The study of protein/peptide folding, misfolding, structure, and interactions are vital to understanding complex biological problems. The work presented in this thesis describes the development and application of mass spectrometry -based techniques to investigate protein structure, aggregation and interference with aggregation, providing insights into the self-assembly and inhibition of several disease-related peptides.
Mass spectrometry has evolved significantly over the past decade, its applications varying from small molecules to macromolecules. Travelling wave ion mobility spectrometry (TWIMS), when combined with mass spectrometry (MS), has the unique and unrivalled capability of separating molecular ions based on their collision cross-sectional area in addition to their mass-to-charge ratio, thus facilitating structural studies of co-populated protein conformations and structural isomers of protein complexes that cannot be separated by molecular weight alone. One biological system that has benefitted enormously from such advances is the study of in vitro amyloid formation.
The ability of amyloidogenic protein/peptides to assemble into insoluble fibrils is the basis of a vast array of human disorders. Human islet amyloid polypeptide (hIAPP) is one such peptide able to readily assemble into amyloid fibrils in vitro at neutral pH, despite being intrinsically disordered. Identifying oligomeric states occupied between monomer and final fibrils creates an enormous challenge, given that few techniques are able to separate and characterise such lowly-populated and transient species. In addition to characterisation of fibril precursors, recent research has focussed on the identification of small molecule inhibitors of the amyloid cascade and understanding their mechanism of action is of great interest to this field.
In the work presented here, the power of TWIMS-MS has been harnessed to achieve the separation and characterisation of oligomeric precursors of the type-2 diabetes-related peptide hIAPP along with IAPP mutants and peptides corresponding to its core sequence. In addition, the effects of small molecule inhibitors on oligomer population and fibril formation have been studied and described in detail. Further, an experimentally simple, in vitro MS-based screen has been developed and implemented that provides rapid and accurate analysis of protein aggregation and its inhibition. All of the results highlight the powers of MS to provide important insights into the mechanism of amyloid formation and demonstrate the potential of this approach for screening for novel inhibitors of disease-related amyloid assembly.


Electricity generation in solid fuel fired power stations is currently the main source of flying particulates and greenhouse gases emissions. Environmental pollution is expected to deteriorate dramatically in the coming century unless pollution abatement technologies for solid fuels energy conversion will be applied. The Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) system, currently under industrial testing, provides for high solid fuel energy conversion efficiency (e.g. ~ 45 %) and favors the application of proven technologies for gas purification (e.g. H 2 S oxidation to elemental sulfur, CO 2 separation and disposal as a stable carbonate solid). Additionally, gasification combined with fuel cell technology (CGFC) may provide in the long run, for energy conversion efficiency well over 50%. This article reports also the results of pilot plant lignite gasification tests for the production of a medium heating value synthesis gas using a novel indirect heat (allothermal) gasification process (ALLOGAS). The latter process employs an indirect heat rotary kiln gasifier and is considered as the most appropriate to gasify moist lignite with the minimum pretreatment.


Chronic heart failure is a complex disorder with interactions among the cardiovascular, immune, and neurohormonal systems. The concept that the progression of heart failure is due to neurohormonal abnormalities has received the greatest attention to date, leading to substantial therapeutic benefits. Although many current therapies are also thought to exert a variety of immunologic effects, this has been much less studied. In this review, the authors discuss a number of interactions among immune pathways and neurohormonal abnormalities relevant to heart failure. Cytokines, in particular tumor necrosis factor-alpha, have tremendous interactive opportunities within a regulatory network of energy metabolism, immune function, and neuroendocrine and hormonal function. Inflammatory cytokines are known to contribute to the progression of heart failure, and have been related to patients' prognosis. Advanced heart failure can be considered a state of chronic (low-grade) inflammation, and there are many reasons to suggest that anticytokine therapy could be successful in these patients. These novel approaches are certainly not without some risk, and many of them are very expensive, which may limit their application to certain subgroups of patients. In the future, it may not be enough to monitor cardiac function alone. Rather, the immune and neurohormonal status of patients may also need to be included in the performance of a complete assessment.


The presence and diversity of marine non-native species, the number of new invasions, and the impact on native communities and habitats are important metrics used to assess the health of marine ecosystems. Monitoring for marine non-native species, using traditional approaches such as rapid assessment surveys (RASs), requires taxonomic expertise and may still fail to detect rare or inconspicuous species. This study reports a validation process for a quantitative PCR (qPCR) assay based on the cytochrome oxidase 1 gene, designed to detect highly invasive tunicate Didemnum vexillum by targeting environmental DNA (eDNA) present in water samples. The D. vexillum qPCR assay showed high sensitivity, with the threshold limit of detection (LOD) and modeled LOD3 (based on triplicate qPCR reactions) estimated as 9.187 and 1.117 copies reaction–1, respectively and the limit of quantification (LOQ) was calculated as 18 copies reaction–1. Analyses of water samples collected from selected Pacific oyster farms and recreational marinas in Scotland showed 100% concordance between the historical data on presence of D. vexillum from RASs and detection of D. vexillum eDNA. Consistency of detection of D. vexillum eDNA among different sampling points within each infected sampling site varied, ranging between 100% positive throughout the site to some sampling points testing "negative" or only as "suspected" for D. vexillum. Sites with lower within-site detection consistency included sites with a low density of D. vexillum as reported by RASs or were sites undergoing D. vexillum management. The present pilot monitoring program demonstrates the potential to generate important data on presence of D. vexillum. This program will be scaled up across large geographic regions and used in the first instance to focus and target the traditional RASs to D. vexillum eDNA-positive sites in a cost-effective way, with an aim to verify the species presence by visual observation and direct Sanger sequencing of positive qPCR products.


The sublittoral forests formed by the fucoid algae Cystoseira spp. are important juvenile habitats for many Mediterranean fish species. However, the spatial variability of juvenile fish assemblages within the forests and the potential environmental drivers, such as depth and habitat complexity, remain poorly understood. We estimated densities, sizes and behaviours of juvenile fish assemblages in subtidal (0-15 meters) Cystoseira brachycarpa var. balearica forests in north Minorca Island (North-western Mediterranean Sea) over two consecutive autumns (2012 and 2013). Depth and forest complexity, here measured as canopy volume, had both a significant and independent effect on the juvenile fish assemblages in terms of species abundance composition and body size. Assemblages found in the shallowest depth range (3-4m) were characterized by greater densities of the ornate wrasse Thalassoma pavo, while those deeper (10-12m) had higher densities of the rainbow wrasse Coris julis, independently of its size composition. Juveniles of both species were more abundant in less complex forests; conversely juveniles of wrasses of the genus Symphodus were more abundant in more complex forests. The smallest sizes of T. pavo occurred in the most complex forests. On the other hand, our results demonstrated that juvenile fish behaviours were unrelated to the complexity of the Cystoseira forests but mainly related to the body length. The effects of body length on behaviour were however species dependent. Cryptic and transitory behaviours were mostly observed in the smallest and largest juveniles of T. pavo and C. julis, respectively, while the behaviour of Symphodus spp. was unrelated to their body length. Our study emphasises the importance of preserving healthy Cystoseira forests and their intrinsic patchy nature, as this habitat, with its mosaic of different complexity degrees and bathymetrical variability, enable the presence of different fish species at various life stages.


BACKGROUND
Caloric restriction in obese diabetic patients quickly improves glucose control, independently from weight loss. However, the early effects of a very-low-calorie diet (VLCD) on insulin sensitivity and insulin secretion in morbidly obese patients with type 2 diabetes are still unclear.

OBJECTIVE
The objective was to study the relative contributions of insulin sensitivity, insulin secretion, or both to improvement in glucose metabolism, after 1 wk of caloric restriction, in severely obese diabetic patients.

DESIGN
Hyperglycemic clamps were performed in 14 severely obese (BMI, in kg/m(2): >40) patients with type 2 diabetes in good glucose control (glycated hemoglobin < 7.5%) before and after 7 d of a VLCD (400 kcal/d).

RESULTS
The VLCD caused a 3.22 ± 0.56% weight loss (P < 0.001), 42.0% of which was fat loss, accompanied by decreases in fasting plasma glucose (P < 0.05) and triglycerides (P < 0.01). In parallel, the Disposition Index, which measures the body's capability to dispose of a glucose load, increased from 59.0 ± 6.3 to 75.5 ± 6.3 mL· min(-1) · m(-2) body surface area (P < 0.01), because of improvements in indexes of both first- and second-phase insulin secretion (P < 0.02), but with no changes in insulin sensitivity (P = 0.33).

CONCLUSION
The marked improvement in metabolic profile, observed in severely obese patients with type 2 diabetes after a 7-d VLCD, was primarily due to the amelioration of β cell function, whereas no contribution of insulin sensitivity was shown. This trial was registered at www.clinicaltrials.gov as NCT01447524.


Modeling software process is a good way to improve development and thus quality of resulting applications. The OMG proposes the SPEM metamodel to describe software processes. Its concepts are described through class diagrams. Unfortunately, it lacks a formal description of its semantics that makes it hard to use. So, we propose a specialization of SPEM that clarifies it and we use OCL to formally express constraints on it.


The relationship between drinking and driving is a complex one. In general, the probability of a crash increases as blood alcohol concentration (BAC) increases. Physiological changes with increased BAC impair attention span, alertness, visual acuity, and reaction times. Risk-taking behavior is increased with alcohol consumption. Alcohol is particularly detrimental for the inexperienced driver as well as for the driver in unfamiliar territory. This report covers research of three major types: research on the physiological effects of alcohol, laboratory and simulation studies of alcohol-related accidents in field settings. /Author/


As adult female mosquito's salivary gland facilitate blood meal uptake and pathogen transmission e.g. Plasmodium, virus etc., a plethora of research has been focused to understand the mosquito-vertebrate-pathogen interactions. Despite the fact that mosquito spends longer time over nectar sugar source, the fundamental question 'how adult female salivary gland' manages molecular and functional relationship during sugar vs. blood meal uptake remains unanswered. Currently, we are trying to understand these molecular relationships under dual feeding conditions in the salivary glands of the mosquito Anopheles culicifacies. During functional annotation of salivary transcriptome database, unexpectedly we discovered a cluster of salivary transcripts encoding plant like proteins. Our multiple experimental validations confirmed that Plant like transcripts (PLTs) are of mosquito origin and may encode functional proteins. A comprehensive molecular analysis of the PLTs and ongoing metagenomic analysis of salivary microbiome provide first evidence that how mosquito may have been benefited from its association with plant host and microbes. Future understanding of the underlying mechanism of the feeding associated molecular responses may provide new opportunity to control vector borne diseases.


The aesthetic senses are the senses by which we experience beauty, grace, and other aesthetic properties. Vision and hearing are commonly recognized as aesthetic senses, while smell, taste, and touch are not. Proprioception is the sense by which we acquire information about the positions and movements of our own bodies, via receptors in the joints, tendons, ligaments, muscles, and skin. My claim is that proprioception is an aesthetic sense and that one can make aesthetic judgments based on proprioceptive experience. I will argue that, just as one can deem a painting beautiful based on one's visual experience of the painting, one can deem a certain movement beautiful based on one's proprioceptive experience of the movement. In addition, I posit that in a certain sense an observer can proprioceive the beauty of another's movement. Although this may sound surprising, I argue that recent discoveries about the function of mirror neurons-neurons that are activated both when one performs a task and when one sees that task performed-as well as other empirical studies illustrating that when seeing others move we kinesthetically represent their motion, support the case and potentially pave the way toward a third-person proprioceptive aesthetics.


Languages have a great evolutionary significance, because linguistic affinities are also clues to population history. A common language frequently reflects a common origin, and a related language indicates a common origin too, but further back in time (Barbujani 1997). Comparison of Sanskrit and modern Indian languages Hindi and Punjabi with Slovenian belonging to a Slavic language family shows that there is a linguistic similarity and the older the language the greater is the resemblance. Sanskrit, especially Vedic Sanskrit, which is the oldest, exhibits more similarities to Slovenian than Hindi or Punjabi. A statistical comparison shows that~20% of Vedic words are same or similar to Slovenian in sound and meaning. Similar comparison with the Classical Sanskrit, shows ~10% similarity. This resemblance is not limited to linguistics, but can be further seen in some family and also some topographical names. This can be taken as indication that Slovenian language has changed relatively slowly over the millennia. Within this context, it would be reasonable to expect, that a modern Slovenian, familiar with the dialects and other Slavic languages, should be able to recognize words and meanings of the Venetic language, if it belongs to the same language family. In addition to linguistics, there are also genetic similarities between Slavs of Europe and the peoples of the Indian sub-continent.


The fetal heart rate (fHR) and fetal electrocardiogram (fECG) are important parameters for diagnosing fetal well-being. Currently, the fECG can only be accurately recorded during labor using an electrode connected directly to the fetal scalp. Another possibility to obtain the fECG is by positioning contact electrodes on the maternal abdomen. The signals recorded by these electrodes are however corrupted by other electrophysiological signals and noise. The maternal electrocardiogram (mECG) is the predominant corruption, which has to be removed to enable detection of the fHR. In this paper a novel technique to remove the mECG from abdominal recordings has been implemented in a prototype fECG monitoring system. Moreover, a novel technique to detect the fHR and subsequently calculate an average fECG complex has been implemented as well. Implementation is performed to enable real-time monitoring of the fHR and fECG. The fHR detected from the maternal abdomen is validated by comparison to the fHR detected by a simultaneously performed recording from the fetal scalp. Preliminary results show a correlation coefficient of 0.98 between the fHR traces.


Preface. 1. Introduction. Arguments. Key Terms. Logic and the Law. 2. Propositional Logic. And. If. Not. Or. Iff. Derived Rules. Truth Tables. 3. Predicate Logic. Symbolization. Proofs. Propositional Analogues. Interpretations. Relations. Identity. Analysis by Instantiation. 4. Disputations. What are Disputations? Denials. Pleading. Distinguo. Affirmative Defenses. 5. Pitfalls and Paradoxes. Necessary and Sufficient Conditions. Problematic Universal Statements. The Paradox of Material Implication. Quantifier Scope. Existential Import. 6. Intensional Contexts. Extensional and Intensional Contexts. Recognizing Intensional Contexts. Examples and Strategies. Intent, Risk, and Inchoate Crimes. 7. Conclusion. Analogical and Deductive Legal Reasoning. Appendices. Deontic Logic. Formation Rules. Alternative Symbols. Solutions to Starred Exercises. Rules of Inference. Index. Table of Cases. Table of Statutes and Rules.


This paper presents a novel application of argumentation for automated Story Comprehension (SC). It uses argumentation to develop a computational ap- proach for SC as this is understood and studied in psychology. Argumentation provides uniform solutions to various representational and reasoning problems re- quired for SC such as the frame, ramification, and qualification problems, as well as the problem of contrapositive reasoning with default information. The grounded semantics of argumentation provides a suitable basis for the construction and re- vision of comprehension models, through the synthesis of the explicit information from the narrative in the text with the implicit (in the reader 's mind) common sense world knowledge pertaining to the topic(s) of the story given in the text. We re- port on the empirical evaluation of the approach through a prototype system and its ability to capture both the majority and the variability o f understanding of sto- ries by human readers. This application of argumentation can provide an important test-bed for the more general development of computational argumentation.


Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine the prevalence of suicide ideation amongst a group of people who had been arrested and taken into police custody, and were then referred to a mental health service operating in the police stations.

Design/methodology/approach

A referred sample of 888 cases were collected over an 18-month period during 2012/2013. Clinical assessments were conducted using a template in which background information was collected (including information about their previous clinical history, substance misuse, alleged offence, any pre-identified diagnoses, and the response of the service) as part of the standard operating procedure of the service. Data were analysed using a statistical software package.

Findings

In total, 16.2 per cent (n=144) reported suicide ideation, with women being more likely to report than men. In total, 82.6 per cent of the suicide ideation sample reported a history of self-harm or a suicide attempt. Suicide ideation was also associated with certain diagnostic categories (depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and personality disorder), a history of contact with mental health services, and recent (within 24 hours) consumption of alcohol or drugs.

Originality/value

This evaluation adds to the limited literature in this area by describing a large sample from a real clinical service. It provides information that can assist with future service designs and it offers support for calls for a standardised health screening process, better safety arrangements for those who have recently used alcohol or drugs (within 24 hours) and integrated service delivery across healthcare domains (i.e. physical healthcare, substance use, and mental health).


Cervical pre-cancer is associated with, and develops from, infection of cervical epithelium by one of a range of oncogenic papillomaviruses. To model the immunology of papillomavirus infection, we have grafted skin transgenic for the E7 major transforming protein of HPV16 to naive recipient mice ([1][1]). We examined the nature of the immune response to E7 developed following grafting, the effect of E7 specific immunotherapy on graft outcome, and the nature of the immune response, which can result in graft destruction. Grafting to transgenic skin in which E7 or hGH is expressed in epithelial cells from a keratin 14 promoter to a naive animal induces active tolerance of the graft antigen, and this tolerance is not broken by immunization. Co-administration of a strong pro-inflammatory signal at the time of grafting E7 transgenic skin results in graft rejection, and animals that have rejected one E7 graft will specifically reject a further E7 transgenic graft without further immune manipulation. Graft rejection requires both CD4 and CD8 T cells, and antigen specific rejection response can be determined either by CD4 cells or by CD8 cells.

To establish the safety, tolerability and immunogenicity of HPV16 specific immunotherapy for CIN in patients with CIN, we conducted a double blind trial using CerVax16™, a fusion protein of E6 and E7 from HPV16 combined with ISCOMs, a saponin based adjuvant. 31 women with CIN 1-3 were randomly allocated to receive active treatment (n = 24) with one of three dose levels of antigen (20 µg, 60 µg, or 200 µg), or placebo (n = 7). Up to three injections were given intramuscularly over 6 weeks. Subjects were assessed for adverse events, immunogenicity, and HPV16 viral load in cervical biopsies taken before and after treatment. Local site reaction (mild n = 11, moderate n = 11, severe n = 2) and systemic symptoms (mild n = 11, moderate n = 8, severe n = 3) were observed in active and placebo groups. Specific antibody was induced for all 24 subjects given active vaccine. 12 of 20 evaluable subjects given active vaccine demonstrated a gamma-interferon response. CTL responses were detected in some subjects. In general, responses increased with multiple vaccinations. No major changes in colposcopic appearance or in cervical histology were observed. Of 14 HPV16 +ve subjects treated, 13 had lower mean HPV copy number per cell after treatment. Mean viral load fell from 50 ± 22 viral copies per cell pre-treatment to 12 ± 8 post-treatment ( P< 0.05; paired t test). Mean viral load did not fall significantly in women given placebo ( P =0.34). CerVax16™ is thus safe and immunogenic in patients with HPV16-associated CIN, and may reduce the load of HPV16 in infected cervical tissue.

This abstract was published in Cancer Immunity , a [Cancer Research Institute][2] journal that ceased publication in 2013 and is now provided online in association with Cancer Immunology Research .

 [1]: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=Pubmed&list_uids=11714778&dopt=Abstract
 [2]: http://cancerresearch.org/


The application of the techniques of modern molecular biology to the study of the genetic control of language development poses many significant challenges. Because language is a complex function, disruption of any of a number of systems can impair language development. The diagnostic classification of specific language impairment includes individuals with an apparently inherited form of disordered language development, and therefore some aspects of this clinical phenotype may be useful for positional cloning studies of genes related to language. Known genetic disorders with specific deficits in language functions may also serve to identify candidate genes for language development. In addition to these specific approaches, the current general strategies for positional cloning and candidate gene studies are reviewed.


The goal of the Robotic Antarctic Meteorite Search is to enable discovery of meteorites in Antarctica by a mobile robot. The extreme environment makes it one of the best places to find meteorites, but one of the worst places for humans to work. The meteorite-finding robot will traverse an ice field in a pattern designed to cover the area completely, stopping to investigate potential meteorites with an array of sensors. High level autonomy is needed for this project in many areas: scientific sensing, scientific analysis, navigational sensing, navigational planning, and mission planning. Navigational planning for this project primarily involves generating coverage patterns for traversing the ice fields as completely as possible. Multiple types of patterns are considered, and some of their benefits and problems are discussed. Several of the coverage patterns have been tested in a gravel slag heap in Pittsburgh and on the ice in Antarctica, and the results of these tests are described. The affect of different environments and robot locomotion configurations on control issues, such as the implementation of the pure pursuit algorithm, and maintaining and regaining a path, are discussed.


From a very young age till the last days of his life, Stanislaw Staszic was occupied by the question of the relationship between God and Nature. In particular, the Polish thinker was interested in the vision of the world in which human life and Nature were seen in unison, in accordance with laws of reason and the outcomes of scientific investigations. His deliberations on Nature validated his monistic worldview, encompassed within a deistic general framework. Staszic pointed out many times that natural order is the creation of God, however, earthly issues are in the hands of humans. In the last years of his life he withdrew from God. He did not accept the Church's hierarchy, while his approach to the Creator was ambivalent.


About the book: This book is concerned with the question of how people in developing countries survive, and how their lives have been affected by the great changes since the Second World War.

Throughout large parts of the developing world rural livelihoods are in crisis. Even in those parts of the third world where there has been growth of food output, that growth has rarely been translated into a commensurate expansion of livelihoods. Frequently, both economic stagnation and economic growth are translated into suffering for those who live in the countryside. Many people are aware that there is a crisis of livelihoods in sub-Saharan Africa, but the understanding of that crisis rarely transcends simple conceptions of food or environmental crisis or the inadequacy of states: the ubiquity of crisis is rarely comprehended.

This book addresses the pressing question of rural poverty. It examines the diverse human implications of rural change, the various crises of rural livelihoods which arise from change, and the survival strategies of individuals and households. It describes the great processes of agrarian transformation which have fundamentally altered rural livelihoods in developing countries and identifies some of the dilemmas for public action which arise from agrarian transformation and the crises of rural livelihoods.

The contributors draw upon a range of disciplinary approaches to the subject, including anthropology, sociology, economics, political economy, agricultural science, and development studies.


OpenVIVO is a free and open hosted semantic web platform open to anyone that gathers and shares open data about scholarship around the world. OpenVIVO, based on the VIVO open source platform, provides transparent access to data about the scholarly work of its participants. OpenVIVO demonstrates the use of persistent identifiers, automatic real-time ingest of scholarly ecosystem metadata, use of VIVO-ISF and related ontologies, attribution of work, and publication and reuse of data – all critical components of presenting, preserving, and tracking scholarship. The system was created by a cross-institutional team over the course of three months. The team created and used RDF models for research organizations in the world based on Digital Science GRID data, for academic journals based on data from CrossRef and the US National Library of Medicine, and created a new model for attribution of scholarly work. All models, data, and software are available in open repositories.


Environmental crises are evident and observable in many countries such as global warming, water and air pollutions, deforestation, destruction of many core species of the seas, extinction or almost extinction of many species of animals, insects and plants, water shortage and food scarcity due to dried or flooded agricultural areas and accelerating spread of deserts. The environmental crises are caused directly or indirectly by humans living on this earth planet. Although humans are part and parcel of the ecological system, they are capable of causing the environmental crises. Their thoughts and actions have contributed to the environmental crises. Human thoughts and actions are shaped by human cultures, beliefs and values. Religions for many human beings are sources for their beliefs, values and actions. One of the world religions is Islam, the religion of Muslims and Islam has some teachings related to humans and their environments. Some of Islamic teachings on humans and environments are the concept of universe as the works and signs of God, the concept of hasanah (amenity) in this world, the concepts of moderation, equilibrium, greediness and wastefulness. This paper intends to elaborate and argue that these Islamic concepts are helpful and useful for human plans, efforts and actions to overcome some environmental crises.


Drawing on our experience as early career researchers who identify as Chinese, we discuss how such an identity has inevitably and unjustifiably come to entrap us in the politics of the great power rivalries of our time. We call for attention to the discrimination against Chinese scholars in the process of academic knowledge production, in particular, in peer review processes.


It is not enough to study animal welfare; our responsibility is to promote it. To this end, we need to step out of our laboratories and develop robust protocols for assessing welfare in groups of animals on farms or in the laboratory. While these protocols must incorporate principles derived from detailed scientific study they will, in practice, need to be based on clinical observations and records that an assessor can acquire at a single visit. Such assessments must also be comprehensive: approaches based only on behaviour, or motivational state, or physical appearance, or performance records, can never tell the full story. The 'Five Freedoms' provide a comprehensive template that incorporates the different elements that define welfare state. However they only describe welfare at the time of observation. Protocols, for example, for on-farm assessment need to include measurements and records that provide evidence of long-term consequences of the quality of husbandry practices (eg body condition, chronic injuries). This paper reviews approaches developed at Bristol for the on-farm evaluation of welfare in dairy cows and free-range hens. The criteria used to assess welfare from clinical evidence were developed through expert consultation using the 'Delphi' review process. Experts were also asked to make value judgements as to the seriousness of different elements of poor welfare by indicating the point at which intervention would be necessary to resolve specific problems. This study identified a serious limitation of Quality Assurance schemes that seek to encompass many different elements of welfare into a single index that ranks overall welfare as acceptable or unacceptable. Specific farms had specific welfare problems and these required specific solutions.


BACKGROUND
Ileocolic anastomoses are commonly performed for right-sided colon cancer and Crohn's disease. The anastomosis may be constructed using a linear cutter stapler or by suturing. Individual trials comparing stapled versus handsewn ileocolic anastomoses have found little difference in the complication rate but they have lacked adequate power to detect potential small difference. This is an update of a Cochrane review first published in 2007.

OBJECTIVES
To compare outcomes of ileocolic anastomoses performed using stapling and handsewn techniques. The hypothesis tested was that the stapling technique is associated with fewer complications.

SEARCH STRATEGY
MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane Colorectal Cancer Group specialised register SR-COLOCA, Cochrane Library were searched for randomised controlled trials comparing use of a linear cuter stapler with any type of suturing technique for ileocolic anastomoses in adults from 1970 to 2005 and were updated in December 2010. Abstracts presented to the following society meetings between 1970 and 2010 were handsearched: American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons, the Association of Coloproctology of Great Britain and Ireland, European Association of Coloproctology.

SELECTION CRITERIA
Randomised controlled trials comparing use of linear cutter stapler (isoperistaltic side to side or functional end to end) with any type of suturing technique in adults.

DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
Eligible studies were selected and their methodological quality assessed. Relevant results were extracted and missing data sought from the authors. RevMan 5 was used to perform meta-analysis when there were sufficient data. Sub-group analyses for cancer inflammatory bowel disease as indication for ileocolic anastomoses were performed.

MAIN RESULTS
After obtaining individual data from authors for studies that include other anastomoses, seven trials (including one unpublished) with 1125 ileocolic participants (441 stapled, 684 handsewn) were included. The five largest trials had adequate allocation concealment.Stapled anastomosis was associated with significantly fewer anastomotic leaks compared with handsewn (S=11/441, HS=42/684, OR 0.48 [0.24, 0.95] p=0.03). One study performed routine radiology to detect asymptomatic leaks. For the sub-group of 825 cancer patients in four studies, stapled anastomosis led to significantly fewer anastomotic leaks (S=4/300, HS=35/525, OR 0.28 [0.10, 0.75] p=0.01). In subgroup analysis of non-cancer patients (3 studies, 264 patients) there were no differences for any reported outcomes. All other outcomes: stricture, anastomotic haemorrhage, anastomotic time, re-operation, mortality, intra-abdominal abscess, wound infection, length of stay, showed no significant difference.

AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS
Stapled functional end to end ileocolic anastomosis is associated with fewer leaks than handsewn anastomosis.


Hyberbaric oxygenation in altitude chambers OKA-MT was used in the complex of prophylactic measures against wound infection in 91 patients with open traumas of the extremities (fractures, amputations, etc.). The effect of hyperbaric oxygenation on the external respiration was studied by the method of spirography. Tetrapolar rheography was used to follow the central hemodynamics. A number of immune parameteres were also studied. Hyperbaric oxygenation was established to abolish hyperventilation and myocardium hyperdynamia, to accelerate the recovery of the neutrophil phagocytic activity and immunoglobulin level, to contribute to the quicker diminishing of edema in the wound area and healing of the stump and open fracture without suppuration, early formation of dry necrosis with a distinct line of demarcation.


Measuring congruence between two texts has several useful applications, such as detecting the prevalent deceptive and misleading news headlines on the web. Many works have proposed machine learning based solutions such as text similarity between the headline and body text to detect the incongruence. Text similarity based methods fail to perform well due to different inherent challenges such as relative length mismatch between the news headline and its body content and non-overlapping vocabulary. On the other hand, more recent works that use headline guided attention to learn a headline derived contextual representation of the news body also result in convoluting overall representation due to the news body's lengthiness. This paper proposes a method that uses inter-mutual attention-based semantic matching between the original and synthetically generated headlines, which utilizes the difference between all pairs of word embeddings of words involved. The paper also investigates two more variations of our method, which use concatenation and dot-products of word embeddings of the words of original and synthetic headlines. We observe that the proposed method outperforms prior-arts significantly for two publicly available datasets.


We present a study of the dielectric function of metallic (III,Mn)V diluted magnetic semiconductors in the infrared regime. Our theoretical approach is based on the kinetic exchange model for carrier induced (III,Mn)V ferromagnetism. The dielectric function is calculated within the random phase approximation and, within this metallic regime, we treat disorder effects perturbatively and thermal effects within the mean field approximation. We also discuss the implications of this calculations on carrier concentration measurements from the optical $f$-sum rule and the analysis of plasmon-phonon coupled modes in Raman spectra.


Legionnaires' disease (LD) is the second most common type of bacterial pneumonia in the United States. It disproportionately affects elderly and immunocompromised individuals and can lead to disability and death. LD is caused by the waterborne bacterium Legionella which is found in many aqueous environments and amplified in man-made structures such as cooling towers and building water systems. LD transmission occurs through inhalation or aspiration of Legionella contaminated water. The majority of LD cases in the US and worldwide are community-acquired with no known association with other cases, which are referred to as sporadic cases. The environmental source is often unknown, thus hindering targeted control measures. The overall objective of this dissertation is to better define the epidemiology of sporadic, community-acquired LD in order to inform targeted public health interventions. This objective was addressed through three studies. The first was a literature review of environmental sources of sporadic, community-acquired LD. We found that residential potable water, large building water systems and car travel contribute to a substantial proportion of sporadic LD. Cooling towers may also be a significant source, but definitive linkage to sporadic cases is difficult. The second study assessed the prevalence of Legionella pneumophila bacteria in Allegheny County cooling towers. We found L. pneumophila in almost half of cooling towers tested; however, the concentration level was relatively low. Facilities were encouraged to develop a water management plan and conduct annual basin water emptying, quarterly cleaning, quarterly Legionella testing and diligent inspection of older towers. The third study is a prospective simulation of community-acquired LD spatiotemporal cluster detection is presented in chapter four to demonstrate the utility and performance of this method in Allegheny County. Larger, cooling tower-associated simulated outbreaks were detected. Health departments should consider adopting this method for improved LD outbreak detection, faster investigation initiation and potential disease prevention. Overall, the findings of these three complementary studies are of public health relevance given they inform locally-focused intervention strategies for LD prevention. LD is a costly disease and interventions should be efficiently tailored for local response. Health departments should allocate resources for locally-focused interventions to reduce LD incidence.


The importance of land restoration has garnered increasing attention on the global stage through large‐scale initiatives such as the Bonn Challenge. However, policies and strategies are often gender‐blind and designed in compliance with entrenched social hierarchies, exacerbating pre‐existing social inequalities that affect restoration initiatives. The challenge of developing gender‐responsive policies and initiatives is accentuated by a persistent lack of sex‐disaggregated data concerning men's and women's differing perceptions and experiences. This study aims to help fill this gap by capturing the differences in men and women's perceptions of ecosystem services before and after restoration interventions in Ethiopia. Towards that end, in October 2021, we collected data from fifty‐nine (59) paired husband‐wife households and six gender‐segregated focus group discussions in two regions of Ethiopia: Amhara and Southern Nations, and Nationalities and Peoples (SNNP). Kendall's concordance analysis established a strong degree of disagreement between men's and women's ratings of restoration outcomes for most indicators. Men attributed degradation to landscape conditions and natural forces, while women considered the lack of appropriate restoration strategies as a precursor for accelerated degradation. The study also reveals that men tended to benefit more than women from enhanced ecosystem services post‐restoration, with increased labour and land management burdens often falling on the shoulders of women. Based on these findings, we argue that including men's and women's perspectives from the earliest planning phases of restoration initiatives is essential to ensure greater equity in benefit‐sharing, mitigate trade‐offs for women, and build more nuanced, just and successful approaches to restoration.


The challenges and complexity of the reconciliation process are still not well understood by a large number of non-Indigenous people in Canada. As a nation, we are attempting to grasp the intricacy of how to unravel and atone for the damage that has been done in establishing and managing the more than 130 residential schools in Canada. This not only impacted more than 150,000 First Nations, Métis, and Inuit children but destroyed generations of families that are still and will continue to be impacted for years to come. The official apology from Prime Minister Stephen Harper on June 11, 2008, to all Indigenous people in Canada for the atrocities of the Indian Residential Schools was the start of a very long and painful continuous journey. The 94 calls to action released in 2015 by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission provide a road map to a complex recovery process for Indigenous people across the country. In January 2018, Health Canada held a national panel discussion with Indigenous leaders and experts on the question "Reconciliation—What Does it Mean?" One of the main themes of reconciliation revolves around education, and, in order to stay focused, we must continue to educate Canadians, including police leaders and new recruits, as we move through the meandering path of econciliation. The book Our Shared Future provides an outstanding in-depth look through the windows into a number of individual perspectives on the reconciliation journey.


Psychology and psychiatry residents independently interviewed 102 serial patients admitted to a general hospital emergency room. On the basis of the interview, trainees of each discipline made independent judgments of the seriousness of the suicidal attempt. These judgments were compared with those of a senior clinician and the ability of each group—over time—to anticipate the more experienced man's judgments was determined. Psychology trainees tended to outperform the psychiatry trainees, raising questions about the training models involved.


Extrasolar planets observation and characterization by high contrast imaging instruments is set to be a very important subject in observational astronomy. Dedicated instruments are being developed to achieve this goal with very high efficiency. In particular, full spectroscopic characterization of low temperature planetary companions is an extremely important milestone. We present a new data analysis method for long slit spectroscopy (LSS) with coronagraphy, which allows characterization of planetary companions of low effective temperature. In a speckle-limited regime, this method allows an accurate estimation and subtraction of the scattered starlight, to extract a clean spectrum of the planetary companion. We performed intensive LSS simulations with IDL/CAOS to obtain realistic spectra of low (R=35) and medium (R=400) resolution in the J, H, and K bands. The simulated spectra were used to test our method and estimate its performance in terms of contrast reduction and extracted spectra quality. Our simulations are based on a software package dedicated to the development of SPHERE, a second generation instrument for the ESO-VLT. Our method allows a contrast reduction of 0.5 to 2.0 magnitudes compared to the coronagraphic observations. For M0 and G0 stars located at 10 pc, we show that it would lead to the characterization of companions with Teff of 600 K and 900 K respectively, at angular separations of 1.0 as. We also show that errors in the wavelength calibration can produce significant errors in the characterization, and must therefore be minimized as much as possible.


As anthropologists increasingly study Christianity in Melanesia, data has become available which allow us to address comparative questions about its differential impact in various societies of the region. In this article, I look at how conversion to Christianity has transformed women's roles in one society in Papua New Guinea and one in Vanuatu. In particular, I examine what Christian values have meant for the construction of new gender roles. In addition, I compare changes in women's roles in these two Christianized societies to the situation in another rapidly changing Papua New Guinea society where Christianization is not a dominant social trend in order to explore how Christianity might be seen to align women with culturally dominant values in ways other kinds of cultural change do not. In the course of the article, I also consider what my analysis has to say about the value of comparing Christian societies across the Melanesian region for the broader project of theorizing the role of religion in shaping contemporary social transformations in this region and beyond.


Complex, multihazard risks such as private groundwater contamination necessitate multiannual risk reduction actions including seasonal, weather‐based hazard evaluations. In the Republic of Ireland (ROI), high rural reliance on unregulated private wells renders behavior promotion a vital instrument toward safeguarding household health from waterborne infection. However, to date, pathways between behavioral predictors remain unknown while latent constructs such as extreme weather event (EWE) risk perception and self‐efficacy (perceived behavioral competency) have yet to be sufficiently explored. Accordingly, a nationwide survey of 560 Irish private well owners was conducted, with structural equation modeling (SEM) employed to identify underlying relationships determining key supply management behaviors. The pathway analysis (SEM) approach was used to model three binary outcomes: information seeking, post‐EWE action, and well testing behavior. Upon development of optimal models, perceived self‐efficacy emerged as a significant direct and/or indirect driver of all three behavior types—demonstrating the greatest indirect effect (β = −0.057) on adoption of post‐EWE actions and greatest direct (β = 0.222) and total effect (β = 0.245) on supply testing. Perceived self‐efficacy inversely influenced EWE risk perception in all three models but positively influenced supply awareness (where present). Notably, the presence of a vulnerable (infant and/or elderly) household member negatively influenced adoption of post‐EWE actions (β = −0.131, p = 0.016). Results suggest that residential and age‐related factors constitute key demographic variables influencing risk mitigation and are strongly mediated by cognitive variables—particularly self‐efficacy. Study findings may help contextualize predictors of private water supply management, providing a basis for future risk‐based water interventions.


The ERS Eating and Health Module, a supplement to the American Time Use Survey (ATUS), included questions on height and weight so that respondents' Body Mass Index (BMI — a measure of body fat based on height and weight) could be calculated and analyzed with ATUS time-use data in obesity research. Some respondents did not report height and/or weight, and BMIs could not be calculated for them. Analyses focusing on correlations between BMIs and time use could be biased if respondents who did not report height and/or weight differ significantly in other observable characteristics from the rest of the survey respondents. However, findings reveal that any nonresponse bias associated with the height and weight data appears to be small and would not affect future analyses of BMIs and time-use pattern correlations.


The paper presents a valid and efficient method to teach ideological and political education courses in linear regression analysis. It includes theory and practice parts, where interactive learning methodologies are created. It adopts case-study teaching, since this teaching method effectively integrates theoretical teaching and practical teaching. The lectures should be not an exhaustive review of regression methodology, but they should focus on how the regression models derived. Moreover, the teacher should pay more attention to the theoretical aspects of models rather than to their implementation using software. Students work in teams of three or four on a problem presented by teachers and choose relevant software to carry out their own projects. Feedback from students indicates that this method of teaching improves students' class attendance and greatly increases their interest in learning.


Several architectures are studied and a boost/buck power supply is proposed as to achieve superior efficiency. A boost and buck, dual mode converter core and drivers is implemented in a 180 nm cmos technology node and running at 220 MHz. Zero Voltage Switching and Width Switching is implemented to increase efficiency. The feedback control of the converter is modeled in Verilog-AMS as a voltage mode feedback with a PID filter. An efficiency of up to 78 % is obtained for a 2.4 V input, and 60 % with a 3.3 V input. This is not a superior efficiency, but higher than an ideal linear regulator. Seen in relation to that it is fully integrated, its switching frequency, and that neither the width switching scheme nor the zero voltage switching is fully tweaked, a further development of the proposed topology seems to be a possible solution of the realization of a stable integrated power supply with superior efficiency and low noise.


We present a reproducible, one-pot colloidal co-assembly approach that results in large-scale, highly ordered porous silica films with embedded, uniformly distributed, accessible gold nanoparticles. The unique coloration of these inverse opal films combines iridescence with plasmonic effects. The coupled optical properties are easily tunable either by changing the concentration of added nanoparticles to the solution before assembly or by localized growth of the embedded Au nanoparticles upon exposure to tetrachloroauric acid solution, after colloidal template removal. The presence of the selectively absorbing particles furthermore enhances the hue and saturation of the inverse opals' color by suppressing incoherent diffuse scattering. The composition and optical properties of these films are demonstrated to be locally tunable using selective functionalization of the doped opals.


In this paper, the investigation of the asymptotical stability of linear neutral systems with time‐varying delay has been presented. In order to achieve the desired results, the integral inequality approach was used to express relationships between terms of Newton‐Leibniz formula technique and was constructed an appropriate Lyapunov‐Krasovskii functional. By improving a delay decay approach, the stability criteria for the zero solution of system were formulated as linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) which can be easily solved. Two numerical examples have been given to show the applicability of established assumptions and the effectiveness of proposed method by MATLAB‐Simulink.


Figure 4. Venn diagram showing the reproducibility of the identification and quantification between the A and B iTRAQ replicates. A total of 585 proteins were identified, with 365 identified in both biological replicates. One hundred thirty proteins out of 365 were quantified in the same way (quantified and agreed, Q & A). The rest were either quantified but with opposite changes (quantified and disagreed, Q & D) or quantified but with no significant differences in both replicates and one of the replicate (quantified and not significant, Q & NS), or not quantifiable (NQ).


This report is on direct observation and modal analysis of irregular spatio-temporal vibration patterns of vocal fold pathologies in vivo. The observed oscillation patterns are described quantitatively with multiline kymograms, spectral analysis, and spatio-temporal plots. The complex spatio-temporal vibration patterns are decomposed by empirical orthogonal functions into independent vibratory modes. It is shown quantitatively that biphonation can be induced either by left-right asymmetry or by desynchronized anterior-posterior vibratory modes, and the term "AP (anterior-posterior) biphonation" is introduced. The presented phonation examples show that for normal phonation the first two modes sufficiently explain the glottal dynamics. The spatio-temporal oscillation pattern associated with biphonation due to left-right asymmetry can be explained by the first three modes. Higher-order modes are required to describe the pattern for biphonation induced by anterior-posterior vibrations. Spatial irregularity is quantified by an entropy measure, which is significantly higher for irregular phonation than for normal phonation. Two asymmetry measures are introduced: the left-right asymmetry and the anterior-posterior asymmetry, as the ratios of the fundamental frequencies of left and right vocal fold and of anterior-posterior modes, respectively. These quantities clearly differentiate between left-right biphonation and anterior-posterior biphonation. This paper proposes methods to analyze quantitatively irregular vocal fold contour patterns in vivo and complements previous findings of desynchronization of vibration modes in computer modes and in in vitro experiments.


In the past, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has strongly favoured not intervening in any way in the international process of dispute resolution and has denied the direct effect of World Trade Organization (WTO) law at the expense of judicial enforcement of WTO rules. This article discusses the Court's recent extension of this well-established case law in the context of an action for compensation brought by companies subjected to retaliatory measures authorized by the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB). The analysis focuses on the Court's interpretation of the binding nature of the Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU) and the implications for the particular function an action for damages fulfils in the context of judicial protection under EC law. The Court's approach to considering the notion of direct effect as a criterion for an action for damages is questioned in light of the Court's own jurisprudence. The article concludes that the Court's well-established stance vis-à-vis WTO rules should not be upheld for the purposes of a claim for damages.


Abstract The aim of this study is to evaluate the performances of the energy dissipation of a new railway disc brake concept, intended for an urban exploitation. Because of the increase in the rates of trains and subways as well as the number of passengers, brakes have become increasingly a major safety component. In urban exploitation, these systems are subjected to multiple braking actions and have operational limits. A new concept based on a liquid-cooled system is suggested to decrease the energy storage in the disc. A numerical model of this new concept was realized and its performances were estimated by comparing temperature evolution at the friction interface with that obtained with the classical brake. The temperatures reached on a single stop with the cooled concept are higher than those of a classical brake. However, an important temperature decrease is observed at the end of braking so that, for successive brakings, the liquid-cooling principle causes an overall decrease in temperature. Moreover, the use of a material with a high thermal effusivity increases the part of the flow generated at the interface transmitted to the pad and thus reduces the surface temperature.


L-Cysteine-grafted polystyrene (Poly(Cys-g-Sty)), was synthesized from a cysteine-styrene monomer (Cys-Sty) in aqueous solution and used as a facile and selective high-recovery material for palladium(II), platinum(IV), and gold(III) ions from aqueous media. The high solubility of the polymer in aqueous metal ion solutions allows for homogeneous and effective adsorption on the polymer in under 1 min. The maximum recovery amounts were found to be 0.442 g g−1 (4.153 mmol g−1), 0.701 g g−1 (3.593 mmol g−1), and as 1.345 g g−1 (6.829 mmol g−1) for palladium(II), platinum(IV), and gold(III), respectively. In the case of platinum and gold, the maximum recovery amounts were greater than for other recovery materials reported in the literature. The obtained Poly(Cys-g-Sty) showed a higher affinity for these three precious metals, even in the presence of other metal ions. The desorption application was performed using various reagents. The solution of 0.5 M NaOH and 1 M KCN provides the maximum desorption efficiency of precious metal ions from the polymer. As one of the applications, the palladium and polymer complex (Poly(Cys-g-Sty)–Pd) was also used as a heterogeneous catalyst for the Suzuki–Miyaura coupling reaction with a high efficiency.


Introduction To evaluate the incidence of liver dysfunction in septic patients and to determine the best available biomarker widely available as a diagnostic and prognostic marker of mortality. Methods Adult inpatients (aged over 18) with positive blood cultures were identified from the microbiology database between Jan 2012 and June 2012. Total protein, albumin, bilirubin, ALP and ALT were recorded pre, peri and post sepsis. Peak derangement of liver function test (LFT) was evaluated. Hb, WCC, Plt and CRP were recorded on the date of positive blood culture. Patients fell into 3 groups; normal liver function, alcoholic liver disease and non-alcoholic liver disease. Kaplan Meier survivorship scores and ROC curves were calculated in SPSSR. Results 93 of 140 patients with positive blood cultures had abnormal LFTs during admission. 71 medical case records were available for review. 41 patients had normal LFTs prior to admission, 30 had pre-existing liver disease with abnormal LFTs (8 ALD; 22 with malignancy). The median age of the cohort was 66.7 yrs (23–93) with an equal sex distribution (35 M:37 F). 47/71 patients had deranged LFTs prior to documented bacteraemia, 19/71 on the day of bacteraemia and 5/71 after. Bilirubin was the most sensitive parameter of the LFT in predicting mortality prior to organism culture,calculated using ROC curves with an area of 0.59. Following positive blood culture, bilirubin, ALT and CRP rises are indicators of mortality with areas of 0.64, 0.55 and 0.55 respectively. The ROC curves were not statistically significant for Hb, WCC and platelets prior to,or after the onset of bacteraemia. 4 patients died within 24 h, 4 between 24–72 h and 7 between 72 h and 30 days. The overall mortality was 30% lower than a comparative study at 44.7% (median age 66.7).1 There was no statistically significant difference in mortality from sepsis with pre-existing liver disease (alcoholic or malignant) compared to no existing liver disease. Sepsis-induced liver dysfunction was present on admission in 66% of septic patients with previously normal LFT's, 27% prior to positive blood cultures and 5% after positive blood cultures. This is comparative to an incidence at admission of 58.3% in a recent study.1 The relative risk of mortality in the presence of sepsis induced liver injury was 1.82. Conclusion Sepsis-induced liver dysfunction is common and clinically important to identify and has prognostic implications. Abnormal liver function can precede organism culture. There is currently no widely available gold standard test reflecting liver failure. Bilirubin is a diagnostic and prognostic marker of mortality before and after the onset of sepsis. ALT and CRP are useful after the onset of sepsis. Reference Kobashi et al. Sepsis associated liver injury:Incidence,classification and the clinical significance. Hepatology Research 2013;43:255–266 Disclosure of Interest None Declared.


For many people in remote parts of Papua New Guinea (PNG) health and illness have their origin in the invisible realm of spirits, ghosts and sorcerers. For instance, death from malaria may be interpreted as witchcraft and other deaths are attributed to the agency of ghosts. An accident, such as a fall, may be regarded by the victim and his family as the result of sorcery. Even though health professionals know a great deal about the physical aspects of the diseases which afflict their communities, they may not understand the people's interpretation of them. Modern medicine has no satisfactory approach for dealing with some culture-bound syndromes.


Organizational Resilience (ORes) is a concept that provides a wide platform to investigate how businesses can survive, adapt and grow in the face of the turbulent changes. In this paper we argue how resilience can be seen as a common pattern for success of textile, clothing and fashion (TCF) firms. Six empirical business cases are analysed to investigate how firms respond to turbulences by orchestrating the dynamic building blocks viz., organizational architecture, skills, and culture along various pathways ('exploring new opportunities' or 'exploiting existing capabilities') to create resilience as ultimate competitive advantage. We see what is common in generating such adaptation strategies or fits in the organization, is what we term as situational adaptation.


The Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) Conversion Device (ACD) System is based on state-of-the-art ATM technology. The system interfaces between high-rate ECL/RS-422 raw data bitstreams and Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) OC-3 fiber. The SONET OC-3 interface uses ATM Adaptation Layer Type Five (AAL5) format. The system exceeds its 50 Mbps raw data, single stream requirement and provides single stream raw data throughput at rates up to 75 Mbps. With ATM and SONET packaging overhead, this translates into 90 Mbps on the OC-3 fiber. In addition to high-rate throughput, the system provides multiplexing and demultiplexing of multiple stream throughput based on the ATM cell header Virtual Path and Virtual Channel Identifier (VPI/VCI) values. The system is designed with the flexibility to provide between three and six throughput channels. All of which are multiplexed/demultiplexed to and from the same OC-3 interface. Multiple stream cumulative raw data throughput rates of up to 80 Mbps, or 96 Mbps on the fiber, have successfully run.


Background: Primary progressive aphasia (PPA) is a progressive language disorder in which aphasia is the first and most prominent symptom of degenerative brain disease. PPA has received increasing attention in the scientific literature over the past 30 years, but there remains a relative lack of awareness and understanding of it in the wider clinical community. As editors of the volume, Clinical Perspectives on Primary Progressive Aphasia, we invited the contributing authors to provide an up-to-date survey of research on a range of topics that are relevant to clinical practice in PPA. Aims: The aim of this article is to address some key questions that may arise when an individual receives a diagnosis of PPA and to direct readers to additional sources of information in this volume and elsewhere that will allow them to gain further knowledge about topics of interest. Main Contribution: We address the following questions: (1) What is PPA? (2) How is PPA diagnosed? (3) What happens to a person's language when they have PPA? (4) How will the disease progress over time? (5) How does PPA impact a person's life and the life of their family and friends? (6) What treatments and support are available? (7) What other services should we be providing? Conclusions: Considerable progress has been made in our understanding of PPA and the relationship between the symptomatology, progression, pathology, and genetics of PPA. However, there are many challenges remaining, particularly in terms of ensuring that people with PPA and their families and friends receive optimal information and support at diagnosis and appropriate interventions and/or management strategies throughout their journey with PPA.


BACKGROUND
It is well-known that the homozygous deficiency of alpha(1)-antitrypsin, phenotype PiZZ, is associated with an increased risk of COPD. However, studies evaluating the association between the heterozygous forms of the alpha(1)-antitrypsin phenotype PiMZ and rapid decline in lung function, both in patient and community populations, have yielded conflicting results.

STUDY OBJECTIVE
To assess the relationship between alpha(1)-antitrypsin phenotypes and decline in FEV(1) values of 2,016 adult subjects in a community population in Tucson, AZ.

DESIGN AND METHODS
Prospective cohort study. Standardized questionnaires and lung function measurements were administered 1.5 to 2 years apart during 12 surveys.

RESULTS
The frequency distribution for PiMM, PiMS, and PiMZ phenotypes did not differ significantly by physician-confirmed diagnoses of emphysema, chronic bronchitis, or asthma. There was no statistically significant difference in mean FEV(1) slope values between PiMM, PiMS, and PiMZ phenotypes (-22.5, -21, and -7 mL per year, respectively). After controlling for smoking and other potential confounders, the FEV(1) slope was associated with an initial FEV(1) level and age for the initial questionnaire but not with the different phenotypes. Selecting cutoff values, we identified rapidly declining and nondeclining subgroups, based on the percent predicted changes in FEV(1). They also were not associated with alpha(1)-antitrypsin phenotypes.

CONCLUSIONS
We conclude that the data from this longitudinal community study suggest that having the PiMZ phenotype is not a significant risk factor for an accelerated decline in FEV(1).


The influence of the load of the unit connected generator on the operating conditions of the ground-fault protection of the stator windings of the generator, excited by the ratio of the third harmonic voltage in the generator neutral and at the generator terminals to ground, was analysed. On the basis of the theoretical analysis, experimental tests and computer simulations, relations between the voltage feeding the measuring element of the ground-fault protection and the load of the unit during ground faults along the entire length of the stator windings were determined. The influence of the method of balancing ground-fault protection on the third harmonic voltage feeding its measuring element was determined. It has been found that correct operation of the ground-fault protection calls for the the influence of the load on the resolution of the third harmonic voltages in unit connected generator circuits to be taken into account.


Operating power tools over extended periods of time can pose significant risks to humans, due to the strong forces and vibrations they impart to the limbs. Telemanipulation systems can be employed to minimize these risks, but may impede effective task performance due to the reduced sensory cues they typically convey. To address this shortcoming, we explore the benefits of augmenting these cues with the addition of audition, vibration, and force feedback, and evaluate them on users' performance in a VR mechanical assembly task employing a simulated impact wrench. Our research focuses on the utility of vibrotactile feedback, rendered as a simplified and attenuated version of the vibrations experienced while operating an actual impact wrench. We investigate whether such feedback can serve to enhance the operator's awareness of the state of the tool, as well as a proxy for the forces experienced during collisions and coupling, while operating the tool an actual impact wrench. Results from our user study comparing feedback modalities confirm that the introduction of vibrotactile, in addition to auditory feedback can significantly improve user performance as assessed by completion time. However, the addition of force feedback to these two modalities did not further improve performance.


ABSTRACT Emotion expressions convey valuable information about others' internal states and likely behaviours. Accurately identifying expressions is critical for social interactions, but so is perceiver confidence when decoding expressions. Even if a perceiver correctly labels an expression, uncertainty may impair appropriate behavioural responses and create uncomfortable interactions. Past research has found that perceivers report greater confidence when identifying emotions displayed by cultural ingroup members, an effect attributed to greater perceptual skill and familiarity with own-culture than other-culture faces. However, the current research presents novel evidence for an ingroup advantage in emotion decoding confidence across arbitrary group boundaries that hold culture constant. In two experiments using different stimulus sets participants not only labeled minimal ingroup expressions more accurately, but did so with greater confidence. These results offer novel evidence that ingroup advantages in emotion decoding confidence stem partly from social-cognitive processes.


The present three-year longitudinal study has clearly demonstrated the advantages of modern and scientific livestock management over the traditional and extensive methods of animal husbandry in the prevention and control of bovine and human Brucella abortus infection. The occupational hazard, in relation to brucellosis, to which livestock farmers are exposed in Oyo State is closely related to the level of infection in the animal population, the level of environmental contamination and hygiene on the farm. This study has also revealed that many farmers could acquire subclinical brucellosis within two years of constant occupational exposure to source of infection. There was no seasonal variation found in the prevalence of brucella infection among the human and cattle population studied at the I.A.R.T. farm in Ibadan: climatic variation is therefore considered to play no important role in the prevalence of brucellosis in Southern Nigeria.


Although contributing to the planning, execution and results evaluation, the needs analysis subsystem has been consistently neglected by the training scientific literature and professional practice, whose bulky investments, therefore, tend to be wasted. The models that guide this important field have been proposed about 50 years ago, so they are not capable, today, of theoretical and methodological guide scholars and practitioners in the area. Thus, this study aimed, through implementation of analysis of covariance in a sample of 213 participants, to investigate the relationship between motivation to work and complexity of training needs, in order to allow the composition of future needs analysis theoretical models integrated not only for components related to the tasks, as prescribed in the literature, but also by variables related to the individual, group and organizational level of analysis. Specifically, four specific objectives, each one associated with particular procedures and research techniques were determined: (1) developing, through documental research and focus group, and validate, theoretically and empirically, from individual interviews and exploratory factor analysis, instrument for measuring training needs; (2) adapt and statistically validate the instrument to measure motivation to work, also through of exploratory factor analysis; (3) to test for mean differences between independent samples produce comparison groups depending on the level of respondents' motivation to work; and (4) identifying control variables for statistical composition of the final research, from bivariate correlations. The results satisfied all of these four intermediate goals: good psychometric indices of reliability and validity of the instruments of needs and motivation were obtained; two groups could be statistically formed according to level of motivation of its members; and the time service might be selected as a control variable for the statistical composition of the final investigation model. Despite these positive results, the covariance analysis performed did not show any relation between motivation and training needs, contrary to conventional wisdom, not directly related to the training area, which certifies this direct relationship. This result makes it necessary to expand and deepen research in this direction, mainly because the motivation is one of the main individual variables responsible for the explanation of post-performance training measures.


Portfolio managers have long sought the ability to increase diversification and hedge market downturns without sacrificing upside returns. Using volatility as a diversifying asset is an attractive proposition because of volatility's asymmetric response to underlying price movements. Theoretically, being able to hold the CBOE Volatility Index in a portfolio should provide substantial benefits to a portfolio. The authors find, however, that currently available VIX-related products are costly in their implementation and yield negative abnormal returns. Even so, if investors insist on investing in volatility assets, using VIX futures offers the best Sharpe ratios.


The 2017 Sustainable LA Environmental Report Card (ERC) for Los Angeles County (LA County) on Energy and Air Quality offers an in-depth look at the region's sustainability efforts focusing on the energy we use, greenhouse gas emissions, and the air we breathe. The LA County Environmental Report Card is the only comprehensive environmental report card for a megacity in the world. This ERC assesses 21 indicators that fall into five categories: Stationary Energy Use; Transportation; Renewable Energy Resources; Greenhouse Gas Emissions; and Air Quality and Human Health Impacts. A majority of these indicators are entirely new areas of inquiry for the ERC, and together will provide a broader picture of current conditions compared to the 2015 ERC. Grades were assigned in each category based on compliance with environmental laws or numeric standards where applicable, on our best professional judgment, and on historical improvements and context. This year's grades range from C-/ Incomplete to B, and although there is progress towards meeting local and state goals, and a number of new standards and regulations that will undoubtedly have a positive impact in years to come.


This thesis describes the automation of turning lights on and off in the room and temperature measurement outside and inside the room. Light in the room is controlled by brightness and the presence of people in the room. Operation of the system can be checked and adjusted via the internet.
The development board Arduino Uno with added module Arduino Ethernet Shield was used. Movement is detected by a passive infrared sensor. Departure from the room is detected as interruption of signal from the infrared light emitting diode. The temperature is measured with a negative temperature coefficient thermistor connected to the analog input.
The system is connected to the computer through a network connection. Computer collects and stores data. From the shared data the web application shows graphs of temperature, brightness and light use. On the website the highest, lowest and average temperature for a selected period can be observed. It is possible to monitor the entry and movement in the room.
By turning off the lights when the room is not used, electricity is saved. This system can monitor temperature and thus heating. This way the energy consumption can be analyzed. When using only one room the savings due to this are small. If the system is extended to the entire house, the savings can be greater. Other types of sensors can be connected to the controller.


Work is described on the development of a scanning near-field optical microscope (SNOM) for the primary purpose of imaging magnetic systems with resolution on the order of 10 nm. Since many magnetic materials are optically opaque, it is desired to have a probe which is appropriate for reflection mode. In addition, the near-field probe must be linearly polarizable, since the magneto-optic Kerr effect (MOKE) will provide the contrast mechanism necessary for magnetic imaging. Data is presented on the characterization and use of approximately 30 nm diameter Ag particles as probes for MOKE-sensitive SNOM. Such small metal particles exhibit a localized plasmon resonance in the visible, which greatly enhances their optical scattering cross-section. Ag particles prepared by colloidal chemistry techniques have been deposited on bismuth doped YIG and silica-coated Permalloy to measure the magnitude of the near-field MOKE. The optical apparatus used to measure near-field MOKE is described. Hysteresis loop data is presented for Bi-YIG using the near-field MOKE. The effect is also seen in Permalloy, with a surprisingly large peak-to-peak rotation of 3 milliradians. A heuristic model is proposed for explaining the near-field MOKE in longitudinally magnetized materials. Finally, it is reported that we now have conventional MOKE microscopic imaging capabilities which will allow us to observe magnetic domain structures in weak magneto-optic materials, such as Permalloy.


We investigate the cyclicality of the private savings to GDP ratio for a panel of 19 OECD countries over the period 1971-2009. We find robust evidence that the private savings ratio is countercyclical. Three theories unambiguously predict a higher private savings ratio during recessions: a Ricardian offset effect, the presence of credit constraints, and precautionary savings. We find evidence only for the latter theory. Our estimations take into account a large number of econometric complications: persistence in the savings ratio, endogeneity of the regressors, cross-country parameter heterogeneity, cross-sectional dependence, stationarity issues, omitted variables, and instrument strength.


Primary tumors of the appendix are rare, comprising 1.1% of all appendectomy specimens. Nevertheless, it often presents in an emergent fashion, creating a need for a well-defined management algorithm that will ensure proper acute management. We performed a retrospective review of medical charts from 1982-2007 on all charts with a diagnosis of appendiceal neoplasm. A cohort of 41 patients was diagnosed with a primary appendiceal neoplasm from a total of 8560 appendectomies over the 25-year period. Several tumors were identified: adenocarcinomas (n = 16), carcinoid tumors (n = 15), mucinous cystadenocarcinoma (n = 7), and a combination of adenocarcinoma and goblet cell carcinoid of the appendix (n = 3). Twenty-one patients presented with an acute abdomen. Tumors were discovered intraoperatively in eighteen patients while performing other procedures. At diagnosis, metastatic disease was found in 41.5% of patients (n = 17); average survival ranged from 6 to 21 months based on tumor type. For patients with non-metastatic disease at diagnosis, all survived longer than 2 years and there were no cases of recurrence or post-operative metastasis. We devised an operative strategy dictated by initial presenting characteristics of the tumor. The presence of carcinoma should be suspected and searched for in patients over 40 presenting with acute appendicitis. Intraoperatively any suspicious mass should undergo frozen sectioning as the finding of a malignancy often necessitates a larger or repeat operation. The propensity of these neoplasms for presentation in the guise of acute appendicitis mandates that the surgeon be familiar with the appropriate management algorithm, both in and out of the operating room.


In many practical scenarios, image encryption has to be conducted prior to image compression. This has led to the problem of how to design a pair of image encryption and compression algorithms such that compressing the encrypted images can still be efficiently performed. In this paper, we design a highly efficient image encryption-then- compression (ETC) system, where both lossless and lossy compressions are considered. The proposed image encryption scheme operated in the prediction error domain is shown to be able to provide a reasonably high level of security. We also demonstrate that an arithmetic coding-based approach can be exploited to efficiently compress the encrypted images. More notably, the proposed compression approach applied to encrypted images is only slightly worse, in terms of compression efficiency, than the state-of-the-art lossless/lossy image coders, which take original, unencrypted images as inputs. In contrast, most of the existing ETC solutions induce significant penalty on the compression efficiency.


Abstract The aim of this paper is to reveal the current situation of gifted education in Turkey. The talents that are valued and the concepts of giftedness were discussed according to the country's cultural and political perspectives. Studies that had been made to analyze the beliefs of lay people, teachers and parents with respect to gifted students and their education were mentioned. Programs such as special schools (science high schools, private school programs), resource rooms and after-school programs (Science and Art Centers [SACs], Education Programs for Talented Students [EPTS], child universities) were introduced. How these programs currently function was also discussed. In addition, it has emerged that the studies carried out in the past 10 years focused on the adaptation of internationally popular intelligence scales, on the development of original intelligence-, talent- and domain-specific creativity identification tests, on the guidance needs of the students and their parents, on the development of differentiated programs in different areas. In conclusion, even though the amount of research and the awareness toward giftedness in Turkey is increasing there is still much to do. In addition, it is recommended that collaboration should be increased among different institutions to be able to serve gifted students effectively.


Abstract:In this study, I provide a new outlook on how to assess the social health of the community to which the Letter to the Hebrews was directed. I challenge the general assumption that the community was on the brink of abandonment by comparing the text with the documentary data produced by the associations of the Greco-Roman world. While these associations reveal that the critical measure of communal health is absenteeism, Hebrews shows very little concern with attendance (with the possible exception of Heb 10:24–25). The Hebrews community, though struggling with unknown difficulties, was relatively healthy because it at least consisted of members who were both present in attendance and likely to heed the exhortations found in the overall speech. It was both implausible and unnecessary for the Hebrews community to penalize its absent members financially; its leadership structure and ability to offer incentives and warnings were sufficiently compelling to motivate attendance. I propose and apply four methodological steps for how to use documentary texts to interpret literary writings with the hopes that these steps can stimulate further methodological reflection and provide guidance for future research that seeks to utilize epigraphical and papyrological data.


In Of Love and Other Demons, Gabriel Garcia Marquez tells a story that depicts the problem of alienation. It is a story about human beings' relationship with his or her fellowbeings; the need of an individual to be related with others. This study attempts to analyse the problem of alienation which is portrayed through the heroine's life. The writer is eager to analyse the causes as well as the process of Sierva Maria's alienation and how alienation influences her life. The study includes the alienation encountered by Sierva Maria, the causes, and the influences upon her physical and psychological conditions. The writer divides the problems experienced by the heroine into two: the alienation encountered by the heroine in her parents' mansion and the alienation encountered by the heroine in the convent of Santa Clara. In order to understand more about the heroine's alienation, the writer applies literary approach, psychological theory about alienation, and additional psychological theories related to the problem. Having analysed the problem of Sierva Maria's alienation, the writer finds out that the heroine's alienation is caused by outside and inside forces which result eventually in rejecting herself. The writer learns that in the first alienation which takes place in her parents' mansion, Sierva Maria's alienation is caused by her parents' inharmonious relationship and an inside force that is her odd behavior. Furthermore, the Catholic belief that rabies in human beings is equal to demonic possession, and the prejudices against Sierva Maria can be considered as the outside forces that bring her to the second alienation in the convent of Santa Clara. From the analysis the writer also proves that the alienation encountered by Sierva Maria has great influences on her physical and psychological conditions. In the end, the writer concludes that the girl is the victim of her parents and the society that holds certain belief and mores. The alienation encountered by Sierva Maria indeed have destructive influences upon her. Finally, due to the alienation, the girl experiences the most severe form of self alienation. She turns out to be an alienated figure who eventually rejects herself.


ABSTRACT Such is the grip of formal methods of statistical inference—that is, frequentist methods for generalizing from sample to population in enumerative studies—in the drawing of scientific inferences that the two are routinely deemed equivalent in the social, management, and biomedical sciences. This, despite the fact that legitimate employment of said methods is difficult to implement on practical grounds alone. But supposing the adoption of these procedures were simple does not get us far; crucially, methods of formal statistical inference are ill-suited to the analysis of much scientific data. Even findings from the claimed gold standard for examination by the latter, randomized controlled trials, can be problematic. Scientific inference is a far broader concept than statistical inference. Its authority derives from the accumulation, over an extensive period of time, of both theoretical and empirical knowledge that has won the (provisional) acceptance of the scholarly community. A major focus of scientific inference can be viewed as the pursuit of significant sameness, meaning replicable and empirically generalizable results among phenomena. Regrettably, the obsession with users of statistical inference to report significant differences in data sets actively thwarts cumulative knowledge development. The manifold problems surrounding the implementation and usefulness of formal methods of statistical inference in advancing science do not speak well of much teaching in methods/statistics classes. Serious reflection on statistics' role in producing viable knowledge is needed. Commendably, the American Statistical Association is committed to addressing this challenge, as further witnessed in this special online, open access issue of The American Statistician.


We introduce the Dynamic Capacity Network (DCN), a neural network that can adaptively assign its capacity across different portions of the input data. This is achieved by combining modules of two types: low-capacity sub-networks and high-capacity sub-networks. The low-capacity sub-networks are applied across most of the input, but also provide a guide to select a few portions of the input on which to apply the high-capacity sub-networks. The selection is made using a novel gradient-based attention mechanism, that efficiently identifies input regions for which the DCN's output is most sensitive and to which we should devote more capacity. We focus our empirical evaluation on the Cluttered MNIST and SVHN image datasets. Our findings indicate that DCNs are able to drastically reduce the number of computations, compared to traditional convolutional neural networks, while maintaining similar or even better performance.


Background: Higher BMI and 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25OHD) levels are associated with higher bone mineral density (BMD). However, obese individuals are more likely to be vitamin D-deficient. There is limited data on other factors influencing BMD in the obese population. Methods: We examined the cross-sectional relationship between BMD and anthropometric, metabolic, biochemical markers, in addition to dietary calcium and phosphate intake and physical activity in 54 overweight or obese but otherwise healthy adults (35 males, 19 females) with 25OHD≤50 nmol/L. BMD, body mass index (BMI), percent body fat (PFAT), fat mass and lean mass (dual energy x-ray absorptiometry), insulin sensitivity (euglycaemic-hyperinsulinaemic clamp, M), 25OHD, calcium and phosphate, PTH, FGF-23, alkaline phosphatase (ALP), high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), lipid profile were measured and physical activity and dietary calcium and phosphate intake were calculated based on self-report and validated questionnaires. Results: BMD was correlated with 25OHD (r=0.3, p=0.02), phosphate (r=0.3, p=0.04), M (r=0.4, p=0.006), dietary calcium (r=0.3, p=0.3) and dietary phosphate (r=0.3, p=0.04) after adjustments for age, sex and BMI. There were no differences in BMD, 25OHD, calcium, phosphate, PTH and FGF-23 levels between insulin-sensitive and insulin-resistant groups (insulin sensitivity (M) cut-off of 4.7 mg/kg/min, all p>0.5). However, ALP was significantly higher in the insulin-resistant group (86.28 vs. 72.92 IU/L, p=0.04). In regression analyses, 25OHD (p=0.02), phosphate (p=0.01), BMI (p=0.02) and M (p=0.02) remained independently related to BMD. Conclusion: Insulin sensitivity and phosphate levels in addition to BMI and 25OHD were related to BMD in this overweight/obese and vitamin D-deficient population. These findings provide further evidence supporting an independent role for insulin sensitivity in bone health. Disclosure N. Naderpoor: None. A. Mousa: None. B. de Courten: None.


Objective: Social media has a strong impact as a reference for consumers in getting information about the product. Electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM), which is usually delivered by social media, is still the most secure advertising media. This study provides information about incentivized eWOM on purchase intention and other factors that can affect consumers. Research Design & Methods: The method used in this research is the quantitative method with an associative approach. Descriptive analysis and structural equation modeling were used to measure the influence of these variables. Findings: The results showed that the incentivized eWOM had a significant effect on purchase intention but had no impact on the company's brand awareness. Meanwhile, the attractiveness of advertising messages has no significant effect in influencing purchase intention but has a significant effect on the company's brand awareness. Implications & Recommendations: Although this research give contributions to the e-WOM literature, several limitations and future research suggestion deserve mentions. Further research can examine the relative effectiveness of nonmonetary incentives. Contribution & Value Added: Researchers have provided input and suggestions to SMEs to optimize incentivized eWOM to increase consumer purchase intention.


Heterogeneous face recognition (HFR) refers to matching a probe face image taken from one modality to face images acquired from another modality. It plays an important role in security scenarios. However, HFR is still a challenging problem due to great discrepancies between cross-modality images. This paper proposes an asymmetric joint learning (AJL) approach to handle this issue. The proposed method transforms the cross-modality differences mutually by incorporating the synthesized images into the learning process which provides more discriminative information. Although the aggregated data would augment the scale of intra-classes, it also reduces the diversity (i.e. discriminative information) for inter-classes. Then, we develop the AJL model to balance this dilemma. Finally, we could obtain the similarity score between two heterogeneous face images through the log-likelihood ratio. Extensive experiments on viewed sketch database, forensic sketch database and near infrared image database illustrate that the proposed AJL-HFR method achieve superior performance in comparison to state-of-the-art methods.


Cancer-germline antigen NY-ESO-1, initially identified with the SEREX method by Yao Chen at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, represents one of the most immunogenic antigens known to date. Spontaneous immune responses against NY-ESO-1 are found in approximately 50% of patients with advanced NY-ESO-1 expressing cancer. A close correlation between detectable NY-ESO-1 serum antibody and CD4+ and CD8+ T-cell responses was confirmed in a large series of patients. Spontaneous NY-ESO-1 antibody and T-cell reactivity was found to be associated with a more favorable prognosis in patients with advanced NY-ESO-1 expressing melanoma compared to patients without detectable NY-ESO-1 immunity. Different strategies of vaccination against NY-ESO-1 have been explored in clinical phase I studies within the network of the Clinical Trials Center of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research. HLA-A2 restricted NY-ESO-1 peptides were used to immunize patients with NY-ESO-1 expressing cancer regardless of their spontaneous NY-ESO-1 antibody status. Intradermal peptide vaccinations administered at weekly intervals led to strong, primary NY-ESO-1 peptide-specific CD8+ T-cell responses after 2-3 months of immunization in the majority of NY-ESO-1 antibody negative patients. A subsequent protocol on intensive-course peptide vaccination over 5 consecutive days showed a rapid induction of high-magnitude CD8+ T-cell responses, which were detectable already after 1 cycle of immunization in the majority of patients. NY-ESO-1 peptide-specific responder T cells were cloned to study the specificity and function in more detail. NY-ESO-1 peptide-specific CD8+ T-cell clones induced during intensive-course peptide vaccination displayed strong tumor-reactivity against HLA-A2+, NY-ESO-1+ tumor cell lines detected in ELISPOT and cytotoxicity assays. Strong NY-ESO-1 specific CD8+ T-cell responses were maintained by prolonged immunization and were associated with extended progression-free intervals in a number of patients. Recombinant NY-ESO-1 vaccinia and fowlpox constructs encoding the full-length NY-ESO-1 protein were used in a clinical phase I study to evaluate the effects on the induction of NY-ESO-1-specific CD4+ and CD8+ T-cell and antibody responses. Immunizations were administered at monthly intervals to patients with detectable or absent NY-ESO-1 immunity at baseline. NY-ESO-1 specific CD8+ T-cell responses were assessed in a cohort of HLA-A2+ patients using the known NY-ESO-1 epitopes p157-167 and p157-165 for monitoring. Strong NY-ESO-1 peptide-specific responses were detected in 9/12 evaluable HLA-A2 positive, NY-ESO-1 antibody negative, and in 2/2 evaluable NY-ESO-1 antibody positive patients after 4 immunizations. CD8+ T-cell responses against new NY-ESO-1 epitopes were identified in 1 patient, the analysis for the MHC class I restriction elements and functional reactivity is ongoing. NY-ESO-1 antibody was induced in 3/20 evaluable patients who were NY-ESO-1 antibody negative at baseline. CD4+ T-cell responses were monitored using a panel of overlapping 18- and 20-mer NY-ESO-1 peptides spanning the entire NY-ESO-1 protein. A primary induction of NY-ESO-1 specific CD4+ T-cell responses was observed in 8/14 NY-ESO-1 antibody negative patients evaluated so far. NY-ESO-1 specific CD4+ T-cell responses detected in NY-ESO-1 antibody positive patients at baseline were broadened against additional NY-ESO-1 epitopes during the course of vaccination in 1/3 cases. One patient with metastatic melanoma developed a partial remission of subcutaneous and peritoneal metastases, and another melanoma patient had a minor response of mediastinal lymph node metastases. Six of 21 evaluable patients experienced stabilization of disease with extended progression-free intervals during prolonged vaccination. These results show convincing efficacy of recombinant NY-ESO-1 viral constructs for the induction of potent CD4+ and CD8+ T-cell responses, which were associated with favorable clinical developments in patients with advanced cancer. This abstract was published in Cancer Immunity, a Cancer Research Institute journal that ceased publication in 2013 and is now provided online in association with Cancer Immunology Research.