The use of solid biomass as a primary energy source for cooking is common to nearly half of the world's population. Household air pollution as a byproduct of biomass combustion creates powerful negative health impacts related to air quality and a strong influence on our global radiative balance. Despite efforts to improve biomass-fueled cooking technology, many current designs still fail to meet WHO guidelines for air quality and consume excessive fuel. One promising method to improve in both of these areas is through introduction of forced primary or secondary air to the combustion process to increase turbulence, mixing, and velocity. Incorporating computational fluid dynamics to the design process for this forced draft air flow can provide insights into the complex and interconnected thermophysical relationships which, otherwise, would require extensive experimentation. The objective of this work is to provide a preliminary computational fluid dynamics study of a secondary air forced draft biomass cookstove. Thermal efficiency and emissions concentrations are investigated relative to various combinations of secondary air flow rates and injection angles. The results from the case study suggest that thermal efficiency of the cookstove is a function of secondary air injection angle, with optimal angle being a function of the specific air-fuel ratio. Additionally, a design trade-off is evident when comparing the pollutant concentration data and thermal efficiency data. Lastly, analysis of the computational results suggests that large pressure gradients about secondary air vortices in the combustion chamber lead to improved thermal efficiency and more complete combustion. The continued development of this work into an open-source computational fluid dynamics tool is underway.


Sensing bitter tastes is crucial for most animals because it can prevent them from ingesting harmful food. This process is mainly mediated by the bitter taste receptors (T2R) that are largely expressed in the taste buds. Previous studies have identified some T2R gene repertoires. Marked variation in repertoire size has been noted among species. However, research on T2Rs is still limited and the mechanisms underlying the evolution of vertebrate T2Rs remain poorly understood. In the present study, we analyzed the structure and features of the protein encoded by the forest musk deer (Moschus berezovskii) T2R16 and submitted the gene sequence to NCBI GenBank. The results showed that the full coding DNA sequence (CDS) of musk deer T2R16 (GenBank accession No. KP677279) was 906 bp, encoding 301 amino acids, which contained ATG start codon and TGA stop codon, with a calculated molecular weight of 35.03 kDa and an isoelectric point of 9.56. The T2R16 protein receptor had seven conserved transmembrane regions. Hydrophobicity analysis showed that most amino acid residues in T2R16 protein were hydrophobic, and the grand average of hydrophobicity (GRAVY) was 0.657. Phylogenetic analysis based on this gene revealed that forest musk deer had the closest association with sheep (Ovis aries), as compared to cow (Bos taurus), Tursiops truncatus, and other species, whereas it was genetically farthest from humans (Homo sapiens). We hope these results would complement the existing data on T2R16 and encourage further research in this respect.


The P1P4-bis(5'-nucleosidyl) tetraphosphate asymmetrical-pyrophosphohydrolase from encysted embryos of the brine shrimp Artemia has been purified over 11,000-fold to homogeneity. Anion-exchange chromatography resolves two major species with very similar properties. The enzyme is a single polypeptide of Mr 17,600 and is maximally active at pH 8.4 and 2 mM-Mg2+. It is inhibited by Ca2+ (IC50 = 0.9 mM with 2 mM-Mg2+) but not by Zn2+ ions. It preferentially hydrolyses P1P4-bis(5'-nucleosidyl) tetraphosphates, e.g. P1P4-bis(5'-adenosyl) tetraphosphate (Ap4A) (kcat. = 12.7 s-1; Km = 33 microM) and P1P4-bis(5'-guanosyl) tetraphosphate (Gp4G) (kcat. = 6.2 s-1; Km = 5 microM). With adenosine 5'-P1-tetraphospho-P4-5"'-guanosine (Ap4G) as substrate, there is a 4.5-fold preference for AMP and GTP as products and biphasic reaction kinetics are observed giving Km values of 4.7 microM and 34 microM, and corresponding rate constants of 6.5 s-1 and 11.9 s-1. The net rate constant for Ap4G hydrolysis is 7.6 s-1. The enzyme will also hydrolyse nucleotides with more than four phosphate groups, e.g. Ap5G, Ap6A and Gp5G are hydrolysed at 25%, 18% and 10% of the rate of Ap4A respectively. An NTP is always one of the products. Ap2A and Gp2G are not hydrolysed, while Ap3A and Gp3G are very poor substrates. When the enzyme is partially purified from embryos and larvae at different stages of development by sedimentation through a sucrose density gradient, its activity increases 3-fold during the first 12 h of pre-emergence development. This is followed by a slow decline during subsequent larval development. The similarity of this enzyme to other asymmetrical-pyrophosphohydrolases suggests that it did not evolve specifically to degrade the large yolk platelet store of Gp4G which is found in Artemia embryos, but that it probably serves the same general function in bis(5'-nucleosidyl) oligophosphate metabolism as in other cells.


Spontaneous bacterial peritonitis (SBP) is an increasingly recognized complication of cirrhosis with ascites. However, the presence of ascites from any cause appears to be a risk factor for this infection. The etiology of SBP is multifactorial, including derangements in the reticuloendothelial system, abnormalities of both the serum and ascitic fluid humoral immune systems, and systemic bacteremia. Gram-negative enteric pathogens are the etiologic agents in 70% of the cases; anaerobes are an uncommon cause. Fever and abdominal pain are the most common presenting symptoms. However, asymptomatic patients are being increasingly recognized. When SBP is suspected, paracentesis is indicated. An absolute polymorphonuclear leukocyte count greater than 500/mm3 is highly suggestive of SBP. Ascitic fluid lactate and pH may offer additional diagnostic assistance when the PMN count is ambiguous. Appropriate antibiotic therapy should be initially based on the centrifuged Gram stain of ascites as well as the patient's renal function. Mortality is substantial and appears to be related to the severity of the underlying liver disease.


The flow field between two blades was analyzed numerically by solving the steady, two dimensional and incompressible (time-mass averaged Navier- Stokes equations). The ( κ - e ) turbulent model was used to simulate the condition of the momentum equation and to obtain the eddy viscosity. The SIMPLE algorithm is used to satisfy velocity-pressure coupling method and to satisfy the conservation of mass. A computer code was constructed in this work using FORTRAN 90 language to simulate the flow. The numerical results were compared with experimental results of other researcher for flow through the cascade of axial compressor, and were found to be in a good agreement. Three different airfoils common, used for axial flow compressors blades, were investigated in the present study. The study shows that stall happens. At incidence angles (-8 0 to 7 0 ) for NACA 65(12)10 and (-9 0 to 3 0 ) for NACA 65(18)10 and (-7 0 to 9 0 ) for NACA 65(8)10. The result also show that stall happens when the total pressure loss is greater than 0.06 for NACA 65(8)10 when stagger angle is greater than 45 0 stall happens for total pressure loss less 0.06 as the outlet flow angle decreases. However, the quasi-three dimensional, steady, incompressible, turbulent, adiabatic and single-phase fluid flow inside the blade-to-blade passage of an axial flow compressor stator was also studied and the study shows that Stall was seen to take place at blade tips during starting.


Light plays a critically important role in driving photo‐ and biogeochemistry of aquatic systems, and our ability to measure and model submarine light fields is fairly sophisticated. However, previous approaches have relied almost entirely upon Eulerian rather than Lagrangian measurements. Such approaches can provide good estimates of the instantaneous light field but do not necessarily reflect the doses of light experienced by particles and chemical species passively transported by physical processes within a lake or ocean surface‐layer. Here, a novel dual‐dye approach, used as a Lagrangian light dosimeter, was applied in Lake Superior's surface mixed layer to determine the importance of mixing in affecting the light dose experienced by particles passively mixed within is this layer. Two fluorescent dyes were deployed in the water column in a known ratio; one of the dyes (fluorescein) was sensitive to light exposure and one (rhodamine WT) was relatively photostable. The photochemistry of the dyes (i.e., the quantum yield of fluorescence bleaching at different wavelengths) and the role of matrix effects on dye response in a natural water system were explored with laboratory experiments. Decay equations for fluorescein and rhodamine WT fluorescence were determined from controlled irradiations of dye solutions with natural sunlight. The mixed‐layer light dose (from 460 nm to 510 nm) was then traced for two dye deployments in Lake Superior. The results show the importance of vertical mixing on the light dose within Lake Superior's surface layer on time scales of hours.


Electrostatic Discharge (ESD) current causes both hard and soft failures on GMR read head technology; however, the current head technology such TMRs, the soft failure phenomenon such magnetization reversal has not been well understood. The previous published work only states that the soft failure does not occur on TMR technology; however none has pinpointed the cause of it. This work for the first time thoroughly explain the mechanism why ESD current does not cause a magnetization reversal on TMR read head instead ESD event likely induces only hard failure on TMRs. The explanation of this mechanism was conducted by investigating the important parameters such as Blocking Temperature (TB), Neel Temperature (TN), Curie Temperature (TC), and Electric Field Breakdown (EB) of a particular TMR head were monitored while an ESD current being applied by using Finite Element simulator. The results reveal that the oxide breakdown at the insulator layer occurs at a lower level of ESD current; for example this particular TMR head the oxide breakdown occurs at ESD peak current of 4 mA while it requires 6 mA to causes a magnetization reversal.


Mixed fluid phenomena in porous media have profound implications on soil-atmosphere interaction, energy geotechnology, environmental engineering and infrastructure design. Surface tension varies with pressure, temperature, solute concentration, and surfactant concentration; on the other hand, the contact angle responds to interfacial tensions, surface topography, invasion velocity, and chemical interactions. Interfaces are not isolated but interact through the fluid pressure and respond to external fields. Jumps, snap-offs and percolating wetting liquids along edges and crevices are ubiquitous in real, non-cylindrical porous networks. Poreand macroscale instabilities together with pore structure variability-and-correlation favor fluid trapping and hinder recovery efficiency. The saturation-pressure characteristic curve is affected by the saturationhistory, flow-rate, the mechanical response of the porous medium, and time-dependent reactive and diffusive processes; in addition, there are salient differences between unsaturation by internal gas nucleation and gas invasion. Capillary forces add to other skeletal forces in the porous medium and can generate open-mode discontinuities when the capillary entry pressure is high relative to the effective stress. Time emerges as an important variable in mixed-fluid conditions and common quasi-static analyses may fail to capture the system response.


Background: Recombinant interferon β is now the mainstay of maintenance therapy for multiple sclerosis in many countries. Retinal lesions are rarely related with subcutaneous interferon β1α in multiple sclerosis. Interferon nephrotoxicity is also an extremely rare side effect. We report a case of interferon-associated retinopathy and nephropathy in a patient with multiple sclerosis receiving subcutaneous interferon β1α.
Case report: A 42 years old Caucasian female with a history of multiple sclerosis on continuous treatment with interferon β1α, presented with anemia, thrombocytopenia, albuminouria, mild elevation of liver enzymes, renal impairment and sudden hypertension without visual disorders. Ocular fundus exam showed several retinal cotton wool spots indicating interferon-retinopathy and the drug was discontinued. Biochemical and immunological analyses were negative for autoimmune renal diseases. The retinopathy disappeared without specific therapy 2 months after discontinuing interferon β1α and kidney function restored. Interferon β1α resumed 16 weeks after stopping treatment due to multiple sclerosis relapse. On an iterative fundus exam 3 months after resumption of interferon β1α, no further cotton wool spots have recurred. 6 and 12 months later, with the patient on interferon β1α treatment, the ocular fundus was free of lesions and kidney function was within normal range.
Conclusions: In our patient, both complications resolved after drug cessation and the diagnosis of interferon β1α retinopathy and nephropathy was retained due to the lack of any other etiology.


In this paper I consider the issue of corporate responsibility though a discussion of the types of reasons that may be given for a firm's actions and outcomes. These reasons may variously be given by the firm as explanation or justification, or by persons affected by the firm as endorsement or critique, or as part of the public policy debate about the scope and limits of a firm's activities. To provide a structure for this analysis I outline a model that seeks to describe the possible extent of a firm's responsibility for the outcomes of its activities through an idea of four dimensions of value. This locates firms along a minimal-maximal spectrum of corporate responsibility, without assuming where this location might be for any particular firm. I then discuss the question of reasons. This starts with some thoughts about agency and responsibility, and then considers the distinction between various types of reasons. I use the minimal-maximal spectrum to map out the various arguments. I group the arguments under the following headings: four dimensions of value; a minimal-maximal spectrum of corporate responsibility; reasons and agency: individual responsibility; reasons and agency: corporate responsibility; minimal corporate responsibility; formal and informal reasons; internal and external reasons; reasons and minimal responsibility: four examples of an appeal to ethical significance; wide and narrow instrumentalism; instrumentalism and self interest; further issues; concluding comments.This arguments presented in this paper are part of an attempt to analyse the conceptual issues that arise from corporate responsibility. Many of these arguments are suggestions, others are more fully developed. I have included both. I hope these ideas stimulate further discussion.


Sampling theory is the study of spaces of functions which are reconstructible from their values at certain sets of points, which gives rise to a sampling formula for the underlying space. For this, it is necessary to consider spaces of functions whose values at a set of points are well-defined. In this work we consider the sampling and interpolation problems in reproducing kernel Hilbert space of entire functions, called de Branges space. Functions in such space are square integrable on the real line with respect to some weight function, and satisfying some growth conditions. Some sampling and interpolation results in the Paley-Wiener spaces, which are a primary example of de Branges spaces, are reviewed. We develop necessary conditions for sampling and interpolating sequences which generalize some well-known sampling and interpolation results in the Paley-Wiener space. The proofs of the necessary conditions rely very much on the Homogeneous Approximation Property and the Comparison Theorem that we prove in de Branges space. We also give necessary and sufficient conditions for Plancherel-Polya sequences, and sufficient conditions for interpolation in some de Branges spaces of exponential type.


SUMMARY Background — In order to minimise retrospective recall in developing estimates of the prevalence of mental dis-orders in the general population, we conducted a prospective study of a cohort of youth from Zurich, Switzerland. Method — A 20 year prospective study of a community-based cohort aged 19-20 from Zurich Switzerland. The sample was enriched by subjects scoring high on the Symptom Checklist 90 R (Derogatis, 1977). A semi-structured diagnostic interview was administered by clinically experienced psychologists and psychiatrists. The six interviews from 1979 to 1999 assessed diagnoses and sub-threshold manifestations of major diagnostic categories (with the exception of schizophrenia) for the past twelve months, depending on the current DSM versions (DSM-IH, DSM-HI R, DSM-IV). Additional information on symptoms and treatment were collected for the years between the interviews. The reported prevalence rates are weighted for stratified sampling and cumulate the one-year rates of the six interviews. Results — The cumulative weighted prevalence rates for any psychiatric disorder were 48.6% excluding, and 57.7% including tobacco dependence. In addition 29.2% and 21.8%, respectively manifested sub-diagnostic syndromes. Overall there were no significant gender differences. The corresponding treatment prevalence rates were 22.4% and 31.1%, respectively for the diagnostic subjects and 6.9% and 6.1 %, respectively for the sub-diagnostic groups. The total treatment prevalence rate was 37.2% of the population (males 30.0%, females 44.1%). Conclusions — Our findings reveal that psychiatric disorders are quite common in the general population. When the spectra of mental disorders are considered, nearly three quarters of the general population will have manifested at least one of the mental disorders across their lifetime. Limitations — The data are based on a relatively small sample; a single age cohort, and the study was conducted in Zurich, Switzerland. These study features may diminish the generalisability of the findings. Declaration of Interest: this work was supported by Grant 3200-050881.97/1 of the Swiss National Science Foundation, and Research Scientist Development Awards (MH 46376 and DA00293) from the US National Institutes of Health (Dr. Merikangas).


Bursa, since the establishment of the Ottoman Empire, being on the important trade roads and having a capital accumulation as a result of silk production, was one of the first cities of modernization activities applied. Bursa maintained its importance even during the Republican Period and became one of the most important cities of the country and today is the fourth biggest and the industrialized city in Turkey. Social, political, economical and cultural changes occured with the reforms starting with the 1839 Edict of Tanzimat that aimed at modernizing the society and the government and centralizing the political power began in the Ottoman Empire. After the Tanzimat Reforms transformation of the city changed and planning processes began in Bursa according to the vision of Governors. The theresholds of the city are very important data for a sustainable planning for the city planners. Main aim of this study is to investigate the changes and transformations of the city according to the changes in the socio-economical and cultural properties for the city planners.


Aims: To examine the mortality experience of 4221 employees from 1973 to 1999 and the illness absence patterns for 2203 employees from 1990 to 1999 of a chemical and refinery facility in Louisiana. Methods: Mortality and illness absence data were extracted from the Shell Oil Company's health surveillance system (HSS). The standardised mortality ratio was used as a measure of mortality risk. Morbidity frequency and duration of absence were calculated by age, sex, and four health risk factors (cigarette smoking, high blood pressure, hypercholesterolaemia, and obesity). Results: Male employees experienced a significant deficit in mortality for all causes of death, all cancers, lung cancer, heart disease, and respiratory disease compared with the corresponding US population. Brain cancer was non-significantly increased, with six observed and five expected deaths; mortality from leukaemia was consistently lower than expected. The majority of employees had no illness absences of six days or longer during the 10 year study period. The loss of productivity (in terms of days of absence) was greater for employees with health risk factors. Ever smoking male employees had a 79% increase of heart disease and more than 50% higher rates of respiratory disease and musculoskeletal disorders compared to non-smokers. Smokers were absent 2.9 and 1.6 more days than non-smokers and ex-smokers, respectively. Conclusions: Regardless of the comparison population, significantly fewer deaths were seen for all causes combined, all cancers, lung cancer, heart disease, or non-malignant respiratory disease. Illness absence rates and duration were higher among employees with health risk factors.


State-of-the-art results in image inpainting are obtained with patch-based methods that fill in the missing region patch-by-patch by searching for similar patches in the known region and placing them at corresponding locations. In this paper, we introduce a context-aware patch-based inpainting method, where the context is represented by texture and color features of a block surrounding the patch to be filled in. We use this context to recognize other blocks in the image that have similar features and then we constrain the search for similar patches within them. Such an approach guides the search process towards less ambiguous matching candidates, while also speeding up the algorithm. Experimental results demonstrate benefits of the proposed context-aware approach, both in terms of inpainting quality and computation time.


The spinel nanocrystalline Co0.5Zn0.5Nd0.05Fe1.95O4 ferrite was prepared by polyacrylamide gel method. Influences of Nd3+ ions substitution on the microstructural and electromagnetic properties for the Co0.5Zn0.5Fe2O4 ferrites had been systematically investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscope (TEM) and wave-guide method. The results showed that the Nd3+ ions can replace Fe3+ ions and adjust lattice parameters. The average size of the Co0.5Zn0.5Fe2O4 and Co0.5Zn0.5Nd0.05Fe1.95O4 particles were identified to be about 50nm and 60nm by TEM, respectively. The complex permittivity (=ε′-jε″) and complex permeability (=μ′-jμ″) for the composites had been measured in the frequency range of 8.2-12.4GHz. The results showed that the Co0.5Zn0.5Fe2O4 and Co0.5Zn0.5Nd0.05Fe1.95O4 ferrites had both dielectric loss and magnetic loss. The dielectric loss tangent (tgδε) and magnetic loss tangent (tgδm) for the Co0.5Zn0.5Nd0.05Fe1.95O4 ferrite were obviously higher than those of the Co0.5Zn0.5Fe2O4. The maximal value of tgδε and tgδm for the Co0.5Zn0.5Nd0.05Fe1.95O4 ferrite was around 0.30 at 12.4GHz and 0.16 at 10.8GHz, respectively.


This paper investigates the feasibility of a city-wide content distribution architecture composed of short range wireless access points. We look at how a target group of intermittently and partially connected mobile nodes can improve the diffusion of information within the group by leveraging fixed and mobile nodes that are exterior to the group. The fixed nodes are data sources, and the external mobile nodes are data relays, and we examine the trade off between the use of each in order to obtain high satisfaction within the target group, which consists of data sinks. We conducted an experiment in Cambridge, UK, to gather mobility traces that we used for the study of this content distribution architecture. In this scenario, the simple fact that members of the target group collaborate leads to a delivery ratio of 90%. In addition, the use of external mobile nodes to relay the information slightly increases the delivery ratio while significantly decreasing the delay.


ABSTRACT Catheter-associated infections are difficult to treat with available antimicrobial agents because of their biofilm etiology. We examined the effect of low-amperage direct electrical current (DC) exposure on established bacterial and fungal biofilms in a novel experimental in vitro catheter model. Staphylococcus epidermidis, Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Candida parapsilosis biofilms were grown on the inside surfaces of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) catheters, after which 0, 100, 200, or 500 μA of DC was delivered via intraluminally placed platinum electrodes. Catheter biofilms and intraluminal fluid were quantitatively cultured after 24 h and 4 days of DC exposure. Time- and dose-dependent biofilm killing was observed with all amperages and durations of DC administration. Twenty-four hours of 500 μA of DC sterilized the intraluminal fluid for all bacterial species studied; no viable bacteria were detected after treatment of S. epidermidis and S. aureus biofilms with 500 μA of DC for 4 days.


Regular path queries (RPQs) have quickly become a staple to explore graph databases. SPARQL 1.1 includes property paths, and so now encompasses RPQs as a fragment. Despite the extreme utility of RPQs, it can be exceedingly difficult for even experts to formulate such queries. It is next to impossible for non-experts to formulate such path queries. As such, several visual query systems (VQSs) have been proposed which simplify the task of constructing path queries by directly manipulating visual objects representing the domain elements. The queries generated by VQSs may, however, have many commonalities that can be exploited to optimize globally. We introduce Tasweet, a framework for optimizing "disjunctive" path queries, which detects the commonalities among the queries to find a globally optimized execution plan over the plan spaces of the constituent RPQs. Our results show savings in edge-walks / time-tocompletion of 59%.


Natural leucocyte interferon (IF) upon injection to two patients affected with Xeroderma pigmentosum for three weeks stimulated the inhibited DNA replication and Host reactivation at the level of healthy donors. Tigasol--the drug used traditionally for the treatment of diseases caused by Xeroderma pigmentosum proved less effective than IF.


The healing of bone fracture with low-intensity pulsed uItrasound (LIPUS) associated with bone formation by osteoblasts has been validated in previous studies. Yet, littIe has been known about the effect of LIPUS on the osteoclasts during the bone remodeling process. To extensively explore this issue, osteoblast precursor cells were insonified by LIPUS in which that the insonification effect was verified by differentiation and other activities of cells. Experiments were performed on the osteoclast precursor cells formed by the differentiation of RAW 264.7 cell line via cuItured the cells in the growth medium containing receptor-activated nuclear factor K B ligand (RANKL) for 3 days. The 1 MHz LIPUS, with calibrated 125 mW/cm2 SATA intensity, 20% duty cycle of a 1 kHz pulse repetition frequency, was arranged to daily insonify the osteoclast precursor cells in the period between the 3rd and 6th day during cuIturing. The morphology and number of tartrate resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP) positive multi-nucleated osteoclasts were observed and measured. Gene expression of receptor activator of nuclear factor K B (RANK), cathepsine K, matrix metalloproteinase 9 (MMP9), and TRAP were determined by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Following the LIPUS insonification, the bone resorptive activity of osteoclast precursor cells tended to be inhibited. The number of TRAP positive multi-nucleated osteoclasts for the experimental group was lower than that of the control group. The resorption pits on the calcium phosphate film also found to be inhibited by LIPUS insonification, where the pit formation of the experimental group was smaller than that of the control group. RT-PCR resuIts reveled that LIPUS decreased the mRNA levels of RANK, TRAP, cathepsin K, and MMP9 mRNA. The LIPUS insonification suppress osteoclast differentiation by the inhibition of multi-nucleated osteoclast formation be demonstrated in this study. These resuIts suggest that the inhibition effect of LIPUS on osteoclasts is through the reduction of RANKL induced expression of cathepsin K and MMP9 for modulating bone remodeling process.


Abstract The closure temperature, TC, of the intracrystalline ordering of Mg-hercynite is estimated with a comparative crystal-chemical approach. The single crystals were selected from two distinct geological environments that represent extremely different cooling rates. The fast cooled setting refers to anatectic metapelitic enclaves that occur in the high-K calc-alkaline lavas of the Neogene Volcanic Province of SE Spain. The slow cooled setting refers to metabauxite from the Anga metamorphic complex, Lake Baikal. Parameters sensitive to TC include the oxygen fractional coordinate (u) and the inversion parameter (i). Experimental equilibration data on the spinel and hercynite end-members and on their solid solution are fitted to equations where TC is given as a function of the hercynite content (Hc) of the solid solution and of u or i. The unavoidable simplifications made in this empirical approach are discussed. A reasonable value for TC, ~400 °C, was obtained for the slow cooled metamorphic hercynite from the oxygen fractional coordinates. In contrast, an unreasonably high value of TC, ~600 °C, was obtained from the inversion parameters. In the case of the fast cooled anatectic samples, TC calculated from the two structural parameters are comparable; the five crystals show a range in the calculated values for TC over ~250 °C, from ~700 to ~950 °C, which is reasonable considering the known diversity of cooling rates exhibited by their volcanic host-rocks.


Abstract Iron is accumulated symplastically in kelp in a non-ferritin core that seems to be a general feature of brown algae. Microprobe studies show that Fe binding depends on tissue type. The sea is generally an iron-poor environment and brown algae were recognized in recent years for having a unique, ferritin-free iron storage system. Kelp (Laminaria digitata) and the filamentous brown alga Ectocarpus siliculosus were investigated using X-ray microprobe imaging and nanoprobe X-ray fluorescence tomography to explore the localization of iron, arsenic, strontium, and zinc, and micro-X-ray absorption near-edge structure (μXANES) to study Fe binding. Fe distribution in frozen hydrated environmental samples of both algae shows higher accumulation in the cortex with symplastic subcellular localization. This should be seen in the context of recent ultrastructural insight by cryofixation–freeze substitution that found a new type of cisternae that may have a storage function but differs from the apoplastic Fe accumulation found by conventional chemical fixation. Zn distribution co-localizes with Fe in E. siliculosus, whereas it is chiefly located in the L. digitata medulla, which is similar to As and Sr. Both As and Sr are mostly found at the cell wall of both algae. XANES spectra indicate that Fe in L. digitata is stored in a mineral non-ferritin core, due to the lack of ferritin-encoding genes. We show that the L. digitata cortex contains mostly a ferritin-like mineral, while the meristoderm may include an additional component.


This study aims to elaborate on the meanings of policy entrepreneurs and through the conceptualisation analysing implementation of local municipal contact centres – a Swedish local e-governmental initiative. The paper builds on qualitative case studies including interviews, observations and document analysis, all analysed through the perspective of policy entrepreneurs. Local policies are implemented in relation to local cultures, norms and economic structures. The networked governance structure demands entrepreneurial actors to combine resources and interests into a change. Here we identified both theoretically and practical, two types of such entrepreneurial actors. The issue entrepreneur focuses on the issue as such and focuses on the solution to a single problem. The political entrepreneur, on the other hand, focuses on core values and long term structural changes. The emerging networked governance structure asks for improved knowledge on policy entrepreneurship both for analytical and practical improvements. The findings may provide useful information for municipal e-government planning specifically when planning for implementing contact centres. The study enriches the existing literature on policy entrepreneurs in networks expanding the roles to include also local e-government contexts.


It is unlikely that any other state attracts more attention of the world community than China; there are endless debates about its geopolitical status, social-economic potential, demographic challenges, environmental threats, political structure, etc. However, scientific and popular-science discourses focus rather on finding an answer to the question of what type of social system China has in terms of the classical dilemma of "capitalism vs socialism", and there are no universal nominations for either the historical past or present. The article aims at identifying the key discursive representations of the "Chinese economic miracle" by reconstructing them from three books recently translated into Russian: Zhang Yu's China's Economic Reform: Experience and Implications, Yifu Lin's Demystifying the Chinese Economy, and How China Became Capitalist, written by Ronald Coase and Ning Wang. The article summarizes the main arguments of the three books. Although their interpretations of the "Chinese economic miracle" differ, including the degree of the politicized enthusiasm and optimism, they agree that developing countries should follow the Chinese path of reforms and ignore a number of this path's serious problems. The article concludes that the books represent three discourses: an ideological-politicized scenario of developing a special type of socialism "from above", a description of the capitalist economy developed from both "above" and "below", and a statement of the completed transition to capitalism not under the party leadership control but mainly "from below" and, despite prohibitions and anti-capitalist rhetoric, "from above". Such discursive contradictions are especially interesting for the Russian reader who remembers disputes about the type of "Russian capitalism" in the 1990s-2000s, and for the sociologist of the "classical type", i.e., one studying historical changes to understand current social transformations.


The study was performed to compare the macro and micro nutrient elements, heavy metal contents and microbiological quality of ten different types of sauces and ketchups available in Bangladesh. Physicochemical properties, vitamin, minerals, preservatives and heavy metals concentration and microbiological quality were determined for all the samples. The results of this study suggest that the selected sauces and ketchups are good source of nutrient, antioxidant like vitamin C and energy. Heavy metals as well as concentration of preservatives were analyzed to assess the safety in terms of physical and chemical hazards associated with sauces and ketchups. Among heavy metals, only aluminum was detected in studying sauces and ketchups, but their concentration were lower than the permitted level. The results of this study were compared with existing results and recommendations which will be helpful for consumers to consider the nutritional quality and safety of sauces and ketchups.


– Despite its very recent history of cultivation in Ethiopia, snap bean is one of the potential legume crops that contribute to the efforts for the realization of food security in the country and to earn foreign currency. However, the scientific information available with regards agronomy of snap bean especially the response of snap bean to N and P fertilizers for its optimum production at Jimma is very limited. Therefore, a field experiment was conducted at Jimma, Southwestern Ethiopia to study the growth response of snap bean as affected by different rates of N and P fertilizer rates. Five levels of N (0, 41, 82, 123, and 164 kg ha −1 ) and four levels of P (0, 46, 92 and 138 kg ha −1 ) were laid down in a randomized complete block design with three replications. N was applied in two equal splits (50% at the time of sowing and 50% during flowering) as urea and the entire dose of P was applied basal as triple super phosphate at sowing. The main effects of N and P fertilizer levels showed significant differences (P ≤ 0.05) for all growth parameters studied. The interaction effects of N by P were significant only for root volume. The optimum total pod yield was obtained by the application of N and P at the rates of 82 N kg and 46 kg P 2 O 5 ha -1 , respectively and beyond those rates there is a non-significant yield increment. Thus, the application of N and P at optimum rates (82 N kg and 46 kg P 2 O 5 ha -1 ) increases the growth and consequently increases the total pod yield of snap bean. However, repeating the experiment for more seasons and similar location would help us draw sound conclusion and recommendations. Hence, future studies should look in to these factors to develop fertilizer recommendation for optimum growth and yield of snap bean in Jimma and similar agro ecology area.


Important in many different sectors of the industry, the determination of stream velocity has become more and more important due to measurements precision necessity, in order to determine the right production rates, determine the volumetric production of undesired fluid, establish automated controls based on these measurements avoiding over-flooding or over-production, guaranteeing accurate predictive maintenance, etc. Difficulties being faced have been the determination of the velocity of specific fluids embedded in some others, for example, determining the gas bubbles stream velocity flowing throughout liquid fluid phase. Although different and already applicable methods have been researched and already implemented within the industry, a non-intrusive automated way of providing those stream velocities has its importance, and may have a huge impact in projects budget. Knowing the importance of its determination, this developed script uses a methodology of breaking-down real-time videos media into frame images, analyzing by pixel correlations possible superposition matches for further gas bubbles stream velocity estimation. In raw sense, the script bases itself in functions and procedures already available in MatLab, which can be used for image processing and treatments, allowing the methodology to be implemented. Its accuracy after the running test was of around 97% (ninety-seven percent); the raw source code with comments had almost 3000 (three thousand) characters; and the hardware placed for running the code was an Intel Core Duo 2.13 [Ghz] and 2 [Gb] RAM memory capable workstation. Even showing good results, it could be stated that just the end point correlations were actually getting to the final solution. So that, making use of self-learning functions or neural network, one could surely enhance the capability of the application to be run in real-time without getting exhaust by iterative loops.


Alkali-silica reaction (ASR) continues to be a detriment to the long-term performance of concrete. Certain initial conditions related to material alkalinity, aggregate reactivity, humidity, and temperature conditions are known to initiate ASR. A key factor in the prediction of ASR in concrete over time is the reactivity of the aggregate, but current test methodology is largely simulative in nature and yields mainly empirical results that apply to only a narrow band of conditions, and leave many questions as to whether these methods have any relevance to concrete performance under field conditions. Improvement can be found by using a performance-based approach that can address the ASR potential of concrete at levels of alkali, temperature, and moisture that are realistic and representative of actual field conditions. In the present study, the concept of ASR-related activation energy is introduced as a representative single parameter of the ASR. An attempt has been made to introduce the dilatometer test met...


Public Food Delivery Systems are of crucial importance in developing countries of the world which are characterized by widespread problems of food and nutritional insecurity. As a country India has failed to provide food and nutritional security to a vast majority of the population and it remains one of the most food insecure nations of the world (UNICEF, 2007). Despite India's impressive growth performance chronic hunger and mass deprivation is a major problem, which may lead to dire consequences for the future. The situation is particularly alarming with respect to women and children. More than half of the women in the country are underweight and about 47 percent of children are of LBW (Low Birth Weight). Six decades after independence India houses the largest number of malnourished persons in the world (ibid). India's food policy has undergone a rapid change since the 1950s and 1960s, when food security was considered a problem of availability at the national level. This was followed by the entitlement approach to food security and in recent years access to food has become a human right. The Government of India has launched a number of initiatives to curb hunger and malnutrition, especially among vulnerable groups like women, young children and tribal. The main aim of the present study is to evaluate three of India's most important food based social protection programs which comprise of the Mid day Meal Scheme (MDMS), the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) and the Public Distribution Scheme (PDS) on the basis of secondary data sources comprising of NSSO Household Consumption Expenditure Survey 2004-05 and 2009-10 as well as NFHS-3 data.


Medical implants offer a unique and powerful therapeutic approach in many areas of medicine. However, their lifetime is often limited as they may cause a foreign body reaction (FBR) leading to their encapsulation by scar tissue1–4. Despite the importance of this process, how cells recognise implanted materials is still poorly understood5, 6. Here, we show how the mechanical mismatch between implants and host tissue leads to FBR. Fibroblasts and macrophages, which are both crucially involved in mediating FBR, became activated when cultured on materials just above the stiffness found in healthy tissue. Coating implants with a thin layer of hydrogel or silicone with a tissue-like elastic modulus of ∼1 kPa or below led to significantly reduced levels of inflammation and fibrosis after chronic implantation both in peripheral nerves and subcutaneously. This effect was linked to the nuclear localisation of the mechanosensitive transcriptional regulator YAP in vivo. Hence, we identify the mechanical mismatch between implant and tissue as a driver of FBR. Soft implant coatings matching the mechanical properties of host tissue minimized FBR and may be used as a novel therapeutic strategy to improve long-term biomedical implant stability without extensive modification of current implant manufacturing techniques, thus facilitating clinical translation.Foreign body reaction to medical implants can be avoided by matching the stiffness of the implant surface to that of the host tissue.


Introduction World Cycling Centre (UCI-WCC) offers training and development, with three permanent groups in the Olympic disciplines of road, track and BMX, in order to leverage their sporting careers. Human, material, and financial resources could become limiting factors when performing talent identification (TID) programs. Consequently, we have designed a test, World Cycling Centre – Power Profile Test (WCC-PPT), which can provide coaches around the world with relevant information about the physical potential of their cyclists and an initial benchmark thanks to a simple but reliable protocol, might become an asset for the cycling industry (Gonzalez-Tablas et al., 2016). Power Profile Test (PPT) assesses a cyclist's maximum capacity to produce power over durations that are strongly related to physiological capacities required to perform in specific cycling events (Quod et al. 2010; Novak et al. 2017).   Purpose: The aim of this study was to generate new references to help coaches identifying potential talented male-endurance cyclists around the world, creating groups per continent.   Methods A total of 469, international level endurance male cyclists from 89 countries of Africa, America, Asia, and Europe completed the WCC-PPT. The data used for analysis were collected over a 3-year period (2013-2016), at the UCI-WCC, its Satellite-Centers and its collaborators. WCC-PPT was performed on an air-braked cycle ergometer (WattBike Ltd, Nottingham, UK), that is consider to be reliable and validity for talent identification purposes (Bellinger & Minahan, 2014; Hopker et al., 2010), with the UCI-WCC standardized protocol (Gonzalez-Tablas et al., 2016).   Continuous variables are summarized by mean, 75th and 90th percentiles.   Results Anthropometrical characteristics and WCC-PPT results for male-endurance cyclists are presented in Table 1. Conclusion The WCC-PPT has been successful to create a large and reliable database, that will allow the cycling community to generate power outputs benchmarks to identify talented male-endurance cyclist all over the world.   It is important to continue working and increase the number of cyclists tested around the world to create relevant references per gender and age groups. Further research will be done to evaluate the reliability and validity of this test for TID purposes as well as to create new databases with more number of cyclists tested.


In this paper, a new type of large span prestressed concrete integral roof was studied. The test uses full scale specimens, the roof's span is 24 meters, the width is 2 meters, across the tallest is 3.6 meters. The different condition of roof structure properties is examined. Through experiment obtaines the deformation and the ultimate bearing capacity of the roof, the design is proved to be correct. Test results show that the roof system with one piece casting has enough bearing capacity and rigidity. Roof destruction presents brittleness nature, destroying position is in lower chord board near the end of place. This research conclusion provides a reference data for this type of roof of popularization and application.


Although the flight accident rate in Indonesia has declined, several accidents still occur every year. In Indonesia, there are several major factors that can affect flight accidents, such as human error, policy aspect, limited facilities, and technological factors.

The present study examines the relationship between the implementation of public policy and pilots' airmanship and flight safety in Indonesia.

 Questionnaires with 171 questions about airmanship, flight safety, and public policy were distributed to 270 randomly selected Indonesian commercial pilots. A structural equation model was used to test the hypothesis model concerning the implementation of public policy, pilots' airmanship, and flight safety.

The empirical results strongly support the hypothesis that there is a significant relationship between behavior, emotional intelligence, and self-efficacy and airmanship; a significant relationship between pilots' airmanship and the implementation of public policies; and a significant relationship between the implementation of public policy and aviation safety.


An experimental investigation was carried out to braze diamond abrasives onto thin steel wires, in which case the brazing was conducted in the vacuum and under high temperatures by using a nickel-based powder as brazing alloy. The morphologies and microstructures of the brazed wires were observed and the comprehensive mechanical properties of the brazed wires were tested. The brazed wires were also used to cut such brittle materials as ceramics, glass, and natural stone. It is shown that a typical phenomenon of brazing alloy's climbing around the diamond grains was observed in brazing the wires. Through observing the cross-section of brazed wires, it is observed that there is a good bonding between the brazing alloy and the body of steel wires. The crystal grains of the steel wires grew significantly after brazing. Through observing the morphologies of the diamond wires and the surfaces of four workpiece materials, few diamond pull-outs were found on the wires and the kerfs on the workpiece materials were basically flat.


ABSTRACT Coping well with retirement could depend on sense of coherence (SOC), how confident an individual is to predict and manage the situation/environment using personal psychological resources. While diverse resources determine SOC, leisure resources could be essential for retirees due to extended free time. This study explored the roles of leisure attitudes (LA) and leisure self-efficacy (LSE) on attitudes toward retirement (ATR) using SOC theory. A total of 423 retirees participated and were asked to complete an on-line questionnaire. Data were analyzed with structural equation modeling. Findings showed that LA and LSE are significant resources in shaping SOC. Moreover, the results demonstrated that the SOC was a crucial determinant of ATR and a mediator between leisure resources and ATR. Overall, this study sheds light on the importance of retirees' views on leisure and perceptions of their ability to perform leisure in retirement and presents implications for leisure-centered retirement planning programs.


ABSTRACT Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a major cause of liver diseases, including hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), and more than 650,000 people die annually due to HBV-associated liver failure. Extensive studies of individual promoters have revealed that heterogeneous RNA 5′ ends contribute to the complexity of HBV transcriptome and proteome. Here, we provide a comprehensive map of HBV transcription start sites (TSSs) in human liver, HCC, and blood, as well as several experimental replication systems, at a single-nucleotide resolution. Using CAGE (cap analysis of gene expression) analysis of 16 HCC/nontumor liver pairs, we identify 17 robust TSSs, including a novel promoter for the X gene located in the middle of the gene body, which potentially produces a shorter X protein translated from the conserved second start codon, and two minor antisense transcripts that might represent viral noncoding RNAs. Interestingly, transcription profiles were similar in HCC and nontumor livers, although quantitative analysis revealed highly variable patterns of TSS usage among clinical samples, reflecting precise regulation of HBV transcription initiation at each promoter. Unlike the variety of TSSs found in liver and HCC, the vast majority of transcripts detected in HBV-positive blood samples are pregenomic RNA, most likely generated and released from liver. Our quantitative TSS mapping using the CAGE technology will allow better understanding of HBV transcriptional responses in further studies aimed at eradicating HBV in chronic carriers. IMPORTANCE Despite the availability of a safe and effective vaccine, HBV infection remains a global health problem, and current antiviral protocols are not able to eliminate the virus in chronic carriers. Previous studies of the regulation of HBV transcription have described four major promoters and two enhancers, but little is known about their activity in human livers and HCC. We deeply sequenced the HBV RNA 5′ ends in clinical human samples and experimental models by using a new, sensitive and quantitative method termed cap analysis of gene expression (CAGE). Our data provide the first comprehensive map of global TSS distribution over the entire HBV genome in the human liver, validating already known promoters and identifying novel locations. Better knowledge of HBV transcriptional activity in the clinical setting has critical implications in the evaluation of therapeutic approaches that target HBV replication.


Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has six well‐known genotypes in worldwide and has a very high genetic diversity. Introduction of DAAs leads to improvement of treatment results with SVR rates exceeding 95%. Development of HCV treatment resistance is a problematic issue that needs sufficient solutions. Many hosts, viral, and drug factors are implemented in the process of treatment resistance. Lack of clinical trials on treatment failure leads to lag in development of certain consensuses for retreatment.


BACKGROUND
Glycosylated hemoglobin, HbA 1c is the most acceptable measure of chronic glycemia. It is not widely available and/or affordable in Nigeria. The mean of the monthly fasting plasma glucose (MFPG) of the preceding 3 months is often used as surrogate for assessing chronic glycemia.

OBJECTIVE
To determine the relationships among fasting plasma glucose (FPG), 2-hour post-prandial glucose (2-hPG), HbA1c, and MFPG.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Hospital records were used to derive the MFPGs of diabetic subjects from the mean of their monthly FPGs of the preceding three months. Other data extracted included the patient's age, sex, body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC), and duration of diabetes mellitus (DMDU). FPG, 2- hPG and HbA 1c were determined during this index consultation.

RESULTS
Ninety five persons (65 males, 30 females) with type 2 were included in the study. Their mean age and DMDU were 54.7 ± 8.9 years and 8.1 ± 6.1 years, respectively. Their mean WC, BMI, FPG, 2-hPG, HbA1c, and MFPG were 100.2 ± 11.0 cm, 24.2 ± 4.3 kgm/2, 7.5 ± 2.4 mmol/l, 10.4 ± 4.1 mmol/l, 8.2 ± 2.2%, and 5.9 ± 2.2 mmol/l, respectively. The males were significantly older (57.5 ± 8.4 vs 49.3 ± 7.6, P<0.001) while the females had higher waist circumference and BMI than their male counterparts: 104.8 ± 11.6 cm vs 92.8 ± 10.1 cm, P<0.004; and 25.8 ± 4.9 kg/m 2 vs 23.3 ± 3.7 kg/m 2 , P<0.005, respectively. There were no significant differences in FPG, 2-hPG, MFPG and HbA1c levels between male and female subjects. There were significant positive correlations between FPG and HbA1c (r=0.45, P=0.05) and between 2-hPG and HbA1c (r=0.52, P=0.01), but there was no positive correlation between MFPG and HbA1c (r=-0.20, P=0.18).

CONCLUSION
There is no positive correlation between MFPG and HbA 1c and thus MFPG may not be a good surrogate for HbA1c in assessment of chronic glycemia in our patients.


Quasi-static tests of three specimens of steel-concrete composite fabricated shear wall were performed to investigate its seismic behavior. The test results indicate that horizontal cracks run through the interface between the wall and the base beam, diagonal cracks appear on the whole prefabricated concrete shear wall. The specimens fail in the mode of bending-shear, the hysteretic curves according to the test were full, it means that they have better seismic bearing capacity.


ABSTRACT RNA interference (RNAi) in animals, cosuppression in plants, and quelling in fungi are homology-dependent gene silencing mechanisms in which the introduction of either double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) or transgenes induces sequence-specific mRNA degradation. These phenomena share a common genetic and mechanistic basis. The accumulation of short interfering RNA (siRNA) molecules that guide sequence-specific mRNA degradation is a common feature in both silencing mechanisms, as is the component of the RNase complex involved in mRNA cleavage. During RNAi in animal cells, dsRNA is processed into siRNA by an RNase III enzyme called Dicer. Here we show that elimination of the activity of two Dicer-like genes by mutation in the fungus Neurospora crassa eliminates transgene-induced gene silencing (quelling) and the processing of dsRNA to an siRNA form. The two Dicer-like genes appear redundant because single mutants are quelling proficient. This first demonstration of the involvement of Dicer in gene silencing induced by transgenes supports a model by which a dsRNA produced by the activity of cellular RNA-dependent RNA polymerases on transgenic transcripts is an essential intermediate of silencing.


In this letter, we propose simple bit-error aware lossless compression algorithms for compression and transmission of waveform data in noisy channels. The developed algorithms consist of two stages. The first stage applies linear prediction and the second stage uses the developed residue coder, bi-level block coding or interval entropy coding, in which we show how to choose the optimal coding parameters for compressing the residue sequence from the first stage. We only encode the linear prediction and bi-level block coding or entropy coding parameters using a forward error correction scheme such as (7,4) Hamming codes, leaving residue sequence or residue offset sequence as they are, in order to preserve the performance of compression ratio. Our experiments show that the developed algorithms achieve high compression ratios and the recovered waveforms have a good signal quality when the bit error rate is equal to or less than 0.001.


Gliomas account for approximately 40% of all brain tumors and are thus the most common primary tumors of the central nervous system (CNS). High-grade (WHO grades III and IV) malignant gliomas that include anaplastic astrocytoma (AA), anaplastic oligodendroglioma (AO), anaplastic oligoastrocytoma (AOA), and glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) are often resistant to treatment; especially, GBM, the most common glioma in adults, kills patients within a median time span of a year after diagnosis despite treatment with aggressive surgical resection, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy. In 2006, Temozolomide (TMZ) was certified as the treatment agent for malignant gliomas in Japan, and it is now used as the first-line therapy. However, its clinical outcomes depend on the O(6)-methylguanine-DNA methyltransferase (MGMT) status, and MGMT modification is one of the key factors to obtain greater clinical benefits. Previously, we demonstrated that Interferon-β (IFN-β) markedly enhanced chemosensitivity to TMZ in an in vitro study of human glioma cells; this finding suggested that one of the major mechanisms by which IFN-β enhances chemosensitivity is the downregulation of MGMT transcription via p53 induction. Previously, we tried clinical trial of gene therapy by means of IFN-β gene in order to evaluate the safety, feasibility, and preliminary clinical effectiveness, and reasonable results could be obtained. As a next step, we are conducting a clinical trial study, namely, genomic therapy using with siRNA-MGMT. We hope that these new regimen will be safe and well tolerated, and may prolong survival in patients with GBM.


Exploration of pH-universal and durable catalysts with specific structure and high performance is desirable but challenging for electrochemical water splitting. Aiming at this goal, hierarchical CoMoS3 nanotubes constructed of ultrathin nanosheet subunits are prepared via a self-sacrifice template method. The conversion from CoMoO4 nanorods to hierarchical MoCoS3 nanotubes is successfully realized through a facile solvothermal process. The obtained sample simultaneously possesses advanced structural superiority and synergism of ternary Co–Mo–S. Endowed with these advantages, MoCoS3 can serve as a pH-universal and high-performance electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution, delivering low onset overpotential, small overpotential required to generate current density of 10 mA cm−2, and good stability. Moreover, it exhibits excellent catalytic performance in the electrochemical oxygen evolution reaction, making it a promising dual-functional catalyst for water electrolysis.


Immunotherapy has demonstrated remarkable responses in patients with metastatic tumors. Targeting the inhibitory CTLA-4 and PD-1 receptors expressed by T cells induces durable responses in a subset of cancer patients, including advanced melanoma. However, cancers, such as melanoma, remain largely resistant to many forms of immunotherapy, most likely due to exploitation of additional, and unidentified, negative feedback loops. It is widely appreciated that combination therapies will be required to extend the benefit of checkpoint blockade. Current approaches for discovery of combination therapies emphasize a 1 + 1 approach in which an active drug is tested in combination with an experimental agent. We hypothesize that many opportunities for synergistic combinations are missed with this strategy. We propose to develop a novel in vivo technique for discovery of combination therapies in the tumor microenvironment. Single-cell RNA-seq will be used to discover genes upregulated in dysfunctional T cells during PD-1 or CTLA-4 monotherapy in a mouse model of melanoma. We will then screen a library of identified targets in CD8 T cells for synergistic combinations using checkpoint blockade along with CRSIPR/Cas9 genome editing. Enrichment within the tumor of specific targets will then be further investigated to determine the most efficacious combinations for the treatment of melanoma. Citation Format: Adam N. Cartwright, Rong En Tay, Kai W. Wucherpfennig. Systematic discovery of combinationimmunotherapy targets in vivo [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Second CRI-CIMT-EATI-AACR International Cancer Immunotherapy Conference: Translating Science into Survival; 2016 Sept 25-28; New York, NY. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Immunol Res 2016;4(11 Suppl):Abstract nr A055.


This paper presents a Finite Elements Modelling (FEM) based methodology dedicated to the evaluation of the lifetime and the reliability of assemblies involving brittle materials under cyclic loading. It focuses on the particular case of metal bonded Aluminium Nitride (AlN) substrates used in power electronic switch modules. The ceramic fracture criterion was formulated according to the weakest link concept, under Weibull's approach. The material's parameters were determined by running three points bending tests. In order to check the relevancy of the proposed methodology, a non linear thermomechanical Finite Elements Model allowed computing the number of thermal cycles before substrate brittle fracture within a test vehicle, which was then compared to experimental results. Once validated, the methodology was applied to two different configurations of a power switch module, designed for harsh environment aeronautic applications. The corresponding external loading profile was considered to compute and monitor the evolution of the maximal principal stresses within the ceramic substrates whole volumes. Their lifetimes and reliabilities was finally assessed and compared to the applications requirements.


This project bridges the divide between policy makers and critical approaches to gender by engaging with both the quantitative (number of women) and qualitative (shifts in underlying social power structures) aspects of gender in the context of CSDP. To do so it examined the policy documents and secondary literature on women, peace and security and the EU. We also conducted interviews with key personnel in Brussels and in Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina to examine the planning, practice and impact of EU crisis management missions in the field. The Project makes the following recommendations based on this research:
• Greater commitment to the Women, Peace & Security (WPS) agenda is required at the very top-level, both within EU planning offices such as the CMPD & CPSS, and within Member States at the highest political level and in addressing institutional cultures within personnel contributing agencies.
• Better resourcing for Gender planning and Gender Focal point staff, doublehatting should be ended and continuity planning between staff should be enhanced.
• Gender-mainstreaming has to include addressing institutional culture at the planning stage in addition to looking at staffing ratios and implementation on the ground.
• Improving gender outcomes requires cooperation between CSDP missions and civil society, as well as better linking between gender mainstreaming initiatives in the other EU institutions and the EEAS.
• Academic researchers working on gender and conflict need to emphasise the translational aspects of their findings and actively seek to engage with policymakers and practitioners
• The CSDP institutions need to improve transparency and accessibility for academic researchers to maximise the accuracy, relevance and impact of research


The mathematical modeling of macromolecular reactions leads to countable (possibly infinite) systems of ordinary differential equations (CODE's). This paper reviews two recent developments of the so-called discrete Galerkin method, which has been developed for the numerical treatment of countable systems, which arise e.g. in polymer chemistry. The first approach can be considered as a method of lines with moving basis functions and has been implemented recently in the program package MACRON. The second type of the Galerkin method is characterized by a so-called outer time discretization of the complete problem and an appropriate and efficient solution of the arising subproblems. This method is realized in the research code CODEX.


Terahertz (THz) imaging has recently attracted significant attention thanks to its non-invasive, non-destructive, non-ionizing, material-classification, and ultra-fast nature for object exploration and inspection. However, its strong water absorption nature and low noise tolerance lead to undesired blurs and distortions of reconstructed THz images. The performances of existing restoration methods are highly constrained by the diffraction-limited THz signals. To address the problem, we propose a novel Subspace-and-Attention-guided Restoration Network (SARNet) that fuses multi-spectral features of a THz image for effective restoration. To this end, SARNet uses multi-scale branches to extract spatio-spectral features of amplitude and phase which are then fused via shared subspace projection and attention guidance. Here, we experimentally construct ultra-fast THz time-domain spectroscopy system covering a broad frequency range from 0.1 THz to 4 THz for building up temporal/spectral/spatial/phase/material THz database of hidden 3D objects. Complementary to a quantitative evaluation, we demonstrate the effectiveness of our SARNet model on 3D THz tomographic reconstruction


This paper is concerned with the state estimation problem for a class of time-delay systems with Markovian jump parameters and missing measurements, considering the fact that data missing may occur in the process of transmission and its failure rates are governed by random variables satisfying certain probabilistic distribution. By employing a new Lyapunov function and using the convexity property of the matrix inequality, a sufficient condition for the existence of the desired state estimator for Markovian jump systems with missing measurements can be achieved by solving some linear matrix inequalities, which can be easily facilitated by using the standard numerical software. Furthermore, the gain of state estimator can also be derived based on the known conditions. Finally, a numerical example is exploited to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.


This paper presents an efficient joint source-channel coding scheme based on forward error correction (FEC) for three dimensional (3D) models. The system employs a wavelet based zero-tree 3D mesh coder based on progressive geometry compression (PGC). Reed-Solomon (RS) codes are applied to the embedded output bitstream to add resiliency to packet losses. Two-state Markovian channel model is employed to model packet losses. The proposed method applies approximately optimal and unequal FEC across packets. Therefore the scheme is scalable to varying network bandwidth and packet loss rates (PLR). In addition, distortion-rate (D-R) curve is modeled to decrease the computational complexity. Experimental results show that the proposed method achieves considerably better expected quality compared to previous packet-loss resilient schemes.


Worldwide, electrical grids are expected to become smarter in the near future. In this sense, there is an increasing interest in intelligent and flexible microgrids, i.e., able to operate in island or in grid-connected modes. Black start operation, frequency and voltage stability, active and reactive power flow control, active power filter capabilities, and storage energy management are the functionalities expected for these small grids. This way, the energy can be generated and stored near the consumption points, thus increasing the reliability and reducing the losses produced by the large power lines. In this article, the main concepts related to the configuration, control, and energy management of intelligent microgrids are reviewed.


A double blind controlled trial has been made of clofibrate in the treatment of diabetic retinopathy. Fifty-six patients completed one year in the trial and form the basis for this paper. At the end of one year there was a significant reduction in the area of retina involved by hard exudation in the treated group. There were no significant effects on other retinal lesions. The improvement in retinal exudates was not associated with any significant improvement in visual acuity.


- Data bases are quintessential part of most modern web and mobile applications. In most part, relational databases dominate the database market but the evolution of object-oriented databases has provided users and developers with an alternative option. Object-oriented databases provide a number of advantages over relational databases like ease of extensibility, custom data models, provision for modelling complex data structures and faster access time. But they do lack in certain areas and have no strict standards and implementation mostly depends upon the vendor. Nevertheless, object-oriented databases are slowly finding their way into database market, especially in the area of large-scale databases. But the long history of relational databases keeps them alive as tough competitor and the future seems to be going towards object-relational databases. object-oriented, database, relational, data- base management system, evolution, advantages, disadvantages.


This research intends to discover the housing conditions of the elderly in rural area in South Korea, and identify measures to improve the conditions for an independent and safe life of seniors. This research conducted both survey research and experimental study. The survey interviewed 1,000 elderly people over 65 in farming areas across the country based on random selection from Census 2010 and sampling by regional size and administrative unit (Eup, Myeon, Li) to reflect the regional characteristics more accurately. The data was analyzed using SPSS 18.0 program. The experimental study identified the housing elements that may threaten the life of seniors based on a complete survey on households of elderly people over 65 in a selected typical rural village. As a result, the most inconvenient and threatening factor in the housing facilities appears to be the floor level difference. It was identified that most houses had the risk of falling due to the differences of the floor level between indoor and outdoor, and slippery floor materials. The squat toilets also bring inconvenience not only to the seniors with limited mobility but also to healthy elderly people. In particular, as most bathroom doors opened inward, it may be difficult to escape from or rescue someone in an emergency of falling, fainting or exhaustion.


Oxyfuel firing and subsequent capture of CO2 is a way to reduce CO2 emissions from coal‐fired boilers. Literature is summarized highlighting results which may contribute to understanding of the corrosion processes in an oxyfuel boiler. Tests were conducted in a 500 kWth oxyfuel test facility constructed by Brandenburg Technical University to gain understanding into oxyfuel firing. Two air‐cooled corrosion probes were exposed in this oxyfuel combustion chamber where the fuel was lignite. Gas composition was measured at the location of testing. Various alloys from a 212 Cr steel, austenitic steels to nickel alloys were exposed at set metal temperatures of 570 and 630 °C for 287 h. The specimens were investigated using light optical and scanning electron microscopy and X‐ray diffraction. The deposit on the probe contained predominantly CaSO4 and Fe2O3. Oxide thickness and depth of the precipitated (perhaps carburized) zone was used as a measure of corrosion rates. The lowest alloyed steel had the highest corrosion rate, and the other austenitic and nickel alloys had much lower corrosion rates. Precipitates in the alloy adjacent the corrosion front were revealed for both Sanicro 28 and C‐276. However, it was observed that precipitates were present on both the concave and fireside convex tube surfaces, thus oxyfuel conditions cannot be responsible for these precipitations.


Most network operators have considered reducing LSR label spaces (number of labels used) as a way of simplifying management of underlaying virtual private networks (VPNs) and therefore reducing operational expenditure (OPEX). The IETF outlined the label merging feature in MPLS-allowing the configuration of multipoint-to-point connections (MP2P)-as a means of reducing label space in LSRs. We found two main drawbacks in this label space reduction scheme: a) it should be separately applied to a set of LSPs with the same egress LSR-which decreases the options for better reductions, and b) LSRs close to the edge of the network experience a greater label space reduction than those close to the core. The later implies that MP2P connections reduce the number of labels asymmetrically.


High-velocity data imposes high durability overheads on Big Data technology components such as NoSQL data stores. In Apache Cassandra, a widely used NoSQL solution with high scalability and availability, write-ahead logging is used to support Commitlog operations, which in turn provides fault tolerance to applications. However, current write-ahead logging techniques are limited by the excessive overhead in the I/O subsystem. To address this performance gap, we have designed a novel CAPI-Flash based high performance durable Commitlog for Apache Cassandra. We take advantage of the high throughput, low latency path to flash storage provided by the Coherent Accelerator Processor Interface (CAPI) on IBM POWER8 Systems. Our experimental results show that for write-intensive workloads CAPI-Flash logging provides up to 107% improvement in throughput compared to Cassandra's durable alternative. We also provide 77% better throughput in update-mostly workloads.


A jury consisting of Anja Shortland (Kings College London), Zeynep Taydas (Clemson University) and Charles Butcher (Norwegian University of Science and Technology) has awarded the 2018 Journal of Peace Research 'Nils Petter Gleditsch Article of the Year Award' to Daniel Karell (New York University Abu Dhabi and Princeton University) and Sebastian Schutte (University of Konstanz) for their article 'Aid, exclusion and the local dynamics of insurgency in Afghanistan', Journal of Peace Research 55(6): 711–725. All articles published in JPR's 56th volume were eligible for the award and the jury was faced with the difficult task of adjudicating between several outstanding articles. Articles were judged on their theoretical contribution, methodological innovation and sophistication and relevance to practical aspects of building peace. Karell & Schutte contribute to the important debate about whether international aid promotes peace in war-torn communities or whether it might incentivize further insurgent attacks. They make the theoretical distinction between infrastructure projects which deliver public goods and more targeted aid delivered to certain sectors of the local community. The authors argue that infrastructure projects are, in general, public goods that reduce community resentment while unequal aid distribution can cause grievances and increased insurgent violence. They show that the onset of more exclusionary aid projects is associated with more insurgent violence when compared to infrastructure projects, using highly disaggregated data on aid projects and insurgent activity and a quasi-experimental 'matched wake analysis'. The article makes an important theoretical contribution by disaggregating developmental aid into more and less equally distributed forms and applies a sophisticated and innovative method to high-quality observational data. The results thus speak to an important debate about how international aid can best bring peace to local communities impacted by war. The jury hopes that Karell & Schutte's article will stimulate further research on the local dynamics of aid and conflict. Policy-makers need such fine-grained analysis to design aid packages that are truly peace-enhancing.


BSTRACT We present a novel approach to use curricula to identify principles by which a system learns. Previous work in curriculum learning has focused on how curricula can be designed to improve learning of a model on particular tasks. We consider the inverse problem: what can a curriculum tell us about how a learning system acquired a task? Using recurrent neural networks (RNNs) and models of common experimental neuroscience tasks, we demonstrate that curricula can be used to differentiate learning principles using target-based and a representation-based loss functions as use cases. In particular, we compare the performance of RNNs using a target-based learning principle versus those using a representational learning principle on three different curricula in the context of two tasks. We show that the learned state-space trajectories of RNNs trained by these two learning principles under all curricula tested are indistinguishable. However, by comparing learning times during different curricula, we can disambiguate the learning principles and challenge traditional approaches of interrogating learning systems. Although all animals in neuroscience lab settings are trained by curriculum-based procedures called shaping, almost no behavioral or neural data are collected or published on the relative successes or training times under different curricula. Our results motivate the systematic collection and curation of data during shaping by demonstrating curriculum learning in RNNs as a tool to probe and differentiate learning principles used by biological systems, over statistical analyses of learned state spaces. trained state. Our results emphasize the importance of studying animals during shaping and the value of curriculum learning in RNNs as a hypothesis test-bed for probing learning principles in the biological brain.


The effect of gender-role perception and employment status on the self-efficacy of womenis examined. The study adopted a 2 (androgynous and sex-typed) X 2 (employed andunemployed) factorial design. One hundred and twenty women participated in the study.The sample consistsof 60 employed and 60 unemployed women. Both the groups ofemployed and unemployed women are categorized into androgynous and sex-typed on thebasis of the median split of their scores on the measure of androgyny. The respondents ofall the four groups are compared with respect to their level of perceived self-efficacy. Theresults indicate that androgynous women show better sense of efficacy compared to sex-typed women. The results further indicate that employed women have better sense of self-efficacy than unemployed women.


Recurrent bacterial peritonitis is a major complication in peritoneal dialysis (PD) patients, which is associated with polymorphonuclear leukocyte (PMN) functional changes and can be assessed by a chemiluminescent (CL) reaction. We applied a new approach of a dynamic component chemiluminescence sensor for the assessment of functional states of PMNs in a luminol-amplified whole-blood system. This method is based on the evaluation of CL kinetic patterns of stimulated PMNs, while the parallel measurements of intracellular and extracellular production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) from the same sample can be conducted. Blood was drawn from diabetic and nondiabetic patients during follow-up, and during peritonitis. Healthy medical personnel served as the control group. Chemiluminescence curves were recorded and presented as a sum of three biological components. CL kinetic parameters were calculated, and functional states of PMNs were assessed. Data mining algorithms were used to build decision tree models that can distinguish between different clinical groups. The induced classification models were used afterward for differentiating and classifying new blind cases and demonstrated good correlation with medical diagnosis (84.6% predictive accuracy). In conclusion, this novel method shows a high predictive diagnostic value and may assist in detection of PD-associated clinical states.


We present an end-to-end system for learning outfit recommendations. The core problem we address is how a customer can receive clothing/accessory recommendations based on a current outfit and what type of item the customer wishes to add to the outfit. Using a repository of coherent and stylish outfits, we leverage self-attention to learn a mapping from the current outfit and the customer-requested category to a visual descriptor output. This output is then fed into nearest-neighbor-based visual search, which, during training, is learned via triplet loss and mini-batch retrievals. At inference time, we use a beam search with a desired outfit composition to generate outfits at scale. Moreover, the attention networks provide a diagnostic look into the recommendation process, serving as a fashion-based sanity check.


In this study, an intelligent system model that can evaluate experimental material properties and safety factors is developed. The model contains Artificial Intelligence Technologies such as Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and Fuzzy Logic. It consists of sub modules into interaction. Also, the model can obtain more precision values than interpolation techniques used to classical design. The study contributes to define safety factors, design criterions and safety stress according to a new approach based on information technologies. So, this study can be seen as one of the sub modules of Intelligence Multi Agent System and it can be integrated with Multi Agent System Model for design. Also, it can be used for classical design studies so that results can be quickly obtained. It is expected that this approach will be widely used by designers.


To test the hypothesis that the putative noradrenergic innervation of intraparenchymal cerebral blood vessels from the nucleus locus ceruleus mediates the vasodilatory response to hypercapnia, regional cerebral blood flow was measured by iodo-[14C]antipyrine autoradiography in awake and restrained rats with unilateral 6-hydroxydopamine lesion of the nucleus locus ceruleus and in unlesioned control rats. Hypercapnia, induced by the inhalation of 5% or 8% CO2 in air for 8 minutes caused a 2 to 5-fold increase in regional cerebral blood flow. However, despite a marked reduction of about 90% in cortical norepinephrine levels ipsilateral to the lesion, blood flow to the frontal and parietal cortex, hippocampus, striatum and cerebellum increased to the same extent in ipsilateral and contralateral regions. Thus, lesion of the locus ceruleus and the resultant depletion of endogenous cortical and hippocampal norepinephrine, does not influence the cerebrovascular response to hypercapnia.


Pre‐kinematic greenschist facies metamorphism is often observed in granites and basement units of mountain belts, but rarely dated and accounted for in orogenic cycle reconstructions. Studying pre‐kinematic alteration is challenging because of its usual obliteration by subsequent syn‐kinematic metamorphism often occurring at conditions typical of the brittle–ductile transition. It is, however, to be expected that pre‐kinematic alteration has major implications for the rheology of the upper crust. In the 305 Ma‐old Variscan basement of the Bielsa massif (located in the Axial Zone of the Pyrenees), successive fluid–rock interaction events are recorded in granites below 350°C. Combined microstructural and petrographic analysis, low‐T thermobarometry and in situ U–Th/Pb dating of anatase, titanite and monazite show extensive pre‐orogenic (pre‐Alpine) and pre‐kinematic alteration related to feldspar sericitization and chloritization of biotite and amphibole at temperatures of 270–350°C at 230–300 Ma. This event is followed by a second fluid–rock interaction stage marked by new crystallization of phyllosilicates at 200–280°C and is associated with the formation of mylonitic shear zones and fractures parallel to the shear planes. U–Pb anatase and monazite ages as well as the microtextural relationships of accessory minerals suggest an age for this event at 40–70 Ma, consistent with independent regional geology constraints. The Variscan basement was therefore softened at late to post‐Variscan time, at least 150–200 Ma before the main Alpine shortening while Alpine‐age compression (c. 35–50 Ma) leads to the formation of a dense net of mylonites. The associated deformation, both distributed at the scale of the Bielsa massif and localized at decametric scale in mylonitic corridors, precedes the strain localization along the major thrusts of the Axial Zone. The Bielsa massif is a good example where inherited, pre‐orogenic upper crustal softening controls the deformation patterns in granitic basement units through low‐grade metamorphic reactions.


Felix K. Chang is an FPRI Senior Fellow, as well as the co-founder of Avenir Bold, a venture consultancy. He was previously a consultant in Booz Allen Hamilton''s Strategy and Organization practice; among his clients were the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Department of the Treasury, and other agencies. Earlier, he served as a senior planner and an intelligence officer in the U.S. Department of Defense and a business advisor at Mobil Oil Corporation, where he dealt with strategic planning for upstream and midstream investments throughout Asia and Africa. His publications include articles in American Interest, National Interest, Orbis, and Parameters.


This paper describes recently developed procedures for local conformal refinement and coarsening of all-hexahedral unstructured meshes. Both refinement and coarsening procedures take advantage of properties found in the dual or "twist planes" of the mesh. A twist plane manifests itself as a conformal layer or sheet of hex elements within the global mesh. We suggest coarsening techniques that will identify and remove sheets to satisfy local mesh density criteria while not seriously degrading element quality after deletion. A two-dimensional local coarsening algorithm is introduced. We also explain local hexahedral refinement procedures that involve both the placement of new sheets, either between existing hex layers or within an individual layer. Hex elements earmarked for refinement may be defined to be as small as a single node or as large as a major group of existing elements. Combining both refinement and coarsening techniques allows for significant control over the density and quality of the resulting modified mesh.


Aimed at producing genetically superior water buffaloes for increased milk and meat purposes, the Philippines through the Philippine Carabao Center endeavoured to develop the advance reproductive biotechnologies. The efficiency of the in vitro embryo production in the production of genetically superior animal was assessed. In Study 1, the viability of in vitro derived vitrified embryos (2n=50) were assessed by non-surgical transfer to river (2n=50) recipients. Study 2 examined the efficiency of swamp buffloes (2n=48) as surrogate mothers of river buffalo embryos, and Study 3 examined the possibility of twinning in water buffaloes by embryo transfer. A Satellite Embryo Biotechnology Laboratory was established in India to secure ovaries from slaughtered river buffaloes and oocytes were collected, matured and fertilized in vitro and cultured for embryo development. In vitro fertilization was carried out using top three progeny tested bulls from National Dairy Development Board of India. Resultant embryos were cryopreserved by vitrification procedure and transported to the Philippines in liquid nitrogen for embryo transfer. Results in Study 1 demonstrated 16.36% (9/55) pregnancy rate and 10.91% (6/55) calving rate. In Study 2, 12.5% (5/40) pregnancy and 10% (4/40) calving rate were achieved and 23.1% (6/26) calving rate was achieved in study 3 with 3.8% (1/26) twinning rate when embryos are transferred in twos. The results demonstrated efficiency of the technology and its potential application in water buffalo genetic improvement program.


In assessing the green building application, CIDB has introduced the Malaysian Carbon Reduction and Environmental Sustainability Tool (MyCREST) which will be fully implemented for government project starting in the year 2018.  In order to spread the awareness of MyCREST implementation and train the MyCREST assessor, and TVET workforce, CIDB has conducted series of MyCREST training every year.  This research aims to investigate the overall performance of MyCREST training through the training objective assessment method.  This research was carried out during the MyCREST in-house training by CIDB involving 33 trainees from all over Malaysia.  A questionnaire survey has been developed for this research, and the data has been analyzed using descriptive statistical analysis.  Result from this research determined that the majority of the respondents who completed this training have acquired new knowledge on MyCREST.  It can be concluded that MyCREST training has achieved the objectives set out by the CIDB.  However, in order to improve and to richen the data, observation during the training is suggested to be added in future research.


India seeks to achieve 175 Giga-Watt (GW) of Renewable power by 2022. As of December 2017, out of 333 GW of total installed capacity of electricity, close to 62GW come from renewable sources. Meeting the set targets calls for augmentation of renewable energy based capacities as expeditiously as possible. However, the sick financial health of the distribution companies/utilities, who act as the primary purchasing authorities of such power, is posing as a threat to the success of the renewable industry. This paper highlights that while the cost of procurement of renewable power, to the utilities, has gone down significantly in the recent past; the worsening financial health of utilities remains a key concern. Data is presented to substantiate that the said distribution companies/utilities are saddled by high gaps between Average Cost of Supply (ACS) and Average Revenue Requirement (ARR). Revenues to the power supplying utilities are under-recovered due to the long standing practice of cross- subsidization in the Indian power sector – agricultural and residential consumers of electricity consume power at lower tariffs, than commercial and industrial consumers. A case is therefore suggested for implementing evidence based tariff setting by the utilities. Under the suggested framework, electricity tariffs for different consumer categories can be charged with a premium for green power, based on their willingness to pay for such power. Collected funds, then can be used towards purchase of green power, by the said utilities, and consequently help foster the development of green energy in the country. This study also presents limited empirical evidence, recording the willingness to pay for such premiums, across different categories of "paying" consumers.


The outage probability performance is analyzed for the optimization of incremental selection decode-amplify-forward (ISDF) multi-node MIMO cooperative communication systems. Firstly, the system model for the proposed multi-node MIMO cooperative protocol. Then, the incremental selection decode-amplify-forward and optimal relay selection strategy (routing) based on the opportunistic relaying scheme is proposed. The mutual information and outage probability between source and destination nodes for the proposed scheme are formulated with the relays have the capability of maximum ratio combining (MRC) receiving and beam-forming transmitting capabilities. Finally, adaptive strategy is proposed for adaptive optimal power allocation (APA). Theoretical analysis and simulation results show that the proposed APA outperforms traditional equal power allocation (EPA) in outage performance.


People with T1D (PWT1D) use many strategies to avoid nocturnal hypoglycemia (NH), however, the current evidence on these strategies is limited. Technologies such as continuous subcutaneous insulin infusion (CSII) or continuous glucose monitors (CGM) could help reduce NH and possibly alter PWT1D' management behaviors. Aim: To describe PWT1D' preferred NH prevention strategies according to their use of technology. Methods: Self-reported data from an online registry of PWT1D were analyzed. To describe which NH prevention strategies are most often used, we ran a χ2 test with a post hoc pairwise comparison of the groups based on their mode of insulin delivery and glucose monitoring (CSII + self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG); CSII + CGM; multiple daily injections (MDI) + CGM; MDI + SMBG). Results: Among 767 adults (64% female, mean age 45 ± 15 years, T1D duration 25 ± 14 years) 42% used MDI + CGM, 40% CSII + CGM, 5% CSII + SMBG, and 13% MDI + SMBG. About 67% reported waking up ≥1 time in the past month due to NH symptoms. The most widely used strategies were verifying bedtime glycemia (71%), having an evening/bedtime snack (60%), and/or reducing nocturnal basal insulin (30%). PWT1D using CSII + CGM or CSII + SMBG relied more on basal insulin reduction (36% and 33.3%, respectively) compared to those using MDI + CGM (26%) or MDI + SMBG (19%). Less PWT1D using CSII + CGM reported having a snack to prevent NH (51%), compared to CSII + SBMG (61%), MDI + CGM (66%), and MDI + SBGM (67%) groups (p Conclusion: Results suggest that PWT1D using technology choose different strategies to avoid NH than non-users. CSII users relying on basal insulin adjustment was expected as CSII offers more flexibility for insulin delivery. Snacks remain a popular strategy to prevent NH but are less used by PWT1D on CSII + CGM. While our findings provide some real-life insight into the methods PWT1D use to avoid NH, the efficacy of these strategies still needs further investigation. Disclosure M. K. Talbo: None. V. Messier: Other Relationship; Self; Eli Lilly and Company. K. Desjardins: None. R. Rabasa-lhoret: Advisory Panel; Self; Bayer Inc., Covance Inc., Insulet Corporation, Pfizer Inc., Other Relationship; Self; Abbott, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim (Canada) Ltd., Dexcom, Inc., Eli Lilly and Company, HLS Therapeutics Inc., Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Medtronic, Merck & Co., Inc., Novo Nordisk, Sanofi-Aventis, Research Support; Self; Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Cystic Fibrosis Canada, Diabetes Canada, JDRF, National Institutes of Health, Prometic, Societe Francophone du Diabete, Speaker's Bureau; Self; CMS Canadian Medical&Surgical Knowledge Translation Research Group, CPD Network. A. Brazeau: None. T. Peters: None. Funding Canadian Institutes of Health Research (JT1-157204); JDRF (4-SRA-2018-651-Q-R)


Presentation at the 6th annual Forum for Development Cooperation with Indigenous Peoples, which commenced in 2005. The Centre for Sami Studies hosted the conference at the University of Tromso, Norway. Full conference report available at http://hdl.handle.net/10037/2999


This thesis examines the development of Birmingham's local administration from the late eighteenth to the mid-nineteenth century, a period of intense reform policy in Britain. It presents an in-depth appraisal of processes that promulgated administrative change during a crucial period of the town's development. There has been a tendency in current literature to present Birmingham in this period as a badly managed town, governed by disparate, self-elected bodies. The research presented here challenges that perspective through a close analysis of Birmingham's administrations both pre-and post- the 1835 Municipal Reform Act. Under this legislation Birmingham was able to attain a Charter of Incorporation, with its first town council elected in 1838. The move to corporation status was badly managed, at a national and local level. As a result, the new administration was not well received, and the first years of its existence were blighted by uncertainty and opposition which, on occasion, descended into riot. Nevertheless, the new administrative system prevailed, and made achievements which current literature has failed to fully acknowledge. Birmingham's administrative reform has been set here in the context of heightened political tensions in Britain, to understand the complex, often intense, relationships between public, local governance and national legislation.

The thesis offers fresh, overlooked examples of town planning and actual achievements in Birmingham, gleaned from a thorough investigation of half a century's worth of administrative documentation. These are presented alongside public responses to both local and national reform issues to give a more comprehensive insight into Birmingham's pre-Chamberlain governance than is currently available. The research presented here also opens the potential for further exploration of the way in which the so-called Age of Reform played out in Britain's burgeoning urban centres in the wake of Industrial Revolution. This is set in a context of change and continuity, challenging still prevalent notions of civic progress. As devolution has become an aspiration for many twenty-first century local administrations, it is useful to look back and understand past attempts at civic reform.