In the first part, the thesis examines the influence of sex on prostanoid formation. Prostaglandins (PG) are generated by cyclooxygenase (COX)-1/2, which convert arachidonic acid (AA) to PGH2 which is further metabolized to distinct PGs by terminal synthases. Recent findings suggest a sex biased regulation in animals. Hence, the regulation of the prostanoid formation in male and female human whole blood and freshly isolated cells was evaluated. Analysis of human blood cells showed higher lymphocyte and neutrophil numbers in females, whereas monocyte numbers were higher in males and long term incubations of whole blood resulted in significantly enhanced levels of PGs in males. The elevated formation in males was not influenced by pre-incubation with sex hormones, independent of COX-1/2 protein and COX-2 mRNA expression and of AA release in leukocytes. In contrast, the involvement of the 15-prostaglandin dehydrogenase and of transcellular interactions of isolated leukocytes could be shown. In the second part, potential 5-lipoxygenase (5-LO) inhibitors were evaluated. Leukotrienes (LT) are bioactive lipid mediators, which are biosynthesized involving 5-LO catalyzing the incorporation of molecular oxygen into AA. Out of three distinct series of potential 5-LO inhibitors, the two most potent compounds F-XII and F-XVI were analyzed in detail. Both compounds showed potent inhibition of 5-LO with IC50 values in the nanomolar range in cell-based and cell-free preparations (F-XII = 70 - 100 nM; F-XVI = 60 - 120 nM). 5-LO inhibition was direct, reversible and not primarily mediated due to radical scavenging and antioxidant properties. Docking simulations proposed binding to the amino acid Asp-166, which is involved in a salt bridge connecting the two domains of 5-LO. Furthermore, inhibition of 5-LO was independent of interference with cellular signals required for the 5-LO activation and were confirmed in human whole blood and in zymosan-induced peritonitis in mice.


Inhibition of non-immune progression of renal insufficiency for control of glomerulonephritis was attempted via hemodynamic, metabolic and hypolipidemic means. Hemodynamic correction was conducted using inhibitors of angiotensin-converting enzyme capoten and renitek. The action on metabolic factors of progression was realized by lovastatin mevakor. Capoten and renitek exhibited in 57 patients with chronic nephritis not only a hypotensive effect, but also reduced intraglomerular hypertension and proteinuria. A long-term (7-12 months) hypolipidemic therapy (diet and lovastatin) in 20 patients with chronic glomerulonephritis with nephrotic syndrome resulted in lowering of serum cholesterol concentrations and proteinuria, raised serum albumin. 9 patients achieved remission of nephrotic syndrome. The highest effect occurred in non-inflammatory nephropathy: membranous nephropathy, focal-segmental glomerulosclerosis, nephrosclerosis.


The aim of my thesis was to assess the relative importance of bottom-up and top-down forces for a plant-herbivore system in a natural multitrophic context. The system consisted of the tall herb Meadowsweet, Filipendula ulmaria (Rosaceae), and the Strawberry leaf beetle Galerucella tenella (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae). I set up a field experiment with four clones of each of 16 genotypes varying in food quality. The four clones of each genet were assigned to one of four G. tenella egg density treatments (10, 20, 40 or 80 eggs). I hypothesized that (1) larval performance increases with plant edibility; (2) larval performance increases at higher larval densities (3) the parasitation rate by the hymenopteran parasitoid Asecodes parviclava increases with increasing larval density and decreasing food quality. The results showed significant relationships between larval density treatment and G. tenella survival (negative), pupal weight (positive), proportion of parasitoids (negative) and generalist predators (positive; for both functional groups "web-forming spiders" and "others"), and plant chewers. Parasitation rate was unaffected by treatments. Otherwise, complex interaction effects dominated and support for my hypotheses was low. Analysis of phenolic compounds, using liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS), showed positive correlations between plant damage and quercetin, and plant quality and catechin. Taken together my study indicates that larval performance is affected by both plant quality and larval density. It is likely that herbivore damage induces release of volatile organic compounds (HI-VOCs), attracting other arthropods. The strength and direction of those interactions will depend upon the composition of the local arthropod community.


Automatic pun generation is an interesting and challenging text generation task. Previous efforts rely on templates or laboriously manually annotated pun datasets, which heavily constrains the quality and diversity of generated puns. Since sequence-to-sequence models provide an effective technique for text generation, it is promising to investigate these models on the pun generation task. In this paper, we propose neural network models for homographic pun generation, and they can generate puns without requiring any pun data for training. We first train a conditional neural language model from a general text corpus, and then generate puns from the language model with an elaborately designed decoding algorithm. Automatic and human evaluations show that our models are able to generate homographic puns of good readability and quality.


We consider a two-period model in which the success of the firm depends on the effort of a first-period manager (the incumbent) and the ability of a second-period manager. At the end of the first period, the board receives a noisy signal of the incumbent manager's ability and decides whether to retain or replace the incumbent manager. We show that the information technology the board has to assess the incumbent manager's ability is an important determinant of the optimal contract and replacement policy. The contract must balance providing incentives for the incumbent manager to exert effort and ensuring that the second-period manager is of high ability. We show that severance pay in the contract serves as a costly commitment device to induce effort. Unlike existing models, we identify conditions on the information structure under which both entrenchment and anti-entrenchment emerge in the optimal contract.


The analysis of examination results and design quality plays a vitally important role in teaching management, greatly helping teachers to perfect teaching, improve teaching quality and enhance proposition quality. Based on the final examination paper of Higher Mathematics (2) in the second term of 2009-2010 school year of Shandong Jiaotong University, this thesis makes a qualitative and quantitative analysis from the perspective of difficulty, discrimination and credibility, etc., concluding the indexes of the above factors in the exam paper. It then makes a rounded analysis of exam design quality and points out some problems in exam design, providing some beneficial enlightenment for future teaching.


OBJECTIVE
This retrospective study compares the perioperative outcomes of laparoscopic simple nephrectomy (LSN) in patients with urinary stone disease (USD) in comparison with LSNs performed for other etiological factors.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
115 LSNs were identified from the two teaching hospitals' database. Depending on the etiological factors, patients were stratified in 2 groups. Group 1 consisted of 63 (mean age 44.8±1.7 [21-71] years) patients; where the cause of non-functioning kidney was USD. Meanwhile, Group 2 included 52 (mean age was 43.6±2.0 [19-78] years) patients; who underwent LSN because of other benign diseases. In both groups, a standardized transabdominal or retroperitoneal approach was used according to the discretion of the attending surgeon. Two groups were compared statistically in terms of perioperative parameters and standardized surgical complications.

RESULTS
The use of transperitoneal approach was higher in Group 1 (69.8% vs. 30.2%) compared to Group 2 (51.9% vs. 48.1%). Elective open conversion was needed in 3 and 2 patients in Groups 1 and 2, respectively. The results for mean operative time (108.9±4.0 min vs. 106.7±5.0), estimated blood loss (92.5±8.2 vs. 86.8±10.1 mL) and length of hospital stay (4.1±0.33 vs. 3.85±0.42 days) were similar between the groups. Despite intraoperative complications were similar between the groups, overall post-operative complications were significantly higher (17.5% vs. 3.8%) in Group 1. However, the rate of significant complications (Clavien 3-5) was similar between the groups.

CONCLUSION
The present study revealed that perioperative outcomes of patients undergoing LSN for USD are similar to those seen in patients undergoing LSN for other etiological factors.


The Onduo Virtual Diabetes Clinic (VDC) for people with type 2 diabetes (T2D) combines a mobile app, remote lifestyle coaching, connected devices, and live video consultations with board-certified endocrinologists. Adults with T2D (n = 594) who were evaluated by a VDC endocrinologist, remotely prescribed and mailed a real-time continuous glucose monitoring (rtCGM) device and used ≥1 sensor completed a CGM satisfaction questionnaire. The CGM satisfaction score was 4.5 ± 0.8 out of 5. Most respondents (94.7%) agreed/strongly agreed that they were comfortable inserting the sensor remotely and that rtCGM use improved understanding of the impact of eating (97.0%), increased diabetes knowledge (95.7%), and helped improve diabetes control when not wearing the sensor (79.4%). HbA1c (n = 372) decreased from 7.7% ± 1.6% to 7.1% ± 1.2% (P < 0.001; 10.2 months). These data suggest that it is feasible to provide rtCGM directly to individuals with T2D through a VDC without in-office training. Intermittent use of rtCGM was well-received by adults with T2D and was associated with improvement in HbA1c.


The aim of this study is to find out the optimum operating conditions in a diesel engine fueled with compressed biogas (CBG) and pilot diesel dual-fuel. One-dimensional (1D) and three-dimensional (3D) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code and multiobjective optimization code were employed to investigate the influence of CBG-diesel dual-fuel combustion performance and exhaust emissions on a diesel engine. In this paper, 1D engine code and multiobjective optimization code were coupled and evaluated about 15000 cases to define the proper boundary conditions. In addition, selected single diesel fuel (dodecane) and dual-fuel (CBG-diesel) combustion modes were modeled to compare the engine performances and exhaust emission characteristics by using CFD code under various operating conditions. In optimization study, start of pilot diesel fuel injection, CBG-diesel flow rate, and engine speed were optimized and selected cases were compared using CFD code. CBG and diesel fuels were defined as leading reactants using user defined code. The results showed that significantly lower NOx emissions were emitted under dual-fuel operation for all cases compared to single-fuel mode at all engine load conditions.


The research referenced in this paper falls into the categories of qualitative, empirical, non-experimental action research, as well as ethnographic and art-based research. The target population consists of students enrolled in senior years of primary school and students of general secondary schools (gymnasiums). The research sample included 425 primary school and gymnasium students, and the empirical research put emphasis on qualitative methods and data collection through systematic observation, interviews and content analysis of student art projects. Since arts education in school is inherently creative, it is marked by significant characteristics of constructivism. Classes of this kind seek to overcome the shortcomings of minimal hours through the benefits of collaborative learning, project-based learning (PBL), research-based learning (RBL) and action learning, as well as other methodological strategies. In order for students to take a stand towards their own learning and assume responsibility for it, they must recognise meaning in what they are learning and creating. This is why it is necessary to enrich the teaching methods currently used in arts education with the digital media accessible to students. In this paper, constructivism and logopedagogy are considered as particular approaches to learning and arts education. The findings of this empirical research show that arts education can be significantly improved and made more interesting for students by relying on logotherapeutic principles and logopedagogical methods. Key words : action research; arts education; extracurricular activities; project-based education; social networks


A 250-concept list was established for the purposes of an ongoing lexically-based study of Sino-Tibetan. This paper supplies the Old Chinese version of the list, in the Old Chinese reconstruction of Baxter and Sagart 2014. Chinese words attested in pre-Han times were selected based on their meaning as given in major lexica such as the Hànyǔ Dà Zìdiǎn. At times more than one OC item was found to match a concept in the list without it being clear which of the terms was the oldest. In such cases all the candidates were retained. As a result, the Old Chinese version of the list contains 301 words.


NanoStreams is a consortium project funded by the European Commission under its FP7 programme and is a major effort to address the challenges of processing vast amounts of data in real-time, with a markedly lower carbon footprint than the state of the art. The project addresses both the energy challenge and the high-performance required by emerging applications in real-time streaming data analytics. NanoStreams achieves this goal by designing and building disruptive micro-server solutions incorporating real-silicon prototype micro-servers based on System-on-Chip and reconfigurable hardware technologies.


We report the immobilization of the ultrarigid ansa-hafnocene complexes [Me2Si(Ind*)2HfCl2] (Ind* = 7,(3',5'-Di-tert-butylphenyl)-4-methoxy-2-methylindenyl) on silica as heteregeneous catalysts for propene polymerization. A sequential three-step synthesis on the siliceous surface led to pre-catalysts of the generalized structure SiO2-Si(Ind*)2HfCl2, which possess the silylene bridge of the substituted bis(indenyl) ligand directly attached to the surface. The immobilized pre-catalysts show very poor performance in the polymerization of propene, independent on the reaction conditions and the employed silica. Based on the results, we suggest that the close proximity of the catalyst to the surface combined with the steric congestion provoked by the ligand prevents a continuous polymerization, most likely due to a blockage of the catalytically active sites with growing polymer.


Human Computer Interaction (HCI), a growing research field in science and engineering, aims to provide a natural way for humans to use computers as tools. Humans prefer to interact with each other mainly through speech, but also through facial expressions and gestures, for certain parts of the speech and displays of emotions. The identity, age, gender, and emotional state of a person can be obtained from his face. The impression we receive from the expression reflected on the face affects our interpretation of the spoken word and even our attitude towards the speaker himself. Although emotion recognition is an easy task for humans, it still proves to be a difficult task for computers to recognize user`s emotional state. Advances in this area promise to arm our technological environment by means for more effective interactions with humans, and hopefully the impact of facial expressions on cognition will increase rapidly in the future. Will do. In recent years, the adoption of digital has increased rapidly, and the quality has improved significantly. Digital printing has resulted in fast delivery and needs-based costs. This article describes a sophisticated combination classifier approach, an empirical study of ensembles, stacking, and voting. These three approaches were tested on Nave Bayes (NB), Kernel Naive Bayes (kNB), Neural Network (NN), Auto MultiLayer Perceptron (Auto MLP), and Decision Tree (DT), respectively. The main contribution of this paper is the improvement of the classification accuracy of facial expression recognition tasks. In both persondependent and nonpersondependent experiments we showed that using a combination of these classifier combinations gave significantly better results than using individual classifiers. It has been observed from experiments that the overall voting technique by voting achieves the best classification accuracy.


Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine the occupational risks faced by operating room nurses, their working conditions and health problems, and the protective measures adopted. Background: Since operating rooms are high-risk environments, the nurses working in them are exposed to correspondingly greater health risks. Method: This qualitative descriptive study design involved 17 operating room nurses and was performed in a public hospital in Turkey. Data were collected by the author during face-to-face interviews using a semi-structured form constructed on the basis of the study aims. Theme establishment continued until new data emerged from the analysis of all interviews. Data were then subjected to qualitative content analysis. Results: Three main themes were determined in the study, worker safety, working conditions, and training. At interview, operating room nurses reported being exposed to several occupational risks, including radiation, sharp implements, long working hours, and working standing up. They also reported experiencing, or were anxious about encountering in the future, various health problems associated with these risks. They also identified activities associated with education and protective measures as inadequate. Discussion and conclusion: Several occupational risk factors in the operating room environment adversely affect the health of nurses working in the unit. We recommend that standards aimed at protecting against occupational risks be applied on a regular basis in order to preserve the personal health and safety of operating room staff.
Implication for nursing and health policy:
Nurses are responsible for the constant care of their patients under all conditions and environments but may face the risk of compromise of their own health as a result. Training, certification, and nursing policies aimed at protecting the health of employees in clinical settings should be implemented.
What is already known about the topic?
Operating room nurses are known to experience severe health problems arising from their working environment. Many nurses have to cope or live with these health problems.
What this paper adds: The study reveals the need for operating room nursing education programs. It also stresses the importance of legislation and monitoring to ensure a safe working environment for nurses in Turkey.


The purpose of the current article is to summarize the evidence-based medical complications and treatments that are both common and unique to adolescents with anorexia nervosa (AN). Recent literature relating to the cardiovascular complications, refeeding syndrome, alterations in linear growth, impaired bone mineral accretion, and structural and functional brain changes was reviewed. The literature suggests that the medical complications in adolescents with AN are different from those reported in adults. The unique clinical presentation, the early onset, and the unknown impact of these complications underscore the need for early identification and treatment of AN in adolescents. AN is a serious disorder with significant and often life-threatening medical complications. The increasing growth of evidence highlights the importance of early identification and treatment by an interdisciplinary team of health care providers who have expertise in managing adolescents with AN and their medical sequelae.


The field of entrepreneurship has struggled with fundamental questions concerning the subject's nature and purpose. To whom and to what means are educational and training agendas ultimately directed? Such questions have become of central importance to policy makers, practitioners and academics alike. There are suggestions that university business schools should engage more critically with the lived experiences of practising entrepreneurs through alternative pedagogical approaches and methods, seeking to account for and highlighting the social, political and moral aspects of entrepreneurial practice. In the UK, where funding in higher education has become increasingly dependent on student fees, there are renewed pressures to educate students for entrepreneurial practice as opposed to educating them about the nature and effects of entrepreneurship. Government and EU policies are calling on business schools to develop and enhance entrepreneurial growth and skill sets, to make their education and training programmes more proactive in providing innovative educational practices which help and facilitate life experiences and experiential learning. This paper makes the case for critical frameworks to be applied so that complex social processes become a source of learning for educators and entrepreneurs and so that innovative pedagogical approaches can be developed in terms both of context (curriculum design) and process (delivery methods).


The article analyzes the scientific views on the concepts of «legal entity» and «corporation» formed in different legal systems, indicating either the identity of these concepts, or their heterogeneity by deducing a number of common and distinct features. Determined that in the Anglo-American legal system, the corporation is seen as a collective term, which should be understood by business associations and nonbusiness capital entities created to meet social objectives. It is proved that in EU law the concept of «corporation» is not identical with that of a legal entity, although a considerable number of types of legal entities are proposed to be included in the list of legal entities.
In the countries of the continental legal system (France, Germany, Switzerland, Russia, Ukraine, etc.) the term «corporation» is rarely used in the law. This concept is used mainly in literary sources. Corporations include: various types of companies (full and limited partnerships, joint stock companies and other companies, members of which are limited liability for the obligations of the company), business associations (groups, trade unions, holdings, etc.), cooperatives, leases and state-owned enterprises, as well as various non-economic unions and associations.
The main difference between the range of legal entities in the Anglo-American and Continental legal families is that in the first case, the terms «legal entity» and «corporation» are correlated as interchangeable concepts, and in the other case, the possibility of correlation between the concepts of «legal entity» and «corporation» depends on the approach of the legislation of the country to the definition of their organizational and legal forms and the formation in the scientific circles of the criteria for their separation or integration into one or another concept, or the introduction of this concept into the existing legislation of the EU country with a clear list of organizational and legal forms. Therefore, every legal family has their own approaches to the concept of «corporation».


Diabetes inspidius is defined as incapability to focus urine secondary to vasopressin deficiency or to vasopressin resistance which outcome is polyuria. The prevalence of DI is approximately 1:25,000 less than 10% of cases are hereditary naturally. Certainly diabetes inspidius is very infrequent. More than 90% of reported cases are from Central DI (CDI) depending on the cause it can occur at any age. Since now no hereditary prevalence of CDI has been confirmed. Whereas Nephrogenic DI is less resistant than CDI. DI can be defined as CDI or NDI [1]. In the magnocellular neurons of the paraventricular and supraoptic nuclei of the hypothalamus Vasopressin is produced which send axons to the posterior pituitary. The vasopressin is then excreted into the bloodstream via posterior pituitary. The neurons which release vasopressin are damaged in case of CDI. Whereas in case of NDI, there is normal production of vasopressin but at kidney level there is no response of the hormone. At the basolateral membrane of the collecting duct of the kidney Vasopressin acts at V2 receptors. Management of DI in patients requiring intravenous fluids needs further attention as no evidence based studies exist to determine optimal fluid choice and fluid rates. NDI is currently managed with thiazide diuretics; however additional research is necessary to optimize management and promising alternatives are on the horizon.


When creating an asset management plan, missing data is perceived to be a huge problem, especially when the event data (breaks in water distribution pipes as an example) are not tracked. The lack of tracking makes it difficult to determine which factors are the critical ones. Many utilities lack the resources for examining buried infrastructure, so other methods of data collection are needed. The concept for this paper was to develop a means to acquire data on the assets for a condition assessment (buried pipe is not visible and in most cases, cannot really be assessed). What was found was that for buried infrastructure, much more information was known than anticipated. Knowing exact information is not really necessary. However, there was a need to track event-breaks, flooding etc.—what would indicate a "failure". The latter would be useful for predicting future maintenance needs and the most at-risk assets.


The Enterprise Volume Management System (EVMS) brings a new model of volume management to Linux. EVMS integrates all aspects of volume management into a single cohesive package. By introducing a new pluggable architecture, EVMS provides extendibility while ensuring consistency and cooperation across multiple volume management schemes. EVMS consists of two main components, the Runtime, which resides in the kernel and handles discovery and I/O functions, and the Engine, which resides in User Space and handles setup and configuration. Packaged with the Engine are three user interfaces, a GTK based GUI, a command line interpreter, and an ncurses based interface. EVMS borrows from the existing Linux volume management technologies, combining them into a single easy to use package. Imagine being able partition your disk, create mirrors and raid devices, define volume groups and logical volumes, all from one integrated, easy to use interface. With EVMS you can do this and more. EVMS provides immediate benefit to system administrators who wish to get a handle on their storage configurations, as well as less technical users who have not memorized all of the various commands and config files. No more scanning through raidtab files or issuing multiple LVM commands just to find out how a system is configured. Just bring up the EVMS GUI and have all of this information at your fingertips. Not only can you see what disks or partitions make up which volumes, but you can also see if these volumes are formatted or mounted.


Geodetic strain and late Quaternary faulting in the Basin and Range province is distributed over a region much wider than historic seismicity, which is localized near the margins of the province. In the relatively aseismic interior, both the magnitude and direction of geodetic strain may be inconsistent with the Holocene faulting record. We document the best example of such a disagreement across the NE striking, ∼55° NW dipping Crescent normal fault, where a NW oriented, 70 km geodetic baseline records contemporary shortening of ∼2 mm/yr orthogonal to the fault trace. In contrast, our geomorphic, paleoseismic, and geochronologic analyses of the Crescent fault suggest that a large extensional rupture occurred during the late Holocene epoch. An excavation across the fault at Fourmile Canyon reveals that the most recent event occurred at 2.8 ± 0.1 ka, with net vertical tectonic displacement of 4.6 ± 0.4 m at this location, corresponding to the release of ∼3 m of accumulated NW‐SE extension. Measured alluvial scarp profiles suggest a minimum rupture length of 30 km along the range front for the event, implying a moment magnitude Mw of at least 6.6. No prior event occurred between ∼2.8 ka and ∼6.4 ± 0.1 ka, the 14C calender age of strata near the base of the exposed section. Assuming typical slip rates for Basin and Range faults (∼0.3 mm/yr), these results imply that up to one third, or ∼1 m, of the extensional strain released in the previous earthquake could have reaccumulated across the fault since ∼2.8 ka. However, the contemporary shortening implies that the fault is unloading due to a transient process, whose duration is limited to between 6 years (geodetic recording time) and 2.8 ka (the age of the most recent event). These results emphasize the importance of providing accurate geologic data on the timescale of the earthquake cycle in order to evaluate geodetic measurements.


A study on the transmission o fbrugian filariasis has been done in the transmigration area of Kumpeh, in the Province of Jambi. During this study an intensive collection of mosquitoes was done in the transmigration areas as well as two nearby villages. Two methods of collections were used, i.e. landing collection and by CDC light traps. From this study 7 genera consist of 34 species of mosquitoes were cought. Among these mosquitoes there were 5 species of Mansonia known as. the vector of brugian filariasis in these area.


Pyothorax, or thoracic empyema, is an infection of the pleural space, characterized by the accumulation of purulent exudate. It is a life-threatening emergency in dogs as well as in cats, with a guarded prognosis. Dyspnea and/or tachypnea, anorexia and lethargy are the most typical clinical signs. Diagnosis is usually straightforward, based on the clinical symptoms combined with pleural fluid analysis, including cytology and bacterial culture. Most commonly, oropharyngeal flora is isolated in the pleural fluid. Treatment can be medical or surgical, but needs to be immediate and aggressive. In this article, an overview of the various causes of both feline and canine pyothorax with its similarities and differences is provided. Epidemiology, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis are discussed.


Current European energy markets are significantly influenced by a strongly growing share of highly volatile renewable electricity generation, not only changing the absolute level and structure of electricity prices but also leading to an increased demand for conventional generation flexibility to compensate supply and demand variations. Standardised reserve energy products provide an established way to trade such flexibility, however imposing additional operational constraints on the involved generation portfolios. This enforces the ability of utilities to derive values and sensitivities of their asset portfolios subject to external reserve requirements in order to manage market price risks and perform state of the art portfolio optimisation.
In this thesis we adopt the Proxy Simulation Scheme (PSS) method of Fries and Kampen (2007) – originally developed with a focus on fixed income markets – for the rolling intrinsic valuation of stylised power plants subject to complex technical constraints. Thereby we succeed to overcome well known numerical performance issues of standard Monte-Carlo approaches and are able to derive robust Monte-Carlo portfolio sensitivities with respect to the underlying price of electricity of both first and second order (∆ and Γ). We employ electricity prices that are affected by a strong photovoltaic production to take into account the current reality of energy markets in Europe. To our knowledge this application of the PSS methodology to energy related real option valuation has not been presented in academic literature before.
Based on this approach we are able to analyse the impact of technical constraints including minimum up- and down-time and externally imposed reserve requirements on the risk profile of stand-alone power plant options in detail. We confirm the quality of our results via backtesting with a Delta-Gamma hedging framework and a Taylor series approach to replicate single step probability densities of option values via numerically derived sensitivities.
Furthermore we evaluate and discuss a variety of power plant option portfolios including technically more flexible and inflexible portfolios as well as larger and smaller portfolios. Thereby we are able to analyse the impact of reserve requirements on different portfolios allowing us to provide a complete value and risk assessment of varying levels of reserve requirements in each portfolio context.
Finally we compare portfolio results of simplified and numerically more cost efficient option dispatching rules with the full rolling intrinsic approach as applied otherwise throughout this thesis.


Aortic stenosis, the most common valvular disease in the Western world, affects mainly people over age 60. It is characterized by years to decades of slow progression followed by rapid clinical deterioration and a high death rate once symptoms develop. Drug therapy for it remains ineffective, and surgical aortic valve replacement is the only effective long-term treatment. We discuss the indications for this surgery, with an emphasis on controversial conditions in which the indications are less well defined. For some patients with aortic stenosis, the choice of management is simple; for others it is less so.


The correct stratigraphic position of the Ordovician/Silurian boundary sediments as well as the exact boundary between these two systems have not as yet been definitely determined. This is connected with the presence of various fossil groups in the pelagic and neritic facies, which greatly hinders a correlation of profiles. The orthostratigraphic division of the Upper Ordovician and the Lower Silurian is based on graptolites which place the currently accepted Ordovician/Silurian boundary at the bottom of the Glyptograptus persculptus zone. In profiles lacking graptolite remains the biostratigraphy of the border sediments is based on brachio-pods and trilobites which indicate the differentiation of the Hirnantian stage. In non-graptolithic facies the upper boundary of the Ordovician system is placed in the top of the Hirnantian stage. During her studies on the Upper Ordovician of the Łeba elevation the present ,writer has also studied the Ordovician/Silurian boundary sediments in this area and compared them with those from other regions of Poland and from some classical areas of their world occurrence. The sediments of the uppermost Ashgillian in the Łeba elevation are developed as grey mudstonesand-marls of the Mucronaspis mucronata zone with M. mucronata Brongniart, Phillipsinella sp., Hirnantia sagittifera (Davidson), Eostropheodonta hirnantensis (M'Coy), Orbiculoidea sp. In their top there occur black mudstones with graptolites of the Llandoverian Akidograptus ascensus zone. The fauna of the uppermost Ashgillian in the Łeba elevation has many features in common with the Hirnantia fauna of Wales. Movements connected with the Taconian phase of the Caledonian orogeny are responsible for distinct facial changes throughout Poland. The muddy-marly Ashgillian deposits, bearing a benthonic fauna of trilobites and brachiopods, have practically everywhere been replaced by mudstones and black muddy shales with a rich Silurian graptolite fauna. Here and there on the Ordovician/Silurian boundary there are. sedimentary lacunae, however, only of a local significance. As a rule the sediments of the M. mucronata zone are in contact with rocks of the Llandoverian Akidograptus ascensus or A. acuminatus zones. During the recent years the occurrence has been noted in various regions of the world (S Kazakhstan, the Perce district in Canada, Meifod-WelshpooI in Wales) of the Llandoverian G. persculptus zone together with the Hirnantian trilobites and brachiopods. This might reasonably suggest that the two stratigraphic units may, . at least partly, be regarded of the same age. On this assumption the top of the Hirnantian would correspond to the bottom of the A. ascensus zone. Two conceptions are now currently accepted for the Ordovician/Silurian boundary: a. In the bottom of sediments with a fauna in common, hence in the· bottom of the Hirnantian and of the G. persculptus zone. b. In the top of the two above units, hence in the bottom of the A. ascensus zone. This latter conception seems more correct in view of the appearance in the bottom of the A., ascensus zone of new characteristic graptolite genera such as Akidograptus, Dimorphograptus and Monograptus. The upper boundary of the Ordovician system as established in the bottom of the A. ascensus zone agrees with data from the Polish territory where this zone is ,readily distinguishable, while the G. persculptus zone has not -one case excepted -been reported from Poland.


The communications, navigation and surveillance (CNS) technologies in air traffic management for civil aviation are currently undergoing a major modernization process. The legacy systems, which were established over several decades ago, such as analog voice communication systems, distance measuring equipment (DME) and VHF omnidirectional range (VOR) may not meet the continuously growing demands in the near future. In communications, L-band digital aeronautical communication system – type 1 (LDACS1) is one of the most promising candidates for the future air traffic management data link. Using digital communication systems, more complex information can be exchanged between pilots and controllers as well as high-capacity data transfer can be achieved. In navigation, the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) is foreseen to be the primary means for high precision navigation and complex flight trajectories. However, there are still concerns about possible GNSS outages due to intentional or unintentional interference. As a result, a parallel backup navigational infrastructure commonly-referred to as alternative positioning navigation and timing (APNT) is needed. The proposed APNT solutions mainly focus on utilizing ground-based navigational systems because their source of errors would be different from that of GNSS.
Several works have been done on the extension of LDACS1 functionality toward navigation and surveillance, and the LDACS1 system has been proposed as one of the APNT solutions. The LDACS1 system was not primarily designed for ranging application but only a few minor modifications are needed to exploit its navigation functionality. LDACS1 is a ground-based cellular system. The networks of LDACS1 ground stations can be used for an aircraft to estimate its position using trilateration. At the moment, enhancing and intensifying the use of the DME system is the most favoured solution for APNT. The major disadvantages for this option are the cost of installing additional DME infrastructure and its inefficient use of L-band spectrum. One of the advantages of using LDACS1 as APNT is that the deployment of LDACS1 ground stations is planned for the future aeronautical communication systems, and navigational functionality can be added without installing any additional infrastructure. Another key advantage of LDACS1 is its spectral deployment, the LDACS1 signal has 500 kHz effective bandwidth and is planned to be allocated in the same frequency band as DME, i.e. the lower part of L-band (960 - 1164 MHz), using inlay approach. The 500 kHz LDACS1 channels will be placed in the 1 MHz spectral gaps between two adjacent DME channels. The LDACS1 system is planned to be able to work in parallel with DME, and therefore both systems can work together as APNT solutions by combining the range calculation in the situations where either of the systems does not have a sufficient number of ground stations available. It is important to ensure the good performance for both systems and several studies on this topic are ongoing.

The German Aerospace Center (DLR) has conducted two measurement campaigns in 2012 and 2013 to assess the usability of the LDACS1 system as APNT solution. Several flight scenarios were performed to evaluate the LDACS1 ranging performance and the analysis of the measurement data gave the conclusion that LDACS1 signals offer an excellent ranging source [1], [2]. One of the measurement scenarios recorded during the 2013 measurement campaign focused on the impact of DME interference on the LDACS signals. During this scenario, the measurements aircraft (LDACS1 receiver) flew at FL250 directly over a testing DME station. To test the feasibility of LDACS1 inlay deployment, similar flight route was flown twice and the DME channel is tuned to 500 kHz and then 1.5 MHz away from the tested LDACS1 carrier frequency. Different signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) can be observed along the flight paths. Additionally, the co-site DME interference, i.e. the interrogating DME signal transmitted from the aircraft, were visible at the receiver in most of the flight scenarios. This event occurred with a very low duty cycle but the damage to LDACS1 received signal can be very severe as the on-board DME transmitted power is much higher than the LDACS1 received power from the ground. The worst case scenario occurs when the LDACS1 received signal is heavily faded due to banking as the view of the LDACS1 receiving antenna was blocked.

The LDACS1 ranging performance with the presence of DME interference is analyzed based on the measurement data and mitigation techniques are investigated. The in-band DME interference can be suppressed using methods based on pulse blanking. These methods have been studied and proved to be effective for the interference mitigation in the case of LDACS1 communication systems [3]. In this work similar approaches are adopted for the LDACS1 ranging applications.
Since the LDACS1 ranging errors caused by DME interference occur in bursts with low duty cycle, the ranging algorithms that accommodate prior information in the range estimation are suitable methods to suppress this type of error bias. In this work, we propose the use of particle filtering and Doppler smoothing filter for the DME interference mitigation. Particle filtering is a variant of sequential Bayesian filter where the dynamic of the estimated parameters is taken into account in the estimation. Doppler smoothing filter is one interpretation of a well-known Hatch filter. This method uses the Doppler information to smooth the raw LDACS1 range estimates from maximum likelihood algorithm or particle filtering and, as a result, sudden error bursts can be suppressed.

[1] D. Shutin et al., "LDACS1 Ranging Performance - An Analysis of Flight Measurement Results," Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC 2013), USA, 2013.
[2] T. Thiasiriphet et al., ""Application of Bayesian Filtering for Multipath Mitigation in LDACS1-based APNT Applications," in ION GNSS+ , USA, 2014."

[3] U. Epple, M. Schnell, "Overview of Interference Situation and Mitigation Techniques for LDACS1", 2011 Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC 2011), USA, 2011.


The linear Boltzmann equation describes the macroscopic transport of a gas of non-interacting point particles in low-density matter. It has wide-ranging applications, including neutron transport, radiative transfer, semiconductors, and ocean wave scattering. Recent research shows that the equation fails in highly correlated media, where the distribution of free path lengths is non-exponential. We investigate this phenomenon in the case of polycrystals whose typical grain size is comparable with the mean free path length. Our principal result is a new generalized linear Boltzmann equation that captures the long-range memory effects in this setting. A key feature is that the distribution of free path lengths has an exponential decay rate, as opposed to a power-law distribution observed in a single crystal.


A comparative study of the foot skin microbiocenosis of 50 healthy persons and 29 patients with diabetes mellitus and diabetic foot syndrome have been carried out. It has been revealed that various topodemes had unequal degree of aerobic microorganisms colonization. Different species of staphylococci are dominating taxons in skin. The gradient of bacterial populations density in healthy and sick persons grows in a direction: back of the foot--sole--interdigital space. Modification of skin microbiocenosis in patients with diabetes mellitus has been shown. The colonization degree by different species of bacteria decreased; the bacilli part enhanced and the corynebacteria part decreased in the biocenosis composition.


This work provides a framework for data-driven control of discrete-time systems with unknown dynamics and outputs controllable by the inputs. This framework leads to stable and robust real-time control such that a feasible output trajectory can be tracked. This is made possible by Hölder-continuous real-time stable learning schemes that act as discrete-time stable uncertainty observers. These observers learn from prior input-output history and ensure finite-time stable convergence of estimation errors to a bounded neighborhood of the zero vector if the system is Lipschitz-continuous with respect to time, outputs, inputs, internal parameters and states. In combination with nonlinearly stable controllers, this makes the proposed framework nonlinearly stable and robust to disturbances, model uncertainties, and unknown measurement noise. Nonlinear stability and robustness analyses of the observer and controller designs are carried out using discrete Lyapunov analysis. A numerical experiment on a second-order system demonstrates the performance of this nonlinear model-free control framework.


Since the Justice and Development Party (the AKP) came to power, it has expanded the rights of non-Muslim minorities. In order to provide a comprehensive theoretical perspective of the AKP's policies toward non-Muslim minorities, this article utilizes constructivist and rationalist insights (the logic of appropriateness and the logic of consequences, respectively). This article argues that the AKP's policies toward non-Muslim minorities are linked to its normative commitment to religious freedom. In addition, by drawing upon the literature of political marketing, this article argues that the AKP's policies toward non-Muslim minorities can be analyzed as a strategy to expand its voter base.


Use of thermophilic organisms has a range of advantages, but the significant lack of engineering tools limits their applications. Here we show that β-galactosidase from Geobacillus stearothermophilus (BgaB) can be applicable in a range of conditions, including different temperatures and oxygen concentrations. This protein functions both as a marker, promoting colony color development in the presence of a lactose analogue S-gal, and as a reporter enabling quantitative measurement by a simple colorimetric assay. Optimal performance was observed at 70 °C and pH 6.4. The gene was introduced into G. thermoglucosidans . The combination of BgaB expressed from promoters of varying strength with S-gal produced distinct black colonies in aerobic and anaerobic conditions at temperatures ranging from 37 to 60 °C. It showed an important advantage over the conventional β-galactosidase (LacZ) and substrate X-gal, which were inactive at high temperature and under anaerobic conditions. To demonstrate the versatility of the reporter, a promoter library was constructed by randomizing sequences around − 35 and − 10 regions in a wild type groES promoter from Geobacillus sp. GHH01. The library contained 28 promoter variants and encompassed fivefold variation. The experimental pipeline allowed construction and measurement of expression levels of the library in just 4 days. This β-galactosidase provides a promising tool for engineering of aerobic, anaerobic, and thermophilic production organisms such as Geobacillus species.


I still hear the miners' voices here...
This year's German Constructec award went to the German architects Boll and Krabel of Essen for their unspectacular yet very consistent reconstruction of the 12th shaft of the Zeche Zollverein coal mine in Essen, once the world's largest coal mine. The significance of this project cannot be fully grasped without the broader context of the changes underway for the last 9 years in the industrial district of Ruhr under the aegis of the International Archi¬tectural Exhibition (IBA). In over 100 projects involving more than 150 architects from all over the world, it tries to materialise the idea of long-term development promoted at the Rio de Janeiro conference. German reclaiming projects are worth taking a closer look at because they are often carried out at a low cost. One of the examples is the Duisburg-Nord mine, transformed into a landscape park. Another is the Gelsenkirchen mine, turned into a Sunday park and venue for the BUGA flower fairs.
The objectives of the modernisation of Shaft 12 have been well summed up by IBA Director in Emscherpark and Gelsenkirchen: "The essence of our activity is to prolong the life of buildings and production devices for as long as possible for ecological and economic reasons. Even a well designed building seems worse in terms of use of materials and maintenance than a modernisation and revitalisation scheme." These words refer primarily to brown sites.
The Zollverein mine was closed as one of the last ones in the region, in 1986, when it was announced to be a technological monument. Underway since the early 1990s, the History and Modern Art Centre project at Zeche Zollverein XII was initiated by the Nordrein-Westfallen authorities. The strategy assumed renting various rooms and halls out to specific people or organisations and then rebuilding them according to these users' needs. The main building was entrusted to the London-based Norman Foster & Partners for design work. Contracting and rebuilding of all other rooms was commissioned to Boll and Krabel of Essen, where Hans Krabbel and Heinrich Boll are the chief architects. They have described their task as "taking a cautious stand towards the existing architecture, abstaining from competition but rather looking for the simplest, unspectacular solutions, adequate for the place; solutions for reconstruction, extension and impro¬vement." Thus, their architectural activity focuses on pre¬serving the historic walls and devices or just metaphorical representation of the former character of the rooms. A new guest is hardly able to notice what has been done there. Still, the Constructec is awarded for architecture and not historic preservation, which means that the work done on Zeche Zollverein XII deserves attention.


War cameraman Damien Parer (1912–44) is best known for his newsreel films of the war in New Guinea. In his most famous work, Kokoda Front Line, in 1942, Parer comments that the Japanese were 'complete masters of camouflage and deception'. The invisibility of the Japanese soldiers posed a challenge to the cameraman and the production team, as film essentially has to rely on visual images. As the war progressed, Parer managed to capture images of the enemy, and these were shown in his newsreels. This paper examines visual images of the Japanese captured by Parer during the battles against them, and their representation in the three newsreels, Kokoda Front Line, Bismarck Convoy Smashed and Assault on Salamaua. An exploration of Parer's footage for these newsreels reveals several shifts in tone as the war increased in intensity and as his attitude towards the enemy hardened in the process.


Steady uniform granular chute flows are common in industry and provide an important test case for new theoretical models. This paper introduces depth-integrated viscous terms into the momentum-balance equations by extending the recent depth-averaged ${\it\mu}(I)$ -rheology for dense granular flows to two spatial dimensions, using the principle of material frame indifference or objectivity. Scaling the cross-slope coordinate on the width of the channel and the velocity on the one-dimensional steady uniform solution, we show that the steady two-dimensional downslope velocity profile is independent of scale. The only controlling parameters are the channel aspect ratio, the slope inclination angle and the frictional properties of the chute and the sidewalls. Solutions are constructed for both no-slip conditions and for a constant Coulomb friction at the walls. For narrow chutes, a pronounced parabolic-like depth-averaged downstream velocity profile develops. However, for very wide channels, the flow is almost uniform with narrow boundary layers close to the sidewalls. Both of these cases are in direct contrast to conventional inviscid avalanche models, which do not develop a cross-slope profile. Steady-state numerical solutions to the full three-dimensional ${\it\mu}(I)$ -rheology are computed using the finite element method. It is shown that these solutions are also independent of scale. For sufficiently shallow channels, the depth-averaged velocity profile computed from the full solution is in excellent agreement with the results of the depth-averaged theory. The full downstream velocity can be reconstructed from the depth-averaged theory by assuming a Bagnold-like velocity profile with depth. For wide chutes, this is very close to the results of the full three-dimensional calculation. For experimental validation, a laser profilometer and balance are used to determine the relationship between the total mass flux in the chute and the flow thickness for a range of slope angles and channel widths, and particle image velocimetry (PIV) is used to record the corresponding surface velocity profiles. The measured values are in good quantitative agreement with reconstructed solutions to the new depth-averaged theory.


OBJECTIVE
To determine the frequency and demographic and clinical characteristics of depression with atypical features in a broadly representative sample of outpatients.

METHOD
Data derived from the first 1500 patients with DSM-IV major depressive disorder enrolled in the Sequenced Treatment Alternatives to Relieve Depression trial at 41 primary care and nonresearch psychiatric outpatient clinics. An algorithm based on the 30-item Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology-Clinician Rating (IDS-C30) determined presence or absence of depression with atypical features. Odds ratios determined whether a variety of demographic and clinical parameters differed between patients meeting and not meeting atypical criteria.

RESULTS
Over 18% of the sample met criteria for atypical features based on items from the IDS-C30. The atypical group was more likely to be female and have an earlier age at onset, greater comorbidity with anxiety symptoms, and greater symptom severity compared with the nonatypical group.

CONCLUSION
Previously identified features of atypical depression were confirmed in this large and broadly representative, nonresearch clinical population.


More than one quarter of human world's population is exposed to intestinal helminth parasites. The Taenia solium tapeworm carrier is the main risk factor in the transmission of both human neurocysticercosis and porcine cysticercosis. Sex steroids play an important role during T. solium infection, particularly progesterone has been proposed as a key immunomodulatory hormone involved in susceptibility to human taeniosis in woman and cysticercosis in pregnant pigs. Thus, we evaluated the effect of progesterone administration upon the experimental taeniosis in golden hamsters (Mesocricetus auratus). Intact female adult hamsters were randomly divided into 3 groups: progesterone-subcutaneously treated; olive oil-treated as the vehicle group; and untreated controls. Animals were treated every other day during 4 weeks. After 2 weeks of treatment, all hamsters were orally infected with 4 viable T. solium cysticerci. After 2 weeks post infection, progesterone-treated hamsters showed reduction in adult worm recovery by 80%, compared to both vehicle-treated and non-manipulated infected animals. In contrast to control and vehicle groups, progesterone treatment diminished tapeworm length by 75% and increased proliferation rate of leukocytes from spleen and mesenteric lymph nodes of infected hamsters by 5-fold. The latter exhibited high expression levels of IL-4, IL-6 and TNF-α at the duodenal mucosa, accompanied with polymorphonuclear leukocytes infiltration. These results support that progesterone protects hamsters from the T. solium adult tapeworm establishment by improving the intestinal mucosal immunity, suggesting a potential use of analogues of this hormone as novel inductors of the gut immune response against intestinal helminth infections and probably other bowel-related disorders.


Sport played a significant part in the growth of television, especially during its emergence as a dominant global medium between 1960 and 1980. In turn, television, together with commercial sponsorship, transformed sport, bringing it significant new income and prompting changes in rules, presentation, and cultural form. Increasingly, from the 1970s, it was not the regular weekly sport that commanded the largest audiences but, rather, the occasional major events, such as the Olympic Games and football's World Cup. In the past two decades, deregulation and digitalization have expanded the number of channels, but this fragmentation, combined with the growth of the Internet, has meant that the era in which shared domestic leisure was dominated by viewing of the major channels is closing. Yet, sport provides an exception, an instance when around the world millions share a live and unpredictable viewing experience.


Transient cortical blindness is extremely rare but usually reversible complication of coronary angiography. We report a case of transient cortical blindness in a 63 year old male patient one hour after native coronary and bypass graft angiography through the right femoral access. A non-contrast enhanced CT and MRI brain scans showed multiple asymmetrical lesions in brain parenchyma in the distribution of posterior cerebral circulation predominantly in the cerebellum and left occipital lobe. Direct contrast neurotoxicity to the sensitive occipital cerebral lobes seemed to be the possible cause but the exact mechanism of cerebral injury remains unknown.


Nano-TiO2 layer was used as photoanode and redox electrolyte couple (I-/I3-) of inorganic (KI) and organic R4N+I- (quaternary ammonium iodide salts) with iodine (I2) were applied in acetonitrile solvent. Dye sensitized solar cells were fabricated with alizarin dye as sensitizer on FTO (fluorine-doped tin oxide) coated transparent fused silica substrate. The photovoltaic properties of DSSCs with alizarin dye investigated in expressions of short circuit current (Jsc), open-circuit voltage (Voc), fill factor (FF) and efficiency (E³) using J-V curve. The absorption spectrum of Alizarin dye showed peaks at 264 nm due to the π→π* transitions and 425 nm due to n→π* transition. The alizarin dye showed good thermal stability up to∼270âA'ˆA'˜C temperature. The maximum efficiency was found excellent in DSSC with (CH3CH2CH2)4NI-I2 redox couple electrolyte. The role of alizarin dye as sensitizer has been analyzed in fabricated DSSCs and obtained photovoltaic properties could be used as light harvesting material.


Abstract A 35-year-old Middle Eastern woman, experiencing moderate depression compounded by animal phobia was referred to an Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) service. Shared understandings were gradually developed using written functional analyses translated in session. Activity scheduling was integrated with graded exposure to increase access to positive reinforcement. Questionnaires and subjective data indicated a reduction in phobic avoidance and functioning increased. Despite the complexity of working as a triad, a positive therapeutic relationship was achieved with increased mutual cultural understanding. Indirect communication led to difficulties maintaining guided discovery and focus. There is limited evidence to support CBT when delivered through an interpreter. IAPT recommendations suggest staff reflect the community; the North East has one of the lowest foreign-born populations in the UK indicating that IAPT services may be ill prepared to work with ethnic minorities. Learning points for the therapist were: maintain simplicity, take time to formulate incorporation of cultural difference, and use transcultural interventions. The interpreter brought advantages; providing means of communication and understanding of cultural differences. Disadvantages were the potential for bias or lost information, increased time and complexity of delivering therapy. This case indicates a deficit in high intensity training and lack of literature to support therapists.


OBJECTIVES
To evaluate the impact on smoking status documentation of a payer-sponsored pay-for-performance (P4P) incentive that targeted a minority of an integrated healthcare delivery system's patients.

STUDY DESIGN
Three commercial insurers simultaneously adopted P4P incentives to document smoking status of their members with 3 chronic diseases. The healthcare system responded by adding a smoking status reminder to all patients' electronic health records (EHRs). We measured change in smoking status documentation before (2008-2009) and after (2010-2011) P4P implementation by patient P4P eligibility.

METHODS
The P4P-eligible patients were compared primarily with a subset of non-P4P-eligible patients who resembled P4P-eligible patients and also with all non-P4P-eligible patients. Multivariate models adjusted for patient and provider characteristics and accounted for provider-level clustering and preimplementation trends.

RESULTS
Documentation increased from 48% of 207,471 patients before P4P to 71% of 227,574 patients after P4P. Improvement from 56% to 83% occurred among P4P-eligible patients (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 3.6; 95% confidence interval [CI], 2.9-4.5) and from 56% to 80% among the comparable subset of non-P4P-eligible patients (AOR, 3.0; 95% CI, 2.3-3.9). The difference in improvement between groups was significant (AOR, 1.3; 95% CI, 1.1-1.4; P = .009).

CONCLUSIONS
A P4P incentive targeting a minority of a healthcare system's patients stimulated adoption of a system wide EHR reminder and improved smoking status documentation overall. Combining a P4P incentive with an EHR reminder might help healthcare systems improve treatment delivery for smokers and meet "meaningful use" standards for EHRs.


Computational fluid dynamics is a computational method that enables engineers and designers to study the motion of fluids through computer simulations and modelling. Many tools on the market are so-called "in-house" tools requiring a certain level of expertise and upfront investment before proving their added value. Facilitated by the emergence of cloud computing, computer-aided engineering (CAE) technology is now offered as a software as a service (SaaS) solution, which increases its accessibility and ease of use. Online fluid flow (CFD) simulation is used in addressing a broad variety of problems like electronics design or pedestrian wind comfort (PWC), allowing engineers to accurately predict fluid flow behaviour guiding them towards smarter design decisions. SimScale is creating a paradigm shift for high-performance computing which can solve several problems that are faced when using on-premises software.


People's tendency to rate themselves as above average is often taken as evidence of undue self-regard. Yet, everyday experience is occasioned with feelings of inadequacy and insecurity. How can these 2 experiences be reconciled? Across 12 studies (N = 2,474; including 4 preregistered studies) we argue that although people do indeed believe that they are above average they also hold themselves to standards of comparison that are well above average. Across a host of domains, we find that people's typical standards of comparison are significantly above the level of the "average" person (Studies 1A, 1B, 2A, and 3). We further show that people's tendency to measure themselves against above-average others is due to the increased mental availability of such high-performing standards of comparison (Studies 4A and 4B). Finally, we present evidence that this is not simply the result of self-enhancement by showing that people measure themselves against above-average others even when they feel subjectively inadequate (Study 5A), receive objective information about their poor performance (Study 5B), or evaluate themselves on domains in which they chronically underperform (Study 5C). Even in domains where being above average is undesirable (e.g., rudeness), people bring to mind and compare themselves with above average targets (Studies 2B and 2C). We discuss the implications for self-enhancement research and the importance of examining who people compare themselves to in addition to how people believe they compare with others.


Two human colorectal tumor cell lines are differentially sensitive to growth inhibition by 5-fluorodeoxyuridine (FdUrd); cell line RCA is less sensitive to FdUrd than is cell line C. Thymidylate synthase (TS), a target of FdUrd, has been purified to homogeneity from both cell lines. Because of differences in the avidity for a folate ligand affinity matrix, TS forms from the cells were purified by two different procedures. Relative to the enzyme from C cells, the enzyme from RCA cells demonstrated higher Km values for the substrates deoxyuridylate and 5,10-methylene-tetrahydrofolate, a lower rate of association of the inhibitor 5-fluorodeoxyuridylate (FdUMP), a similar rate of FdUMP dissociation, and lower enhancement of covalent FdUMP binding by folate derivatives. The activities of the enzymes in situ and the catalytic efficiencies of the purified enzymes were similar. Thus, a cell line that is naturally resistant to FdUrd has been identified that expresses a TS with reduced affinity for FdUMP and 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate, relative to the enzyme expressed in a FdUrd-sensitive cell line.


The provision of quality of service (QoS) in a differentiated services (Diff-Serv) environment requires an adequate differentiation between high-priority/assured and low-priority/best-effort classes of service in the presence of congestion, giving priority/preference to assured-tagged traffic. For this purpose, a new active queue management scheme, implemented within the Diff-Serv framework, is presented that provides congestion control in TCP/IP networks using a fuzzy logic control approach. The proposed fuzzy logic approach for congestion control allows the use of linguistic knowledge to capture the dynamics of nonlinear probability marking functions, uses multiple inputs to capture the dynamic state of the network more accurately, and can offer effective implementation. A simulation study over a wide range of traffic conditions - considering multiple bottleneck links - shows that the fuzzy logic based controller outperforms the random early detection (RED) implementation for Diff-Serv in terms of link utilization, packet losses, and queue fluctuations and delays. Also, the proposed scheme can offer better differentiation among assured and best-effort traffic, thus it can provide better QoS to different types of data streams, such as TCP/FTP traffic or TCP/Web-like traffic, whilst maintaining high utilization.


This paper evaluates the performance of space shift keying (SSK) free-space optical communication (FSO) over moderate and strong turbulent channels. It has been shown previously that repetition codes (RCs) using intensity modulation with direct detection techniques are superior to SSK system for a spectral efficiency of 1 bit/s/Hz. It is shown in this study that SSK outperforms RCs using M-ary pulse amplitude modulation for spectral efficiencies of 3 bits/s/Hz or larger. Analytical expressions for the bit error rate for the SSK system under study are derived and extensive simulation results corroborate the correctness of the conducted analysis.


Contemporary studies of tourism in the 'Third World' often focus on the far-reaching economic, cultural and environmental consequences of tourism on local populations. Scholars have argued that guest/host interactions reflect a relation of domination in which, much like imperialism, wealthy Western tourists travel in search of the exotic Orient. The tourists are then served and catered to by local communities who are dependent on their business. Such polarities tend to privilege the 'guests' as the purveyors of change, while the creative and innovative practices of the host group are rendered invisible. In this paper, I examine the boatmen of Varanasi and their role as culture brokers, negotiating the sacred city for visitors who include pilgrims, domestic and foreign tourists. Concentrating mostly on the relationship between the boatmen and foreign tourists, I look at the multiple strategies and tactics that boatmen have developed to satisfy their needs and desires to their own advantage. Such techniques vary according to the visitors and their desired experience. Thus, the boatmen are quick to 'tune in' to those with whom they are dealing. Moreover, the close encounters that boatmen have with tourists enable them to view Western culture as well as their own local culture critically.


SUMMARY Acute renal failure (ARF) is a clinic syndrome characterized by decline in renal function occurring over a short time period. Is a relatively common complication in hospitalized critically ill patients and is associated with high morbidity and mortality. ARF has often a multi-factorial etiology syndrome usually approached diagnostically as pre-renal, post-renal, or intrinsic ARF. Most intrinsic ARF is caused by ischemia or nephrotoxins and is classically associated with acute tubular necrosis (ATN). High mortality is associated with severity of ARF, age more than 60 years old and presence of pulmonar and cardiovascular complications. Most patients who survive an episode of ARF recover sufficient renal function; however, 50% have subclinical functional defects in renal function or scarring on renal biopsy. ARF is irreversible in approximately 5% of patients, usually as a consequence of complete cortical necrosis. ( Rev Med Hered 2003; 14: 36-43 ).


This thesis addresses the usability of the Access Control System of OpenLDAP. OpenLDAP is a open source implementation of the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP), which is a protocol that communicates with a directory service. A directory service is a database that stores information about network resources, such as files, printers and users. An access control system is the mechanism that mediates access, for example, read or write, to a resource by a user. The access control system makes these decisions based on an access control policy which states who should have access to what. We hypothesize that the access control system of OpenLDAP has poor usability. By usability, in this context, we mean how easy it is for a systems administrator to encode a high-level, informally expressed, enterprise security policy as an access control policy in syntax that OpenLDAP expects. We discuss the design and carrying out of a human-subject study to validate this hypothesis. The study consist of presenting a high-level policy to the participants and asking them to translate it into an OpenLDAP policy. The study has been approved by the University of Waterloo's office of research ethics. We have carried out the study with a total of 54 users. We present the results from analyzing the data we collected from the study. We observe that our hypothesis is validated in that only few (20%) people were able to express a high-level policy as a correct OpenLDAP policy. There is a low correlation between self reported correctness and actual correctness which suggest that people are not aware if they made any mistake in their submission. The main source of error comes from confusion about the OpenLDAP syntax and how precedence rule works.


The marine neuston, organisms living in the vicinity of the ocean surface, is one of the least studied zooplankton groups. Neuston occupies a restricted ecological niche and is affected by a wide range of endogenous and exogenous processes while also being a food source to zooplankton fish migrating from the deep layers and seabirds. In this study, the neustonic communities were characterized along the Malaspina global expedition sampling tropical and subtropical oceanic provinces using stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes to explore their trophic structure and relationships with environmental variables. The differences in stable isotopes mirrored the patterns in environmental characteristics of each province. High δ13C values were associated with atmospheric carbon inputs, while the presence of dinoflagellates, coccolithophorids, and upwelling influence is related to low δ13C values. Similarly, provinces presenting high δ15N values were associated with denitrification and nitrate diffusive fluxes, whereas the presence of low δ15N is attributable to nitrogen supplied through N2 fixation by diazotrophs. Neuston showed a large overlap among the isotopic niches of four functional groups, with chaetognaths and detritivores generally exhibiting a smaller degree of overlap compared to carnivores and omnivores/herbivores. These results support the hypothesis of a common trophic structure in the neuston community across the ocean. However, the size of the niche, small in coastal areas and those influenced by upwelling and large in oligotrophic regions, and their overlap, low in more productive provinces and high in oligotrophic provinces, may be associated with food availability. Small trophic niches are associated with a dominance of specialized over-opportunistic feeding in productive environments.


This study presents impact properties and interfacial strength of Ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene fiber plain woven fabric reinforced vinyl ester composites with different matrix volume fraction. The interfacial strength was found to be decreased by reducing the matrix volume fraction. Stress, strain and energy absorption per thickness in the impact process were evaluated and the relation between these impact parameters and interfacial strength of the laminates were investigated. The maximum stress was decreased and the maximum strain was increased with the drop of interfacial bonding strength. The experiment results also revealed that the sample with a matrix volume fraction 23% showed higher energy absorption than other ones.


An alternative In/sub 0.3/Ga/sub 0.7/As/In/sub 0.29/Al/sub 0.71/As heterostructure based on GaAs is proposed, which provides a large conduction-band discontinuity for a better carrier confinement, resulting in a high-carrier density. This unstrained high-In channel achieved a better device performance, as compared with the conventional pseudomorphic channel, which is always limited by the critical thickness. This unstrained channel is also proven to be more stable after a long-term biased-stress.


Vehicles with autonomous driving capabilities are present on public streets. However, edge cases remain that still require a human in-vehicle driver. Assuming the vehicle manages to come to a safe state in an automated fashion, teleoperated driving technology enables a human to resolve the situation remotely by a control interface connected via a mobile network. While this is a promising solution, it also introduces technical challenges, one of them being the necessity to transmit video data of multiple cameras from the vehicle to the human operator. In this paper, an adaptive video streaming framework specifically designed for teleoperated driving is proposed and demonstrated. The framework enables automatic reconfiguration of the video streams of the multi-camera system at runtime. Predictions of variable transmission service quality are taken into account. With the objective to maximize visual quality, the framework uses so-called rate-quality models to dynamically allocate bitrates and select resolution scaling factors. Results from deploying the proposed framework on an actual teleoperated driving system are presented.


Ginsenoside Rg3 is a bioactive ginseng constituent that has been reported to have diverse pathological and physiological effects, including anti-inflammatory and anti-metastatic activities. Metastasis is one of the most important factors involved in patients with melanoma. However, the molecular mechanism underlying the anti-metastatic activities of Rg3 in malignant melanoma cancer has not been fully elucidated. In this study, we have evaluated that Rg3 effectively inhibits metastasis of B16F10 melanoma cancer cells. We found that Rg3 significantly suppresses the migration, invasion, wound healing, and colony-forming abilities of B16F10 cells in a dose-dependent manner. Mechanistically, we demonstrate that Rg3 suppresses B16F10 cell metastasis by inhibiting MMP-13 expression. These results indicate that Rg3 suppresses the metastasis of B16F10 mouse melanoma cancer cells via MMP-13 regulation. Importantly, MMP-13 downregulation may influence the migration and invasion capabilities of melanoma cells and has been correlated with melanoma progression. Therefore, Rg3 is a potential therapeutic candidate that could be used to treat patients with metastatic melanoma.


iAbstract Vascular malformations are presented at birth. Some %35 of vascular malformations occurs in bone. Intrabony hemangioma may also occur and probably is indicative of either venous or arteriovenous malformations. The aim of this report was to assess previous studies and also presenting a patient with intrabony vascular malformation. A twenty - year old man with an extensive multi-locular radiolucent lesion at the right side of mandible with bone destruction, buccal and lingual cortex expansion, malocclusion, teeth displacement, facial asymmetry, and bleeding after tooth extraction or biopsy was referred for control of bleeding. Intra - osseous hemangioma was diagnosed by clinical and para - clinical (panoramic - computerized tomography - angiography) examinations. Following access to external carotid artery by a vascular surgeon and retraction of buccal and lingual soft tissues, the right side of mandible was resected (from middle portion of ramus to left central incisor). After complete curettage of lesion and inter - maxillary fixation, the mandibular bone was fixed at its exact location by using three plates and ten screws for six weeks. The advantages of this method are: The use of patient's bone for mandibular reconstruction bypasses the process of bone harvesting from another site (iliac - calvarium), Shorter time of surgery and general anesthesia and lower morbidity rate, Intra - orally approach leaves no scar on the skin.


Ammonia assimilation by the plastidic glutamine synthetase/glutamate synthase system requires 2-oxoglutarate (2-OG) as a carbon precursor. Plastids depend on 2-OG import from the cytosol. A plastidic dicarboxylate translocator 1-[2-OG/malate translocator (DiT1)] has been identified and its substrate specificity and kinetic constants have been analyzed in vitro. However, the role of DiT1 in intact plants and its significance for ammonia assimilation remained uncertain. Here, to study the role of DiT1 in intact plants, its expression was antisense-repressed in transgenic tobacco plants. This resulted in a reduced transport capacity for 2-OG across the plastid envelope membrane. In consequence, allocation of carbon precursors to amino acid synthesis was impaired, organic acids accumulated and protein content, photosynthetic capacity and sugar pools in leaves were strongly decreased. The phenotype was consistent with a role of DIT1 in both, primary ammonia assimilation and the re-assimilation of ammonia resulting from the photorespiratory carbon cycle. Unexpectedly, the in situ rate of nitrate reduction was extremely low in alpha-DiT1 leaves, although nitrate reductase (NR) expression and activity remained high. We hypothesize that this discrepancy between extractable NR activity and in situ nitrate reduction is due to substrate limitation of NR. These findings and the severe phenotype of the antisense plants point to a crucial role of DiT1 at the interface between carbon and nitrogen metabolism.


The paper analyzes environmental tax policy reform using a competitive model of world trade that includes production-generated environmental damage (pollution) and trade tariffs. The authors examine the feasibility of Pareto-improving multilateral reforms of environmental taxes, and show that any environmental tax reform that is mutually welfare-improving when compensating lump-sum transfers are assumed is also welfare-improving when a suitable tariff reform (but no transfers) is combined with the tax changes. Several specific reform proposals are developed. These results expand the feasible set of mutually improving policy proposals for international policy initiatives.


Aims: The aim of this study was to assess some parameters of cardiovascular health among male problem gamblers and the possible effect of long-term participation in aerobic exercise training on the parameters. Materials and Methods: Three hundred and sixty-eight male volunteers aged between 35 and 55 years, were enrolled in this randomized controlled trial, they were confirmed as problem gamblers from the results obtained from the analysis of the South Oaks Gambling Screen. After the exclusion of 168 participants, 200 participants were randomly assigned to the control group (n = 100) and treatment group (n = 100), respectively. Body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC), heart rate (HR), systolic blood pressure (SBP), and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) were measured. Participants in the treatment group participated in a supervised vigorous-intensity aerobic exercise training program; jogging for 30 min/day at an estimated intensity of 6.32 metabolic equivalents, three times/week, consistently for 1 year. Data were analyzed using the SPSS (version 20 Armonk, NY, USA), and significant difference was determined at the level of P < 0.05. Results: The findings from this study shows statistically significant improvements in BMI (control: 27.18 ± 0.52, treatment: 21.73 ± 0.30, P < 0.000), SBP (control: 134.35 ± 1.63, treatment: 110.69 ± 1.11, P < 0.000), DBP (control: 89.18 ± 1.16, treatment: 77.14 ± 0.52, P < 0.000), HR (control: 76.85 ± 0.70, treatment: 72.06 ± 0.25, P < 0.000), and WC (control: 91.14 ± 0.78, treatment: 86.26 ± 0.41, P < 0.000) among participants in the treatment group compared to the control group. Conclusion: Vigorous-intensity aerobic exercise training led to a statistically significant decrease in BMI, SBP, DBP, HR, and WC among male problem gamblers.


Cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) is used extensively in the diagnosis and management of cardiovascular disease. Deep learning methods have proven to deliver segmentation results comparable to human experts in CMR imaging, but there have been no convincing results for the problem of end-to-end segmentation and diagnosis from CMR. This is in part due to a lack of sufficiently large datasets required to train robust diagnosis models. In this paper, we propose a learning method to train diagnosis models, where our approach is designed to work with relatively small datasets. In particular, the op-timisation loss is based on multi-task learning that jointly trains for the tasks of segmentation and diagnosis classification. We hypoth-esize that segmentation has a regularizing effect on the learning of features relevant for diagnosis. Using the 100 training and 50 testing samples available from the Automated Cardiac Diagnosis Challenge (ACDC) dataset, which has a balanced distribution of 5 cardiac diag-noses, we observe a reduction of the classification error from 32% to 22%, and a faster convergence compared to a baseline without segmentation. To the best of our knowledge, this is the best diagnosis results from CMR using an end-to-end diagnosis and segmentation learning method.


In order to understand the distribution of exchangeable magnesium content for tobacco-growing soils in Shaoyang, exchangeable magnesium content and its influencing factors such as pH, organic matter were analyzed using traditional statistics and geostatistics based on 1 790 observed soil samples. The results showed: ①The exchangeable magnesium content in the tobacco-growing soil was in lower level,with a mean of 0.78 cmol/kg and variation coefficient of 51.39%, and about 16.98% of exchangeable magnesium content in the observed soil samples was suitable for tobacco cultivation. ②The exchangeable magnesium content in tobacco-growing soils in Longhui and Shaoyang counties were significantly higher than that of in Xinning county; From the map interpolated by Kriging, the tendency of spatial variation of exchangeable magnesium decreased from north to south; Compared to the results of soil survey in 2002, the exchangeable magnesium in tobacco soils showed a decreased tendency. ③A quadratic curve relationship was found between exchangeable magnesium and soil pH value. If the pH value was lower than 5.0, the exchangeable magnesium was in the state of insufficiency or latent insufficiency; There was no apparent relationship between exchangeable magnesium and organic matter for tobacco-growing soils.


Abstract Processes of mineral alteration involving the mobilization and deposition of more than 30 chemical elements during bauxite formation and epigenesis have been studied on specimens from the Devonian Schugorsk bauxite deposit, Timan, Russia. Chemical analyses of the minerals were obtained by electron microprobe and element distribution in the minerals was studied by element mapping. Interpretation of these data also utilized high-resolution BSE and SE images. The main rock-forming minerals of the Vendian parent rock are calcite, dolomite, feldspar, aegirine, riebeckite, mica, chlorite and quartz; accessory minerals are pyrite, galena, apatite, ilmenite, monazite, xenotime, zircon, columbite, pyrochlore, chromite, bastnaesite and some others. Typically, the grainsize of the accessory minerals in both parent rock and bauxite is from 1 to 40 mm. However, even within these rather small grains, the processes of crystal growth and alteration during weathering can be determined from the zonal distribution of the elements. The most widespread processes observed are: (1) Decomposition of Ti-bearing minerals such as ilmenite, aegirine and riebeckite with the formation of 'leucoxene', which is the main concentrator of Nb, Cr, V and W. Crystal growth can be traced from the zonal distribution of Nb (up to 16 wt.%). Vein-like 'leucoxene' is also observed in association with organics. (2) Weathering of columbite and pyrochlore: the source of Nb in 'leucoxene' is now strongly weathered columbite, while the alteration of pyrochlore is expressed in the growth of plumbopyrochlore rims around Ca-rich cores. (3) Dissolution of sulphide minerals and apatite and the formation of crandallite group minerals: 'crandallite' crystals of up to 40 mm size show a very clear zonation. From the core to the rim of a crystal, the following sequence of elements is observed: Ca → Ba → Ce → Pb → Sr → Nd. Sulphur also shows a zoned but more complicated distribution, while the distribution of Fe is rather variable. A possible source of REE is bastnaesite from the parent rock. More than twelve crandallite type cells can be identified in a single 'crandallite' grain. (4) Alteration of stoichiometric zircon and xenotime with the formation of metamict solid solution of zircon and xenotime: altered zircon rims also bear large amounts of Sc (up to 3.5 wt.%), Fe, Ca and Al in the form of as yet unidentified inclusions of 1 →2 μm. Monazite seems to be the least altered mineral of the profile. In the parent rock, an unknown mineral of the composition (wt.%): ThO2−54.8; FeO − 14.6; Y2O5− 2.; CaO − 2.0; REE −1.8; SiO2− 12.2; P2O5 − 2.8; total 94.2 (average from ten analyses) was determined. In bauxite, another mineral was found, which has the composition (wt.%): ThO2 − 24.9; FeO − 20.5; Y2O5 − 6.7; CaO − 2.0; ZrO − 17.6; SiO2 − 8.8; P2O5 − 5.4; total 89.3 (F was not analysed; average from nine analyses). Presumably, the second mineral is the result of weathering of the first one. Although the Th content is very high, the mineral is almost free of Pb. However, intergrowths of galena and pyrite are observed around the partially decomposed crystals of the mineral. Another generation of galena is enriched in chalcophile elements such as Cu, Cd, Bi etc., and is related to epigenetic alteration of the profile, as are secondary apatite and muscovite.


E.S. Markarian's traditiology is considered in the article against the background of foreign tradition theories by R. Redfield, A. Royce, E. Shils and S. Eisenstadt. All Western authors who wrote about tradition, one way or another base on the dichotomy of "tradition-modernization" what is not typical for Russian scientists. Tradition itself for them is a mechanism for the development of any society. S. Eisenstadt's tradition theory, as well as E.S. Markarian's traditiology assumes variability of tradition, the presence of creative component in it. The difference lies in the fact that Markarian's tradition itself has a mechanism of self-development, and development is a natural characteristic of tradition and acts, in turn, as a mechanism for the development of society. Markarian's traditiology describes the world volatile in its nature and a conservative component of tradition in the works by Markarian is paid much less attention. Markarian closely links traditiology with his theory of adaptation and activity approach in culturology. Markarian's traditiology is convenient as a theoretical justification of ethnology tools that allows to observe what in culture is permanent and what changes, and how. The history of Soviet and Russian traditiology is considered in the article as well.


Various vertebrate-type steroid and gonadotropin hormones have been identified in invertebrates, including insects; however, studies in this area are not sufficient to presume a generalized role for these hormones. We identified testosterone, progesterone, and follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) in the whole-body homogenates of Galleria mellonella L. (Lepidoptera: Pyralidae) and its parasitoid Pimpla turionellae L. (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae). Testosterone concentration significantly decreased from early instars to last instars and pupal stages of G. mellonella; however, no significant difference was observed in progesterone levels at different stages. FSH concentration reached the highest level at the pupal stage of G. mellonella. No significant difference was observed in testosterone, progesterone, and FSH concentrations in young and mature adults of the parasitoid P. turionellae for both sexes. We also monitored the changes in testosterone, progesterone, and FSH levels over 2, 6, and 24 h in parasitized G. mellonella pupae. During the experimental periods no significant difference in hormone levels was found between controls and parasitized G. mellonella pupae.


OBJECTIVE
To examine the ability of quantitative histomorphometry to predict DNA ploidy of prostate carcinoma in biopsy tissue sections assigned after quantitation by nuclear digital image analysis.

STUDY DESIGN
Thirty-five diploid, 35 tetraploid and 35 aneuploid prostatic carcinomas in biopsies, assessed by the CAS 200 image analyzer (Bacus Laboratories, Lombard, Illinois, U.S.A.), were reevaluated by the Bacus Laboratories Incorporated Slide Scanner, a microscope that quantifies histologic images. Thirty-one histomorphometric features from cancer cells were captured at 40 x magnification, averaged across tilesfor each case and incorporated into a multivariate discriminant model to determine which features predicted ploidy interpretation by nuclear image analysis using the CAS 200.

RESULTS
On average, 60 and 15 minutes were required to perform nuclear image analysis and histomorphometry, respectively. The multivariate discriminant model identified configurable run length, difference variance, contrast, inverse difference moment, sum entropy and diagonal variance as histomorphometry features capable of distinguishing diploid from nondiploid tumors (P < .05). Cross-validation studies showed the model correctly classified 74.3% of the diploid and 57.1% of the nondiploid cases.

CONCLUSION
Quantitative histomorphometry can predict the ploidy of prostate carcinoma in biopsy tissue sections. Quantitative histomorphometry has potential as a method of rapidly assessing DNA ploidy otherwise earmarked for nuclear image analysis, resulting in savings of time and expense.


Abstract John Carroll was one of the foundational members of the drama education community in Australia, a creative innovator who could perhaps be called a dramatic engineer. Through his work with legendary teacher Dorothy Heathcote, Carroll found the focus for combining his diverse interests in science, the arts and education, leading to research and key developments in drama education. His inherent curiosity and desire to understand how things worked or could work lead to significant contributions: firstly, in understanding how drama challenged typical classroom interactions and dynamics; and secondly, in conceptualising how drama could be enacted and played out through cyberspaces and digital technologies. With his passing in 2011 it is fitting that his legacy and contributions be acknowledged. This article aims to do so through analysing his life and work with reference to a framework drawn from socio-cultural and systems models of creativity. This article follows on from one that applies a similar treatment to the life and work of his mentor Dorothy Heathcote. It draws on interviews and conversations with family, friends and colleagues as well as published works. The result is a case study or creative profile, which considers the development, outcomes and significance of John Carroll's work.


The rapid growth of mobile phone technologies encourages many researchers to explore, design and develop mobile learning applications for tertiary students. In computer science related disciplines, students always find computer science concepts as complex, abstract, and esoteric subject. Hence, we have seen the number of students enrolled for computer science related programs has decreased lately. Current delivery methods for computer science concepts are found not to be interesting to the students. This project focuses on the design and development of an AVL tree learning object for tertiary students by utilizing current mobile phone features such as mobility, multimedia capability and connectivity. Our approach is to incorporate video clips in presenting the algorithm systematically. With this mobile learning application, student could learn at his or her own pace, anywhere anytime. This application intends to complement the current traditional classroom and e-learning systems. Initial testing has shown that a well-presented video clip of AVL tree concept that delivered through mobile phone has a great potential to promote and enhance learning process.


This project is designed to generate high voltage DC using Marx generator principle by using MOSFET and capacitor stacks. The Marx Principle was developed by Erwin Otto Marx. Its principle is to generate a high voltage pulse using a number of capacitors in parallel to charge up during the on time and then connected in series to develop higher voltage during the off period. This principle is used to generate voltages in the range of KV's in real-time for testing the insulation of the electronic appliances like transformers and the insulation of the power carrying lines. This project consists of 4 stages and each stage is made of one MOSFET, two diodes, and one capacitor. MOSFET is used as a switch; diodes are used to charge the capacitor at each stage without power loss. A 555 timer generates pulses for the capacitors to charge in parallel during ON time. During OFF tine of the pulses the capacitors are brought in series with the help of MOSFET switches. Finally, number of capacitors used in series (4 in our project) adds up the voltage to approximately 3 (4 capacitors-1 capacitor) times the supply voltage. This system structure gives compactness and easiness to implement the total system from a DC supply of 12V to get approximately (30V-36V). This concept in future can be extended to Generate High voltages (KV) using more number of capacitors. This technique is adopted for insulation testing of the electronic components, wires, gadgets etc. IndexTerms – MOSFET, IGBT, Marx Generator, 555 Timer, Opto-isolator ________________________________________________________________________________________________________