Based on high-resolution, spatially resolved data of 10 z ∼ 2 star-forming galaxies from the SINS/zC-SINF survey and LUCI data for 12 additional galaxies, we probe the excitation properties of high-z galaxies and the impact of active galactic nuclei (AGNs), shocks, and photoionization. We explore how these spatially resolved line ratios can inform our interpretation of integrated emission line ratios obtained at high redshift. Many of our galaxies fall in the "composite" region of the z ∼ 0 [N ii]/Hα versus [O iii]/Hβ diagnostic (BPT) diagram, between star-forming galaxies and those with AGNs. Based on our resolved measurements, we find that some of these galaxies likely host an AGN, while others appear to be affected by the presence of shocks possibly caused by an outflow or from an enhanced ionization parameter as compared with H ii regions in normal, local star-forming galaxies. We find that the Mass-Excitation (MEx) diagnostic, which separates purely star-forming and AGN hosting local galaxies in the [O iii]/Hβ versus stellar mass plane, does not properly separate z ∼ 2 galaxies classified according to the BPT diagram. However, if we shift the galaxies based on the offset between the local and z ∼ 2 mass–metallicity relation (i.e., to the mass they would have at z ∼ 0 with the same metallicity), we find better agreement between the MEx and BPT diagnostics. Finally, we find that metallicity calibrations based on [N ii]/Hα are more biased by shocks and AGNs at high-z than the [O iii]/Hβ/[N ii]/Hα calibration.


Objectives: Arthroscopic knee procedures are commonly performed in pediatric/adolescent patients. Reported complications following these procedures are low, however, no childhood specific data exists. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to determine the acute complications (within 6 months) of arthroscopic knee procedures in patients aged 17 years or less. Methods: This is a retrospective review of patients aged 17 years or less who underwent an arthroscopic knee procedure from 1997 to 2009 at a single institution. Demographic and surgical data was collected, in addition to specific data on intra-operative and post-operative complications. Minor complications included peripheral nerve block failure, regional anesthesia failure requiring conversion to general anesthesia, superficial wound infection/dehiscence, persistent knee effusion requiring aspiration, and sensory nerve dysesthesia. Major complications included death, major medical complication, septic arthritis, wound requiring repeat closure, arthrofibrosis, equipment failure, and revision surgery. Results: 1015 patients (555 males (54.7%), 460 females (45.3%)) with average age 15.3 (range 4-17) years were analyzed. The average operative time was 133.9 minutes (range 14-520). 467 (46%) underwent ACL reconstruction, 465 (45.8%) underwent synovectomy, treatment of an OCD lesion, meniscal treatment, or lateral release, 52 (5%) had a medial patellofemoral ligament reconstruction +/- tibial tubercle transfer, 17 (1.7%) arthroscopic fixation of a tibial eminence fracture, and 14 (1.4%) other ligament reconstruction. There were 147 (14.5%) total complications recorded. Major complications occurred in 21 (1.4%) of patients and minor complications in 126 (12.4%) of patients. Major complications included: intra-articular instrument breakage in 1(0.098%), septic arthritis in 4 patients (0.394%), 9 wounds requiring repeat closure (0.886%), arthrofibrosis in 5 patients (0.492%), unplanned subsequent surgical procedure in 3 patients (0.002%), and death in 1 patient (0.098%). 2 patients were readmitted to the hospital (1 DIC, 1 a-fib and syncope). There were no pulmonary emboli or DVTs, and no vascular injuries. No patients developed CRPS. Minor complications included:5 patients (0.492%) sensory nerve paresthesias, 10 (0.985%) patients with failed regional anesthetic, 16 (1.57%) patients with post-operative pain pump that required early discontinuation, 18(1.77%) patients with superficial wound infection/irritation, 60 (5.91%) patients with persistent effusion/hemarthrosis requiring arthrocentesis, and 17(1.67%) patients had medical problems that required intervention (asthma exacerbation, urinary retention). Conclusion: Major complications following knee arthroscopy in children and adolescents are relatively low 1.4%. Minor complications are more common (12.4%) but did not alter the post-operative course or recovery. DVT, PE, and CRPS did not occur in this patient cohort.


Reservoir rocks parameters evaluating in particular determination of effective porosity and water, oil or gas saturation is based on resistivity logs measured in boreholes. It is realised in stationary variants (classical resistivity logs and laterologs different types) and in variants using electromagnetic fields (induction and EPT). Measurement methods applied in recent decades in Poland and Middle or East European countries used for determining resistivity a set of five lateral devices of different length or a set of two normal devices and one lateral device, which allowed to examine the formation in radial direction. Thus there exists the huge archive of data which may be treated as a base for detailed quantitative interpretation. Obtaining real values of petrophysical parameters in particular hydrocarbon saturation depends on applying such interpretation methods, which allow to find a proper model of the formation and determine real resistivity of beds and zones changed by invasion of the mud and other processes in the formation after drilling a borehole.


In the autumn of 1915 Will Bird was working on a farm in Saskatchewan when the ghost of his brother Stephen, killed by German mines in France, appeared before him in uniform. Rattled, Bird rushed home to Nova Scotia and enlisted in the army to take his dead brother's place. And We Go On is a remarkable and harrowing memoir of his two years in the trenches of the Western Front, from October 1916 until the Armistice. When it first appeared in 1930, Bird's memoir was hailed by many veterans as the most authentic account of the war experience, uncompromising in its portrayal of the horror and savagery, while also honouring the bravery, camaraderie, and unexpected spirituality that flourished among the enlisted men. Written in part as a reaction to anti-war novels such as All Quiet on the Western Front, which Bird criticized for portraying the soldier as "a coarse-minded, profane creature, seeking only the solace of loose women or the courage of strong liquor," And We Go On is a nuanced response to the trauma of war, suffused with an interest in the spiritual and the paranormal not found in other war literature. Long out of print, it is a true lost classic that arguably influenced numerous works in the Canadian literary canon, including novels by Robertson Davies and Timothy Findley. In an introduction and afterword, David Williams illuminates Bird's work by placing it within the genre of Great War literature and by discussing the book's publication history and reception.


Introduction : Hormone receptor status had been correlated with prognosis in breast cancer patients. Breast cancer patients with no expression of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR) and her-2 neu (her-2) have been grouped in the Triple Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC) category. At present, these patients have very limited adjuvant therapy alternatives. TNBC has been correlated with poor prognosis among African-American and Hispanic populations. However, there is very few data regarding the prevalence and characterization of TNBC among Hispanics groups (e.g. Puerto Ricans, Cubans, etc.). The objective of this study is to characterize the TNBC population among the Puerto Rican population and to assess whether expression of ER change the characteristics of the disease in this group. We hypothesize that expression of ER+ in her-2 negative breast cancer tumors will change the initial presentation of the disease. Methods : This cross-sectional study analyzed data from female patients with breast cancer diagnosed between 2000 and 2005, at the I. Gonzalez Martinez Hospital and the Auxilio Mutuo Hospital (n=1,082) in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Information on Her-2 status and other clinical characteristics was retrieved from the hospital9s cancer registries and from medical record review. This study was approved by the Institutional Review Boards of the participating hospitals. Logistic regression models were used to evaluate the associations between relevant clinical characteristics and TNBC. We also evaluated whether there were any interaction between age, tumor size and receptor status. Results: The prevalence of TNBC in our study was 16.3% and 58.7% for the Her-2-ER+s phenotype. Patients in the TNBC group have younger age ( 2cm) (70.3% vs 45.6%), invasive ductal histology (87.3% vs 68.7%), and higher tumor grades (III-IV) (49.7% vs 13.2%) compared to Her-2-ERs+. Using multinomial models, we found that, compared to TNBC, women with Her-2-ER+PR- and those with Her-2-ER+PR+ were 1.99 (CI95%= 1.15,3.44) and 1.66 (CI95%= 1.11, 2.46) times more likely to have > 50 years at diagnosis as compared to those with 2cm. There was no interaction between receptor status, age and tumor size (p=0.582). Conclusions: TNBC in Hispanics from Puerto Rican origin showed the same prevalence of Hispanic women in California. Furthermore, disease characteristics (early age at diagnosis, tumor size, and histology and tumor grade) were also similar, suggesting that race has a significant effect in the presentation of TNBC in Hispanic women. In addition, the expression of ER, but not PR in Her-2 negative patients dramatically changes the initial presentation of the disease. Note: This abstract was not presented at the AACR 101st Annual Meeting 2010 because the presenter was unable to attend. Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 101st Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2010 Apr 17-21; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2010;70(8 Suppl):Abstract nr LB-393.


The flagellum is the organelle imparting motility to common bacteria. This paper, the third of three, takes a systems engineering and systems biology perspective on the bacterial flagellum. The first paper (Part 1 of the series) provided a constructive or top-down view from a systems engineering viewpoint. It detailed the typical environment, the purpose, the required existing and new resources, the necessary functional requirements, the various constraints, the control means, and the self-assembly for any kind of bacterial motility organelle. The specification of these requirements was intended to be independent of knowledge about the actual flagellum. A converse approach was detailed in the second paper (Part 2 of the series). It was an analytical or bottom-up view, which discussed the known 40+ protein components and the observed and inferred structure, control, and assembly of a typical bacterial flagellum. This cellular subsystem is well-researched. Much of that research was reviewed in Part 2 from a systems biology viewpoint, including the chemotaxis feedback control system. Part 2 included a very detailed dependency graph of the orchestrated assembly not found elsewhere. This third paper (Part 3) concludes the three-part study with original observations. The observations include an ontology of the exceedingly specific protein binding relationships in the flagellum. The latter observation is new and significant and suggests research to further elaborate the details of the molecular configurations of the proteins. Part 3 also compares the independent constructive and analytical views, which correlate well. Finally, it is suggested that a motility organelle of this scope and scale seems profoundly unlikely to naturally evolve in the absence of foresight and mindful intent.


Hot-stamping molding for ultra-high-strength steel have some similarities with traditional cold-stamping molding in the aspects of molding process and die design. But due to the effect of temperature variation of blank, hot-stamping have some differences in ultra-high-strength products design, material selection and forming process design. Some special forming defects, such as local thinning, cracking and wrinkling, could appear in hot-stamping process due to these differences. In order to obtain uniform phase structure and get high-quality products, it is very important to be able to predict and control the blank temperature and the consistence of blank cooling rate. The thermo-mechanical characteristics of hot-stamping are studied with the material of ADVANCE1500 (22SiMnTiB). Based on the results of simulations and experiments, conclusion are drawn that the complexity of the product and the blank which contacts with die asynchronously causes the uneven distribution of the blank temperature. This is the key factor that leads to the poor mobility of the blank material and local thinning, cracking, wrinkling and other defects in forming process. Proper clearance between punch and die can reduce the probability of defects which could contribute to the improvement of hot-stamping process.


This is a concise and comprehensive book for practicing pharmacists, pharmacy technicians, and pharmacy students to better understand diagnostic imaging and the pharmaceuticals used as part of the imaging process. Today, diagnostic imaging procedures play an essential role in medical care, and many of them directly dictate patients' treatment plans. Nevertheless, few practicing pharmacists have sufficient knowledge and comfort with issues related to diagnostic imaging and its pharmaceutical agents because most schools of pharmacy do not cover this area in their curricula. This book perfectly fills this gap and serves as a standard textbook. The book is divided into 13 chapters, and its primary focus is on the pharmaceutical agents used in the imaging suite: contrast agents in radiography, CT, MR imaging, and ultrasound; radiopharmaceuticals in nuclear medicine; and traditional pharmaceuticals as interventional agents in various imaging procedures. The book also introduces the principles, features, and clinical applications of each type of imaging modality in this field. Moreover, the final chapter introduces the regulations associated with ionizing radiation in the United States and addresses the potential risk of unnecessary CT scans, which may cause additional radiation exposure to patients and personnel who are associated with the procedure. Unlike most books on radiology and diagnostic imaging, this book has the pharmacist as its major target. Therefore, the authors have narrowed the pharmacologic agents to only those that have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration and are currently used in the clinic. For each agent, the authors intensively describe its dosage and administration, adverse effects, contraindications, and medication therapy management concerns. In addition, chapter 8 covers the nonradioactive pharmaceuticals that are most frequently used as adjunct agents in nuclear medicine imaging studies. These features are usually not covered in traditional radiology or nuclear medicine books. Overall, this book serves as a great introduction to diagnostic imaging for pharmacists. Most chapters contain illustrative figures, helpful image examples, and informative tables. The chapters on nuclear medicine and its radiopharmaceuticals (chapters 5–7), however, are not as well composed as the other chapters. For instance, chapter 5 is assumed to serve as a general introduction to nuclear medicine, but unfortunately, it is not organized logically. The authors discuss the imaging agents in that chapter, but these heavily overlap with the content of chapter 6. Suggestions for the next edition include removing the discussion of imaging agents in chapter 5 and instead adding an introduction to radioisotopes for SPECT and PET. An illustration of SPECT and PET cameras may help the readers to better understand the principles of these imaging modalities. Furthermore, the addition of chapters on optical imaging and MR spectroscopy to the next edition is suggested. Although not widely used in the clinic today, these 2 novel modalities certainly will become more crucial in diagnostic imaging. At the end of each chapter, a comprehensive list of updated references is provided for readers who are interested in certain topics. For pharmacists who would like to further explore the field of radiopharmaceutical development and nuclear medicine, the third edition of Radiopharmaceuticals in Nuclear Pharmacy and Nuclear Medicine, described in the next book review, is recommended.


loud computing is an prevalent data interactive paradigm for processing of large amounts of data and storage without considering the local infrastructure limitations. The advent of cloud storage enables the organizations and enterprises to outsource their data to third party cloud service providers (CSP). Though the services provided by Cloud has many advantages, the users voluntarily give up the physical possession of their outsourced data which inevitably poses new security and privacy risks and yet another challenge is the management of ever increasing volume of data for CSP. In order to deal with these security issues, a new secure storage with deduplication scheme has been adopted. In order to provide security of outsourced data against malicious users and curious CSP's, a new convergent encryption technique is proposed. Every Client encrypts the file before uploading and the encrypted file is input to Hash algorithm which generates a unique identifier for every file. The Client specifies the authorized users and their access rights in a metafile uploaded to the cloud and user can decrypt the downloaded file with his secret key.


Sea ice is a complex and heterogeneous medium that hosts a rich community of microbial organisms and small invertebrates. This ecosystem is shaped by a network of inhabitable spaces where the upward and downward fluxes of solutes and light support primary production, and ultimately the whole sea-ice trophic network. Describing the optical, physical, biological and biogeochemical processes that drive the functioning of the sea-ice ecosystem at the appropriate, i.e. small scale (micro- to centimeter), is very challenging. This medium is solid, fragile and highly heterogeneous. Traditional sea-ice sampling methods based on coring are most often coarse and destructive. Not only do they not allow the small scale to be explored, they generally alter the material to be analyzed. Here, we present a new approach for measuring relevant variables of the sea-ice ecosystem at small scale and, as much as possible, non-destructively. Inspired by medical endoscopes, the custom-built platform is intended to carry various types of miniaturized optical sensors for radiometry, chemistry and high-resolution imaging of the sea-ice interior. In this presentation, we will describe the concept and present the progress made to date.


MRSA has become a major challenge for the health system. The proportion of MRSA in the total collective of Staphylococcus aureus cases in Germany amounts to about 35 %. The further spread of MRSA must be prevented or at least slowed down. There is controversial discussion about which hygienic measures are meaningful. In Germany most people and institutions attempt to follow the recommendations of the Robert Koch Institute. These recommendations include, among others, the isolation of MRSA patients. However, this measure can only be achieved with difficulty and has limited efficacy. It may even happen that MRSA patients are treated less effectively just on account of the isolation and the other extensive measures and may more frequently experience complications. Thus it must be considered whether or not better results would be obtained without isolation when the standard hygienic protocols are strictly observed.


OBJECTIVE
Cardiovascular risk reduction is an important focus in the management of people with diabetes. Although event rates have been declining over the long term, they have been observed to plateau or reverse in recent years. Furthermore, the impact of income-related disparities in cardiovascular events is unknown. The objective of this study is to evaluate age-, sex-, and income-related trends in cardiovascular hospitalization rates among people with diagnosed diabetes.

RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS
We calculated rates of hospitalization for acute myocardial infarction, stroke, heart failure, and lower-extremity amputation in annual cohorts of the entire population of Ontario, Canada, with diagnosed diabetes, from 1995 to 2019. Event rates were stratified by age, sex, and income level.

RESULTS
We studied nearly 1.7 million people with diabetes. The rate of acute myocardial infarction declined throughout the 25-year study period (P < 0.0001), such that the rate in 2019 was less than half the rate in 1995. Rates of stroke (P < 0.0001), heart failure (P < 0.0001), and amputation (P < 0.0001) also changed over time, but hospitalization rates stabilized through the 2010s. This apparent stabilization concealed a growing income-related disparity: wealthier patients showed continued declines in rates of these outcomes during the decade, whereas rates for lower-income patients increased (p for interaction < 0.0001 for all four outcomes).

CONCLUSIONS
During a quarter-century of follow-up, cardiovascular hospitalization rates among people with diabetes fell. However, the apparent stabilization in rates of stroke, heart failure, and amputation in recent years masks the fact that rates have risen for lower-income individuals.


BACKGROUND
Many researchers have used paper diaries in an attempt to capture patient experience. However, patient non-compliance with written diary protocols is a serious problem for researchers. Electronic patient experience diaries (eDiary) facilitate Ecologic Momentary Assessment (EMA) study designs by allowing the researcher to administer flexible, programmable assessments and mark each record with a time and date stamp.

OBJECTIVES
The objectives of the current study were to evaluate methodological issues associated with real-time pain reports (EMA) using electronic patient experience diaries, to quantify compliance (percentage of the total number of diary reports scheduled that were actually completed), and to examine the circadian rhythm in pain and stiffness of patients with rheumatic diseases in an ecologically valid manner.

METHODS
In this cross-sectional study we examined 49 patients with rheumatic diseases (14 patients with rheumatoid arthritis, 18 with fibromyalgia and 17 with osteoarthritis of the knee), attending the care facilities of the Department of Rheumatology of Università Politecnica delle Marche. All patients fulfilling the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria. The assessment of pain and stiffness in all patients were repeated seven times a day (8 A.M., 10 A.M., 12 A.M., 2 P.M., 4 P.M., 6 P.M. and 8 P.M.) on seven consecutive days using an electronic diary (DataLogger® - Pain Level Recorder). A datalogger is newly developed electronic instrument that records measurements of pain and stiffness over time. Dataloggers are small, battery-powered devices that are equipped with a microprocessor. Specific software is then used to select logging parameters (sampling intervals, start time, etc.) and view/analyse the collected data. Compliance is based on the time and date record that was automatically recorded by the devices.

RESULTS
Using the data from the electronic diary, we determined that the average verified compliance rate for pain and stiffness were 93.8 and 93.6%, respectively. The two highest compliance rates were observed in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (95.6 and 95.2%, respectively). There were no statistically significant difference in compliance between females and males or patients above or below 60 years old. Significant circadian rhythms in patients with RA and OA of the knee were detected in pain and stiffness. No rhythm in pain or stiffness was observed in subjects with fibromyalgia.

CONCLUSIONS
We conclude that collection of subjective data using electronic diary in rheumatologic setting is a feasible method than can be adopted with high compliance rates across a range of patient demographic subgroups. The identification of diurnal cycles of self-reported pain and stiffness, using EMA method, has important implications for patients with respect to planning their daily activities and in developing individual therapeutic programs with respect to diurnal variability, which therefore may be more effective.


Colorectal cancer remains the second leading cause of cancer-related mortality in the United States. Although surgical resection is still the primary treatment for colorectal cancer, in recent years, there has been a remarkable progress in the development of new therapies to treat colorectal cancer. Response rates have increased substantially and new immunotherapeutic approaches are shedding new light in the battle against the disease. This review will focus on the current immunotherapeutic approaches being developed and will discuss clinical data for some of these new treatments.


Synopsis One of the main problems related to mining investment decisions is the use of accurate prediction models. Metallurgical recovery is a major source of variability, and in this regard, the Chuquicamata processing plant recovery was modelled as a function of geomining-metallurgical data and ore characteristics obtained from a historical database. In particular, the dataset gathered contains information related to feed grades, ore hardness, particle size, mineralogy, pH, and flotation reagents. A systemic approach was applied to fit a multivariate regression model representing the copper recovery in the plant. The systemic approach consists of an initial projection of the characteristic grinding product size (P 80), based upon energy consumption at the particle size reduction step, followed by a flotation recovery model. The model allows for an improvement in the investment decision process by predicting performance and risk. The final geometallurgical model uses eight operational variables and is a significant improvement over conventional prediction models. A validation was performed using a recent data-set, and this showed a high correlation coefficient with a low mean absolute error, which reveals that the geometallurgical model is able to predict, with acceptable accuracy, the actual copper recovery in the plant.


Context: Ankle nonunions with deformity and bone loss are challenging cases, often with broken hardware and infection. These cases are often associated with multiple previous surgeries making revision surgery difficult. Ankle fusion for failed total ankle arthroplasty or neuropathic joints are particularly challenging, which is reflected in high reported failure rates. Aims: Fixator-assisted nailing combines Taylor spatial frame (TSF) with an intramedullary nail, allowing for correction of deformity and compression at the nonunion site, as well as internal fixation protecting the fusion after frame removal. Subjects and Methods: Between 2001 and 2014, 24 patients with 26 failed ankle fusions, with bone loss and deformity, were treated using this technique. After removal of the original internal fixation hardware and revision of the fusion surfaces, a Taylor frame is used for acute or gradual correction of deformity and compression at the nonunion site. This was followed by insertion of intramedullary nail. The nail was locked at the time of fixator removal. Results: Acute correction was possible in 23 of the 26 cases with gradual correction in the others. Union was obtained in 25 cases (96.2%) and maintained at 24 months in 23 cases (88.4%). The overall salvage rate (avoidance of amputation) was 96.2% (25/26 cases). All salvaged limbs remain free of clinical infection and do not require ongoing antibiotic treatment. The foot was in neutral position in all salvaged cases. The average time in external fixation was 11 weeks (6-13 weeks). The average AOFAS ankle/hindfoot score was 74 (range: 61-80). Conclusions: Fixator-assisted nailing, combining a TSF and an intramedullary nail, is a reliable technique for revision ankle fusion for complex nonunion with deformity and/or infection.


This data represents the geographic area described in Title 50 CFR Part 622.435 (a)(2)(iv), Fisheries of the Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico, and South Atlantic, Subpart S— Reef Fish Fishery of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, Seasonal closures applicable to broad categories of fish or to all fishing, Bajo de Sico closed area as of 6/26/14.


The share in world exports of manufactured goods of U.S. multinational firms, including their majority-owned overseas affiliates, has been nearly stable since 1966. This stability, over a period in which the export share of the U.S. as a geographical entity was declining for the most part, suggests that it was not declines in the competitiveness of American firms' management and technology that were responsible for the deterioration of the U.S. trade position. That view is reinforced by the fact that a good deal of the change in U.S. export shares can be explained by changes in U.S. prices relative to those of other countries. The comparative advantage of both the U.S. and U.S. multinational firms, especially the latter, has been in chemicals, machinery, and transport equipment, industries with relatively fast growth in worldwide exports. The growth of U.S. exports in 1966-77 fell far short of what it would have been if the U.S. had retained its share in each industry. The growth of U.S. multinationals' exports fell a little short of that implied by constant-shares but surpassed that of the U.S. as a country in almost every industry. After 1977, both the U.S. and its multinationals kept up with their constant share growth rates and the U.S. even ran a bit ahead. The multinationals' position as exporters, now supplying almost half their exports from their majority-owned overseas affiliates, seems to have been quite insulated from changes in U.S. policies and circumstances.


Human-rights organizations and prisoner advocacy groups try to create positive attitudes toward liberal prison reform by emphasizing similarities between the public and prisoners. Theories of similarity and attraction, however, suggest that this strategy can backfire. Although it commonly increases liking, similarity can increase rejection when the similar other is stigmatized. An experimen1 tested the efficacy of appeals to similarity in changing prison reform attitudes. Republicans and Democrats listed aspects of themselves that made them similar to or different from prisoners, and then they completed a measure of prison reform attitudes (Silvia, 2003). Emphasizing similarity between the participant and prisoners did not always cause positive attitudes. After focusing on similarity to prisoners, Democrats reported more liberal prison reform attitudes, and Republicans reported more punitive attitudes. Implications for changing attitudes toward prison reform are discussed.


The zic1 gene plays an important role in early patterning of the Xenopus neurectoderm. While Zic1 does not act as a neural inducer, it synergizes with the neural inducing factor Noggin to activate expression of posterior neural genes, including the midbrain/hindbrain boundary marker engrailed-2. Since the Drosophila homologue of zic1, odd-paired (opa), regulates expression of the wingless and engrailed genes and since Wnt proteins posteriorize neural tissue in Xenopus, we asked whether Xenopus Zic1 acted through the Wnt pathway. Using Wnt signaling inhibitors, we demonstrate that an active Wnt pathway is required for activation of en-2 expression by zic1. Consistent with this result, Zic1 induces expression of several wnt genes, including wnt1, wnt4 and wnt8b. wnt1 gene expression activates expression of engrailed in various organisms, including Xenopus, as demonstrated here. Together, our data suggest that zic1 is an upstream regulator of several wnt genes and that the regulatory relationships between opa, wingless and engrailed seen in Drosophila are also present in vertebrates.


The type section of the Oligocene to lower Miocene Maikop Group, considered the main source rock in the eastern Paratethys, has been studied using geochemical proxies to gain insights into depositional setting and hydrocarbon potential. The Maikop Group at the type section is approximately 600 m (2000 ft) thick. Deposition commenced after a major late Eocene sea level drop and a subsequent early Oligocene sea level rise. The Maikop Group is composed mainly of carbonate-free pelitic rocks. Calcareous rocks are limited to the lower Oligocene succession, including the Polbian Bed that forms a basin-wide marker horizon deposited during a time with significantly decreased salinity (Solenovian event). Anoxic conditions prevailed and were only interrupted for longer periods during deposition of the lower part of the lower Oligocene Pshekha Formation, the Polbian Bed, and the lower Miocene Olginskaya Formation. Total organic carbon (TOC) contents range up to 3.5 wt. %. Hydrogen index values are typically less than 300 mg hydrocarbons (HC)/g TOC but reach 420 mg HC/g TOC in black shales overlying the Polbian Bed (lower Morozkina Balka Formation). Organic richness of this level, approximately 10 m (33 ft) thick, is controlled by low salinity and high bioproductivity. The Maikop Group could generate approximately 2.0 t HC/m2 surface area. A significant part (0.45 t/m2) comes from the lower Morozkina Balka Formation, which generates a high-wax paraffinic–naphthenic–aromatic mixed oil. The Pshekha, upper Morozkina Balka, and Batalpashinsk Formations would generate low-wax oil or condensate. The hydrocarbon generation potential of the overlying formations is minor. Overall, the generation potential of the Maikop Group is surprisingly low.


The objectives of this article are to describe the health sector reform process in Latin American countries and its impact on the health systems of Brazil, Colombia, and Peru; analyze the structure of the national health systems of these bordering nations; and assess the constraints and potential for integrating the local health systems along the triple Amazon border. Using official documents and databases, we analyzed health system development and the structure of the services network in this segment of the border located in the heart of the Amazon region. Comparison of the three countries confirmed that Brazil's model has the characteristics of a national public health system, while the Colombian and Peruvian models emphasize insurance systems, with the adoption of compulsory health care plans, the segmentation of users, and limitations on coverage. The three countries are similar in their adoption of a public-private mix in service delivery, but they differ in the degree of access and type of State regulation. We concluded that the characteristics of the health systems in the three countries make the challenge of building a unified health system capable of guaranteeing universal access, equity in care, and comprehensive care a complex undertaking. However, despite the differences identified, we can state that the weight of the public sector in the basic care network makes it possible to foresee integration of the local health systems to provide an organized supply of programmatic health actions at the primary and secondary level of care.


This paper considers the null hypothesis that the errors on a regression equation form a random walk. By using the standard Durbin-Watson assumptions, we derive three test statistics that are uniformly most powerful against the alternative hypothesis that the errors are being generated by the stationary first order Markoff process. Unfortunately, the tabulated lower and upper bounds are too wide apart and so we compare the powers of the three tests using simulated as well as economic data. It is then recommended that the Imhof routine should be attached to standard regression programs to calculate the exact limit of the Berenblut-Webb statistic.


Solvent injection at elevated temperatures (hot solvent or steam-solvent hybrid injection) into heavy-oil/bitumen reservoirs is a promising recovery process. It increases oil mobility via oil dilution, molecular diffusion, and gravity drainage. Meanwhile, injection of light hydrocarbon solvents creates disequilibrium between resins and asphaltene in the oil. Then, asphaltene starts to flocculate and bond to each other in the fluid and on the rock surface. Consequently, permeability reduction due to pore plugging and wettability alteration may take place affecting the underground upgrading and recovery process negatively. In this thesis, these asphaltene related concerns during solvent injection at different reservoir conditions were investigated through experimental work. A combination of two heavy-oil compositions and four solvent types were tested at different pressure and temperatures to determine the optimal solvent type and operational conditions minimizing the negative effect of asphaltene. The results obtained from visual PVT cell (testing fluid behaviour) and sandpack system (testing heavy-oil recovery) experiments were cross-checked. The roles of solvent type and operation conditions (mainly temperature) on the heavy-oil recovery, wettability alteration, and pore plugging were clarified and presented quantitatively and visually.


Quantum dynamics with local interactions in lattice models display rich physics, but is notoriously hard to study. Dual-unitary circuits allow for exact answers to interesting physical questions in clean or disordered one- and higher-dimensional quantum systems. However, this family of models shows some non-universal features, like vanishing correlations inside the light-cone and instantaneous thermalization of local observables. In this work we propose a generalization of dual-unitary circuits where the exactly calculable spatial-temporal correlation functions display richer behavior, and have non-trivial thermalization of local observables. This is achieved by generalizing the single-gate condition to a hierarchy of multi-gate conditions, where the first level recovers dual-unitary models, and the second level exhibits these new interesting features. We also extend the discussion and provide exact solutions to correlators with few-site observables and discuss higher-orders, including the ones after a quantum quench. In addition, we provide exhaustive parametrizations for qubit cases, and propose a new family of models for local dimensions larger than two, which also provides a new family of dual-unitary models.


There is a common belief that rabid dogs bite without provocation, hence a dog bite under provocation is free from the risk of rabies. This is not always true as is evident from the case report narrated below. Here in this article, a man of 38 years was bitten by a dog under provocation. He developed rabies 4 months after the bite and subsequently died. Autopsy revealed Negri bodies from the brain tissue.


Conditioned by globalisation and constant change, higher education institutions (HEIs) are forced to pursue new instruments for quality assurance in higher education. States seem to pursue this aim by attempting to create an efficiently operating system of higher education that satisfies needs of diverse societal groups. Quality dimension is the most important element of efficient and effective higher education. From the perspective of a state, assessment and monitoring of quality are instruments for the management of processes of higher education. The article substantiates these statements using the evolution of the dimension of quality in the European and Lithuanian higher education in the course of the Bologna Process. The article also presents a benchmarking method and discusses its development and application tendencies in business organisations. Also, it looks at possibilities to apply this method in higher education. The main aim of this article is to explore benchmarking as an effective instrument for the improvement of performance quality in HEIs and complement the already implemented quality management systems. Another aim is to suggest this method to national agencies for quality assurance in higher education for monitoring and analysis of qualitative changes on the systematic level. The object of the article is the improvement of performance quality in HEIs. Benchmarking is proposed for the use in higher education on the institutional level as an instrument that complements presently introduced quality management systems in Lithuanian HEIs. This way, it will contribute to the formation of the culture of quality in higher education.


Phase-change materials have been extensively used for optical data storage in commercial rewritable compact disks and digital video disks. These materials are also widely considered for next-generation phase-change random access memories to replace current Flash memories. We suggest a different application of phase-change materials in optically triggered microactuators. The suggested device consists of a thin film of a phase-change material deposited on a microfabricated cantilever. A laser-induced phase transformation in the film initiates a cantilever deflection since the transformation is accompanied by a large density change. We analyze quantitative criteria for material selection and optimization of device dimensions for the largest possible actuation angles and deflections. The resulting analytical model is both verified numerically and applied experimentally. Furthermore, we show that these cantilevers offer a convenient way to measure film stresses and film strains associated with laser-induced phase transformations.


In a recent paper [I. P. Neupane and D. L. Wiltshire, Phys. Lett. B 619, 201 (2005).] we have found a new class of accelerating cosmologies arising from a time-dependent compactification of classical supergravity on product spaces that include one or more geometric twists along with nontrivial curved internal spaces. With such effects, a scalar potential can have a local minimum with positive vacuum energy. The existence of such a minimum generically predicts a period of accelerated expansion in the four-dimensional Einstein conformal frame. Here we extend our knowledge of these cosmological solutions by presenting new examples and discuss the properties of the solutions in a more general setting. We also relate the known (asymptotic) solutions for multiscalar fields with exponential potentials to the accelerating solutions arising from simple (or twisted) product spaces for internal manifolds.


Abstract. We use realistic numerical experiments to assess the sensitivity of 8-day CO2 flux estimates, inferred from space-borne short-wave infrared measurements of column-averaged CO2 dry air mixing ratio XCO2, to the choice of Earth observing orbit. We focus on three orbits: (1) a low-inclination circular orbit used by the NASA Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM); (2) a sun-synchronous orbit used by the Japanese Greenhouse Gases Observing SATellite (GOSAT) and proposed for the NASA Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO-2) instrument; and (3) a precessing orbit used by the International Space Station (ISS). For each orbit, we assume an instrument based on the specification of the OCO-2; for GOSAT we use the relevant instrument specification. Sun-synchronous orbits offer near global coverage within a few days but have implications for the density of clear-sky measurements. The TRMM and ISS orbits intensively sample tropical latitudes, with sun-lit clear-sky measurements evenly distributed between a.m./p.m. For a specified spatial resolution for inferred fluxes, we show there is a critical number of measurements beyond which there is a disproportionately small decrease in flux uncertainty. We also show that including spatial correlations for measurements and model errors (of length 300 km) reduces the effectiveness of high measurement density for flux estimation, as expected, and so should be considered when deciding sampling strategies. We show that cloud-free data from the TRMM orbit generally can improve the spatial resolution of CO2 fluxes achieved by OCO-2 over tropical South America, for example, from 950 km to 630 km, and that combining data from these low-inclination and sun-synchronous orbits have the potential to reduce this spatial length further. Decreasing the length of the error correlations to 50 km, reflecting anticipated future improvements to transport models, results in CO2 flux estimates on spatial scales that approach those observed by regional aircraft.


The historic record for the central Peru subduction zone suggests significant variations in the earthquake size during the last 400 years. During this century there have been four great underthrusting earthquakes along the central Peru seismic zone. From north to south these are the 17 October 1966 (Mw=8.1), 24 May 1940 (M∼8), 3 October 1974 (Mw=8.1), and 24 August 1942 (M∼8.2) earthquakes. Modified Mercalli intensity data and tsunami observations for the earthquakes in this century are compared with the 29 October 1746 and 20 October 1687 earthquakes. The 1746 earthquake had maximum intensity values between 9° and 13°S while the 1687 event had maximum values between 12° and 14°S suggesting that the two events failed different segments of the subduction zone. We find that the 1746 event occurred along the segiment that includes both 1940 and 1966 earthquakes. The size of the 1746 event is estimated to be Mw ∼8.8 based on the ratio of near-field tsunami heights for the 1746 and 1966 earthquakes. The 1687 earthquake probably raptured the 1974 segment as well as the adjacent segment to the south where there is at present a gap between the 1942 and 1974 rupture zones. The size of the 1687 event is estimated to be Mw∼8.7 based on both far-field and near-field tsunami height ratios of the 1687 and 1974 events. Both 1746 and 1687 earthquakes appear to be much larger than the events of this century. In contrast to the simple, single asperity nature of the 20th century earthquakes, these older and larger events may represent multiple-asperity ruptures along the Peru subduction zone. Hence, variations in the mode of earthquake rupture from cycle to cycle along the central Peru seismic zone may explain the significant difference in earthquake size during die last 400 years.


The dynamical Mertens' theorem describes asymptotics for the growth in the number of closed orbits in a dynamical system. We construct families of ergodic automorphisms of fixed entropy on compact connected groups with a continuum of growth rates on two different growth scales. This shows in particular that the space of all ergodic algebraic dynamical systems modulo the equivalence of shared orbit-growth asymptotics is not countable. In contrast, for the equivalence relation of measurable isomorphism or equal entropy it is not known if the quotient space is countable or uncountable (this problem is a manifestation of Lehmer's problem).


Extended stage small cell lung cancer (SCLC) responds to platinum/vepeside-based first-line chemotherapy but relapses early as drug-resistant tumor associated with a dismal prognosis. A pair of SCLC cell lines obtained from a single patient at different time points during treatment allows for the investigation of the changes in gene expression prior to (GLC14) and following cycles of chemotherapy and irradiation (GLC19). GLC19 cells were reported to reveal an increased doubling time and exhibit increased chemoresistance to doxorubicin, etoposide, melphalan and vinblastine. Upregulated transcripts in GLC19, as assessed by microarray analysis, comprised proteins involved in regulation of cellular growth (NGFRAP1/BEX3), adhesion, glutathione metabolism and, in particular, WNT/Notch pathways and the putative cancer stem cell phenotype (CD44, ALDH1A1, and AKR1C1/13). Metallothioneins, tubulins TUBA3/4 and tumor protein p53 inducible protein 11 (TP53IP11) were downregulated in this cell line compared to GLC14. Except increased expression of glutathione transferases no classical markers of chemoresistance were found, pointing to a role of altered growth control/differentiation and reduced accessibility of this SCLC tumor cells growing as multicellular spheroids. In conclusion, treatment of this single SCLC with cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin and etoposide (CDE) followed by radiotherapy ultimately resulted in an enrichment of tumor cells displaying the typical signature of tumor-initiating or cancer stem cells (CIC/CSC).


Knowledge graph embedding (KGE) models represent each entity and relation of a knowledge graph (KG) with low-dimensional embedding vectors. These methods have recently been applied to KG link prediction and question answering over incomplete KGs (KGQA). KGEs typically create an embedding for each entity in the graph, which results in large model sizes on real-world graphs with millions of entities. For downstream tasks these atomic entity representations often need to be integrated into a multi stage pipeline, limiting their utility. We show that an off-the-shelf encoder-decoder Transformer model can serve as a scalable and versatile KGE model obtaining state-of-the-art results for KG link prediction and incomplete KG question answering. We achieve this by posing KG link prediction as a sequence-to-sequence task and exchange the triple scoring approach taken by prior KGE methods with autoregressive decoding. Such a simple but powerful method reduces the model size up to 98% compared to conventional KGE models while keeping inference time tractable. After finetuning this model on the task of KGQA over incomplete KGs, our approach outperforms baselines on multiple large-scale datasets without extensive hyperparameter tuning.


We have studied the elongation of oligosaccharides containing N-acetyl-lactosamine repeats using glycosylated human lysozyme mutants as a model. We reported previously that a combination of glycosylation sites at the 49th (site IV) and 68th (site II) amino acid residues of the protein particularly stimulates the synthesis of N-acetyl-lactosamine repeats [Melcher, Grosch, Grosse and Hasilik (1998) Glycoconjugate J. 15, 987-993]. In the present study we show that it is the carbohydrate attached to site IV that is selectively affected. It contains more N-acetyl-lactosamine repeats when site II is glycosylated in the same molecule. As a corollary of the glycosylation at site II, the synthesis of a third antenna at site IV is increased. The triantennary oligosaccharides at site IV contain more N-acetyl-lactosamine repeats than the biantennary ones. Thus placing a carbohydrate at site II stimulates the branching and the elongation of the carbohydrate at the other site.


The lingulid brachiopod Glottidia inexpectans, previously known from the Yorktown Formation in Virginia, is here, reported from the Early Pliocene beds of South Carolina and Florida.  Glottidia inexpectans differs from intertidal to shallow subtidal Recent species in apparent habitat bathymetry.  In Virginia, the associated molluscs indicate water depths of 40 to 60 meters, the fishes somewhat deeper.  Associated taxa in Florida apparently lived in subtidal habitats to 20 meters. The proclivity of G. inexpectans for shell degradation parallels the taphonomic destruction patterns of the more thoroughly studied Recent species.  Preservation of specimens in any numbers must combine structural integrity with protection from chemical deterioration.  The 155 pairs of juvenile G. inexpectans here reported from Carter's Grove, Zone 1, Yorktown Formation, and the smaller population reported by Olsson (1914) were preserved within closed valves of Chesapecten jeffersonius, a large species of scallop with thick, well-inflated valves. These two populations probably represent single spatfalls of Glottidia larvae which settled in gaping scallop shells partially filled with sediment.  They then died of starvation or oxygen deprivation after the valves closed by relaxation of the ligament or by burial.  The physical protection afforded by this micro-habitat appears essential for preservation of fragile subadult shells.  Interpreting this assemblage prompted a review of the systematics, ecology, distribution, and taphonomy of Glottidia.


Framing has become one of the most popular areas of research for scholars in communication and a wide variety of other disciplines, such as psychology, behavioral economics, political science, and sociology. Particularly in the communication discipline, however, ambiguities surrounding how we conceptualize and therefore operationalize framing have begun to overlap with other media effects models to a point that is dysfunctional. This article provides an in-depth examination of framing and positions the theory in the context of recent evolutions in media effects research. We begin by arguing for changes in how communication scholars approach framing as a theoretical construct. We urge scholars to abandon the general term "framing" altogether and instead distinguish between different types of framing. We also propose that, as a field, we refocus attention on the concept's original theoretical foundations and, more important, the potential empirical contributions that the concept can make to our field and our understanding of media effects. Finally, we discuss framing as a bridge between paradigms as we shift from an era of mass communication to one of echo chambers, tailored information and microtargeting in the new media environment.


BACKGROUND
Increasing proportions of smokers in Japan smoke <10 cigarettes per day (CPD). Yet, the health risks of low-intensity smoking in Asia are poorly understood.

METHODS
We performed a pooled analysis of 410 294 adults from nine population-based prospective cohort studies participating in the Japan Cohort Consortium. Cigarette-use data were collected at each study baseline in 1983-1994. Study-specific hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for all-cause and cause-specific mortality were calculated using multivariable-adjusted Cox regression by CPD among current smokers and by age at cessation among former smokers, with never smokers as the referent group. Pooled HRs and CIs were computed using a random-effect model.

RESULTS
The smoking prevalence was 54.5% in men and 7.4% in women. About 15.5% of male and 50.4% of female current smokers smoked 1-10 CPD (low-intensity). Both male and female low-intensity smokers had higher all-cause mortality risks than never smokers. Risks were further higher with increasing CPD in a dose-response manner. HRs (95% CIs) were 1.27 (0.97-1.66), 1.45 (1.33-1.59) and 1.49 (1.38-1.62) for 1-2, 3-5 and 6-10 CPD, respectively, in men; 1.28 (1.01-1.62), 1.49 (1.34-1.66) and 1.68 (1.55-1.81) for 1-2, 3-5 and 6-10 CPD, respectively, in women. Similar associations were observed for smoking-related causes of death. Among former low-intensity smokers, younger age at cessation was associated with lower mortality risk.

CONCLUSIONS
Smoking very low amounts was associated with increased mortality risks in Japan. All smokers should quit, even if they smoke very few CPD.


Crit Care Med 2015 • Volume 43 • Number 12 (Suppl.) a surrogate for aspiration. This study was Institution Review Board approved. Results: Among 174 patients admitted with acute bronchiolitis, 70 met criteria for inclusion, of which 68 (97%) received oral nutrition and 2 (3%) received nutrition via nasogastric tube. During ICU admission, 34 (49%) children reached goal nutritional intake, of which 12 (19%) reached goal while on HFNC. Mean HFNC flow on admission was 7.9 L/min and 7.2 L/min at nutrition initiation (p=0.29). Mean respiratory rate on admission was 53 breaths/min (σ=14.5) and 40 breaths/min (σ=11.8) at nutrition initiation (p=0.39). Seven (10%) children experienced nutritional interruptions of which 1 (1.4%) was associated with emesis and subsequent mechanical ventilation. At the time of emesis and aspiration, that subject was receiving feeds via NG tube, had a respiratory rate of 27 breaths/ min and on 5 L/min of HFNC. Children with nutritional interruptions did not differ in age, viral pathology, HFNC flow rate and respiratory rate from those without interruptions. Those with interruptions had longer lengths of ICU stay (3.8 vs. 2.6 days, p=0.04) and duration of HFNC use (3 vs. 1.9 days, p=0.03), but no detectable difference in time to goal nutrition (2.4 vs. 1.4 days, p=0.18). Conclusions: In otherwise healthy, full term children with acute bronchiolitis, our data reveals a tolerance of enteral nutrition during concurrent use of HFNC.


Macaque visual area V4 has been implicated in the selective processing of stimuli. Prior studies of selection in area V4 have used spatially separate stimuli, thus confounding selection of retinotopic location with selection of the stimulus at that location. We asked whether V4 neurons can selectively respond to one of two differently colored stimuli even when they are spatially superimposed. We find that delaying one of the two stimuli leads to selective processing of the delayed stimulus by area V4 neurons. This selective processing persists when the stimuli move together across the visual field, thereby successively activating different populations of neurons. We also find that this effect is not a spatially global form of feature-based selection. We conclude that selective processing in area V4 is neither exclusively spatial nor feature-based and may thus be surface- or object-based.


Background: Surgery and chemotherapy can cause depressive risk in patients with rectal cancer (RC). However, few comprehensive studies are conducted on RC patients associated alterations induced by emotional disorders in the topological organization of structural and functional networks.
Methods: Resting-state functional MRI and Diffusion tensor imaging data were collected from 36 RC patients with surgery and chemotherapy and 32 healthy controls (HC). Functional network (FN) was constructed from extracting average time courses for 246 regions of interest (ROI) and structural network (SN) was established by deterministic tractography. Graph theoretical analysis was used to calculate small-worldness property, clustering coefficients, shortest path length and network efficiency. Additionally, we assess network resilient on FN and SN.
Results: Abnormal small-worldness property of FN and SN were found in RC patients. The FN and SN exhibited increased local efficiency and global efficiency respectively in RC patients.The increased nodal efficiency in RC patients were mainly found in the frontal lobe, parietal lobe and limbic lobe for FN and SN, while the decreased nodal efficiency were distributed in subcortical nuclei, parietal lobe and limbic lobe only for SN. In network resilient analysis, the RC patients showed less resilient to targeted or random node deletion in both networks compared with HC. Moreover, FN is more robust than SN for all participants.
Conclusions: This study revealed that topological organizations of the FN and SN may be disrupted in RC patients. Brain network reorganization is a compensation mechanism to alleviate the depressive risk in RC patients after surgery and chemotherapy.


This paper considers the problem of detecting actions from cluttered videos. Compared with the classical action recognition problem, this paper aims to estimate not only the scene category of a given video sequence, but also the spatial-temporal locations of the action instances. In recent years, many feature extraction schemes have been designed to describe various aspects of actions. However, due to the difficulty of action detection, e.g., the cluttered background and potential occlusions, a single type of features cannot solve the action detection problems perfectly in cluttered videos. In this paper, we attack the detection problem by combining multiple Spatial-Temporal Interest Point (STIP) features, which detect salient patches in the video domain, and describe these patches by feature of local regions. The difficulty of combining multiple STIP features for action detection is two folds: First, the number of salient patches detected by different STIP methods varies across different salient patches. How to combine such features is not considered by existing fusion methods [13] [5]. Second, the detection in the videos should be efficient, which excludes many slow machine learning algorithms. To handle these two difficulties, we propose a new approach which combines Gaussian Mixture Model with Branch-and-Bound search to efficiently locate the action of interest. We build a new challenging dataset for our action detection task, and our algorithm obtains impressive results. On classical KTH dataset, our method outperforms the state-of-the-art methods.


This study examines the impact of task repetition on second language learners' task performance and the mediating role of teacher feedback and learner self-assessment on oral performance. The study was conducted in a university-based English for Academic Purposes (EAP) program, where, as part of a course, intermediate proficiency learners (n = 52) were tasked with preparing and delivering a technology-mediated oral presentation (i.e., task) on a topic of their choice. First, they presented the task to the whole-class, reflected on their performance in terms of language and format quality, and received teacher's feedback. Four weeks later, they produced a second recording and reflected on it again. A comparison group (n = 26) also delivered a presentation before a class but did it once, without reflection or teacher feedback. Both groups used technology to prepare, deliver, and document their presentations. The recordings were rated on six rubric-determined traits by the teacher and an independent rater, and the scores were compared between groups. To determine the effects of self-assessment, coupled with teacher feedback, on task repetition, learners' written reflections and teacher's comments were analyzed using discourse coding techniques. The results revealed benefits for task repetition and self-assessment during the performance of the same task for the experimental group, confirming the importance of task repetition in EAP contexts and the need for continuous and teacher-supported learner self-assessment in learner task performance and outcome.


This paper explores the dynamics of international judicial interactions in civil cases. It proposes a positive model of court-on-court encounters based on contract theory. It argues that this model provides a superior account of these interactions compared to the prevailing account. The dialogue model developed by international relations specialists and international lawyers posits transnational judicial networks that engage judges in a constitutive and constructive project of building the global rule of law. The paper demonstrates that this model does not capture contemporary judicial practice, rests on outmodes historical judgments, and is normatively problematic. Contract theory not only explains contemporary judicial practice, but also is normatively attractive as a basis for international and transnational judicial interactions.


Hidden Markov models of protein domain families are very powerful descriptions for use in protein database searches. The ability of these models to incorporate position-specific insertion and deletion probabilities as well as position-specific amino-acid substitution information gives more detail than non-position-specific methods such as Smith-Waterman or BLAST which are based on standard amino-acid substitution matrices. The drawback for protein database search is that database scoring using dynamic programming and HMM parameters is quite slow, especially when compared to using a protein domain consensus sequence in BLAST. This work proposes a method to search for protein domain family homologs using HMM parameters where the search employs genetic algorithms rather than dynamic programming.


Owing to the increase in Green House Gases in the atmosphere, the most widely known Global Warming, in the present scenario, is inevitable. Thus, to mitigate the comparatively larger amount of these gases, various scientific and technological developments have been ensured. Carbon Capture & Storage (CCS) technique helps in this regard to lessen the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere by absorbing CO2 in a suitable absorbent and then stripping it from that absorbent in the subsequent process to get almost pure CO2, which is stored and used for its many industrial applications. Amongst the sources of CO2, Natural Gas Power Plant, Coal-fired Power Plant and Nuclear Power Plant are of prime concern to subject our problems and project a solution. Although having a different prospects and methods of CO2 capture, CCS by Chemical Absorption Method (Post-Combustion) can be viewed as a commercial approach to have a large scale application. For this, although a large number of solvent along with their blends has been experimented, a systematic theoretical as well as realistic practical approach on many of the solvent and the comparison between them has yet not been performed. Again, where many of the literature review shows VLE studies on the respective solvents; very few of them have revealed a significant approach on Rate Studies. This thesis is about ensuring a more practical approach to determine the performance of the solvent MEA (Monoethanol Amine) in CO2 absorption in Rate Model using ASPEN PLUS.


Abstract Hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH) is a highly fatal, hyperinflammatory syndrome in adults triggered by an underlying illness in most cases. As such, suspicion of HLH dictates further investigation to identify the HLH trigger and determine treatment. HLH is clinically challenging due to diverse presentations and underlying triggers, provider unfamiliarity, and bleeding complications. Clinically, we observed diagnostic error from incorrect testing and cognitive biases (interleukin-2 confused with soluble interleukin-2 receptor and natural killer cell quantification confused with functional assays). This study reports our single institutional experience with adult HLH with the aim to reduce erroneous testing with a quality improvement (QI) project, and to facilitate trigger discovery and mitigate hemorrhage. Provider education on HLH testing was the prospective intervention, followed by mistaken test removal. HLH triggers and diagnostic utility were determined by retrospective chart review. Risk factors for hemorrhage were determined by multivariable analysis. Erroneous HLH testing was reduced from 74% to 24% of patients (P < .001) by the QI intervention. These changes were projected to save $11,700 yearly. The majority (64%) of patients evaluated for HLH were on non-hematology/oncology services, highlighting the need for vigilance in hematology consultation. Sixty-three patients met classic HLH-2004 criteria for HLH. Malignancy (38%), infection (27%), Epstein–Barr virus (EBV) (14%), or autoimmune disease (8%) triggered most HLH cases. HLH triggers were most commonly identified by serologic testing (27%) and bone marrow biopsy (19%). Biopsy of other affected organs based on PET-CT imaging after unsuccessful initial diagnostic measures was helpful, and focal fluorodeoxyglucose uptake was predictive of an underlying malignancy (likelihood ratio 8.3, P = .004). Major hemorrhage occurred in 41% of patients. On multivariable analysis the odds ratios (OR) for major hemorrhage were increased for patients with intensive care unit level care (OR 10.47, P = .005), and disseminated intravascular coagulation in the first week of admission (OR 10.53, P = .04). These data are incorporated into a framework to encourage early HLH recognition with the HScore, facilitate trigger identification, identify those at risk for hemorrhage, and minimize low-yield or erroneous testing.


Mining activities could produce a large volume of spoils, waste rocks, and tailings, which are usually deposited at the surface and become sources of metal pollution. Phytostabilization of the mine spoils could limit the spread of these heavy metals. Phytostabilization can be enhanced by using soil amendments like manure-based biochar capable of immobilizing metal(loid)s when combined with plant species that are tolerant of high levels of contaminants while simultaneously improving properties of mine soils. However, the use of manure-based biochar and other organic amendments for mine spoil remediation are still unclear. In this greenhouse study, we evaluated the interactive effect of biochar application and compost on shoots biomass yield (SBY), roots biomass yield (RBY), uptake, and bioconcentration factor (BCF) of Zn and Cd in corn (Zea mays L.) grown in mine soil. Biochar sources (BS) consisted of beef cattle manure (BCM); poultry litter (PL); and lodge pole pine (LPP) were applied at 0, 2.5, and 5.0% (w/w) in combination with different rates (0, 2.5, and 5.0%, w/w) of cattle manure compost (CMC), respectively. Shoots and roots uptake of Cd and Zn were significantly affected by BS, CMC, and the interaction of BS and CMC. Corn plants that received 2.5% PL and 2.5% BCM had the greatest Cd and Zn shoot uptake, respectively. Corn plants with 5% BCM had the greatest Cd and Zn root uptake. When averaged across BS, the greatest BCF for Cd in the shoot of 92.3 was from the application BCM and the least BCF was from the application of PL (72.8). Our results suggest that incorporation of biochar enhanced phytostabilization of Cd and Zn with concentrations of water-soluble Cd and Zn lowest in soils amended with both manure-based biochars while improving biomass productivity of corn. Overall, phytostabilization technique and biochar application have the potential to be combined in the remediation of heavy metals polluted soils.


Traditional design rules, wherein cells are dimensioned in order to get an equal amount of demand in each cell are not directly applicable to CDMA networks where large cells can cause a lot of interference to adjacent small cells. In order to enable iterative cell placement we use a computationally efficient iterative process to calculate the inter-cell and intra-cell interferences as a function of pilot-signal power and base station location. These techniques enable us to improve the placement of cells in a CDMA network so as to enhance network capacity. We show examples of how networks using this design technique will provide higher capacity than ones designed using conventional techniques.


This paper presents a field-circuit-coupled method to investigate differences between intrinsic and measured permittivi- ties for a Mn-Zn ferrite. Electric and magnetic fields in a flat cylin- drical ferrite, which is used here to construct a ferrite capacitor, are solved analytically. Then, complex power supplied to the ca- pacitor is calculated. On the basis of the complex power, parame- ters in an equivalent circuit for the ferrite capacitor are extracted. The paper examines the validity of the developed mathematical model. Numerical results show that for a ferrite with high per- meabilities, measured permittivities follow intrinsic values well at low frequency but fail to embody the intrinsic values when the fre- quency runs above several hundred kilohertz. Numerical results also demonstrate that the dimensions of the sample under inves- tigation play a role in measurement errors. The larger the radius of the cylindrical ferrite is, the higher the errors are. Correction curves are generated, from which the measured permittivities can be corrected to reflect the intrinsic values.


Introduction: The prognosis and diagnosis of cancers are two of crucial issues in Precision Oncology. Researchers are investigating the possibility of using ensemble machine learning tools to help detect cancers including breast cancer. This study reviews ensemble classifier methods and their applications in breast cancer detection and compares their results. At first, we surveyed 14 ensemble classifier machine learning methods in related to breast cancer prognosis and diagnosis. Then, we selected five of these approaches that prioritize genes and introduce breast cancer genomic biomarkers. They are include of Multiple RFE (Recursive Feature Elimination), DECORATE (Diverse Ensemble Creation by Oppositional Relabeling of Artificial Training Examples), HyDRA (Hybrid Distance-score Rank Aggregation), GenEnsemble for 4 base classifiers (NBS, IB3, SVM and C4.5), and the collective approach for 4 individual methods (correlation, color palette, color proportion and SVM). Conclusions: This study can help to researchers in using ensemble methods in field of molecular biology and breast cancer diagnosis to choose most suitable ensemble method according to their problem. Today, there are many approaches for this problem and other cancers, and a key question is "which proposed ensemble method is the best?" The results show there is not best approach for all classification problems, and the best solution depends on kind of problem, the structure of the available data and prior knowledge about related algorithm [7]. Finally, using machine learning is less costly than biomolecular testing. However, we suggest in order to provide better evaluation of accuracy of the results of this approaches, biomolecular techniques such as qRT-PCR and the next generation sequencing (NGS) are applied. In the light of this research, we hope to help for introducing of novel driver genes as genomic biomarkers for precision oncology to increase patients' life expectancy.


Interconnect speeds currently surpass the abilities of today's processors to satisfy their demands. The throughput rate provided by the network simply generates too much protocol work for the processor to keep up with. Remote direct memory access has long been studied as a way to alleviate the strain from the processors. The problem is that until recently RDMA interconnects were limited to proprietary or specialty interconnects that are incompatible with existing networking hardware. iWARP, or RDMA over TCP/IP, changes this situation. iWARP brings all of the advantages of RDMA, but is compatible with existing network infrastructure, namely TCP/IP over Ethernet. The drawback to iWARP up to now has been the lack of availability of hardware capable of meeting the performance of specialty RDMA interconnects. Recently, however, 10 Gigabit iWARP adapters are beginning to appear on the market. This paper demonstrates the performance of one such 10 Gigabit iWARP implementation and compares it to a popular specialty RDMA interconnect, InfiniBand


This paper describes a novel data structure and an algorithm for processor self-scheduling in parallel discrete event simulation. The presented data structure allows the efficient scheduling of future computations, it facilitates the inexpensive use of processor affinity information, it reduces the contention on the scheduling queue, and it integrates load balancing and locality management methods into a single mechanism. We use the behavioral simulation of a multiprocessor system to characterize the behavior of the proposed data structure and the associated scheduling algorithm. The results of our study show that it is important to maintain as detailed affinity information as possible and exploit this information at run time.


Smart structures, which are equipped with piezoelectric actuators and sensors, and which involve automatic control, represent an important branch of Mechatronics. This paper gives a review over own research on smart structures, which has been performed during the last decade based on the principles of analogy and interdisciplinarity. The latter principles form a research strategy, which seems to be perfectly suited in order to answer the innovation request in Mechatronics, namely to decrease the time-lag between consecutive steps in the scientific development, and to keep fundamental and applied research in close co-operation. We start our report with a short excursion into the history of engineering sciences, in order to demonstrate this time-lag, where we use the history of elastic and piezoelastic plates as an example, and we discuss the notions of analogy and interdisciplinarity as means to systematically decrease the timelag. In our own work, we particularly have used an eigenstrain analogy as guideline. In the light of this analogy, various own works in the following fields are reviewed: Accurate electromechanically modeling; dynamic shape control by piezoelectric actuation and sensing; extension of dynamic shape control to closed loop control and active noise cancellation.


The need for integration of renewable energy to the electricity grid promotes research and development of new energy storage technologies, as well as models and techniques to study them. In this sense, the present work proposes a model to evaluate the benefit that can be harnessed through energy arbitrage in function of a daily hourly rate differentiation. The Vanadium Redox Battery is one of the energy storage technologies that have proven most interesting for stationary applications in recent years, especially to medium and large-scale installations. A mathematical model is presented and applied to a case study to evaluate the feasibility of investing in an energy storage system of vanadium redox batteries. The results indicate that at present the capital cost should decrease around 75% to be considered profitable for the case study. Finally, real options approach analysis is suggested to assess the flexibility offered by VRB ESS, such as relocation, expansion and abandonment.


Bath smelting has recently been the focus of several large research and development programs investigating alternative ironmaking processes. Fundamental studies have contributed to the understanding of smeltingreduction processes however these have not been entirely applicable to the smelting of composite pellets. Recently, bath smelting has also been evaluated for its potential for processing metallurgical wastes, the driving force being to develop suitable alternatives to traditional disposal methods such as dumping in landfills; one such technology is the EnvlRONment process. In general, many pyrometallurgical waste processes have been developed but few have been commercialised successfully. It is evident many processes have suffered economically because of poor understanding and control of process fundamentals. Although the EnvlRONment process, which smelts composite organic and ferrous waste pellets in a single vessel reactor, had been developed to the pilot plant stage, the mechanisms of smelting-reduction were not fully understood. Pilot plant trials highlighted critical aspects of the process but did not provide sufficient information to quantify process fundamentals, clearly further investigation was warranted. Smelting, Xray, and thermogravimetric experiments provided foundation for an in-depth study of reaction kinetics and mechanisms, while also allowing other relevant issues of waste processing, using bath smelting technology, to be addressed. Supporting the experimental investigations an extensive heat transfer model was developed which was used to predict temperature profiles and smelting times. The bath smelting reactor was modelled in 2 distinct stages, a falling gas region and an in-slag smelting region, heating was determined to be controlled by internal resistance. The general smelting behaviour of composite pellets was observed during pilot plant and laboratory trials. Smelting of composite pellets, as performed in the EnvlRONment process, was simulated in the laboratory by smelting composite pellets in crucibles containing slag at 1500°C; to allow for accurate experimental interpretation, and to increase the degree of experimental control, process pellets were replicated by surrogate laboratory pellets with a simplified number of components. Cellulose was trialled as a surrogate component for organic waste. Further experiments were performed using Xray fluoroscopy and radiography techniques to observe the progress of the smelting-reduction reactions in slag at 1500°C. Examination of the smelting reaction with the Xray techniques also allowed observation of the effect of composite smelting on slag foaming. The kinetics and mechanisms of reduction of composite pellets was investigated using non-isothermal thermogravimetric techniques to 1200°C. Thermal analysis via this route was selected because the experimental techniques are the most suited means to investigate temperature dependant phenomena of self-reducing systems. Smelting experiments provided significant fundamental information relevant to an understanding of smelting reactions in composite smelting. Analysis and interpretation of the experiments corroborated with the heat transfer model predictions, which was used together with the thermogravimetric results to clearly identify reaction mechanisms and explain other process phenomena. Key process reactions in composite smelting were identified as: thermal decomposition of volatiles direct reduction and carburisation of iron pellet ablation through melting and dissolution reduction of dissolved oxides in slag. Predicted temperature profiles within the composite pellets suggest that much of the volatile matter is lost during the falling gas region by thermal decomposition. For the surrogate pellets containing cellulose upto 7 8 % of the volatile matter is lost during the falling gas region. The heat transfer model predicted sensible melting times, for a 1.5cm diameter pellet a melting time of 92s was predicted, similar times were observed in smelting trials. An important finding of the heat transfer work was that although the in-slag smelting stage w a s based on a fully submerged object experimental observations show that an immersion crust does not form on the pellet during its initial contact with the slag bath, and that the composite pellet is not submerged during smelting. Thermogravimetry revealed the complexity of internal reduction in iron oxidecarbon systems when high and low volatility carbon sources contribute towards reduction. The contribution to reduction from the high volatility carbon being influenced by heating rate and the presence of secondary non-volatile material, measured charring levels for cellulose varied between 13 and 2 2 % . The main steps in the thermogravimetric reaction profiles were attributed to thermal decomposition of cellulose between 280 and 320°C and stepwise reduction of hematite above 550°C. The dominant reduction mechanism in composite bath smelting was identified as internal reduction within the pellet. Approximately 9 0 % of the total reduction occurs within the pellet, the extent of which is sufficient that much of the iron is also carburised before pellet ablation is complete. The other significant finding of the study was that slag foaming was shown not to be a critical issue for process control of composite smelting.


The study was undertaken to estimate broad-sense heritability and correlations between grain yields and other traits in maize under non-stress, intermediate stress and severe drought stress conditions. Fifty six genotypes were evaluated in a simple lattice design with two replications during the 2012/13 dry season at Institute for Agricultural Research farm Samaru (11o11'N; 07o38'E) in the Northern Guinea savannah of Nigeria. The results showed high (>60%) heritability estimates for all the traits studied except number of ears per plant under non-stress and intermediate stress that showed low (<30%) and moderate (30-60%) heritability of 33.33% and 50.00%, respectively, while leaf senescence under intermediate stress showed moderate heritability of 57.14%. The heritability of anthesis-silking interval (ASI), plant height, ear height, leaf senescence, and number of ears per plant increased with increasing drought stress, whereas, that of days to 50% tasseling, days to 50% silking and grain yield decreased with increasing drought stress. Correlation analysis revealed that days to 50% tasseling and silking under non-stress, ASI and leaf senescence under severe stress exhibited negative and significant correlations with grain yield. The correlations between grain yield and plant height, ear height under non-stress, intermediate and severe stress conditions, respectively and number of ears per plant under severe stress were positive and significant. Traits that had high heritability and positive correlation with grain yield may be considered as important traits in selection programmes aimed at maize yield improvement and the breeder may consider these traits as main selection criteria. Keywords : Drought, Maize, Heritability, Correlation and Traits


Female sex workers have a high risk of suffering from sexual transmitted infections (STIs). If the female sex workers suffer from STIs, besides affecting themselves, they also have potential to transmit the disease to their clients. Fluor albus is one of the symptoms of STIs. The purpose of this research is to evaluate the type of STIs that the female sex workers suffer from. This research was conducted retrospectively on 100 female sex workers in Puskesmas Putat Surabaya in 2013-2014. The result of this research showed that from 100 female sex workers, 14 subjects (14%) suffered from gonococcal cervicitis, 51 subjects (51%) suffered from nongonococcal cervicitis, 10 subjects (10%) suffered from nongonococcal cervicitis accompanied by bacterial vaginosis, 9 subjects (9%) suffered from bacterial vaginosis, 1 subject (1%) suffered from trichomoniasis, and 14 subjects (14%) had no data. This research concluded that nongonococcal cervicitis is the most major cause of STIs suffered by female sex workers. Therefore, the vigilances to prevent transmission of nongonococcal infection to the clients is highly needed.


Many wireless sensor network applications must resolve the inherent conflict between energy efficient communication and the need to achieve desired quality of service such as end-to-end communication delay. To address this challenge, we propose the real-time power-aware routing (RPAR) protocol, which achieves application-specified communication delays at low energy cost by dynamically adapting transmission power and routing decisions. RPAR features a power-aware forwarding policy and an efficient neighborhood manager that are optimized for resource-constrained wireless sensors. Moreover, RPAR addresses important practical issues in wireless sensor networks, including lossy links, scalability, and severe memory and bandwidth constraints. Simulations based on a realistic radio model of MICA2 motes show that RPAR significantly reduces the number of deadlines missed and energy consumption compared to existing real-time and energy-efficient routing protocols


A double set of turning vanes was carried inside the jet tailpipe. To produce reverse thrust, the tailpipe opens into two side sections and the turning vanes move outward to form a V-shaped cascade, which deflects the exhaust-gas flow. Forward and reverse net thrust were measured over a range of engine speeds with the airplane stationary. Taxi tests were made to determine the comparative stopping distances using wheel braking and reverse thrust separately, and a combination of both. The effect of turning-vane spacing on thrust-reverser performance was determined by scale-model tests using unheated air.


ABSTRACT In vertebrate photoreceptors, opsins are highly concentrated in a morphologically distinct ciliary compartment known as the outer segment (OS). Opsin is synthesized in the cell body and transported to the OS at a remarkable rate of 100 to 1000 molecules per second. Opsin transport defects contribute to photoreceptor loss and blindness in human ciliopathies. Previous studies revealed that the rhodopsin C-terminal tail, of 44 amino acids, is sufficient to mediate OS targeting in Xenopus photoreceptors. Here, we show that, although the Xenopus C-terminus retains this function in zebrafish, the homologous zebrafish sequence is not sufficient to target opsin to the OS. This functional difference is largely caused by a change of a single amino acid present in Xenopus but not in other vertebrates examined. Furthermore, we find that sequences in the third intracellular cytoplasmic loop (IC3) and adjacent regions of transmembrane helices 6 and 7 are also necessary for opsin transport in zebrafish. Combined with the cytoplasmic tail, these sequences are sufficient to target opsin to the ciliary compartment. Summary: Transgenic and expression analyses reveal a complex set of molecular features that function together as address labels to target opsin to the outer segment.


A woman in the first trimester of pregnancy presented with pneumonia and hilar lymphadenopathy after exposure to lambing ewes. She subsequently aborted. Infection with Chlamydia psittaci of ovine origin was confirmed. Pregnant women are susceptible to this infection, which may cause life threatening disease. The patient also had features of sarcoidosis, and the two conditions ran a similar time course. There is a possibility that ovine psittacosis caused an illness indistinguishable from sarcoidosis.


In this article, I investigate India's two-pronged policy approach, which combines security and development intervention to address the root cause and symptoms of left wing extremism. While the two policy sets are meant for two very distinct policy subjects – the angry extremist and the neglected poor – I argue that in renewing state legitimacy against internal dissent, development goals are made to coincide with traditional security concerns for state survival and stability. In this article, I unpack three representations of the problem of left wing extremism – as terrorism, as a parallel regime and as a 'political disorder' – in relation to the particular policy responses they each advocate. Through these three representational frames, the effects that the security imperative has on the idea and practice of development are uncovered.


The use of botulinum toxin (BoNT) has now become the treatment of choice for a range of debilitating neuromuscular diseases and for aesthetic medicine. BoNT products are licensed as prescription-only medicines by the health authorities of each country in which they are approved. The authors describe here the current status with regard to BoNT formulations and detail more precisely what is in each product. These data have been presented previously, in a fragmented way, in papers that discuss characteristics of the BoNT products but not the formulations in detail. This information is essential for clinicians in order to enable informed decisions about which products they wish to use clinically. The authors have also examined developments that are either in progress or likely to occur, based on currently available information.


Objective To assess the utility of left bundle branch block (LBBB) as an activation criterion for primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PPCI). Design Retrospective observational cohort study. Setting Single UK heart attack centre. Patients Consecutive patients referred for PPCI September 2008–December 2011 (n=2192). Interventions Demographic and outcome data were obtained by review of case notes, angiograms and interrogation of local/national databases. Main outcome measures Angiographic culprit lesion assessment defined appropriate and inappropriate activations. Patients outcomes were assessed by Major adverse cardiac events (MACE), defined as a composite of mortality and unplanned revascularisation at 1-year. Results LBBB-activation occurred in 120 patients (5.5%), of whom 21 (17.5%) had acute coronary occlusion angiographically, and were adjudicated appropriately. Compared with appropriate activations for ST segment elevation, appropriate LBBB-activations were older (71.0±9.6 vs 64.2±12.4 years, p=0.01) and more likely to be in cardiogenic shock (19.0% vs 4.3%, p<0.01). Extent of disease quantified by the SYNTAX score did not differ (median 21.5, IQR 11.0–27.0 vs 19, 11.0–25.5, p=0.66), but amount of myocardium at-risk was higher in appropriate LBBB-activations (culprit jeopardy score median 4, IQR 2–6 vs 2, 2–4, p=0.02). Final diagnoses for LBBB-activations were acute coronary syndrome (39.2%), non-acute coronary syndrome cardiac chest pain (33.3%) and non-cardiac chest pain (27.5%). In appropriate LBBB-activations 1-year mortality and MACE were higher (23.8% vs 6.6%, p=0.002 and 28.6% vs 10.5%, p=0.007, respectively). Conclusions Our data suggests that despite its poor specificity for identifying acute coronary occlusion, LBBB should at the present time remain an activation criterion for PPCI and such patients should continue to be transferred to heart attack centres for assessment and treatment.


In this paper, we have successfully synthesized polyaniline nanotubes by using chemical oxidation polymerization. This synthesis is simple and an effective way to prepare one-dimensional polymer nanotubes. By transmission electron microscope (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Fourier transform infrared spectrum (FTIR), the morphology and physical structures of the as-prepared products were characterized. By cyclic voltammetry we studied the electrocatalytic activity of polyaniline nanotube modified glassy carbon electrode on ascorbic acid. The results show that the polyaniline nanotube modified electrode has excellent electrocatalytic activity on ascorbic acid. Compared with those of the bare glassy carbon electrode, the anodic peak potential of ascorbic acid shifts negatively 0.212 V on the modified electrode, and the anodic peak current increases 43 %. And the concentration of ascorbic acid shows a good linear relation at the range of 1.0×10-5 ~ 0.1 M with the minimum detection limit of 1.0 × 10-6 M.


Dental management for the patient who abuses drugs is always a challenge. The numbers of patients abusing methamphetamines appears to be increasing. The dentist needs to be aware of the clinical presentation and medical risks presented by these patients and to attempt to get the patient to seek professional help. Additionally, special attention will be necessary for the high prevalence and severity or oral manifestations including: rampant caries, enamel erosion, xerostomia, bruxism and muscle trismus.


In this paper we show the occurrence of cubic-root asymptotics in misspecified conditional quantile models where the approximating functions are restricted to be binary decision trees. Inference procedure for the optimal split point in the decision tree is conducted by inverting a t-test or a deviation measure test, both involving Chernoff type limiting distributions. In order to avoid estimating the nuisance parameters in the complicated limiting distribution, subsampling is proved to deliver the correct confidence interval/set.


In this article I examine how a participatory painting project in Wellington enhanced cross-cultural understanding between former refugee and host-society participants and enabled a more inclusive urban narrative. In light of the current global humanitarian crisis, a climate of fear has arisen around refugees, which is often exacerbated by the media perpetuating misinformation and negative stereotypes. To counteract misrepresentation, the painting project provided a space for participants to share their lived experiences of home, belonging, and public visibility. A scholar activist orientation was employed, informed by a participatory action research epistemology. These philosophical foundations influenced a qualitative multi-method methodology consisting of painting workshops, semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and public feedback. Through the process of painting a collaborative mural, participants used symbolism to deconstruct language barriers, elicit new ideas, and co-construct a more inclusive narrative whereby differences were negotiated rather than excluded, oppressed, or assimilated. In this manner, social unity was achieved in such a way that it that did not over-ride diversity.


PURPOSE
The aim of this study was to clarify the aspects of loss of interproximal contact (IC) between fixed implant prostheses and the adjacent teeth.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
A total of 146 implant prostheses in 105 patients were investigated. The loss of IC between fixed implant prostheses and adjacent teeth was evaluated using a 50-Μm-thick contact gauge, and the IC was regarded as lost when the gauge was inserted into an IC without resistance at follow-up visits. Statistical analyses were performed to clarify the IC loss rate and factors affecting it.

RESULTS
Eighty of 186 ICs (43%) were regarded as lost. The IC loss rate at the mesial aspect was significantly greater than that at the distal aspect (P = .000, Wilcoxon test). Age, the condition of the opposing dentition, the vitality of the adjacent teeth, and the state of splinting of the adjacent teeth affected the loss of IC at the mesial aspect significantly (P < .05, Cox regression analysis).

CONCLUSION
Loss of IC between fixed implant prostheses and adjacent teeth was observed frequently at follow-up visits, especially at the mesial aspects of the prostheses. It is considered that this phenomenon may induce food impaction and cause an adverse effect on the peri-implant tissue. Hence, appropriate informed consent and careful maintenance at follow-up visits regarding IC between implants and adjacent teeth are important, and the loss of IC should be recovered if observed.