Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in international development struggle between being actors in the mainstream or representatives of alternatives to it. However, many NGOs all over the world align with the mainstream and are increasingly similar to each other. This homogenization results from institutional isomorphism, which is affected by their aspirations to be legitimate vis-á-vis the international field. Consultancies are among the main practices to promote normative isomorphism, but little is known about their micro-level dynamics. Drawing on the notion of program mechanisms in realistic evaluation, we scrutinize how external facilitators in organizational development processes enable normative isomorphism. As a result of analysis of interventions in three Finnish development NGOs, we identify program mechanisms of convincing, embedding, and consolidating. Our findings show how organizational development activities contribute to the direction of change toward normative isomorphism and argue that a detailed analysis of intervention mechanisms would be useful for self-reflection in any field of activity.


The model of milling force is mainly proposed to predict and analyze the cutting process based on finite element method in this paper. Firstly, milling finite element model is given based on orthogonal cutting principle, and then the influence laws of cutting parameters on chip formation are analyzed by using different simulation parameters. In addition, the three-dimensional milling forces are obtained from finite element models. Finally, the values of milling force by the milling experiment are also compared and analyzed with the simulation values to verify the feasibility and reasonability. It can be shown that milling forces match well between simulation and experiment results, which can provide many good basic data and analysis methods to optimize the machining parameters, reduce tool wear, and improve the workpiece surface roughness and adapt to the programming strategy of high speed machining.


In the retelling of my experiences as a community development worker in Khao Lak, Thailand in 2004, I attend to possible shifts in community development practice through narrative pedagogy. In this moral space, I encounter the dominant community development story alongside the stories of displaced persons. Though this encounter I begin to retell the dominant community development story by thinking with stories, rather than about stories. It is here in the reconsideration that I wonder about the possibilities when one begins with the sacred stories of a sense of community as lived out in unfamiliar places.


We report on a dip-coating method to prepare catalyst particles (mixture of iron and cobalt) with a controlled diameter distribution on silicon wafer substrates by changing the solution's concentration and withdrawal velocity. The size and distribution of the prepared catalyst particles were analyzed by atomic force microscopy. Carbon nanotubes were grown by chemical vapor deposition on the substrates with the prepared catalyst particles. By decreasing the catalyst particle size to below 10 nm, the growth of carbon nanotubes can be tuned from few-walled carbon nanotubes, with homogeneous diameter, to highly pure single-walled carbon nanotubes. Analysis of the Raman radial breathing modes, using three different Raman excitation wavelengths (488, 633, and 785 nm), showed a relatively broad diameter distribution (0.8–1.4 nm) of single-walled carbon nanotubes with different chiralities. However, by changing the composition of the catalyst particles while maintaining the growth parameters, the chiralities of single-walled carbon nanotubes were reduced to mainly four different types, (12, 1), (12, 0), (8, 5), and (7, 5), accounting for about 70% of all nanotubes.


A Brandgrubengrab entails a specific way of depositing human remains whereby the cremated remains of the deceased and other remnants of the funeral pyre, such as charcoal and burnt objects, are jointly deposited onto the bottom of a pit. This type of burial became increasingly popular during the Late Iron Age and the Roman period, when it was the main basic funerary structure used in western Flanders. In recent years, more attention has been paid to establishing a more precise chronology for these funerary structures by applying radiocarbon dating. A set of 40 14C dates obtained from samples originating from small cemeteries and isolated cremations now offers new insights in the development of this specific cremation burial ritual.


In this paper, we investigate the viability of multilayered neural network (NN)-based extension of a conventional "perception" control concept. The perception process selects and completes the information from the system to be controlled before passing it to the controlling agent so that control is not lost when sensory information from the system is incomplete. The perception process produces an expectation of the next set of information to be received from the system. The expectation is used to replace missing parts of the information received and it also influences the next perception. In the existing work, each of the expectation elements is linearly acquired such that the expectation tells only the dominant information in the recent past, i.e., this approach has no capability to sense the trend and the dynamics in the information. This handicap could become a serious problem when the perception process is applied to real physical systems. Here, we introduce an extension of the perception control process by using a radial basis function (RBF) feedforward NN to learn the trend and the dynamics in the information and produce the expectation of the next observation. Through some simulation comparisons, we show that the proposed RBFNN-based method is better than the existing one.


In this study, an innovative method consisting of electrospinning and conventional textile production techniques was built up to produce hybrid yarns enabling the production of functional textile products. The principle of the developed method is to open the twist of spun yarn, make this fibre bundle conductive for use as a collector, collect the electrospun nanofibres onto the conductive opened fibre bundle and finally twist this structure to produce hybrid yarn. To determine the feasibility of the developed method, surface morphology, chemical composition, coating features and tensile properties of the hybrid yarns were compared with that of the pure yarn and nanofibre-coated yarns produced without untwisting and retwisting processes. Test results demonstrated that untwisting process in hybrid production method provided the application of nanofibres interior structure of the spun yarn while retwisting process made integration of classical textile fibres and nanofibres together and hence locking the obtained yarn structure effectively. Thanks to the integrated structure, it was successful to get the yarn have the required tensile properties for weaving, knitting and other processes. Three minutes was determined as the optimum coating time for the effective nanofibre deposition and tensile properties. Summing up the results, it was believed that the method helps to benefit from the special properties of nanofibres for the functional yarn production together with durability and higher tensile properties of the spun yarns for larger usage areas. The presented findings could encourage the researchers to commercialize the method in order to get nanofibre-coated functional yarns.


Automotive telematic systems will be as common in future cars as ABS and airbags are in current cars. These systems will provide services such as navigation aid, automatic emergency alerts, traffic and road information, information about parking possibilities, tourist information, and personalized news. All these services need a communication link to the mobile Internet to be able to work properly. In this master's thesis General Packet Radio Service, GPRS will be investigated and evaluated as a bearer for these kinds of services. A test application was built to test the location aware communication on the field. Upstream and downstream delays, possible bottlenecks in the network, connection set-up time, characteristics of different operators, and connection breakdowns where analyzed. The tests showed high network delays, and that many connection breakdowns occurred. The operators did not differ much when it comes to performance. One mayor drawback with GPRS is the low scalability with respect to operator's lack of IP addresses, which will be discussed. Conclusions of the evaluation were that only certain location-based services are suitable over GPRS with the quality of today.


This chapter is intended to call the attention towards a relatively new topic in engineering forensics: forensic analysis in hydrology. This type of analysis can be seen as a useful tool through which it is possible, in a fully objective way, to determine the real causes, natural or human induced that made a natural phenomenon a disaster. This branch of forensic analysis and particularly of engineering forensics can be applied directly to the case of floods and droughts but is not limited to those extremes phenomena. In particular, the application of these concepts to case of floods looks immediate, but other applications such as drought analysis can be addressed too. In the case of flooding events causing material damages and even loss of human lives, forensic analysis can provide results that help to clarify responsibilities but specially to prevent that future disasters happen again. This chapter will provide important information for the new forensic hydrologists, a discipline with great future, especially in the context of climate change, which will increase the magnitude, and frequency of extremes.


In this paper we describe the synthesis of nanocrystalline boron nitride (BN) with a hollow morphology by the reaction of NH4BF4 and NaNH2 at 500 oC for 24h. Characterized by XRD, FTIR, XPS, TEM, and EDXA spectra, the composition and morphology of the products were confirmed. The possible formation mechanism was also discussed.


Recent advances in MEMS (micro electromechanical systems) technology are leading to spacecraft which are the shape and size of computer chips, so-called SpaceChips, or 'smart dust devices'. These devices can offer highly distributed sensing when used in future swarm applications. However, they currently lack a feasible strategy for active orbit control. This paper proposes an orbit control methodology for future SpaceChip devices which is based on exploiting the effects of solar radiation pressure using electrochromic coatings. The concept presented makes use of the high area-to-mass ratio of these devices, and consequently the large force exerted upon them by solar radiation pressure, to control their orbit evolution by altering their surface optical properties. The orbital evolution of Space Chips due to solar radiation pressure can be represented by a Hamiltonian system, allowing an analytic development of the control methodology. The motion in the orbital element phase space resembles that of a linear oscillator, which is used to formulate a switching control law. Additional perturbations and the effect of eclipses are accounted for by modifying the linearized equations of the secular change in orbital elements around an equilibrium point in the phase space of the problem. Finally, the effectiveness of the method is demonstrated in a test case scenario.


• To be aware of how malnutrition presents and how to screen, assess, and monitor patients for nutritional risk and for response to nutritional support; • To be aware of the importance of the routine screening all patients for malnutrition and of the continued monitoring of those at risk; • To appreciate the value of such diagnostic methods combined with measures of growth and development to indicate the presence of underlying disease as well as guiding nutritional management; • To appreciate the value and place of investigative methods such as DEXA, Biochemistry etc.; • To be aware of the value of an expert Nutrition Team in all major Paediatric centres.


The widespread availability of high-quality, high-frequency data has revolutionised the study of financial markets. By describing not only asset prices, but also market participants' actions and interactions, this wealth of information offers a new window into the inner workings of the financial ecosystem. In this original text, the authors discuss empirical facts of financial markets and introduce a wide range of models, from the micro-scale mechanics of individual order arrivals to the emergent, macro-scale issues of market stability. Throughout this journey, data is king. All discussions are firmly rooted in the empirical behaviour of real stocks, and all models are calibrated and evaluated using recent data from Nasdaq. By confronting theory with empirical facts, this book for practitioners, researchers and advanced students provides a fresh, new, and often surprising perspective on topics as diverse as optimal trading, price impact, the fragile nature of liquidity, and even the reasons why people trade at all.


An overview is given of different modeling work that has been carried out, and is currently going on in our research group, in the field of modeling for laser ablation (LA). Most emphasis will be put on nanosecond (ns) LA, more specifically describing the laser-solid interaction, leading to heating, melting and vaporization of the target, by a heat conduction model, the expansion of the evaporated plume in vacuum or in a background gas by a set of conservation equations, and the plasma formation in the plume, assuming local thermal equilibrium. Some first results for nanoparticle formation in the expanding plume will be presented as well. Also, the process of target heating in the case of femtosecond (fs) LA will be described by means of a two-temperature model, and phase transitions, more specifically evaporation, will be illustrated by means of molecular dynamics simulations.


We consider the Goursat problem for second order operators and show existence and uniqueness of smooth solutions. We prove one of the results of Hasegawa (J. Math. Soc. Japan 50 (1998), no. 3, 639{662) by the energy method. The same method is applied when one of the surfaces where the Goursat data are given is a non-characteristic.


Library services are undergoing transformation. The transformation from manual to automated systems is changing the services provided by these libraries and the way they are performed. But the automation programmes of Nigerian libraries are facing serious threat of inadequate funding. Inadequate funding is affecting the ability to adopt good software that incorporates all the features that can turn around library services. It has however been discovered that there are some government parastatals which can be made to be of assistance to these libraries. These are software oriented industries like NITDA, ISPON, Digital Bridge Institute, et cetera. These institutions can be made to work in partnership with the libraries on how their services can be enhanced. Some renowned institutions that have assisted libraries and research in the developed countries were also discussed.


Processing the right customer information is fundamental for category managers to become more market oriented. Information supply has to respect individual knowledge to support effective information processing and to avoid information overload. The paper investigates mental maps from category managers in order to show how they think in terms of customers. The maps show the relevance and sophistication of customer knowledge on an individual basis. The results indicate that capacity for customer information processing is limited and customer oriented goals play an important role. Market research could improve market orientation of category managers by highlighting very few customer oriented concepts.


Aims. We study the Milky Way (MW) thin disk with the RAdial Velocity Experiment (RAVE) survey. We consider the thin and thick disks as different Galactic components and present a technique to statistically disentangle the two populations. Then we focus our attention on the thin disk component. Methods. We disentangle the thin disk component from a mixture of the thin and thick disks using a data set providing radial velocities, proper motions, and photometrically determined distances. Results. We present the trend of the velocity dispersions in the thin disk component of the MW in the radial direction above and below the Galactic plane using data from the RAVE. The selected sample is a limited subsample from the entire RAVE catalogue, roughly mapping up to 500 pc above and below the Galactic plane, a few degrees in azimuthal direction and covering a radial extension of 2.0 kpc around the solar position. The solar motion relative to the local standard of rest is also re-determined with the isolated thin disk component. Major results are the trend of the velocity mean and dispersion in the radial and vertical direction. In addition the azimuthal components of the solar motion relative to the local standard of rest and the velocity dispersion are discussed.


We present the results of the Dravidian-CodeMix shared task held at FIRE 2021, a track on sentiment analysis for Dravidian Languages in Code-Mixed Text. We describe the task, its organization, and the submitted systems. This shared task is the continuation of last year's Dravidian-CodeMix shared task held at FIRE 2020. This year's tasks included code-mixing at the intra-token and inter-token levels. Additionally, apart from Tamil and Malayalam, Kannada was also introduced. We received 22 systems for Tamil-English, 15 systems for Malayalam-English, and 15 for Kannada-English. The top system for Tamil-English, Malayalam-English and Kannada-English scored weighted average F1-score of 0.711, 0.804, and 0.630, respectively. In summary, the quality and quantity of the submission show that there is great interest in Dravidian languages in code-mixed setting and state of the art in this domain still needs more improvement.


Instead of focusing on individual network attributes, such as centrality or constraint, and their respective effects on performance, this study investigates the overall advantage that results from holding a network position (i.e., composite structural advantage) and its effect on performance at the syndicate level. Specifically, in the context of venture capital syndication, it investigates a syndicate's composite structural advantage and suggests its positive effect on syndicate performance. Moreover, this study examines two moderating factors to this relationship. Composite structural advantage diversity within a syndicate is suggested to weaken the positive effect, while the lead venture capital firm's reputation is proposed to strengthen it. Two-stage least squares analyses, with 1,137 venture capital syndicate investments, confirmed the predicted effect of composite structural advantage and the negative effect of composite structural advantage diversity on the relationship. However, the lead venture capital firm reputation showed the opposite result from the expectation. The reputation weakened the positive effect of composite structural advantage on performance, as did composite structural advantage diversity.


The debate over "aptitude" versus "achievement" tests in college admissions is an old one. Aptitude-type tests, exemplified by the SAT I, are intended to assess students' capacity for future learning, whereas achievement-type tests, exemplified by the SAT II subject tests, are designed to assess students' current mastery of college-preparatory subjects. As one of the few institutions in the nation that requires both the SAT I and SAT II, the University of California (UC) has an extensive database with which to assess their relative utility in predicting student success in college. This study examines the relationship between SAT scores and freshman grades based on the records of 77,893 students who entered UC between Fall 1996 and Fall 1999. The study found that (a) the SAT II achievement tests are consistently better predictors of student success at UC than the SAT I, although the incremental gain in prediction is relatively modest and there is substantial redundancy across the tests; (b) the predictive validity of the SAT II appears to be less conditioned by socioeconomic factors than is the SAT I; and (c) racial/ethnic group performance is substantially similar across the SAT I and SAT II. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, these findings suggest that the benefits of achievement tests for college admissions-greater clarity in admissions standards, closer linkage to the high-school curriculum - can be realized without any sacrifice in the capacity to predict success in college.


The education is a right that people have to face life and contribute to the progress of society; for such a reason, education in the childhood stage is considered by the world organizations promoting culture and development, as a critical process which should be especially met by all of the nations. In accordance to the former concern, the Government of the Republic of Equatorial Guinea considers Children's Education as an essential factor for the future of the country, hence, the national educational policies emphasize on the Children's Education sector and call for a logistical and scientific immediate assessment in order to rise the quality levels in the children's educational process since they are the hope for prosperity of nations. The problem stated on the present doctoral thesis refers to the implementation and projection necessity of the teaching staff's educational infrastructure that responds to the minimum demands guaranteeing an education in childhood within the Equatorial Guinean context. Concretely, we refer in this work to the professionals in Guinea that assume the above mentioned responsibility, they who are: the Coordinators and the Promoter women. Thus, the Promoter women run great part of the classrooms for Children's Education in Equatorial Guinea, that is to say, they are who directly interact with the children and with their families; in contrast, the Coordinators are who guide and systematically audit the Promoter women's work to trace correction and improvement rules of their educational practice, and of their formation as school teachers. Actually, and in spite of the endeavors carried out in the curricular projection by the educational agents formerly referred to, inadequacies that are expressed in the following investigation problem still persist: inadequacies in the teaching formation of Coordinators and Promoter women of the Children's Education in Equatorial Guinea as educational agents of this level...


The relationship between the force in the left ventricular wall during systole and myocardial O2 consumption (MVO2) was determined. In addition, the relative influence of the load imposed during shortening and fiber shortening on MVO2 was assessed. For this purpose, 14 servo-regulated, paced, isolated canine hearts were used and the steady-state response in total coronary flow and arteriovenous oxygen difference was measured. For both the isovolumetrically beating and the ejecting ventricle, statistically significant linear relations were observed between MVO2 and the integral of systolic force. These relations were not significantly different from one another, indicating that shortening was not a determinant of MVO2. Moreover, when ejecting an isolumetric beats of equivalent developed force were compared, a difference in MVO2 (deltaMVO2) was found. deltaMVO2 was a function of the force integral difference between these contractions and not fiber shortening. Thus, under the conditions of this experiment, the integral of systolic force that includes developed force and shortening load is the predominant factor regulating MVO2 for any given contractile state, whereas the influence of fiber shortening is negligible.


With the extensive use of composite materials in aviation industry, the research of factors which affect their basic performances in production and usage has become very important. In this paper, a finite element analysis model is built by the commercial software MSC.Nastran / Patran to research the effect of fiber lay-up direction misalignment on the natural frequency of composite laminates. The results show that, in the same boundary conditions, stacking sequence has a significant impact on the natural frequencies and vibration modes of composite laminates, and in the lay-up process, the natural frequency change of laminates caused by 0° fiber lay-up direction misalignment is much larger than the natural frequency change of laminates due to 90° fiber lay-up direction misalignment. In the process control and certification of composite laminate plates lay-up, special attention should be taken to the inspection of 0° direction fibers.


Cloud computing providers are under great pressure to reduce operational costs through improved energy utilization while provisioning dependable service to customers; it is therefore extremely important to understand and quantify the explicit impact of failures within a system in terms of energy costs. This paper presents the first comprehensive analysis of the impact of failures on energy consumption in a real-world large-scale cloud system (comprising over 12 500 servers), including the study of failure and energy trends of the spatial and temporal environmental characteristics. Our results show that 88% of task failure events occur in lower priority tasks producing 13% of total energy waste, and 1% of failure events occur in higher priority tasks due to server failures producing 8% of total energy waste. These results highlight an unintuitive but significant impact on energy consumption due to failures, providing a strong foundation for research into dependable energy-aware cloud computing.


The queue management are flow fairness and queuelength stability However, most prior works dealt with these goals independently. This paper presents two recommendations to the Internet community concerning measures to improve and preserve Internet performance. It presents a strong recommendation for testing, standardization and widespread deployment of active queue management in routers to improve the performance of today's Internet. It also urges a concerted effort of research, measurement, and ultimate deployment of router mechanisms to protect the Internet from flows that are sufficiently responsive to congestion notification.


Aesthetics is the study of people's perception and experience of heaven, earth and man and all things. Environment and landscape are the most important perceptual manifestation of ecosystem. How this perceptual manifestation affects human mind needs to be answered by aesthetics. It is not only possible but also necessary to study ecosystem from the perspective of aesthetics. Taking the ecological aesthetics of the English world as the main research object, this paper studies the three main approaches to the construction of western ecological aesthetics, which are philosophical speculation, ecological art theory and environmental practice. This study shows that: the interaction between ecological aesthetics and ecological art makes ecological aesthetics become the universal aesthetics of all aesthetic objects (including environment and Art), so as to distinguish it from environmental aesthetics more clearly. Strengthening the interaction between aesthetics and ecological aesthetic experience can make the connotation of ecological aesthetics more profound and clear. The results of this study have a certain reference value for the study of modern western ecological aesthetics from the perspective of aesthetics.


Real-time imaging in the terahertz (THz) spectral range was achieved using a milliwatt-scale, 2.8 THz quantum cascade laser and an uncooled, 160 x 120 pixel microbolometer camera modified with Picarin optics. Noise equivalent temperature difference of the camera in the 1-5 THz frequency range was estimated to be at least 3 K, confirming the need for external THz illumination when imaging in this frequency regime. Despite the appearance of fringe patterns produced by multiple diffraction effects, single-frame and extended video imaging of obscured objects show high-contrast differentiation between metallic and plastic materials, supporting the viability of this imaging approach for use in future security screening applications.


I examine the following plausible and oft-defended line of thought: (1) Rationality is a normative phenomenon.(2) Facts about intentionality essentially depend on facts about rationality, so intentionality is a normative phenomenon too.(3) Normative phenomena resist naturalistic treatment.So, (4) the normative aspect of intentionality precludes a fully naturalistic account of the mind.I believe the conclusion is mistaken, and I attempt to show this by means of a clarification and assessment of claims (2) and (3). Unlike many of those who resist the above line of thought, I think (2) can be adequately defended. Its defense depends, in my view, on sufficiently appreciating the dynamic character of intentionality. That is, as worldly conditions and conceptual repertoires change, so too does the intricate causal network in which intentional states figure. A purely causal-dispositionalist theory, however, is unable to say anything about these changes and why they take place; it must simply be updated to take account of them. It is here that the essential role of rationality considerations comes in: the development of an intentional state's causal profile tracks the development of its rational profile. In other words, the dispositionalist would have to await a verdict, so to speak, on a given connection's rational status before knowing whether to include it in a state's defining causal repertoire. (An analogy: a purely dispositionalist approach is akin to defining a biological species in terms of its current structural features, when a species is in fact a dynamic entity whose characteristic structural features change over time). If (2) is defensible, then the problem must lie in claim (3). That said, I do not attempt to overturn (3) by offering, as others have, a naturalistic account of normativity or rationality as such (e.g. expressivism); in my view, the prospects for a naturalistic account of intentionality are independent of this more general issue. I focus, instead, on two key ways in which (3) is underspecified: first, it needs to be said precisely what is required for a naturalistic treatment of some phenomenon, and second, it needs to be said precisely how normativity comes into play in a given instance. Once these details are properly filled in, I claim, (3) is false for the particular case of intentionality.On the first point, I argue that the standards for naturalistic explanation must be less demanding than full reductionism but more demanding than the naive naturalism of many anti-reductionists. I claim that evolutionary continuity provides the proper naturalistic measure: a phenomenon must be shown to have arisen through a seamless course of evolutionarily explicable transitions. This yields a robust explanatory requirement, but one that is flexible enough to handle cases to which reductionism is ill-suited (like intentionality). Moreover, this brand of naturalism quite clearly calls for an interdisciplinary approach, as I believe naturalism should. In this case, that approach depends on continuing investigation into the evolution of cognition and the brain.As for the second point, I think the tendency to give (2) a strongly metaphysical reading must be resisted. That is, intentional states should be seen not as fundamentally normative entities (as when beliefs are equated with states of commitment), but as causal entities that are essentially approximations to a dynamic normative ideal. The involvement of that ideal is enough to rule out straightforward reductions - the failure of dispositionalism has already been mentioned, and similar considerations can be used to support a broader anti-reductionist thesis - but the more modest naturalistic demand of evolutionary continuity can still be met. This requires an account of our capacity to construct and utilize normative models in our thinking. If it can be shown how we acquired the ability to run through various courses of reasoning and behavior off-line, and to have the results of that feed back and modify our cognitive dispositions, then we can make sense of our having intentional states, i.e. dynamic causal states that approximate to and are in some sense guided by a normative ideal. I cannot claim to tell the whole naturalistic story, but I hope to have made the project look tractable.


Active learning is a commonly used technique to reduce the amount of labeled data necessary for supervised learning. In this paper, we focus on collection of labeled examples in a domain with large unlabeled dataset and extreme class imbalance. This scenario presents several challenges to Active learning. Traditional active learning strategies can face acute difficulty in locating minority class examples and can fail completely due to the well-known cold start problem. The problem is further complicated by scale as for large datasets it can be expensive to execute Active learning computations on the whole domain set. Additionally, the active learning strategies can turn out to be impractical or inefficient for interactive use due to high computation time for the iterative selection cycles. In this paper, we proposed a two-phase approach that takes into account both high-class imbalance and the scale of the input data space. Specifically, our approach employs two active learners in a tiered fashion first phase active learner efficiently learns a domain classifier (a filter function) defined on the entire input space and second learner tries to efficiently learn final ML classifier defined on the output of filter. The second-phase selects informative instances from a smaller pool of unlabeled examples which doesn't require operating on the full dataset. The proposed method allows active learning to be applied to large datasets with class skew. The two-phases are interleaved (rather than isolated) and allow for a bi-directional flow of information. The combined two-phase learner progressively expands knowledge of input data space and uses successive first phase and second phase strategies to switch between learning the decision boundary and expanding domain boundary. Given labeled data at certain iteration, the second-phase focuses on exploiting the decision boundary (up to a performance threshold) and then, first-phase focuses on exploiting given information to intelligently search and expand the domain. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our strategy for product classification on sample of Amazon catalog dataset. Our results show that the proposed ∗Both authors contributed equally to this research. Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from email@example.com. Woodstock '18, June 03–05, 2018, Woodstock, NY © 2018 Association for Computing Machinery. ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-XXXX-X/18/06. . . $15.00 https://doi.org/10.1145/1122445.1122456 method achieves a fast solution with competitive performance in extreme imbalanced setting.


In 2017, hot spot policing interventions were implemented in four cities in Argentina: La Plata, Morón, Santa Fe and Tres de Febrero. Each intervention was similarly designed, organized and implemented. Results differed between cities. La Plata experienced the largest decreases, including a significant 31% decrease in robbery (while controlling for geographic displacement), whereas in other cities, a mix of non-significant decreases and increases in robbery and theft were observed. No displacement was observed to assaults or vehicle crime. The differences in impact between cities were likely to be associated with differences in the project management of each intervention.


This study examined the potential effect of special paintings of shared lane markings (super sharrows) on a number of operational and safety performance parameters for cyclists and motor vehicles. These performance parameters were used to assess pretreatment and posttreatment behavior when cyclists and motor vehicles were near one another. The performance parameters were (a) rate of lane change maneuvers performed by vehicles in the presence as well as the absence of cyclists and (b) lateral spacing between cyclists, vehicles, and curb edge. In general, the main objectives of this treatment were (a) providing cyclists with comfort by allowing them to ride in the middle of the travel lane and (b) promoting safe passing by motor vehicles. The effect of the super sharrows on cyclists and motor vehicles was analyzed with statistical analysis by comparing pretreatment and posttreatment conditions. The key findings are as follow: (a) super sharrows had an effect on motor vehicle lane change maneuvers, represented by an increase in the percentage of motor vehicles that changed from the right lane (location of super sharrows) to the left lane with the presence of a cyclist on the right lane; (b) the number of motor vehicles that changed from right lane to left lane and back to right lane in both full and partial encroachment into the left lane decreased; (c) the number of the motor vehicle lane change maneuvers from left to right lane decreased; and (d) cyclists were found to be riding farther from the right curb with the presence of the super sharrows.


ABSTRACT Purpose: This study investigated changes in quality of life (QoL) in relation to return to work among patients with acquired brain injury (ABI). Method: The sample consisted of 1487 patients with ABI (63% men) aged 18–66 years (mean age 52) from the WebRehab Sweden national quality register database. Only patients who worked at least 50% at admission to hospital and were on full sick leave at discharge from hospital were included. QoL was measured by the EuroQol EQ-5D questionnaire. Results: Patients who returned to work perceived a larger improvement in QoL from discharge to follow-up one year after injury compared to patients who had not returned to work. This difference remained after adjustment for other factors associated with improved QoL, such as having a university education, increased Extended Glasgow Outcome Scale scores and getting one's driving licence reinstated. Conclusion: Return to work is an important factor for change in QoL among patients with ABI, even after adjusting for other factors related to QoL. This is consistent with the hypothesis that having employment is meaningful, increases self-esteem and fosters participation in society. Thus, helping patients with ABI return to work has a positive influence on QoL.


Background: Intraoperative hypertension and tachycardia are common hemodynamic disturbances in patients undergoing laparoscopic assisted vaginal hysterectomy. In addition there is increase in systemic vascular resistance, and is associated with a decrease in cardiac index and metabolic changes. Dexmedetomidine a centrally acting α-2 agonist has been particularly effective in blunting the haemodynamic response to tracheal intubation and pneumoperitoneum.
Methodology: Sixty patients, scheduled for elective laparoscopic assisted vaginal hysterectomy belonging to ASA class I and II, in the age group 38 to 55 years were included in the study and they were assigned randomly into two groups.Group D (n=30): received dexmedetomidine as a bolus of 0.6 μg/kg body weight (0.3 ml/kg body weight) over 10 min intravenously, 10 min before induction, followed by infusion at a rate of 0.2 μg/kg/hr(0.1 ml/kg/hr) throughout the surgery. Group C (n=30): received bolus of normal saline at a rate of 0.3 ml/kg body weight in 50 ml syringe over 10 min intravenously, 10 min before induction followed by infusion at a rate of 0.1 ml/kg/hrthroughout the surgery.
Results: It was noted that HR, SBP, DBP and MAP in group D were significantly decreased after intubation, throughout the period of pneumoperitoneum and after extubation. In addition dexmedetomidine produced arousable sedation after extubation, decreased the incidence of post operative nausea and vomiting without significant side effects like bradycardia and hypotension.
Conclusion: Dexmedetomidine as a single bolus dose of 0.6 μg/kg body weight and continuous infusion at a rate of 0.2 μg/kg/hr was seen to effectively attenuate the haemodynamic response to laryngoscopy and tracheal intubation and also to pneumoperitoneum without any side effects.

Keywords: Dexmedetomidine; Haemodynamic response; Laparoscopic assisted vaginal hysterectomy


Abstract In this study, bottom ash from the Tuncbilek power plant has been characterized by X-ray fluorescence, X-ray diffraction, and infrared analysis. The bottom ash sample is potentially of class C type and has unburned carbon. The unburned carbon was separated from the bottom ash in a laboratory flotation cell. In the flotation experiment, sodium silicate (as a potential dispersant and depressant), butanol (promoter), kerosene oil (collector), and pine oil (frother) were used and the optimization of these flotation reagents were done through statistical modeling using a full two-level factorial design in order to evaluate the main and interaction effects of variables in flotation of unburned carbon; the evaluation of the results was done by Yates' notation. Test results showed that a product with 45.41% combustible grade at 40.0% recovery and 94.86% ash rejection was obtained at 1.98 g/kg sodium silicate, 1.38 g/kg promoter, 4.95 g/kg collector, and 2.41 g/kg frother.


The basis of the conventional gene-centric view on tumor evolution is that vertically inherited mutations largely define the properties of tumor cells. In recent years, however, accumulating evidence shows that both the tumor cells and their microenvironment may acquire external, non-vertically inherited genetic properties via horizontal gene transfer (HGT), particularly through small extracellular vesicles (sEVs). Many phases of sEV-mediated HGT have been described, such as DNA packaging into small vesicles, their release, uptake by recipient cells, and incorporation of sEV-DNA into the recipient genome to modify the phenotype and properties of cells. Recent techniques in sEV separation, genome sequencing and editing, as well as the identification of new secretion mechanisms, shed light on a number of additional details of this phenomenon. Here, we discuss the key features of this form of gene transfer and make an attempt to draw relevant conclusions on the contribution of HGT to tumor evolution.


There seems to be no sufficient mentoring programmes for supporting and guiding newly appointed nurse educators (NANEs) in nursing education institutions (NEIs) in South Africa. The available programmes are international and yet seem not to fully address the needs in the South African context. However, the research identified the need to determine the mentoring needs of NANEs in NEIsin South Africa. The aim of this study was to describe the mentoring needs of NANEs in NEIs in South Africa. A quantitative, descriptive research design was utilised. The population for this study consisted of nurse educators appointed at nursing education institutions in South Africa. The sample was drawn from nurse educators appointed at the universities and nursing colleges in South Africa using a probability, multi-stage, cluster sampling method. The results indicated the need for mentoring to develop required competencies in NEIs and to be mentored in order to improve the performance of NANEs. Two stakeholders in a mentoring relationship, namely, mentor and mentee\ were identified. The role of a mentor seems to be important in facilitating the relationship between the two while the mentee is important in participative interaction. The research concluded that both mentor and men tees have a need to commit to, and actively participate in a relationship. The researcher recommended mentoring of NANE in order to develop required academic competencies and to improve their performance.


Consumption rates of major forest products such as timber and
 firewood, place significant strain on wood stock and forest area in
 Pakistan. With the country's rising population, the consumption of these
 two major products is increasing because of the growing energy demand,
 and no alternative products are likely to replace wood consumption in
 the near future. We apply system dynamics modelling to an analysis of
 the forestry sector in Pakistan for novel insights into the drivers and
 future trajectories of wood consumption. The present research is based
 on time series macroeconomic data from 1990-2010 and projections to 2040
 of wood supply, forest area, population growth, wood extraction, wood
 imports and different uses of wood in the country. The study reveals
 that there is no significant increase in area under forest, while
 consumption of firewood and timber has increased. The consumption of
 firewood is greater than timber consumption in Pakistan, both in
 percentage share and in total volume of wood consumption. The
 sustainable supply of wood is less than wood consumption, and with
 population growth this gap is increasing; wood supply from agricultural
 lands is a viable option to fill the gap. Keywords: Wood Consumption,
 Sustainable Wood Supply, Projected Wood Shortage


BitTorrent suffers from one fundamental problem: the long-term availability of content. This occurs on a massive-scale with 38% of torrents becoming unavailable within the first month. In this paper we explore this problem by performing two large-scale measurement studies including 46K torrents and 29M users. The studies go significantly beyond any previous work by combining per-node, per-torrent and system-wide observations to ascertain the causes, characteristics and repercussions of file unavailability. The study confirms the conclusion from previous works that seeders have a significant impact on both performance and availability. However, we also present some crucial new findings: (i) the presence of seeders is not the sole factor involved in file availability, (ii) 23.5% of nodes that operate in seedless torrents can finish their downloads, and (iii) BitTorrent availability is discontinuous, operating in cycles of temporary unavailability.


As soon as with the Treaty of Maastricht, the newly founded European Union formally stated a broad development cooperation approach in the supranational treaties. Since then the overall institutional framework has been continuously improved in favour of development cooperation by both, legal acts and 'soft law' while implementation of development policy issues mostly has lagged behind. Based on an evaluation of the changes on the institutional layer, the analysis will provide few selected evidence, that from a political view European development cooperation has failed to meet its rather high ambitions.


Shrinking technology nodes combined with the need for higher clock speeds have made it increasingly difficult to distribute a single global clock across a chip while meeting the power requirements of the design. Globally asynchronous locally synchronous (GALS) design style can help achieve low power consumption and modularity of a design while greatly reducing the number of global interconnects. Such multiple clock domain architectures can benefit from having frequency/voltage values assigned to each domain based on workload requirements. The work presented in this paper proposes a new hardware-based approach to dynamically change the frequencies and potentially voltages of a voltage-frequency island (VFI) system driven by a dynamic workload. This technique tries to change the frequency of a synchronous island such that it will have efficient power utilization while satisfying performance constraints. In recent years, there have been major developments, both in industry and academia, in the field of multiprocessor systems. Such multiprocessor systems are very good candidates for VFI design style implementation, where one or more processors can be part of a single VFI. To demonstrate the feasibility of our proposed method, we have implemented a multiprocessor system for a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) platform that uses independently generated clocks for each processor. The results from the FPGA platform confirm the claim that the power consumption of a system can potentially be reduced while maintaining the performance of many applications. Our work concentrates primarily on embedded systems, but the idea can be explored for general-purpose computing as well.


Work-life issues have important implications at both organizational and individual levels. This paper provides a critical review of the work-life literature from 1990 onwards through the lens of diversity, with a particular focus on disparities of power induced by methodological and conceptual framings of work and life. The review seeks to answer the following questions: What are the gaps and omissions in the work-life research? How may they be overcome? To answer these questions, the review scrutinizes blind spots in the treatment of life, diversity and power in work-life research in both positivist and critical scholarship. In order to transcend the blind spots in positivist and critical work-life research, the review argues the case for an intersectional approach which captures the changing realities of family and workforce through the lens of diversity and intersectionality. The theoretical contribution is threefold: first, the review demonstrates that contemporary framing of life in the work-life literature should be expanded to cover aspects of life beyond domestic life. Second, the review explains why and how other strands of diversity than gender also manifest as salient causes of difference in experiences of the work-life interface. Third, the review reveals that social and historical context has more explanatory power in work-life dynamics than the micro-individual level of explanations. Work-life literature should capture the dynamism in these contexts. The paper also provides a set of useful recommendations to capture and operationalize methodological and theoretical changes required in the work-life literature.


Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose that sales managers use mobile technologies in the working environment to communicate and supportively monitor sales person performance. Design/methodology/approach – A model of supervisor monitoring using mobile technologies is conceptualized that specifies the types of behaviours that promote high-quality working relationships, how mobile technologies increase the likelihood of work-to-nonwork role spill-over that may damage the relationship and why perceptions of supervisor fairness are critical. The paper concludes by presenting strategies for testing hypotheses and for researching mobile technology use by sales managers using qualitative and quantitative methods. Findings – Mobile technology use, supervisory monitoring, and relationship development co-exist in the current workplace. This research heightens awareness of how work-to-nonwork spillover may influence important outcomes of mobile technology usage. Perceptions of quality supervisor-employee relationships are important to retaining and motivating employees. As the workforce ages and skilled workers become more scarce, it is expected that this theoretical examination and ensuing future research will be interesting and important to the twenty-first century manager. Originality/value – This paper aligns research in the areas of leadership, monitoring and ubiquitous or mobile technologies. Previous leadership researches have questioned whether or not the use of different electronic monitoring tools affects the leader's ability to influence others. However, few researchers have examined performance-based monitoring using mobile technologies, although mobile technologies make it easier for sales managers to monitor non-traditional work arrangements (i.e. off-site or contracted work). Furthermore, past research has been inconsistent in explaining how employees view information-gathering or monitoring by their managers.


Lower UrinaryTracts Symptoms (LUTS) due to Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) represent an increasing prevalent condition in ageing men. Patients often seek primarily consultation at their general practitioner. Aetiology and natural history of LUTS due to BPH have not been completely clarified. The development of symptomatic LUTS is age-dependent and determined to varying degrees by the presence of Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH), Benign Prostatic Enlargement (BPE) as well as Bladder Outlet Obstruction (BOO). A causal relationship does not always exist. Basis for a specific medical or surgical treatment in the individual patient with LUTS due to BPH is an exact diagnosis by the practising urologist.


Collaborative working fosters interaction, improves the process of becoming familiar with pupils and has a strong socializing impact, especially in inclusive education. It appeals to tolerance towards different ways of thinking and feeling and it emphasizes the pupil's need in a friendly and supporting environment.
Significant policy developments have taken place on an international basis to harness and adopt inclusive education however reforms in many areas are needed and this remains very challenging for many EU member states. The experience of latest years and the new concepts and policies related to integration, inclusion and diversity underpin the new equity-based approach to the educational system. The adoption of this new approach has, in most cases, become a new challenge for professionals in education.
FIESTA project provides professionals in education with e-learning tools, training materials and resources in order to offer equal opportunities and respect fundamental rights to education for all children. This project supports educational stakeholders giving them the opportunity to collaborate and thus meet the individual needs of pupils. FIESTA recognizes the current difficulties & gaps facing EU countries in relation to inclusion, transition & collaborative working. Using an interactive approach, professionals will have the opportunity to learn through professional development resources.
The project merges action research originating in teacher training colleges together with a methodology that facilitates teachers, therapists, learning support specialists and disabled students at key transition points in their school careers. This connected research and action perspective is an innovative application of integrated thinking and policy in transforming traditional schooling structures and systems to promote more advanced methods of integration and mutually beneficial learning.


In recent years, a number of large enterprises have gradually begun to use vari-ous Augmented Reality technologies to prominently improve the audiences' view oftheir products. Among them, the creation of an immersive virtual interactive scenethrough the projection has received extensive attention, and this technique refers toprojection SAR, which is short for projection spatial augmented reality. However,as the existing projection-SAR systems have immobility and limited working range,they have a huge difficulty to be accepted and used in human daily life. Therefore,this thesis research has proposed a technically feasible optimization scheme so thatit can be practically applied to AR broadcasting and demonstrations.

Based on three main techniques required by state-of-art projection SAR applica-tions, this thesis has created a novel mobile projection SAR cameraman for ARbroadcasting and demonstration. Firstly, by combining the CNN scene parsingmodel and multiple contour extractors, the proposed contour extraction pipelinecan always detect the optimal contour information in non-HD or blurred images.This algorithm reduces the dependency on high quality visual sensors and solves theproblems of low contour extraction accuracy in motion blurred images. Secondly, aplane-based visual mapping algorithm is introduced to solve the difficulties of visualmapping in these low-texture scenarios. Finally, a complete process of designing theprojection SAR cameraman robot is introduced. This part has solved three mainproblems in mobile projection-SAR applications: (i) a new method for marking con-tour on projection model is proposed to replace the model rendering process. Bycombining contour features and geometric features, users can identify objects oncolourless model easily. (ii) a camera initial pose estimation method is developedbased on visual tracking algorithms, which can register the start pose of robot to thewhole scene in Unity3D. (iii) a novel data transmission approach is introduced to establishes a link between external robot and the robot in Unity3D simulation work-space. This makes the robotic cameraman can simulate its trajectory in Unity3D simulation work-space and project correct virtual content.

Our proposed mobile projection SAR system has made outstanding contributionsto the academic value and practicality of the existing projection SAR technique. Itfirstly solves the problem of limited working range. When the system is running ina large indoor scene, it can follow the user and project dynamic interactive virtualcontent automatically instead of increasing the number of visual sensors. Then,it creates a more immersive experience for audience since it supports the user hasmore body gestures and richer virtual-real interactive plays. Lastly, a mobile systemdoes not require up-front frameworks and cheaper and has provided the public aninnovative choice for indoor broadcasting and exhibitions.


Effective and efficient modern manufacturing operations require the acceptance and incorporation of the fourth industrial revolution, also known as Industry 4.0. Traditional shop floors are evolving their production into smart factories. To continue this trend, a specific architecture for the cyber-physical system is required, as well as a systematic approach to automate the application of algorithms and transform the acquired data into useful information. This work makes use of an approach that distinguishes three layers that are part of the existing Industry 4.0 paradigm: edge, fog, and cloud. Each of the layers performs computational operations, transforming the data produced in the smart factory into useful information. Trained or untrained methods for data analytics can be incorporated into the architecture. A case study is presented in which a real-time statistical control process algorithm based on control charts was implemented. The algorithm automatically detects changes in the material being processed in a computerized numerical control (CNC) machine. The algorithm implemented in the proposed architecture yielded short response times. The performance was effective since it automatically adapted to the machining of aluminum and then detected when the material was switched to steel. The data were backed up in a database that would allow traceability to the line of g-code that performed the machining.


Two unique hybrids based on Wells–Dawson polyoxometalates, [Cu(en)2(OH2)]2[{Cu(en)2}{As2WV2WVI16O61}]·6H2O (1) and (H2dap)[Cu(H2dap)(H2O)2][{Cu(dap)(H2O)2}{As2W17CuO61}]·5H2O (2) (en = ethylenediamine and 1,2-dap = 1,2-diaminopropane), have been synthesized hydrothermally by reaction of Na2WO4, NaAsO2 and CuCl2 with 1,2-dap or en, and further characterized by elemental analysis, infrared radiation (IR) spectrophotometry, ultraviolet (UV) spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and single crystal X-ray diffraction. In compounds 1 and 2, the emerging building blocks link into new one-dimensional (1D) chain-like Wells–Dawson architectures via two M–O–M (M = Cu/W) and O–Cu–O bridges, which are rarely observed among this arsenotungstate class. The 1D chain-like architectures further extend into 3D supramolecular frameworks through hydrogen bond interactions. They represent the first family of Dawson-type double-bridge arsenotungstate chains built from M–O–M and Cu–L linkers. Compounds 1 and 2 have exhibited electrocatalytic activity toward the reduction of nitrite. Adsorption experiments show that the compounds have the ability to selectively adsorb MB from binary mixed dye solutions (MB and MO and MB and RhB). These compounds still maintain their excellent stability and adsorption properties after several cycles.


BACKGROUND
We examined the relationship between glucose homeostasis and comprehensive measures of cardiac structure and function among a representative sample of US Hispanics.

METHODS AND RESULTS
ECHO-SOL (Echocardiographic Study of Latinos), an echocardiographic ancillary study of the HCHS/SOL (Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos), enrolled 1818 Hispanic/Latino men (43%) and women (57%) aged ≥45 years (mean=56). Glucose intolerance was defined as follows: (1) prediabetes: hemoglobin (HbA1c) ≥5.7 and <6.5% and (2) diabetes mellitus: fasting plasma glucose ≥126 mg/dL, 2-hour postload glucose ≥200 mg/dL, HbA1c ≥6.5%, or hypoglycemic agent use. Uncontrolled diabetes mellitus was defined as HbA1c ≥7.0%. Insulin resistance was defined using the homeostatic model assessment for insulin resistance. Echocardiography examinations assessed left ventricular structure and systolic/diastolic function. Multivariable linear and logistic regression models were used. Prediabetes prevalence was 42%, and diabetes mellitus prevalence was 28% (47% uncontrolled). Glucose intolerance was associated with increased left ventricular posterior wall and interventricular septal and relative wall thicknesses (all P<0.05), reduced ejection fraction (P<0.01), reduced stroke and end-diastolic volumes (both P<0.001), decreased peak E' velocity (lateral and septal P<0.001), and increased E/E' ratio (lateral and septal P<0.01). The odds ratios (95% confidence intervals) for diastolic dysfunction among individuals with prediabetes and diabetes mellitus (versus diabetes mellitus free) were 1.36 (0.96-1.9) and 1.90 (1.3-2.8), respectively(P=0.006). Results were consistent for uncontrolled diabetes mellitus versus diabetes mellitus. Homeostatic model assessment for insulin resistance was associated with increased E/E' (P<0.001), and greater relative wall thickness and septal thickness (both P<0.05); lower stroke volume (P<0.0001); and lower peak lateral and septal E' velocities (both P<0.01).

CONCLUSIONS
Glucose intolerance and insulin resistance are associated with unfavorable cardiac structure and function, particularly worsened measures of diastolic function, even before the development of diabetes mellitus.


This research is to disambiguate word sense occurred in document. We have studied a research to create a lexical dictionary automatically for unknown word that is generated newly by social trend, new technology, new products, and so on. The mandatory thing of the processes is word sense disambiguation (WSD). Many researches for WSD have showed good results however, they have a limitation to adapt for automation of our final objective. Therefore, we propose new WSD method. For WSD, we design a relation structure (RS) that measures relationship and distance between terms using WordNet . Based on the RS, we could grasp an exact sense of word. Through an experiment and evaluation, our method is as wonderful as a structural semantic interconnection (SSI) that is the best research for WSD.


Selected response items and constructed response (CR) items are often found in the same test. Conventional psychometric models for these two types of items typically focus on using the scores for correctness of the responses. Recent research suggests, however, that more information may be available from the CR items than just scores for correctness. In this study, we describe an approach in which a statistical topic model along with a diagnostic classification model (DCM) was applied to a mixed item format formative test of English and Language Arts. The DCM was used to estimate students' mastery status of reading skills. These mastery statuses were then included in a topic model as covariates to predict students' use of each of the latent topics in their written answers to a CR item. This approach enabled investigation of the effects of mastery status of reading skills on writing patterns. Results indicated that one of the skills, Integration of Knowledge and Ideas, helped detect and explain students' writing patterns with respect to students' use of individual topics.


Background Recent studies have demonstrated that QRS duration (QRSd) is associated with poor prognosis in heart failure and ST-elevation myocardial infarction. Less is known about the prognostic importance of QRSd in patients with non-ST elevation acute coronary syndrome (non-ST ACS). Aim To determine if admission QRSd is associated with 1-year mortality in non-ST ACS. Methods We studied 539 patients (aged 65.52 +/- 12.47 years, 69.9% male) admitted to the coronary unit with non-ST ACS. QRSd was measured on the admission electrocardiogram. Results Mean QRSd was 94.29 +/- 18.3 ms. One-year mortality was 13.4%. QRSd showed a good correlation with 1-year mortality and its best cut-off was 92 ms. Patients with QRSd > or = 92 ms were older, more frequently male and with prior history of coronary heart disease. On admission they presented more often in Killip class > 1, and had a higher incidence of heart failure and left ventricular systolic dysfunction. They less often underwent coronary angiography. One-year mortality was higher in patients with QRSd > or = 92 ms. After adjusting for baseline characteristics and treatment, QRSd > or = 92 ms remained an independent predictor of 1-year mortality (adjusted OR=3.87; 95% CI 1.74-8.44). Conclusion In this non-ST ACS population, QRSd was an independent predictor of 1-year mortality after the event.


by Nathaniel Marx While the reform of Catholic liturgy that followed the Second Vatican Council by no means rejected Latin as a language of liturgical celebration, the Latin Mass quickly became the province of traditionalist groups that refused to accept the revised Order of Mass and offered the pre-conciliar Tridentine Mass in defiance of the Roman Catholic hierarchy. Nevertheless, there have always been some Catholics who either obtained permission to celebrate the Tridentine Mass or found celebrations of the post-conciliar Mass in Latin that maintained certain practices associated with the pre-conciliar Mass. This dissertation focuses on this latter group of Latin Mass Catholics, who have remained within the bounds of the institutional church and who, since 2007, have had permission to celebrate the Tridentine Mass as an "extraordinary form" of the Mass of the Roman Rite. In particular, this study seeks a better understanding of the motives of contemporary Latin Mass Catholics in America. Critics sometimes view attachment to the Latin Mass as an example of modern Catholicism's still incomplete liberation from "dead ritual." Supporters, on the other hand, often valorize the same attachment as a sign of resurgent interest in "the sacred" following Vatican II's alleged desacralization of the liturgy. As an alternative to both of these positions, this study explains adherence to the Latin Mass as the embodiment of one particular approach to the formation of an "authentic" human subject of liturgical prayer. Personal sincerity and continuity with tradition are both essential to how Latin Mass Catholics evaluate authenticity in liturgical prayer and cultivate authenticity in their own selves. In practice, these modes of authentication are held together by an acquired habitus of "reverence." An ethnographic account of contemporary adherence to the Latin Mass fleshes out the particular practices associated with this inculcation of reverence. Fieldwork in four Latin Mass communities and interviews with Latin Mass adherents reveal the viability of this approach to liturgical formation. It is argued that the liturgical reform and adherence to the Latin Mass can provide complementary insights into the formation of an authentic human subject of liturgical prayer in the modern world. Nathaniel Marx


This paper presents a therapist-in-the-loop framework for robotics-assisted mirror rehabilitation integrated with adaptive assist-as-needed therapy (ANT) that is adjusted based on the impairment level of the patient's affected limb. The framework, which is designed for patients with hemiparesis and/or hemispatial neglect, uses a patient's functional limb as the medium to transfer therapeutic training from the therapist to the patient's impaired limb (PIL). This allows the patient to use his/her functional limb to adjust the desired trajectory generated by the therapist if the trajectory is painful or uncomfortable for the PIL. In order to realize the adaptive patient-targeted therapy, two motor-function assessment metrics, performance symmetry and level of guidance, are proposed, providing real time, task-independent, and objective assessment of the PIL's motor deficiency. An adaptation law is also presented to adjust the intensity of the therapy delivered to the patient in real time and based on the aforementioned estimation of the impairment level of the PIL. Closed-loop system stability has been investigated in the presence of communication delays to facilitate tele/in-home rehabilitation. For this purpose, a combination of the Circle Criterion and the Small-Gain theorem has been applied to account both for communication time delays and the time-varying adaptive ANT. Results of experiments to investigate the performance of the proposed framework are reported.


We introduce a new sorting algorithm that is the combination of ML-enhanced sorting with the In-place Super Scalar Sample Sort (IPS 4 o). The main contribution of our work is to achieve parallel ML-enhanced sorting, as previous algorithms were limited to sequential implementations. We introduce the In-Place Parallel Learned Sort (IPLS) algorithm and compare it extensively against other sorting approaches. IPLS combines the IPS 4 o framework with linear models trained using the Fastest Minimum Conflict Degree algorithm to partition data. The experimental results do not crown IPLS as the fastest algorithm. However, they do show that IPLS is competitive among its peers and that using the IPS 4 o framework is a promising approach towards parallel learned sorting.


The original multiscale MRF texture model proposed by Paget (IEEE Transactions on Image Processing, 1998, page 925-931) can be used to synthesize a broad range of textures but is limited to taking a single input texture and outputting a homogeneous texture similar to the input. This is insufficient for textures that have combined visual characteristics from several different sources. To address this problem, this paper presents a new method, called User Constrained multiscale MRF model, for synthesizing a new texture mixture from multiple input textures. Since the Gibbs sampler and exhaustive search are used in the original multiscale MRF model, a brute force implementation of the algorithm is slow. To overcome this problem, an existing fast neighborhood search technique is adapted for our model, and the run time is decreased by a factor of 5001000. We also demonstrate that our method can be used in texture replacement. The experimental results show that our algorithm performs well in the quality of results.


: The article summarizes forty-year experience in working over the problem of the artificial heart and auxiliary blood circulation in Laboratory and later Research Institute of Transplantology and Artificial Organs. This work has resulted in the development of balloon pumps for intraaortic contrapulsation, the technique of balloon installation, and indications to its application. The results of the clinical application of the method in patients with various pathologies have been estimated. Preclinically, left ventricular bypass techniques have been tested on more than twenty models of membrane type artificial ventricles. The results of the clinical application of left ventricular bypass have been analyzed. The authors adduce data on the development of the thermomechanical implantable bypass system "Micron-M". After achieving 100-day survival of calves with an artificial heart, an artificial heart with external power supply was used as a "bridge" to heart transplantation, but there was only one patient in whom transplantation was performed. The authors consider development of implantable auxiliary blood circulation devices and the artificial heart to be of great prospective value.


The purpose of the experiment reported below was to explore various correlates or influences of distant healing, the most prominent being the effect of the earth's geomagnetic field (GMF) or its equivalent on both the participants (Ps) and the target system. In order to test these hypotheses in a highly controlled context, distant healing was operationalized as retardation of the hemolysis of red blood cells, following an earlier experiment by Braud (1990). Distant healing has been defined as "involving acts in which one or more individuals consciously will, intend or ask for the improved well being of another, insofar as such wishes are not primarily mediated and effected by direct physical or social contact with the receiver" (Leder, 2005, p. 924). The current western zeitgeist indicates a shift from the dominant biological paradigm toward alternative or complementary medicine (Krippner & Achterberg, 2000), reflecting the increasing influence of "new age" beliefs and practices (e.g., Farias, Clarridge, & Lalljee, 2005). For example, in a recent American survey 58.6% of respondents reported belief in "psychic healing" (Rice, 2003), and the U.S. Office of Alternative Medicine's budget increased from $2 million in 1992 to $12 million in 1997 (cited in Krippner & Achterberg, 2000). It is therefore of social, medical, and academic interest to address whether psychic healing is real. Controlled investigations of direct mental interactions with living systems (DMILS) have addressed the effects of intention on a variety of such systems, including enzymes, cell cultures, bacteria, plants, mice, hamsters, and dogs, as well as humans (see Benor, 2001; Radin, 1997). The notion that conscious intention can influence living systems at a distance is common to many cultures and historical periods (e.g., Leder, 2005). The variants of distant mental healing are spiritual healing, prayer, faith healing, divine healing, and bioenergy therapy (Radin, 1997). Healing methods across cultures include shamanism, intercessory prayer, the deployment of "healing energy" (e.g., Reiki), blessings, invocations, and the use of objects (e.g., in voodoo). Krippner and Achterberg (2000) list 19 variants of anomalous healing events with a variety of subjective components (e.g., state of consciousness, assistance from discarnate spirits, and use of a healing energy). Findings in this research area have been mixed (for a review of recent studies see Leder, 2005). If there is no psychic effect, placebo effects derived from belief in psychic healing may have their own health benefits (e.g., Lyvers, Barling, & Harding-Clark, 2006). Personality and Healing Addressing the correlates of DMILS or distant healing would provide further understanding of the modus operandi of such processes. However, to date, personality correlates have been relatively neglected in these areas. Irwin (2004, p. 124) notes that research has yet to determine a detailed personality profile of psychic healers, but he cites two studies indicating that healers possess a fantasy prone personality (Wilson & Barber, 1983) and an external locus of control (Snel & van der Sijde, 1997). It is not clear to what extent distant healing is the same as PK, despite the frequent assumption that they are identical. There has been relatively little work investigating how PK performance relates to major personality variables (see Irwin, 2004). Correlates of PK success include belief in PK (see Irwin, 2004), prior PK experiences (e.g., Gissurarson & Morris, 1991; Heath, 2000), a tendency toward "spontaneity" (e.g., Van de Castle, 1958), prior synaesthetic experiences (Roe, Holt, & Simmonds, 2003), relaxed testing conditions (e.g., Debes & Morris, 1982; Gissurarson, 1997), motivation (Hinterberger, Houtkooper, & Kotchoubey, 2004), and a tendency toward "effortless effort" and absorption (Heath, 2000; Houtkooper, 2004; Isaacs, 1986), among other factors. …


We present a technique to automatically transform a voice application's call flow, or interaction graph, into the set of application pages that encapsulate the call flow nodes and resources needed to run such application in a clientserver environment. Our technique, called NOVA, performs this automatic partition by making use of a set of cost functions that model the latencies associated with the transmission of data and application resources through a network and their processing by the client components (e.g., voice browsers, grammar compilers and system engines). Our technique facilitates the existence of tools that permit application developers to focus on designing the call-flow of the application while leaving the task of segmenting and packaging the application into pages to our algorithm. The cost functions utilized by our algorithm can be dynamically computed allowing for runtime application optimization. We demonstrate the impact of our algorithm through simulation experiments.


Inquiry oriented approaches to learning have gradually entered science laboratory programs, aiming to deliver an authentic experience of doing science, enhance student engagement with the material, and bring greater emphasis on generic skills underpinning graduate attributes. Although such approaches have demonstrated pedagogical advantages and improved student engagement, it is not clear how the advantages should be weighted against other elements of what may be regarded as the laboratory program's cultural framework.
We analysed two large-enrolment introductory tertiary programs: physics and chemistry at the University of Technology Sydney. The programs differed in the level of inquiry orientation but also in approaches to design, logistics and relevancy. We found that, based on student survey responses and academic performance, the putative advantages of a deeper inquiry orientation in the physics laboratory were insufficient to compensate for the apparent advantages arising from the other elements of the cultural framework in the chemistry laboratory.


Overview There is a risk of diluting our logic by looking at things absolutely (Peirce, in Hoopes, 1991, p. 187). Signs gain their meaning, not in any absolute sense, but rather in relation to their context in any given time, and in relation to their meaning to any given interpreter. According to Eco (1979) "A sign is everything which can be taken as significantly substituting for something else" (p. 7). A sign not only stands for something, but it stands to someone and that important relationship with the signs in our landscape is what I discuss below. I begin in section one by describing two parts of Tucson, a city of around one million inhabitants in the Southwest of the United States, that are different in many ways, but curiously differ in their linguistic landscapes. In section two I define linguistic landscapes and situate an analysis of street signs within linguistic landscape research. Section three is a diachronic and synchronic analysis of street signs in Tucson, including the myths (Barthes, 1972) that have accompanied the acceptance of street sign language at different points in the city's history and how these myths have served to promulgate what Jane Hill (1993) refers to as a larger social project of the white elite in maintaining a dominant economic and political position of power in society. In section four I focus on how street signs interact with all those who view them on both the syntagmatic and paradigmatic axes. A deeper explanation of how these linguistic messages enter our cognition and influence our ideologies continues in section five with a description of the various conceptual metonyms and metaphors born out of street sign language and organization. All of these sections treating the unconscious understanding and influence of street signs feed into section six and a discussion on the seemingly conscious and intentional authorship in linguistic landscapes (Malinowski, 2008) and how the expected commitment of top-down governmental signs, such as street signs, to the linguistic code of the dominant culture (Gorter, 2006), is violated in both parts of Tucson through reverse indexicality. I make a distinction in this section between what I call elective vs. circumstantial reverse idexicality in order to attempt to explain the differing power dynamics at play in the two Tucsons and link these dynamics to educational policy.   In the final section, all of these contributions get funneled into a cone of connections, which together illuminate how ideologies are influenced regarding classroom language of instruction policies that both promote and prohibit Spanish language use in schools. This study proposes to extend the idea of schoolscapes from the elements, text, and space, within a school-based environment (Brown, 2012; Szabo, 2015), to the immediate streets and neighborhoods surrounding schools, to demonstrate the subliminal influence of street signs on (re)constructing the language ideologies of individuals who live in these neighborhoods and who support the language policies of their children's schools. In taking this stance, my desire is not to claim that there exists a linear connection between street sign language and classroom language of instruction policy, with exception to the case of National City discussed below; rather it is my goal to light a match of awareness of the great potential for meaning making that street signs possess and leave in the reader a profound awakening that impacts how she or he sees, interprets, and thus understands street signs for quite some time. As I attempt to overtly uncover covert collocations of hidden agendas and implicit messages in the linguistic landscape of educational environments, I recognize that as an academic living in the American Southwest, I am both a product of these messages, influenced perhaps in ways that remain unconscious to me, and a producer of messages through my own interpretive research of their potential meaning.


The article presents investigation into dynamic modes of braking of linear induction drives when motors windings are supplied by direct current. Dynamic models of braking are developed for three different connection types of windings. During braking linear motor windings are supplied by asymmetrical voltage. Models of linear electric drives are developed for direct, inverse and zero components. Dependences of braking duration on winding connection type and supplied voltage is investigated. Dependences of linear motor developed force, inductor current and secondary element current against time are analyzed at different windings connection type. Discussed dynamic processes of braking linear motors by direct current allows to choose a scheme of linear induction motors connection and to form required dynamic characteristics of braking. Ill. 7, bibl. 12 (in Lithuanian, summaries in Lithuanian, English and Russian).


Study of the problem of "class character" of 1917' revolution and competency of the term "proletarian revolution". The author considers questions of participation of various social groups in the Russian revolution, draws analogies of social composition of previous revolutions, considers the principle of "proletarian revolution", as an ideology element for positioning of Bolsheviks and power capture. It is necessary to consider that an age, gender and national factor played much bigger role un Russian revolution than class factor. Revolution in Russia in many respects leaned on young generations which made more than a third of the population of the Russian Empire by 1917. In fight against tsarism separate calculation was based on the non-russian population and national suburbs of the empire. The special role in the Russian revolution was played by the peasantry. Revolution happened in the capital (in two capitals in Russia), the peasantry remained indifferent to revolution while Bolsheviks didn't begin to take away from them the food violently. This period:(summer - fall of 1919) became the time of peak of the Civil war. However return of landowners and their claim for property of the land forced peasants to turn bayonets for revolution and the earth and, eventually, to provide to Bolsheviks a victory in the Civil war.


In the aftermath of the US Presidential election on 8 November 2016, the Malaysian currency Ringgit (MYR) had witnessed unprecedented volatility in its value relative to the USD. As a policy response, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) implemented a Supplemental Foreign Exchange Administration (SFEA) Rule in December 2016. Exporters are required to convert 75 per cent of foreign currency proceeds from the exports of goods into MYR with a licensed onshore bank. This study evaluates the impact of the new SFEA Rule on the relationship between country-specific FDI and MYR. Based on the data of five major inward FDI countries from 2015 to 2018, our results show: Firstly, Japanese FDI strengthens MYR in post-SFEA Rule; Secondly, FDI from Singapore is found to exert downward pressure on MYR; Thirdly, FDI from China, the Netherlands and the US are insignificant in influencing the MYR; Finally, inward FDI from different countries responds differently to the Rule. Notably, the results obtained are robust to different measures of the exchange rate. On policy suggestion, the Foreign Exchange Rule should also target non-export oriented inward FDIs to achieve the policy target. The result also highlights the importance of export-oriented FDIs for the long-run benefit of the Malaysian economy.


The intriguing properties of graphene has paved way for many potential biomedical applications like drug delivery, tissue engineered scaffold, bio sensing and so on. Here, we report the interaction of Maura reduced graphene oxide (MRGO) with the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMNCs), as there is a likelihood of graphene coming in contact with the blood through intentional or accidental exposure. MRGO was synthesized by reducing graphene oxide using Halomonas Maura and autoclaved subsequently to prevent microbial contamination. It was characterized by TEM, AFM and FITR. Initial cytotoxicity was conducted in L929 cells to get the dose response. Oxidative stress potential, effect on proliferative capacity, genotoxicity and induction of apoptosis in PBMNCs treated with MRGO were assessed. MRGO elicited a dose dependent ROS generation which promoted apoptosis in PBMNCs. Proliferation of these cells were also found to be hindered. However, MRGO did not induce genotoxicity and generation of reactive nitrogen species. In conclusion MRGO shows a dose dependent toxicity in cells, generating ROS, inducing apoptosis and affecting proliferation, which may be due to the loss of exopolysaccharide coating due to autoclaving. This study raises a serious concern regarding the in vivo biomedical application of MRGO, where IV and IP are the main routes of exposure. Further evaluation is required regarding the interaction of autoclaved MRGO with the blood cells.


This is a very different book on the C language! In an easy, conversational style, Peter van der Linden, of Sun's compiler and OS kernel group, presents dozens of astonishing examples drawn from practical experience, including: Software that blew up the space probe to Venus The C bug that shut down the entire AT&T phone system C programmer job interview secrets Why programmers can't tell Halloween from Christmas day The C code for a complete BASIC interpreterExpert C Programming reveals the coding techniques used by the best C programmers. It relates C to other languages, and includes an introduction to C++ that can be understood by an programmer without weeks of mind-bending study. Covering both the IBM PC and UNIX systems, it is an entertaining and educational romp through C showing how experts really use it. Expert C Programming is a must read for anyone who wants to learn more about the implementation, practical use, and folklore of C."Not just clearly written, but fun to read. The tone and style of this text should make this a popular book with professional programmers. However, the tone of this book will make it very popular with undergraduates. Appendix A alone would make the purchase of this book a must. It's filled with great advice." -Professor Jack Beidler, Chairman, Department of Computer Science, University of Scranton"So that's why extern char *cp isn't the same as extern char cp. I knew that it didn't work despite their superficial equivalence, but I didn't know why. I also love the job interview test questions on C." -David S. Platt, Rolling Thunder Computing"In Expert C Programming, Peter van der Linden combines C language expertise and a subtle sense of humor to deliver a C programming book that stands out from the pack. In a genre too often known for windy, lifeless prose, van der Linden's crisp language, tongue-in-cheek attitude, and real-world examples engage and instruct." -John Barry, author of Sunburst, Technobabble, and other books


Cultural transmission in our species is a cumulative inheritance system that leads to a cultural evolution process with a great adaptive value. Our genes have promoted a social learning system very effective for the transmission of learned behaviours. The ability to accumulate knowledge based on an efficient transmission process is what distinguishes human culture from other kinds of social learning present in nonhuman primates. Human behaviour is a product of two different and interacting processes: genetic evolution and cultural evolution. Much variation in human behaviour cannot be understood without accounting for beliefs, values and other socially acquired determinants of behaviour. Thus, culture is crucial for understanding human behaviour and coevolves with biology. On the one hand, the psychobiological capacities guiding cultural processes are the product of evolution. On the other hand, culture modifies the environment in which we live and therefore determine future action of natural selection.

Key Concepts:

Human culture is a system of inheritance, in which people acquire skills, techniques, beliefs, values, norms, desires and so on, by imitation and teaching.

Cultural transmission arises from genetically evolved psychological adaptations for acquiring cultural traits from other individuals by observation and inference.

Cultural transmission differs from nonhuman primate social learning in that it is cumulative.

Cumulative cultural transmission led to a cultural evolution process with a great adaptive value.

Evolved psychobiological mechanisms guide the preference among different cultural variants.

Culture created social environments, in which specific adaptations were selected for by natural selection.

Keywords:

culture;
cultural evolution;
dual inheritance theory;
sociobiology;
meme;
evolutionary psychology;
assessor hominids;
social learning


Objective Sodium valproate, otherwise termed valproate, has been suggested in the literature to be associated with a wide variety of congenital abnormalities. These abnormalities can occur in children as a result of intrauterine exposure due to maternal epilepsy. Some of these deficits are cognitive in nature. The purpose of this systematic literature review was to provide evidence of a search that was undertaken in order to gain an understanding of these cognitive deficits. The aim was to assess the quality of the evidence and to draw as concrete conclusions as it permits. Method This systematic literature review was performed with adherence to the PRISMA checklist and search flow. Database searching involved Medline, Embase, PsycINFO, as well as Google Scholar, ClinicalTrials.gov, and Web of Science. Results Results indicate that valproate exposure in utero can lead to deficiencies in intelligence quotient (IQ), language abilities, cognitive fluency, and originality. Findings also suggest that valproate-exposed children require more special educational assistance, experience more developmental delay, and are more prone to autism than non-exposed children and children exposed to other antiepileptic drugs in utero. Conclusion The literature provides compelling evidence for cognitive impairment due to valproate exposure in utero. One advantage of the evidence is that most of the included studies are prospective in nature. However, the data that they provide should be interpreted with some degree of discretion. Due to ethical considerations and the nature of the topic under investigation, studies can at best provide evidence of an association and cannot show true causation. Finally, the ethics of prescribing valproate to pregnant epileptics and possibilities for future research are discussed.


Abstract. The contribution deals with the comparison of two laser scanners manufactured by Leica company. In BIM modelling, there is a need for fast and accurate gathering of spatial data, e.g. point clouds. Those data can be gathered by photogrammetry or laser scanning. Last years on the market, there occurred some light and easy-to-use alternatives to classic laser scanners. There were chosen two scanners that belong to the easy-to-use category. The first scanner is stationary Leica BLK360 and the second scanner is Leica BLK2GO which is a handheld scanner based on SLAM technology. Both laser scanners were tested on three different test objects. The first object is an administrative building, the second object is a historical administrative building and the third object is the vaults of the church. In all cases, only the indoor side of the objects was measured. The point clouds were compared to each other and the comparison was discussed. The parameters derived from the point clouds were also compared to the parameters read in the original documentation of the object. The comparison of the parameters may show, how those point clouds are usable for the final BIM modelling.


Different pulps were chemically (nitren) and biologically (enzyme) treated in order to improve the chemical accessibility and dissolution capacity in cold NaOH. The treatments effect on the pulp properties was accessed by studying the changes on their chemical and macromolecular structure and by analyzing the dissolution performance in cold NaOH.The nitren treatment has the effect of removing a large part of the xylan present in a dissolving pulp and is also removing mannans. Increasing the nitren concentrations will extract also cellulose and decrease its mean molar mass. These extractions are favorable for the dissolution in cold NaOH–water, being more effective with higher nitren concentrations. A maximum of 44.7% increase on the dissolution yield was achieved.The new enzymatic treatment shows a higher efficiency on promoting fibers accessibility to NaOH ions, (directly correlated with the enzymatic load), allowing a maximum increase of 150% on the dissolution yield. A slight decrease of the average molar mass was also seen. The different pulps reacted differently to the treatments, showing that the pulping pretreatments have an influence on the enzymatic efficiency. Using a mixture of enzymes and endoglucanase showed that the synergistic effect of these two enzymes is more effective on cellulose activation.Both nitren and enzymatic treatments are improving the pulp chemical accessibility mostly by modifying the structure of the primary wall and S1 wall. This promotes the swelling of these wood cell structures, allowing the access of the NaOH solvating ions into fiber regions not accessible on the original pulp. The nitren is disassembling the fiber surface with extraction of hemicelluloses and degrading the cellulosic structure.The use of this enzyme on the cellulose pulps activation towards dissolution in cold NaOH is of great importance. It presents a high potential in both technical, with further development and industrial implementation, and fundamental research fields, with further studies on mechanisms of cellulose activation.The work was performed in Cemef - Mines ParisTech, Sophia Antipolis, France, and TI / Hamburg University, Germany and financed by Sappi, Tembec, Lenzing, Viskase and Spontex and had support from EPNOE (European Polysaccharide Network of Excellence).