In the Solanaceae, biotic and abiotic elicitors induce de novo synthesis of sesquiterpenoid stress metabolites known as phytoalexins. Because plant hormones play critical roles in the induction of defense-responsive genes, we have explored the effect of abscisic acid (ABA) on the synthesis of capsidiol, the major wild tobacco (Nicotiana plumbaginifolia) sesquiterpenoid phytoalexin, using wild-type plants versus nonallelic mutants Npaba2 and Npaba1 that are deficient in ABA synthesis. Npaba2 and Npaba1 mutants exhibited a 2-fold higher synthesis of capsidiol than wild-type plants when elicited with either cellulase or arachidonic acid or when infected by Botrytis cinerea. The same trend was observed for the expression of the capsidiol biosynthetic genes 5-epi-aristolochene synthase and 5-epi-aristolochene hydroxylase. Treatment of wild-type plants with fluridone, an inhibitor of the upstream ABA pathway, recapitulated the behavior of Npaba2 and Npaba1 mutants, while the application of exogenous ABA reversed the enhanced synthesis of capsidiol in Npaba2 and Npaba1 mutants. Concomitant with the production of capsidiol, we observed the induction of ABA 8′-hydroxylase in elicited plants. In wild-type plants, the induction of ABA 8′-hydroxylase coincided with a decrease in ABA content and with the accumulation of ABA catabolic products such as phaseic acid and dihydrophaseic acid, suggesting a negative regulation exerted by ABA on capsidiol synthesis. Collectively, our data indicate that ABA is not required per se for the induction of capsidiol synthesis but is essentially implicated in a stress-response checkpoint to fine-tune the amplification of capsidiol synthesis in challenged plants.


Today's information retrieval applications have become increasingly complex. The Social Book Search (SBS) lab at CLEF 2015 allows evaluating retrieval methods on a complex search task with several textual and non-textual meta-data fields. The challenge is to incorporate the different information types (modalities) into a single ranked list. We build a strong textual baseline and combine it with a document prior based on social signals. Further, we include non-textual modalities in relation to the user preferences using random forest learning to rank. Our experiments show that both the social document prior and the learning to rank approach improve the search results.


The use of 6-(N-acetyl-L-phenylalanyl)-aminoluciferin as a novel substrate for alpha-chymotrypsin has been demonstrated. The kinetic parameters determined are KM = 0.38 mmol/L, kcat = 6.5 s-1 and kcat/kM = 17,100 (L/mol s). The test principle of the coupled assay is the release of aminoluciferin by enzymatic cleavage of 6-(N-acetyl-L-phenylalanyl)-aminoluciferin. Aminoluciferin is oxidized, with light emission, by firefly luciferase (Photinus pyralis) and can be quantified in a luminometric assay. The detection limit for chymotrypsin was found to be 0.3 ng per assay. 6-(N-acetyl-L-phenylalanyl)-aminoluciferin has been synthesized as an example for a new class of highly sensitive substrates. By modification of the peptide residue these new substrates may be suitable for ultrasensitive detection of different proteinases.


This collection of papers, written by doctors, psychiatrists, educators, lawyers, social workers, sociologists, and natural scientists, represents the first Canadian book devoted to the study of sexual behaviour. The papers provide a general view of sexual attitudes, sexual identity, and current sex research in Canada as well as perspectives on the subject from a variety of disciplines. As a companion to Family Planning in Canada: A Source Book, this volume is an important resource for teachers and students in medicine, nursing social work, family life studies, sociology, psychology, and psychiatry. It will also be useful to those who conduct in-service courses for the helping professions, and to any teachers or schools planning to introduce the topic. An extensive section on resources includes a glossary, a basic library on sexuality, a list of Canadian references, a bibliography, an index to films, and a list of organizations in Canada and the United States active in the area.


TalkMoves is an innovative application designed to support K-12 mathematics teachers to reflect on, and continuously improve their instructional practices. This application combines state-of-the-art natural language processing capabilities with automated speech recognition to automatically analyze classroom recordings and provide teachers with personalized feedback on their use of specific types of discourse aimed at broadening and deepening classroom conversations about mathematics. These specific discourse strategies are referred to as"talk moves"within the mathematics education community and prior research has documented the ways in which systematic use of these discourse strategies can positively impact student engagement and learning. In this article, we describe the TalkMoves application's cloud-based infrastructure for managing and processing classroom recordings, and its interface for providing teachers with feedback on their use of talk moves during individual teaching episodes. We present the series of model architectures we developed, and the studies we conducted, to develop our best-performing, transformer-based model (F1 = 79.3%). We also discuss several technical challenges that need to be addressed when working with real-world speech and language data from noisy K-12 classrooms.


The science and technology of ultrashort-pulse lasers have enjoyed much exciting progress. The past decade has seen the achievement of pulses shorter than 10 fs. Time-resolved optical spectroscopy with femtosecond-pulse lasers can be used to examine the electronic and phonon dynamic processes and their interaction in semiconductors. An asymmetric double quantum well is a very simple system, in which it is possible to study the interplay between quantum beating, tunneling and interactions with light and with the lattice. In this system it is possible to create a macroscopic coherent superposition of two different conduction sub-bands by femtosecond intersub-band photoexcitation of sufficient bandwidth. The two excited eigenstates form a wave packet, and each of these components evolves at different rates leading to an oscillating electric dipole moment. The dephasing time is mainly related to electron-electron interactions but elastic electron-LO-phonon scattering also gives an important contribution to the dephasing process. A microscopic study of the polaron lifetime in each of the three, previously designed, states gives valuable information on the behavior of electrons in the coherent stage, while in the thermalization stage it is the inelastic scattering coming from electronic transitions between the three states that is responsible for the decay of the terahertz radiation. The time evolution of populations is compared, within a classical phenomenological model, for scattering rates obtained under two different assumptions and it is found that the time evolution of the population is strongly dependent on these rates.


This paper studies how the adoption of digital technologies has changed the employment structure of UK firms. While the scientific literature traditionally has shown inconclusive results about who is winning the race between man and machine, we argue that currently there are reasons to be less pessimistic about the effect of technology on labor. Drawing on an employer-employee panel survey in 2004 and 2011 in the UK, this study shows that the effect of the firms' routine exposure on employment and wages varies according to the skill content of occupations and by sectors. Our results suggest that firms' concentration on routine cognitive jobs does not generate outright job-losses and could even have a positive effect on overall employment at firm-level. On the other hand, firms exposed to routine manual task jobs are more at risk of generating a negative impact on firms' labor, mainly decreasing their workforce. While the concentration of routine occupations has a job-creating effect in the tertiary sector, this does not necessarily imply consistent job-losses within the secondary sector. Finally, we conclude that the investment in routine workforce without the appropriate technological adoption is not enough to generate positive effects on labor at firm-level, specifically in the manufacturing sector.


Since the beginning of the history of the world, the truth about man as a being in relation has been known. In a wide range of relations we discover two categories of its meanings. The first one, marked with superficiality and self-interest, sets up the relations between two persons in the sphere of being closed to life. The second one, characterized by openness, another person's good and the attitude of acceptance, aims at living and tasting life as a gift. The second type of relation defines pedagogical relation as a shared way of an educator and a pupil towards the height of humanity. Relation with another man constitutes the first step in evangelical pedagogy, where Jesus is shown as the One, who goes to meet man and seeks him in various moments and events of his fate. To specify these deliberations, two biblical pericops – "The Rich Young Man" (Matthew 19, 16–22) and "The First Four Disciples Are Called" (Mark 1, 16–22) – may prove helpful. Building a pedagogical relation in these evangelical texts between Jesus – the Educator and the pupil is revealed in four stages: intentionality in building relations, ability to participate in an educational situation, willpower to get to know the pupil and a project for one's own life. In addition, a universal message for contemporary education is shown in each of these stages.


Prisoner health is influenced as much by structural determinants (institutional, environmental, political, economic and social) as it is by physical and mental constitutions of prisoners themselves. Prison health may therefore be better understood with greater insight into how people respond to imprisonment - the psychological pressures of incarceration, the social world of prison, being dislocated from society, and the impact of the institution itself with its regime and architecture. As agencies of disempowerment and deprivation, prisons epitomise the antithesis of a healthy setting. The World Health Organisation's notion of a 'healthy prison' is in this sense an oxymoron, yet the UK government has signalled that it is committed to WHO's core health promotion principles as a route to reducing health inequalities. This paper reports on the findings of an ethnographic study which was conducted in an adult male training prison in England, using participant observation, group interviewing, and one-to-one semi-structured interviews with prisoners and prison officers. The paper explores how different layers of prison life impact on the health of prisoners, arguing that health inequalities are enmeshed within the workings of the prison system itself.


«Turn off that bullshit!» is the English translation of the Danish quote in the title, uttered by one of the interlocutors in this article. This folkloristic study of media culture consists of interviews with 14 Danish radio listeners born from 1928–1948. During their life course, the 14 interviewees have grown with media, learning to live a media life with radio as a phenomenon of sociability. The article focuses particularly on issues of negotiation and conflict while listeners are saturated in the soundscape of radio as a part of everyday life. The analysis of interactions between human/non-human actors involved in radio listening shows how the everyday life is influenced by the appearance of a media technology like radio, and how these actors, in a mutual process of «becoming», converge with wider cultural and social processes, such as the emergence of new cultural values related to «age», «family», «authorities», and «individual integrity». As a comment to Silverstone's notion of «domestication», referring to social groups, it is emphasized that listeners do not represent «one» listening culture in singularis, which is one reason why media use may result in conflicts among listeners who negotiate about the character of their common soundscape and imaginations of personal integrity that are trespassed by sounds from radio.


Introduction The effect of female sex hormones on the natural history of herpes simplex virus (HSV) is poorly understood. Studies suggest that vaginal immunity varies throughout the menstrual cycle, with increased inflammatory cytokines and decreased innate immune factors observed during the luteal (post-ovulatory) phase. Whether HSV shedding or presence of genital lesions vary throughout the menstrual cycle is unknown. Methods We studied HSV-2 seropositive women enrolled in prospective studies of genital herpes at the University of Washington Virology Research Clinic. Participants were eligible if they had established HSV-2 infection, performed daily genital swabbing for HSV DNA, recorded a menstrual diary, and were not using hormonal contraception. We used Poisson mixed effects models to determine if genital HSV DNA detection or lesion frequency differed throughout the menstrual cycle, categorised into four seven-day phases based on most proximate first day of menstrual bleeding: early and late for each of follicular and luteal. Results In 189 women aged 19–46 (median age 33) who collected 9307 genital swabs, HSV was detected on 1822 days (20%). The rate of shedding was 21% during the early follicular phase versus 18% during late luteal (RR=1.2, 95% CI 1.0–1.4, p=0.04), 21% during late follicular (RR=1.2 relative to late luteal, 95% CI 1.0–1.5, p=0.06), and 19% during early luteal (RR 1.1 relative to late luteal, 95% CI 0.9–1.3, p=0.53). In sensitivity analyses reducing misclassification of phase by excluding samples>10 days from day 1 of menses, these observations were strengthened. The pattern was similar for genital lesions, present on 13% of days during the follicular phase and 11% during the luteal phase. Conclusion In women with established HSV infection, genital HSV-2 shedding and lesions were slightly more common during the early follicular phase of the menstrual cycle than in the luteal phase. These cyclic variations may be related to changes in oestrogen and progesterone affecting vaginal immunity.


A relatively simple and convenient way to analyse a company's financial status is to examine the patterns of cash flow. The cash flow patterns derived from positive and negative signs of its cash flow components that consist of operating, investing and financing activities. The present study investigated eight types of cash flow patterns to predict financial distress incidence. The data collected consists of 62 distressed and 62 healthy companies within the context of Malaysian public listed companies for three years prior distress year between 2006 until 2013. The primary aim of the present study is to examine whether there is any significant relationship between patterns of cash flow components and financially distress companies. The results revealed that the patterns that can be predictor of financial distress incidence are the second (+ - -), third (+ + -), fourth (+ - +) and eighth (---- ) cash flow patterns. The results also found that there is a significant difference between distressed and healthy companies in incidence of different patterns of cash flow. In addition, in one year before distressed, the most popular patterns among distressed companies in Malaysia are second (+ - -) and third (+ + -) type of cash flow pattern. For two and three years before distressed, the most frequent pattern is also the second (+ - -) type of cash flow pattern followed by sixth (- - +) cash flow pattern. Therefore, patterns of cash flow can be considered as an alternative tool to predict the occurrence of financial distress. The results provide an insight to the investors that this is another warning sign of impending bankruptcy.


The differential equations describing the statistical fluctuations of a simple autocatalytic reaction mechanism are set up and solved completely. The fluctuations are found to approach a constant limiting value when the amount of reaction product is large compared to the amount which initiates the reaction. The relative fluctuations which arise from the reaction mechanism are then equal to the reciprocal of the square root of the initial number of particles. Conversely the fluctuation in the time required to attain a threshold amount of reaction product also approaches a limiting value for high thresholds. This limiting value is greater than one time unit if the reaction is initiated by one particle, and becomes equal to one divided by the square root of the number of initiating particles if this number is large.


The solution to the problem of optical or electromagnetic-wave scattering from perfectly conducting rough surfaces modeled by a multiscale fractal function is generalized to the case of relative uniform translating motion with respect to the observer. The presence of motion can be treated by the relativistic frame hopping method by means of plane-wave simplification techniques, since the solution relevant to the static case is expressed in terms of a generalized expansion of Floquet modes.


I present a theory of distributed improvement that extends Agile, Lean, and the Theory of Constraints by demonstrating how to simultaneously improve global and local performance in large systems, especially large organisations.
I describe simple, effective rules that allow anyone in an arbitrarily large system to "begin where they are" by first making local improvements without degrading the neighborhood (the next level up in the system). Furthermore, by contributing freed up capacity from local improvements to help improve the neighborhood local improvement efforts align without centralized control. The effects of adopting this approach at all levels are cumulative, and lead to a form of global optimization through distributed collaboration and coordination.
My central point is that if we wish to improve the whole system, making a local improvement must not carry an obligation to immediately raise local output. Incentive structures and habits that act otherwise (while widespread) must be changed!
From a systemic perspective there are typically wiser ways to exploit the freed up capacity than mindlessly doing more work: principally raising local morale, reserving a portion for future improvement, and assisting at the next level of the system by contributing capacity where it is needed and sharing improvements and innovations.
Only in the case where the local improvement has been made at a bottleneck should output be increased. Hence Prager's law: "After you make an improvement, the last thing you should do is more work."
This approach paves the way to a new generation Agile meta-framework — CSIC: Create Slack, Improve, Contribute — that promises unprecedented productivity gains through compounding improvements, as well as elevated staff morale and insights into how best to deploy coaches and other systems thinkers at all organisational levels.
Additional ramifications include changes to executive, manager, and knowledge-worker education, and revision of measurement and incentive design, including staff promotion criteria.
Overall, this development is exciting because it points to a balanced way forward that simultaneously improves performance of large systems and improves the quality of life for the people who work within the system.


Deterministic models developed to predict fatigue crack growth in metallic materials are considered with special emphasis on approaches suitable for variable amplitude load histories. Part I gave a concise review of available models and their assessment based on reported in the literature comparisons between predicted and observed results. It was concluded that the so-called strip yield model based on the plasticity-induced crack closure mechanism is a most versatile predictive tool convenient to use in the case of mode I crack growth under arbitrary variable amplitude loading. Part II of the paper is focused on the strip yield model and its predictive capabilities. Implementations of this type prediction approach reported in the literature are reviewed. It is shown that decisions regarding the constraint factor conception, a choice of the crack driving force parameter, the crack growth rate description and various numerical details can have a profound effect on the model results and the prediction quality.


NG2 is the rat homologue of the human melanoma proteoglycan, also known as the high molecular weight melanoma-associated antigen. This developmentally regulated membrane-spanning chondroitin sulfate proteoglycan is expressed primarily by glial, muscle, and cartilage progenitor cells. Upon maturation, these cell types down-regulate NG2 expression. In adult animals, the expression of NG2 is restricted to tumor cells and angiogenic tumor vasculature, making this proteoglycan a potential target for directing therapeutic agents to relevant sites of action. To this end, we have identified specific NG2-binding peptides by screening a phage-displayed random peptide library on purified NG2. Several rounds of biopanning on NG2 resulted in the specific enrichment of two phage-displayed decapeptides, TAASGVRSMH and LTLRWVGLMS. The binding of these phages to NG2 was inhibitable both by soluble NG2 and by glutathione S-transferase (GST) fusion proteins containing the cognate peptide sequences. In addition, direct binding between GST-TAASGVRSMH and GST-LTLRWVGLMS fusion proteins and NG2 was demonstrated in solid-phase binding assays. Interestingly, these NG2-binding fusion proteins cross-inhibited each other's binding to NG2, suggesting that the two sequences bind to the same or overlapping sites on the proteoglycan. Upon injection into tumor-bearing mice, NG2-binding phages specifically homed to tumor vasculature in wild-type mice but did not localize to the tumor vasculature in NG2 knockout mice. Thein vivo targeting capability of these sequences suggests that they can be used for tumor targeting.


The integration of ferroelectrics in electronic devices requires that they be used in the form of thin films, which implies that for such systems finite-size effects related to the presence of a ferroelectric-electrode interface become important. In this thesis, a number of theoretical studies are presented on the properties of metal-ferroelectric-metal structures, focusing on the impact of the metal-ferroelectric interface on the polarization response of the system. First, a model for reverse domain nucleation in ferroelectrics is introduced, which takes into account the ferroelectric-electrode coupling in both the homogeneous and random cases. The model provides a solution to the coercivity paradox—i.e., the large discrepancy between the observed and predicted coercive fields. The possibility of non-thermally activated nucleation of reverse domains is demonstrated. It is found that small inhomogeneities in the ferroelectric-electrode interface may lead to an exponentially wide spectrum of waiting times for switching. The model predicts that switching is facilitated near morphotropic phase boundaries in perovskite-type ferroelectrics. In order to quantitatively analyze the size-effect problem in metal-ferroelectric-metal systems, an approach is developed which combines first-principles calculations and phenomenological theory. The parameters of the model can be extracted from calculations on ultrathin films, while experimentally verifiable predictions can be made on thick films. Using the developed approach, it is demonstrated how the size effect can be separated into two distinct contributions: a long-range electrostatic and a short-range "chemical" one. By considering symmetric SrRuO3/BaTiO3/SrRuO3 heterostructures with different types of termination (TiO2–TiO2 or RuO2–RuO2), it is shown that the balance between the long-range and the short-range contribution to the size effect can be essentially affected by the type of termination of the ferroelectric and by the polarization hardness of the electrode. The leading role of the long-range contribution to the size effect in SrRuO3/BaTiO3/SrRuO3 heterostructures is demonstrated. Application of the approach to the case of SrRuO3/BaTiO3/SrRuO3 heterostructures with asymmetric interfaces enables to provide a quantitative description of a number of manifestations of such asymmetry in films of technologically meaningful thickness. In particular, it is found that the asymmetry exerts a poling effect on the films, leading to a smearing of the phase transition, to an induced piezoelectric response above the transition temperature, and to the reversal of the polarization asymmetry by application of biaxial strain. Another important result of such calculations is the observation that the ionic relaxations in the metal-oxide electrode play a crucial role in stabilizing the ferroelectric phase of the films. Comparison with frozen-phonon calculations shows that the degree of softness of the SrRuO3 lattice has an essential impact on the screening of ferroelectric polarization, reducing the critical thickness for ferroelectricity of the system. These results provide a possible explanation for the observed beneficial impact of oxide electrodes on the switching and dielectric properties of ferroelectric capacitors.


ABSTRACT The distribution and transport of suspended sediments in the Bay of Fundy are extremely difficult to define because of the high tidal range and resulting high time variability in sediment distribution. The spatial distribution of suspended sediments have been mapped using Landsat imagery. During a period of two years a field verification program has been underway to relate multispectral seawater radiance recorded digitally by Landsat 1 and 2 to the absolute surface suspended sediment concentration. A correlation of 0.96 has been established for the two variables for multi temporal data and for a variety of sediment types. Thematic maps generated for clear Landsat imagery can be used quantitatively to determine circulation patterns, sources of material, and volumes of suspended sedimen for the local region. Initial results suggest that the calibration may be applied to any marine environment similar to Minas Basin and is valid for a variety of sediment sizes, shapes, and composition.


. The Scratch system was designed to enable computing novices, without much programming experience, to develop their creativity, make multimedia products, and share them with their friends and on a social media website. It can also be used to introduce programming to novices. In this initial study, we used Scratch to teach some elementary programming to young children (eight years old) in their ICT class, for eight lessons in all. Data were recorded to measure any cognitive progress of the pupils, and any affective impact that the lessons had on them. Thechildren were soon able to write elementary programs, and moreover evidently had a lot of fun doing so. An interview with their teacher showed that some of the pupils did surprisingly well, beyond all expectations. While the cognitive progress is moderate, the main advantage to Scratch in this study seems to be that its enjoyability makes learning how to program a positive experience, contrary to the frustration and anxiety that so often seems to characterise the usual learning experience.


Parasympathetic control of the heart is attenuated in heart failure (HF). We investigated possible mechanisms and sites of altered vagal control in dogs with HF induced by rapid pacing. Muscarinic blockade reduced the R-R interval by 308 ms in controls but only by 32 ms in HF, indicating low levels of resting vagal tone. Vagomimetic doses of atropine sulfate prolonged the R-R interval by 109 ms in controls and increased standard deviation of the R-R interval by 66 ms but only by 46 and 16 ms, respectively, in HF. Bradycardia elicited by electrical stimulation of the vagus nerve was also attenuated in the HF group. Conversely, muscarinic receptor activation by bethanechol, and indirectly by neostigmine, elicited exaggerated R-R interval responses in HF. To investigate possible mechanisms, we measured muscarinic receptor density (Bmax) and acetylcholinesterase activity in different areas of the heart. In sinoatrial nodes, Bmax was increased (230 +/- 75% of control) and acetylcholinesterase decreased (80 +/- 6% of control) in HF. We conclude that muscarinic receptors are upregulated and acetylcholinesterase is reduced in the sinus node in HF. Therefore, reduced vagal control in HF is most likely due to changes of presynaptic function (ganglionic), because postsynaptic mechanisms augment vagal control in HF.


Sugar factories are a significant source of water pollution, particularly in developing countries such as Pakistan, where the sugar industry is the second largest after tanneries. The wastewater is disposed of untreated to the environment, since traditional wastewater treatment processes are capital-intensive, energy-demanding and complex in operation. The common approach is to use waste stabilization ponds or lagoons mostly operated on complete retention basis.

This work is an attempt to highlight the possibility of effectively applying wastewater lagooning process utilizing the inherent organic contents of sugar factory wastewater with the aid of an algae-bacterial consortium (ABC) to investigate its capacity to utilize this resource to produce renewable fuel while de-polluting wastewater rather than it being a liability to be disposed of. A lagoon photo tank (LPT) resembling a prototype raceway lagoon was designed and used to carry out mass cell cultivation on a sugar-oriented medium for the assessment and inter-optimization of the process conditions such as temperature, incident light (IL), pH, dissolved oxygen (DO). The evaluation of the process performance was observed via the analyses of parameters such as chemical oxygen demand (COD), total organic carbon and cell mass growth.

The first part of this study was related with the baseline assessment of LPT process conditions using distilled water as well as sucrose solution or sugar water to establish basis for a priori analysis of simulated sugar factory wastewater (SSFW) carried out in the second part. The suitability of the dosing of copolymer Polyacrylate polyalcohol was optimised through a series of trial runs to aid in the immobilization of mono or mixotrophic cultures of green algae Chlorella Vulgaris and bacteria Pseudomonas Putida at the surface of LPT in order to influence reduction in the organic concentration of SSFW.

This research study has contributed to the knowledge base of the concerned area of study with respect to hitherto unknown application of copolymer Polyacrylate polyalcohol, which showed viable characteristics in the cultivation medium in terms of cell immobilization at the surface of LPT resulting in the formation of growth-conducive copolymer-algae matrices leading to the rapid growth of the cell mass with increased process efficiency. This process optimisation resulted in SSFW depollution by around 89% along with energetic biomass growth with a calorific value of 27 kJ g1 and at an optimum growth rate of 1.2 d1 suggesting towards the potential of copolymer addition in the system to enhance the efficiency of the organisms inducing optimum substrate utilization.


Age progression and regression refers to aesthetically rendering a given face image to present effects of face aging and rejuvenation, respectively. Although numerous studies have been conducted in this topic, there are two major problems: 1) multiple models are usually trained to simulate different age mappings, and 2) the photo-realism of generated face images is heavily influenced by the variation of training images in terms of pose, illumination, and background. To address these issues, in this paper, we propose a framework based on conditional Generative Adversarial Networks (cGANs) to achieve age progression and regression simultaneously. Particularly, since face aging and rejuvenation are largely different in terms of image translation patterns, we model these two processes using two separate generators, each dedicated to one age changing process. In addition, we exploit spatial attention mechanisms to limit image modifications to regions closely related to age changes, so that images with high visual fidelity could be synthesized for in-the-wild cases. Experiments on multiple datasets demonstrate the ability of our model in synthesizing lifelike face images at desired ages with personalized features well preserved, and keeping age-irrelevant regions unchanged.


This study describes patch selection by Dunlin, a small, shallow feeding wader, observed feeding on physically heterogeneous intertidal mudflats at Seal Sands, Teesmouth in N. E. England. Seal Sands was not viewed as a homogeneous feeding ground by the dunlin population. The dunlin showed a tendency to congregate on certain subareas, namely Greenabella (A), and Central (C), Banks. The feeding distribution of the dunlin was examined with respect to the substratum characteristics, and it was shown that dunlin concentrated on the soft, wet, muddy substrata. Thus, their feeding distribution was influenced by the stage of the tidal cycle. The tide can affect the dunlins' distribution both directly, by restricting the space in which they can feed, and indirectly, by affecting the substratum's texture (wetness) and hence the availability of prey within it. In general, the feeding dunlins' microdistribution revealed a preference for the "Film" microhabitat. Hence the birds' feeding activity showed a tidal rather than a diurnal periodicity. The feeding behaviour of dunlin was also influenced by the wetness of the substratum, and thereby the tidal situation. Final conclusions, with regard to the Bill length differences between sexes, and the seasonal change in Body Weight, due primarily to the accumulation and depletion of fat reserves are not presented here in order to emphasizetheir tentative nature, resulting from small sample size. For the same reason, this data was simply presented in appendix IV rather than in the body of the text. The two commonest races of Dunlin on the Teesmouth estuary, Calidris alpina alpina and Calidris alpine schinzii, were both captured during both the spring and autumn migrations. In the latter period, juveniles were in the majority in the captured samples.


Objectives To assess the influence of stage at breast cancer diagnosis, tumour biology, and treatment on survival in contemporary times of better (neo-)adjuvant systemic therapy. Design Prospective nationwide population based study. Setting Nationwide Netherlands Cancer Registry. Participants Female patients with primary breast cancer diagnosed between 1999 and 2012 (n=173 797), subdivided into two time cohorts on the basis of breast cancer diagnosis: 1999-2005 (n=80 228) and 2006-12 (n=93 569). Main outcome measures Relative survival was compared between the two cohorts. Influence of traditional prognostic factors on overall mortality was analysed with Cox regression for each cohort separately. Results Compared with 1999-2005, patients from 2006-12 had smaller (≤T1 65% (n=60 570) v 60% (n=48 031); P<0.001), more often lymph node negative (N0 68% (n=63 544) v 65% (n=52 238); P<0.001) tumours, but they received more chemotherapy, hormonal therapy, and targeted therapy (neo-adjuvant/adjuvant systemic therapy 60% (n=56 402) v 53% (n=42 185); P<0.001). Median follow-up was 9.8 years for 1999-2005 and 3.9 years for 2006-12. The relative five year survival rate in 2006-12 was 96%, improved in all tumour and nodal stages compared with 1999-2005, and 100% in tumours ≤1 cm. In multivariable analyses adjusted for age and tumour type, overall mortality was decreased by surgery (especially breast conserving), radiotherapy, and systemic therapies. Mortality increased with progressing tumour size in both cohorts (2006-12 T1c v T1a: hazard ratio 1.54, 95% confidence interval 1.33 to 1.78), but without a significant difference in invasive breast cancers until 1 cm (2006-12 T1b v T1a: hazard ratio 1.04, 0.88 to 1.22), and independently with progressing number of positive lymph nodes (2006-12 N1 v N0: 1.25, 1.17 to 1.32). Conclusions Tumour stage at diagnosis of breast cancer still influences overall survival significantly in the current era of effective systemic therapy. Diagnosis of breast cancer at an early tumour stage remains vital.


Background Y294002 (LY) is a potent inhibitor of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinases (PI3Ks); however, biological applications of LY are limited by its poor solubility and pharmacokinetic profile. This study aimed at developing LY-loaded surfactant-free poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) nanoparticles (SF-LY NPs) to improve the therapeutic efficacy of LY. Materials and methods Cellular viability was measured by MTT assay. The subcellular distribution of NPs was studied using an ultraviolet-visible spectrophotometer and confocal microscope. The expression of cell-death-associated proteins was determined using Western blotting and the in vivo activity of SF-LY NPs was tested in a xenograft animal model. Results SF-LY NPs enhanced the intracellular level of LY, induced sustained suppression of AKT, and induced marked cancer cell death. In addition, SF-LY NPs tended to accumulate in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and induce pronounced ER stress. Finally, SF-LY NPs exhibited a prominent antitumor effect in vivo. Conclusion The surfactant-free formulation of PLGA is critical to the promising anticancer activity of SF-LY NPs.


Summary form only given. In the upcoming smart grid environment many more measurements will be available, which can be locally processed by the so-called substation state estimator (SSE). Distribution substations serve energy to a large set of feeders, each one delivering power to a certain number of secondary transformers. In this context, the SSE may have to deal with a huge network model, comprising several hundred or even thousand buses. Taking advantage of the weak electrical coupling existing among the set of feeders connected to the same or adjacent substations, a two-stage procedure is proposed in this paper to efficiently solve the SSE. In the first stage the overall SE is decomposed into f + s WLS subproblems (f and s being the total number of feeders and substations, respectively), which are then solved in a decoupled manner. The second stage, involving a linear WLS problem, consists of coordinating the solution provided by each subsystem (feeder or substation). The proposed solution scheme has a number of advantages, as shown by the case studies.


An experimental and computational study of coupling between lithographically fabricated, near-single-domain nanomagnets is presented. Pairs of coupled nanomagnets were fabricated, and their switching properties were characterized by a vibrating sample magnetometer with vector coils. Coupling fields between on-chip nanomagnets compete with (known) magnetic fields that are externally generated. Consequently, nanomagnets flip in the direction of the stronger contribution. Using this method, the volume-averaged coupling field can be directly measured. The experimental data was compared to results from micromagnetic simulations and macrospin models. Correlating the experimental results with simulations reveals the details of the switching process of nanomagnets, and shows the limitations of the macrospin model.


Objectives & Background Early recognition and treatment of sepsis in the emergency department (ED) has been shown to reduce mortality. At present, we are able to identify patients who satisfy the septic shock criteria. However, many patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) do not satisfy the shock criteria whilst in the ED yet have a mortality rate of approximately 30% (unpublished internal data). The Mortality In Severe Sepsis in the Emergency Department (MISSED) score was derived and validated in ED patients admitted to the ICU. This score enables identification of patients at high risk of death. The score has now been simplified. The simplified MISSED score is made up of three independent variables which predict mortality in sepsis. They are, age >65 years, a serum albumin <27 g/l and an INR of >1.3. The score ranges from 0 to 3 depending on the number of variables present at presentation in the ED. The simplified MISSED score has been internally validated in 674 ED patients admitted in 2012. The aim of this study is to identify the mortality rate associated with the simplified MISSED score at one year from the index admission. Methods Of the 674 patients studied in the internal ED validation study, those with active malignancy and those whose final diagnosis was not one of infection were identified from the hospital IT system and excluded. The date a patients was last known to be alive before loss to follow up and dates of death were obtained from the hospital IT system. The in-hospital mortality rates and the one year mortality rates from the date of admission, were calculated for each of the simplified MISSED scores. Results Of the 674 patients 100 had active malignancy and a further 44 did not have a final diagnosis of an infection. Thus 144 patients were excluded. The study population consisted of 530 patients. Of the 102 deaths which occurred within a year of the index admission 42 occurred on the index admission. The mortality rates associated with the simplified MISSED scores of 0, 1, 2 and 3 on the index admission were 0.5%, 7.5%, 26.8% and 25% and at one-year were 2.1%, 22.2%, 43.7% and 66.7%, respectively. The hazard ratio for mortality at 1 year for a score of 2 or 3 compared to a score of 0 or 1 was 3.9 [95% confidence interval 2.2–6.9], p<0.0001. Conclusion In patients admitted with an infection, increasing simplified MISSED scores in the ED were associated with significantly increased mortality rates at one year. Kaplan Meier plot illustrating the one-year survival associated with the simplified MISSED score


Tuna are highly prized in Oriental cuisine, and the bigeye tuna (Thunnus obesus) is of great commercial importance. Quality is assessed by the tuna meat quality, freshness, texture and fat, which can be altered by factors inherent to capture, such as days of onboard storage, months of the year, whether the catch was living or dead, fish weight and year. These factors were correlated to identify those that affect quality. We obtained data from nine vessels, from January 2007 to April 2010, creating an information bank of 21,908 bigeye tuna. Fish quality and parameters were related using multiple linear regression analysis, in which the variables were included in the model by a stepwise procedure (F>4). We found that live catch, heavier fish and fewer days of storage positively affected the quality, and that there is a seasonality of quality related to biological factors, which are not amenable to control.


Background The Ministry of Health in Norway has requested an expanded contribution from clinical pharmacy in healthcare delivery because of serious medication-related issues. Examples of this are participation in treatment teams in hospital wards and review of the patient's total use of medicine in cooperation with a medical practitioner. The concept of integrated medicines management (IMM) has been approved as a model to enhance medication effectiveness and safety. Purpose The objective of this study was to evaluate the clinical significance of recommendations made by pharmacists in drug-related problems (DRP). Materials and Methods The study was conducted on a respiratory ward and a rheumatology ward at the University Hospital of St. Olav, Trondheim, Norway. Patients admitted to hospital in the period of June to October 2011 were included. All patients using one or more drugs at admission, having DRPs identified by the pharmacist according to the IMM (Integrated Medicine Management) model, were included. DRPs were identified through medicines reconciliation and medication reviews. All recommendations made by the pharmacists were independently assessed and scored by a physician with a special interest in pulmonary diseases, or respectively rheumatology, a clinical pharmacologist and a clinical pharmacist. A Hatoum six-point scoring system [1] for assessing the quality of pharmacists' interventions was used, with rankings between 1. Adverse significance – (the recommendation supplied by the pharmacist may lead to adverse outcome and 6. Extremely significant – information qualified by life and death situation.). Results A total of 112 recommendations in 46 patients (average age 66 years), were assessed. On average 4 DRPs per patient were found. 85% of the recommendations were assessed as somewhat significant or more (≥ rank 3). The physicians accepted 71% of the pharmacists' recommendations. Conclusions Recommendations made by pharmacists were assessed as clinically significant to a large extent. The fact that the physicians followed the pharmacists recommendations in most cases, demonstrates the effectiveness and value of the IMM model in improving patient drug treatment. Reference Hatoum HT et al, Evaluation of the contribution of clinical pharmacists: inpatient care and cost reduction. Drug Intelligence and Clinical Pharmacy, March 1988, Vol. 22, 252–258. No conflict of interest.


The use of the Fenton's process for the depuration of a post-biological treated milk whey wastewater was studied, aiming to achieve adequate operational conditions for a cost effective treatment to generate a suitable effluent to be directly discharged into the natural water courses. A design of experiments was implemented in order to understand the role of the independent parameters and their combinations over the treatment process. From our results the hydrogen peroxide concentration and the ratio between [H2O2]:[Fe2+] as well as their interaction were statistically important concerning both TOC and COD removal. The experiments performed at the highest value of [H2O2] and at the lowest level of [H2O2]:[Fe2+] lead to effluents accomplishing the environmental legislation. Moreover, toxicological tests revealed that the treated effluent was harmless to the ecosystems. A cost estimation analysis was performed and the catalytic activity of the remaining sludge from the homogeneous process was checked. This activity decreases with the number of reuses which reduces the possibility of the direct utilization of the sludge.


During the first trimester of 2020, the Ministry of Health of Costa Rica reported the first three cases of primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM). In two cases, laboratory personnel of the hospitals preliminarily identified amoeboid forms in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) samples. For the molecular confirmation of species, CSF samples were sent to our laboratory. We carried out microscopic analyses and exflagellation assays. Besides, samples were cultured in 2% casein hydrolysate medium and in non-nutrient agar plates supplemented with Escherichia coli. Finally, PCR and sequencing were employed for the molecular diagnosis and species identification. In all cases, the presence of Naegleria fowleri was confirmed. An environmental investigation to identify the possible infection sources was also performed. Water samples from hot springs and groundwater from an artisan well were collected and after filtration and culture in non-nutrient agar plates supplemented with E. coli, thermotolerance and exflagellation assays were carried out. For the positive samples, PCR and sequencing were performed, confirming the presence of N. fowleri in several water samples. The report of these cases and the possible association with hot springs has had a significant impact on the population and health authorities of Costa Rica.


A general approach for controlling pulse-width-modulated (PWM) -type switching DC-DC converters digitally using state-feedback techniques and linear optimal control theory is reported. The methodology for redesigning the state estimator is investigated, and a method derived from the general linear-quadratic-regulator (LQR) problem, is proposed. The method is found to offer better transient responses and robustness to uncertainties in plant parameters when compared with the typical eigenvalue-assignment method. Special attention is directed to plant models with possible migrations of the open-loop zeroes across the stability boundary during operation. Results of applying these techniques to a published Cuk converter are reported to illustrate different points of interest. >


While considerable improvements have been made over the last 30 years in hypertension (HTN) awareness, treatment, and control, a recent reversal of these trends has been documented with African-American adults, particularly among those continuing to suffer from uncontrolled hypertension and its adverse consequences. This paper presents data from a cross-sectional representative survey of the health status of an urban African-American community. The study was designed in partnership with community leadership to improve HTN care and control. The baseline survey was a face-to-face interview (including blood pressure [BP] measurements) of 2,196 adults residing in randomly selected blocks in the Sandtown-Winchester neighborhood in Baltimore City. These sample data were compared with national data from the NHANES III survey, and demonstrated similar awareness of hypertension. However, hypertension control rates among treated hypertensives were significantly lower in the study community (28%) than in the national survey (44%). Compared with normotensive individuals, those with HTN were significantly older, had less education, were less likely to be employed, and had lower annual incomes. Individuals with HTN were also significantly more likely to rate their health as poor/fair, to report a history of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, kidney disease, obesity, high cholesterol, and lack of exercise, as well as to be at greater risk of alcoholism or alcohol problems. Hypertensive individuals (88% with reported prior history, 12% newly detected) were significantly more likely to have a usual source of care, have seen a health professional in the last 12 months, and to be extremely satisfied with the provider; however, 20% of individuals with hypertension reported no health insurance. These data indicate the need for focused interventions to enhance hypertension maintenance of care and adherence to treatment.


: We report on the case of a 61-year old man who developed a reversible Brown-Sequard syndrome immediately after an uncomplicated lumbar discectomy. Magnetic resonance imaging showed ischaemic lesions in the upper cervical medulla, the caudal part of the medulla oblongata, and in the cerebellum. Vertebral artery compression due to spondylosis and hyperflexion of the cervical spine during operation is discussed as a possible pathogenetic mechanism.


We introduce two iterative algorithms by the hybrid extragradient method with regularization for finding a common element of the set of solutions of the minimization problem for a convex and continuously Frechet differentiable functional, the set of solutions of finite generalized mixed equilibrium problems, the set of solutions of finite variational inequalities for inverse strong monotone mappings and the set of fixed points of an asymptotically -strict pseudocontractive mapping in the intermediate sense in a real Hilbert space. We prove some strong and weak convergence theorems for the proposed iterative algorithms under mild conditions.


This paper employs a systems GMM model using data on 43 Sub-Saharan African countries from 1960 to 2005 to find that natural disasters have a significant impact on migration from SSA, raising the net out-migration by around 0.37 persons per 1,000. No direct evidence was found that natural disasters lead to further migration through impacting on GDP growth. It is however established that natural disasters is associated with a slightly increased probability that a country will be in conflict in a subsequent period. The frequency of natural disasters will not influence the duration of the conflict. It is concluded that natural disasters is an important determinant of migration from SSA. The findings in this paper imply that global climate change, through leading to more extreme weather events, will contribute to further migration from the continent.


The objective of the Second Road Reconstruction and Improvement Project (PRMC-II) for Honduras is to improve the quality of road network and of road management in support of the government's economic growth and competitiveness goals. The purpose of the indigenous peoples plan (IPP) / marco sobre pueblos indigenas is to guide, advice and promote development activities among the participating communities for strengthening their organizational capacity, reaffirm their land property rights and to mitigate possible adverse impacts during project implementation. Recommendation and mitigation measures include: avoid as much as possible adverse impacts to IPs and when this is not possible minimize those impacts or provide full compensation for their losses; restore access to education and health services; hire specialized consultant to advice and promote relations and communication among the participating communities; promote a participatory approach, which includes fostering public awareness and public consultations to ensure IPs are included in all stage of the project cycle; adhere to the country's legal and regulatory framework, decrees and resolutions, regarding IPs, and the Bank operational safeguard directive on indigenous populations (OP 4.10); it is also recommended that monitoring of the indigenous peoples plan be effectively implemented in order to identify any changes in the predicted impacts and take appropriate measures to off-set any unexpected adverse impacts; and finally, ensure that project benefits to indigenous communities are culturally appropriate, include provisions for respect to their dignity, identity and diversity, and that their quality of life will be improve if not restored to pre-project standards.


Security system was design to be capable on protecting human being with their properties and assets towards danger. Each of implementation of security system will be depending on the building type and location, and on what needs to be secured. Building security should be addressed early in the design process in order to ensure an appropriate and cost-effective level of security. Since September, 11 tragedy, every building especially government building have been tightening their security controls. It became one of the most local authority requirement that need to be fulfilled before constructing a new building. Which means, every new design will have to comply the security and safety requirement before proceed with the construction. Different type of building will have different type of security technology system that being installed in the building. For example, fire alarm is one of security technology system that being applied in any types of building without differentiating their uses on the building. But, for a security device such as radio- frequency identification (RFID), the device is only being use in certain area such as in order to locate the machinery or other hospital equipment. By identifying the types of security technology system apply in hospitals building, thus it will helps the hospitals on choosing the right and best device that suit their building needs to cater the security and safety issues that reportedly occur in the hospital building.


Resilience ethics means a shared ethical responsibility for our actions and environment. Sustainable governance is interested in the complexity of sustainability and the rise of resilience thinking. There are multiple ways to apply the idea of resilience to shared narratives about public problems and environmental concerns for the future. In particular, resilience ethics are related to human interventions in ecosystems and the resultant responsibility to care for them. The integration of resilience and sustainability leads us to study the distribution of wealth and other root causes of social inequality and injustice. The current paper argues that institutional change and collective action are critical elements in society's resilience. Therefore, three global problems should be addressed as the focus of resilience and sustainability: (1) divided societies and growing inequalities should be considered in terms of income distribution, employment, and education; (2) wealth and power should be redistributed in terms of common-pool resources and affected communities; and (3) intersectional inequality should be reconsidered in different axes of oppression and social injustice. A renewed perspective for democratic and responsible citizenship is required to enhance direct citizen participation in public policies and social change. In this regard, social and administrative scientific advances create opportunities for the resilient future.


In this thesis work, a 600 / 28V full-bridge converter is investigated regarding its efficiency.
Moreover, a purpose was also to implement a first SiC BJT prototype into a simulation set-up
in order to study if the existing data and model set-up was sufficient for accurate dynamic
modelling.
The focus was put on comparing the losses of the SiC BJT prototype with that of a classical
IGBT in a full-bridge application
An equivalent transistor model of a classical MOSFET has been programmed in Matlab with
the objective to achieve estimations of switching and conduction losses. Due to the complex
nature of the SiC BJT it was not possible to achieve realistic loss estimations of this transistor.
Lack of sufficient data based on measurements of this first SiC BJT prototype also
contributed to the fact that these simulation results were not sufficient.
Measurements have been available only for lower voltage and current levels at turn-on and
turn-off for the SiC BJT. To achieve an estimation of the switching losses, the measured
results of the SiC transistor have been scaled to the voltage and current levels applied in this
DC/DC converter application.
Calculations of losses in the transformer and filter inductor of the DC/DC converter have also
been made.
The conclusion that can be drawn from this thesis work is that this promising SiC BJT
prototype, with accordingly high losses, still is at an early stage and more investigations need
to be conducted.


Abstract. Numerical analysis of the model for cyclotron instability in the Earth's magnetosphere is performed. This model, based on the self-consistent set of equations of quasi-linear plasma theory, describes different regimes of wave generation and related energetic particle precipitation. As the source of free energy the injection of energetic electrons with transverse anisotropic distribution function to the interaction region is considered. A parametric study of the model is performed. The main attention is paid to the analysis of generation regimes for different characteristics of energetic electron source, such as the shape of pitch angle distributions and its intensity. Two mechanisms of removal of energetic electrons from a generation region are considered, one is due to the particle precipitation through the loss cone and another one is related to the magnetic drift of energetic particles. It was confirmed that two main regimes occur in this system in the presence of a constant particle source, in the case of precipitation losses. At small source intensity relaxation oscillations were found, whose parameters are in good agreement with simplified analytical theory developed earlier. At a larger source intensity, transition to a periodic generation occurs. In the case of drift losses the regime of self-sustained periodic generation regime is realized for source intensity higher than some threshold. The dependencies of repetition period and dynamic spectrum shape on the source parameters were studied in detail. In addition to simple periodic regimes, those with more complex spectral forms were found. In particular, alteration of spikes with different spectral shape can take place. It was also shown that quasi-stationary generation at the low-frequency band can coexist with periodic modulation at higher frequencies. On the basis of the results obtained, the model for explanation of quasi-periodic whistler wave emissions is verified.


CircRNAs are expressed in many important biological processes. Studying their function requires an effective expression method. When we used intron-mediated enhancement (IME) to improve circRNA expression of mouse Rtn4 (Nogo, a key protein in Nogo-Rho pathways) circRNA as a test case, we achieved a 4-6-fold improvement compared to an existing method. We further developed this approach into a general circRNA expression vector pCircRNA-DMo. An unexpected feature of our approach is its ability to promote translation of circRNA into detectable amounts of proteins. Intriguingly, both monomer and multimer repeating peptides can be observed as a result of rolling circle translation of RTN4 circRNA. We also confirmed the presence of both peptide forms in human and mouse brains, highlighting the significance of circRNA translation in vivo. In summary, we demonstrate the significant advantage of IME in enhancing circRNA biogenesis and hence our vector offers a robust platform for exploring potential circRNA peptide-encoding functions.


This bachelor's thesis was written in the context of a joint research group, which developed a framework for finding and providing the best-fit web service for a user. The problem of the research group lays in testing their developed framework sufficiently. The framework can either be tested with test data produced by real web services which costs money or by generated test data based on a simulation of web service behavior. The second attempt has been developed within this scientific paper in the form of a test data generator. The generator simulates a web service request by defining internal services, whereas each service has an own internal graph which considers the structure of a service. A service can be atomic or can be compose of other services that are called in a specific manner (sequential, loop, conditional). The generation of the test data is done by randomly going through the services which result in variable response times, since the graph structure changes every time the system has been initialized. The implementation process displayed problems which have not been solved within the time frame. Those problems are displaying interesting challenges for the dynamical generation of random graphs. Those challenges should be targeted in further research.


Current Enterprise Networks deployments must accomplish a strong set of requirements in terms of resiliency, reliability and resources usage. As current approaches are based on monolithic and expensive infrastructures built on dedicated overlay links, vendors are trying to move to economical hybrid solutions that encompasses private dedicated links with public/regular Internet connections. However, these usually rely on complex Traffic Engineering solutions hardware dependent or proprietary that are costly in terms of computational time and memory usage in the forwarding nodes. In this paper, we propose SEMPER: a lightweight traffic engineering (TE) solution based on MP-TCP which, in contrast to other TE solutions, moves the complexity to the endpoints of the connection, and relieves the forwarding elements from complex operations or maintaining state. As our evaluation shows, SEMPER efficiently makes use of all available paths between the endpoints while maintaining fairness, and properly adapts to variations on the available capacity.


April 2014 The objective of the paper is defining the influence of agricultural land area (AL) and economic size on energy inputs in family farms that are beneficiaries of European Union funding. 70 farms of Bi ł goraj County that were beneficiaries of EU funding for technical modernization were researched within 2004-2009. In order to define energy inputs, the group of farms that were the object of the research were divided according to the amount of subsidy, area of agricultural land, economic size (ESU) and the income of an enterprise. In the process of characterizing the researched farms according to the level of possessed energy means, tractors, self-propelled combine harvesters and electric engines used in the process of farm produc- tion were taken into account, including also the ones mounted in the equipment operated in the farms. The level of energy inputs in the researched farms calculated into area unit was decreasing system-atically, both when the amount of funding increased, as well as area, eco- nomic size and income of an enterprise. In the group of farms according to the economic size, when its size increased, energy inputs decreased, and the tendency remained the same in farms of the highest income of an enterprise. In farms of a small area (up to 10 ha) of agricultural land (AL), apart from high level of specific labour input, there were high inputs of


Three-dimensional (3-D) meshes have been used more and more in industrial, medical and entertainment applications during the last decade. Many researchers, from both the academic and the industrial sectors, have become aware of their intellectual property protection and authentication problems arising with their increasing use. This paper gives a comprehensive survey on 3-D mesh watermarking, which is considered an effective solution to the above two emerging problems. Our survey covers an introduction to the relevant state of the art, an attack-centric investigation, and a list of existing problems and potential solutions. First, the particular difficulties encountered while applying watermarking on 3-D meshes are discussed. Then we give a presentation and an analysis of the existing algorithms by distinguishing them between fragile techniques and robust techniques. Since attacks play an important role in the design of 3-D mesh watermarking algorithms, we also provide an attack-centric viewpoint of this state of the art. Finally, some future working directions are pointed out especially on the ways of devising robust and blind algorithms and on some new probably promising watermarking feature spaces.


IntroductionGovernment and public agencies in Sweden have promoted the expansion of eHealth. The strategy behind many of the eHealth services is to increase quality of care, enhance efficiency, patient empowerment and patient safety. Patient online access to their electronic health record (EHR) is one of the most important civic eHealth services. By 2017, all patients in Sweden will be able to access their EHR online. In Mars 2014, Region Skane (RS) introduced the service in somatic care and in September 2015 RS introduced the service in adult psychiatry. The aim of this presentation is to discuss 1) how the employees in somatic care experience the service in terms of effects on work environment and patient safety. 2) How the employees in psychiatric care anticipated that the service would affect their work environment and patient safety. Material and methodsThe material presented derives from two surveys: 1) A full population web survey distributed to employees in somatic care in RS approximately two years after the introduction of the service (post implementation). Response rate: 20% (n = 2376). 2) A full population web survey that was distributed to employees in adult psychiatry in RS just before the introduction of the service (ante implementation). Response rate: 29% (n = 871). ResultsThe results show that the experience in somatic care and the expectation in adult psychiatric care correspond to a large degree. Respondents in both groups are sceptical to the anticipated positive effects of the service. The comparison between the two surveys further show that the employees with experience of the service (somatic care) are even more negative then the employees without experience (psychiatric care).ConclusionsThe results from the two surveys indicate that there is a large difference between the aimes of the national eHealth strategy and the expectations and experiences of the healthcare personell and that little attention is given to the negative effects that civic eHealth services may have on the work environment of healthcare personell. There is thus a need for more research about how eHealth services affect work environment, patient safety and quality of care. (Less)


Object. Patients with high-grade gliomas have poor prognoses following standard treatment. Generally, malignant brain tumors have a decreased blood flow that results in increased resistance to radiation and reduced delivery of chemotherapeutic agents and oxygen. The aim of the present study was to assess the effect of spinal cord stimulation (SCS) on locoregional blood flow in high-grade tumors in the brain. Methods. Fifteen patients (11 with Grade III and four with Grade IV brain tumors) had SCS devices inserted prior to scheduled raditherapy. Both before and after SCS, the patients underwent the following procedures: 1) single-photon emission computerized tomography (SPECT) scanning; 2) middle cerebral artery (MCA) blood flow velocity measurements (centimeters/second) with the aid of transcranial oppler (TCD) ultrasonography; and 3) common carotid arter (CCa) blood flow volume quantification (mililiters/minute) based on time-domain processing by using color Doppler ultra-sonography. The indices demonstrated on SPECT scanning before SCS were significantly lower (p < 0.001) in tumor sites compared with those in peritumoral sites (32%) and healthy contralateral areas (41%). Poststimulation of results revealed the following: 1) a mean increase of15% in tumor blood flow in 75% of patients (p = 0.033), as demonstrated on SPECT scanning; 2) a mean incrase of greater than 18% in systolic and diastolic blood flow velocities in both tumorous and healthy MCAs in all but one patient (p < 0.002), as exhibited on TCD ultrasonography; and 3) a mean increase of greater than 60% in blood flow volume in tumorous and healthy CCAs in all patients (p < 0.013), as revealed on color Doppler ultrasonography studies. Conclusions. Preliminary data show that SCS can modify locoregional blood flow in high-grade malignant tumors in the brain, thus indicating that SCS could be used to improve blood flow, oxygenation, and drug delivery to such tumors and could be a useful adjuvant in chemoradiotherapy.


Addressing corruption in fragile and conflict-affected environments is constrained by the risk that reforms can spark violent resistance. Two different political economies of corruption in fragile states – distinguished by the character of elite politics – affect the way corruption manifests itself. The differences have important implications for anti-corruption programming. Gradualism, changing elite incentives, and creating political space for reforms are approaches to emphasise. Anti-corruption institutions can be access points for reforms when underlying conditions are conducive.


Glycogen synthase is a rate-limiting enzyme in the biosynthesis of glycogen and has an essential role in glucose homeostasis. The three-dimensional structures of yeast glycogen synthase (Gsy2p) complexed with maltooctaose identified four conserved maltodextrin-binding sites distributed across the surface of the enzyme. Site-1 is positioned on the N-terminal domain, site-2 and site-3 are present on the C-terminal domain, and site-4 is located in an interdomain cleft adjacent to the active site. Mutation of these surface sites decreased glycogen binding and catalytic efficiency toward glycogen. Mutations within site-1 and site-2 reduced the Vmax/S0.5 for glycogen by 40- and 70-fold, respectively. Combined mutation of site-1 and site-2 decreased the Vmax/S0.5 for glycogen by >3000-fold. Consistent with the in vitro data, glycogen accumulation in glycogen synthase-deficient yeast cells (Δgsy1-gsy2) transformed with the site-1, site-2, combined site-1/site-2, or site-4 mutant form of Gsy2p was decreased by up to 40-fold. In contrast to the glycogen results, the ability to utilize maltooctaose as an in vitro substrate was unaffected in the site-2 mutant, moderately affected in the site-1 mutant, and almost completely abolished in the site-4 mutant. These data show that the ability to utilize maltooctaose as a substrate can be independent of the ability to utilize glycogen. Our data support the hypothesis that site-1 and site-2 provide a "toehold mechanism," keeping glycogen synthase tightly associated with the glycogen particle, whereas site-4 is more closely associated with positioning of the nonreducing end during catalysis.


This researcher investigated the professional experiences and development of trainee dental technicians and undergraduate dental students during a shared learning exercise in a combined UK university dental school and hospital. Two purposes framed the investigation: 1. To gain an in-depth understanding of the experiences of trainee dental technicians and undergraduate dental students during shared learning opportunities and 2. To examine whether interprofessional learning between trainee dental technicians and undergraduate dental students offered any professional and occupational specific disciplinary developmental benefits or disadvantages. Using a qualitative approach with a phenomenological framework, data sources included reflective diaries, focus group interviews and other salient material. Dialogue between the researcher and participants played a major part in ensuring the rigour of the study, participants having the opportunity to review the central concepts and excerpts within the thesis. Results indicated that both trainee dental technicians and undergraduate dental students were pragmatic but positive in terms of their expectations of shared learning. In particular, they regarded the exercise as useful in terms of communication and understanding each other"s role. Overall there was little evidence arising from the data to support issues of power and perceived social and interprofessional hierarchies as impediments to learning. Findings from this study are consistent with previous research into interprofessional education, which demonstrate the significance of preconceptions based upon traditional and perhaps stereotypical perceptions of their own professional status. The students regarded the processes of shared learning as having a positive impact on future interprofessional teamwork. This empirical study assists in creating understandings about the benefits and limitations to shared learning between these two groups within the dental team. It also contributes to a currently under-theorised account of how relationships developed between these two groups may affect longer-term professional development. Implications are offered for future research involving the investigation that such learning may have on patient care.


We describe new work that uses deep learning to learn temporal changes in Planetary Boundary Layer Height (PBLH). This work is performed in conjunction with a deep edge detection method that identifies edges in imagery based on ceilometer backscatter signal from LIDAR observations. We implement a convolutional Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) to predict small temporal changes in PBLH estimates. In the presence of rain, clouds, and other unfavorable conditions, PBLH heights are challenging to estimate. The convolutional LSTM acts as an internal state representation of the external partially observable environment, supplementing the deep edge detection method, providing a prediction of PBLH in the absence of a reliable estimation. Convolutional LSTMs trained on image-based frames that define the movements of artifacts in the images, such as Moving MNIST digits, have been used to predict the movement of these artifacts for a set of frames in a sequence. We show how a similar network could be extended to learn more complex movement across frames and learn new information introduced at each frame. Utilizing the convolutional LSTM model with our proposed augmentation methodology applied to ten-minute frames, we predicted the change of the movement of edges identified as the PBL over time with favorable accuracy. We show the result of the prediction of PBL-based edges and evaluate the performance using three different metrics.


The possibilities of dissolving grade pulp production from reed were investigated in this paper. Two – stage prehydrolysis – kraft pulping and CEHA bleaching process of reed for preparation of dissolving grade pulp were studied in laboratory. The optimum cooking and bleaching conditions were found out. The mechanism and its kinetics of reed in prehydrolysis process were also discussed. The results showed that under the laboratory conditions the rate for removal of materials at about 175°C follow approximately a pseudo first order law with two distinct phrases: the bulk removal and the residual removal of the materials. The prehydrolysis-factor (P-factor) was established. The advantage of using P-factor is predict compensating adjustments in cooking time and/or temperature to give the same degree of pulping and to produce pulp with predetermined characteristics. It is found that three distinct delignification rate stages about 75% of pentosans and about 50% of lignin were removed. A CEHA four stage bleaching is used for dissolving grade pulp. Total chlorine charge in bleaching is 6% (to oven-dry pulp). The results show that all of the indices fitted the quality standards of dissolving grade pulp.


Digital library and digital services are important component of any library, as role of library has changed to great extent with the advancement of information technology, network technology and communication technology. This study aims to report the digital library facilities and services available at engineering college libraries in Karnataka. It showcases the perception/opinion of librarians about digital library and digital services. From study it is clear that librarians have provided digital library and digital services and have positive opinion on the renowned role of digital library in library and information centers. Keyword: Digital Library, Digital Services, Opinion of Librarians, Impact of Digital library, Digital Infrastracture


Two patients, with cervical lymphadenopathies and a presumptive diagnosis of lymphoma or scrofula, were submitted to biopsies of the affected lymph nodes. Unexpectedly, the histological picture revealed a necrotic-granulomatous reaction and the presence of leishmania (amastigotes) in some vacuolated macrophages. The patients were from different endemic areas of leishmaniasis in Brazil, and had no perceptible cutaneous or mucosal lesions. Later, however, one of them developed such lesions, probably as an effect of a treatment for toxoplasmosis. These findings support the idea that the agents of the disease, once in the host organism, would invade the organs of the phagocytic-mononuclear system, there remaining for a long time, maybe for the rest of the host life. Eventually, under the action of several factors, that could modify the host resistance, the parasites migrate to the skin or the mucosal membranes, causing secondary or reactivating lesions.


While audio data play an increasingly central role in computer-based music production, interaction with large sound collections in most available music creation and production environments is very often still limited to scrolling long lists of file names. This paper describes a general framework for devising interactive applications based on the content-based visualization of sound collections. The proposed framework allows for a modular combination of different techniques for sound segmentation, analysis, and dimensionality reduction, using the reduced feature space for interactive applications. We analyze several prototypes presented in the literature and describe their limitations. We propose a more general framework that can be used flexibly to devise music creation interfaces. The proposed approach includes several novel contributions with respect to previously used pipelines, such as using unsupervised feature learning, content-based sound icons, and control of the output space layout. We present an implementation of the framework using the SuperCollider computer music language, and three example prototypes demonstrating its use for data-driven music interfaces. Our results demonstrate the potential of unsupervised machine learning and visualization for creative applications in computer music.


This study aimed at assessing the nature of street trade, existing conditions of the street traders at their work settings, exploring the threats and risks faced by them, driving forces of street trade, and analysing livelihood outcomes of street trade both on the operators and the poor urban dwellers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Due to the nature of the study, Qualitative research method was used. Purposive sampling under non-probability sampling method was employed. Primary data was collected from street traders and some customers of in the purposively s elected streets. Two streets (Megenagna and Mexico) were purposively selected for which the researcher had observed that street trade is rampant and there are many street traders operating in these areas. Among the driving forces why people engage in street vending as to some people is that they got it better to supplement the income they get from the other livelihood strategies (income earned from formal employment, but there are also others engaged due to chronic poverty. Some venders become engaged in street trade activities because it does not demand much start-up capital intermes of finance and skill but better option to earn income and accumulate capital and maximize profit. Street traders are found vulnerable to different hazardous conditions due to their activities. As reported by the informants, the street trade activity in urban informal sector is found to be pivotal for the livelihood enhancement of the street traders and other sections of poor dwellers.  According to urban authorities, street vending activity in is directly associated with illegality, criminality, poor sanitation of the urban environment, and congestion of pedestrians on the behalf of the urban authorities. Key terms: Street trade, driving forces, livelihoods, economic importance DOI : 10.7176/RHSS/9-5-02 Publication date :March 31 st 2019


The pace at which new words are acquired is influenced by the degree of engagement with them on the part of the learner. Insights from cognitive linguistics into the non-arbitrary aspects of vocabulary can be turned into stimuli for such engagement. The majority of Cognitive Linguists' proposals for vocabulary teaching aim at helping learners appreciate the way a single word form can develop different meanings. This, however, presupposes knowledge of the 'basic' meaning of that word. We report an experiment in which learners under an experimental treatment were stimulated to consider the possibility that the form–meaning link in target words might not be fully arbitrary. The mnemonic effect of this task-induced engagement was assessed in relation to comparison treatments in immediate and delayed post-tests measuring both receptive and productive knowledge. Results show that simply prompting learners to evaluate the form–meaning match of words can foster vocabulary acquisition, although not all target words lends themselves equally well to this type of engagement.


The micro-motion stages are critically important in modern manufacturing technology. In this paper, an integrated approach for measuring micro-displacement of micro-motion stage that incorporates micro-motion measurement algorithm into the computer microvision is proposed. At first, the basic principle of the computer microvision measurement is analyzed. Then, an algorithm for micro-motion measurement is proposed. Finally, the micro-displacement of the micro-motion stage is measured using the integrated approach. The maximal bias of this proposed combined approach reached 12.5 nm. Experimental results show that this method can measure micro-displacement with nanometer accuracy.


Background: To determine concordant or discordant breast biopsy results and see their effect on patient management and outcome.
Material and methods: This descriptive analytical study was conducted at the department of Diagnostic Radiology Aga Khan University Hospital Karachi Pakistan from January to December 2013. All patients fulfilling our selection criteria were included. A concordant result was defined when the imaging and pathology results concluded same diagnosis and a discordant result when they did not match. All histopathology results were reviewed and a decision was made regarding concordant/discordant biopsy results and recommendations given for further management of all patients.
Results: A total of 282 patients underwent core biopsy of lesions in the breast. The mean age was 47.87 ± 13.99 years. Out of 282 lesions biopsied, 172 were concordant malignant and 105 were concordant benign. Two lesion out of 282 were borderline or high risk, one case was discordant benign and 2 cases discordant malignant. The appropriate management for all cases was recommended after radiology-pathology correlation.
Conclusion: Cautious Radiology-Pathology co relation is indispensable in addition to appropriate post biopsy management for managing a successful core breast biopsy program. This practice identifies a substantial number of false negative results of core biopsy by identifying discordant results avoiding delays in diagnosis of breast cancer.


I appreciate the useful article from Maqsood and Mahmood on the identification and diagnosis of herpes simplex ophthalmia neonatorum.1 As McKechnie and Snelson suggest in their response, a key differential for 'sticky eye' in the neonate is congenital nasolacrimal duct obstruction.2 A large cohort study of all children in Olmsted County, Minnesota, found that the prevalence of congenital nasolacrimal duct obstruction was 11.3%. Of these cases, over 90% were identified in primary care.3 Ophthalmia neonatorum however is comparatively rare. A survey sent to members of the American Association for Paediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus found that most ophthalmologists encountered fewer than five cases per year. Of these cases, the most common causative organism was Chlamydia trachomatis.4 The diagnostic challenge for the GP is clear. While they will see numerous cases of congenital nasolacrimal duct obstruction, they will rarely encounter ophthalmia neonatorum. From the literature it appears that herpes simplex ophthalmia neonatorum is relatively uncommon even for specialists working in a more selected population. Given this difficulty, the pragmatic approach of referral of all cases suspicious for infection, as suggested by McKechnie and Snelson, is prudent. Prompt secondary care assessment would then allow timely and effective treatment to prevent sightthreatening complications.


In this paper, a novel robust inversion-based 2-DOF control approach for output tracking is proposed. Inversion-based feedforward control techniques have been successfully implemented in various applications. Usually, to account for adverse effects such as dynamics variations and disturbances, the inverse feedforward control is applied by augmenting it with a feedback control. However, such effects have not been directly addressed in existing system-inversion methods, and the integration of the feedback control with the inversion-based feedforward control is performed in an ad hoc manner, which may not lead to an optimal complement of the inversion-based feedforward control with the feedback control. The contribution of this paper is the development of the following: 1) a robust system-inversion approach to directly account for and then minimize the dynamics-uncertainty effect when finding the inversion-based feedforward controller, and 2) a systematic integration (of such a feedforward controller) with a robust feedback controller. The proposed robust inversion method achieves a guaranteed tracking performance of the feedforward control for bounded dynamics uncertainties. Then, the quantified bound of the feedforward control tracking error is utilized in designing an H infin robust feedback controller to complement the feedforward control. Based on the concept of Bode's integral, it is shown that the feedback bandwidth can be improved from that obtained by using feedback alone. We illustrated the proposed approach by implementing it in experiments on a piezotube actuator of an atomic force microscope for precision positioning.


Some receiver architectures for the down-link in a DS-CDMA (direct sequence-code division multiple access) mobile communications system are here outlined. The performance relevant to a three-arms RAKE receiver, with a refined multipath tracking structure, is compared with that obtained by a less sophisticated RAKE receiver and, for reference purposes, with that of a classical receiver synchronized on the strongest path. The receiver makes use of a pilot signal transmitted by the base station for synchronization and channel equalization purposes. The effects of the multipath tracking algorithm and the sensitivity to some parameters of paramount importance (pilot to useful signal power ratio, mobile speed, quantization) have been simulated under multipath fading propagation conditions. The results of such simulations are presented as well as some indications about a design of a receiver based on the above structure.<<ETX>>


Blood biochemistry attributes form an important class of tests, routinely collected several times per year for many patients with diabetes. The objective of this study is to investigate the role of blood biochemistry for improving the predictive accuracy of the diagnosis of cardiac autonomic neuropathy (CAN) progression. Blood biochemistry contributes to CAN, and so it is a causative factor that can provide additional power for the diagnosis of CAN especially in the absence of a complete set of Ewing tests. We introduce automated iterative multitier ensembles (AIME) and investigate their performance in comparison to base classifiers and standard ensemble classifiers for blood biochemistry attributes. AIME incorporate diverse ensembles into several tiers simultaneously and combine them into one automatically generated integrated system so that one ensemble acts as an integral part of another ensemble. We carried out extensive experimental analysis using large datasets from the diabetes screening research initiative (DiScRi) project. The results of our experiments show that several blood biochemistry attributes can be used to supplement the Ewing battery for the detection of CAN in situations where one or more of the Ewing tests cannot be completed because of the individual difficulties faced by each patient in performing the tests. The results show that AIME provide higher accuracy as a multitier CAN classification paradigm. The best predictive accuracy of 99.57% has been obtained by the AIME combining decorate on top tier with bagging on middle tier based on random forest. Practitioners can use these findings to increase the accuracy of CAN diagnosis.


Contemporary research on roadblocks and facilitators of settlement has thus far been framed by standard economic modeling and distributive bargaining theories. Each of these frameworks provides helpful insights into those elements that assist or hinder the settlement process. However, each of these models has thus far not examined how particular roadblocks and facilitators of settlement operate in the context of international commercial arbitration proceedings from a comparative cross-cultural perspective. How diverse regions approach roadblocks and facilitators of settlement in the context of the integration of global markets is a new arena for research and practice. To date, most research on international arbitration has focused exclusively on Western models of arbitration as practiced in Europe and North America. While such studies accurately reflected the geographic foci of international arbitration practice in the mid20th century, in recent years, the number of international arbitrations conducted in East Asia has grown steadily and on par with growth in Western regions. This article presents a cross-cultural examination of how international arbitrators in East Asian and Western countries view the particular factors that help or hinder the settlement process in international arbitration. The result of a 115-person survey and 64 follow up interviews shed light on the underlying cultural attitudes and approaches to perceived roadblocks and facilitators of settlement in international arbitration. The findings indicate that arbitration practitioner's perceptions of the factors influencing the achievement of settlement as well as specific barriers to settlement demonstrate a high degree of convergence across regions. At the same time, regional and socio-economic distinctions are reflected in varying arbitrator perceptions regarding arbitrator proclivity towards making the first move towards settlement in arbitration, the degree of focus on past facts and legal rights as opposed to exploring creative solutions and orientation toward adversarial procedures.


In the past few years the flow of FDI towards the developing countries and especially towards the African countries is growing due to the pursuit of MNEs to maximize their profits, to lower their costs and to search for new markets. This is an opportunity for the African countries to work not only towards economic growth but also towards creating employment opportunities that can translate this growth into inclusive development. The changes brought about by technology including the wide spread use of internet and mobile phones have changed the way people work. There are even virtual markets, e-commerce activities and websites supporting for employment opportunities. Part-time or temporary employment is not uncommon e.g. in South Africa temporary workers comprise of about 7 percent of the labour force (The World Bank 2013). The employment impact of FDI needs to be looked at from such varied dimensions for the FDI policy perspective. Adoption of appropriate policies to create conducive factors for attracting employment generating FDI is the key to a bright future for Africa.
Based on the above, the main objective of this research is to address whether FDI is effective in creating employment opportunities in Africa. The research addresses three sub-problems. Firstly, whether FDI impacts the quantity and quality of employment in Africa. Secondly, the impact of various sectors of FDI on the different employment sectors. Thirdly, to see if there are geographical differences across different regions and cities. As a culmination of the research it is also intended to contribute towards policy recommendations on the subject, as the topic of research is of considerable socio-economic relevance for the region.
The literature analysing the correlation between FDI and employment uses a variety of methods and models and panel data analysis is often used for such research. The data used for the present research is panel data for the continent, region, country and city level analysis. Panel data is the data that consists of a number of observations with two dimensions i.e. time and space. Thus panel data analysis enables the study of data from multiple locations collected periodically over a certain period of time and is a combination of time series and cross sectional (Greene 2012). The period under research is a time span of twelve years from 2003 to 2014. An interaction between two variables is also used to avoid multi collinearity and thus to get more authentic results.
It is clear from the findings of the research that the aggregate FDI does not have any significant impact on the overall employment in Africa. However, at sectoral employment front, it has a negative impact on employment in agriculture and positive impact on industry sector employment. Sectoral FDI too does impact employment industry sector. The negative impact of hi-tech FDI on overall employment and the positive impact of resource FDI on employment in industry are noticeable. The service sector employment, however, remains hardly impacted by the inward FDI, both in terms of aggregate FDI and sectoral FDI. As regards quality of employment the aggregate inward FDI does not exert any significant impact, neither at the continent level, nor at the regional level.
The key variables of this research, both inward FDI and employment are pivotal for African countries to address the present development challenge and elevate them to the next level of development. The burgeoning youth population in Africa calls for urgent steps to generate employment opportunities. The research analyses the ways in which FDI has impacted employment in Africa during the research period that covers a span of twelve years i.e. 2003 to 2014. While historically, resource FDI has been a dominant other sectors are taking over,
Impact of Foreign Direct Investment on Employment in Africa iv
manufacturing FDI has the largest share during the research period, and looking at the recent trends in FDI, in future services FDI may takes its place. Overall amongst the FDI sectors manufacturing FDI is the key driver of employment during the research period, which may be replaced by services FDI a few years hence. Africa's leaders need to pay heed to these aspects and take measures to attract suitable FDI for their country


Image hash functions provide compact representations of images, which is useful for search and authentication applications. In this work, we have identified a general three step framework and proposed a new image hashing scheme that achieves a better overall performance than the existing approaches under various kinds of image processing distortions. By exploiting the properties of discrete polar Fourier transform and incorporating cryptographic keys, the proposed image hash is resilient to geometric and filtering operations, and is secure against guessing and forgery attacks.