This paper presents a Fuzzy Neural Network-based irrigation water control system for realizing accurate irrigation and water saving. The control system consists of a PC based server with a FNN-based control module, data sampling device, CAN bus communication network and remote irrigation units with sensors and controller. It can estimate irrigation water compensation according to the irrigation environments. By using Fuzzy Logic function and Fuzzy Neural Network, the controller module can fuse multi-source information that from Internet, sensors and other sources to make decision of irrigation water compensation on the control spot. Experimental result indicates that the compensation generated by FNN have higher precision than that by FL in this irrigation water control system.


Abstract Urinary catheterization has risks and its use should be limited because it is the main cause of healthcare-associated urinary tract infection. Other risks are the potential for urethral injuries and the possibility that the catheter will be left in permanently. Rates of urinary catheterization in internal medicine departments generally range from 8% to 20%, with higher rates in older adult patients. Various attempts have been made to decrease catheterization rates with variable success. A major problem is that the guidelines and criteria for urinary catheterization are inconsistent and open to variable interpretations. More restrictive criteria based on observable patient benefit can reduce rates of urinary catheterization and may improve patient care.


Since the 1980s, companies have taken a larger interest in quality and it´s economic impact within the company. Having the knowledge that it´s not quality that costs money, but it´s rather the lack of quality. The work immerses itself in the field of cost of poor quality and the development of key performance indicators.The thesis is performed at Bufab Holding in Varnamo. Bufab Holding is a trading company which mainly buys and sells C-parts. C-parts include fasteners, other small metal-, rubber- or plastic parts such as wires, springs and electronic fasteners.The aim of this thesis was to make a survey of the cost of poor quality and to find key performance indicators (KPI) for cost of poor quality that can be continuously monitored. This work can serve as a basis for other companies within the Bufab group if the company believes that the content of the report can be used. With this aim two issues was created. What is the cost of poor quality that are linked to Bufabs complaints today, and where do they occur? Which key performance indicators can be created, which continuously can be monitored? The work began with a literature study to gain a deeper understanding of the cost of poor quality and the creation of KPI´s. The literature led the writers of this thesis into the methods that were used. Through the data collection, document gathering and given interviews an understanding of the company´s current economic situation. On this basis the company´s claims and processes where analysed with the help of "Seven quality tools". With the help of the piece cost model cost barriers was prepared and the cost of poor quality was calculated. Furthermore KPI´s was created through Lars Sorqvists description of ratio.The cost carriers differed depending on whether it was Bufab who caused the error, if it was a wrong product quality claim or if it was the supplier who caused the error. The cost of poor quality totaled of 4,7 Mkr. The pareto chart shows that the cause wrong product quality caused the highest costs. The costs of poor quality that where calculated mostly consisted of different labor costs. One of the KPI´s was based on labor cost and the other was based on total costs. Furthermore KPI´s where made of the number of complaints with the base of total number of order lines that have been sent.The company can then use this result to show how good quality the company have when new contracts are negotiated. If the methodology and results are promising, this thesis can be a working model for more companies within the Bufab group.Not all visible costs of poor quality was calculated in this thesis due a lack of time. The thesis also lacks entirely an assessment of the hidden costs of poor quality.


Three new species of the bamboo-feeding genus Bambusiphaga Huang & Ding, 1979, B. parvula sp. nov., B. angulosa sp. nov., and B. nigrigena sp. nov., are described and illustrated from China. A key to species of the genus is provided. Habitus photos for adults and illustrations of male genitalia are also given.


A cancer-associated mutation in PKCι maps to a motif that mediates interactions between PKCι and substrates involved in cell polarity. This Podcast features an interview with Peter Parker, Mark Linch, and Neil McDonald, authors of a Research Article that appears in the 17 September 2013 issue of Science Signaling. Atypical protein kinase Cι (PKCι) is a serine-threonine kinase that affects many cellular processes, including apical-basal polarity in epithelial cells. Loss of cell polarity is associated with aggressive epithelial cell cancers, and PKCι is frequently found in abnormally high abundance in epithelial cancers. Linch et al. identified a motif within PKCι that mediates interactions between PKCι and some of its substrates that control cell polarity. They also found that an amino acid within this motif is commonly affected in PKCι mutants associated with human cancer.


Abstract Proteomic characterization of human brain tissue is increasingly utilized to identify potential novel biomarkers and drug targets for a variety of neurological diseases. In whole-tissue studies, results may be driven by changes in the proportion of the largest and most abundant organelles or tissue cell-type composition. Spatial proteomics approaches enhance our knowledge of disease mechanisms and changing signalling pathways at the subcellular level by taking into account the importance of cellular localization, which critically influences protein function. Density gradient-based ultracentrifugation methods allow for subcellular fractionation and have been utilized in cell lines, mouse and human brain tissue to quantify thousands of proteins in specific enriched organelles such as the pre- and post-synapse. Serial ultracentrifugation methods allow for the analysis of multiple cellular organelles from the same biological sample, and to our knowledge have not been previously applied to frozen post-mortem human brain tissue. The use of frozen human tissue for tissue fractionation faces two major challenges, the post-mortem interval, during which proteins may leach from their usual location into the cytosol, and freezing, which results in membrane breakdown. Despite these challenges, in this proof-of-concept study, we show that the majority of proteins segregate reproducibly into crude density-based centrifugation fractions, that the fractions are enriched for the appropriate organellar markers and that significant differences in protein localization can be observed between tissue from individuals with Alzheimer's disease and control individuals.


The symmetry in action and reaction between interacting particulate matter breaks down when the interaction is mediated by an out-of-equilibrium environment. Nevertheless, even in this case, the space translational invariance still imposes the conservation of canonical momentum. Here we show that optical binding of an asymmetric material system can result in non-reciprocal interactions between constituents. We demonstrate that a non-conservative force applies to the center of mass of an optically bound dimer of dissimilar particles, which leads to an unexpected action in the transversal direction. The sign and the magnitude of this positional force depend on the abrupt phase transitions in the properties of the asymmetric dimer.


Positive self-beliefs are important for well-being, and are influenced by how others evaluate us during social interactions. Mechanistic accounts of self-beliefs have mostly relied on associative learning models. These account for choice behaviour but not for the explicit beliefs that trouble socially anxious patients. Neither do they speak to self-schemas, which underpin vulnerability according to psychological research. Here, we compared belief-based and associative computational models of social-evaluation, in individuals that varied in fear of negative evaluation (FNE), a core symptom of social anxiety. We used a novel analytic approach, 'clinically informed model-fitting', to determine the influence of FNE symptom scores on model parameters. We found that high-FNE participants learn more easily from negative feedback about themselves, manifesting in greater self-negative learning rates. Crucially, we provide evidence that this bias is underpinned by an overall reduced belief about self-positive attributes. The study population could be characterized equally well by belief-based or associative models, however large individual differences in model likelihood indicated that some individuals relied more on an associative (model-free), while others more on a belief-guided strategy. Our findings have therapeutic importance, as positive belief activation may be used to specifically modulate learning. Author Summary Understanding how we form and maintain positive self-beliefs is crucial to understanding how things go awry in disorders such as social anxiety. The loss of positive self-belief in social anxiety, especially in inter-personal contexts, is thought to be related to how we integrate evaluative information that we receive from others. We frame this social information integration as a learning problem and ask how people learn whether someone approves of them or not. We thus elucidate why the decrease in positive evaluations manifests only for the self, but not for an unknown other, given the same information. We investigated the mechanics of this learning using a novel computational modelling approach, comparing models that treat the learning process as series of stimulusresponse associations with models that treat learning as updating of beliefs about the self (or another). We show that both models characterise the process well and that individuals higher in symptoms of social anxiety learn more from negative information specifically about the self. Crucially, we provide evidence that this originates from a reduction in the amount of positive attributes that are activated when the individual is placed in a social evaluative context.


We report novel Bragg-reflecting structures that represent a departure from the conventional quarter-wavelength stacks used currently in the optoelectronics industry. These structures can be used to design high-reflectivity mirrors in strained material systems and mirrors that will provide high reflectivities in more than one wavelength band. Such mirrors can be used to design resonant-cavities for optical absorption as well as emission. Resonant-cavity photodetectors were demonstrated. >


Background: Paroxysmal nocturnal haemoglobinuria (PNH) is a rare clonal disorder of hematopoietic stem cells causing complement-mediated intravascular haemolysis, bone marrow aplasia and thromboembolic events. Allogeneic stem cell transplantation (SCT) has the potential to cure the disease but it is burdened by transplant-related mortality (TRM), which is lower in younger patients and with reduced-intensity conditioning regimens. Eculizumab is a monoclonal antibody suited to stop the abnormal complement cascade and capable of reducing thromboembolic events and related fatalities. Which of the two therapeutic options achieves the best health-care benefit to patients is uncertain as well as the economic burden of the two options onto health-care budget. Methods: We built a decision tree comparing upfront allogeneic SCT with lifelong eculizumab. Only patients with no prior thrombosis were analysed. A Markov model tracked PNH patients lifelong and accounted for persisting health-care modifications (states, such as transfusion-dependence, long-term disability related to severe thromboembolic events or GVHD, as well as for transitory modifications (events), such as acute phase of thromboembolic events and the first 3 months after SCT. TRM for sibling and unrelated fully matched donors was considered to be 15%, as reported by EBMT for patients transplanted for aplastic anemia after the year 2002 and by other institutions after reduced-intensity conditioning (de Latour 2012; Pantin 2014). However, patients 30-40 years of age were assigned a TRM of 20% and those older than 40 a TRM of 30%. The probability of thrombotic events was estimated based onthe reported cumulative rate of 40% in 15 years (de Latour 2008), but the risk was 4 times as higher for recurrent events. The fatality rate of thrombotic events was assumed to be 10%. The probability of death not related to thrombotic events was calculated based on the rate (8% in 10 years) reported by the French retrospective study (de Latour 2008) for individuals diagnosed after 1996. Patients being treated with eculizumab, however, were assigned thrice as higher the mortality probability of age-matched general population according to the 2008 Italian life tables (Hillmen 2011). Quality of life for PNH patients was calculated from EORTC scores reported by the International PNH Registry (conversion algorithm reported by Kontodimopoulos 2009): it was 0.81 in non-transfused patients, but decreased to 0.71 after thrombotic events, and to 0.51 in transfusion-dependent patients and in those with severe GVHD. Allogeneic SCT was assigned a cost of €80,000 upfront and €100 per month subsequently. Eculizumab was assigned a monthly cost of €20,000 assuming standard scheduling (600 mg weekly for 4 weeks followed by 900 mg biweekly). Future life years and costs were discounted by 3.5% per year, according to international guidelines. The model was built and analyzed with TreeAgePro2014. Results: At baseline analysis, patients aged 35 years would expect 41.32 life years after allogeneic SCT versus 35.0 on lifelong eculizumab. At two-way sensitivity analysis, we analyzed the role of TRM and relative survival of patients treated with eculizumab, as compared with healthy individuals. Allogeneic SCT is expected to provide better life expectancy so far as mortality in patients treated with eculizumab is >38% higher than general population. At TRM rates of 30%, allogeneic SCT keeps more effective than eculizumab only provided that PNH-related mortality is > 100% higher than general population. Similar results were obtained for discounted quality-adjusted life expectancy, which was 37.1 QALYs after allogeneic SCT versus 26.8 QALYs with lifelong eculizumab. In patients aged more than 52 years, eculizumab provided a better life expectancy than SCT. Lifelong discounted costs were estimated to be €113,341 after allogeneic SCT versus €8,362,079 with eculizumab. Conclusions: In an era of improved transplant yield and of budget constraints, allogeneic SCT should still be considered a therapeutic option for younger PNH patients with an aplastic phenotype. Disclosures No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.


Network processors are the basic building blocks of today's high-speed, high-demand, quality-oriented communication networks. Designing and implementing network processors requires a new programming paradigm and an in-depth understanding of network processing requirements. This book leads the reader through the requirements and the underlying theory of networks, network processing, and network processors. It covers implementation of network processors and intergrates EZchip Microcode Development Environment so that you can gain hands-on experience in writing high-speed networking applications. By the end of the book, the reader will be able to write and test applications on a simulated network processor.Comprehensive, theoretical, and pracitical coverage of networks and high-speed networking applicationsDescirbes contemporary core, metro, and access networks and their processing algorithmsCovers network processor architectures and programming models, enabling readers to assess the optimal network processor typer and configuration for their applicationFree download from http://www.cse.bgu.ac.il/npbook includes microcode development tools that provide hands-on experience with programming a network processor


Android malware unfortunately have little difficulty to sneak in marketplaces. While known malware and their variants are nowadays quite well detected by antivirus scanners, new unknown malware, which are fundamentally different from others (e.g. "0-day"), remain an issue. To discover such new malware, the SherlockDroid framework filters masses of applications and only keeps the most likely to be malicious for future inspection by antivirus teams. Apart from crawling applications from marketplaces, SherlockDroid extracts code-level features, and then classifies unknown applications with Alligator. Alligator is a classification tool that efficiently and automatically combines several classification algorithms. To demonstrate the efficiency of our approach, we have extracted properties and classified over 600,000 applications during two crawling campaigns in July 2014 and October 2014, with the detection of one new malware, Android/Odpa.A!tr.spy, and two new riskware. With other findings, this increases SherlockDroid's "Hall of Shame" to 9 totally unknown malware and potentially unwanted applications.


Sexual behavior among college students today is significantly different than in the past. Hooking-up captures this difference and getting some satisfaction seems to capture hooking-up. Although this may have always been the intent of college-age men, what seems new is that women are now adopting a similar mantra. The purpose of this study was to assess this trend by measuring sexual subjectivity and sexual objectification in male and female college students. One hundred and ninety one students (105 women, 86 men) took an online survey consisting of 20 items from the Female Sexual Subjectivity Inventory developed by Horne and Zimmerman (2006) and 30 items from the Sexual Objectification Scale – Revised developed by Morse (2007). Gender similarities as well as gender differences were found. Men and women did not differ in self-efficacy in achieving sexual pleasure or sexual objectification. Sexual self-reflection was greater in women than men as was sense of entitlement to sexual pleasure from partner. A major limitation of the study was its unorthodox use of instruments developed to assess sexual subjectivity and objectification in women and men, respectively, in the case of both men and women.


A great deal of interest is placed nowadays in the so called Internet of Things (IoT), it is said to be part of the society of the future where all devices are at the same time connected to the internet and among them. Nevertheless, must of the research devoted to this field has only been focused on the design of devices to operate with air as the surrounding medium. When the medium where the device is supposed to work is different than air, or when this medium has physical and chemical properties that change in time, there's a whole new set of constrains a device embedded in such a medium must meet so its adequate performance is guaranteed. To broaden the application spectrum of this technology, it is required to adequate the design of such devices to meet the requirements of the new medium, while still achieving the performance of the already existing devices. This master thesis studies the case of a RFID sensor embedded in a medium equivalent to concrete. A device adapted to the characteristics of the surrounding environment is designed, manufactured, tested and optimized in both a medium with properties equivalent to the ones of concrete and in concrete itself.


The distance matrix of a dataset $X$ of $n$ points with respect to a distance function $f$ represents all pairwise distances between points in $X$ induced by $f$. Due to their wide applicability, distance matrices and related families of matrices have been the focus of many recent algorithmic works. We continue this line of research and take a broad view of algorithm design for distance matrices with the goal of designing fast algorithms, which are specifically tailored for distance matrices, for fundamental linear algebraic primitives. Our results include efficient algorithms for computing matrix-vector products for a wide class of distance matrices, such as the $\ell_1$ metric for which we get a linear runtime, as well as an $\Omega(n^2)$ lower bound for any algorithm which computes a matrix-vector product for the $\ell_{\infty}$ case, showing a separation between the $\ell_1$ and the $\ell_{\infty}$ metrics. Our upper bound results, in conjunction with recent works on the matrix-vector query model, have many further downstream applications, including the fastest algorithm for computing a relative error low-rank approximation for the distance matrix induced by $\ell_1$ and $\ell_2^2$ functions and the fastest algorithm for computing an additive error low-rank approximation for the $\ell_2$ metric, in addition to applications for fast matrix multiplication among others. We also give algorithms for constructing distance matrices and show that one can construct an approximate $\ell_2$ distance matrix in time faster than the bound implied by the Johnson-Lindenstrauss lemma.


This study examined the development of adolescents' conflict frequency and conflict resolution with their best friends, and tested whether adolescents with different personality types differed in these developmental changes from early to middle adolescence. Dutch adolescents (N = 922, 468 boys; Mage = 12.4 years at first wave) annually filled in questionnaires for five consecutive years. Growth modelling revealed that, whereas adolescents' conflict frequency and hostile conflict resolution did not change, positive problem solving, withdrawal, and compliance during conflict with best friends increased from age 12 to 16 years. Adolescents with different personality types differed in the mean levels of conflict frequency and conflict resolution strategies. That is, resilients had less conflict with friends than undercontrollers and overcontrollers. During conflict, resilients used the least hostile conflict resolution and compliance, and employed the most positive problem solving. Undercontrollers adopted the least positive problem solving, and overcontrollers complied and withdrew the most. Using a person–centred approach, three developmental conflict resolution types were identified based on different constellations of the four conflict resolution strategies over time. Adolescents with different personality types had different distributions on the conflict resolution types. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Motivation, BRCA1 and BRCA2 are genes with tumor suppressor activity. They are involved in a considerable number of biological processes. To help the biologist in tumor classification, we developed a deep learning algorithm. The question when we want to construct a neural network is how many hidden layers and neurons should we use. If the number of inputs and outputs is defined by the problem, the number of hidden layers and neurons is difficult to define. Hidden layers and neurons that make up each layer of the neural network influence the performance of system predictions. There are different methods for finding the optimal architecture. In this paper, we present the two packages that we have developed, the genetic algorithm (GA) and the particle swarm optimization (PSO) to optimize the parameters of the neural network for predicting BRCA1 and BRCA2 pathogenicity; Results, we will compare the results obtained by the two algorithms. We used datasets collected from our NGS analysis of BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes to train deep learning models. It represents a data collection of 11,875 BRCA1 and BRCA2 variants. Our preliminary results show that the PSO provided the most significant architecture of hidden layers and the number of neurons compared to grid search and GA; Conclusions, the optimal architecture found by the PSO algorithm is composed of 6 hidden layers with 275 hidden nodes with an accuracy of 0.98, precision 0.99, recall 0.98, and a specificity of 0.99.


We propose a novel method for model-based 3D tracking of hand articulations that is effective even for fastmoving hand postures in depth images. A large number of augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) studies have used model-based approaches for estimating hand postures and tracking movements. However, these approaches exhibit limitations if the hand moves rapidly or into the camera's field of view. To overcome these problems, researchers attempted a hybrid strategy that uses multiple initializations for 3D tracking of articulations. However, this strategy also exhibits limitations. For example, in genetic optimization, the hypotheses generated from the previous solution may search for a solution in an incorrect search space in a fast-moving hand gesture. This problem also occurs if the search space selected from the results of a trained model does not cover the true solution although the tracked hand moves slowly. Our proposed method estimates the hand pose based on model-based tracking guided by classification and search space adaptation. From the classification by a convolutional neural network (CNN), a data-driven prior is included in the objective function and additional hypotheses are generated in particle swarm optimization (PSO). In addition, the search spaces of the two sets of the hypotheses, generated by the data-driven prior and the previous solution, are adaptively updated using the distribution of each set of the hypotheses. We demonstrated the effectiveness of the proposed method by applying it to an American Sign Language (ASL) dataset consisting of fast-moving hand postures. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm exhibits more accurate tracking results compared to other state-of-the-art tracking algorithms.


In a previous paper (Mounsey, 1966) the genesis of praecordial pulsations in health and disease was examined. The normal, short, outward impulse at the apex reflected underlying early systolic outward movement of the underlying ventricle as visualized in the lateral angiocardiogram. The sustained impulse of left ventricular hypertrophy was seen in the angiocardiogram to be due to failure of retraction of the antero-apical portion of the left ventricle in late systole. In cardiac aneurysm where a sustained impulse is also met, paradoxical pulsation of the aneurysm with failure of late systolic retraction accounted for the abnormal impulse. Marked systolic retraction of the cardiac impulse was met in two important conditions, tricuspid incompetence and constrictive pericarditis. The high stroke-output of the dilated right ventricle in tricuspid incompetence with both forward and backward ejection of blood accounted for systolic retraction at the apex in this condition. In constrictive pericarditis, on the other hand, in cases where the process involves predominantly the atrioventricular groove and outflow tract regions, the relatively free surface of the anterior wall of the right ventricle may show compensatory increased movement with marked systolic retraction and diastolic expansion, themselves in turn transmitted to the praecordium. The giant atrial beat of hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy reflected increased atrioventricular transport function as was shown in the timed cineangiocardiogram. In the present paper, details of the form of the cardiac impulse in health and disease are described. These have been recorded with an instrument measuring absolute displacement, the impulse cardiograph (Beilin & Mounsey, 1962). The impulse cardiogram aims at being a graphic record of what the physician's hand and fingers feel.


Article Title: The Role of Noninvasive Tests in Clinical Gastroenterology Practices to Identify Patients With Non-Alcoholic Steatohepatitis at High Risk for Adverse Outcomes: Expert Panel Recommendations.


Lip reconstruction is a challenge to the plastic surgeon. The lips are the dynamic center of the lower third of the face, being essential for facial movements and expression, speech, deglutition, suction, and containment of salivary secretions, as well as esthetic appearance. Therefore, the objective of lip reconstruction should be functional recovery of the damaged structure and a good esthetic result. This article reports a case of severe traumatic labial injury and reconstruction, using the Karapandzic flap. The authors demonstrate its functionality and easy implementation as well as the final result. ■ ABSTRACT


In the United States, the implementation of a successful system of mandated reporting of suspected child abuse continues to be plagued by the absence of a clear standard for when one must report. All 50 states of the U.S. have laws requiring certain individuals to report suspected child abuse. However, at present, there are variable thresholds for mandated reporting and no clear consensus on how existing thresholds should be interpreted. Because "child abuse" is often present as a possible etiology for injuries and non-infectious conditions that beset children, it is problematic to suggest that "the mere possibility of child abuse" qualifies as cause to report. In an effort to move toward a more effective system of mandated reporting of child maltreatment, this paper discusses how the absence of a clear threshold affects mandated reporters, examines the relevant legal and conceptual issues, and suggests future directions for policy, practice, and research. Language: en


In Industry 4.0, a network of enterprises and factories is constructed collaboratively and dynamically according to the cyber physical system (CPS) paradigm. It is necessary to build smart supply chains according to this concept. A network of component enterprises in a supply chain would be modeled as a virtual supply chain in the cyber world. From the viewpoint of Industry 4.0, virtualizing a supply chain is the foundation for constructing a CPS for a supply chain. The virtualization of a supply chain makes it easier for companies to study their integrating and expanding opportunities. By using this CPS, comprehensive and autonomous optimization of the supply chain can be achieved. This virtual supply chain can be used to simulate the planning phase with negotiation, as well as the production phase. In this paper, instead of specific mathematical modeling for each supply chain, a general configuration method of a virtual supply chain is proposed. The configuration method of a supply chain model is proposed as a virtual supply chain using enterprise e-catalogues. A virtual supply chain is constructed as a multi-agent system, which is connections of software agents that are automatically created from each selected enterprise model in the e-catalogues. Three types of component enterprise models are provided: manufacturer model, part/material supplier model, and retailer model. Modeling templates for these three types of enterprises are prepared, and each template is a nominal model in terms of enterprise's behavior. Specific component-enterprise models are prepared by filling the appropriate template. Each component enterprise agent is implemented using the enterprise model selected from the catalogues. Manufacturer, retailer, and supplier e-catalogues, as well as an automatic construction system of a virtual supply chain, are implemented. Methods for developing templates for the manufacturer, retailer and supplier were provided, and the construction system for specific enterprise models (as e-catalogues) is implemented as a trial.


With healthcare representing a significant portion of the global economy, it is important to be able to understand the environmental impacts of this industry due to its size and nature of its operations. Interviews with people who have intimate knowledge of the healthcare industry indicate that significant efforts and advances have been made over the past ten to fifteen years in developing environmental impact assessment methods and tools tailored for the sector. These methods and tools have been important in helping to improve the overall environmental sustainability of the sector. However, comprehensive literature searches reveal that only a limited portion of the environmental impact assessment work has been published and/or is publicly available. This lack of visibility to the full scope of environmental impact assessment methods and the results of application of those methods can impair the advancement of these methods. To help facilitate further advancement of environmental assessment methodologies in the healthcare sector, Ghent University and the European Commission's Joint Research Centre, Sustainability Assessment Unit (JRC IES SA) undertook a study to map current challenges in conducting assessments, identify best practices in assessing and advancing the state-of-the-art, and to develop recommendations and priority action points based on the study learning. The study was accomplished through: (1) conducting a thorough literature review; (2) broad engagement of healthcare sector stakeholders, including industry, academia, NGOs, policy makers, GPs, patients, etc.; (3) execution of a stakeholder survey; (4) expert interviews; and (5) roundtable discussions with sustainability professionals in the field. Upon identifying the bottlenecks in current practices, four recommendations and key action points were determined: (1) the integration of the complete healthcare pathway within system boundaries; (2) the establishment of life cycle databases for pharmaceuticals and supplied resources; (3) the integration of LCA calculations directly into Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems to work with primary data as much as possible; and, (4) the need to further harmonize developments in the field. The authors provide suggested actions to address the recommendations and propose this work as guidance to steer further research and developments in academia, industry and policy environments in order to serve and support decision making processes.


Research was carried out with 'Arch', a third party hate incident reporting scheme in the North East of England, through which we were given access to data concerning reported and recorded incidents collected in Sunderland and Newcastle between 2005-2015. The data set comprises 3908 incidents in total, making this the largest data set of its kind in the UK. The data was cleaned to allow for statistical analysis defining the data through key variables including categories of hate incident (racist/religious based, homophobic/transphobic and disablist). This allowed observations regarding: similarities and differences between incident types in this region; the value of this type of model for recording and responding to hate incidents/crimes; and consideration of the role of frontline organisations, including Arch, in challenging hate incidents/crime.


Abstract Objective: This study tested how media, family, and peer sources of health and beauty information predict indoor tanning (IT) beliefs and behavior. Participants: 210 undergraduate women at a state university in the southeastern United States. Methods: Respondents completed a survey about sources of health and beauty information, IT beliefs, and IT behavior. Correlations and a path model were used to test associations between variables. Results: Friends were positively and family were negatively associated with positive outcome expectations, with mood enhancement beliefs positively predicting behavior. Reliance on news positively predicted appearance damage and immediate risk, which both predicted behavior. Reliance on social media was negatively associated with beliefs about immediate risks. Conclusion: Health and beauty information from social media and from friends may promote beliefs about tanning, while information from news or one's family may reduce risky beliefs. Prevention efforts could leverage information sources to shift tanning beliefs and behavior.


Methods for Knowledge Base Completion (KBC) reason about a knowledge base (KB) in order to derive new facts that should be included in the KB. This is challenging for two reasons. First, KBs only contain positive examples. This complicates model evaluation which needs both positive and negative examples. Second, those facts that were selected to be included in the knowledge base, are most likely not an i.i.d. sample of the true facts, due to the way knowledge bases are constructed. In this paper, we focus on rule-based approaches, which traditionally address the first challenge by making assumptions that enable identifying negative examples, which in turn makes it possible to compute a rule's confidence or precision. However, they largely ignore the second challenge, which means that their estimates of a rule's confidence can be biased. This paper approaches rule-based KBC through the lens of PU-learning, which can cope with both challenges. We make three contributions.: (1) We provide a unifying view that formalizes the relationship between multiple existing confidences measures based on (i) what assumption they make about and (ii) how their accuracy
 depends on the selection mechanism. (2) We introduce two new confidence measures that can mitigate known biases by using propensity scores that quantify how likely a fact is to be included the KB. (3) We show through theoretical and empirical analysis that taking the bias into account improves the confidence estimates, even when the propensity scores are not known exactly.


Fully grown larvae have been described of chalcidoids belonging to four genera, viz., Torymus Dalman (Torymidae), Aprostocetus Westwood (Eulophidae), Psilonotus Walker (Pteromalidae) and Eupelmus Dalman (Eupelmidae), all parasitoids of gall midges of the genus Semudobia Kieffer (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae), associated with fruit catkins of birch, Betula. Identification keys are provided for mature larvae as well as adults. Phenology and host-parasitoid associations have been analysed from samples collected in The Netherlands at about sea level and from western Germany at an altitude of 760 m. Finally, possible patterns of co-speciation have been discussed for gall midge hosts and parasitoids.


This paper presents an automatic image segmentation method for polarimetric synthetic aperture radar data. It utilizes the full polarimetric information and incorporates texture by modeling with a non-Gaussian distribution for the complex scattering coefficients. The modeling is based upon the well-known product model, with a Gamma-distributed texture parameter leading to the K-Wishart model for the covariance matrix. The automatic clustering is achieved through a finite mixture model estimated with a modified expectation maximization algorithm. We include an additional goodness-of-fit test stage that allows for splitting and merging of clusters. This not only improves the model fit of the clusters, but also dynamically selects the appropriate number of clusters. The resulting image segmentation depicts the statistically significant clusters within the image. A key feature is that the degree of sub-sampling of the input image will affect the detail level of the clustering, revealing only the major classes or a variable level of detail. Real-world examples are shown to demonstrate the technique.


In this paper, we characterize the polarization impedance behavior of several common metals in diluted NaCl solution operated at low current densities. The objective was to provide a useful reference for those wishing to calculate the electrode polarization impedance in diluted NaCl solutions. Serial equivalent resistance (R) and capacitance (C) for silver, aluminum, gold, platinum, and medical stainless-steel were measured as a function of frequency ( - Hz) and NaCl concentration (2.4-77.0 mmol/L). The ratio of electrode polarization impedance with respect to the bulk resistance was calculated and plotted against concentration for each metal. Such a ratio shows the effect of the electrode polarization contribution as a function of electrolyte concentration when the bulk resistance of the solution changes. All metals showed a decrease of serial resistance and capacitance as a function of frequency. The medical stainless-steel electrode showed largest impedance values at lower frequencies compared to the other electrodes, and was concen- tration independent at all frequencies. Aluminum had smallest polarization impedance at low frequencies. Pure gold and plat- inum behaved similar with the exception that the serial resistance for gold showed a lower value at higher frequencies.


BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE
During periodontitis or orthodontic tooth movement, the periodontal vasculature is severely impaired by chronic inflammation or excessive mechanical force. This leads to a hypoxic microenvironment of the periodontal cells and enhances the expression of various cytokines and growth factors that may regulate angiogenesis and alveolar bone remodeling. However, the role of hypoxia in regulating the communication between endothelial cells (ECs) and osteoblast progenitors during the remodeling and repair of periodontal tissue is still poorly defined. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of vascular ECs on osteogenic differentiation, mineralization and the paracrine function of noncontact co-cultured periodontal ligament stem cells (PDLSCs) under hypoxia, and further reveal the involvement of MEK/ERK and p38 MAPK pathways in the process.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
First, PDLSCs were obtained and a noncontact co-culture system of PDLSCs and human umbilical vein endothelial cells was established. Second, the effects of different time-periods of hypoxia (2% O(2) ) on the osteogenic potential, mineralization and paracrine function of co-cultured PDLSCs were investigated. Third, ERK1/2 and p38 MAPK activities of PDLSCs under hypoxia were measured by western blotting. Finally, we employed specific MAPK inhibitors (PD98059 and SB20350) to investigate the involvement of ERK1/2 and p38 MAPK in PDLSC osteogenesis under hypoxia.

RESULTS
We observed further increased osteogenic differentiation of co-cultured PDLSCs, manifested by markedly enhanced alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity and prostaglandin E(2) (PGE(2)) levels, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) release, runt-related transcription factor 2 (Runx2) and Sp7 transcriptional and protein levels and mineralized nodule formation, compared with PDLSCs cultured alone. ERK1/2 was phosphorylated in a rapid but transient manner, whereas p38 MAPK was activated in a slow and sustained way under hypoxia. Furthermore, hypoxia-stimulated transcription and expression of osteogenic regulators (hypoxia-inducible factor-1α, ALP, Runx2, Sp7, PGE(2) and VEGF) were also inhibited by PD98059 and SB203580 to different degrees.

CONCLUSION
Further increased osteogenic differentiation and mineralization of co-cultured PDLSCs under hypoxia were regulated by MEK/ERK and p38 MAPK pathways. And the ECs-mediated paracrine of PGE(2) and VEGF may facilitate the unidirectional PDLSC-EC communication and promote PDLSCs osteogenesis.


It has long been recognized that using multiple approaches to solve problems is essential for students to obtain understanding of mathematical concepts. In view of this, we consider an interesting plane geometry problem with a straightforward formulation, known as the one-seventh area triangle or Feyman's triangle problem. We present solutions using GeoGebra constructions and manipulation, coordinate geometry, Euclidean geometry and linear algebra. This allows students to apply many of the tools they acquired at the secondary level and to make important and crucial connections between them. The linear algebra section can be used as an introduction to the subject. This section can also reinforce the close relationship between linear algebra and geometry which might not receive enough emphasis at the undergraduate level. GeoGeobra diagrams, constructions and computer algebra are used throughout the paper. All explanations are done through questions and answers which allows instructors to easily format the sections into inquiry-based lessons.


Trichloroethene (TCE) was detected in cores of trees growing above TCE‐contaminated ground at three sites: the Carswell Golf Course in Texas, Air Force Plant PJKS in Colorado, and Naval Weapons Station Charleston in South Carolina. This was true even when the depth to water was 7.9 m or when the contaminated aquifer was confined beneath ∼3 m of clay. Additional ground water contaminants detected in the tree cores were cis–1,2‐dichloroethene at two sites and tetrachloroethene at one site. Thus, tree coring can be a rapid and effective means of locating shallow subsurface chlorinated ethenes and possibly identifying zones of active TCE dechlorination. Tree cores collected over time were useful in identifying the onset of ground water contamination. Several factors affecting chlorinated ethene concentrations in tree cores were identified in this investigation. The factors include ground water chlorinated ethene concentrations and depth to ground water contamination. In addition, differing TCE concentrations around the trunk of some trees appear to be related to the roots deriving water from differing areas. Opportunistic uptake of infiltrating rainfall can dilute prerain TCE concentrations in the trunk. TCE concentrations in core headspace may differ among some tree species. In some trees, infestation of bacteria in decaying heartwood may provide a TCE dechlorination mechanism within the trunk.


Most states enacted shelter-in-place orders (SIPOs) in mitigating the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Emerging evidence indicates SIPOs have reduced COVID-19 cases. Using data starting at different dates in March through May 15, 2020, we examine effects of SIPOs on daily growth rates of COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations using event study models. We find that SIPOs reduced the daily mortality growth rate after nearly three weeks from enactment, and the daily growth rate of hospitalizations two weeks after enactment. After 42 days from enactment, the daily mortality growth rate declined by up to 6.1 percentage points. Projections suggest as many as 250,000-370,000 deaths possibly averted by May 15 in the 42 states plus the District of Columbia with statewide SIPOs. The daily hospitalization growth rate examined in 19 states with SIPOs and 3 states without SIPOs with data on hospitalizations has declined by up to 8.4 percentage points after 42 days. This evidence suggests that SIPOs have been effective in reducing the daily growth rates of COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations. [Editor's Note: This Fast Track Ahead Of Print article is the accepted version of the peer-reviewed manuscript. The final edited version will appear in an upcoming issue of Health Affairs.].


Many companies have historically forced their interests through without any thoughts about the future needs of the humans and the society. In the last few years voices have been raised for a change, companies need to take their responsibility regarding sustainable development.The purpose of the report is to describe and explain possible relations between sustainabil-ity performance of companies and profitability, valuation, industry and size respectively.To be able to judge the sustainability performance of the companies Folksam (2006a) have been used. This is a solid investigation of the companies listed on the A- and O-lists of the Stockholm Stock Exchange by the end of 2005. The sustainability marks have been com-pared with the chosen key values for each hypothesis respectively. With this quantitative data as foundation, a quantitative approach and a deductive method have been used.In the first area of the investigation, profitability, the authors found correlation for the main hypothesis between sustainability performance and "Return on Total Assets" through a statistical test. The level of significance was very good and the correlation was lightly positive. The sub hypothesises showed no significance why a conclusion of relationship could not be drawn. Earlier studies in the area have mostly reported about positive relations which consequently are not supported. Regarding company valuation, the p/e-ratio is the most used key value and has therefore been chosen as main hypothesis. This investigation showed the best possible level of significance and a good, negative correlation. Further on the sub hypothesis did not show any significance. As the p/e-ratio is the key value of most importance the authors states a relationship between sustainability performance and valuation. This conclusion is in line with the earlier Swedish report by Hassel et.al. (2005) but contradicts the result from several foreign studies. The third investigation about the re-lationship between sustainability performance and industry showed a significant relation-ship. The industries which had the best sustainability performance were the Forest industry followed by "Vehicles & Mechanical engineering", "Building" and "Mining & Metal". Among the worst placed were different service industries like "IT", "Media & Entertain-ment" and "Services". This supports the theories which state that those with the highest risk regarding the influence on the environment and human rights also perform the best sustainability work. The last investigation was about the relationship between sustainability performance and the size of companies. The correlation test showed a palpable relation which also corresponds with the theories in the area. The relationship between sustainability performance and company size is positive.


Contents: Preface. Part I: Foundations of School Violence and Safety. S.R. Jimerson, G.M. Morrison, S.W. Pletcher, M.J. Furlong, Youth Engaged in Antisocial and Aggressive Behaviors: Who Are They? M.K. Demaray, C.K. Malecki, L.K. DeLong, Support in the Lives of Aggressive Students, Their Victims, and Their Peers. K.A. Bailey, Legal Knowledge Related to School Violence and School Safety. D. Osher, K. Dwyer, S.R. Jimerson, Safe, Supportive, and Effective Schools: Promoting School Success to Reduce School Violence. J. Larson, R.T. Busse, A Problem-Solving Approach to School Violence Prevention. A.B. Nickerson, K.M. Osborne, Crisis Preparedness, Response, and Management: Surveys of School Professionals. R.A. Astor, R. Benbenishty, R. Marachi, Making the Case for an International Perspective on School Violence: Implications for Theory, Research, Policy, and Assessment. Part II: Assessment and Measurement. J.D. Sharkey, M.J. Furlong, G. Yetter, An Overview of Measurement Issues in School Violence and School Safety Research. D.C. Smith, M.J. Furlong, P. Boman, Assessing Anger and Hostility in School Settings. M.R. Randazzo, R. Borum, B. Vossekuil, R. Fein, W. Modzeleski, W. Pollack, Threat Assessment in Schools: Empirical Support and Comparison With Other Approaches. R. Skiba, A.B. Simmons, R. Peterson, S. Forde, The SRS Safe Schools Survey: A Broader Perspective on School Violence Prevention. M.J. Mayer, The Current State of Methodological Knowledge and Emerging Practice in Evidence-Based Evaluation: Applications to School Violence Prevention Research. D.G. Cornell, P.L. Sheras, J.C.M. Cole, Assessment of Bullying. G.M. Morrison, M. Redding, E. Fisher, R. Peterson, Assessing School Discipline. R.A. Astor, R. Benbenishty, R. Marachi, H.A. Meyer, The Social Context of Schools: Monitoring and Mapping Student Victimization in Schools. M.J. Furlong, J.D. Sharkey, A Review of Methods to Assess Student Self-Report of Weapons on School Campuses. Part III: Research-Based Prevention and Intervention Programs. S.M. Swearer, J. Peugh, D.L. Espelage, A.B. Siebecker, W.L. Kingsbury, K.S. Bevins, A Socialecological Model for Bullying Prevention and Intervention in Early Adolescence: An Exploratory Examination. R.J. Hazler, J.V. Carney, Critical Characteristics of Effective Bullying Prevention Programs. S.P. Limber, The Olweus Bullying Prevention Program: An Overview of Its Implementation and Research Basis. M. Hirschstein, K.S. Frey, Promoting Behavior and Beliefs That Reduce Bullying: The Steps to Respect Program. K. Rigby, What We Can Learn From Evaluated Studies of School-Based Programs to Reduce Bullying in Schools. R.J. DioGuardi, L.A. Theodore, Understanding and Addressing Peer Victimization Among Students. E.L. Feindler, S. Weisner, Youth Anger Management Treatments for School Violence Prevention. D.C. Smith, J. Larson, D.R. Nuckles, A Critical Analysis of School-Based Anger Management Programs for Youth. P.D. Fitzgerald, L. Van Schoiack Edstrom, Second Step: A Violence Prevention Curriculum. M.T. Greenberg, C.A. Kuscha', Building Social and Emotional Competence: The PATHS Curriculum. J.R. Sprague, R.H. Horner, Schoolwide Positive Behavioral Supports. J. Derzon, How Effective Are School-Based Violence Prevention Programs in Preventing and Reducing Violence and Other Antisocial Behaviors? A Meta-Analysis. S.E. Brock, S.R. Jimerson, S.R. Hart, Preventing, Preparing for, and Responding to School Violence With the National Incident Management System. Part IV: Implementing Comprehensive Safe School Plans. C. Griffiths, T. Weatherilt, Creating a Safe and Friendly School: Using a 360-Degree Approach. R. Benbenishty, R.A. Astor, R. Marachi, A National Study of School Violence in Israel: Implications for Theory, Practice, and Policy. R.S.L. Guzzo, F. Lacerda, Jr., A.E. Filho, School Violence in Brazil: A Psycholocial Perspective. J.A. Welsh, C.E. Domitrovich, The Safe Schools, Healthy Students Initiative in Rural Pennsylvania. K.H. Armstrong, O.T. Massey, M. Boroughs, Implementing Comprehensive Safe School Plans in Pinellas County Schools, Florida: Planning, Implementation, Operation, Sustainability, and Lessons Learned. G.G. Bear, S.P. Giancola, L.S. Goetz, J.P. Veach, Beyond Face Fidelity: When Less Is More. L.Z. Paige, S.N. Kitzis, J. Wolfe, J. Kitson, Implementing the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative in Kansas. S. Telleen, Y.O.R. Kim, H. Stewart-Nava, R.C. Pesce, S. Maher, Implementing Comprehensive Safe School Plans: Effective School and Community Mental Health Collaborations to Reduce Youth Violence. D. Cornell, F. Williams, Student Threat Assessment as a Strategy to Reduce School Violence. R.B. Van Dyke, J.L. Schroeder, Implementation of the Dallas Threat of Violence Risk Assessment. L. Delizonna, I. Alan, H. Steiner, A Case Example of a School Shooting: Lessons Learned in the Wake of Tragedy. R. Skiba, S. Ritter, A. Simmons, R. Peterson, C. Miller, The Safe and Responsive Schools Project: A School Reform Model for Implementing Best Practices in Violence Prevention.


Polyaniline (PAni) is an example of a conducting polymer that can be switched between an insulating and a conductive state. This switching is accompanied by a colour change. Recently, interest has developed in the nanofibre form of PAni as these low dimensional structures have a very high surface area, thus enabling a faster response time. We investigate how the surface chemistry of these nanofibres can be modified by covalently attaching functional side-groups. In particular, we demonstrate the attachment of both amide and carboxylic acid groups. This can be achieved using a simple reflux technique. The modified material retains its nanomorphology and the intrinsic electrochemical, spectroscopic and redox properties of PAni are also preserved. Both acid and amine side-groups are interesting in that they provide a template, which could be further altered to enhance the selectivity of PAni. Acid terminated chains can also be used to introduce self-doping behaviour to PAni.


We investigated isotropization and thermalization of the quark-gluon plasma produced by decaying color-electric flux tubes created at the very early stages of ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions. The dynamical evolution of the initial classical field, which decays to a plasma by the Schwinger mechanism, is coupled to the dynamics of the many particles system produced. The evolution of such a system is described by relativistic transport theory at fixed values of the viscosity over entropy density ratio. With a single self-consistent computation we obtained quantities which serve as indicators of the equilibration of the plasma for a 1+1 dimensional expanding geometry and for the more realistic 3+1 dimensional case. We find that the initial color-electric field decays within 1 fm/c and particles production occurs in less than 1 fm/c; however, in the case of large viscosity oscillations of the field appear along the whole time evolution of the system, affecting also the behaviour of the ratio between longitudinal and transverse pressure. In case of small viscosity we find that the isotropization time is about 0.8 fm/c and the thermalization time is about 1 fm/c, in agreement with the common lore of hydrodynamics.


This paper reports the design process for the manufacture of higher-power rare-earth permanent-magnet (PM) motors using postassembly magnetization. Difficulties can be encountered in production using normal manufacturing processes due to the high intensity of rare-earth magnets that are premagnetized. Postassembly magnetization utilizes the stator windings of a PM motor to magnetize the magnets after assembly. With this method, some parameters, such as slot-fill factor, number of turns, wire diameter, etc., must be considered for the magnetization and motor operation. In this paper, a design process that incorporates the design considerations for postassembly magnetization (for complete magnetization) together with the design requirements is described for successful motor operation. A 6-kW surface-mounted PM (SPM) motor is designed using the proposed process as a demonstration, which is verified using finite-element analysis. Another 400-W SPM motor is also designed for experimental purpose. The experimental results validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.


An inverse-scattering algorithm (ISA) based on integral-equation formulation is used as an inverse coarse model in the space-mapping inverse-difference (SMID) method and named as ISA-based SMID (ISA-SMID). The enhancement of ISA-SMID optimization over inverse-scattering algorithms is tested. To this aim, extraction of dielectric profile problem is examined with ISA-SMID, which is obtained by the hybridization of SMID and Newton-based inverse-scattering algorithm. The method of moments solution of integral equation is used in the utilized inverse algorithm for the reconstruction of complex permittivity of the inhomogeneous object loaded in the waveguide.


We advance a simple framework based on "time of detection" for estimating the observational needs of studies assessing climate changes amidst natural variability and apply it to several examples related to ocean acidification. This approach aims to connect the Global Ocean Acidification Observing Network "weather" and "climate" data quality thresholds with a single dynamic threshold appropriate for a range of potential ocean signals and environments. A key implication of the framework is that measurement frequency can be as important as measurement accuracy, particularly in highly variable environments. Pragmatic cost‐benefit analyses based on this framework can be performed to quantitatively determine which observing strategy will accomplish a given detection goal soonest and resolve a signal with the greatest confidence and to assess how the trade‐offs between measurement frequency and accuracy vary regionally.


Author(s): Sletten, Ellen | Advisor(s): Bertozzi, Carolyn R | Abstract: Bioorthogonal is defined as not interfering or interacting with biology. Chemical reactions that are bioorthogonal have recently become valuable tools to visualize biomolecules in their native environments, particularly those that are not amenable to traditional genetic modification. The field of bioorthogonal chemistry is rather young, with the first published account of the term bioorthogonal in 2003, yet it is expanding at a rapid rate. The roots of this unique subset of chemistry are in classic protein modification and subsequent bioconjugation efforts to obtain uniformly and site-specifically functionalized proteins. These studies are highlighted in Chapter 1. Chapter 2 opens with a summary of the bioorthogonal chemical reporter strategy, a two-step approach where a bioorthogonal functional group is installed into a biomolecule of interest, most often using endogenous metabolic machinery, and detected through a secondary covalent reaction with an appropriately functionalized chemical partner. It is this chemical reporter strategy that empowers bioorthogonal chemistry and allows for a wide variety of biological species to be assayed. Chapter 2 proceeds to outline the discovery of the Staudinger ligation, the first chemical reaction developed for use in the bioorthogonal chemical reporter strategy. The Staudinger ligation employed the azide as the chemical reporter group and, since its debut in 2000, many laboratories have capitalized on the exquisite qualities of the azide (small, abiotic, kinetically stable) that make it a versatile chemical reporter group. The success of the azide prompted the development of other bioorthogonal chemistries for this functional group. One of these chemistries, Cu-free click chemistry, is the 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition between cyclooctynes and azides. The cycloaddition is promoted at physiological conditions by the ~18 kcal/mol of ring strain contained within cyclooctyne, and further modifications to the cyclooctyne reagents have lead to increased reactivity through augmentation of the ring strain or optimization of orbital overlap. When I began my graduate work, a difluorinated cyclooctyne (DIFO), which was 60-fold more reactive than other existing bioorthogonal chemistries, had just been synthesized and employed for labeling azides on live cells and within living mice. DIFO performed very well on cultured cells, but it was outperformed by the slower Staudinger ligation in the more complex environment of the mouse. We hypothesized that DIFO was too hydrophobic to be effective in mice and designed a more hydrophilic cyclooctyne reagent, a dimethoxyazacyclooctyne (DIMAC). DIMAC was synthesized in nine steps in a 10% overall yield (Chapter 3). As predicted, DIMAC displayed reaction kinetics similar to early generation cyclooctynes, but exhibited improved water-solubility. Consequently, DIMAC labeled cell-surface azides with comparable efficiencies to the early generation cyclooctynes but greater signal-to-noise ratios were achieved due to minimal background staining. Encouraged by these results, we assayed the ability for DIMAC to label azides in living mice and found that DIMAC was able to modify azides in vivo with moderate signal over background. However, the Staudinger ligation was still the superior bioorthogonal reaction for labeling azides in vivo. Our results collectively indicated that both hydrophilicity and reactivity are important qualities when optimizing the cyclooctynes for in vivo reaction with azides (Chapter 4).We were also interested in modifying DIMAC so that it would become fluorescent upon reaction with an azide. Previous work in the lab had established that fluorogenic reagents could be easily created if a functional group was cleaved from the molecule upon reaction with an azide. We envisioned a leaving group could be engineered into the azacyclooctyne scaffold by strategically positioning a labile functional group across the ring from a nitrogen atom. The cyclooctyne structure should be stable, as it is rigid and intramolecular reactions are not favorable. However, upon reaction with an azide, a significant amount of strain is liberated and the intramolecular reaction should readily occur. Efforts toward the synthesis of this modified DIMAC reagent are chronicled in Chapter 5.Chapter 6 is a very short account of our early work to use DIFO-based reagents for proteomics. The results contained in this chapter are preliminary and further endeavors towards this goal are underway by others within the group.Chapters 7, 8 and 9 are devoted to strategies to increase the second-order rate constant of Cu-free click chemistry. In Chapter 7, various routes toward a tetrafluorinated cyclooctyne are outlined, although none of them successfully yielded this putatively highly reactive cyclooctyne. Chapter 8 describes the synthesis of a difluorobenzocyclooctyne (DIFBO), which is more reactive than DIFO, but unstable due to its propensity to form trimer products. However, DIFBO can be kinetically stabilized by encapsulation in beta-cyclodextrin. Only beta-cyclodextrin and not the smaller (alpha) or larger (gamma) cyclodextrins were able to protect DIFBO. We did observe an intriguing result when complexation with the larger gamma-cyclodextrin was attempted. It appears as though two DIFBO molecules can fit inside the gamma-cyclodextrin and dimeric products, which were not apparent in the absence of gamma-cyclodextrin, were observed. We hypothesized that all oligomer products of DIFBO were derived from a common cyclobutadiene intermediate. While DIFBO was chemically interesting, it was not a useful reagent for labeling azides in biological settings. Thus, Chapter 9 is devoted to the modification of DIFBO, with the aim of identifying a reactive yet stable cyclooctyne. The data from Chapter 9 suggest we are rapidly approaching the reactivity/stability limit for cyclooctyne reagents. The results contained within Chapters 7-9 indicated that it was time to explore other bioorthogonal chemistries. When embarking on the development of a new bioorthogonal chemical reaction, we aimed to explore unrepresented reactivity space, such that the new reaction would be orthogonal to existing bioorthogonal chemistries. We became attracted to the highly strained hydrocarbon quadricyclane and performed a screen to find a suitable reactive partner for this potential chemical reporter group (Chapter 10). Through this analysis, we discovered that quadricyclane cleanly reacts with Ni bis(dithiolene) reagents and this transformation appeared to be a good prototype for a new bioorthogonal chemical reaction. After a thorough mechanistic investigation and many rounds of modification to the Ni bis(dithiolene) species, a nickel complex with suitable reaction kinetics, water-solubility, and stability was obtained (Chapter 11). Gratifyingly, this Ni bis(dithiolene) reagent selectively modified quadricyclane-labeled bovine serum albumin, even in the presence of cell lysate (Chapter 12). Other results in Chapter 12 highlight that this new bioorthogonal ligation reaction is indeed orthogonal to Cu-free click chemistry as well as oxime ligation chemistry. Additionally, quadricyclane-dependent labeling is observed on live cells, although further optimization is necessary.The final chapter of this dissertation outlines the current state of the field. There are now many methods to modify biomolecules including several new, although relatively untested, bioorthogonal chemistries. The rapid pace of this field makes it an exciting time to be pursuing bioorthogonal chemistry.


The J -integral is widely used as a fracture parameter for elastic-plastic materials. The J -integral describes the intensity of the stress field close to the crack tip in a power-law hardening material under a set of well-known restrictions. This study investigates what happens when one of these restrictions is broken, namely the requirement for no unloading to occur. In this work, a centre-cracked plate is subjected to a single cycle of load in which unloading occurs. A remote tensile stress is applied, then released, then applied again up to and beyond its initial magnitude. The J -integral at each step of the analysis is calculated using finite element analysis. Its validity as a fracture parameter at each step is discussed with the aid of results from a strip yield analysis of the same problem. The relevance of the results in the context of structural integrity assessment is discussed.


The Chatham Rise is a highly productive deep-sea ecosystem that supports numerous substantial commercial fisheries, and is therefore a likely candidate for an ecosystem based approach to fisheries management in New Zealand. This thesis describes model construction, calibration and validation, for the first end-to-end ecosystem model of the Chatham Rise, New Zealand. The work extends beyond what has previously been done for validating such models, and explores uncertainty analyses through bootstrapping the oceanographic variables, perturbing the model's initial conditions, and analysing species interaction effects, with the results further analysed with respect to known data gaps. This enables the inclusion of uncertainty in simulated scenarios using the Chatham Rise Atlantis model, thus providing an envelope of results with which to analyse and understand the likely responses of the Chatham Rise ecosystem. The model was designed with 24 dynamic polygons, 5 water column depth bins, 55 species functional groups, and used 12-hour timesteps. The transfer of energy was tracked throughout the system using nitrogen as the model's main currency. The model simulated the system from 1900–2015, preceded by a 35 year burn-in period. The model produced very similar biomass trajectories in response to historical fishing to corresponding fisheries stock assessment models for key fisheries species. Population dynamics and system interactions were considered realistic with respect to growth rates, mortality rates, diets and species group interactions. The model was found to be generally stable under perturbations to the initial conditions, with lower trophic level species groups having the most variability. The specification of the Spawning Stock Recruitment curve was explored, as it relates to the multi-species and ecosystem models within which it is now applied. Close attention needs to be given to population dynamics specific to multi-species interactions such as predation-release, in particular the Spawning Stock Recruitment curve. Potentially misleading dynamics under predation-release were identified, and the simple solution of applying a cap to recruitment when biomass exceeds virgin levels was explored. The population dynamics of myctophids under fishing induced predation release were analysed with and without limiting recruitment to virgin levels. The effects were evident in several ecosystem indicators, suggesting unintentional mis-specification could lead to erroneous model results. It raises several questions around the specification of the Spawning Stock Recruitment relationship for multispecies models, and more generally, whether the concept of 'virgin' (or 'unfished') biomass should be reconsidered to reflect dynamic natural mortality and potentially changing unfished states. The model components that had knowledge gaps and were found to most likely to influence model results were the initial conditions, oceanographic variables, and the aggregate species groups 'seabird' and 'cetacean other'. It is recommended that applications of the model, such as forecasting biomasses under various fishing regimes, should include alternatives that vary these components, and present appropriate levels of uncertainty in results. Initial conditions should be perturbed, with greater variability applied to species groups modelled as biomass-pools, and age-structured species groups that have little data available from the literature.


Charts are presented showing the correlation of graptolite biozonations for the Lower Ordovician to Lower Devonian, i.e. for the entire stratigraphical range of the planktonic graptoloid graptolites. Regions chosen are those for which the most detailed biostratigraphical studies have been undertaken. For Baltica, average graptolite zone (chron) duration appears to vary from c. 300 000 years (Ludlow Epoch) to 2.4 Ma (Lochkovian Epoch).


PFAS layers consist of Public Land Survey System (PLSS) data and are primarily Townships and Sections, and can also contain additional features such as special surveys including metes and bounds areas, un-surveyed areas, water, French long lots and Texas Tracts.


A frequent scenario in public decision-making is that of choosing between a number of proposed changes from the status quo. In such a case, stated preference surveys, such as the contingent valuation method, are often undertaken to assess the size of the benefits associated with each proposed change. For certain undesirable options, respondents may prefer the status quo; however, it may not be credible to directly elicit negative willingness to pay or willingness to accept to endure the change. This study, using contingent valuation, outlines an indirect means of measuring negative willingness to pay – for the problem of visual disamenity arising from alternative electricity transmission tower designs – based on the elicitation of indicators of how inconvenienced respondents would feel if a less preferred option were to replace the status quo; that is, the time and cost respondents were prepared to commit to opposing the change. The results show that taking account of negative willingness to pay matters and this significantly changes value estimates for some of the least liked options.


With the entry of the Ballast Water Management Convention into force, ballast water discharged from ships must meet standards limiting the concentrations of living organisms. Monitoring devices to confirm compliance with these standards would ideally be portable, easy-to-use instruments capable of rapid and accurate shipboard analysis of ballast water. Following a framework established for the validation of such potential devices, six devices were evaluated in a series of laboratory and field tests at three contrasting coastal locations. Devices were designed to quantify organisms in the ≥ 10 and < 50 μm size class. In all cases, the compliance monitoring devices were compared to the agreed-upon performance standard for quantifying living organisms: microscopy-based, vital fluorophore approach. Specific results from these validations are available elsewhere, although examples are shown to demonstrate the analytical and statistical approaches used for gauging—with data analysis and statistical approaches—each device's performance. Each metric used to evaluate devices (e.g., linearity, precision, and accuracy) was informative. However, linearity between the microscopy-based method and the compliance devices, especially along a large range of organism concentrations, would not be suitable for establishing performance criteria. Concentrations well below or above the limit for this size class (10 living organisms mL-1) would be easily categorized as meeting or exceeding discharge standard and their values do not need to be well constrained and pinpointed. Precision, when measured as the coefficient of variation, was sensitive to the dimensions and scale of the devices' measurements, as certain devices calculated and reported cell concentrations, whereas other devices reported non-dimensional values along a wide dynamic range. Accuracy, defined as the agreement between the compliance device and the standard approach as to whether the sample met or exceeded the discharge standard, was measured by logistic regression analysis. Following this analysis, the likelihoods of detecting exceedances based upon cell concentration were calculated for each field site and cultured test organism. Accuracy was useful in defining the likelihood of correctly identifying an exceedance, and these likelihoods could be calculated for a range of cell concentrations. The concurrent testing of multiple compliance devices minimized the analysis burden as well as the logistical hurdles associated with field testing at multiple—for this study, three—locations. Eventually, the test procedures could be modified to measure variation among different units of the same device or applied to actual measurements of ballast water rather than communities of ambient organisms or cultured microalgae.


Recently, a branch of multilevel converters is emerged, in which their 'reduced structure' topologies use lower number of devices compared to the available topologies. To get a cost efficient converter, lower number of components as well as high quality waveforms, multilevel converters with a 'reduced structure' (MCRS) are suitable for high/medium power systems. Also, utilizing the fast microprocessors available today, applications of predictive control in power converters are of very powerful and attractive alternatives to classical controllers. This paper proposes a finite control set model-based predictive control (FCS-MPC) for load current regulation and capacitor voltage balancing for a typical MCRS. A case study considered, three-phase seven level packed U-cell (PUC), which is among reduced structure multilevel converters. A discrete model of the system is derived, and a predictive model-based control is developed according to this model in order to predict the future behavior of the system for all possible switching states; then, the switching state that optimized the cost function is selected. The feasibility of the proposed FCS-MPC strategy for a seven level PUC is evaluated based on simulations with MATLAB/ SIMULINK. Moreover, experimental validation of the proposed control system on a 5 kVA PUC is examined through DSP implementation . Full Text: PDF DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.11591/ijpeds.v7.i2.pp568-582


Title of Document: ANIMAL DISTRIBUTIONS AND MOVEMENT BEHAVIORS IN RELATION TO RESOURCE DYNAMICS Thomas Mueller, Ph.D., 2008 Directed By: Professor William F. Fagan Department of Biology Animal movements, whether spatially constrained or spread across broad spatial scales, are often motivated by a need for resources. This thesis seeks to explore the role spatial and temporal resource dynamics may play in animal movements and population distributions. The first chapter synthesizes existing research of animal movements and builds a conceptual framework that integrates individual-level movement behaviors. It distinguishes among (1) non-oriented movements in response to proximate stimuli, (2) oriented movements utilizing perceptual cues of distant targets, and (3) memory mechanisms that assume prior knowledge of a target's location. I outline how species' use of these mechanisms should depend on resource dynamics and lead to population-level patterns, such as sedentary ranges, migration between disjunct and predictable seasonal resource areas, or nomadism when resource distributions are unpredictable in both space and time. The second chapter examines resource dynamics in an empirical setting, which, especially in ecosystems where changes may happen rapidly across broad spatial scales, is challenging because field measurements may be logistically infeasible. I use satellite imagery of vegetation productivity to track habitat dynamics for Mongolian gazelles in the eastern steppes of Mongolia. I show that spatiotemporal variation of gazelle habitats is extremely high, which may force gazelles to range over vast areas in search of food. This has important conservation implications because single protected areas may not provide sufficient gazelle habitats at all times and landscape level management plans are needed. In the third chapter I develop a theoretical simulation model, that implements and combines the three different classes of movement behaviors (nonoriented, oriented, memory) and explores their efficiency under different scenarios of resource dynamics. Adapting techniques from artificial evolution and intelligence, I show how individuals evolve to rely heavily on memory if their landscape dynamics are predictable. In contrast, non-oriented movement evolves predominately in situations where landscape dynamics are unpredictable. Oriented movement proves important at smaller scales, when movement targets are distributed within perceptual ranges. Future studies may transfer this theoretical model into empirical settings and use actual dynamic habitat models like that developed in chapter two, to reveal the underlying movement behaviors of real animals. ANIMAL DISTRIBUTIONS AND MOVEMENT BEHAVIORS IN RELATION TO RESOURCE DYNAMICS


Although often unrecognized by care providers, uncertainty during pregnancy is universally experienced. The antecedents to uncertainty are exemplified with qualitative data from interviews with pregnant women. The following antecedents are discussed: (1) symptom patterns; (2) event familiarity; (3) event congruence; (4) cognitive capacity; (5) structure providers; and (6) credible authority. The importance of exploring uncertainty during pregnancy stems from the relationship between the stress associated with uncertainty and perinatal complications. Negative caregiver reactions to uncertainty that can intensify stress include ignorance, intolerance, and indifference. Suggestions for nursing assessments and interventions during prenatal care are provided.


Aim: To study the epidemiology of Burkholderia cepacia infection in cancer patients.
Objectives:
•To study the patients characteristics features of Burkholderia infections.
•To study the characteristics features of Burkholderia cepacia infections.
•To study the pattern of antimicrobial sensitivity and resistance.
•To identify the cause of infection and reduce the risk of Hospital acquired infections.
Methods: This retrospective study was conducted from July 2017 to July 2018 at HCG Tertiary Cancer Hospital, Bangalore, India. Results: Total 21 patients were diagnosed with BCC infection during the study period. Those affected were mostly Female patients (80%), admitted in medical ward for chemotherapy with mostly central lines.
In our study, the incidence of Burkholderia infection was mostly found with Blood Stream Infections (90%), mostly seen in those with central line associated blood stream infection (52%) and peripheral blood stream infection(38%) . Before the incidence of infection, 11 patients (52%) had already been treated with higher antibiotics including Carbapenems. In our study, all patients (100%) could be salvaged with treatment and were discharged.
Conclusions: Burkholderia cepacia infection is one of the emerging infections in the tertiary cancer setting .Hospital Infection Control Committee's regular surveillance program and the training of healthcare workers are vital to reduce the hospital acquired infections.


The Antarctic Peninsula represents the southernmost segment of a magmatic arc once present along the western margin of Gondwanaland. Zircon U-Pb geochronology of a suite of calc-alkaline granitoids from the west coast of Graham Land, northern Antarctic Peninsula, resulted in ages for the rocks ranging from 117.0 ± 0.8 to 73.6 ± 0.4 Ma. Discordant zircon populations from peraluminous granites reveal inheritance characteristics resulting from entrainment of older crustal materials. Upper intercept ages of discordant zircon populations in four samples indicate that the age of assimilated material is approximately late Paleozoic. This inherited component is present in four samples from Bone Bay, Charlotte Bay, and Stonington Island and thus may extend for ∼600 km along the west coast of Graham Land. A possible source for the inherited components is the late Paleozoic(?) sediments of the Trinity Peninsula Group. However, a late Proterozoic upper intercept age for the Charlotte Bay granodiorite in western central Graham Land indicates that the age of the rocks assimilated by this suite of plutons is not uniformly late Paleozoic and might include unexposed basement rocks. Finally, an upper intercept age of 431 ± 12 Ma from a granite clast in metaconglomerate from Horseshoe Island provides further evidence for the presence of mid-Paleozoic basement in Graham Land. These results confirm the already postulated minimum early Paleozoic age for Antarctic Peninsula basement.


The aim was to examine achievement and self-efficacy in mathematics and native and foreign language literacy in children with specific mathematic LD (MD-only), children with comorbid mathematic and reading difficulties (MD-RD), and compare them with children without LD (controls), as well as to explore gender differences. Participants were 143 fifth-graders in Sweden who completed National Tests and measures of self-efficacy in mathematics and literacy. The MD-RD children displayed lower self-efficacy in all subjects compared to the controls, even when controlling for achievement. The MD-only children displayed lower self-efficacy in mathematics, completely accounted for by their lower mathematic achievement. The lower self-efficacy for children with learning disabilities may primarily be explained by their history of low achievement interpreted as failures and their emphasis on negative appraisals.


Abstract. The varved sedimentary AD 1917–2004 record from the depositional center of the Santa Barbara Basin (SBB, California) was analyzed with monthly to triannual resolution to yield relative abundances of six coccolithophore species representing at least 96% of the coccolithophore assemblage. Seasonal/annual relative abundances respond to climatic and surface hydrographic conditions in the SBB, whereby (i) the three species G. oceanica, H. carteri and F. profunda are characteristic of the strength of the northward flowing warm California Counter Current, (ii) the two species G. ericsonii and G. muellerae are associated with the cold equatorward flowing California Current, (iii) and E. huxleyi appears to be endemic to the SBB. Spectral analyses on relative abundances of these species show that all are influenced by the El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and/or by the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). Increased relative abundances of G. oceanica and H. carteri are associated with warm ENSO events, G. muellerae responds to warm PDO events and the abundance of G. ericsonii increases during cold PDO events. Morphometric parameters measured on E. huxleyi, G. muellerae and G. oceanica indicate increasing coccolithophore shell carbonate mass from ~1917 until 2004 concomitant with rising pCO2 and sea surface temperature in the region of the SBB.


Education has a long tradition in the use of illustrations. The aims of the illustrations are to make it easier and to clarify for the students. But is that really the case? The topic of this study is to generate knowledge about how children make use of illustrations in mathematical textbooks in primary school. This study focuses Swedish primary school in year one (7 years old) where video observations from twelve students were made. The empirical material was analyzed using affordances (Gibson, 1986) and subtraction situation (Fuson, 1992). The survey was conducted in accordance with the Swedish Research Council's ethical principles in the humanities and social sciences, which have four main demands: according to information, consent, confidentiality and utilization.The analysis showed that the students sometimes discover the aimed subtraction situation and/ or affordance and sometimes not. This affects how students handle the mathematical operations. A conclusion of this was that students have to discover the aimed subtraction situation as well as the aimed affordance to be able to handle a mathematical operation in the textbook in a desirable way. The result also showed a number of variables that effected how the students handled the illustrations. A conclusion of this was that the teacher plays an important role when students work with their textbooks. We live in a visual world and the ability to read illustrations are today of great importance. What is more, the mathematics education is a textbook controlled subject. Little has been written about how students make use of illustrations in mathematics book, especially concerning younger children. This is therefore of great importance.


An easy method to achieve a fluorinated graphene oxide–silica nanohybrid (GOSF) is presented. Graphene oxide (GO) was synthesized by Hummer's modified method, the GO–silica nanohybrid (GOS) was obtained via Fischer esterification, the fluorinated moiety (3-pentadecafluoroheptyl-5-perfluorophenyl-1,2,4-oxadiazole) was introduced by nucleophilic substitution operated by the hydroxyl functionalities onto the GOS surface. Full characterization of the new materials confirmed the formation of covalent bonds between the graphene oxide/silica hybrid matrix and the fluorinated moieties. The proposed methodology offers an easy way to get fluorinated carbon/silica hybrid nanomaterials avoiding the harsh reaction conditions usually involved in the preparation of fluorinated materials, and allowing the selective immobilization of specific fluorotails. Moreover, performed oxygen uptake and release kinetics showed that the introduction of fluorinated moieties increases the oxygen exchange, making the material interesting for prospective applications in the biomedical field, as oxygen delivery system, as filler for biocompatible materials, and in the preparation of membranes for the purification of water.


It is known that neoliberal policies are effective in the reawakening of concepts such as civil society and civil society organizations. In addition, it is mostly ignored that women's civil society organizations' potential of reflecting discriminations make feminist movements visible. Civil society organizations of women have gotten into the process of differentiation and multiplication in the sense of both issues they are dealing with and places they operate in. The centre of the women movement spreads from big cities to peripheral centres. The feminist movement is no longer the movement of a specific class or ethnicity but rather includes groups and compositions that have different features. In the context of the Turkish nation and supranational women, sensitive actors and gender-blindness of mere political struggle contribute to this process. As Iris Marion Young has asserted, although civil society helps groups that have material and organizational power to sustain their social advantages, civil society and civil society organizations, in private, support democratic virtues. In this sense, civil society organizations of women which have different economical and social capital can contribute to the aim of widening public space and can turn the discourse of civil society woman-sensitive. Within this framing, experiences of two different examples from civil society organizations of women which are the carrier actors of women movement in Turkey after 1990 will be formulated. First one of these is KAGIDER (Women Entrepreneurs Association of Turkey ) which operates in Istanbul and the second one is KAMER (Women's Centre) which operates in South-eastern and Eastern Anatolia . With these examples, moving from two different cultures and two different civil society organizations, it seems possible to develop an idea about early period of women movement in Turkey .


INTRODUCTION
The U.S. Army's Soldier 2020 program, which started in January 2016, was designed to achieve full integration of women in all military occupational specialties. This study was undertaken to determine differences in risk of musculoskeletal injury and behavioral health (BH) disorders among U.S. Army Active Duty Servicewomen (ADSW) in ground combat military occupational specialties (MOS) versus those in non-ground combat MOS since the start of the program until January 2019.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Using healthcare claims data from the Military Health System's Data Repository we conducted a cross-sectional study on ADSW from January 1, 2016 to January 1, 2019 and categorized them as either ground combat specialists (GCSs) or non-ground combat specialists (NGCSs). We identified all female soldiers in our cohort with a musculoskeletal injury (MSKI) and/or BH diagnosis during the study period. A multivariable logistic regression, adjusted by pregnancy or delivery status, was used to assess risk factors associated with GCS and included soldier age, race, body mass index (BMI), tobacco use, alcohol/substance use, and MSKI and BH status as predictor variables.

RESULTS
A total of 92,443 U.S. Army ADSW were identified, of whom 3,234 (3.5%) were GCS (infantry, field artillery, cavalry/armor, and air defense) and 89,209 (96.5%) were in non-ground combat billets. A large difference was observed when comparing the age of the population by occupation; GCS women were predominantly between the ages of 18-23 years (71.9%), compared to NGCS women aged 18-23 (41.0%). Top MSKI and BH diagnoses for both occupations were joint pain (44.9% GCS, 50.2% NGCS) and adjustment disorders (26.2% GCS, 28.0% NGCS). GCS women had lower odds for musculoskeletal injury (0.86 AOR, 0.79-0.93 CI, P = 0.0002), obesity per BMI classification (0.82 AOR, 0.70-0.97 CI, P = 0.0214), and BH disorders (0.87 AOR, 0.80-0.95 CI, P = 0.0019); and higher odds for tobacco use (1.44 AOR, 1.27-1.63 CI, P < 0.0001), substance use (1.36 AOR, 1.04-1.79 CI, P = 0.0257), and alcohol use (1.18 AOR, 1.02-1.38 CI, P = 0.0308) when compared to NGCS women.

CONCLUSIONS
With the increasing focus on soldier medical readiness in today's U.S. Army, the health of all soldiers is of paramount concern to command groups, unit leaders, and individual soldiers. The integration of women into ground combat military occupational specialties is a relatively new program; further longitudinal research of these groups should follow, focusing on their progression and improvement in soldier readiness, overall health, and the well-being of all servicewomen.


This paper presents stability analysis of large-scale SRAM arrays directly after terminating NBTI stress. While the impact of static NBTI is well examined for cells and arrays, the fast-recovering component was not yet measured on SRAM arrays. The novel method presented here analyzes the flipping of cells directly after the supply voltage was lowered to a specific value where the structure is most sensitive for NBTI induced cell flips. Thus, read margin criterion is used to characterize the decreasing cell stability due to NBTI degradation with a resolution down to 1 ms. Applying this method, the impact of static and dynamic NBTI is measured in a 65 nm low power CMOS technology. Between 1 ms and 10.000 s after stress, the NBTI induced number of cell flips decreases by almost one half.


Laser surgery experts have indicated that surgical lasers provide a number of potential benefits when compared to conventional surgical methods. The most significant are: a reduction in hospital costs; an opportunity to increase the surgical case load; and the opportunity to provide competitive, "high-tech" clinical services to the hospital's community. Lasers change the procedures utilized in the hospital in terms of procurement, processing, safety and other areas. It is incumbent upon materials managers and CS personnel to become familiar with and keep pace with these changes. As a these provider, it is important that you follow the laser revolution. The emergence of lasers in surgery will affect almost every segment of hospital operations, and each department manager can turn change into opportunity for their facility.


There are conflicting data regarding the effect of digoxin use on mortality in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) or with congestive heart failure (CHF). The aim of this meta-analysis was to provide detailed analysis of the currently available study reports. We performed a MEDLINE and a COCHRANE search (1993–2014) of the English literature dealing with the effects of digoxin on all-cause-mortality in subjects with AF or CHF. Only full-sized articles published in peer-reviewed journals were considered for this meta-analysis. A total of 19 reports were identified. Nine reports dealt with AF patients, seven with patients suffering from CHF, and three with both clinical conditions. Based on the analysis of adjusted mortality results of all 19 studies comprising 326 426 patients, digoxin use was associated with an increased relative risk of all-cause mortality [Hazard ratio (HR) 1.21, 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.07 to 1.38, P , 0.01]. Compared with subjects not receiving glycosides, digoxin was associated with a 29% increased mortality risk (HR 1.29; 95% CI, 1.21 to 1.39) in the subgroup of publications comprising 235 047 AF patients. Among 91.379 heart failure patients, digoxin-associated mortality risk increased by 14% (HR 1.14, 95% CI, 1.06 to 1.22). The present systematic review and meta-analysis of all available data sources suggest that digoxin use is associated with an increased mortality risk, particularly among patients suffering from AF.


Expanding access to family planning (FP) is a principal objective of global family planning efforts and has been a driving force of national family planning programs in recent years. Many country programs are working alongside with the international family planning community to expand access to modern contraceptives. However, there is a challenging need for measuring all aspects of access. Measuring access usually requires linking information from multiple sources (e.g., individual women and facilities). To assess the influence of access to family planning services on modern contraceptive use among women, we link four rounds of individual women and service delivery points survey data from PMA2020 in Kinshasa. Multilevel logistics regression on pooled data is performed to test the influence of facility-level access factors on individual-level contraceptive use. We add variables tailored from a conceptual framework to cover elements of access to family planning: administrative access, geographic or physical access, economic access or affordability, cognitive access, service quality, and psychological access. We find that the effect of community and facility-level access factors varies extensively but having fewer stocked-out facilities and more facilities with long-acting permanent methods (LAPM) increases the odds of using modern contraceptives among women in Kinshasa. Our study shows that reliable supply chain with a broad array of method mix will increase the odds of modern contraceptive use at community level among women in Kinshasa. Using to community-oriented practices and service delivery along with empowering women to make health-related decisions should become a priority of family planning programs and international stakeholders in the country.