SMEs employ a large proportion of the labour force in developing countries. Compared to large firms, however, few SMEs export – direct exports represent just 3% of total SME manufacturing sales, compared to 14% for large enterprises (World Trade Organisation, 2016). Recent research has found that exporting provides important gains for small firms. An innovative project in Egypt found that exporting raised rug firms' profits by 26%, with similarly dramatic rises in productivity (Atkin et al., 2017). By learning new skills from intermediaries and foreign buyers, exporting firms increased the quality of their products as well as their efficiency. Demonstrating the importance of this process of "learning by exporting" and the resulting increases in profitability makes the case for increases in trade finance and better policies to facilitate trade for SMEs. Policies to boost SME trade need to address the often high costs and barriers to finding and matching buyers and sellers. Such policies can lower costs by facilitating connections between buyers and sellers, increasing access to information about regulations and export opportunities, and introducing measures to ensure quality of goods and services. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) provide the majority of jobs in developing countries, yet they have low productivity and exports. International trade can spur the growth of SMEs. Trading up: The benefits of exporting for small firms


Our society faces multiple daunting challenges including finding sustainable solutions towards climate change mitigation; efficient production of food, biofuels, and biomaterials; maximizing land-use efficiency; and enabling a sustainable bioeconomy. Plants can provide environmentally and economically sustainable solutions to these challenges due to their inherent capabilities for photosynthetic capture of atmospheric CO2, allocation of carbon to various organs and partitioning into various chemical forms, including contributions to total soil carbon. In order to enhance crop productivity and optimize chemistry simultaneously in the above- and belowground plant tissues, transformative biosystems design strategies are needed. Concerted research efforts will be required for accelerating the development of plant cultivars, genotypes, or varieties that are cooptimized in the contexts of biomass-derived fuels and/or materials aboveground and enhanced carbon sequestration belowground. Here, we briefly discuss significant knowledge gaps in our process understanding and the potential of synthetic biology in enabling advancements along the fundamental to applied research arc. Ultimately, a convergence of perspectives from academic, industrial, government, and consumer sectors will be needed to realize the potential merits of plant biosystems design for a carbon neutral bioeconomy.


Although hollow-core reinforced concrete (RC) bridge piers are frequently used in practice, no guidelines are available for the design of their upgrade. Also, literature on hollow columns is scarce. Recent studies confirmed that the failure of hollow columns is affected by premature bars buckling and concrete cover spalling. This paper discusses a pilot experimental investigation on full-scale RC hollow columns confined with glass FRP (GFRP) and subjected to pure axial load. Hollow column specimens were characterized by an overall length of 3.05 m [10 ft], cross-sectional dimensions of 508 mm by 737 mm [20 in by 29 in] and a wall thickness of 114 mm [4.5 in]. Three specimens were tested: one unstrengthened (benchmark) and two GFRP-jacketed with two different confining reinforcement ratios. The specimens were designed according to dated codes (i.e., prior to 1970) for gravity loads only. In particular, steel longitudinal bar area and steel tie spacing were designed following the ACI 318-63 code-mandated minimum amount of longitudinal reinforcement and minimum tie area at maximum spacing for solid elements. The objective of this study was to determine how the confinement by means of externally bonded FRP sheets impacts column performance. Specifically, the investigation aimed at characterizing: the confinement contribution in terms of axial strength and prevention of instability of longitudinal bars; and the sensitivity of any enhancement in performance to the confining reinforcement ratio. It is demonstrated that the FRP confinement contributes to an increase in deformability as a function of the confinement reinforcement ratio.


Aims. We produce a clean and well-characterised catalogue of objects within 100 pc of the Sun from the Gaia Early Data Release 3. We characterise the catalogue through comparisons to the full data release, external catalogues, and simulations. We carry out a first analysis of the science that is possible with this sample to demonstrate its potential and best practices for its use.
Methods. The selection of objects within 100 pc from the full catalogue used selected training sets, machine-learning procedures, astrometric quantities, and solution quality indicators to determine a probability that the astrometric solution is reliable. The training set construction exploited the astrometric data, quality flags, and external photometry. For all candidates we calculated distance posterior probability densities using Bayesian procedures and mock catalogues to define priors. Any object with reliable astrometry and a non-zero probability of being within 100 pc is included in the catalogue.
Results. We have produced a catalogue of 331 312 objects that we estimate contains at least 92% of stars of stellar type M9 within 100 pc of the Sun. We estimate that 9% of the stars in this catalogue probably lie outside 100 pc, but when the distance probability function is used, a correct treatment of this contamination is possible. We produced luminosity functions with a high signal-to-noise ratio for the main-sequence stars, giants, and white dwarfs. We examined in detail the Hyades cluster, the white dwarf population, and wide-binary systems and produced candidate lists for all three samples. We detected local manifestations of several streams, superclusters, and halo objects, in which we identified 12 members of Gaia Enceladus. We present the first direct parallaxes of five objects in multiple systems within 10 pc of the Sun.
Conclusions. We provide the community with a large, well-characterised catalogue of objects in the solar neighbourhood. This is a primary
benchmark for measuring and understanding fundamental parameters and descriptive functions in astronomy.


We report the serendipitous discovery of transient, point-like high energy gamma-ray emission coincident with the position of the suspected BL Lac object 5C 3.178. The source was detected using the Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) at a significance level of similar to 8 sigma during a 200 day period which began on November 17th 2011 (MJD 55 882). The observed gamma-ray emission is characterised by a moderate 0.2-300 GeV flux F0.2-300 (GeV) = (8.22 +/- 2.04) x 10(-9) ph cm(-2) s(-1) and a hard power law spectrum with spectral index Gamma = 1.76 +/- 0.09. These properties appear consistent with the known sub-population of TeV gamma-ray-emitting BL Lac objects, implying that the source may be detectable using atmospheric Cherenkov telescope arrays. Moreover, the temporal variability of the source suggests that real-time searches of the Fermi-LAT all-sky dataset for weak emission on similar to 200 day timescales may represent a rewarding strategy.


In order to avoid load imbalances on the GPU during direct volume rendering, a common scheme was to move the generation of proxy geometry, that quite often consists of polygons retrieved through box-plane intersections, from the CPU to the vertex stage of the GPU. Nowadays, with the unified shader architectures implemented by modern graphics hardware, usually non of the programmable stages will starve anymore. Nevertheless, redistributing calculations for proxy geometry generation from the vertex stage to the newly introduced geometry stage of the graphics hardware results in some serial computations that can be performed more finely grained, thus hinting the graphics driver to schedule more tasks in parallel. We propose different implementations of box-plane intersection algorithms on the GPU that use the vertex- as well as the geometry stage and compare their performance on modern graphics hardware.


This paper focuses on hydrogen production for green mobility applications (other applications are currently under investigation). Firstly, a brief state of the art of hydrogen generation by hydrolysis with magnesium is shown. The hydrolysis performance of Magnesium powder ball–milled along with different additives (graphite and transition metals TM = Ni, Fe, and Al) is taken for comparison. The best performance was observed with Mg–10 wt.% g mixtures (95% of theoretical hydrogen generation yield in about 3 min). An efficient solution to control this hydrolysis reaction is proposed to produce hydrogen on demand and to feed a PEM fuel cell. Tests on a bench fitted with a 100 W Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cell have demonstrated the technological potential of this solution for electric assistance applications in the field of light mobility.


The placebo is a therapeutics tool well known since the antiquity. It is used in clinical practice and research. In this article I have define the concept and resume the guidelines for its use in clinical research.


Abstract High-frequency oscillations (HFOs) are an intriguing potential biomarker for epilepsy, typically categorized according to peak frequency as either ripples (100–250 Hz) or fast ripples (>250 Hz). In the hippocampus, fast ripples were originally thought to be more specific to epileptic tissue, but it is still very difficult to distinguish which HFOs are caused by normal versus pathological brain activity. In this study, we use a computational model of hippocampus to investigate possible network mechanisms underpinning normal ripples, pathological ripples, and fast ripples. Our results unify several prior findings regarding HFO mechanisms, and also make several new predictions regarding abnormal HFOs. We show that HFOs are generic, emergent phenomena whose characteristics reflect a wide range of connectivity and network input. Although produced by different mechanisms, both normal and abnormal HFOs generate similar ripple frequencies, underscoring that peak frequency is unable to distinguish the two. Abnormal ripples are generic phenomena that arise when input to pyramidal cells overcomes network inhibition, resulting in high-frequency, uncoordinated firing. In addition, fast ripples transiently and sporadically arise from the precise conditions that produce abnormal ripples. Lastly, we show that such abnormal conditions do not require any specific network structure to produce coherent HFOs, as even completely asynchronous activity is capable of producing abnormal ripples and fast ripples in this manner. These results provide a generic, network-based explanation for the link between pathological ripples and fast ripples, and a unifying description for the entire spectrum from normal ripples to pathological fast ripples.


Iran's proved natural gas reserves are the world's second largest reserves. Mainly, because of different climate changes and different reservoirs' characterizations, studying the behavior of producing outcome fluids and their transportation is greatly essential. One of the main problems occurs in the gas reservoirs is related to the hydrate formation while producing from a well, either in production strings or production lines (before and after choke). Effective parameters which lead to form hydrates are: high pressure, low temperature and water presence; and therefore, the high possibility of having this phenomenon in Iranian reservoirs is quite obvious especially in the cold climates and for the gas wells. Hydrate formation in production lines and equipments will also result in many different obstacles such as: complete or partial closure in production lines and heat exchangers, erosion of the equipment, pressure reduction, etc. In this paper, by the experimental data from one the Iranian sour gas field, the conditions of hydrate formation, which will be helpful to determine the safe/unsafe zones by P-T curves, will be discussed. In addition, the final data will be compared to other correlations, as well.


A cysteine protease inhibitor with an apparent Mr = 12,600, designated limulus (L)-cystatin, was isolated from hemocyte lysates of the Japanese horseshoe crab (Tachypleus tridentatus), using two steps of chromatography, including dextran sulfate-agarose, and carboxymethylated papain-agarose. L-cystatin inhibits amidolytic activity of papain by forming a noncovalent 1:1 complex with an equilibrium constant (Ki) of 0.08 nM. It also inhibits cathepsin L (Ki = 0.17 nM) and ficin (Ki = 0.52 nM), but not argingipain (a bacterial cysteine protease) and calpains. A cDNA for L-cystatin was isolated and the open reading frame coded for a mature protein of 114 amino acids, of which 99 residues were confirmed by peptide sequencing. L-cystatin shows significant sequence identities to members of the family 2 cystatin, such as bovine colostrum cystatin (33%) and human cystatin S (31%). Northern blotting revealed expression of the mRNA in hemocytes and slightly in heart but expression was negligible in hepatopancreas, intestine, stomach, and muscle. Immunoblotting revealed the localization to be in the large granules of hemocytes. Furthermore, L-cystatin has an antimicrobial activity against Gram-negative bacteria, which is much stronger than that of chicken egg white cystatin. These data suggest that the large granule-derived L-cystatin serves synergistically to accomplish an effective defense against invading microbes, together with other defense molecules that are released in response to external stimuli.


S ummer is the time for fun—and as I write, looking at today's New York Times (8 July), there is the president of the United States having some. In a four-color photograph above the fold, he is helping his daughter Jenna boat an impressively large fish. It is not named in the caption but is readily identifiable as Morone saxatilis, called striped bass by us New Englanders, though doubtless known to the White House chef by its Chesapeake name, rockfish. Everyone in the picture is having a wonderful time. But the president, without his knowledge, has just captured a fish with a message.

In my summertime reverie, I imagined that the 43rd president might have turned to no. 41, who was driving the boat, and said "Gee, Dad—did you catch 'em like this when you were Jenna's age?" Although tempted to employ the usual fisherman's license to lie, former President Bush would have had to answer: "No, son. I don't remember that we did." In fact, when I was Jenna's age and studying fish biology at Woods Hole, it was almost a mantra that stripers (and bluefish, another sport-fishing favorite) were relatively scarce north of Cape Cod.

The recent northward redistribution surely delights the Bushes and other Gulf of Maine fishermen. More important, these changes in biogeography have many parallels, as the striper's message to the president is repeated elsewhere. On the West Coast, in the intertidal at Hopkins Marine Station near Monterey, California, old transects made in John Steinbeck's day have been reexamined, demonstrating a massive replacement of northern invertebrates by ones with a more southern distribution. On land, around the Bush estate in Kennebunkport, Maine, American cardinals, birds unknown in New England in my youth, now not only breed but even come to feeders in the dead of winter!

These observations typify a growing host of phenetic studies that have documented biological responses to global warming during the past century. The list is rich indeed: significant advances in the dates for first breeding in a number of bird species; changes in the dates at which British plants first flower; upward shifts in the distribution of Alpine flowering plants, at rates up to 4 meters of elevation per decade; and northward adjustments in the distribution of several species of North American butterflies. Such changes document the reality of global warming, though they are not necessary for that purpose, as we now have so much physical data (ranging from average global temperature to rates at which glaciers are receding or river ice breaks up) to show that it's happening. But examining the biological impacts is useful for at least two reasons.

The first is that it tells us something about what continuing change may portend. What is clear is that natural communities will not be displaced intact as the temperature rises. Each ecosystem depends on a kind of coevolved synchrony, in which flowers and pollinators, predators and prey, herbivores and their food plants not only depend on one another but also on one another's timing. If the flower isn't blooming, the butterfly can't pollinate it: result, no nectar for the insect, no seeds for the plant. Most of the studies show that different species respond at different rates, dismembering communities that once worked well together. It is something we should expect in estimating the impacts of climate change.

The second is that the biological effects tell us things directly that we can otherwise learn of only from someone else's numbers. Anyone my age (I'm 71) can document such changes as a result of personal experience. That's why it always surprises me when thoughtful outdoorsmen like the president don't buy into the reality of global warming right away, without requiring persuasion from bevies of advisers.

My impression is that President Bush is coming awake to this particular problem, and he probably doesn't need much help from me. Nevertheless, here is a suggestion. The next time he meets with a group of old friends from the oil bidness who are still in denial about climate change, he should tell them a fish story. The message from Jenna's striper could just as well have come in a bottle from the scientific community: Climate change is real, and it's time to do something.


Electrochemical voltage shifts in metallic biomedical implants occur in-vivo due to a number of processes including mechanically assisted corrosion. Surface potential of biomedical implants and excursions from resting open circuit potential (OCP), which is the voltage they attain while in contact with an electrolyte, can significantly change the interfacial properties of the metallic surfaces and alter the behavior of the surrounding cells, compromising the biocompatibility of metallic implants. Voltages can also be controlled to modulate cell function and fate. To date, the details of the physico-chemical phenomena and the role of different biomaterial parameters involved in the interaction between cells and metallic surfaces under cathodic bias have not been fully elucidated. In this work, changes in the interfacial properties of a CoCrMo biomedical alloy (ASTM F-1537) in phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) (pH 7.4) at different voltages was studied. Step polarization impedance spectroscopy technique was used to apply 50 mV voltage steps to samples, and the time-based current transients were recorded. A new equation was derived based on capacitive discharge through a Tafel element and generalized to deal with non-ideal impedance behavior. The new function compared to the KWW–Randles function, better matched the time-transient response. The results also showed a voltage dependent oxide resistance and capacitance behavior. Additionally, the in-vitro effect of static voltages on the behavior of MC3T3-E1 preosteoblasts cultured on CoCrMo alloy (ASTM-1537) was studied to determine the range of cell viability and mode of cell death beyond the viable range. Cell viability and morphology, changes in actin cytoskeleton, adhesion complexes and nucleus, and mode of cell death (necrosis, or intrinsic or extrinsic apoptosis) were characterized at different voltages ranging from -1000 to +500 mV (Ag/AgCl). Moreover, electrochemical currents and metal ion concentrations at each voltage were measured and related to the observed responses. Results show that cathodic and anodic voltages outside the voltage viability range (-400 < V < +500) lead to primarily intrinsic apoptotic and necrotic cell death, respectively. Cell death is associated with cathodic current densities of 0.1 μAcm and anodic current densities of 10 μAcm. Significant increase in metallic ions (Co, Cr, Ni, Mo) was seen at +500 mV, and -1000 mV (Cr only) compared to open circuit potential. The number and total projected area of adhesion complexes was also lower on the polarized alloy (p < 0.05). These results show that reduction reactions on CoCrMo alloys leads to apoptosis of cells on the surface and may be a relevant mode of cell death for metallic implants in-vivo. On the other hand, we studied how surface oxide thickness of Ti affects its voltage viability range and cellular response and whether anodic oxidation can serve as a means to extend this range. Cellular behavior (cell viability, cytoskeletal organization, and cellular adhesion) on bare and anodized Ti samples, potentiostatically held at voltages at the cathodic edge of the viability range, were assessed. Surfaces were characterized using contact angle (CA) measurement technique and atomic force microscopy (AFM), and the observed cellular response was related to the changes in the electrochemical properties (electrochemical currents, open circuit potential, and impedance spectra) of the samples. Results show that anodization at a low voltage (9 V) in phosphate buffer saline (PBS) generates a compact surface oxide with comparable surface roughness and energy to the starting native oxide on the bare surface. The anodized surface extends the viability range at 24 hours by about a 100 mV in the cathodic region, and preserved the cytoskeletal integrity and cell adhesion. Broadening of the viability range corresponds to an increase in impedance of the anodized surface at -400 mV(Ag/AgCl) and the resulting low average currents (below 0.1 μAcm) at the interface, which diminish the harmful cathodic reactions. Finally, cellular dynamics (size, polarity, movement) and temporal changes in the number and total area of focal adhesions in transiently transfected MC3T3-E1 pre-osteoblasts cultured on a CoCrMo alloy polarized at the cathodic and anodic edges of its voltage viability range (-400 and +500 mV(Ag/AgCl) respectively) were studied. Nucleus dynamics (size, circularity, movement) and the release of reactive oxygen species (ROS) was also studied on the polarized metal at -1000, -400, and +500 mV(Ag/AgCl). The results show that at -400 mV(Ag/AgCl) a gradual loss of adhesion occurs over 24 hours while cells shrink in size during this time. At +500 mV, cells become non-viable after 5 hours without showing any significant changes in adhesion behavior right before cell death. Nucleus size of cells at -1000 mV decreased sharply within 15 minutes after electrochemical polarization, which rendered the cells completely non-viable. No significant amount of ROS was released by cells on the polarized CoCrMo at any of these voltages. Voltage effects on cells cultured on metallic biomedical implants By Seyed Morteza Haerihosseini B.S., Iran University of Sci. & Tech., Tehran, Iran, 2003 M.S., AmirKabir University of Technology, Tehran, Iran, 2007 Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the field of Biomedical Engineering in the Graduate School of Syracuse University Syracuse University December 2012 ©Copyright 2012, Morteza Haeri All Rights Reserved


The in vitro replication of the Torque teno virus (TT virus) tth8 full-length genome and particle formation in a Hodgkin's lymphoma-derived cell line after transfection with cloned viral DNA were demonstrated. Analyses of the transcription patterns of tth8 and tth7 TT virus isolates in a number of lymphoma and T-cell leukemia cell lines indicated differential additional splicing events and intragenomic rearrangement generating open reading frames which could not be deducted from the genomic sequence. We also demonstrated the presence of rearranged TT virus genomes in vivo in sera taken from pregnant mothers whose children later developed childhood leukemia, as well as sera from control mothers. Control experiments using religated cloned genomic tth8 DNA mixed with cellular DNA did not result in such subviral molecules. These subviral isolates ranged from 172 bp to full-length TT virus genomes. Possible in vivo selection for specific rearranged molecules was indicated by the presence of one isolate (561 bp) in 11 serum samples. It remains to be clarified whether selected rearranged subviral components resulting from specific TT virus types may contribute to the initiation of disease. These data demonstrate new features of TT viruses suggesting possible similarities to plant viruses of the family Geminiviridae , as well as raise questions about the


Each year in the US at least 2 million people are sickened with antibiotic resistant infection. The development of antibiotics was one of the most important advances of medicine. Many bacterial infections (e.g. tuberculosis and infected wounds) that previously had no effective treatment and often killed people became treatable with antibiotics, saving millions of lives. Now, because of the overuse and misuse of antibiotics, bacterial infections that were once easily cured with antibiotics are becoming harder to treat. This is due to antibiotic resistance. The World Health Organization has called this as one of the biggest threats to human health today (World Health Organization 2014). Antibiotics have transformed human health and saved millions of lives. Now, as a result of overuse, they are no longer working. The golden age of medicine has come to an end (Joe Shute). But 99% of microbes will not grow in laboratory conditions leaving researchers frustrated that they could not get to the life-saving natural drugs. The dramatic rise in the incidence of antibiotic resistance demands that new therapeutic options will have to be developed. One potentially interesting class of antimicrobials is the modified bacteriocins termed lantibiotics, which are bacterially produced, post-translationally modified, lanthionine/methyllanthionine containing peptides. The present study was aimed at isolating bacteriocinogenic LAB from a traditional fermented food, "Ambali". Twenty five colonies of LAB were isolated and screened for bacteriocin production potential. Ten isolates showed good antimicrobial activity against Gram-positive viz., Bacillus cereus, Staphylococcus aureus, Listeria monocytogenes as well as Gram-negative viz., Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Vibrio parahaemolyticus and Aeromonas hydrophila microorganisms. During characterization of these strains, two of them were found to resemble two other strains. One of the bacilli has been reported earlier. Therefore, in this study characterization of seven isolates through morphological, physiological, biochemical and carbohydrate fermentation tests as well as cell wall protein profiles have been reported. Five of them were cocci, identified as Pediococcus pentosaceous (four strains) and the other as Tetragenococcus halophilus, while the remaining two being rods and were found to be Lactobacillus plantarum. Keywords: Antibiotics, bacteriocinogenic, tuberculosis Cite this Article Revansiddappa, Chandrashekhar Naik. Isolation and Characterization of Lantibiotic Producing Lactic Acid Bacteria from Ambali, Aged Mango Pickle Probiotics. Research & Reviews: A Journal of Bioinformatics . 2016; 3(3): 30–36p


Objectives:In HIV infection, activated monocytes are enriched in blood and in the perivascular area of the brain, especially in patients with HIV-associated dementia. Although clinical brain disease is uncommon during combination antiretroviral therapy (ART), autopsy series indicate that HIV-infected brain tissue can contain high numbers of monocytes/macrophages despite ART. Design:We assessed activated monocytes in blood and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in 76 living patients on and off ART. Plasma lipids were measured because they have been associated with monocyte activation and ART. Methods:A novel quantitative six-color flow cytometric approach was used to identify monocytes in blood and CSF and to evaluate monocyte activation status. Results:The mean percentage and number of activated CD16 monocytes in CSF was highest in individuals on combination ART, especially in those receiving protease inhibitors (PI). CSF viral load was also associated with higher monocyte activation in CSF. The mean calculated low density lipoprotein (LDL)-, oxidized LDL- and total cholesterol in plasma were highest in patients receiving PI. Conclusions:Activated monocytes are enriched in the CSF of persons living with HIV-1 and receiving ART. This finding is consistent with previously reported autopsy series. The mechanisms and long-term clinical consequences of persistent monocyte activation require further study.


Recognition of suitable group members can be learned through experience or can be genetically based. To determine when learning may be important in social recognition, we compared the social recognition of juveniles and adults of 2 sympatric species of three-spined sticklebacks (Gasterosteus spp.). We altered the social environment of both species, rearing individuals with varying numbers of conspecifics and heterospecifics. We measured the effect of this social experience with heterospecifics on shoaling tendency and shoal member preferences. We also explored age effects by comparing juveniles and adults. Experience modified both the degree of sociality and the choice of social partners. We found that juveniles of both species had a stronger tendency to shoal than adults and that experience with heterospecifics influenced social tendency for juvenile benthics but not limnetics. Use of body size cues in selecting social partners by juveniles was also altered by experience. Only juveniles raised with conspecifics preferred conspecifics that were similar in size. Experience had a large effect for adults who preferred to associate with the species they had been raised with. Differences between juveniles and adults were more pronounced than differences between species. Our results suggest that individuals learn their species identity from the social environment and that this affects social preference. Learned social preferences may also have implications for the maintenance of reproductive isolation between these species. Copyright 2008, Oxford University Press.


The recent installation of a full metal, ITER-like, first wall provided the opportunity to study the impact of the plasma-facing materials on plasma initiation or breakdown. This study will present for the first time a full experimental characterisation of tokamak breakdown at JET, using all discharges since 2008, covering both operations with a main chamber carbon and beryllium ITER-like wall. It was found that the avalanche phase was unaffected by the change in wall material. However, the large reduction in carbon levels resulted in significant lower radiation during the burn-through phase of the breakdown process. Breakdown failures, that usually developed with a carbon wall during the burn-through phase (especially after disruptions) were absent with the ITER-like wall. These observations match with the results obtained with a new model of plasma burn-through that includes plasma-surface interactions. The simulations show that chemical sputtering of carbon is the determining factor for the impurity content, and hence the radiation, during the burn-through phase for operations with a carbon wall. For a beryllium wall, the plasma surface effects do not raise the radiation levels much above those obtained with pure deuterium plasmas, similar as seen in the experimental study. With the ITER-like wall, operation with higher pre-fill pressures, and thus higher breakdown densities, was possible, which helped maintaining sufficient density after breakdown.


The accelerations due to a fast ambulance journey may cause dangerous trauma to the patient. The use of an active suspension system for the ambulance stretcher could significantly reduce the risk of trauma. A specialpurpose parallel robot, interposed between the ambulance frame and the stretcher, and a possible control strategy have been designed in order to compensate the road unevenness and the accelerations due to the ambulance trajectory. The system performance has been assessed using the multibody simulation package Pro/Mechanica by PTC integrated with extensions in C language. The main results of the simulations are reported, showing the feasibility of the project.


Advances in battery technology have not kept pace with rapidly growing energy demands. Most laptops, handheld PCs, and cell phones use batteries that take anywhere from 1.5 to 4 hours to fully charge but can run on this charge for only a few hours. The battery has thus become a key control parameter in the energy management of portables. To meet the stringent power budget of these devices, researchers have explored various architectural, hardware, software, and system-level optimizations to minimize the energy consumed per useful computation. Research in battery-aware optimization is now moving from stand-alone devices to networks of wireless devices, specifically, ad hoc and distributed sensor networks. Computationally feasible mathematical models are now available that capture battery discharge characteristics in sufficient detail to let designers develop an optimization strategy that extracts maximum charge.


Cadmium has been described as being toxic in all living species. At
no level of intake does it appear to have a useful biological function.
Although it was not recognised until 1817 as a separate element man has
been polluting his environment with it for centuries - from the time the
early Greek metallurgist began working with "bronzes". Widely distributed
in the earths crust in low concentrations it remains "locked in"
unless other more important resources are extracted and refined.
Erosion and weathering of the earths crust contributes little to the
level of environmental cadmium.
In nature it is closely associated with zinc. It is also found in many
other polymetallic ores, particularly those containing copper and lead.
Fossil fuels, coal and oil, as well as phosphate rock also contain
significant quantities of cadmium. When mankind refines and utilises
and purifies these materials cadmium is released. It is a relatively
unimportant resource, a by-product of far more important resources.
Whether needed or not it is being separated and recovered in greater
quantities annually. Many uses have been found to make it marketable.
Little recycling of the end product occurs. Consequently an increasing
quantity of "free" cadmium is available for contamination of the environment.
Water, air, food chains, foodstuffs are providing an increasing
load to all living things. It has been claimed it poses a threat to all
life on earth.
Almost 150 years passed from the time cadmium was recognised to the
time it was generally accepted as a dangerous substance. 19th century
industry provided many examples of its acute toxicity but it was the
mid twentieth century before it was established that the metal could
accumulate in the body over many years and ultimately reach a concentration
which interfered with the function of the host cell.
Those most at risk are those who handle the material in their occupation.
But heavy pollution of some Japanese waterways has resulted in death and
chronic disability to the population living along the shores. Chronic
obstructive airways disease and renal tubular disease are common in
those whose working conditions expose them to high concentrations.
Anaemia, bone disease, general malaise have also been found.
Animal experimentation has shown that cadmium, though poorly absorbed,
can enter the body via the skin, lungs and alimentary canal. Its
entry stimulates the formation of a special protein, Metallothionein,
which acts both as a carrier and a receptacle. Cells of many tissues
take up cadmium - in particular the liver, kidney, pancreas, gonads,
salivary and intestinal glands. Because of its environmental ubiquity
and its slow excretion - mainly via the kidney, lifelong accumulation
occurs. How much can the body accumulate before signs of toxicity
appear? Just how toxic is it to various organs?
I have compared the health of 34 workers at the Electrolytic Zinc
Company of Australasia, Risdon, Tasmania who have spent many years
working in a moderately contaminated atmosphere with fellow workers
exposed only to environmental cadmium. I restricted my investigation to the clinical field and avoided invasive investigational procedures..
I found no evidence of any serious ill health specific to the exposed
group. In particular this group did not manifest any of the disabilities
found in similar surveys by others. My group of workers were different
in that they were working in levels well below accepted tolerable
levels. This group therefore could be used as representatives of a
middle group between those environmentally at risk and those seriously
at risk because of heavy occupational exposure.
I found cadmium did cause chronic pulmonary symptoms even in these
low concentrations but without objective pulmonary disease. Some of
those with the longest exposure and presumably the largest body burden
did show evidence of altered haemoglobin and protein synthesis without
obvious clinical manifestations.
I found no evidence of any of the conditions - hypertension, malignancy
endocrine disorders speculatively linked to cadmium by epidemiologists
using results of animal studies on environmental studies and disease
patterns. Though definitely toxic to cells cadmium can be tolerated up
to a certain body burden for a "no effect". I was not able to establish
this burden but the study may provide areas for further research into
this very important question.


The weighted L1 penalty was used to revise the traditional Lasso in the linear regression model under quadratic loss. We make use of this penalty to investigate the highdimensional regression and classification under a wide class of convex loss functions. We show that for the dimension growing nearly exponentially with the sample size, the penalized estimator possesses the oracle property for suitable weights, and its induced classifier is shown to be consistent to the optimal Bayes rule. Moreover, we propose two methods, called componentwise regression (CR) and penalized componentwise regression (PCR), for estimating weights. Both theories and simulation studies provide supporting evidence for the advantage of PCR over CR in high-dimensional regression and classification. The effectiveness of the proposed method is illustrated using real data sets.


Learn more about some of the more common natural disasters that can occur and how to prepare and respond effectively to an environmental threat.


Positive identification of the nature of biological material present on evidentiary items can be crucial for understanding the circumstances surrounding a crime. However, traditional protein-based methods do not permit the identification of all body fluids and tissues, and thus molecular based strategies for the conclusive identification of all forensically relevant biological fluids and tissues need to be developed. Messenger RNA (mRNA) profiling is an example of such a molecular-based approach. Current mRNA body fluid identification assays involve capillary electrophoresis (CE) or quantitative RT-PCR (qRT-PCR) platforms, each with its own limitations. Both platforms require the use of expensive fluorescently labeled primers or probes. CE-based assays require separate amplification and detection steps thus increasing the analysis time. For qRT-PCR assays, only 3-4 markers can be included in a single reaction since each requires a different fluorescent dye. To simplify mRNA profiling assays, and reduce the time and cost of analysis, we have developed single- and multiplex body fluid High Resolution Melt (HRM) assays for the identification of common forensically relevant biological fluids and tissues. The incorporated biomarkers include IL19 (vaginal secretions), IL1F7 (skin), ALAS2 (blood), MMP10 (menstrual blood), HTN3 (saliva) and TGM4 (semen). The HRM assays require only unlabeled PCR primers and a single saturating intercalating fluorescent dye (Eva Green). Each body-fluid-specific marker can easily be identified by the presence of a distinct melt peak. Usually, HRM assays are used to detect variants or isoforms for a single gene target. However, we have uniquely developed duplex and triplex HRM assays to permit the simultaneous detection of multiple targets per reaction. Here we describe the development and initial performance evaluation of the developed HRM assays. The results demonstrate the potential use of HRM assays for rapid, and relatively inexpensive, screening of biological evidence.


This thesis provided a systematic comparison of Religious Education (RE) as it has evolved in the secondary school curriculum of Scotland and Malawi, between 1970 and the present day (2010). It sought to draw analogies and, where valid, to indicate significant points of difference regarding key issues that underpin this development between two countries that also have a historical relationship dating back to 1859. This was a qualitative study which used the phenomenological research method. In both countries data was collected through field-based research using key informant interviews (n60), relevant documents and school surveys.

The conceptual framework of the thesis was based on concepts and issues in the discourse of contemporary RE. The constant comparison strategy of data analysis was implemented in exploring issues that emerged in the research. To further facilitate the analysis of secondary school RE in Scotland and Malawi a thematic approach was adopted in which six key issues were identified and investigated. The first explored the historical problem of underdevelopment in RE. The second examined motives that engendered reforms in the RE curriculum. The third described the various curriculum changes in RE during the period under study. The fourth discussed contested spaces related to the micro-politics of RE. The fifth surveyed the level of provision in RE in different school contexts. The sixth and last assessed the current state of RE.

The findings of this study suggested that despite some points of difference, there was greater similarity on salient issues that underpinned the nature of secondary school RE in the two countries, in areas such as the need for curriculum reform, micro-politics of reform, provision in schools and status of the subject. Given the challenges the subject faces in both Scotland and Malawi, the study concluded that without government intervention and support from other key stakeholders RE will continue to be regarded as a marginal curriculum subject.


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Purpose This study was performed to evaluate the enzyme production in response to implantation of the hydrogel material used in the experimental Chirila keratoprosthesis (KPro) and to assess the effects of five topical drugs on enzyme production and activity. KPros may be extruded from the cornea as a result of tissue melting, a process that involves excessive enzyme activity. To reduce the possibility of implant loss for the hydrogel Chirila KPro, a number of antiinflammatory drugs that have been used to treat other corneal melting conditions were investigated for their effect on initial collagenase activity after the implantation of KPro material into the rabbit cornea. Methods Poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate) sponge pieces were implanted into rabbit corneas. Prednisolone, tetracycline, medroxyprogesterone, acetylcysteine, and sodium citrate were assessed for effects on gelatinolytic activity and stromal collagenase [matrix metalloprotease-1 (MMP-1)] production in vivo and in vitro by using zymography and Western blotting techniques. Results Whereas all five anticollagenase drugs were effective in reducing gelatinolytic activity in vitro, many were ineffective in vivo. However, medroxyprogesterone caused a reduction of gelatinolytic activity in vivo. The amount of MMP-1, as measured by immunoblotting, also was reduced by medroxyprogesterone treatment when compared with untreated controls. An increase in the apparent molecular weight of MMP-1 in operated corneas appears to be the result of the association of MMP-1 with collagen fragments resulting from the surgical trauma. Conclusion This study indicates that topical medroxyprogesterone may be a useful adjunctive therapy after prosthokeratoplasty.


A complete modelling and numerical simulation of a system comprising a separately excited d.c. motor fed from a single-phase, single-way rectifier are presented in this paper. The strategy of this approach is based on the cascade combination of a diode bridge rectifier and a Sepic (single-ended primary inductance converter) circuit. Both step-up and step-down characteristics of the output voltage can be obtained. The supply current is approximately sinusoidal and its power factor is high. A good performance is achieved with a simple control circuit and only one switch for the converter. Differential equations describing the system behaviour in different modes of operations are presented. Solving these equations enable the predication of the motor performance in both transient and stead-state conditions. The total harmonic distortion of the supply and motor currents are obtained using the numerical simulation of this system. Moreover, the effect of the duty ratio of the converter on the system performance is investigated. The experimental and simulation results confirm the theoretical analysis. The proposed configuration provides a useful rectifier with sinusoidal input current and a satisfactory motor speed regulation.


Face anti-spoofing is an important task in full-stack face applications including face detection, verification, and recognition. Previous approaches build models on datasets which do not simulate the real-world data well (e.g., small scale, insignificant variance, etc.). Existing models may rely on auxiliary information, which prevents these anti-spoofing solutions from generalizing well in practice. In this paper, we present a data collection solution along with a data synthesis technique to simulate digital medium-based face spoofing attacks, which can easily help us obtain a large amount of training data well reflecting the real-world scenarios. Through exploiting a novel Spatio-Temporal Anti-Spoof Network (STASN), we are able to push the performance on public face anti-spoofing datasets over state-of-the-art methods by a large margin. Since the proposed model can automatically attend to discriminative regions, it makes analyzing the behaviors of the network possible.We conduct extensive experiments and show that the proposed model can distinguish spoof faces by extracting features from a variety of regions to seek out subtle evidences such as borders, moire patterns, reflection artifacts, etc.


The half‐life of factor VIII (FVIII) increases with the age of the patient, while studies on recombinant factor IX (rFIX) and factor VIIa (rFVIIa) have not demonstrated corresponding age‐related changes. The purpose of this analysis was to relate the changes in FVIII and rFIX pharmacokinetics (PK) with age to developmental changes in body size and fluid volumes and explain why the elimination half‐life of FVIII, but not of rFIX, would change with age, and to consider how the findings could be applied prospectively to other coagulation factors. Published PK data for FVIII from 186 patients aged 1–74 years and for rFIX from 56 patients aged 4–56 years were used. The relationships of FVIII and rFIX clearance (CL) with body weight could be described by allometric expressions. Relative changes in CL with age or weight were similar for FVIII and rFIX. The age‐related change in volume of distribution at steady state (Vss) of rFIX was parallel to the change in CL in the children while for FVIII the change was much less pronounced. Elimination half‐life was clearly age‐dependent for FVIII while only a very weak trend could be seen for rFIX. Limited data suggest that rFVIIa in this respect resembles rFIX, with parallel changes in CL and Vss producing insignificant change in half‐life. To what extent the elimination half‐life of a coagulation factor would show a correlation with age can in principle be predicted from the characteristics of its CL and distribution.


Resilience of the economy is related with its ability to cope with the challenges (e.g., economic and environmental crises). Economies need to be resilient as countries having resilient economy can enhance welfare of their people and achieve sustainable development (SD). Total factor productivity can be improved through smart technologies, smart workforce, and innovations. It requires holistic and systematic as well as strategic approach as it is directly related with the SD of the countries and welfare of their people. It is directly related with the policies covering all these main aspects with the long-term, systematic, and holistic view. Resilient economies need to enhance their resilience to keep them resilient despite of the changes which can act as threats in the future. Resilience of the economy necessitates transformation of the manufacturing industry (MI) into the sustainable, smart, circular, and global one. In this way MI's competitiveness can be enhanced. For this reason, based on an in-depth literature review, this chapter aims to examine ways for enhancing resilience of the global economy through smart, circular, and competitive MI. Specific focus is on the policies fostering the transformation of the MI into the sustainable, smart, circular, global, and innovative one. This chapter emphasizes the importance of and need for the productivity-based resilient economy. Policy makers, academics, and researchers in the relevant field can get benefit from this chapter.


This letter presents a beamspace version of the class of polynomial parameterized weighted subspace fitting (WSF) methods, including the well-known methods iterative quadratic maximum likelihood and method of direction estimation ,f or direction-of-arrival estimation with a uniform linear array. The difficulty with beamspace operation is that the Vandermonde structure of the array manifold may not preserve during a beamspace transformation. We tackle this obstacle using discrete Fourier transform beams and derive a parameterized polynomial representation of the signal subspace in the beamspace dimension. The resulting beamspace iterative quadratic WSF algorithm is not only computationally attractive, but also enjoys improved resolution threshold over element-space estimation.


Objective: Due to accuracy concerns, the Food and Drug Administration issued guidances to manufacturers that resulted in Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services stating that the use of meters in critically ill patients is "off-label" and constitutes "high complexity" testing. This is causing significant workflow problems in ICUs nationally. We wished to determine whether real-world accuracy of modern glucose meters is worse in ICU patients compared with non-ICU inpatients. Design: We reviewed glucose results over the preceding 3 years, comparing results from paired glucose meter and central laboratory tests performed within 60 minutes of each other in ICU versus non-ICU settings. Setting: Seven ICU and 30 non-ICU wards at a 1,300-bed academic hospital in the United States. Subjects: A total of 14,763 general medicine/surgery inpatients and 20,970 ICU inpatients. Interventions: None. Measurements and Main Results: Compared meter results with near simultaneously performed laboratory results from the same patient by applying the 2016 U.S. Food and Drug Administration accuracy criteria, determining mean absolute relative difference and examining where paired results fell within the Parkes consensus error grid zones. A higher percentage of glucose meter results from ICUs than from non-ICUs passed 2016 Food and Drug Administration accuracy criteria (p < 10–10) when comparing meter results with laboratory results. At 1 minute, no meter result from ICUs posed dangerous or significant risk by error grid analysis, whereas at 10 minutes, less than 0.1% of ICU meter results did, which was not statistically different from non-ICU results. Conclusions: Real-world accuracy of modern glucose meters is at least as accurate in the ICU setting as in the non-ICU setting at our institution.


While many firms grant executive stock options that can be repriced, other firms systematically restrict or prohibit repricing. This article investigates the determinants of firms' repricing policies and the consequences of such policies for executive turnover and retention. Firms that have better internal governance, that use more powerful stock-based incentives, or that face less shareholder scrutiny are more likely to maintain repricing flexibility. Firms that restrict repricing are more vulnerable to voluntary executive turnover following stock price declines. When share price declines are severe, restricting firms appear to award unusually large numbers of new options. Copyright 2004 by The American Finance Association.


Hemoplasma infections are emerging and wild fauna can represent an important reservoir of these pathogens. However, there are very few epidemiological studies about the occurrence of hemoplasmas in wild cats around the world. The purpose of this study is twofold: (1) evaluate the occurrence and phylogeny of hemoplasmas in captive wild felines at a zoo in the state of Parana, Brazil, and (2) verify the correlation between subpopulations of these bacteria and the hematological and biochemical parameters of the animals. PCR was used to detect hemoplasmas in the blood of three cougars (Puma concolor), a jaguar (Panthera onca), a tiger (Panthera tigris) and a lion (Panthera leo), followed by sequencing and phylogenetic analysis. The cougars and jaguar were found to be hemoplasma-positive by PCR. The phylogenetic analysis of the 16S rRNA gene sequences enabled the identification of genotypes of 'Candidatus Mycoplasma haemominutum' circulating in this zoo. The identified sequences were closely related to hemoplasma sequences originating from domestic cats and other wild cats, but the infected cougars and jaguar were healthy and showed no hematological or biochemical changes. It was concluded that P. concolor and P. onca are exposed to 'Candidatus Mycoplasma haemominutum' in Parana, but further research is suggested to assess the resistance of wild cats to different hemoplasma subpopulations.


The right-stepping Dobe and Hanle grabens display a variety of structures that serve to transfer extensional displacement. These structures range from relay zones between overlapping fault segments to accommodation zones between interacting rift segments. The study reveals the presence of three examples of displacement transfer structures: a breached relay zone, a large-scale accommodation zone that is partially breached, and a composite zone that combines elements of both. All three examples exhibit common structural elements. First, dipping ramps develop between horizontal horst blocks and graben floors. Second, these ramps are cut by numerous faults, most of which are antithetic to the ramps and the graben boundary faults. The antithetic faults bound elongate blocks that are rotated into the grabens. Third, crosscutting faults partially or completely link the en echelon or overlapping graben boundary faults. The identification of precursory structures (mode I fractures) at the leading edge of the Dobe–Hanle accommodation zone breaching faults suggest that the breaching process may be continuing. The spatial alignment from north to south of the crosscutting faults, open fractures and lineaments indicates that the breaching process is progressing from the Dobe graben towards the Hanle graben.


As instructional leaders, knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSA) play a vital role in managing the city's public secondary school. The effectiveness and quality of management of people and resources are the accountability of a school leader. If the resources of the school are utilized in all undertakings and the decision-making is always in accord with the guidelines, there is a possibility of effective management and delivery of instruction to the learners. This study aimed to determine the KSA of the school heads as instructional leaders in managing city public secondary schools in Laguna Province and ascertained its relationship to the level of school performance. The descriptive method using the self-structured questionnaires was used to gather the data from 59 school heads and 1,194 teacher respondents from five-component cities in the province. The frequency and percentage were employed to determine the demographic profile and status of programs and projects, while the mean and standard deviation for the level of school performance. The multiple regression analysis was used to know the relationship between knowledge, skills, and attitude (KSA) to school performance. Findings revealed that respondents have a high level of KSA, and it has a significant relationship with the school level of performance. Relative to the findings, instructional leaders may provide dynamic and flexible leadership, as a person responsible for shaping the school curriculum. More so, they should be capable of formulating schools' vision and mission, where developmental supervision, monitoring, and evaluation are necessary to sustain best practices including communication and linkages, utilizing resources to improve the level of school performance. Keywords: Knowledge, Skills and Attitude, Instructional Leaders, school performance, instructional supervision, linkages, and partnership.


Growing evidence shows that a homozygous 6.7-kb deletion of the novel anti-inflammatory molecule leukocyte immunoglobulin like receptor A3 (LILRA3) is associated with many autoimmune disorders. However, its effects on pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) have not been clarified yet. LILRA3 is mainly expressed in monocytes, whereas its effects on biological behaviors of monocytes have not been systematically reported. To investigate the association between LILRA3 polymorphism and IBD susceptibility, LILRA3 polymorphism was assessed in 378 IBD patients and 509 healthy controls in our study, quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR), western blot and immunohistochemistry (IHC) were employed to detect the LILRA3 expression in IBD patient blood and intestinal samples. Despite no association of the polymorphism with IBD development was found, LILRA3 expression was markedly increased in IBD patients compared with healthy controls. Human U937 monocyte cell line was employed to establish LILRA3-overexpressing cells and the effects of LILRA3 on the biological behaviors of U937 cells were systematically explored. We found that overexpression of LILRA3 in monocytes led to significant decreases in secretion of interferon-γ (IFN-γ), tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) and interleukin 6 (IL-6). Additionally, LILRA3 abated monocyte migration by reducing the expression of several chemokines and enhanced monocyte phagocytosis by increasing CD36 expression. Furthermore, LILRA3 promoted monocyte proliferation through a combination of Akt and MEK/Erk signaling pathways. We report for the first time that LILRA3 is related to IBD and functions as an anti-inflammatory modulator in U937 cells.


The increasing commoditization of laboratory practice risked favouring speed and cost at the expense of quality. Recent retroactive reagent recalls and literature reports of failure to detect significant analytical deviation suggest that the practice of traditional quality control measures is increasingly insufficient to maintain the quality required for resource restricted, high throughput and complex laboratory testing environment. Newer, patient result-based quality techniques have shown good capability in detecting analytical errors. However, a limitation of such techniques is the difficulty in determining whether a breach in control limit is due to an analytical error or a shift in underlying population being monitored. The next generation electronic medical record is an information technology system that brings together different silos of healthcare databases. It has the potential to significantly alter the way laboratory practices quality control by matching patient result-based laboratory observations with clinical practice and findings. This way, any significantly abnormal laboratory findings can be quickly verified with clinical information. It is possible that the traditional internal quality control practice will be replaced by these techniques, although more research is required before this becomes commonplace.


This paper adds to our understanding of the causes of income inequality across nations by examining the influence of different aspects of gender equality or female empowerment. Whereas the economics of income inequality has been an area of active academic inquiry, the role of gender equality has largely been ignored. Are there positive spillovers from gender equality onto income equality? The answer to this question, using data for nearly 150 nations over the years 1985-2019, is in the affirmative. Specifically, nations with a history of women's suffrage, greater representation of women in the government, lower fertility rates, and better overall gender equality experienced lower income inequality, ceteris paribus. These results are largely supported in considerations of cross-section versus pooled data, simultaneity issues, and the measurement of income inequality. The spillovers from some dimensions of gender equality are found to be sensitive to the existing prevalence of income inequality. Policymakers ignoring the payoffs from gender empowerment on income distribution might be underinvesting in initiatives to empower women.


Although accounting for 2% of body weight, brain has one of the greatest metabolic rates compared with other organs and systems. The energy metabolic consum is expended mainly in the maintenance of ionic gradient, essential to neuronal activity. Brain receives energy substrates from circulation, with interference of blood brain barrier (BBB). Glucose is the main substrate and has a metabolic rate so high as 150 g/day (0.7 mM/G/min). At cellular level, metabolism of glucose seems to be controlled by phosphofructokynase. If the cellular level were high enough, manose and other products like fructose 1,6 biphosphate, pyruvate, lactate and acetate can be used in the place of glucose. Lactate, when oxyded, consums at least 21% of the cerebral needs of O2. In ischemia and inflammatory infections, brain tissue produces lactate instead of use it. Ketone bodies reduce cerebral needs of glucose; in view of the disturbances that occur in cerebral production of succinyl CoA and guanosine 3 phosphate (GTP), they must be considered as complementary substrate but not as an alternative one. Although they can be metabolized, there are no evidences that brain could produce energy from systemic free fatty acids, even when hypoglicemia is present. Ethanol and glycerol are considered only at experimental level. Brain uptake of aminoacids occur better for long chain aminoacids, specially valine. The aminoacids that are synthetised in the brain (aspartate, gluconate and alanine) show the lower absortion rates. All aminoacids should be oxided to CO2 and H2O. Even when glucose consum is reduced to 30%, aminoacid accounts for only 10% of the energetic expenditure of the brain. To maintain cerebral glucose and oxygen supply to the brain, blood flow must be at least 800 ml/min. The regulation of supply and consumption of energy substrate by the brain is changed in few situations. Among them, are included the oxidation of lactate immediately before milk diet early in development and utilization of ketone bodies at the beginning of lactation. This review includes a brief discussion about the relevance of glucose as the main energy substrate for cerebral tissue in different ages and ischemia or hypoxia.


We describe a spoken dialogue system domain: that of the personal secretary. This domain allows us to capitalise on the characteristics that make speech a unique interface; characteristics that humans use regularly, implicitly, and with remarkable ease. We present a prototype system - the KTH Connector - and highlight several dialogue research issues arising in the domain.


ABSTRACT:Since 2013, the Museum of Islamic Art in Berlin and the German Archeological Institute (DAI) have hosted a digital archive documenting Syrian heritage and built environment. This project was developed in the face of a war that would destroy places of cultural heritage on a large scale. The archive consists of photos, plans, and documents and includes more than 200,000 items. For long-term storage and attainability they are integrated into the digital world of the DAI. In order to raise awareness and to present the data to a wider audience, selected photos and drawings are bundled into stories on a new website with text in English, Arabic, and German. The project exhibits Syrian cultural heritage in both its tangible and nontangible aspects.


Advances in technology and the rise of interconnected devices have ushered in new ways of accessing, communicating, and showcasing that have the potential to help us reimagine education as a networked ecosystem, supporting learners and information to move freely across connected nodes including and beyond school. In this paper, I explore the idea of recognizing and designing for a healthy learning ecosystem that supports freedom of movement, supporting crossing physical boundaries of location, domain-specific boundaries of different topical areas, and conceptual boundaries of value and goodness of fit. The paper begins with a look of my own childhood, serving as both an example and metaphor for the idea of freedom of movement. I then share three design-based implementation initiatives from the Digital Youth Network to support freedom of movement. I close with a suggested framework for defining a healthy learning ecosystem, one that utilized existing infrastructure and sociotechnical systems to leverage movement within communities towards the goal of optimizing youth development.


Check valves are important valves in pipeline system. However, the closure of them may provoke serious turbulence. It is very important and essential for pipeline systems to correctly predict and calculate the surge pressure due to the closure of check valves. Firstly, the solution of differential equations governing movement of the clack of swing check valve is derived, and the surge pressure is computed by characteristics method. Secondly, for the purpose of simplification, a simple and applicable method for calculating the closure pressure is put forward by making use of the dynamic characteristic of check valve. All these could be of referenced value to engineering design and selection of check valves.Copyright © 2003 by ASME


Wetlands comprise 14% of the land area of Canada. They have considerable impact on water storage and runoff, water quality, atmospheric exchanges of carbon, and important elements such as nitrogen. In less remote parts of Canada, wetlands have suffered from reclamation, exploitation, contamination and degradation, which have seriously impaired their ecological function. Public recognition of their environmental significance has highlighted the need for a better understanding of the hydrological processes, to better plan and manage wetland areas, restore degraded systems, and predict responses to global change. This paper reviews current hydrological research in all types of Canadian wetlands. The scope of hydrological processes discussed herein includes runoff, surface and groundwater flows, evaporation, microclimate, water balance, geochemical and solute transport phenomenon, carbon dynamics, isotope studies, exploitation and restoration. Field, laboratory and modelling studies are included. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Background: Prosthetic Mitral valve dysfunction is a serious complication associated with a high mortality rate particularly in obstructive cases. The number of cases undergoing redo mitral valve surgery is increasing. This study aims to identify the risk factors of mortality and morbidity in patients who underwent redo mitral valve surgery for prosthetic mitral valve dysfunction.

Methods: This study was conducted on 80 patients who underwent re-operation for management of prosthetic mitral valve dysfunction from December 2014 to February 2018. Patients' age ranged between 21 and 58 years with a mean of 36.8±9.60 years, and 53 patients (66.3%) were males. The causes of mitral valve malfunction were thrombus in 67 patients (83.7%) and pannus in 13 patients (16.3%).
Results: 53 patients (66.25%) had urgent surgical intervention. Thrombectomy or pannus resection was done in 75 patients (93.75%) and valve replacement in 5 patients (6.25%). Re-exploration was required in 11 patients (13.75%) and was significantly associated with diabetes (p= 0.004), preoperative liver dysfunction (p= 0.04), elevated INR (p= 0.006), trial of thrombolysis (p<0.001) and prolonged ischemic time (p= 0.01). Postoperative renal failure occurred in 11 patients (13.75%) and was associated with diabetes (p< 0.001), preoperative renal dysfunction (p< 0.001), prolonged cardiopulmonary bypass and ischemic times (p< 0.001). 17 patients (21%) required prolonged mechanical ventilation and it was significantly associated with chronic obstructive lung disease (p< 0.001), pulmonary edema (p <0.001), low systolic blood pressure (p <0.001), low ejection fraction (p<0.001) and thrombectomy (p<0.001). Operative mortality occurred in 13 patients (16%) and was significantly associated with preoperative stroke, renal dysfunction, low blood pressure and acute pulmonary edema (p <0.001).
Conclusion: Reoperation for prosthetic mitral valve dysfunction is associated with high morbidity and mortality. Outcomes can be predicted based on preoperative clinical status and operative times. Thrombectomy and pannus resection with the repair of the paravalvular leak is a simple and easy technique for management of those patients with a reduction of cardiopulmonary bypass and cross-clamp times.


From Paris to Stalingrad, the Nazis systematically plundered all manner of art and antiquities. But the first and most valuable treasure they looted were the Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman Empire. This is the true-life Indiana Jones story of a college professor turned Army sleuth who foils a Nazi plot to preserve these cherished symbols of Hitler's Thousand Year Reich. Author Sidney Kirkpatrick draws on recently discovered and previously unpublished documents, including interrogation and intelligence reports, diaries and correspondence, as well as on interviews with all remaining living participants involved with the case, to re-create this thrilling true-life story.


The proportion of cells with a high density of ED2 (ED2high cells) in peritoneal cells from old rats was significantly lower than that from young rats. The expression of major histocompatibility complex class II (MHC class II) molecules, the antigen presentation, production of interleukin (IL)-1beta and IL-6, and nuclear factor-kappaB activity in ED2high cells were markedly higher than those in cells with a low density of ED2 (ED2low cells), although no significant difference was observed in the expression of MHC class II molecules and the antigen presentation between ED2high cells from young and old rats. Meanwhile, basal corticosterone concentration in serum and glucocorticoid (GC) receptor mRNA expression in peritoneal cells increased significantly in old rats. The proportion of ED2high cells was increased by adrenalectomy in young rats. Furthermore, nuclear translocation of GC receptor was observed in ED2low cells, whereas GC receptor was detected in cytoplasmic extracts from ED2high cells. These results suggest that the decrease in functional ED2high macrophages with age results in the age-associated decline of immune responses, which is regulated, in part, by the basal GC concentration.


Hypertension is a global health problem, with the prevalence increasing by 30% from 2013 to 2018 in Indonesia. Furthermore, obesity, a major risk factor for hypertension, has also escalated by 50%. Hence, the incidence of Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Syndrome (OSAS), which is strongly associated with hypertension and obesity, is expected to increase. OSAS is part of the complex sleep disorder breathing syndrome, but there is a lack of data regarding its prevalence and association with hypertension.

 To investigate the prevalence of OSAS and its association with hypertension in Jatinangor, West Java, Indonesia.

 A cross-sectional study was conducted from September to October 2018 of subjects from two villages in Indonesia selected by purposive sampling. Fifteen neighbourhoods were chosen by the cluster random sampling method, with a total of 1,308 respondents included in this study. Inclusion criteria were age > 17 years old and resident in the village for more than one year. OSAS was determined by a 4-variable screening tool questionnaire (4-V) and hypertension was measured by a standardised method (average of three measurements in each session with a one-minute break using a digital device); both measurements were performed by trained health cadres. All results were statistically analysed using chi-square and logistic regression.

 Of the total of 1308 respondents included in this study, 33 (2.5%) had OSAS and 299 respondents (22.8%) had hypertension. In the population with OSAS, 18 respondents (54.5%) had hypertension, significantly higher (p<0.001) compared to the non-OSAS group (22%). After adjustment for age, gender, and Body Mass Index (BMI), OSAS was still an independent predictor of hypertension (OR = 4.3, p = 0.000).

 The prevalence of OSAS in the Jatinangor district of Indonesia is 2.5% and it is significantly associated with hypertension.


The structural and magnetic properties of the FeHx (x=0.25; 0.50; 0.75) compounds have been studied using the projector augmented wave (PAW) method within the generalized gradient approximation (GGA). We compare the hcp, dhcp and fcc structures and find that for the considered concentrations of hydrogen the hcp structure is most stable in a wide pressure range. The magnetic behavior of iron is crucially influenced by hydrogen. In particular, the local moment on a Fe atom depends on the number of hydrogen atoms in the atom surroundings. Iron atoms, which are crystallographically equivalent in their original structures (hcp, fcc) but have different number of hydrogen neighbors, are shown to have different local magnetic moments. This finding suggests that the experimental observations of two magnetic moments in iron hydride can be explained by nonstoichiometry of the hydride and might not be a direct evidence for the presence of the dhcp phase.


ABSTRACT Genes encoding proteins that carry out essential informational tasks in the cell, in particular where multiple interaction partners are involved, are less likely to be transferable to a foreign organism. Here, we investigated the constraints on transfer of a gene encoding a highly conserved informational protein, translation elongation factor Tu (EF-Tu), by systematically replacing the endogenous tufA gene in the Escherichia coli genome with its extant and ancestral homologs. The extant homologs represented tuf variants from both near and distant homologous organisms. The ancestral homologs represented phylogenetically resurrected tuf sequences dating from 0.7 to 3.6 billion years ago (bya). Our results demonstrate that all of the foreign tuf genes are transferable to the E. coli genome, provided that an additional copy of the EF-Tu gene, tufB, remains present in the E. coli genome. However, when the tufB gene was removed, only the variants obtained from the gammaproteobacterial family (extant and ancestral) supported growth which demonstrates the limited functional interchangeability of E. coli tuf with its homologs. Relative bacterial fitness correlated with the evolutionary distance of the extant tuf homologs inserted into the E. coli genome. This reduced fitness was associated with reduced levels of EF-Tu and reduced rates of protein synthesis. Increasing the expression of tuf partially ameliorated these fitness costs. In summary, our analysis suggests that the functional conservation of protein activity, the amount of protein expressed, and its network connectivity act to constrain the successful transfer of this essential gene into foreign bacteria. IMPORTANCE Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is a fundamental driving force in bacterial evolution. However, whether essential genes can be acquired by HGT and whether they can be acquired from distant organisms are very poorly understood. By systematically replacing tuf with ancestral homologs and homologs from distantly related organisms, we investigated the constraints on HGT of a highly conserved gene with multiple interaction partners. The ancestral homologs represented phylogenetically resurrected tuf sequences dating from 0.7 to 3.6 bya. Only variants obtained from the gammaproteobacterial family (extant and ancestral) supported growth, demonstrating the limited functional interchangeability of E. coli tuf with its homologs. Our analysis suggests that the functional conservation of protein activity, the amount of protein expressed, and its network connectivity act to constrain the successful transfer of this essential gene into foreign bacteria. Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is a fundamental driving force in bacterial evolution. However, whether essential genes can be acquired by HGT and whether they can be acquired from distant organisms are very poorly understood. By systematically replacing tuf with ancestral homologs and homologs from distantly related organisms, we investigated the constraints on HGT of a highly conserved gene with multiple interaction partners. The ancestral homologs represented phylogenetically resurrected tuf sequences dating from 0.7 to 3.6 bya. Only variants obtained from the gammaproteobacterial family (extant and ancestral) supported growth, demonstrating the limited functional interchangeability of E. coli tuf with its homologs. Our analysis suggests that the functional conservation of protein activity, the amount of protein expressed, and its network connectivity act to constrain the successful transfer of this essential gene into foreign bacteria.


BACKGROUND
The XRCC1 protein facilitates various DNA repair pathways; single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in this gene are associated with a risk of gastrointestinal cancer (GIC) with inconsistent results, but no data have been previously reported for the Sabah, North Borneo, population. We accordingly investigated the XRCC1 Arg194Trp and Arg399Gln SNPs in terms of GIC risk in Sabah.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
We performed genotyping for both SNPs for 250 GIC patients and 572 healthy volunteers using a polymerase chain reaction- restriction fragment length polymorphism approach. We validated heterozygosity and homozygosity for both SNPs using direct sequencing.

RESULTS
The presence of a variant 194Trp allele in the Arg194Trp SNP was significantly associated with a higher risk of GIC, especially with gastric and colorectal cancers. We additionally found that the variant 399Gln allele in Arg399Gln SNP was associated with a greater risk of developing gastric cancer. Our combined analysis revealed that inheritance of variant alleles in both SNPs increased the GIC risk in Sabah population. Based on our etiological analysis, we found that subjects ≥50 years and males who carrying the variant 194Trp allele, and Bajau subjects carrying the 399Gln allele had a significantly increased risk of GIC.

CONCLUSIONS
Our findings suggest that inheritance of variant alleles in XRCC1 Arg194Trp and Arg399Gln SNPs may act as biomarkers for the early detection of GIC, especially for gastric and colorectal cancers in the Sabah population.


The Paul Trap Simulator Experiment (PTSX) is a compact laboratory device that simulates the nonlinear dynamics of intense charged particle beams propagating over a large distance in an alternating-gradient magnetic transport system. The radial quadrupole electric field forces on the charged particles in the Paul Trap are analogous to the radial forces on the charged particles in the quadrupole magnetic transport system. The amplitude of oscillating voltage applied to the cylindrical electrodes in PTSX is equivalent to the quadrupole magnetic field gradient in accelerators. The temporal periodicity in PTSX corresponds to the spatial periodicity in magnetic transport system. This thesis focuses on investigations of envelope instabilities and collective mode excitations, properties of high-intensity beams with significant space-charge effects, random noise-induced beam degradation and a laserinduced-fluorescence diagnostic. To better understand the nonlinear dynamics of the charged particle beams, it is critical to understand the collective processes of the charged particles. Charged particle beams support a variety of collective modes, among which the quadrupole mode and the dipole mode are of the greatest interest. We used quadrupole and dipole perturbations to excite the quadrupole and dipole mode respectively and study the effects of those collective modes on the charge bunch. The experimental and particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation results both show that when the frequency and the spatial structure of the external perturbation are matched with the corresponding collective mode, that mode will be excited to a large amplitude and resonates strongly with the external perturbation, usually causing expansion of the charge bunch and loss of particles. Machine imperfections are inevitable for accelerator systems, and we use random noise to simulate the effects of machine imperfection on the charged particle beams. The random noise can be Fourier decomposed into various frequency components and experimental results show that when the random noise has a large frequency component that matches a certain collective mode, the mode will also be excited and cause heating of the charge bunch. It is also noted that by rearranging the order of the random noise, iii the adverse effects of the random noise may be eliminated. As a non-destructive diagnostic method, a laser-induced-fluorescence (LIF) diagnostic is developed to study the transverse dynamics of the charged particle beams. The accompanying barium ion source and dye laser system are developed and tested.


Article history: Received: 5 January 2011 Accepted: 14 July 2011 Available online:17 August 2011 Background: Diazinon and paraoxon are a group of pesticide organophosphates which are widely used in agriculture. Some organophosphates increase the production of free radicals. This study aims to compare the effects of diazinon and paraoxon on biomarkers of oxidative stress in rat serum. Materials and Methods : This experimental study was performed in 2010 in Baqiyatallah (a.s) University of Medical Sciences. 49 male Wistar rats were randomly divided into 7 groups: the control group was given corn oil as a solvent of diazinon and paraoxon and the other six groups were given diazinon at doses 30, 50 and 100 mg/kg and paraoxon at doses 0.3, 0.7 and 1 mg/kg intraperitoneally. 24 hours after the injection, blood was collected by cardiac puncture and serum was prepared. Then, the activities of butrylcholinesterase enzyme (BChE), superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and glutathione level (GSH) were measured by chemical methods. Results: The decreased SOD and CAT activities and GSH level after administration of Diazinon (more than 30 mg/kg) and paraoxon (more than 0.3 mg/kg) is significant compared to control group, whereas the activity of LDH enzyme significantly increases. The decreased BChE activity is not significant compared to control group. Conclusion: Diazinon and paraoxon induce the production of free radicals and oxidative stress in a dose-dependent manner. The decreased activity of antioxidant enzymes and depleted GSH content probably represent the antioxidant defense system failure against the toxic actions of free radicals and oxidative tissue damage. Paraoxon has more severe effects than diazinon. © 2012 Zahedan University of Medical Sciences, ZJRMS. All rights reserved.


This cross-national scenario based study examined fourth-grade students' perceptions of high-performing classmates in terms of their expected intellectual abilities, positive social qualities and popularity among their peers across seven countries. The overall results show that high academic achievements predominantly lead to positive expectations within the peer group. However, pronounced differences were found between the countries. The results indicated that students from Spanish-speaking countries viewed their potential high-performing peers most favorably, followed by students from Australia, the United Kingdom and Germany. The least favorable expectations, but by no means negative attitude, were exhibited by students from the two East-Asian countries Korea and Vietnam. In contrast, the respondents' gender and the gender of the hypothetical successful classmates had less influence on student perceptions of high-performers. These findings have implications for the educational provision of high performing students in different crossnational contexts.


The results of treatment of 132 patients with the type I diabetes mellitus of middle end critical severity, trophic disorders and purulent-necrotic complications were analysed. Clinical efficacy of intravascular laser irradiation of blood, the prolongated medicinal intraarterial infusion, antioxidant therapy were established.


Bobrowitz,' in a study of 174 patients, had only one patient with symptoms which "might have been due to ethambutol". He also states: "the incidence of visual acuity change ... was the same whether the patients had ethambutol or PAS." The point at issue is the use of the word "irreversible", which may well imply in the minds of many people that such changes have in fact occurred, and that therefore the drug should not be used. What is known is that loss of visual acuity has occurred, and that in all cases it. has been reversible. In fact, some patients who have been taken off the drug because of visual changes have subsequently been given ethambutol again without any recurrence of eye symptoms. It is recommended that at least monthly, during the early months of treatment with ethambutol, patients should have testing of visual acuity and colour discrimination by Snellen's eye charts. From the large experience in the use of ethambut.ol in many centres throughout the world, it would seem that the risk of optic neuritis has been over-emphasized in the past, and is a remote risk if the dose of the drug is controlled within the range advised.


In this paper, we propose a model with a Dirichlet process mixture of gamma densities in the bulk part below threshold and a generalized Pareto density in the tail for extreme value estimation. The proposed model is simple and flexible for posterior density estimation and posterior inference for high quantiles. The model works well even for small sample sizes and in the absence of prior information. We evaluate the performance of the proposed model through a simulation study. Finally, the proposed model is applied to a real environmental data.


Chemical data from 43 334 wells were used to examine the role of land surface-soil-aquifer connections in producing elevated manganese concentrations (>300 μg/L) in United States (U.S.) groundwater. Elevated concentrations of manganese and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) in groundwater are associated with shallow, anoxic water tables and soils enriched in organic carbon, suggesting soil-derived DOC supports manganese reduction and mobilization in shallow groundwater. Manganese and DOC concentrations are higher near rivers than farther from rivers, suggesting river-derived DOC also supports manganese mobilization. Anthropogenic nitrogen may also affect manganese concentrations in groundwater. In parts of the northeastern U.S. containing poorly buffered soils, ∼40% of the samples with elevated manganese concentrations have pH values < 6 and elevated concentrations of nitrate relative to samples with pH ≥ 6, suggesting acidic recharge produced by the oxidation of ammonium in fertilizer helps mobilize manganese. An estimated 2.6 million people potentially consume groundwater with elevated manganese concentrations, the highest densities of which occur near rivers and in areas with organic carbon rich soil. Results from this study indicate land surface-soil-aquifer connections play an important role in producing elevated manganese concentrations in groundwater used for human consumption.


The polarimeter system for ITER features 10 viewing chords covering almost the full poloidal cross section of the plasma in a fan-like arrangement. The 10 laser beams all enter the plasma via 150 mm diam penetrations through the diagnostic plug at the low-field side. Small retroreflectors at the high-field side mirror the laser beams back towards the penetrations at the low-field side. Extensive feasibility calculations have led to the conclusion that the optimum wavelength for the polarimeter is around 100 mu m. At this wavelength counterproductive effects like refraction and electron cyclotron absorption are negligibly small. However, the anticipated Faraday rotation angles are still very large, such that several important plasma parameters can be measured within the requirements set by the ITER team. In this article the status of the conceptual design of the polarimeter system for ITER will be presented. (C) 1999 American Institute of Physics. [S0034-6748(99)63801-1].


Objective. The aim of our study was to investigate the effects of naproxen, an antiinflammatory analgesic drug, on brain response to painful stimulation on the affected knee in chronic osteoarthritis (OA) using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in a double-blind, placebo-controlled study. Methods. A sample of 25 patients with knee OA received naproxen (500 mg), placebo, or no treatment in 3 separate sessions in a randomized manner. Pressure stimulation was applied to the medial articular interline of the knee during the fMRI pain sequence. We evaluated subjective pain ratings at every session and their association with brain responses to pain. An fMRI control paradigm was included to discard global brain vascular effects of naproxen. Results. We found brain activation reductions under naproxen compared to no treatment in different cortical and subcortical core pain processing regions (p ≤ 0.001). Compared to placebo, naproxen triggered an attenuation of amygdala activation (p = 0.001). Placebo extended its attenuation effects beyond the classical pain processing network (p ≤ 0.001). Subjective pain scores during the fMRI painful task differed between naproxen and no treatment (p = 0.037). Activation attenuation under naproxen in different regions (i.e., ventral brain, cingulate gyrus) was accompanied by an improvement in the subjective pain complaints (p ≤ 0.002). Conclusion. Naproxen effectively reduces pain-related brain responses involving different regions and the attenuation is related to subjective pain changes. Our current work yields further support to the utility of fMRI to objectify the acute analgesic effects of a single naproxen dose in patients affected by knee OA. The trial was registered at the EuropeanClinicalTrials Database, "EudraCT Number 2008-004501-33".


Face age estimation is a challenging problem due to the variation of craniofacial growth,
skin texture, gender and race. With recent growth in face age estimation research, wrinkles
received attention from a number of research, as it is generally perceived as aging
feature and soft biometric for person identification. In a face image, wrinkle is a discontinuous
and arbitrary line pattern that varies in different face regions and subjects.
Existing wrinkle detection algorithms and wrinkle-based features are not robust for face
age estimation. They are either weakly represented or not validated against the ground
truth. The primary aim of this thesis is to develop a robust wrinkle detection method
and construct novel wrinkle-based methods for face age estimation. First, Hybrid Hessian
Filter (HHF) is proposed to segment the wrinkles using the directional gradient
and a ridge-valley Gaussian kernel. Second, Hessian Line Tracking (HLT) is proposed
for wrinkle detection by exploring the wrinkle connectivity of surrounding pixels using a
cross-sectional profile. Experimental results showed that HLT outperforms other wrinkle
detection algorithms with an accuracy of 84% and 79% on the datasets of FORERUS
and FORERET while HHF achieves 77% and 49%, respectively. Third, Multi-scale
Wrinkle Patterns (MWP) is proposed as a novel feature representation for face age
estimation using the wrinkle location, intensity and density. Fourth, Hybrid Aging Patterns
(HAP) is proposed as a hybrid pattern for face age estimation using Facial Appearance
Model (FAM) and MWP. Fifth, Multi-layer Age Regression (MAR) is proposed as
a hierarchical model in complementary of FAM and MWP for face age estimation. For
performance assessment of age estimation, four datasets namely FGNET, MORPH,
FERET and PAL with different age ranges and sample sizes are used as benchmarks.
Results showed that MAR achieves the lowest Mean Absolute Error (MAE) of 3.00
( 4.14) on FERET and HAP scores a comparable MAE of 3.02 ( 2.92) as state of the
art. In conclusion, wrinkles are important features and the uniqueness of this pattern
should be considered in developing a robust model for face age estimation.


The purpose of this study is to introduce a new learning tool to the interior design studio, namely, a "digital process book." Paper-based process books are not new to the studio. A process book includes representations of the activities that occur and artifacts that are constructed as a student completes a design project. It allows the instructor, jurors, and others, to see the processes a student goes through to complete a project. It is also intended to assist students as a tool in the learning and design process. Schenk (2007) similarly describes this process work in the graphic design context as "job bags," where this material, for the most part, provides the "drawn record" of the design process. However, paperbased process books are mostly a linear compilation of the design process that provides little of the scaffolding that a novice designer neeeds. The goal of this project is to take the existing strengths and capabilities of the computer and other digital technology, and merge them with the positive qualities of the paper-based process work, while also incorporating an underlying structure that is grounded in educational psychology theory.


Software testing can benefit from technologies that enable evolution toward increased engineering discipline. In current practice, software developers lack practical means to determine the full functional behavior of programs under development, and even the most thorough testing can provide only partial knowledge of behaviors. Thus, effective scientific principles and engineering technology for revealing software behavior should have a positive impact on software testing. This paper describes the emerging technology of function extraction (FX) for computing the behavior of programs to the maximum extent possible with mathematical precision. We explore how the use of FX technologies can transform methods for functional verification of software. An example illustrates the value of full behavior knowledge for complete and confident assessment of software function and fitness for use. We conclude by describing a transition strategy for introducing FX technology into the development and operation of software systems.