† Background and Aims Bisexual flowers of Carica papaya range from highly regular flowers to morphs with various fusions of stamens to the ovary. Arabidopsis thaliana sup1 mutants have carpels replaced by chimeric carpel–stamen structures. Comparative analysis of stamen to carpel conversions in the two different plant systems was used to understand the stage and origin of carpeloidy when derived from stamen tissues, and consequently to understand how carpeloidy contributes to innovations in flower evolution. † Methods Floral development of bisexual flowers of Carica was studied by scanning electron microscopy and was compared with teratological sup mutants of A. thaliana. † Key Results In Carica development of bisexual flowers was similar to wild (unisexual) forms up to locule initiation. Feminization ranges from fusion of stamen tissue to the gynoecium to complete carpeloidy of antepetalous stamens. In A. thaliana, partial stamen feminization occurs exclusively at the flower apex, with normal stamens forming at the periphery. Such transformations take place relatively late in development, indicating strong developmental plasticity of most stamen tissues. These results are compared with evo-devo theories on flower bisexuality, as derived from unisexual ancestors. The Arabidopsis data highlight possible early evolutionary events in the acquisition of bisexuality by a patchy transformation of stamen parts into female parts linked to a flower axis-position effect. The Carica results highlight tissue-fusion mechanisms in angiosperms leading to carpeloidy once bisexual flowers have evolved. † Conclusions We show two different developmental routes leading to stamen to carpel conversions by late re-specification. The process may be a fundamental aspect of flower development that is hidden in most instances by developmental homeostasis.


The paper addresses NEETs (Not in Education, Employment or Training) as an ideological and discursive formation, lodging the discussion within its socio-economic context - one of increasing insecurity and precariousness. It argues that frequently quasi-political and ideological constructions of NEET can readily fold over into and articulate with discourses of the underclass, the broken society as well as, paradoxically, that of social recession. Consequently, such arguments divert attention from processes of 'othering', the secular changes facing society as well as the spectre of a return to a form of nineteenth century liberalism


Students' poor performance in the Yoruba language is being considered a serious problem by researchers and education stakeholders. Despite their efforts, no appreciable improvement is noticeable for hardly are enough researches on the extent to which school material resources availability, parental subject perception and school type correlate with students' achievement in Yoruba Language which this study is out to investigate. Being an Ex-post-facto design of survey research type, multi-stage sampling technique was used to draw 400 parents of 820 Yoruba Language students and their 20 teachers from two Local Government Areas in Oyo State. School Material Resources Availability Inventory (r= .85), Parental Subject Perception (r=.75), and Yoruba Language Achievement Test (r=.70) were instruments for data collection. Four research questions were posed and data generated were analyzed using Multiple Regression Analysis at P< 0.05. Findings revealed relationship between school material resources availability and students' achievement (r=.248); between parental subject perception and students' students' achievement (r=.244); and positive significant correlation between school type and students' achievement (r=.250). Parental subject perception is most influential (β=.143) and school type (β=.126). Therefore, parents should have right perception of the Yoruba Language while Government provides school material resources and facilities to improve students' performance in the Yoruba Language. Keywords: Material resources Availability, Parent subject Perception, School type, Student performance, Yoruba Language


The spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), an infection which is life-long and after a few years leads to the development of the deadly acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), has led to a pandemic of HIV/AIDS affecting the size and life expectancy of the world's population. The article presents data on the incidence of HIV infection and related mortality in the Russian Federation collected and systematized by the authors. In Russia, around 100,000 new cases of HIV are registered annually. The total number has reached 1 million, with the share of AIDS-related deaths relentlessly approaching 1% of total mortality from all causes, and in the 30–39 age group exceeding 5%. HIV represents nearly 50% of all deaths from infectious diseases, and is causing an overall growth in the number of such diseases. There is a direct threat of a further increase in HIV/AIDS-related deaths, as HIV-infected Russians comprise 1% of Russia's population aged 15-49. The group most affected by HIV are those aged 35-39: 2% of them are living with HIV. In the 30-34 age group, the proportion of persons with HIV is approaching 2%, and in the 40-44 age group it exceeds 1%. The growing proportion of heterosexual transmissions of HIV and the increasing number of HIV-infected women are alarming signs of the HIV epidemic's spillover from intravenous drug users into the general population, making the economic impact of the epidemic even worse. It is necessary to prevent further losses in the most productive part of the population by introducing more efficient HIV prevention strategies and expanding access to treatment of people living with HIV.


: Data on the seroimmunotypic and hemadsorbing characteristics of African swine fever virus (ASF) are summarized. According to the results of immunological sampling in pigs and those of hemagglutination inhibition test, the known ASFV strains and isolates were divided into 11 groups, 8 were characterized as seroimmunogroups having their specific reference strains. A 110-140-kD ASFV serotype-specific nonstructural major glycoprotein was identified. It is suggested that it is the glycoprotein that corresponds to the genetic engineering detected virus-specific homolog of lymphocyte membrane protein CD2, gene deletion of which results in the loss of hemadsorbing properties by ASFV.


This study provided a novel flipped classroom model with a detailed combination of in-class and out-of-class activities to teach a Vietnamese-English Translation module. The study aimed to (1) provide an in-depth insight into how the model was actually implemented in a specific scenario to make the teaching-learning process more interesting and meaningful, and (2) investigate the effectiveness of the flipped classroom model towards learners' translation performance through various assessments. 39 English-majored juniors at Banking University of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam participated in the study during the second semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. The study implemented a case-study mixed method design, applying assessment analysis and content analysis of one specific learning scenario to clarify how the flipped learning model contributed to the training process. Results show that a careful design of the flipped model contributed to the relevant literature on how to implement flipped learning in actual classroom settings, but also effectively improved learners' performance in translation studies.


In this work we investigate the dynamics of self-sustained detonation waves that have an embedded information boundary such that the dynamics is influenced only by a finite region adjacent to the lead shock. We introduce the boundary of such a domain, which is shown to be the separatrix of the forward characteristic lines, as a generalization of the concept of a sonic locus to unsteady detonations. The concept plays a fundamental role both in steady detonations and in theories of much more frequently observed unsteady detonations. The definition has a precise mathematical form from which its relationship to known theories of detonation stability and nonlinear dynamics can be clearly identified. With a new numerical algorithm for integration of reactive Euler equations in a shock-attached frame, that we have also developed, we demonstrate the main properties of the unsteady sonic locus, such as its role as an information boundary. In addition, we introduce the so-called "nonreflecting" boundary condition at the far end of the computational domain in order to minimize the influence of the spurious reflected waves. © 2004 American Institute of Physics . [DOI: 10.1063/1.1776531]


Background Medical education has undergone drastic changes with the advent of novel technologies that enable e-learning. Medical students are increasingly using e-learning methods, and universities have incorporated them into their curricula. Objective This study aimed at delineating the pattern of use of e-learning methods among medical undergraduates and new graduates of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo, and identifying the challenges faced by these students in using e-learning methods. Methods A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo, in April 2020, with the participation of current undergraduates and pre-intern medical graduates, using a self-administered questionnaire that collected data on sociodemographic details, pattern of use of learning methods, and challenges faced using e-learning methods. Results There were 778 respondents, with a response rate of 65.1% (778/1195). All the study participants used e-learning resources with varying frequencies, and all of them had at least 1 smart device with access to the internet. Electronic versions of standard textbooks (e-books), nonmedical websites, online lectures, medical websites, and medical phone apps were used by the majority. When comparing the extent of use of different learning methods, it appeared that students preferentially used traditional learning methods. The preference was influenced by the year of study and family income. The 3 most commonly used modalities for learning new study material and revising previously learned content were notes on paper material, textbooks (paper version), and e-books. The majority (98.7% [n=768]) of participants have encountered problems using e-learning resources. The most commonly faced problems were unavailability of free-of-charge access to some e-learning methods, expenses related to internet connection, poor connectivity of mobile internet, distractions while using online resources, and lack of storage space on electronic devices. Conclusions There is a high uptake of e-learning methods among Sri Lankan medical students. However, when comparing the extent of use of different learning methods, it appeared that students preferentially used traditional learning methods. A majority of the students have encountered problems when using e-learning methods, and most of these problems were related to poor economic status. Universities should take these factors into consideration when developing curricula in medical education.


Age of the Killarney Granite INTRODUCTION In 1916 I attempted 2 a correlation of the pre-Cambrian of the various districts that had been studied between Rainy Lake and the Adirondacks on the basis of the hypothesis that throughout this region there had been two, and only two, distinct periods of granitic irruption in the earth9s crust.3 For the earlier of these two periods the term "Laurentian" was retained, in accordance with long usage, and the later was called the "Algoman," a term which since has been widely adopted. The two plutonic upheavals are widely separated in time. The Huronian rocks rest on the peneplained surface of the Laurentian granite and are cut by the Algoman granite. The Algoman granite was in turn deeply eroded and certainly peneplained before the deposition of the Animikie rocks of Thunder Bay. This alternation of granitic invasions and peneplanations, if general throughout the region referred . . .


Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) are believed to influence tumor behavior and clinical outcomes. We previously showed that conditioned medium (CM) from CAFs induces proliferation and motility of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) cells. Here, we investigated the molecular mechanisms by which the CAF-secreted proteins induce ESCC development and progression. Using antibody arrays, we identified urokinase plasminogen activator (uPA) as one of the main proteins whose release was increased in CAFs compared to normal fibroblasts (NFs). Immunohistochemical analysis of pathological sections showed that uPA-positive cells were localized at the boundaries of tumor and stroma tissues, in stroma between tumor nests, and within the tumors. Increased stromal uPA levels (132/146 cases) correlated with tumor invasion (p < 0.05) and overall survival of ESCC patients (p < 0.05). In vitro assays showed that uPA promotes ESCC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion via PI3K/AKT and ERK signaling pathways. In vivo, anti-uPA antibody suppressed tumor growth in ESCC xenografts. These results suggest that uPA released from stroma, and especially from CAFs, might be a predictive marker for ESCC diagnosis and prognosis, as well as an effective therapeutic target.


Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder, where social and communication deficits and repetitive behaviors are present. Plant-derived bioactives have shown promising results in the treatment of autism. In this sense, this review is aimed at providing a careful view on the use of plant-derived bioactive molecules for the treatment of autism. Among the plethora of bioactives, curcumin, luteolin, and resveratrol have revealed excellent neuroprotective effects and can be effectively used in the treatment of neuropsychological disorders. However, the number of clinical trials is limited, and none of them have been approved for the treatment of autism or autism-related disorder. Further clinical studies are needed to effectively assess the real potential of such bioactive molecules.


Background: Repairs of zone II flexor tendons have benefited in recent years from modifications involving suture technique and configuration. These advances, however, present new obstacles in resident training. A focused tutorial incorporating a practical, hands-on exercise and standardization of technique may offer an effective low-risk, low-cost strategy for overcoming these challenges. Methods: Plastic surgery residents (n = 14) were asked to perform their preferred zone II flexor tendon repair using a tabletop exercise before and after a focused tutorial. The tutorial reviewed primary literature and presented a standardized technique. Repairs were photographed, tested for load strength, and analyzed to determine effectiveness of this teaching approach. Participants were retested at 6 months to evaluate for persistence of findings. Results: Posttutorial repairs required higher loads to generate a 2-mm gap (p < 0.001) and ultimate breakage (p < 0.001). Tendon purchase and resident confidence increased significantly. Subgroup analysis demonstrated significant improvements for both junior and senior residents. Retesting at 6 months revealed that gains were maintained over time. Conclusions: The authors created a practical educational model to teach zone II flexor tendon repair outside of the time- and error-sensitive confines of the operating room. Analysis of resident pretutorial repairs revealed common misconceptions in suture technique, strand count, and purchase. This may in part be attributable to the multitude of suggested repair techniques, difficulty in comparing data across multiple studies, and steep learning curve. Training programs can use this hands-on teaching exercise as part of a hand surgery simulation curriculum.


With increasing volatility in the oil prices, continued focus on low cost solutions is key to maintain a sustainable subsea industry. The industry has and will continue to have a tremendous amount of focus across many standardization initiatives and Joint Industry Programs.
 The total number of trees awarded since 1961 is in the range of 7 000 - 8 000 representing an annual average of approximately 140 which in the last 10 years has been closer to 300.
 Assuming 2/3 are installed by a manifold with an average of 4.5 trees per manifold, gives roughly 45 manifolds worldwide per year in the entire subsea industry. Take into consideration that the manifold is the largest piece of equipment in the subsea production system acting as system integrator and interface, bridging the trees with the flow line, often having to absorb the field specific requirements and you have the ultimate standardization challenge in a low volume environment.
 An important aspect discussed above is that the manifold is indeed part of a bigger system. There are many ways to approach standardization and, in the article, we argue that the optimal approach is to standardize from materials and upwards in the system hierarchy. The approach taken to standardize the manifold was therefore to start with a broad set of system attributes across the subsea production system rather than focusing on the manifold alone. This allows the standardization to be a wholistic approach aiming to optimize the supplier's operational production strategies, maximize use of lowest cost production processes as well as developing the right standard products.
 The modular compact manifold has therefore been developed through extensive use of data analytics due both to the large number of variables and the size of the dataset to find the optimum breakdown of the manifold into modules. The manifold shares components and production process with the subsea tree for valves and branch blocks using standard pressure classes. Standard pipe schedules have been identified to further reduce number of parts required in the portfolio. This has enabled configure to order manifolds with a limited number of pre-defined components that can be held in stock to minimize lead time. The use of compact branch blocks has also the allowed the manifold to significantly reduce footprint and weight further ensuring efficient installation.


ABSTRACT: The emergence of resistant biotypes of the Amaranthus palmeri species in cotton production areas of the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil, generated the need for correct identification of this species and information on viable herbicidal tools for their management. Thus, greenhouse experiments were conducted to evaluate the efficacy of alternative herbicides applied to A. palmeri in pre and post emergence. A randomized block design with four replications was used. The efficacy of herbicides applied in pre emergence was evaluate in two experiments, one in a clayey and other in a sandy soil; 9 herbicide treatments (8 with herbicide application and a control without application) were applied on each soil. Subsequently, two experiments with different populations of A. palmeri were conducted, using a 13 x 2 factorial arrangement, to evaluate the efficacy of herbicides applied in post emergence. The factors consisted of 13 herbicide treatments (12 with herbicide application and a control without application) and two weed development stages (2-4 and 6-8 leaves). Pre-emergence application of the flumioxazin, S-metolachlor, isoxaflutole, and trifluralin herbicides controlled the weed satisfactorily in both evaluated soils. The sulfentrazone and metribuzin herbicides were effective in the sandy soil, and diuron was effective in the clayey soil. The clomazone herbicide did not successfully controlled the A. palmeri plants in any of the soils. All post-emergence herbicide treatments were effective for the management of A. palmeri plants, when they were applied at the 2-4 leaf stage.


Accurate estimation of subsurface properties plays an important role in successful hydrocarbon exploration, and a variety of different types of inversion schemes are used to infer earth properties such as velocity or density by analyzing the surface seismic. The Markov-chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) stochastic approach is widely used to estimate subsurface properties. We have used a transdimensional form of MCMC, reversible jump MCMC (RJMCMC), to estimate seismic impedance, which allows the inference of the number of interfaces as well as the interface location and layer impedances. Estimating the uncertainty quantitatively is also very important when performing stochastic inversion. Therefore, the goal of this paper is to apply the transdimensional method to obtain a 3D seismic impedance model and to quantify uncertainty in impedance and interface locations. We also measured the speedup of the proposed algorithm by applying data and task parallelism. To demonstrate the performance and reliability of the proposed RJMCMC impedance inversion, we used seismic data from the E-segment of the Norne field in Norwegian Sea. The results of the quasi 3D transdimensional MCMC approach, which independently inverts data from each common-depth-point location, indicate high velocity contrasts near gas-oil contacts and high uncertainty in impedance near discontinuities. Also, the cross section of the impedance uncertainty volume helps to identify the location of a high-contrast boundary corresponding to the location of the possible gas reservoir. The proposed uncertainty measure can serve as an attribute to identify important reservoir features.


Prion diseases are a group of fatal neurodegenerative diseases, including CJD and scrapie, which are thought to be caused by a protein termed a prion (PrP). As manganese has previously been suggested to be involved in prion disease we have investigated manganese binding to PrP and its role in the toxicity of the protein. We have shown that manganese bound PrP (MnPrP) has several of the characteristics of the disease form of PrP, including protease resistance and toxicity that is dependent on cellular PrP expression. Further investigation into the mechanism of toxicity revealed that MnPrP is significantly more toxic to neuronal cells than nonmanganese bound PrP and that toxicity requires the presence of known metal binding residues within the protein. We have demonstrated that treatment of neuronal cells with MnPrP causes caspase 3 activation and apoptosis, as demonstrated by DNA laddering, and we hypothesise that caspase 3 is activated by a p38 pathway. Treatment of neurones with MnPrP also caused a significant increase in cellular ROS production, although this did not appear to be a major cause of cell death as antioxidants were unable to save cells from cell death. We also investigated mechanisms by which cells can survive scrapie infection and MnPrP toxicity. We have shown that cells infected with scrapie have increased ERK activation which was important for their survival. Cells that survived MnPrP treatment were also found to have increased ERK activation. This suggests that ERK may have a protective role in prion diseases and may be a potential therapeutic target.


AIM
Leg blood pressure (BP) measurement is needed when arm BP evaluation is not feasible, and calf BP, especially when measured in standing position, may have greater association with cardiovascular remodeling than arm BP. This study evaluated the relationship between calf and arm BP, and investigated whether calf BP would be superior to arm BP in predicting increased arterial stiffness [pulse wave velocity (PWV) > 10 m/s].

METHODS
We evaluated clinical and laboratory characteristics, BP measurements, and PWV in 1397 individuals resident in Baependi, Brazil, between 2017 and 2019. Arm BP was measured in the seated and supine positions while calf BP was measured in supine and standing positions using digital oscillometric devices. Carotid-femoral PWV was measured using a noninvasive mechanotransducer.

RESULTS
The sample had 62.7% females, age = 48.1 ± 15.4 years and 8.4% with PWV >10 m/s. Results of linear regression analysis showed that BP values of 140/90 mmHg measured in the arm in supine and seated position were equivalent to calf supine BP values of 164/81 mmHg and 166/78 mmHg and calf standing BP values of 217/137 mmHg and 221/137 mmHg, respectively. Calf-arm BP differences were associated with age, glomerular filtration rate, body mass index, smoking, low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol, diabetes and height. Furthermore, stepwise logistic regression analysis revealed that arm supine systolic BP, but not calf BP measurements, was independently associated with increased arterial stiffness.

CONCLUSION
Thresholds of ≈165/80 mmHg and ≈220/135 mmHg could be used for diagnosing hypertension when only calf measurements in supine and standing positions, respectively, are available. Conversely, calf BP was not superior to arm BP in predicting increased arterial stiffness.


An experimental canine model was designed to evaluate the effect of granulocyte transfusions on systemic infection with Candida albicans in the granulocytopenic host. Each of a pair of dogs was rendered granulocytopenic with a single intravenous (i.v.) dose of cyclophosphamide (50 mg/kg body weight) and challenged with 10(6) Candida albicans organisms administered i.v. when granulocyte counts were less than or equal to 500/mm3. Granulocytes procured by leukofiltration were infused into six experimental dogs 1, 24, 48, and 72 hr after challenge with Candida. An average of 13 +/- 1.3 X 10(9) granulocytes were administered per infusion, producing an average 1-hr increment of 588 +/- 146 granulocytes/mm3 over the pretransfusion granulocyte count. Experimental and control dogs were killed 96 hr after challenge and organs examined grossly and by quantitative culture techniques to measure the extent of infection. All animals receiving granulocyte transfusions had significantly less tissue infection than nontransfused controls (p less than 0.05). It was concluded that granulocyte transfusions are effective in reducing the severity of infection by Candida albicans during periods of leukopenia.


Secure access to energy and food are two of the challenges facing the Northeast region of the United States. Traditional biofuel feedstocks, such as corn and oil seed, are able to satisfy energy requirements. However, they compete with food production for desirable land and water resources and, in any case, are not likely to exploit the region's current comparative advantages. This study investigates a potential solution to the energy security problem in the Northeast: biofuel from advanced feedstock in the form of net forest growth and woody wastes, of which the region has abundant endowments. The federal government has committed to requiring 79.5 billion liters (BL) of advanced biofuel production annually by 2022. We evaluate both the physical capacity for its production and its cost competitiveness using an input‐output model of consumption, production, and trade in the 13‐state region. The model minimizes resource use required to satisfy given consumer demand using alternative technological options and subject to resource constraints. We compile data from the technical literature quantifying state‐level biofuel feedstock endowments and the technological requirements for cellulosic ethanol production. We find that exploiting the region's endowment of cellulosic feedstock requires either making the price of biofuels competitive with gasoline through subsidies or restricting imports of gasoline. Based on this initial investigation, we conclude that the region can produce significant amounts of advanced biofuel, up to 20.28 BL of cellulosic ethanol per year, which could displace nearly 12.5% of the gasoline that is now devoted to motorized transport in the region.


Ever since the discovery of the foot pad technic for growth of M. leprae in mice, investigators have overemphasized the laboratory results in clinical applications. Overenthusiasm has led to some dire results in the leprosy field. Two well-known examples can be cited, which are based on the presumption that: a) all the nonsolidly stained M. leprae are dead, and b) that a negative finding in the mouse foot pad indicates no growth of M. leprae in the animals. The former led clinical investigators to claim a false emergence of drug resistance after one year's treatment with a potent antileprosy drug, B663, which was almost abandoned for later clinical use. The latter led investigators to introduce a low-dose drug treatment, which resulted in a worldwide appearance of DDS resistance in leprosy. This paper outlines the reasoning that not all nonsolid M. leprae are dead, and that not all the organisms in the foot pads are detectable by the present standard foot pad/ M. leprae technic.


OBJECT
Critical reductions in oxygen delivery (DO(2)) underlie the development of delayed cerebral ischemia (DCI) after subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH). If DO(2) is not promptly restored, then irreversible injury (that is, cerebral infarction) may result. Hemodynamic therapies for DCI (that is, induced hypertension [IH] and hypervolemia) aim to improve DO(2) by raising cerebral blood flow (CBF). Red blood cell (RBC) transfusion may be an alternate strategy that augments DO(2) by improving arterial O(2) content. The authors compared the relative ability of these 3 interventions to improve cerebral DO(2), specifically their ability to restore DO(2) to regions where it is impaired.

METHODS
The authors compared 3 prospective physiological studies in which PET imaging was used to measure global and regional CBF and DO(2) before and after the following treatments: 1) fluid bolus of 15 ml/kg normal saline (9 patients); 2) raising mean arterial pressure 25% (12 patients); and 3) transfusing 1 U of RBCs (17 patients) in 38 individuals with aneurysmal SAH at risk for DCI. Response between groups in regions with low DO(2) (< 4.5 ml/100 g/min) was compared using repeated-measures ANOVA.

RESULTS
Groups were similar except that the fluid bolus cohort had more patients with symptoms of DCI and lower baseline CBF. Global CBF or DO(2) did not rise significantly after any of the interventions, except after transfusion in patients with hemoglobin levels < 9 g/dl. All 3 treatments improved CBF and DO(2) to regions with impaired baseline DO(2), with a greater improvement after transfusion (23%) than hypertension (14%) or volume loading (10%); p < 0.001. Transfusion also resulted in a nonsignificantly greater (47%) reduction in the number of brain regions with low DO(2) when compared with fluid bolus (7%) and hypertension (12%) (p = 0.33).

CONCLUSIONS
The IH, fluid bolus, and blood transfusion interventions all improve DO(2) to vulnerable brain regions at risk for ischemia after SAH. Transfusion appeared to provide a physiological benefit at least comparable to IH, especially among patients with anemia, but transfusion is associated with risks. The clinical significance of these findings remains to be established in controlled clinical trials.


The influence of gas introduction on the critical safety of the nuclear fuel system under the condition of cold condition, given reactor material and geometry structure is studied.
 Refer to bubble effect test experiment on nuclear critical safety test device (YSR) and considering solid-liquid two-phase nuclear fuel system with uranyl nitrate solution - uranium dioxide fuel element as the experimental platform, the dynamic process of the real behavior of bubbles in uranyl nitrate solution has been simulated in the quasi-static way by replacing bubble generator with aluminous bubble simulation elements.
 Bubble effect is the reactivity change caused by the change of volume of solution, neutron leakage and absorption property in the nuclear fuel system due to the bubbles generated in the solution. In the dissolving process of spent fuel, oxygen or nitrogen are usually added to accelerate the dissolution of fuel element shear section, and some other bubble production are also caused by the heat released during the dissolution process. Here, the bubble production caused by the heat is omitted and only artificial gas introduction is considered in my study. When there are enough bubbles in the uranium solution system, the volume of the solution will increase, which will inevitably influence the absorption and leakage property of the neutrons, and further influence the reactivity of the nuclear fuel system.
 The corresponding relationship between the bubble-intake rate and the bubble equivalent diameter, arising velocity and bubble share is determined through fluid dynamics modeling to manufacture the aluminous bubble simulation elements. The theoretical calculation by MONK9A and the critical experimental measurements are also compared and analyzed in this paper.
 The results showed that the reactivity caused by bubbles was negative, and the greater the intake rate, the greater the negative effect. Meanwhile the theoretical calculated value was in good agreement with the experimental value and the maximum deviation was 63.4 pcm.


There is increasing discussion of a potential role for statins in the management of sepsis. A search of PubMed, Embase, Scopus and the Cochrane Library databases was performed by combining the terms 'statins', 'infection', 'sepsis', 'bacteraemia', 'pneumonia', and 'ICU infections'. A total of 22 studies were retrieved, which included 177,260 people and compared clinical outcomes between 51,193 statin users and 126,067 non-statin users. Nineteen were cohort studies (seven prospective and 12 retrospective), two were retrospective case-control studies, and one was a randomized controlled study. Nine studies examined the use of statins in sepsis, four in community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), three in bacteraemia, and three in post-operative patients. Mortality data were presented in 15 studies; in ten, mortality was lower among statin users (three of six sepsis studies, five of six CAP studies, and two of three bacteraemia studies). In four studies, there was no difference in mortality (two of six sepsis studies, one of six CAP studies, and one of three bacteraemia studies) and in one study there was increased mortality among septic intensive-care unit patients receiving statins. Five of the nine studies that examined the risk of developing sepsis/infection as a primary outcome (six of nine sepsis studies and all studies in the postoperative setting) found a decreased risk among statin users, whereas the remaining studies found no difference. Irrespective of their design (matched vs. non-matched), the majority of the studies suggested that statins have a beneficial effect on the outcome of infection; however, their observational design does not allow us to draw firm conclusions. The clinical benefit of statin therapy in sepsis remains to be determined by ongoing randomized controlled trials.


Background: Covid-19 pandemic is developing worldwide with common dynamics but also with partly marked differences between regions and countries. They are not completely understood, but presumably, provide one clue to find ways to mitigate epidemics until exit strategies to its eradication become available. Method: We provide a monitoring tool available at www.izbi.de. It enables inspection of the dynamic state of the epidemic in 187 countries using trajectories. They visualize transmission and removal rates of the epidemic and this way bridge epi-curve tracking with modelling approaches. Results: Examples were provided which characterize state of epidemic in different regions of the world in terms of fast and slow growing and decaying regimes and estimate associated rate factors. Basic spread of the disease associates with transmission between two individuals every two-three days on the average. Non-pharmaceutical interventions decrease this value to up to ten days where complete lock down measures are required to stop the epidemic. Comparison of trajectories revealed marked differences between the countries regarding efficiency of measures taken against the epidemic. Trajectories also reveal marked country-specific dynamics of recovery and death rates. Conclusions: The results presented refer to the pandemic state in May 2020 and can serve as working instruction for timely monitoring using the interactive monitoring tool as a sort of seismometer for the evaluation of the state of epidemic, e.g., the possible effect of measures taken in both, lock-down and lock-up directions. Comparison of trajectories between countries and regions will support developing hypotheses and models to better understand regional differences of dynamics of Covid-19.


The computational and storage demands for the future Square Kilometer Array (SKA) radio telescope are significant. Building on the experience gained with the collaboration between ASTRON and IBM with the Blue Gene based LOFAR correlator, ASTRON and IBM have now embarked on a public-private exascale computing research project aimed at solving the SKA computing challenges. This project, called DOME, investigates novel approaches to exascale computing, with a focus on energy efficient, streaming data processing, exascale storage, and nano-photonics. DOME will not only benefit the SKA, but will also make the knowledge gained available to interested third parties via a Users Platform. The intention of the DOME project is to evolve into the global center of excellence for transporting, processing, storing and analyzing large amounts of data for minimal energy cost: the 'ASTRON & IBM Center for Exascale Technology'.


A novel deterministic packet marking scheme for IP trace back against distributed denial of service attacks is presented. Besides the hash correlation functions, our scheme has a unique technique: redundant decomposition, which plays an important role in improving the recovery performance. Theoretical analyses, the pseudo code and the experimental results are provided. The scheme is proved to be accurate and efficient and can handle large-scale DDoS attacks.


Betulin is a naturally abundant compound in the outer bark of birch and can be easilyobtained by solvent extraction. Herein, solutions of betulin were used to treat cellulosictextile fibers and improve their water repellency. Cotton fabrics impregnated in a 7.5 gL-1 solution of betulin in ethanol showed the highest water contact angle of about 153°while the impregnation in a 3.75 g L-1 solution resulted in a close effect. A terephthaloylchloride-betulin copolymer was synthesized and dissolved in tetrahydrofuran to afford asolution with a concentration of 3.75 g L-1. The cotton fabric impregnated in thissolution showed a water contact angle of 150°. Changes in morphology of the cellulosefibers before and after the treatment were observed by scanning electron microscopy,and the water repellency was measured by a standard spray test. The marketing strategyof the potential product, which will be developed based on this technique, was discussed.


UNLABELLED
Patients may have concerns about their ability to manage postoperative symptoms at home after ambulatory surgery. We assessed patients' attitudes toward postoperative care at home or in the hospital after laparoscopic cholecystectomy. Thirty-eight patients undergoing elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy were pre- and postoperatively (within a week each) presented with scenarios describing symptoms of differing severity in either a home or hospital setting and were asked to rank and rate the relative desirability of the scenarios using rating scale, standard gamble, and willingness-to-pay techniques. Preoperatively, 16 (42%), 21 (55%), and 30 (79%) patients ranked pain of mild, moderate, and severe levels, respectively, as worse than the respective levels of nausea and vomiting. Of 24 patients, 19 (79%) preferred home care to hospital care for mild symptoms, and 12 of 22 patients (55%) preferred home care to hospital care for moderate symptoms. The average ratings were 20, 53, and 90 for mild, moderate, and severe symptoms, respectively, where 0 = no symptoms and 100 = the worst symptoms possible. Patients who preferred care outside the home indicated that they were willing to pay a mean of $142 (maximum $410) as a maximal copayment to have postoperative care in the hospital and a mean of $255 to receive care in a medical hotel-like facility. Postoperative assessment correlated highly with the preoperative assessment (correlation coefficient >0.6 for rating, standard gamble, and willingness-to-pay assessments). We conclude that patients vary in their attitudes toward where they would like to receive postoperative care. Attitudes assessed preoperatively may predict their attitudes postoperatively.

IMPLICATIONS
Patients preferred to be at home for mild postoperative symptoms but in the hospital for worse postoperative symptoms. Preferences did not change with different methods of asking and were the same pre- and postoperatively. If patients made choices for their care before their procedure, they would still be happy with those decisions postoperatively.


Abstract Studies deploying Platform Transmitter Terminals (PTTs) or Global System for Mobile Communications-GPS (GSM) packages on Golden Eagles have typically used backpack harnesses for attachment despite evidence indicating potential significant negative effects on reproduction and survival. Retention, safety, and utility of tail-mounted PTTs were tested on a sample of Golden Eagles in southwestern Montana. Argos satellite-tracked PTTs of two configurations were attached dorsally or ventrally to the central rectrices of 27 Golden Eagles to study survival. Sixteen packages were known to have been molted or removed (i.e., shed) by the eagle and 13 recovered. Of recovered tail-mounts, six (46%) were forcibly removed by eagles; five by males and one by a female. All packages that were forcibly removed were 32-g ventral mounts. Females tended to retain tail-mounts longer than males and dorsally mounted PTTs tended to be retained longer than those mounted ventrally. Eagles tagged in winter retained PTTs the longest. The duration of tail-mounted PTT retention was adequate for analysis of survival and yielded an adult annual survival rate (86%) consistent with recent U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates (87%). Eight of 13 (62%) territorial adults tagged with PTTs were known to attempt breeding the year they were tracked and six (46%) produced young, rates that did not differ (P > 0.23) from those of a larger sample of the population surveyed during the same period. Logistic regression analysis of cumulative range size by monitoring duration of four territorial adult eagles with tail-mounted GPS indicated that 99% of total range was recorded within 140 d of tracking.


Background and Purpose: Distal radial fractures are common fractures of postmenopausal age group patients. They are often called fractures of osteoporosis. These fractures are considered to be one of the commonest minor injuries to cause major morbidity in the community. A lot of patient who need surgery, fail to afford offered treatment owing to their socioeconomic conditions. We tried to highlight that postmenopausal distal radius fractures attributed to osteoporosis, are not given much of consideration when lot of funds and researches are being diverted to osteoporosis and related diseases. Methods: 60 elderly female patients with distal radius fracture were studied for outcome. The primary outcome parameter was grip strength. Patients were followed for 6 months for subjective and objective clinical assessment. Patients were also assessed for their socioeconomic status. Clinical outcome were correlated with socioeconomic status. Results: At 6 months post treatment, grip strength was measured 85% of the uninjured side in the operative group and 56% in the conservatively treated group. 42.85% of patients in whom surgery was indicated refused the surgery because of financial constraints. Conclusion: Patients who had opted for operative intervention did better. Financial constraint was the common reason for not opting for surgical treatment by patients in whom surgery was indicated. Keywords: Distal Radius Fracture, Postmenopausal, Osteoporosis, Socioeconomic Condition


Lymphoepithelioma-like carcinoma (LELC) is a rare form of lung cancer, usually encountered in Chinese patients. Similar to nasopharyngeal carcinoma, LELC of the lung is strongly associated with Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection in Asian patients, but there is controversy over whether an association exists in patients from Western countries. To determine whether such a relationship exists, we retrospectively studied 6 cases of primary LELC of the lung, all of which were in Western patients. There were 4 men and 2 women, ranging in age from 49 to 75 years. The tumors ranged from 1 to 4.5 cm in diameter. Four patients had stage I disease, 1 had stage IIb disease, and 1 had stage IIIa disease. All patients are alive without evidence of disease with a follow-up of 18 to 30 months. Formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue was stained with hematoxylin-eosin for routine evaluation and immunostained for keratin and leukocyte common antigen (LCA). LCA staining was performed to exclude large-cell lymphoma. Immunoperoxidase staining (1:500 clone CS1-4; Dako, Carpinteria, CA) and in situ hybridization were performed to detect EBV. Tumors consisted of solid nests of undifferentiated tumor cells in a syncytial arrangement surrounded by heavy lymphoplasmacytic infiltrate. Tumor cells stained positively for keratin but negative for LCA. All 6 cases were negative for EBV, suggesting no association between EBV and LELC in the Western population.


Introduction Telemental health (TMH) is a promising approach to increase access to mental healthcare. This study examined the TMH adoption rates and associations with facility- and state-level factors among US mental health (MH) facilities. Methods This retrospective, cross-sectional study used linked data for 2016 from the National Mental Health Services Survey (N = 11,833), Area Health Resources File, and national reports for broadband access and telehealth policies. The associations of facility and state-level characteristics with TMH adoption were examined with multi-level logistic regressions. Results Overall, 25.9% had used TMH. Having veteran affiliation [Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR) = 18.53, 95% Confidence Interval (95%CI): 10.66–32.21] and greater Information Technology (IT) capacity [AOR(95%CI): 2.89(2.10–3.98)] were the strongest correlates of TMH adoption. Other facility characteristics associated with higher likelihood of TMH adoption were: public ownership, high patient volumes, having comprehensive MH treatments or Quality Improvement practices, having private or non-Medicaid public payers, and treating elderly patients (AORs: 1.16–2.41). TMH adoption was less likely among facilities treating more African Americans or patients with substance abuse disorders. TMH adoption varied substantially across states, with adoption more likely in states issuing special telehealth licences and those with more rural counties. Discussion One in four MH facilities adopted TMH in 2016. TMH adoption varied by multiple facility- and state-level factors. Our findings suggest that: legal/regulatory burden and lower facility IT capacity may discourage TMH adoption; significant racial disparities exist in TMH adoption; and there is a need to increase TMH use for substance abuse disorders.


We propose a radix-4 modular multiplication algorithm based on Montgomery's algorithm, and a fast radix-4 modular exponentiation algorithm for Rivest, Shamir, and Adleman (RSA) public-key cryptosystem. By modifying Booth's algorithm, a radix-4 cellular-array modular multiplier has been designed and simulated. The radix-4 modular multiplier can be used to implement the RSA cryptosystem. Due to reduced number of iterations and pipelining, our modular multiplier is four times faster than a direct radix-2 implementation of Montgomery's algorithm. The time to calculate a modular exponentiation is about n/sup 2/ clock cycles, where n is the word length, and the clock cycle is roughly the delay time of a full adder. The utilization of the array multiplier is 100% when we interleave consecutive exponentiations. Locality, regularity, and modularity make the proposed architecture suitable for very large scale integration implementation. High-radix modular-array multipliers are also discussed, at both the bit level and digit level. Our analysis shows that, in terms of area-time product, the radix-4 modular multiplier is the best choice.


A randomized trial of a telephone family assessment intervention was conducted during a 2.5 month period on 224 ambulatory primary care patients, aged 18-49 years, who were selected according to self-report of elevated family stress levels. Family physicians conducted telephone interviews to collect information from patients on their supportive and stressful family members. The working hypothesis was that this process would lead to reduction in the patient's family stress and to improvement in family support and personal health status. Patients reported that the intervention caused them to think about their family support and helped them to feel better. Comparison of family factor and functional health scores before and after intervention also indicated a limited beneficial effect, but only for a small subset of black patients. These results suggest that the telephone family assessment alone is inadequate as an intervention and should be strengthened to include professional assistance to patients for the family problems that are identified by the assessment.


2014 International Conference on Chemical Thermodynamics and South African Institution of Chemical Engineering Conference, Durban, South Africa, 27 July - 1 August 2014. . Due to copyright restrictions, the attached PDF file only contains the abstract of the full text item. For access to the full text item, please consult the publisher's website


The COVID-19 pandemic has caused an overabundance of valid and invalid information to spread rapidly via traditional media as well as by internet and digital communication. Health literacy (HL) is the ability to access, understand, appraise, and apply health information, making it fundamental for finding, interpreting, and correctly using COVID-19 information. A cross-sectional study of a sample of 3500 participants representative of the Italian adult population aged 18+ years was conducted in Italy in 2021. A validated HL questionnaire was employed, including sections on coronavirus-related HL, general HL, sociodemographic characteristics, risk factors, and respondents' lifestyle. Of our sample, 49.3% had "excellent" levels of coronavirus-related HL and 50.7% had "sufficient" (20.7%) or "limited" (30.0%) levels. Although the overall HL-COVID level was high, many participants reported difficulties dealing with COVID-19 information; in particular, participants older than 65 years, with a low education level, living in southern regions of Italy, and with high financial deprivation. Targeted public information campaigns and the promotion of HL are required for better navigation of health information environments. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need to improve HL and to prepare the general population for future emergency and non-emergency situations, confirming that HL can be considered a social vaccine.


The light-cone (LC) effect causes the mean as well as the statistical properties of the redshifted 21-cm signal $T_{\rm b}(\hat{\bf n},\nu)$ to change with frequency $\nu$ (or cosmic time). Consequently, the statistical homogeneity (ergodicity) of the signal along the line of sight (LoS) direction is broken. This is a severe problem particularly during the Epoch of Reionization (EoR) when the mean neutral hydrogen fraction ($\bar{x}_{\rm HI}$) changes rapidly as the universe evolves. This will also pose complications for large bandwidth observations. These effects imply that the 3D power spectrum $P(k)$ fails to quantify the entire second-order statistics of the signal as it assumes the signal to be ergodic and periodic along the LoS. As a proper alternative to $P(k)$, we use the multi-frequency angular power spectrum (MAPS) ${\mathcal C}_{\ell}(\nu_1,\nu_2)$ which does not assume the signal to be ergodic and periodic along the LoS. Here, we study the prospects for measuring the EoR 21-cm MAPS using future observations with the upcoming SKA-Low. Ignoring any contribution from the foregrounds, we find that the EoR 21-cm MAPS can be measured at a confidence level $\ge 5\sigma$ at angular scales $\ell \sim 1300$ for total observation time $t_{\rm obs} \ge 128\,{\rm hrs}$ across $\sim 44\,{\rm MHz}$ observational bandwidth. We also quantitatively address the effects of foregrounds on MAPS detectability forecast by avoiding signal contained within the foreground wedge in $(k_\perp, k_\parallel)$ plane. These results are very relevant for the upcoming large bandwidth EoR experiments as previous predictions were all restricted to individually analyzing the signal over small frequency (or equivalently redshift) intervals.


Abstract Background People are increasingly seeking health information and managing their health through electronic technologies. We aimed to determine if women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) identified a need for PCOS-related mobile health apps and to evaluate related apps currently available. Design A national survey of women and a review of apps available on the iOS and Android platforms. Setting Community recruitment in Australia in 2016 and review of mobile apps available in 2017. Sample The survey received 264 responses. Sixteen apps related to PCOS were evaluated. Main Outcome Measures Survey: Women's likeliness to use mobile health apps, specifically a PCOS-related app and preferred features of apps. App review: Mapping of available apps and evaluation using the Mobile Application Rating Scale (MARS). Results Of 264 respondents, almost all women had a smartphone (98%), 72% had previously used an app to manage their health, and most (91%) would use a PCOS-specific app if available. The most important feature was the availability of current, evidence-based information. Current apps on PCOS lack provision of quality information. Conclusion Women with PCOS would use a PCOS-specific app of good quality that responds to their needs and facilitates self-care; however, currently available apps are unlikely to meet their information needs.


Since no study has yet been able to assess the Quebec portrait of teachers' evaluation practices in the context of clinical education in nursing. Considering the importance of clinical teaching and evaluation in the education of nursing students, this study is justified. This article presents the results of a study that aimed to describe and understand the experience of teachers in the ongoing assessment of nursing students' learning during clinical education. It aimed to describe the evaluation practices of teachers during the learning of students in clinical education and achievement context, and to identify factors influencing these practices. In the context of descriptive qualitative research, the data collection was mainly based on the description of practices reported and collected during interviews realized with 10 nursing teachers of a college of the region of Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean (SLSJ, Quebec, Canada). The results allowed, for instance, to identify and to describe the evaluation practices led in this specific context of the study : the direct and indirect observation ; the questions asked to the sudent and to the group of sutdents and individual and group feed-back. They also allowed to enumerate and to categorize factors which can influence these practices, that is facilitates factors, barriers and faiths.


Most cases of idiopathic osteonecrosis are caused by many factors and rarely by an instantaneous, sudden, or solitary phenomenon. The cells in bony tissues become progressively sick or ill and therefore stressed. Depending on the condition, the cell sickness may intensify as the underlying disease progresses or as other factors are added that further decompensate the cells to the point at which they can no longer maintain cellular equilibrium. In many diseases, the final stress that overwhelms the cell is a course of corticosteroid therapy that could cause necrosis by several mechanisms, including increased stores of marrow fat, fat embolization, intraosseous hypertension, and a direct cellular toxic effect (see Fig. 3). The reasons why bone cells within the femoral head and condyles, humeral head, and certain other anatomic locations are especially susceptible remain obscure. However, in each of these sites, the blood supply enters from one direction only, and this relative ischemia could limit the reparative abilities of the cells.


Background Adolescent is a time of heightened violence and the frequency of engaging in violent behaviour is greater for adolescents than for all other age groups. A better understanding of factors related to assault among adolescents is important to reduce the incident. This study described and characterised the socio-demographic factors, circumstances and characteristic of assault in emergency department. Methods A descriptive study was carried on 140 patients at ER, Yangon General Hospital during one year. Adolescent assault victims with musculoskeletal injuries were collected involving demographic details, circumstances of injury, characteristics of injury and initial treatment parameter. Results Among the 140 respondents, males (80%) and females (20%) reported been an assault. Males were more likely to have been in a physical fight. The majority of cases (47.1%) were of low educational status (primary education). Casual workers and dependent were the most common group among the injured, occurred at public place during night time. Blunt object (81%) were the most common weapons used. Head and neck were commonly affected in over half of cases (58%) and soft tissue injuries (90%) were the most frequent type. 71% of the patients were treated as out-patients. Conclusion assaults are responsible for significant morbidity and may be an important opportunity for prevention. Socioeconomic status, contributing factors and injury characteristics identified to this study should help strategies for preventing adolescent assault.


Systemically low levels of survival motor neuron-1 (SMN1) protein cause spinal muscular atrophy (SMA). α-Motor neurons of the spinal cord are considered particularly vulnerable in this genetic disorder and their dysfunction and loss cause progressive muscle weakness, paralysis and eventually premature death of afflicted individuals. Historically, SMA was therefore considered a motor neuron-autonomous disease. However, depletion of SMN in motor neurons of normal mice elicited only a very mild phenotype. Conversely, restoration of SMN to motor neurons in an SMA mouse model had only modest effects on the SMA phenotype and survival. Collectively, these results suggested that additional cell types contribute to the pathogenesis of SMA, and understanding the non-autonomous requirements is crucial for developing effective therapies. Astrocytes are critical for regulating synapse formation and function as well as metabolic support for neurons. We hypothesized that astrocyte functions are disrupted in SMA, exacerbating disease progression. Using viral-based restoration of SMN specifically to astrocytes, survival in severe and intermediate SMA mice was observed. In addition, neuromuscular circuitry was improved. Astrogliosis was prominent in end-stage SMA mice and in post-mortem patient spinal cords. Increased expression of proinflammatory cytokines was partially normalized in treated mice, suggesting that astrocytes contribute to the pathogenesis of SMA.


Large, sustained, multinational, and collaborative research networks are becoming more popular because of their power to produce findings that generalize across contexts as well as to provide contextually nuanced views of a phenomenon. In educational leadership, four major projects have been initiated since the beginning of the 21st century: The International Successful School Principalship Project; the International Study of the Preparation of Principals; Leadership for Learning; and the International School Leadership Development. These projects cover from seven to more than 20 countries and have run for 5 or more years. The discussion of these projects provides insight into principal effectiveness research and some guidance to those who seek to collaborate with colleagues nationally and internationally. International projects like these bring the interplay of leadership and context into focus and show that context is important in terms of educational success and how leadership is enacted. Despite the complexity in considering leadership and context, a standout feature of the projects is that across different contexts, there are general findings that emerge, either confirming contemporary understandings or proposing new views through the construction of leadership models, and recommendations emerge that can transcend contexts (such as the need for high-quality but contextually relevant leadership preparation programs). These international comparative projects are important works, as they endeavor to counter the blancmange view of education that comes through the pervasiveness of things like international testing programs and the reliance on meta-analyses.


A highway system serves two needs: mobility and accessibility. Access control techniques are used to restrict access to the highway and improve vehicle flow. The objective of this research was to develop a comprehensive procedure to evaluate access control alternatives. The procedure includes the design and quantitative evaluation of alternatives to select the best one. Evaluation of each alternative includes prediction of turning volumes, delays, crash rates, and economic effectiveness. Several existing models predict traffic delays for signalized intersections and for minor streams at unsignalized intersections. Models are needed to predict delays of arterial streams caused by minor streams at unsignalized intersections. To address this missing component, models were developed to predict the delays caused to arterial streams by the following maneuvers: merging onto the arterial, diverging from the arterial, and left turn from the arterial. Models to predict crash rates for multi-lane arterial segments in Indiana based on geometric and access control characteristics were also developed. Models were developed to predict total, property-damage-only, and fatal/injury crashes. For the economic evaluation of each alternative, delays and stops are converted to operating costs for representative periods, and the crash rates are converted to crash costs. The agency costs can also be estimated. After the economic evaluation of each access control alternative, the best alternative can be selected. This volume, Part I, contains the research report, presenting the literature review, procedure to evaluate access control alternatives, the traffic delay models, the safety models, the economic evaluation of alternatives, implementation considerations, and a summary of the research findings.


Two moderate-size earthquakes occurred in the United Kingdom, the first near Folkestone in 2007 with M w 4.0 and the second near Market Rasen in 2008 with M w 4.5. Both were strongly felt and caused some nonstructural damage. The earthquakes occurred at significantly different depths, the Folkestone earthquake at 5 km and the Market Rasen earthquake at 20 km. We determined the seismic moment and the stress drop of the two mainshocks, and two smaller earthquakes in the same locations, by modeling the source displacement spectra. We found stress drops of 30±34 bar and 344±136 bar for the Folkestone and Market Rasen mainshocks, respectively. This is a significant difference considering the earthquakes are only 275 km apart and both are of intraplate origin. We applied the stochastic ground-motion modeling technique and used the stress drop and seismic moment to compute vertical component peak ground acceleration. The modeled ground motions are consistent with the observations. We also computed vertical peak ground acceleration for a hypothetical M w 6.0 high stress-drop (200 bar) earthquake and found that it would be 4.6 m/sec2 at 20 km hypocentral distance.


In this paper, a new linear estimator that enables solution of the user position estimation problem has been designed for the case of global navigation satellite system (GNSS) utilization. The proposed recursive linear Kalman filter (LKF) does not need any linearization for nonlinear GNSS measurements and enables accurate estimation of the user coordinates and the distance measuring errors resulting from the time differences between the user and the satellite (clock bias). Comparison of the presented linear and conventional extended Kalman filters for the stationary and moving users' position estimation via GNSS measurements is performed.


Variable frequency drives induce shaft voltages onto the shaft of the driven motor because of the extremely high speed switching of the insulated gate bipolar transistors which produce the pulse width modulation used to control AC motors in commercial industrial and even consumer applications. This voltage induced on the shaft becomes great enough to overcome the dielectric of the oil film in the bearing causing bearing discharges known as electrical discharge machining effect. Unless mitigation for these shaft voltages is employed in the motor, the motor's bearings may become damaged from the electrical bearing currents which cause pitting and excessive bearing noise, fluting and finally motor failure. The cause of this problem and commonly applied mitigation methods are discussed as well as a new and highly effective conductive micro fiber shaft grounding ring technology which resolves these problems.


The Western-led efforts to establish a new post-Taliban order in Afghanistan are in serious trouble, and in this book Suhrke sets out to explain why. She begins with the dynamic of the intervention and its related peace-building mission. What were the forces shaping this grand international project? What explains the apparent systemic bias towards a deeper and broader international involvement? Many reasons have been cited for its limited achievements and ever-growing difficulties, the most common explanation being that the national, regional, and international contexts were unfavourable. But many policies were misguided while the multinational operation itself was extraordinarily and unnecessarily complex. Astri Suhrke's main thesis is that the international project itself contains serious tensions and contradictions that significantly contributed to the lack of progress. As a result, the deepening involvement proved dysfunctional: massive international support has created an extreme version of a rentier state that is predictably weak, corrupt and unaccountable; US-led military operations undercut the peacebuilding agenda, and more international aid and monitoring to correct the problems generate Afghan resentment and evasion. Continuing these policies will only reinforce the dynamic. The alternative is a less intrusive international presence, a longer time-frame for reconstruction and change, and negotiations with the militants that can end the war and permit a more Afghan-directed order to emerge.


The reduced-form correlation between inflation and measures of real activity has changed substantially for the main developed economies over the post-WWII period. In this paper we attempt to describe the observed inflation dynamics in the United Kingdom, the United States and the euro area with a sequence of New Keynesian Phillips Curve (NKPC) equations that are log-linearised around different, non-zero, steady-state inflation levels. In doing this, we follow a two-step estimation strategy. First, we model the time variation in the relationship between inflation and a real cost-based measure of activity through a Markov-switching vector autoregressive model. We then impose the cross-equation restrictions of a Calvo pricing-based NKPC under non-zero steady-state inflation and estimate the structural parameters by minimising for each inflation state the distance between the restricted and unrestricted vector autoregressive parameters. The structural estimation results indicate that for all the economies there is evidence for a structurally invariant NKPC, albeit with a significant backward-looking component.


A photoinduced solid-state SO₂ isomerism drives a larger mechanical change (benzene-ring rotation) in a neighbouring ion (i.e., the system acts as a solar-powered molecular transducer). The ring rotation and SO₂ photoisomerisation are observed using in situ X-ray crystallography and are controllable, reproducible, and metastable at low temperatures. This discovery presents a new range of materials for solar-energy-based molecular transduction.


We report on YBCO/strontium titanate (STO) thin film K-band tunable ban@ass filters on lanthanum aluminate substrates. The 2 pole filters were designed for a center frequency of 19 GHz and 4% bandwidth. Tunability is achieved through the non-linear dc electric field dependence of the relative dielectric constant of STO(ErSTO). Center frequency shifts of greater than 2 GHz were obtained at a 400V bipolar dc bias at temperatures below 77K, with minimal degradation in the insertion loss of the filters. performance indicated 12% and 9% tunability at 30K and 77K, respectively, using the electric field dependence of the erSTO. Our results prove the feasibility of using tunable HTS/ferroelectric thin film planar microstrip circuits at K-band frequencies.


Aim of the study is to cite the recent research findings
 about multipotent adult mesenchymal stem cells or
 stromal cells (MSCs) considering their origin, phenotypical
 and functional characterization as well as being a bio
 medical ideal candidate for their effective administration
 in MSC-mediated clinical trials. MSCs were firstly reported
 by Friedenstein along with his coworkers within the bone
 marrow of an adult individual categorized as plastic
 adherent, colony forming fibroblastic cells with capability
 of reconstituting a hematopoietic medium when grafted in vivo. Gradually with years, it has been revealed that
 these stromal cells with potential to differentiate in
 multiple mesenchymal mesodermal and non-mesodermal
 cell lines like adipocytes, osteoblasts and chondrocytes,
 are not limited to bone marrow cells but are also exclusive
 part of some other tissues and organs. Many evidences
 have provided an insight supporting their self-renewal
 ability combined with their multipotency both in vivo and in vitro and it has exploited their potential in multiorgan
 engraftment, tissue engineering therapies, immune
 regulatory properties along with capacity to aid as natural
 repair mechanism for tissues both in vitro and in vivo.
 Though, despite this striking spectrum of investigation,
 many queries regarding their developmental origin,
 reproducible pluripotency and their in vivo functional
 mechanism of modeling and remodeling of bones along
 with tissue mending are yet answerable and a lot of
 challenges are needed to deal with before administering
 them in broad clinical prosecutions.


PURPOSE
The phase III North American Intergroup E2496 Trial (Combination Chemotherapy With or Without Radiation Therapy in Treating Patients With Hodgkin's Lymphoma) compared doxorubicin, bleomycin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine (ABVD) with mechlorethamine, doxorubicin, vincristine, bleomycin, vinblastine, etoposide, and prednisone (Stanford V). We report results of a planned subgroup analysis in patients with stage I or II bulky mediastinal Hodgkin lymphoma (HL).

PATIENTS AND METHODS
Patients were randomly assigned to six to eight cycles of ABVD every 28 days or Stanford V once per week for 12 weeks. Two to 3 weeks after completion of chemotherapy, all patients received 36 Gy of modified involved field radiotherapy (IFRT) to the mediastinum, hila, and supraclavicular regions. Patients on the Stanford V arm received IFRT to additional sites ≥ 5 cm at diagnosis. Primary end points were failure-free survival (FFS) and overall survival (OS).

RESULTS
Of 794 eligible patients, 264 had stage I or II bulky disease, 135 received ABVD, and 129 received Stanford V. Patient characteristics were matched. The overall response rate was 83% with ABVD and 88% with Stanford V. At a median follow-up of 6.5 years, the study excluded a difference of more than 21% in 5-year FFS and more than 16% in 5-year OS between ABVD and Stanford V (5-year FFS: 85% v 79%; HR, 0.68; 95% CI, 0.37 to 1.25; P = .22; 5-year OS: 96% v 92%; HR, 0.49; 95% CI, 0.16 to 1.47; P = .19). In-field relapses occurred in < 10% of the patients in each arm.

CONCLUSION
For patients with stage I or II bulky mediastinal HL, no substantial statistically significant differences were detected between the two regimens, although power was limited. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first prospective trial reporting outcomes specific to this subgroup, and it sets a benchmark for comparison of ongoing and future studies.


Abstract. Four successive storms with freezing rain and snow blanketed South China from 10 January–2 February 2008, when the precipitation increased more than 200%–300% above the average for the corresponding period. The unusual atmospheric circulation associated with these disasters was caused by many complex physical processes, one of which was the active southern branch of currents over low latitude ocean areas which provided plenty of water vapor for South China. The ground-based GPS Precipitable Water Vapor (PWV) measurements on the Tibetan Plateau, supported by the China and Japan Intergovernmental Cooperation Program (JICA), has compensated for the lack of conventional observations of atmospheric water vapor in this area and provided a good opportunity to analyze the character of the water vapor transport in the four heavy precipitation processes. It was found that the GPS stations located on the southeastern Tibetan Plateau were on the route of the water vapor transport during 25 January–29 January and 31 January–2 February when two heavy precipitation events occurred over South China. The increasing trend from the one to two days pre-observation by the GPS stations was then associated with the heavy precipitation. Precipitation during 10 January–16 January and 18 January–22 January was significantly related to the abnormal variation of the one day pre-observation by the GPS stations located on the northeastern Tibetan Plateau. This research indicates that ground-based GPS measurements are applicable to data assimilation in operational numerical models.


We study the problem of designing estimators when the data has heavy-tails and is corrupted by outliers. In such an adversarial setup, we aim to design statistically optimal estimators for flexible non-parametric distribution classes such as distributions with bounded-2k moments and symmetric distributions. Our primary workhorse is a conceptually simple reduction from multivariate estimation to univariate estimation. Using this reduction, we design estimators which are optimal in both heavy-tailed and contaminated settings. Our estimators achieve an optimal dimension independent bias in the contaminated setting, while also simultaneously achieving high-probability error guarantees with optimal sample complexity. These results provide some of the first such estimators for a broad range of problems including Mean Estimation, Sparse Mean Estimation, Covariance Estimation, Sparse Covariance Estimation and Sparse PCA.


The interpretation of the strong 14-C variation around AD 775 as one (or several) solar super-flare(s) by, e.g., Usoskin et al. (2013) is based on alleged aurora sightings in the mid AD 770s in Europe: A "red cross/crucifix" in AD 773/4/6 from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "inflamed shields" in AD 776 (both listed in the aurora catalogue of Link 1962), and "riders on white horses" in AD 773 (newly proposed as aurora in Usoskin et al. 2013), the two latter from the Royal Frankish Annals. We discuss the reports about these three sightings in detail here. We can show that all three were halo displays: The "red cross" or "crucifix" is formed by the horizontal arc and a vertical pillar of light (either with the Sun during sunset or with the moon after sunset); the "inflamed shields" and the "riders on white horses" were both two mock suns, especially the latter narrated in form of a Christian adaptation of the antique dioscuri motive. While the latter event took place early in AD 774 (dated AD 773 in Usoskin et al. 2013), the two other sightings have to be dated AD 776, i.e. anyway too late for being in connection with a 14-C rise that started before AD 775. We also sketch the ideological background of those sightings and there were many similar reports throughout that time. In addition, we present a small drawing of a lunar halo display with horizontal arc and vertical pillar forming a cross for shortly later, namely AD 806 June 4, the night of full moon, also from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle; we also show historic drawings of solar and lunar halo crosses from G. Kirch and Helevius and a modern photograph.


Bilateral and multilateral creditors have made a significant effort to increase financial resources flowing to low-income African countries, helping them expand their import capacity. But the increasing share of pure grants and debt relief from bilateral donors in recent years has not allowed these countries to reduce their total indebtedness and solve their debt-overhang problem. Debt relief from bilateral donors has been neutral regarding recipient countries' import capacity. Hernandez and Katada analyze the effects of bilateral debt forgiveness (part of official development assistance) on 32 low-income countries in Africa (198493). Asking whether it makes a difference for recipient countries to receive pure grants rather than official development assistance (ODA) debt relief, they focus on how one form of aid or the other affects the countries' import capacity. They conclude that: Grants allowed recipient countries to significantly expand their import capacity for 198493 as grants and import capacity have been increasing since 1984. But the increasing share of concessional lending and debt relief in recent years has not allowed these countries to reduce their total indebtedness and solve their debt overhang problem. Their arrears increased significantly. The biggest recipients of debt relief also received the lion's share of the increase in pure grants. Debt forgiveness and pure grants were allocated in a way not entirely consistent with standard economic hierarchies (such as poverty levels, indebtedness, and access to alternative sources of finance). Bilateral ODA debt forgiveness appears to be neutral in the sense of not having any significant impact on recipient countries' capacity to import. Bilateral ODA debt forgiveness has neither increased or curtailed the import capacity of the major recipient countries. During 1989-93, multilateral lending replaced the decrease in bilateral lending that, in turn, was caused by an increase in grants. (Bilateral ODA debt relief implies smaller cash flows because it is pseudo or accounting money and because with it goes reduced new lending from bilateral sources.) Private creditors have typically withdrawn money from the countries in the sample as grants increased. And debt relief has had a crowding-out effect on new lending. Bilateral donors are switching their development finance to Africa from concessional and nonconcessional lending to a combination of pure grants and ODA debt relief. This paper - a product of the International Finance Division, International Economics Department - is part of a larger effort in the department to monitor developments in highly indebted low income countries.


Carbon nanotubes have been envisioned to become a very important material in various applications. This is due to the unique properties of carbon nanotubes which can be exploited in applications on length scales spanning from the nano world to our macroscopic world. For example, the electronic properties of carbon nanotubes makes them utterly suitable for nano electronics while the strength of them makes them suitable for reinforcements in plastics. Both of these applications do however require... mer the ability for systematic production of carbon nanotubes with certain properties. This is called selective carbon nanotube growth and today this has not been achieved with total success. In the work presented in the thesis several different computational methods have been applied in our contribution to the systematic search for selective carbon nanotube growth. Put in a context of previous knowledge about carbon nanotube growth our results provide valuable clues to which parameters that control the carbon nanotube growth. In association with the latest results we even dare to, with all modesty, speculate about a plausible control mechanism. The studies presented in the thesis addressed different stages of carbon nanotube growth, spanning from the properties affecting the initiation of the growth to the parameters affecting the termination of the growth. In some more detail this included studies of the melting temperatures of nanoscaled metal clusters. The expected size dependence of the melting temperatures was confirmed and the melting temperatures of clusters on substrates were seen to depend both on the material and shape of the surface. As this constitute the premises prior to the carbon nanotube growth it was followed by studies of the interaction between carbon nanotubes and metal clusters of different size and constitution. This was done using different computational methods and at different temperatures. It soon became apparent that the clusters adapted to the carbon nanotube and not vice versa. This held true irrespectively of the constitution of the cluster, that is for both pure metal and metal carbide. It was also seen that there exist a minimum cluster size that prevent the carbon nanotube end from closing. Closure of the carbon nanotube end is likely to lead to the termination of the growth which lead to studies of other reasons for growth termination, e.g., Ostwald ripening of the catalyst particles. This was investigated with the result that the rate of the Ostwald ripening may depend on both the chirality and diameter of the carbon nanotubes. It is suggested that this may provide some answers to the controlled growth of carbon nanotubes.


Preliminary studies have been carried out on some nickel-accumulating plants from New Caledonia: Hybanthus austrocaledonicus forms A and B, Hybanthus caledonicus var. linearifolia, and Psychotria douarrei. The Australian nickel accumulator Hybanthus floribundus was also studied for comparison purposes. The nickel content of all the New Caledonian species was extremely high, and reached nearly 16.0% (mass of ash basis) in H. caledonicus var. linearifolia. Except for H. floribundus (29%), most of the nickel in the plants was soluble in water, and reached 94% for P. douarrei (dry mass basis). Column chromatography with Sephadex G-10 gel showed that nickel existed in most species in two forms: a charged complex (molecular mass < 200) and free nickel ions. Ultracentrifugation experiments and electron microprobe studies showed no evidence for the accumulation of nickel in any specific plant tissues. High-voltage electrophoresis paper was used to study amino acid patterns and revealed that the nickel was entirely present in a double-charged form (free and complexed) and was not associated with any of the amino acids. The amino acid patterns, together with data on the morphology, elemental content, and ecology of the plants, indicated that H. caledonicus form B may be a separate variety of the species.


INTRODUCTION
Haemophilus influenzae, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Neisseria meningitidis are the main human pathogens that cause meningitis.

OBJECTIVE
Primers omp2, lytA and crgA were evaluated with H. influenzae, S. pnumoniae and N. meningitidis DNA in a multiplex PCR, determining the sensitivity and the specificity of the technique.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Primers for H. influenzae outer membrane protein (omp2, 1000 pb), S. pneumoniae autolysin (lytA, 395 pb) and N. meningitidis, contact regulated gene (crgA, 230 pb) were evaluated in a multiplex PCR, determining the sensitivity and the specificity of the technique.

RESULTS
Reproducible results were obtained with 50 nM of each of the three primers and annealing temperature of 57 degrees C in the multiplex PCR, obtaining a sensitivity of 12.5 fg for H. influenzae and S. pneumoniae and 3.12 fg for N. meningitidis. No cross reactions with other microorganisms agents of meningitis or related with the genera, appeared.

CONCLUSIONS
The results for sensitivity and specificity suggest that the evaluated primers can be used for the development of a PCR in a multiplex format to the identification of the three main pathogens that cause meningitis.


Abstract Heterodontosaurids are an enigmatic group of primitive ornithischian dinosaurs best known from the Early Jurassic of southern Africa. Because fossil material is rare and often poorly preserved, the taxonomy, systematics, and palaeobiology of this clade are controversial. Here we describe a new partial skull of a juvenile Heterodontosaurus tucki from the 'Stormberg' of South Africa. This skull provides new information on the cranial anatomy of this taxon as well as insights into cranial ontogeny, sexual dimorphism and tooth replacement in heterodontosaurids. Few ontogenetic changes in dental morphology occur in Heterodontosaurus, supporting previous suggestions that tooth characters are informative for species-level taxonomy in heterodontosaurids. Furthermore, the presence of well-developed caniniform teeth in the juvenile specimen does not support the hypothesis that these represent secondary sexual characteristics in heterodontosaurids. Computed tomography reveals that replacement teeth are absent in both juvenile and adult specimens of Heterodontosaurus; however, the difference in the absolute size of the teeth between the juvenile and adult specimens demonstrates that replacement must have occurred during ontogeny.


With the significant penetration of wind generation, the variability and uncertainty of wind energy poses new challenges to power system operations. In particular, more rapid reserve is required, which may result in the scarcity of balancing services. With the increasing penetration of renewable generation, it is envisaged that renewable resources will be required to partake in the system balancing tasks. In this paper, a combined flexible dispatch and reserve scheduling policy is proposed by determining a flexible wind dispatch margin. In order to provide a flexible dispatch margin, wind generators underschedule in the hour-ahead energy market, so as to hold some expected output for reserves. Additional wind energy is then available for mitigating forecast errors and other system uncertainties. This paper presents a framework to find the optimal policy to incorporate the flexible wind dispatch margin into the hour-ahead market. A finite-state Markov chain wind power forecast model, based on spatio-temporal analysis, is utilized. The presented framework is used to find the appropriate level of wind dispatch margin. The proposed approach is tested and the wind generation data are used to analyze the effectiveness of the presented model in coping with forecast errors and achieving a more secure system operation.


"Wireframe" is a line segment based representation designed to well capture large-scale visual properties of regular, structural shaped man-made scenes surrounding us. Unlike the wireframes, conventional edges or line segments focus on all visible edges and lines without particularly distinguishing which of them are more salient to man-made structural information. Existing wireframe detection models rely on supervising the annotated data but do not explicitly pay attention to understand how to compose the structural shapes of the scene. In addition, we often face that many foreground objects occluding the background scene interfere with proper inference of the full scene structure behind them. To resolve these problems, we first time in the field, propose new conditional data generation and training that help the model understand how to ignore occlusion indicated by holes, such as foreground object regions masked out on the image. In addition, we first time combine GAN in the model to let the model better predict underlying scene structure even beyond large holes. We also introduce pseudo labeling to further enlarge the model capacity to overcome small-scale labeled data. We show qualitatively and quantitatively that our approach significantly outperforms previous works unable to handle holes, as well as improves ordinary detection without holes given.


Context. The BEER algorithm searches stellar light curves for the BEaming, Ellipsoidal, and Reflection photometric modulations that are caused by a short-period companion. These three effects are typically of very low amplitude and can mainly be detected in light curves from space-based photometers. Unlike eclipsing binaries, these effects are not limited to edge-on inclinations. Aims. Applying the algorithm to wide-field photometric surveys such as CoRoT and Kepler offers an opportunity to better understand the statistical properties of short-period binaries. It also widens the window for detecting intrinsically rare systems, such as shortperiod brown-dwarf and massive-planetary companions to main-sequence stars. Methods. Applying the search to the first five long-run center CoRoT fields, we identified 481 non-eclipsing candidates with periodic flux amplitudes of 0.5–87 mmag. Optimizing the Anglo-Australian-Telescope pointing coordinates and the AAOmega fiberallocations with dedicated softwares, we acquired six spectra for 231 candidates and seven spectra for another 50 candidates in a seven-night campaign. Analysis of the red-arm AAOmega spectra, which covered the range of 8342–8842 Å, yielded a radial-velocity precision of ∼1 km s−1. Spectra containing lines of more than one star were analyzed with the two-dimensional correlation algorithm TODCOR. Results. The measured radial velocities confirmed the binarity of seventy of the BEER candidates – 45 single-line binaries, 18 doubleline binaries, and 7 diluted binaries. We show that red giants introduce a major source of false candidates and demonstrate a way to improve BEER's performance in extracting higher fidelity samples from future searches of CoRoT light curves. The periods of the confirmed binaries span a range of 0.3–10 days and show a rise in the number of binaries per ΔlogP toward longer periods. The estimated mass ratios of the double-line binaries and the mass ratios assigned to the single-line binaries, assuming an isotropic inclination distribution, span a range of 0.03–1. On the low-mass end, we have detected two brown-dwarf candidates on a ∼1 day period orbit. Conclusions. This is the first time non-eclipsing beaming binaries are detected in CoRoT data, and we estimate that ∼300 such binaries can be detected in the CoRoT long-run light curves.


We show that the structure of a growing tree preserves an information on the shape of an initial graph. For the exponential trees, evidence of this kind of memory is provided by means of the iterative equations, derived for the moments of the node-node distance distribution. Numerical calculations confirm the result and allow to extend the conclusion to the Barabási–Albert scale-free trees. The memory effect almost disappears, if subsequent nodes are connected to the network with more than one link.


Publication bias, the fact that studies identified for inclusion in a meta analysis do not represent all studies on the topic of interest, is commonly recognized as a threat to the validity of a meta analysis. One way to explicitly model publication bias is via weighted probability distributions. We adopt the non‐parametric approach initially introduced by Dear and Begg (1992) but impose that the weight function w is monotonely non‐increasing as a function of the p‐value. Since in meta analysis one typically only has few studies or "observations," regularization of the estimation problem seems sensible. In addition, virtually all parametric weight functions proposed so far in the literature are in fact decreasing. We discuss how to estimate a decreasing weight function in the above model and illustrate the new methodology on two well‐known examples. Some basic properties of the log‐likelihood function and computation of a p‐value quantifying the evidence against the null hypothesis of a constant weight function are indicated. In addition, we provide an approximate selection bias adjusted profile likelihood confidence interval for the treatment effect. The corresponding software and the data sets used to illustrate it are provided as the R package selectMeta (Rufibach, 2011).


Distributed parallel stochastic gradient descent algorithms are workhorses for large scale machine learning tasks. Among them, local stochastic gradient descent (Local SGD) has attracted significant attention due to its low communication complexity. Previous studies prove that the communication complexity of Local SGD with a fixed or an adaptive communication period is in the order of O (N3/2 T1/2) and O (N3/4 T3/4) when the data distributions on clients are identical (IID) or otherwise (Non-IID), where N is the number of clients and T is the number of iterations. In this paper, to accelerate the convergence by reducing the communication complexity, we propose STagewise Local SGD (STL-SGD), which increases the communication period gradually along with decreasing learning rate. We prove that STL-SGD can keep the same convergence rate and linear speedup as mini-batch SGD. In addition, as the benefit of increasing the communication period, when the objective is strongly convex or satisfies the Polyak-Lojasiewicz condition, the communication complexity of STL-SGD is O (N log T ) and O (N1/2 T1/2) for the IID case and the Non-IID case respectively, achieving significant improvements over Local SGD. Experiments on both convex and non-convex problems demonstrate the superior performance of STL-SGD.


Background: The burn unit is a suitable environment for the growth of pathogenic bacteria that can reduce these pathogens by appropriate disinfection methods. So, choosing an appropriate disinfectant and applying standard methods of disinfection can be effective in reducing nosocomial infections. The aim of this study is evaluation of efficacy of current disinfectants on pathogens isolated from surface of different parts of Shahid Sadughi accidents burns hospital in city of Yazd. Methods: In this study, the sampling method has done simple randomly and 240 samples were collected from 30 different parts of hospital surfaces (for every disinfectant 30 samples before and 30 samples after disinfection). The samples in the Microbiology laboratory of Medical Sciences University were cultured on blood agar and EMB agar culture. Colonies that were suspected to pathogens were identified by biochemical tests and their colony count was determined. Data were analyzed using Paired T-test. Results: The average of isolated bacteria at 4 parts of burn unit of hospital before disinfecting by Deconex 50 AF, Descoscid, Epimax SC and Silvosept was 58.02, 18897.28, 30989.05 and 38.52 respectively and after disinfecting was 12.8, 0.62, 1.65 and 5.09 respectively. Reducing of contamination in all disinfectants shown a significant difference (p<0.05). The most common isolated pathogens were Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Klebsiella, staphylococcus aureus, Enterobacter and Escherichia coli. Conclusion: The results showed that all disinfectants was effective on isolated pathogens and also have shown a significant difference (p<0.05) between the average of bacteria count before and after disinfection. Keyword: Disinfectant, Pathogen, Burn unit, Nosocomial infections D ow nl oa de d fr om je he .a bz um s. ac .ir a t 1 7: 55 + 03 30 o n T ue sd ay D ec em be r 18 th 2 01 8 [ D O I: 10 .1 88 69 /a ca dp ub .je he .3 .2 .9 3 ]


In the memory hierarchy of computer systems, the traditional semiconductor memories Static RAM (SRAM) and Dynamic RAM (DRAM) have already served for several decades as cache and main memory. With technology scaling, they face increasingly intractable challenges like power, density, reliability and scalability. As a result, they become less appealing in the multi/many-core era with ever increasing size and memory-intensity of working sets.
Recently, there is an increasing interest in using emerging non-volatile memory technologies in replacement of SRAM and DRAM, due to their advantages like non-volatility, high device density, near-zero cell leakage and resilience to soft errors. Among several new memory technologies, Phase Change Memory (PCM) and Spin-Torque-Transfer Magnetic-RAM (STT-MRAM) are most promising candidates in building main memory and cache, respectively. However, both of them possess unique limitations that preventing them from being effectively adopted.
In this dissertation, I present my circuit design work on tackling the limitations of PCM and STT-MRAM. At bit level, both PCM and STT-MRAM suffer from excessive write energy, and PCM has very limited write endurance. For PCM, I implement Differential Write to remove large number of unnecessary bit-writes that do not alter the stored data. It is then extended to STT-MRAM as Early Write Termination, with specific optimizations to eliminate the overhead of pre-write read. At array level, PCM enjoys high density but could not provide competitive throughput due to its long write latency and limited number of read/write circuits. I propose a Pseudo-Multi-Port Bank design to exploit intrabank parallelism by recycling and reusing shared peripheral circuits between accesses in a time-multiplexed manner. On the other hand, although STT-MRAM features satisfactory throughput, its conventional array architecture is constrained on density and scalability by the pitch of the per-column bitline pair. I propose a Common-Source-Line Array architecture which uses a shared source-line along the row, essentially leaving only one bitline per column.
For these techniques, I provide circuit level analyses as well as architecture/system level and/or process/device level discussions. In addition, relevant background and work are thoroughly surveyed and potential future research topics are discussed, offering insights and prospects of these next-generation memories.