Thermoluminescence kinetics is discussed within the framework of a band model containing an arbitrary number of types of recombination and trapping centres at an arbitrary correlation of all centre parameters. It is shown that the initial system of kinetic equations is reduced to an equivalent system consisting of two integro-differential equations which permit one to perform an accurate generalisation, in the case of a continuous centre distribution, to their parameters for the description of irradiation and thermoluminescence, taking into account charge carrier redistribution to both types of centre. In addition, if only one electron (hole) channel is taken into account, only one integro-differential equation is obtained. On the basis of this equation a precise algebraic equation is obtained for calculation of the area of an arbitrary part of the thermoluminescence curve (TLC), consisting of one or several peaks, which slightly overlap with other peaks. It is shown that at doses which are less than the saturation dose, when the centres are not completely filled by the charge carriers, the dose dependences of such a part of the TLC may have a non-linear character at a simultaneous linear dependence of the area of the whole TLC. At doses which are greater than the saturation dose, the dose dependences of the area of the whole TLC, as well as of its separate parts, undergo breaks at the saturation doses.


Activating mutations of the RET proto-oncogene cause hereditary medullary thyroid carcinoma. To examine whether selective inactivation of mutant RET could prevent transformation, a hammerhead ribozyme was designed to cleaveRET mRNA containing a transforming mutation of codon 634 TGC3 TAC (Cys634Tyr). In vitro RNA cleavage assay demonstrated that the ribozyme selectively cleavedRET RNA with a Cys634Tyr but not Cys634Arg or the normal sequence. Expression of ribozyme in NIH/3T3 cells preventedRET-mediated colony formation in soft agar. This inhibition required catalytically active ribozyme and was specific for the TAC mutation. Therefore, ribozymes designed to selectively target mutant RET RNA may provide an effective therapeutic in the treatment of this syndrome.


See related article, p 1387.

Each year nearly 800 000 people in the United States have a clinically evident stroke. Despite the availability of an effective and time-dependent treatment, intravenous recombinant tissue-type plasminogen activator (r-tPA), in 2011, only 33.8%1 of eligible ischemic stroke patients received treatment within 60 minutes from time of hospital arrival, as recommended by current acute stroke guidelines.2 This suboptimal expediency of treatment, nearly constant for a decade, represents lost opportunity for optimal neurological outcome and reduced mortality. The pooled analyses of the Alteplase Thrombolysis for Acute Noninterventional Therapy in Ischemic Stroke (ATLANTIS), European Cooperative Acute Stroke Study (ECASS), and National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke r-tPA Stroke Study (NINDS) r-tPA trials by Hacke et al3 in 2004 showed a strong association between early treatment and improved outcomes in patients with ischemic stroke treated with r-tPA. A recent analysis of the Get With the Guidelines Stroke registry by Saver et al4 confirmed that earlier treatment yields better patient outcomes.

The American Heart Association/American Stroke Association Target Stroke initiative was created to provide a framework through which hospitals could reduce their door-to-needle (DTN) times. In the development of the Target Stroke program, best practice strategies were identified by a multidisciplinary work group after reviewing published literature and expert consensus. Strategies proven successful in reducing time to treatment of ST-segment–elevation myocardial infarction were identified as best practice strategies that could be easily and effectively adopted by acute care hospitals in the treatment of stroke. Eleven such strategies were promoted, including prehospital notification; the use of single-call stroke team activation; rapid triage, imaging, and laboratory testing; and …


This book chapter for "Lessons from the Identity Trail: Anonymity, Privacy and Identity in a Networked Society" (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009) - a forthcoming comparative examination of approaches to the regulation of anonymity edited by Ian Kerr - discusses the sources of hostility to National ID Cards in common law countries. It traces that hostility in the United States to a romantic vision of free movement and in England to an equally romantic vision of the 'rights of Englishmen'. Governments in the United Kingdom, United States, Australia, and other countries are responding to perceived security threats by introducing various forms of mandatory or nearly mandatory domestic civilian national identity documents. This chapter argues that these ID cards pose threats to privacy and freedom, especially in countries without strong data protection rules. The threats created by weak data protection in these new identification schemes differ significantly from previous threats, making the romantic vision a poor basis from which to critique (highly flawed) contemporary proposals.


Background: Minimally invasive mitral valve surgery became an attractive option because of its cosmetic advantages over the conventional approach. The superiority of the minimally invasive approach regarding other aspects is still debatable. The aim of our study was to determine the potential benefits of minimally invasive mitral valve replacement with intraoperative video assistance over conventional surgery.
Methods: This is a single-center prospective cohort study that included 60 patients with rheumatic heart disease who underwent mitral valve replacement. Patients were divided into two groups: group (A) included patients who had conventional sternotomy (n= 30), and group (B) included patients who had video-assisted minimally invasive mitral valve replacement (n= 30). Intraoperative and postoperative outcomes were compared between both groups.
Results: Mortality occurred in one patient in the group (A). Cardiopulmonary bypass time was 118.93 ± 29.84 minutes vs. 64.73 ± 19.16 minutes in group B and A respectively (p< 0.001), and ischemic time was 102.27 ± 30.03 minutes vs. 53.67± 18.46 minutes in group B and A respectively (P < 0.001). Ventilation time was 2.77± 2.27 vs. 6.28 ± 4.48 hours in group B and A respectively (p< 0.001) and blood transfusion was 0.50 ± 0.63 vs. 2.83 ± 1.34 units in group B and A respectively (p< 0.001).  ICU stay was 1.73 ± 0.64 days in the group (B) vs. 4.47 ± 0.94 days in group A (p< 0.001). Postoperative bleeding was 353.33 ± 146.77 ml in the group (B) vs. 841.67 ± 302.03 ml in group A (p <0.001). No conversion to full sternotomy was reported in group B. In group (B), two cases (6.6%) required re-exploration for bleeding vs. four cases (13.2%) in group (A) (p=0.67). The hospital stay was 6.13 ± 1.59 days in the group (B) vs. 13.27 ± 7.62 days in group A (p< 0.001). Four cases (13.3%) developed mediastinitis in group A and in the group (B), there was one case of acute right lower limb embolic ischemia.
Conclusion: Video-assisted minimally invasive mitral operations could be a safe alternative to conventional sternotomy with the potential of lesser morbidity and earlier hospital discharge.


Rare-earth metal-organic frameworks [Tb2(pdc)3(H2O)9]n3nH2O, were synthesized and characterized by elemental analysis, IR spectra and single-crystal X-ray diffraction. The title compound consisted of one-dimensional dual-chains, in which each metal atom is nine-coordinated with oxygen atoms. The carboxylate groups of pdc provided two kinds of coordination ways as bidentate and monodentate. The solid-state photoluminescence measurement exhibited green light-emitting characteristic of terbium (III) coordination polymer, and the fluorescence intensities were stronger than that of the europium compound with the same ligand.


In the present there are many problems in the research of teaching and the application of E-Learning, like theories separated, theoretical basis indefinite, techniques used indiscriminately, interaction lacked, extension of the knowledge and dialectical thoughts insufficient etc. Therefore the ideal effect of knowledge extension could not be reached based on modern instructional theories. The paper combines the course with experience, creatively develops an E-Learning system based on web, and puts the basic theories of E-Learning and technical development into practice synthetically. This paper practices this brand new mode, through the development of E-Learning instructional system, and along with the teaching experience. Keywords-E-Learning; Web; Design of Teaching; Modularization


This study aims to improve the quality of learning in physics learning planning courses through the implementation of Project Based Learning (PjBL) assisted by E-Learning through Lesson Study activities. This type of research was qualitative research through the stages of Lesson Study activities. Subjects in this study were the 5th-semester students who program 11 physics learning planning subjects in the 2018-2019 academic year in the Department of Physics Education, University of Papua. The research data was obtained through the student learning outcomes test instrument that was given after the submission of each topic of study, observation sheet of student activities, interview guidelines, documentation in the form of video recordings during open class implementation, and student response questionnaire. Data were analyzed through Rasch modeling with the help of the Winstep application to analyze student responses after learning. Lesson Study activities consist of three phases of activities, namely Plan, Do, and See. In the Plan stage discussions with the team of lecturers were held to develop Chapter Design and Lesson Plan. In the Do stage, the model lecturer based on the tools that have been prepared does learning. In the See stage, the reflection was done to find out weaknesses and strengths during learning which is then followed up on further learning. The results showed that student-learning outcomes increased student responses to good learning and learning atmosphere seemed very fun. Therefore, it can be concluded that through the implementation of PjBL assisted E-Learning through Lesson Study activities can improve the quality of learning in physics learning planning subjects.


Randomization enables reuse, minimizes the chance of error, and minimizes user time. Randomization is applicable in problem solving techniques such as searching and optimization. With the emergence of service oriented architectures (SOAs), building software by composing existing components has been facilitated to make use of components across the Internet. Such facilitation has scaled up the corresponding problem search space from tens of components in the local component repository to hundreds or thousands of components available anywhere connected by a network. In order to search for the right composites in a large search space, randomization can be used to heuristically reduce the search time. This paper demonstrates, for the software engineering community, how randomization can be applied using granularization of context-free grammatical reduction for the automatic synthesis of component-based software using service-oriented architectures. The approach taken is to iteratively extract largest common component granules and form productions using these granules. The grammar is then written using the common granule components. We review the savings incurred by such randomization in searching for a solution. A theoretical analysis and a use case scenario are provided. Granules allow us to search the space using more formal parameters for a temporal savings of orders of magnitude associated with the symmetric granules. Granted that we can miss viable solutions in this way, the speedup however is too great to be ignored. Furthermore, given that there is a high degree of reuse between solutions, symmetric granule solutions work best.


In this study, we focus on the theoretical framework of a decision model for a real world problem. The problem reveals itself as simultaneous distribution of commodities and recollection of empty packages the same size as the initial state with a single depot and a fleet of uniform vehicles with limited capacities. Resembling instances pile a profound literature under the category of "pick-up and delivery problems with backhauls" and "rural postman problem." To solve the arousing NP-hard problem we use genetic algorithm approach. Computational efficiency and a good solution performance are sought. We have studied the wide literature of the vehicle routing problems, classified and briefly introduced the previous asserted algorithms, which provide considerably high quality solutions. We have developed a genetic algorithm based meta-heuristic on a linear IP model proposed by Dethloff (2001) and conducted tests to come up with a robust heusritic producing results with a reasonable quality. The models we studied were mainly taken from the machine scheduling literature and adapted to handle our problem. Our research has revealed that no resembling problem has ever been proposed to be solved using the genetic algorithms approach. Thus, this work is a first in its field. The improvement algorithm is found to be considerably good performing while the random keys method failed to produce reasonable solutions. We have tested our algorithm on two benchmark problems introduced by Min (1989) and Dethloff (2001). The latter is composed of 40 problem instances generated. We have performed parameter tests to tune our algorithm and shown that our algorithm produced the best ever solution for the first problem and considerably good solutions for the second one.


PURPOSE
The purpose of this trial was to evaluate the effect of a Web-based, self-report assessment and educational intervention on symptom distress during cancer therapy.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
A total of 752 ambulatory adult participants were randomly assigned to symptom/quality-of-life (SxQOL) screening at four time points (control) versus screening, targeted education, communication coaching, and the opportunity to track/graph SxQOL over time (intervention). A summary of the participant-reported data was delivered to clinicians at each time point in both groups. All participants used the assessment before a new therapeutic regimen, at 3 to 6 weeks and 6 to 8 weeks later, completing the final assessment at the end of therapy. Change in Symptom Distress Scale-15 (SDS-15) score from pretreatment to end of study was compared using analysis of covariance and regression analysis adjusting for selected variables.

RESULTS
We detected a significant difference between study groups in mean SDS-15 score change from baseline to end of study: 1.27 (standard deviation [SD], 6.7) in the control group (higher distress) versus -0.04 (SD, 5.8) in the intervention group (lower distress). SDS-15 score was reduced by an estimated 1.21 (95% CI, 0.23 to 2.20; P = .02) in the intervention group. Baseline SDS-15 score (P < .001) and clinical service (P = .01) were predictive. Multivariable analyses suggested an interaction between age and study group (P = .06); in subset analysis, the benefit of intervention was strongest in those age > 50 years (P = .002).

CONCLUSION
Web-based self-care support and communication coaching added to SxQOL screening reduced symptom distress in a multicenter sample of participants with various diagnoses during and after active cancer treatment. Participants age > 50 years, in particular, may have benefited from the intervention.


During the first decade of the 21st century, a political movement based in Arizona sought, through legislation, to ban the use of certain books and the teaching of certain authors and concepts in high school classrooms in the Tucson Unified School District. HB 2281 was signed into law in May 2010 on the heels of one of the strictest anti-immigrant legislative acts, SB 1070. These two bills would become intertwined in the imagination of the country and would elicit protests and generate actions by activists, writers, and teachers as they wound through the legal battles that ensued. This article explores the consequences of the law and the impact both locally and nationally of such actions by focusing on two key events: The Poets Against SB 1070 and the Librotraficante project led by Houston activist Tony Díaz. Moreover, it contextualizes such a historic event within the larger history of educational disenfranchisement of Latinx in the United States.


AIM
The increase in the number of people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and the disease burden, has prompted concerted efforts to improve healthcare, particularly outpatient services. In line with these attempts the Partnership-Based Nursing Practice Theoretical Framework for People with COPD was developed to guide outpatient nursing care. The principal approach of the framework is a 'Dialogue' with the patients, which has four components: 'Establishing family involvement', 'Assisting living with symptoms' and 'Facilitating access to healthcare', with the primary goal being 'Enhancement of the health experience'. With new knowledge, research on the framework, and extensive experience in using it, a need arose to modify the framework to maximize its clinical utility.

DESIGN
Discursive paper.

METHODS
A narrative review and critical reflection was conducted to revise the nursing practice framework via selected literature search from 2012 to 2022, research on the framework, and the authors' reflections on the clinical experience of using the framework.

RESULTS
The nursing practice framework highlights capacities and possibilities that lie in the nurse-patient relationship. The overarching dialogue in the revised framework includes both patients and families. The action-related component 'Assisting living with the disease' was added to the framework to underscore the significance of attempting to understand what may lie ahead for patients and families. The other action-related components are as follows: 'Assisting living with symptoms' and 'Facilitating access to healthcare'. The primary goal remains unchanged: enhancing the 'Health experience'.

CONCLUSION
Using the revised nursing practice framework in outpatient care may help to enhance the lives of people with COPD and their families, particularly at advanced stages of the disease. It may have transferability to other groups of people living with progressive diseases dealing with complicated health problems, and to reduce the usage of costly healthcare resources such as hospital care.

IMPLICATIONS FOR THE PROFESSION AND/OR PATIENT CARE
The partnership-based nursing practice framework assumes an extension of conventional specialized respiratory service and embraces a comprehensive account for that which may influence the patient's health problems. This guidance, which holistically attends to patient-family needs of living with complicated and progressive health predicaments, is fundamental. It contributes to strengthening the disciplinary focus of nursing, interdisciplinary collaboration, person-family-centred quality nursing care and inspires research initiatives. Critical reflections and updates on nursing practice frameworks, such as this revision, are essential to advance nursing and healthcare.

PATIENT OR PUBLIC CONTRIBUTION
There is no direct patient- or public contribution.


Filtering face-piece respirators (FFRs) are one method of protecting health care workers from airborne particles; however, research suggests adherence is poor, perhaps due to worker discomfort. Three separate focus groups were conducted at two Veterans Affairs health care facilities. Seventeen health care workers who reported using FFRs as part of their job duties were in the focus groups. Focus group transcripts were coded using qualitative descriptive coding techniques. Participants described experiences of discomfort and physical mask features they believed contributed to discomfort. Participants believed FFRs influenced patient care because some patients felt uneasy and changed health care workers' behaviors (e.g., doffing procedures, loss of concentration, rushed patient care, and avoidance of patients in isolation resulting from FFR discomfort). Assessment of comfort and tolerability should occur during fit-testing. These factors should also be taken into account by management when training employees on the proper use of FFRs, as well as in future research to improve comfort and tolerability.


With an abundance of research papers in deep learning, adoption and reproducibility of existing works becomes a challenge. To make a DL developer life easy, we propose a novel system, DARVIZ, to visually design a DL model using a drag-and-drop framework in an platform agnostic manner. The code could be automatically generated in both Caffe and Keras. DARVIZ could import (i) any existing Caffe code, or (ii) a research paper containing a DL design; extract the design, and present it in visual editor.


In the following we present a collision avoidance method named COLA. The method has been designed to predict collisions for Earth orbiting spacecraft on any orbits, including orbit changes, with other space-born objects. The point in time of a collision and the collision probability are determined. To guarantee effective processing the COLA method uses a modular design and is composed of several components which are either developed within this work or deduced from existing algorithms: A filtering module, the close approach determination, the collision detection and the collision probability calculation. A software tool which implements the COLA method has been verified using various test cases built from sample missions. This software has been implemented in the C++ programming language and serves as a universal collision detection tool at LSE Space Engineering & Operations AG.


In this
article, the theory of information security is written as a context of national
security. Article is devoted to an actual problem of legal support of
information security in the Republic of Kazakhstan. The author analyzes modern
problems and threats of information security in the conditions of globalization
and considers aspects of information security. This article focuses on issues
of spreading harmful information, which negatively affects the psyche,
behavior, health, society and destabilizes the government administration. The
article makes the case for improving the legislation of the Republic of
Kazakhstan in strengthening informational security of individuals, society, the
state, and measures to prevent the destructive impact of harmful information.


Aspect-oriented software development (AOSD) has primarily focused on linguistic and meta-linguistic mechanisms for separating concerns in program source. However, the kinds of concern separation and complexity management that AOSD endeavors to achieve are not the exclusive province of programming language design.In this paper, we propose a new model of concern separation called visual separation of concerns (VSC), which is based on a new model of program storage. By altering the mechanisms used to store and manipulate program artifacts, much of the capability of concern separation can be captured without performing any linguistic transformations. We also describe our implementation of VSC, which is based on Stellation, an experimental software configuration management system. The VSC approach combined with software configuration management can have advantages over conventional approaches by avoiding program transformations, by providing persistent storage of features such as concern maps, and by enabling new techniques for concern identification and manipulation.


The red-eared slider turtle (Trachemys scripta elegans) is native to portions of the United States of America (USA) and adjacent northeastern Mexico. The bright and colorful hatchlings have long been popular as pets globally but numerous individuals have been released into the wild establishing populations in areas well outside their native range. As a result, slider turtles are now introduced worldwide on all continents, with the exception of Antarctica, and many temperate and tropical islands, including Japan. They are very successful at establishing breeding populations in a variety of habitats, even those in proximity to human development. Once established in large populations, they compete with native turtle species sometimes to the detriment of the latter. Tin toy turtles were popular in Japan for decades, and they were an important export item after World War II. From the 1920s to the 1950s, prior to the widespread establishment of slider populations in Japan, the toys were characterized by muted earth-tone colors representative of native species of Japanese turtles. After the 1950s, toy turtles exhibited brighter combinations of yellow, red and green more typical of slider turtles. This transition may reflect demand for more colorful toys by importing countries like the USA. Alternatively, the change was coincident with the importation of large numbers of colorful slider turtles to Japan via the pet trade and their subsequent establishment and numerical dominance in Japanese wetlands. This switch in toy turtle colors may reflect a cultural transition in awareness of what constitutes the appearance of a typical turtle in Japan. Sliders appear to have been accepted by Japanese consumers as a new cultural norm in the appearance of turtles, a case of art imitating life.


A central theme in current work in quantum information and quantum foundations is to see quantum mechanics as occupying one point in a space of possible theories, and to use this perspective to understand the special features and properties which single it out, and the possibilities for alternative theories. Two formalisms which have been used in this context are operational theories, and categorical quantum mechanics. The aim of the present paper is to establish strong connections between these two formalisms. We show how models of categorical quantum mechanics have representations as operational theories. We then show how nonlocality can be formulated at this level of generality, and study a number of examples from this point of view, including Hilbert spaces, sets and relations, and stochastic maps. The local, quantum, and no-signalling models are characterized in these terms.


This paper concerns the handling of out-of-vocabulary (OOV) words in the JUPITER weather information system. Specifically our objective is to deal with weather queries regarding unknown cities. We have implemented a system which can detect the presence of an unknown city name, and immediately propose a plausible spelling for that city. Potentially, the city can be dynamically incorporated into the recognizer lexicon. The three-stage system described in [1] was implemented in the JUPITER domain, and this paper will detail the development of a system that uses an ANGIE-based framework to model both spelling and pronunciation simultaneously, and uses automatically derived novel lexical units in the first stage. We report results on an independent test set containing unknown cities. Compared with a single-stage baseline, word error was reduced by 29.3% (from 24.6% to 17.4%) and understanding error was reduced by 67.5% (from 67.0% to 21.8%) on the three-stage configuration.


We propose to store several integers modulo a small prime into a single machine word. Modular addition is performed by addition and possibly subtraction of a word containing several times the modulo. Modular Multiplication is not directly accessible but modular dot product can be performed by an integer multiplication by the reverse integer. Modular multiplication by a word containing a single residue is a also possible. Therefore matrix multiplication can be performed on such a compressed storage. We here give bounds on the sizes of primes and matrices for which such a compression is possible. We also explicit the details of the required compressed arithmetic routines.


Four agricultural residues, namely, sheath of peanut pods, flax shivers, red sawdust, and white sawdust were composted with different amendments for four months under greenhouse and field conditions. Results emphasized that composting proceeded at different rates and was principally influenced by the type of residues and/or added amendments. Initial bio-fortification of residues with cellulose decomposing microorganisms exhibited a recognized trend of stimulation and led to a higher rate of organic carbon loss. Percentage losses in organic carbon of the sheath of peanut pods after composting were higher in bio-fortified treatment. The organic accelerator associated with bio-fortification led to a loss in the organic carbon amounting to 15.61% of the initial value of flax shivers after 120 days of composting. Bio-fortification of red sawdust receiving either an organic or a chemical accelerator increased the amounts of bio-oxidized organic carbon to 9.13% in control and to 16.45 or 12.97% respectively in amended red sawdust. In white sawdust, the differences in the percentage of oxidized carbon were hardly detectable. The nitrogen (N) concentrations increased in the final compost, and the largest amount was found in the sheath of peanut pods, reaching 2.6%. The level of total N was more or less the same in composts prepared from either flax shivers, red or white sawdust where it was 1.65, 1.63 and 1.5%, respectively. Oxidation of organic matter associated with the increase in nitrogen concentrations, whether initially or during composting, led to a reduction in carbon-to-nitrogen (C/N) ratios in the final composts. Generally, all bio-fortified composts had narrower C/N ratios compared to the non-biofortified ones. The lowest organic carbon and total nitrogen contents and consequently C/N ratios were found in sheath of peanut pods compost compared to other residues.  Initial neutral pH values of different composted residues were slightly shifted towards acidity before settling around neutrality. Total soluble salts in the final composts varied within the type of agricultural residues used. Nevertheless, values in all composts at the end of the composting did not exceed safe levels.

 Key words: Potting soil, biofortification, composting, cellulose decomposing microorganisms, sawdust, carbon-to-nitrogen (C/N) ratios.


The low abundance fibrillar collagen type V is widely distributed in tissues as an alpha1(V)(2)alpha2(V) heterotrimer that helps regulate the diameters of fibrils of the abundant collagen type I. Mutations in the alpha1(V) and alpha2(V) chain genes have been identified in some cases of classical Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS), in which aberrant collagen fibrils are associated with connective tissue fragility, particularly in skin and joints. Type V collagen also exists as an alpha1(V)alpha2(V)alpha3(V) heterotrimer that has remained poorly characterized chiefly due to inability to obtain the complete primary structure or nucleic acid probes for the alpha3(V) chain or its biosynthetic precursor, pro-alpha3(V). Here we provide human and mouse full-length pro-alpha3(V) sequences. Pro-alpha3(V) is shown to be closely related to the alpha1(V) precursor, pro-alpha1(V), but with marked differences in N-propeptide sequences, and collagenous domain features that provide insights into the low melting temperature of alpha1(V)alpha2(V)alpha3(V) heterotrimers, lack of heparin binding by alpha3(V) chains and the possibility that alpha1(V)alpha2(V)alpha3(V) heterotrimers are incorporated into heterotypic fibrils. In situ hybridization of mouse embryos detects alpha3(V) expression primarily in the epimysial sheaths of developing muscles and within nascent ligaments adjacent to forming bones and in joints. This distribution, and the association of alpha1(V), alpha2(V), and alpha3(V) chains in heterotrimers, suggests the human alpha3(V) gene COL5A3 as a candidate locus for at least some cases of classical EDS in which the alpha1(V) and alpha2(V) genes have been excluded, and for at least some cases of the hypermobility type of EDS, a condition marked by gross joint laxity and chronic musculoskeletal pain. COL5A3 is mapped to 19p13.2 near a polymorphic marker that should be useful in analyzing linkage with EDS and other disease phenotypes.


Abstract Questions: Studies of gap effects have been conducted mainly in forests. We studied gap ecology in a pyrogenic Ceratiola ericoides (Florida rosemary) dominated shrubland and asked: How do gap size and the frequency of large gaps change across the fire chronosequence? Do larger gaps differ from smaller gaps in vegetation structure or species diversity? Are effects of gaps independent of, or dependent upon, time-since-fire? Are larger gaps refugia for herbs and subshrubs? Location: Archbold Biological Station, Lake Wales Ridge, south-central Florida, USA. Methods: We investigated plant species occurrence and diversity in 805 gaps (areas free of shrubs taller than 50 cm) in 28 fire-dependent Florida rosemary scrub sites. We collected quantitative cover data in a subset of seven sites. Results: Gap area distribution was lognormal. The largest gaps occurred throughout all but the longest time-since-fire intervals. Gaps were smallest in the longest unburned site but otherwise did not show strong patterns across the fire chronosequence. Species diversity measures increased with increasing gap area, with herbaceous diversity increasing with both gap area and bare sand. Herb diversity (H') decreased with time-since-fire. Larger gaps are refugia for some species. Of 14 species occurring in 25–75% of gaps, 13 had increased occupancy with increasing gap area, and gap area was the strongest predictor of occupancy for seven species of herbs and shrubs. Time-since-fire was the strongest predictor of occupancy for five species, including four ground lichens that increased with time-since-fire. Conclusions: Community structure within Florida scrub gaps is influenced by gap size, which in turn is affected by fire, the dominant ecological disturbance. We present a conceptual model that considers both gap size and time-since-fire as drivers of community structure and herbaceous plant diversity in Florida scrub. Because gap properties (independently of fire) have strong influences on species assemblages in Florida rosemary scrub gaps, fire management should consider the number and size of gaps across the landscape. Nomenclature: Wunderlin & Hansen (2003) for vascular plants; Brodo et al. (2001) for ground lichens unless otherwise noted.


Qualitative Modeling and Interpretation (QMI) and Qmimic are online monitoring and diagnosis systems which use multiple qualitative models of a plant to monitor noisy data streams and rapidly diagnose faults from observed dynamic behavior. Both systems continue monitoring after faults have occurred. QMI simulates normal and faulty plant behavior off-line using purely qualitative QSIM models, and uses plant data to select the correct model, yielding a diagnosis. Qmimic incrementally simulates online qualitative models which describe the current behavior of the plant, using plant data to constrain further predictions and select between the models. Although both systems are based on qualitative models of the plant, Qmimic also incorporates semi-quantitative data (quantitative ranges and bounding envelopes) into the qualitative simulation in order to achieve better predictions. QMI and Qmimic are described and compared in detail, and both are tested on a simulated chemical reactor. >


The adult Drosophila melanogaster body develops from imaginal discs, groups of cells set-aside during embryogenesis and expanded in number during larval stages. Specification and development of Drosophila imaginal discs have been studied for many years as models of morphogenesis. These studies are often based on mutations with large developmental effects, mutations that are often lethal in embryos when homozygous. Such forward genetic screens can be limited by factors such as early lethality and genetic redundancy. To identify additional genes and genetic pathways involved in leg imaginal disc development, we employed a Genome Wide Association Study utilizing the natural genetic variation in leg proportionality found in the Drosophila Genetic Reference Panel fly lines. In addition to identifying genes already known to be involved in leg development, we identified several genes involved in pathways that had not previously been linked with leg development. Several of the genes appear to be involved in signaling activities, while others have no known roles at this time. Many of these uncharacterized genes are conserved in mammals, so we can now begin to place these genes into developmental contexts. Interestingly, we identified five genes which, when their function is reduced by RNAi, cause an antenna-to-leg transformation. Our results demonstrate the utility of this approach, integrating the tools of quantitative and molecular genetics to study developmental processes, and provide new insights into the pathways and networks involved in Drosophila leg development.


Brazilian Hansen's disease detection rate rose during the 80s and 90s of the 20th century. The Brazilian health system reform happened during the same period. Detection rate is a function of the real incidence of cases and the diagnostic agility of the health system. Coverage of BCG immunization in infants was used as a proxy variable for primary healthcare coverage. A log-normal regression model of detection rate as a function of BCG coverage, time and time square was adjusted to data. The detection rate presents an upward trend throughout the period and with a downturn beginning in 2003. The model showed a statistically significant positive regression coefficient for BCG coverage, suggesting that detection rate behavior reflects the improvement of access to health care. The detection rate began a trend towards decline in 2003, indicating a new phase of Hansen's disease control.


Named entity recognition (NER) plays a significant role in many applications such as information extraction, information retrieval, question answering, and even machine translation. Most of the work on NER using deep learning was done for non-Arabic languages like English and French, and only few studies focused on Arabic. This paper proposes a semi-supervised learning approach to train a BERT-based NER model using labeled and semi-labeled datasets. We compared our approach against various baselines, and state-of-the-art Arabic NER tools on three datasets: AQMAR, NEWS, and TWEETS. We report a significant improvement in F-measure for the AQMAR and the NEWS datasets, which are written in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), and competitive results for the TWEETS dataset, which contains tweets that are mostly in the Egyptian dialect and contain many mistakes or misspellings.


Closed formulas are established for the magnetic multipole moment integrals of integer and noninteger n Slater-type orbitals (ISTOs and NISTOs) in terms of electric multipole moment integrals for which the analytic expressions through the overlap integrals with ISTOs and NISTOs are derived. The overlap integrals are evaluated by the use of auxiliary functions. Using the derived expressions the multipole moment integrals, and therefore the electric and magnetic properties of molecules, can be evaluated most efficiently and accurately.


Culture shock is an intensely personal universal human experience that may emerge in any cross cultural social encounter. Therefore, it may be deduced that culture shock is an experience that may occur in all spheres of life in which individuals are confronted by world views and life styles that differ from their own whether in terms of health, education or occupation amongst others. It is a situation that calls for adaptation or adjustment on the part of the individual. This article explores the relationship between culture shock and culture adaptation as an aspect of learning which has been developed by Thelma Barer-Stein. Stress is laid on the role of the individual, as health educator, and the choices must make if he/she is to gain an understanding of the community in which he/she serves and to attribute new meanings to the situation by which he/she is confronted.


Lead optimization requires toxicity screening strategies to select a compound with a high likelihood of successful development. As numerous compounds need to be screened and resources to direct toward any single compound are limited, short turnaround times to generate and interpret data are needed. Utilization of in vivo toxicity screens is necessary for an effective screening strategy, however, if not appropriately implemented, they may consume excessive resources and prolong selection of a developable compound. Optimization of in vivo studies requires identifying effective placement into the screening strategy, selecting the appropriate study designs, implementing processes that allow rapid data generation and interpretation, and understanding the utilities of in vivo data. When implemented, an effective, high-throughput screening strategy will utilize adequate but minimal amounts of resources, and will prioritize processing near technical time limits. These require generating only the data from which decisions will be made and can be best achieved using as few animals as possible per study.


OBJECTIVE: To determine whether video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery is as effective as the traditional open method through axillary thoracotomy for the management of primary spontaneous pneumothorax in adults. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This retrospective study was conducted at King Hussein Medical Center in the period between March 2002 and March 2007. Eighty-two patients were included in this study. The patients were divided in two groups: group A, which included patients who underwent video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery; and group B, which included patients who underwent open technique through axillary thoracotomy. Efficiency of the procedure, operative time, postoperative complications, length of hospital stay, time to return to work and recurrence were compared between the two groups. RESULTS: There were 79 males (96.3%) and 3 females (3.7%) with a mean age of 23.7 ± 4.2 years for group A patients and 24.2 ± 4.6 years for group B patients (range 16–37 years). Forty-one patients (50%) underwent video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (group A), and 41 patients (50%) underwent open surgical technique through axillary thoracotomy (group B). Postoperative complication occurred in 8 patients (19.3%) from among those who underwent open technique and 6 patients (14.6%) from among those who underwent thoracoscopic technique. There was no perioperative mortality in both groups. Postoperative pain, volume of blood loss, period of air leak and hospital stay were less in group A, although the operative time was less in group B. CONCLUSION: Video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery is an efficient and safe method for the treatment of patients with primary pneumothorax in the adults.


COVID-19 has currently become a major global health problem. Due to novelty and high morbidity and mortality, there are some important medical challenges to achieve proper management and treatment of the disease. Different pharmaceutical categories have been candidate for viral or cytokine phase control, and in this regard many clinical trials are underway to obtain evidences and acceptable results. One of these compounds is magnesium (Mg) sulfate which may have potential therapeutic effect on the cytokine phase of COVID-19. Mg compounds have long been used in practice under various indications and purposes as supplemental compounds, electrolyte regulation and also prevention of drugs side effects. In addition, the effectiveness of Mg sulfate in controlling asthma attacks, gynecological cases and pre-natalogical problems has also been proven. Herein we briefly reviewed immunomodulatory and respiratory effects of Mg and its potential benefits in COVID-19 treatment. Mg sulfate can be used both systemically and by inhalation, but nebulizer route has potential effect on rapid onset of action on respiratory system and reduced incidence of systemic side effects. To the best of our knowledge, in COVID-19 patients, as other viral infections, airway hyper-reactiveness can be overrepresented. In this regard ventilation improvement and reducing of airway resistance should be considered. Some bronchodilators, such as β2-agonists and anti-muscarinic agents used to relieve these symptoms. Another option has provided for hospitalized patients, is nebulized Mg sulfate. It has been suggested in the literature that Mg sulfate can cause bronchodilation in asthmatic patients by various mechanisms, including by inhibition of calcium influx into the cytosol, prevention of acetylcholine secretion, inhibition of histamine release; and finally, by β2-receptor affinity enhancement, increases bronchodilator effect of β2-agonists. On the other hand, according to some researches, low Mg level is associated with increased inflammatory response.  in vitro studies showed that short-term exposure to Mg sulfate without affecting on viability and function of phagocytes, diminished cytokine gene and protein expression, and consequently could reduce production of TNF-α and IL-6 from neonatal monocytes. Moreover, Mg sulfate can reduce the level of interleukin 1β, that is a potent pro-inflammatory cytokine. Another study of the anti-inflammatory effect of Mg compounds showed that neutralized Mg ions can convert THP-1-derived macrophages to the M2 phenotype (anti-inflammatory macrophages), thereby reduce the production of inflammatory cytokines and enhance the secretion of anti-inflammatory cytokines. As well as, according to in vitro and in vivo studies, Mg sulfate significantly reduces baseline level along with LPS-stimulated cytokine production. Altogether, given that the cytokine phase of COVID-19 plays a very significant role in patient morbidity and mortality, therefore proper management and control of this stage of the disease is important on rescuing patients. It seems that, administration of Mg compounds as an adjuvant treatment may improve this condition of disease. Our preliminary experiences indicated the potential positive effects of Mg sulfate on the improvement process in covid-19. However, in order to achieve more accurate and reliable results, adequate randomized clinical trials are needed. It should be considered that intravenous administration of this drug can be performed only in the intensive care unit (ICU) and or under close observation, but the Inhaler form does not require close monitoring. Moreover, oral Mg supplementation in outpatients may also reduce the inflammatory response in COVID-19


Over the past few decades, there has been a rapid proliferation of eGovernance for Development projects aimed at introducing ICTs to improve systems of governance and thereby to promote development. In this book, the author unpacks the theoretical concepts of development and governance in order to propose an alternative conceptual framework which encourages a deeper understanding of macro and micro-level political, social and administrative processes within which eGovernance projects are implemented. The book draws on over fifteen years of research in India during which time many changes have occurred in terms of the country's development ideology, governance reform strategy and ICT deployment. Three case studies are presented, each specific to a different social sector and located in a different state within India, to expose the rich context within which eGovernance applications are implemented. The aim of this book is not to prescribe but to draw attention to the fact that technological solutions such as eGovernance should not overshadow the need to gain a deep understanding of the historical processes of development and governance that have evolved over time.


Polylactide (PLA) is one of the most commonly used biodegradable polymers for various fields such as biomedical and renewable industries. This material must undergo molding processes to achieve the desired shape in the final manufactured product, which are typically thermal- or solvent-based. Unfortunately, the mechanical and thermal properties of PLA, such as the strength and crystallinity, are inevitably damaged during the molding process due to the slow crystallization rate. To overcome this limitation, a simple, novel, one-pot, self-accelerating method for the in situ self-nucleating (ISN) polymerization of l-lactide is developed. This strategy results in the simultaneous polymerization and self-nucleation of l-lactide crystallites upon addition of a self-nucleating agent. The results show that ISN-PLA experiences an acceleration effect on the crystallization with stereocomplex polylactide (sc-PLA) as the nucleating agent and has enhanced mechanical and thermal properties, despite repetitive thermal p...


Artists and designers are positioned at the centre of the 21st century creative economy. In order to recognise and make the most of the opportunities afforded by this new era, artists and designers still require the creativity, disciplinary depth of knowledge, and technical skills traditionally possessed by professionals in these fields – skills which are a core strength of higher and further art and design education. However, they may also require a range of other, '21st century' creative capabilities which are harder to define, teach for and assess, and are not the focus of traditional art and design pedagogies. This article draws upon the findings of nine in-depth interviews with award-winning Australian artists and designers about their careers and working practices, along with recent international research about the characteristics of the 21st century creative career, in order to highlight the importance of certain professional capabilities for art and design. It discusses the implications of these findings for art and design educators in universities, and curricular and pedagogic considerations associated with embedding these capabilities into undergraduate courses.


Making a decision in a changeable and dynamic environment is an arduous task owing to the lack of information, their uncertainties and the unawareness of planners about the future evolution of incidents. The use of a decision support system is an efficient solution of this issue. Such a system can help emergency planners and responders to detect possible emergencies, as well as to suggest and evaluate possible courses of action to deal with the emergency. We are interested in our work to the modeling of a monitoring preventive and emergency management system, wherein we stress the generic aspect. In this paper we propose an agent-based architecture of this system and we describe a first step of our approach which is the modeling of information and their representation using a multiagent system.


As universities invest in the development of e-learning resources, e-learning sustainability has come under consideration. This has largely focused on the challenges and facilitators of organisational and technological sustainability and scalability, and professional development. Little research has examined the experience of a teacher dealing with e-learning sustainability when taking over a course with an e-learning resource and associated assessment. This research focuses on a teacher who was inexperienced with e-learning technology, yet took over a blended unit of study with an e-learning resource that accounted for one-fifth of the subject assessment and was directed towards academic skills development relevant to the degree program. Taking a longitudinal approach, this research examines the challenges faced by the new teacher and the way she changed the e-learning resource and its implementation over two years. A focus of the research is the way the teacher's reflections on the challenges and changes provided an opportunity and stimulus for change in her e-learning beliefs and practices. This research has implications for the way universities support teachers taking over another teacher's e-learning resource, the need for explicit documentation of underpinning beliefs and structured handover, the benefit of teamwork in developing e-learning resources, and provision of on-going support.


This paper presents estimated national and regional changes in numbers of breeding woodland birds in predominantly broadleaved woodland in Britain between the mid 1980s and 2003–04, derived from the Repeat Woodland Bird Survey (RWBS). A total of 405 sites across Britain for which historical data on bird populations were available were re-surveyed by BTO and RSPB fieldworkers during the RWBS. Changes were estimated separately for sites surveyed by the RSPB (n = 252) and BTO (n = 153) because of differences between the two groups in the field methods used in the original surveys. Changes between the 1960s and 1970s and 2003–04 were also estimated with the BTO data set only. The BTO and RSPB sites provide geographically complementary coverage of Britain and together provide much more widespread coverage than did the Common Bird Census (CBC), the former national monitoring scheme. Nationally, between the 1980s and 2003–04, six species declined significantly and three increased significantly based on the RSPB data, whereas eight declined and 13 increased according to the BTO data, with good correspondence between the changes recorded by the two data sets (only seven of 34 species showing trends differing in direction). Eight species showed large national declines (> 25%) according to both data sets: Garden Warbler Sylvia borin, Lesser Redpoll Carduelis cabaret, Lesser Spotted Woodpecker Dendrocopos minor, Spotted Flycatcher Muscicapa striata, Tree Pipit Anthus trivialis, Willow Tit Poecile montanus, Willow Warbler Phylloscopus trochilus and Wood Warbler P. sibilatrix. Eleven species showed large national increases (> 25%) in both data sets: Blackcap Sylvia atricapilla, Blue Tit Cyanistes caeruleus, Common Chiffchaff Phylloscopus collybita, Coal Tit Periparus ater, Great Spotted Woodpecker Dendrocopos major, Great Tit Parus major, Green Woodpecker Picus viridis, Goldcrest Regulus regulus, European Robin Erithacus rubecula, Eurasian Treecreeper Certhia familaris and Winter Wren Troglodytes troglodytes. Analysis of the longer-term changes using the BTO data set showed significant declines between the 1960s and 2003–04 in seven species and increases in 12 species. The large declines detected by the national monitoring schemes (CBC/BBS) for Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Lesser Redpoll, Spotted Flycatcher, Tree Pipit, Willow Tit, Willow Warbler and Wood Warbler were all confirmed by the RWBS but the declines of the Common Bullfinch Pyrrhula pyrrhula, Marsh Tit Poecile palustris and Mistle Thrush Turdus viscivorus were not clearly supported. The declines detected by the RWBS for Garden Warbler, Pied Flycatcher Ficedula hypoleuca and Common Redstart Phoenicurus phoenicurus were not evident from the national monitoring schemes. Most of the increases detected by the monitoring schemes were confirmed by the RWBS. However, the large increases detected by the RWBS for Coal Tit, Goldcrest, Great Tit and Eurasian Treecreeper were unexpected. All long-distance migrants have declined whilst medium-distance migrants (Blackcap and Common Chiffchaff) have increased. Also, rare and specialist woodland species have fared less well than common and generalist species.


The Alloys based on Iron-Aluminium have important prospective for operational applications at elevated temperature because they maintain an outstanding elevated temperature corrosion resistance and they possess a lower density in compare with the other Iron - based materials such as stainless steels and cast iron. The cost of Ion-Aluminium based alloys has comparatively low because of the widely availability of their manufacturing and handling processes. Fe-Al alloy is acquiring its desirability in many business applications for its wear properties andcorrosion properties, which is due to the presence of Aluminium as an alloying element. The current study is focused on the investigation of the effect of the changes in phases due to heat treatment on the Tribological behavior of Fe-Al alloy. This experiment contains the analysis of microstructure by means of microscope, crystalline phases and its structure properties by means of X-Ray Diffraction analysis. Specimen were heat treated at different temperatures (600oC, 750oC, 950oC, 1100oC) and then followed by water quenching. The soaking time is being 1 hour. The analysis of microstructure, XRD and Vickers hardness test were done the post heat treatment process. Then the dry sliding wear behavior of the heat treated samples were done by the Ball-on-Plate tribometer. After that the SEM analysis of the worn surfaces were done. Then the samples were subjected to sea water and acid rain sample for the investigation of its corrosion resistance, that is for finding the phases which has corrosion resistance. SEM study of these corroded surface illustrated that the acid rain corroded samples showed some crack propagation on the surface that may be due to hydrogen and the sea water corroded sample shows deposition of cations present in sea water. It has been found that the sample which was heat treated at 950oC has highest hardness value in comparison with other samples as well as, it has the high resistance force against the indentation. And the material which was heat treated at 1100oC has less hardness value but it is ductile and it may has resilience property. It has less resistance against the indentation. From the corrosion test we found the phase FeAl has showed the most resistance against corrosion from sea water and acid rain. We have also seen that there were changes in phases after the heat treatment in various temperatures.


SummaryNeurosarcoidosis mimics many neurologic diseases and poses a major diagnostic challenge. Blind conjunctival biopsy is often used to help diagnose neurosarcoidosis when biopsy of affected nervous system tissue is not feasible. While this test is relatively inexpensive and well-tolerated, the diagnostic yield in patients with inflammatory nervous system disease of unknown etiology remained uncertain. We evaluated 440 patients who underwent conjunctival biopsy due to concern for neurosarcoidosis. Only a small minority of patients (3%) had positive conjunctival biopsies consistent with sarcoidosis, and some patients (1%) with positive biopsies were found to have a cause for their neurologic disease other than neurosarcoidosis. Many patients (14%) had negative conjunctival biopsies but were later confirmed to have neurosarcoidosis after additional evaluations. This study demonstrates that conjunctival biopsy has a low diagnostic yield for neurosarcoidosis in patients with inflammatory nervous system disease and suggests that alternative diagnostic means should be pursued.


The rapid development of Network-on-Chip (NoC) calls for a systematic approach to evaluate and fairly compare various NoC architectures. In this specification, we define a generic NoC architecture, a comprehensive set of synthetic workloads as micro-benchmarks, workload scenarios and evaluation criteria. These micro-benchmarks enable measuring particular properties of NoC architectures, complementing application benchmarks.


The objective of this paper is to use polycondensation in situ to prepare phenolic resin / calcium carbonate nanocomposites in alkaline catalyst. This paper explored the optimization time of produce in situ calcium carbonate making use of metathesis reaction in the system of phenolic resin condensation, and analyzed the effects of the added time on water dilution and solid content of phenolic resin / calcium carbonate nanocomposites. We obtained the optimum preparation process, which provided a good research base for studying further their performances.


Talonavicular coalition is a rare entity and is often discovered as a secondary radiographic finding. Today, orthoses are as varied as the patients for whom they are prescribed; however, in cases of symptomatic talonavicular fusion, the use of a shallow U-shaped dispersion within the high medial flange of an orthosis can prove beneficial to the pediatric patient. This article encourages podiatric physicians to return to utilizing basic diagnostic tools (gait analysis, biomechanical examination, and radiographs) to detect and treat talonavicular coalition, a significant but rare anomaly of the foot.


We evaluate the performance of the MODerate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF)/Albedo algorithm using observations from MODIS instruments aboard NASA's Terra (EOS AM-1) and Aqua (EOS PM-1) platforms. This "combined" albedo product is evaluated against continuous field measurements from SURFace RADiation Budget Network (SURFRAD) and Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Southern Great Plains (ARM/SGP) stations, and through an internal analysis of the product's quality assurance (QA) fields. The combined product is compared to the initial MODIS albedo product, which used observations from the Terra satellite only. During the spring and summer months, the combined product showed a slight improvement over the original Terra-only albedo product, with a root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.0130 and a bias of about -0.02. As with the Terra-only product, accuracy drops during the fall and winter months at some sites. Jin et al. found that increased heterogeneity of validation sites during the fall and winter months is partially responsible for this drop in accuracy. The additional data provided by the Aqua platform changes high-quality albedo estimations only slightly, which underscores the stability of the MODIS algorithm. The most significant benefit of the combined product is a near 50% decrease in lower quality backup algorithm retrievals for the entire globe. A decrease in backup algorithm retrievals improves the overall accuracy of the MODIS albedo product, as it reduces algorithm reliance upon an a priori determination of the underlying surface anisotropy that is not entirely data derived.


Tenure responses in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the National Longitudinal Surveys are often inconsistent with calendar time. These inconsistencies pose special problems in the PSID because job changes cannot be identified directly, so researchers must infer them from error-ridden tenure data. We use alternative rules for partitioning PSID data into jobs and then estimate several wage and mobility models to assess the sensitivity of parameter estimates to the partitioning method. We also assess the importance of replacing "raw" tenure data with imputed measures that are internally consistent.


The Taconic orogeny of eastern North America was not, as traditionally defined, a single orogenic event that occurred at the end of the Ordovician period, but rather a complex series of orogenic episodes or climaxes spread over the larger part of that period. In most sectors of the northern Appalachians it included at least three of the following: disconformity in an external belt where carbonate was accumulating; severe early deformation in an internal volcanic belt; gravity slides from internal uplifts into the external belt; and widespread deformation, especially in the more external belts. In general, these events did not occur at the same time in the various sectors; each took a considerable time, and they overlapped to some extent. The Taconic orogeny also affected the southern Appalachians and may have been the most important one there, but evidence for this assertion is meager and inconclusive. Detailed analysis of the "fine structure" of the Taconic orogeny combats the dogma that orogenies are sharp, discrete events punctuating the geologic record (separating periods and abruptly terminating geosynclinal sedimentation) and suggests instead that they reflect "random-walk" processes within the Earth, in all likelihood the same as those responsible for sea-floor spreading and the present tectonic state of the Earth.


Since its first appearance just over a decade ago, Habermas's constitutional patriotism has inspired a rich and articulate series of theoretical analyses and has indirectly encouraged constitutional projects such as the Constitution for Europe. The popularity of constitutional patriotism among political and constitutional theorists has, however, also generated some confusion over the aims and basic structure of Habermas's endeavour. For instance, it is unclear whether constitutional patriotism ought to be considered a constitutional or political theory. This paper seeks to clarify some of the misunderstandings surrounding constitutional patriotism. It will contend that the theory is, at its core, a political theory that explains the implications of having a democratically open constitutional polity. The paper is divided into three sections. The first section introduces Habermas's theory of constitutional patriotism. I argue that one of constitutional patriotism's main contributions to current constitutional and political debates is an increased awareness of the democratic accountability of constitutional norms. The second section discusses the effect that pluralism should have in a deliberative democracy. In the third section, I discuss the implications of pluralism in the debate over the role of nationalism and democracy.


The information explosion makes selective journal reading mandatory. This article reports the results of a survey of the journal reading habits of a random sample of practicing American psychiatrists. Psychiatrists describing themselves as analytic in orientation are compared with those describing themselves as eclectic in orientation. Using criterion of readership, religiosity of reading and an index of prestige various journals appear differentially important to these two groups with considerable overlap. Several journals rarely considered as "important journals" loom large on this survey. Implications for our profession are raised.


Herein, supramolecular gels from L-aspartic acid-based perylenebisimides (APBI) and various isomeric benzene dicarboxylic acids (o-phthalic acid, OPA; isophthalic acid, IPA and terephthalic acid, TPA) were obtained. It has been found that spatial position of carboxyl on the benzene ring plays a key role in the gelation process, and OPA or IPA could lead to gel formation while TPA could not. Intermolecular hydrogen bonding and π–π stacking interactions have been found to guide the aggregation as determined by UV-vis spectra, fluorescence spectra and FT-IR. Moreover the chirality transfer from perylene chromophores to benzene dicarboxylic acids was detected via circular dichroism spectroscopy (CD). The interesting features of the two-component gel system may give a better understanding of supramolecular chirality.


Nkosinathi and Ntsiki Biko, Steve Biko's wife and son, with human rights lawyer, George Bizos, Port Elizabeth 1997. Steve Biko, the leader of the Black Consciousness movement, died in Pretoria on 12 September 1977. He was beaten into a coma during interrogation by security officers. The inquest found that Biko had died of head injuries inflicted over a period of several days during his detention. Five security policemen came forward to confess to the assault in 1997. The application for amnesty was successfully opposed by the Biko family.


Ethnic and geographical differences are important factors in studying disease frequencies, because they may highlight the environmental or genetic influences in the etiology. We retrieved the studies which have been published regarding the epidemiologic features of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) in Asia, based on the definitions of GERD, study settings, publication years and geographical regions. From the population-based studies, the prevalence of symptom-based GERD in Eastern Asia was found to be 2.5%-4.8% before 2005 and 5.2%-8.5% from 2005 to 2010. In Southeast and Western Asia, it was 6.3%-18.3% after 2005, which was much higher than those in Eastern Asia. There were robust epidemiologic data of endoscopic reflux esophagitis in medical check-up participants. The prevalence of endoscopic reflux esophagitis in Eastern Asia increased from 3.4%-5.0% before 2000, to 4.3%-15.7% after 2005. Although there were only limited studies, the prevalence of extra-esophageal syndromes in Asia was higher in GERD group than in controls. The prevalence of Barrett's esophagus was 0.06%-0.84% in the health check-up participants, whereas it was 0.31%-2.00% in the referral hospital settings. In summary, the prevalence of symptom-based GERD and endoscopic reflux esophagitis has increased in Asian countries. However, the prevalence of Barrett's esophagus in Asia has not changed and also still rare.


A preference is not located anywhere in the agent's cognitive architecture, but it is rather a constraining of behavior which is in turn shaped by behavior. Based on this idea, a minimal model of behavioral preference is proposed. A simulated mobile agent is modeled with a plastic neurocontroller, which holds two separate high dimensional homeostatic boxes in the space of neural dynamics. An evolutionary algorithm is used for creating a link between the boxes and the performance of two different phototactic behaviors. After evolution, the agent's performance exhibits some important aspects of behavioral preferences such as durability and transitions. This article demonstrates (1) the logical consistency of the multi-causal view by producing a case study of its viability and providing insights into its dynamical basis and (2) how durability and transitions arise through the mutual constraining of internal and external dynamics in the flow of alternating high and low susceptibility to environmental variations. Implications for modeling autonomy are discussed.


As the improve of voltage class in power system and the aggravation of industrial pollution, flashover of contaminated insulators in HV and UHV system is growing, imperiling the security of power system severely. The linchpin of enhancing the security of system is excavating ways of monitoring status of insulator's surface by some eigenvalues. In this paper, distinctive spectrum features of leakage current(LC) are computed, including power spectrum and bispectrum. The results show that bispectrum depicts the information of arc discharge in LC more valid than power spectrum, which is a good eigenvalue for flashover identification and risk predictions.


This study reveals the complexity of relationships inherent in a system of theatre governance shaped by exclusive rights. Royal patents granted in 1662 entrusted sole guardianship of the 'national' or 'regular' drama to two 'patent' or 'legitimate' theatres (ultimately, established as The Theatres Royal Drury Lane and Covent Garden). These held privileged access to the traditional canon of serious, literary drama, including Shakespeare. The monopoly regime's power, re-affirmed in The Theatre Licensing Act 1737, prevented all other playhouses, labelled 'minor', from producing the national corpus of plays, and from employing 'the spoken word': continuous speech unaccompanied by music. 'Minor' theatres were restricted to exhibitions of movement, music, and rhyme, commonly termed 'burletta'. By the early 1800s a consensus held the 'patent' regime responsible for degrading rather than preserving dramatic standards.

Actor/manager Robert William Elliston purchased his first London 'minor' theatre in February 1809. From that moment he began a largely self-interested campaign to overthrow the monopoly. Seeking an equitable footing, Elliston made a series of formal challenges, but when they failed he abandoned official channels. Thereafter, while remaining within the law, he adopted subversive means to gain his goal of a free stage. The Times's review of Elliston's first circumvention of the law in August 1809, an innovative 'burletta'-ized Macbeth, lauded his 'irregular' production, while recognizing this novel version as a landmark incursion into the 'legitimate' canon.

Elliston's pioneering role in the struggle for reform, recorded in 1926, has been little researched since. The thesis re-evaluates Elliston's agency in the 'patent' cartel's demise, so contributing to a re-assessment of the narrative of the monopoly regime, and the ideological and social significance of its abolition. Once free competition was achieved, the theatre became a space in which the 'legitimate' canon could be accessed by every class of theatre-goer.


The experiment was conducted to develop candy from Dhakki dates picked at Khalal stage. Physicochemical and sensory characteristics like moisture, pH, TSS, color, flavor, texture and overall acceptability were studied for total period of six months. Candy was prepared from 5 different sugar concentrations, i.e., T0 (control), T1 (20%), T2 (40%), T3 (60%), and T4 (70%). Among them, best treatment was identified on the basis of overall acceptability. Candy prepared from T3 (60%) proved to be best but the candy prepared from T2 (40%) was equally good. The least acceptable was the candy of T1 followed by T4. Sensorial properties, moisture and pH decreased while TSS increased during six months of storage. Candy packed in HDPE bags can be kept safely up to six months.


Outcome studies in foster care have tended to focus on children's development and long-term adjustment. The economic aspects of placements and their effect on children's immediate welfare have been little explored. Stefan Wiklund and Marie Sallnäs compare the economic circumstances of Swedish foster carers with adults in the wider population and contrast the situation of 125 older children in foster homes, teenagers in the community and a group in residential care. As few differences were found, except for the relative disadvantage of those in residential settings, it is concluded that there is no intrinsic reason why foster care should deprive children economically. Moreover, as the child's welfare while in care is important in its own right, the criteria used to assess the suitability of carers should include measures of available resources.


Crystallization has become one of the most important unit operation in the chemical industries. The need to reduce the time from product discovery to market introduction is an inherent concern. In order to achieve the prescribedproduct quality characteristics, the process of engineering experimentation has to be optimized. Therefore, an experimental design method for crystallization processes is presented in this paper. Initially, the standardized Taguchi method was used to plan a minimum number of experiments. After identifying the working levels of the design factors and the main performance characteristics of the product under study, the method can be successfully applied to the crystallization processes. The simultaneous variations of the main crystallization parameters and their interactions were investigated using orthogonal array technique. A statistical analysis of 'signal-to-noise' ratio was followed by performing a variance analysis. After developing some special criteria, which depend on performance objectives, the optimal levels of the design factors were determined.
Crystallization of $KNO_3$ with desirable particle size as a performance characteristic was used to illustrate the design procedure. The effects of rotational frequency of the stirrer, linear cooling rate and added admixture on final particle size were studied. In order to keep the selected parameters constant during the experiment and to ensure reproduction of entire experiment the automated reaction calorimeter RC1 was used.


With the rising incidence of metabolic syndrome and progressive kidney disease, efforts to halt this progression have become the mainstay of therapies in the era of modern nephrology. The necessity of one versus two kidneys has occupied the minds of leading scientists and philosophers throughout the ages and has laid the foundation for our understanding of progressive kidney disease. This review focuses on the major discoveries of the leading thinkers who with their paradigm shifting ideas and skepticism pushed the boundaries of our knowledge and shaped the theory of hyperfiltration.


Aim: Recurrent aphthous stomatitis (RAS) is an inflammatory condition of the oral mucosa. The etiology of RAS remains unclear. Calprotectin is a major cytoplasmic protein contained in granulocytes, monocytes/macrophages and epithelial cells, and its level is increased body fluids in some inflammatory diseases. The aim is to determine the relationship between salivary calprotectin and RAS. Material and Methods: In the cross-sectional study, 67 patients with active lesions of RAS (F/M: 43/24, mean age: 30.27 ± 9.14 years) and 42 healthy controls (HC, F/M: 30/12, 30.54 ± 9.49 years) were included. Calprotectin levels were evaluated in unstimulated whole saliva samples by using the ELISA method in both groups. Results: Salivary calprotectin levels were significantly higher in RAS group (23.72 ± 4.28 mg/L) compared to the HC group (21.59 ± 4.27 mg/L) (P = 0.013). No significant relationship was found between calprotectin levels and age or gender in both groups (P >0.05). Conclusion: RAS is a very common inflammatory ulcerative condition of the oral cavity and its etiology is uncertain. Regarded as an inflammatory mechanism, releasing a high level of calprotectin in saliva has been suggested that it may play a role in pathogenesis of RAS.


This paper aims to summarise the current state of coaching research as a basis for future studies. It seeks to provide a frame of reference for researchers and reflective practitioners interested in research to ensure that future studies build on previous work and add to our knowledge and understanding of coaching as a unique domain of practice. The paper is divided into three sections. The first two sections review the state of coaching research over the past 100 years, with a greater focus on the past decade when the number of studies published has accelerated. The paper divides the recent research into categories: the nature of coaching, coach behaviour studies, client behaviour studies, relationship studies and executive coaching impact studies and discusses research methods including Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, Grounded Theory and Discourse Analysis, randomised controlled trials, meta-analysis and mixed methods research. The third section considers the future direction research may take. It identifies key themes and sample research questions which the authors believe could be the focus of future research. The paper concludes by noting that coaching research is likely to continue to grow over the coming decade, and this growth offers an opportunity for the research–practitioner partnership to be strengthened and maintained.


The comparative analysis of Jinan and Qingdao which are located in Shandong peninsula is made with the purpose of improving urban competitiveness of these two most influential cities and reinforcing Shandong province's macroeconomic strength accordingly. The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) methodology is applied to structure an urban competitiveness model. Furthermore, a dynamic evaluation of both cities is conducted based on evaluation methodology involving factorial analysis and AHP, which is followed by strategic proposals beneficial to both of them and is thus conducive to the region's economic harmonious development.


. Lemna minor grown in sterile culture on a minerals-sucrose medium can utilize as nitrogen source, in order of increasing growth rate: ammonia, nitrate, a mixture of glutamic and aspartic acids plus arginine, or a balanced mixture of amino acids (hydrolyzed oasein). Maximum growth is found with nitrate plus hydrolyzed casein. Many synthetic mixtures of amino acids are unable to support growth. Many single amino acids are inhibitory, and when added (at 2 mM or less) to cultures, growing in the presence of nitrate, cause a decrease in growth rate or even death of the plants (e.g. with alanine, valine, methionine or leucine). Some of these inhibitory effects are also found when the amino acid is added to cultures growing on ammonia or hydrolyzed casein. Arginine was the only amino acid of those tested which gave a marked stimulation of growth when added to cultures growing with inorganic nitrogen. The rapid rate of growth, sterile nature of tissue, decreased biological variation of samples containing many plants and ability to utilize different culture media make this an attractive organism for studies on higher plant metabolism.


[1] While many earthquakes have now been studied using interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) data, a full assessment of the quality and additional value of InSAR source parameters compared to seismological techniques is still lacking. We compile a catalog of source models obtained using InSAR and estimate the corresponding centroid moment tensor (CMT) parameters; we refer to this compilation as the ICMT archive. We compare source parameters from over 70 InSAR studies of 57 global earthquakes with those in the Global CMT (GCMT), International Seismological Centre (ISC) and Engdahl‐Hilst‐Buland (EHB) seismic catalogs. We find an overall good agreement between fault strike, dip and rake values in the GCMT and ICMT archives. Likewise, the differences in seismic moment between these two archives are relatively small, and we do not find support for previously suggested trends of InSAR leading to larger moments than seismic data. However, epicentral locations show substantial discrepancies, which are larger for the GCMT (median differences of ∼21 km) than for the EHB and ISC catalogs (median differences of ∼10 km). Since InSAR data have a high spatial resolution, and thus should map epicentral locations accurately, this allows us to obtain a first independent estimate of epicentral location errors in the seismic catalogs. Earthquake depths from InSAR are systematically shallower than those in the EHB catalog, with a median of differences of ∼5 km. While this trend may be partly due to unmodeled crustal complexity, it is also compatible with the observation that the rupture of crustal earthquakes tends to propagate upward in the seismogenic layer.


Human monocytes contain two distinct receptor sites, one specific for the third component of complement (C'3), the other for immunoglobulin G(γG). The two receptors may function either independently or cooperatively in the induction of phagocytosis. Ingestion of erythrocytes coated with immunoglobulin M antibody requires a relatively large number of bound C'3 molecules per cell. Ingestion of erythrocytes sensitized with γG antibody is independent of complement; however, the reaction is inhibited by concentrations of γG far below those in normal serum. Inhibition by γG-globulin is overcome by a relatively small number of bound C'3 molecules per cell. The two monocyte receptors exert a cooperative effect on ingestion by monocytes of erythrocytes coated with γG antibody in the presence of inhibitory amounts of free γG.


Background Conventional neural probes are primarily fabricated in a cleanroom, requiring the use of multiple expensive and highly specialized tools. New method We propose a cleanroom "light" fabrication process of carbon fiber neural electrode arrays that can be learned quickly by an inexperienced cleanroom user. This carbon fiber electrode array fabrication process requires just one cleanroom tool, a parylene-c deposition machine, that can be learned quickly or outsourced to a commercial processing facility at marginal cost. Our fabrication process also includes hand-populating printed circuit boards, insulation, and tip optimization. Results The three different tip optimizations explored here (Nd:YAG laser, blowtorch, and UV laser) result in a range of tip geometries and 1kHz impedances, with blowtorched fibers resulting in the lowest impedance. While previous experiments have proven laser and blowtorch electrode efficacy, this paper also shows UV laser cut fibers can record neural signals in vivo. Comparison with existing methods Existing carbon fiber arrays either do not have individuated electrodes in favor of bundles or require cleanroom fabricated guides for population and insulation. The proposed arrays use only tools that can be used at a benchtop for fiber population. Conclusions This carbon fiber electrode array fabrication process allows for quick customization of bulk array fabrication at a reduced price compared to commercially available probes.


There is a general perception that hedge funds are dangerously high risk vehicles designed only for the elite. The majority of statistical and intellectual evidence suggests otherwise. As has been demonstrated, there is an inherent return in hedge funds, which exists partly because there is excess profit to be earned from consistently dealing in the world's capital and derivative markets. Hedge funds are paid, and have the incentive, to trade and invest when others cannot, will not, or need to be on the other side.


Introduction: Sarcoidosis is a form of interstitial lung disease of unknown cause. In this disease the formations of granulomas are diagnosed also among individuals with berylliosis – an occupational disease clinically similar to sarcoidosis, but associated with hypersensitivity to beryllium. Aim of study: Our objective is to determine the frequency of hypersensitivity to beryllium in individuals with diagnosed sarcoidosis of lungs and to attempt to work out diagnostic methods of berylliosis. Methodology: Individuals selected for the research were diagnosed with sarcoidosis. All individuals were screened using a modified beryllium lymphocyte proliferation test (BeLPT). The method involved isolating blood lymphocytes, staining them with fluorescent marker (CFSE) and exposing them to beryllium sulfate (of various concentration) or mitogen (positive control). The number of dividing cells (CFSE dilution) was marked after 5 days of incubation with flow cytometry. Individuals suspected of positive proliferation test result and those suspected of the risk for beryllium compounds exposure will be examined by patch tests with beryllium sulfate. Results: 30 individuals with sarcoidosis have been tested. 5 of them (14.3%) exhibited increased lymphocyte proliferation index. Conclusions: The study attempts to present a new diagnostic method of identifying hypersensitivity to beryllium. Presently, neither reliable in vitro tests for berylliosis have been standardised nor routinely carried out. Our method requires validation among patients with berylliosis, testing the method in control group and comparison of BeLPT-CFSE methods with a standard thymidine test.


Electron and hole diffusions in the plane of semiconductor quantum wells play an important part in the static and dynamic operations of semiconductor lasers. It is well known that the value of diffusion coefficients affects the threshold pumping current of a semiconductor laser. At the same time, the strength of carrier diffusion process is expected to affect the modulation bandwidth of an AC-modulated laser. It is important not only to investigate the combined DC and AC effects due to carrier diffusion, but also to separate the AC effects from that of the combined effects in order to provide design insights for high speed modulation. In this presentation, we apply a hydrodynamic model developed by the present authors recently from the semiconductor Bloch equations. The model allows microscopic calculation of the lateral carrier diffusion coefficient, which is a nonlinear function of the carrier density and plasma temperature. We first studied combined AC and DC effects of lateral carrier diffusion by studying the bandwidth dependence on diffusion coefficient at a given DC current under small signal modulation. The results show an increase of modulation bandwidth with decrease in the diffusion coefficient. We simultaneously studied the effects of nonlinearity in the diffusion coefficient. To clearly identify how much of the bandwidth increase is a result of decrease in the threshold pumping current for smaller diffusion coefficient, thus an effective increase of DC pumping, we study the bandwidth dependence on diffusion coefficient at a given relative pumping. A detailed comparison of the two cases will be presented.


Adapting the final sample size of a trial to the evidence accruing during the trial is a natural way to address planning uncertainty. Since the sample size is usually determined by an argument based on the power of the trial, an interim analysis raises the question of how the final sample size should be determined conditional on the accrued information. To this end, we first review and compare common approaches to estimating conditional power, which is often used in heuristic sample size recalculation rules. We then discuss the connection of heuristic sample size recalculation and optimal two‐stage designs, demonstrating that the latter is the superior approach in a fully preplanned setting. Hence, unplanned design adaptations should only be conducted as reaction to trial‐external new evidence, operational needs to violate the originally chosen design, or post hoc changes in the optimality criterion but not as a reaction to trial‐internal data. We are able to show that commonly discussed sample size recalculation rules lead to paradoxical adaptations where an initially planned optimal design is not invariant under the adaptation rule even if the planning assumptions do not change. Finally, we propose two alternative ways of reacting to newly emerging trial‐external evidence in ways that are consistent with the originally planned design to avoid such inconsistencies.


This paper establishes two theorems for two time-delayed (chaotic) discrete systems to achieve timedelayed generalized synchronization (TDGS). These two theorems uncover the general forms of two TDGS systems via a prescribed transformation. As examples, we convert the Lorenz three-dimensional chaotic map to an equal time-delayed system as the driving system, and construct the TDGS driven systems according to the Theorems 1 and 2. Numerical simulations demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed theorems.


TiN films were deposited on the AZ 31 magnesium alloy substrates by d.c. magnetron sputtering technique. The surface properties of the films were investigated. The scanning electronic microscope observations reveal the dense structure characteristics of as-deposited TiN films. Under 200°C heat treatment for 30 minutes or 4 times' heat cycles at 85°C for one hour, no structural defects such as cracks are observed on the surface of the films. Adhesion experiment further demonstrates the stability of the film and the strong combination between the film and the substrate. Nano-indentation experiment shows that the average micro-hardness of TiN film reaches 23.85 Gpa. Finally, the corrosion experiments in simulated body fluid initially reveal the degradation property of TiN film.


The large bedded slopes are the common engineering geology in mountain areas. In this paper, the influence factors, including the gradients, slope length, thickness of slide body, of the large bedded slopes were analyzed. The influence laws of the toe segment slippage length of the factors were obtained and the computing formulas of the toe segment slippage length were presented. The computing formulas were validated by the data of field survey. The results indicated that the toe segment slippage length which were determined by the slope length (L), thickness of slide body (H) and slope gradient (α) were according with the field survey and had the better safety coefficients.


Abstract Objective: Type I diabetes is a disease characterised by an extreme reduction in serum insulin levels. Diet and exercise have gained considerable attention in the treatment of diabetes. Therefore, this study was carried out to investigate the effect of diet with carbohydrate but without daily energy restriction on various metabolites (glucose, triglycerides, cholesterol, lactate), some electrolytes (Ca, Mg, Na, K, P, Cl) and essential metals (Mn, Co, Cu, Se, Zn, Fe) in the blood of rats with streptozotocin-induced diabetes. Materials and methods: Thirty-three male rats were divided into four groups of standard rat diet (SR)-fed control, SR-diet fed diabetics, low carbohydrate-standard protein-high fat (LCSPHF) diet-fed diabetics, and very low carbohydrate-high protein-high fat (VLCHPHF) diet-fed diabetics. Diabetes was induced by an i.p. injection of 50 mg/kg streptozotocin. The rats were fed with the specially prepared diets for 28 days. Results: The decreased-serum Cl and the increased-serum glucose levels were only the difference between the controls and SR diet-fed diabetic rats regarding to measured parameters. Lowering carbohydrate and increasing fat ratio in diet caused an increase in serum cholesterol and triglyceride levels leading to an increased-serum Fe and Ca, and decreased-serum Na and Cu levels in diabetic rats. Conclusion: The serum mineral changes should be taken into consideration together with the changes in serum glucose, cholesterol, and triglyceride levels for the secondary complications of diabetes mellitus.


This symposium contains three papers that discuss aspects of social capital. Social capital has become a major focus of research in many social sciences. Its increased prominence in economics reflects a general increase in interest in questions that have traditionally been deemed sociological. Regardless of one's opinion of social capital per se, this broadening of questions addressed within economics has been very salutary.


We are currently developing a prototype monolithic scintillator PET detector module based on neural network position estimators. The detector module comprises a 25.5 mm × 25.5 mm × 10 mm LYSO crystal coupled to a Hamamatsu 64 channels multi-anode PMT H7546B. The electronics for the detector module reads out all the signal channels, which represents the distribution of the scintillating light for each 7 event, and calculates the impinging position according to the pre-defined neural network algorithms if the event satisfies the energy and timing selection conditions. Compared with classical pixelated detectors, a monolithic scintillator based detector module features a simpler design, lower cost, and better energy resolution, but has lower signal to noise ratio and a more complicated signal readout scheme and data processing. By Monte-Carlo simulation, the performances of several readout schemes were compared. An optimized readout scheme which combines the 64 channels into 16 digitized signals was adopted in our electronics design. After the high resolution signal waveform digitization, an FPGA takes charge of the remaining digital signal processing, including the on-line hardware execution of the neural network positioning algorithms. We have implemented the electronics system for the detector modules. A pipelined implementation of the optimized neural network algorithms in the FPGA is able to process up to 15.3 M events per second without loss of performance compared to an off-line implementation. In addition to the function validation tests, the preliminary performance of the detector module we are building for a PET system is also reported.


In the unmodified and EP-modified melt of Q235 steel, the solidification behavior including the nucleation and growth of crystals has been observed in situ by use of a confocal scanning laser microscope combined with an infrared image furnace, and meanwhile, described the characteristic of phase transformation. The result shows that the every stage of phase transformation is advanced; the phase transformation time is shortened, and temperature is reduced during heating proceeds. On the other hand, it can be observed that the nucleation density of solid phase increases and has an even distribution among the liquid phase.


The present investigation is based on detailed taxonomical analyses combining light microscopy (LM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and critical reviews of publications and type material. This method revealed a higher number of diatom taxa than that reported for the Altiplano, reports that are based on LM and SEM, but force-fitting the taxa into their European relatives. It also became evident that some taxa often reported from the Altiplano do not occur or are less common in this region and that misidentifications are the consequence not only of force-fitting, but also of misinterpretation of the original protologues and illustrations (taxonomic concept drift). These findings have important repercussions on past palaeoecological assessments for the Altiplano, which have been based on ecological information for taxa developing in ecosystems of highly contrasting conditions. Here we present the case of three araphid diatoms, which were reported as known taxa from Europe and elsewhere, but in fact correspond to taxa described as new for the Altiplano or unpublished taxa. It is recommended that: (1) a flora for this region is developed utilizing sound microscopical data and reviewing pertinent type material, (2) key common taxa used for past palaeoecological studies in the Altiplano are reviewed using a taxonomically thorough and critical method, and (3) future palaeoecological studies for the Andes are supported by prior detailed taxonomical analysis.


Pd(x)Ru(1-x) solid solution alloy nanoparticles were successfully synthesized over the whole composition range through a chemical reduction method, although Ru and Pd are immiscible at the atomic level in the bulk state. From the XRD measurement, it was found that the dominant structure of Pd(x)Ru(1-x) changes from fcc to hcp with increasing Ru content. The structures of Pd(x)Ru(1-x) nanoparticles in the Pd composition range of 30-70% consisted of both solid solution fcc and hcp structures, and both phases coexist in a single particle. In addition, the reaction of hydrogen with the Pd(x)Ru(1-x) nanoparticles changed from exothermic to endothermic as the Ru content increased. Furthermore, the prepared Pd(x)Ru(1-x) nanoparticles demonstrated enhanced CO-oxidizing catalytic activity; Pd0.5Ru0.5 nanoparticles exhibit the highest catalytic activity. This activity is much higher than that of the practically used CO-oxidizing catalyst Ru and that of the neighboring Rh, between Ru and Pd.