We present a simple classical (random) signal model reproducing Born's rule. The crucial point of our approach is that the presence of detector's threshold and calibration procedure have to be treated not as simply experimental technicalities, but as the basic counterparts of the theoretical model. We call this approach threshold signal detection model (TSD). The experiment on coincidence detection which was done by Grangier in 1986 [22] played a crucial role in rejection of (semi-)classical field models in favour of quantum mechanics (QM): impossibility to resolve the wave-particle duality in favour of a purely wave model. QM predicts that the relative probability of coincidence detection, the coefficient g(2) (0), is zero (for one photon states), but in (semi-)classical models g(2)(0) ≥ 1. In TSD the coefficient g(2)(0) decreases as 1/ε2d, where εd > 0 is the detection threshold. Hence, by increasing this threshold an experimenter can make the coefficient g(2) (0) essentially less than 1. The TSD-prediction can be tested experimentally in new Grangier type experiments presenting a detailed monitoring of dependence of the coefficient g(2)(0) on the detection threshold. Structurally our model has some similarity with the prequantum model of Grossing et al. Subquantum stochasticity is composed of the two counterparts: a stationary process in the space of internal degrees of freedom and the random walk type motion describing the temporal dynamics.


Escherichia coli O157 is the most common member of a group of pathogenic E. coli strains and a cause for food borne illness. Transmission of E. coli O157:H7 to humans is principally via contamination of food by animal faeces, with cattle considered to be the primary reservoir. Typical illness as a result of an E. coli O157:H7 infection in humans can be life threatening, and susceptible individuals show a range of symptoms including haemolytic colitis, hemolytic-uremic syndrome, and thrombotic thrombocytopenia purpura. People of all ages are susceptible to infection with enterohemorrhagic E. coli O157:H7. However, the young and the elderly are more susceptible and are more likely to develop more serious symptoms. The enteric habitat of E. coli in animals provides easy access to animal-derived meats at slaughter and at points downstream in the food production process. An effective control program to substantially reduce E. coli O157:H7 infections will require the implementation of intervention strategies throughout the food continuum, from farm to table. Keywords: E. coli O157:H7, Enterohemorrhagic, Haemolytic uraemic syndrome, Shiga-like toxin


The present study examined the consumption of cigarettes and two alternative reinforcers in dependent smokers. Cigarette price (response requirement) increased across sessions while alternatives were available at a fixed price in four phases of availability: (1) cigarettes alone; (2) cigarettes and nicotine gum; (3) cigarettes and money; and (4) cigarettes, nicotine gum, and money. Cigarette consumption decreased with increasing price throughout. In the cigarette and nicotine gum phase, nicotine gum consumption increased with cigarette price, indicating nicotine gum to be a substitute for cigarettes. In the cigarette and money phase, money consumption increased slightly with cigarette price, indicating money to be an independent reinforcer for cigarettes. When all three reinforcers were present, money again served as an independent reinforcer. During this phase, nicotine gum consumption increased marginally, but the small magnitude of increase suggests that nicotine gum functioned as an independent reinforcer rather than a substitute. Cigarette consumption decreased modestly when nicotine gum was available, and to a larger extent when money or both alternatives were available. The results highlight the potential for an independent reinforcer such as money to be more effective at reducing drug use than a pharmacological substitute.


During the process of cell division, if chromosomes fail to align correctly on the bipolar mitotic spindle, completion of mitosis will be delayed until alignment has been corrected. Martin-Lluesma et al. describe the role of a protein, Hec1, that recruits a pair of proteins, Mad1 and Mad 2, to the kinetochores at the center of condensed chromosomes. This interaction is important both for the binding of kinetochores to the microtubules of the mitotic spindle and for maintenance of the spindle checkpoint. Mad 1 and Mad 2 were already known to be involved in the spindle checkpoint, but the contribution of Hec1 had been unanticipated and suggests an additional degree of complexity in checkpoint controls in higher eukaryotes versus yeast. S. Martin-Lluesma, V. M. Stucke, E. A. Nigg, Role of Hec1 in spindle checkpoint signaling and kinetochore recruitment of Mad1/Mad2. Science 297, 2267-2270 (2002). [Abstract] [Full Text]


Abstract While researchers in many western countries have documented the nature of psychological distress that is commonly present among individuals living with HIV, there has been virtually no research on the same topic among other high prevalence areas of the world, particularly in countries like Kenya. This study sought to document the nature of psychological distress among 397 individuals living with HIV in western Kenya and who were participating in psychosocial support groups in conjunction with their enrolment in HIV-related treatment. Psychological distress was assessed using the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI), a 53-item self-report psychological inventory that asks individuals to recall symptoms experienced in the prior seven days. The levels of psychological distress in this sample were moderate with a substantial proportion of participants meeting the criteria that suggested a need for further psychiatric evaluation. Findings support the need for further assessments of the range and nature of psychological distress among the diverse communities of countries like Kenya and the need for greater attention to the inclusion of mental health services in the rapidly developing treatment and prevention programs in this region of the world.


Organized in an A to Z format for easy reference, the Dictionary of Jewish Words contains 1,200 entries derived from Yiddish, Hebrew, Aramaic, and English. The entries include words for and associated with Jewish holidays and life-cycle events, culture, history, the Bible and other sacred texts, worship, and more. Each entry has a pronunciation guide and is cross-referenced to other related terms. The introduction is an excellent primer on the history of Jewish words, their transliteration, and pronunciation. The indexes at the back, arranged by categories, help readers easily find the words they want, even when they don't know the exact spelling. This handy and very accessible dictionary is an excellent resource not just for Jews, but for anyone who wants to check the meaning, spelling, and/or pronunciation of Jewish words.


In this paper, a Conic Section Function Neural Network (CSFNN) based system for signature recognition problem is developed. The purpose of this work is to optimize CSFNN parameters for signature recognition problem to be applied to the VLSI Neural Network (NN) chip. Signature database is constructed after some preprocessing techniques are applied on collected raw data. After the preprocessing phase, the database is introduced to the CSFNN. Then CSFNN parameters are optimized to obtain acceptable signature recognition accuracy for a compact NN chip. Simplicity of the CSFNN structure and the range of parameters make CSFNN suitable for hardware implementation for this problem.


Basolateral transport of the prototypical type I organic cation tetraethylammonium (TEA) by the Malpighian tubules of Drosophila melanogaster was studied using measurements of basolateral membrane potential (V(bl)) and uptake of [(14)C]-labeled TEA. TEA uptake was metabolically dependent and saturable (maximal rate of mediated TEA uptake by all potential transport processes, reflecting the total transport capacity of the membrane, 0.87 pmol.tubule(-1).min(-1); concentration of TEA at 0.5 of the maximal rate of TEA uptake value, 24 muM). TEA uptake in Malpighian tubules was inhibited by a number of type I (e.g., cimetidine, quinine, and TEA) and type II (e.g., verapamil) organic cations and was dependent on V(bl). TEA uptake was reduced in response to conditions that depolarized V(bl) (high-K(+) saline, Na(+)-free saline, NaCN) and increased in conditions that hyperpolarized V(bl) (low-K(+) saline). Addition of TEA to the saline bathing Malpighian tubules rapidly depolarized the V(bl), indicating that TEA uptake was electrogenic. Blockade of K(+) channels with Ba(2+) did not block effects of TEA on V(bl) or TEA uptake indicating that TEA uptake does not occur through K(+) channels. This is the first study to provide physiological evidence for an electrogenic carrier-mediated basolateral organic cation transport mechanism in insect Malpighian tubules. Our results also suggest that the mechanism of basolateral TEA uptake by Malpighian tubules is distinct from that found in vertebrate renal tubules.


Pre-pregnancy maternal obesity is associated with adverse offspring outcomes at birth and later in life. Epigenetic modifications such as DNA methylation could contribute, but data are scarce. Within the Pregnancy and Childhood Epigenetics (PACE) Consortium, we meta-analysed the association between pre-pregnancy maternal BMI and methylation at over 450,000 sites in newborn blood DNA, across 19 cohorts (9,340 mother-newborn pairs). We attempted to infer causality by comparing effects of maternal versus paternal BMI and incorporating genetic variation. In four additional cohorts (1,817 mother-child pairs), we meta-analysed the association between maternal BMI at the start of pregnancy and blood methylation in adolescents. In newborns, maternal BMI was associated with modest (<0.2% per BMI unit (1kg/m2), P<1.06*10-7) methylation variation at 9,044 sites throughout the genome. Adjustment for estimated cell proportions attenuated the number of significant CpGs to 104, including 86 sites common to the unadjusted model. These 86 sites map to several genes reported to be associated with adiposity-related and/or neuropsychiatric traits. At 72/86 sites, the direction of association was the same in newborns and adolescents, suggesting persistence of signals. However, we found evidence for a causal intrauterine effect of maternal BMI on newborn methylation at just 8/86 sites. In conclusion, maternal adiposity is associated with modest variations in newborn blood DNA methylation, but the potential biological consequences of these variations are currently unclear.


In this article, we derive conditions for structural controllability of temporal networks that change topology and edge weights with time. The existing results for structural controllability of directed networks assume that all edge weights are chosen independently of each other. The undirected case is challenging due to the constraints on the edge weights. We show that even with this additional restriction, the structural controllability results for the directed case are applicable to the undirected case. We further address two important issues. The first is optimizing the number of driver nodes to ensure the structural controllability of the temporal network. The second is to characterize the maximum reachable subspace when there are constraints on the number of driver nodes. Using the max-flow min-cut theorem, we show that the dimension of the reachable subspace is a submodular function of a set of driver nodes. Hence, we propose greedy algorithms with approximation guarantees to solve the above NP-hard problems. The results of the two case studies illustrate that the proposed greedy algorithm efficiently computes the optimum driver node set for both directed and undirected temporal networks.


The present review article surveys an outline on the most recent efforts and exciting
developments (between 2010-2018 years) in the application of chitosan and modified
chitosan derivatives as bio support for metal immobilization in the cross coupling reactions.
The procedures incorporated in this review comprise metal nanoparticles (Pd, Ni,
Cu, Au, Co) or metal ions immobilization on non-modified chitosan, porous chitosan microspheres,
chitosan hybrid with other organic and inorganic polymers and functionalized
chitosan with different ligands such as amine, amide, thiourea, amino acid, carbene and
Schiff base derivatives. Also, in each case, the catalytic efficiency was described in various
cross coupling reactions.


OBJECTIVE
Chronic post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has been associated with personality impairments involving externalized and internalized psychopathology. This study has explored the association between PTSD symptoms as consequences of prolonged torture experiences or early childhood trauma exposure and personality traits.

METHOD
One hundred and sixty-one men were included: 36 Iraqi men refugees (mean age = 43.9, SD = 8.7) who had longstanding torture experiences as adults; 42 Swedish prisoners (mean age = 33.8, SD = 7), with early childhood trauma exposure; 31 Arab men refugees (mean age = 41.8, SD = 8.9) without self-reported torture or violence experiences; 52 non-traumatized Swedish males (mean age = 39.3, SD = 5.5). They were assessed for symptoms of PTSD or PTSD hypothetical clusters. Personality profile was assessed by the Karolinska Scales of Personality (KSP). Factor analysis with varimax rotation was conducted and yielded three factors: externalized, internalized and avoidance domains.

RESULTS
Individuals who suffered prolonged torture experiences or had early childhood trauma exposure showed impaired personality profiles in internalized and externalized domains. Individuals with or without PTSD showed significant differences p < 0.05 concerning: internalized, externalized and avoidance. ANOVA and post-hoc analysis according to Scheffé showed that the prolonged torture group > early childhood trauma exposure > nontraumatized group.

CONCLUSION
Prolonged torture experiences or early trauma exposure may impair personality formation by enhancing the effects of cognitive, affective and behavioural vulnerabilities.


Purpose To characterize retinal micromorphic changes on en face optical coherence tomography (OCT) and to determine their role in pathogenesis and visual outcomes in macular hole (MH) surgery. Patients and Methods This is a retrospective, interventional, consecutive case series of 28 eyes undergoing successful MH surgery. Pre- and post-operative en face OCT were manually segmented, and the correlation between parameters such as MH basal diameter and minimal inlet area, area of cyst in inner plexiform layer (IPL) and outer plexiform layer (OPL), percentage of cyst in IPL and OPL, and amount of ellipsoid zone (EZ) defect and external limiting membrane (ELM) defect was performed. Their relationship with visual acuity (VA) outcomes (Group 1: ≥20/60; 14 eyes; Group 2: <20/60; 14 eyes) was also evaluated. Results A significant positive correlation was noted between the cyst area in OPL and IPL (r=0.768; p<0.001), which in turn were positively correlated with the basal diameter of the MH in all eyes. The cyst area was significantly more in IPL as compared to OPL in all eyes (p=0.049) and in group 2 (p=0.03) but not in group 1 (p=0.62). As compared to group 2, eyes in group 1 had significantly better pre- and post-operative VA, and significantly smaller basal diameter, minimal inlet area, area of cyst in IPL and OPL, and amount of defect in the ELM (postoperative) and EZ (pre- and post-operative), respectively. Conclusion An increase in the basal diameter of the MH is associated with a simultaneous congruous enlargement of the area of cyst in IPL and OPL. Based on these imaging findings, we propose that the possible rationale for the origin of these intraretinal cysts could be a breakdown in the physiological retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) pump due to the anatomical separation of the neurosensory retina from the underlying RPE, ie, "RPE contact loss" theory.


ABSTRACT This paper presents results from one hundred and twenty samples which were collected from sand ripples in the Algerian Sahara. Ripples were found that are transitional between small aeolian ripples (wavelength 1 cm-20 cm) formed in fine unimodal sand, and larger ripples (wave length 20 cm-20 m) formed in coarse bimodal sand; these are commonly distinguished as two distinct types. The formation of the first type is usually explained by a grain impact mechanism in which the ripple wavelength corresponds to the mean path length of the saltating sand grains. A mathematical model is described which simulates the saltation mechanism of bimodal sand mixtures; the spread of grain impact velocities is taken into account by means of an empirically determined rebound probability matrix. Results f computations using this model are presented which demonstrate that the mechanism of saltation can also account for the largest ripples. These results which explain the presence of the transitional ripples, are attributed to the improved rebound of the fine fraction off the coarse fraction in bimodal sand.


Restoration of the lost bone volume is one of the most deliberate issues in dentistry. Sustained‐release microspherical oxytocin hormone in a poloxamer hydrogel scaffold combined with a mixture of β‐tricalcium phosphate and hydroxyapatite (CP) may serve as a suitable bone graft. The aim of this study was to design and test a novel thermosensitive hydrogel graft incorporating oxytocin‐loaded poly(d, l‐lactide‐co‐glycolide) (PLGA) sustained‐release microspheres and CP. Thermosensitive poloxamer hydrogel containing CP (HCP graft) was prepared as a base and combined with hollow microspheres (HCPM) and oxytocin‐loaded microspheres (HCPOM). Eighty Wistar rats were used for testing the grafts and a control group in 8‐mm‐diameter critical‐sized calvarial defects (CSD); (n = 20). Bone healing at the 4th and 8th weeks was evaluated by histological, histomorphometric, and radiological (micro‐computed tomography [µCT]) analyses. The results were analyzed by two‐way analysis of variance (P < .05). Oxytocin‐loaded PLGA microspheres prepared by the solvent displacement method yielded a high encapsulation efficiency of 89.5% and a slow drug release. Incorporation of the microspheres into the hydrogel graft slowed the release rate down and the release completed within 32 days. HCPOM revealed the highest new bone formation (26.45% ± 6.65% and 30.76% ± 4.37% at the 4th and 8th weeks, respectively; P < .0001) while HCPM and HCP groups revealed a bone formation of around 10% (P > .05). µCT findings of HCPOM group showed the highest mean bone mineral density values (42.21 ± 5.14 and 46.94 ± 3.30 g/cm3 for the 4th and 8th weeks, respectively; P < .0027). The proposed oxytocin‐loaded sustained‐release PLGA microspheres containing thermosensitive hydrogel graft (HCPOM) provide an accelerated bone regeneration in the rat calvaria.


Objective: To examine retinal vascular caliber, an indicator of early microvascular disease and depression in patients with Type 2 diabetes. Methods: We conducted a clinic-based study, comparing participants with Type 2 diabetes with major depression (n = 43), without depression (n = 49), and healthy controls without diabetes or depression (n = 54). Retinal vascular caliber was measured from digital photographs. Depression status was determined, using standardized clinical assessment. Results: After adjusting for age and gender, participants with diabetes and depression had larger arteriolar and venular calibers (147.7 &mgr;m for arteriolar and 215.7 &mgr;m for venular calibers) than participants with diabetes but without depression (143.3 &mgr;m and 213.9 &mgr;m) and healthy controls (135.8 &mgr;m and 202.5 &mgr;m, p for trend = .002 for arteriolar and p = .02 for venular caliber). In multivariate models adjusting for duration of diabetes, systolic blood pressure, cigarette smoking, serum glucose, Cerebrovascular Risk Factor Scale, Cumulative Illness Rating Scale, and retinopathy levels, this relationship remained significant for retinal arterioles (p = .02) but not for retinal venules (p = .10). Conclusions: These data show that patients with Type 2 diabetes with major depression have wider retinal arterioles, supporting the concept that depression is associated with early microvascular changes in Type 2 diabetes. CIRS = Cumulative Illness Rating Scale; CRFS = Cerebrovascular Risk Factor Scales; MRI = magnetic resonance imaging; SBP = systolic blood pressure.


PURPOSE OF REVIEW
Anticoagulants in general, but especially the relatively new direct oral anticoagulants and platelet inhibitors, pose a great challenge for physicians in the hemorrhaging patient. The aim of the present review is to provide an overview on recent studies dealing with the reversal of anticoagulation in the hemorrhaging patient and to describe our therapeutic emergency strategy for those patients.

RECENT FINDINGS
A specific antidote for dabigatran is already on the market and antidotes for the direct and indirect factor Xa inhibitors are in development. Moreover, bleeding under platelet inhibitors remains critical with very little evidence on effective reversal strategies.

SUMMARY
To reverse anticoagulation in the hemorrhaging patient, specific antidotes should be the first option if available, followed by four-factor prothrombin complex concentrate (PCC), activated PCC and recombinant activated factor seven as the emergency strategy. Fibrinogen concentrate, antifibrinolytics and oral charcoal, respectively, can be considered as an additional measure. Massive blood loss and thrombocytopenia should be treated independently according to the respective, local guidelines for (massive) transfusion of blood and blood products.


This book is a summary of the proceedings of an international symposium concerning male pattern alopecia held in Rapallo, Italy, in July 1967. It consists of 219 pages with 120 figures and 32 tables. Thirty-six authors have contributed 20 short chapters, which have been divided into five principal subsections: Phylogenesis and Ontogenesis; Heredity and Hormones; The Hair; The Sebaceous Gland; and The Dermis. The brevity and division of labor have made the reading notably more interesting and factual as well. The editing is of high caliber, which is no small achievement in an international symposium. The bibliographies are selective and up to date. The most gratifying aspect of the book is its general scientific merit, which is refreshingly good for topics of this kind. There are only three or four chapters which should not have been published. More than one third of the book deals with aspects of hair growth


This paper proposes a combination of the thyristor controlled series capacitor (TCSC) and static VAr compensator (SVC) installation for enhancing the dynamic performance of a power system. The developed scheme employs a damping controller which coordinates measurement signals to control the TCSC and SVC. The coordinated control method is based on the application of projective controls. The effectiveness of the proposed controller is demonstrated through simulation studies on a single machine to infinite bus system. The simulation results show that the controller can significantly improve the damping performance of the system. In this paper, a current injection model of TCSC is introduced and included in the transmission system model. By using equivalent injected currents at terminal buses to simulate a TCSC no modification of the bus admittance matrix is required at each iteration.


For a generation, the law of corporations depended on, and sprang from, a notion of economic rationality. This rationality took as its touchstone the efficiency of the marketplace (especially the securities market) and the predictability of the utility-maximizing behavior of the various actors. These assumptions undergirded both the doctrinal innovations and the academic conceptualizations of the field, leading to a prioritization of contractarian reasoning in chancery courts and corporate law classrooms. The judicial enforcement of traditional fiduciary duties melted away, as markets themselves came to be seen as the primary method of keeping management careful and loyal. Disclosure was vested with the mantle of favored regulatory mechanism, since the dominant assumption was that investors armed with information needed no other protection from corporate negligence or malfeasance. Behavioral economics began to be taken seriously in the legal academy in the last decade of the twentieth century, and by the early 2000s was beginning to gain traction in corporate law scholarship. Though corporate and securities law was perhaps the last bastion in the legal academy of the assumptions of neoclassical economics, it is safe to say that the global financial crisis of 2007–8 finally marked the end of the glory days of homo economicus. The evidence of the persistence and ubiquity of so-called irrationalities is so pervasive, replicable, and defensible that the primary debate is no longer between behaviorists and those who would defend a more traditional position. Instead the debate is over what to do with, and about, the spoils of victory. This chapter will offer some thinking in that regard in connection with corporate and securities law. To begin, the chapter will describe some of the ways in which economic rationality influenced corporate law doctrine and scholarship during its heyday. This backward nod is helpful in defining possible implications for the weakening of the rationality assumptions later. Section 2 focuses on the difficulty of developing behavioral research in the area of corporate governance, arguing that the main behavioral innovation is a move away from libertarianism toward regulatory "agnosticism." In section 3, I will discuss what I believe to be the most profound potential implication of behavioral scholarship on corporate governance: using insights on the decision-making of groups to bolster the argument that board homogeneity is a danger, and that increased board diversity of various kinds is likely to improve board performance.


"Through a glass, darkly" is a biblical description of the imperfect way in which we see the world around us.


To evaluate the concept that genetic factors modulate susceptibility to agents that cause interstitial lung disease, animal models of interstitial lung disease caused by bleomycin or by inhalation of organic particulates (ovalbumin or bovine gamma globulin after specific immunization) were studied in strains of mice with different genetic backgrounds. Because immune processes have been implicated in modulating the susceptibility to agents that cause interstitial lung disease, we also compared congenic, resistant strains (strains with the same background but with different H-2 haplotypes) for their sensitivity to the same agents. In bleomycin-induced disease, the degree of lung disease was different in some of the different strains of mice and, in some strains, was related to H-2 locus genes since all strains with H-2b haplotypes were high responders, whereas most of the strains with H-2a, H-2d, and H-2k haplotypes were low responders. However, some of the strains of mice with the same H-2 haplotype but otherwise different genetic backgrounds had different responses to bleomycin, suggesting that there is also a role for non-H-2 genetic factors in modulating the response to this experimental interstitial lung disease. In the ovalbumin-induced lung disease model, as in bleomycin-induced lung disease, there were different strain susceptibilities: 2 of the 3 strains in the H-2b group were high responders, as was 1 of the 3 strains in the H-2k group. Interestingly, evaluation of the congenic, resistant strains showed that on the same backgrounds the H-2-related genes were able to modulate the degree of lung lesions.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


In the last decade, Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) radar has emerged as a leading candidate for stimulating major new advancement in radar theory. A fundamental challenge in MIMO radar is to identify a theoretical framework within which the radar system may be represented and analysed. In the relatively well-established field of Single Input Multiple Output (SIMO) array signal processing, this task has already been achieved using the array manifold (which is a geometric object that completely characterises the array system). A central objective of this thesis is therefore to bridge the gap between SIMO and MIMO by developing a manifold representation of the MIMO radar system. A new differential geometric framework, based on the complex Cartan matrix, is exploited in this thesis for characterising array manifold curves. New formulas are presented for recursively calculating the strictly orthonormal moving frame, U(s), and corresponding complex Cartan Matrix, C(s), for arbitrary array geometries. The circular approximation of the array manifold is derived under this new framework and compact closed-form expressions are provided for the popular uniform linear array geometry. Based on a number of approximations derived using the circular approximation of the array manifold, the performance capabilites of various popular detection and parameter estimation algorithms are investigated. The figure of merit "C"is then used to place these capabilities into the context of the theoretically ideal algorithm. The concept of a virtual SIMO array system is used as a basis for characterising the full MIMO radar configuration using a single equivalent response vector. By tracing out this response vector across the whole parameter space, a manifold is formed that fully characterises the MIMO radar system. In the important case of orthogonal transmit waveforms, the fundamental performance bounds of the MIMO radar system are studied. A space-time receiver architecture is proposed which exploits the virtual SIMO structure as part of a subspace-based joint Doppler, delay and direction of arrival (DOA) estimation framework. Due to the great computational burden of an exhaustive 3-parameter search, the joint Doppler-delay-DOA estimation is partitioned into an equivalent two-stage algorithm. The proposed approach is evaluated via computer simulation studies and shown to outperform existing methods.


Capicua (Cic) is a transcriptional repressor mutated in the brain cancer oligodendroglioma. Despite its cancer link, little is known of Cic's function in the brain. Here, we investigated the relationship between Cic expression and cell type specification in the brain. Cic is strongly expressed in astrocytic and neuronal lineage cells but is more weakly expressed in stem cells and oligodendroglial lineage cells. Using a new conditional Cic knockout mouse, we show that forebrain-specific Cic deletion increases proliferation and self-renewal of neural stem cells. Furthermore, Cic loss biases neural stem cells toward glial lineage selection, expanding the pool of oligodendrocyte precursor cells (OPCs). These proliferation and lineage selection effects in the developing brain are dependent on de-repression of Ets transcription factors. In patient-derived oligodendroglioma cells, CIC reexpression or ETV5 blockade decreases lineage bias, proliferation, self-renewal and tumorigenicity. Our results identify Cic is an important regulator of cell fate in neurodevelopment and oligodendroglioma, and suggest that its loss contributes to oligodendroglioma by promoting proliferation and an OPC-like identity via Ets overactivity.


The aim of this work is to investigate the effects of mixed alkaline earth oxide in potash silicate glasses with regards to their physical properties. More recently; there has been an increase in the demand for light weight glasses which retains their physical and chemical properties for both domestic and industrial applications. The effect of mixing Alkaline earth oxide in potash silicate glass on their density, thermal properties and other physical properties has been studied. As for the method used, raw materials were collected, batch calculations were made, and the batches (A and B) were melted in an electric furnace to produce blocks of glasses. Three pieces were cut out of the block of glasses, grinded, polished and re – annealed. The re – annealed glasses were measured, for their densities, thermal, toughness, hardness, elastic moduli and brittleness. More so micrographs of the indented glasses were taken. Results showed that mixed alkaline effect (MgO:CaO) is minimal on the densities of the A glass series while the addition of (MgO:BaO) to the glass matrix of the B glass series increased its density. The crystallization temperatures of the glasses were influenced by the addition of alkaline earth oxides. The hardness and brittleness of both glass series (A and B) decreases with increasing magnesia fraction of the total alkaline earth oxide. The fracture toughness increases as the magnesia fraction of the total alkaline earth oxide increases. Conclusively, glasses of different properties depending on the desired requirement can be obtained by varying the known quantities of mixed alkaline earth oxides. http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/njt.v34i4.10


It is known that every operator on a (separable) Hilbert space is the direct integral of irreducible operators, but not every one is the direct sum of irreducible ones. We show that an operator can have either finitely or uncountably many reducing subspaces, and the former holds if and only if the operator is the direct sum of finitely many irreducible operators no two of which are unitarily equivalent. We also characterize operators T which are direct sums of irreducible operators in terms of the C*-structure of the commutant of the von Neumann algebra generated by T .


Hydrodynamic instabilities in disks around young stars depend on the thermodynamic stratification of the disk and on the local rate of thermal relaxation. Here, we map the spatial extent of unstable regions for the Vertical Shear Instability (VSI), the Convective Overstability (COS), and the amplification of vortices via the Subcritical Baroclinic Instability (SBI). We use steady-state accretion disk models, including stellar irradiation, accretion heating, and radiative transfer. We determine the local radial and vertical stratification and thermal relaxation rate in the disk, which depends on the stellar mass, disk mass, and mass accretion rate. We find that passive regions of disks—that is, the midplane temperature dominated by irradiation—are COS unstable about one pressure scale height above the midplane and VSI unstable at radii >10 au. Vortex amplification via SBI should operate in most parts of active and passive disks. For active parts of disks (midplane temperature determined by accretion power), COS can become active down to the midplane. The same is true for the VSI because of the vertically adiabatic stratification of an internally heated disk. If hydrodynamic instabilities or other nonideal MHD processes are able to create α-stresses (>10−5) and released accretion energy leads to internal heating of the disk, hydrodynamic instabilities are likely to operate in significant parts of the planet-forming zones in disks around young stars, driving gas accretion and flow structure formation. Thus, hydrodynamic instabilities are viable candidates to explain the rings and vortices observed with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array and Very Large Telescope.


Contemporary workflow-management systems cannot represent change or evolution of business processes. When a change is needed due to external reason, an offline procedure is invoked in order to create a new workflow engine template for the future instances in the workflow enactment module. The standard interfaces do not deal with the business process metadata in a way that can actually change it as a reaction to inbound knowledge. There are many relevant cases, especially in the virtual enterprise arena, where the business process is not deterministic and is influenced by external parameters (such as the selection of virtual partners), so the knowledge of what should be done is available, however it is external to the system. There is a need to develop a modeling mechanism that enables to transfer process definitions in an automatic way, without the need for human interference. One way of confronting with these issues is the use of a rule-based engine to monitor business process execution. This engine will contain internal meta-rules that refer to metadata entities, i.e. rules that describe how to act on other rules (business process routing) when a change is detected, while executing all needed consistency checks.


Unexpected Magnetic Highway The heliopause is thought to separate the heliosphere (the bubble of plasma and magnetic field originating at the Sun) from interstellar plasma and magnetic field. In August last year, the Voyager 1 spacecraft, which was launched 35 years ago, was 18.5 billion kilometers away from the Sun, close to the expected location of the heliopause. Krimigis et al. (p. 144, published online 27 June) report observations of energetic ions and electrons by Voyager 1 that suggest that a sharp and distinct boundary was crossed five times over ∼30 days. Burlaga et al. (p. 147, published online 27 June) found that the magnetic field direction did not change across any of the boundary crossings, indicating that Voyager 1 had not crossed the heliopause but had entered a region in the heliosphere that serves as a magnetic highway along which low-energy ions from inside stream away and galactic cosmic rays flow in from interstellar space. Stone et al. (p. 150, published online 27 June) report the spectra of low-energy galactic cosmic rays in this unexpected region. The Voyager 1 spacecraft entered an unexpected region of the heliosphere at the boundary with interstellar space. On 25 August 2012, Voyager 1 was at 122 astronomical units when the steady intensity of low-energy ions it had observed for the previous 6 years suddenly dropped for a third time and soon completely disappeared as the ions streamed away into interstellar space. Although the magnetic field observations indicate that Voyager 1 remained inside the heliosphere, the intensity of cosmic ray nuclei from outside the heliosphere abruptly increased. We report the spectra of galactic cosmic rays down to ~3 × 106 electron volts per nucleon, revealing H and He energy spectra with broad peaks from 10 × 106 to 40 × 106 electron volts per nucleon and an increasing galactic cosmic-ray electron intensity down to ~10 × 106 electron volts.


We revisit the derivation of Rabi- and Dicke-type models, which are commonly used for the study of quantum light-matter interactions in cavity and circuit QED. We demonstrate that the validity of the two-level approximation, which is an essential step in this derivation, depends explicitly on the choice of gauge once the system enters the ultrastrong-coupling regime. In particular, while in the electric dipole gauge the two-level approximation can be performed as long as the Rabi frequency remains much smaller than the energies of all higher-lying levels, it can dramatically fail in the Coulomb gauge, even for systems with an extremely anharmonic spectrum. We extensively investigate this phenomenon both in the single-dipole (Rabi) and multidipole (Dicke) case, and consider the specific examples of dipoles confined by double-well and square-well potentials, and of circuit QED systems with flux qubits coupled to an LC resonator.


Most of the research on Hybrid Power Systems (HPS) is to provide an economical and sustainable power to the rural electrification. This paper focuses on the design of an HPS for the building which is a part of the urban electrification. In the developing countries, the rate of increase in the demand is more than the rate of increase in the supply, which is a major challenge resulting in very frequent outages. There are number of motives to build integrated and synergistic renewable energy based HPS including environmental, economic, and social benefits. Most of these HPS topologies use inverters to interface the renewable sources to the buildings with an offering of low quality power. Hence, modern sustainability initiatives call for a design for both new HPS and retrofitting of an existing HPS topology. With this aspect, this paper describes the topology of retrofitting HPS with dc Motor-Synchronous Generator set instead of the use of inverter to an existing building power system. This can improve the power quality, reliability of the supply, and ensures stable plant operation. The proposed HPS topology can be used in small-to-medium sized isolated constructions like green buildings, industries, and universities. Different renewable energy sources like Photo Voltaics (PV), Wind Power (WP), and Fuel Cells (FC) are integrated to form HPS. An energy management and control algorithm is proposed to use the energy sources optimally to upgrade these buildings with more reliability and efficiency. The modeling and simulation is done using MATLAB/Simulink.


It has become apparent that major sources of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in mammalian cells are the NADPH oxidases. These multimeric enzymes are composed of membrane-bound catalytic subunits, or Nox enzymes, and a small docking subunit called p22phox. Depending on the Nox isoform, cytosolic regulatory subunits also play a role in their activation. There are 7 Nox isoforms. The first identified was Nox2, also called gp91 phox , which is present in phagocytic cells and is responsible for the oxidative burst. Unlike Nox2, the other Nox enzymes exhibit sustained production of ROS at somewhat lower levels. Their modes of activation differ, as do their cellular distributions. Nox1 through Nox4 are expressed in vascular cells in rodents. Nox5 has been identified in atherosclerotic lesions of humans but is not expressed in rodents. Stimulation of cells with angiotensin II, cytokines, catecholamines, high glucose, or mechanical stretch promotes NADPH oxidase activation, in large part as a result of recruitment of cytosolic subunits to the membrane subunit, leading to the formation of the functional enzyme complex that can transfer electrons to molecular oxygen and the formation of superoxide (O2·−).1 O2·−serves as a progenitor for other ROS, including hydrogen peroxide, peroxynitrite, and hypochlorous acid. Enhanced activity of the NADPH oxidases and increased expression of its subunits occur in many pathological conditions, including hypertension, diabetes mellitus, atherosclerosis, cardiac hypertrophy, and heart failure. Studies of genetically altered mice have shown that the deletion of various NADPH oxidase subunits protects against these diseases and their overexpression promotes pathology.2−4

Article see p 1888

A consequence of excessive ROS formation is loss of endothelial nitric oxide (NO), which can occur by rapid radical-radical reactions with O2·− and other radicals or as a result of dysfunction of the endothelial NO synthase. …


We investigate how changes in legislative boundaries affect firms in the U.S. Every decade, states redraw their congressional districts to account for changing population dynamics within the state and across the country. We find that redistricting imposes considerable costs on firms that operate in districts whose boundaries change. At the state level, we document that firm-level uncertainty significantly increases when new district lines are drawn. Additionally, firms affected by these new boundaries experience negative abnormal equity returns. Within a state, we examine firms who experience a change in representation due to redistricting relative to those firms whose representation is unaffected. We find that redistricted firms decrease capital expenditures and investment in R&D, and there is a higher likelihood of subsequently relocating. These effects are stronger for standalone firms. Taken together, this paper provides evidence about the link between political boundaries and the boundaries of firms.


OBJECTIVE
To describe client and veterinarian perceptions of client-centeredness during euthanasia discussions and assess agreement between measures of these perceptions.

DESIGN
Descriptive study.

SAMPLE
Stratified random sample of 32 companion animal veterinarians in southern Ontario.

PROCEDURES
2 case scenarios (a geriatric dog with worsening arthritis and a cat with inappropriate urination) designed to initiate euthanasia discussions were presented by 2 different undisclosed standardized clients (USCs) to study veterinarian communication during clinical visits. At the end of appointments, the USC's identity was disclosed, and questionnaires to measure veterinarian and client perceptions of client-centeredness were completed. Agreement was assessed by statistical methods.

RESULTS
Data were analyzed from 60 appointments (30/scenario). Of 10 questions, significant agreement was found between veterinarians and USCs for only 1 (extent to which relevant personal and family issues were discussed; κ = 0.43) for the dog scenario and 3 (extent of discussion of respective roles [κ = 0.43], better preparedness of the USC to make a euthanasia decision [κ = 0.42], and discussion of relevant personal and family issues [κ = 0.25]) for the cat scenario. When the USC and veterinarian disagreed, the veterinarian perceived that the client-centeredness components were addressed more thoroughly than did the USC.

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE
Lack of agreement was found between USC and veterinarian perceptions, with USCs perceiving less client-centeredness in euthanasia discussions. This communication gap suggested the need for training of veterinarians in eliciting client perspectives and assessing lifestyle-social information, including client social support systems.


Stigma attached to HIV/AIDS remains a global problem, with severe negative consequences for people living with HIV (PLHIV). Family support is fundamental for PLHIV's psychological and physical well-being. HIV-related stigma is high in Turkey, where HIV/AIDS prevalence is low and the epidemic is not considered a priority. Based on qualitative data generated with HIV-positive women and men, this article explores the process of stigmatization, as experienced and perceived by PLHIV in Turkey, focusing on the institution of the family. Results indicated that enacted stigma from family members is lower than anticipated. While most participants' narratives showed patterns of support rather than rejection from families, the strong expectations around the cultural value attributed to "the family" are found to be the main facilitators of internalized stigma. The article critically discusses the meaning and implications of family support, addressing the role of patriarchal values attributed to womanhood, manhood, and sexuality in Turkey.


These include: Data Supplement http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/suppl/2013/08/28/bmjopen-2013-003476.DC1.html "Supplementary Data" References http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/3/8/e003476.full.html#ref-list-1 This article cites 115 articles, 41 of which can be accessed free at: Open Access non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 3.0) This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the


OBJECTIVE
This study examined the relationship between characteristics of borderline personality disorder and suicidal behavior. The authors hypothesized that a specific feature of borderline personality disorder, impulsivity, and childhood trauma, a possible etiological factor in the development of impulsivity, would be associated with suicidal behavior.

METHOD
Information on lifetime history of suicidal behavior was obtained from 214 inpatients diagnosed with borderline personality disorder by structured clinical interview. The authors examined the relationship between DSM-III-R criteria met and the following measures of suicidal behavior: presence or absence of a previous suicide attempt, number of previous attempts, and lethality and intent to die associated with the most lethal lifetime attempt.

RESULTS
Impulsivity was the only characteristic of borderline personality disorder (excluding the self-destructive criterion) that was associated with a higher number of previous suicide attempts after control for lifetime diagnoses of depression and substance abuse. Global severity of pathology of borderline personality disorder was not associated with suicidal behavior. History of childhood abuse correlated significantly with number of lifetime suicide attempts.

CONCLUSIONS
The trait of impulsivity is associated with number of lifetime suicide attempts and may therefore be a putative risk factor for a future suicide attempt. If so, impulsivity is a potential target therapeutically for prevention of future suicide attempts. The association between childhood abuse and number of lifetime suicide attempts is consistent with the hypothesis that childhood abuse is an etiological factor in the development of self-destructive behaviors.


General aviation (GA) is an important component of
aviation in the United States. In 2011, general aviation and air
taxi operations represented 63% of all towered operations in the
United States, while commercial aviation was responsible for 34% of
those operations. It is clear that GA is a considerable component
of the national airspace and airport system, even when only
accounting for towered operations. Because of this significant
presence, insight into GA is relevant to issues in air traffic
management, air transportation infrastructure, and aviation safety,
among others. Beyond the operational aspect, GA is of significance
to society as a whole and to other stakeholders, including pilots
groups, aircraft manufacturers, and the work force. In 2009,
general aviation generated 496,000 jobs and its total economic
contribution to the U.S. economy was valued at $76.5 billion.
However, a comparison of general aviation's impact on jobs and on
the economy between 2008 and 2009, shows a 20% decrease in jobs and
a 21% decrease in total economic impact in the course of a year.
There is also a significant decreasing trend in the active pilot
population, along with steady decreases in GA flight hours and
towered operations. The objective of this thesis is to explore the
details of these changing trends and to determine what drives and
what hinders general aviation activity in the country. A
combination of data analysis and the development of a survey
administered to general aviation pilots shed light on what has
driven activity in the past on a national scale, what factors
affect an individual pilot's level of activity, and what challenges
the general aviation community faces in the future.


It shall be the policy of the United States to encourage the provision of new technologies and services to the public.(1) I. INTRODUCTION Wireless service providers are not unlike their more traditional counterparts in their need for an infrastructure from which to provide service. In addition to traditional landlines, wireless communications facilities (WCFs) require numerous strategically placed transmission antennae, which are necessary to send and receive signals. New wireless technology has created new tower construction, which was valued at $1.6 billion in 1996 and is expected to peak in 2000 at $2.3 billion.(2) There are already over 57,000 radio transmission sites throughout the country, with an anticipated 110,000 antennae to be in place by 2002.(3) This proliferation of antennae is a function of the burgeoning demand for wireless service and new technology. The two major competing modes of wireless communications are cellular and Personal Communications Services (PCS). As demand for cellular service has outgrown the available radio spectrum used for cellular signals,(4) the wireless industry has turned to PCS, which utilizes digital technology that triples the capacity of traditional cellular systems.(5) Personal Communications Services enable "users to send and receive voice, data and video communications to and from any location."(6) However, "[a]lthough PCS offer advantages in service, performance and quality, one potential drawback is that a PCS network requires four times the number of antennas and towers to transmit signals in order to meet the same coverage as cellular services."(7) This demand for new sites caught many local zoning authorities off guard, as their antiquated zoning laws were not drafted to respond to the unique demands of PCS tower siting. This Note seeks first to establish the significance of a fully deployed wireless infrastructure and its potential impact. Part III offers a comprehensive analysis of the relevant federal regulation of tower siting, including recent judicial action. Drawing on existing case law, this Part makes recommendations for the enforcement of the particular provisions of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (1996 Act or Act). Part IV then discusses the role of state and local governments, emphasizing the need for cooperation and education among all relevant participants. II. THE CURRENT STATE OF AFFAIRS Telephony is at the forefront of the dynamic communications revolution. "The mobile telephone, scourge of the commuter train, the beach and the ski slopes, has been the mainstay of the telecommunications revolution over the past five years."(8) The significance of the mobile telephone cannot be understated, and while its impact on the developing world will no doubt be revolutionary, it also carries special significance for local communities as it offers an alternative to the local near-monopoly.(9) It is this ability of wireless service to serve as a catalyst in opening local telephone markets that offers an opportunity for profound change. The mobile telephone, once available only to the affluent, continues to become more relevant to the life of the average American, and the reasons are simple. One of the most promising developments in communications technology is the ability of the mobile phone to act as a substitute to a traditional landline. According to Federal Communications Commission Chairman William Kennard: "[T]he overarching goal should be--first and foremost--doing everything we can to foster an environment wherein wireless can become a full-fledged substitute for wireline service."(10) A shortage of competition is largely to blame for the fact that the cost of a wired call is still generally less than that of a call made from a mobile phone.(11) "`The capital costs for cellular are lower than for wired,'"(12) and the available evidence supports the cost-reducing effect of competition. …


Middleware-based database replication approaches have emerged in the last few years as an alternative to traditional database replication implemented within the database kernel. A middleware approach enables third party vendors to provide high availability solutions, a growing practice nowadays in the software industry. However, middleware solutions often lack scalability and exhibit a number of consistency and performance issues. The reason is that in most cases the middleware has to handle the database as a black box, and hence, cannot take advantage of the many optimizations implemented in the database kernel. Thus, middleware solutions often reimplement key functionality but cannot achieve the same efficiency as a kernel implementation. Reflection has been proposed during the last decade as a fruitful paradigm to separate non-functional aspects from functional ones, simplifying software development and maintenance whilst fostering reuse. However, fully reflective databases are not feasible due to the high cost of reflection. Our claim is that by exposing some minimal database functionality through a lightweight reflective interface, efficient and scalable middleware database replication can be attained. In this paper we explore a wide variety of such lightweight reflective interfaces and discuss what kind of replication algorithms they enable. We also discuss implementation alternatives for some of these interfaces and evaluate their performance


The Earth's Children series of prehistoric novels by Jean M. Auel, beginning with The Clan of the Cave Bear (1980) and culminating in The Land of Painted Caves (2010), contains a compelling vision of two species of human practising two utterly different kinds of religion. On the one hand there are the Neanderthals, who practice a pure totemism, while on the other there are the anatomically modern humans, whose religion centres on the worship of an Earth Goddess. Auel's heroine, Ayla, straddles both religious spheres, but she herself initiates a crisis within the anatomically modern human religious world. This article examines the different fictional religions in these popular and influential books, considers the sources Auel drew on in creating them and considers the influence these books may exert on public understanding of religion, including among future cohorts of students of religion.


This paper reviews evidence from paleoanthropology about the mode and tempo of human evolutionary history. Rather than a gradualistic, "uphill" directional change as one species is transformed into another by selection, the fossil record indicates many species related to ours, some quite successful with respect to their longevity as a lineage. The implications of the fossil record include a revival of group selection, a recognition of groups as selective (and selected) environment, and a concern about the "grain" or complexity of adaptations.


The paper presents a novel software framework for Association Rule Mining named uARMSolver. The framework is written fully in C++ and runs on all platforms. It allows users to preprocess their data in a transaction database, to make discretization of data, to search for association rules and to guide a presentation/visualization of the best rules found using external tools. As opposed to the existing software packages or frameworks, this also supports numerical and real-valued types of attributes besides the categorical ones. Mining the association rules is defined as an optimization and solved using the nature-inspired algorithms that can be incorporated easily. Because the algorithms normally discover a huge amount of association rules, the framework enables a modular inclusion of so-called visual guiders for extracting the knowledge hidden in data, and visualize these using external tools.


Chronic hepatitis B (CHB) infection has far-reaching implications for patients' quality of life (QOL), regardless of cirrhosis or complications. However, limited research exists on the psychosocial impact of CHB, particularly in asymptomatic, noncirrhotic patients. Noncirrhotic CHB patients without comorbidities affecting QOL were evaluated in hepatology clinics. Patients underwent a standardized interview and completed the Short Form-12 (SF-12) questionnaire. Multiple social and psychological parameters were compared between patients receiving chronic treatment and untreated controls with HBeAg-negative chronic infections. A total of 41 CHB patients were included in the study, with 41% in the treatment group and 59% in the control group. Both groups showed a male predominance, and their average age, ethnic distribution and family status were comparable. High unemployment rates and discrimination at work due to HBV status were prevalent, with many patients feeling their career choices were influenced by HBV, particularly among untreated patients. Treated patients reported significantly lower scores in general health perception (41% vs. 13%; p = .06) and limitation of usual activity secondary to CHB (29% vs. 0%; p = .008), resulting in a substantial impact on overall health-related QOL. This study highlights the psychosocial implications of CHB in asymptomatic, noncirrhotic patients, underscoring the importance of comprehensive support and increased awareness. Additionally, addressing challenges related to long-term treatment, such as adherence and cost, may have the potential to improve patient well-being and outcomes.


This paper describes a computer-aided system for analyzing immunohistochemically stained meningioma cancer cell images. Accurate segmentation of cells in such images plays a critical role in diagnosing diffrent type of meningioma cancer. The methodpresented to automatically extract the positive cells in meninigioma tumor immunohistochemical pathology images based on HSV color space. First, according to distribution rules of positive cells in the HSV color space, it uses the component H, S and V as threshold conditions and leverages the maximal entropy principle to build a model to segment and extract positive cells. Experimental results shows that proposed algorithm can be used by pathologist to detection reliable quantitatively analyze the parameter of tumor cells and over come to disadvantages of the traditional approach.


To provide a strong security service in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), cryptographic mechanisms are required. Generally these security mechanisms demand intensive use of limited resource, such as memory, and energy to provide a defense against attacks. Monitoring the behavior of nodes and detecting risks according to these behaviors, and then taking decisions based on these measurements generally requires the use of a trusted Key Management scheme. In this paper we compare two existing security key management schemes that were designed for use in mobile ad hoc networks: "An overlay approach to data security in ad-hoc networks" authored by Jorg Liebeherr, Guangyu Dong, and "A hierarchical key management scheme for secure group communications in mobile ad hoc networks" authored by Nen-Chung Wang, Shian-Zhang Fang. Then a Hybrid Security Key Management Mechanism designed for use in the marine environment is proposed. This scheme focuses on reducing the memory storage of keys, using a leader node that is responsible for both the node joining and the node revoke processes. This security mechanism is implementing in real time on the Waspmote sensor platform.


Antigen binding to its specific receptor on T cells initiates a series of intracellular events that result in cell differentiation, activation, and clonal expansion. However, the mechanism by which these antigen-occupied receptors induce the transmembrane signal transduction needs clarification. Because this mechanism appears to involve an increase in intracellular free Ca2+ concentration and activation of protein kinase C (PKC), we tested the effect of Ca2+ ionophores and PKC activators on alloantigen-specific primary mixed leukocyte culture cells. Both calcium ionophores, A23187 and ionomycin, in conjunction with 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol 13-acetate (TPA) mimicked the effect of antigen or interleukin 2 (IL 2) by inducing strong proliferative and alloantigen-specific cytotoxic responses. In addition, Ca2+ ionophore and TPA induced IL 2 receptor expression and IL 2 secretion. The capacity of other phorbol esters or a non-phorbol ester tumor promoter (teleocidin) to replace TPA in induction of cell activation correlated with their ability to bind to and to activate PKC. In addition, the synergistic effect of Ca2+ ionophore and TPA was blocked by either a Ca2+ chelator (EGTA) or cAMP, which is thought to inhibit phosphatidylinositol metabolism. To determine whether the induction of this cytotoxic activity was mediated by a direct effect of Ca2+ ionophore and TPA on cytotoxic T (Tc) cells or was secondary to IL 2 secretion by activated helper T (Th) cells, we tested the effect of Ca2+ ionophore and TPA on isolated populations of cloned, alloantigen-specific Th and Tc cells. Both agents induced cell proliferation and IL 2 production by Th cells, but not by Tc cells. Activation of mixed clones of Th and Tc cells, but not of Tc cells alone, resulted in cytotoxic activity, an effect that could be blocked by anti-IL 2 receptor antibodies. The results thus demonstrate that an increased concentration of intracellular Ca2+ in conjunction with PKC activation can bypass the signal provided by antigen-receptor interaction on Th cells, but does not substitute for IL 2 in activating cytotoxicity by isolated Tc cells.


In literature only very scanty information is to be found about the viscera of the Boid genera Tropidophis and Trachyboa, and therefore I believed it worth while to publish some notes which I made during dissections of the following species and subspecies: Tropidophis melanurus (Schleg.), Tropidophis maculatus haetianus (Cope), Tropidophis pardalis pardalis (Gundl.) and Trachyboa gularis Ptrs. The notes are in no way exhaustive; the specimens have been preserved in alcohol for a long time, and therefore it was not possible to study all features in detail. All but two genera of the Boidae have two well developed lungs. One of these two exceptions was mentioned already by Cope (1894, pp. 218, 220: Ungualia; 1900, p. 697), viz., the genus Ungalia (i.e., Tropidophis of present day nomenclature). In this genus only one lung is present, and besides1 a tracheal lung has developed. The second exception is the genus Trachyboa; the fact that in this genus too a tracheal lung and only one true lung have developed, seems to have escaped notice up till now. As will be shown below there are also other features in which Tropidophis and Trachyboa agree with one another, while they differ from the other Boidae. Tropidophis melanurus (Schleg.) Specimens examined: 1 $, Cuba, leg. Ramon de la Sagra, Mus. Leiden reg. no. 1299. 1 # juv., Cuba, leg. Ramon de la Sagra, Mus. Leiden reg. no. 1298. Both specimens were labelled "Ungalia maculata", but after due consideration I refer them to Tropidophis melanurus (Schleg.). Especially the identification of the male no. 1299 caused me some difficulties, and therefore I may give my reasons for this identification. This male has a quadrifurcate


The concept of laboratory rat is giving way to the computer mouse arose after the famous handshake between Clinton-Blair for the completion of the human genome in April 2003. Bioinformatics is defined as the application of computational techniques to understand and organize the information associated with biological macromolecules. There is availability of large databases of genomic information which has enabled research efforts for discovering methods for diagnosis and treatment of human diseases using DNA microarrays and proteomics experiments. But there are various problems while doing this like it's always challenging  to develop proper and sophisticated analysis method  which can properly use genomic data bases considering its and heterogeneity of the data. The main purpose of this first paper is to explore and explain Bioinformatics in a more scientific way, and try highlighting applications of bioinformatics in the medical sector. Int J Appl Sci Biotechnol, Vol 4(4): 425-429


Introduction Antiphopholipid syndrome (APS) is a systemic autoimmune condition characterised by venous or arterial thrombosis, hypercoagulability and pregnancy comorbidities in the presence of circulating antibodies directed against phospholipids. Cerebrovascular disease including sinus vein thrombosis and ischaemic stroke are the presenting features in approximately 30% of cases. Primary APS in the paediatic population is very rare with the exact incidence unknown. A significant number of cases of APS will be associated with autoimmune disease, particularly systemic lupus erythematosus. There are no studies on the management of paediatric APS, which makes the management of these children a challenge for the paediatrician Case description A 2 year old girl, with no comorbidities presented to the local hospital with one episode of tonic-clonic seizure. Of note, is that for the previous days she became more lethargic, decreased appetite and decreased speech. She was developing normally and there was no family history of note. She had a full septic screen but this showed no evidence of acute infection. An MRI head showed left transverse sinus thrombosis with bilateral thalamic infarcts and right basal ganglia infarction. In view of these findings she had a full thrombophilia screen. The results showed evidence of APS with positive anti cardiolipin antibodies. There was no laboratory features of a secondary autoimmune disease, so a diagnosis of primary APS was made (ANA, ANCA, R. F., C3, C4, IG A, G, M-, Direct Antiglobulin test, PR3, MPO,-negative). She has been anticoagulated with warfarin but her ongoing management has been difficult. Discussion Evidence for the treatment of APS is based on adult studies and the treatment itself comes with it's own complications. Warfarin dosage is age and weight dependent, so needs to be carefully monitored to achieve the correct dosing. The 2 year old has experienced symptoms of transient ischaemic attacks with an INR of 1.8 and extensive bruising with an INR >2.7. There is also the psychological and emotional impact involved with the frequent hospital admissions and blood tests. This is all in addition to the impact of the neurodisability, which has resulted from the initial thrombotic insult.


One of the most important parameters in a wireless system is Bit Error Rate (BER). Hence in this paper we present a new system in which BER is lower than the other similar systems such as MC-CDMA, TH-MC-CDMA. In this paper, we describe the suggested system and analyse the BER for a flat fading channel with additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN).


Abstract : Lavender, Body Butter, Antiaging. Antiaging product must contain antioxidant and sunscreens compound to protect skin from free radical. Lavender oil was a popular parfume of cosmetic form because of its antioxidant dan sunscreen activity. Body butter form was needed to increase antiaging activity of lavender oil. The study aimed to evaluate antiaging activity of lavender body butter trough antioxidant and sunscreen activity evaluation. Body butter was made from combination of lavender oil, olive oil, coconut oil beside cocoa butter. DPPH method was used to evaluate antioxidant activity, sunscreen activity was evaluated of the Sun Protection Factor value (SPF), the percentage of erythema transmission (%Te) and percentage of pigmentation (% Tp). The study showed that the body butter formula had IC50 of  56,34 ppm, 6,68 of %Te, 16,34 of %Tp and the SPF value was 10,88. The formula can increase lavender oil's antioxidant and sunscreen activity and it was need the addition of chemical sunscreen compound such as Zinci Oxyde or Titanium Oxyde. It can concluded body butter had strong  antioxidant activity. It can  protect the skin to againt UVA ray but less protect from UVB and UVC rays. Keywords : Lavender, Body Butter, Antiaging Link OJS 3 artikel UJI AKTIVITAS ANTIAGING INVITRO LAVENDER BODY BUTTER


Steenberg T. and Eilenberg J. (1995): Natural occurence of entomopathogenic fungi on Aphids at an agricultural field site. Czech Mycol. 48: 89-96 The occurrence of insect pathogenic fungi on cereal aphids (Sitobion avenae, Rhopalosiphum padi and Metopolophium dirhodum) and other aphid species was studied at an agricultural field site over two years. Aphids were sampled from crops (Tricitum sativum, Avena sativa and Secale cereale) and weeds (Chenopodium album, Polygonum spp., Lamium sp., Capsella bursa-pastoris and others) and the following fungal species were documented: Erynia neoaphidis, Entomophthora planchoniana, Conidiobolus obscurus, Conidiobolus thromboides, Neozygites fresenii and Verticillium lecanii. Epizootic development from mid July onwards occurred in a population of S. avenae. The dominant fungus species in 1993 was E. neoaphidis, and in 1994 E. planchoniana. It was possible to infect S. avenae with E. neoaphidis originating from other aphid species.


The magnitude and consequences of current global environmental challenges require partnerships across sectors and scales. Accordingly, there is a need to learn from partnerships that have been effective. This article analyses a successful national partnership that is contributing to implementation of the Montreal Protocol. It uses a case study methodology that draws on expert views from industry, government, and science, and contributes to the literature on partnerships in several ways. First, it highlights the relevance of insights from science-practice interfaces, and on institutions that can work across scales, for partnerships where knowledge is incomplete, and the challenges are dynamic. Second, it identifies five attributes of the successful multi-stakeholder partnership for Montreal Protocol sectors in Australia. While the wider applicability of these attributes needs testing, they are proposed for consideration by researchers and practitioners in partnerships where environmental challenges demand new knowledge and technologies, and systemic industrial practice change across scales.


This paper explores the question of autobiographical discourse in the work "Аutobiography" by Marko Cepenkov. Firstly, we will determine the basic theoretical settings according to which a text can be said to be autobiographical or it contains autobiographical elements. Then, we will specifically indicate the presence of the explicit and implicit techniques or elements in certain works that are used by the author in addition to which his work can be called an "autobiographical text". Even though his theoretical model will be used, in the same time the inconsistencies in this model will be indicated as well as its modification in the literary works of autobiographical discourse. In that context, the "Autobiography" by Marko Cepenkov will be reviewed, in which, joining the private and the socially-public, depicted through the whole relevant Balkan situation in that time, he created a specific autobiographical – biographical discourse of memoirs. In that manner, the uncertain theoretical status of autobiography will be confirmed, the previous definition of autobiography as "dogmatic" will be unmasked and a notion that autobiography cannot be seen isolated from the other genres will be created, i.e. the existence of hybrid genres will be confirmed.


Summary Until the last two decades the magmato-hydrothermal theories for the origin of ores were considered to be predominant. The change in viewpoint over 20 years or so towards a general acceptance of various syngenetic and epigenetic concepts in ore genesis is outlined in the opening section of this review. In the following section the concentration of metals particularly Al, Ni and to some extent Au in the weathering crust is described. The ways in which metals are concentrated by physical sedimentation are outlined, with particular attention to gold and tin placer deposits and the importance of concepts such as geomorphic thresholds, complex response, and episodic erosion is emphasized. For these deposits it is shown that following the release of elements from bedrock sources they are cycled through the sedimentary system. Essentially, elements move from proximal to distal fluvial sites and from stratigraphically lower to higher positions. Resultant orebodies trend from high grade/low tonnage to lower grade/higher tonnage in a cycle. Chemical sediments, and particularly ironstones are then discussed. Oolitic ironstones occur in two major phases in the Phanerozoic and although their formation in nearshore sheltered sites is becoming established the precise mode of formation, whether primary or diagenetic, is still uncertain. The mainly Precambrian 'banded iron formations' pose the problems of the source and transport mechanism for such vast volumes of iron-bearing sediment. Various hypotheses are discussed and a palaeoenvironmental approach adopted. The possibility is emphasized that the unroofing of mafic Archaean basement in the early Proterozoic may well have been a critical factor in their formation and time distribution. Ore deposits of lead, zinc, copper and uranium are found in continental or marine sediments. The metals are derived from bedrock, pass through the weathering crust and are then incorporated into the sedimentary prism as 'fluid' or detrital oxide complexes. Migration takes place in interstratal solutions and they are finally precipitated as ores in the diagenetic environment. A broad 2-fold environmental division can be recognized, with some ores forming in fluviatile, lacustrine or paralic environments (Cu, U and to a lesser extent Pb, Zn) and secondly those in nearshore to offshore basin or platform sites (Pb, Zn). The movement of metallic fluids out of basinal shales and into basin margin facies, often up growth faults, is described and a model is outlined to account for lead-zinc deposits associated with carbonates and black shales. The formation of copper and uranium deposits in continental facies associations and above sub-redbed unconformities, the origin of uranium-rich conglomerates in the Proterozoic, the formation of sediment-hosted copper deposits and the copper-gold-uranium association in sedimentary rocks are all discussed in terms of a 'fluid unroofing' model. In the final section it is emphasized that we need to refine 'fluid unroofing' models, and have a better understanding of the way metal is cycled through the sedimentary — diagnetic environment. The importance of sophisticated facies analysis, the relevance of 'maturity' with regard to metals as well as oils, and the significance of biological mediation in ore formation are all emphasized. Finally the critical importance of the weathering horizon in establishing the potential metal fertility of any sedimentary basin is noted.


Score-based models play an important role for predicting the failure of non-listed SME's within a few years before bankruptcy, and the the reason of their success is in the fact that they are easy to understand and use easily obtainable data from both balance sheets and statements. This paper ascertains if two of such warning tools, one originally developed for U.S. firms (Z'-Score) while the other one is an adaptation of the latter to the peculiarities of the socio-economic Italian enviroment (BCS), are effectively reliable in measuring the default potential of industrial businesses in Italy. First, we have analyzed the theoretical and practical characteristics of the two models and we highlight some of its potential shortcomings. Second, we have examined a sample of 200 industrial SME's, of which 100 companies have been subjected in the period 2005-2015 in bankruptcy proceedings because of a default, whereas the remaining 100 companies, which have been selected based on same core business, year of data collection and a comparable size of total assets, did not go bankruptcy. The models were tested by verifying, yesterday for today, whether the future health status of the businesses in the sample, and the impending business failures specifically, could have been predicted up to three years earlier and with reasonable precision using the examined models. We found that the models still work effectively and perform well in predicting failures of Italian SME's, provided that some critical points illustrated in this study are taken into account.


Abstract It has been proposed that cropping systems can be managed to promote the development of soil microbial communities that accelerate weed seed mortality. We examined soil fungal and bacterial communities, soil C:N ratio, soil particle size fractions, and weed seed mortality in soil from fields with over 10 yr of five contrasting management histories with the objective of determining if seed mortality could be explained by differences in soil properties. Seed mortality of giant foxtail and velvetleaf were greatest in soil from the conventionally managed systems and lowest in soil from a reduced input system. Principal-components analysis of soil microbial communities, as determined through denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis of polymerase chain reaction–amplified ribosomal RNA genes (PCR-DGGE), showed distinct differences in the composition of fungal and bacterial communities among the study soils. The first principal component of the 18S rDNA PCR-DGGE analysis of fungal community composition showed a strong negative correlation with both giant foxtail (− 0.52, P < 0.05) and velvetleaf (− 0.57, P < 0.01) seed mortality, as did ordination with nonmetric multidimensional scaling (NMS) [giant foxtail (− 0.54, P < 0.01) and velvetleaf (− 0.60, P < 0.01)], suggesting that seeds of the two species were affected similarly by changes in the soil fungal community. For giant foxtail, weed seed mortality was also positively correlated (r = 0.48, P < 0.05) with the first NMS axis of the bacterial 16S rDNA analysis. None of the other measured soil properties were significantly correlated with weed seed mortality. Thus, for the soils tested here, management history, microbial community composition, and weed seed mortality were linked. To extend these results to the field, more work is needed to identify components of the fungal and bacterial communities that are active in seed degradation, and to develop conservation biocontrol recommendations for these species. Nomenclature: Giant foxtail, Setaria faberi Herrm., SETFA; velvetleaf, Abutilon theophrasti Medik., ABUTH.


The major heat shock protein, hsp 70, of Dictyostelium discoideum was found to be rapidly phosphorylated. Analysis of [35S]methionine- and 32Pi-labeled hsp 70 revealed that two similar but distinct proteins of about 70,000 daltons each are synthesized at a high rate after a heat shock, and that each has a phosphorylated member. The phosphorylation chiefly modifies threonine residues. Rapid turnover of the phosphate group occurs, resulting in a steady-state condition in which only about half of the hsp 70 is phosphorylated at a given time.


This paper presents a concept of a waveguide single-pole single-throw (SPST) switch based on a MEMS-reconfigurable surface. A set of vertical columns, split into two groups of movable and fixed sections which can be actuated laterally by integrated MEMS comb-drive actuators, allows for the transition between the transmissive and the blocking state. In the totally-blocking state, the vertical columns inhibit the wave propagation by short-circuiting the electrical field lines of the predominant TE10 mode. The paper reports on the integration method for fabricated chips into a WR-12 waveguide by using tailor-made flanges. The RF measurement of fabricated chips show that devices have better than 30 dB isolation in the OFF state and better than 0.65 dB insertion loss in the ON state for 60-70 GHz, which is mainly attributed to the integration into the waveguide and the measurement assembly setup. The actuation voltage is 44 V, and life-time measurements were carried out for 14 hours after which 4.3 million cycles were achieved without any indication on degradation.


ABSTRACT The first fossil opilioacariform mite (Acari: Opilioacariformes), Paracarus pristinus sp. n., is described from Baltic amber (Tertiary: Eocene). This well-preserved inclusion has six eyes and, thus, can be excluded from the derived, four-eyed genera. Based on characters such as the extremely long leg 4, it is assigned to the extant central Asian genus Paracarus Chamberlin & Mulaik, 1942. As with many Baltic amber inclusions, we lack an exact provenance for the type specimen, but the Baltic region is further north than the present day range of Recent opilioacariform species and suggests that the range of this group was once more extensive within Eurasia. The first solifuge (Solifugae) from Baltic amber is described as Palaeoblossia groehni gen. et sp. n. Based on its size and general appearance, it can be assigned to Daesiidae, and again represents an arachnid group which previously had a much wider geographical range. If adult, it may represent the smallest solifuge known.


Introduction: There is considerable variation in the arterial supply of diaphragmatic surface of the heart. Diaphragmatic myocardial infarction is one of the more common consequences of coronary artery disease. The aim of this study was to assess the incidence of anatomic variants of origin and termination of Posterior Descending Artery (PDA) and to determine the type of coronary dominance in North Indian population. Subjects and Methods: This prospective study was carried out on 50 routine subjects of different age groups who came to the Department of Radiodiagnosis, King George's Medical University UP, Lucknow in the year 2010- 2011 with known or suspected coronary artery disease. All the cases were investigated on a 64 slice Multidetector Computed Tomographic (MDCT) scanner, using retrospective Electrocardiographic gating. Endeavour was made to determine the incidence of sites of origin and termination of PDA as well as to determine the type of coronary dominance. Results: PDA arose from Right Coronary Artery (RCA) in 39 (78%) cases and from Left Circumflex (LCx) artery in 11(22%) cases. The PDA was found to terminate in the upper 1/4 of Posterior Inter-Ventricular Groove (PIVG) in 18 (36%) cases, in upper 1/2 of PIVG in 19 (38%) cases, in upper 3/4 of PIVG in 10 (20%) cases and at the apex of the heart in 1 (2%) case. None of the female had termination of PDA at the apex. Termination of PDA could not be determined in 2 (4%) cases. Right dominance was seen in 36 (72%) cases, Left dominance in 11 (22%) cases. and Co-dominance in 3 (6%) cases. Conclusion: Posterior descending artery most commonly terminated after traversing the upper half of posterior inter-ventricular groove. The incidence of left coronary dominance was more in females, it was approximately twice the incidence found in males. Co-dominance was observed only in male subjects.


: Pain and disturbed function in the sole of the foot leads to damage of the tendo Achilles and to abnormalities in its vicinity. They are frequent consequences of some sporting activities (jogging). Differentiation between bursitis, fat necrosis, degenerative changes in tendons and their rupture and from abnormalities of the ankle joint is important for treatment. In the symptomatic patients whom we examined, the bursa was involved in 72.9% and lesions of the tendo Achilles were found in 62.1%.


Task allocation is a key problem, which has a direct influence on the system performance in all kinds of distributed systems. This paper focuses on a specific kind of task allocation in swarm robotic systems, where the tasks are associated with specific time constraints. The paper presents a self-organized task allocation strategy, which aims to assign robot swarms to time-constrained tasks in a distributed manner. The robots assignment is performed based on particular specifications including task sizes and deadlines in addition to the specification of the single robot performance on the considered tasks. No central control is required to govern the swarm behaviour and no communication is exploited among robots.


Sources of fertilizer are one of the major factors influencing baby spinach leaf texture, sweetness, bitterness and after-taste. However, the effects of fertilizer sources on baby spinach growth performance and consumer preferences are not known. A survey was carried out at the Seke Teachers' College (SKC) community, Zimbabwe to determine the consumer preferences on the baby spinach grown on the organic fertilizer (cattle, poultry and goat manures) as well as on control inorganic  fertilizers (7% N, 14% P, 7% K). The study used 32 females and 30 males as panellists for sensory evaluations. Organoleptic tests were performed for the baby spinach leaves using a panel of 62 testers. An interval line scale (16 cm long) was used to measure the liking for sweetness, colour, bitterness and after-taste. A 9-point hedonic scale was used to decide the overall preferences. Organoleptic tests showed significant differences (P<0.05) in appearance and taste between the inorganic and organic fertilizers used. The baby spinach leaves grown on organic fertilizers was preferred more compared to that grown on inorganic fertilizer (control). Therefore, it is recommended to use organic fertilizers in baby spinach production in order to satisfy consumer preferences.


Interfaces for users on the web are usually created using standard HTML-technologies. Although dynamic textbased features are widely available on the web (e.g. by using DHTML) there are still some limitations in the user experience when using dynamic graphical elements. In this article we focus on a GUI-prototype using Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) as an interface to an existing Digital Library. First we describe the current situation of the running system and explain some of the limitations in the GUI. Thereafter we compare the document-format with other electronic formats. An overview of the prototype and a description of the used framework will be given in the main section of this article. Finally we are going to show an improved version of a search task using an SVG-category viewer. The currently supported SVG-recommendation (SVG 1.1) by the SVG-plugins have some limitations. The upcoming release will solve some of the problems and introduce new features related to data-handling and database access. An outlook of these new features and lessons learned in implementing the prototype will close the article.


A field experiment was conducted at Mettupalayam to evaluate the bioefficacy of new acaricides against the spider mite, Tetranychus urticae Koch on rose. Among the chemicals tested, fenpyroximate 5 SC (0.006%) was the most effective one recording 81.73-93.28 per cent reduction in mites after the first round of spray up to 15 DAT followed by fenazaquin 10 ECat 0.02%(78.18-86.90%), diafenthiuron 50 SCat 0.09%(73.24-86.90%), buprofezin 25ECat 0.03%(74.63-83.05%) and diafenthiuron 50WP at 0.09% (67.59 - 85.90%).Asimilar trend was also observed in the second round of spraying. The highest yield was recorded in plants treated with fenpyroximate 5 SC followed by fenazaquin 10 EC when compared to untreated check. No phytotoxicity symptom was observed in any of the plots treated with new acaricides/ insecticides.


The effects of the self-inhibitor, N,N-dimethylguanosine, on the metabolism of spores of Dictyostelium discoideum were investigated. It is concluded that since both self-inhibited and activated spores had similar initial Qo, values, the site of action of the self-inhibitor was not on respiratory metabolism. Incorporation of [U14C]glucose revealed that organic acids and amino acids accumulated in self-inhibited spores and that protein synthesis was inhibited. Succinic acid accumulated only when the activated self-inhibited spores became anaerobic so its accumulation was not directly related to self-inhibition. Phenylalanine, methionine and tryptophan were absent in dormant spores but appeared after heatactivation and accumulated in self-inhibited spores. The accumulation of amino acids was related to the inability of self-inhibited spores to synthesize protein. In viva analysis showed that protein synthesis began early in spore germination and that the self-inhibitor immediately arrested this process when added to activated spores and slowed it when added to germinating spores. No effect of self-inhibitor on RNA synthesis during germination was detected. Thus, we conclude that the self-inhibitor, a methylated base of guanine, regulated spore germination by preventing the synthesis of protein necessary for subsequent development.


As an integrated observing strategy, the concept of sensorweb for Earth observations is appealing in many aspects. For instance, by increasing the spatial and temporal coverage of observations from space and other vantage points, one can eventually aid in increasing the accuracy of the atmospheric models which are precursor to hurricane track prediction, volcanic eruption forecast, and trajectory path of transcontinental transport of dust, harmful nuclear and chemical plumes. In reality, there is little analysis available in terms of benefits, costs and optimized set of sensors needed to make these necessary observations. This is a complex problem that must be carefully studied and balanced over many boundaries such as science, defense, early warning, security, and surveillance. Simplistically, the sensorweb concept from the technological point of view alone has a great appeal in the defense, early warning and security applications. In fact, it can be relatively less expensive in per unit cost as opposed to building and deploying it for the scientific use. However, overall observing approach should not be singled out and aligned somewhat orthogonally to serve a particular need. On the other hand, the sensorweb should be designed and deployed to serve multiple subject areas and customers simultaneously; and can behave as directed measuring systems for both science and operational entities. Sensorweb can be designed to act as expert systems, and/or also provide a dedicated integrated surveillance network. Today, there is no system in the world that is fully integrated in terms of reporting timely multiple hazards warnings, computing the loss of life and property damage estimates, and is also designed to cater to everyone's needs. It is not an easier problem to undertake and more so is not practically solvable. At this time due to some recent events in the world, the scientific community, social scientists, and operational agencies are more cognizant and getting together to address such colossal problems. Increasing our knowledge of the home planet, via amplified set of observations, is certainly a right step in a right direction. Furthermore, this is a pre-requisite in understanding multiple hazard phenomenas. This paper examines various sensorweb options and observing architectures that can be useful specifically in addressing some of these complex issues. The ultimate goal is to serve the society by providing potential natural hazards information to the decision makers in the most expeditious manner so they can prepare themselves to mitigate potential risks to human life, livestock and property.


This paper describes an experimental study on the tensile capacity of post-installed rebars setting with adhesive. Eighty-one specimens containing single or double rebars were tested by an extraction tester to investigate the influence of embedment depth, edge distance and spacing of rebars on the tensile behavior of rebar system. The experimental results show that embedment depth is the most significant factor for rebar capacity and failure mode. The edge distance and the spacing effects are more significant only for the rebars with insufficient embedment depth. This study also attempts to evaluate two available design procedures provided by manufacturers. The comparison between the experimental data and predicted values calculated according to the two design procedures shows that both of the design approaches lay on the conservative side.


Males and females can be under different evolutionary pressures if sexual and natural selection is differentially operating in each sex. As a result, many species have evolved sexual dichromatism, or differences in coloration between sexes. Although sexual dichromatism is often used as an index of the magnitude of sexual selection, sexual dichromatism is a composite trait. Here, we examine the evolution of sexual dichromatism in one of the largest and most ecologically diverse families of birds, the tanagers, using the avian visual perspective and a species‐level phylogeny. Our results demonstrate that the evolutionary decreases of sexual dichromatism are more often associated with larger and more frequent changes in male plumage coloration, and evolutionary increases are not more often associated with larger changes in either sex. Furthermore, we show that the crown and ventral plumage regions are correlated with sexual dichromatism in males, and that only male plumage complexity is positively correlated with sexual dichromatism. Finally, we demonstrate that light environment is important in shaping both plumage brilliance and complexity. By conducting a multilevel analysis of plumage evolution in males and females, we show that sexual dichromatism evolves via a mosaic of sexual and natural selection in both sexes.

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Ocmium teniflorum (Local name: Tulsi, Family: Lamiaceae) is a plant well known for its medicinal uses in unani and ayuveda medicine. It is called the 'queen of herbs' for its antimicrobial, antiinflammatory, hypotensive, hypoglycemic antipyretic and analgesic activities. Azadirachta indica (Local name: Neem, Family: Meliaceae) is a medicinal plant best known for its antimicrobial, antiinflammatory, anticancer and antiviral activities. It is a fact that the individual exudates of each plant attract a specific species of microbes and induce them to produce possible novel compounds under the influence of the plant environment. With this idea in mind, we investigated the antimicrobial activity of endophytic actinomycetes inhabiting tulsi and neem plants. The preliminary screening was done using agar plug method and it displayed 12 isolates with prominent bioactivity. Further biological screening of their active metabolites showed that the compounds were most active against Salmonella enteritidis, Campylobacter jejuni and Proteus mirabilis. The thin layer chromatography (TLC) and high performance liquid chromatography-UV (HPLC-UV) displayed UV absorbing polar and non polar compounds. Our study reveals tulsi and neem plant microenvironment as an unexplored niche harboring endophytes that are prominently bioactive against multidrug resistant (MDR) poultry and human pathogens.