Program Number: 5114 Poster Board Number: A0152 Presentation Time: 3:45 PM–5:30 PM A Glasses-Mounted Platform for Optimized Ocular Electrophysiology Amy E. Canham, Ramesh Raskar. MIT Media Lab, Cambridge, MA. Purpose: The aim of this work is to develop a first prototype for performing electroretinography in a unified interface which can be mounted into a pair of glasses and conducted with minimal training required, to better integrate electrophysiology into routine ophthalmic care and improve outcomes in pediatric patients. Methods: The device incorporates both rigidly affixed electrodes and low-profile stimulator into a modified glasses frame. The electrodes are gold casted discs which are positioned and stabilized by the frame. The stimulator is a DLP projector driven, low-profile dome coupled with a fresnel lens. Analog signal processing and capture via Arduino microprocessor is also mounted within the glasses frame. The function of the 0.3Hz to 300Hz, 1000 V gain filter and amplification circuitry was evaluated by delivering sample signals generated computationally and rendered by a Realtek High Definition Audio sound card. The sample signals consisted of continuous, 30mV peak-to-peak, sine waveforms at 3Hz, 15Hz, 30Hz, 100Hz and 1kHz and decaying, oscillatory impulse signals with total voltage offset from first peak to trough of 30mV. The luminous emittance of the stimulus was measured to calibrate the device against ISCEV standards. Preliminary evaluation of the system was conducted by administering scotopic 3.0 ERG with both our system and a Diagnosys ColorDome ERG system. Results: The analog filter and amplification stage demonstrated 1000 fold amplification of signals within cutoff frequencies and effectively attenuated the 1kHz waveform. The programmable stimulus system demonstrated the ability to render both full-field and patterned stimuli at multiple wavelengths, with adjustable intensity from 0.1 to 3.0 candela second per meters squared over the surface of the dome. Preliminary evaluation demonstrated comparable results from both our system and the Diagnosys ERG system. Conclusions: The integration of the system into a glasses-mounted interface simplifies electrode alignment while delivering comparable results and the potential for administering a wide range of tests. Ophthalmic electrophysiology has tremendous potential as an asset in diagnosis and monitoring. Accessible technologies which deliver objective evaluations of retinal function can impact routine ophthalmic practice and large scale screening scenarios. Commercial Relationships: Amy E. Canham, None; Ramesh Raskar, None


[1] The planned 2003 Mars Exploration Rover (MER) Mission and follow-on surface activities associated with landed missions will focus on long distance roving and sample return, which require detailed knowledge of vehicle locations in both local and global reference systems. In this paper we argue that this rover localization should be known to within 0.1 of the distance traversed for local coordinate systems. To test the ability to meet this goal using only descent and rover-based data, we conducted experiments with simulated descent images and Field Integrated Design and Operations Rover data collected during field tests at Silver Lake, California, in April 1999. Specifically, an integrated bundle adjustment system incorporating both descent and rover-based images was developed and used to localize the rover positions. On the basis of surveyed ground control points it is demonstrated that the joint analysis produces RMS errors of 0.24, 0.15, and 0.38 m in x, y, and z% directions in a local coordinate system, respectively, for ground points within 500 m from the landing point and 0.23, 0.21, and 0.46 m within a distance of 1.5 km. Results show that it is possible to meet the 0.1 goal using descent and rover-based data only.


This study aimed at analyzing the Family Health Program as a reoriented strategy for basic attention; to discuss the anthropologic health vision correlating it with the FHP. We verified that there are two main elements in the conduction of the FHP the conceptual element and the structural element. They directly act on in the institutional scope and, therefore, in the health care as a whole. Considering the strong factors that smooth the change in the illness and health process, the perspectives that should be marked must be supported in search of a health anthropologic vision as a tool to accomplish the family's health strategy, as a matter of fact, as well as a special health care that must be rendered with top quality.


This article tests the efficiency of the hog options market and assesses the impact of the 1996 contract redesign on efficiency. We find that the hog options market is efficient, but some options yielded excess returns during the live hogs period but not during the lean hogs period. Our findings indicate that the hog options market is efficient and is consistent with the new contract improving the efficiency of the market. However, other market conditions such as lower transaction costs during the lean hogs period can also contribute to reduce expected option returns during the latter period.


It has been difficult to estimate the sensible heat flux at the air‐sea interface using satellite data because of the difficulty in remotely observing the sea level air temperature. In this study, a new method is developed for estimating the sensible heat flux using satellite observations under unstable conditions. The basic idea of the method is that the air‐sea temperature difference is related to the atmospheric convergence. Employed data include the wind convergence, sea level humidity, and sea surface temperature. These parameters can be derived from the satellite wind vectors, Special Sensor Microwave Imager (SSM/I) precipitable water, and Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) observations, respectively. The authors selected a region east of Japan as the test area where the atmospheric convergence appears all year. Comparison between the heat fluxes derived from the satellite data and from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) data suggests that the rms difference between the two kinds of sensible heat fluxes has low values in the sea area east of Japan with a minimum of 10.0 W m22. The time series of the two kinds of sensible heat fluxes at 10 locations in the area are in agreement, with rms difference ranging between 10.0 and 14.1 W m22 and correlation coefficient being higher than 0.7. In addition, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard SatelliteBased Surface Turbulent Flux (GSSTF) was used for a further comparison. The low-rms region with high correlation coefficient (.0.7) was also found in the region east of Japan with a minimum of 12.2 W m22. Considering the nonlinearity in calculation of the sensible monthly means, the authors believe that the comparison with GSSTF is consistent with that with NCEP data.


Our changing climate will affect human lives in manifold ways. Especially sea-level rise is driven by diminishing amounts of snow and land ice. The cryosphere as part of the Earth's climate system provides interconnecting feedbacks between its components, leading to multifaceted changes. To understand these feedback mechanisms we have to consider the various interactions between the atmosphere, the oceans and the ice covering both polar land and seas. The state and evolution of Earth's glaciers and ice sheets play a key role therein and thus profound ice physics knowledge with respect to ice sheet dynamics is required. Ice sheet dynamics on multiple scales, from microscopic processes to continental-sized phenomena, are in the focus of scientific attention to improve climate predictions on a global scale.

Snow and ice physics are mutual research interests for AWI glaciologists and ILTS researchers. The state and evolution of ice sheets and glaciers is partly recorded in deep ice cores drilled through the Antarctic and Greenlandic ice. Two upcoming drilling projects will further strengthen the Japanese-German cooperation in glaciological research: EGRIP(Greenland) focusing on questions concerning the dynamics of ice streams and IPICS Oldest Ice (Antarctica) focusing on obtaining oldest paleao-climate information from ice cores. Advanced analysis of ice core material can teach us the climate history of our planet and reveal physical mechanisms leading to ice motion. Selected ice-related research topics relevant for AWI and ILTS will be presented, as for example, the mapping of ice micro-structures, which are reflecting the deformation and recrystallisation processes that control ice sheet flow. The connection between ice dynamics, microstructures, and climatic changes is tackled by additional application of palaeo-climate record methods on impurities measured in ice cores. Experiments on pure and doped ice material (e.g. with solved or insoluble chemicals and antifreeze proteins) provide better understanding of basic processes in ice polycrystals. Process modelling as well as phenomenological modelling of ice deformation then tests and completes our current understanding of ice sheet dynamics and result in improved future projections.


Within an organization, there will always be more project proposals than the resources available. Having this in mind, selecting projects must be made through a system of priorities as those projects which contribute to reaching the organization's aims should be selected.
Planning a project is complete after having scheduled all activities, taking into account the entire resource basis available in the organization.
We should also keep in mind the fact that in order to successfully run a project one should focus on the project finalizing effort in accordance with the deadline. Thus, the planning process should comprise the fact that the organization resources are to be employed neither excessively nor deficiently. All the above lead to a rather complex planning process, should we keep in mind the scheduling or the organization could face great unbalance in carrying out the project or situations could appear in which the resources necessary to the project could be more numerous than the ones available in the organization.
Unfolding a project under an ideal execution program cannot be always a fact, but using rules and best working tools definitely lead to a rational and efficient scheduling of resources.
Employing an adequate method could support starting a project in a short period of time only if scarce resources are available and can be legally allotted to the respective project.
While allotting resources, most of the times observation can be made that available resources do not allow unfolding activities quickly enough so that the project could reach the final deadline.
Projects are limited in using resources by the level and the bulk of available resources and the maximum deadline set in finalizing the respective project.


Preparing to share your research or ideas in class or at a conference? Check out this LibGuide for tips, tricks, and resources for creating dynamic presentations that will capture and engage your audience.


OBJECTIVES
To describe cancer screening characteristics and better understand individual-, environmental-, and organizational-level barriers of sexual and gender minority (SGM) populations. .

SAMPLE & SETTING
This study was conducted using a combined sample from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) national dataset from 2014 and 2016.

METHODS & VARIABLES
Chi-square tests for independence and logistic regression analysis tests were performed to determine whether relationships existed between SGM status and demographics.

RESULTS
Black respondents or those who reported their race as other, were female, had some college or technical school or more, and had healthcare coverage were less likely to present for cancer screening. SGM respondents who were in good or better health; were unmarried; were aged 18-44 years or 45-55 years; or were Asian, Native American, or Hawaiian, or reported their race as other, had higher odds of screening for cancer.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING
Disparities in cancer screening among SGM populations are not well documented. These findings will inform structured education and preventative interventions to improve screening participation among SGM populations.


Malnutrition is a serious problem among people of old age. To overcome malnutrition, a change of food consumption behaviour is necessary, which needs to be based on specialist advice from health-care professionals. Changing food-related behaviour, however, is known to be difficult. Our approach to this problem is to provide an intelligent meal planning system to be used by the elderly person in his or her home. The system provides recommendations of suitable food recipes, taking into account the advice of the care givers (e.g. in terms of dietary restrictions, suitable energy and fat levels, etc). We describe the requirements, design, algorithms, and user interface of the system, and discuss ongoing and future work.


Objective: To determine the prevalence and socio-economic disparity among victims with disabilities caused by RTAs in Iran as country with a high rate of accidents. Method: The source of data was the Iranian Multiple Indicator Demographic and Health Survey, a nationwide cross-sectional study. The sampling framework was based on the population and housing census for Iran in 2006. Provincial samples ranged from 400 to 6,400 households. The target sample was 3,096 clusters consisting of 2,187 urban and 909 rural clusters. In the present study, all but a few indicators are reported at provincial levels. Mortality indicators, accident and disability rates, low birth weight rate and young age at marriage rates are presented at the national level only. Logistic regression was performed to investigate the individual and family factors influencing RTAs that lead to disability in Iran. Results: The period prevalence (12 months) of road traffic accident disabilities (RTADs) in the total population of 111415 was 30.52 (95% CI: 188.8.131.52) per 100,000 individuals. Among those who had been injured during the year leading up to the study, the proportion of disabilities caused by RTAs was 31.67 (95% CI; 18.104.22.168) per 1000 pedestrians, 20.99 (95% CI: 184.108.40.206) per 1000 motorcyclists, 18.64 (95% CI: 18.104.22.168) per 1000 vehicle drivers. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the risk of RTADs differed significantly in relation to age (AOR 50-59 vs. 0-9=10. 78, p-value:0.05); activity status (AOR unemployed vs. employed=4.72, p-value:0.001) and family income (AOR q2 vs. q1=0.37, p-value:0.048) of the victim. Conclusion: In addition to the risks associated with socio-economic groups, particularly vulnerable groups, RTADs have consequences which can lead to further marginalization of individuals, can affect their quality of life and damage the community as a whole.


Reducing test data size is one of the major challenges in testing systems-on-a-chip. This can be achieved by test compaction and/or compression techniques. Having a partially specified or relaxed test set increases the effectiveness of compaction and compression techniques. In this paper, we propose a novel and efficient test relaxation technique for combinational circuits. It is based on critical path tracing and hence it may result in a reduction in the fault coverage. However, based on experimental results on ISCAS benchmark circuits, the drop in the fault coverage (if any) after relaxation is small for most of the circuits. The technique is faster than the brute-force test relaxation method by several orders of magnitude.


Abstract : The aim of the current research is to understand unsteady lift generation on three-dimensional flapping wings in the MAV flight regime and, if a leading edge vortex develops at MAV-like Reynolds numbers, characterize the time-scale of the development and stability of the vortex. The waving wing experiment is a model of the translational phase of the insect wing stroke. It was designed to produce a simple flow-field while preserving flow unsteadiness, threedimensionality, and wing rotation. The wing rotates in a propeller-like motion through a wing stroke angle up to 90 degrees. Unsteady lift and drag force data was acquired throughout the wing stroke and particle image velocimetry (PIV) was used to measure the velocity field and quantify the circulation of the leading edge vortex. The shape of the lift curve was similar for all cases tested. A transient high lift peak approximately 1.5 times the quasi-steady value occurred in the first chord-length of travel, caused by the formation of a leading edge vortex. This vortex then separated from the leading edge resulting in a sharp drop in lift. Subsequent vortices continued to form, shed, and move downstream over the wing as lift values recovered to an intermediate value. The circulation of the LEV has been measured and agrees well with force data. Wing kinematics had only a small effect on the aerodynamic forces produced by the waving wing. In the early stages of the wing stroke, velocity profiles with low accelerations affected the timing and magnitude of the lift peak but at higher accelerations the velocity profile was insignificant. Variations in angle of attack between 5 and 45 degrees, Reynolds number between 10,000 and 60,000, and aspect ratio 2 or 4 did not affect the fundamental structure of the flow. Unlike previous studies at much lower Reynolds numbers, there is no evidence of an attached leading edge vortex over an extended period of time.


Steganography techniques or information hiding are concerned with hiding the existence of data in other cover media. Usually one hiding method is used to hide secret data in a cover text and that will reduce the security, so in this paper we will use more than one hiding method to hide secret data according to syntax grammars of cover text produced by a special parser. We represent the Arabic language grammar as logical terms and use B + tree for storing, and Augmented Transition Network( ATN) for parsing. The proposed technique was implemented using Visual Prolog and after testing according to the authorized measures that are used in this field The proposed approach has provide good security (transparency) for steganography.


A speed hump is a local rising of a public road, formed as a sinusoidal, and meant to force drivers physically to decrease their speed. A plateau is also meant to moderate the speed, but this is a flat rising with gradual slopes. Because of the large diversity in legally normalized construction types, the geometric control of these raised constructions is a complex matter. Moreover, because of the typical low to the ground form of a flatbed truck, problems arise when the road crossings shows a round form. The objective of this study is to find a surveying method to collect geometric data, in order to inspect speed humps, plateaus and road crossings. Depending on the categorisation of the different sorts of roads, and the construction principles for flatbed trucks, the work also deals with the theoretical definition of the possibility of passing the road crossings with flatbed trucks. The problem is extrapolated to several successive obstacles and is also applied on traffic thresholds and traffic plateaus, which are also considered as obstacles for flatbed trucks. The paper discusses a surveying and processing method in design, which makes use of a surveyor's level and proposes the development of new surveying methods namely an adapted method for a level, a method for a total station and a method for a GPS instrument. Finally, the results of an interesting comparison between the different methods by means of surveys on site are presented and the results are applied on some practical examples.


In this paper, we shall introduce a concept widely used by statisticians, the principal component analysis technique. We shall show that this principal component analysis technique can be used to create new keys from a set of old keys. These new keys are very useful in narrowing down the search domain. We shall also show that the projections on the first principal component direction can be viewed as hashing addresses for the best-match searching problem.


Aim: To determine emotional behavior and the factors affecting nurses using research, descriptive, and labor relations through seeker design. Methods: The research sample was drawn from Istanbul province constitute, from nurses working in six hospitals in Europe nurses who had completed the adjustment process in the institution (6 months and over) were collected and data were collected from 504 nurses. The data was collected using a questionnaire describing the personal and professional characteristics of the nurses. The study had 21 questions and used the "Emotional Labor Behavior Scale". The data was analyzed by number, percentage, and logistic regression. Results: In the study, 91.9% of nurses were women, 54% were single, 65.1% did not have childrn; 48.4% were university graduates, the average age was 29.86±6.71, 36.1% were working in state hospitals, 6.68±6.61 of the average year of study in the institution, 78.4% were service nurses, nurses were rated on the highest in-deph subscale (20.49±3.90) and lowest suppression subscale (11.71±3.80). Conclusion: Nurses of the most in-depth, at least the depth of the three dimensions of their use to suppress behavior and emotional labor behavior scale, the arguments with role-playing and suppression behavior (personal-professional characteristics) in that there are significant relationship (p<0.05).


The raising of pervasive computing environments of heterogeneous network has provided a major impact to replicate the network-based service discovery technologies in ad hoc networks and mobile networks. The ability to interact and control network devices with different modalities within the home and office environment could be very beneficial to many users. The Service discovery in computers and handheld devices enabled them to interact with one another through heterogeneous wired and wireless networks. These services advertise their existence in a dynamic way and the devices may automatically discover them together with their properties. Service discoveries were used in home and office environment where the devices in homes and offices can be monitored and controlled over the Internet by handheld devices such as laptop and mobile devices. These devices which are based on different technologies are able to communicate and be discovered over the internet with the service discovery technologies. However, there are few issues that prevent these to be realized due to the complexities of the ad hoc environment. This thesis focuses and provides a preliminary study and analysis of the service discovery technologies in an ad hoc network along with the requirements that need to be met. The challenges are to communicate devices of different communication protocols in a heterogeneous network and platform and the devices are able to be accessed over wide-area network which currently are poor in support. An architecture of devices interaction is proposed based on the analysis of requirements. A new service discovery concept for dynamic office network is developed and presented in a scenario where a salesman, bringing his pocket pc into his client office which was enabled with UPnP support, able to discover a printer around and print his product details without any network setup and configuration. The service-oriented OSGi (Open Service Gateway Initiative) framework is proposed as the base platform of the architecture. A prototype is partially deployed on the knopflerfish OSGi framework to evaluate the possibility of the proposed architecture. This prototype demonstrates and satisfies the requirement that services could be discovered over different networks and communication platform such as UPnP and OSGi.


A voluntarily childless identity is a pertinent aspect in the discussion of family formations and non-reproduction. While childlessness describes a person or couple who does not have children, voluntary childlessness is characterized by a choice, commitment, and permanence regarding the decision not to parent. Voluntary childlessness is a burgeoning lifestyle choice that is also becoming increasingly vocal through a growing international social movement that has emerged to provide support and connect like-minded people. In 1973, Veevers' paper 'Voluntary childlessness: A neglected area of family study' described the voluntarily childless as receiving 'selective inattention'. Since, there has been considerable research examining voluntary childlessness. This paper reviews the literature on voluntary childlessness by examining four central debates: (1) who chooses to be childless; (2) why do individuals choose voluntary childlessness; (3) what are the consequences of voluntary childlessness; and, (4) stigmatization of voluntary childlessness and the response to stigma. In so doing, this paper reviews diverse literature and critically discusses the underlying assumptions of the field.


The field equations in a three-dimensional commutative space based on a set of commutation relations are derived. In this space, the commutation relation of the position and kinematic momentum of a particle is generalized to include a metric tensor field in addition to a vector field. The introduction of a metric tensor is a generalization of the commutation relation for Feynman's proof of the Maxwell equations. In this paper, as the equations of motion and the field equations are classical, the Poisson bracket and not the commutation relation is used in the calculations. As the commutative space is defined by the Poisson bracket, the equations of motion for the particle and the field equations for the metric tensor and vector are derived from the Poisson bracket in Hamiltonian mechanics. The Helmholtz conditions, which express the existence of a Lagrangian for a particle in the space, are also derived from the Poisson bracket. Then the field equations are calculated explicitly by two approaches. One is to calculate the Helmholtz conditions using the equations of motion. The other is to calculate the Jacobi identity for the kinematic momentum or velocity of the particle. In addition to the homogeneous Maxwell equations, the generalized field equations are obtained to define the generalized electric and magnetic fields of the tensor field. Just like the usual electric and magnetic fields, the generalized fields are invariant under a local gauge transformation and should play significant roles in physics. Finally, the homogeneous Maxwell equations of the vector field are seen to exhibit similarities with the generalized field equations for the tensor field. This similarity provides a useful theoretical framework for constructing gravitoelectromagnetism, which is based on analogies between the equations for electromagnetism and relativistic gravitation. It remains to establish the usefulness of the theoretical framework with applications of the field equations.


This paper proposes a new loss function for linear autoencoders (LAEs) and analytically identifies the structure of the associated loss surface. Optimizing the conventional Mean Square Error (MSE) loss results in a decoder matrix that spans the principal subspace of the sample covariance of the data, but, owing to an invariance that cancels out in the global map, it will fail to identify the exact eigenvectors. We show here that our proposed loss function eliminates this issue, so the decoder converges to the exact ordered unnormalized eigenvectors of the sample covariance matrix. We characterize the full structure of the new loss landscape by establishing an analytical expression for the set of all critical points, showing that it is a subset of critical points of MSE, and that all local minima are still global. Specifically, the invariant global minima under MSE are shown to become saddle points under the new loss. Additionally, the computational complexity of the loss and its gradients are the same as MSE and, thus, the new loss is not only of theoretical importance but is of practical value, e.g., for low-rank approximation.


Using a yeast two-hybrid screen, we identified Dok1 as a docking protein for RET tyrosine kinase. Dok1 bound more strongly to RET with a multiple endocrine neoplasia (MEN) 2B mutation than RET with a MEN2A mutation and was highly phosphorylated in the cells expressing the former mutant protein. Analysis by site-directed mutagenesis revealed that tyrosine 361 in mouse Dok1 represents a binding site for the Nck adaptor protein and tyrosines 295, 314, 361, 376, 397, and 408 for the Ras-GTPase-activating protein. We replaced tyrosine 361 or these six tyrosines with phenylalanine (designated Y361F or 6F) inDok1 and introduced the mutant Dok1 genes into the cells expressing the wild-type RET or RET-MEN2B protein. Overexpression of Dok1 or Dok1-Y361F, but not Dok1–6F, suppressed the Ras/Erk activation induced by glial cell line-derived neurotrophic factor or RET-MEN2B, implying that this inhibitory effect requires the Ras-GTPase-activating protein binding to Dok1. In contrast, overexpression of Dok1, but not Dok1-Y361F or Dok1–6F, enhanced the c-Jun amino-terminal kinase (JNK) and c-Jun activation. This suggested that the association of Nck to tyrosine 361 in Dok1 is necessary for the JNK and c-Jun activation by glial cell line-derived neurotrophic factor or RET-MEN2B. Because a high level of the JNK phosphorylation was observed in the cells expressing RET-MEN2B, its strong activation via Nck binding to Dok1 may be responsible for aggressive properties of medullary thyroid carcinoma developed in MEN 2B.


The increasing importance of sustainability in urban and architectural design progressively influences the conception of urban neighborhoods. Among the multiple aspects of this evolution, the reduction of global energy consumption plays a crucial role. Its full achievement involves carrying out different complementary strategies in a structured approach at the territorial, urban, architectural and constructive levels. Analyses made during the realization of the Ecoparc neighborhood in Neuchâtel (Switzerland) provide the opportunity to illustrate these multiple issues.


Rough end mill tools with serrated cutting edges profile are extensively used for removing a bulk of material and suppressing the chatter vibrations during milling operations. The serrated profile of cutting edge has phase shift from one flute to the next and interfere with the regeneration of waviness of the cut surface. In this research, serrated cutting edges are analytically defined and geometrically modeled as a NURBS curve. In addition; the chip load on the serrated cutting edges is calculated by a newly proposed algorithm. The validity of the algorithm is investigated by applying solid modeling techniques using ACIS 3D solid Modeler. In order to validate the results, several experiments were performed by utilizing serrated end mill. Verification of simulated and experimental results shows that the developed algorithm can be effectively implemented to simulate the cutting force for any geometry of milling tools as well as serrated end mills.


Lyme borreliosis is rapidly emerging in the United Kingdom, with over 1000 cases per annum now reported. Lyme borreliosis is caused by the Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato (s.l.) group of spirochetes, which are transmitted by ixodid ticks. In the United Kingdom, Ixodes ricinus is recognized as the principal vector of the spirochetes, and this tick species is widely distributed across the country. However, as yet, it is unclear whether the distribution of B. burgdorferi essentially mirrors that of its vector, or if there are marked differences between the 2. The aim of this survey was to investigate the prevalence of B. burgdorferi in I. ricinus populations across northern England, north Wales, and the Scottish Border region. We surveyed for questing I. ricinus nymphs and adults at 17 sites, encountering ticks at 12. At 8 sites, large numbers (>160) ticks were collected, and at 3 of these sites B. burgdorferi infection prevalence was significantly higher (>7.5%) than the other 5 (<1.0%). Habitat type was associated with B. burgdorferi prevalence, with ticks from deciduous and mixed woodland being significantly more likely to be infected than those from other habitat types. Identification of infecting Borrelia species indicated that Borrelia valaisiana was the most common and widespread species encountered. B. garinii was common at sites where infection prevalence was high, and B. afzelii was also occasionally encountered at these sites. The survey revealed a surprisingly uneven distribution of B. burgdorferi s.l. across the region, thereby indicating that the presence of ticks does not necessarily mean the presence of the pathogen. Indeed, the spirochete appears to be absent or very rare at some sites where ticks are abundant.


One of the main tasks of conjoint analysis is to identify consumer preferences about potential products or services. Accordingly, different estimation methods have been proposed to determine the corresponding relevant attributes. Most of these approaches rely on the post-processing of the estimated preferences to establish the importance of such variables. This paper presents new techniques that simultaneously identify consumer preferences and the most relevant attributes. The proposed approaches have two appealing characteristics. Firstly, they are grounded on a support vector machine formulation that has proved important predictive ability in operations management and marketing contexts and secondly they obtain a more parsimonious representation of consumer preferences than traditional models. We report the results of an extensive simulation study that shows that unlike existing methods, our approach can accurately recover the model parameters as well as the relevant attributes. Additionally, we use two conjoint choice experiments whose results show that the proposed techniques have better fit and predictive accuracy than traditional methods and that they additionally provide an improved understanding of customer preferences.


In this paper, spacecraft kinematics and dynamics for a rigid body in circular orbit were studied to recognize the system how operates in geosynchronous orbit for linearized attitude motion. The linear model of flexible spacecraft was figured out with linearized rigid spacecraft attitude dynamics, linearized gravity gradient torque and a sinusoidal effect as a disturbance which consists of flexible solar panels vibration effects, sun pressure and other unmodelled external or internal disturbances. Satellite's linear attitude motion is presented in the state-space form. State-space linear controller is designed by using pole placement method. Designed system is simulated by using Matlab-Simulink. Simulation results show that a satellite unstable attitude motion is successfully stabilized (with settling time about twenty minutes) by designed linear controller. Other control performances such as overshoot, steady-state error, etc., are also very good.


This paper discusses multidisciplinary international research collaboration team formation during the COVID-19 pandemic, challenges faced, strategies adopted, achievements and dynamics in the implementation of research on Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), by the African Translational Research Group (ATReG). The paper also discusses the lessons learnt and future opportunities for global collaborative research. In-depth virtual interviews were conducted with consenting members of ATReG. Questions were designed to provide rich, deep, and insightful opinions, lived experiences and perspectives of ATReG group members on group formation, challenges, strategies and achievements. Interview data was transcribed and analysed thematically, and the results were presented with important quotations presented. The ATReG consisted of English (n = 13) and French (n = 1) speaking sub-Saharan African (SSA) researchers who specialise in public health, epidemiology, optometry, information technology, supply chain management, psychiatry, community health, general medical practice, nutrition and biostatistics. Most members of the group reported an informal but well-coordinated structure of the group. Formed during the pandemic, all group meetings were held online, and many members are yet to meet each other in person. The group collected data from Africans and published 10 peer reviewed journal articles on COVID-19 within two years. It presented in international conferences, engaged with the media and the public and was awarded a national competitive funding in Nigeria all of which which contributed to career progression and academic promotion of some members. There have been challenges in sustaining the research collaboration and maintaining productivity. Challenges include difficulties meeting deadlines and obtaining funding for research activities. However, these challenges have been addressed through a collaborative problem-solving approach. The study found the need for operational and methodological flexibility, centralised coordination, and established funding sources as being essential for long term sustainability and performance of the group. The ATReG's objective of providing useful data on COVID-19 and generating useful knowledge about COVID-19 in SSA has been achieved. In such a multi-disciplinary international collaborative team relaiant on the online medium to operate, the experiences and challenges can be a model for learning for researchers intending to form international multidisciplinary collaborative groups. Nonetheless, there are still many important areas of research which ATReG will continue to pursue.


A display consisting of two vibrators attached to the body was tested using three different error signal-to-vibration amplitude transformations. In addition, a novel ripple display consisting of seven sequentially activated air-jet stimulators was tested on a compensatory tracking task. For both displays the range of gains and body locations were determined by both describing-function and error-power analyses. The results showed that the two-vibrator display was equally effective on all five body areas tested, but that the ripple display produced best tracking performance only when widely spaced or situated on an anatomical landmark. The best ripple display, however, was better than the best vibrator display and provided tracking performance nearly equivalent to visual displays. It was found that the ripple display was not enhanced by apparent motion but produced equivalent operator time delays shorter than those measured with visual displays.


In this study, a constant temperature environment chamber with high stability is proposed. In the proposed design, the outer temperature is controlled by the air conditioner, the inner temperature is controlled by the electric current generated to control several thermoelectric cooling units. The separation design of the environment chamber from the cooling system can reduce the vibration caused by the thermoelectric cooling elements. This system adopted the Rake's System Identification Method to obtain the system model, so that optimum PID parameters can be acquired from the simulation of Matlab Simulink. The results show that the vibration can be effectively reduced and the temperature can be controlled within the range of 20±0.007°C in the steady state.


Smooth specimens of single crystal (SC) superalloy SRR99 with [001] orientation were subjected to high-cycle fatigue (HCF) loading at temperatures of 700°C, 760°C, 850°C and 900°C in air atmosphere. The results demonstrated that conditional fatigue strength reached the maximum at 760°C and decreases with increasing temperature. Analysis on fracture surface showed a trend for cleavage rupture at 850°C and 900°C and ductile rupture at 700°C and 760°C. Fatigue cracks initiated at the surface or subsurface were primarily responsible for the ultimate failure. The influence of testing temperature on fatigue lifetime was studied by examining evolution of the microstructure through SEM observation. With the process of cyclic loading at elevated temperatures, the primary cuboidal γ′ precipitates tended to agglomerate and spheroidized, meanwhile a larger number of secondary γ′ particles were formed in the γ matrix in specimens fatigue tested at 700°C, which would have a significant effect on the high temperature properties.


Whether you're purchasing groceries with your Safeway "club card" or casting a vote on American Idol, that data is being collected. From Amazon to iTunes, cell phones to GPS devices, Google to TiVo--all of these products and services give us an expansive sense of choice, access, and participation. But, in an era now marked by large-scale NSA operations that secretly monitor our email exchanges and internet surfing, Mark Andrejevic shows how these new technologies are increasingly employed as modes of surveillance and control. Many contend that our proliferating interactive media empower individuals and democratize society. But, Andrejevic asks, at what cost? In iSpy, he reveals that these and other highly touted benefits are accompanied by hidden risks and potential threats that tend to be ignored by mainstream society. His book offers the first sustained critique of a concept that has been a talking point for twenty years, an up-to-the-minute survey of interactivity across multiple media platforms. It debunks the false promises of the digital revolution still touted by the popular media while seeking to rehabilitate, rather than simply write off, the potentially democratic uses of interactive media. Andrejevic opens up the world of digital rights management and the data trail each of us leaves--data about our locations, preferences, or life events that are already put to use in various economic, political, and social contexts. He notes that, while citizens are becoming increasingly transparent to private and public monitoring agencies, they themselves are unable to access the information gathered about them--or know whether it's even correct. (The watchmen, it seems, don't want to be watched.) He also considers the appropriation of consumer marketing for political campaigns in targeting voters, and also examines the implications of the Internet for the so-called War on Terror. In iSpy, Andrejevic poses real challenges for our digital future. Amazingly detailed, compellingly readable, it warns that we need to temper our enthusiasm for these technologies with a better understanding of the threats they pose--to be able to distinguish between interactivity as centralized control and as collaborative participation. This book is part of the CultureAmerica series.


Apparent streaming potentials were elicited across Necturus gallbladder epithelium by addition or removal of sucrose from the apical bathing solution. In NaCl Ringer's solution, the transepithelial voltage (Vms) change (reference, basolateral solution) was positive with sucrose addition and negative with sucrose removal. Bilateral Cl- removal (cyclamate replacement) had no effect on the polarity or magnitude of the Vms change elicited by addition of 100 mM sucrose. In contrast, bilateral Na+ removal (tetramethylammonium [TMA+] replacement) inverted the Vms change (from 2.7 +/- 0.3 to -3.2 +/- 0.2 mV). Replacement of Na+ and Cl- with TMA+ and cyclamate, respectively, abolished the change in Vms. Measurements of cell membrane voltages and relative resistances during osmotic challenges indicate that changes in cell membrane parameters do not explain the transepithelial voltage changes. The initial changes in Vms were slower than expected from concomitant estimates of the time course of sucrose concentration (and hence osmolality) at the membrane surface. Paired recordings of the time courses of paracellular bi-ionic potentials (partial substitution of apical Na+ with tetrabutylammonium [TBA+]) revealed much faster time courses than those produced by sucrose addition, although the diffusion coefficients of sucrose and TBACl are similar. Hyperosmotic and hypoosmotic challenges yielded initial Vms changes at the same rate; thereafter, the voltage increased with hypoosmotic solution and decreased with hyperosmotic solution. These late voltage changes appear to result from changes in width of the lateral intercellular spaces. The early time courses of the Vms changes produced by osmotic challenge are inconsistent with the expectations for water-ion flux coupling in the junctions. We propose that they are pseudo-streaming potentials, i.e., junctional diffusion potentials caused by salt concentration changes in the lateral intercellular spaces secondary to osmotic water flow.


Tudor and Stuart Gardens explores the love of formality that characterised gardening in the 16th and 17th centuries, and the influence of Renaissance culture on British gardens. Intricate knot gardens and parterres, the structural use of topiary and hedges and the period's fascination with non-native plants influenced the evolution of British gardens over the following centuries. This was a time when gardens were used to demonstrate the status, wealth and education of the owner, and the period provides an intriguing perspective on how garden design and plantsmanship reflected social differences and divisions. Tudor and Stuart garden design and planting includes much that can inspire today's gardener, and the book includes tips and advice on how to create elements of these gardens in modern plots, large or small.


The purpose of the study was to identify the constrains affecting urban agriculture in Tehran, Iran. The statistical population of this study consisted of city dwellers within the 22 municipal districts of Tehran out of which 320 individuals were selected as the sample of the study. Cochran's formula was used to determine the sampling size based on stratified sampling method. A panel of experts confirmed the validity of the questionnaire used in this study. The calculated Cronbach's alpha for the main sections of the questionnaire was 0.95 and 0.93. Results of the ranking of constrains and challenges revealed that "high start-up costs" and "lack of knowledge among managers and authorities" were among the most important constrains. The results of factor analysis revealed that 7 factors including "education-research", "infrastructure", "support", "regulations and policy making", "technical", "financial-economic" and "cultural" explained 67.36 of the variance. Although list of constrains revealed is not perfect, this work paves the way for further research regarding factors influencing urban agriculture. It also provides interesting information for planners about the challenges of urban agriculture development.


We report on a heterodyne interferometric scanning near-field optical microscope developed for characterizing, at the nanometric scale, refractive index variations in thin films. An optical lateral resolution of 80 nm (lambda/19) and a precision smaller than 10(-4) on the refractive index difference have been achieved. This setup is suitable for a wide set of thin films, ranging from periodic to heterogeneous samples, and turns out to be a very promising tool for determining the optical homogeneity of thin films developed for nanophotonics applications.


Hallux valgus is a common foot deformity characterized by hypermobility of the first metatarsal ray. The lower longitudinal arch is an intrinsic factor related to the lateral drift of the hallux. This paper conducted a quantitative study on the improvement of the first metatarsal and arch condition by arch support and used finite element analysis to simulate the bone displacement with the intervention of arch support. In this research, a foot arch support made of carbon fiber was developed and seventy-six female subjects were recruited for a two-month wear trial. Footprints of their dominant foot were measured to investigate the effect of the arch support on lifting the arch and correcting the hallux valgus pathology. Different foot parameters including foot length, foot breadth, heel breadth, arch angle, arch breadth, plantar arch index, foot type index, and hallux valgus angle were also compared. By using finite element analysis, the biomechanical effects of the arch support on the foot structure can be visualized. According to the results of the wear trial, the use of the arch support can significantly improve the arch curvature of the foot, while no significant correction of the hallux valgus angle was found. Among the arch parameters, the arch breadth and the foot type index are the key indicators to precisely characterize foot types and arch conditions. When a clear outline of the footprint is not available, arch breadth provides reliable association with the foot type index (R2 = 0.928). An arch breadth ≥ 4 cm is categorized as flatfoot. This article confirms the effectiveness of our arch support in lifting the arch over a two-month period and provides a scientific surrogate index to aid in diagnosis, which is important for therapeutic and diagnostic applications.


As communication systems become more and more complex and integrate an increasing variety of different types of systems and devices, an important aim of pervasive systems is to provide users with more control over the delivery of different forms of communications. Simple forms of user control already exist in some systems, and work is ongoing to develop more sophisticated systems. Daidalos and Persist are two European research projects aimed at developing pervasive systems. In the process one aspect that has been investigated is the user control over communications in a general context-aware pervasive system. This paper outlines a general model developed to describe the processes, which was used as the basis of the implemented system in Daidalos. This model is being studied further in the Persist project.


Summary
Methyl benzimidazol-2-yl carbamate (MBC, carbendazim) is the fungitoxic principle of the systemic fungicide benomyl. It reduces the severity of symptoms produced by tobacco mosaic virus infection of tobacco plants (Tomlinson et al. 1976). Measurements of the accumulation of TMV RNA in MBC-treated and control plants showed that MBC treatment significantly reduced the accumulation of virus, by 20% in lower leaves and by up to 90% in upper leaves. No phytotoxic effects of MBC were observed at the concentrations effective against virus multiplication. Possible modes of action of MBC are discussed.


After collecting information on 166 high speed rail (HSR) projects across the world, this working paper examines some of the most relevant empirical issues related to the development of this transport mode in recent years. We start by discussing the economic definition of HSR, trying to identify different HSR exploitation models. Our next step consists in providing what could be considered a representative cost of building high speed infrastructure. A similar analysis is carried out regarding operating, maintenance and external costs. Finally, we study current demand and its projections, and try to draw some patterns about its future evolution, particularly within Europe and in the 2020 horizon.


This study examines how competitive intelligence is important to make the marketing effective for a business. Competitive intelligence is a phenomenon in the business world that has started gaining more importance and attention. Competitive intelligence is the both external and internal information of the environment in which a business operates. Competitive intelligence is a tool through which business can gain competitive advantage and compete against their competition. In this research competitive intelligence is diffused into sub variables which all combine to make competitive intelligence. The sub variables include market opportunities, competitor risks, competitor threats, technological intelligence, technical intelligence, and strategic intelligence. Through this research it tested whether competitive intelligence is being used by the organizations in Pakistan which will prove the importance of competitive intelligence in business and it is also shown to what extent it is used. T-test has been used to individually test each variable and see for significance. The results of the research show that all the sub variables are significantly used by the organizations in Pakistan to make their marketing effective and thus competitive intelligence is important to make the marketing effective for a business.


In this study, to understand how cellulosic materials characteristics influence the mechanical properties of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) composites, we first studied the effect of different types (wood flour and pulp fiber) and contents on selected mechanical properties of uncompatibilized wood plastic composites. We then compared the properties of hybrid composites to those of composites reinforced with wood flour or fiber, individually. PVC as polymer matrix and cellulosic materials were compounded by twin-screw extrusion and test specimens were prepared by injection molding. All tested properties vary significantly with filler form or content. With the addition of wood flour, the tensile strength moderately increases, but with the addition of hybrid filler and pulp fiber, it increases significantly. Notched impact strength increased with increasing particle size. Pulp fiber resulted in higher strength at the 40 wt % level compared with the strength properties of wood flour composites. The higher aspect ratio of the fiber had significant effect on the mechanical properties. Increasing filler load improves the strength of the composite up to a load of 40 wt %, further increase in the filler loading (>40 wt %) results in a decrease in properties, due to the to filler agglomerates. Incorporation of 25% weight fraction of wood pulp fiber in hybrid composites gave the highest values of composite properties. The mechanical properties of hybrid composites are found to be much higher than that composites filled with wood flour. Finally, results showed that the hybrid composites had the maximum improvement in selected mechanical properties. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2011


Thermally expandable microspheres are polymeric core/shell particles in which a volatile hydrocarbon is encapsulated by a thermoplastic shell. When these microspheres are heated, they expand and increase their volume dramatically. This volume increase is retained upon cooling, leading to a density reduction from around 1100 kg m-3 to about 30 kg m-3. Since the development in the early 1970´s, microspheres have been used extensively by the industry as a foaming agent or light weight filler. In this thesis, microspheres with a poly(acrylonitrile-co-methacrylonitrile) shell have been synthesized through free radical suspension polymerization. The microspheres have been characterized with respect to particle morphology and expansion properties in order to deepen the understanding of the microspheres. It was found that the monomer feed ratio and the polymerization temperature are very important parameters with respect to the expansion properties. Excellent expansion could only be accomplished when polymerizing at 62 °C, with the acrylonitrile feed, fAN, being around 60 mol%, even though core/shell microspheres are formed over a much wider range of fAN. Furthermore, no expansion was achieved when polymerizing at 80 °C, even though no noticeable differences were found, compared to the corresponding sample polymerized at 62 °C. It was also shown that the expansion properties can be modified by replacing the encapsulated hydrocarbon by another hydrocarbon with a different boiling point. Not only is the boiling point important, the structure of the hydrocarbon is also important. Isooctane which is highly branched was found to give superior expansion compared to linear or cyclic hydrocarbons having a similar boiling point. Crosslinking of the polymer shell has proven to be very important for the expansion properties. Both the amount and the structure of the crosslinker are important parameters. Especially the maximum expansion can be improved by the crosslinking of the polymer shell. This originates in an increase in the shape persistence of the expanded microspheres at elevated temperatures. By the combination of crosslinkers that are incorporated separately into the polymer shell, the onset temperature of expansion can be increased significantly. Finally, the surface of microspheres has been modified by grafting poly(glycidyl methacrylate) from the surface by ARGET ATRP. Given that the reaction conditions are appropriate, such modifications can be performed with only limited effects on the expansion properties of the microspheres.


The U. S. Geological Survey is investigating the mechanism of collapse of nuclear explosion cavities for its value in containment, with the hope of eventually determin. ing those geologic environments most susceptible to early collapse or most adaptable to the incitation of collapse. This is a progress report on a part of these studies. The investigations to date have been confined largely to the subsidence of the ground surface in the desert alluvium of Yucca Flat by collapse of volcanic rocks and (or) alluvium into the large cavities formed by nuclear explosions. The sinks thus formed are as much as 60 m (meters) deep and 250 m in radius; they have forms that are commonly variations of inverted cones or sectors of spheres. The outer half of each sink is an inward slide of Slightly disoriented but relatively undisturbed alluvium. The major physical disturbance within the slide mass is by subsidiary spoon-shaped cracks and slide surfaces along which individual blocks have adjusted within the glide mass. Each individual block moves a net distance that is small relative to the total movement of the main slide. The cracks or glide surfaces are assumed to flatten with depth within the slide and to join the major surface of failure at the base of the main slide mass. The spoon-shaped surfaces, where they intersect the top surface of the slide, dip steeply to vertically. In plan they make a pattern of curving, intersecting cracks. The depth of burial of the explosion cavity in alluvium relative to its size affects the profile of the sinks, the height of chimneys for collapses not extending to the surface, and, to an extent, the likelihood that later surface subsidence will occur. A working model of collapse includes: (a) maintenance of the explosion cavity until main collapse occurs; (b) a two-phase collapse taking place in several seconds or several tens of seconds, culminating in surface subsidence if the cavity is sufficiently close to the surface. The first phase of collapse in alluvium, at least, consumes 70 90 per cent of the collapse period; collapse propagates upward at rates of 50-80 ft/sec. The second phase shows faster rates of upward propagation, a lesser degree of particulation of the collapse material, and ends with the drop of a central mass of alluvial material that initiates formation of the sink. The shape, size, and distance of vertical drop of this alluvial plug control the size and form the resulting sink. Acceleration of this mass ranges from 0.35 to 0.8 g.


This paper presents a first validation of a novel methodology for identifying the parameters of a crystallographic elastoplastic constitutive law. This is accomplished by comparing simulation and experimental results at different length scales: the microstructure scale and the representative volume element scale. Experimentally, the microscopic strain fields and the microstrucural characteristics can be obtained only at the surface of the specimen. As a consequence, in finite element simulations only at the surface there is a oneto-one correspondence between the mesh and the experimental observed grain morphology. In this paper, the morphology of the subsurface grains is obtained by a simple extension in the thickness direction of the surface morphology. The aim of this study is then to verify whether the surface data contain sufficient information for the identification of the parameters of the constitutive law.


The European environmental risk assessment (ERA) of plant protection products follows a tiered approach. The approach for soil invertebrates currently consists of two steps, starting with a Tier 1 assessment based on reproduction toxicity tests with earthworms, springtails, and predatory mites. In case an unacceptable risk is identified at Tier 1, field studies can be conducted as a higher tier option. For soil invertebrates, intermediate tiers are not implemented. Hence, there is limited possibility to include additional information for the ERA to address specific concerns when the Tier 1 fails, as an alternative to e.g., a field study. Calibrated intermediate tier approaches could help to address risks for soil invertebrates with less time and resources but also with sufficient certainty. A multi-stakeholder workshop was held on 2nd to 4th of March 2022 to discuss potential intermediate tier options, focusing on four possible areas: 1) natural soil testing, 2) single species tests (other than standard species), 3) assessing recovery in laboratory tests, and 4) the use of assembled soil multi-species test systems. The participants acknowledged a large potential in the intermediate tier options but concluded that some issues need to be clarified before routine application of these approaches in the ERA is possible, i.e., sensitivity, reproducibility, reliability, and standardization of potential new test systems. The definition of suitable assessment factors needed to calibrate the approaches to the Protection Goals was acknowledged. The aims of the workshop were to foster scientific exchange and a data driven dialog, to discuss how the different approaches could be used in the risk assessment, and to identify research priorities for future work to address uncertainties and strengthen the tiered approach in the ERA for soil invertebrates. This paper outlines the background, proposed methods, technical challenges, difficulties and opportunities in the ERA, and conclusions of the workshop.


The apolipoprotein B mRNA editing enzyme, catalytic polypeptide-like (APOBEC) family of DNA cytosine deaminases provides a broad and overlapping defense against viral infections. Successful viral pathogens, by definition, have evolved strategies to escape restriction by the APOBEC enzymes of their hosts. HIV-1 and related retroviruses are thought to be the predominant natural substrates of APOBEC enzymes due to obligate single-stranded (ss)DNA replication intermediates, abundant evidence for cDNA strand C-to-U editing (genomic strand G-to-A hypermutation), and a potent APOBEC degradation mechanism. In contrast, much lower mutation rates are observed in double-stranded DNA herpesviruses and the evidence for APOBEC mutation has been less compelling. However, recent work has revealed that Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV), and herpes simplex virus-1 (HSV-1) are potential substrates for cellular APOBEC enzymes. To prevent APOBEC-mediated restriction these viruses have repurposed their ribonucleotide reductase (RNR) large subunits to directly bind, inhibit, and relocalize at least two distinct APOBEC enzymes—APOBEC3B and APOBEC3A. The importance of this interaction is evidenced by genetic inactivation of the EBV RNR (BORF2), which results in lower viral infectivity and higher levels of C/G-to-T/A hypermutation. This RNR-mediated mechanism therefore likely functions to protect lytic phase viral DNA replication intermediates from APOBEC-catalyzed DNA C-to-U deamination. The RNR-APOBEC interaction defines a new pathogen-host conflict that the virus must win in real-time for transmission and pathogenesis. However, partial losses over evolutionary time may also benefit the virus by providing mutational fuel for adaptation.


When technology has successfully penetrated in all aspects of life, a discussion on public sphere and its relevance in today's scenario is becoming more complicated. It is needless to say that opinions will differ as the post-modern critics dissect Habermas' concept of public sphere with full acuity. As the mass media is being dominated by the Information and Communications Technology industry, the perceptible change and the aspect of critical publicity that Habermas emphasized on with a higher sense of responsibility is worth discussing. Computer-mediated communication and its uses in education is dominating today's age and the issue like commercialization, commodification, media ownership, instructional technologies are sometimes considered to be challenging the power of free, rational thinking and freedom of speech. This age of digitalization is definitely getting dependent to cyberspace more for every reason or the other, but what needs to be assessed is if this dependency is effecting the freedom of democratic discussion.


In discussing prevention, the author deals first with the provision of permanently safe water, supplied from waterworks or wells, and with other improvements in environmental sanitation. Control of food and drinks, public health propaganda and education, and vaccination are also considered under this heading.The greater part of this study is devoted to suppressive measures, affecting the individual, the environment, and persons in the mass. Discussion of the isolation, detection and management of cholera patients, the management of contacts, and the management and treatment of carriers is followed by sections on, inter alia, disinfection, temporary improvements in water supplies, fly control, and personal prophylaxis. In dealing with mass prophylaxis, the author pays particular attention to vaccination. In the concluding sections he goes into the control of pilgrimages and local and international quarantine measures.


In this paper a case study of an open source, home-built 3D printer called 'Rep-rap' serves as an entry point to the deskilling debate. This debate has centred on Harry Braverman's proposition that deskilling is a general trend, given the prevalence of capitalist relations of production, or, differently put, contractual employment relations. The origins of 3D printing can be traced back to numerically controlled (NC) and computerised numerically-controlled (CNC) machinery and can even be seen to incorporate 'material traces' of these. Both technologies are based on the same principle: guiding a machine tool with the help of software. NC and CNC machines were introduced in the midst of industrial conflicts and served as a touchstone in academic debates for and against the deskilling thesis during the 1970s. The open source, home-built 3D printer, in contrast, is being developed by a community of hobbyists. By definition, these hobbyists are located outside of contractual employment relations. Still, they are striving to make the 3D printer user-friendly, or, in other words, to deskill the user. Reflecting on this difference, this paper sets out to incorporate some of the critiques of the deskilling thesis in order to advance an updated, Bravermanian position on user-friendly technology.


Thermal barrier and environmental barrier coatings (TBCs and EBCs) will play a crucial role in future advanced gas turbine engines because of their ability to significantly extend the temperature capability of the ceramic matrix composite (CMC) engine components in harsh combustion environments. In order to develop high performance, robust coating systems for effective thermal and environmental protections of the engine components, appropriate test approaches for evaluating the critical coating properties must be established. In this paper, a laser high-heat-flux, thermal gradient approach for testing the coatings will be described. Thermal cyclic behavior of plasma-sprayed coating systems, consisting of ZrO2 -8wt%Y2 O3 thermal barrier and NASA Enabling Propulsion Materials (EPM) Program developed mullite+BSAS/Si type environmental barrier coatings on SiC/SiC ceramic matrix composites, was investigated under thermal gradients using the laser heat-flux rig in conjunction with the furnace thermal cyclic tests in water-vapor environments. The coating sintering and interface damage were assessed by monitoring the real-time thermal conductivity changes during the laser heat-flux tests and by examining the microstructural changes after the tests. The coating failure mechanisms are discussed based on the cyclic test results and are correlated to the sintering, creep, and thermal stress behavior under simulated engine temperature and heat flux conditions.Copyright © 2002 by ASME


Data from North Dakota farmers are used to develop regression equations estimating seasonal use of farm operator labor and management time by farm size. Management time has a large fixed component and increases linearly with farm size. Annual labor supervision time per man-month supervised increases when more than 15 man-months of hired or family labor are used.


SUMMARY: Hypocholesteremic compounds, triparanol, SKF 525-A, SKF 3301-A, SKF 16467-A, inhibited the multiplication of some bacteria and ascomycetes; phycomycetes were not inhibited. Gram-positive bacteria were most sensitive to these compounds. Dimethyl or diethyl aminoethanol and SKF 2314, compounds resembling the major moieties of the SKF compounds, were not inhibitory alone or together; the whole molecule was necessary for inhibition. Inhibition by triparanol of the multiplication of several Gram-positive bacteria was annulled by albumin and ergosterol; oleic acid and squalene were mostly inactive.


BACKGROUND
Mortality, health, and well-being across the lifespan are associated with socioeconomic position (typically operationalised as occupational status). There is some evidence that adolescence represents a period of 'relative equalisation' of health inequalities. Our aim was to examine the association between inequalities in household income and health in childhood and adolescence.

METHODS
Cross-sectional survey using multistage stratified random sample of households in Britain. Information was collected on 10438 children aged 5-15 years.

RESULTS
Low levels of equivalised household income was associated with poorer health for 13 out of the 22 indicators examined (odds ratio P < 0.05 for > or =1 income quintile). Multivariate analyses controlling for child characteristics, parental socioeconomic status and household composition indicated that low levels of equivalised household income increased the odds of poor health for 9 out of the 22 indicators examined. There was little evidence of any systematic differences in the extent of health inequalities across age groups (5-10 and 11-15 years).

CONCLUSION
Household income is related to a range of health outcomes for children and adolescents, even when other indicators of socioeconomic status are taken into account. We found little evidence that adolescence represents a period of relative equalisation of health inequalities.


Through the Vanguard Technologies initiative, the Federal Highway Administration is promoting proven, high-payoff innovations that save time, boost safety and quality, and decrease congestion during highway construction. These innovations include road safety audits, prefabricated bridge elements and systems, precast concrete pavement systems, techniques for making work zones work better, and the safety edge to reduce roadway departure crashes. An insert with this article describes the use of accelerated bridge construction techniques, including prefabricated bridge elements and systems, to build a new superstructure alongside the 4500 South Bridge over Interstate 215 in Salt Lake City while traffic continued to flow. The new superstructure was shifted into place in one weekend.


Finding the production date of a pre-modern manuscript is commonly a long process in historical research, requiring days of work from highly specialised experts. In this paper, we present an automatic dating method based on modelling both the language and the image data. By creating a statistical model over the changes in the pen strokes and short character sequences in the transcribed text, a combination of multiple estimators give a distribution over the time line for each manuscript. We have evaluated our estimation scheme on the medieval charter collection "Svenskt Diplomatariums huvudkartotek" (SDHK), including more than 5300 transcribed charters from the period 1135 - 1509. Our system is capable of achieving a median absolute error of 12 years, where the only human input is a transcription of the charter text. Since reading and transcribing the text is a skill that many researchers and students have, compared to the more specialized skill of dating medieval manuscripts based on palaeographical expertise, we find our novel approach suitable for helping individual researchers to date collections of manuscript pages. For larger collections, transcriptions could also be collected using crowd sourcing.


Background: For the past two decades, more and more women in certain European countries, Japan, and the United States are giving birth to their first child at a considerably later age than ever before. It remains unclear as to what extent this age-related general fertility decline is affected by changing social and cultural norms. Method: The Global Centers of Excellence Survey was conducted by Osaka University in Japan (n=5313) in 2009. Multivariate regression analyses were conducted to examine the impact of psychosocial norms, cultural differences, and economic conditions on the perception of childbearing.Results: The findings suggest that a subjective measure of happiness has a significant influence on childbearing. A society with income inequalities between classes discourages childbearing. It is observed that women's higher labor force participation generates a negative impact on mother-child relations which causes discouragement of childbearing. A higher female labor force participation stemmed from a transition of a traditional society into a modern and market-oriented society discourages childbearing.Conclusions/implications: A woman's decision to delay childbearing is based on her perception of psychosocial norms with surrounding economic environment and her own value of opportunity in the market oriented society. Childbearing also imposes psycho-economic burdens on the working population under mix of a traditional, patriarchal society, and a modern market oriented framework. Childbearing incentives could be a strategic policy to encourage positive attitudes of childbearing in general and proper welfare policy, labor law(s), employment conditions, and social security system for a working mother with a child or children.


Wind energy is one of the most important renewable energy sources in the world. Accurate wind power prediction is of great significance for achieving reliable and economical power system operation and control. For this purpose, this paper is focused on wind power prediction based on a newly proposed shuffle–and–fusion interaction network (SFINet). First, a channel shuffle is employed to promote the interaction between timing features. Second, an attention block is proposed to fuse the original features and shuffled features to further increase the model's sequential modeling capability. Finally, the developed shuffle–and–fusion interaction network model is tested using real-world wind power production data. Based on the results verified, it was proven that the proposed SFINet model can achieve better performance than other baseline methods, and it can be easily implemented in the field without requiring additional hardware and software.


Increasing water demands have formed challenges and conflicts over the limited water resources. The existing optimization models have limitations in resolving such conflict problems. In recent years a few discrete stochastic dynamic models have attempted to solve cases of water use (conflicts) so that more efficient water distribution management can be achieved. These models have to some extent addressed the conflict issues of water resources. However, they still do not cover certain constraints, and also require complicated procedures and massive computational efforts. The discrete nature of these models seems to be the limiting factor. In order to resolve these shortcomings, in this research a continuous dynamic deterministic game model is proposed to manage water supply and consumption under challenging conditions. Continuous value functions (long term), utility functions (short terms), and equation of motion are defined in the proposed model. The mathematical equations are formed in a way to decrease the computational time. For this purpose the Ricatti equations are used to solve the proposed continuous stochastic game model. The proposed model is applied to the Zayandeh-rud river basin in central Iran. The results are quite favorable compared to the Dynamic Programming (DP) model outcomes.


Introduction Bone arrowheads are quite numerous among the archaeological finds of the Late Bronze Age (ca 1100-500 BC) from the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea. The present article is mainly based on Estonian finds, but in spring 2006 the author had an opportunity to study some bone arrowheads from two fortified settlements of Lithuania in the Lithuanian National Museum. Still, most of the Lithuanian and Latvian material is discussed on the basis of published finds: about Lithuania the material published by Elena Grigalaviciene (1986a; 1986b; 1992; 1995) and Regina Volkaite-Kulikauskiene (1986) has been used, and about Latvia the publications by Janis Graudonis ([TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] 1967; Graudonis 1989) and Andrejs Vasks (1994). Estonian arrowheads have been discussed in greater detail by Vello Lougas (1970, 99-106) and Uwe Sperling (2006, 112-114), but they have also been mentioned in various other publications concerning archaeological finds from fortified settlements (e.g. Indreko 1939, 24; Vassar 1939, 82; Baccap 1955, 118; Lang 1996, 49). The present study does not aim tot compile a typology of Bronze Age arrowheads, such typologies have been compiled in each Baltic country (Lougas 1970, 100 ff; Graudonis 1989, 34-35; Grigalaviciene 1995, 113-115; Sperling 2006, 112-114, fig. 35). Sometimes small sharp-tipped bone fragments, which have been but slightly worked, have been discussed together with arrowheads (e.g. Grigalaviciene 1986a, fig. 19; 1986b, fig. 20: 1-5; 1995, fig. 63), but his article deals only with carefully finished arrowheads. One of the aims of the article is to analyze the material, tools and technology used to make these arrowheads. An answer is sought to the question whether these arrowheads were used for hunting or for warfare. Finds of bone arrowheads from Estonia and other eastern Baltic countries About 50 bone arrowheads have been found from the fortified settlements of Estonia (Fig. 1). From Asva more than 30 bone arrowheads and their fragments have been found, including some blanks and unfinished objects (Figs. 2: 1-6; 3; 5; Indreko 1939, 24, fig. 7: 3; Baccap 1955, 118, fig. 35: 4, 5, 7; Lougas 1970, 99, pl. 22; Sperling 2006, 112-114, pls. LI: 1-2; LIV). The number of arrowheads and their fragments from Ridala is more than 20 (Fig. 2: 8-9; Lougas 1970, 99) and three arrowheads and their fragments dating from the Bronze Age have been found from Iru (Fig. 2: 7; Lougas 1970, 99; Lang 1996, 49, pl. VII: 4) (2) From Iru a couple of bone fragments are also known which may be blanks for making bone arrowheads. One arrowhead was found from Kaali (Fig. 4; Lougas 1978, 328) and one more from Peedu in south-eastern Estonia (Moos 1939, fig. 70). Some bone arrowheads are also known from the Bronze Age fortified settlement of Joaorg in Narva (Nikitjuk 1997, 79, fig. 2), but as this site was already inhabited in the Neolithic, the exact date of these arrowheads is not certain. [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] Bone arrowheads are also numerous among archaeological finds from the fortified settlements of Latvia, e.g. from Kivutkalns, Vinakalns, Mukukalns, Brikuli (Fig. 1; [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] 1967, 89-90, pl. XII; Latvijas 1974, pl. 18: 3-9, 11-16; Graudonis 1989, 34-35, pls. XVI-XVIII, XLVIV: 16-19; Vasks 1994, 40, pl. VIII: 2, 10-12); and Lithuania, e.g. from Narkunai, Kereliai, Sokiskiai, Moskenai, Petresiunai (Fig. 1; Volkaite-Kulikauskiene 1986, 28 29, figs. 33, 34; Grigalaviciene 1986b, fig. 20: 6, 7; 1995, 113-115, fig. 62). In Lithuanian National Museum I could examine some arrowheads from the hillforts of Narkunai and Kereliai, which resemble Estonian ones by their manufacturing techniques and working traces. Bone arrowheads of the Bronze Age occur also in other countries around the Baltic--in Poland, Sweden and Russia as well as in Finland, where they are found also from the Iron Age sites (Lougas 1970, 101 ff.; Ikaheimo et al. 2004, 8-10, fig. …


Objective: Arteriovenous fistulas created for hemodialysis often fail to become usable and are frequently abandoned. This prospective trial evaluated the efficacy of vonapanitase, a recombinant human elastase, in increasing radiocephalic fistula use for hemodialysis and secondary patency. Methods: PATENCY-2 was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial in patients on or approaching the need for hemodialysis undergoing radiocephalic arteriovenous fistula creation. Of 696 screened, 613 were randomized, and 603 were treated (vonapanitase n = 405, placebo n = 208). The study drug solution was applied topically to the artery and vein for 10 min immediately after fistula creation. The primary endpoints were fistula use for hemodialysis and secondary patency (fistula survival without abandonment). Other efficacy endpoints included unassisted fistula use for hemodialysis, primary unassisted patency, fistula maturation and unassisted maturation by ultrasound criteria, and fistula procedure rates. Results: The proportions of patients with fistula use for hemodialysis was similar between groups, 70% vonapanitase and 65% placebo, (p = 0.33). The Kaplan–Meier estimates of 12-month secondary patency were 78% (95% confidence interval [CI], 73–82) for vonapanitase and 76% (95% CI, 70–82) for placebo (p = 0.93). The proportions with unassisted fistula use for hemodialysis were 46% vonapanitase and 37% placebo (p = 0.054). The Kaplan–Meier estimates of 12-month primary unassisted patency were 50% (95% CI, 44–55) for vonapanitase and 43% (95% CI, 35–50) for placebo (p = 0.18). There were no differences in the proportion of patients with fistula maturation or in fistula procedure rates. Adverse events were similar between groups. Vonapanitase was not immunogenic. Conclusions: Vonapanitase treatment did not achieve clinical or statistical significance to meaningfully improve radiocephalic fistula surgical outcomes. Outcome in the placebo group were better than in historical controls. Vonapanitase was well-tolerated and safe. TRIAL REGISTRATION: clinicaltrials.gov: NCT02414841 (https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT02414841)


Two critical limitations for using current satellite sensors in real-time crop management are the lack of imagery with optimum spatial and spectral resolutions and an unfavorable revisit time for most crop stress-detection applications. Alternatives based on manned airborne platforms are lacking due to their high operational costs. A fundamental requirement for providing useful remote sensing products in agriculture is the capacity to combine high spatial resolution and quick turnaround times. Remote sensing sensors placed on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) could fill this gap, providing low-cost approaches to meet the critical requirements of spatial, spectral, and temporal resolutions. This paper demonstrates the ability to generate quantitative remote sensing products by means of a helicopter-based UAV equipped with inexpensive thermal and narrowband multispectral imaging sensors. During summer of 2007, the platform was flown over agricultural fields, obtaining thermal imagery in the 7.5-13-mum region (40-cm resolution) and narrowband multispectral imagery in the 400-800-nm spectral region (20-cm resolution). Surface reflectance and temperature imagery were obtained, after atmospheric corrections with MODTRAN. Biophysical parameters were estimated using vegetation indices, namely, normalized difference vegetation index, transformed chlorophyll absorption in reflectance index/optimized soil-adjusted vegetation index, and photochemical reflectance index (PRI), coupled with SAILH and FLIGHT models. As a result, the image products of leaf area index, chlorophyll content (C ab), and water stress detection from PRI index and canopy temperature were produced and successfully validated. This paper demonstrates that results obtained with a low-cost UAV system for agricultural applications yielded comparable estimations, if not better, than those obtained by traditional manned airborne sensors.


Background Approximately 67% of U.S. households have pets. Limited data are available on SARS-CoV-2 in pets. We assessed SARS-CoV-2 infection in pet cohabitants as a sub-study of an ongoing COVID-19 household transmission investigation. Methods Mammalian pets from households with ≥1 person with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 were eligible for inclusion from April–May 2020. Demographic/exposure information, oropharyngeal, nasal, rectal, and fur swabs, feces, and blood were collected from enrolled pets and tested by rRT-PCR and virus neutralization assays. Findings We enrolled 37 dogs and 19 cats from 34 of 41 eligible households. All oropharyngeal, nasal, and rectal swabs tested negative by rRT-PCR; one dog's fur swabs (2%) tested positive by rRT-PCR at the first animal sampling. Among 47 pets with serological results from 30 households, eight (17%) pets (4 dogs, 4 cats) from 6 (20%) households had detectable SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies. In households with a seropositive pet, the proportion of people with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 was greater (median 79%; range: 40–100%) compared to households with no seropositive pet (median 37%; range: 13–100%) (p=0.01). Thirty-three pets with serologic results had frequent daily contact (≥1 hour) with the human index patient before the person's COVID-19 diagnosis. Of these 33 pets, 14 (42%) had decreased contact with the human index patient after diagnosis and none (0%) were seropositive; of the 19 (58%) pets with continued contact, 4 (21%) were seropositive. Interpretations Seropositive pets likely acquired infection from humans, which may occur more frequently than previously recognized. People with COVID-19 should restrict contact with animals. Funding Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Department of Agriculture


Stem cell research and scaffolding are now the buzz words in basic science pulp researches. The endodontic community needs to enhance its clinical understanding of the vital pulp and dentin, and embrace new treatment modalities. Several regenerative techniques have been described, while therapies involving stem cells, growth factors and scaffolds have been proposed. Each technique has its own advantages and disadvantages, although some techniques are still in a hypothetical stage or in an early stage of development. It has been accepted that the regenerative therapies could revolutionize the future endodontics with the synergitic confluence of advances in signaling pathways underlying morphogenesis and lineage stem/ progenitor cells by morphogens such as bone morphogenic proteins and synthetic scaffolds.

 Key words: Stem cells, scaffolds, gene therapy, endodontics.


Get set for possible sticker shock when wholesale distribution contracts come up for renewal. Drug wholesalers are starting to charge drugmakers fees for distributing their products. Pharmacy providers—retail pharmacies, managed care organizations, and health systems—will see the change reflected in new contract prices.


Susan K. Besse broadens our understanding of the political by establishing the relevance of gender for the construction of state hegemony in Brazil after World War I. Restructuring Patriarchy demonstrates that the consolidation and legitimization of power by President Getulio Vargas's Estado Novo depended to a large extent on the reorganization of social relations in the private sphere. New expectations and patterns of behavior for women emerged in postwar Brazil from heated debates between men and women, housewives and career women, feminists and antifeminists, reformist professionals and conservative clerics, and industrialists and bureaucrats. But as urban middle- and upper-class women challenged patriarchal authority at home and assumed new roles in public, prominent intellectuals, professionals, and politicians defined and imposed new 'hygienic,' rational, and scientific gender norms. Thus, modernization of the gender system within Brazil's rising urban-industrial society accommodated new necessities and opportunities for women without fundamentally changing the gender inequality that underlay the larger structure of social inequality in Brazil.


Using synthetic aperture radiometer to retrieve the brightness temperature distribution of the Earth is a relative new technique for the microwave Earth observation. But the side lobe of the synthetic aperture pattern will deteriorate the retrieved image. In the one dimensional synthetic aperture radiometer system, synthetic aperture pattern side lobe will produce the along-track streaks in the retrieved image, together with some other factors. Reducing these streaks is one of the most important tasks in the post data processing and image retrieving. In this paper, the Dolph-Chebyshev Linear Array Method is introduced to reduce the side lobe level (SLL) of the synthetic aperture pattern. Using the Dolph-Chebyshev taper window can achieve the optimal compromise between the main beam width and the SLL of the synthetic aperture pattern: all side lobes would be suppressed to the same specific level, while the main beam width would be as narrow as possible. The method is applied to some experimental data we achieved before. And the retrieved brightness temperature images are improved apparently.


Analytical and econometric models are developed where exogenous money supply causes changes in inflation and output growth rate. It is found that money through the velocity of money is important for determining output growth and inflation structural breaks. The analytical model explain these facts by considering inflation as a tax on the return to human capital, which in turn induces a growth rate decrease. The empirical model uses Mexican data and panel Vector Autoregressive methodology to expound the equilibrium path dynamics for leading macroeconomic indicators: money growth, inflation and output growth. Granger causality tests support the finding that money Granger causes inflation and inflation Granger causes output.


Cloud computing is a new paradigm that combines several computing concepts and technologies of the Internet creating a platform for more agile and cost-effective business applications and IT infrastructure. The adoption of Cloud computing has been increasing for some time and the maturity of the market is steadily growing. Security is the question most consistently raised as consumers look to move their data and applications to the cloud. I justify the importance and motivation of security in the migration of legacy systems and I carry out an approach related to security in migration processes to cloud with the aim of finding the needs, concerns, requirements, aspects, opportunities and benefits of security in the migration process of legacy systems.


A Domain Decomposition Method (DDM) for solving electromagnetic radiation problems using the finite element method is proposed. To minimize the size of the computational domain, disjoint scatterers and/or radiators which are relatively far from each others are bounded separately. An iterative Absorbing Boundary Condition (ABC) is applied upon an outer boundary of arbitrary shape which may be conformal to the surface of each scatterer and radiator. The boundary condition of each subdomain is updated iteratively using the contribution of the scattered field from the subdomain itself and also from the other subdomains, which makes it fully coupled. An accurate waveguide port boundary condition is employed to model horn antenna feeds. Unlike most DDMs, the proposed method uses an arbitrary shaped truncation boundary placed very close to the scatterers and radiators of each disjoint subdomain to minimize the computational domain; and more importantly, the method produces a solution that converges to the true solution (if we ignore discretization error) as the iteration proceeds. A numerical example is provided to demonstrate the correctness of the feed modelling by computing antenna input impedance. Results are provided to validate the multi-domain approach and compare it with the single domain results.


Conflict resolution theory posits that understanding the sources of conflict aids peace making by informing the selection of interventions most likely to support the resolution of conflict. At the workplace level, a common approach to addressing conflict between staff is to treat the situation as a grievance and refer it to mediation or investigation. Such interventions presume the source of the conflict is between the staff who are parties to the grievance. In doing so, the interventions may be limited in their effectiveness, as a focus on individuals does not consider the role that organisational factors can play in conflict. This case study of a grievance is used to explore theories on the sources and resolution of workplace conflict. The case study illustrates what a dispute labelled as being between individuals can reveal about the role of the organisation as a source of conflict. This understanding is used to critique typical Human Resources ('HR') responses to conflict, and explore alternative interventions. Fundamentally, the case study highlights what happens when there is a mismatch between the sources of conflict and the conflict resolution intervention, and how this can be addressed by broadening the range of interventions utilised in a workplace environment.


This particular study was conducted on Ovipositional preference of Bactrocera zonata on jujube varieties under laboratory condition during 2015-2016. The research was carried out on the host preference, maximum adults' emergence, and sex ratio and to observe the impact of different jujube varieties The results showed that the highest adults emergence percentage (56.74%), was recorded on late gola while lowest (41.96%), on Kherol Mukhri, respectively. The data further described that the maximum pupal period 7.85±0.07 days was observed on white gola, while minimum on sufiimran 6.20±0.06, under free choice. However, the highest sex ratio of male and female 1.36:1 was noted on Kherol Mukhri, whereas lowest was 1.13:1, on late gola. This experiment also indicated that female sex ratio was higher compared to male adults in all varieties. Such as, the highest pupal weight was recorded (0.0118±0.003) on late gola, and lowest was (0.0075±0.001), on Kherol Mukhri, respectively. The further results determined under no choice, the highest males and females emergence (79.02%), was recorded on Kherol Mukhri while lowest (54.35%), on white gola, respectively. The data further revealed that the maximum pupal period 7.85±0.07 days was observed on white gola, while minimum on sufiimran 6.20±0.06. On the other hand, the maximum emergence of female adult (132.54±29.20) was recorded on Kherol Mukhri, this experiment also described that pupal weight is different on all varieties and population of B. zonata highest on under no choice as compared to under free choice. Such as, the better adults' emergence percentage as well as sex ratio was occurred Kherol Mukhri as compared to other varieties.


We consider the problem of unambiguous discrimination between a set of linearly independent pure quantum states. We show that the design of the optimal measurement that minimizes the probability of an inconclusive result can be formulated as a semidefinite programming problem. Based on this formulation, we develop a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for an optimal quantum measurement. We show that the optimal measurement can be computed very efficiently in polynomial time by exploiting the many well-known algorithms for solving semidefinite programs, which are guaranteed to converge to the global optimum. Using the general conditions for optimality, we derive necessary and sufficient conditions so that the measurement that results in an equal probability of an inconclusive result for each one of the quantum states is optimal. We refer to this measurement as the equal-probability measurement (EPM). We then show that for any state set, the prior probabilities of the states can be chosen such that the EPM is optimal. Finally, we consider state sets with strong symmetry properties and equal prior probabilities for which the EPM is optimal. We first consider geometrically uniform (GU) state sets that are defined over a group of unitary matrices and are generated by a single generating vector. We then consider compound GU state sets which are generated by a group of unitary matrices using multiple generating vectors, where the generating vectors satisfy a certain (weighted) norm constraint.


OBJECTIVE
To gain a better understanding of the extent to which rectangular collimation is being used in private practice and the barriers to adoption by practitioners.

METHODS
Licensed dentists in private practice were asked to answer a survey composed of 17 multiple-choice questions and 1 open-ended question regarding demographics, radiation safety, image receptor type, intraoral imaging techniques and use of rectangular collimation.

RESULTS
Among all participants (n = 82), 86.6% used digital systems (n = 71) and 13.4% conventional film (n = 11). Most (74.0%, n = 60) were aware of the benefits of using rectangular collimation, with 5.5% reporting not knowing of the existence of this device (n = 3). Only 12.9% of the dentists reported using rectangular collimation routinely (n = 10). The youngest and oldest age groups had the lowest compliance rates, 5.6% and 0%, respectively.

CONCLUSION
Although 74.0%, (n = 60) of private practitioners were aware of the benefits of using rectangular collimation to reduce radiation dose, only 12.2% (n = 10) used it routinely for intraoral imaging. Barriers to implementing rectangular collimation in private practice settings included challenges in training support staff and fear of an increase in the occurrence of technical errors that would result in re-exposure of patients.