The subthalamic nucleus (STN), also known as the corpus Luysii, is a popular surgical target for deep brain stimulation (DBS) in patients with advanced Parkinson (PD). 1 The relief of movement disability by STN stimulation is predictable because the STN is a critical part of the brain's motor circuit. 2 This important, but relatively small, brain region has an interesting history. It was initially named erroneously, and clinically it was associated only with hyperkinesias, including hemiballismus. In addition, researchers speculated for decades that the STN efferents were inhibitory. Now we know that the STN has a major role in hypokinetic disorders, including PD, and that its efferents are excitatory, using glutamate as the neurotransmitter. The STN is the only glutamatergic nucleus in the basal ganglia.


Luitjohan, Kara Eileen. M.S.M.S.E., Purdue University, May 2015. The Effects of an Electric Field on the Sintering of Ceramics. Major Professor: Lia Stanciu. Sintering is a method used to condense a solid powder material into a single solid mass allowing for the production of metal or ceramic parts. Different sintering techniques involve the manipulation of different processing variables. To fully exploit the processing variables, how they affect the sintering process must be fully understood. One such processing variable is an applied electric field, utilized in spark plasma sintering and flash sintering. Both techniques allow for densification to occur at lower temperatures and in shorter times when compared to other sintering techniques. Though various theories exist in literature for how the electric field affects the sintering process, not one has been universally agreed upon. In this work, the sintering of zinc oxide was characterized to determine its response to an electric field. Samples were sintered in a modified tube furnace under various strengths of an applied electric field ranging up to 112 V/cm. After sintering, densities and grain sizes were analyzed. For applied fields up to 112 V/cm, there was no change in the final density or final grain size with respect to the strength of the applied field. It can be concluded that while the field does not affect the final density and final grain size, it does affect when the material reaches those values during the sintering process. With increasing field strengths, less time and lower temperatures are required to reach final density and final grain size. Before the advantages of spark plasma sintering or flash sintering can be applied at the industrial level, more work is still needed to determine the specific effects of an electric field on the sintering of ceramic materials.


In this paper we introduce some general necessary conditions for the existence of graph homomorphisms, which hold in both directed and undirected cases. Our method is a combination of Diaconis and Saloff–Coste comparison technique for Markov chains and a generalization of Haemers interlacing theorem. As some applications, we obtain a necessary condition for the spanning subgraph problem, which also provides a generalization of a theorem of Mohar (1992) as a necessary condition for Hamiltonicity. In particular, in the case that the range is a Cayley graph or an edge‐transitive graph, we obtain theorems with a corollary about the existence of homomorphisms to cycles. This, specially, provides a proof of the fact that the Coxeter graph is a core. Also, we obtain some information about the cores of vertex‐transitive graphs. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 44: 15–38, 2003


This thesis examines the works of three 'forgotten' British artists, working from the late nineteenth century and well into the 1920s. In a period which saw momentous changes associated with the onset of modernity, artworks appeared to speak of revivalism, tradition, even nostalgia, rather than the new. Thomas Cooper Gotch, Robert Anning Bell and Frederick Cayley Robinson shared an interest in the spiritual, the unseen and immaterial, which they expressed through representations of women, placing faith, broadly, in 'the feminine' as synonymous with humanity's neglected 'spirit' in the modern, materialistic world. The eclectic and contradictory nature of the artworks examined, their complex and ambiguous representations of womanhood and female spirituality were expressive of the condition of modernity in its rich, varied forms.

These artworks are analysed in the context of an important historical moment for the feminist movement, since all three artists addressed the explosion in female agency related to contemporary feminism, the 'gender crisis' and the Suffragette movement. By placing artworks in this context, I have attempted to bring women, their presence in the public sphere and visual culture, their discovery of a 'feminist voice' in this period, into the frame. Women imagined invigorating movements, from the confines of the domestic interior into the airy heights of mountain tops, using languages of righteousness and joyous expectancy, and the artworks examined provide visual analogues and commentaries on these feminist possibilities and new imaginative aspirations.

While all three artists mediated the visual 'types' of womanhood available within art languages, they created quite distinct images of women. Representations range from Gotch's female Messiah, where woman's spiritual power originates in her innocence and purity, Bell's images of Amazonian strength allied with a closer female relationship with nature, to more occult versions in Cayley Robinson's paintings, related to theosophy. The artworks participated in a tremendous moment of hope for women in their endeavours toward autonomy and fulfilment. In presenting women's spiritual role as humanity's redeemer, these paintings reveal how art may envisage intangible forms of spirituality and emancipatory possibilities.


Introduction In Africa, there is increasing evidence that a large proportion of new HIV infections occur in cohabitating couples, many of whom are unaware of both partners' serostatus. Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest prevalence and incidence of HIV infection worldwide, mostly attributable to heterosexual transmission. In Nigeria, the bulk of the new infections occur in persons who are not engaging in high risk sex, a sub-population that includes cohabiting or married sexual partners. This study was undertaken to determine the prevalence and assess factors associated with HIV serodiscordance status among HIV positive patients accessing ART in secondary health facilities in Ogun State, South West Nigeria. Methods This is a descriptive cross-sectional study conducted in four secondary health facilities offering HIV services in Ogun State over a six months period. Sample size of 650 was determined using the Cochrane formula and the respondents were consecutively recruited into the study. Data was collected using a structured interviewer administered questionnaire and analysis was done using the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) version 17.0. Results was presented using frequency tables, tests of associations was done using the Chi-square test and multiple Logistic regression with level of significance set at 0.05. Results A total of 637 questionnaires was retrieved (response rate 98%). Two hundred and Seventy eight (43.6%) of the respondents did not know their spouse HIV status while 359 knew partners status. Of the 359, 166 clients are serodiscordant (46.2%) while 193 (53.8%) were seroconcordant. 50.7% were aged 30–39 years, the mean age was 35.8±9.1 years. Significantly more females (74.7%) than males (25.3%) had serodiscordant partners (p-value=0.002). Clients who did not consume alcohol were significantly more likely to have serodiscordant partners compared with clients who consumed alcohol (p-value=0.001). Serodiscordant partners were significantly more among clients with infrequent sexual activities compared with clients with frequent sexual activities (p-value=0.001). Predictors of serodiscordance status among partners were clients who were <35 years old (odd ratio (OR)=1.727, confidence interval (CI)=1.107–2.693) and did not consumed alcohol (OR=2.204, CI=1.070–4.542), with partners whose occupation were skilled (OR=7.159, CI=1.440–35.604) and semi-skilled (OR=6.189, CI=1.216–31.503) and clients with infrequent sexual activities (OR=3.182, CI=1.437–7.046). Conclusion The study indicates that HIV positive clients could have serodiscordant partners if they could modify their life-style, have infrequent sexual activities (Not more than twice in a month) with partners that are gainfully engaged. It is therefore recommended that for early identification of at risk partners, couple HIV counselling and testing needs to be scaled up in addition to group-based interventions in order to pick serodiscordant partners early and provided all the necessary behavioural change support required to remain serodiscordant.


ABSTRACT
 Sign surveys are commonly used to study and monitor wildlife species but may be flawed when surveys are conducted only once and cover short distances, which can lead to a lack of accountability for false absences. Multiple observers surveyed for river otter (Lontra canadensis) scat and tracks along stream and reservoir shorelines at 110 randomly selected sites in eastern Kansas from January to April 2008 and 2009 to determine if detection probability differed among substrates, sign types, observers, survey lengths, and near access points. We estimated detection probabilities (p) of river otters using occupancy models in Program PRESENCE. Mean detection probability for a 400-m survey was highest in mud substrates (p = 0.60) and lowest in snow (p = 0.18) and leaf litter substrates (p = 0.27). Scat had a higher detection probability (p = 0.53) than tracks (p = 0.18), and experienced observers had higher detection probabilities (p > 0.71) than novice observers (p < 0.55). Detection probabilities increased almost 3-fold as survey length increased from 200 m to 1,000 m, and otter sign was not concentrated near access points. After accounting for imperfect detection, our estimates of otter site occupancy based on a 400-m survey increased >3-fold, providing further evidence of the potential negative bias that can occur in estimates from sign surveys when imperfect detection is not addressed. Our study identifies areas for improvement in sign survey methodologies and results are applicable for sign surveys commonly used for many species across a range of habitats.


Proteolytic enzymes (also known as proteases, proteinases or peptidases) offer a wide range of applications. They are routinely used in detergent, leather, food and pharmaceutical industries, as well as in medical and basic research. Therefore, effective isolation procedures are of great importance. The chapter describes the use of recently discovered protease inhibitors from basidiomycetes as affinity chromatography ligands for isolating proteases. Affinity columns with serine and cysteine protease inhibitors immobilized to the natural polymer Sepharose have been prepared, the chromatography procedure optimized and used for isolating proteases from various bacterial, plant and animal sources. The cysteine protease inhibitor macrocypin showed superior characteristics as a ligand, so was selected for immobilization to CIM (Convective Interaction Media) monolithic disks. Different immobilization chemistries and process conditions were optimized to determine the best conditions for high capacity and selectivity. A very effective method for isolating cysteine proteases was developed using affinity chromatography with the fungal cysteine protease inhibitor macrocypin immobilized to a CIM monolithic disk.


Larvae of the butterfly Erionota thrax, the banana skipper, destroy the leaves of bananas by eating them and forming massive protective rolls of leaf tissue. They were first observed in north-western Papua New Guinea in 1983 and over the next 6 years spread throughout the mainland at the rate of up to 500 km/year. E. thrax has also spread across the ocean to the east, to invade New Britain, Duke of York and New Ireland islands, and possibly Bougainville. As the banana skipper spread, it destroyed an average of some 60% of banana leaves, leading to both a serious delay in fruit maturation and reduced weight of banana bunches. Previous successful biological control of E. thrax when it invaded Mauritius, Hawaii, Guam and Saipan encouraged Papua New Guinea to launch an approach to ACIAR for funds. This was successful and a project was undertaken from 1988 to 1990. After careful tests to ensure that it was safe to do so, the larval parasite Cotesia erionotae was introduced and established, leading to a reduction in the estimated average leaf damage from about 60% to 5%. Using the estimated production value of bananas in Papua New Guinea to the year 2020, the losses due to banana skipper each year were calculated. Using a discount rate of 5%, the net present value of lost production amounts to approximately A$301.8 million. The value of damage prevented by biological control is estimated at $201.6 million. The reduction of banana skipper abundance by 90% in southern Papua New Guinea has correspondingly reduced the chance of adults invading not only Australian islands in the Torres Strait but also the Australian mainland. The successful biological control program in Papua New Guinea has therefore provided significant benefits to banana production in Australia. Assuming similar levels of damage in Australia as in Papua New Guinea, we estimate these benefits to be $223 million to the year 2020. The present value of total benefits from the ACIAR project equals $424.7 million ($201.6 million to Papua New Guinea and $223.1 million to Australia). This compares with the present value of the cost of the ACIAR project of $0.70 million, giving a benefit–cost ratio of 607 and an internal rate of return of 190%.


Introduction: Abdominal masses in pediatric patients are common findings& may be caused by congenital anomalies, tumors, trauma, infection or abscess, or by organ enlargement. Imaging modality choice is a core issue in the evaluation of pediatric patients.Objective-: The objective of this study is to compare and examine the correlation of B-mode    US diagnosis with that of pathological diagnosis of pediatric abdominal masses (PAMs).Methods: A retrospective study conducted on 83 (47 male, 36 female) pediatric abdominal   masses (PAM) casesadmitted to TASH, pediatric surgical ward to study the US patterns of PAMs withpathologic correlation to see diagnosis sensitivity of US.Results: All the 83 patients had US evaluation, 42(50.6%) of them had both US & biopsy diagnoses, 60(72.3%) have US & FNAC result, 44(53%) had both US & IVP study, 10(12%) had both US & CT study, 8(9.6%) had both CT & Biopsy, 27(32.1%) had IVP & Biopsy results. When US diagnosis was compared with the final diagnosis, 31 of the 42 cases (74%) including cystic abdominal masses had similar diagnosis with the biopsy. From the 20 case with final diagnosis of wilm's tumor (WT), 17(85%) were correctly diagnosed by ultrasound as WT. that showed US sensitivity to be high for WT in particular than PAMs as a whole. When the FNAC, U/S & Biopsy cross tabulation was analyzed, only13 of the 25 cases (52%) of FNAC results matched  the biopsy diagnosis but 19 of 25 cases (76%) of U/S diagnosis matched  the results of the final diagnosis, making U/S more sensitive than FNAC in the diagnosis of PAMs in our study.     Conclusion: - In addition to describing the location, size & consistency of the PAMs, US was shown to give exact diagnosis in a good percentage of patients in this study. US has far better sensitivity (76% to 52%) in diagnosing PAMs as a whole compared to the FNAC results in the study. So, Ultrasound scanning is a noninvasive method of visualizing th cross sectional anatomic relation of PAMs with a good sensitivity in the diagnosis of the different PAMs which make it especially valuable in pediatric patients, where prompt diagnosis and treatment are essential & radiation exposure risk is a concern.


Using a level-oriented model for verification of asynchronous circuits helps users to easily construct formal models with high readability or to naturally model datapath circuits. On the other hand, in order to use such a model on large circuits, techniques to avoid the state explosion problem must be developed. This paper first introduces a level-oriented formal model based on time Petri nets, and then proposes its partial order reduction algorithm that prunes unnecessary state generation while guaranteeing the correctness of the verification.


Initial fixation with bone and the long term bone loss are two main problems associated with total hip replacement (THR), which are studied by electron microscope and computer simulation in this thesis. Bare Titanium-6 wt% Aluminum4 wt% Vanadium (Ti64) implants, Ti64 implants with plasma-sprayed hydroxyapatite (PSHA), and Ti64 implants with electrochemically-deposited hydroxyapatite (EDHA) were implanted into canine trabecular bone for 6 hours, 7 days, and 14 days to study the initial bone formation on these implant materials. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) results showed that at 7 days PSHA had a higher bone apposition ratio than Ti64 and EDHA samples; however, at 14 days, the bone apposition on EDHA increased to be similar to PSHA, much higher than that on Ti64. By transmission electron microscope (TEM), a layer of new bone tissue was observed on PSHA coating surface; in contrast, no much bone was found on EDHA surface. At 14 days, substantial bone was found on both EDHA and EDHA coating surface. Technetium-99m-methylene-diphosphonate (Tc-99m-MDP) labeling was used to quantify mineralization of cultures of MC3T3 osteoblast-like cells in vitro on tissue culture polystyrene (TCPS). The gamma signal from labeled samples was imaged with a gamma camera and compared with the calcium content in the same samples determined by inductively coupled plasma. The high correlation (0.88) between these two values validated that radiotracer uptake method as a quantitative analytical tool for certain mineralization studies in vitro. There was an association between mineralization and radionuclide uptake in the MC3T3 cultures on titanium alloy, but the attenuation of the gamma photons by the metal resulted in a less robust correlation. The results warrant implementation of this scintigraphic method for quantitative studies of osteoblast-mediated mineralization in vitro. A 2-D truss finite element model is used to study the remodeling of trabecular bone. Using strain energy density (SED) as the optimization object and the trabecular width as the optimization variable, an optimal structure with minimum SED was achieved. This structure is similar to real bone in the dense outside, porous inside, and orientation of the trabeculae. The bone density distribution pattern also matched with previous result by other people. Different implants were introduced to simulate the replacement for the femoral head. It has been proved that the difference in Young's modulus between bone and implant materials is the main reason for the long-term bone loss (stress screening). This problem can be alleviated by proper implant design and resurfacing instead of replacing the whole femoral head.


This study was conducted to assess the efficacy of portal vein reconstruction with an expanded polytetrafluoroethylene (e-PTFE) graft. Five patients underwent interposition of the portal vein with e-PTFE graft following en bloc resection of the entire pancreas and the portal vein for advanced pancreatic cancer. The length of the excised vein ranged from 5 to 7 cm and that of the implanted graft (8 or 10 mm in diameter), 3 to 7.5 cm. In 4 of the 5 cases, the graft was patent at five to eighteen months following implantation. One patient died of respiratory failure two months after operation, and partial occlusion of the graft was noted at autopsy. Four patients died of recurrence of the original disease five to eighteen months after operation. The implanted graft taken at autopsy eighteen months after operation was covered uniformly with thin neointima on the internal surface. Microscopic examination showed endothelial cells covering the surface of the neointima, and capillary vessels had developed in the neointimal layer. Experimentally, five grafts, 0.8 cm in diameter and 2.5 cm in length with external ring support, were interposed in the portal vein in pigs. All grafts were patent during a four-month follow-up period. The authors conclude that the e-PTFE graft is a suitable prosthesis for replacement of the portal vein following its resection.


Abstract: The unicity of the time-varying quantile-based spectrum proposed in Birr et al. (2016) is established via an asymptotic representation result involving Wigner-Ville spectra.


Diamond bearing, kimberlite pipes in the Central Zone of the Limpopo Belt, Limpopo Province, South Africa were discovered on the Farm Venetia in the late 1970's. These ~530 to ~519 Ma pipes constitute a world class ore body, with a historic head grade (since 1992) varying between ~100 and ~135 carats/100 tonnes. They presently produce about ~40% of South Africa's diamonds and hence ~6% of the total world's. The position of these pipes within in the Central Zone, an ~2.04 to ~2.0 Ga assembly of various Archean and Proterozoic terranes between the Kaapvaal and Zimbabwe Cratons, apparently defies one of the basic axioms of diamond exploration, that diamondiferous kimberlite pipes only occur on old, cold cratons (Clifford's rule). Two other clusters of diamondiferous kimberlite pipes, River Ranch in Zimbabwe and the Oaks in South Africa, are roughly of the same age and appear to be in similar geological settings. To investigate the geological relationships between these other clusters and the Venetia kimberlite pipes with the surrounding country rocks, a number of individual and collaborative geological research projects were undertaken. These projects had the additional function of providing data to help with exploration, long term mine development and grade control.

It is worth a special mention that staff at De Beers Consolidated Mines, Venetia Mine and independent consultants for DeBeers were both contributors and active participants in these projects. In particular, we would like to highlight the several individuals within De Beers Consolidated Mines. Roger Clement, Hans Hannweg and Fred Brown encouraged the initial and continued collaboration with universities (RAU and Wurzberg) in the studies of the …


This pilot study aimed to examine KNDy peptide mRNA (Kiss1/Tac3/Pdyn) expression and to determine the effects of peripheral neurokinin 3 receptor agonist (senktide) administration on the ARC Kiss1 mRNA expression and LH secretion that was affected by fasting condition in intact female goats during the luteal phase of the estrus cycle. During the mid to late luteal phase of the estrus cycle, the goats were randomly divided into three groups; the fed group (n = 2), which was fed ad libitum throughout the experimental period, the fasted group (n = 2) and the fasted + senktide group (n = 2) which were fasted for 96 hours. Blood samples were collected every 10 mins for 7 consecutive hours on the last day of fasting. The brain was collected immediately after the cessation of blood sampling. Senktide (200 nmol) was intravenously administered 2 times, 1 hour after the beginning of blood collection and 30 minutes before brain collection. The serum LH concentration was measured using a competitive inhibition enzyme immunoassay. KNDy peptide mRNA expression was evaluated by RTqPCR. The ARC Kiss1 and Pdyn expressions level in both fasted and fasted + senktide groups were significantly lower than in the fed group (p<0.05), which corresponded to mean serum LH concentration. There was neither recovery of serum LH concentration nor an increase in Kiss1 mRNA expression in the fasted + senktide group. This pilot study suggests that fasting conditions suppress serum LH concentration by decreasing ARC Kiss1 mRNA expression. Moreover, peripheral senktide administration was unable to recover either Kiss1 mRNA expression or serum LH concentration in fasted goats during the luteal phase of the estrus cycle.


Fly ash generates as the result of coal combustion in thermoelectric power stations whereas ore mining activities produce mine waste-rock and tailings worldwide. High concentrations of metal(loid)s and organic pollutants in fly ash and mine wastes are released into soil, air and water presenting a global threat to the surrounding environment and human health. The environmentally sound management of fly ash and mine waste–rock and tailings includes monitoring stability of the dam construction and seepage flowrate, prevention of water erosion and dust spreading, reducing the footprint of the management facilities and successful restoration / revegetation. Harsh conditions prevailing on fly ash and mine deposits are unfavorable mechanical composition and pH, high concentrations of soluble salts, lack of nitrogen and phosphorous, reduced number of microorganisms and fungus, toxic concentrations of As, Au, Ag, B, Cu, Cd, Cr, Hg, Mn, Mo, Ni, Pb, Zn and the presence of PAHs and PCBs. The review addresses phystostabilization, phytoextraction, rhizodegradation and phytodegradation as main phytoremediation green technologies which use plants to clean up the contaminated area to safe levels. Establishment of the self–sustaining vegetative cover on fly ash and mine deposits is crucial for recovering ecosystem health, stability and resilience. Therefore, here we have discussed the essential role of native plants in the ecorestoration process on waste deposits. Additional emphasis is given to the evaluation of plant adaptive response to pollution stress. This review presents a current knowledge in phytomanagement of fly ash deposits, mine waste-rock and tailings. Also, it provides a new frontier in restoration physiology where physiological and biochemical tools can be used to predict plant response to stressors and success of restoration projects.


Child diarrhea is one of the primary causes of infant death in the world. It affects poor populations in developing countries who do not have access to clean water or sanitation. Due to the limited resources that can be allocated to its solution in developing countries, new methods try to be sustainable and scalable in cost-effective ways. One such intervention funded by the Acumen Fund is a market-based, community-level water, water quality intervention in Andhra Pradesh, India. This intervention utilizes ultraviolet disinfection to provide safe drinking water at an affordable price of one Rupee for 12 liters. The objective of this longitudinal study is to quantify the economic benefits of this intervention resulting from the reductions in coping costs of diarrhea. In order do this, household averting behaviors were identified and their costs calculated using revealed preferences, specifically the averting cost and cost of illness method. This study is part of larger impact evaluation conducted by RTI International that uses a quasiexperimental research design. The data utilized in this study was gathered from 25 treatment and 25 control villages, matched using propensity score matching, over the course of a year through bi-weekly household surveys. The resulting panel data consists of 100 households observed in 26 rounds. Regression analysis using fixed effects to account for household characteristics that are time-invariant was employed to determine the effects of using clean water from the treatment plant are on averting costs. This study finds that averting costs decrease as the percentage of the household's water that comes from the clean water source increases. For the average household purchasing clean water, monthly savings due to reductions in averting costs is about 580 Rupees, or 32% of their monthly income. Thus, providing clean water at an affordable price can help reduce household coping costs of diarrhea.


The objective of this paper is to have an intelligent service robot that not only autonomously estimates the environment structure but also simultaneously detects the commonly recognized symbols/signs in the building. The result is an information-enriched map constructed by the environment geometry from a laser ranger and the indoor indicators from visual image. To implement this enriched map, multisensor fusion techniques, i.e., covariance intersection and covariance union, are tactically utilized for robust pose association and sign estimation. Furthermore, an improved alignment technique is applied to promote the mapping precision in a single simultaneous localization and mapping process with the posterior convenience. Additionally, a 2.5-D environment enriched map has been rapidly constructed with the Mesa SwissRanger. We have successfully experimentally demonstrated the proof of concept and summarized it in the conclusion.


The 1167 ± 2 Ma Leo Lake pluton, located at the southern part of the Frontenac terrane in Central Metasedimentary Belt of southeastern Ontario, is a bimodal pluton that is dominated by olivine gabbro, gabbro, syenite, and lesser monzonite. The adjoining 1166 ± 3 Ma Lyndhurst pluton is composed of syenite and granite, and exhibits magma mingling. Even though geochemical data from both plutons suggest fractional crystallization as the main crystallization process, magma mingling is evident in the Lyndhurst pluton. Hornblende from the Leo Lake syenite yields a 40Ar–39Ar age of 1120 ± 6 Ma and titanite from the adjacent St. Lawrence skarn yields a U–Pb age of 1147 ± 8 Ma. The 40Ar–39Ar age indicates that the pluton cooled to 550 °C at a rate of ca. <2 °C/Ma following emplacement. The two plutons are similar in petrology to several other granitic, syenitic, and monzonitic intrusions of the Frontenac suite in the Frontenac terrane. Moreover, the spatial distribution, textural features, and geochemistry indicate...


Summary: Comprehensive knowledge of nasal anatomy is essential for obtaining aesthetically and functionally pleasing results in rhinoplasty. In this study, the authors described the anatomy, histology, and clinical relevance of the interdomal region, keystone, and scroll complex. The current study examined these areas in 26 fresh cadaver heads. All cadavers were fresh, and no conservation or freezing processes were applied. All dissections were performed by the first author. It was determined that the structure that connected the middle crura in the interdomal region actually came together in the transverse plane and contained abundant capillaries within. It was observed that chondroblasts with high regenerative potential were present in the keystone area, and there was very tight attachment between periosteum and perichondrium. The scroll complex was found to be more flexible and thin and had fewer regenerative cells compared to the keystone region. With its unique anatomy and histology, the keystone acts as a transition area between the flexible and fixed units of the nose. The scroll complex should be taken into consideration during rhinoplasty because of its effects on fixation of the skin in the lateral supratip area and functional effects on internal and external nasal valves. The interdomal ligament, in contrast, acts as a transition between both middle crura rather than a real ligament.


This study focuses on a newsvendor problem with multiple suppliers, considering the risk-neutral and risk-averse objectives in a mean-risk optimisation model. The firm first decides order quantities from the primary (unreliable) suppliers and reserve capacity from the secondary (reliable) backup supplier. After the state of its primary suppliers and customer demand is revealed, the firm purchases from the available suppliers and uses the backup supplier subject to the reserved capacity. For the special case of normal distribution and risk-neutral objective, optimality properties were developed. A comprehensive numerical study examines the sensitivity of the sourcing strategies of firms to risk, shortage cost, demand uncertainty, salvage value, and capacity reserve options; various managerial insights are offered based on this.


The Companies Act 2006 (CA 2006) codified the duties of directors. One of the main aims of this codification process was to increase the law's accessibility, coherence and comprehensibility to company directors, particularly directors of small and medium-sized enterprises. This article seeks to examine the nature of certain code provisions, and looks at how well the code achieves its objectives. The article focuses on four areas. First, the structure of the code is looked at, then the role of the old law is examined. This second area involves looking at section 178 of the CA 2006 on remedies, which applies the general law of remedies, and comparing it with section 195, which provides similar statutory remedies where the prohibition on "substantial property transactions" has been breached. Thirdly, the ambit of the general codified duties is considered, which entails looking at section 170 of the CA 2006, which reasserts the rule that a director owes duties to the company she or he directs, and considers how section 170 interacts with section 172; consideration is also given to the requirement, in section 172(3), regarding the "interests of creditors". Finally, the conflicts provisions (sections 175 and 177) are considered, as is section 176 of the CA 2006, concerning benefits received from third parties.


The case of an elderly woman with asymptomatic P. malariae infection that acutely reactivated after 45 y of latency following treatment with chlorambucil and methylprednisolone is reported. Only 1 similar case with methotrexate-induced acute malaria has been reported in the English literature thus far.


The optical designs of resonant GaN light-emitting diodes (LEDs) have been determined for maximum extraction efficiency into typical plastic optical fiber of numerical aperture 0.5. An optimum extraction efficiency of 3.9% can be achieved for a practical resonant cavity LED (RCLED), taking account of current growth and processing considerations. The optimized device is a metal-active layer distributed Bragg reflector construction. Constructive interference effects from the top metal mirror are found to play the dominant role in efficiency enhancement. The extraction efficiency of an optimized resonant single-mirror LED is found to be 3.3%, indicating a small compromise in performance compared with the more complex RCLED structure.


Hybrid simulation can provide significant advantages for large-scale experimental investigations of the seismic response of structures through collapse, particularly when considering cost and safety of conventional shake table tests. Hybrid simulation, however, has its own challenges and special attention must be paid to mitigate potential numerical and experimental errors that can propagate throughout the simulation. Several case studies are presented here to gain insight into the factors influencing the accuracy and stability of hybrid simulation from the linear-elastic response range through collapse. The hybrid simulations were conducted on a four-story two-bay moment frame with various substructuring configurations. Importantly, the structural system examined here was previously tested on a shake table with the same loading sequence, allowing for direct evaluation of the hybrid simulation results. The sources of error examined include: (1) computational stability in numerical substructure; (2) setup and installation of the physical specimen representing the experimental substructure; and (3) the accuracy of the selected substructuring technique that handles the boundary conditions and continuous exchange of data between the subassemblies. Recommendations are made regarding the effective mitigation of the various sources of errors. It is shown that by controlling errors, hybrid simulation can provide reliable results for collapse simulation by comparison to shake table testing.


Tests of a 1/7 size model of the Grumman XJR2F-1 amphibian were made in Langley tank no.1 to examine the landing behavior in rough water and to measure the normal and angular accelerations experienced by the model during these landings. All landings were made normal to the direction of wave advance, a condition assumed to produce the greatest accelerations. Wave heights of 4.4 and 8.0 inches (2.5 and 4.7 ft, full size) were used in the tests and the wave lengths were varied between 10 and 50 feet (70 and 350 ft, full size). Maximum normal accelerations of about 6.5g were obtained in 4.4 inch waves and 8.5g were obtained in 8.0 inch waves. A maximum angular acceleration corresponding to 16 radians per second per second, full size, was obtained in the higher waves. The data indicate that the airplane will experience its greatest accelerations when landing in waves of about 20 feet (140 ft, full size) in length.


The paper focused on the challenges of the balanced score card in strategy implementation and was a case study on Ernst & Young-Kenya, an auditing and consultancy firm. The paper aimed at finding out how Ernst & Young-Kenya, has applied the balanced score card in strategy implementation across the business and the challenges faced in the application of the balanced score card. The paper is presented in five chapters and sections through which the researcher tries to discuss the above issues. Data collection instrument was an interview guide and observation. 40 respondents were drawn from all levels and functions of the organization. Out of the 40 only 25 were interviewed and responses analysed by using content analysis. The paper established that Ernst & Young-Kenya has used the balanced score card to implement its strategies. From the study, a number of challenges were established. The findings should be understood and evaluated in light of the limitations. This study is especially helpful to Ernst & Young-Kenya, Ernst & Young Global and other similar organizations. Institutional policy and practice implications to overcome the challenges of strategy implementation using the balanced score card are highlighted. Suggestions for further research are also given.


Introduction HIV/AIDS-related stigma affects the access and utilisation of health services. Although HIV/AIDS-related stigma in the health services has been studied, little work has attended to the relationship between professional development and stigmatising attitudes. Hence, in this study, we will extend earlier research by examining the relationship between the stage of professional development and the kinds of stigmatising attitudes held about people living with HIV/AIDS. Methods and analysis A serial cross-sectional design will be combined with a two-point in time longitudinal design to measure the levels of stigma among healthcare students from each year of undergraduate and graduate courses in Malaysia and Australia. In the absence of suitable measures, we will carry out a sequential mixed methods design to develop such a tool. The questionnaire data will be analysed using mixed effects linear models to manage the repeated measures. Ethics and dissemination We have received ethical approval from the Monash MBBS executive committee as well as the Monash University Human Research Ethics Committee. We will keep the data in a locked filing cabinet in the Monash University (Sunway campus) premises for 5 years, after which the information will be shredded and disposed of in secure bins, and digital recordings will be erased in accordance with Monash University's regulations. Only the principal investigator and the researcher will have access to the filing cabinet. We aim to present and publish the results of this study in national and international conferences and peer-reviewed journals, respectively.


The Świniary sand-pit (Middle Miocene; southern slopes of the Holy Cross Mountains, Central Poland), which has yielded innumerable fossils of various kinds over the last fifty years, is revisited. Most significant there were mass accumulation of a single echinoid species, Psammechinus dubius (L. AGASSIZ, 1840), tests of which preserved spine canopies and Aristotle's lanterns in position. Other echinoids represented were rare, e.g. Spatangus austriacus LAUBE, 1871, 'Giant Psammechinus sp.', Echinocardium peroni COTTEAU, 1877, and Echinocyamus pusillus (O.F. M LLER, 1776). The pit has since been abandoned and recultivated entirely; in view of this an updated review of, and supplement to, previous data on the Świniary biotic assemblages, and their environmental living conditions, is here presented. The mass accumulations of Psammechinus dubius are interpreted to have been of storm origin, i.e. mass transportation and burial of live, or freshly dead, specimens.Hinted at is a predatory activity of the starfish Astropecten forbesi HELLER, 1858, upon juveniles of Psammechinus dubius absent from the storm-related thanatocoenoses. Associated with echinoderms are, amongst other groups, verrucid barnacles Verruca sp. and inarticulate brachiopods Discinisca leopolitana (FRIEDBERG, 1921) derived from eulittoral habitats, as well as pieces of terrestrial amber swept out of the shore. A general shallowing-up trend in the Świniary sequence is recognised, as indicated by environmental conditions changing from deeper offshore to proximal sublittoral, possibly shallow subtidal.


Objectives: Natural head position is recommended to be optimal at cone-beam computed tomography acquisition. For standardization purposes in control of treatment outcome, it is clinically relevant to discuss, if a change of posture from natural head position may have an effect on the pharyngeal airway dimensions and morphology, during computed tomography, conebeam computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging acquisition. This was the aim of the present literature review study for purposes of valid evidence, which was hypothesized, to be present. Material and Methods: This systematic literature review has been registered in PROSPERO database with following number: CRD42015024567. A systematic literature search performed in PubMed, Embase and Cochrane was carried out in order to evaluate if the effect of human head or tongue posture has an effect on upper airway dimensions and morphology in CT, CBCT or MRI. Study quality assessment was performed. Predictor variable was head and tongue posture. Endpoints were numerical values of upper airway dimensions and morphology. Results: Overall 1344 articles (Embase 1063, PubMed 269, and Cochrane 12) resulted in four included publications. Quality assessments revealed poor quality and low-level evidence by 46 67% of the maximum achievable score. Heterogeneous methodology made a meta-analysis impossible, consequently a narrative synthesis was performed. Conclusions: Limited, poor quality and low evidence level literature is available on the effect of head posture on upper airway dimensions and morphology in three-dimensional imaging. Valid evidence requires a standardized method of head and tongue posture during image acquisition in future studies.


BACKGROUND Medication reviews may be an important strategy to improve medication use, especially for individuals receiving many drugs. OBJECTIVE To describe the types of medication issues and recommendations identified in the Iowa Priority Brown Bag Medication Reviews, compare individuals with medication issues with those without medication issues, and describe Iowa Priority enrollees' experiences with and satisfaction of the review. METHODS A retrospective review of enrollment forms and medication review records and a survey of Iowa Priority members were conducted in 2002. Subjects were Medicare-eligible individuals who joined the Iowa Priority Prescription Savings Program. Frequency distributions and descriptive statistics were calculated. Analysis using t-test and χ2 test determined differences between individuals with and without issues regarding use of drug therapy. RESULTS Almost 13% of Iowa Priority enrollees received a review. There were 1167 individuals with 2123 medication issues identified. Nonprescription medications accounted for one-third of drug interactions and >40% of duplications. People with issues had poorer health, more chronic conditions, and took more drugs than people without medication issues. One-third of survey respondents discussed the review with their physicians, and 17.7% reported medication changes. Satisfaction with the review was good; however, only 24% were likely to have received an annual review. CONCLUSIONS Iowa Priority Brown Bag Medication Reviews showed that individuals with fair/poor health, higher numbers of medications, and more chronic conditions were likely to have medication issues. Reviews generated discussions between physicians and patients, produced some medication changes, and helped individuals save money.


Flood-generated turbidity currents represent an important process of marine sedimentation. However, no deposit related to this process has yet been described at sea. Turbiditic sequences cored at 2000 m water depth in the Mediterranean show tractive structures and superposition of reverse and normal grading. They are related to floods triggered during the twentieth century. Deposits from flood-generated turbidity currents have a great impact on the interpretation of deep-ocean paleoclimate records obtained near continental margins by linking deep-marine sedimentary records to continental climatic changes through flood frequency and magnitude. Implications of this study should help redefine the reservoir character of oil fields in fine-grained turbidites.


In this paper, we unpack three themes for the multidisciplinary codesign of a physical and digital meeting space environment in supporting collaboration: that social practices should dictate design, the importance of supporting fluidity, and the need for technological artifacts to have a social voice. We describe a prototype meeting space named inSpace that explores how design grounded in these themes can create a user-driven, information-rich environment supporting a variety of meeting types. Our current space includes a table with integrated sensing and ambient feedback, a shared wall display that supports multiple concurrent users, and a collection of storage and infrastructure services for communication, and that also can automatically capture traces of how artifacts are used in the space.


1. Two pro-(phenol oxidase) were distinguished when the blood of late-third-instar larvae of Calliphora erythrocephala was electrophoresed in polyacrylamide gels with Tris-glycine buffer, pH 8.3. One pro-(phenol oxidase), after activation by an enzyme readily catalyses the oxidation of both L-tyrosine and L-3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine (L-dopa). The second enzyme catalyses the oxidation of L-dopa but not of L-tyrosoine. 2. One of the pro-(phenol oxidases) was purified over 2000-fold from homogenates of whole larvae. This enzyme, after activation, catalyses the oxidation of both dopa and tyrosine. On electrophoresis in polyacrylamide gels with Tris-glycine buffer, pH 8.3, it has the same mobility as the enzyme in the blood which catalyses the oxidation of both tyrosine and dopa. 3. The pro-(phenol oxidase)-activating enzyme was purified over 100-fold from homogenates of whole larvae. 4. The oxidation of L-tyrosine, in the presence of the activated purified phenol oxidase, reached a steady maximum rate after a lag period that was directly related to tyrosine concentration and inversely related to enzyme concentration. 5. The effect of the addition of electron donors on the lag period was studied. Dopa, dopamine (3,4-dihydroxyphenethylamine) and 2-amino-4-hydroxy-6,7-dimethyl-5,6,7,8-tetrahydropteridine are the most effective hydrogen donors. 3,4-Dihydroxybenzoic acid, the oxidation of which was not catalysed by the activated pro-(phenol oxidase), did not affect the lag period.


Ethernet becomes the predominant layer 2 technology in metropolitan area networks (MAN) and starts challenging multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) as the convergence layer for core networks in combination with IP. However, as these environments are driven by substantially different architectural constraints (such as meshing instead of common broadcast access segments and larger distances) the control of the Ethernet technology must be designed such that it can face these new challenges. To achieve this goal, this paper proposes to extend the capability of the generalized multi-protocol label switching (GMPLS) protocol suite to Ethernet and more generically to any layer 2 switching technology.


Observing leukocyte motility and leukocyte phagocytosis of Indiaink on the infectious hepatitis cases, and the following results were obtained. 1. In the healthy individuals, the leukocyte motility was ranging over 22.05 to 35.71 μ/min. and 1.88 to 2.22 in the leukocyte phagocytosis of India-ink. 2. In the acute hepatitis cases, the leukocyte motility was depressed initially and was then accelated in the convalescent stadium. Leukocyte phagocytosis of India-ink showed similar tendencies although they were fairly variable in the clinical courses. 3. The both functions of leukocyte showed approximate correlations to the impairments of liver functions. 4. In the acute hepatitis cases, the both functions of leukocyte were depressed in almost parallel with fever and leukocytosis. 5. In the chronic hepatitis cases, the leukocyte motility was within normal range, however, the phagocytosis of India-ink was depressed in some cases. The leukocyte motility showed approximate correlation to the impairments of liver function, on the other hand, the phagocytosis of India-ink did not always showed such correlation.


AIMS
To examine the associations between different workplace violence sources and health outcome in nurses.

BACKGROUND
Workplace violence is a major threat to nurses' physical and mental health. Other workers in the health sector, patients and visitors can cause workplace violence. To effectively prevent workplace violence-related health problems, the differential impact of internal and external violence needs to be explored.

DESIGNS
A cross-sectional survey of 1,690 fully employed female nurses.

METHODS
A self-administered questionnaire was used to record the nurses' experiences of workplace violence, including types (physical, psychological, verbal and sexual) and sources (internal and external) of violence. Data on psychosocial work conditions including work shift, psychological job demands, job control and workplace justice, were also collected. The nurses' health condition was measured using the 5-item Brief Symptom Rating Scale and Self-Rated Health Scale and multivariable logistic regression was used to examine the associations between workplace violence and health. The study was carried out in 2015-2016.

RESULTS
Sixty percent of the internal workplace violence was psychological and verbal and adverse psychosocial work conditions were associated with workplace violence. After adjustment for demographic characteristics and psychosocial work conditions, internal workplace violence resulted in higher risks of poor self-rated health and mental health than did external workplace violence, particularly in nurses who had experienced psychological and verbal violence.

CONCLUSION
Internal workplace violence in the form of psychological and verbal violence had a stronger effect on nurses' health than did external workplace violence. Organization-level measures should be implemented to prevent internal violence.


Although cogeneration with nuclear power has been proving its feasibility for many years and in many parts of the world, the French nuclear fleet does not use this technique. Nevertheless, current developments within the energy context may offer new opportunities to review the use of nuclear cogeneration. This paper focuses on the use of cogeneration for district heating and its possible development perspectives within the French energy transition. After recapping some common assumptions about nuclear cogeneration, we will describe the techno-economic model that we built to evaluate the characteristics of introducing cogeneration into an already operating power plant. The second step consists in applying the above-described model to a use-case describing the heating of the Parisian area, which represents the largest target for this study. The last step presents the results of a simplified model derived from the first step. Summarizing the model's main input data in a few pertinent parameters gives an initial picture of the potential for developing nuclear district heating in France.


Head shaping was a common practice in the areas around the Black Sea in the first centuries ad. From there it spread into central and western Europe. By the fifth and sixth centuries ad it was widespread in Hungary and Austria, and occurred in rare cases as far west as France. Cranial modification is achieved by binding the head during early childhood when the bones of the skull are still incompletely mineralized and unfused. Ethnographic parallels show that head shaping was an aspect of childcare that required high levels of knowledge and involvement by those caring for children. It was frequently thought to provide benefits for the health, beauty, or intellect of the child. Skull modification suggests that concepts of the body varied among different early medieval populations, some of which considered the body as imperfect at birth and in need of improvement through social intervention.


To clarify the randomness of protein sequences, we make a detailed analysis of a set of typical protein sequences representing each fold by using the nonlinear prediction method developed in nonlinear dynamics theory. No deterministic structures are found in these protein sequences and this implies that they behave as random chains. We also explain the controversial results obtained in previous investigations.


The in vitro absorption by rat jejunal and ileal gut sacs of soluble antigen-antibody complexes and of antigen alone was compared. Complexes prepared in 2-fold antibody excess were absorbed in significantly smaller quantities than was antigen alone. Complexes prepared in 50-fold antigen excess were absorbed by jejunal gut sacs in quantities equivalent to that of antigen alone, whereas the absorption of such complexes by ileal sacs was somewhat decreased compared to that of antigen. There was less radiolabeled antigen tightly bound to the intestinal mucosa of gut sacs exposed to complexes prepared in antigen or antibody excess compared to antigen alone. Complexes prepared in antibody excess appeared to stimulate secretion of mucus and complexes were associated with the mucus fraction. It was suggested that the large size of complexes prepared in antibody excess may result in their trapping in the mucus coat of the gut, thereby preventing contact with the surface of the enterocyte from whence uptake by pinocytosis is initiated. In addition, complexes appear to be shed from the surface with mucus by a mechanism still to be elucidated.


Background: Current guidelines recommend regional anesthesia versus general as a method of choice for women undergoing cesarean deliveries (CS). However, little is known about the surgical times in the operating room and a choice of anesthesia for cesarean deliveries. Objective: This study was designed to compare times from the arrival to the OR to the delivery of the fetus between regional and general anesthesia along with maternal and fetal outcomes, for patients undergoing cesarean sections for non-reassuring fetal tracing. Study Design: Records were reviewed for patients who underwent cesarean delivery for non-reassuring fetal heart rate tracing from February 2012 to May 2018. A total of 190 charts were selected. Seven patients who received epidural or spinal anesthesia and then converted to general anesthesia (GA) were excluded. The primary outcomes were: 1) entering the operating room to skin incision (min); 2) the time from entering the operating room to delivery of the fetus (min). These times were compared among the patients who underwent epidural, spinal and general anesthesia. The secondary criteria included time from skin incision to delivery of the fetus (min), estimated blood loss (ml), Apgars scores, Arterial/venous cord pH, NICU admissions and fetal complications. ANOVA or Kruskal-Wallis Test was used for the continuous variable and Fisher's exact test was used for the categorical variable to test the differences between groups. Logistic regression model was used for the binary outcomes after adjusting for age, BMI and number of prior laparotomies. Results: Infants in the GA group were delivered significantly faster when compared to epidural and spinal group separately with a P-value of 0.001. The mean time from arrival to OR to delivery of the newborn in GA group was 12.7 minutes, compared to 27 minutes in epidural group and 32.7 minutes in the spinal group. Time intervals from time in the OR to incision and time from incision to delivery of the fetus were also calculated and were significantly shorter in the GA group when compared to spinal and epidural groups, P < 0.001. The estimated blood loss (EBL) was similar between these three groups. Both arterial and venous umbilical cord mean PH were comparable in GA, spinal and epidural groups. Potential complications of GA include 36% of newborns had an Apgar score of less than 7 at 1 minute in GA group when compared to 15% of newborns in the epidural group, and 22% of newborns in the spinal group, which was not statistically significant. When comparing the NICU admission between the groups: 77% of newborns delivered under GA required NICU admission, 54% of the newborns delivered via epidural anesthesia were admitted versus 50% of newborns delivered via spinal anesthesia. Conclusion: The induction of general anesthesia for emergency cesarean section resulted in shorter times to delivery compared to spinal and epidural. General anesthesia was associated with lower, albeit not statistically significant Apgar scores and higher NICU admissions, and had similar cord gases compared to neuraxial anesthesia group.


Nutritional status of children can be influenced by breakfast habits. One factor that influences the consumption of breakfast is knowledge of breakfast. Based on the results of a preliminary survey, 65% of students have less knowledge about the importance of breakfast. The objective of this research was to determine the correlation between knowledge of breakfast with protein intake and nutritional status on elementary school children at Madrasah Ibtida'iyah Muhammadiyah (MIM) Innovative Gonilan Kartasura Sukoharjo Indonesia. This was an observational study with a cross-sectional approach and sample size of 245 children selected by simple random sampling. The knowledge was assessed using a questionnaire containing 20 items with a true or false response. The protein intake was assessed by an interview using a 24-hour food recall form while the nutritional status was obtained using anthropometric measurements and was interpreted by Z-score of body mass index (BMI-for-Age). The correlation test in this study was done by rank Spearman correlation test.  The knowledge and protein intake were considered adequate with the respective values of 55.1% and 49.0%, while the nutritional status was classified as normal with the number of 65.3%. There was a correlation between knowledge with protein intake (p=0.032) and nutritional status (p=0.001). It is expected that the school can cooperate with community health centers to conduct nutrition education, especially about the breakfast behavior to improve the nutritional status of primary school students.


This chapter highlights crime prevention. Preventive strategies represent an approach that is less concerned with dispensing justice than with minimising the risk of crime being committed in the first place. Crime prevention strategies are thus based on a combination of assumptions about human motivations and research evidence about observed patterns of offending behaviour. The chapter then looks at the political and strategic factors that may influence decisions about which crimes to try to prevent. It considers perspectives on crime prevention focusing on potential offenders (in terms of deterrence and diversionary approaches), potential victims, and the idea of community safety and well-being. Finally, the chapter addresses some of the continuing and unresolved questions about the purported achievements and effectiveness of crime prevention strategies.


We write as a collective of BIPOC undergraduate activist students/organizers and contingent/tenured professors dedicated to Black, Third World, and Indigenous liberation through a feminist analysis at Soka University of America (SUA). We focus our critique on liberalism as a dominant political paradigm that has solidified the reign of empire and it's necropolitical grips on our communities within and without SUA, our SLAC. We highlight through a brief chronology of the epistemic and physical struggles against hegemonic power exercised by our university the ways in which liberalism acts as counterrevolutionary ideology and offer critical reflections/interventions on our struggles against white supremacy at our SLAC, as well as on how our university administration utilizes "liberalism" as a technology of imperialism. We come together to resist empire from where we stand. We believe in the pedagogical possibilities of resistance.


Thermally-stimulated current (TSC) measurements and a detailed analysis of current-voltage (I-V) characteristics have been made on semi-insulating GaAs (SI-GaAs) Schottky diode particle detectors, fabricated on substrates from several suppliers, before and after irradiation with 24 GeV protons and 300 MeV pions. The analysis of I-V characteristics allows the determination of the barrier height and bulk resistance in detectors. Changes observed in I-V characteristics and TSC spectra after irradiation are described and a dislocation-net model of radiation-damaged devices is proposed.


Unrelenting traffic growth, device heterogeneity, and load unevenness create scalability challenges for traffic monitoring. In this paper, we propose Robust Distributed Computation (RoDiC), a new approach that addresses these challenges by shifting a portion of the monitoring-task execution from an overloaded network element to another element that has spare resources. Moving the entire execution of the task away from the overloaded element might be infeasible because execution on multiple elements is inherent in the task or requires at least partial participation by the designated overloaded element. Furthermore, distributed execution of a stateful task has to be resilient to network noise in the form of packet reordering and loss. The RoDiC approach relies on two main principles of packet grouping and state overlap to support exact robust distributed monitoring of traffic flows under network noise. RoDiC uses an open-loop paradigm that does not add any control packets, communicates flow state in-band by appending few control bits to packets of monitored flows, and keeps measurement latency low. We apply RoDiC to the problem of flow-size computation and discuss how to instantiate our general technique for real-time packet-loss telemetry. The paper develops robust algorithms, proves their correctness and performance properties, and reports an evaluation driven by realistic traffic traces. The RoDiC algorithms successfully distribute the monitoring-task load while keeping the memory and computation overhead low.


Background: The most commonly used method for extracting DNA from plant leaf tissue involves cetyl trimethylammonium bromide but some species, such as Acacia mearnsii, contain high levels of secondary metabolites and polysaccharides that interfere with this process. Various modifications have been proposed for effective removal of these biomolecules but these methods can be time consuming. Therefore, this study was initiated to optimise the cetyl-trimethylammonium bromide protocol for the extraction of high-quality genomic DNA and to develop a fingerprinting tool using cross species transferable simple sequence repeat markers for genetic diversity studies in A. mearnsii.
Methods: Five CTAB-based modification were examined and 49 cross-species microsatellite markers, developed for several Acacia species, were tested in four multiplex panels of A. mearnsii populations.
Results: The modified protocol yields high quantity and quality DNA from A. mearnsii leaves using high concentration of NaCl to remove polysaccharides and polyvinylpolypyrrolidone (PVPP) to eliminate polyphenols during DNA purification. In addition, omitting the selective precipitation and NaCl gradient steps in the extraction protocol, enabled us to extract DNA 10–20 min faster than the normal protocol. Of the tested microsatellite loci, 11 were successful in amplifying sharp and high-intensity bands in all the four multiplex panels and were polymorphic. The level of polymorphism ranged from 0.115 to 0.794, with a mean 0.50 and mean number of alleles varied from 2 to 10, with overall mean of 6 alleles per locus. The mean observed and expected heterozygosity ranged from 0.058 to 0.970 and 0.102 to 0.796, respectively. The 11 microsatellite loci that were effectively amplified from A. mearnsii DNA were adequate in detecting genetic variation among the tested populations.
Conclusions: These PCR-based, multi-allelic, co-dominant microsatellite markers provide a powerful tool for genetic, breeding and conservation studies in A. mearnsii.


Synchronous changes were found in the intracellular ATP content and in the ratio of "dark" and "light" cells in the monolayer culture of hepatocytes. An attempt has been made to change these ratios by the effect of hormones. The rhythmical processes in the culture are interpreted as a universal cell property.


Information extraction is the task of finding structured information from unstructured or semi-structured text. It is an important task in text mining and has been extensively studied in various research communities including natural language processing, information retrieval and Web mining. It has a wide range of applications in domains such as biomedical literature mining and business intelligence. Two fundamental tasks of information extraction are named entity recognition and relation extraction. The former refers to finding names of entities such as people, organizations and locations. The latter refers to finding the semantic relations such as FounderOf and HeadquarteredIn between entities. In this chapter we provide a survey of the major work on named entity recognition and relation extraction in the past few decades, with a focus on work from the natural language processing community.


The achievement gap between Latino and White youth is well documented. This is of particular concern as children enter middle school because of the decline in school engagement and achievement noted in many students. The impact parent and peer beliefs and behaviors have on academic achievement, engagement, and achievement values of Latino middle school youth have received less attention than in White youth. The current study explored how these parent and peer beliefs and behaviors influenced Latino adolescents' achievement values, school behavioral engagement, and school achievement. Results indicated that the beliefs and behaviors of parents and peers significantly predicted two sets of achievement values (Subjective Task Values & Economic Benefits to Education). However, student achievement was only related to subjective task values and behavioral engagement. In addition, subjective task values mediated the relation between parent and peer beliefs and behaviors and student achievement. Implications for future research and intervention are discussed.


Eventual consistency is a consistency model that emphasizes liveness over safety, it is often used for its ability to scale as distributed systems grow larger. Eventual consistency tends to be uniformly applied to an entire system, but we argue that there is a growing demand for differentiated eventual consistency requirements. We address this demand with UPS, a novel consistency mechanism that offers differentiated eventual consistency and delivery speed by working in pair with a two-phase epidemic broadcast protocol. We propose a closed-form analysis of our approach's delivery speed, and we evaluate our complete mechanism experimentally on a simulated network of one million nodes. To measure the consistency trade-off, we formally define a novel and scalable consistency metric that operates at runtime. In our simulations, UPS divides by more than 4 the inconsistencies experienced by a majority of the nodes, while reducing the average latency incurred by a small fraction of the nodes from 6 rounds down to 3 rounds.


Vonnegut has just published what he says will be his final novel. This is an appropriate time, therefore, to try to come to terms with the totality of his output. Characterizing the array of books he has produced over the last 45 years is no easy task. Although a few of his novels can loosely be called science fiction, one would not read him for the pleasures of that genre. Slaughterhouse-Five made him famous as an anti-war novelist, but war is not his only or even his chief concern. He is a humorist, but if you want a cheery laugh, you can do better elsewhere. His attitude toward most social structures is satiric. He is hostile to most kinds of institutional power, and he sympathizes with the poor--sixties characteristics still present in his most recent novel. He has certainly been successful--his own Absolut Vodka ad, high fees for public speaking--yet the popularity of his fiction comes neither from providing emotional candy of romance or adventure nor from pleasuring the professoriat. What is the nature of Kurt Vonnegut's enterprise? For some novelists, the enterprise is patent. Trollope's is to present institutional politics, usually within the framework of a nominal love story. Faulkner portrays a cross-section of society in a small locale as the inhabitants live out the residual effects of the War between the States. Silko records native ways in the modern world, and gives body to old myths in hopes of aiding the demise of non-tribal cultures. Mailer and Pynchon target the interactions between people and power, while Updike examines the erosion of Protestant faith as it comes up against secularism and modern sexual mores. When we turn to Vonnegut, we see that he comes across as a novelist of ideas (rather than of action or character),(1) and his enterprise is to tackle problems--usually social problems, but sometimes artistic and personal. In novels of ideas by such writers as Thomas Mann, Doris Lessing, Umberto Eco, Italo Calvino, John Barth, and Salman Rushdie, we find the initial problem or question teased out, analyzed, explored, and tested. In The Sentimental Agents, Lessing defamiliarizes political rhetoric. Rushdie's novels ring many variations on the dictator looming over the lowly individual, who tries to find some standpoint from which political action is possible. In novels after The Sotweed Factor, Barth tries to generate stories that might help free him from his excruciatingly self-conscious knowledge of the hero monomyth. Vonnegut overtly explores an idea in Breakfast of Champions when he considers the implications of treating humans as machines. Usually, though, Vonnegut does not work the idea through very elaborately. His presuppositions about people and about the nature of reality create impasses, preventing him from considering solutions that might seem logical to someone not sharing those presuppositions. This, I shall argue, is the unseen pattern that characterizes Vonnegut's fiction. Intellectual quest is derailed by presupposition; the forward motion dissipates into stasis, and what supplants it is melancholy emotion.(2)` To identify and distinguish between what Vonnegut tries to achieve and what he actually achieves, one must analyze the recurrent elements that characterize the unusual reading experience that his fiction offers. I shall outline his presuppositions, the problems he tackles, and the dynamics that transform intellectual endeavor into emotions. Then we can examine the core elements in his vision, including the relationship he establishes with the reader. Along the way, I shall try to locate his fiction in relation to that of other contemporary writers. What he produces is so much sui generis that critics do not connect him to other figures of this period, yet without such comparisons (whether to Vonnegut's advantage or disadvantage), one cannot truly understand what he has been doing so long and so successfully for specific audiences. Let us start with Vonnegut's presuppositions. …


This article explores the views held by content subject teachers on the implementation of the English Across the Curriculum (EAC) approach in their high school classrooms. In South Africa, the EAC approach has been part of the school curriculum since 2014; however, to date, there is a paucity of studies that have focused on understanding how high school teachers implement this approach. In 2017, the South African Department of Basic Education reported that high school teachers were not using this approach without indicating why this was the case. To provide the views of the teachers, the present study drew theoretical insights from reflective teaching to explore the phenomenon. We conducted a qualitative intrinsic case study inquiry, during which we examined the views that 15 high school teachers held on implementing English language skills in content subjects. We collected data using a focus group interview form prepared based on Gibb's model. The findings indicate that content subject teachers have views on (i) the merits of EAC in general language development, (ii) EAC as a challenge to pedagogical-content knowledge, and (iii) strategies for improving the implementation of the EAC approach. This exploratory study has certain implications for the practice of implementing the EAC approach in content teaching, finding that there may be merit in the use of targeted continuing professional development for content teachers when implementing EAC. Secondly, there is a need for partnerships between teachers of English as a second language and content subject teachers, as this cross-curricular collaboration has the potential to enhance the implementation of the EAC approach in high school classrooms.


During this time, in which Lithuania is going through the deinstitutionalization of its mental health services, the principles of Global Mental Health are especially relevant. This global field for study, research and practice places a priority on improving mental health outcomes as well as reducing respective inequities for all people worldwide. Scaling-up support services for persons who have mental health problems based on both scientific evidence and human rights has become one of the main focuses for action globally, and the key principles of Global Mental Health apply to the situation in Lithuania as much as they do in a number of other countries. This article explores the critical need to effectively reform the existing mental health care system in the country, which in its current form often results in human rights violations. It points to the idea, based on the global evidence base, that different Lithuanian authorities and other key stakeholders could start working together in an intersectoral way in order to reorganize mental health services from institutional to community-based models of care. It is suggested by this article that a sensible, local application of the broad key principles of Global Mental Health could be a mature and rational step taken by Lithuania. This has the potential to be a major step toward the improvement of human rights and mental health outcomes in the country.


Single crystals of S-doped InP grown with very low dislocation density under conditions of low axial and radial thermal gradients, are typified by a flat solid-liquid interface. For these crystals, the hot zone of the growth system is designed to sustain vertical, rather than radial heat flow through the crystal. The consequence of a reduced thermal gradient, together with the dislocation pinning effect of sulfur doping, produces single crystal InP crystals with EPD<500/cm/sup 2/. Dislocations generated at the periphery of the growing crystal are blocked by the high S-concentration, especially at striations where high doping concentrations increase the critical resolved shear stress on a local scale.


Abstract. Time effects and human offenses threaten cultural heritage. The constant observation and periodic maintenance activities are the most suitable safeguarding solution: they can limit risk situations and facilitate interventions. Today, planned conservation is thus the best pattern to preserve the monuments as focused on small preventive restoration: actions organized and structured according to steady and regular monitoring. The preliminary survey, the interpretation of metric and material data and the subsequent verification of the evolution of instability and degradation phenomena based on a comparison with previous information, is a long and expensive activity if carried out by traditional systems. Otherwise, 3D laser scanning and image-based reconstruction methodologies – if properly applied within optimized operational practices – can allow both the systematic control of assets' conditions and the evaluation of their health status and decay problems in a short time and with lower costs. This paper intends to show the validity of such an innovative methodology through a case study applied to the former church and convent of Sant'Agostino (St. Augustine) in Bergamo.


In this work, an effective energy-saving device is proposed to extract wave energy and convert to useful propulsive thrust for a merchant ship travelling in waves. Eco-Ship was internationally introduced and aimed to reduce carbon dioxide emission generated from ships. The energy-saving device equipped underneath the front part of the ship model of general merchant ships that inspired by marine mammals is investigated in this work. An active control of pitch-oscillating bow fin with NACA0016 section is applied as an effective energy-saving device in this work. Free-running model test using a 1/50th scale model of a container ship was conducted for validating the effectiveness of this device. The ship speed, ship motion, angle of bow fin and power consuming are measured and recorded. There are two kinds of wavelength to ship length ratio of regular wave in the experiments with fixed propeller speed. Based on different heave motion, the different pitch angle of bow fin is controlled to obtain the extra energy from wave. The experimental results shows the feasibility of the energy-saving device when the phase lead of the bow fin pitch motion with respect to its heave motion set in a proper range between 60 degree to 200 degree. When the ratios of wavelength to ship length are 1.0 and 1.3, the maximum of power efficiency improving are around 6.5% and 18.9% respectively. The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed device is effective to enhance ship speed and save energy for achieving the goal of Eco-Ship.


Three types of merit functions were applied in automatic design of optical systems: mean square value of wave aberrations; variance of wavefront aberrations; and variance of an MTF based function suggested by H. H. Hopkins. They have proved to be very powerful in the final stages of optimization of well corrected systems and lend themselves readily to automatic control of minimization. The method of application and actual design examples are described.


Wildland firefighters in the United States are exposed to a variety of hazards while performing their jobs. Although vehicle accidents and aircraft mishaps claim the most lives, situations where firefighters are caught in a life-threatening, fire behaviour-related event (i.e. an entrapment) constitute a considerable danger because each instance can affect many individuals. In an attempt to advance our understanding of the causes of firefighter entrapments, a review of the pertinent literature and a synthesis of existing data were undertaken. Examination of the historical literature indicated that entrapment potential peaks when fire behaviour rapidly deviates from an assumed trajectory, becomes extreme and compromises the use of escape routes, safety zones or both. Additionally, despite the numerous safety guidelines that have been developed as a result of analysing past entrapments, we found issues with the way factual information from these incidents is reported, recorded and stored that make quantitative investigations difficult. To address this, a fire entrapment database was assembled that revealed when details about the location and time of entrapments are included in analyses, it becomes possible to ascertain trends in space and time and assess the relative influence of various environmental variables on the likelihood of an entrapment. Several research needs were also identified, which highlight the necessity for improvements in both fundamental knowledge and the tools used to disseminate that knowledge.


One of the main challenges in disciplines such as ecology, biogeography, conservation and evolutionary biology is to understand and predict how species will respond to environmental changes, especially within a climate change context. We focus on the deep subterranean environment to minimize uncertainties in predictions, because it is one of the few ecosystems in nature whose environmental conditions are as homogeneous as those in the laboratory and their species cannot accommodate to changing conditions by behavioural plasticity, dispersal or microhabitat use (i.e., their only possibility to cope with climate change is to persist in situ). The hypotheses established for this project are based on the exciting results obtained in some of our previous studies, in which, we found that different subterranean beetle species living under different environmental conditions have identical/similar narrow thermal tolerance ranges, suggesting a lack of evolutionary adjustment to ambient temperature for these species. This could be due to the loss of some of the physiological mechanisms related to thermal tolerance, with a likely high metabolic cost, in a stable environment but with severe resource restrictions. However, the question that remains is to what extent this surprising narrow and homogeneous thermal niche is common for the whole subterranean biodiversity, and how this issue could determine the fate of subterranean biodiversity to climate change. In this project, we are testing for the generality of these exciting previous findings by studying the thermal niche (species acclimation abilities and thermal tolerances) of different lineages of cave beetles with different degrees of specialization to subterranean environments and from different geographical areas (Pyrenees and Cantabrian Mountains) (Suppl. material 1).


Centralized water distribution in developing countries continues to be fraught with great difficulties. One major deficiency is the intermittent distribution of water. Most distribution systems were originally designed for a continuous supply mode and are now operated intermittently because of various constraints. In this mode of operation, the piping system is supplied with water for limited periods of time and is not filled with water under pressure continuously as originally provided for in the technical design concept. Periodic filling and draining of the pipe system is associated with numerous negative consequences which ultimately aggravate or prevent sustainable safe water distribution. To overcome this problem, thorough knowledge of intermittent water distribution is required. This paper discusses possible causes and consequences, and their interactions. These considerations are largely limited to the technical side of water distribution and are mainly based on the technical literature in the field.


This article examines some issues surrounding transition to higher education. It is based on the case study of a cohort of Year 1 students in a modern university in England. The purpose of the study was to ascertain any potential transitional issues and therefore any areas for development in our Year 1 programmes to aid student progress. Data were gathered via semi‐structured questionnaires distributed to Year 1 initial teacher training students and their lecturers and through focused conversations with a group of students. The main findings of the study indicate that independent study and assessment processes pose challenges for students in their first year at university, and it is hoped that the outcomes of this research will contribute to a more informed transition from school to university through developing a clearer understanding of prior educational experiences that inform first‐year undergraduate expectations and needs.


Postsynaptic mechanisms of the connection between an interneuron initiating the bursting activity in neurons RPa1 and V7 and the neurons themselves were examined. Under voltage clamp conditions a slow inward current could be recorded in these neurons after stimulation of the interneuron. A decrease of temperature reduced the speed of rise and fall of this current with a temperature coefficient about 10. The current-voltage characteristic of the slow inward current had a maximum near -65 mV. The decrease in external concentration of Na+ ions led to a decrease of its amplitude. At the maximum of this current short hyperpolarizing pulses induced outward currents instead of inward ones. It is concluded that interneuronal stimulation activate at least two types of ionic channels in the bursting neurons soma. This process, perhaps, is mediated via a chain of cytoplasmic biochemical reactions.


Settlement areas today can no longer be aptly described as either "urban" or "rural". We now live in sprawling conglomerations, collages of urban, suburban, and rural elements. New political solutions need to be found, challenging the institutional framework of federalism and the concept of local government. Commissioned by the foundation 'avenir suisse' (Think Tank for Economic and Social Issues), this publication gathers contributions by experts from the fields of sociology, geography, politics, economics and architecture, including Winy Maas' (MVRDV) vision for a Switzerland of the future. Whilst focusing on Switzerland as a case study, this book is a thought-provoking report on the gradual changes taking place in all industrialised countries. Angelus Eisinger teaches at the Department of Architecture at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. Michael Schneider is the project leader at 'avenir suisse'.


Background The sale of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) containing nicotine is prohibited in all Australian states and territories; yet, the growing availability and convenience of the internet enable the promotion and exposure of e-cigarettes across countries. Social media's increasing pervasiveness has provided a powerful avenue to market products and influence social norms and risk behaviors. At present, there is no evidence of how e-cigarettes and vaping are promoted on social media in Australia. Objective This study aimed to investigate how e-cigarettes are portrayed and promoted on Twitter through a content analysis of vaping-related tweets containing an image posted and retweeted by Australian users and how the portrayal and promotion have emerged and trended over time. Methods In total, we analyzed 1303 tweets and accompanying images from 2012, 2014, 2016, and 2018 collected through the Tracking Infrastructure for Social Media Analysis (TrISMA), a contemporary technical and organizational infrastructure for the tracking of public communication by Australian users of social media, via a list of 15 popular e-cigarette–related terms. Results Despite Australia's cautious approach toward e-cigarettes and the limited evidence supporting them as an efficacious smoking cessation aid, it is evident that there is a concerted effort by some Twitter users to promote these devices as a health-conducive (91/129, 70.5%), smoking cessation product (266/1303, 20.41%). Further, Twitter is being used in an attempt to circumvent Australian regulation and advocate for a more liberal approach to personal vaporizers (90/1303, 6.90%). A sizeable proportion of posts was dedicated to selling or promoting vape products (347/1303, 26.63%), and 19.95% (260/1303) were found to be business listings. These posts used methods to try and expand their clientele further than immediate followers by touting competitions and giveaways, with those wanting to enter having to perform a sequence of steps such as liking, tagging, and reposting, ultimately exposing the post among the user's network and to others not necessarily interested in vaping. Conclusions The borderless nature of social media presents a clear challenge for enforcing Article 13 of the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which requires all ratifying nations to implement a ban on tobacco advertising, promotion, and sponsorship. Countering the advertising and promotion of these products is a public health challenge that will require cross-border cooperation with other World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control parties. Further research aimed at developing strategies to counter the advertising and promotion of e-cigarettes is therefore needed.


The Spanish society is now more vulnerable and exclusive than thirty years ago. Economic growth in good times has not been accompanied by social development, quite the contrary. So, social failures are observed along with economic weakness of the model, that are detrimental to the integration and social cohesion of communities. The family and community developments, however, are possible through a strategy of social growth detached from the labour market from the reformulation of social policies and the Social Work discipline. Therefore, this work address the development through the family planning and women, proceed on the basis of the model established for welfare improvement.


The central purpose of this paper is to explore the dynamic relationship between Javanese strongmen and religious leaders in search of power. Two groups of strongmen --jago in Central and East Java and jawara in Banten-- and religious leaders, such as kyai, tarekat teachers and guru ngaji are the subjects of this discussion. I present two groups of strongmen and religious leaders and sketch how both groups, through their socio-political as well as religious roles, preserve the values of the Javanese and Bantenese. Religious leaders and strongmen have been the source of informal traditional leadership, particularly in villages. Religious leaders have represented leadership in knowledge, while strongmen have represented leadership with regard to braveness and physical magical power. The most visible roles of the strongmen are as power brokers. In the meantime, religious leaders have to be aware of the risk of being alienated and isolated from their horizontal networks within religious circles, but also more importantly, that their high position in society will gradually fade away if they place themselves too close to strongmen and the authorities.


ABSTRACT Some published data indicate that several minerals, some of which are usually considered relatively stable species, become corroded within fresh and unweathered sandstone strata. This solution or decomposition is evidently due to the action of solutions within the buried strata, and the surficial alteration due to weathering is not included in this discussion. This corrosion of minerals has suggested that some of the less stable ones may have completely disappeared from ancient strata. Examples are presented which show that hornblende and epidote have disappeared from some Miocene sandstones. The mere absence of some relatively unstable mineral, especially some of the ferro-magnesian group, therefore seems doubtful evidence for conclusions regarding the source rocks or the stratigraph c relations of sandstones. These considerations seem especially important for older formations, as the small assemblage of stable minerals, that is usual in early Paleozoic strata, may represent only a survival of the fittest.


Despite its broad implications for community structure and dynamics, we lack a clear understanding of how forest productivity is partitioned among tree species. As leaf mass per unit of standing biomass declines with tree size, species achieving larger stature should show lower relative productivity as compared to smaller stature species. However, many observations indicate large‐stature species grow faster than small‐stature species. In this study, we address this apparent paradox, and clarify interspecific trade‐offs between turnover rates and maximum size in terms of forest‐level productivity and biomass storage. We examined data from the 1990 and 2000 surveys of the Pasoh 50‐ha plot of Malaysian rain forest. In these data, individual stems ≥1 cm stem diameter (dbh) have been identified, marked, measured and mapped. We applied site‐specific equations to estimate tree biomass from dbh. We estimated species‐level productivity and loss rates that are less influenced by census interval‐related effects and biases. Among 390 abundant tree species, species with high stand‐level biomass were predominantly those large‐stature species where individuals could achieve large sizes. We found that relative (= per‐species‐biomass) productivity and loss rate, per‐capita recruitment and mortality of species were all negatively correlated to species biomass and maximum size, but not to species abundance. Large‐stature species grew faster than small‐stature species at the same tree sizes up to 36 cm dbh. However, the relative growth of large species at their maximum size markedly declined. As a result, tree‐level relative growth at maximum size and species‐level relative productivity decreased with species‐level biomass. Performing further analyses using smaller plots in four old‐growth forests in Indonesia and Japan, we observed a similar interspecific negative relationship between relative productivity and biomass. We expect this phenomenon is widespread across species‐rich forests. Synthesis. How productivity is partitioned among species determines and reflects forest ecosystem functioning and species coexistence. Many species with low biomass and small maximum stem sizes disproportionally contribute to forest primary productivity, rapid recovery and resilience. In contrast, long‐lived, high‐biomass species contribute disproportionally to ecosystem stability and carbon storage. This complementarity reflects differentiation by adult stature among species.


One of the fundamental problems in neuroscience today is to understand how the activation of large populations of neurons give rise to the higher order functions of the brain including learning, memory, cognition, perception, action and ultimately conscious awareness. Electrophysiological recordings in behaving animals over the past forty years have revealed considerable information about what the firing patterns of single neurons encode in isolation, but it remains largely a mystery how collections of neurons interact to perform these functions. Recent technological advances have for the first time provided a glimpse into the global functioning of the brain. These technologies include functional magnetic resonance imaging, optical imaging methods including intrinsic, voltage-sensitive dye, and two-photon imaging, high-density electroencephalography and magnetoencephalography, and multi-microelectrode array electrophysiology. These technologies have expanded our knowledge of brain functioning beyond the single neuron level. At the same time, our understanding of how neuronal ensembles carry information has allowed the development of brain-machine interfaces (BMI) to enhance the capabilities of patients with sensory and motor deficits. Knowledge of how neuronal ensembles encode sensory stimuli has made it possible to develop perceptual BMIs for the hearing and visually impaired. Likewise, research in how neuronal ensembles decode motor intentions has resulted in motor BMIs by which people with severe motor disabilities can control external devices. There are three major goals of this conference. First and foremost, this conference is intended to bring scientific leaders from around the world to present their recent findings on the functioning of neuronal ensembles. A secondary goal of the conference is to provide an informal yet spectacular setting on Santorini in which conference attendees can discuss and share ideas outside of the presentations at the conference center. Third, this conference is the kick-off event for our long term project to form a systems neuroscience research institute within Greece. This institute will conduct state-of-the-art research, offer meetings and courses, and provide a center for visiting scientists from around the world to interact with Greek researchers and students.


The mean annual temperature during a minor glacial readvance prior to deposition of the Pinnacle Hills moraine in western New York State is inferred to have been −5 °C. This conclusion is based upon an analysis of a glacially induced bedrock thrust exposed in the bank of Densmore Creek, 5 km northeast of Rochester. Deformation could have occurred only if the glacier were frozen to the bed and excessive pore pressures existed. This condition was created by a lack of drainage of pore water from overridden sediment and bed rock, reducing the normal stresses produced by the overlying ice. Only when the glacier was frozen to the substrate could the basal shear stress of the ice exceed the shear strength of the bed rock. Using a conservatively high basal temperature of−1 °C and a thickness of ice based upon its terminal position, coupled with genetic data from the thrust, an estimated surficial temperature of−5 °C is calculated.