A trilayer system consisting of an IrMn layer exchanged coupled to two CoFe layers of equal thickness has been studied. A single stage reversal was observed over a wide range of temperatures. Two bilayers with the same thicknesses of the pinning layer but different ferromagnetic thicknesses were also studied. By comparing the magnetic properties of these three stacks the effect of the interfacial area on the exchange field and the coercivity has been determined. We find that the interfacial area has a very minor effect on the exchange field Hex and the blocking temperature (TB) but causes a doubling of the coercivity (Hc). This indicates that Hc  is dominated by the interface whereas the exchange bias is controlled by volumetric effects


In the present work, the formation of 2-phenyl indole, 2 was carried out by the Fischer Indole Synthesis method through AcetoPhenyl hydrazine (1) and by cyclaization with Polyphosheric acid (PPA). 2-Phenyl Indole (2) was also synthesized by alternate method from direct Acetophenone through conc. H2SO4. The derivative 2-phenyl-1H-Indole-3-carbaldehyde (3a) was synthesized from Compd. (2) by the method of Vilsmeier reaction using Phosphorous oxy chloride in DMF. Phenyl (2-phenyl-1H-indol-3-yl) methanone (3b) and 1-(2-phenyl-1H-indol-3-yl) ethan-1-one (3c) was prepared by the Friedal Craft reaction method using benzoyl chloride and acetyl chloride respectively along with aluminum chloride and DCM. The synthesized derivatives (1), (2) and (3a-c) were screened for instrumental analysis and molecular docking studies.


This article reports the use of electrical stimulation to provide paraplegic patients with complete lesions of the spinal cord the ability to rise from sitting to standing, to maintain a standing position, and to walk with a reciprocal gait. Four channels of electrical stimulation are sufficient for synthesis of a simple reciprocal gait pattern in these patients. During the double-stance phase, knee extensor muscles of both knees are stimulated, providing sufficient support for the body. Only one knee extensor muscle group is excited during the single-stance phase. The swing phase of the contralateral lower extremity is accomplished by eliciting the synergistic flexor muscle response through electrical stimulation of afferent nerves. The transition from the double-stance phase to the swing phase is controlled by two hand switches used by the therapist or built into the handles of the walking frame or crutches for use by the patient.


Representing a sparse histogram, or more generally a sparse vector, is a fundamental task in differential privacy. An ideal solution would use space close to information-theoretical lower bounds, have an error distribution that depends optimally on the desired privacy level, and allow fast random access to entries in the vector. However, existing approaches have only achieved two of these three goals. In this paper we introduce the Approximate Laplace Projection (ALP) mechanism for approximating k-sparse vectors. This mechanism is shown to simultaneously have information-theoretically optimal space (up to constant factors), fast access to vector entries, and error of the same magnitude as the Laplace-mechanism applied to dense vectors. A key new technique is a unary representation of small integers, which we show to be robust against "randomized response'' noise. This representation is combined with hashing, in the spirit of Bloom filters, to obtain a space-efficient, differentially private representation. Our theoretical performance bounds are complemented by simulations which show that the constant factors on the main performance parameters are quite small, suggesting practicality of the technique.


This paper describes a wavelet based approach to derivative spectroscopy. The approach is utilized to select, through optimization, optimal channels or bands to use as derivative based remote sensing algorithms. The approach is applied to airborne and modeled or synthetic reflectance signatures of environmental media and features or objects within such media, such as benthic submerged vegetation canopies. The technique can also applied to selected pixels identified within a hyperspectral image cube obtained from an board an airborne, ground based, or subsurface mobile imaging system. This wavelet based image processing technique is an extremely fast numerical method to conduct higher order derivative spectroscopy which includes nonlinear filter windows. Essentially, the wavelet filter scans a measured or synthetic signature in an automated sequential manner in order to develop a library of filtered spectra. The library is utilized in real time to select the optimal channels for direct algorithm application. The unique wavelet based derivative filtering technique makes us of a translating, and dilating derivative spectroscopy signal processing (TDDS-SP (R)) approach based upon remote sensing science and radiative transfer processes unlike other signal processing techniques applied to hyperspectral signatures.


Why are US labor unions so weak? Union decline has had important consequences for politics, inequality, and social policy. Common explanations cite employment shifts, public opinion, labor laws, and differences in working class culture and organization. But comparing the United States with Canada challenges those explanations. After following US unionization rates for decades, Canadian rates diverged in the 1960s, and are now nearly three times higher. This divergence was due to different processes of working class political incorporation. In the United States, labor was incorporated as an interest group into a labor regime governed by a pluralist idea. In Canada, labor was incorporated as a class representative into a labor regime governed by a class idea. This led to a relatively stronger Canadian labor regime that better held employers in check and protected workers' collective bargaining rights. As a result, union density stabilized in Canada while plummeting in the United States.


A safety case is a well-reasoned argument, supported by evidence that a system is acceptably safe to operate in a particular context. For many, evolving a safety case in step with the design has proved to be an effective means of identifying and addressing safety concerns during a system's lifecycle. However, ultimately safety cases address only one system attribute safety. Increasingly, the idea of extending the well-established concept of the safety case to address wider dependability concerns is being discussed. Attempting to address all dependability attributes can result in competing objectives. As a consequence, there are trade-offs among the dependability attributes that need to be resolved in order to achieve the optimum dependability characteristics for the system. Furthermore, the balance of these trade-offs can depend heavily upon the context in which the system operates. In this paper we examine the suitability of extending existing methodologies and concepts from safety case development practice to address the wider concerns of dependability arguments. We will discuss existing approaches to managing trade-offs between competing design objectives and explain how trade-offs may be supported within the Goal Structuring Notation


We study the decidability and complexity of verification problems for infinite-state systems. A fundamental question in formal verification is if the behaviour of one process is reproducible by another. This inclusion problem can be studied for various models of computation and behavioural preorders. It is generally intractable or even undecidable already for very limited computational models. The aim of this work is to clarify the status of the decidability and complexity of some well-known inclusion problems for suitably restricted computational models. In particular, we address the problems of checking strong and weak simulation and trace inclusion for processes definable by one-counter automata (OCA), that consist of a finite control and a single counter ranging over the non-negative integers. We take special interest of the subclass of one-counter nets (OCNs), that cannot fully test the counter for zero and which is subsumed both by pushdown automata and Petri nets / vector addition systems. Our new results include the PSPACE-completeness of strong and weak simulation, and the undecidability of trace inclusion for OCNs. Moreover, we consider semantic preorders between OCA/OCN and finite systems and close some gaps regarding their complexity. Finally, we study deterministic processes, for which simulation and trace inclusion coincide.


Several case studies are presented to demonstrate that significant migration of elements in regolith over mineral deposits can reach the earth surface through thick layers of superimposed regolith. Data obtained from drill-holes in Mo-W and Mo-Ag mineral deposits in Eastern Inner Mongolia, China using portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF, Niton XL3t 950) and data from other areas reported in the literature have been modeled using power-law decay functions that describe the regolith decay trends with increasing distance from the underlying altered rocks or saprocks. The results demonstrate that the element concentration in the surface media can be very low due to decay and mask effects, even if a thin layer of overburden exists. In order to characterize the decay behaviour of geochemical concentration of an element in a vertical regolith profile caused by complex mechanisms, a new non-linear differential equation was proposed which assumes the decay rate of concentration is negatively proportional to the concentration itself, with a functional coefficient dependent on vertical distance from the underlying surface of mineralised rocks. Applying Taylor series expansion to the coefficient function, the differential equation can be approximated by four simple dynamic systems, each with explicit solutions including Gaussian functions, exponential functions, power-law functions and exponential functions with inverse distance. These functions can be utilized as either separate or combined models to fit observed data by means of simple linear regression or multivariate regression. The combined mode is useful for evaluating the comprehensive effect of element concentration distribution due to various mechanisms.


The evolution and formation of our urban fabric have an inextricable relationship with transportation and urban mobility. The revolution in speed and power of transportation as a result of the automobile in the early 1900's brought about radical changes in how cities were designed and constructed. City streets, previously built for horse-drawn vehicles and foot traffic, were modernized with asphalt and segregated for the sake of speed and convenience. Parking lots, garages and gas stations were carved out of the city fabric to support the population's addiction and dependence on it as the ultimate form of movement. Expansive highways and extensive networks of arterial thoroughfares were put in place as cities began to undergo urban sprawl. As North American cities have evolved and developed around the use of automobiles, the requirements to support its use have become increasingly oppressive to other forms of city life. However, an upcoming revolution in transportation and urban mobility, ushered in by the development of autonomous technology, will present urban designers with new opportunities to re-evaluate the relationship between motorists and the city. Autonomous technology has the potential to completely redefine the rules regarding the spatial requirements of automobiles and how they operate within the city. It is widely believed that AV (autonomous vehicle) technology will encourage car sharing, shifting the business model from that of predominantly individual car ownership to a service based model, resulting in a significant decrease in number of vehicles on the streets. The efficiency of AVs will also drastically reduce the amount of space required to operate vehicles, allowing for a reduction in traffic congestion and road sizes. Another consequence of AV technology will be the reduction in need for parking, as a result of car-sharing opportunities and the possibility for vehicles to perpetually be in operation. This thesis explores the implications of AVs on the urban fabric and aims to direct urban design towards incorporating AVs towards a more equitable future. The city of Toronto will be used as a lens for envisioning how a future urban landscape incorporating AVs may take shape. The city currently suffers from immense friction between the overbearing requirements of automotive infrastructure and daily city life. Accidents involving motorists and cyclists are increasingly a problem and efforts to limit the range of the automobile within the city are becoming popular. It is estimated that one third of land in Canadian cities are for cars that aren't even moving, removing land that could otherwise be allocated to additional housing or retail space. Toronto is putting its best foot forward towards a future with AVs though with investment from all levels of government, academia and private entities. The thesis studies the impact of the automobile on a variety of actors and spaces within the city and proposes visions of how the ubiquity of AVs may change the inherent structure of typical typologies in our city today. The work serves as a guideline in how we may design a more equitable city as a result of the opportunities presented from AVs. The advent of autonomous vehicles is inevitable and the visions proposed serve as a porthole into what may become reality within just a couple of decades.


Intracellular microelectrode technique and standard organ bath technique were used to investigate the effects of pentagastrin, G17, and G34 on the electrical and mechanical activities of canine antral circular muscle. All three molecular forms increased the amplitude and duration of the plateau of the gastric action potential and the frequency of spontaneous action potentials. They also increased the amplitude and frequency of spontaneous contractions. G17 was equal to or less potent than pentagastrin in all of its actions on this tissue. G34 had an equal or greater activity than G17. The electrical studies indicate that G17 is active in this tissue in a physiological range of concentrations. The ED50 for the effect of G17 to increase the amplitude of the plateau potential is less than that for the effect of G17 on gastric secretion, indicating that this is a physiological action of gastrin. Atropine studies indicate that only part of the in vitro inotropic action of gastrin is caused by the release of acetylcholine from nerve terminals, but that the chronotropic action is attributable to a direct effect on the smooth muscle membrane.


Vaccination is an effective means for prevention of the progression and spread of influ - enza virus infection. Nonetheless, there is a risk of adverse reactions, such as pain and fever, during the vaccination. In addition, because people from a wide age range, that is, from children to the elderly, are inoculated with vaccines, safety confirmation of these vaccines is important. Safety assessments of a vaccine, in the form of quality controls, have been carried out on animals. For example, the abnormal toxicity test is based on body weight changes as a toxicity index, and the leukopenic toxicity test can evaluate hematological toxicity. Meanwhile, since the 2000s, safety evaluation of drugs and chemi cals by the genomic approach has been conducted frequently. The benefits with respect to safety evaluation are high sensitivity and abundant information about toxicity profiles. In this chapter, we describe the genes that are helpful as safety assessment markers and their usefulness for safety testing and vaccine development. In addition, this information may provide toxicity profiles, help understand the reactogenicity of nasal vaccines or adjuvants, and explain the prospects of genomic analyses in the development of novel vaccines and adjuvants.


Purpose –This paper empirically investigates the performance of Islamic funds, which have been praised for weathering the 2008 financial storm relatively well and compares it to a European product designed to protect the most vulnerable of investors, UCITS funds. Design/methodology/approach – This paper builds on 128 time-series regressions using various factor models to analyse the risk-return relationship of 242 Islamic and UCITS funds relative to a market benchmark, over a 10-year period starting January 2006, to capture severe bear and bull market conditions. Findings – Islamic funds do not face a competitive disadvantage arising from their strict compliance with Shar ıʿah principles, and their performance and investment style is relatively similar to UCITS schemes. Practical implications – Islamic funds represent a low risk investment due to their very mild betas. Therefore, when forming part of a diversified portfolio, they can act as a hedging tool against adverse market movements. Social implications – Muslim investors are not punished relative to conventional retail investors when following their own beliefs. Other investors can consider Islamic funds in their portfolio allocation, especially those who seek socially and ethically responsible investments. Originality/value – This paper fills a lacuna in the existing literature, because the sample is made up of Islamic funds established worldwide and includes not only equity, but also fixed income and mixed allocation funds.


This paper describes qddb, a database program suite that addresses the common situation in which data are infrequently changed. Searches in the stable parts of databases are very efficient because they use hash-based searching through a completely inverted index, whereas searches in updated sections are less so. All files used by qddb are in Ascii format, so they can be easily modified by a knowledgeable user with a simple text editor. The Ascii format does not detract significantly from the efficiency of our database package, and it allows databases to be distributed and completely portable between architectures. The qddb suite currently runs under both BSD and System V Unix on a variety of machines. It is capable of querying large databases on small machines with limited memory.


doi: https://doi.org/10.15447/sfews.2016v14iss4art5 Many contaminants in the California Bay–Delta (Bay–Delta) exceed regulatory standards, affect aquatic species, and potentially affect human health. Recent studies provide multiple lines of evidence that contaminants affect species of concern in the Bay–Delta (e.g., the decline of several important fish species referred to as the "Pelagic Organism Decline" or POD). Contaminants occur as dynamic complex mixtures and exert effects at multiple levels of biological organization. Multiple chemicals impair processes at cellular and physiological levels (measured as growth, development, and behavior abnormalities), and when viability and reproductive output are affected, populations are affected. As an important example, the population decline of the endangered Delta Smelt (Hypomesus transpacificus) is significantly associated with multiple stressors, including insecticide use. New analyses presented in this paper show significant correlations between pyrethroid use and declining abundance of POD fish species. Water sampled from the Bay–Delta causes multiple deleterious effects in fish, and Delta Smelt collected from the Bay–Delta exhibit contaminant effects. Fish prey items are also affected by contaminants; this may have an indirect effect on their populations. Co-occurrence with thermal changes or disease can exacerbate contaminant effects. Contaminants also pose threats to human health via consumption of fish and shellfish, drinking water, and contact recreation, in particular, mercury, cyanobacteria toxins, disinfection byproducts, pathogens, pesticides, and pharmaceuticals and personal care products. The role of contaminants in the decline of Bay–Delta species is difficult to accurately assess in a complex, dynamic system. However, tools and approaches are available to evaluate contaminant effects on Bay–Delta species, and separate the effects of multiple stressors. Integrated monitoring and focused mechanistic studies are instrumental for addressing management needs. Effect and risk assessments should be conducted for different species across multiple life stages, with emphasis on early life stages of high-priority Bay–Delta species.


A total of 482 pigs (initial BW of 21.9 lb) were used in a 22-d study to determine the effects of dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) on growth performance of nursery pigs reared in a commercial environment. Pigs were allotted to one of two dietary treatments based on corn-soybean meal and containing either 0 or 10% DDGS. There was a tendency for pigs fed the diet containing 10% DDGS to have decreased (P 0.21). For economic analysis, the DDGS price was compared at $109, $93, or $80/ton. There were no differences in feed cost per pound of gain in diets containing DDGS at the three price levels (P>0.29). Pigs fed the diets containing 10% DDGS had a tendency for reduced (P<0.12) margin over feed cost ($0.52, $0.54, and $0.56), regardless of DDGS price ($106, $93, or $80/ton, respectively). Although only a trend for decreased ADG was observed, feeding diets containing DDGS was less economical, as measured by margin over feed costs.


The heat transfer and the fluid dynamics characteristics of subsonic gas flows through micro-channels are examined using numerical method. Detailed analysis on the Stirling MEMS device has been examined for the feasibility of the performance. The 1-D Stirling engine design code was utilized to provide basic information to meet the design parameters and criteria. Furthermore a 2-D CFD code has been used to perform a detailed analysis. The simulation results show that the numerical method used here could be used for the prediction of MEMS performance before experimental test and manufacture process start.


Background: Lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD), the major subtype of lung cancer, is among the leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Energy-related metabolic reprogramming metabolism is a hallmark of cancer shared by numerous cancer types, including LUAD. Nevertheless, the functional pathways and molecular mechanism by which FAM83A-AS1 acts in metabolic reprogramming in lung adenocarcinoma have not been fully elucidated. Methods: We used transwell, wound-healing scratch assay, and metabolic assays to explore the effect of FAM83A-AS1 in LUAD cell lines. Western blotting, Co-IP assays, and ubiquitination assays were used to detect the effects of FAM83A-AS1 on HIF-1α expression, degradation, and its binding to VHL. Moreover, an in vivo subcutaneous tumor formation assay was used to detect the effect of FAM83A-AS1 on LUAD. Results: Herein, we identified FAM83A-AS1 as a metabolism-related lncRNA, which was highly correlated with glycolysis, hypoxia, and OXPHOS pathways in LUAD patients using bioinformatics analysis. In addition, we uncovered that FAM83A-AS1 could promote the migration and invasion of LUAD cells, as well as influence the stemness of LUAD cells in vivo and vitro. Moreover, FAM83A-AS1 was shown to promote glycolysis in LUAD cell lines in vitro and in vivo, and was found to influence the expression of genes related to glucose metabolism. Besides, we revealed that FAM83A-AS1 could affect glycolysis by regulating HIF-1α degradation. Finally, we found that FAM83A-AS1 knockdown could inhibit tumor growth and suppress the expression of HIF-1α and glycolysis-related genes in vivo. Conclusion: Our study demonstrates that FAM83A-AS1 contributes to LUAD proliferation and stemness via the HIF-1α/glycolysis axis, making it a potential biomarker and therapeutic target in LUAD patients.


A gregarine pathogen of Ips sexdentatus is reported in Turkey for the first time and described as Gregarina typographi. A mixed nematode parasitization and gregarine infection is reported. Gregarines were observed in the populations of I. sexdentatus in Şalpazari (Sisdagi), Trabzon. During the study, several life stages of the gregarine pathogen were observed, measured, and photographed. Measurements of gamonts and gametocysts of G. typographi are given and compared with other gregarine isolates from Turkey.


Calcium imaging is a powerful method to record the activity of neural populations, but inferring spike times from calcium signals is a challenging problem. We compared multiple approaches using multiple datasets with ground truth electrophysiology, and found that simple non-negative deconvolution (NND) outperformed all other algorithms. We introduce a novel benchmark applicable to recordings without electrophysiological ground truth, based on the correlation of responses to two stimulus repeats, and used this to show that unconstrained NND also outperformed the other algorithms when run on "zoomed out" datasets of ~10,000 cell recordings. Finally, we show that NND-based methods match the performance of a supervised method based on convolutional neural networks, while avoiding some of the biases of such methods, and at much faster running times. We therefore recommend that spikes be inferred from calcium traces using simple NND, due to its simplicity, efficiency and accuracy.


Server Flash Cache (SFC) is increasingly adopted in virtualization environments for IO acceleration. Deciding the optimal SFC allocation among VMs or VM disks is a major pain-point, dominantly handled manually by administrators. In this paper, we present vCacheShare, a dynamic, workload-aware, policy-driven framework for continuous and automated optimization of SFC space partitioning. Its decision-making is based on multiple IO access characteristics. In particular, vCacheShare adopts a cache utility model that captures both longer-term locality behavior and transient locality spikes.

This paper validates the growing applicability of analytical programming techniques to solve real-time resource management problems, traditionally addressed using heuristics. We designed vCacheShare to coordinate with typical VM mobility events and implemented it within the widely used ESXi hypervisor. We performed extensive evaluation using 13 representative enterprise IO workloads, one IO benchmark, and two end-to-end deployment test cases targeting Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) and data warehousing scenarios respectively. Our results verified the advantage of vCacheShare over implicit management schemes such as global LRU, and confirmed its self-adaptive capability.


Research results from the neotropics showed a high positive correlation between plant population densities and yields of marketable berries in hot pepper (Capsicum chinense Jacq.). Densities were compared on a Piarco Series soil (Ultisols of the Aquoxic Tropudults sub-group) during 2011 in central Trinidad on cv. Moruga Red to determine the density that will produce the highest yields of berries, mean berry weights and mean plant developmental traits. The 16 different densities ranged from 60 x 30 cm to 150 x 120 cm. The split-plot design comprised four levels of between-row spacings of 60, 90, 120, and 150 cm. The subplots represented four levels of within-row spacings, viz.: 30, 60, 90, and 120 cm. The 16 treatments were replicated thrice thus producing 48 gross plots of 6 x 6 m each. The nett plots in the centre of the gross plots measured 4.88 x 4.57 m (22 m2). A principal finding was that the highest plant population densities, 60 x 30 cm, 90 x 30 cm, 120 x 30 cm and 150 x 30 cm yielded the highest weight of berries per nett plot (P = 0.001). Another conclusion was that the different densities had no effect on mean weights of the berries (P = 0.080), mean plant height (P = 0.702), mean width of plant canopy (P = 0.46) and mean number of secondary lateral branches per plant (P = 0.655). The results from this study should guide farmers to adopt higher plant population densities.


This paper compares the computational performances of four model order reduction methods applied to large-scale electric power RLC networks transfer functions with many resonant peaks. Two of these methods require the state-space or descriptor model of the system, while the third requires only its frequency response data. The fourth method is proposed in this paper, being a combination of two of the previous methods. The methods were assessed for their ability to reduce eight test systems, either of the single-input single-output (SISO) or multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) type. The results indicate that the reduced models obtained, of much smaller dimension, reproduce the dynamic behaviors of the original test systems over an ample range of frequencies with high accuracy.


Ransom, Fazelpour, and Mole (this journal - 2017) raise an important puzzle for the 'prediction error minimization' account of cognitive processing. That account depicts all cognitive processing as fundamentally in the business of minimizing prediction errors concerning the evolving flow of sensory information. One of the cornerstones of these highly ambitious, would-be unifying accounts is their depiction of attention as nothing other than the process of optimizing the precision (inverse variance) of critical prediction error signals. But that story, Ransom et al suggest, cannot accommodate voluntary shifts of attention. In this paper, I show why this challenge to the grand unifying project fails. It fails because it locates the origins of voluntary attention in complexes of unanalyzed desire rather than in changing complexes of beliefs. Abstract Ransom, Fazelpour, and Mole (this journal - 2017) raise an important puzzle for the 'prediction error minimization' account of cognitive processing. That account depicts all cognitive processing as fundamentally in the business of minimizing prediction errors concerning the evolving flow of sensory information. One of the cornerstones of these highly ambitious, would-be unifying accounts is their depiction of attention as nothing other than the process of optimizing the precision (inverse variance) of critical prediction error signals. But that story, Ransom et al suggest, cannot accommodate voluntary shifts of attention. In this paper, I show why this challenge to the grand unifying project fails. It fails because it locates the origins of voluntary attention in complexes of unanalyzed desire rather than in changing complexes of beliefs.


SUMMARY: Fatty acids and sterols of gametophytes and sporophytes of Chondrus crispus were isolated and identified. Although chemical variation in the proportions of other natural compounds (eg. different carrageenan type) between gametophytes and sporophytes has already been observed, this is the first comparative study of the lipid composition in both generations. The content of fatty acids and sterols in gametophytes (0.710 and 0.190 mg g-1 dry weight respectively) was higher than in sporophytes (0.622 and 0.113 mg g -1 dry weight). The main fatty acids were palmitic, palmitoleic, oleic, arachidonic and eicosapentaenoic acids. These five fatty acids represented more than 78% of the all fatty acid composition in both generations. In addition unsaturated fatty acids were present in a much greater quantity (>80%) than saturated fatty acids. However, differences in the distribution of fatty acids between the two generations were observed. Gametophytes demonstrated higher amounts of monounsaturated fatty acids while sporophytes had a relatively higher content of saturated and polyunsaturated fatty acids. The major sterol in both generations was cholesterol (>94%). Differences were also observed in the sterol distribution between gametophytes and sporophytes, the former containing smaller amounts of 7-dehydrocholesterol and stigmasterol, while the latter had smaller amounts of 22-dehydrocholesterol, campesterol and sitosterol. Gametophytes were lacking 24-methylenecholesterol. Fatty acids and sterol of algal class, families and sometimes even species are characteristic to those particular taxa, and could be useful as chemotaxonomic markers. The results of this study showed that intra-specific variation in algae can be occured.


GABAB receptor-mediated inhibition is indispensable for maintaining a healthy neuronal excitation/inhibition balance. Many neurological diseases are associated with a disturbed excitation/inhibition balance and downregulation of GABAB receptors due to enhanced sorting of the receptors to lysosomal degradation. A key event triggering the downregulation of the receptors is the phosphorylation of S867 in the GABAB1 subunit mediated by CaMKIIβ. Interestingly, close to S867 in GABAB1 exists another phosphorylation site, T872. Therefore, the question arose as to whether phosphorylation of T872 is involved in downregulating the receptors and whether phosphorylation of this site is also mediated by CaMKIIβ or by another protein kinase. Here, we show that mutational inactivation of T872 in GABAB1 prevented the degradation of the receptors in cultured neurons. We found that, in addition to CaMKIIβ, also ERK1/2 is involved in the degradation pathway of GABAB receptors under physiological and ischemic conditions. In contrast to our previous view, CaMKIIβ does not appear to directly phosphorylate S867. Instead, the data support a mechanism in which CaMKIIβ activates ERK1/2, which then phosphorylates S867 and T872 in GABAB1. Blocking ERK activity after subjecting neurons to ischemic stress completely restored downregulated GABAB receptor expression to normal levels. Thus, preventing ERK1/2-mediated phosphorylation of S867/T872 in GABAB1 is an opportunity to inhibit the pathological downregulation of the receptors after ischemic stress and is expected to restore a healthy neuronal excitation/inhibition balance.


Service-Oriented Computing (SOC) is an emerging new paradigm for distributed and object-oriented computing by allowing autonomous, platform-independent computational entities (called services) to be built (described, discovered, composed, orchestrated) within and across organizational boundaries. Like no other computing paradigm before, SOC is destined to exert a lasting influence on the business domain, among others (e-commerce, e-government, e-business, e-learning, e-health, etc.).
The Young Researchers workshop series on Service-Oriented Computing is meant to be a platform for junior researchers from industry and academics alike. Its core objectives are to exchange information regarding advancements in the state of the art and practice of SOC, as well as to identify emerging research topics and the future trends in this domain.
Following the success of the previous three workshops, the 4th European Young Researchers Workshop on Service-Oriented Computing (YR-SOC 2009) introduced two novelties: it was organised outside of the UK and it saw the introduction of a number of tutorials, thus making the workshop a 3-day event. YR-SOC 2009 took place at the CNR Institute of Information Science and Technologies in Pisa, Italy, and was organised by Maurice ter Beek, Barry Norton, Stephan Reiff-Marganiec and Monika Solanki.
The contributions in this volume cover aspects such as automated service composition, context-aware SOC, service-oriented programming, QoS-aware SOC, service-oriented architectures, SOC modelling and analysis, process management, web services, ontologies and the semantic web.


As introduced by Bentley et al. (2005), artificial immune systems (AIS) are lacking tissue, which is present in one form or another in all living multi-cellular organisms. Some have argued that this concept in the context of AIS brings little novelty to the already saturated field of the immune inspired computational research. This article aims to show that such a component of an AIS has the potential to bring an advantage to a data processing algorithm in terms of data pre-processing, clustering and extraction of features desired by the immune inspired system. The proposed tissue algorithm is based on self-organizing networks, such as self-organizing maps (SOM) developed by Kohonen (1996) and an analogy of the so called Toll-Like Receptors (TLR) affecting the activation function of the clusters developed by the SOM.


This Special Issue is based on selected papers from the Environmental Social and Governance (ESG) and Sustainability Conference (2021). This is the second ESG conference held by Victoria University Business School (VUBS) and the Institute of Sustainable Industries and the Liveable Cities (ISILC) of Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia.


Human papillomavirus (HPV) infections are associated with benign and
malignant lesions of the female and male anogenital tract. In the current
study, we aimed to investigate the role of high-risk HPVs infection in the
pathogenesis of prostate cancer among nations or ethnic groups, in
addition to testing the role of homozygosity of arginine form at codon 72
of the p53 gene among prostate cancer patients whose prostate tissues
were infected with high-risk HPVs.
Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue samples of 123 primary prostate
adenocarcinoma cases and 267 control tissues of benign prostatic
hyperplasia were used in the study. Genomic DNA was purified and
amplified through MY09/MY11 degenerate primers, GP5+/GP6+
consensus primers, SPF1/2 cocktail of six primers using conventional,
multiplex and nested PCR techniques, and subsequently subjected to viral
load quantification, genotyping, testing of polymorphism of codon 72 of
the p53 gene and apoptosis index assessment by in situ assay. Also, the
status of the p53 tumour suppressor gene, p16INK4a transcription factor as
well as the E6 protein of the high risk HPVs have been tested by
immunohistochemistry in both the study and control groups.
High-risk HPVs were detected in 30 of 123 (24.3%) PCa and 16 of 267
(5.9%) BPH samples with positive HPV-DNA. The detection rate of the
high-risk HPV infections was 4%, 44% and 29% among the ethnic
subgroups from the Middle Eastern, Caucasian, and Afro-Caribbean of the
PCa patients. There was no association between the existence of high-risk
HPV infections and their viral load in PCa patients and the tumour
staging, grading, PSA level and patient survival rate in those patients.
Likewise, there was no significant difference in the frequency of p53 Arg
16
homozygosity between the high-risk HPV-positive and the HPV-negative
PCa samples. Moreover, it has been found that the existence of the highrisk
HPV E6 protein within the PCa samples was independent of the
status of the p53 gene, p16INK4a transcription factor, and the apoptosis
index in these samples.
Our data showed that HPV infections do exist in PCa and BPH samples
with different prevalence within ethnic groups with the least occurrence in
the Middle Eastern patients. However, the infections with high-risk HPVs
are not associated with the prostate cancer grade, stage, patient's PSA
level, and survival rate. Therefore, our data do not support the role of
HPV infection in the pathogenesis of prostate carcinoma.


Different multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) techniques are designed for different decision making types and also may be suited for different application or domains. The ability to identify a suitable MCDM technique is important. This paper proposes an evaluation framework to identify suitable MCDM techniques for Business-to-Business (B2B) collaboration. The specific needs of B2B collaborations are considered in this framework development. This proposed evaluation framework consists of three main categories of considerations; Model Formulation, Automation Practicality and Quality of Solution. An assessment using the first two categories of the proposed framework is also discussed, as a case study of how this evaluation framework can be used.


This work reports the synthesis and multifunctionality of 2D layered coordination polymers formulated as [Ln2(H3nmp)2]·xH2O (1, where Ln = Sm3+, Eu3+, Tb3+, Dy3+, Ho3+, Er3+ and Y3+) (x = 1 to 4). We describe detailed synthesis of the materials using various methods [typical hydrothermal reaction (HT), microwave-assisted synthesis (MWAS) and one-pot method (OP)], while discussing the various crystal morphologies which can be fine tuned by varying systematically the conditions. We further explore the multifunctionality of this material by studying its heterogeneous catalytic activity in the ring opening of styrene oxide, its photoluminescence behaviour and its cytotoxicity. A conversion of 88%/100% yield at 4 h/24 h reaction respectively, with excellent selectivity towards 2-methoxy-2-phenylethanol product (100%) was observed. Photoluminescence properties of the optically-active [Eu2(H3nmp)2]·xH2O (1Eu) and the mixed-lanthanide [(Gd0.95Eu0.5)2(H3nmp)2]·xH2O (1GdEu), on the other hand, show potential use for UV-to-visible light converters, with lifetimes of 2.31 ± 0.01 and 2.61 ± 0.01 ms at ambient temperature for 1Eu and 1GdEu samples. Preliminary cytotoxic studies showed no effects on metabolic activity of both in vitro human epithelial kidney (HK-2) and human hepatocellular carcinoma (HepG2) cell lines. A reduction of NR uptake was, however, observed indicating some cytotoxic effect on lysosomal activity.


This paper presents a detailed analysis of the dynamic behaviour of a hybrid ac-dc electric power system under large disturbances. The system under study is representative of a power distribution network which is currently being developed for future "more electric" aircraft (MEA). Brayton-Moser mixed potential is employed along with Lyapunov stability theorems to determine an analytical estimation of the large-signal stability boundary of the system. Extensive time- domain simulations using detailed behavioural models of the power system components are undertaken. It is shown that the analytically derived region of attraction agrees reasonably well with that obtained from the time-domain simulation. The predicted instability is experimentally validated.


This paper examines the background to calls for further fiscal decentralisation in Scotland in the light of theories of fiscal federalism. In particular, it examines whether spatial differences in preferences, which are central to 'first generation' theories of fiscal federalism can be argued to play a central role in the case for granting Scotland further tax and spending powers. 'Second generation' theories of fiscal federalism draw attention to the political economy of allocating tax powers to different levels of government. Some of the authors in this strand of theory argue that the case for allocating tax powers to subnational governments can be made in terms of 'accountability' – the notion that local politicians can be better held to account for the outcomes of policy actions. Our empirical analysis suggests that there is no clear difference in preferences between Scotland and the rest of the UK along a number of key political dimensions. However, the Scottish parliament enjoys substantially higher levels of trust among the Scottish electorate than does the UK parliament.


Mobile robot navigation through natural terrains is a challenging issue with applications such as planetary exploration or search and rescue. This paper proposes navigability assessment of natural terrains scanned from ground-based 3D laser rangefinders. A continuous model of the terrain is obtained as a fuzzy elevation map (FEM). Based on this model, the proposed solution incorporates terrain navigability both in terms of uncertainties of the 3D input data and slope of the fuzzy surface. Moreover, the paper discusses the application of this method for local path planning. For this purpose, the Bug algorithm has been adapted to compute local paths on the navigable region of the FEM. The method has been applied to actual 3D point clouds on two different experimental sites.


Molluscum contagiosum is a viral infection that affects the first years of life; the infection subsides spontaneously in about a year when the organism processes specific defenses against the virus that consequently disappears from the body; the infection usually confers lifelong immunity (1).The peculiarity of this case is the presence of a typical molluscum contagiosum within a fibrous epithelial structure; despite having tried to dissect the piece otherwise we could not find a connection with the epidermis covering the fibrous papilloma.We searched in the relevant literature for similar cases but we did not find anything. We only found a few cases of cysts located inside the dermis and containing molluscum contagiosum bodies both in the central keratin and focally in the cyst wall itself; even in these cases the virus infected cyst was within the dermis and covered by normal epidermis (2).


Recombinant human granulocyte-macrophage (GM) colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF), G-CSF, and interleukin-3 (IL-3) labeled with 125I were used to study the characteristics and distribution of receptors for these factors on in vitro cell lines and on cells from patients with acute nonlymphocytic leukemia (ANL) and acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL). Receptors for GM-CSF and G-CSF were restricted to a subset of myelomonocytic cell lines whereas IL-3 receptors were also found on pre-B- or early B-cell lines. Receptors for all three CSFs were broadly distributed on ANL cells, with considerable variability in levels of expression. Measurement of the colony-forming ability of ANL cells in response to the CSFs showed that there was no direct correlation between the ability of the cells to respond to a growth factor and the absolute number of receptors expressed for that growth factor. Binding of radiolabeled IL-3 and GM-CSF to ANL cells produced complex biphasic curves. Further analysis showed that both IL-3 and GM-CSF were able to partially compete for specific binding of the heterologous radiolabeled ligand to cells from several ANL patients, suggesting that heterogeneity may exist in human CSF receptors. These results provide new insights into the complex role that CSFs may play in ANL.


As per 'year 2001 census' population of India stands to be 1027 million where 496 million are female inhabitants, i.e. 48% of total population consist of women. For sustainable economic and social development to take place in any country, it is necessary that people participate in the necessary economic and social process. The process of participation is complex — and it is by no means clear that it is comprehensively inclusive. By this, we mean that it is not possible to assume that all sections of the population take part effectively in the economic, social and hence political and democratic processes of society. There are many reasons why people may not participate — from apathy to a sense of helplessness. Women are one side of a coin, half in every respect, then why not in socio-economic and political power? National Dairy Development Board, India, an apex development organisation initiated by Government of India to replicate successful white revolution movement amongst small farmers, by affirmative actions empowered women and made them involved in socio-economic activities. The paper discusses various schemes launched by NDDB and its benefits to women and society.


Deep etching of spinach thylakoids frozen in water exposes the inner and outer surfaces of the thylakoid. Both these surfaces differ greatly in appearance from their respective adjacent fracture planes. This finding constitutes further evidence for membrane splitting during the fracture process. Modification of the fracture face by loss of shattered material or by plastic deformation may explain the partial mismatch between the two fracture faces observed in washed thylakoids.


In this work we analyse the ultrastructure and behaviour of two representative types of parenchymella sponge larvae: the evenly ciliated larva of Scopalina lophyropoda, and the tufted larva of Cacospongia mollior. We sought to find correlates of the dispersal abilities and distribution patterns of these species. Laboratory experiments were performed under two different conditions of water movement (still water and a slight oscillatory movement), and at different times of the larval life-span. Larvae of S. lophyropoda were motionless most of the time, maintaining a vertical posture and rotating on their main axis, and they did not respond to directional light. Larvae of C. mollior were active swimmers that responded negatively to light stimuli. In both cases, movement decreased as the larval age increased. Ultrastructurally, C. mollior larvae were more compact, with more reserves and abundant collagen bundles. Desmosome-like structures were seen connecting the apical parts of the ciliated surface in both species. Two different types of putative light-sensitive structures were found. Both structural and behavioural characteristics favour a greater dispersal capability for C. mollior and a philopatric dispersal mode for S. lophyropoda. These predictions are in agreement with the observed ecological distribution of the species.


The growing operational capability of global Earth Observation (EO) creates new opportunities for data-driven approaches to understand and protect our planet. However, the current use of EO archives is very restricted due to the huge archive sizes and the limited exploration capabilities provided by EO platforms. To address this limitation, we have recently proposed MiLaN, a content-based image retrieval approach for fast similarity search in satellite image archives. MiLaN is a deep hashing network based on metric learning that encodes high-dimensional image features into compact binary hash codes. We use these codes as keys in a hash table to enable real-time nearest neighbor search and highly accurate retrieval. In this demonstration, we showcase the efficiency of MiLaN by integrating it with EarthQube, a browser and search engine within AgoraEO. EarthQube supports interactive visual exploration and Query-by-Example over satellite image repositories. Demo visitors will interact with EarthQube playing the role of different users that search images in a large-scale remote sensing archive by their semantic content and apply other filters.


Outbreaks of emerging coronaviruses in the past two decades and the current pandemic of a novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) that emerged in China highlight the importance of this viral family as a zoonotic public health threat. To gain a better understanding of coronavirus presence and diversity in wildlife at wildlife-human interfaces in three southern provinces in Viet Nam 2013-2014, we used consensus Polymerase Chain Reactions to detect coronavirus sequences. In comparison to previous studies, we observed high proportions of positive samples among field rats (34.0%, 239/702) destined for human consumption and insectivorous bats in guano farms (74.8%, 234/313) adjacent to human dwellings. Most notably among field rats, the odds of coronavirus RNA detection significantly increased along the supply chain from field rats sold by traders (reference group; 20.7% positivity, 39/188) by a factor of 2.2 for field rats sold in large markets (32.0%, 116/363) and 10.0 for field rats sold and served in restaurants (55.6%, 84/151). Coronaviruses were detected in the majority of wildlife farms (60.7%, 17/28) and in the Malayan porcupines (6.0%, 20/331) and bamboo rats (6.3%, 6/96) that are farmed. We identified six known coronaviruses in bats and rodents, clustered in three Coronaviridae genera, including the Alpha-, Beta-, and Gammacoronaviruses. Our analysis also suggested either mixing of animal excreta in the environment or interspecies transmission of coronaviruses, as both bat and avian coronaviruses were detected in rodent feces in the trade. The mixing of multiple coronaviruses, and their apparent amplification along the wildlife supply chain into restaurants, suggests maximal risk for end consumers and likely underpins the mechanisms of zoonotic spillover to people.


The ongoing SARS-CoV-2 outbreak marks the first time that large amounts of genome sequence data have been generated and made publicly available in near real-time. Early analyses of these data revealed low sequence variation, a finding that is consistent with a recently emerging outbreak, but which raises the question of whether such data are sufficiently informative for phylogenetic inferences of evolutionary rates and time scales. The phylodynamic threshold is a key concept that refers to the point in time at which sufficient molecular evolutionary change has accumulated in available genome samples to obtain robust phylodynamic estimates. For example, before the phylodynamic threshold is reached, genomic variation is so low that even large amounts of genome sequences may be insufficient to estimate the virus's evolutionary rate and the time scale of an outbreak. We collected genome sequences of SARS-CoV-2 from public databases at 8 different points in time and conducted a range of tests of temporal signal to determine if and when the phylodynamic threshold was reached, and the range of inferences that could be reliably drawn from these data. Our results indicate that by February 2nd 2020, estimates of evolutionary rates and time scales had become possible. Analyses of subsequent data sets, that included between 47 to 122 genomes, converged at an evolutionary rate of about 1.1×10−3 subs/site/year and a time of origin of around late November 2019. Our study provides guidelines to assess the phylodynamic threshold and demonstrates that establishing this threshold constitutes a fundamental step for understanding the power and limitations of early data in outbreak genome surveillance.


It is widely acknowledged that the media industries are facing an unprecedented period of disruption within the internet age. Whilst avoiding technological determinism, it is important to recognize the scale of the changes being faced and the altering landscape which media businesses, particularly those with a strong legacy, are forced to operate in (Chan-Olmsted and Chang, 2003; Kung, 2008; Kung, Picard and Towse, 2008; Kung, 2013). This paper focuses on the initial findings from a case study of Elle, UK and the title's explicit engagement with multi-platform which has involved multiple and wide ranging product, process and content innovations. The paper focuses on an analysis of documentary evidence and semi-structured interviews with Hearst Magazines UK and Elle UK senior employees. With regard to adjusting to a multiplatform approach to publishing, Hearst UK is considered to have innovated more quickly than rivals (Halliday and Sweney, 2013) and Elle UK has engaged with a multi-platform strategy, 'Elle 360' for the past 18 months. Despite a public discourse of platform neutrality, evidence from the initial research suggests that the economic strategies, as a corollary work practices and content decisions, continue to preference the print magazine above emerging and alternative platforms. This is suggested to be a result of the fact that the print magazine remains the dominant source of revenue despite wider experimentation. The paper concludes by identifying tensions in the continuing experimentation with new business models and maintaining the delicate balancing act of editorial integrity.


The RSH SPECT scanner provides parallel-beam attenuated projections for a fully 3D acquisition geometry. The geometry can be represented by circles on the unit sphere of projection directions, one circle for each position of the detector head. Unlike most other fully 3D geometries this one is particularly challenging because there are no 2D subsets in the data. When no attenuation is present, it is well known that an unmeasured projection can be synthesized if it lies inside one of the measured circles. The main result of this work is that under some assumptions on the attenuation distribution, attenuated projections within a circle can be synthesized from available attenuated projections. One consequence is that RSH SPECT projections can be rebinned into a conventional SPECT geometry for which analytic attenuation correction techniques are available.


Companies in today's world need to become and stay competitive. This means, among other things, that they have to create new ideas and turn them into innovative products and processes. Appropriate innovation management strategies, including creation of various kinds of alliances with other business entities, need to be adopted within the company. Clustering is one of such possibilities. The paper discusses the main features of clusters and the benefits for their members; in addition, it identifies specific features of the construction sector that require specific approaches to establish a cluster. The methodology Innovative Cluster Model with 3x3x3 mail elements (ICM333) is proposed and used to initiate and develop a cluster in the construction sector. In the cluster development three stages are identified: emergence, development and maturity of the cluster. Actions associated with these three stages tackle four areas (in each stage): rationale, organization, resources, and implementation. All areas are thoroughly elaborated and discussed in the paper. In the first step, the emerging cluster, the key element is identification, assessment and dissemination of development opportunities. It can run parallel with the cluster initiation, which is followed by the operation. Within the steps to be taken in the stage of the developing cluster, visions nad the goals have to be defined first, followed by the definition of the cluster organisation. The mature cluster stage has to focus on performance measurement and management, and take appropriate measures to garantee its sustainability and adequate innovative character. Implementation of the proposed cluster development methodology has the potential of greatly facilitating the betterment of a construction sector in a particular country. It can be a valuable tool, when available to policymakers, chambers of commerce and trade, and other stakeholders that wish to foster the development of such clusters. The paper reports on the results of the 7th Framework project FP7-REGIONS-2007-1 RegCon - Support Action for Innovation Driven Clusters in Construction. http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.ee.22.1.217


We investigate whether the dynamical lattice supersymmetry discussed for various Hamiltonians, including one-dimensional quantum spin chains, by (Fendley et al 2003 J. Phys. A 36, 12399424; Yang and Fendley 2004 J. Phys. A 37, 893748; Hagendorf and Fendley 2012 J. Stat. Phys. 146, 112255) and (Hagendorf et al 2013 J. Stat. Phys. 150, 60957; Hagendorf and Liénardy 2017 J. Phys. A 50, 185202; Hagendorf and Liénardy 2018 J. Stat. Mech. 033106) might also exist for the Markov matrices of any one-dimensional exclusion processes, which have the additional constraint of zero column sums by comparison with the spin chains. We find that the DiSSEP (Dissipative Symmetric Simple Exclusion Process), introduced by Crampe et al in (Crampe et al 2016 Phys. Rev. E 94, 032102; Vanicat [arXiv:1708.02440]), provides one such example for suitably chosen parameters. The DiSSEP Markov matrix admits the supersymmetry in these cases because it is conjugate to Ising (λ2 = 1) and Δ = −1/2 XXZ (λ2 = −3) spin chain Hamiltonians which also possess the supersymmetry. The consequences for the spectrum of the DiSSEP Markov matrix are discussed. We also note that the length-changing supersymmetry relation for the DiSSEP Markov matrix ML and the supercharge QL† for L sites, M L Q L † = Q L † M L − 1 , is reminiscent of a 'transfer matrix' symmetry that has been observed in other exclusion processes and discuss the similarity.


Active and passive microwave characteristics of diurnal soil freeze-thaw transitions and their relationships are crucial for developing retrieval algorithms of the soil liquid water content ( <formula> <tex>$θ_{liq}$</tex> </formula> ) and freeze/thaw state, which, however, have been less explored. This study investigates these microwave characteristics and relationships via analysis of ground-based measurements of brightness temperature ( <formula> <tex>$T_{B}$</tex> </formula> ) and backscattering coefficients (σ⁰) in combination with simulations performed with the Tor Vergata discrete radiative transfer model. Both an L-band (1.4 GHz) radiometer ELBARA-III and a wide-band (1-10 GHz) scatterometer are installed in a seasonally frozen Tibetan meadow ecosystem to measure diurnal variations of TB and copolarized σ⁰ at both hh (σ <formula> <tex>$_{hh}$</tex> </formula> ⁰) and vv (σ <formula> <tex>$_{vv}$</tex> </formula> ⁰) polarizations. Analysis of measurements collected between December 2017 and March 2018 shows that 1) diurnal cycles are observed in both T <formula> <tex>$_{B}$</tex> </formula> and σ ⁰ due to the change in surface θliq caused by diurnal soil freeze-thaw transitions; 2) a negatively linear relationship is found between e and σ⁰ regardless of frequency, polarization combinations, and observation angles; 3) slopes (β ) of linearly fit equations between eH and σ <formula> <tex>$_{hh}$</tex> </formula> ⁰ decrease with increasing observation angles of ELBARA-III, while the ones between eV and σ <formula> <tex>$_{vv}$</tex> </formula> ⁰ increase with increasing observation angles; and 4) correlations between e and σ⁰ increase with decreasing microwave frequency of σ⁰ measurements and ELBARA-III observation angles, and magnitudes of diurnal σ⁰ cycles also increase with decreasing microwave frequency. Moreover, the calibrated Tor Vergata model shows capability to reproduce both diurnal e and σ⁰ variations as well as to quantify their relationships at different frequencies and observation angles.


Career plateauing has received little attention in the literature of late, even when employees are retaining their positions longer with little likelihood for advancement or increased job responsibilities. Relationships between reasons for structural and content plateauing and work outcomes are investigated among professional accounting association members. Contributing to the literature, our findings confirm existence of external and internal plateauing reasons and various relationships with outcomes. External reasons for structural plateauing were negatively related to job and career satisfaction, while content plateauing for external reasons was negatively related to job involvement and work motivation. Structural plateauing for internal reasons lowered job involvement, but increased job and career satisfaction, as well as intention to stay. Job involvement and work motivation mediated relationships between several reasons and job satisfaction, career satisfaction, and intention to stay. Managerial implications and future research opportunities are noted.


Historically, women have been at a disadvantage in U.S. politics. Recently, social-cognitive researchers have begun to investigate how gender and partisan stereotypes operate through politician appearance. Here I test the hypothesis that the gendered nature of the two major political parties in the United States manifests itself in the sex-typicality of politician appearance and has consequences for evaluations of female and male politicians. I draw from basic social cognition theory and the prejudice and stereotyping literature to propose a novel approach to understanding the consequences of gender stereotypes for perceptions of politicians (Chapter I). I specify a model documenting how partisan stereotypes and party-based adherence to traditional gender roles impact politician perceptions. The central tenets of this model are tested in Chapter II, Chapter III, Chapter IV, and Chapter V, and focus on a range of outcomes--trait evaluations, issue competencies, leadership ability, vote choice, and electoral success.In the study described in Chapter II, I describe how politicians' gendered appearance impacts trait evaluations. I find that when politicians' appearance is congruent with their partisan stereotype that they fare better in their evaluations of warmth and competence. Moreover, perceived warmth varies as a function of gendered appearance for counter-stereotypic groups. Thus, gendered appearance impacts assessments of male politicians' warmth and evaluations of female politicians' competence.In the study described in Chapter III, I test whether partisan stereotypes influence perceptions of politicians' issue competencies. I find evidence that partisan stereotypes drive perceptions of politicians' issue competencies such that a more feminine appearance compels more favorable evaluations of Democrats' ability to handle compassion/women's issues; a more masculine appearance compels more favorable assessments of politicians' ability to handle economic/military issues. In the study described in Chapter IV, I describe how politicians' gendered appearance impacts leadership ability assessments. The pattern of result remains unclear. A feminine-appearance benefits perceptions of female Democrats' and female and male Republicans' leadership ability; however, a masculine appearance benefits perceptions male Democrats' leadership ability. These findings are not in line with my prior research and other published findings regarding gendered appearance and perceptions of leadership ability. Therefore, additional research is warranted to fully understand the influence of gendered appearance on assessments of leadership ability.


We describe a patient with acute myeloblastic leukemia in remission who developed painful, swollen knees 6 weeks after being ventilated for acute respiratory distress syndrome. Synovial fluid analysis was nondiagnostic and initial radiographs of his knees were normal. Repeat radiographs 5 weeks later showed periarticular calcification and the diagnosis of heterotopic ossification was made. Heterotopic ossification should be part of the differential diagnosis of acute arthritis in critically ill patients.


In this paper, a new sparse method called (MAVE-SiER) is proposed, to introduce MAVE-SiER, we combined the effective sufficient dimension reduction method MAVE with the sparse method Signal extraction approach to multivariate regression (SiER). MAVE-SiER has the benefit of expanding the Signal extraction method to multivariate regression (SiER) to nonlinear and multi-dimensional regression. MAVE-SiER also allows MAVE to deal with problems which the predictors are highly correlated. MAVE-SiER may estimate dimensions exhaustively while concurrently choosing useful variables. Simulation studies confirmed MAVE-SiER performance.


I estimate and decompose the welfare benefit of Thailand's universal health care policy, also known as the "30 Baht program". The total welfare impact of the 30 Baht program is defined as the amount of consumption that an enrollee would need to give up that would leave her at the same expected utility as without the 30 Baht program. I find that the total welfare benefit is approximately 75 cents per one dollar of government spending. The main source of the welfare effect can be attributed to improved consumption smoothing rather than increases in the consumption level. Using difference in differences method, I find that the effect of the 30 Baht program on income is signicantly positive, while the effect on consumption is slightly negative but not significant. This implies that the 30 Baht program has a positive impact on savings and future consumption, rather than current consumption.


Rasayana is one of the eight clinical specialities of classical Ayurveda. Rasayana replenish the vital fluids of our body, thus keeping us away from diseases. The rasayana therapy enhance the qualities of rasa, enriches it with nutrients so one can attains longevity, memory, intelligence, freedom from disorder, youthfulness, excellence of luster, complexion and voice, optimum development of physique and sense organs, mastery over phonetics and brilliance. Taking rasayana is helpful to increase the immunity of the person to keep him away from disease and also reverses the disease process and prevents the re-occurrence. The Rasayanas are rejuvenators, nutritional supplements and possess strong antioxidant activity. They also have antagonistic actions on the oxidative stressors, which give rise to the formation of different free radicals. Ocimum sanctum, Tinospora cordifolia, Emblica officinalis, Convolvulus pluricaulis, Centella asiatica, Bacopa monniera, Withania somnifera, Triphala rasayana, Chyawanprash, Brahma rasayana are very important rasayanas which are described in ayurveda and proved by new researches.


Multi-view clustering has hitherto been studied due to their effectiveness in dealing with heterogeneous data. Despite the empirical success made by recent works, there still exists several severe challenges. Particularly, previous multi-view clustering algorithms seldom consider the topological structure in data, which is essential for clustering data on manifold. Moreover, existing methods cannot fully explore the consistency of local structures between different views as they uncover the clustering structure in a intra-view way instead of a inter-view manner. In this paper, we propose to exploit the implied data manifold by learning the topological structure of data. Besides, considering that the consistency of multiple views is manifested in the generally similar local structure while the inconsistent structures are the minority, we further explore the intersections of multiple views in the sample level such that the cross-view consistency can be better maintained. We model the above concerns in a unified framework and design an efficient algorithm to solve the corresponding optimization problem. Experimental results on various multi-view datasets certificate the effectiveness of the proposed method and verify its superiority over other SOTA approaches.


When a location parameter is restricted to a bounded interval, the paper addresses the issue of deriving estimators improving on the best location equivariant (or Pitman) estimator under the squared error loss. A class of improved estimators is constructed, and it is verified that the Bayes estimator against the uniform prior over the bounded interval and the truncated estimator belongs to the class. When a symmetric density is considered for the location family, the paper obtains sufficient conditions on hte density under which the class includes the Bayes estimators with respect to the two-point boundary symmetric prior and general continuous prior distributions. It is demonstrated that the conditions on the symmetric density can be applied to logistic, double exponential and t-distributions as well as a normal distribution. The conditions can be also applied to scale mixtures of normal distributions. Finally, some similar results are developed in the scale family.


Background/Aims To ascertain the prevalence and joint prevalence of elevated BMI and elevated BP in children and adolescents receiving clinical care, using electronic medical record (EMR) data. Methods We studied BP and BMI percentiles (%) of 79,838 U.S. subjects age 3 to 17 years with three or more eligible BP percentile measures from 1/1/2007 to 12/31/2009. We extracted data on age, diastolic and systolic BP, height, and weight from electronic medical records (EMR) and calculated BMI percentiles and BP percentiles using standard methods. Here we report by age group the proportions of subjects with normal BMI and normal BP percentile, elevated BMI >=85th percentile or >=95th percentile, or hypertension (HT) defined as elevated BP >= 95th percentile on 3 or more occasions, or Pre-Hypertension (Pre-HT) defined as BP >= 90th percentile at least once but not meeting definition for HT. Results Data Supplied as a Table, Not Accepted By Abstract Software. Discussion The proportion of children and adolescents with both normal BP and normal BMI was 46.7% and decreased with age, while the proportion with both elevated BP and BMI rose from 7.8% to 20.0% with increasing age. Clinical and public policy initiatives to reduce the very high frequency of these risk factors in U.S. children and adolescents should be carefully considered.


Abstract A study was carried out in Tabora region between July 1991 and September 1991, with the aim of determining the adequacy of measles vaccine given to children in Maternal Child Health clinics. Measles vaccine dose used per child was found to be 0.485 ml, which is about 0.385 ml when wastage due to removal of air bubbles is subtracted. Workers in the field need to be trained on the exact volume of vaccine required to be drawn into the syringe before vaccination, to ensure that a dose measuring exactly 0.5 ml of vaccine is injected to a child.


Despite the progress in poverty reduction globally, millions of people are either near or living in severe multidimensional poverty in Nigeria. This study examined multidimensional poverty transitions in rural Nigeria, employing the Alkire and Foster measure of multidimensional poverty, Markov model of poverty transitions and the multinomial logistic regression model for analysis. Results showed that multidimensional poverty among rural households in Nigeria was mainly chronic (46.5%) while education and assets dimensions contributed most to the incidence and severity of multidimensional poverty among the households respectively. Educational and marital status, household size and number of assets owned influenced transient poverty while tertiary education, household size and number of assets owned influenced chronic poverty. The enactment and implementation of relevant laws and policies against the marginalization of the poor and vulnerable with respect to ownership of assets and intensification of efforts and incentives, aimed at encouraging human capital development, is key in the fight against poverty in rural Nigeria.


Summary The facts and causes for the margination of people that suffer epilepsy, their problems regards social adaptation and even familiar troubles, all together circumstances that they are carrying since ever in the times until nowadays, are reviewed on the basis of the social and historical aspects and the evolution of ideas regards epileptology. It is stated why such opinions should be reconsidered and instead of which, to divulge appropriate arguments to realize that those persons should enjoy general acceptance and achieve the most adequate development.


Model-based prognostics approaches use domain knowledge about a system and its failure modes through the use of physics-based models. Model-based prognosis is generally divided into two sequential problems: a joint state-parameter estimation problem, in which, using the model, the health of a system or component is determined based on the observations; and a prediction problem, in which, using the model, the state-parameter distribution is simulated forward in time to compute end of life and remaining useful life. The first problem is typically solved through the use of a state observer, or filter. The choice of filter depends on the assumptions that may be made about the system, and on the desired algorithm performance. In this paper, we review three separate filters for the solution to the first problem: the Daum filter, an exact nonlinear filter; the unscented Kalman filter, which approximates nonlinearities through the use of a deterministic sampling method known as the unscented transform; and the particle filter, which approximates the state distribution using a finite set of discrete, weighted samples, called particles. Using a centrifugal pump as a case study, we conduct a number of simulation-based experiments investigating the performance of the different algorithms as applied to prognostics.


To the Editor: I read with interest the article by Ben-Zvi et al on the effectiveness of anakinra in colchicine-resistant familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) (Ben-Zvi I, Kukuy O, Giat E, Pras E, Feld O, Kivity S, et al. Anakinra for colchicine-resistant familial Mediterranean fever: a randomized, double-blind, placebocontrolled trial. Arthritis Rheumatol 2017;69:854–62). Two important issues, however, should be noted concerning their study. First, although the authors acknowledge that the sample size used was too small, they neglect to note that the size makes their conclusions prone to both Type I error (claiming significance where there is none) and Type II error (claiming lack of significance where significance exists) (Halsey LG, CurranEverett D, Vowler SL, Drummund GB. The fickle P value generates irreproducible results. Nat Methods 2015;12:179–85). The conclusion that anakinra is useful only for arthritis in FMF (possibly a Type I error) and not for peritonitis or pleuritis (possibly Type II errors) is, I suggest, premature. The second issue is that the statistics related to the survival analysis based on the time to reach an end point of 4 attacks are inaccurate. In Figure 2 of their article, the authors compare 2 KaplanMeier curves, one representing the anakinra group, and the other representing the placebo group. The time unit that Ben-Zvi and colleagues use for this comparison is mean days, and they come up with a significant P value without indicating the test used. There are 2 problems here. First, the usual way to compare 2 Kaplan-Meier curves is by log rank test, and in the Methods section the authors state that a log rank test was indeed used for this analysis. However, it is difficult to see how this test could have been used since it is nonparametric and compares proportions of events per unit time and not the means of a time unit. The second problem is that the authors use days as the time unit in their analysis, a data assessment interval that they had not used during the study. It should be noted that choosing shorter time intervals, such as hours, for the same analysis would provide an even more statistically significant P value. Overall, I am concerned that the authors' conclusions regarding both significant and nonsignificant results cannot be considered valid based on the statistical methods used.


The article focuses on the issue of history as narrative in Graham Swift's novel  Waterland , drawing on Roland Barthes's theory of the discourse of history as well as on Hayden White's claim that historical narratives are invented verbal fictions. The postmodernist notion of history denies the fixity of any text, of the past and of any single objective truth about the past. For Swift the creation of history means the reconstruction of the past by means of imagination. Thus in his historiographic metafiction history and imagination are subtly intertwined. History becomes story telling. The opposition between history and story telling is the focus of Swift's novel. By telling stories its narrator recaptures the lost past, reconstructs his lifestory and by this act constructs history. History  as narrative is primarily a personal rather than a factual reality.


ABSTRACT Background: Stimulant medications misuse is widespread on college campuses. Drug-seeking behavior has been proposed to be associated with temperament traits. No studies have investigated the association of individual temperament traits with the nonmedical use of prescription stimulants in graduate college students. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study performed at a Northeast US medical college. A total of 303 students were investigated using the short form of Akiskal's TEMPS-A auto-questionnaire. The association of demographic variables and substance use (drinking, smoking, use of illicit drugs) with the nonmedical use of prescription stimulants was assessed. Predictors were investigated using logistic regression. Results: The prevalence of stimulant medications misusers at this medical college was 32.3%. Among the misusers, 6.3% were previously diagnosed with ADHD and were taking stimulants at a different dosage and/or for a different reason than that recommended by a doctor. Stimulant medications misuse was associated with membership in student clubs, drinking, and illicit drugs use. Misusers had higher scores on the hyperthymic scale. This temperament trait, drinking, and the use of illicit drugs increased the odds of the nonmedical use of prescription stimulants. Conclusions: Temperament traits and behavior, which are powerful indicators of students' inclination to use prescription stimulants for neuroenhanchment, were identified. The results might be of importance in designing prevention and treatment strategies at medical colleges.


This study evaluates the reliability and validity of the Impact on Autonomy and Participation instrument (IPA) for heterogeneous populations of social support clients. Decentralisation of social support and accompanying budget cuts spurred interest in outcome-related payment systems to foster efficiency of social support. This prompted the need to have insight in outcomes of social support, defined as 'self reliance and participation'. Eight municipalities in different parts of the Netherlands used an adapted version of IPA (IPA-MO) to collect self-reported outcome measures among cohorts of inhabitants receiving social or income support. Participants included people with mild physical, severe physical, cognitive or mental impairments and people depending on income support. Survey data were combined in a single database (N=4.120). Multivariate analysis was used to analyse reliability and validity of IPA-MO. The original IPA model distinguished five scales ('participation domains'): Autonomy indoors, Family Role, Autonomy outdoors, Social life and Work & education, each scale loading on a separate factor. Due to high non-response on Work & education, our analysis mostly focused on the remaining four scales. These were confirmed, with minor changes, for IPA-MO. Financial autonomy was found as a new participation domain, composed by two new items added to the original single one. Five items of the original IPA were eliminated for duplicity and high correlation with other items. Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed construct validity of the five-scale IPA-MO model (CFI .936, TLI .925, SRMR .051). Internal reliability was confirmed for all scales (Cronbach alpha >.80, item-test correlation >.50 for all items). Exploratory factor analysis revealed a four-factor structure, with two scales (Family role and Autonomy outdoors) located on one factor. Yet, model fit is better when treated as separate scales. Two approaches to create more homogeneous groups were tested: impairment-based and age-based groups. The IPA-MO model as found for total research population, proved valid for both types of groups. The Work & education scale was tested for a small number of participants (N=234). One item was eliminated for duplicity. Exploratory factor analysis showed six scales loading onto six factors. Model fit was acceptable (CFI .915, TLI .903, SRMR .067) We conclude that the IPA-MO model is a valid and reliable instrument for local governments to assess participation of heterogeneous social-support populations. Further research is needed to test if Financial autonomy sufficiently covers clients' perspectives.


Hepatico-jejunoanastomosis (HJA) was formed in accordance to the high-frequency electric welding method: in 14 patients – for the main bile outflow disorders, in 8 of them – as a consequence of the periampullar zone malignances, in 6 – stricture of a common hepatic duct, HJA earlier formatted, purulent cholangitis, iatrogenic damage of biliary ducts. In all the patients the welded averting one-layered termino-lateral or latero-lateral HJA were formatted. The welded anastomoses have appeared hermetic, sufficiently hard, immediately after the formation and further.


more friendly than Lohfink to the existence of an earlier tradition of the ascension used by Luke). Technical terms of literary criticism are clearly explained, and the argument as a whole is attractively presented. The thesis reveals an accomplished scholar who has shed fresh light on Luke-Acts by making use of techniques developed in other fields and opened up lines of investigation that could profitably be extended to the other Gospels. I. HOWARD MARSHALL


We report the production of high power (20 W average, ∼1 MW peak) broadband THz light based on coherent emission from relativistic electrons. We describe the source, presenting theoretical calculations and their experimental verification. For clarity we compare this source with that based on ultrafast laser techniques, and in fact the radiation has qualities closely analogous to those produced by such sources, namely that it is spatially coherent, and comprises short duration pulses with transform-limited spectral content. In contrast to conventional THz radiation, however, the intensity is many orders of magnitude greater due to the relativistic enhancement.


The European Commission Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO) commissioned SOS Children's Villages International to undertake case studies of arrangements for 'alternative child care' in six non-European countries across three continents to help inform the EU's future strategy for provision of support for children in countries outside Europe. This report is a case study of one of the six countries, Nigeria. A companion report provides a summary of alternative child care across Sub-Saharan Africa. The results of the regional reports and case studies are synthesised in a report entitled Towards the Right Care for Children: Orientations for reforming alternative care systems. Africa, Asia, Latin America (European Union, Brussels, 2017).


Angiogenesis is regulated by the highly coordinated function of various proteins with pro- and antiangiogenic functions. Proangiogenic factors include vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), fibroblast growth factor, platelet-derived growth factor, insulin-like growth factor, transforming growth factor, angiopoietins, and several chemokines; antiangiogenic factors include thrombospondin-1, angiostatin, and endostatin. Matrix metalloproteinases display a dual role in vascular development. Notch signaling affects remodeling of the primary vascular network of uniformly sized vessels into functionally and morphologically distinct arteries, veins, and capillaries. Tumors, described as 'wounds that never heal', lose the appropriate balance among these factors. Although VEGF-targeted therapies are showing promise, new angiogenesis targets are needed to make additional gains. Here, we highlight recent advances in our understanding of the regulation of tumor angiogenesis and discuss the potential of molecular targeting as a new therapeutic approach.


Purpose

The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) is a new program for the provision of support to people with disabilities in Australia. The purpose of this paper is to explore the early implementation experience of this scheme, with a particular focus on the implications of this scheme for issues of care integration.

Design/methodology/approach

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 26 policymakers in the Commonwealth government charged with the design and implementation of the NDIS.

Findings

The authors find somewhat of a lack of clarity concerning the boundaries of the NDIS and how it will work with a range of different services in the provision of seamless and consumer-directed care. Many of the same kinds of debates about interfaces with services were detected in this study as have been highlighted in relation to UK individual funding schemes. If the NDIS is truly to support individuals with disabilities to achieve choice and control, important work will need to be undertaken in to overcome organizational and institutional boundaries.

Originality/value

There is little empirical data relating to the implementation of the NDIS to date. This is the first study to explore boundary issues in relation to care integration.


Most branches of computer science research are already involved in working rewards collaborative problem solving. In AI, the two fields of knowledge acquisition and distributed AI play a major role. The construction of collaborative knowledge-based systems (cooperative KBSs) needs an important stage of knowledge acquisition from the experts involved in the group activity. On the other hand, distributed AI and multi-agent systems are merely concerned with cooperative KBSs since they investigate some related problem and enable distributed modeling. However, not much work has been done on modeling multi-expertise. Moreover, there is a low level of exchange between these two fields. In this paper, we propose an agent-based method for multiple-expert knowledge engineering. This method is based on a set of generic models, which serves as a template to the knowledge engineer. Experts are described as a society of interacting cognitive agents.


Objective: To establish the effect of customised functional foot orthoses on patients' pre-existing, idiopathic low back pain (LBP).
Design: A matched-subject randomised controlled trial designed to test the hypothesis that the use of functional foot orthoses is effective in alleviating chronic, idiopathic LBP. The experimental group will receive customised functional foot orthoses and the control will be a 'wait-list' group who will be monitored for 6 months prior to receiving the intervention.
Setting: Podiatry clinic in Ilkley, West Yorkshire with recruitment from the Leeds and Bradford Metropolitan District Council areas.
Participants: Initial recruitment of 60 participants with LBP who meet the inclusion criteria and have given their written informed consent to take part in the study. Allowing for withdrawals, a minimum final number of 40 participants is expected.
Intervention: The treatment group will receive customised standard functional foot orthoses, vacuum-formed from polypropylene by LBG Medical. Measurements: Changes in levels of perceived LBP will be measured using the Low Back Pain Rating Scale (LBPRS), the Million Visual Analog Scale (VAS), and functional health status will be measured using the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) over an initial six month period for both the experimental and control group participants. After six months, the control group will receive the intervention and both groups will continue to be monitored; the experimental group for a minimum of six more months and the control group for twelve months, using the same measurements. Participants will complete the Global Perceived Effect (GPE) scale at the end of the trial in order to determine whether they consider their LBP to have changed since the start of the trial. Data analysis: Homogeneity between the control and experimental groups will be verified for the variables of age, height, weight and LBP at the start and end of the trial using the Student's t-test. The p-values will then be calculated to determine whether there is a statistically significant difference between baseline and final scores. Statistical significance will be considered reached if p < 0.05. Homogeneity of Body Mass Index (BMI) and the Foot Postural Index (FPI-6) between the groups will be assessed using the Mann–Whitney U-test, and, for gender, the Pearson's chi-squared test. The data obtained during the trial from the pain scales will be assessed using the Wilcoxon signed-ranks test. The data will be analysed using the SPSS statistics software package (IBM 2016). Conclusion: The proposed trial aims to address the short-comings of previous research into the alleviation of LBP with the use of functional foot orthoses and aims to support the hypothesis that customised functional foot orthoses significantly help to alleviate LBP in people who have biomechanical abnormalities.
Dissemination: The proposed trial will be registered with The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE 2017) and the editorial committees of relevant medical journals will be approached regarding publication.


In the last few years, convolutional neural networks (CNN) have been widely used to address very different image analysis problems. In medical imaging, they are becoming standard for aid in diagnosis in many imaging modalities at the cost of great computational load and huge amounts of annotated training data. When it comes to 3D image exams, the computational cost can easily became prohibitive demanding methods that promote efficiency in data representation. In this context, this paper presents a novel sampling method based on trigonometric functions that delivers comprehensive bidimensional data representation out of 3D volumetric patches for an efficient CNN-based classification. We used the publicly available LUNA challenge dataset and demonstrate that our representation allows 2D CNNs to achieve very good results, superior to the ones delivered using regular 2D cross-sections and similar to the ones delivered by 3D CNNs using 16 times less data and running 4 times faster.


The role of effort in the recovery of arm function following a stroke. by Stella-marie Sluman Stroke patients often report an increased sense of effort when using their paretic limb. Currently there is little research investigating this phenomenon and the implications that it could have for recovery. This study was an exploratory piece of work which combined quantitative and qualitative methods to investigate the role of effort in the recovery of arm function following a stroke. For the study, a new piece of equipment was designed called the assessment of perceived stiffness to provide a measure of effort that was less open to subjective bias than previous studies. In this new approach, stroke patients were asked to subjectively match the force of the grip strength being exerted by the impaired and unimpaired hand and then measures of the actual force being applied were taken using a dynamometer that was attached to the equipment. An interview schedule was also designed to examine stroke participants' experiences of effort and compare them with the performance on the assessment of perceived stiffness. Seventeen participants were recruited for the study and were divided into three groups namely, a stroke participant group, an age-matched control group and a young control group. The stroke participants' performance on the assessment of perceived stiffness was compared with that of the two control groups. The stroke participants' perception of perceived stiffness was then compared with their reports of increased effort in everyday life when they performed a movement task with their recovering arm. Furthermore, the research investigated whether stroke participants make a distinction between physical effort and mental effort. The results from the stroke sample showed that there were differences in their perception of stiffness compared to the control groups. The stroke participants' performance suggests that they were perceiving a greater stiffness on their paretic side when exhibiting the same amount of force on both sides. The results from the interview data demonstrated that the stroke participants who perceive increased stiffness on their paretic side report greater effort in everyday life. Individual differences were demonstrated when stroke participants were asked if they made a distinction between physical effort and mental effort. The results confirm the findings of previous studies and add weight to earlier research that an increased sense of effort is reported during recovery of arm function. Furthermore, this study highlights the need for additional research to investigate this area. The clinical implications of the results and areas for future research are discussed in detail.


Improved analytical methods provide new opportunities for both biological research and medical applications. This thesis describes several novel molecular techniques for nucleic acid and protein analysis based on detection or sequencing of amplified single molecules (ASMs). ASMs were generated from padlock probe assay and proximity ligation assay (PLA) through a series of molecular processes.In Paper I, a simple colorimetric readout strategy for detection of ASMs generated from padlock probe assay was used for highly sensitive detection of RNA virus, showing the potential of using padlock probes in the point-of-care diagnostics. In Paper II, digital quantification of ASMs, which were generated from padlock probe assay and PLA through circle-to-circle amplification (C2CA), was used for rapid and sensitive detection of nucleic acids and proteins, aiming for applications in biodefense. In Paper III, digital quantification of ASMs that were generated from PLA without C2CA was shown to be able to improve the precision and sensitivity of PLA when compared to the conventional real-time PCR readout. In Paper IV, a non-optical approach for detection of ASMs generated from PLA was used for sensitive detection of bacterial spores. ASMs were detected through sensing oligonucleotide-functionalized magnetic nanobeads that were trapped within them.Finally, based on in situ sequencing of ASMs generated via padlock probe assay, a novel method that enabled sequencing of individual mRNA molecules in their natural context was established and presented in Paper V. Highly multiplex detection of mRNA molecules was also achieved based on in situ sequencing. In situ sequencing allows studies of mRNA molecules from different aspects that cannot be accessed by current in situ hybridization techniques, providing possibilities for discovery of new information from the complexity of transcriptome. Therefore, it has a great potential to become a useful tool for gene expression research and disease diagnostics.


reacTIVision is an open source computer vision framework for recognition and tracking of fiducials. It finds its main application in development of table-based tangible user interfaces (TUI) and multi-touch interactive surfaces (tabletops). This Master Thesis aims to improve the current reacTIVision system. It reviews the state of the art of the algorithms that can be used for parameter extraction from generic objects, focusing in the algorithms that can be used for control and real-time interaction. Among all shape description techniques, three different and complementary techniques have been implemented: some simple global descriptors give us the position and orientation of the shape with a rough classification, the polygon simplification can be used for user feedback and polygon recognition, and finally a simplification of the Medial Axis Transform (skeleton) is better suited for deformable objects.