 years. Structured surveys were administered at four assessment times to a convenience sample of caregivers of 655 children in the study. Multilevel modeling was used to assess the effects of the intervention on physical activity. Results. The relative change in physical activity in the intervention group compared with the comparison group over the 2-year period was 1.56 (95% confidence interval [1.02, 2.38]; p = .04). Among specific promoted activities (ball playing, dancing, active games, jumping, and walking), dancing increased significantly in the intervention compared with the comparison group (2.9; 95% confidence interval [1.2, 7.1]; p = .02). Conclusions. The CHILE intervention was effective at increasing physical activity at home in preschool children in priority populations. Future research should focus on increasing family involvement and strengthening messaging about physical activity in these populations.


Translation memory (TM) systems have become a key technology to help translators in dealing with a steadily growing demand for translation, and areknown to have a positive effect on productivity, quality, and cost of translation. However, certain restrictions of this technology prompt developers ofcomputer assisted translation (CAT) tools to improve and expand the functionality of TM systems. Therefore, machine translation (MT) is beingprogressively integrated into TM tools. The paper aims at analysing potential advantages of TM and MT integration, discusses the effects of MT on awork routine of professional translators, and presents opinions of translators towards the integration of MT into the process of translation. There are two ways of integrating MT into TM systems: MT systems are included into CAT software packages or translators are provided with apossibility to port their TM tools to commercial or free access on-line MT providers; according to the second scenario, TM systems are complementedwith statistical, example-based or rule-based MT technologies. The poor quality of MT output made a lot of professional translators reluctant to use MT; however, the data-driven MT approach is making a difference.There are studies that compare translation speed when post-editing MT suggestions, reviewing repetitions and correcting fuzzy matches from a TMdatabase. Results demonstrate that the difference is not so significant and the MT output when post-edited by a human translator can also reach thedesirable level of the quality. Thus, technological competence and post-editing skills are being emphasised as the most significant skills for a professionaltranslator. Although there are disagreements among translators towards the integration of MT into their workflow, potential productivity gains derived from theintegration of TM and MT technologies and changing requirements of the translation market with regard to speed and cost of translation are likely totrigger further developments in the automation of the process of translation. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.sal.0.23.5559


Reasoning about sampling distributions is notably challenging for humans. It has been argued that the complexity involved in sampling processes can be facilitated by interactive computer simulations that allow learners to experiment with variables. In the current study, we compared the effects of learning sampling distributions through a simulation-based learning (SBL) versus direct instruction (DI) method. While both conditions resulted in similar improvement in rule learning and graph identification, neither condition improved more distant transfer of concepts. Furthermore, the simulation-based learning method resulted in unintuitive and surprising kinds of misconceptions about how sample size affects estimation of parameters while the direct instruction group used correct intuitive judgments more often. We argue that similar perceptual properties of different sampling processes in the SBL condition overrode learners' intuitions and led them to make conceptual confusions that they would not typically make. We conclude that conceptually important differences should be grounded in easily interpretable and distinguishable perceptual representations in simulation-based learning methods.


This paper presents the design and development of horizontal I-shape slots loaded on proximity coupled equilateral triangular microstrip antenna (HISPCETMSA) for quad band operation and omnidirectional radiation characteristics. The quad band frequency points are achieved between 2.75GHz to 9.23GHz. The magnitude of operating bandwidth has been enhanced to a maximum value of 14.77% in comparison to that of conventional microstrip antenna which resonates at 3GHz with bandwidth of 6.97%, by varying the length of horizontal Ishape slots on the patch. The proposed antenna presents a method for increasing the bandwidth and gain of an antenna. The design considerations and experimentally measured results are presented and discussed. This antenna may find application in modern wideband wireless communication systems like LTE 2006(Long Term Evolution), IMT (International Mobile Communication) and in radar systems.


The profile of dopamine receptor subtype activation contributing to the therapeutic efficacy and motor response complications of levodopa (nonselective pro-agonist) in Parkinson's disease remains unclear. Potent, selective, short-acting dopamine D2 receptor subfamily agonists show good antiparkinsonian efficacy but produce dyskinesias comparable to levodopa. Nonetheless, agonists displaying higher affinity for dopamine receptors other than the D2 subtype may have a better therapeutic index. To clarify this issue, we compared the nonselective dopamine D1/D2 receptor subfamilies agonist apomorphine to the dopamine D3 receptor preferring agonist [R-(+)-trans-3,4,4a,10b-tetrahydro-4-propyl-2H,5H-[1]benzopyrano[4 , 3-b]-1,4-oxazin-9-ol] (PD 128,907) in 6 levodopa-primed , 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine-lesioned parkinsonian monkeys with reproducible dyskinesias. Single s.c. dosing with the lowest fully effective dose of apomorphine (averaging 27.9 +/- 4.5 microg/kg) and PD 128,907 (averaging 41.7 +/- 4.4 microg/kg) yielded equivalent antiparkinsonian efficacy on the behavioral scale and portable activity monitoring used. A comparable significant dose-dependent increase in the response magnitude and duration was seen with two higher doses. The severity of dyskinesia was also similar between the two drugs. When the lower dose for each drug was administered six times at a fixed 90-min interval, both drugs remained efficacious with no significant tolerance observed. The D3 receptor preferring antagonist U-99194A significantly reduced the motor effects of both apomorphine and PD 128,907. Thus, increased D3 receptor tone does not acutely ameliorate dyskinesias in levodopa-primed parkinsonian monkeys. Given the reported lack of affinity of PD 128,907 for central D1 receptors, our data support the concept that the pharmacological activation of D1 receptors is not mandatory for relief of parkinsonism and production of dyskinesia.


We present a texture network called Deep Encoding Pooling Network (DEP) for the task of ground terrain recognition. Recognition of ground terrain is an important task in establishing robot or vehicular control parameters, as well as for localization within an outdoor environment. The architecture of DEP integrates orderless texture details and local spatial information and the performance of DEP surpasses state-of-the-art methods for this task. The GTOS database (comprised of over 30,000 images of 40 classes of ground terrain in outdoor scenes) enables supervised recognition. For evaluation under realistic conditions, we use test images that are not from the existing GTOS dataset, but are instead from hand-held mobile phone videos of similar terrain. This new evaluation dataset, GTOS-mobile, consists of 81 videos of 31 classes of ground terrain such as grass, gravel, asphalt and sand. The resultant network shows excellent performance not only for GTOS-mobile, but also for more general databases (MINC and DTD). Leveraging the discriminant features learned from this network, we build a new texture manifold called DEP-manifold. We learn a parametric distribution in feature space in a fully supervised manner, which gives the distance relationship among classes and provides a means to implicitly represent ambiguous class boundaries. The source code and database are publicly available1.


ABSTRACT The International Organization for Migration (IOM) exerts increasing power in global migration governance, yet research on IOM's early history is scarce. Explanations of IOM's founding and early migration management efforts are often reduced to bipolar, Cold War politics, with the US creating the organisation outside the UN to sidestep Soviet interference. Such simplistic accounts fail to grapple with the ways in which its creation and early activities also reflected and entrenched legacies of colonialism and related racialized inequalities. Drawing on extensive archival research, this article analyses how colonial interests and biases also shaped IOM's establishment, founding documents, and vacillating positions in decolonisation movements. It examines the organisation's role in moving colonists out of newly independent states; facilitating settler colonial states' preference for white migrants; and advancing western interests in having an international migration forum in which opposition to exclusionary policies was virtually non-existent. In particular, it questions the agency's involvement in supporting white migration to Southern Africa in the apartheid era, and the sanitisation of such work from IOM's institutional history. Theoretically, the article analyses these dynamics through the lens of 'colonial unknowing', thereby laying the foundation for deeper, historicised understandings of IOM's continued, contested roles in migration management.


In this contribution the complexity of the clinical picture of post-partum depression will be brought to light, which connects to the deep psychological dynamics experienced by women during the gestation and birth of the child. Starting with some reflections which arose from within a clinical journey of a group of women who suffer from this psychopathology, it highlights how the woman's pregnancy is a time when childhood conflicts re-emerge, and on the basis of personal experiences with her own mother, she rearranges her new role. There will be various considerations suggested on the usefulness of group intervention to address this pathology and its highly dysfunctional effects, recognized by international literature on the development and growth of the child.


The present surge of interest in participative rural development projects based on peasant communities differs from similar past experiences in that it forms part of a broader tendency to decentralize social management, to enhance the role of the beneficiaries of social policies, and to give them a bigger say in their implementation. In order to avoid repeating the failures of past decades in programmes designed to reduce rural poverty, it is necessary to incorporate elements of modern applied anthropology in programmes for the training of extension workers and in the explanatory models of specialists formulating rural development projects. The practical contribution that applied anthropology can make stems not only from the experience of anthropologists in development projects but also, and above all, from a knowledge of the empirical reality revealed by academic anthropology. Although some anthropological concepts are already being used in some other disciplines, they usually correspond to outmoded theories already discarded by many anthropologists. This article identifies some of these "anthropological myths" and explores ways in which the new perceptions of anthropology could be applied to some of the commonest components of rural development projects. The concepts used in this dual task include the development cycle of peasant households, kinship as a reserve of mutual aid, the community as a referent of prestige, and ethnic identity as a social resource.


INTRODUCTION: Appropriate management of patients with supraglottic laryngeal carcinoma and negative findings in the neck is still controversial. A prospective and retrospective study comprised 193 patients who were treated primary surgically between 1976 and 1993. They all had clinically and ultrasound negative findings on the neck (N0). Supraglottic carcinomas usually spread regionally. Metastases develop in the jugular group, between level II-IV. The incidence of metastases has been reported to vary from 12 to 62.5%. The size and localization of the primary tumor, its histological grade, genotype of the malignant cells, immunological and other elucidated factors can all affect the incidence of regional spread. AIM: Aim of this study was to specify the incidence of occult cervical metastases; to analyze the distribution of occult metastases related to tumor localization; to specify the distribution of occult metastases related to local spread; to analyze the distribution of occult metastases according to localization in the neck. RESULTS: All patients had primary surgery of primary tumor and bilateral jugular, selective neck dissection at the level II-IV with histological examination of removed lymphoid tissue. Out of 193 patients, metastatic deposits were detected in 35 (18%). Occult metastases were found in patients with carcinoma of the epilarynx in 19% (14/72) of cases, and in 17% (21/121) patients with carcinoma of the supraglottis excluding the epilarynx. This difference in frequency is not statistically significant. The incidence of occult metastases in epilaryngeal tumors did not depend on the degree of local spread. Even relatively small tumors (T1 and T2) yielded occult metastases in 33% (5/15), and 24% (6/25) of patients, respectively. In patients with T1 tumors localized at the supraglottis, excluding the epilarynx, occult metastases were not found. In the supraglottis excluding the epilarynx increased local spread was associated an increase of occult metastases. The incidence of occult metastases was directly related to the degree of the local spread of the tumor in the supraglottis excluding the epilarynx (Table 1). Occult metastases were usually ipsilateral, like the palpable ones. In medially localized tumors bilateral metastases were possible. Ipsilateral metastases were more frequent than both bilateral and contralateral ones. The possibility of contralateral and bilateral occult metastases necessitated bilateral neck dissection. Postoperative radiotherapy (60 Gy) was given to all patients with verified occult metastases. Only in two patients (1%) of the total did metastases develop subsequently, indicating the effectiveness of planned postoperative radiotherapy. DISCUSSION: Controversies in application of jugular, selective neck dissection are present since it has been in use, because of the unclear role which regional lymph tissue play in antitumor immune response. Jugular, selective neck dissection was advocated in all patients with a primary supraglottic laryngeal carcinomas. It was suggested that selective neck dissection was needed only in advanced (T3 and T4) tumors. Selective dissection is believed to be needed only when tumor has spread into the vallecula, the base of the tongue, or the medial wall of the piriform sinus. The idea of selective neck dissection has been opposed since the protective role of the cervical lymph tissue has been stressed. Ultrasound and computerized tomography of the neck cannot detect occult metastases. Today, only removal and histological examination of the lymph tissue can determine occult metastasis. The importance of selective neck dissection is considered in diagnostic biopsy procedure by which occult metastatic spread in the neck region is established. CONCLUSION: Due to the tendency of supraglottic carcinoma resulting in occult cervical metastases, early detection is imperative in order to apply the appropriate therapy. Occult cervical metastases are usually ipsilateral, but bilateral and contralateral may be found as well. Due to the aforementioned, it is necessary to perform bilateral jugular, selective cervical dissection of the neck level II-IV with histological evidence of removed lymph tissue. When metastases is verified histologically, postoperative radiotherapy is indicated as being efficient in hampering the development of palpable metastases. Five-year survival with no evidence disease is 86% (166/193).


A new description of the exact completion C ex/reg of a regular category C is given, using a certain topos Shv(C) of sheaves on C; the exact completion is then constructed as the closure of C in Shv(C) under nite limits and coequalizers of equivalence relations. An innnitary generalization is proved, and the classical description of the exact completion is derived.


This paper investigates an adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS)-based maximum power point tracking (MPPT) technique applied to a reconfigurable photovoltaic (PV)-based battery charger. The proposed method uses training data collected from a dynamic model of the PV module to train the ANFIS to locate the maximum power point (MPP) under different environmental conditions. Based on the estimated MPP, the proposed method can select the optimal configuration of a PV array and the corresponding global MPP under the non-uniform distribution of the temperature and irradiance. In this way, the proposed method can guarantee the highest possible power harvesting to charge a lithium-ion battery under either partial shading conditions or characteristics mismatch, achieving a high system efficiency. The proposed method is compared with the conventional MPPT scheme to verify its feasibility and effectiveness. The verification results show that the proposed method provides higher accuracy, faster response and better tracking efficiency.


An analytic method for the design of automatic controls is developed that starts from certain arbitrary criterions on the behavior of the controlled system and gives those physically realizable equations that the control system can follow in order to realize this behavior. The criterions used are developed in the form of certain time integrals. General results are shown for systems of second order and of any number of degrees of freedom. Detailed examples for several cases in the control of a turbojet engine are presented.


Over the last century, the social function and the role of the universities and other higher education institutions (HEI) changed significantly. What the contemporary students expect to gain due to their university education is neither enlightenment nor insight, but rather skills and practical knowledge needed to successfully find and retain a job. In turn, the modern HEI ceased to be the entities isolated from their surroundings but became the institutions intertwined into community life. Hence, our purpose is to redefine the role of the universities in their communities with the emphasis put on the relationship between the HEI and the communities' economic performance. The general discussion on the transition in academy's place in the society is presented in the first section of the article, whereas its second part provides an overview of the potential contributions to the reciprocal development made by the universities and communities. Against such a background two illustrative examples are analyzed, i.e. Lodz, Poland and Brownsville, Texas. Both the theoretical inquiries and these examples' analysis confirm that the relationship between the development of the universities and economic performance is bi-directional: on the one hand, the investments in HEI trigger stimuli towards economic growth, and on the other, the economic prosperity of the city commonly results in invigorating the scientific research. The article concludes that despite the fact the interrelatedness between universities and local communities' economic performance is too complex to be boiled down to any simple rule, the communities' investments in HEI may sow seeds of future economic growth and provide a safety net protecting the economy in times of stagnations or slumps.


Retaining valuable information technology (IT) professionals or employees is critical for firms to fulfill their strategic goals. Avenues for understanding how to retain valued IT professionals may be through the exploration of work exhaustion and engagement. Organizational behavior researchers have suggested that job crafting can decrease employees' work exhaustion and increase their work engagement, which in turns decreases their turnover intention. However, the relationships between job crafting, exhaustion, engagement, and turnover intention remains relatively little understood in the information systems (IS) literature. On the basis of the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, we will construct and test a framework that demonstrates how job crafting explains turnover intention. In particular, our model theorizes that IT professionals who can craft their own jobs are likely to stay engaged and have low turnover intention. In this study, job crafting can take the form of increasing social job resources, increasing structural job resources, and increasing job challenges. This study will empirically test the model with data collected from 200 IT/IS professionals of Taiwan's top 500 companies. work


Ten clinical isolates of Pseudomonas cepacia from the sputum of cystic fibrosis patients were examined for the ability to produce lipase. Lipase substrates used included egg yolk agar, four different polyoxyethylene sorbitans (Tweens), and p-nitrophenylphosphorylcholine, a chromogenic substrate used to assay for phospholipase C. Lipase activity was detected in the filtrates of organisms grown to the exponential phase in either tryptose minimal medium or chemically defined medium. Lipase activity increased in the filtrates if the cultures were allowed to proceed into the stationary phase. None of the isolates produced phospholipase C. Lipase activity on Tween 20 ranged from 41.6 X 10(-3) to 640.0 X 10(-3) U/micrograms of protein. The activity was similar or slightly lower when Tween 40, 60, or 80 was used as the substrate. There was no correlation between lipase activity on Tween and that demonstrated on egg yolk agar. Lipase activity increased as pH increased from 7.0 to 9.0. Boiling for 5 min resulted in 66% loss of enzyme activity. The remaining activity continued to decrease with increasing boiling time. The enzyme was purified by gel filtration on Sephadex G-200, and the resultant preparation, when subjected to polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, resulted in a single protein band (molecular weight, approximately 25,000) from which lipase activity could be eluted. The purified lipase was not cytotoxic to HeLa cells, nor was it toxic when injected intravenously into mice.


Introduction The provision of a dedicated and accessible IBD advice service (AS) is a key element of IBD management and, often, the responsibility of the Advanced, or specialist, IBD Nurse according to the N-ECCO Consensus statements. UK IBD Standards require IBD patients to have rapid access to specialist advice before the end of the next working day (EONWD). Our AS aims to provide timely access to clinical advice, support and acts as a point of contact to co-ordinate the patient journey. We evaluated if our advice service was meeting these goals. Methods Over a 5 week period (23 working days) during October and November 2013, all contacts to the AS of a central London tertiary IBD service were recorded. Patients either called and left a message on an answering machine, or emailed a dedicated email address. Two experienced IBD CNS' collected data during each encounter. This included demographics of gender, age, and diagnosis; the format of contact (phone/email); if a medical opinion (IBD specialist or IBD registrar/fellow) was sought; time to response, and amount of time spent on each contact. The content of the encounter (administrative, clarification, a new query, or a symptomatic change/flare) was documented along with the response (administrative, information, results, treatment changes, medical decision), and the follow up required for the patient (routine, earlier or urgent outpatient appointment, or hospital admission/presentation to AandE). Results 262 contacts were made to the AS. 4 could not be re-contacted and 23 had missing data, leaving 235 complete encounters for analysis, of which 3 enquiries were non-IBD related. Those who contacted the AS were predominantly female (148/235, 62.98%), between 26–35 (97/235, 41.28%), with a diagnosis of Crohn's Disease (160/235, 68.09%), the latter reflecting the tertiary nature of our IBD service. 99.15% (233/235) of contacts were replied to by EONWD, with 38.29% (90/235) answered within 12 h. The majority of contacts (85.11%) were for clinical reasons with 14.89% administrative (35/235). 51/235 (21.70%) pertained to flares. 88.94% (209/235) were autonomously handled by the IBD CNS though IBD Consultant/Fellow support was required in 26 cases. AandE presentation was recommended to 2 patients (2/235, 0.85%) and 25(10.64%) had their outpatient appointment brought forward, meaning the vast majority were clinically managed without the need for additional outpatient review. Conclusion Our IBD advice service provides patients with rapid access to specialist advice, symptom management and disease-specific information, meeting UK national standards. The IBD CNS' expertise means clinical enquiries can be effectively managed whilst avoiding additional, unnecessary burden to the patient and to outpatient clinics. Disclosure of Interest None Declared.


This paper is a continuation of previous papers by the authors that focuses on predicting the mistuned embedded rotor blade forced response. The compressor under consideration is a part of a 3.5stage rig located at Purdue University. Previously, the current authors have discussed the impact of sideband travelling wave forcing functions on the mistuned response and pinned down the reason for a constant underprediction in the amplification factor. This prompted further research to determine the sensitivity of the response to a known change in the system mode. In the first section of the current paper, the authors perturb the system modes frequencies in a probabilistic manner and compute the influence of the system mode on the mistuning amplification factor. The second part of this study involves determining the impact of a perturbation in the structural damping on the mistuned response. Finally, a brief investigation of system eigenvalues and eigenvectors is conducted to understand the impact of mistuning on aerodynamic damping suppression. The key conclusions from this paper are: 1) The mistuned forced response was highly sensitive to the system mode input. 2) Since the aerodynamic damping dominates in the case study, a change in the structural damping parameter has minimal effect on the mistuning amplification factor. 3) The results of the flutter analysis show that a perturbation in the system mode frequency stabilizes the system much faster than a perturbation in the structural damping .


We use the American Time Use Survey (ATUS) to characterize how different consumers in the US might use Autonomous Vehicles (AVs). Our approach is to identify sub-groups of the population likely to benefit from AVs and compare their activity patterns with an otherwise similar group. The first subgroup is working individuals who drive to work with long total travel times. Auto-travelers in the top 20% of travel time number 19 million and travel 1.6 h more on a workday than those in the bottom 80%. For car-commuting professionals, the additional travel time of the long-traveling group comes from 30 min less work, 29 min less sleep, and 30 min less television watching per day. The second subgroup is working individuals with a long travel time and who take public transport. Long public transit riders show very similar differences in activity times as the driving subgroup. Work, sleep, and video functionalities of AVs are presumably in high demand by both groups. The third sub-group identified is elderly retired people. AVs enable mobility-restricted groups to travel more like those without restrictions. We compare two age groups, 60–75 years and >75 years old, the latter, on average, experiencing more mobility restrictions than their younger counterparts. The retired population older than 75 years numbers 16 million and travels 14 min less per day than retirees aged 60–75 years. The main activity change corresponding to this reduced travel is 7 min per day less shopping and 8 min per day less socializing. If older retired people use AVs to match the lifestyle of the 60–75 years old group, this would induce additional personal travel and retail sector demand. The economic, environmental and social implications of AV are very difficult to predict but expected to be transformative. The contribution of this work is that it utilizes time-use surveys to suggest how AV adoption could induce lifestyle changes inside and outside the vehicle.


. Due to the growing dynamism and complexity of technology development, early recognition and monitoring of technological, market, political and social developments is of growing importance to successful innovation. In this context, roadmapping is a method that answers the questions of creating new product development in innovation terms. Nevertheless, the important point is not solely to project what is technically feasible to be implemented, but rather to broaden the perspective with socio-economic aspects and particularly, as a critical factor, incorporating customer requirements at an early stage. This research elaborates the integration of conjoint analysis into product-technology roadmapping to develop a strategic e-money product-technology roadmap in Indonesia. This research focuses on the case of chip-based e-money and how to increase the utilization of the chip-based e-money in Indonesia. The chip-based e-money features resulted from conjoit analysis were minimum top-up Rp.20.000,-, no minimum amount on account, no minimum amount on one transaction, validity period 5 years and security mode on transaction using PIN. These features are then integrated into the product-technology roadmap, which was created and validated through in-depth interviews with experts from Bank Indonesia and University of Indonesia. The output of the research was a strategic product-technology roadmap of chip-based e-money in Indonesia until 2025, as the standard reference of the chip-based e-money development in Indonesia.


There are only 0.3 psychiatrists and 0.047 psychologists per 100,000 people in India, compared to a country like the US, which has 29 psychologists per 100,000 people (according to WHO), thereby leading to lack of counselling services and mental health-care. Fortunately, researchers in India have found mental health interventions delivered by lay counsellors rather than specialists to be effective in treating and preventing mental health problems. However, choosing a lay counsellor from a pool of candidates becomes a very important but time-consuming and tedious task because of our deficits in evaluating emotional capabilities, implicit biases and facilitation skills in a resume and standard interview. In this paper, we present a highly scalable web application that can help in hiring emotionally intelligent lay-counselors. The backend framework measures several vital emotional intelligence features that are crucial in a prospective lay counsellor. The framework uses multi-modal data and provides a ranking of potential counsellors. The results and inferencing help establish the importance of each modality and gives insights on features that are key to identify the emotional skills. We compare the predicted rankings to those given by the interviewers (a clinical psychologist and a psychiatrist) and recognize the benefits of automation of the process as well as a need for a deeper analysis of interview questions, discriminative features and importance of multi-modality assessments.


CAREM is an Argentine project to achieve the development, design and construction of an innovative, simple and small Nuclear Power Plant (NPP). This NPP has an indirect cycle reactor with some distinctive and characteristic features (e.g. integrated primary cooling system by natural circulation, self-pressurized primary system and passive safety systems, etc.). In the frame of an IAEA forwarded HUMAN RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT "Advice on CAREM passive emergency condenser" at the Centro At6mico in San Carlos de Bariloche (Argentina) German experimental as weil analytical investigation of passive safety systems mainly performed at the research centers Julich and Rossendorf were presented. During this visit it was decided that FZR should determine the emergency condenser capacity by using the ATHLET code with and without the condensation module extension KONWAR (condensation inside horizontal tube). These results should be compared and assessed with existing RELAP calculations. The ATHLET and ATHLETIKONWAR calculations ofthe emergency condenserwere used for minimizing the user influence performed with exactly the same nodalization scheme and the same initial and boundary conditions than the RELAP calculations. The comparison of all three computational results shows that the required condenser capacities were achieved. The magnitudes were in order of up to 12%. An additionally performed evaluation of local f10w parameters show large deviations especially for the heat transfer coefficients at the inner and outer tube wall. Due to the good validation progress of KONWAR by an extensive module validation agalnst NOKO and HORUS experiments, the focus of the further investigation ware concentrated on the boiling heat transfer. A comparison of the ATHLET bolllng model (according to Forster and Zuber in combination with the equation of Thom for the determination of temperature difference between wall and saturated fluid) wtth other models from literature (Borishansky, Fritz. Gormenflo. Stefan and Abdelsalam) shows a streng unclerestimation of heat transfer coefficients in Iow pressure condltions. Therefore the model of Forster and Zuber is replaced againsl the modal of Stafan and Abdelsalam. The calculations with ATHELTIKONWAR ware repeated and show now a better agreement (deviations less equal than 3 %) with the RElAP results.


In an effort to replace fossil hydrocarbon fuels, chemists have looked for ways to convert biomass to useful fuels. In his Perspective,
 Rostrup-Nielsen
 discusses recent work on converting carbohydrates such as sugars and cellulose to ethanol and hydrogen, both of which can serve as alternatives to hydrocarbon fuels. However, ethanol requires an expensive distillation step, and hydrogen would require a new infrastructure. He highlights the report by
 Huber
 et al., who have found a way to convert carbohydrates directly to hydrocarbons. The latter would not require a new infrastructure nor expensive distillation.


During the past 50 years the border area between psychiatry and somatic medicine has undergone remarkable changes. Theories have become better-founded, both psychologically and neurobiologically, research has become more sophisticated, and liaison-psychiatrists and health psychiatrist/behavioural medicine psychologists have played an increasingly active role in this domain. At the beginning of the 21st century modern psychosomatic medicine is facing new challenges; these include how to create a workable diagnostic classification system, how to instruct and educate both health professionals and lay-persons to an adequate level, how to utilize innovative research paradigms without having recourse to reductionism and how to implement in medical practice treatments that are geared to the needs of the individual patient.