Background
Selective laser trabeculoplasty (SLT) and antiglaucomatous medications can be used to treat both glaucoma and ocular hypertension.However, which is more effective and safe remains proofless.

Objective
This meta-analysis was to identify the possible differences in clinical outcomes between SLT and topical medication administration in the treatment of glaucoma and ocular hypertension.

Methods
Pertinent prospective randomized controlled trials that compare the efficacy and safety between SLT and medication were selected by extensive searches of PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Controlled Trials Register database and Wanfang database from their inception to May 2016.The efficacy included the range of intraocular pressure reduce (IOPR) and successful rate in follow-up period were estimated by weighted mean difference (WMD) and the odds ratio (OR) respectively.The safety was to observe the adverse reactions of both SLT and medications.

Results
Six prospective randomized controlled trials were included in the meta-analysis with 598 eyes of 361 patients who suffered from glaucoma and ocular hypertension, including 243 eyes of Caucasian patients, 291 eyes of Asian patients and 67 eyes of other races.Five studies involving 431 eyes compared SLT with medication in terms of IOPR and showed that the IOPR in antiglaucomatous medication group was 0.21 mmHg higher than that in the SLT group [WMD=-0.21 mmHg; 95%(confidence interval) CI: -0.30, -0.11; P<0.000 1]. No statistical heterogeneity was observed among the studies (I2=0%). All the six studies reported success rate and exhibited that the successful rate was higher in antiglaucomatous medication group than that in the SLT group, with statistical significance between the 2 groups (OR=0.57; 95%CI: 0.37, 0.87; P=0.01). No statistical heterogeneity was observed (I2=13%).

Conclusions
Both antiglaucomatous medication and SLT therapies can lower IOP in the patients with glaucoma and ocular hypertension, and the medication therapy seems to be more effective than SLT.

Key words:
Glaucoma/therapy; Ocular hypertension/therapy; Selective trabeculoplasty; Laser/therapy use; Medications; Randomezid controlled clinical trials; Meta-analysis


Background: Deep brain stimulation (DBS) systems in current mode and new lead designs are recently available. To switch between DBS-systems remains complicated as clinicians may lose their reference for programming. Simulations can help increase the understanding.
Objective: To quantitatively investigate the electric field (EF) around two lead designs simulated to operate in voltage and current mode under two time points following implantation.
Methods: The finite element method was used to model Lead 3389 (Medtronic) and 6148 (St Jude) with homogenous surrounding grey matter and a peri-electrode space (PES) of 250 μm. The PES-impedance mimicked the acute (extracellular fluid) and chronic (fibrous tissue) time-point. Simulations at different amplitudes of voltage and current (n=236) were performed using two different contacts. Equivalent current amplitudes were extracted by matching the shape and maximum EF of the 0.2 V/mm isolevel.
Results: The maximum EF extension at 0.2 V/mm varied between 2-5 mm with a small difference between the leads. In voltage mode EF increased about 1 mm at acute compared to the chronic PES. Current mode presented the opposite relationship. Equivalent EFs for lead 3389 at 3 V were found for 7 mA (acute) and 2.2 mA (chronic).
Conclusions: Simulations showed a major impact on the electric field extension between postoperative time points. This may explain the clinical decisions to reprogram the amplitude weeks after implantation. Neither the EF extension nor intensity is considerably influenced by the lead design. However, the EF distribution is affected by the larger contact of Lead 6148 generating an electric field below the tip.


The field of acoustics is of immense industrial and scientific importance. The subject is built on the foundations of linear acoustics, which is widely regarded as so mature that it is fully encapsulated in the physics texts of the 1950s. This view was changed by developments in physics such as the study of quantum chaos. Developments in physics throughout the last four decades, often equally applicable to both quantum and linear acoustic problems but overwhelmingly more often expressed in the language of the former, have explored this. There is a significant new amount of theory that can be used to address problems in linear acoustics and vibration, but only a small amount of reported work does so. This book is an attempt to bridge the gap between theoreticians and practitioners, as well as the gap between quantum and acoustic. Tutorial chapters provide introductions to each of the major aspects of the physical theory and are written using the appropriate terminology of the acoustical community. The book will act as a quick-start guide to the new methods while providing a wide-ranging introduction to the physical concepts.


omega-Conotoxin GVIA, a peptide of 27 amino acid residues and three disulfide bridges, has been studied by NMR techniques. The complete assignment of the corresponding proton NMR spectra was performed by two-dimensional sequence specific methods at 288 K and pH 3.5. On the basis of 169 distance restraints derived from this analysis, the three-dimensional structure was obtained. A total of 30 initial structures were generated by distance geometry methods and further refined by restrained energy minimization techniques yielding a final set of 8 structures. The mean root-mean-square deviation between each of the 8 structures and the mean atomic coordinates for all residues is 0.82 +/- 0.06 A for the backbone atoms and 1.45 +/- 0.18 A for all non-H atoms. The structure shows a globular folding pattern that is stabilized by the three disulfide linkages and a number of intramolecular hydrogen bonds. A total of 14 hydroxyl groups are found at the periphery fully exposed to the solvent. These groups, together with the charged side chains of Lys and Arg residues emerging radially from the peptide core, provide specific recognition elements for the interaction of this toxin with neuronal calcium channels.


The use of alloplastic materials in plastic surgery has become more extensive with advancement of autogenous-tissue reconstruction techniques for the repair of defects, tissue augmentation, and the stabilization of bones. An ideal alloplastic material should be nonallergenic, noncarcinogenic, sterilizable, and easy to shape and should not cause rejection. Alloplastic material used for tissue augmentation should have a low rate of resorption and distortion. High-density porous polyethylene implants (Medpor) have been used widely and successfully for tissue augmentation. The Turkish Delight is a material composed of diced cartilage grafts wrapped in oxidized regenerated cellulose (Surgicel). Its indications are similar to those of the Medpor implant, and an additional donor site is usually not needed. Both materials are used in the same anatomical locations, especially for augmentation. Therefore, the authors evaluated the long-term stability of and suitable anatomical sites for these materials. Medpor implants or Turkish Delights were placed subperiosteally or subfascially in 10 young rabbits, and the resultant changes were evaluated 16 weeks after the operation by macroscopy and histopathology. Changes in projections were measured with an ocular micrometer. Medpor implants were neither resorbed nor distorted when placed subperiosteally or subfascially, and were highly stabilized by the surrounding tissues. Turkish Delight also enabled tissue augmentation, but had a significantly higher rate of resorption compared with the Medpor implant and was loosely bound to the surrounding tissue. The Turkish Delight was less resorbed and better fixed to adjacent tissues when placed subperiosteally than when placed subfascially.


A detailed study of ion cyclotron interactions in a toroidal plasma has been carried out in order to elucidate the role of toroidal effects on ion cyclotron emission. It is well known that non-relaxed distribution functions can give rise to excitation of magnetosonic waves by ion cyclotron interactions when the distribution function increases with respect to the perpendicular velocity. We have extended and clarified the conditions under which even collisionally relaxed distribution function can destabilize magnetosonic eigenmodes. In a toroidal plasma, cyclotron interactions at the plasma boundary with ions having barely co-current passing orbits and marginally trapped orbits can cause destabilisation by the strong inversion of the distribution function along the characteristics of cyclotron interaction by neo-classical effects. The unstable interactions can further be enhanced by tangential interactions, which can also prevent the interactions from reaching the stable part of the characteristics, where they interact with trapped orbits. Conditions on the localization of the magnetosonic eigenmodes for unstable excitation are analysed by studying the anti-Hermitian part of the susceptibility tensor of thermonuclear alpha-particles. The pattern of positive and negative regions of the anti-Hermitian part of the susceptibility tensor of thermonuclear alpha-particles is, in general, consistent with the excitation of edge localized magnetosonic eigenmodes, even though the eigenmodes are usually not localized in the major radius and for distribution functions that have relaxed to steady state.


User-generated web content is rife with abusive language that can harm others and discourage participation. Thus, a primary research aim is to develop abuse detection systems that can be used to alert and support human moderators of online communities. Such systems are notoriously hard to develop and evaluate. Even when they appear to achieve satisfactory performance on current evaluation metrics, they may fail in practice on new data. This is partly because datasets commonly used in this field suffer from selection bias, and consequently, existing supervised models overrely on cue words such as group identifiers (e.g., gay and black) which are not inherently abusive. Although there are attempts to mitigate this bias, current evaluation metrics do not adequately quantify their progress. In this work, we introduce Adversarial Attacks against Abuse (AAA), a new evaluation strategy and associated metric that better captures a model's performance on certain classes of hard-to-classify microposts, and for example penalises systems which are biased on low-level lexical features. It does so by adversarially modifying the model developer's training and test data to generate plausible test samples dynamically. We make AAA available as an easy-to-use tool, and show its effectiveness in error analysis by comparing the AAA performance of several state-of-the-art models on multiple datasets. This work will inform the development of detection systems and contribute to the fight against abusive language online.


Intrabody communication (IBC) uses the human body as a signal transmission medium. In the capacitive coupling IBC approach, the signal is transmitted through the body, and the signal return path is closed through the environment. The received signal level is affected by the orientation of the transmitter with respect to the receiver, the number of ground electrodes connected to the body, the size of the receiver ground plane, and the surrounding environment. In this paper, we present a characterization of the capacitive IBC channel in the frequency range from 100 kHz to 100 MHz, obtained using a network analyzer and a pair of baluns. In order to better understand the transmission path in the frequency range of interest, we analyze the intrabody channel transmission characteristics using different electrode arrangements, test persons, environments, and body positions and movements. The transmission gain increases with frequency for 20 dB/dec and depends on the transmitter to the receiver distance, and the electrode arrangements. For a proper IBC configuration, the variations of the environment, test persons, body positions, and movements affect the transmission gain less than 2 dB.


[1] The Asal-Ghoubbet (AG) Rift has sustained a major volcano-tectonic rifting episode in 1978 and has been subsequently monitored with continuous geodetic and seismological surveys. It is therefore an ideal place to study the transient magmato-tectonic processes that operate after a rifting episode. We examine the space-time evolution of ∼2500 Md ≤ 2.8 earthquakes recorded in the rift from 1979 to 2001. We focus on the relationships between this seismic activity and both the three-dimensional structure of the rift and its postrifting behavior depicted from geodesy. The results highlight the major role of the central magmatic system (Fieale-Shark Bay) on the structure, seismic activity, and overall behavior of the rift. From 1978 to 1986, the rift opens at a fast rate, yet mainly aseismically; the opening is magmatically driven and accommodated. Since 1986, when the opening rate abruptly decreased, the seismicity is concentrated in the central part of the rift and reveals pulses of activity of the central volcanic system. These pulses result from that magmatic zone undergoing alternating stretching and inflating episodes. Thus, while the plate-driven induced stresses have been rebuilding in the rift since 1987, the rift opening is still essentially accommodated in the axial magmatic zone. The AG Rift has thus sustained a postrifting unsteady opening over more than 23 years following its stretching episode. That transient opening has essentially occurred aseismically, and most tectonic faults remain relaxed and locked.


Purpose: The aim of this study is to evaluate the frequency of cardiac involvement in patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), possible immune mechanisms of myocardial injury, and the place of cardiovascular pathology among other prognostic factors. Methods: The study included 86 patients (48 male, 60.2 ± 16.6 years) with COVID-19. In addition to common investigation, examination of troponin T (n = 18) and anti-heart antibodies (AHA, n = 34) were used. The average hospital period was 14 [12; 18] days. Results: The incidence of cardiovascular disease and symptoms was 45.3%. Arrhythmias, heart failure, low-QRS voltage, repolarization disorders, and pericardial effusion were the typical for coronavirus cardiac injury. The level of AHA was increased in 73.5%. Significant (p < 0.05) correlations of AHA level with inflammatory activity, pneumonia, respiratory failure, cardiac symptoms, and death were found. D-dimer >0.5 μg/mL had a sensitivity of 79.2% and specificity of 60% in the prediction of cardiovascular manifestations. Cardiac failure was one of the causes of death in 3/8 patients (37.5%). Lethality in the presence of cardiovascular pathology was 17.9 versus 2.2% without it, p < 0.05. The most powerful prognostic model includes age, diabetes, oxygen therapy volume, maximum leukocyte level, C-reactive protein, and D-dimer (correlation coefficient 0.871, p < 0.001). The model with only age, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease included also had predictive power (correlation coefficient 0.568, p < 0.001). Conclusions: The cardiovascular pathology is frequent in patients with COVID-19 and strong correlates with the D-dimer. It indicates the high significance of prothrombotic and ischemic mechanisms. High AHA levels may reflect an inflammatory heart injury. The cardiovascular pathology is associated with higher lethality.


This title is designed to serve as a textbook supplement for an advanced course in immigration law in law schools in the United States or in other countries seeking to introduce comparative and international perspectives to the study of immigration law and policy. Topics include an introductory discussion of comparative versus international law and the relevance of both to U.S. Jurisprudence; a comprehensive overview of international migration multilateral and bilateral regimes; glimpses into the immigration law and practices of Mexico, Canada, the European Union, the United Kingdom, France, and Spain; and a final part that examines international norms on freedom of movement, the right to nationality, policing, living conditions, immigrant workers and anti-terrorism law. For more information visit the companion site .


In this paper, real-time hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) simulation is adopted to augment the development of functional reconfiguration of power electronic building blocks and universal controllers. The simulation environment employs a commercial real-time digital simulator allowing real time simulations of large power systems. Two case studies regarding functional reconfiguration are discussed. The first case is a marine all-electric-ship application to improve system power quality. A novel control algorithm is proposed for an active filter, which is derived from reconfiguring variable speed motor drive. The second case outlines how the HIL simulator is utilized to a static synchronous compensator application where a commercial controller provides firing pulses to a simulated converter and the connected power system. Details of the control scheme, the HIL setup, and test results are given.


Depression is a chronic, recurrent and long-term disorder characterized by high rates of impairment and several comorbidities. Early life stress (ELS) is associated with the increased risk for developing depression in adulthood, influences its clinical course and predicts a poorer treatment outcome. Stressful life events play an important role in the pathogenesis of depression, being well established as acute triggers of psychiatric illness. The vulnerability for developing depression is associated to changes in neurobiological systems related to stress regulation. The hypothalamic-pituitaryadrenal (HPA) axis responds to external and internal stimuli. Reported results indicate that stress in early phases of development can induce persistent changes in the response of the HPA axis to stress in adulthood, leading to a raised susceptibility to depression. These abnormalities appear to be related to the HPA axis deregulation in depression, partially due to an imbalance between glucocorticoid receptors (GR) and mineral ocorticoid receptors (MR). While most studies have consistently demonstrated that GR function is impaired in major depression (reduced GR-mediated feedback in HPA axis), data about the MR role in depression are still limited and contr oversial. Thus, in this review article we summarize the main reported findings about the consequences of ELS in HPA axis functioning and in the responsivity of MR/GR receptors in depression.


In order to provide the "guiding principles of clinical research on mild cognitive impairment (MCI) (protocol)" edited by Beijing United Study Group on MCI of the Capital Foundation of Medical Developments (CFMD) with evidence support, clinical criteria, subtypes, inclusion and exclusion of MCI, and use of rating scales were reviewed. The authors suggested that MCI clinical criteria and new diagnosis procedure from the MCI Working Group of the European Alzheimer's disease Consortium (EADC) may better reflect the heterogeneity of MCI syndrome. Diagnostic rating scales including Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR), Global Deterioration Scale (GDS), Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-cognitive subscale (ADAS-cog) and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADL) are very useful in definition of MCI but can not replace its clinical criteria. Absence of major repercussions on daily life in patients with MCI was emphasized, but the patients may have minimal impairment in complex IADL. According to their previous research, the authors concluded that highly recommendable neuropsychological scales with cut-off scores in the screening of MCI cases should include Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), logistic memory test such as Delayed Story Recall (DSR), executive function test such as Clock Draw Test (CDT), language test such as Verbal Category Fluency Test (VCFT), etc. And finally, the detection of biological and neuroimaging changes, including atrophy in hippocampus or medial temporal lobe in patients with MCI, was introduced.


Lysin, a protein from abalone sperm, creates a hole in the envelope of the egg, permitting the sperm to pass through the envelope and fuse with the egg. The structure of lysin, refined at 1.9 angstroms resolution, reveals an alpha-helical, amphipathic molecule. The surface of the protein exhibits three features: two tracks of basic residues that span the length of the molecule, a solvent-exposed cluster of aromatic and aliphatic amino acids, and an extended amino-terminal hypervariable domain that is species-specific. The structure suggests possible mechanisms of action.


Background and Objectives: Today, drug abuse is one of the major health problems that put many population groups, such as mothers and their newborns, at serious risk. This study aimed to determine the association between drug abuse and duration of exclusive breastfeeding in the mothers of Sabzevar city. Methods: In this study that was performed as a cohort study, 81 pregnant women were assigned to two groups of drug abuse (n=41) and non-drug-abuse (n=40), which eventually 6 crystal- and crack-addicted mothers were excluded due to breastfeeding ban. A purposive non -probability sampling was done and the duration of exclusive breastfeeding was studied at 2, 4, and 6 months of age. Data collection was done using questionnaire, and data analysis was done using indices of mean and standard deviation and inferential statistics chi-square at the significance level of p<0.05. Confidence coefficient was considered to be 95%. Results: In this study, the type of drug used by 53.7% of mothers was opium, 22% opium sap, 4.9% opium and opium sap, 4.9% methadone, 9.7% crystal, and 4.8% crack. Also, 31.4% of drug abusing mothers had exclusive breastfeeding up to 6 months. While, in the non-drug-abuse group, 85% of mothers had exclusive breastfeeding up to 6 months. Also, the exclusive breastfeeding status at 2, 4, and 6 months of age was significantly statistically different between the two groups (p<0.001). Conclusion: According to the results of this study, drug abuse by mother during pregnancy and lactation can reduce the duration of exclusive breastfeeding, therefore, preventive educational programs during pregnancy should focus on reduction and elimination of use of such drugs.


Content caching at the Internet edge using a network of wireless edge caching stations (ECSs) is recently considered as a key solution to alleviating the backhaul traffic burden and improving the quality of experience in 5G networks. This paper studies wireless edge caching systems with the following features: first, content files can be partitioned into many coded packets, which then can be cached in multiple ECSs for collaborative content delivery; second, the service provider (SP) deploys time-to-live cache at ECSs and each cached content file has an occupancy time that needs to be guaranteed; third, the content-to-be-cached arrives at the caching system following a stochastic process as users request new content over time. Unlike existing works that determine which content to cache, this paper focuses on how to distribute the coded packets of content-to-be-cached among the network of ECSs in order to reduce the content downloading time. A novel content placement strategy, called stochastic collaborative content placement is proposed based on Lyapunov techniques. The proposed algorithm makes content placement decisions using only currently available information without foreseeing future content arrivals, takes advantage of the spatial content popularity variation with coded caching, and achieves the provable close-to-optimal long-term caching performance. Simulations are carried out on a real-world YouTube video request trace and the results demonstrate a tremendous caching performance improvement against a variety of benchmark schemes.


Aims: To determine the extent to which the adverse effects of blood pressure (BP) are mediated by pulsatile haemodynamic changes across the normotensive as compared with the hypertensive adult brachial BP range, and whether aortic rather than brachial pulsatile changes best index these effects. Methods: In 1307 community participants, the contribution of pulsatile haemodynamics (applanation tonometry and SphygmoCor software) to variations in left ventricular mass index (LVMI) (echocardiography) (n = 920), carotid intima–media thickness (IMT) (n = 712) and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) (n = 1164) were assessed. Results: In normotensive participants (50.5%) independent of steady-state pressure (mean arterial pressure), significant relations between aortic backward wave pressure and LVMI (partial r = 0.16, P < 0.001) or IMT (partial r = 0.15, P < 0.005) and between aortic pulse wave velocity and eGFR (partial r = −0.18, P < 0.0001) were noted, effects which in hypertensive participants were observed for LVMI and eGFR, but not IMT. With adjustments for brachial pulse pressure (PP) or SBP and confounders, aortic backward wave pressure and aortic pulse wave velocity showed independent relations with LVMI, IMT or eGFR in normotensive participants, but only with LVMI or eGFR in hypertensive participants. In normotensive participants, as compared with brachial PP or SBP, aortic backward wave pressure showed a greater slope (&bgr;-coefficient) of the relation with LVMI (0.99 ± 0.24 versus 0.47 ± 0.10 and 0.41 ± 0.09 mmHg, P < 0.05) and IMT (0.0045 ± 0.0013 versus 0.0013 ± 0.0006 and 0.0013 ± 0.0005 mmHg, P < 0.05) and a stronger association with left ventricular hypertrophy [odds ratios (95% confidence interval), 1.125 (1.059–1.195) versus 1.054 (1.027–1.082) and 1.042 (1.020–1.066), P < 0.05]. However, in hypertensive participants, only the slope of the aortic backward wave pressure–LVMI relationship was greater than that of PP–LVMI and SBP–LVMI relations. Conclusion: Beyond brachial BP, pulsatile haemodynamics rather than steady-state pressures account for end-organ effects more consistently across the normotensive than the hypertensive BP range. Hence, targeting aortic pulsatile haemodynamic changes may best limit BP-related cardiovascular risk within the normotensive BP range.


Forty-year experience with surgical treatment of generalized myasthenia (GM) based on 2977 cases is analyzed. Role of special methods of mediastinum examination (CT, MRT) is demonstrated, indications to thymectomy are validated. It is noted that developed diagnostic algorithm, surgical technique, management before and after surgery improved significantly immediate and long-term results. Development of clinical, immunological and morphologic criteria of thymectomy effect permitted to predict course of GM and to optimize complex therapy after surgical treatment.


This series on research in international human resource management and strategy is designed to stimulate discussions on current developments in these disciplines. The scope of this series reflects the importance of the fields of strategy and human resource management in the international environment of a globalised world. Both fields have the potential to contribute essentially to the description and explanation of competitive advantage realisation, performance issues and to achieving other corporate goals and objectives. Therefore, these areas need attention in research as well as in practice. This series will focus on the latest research results in this field by integrating original research results from research projects including PhD theses. This volume consists of three parts mapping the field of the series: Part I focuses on the field of strategy in an international context. Competitive advantage realisation in different forms of value net organisations, industry structures and knowledge structures as well as SME issues and strategy in an international context are investigated in this part. Part II provides contributions to the field of International Human Resource Management. They focus on global performance management, expatriate careers and compensation strategies in multinational enterprises. Part III of this volume is dedicated to understanding the context of international business focusing on the institutional context explaining convergence or divergence in personnel management in Europe, the impact of the corporate culture on employee behaviour in multinational firms as well as a multiple environmental perspective related to the situation of single firms in clusters.


Introduction To examine the effectiveness of universal suicide prevention interventions on reducing suicide mortality in high-income Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member countries. Methods We implemented a comprehensive search strategy across three electronic databases: MEDLINE (Ovid), PsycINFO (Ovid) and Embase (Ovid). All studies using time-series, retrospective, prospective, pre–post or cross-sectional study designs were included. Studies were required to examine suicide mortality as the outcome of interest. To help organise the results, studies were grouped into six broad categories of universal interventions consistent with the World Health Organization (WHO) Comprehensive Mental Health Action Plan. A narrative synthesis of results was used to describe the findings. Results Of the 15 641 studies identified through the search strategy, 100 studies were eligible in the following categories: law and regulation reforms (n=66), physical barriers (n=13), community-based interventions (n=9), communication strategies (n=4), mental health policies and strategies (n=7), and access to healthcare (n=1). Overall, 100% (13/13) of the included physical barrier interventions resulted in a significant reduction in suicide mortality. Although only 70% (46/66) of the law and regulation reform interventions had a significant impact on reducing suicide, they hold promise due to their extended reach. Universal suicide prevention interventions seem to be more effective at reducing suicide among males than females, identifying a need to stratify results by sex in future studies. Conclusions These findings suggest that universal suicide prevention interventions hold promise in effectively reducing suicide mortality in high-income OECD countries.


Protozoal parasites occurring in the red cells of mammals are: Hepatozoon, Babesia, Theileria and Plasmodium. The frequency with which these forms occur differs considerably in the different mammalian orders. But whilst there is a relationship apparent between the mammalian stem and the form of parasite, there appears to be an even closer association with the type of blood-sucking arthropods which the mode of life of the animals in a particular stem favours. Ungulates in the days of their greatest development chiefly roamed in herds over rather arid country not favouring mosquitoes, but suitable for tick infestation. Monkeys and bats are more likely to live in a humid sheltered environment where they are more liable to attack by mosquitoes. Knowledge of the plasmodial parasites of monkeys has up to recently been very meagre, but from the work of Sinton and Mulligan it appears certain that in the main distinct parasites occur respectively in the Oriental and Ethiopian regions, just as the genera of monkeys under present nomenclature are mainly confined to one or other of these zoo-geographical realms. P. brasilianum occurring in the Neotropical monkeys is a distinct parasite from any Old World form. None of the monkey parasites are probably really very close to those of man. The apes evolved as part of a great Pliocene fauna, and their remains occur in Europe, Egypt and India. The progenitors even of the present-day African forms are found in the Indian deposits. In the gorilla and chimpanzee, forms of plasmodium, so far described, appear to be very similar to those of man, including the characteristic cresceni forms. In the main the races of men are essentially Pleistocene and Palæarctic. They none of them form true Neotropical, Australasian or Oriental man in the zoological sense, but it is less certain there is not a relationship in the case of the Ethiopian region. The parasites of malaria in any case do not show any apparent relationship to the usual zoogeographical realms, and their distribution and prevalence appear to be determined on quite other grounds than those normal to zoological distributions. P. vivax occurs almost throughout the world within the July and January isotherms of 60°. P. falciparum is limited by the isotherms of 70°. Quartan is believed by Knowles and Senior White to have a peculiar geographical distribution. Frequency of occurrence is, however, entirely different from distribution, and this parasite probably also has its distribution determined by factors other than those usually concerned in the distribution of animal forms of life. Among other features it appears to be associated with areas of severe endemicity, and becomes conspicuous when transmission is abeyance. Mer has recently shown that it has a very slow development in the mosquito, and this may explain some of its peculiarities.


Ballet Shoes was Noel Streatfeild's first children's novel and has remained her most popular, delighting generations of children - and adults - since its publication in 1936. At the heart of the novel are Pauline, Petrova and Posy Fossil, three very different girls who 'vow to try and put their name into history books'. When money at home is short, all three are sent to train for the stage: for Pauline, it is a chance to shine; for Petrova, it is something to be endured; and, for Posy, it is the beginning of a dream come true ...Illustrated by Ruth Gervis, with an Afterword by Juliette Mitchell.


The well established, gold standard approach to finding out what works in education research is to run a randomized controlled trial (RCT) using a standard pre-test and post-test design. RCTs have been used in the intelligent tutoring community for decades to determine which questions and tutorial feedback work best. Practically speaking, however, ITS creators need to make decisions on what content to deploy without the luxury of running an RCT. Additionally, most log data produced by an ITS is not in a form that can be evaluated for learning effectiveness with traditional methods. As a result, there is much data produced by tutoring systems that we as education researchers would like to be learning from but are not. In prior work we introduced one approach to this problem: a Bayesian knowledge tracing derived method that could analyze the log data of a tutoring system to determine which items were most effective lbr learning among a set of items of the same skill. The method was validated by way of simulations. In the current work we further evaluate this method and introduce a second, learning gain, analysis method for comparison. These methods were applied to 11 experiment datasets that investigated the effectiveness of various forms of tutorial help in a web-based math tutoring system. We found that the tutorial help chosen by the Bayesian method as having the highest rate of learning agreed with the learning gain analysis in 10 out of 11 of the experiments. An additional simulation study is presented comparing the statistical power of each method given different sample sizes. The practical impact of this work is an abundance of knowledge about what works that can now be learned from the thousands of experimental designs intrinsic in datasets of tutoring systems that assign items or feedback conditions in an individually-randomized order.


Recent precise measurements of cosmic ray (CR) spectra reveal features that challenge the hypothesis of CR origin. The results of hybrid simulations focused on the injection phase of the diffusive shock acceleration (DSA) and analytic modeling provide an explanation for an "anomaly" in the measured CR rigidity spectra. Moreover, the simulations have captured a new phenomenon in the DSA: the spectrum steepening associated with the variation of shock obliquity along its face. Both results make a step forward to reconcile the DSA with high-precision observations.


We examined the relationship between coronary flow rate and epicardial adipose tissue (EAT) in patients with slow coronary flow (SCF) and normal coronary arteries. The study included 40 consecutive patients with stable angina pectoris who had normal coronary arteries. All patients underwent echocardiography. To determine the SCF, thrombolysis in myocardial infarction (TIMI) frame count method was used. Half of the patients had SCF at least in 1 coronary artery. Thrombolysis in myocardial infarction frame counts, the mean TIMI frame count, and EAT thickness were significantly higher in patients with SCF. Slow coronary flow showed a significantly positive correlation with EAT thickness. Epicardial adipose tissue thickness was the only independent predictor of SCF. Our findings suggest that there is a significant correlation between the SCF and EAT. Therefore, echocardiographic EAT may become a predictor of subclinical atherosclerosis in patients with stable angina pectoris.


Kleptoparasitism, or food piracy, is common in a wide range of taxa, particularly among predators, with the larger species forcing smaller species to surrender their catch. The Bald Eagle ( Haliaeetus leucocephalus ) is known to rob Peregrine Falcons ( Falco peregrinus ) of just-caught prey. We present time series of kleptoparasitic interactions between eagles and peregrines hunting Dunlin ( Calidris alpina ) that were wintering at Boundary Bay in the Fraser River valley, British Columbia. In 1108 hours of observation during January, intermittently between 1994 and 2014, we recorded 667 sightings of Peregrine Falcons, including 817 attacks on Dunlin resulting in 120 captures. The population of wintering Bald Eagles in the study area increased from about 200 in 1994 to 1800 in 2014, while the rate of kleptoparasitism at the expense of peregrines increased from 0.05 to 0.20. The increase in the number of Bald Eagles coincided with a decline in January sightings of Peregrine Falcons, which suggests that some falcons may have left the study area because of interference from eagles. The decrease in Peregrine Falcon numbers can be expected to have led to reduced predation risk for Dunlins. Christmas Bird Counts conducted in the Fraser River Valley have underscored the fluctuation in eagle and peregrine numbers reported here.


Through a manipulative experiment, the colonization of leaf litter by invertebrates was investigated in two sections of a tropical stream (spatial scale) that differed in function of the canopy cover, one with the presence (closed area) and another without riparian vegetation (open area), during one month of the dry and one of the wet season (temporal scale). The work aimed to verify differences related to four variables: season, canopy cover, leaf type and leaf condition. Litter bags containing arboreal and herbaceous leaves (leaf type variable), non-conditioned and preconditioned (leaf condition variable) were placed at the bottom of the stream in each area (canopy cover variable) and season (dry and wet), and removed after 13-day colonization. The analysis of the remaining litter dry mass per leaf bag emphasizes differences related mainly to seasonality, canopy cover and leaf type, although leaf condition was also important when combined with those three factors. Comparing the abundance of invertebrates per treatment, there was a tendency of high predominance of Chironomidae during the dry season and greater taxa diversity and evenness during the wet season, when the water flow increase could alter the availability of microhabitats for local fauna. Even though canopy cover alone was not a significant source of variation in the abundance of invertebrates, the results showed a tendency of a combined effect of canopy cover with seasonality and leaf condition.


OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to determine the long term survival of patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma who underwent surgical resection and to assess the association of clinical, pathological, and treatment features with survival.

METHODS
Between January, 1990, and December, 1998, 125 patients underwent a pancreaticoduodenal or partial pancreatic resection for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma at our institution. The records of these patients were reviewed for demographics, tumor characteristics including size, histological grade, margin status, lymph node status, surgical TNM staging, and postoperative adjuvant therapy. The primary outcome variable analyzed was survival.

RESULTS
A total of 116 patients had complete follow-up and were included in the final analysis. The median survival after surgery was 16 months. The 1-, 3-, 5-, and 7-yr survival rates for all 116 patients were 60%, 23%, 19%, and 11%, respectively. The 1-, 3-, 5-, and 7-yr survival rates for patients who received adjuvant therapy were 69%, 28%, 23%, and 18% compared with 20% and 0% in patients who did not receive adjuvant therapy (p < 0.0001). The 1-, 3-, 5-, and 7-yr survival rates for patients with negative lymph nodes were 73%, 38%, 26%, and 22% compared with survival rates of 52%, 14%, 14%, and 9% in patients with positive lymph nodes (p = 0.01). In multivariate analyses, adjuvant therapy was the only feature found to be strongly associated with survival (hazards ratio = 0.26, 95% CI = 0.15-0.44).

CONCLUSIONS
The overall 5- and 7-yr survival rates of 19% and 11% in our study further validate that surgical resection in patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma can result in long term survival, particularly when performed in association with adjuvant chemoradiation.


Non-muscle–invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) is a highly recurrent tumor despite intravesical immunotherapy instillation with the bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine. In a prospective longitudinal study, we took advantage of BCG instillations, which increase local immune infiltration, to characterize immune cell populations in the urine of patients with NMIBC as a surrogate for the bladder tumor microenvironment. We observed an infiltration of neutrophils, T cells, monocytic myeloid-derived suppressor cells (M-MDSCs), and group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2). Notably, patients with a T cell–to-MDSC ratio of less than 1 showed dramatically lower recurrence-free survival than did patients with a ratio of greater than 1. Analysis of early and later time points indicated that this patient dichotomy existed prior to BCG treatment. ILC2 frequency was associated with detectable IL-13 in the urine and correlated with the level of recruited M-MDSCs, which highly expressed IL-13 receptor &agr;1. In vitro, ILC2 were increased and potently expressed IL-13 in the presence of BCG or tumor cells. IL-13 induced the preferential recruitment and suppressive function of monocytes. Thus, the T cell–to-MDSC balance, associated with a skewing toward type 2 immunity, may predict bladder tumor recurrence and influence the mortality of patients with muscle-invasive cancer. Moreover, these results underline the ILC2/IL-13 axis as a targetable pathway to curtail the M-MDSC compartment and improve bladder cancer treatment.


Introduction: Probiotics are widely known for their health promoting benefits, especially with its association to gastrointestinal health. For many years, most research has been focused on the prevention or treatment of gastrointestinal infections or diseases. However, recently probiotics has been a subject of investigation with its association to oral health. This review of literature is designed to analyze the effectiveness of using probiotics as a preventative and therapeutic method for oral infections/diseases such as periodontitis, dental caries, and the like. Methods: Databases such as the PubMed, and Google Scholar were utilized to find current and relevant findings for this reviewed literature. Mendeley was utilized to gather and store findings. Following keyword search items include probiotics, oral health, periodontal diseases, periodontitis, dental caries, gingivitis, halitosis, Lactobacilli, and biotherapy. Articles were narrowed down to include studies published within the last 5 years. Results: Short-term clinical studies suggest that the oral intake of probiotics show a strong inhibitory effect on the growth and biofilm formation of pathogenic strains, stimulate the immune function, and regulate the inflammatory response. Their repeated success in inhibiting harmful oral bacteria suggests that the use of probiotics holds a promising future in dentistry. Conclusion: Although still in its initial stages, the use of probiotics is being established as a living biotherapeutic designed to restore normal oral microflora in the oral cavity. More longterm clinical trials are needed to fully understand their functioning and substantiate their role in oral health.


Fischer plots are graphic representations of cyclic carbonate deposits showing cumulative departure from average cycle thickness plotted against cycle number and corrected for assumed subsidence during each cycle. Observed cycle thicknesses in excess of subsidence have been interpreted to represent depositional accommodation space formed by eustatic sea-level rise. However, implicit in this interpretation is the assumption that preserved cycle thickness is a proxy for accommodation. To test this assumption, a survey of carbonate-sediment accumulation patterns (i.e., cycle thicknesses) developing during a single transgressive event (the Holocene postglacial sea-level rise) was conducted on a shallow carbonate platform (Great Bahama Bank) where accommodation was created primarily by sea-level rise over the platform margin (i.e., subsidence was minimal). This survey demonstrates that Holocene sediment (cycle) thickness and accommodation are uncorrelated (r 2 = 0.03). Consequently, Fischer plots constructed by using Holocene cycle thicknesses are poor representations of the Holocene transgression. In extreme examples, Holocene Fischer plots would be interpreted to show relative sea-level fall during the Holocene on Great Bahama Bank because Holocene subsidence currently exceeds sediment thickness. In addition, a simple sensitivity test shows that eustatic sea-level interpretations based on interbasinal correlation of Fischer plots are equivocal. The gross form of Fischer plots appears so overly robust as to be insensitive to broad variations in stratigraphic completeness, cycle duration, or subsidence. Because cycle thickness apparently is uncorrelated with accommodation and the gross form of Fischer plots is relatively invariant, it seems prudent to reevaluate the practice of interpreting Fischer plots as sea-level curves per se in the analysis of ancient carbonate cycles.


Warriors in the history wars' do battle over the accuracy and portrayal of Aboriginal history in Tasmania, but for the descendants of the traditional people this contested field is also the site of our families' stories. This paper juxtaposes, via the woven narrative of Woretemoeteryenner, a personal perspective against the history wars sterile dissection of official records. Woretemoeteryenner's story serves as a personalising frame for Tasmanian colonial history. Born before the beginning of European colonisation, by the end of her life fewer than 50 traditional Tasmanians remained. Her story also shines a light on the lived experiences of that small group of Aboriginal women who form the link between the traditional people and present Tasmanian Aboriginal communities. Most critically, Woretemoeteryenner's life is a personal story of a life lived through these now disputed and debated times.


Rammed earth is a sustainable material with low embodied energy. However, its development as a building material requires a better evaluation of its moisture-thermal buffering abilities and its mechanical behavior. Both of these properties are known to strongly depend on the amount of water contained in wall pores and its evolution. Thus the aim of this paper is to present a procedure to measure this key parameter in rammed earth or cob walls by using two types of probes operating on the Time Domain Reflectometry (TDR) principle. A calibration procedure for the probes requiring solely four parameters is described. This calibration procedure is then used to monitor the hygrothermal behavior of a rammed earth wall (1.5 m × 1 m × 0.5 m), instrumented by six probes during its manufacture, and submitted to insulated, natural convection and forced convection conditions. These measurements underline the robustness of the calibration procedure over a large range of water content, even if the wall is submitted to quite important temperature variations. They also emphasize the importance of gravity on water content heterogeneity when the saturation is high, as well as the role of liquid-to-vapor phase change on the thermal behavior.


The foregoing clearly indicates that there are tremendous differences in the responsiveness of the iris sphincters of different mammalian species to the miotic effects of PGs. The iris sphincter of cats and dogs contracts in response to PGF2 alpha, but not in response to other PGs, at concentrations that can be expected to occur under in vivo physiological conditions. In both of these species, PGF2 alpha, but none of the other PGs tested, yielded a dose-dependent full miosis when applied topically to intact eyes. Although in vivo studies are not available on bovine eyes, in vitro studies show that the isolated bovine iris sphincter exhibits a contractile response in the presence of several PGs, but that the threshold concentration for this response is about hundred-fold higher than the concentration of PGF2 alpha required to cause a similar or an even larger effect on feline or canine iris sphincters. Thus, in contrast to the feline iris, the bovine iris shows low sensitivity and low specificity, exhibiting responses to high concentrations of several PGs. In vivo and in vitro studies also are in full agreement that the iris sphincter of several other species, including rabbits and diurnal primates (rhesus and cynomolgus monkeys, baboons, and humans) do not exhibit similar miotic responses to any of the PGs that had been studied so far. It is difficult to summarize all these findings in a truly quantitative manner because the in vitro studies have used different experimental conditions, especially with respect to the inhibitors or precontracting agents used, while in vivo studies have differed with respect to the form of the PG used and in the mode of its administration. These differences, together with the lack in some instances of adequate descriptions of experimental conditions, must be borne in mind in any effort to compare the effects of PGs on the iris sphincter of different species. Nevertheless, because of the importance of obtaining at least a semi-quantitative picture of the extent of these species differences, the data derived from reports on in vivo studies of miosis have been tabulated in the chapter dealing with the effects of PGs on IOP (see Bito et al., 1989). Results extracted from some of the in vitro studies that have been reviewed in the previous sections are summarized in Table 1. The readers are urged to study the original publications and to bear in mind the problems described in the preceding sections that are encountered when trying to interpret the results presented by van Alphen et al. (1977).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)


Respiratory aspiration is a serious potential complication of glyphosate-surfactant herbicide intoxication. From October 1, 1992 to June 30, 1996, we performed laryngeal evaluations in 53 cases to investigate the possible pathophysiological mechanism of glyphosate intoxica tion. There were 36 cases with significant laryngeal injury. The blood WBC count were significantly higher and the hospital stays were significantly longer in patients with laryngeal injury, when compared with patients with no laryngeal injury (Student t-test, P < 0.005). Laryngeal injury was strongly correlated with aspiration pneumoni tis (X2 =4.449, P<0.05). We concluded that laryngeal injury may be the major cause of aspiration that leads to some degree of morbidity and mortality, following concentrated glyphosate-surfactant herbicide intoxica tion. Laryngeal survey may be indicated in cases of glyphosate-surfactant intoxication, to evaluate the sever ity of mucosal injury, and to apply adequate supportive management as early as possible to prevent from aspiration complications and even mortality.


A checklist with preliminary conservation assessments of native South American species of Acalypha is presented. This work is supported by the study of ca 6500 herbarium specimens and an in-depth literature review. As a result, 87 species (83 native and four introduced) and eight subspecies are accepted, and a further 395 names are considered synonyms. Geographical distribution, habitat, and altitudinal range for all species are also indicated. Brazil is the richest country in number of species of Acalypha (40), followed by Peru (32), Bolivia (29), Colombia and Ecuador—including Galapagos Islands—(24), Venezuela (18), Argentina (17), Paraguay (13), Guyana (8), Uruguay (5), French Guiana (4), and Suriname (3). The presence of the genus Acalypha in Chile is reported for the first time, alongside new country records of A. poiretii in Peru and A. venezuelica in Guatemala. The specimens previously identified as A. plicata from Colombia and Venezuela, are here considered belonging to A. cuspidata. The red list provided follows IUCN criteria and includes 39 species and three subspecies, 47% of total native species of Acalypha in South America: 16 species and one subspecies Critically Endangered (nine of them probably extinct), 15 species and two subspecies Endangered, and eight species Vulnerable.


In this paper, we investigate incentives other than altruism that developed countries have in improving technologies speciÞc to developing countries. We propose a simple model of international trade between two regions, in which all individuals have similar preferences over an inferior good and a luxury good. The poor region has a comparative advantage in the production of the inferior good, and the rich in the luxury good. Even when costly adaptation of the technology to the poor region's characteristics is required — which makes the technology inappropriate for local use — we show that there are parameter conÞgurations for which the rich region has an incentive to incur this cost. By raising the efficiency of the productive process of the developing region, the developed region can redirect its own productive resources toward the luxury good; it can also gain access to a more diversiÞed set of consumption choices. Indeed, there are cases where the rich region would prefer to improve the poor region's technology for producing the inferior good rather than its own. Such technology transfers can increase the welfare of both regions. We apply our model to the Green Revolution and provide a quantitative assessment of its welfare effects.


When single species of foraminifera picked from marine sediments are 14C dated with Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS), bioturbation puts limits on the minimal sample size to be used, as uncertainty is added to the result by statistics of the picking process. The model presented here simulates the additional statistical uncertainty introduced into the measurement by the coupling of bioturbation and small sample amounts. As there is no general solution for this problem, we present two simple cases only. The model can also be used to simulate more complicated situations occurring in sediments.


Non-native Lake Trout Salvelinus namaycush threaten to extirpate native Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout Oncorhynchus clarkii bouvieri in Yellowstone Lake, Yellowstone National Park. Suppression of Lake Trout in Yellowstone Lake has been ongoing since 1995, primarily by gillnetting. Unfortunately, bycatch of Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout is associated with this removal method, which targets adult and subadult Lake Trout. Alternative methods effective at causing mortality in Lake Trout early life stage(s) could be used simultaneously with gillnetting to improve suppression effectiveness. The vulnerability of salmonid embryos suggest increasing Lake Trout embryo mortality is feasible and because population growth rates are sensitive to age-0 survival an effective embryo suppression method could have population-level effects. Thus, the primary objective of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of methods to increase mortality of Lake Trout embryos. In situ experiments tested the effect of suction dredging, electroshocking, tarping, and Lake Trout carcass deposition on embryo mortality. The secondary objective of this study was to evaluate interstitial water flow using NaCl dry injection to better understand the feasibility of using chemicals for embryo suppression. Concurrent laboratory studies have shown that Lake Trout embryos experience high mortality after chemical exposure. Tarping and suction dredging were not effective at increasing embryo mortality. Electroshocking caused 0.92 mortality of embryos at the substrate surface but only 0.38 at 20 cm depth in the substrate. Lake Trout carcass deposition caused 0.99 mortality of embryos, both at the surface and at 20 cm in the substrate. The direction and rate of interstitial water flow was not consistent and future work on a larger scale is needed to inform the feasibility of chemical suppression. Hypoxic conditions within the carcass sites may have caused embryo mortality. In addition, carbon dioxide CO2 and hydrogen sulfide H2S are byproducts of organic matter decomposition that harm developing salmonid embryos. Embryo suppression methods are unlikely to replace traditional Lake Trout suppression methods. However, the success of Lake Trout carcass deposition shows potential for the development of an effective additional suppression method that could be implemented on a large scale.


This essay proposes a little housecleaning in the law of communications regulation. Red Lion Broadcasting Co. v. FCC, 395 U.S. 369 (1969), deserves to be transferred in its entirety from the realm of doctrine to that of history. Defenders of Red Lion and the discourse-based model of free speech jurisprudence symbolized by that decision seek to preserve one communicative niche where the public at large does absolutely nothing besides watch or listen. Appeals to civic republicanism and other lofty ideals notwithstanding, what Red Lion privileges above all else is sloth, the idea that there should be one form of mass communication that all citizens, without regard to wealth or power, can access solely by virtue of buying a receiving device and turning it on.For four decades Congress and the FCC have imposed mandatory carriage obligations on cable and broadcast satellite operators for the benefit of conventional television stations. The emergence of intermediate constitutional scrutiny in those decisions has effectively confined Red Lion's deferential standard of review to structural regulation of the broadcast industry itself. Sustained resort to mandatory carriage schemes has reduced conventional broadcasting from a pervasive medium into the legal ward of byzantine regulatory systems designed to leverage the greater dominance of subscription-based platforms for delivering multichannel video programming.


The saccus vasculosus of Notopterus chitala is situated posteriorly to the pituitary gland. It consists of a number of loculi surrounded by blood sinusoids. The loculi open into a number of collecting channels which unite and ultimately drain into the third ventricle of the brain. The loculi are lined by a layer of pear-shaped 'coronet cells'. The coronet cell has an apical protrusion provided with hairs, each ending in a globule. The coronet cells contain glycogen, especially in the apical protrusions and in the globules. Phospholipid, alkaline phosphatase, and mitochondria are concentrated in the apical protrusion and globules. There are also mitochondria round the nucleus. The Golgi element is not only present in the characteristic Golgi zone but occasionally round the nucleus as well. It has been stated by other authors that acid mucopolysaccharides are synthesized in the coronet cells of the rainbow trout and 'secreted' into the lumen of saccus vasculosus. However, acid mucopolysaccharides are not histochemically demonstrable in the coronet cells of Notopterus. The observations recorded in this paper indicate that the coronet cells in the saccus vasculosus of Notopterus are secretory and that glycogen is abundant in them.


Talin functions both as a regulator of integrin affinity and as an important mechanical link between integrins and the cytoskeleton. Using genetic deletion of talin, we show for the first time that the capacity of talin to activate integrins is required for fibrin clot retraction by platelets. To further dissect which talin functions are required for this process, we tested clot retraction in platelets expressing a talin1(L325R) mutant that binds to integrins, but exhibits impaired integrin activation ascribable to disruption of the interaction between talin and the membrane-proximal region (MPR) in the β-integrin cytoplasmic domain. Talin-deficient and talin1(L325R) platelets were defective in retracting fibrin clots. However, the defect in clot retraction in talin1(L325R) platelets, but not talin-deficient platelets, was rescued by extrinsically activating integrins with manganese, thereby proving that integrin activation is required and showing that talin1(L325R) can form functional links to the actin cytoskeleton.


Dam removal is typically intended for river restoration or as a countermeasure for aging dams. The influence of dam removal has mainly been studied in large rivers. This study is intended to investigate the influence of the sediment supplied after opening a check dam drain in a small steep stream to contribute to the establishment of sediment release technology form check dam by accumulating the basic knowledge about the influence of sediment release. Deposited sediment in the impoundment was rapidly discharged immediately after opening the drain outlet, and a moderate sediment discharge followed. The water course of the sediments deposited by repeated channel widening and riverbed degradation tended to stop longitudinal topographic changes from downstream. In addition, the turbidity during a flood was high in the first year and tended to decrease in the second year. As for the ecosystem response, changes in the benthic macroinvertebrate community were confirmed in downstream sites, and net-spinning species especially deceased immediately after the sediment supply began. Our monitoring results suggest that the increasing turbidity was suppressed during the flood because sediment release was conducted from the small-scale facility. As a result, a negative impact on the aquatic ecosystem seemed to be reduced.


Anthropogenic activities such as land‐use change, pollution and fishing impact the trophic structure of coral reef fishes, which can influence ecosystem health and function. Although these impacts may be ubiquitous, they are not consistent across the tropical Pacific Ocean. Using an extensive database of fish biomass sampled using underwater visual transects on coral reefs, we modelled the impact of human activities on food webs at Pacific‐wide and regional (1,000s–10,000s km) scales. We found significantly lower biomass of sharks and carnivores, where there were higher densities of human populations (hereafter referred to as human activity); however, these patterns were not spatially consistent as there were significant differences in the trophic structures of fishes among biogeographic regions. Additionally, we found significant changes in the benthic structure of reef environments, notably a decline in coral cover where there was more human activity. Direct human impacts were the strongest in the upper part of the food web, where we found that in a majority of the Pacific, the biomass of reef sharks and carnivores were significantly and negatively associated with human activity. Finally, although human‐induced stressors varied in strength and significance throughout the coral reef food web across the Pacific, socioeconomic variables explained more variation in reef fish trophic structure than habitat variables in a majority of the biogeographic regions. Notably, economic development (measured as GDP per capita) did not guarantee healthy reef ecosystems (high coral cover and greater fish biomass). Our results indicate that human activities are significantly shaping patterns of trophic structure of reef fishes in a spatially nonuniform manner across the Pacific Ocean, by altering processes that organize communities in both "top‐down" (fishing of predators) and "bottom‐up" (degradation of benthic communities) contexts.


Viscoelastic braking theories developed by Shanahan and de Gennes and by others predict deformation of a solid surface at the solid-liquid-air contact line. This phenomenon has only been observed for soft smooth surfaces and results in a protrusion of the solid surface at the three-phase contact line, in agreement with the theoretical predictions. Despite the large (enough to break chemical bonds) forces associated with it, this deformation was not confirmed experimentally for hard surfaces, especially for hydrophobic ones. In this study we use superhydrophobic surfaces composed of an array of silicon nanostructures whose Young modulus is 4 orders of magnitude higher than that of surfaces in earlier recorded viscoelastic braking experiments. We distinguish between two cases: when a water drop forms an adhesive contact, albeit small, with the apparent contact angle θ < 180° and when the drop-surface adhesion is such that the conditions for placing a resting drop on the surface cannot be reached (i.e., θ = 180°). In the first case we show that there is a surface deformation at the three-phase contact line which is associated with a reduction in the hydrophobicity of the surface. For the second case, however, there cannot be a three-phase contact line associated with a drop in contact with the surface, and indeed, if we force-place a drop on the surface by holding it with a needle, no deformation is detected, nor is there a reduction in the hydrophobic properties of the surface. Yet, if we create a long horizontal three-phase contact line by partially immersing the superhydrophobic substrate in a water bath, we see a localized reduction in the hydrophobic properties of the surface in the region where the three-phase contact line used to be. The SEM scan of that region shows a narrow horizontal stripe where the nanorods are no longer there, and instead there is only a shallow structure that is lower than the nanorods height and resembles fused or removed nanorods. Away from that region, either on the part of the surface which was exposed to bulk water or the part which was exposed to air, no change in the hydrophobic properties of the surface is observed, and the SEM scan confirms that the nanorods seem intact in both regions.


Life annuities are products sold by insurance companies to protect retirees against the risk of outliving their money. A life annuity is a once-in-a-lifetime purchase with lifelong consequences. Requiring retirees to buy life annuities with their individual accounts has advantages and disadvantages. Mandatory annuities cost less on average, while voluntary annuities cost more because shortlived people tend not to buy them. An inherent tension exists between the interests of heirs and the purchase of annuities because money used to buy a life annuity is no longer available to leave to heirs. The timing of annuity purchase can have an important impact on the amount of funds left for a widowed spouse or other heirs. Retirees may want help in understanding the impact of different decisions on their own financial security and that of their spouses, dependents, and other heirs. This brief draws on analyses and findings in the study panel report, Uncharted Waters: Paying Benefits from Individual Accounts in Federal Retirement Policy, to highlight key points about the purchase of life annuities at retirement from the perspective of single and married retirees.


At CMS, a beam loss monitoring system is operated to protect the silicon detectors from high particle rates, arising from intense beam loss events. As detectors, poly-crystalline CVD diamond sensors are placed around the beam pipe at several locations inside CMS. In case of extremely high detector currents, the LHC beams are automatically extracted from the LHC rings.Diamond is the detector material of choice due to its radiation hardness. Predictions of the detector lifetime were made based on FLUKA monte-carlo simulations and irradiation test results from the RD42 collaboration, which attested no significant radiation damage over several years.During the LHC operational Run1 (2010 ?? 2013), the detector efficiencies were monitored. A signal decrease of about 50 times stronger than expectations was observed in the in-situ radiation environment. Electric field deformations due to charge carriers, trapped in radiation induced lattice defects, are responsible for this signal decrease. This so-called polarization effect is rate dependent and results in a non-linearity of the detector response. Measurements using the transient current technique reveal the electric field distribution. Online measurements and laboratory analysis of polarization effects in diamond sensors are presented.In the scope of the HL-LHC upgrade, various changes are foreseen. Perspectives for upgrades of the detector electronics are presented. Different candidates for sensor technologies are tested for their performance in a high rate, highly damaging radiation environment.


Aquaculture is one of the fast-growing food-producing agriculture subsectors. However, the digital infrastructures developed in aquaculture are self-organising platforms i.e. they do not rely on a centralized intermediary for monitoring, coordinating activities or for overseeing transactions. Hence, the main objective of this research paper is to identify the challenges farmers face in an entire supply chain for designing a digital platform for the aquaculture domain. The main problems faced by the farmers include water quality issues, disease outbreak, lack of proper information regarding suitable insurance policies etc. We have identified eight such issues that the farmers face in an entire harvest period and also prioritized them. The results from our study could be used for the further advancement of an integrative perspective in the design and implementation of the digital platform for aquaculture.


Techniques are described for the propagation of rhinoviruses on WI-38 monolayers in rolling bottles. High yields of viruses were obtained, as indicated by infectivity titers and electron microscopy. When crude harvests were subjected to low-speed centrifugation and then filtered through a 0.45-μ membrane filter, little or no loss in infectivity titer was observed. However, electron microscopic examination indicated that the concentration of viral physical particles was reduced below detectable levels after filtration. The guinea pig potency test on the lot of unfiltered rhinovirus 14 vaccine prepared in rolling bottles indicated that this vaccine stimulated higher reciprocal serum-neutralizing titers than a rhinovirus 14 vaccine prepared in stationary monolayers.


Enclosed with No. 1266. Spent three weeks in Belgium; was unable to interview King, but talked with some of his staff; Count P. de la Capelle expressed optimism; Belgium vulnerable but he thought would not be invaded; King determined on independence; in April 1937 France and England offered unilateral guarantee of Belgian independence and in Oct. of same year Germany made same offer; head of present government, Hubert Pierlot, a mere "yes" man of King, knows nothing of foreign politics; [Paul Henry] Spaak former Prime Minister supports King's policy; Emile Hamhresine, newspaper man, would have Belgium seek firmer alliances with England and France at same time increasing her fortifications; spent short while in Luxemburg and talked with Josef Beck, Minister of State; Luxemburg, between German and French fortifications, leads uncomfortable existence and could become battlefield; Beck hoped German need of Luxemberg's iron ore would prevent an attack through that country.


XP-Endo during Retreatment: An in Vitro Eur J 2022; 7: 40-46 Objective: The aim of the study was to examine the efficacy and debris extrusion of XP -Endo Finisher and XP-Endo Finisher R when used in the removal of root canal filling as supplementary files. Methods: Sixty single-rooted mandibular premolars with single canals were selected. After root canal prepa- ration and obturation, roots were distributed across four groups according to the method of retreatment (n=15): H files, D Race files, D Race +XP-Endo Finisher and D Race+ XP -Endo Finisher R. After retreatment completion, the debris was dried in a hot air oven and weighed. Later, the coronal, middle and apical thirds were assessed using the stereomicroscope. One-way ANOVA followed by Tukey's post hoc test was used to compare across all tested groups. The significance level was set at 0.05 (P<0.05). Results: XP- Endo Finisher R exhibited significantly cleaner root canals than XP- Endo Finisher (41.58±10.56 and 52.68±9.94 respectively) and extruded more debris apically (16.56%±4.07 and 12.82%±3.41 respectively) (P<0.001). Conclusion: Although none of the tested approaches rendered root canals free of filling remnants, the XP- Endo Finisher R cleaned canals significantly more than the XP-Endo Finisher and extruded more debris apically. ABSTRACT


Objective Structured Clinical Examinations (OSCEs) are extensively used for clinical assessment in the health professions. However, current social distancing requirements (including on-campus bans) at many universities have made the co-location of participants for large cohort OSCEs impossible. While there is a developing literature on remote OSCEs, particularly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, this is dominated by approaches dealing with small participant numbers. This paper describes our recent large scale (n = 361 candidates) implementation of a remotely delivered 2 station OSCE. The planning for this OSCE was extensive and involved comprehensive candidate, examiner and simulated patient orientation and training. Our processes were explicitly designed to develop platform familiarity for all participants and included building on remote tutorial experiences and device testing. Our remote OSCE design and logistics made use of using existing enterprise solutions including videoconferencing, survey and collaboration platforms and allowed extra time between candidates in case of technical issues. We describe our process in detail including examiner, simulated patient, and candidate perspectives to provide precise detail, hopefully assisting other institutions to understand and adopt our approach. Although logistically complex, we have demonstrated that it is possible to deliver a remote OSCE assessment involving a large student cohort with a limited number of stations using commonly available enterprise solutions. We recognise it would be ideal to sample more broadly across stations and examiners, yet given the constraints of our current COVID-19 impacted environment, we believe this to be an appropriate compromise for a non-graduating cohort at this time.


AIM
Pancreatic cancer is a near fatal disease. External beam radiotherapy and intraoperative radiation therapy (IORT) has been proposed with the aim to improve clinical outcome in resectable tumors. The aim of this study is to assess the feasibility and outcome in patients with cT1-3 pancreatic cancer, treated with surgery, external beam radiotherapy and IORT.

METHODS
From 1990 to 1996, 17 patients with clinical stage T1-3N0-1M0 adenocarcinoma of the head of the pancreas were treated with pancreatectomy and pre- (nine patients: 5 Gy), intra- (all patients: 10 Gy) and post-operative (all patients: 50 Gy) radiotherapy. The pathologic T stages were: 4 pT2 and 13 pT3. The pathologic N stages were: 9 pN0 and 8 pN1. Minimum follow-up in living patients was 60 months.

RESULTS
No perioperative mortalities were recorded. Two patients showed postoperative morbidity (11.8%) which required a subsequent laparotomy. The disease-free survival at 1, 3 and 5 years was 41, 23 and 18%, respectively (median: 9 months). The overall survival at 1, 3 and 5 years was 70%, 41% and 18%, respectively (median: 17.5 months). Three patients developed local failure (17.6%) and 12 patients showed distant metastases (70.6%). Univariate analysis (logrank) showed: a significant correlation between both N-stage and retroperitoneal involvement (RPI) with local control (N-stage: P=0.0155; RPI:P =0.0295), a significant correlation between maximum tumor size and metastases-free survival (P=0.0167) and overall survival (P=0.0241); the female gender was another predictor of prolonged survival (P= 0.0465). Multivariate analysis (Cox) showed a significant impact of N-stage and retroperitoneal involvement on local control and also a significant correlation between perineural involvement and tumor diameter with metastases-free survival.

CONCLUSIONS
These results are similar to those of other published series and suggest that this approach is feasible with acceptable local control and survival, especially in patients with small tumors (<2.5 cm: 5 year survival=33.3%) and in female patients (5 year survival=30%). Due to the impact of gender, tumor diameter and N stage on prognosis, in the design of future trials a stratification of patients based on these categories should be considered. The search of effective chemotherapeutic agents is required, to reduce the high incidence of distant metastases, especially in larger tumors.


This paper aims to explore how do the structural and relational social capital configurations of entrepreneurs influence their ability to get access to financial sources directly and under which conditions they do (have to) rely on third-parties on higher-risk investments? A semi-structured interview with a short questionnaire was adopted and six technology-based new ventures were selected that shared some common characteristics from an initial shortlist of 10 technology-based ventures backed or not by Moroccan venture capitalists. Our findings show that social capital of entrepreneurs seems to have positive effect, although indirectly, on higher investment decisions facing more risks, typically venture capitalists investment. The effects of social capital, sense-making as favorable anticipation, are contingent on specific characteristics of third-parties involved in venture capitalists funding process rather than on just that of their entrepreneurial teams. Also, results show the optimal scenario when new venture able to get access to financial sources directly and under which conditions they do (have to) rely on thirdparties involved in venture capitalists investment decision process. However, the validity of exploratory research rests on the concept of theoretical saturation, we cannot definitively claim for it with six cases with 19 external financial sources because interview with entrepreneurs is not sufficiently refined to detect unless social capital of entrepreneur can have effects on venture capitalists' investment decisions. The extension to high technologies is the most natural step, moving to other low-risk industries is possible with the same kind of research protocol. Finally, this study contributes to the new venture's social capital and venture capital literature by providing an optimal combination of these two approaches. It also clearly points to the complementary nature between the social capital and contingency approach to study and explain the complex reality of equity capital, especially venture capital financing.


Basic HLH proteins heterodimerize with class I HLH/E proteins to promote transcription. Here we show that E proteins differentially co-operate with proneural bHLH transcription factors sharpening their neurogeneic activity. We find that inhibiting BMP signaling or its target ID2, in the chick embryo spinal cord, impairs the neuronal production from progenitors expressing ATOH1/ASCL1, but less severely that from progenitors expressing NEUROG1/2/PTF1a. We define the mechanisms of this differential response as a dual co-operation of E proteins with proneural proteins. E proteins synergize with bHLH proteins when acting on CAGSTG motifs, thereby facilitating the neurogenic activity of ASCL1/ATOH1 which preferentially bind to such motifs. Conversely, E proteins restrict the strong neurogenic potential of NEUROG1/2 by directly inhibiting their preferential binding to CADATG motifs. Since we find this mechanism to be conserved in corticogenesis, we propose this dual co-operation of E proteins with bHLH proteins as a novel though general feature of their mechanism of action.


Semantic parsing is the problem of deriving machine interpretable meaning representations from natural language utterances. Neural models with encoder-decoder architectures have recently achieved substantial improvements over traditional methods. Although neural semantic parsers appear to have relatively high recall using large beam sizes, there is room for improvement with respect to one-best precision. In this work, we propose a generator-reranker architecture for semantic parsing. The generator produces a list of potential candidates and the reranker, which consists of a pre-processing step for the candidates followed by a novel critic network, reranks these candidates based on the similarity between each candidate and the input sentence. We show the advantages of this approach along with how it improves the parsing performance through extensive analysis. We experiment our model on three semantic parsing datasets (GEO, ATIS, and OVERNIGHT). The overall architecture achieves the state-of-the-art results in all three datasets.


A method for locally sensing and storing data of transverse domain wall chirality in planar nanowire logic and memory systems is presented. Patterned elements, in close proximity to the nanowires, respond to the asymmetry in the stray field from the domain wall to produce a chirality-dependent response. When a bias field is applied, a stray field-assisted reversal of the element magnetization results in a reversed remanent state, measurable by scanning electron microscopy with polarization analysis (SEMPA). The elements are designed as triangles with tips pointing toward the nanowire, allowing the shape anisotropy to be dominated by the base but having a portion with lower volume and lower energy barrier closest to the domain wall. Micromagnetic modeling assists in the design of the nanowire-triangle systems and experiments using SEMPA confirm the importance of aspect ratio and spacing given a constant bias field magnitude.


Personal information archives (PIAs) can include materials from many sources, e.g. desktop and laptop computers, mobile phones, etc. Evaluation of personal search over these collections is problematic for reasons relating to the personal and private nature of the data and associated information needs and measuring system response effectiveness. Conventional information retrieval (IR) evaluation involving use of Cranfield type test collections to establish retrieval effectiveness and laboratory testing of interactive search behaviour have to be re-thought in this situation. One key issue is that personal data and information needs are very different to search of more public third party datasets used in most existing evaluations. Related to this, understanding the issues of how users interact with a search system for their personal data is important in developing search in this area on a well grounded basis. In this proposal we suggest an
alternative IR evaluation strategy which preserves privacy
of user data and enables evaluation of both the accuracy of
search and exploration of interactive search behaviour. The
general strategy is that instead of a common search dataset
being distributed to participants, we suggest distributing
standard expandable personal data collection, indexing and
search tools to non-intrusively collect data from participants conducting search tasks over their own data collections on their own machines, and then performing local evaluation of individual results before central agregation.


Treatment of eutrophic lake water was investigated, when alum sludge and/or wood were used as the media for lab-scale filtration. Process 1 consisted of Column 1 with wood and Column 2 with alum sludge in series, and Process 2 of Column 3 with alum sludge. The filtration velocity was 0.45 and 0.91 m/d for 49 days each. Both processes removed SS and T-P well with about 98% and 92% removal efficiency, respectively. Total nitrogen removal efficiency was higher in Process 1 (64–72%) than Process 2 (18–19%), because of biological denitrification using organics supplied from wood. The dissolution of organics and aluminium from wood and alum sludge, respectively, was not significant in the effluent. An alkaline extraction method was able to extract two-thirds of phosphorus in the alum sludge. Thus, alum sludge was excellent at removing and recovering phosphorus and the filtration combining wood and alum sludge enabled the concomitant removal of nitrogen and phosphorus.


In recent years, sensing and communication applications have fueled important developments of group-IV photonics in the mid-infrared band. In the long-wave range, most platforms are based on germanium, which is transparent up to ∼15-µm wavelength. However, those platforms are limited by the intrinsic losses of complementary materials or require complex fabrication processes. To overcome these limitations, we propose suspended germanium waveguides with a subwavelength metamaterial lateral cladding that simultaneously provides optical confinement and allows structural suspension. These all-germanium waveguides can be fabricated in one dry and one wet etch step. A propagation loss of 5.3 dB/cm is measured at a wavelength of 7.7 µm. These results open the door for the development of integrated devices that can be fabricated in a simple manner and can potentially cover the mid-infrared band up to ∼15 µm.


Meningiomas are the most frequently occurring benign central nervous system tumours. We determined whether a subcutaneous animal model of meningioma was feasible by implanting fresh meningioma tissue from six patients into 60 athymic (nude) mice, either as tissue blocks (38 mice) or as cell suspensions (22 mice). The tumour take-rates were 74% (block) and 50% (suspension), and the xenografts retained the original tumour grade and subtype morphology by light microscopy. Comparison of cell proliferation markers in xenografts and original tumours gave similar immunohistochemical score rates for Ki-67, but not for PCNA. With the exception of one atypical tumour surgical specimen, all tumours lacked p53 immunopositivity. Transmission electron microscopy of sections of tumour xenografts revealed ultrastructural features, including desmosomes and desmosome-like structures, characteristic of well-differentiated meningiomas. The xenografts grew progressively with a volume increase of more than 10-fold over 6-11 months and an apparent doubling time of 16 weeks. This study demonstrates the utility of the subcutaneous meningioma xenograft as a model for further biological and therapeutic studies.


Photothermal therapy (PTT) is providing new opportunities for killing cancer cells. In this work, we introduce a new nanomedicine based on spherical MoS_2 nanoparticles for PTT treatment of tumors, prepared using "green" bottom-up technology. To increase water solubility and avoid rapid clearance by the reticuloendothelial system, polyethylene glycol (PEG) was used to coat them. These MoS_2-PEG nanospheres with an appropriate size (~100 nm) exhibit high photothermal conversion efficiency (26.7%). In vitro cellular studies revealed that the MoS_2-PEG nanospheres showed negligible cytotoxicity. Additionally, through combining the MoS_2-PEG nanosphere samples with NIR irradiation at 808 nm, excellent in vitro tumor cell killing efficacy was achieved. In the 4T1 tumor model, the MoS_2-PEG nanospheres exhibited good antitumor efficiency in vivo , displaying complete tumor inhibition over 16 days after treatment. Therefore, MoS_2-PEG nanospheres played an important role in tumor destruction, and this concept for developing spherical MoS_2-based nanomedicines can serve as a platform technology for the next generation of in vivo PTT agents.


Pulmonary surfactant (PS) dysfunction because of the leakage of serum proteins into the alveolar space could be an operative pathogenesis in acute respiratory distress syndrome. Albumin-inhibited PS is a commonly used in vitro model for studying surfactant abnormality in acute respiratory distress syndrome. However, the mechanism by which PS is inhibited by albumin remains controversial. This study investigated the film organization of albumin-inhibited bovine lipid extract surfactant (BLES) with and without surfactant protein A (SP-A), using atomic force microscopy. The BLES and albumin (1:4 w/w) were cospread at an air-water interface from aqueous media. Cospreading minimized the adsorption barrier for phospholipid vesicles imposed by preadsorbed albumin molecules, i.e., inhibition because of competitive adsorption. Atomic force microscopy revealed distinct variations in film organization, persisting up to 40 mN/m, compared with pure BLES monolayers. Fluorescence confocal microscopy confirmed that albumin remained within the liquid-expanded phase of the monolayer at surface pressures higher than the equilibrium surface pressure of albumin. The remaining albumin mixed with the BLES monolayer so as to increase film compressibility. Such an inhibitory effect could not be relieved by repeated compression-expansion cycles or by adding surfactant protein A. These experimental data indicate a new mechanism of surfactant inhibition by serum proteins, complementing the traditional competitive adsorption mechanism.


Migration, especially of indigenous peoples, related to or influenced by climate change continues to gain increasing research and policy attention. Limited material remains for this topic for Scandinavia's indigenous people, the Saami. This paper contributes to filling this gap by providing a review for the Scandinavian Saami of the possible impacts of climate change on migration. Environmental influences, social influences, and a synthesis through livelihoods impacts, including for reindeer herding, is provided, followed by a discussion of Saami responses to climate change and migration mainly through a governance analysis. Overall, climate change's impacts on the Saami do not necessarily entail abandoning their traditions, livelihoods, or homes. Instead, the most significant impact is likely to be migrants moving into the Arctic to pursue resource opportunities. Working collaboratively with the Saami, policies and practices are needed to ensure that indigenous interests are respected and that indigenous needs are met.


Single-species light emitters with high photoluminescence quantum yields (PLQYs) and broad- spectrum color tunability are sought-after for applications ranging from bio-imaging to artificial lighting. We explore a new strategy to design such emitters, inspired by bioluminescent fireflies and click-beetles. These organisms use a single molecular substrate, D-Luciferin (LH2), to emit light ranging in color from green to red. By combining LH2 with metals, we synthesize new bio-analogous, color-tunable, luminescent metal complexes. The copper complex forms an organic molecule of intrinsic microporosity (OMIM), which crystallizes into a stable structure with intermolecular voids. By changing the composition of guest molecules in the voids, we can tune the emitted color. The optimum composition gives nearly perfect white light, with the highest PLQY reported for a single-species white- light emitter. Similarities between our OMIM and the luciferase active site provide a new approach to investigating the heavily-debated mechanisms underlying in-vivo bioluminescence color variations. Moreover, as a proof of principle, we show that these materials can be used in a new type of light- emitting device (LED). The current generation of LEDs requires at least two active layers to achieve color tunability. The tunability is intrinsic in our materials, and therefore may lead to simpler device fabrication.


We investigate the spin polarized current through a quantum dot connected to ferromagnetic leads in the presence of a finite spin-dependent chemical potential. The effects of the spin polarization of the leads p and the external magnetic field B are studied. It is found that both the magnitude and the symmetry of the current are dependent on the spin polarization of the leads. When the two ferromagnetic leads are in parallel configuration, the spin polarization p has an insignificant effect on the spin current, and an accompanying charge current appears with the increase of p. When the leads are in antiparallel configuration, however, the effect of p is distinct. The charge current is always zero regardless of the variation of p in the absence of B. The peaks appearing in the pure spin current are greatly suppressed and become asymmetric as p is increased. The applied magnetic field B results in an accompanying charge current in both the parallel and antiparallel configurations of the leads. The characteristics of the currents are explained in terms of the density of states of the quantum dot.


Toxic oil syndrome (TOS) was a massive food-borne intoxication that occurred in Spain in 1981. Epidemiological studies imputed 3-( N-phenylamino)propane-1,2-diol (PAP) derivatives as the toxic agents. The in vitro bioactivation of PAP by rat and human liver microsomes was studied. In both cases, 3-[ N-(4'-hydroxyphenyl)amino]propane-1,2-diol ( 1) was detected as the main metabolite. Inhibition studies with pooled human liver microsomes in the presence and absence of P450-specific inhibitors suggest that 2C8 and 2E1 are the main enzymes involved in PAP bioactivation, followed by 3A4/5, 1A1/2, and 2C9. Incubations of PAP with 10 different recombinant P450 enzymes showed that 2C8, 2C9, 2C18, 2D6, and 2E1 catalyzed PAP 4'-hydroxylation. Incubations of phenol 1 with rat and human liver microsomes in the presence of GSH resulted in the formation of a glutathione conjugate of a quinoneimine metabolite derived from 1. In rat liver microsomes, P450 enzymes play a key role in the bioactivation of 1, whereas in human liver microsomes, autoxidation appears to be the major mechanism. The implications of these results for toxic oil syndrome are discussed.


In mixture modeling, it is assumed that the data set shows a heterogeneous structure. This heterogeneity is defined as unobservable heterogeneity. The data set's heterogeneity produces serious deviations in the parameter estimates and the standard deviations. Heterogeneity is overcome when the data set divides itself into homogeneous sub-populations. Thus, while homogeneity is attained for subpopulations, the heterogeneity between the sub-populations is tried to be put forward. Akaike's information criteria (AIC), Bayesian information criteria (BIC), and Entropy classification criteria are used to determine the number of sub-populations. After the number of sub-populations is determined, the model determines the probability that each observation will fall within a particular sub-population. In this study, the classification of districts based on fruit traits is achieved by applying mixture modeling to walnut fruits collected from eight districts. According to the AIC, BIC, and entropy criteria, a model with five sub-populations was chosen where the data set is the most distributed. Therefore, it was determined that each district does not form a different population according to the studied walnut fruit traits, but are distributed into five sub-populations. The fourth sub-population had the most desirable traits for walnut improvement, and the highest proportion of these traits came from the naturally grown populations of Adilcevaz and Ahlat districts.


Background. As diabetes mellitus is a major risk factor of sepsis, we aimed to evaluate the possible effects of diabetes mellitus and poor glycemic control on the diagnosis of sepsis. Methods. In our retrospective study, we included diabetic, septic patients—in whom the diagnosis of sepsis was based on the systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) criteria (n� 112, SIRS group)— who had HbA1c levels measured either in the previous 30 days (n� 39, SIRS 30 d subgroup) or within 24 hours after their emergency department admission (n� 73, SIRS 24 h subgroup). We later selected those patients from the SIRS group, whose sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) score was ≥2 (n� 55, SOFA group), and these patients were also divided based on the time of HbA1c measurement (n� 21, SOFA 30 d subgroup and n� 34, SOFA 24 h subgroup). We analyzed the relationship between laboratory parameters, length of hospital stay, and HbA1c. Results. We found a significant positive correlation between glucose and HbA1c (p< 0.001, p< 0.001, respectively), significant negative correlations between white blood cell count (WBC) and glucose (p � 0.01, p � 0.02, respectively), WBC and HbA1c levels (p � 0.001, p � 0.02, respectively) in the SIRS 24 h and SOFA 24 h subgroups. Furthermore, there was a significant positive correlation between length of hospital stay and HbA1c in the SOFA 24 h subgroup (p � 0.01). No significant correlations were found in the SIRS 30 d and SOFA 30 d subgroups. Conclusion. Based on our results, normal WBC with elevated HbA1c might be considered a positive SIRS criterium in diabetic, SIRS 24 h patients. Besides this potential diagnostic role, HbA1c might also be an additional prognostic biomarker in diabetic, SOFA 24 h patients.