The Transformer has proven to be a powerful feature extraction method and has gained widespread adoption in natural language processing (NLP). In this paper we propose a multimodal item categorization (MIC) system solely based on the Transformer for both text and image processing. On a multimodal product data set collected from a Japanese e-commerce giant, we tested a new image classification model based on the Transformer and investigated different ways of fusing bi-modal information. Our experimental results on real industry data showed that the Transformer-based image classifier has performance on par with ResNet-based classifiers and is four times faster to train. Furthermore, a cross-modal attention layer was found to be critical for the MIC system to achieve performance gains over text-only and image-only models.


With the growth of technology in the workplace, employee privacy is an increasingly significant legal issue. Employees, perhaps irrationally, often overestimate the amount of privacy they should expect in technological communication. A decision issued by the United States Supreme Court in June 2010, City of Ontario v. Quon, highlights the importance of privacy in the workplace and employees' expectations of privacy. Employee privacy is protected by various constitutional, tort, and statutory causes of action; however, each of these theories has limitations, failing to protect some reasonable expectations of privacy. The implied-in-fact contract is a theory that has been recognized by some courts in the context of employment law, usually protecting job security, and it may become a valuable avenue for the protection of employee privacy. A court applying an implied-in-fact contract theory protecting employee privacy will determine whether the employer and employee reached an enforceable agreement, albeit an implied agreement, regarding the employee's privacy rights by considering the totality of the circumstances and the employee's reasonable expectations. Where other causes of action fail to protect an employee's reasonable expectations of privacy in the workplace, such as in Quon where the Fourth Amendment claim failed, the implied-in-fact contract theory may be available. To align employer and employee expectations, employers should consider this potential cause of action when establishing polices and practices bearing on employee privacy issues.


Gustav Mahler's Eighth Symphony, a setting of the hymn Veni Creator Spiritus and the final scene of Johann Wolfgang Goethe's Faust II, is a composition surrounded by myth: from the story of the composer's mystical inspiration in the summer of 1906 to the promotion of the work at its 1910 premiere as the "Sinfonie der Tausend" for its epic orchestration and cosmic vision. Yet Mahler's interpretation of Goethe's text, which he explained in letters to family and friends, suggest another source of inspiration: his friend and mentor, the poet Siegfried Lipiner. Lipiner's critical writings on Faust, as well as his dramatic work Hippolytos (1898/1913), reveal the important role of Goethe's text in Lipiner's artistic and philosophical program for the spiritual renewal of society at this time. Tracing the intellectual friendship of Lipiner and Mahler during the conception of the Eighth Symphony, this study reveals that Mahler's composition can be viewed as achieving the goal of "cosmic drama" to which Lipiner's works aspired: the presentation of metaphysical ideals through myth and music. In revealing Mahler's indebtedness to Lipiner's Faust interpretation, this article sheds new light on the reception of Goethe's work in fin-de-siècle German culture. (CK)


The Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act (FRBMA), 2003 sets fiscal rules that seek to foster fiscal discipline on the Central Government and achieving a balanced budget with effective revenue management. The Act sets targets and suggests means of reducing fiscal and revenue deficits. It has however, had limited success. The targets that were to be achieved by 2008-09 were relaxed because of financial crisis of 2008. However, strict implementation of FRBMA has been a matter of concern. This paper notes that there is an urgent requirement for greater transparency in budget preparation, making the medium-term framework more binding and greater capacity building on the part of government to promote budgetary and debt management institutions.


Abstract Cation partition among coexisting minerals has been widely applied to eclogite thermometry, but an accurate estimation of Fe3+ content compared to total Fe is crucial in obtaining reasonable temperatures for petrologic studies. Room-temperature Mössbauer spectroscopy was measured for garnet-omphacite pairs in high-pressure (HP) and ultrahigh-pressure (UHP) eclogites from the Dabie terrane in east-central China. The results show very low Fe3+/ΣFe ratios of 0.026 to 0.082 in garnet but high Fe3+/ΣFe ratios of 0.240 to 0.689 in omphacite. The hyperfine parameters of minerals record the HP-UHP conditions that the eclogites experienced. Fe2+ in clinopyroxenes with low Na + Ca contents in their M2 sites shows pressure-induced occupation in M1 site. The quadrupole splitting of Fe2+ in HP-UHP garnets (3.61 to 3.77 mm/s) and omphacites (2.77 to 3.06 mm/s) are among the highest values ever reported, indicating effectively pressure-regulated polyhedral sites. After the Fe3+ was corrected, Fe2+-Mg partitioning not only significantly narrow the ranges relative to those without Fe3+ correction, but also yield temperatures about 8 to 370 ºC lower than the uncorrected temperatures for the same garnet-pyroxene pairs. The recalculated temperatures are constrained to narrow ranges of 477 to 647 °C for quartz-bearing eclogites and 624 to 843 °C for coesite-bearing eclogites. These maximum values provide close proxies to peak metamorphic temperatures provided that the retrograde exchange of Fe-Mg cations by diffusion between minerals during exhumation is taken into account.


BACKGROUND
A family was identified with autosomal dominant inheritance of anemia, polyuria, hyperuricemia, and chronic kidney disease. Mutational analysis revealed a novel heterozygous mutation c.58T > C resulting in the amino acid substitution of cysteine for arginine in the preprorenin signal sequence (p.cys20Arg) occurring in all affected members.

METHODS
Effects of the identified mutation were characterized using in vitro and in vivo studies. Affected individuals were clinically characterized before and after administration of fludrocortisone.

RESULTS
The mutation affects endoplasmic reticulum co-translational translocation and posttranslational processing, resulting in massive accumulation of non-glycosylated preprorenin in the cytoplasm. This affects expression of intra-renal RAS components and leads to ultrastructural damage of the kidney. Affected individuals suffered from anemia, hyperuricemia, decreased urinary concentrating ability, and progressive chronic kidney disease. Treatment with fludrocortisone in an affected 10-year-old child resulted in an increase in blood pressure and estimated glomerular filtration rate.

CONCLUSIONS
A novel REN gene mutation resulted in an alteration in the amino acid sequence of the renin signal sequence and caused childhood anemia, polyuria, and kidney disease. Treatment with fludrocortisone improved renal function in an affected child. Nephrologists should consider REN mutational analysis in families with autosomal dominant inheritance of chronic kidney disease, especially if they suffer from anemia, hyperuricemia, and polyuria in childhood.


Porous titanium compacts were fabricated by powder metallurgy using cold isostatic press with and without pore forming agents. Their microstructure and mechanical properties were investigated in this study. These alloy powders were sintered under 1300°C in vacuum of 10-3 Pa for 2h, followed by furnace cooling. Young's modulus of sintered Ti could equal that of human's dense bones. It was found that the strength of porous Ti enhanced by increasing the pressure or decreasing the amounts of pore forming agents. We prepared a porous pure Ti with 30wt.% NH4HCO3 as pore forming agents whose modulus was near to the human cortical bone, as compared in the range from 10 to 30GPa of Young's modulus for human bone.


Poised at a bifurcation, the educator preparation community in Vermont faced either the adoption of a generic product for the assessment of initial educator licensure candidates or the comprehensive revision of a longstanding state-based assessment portfolio. Using a case study approach and narrative methods, specifically the Narrative Policy Framework (McBeth, Jones, & Shanahan, 2014), the authors analyze a project in which teacher educators intervened to shape the direction of educator preparation policymaking by designing an innovative assessment portfolio and a collaborative calibration system. The analysis reveals insights about the policymaking arena and demonstrates the value of education-related policymaking that includes teacher educators as active agents in collaboration with state personnel and policymakers. The case contributes to the notion of policymaking as a narrative process. In this case, a narrative of hope emerged as a guiding storyline.


[1] A record of the Mg/Ca ratio of ancient seawater is essential to understand variations in the major geological processes that control ocean chemistry and for estimating past ocean temperatures. A recent contribution by Broecker and Yu (2011) regarding past seawater Mg/Ca provides an unbalanced assessment of the uncertainties and key assumptions of the methodologies considered. It misrepresents aspects of a new method to estimate past ocean Mg/Ca proposed by Coggon et al. (2010); here we provide clarification of that approach. We estimate the accuracy and precision of seawater Mg/Ca estimates derived from planktonic foraminifera test calcite, the preferred approach of Broecker and Yu. These are shown to be consistent with other records that suggest major changes in seawater cation chemistry. An explanation of how major changes in the Mg/Ca of seawater might occur is beyond the scope of this comment.


This research provides an important step in the conceptualization and development of an integrated wildfire fuels reduction system from silvicultural prescription, through stem selection, harvesting, in-woods processing, transport, and market selection. Decisions made at each functional step are informed by knowledge about subsequent functions. Data on the resource characteristics of small-diameter ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Dougl. ex Laws.), harvest equipment productivity, lumber recovery, and net profit (loss) by level of fuels reduction achieved were collected from four 8.1-ha (20 ac) sites in northern Arizona. These data were used to develop a Windows-based, financial and engineering software program, the harvest cost-revenue (HCR) estimator, to identify the economic costs of wildfire fuel reduction treatments that may be used to evaluate cost per acre thresholds for logging contractors, appraise contract bid rates, or assess stumpage values for ponderosa pine stands in the southwestern United States. Application of the model illustrates variability in fuels reduction costs owing to the level of fuels reduction achieved, the volume of merchantable wood removed from different forest stands, and the availability of markets for removed material. Machine productivity helps predict differences in harvest costs but is secondary to market constraints and the volume of wood harvested. FOR .S CI. 54(3):273-283.


The LA. sherriff's deputy Sid Heal is creating a world-renowned test bed for police technology to combat criminals. This paper describes Heal's technology project which was started in 1997 with the emphasis on nonlethal weapons such as the taser. In 2001 the technology development project was opened up beyond nonlethal weapons to include anything useful to the bureau. He assigned a SWAT team to be his technical-assault squad. Though this squad still trains and operates just like the other SWAT teams, its members are also responsible for deploying robotics and electronics equipment as needed, and for scouting out and evaluating new products.


As a consequence of technology shrinking, leakage current has become a significant contributor to the overall power dissipation of embedded memories. In this paper, we compare design trade-offs of two leakage reduction techniques, namely the diode clamp scheme and the replica cell biasing scheme. We show how the two techniques compare using a 1V, 900MHz, 1kx32b reference SRAM in 45nm technology with a data retention voltage of 0.5V, which employs no leakage reduction scheme. The performance comparison is presented over an operating temperature range of −40°C to +130°C. We show that the replica cell biasing scheme can achieve 85.9% reduction in leakage current with an estimated gate area overhead of 2.3% plus area of polysilicon resistors (per memory instance) together with a speed reduction of 34.5% under most leaking conditions. The figures are 84.8%, 2.2% and 23.7% respectively for the diode clamp scheme.


Purpose: To determine the acute effects of carbohydrate (CHO) ingestion following a bout of maximal eccentric resistance exercise on key anabolic kinases of mammalian target of rapamycin and extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) pathways. The authors' hypothesis was that the activation of anabolic signaling pathways known to be upregulated by resistance exercise would be further stimulated by the physiological hyperinsulinemia resulting from CHO supplementation. Methods: Ten resistance-trained men were randomized in a crossover, double-blind, placebo (PLA)-controlled manner to ingest either a noncaloric PLA or 3 g/kg of CHO beverage throughout recovery from resistance exercise. Muscle biopsies were collected at rest, immediately after a single bout of intense lower body resistance exercise, and after 3 hr of recovery. Results: CHO ingestion elevated plasma glucose and insulin concentrations throughout recovery compared with PLA ingestion. The ERK pathway (phosphorylation of ERK1/2 [Thr202/Tyr204], RSK [Ser380], and p70S6K [Thr421/Ser424]) was markedly activated immediately after resistance exercise, without any effect of CHO supplementation. The phosphorylation state of AKT (Thr308) was unchanged postexercise in the PLA trial and increased at 3 hr of recovery above resting with ingestion of CHO compared with PLA. Despite stimulating-marked phosphorylation of AKT, CHO ingestion did not enhance resistance exercise–induced phosphorylation of p70S6K (Thr389) and rpS6 (Ser235/236 and Ser240/244). Conclusion: CHO supplementation after resistance exercise and hyperinsulinemia does not influence the ERK pathway nor the mTORC1 target p70S6K and its downstream proteins, despite the increased AKT phosphorylation.


The number of mitoses per tissue area gives an important aggressiveness indication of the invasive breast carcinoma.However, automatic mitosis detection in histology images remains a challenging problem. Traditional methods either employ hand-crafted features to discriminate mitoses from other cells or construct a pixel-wise classifier to label every pixel in a sliding window way. While the former suffers from the large shape variation of mitoses and the existence of many mimics with similar appearance, the slow speed of the later prohibits its use in clinical practice.In order to overcome these shortcomings, we propose a fast and accurate method to detect mitosis by designing a novel deep cascaded convolutional neural network, which is composed of two components. First, by leveraging the fully convolutional neural network, we propose a coarse retrieval model to identify and locate the candidates of mitosis while preserving a high sensitivity.Based on these candidates, a fine discrimination model utilizing knowledge transferred from cross-domain is developed to further single out mitoses from hard mimics.Our approach outperformed other methods by a large margin in 2014 ICPR MITOS-ATYPIA challenge in terms of detection accuracy. When compared with the state-of-the-art methods on the 2012 ICPR MITOSIS data (a smaller and less challenging dataset), our method achieved comparable or better results with a roughly 60 times faster speed.


Within the gallery, Connecting Space Hong Kong, a special form of cooperation will emerge between the artists-in-labs program of the Zurich University of the Arts, which promotes collaborations between artists and scientists of all disciplines, and ISEA. The collaboration between three artists from Switzerland chosen by Irene Hediger and three artworks juried by ISEA will function as a laboratory for the exchange of practices, strategies and situated knowledge to be found among the artists of the exhibition and visitors to ISEA. Connecting Spaces will host these intercultural and transdisciplinary encounters focusing around creative production and methodologies that cross borders to connect art and science.

"Oscillating between kinetic mechanics, material collages and poetic acoustics, the selected group of artists shared an interest in experimental concepts and transdisciplinary encounters. The exhibition of installed works is a laboratory enriched by discussions and performances, with Brass Art, Pe Lang, Takuma Takahashi + Shugo Hirao, Ip Yuk-Yiu, Marianthi Papalexandri-Alexandri and Nicole Ottiger."

http://www.artistsinlabs.ch/en/exhibitions


Recent studies have established that the Japanese stock market was quite large in the pre-war period, and played an important role in financing the economic development. The pre-war stock market in Japan, however, did not achieve its size and status quickly. Indeed, the market capitalization stayed relatively small during the early years of the stock market development in Japan. This paper studies the pre-war development of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, which eventually grew to be one of the two largest stock exchanges in the pre-war Japan, and examines why the development was rather stagnant since its establishment in 1878 to the 1910s and what led to its take-off in the late 1910s. The paper argues that the TSE stayed small because the low liquidity discouraged the new companies from listing their stocks. The lack of growth in new listed stocks meant the liquidity continued to be low until 1918, when the TSE changed its listing policy to start listing companies without waiting for their listing applications. The provides empirical evidence from listing behavior of cotton spinning firms that shows the size of the market indeed mattered for their listing decision before 1918.


114 diazotrophic bacteria from the rice rhizosphere of five districts of Eastern Uttar Pradesh (India) were isolated and screened for plant growth promoting (PGP) activities employing standard microbiological and biochemical techniques. All these isolates showed nitrogenase activity in the range of 0.23 to 1.72 μmol C 2 H 4 mg -1 protein h -1 . Further analysis showed that 84 (73.68%) isolates were Indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) producer; the value of IAA production ranged from 10.1 to 353.0 μg IAA mg -1 protein. IAA production occurred solely in the medium supplemented with tryptophan. P solubilization activity was observed in 28 (24.56%) isolates, the activity being in the range of 38.50 to 321.0 P released μg mg -1 protein. 45 (39.46%) isolates were capable of producing siderophore, the range of production being 4.50 to 223.26 μg mg -1 protein. Analysis of molecular diversity was made by amplified ribosomal DNA restriction analysis (ARDRA) and denaturating gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE), which exhibited distinct differences among all the isolates. Of the 114 isolates, twenty one (21) isolates showed multiple plant growth promoting traits and were potent in terms of PGP activities. These isolates were identified on the basis of 16S rDNA sequencing and belonged to the genera Pantoea, Bacillus, Microbacterium, Pseudomonas, Sphingomonas, Ancylobacter, Enterobacter, Advenella, γ-proteobacterium strain VA3S1, Rhizobium and Agrobacterium . Findings of this study suggest that certain isolates may be exploited for developing a potential source of biofertilizer. Key words: Plant growth promoting rhizobacteria, N 2 fixation, amplified ribosomal DNA restriction analysis, indole-3-acetic acid, siderophore, denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis, temperature gradient gel electrophoresis


In this paper, we aim to solve the object extraction problem in remote sensing images using interactive segmentation tools. Firstly, an overview of the interactive segmentation algorithm is proposed. Then, our detailed implementation of intelligent scissors and GrabCut for remote sensing images is described. Finally, several experiments on different typical features (water area, vegetation) in remote sensing images are performed respectively. Compared with the manual result, it indicates that our tools maintain good feature boundaries and show good performance.


Alcohol is considered one of the most common hepatotoxin, and chronic alcoholic liver disease is affecting millions of subjects worldwide. The three most frequently manifestations of alcoholic liver disease are steatosis, acute alcoholic hepatitis and liver cirrhosis. The diagnosis of Alcoholic Liver Diseases (ALD) is made by clinical and laboratory analysis. Actually do not exist a single laboratory test able to confirm the diagnosis of ALD, but in the last years several serum markers and laboratory abnormalities have been discovered in these patients. In particular the combination of tests and markers can increase the diagnostic accuracy, for this reason the last studies are focusing on the development of serum biomarkers panel able to diagnose alcohol-related liver damage.


Background: Recent evidence suggests a role for vitamin D in breast cancer etiology and survival. Although data are not definitive, breast cancer survivors might derive additional benefits from adequate vitamin D levels, including better quality-of-life (QoL) and psychosocial well-being. Objective: Using a prospective study design, we examined associations between QoL and psychosocial functioning among breast cancer survivors and circulating 25(OH)D levels at the time of initial breast cancer diagnosis and 1 year post diagnosis. Methods: Women (n=504) with incident breast cancer (stages 0-III) were recruited prior to initiating breast cancer treatment at Roswell Park Cancer Institute (RPCI), with 372 patients also providing data 1 year later. Demographic and clinical data were obtained from the RPCI Surgical Oncology Breast Database. At each time point, participants provided blood samples and completed surveys on mental and physical health (SF36 Health Survey), perceived stress (Perceived Stress Scale), depression (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale), and their experiences with fatigue (Multidimensional Assessment of Fatigue Scale). Serum 25(OH)D levels were measured by immunochemiluminometric assays. Results: Median 25(OH)D levels at diagnosis and 1 year post were 23.8 ng/ml (range 0.1-67.4) and 26.6 ng/ml (range 3.0 – 80.0), respectively. At the time of diagnosis, multivariate logistic regression analyses indicated that women with sufficient levels of 25(OH)D (≥ 30 ng/ml) had ∼50% lower odds of reporting poor physical health (OR=0.52, 95% CI: 0.29, 0.90) or poor mental functioning (OR=0.54, 95% CI: 0.31, 0.95) compared to women with deficient levels ( median) of perceived stress (OR=0.45, 95% CI: 0.26-0.80), depression (OR=0.46, 95% CI: 0.25-0.83) or fatigue (OR=0.54, 95% CI: 0.31, 0.92). Findings were similar 1 year later, with reduced odds of poor physical health (OR=0.47, 95% CI: 0.24-0.93), poor mental health (OR=0.62, 95% CI: 0.33, 1.13), high levels of perceived stress (OR=0.67, 95% CI: 0.36, 1.25), depression (OR=0.33, 95% CI: 0.15, 0.71), and fatigue (OR=0.45, 95% CI: 0.24, 0.84). Changes in vitamin D levels over the 1 year period were also assessed. While none of the relationships were significant, women in the upper tertile of vitamin D change (>3.99 ng/ml) were more likely to report low mental health and higher levels of perceived stress at 1 year compared to patients with declines in 25(OH)D of >0.95 ng/ml, but were less likely to report poor physical health or fatigue. This may have been due, in part, to women being somewhat more likely to use vitamin D supplements if they reported lower mental health QoL scores. Changes in circulating 25(OH)D levels during this 1 year period were strongly associated with use of supplements (p=0.001). Conclusions: Breast cancer survivors with adequate vitamin D levels were less likely to report poor QoL compared to women with deficient vitamin D levels. Maintenance of optimal vitamin D levels may help improve breast cancer patients' QoL as they go through breast cancer treatment. Citation Format: Chi-Chen Hong, Song Yao, Yali Zhang, Shicha Kumar, Christine Ambrosone. High serum levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D are associated with better quality-of-life, and lower levels of perceived stress, depression, and fatigue among breast cancer survivors [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Thirty-Seventh Annual CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium: 2014 Dec 9-13; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(9 Suppl):Abstract nr P1-09-27.


Modern software systems rely on mining insights from business sensitive data stored in public clouds. A data breach usually incurs significant (monetary) loss for a commercial organization. Conceptually, cloud security heavily relies on Identity Access Management (IAM) policies that IT admins need to properly configure and periodically update. Security negligence and human errors often lead to misconfiguring IAM policies which may open a backdoor for attackers. To address these challenges, first, we develop a novel framework that encodes generating optimal IAM policies using constraint programming (CP). We identify reducing dormant permissions of cloud users as an optimality criterion, which intuitively implies minimizing unnecessary datastore access permissions. Second, to make IAM policies interpretable, we use graph representation learning applied to historical access patterns of users to augment our CP model with similarity constraints: similar users should be grouped together and share common IAM policies. Third, we describe multiple attack models and show that our optimized IAM policies significantly reduce the impact of security attacks using real data from 8 commercial organizations, and synthetic instances.


Escherichia coli B strains, either more sensitive or resistant to ozone than wild-type (OZs or OZr), were obtained after mutagenesis. OZs strains carrying a mutation in ozrA or orzB, two genes located on both sides of malB, appeared as phenotypically different with regards to radiosensitivity and cellular filamentation. OZr strains, on the other hand, probably carry an allele of ozrA but were radioresistant and divided normally even with induction. A single gene (ozrA) thus seems to determine three levels of sensitivity to ozone, sensitivity to radiation and cellular filamentation in this organism. The possible involvement of a specific endonuclease in the repair of ozone-induced DNA lesions is considered.


We propose an algorithm for the application of the Laplace method for the calculation of the simplest Feynman diagram with a single loop in the scalar {\phi}^3 theory. The calculation of the contribution of such a diagram to the scattering amplitude requires the calculation of a fourfold integral over the four-momenta components circulating in a loop. The essence of the Laplace method for the calculation of multiple integrals lies in the fact that if the module of an integrand has a point of sufficiently sharp maximum inside the integration domain, then the integral can be replaced by a Gaussian integral by representing the integrand in the form of an exponent from the logarithm and expanding this logarithm into Taylor series in the vicinity of a maximum point up to the second degree terms. We show that there are two-dimensional and non-intersecting surfaces inside the four-dimensional region of integration, on which the maximum of the module of integrand is reached. This leads to a problem that the integrand is non-analytically dependent on the parameters responsible for bypassing the poles. Also the derivatives of logarithm of the scattering amplitude are non-analytically dependent on these parameters. However, in the paper we show that these non-analyticities compensate each other. As a result of such a procedure, three of the four integrations can be done analytically, and the calculation of the contribution of the diagram to the scattering amplitude is reduced to a numerical calculation of the single integral in finite bounds from an expression that does not contain non-analyticities. The described calculation method is used to construct a model dependence of elastic scattering differential cross section d{\sigma}_elastic/dt on the square of the transmitted four-momentum t (Mandelstam variable).


Mirroring trends elsewhere in Southeast Asia, Cambodia has witnessed a pronounced shift towards stricter authoritarianism over recent years. The state appears more firmly ruled by prime minister Hun Sen than at any time during the past three decades, while the de facto status of the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) more closely resembles the single party regimes of neighboring states. One of the major tools of political control and expansion of authority employed by the hierarchical CPP network is the construction of major infrastructure projects, most notably hydropower dams and irrigation schemes. This article focuses attention on the hydraulic infrastructure aspects of exacting political authority and social control by the elite over the nation, drawing upon Wittfogelian perspectives for a conceptual framework. It maintains that Cambodia increasingly represents a modern variant of a hydraulic society, but primarily functions as a satellite hydraulic state of China. The growing influence of China over Cambodia's hydraulic development has helped elevate Hun Sen to resemble a neo-classic hydraulic despot. Hydraulic society concepts help provide partial understanding of contemporary power relations and party-state ascendency, including the longevity and resilience of Hun Sen's supremacy.


The people of Vassilikos, farmers and tourist entrepreneurs on the Greek island of Zakynthos, are involved in a bitter environmental dispute concerning the conservation of sea turtles. Against the environmentalists' practices and ideals they set their own culture of relating to the land, cultivation, wild and domestic animals. Written from an anthropological perspective, this book puts forward the idea that a thorough study of indigenous cultures is a fundamental step to understanding conflicts over the environment. For this purpose, the book offers a detailed account of the cultural depth and richness of the human environmental relationship in Vassilikos, focusing on the engagement of its inhabitants with diverse aspects of the local environment, such as animal care, agriculture, tourism and hunting. (Text from Berghahn Books )


This article describes a state-supported, multiuniversity, interdisciplinary effort to address unmet disaster recovery needs identified by six hard-hit, low-capacity North Carolina communities following Hurricane Matthew. At the request of the director of the North Carolina Division of Emergency Management and the state governor, university officials created a team of faculty, practitioners, and students called the Hurricane Matthew Disaster Recovery and Resilience Initiative (HMDRRI). This 2-year program delivered research, teaching, and engagement activities of the sort that are not typically undertaken by federal or state emergency management agencies, insurance providers, or nonprofit organizations. HMDRRI also offered graduate students in land-use planning, landscape architecture, and architecture opportunities to help provide community assistance under the supervision and mentoring of faculty and practitioners. An overarching goal of the program was to help build greater rural resilience, an outcome that has received inadequate attention from academics and practitioners.


Purpose The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of the autologous blood injection (ABI) for chronic recurrent temporomandibular joint (TMJ) dislocation using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Materials and Methods ABI was applied to 14 patients who had chronic recurrent TMJ dislocation. MRIs of the patients were taken and compared before and one month after the injection. Results All of the patients had no dislocations of their TMJs on clinical examination one month after the injection. In the pre-injection, unilateral or bilateral TMJ dislocations were observed on MRIs in all patients. One month after the injection, TMJ dislocations were not observed in MRI evaluation of any patients. A significant structural change that caused by ABI was not observed. Conclusion The procedure was easy to perform and it caused no foreign body reaction. However, it was unclear how the procedure prevented the dislocation.


BACKGROUND
Urinary alkalinization and multiple-dose activated charcoal are modalities advocated for the enhancement of phenobarbital elimination in poisoned patients. However, no studies exist comparing the efficacy of these two means of elimination enhancement. We compared their effects on the pharmacokinetic disposition of intravenously administered phenobarbital.

METHODS
Ten healthy volunteers participated in each of three randomly ordered study phases. During each phase, 5 mg of intravenous phenobarbital per kilogram of body weight was administered. During phase I, no interventions were made in attempt to enhance phenobarbital elimination. In phase II, participants underwent 24 hours of urinary alkalinization. Throughout phase III, volunteers received six doses of activated charcoal and two doses of sorbitol over 24 hours.

RESULTS
The phenobarbital elimination half-life was 148 hours, 47 hours and 19 hours during the control, alkalinization and charcoal phases, respectively. Statistically significant differences in the elimination of phenobarbital were detected when each of the following phases were compared: I vs II, I vs III and II vs III.

CONCLUSIONS
Both urinary alkalinization and multiple doses of activated charcoal are effective for the enhancement of phenobarbital elimination but multiple-dose charcoal was superior to urinary alkalinization in our study population.


The erector spinae plane block is a novel interfascial plane block that can provide thoracic and abdominal analgesia. We describe a patient with opioid intolerance scheduled for breast surgery who received an erector spinae plane block with liposomal bupivacaine as well as a supplemental T1 paravertebral block resulting in profound analgesia throughout her postoperative course. This case report demonstrates that use of liposomal bupivacaine in the erector spinae plane block can be successful in providing extended duration postoperative analgesia and minimizing systemic opioid requirements.


The way that human beings live and consume the natural and environmental resources of the planet are not sustainable. Sustainability involves changes in individual beliefs, expectations, values and behaviours at the microlevel, changes in policy at the macrolevel of governments, and changes in the design of objects, social organisations and structures at the mesolevels. Design for sustainability has a big challenge: we need a ninety percent gain in energy and material efficiencies over the next thirty years. Bottom-up and top-down design and policy interventions are needed at all levels. These multilevel dynamics interact in ways not understood by conventional social and natural science: human beings and their physical environment form a bewilderingly complex multilevel system of systems of systems. The science of complex systems must, necessarily, conduct experiments through policy: scientists do not have the mandate or the money to perform large interventionist experiments. Policy can be construed as designing the future. Thus complex systems are entangled in both policy and design. We conclude that (i) the design professions impact on the community at all levels, and that 'good? design at any level is relative to design at all other levels, and the emergent design of the whole, (ii) design, complex systems science and policy must all work together to create a sustainable future, and (iii) policy and complex systems science must progress through a designerly way of thinking to achieve sustainable design coherently applied at all levels in the complex multilevel system of humankind living on planet earth in the decades, centuries and millennia of the future. This view puts design and complexity science at the centre of policy for sustainability.


Safety is one of the key issues of future automotive development. With the trend of increasing functionality and complexity in automotive embedded system, there are increasing risks of functional failures. It is necessary to perform the functional safety process throughout the safety lifecycle of these systems. The appearance of the new functional safety standard ISO WD 26262 also makes the consideration of functional safety as part of the design and implementation process for these systems. This paper introduces the new standard ISO WD 26262 and analyses its features. The safety life cycle according to the new standard, activities necessary for the achievement of functional safety during the development phase are shown. An example application according to ISO WD 26262 is given and the process and methods of functional safety analysis in this example are proposed.


Heat removal and power density distribution delivery have become two major reliability concerns in 3D stacked technology. In this paper, we propose a thermal-driven 3D floor planner. Our contributions include: (1) a novel multi-objective formulation to consider the thermal and performance constraints in the optimization approach, (2) an efficient Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) representation of the floor planning model, and (3) a smooth integration of the MILP model with an accurate thermal modelling of the architecture. The experimental work is conducted for two realistic many-core single-chip architectures: an homogeneous system resembling Intel's SCC, and an improved heterogeneous setup. The results show promising improvements of the mean, peak temperature and the thermal gradient, with a reduced overhead in the wire length of the system.


Speaker diarization is usually performed in a blind manner without using a priori knowledge about the identity or acoustic characteristics of the participating speakers. In this paper we propose a novel framework for incorporating available a priori knowledge such as potential participating speakers, channels, background noise and gender, and integrating these knowledge sources into blind speaker diarization-type algorithms. We demonstrate this framework on two tasks. The first task is agent-customer speaker diarization for call-center phone calls and the second task is speaker-diarization for a PDA recorder which is part of an assistive living system for the elderly. For both of these tasks, incorporating the a priori information into our blind speaker diarization systems significantly improves diarization accuracy.


Germline mutations of BRCA1 predispose women to breast and ovarian cancers. BRCA1 functions as a tumor suppressor. A wealth of evidence has established that BRCA1 plays an important role in DNA repair and cell cycle checkpoint control. Efficient repair of double-strand-breaks (DSBs) by BRCA1 is essential to its tumor suppression function. DSBs can be repaired either by homologous recombination (HR) or by nonhomologous end-joining (NHEJ). BRCA1 is hyperphosphorylated upon DSBs. Although phosphorylation of BRCA1 is among the earliest events documented upon DNA damage, the role of BRCA1 phosphorylation in DNA repair remains unclear after more than a decade. It has been proposed that BRCA1 serves as a scaffolding protein that recruits multiple repair proteins to the break sites. One of the BRCA1-containing complexes, MRN (Mre11-Rad50-Nbs1)-BRCA1-CtIP, promotes HR repair by initiating DNA end-resection, the first step in the HR pathway. Mre11 possesses intrinsic nuclease activity, which likely facilitates initial processing of DNA ends for subsequent extensive end-resection. Believed to stimulate the nuclease activity of the MRN complex, CtIP is recruited to the complex by BRCA1. In spite of these useful molecular models, the precise function of BRCA1 in DSB repair, especially the role of its phosphorylation, remains elusive. BRCA1 is phosphorylated by Chk2 kinase upon γ-irradiation at serine 988 (human) or serine 971 (mouse). Our data shows that a point mutation in mouse BRCA1 (S971A) that abolishes the Chk2 phosphorylation site impairs end-resection after DSBs. The S971A mutation does not appear to affect the assembly of MRN and CtIP at DSBs, but specifically delays dispersion of BRCA1 from DSBs. Interestingly, BRCA1 is ubiquitinated and degraded by SCF Skp2 , and loss of Chk2 phosphorylation at S988 of human BRCA1 impairs its ubiquitination. Previous work has revealed BRCA1 as a scaffold protein for the assembly of HR proteins at DSBs. Paradoxically, BRCA1 also inhibits Mre11 nuclease activity. Our study suggests that BRCA1 plays a dual role in HR. Although BRCA1 is required for initial assembly of the MRN-BRCA1-CtIP complex at DSBs, the exit of BRCA1 from the MRN-BRCA1-CtIP complex is required to relieve its inhibitory effect on Mre11 nuclease activity. Mechanistically, this critical "exit" of BRCA1 from the MRN-BRCA1-CtIP complex is regulated through phosphorylation catalyzed by Chk2 and then degraded by SCF Skp2 , which is expressed at S/G2 phases, thus ensuring the initiation of end resection/HR to S/G2 phases of the cell cycle. Our study explains two seemingly paradoxical observations: BRCA1 is required for assembly of the MRN-BRCA1-CtIP complex, but it inhibits Mre11 nuclease activity required for end-resection. Citation Format: Yanfen Hu, Balaji Parameswaran, Huai-Chin Chiang, Yunzhe Lu. Damage-induced BRCA1 phosphorylation contributes to the timing of end resection. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2014 Apr 5-9; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2014;74(19 Suppl):Abstract nr 1563. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2014-1563


The ability to maximize service quality while minimizing cost is very important to service-oriented businesses, such as lorry leasing. Very often, the ability to consistently offer higher quality service is the main differentiating factor between a business and its competitors. For lorry leasing businesses, service quality and cost are directly related to how resources-vehicles, cranes, and drivers-are allocated to jobs. The ability to assign the right combination of resources is crucial to daily operations. This paper presents how we modeled this assignment problem as a constraint-satisfaction problem (CSP) and implemented using constraint programming (CP) with an algorithm that we call the crane-lorry optimizing engine (CLOE). CLOE was implemented for the largest crane-lorry company in Hong Kong. Furthermore, plans are generated within seconds compared to close to an hour if done manually. All necessary constraints and criteria are considered systematically. We have experimented with many different types of search heuristics and have analyzed their effects on plan quality. We have found that by considering both the experience of the crane-lorry-driver combination and maximizing on the order assignment, we were able to generate plans that were significantly better than those produced by human planners, and within a substantially shorter time. Although the use of constraint-based assignment techniques is still limited in the vehicle leasing industry, we hope our combination of automated assignment with Internet portal technology that streamlines business-to-business, business-to-consumer, and business-to-employee communications can excite interest in this area


Abstract. Megacities are places with intensive human activity and energy consumption. To reduce air pollution, many megacities have relocated energy supplies and polluted industries to their outer regions. However, regional transport then becomes an important source of air pollution in megacities. To improve air quality before and during the 2008 Beijing Olympics, a wide range of control strategies were implemented, including the relocation of polluting industries. High sulfur dioxide (SO 2 ) concentrations were occasionally observed during this period. Potential sources from southern regions of Beijing were indicated by backward trajectories model and urban/rural stationary measurements, but direct evidence was lacking. Here we used a mobile laboratory to characterize the spatial distribution and regional transport of SO 2 to Beijing during the Campaign for Air Quality Research in Beijing and the Surrounding Region (CAREBEIJING)-2008. Among the five days chosen for the case studies during the Olympic air pollution control period, four had high SO 2 concentrations (6, 20 August and 3, 4 September 2008) while one had low SO 2 concentration (11 September 2008). The average values of SO 2 during the low SO 2 concentration day were 3.9 ppb, much lower than during the high concentration days (7.8 ppb). This result implied an impact by regional transport from outside Beijing. During these days, we captured transport events of SO 2 from areas south of Beijing, with a clear decrease in SO 2 concentrations southeast of the 6th to 4th Ring Roads around Beijing and along the 140 km highway from Tianjin to Beijing. The influx of SO 2 through the 4th to 6th Ring Roads ranged from 2.1 to 4.6 kg s −1 on 4 September and 0.2 to 1.6 kg s −1 on 20 August 2008. The differences of influx in days were due to the variations of emission changes, transport directions and dilutions. Locally emitted SO 2 from a source located along Jingshi Highway outside the southwest section of the 5th Ring Road of Beijing was identified using wind field data generated by the Weather Research and Forecasting model and the measured particle size distribution, with an estimated flux of 0.1 kg s −1 to Beijing. Estimated uncertainties for SO 2 influx were approximately 31%.


Vehicle suspensions impose conflicting design requirements to satisfy the performance goals related to ride, handling and road holding. Semi-active damping suspensions, with their low cost and low power requirement, have been extensively investigated to achieve better compromises among different performance measures. The magneto-rheological (MR) fluid dampers offer superior potential to achieve rapid variations in the damping force and thus the wide bandwidth. The MR dampers, however, exhibit strong nonlinearities associated with force saturation and hysteresis, which affect the force-tracking performance of the controller in an adverse manner. This dissertation research focuses on characterization and modeling of the hysteretic force-velocity ( F-v ) characteristics of a MR-fluid damper, and analyses of different semi-active controller syntheses to achieve improved multi-objective vehicle suspension performance. The force-limiting and hysteresis properties of a prototype MR-damper are characterized in the laboratory as functions of applied magnetic field, and response and excitation variables. An asymmetric force generation algorithm is formulated and integrated into the command current circuit to achieve asymmetric force in compression and rebound from the symmetric damper hardware. The measured data are used to identify the low-speed pre-yield, post-yield, force-limiting and hysteretic force-velocity characteristics in both symmetric as well as asymmetric damping modes. A generalized analytical model of the MR-damper is developed using symmetric and asymmetric sigmoid functions. The validity of the proposed model is demonstrated under wide ranges of control current and excitations. A number of control syntheses are formulated to achieve semi-active modulation in drive current of the MR-damper, including four different on-off and "skyhook"-based hi-lo, and "inverse-model"-based hi-lo and sliding-mode controllers. Continuous modulation (CM) and asymmetric damping force generation (ADFG) algorithms are proposed and integrated within the control policies to minimize switching transients in the symmetric and asymmetric modes


In the assessment of the conductive materials of the natural contaminants accumulated on insulators in terms of equivalent salt deposit density (ESDD), not much attention has been paid to the basic consideration, such as its solubility in water, correction of the conductivity of its water solution to the standard temperature, etc. A study was made on these important factors through repeated measurements of the actual contaminants on the insulators. As a result, practical precautions for the measurement of ESDD are indicated. Also, it is pointed out that the difference in the performance of the naturally and artificially contaminated insulators even with the same ESDD may be explained by the solubility of the materials and that the ambient temperature has a significant influence on the contamination flashover voltage. >


We review here our recent studies on plasmonic enhanced photothermal effects in metallic nanostructure, and the applications of such effects. When light is shined on a prefect metamaterial absorber patterned with e-beam lithography, the gold nanoparticles (NPs) forming the absorber can be either transformed to nano-spherical-domes, or to truncated-octahedral shaped or multi-twined nanocrystals with large crystal grain sizes and flat boundary facets. The evolution of morphology and crystallinity of the gold NPs can be also observed. Evidences clearly show that the surface melting and the coalescence mechanism play a key role on nanocrystals formation. These melted gold nanospheres can even be transferred to another substrate, on which the transferred NPs exhibit excellent size uniformity. The strong photothermal effects can also be utilized to tune silicon photonics waveguides and resonators. It is shown that all-optical photothermal switching of Mach-Zehnder interferometers (MZI), silicon disk resonators, and silicon ring resonators is possible with the help of plasmonic nanoheaters. The switching response time and power consumption are all at reasonably low level.


It is known that continuous variable quantum information cannot be protected against naturally occurring noise using Gaussian states and operations only. Noh et al. proposed bosonic oscillator-to-oscillator codes relying on non-Gaussian resource states as an alternative, and showed that these encodings can lead to a reduction of the effective error strength at the logical level as measured by the variance of the classical displacement noise channel. An oscillator-to-oscillator code embeds K logical bosonic modes (in an arbitrary state) into N physical modes by means of a Gaussian N-mode unitary and N-K auxiliary one-mode Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill-states. Here we ask if – in analogy to qubit error-correcting codes – there are families of oscillator-to-oscillator codes with the following threshold property: They allow to convert physical displacement noise with variance below some threshold value to logical noise with variance upper bounded by any (arbitrary) constant. We find that this is not the case if encoding unitaries involving a constant amount of squeezing and maximum likelihood error decoding are used. We show a general lower bound on the logical error probability which is only a function of the amount of squeezing and independent of the number of modes. As a consequence, any physically implementable family of oscillator-to-oscillator codes combined with maximum likelihood error decoding does not admit a threshold.


The personal use of social media by healthcare professionals is a hot topic within oncology practice settings. The widespread availability of both patient and provider personal information online threatens professional boundaries. This commentary article will provide an overview of the oncology nurses' responsibility to maintain boundaries and the potential risk to professional image if clients and families are able to access providers' personal information online. Work undertaken by the Advanced Practice Nursing Social Media Taskforce in the Hematology Oncology Transplant Program at the Alberta Children's Hospital will be presented including a literature review and development of a staff survey to explore perceptions and practices related to personal social media use by health professionals. Case scenarios of common social media challenges are explored and knowledge translation activities presented.


In 1989, the tailings pond dam at the site of a former copper mine near Little Bay, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, ruptured and tailings spilled into Little Bay Arm. At the time, no action was taken to arrest the flow of tailings or to mitigate the effects of the spill. To date, no action has been taken to repair the dam and tailings continue to flow into Little Bay Arm. As a result, the marine environment around Little Bay Arm has become contaminated with heavy metals from the tailings. However, the tailings are not the only source of heavy metals to the ecosystem. An old slag heap and what is presumably concentrated copper ore spilled during the loading of ore freighters, are also contributing to the ecosystem's metal load. Marine sediment throughout the Arm contained elevated concentrations of Cu, Ni, Zn, As, V, Co, and Mn. Beach material also contained elevated concentrations of metals with material near the slag heap being the most contaminated. At this site, Cu concentrations were in excess of 5000 mg kg(-1) dry weight, Zn greater than 3000 mg kg(-1) and Co concentrations exceeded 700 mg kg(-1). The highest concentrations of metals in biota were found near the slag heap, near the tailings dam breach, and at the site of the former concentrate loading dock. Despite elevated metal concentrations, the tailings and nearby sediment were not devoid of life. Bivalves and seaweed were abundant in the area and there were no obvious signs of tissue damage or disease in soft shell clams (Mya arenaria) living in the tailings. These clams may be suffering from chronic exposure to the tailings, however, evidence of lipid peroxidation in the clams was inconclusive.


Supercavitating vehicles which cruise at a certain depth with high underwater velocity undergo high longitudinal force and circumferential pressure caused by ventilated cavity. The combination loads may cause structure buckling. Critical buckling loads coefficient of thin cylindrical shell with stiffened rings is obtained by semi-analytical FEM. The uncertainty of structural own parameters and ventilated cavitation number is described by interval sets, and then computational steps of COA for calculating buckling non-probabilistic reliability index (BNRI) are presented. It is analyzed that variety of each interval variable width, number and configuration of rings influence on the variety of BNRI in this paper.


Rapid increase in drug-resistant influenza virus isolates, and pandemic threat posed by highly pathogenic avian influenza A and swine flu viruses provide clear and compelling reasons for fast tracking development of novel antiviral drugs. Nucleic acid-based drugs represent a promising class of novel antiviral agents that can be designed to target various seasonal, pandemic and avian influenza viruses. Nucleic acids can be designed to elicit broad-spectrum antiviral responses in the host, by suppressing viral gene expression, or by inducing cleavage or degradation of viral RNA. Immunomodulating nucleic acids, such as double stranded RNA and CpG oligonucleotides, can be potent anti-influenza agents that work by eliciting protective innate and adaptive immunity in the host. By activating the toll-like receptor signaling pathways, these drugs can activate the host's antiviral and inflammatory defenses to combat influenza viruses. Antisense oligonucleotides, small interfering RNAs (siRNA), and nanoRNAs represent sequence specific gene-silencing approaches that could be deployed to suppress or inhibit viral protein gene expression. Lastly, catalytic nucleic acids such as DNAzymes and/or ribozymes can suppress viral replication by repeatedly cleaving viral mRNAs and template RNAs. In summary, nucleic acid-based antiviral agents are versatile, diverse and could complement existing antiviral drugs in combating influenza.


The phylogenetic relationship among toad, frogs and newt from Japan was investigated by means of immunoelecrophoresis. Homologous, heterologous and non-identity reactions between rabbit anti-Bufo bufo antiserum and antigen from each of 13 species and 2 subspecies of Japanese amphibia were examined. The number and positions of arcs appeared in these reactions were compared. The relationship observed in the comparison well coincided with the classification of the upper taxa of amphibia; viz. 1) Hyla arborea is more intimately related to B. bufo, 2) members of Ranidae and Rhacophoridae have equal intimacy for B. bufo, and 3) Cynops pyrrhogaster is most distantly related to B. bufo. By contrasting arcs obtained in non-identity reaction and those obtained in homologous reaction, it was found that toad, B. bufo carried 22 antigens, and among these antigens, one was observed through all amphibians tested, 12 were carried solely by toad, and some of the remainders were common to antigens carried by various frogs. Newts carrid only one antigen common to toad. Based on these results, the phylogeny of Japanese amphibia was discussed.


OF DISSERTATION IMPACT OF SHORT MEDITATION ON ATTENTIONAL PERFORMANCE Meditation describes a large variety of traditions that all include the conscious focus of attention. By maintaining attention, meditators experience both acute and longterm changes in physiology, anatomy, and cognitive performance. The type of performance benefit is believed to depend, at least in part, on the specific type of mental training. What is much less clear in the literature is the impact of a single session of meditation on the brain and how the acute changes could impact performance. Studies in advanced meditators show an increase in neuronal coordination and slowing of neuronal firing across many regions in the brain, but this remains poorly studied in novices. It is also unknown how neural dynamics fluctuate over time during meditation, as most studies have assumed the changes remain relatively constant. To investigate this, non-meditators were taught a simple eyes-closed focused breathing meditation. This technique is common to many meditation traditions and is often used at the start or end of more advanced meditation techniques. Using a within subject design, attention and vigilance were measured using the psychomotor vigilance test (PVT). Novice meditators showed improvement on the PVT with 20 minutes, and even 5-minutes of meditation in a large classroom setting. Using electroencephalography, EEG, the neural dynamics during a single session of 20-minute meditation were investigated. This exploratory analysis also implemented a phase synchronization measure of coherence, mean phase coherence (MPC), which is novel to the meditation field. Results suggest that MPC may have identified regions of high coherence during meditation that are also correlated with improved PVT attentional performance. The results also suggest that meditation is a dynamic neural process that requires more careful analysis into changes over time (across a single meditation bout). Finally, results suggest that "control" conditions need to be more systematically studied, as many conditions may show similar benefits or neural dynamics to meditation.


Tightening legislation for vehicles across the world has caused the use of monolith catalysts in automotive emission control to become ubiquitous. Control of the adherence and homogeneity of the platinum group metal (PGM) coating onto the monolith block, to maximise catalytic performance for a minimum PGM loading, is therefore paramount. In this study, an automatic film application is used for coating γ–alumina slurries onto Fecralloy®, an integral component of metallic monolith catalysts, to achieve the desired coating properties. Upon coating of the Fecralloy® coupons, the samples preoxidised for 10 h gave the best performance in terms of coating loading (7.94 mass %) and adherence (< 10 mass % loss) based on ultrasonic vibration test. These conditions produced the optimal surface topography, typified by conspicuous and randomly-oriented α–alumina whiskers which promote coating adherence. The optimal coating loading and adherence were achieved at a pH of 4 and solids concentrations not exceeding 40 wt%. A newly devised technique using the electromechanical testing system showed that finest particle coatings of 40 wt% solids concentration produced the best coating adherence. At solids concentration of 45 wt% the coating adherence was poor and insensitive to the blends of different particle size distributions.


The armyworm (Pseudaletia unipuncta) was used as a model host insect to explore the influence of agricultural landscape structure at two spatial scales on larval parasitoid species richness and rates of larval parasitism in southern Michigan. First, within fields, we compared parasitoid communities in maize fields near, and distant from, a hedge- row edge. Second, we replicated these studies within a complex landscape (agricultural fields of small size embedded in a landscape with abundant hedgerows and woodlots) vs. a simple landscape (agricultural fields of large size embedded in a landscape with few hedgerows and woodlots). The structural differences between the simple and complex agricultural landscapes were characterized by analysis of aerial photographs and digital land-use data. After landscape analysis, three maize fields from each area were selected for the experimental studies. The complex landscape contained fields that were 75% smaller, had 63% more perimeter of wooded field edge per hectare of field area, and had 81% more field edge in wide hedgerow than fields in the simple landscape. Fields in the simple landscape had 74% and 53% more field edge in herbaceous roadside and crop-to-crop interfaces, respectively, than did fields in the complex landscape. In the six selected maize fields, third and fifth instar P. unipuncta were released indi- vidually onto maize plants 5 m and 90 m from a hedgerow edge. Larvae were recovered after 4-5 d and reared in the laboratory to record parasitoid emergence. Parasitoid species diversity was similar in both landscape types (simple landscape: four species; complex landscape: five species). Mean percentage parasitism was significantly higher in the complex landscape than in the simple landscape (13. 1% vs. 2.4%) but was not affected by the location within fields (near hedgerows vs. distant from hedgerows) in either landscape type.


After extensive work spanning more than half a century, liposomes have crossed the chasm and emerged as a prominent candidate in mainstream drug delivery. Post the historic launch of the first liposome-based drug, it is in the last three decades when liposome technology has slowly transformed from a research apparatus to a versatile drug carrier system influencing many biomedical areas. Liposomes have the ability to deliver a drug to a target site with the least amount of systemic toxicity by overcoming hurdles of cellular and tissue uptake, stabilizing therapeutic compounds, and improving biodistribution. They have been investigated for diverse applications such as treatment of cancer, delivery of gene and vaccine, treatment of lung and skin diseases, treatment of tumours, and imaging tumours at the site of infection. They are leading present-day smart delivery systems due to their flexible biophysical and physicochemical properties, which permit easy control to address different delivery concerns. This review will discuss various advances and updates in liposome-assisted drug delivery and the current clinical use of liposomes for biomedical applications.


The soybean cyst nematode (SCN), Heterodera glycines Ichinohe, is a destructive pest of soybean, Glycine max (L.) Merr. Field research was conducted at Waseca and Lamberton, MN, from 1996 through 1999 to evaluate the effect of crop sequence on SCN population density and on crop yields. Cropping sequence treatments were (i) monocultures of corn (Zea mays L.), SCN-resistant soybean, and SCN-susceptible soybean; (ii) susceptible soybean rotated with 1, 2, or 3 yr of corn; (iii) resistant soybean rotated annually with corn; and (iv) rotation of corn-resistant soybean-corn-susceptible soybean. Egg density was determined at sowing and harvest, and crop yields were determined each year. In general, yields of resistant soybean were higher than susceptible soybean. Resistant soybean in annual rotation with corn produced the highest yield, and susceptible soybean in monoculture produced the lowest yield among all treatments. A longer period of corn in rotation resulted in higher yield of subsequent susceptible soybean in most instances. Yields of corn following corn were lower than following soybean. Egg density at the start of the study was 6994 and 14 000 eggs 100 cm -3 soil at Waseca and Lamberton, respectively. Average Pf/Pi (egg density at harvest/egg density at sowing) was 0.59 (0.23-0.86) for corn, 0.49 (0.21-0.73) for resistant soybean, and 3.3 (0.74-9.91) for susceptible soybean for all treatments at the two sites across the 4-yr period. After 3 yr of corn, egg density decreased to 889 and 3695 eggs 100 cm -3 soil at Waseca and Lamberton, respectively. Annual rotation of resistant soybean and corn resulted in the lowest SCN population density and produced the highest yield of both crops.


The paper outlines a cultural–psychological interpretation of the current European societies' socio-institutional crisis. To this end, preliminarily, the cultural psychological view of social behaviour is outlined, focusing on the idea that socio-political choices depend on how people make sense of their world. Second, the paper provides an interpretation of the current socio-political European scenario of crisis, based on the main results of a recent study that has mapped the cultural dynamics underpinning some European countries. The interpretation focuses on two complementary facets: on the one hand, the lack of symbolic resources (defined: semiotic capital) enabling people to perceive the collective dimension of life as a lived, subjectively relevant fact of experience; on the other hand, the relevance of a cultural form (defined: paranoid belongingness) that channels a trajectory of sensemaking consisting of the affective connotation of otherness in terms of threat and enemy. Third, the paper deepens the interplay between these cultural dynamics and the social, political and economic conditions that may have been triggered by them. In that perspective, the function of semiotic regulation played by the enemization of the other is highlighted. The conclusive part of the work is devoted to discuss implications the analysis suggests for policy makers.


Background: Cognitive dysfunction, a distressing outcome of mental-health disorders (MHDs), hinders an individual's occupational performance (OP). OP is the outcome of dynamic interaction between a person, their unique environment and occupation. With only pharmacological treatment, symptom reduction was not in pace with the recovery rate of cognitive and OP dysfunction resulting persistence of these dysfunctions even post-hospital discharge. Hence, occupational therapy (OT) intervention before discharge would be required, for patient's functioning at premorbid level postdischarge. However, till date, very few Indian studies on the effect of OT on cognition and OP in individuals with MHDs are done with under-representation of the client population. Objectives: To study the effect of OT on cognitive functions and OP in hospitalized patients with MHDs. Study Design: A single-arm interventional study was conducted. Methods: Based on the selection criteria, 88 patients who were (aged 18–55 years) diagnosed with MHDs and were admitted in the hospital were enrolled after screening during their first visit to OT department using the purposive sampling method. Participants recruited were categorized into diagnostic groups: schizophrenia, neurotic disorders, mood disorders, and alcohol-substance use disorders for data analysis. Patients were assessed on Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and comprehensive OT evaluation (COTE) scale pre- and post-therapy after 3 weeks, i.e. after 6 sessions. Cognitive-OP focused-OT intervention was given twice a week. Results: The descriptive data analysis showed an increase in performance posttherapy for all subtests (except Language-praxis subtest in Group-Neurotic Disorders) and overall scores of both assessments in all the groups. Total MMSE performance both pre- and post-therapy was better than total COTE performance in all the groups. Posttherapy, maximum improvement was observed in Recall among MMSE subtests and in Task-behavior among COTE subtests across all groups. Inferential data analysis showed highly significant improvement posttherapy for total MMSE and total COTE scores (P < 0.01, 95% confidence interval: Groups: schizophrenia [(−3.218, −2.302) and (15.991, 18.329)], neurotic disorders [(−3.169, −1.631) and (13.230, 18.970)], mood disorders [(−3.100, −1.650) and (15.095, 19.155)] and Group: alcohol and substance-use disorders [(−4.210, −1.456) and (17.855, 22.47)] respectively). Conclusion: OT intervention is effective in improving cognitive and OP in hospitalized patients with MHDs.


New field mapping has discovered numerous sections of pillow lavas with hyaloclastites at the lowest levels of Jurassic Karoo volcanic sequences across Lesotho and South Africa. Vesicularity (content and size) and geochemistry of the ca. 1 to 50 m thick pillow lavas sequences presently preserved at 1 670 to 2 150 m asl reveal they originated below 500 m of water. Most of the initial 87Sr/86Sr ratios of the pillow lavas scatter around ca. 0.708, which is also the value of Jurassic seawater. There is an increase in the δ18O values concomitantly with increasing alteration, a well-known feature at low-temperature when marine basalts alter to high-δ18O bearing minerals, such as clays and zeolites, stripping 18O by mass balance from seawater. This feature, combined with element behavior of the most altered samples, as well as the Sr-isotope signatures, suggest that the Karoo pillow lavas and hyaloclastites most likely altered under low-temperature conditions in seawater.
 Geochemistry of the major oxides and trace elements of the Karoo pillow lavas reveal they define tholeiitic basalt with minor basaltic andesite. The pillow lavas define Th/Yb-ratios well above the mantle array indicating derivation from subduction-related components, and their Ti-V relations are similar to mid-oceanic ridge basalt (MORB). The Nd-Sr isotope data for the pillow lavas indicate that the primary magma assimilated ca. 10 to 15% of continental crust. This is consistent with knowledge from mapping that sills and dykes cover close to 50% of the surface geology surrounding the sub-horizontal pillow lava sequences, and from drill-cores that these dolerites reached a minimum crustal depth of ca. 6 km below Jurassic sea level.
 The Karoo pillow lavas erupted between 186 and 184 Ma in relatively deep seawater of a possible rift system linked to fragmented continental lithosphere surrounded by ocean spreading domains, such as at the open-end of the East African rift across the Afar. By 183 Ma, Karoo volcanics extruded above sea level and after 182 Ma the pillow lavas were uplifted by at least 1 700 m. Thereafter, during farther up warping across the Karoo Large Igneous Province (KLIP), lavas across Lesotho reached heights over 3 500 masl by 140 Ma, and then eroded to their near present heights around 120 to 100 Ma as determined through a number of thermo-chronology and offshore sedimentation analyses. Thus, unlike the volcanics of the Ethiopian LIP, which erupted across continental crust at 2 000 masl ca. 30 to 40 million years prior to extensional tectonism across the Afar triple junction, KLIP reached its highest topography ca. 30 to 40 Myrs after early initiation across a triple junction system well-below sea level. This difference in timing between crustal extension and epeirogeny has implications for geodynamic and geochemical models that trace dispersal across southern Gondwana between Africa and Antarctica.


This paper proposes a new converter protection method, primarily based on a series reactor which avoids the doubly-fed induction generator being disabled by crowbar protection during fault conditions. The series reactor shows high impedance under "fault frequency" and low impedance under "normal frequency", which makes it limit fault current effectively. A combined robust demagnetization control scheme which doesn't rely on system parameter is also discussed here. The analysis indicates that the induced series reactor also accelerates the damping of dc stator flux. In order to validate the proposed strategy, simulations have been carried out, and the result shows that the proposed system could survive grid fault without crowbar.


There are many participants in the tourism network who have vested interests in tourism development. These organizations include hotels, associations of hotels and hotel owners, inbound travel agents, travel wholesalers, tourism industry associations, airlines, cruise lines, tourism promotional agencies, regional and local tourism authorities, SME tourism businesses, conference and convention centres and many more. Individuals in the tourism industry intermittently change employment. They often remain in the industry and can move between types of organizations. Their contacts, associations and personal networks remain useful and indeed are utilized. The Interactive Approach postulated by the IMP Group proposes that both suppliers and manufacturers are often involved in close, long-lasting adaptive relationships. Firms within relationships must work together, share objectives, share information and also communicate clearly and precisely using a common language. Here relationship partners should have a similar point of view on the meaning of marketing strategy and related concepts including market segmentation, differentiation and competitive positioning. This paper seeks to assess the nature, perspectives and characteristics of interactions in the tourism network in Australia. There are two stages of this research. The first stage obtained the perspectives of network participants on the challenges facing tourism, key growth segments, brand and promotional strategies and customer insights and satisfaction levels. Participants were also asked to provide advice to the national marketing organization on a range of developmental topics. The second stage of this research assesses the interaction patterns among network participants Network picture, network position, resource constellations, interaction, resources and activities, interdependence, adaptation, actor bonds, strategy and change are also assessed. The relationships are political and consultative in nature. There is much interdependence and possible conflict between the network participants. The national tourism body has particular skills in tourism planning and tourism research. They also have significant resources and the ability to influence inbound tourism patterns. This paper seeks to assess and understand the interactions within this network.


Francisco de Miranda (March 28, 1750, Caracas, Venezuela—July 14, 1816, La Carraca, Spain) was a Spanish American revolutionary who after a career in the Spanish Army from 1783 devoted his life to the cause of Spanish American independence. The various designs of Miranda in the 1780s–1800s were founded upon the idea of a military liberation expedition to Spanish America led by him and organized with the support of a power (Great Britain, United States, France) in conflict with Spain that would then foment existing discontent and lead to a wide-scale revolt and independence. Though these plans failed, as did his attempt to organize an expedition from New York without the support of any power (1805–1807), in 1810 the revolution in Spanish America started without his participation as a consequence of the Napoleonic invasion of Spain. Miranda was called to Caracas and eventually led the short-lived First Venezuelan Republic in 1812. After its defeat he spent the last years of his life in Spanish jails. Miranda's failure influenced the South American revolutionaries who adopted the tactics of unconditional warfare against the Spanish troops from 1813.
 A shrewd and sophisticated expert in world affairs and political intrigues and an acclaimed military commander, Miranda was persistently trying to use the conflicts between great powers to achieve his goal though he knew that these powers' leaders were eager to use him as a trump card against the Spanish Empire in their geopolitical games. His contacts ranged from US Founding Fathers, British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger and Viscount Melville to the Prussian king Friedrich II and the Russian empress Catherine II. He was a respected peer in the high society of the European "republic of letters" in the Age of Enlightenment. In the United States his friends belonged to the Federalist Party, which represents an interesting phenomenon since Federalists are usually viewed as being generally skeptical toward foreign revolutions. In Spanish America Miranda's ideas received no support until 1810–1812, as his failed expedition clearly shows—this is an excellent example of the interplay between "evental history" (histoire évenémentielle) and the longue durée, demonstrating how fast and unpredictable radical historical change may be. In spite of this long political solitude, Miranda entered the Spanish American symbolic pantheon as the precursor of independence.


Capital adequacy is very crucial in determining the level of risk absorption in banking institution. This issue has been discussed widely as it is an important yardstick to portray the whole picture of banking performance. Therefore this study investigates the financial performance and economic impact on capital adequacy ratio of regional bank in Japan. Five variables represent economic performance are unemployment rate, inflation rate, real exchange rate, money supply and gross domestic product, while financial performance of regional banks consists 6 variables namely deposit to asset ratio , return on asset, return on equity, total asset, total deposit and total loans. 64 regional banks were tested and covered the period of 10 years from 2005 to 2014. Secondary data were composed from World Bank data and individual financial statement of regional banks. Panel regression analysis was deployed In order to measure the relationship between capital adequacy and each variable. Keywordscapital adequacy ratio, financial ratio, financial performance.


In order to find new effective HIV protease inhibitors, two diterpenes (carnosic acid [1] and carnosol [5]) were isolated from rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis L.), and rosmanol [2] and semisynthetic derivatives (7-O-methylrosmanol [3], 7-O-ethylrosmanol [4], and 11,12-O,O-dimethylcarnosol [6]) were prepared. The inhibitory activity of all six compounds against HIV-1 protease was tested. The carnosic acid [1] showed the strongest inhibitory effect (IC90 = 0.08 micrograms/ml). The same compound was also assayed against HIV-1 virus replication (IC90 = 0.32 micrograms/ml). The cytotoxic TC90 on H9 lymphocytes was 0.36 micrograms/ml, which is very close to the effective antiviral dose. Additionally, the tested compounds did not inhibit cellular aspartic proteases cathepsin D and pepsin at the concentration range up to 10 micrograms/ml [corrected].


We investigated the interaction between transient change in the local structure of gastrocnemius muscle fibers and the segmented leg motor responses elicited by toes-up rotation of the support surface. The gastrocnemius muscle in healthy young subjects underwent a sustained 2-min. isometric stretch (Prestretch group), followed immediately by the rotations. Analysis showed that the prestretch affected the amplitude of the monosynaptic but not the automatic components of the medial gastrocnemius muscle responses (monosynaptic response: 93 ±20% of the mean of the last three rotations in the Prestretch group compared to 174 ± 42% in the Control group; automatic response: 128 ± 18% in the Prestretch group versus 123 ± 31% in the Control group). The shortened tibialis anterior muscle response and the onset latencies of responses were not affected by prestretching the gastrocnemius muscle. The prestretch effect on the amplitude of the monosynaptic (mediated by group la afferents) but not the automatic gastrocnemius muscle response (mediated by group II afferents) suggests that the automatic component of the muscle response to platform rotations has a stronger supraspinal influence than the monosynaptic response and is thus less affected by local events such as prolonged stretching.


Rhyacophila lobifera Betten, 1934 has been previously documented in the upper Midwest states of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, and the province of Ontario. Here we report on the diversity of this species in the Rouge and Huron River watersheds using DNA barcode-verified identifications to confirm the first known Michigan record of this species, with collection from the lower Rouge River in 2003 and again in 2008. Since first detection, we document that the range of R. lobifera in the Rouge River watershed has expanded to include at least one additional site on the Lower Branch and five sites on the Middle Branch (Johnson Creek), as well three sites in the neighboring Huron River watershed. Our sequence analysis of the mitochondrial COI barcode gene region suggests a fine scale population structure in these watersheds, with haplotype partitioning congruent with proposed dispersal patterns based on first records at each site. Ranking as a 4 on the Hilsenhoff's biotic index—an intermediate level of water quality tolerance, discovery of R. lobifera in an urbanized southeast Michigan watershed is not unexpected, but population genetic patterns lend insight into its recent range expansion.


The scope of this study was to show the cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the Health and Taste Attitude Scale in Portuguese. The methodology included translation of the scale; evaluation of conceptual, operational and item-based equivalence by 14 experts and 51 female undergraduates; semantic equivalence and measurement assessment by 12 bilingual women by the paired t-test, the Pearson correlation coefficient and the coefficient intraclass correlation; internal consistency and test-retest reliability by Cronbach's alpha and intraclass correlation coefficient, respectively, after application on 216 female undergraduates; assessment of discriminant and concurrent validity via the t-test and Spearman's correlation coefficient, respectively, in addition to Confirmatory Factor and Exploratory Factor Analysis. The scale was considered adequate and easily understood by the experts and university students and presented good internal consistency and reliability (µ 0.86, ICC 0.84). The results show that the scale is valid and can be used in studies with women to better understand attitudes related to taste.


Studies to evaluate the practice of irrigating alternate furrows in cotton were conducted for two years on a sandy laom soil at the U. S. Cotton Research Station, Shafter. With an alternate-furrow irrigation system, soil moisture used by the plant before irrigating is replenished on only one side of the row at the time of irrigation. This system provides a more sensitive means of regulating plant water stress, which can be of help in controlling the vegetative growth rate of the plant. However, since the entire soil zone is not all used for water storage, care must be exercised to avoid excessive water stress. Total lint yields for alternate-furrow test plots were as good or better than yields for regular furrow irrigation, and with considerable less water used.


Five-axis machine tools with two additional rotational degrees of freedom provide more flexibility in tilting the tool axis to various orientations than conventional three-axis machine tools do, subsequently increasing the cutting efficiency and avoiding tool collision against a workpiece. Also, the risk of programming error can be avoided by simulating the five-axis Numerical Control (NC) code before real machining. This work presents a five-axis machine tool cutting simulation system with a nonorthogonal linear axis configuration. A window-based cutting system written by Borland C++ Builder and OpenGL is also developed based on the kinematics model of the proposed machine tool. Furthermore, implementing and verifying the five-axis NC code demonstrates the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.


It is well-established that the attention of alcoholics compared with non alcoholics or social drinkers, is captured more by alcohol related than by neutral stimuli. This phenomenon is defined as an attentional bias for alcohol cues. This report focuses on whether attentional bias, commonly found in dependent alcoholics, can be generalised to non-dependent social drinkers.

Binge drinking university students will be compared with non-binge drinkers of the same university population. Participants' eye movements to alcohol-related and control pictures were monitored during a visual probe task where attentional bias was determined from both the eye movement data and latencies in responding to the probe. Questionnaires were also used to examine relations among attention and two general motivation systems.

The results failed to support the hypothesis that binge social drinkers display an enhanced attentional bias towards alcohol related stimuli compared with non-binge social drinkers. Nevertheless, interestingly a significant perceptual direction bias for the left visual field across all participants was found indicating a potential scanning effect. Also, a significant generic slow down of reaction time responses across all groups for alcohol trials indicated a potential emotional Stroop effect.

The results show that binge and non-binge sub types of social drinkers may not be as experimentally comparable to other sub categories of social drinking as originally thought. This suggests that research into attentional bias for specific sub groups of social drinkers should be cautious when generalising the findings to all social drinkers.


Summary The effect of desmopressin (DDAVP) on reducing postoperative blood loss after cardiac surgery has been studied in several randomized clinical trials, with conflicting outcomes. Since most trials had insufficient statistical power to detect true differences in blood loss, we performed a meta-analysis of data from relevant studies. Seventeen randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials were analyzed, which included 1171 patients undergoing cardiac surgery for various indications; 579 of them were treated with desmopressin and 592 with placebo. Efficacy parameters were blood loss volumes and transfusion requirements. Desmopressin significantly reduced postoperative blood loss by 9%, but had no statistically significant effect on transfusion requirements. A subanalysis revealed that desmopressin had no protective effects in trials in which the mean blood loss in placebo-treated patients fell in the lower and middle thirds of distribution of blood losses (687-1108 ml/24 h). In contrast, in trials in which the mean blood loss in placebo-treated patients fell in the upper third of distribution (>1109 ml/24 h), desmopressin significantly decreased postoperative blood loss by 34%. Insufficient data were available to perform a sub-analysis on transfusion requirements. Therefore, desmopressin significantly reduces blood loss only in cardiac operations which induce excessive blood loss. Further studies are called to validate the results of this meta-analysis and to identify predictors of excessive blood loss after cardiac surgery.


The effects of 4-cyano and 3-cyano substituents on the spectroscopic properties and photoacidity of 3- and 4-hydroxystilbene have been investigated. In nonpolar solvents, the 3-hydroxycyanostilbenes have much longer singlet lifetimes and larger fluorescence quantum yields than do the 4-hydroxycyanostilbenes. The longer lifetimes of 3-hydroxystilbene and its cyano derivatives are attributed to a "meta effect" on the stilbene torsional barrier, similar to that previously observed for the aminostilbenes. The cyano substituent causes a marked increase in both ground state and excited-state acidity of the hydroxystilbenes in aqueous solution. The dynamics of excited-state proton transfer in methanol-water solution have been investigated by means of femtosecond time-resolved transient absorption spectroscopy. Assignment of the transient absorption spectra is facilitated by comparison to the spectra of the corresponding potassium salts of the conjugate bases and the methyl ethers, which do not undergo excited-state proton transfer. The 4-cyanohydroxystilbenes undergo excited-state proton transfer with rate constants of 5 x 10(11) s(-1). These rate constants are comparable to the fastest that have been reported to date for a hydroxyaromatic photoacid and approach the theoretical limit for water-mediated proton transfer. The isotope effect for proton transfer in deuterated methanol-water is 1.3 +/- 0.2, similar to the isotope effect for the dielectric response of water. The barrier for excited state double bond torsion of the conjugate bases is small for 4-cyano-4-hydroxystilbene but large for 4-cyano-3-hydroxystilbene. Thus the "meta effect" is observed for the singlet states of both the neutral and conjugate base.


Aim: This case report presents a root canal retreatment distinguished by a canal perforation successfully treated with a calcium-silicate based sealer (EndoSequence BC sealer, Brasseler USA, Savannah, GA, USA) with a 4 year follow-up.
Summary: Root canal retreatment of a lower left second molar was performed in 80 years old patient because of a periapical chronic periodontitis with buccal fistula. The scouting of the mesio-lingual and distal canal was obtained with a k-file #10, while the mesio-buccal was not negotiable because of a perforation in the middle third of the root. Instrumentation of patent root canal was performed and the distal canal was filled with AH Plus (Dentsply DeTrey GmbH, Konstanz, Germany) and Thermafil Obturator (Dentsply Maillefer, Ballaigues, Switzerland) whereas the mesial canals and the per foration were sealed using EndoSequence BC Sealer and dedicated EndoSequence BC Points in order to perform a successive apical surgery. The improvement of clinical conditions and, successively, the gradual bone healing, confirmed with analogical radiographs, led to avoid the complicated endodontic surgery on this lower second molar, having already an acceptable clinical success.
Key Learning Points: This case report confirmed the favorable physical and biological properties of calcium-silicate based sealers and, most of all, the handling properties of the EndoSequence BC sealer. In selected cases these type of sealers might lead to resolve complex treatments without using specialistic equipments like microscope and help general clinicians to approach complicated endodontic cases in an easier way.


This paper presents a research work within Collaborative Research Centre 653 "Gentelligent Components in Their Lifecycle". The term "gentelligent" refers to the genetic and intelligent character of these components. Specific data are inherently saved in the components which are used during its lifecycle for the means of identification, processing and reproduction. The presented study aims for the development of a method to manufacture and utilize gentelligent sintered parts. As data carrier, foreign materials shaped in fonts, logos or codes, are embedded in the powder material proceeded by pressing and sintering processes. The foreign material can be applied in forms of particles or compound powder. The information read-out is based on radiographic methods. The objectives of the investigations are the determination of the process parameters of each method and the impact of the integrated foreign materials on the mechanical properties of the component. The experimental studies are supported by numerical simulations.


As more female and first generation college students (FGN) embrace higher-education – business in particular, and also as online learning gains more traction there is a need to explore the factors that drive the academic success of these learners. Online learners, female students and FGN all share a common bond, i.e. reduced social support. This study examines whether reduced social support – caused by technical (Internet/Online), cultural (females) and social (FGN) factors could have a parallel dampening, or other, influence on the impact of learning processes on learning outcomes for these students. The study relies on the 3P model of student learning to integrate diverse theories which substantiate reduced social support for these demographics, such as Media Richness for online learners, Stereotypes for females, and Social and Cultural Capital theories for FGN students. Data were collected from students enrolled in various business courses in a Midwestern University and analyzed using the Structural Equation Modeling approach.


The International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements IFOAM, the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture FiBL, Frick, and Foundation Ecology and Agriculture SOEL have been providing global organic farming statistics annually since 2000. In the framework of the survey the current number of farms and organic agricultural land is collected, and since the 2006 edition land use details have been included. It is planned to expand the data collection to other variables. The data are published annually in the yearbook 'The World of organic Agriculture' of which both IFOAM and FiBL are the publishers. The 2008 edition is also published by Earthscan, London, as a hardcover book.
Even though in many countries the data availability has improved considerably since 2000, when the data collection was started, there are still major problems associated to data collection in many countries, particularly in countries which do not have a legislation on organic farming and where there is little public interest in such data. In these countries, data collection is carried out by the private sector who does not always have access to the full data and not always the resources to process the data.
This workshop aims to
- Present existing models of data collection based on activities of the private sector
- A) Data based on information inspection bodies: Opportunities and problems
- B) Data based in information of the operators (exporters): Opportunities and problems
- Data classification: Land use data, production data, market data
- Outlook

The data collectors who support the global organic survey will be invited to this workshop, but it will be open to all participants of the IFOAM Organic World Congress.

Speakers will be invited from a) inspection bodies and b) private sector representatives who collate data either from inspection bodies or operators. The workshop organisers will present their experiences with global data collection and processing.


This study as other previous studies find that theory puts has a higher consequence as outcome arising from preexisting structural characteristic. Also there is clear evidence that complexity is the most predominate, enhance, this study aims to examine the performance of merger –acquisition of organization as it involves the pre-established structural specific characteristic, as team behavior, infrastructure support, organization complexity, enhance the effect task structure, and motivation, also the willingness to share information and cultural unification. The extent to which the organizational provides infrastructure of firms support is also quite in adequate levels, and expected to have a positive correlation with the post merger outcomes for the Jordanian companies. Individuals- willingness to have the information is in the lowest level of association with the performance and integration of the organization. Counterintutively, the analyzed leading to a cohesive of behavioral theory of the post merger, and has a paves away of the scholar to study and applied the integration dynamics and using mathematical models which can be tailored as a specific circumstances.