SIR,-We read with interest the study by Sieber et al' in which they used Doppler ultrasound to measure superior mesenteric arterial blood flow in response to liquid test meals given orally and intraduodenally (with and without atropine), and the additional effects of the infusion of combinations of cholecystokinin octapeptide 8, secretin, gastrin 17, and glucagon. We would like to raise several points. (1) The authors used a 3 MHz Doppler flowmeter. Wavelength considerations with this frequency probe dictate that the best AP spatial resolution of the diameter measuring cursor is ± 1 mm (a best 'guess' of 0 5 mm can sometimes be made). The authors, however, have quoted superior mesenteric artery diameter readings to two decimal points and claim to be able to show increases in the diameter of between 5 and 26% after food intake. Furthermore, it is not clear whether an AP and lateral cross sectional diameter reading or a single longitudinal AP diameter reading was taken (in which case the superior mesenteric artery was assumed to be circular). It would have been better if the authors had quoted the mean and the range of the diameter reading. (2) The quoted increase in superior mesenteric arterial blood flow in response to the oral test meal (180-360% above basal) is far greater than previous reports.2It is not clear from the data whether the same subjects were studied on all occasions and compared a total of nine subjects was enrolled in the study but data are only shown for six. Ifthe same six subjects were not examined on each occasion, direct comparisons between experiments are less reliable. This is further compounded by the clear differences in basal mean (SEM) flow rates between the experiments (data not all shown) of 443 (38) ml/minute before the oral test meal and 520 (56) ml/minute before the intraduodenal test meal. What is the day to day coefficient of variation for the technique in their hands? Were all observations performed by one operator? (3) The authors state that they infused glucagon, cholecystokinin octapeptide 8, secretin, and gastrin in doses designed to simulate postprandial circulating concentrations. No data, however, are presented to support this, and the authors cannot therefore be sure that physiological concentrations of these hormones were achieved. Furthermore, the dose of glucagon used (500 ng/kg/hour or 8-33 ng/kg/minute) is a supraphysiological dose"'0 and would result in plasma concentrations much greater than those normally circulating postprandially. A dose of less than 3 ng/kg/minute would have been more appropriate. We cannot therefore agree with the authors' contention that the hormones 'are unlikely to be involved as blood borne hormones' in mediating splanchinic vasodilation on the data presented but agree with the hypothesis. We have recently shown (unpublished data) that fasting superior mesenteric arterial blood flow in six subjects measured by Doppler ultrasound decreases during physiological infusions of glucagon. A 1 ng/kg/minute infusion produced no detectable rise in basal glucagon concentrations (mean (SEM) basal glucagon values 144 (15) ng/l: after 30 minutes 1 ng/kglminute glucagon infusion resulted in a value of 129 (80) ng/l) and a 3 ng/kg/minute glucagon infusion raised values to 214 (37) ng/l. Mean (SEM) fasting blood flow fell from 678 (97) ml/minute to 549 (88) ml/minute after 30 minutes of 1 ng/kg/minute glucagon infusion and to 453 (63) ml/minute after 20 minutes of a 3 nglkg/minute infusion. There were no associated changes in cardiac output, stroke volume, blood pressure, pulse, or peripheral vascular resistance. This suggests that glucagon is a selective splanchnic vasoconstrictor at physiological concentrations and, indeed, is not involved in mediating the postprandial hyperaemia observed in previous studies. It is noteworthy, however, that Lee et al" using indocyanine dye clearance methods showed that supraphysiological infusions of 10 and 20 ng/kg/minute glucagon caused no systemic haemodynamic or total hepatic blood flow changes in a group of cirrhotic subjects. Azygous blood flow, however (and hence superior mesenteric blood flow), rose significantly in those with well compensated cirrhosis, suggesting that at supraphysiological doses (similar to those used by Sieber et al') glucagon may be a splanchnic vasodilator. (4) The authors state that blood pressure and pulse were monitored throughout the experiments but apart from incomplete data for the intraduodenal test meal with and without atropine, they present no evidence of blood pressure or pulse rate changes in response to any of their meals or infusion experiments. The pulse and blood pressure response to meals varies with both the age of the subject'2 and meal composition," and these data should have been included or discussed in the current study. (5) Atropine was shown to attenuate the postprandial hyperaemic response to the meal, suggesting that the cholinergic nervous system has a role in this change. The mechanism for the postprandial response is, however, likely to be multifactorial and may also involve Pi adrenergic"4 and peptidergic mechanisms. Neurotensin," vasoactive intestinal polypeptide,'6 and calcitonin gene related peptide' are known to be powerful splanchnic vasodilators and may also be involved in postprandial splanchnic vasodilation. G D BRAATVEDT A E READ R J M CORRALL Department ofMedicine M HALLIWELL P N T WELLS Department ofMedical Physics, Bristol Royal Infirnmaty, Bristol BS2 8HW


Abstract The most significant energy consuming infrastructures and the greatest contributors to greenhouse gases for any nation today are electric and freight/passenger transportation systems. Technological alternatives for producing, transporting, and converting energy for electric and transportation systems are numerous. Addressing costs, sustainability, and resiliency of electric and transportation needs requires long-term assessment since these capital-intensive infrastructures take years to build with lifetimes approaching a century. Yet, the advent of electrically driven transportation, including cars, trucks, and trains, creates potential interdependencies between the two infrastructures that may be both problematic and beneficial. We are developing modeling capability to perform long-term electric and transportation infrastructure design at a national level, accounting for their interdependencies. The approach combines network flow modeling with a multiobjective solution method. We describe and compare it to the state of the art in energy planning models. An example is presented to illustrate important features of this new approach. Abstract – The most significant energy consuming infrastructures and the greatest contributors to greenhouse gases for any nation today are electric and freight/passenger transportation systems. Technological alternatives for producing, transporting, and converting energy for electric and transportation systems are numerous. Addressing costs, sustainability, and resiliency of electric and transportation needs requires long-term assessment since these capital-intensive infrastructures take years to build with lifetimes approaching a century. Yet, the advent of electrically driven transportation, including cars, trucks, and trains, creates potential interdependencies between the two infrastructures that may be both problematic and beneficial. We are developing modeling capability to perform long-term electric and transportation infrastructure design at a national level, accounting for their interdependencies. The approach combines network flow modeling with a multiobjective solution method. We describe and compare it to the state of the art in energy planning models. An example is presented to illustrate important features of this new approach.


Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1 (MEN1) is an autosomal dominant endocrine tumor syndrome, caused by inactivating mutations of the MEN1 tumor suppressor gene at 11q13 locus, which predisposes to develop tumors in target neuroendocrine tissues. As the positional cloning and identification of the causative gene in 1997, genetic diagnosis, by the sequencing-based research of gene mutations, has become an important tool in the early and differential diagnosis of the disease. Application of the genetic test, in MEN1 index cases and in first-degree relatives of mutated patients, has been constantly increasing during the last two decades, also thanks to the establishment of multidisciplinary referral centers and specific genetic counseling, and thanks to the wide availability of high throughput instruments for gene sequencing and gene mutation identification. The MEN1 genetic test helps the specific diagnosis of probands, and allows the early identification of asymptomatic carriers, strongly contributing, together with progressions in tumor diagnostic techniques and in pharmacological and surgical therapeutic approaches, to the reduction of morbidity and mortality associated with the syndrome. International clinical guidelines for MEN1 have been drafted by panels of specialists in the field, with the main goal to improve the management of the disease and grant patients a better quality of life. Here, we review main recommendations and suggestions derived by the last published general guidelines in 2012, and by most recent published studies about MEN1 syndrome diagnosis, clinical management, therapeutic approaches and patients' quality of life.


The purpose of this paper is to assess the selected tax expenditures in German personal income tax aimed to support farmers. German system of tax preferences is undoubtedly one of the most interesting examples of agricultural tax expenditures in the member states of the European Union. The paper is also an attempt to answer the question, whether method applied to estimate agricultural production income in the German personal income tax, in fact, lowers the tax burden of farms owners and, secondly, what are the consequences of this instrument for agriculture sector? The conducted study confirmed that the introduction of this tax expenditure has resulted in a simplification of the tax accountancy obligations of farmers. However, at the same time due to the reduction of the fiscal burden, there is significant inhibition of transformation of the area structure of farms in Germany.


We review the state of the art and our perspectives on silicon and hybrid silicon photonic devices for optical interconnects in datacenters. After a brief discussion of the key requirements for intra-datacenter optical interconnects, we propose a wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM)-based optical interconnect for intra-datacenter applications. Following our proposed interconnects configuration, the bulk of the review emphasizes recent developments concerning on-chip hybrid silicon microlasers and WDM transmitters, and silicon photonic switch fabrics for intra-datacenters. For hybrid silicon microlasers and WDM transmitters, we outline the remaining challenges and key issues toward realizing low power consumption, direct modulation, and integration of multiwavelength microlaser arrays. For silicon photonic switch fabrics, we review various topologies and configurations of high-port-count N-by-N switch fabrics using Mach–Zehnder interferometers and microring resonators as switch elements, and discuss their prospects toward practical implementations with active reconfiguration. For the microring-based switch fabrics, we review recent developments of active stabilization schemes at the subsystem level. Last, we outline several large challenges and problems for silicon and hybrid silicon photonics to meet for intra-datacenter applications and propose potential solutions.


Injuries and fatalities caused by anti-personnel landmines have become a global epidemic. Over 250 000 people alive today have been injured by landmines, many of whom required amputations. Civilians, including a large percentage of women and children, are injured at least as frequently as are military personnel. An estimated 10 000-100 000 additional people are killed or injured by landmines each year. There are presently in excess of 100 million active landmines buried or scattered throughout the world, and every day, an additional 5000 are put in place. The majority are in poor, underdeveloped, war-torn countries whose populations are already traumatized by conflict. At the cost of $300-000 per mine, the governments of these countries can not afford the process of de-mining their land, nor can they provide adequate emergency medical care and rehabilitation for landmine victims. The presence of mines in agricultural fields, near water supplies, along roadways and around villages, prevents the use of these essential resources, severely impacting on economic development. Health professionals are urged to support national and international legislation to completely ban the manufacture, sale and use of anti-personnel landmines.


We develop a simple strain sensor using polymer optical fibre Bragg grating and long period fibre grating. The sensor head is formed by a polymer optical fiber Bragg grating. A long period fibre grating is used for strain related wavelength shift demodulation. This particular combination of two quite different gratings could offer very large dynamic, up to tens of thousands micro-strains, for strain sensing. The preliminary experimental results have demonstrated that this sensing scheme provides good linearity, high resolution and large dynamic range.


The hydrophobicity and instability of organic crystals restrict their further applications. Here, we present a general and scalable method to encapsulate different organic crystals in a conductive polyaniline (PANI) shell. The shell significantly improves the stability and dispersity of the nanocrystals, without compromising their luminescence intensity.


In the field of automated program repair, the redundancy assumption claims large programs contain the seeds of their own repair. However, most redundancy-based program repair techniques do not reason about the repair ingredients– the code that is reused to craft a patch. We aim to reason about the repair ingredients by using code similarities to prioritize and transform statements in a codebase for patch generation. Our approach, DeepRepair, relies on deep learning to reason about code similarities. Code fragments at well-defined levels of granularity in a codebase can be sorted according to their similarity to suspicious elements (i.e., code elements that contain suspicious statements) and statements can be transformed by mapping out-of-scope identifiers to similar identifiers in scope. We examined these new search strategies for patch generation with respect to effectiveness from the viewpoint of a software maintainer. Our comparative experiments were executed on six open-source Java projects including 374 buggy program revisions and consisted of 19,949 trials spanning 2,616 days of computation time. Deep-Repair's search strategy using code similarities generally found compilable ingredients faster than the baseline, jGenProg, but this improvement neither yielded test-adequate patches in fewer attempts (on average) nor found significantly more patches (on average) than the baseline. Although the patch counts were not statistically different, there were notable differences between the nature of DeepRepair patches and jGenProg patches. The results show that our learning-based approach finds patches that cannot be found by existing redundancy-based repair techniques.


Author(s): Rofeh, Justin | Advisor(s): Theogarajan, Luke S | Abstract: Model membranes are synthetic structures that mimic cell membranes. They may be used for basic research or as part of an engineered device. Phospholipids are typically used to make model membranes, but they may be replaced by amphiphilic block copolymers that are more physically and chemically stable, more tunable, and less costly. In this work, we explore the use of block copolymer membranes for biosensing applications. Specifically, we target the goal of nanopore DNA sequencing using the protein nanopore MspA in block copolymer membranes.As a first step, we extended previous work on MspA in a block copolymer membrane by translating it to an array of apertures using a microfluidic painting technique. We found that the use of a volatile solvent in a microfluidic channel caused variations in membrane properties with corresponding undesirable variations in MspA behavior. Additionally, we used this method to demonstrate DNA translocation through MspA in block copolymer membranes. We selected droplet interface bilayers (DIBs) to investigate which membrane properties are responsible for variations in MspA behavior. However, we found that our aqueous block copolymer DIBs behave differently than any previously studied DIB, necessitating the use of new techniques to characterize their behavior. Key differences include reduced bilayer stability due to poor packing of the monolayer and slow equilibration kinetics. We addressed the poor bilayer stability by establishing a technique for manually packing monolayers prior to bilayer formation. We addressed the slow equilibration kinetics by establishing a new method for measuring monolayer and bilayer tensions in DIBs using droplet shape analysis. While droplet shape analysis is typically used for single droplets with axial symmetry, our method works even for DIBs with asymmetric volumes and tensions. Another advantage is that the method can determine monolayer and membrane tensions in real time, independent of the applied voltage. The method may be used for polymer and phospholipid DIBs alike. The work presented in this thesis contributes to the understanding of amphiphilic block copolymer behavior and will aid in the optimization of membrane properties for biosensing applications.


Existing screening tools for early detection of autism are expensive, cumbersome, time-intensive, and sometimes fall short in predictive value. In this work, we apply Machine Learning to gold standard clinical data obtained across thousands of children at risk for autism spectrum disorders to create a low-cost, quick, and easy to apply autism screening tool that performs better than most widely used standardized instruments. This new tool combines two screening methods into a single assessment, one based on short, structured parent-reported questionnaires and the other based on tagging key behaviors from short, semi-structured home videos of children. We demonstrate a significant accuracy improvement over standard screening tools in a clinical study sample of 162 children. We further discuss the challenge of extending machine learning algorithms to conditions beyond autism, and we propose a generalized framework for using machine learning algorithms to simultaneously search for the presence of many different conditions.


Multidisciplinarity, interdisciplinarity, and sub-disciplines characterize medieval studies in most topical areas, while topics can expand beyond the limits of the medieval frame. This guide offers entry points to this complex scholarship..


No studies are available so far on the way dying and death in the ICU are perceived by relatives of the patients. It is also not clear in how far the current criticism of intensive care medicine stems from these relatives. These problems were investigated by sending a self-developed 48-item questionnaire to relatives of patients who had died in the ICU. The questions centred on the following subjects: Communication and information structures Perception of the ICU and emotional reaction Assessment of treatment Dying and death in the ICU. Of 181 questionnaires distributed, 145 (85.3%) were returned. We present the replies of the 109 persons who visited their relatives in the ICU. The majority regarded themselves as well informed. Initial impressions were a high technical and medical standard. Emotional reactions to ICU treatment of a relative alternated between anxiety and hope with the dominant impression that the patient received the best possible therapy. However, the treatment was not perceived as an artificial prolongation of life. Although death loses dignity in the ICU according to those questioned, dying in peace does seem possible in this situation. The high response rate, the positive general assessment and the critical view of death in the ICU are discussed in the following.


Professor Adam Zeman. I trained in Medicine at Oxford, after a first degree in Philosophy and Psychology. I worked as a consultant neurologist in Edinburgh, from 1996, and, from 2005, in Exeter. My specialised clinical work is in cognitive and behavioural neurology, including neurological disorders of sleep. My research interests include amnesia associated with epilepsy and disorders of visual imagery. I have an active background interest in the science and philosophy of consciousness, writing an accessible introduction to the subject, intended for a general readership (Consciousness: a user's guide, Yale University Press, 2002). I have written an introduction to the brain, 'A Portrait of the Brain' (Yale, 2008), and recently edited 'Epilepsy and Memory' (OUP, 2012) with Marilyn Jones-Gotman and Narinder Kapur. I was Chairman of the British Neuropsychiatry Association from 2007–2011. The underlying argument of this talk is simple: just as cognition can be divided into a number of domains (eg language, executive function), so several types of memory can de distinguished (eg episodic, semantic, procedural) and tested clinically; these domains depend on somewhat distinct neuronal systems or networks within the brain; several established subtypes of dementia are distinguished by their early involvement of one or other of these cognitive domains and neural systems. Thus recent research, particularly using resting state studies and graph theoretical descriptions of key neuronal networks, is helping to make sense of the taxonomy of cognition, memory and dementia. This talk aims to provide a clinically helpful guide to this fascinating but potentially confusing territory.


Anodic particle coloumetry is used to size silver nanoparticles impacting a carbon microelectrode in a potassium chloride/citrate solution. Besides their size, their agglomeration state in solution is also investigated solely by electrochemical means and subsequent data analysis. Validation of this new approach to nanoparticle agglomeration studies is performed by comparison with the results of a commercially available nanoparticle tracking analysis system, which shows excellent agreement. Moreover, it is demonstrated that the electrochemical technique has the advantage of directly yielding the number of atoms per impacting nanoparticle irrespective of its shape. This is not true for the optical nanoparticle tracking system, which requires a correction for the nonspherical shape of agglomerated nanoparticles to derive reasonable information on the agglomeration state.


Noting how organizations today are increasingly dependent on IT for a broad range of organizational activities, the thesis starts from the observation that many IT-related endeavors nevertheless fail. In tracing part of the problem to the inability of many organizations to cope with changes in the surrounding material and social context, the emphasis is put on the processes by which IT-artifacts are adapted and re-adapted, after they have been put into daily use. Assuming human sensemaking as a good basis for coping with the changes, qualitative data from two organizations — a Swedish social services department and a software firm — provides an empirical context for assessing how sensemaking processes affect IT-adaptation.Conceptually, the thesis draws on Karl Weick's thinking, introducing the "double interact" and the "response repertoire" as sensitizing concepts with which to understand the mechanisms generating adaptation of IT-artifacts. Methodologically, the interpretive case study is employed, using the "hermeneutic circle" as the guiding principle for the research process.The thesis draws some specific implications concerning how IT-adaptation can be understood in organizations. The generic IT-adaptation process can be divided into two elementar}- phases, exploration and exploitation. During the exploration phase, several individual interpretations of a particular IT-artifact co-exist, occasioning ambiguity about its meaning in organizational daily activity. During the exploitation phase, the IT-artifact itself is in the background of matters of attention, providing organizational actors, who pursue individual goals and desires, the opportunity to exploit the shared and taken-for-granted meaning they see in the artifact. While the exploitation phase is important for organizational efficacy, there is nevertheless a risk that the meaning exploited becomes outdated by surrounding socio-material changes over time. Among other proposals, the thesis therefore suggests that triggering sensemaking processes can be important for meaningful IT-adaptation. In addition, it suggests the activity of searching for the interlacing areas of professional identity of actor groups, as a means to make IT-artifacts meaningful in organizing endeavors.


Given a family of feasible subsets of a ground set, the packing problem is to find a largest subfamily of pairwise disjoint family members. Non-approximability renders heuristics attractive viable options, while efficient methods with worst-case guarantee are a key concern in computational complexity. This work proposes a novel near-Boolean optimization method relying on a polynomial multilinear form with variables ranging each in a high-dimensional unit simplex, rather than in the unit interval as usual. The variables are the elements of the ground set, and distribute each a unit membership over those feasible subsets where they are included. The given problem is thus translated into a continuous version where the objective is to maximize a function taking values on collections of points in a unit hypercube. Maximizers are shown to always include collections of hypercube disjoint vertices, i.e. partitions of the ground set, which constitute feasible solutions for the original discrete version of the problem. A gradient-based local search in the expanded continuous domain is designed. Approximations with polynomial multilinear form of bounded degree and near-Boolean games are also finally discussed.


Abstract Background: Transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) has emerged as a treatment for patients with aortic stenosis (AS) and high surgical risk. To date, reports of short- and mid-term survival have been favourable. The aim of this thesis was to evaluate early safety, risk assessment and late survival following TAVI. Methods: In this work we studied clinical outcome, prediction of 30-day mortality and acute kidney injury and late renal dysfunction following TAVI. In paper I and IV, a comparisons to propensity score matched patients undergoing AVR were made. Results: The 30-day mortality following TAVI and AVR was 4.2% and 4.8% respectively (p=0.81); however, significant differences were seen in corresponding rates of survival (51.7±5.8% vs 72.3±4.3%; p<0.001) and in cumulative re-hospitalizations for congestive heart failure (CHF) (41.3±7.2% vs 23±4.3%; p=0.006) over a 4-year period. Postoperative AKI was diagnosed in 33% following TAVI and renal function remained impaired at 1 year of follow-up. The observed/expected mortality ratio was 0.16 for logistic EuroSCORE, 0.56 for STS score, and 0.52 for EuroSCORE II. The AUC was 0.69 (95% CI 0.54–0.84) for the logistic EuroSCORE, 0.60 (95% CI 0.38–0.82) for the STS score, and 0.66 (95% CI 0.46–0.86) for the EuroSCORE II. Conclusions: The results of this thesis confirm the merit of TAVI in high risk patients with AS, although late outcome with TAVI proved inferior to that of AVR in propensity score matched patients. In our view, the relationship between TAVI and AVR appears to be complementary rather than substitutive. Furthermore, more accurate risk assessment tools are needed. (Less)


Notorious for a misspent life full of binges, blackouts, and unimaginable bad luck, Malcolm Lowry managed, against every odd, to complete and publish two novels, one of them, Under the Volcano, an indisputable masterpiece. At the time of his death in 1957, Lowry also left behind a great deal of uncollected and unpublished writing: stories, novellas, drafts of novels and revisions of drafts of novels (Lowry was a tireless revisiter and reviser-and interrupter-of his work), long, impassioned, haunting, beautiful letters overflowing with wordplay and lament, fraught short poems that display a sozzled off-the-cuff inspiration all Lowry's own. Over the years these writings have appeared in various volumes, all long out of print. Here, in The Voyage That Never Ends, the poet, translator, and critic Michael Hofmann has drawn on all this scattered and inaccessible material to assemble the first book that reflects the full range of Lowry's extraordinary and singular achievement. The result is a revelation. In the letters-acknowledged to be among modern literature's greatest-we encounter a character who was, as contemporaries attested, as spellbinding and lovable as he was self-destructive and infuriating. In the late fiction-the long story "Through the Panama," sections of unfinished novels such as Dark as the Grave Wherein My Friend Is Laid, and the little-known La Mordida-we discover a writer who is blazing a path into the unknown and, as he goes, improvising a whole new kind of writing. Lowry had set out to produce a great novel, something to top Under the Volcano, a multivolume epic and intimate tale of purgatorial suffering and ultimate redemption (called, among other things, "The Voyage That Never Ends"). That book was never to be. What he produced instead was an unprecedented and prophetic blend of fact and fiction, confession and confusion, essay and free play, that looks forward to the work of writers as different as Norman Mailer and William Gass, but is like nothing else. Almost in spite of himself, Lowry succeeded in transforming his disastrous life into an exhilarating art of disaster. The Voyage That Never Ends is a new and indispensable entry into the world of one of the masters of modern literature.


We study symmetric spiked matrix models with respect to a general class of noise distributions. Given a rank-1 deformation of a random noise matrix, whose entries are independently distributed with zero mean and unit variance, the goal is to estimate the rank-1 part. For the case of Gaussian noise, the top eigenvector of the given matrix is a widely-studied estimator known to achieve optimal statistical guarantees, e.g., in the sense of the celebrated BBP phase transition. However, this estimator can fail completely for heavy-tailed noise. In this work, we exhibit an estimator that works for heavy-tailed noise up to the BBP threshold that is optimal even for Gaussian noise. We give a non-asymptotic analysis of our estimator which relies only on the variance of each entry remaining constant as the size of the matrix grows: higher moments may grow arbitrarily fast or even fail to exist. Previously, it was only known how to achieve these guarantees if higher-order moments of the noises are bounded by a constant independent of the size of the matrix. Our estimator can be evaluated in polynomial time by counting self-avoiding walks via a color -coding technique. Moreover, we extend our estimator to spiked tensor models and establish analogous results.


A growing body of research has documented associations between personality disorders (PDs) and attachment disturbance, and yet, attachment disturbance does not necessarily guarantee the development of PD pathology. Thus, understanding the mechanisms mediating the relationship between attachment disturbance and PD pathology remains an open area of research. One area with sound theoretical and empirical evidence has shown that attachment disturbances are associated with emotion regulation difficulties, as well as maladaptive interpersonal patterns of behavior. However, the research conducted thus far has predominately focused on borderline personality disorder, at the exclusion of other PD domains, and also has not broadened the scope of research to include other relevant psychological processes that may clarify how personality pathology and attachment disturbance are interrelated. Using a large independent sample of college (n = 946) and community-based individuals (n = 271), the current study aimed to (1) examine how the Personality Inventory for DSM-5 (PID-5) PD trait domains would be differentially associated with maladaptive attachment processes and emotion regulation problems, and (2) explore whether deficits in mindfulness and emotion regulation mediated the relationship between disturbed attachment and PD trait domains. Findings suggested that the PID-5 PD trait domains have general and specific relations to attachment insecurity, impairments in emotion regulation, and decreased mindfulness. Overall, the current study suggests that improving emotion regulation skills and increasing dispositional mindfulness may limit the expression of pathological personality traits. Implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.


The title compound, C13H12F3NO3, is almost planar if one excludes the F atoms of the –CF3 group [maximum deviation for the other hetero atoms = 0.069 (1) Å], and the dihedral angle between the pyrrole and benzene ring of the indole system is 2.54 (8)°. In the crystal, molecules are linked by N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds, forming chains propagating along the a-axis direction. These chains are linked via C—H⋯O and C—H⋯F hydrogen bonds, forming a three-dimensional network.


Loss of heterozygosity (LOH) is considered a causal event in the formation of many cancers, with increasing evidence suggesting that DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) play a major role in its occurrence. Despite its prominence in cancer, however, the precise molecular mechanisms responsible for extensive LOH and how such events are suppressed in normal cells is poorly understood. To investigate the mechanisms responsible for extensive break-induced LOH in eukaryotes, this study took advantage of an assay system in which such events could be identified through screening for loss of an auxotrophic his3 + marker, found ~25kb distal to an HO-endonuclease cut site in a non-essential minichromosome in Schizosaccharomyces pombe . Studies using this system had previously shown that extensive break-induced LOH in wild-type background, whilst infrequent, was predominantly associated with large translocations resulting from both allelic crossovers during G2 phase and breakinduced replication (BIR). Such extensive loss of allele specific information was also found to require rhp55 + , rhp51 + , rhp54 + and mus81 + . This study has identified an additional role for the MRN complex, Rad22 and RPA in such break-induced translocations, suggesting that both allelic crossovers and BIR require homologous recombination (HR) in fission yeast. Surprisingly, break-induced extensive LOH was still observed in HR mutants. In contrast to wild-type cells, however, such extensive LOH was found to arise predominantly through de novo telomere addition at, or near, the break-site. Interestingly, telomere addition was most frequently observed in a rad22Δ background that disrupts HR following end resection. Further analysis demonstrated that de novo telomere addition was also significantly increased in ku70Δ rhp55Δ cells. Moreover, overexpression of rhp51 in rhp55Δ cells led to a substantial reduction in break-induced de novo telomere addition. Together, these findings support a model in which HR prevents de novo telomere addition at DSBs by competing for resected ssDNA ends. In addition to providing information on break-induced LOH this study has identified a requirement for the MRN complex in efficient repair in rhp55Δ cells, which was previously found to occur via sister chromatid recombination (SCR) or a HRdependent end-joining pathway (EJ). Interestingly, deletion of MRN components also resulted in an increase in telomere addition, providing further evidence that HR competes with telomere addition for the repair of DSBs. Overall, these findings shed light on the competitive relationships between pathways of DSB repair/misrepair in S. pombe and how such mechanisms contribute to the prevention or promotion of genome instability.


Nowadays high intensity proton accelerators are extensively applied, and this paper gives particular emphasis on CYCIAE-100, a 100 MeV high intensity compact cyclotron being constructed at CIAE. For accelerators of this type, the study is focused on how to improve the beam intensity. As for CYCIAE-100, the charge-exchange extraction is used to get protons. So it is crucial to enhance the lifetime of the stripping foil, which is largely determined by the energy deposition on it. For this cyclotron, due to the influence of the magnetic field, the electrons will spin near the foil and lose energy each time when they cross the foil. The energy deposition refers to all the energy deposition of protons and electrons. This paper stresses the stripper study of CYCIAE-100, in which the particle distribution on the foil is simulated and the energy deposition of the protons and electrons stripped from the H- ions are calculated. The temperature distributions are then calculated as a main reference for the foil design.


In this study, a partial state feedback controller is proposed for the link position tracking control problem of flexible tendon driven robotic systems. Specifically; a nonlinear model based controller is formulated for tendon driven robot manipulators under the constraint that only the link position and tendon expansion force measurements are available. Despite the lack of link and actuator side velocity and actuator position measurements, the proposed controller ensures exponential link position tracking. To eliminate the need of actuator position and velocity measurements, a model based velocity observer has been utilized. Stability of the closed loop system and boundedness of system states are proven via Lyapunov based arguments. The performance of the purposed observer-controller couple is then verified by a set of numerical simulations.


A study of the spiders occurring in three types of isolated wetlands (marshes, savannas, and swamps) in southwestern Georgia was conducted in the fall of 2005 and the spring of 2006 using 30 one meter long sweep net passes per wetland. Twenty-seven taxa from nine families of spiders were observed. Tetragnathidae and Pisauridae were the most common spider types with marsh wetlands having the greatest richness and abundance. Species found were mostly those associated with aquatic habitats; Dolomedes triton being the most abundant with an overall mean density of 1.29/m2. Patterns of spider richness and abundance were similar to patterns observed for other wetland invertebrates, i.e., greatest in marshes. Life history requirements for spiders occupying isolated wetlands in the longleaf pine landscape appear to be excellent dispersal ability for recolonizing following frequent and heterogeneous fires, and flexibility in habitat preference enabling persistence during frequent cycles of wetting and drying.


The paper describes a system for structure-from-motion using vanishing points and three-dimensional lines extracted from omnidirectional video sequences. Two novel aspects of this work are its deferred initialization of features using noisy observations from multiple, uncertain vantage points, and its use of dynamic programming for efficient 3D line tracking. We show preliminary results from the system for both indoor and outdoor sequences.


In quantitative studies on animal movements and foraging, there has been ongoing debate over the relevance of Levy walk and related stochastic models to understanding mobility patterns of diverse organisms. In this study, we collected and analyzed a large number of GPS logs that tracked the movements of different livestock species in northwestern Kenya. Statistically principled analysis has only found scant evidence for the scale-free movement patterns of the Levy walk and its variants. Instead, the analysis has given strong support to composite exponential distributions (composite Brownian walks) as the best description of livestock movement trajectories in a wide array of parameter settings. Furthermore, this support has become overwhelming and near universal under an alternative criterion for model selection. These results illuminate the multi-scale and multi-modal nature of livestock spatial behavior. They also have broader theoretical and empirical implications for the related literature.


An ethnonursing method was selected to explore and describe nursing support relationships, from the perspectives of recipients, within the mental health subculture. Data sources consisted of three semi-structured client interviews (n = 14) and field notes. When nurses were described as nice and friendly, and validated the client as a person by listening, three overlapping phases of development emerged from the data. These included: a glimmer of help, exploring and problem solving, and saying goodbye. When clients had negative experiences with nurses, they felt a lack of trust towards nurses and felt that their feelings were left unexplored. As a result, the relationships deteriorated. Deterioration began immediately in the first phase called withholding, and continued through the phases of avoiding and ignoring, and struggling with and making sense of. These findings raise healthcare providers' awareness about developing and deteriorating nurse-client relationships, and support the value of the therapeutic relationship as an instrument to restore and promote clients' health.


Graham, Russell T.; Harvey, Alan E.; Jain, Theresa B.; Tonn, Jonalea R. 1999. The effects of thinning and similar stand treatments on fire behavior in Western forests. Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-463. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. 27 p. In the West, thinning and partial cuttings are being considered for treating millions of forested acres that are overstocked and prone to wildfire. The objectives of these treatments include tree growth redistribution, tree species regulation, timber harvest, wildlife habitat improvement, and wildfire-hazard reduction. Depending on the forest type and its structure, thinning has both positive and negative impacts on crown fire potential. Crown bulk density, surface fuel, and crown base height are primary stand characteristics that determine crown fire potential. Thinning from below, free thinning, and reserve tree shelterwoods have the greatest opportunity for reducing the risk of crown fire behavior. Selection thinning and crown thinning that maintain multiple crown layers, along with individual tree selection systems, will not reduce the risk of crown fires except in the driest ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Dougl. ex Laws.) forests. Moreover, unless the surface fuels created by using these treatments are themselves treated, intense surface wildfire may result, likely negating positive effects of reducing crown fire potential. No single thinning approach can be applied to reduce the risk of wildfires in the multiple forest types of the West. The best general approach for managing wildfire damage seems to be managing tree density and species composition with well-designed silvicultural systems at a landscape scale that includes a mix of thinning, surface fuel treatments, and prescribed fire with proactive treatment in areas with high risk to wildfire.


To master group rules pedestrian movement emerged is prior to construct and plan the base of pedestrians design Tightness. The existing research focuses on the research of pedestrian movement rules, especially for behavior in evacuation. But there is just lack of engineering practical calculation method with respect to infrastructure layout optimization according to the pedestrian movement characteristics. This paper puts forward a method based on the cellular automata method to simulate group behavior in the cases of evacuation. On this basis, this paper gives the optimization method of the building export position. Meanwhile, the method in the paper also considering the construction cost, showing a strong practicability.


BACKGROUND
Surgery for Graves' disease was largely replaced in the mid-1900s by radioiodine and antithyroid drugs, due to the belief that they were more safe and effective. Since then, thyroid surgery has improved with preoperative drug therapy and modern operative techniques. Recent clinical studies of thyroidectomy for Graves' disease may not reflect outcomes accurately because of small sample size, especially when estimating ideal thyroid remnant size. The purpose of this study was to combine modern clinical trials and use meta-analysis to determine the overall efficacy of both total (TT) and subtotal thyroidectomy (ST) for Graves' disease, compare thyroid function and complications rates of TT and ST, and determine ideal thyroid remnant size.

METHODS
Meta-analysis was performed on published studies in which patients underwent either TT or ST for Graves' disease. Meta-analysis was performed by weighted least-squares linear regression. P < 0.05 was considered significant.

RESULTS
There were 35 studies comprising 7241 patients. Mean follow-up was 5.6 years. Overall, persistent or recurrent hyperthyroidism occurred in 7.2% of patients. TT was performed on 538 patients and hypothyroidism occurred in all cases. ST was performed in 6703 patients, 59.7% of whom achieved euthyroidism, 25. 6% became hypothyroid, and 7.9% had either persistent or recurrent hyperthyroidism. Permanent recurrent laryngeal nerve injury occurred in 0.9% of TT patients and 0.7% of ST patients (P = NS). Permanent hypoparathyroidism occurred in 1.6% of TT patients and 1.0% of ST patients (P = NS). There was an 8.9% decrease in hypothyroidism and 6.9% increase in euthyroidism for each gram of thyroid remnant (P < 0.0001 each).

CONCLUSIONS
Overall, thyroidectomy successfully treated hyperthyroidism in 92% of patients with Graves' disease. There were no cases of hyperthyroidism following TT. ST achieved a euthyroid state in almost 60% of patients with an 8% rate of persistent or recurrent hyperthyroidism. There was no significant difference in complication rates between TT and ST.


Using the LS-DYNA software, this paper studied the penetration phenomenon that the long rod armour-piercing projectile with the material of Wf/Zr metallic glass composites and tungsten-alloy penetrating into target. It found that the 93W alloy projectile has a clear mushroom head, and the Wf/Zr metallic glass composite projectile has an acute head and appears "self-sharping" effect obviously. It studied the variation law of the penetration results parameters of the two materials at different penetration initial velocity, and found that the "self-sharping" effect of the Wf/Zr metallic glass composite projectile change to more obvious with the increasing of penetration velocity. It also obtained the change law of the projectile head shape with the penetration velocity.


Eight out of 47 Bradypus griseus and 14 out of 18 Choloepus hoffmanni yielded positive cultures for flagellates from blood, skin, liver or spleen. In some cases, more than one species of flagellate was isolated from one animal or site. Although amastigotes were obtained in tissue cultures from several isolates containing different types of promastigotes, only four of these strains (two from each species of host) were infective for hamsters and considered as Leishmania braziliensis. Infection with one of the strains was possible only after it has been passed through tissue culture.


We consider the choice of farm animal breeds for conservation programmes. An expert survey among breed societies and scientists and the analysis of past decisions in EU member countries to enter breeds into conservation programmes show differences in the valuation of breed characteristics. Whereas both sets of actors value diversity aspects as well as cultural and economic aspects of breed conservation, policy makers, in comparison with experts, seem to be less concerned about true extinction risk. The results suggest broadening the discussion about the conservation of animal genetic resources to aspects preserving societal and cultural resources. Copyright 2006, Oxford University Press.


The problem of swearing by youth in public is becoming acute nowadays. A growing tendency can be traced in Ukraine that young women are on equal terms with men in this respect. The authors of the article explored the reasons of using non-standard language by Ukrainian students under modern conditions and specified what should be done to improve their speech culture and eliminate their swearing. The primary aim of the research is to find out the motives why Ukrainian university students swear in their everyday life. To achieve the goal a special questionnaire was designed. All in all, 118 respondents of 2 age groups participated in the survey. Differences and similarities in using swear words by junior and senior students were investigated according to 3 criteria: motives, types of emotions, recommendations of eliminating or at least minimising this phenomenon. As it is shown by results of the research, the most typical motive of using non-standard language for males and females is the opportunity to express both negative and positive emotions. Neither juniors nor seniors considered it to be extraordinary. Yet, they agreed that various educational activities should be arranged to eliminate the usage of swear words and uplevel the speech culture of university students.


Human resources is one of the key indexes in measuring the competitiveness of en enterprise. However, evaluation of enterprise human resource competitiveness, evaluation index system and evaluation model remain a problem in academic and practice. Nowadays, key factors in evaluation of enterprise human resources competitiveness and evaluation index are incomplete and imperfect, and processing methods of corresponding evaluation index is not scientific. Thus, studies on analysis model of enterprise human resource are of great importance. In this paper, an improved grey correlation analysis model of human resource competitiveness was put forward. This model provides relative restrictive factors in analysis of enterprise resource competitiveness, and analysed enterprise competitiveness from the aspects of human resource quality competiveness, market development competiveness, management quality competiveness, etc. and evaluation analysis based on improved grey correlation analysis method was conducted. Its evaluation result can be a basis of selection of human resource developing strategies for direction and of frame of decision-making. Finally, the model and algorithm was proved feasible by implementation of actual case.


Configurational studies involve the groups of elements fulfilling restrictions defined by the designer in Architectural design. According to its necessities and intentions, the planner distributes the components of the group in a certain tridimensional way, establishing a composition. This operative procedure implies a classification system according to typologies that respond to a bigger system, and this in turn to another, until the whole is obtained. From the beginning the pattern should satisfy form restrictions, as well as dimensional and positional restrictions for each part that conforms the whole. Functional requirements are attended for each object satisfying relationships of connectivity and adjacency among them. In this work the parts are restricted by their relative position to a central element. Evolutionary Algorithms (EA) are used to solve this type of problem. Using evolutionary metaphors they originate concepts such as "genes", "chromosomes", "mutation", "crosses" and " population " (among other), which come closer to one of the solutions looked for by the designer, under combinatory stochastic methods. The most appropriate use of EA corresponds to problems of complexity NP-completeness (for example, problems of generation of cases of composition), allowing an efficient although not exhaustive analysis. Applying this technique to the generation of architectural volumes, some obtained results are exemplified.


Photodynamic therapy (PDT) has been applied in cancer treatment by utilizing reactive oxygen species (ROSs) to kill cancer cells. However, a high concentration of reduced glutathione (GSH) is present in cancer cells and can consume ROSs and sharply reduce the PDT activity. To address this problem, herein, we synthesized a thymine modified Zn phthalocyanine (ZnPc, a monomer and an active form for PDT) and prepared its nanoparticle form (an aggregator and an inactive form) with Hg2+ providing the driving force for the "thymine-Hg2+-thymine" interaction. The nanoparticles could remain in the inactive form during the delivery process in blood. Once endocytosed by cancer cells, the nanoparticles are disintegrated, and deprived of Hg2+ by intracellular GSH, which decreases the level of GSH. Simultaneously, the activity of the released monomer ZnPc is recovered and high PDT activity is observed.


At the Annual General Meeting of the Library Association held at Bournemouth on 2nd May, 1952, a motion was passed instructing the Council to prepare in consultation with branches and sections a revision of Section B of the Byelaws (Constitution of Council, Committees and Officers), designed to ensure that the majority of the Council shall consist of persons nominated and elected by the members at large. It will be recalled also that the President gave an undertaking that the Council would consider proposals for proxy voting at annual meetings, and for a referendum by postal vote as a means of securing for all members an effective voice in the affairs of the Association. These contentious matters have been duly debated by the Executive Committee, whose findings are submitted in reasoned form in a Memorandum, which, by the consent of the Council, has been issued to branches and sections, who are asked to consider the suggested constitutional changes, and to send their observations, together with any alternative proposals, to the Secretary at Chaucer House not later than 23rd February, 1953. It is stressed that the whole matter is still under consideration by the Council, whose final decision will presumably be made in the light of recommendations from branches, sections and individual members interested enough to express their opinions. The subject is so important for the future of the Association that this symposium of views by representative librarians is offered as a stimulus to the membership at large.


The upper Middle Jurassic-Lower Cretaceous Gravina belt lies along the eastern margin of the Alexander terrane in southeastern Alaska. This group of turbidites and mafic to intermediate volcanic rocks was deformed during mid to Late Cretaceous time during the closing of a basin of unknown size between the Alexander terrane on the west and the Stikine terrane to the east. Therefore structures of Gravina belt rocks largely reflect the final accretion and subsequent transport of the Alexander terrane. Six geologic transects across the central Gravina belt (southern Mitkof Island to northern Douglas Island) define a structural history that includes (1) syndepositional soft-sediment folding and faulting, possibly in conjunction with block tilting and extension; (2) tight to isoclinal folding or thrust faulting, with formation of a slaty cleavage (S1) striking ∼330°; (3) local coaxial refolding with formation of crenulation cleavage (S2); (4) development of domainal crenulation folds and cleavage (S3) oriented at a large angle to the margin of the belt; (5) intrusion of tonalitic plutons around 90 Ma; and (6) right-lateral strike-slip displacement on faults oriented ∼330°. Finite strain measurements on sedimentary rocks suggest the belt was at least twice its present width, normal to the foliation, before deformation. Subhorizontal margin-parallel fold axes, margin-parallel slaty cleavage, and margin-perpendicular stretching lineations suggest orthogonal contraction of the Gravina basin, assuming that oblique plate convergence was not decoupled along strike-slip faults. After contractional deformation, strike-slip faults indicate dextral displacement (probably of the order of several tens of kilometers) of the Alexander terrane with respect to the terranes to the east. Domainal crenulation folds and cleavages at a high angle to the margin of the belt suggest that the change in convergence directions occurred while the rocks (presently at the surface) could still plastically deform. This kinematic interpretation of structures is consistent with changes in plate motions [Engebretson et al., 1985]. Before 100 Ma, the convergence directions between the Kula and North America plates were at a high angle to the continental margin, whereas after 100 Ma, convergence directions were at a small angle to the continental margin. In addition, after 100 Ma, the Kula-North America, and not the Farallon-North America, convergence direction is most compatible with a N-S principal paleostress orientation derived from inversion of strike-slip fault data. This relationship suggests that it may have been the Kula plate that drove northward transport of the Alexander terrane along the margin of North America.


Abstract The North German Basin yields enormous geothermal resources of more than 13 000 EJ (exajoule: 1 EJ = 1 × 1018 J) heat in place bound to Paleozoic petrothermal and Mesozoic hydrothermal reservoirs. So far, these resources are only exploited at a few localities. Thus, geothermal energy is considered an underutilized energy resource. Despite long-term experience in exploiting Rhaetian hydrothermal reservoirs, the exploration risk remains high, which is mainly related to high expectations on reservoir thickness and quality. Previous exploration campaigns have identified potential hydrothermal reservoirs in six Mesozoic reservoir complexes. But, as high-resolution subsurface maps are not available, the reliable prediction and targeting of reservoirs remains an unsolved problem. As such, an exploration strategy integrating methods of sedimentology, palaeontology, petrography and reservoir characterization was applied to a large database of cores and wireline logs. This contribution details the key results of the exploration of Upper Keuper and Middle Jurassic reservoir complexes, including high-resolution subsurface facies, sandstone thickness and reservoir quality maps. Sets of these maps enable the reliable prediction and targeting of individual hydrothermal reservoirs, and, thus, make a significant contribution to a lowered exploration risk.


Abstract. Mineral dusts are well known to be efficient ice nuclei, where the source of this efficiency has typically been attributed to the presence of clay minerals such as illite and kaolinite. However, the ice nucleating abilities of the more minor mineralogical components have not been as extensively examined. As a result, the deposition ice nucleation abilities of 24 atmospherically relevant mineral samples have been studied, using a continuous flow diffusion chamber at −40.0 ± 0.3 °C and particles size-selected at 200 nm. By focussing on using the same experimental procedure for all experiments, a relative ranking of the ice nucleating abilities of the samples was achieved. In addition, the ice nucleation behaviour of the pure minerals is compared to that of complex mixtures, such as Arizona Test Dust (ATD) and Mojave Desert Dust (MDD), and to lead iodide, which has been previously proposed for cloud seeding. Lead iodide was the most efficient ice nucleus (IN), requiring a critical relative humidity with respect to ice (RH i ) of 122.0 ± 2.0% to activate 0.1% of the particles. MDD (RH i ) 126.3 ± 3.4%) and ATD (RH i 129.5 ± 5.1%) have lower but comparable activity. From a set of clay minerals (kaolinite, illite, montmorillonite), non-clay minerals (e.g. hematite, magnetite, calcite, cerussite, quartz), and feldspar minerals (orthoclase, plagioclase) present in the atmospheric dusts, it was found that the feldspar minerals (particularly orthoclase) and some clays (particularly kaolinite) were the most efficient ice nuclei. Orthoclase and plagioclase were found to have critical RH i values of 127.1 ± 6.3% and 136.2 ± 1.3%, respectively. The presence of feldspars (specifically orthoclase) may play a significant role in the IN behaviour of mineral dusts despite their lower percentage in composition relative to clay minerals.


Targeting beneficiaries of development interventions in the context of poverty alleviation remains a challenge to most development agencies and policy-makers. Due to limited resources and the small scale of operations, most non governmental development organisations' (NGDOs) practice targeting in order to limit themselves to interventions that only select a group of individuals considered to be most in need. This paper analyses the targeting performance of two child-safety net programmes operating in rural Kenya and examines the factors influencing it. In addition, an econometric model is developed to identify the characteristics of the households participating in these programmes. Data for this paper was collected through a household survey of 120 randomly selected households, stratified equally into participants and non-participants. The targeting performance of the studied NGDOs' interventions was found to be poor due to reliance on local social structures that led to under-representation of the poorest group of households in programme activities. The paper further shows that although the case study NGDOs and their child programmes could be supporting households with characteristics that indicate that they are not among the well-off in the society, such households do not necessarily belong to the poorest group of community members in relative terms.


Fluoride contamination in drinking water due to natural and anthropogenic activities has been recognized as one of the major problems worldwide imposing a serious threat to human health. Up to a small level (1–1.5 mg/L) this strengthens the enamel. Concentrations in the range of 1.5–4 mg/L result in dental fluorosis whereas with prolonged exposure at still higher fluoride concentrations (4–10 mg/L) dental fluorosis progresses to skeletal fluorosis. Several materials including aluminium salts, calcined alumina, magnesia, lime, activated carbon sulphonated carbonaceous materials and ion exchange resins have been screened for their utility in defluoridation of water. Aluminium impregnated cation exchange resin and sulphonated carbonsaceous materials prepared from coconut shell, paddy husk have been found to have a significant defluoridation capacity. Aluminium sulphate (Filter alum) solution is also found efficacious. On the basis of results extensive investigations, different researchers have developed a simple and economical domestic defluoridation processes. This paper represents the critical review of the past work on defluoridation studies by using conventional and unconventional materials and different methodologies.


Caring for the elderly is turning to forms of community care and home care. Telecare is one of those emergent modalities of caring. This article will explore the meanings that older people give to the experience of staying at home in later life by using telecare. Discourse analysis is used to examine a set of focus groups and interviews with telecare users from different cities of Catalonia (Spain). The outcomes include three interpretative repertoires that we called: "Aging at home", "normal aging" and "unsafe aging". For each repertoire we examine how the permanence of older people in their homes is accounted, and which role telecare plays in such experience.


This paper presents a novel on-line rotor ground fault location method for synchronous machines, which, combined with rotor ground fault protection, can detect and locate faults in the rotor. This method is suitable for synchronous machines with static excitation systems, whose excitation field winding is fed by rectifiers through an excitation transformer. The main contribution of this new technique is that it can locate the position of a ground fault in the rotor winding online, reducing the repair time. The proposed technique is based on the analysis of the ac and dc components of the excitation voltage and the voltage measured in a grounding resistance located in the neutral terminal of the excitation transformer. This technique has been validated through computer simulations and experimental laboratory tests.


Technological justice can play an important role within the international system in resolving global challenges and creating a smart and more egalitarian society. Technological and scientific developments are generating huge opportunities for tackling societal challenges. However, the benefits of technology and innovation are unequally distributed, and they tend to cause economic and political disruptions in our societies that widen inequalities within states as well as between countries. Digitalisation and, especially, automation are challenges that must be faced if developing countries are to avoid premature de-industrialization, expulsion from global value chains of the world economy, and the serious damage to their growth paths that would result. The authors propose adopting the concept of 'technological justice' within our societies as a new paradigm for the international system to reconcile technological advances with the societal challenges facing our global society, especially poverty and sustainability; and propose a number of policies and measures by which the G-20 could take on a central role in pushing this major contribution onto the global agenda. The authors participate in the T-20 network of think tanks that facilitates interaction between its members, the public policy community and the general public, being its primary objective to add value to the G20 process with evidence-based public policy proposals on areas of interest for the international agenda. (Submitted as Global Solutions Paper) JEL D63 F60 O14 O19 O20 O30 O47


The western Sierra Nevada metamorphic belt is subdivided into six tectonic terranes, which are juxtaposed along mostly cryptic, pre-Late Jurassic faults. The Northern Sierra terrane contains a basement of imbricated and locally chaotic lower Paleozoic quartz sandstone, mafic rocks, chert, argillite, and other rocks, overlain unconformably by Upper Devonian-Middle Jurassic volcanic and siliceous strata. The Feather River terrane is a Paleozoic, possibly polygenetic ophiolite. The Red Ant terrane is a small terrane with an early Mesozoic blueschist-facies overprint. The Calaveras terrane is a chaotic assemblage of upper Paleozoic-Triassic argillite, chert, volcanic rock, and limestone contained in two regionally mapped melange units. The Tuolumne River terrane is a stratigraphic assemblage of disrupted Paleozoic ophiolite overlain by Middle Triassic-Lower Jurassic siliceous and volcanic strata, both intruded by 200 Ma (Lower Jurassic) plutons. The Slate Creek terrane is a 200 Ma pseudostratigraphic sequence of cumulate ultramafic, plutonic, and volcanic rocks. The Northern Sierra and Calaveras terranes contain Permian McCloud fossils, whereas the Tuolumne River terrane contains Permian McCloud and Tethyan fossils in olistoliths within lower Mesozoic deposits. These terranes are bounded mostly by steeply dipping faults of the Late Jurassic Foothills fault system but locally are juxtaposed along earlier, highly deformed, low-angle faults that are remnants of major terrane-bounding faults. A system of early, mostly cryptic, east-dipping faults juxtapose, in descending structural order, the Northern Sierra, Feather River, Red Ant, Calaveras, and Tuolumne River terranes. Each of the four boundaries that separate these five terranes have three or more independent pre-Late Jurassic upper age brackets, including crosscutting plutons, sedimentary provenance, and shared structural fabrics. The Slate Creek terrane tectonically overlies the Tuolumne River, Calaveras, and Red Ant terranes along an isoclinally folded, west-dipping fault that is cut by a 165 Ma pluton. Callovian-Kimmeridgian strata and coeval intrusive rocks, including the 155-165 Ma volcanic rocks, sheeted dikes, and zoned mafic plutons of the Smartville Complex, are deposited on and intruded into the older, previously juxtaposed terranes and constitute an overlap sequence. The well-known faults of the Foothills fault system, including the Melones fault, cut Kimmeridgian strata of the overlap sequence and thus cannot include ancient sutures. These faults reactivated many of the earlier terrane-bounding faults. Pre-Late Jurassic amalgamation of the Sierra Nevada metamorphic belt rules out previous models of Late Jurassic arc-continent collision; earlier collisions and/or noncollisional tectonic processes must be invoked to explain strong contractional deformation in the western Sierra Nevada metamorphic belt.


It is generally well known that a steelmaking ladle operation plays an important role in the production of clean steel. A turbulent mixing of melt with Ar gas bubbling from the ladle bottom can homogenize a melt temperature and can control precisely chemical compositions of steel. In order to figure out these phenomena, a quantitative analysis of fluid flow behavior of gas and melt during a ladle operation is required and special concerns should be focused on effects of operating parameters on the perfect mixing time of melt. In this study, as a basic approach, effects of operating parameters such as a melt depth (aspect ratio) and a nozzle type (one-hole or porous plug) on the mixing behavior in ladle operation are investigated. Water model experiments are carried out to simulate these melt behaviors in steelmaking ladle. As a result, it was found that there exist an optimized melt depth and a nozzle type at a given gas flow rate, which affect significantly on the mixing behavior of melt.


The United Nations Human Development Report Office this week released preliminary figures from the 2005 human development report projecting that the UN's millennium development goals will be missed by a wide margin in Africa. The UN undertook in 2000 to halve the number of people living on less than a dollar a day, to cut infant mortality by two thirds, and to give every child primary education by 2015.

But according to the latest figures, the UN is now predicting five million deaths in children younger than 5 in the year 2015, worse than current rates, and three million more than the millennium development goal. Between now and 2015, the UN predicted 29 million children under five will die as a result of the failure to reach the target. Ten African countries have worse infant mortality rates now than in 2000, and another 29 countries are on course to meet the infant mortality development goal more than 35 years late.

Current trends will mean that Africa will still have more than 40 million unschooled children in 2015, and the number of …


The phytochemical, antibacterial, antifungal and MIC (minimum inhibitory concentration) study of the leaves and bark of Colebrookea oppositifolia Smith was evaluated. Phytochemical screening C. oppositifolia Sm. indicated the presence of alkaloids, flavonoids, glycosides, steroids and saponins whereas terpenoids, tannins, and cardiac glycosides are showed only in bark extract. Petroleum ether extract showed maximum effectiveness against P. aeruginosa with bark extract (18±2.2 mm) and maximum antifungal potential exhibited by petroleum ether extract of leaves (15 ±0.3 mm) against A. nigar. It was noticed that the extracts in distilled water had not shown much potential. The MIC assay was carried out for further verification of results obtained by the Zone of Inhibition against both bacterial and fungal strains. The lowest MIC value is 0.09±0.3 at 1 mg/mL against E. coli exhibited by bark extract and 0.09±0.2 at 0.9 mg/mL against K. pneumoniae shown by leaf extract. Whereas, in fungi minimal MIC value exhibited 0.11±0.3 at 0.9mg/mL by leaf extract against A. oryzae. Hence, it is recommended further investigation to explore toxicological and clinical trials before using this plant as drug.


Online media consumption has been radically transformed by how media companies algorithmically recommend content to their users. Public service media (PSM) have also realized the potential of recommender systems and are increasingly using these technologies to personalize their online offering. PSM are on the other hand required to disseminate diverse content, which can be incompatible with the logics of commercial recommender systems that primarily seek to drive up media consumption. Drawing on previous research on selective exposure and media diversity, this study presents the results from interviews with ten PSM informants across Europe, revealing that data scientists within these organizations are highly aware of the effects recommendations have on media consumption, and design the PSM online services accordingly. This study contributes with in-depth knowledge of how diversity has been interpreted at operational levels in PSM and how recommender systems are being adapted to a non-commercial setting.


Machine learning, combined with a proliferation of electronic healthcare records (EHR), has the potential to transform medicine by identifying previously unknown interventions that reduce the risk of adverse outcomes. To realize this potential, machine learning must leave the conceptual 'black box' in complex domains to overcome several pitfalls, like the presence of confounding variables. These variables predict outcomes but are not causal, often yielding uninformative models. In this work, we envision a 'conversational' approach to design machine learning models, which couple modeling decisions to domain expertise. We demonstrate this approach via a retrospective cohort study to identify factors which affect the risk of hospital-acquired venous thromboembolism (HA-VTE). Using logistic regression for modeling, we have identified drugs that reduce the risk of HA-VTE. Our analysis reveals that ondansetron, an anti-nausea and anti-emetic medication, commonly used in treating side-effects of chemotherapy and post-general anesthesia period, substantially reduces the risk of HA-VTE when compared to aspirin (11% vs. 15% relative risk reduction or RRR, respectively). The low cost and low morbidity of ondansetron may justify further inquiry into its use as a preventative agent for HA-VTE. This case study highlights the importance of engaging domain expertise while applying machine learning in complex domains.


In this short note we show that the group of projectivities of a projective plane of order 23 cannot be isomorphic to the Mathieu group M24. By a result of T. Grundhöfer [6], this implies that the group of projectivities of a non-desarguesian projective plane of finite order n is isomorphic either to the alternating group An+1 or to the symmetric group Sn+1.


The effect of short-term bilateral intracarotid infusions of hypertonic saline on plasma vasopressin concentration (pAVP) was evaluated in five dogs. Intracarotid infusion of saline at 90 mumol . kg-1 . min-1 . artery-1 significantly (P less than 0.05) increased jugular vein osmolality (pOsm) and sodium concentration (pNa+) within 2 min. Saphenous vein pOsm was not altered during the 6 min of infusion, whereas pNa+ was increased (P less than 0.05) from 0.8 +/- 0.1 to 2.3 +/- 0.3 pg/ml. Subsequent experiments using hypertonic saline infusions of 90 and 180 mumol . kg-1 . min-1 administered intracarotidly and intravenously for 6 min were performed. Intracarotid isotonic infusions and intravenous hypertonic infusions did not significantly alter pAVP. Hypertonic intracarotid saline increased jugular vein pOsm and pNa+ in a dose-related fashion, whereas saphenous vein pOsm and pNa+ were not significantly changed after 6 min of infusion. Plasma vasopressin, compared with the isotonic intracarotid infusion (1.5 +/- 0.3 pg/ml), was increased (P less than 0.05) after hypertonic saline to 3.2 +/- 0.6 and 4.8 +/- 0.2 pg/ml for the 90 and 180 mumol . kg-1 . min-1 infusions, respectively. The cerebral osmolality indicated by jugular vein pOsm was therefore increased in the absence of changes in systemic pOsm during intracarotid hypertonic infusions. The increase in pAVP in response to these changes in pOsm supports the presence of central osmoreceptors regulating vasopressin release in the area of distribution of the common carotid arteries.


The paper deals with evaluating the success of small and medium-sized enterprises in the international process. The process of internationalization of small and medium-sized businesses is frequently discussed topic. In this article is discussed a simple evaluation model that could be used by SMEs to determine not only how strong are they compared to competitors, but also at what level are their success factors in the process of internationalization. A lot of SMEs have problems to identify the key success factors in the process of internationalization, as well as to determine in what areas, that success in foreign markets determine, have their strengths and weaknesses, therefore we decided to focus on this problem and there is presented a proposal of a simple model of performance evaluation of small and medium-sized enterprises in this paper. The key success factors of internationalization process are identified according to a survey of 40 small and medium engineering companies and also the use of the knowledge of literature and similar surveys conducted abroad. The key success factors of internationalization process were grouped into 4 categories: 1) Key employee, 2) Internationalization rate, 3) International marketing, 4) Efficiency of foreign trade. The proposed rating system because of its graphical output simply shows what the area has a rated entity weaknesses and where its strengths has. The model was applied to data obtained from a above mentioned survey and in the paper there are presented specific examples of graphical output of the model for selected companies. For SMEs it is often difficult to succeed and then to maintain the position in the foreign markets than for large multinational companies. Large enterprises have more opportunities to detailed analysis and evaluation of factors that have to determine their success in the field of internationalization. In the current literature there are not many models which SMEs have shown how easily assess their situation in internationalization process. The authors followed up on previous efforts to design assessment method of evaluating the international success of small and medium sized enterprises (Peprný, Kubickova, Rovný, 2009), however they tried to simplify the previously presented method to be applicable to SMEs in practice and they have tried to adapt the evaluation model to the needs of small and medium sized companies. The proposed rating system could be further adjusted in practice. It is possible to modify the weight of individual blocks as needed for particular businesses.


Horizontal washing machines use significantly less water and energy as opposed to conventional machines. Unbalanced load in washing machines limit the performance, and therefore accurate estimation of unbalanced loads, including their magnitudes and locations in washing drum, is required. In this paper, we propose an approach to evaluate the angular position and mass of the unbalanced load. A simulation model of the system was developed and various experiments were performed. The proposed algorithms and the developed experimental system can estimate the angular position of the unbalance load with maximum %3 error. The research on unbalanced load increase the performance of the washing machine and in addition to this, this research can be used to eliminate unbalanced load in future studies.


This paper presents a robust control of Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor (TCSC) using the phaseplane fuzzy logic to improve the power oscillation damping of a wide-area power system. First, the TCSC is installed in series with transmission lines of two-area four-machine interconnected power system. Then, the phase-plane fuzzy logic control is adopted so as to control the power oscillations robustly and to improve the power system stability due to uncertainty from the delay time of a wide area control. The performance of the proposed phase-plane fuzzy logic controller is compared with the lead-lag compensator optimally tuned by GA. The simulation results reveal that the proposed phase-plane fuzzy logic control can achieve higher performance and more robustness under the large communication delay. Phase-Plane Fuzzy Logic Control , Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor, Robust Control, Wide Area Control


We present ALMA observations on and around the radio-quiet quasar UM 287 at z = 2.28. Together with a companion quasar, UM 287 is believed to play a major role in powering the surrounding enormous Lyα nebula (ELAN), dubbed the Slug ELAN, that has an end-to-end size of 450 physical kpc. In addition to the quasars, we detect a new dusty star-forming galaxy (DSFG), dubbed the Slug-DSFG, in 2 mm continuum with a single emission line consistent with CO(4−3). The Slug-DSFG sits at a projected distance of 100 kpc southeast from UM 287, with a systemic velocity difference of −360 ± 30 km s−1 with respect to UM 287, suggesting it is a possible contributor to the powering of the Slug ELAN. With careful modeling of the SED and dynamical analyses, it is found that the Slug-DSFG and UM 287 appear low in both gas fraction and gas-to-dust ratio, suggesting environmental effects due to the host's massive halo. In addition, our Keck long-slit spectra reveal significant Lyα emissions from the Slug-DSFG, as well as a Lyα tail that starts at the location and velocity of the Slug-DSFG and extends toward the south, with a projected length of about 100 kpc. Supported by various analytical estimates we propose that the Lyα tail is a result of the Slug-DSFG experiencing ram pressure stripping. The gas mass stripped is estimated to be about 109 M ⊙, contributing to the dense warm/cool gas reservoir that is believed to help power the exceptional Lyα luminosity.


Active and semisupervised learning are related techniques aiming at reducing the effort of creating training sets for classification and regression tasks. In this work, we present a framework for combining these two techniques on the basis of Renyi entropy regularization, enabling a synergy effect. We build upon the existing semisupervised learning model which attempts to balance the likelihood of labeled examples and the entropy of putative object probabilities within the unlabeled pool. To enable efficient optimization of the model, we generalize the deterministic annealing expectation-maximization (DAEM) algorithm, originally designed for Shannon entropy, to accommodate the use of Renyi entropies. The Renyi-regularized model is then applied to expected error reduction (EER), an active learning approach based on minimizing the entropy of unlabeled object probabilities. We investigate object preselection with a greedy approximation of the object feature matrix as a means to reduce computational complexity. To assess the performance of the proposed framework, we apply it to two real-world remote sensing problems with significantly different input data characteristics: detecting dead trees from color infrared aerial images (2-D) and detecting dead trunk stems in ALS point clouds (3-D). Our results show that for small training sets, the semisupervised Renyi-regularized classifier improves the classification rate by up to 11% and 10% points compared to the unregularized baseline for ALS and image data, respectively. This gain carries over to active learning, where the regularized EER achieves 90% of the final classification performance using 50% and 70% of the number of queries required by standard EER.


The large genome size of easter lily (Lilium longiflorum (77.1 pg/2C nucleus)), coupled with repetitive DNA sequences, makes it difficult to use molecular techniques to identify or fingerprint lily (Lilium) species, hybrids, and clones. Previous research demonstrated that amplified fragment length polymorphisms could not be optimized for consistency and repeatability to obtain reliable genetic variation assessments of lily species and clones. The objective of this research was to analyze the effectiveness and stringency of intersimple sequence repeats (ISSRs) to determine genetic differences between L. longiflorum 'Nellie White' clonal ramet populations from bulb growers over years. DNA from closely related clones ofL. longiflorum 'Nellie White' included 2002 (n = 11 bulb lots) and 2003 (n = 12 bulb lots). Comparison cultivars and species were also included. Five University of British Columbia (UBC) primers (P808, P810, P811, P814, and P818) that were used produced 56 polymorphic loci. ISSR banding patterns were consistent among three replications within 'Nellie White' clonal genotypes. 'Nellie White' clones differed significantly within (82%) and among (18%) growers in 2002 and 2003. 'Nellie White' clones are not uniform or part of a single ramet population. Principal clades within years separated at Nei's genetic distances (GDs) of GD = 0.6 (growers 2, 4, and 12) to GD = 0.82 (grower 6) in 2002 and GD = 0.51 (grower 4) to GD = 0.78 (grower 14). The most closely related 'Nellie White' clones within growers ranged from GD = 0.8 to 0.95 in 2002 and GD = 0.7 to 0.91 for 2003. Five top-performing growers (1, and 3-6) from previous morphological studies and, particularly growers 3 and 5, were in similar clades, cosegregating with phenotypic traits of stem emergence and flowering dates. The lack of a meiotic sieve (Muller's ratchet) may be responsible for the high level of mutational differences present in the 'Nellie White' clones and significantly affects the ability of commercial greenhouse growers to produce a uniform easter lily crop, particularly in years when the Easter holiday is early.


To Do, To Die, To Reason Why offers a new account of the ethics of war and the legal regulation of war. It is especially concerned with the conduct of individuals, including whether they are required to follow orders to go to war, what moral constraints there are on killing in war, what makes people liable to be killed in war, and the extent to which the laws of war ought to reflect the morality of war. Victor Tadros defends a largely anti-authority view about the morality of war, and notable moral constraints on killing in war, such as the Doctrine of Doing and Allowing and a version of the Doctrine of Double Effect. However, he argues that a much wider range of people are liable to be harmed or killed in war than is normally thought to be the case, on grounds of both causal involvement and fairness. And it argues that the laws of war should converge much more closely with the morality of war than is currently the case.


The 'rule of law' has traditionally been conceived as an intrinsically positive and politically neutral 'tool', universally valid and capable of being 'exported' everywhere. This paper - which represents a synthetic exposition of the ideas expressed in Ugo Mattei and Laura Nader, Plunder: When the Rule of Law is Illegal (Blackwell Publishing, Oxford 2008) - asserts that such an ambiguous concept has a bright and a dark side, the latter being excluded from any public discussion. The rhetoric of the 'rule of law' has been used by Western powers in order to justify interventions (mainly) into the 'developing' world, that ultimately turned into practices of plunder, allowing the expansion of Western economic power over the 'rest', thus backing a claim that the rule of law has been used 'illegally'. Intellectual myopia, ethnocentrism and imperial attitudes stand behind the conception of the rule of law that currently wraps international financial institutions - today's global legislators - reform projects in the 'developing world'. The transformation of the concept of 'law' into that of a 'technicality', the globally dominant position enjoyed by U.S. law and the imperial attitude of today's Western international corporate actors are some of the elements that show a pattern of continuity between colonialism and today's neo-liberal policy.


Typical integrated optical phase tuners alter the effective index. In this paper, we explore tuning by geometric deformation. We show that tuning efficiency, Vπ L, improves as the device size shrinks down to the optimal bend radius, contrary to conventional index-shift based approaches where Vπ L remains constant. We demonstrate that this approach is capable of ultra-low power tuning across a full FSR in a low-confinement silicon nitride based ring resonator of 580 μm radius. We demonstrate record performance with VFSR = 16 V, Vπ L = 3.6 V dB, Vπ Lα = 1.1 V dB, tuning current below 10 nA, and unattenuated tuning response up to 1 MHz. We also present optimized designs for high confinement silicon nitride and silicon based platforms with radius down to 80 μm and 45 μm, respectively, with performance well beyond current state-of-the-art. Applications include narrow-linewidth tunable diode lasers for spectroscopy and non-linear optics, optical phased array beamforming networks for RF antennas and LIDAR, and optical filters for WDM telecommunication links.


Purpose: To present dose uncertainty in composite radiation plans generated through Deformable Image Registration (DIR). We introduce a Fuzzy Composite Dose (FCD) with fuzzified deformation vectors. We compared the Fuzzy method to the statistical approach. Methods: The accuracy of the DIR is generally verified through visual checks, including confirmation of matching corresponding anatomies. However, most of the soft tissues have few significant image features and therefore greater uncertainty in registration. We fuzzified the deformation vectors and derived a FCD. We utilized a Gaussian function for uncertainty allocation. A Gaussian variance (two standard deviation; 2sigma) between 2mm to 10mm was assigned, which is based on previous publications analyzing the difference between various DIR methods. The least uncertainty (2sigma=2mm) was assigned to the areas having significant image features. The most uncertainty (2sigma=10mm) was assigned to the areas with few features or a lot of noise. A Fuzzy union operator was utilized to derive the FCD from the Fuzzy deformation vector. The Alpha‐cut method was employed to present the uncertainty range of FCD. A patient example is presented. After radiation treatment to the right lung, they returned to the hospital later to have another radiation treatment to the right rib cage near the liver. B‐Spline DIR was utilized to create the composite dose. Results: In the liver, the statistical analysis shows the uncertainty up to 2sigma=17Gy. With the fuzzy approach, the alpha‐cut showed the uncertainty range up to 35Gy. The dose uncertainty range using the alpha‐cut is shown to be asymmetric, a representation not possible using the standard statistical approach. Conclusions: FCD showed the better presentation including the range and direction of uncertainty in the composite dose. This will enable the clinician to deliver effective dose to a recurrent tumor or new tumor near the previously treated site while minimizing complications.


The activity on 'Enhancing Energy Efficiency of Public Buildings in the Presov Region' is designed to assess the existing regulatory framework and financial alternatives and recommend strategic planning options to implement an energy efficiency (EE) program in public buildings in the Presov Self-Governing Region (PSK). The activity is also designed to assist PSK in establishing an energy management unit within PSK's Property Management Department (PMD). This report on 'Strategic Planning for Scaling-up EE in PSK Buildings' examines financing mechanisms for investment in energy efficiency projects in public buildings in Slovakia, the readiness of market participants such as Energy Service Companies (ESCOs) and installers, and the supportive legal framework for ESCOs to implement projects in public buildings. The report provides a systematic process for identifying and prioritizing EE investment projects, and a financing framework for undertaking investments in PSK public buildings. The report has been prepared in close collaboration with the relevant teams from the PSK office and with inputs from multiple stakeholders in Slovakia. This report builds on the earlier task which prepared a 'Diagnostic Assessment of the Regulatory and Institutional Framework to Increase Opportunities for the Implementation of EE in PSK public buildings.' That diagnostics report provided an overview and analysis of existing EE regulatory and legal mandates, implementation instruments, regional procurement regulations, and financing schemes at the central and regional levels, which are included in the first part of this report.


The claim in additive manufacturing (AM) changes from simply producing prototypes as show objects to the fabrication of final parts and products in small volume batches. Thereby the focus is on freedom of material, dimensional accuracy and mechanical component properties.
 A novel extrusion-based AM technology has been developed focusing on these issues. The working principle is to form spheres from a thermoplastic polymer melt and build parts by single droplets. The material preprocessing is similar to the injection molding technology and enables a wide range of different thermoplastic polymers as build materials. With the droplet-based working principle high mechanical component properties and dimensional accuracy can be reached compared to similar processes.
 Further improvements to the process need a detailed knowledge of the physical effects during the build process. The temperature distribution during the manufacturing process determines at which temperature material is fused and how solidification takes place and shrinkage can occur or is suppressed. Thus, it has a significant influence on the mechanical properties and warpage effects of produced parts.
 In this work a thermal model is presented that describes the heat transfer during the build process. The necessary input data are the material properties and a print job description including the part geometry and building strategy. The basic idea is to simulate each single droplet deposition by applying a dynamic Finite Element Method. All relevant heat transfer effects are analyzed and represented in the model.
 The model was validated with measurements using a thermal imaging camera. Several measurements were performed during the build process and compared to the simulation results. A high accuracy could be reached with an average model error of about 4° Celsius and a maximal error of 10° Celsius.


A method to extract the equivalent parameters of transient electric circuit and magnetic field coupled problem based on sensitivity computation on the system equations is presented. The field equations are derived by using the finite element method. In contrast to traditionally used methods which are based on the physical meanings and physical relationships of the parameters, in this method, the parameters are extracted from the mathematical system equations which include the eddy-current magnetic field equations and internal circuit equations. Its advantage is that it is applicable to complex problems, inside which the reactive energy, iron losses, and copper losses are difficult to be isolated and expressed. The extracted parameters can include the effects of eddy currents, internal circuits, and mechanical motion. It has been applied to indirect coupling between external circuits and transient magnetic field with internally connected circuits.


This paper demonstrates that the level of competition in the existing Panzar Rosse (P-R) literature is systematically overestimated and that the tests on both monopoly and perfect competition are distorted. This is due to the use of bank revenues divided by total assets as dependent variable in the P-R model instead of unscaled bank revenues. We provide both theoretical and empirical evidence to illustrate the impact of the misspecification on the estimation of competition and the statistical tests on the market structure. Inclusion of scale variables as explanatory variables, which is commonpractice in the current literature, has a similar distorting effect. Our overview of the extensive P-R literature reveals that all 28 studies considered suffer from these types of misspecification. The empirical evidence provided in this paper is based on a large sample of more than 18,000 banks in 101 countries over 16 years. We find that monopoly cannot be rejected in 28% of the countries (against 0% under misspecification) and that perfect competition cannot be rejected in 38% of the cases (against 20-30% under misspecification).


Materials, include polymer modified asphalt, coarse aggregate, fine aggregate, packing and lignin fiber, of SMA-13 Warm Mix Asphalt used in maintenance engineering of Jing-Shen expressway (K17-K22), were tested in quality. Based on different grading Marshall tests of stone matrix asphalt of HMA (no additive) and WMA (with additives), materials proportion, asphalt aggregate ratio and target densities of SMA-13 WMA were designed, which will be applied in expressway surface maintenance. Through rutting test, water immersion Marshall test, tensile strength ratio test, seepage test and other proportioning examinations, it shows that the designed asphalt can meet code requirements and guarantee good high temperature stability and water stability.