This thesis describes the development and the applicability of a finite element sequence of computer programs for the elastic stress analysis of axisymmetric structures. The following topics are discussed:- (i) the need for an asymmetric element, (ii) the mathematical theory outlined in physical terms, (iii) the philosophy adopted in writing computer programs, and (iv) an ideal problem used to test the sequence of programs, Particular attention has heen paid to accuracy, minimization of errors and ease of-running programs. Thus, in determining the fifteen integrals required to obtain the element stiffnesses, algebraic equations v/ere used in preference to numerical integration and thus avoid both truncation error and round-off error. Care was taken in the formulation of these equations to allow for the possibility of one or more vertices to lie on the axis of symmetry and to allow for two vertices to have the same radius. The latter facility is not available in treatments by other authors. To enable the unsymmetric matrices used in the formation of element stiffness to be inverted; to improve the accuracy of the application of the overall stiffness matrix to the load vector; and in fitting surfaces by the method of least squares, special subroutines were written in a form suitable for partial pivoting. To avoid large ratios of matrix element size, which would prevent inversion on even the largest word length computer, a technique of changing origin and scaling v/as adopted in fitting surfaces by the method of least squares. The technique of changing origin was also used in the formation of certain of the integrals to obtain a greater degree of accuracy on the digital computers with their inherent round-off error. Axisymmetric analysis was eased by separating the computation into a sequence of discrete programs. Adopting this procedure (a) reduced the requirements for computer time . and space thus minimizing cost and restrictions imposed by normal operating procedures; (b) allowed decisions on restraint and external loading to be deferred until the relevant values were required and available; (c) allowed modifications to be made to any program in the sequence without having a feedback effect on any of the other programs, and, finally, (d) facilitated parametric studies to be made of the effect of varying geometry, material properties, restraints, and loading. The novel fitting of fourth order surfaces to displacements to obtain strains and stresses, a feature unique to this sequence of programs, produces a| high order of accuracy. The high order of accuracy was illustrated by the problem used to test the sequence of computer programs, where with three quarters of a million matrix elements, the resulting accumulation of round-off error only amounted to 0,001%. There was very good agreement between finite element results and Lame, the general error (except v/here the loads were applied) being about 0.03%, so that the accumulated round-off error was insignificant even with one thousand finite elements. In addition to solving small-deflect ion static-elastic problems, the described sequence of computer programs may be utilised to solve large displacement problems by adopting an iterative 'procedure and, by taking advantage of the mid-side nodes, small modifications would permit analysis of pseudo dynamic problems.


Photons for quantum technologies have been identified early on as a very good candidate for carrying quantum information encoded onto them, either by polarization encoding, time encoding or spatial encoding. Quantum cryptography, quantum communications, quantum networks in general and quantum computing are some of the applications targeted by what is now called quantum photonics. Nevertheless, it was pretty clear at an early stage that bulk optics for handling quantum states of light with photons would not be able to deliver what is needed for these technologies. More recently, single photons, entangled photons and quantum optics in general have been coupled to more integrated approaches coming from classical optics in order to meet the requirements of scalability, reliablility and efficiency for quantum technologies. In this article, we develop our recent advances in two different nanophotonic platforms for quantum photonics using elongated optical fibers and integrated glass waveguides made by the so-called ion-exchange technique. We also present our latest results on quantum nanoemitters that we plan to couple and incorporate with our photonics platforms. These nanoemitters are of two kinds: nanocrystals made of perovskites as well as silicon-vacancy defect centers in nanodiamonds. Some of their properties are developed in this work. We will then give the general steps necessary in order to couple these nanoemitters efficiently with our platforms in the near future.


Adequate infliximab (IFX) trough concentrations (TCs) during induction treatment are predictive for long-term clinical and endoscopic remission in paediatric patients with inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD). However, under the approved weight-based dosing (5 mg/kg), children often have low IFX TCs, since the relationship between bodyweight and the IFX pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters is nonlinear. Therefore, there is a need to optimise paediatric dosing to engage optimal IFX TCs during induction treatment.

 Fifty-two paediatric patients with IBD (34 Crohn's disease (CD), 18 ulcerative colitis (UC)) contributed IFX samples (246 intermediate and 150 trough samples) during either induction treatment (n=32) or maintenance treatment (n=20). A population PK (popPK) model was developed to describe the relationship between IFX dose and exposure. The previously published IFX popPK model based on data of 112 children with CD in the Phase 3 REACH trial was used as a frequentist prior to inform parameter estimation using NONMEM. Our popPK model was used to simulate IFX TCs during induction treatment under different induction dosing regimens (5 mg/kg, 7.5 mg/kg, and 10 mg/kg IFX at weeks 0, 2, and 6). Probabilities of TC target attainment (PTA) were compared. The TC target, associated with a 75% probability of achieving deep remission (DR) at six months after initiating IFX treatment, was identified using a logistic regression model and a ROC analysis. DR was defined as combined endoscopic remission (Simple Endoscopic Score for CD <3 or Mayo endoscopic sub-score 0) and corticosteroid-free clinical remission (Paediatric CD or UC Activity Index <10).

 The median boyweight was 44 kg (range 15-92 kg). A 2-compartment popPK model with first-order elimination described IFX concentrations well (Table 1). The IFX clearance by weight increased with decreasing bodyweight, decreasing serum albumin and absence of immunomodulator combo-therapy. Also, the IFX volume of distribution in the central and peripheral compartment by weight increased with decreasing bodyweight. A total of 18/32 (56%) patients in the induction treatment achieved DR at six months. An IFX TC of 23.0 mg/L at week 6 was identified as the TC target (100% sen, 33% spe, 100% npv, and 50% ppv). Children with a bodyweight less than 30 kg could only reach a 50% PTA when receiving 10 mg/kg IFX combo-therapy during induction (Figure 1). While children with a bodyweight above 30 kg had more than 50% PTA when receiving either 10 mg/kg IFX monotherapy or 7.5 mg/kg IFX combo-therapy (Table 2).

 IFX doses higher than 5 mg/kg are needed during induction in children with IBD to facilitate the attainment of the TC target, thereby increasing the chance of long-term DR.


Spatial accessibility is an increasingly popular indicator of assessing the level of development of transport infrastructure, and its impact on the development of particular territorial units. Among the most often used indexes of accessibility that can be applied to analyses prepared for the purposes of sea ports and coastal areas, are the following: ♦ time accessibility (presenting in a cartographic review how much time it takes to get to particular points), and accumulated accessibility; ♦ potential accessibility (presenting units positions on the background of general transportation network of a given mode). The aim of this study was to assess the potential road accessibility in the years 2015 and 2030, as well as the changes resulting from the investments planned for this period of time. In the study of accessibility to the network of the existing sea ports, there were taken into account: Elbląg, Gdańsk, Gdynia, Ustka, Darłowo, Kołobrzeg, Świnoujście, Police and Szczecin. Analyses of these ports' time accessibility have been also performed. It has been established that none of the Polish ports can boast of sufficient road connections with important national centres, which are their vital economic hinterland. The situation in Tricity (Gdansk, Sopot, Gdynia) is most favourable, and its further improvement depends on completion of the S5 and S7 express roads, and on the implementation of investments within the agglomeration. Extending the Szczecin Lagoon ports' hinterland is going to be more problematic though it will also take place after the S3 road is completed. The small ports on the central coast are accessible by the system of roads only to a very limited degree and are not likely to improve their situation in the years to come. Implementation of the S6 express road will alter this state only partially (because of it running latitudinally). An integrated, spatially big market can be found only in the Tricity region. No integration of this kind can be found in the Szczecin-Świnoujście complex, not to mention the central part of the coast. The planned investments are to increase the range of the Tricity metropolis's employment market (e.g. by Elbląg), and will allow an integration of the market within the area of the Szczecin Lagoon.


Pelvic organ prolapse (POP) is a condition of herniation of the pelvic organs into the vagina or past the introitus. Management options include pessary use. A very rare complication of pessary usage is erosion resulting in a vesicovaginal or rectovaginal fistula. We present two cases of patients who were found to have rectovaginal fistulas from Gellhorn pessary usage. Both patients were surgically treated with colostomies. Pessary management of POP is very common and accepted form of treatment. For optimal outcomes with pessary use, we recommend that patients be actively managed with individualized periodic evaluations. Estrogen cream may be considered for prevention and treatment of eroded vaginal epithelium. J Clin Gynecol Obstet. 2015;4(1):193-196 doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.14740/jcgo308w


Intimal hyperplasia development in the downstream anastomosis of a peripheral bypass grafts has been the subject of much investigation due to its site specific focal development at specific sites within the junction. Compliance mismatch between the synthetic graft and host artery is seen as a major cause of intimal hyperplasia formation along the suture line of synthetic graft/host artery anastomoses, with wall stress, wall shear stress, and local mass transport also playing an important role in intimal hyperplasia formation. The majority of previously published computational and experimental analyses focus on flow dynamics and the distribution of wall shear stress at distal End-To-Side bypass anastomoses. Studies associated with anastomotic mechanics and associated wall stress have reported abnormal wall stress at graft/artery anastomoses associated over excessive response by arterial tissue to the aforementioned stresses may correlate to intimal hyperplasia formation at anastomotic sites. The aim of this study is to further investigate abnormal wall stresses at the synthetic graft/artery anastomoses and to correlate abnormal wall stresses to sites of intimal hyperplasia formation at the distal End-To-Side anastomosis of the femoropopliteal system. To this end, computational investigation was undertaken to examine mechanical factors affecting the wall stresses of the arterial tissue at anastomoses. These mechanical factors included variations in geometry and compliance mismatch between the graft and host artery. Results show that abnormal wall stresses exist at the suture line of End-To-Side anastomoses, and the geometry of an idealised End-To-Side anastomosis significantly affect these abnormal wall stresses. Peak abnormal equivalent Cauchy stress magnitudes reach a peak are 113 times baseline values along the suture line, with an average deviation of 38 times baseline equivalent Cauchy stress across the suture line of an idealised End-To-Side anastomosis. This large deviation of wall stress deviation correlates to intimal hyperplasia formation at the suture line, which is reportedly induced by compliance mismatch between the graft and host artery. To quantify the affect of compliance mismatch, a compliant graft was employed at an idealised End-To-Side anastomosis. Abnormal equivalent Cauchy stress magnitudes were significantly reduced across the suture line, with the average and peak equivalent Cauchy stress reduced by 46.58% and 32.99%, respectively. But significant abnormal wall stresses are still present at the suture line with a compliance matching graft, with approximately 16 and 46 fold increase for average and peak abnormal equivalent Cauchy stress. The Prolong R © bypass graft was considered as an alternative arterial bypass configuration to the End-To-Side procedure. The analysis included four different configurations of End-To-End anastomoses, including a novel technique for joining synthetic grafts to host arterial tissue, which comes in the form of an S shaped incision (S-cut). Resolved abnormal wall stresses along the suture line for the four different End-To-End configurations were compared to the resolved abnormal wall stresses along the suture line of the End-To-Side anastomosis. It was demonstrated that a percentage reduction for the normalised equivalent Cauchy stress of 85.77%, 78%, 77.77%, and 74.11%, for the Planar, Bevel, S-cut1, and S-cut2 anastomosis configurations was achieved for the Prolong R © graft when compared to the idealised End-To-Side anastomosis. It is common perception that the compliance mismatch between the graft and the host artery is a major cause of graft failure. In the case of the distal End-To-Side anastomosis, this study has shown that it is the geometry that influences the wall stresses the most, and that a compliance matching graft material reduces abnormal wall stress of the arterial tissue, but they still do not approach the idealised healthy case of a healthy arterial vessel.


Globalization provides ever-growing opportunities for small groups of producers, employers and service providers to shop the globe for more amenable jurisdictions. An international "race to the bottom," spawned by the decreasing exit costs of many businesses threatens to compromise the achievements of the welfare state. National governments, weakened by this competition that requires leaner budgets, find it ever more difficult to cooperate in the appropriation of crucial shared natural resources such as water, flora and fauna, seriously endangering these assets. Beyond the efficiency losses and social problems involved, these global competitions raise a challenge to the principle of democracy and self-determination. As national choices get more and more limited, the opportunities for individuals to take a meaningful part in shaping their lives in collective decision-making through the national political process are decreasing. Largely pessimistic analyses of these challenges are dominated by what may be termed the Westphalian paradigm, namely the model which views global conflicts as inter-national conflicts among the 200-some sovereign states which constitute the primary building blocks of the global arena. This paradigm is premised on the still-prevailing perception of nation-states as unitary actors engaging in inter-national competition. This Article suggests that this paradigm fails to identify the various actors in the international arena. Instead of the Westphalian paradigm, this Article adopts a different paradigm -- the transnational conflict paradigm -- that explains better various collective action failures and provides guidance to feasible mechanisms to correct these failures. At its core lies the observation that states are not monolithic entities, and that many of the pervasive conflicts of interest are in fact more internal than external and stem from the heterogeneity within states. Indeed, this alternative view suggests that many domestic interest groups cooperate with foreign interest groups located across national boundaries in order to impose their externalities on their respective rival domestic groups. Thus, many global collective action failures must be attributed to conflicts among rival domestic groups rather than to inter national competition. The transnational conflict paradigm exposes the crucial constitutional and international norms that have been designed to perpetuate that imbalanced power relationship among rival interest groups. The Article demonstrates that current norms and procedures, both constitutional and international, are inherently slanted in favor of groups with historically stronger voice in domestic political arenas, and provide them exit options from domestic regulation. These exit options permit the global race to the bottom and other collective action failures. The Article explores the ramifications of the still dominant Westphalian paradigm from the perspectives of efficiency, democracy and equity. This analysis leads to the development of a theory on transnational institutions. It argues that such institutions could limit capture gains by small groups, and at the same time offer more effective opportunities for democratic participation in national and transnational decisionmaking.


This symposium showcases the latest work from Japan and Southeast Asia on interactive systems and user interfaces that address under-explored problems and demonstrate unique approaches. In addition to circulating ideas and sharing a vision of future research in human-computer interaction, this symposium aims to foster social networks among young researchers and students and create a fresh research community.


Abstract. The empirical formulations to forecast landslide generated water waves, recently defined in the framework of a research program funded by the Italian National Dam Office RID (Registro Italiano Dighe), are here used to study three real cases of subaerial landslides which fell down italian artificial reservoirs. It is well known that impulse water waves generated by landslides constitute a very dangerous menace for human communities living in the shoreline of the artificial basin or downstream the dam. In 1963, the menace became tragedy, when a 270 millions m3 landslide fell down the Vajont reservoir (Italy), generated an impulse wave which destroyed the city of Longarone, and killed 2000 people. The paper is aimed at presenting the very satisfactorily reproduction of the events at hand by using forecasting formulations.


Vibrant agricultural commodity exchanges will greatly enhance the performance of Africa's agricultural sectors and contribute to overall economic development. Yet specific conditions in grain markets are required for agricultural commodity exchanges to develop.1 The absence or short-lived nature of many of these conditions explains why commodity exchanges for staple grains have remained stunted in Sub-Saharan Africa despite strong interest in their development by the international donor community and by most elements of the private sector. This study identifies these preconditions and assesses the scope for development organizations to support the sustainable development of commodity exchanges in eastern and southern Africa.


The purpose of this study was to develop the Functioning Everyday with a Wheelchair - Capacity (FEW-C), a valid and reliable performance-based observation tool to measure the effects of wheeled mobility and seating interventions on functional capabilities specific to consumers needs. The tool was modeled after the Functioning Everyday with a Wheelchair (FEW), a companion self-report measure and characteristics of the capacity qualifier of the World Health Organization International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health. Prior to the development of the tool a systematic review of the scientific literature revealed limited availability of performance based measures of functional outcome that could be applied across the spectrum of wheeled mobility and seating devices or types of impairments. Excellent interrater reliability coefficients (ICC 2,k = 0.98) were established with 13 wheeled mobility and seating device users and 8 trained raters. Internal consistency of the FEW-C, based on a sample of 25 wheeled mobility and seating device users, yielded Cronbach's alphas ranging from 0.74 to 0.89 indicating good internal consistency without redundancy. Multitrait-multimethod matrix analyses, yielded fair to good convergent and discriminant validity when compared with other tools that were measuring similar traits by different methods. A non-randomized clinical trial was implemented to test the ability of the performance-based FEW-C to detect statistical and practical change over time, and to ascertain if the FEW-C results differed from the companion self-report tools. Findings indicated that the FEW-C and other self-report tools were able to measure practical changes in function over time with very large Cohen's d effect sizes ( 2.28 - 3.18) following the provision of a new wheeled mobility and seating device, however, each of the tools behaved differently. These findings further confirmed the effectiveness of the wheeled mobility and seating interventions provided by the clinicians. Our findings also indicated that the operationalization of the items of the reliable and valid FEW self-report tool into a performance-based observational tool yielded another reliable and valid tool for gathering data about functioning with a wheeled mobility and seating device, and that each tool contributed unique information to wheeled mobility and seating assessments.


This ethnographic essay reflects on the process of the past coming into the present. In particular, it questions the ethics and politics of which pasts are appropriate to encounter.  It creates tensions between which pasts are considered real or authentic, which questions the ownership of pasts we are not permitted to feel. It suggests that when we encounter and touch things that are not ours, we feel a connection to an Othered past.  This "Othering" risks prescribing an Orientalist, colonial narrative. It concludes that perhaps to meaningfully encounter the past, we must recognise that the only authentic pasts are our own.


Thesis is one of the requirements that must be fulfilled by students to complete the bachelors program (S1). Ideally the thesis can be completed in six months, but in fact many students who completed it exceeded the ideal time, including students who have a GPA above 3.51 (high category). 51% of graduates from Faculty of Teacher's Training (FTIK) IAIN Bukittinggi who belongs to the high capability delays in completing their thesis. Many factors affect the delay both internally and externally. To see what factors significantly influence the researchers used the CHAID Methods. This method is superior compared to other methods because the analysis is faster and the data is presented in the form of tree diagrams, making it more interesting and easier to translate. Based on the analysis of CHAID, it was obtained that the significant factors influence the length of time to finish thesis; they are department and data sources. Characteristics of students who are likely to be late in completing their thesis are students from Islamic studies department or Counseling department and students from English department or mathematics department or informatics and computer engineering department with secondary data sources. The analytical accuracy of the resulting model is 80.6%. These results are supposed to be one of the references to minimize time delays in completing the thesis for high capability students in Faculty of Teacher's Training IAIN Bukittinggi.


Prehistoric Egypt, Socioeconomic Transformations in North-east Africa from the Last Glacial Maximum to the Neolithic, 24.000 to 4.000 BC takes a supra-regional approach to the environmental and socioeconomic landscapes of SW Asia and NE Africa across this crucial period. Using a rich array of empirical data combined with a holistic theoretical approach, this book challenges many of the current ideas on the beginnings of food production in North-east Africa, and the secondary effects this transition had on human settlements and cultures. Some of the key issues examined include the autochtonous domestication of cattle in the Eastern Sahara, the development of different pottery techno-complexes, the role of the Sinai and the Negev in the spread of ovicaprines, and the mechanisms by which domesticated wheat, barley and other domesticated species entered Egypt.This book is essential reading for anybody interested in the origins of the ancient Egyptian civilisation.


Forward error correction (FEC) and automatic repeat request (ARQ) are typically used to improve the reliability of the wireless link. During fading periods, it is difficult to achieve strict delay guarantees using ARQ schemes alone. On the other hand, FEC can provide constant throughput and bounded delay. However, if designed for the worst channel conditions, this causes unnecessary overhead and reduces the maximum achievable throughput when the channel is in good conditions. The target video quality is greatly affected by the instantaneous playback buffer occupancy. Retransmissions of erroneous packets and the reduction in throughput due to FEC overhead can lead to playback buffer starvation. In this study, we introduce a scalable source-rate control scheme for video transmission over wireless packet networks. The scheme aims at maximizing the source bit rate at the encoder while preventing occurrences of starvation at the playback buffer. We carry out the analysis while taking into account the channel variations during video-frame transmission. We characterize the evolution of the transmission process by a finite-state Markov chain (FSMC) that facilitates the analysis. Then, we provide a time average expression that contains the key parameters of the proposed scalable scheme. In our scheme, the amount of frame scaling is optimized while guaranteeing certain delay and loss bounds. Simulation and numerical investigations are carried out to study the interactions among various key parameters and verify the adequacy of the analysis.


We investigated the effects of varying salt intake on five factors that could affect sodium balance during furosemide (F) administration: the quantity of F reaching the renal tubules; the magnitude of the acute natriuresis; Na+ excretion in the period after the acute diuresis; diuretic tolerance; and changes in plasma aldosterone. Six normal subjects were given F (40 mg day-1) for 3 days after equilibration to Na+ intakes of 20 mmol day-1 (low salt, LS) and 270 mmol day-1 (high salt, HS). Salt intake did not modify F excretion. Salt restriction reduced the short-term natriuretic response to F, led to diuretic tolerance, and potentiated the F-induced rise in plasma aldosterone. There was a progressive diminution in the quantity of Na+ excreted per unit of F excreted during LS. In spite of this, cumulative Na+ balance was negative only during LS because of a compensatory increase in Na+ reabsorption in the period between diuretic doses. During HS, this compensation exactly matched the short-term loss of Na+ produced by F, leading to neutral Na+ balance. During LS, the acute natriuresis exceeded the daily Na+ intake, so that, despite the renal compensation, Na+ balance was negative. In conclusion, salt restriction impairs the short-term natriuretic response to F and leads to diuretic tolerance. However, homeostatic mechanisms activated by the diuretic can maintain Na+ balance even in subjects without a disease causing Na+ retention, unless dietary salt is restricted.


This work proposes a method for unified junction-temperature and device-current sensing that utilizes the body-diode electroluminescence of SiC MOSFETs. During conduction, the body diode of SiC MOSFETs emits light in the visible spectrum that is dependent on the device current and junction temperature. The sensing of this light offers the potential for a galvanically isolated and high-bandwidth junction-temperature and device-current measurement. Previous publications successfully showed that either temperature or current information can be extracted from the intensity of the emitted light if the other variable is known. However, they did not aim to independently extract the two variables. This work presents a unique extraction method that separately extracts device current and junction temperature by using intensity and wavelength information of the body-diode electroluminescence. The decoupled device-current and junction-temperature extraction works on the basis of multiple optical sensors with different wavelength sensitivities and artificial-intelligence techniques. This method is demonstrated via experimental evaluations using an automotive-grade SiC power module. Its integration in next generation power modules enables high-performance electrothermal monitoring for safe and reliable long-term operation.


Background and purpose: Good quality of life among elderly will reduce social and economic burden among the productive age people. This study aims to determine association between social function and quality of life among elderly in Denpasar.Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 144 elderly in Denpasar who were selected by cluster sampling and data were collected by a structured interview. Data were analyzed using logistic regression to determine the relationship between quality of life of the elderly with social activities, social interactions and family functions.Results: The study showed that the proportion of lower quality of life of the elderly in Denpasar was 64.58%. Proportion of elderly with lower quality of life was found among elderly of older age, female, low education, not working, low-income and widow/widower. Multivariate analysed showed that there was an association between quality of life of elderly with gender (AOR=6.42; 95%CI: 1.79-23.0), employment (AOR=9.81; 95%CI: 2.45-39.1), health status (AOR=8.65; 95%CI: 2.57-29.02), social activities (AOR=3.85; 95%CI: 1.22-12.1), social interactions (AOR=5.59; 95%CI: 2.01-15.5) and family functions (AOR=21.7; 95%CI: 6.09-77.7)Conclusion: Good quality of life of elderly was found associated with gender, employment, health status, social activities, social interactions and family functions.


During the past decade, several methane/air explosions in abandoned or sealed areas of underground coal mines have been attributed to lightning. Previously published work by the authors showed, through computer simulations, that currents from lightning could propagate down steel-cased boreholes and ignite explosive methane/air mixtures. The presented work expands on the model and describes a methodology based on IEEE Standard 1410-2004 to estimate the probability of an ignition. The methodology provides a means to better estimate the likelihood that an ignition could occur underground and, more importantly, allows the calculation of what-if scenarios to investigate the effectiveness of engineering controls to reduce the hazard. The computer software used for calculating fields and potentials is also verified by comparing computed results with an independently developed theoretical model of electromagnetic field propagation through a conductive medium.


This paper presents a study of the constraint factors that condition the form and functions of questions in a corpus composed of several face-to-face election debates that took place in Spain during different election campaigns. Some of these factors are of a distributional nature, such as the position of the questions in the politician's turns at talk, with final positions and fragments of simultaneous speech being the most favourable contexts for the formulation of these utterances. Questions are also favoured by stylistic and rhetorical forces, such as those which lead the speaker to repeat questions or question formats within wider inquisitive sequences, which represent almost half the corpus. In addition, these communicative units are also influenced by institutional factors, such as the political role played by the candidates in the debates (government/opposition), as well as the political expectations and identities that the politicians seek to enhance, and which may vary in different moments of the election campaign.


NCBI BLASTP is a popular sequence analysis tool used to study the evolutionary relationship between two protein sequences. Protein databases continue to grow exponentially as entire genomes of organisms are sequenced, making sequence analysis a computationally demanding task. For example, a search of the E. coli. k12 proteome against the GenBank Non-Redundant database takes 36 hours on a standard workstation. In this thesis, we look to address the problem by accelerating protein searching using Field Programmable Gate Arrays. We focus our attention on the BLASTP heuristic, building on work done earlier to accelerate DNA searching on the Mercury platform. We analyze the performance characteristics of the BLASTP algorithm and explore the design space of the seed generation stage in detail. We propose a hardware/software architecture and evaluate the performance of the individual stage, and its effect on the overall BLASTP pipeline running on the Mercury system. The seed generation stage is 13x faster than the software equivalent, and the integrated BLASTP pipeline is predicted to yield a speedup of 50x over NCBI BLASTP. Mercury BLASTP also shows a 2.5x speed Type of Report: Other Department of Computer Science & Engineering Washington University in St. Louis Campus Box 1045 St. Louis, MO 63130 ph: (314) 935-6160 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY THE HENRY EDWIN SEVER GRADUATE SCHOOL DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF AN ACCELERATED SEED GENERATION STAGE FOR BLASTP ON THE MERCURY SYSTEM by Arpith Chacko Jacob Prepared under the direction of Jeremy Buhler and Roger Chamberlain A thesis presented to the Henry Edwin Sever Graduate School of Washington University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF SCIENCE August 2006 Saint Louis, Missouri WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY THE HENRY EDWIN SEVER GRADUATE SCHOOL DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE


The exhibition 'Morandi, Balla, de Chirico and Italian Painting 1920-1950' at Tornabuoni Art Gallery presents work by painters who, in the late 1920s and early 1930s, had been part of Novecento, the Milan-based group introduced by art critic Margherita Sarfatti. Yet, the majority of the works on show, while being framed by the seemingly a-temporal 'classicism' of Novecento, date from the 1940s and 1950s. This review reflects on the effects of this curatorial choice, considering the unexpected juxtapositions created by a varied body of works which interweave different 'classicisms' and diverse temporalities.


Nutrient pollution in Elefsis Bay arises mainly from the disposal of Athens untreated wastewater at the eastern entrance of the Bay. The absence of river discharge, lack of cultivated agricultural areas providing runoff and the Bay's limited circulation provide the conditions for the Bay's eutrophication by the discharge of untreated wastewater. In the spring of 1993 this discharge was replaced by a new deep outfall system. To monitor any future changes an assessment of the present ecological state of the Bay is required. Analysis of appropriate data showed that Elefsis Bay accumulates nutrients. In summer a strong thermal stratification causes anoxic conditions to occur in the lower layer. The ecosystem exhibits reduced species diversity and strong oscillations of plankton annual cycles. Flagellates ( Cryptomonas sp. ) dominate the phytoplankton, followed by dinoflagellates ( Gyrodinium aureolum, Prorocentum dentatum ) and only in the spring diatoms ( Nitzschia ) predominate. The zooplankton was dominated by copepods ( Acartia clausi ) and cladoceran ( Podon polyphemoides ). Macrobenthos consists of a small number of pollution-resistant species of Polychaeta ( Capitela capitata ), whilst in summer only one species of Molluscs ( Corbula gibba ) survives.


BACKGROUND
A recognized limitation of endovascular beta-radiation therapy is the development of new stenosis at the edges of the irradiated area. The combination of injury and low-dose radiation may be the precursor of this phenomenon. We translated the radio-oncological concept of "geographic miss" to define cases in which the radiation source did not fully cover the injured area. The aims of the study were to determine the incidence and causes of geographic miss and evaluate the impact of this inadequate treatment on the outcome of patients treated with intracoronary beta-radiation.

METHODS AND RESULTS
We analyzed 50 consecutive patients treated with beta-radiation after percutaneous coronary intervention. The prescribed dose ranged between 12 and 20 Gy at 2 mm from the source axis. By means of quantitative coronary angiography, the irradiated segment (IRS) and both edges were studied before and after intervention and at 6-month follow-up. Edges that were injured during the procedure constituted the geographic miss edges. Twenty-two edges were injured during the intervention, mainly because of procedural complications that extended the treatment beyond the margins of the IRS. Late loss was significantly higher in geographic miss edges than in IRSs and uninjured edges (0.84+/-0.6 versus 0.15+/-0.4 and 0.09+/-0.4 mm, respectively; P<0.0001). Similarly, restenosis rate was significantly higher in the injured edges (10% within IRS, 40.9% in geographic miss edges, and 1.9% in uninjured edges; P<0.001).

CONCLUSIONS
These data support the hypothesis that the combination of injury and low-dose beta-radiation induces deleterious outcome.


A family study is presented in which the father of a girl with severe cystic fibrosis (CF) was also found to have CF but was mildly affected. He was diagnosed with three positive sweat tests including one after suppression with fludrocortisone. Genetic analysis showed that he is a compound heterozygote with the delta F508 CF mutation associated with haplotype B and a second CF mutation associated with haplotype C. In this unusual, fertile CF male, the late age of diagnosis (30 years) and the mild clinical picture suggest that the compound genotype (delta F508/other CF mutation) determines a much less severe form of the disease which might have gone unnoticed in the absence of a severely affected child. The implications of these findings for genetic counselling of families with CF are discussed.


The stock of Norwegian spring spawning herring (NSSH) is managed and fished by 5 different parties. These are the EU, Faroe Islands, Iceland, Norway and Russia. The most common gears are purse seine and pelagic trawl. The fishery is regulated by quota, and to prevent the fishery exceeding the quota, landings are recorded. Taking account of how the fishery is conducted, potential sources of unaccounted mortality may be identified. In this paper we will focus on the possibility of unaccounted mortality caused by errors in the landing figures, error concerning the water content in herring deliveries and errors concerning conversion factors between fillets and live weight of herring.


Introduction of BIM(Building Information Modeling) was led by public institutions, and all buildings over a certain size were obligated to apply BIM. However, through various attempt to apply BIM to actual practice, people had doubt whether it is a usable technology in reality appeared. Therefore, this study investigated cases about implementation strategies of foreign countries, and conducted survey on BIM performances and preparation in architectural firms adopted BIM. On the basis of this, it suggests the longterm development strategy of BIM and the basic direction of road map to adopt BIM effectively to domestic architectural design market. After considering the cases abroad and the results of survey, it is identified that incentive policies supporting finance and education should be carried out together with partially obligation method led by government in order to introduce BIM into architectural design market effectively by reflecting current situation of architectural firms.


This paper presents a cognitive model of goal formulation in designing that is triggered by surprise. Cognitive system approaches to design synthesis focus on generating alternative designs in response to design goals or requirements. Few existing systems provide models for how goals change during designing, a hallmark of creative design in humans. In this paper we present models of surprise and reformulation as metacognitive processes that transform design goals in order to explore surprising regions of a design search space. The model provides a system with specific goals for exploratory behaviour, whereas previous systems have modelled exploration and novelty-seeking abstractly. We use observed designs to construct a probabilistic model that represents expectations about the design domain, and then reason about the unexpectedness of new designs with that model. We implement our model in the domain of culinary creativity, and demonstrate how the cognitive behaviors of surprise and problem reformulation can be incorporated into design reasoning.


PURPOSE
In this study, the authors sought to develop and characterize techniques for measuring changes in choroidal neovascularization (CNV) lesion size and fluorescence over time for quantitative analysis of fluorescein angiograms.

METHODS
Initial assessment of the quantitative technique was made by retrospectively analyzing digital fluorescein angiograms taken before and 3 months after photodynamic therapy (PDT) for CNV (6 patients, group 1). The method was then applied prospectively to digital fluorescein angiograms (baseline and day 71) obtained on 12 patients taking part in a clinical trial investigating the effect of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) Trap in CNV (group 2). Two masked observers, with the use of image processing, measured the area of hyperfluorescence and fluorescence intensity above background. Values for each image were plotted against time after dye injection to generate curves, and each area under the curve (AUC) was calculated.

RESULTS
The physician who treated the patients in group 1 judged the condition of three patients to be improved and of three to be worse 3 months after PDT. Masked retrospective grading of fluorescein angiograms showed an 11% decrease in AUC for fluorescence area and a 32% decrease in AUC for fluorescence intensity in the three patients whose conditions clinically improved but increases of 131% and 292% in the three patients whose conditions clinically worsened. In group 2, a 38% decrease in AUC for fluorescence intensity and a 19% decrease in AUC for fluorescence area were observed in patients who received VEGF Trap compared with increases of 66% (P = 0.004, Mann-Whitney U test) and 21% (P = 0.07) for patients who received placebo. Macular volume decreased by 11% in VEGF Trap-treated patients and increased by 10% in placebo-treated patients (P = 0.03).

CONCLUSIONS
This study reports a technique for analysis of change in fluorescence area and intensity over time during fluorescein angiography (FA) using a continuous scale and its application in a clinical setting and a clinical trial. Compared with previous techniques making use of categorical scales, this approach provides an advantage for evaluating responses to treatment that may improve the value of FA as an outcome measure in clinical trials.


Tin sulfide (SnS) is a promising thermoelectric material with advantages of non-toxicity, abundant resources and low cost of its components. However, its figure of merit (ZT) is lower than that of its analogue SnSe, which was recently revealed to have an unprecedentedly high ZT value. Here, we demonstrate the differences of electronic structures between SnS and SnSe by combining angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) and density functional theory (DFT). Additionally, by n-type doping with Sb or Bi, our findings reveal novel resonant states near the bottom of the SnS conduction band and a considerable increase of the electron delocalization along the out-of-plane direction. Effectively, Boltzmann transport calculations show that controlled doping with Sb or Bi results in an effective increase of the Seebeck coefficient as well as a remarkably improved normalized electrical conductivity. Thus, together with the lower thermal conductivity along the out-of-plane direction due to the interface scattering from the SnS layered structure, an improved thermoelectric performance may be realized along the out-of-plane direction. These results pave the way towards new opportunities for developing high-performance thermoelectric materials based on electronic structure tuning by atomically controlled n-type doping.


In this note we present a formula for the equivariant index of the cohomological complex obtained from localization of N=2 SYM on simply-connected compact four-manifolds with a T  2-action. Knowledge of said index is essential to compute the perturbative part of the partition function for the theory. In the topologically twisted case, the complex is elliptic and its index can be computed in a standard way using the Atiyah–Bott localization formula. Recently, a framework for more general types of twisting, so-called cohomological twisting, was introduced for which the complex turns out to be only transversally elliptic. While the index of such a complex has been computed for some cases where the manifold can be lifted to a Sasakian S 1-fibration in five dimensions, a general four-dimensional treatment was still lacking. We provide a formal, purely four-dimensional treatment of the cohomological complex, showing that the Laplacian part can be globally split off while the remaining part can be trivialized uniquely in the group-direction. This ultimately produces a simple formula for the index applicable for any compact simply-connected four-manifold. Finally, the index formula is applied to examples on S 4, CP2 and F1 . For the latter, we use the result to compute the perturbative partition function.


Platelets play a pivotal role in thrombosis and hemostasis, but an increasing variety of extra-hemostatic functions of platelets are being recognized. This review summarizes recent advances in the understanding of the role of platelets in various pathologies involving the liver. In ischemia/reperfusion injury of the liver, platelets appear to play a dual role. On one hand, platelets bind to the activated sinusoidal endothelium and induce apoptosis of these cells; on the other hand, platelet-derived serotonin assists in repair of the ischemic tissue. Furthermore, platelets are attracted to the liver following systemic inflammatory stimuli, but the significance of this finding is still unclear. Platelets and platelet-derived serotonin appear vital for liver regeneration following a partial liver resection. Finally, platelets and platelet-derived serotonin aggravate viral hepatitis by affecting the microcirculation in the liver.


This study aimed to evaluate the protein-phenolic interaction in functional crackers made of wheat/lentil flour with onion skin phenolics (onion skin powder: OSP, onion skin phenolic extract: OSE, or quercetin: Q) after in vitro gastrointestinal digestion. Phenolic/antioxidant recovery in crackers was lower with higher levels of phenolic addition. In vitro gastrointestinal digestion procedure was applied for crackers prepared/cooked with onion skin phenolics (functional crackers) or crackers consumed with onion skin phenolics (co-digestion). Functional crackers had similar nutritional attributes (p > 0.05), however they had lower L* values, and higher a* values. A higher concentration of OSP/OSE caused a decrease in the b* value while it was increased with the quercetin addition. Phenolic/antioxidant recovery in functional crackers was decreased by increasing the ratio of phenolic supplements. The amount of quercetin 7,4-diglucoside was lower than the theoretical value whereas the amount of quercetin was higher in functional crackers. The phenolic bioavailability index (BIP) of co-digested crackers was higher than that of functional crackers, whereas antioxidant bioavailability index (BIA) was mostly similar. Quercetin was only identified in functional wheat/lentil crackers with OSE. After digestion (1) TCA-precipitated peptides of the wheat crackers could not be identified, whereas that of co-digested lentil crackers was more abundant, (2) level of free amino groups of co-digested/functional crackers were lower than the control except for the co-digested sample of lentil cracker with quercetin.


Based on existing literature this paper provides a clearly conceptual framework for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) financing in the global context. The conceptual framework has been organized in terms of some selected crucial aspects, such as: the financial institution structures; the lending infrastructures, and finally the lending strategies in using SME financing. The financial institution structures deals with the comparative advantages of different types of financial institutions. Here we focus mainly on the comparative advantages of large vs. small financial institutions; foreign-owned vs. domestically-owned institutions, and state-owned vs. privately-owned institutions in lending to SMEs. The lending infrastructure includes: the information environment; the legal, judicial and bankruptcy environment, and finally the tax and regulatory environments, all of which may directly or indirectly affect SME credit availability. Regarding lending strategies, we focus mainly on the core technologies such as: financial statement lending; small business credit scoring; asset-based lending; factoring; trade credit, and finally the relationship lending technology. We focus on the parts of the financial system that are most relevant to SME finance. We concentrate on the private debt markets that provide external finance to SMEs, and exclude discussions of the public equity and debt markets, which are generally beyond the reach of SMEsSmall and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) Financing Revisited: Lessons for Bangladesh


BACKGROUND
Older workers are increasingly represented in the U.S. workforce, but frequently work part-timeor intermittently, hindering accurate injury rate estimates. To reduce the impact of reporting barriers on rate comparisons, we focused on reinjury (both injury recurrence and new injury) among workers with a workers' compensation claim, assessing: (1) reinjury risk for workers age 65+ versus <65; (2) importance of work-time at-risk measurement for rate estimates and comparisons; and (3) age distribution of potential risk factors.

METHODS
Washington State workers' compensation claims for a retrospective cohort of workers with work-related permanent impairments were linked to state wage files. Reinjury rates were calculated for the cohort (N = 11,184) and a survey sample (N = 582), using both calendar time and full-time equivalent (FTE)-adjusted time. Risk differentials were assessed using rate ratios and adjusted survival models.

RESULTS
The rate ratio for workers age 65+ (vs. <65) was 0.45 (p < 0.001) using calendar time, but 0.70 (p = 0.07) using FTE-adjusted time. Survey-based rates were 35.7 per 100 worker-years for workers age 65+, versus 14.8 for <65. Workers age 65+ (vs. <65) were more likely to work <100% FTE, but were similar regarding job strain, their ability to handle physical job demands, and their comfort reporting unsafe conditions or injuries.

CONCLUSIONS
Accounting for work-time at risk substantially improves age-based reinjury comparisons. Although the marked elevation in self-reported reinjury risk for older workers might be a small-sample artifact (n = 34), workers age 65+ are likely at higher risk than previously appreciated. Ongoing workforce trends demand increased attention to injury surveillance and prevention for older workers.


Because of the scarcity of spectrum, it is becoming more and more important to use the spectrum efficiently. Dynamic spectrum allocation schemes are proposed to increase the efficiency of spectrum usage. Meanwhile, delay-sensitive services like voice service are still a strong contributor to operator revenues and constitute a significant portion of user demand. Therefore, it is valuable to study whether delay-sensitive services like voice service can be provided in multichannel random access network, in which multiple operators use the unlicensed spectrum and decentralized dynamic spectrum allocation scheme is adopted.In this study, two User Reinforcement Learning schemes are proposed to model the behavior of selfish users in the multichannel random access network. We analyze the performance of these two schemes and compare them with Operator Reinforcement Learning scheme and Operator Non-Reinforcement Learning scheme in terms of delay, jitter, packet loss rate, consecutive packet loss rate, throughput per channel and utility per user.We find that both the "User Reinforcement Learning Non-Retransmission" scheme and the "Operator Reinforcement Learning" scheme can provide a satisfactory quality service under a moderately high load.


BACKGROUND
Recurrent aphthous stomatitis (RAS) is a chronic inflammatory disease of unknown etiology characterized by recurring formation of painful oral ulcers. RAS may result from oral epithelium damage caused by T-cell-mediated immune response. CD4(+)CD25(+) T regulatory (Treg) cells suppress proliferation and effector functions of other immune cells, and therefore are crucial in regulating the immune response.

METHODS
We tested the function of peripheral CD4(+)CD25(high) Treg cells in active RAS through their ability to inhibit proliferation and cytokine production of conventional CD4(+) T cells. We also attempted to detect the presence of FOXP3 and indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) mRNA in the lesional and non-lesional oral mucosa of RAS patients and healthy individuals using real-time PCR assay.

RESULTS
Treg cells derived from RAS patients were less efficient in the suppression of cytokine production of CD4(+) T effector cells than Treg cells from healthy individuals. Moreover, in RAS, Treg cells were nearly twice less potent in the inhibition of CD4(+)CD25(-) T cell proliferation than in healthy donors. Furthermore, we have demonstrated the decreased proportion of CD4(+)CD25(+)FOXP3(+) Treg cells in peripheral blood of RAS patients compared with controls. We failed to detect FOXP3 mRNA, while IDO mRNA expression was decreased in non-lesional mucosa biopsies from RAS patients compared with ulcer biopsies or normal mucosa from healthy donors.

CONCLUSIONS
These findings suggest that CD4(+)CD25(high) Treg cells are both functionally and quantitatively compromised in RAS and that decreased constitutive expression of IDO in oral mucosa in RAS may lead to the loss of local immune tolerance.


This paper deals with friction compensation techniques for accuracy trajectory tracking control of robots. We extend the traditional model-based adaptive control algorithms that are prevalent in the robotics literature with adaptive friction compensation. Adaptive controllers that consider both static and dynamic friction effects in the robot dynamics are proposed. Stability of the proposed adaptive controller with friction compensation is shown. An extensive experimental study has been done to illustrate the importance of friction compensation in trajectory tracking. The tracking performance of the proposed adaptive controller utilizing the dynamic friction models for compensation is far superior to the conventional adaptive controller without friction compensation. Using the data collected for a series of experiments we compare the proposed adaptive controllers with static and dynamic friction compensation with two well known robot control algorithms, i.e., model-based computed-torque control and adaptive control. A representative sample of the experimental data is shown and discussed.


Among opportunistic infections with gram-negative bacilli, those caused by Pseudomonas aeruginosa are associated with particularly high mortalities. Accordingly, considerable interest exists to develop immunotherapeutic or immunoprophylactic agents for this pathogen. In vitro as well as in vivo studies in animal models have demonstrated that LPS serotype-specific antibodies against P. aeruginosa confer protection. Thus, cell wall-derived LPS P. aeruginosa vaccines have been developed for active immunization. Toxic side effects from LPS and relatively slow immune response to active immunization in patients needing rapid protection have led to the development of high-titered anti-P. aeruginosa immunoglobulin G preparations. Passive immunotherapy with these polyclonal antibody preparations has shown promising results in animal models and in clinical pilot studies. More recently, murine and human monoclonal antibodies against P. aeruginosa have been developed. These preparations offer the potential advantage over polyclonal globulin preparations of low protein dosages and virtually unlimited supply.


Since long latency due to remote memory access could be tolerated by rapidly switching to another thread in multithreaded processing, caching I-structure data is expected to have less beneficial effect on the performance than caching ordinary data. In this paper we show that caching I-structure data could improve the overall performance in spite of latency tolerating property of multithreading. Our quantitative analysis reveals that the most important caching effect off-structure data in frame-based multithreading is the enhancement of frame parallelism. It reduces the idle time due to latency by lowering latency sensitivity and at the same time decreases the thread processing time by exploiting more processors.


The author of this article makes studies and discussion on the image cryptography of transforming domains. In the image cryptographic algorithm, the sine chaotic mapping scrambling is applied to the original image and the scrambling matrix is generated by Logistic chaotic system. Fractional Fourier transform (FFT), respectively, is along the x-axis and y-axis that generates a function which is transformed random in the phase mask. The function of the phase mask uses the Logistic chaotic system. The simulation experiments verifies that this algorithm can effectively resist plaintext attack, differential attack and statistical analysis, and the large key space can be achieved to 1087, and has a higher security.


Myocardial tissue lacks the ability to appreciably regenerate itself following myocardial infarction (MI) which ultimately results in heart failure. Current therapies can only retard the progression of disease and hence tissue engineering strategies are required to facilitate the engineering of a suitable biomaterial to repair MI. The aim of this study was to investigate the in vitro properties of an injectable biomaterial for the regeneration of infarcted myocardium. Fabrication of core/shell fibers was by co-axial electrospinning, with poly(glycerol sebacate) (PGS) as core material and poly-l-lactic acid (PLLA) as shell material. The PLLA was removed by treatment of the PGS/PLLA core/shell fibers with DCM:hexane (2:1) to obtain PGS short fibers. These PGS short fibers offer the advantage of providing a minimally invasive injectable technique for the regeneration of infarcted myocardium. The scaffolds were characterized by SEM, FTIR and contact angle and cell–scaffold interactions using cardiomyocytes. The results showed that the cardiac marker proteins actinin, troponin, myosin heavy chain and connexin 43 were expressed more on short PGS fibers compared to PLLA nanofibers. We hypothesized that the injection of cells along with short PGS fibers would increase cell transplant retention and survival within the infarct, compared to the standard cell injection system.


Parkinson's disease (PD) is an increasing threat to first-world nations as their population ages, with around one in 100 suffering from it by age 60. Incurable, with treatments that do little to delay disease progression, PD induces severe disability and even death in those afflicted. The search for preventative measures has revealed the widely used psychoactive stimulant caffeine, which competitively inhibits adenosine receptors to induce a wide variety of effects. The inhibition of inflammation and microglial cell activation to reduce reactive oxygen species (ROS)-induced cellular damage and the resultant mitochondrial dysfunction of the dopaminergic neurons appears to be the main pathway, inducing neuronal loss via the activation of the intrinsic pathway to apoptosis. Mouse models and human data reinforce that caffeine delays the onset of PD in a dose-dependent manner. Evidence suggests it is more beneficial in men than women and is not beneficial at all in women undergoing hormone replacement therapy (HRT). Additionally, some studies suggest that although caffeinated drinks such as cola and tea are beneficial, there may be other products in coffee that prevent the effect, though this requires further research. Although there is strong evidence that caffeine is neuroprotective, there is less evidence that it delays the onset of PD. Given the association with cardiovascular disease, it may be disadvantageous overall to the majority of the population to supplement caffeine, though still a beneficial preventative technique for individuals with a genetic predisposition to PD that may otherwise suffer early onset.


The characteristics of sheared surfaces of ductile metals are fundamentally interesting for tribological performance. This research applies an atomic force microscope (AFM) to characterize the shear patterns and characteristics of pure copper metal. Two approaches were used, micro indentation and equal channel angular extrusion (ECAS). This poster discusses our findings in nano scale behavior of shear and compares the process of materials deformation. New insight of ductility for wear is reported.Copyright © 2005 by ASME


While large outbreaks of C. auris in hospital settings have been described, few clear cases of direct transmission have been documented. We here investigated the transmission of C. auris clade I between two patients with a 41- to 61-day delay between exposure and the development of colonization. This may lead to changes in the recommendations concerning treatment of C. auris cases, as an incubation period of this length is one of the first to be reported. ABSTRACT Candida auris is a recently described emerging pathogen in hospital settings. Five genetic clades have been delineated, with each clade being isolated from specific geographic regions. We here describe the first transmission between 2 patients (P0 and P1) of a clade I C. auris strain imported into our burn intensive care unit from the Middle East. The strains have been investigated with whole-genome sequencing, which validated the high similarity of the genomes between isolates from P0 and P1. We repeatedly screened the two patients and contact patients (i.e., other patients present in the same hospital ward at the time of the first positive sample from P0 or P1; n = 49; 268 tests) with fungal culture and a C. auris-specific quantitative PCR assay to assess transmission patterns. We observed that P1 developed C. auris colonization between 41 and 61 days after potential exposure to P0 contamination, despite three negative screening tests as recommended by our national authorities. This study illustrates that transmission of C. auris between patients can lead to long-term incubation times before the detection of colonization. The recommended screening strategy may not be optimal and should be improved in the light of our findings. IMPORTANCE While large outbreaks of C. auris in hospital settings have been described, few clear cases of direct transmission have been documented. We here investigated the transmission of C. auris clade I between two patients with a 41- to 61-day delay between exposure and the development of colonization. This may lead to changes in the recommendations concerning treatment of C. auris cases, as an incubation period of this length is one of the first to be reported.


: - Extremely massive MIMO (Multiple-Input Multiple-Output) is a crucial technology in wireless communication systems. By deploying a large number of antennas, extremely massive MIMO enables spatial diversity, but it also introduces significant computational complexity due to the large number of antennas involved in various processing tasks. One such task is precoding, where numerous improvements have been proposed in the literature. However, most existing methods assume spatially stationary channels and do not adequately account for the spatial non-stationarity that arises when the number of antennas increases. The randomized Kaczmarz algorithm (rKA) method and the sampling without replacement rKA (SwoR-rKA) method, that is an enhancement method of rKA, are proposed for the spatial non-stationarity downlink. The bit error ratio of rKA and SwoR-rKA are good at lower signal-to-noise ratio but the performances level off due to the residuals at higher signal-to-noise ratio, so the performances of bit error ratio are limited with the residuals. This paper focuses on reducing the residuals with the same or lower computational complexity. In the rKA method, the factors of precoding matrix are updated iteratively and a column to be updated is selected by a probability. The rKA method select each column at randomly and the SwoR-rKA tends to select a column corresponding to the channel in better condition. It, however, is not effective to update the column corresponding to good conditions because the columns corresponding to the good channels can be estimated to some extent with a small number of iterations. Our idea to improve the SwoR-rKA is that the policy to select a column to be updated is set that the columns corresponding to channels in bad condition tend to be selected. With this policy, all the columns corresponding to each channel are considered to reach a certain degree of estimation criteria. The result of computer simulation shows that proposed method defeats the original SwoR-rKA in view of bit error ratio performance with the same complexity, particularly at high signal-to-noise ratios of about 16 dB or more. The simulation results provide evidence of the effectiveness of the proposed approaches in mitigating the impact of spatial non-stationarity, leading to improved bit error ratio performance.


Background and Objectives: Ketamine has been used in pediatric flexible fiberoptic bronchoscopy (FFB). Its efficacy and safety for sedation of adults undergoing FFB has not been thoroughly investigated, and, consequently, it is not used by most interventional bronchoscopists. We aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of sedation for FFB under ketamine-propofol-midazolam (KPM) compared with the fentanyl-propofol-midazolam (FPM) regimen. Materials and Methods: This was a prospective randomized trial of adult patients (n=80) undergoing FFB, randomized to receive sedation with either KPM (n=39) or FPM (n=41). Vital signs including transcutaneous carbon dioxide tension (TcPCO2) were continuously monitored. Sedation-related complications and interventions to maintain respiratory and hemodynamic stability were compared. Both operator and patient were blinded to the sedation regimen used. The operator's and patient's satisfaction from sedation were assessed following recovery. Results: Maximal intraprocedural TcPCO2 values and minimal oxygen saturation did not differ significantly between the KPM and FPM groups (63.2±11.4 mm Hg vs. 61.1±7.2 mm Hg) and (77.1%±12.5% vs. 81.8%±12.0%), respectively. No significant differences were noted between the KPM and FPM groups with respect to sedation-related respiratory or hemodynamic complications. The operator's and patient's satisfaction from sedation was similar between the groups. Conclusions: Ketamine is as safe and effective as fentanyl for adult analgesia and sedation during FFB. In light of this observation and the fact that ketamine does not cause hemodynamic suppression, like most sedative agents, and is a potent bronchodilator, should encourage its more widespread use for adult sedation during FFB.


Sucrose addition to the vase solution improved the postharvest qualities of cut liatris by increasing the length of inflorescence s showing color and by prolonging the vase life of the spikes. The main effect of sucrose was on the development and opening of the flower heads with minimal effect on their longevity. Pulsing with con- centrations of sucrose ≥10% for 20 hours prolonged the vase life of the spikes. Re- sponses of spikes to the pulsed treatment varied greatly due to the differences in their degree of leafiness, thus limiting its commercial application. A continuous supply of 2.5% or 5% sucrose in the vase solution allowed most of the flower heads on the spikes to develop and doubled the vase life of the spikes.


In a local network or the Internet in general, data that is transmitted between two computers (also known as network traffic or simply, traffic) in that network is usually classified as being of a malicious or of a benign nature by a traffic authenti cation system employing databases of previously observed malicious or benign traffic signatures, i.e., blacklists or whitelists, respectively. These lists typically consist of either the destinations (i.e., IP addresses or domain names) to which traffic is being sent or the statistical properties of the traffic, e.g., packet size, rate of connection establishment, etc. The drawback with the list-based approach is its inability to of fer a fully comprehensive solution since the population of the list is likely to go on indefinitely. This implies that at any given time, there is a likelihood of some traffic signatures not being present in the list, leading to false classification of traffic. From a security standpoint, whitelists are a safer bet than blacklists since their underlying philosophy is to block anything that is unknown hence in the worst case, are likely to result in high false rejects with no false accepts. On the other hand, blacklists block only what is known and therefore are likely to result in high false accepts since unknown malicious traffic will be accepted, e.g., in the case of zero-day attacks (i.e., new attacks whose signatures have not yet been analyzed by the security community). Despite this knowledge, the most commonly used traffic authentication solu tions, e.g., antivirus or antimalware solutions, have predominantly employed blacklists rather than whitelists in their solutions. This can perhaps be attributed to the fact that the population of a blacklist typically requires less user involvement than that of a whitelist. For instance, malicious traffic signatures (i.e., behavior or destinations) are usually the same across a population of users; hence, by observing malicious ac tivity from a few users, a global blacklist that is applicable to all users can be created. Whitelist generation, on the other hand, tends to be more user-specific as what may be considered acceptable or benign traffic to one user may not be considered the same to a different user. As a result, users are likely to find whitelist-based solutions that require their participation to be both cumbersome and inconveniencing. This dissertation offers a whitelist-based traffic authentication solution that reduces the active participation of users in whitelist population. By relying on activity that users regularly engage in while interacting with their computers (i.e., typing), we are able to identify legitimate destinations to which users direct their traffic and use these to populate the whitelist, without requiring the users to deviate from their normal behavior. Our solution requires users to type the destinations of their outgoing traffic requests only once, after which any subsequent requests to that destination are authenticated without the need for them to be typed again. Empirical results from testing our solution in a real time traffic analysis sce nario showed that relatively low false reject rates for legitimate traffic with no false accepts for illegitimate traffic are achievable. Additionally, an investigation into the level of inconvenience that the typing requirement imposes on the users revealed that, since users are likely to engage in this (typing) activity during the course of utilizing their computer's resources, this requirement did not pose a significant deterrent to them from using the system. APPROVAL FOR SCHOLARLY DISSEMINATION The author grants to the Prescott Memorial Library o f Louisiana Tech University the right to reproduce, by appropriate methods, upon request, any or all portions o f this Thesis. It is understood that "proper request" consists o f the agreement, on the part o f the requesting party, that said reproduction is for his personal use and that subsequent reproduction will not occur without written approval o f the author o f this Thesis. Further, any portions o f the Thesis used in books, papers, and other works must be appropriately referenced to this Thesis. Finally, the author o f this Thesis reserves the right to publish freely, in the literature, at any time, any or all portions o f this Thesis.


Ascariasis, affecting roughly 1000 million people in the world, is the commonest human parasite infection. Children bear the brunt of the morbidity and mortality associated with this disease that, as the introduction to this book states, 'ranks high in 'the forgotten problems of forgotten people'.' This book records the contributions to an international conference in 1984, which was the first workshop since 1967 devoted entirely to ascariasis. The book is divided into four sections-biology, epidemiology, the disease, and prevention and control. Each section concludes with a discussion that helps to clarify some of the issues. High technology brings the reader face to face with a scanning electronmicrograph of the trifid mouth of a worm, and there is a chapter on mathematical modelling of ascaris populations. This latter chapter serves to illustrate that there is a lack of basic epidemiological data about this disease. Further chapters from three continents emphasise the variability of incidence and morbidity, which should encourage local surveys before embarking on control programmes. The significance of ascariasis as a cause of malnutrition remains controversial, but the evidence available is clearly presented. Chapters on surgical complications and on allergy are fascinating, but it is the final section about prevention and control to which health planners will turn for guidance. There is an excellent chapter on sanitation. Exhortations to incorporate control of ascariasis within primary health care systems outnumber the few reports of this actually happening. Ascariasis does not have a dramatic appeal to health planners, unlike some other diseases of poverty. The point is well made, however, that worm infestation is a problem easily understood by villagers and may provide a focus for them to work together to improve their own health. This book is a comprehensive review of a global problem and should be read by those concerned with child health in poorer countries. DAVID CUNDALL The Psychology of Childhood Illness. By C Eiser. Pp 212: DM 94 hardback. SpringerVerlag, 1985.


We present experimental observations of the disk of air caught under a drop impacting onto a solid surface. By imaging the impact through an acrylic plate with an ultra-high-speed video camera, we can follow the evolution of the air disk as it contracts into a bubble under the centre of the drop. The initial size and contraction speed of the disk were measured for a range of impact Weber and Reynolds numbers. The size of the initial disk is related to the bottom curvature of the drop at the initial contact, as measured in free-fall. The initial contact often leaves behind a ring of micro-bubbles, marking its location. The air disk contracts at a speed comparable to the corresponding air disks caught under a drop impacting onto a liquid surface. This speed also seems independent of the wettability of the liquid, which only affects the azimuthal shape of the contact line. For some impact conditions, the dynamics of the contraction leaves a small droplet at the centre of the bubble. This arises from a capillary wave propagating from the edges of the contracting disk towards the centre. As the wave converges its amplitude grows until it touches the solid substrate, thereby pinching off the micro-droplet at the plate, in the centre of the bubble. The effect of increasing liquid viscosity is to slow down the contraction speed and to produce a more irregular contact line leaving more micro-bubbles along the initial ring.


The paper reports on the solvation of Sodium citrate in water, water + CH3 0 λ m CN and water + DMSO mixtures (v/v) under varying dielectric constant at different temperature. The specific conductance data obtained was analyzed by Kraus-Bray and Shedlovsky conductivity models. Limiting molar conductance ( ), dissociation constant/ association constant (KC/Ka 0 λ m ) were evaluated for all the solvent compositions. The limiting molar conductance, decreases with the increase in amount of co-solvent in water, due to increased solvent-solvent interaction and decrease in dielectric constant. Due to high viscosity and molecular size of DMSO in water, lower conductance was observed in water + DMSO media. The Ka values increases with the increase in amount co-solvent in water at all the temperatures studied. Energy of activation of the rate process and related thermodynamic parameters such as ΔHa, ΔGa and ΔSa have been evaluated. ΔGa is found to be negative indicating spontaneity of the process. Walden product (λ0mη0) and corrected Stoke's radius (r ) have also been evaluated. Fuoss- Accascina equation was used to identify the ion-pairs and ion-triplets in the system. But the slopes of the plot were found to be less than -0.5, indicating the absence of ion-pairs or ion-triplets. Born relation of solvation was verified. These data have been used to study the nature of ion-solvent interaction and solvent-solvent interactions existing in the system


In 1984 George Orwell described a future theocracy that demanded unity at all costs, and in which all independent thought would be eradicated. According to the authors of this book, such a theocracy now exists. They describe how, in an increasingly restrained ?New World Society?, Jehovah?s Witnesses busily go about the business of warning the world that their God, Jehovah, will act soon to destroy all who oppose him and his organization. For them 1984 appears to be the current unofficial deadline for Armageddon, for they believe that God promised that the generation that saw the beginning of world distress (starting with World War I in 1914) would not pass away before the end came. A biblical generation is seventy years. 1914 + 70 = 1984. Convinced that the world Is due to end, they have given up their independence to the central theocracy. The Bottings, both Witnesses, can and do answer the questions everyone asks about this sect. They examine its history, the ways in which history itself has been interpreted in the light of bible prophecy, the basic beliefs or ?symbols? in which Witnesses are required to put their faith, and the dynamics of conversion and indoctrination. They also reveal why Jehovah?s Witnesses turn away from their calling by the thousands and how the sect effects a ?mental-regulating? of youth as choice is taken away from children at a very young age. The sect is not only subject to forces of dissidence and disaffection from its membership, it has also been subject to a major rift within its headquarters. This event and what was done about it are also described. The authors conclude this serious, concerned, probing but readable study with an exploration of parallels between the contemporary Jehovah?s Witness sect and the world described by George Orwell in 1984.


Objectives
Selenium (Se) is a non-metallic, essential trace element for many organisms, including humans. Se may have potential in cancer prevention, as evidenced by multiple animal and human epidemiological studies. Selenium-binding protein 1 (SBP1) is a highly-conserved protein that covalently binds Se. Prostate cells exhibit cytoplasmic and nuclear SBP1 localization. Reduced levels of nuclear SBP1 were previously shown to be associated with a higher tumor grade and a greater likelihood of prostate cancer recurrence following prostatectomy. The Krebs cycle of the normal prostate is inhibited in favor of the production of citrate energy, therefore distinguishing the energy metabolism of the normal prostate from that of other organs. This inhibition is generally relieved during cancer progression. The objective of this study was to investigate a contribution of SBP1 in this process of metabolic shift.

Methods
Human PC-3 prostate cancer cells that express very low levels of SBP1 were engineered to express the native, nuclear-targeted, or nuclear-excluded SBP1 by transfection of constitutive- or inducible-SBP1 expression constructs. Oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) was examined by quantifying the oxygen consumption rate (OCR) using a Seahorse XF analyzer (Agilent, Inc.). Western blotting with SBP1 and phospho-AMPK specific antibodies was employed to interrogate the activation of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK), a key regulator of energy homeostasis.

Results
Overexpressing SBP1 in PC-3 cells increased the activating phosphorylation of AMPK at Thr172 by approximately 70%. In addition, overexpressing the native, nuclear-targeted or nuclear-excluded SBP1 significantly reduced OCR and mitochondrial ATP synthesis, as measures of mitochondrial respiration (32-43% reduction in basal respiration and 40-55% reduction in maximal respiration). These changes in energy metabolism occurred without affecting cellular proliferation.

Conclusions
These results indicate that the loss of SBP1 during prostate cancer development may contribute to disease progression by facilitating the transition to an energy metabolism that favors increased energy production as well as the building blocks required to sustain tumor growth and survival.

Funding Sources
National Institute of Health.


OBJECTIVE
To observe the changes of forward displacement of maxillary complete denture during centric occlusion, three different methods were used to record the changes of vertical overlap and the comfort level of patients before and after the selective grinding of the three dentures made according to maxillo-mandibular horizontal relationship record.

METHODS
Twelve edentulous patients with normal stomatognathic system were recruited in this study. Three types of complete dentures for these 12 edentulous patients were made according to their different maxilla-mandibular horizontal relationship record methods. The amount of displacement of the maxillary complete denture, the vertical overlap of the anterior teeth as well as patient comfort level were recorded before and after selective grinding. Statistical analysis was performed using the SPSS 17.0 software package.

RESULTS
Before selective grinding, the amount of displacement of denture A was significantly larger than those of dentures B and C (P<0.05). After selective grinding, there was no statistical difference among the three dentures (P>0.05). During selective grinding, the vertical overlap variation of denture A was significantly greater than those of dentures B and C (P<0.05). Before selective grinding, the comfort level of the denture A was the lowest (P<0.05), and no statistical difference was found between dentures B and C (P>0.05). After selective grinding, no statistical difference was found among the three dentures (P>0.05).

CONCLUSIONS
Among the complete dentures with anatomical teeth, the dentures whose horizontal relationship was recorded at 1 mm before the apex of the Gothic arch apex and with checkbite are more in line with clinical repair requirements. Complete dentures whose horizontal relationship was recorded at the apex of Gothic arch need to be adjusted with selective grinding to meet the clinical restoration requirements.


It is known that there is a distortion of hue and saturation in the peripheral visual field. In a previous study, when an asymmetric matching paradigm was used, four hues in the blue, red, yellow and green regions of colour space were unchanged and these were referred to as peripherally invariant (Parry et al., J Opt Soc Am A, 23, 2006, 1586). Three of these invariant hues were similar to unique blue, red and yellow. However, for most observers there was a marked difference between unique and invariant green. To investigate this apparent paradox, we have measured unique hues using a range of eccentricities and colourimetric purities. An asymmetric matching and a 4‐AFC paradigm were used to establish peripherally invariant and unique hues, respectively. In the asymmetric matching task the observer matched a peripheral spot with a para‐foveal spot, for 24 different hues at 18° eccentricity. In the 4‐AFC paradigm, 41 hues were presented 20 times at three purities (0.5, 0.75 and 1.0) and three eccentricities (18°, 10° and 1°). The observer had to name the hues as red, blue, green or yellow. Unique hues were found to be constant with eccentricity and purity. The unique green, established with 4‐AFC, was found to differ from the invariant green, determined using the matching task. However, red, blue and yellow invariant hues correspond well with unique hues. The data suggest that different mechanisms mediate the matching of green compared with the identification of unique hues. This is similar to the difference between detection and discrimination of spectral stimuli: the detection process is dominated by the cone opponent mechanisms and is most sensitive, whereas more central processes, serving unique hues, influence discrimination.


A two sector small open economy model developed by Corden (1991, 2002) is used to analyse the impact of sudden stops in capital inflows on an internal and external equilibrium and to explore the merits of disposing of the nominal exchange rate as policy tool in rectifying real exchange rate misalignments. It is shown how the economy's sectoral demand properties determine the extent of recession associated with real exchange rate adjustment that is neither engineered by nominal exchange rate changes nor brought about by a decline in nontraded goods prices. The conclusion is drawn that, when deciding on the design of exchange rate regimes, the structural characteristics of the economy ought to be considered so as to appropriately strengthen its capacity to cope with shocks in the form of negative swings in capital inflows.


Discovering opinion leaders in social circles is an important issue in social networks. Most existing opinion leader detection methods usually focus on the whole social network. However, the composition of social networks is complicated, as many social circles or communities based on interests exist in social networks. We find that it is hard to find all the opinion leaders of small social circles if we only focus on the whole network. In this work, we propose a method in which we conduct community detection first and then perform influence analysis on the communities to find the opinion leaders of social circles. Most previous overlapping community detection methods are usually time-consuming and cannot output results in acceptable time on a large-scale dataset; therefore, we propose a linear time complexity overlapping community detection method based on topic graph. We calculate degree centrality, betweenness centrality, closeness centrality, and PageRank value of the nodes in each community detected to find opinion leaders. We collect a large-scale dataset from Zhihu and use it to validate our methods. The extensive results demonstrate that our method can produce better results in finding opinion leaders in social circles compared with other methods.


Objectives: To identify educational practices in family planning, facilitating factors, difficulties and resulting impacts.
Method: This is an integrative literature review, using the three descriptors: "family planning", "health education" and "contraception"; In the databases of the Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO), Latin American and Caribbean Literature in Health Sciences (LILACS) and Nursing Database (BDENF), were searched in January and February 2016.
Results: Regarding the accomplishment of educational practices, most of the studies pointed out its accomplishment. The difficulties and facilitators aspects were related to the management of the health service, professional competence and users. Guarantee of family rights and autonomy were the impacts pointed out.
Conclusion: The study showed that educational practices in family planning are tools to be encouraged as a guarantee and respect for sexual and reproductive rights.
Descriptors: family planning; education in health; contraception.


BACKGROUND
The present study focused on the inflammatory disease progress after periodontal defect induction and aimed to specifically determine periodontal tissue responses following dental plaque accumulation by ligatures on a site with/without standardized periodontal defect induction.

METHODS
After 1 month from extraction of the adjacent teeth, semi-circumferential defects were surgically created in the unilateral second and fourth premolars (test group), while no defects being induced at the contralateral sites (control group). One week later, silk was used to ligate the tooth cervix at both sites to encourage the accumulation of dental plaque. Four weeks later, the tissue samples were collected for histological/histomorphometric and microarray analysis. Microbiological analysis was performed before defect induction and at ligatures, and after 4 weeks of dental plaque accumulation.

RESULTS
Remarkable inflammation was clinically and histologically observed in both groups after plaque accumulation, and the intrabony type of periodontal defect exaggerated inflammatory cell infiltration into the connective tissue layer. Expression of genes related to inflammation such as IL-1 was highly up-regulated in test sites. However, these inflammatory infiltrations did not invade to a boundary of periodontal ligament and connective tissue attachment in both groups, and histomorphometric results corresponds to these observational results. Bacterial findings also showed no significant differences in detected microbiome compositions between control and test groups at three-time points.

CONCLUSION
Intrabony defect might exaggerate the plaque-induced inflammation in the aspect of inflammatory cell infiltration and the related gene expression, but both dental plaque and the pre-existing periodontal defect negligibly disrupt periodontal attachment and the underlying alveolar bone. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.


There is a growing body of knowledge on the link between environmental management and supply chain management, but there is contradicting evidence on the impact of a proactive environmental strategy on environmental performance. Therefore, this paper investigates the impact of proactive environmental strategy on environmental performance as mediated by environmental investments. We also consider the antecedents of the adoption of proactive environmental strategy. We develop and test hypotheses, using data collected from 96 Turkish manufacturers through an online questionnaire. The model was tested using partial least squares (PLS), a structural equation modelling method. The results show that a proactive environmental strategy leads to higher environmental investments; both internally and externally in collaboration with suppliers. Our findings support our hypothesis that environmental investments act as a mediating variable between proactive environmental strategy and environmental performance. The results also show that customer pressure and, particularly, organisational commitment positively impact the extent to which firms adopt a proactive environmental strategy.


FOXP3 is a lineage-specific transcription factor that is required for regulatory T cell development and function. In this study, we determined the crystal structure of the FOXP3 forkhead domain bound to DNA. The structure reveals that FOXP3 can form a stable domain-swapped dimer to bridge DNA in the absence of cofactors, suggesting that FOXP3 may play a role in long-range gene interactions. To test this hypothesis, we used circular chromosome conformation capture coupled with high throughput sequencing (4C-seq) to analyze FOXP3-dependent genomic contacts around a known FOXP3-bound locus, Ptpn22. Our studies reveal that FOXP3 induces significant changes in the chromatin contacts between the Ptpn22 locus and other Foxp3-regulated genes, reflecting a mechanism by which FOXP3 reorganizes the genome architecture to coordinate the expression of its target genes. Our results suggest that FOXP3 mediates long-range chromatin interactions as part of its mechanisms to regulate specific gene expression in regulatory T cells.


It is estimated that about one third of the UK's total carbon emissions come from its housing stock: some 26 million existing homes. Therefore, the energy needs of domestic properties are clearly a significant issue in any overall attempts to 'decarbonise' the economy. Due to its share of UK housing stock and potential for impacting on CO2 emissions, the Social Housing sector represents a platform for more wide-spread and rapid penetration of low-carbon interventions. However, the more widespread application of energy saving technologies has not delivered expected savings, and behaviour is becoming more recognised as a crucial factor in yielding the highest energy savings. Strategies to tackle energy efficiency in social housing often centre only on technical interventions (such as installation of improved insulation, more efficient heating systems or renewable energy sources) and neglect the importance of the behavioural responses to them. It is thus advisable to consider technological and behavioural factors collectively to evaluate these approaches. This paper is based on initial findings of a project conducted with Gentoo Group (an organisation managing 30,000 rented housing units around Sunderland) which monitored the installation of new low-carbon energy solutions in a sample of 100 households. With a focus on energy consumption, the findings identify behavioural barriers and potential opportunities to achieving low-carbon homes in a social housing setting. Further exploration of these issues may direct future retrofit interventions, attempting to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from existing social housing stock.


Are we environmentally victimizing, perhaps even poisoning, our minority and low-income citizens? Proponents of "environmental justice" assert that environmental decisionmaking pays insufficient heed to the interests of those citizens, disproportionately burdens their neighborhoods with hazardous toxins, and perpetuates an insidious "environmental racism." In the first book-length critique of environmental justice advocacy, Christopher Foreman argues that it has cleared significant political hurdles but displays substantial limitations and drawbacks. Activism has yielded a presidential executive order, management reforms at the Environmental Protection Agency, and numerous local political victories. Yet the environmental justice movement is structurally and ideologically unable to generate a focused policy agenda. The movement refuses to confront the need for environmental priorities and trade-offs, politically inconvenient facts about environmental health risks, and the limits of an environmental approach to social justice. Ironically, environmental justice advocacy may also threaten the very constituencies it aspires to serve--distracting attention from the many significant health hazards challenging minority and disadvantaged populations. Foreman recommends specific institutional reforms intended to recast the national dialogue about the stakes of these populations in environmental protection.


This paper examines the Opportunities to Learn (OTL) natural sciences in two primary schools in Botha-Bothe, Lesotho. Two case studies relating to curriculum delivery were used to understand how teachers make sense of the curriculum, how they interpret it and how they teach natural sciences. Observations of and interviews with Standard 7 teachers and their principals were used to collect data. The data reveal that different classrooms and schools vary in their provision of OTL. The paper concludes that teachers' own OTL shape curriculum delivery and practice in their classrooms. We recommend the provision of targeted ongoing professional development for primary-school teachers, in order to improve the teachers' own OTL and thereby enhance curriculum delivery and learning by school learners.


We present the first formal analysis of two avionic protocols that aim to secure air-ground communications, the ARINC823 public-key and shared-key protocols. We verify these protocols both in the symbolic model of cryptography, using ProVerif, and in the computational model, using CryptoVerif. While we confirm many security properties of these protocols, we also find several weaknesses, attacks, and imprecisions in the standard. We propose fixes for these problems. This case study required the specification of new cryptographic primitives in CryptoVerif. It also illustrates the complementarity between symbolic and computational verification.