An optofluidic birefringent lens is demonstrated using hydrodynamic liquid-liquid (L(2)) interfaces in a microchannel. The L(2) lens comprises a nematic liquid crystal (NLC) phase and an optically isotropic phase for the main stream and the surrounding sub-stream, respectively. When the optofluidic device is subjected to a sufficiently strong electric field perpendicular to the flow direction, NLCs are allowed to orient along the external field rather than the flow direction overcoming fluidic viscous stress. The characteristics of the optofluidic birefringence lens are investigated by experimental and numerical analyses. The difference between the refractive indices of the main stream and the sub-stream changes according to the polarization direction of incident light, which determines the optical behaviour of the lens. The incidence of s-polarized light leads to a short focal point, while p-polarized light has a relatively long focal distance from the same L(2) interface. The curvatures and focal lengths of the lens are successfully evaluated by a hydrodynamic theory of NLCs and a simple ray-tracing model.


As the network is growing exponentially, challenges and issues also increases. They affect the performance of the network. Many factors contribute to improve the performance of the network. One such factor is finding the path quickly. In this paper, we are going to find a shortest path faster compared to Dijkstra's shortest path algorithm. We have introduced new ideas in building the end-to-end path. Various steps involved in finding the shortest path are refined. The simulated algorithm shows better results than the existing algorithm. We are sure that, the outcome of this paper reduces computation overhead and processing overload.


BACKGROUND
Psychosocial impairment after whiplash injury could be extensive; presumably about 15% of whiplash patients suffer from long lasting disabling health problems and about 5% do not return to work.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
A PubMed search of all available literature on whiplash and whiplash-associated disorders was performed.

RESULTS
Psychosocial impairment following whiplash injury is influenced by vulnerability factors, the biomechanical trauma and factors affecting symptom formation. Vulnerability factors indicating a poorer prognosis include low mental abilities, previous mental illness, old age and female sex, pre-existing cervical degenerative changes, narrow spinal canal and high neurobiological reactivity to sustained activation. The actual physical trauma consists of a nonphysiologic kinematic response in the cervical column, which may induce stress in neural structures, facet joints and musculature. Activation of reflex connections may lead to disturbances in the posture control and autonomic system. Trauma-related prognostic factors include head position at impact and degree of acute psychological stress reactions. Manual work, expectation of disability and an ongoing compensation claim case seem to be important moderator variables affecting symptom formation.

INTERPRETATION
An integrated psychosomatic model is needed to explain psychosocial impairment after whiplash injury as presented.


Robotics control system with leader-follower approach has a weakness in the case of formation failure if the leader robot fails. To overcome such problem, this paper proposes the formation control using Interval Type-2-Fuzzy Logic controller (IT2FLC). To validate the performance of the controller, simulations were performed with various environmental systems such as open spaces, complexes, circles and ovals with several parameters. The performance of IT2FLC will be compared with Type-1 Fuzzy Logic (T1FL) and Proportional Integral and Derivative (PID) controller. As the results found using IT2FLC has advantages in environmental uncertainty, sensor imprecision and inaccurate actuator. Moreover, IT2FLC produce good performance compared to T1FLC and PID controller in the above environments, in terms of small data generated in the fuzzy process, the rapid response of the leader robot to avoid collisions and stable movements of the follower robot to follow the leader's posture to reach the target without a crash. Especially in some situations when a leader robot crashes or stops due to hardware failure, the follower robot still continue move to the target without a collision.


Within the field of automated planning, two areas of study are planning with preferences and epistemic planning. Planning with preferences involves generating plans that optimize for properties of the plan instead of, or in addition to, trying to reach a fixed goal. Epistemic planning allows for planning over the knowledge or belief states of one or more agents for the purpose of achieving epistemic goals (where agents have particular states of knowledge or belief). In this paper we motivate and explore the task of planning with epistemic preferences, proposing a method by which existing automated planning techniques can be combined for this purpose.


Superiority in logistics, distribution and inventory management are emerging as some of the most important success factors in today's omnichannel world. One observed development on this topic is that more and more retailers are seen to start offering same day delivery to customers. The focal company of this master thesis, a medium sized Swedish company producing high quality premium fashion, has certainly also seen this development and will investigate same day delivery options and its potential in a Pilot Project in the Stockholm region during the autumn of 2018.This thesis is in turn conducted in order to investigate how to approach and set up such an initiative and in order to do so, the purpose is to investigate how a mid-sized company in the apparel industry can approach and design same day delivery distribution to customers in metropolitan areas.
The thesis approaches the problem using an abductive research approach and is built upon four different research pillars: a comprehensive literature review, a survey with retailers, secondary data collections with data from the focal company and a far-reaching set of interviews with both industry professionals and academics.
In order to fulfil the purpose of the thesis it begins with a market analysis investigating the changes that has been happening into the field of e-commerce and e-commerce distribution. From this study it can be concluded that omnichannel strategies are crucial for every company in retail environment, that customer demands will continue to push the market towards faster and more convenient solutions for e-commerce distribution, that same day deliveries are likely to impact the industry to a very large degree and that the topic thus is of crucial importance for both companies and academics in the field.
The research continues with presenting a strategy for The Company's same day initiative and does so by first investigating different storage solutions that can help solve the same day transportation dilemma. It is concluded that during the initial stage the initiative should be setup around store storage. This solution provides a combination of minimal investment costs, low risks and low response time. Likewise, the transportation service that should be used in conjunction with the storage setup is investigated. The recommendation here becomes to establish a partnership with a service provider that provides the customer centred service, has focusing on home deliveries during evening, and offer flexibility and dependability of the transportation service. The two providers investigated in this study that satisfy this are Best Transport and Budbee. Finally, the thesis also gives recommendation of a series of other omnichannel services that should be included by The Company in order to complete the holistic view and approach. Among these are return in store, drop shipment and click and collect


The double diffusive convection between two parallel plates is numerically studied for a series of parameters. The flow is driven by the salinity difference and stabilised by the thermal field. Our simulations are directly compared with experiments by Hage & Tilgner (Phys. Fluids, vol. 22, 2010, 076603) for several sets of parameters and reasonable agreement is found. This, in particular, holds for the salinity flux and its dependence on the salinity Rayleigh number. Salt fingers are present in all simulations and extend through the entire height. The thermal Rayleigh number seems to have a minor influence on the salinity flux but affects the Reynolds number and the morphology of the flow. In addition to the numerical calculation, we apply the Grossmann–Lohse theory for Rayleigh–Bénard flow to the present problem without introducing any new coefficients. The theory successfully predicts the salinity flux both with respect to the scaling and even with respect to the absolute value for the numerical and experimental results.


BACKGROUND
Prematurity is considered the main factor of neonatal mortality in developed countries (60 to 80% of cases).

OBJECTIVE
To determine if obstetric morbidity and/or prematurity are associated with neonatal death.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
A cohort of 25,365 live newborns since January 1st 2000 to December 31st 2004 was studied. Neonatal mortality was compared according to the number of prenatal visits, single or multifetal pregnancy, the presence or not of preeclampsia/eclampsia, cesarean section or vaginal delivery, and duration of rupture of membranes, stratifying by weeks of gestational age or by preterm and term gestation, as it was convenient. Chi-square test and Odds Ratio (OR) with 95% Confidence Intervals were calculated (CI).

RESULTS
There was not significant statistical difference in neonatal mortality at less number of prenatal visits, between single and twin pregnancies, in the presence of preeclampsia/eclampsia and pregnancies without complications, when they were stratified by group of gestational age. When it was controlled gestational age, malformations and maternal-fetal and obstetrical morbidity, there was not difference in mortality of neonates born vaginally or by cesarean section. It was observed an increased risk or neonatal mortality in preterm neonates with 48 hours or more of rupture of membranes (OR 3.05 CI 95% 1.64-5.66)

CONCLUSIONS
Performing and stratified analysis, prematurity was the factor associated with neonatal mortality, and not the number of prenatal visits, multifetal pregnancy, preeclampsia/eclampsia, or cesarean section. The duration of rupture of membranes is an independent factor of prematurity for neonatal mortality.


ABSTRACT Modelling is a central activity in practical engineering and something that is also useful in engineering education research (EER). Additionally, qualitative research methods have found important applications in engineering research, although their use in EER has not always been widely accepted. Design science research is a qualitative research approach in which the object of study is the design process, i.e. it simultaneously generates knowledge about the method used to design an artefact and the design or the artefact itself. This paper uses techniques from design science research to analyse the method used when deriving the 'learning of a complex concept' (LCC) model, which we developed while designing teaching sequences for a course on electrical engineering. Our results demonstrate the value of design science research in EER and suggest that the LCC model is generally applicable in this field.


Many researchers have analyzed the relationship between the financial success patterns of a motion picture and many other factors, such as the production cost, marketing, stars, awards, reviews, genre, and rating. Through these studies, many researchers and investors concluded that big budgets to make a blockbuster movie can serve as an insurance policy to meet their ROI; thus the box office is dominated by blockbuster movies. High-budget blockbuster movies are more likely to receive attention because these movies are more recognizable given their high expenses for production and casting. Therefore, audiences choose blockbusters in an effort to reduce the searching cost and to mitigate the possibility of a regrettable choice. This behavior of consumers, in turn, causes distributors to allocate screens for blockbusters, resulting in "concentration of blockbuster consumption." As such, low-budget films cannot easily become popular due to the lack of distribution. Indeed, low-budget films released on a small number of screens often end up becoming dismal failures. However, there are exceptional examples which are contrary to the general idea in the movie industry that a big budget and showings on a large number of screens can guarantee the success of a movie. Although researchers have attempted to analyze the performances of movies with small budgets, such movies are likely to be regarded as outliers and then be entirely discarded, as they are far from the 'three-sigma' range, especially given that previous research methodologies could not explain the financial success of such unique examples. This study attempts to explain the financial success at the box office of low-budget movies by applying the concept of the tunnel effect in quantum mechanics, as the phenomenon found in the movie industry is similar to a particle's movement in quantum physics. The tunneling effect is a phenomenon by which a particle without enough energy to pass over a potential barrier tunnels through it. Adopting the analogy, this study draws a tunneling probability function and cultural constant to forecast other outliers using the Schrodinger equation. Moreover, the study finds that word-of-mouth creates in the movie industry this phenomenon of finding outliers.


The respiratory system in a human body is a control system for maintaining the stability of the body against the variations of the external environment. In the system, the gas concentration in the alveoli and the blood play an important role as a source of information. A computer simulation of the respiratory system is performed based on a model in which the diffusion phenomenon and the gas transportation delay are incorporated. Also, analyses of the response of the system to a variation of the control mechanism as well as of the overall inspired gas components in the system are conducted. The simulation model used in this paper is largely composed of two components, i.e., the control system itself and several kinds of body tissues, representing a whole body. The system to be controlled is the vascular circulatory system which connects the lungs, the brain and the body tissues. O2, CO2 and N2 are carried through the system. On the basis of this fact, the external respiration in the lungs and the internal respiration in the body tissues can be expressed by equilibrium functions, representing the gas exchange by the diffusion phenomenon, the variation of hydrogen ion concentration in the blood, and the quantity of oxidized hemoglobin. Utilizing the model, the variation of the respiratory system in response to the inspiration of air lacking O2 as well as to the possible damage occurring within the system are investigated.


Nonlinear regression is usually implemented in SAS either by using PROC NLIN or PROC NLMIXED. Apart from the model structure, initial values need to be specified for each parameter. And after some convergence criteria are fulfilled, the second order conditions need to be analyzed. But numerical problems are expected to appear in case the likelihood is nearly discontinuous, has plateaus, multiple maxima, or the initial values are distant from the true parameter estimates. The usual solution consists of using a grid, and then choosing the set of parameters reporting the highest log-likelihood. However, if the amount of parameters or grid points is large, the computational burden will be excessive. Furthermore, there is no guarantee that, as the number of grid points increases, an equal or better set of points will be found. Genetic algorithms can overcome these problems by replicating how nature optimizes its processes. The MLGA macro is presented; it solves a maximum likelihood estimation problem under normality through PROC GA, and the resulting values can later be used as the starting values in SAS nonlinear procedures. As will be demonstrated, this macro can avoid the usual trial and error approach that is needed when convergence problems arise. Finally, it will be shown how this macro can deal with complicated restrictions involving multiple parameters.


PURPOSE Targeting the BCL-XL pathway has demonstrated the ability to overcome Janus kinase inhibitor resistance in preclinical models. This phase II trial investigated the efficacy and safety of adding BCL-XL/BCL-2 inhibitor navitoclax to ruxolitinib therapy in patients with myelofibrosis with progression or suboptimal response to ruxolitinib monotherapy (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT03222609). METHODS Thirty-four adult patients with intermediate-/high-risk myelofibrosis who had progression or suboptimal response on stable ruxolitinib dose (≥ 10 mg twice daily) were administered navitoclax at 50 mg once daily starting dose, followed by escalation to a maximum of 300 mg once daily in once in weekly increments (if platelets were ≥ 75 × 109/L). The primary end point was ≥ 35% spleen volume reduction (SVR35) from baseline at week 24. Secondary end points included ≥ 50% reduction in total symptom score (TSS50) from baseline at week 24, hemoglobin improvement, change in bone marrow fibrosis (BMF) grade, and safety. RESULTS High molecular risk mutations were identified in 58% of patients, and 52% harbored ≥ 3 mutations. SVR35 was achieved by 26.5% of patients at week 24, and by 41%, at any time on study, with an estimated median duration of SVR35 of 13.8 months. TSS50 was achieved by 30% (6 of 20) of patients at week 24, and BMF improved by 1-2 grades in 33% (11 of 33) of evaluable patients. Anemia response was achieved by 64% (7 of 11), including one patient with baseline transfusion dependence. Median overall survival was not reached with a median follow-up of 21.6 months. The most common adverse event was reversible thrombocytopenia without clinically significant bleeding (88%). CONCLUSION The addition of navitoclax to ruxolitinib in patients with persistent or progressive myelofibrosis resulted in durable SVR35, improved TSS, hemoglobin response, and BMF. Further investigation is underway to qualify the potential for disease modification. Novel Combo: Navitoclax plus Rux for patients w/MF and poor Rux response ïƒ improved SVR, TSS, and BMF | #MPNSM


The ongoing development practices in the developing countries tend to ignore the indigenous knowledge and experience that gathered through generations. Subsequently, it undervalues the importance of citizen participation in the process of local level development which, in turn, is believed to be diluting the outcomes of any initiative significantly. This book looks at the participatory development with an eye to institutionalizing it as an alternative approach. It suggests participation as to be intrinsic feature of any development initiatives. The investigation under this study suggests a system where both political and administrative institutions will offer and ensure a fitting ambience of the citizen inclusion; where development actors will come out of the previous roles and behavior; and the local citizens will strive for discarding their dependent mentality. The analysis and suggestions of this book could be instrumental in developing an alternate thinking to the mainstream development practices. This book should be helpful to the policy planners and think tanks of the developing countries and would equally be of use for the development partners and their representatives.


Many organizations have started to use agile development processes to speed up the development cycle and to improve the ability of the company in reacting to changing requirements. Adopting agile practices may happen as a revolution where all old practices are removed or as a more gradual process. In this paper, we discuss lessons learnt in two agile transition processes. Based on our experience, agile processes can be used in embedded software development for products. The challenges include the varying size of user requirements, the role of system requirements, and architecturally significant requirements. It is difficult for large organizations to be agile. Work allocation for a large number of different teams with different competencies tends to decrease speed, and increase the role of design and management. We conclude that agile development in this context needs very skilled developers and has to be a combination of new and old practices.


This paper demonstrates the application of Simulink to building a discrete event model that simulates the operation of urban public transport services. An important feature of the model is the explicit tracking of change of passenger demands at a transport station along a given route, including the passengers coming to the station to board (and alighting) a transit vehicle (e.g. a bus or a train), the passengers boarding the vehicle, and the passengers remaining at the station for next services. This feature enables the formulation of average waiting time of passengers at a station, which differs from many of its type found in the literature by accounting for the fact that passengers may miss a number of vehicles (due to high demand) before successfully boarding one. To demonstrate the potential of the model in assisting operational planning for urban public transport services, the paper presents simulation results from a parametric study that uses the model to investigate the correlation between operation parameters (e.g. cycle time) and key performance indicators of a shuttle bus route in Wollongong City (New South Wales, Australia). The discrete event model together with sample input datasets and post-processing codes of simulation results are available at https://github.com/smart-facility/PTSim.


New subjective experiments using sound fields simulated in an anechoic room confirm that spatial impression in concert halls is composed of at least two distinct aspects: apparent source width and listener envelopment. Previously published research has shown that apparent source width is related to the relative level of early lateral reflections. This new work demonstrates that listener envelopment is related to the level, direction of arrival, and temporal distribution of late arriving reflections. It is further shown that increased amounts of listener envelopment decrease the subject's sensitivity to changes in the apparent source width of the sound field. Listener envelopment is related to objective acoustical measures, and the implications for concert hall design are discussed.


We report on the first simultaneous measurements of medium‐high frequency (MF/HF) auroral radio emissions (above 1 MHz) by ground‐ and satellite‐based instruments. Observational data were obtained by the ground‐based passive receivers in Iceland and Svalbard, and by the Plasma Waves and Sounder experiment (PWS) mounted on the Akebono satellite. We observed two simultaneous appearance events, during which the frequencies of the auroral roar and MF bursts detected at ground level were different from those of the terrestrial hectometric radiation (THR) observed by the Akebono satellite passing over the ground‐based stations. This frequency difference confirms that auroral roar and THR are generated at different altitudes across the F peak. We did not observe any simultaneous observations that indicated an identical generation region of auroral roar and THR. In most cases, MF/HF auroral radio emissions were observed only by the ground‐based detector, or by the satellite‐based detector, even when the satellite was passing directly over the ground‐based stations. A higher detection rate was observed from space than from ground level. This can primarily be explained in terms of the idea that the Akebono satellite can detect THR emissions coming from a wider region, and because a considerable portion of auroral radio emissions generated in the bottomside F region are masked by ionospheric absorption and screening in the D/E regions associated with ionization which results from auroral electrons and solar UV radiation.


OBJECTIVES
Amphotericin B inhalation powder (ABIP) is a novel dry-powder amphotericin B formulation that is directly delivered to the lung, resulting in elevated lung tissue drug concentrations of this polyene. We evaluated the prophylactic efficacy of single dose administration of ABIP in a guinea pig model of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis.

METHODS
Guinea pigs were immunosuppressed with cyclophosphamide and cortisone acetate and challenged with Aspergillus fumigatus conidia in an aerosol chamber. Guinea pigs received prophylaxis with a single inhaled dose of ABIP at 0.05, 0.5, 4 or 10 mg/kg administered 24 h prior to infection. Treatment with oral voriconazole at doses of 5 or 10 mg/kg twice daily beginning 24 h post-challenge served as the positive control.

RESULTS
Improvements in survival were observed with ABIP prophylaxis. A single inhaled dose of 4 mg/kg ABIP and treatment with 5 mg/kg voriconazole both improved median and percentage survival compared with untreated controls. In addition, pulmonary fungal burden, as assessed by cfu, quantitative PCR and galactomannan, was also reduced in a dose-dependent fashion with ABIP prophylaxis as well as with both doses of voriconazole treatment.

CONCLUSIONS
Single-dose prophylaxis with inhaled ABIP as prophylaxis demonstrated a significant survival advantage and reductions in pulmonary fungal burden in this model of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis. Optimization of the dose and dosing frequency of ABIP dose may help to further enhance the anti-Aspergillus activity of this novel amphotericin B formulation.


The wavelength dependence of optical linear polarization of the highly polarized quasar (HPQ) PKS 1546+027 is investigated for the first time. Both spectropolarimetry and broad-band filter polarimetry are presented for a period when the object was undergoing a strong ourburst in flux and polarization. The rapid polarization variations observed argues that an optically thin synchrotron-emitting region, similar in polarization properties to BL Lacertae objects and optically violent variable (OVV) quasars, is the major source of polarized flux from this object. The continuum polarization increases dramatically with wavelength and is about twice as high at 8000 A than at 4000 A. Spectropolarimetry reveals that the emission-line flux from PKS 1546+027 dilutes the continuum polarization and is probably unpolarized. There is no evidence for any variation in polarization position angle with wavelength. The polarized flux spectrum is well-represented by a steep power law with a spectral index of -2.2, supporting the view that the polarized flux has a nonthermal origin. The observed polarization properties of PKS 1546+027 are consistent with a model that has been proposed to explain the optical to ultraviolet continua of several OVVs. In this model the optical to near-UV spectral flux distribution is a combination of light from a polarized synchrotron component plus an unpolarized component with spectral properties typical of low-polarization quasars.


P130

 Iron is a transition metal which generates reactive oxygen species (ROS). ROS-induced oxidative stress impairs endothelial function and plays a central role in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. To investigate whether body iron store is associated with endothelial dysfunction via oxidative stress, the effects of 1) parenteral iron loading and 2) iron chelation on endothelial function were measured. 1) In healthy volunteers, we administrated therapeutic dose of iron dextran (0.7 mg/kg body weight, i.v.) or vehicle, and examined flow-mediated vasodilation (FMD) of the brachial artery by high resolution ultrasonography, as a non-invasive measure of endothelial function. We also measured plasma levels of malondialdehyde (MDA), as an index of oxidative stress. Iron loading increased plasma levels of iron (from 89±13 to 232±12 mg/dl, p<.0001) and decreased FMD (from 9.2±1.4 to 5.3±1.1 %, p<.0003). Plasma levels of MDA were significantly increased after iron loading (from 2.4±0.2 to 3.1±0.2 nmol/ml, p<.0005) and were positively correlated with plasma iron concentrations (r=.64, p<.005). 2) In smokers without apparent cardiovascular disease, we administrated an iron chelator, deferoxamine (8.3 mg/kg body weight, i.v.) or vehicle, and measured FMD and MDA. Iron chelation by deferoxamine eliminated plasma iron (from 105±16 to 88±11 mg/dl, p<.02) and restored FMD in smokers (from 4.6±0.4 to 7.7±0.7 %, p<.0008), whereas plasma MDA was significantly decreased after deferoxamine (from 2.5±0.2 to 2.2±0.2 nmol/ml, p<.01). In each experiment, vehicle had no effects on vascular function or MDA and endothelium-independent vasodilation by nitroglycerin was not changed. Thus, iron loading exacerbated and iron chelation restored endothelial function paralleled with lipid peroxidation. Our series of experiments suggest that increased body iron stores may be associated with cardiovascular events via ROS-related endothelial dysfunction.


We propose a deterministic compartmental model of infectious disease that considers the test kits as an important ingredient for the suppression and mitigation of epidemics. A rigorous simulation (with an analytical argument) is provided to reveal the effective reduction of the final outbreak size and the peak of infection as a function of basic reproduction number in a single patch. Furthermore, to study the impact of long and short-distance human migration among the patches, we consider heterogeneous networks where the linear diffusive connectivity is determined by the network link structure. We numerically confirm that implementation of test kits in a fraction of nodes (patches) having larger degrees or betweenness centralities can reduce the peak of infection (as well as the final outbreak size) significantly. A next-generation matrix-based analytical treatment is provided to find out the critical transmission probability in the entire network for the onset of epidemics. Finally, the optimal intervention strategy is validated in two real networks: the global airport network and the transportation network of Kolkata, India.


PW7007 cells were grown in media containing 20 µM iron, then transferred to media containing no added iron to monitor the induction of siderophore biosynthetic genes. A rise in the expression of the vbsS gene above basal level was measurable 4 h post-transfer in control cultures. Addition of the potential precursor amino acids L-glutamate and Lomithine or the amino acid L-arginine did not alter the time or extent of induction of expression.

Addition of the siderophores vicibactin, desferrioxamine, enterobactin or vicibactin/enterobactin together caused expression of the siderophore synthesis gene to be measurable earlier than in control cultures, at 2 h post-transfer. This early induction is probably due to the siderophores binding all the residual iron in the low-iron cultures and rendering it 'invisible' to the cells until suitable outer membrane receptors and uptake proteins can be synthesised. Addition of citrate to the low-iron cultures caused the induction of synthesis genes to occur at the same time as control cultures (4 h post-transfer), but with a reduced level of expression. The citrate-iron complex is constitutively taken up by WSM710 and so can immediately supply some of the cell's iron needs.

Expression of vbsS was repressed by the addition of iron to cells growing in low-iron medium, regardless of whether cells had iron reserves (cells that had been grown in high iron medium prior to transfer into low iron medium) or no iron reserves (cells which had been grown in low iron medium prior to subculture in low iron medium). It is suggested that this is because synthetase activity is non-rate-limiting for the synthesis of vicibactin; cells can still manufacture vicibactin even with a low residual level of synthetase.

The synthesis of vicibactin was then studied in planta through monitoring the expression of the labelled siderophore biosynthetic gene (vbsS) in PW7007. Vetch plants were inoculated with WSM710 or PW7007 (which differ only in their siderophoreproducing abilities) and grown in low and high iron hydroponic media. Analysis of the nitrogen and iron concentration in plant tops, the weight of plant tops, the number of nodules per plant and the histological characteristics of those nodules in terms of bacteroid content, revealed no inoculant-based difference between plant nodules with bacteroids from a strain able to synthesise siderophores and those nodulated with a siderophore-negative strain. The only inoculant-based difference detected was a higher level of iron accumulated in nodules containing PW7007 bacteroids compared with nodules occupied by WSM710. Even nodules containing PW7007 from plants grown in low-iron medium had more iron than nodules containing WSM710 from plants grown in high iron medium. The reason for this accumulation of iron in nodules occupied by non-siderophore producing cells is currently unexplained.

Nodules harvested from plants grown in high and low iron-media and containing PW7007 were stained to assay activity of the gusA reporter gene (an indicator of vbsS expression). Nodules from both iron-deficient and iron-sufficient plants stained deep blue. However, after the bacteroids were extracted and assayed for specific activity, the level of actual gusA activity was found to be very low, at levels similar to those of uninduced laboratory-grown bacterial cultures. The intense colour development seen in whole nodule stains was probably due to low-level basal expression of (3-glucuronidase leading to product building up within the nodule. This emphasises the need for specific activities to be assayed on extracted bacteroids, so that a true picture of the level of expression of marked genes, such as those involved in siderophore production, can be determined. The lack of expression of the vicibactin biosynthetic gene, vbsS, shows that siderophore synthesis in nodules does not occur even in severely iron-deficient plants.


Fang, Irving (1997). A History of Mass Communication: Six Information Revolutions. Boston: Butterworth-Heinemann. 280 pp. Paperback, $34.95. Irving Fang's A History of Mass Communication attempts to be as inclusive as possible while breaking the typical chronological organizational model of standard history books. Instead, he chooses to illustrate the history of mass communication in terms of six "information revolutions": writing, printing, mass media, entertainment, media in the home, and the information highway. If this seems like there may be considerable overlap, there is. To his credit, Fang admits that "each information revolution appears to share certain characteristics with the others." This overlap causes a number of problems, however, in terms of presentation, omissions, continuity, intuition, and analysis. Fang defines a revolution as "profound changes involving new means of communication that permanently affect entire societies, changes that have shaken political structures and influenced economic development, communal activity, and personal behavior." He spends only a brief moment on the first revolution, writing, but describes the origins of recording symbols of communication. The second revolution traces the move of printing from China to Europe, and discusses pre-Gutenberg Europe before discussing the printing press. Mass Media, or the third revolution, touches briefly on the impact of the printing press, but quickly begins discussing the emergence of newspapers, advertising, photography, the telegraph, radio, and movies. Entertainment, as the fourth revolution, discusses magazines, phonographs, broadcasting, cameras, and movies (again). Then, Fang brings technology into the home as the fifth revolution, "The Toolshed Home," which comprises home mail delivery, phones, radio (again), television, broadcast news, cable, VCRs, records, and books. Finally, Fang emerges into the information age with his sixth revolution, "The Highway." Not surprisingly, it focuses on the computer and its communication capabilities, including multimedia, cable (again), satellites, telecommuting, the Internet, e-mail, fax, teletext and videotex, and on-line newspapers. While there is a lot of good, valuable information, there are two notable omissions to the book. The first involves regulation and the second involves communication effects. Nowhere is the First Amendment mentioned or discussed. The lack of discussion regarding the U.S. government's involvement in broadcasting becomes particularly noticeable when Fang attempts to discuss PBS. Second, by ignoring mass communication history that revolves around effects and effects research, Fang makes it impossible to underscore the connections between his revolutions and their social impacts. …


Abstract Background/Objective: To determine the validity, accuracy, and predictive value of the signs and symptoms of urinary tract infection (UTI) for individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI) using intermittent catheterization (IC) and the accuracy of individuals with SCI on IC at predicting their own UTI. Design: Prospective cohort based on data from the first 3 months of a 1 -year randomized controlled trial to evaluate UTI prevention effectiveness of hydrophilic and standard catheters. Participants: Fifty-six community-based individuals on IC. Main Outcome Measures: Presence of UTI as defined as bacteriuria with a colony count of at least 105 colony-forming units/mL and at least 1 sign or symptom of UTI. Methods: Analysis of monthly urine culture and urinalysis data combined with analysis of monthly data collected using a questionnaire that asked subjects to self-report on UTI signs and symptoms and whether or not they felt they had a UTI. Results: Overall, "cloudy urine" had the highest accuracy (83.1%), and "leukocytes in the urine" had the highest sensitivity (82.8%). The highest specificity was for "fever" (99.0%); however, it had a very low sensitivity (6.9%). Subjects were able to predict their own UTI with an accuracy of 66.2%, and the negative predictive value (82.8%) was substantially higher than the positive predictive value (32.6%). Conclusions: The UTI signs and symptoms can predict a UTI more accurately than individual subjects can by using subjective impressions of their own signs and symptoms. Subjects were better at predicting when they did not have a UTI than when they did have a UTI.


Populations of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) have become overabundant through- out their historic range, especially in developed landscapes. A variety of techniques, including controlled hunts in urban-suburban areas, are being used to increase harvest. Deer donation programs have been initiated in nearly all 50 states of the United States, and have been successful at providing venison to the hungry, but at significant costs to wildlife agencies and hunters. Our objectives were to: 1) develop a low-cost program to facilitate the exchange of excess harvested deer from hunters to recipients; 2) evaluate the attitudes of participating hunters and recipients; and 3) determine the effectiveness of the Nebraska Deer Exchange (NDE). The NDE was developed in 2008, featuring an interactive webpage hosted by the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission (NGPC). The NDE served as a database and matchmaker for hunters and recipients to contact each other and arrange the transfer of harvested deer. We evaluated the program by conducting an e-mail survey of participants. The code and website for the NDE were developed in 40 hr and the overall cost to NGPC was US$1,120. A total of 1,172 people participated the first year and >6,900 kg of venison was donated to willing recipients. Sixty-six percent of donors indicated they harvested additional deer as a direct result of the NDE. Surveyed participants overwhelmingly indicated that the program was easy, inexpensive, and should continue the next year. The NDE aided in the harvest of additional deer, increased interactions between hunters and nonhunters, and provided nutritious venison to willing recipients. 2011 The Wildlife Society.


This paper addresses the problem of semantic support for multimedia information systems. The problem has become very important in the "infotainment" environment, which utilizes very large amounts of bitstream data. This voice, audio, picture, video, text etc., data has a very low semantic meta-information content. Further, the paper presents the Multimedia Information System (MMIS) which contains semantic support for efficient navigation in the hypermedia knowledge base. This system uses semantic nets as a formalized basis for knowledge representation of collected heterogeneous data.


It is of great importance in telemedicine to protect authenticity and integrity of medical images. They are mainly addressed by two technologies, which are region of interest (ROI) lossless watermarking and reversible watermarking. However, the former causes biases on diagnosis by distorting region of none interest (RONI) and introduces security risks by segmenting image spatially for watermark embedding. The latter fails to provide reliable recovery function for the tampered areas when protecting image integrity. To address these issues, a novel robust reversible watermarking scheme is proposed in this paper. In our scheme, a reversible watermarking method is designed based on recursive dither modulation (RDM) to avoid biases on diagnosis. In addition, RDM is combined with Slantlet transform and singular value decomposition to provide a reliable solution for protecting image authenticity. Moreover, ROI and RONI are divided for watermark generation to design an effective recovery function under limited embedding capacity. Finally, watermarks are embedded into whole medical images to avoid the risks caused by segmenting image spatially. Experimental results demonstrate that our proposed lossless scheme not only has remarkable imperceptibility and sufficient robustness but also provides reliable authentication, tamper detection, localization, and recovery functions, which outperforms existing schemes for protecting medical images.


Balancing the trade-off across dependability and cost-effectivcncss is essential to promote the viability of X-by-Wire systems in mass market commercial vehicles. To achieve this goal, focusing on the electronic platform architecture, we have proposed a network centric architecture based on a concept of autonomous decentralized systems. In this architecture, if one electronic control unit (ECU) fails, the remaining normal ECUs autonomously execute a backup control to maintain at least minimal necessary functionality of the system. Thus, our architecture can tolerate the existence of the failed ECU and docs not require the high cost redundant ECUs. We have also proposed a membership middleware layer as a core element of the network centric architecture to ensure consistency of the ECU status information among all ECUs. In this work, we have implemented the membership middleware on a hardware and software platform equivalent to one assumed to be used in commercial X-by-Wire systems. Subsequently, we have developed a prototype FlexRay-bascd brake-by-wire system based on the proposed network centric architecture to evaluate a required overhead, especially CPU computational load of the membership middleware. This paper describes implementation details and performance evaluation results of the membership middleware. Furthermore, it proposes improved membership algorithms to reduce CPU computational load, which will be an inevitable constraint for practical X-by-Wirc systems.


Building Sites In The Expanding Field is a two-part research project that examines,
through art practice and theory components, relations between institutional critique and
white cube gallery conventions at the start of the twenty-first century. The project
responds to commentaries by critics such as John Roberts, David Beech and Stewart
Martin, in which notions of participation, sociability and conviviality – modes of
interaction identified by the curator Nicolas Bourriaud with relational installation – are
framed as the institutional framework of the work's articulation. My project, in contrast,
examines the relevance of earlier modes of institutional critique to this post-relational
moment; it is intended also to bring focus to my own practice of architectural
intervention. The project's core problematic is the way in which the ubiquitous frame of
display known as the white cube gallery continues to inform gallery design and thus
shapes the parameters of artistic reception and critical art practice. My thesis is that the
architectural frames of gallery spaces continue to support an ideological construction of
artistic reception as a mode of encounter indebted to the legacy of minimalist art and set
apart from the instrumentality of capitalist production and consumption outside the
gallery's walls. I argue that critical intervention within gallery architecture can prompt
people to critically question the relation between the roles or identities they adopt in
these spaces and the function that the spaces themselves perform. To this end, I examine
historical debates that have linked institutional critique and architectural intervention
with notions of allegory, focusing particularly upon the contributions of Michael Asher,
Brian O'Doherty, Rosalind E. Krauss, Benjaimin H. D. Buchloh and Craig Owens, and
presenting recent post-relational debates in relation to the legacy of the white cube
gallery. The key contribution of both the practice and theory components of my project
is my critical analysis of the legacy of the white cube gallery beyond the moment of
relational installation, as a context open to re-appropriation through allegorical readings
that draw forth the processes of its socio-historical construction. Whilst legacies of
critical postmodernism figure in post-relational debates staged recently in journals and
magazines such as Third Text and Art Monthly, my project draws explicit links between
contemporary modes of artistic display and critique, and this moment.


Cycles-Per-Instruction (CPI) stacks provide intuitive and insightful performance information to software developers. Performance bottlenecks are easily identified from CPI stacks, which hint towards software changes for improving performance.
 Computing CPI stacks on contemporary superscalar processors is non-trivial though because of various overlap effects. Prior work proposed a CPI counter architecture for computing CPI stacks on out-of-order processors. The accuracy of the obtained CPI stacks was evaluated previously, however, the hardware overhead analysis was not based on a detailed hardware implementation.
 In this paper, we implement the previously proposed CPI counter architecture in hardware and we find that the previous design can be further optimized. We propose a novel hardware- and power-efficient CPI counter architecture that reduces chip area by 44% and power consumption by 47% over the best possible prior design, while maintaining nearly the same level of performance and accuracy.


This textbook is the third of three volumes which provide a modern, algorithmic introduction to digital image processing, designed to be used both by learners desiring a firm foundation on which to build, and practitioners in search of critical analysis and concrete implementations of the most important techniques. This volume builds upon the introductory material presented in the first two volumes with additional key concepts and methods in image processing. Features: practical examples and carefully constructed chapter-ending exercises; real implementations, concise mathematical notation, and precise algorithmic descriptions designed for programmers and practitioners; easily adaptable Java code and completely worked-out examples for easy inclusion in existing applications; uses ImageJ; provides a supplementary website with the complete Java source code, test images, and corrections; additional presentation tools for instructors including a complete set of figures, tables, and mathematical elements.


The specific activity of natural radionuclides in (18) soil samples collected from antiquities area of Girsu city in Dhi-Qar Governorate (31.0459863N, 46.2534257E) in southern Iraq have been studied and evaluated. Experimental results were obtained by using a gamma ray spectrometer analysis system consists of a scintillation detector Sodium Iodide activated by Thallium NaI(Tl) of (3"×3") crystal dimension at the laboratory of radiation detection and measurement in Science Collage, University of Kufa. The spectrometer has been calibrated for energy by acquiring a spectrum from four standard sources of gamma radiations supplied by spectrum techniques (LLC). The measuring time of all soil samples is (18000 seconds), it was found that, for Girsu city the soil specific activity ranges from (22.68±3.94 to 14.69±2.24) Bq/kg for 146 23892 U , from (17.41±2.23 to 11.23±2.34) Bq/kg for 142 23290 Th and from (346.49±10.68 to 266.96±10.55) Bq/kg for 21 4019 K . The results have been compared with the acceptable data of the worldwide literatures. In order to evaluate the radiological hazard of the natural radioactivity, the radium equivalent activity (Ra eq ), the gamma absorbed dose rate (D), the annual effective dose rate and the both (external and internal) hazard index have been calculated and compared with the acceptable values of the worldwide average (UNSCEAR, 2000).


A navigation system should improve the quality of a total knee prosthesis implantation in comparison to that obtained with the classical, surgeon-controlled operative technique. The authors implanted 30 total knee prostheses with an infrared navigation system (Orthopilot®, Aesculap, Tuttlingen, Germany). The quality of implantation was studied on postoperative long-leg coronal and lateral X-rays, and compared to a control group of 30 matched-paired total knee prostheses of the same type (Search® prosthesis, Aesculap, Tuttlingen, Germany) implanted with a classical, surgeon-controlled technique. An optimal mechanical femorotibial angle (177 to 183°) was obtained in 25 cases in the study group and 21 cases in the control group (p > 0.05). Similar differences were seen for the coronal and sagittal orientations of both tibial and femoral components. Globally, 23 cases in the study group and 8 cases in the control group were implanted in an optimal manner for all studied criteria (p < 0.001). The navigation system used allows a significant improvement in the quality of implantation of a total knee prosthesis in comparison to that obtained with a classical, surgeon-controlled instrumentation, and long-term outcome could consequently be improved.


Abstract. The availability of dissolved silica (Si) in the ocean provides a major control on the growth of siliceous phytoplankton. Diatoms in particular account for a large proportion of oceanic primary production. The original source of the silica is rock weathering, followed by transport of dissolved and biogenic silica to the coastal zone. This model study aims at assessing the sensitivity of the global marine silicon cycle to variations in the river input of silica on timescales ranging from several centuries to millennia. We compare the performance of a box model for the marine silicon cycle to that of a global biogeochemical ocean general circulation model (HAMOCC2 and 5). Results indicate that the average global ocean response to changes in river input of silica is comparable in the models on time scales up to 150 kyrs. While the trends in export production and opal burial are the same, the box model shows a delayed response to the imposed perturbations compared to the general circulation model. Results of both models confirm the important role of the continental margins as a sink for silica at the global scale. Our work also demonstrates that the effects of changes in riverine dissolved silica on ocean biogeochemistry depend on the availability of the other nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus and iron. The model results suggest that the effects of reduced silica inputs due to river damming are particularly pronounced in the Gulf of Bengal, Gulf of Mexico and the Amazon plume where they negatively affect opal production. While general circulation models are indispensable when assessing the spatial variation in opal export production and biogenic Si burial in the ocean, this study demonstrates that box models provide a good alternative when studying the average global ocean response to perturbations of the oceanic silica cycle (especially on longer time scales).


Key messages
• Older people are particularly vulnerable to
social isolation or loneliness owing to loss
of friends and family, mobility or income.
• Social isolation and loneliness impact upon
individuals' quality of life and wellbeing,
adversely affecting health and increasing
their use of health and social care services.
• The interventions to tackle social isolation
or loneliness include: befriending,
mentoring, Community Navigators, social
group schemes.
• People who use befriending or Community
Navigator services reported that they were
less lonely and socially isolated following the
intervention.
• The outcomes from mentoring services are
less clear; one study reported improvements
in mental and physical health, another that
no difference was found.
• Where longitudinal studies recorded
survival rates, older people who were part
of a social group intervention had a greater
chance of survival than those who had not
received such a service.
• Users report high satisfaction with services,
benefiting from such interventions by
increasing their social interaction and
community involvement, taking up or going
back to hobbies and participating in wider
community activities.
• Users argued for flexibility and adaptation
of services. One-to-one services could be
more flexible, while enjoyment of group
activities would be greater if these could
be tailored to users' preferences.
• When planning services to reduce social
isolation or loneliness, strong partnership
arrangements need to be in place between
organisations to ensure developed services
can be sustained.
• We need to invest in proven projects.
Community Navigator interventions
have been shown to be effective in
identifying those individuals who are
socially isolated. Befriending services can
be effective in reducing depression and
cost-effective.
• Research needs to be carried out on
interventions that include different
genders, populations and localities.
• There is an urgent need for more
longitudinal, randomised controlled
trials that incorporate standardised
quality-of-life and cost measures.


our country too. The purpose of our study was to determine the prevalence of osteoporosis, and also to establish the risk factors associated with it in Pakistan. Method: It was a cross sectional study that was conducted in the primary care setting in different areas of Karachi. Bone mineral density assessment was done by the speed of sound using the quantitative ultrasound technique at the right Calcaneus. A structured questionnaire was prepared, to evaluate the risk factors associated with osteoporosis Results: Out of 500 participants 21.6% were male and 78.4% were female. The overall prevalence of osteoporosis was 30.7% (24% male and 32.6% females). The prevalence of osteopenia was 44.5% (51% being male and 42.6% being female). Factors that were statistically (p value <0.05) associated with low bone mineral density were increasing age, female gender for osteoporosis, normal to heavy weight, office work in both male and female, inadequate physical activity, inadequate sun exposure, inadequate intake of calcium, smoking in males and smokeless tobacco in both male and female, intake of steroids. Past history of fracture among the participants and the history of fracture in the parents, diabetes and depression also showed positive association, balanced diet and educational status and hypertension could not provide any significant statistical association with low bone mineral density. Conclusion: The prevalence of osteoporosis is high among the adult population of Karachi and it is associated with modifiable risk factors. Non-communicable diseases like, diabetes and depression, also gave a positive association, which needs further prospective studies to confirm this association.


Summary: Cell-free extracts of an itaconic acid producing strain of Aspergillus terreus contained NADP-dependent isocitrate dehydrogenase activity but no NAD-dependent activity was detected. During the acid-producing phase the activity of the NADP-linked enzyme fell to one-eighth of its value during the growth phase, whereas citrate synthase activity increased. Intact mitochondria were isolated from growth and production phase mycelium. The preparation from the growth phase oxidized exogenous NADH and all tricarboxylic acid cycle intermediates tested. That from the production phase oxidized tricarboxylic acid cycle intermediates at a reduced rate but exogenous NADH oxidation remained high. [2-14C]Acetate was incorporated into itaconic acid and over 90% of the incorporated radioactivity was located in the methylene carbon. [1-14C]-Acetate was a poorer precursor and did not preferentially label the methylene carbon. These results support the view that itaconic acid biosynthesis in A. terreus occurs by decarboxylation of aconitic acid, the latter produced by the normal reactions of the tricarboxylic acid cycle.


In this paper, we study the problem of designing proxies (or portfolios) for various stock market indices based on historical data. We use four different methods for computing market indices, all of which are formulae used in actual stock market analysis. For each index, we consider three criteria for designing the proxy: the proxy must either track the market index, outperform the market index, or perform within a margin of error of the index while maintaining a low volatility. In eleven of the twelve cases (all combinations of four indices with three criteria except the problem of sacrificing return for less volatility using the price-relative index) we show that the problem is NP-hard, and hence most likely intractable.


Cloud is a relatively new concept and so it is unsurprising that the information assurance, data protection, network security and privacy concerns have yet to be fully addressed. The cloud allows users to avoid upfront hardware and software investments, gain flexibility, collaborate with others, and take advantage of the sophisticated services. However, security is a huge issue for cloud users especially access control, user profile management and accessing services offered by the private cloud environment. A privacy enhancement system on Academic-based private cloud system using Eucalyptus open source cloud infrastructure has been proposed in this paper. This system provides the cloud users to improve the privacy and security of the private personal data. Two approaches (Role-based Access Control and Attribute-based Access Control model) are combined as a new approach (ARBAC). This means that they are applied to improve the privacy which supports both mandatory and discretionary access control needs on the target private cloud system.


This research will demonstrate how insights are generated in anthropology and design through the process of data gathering and data analysis towards making meaning. By making the tacit knowledge embedded in practice more explicit and comparing that to observations made by researchers I will explain why certain practices work better for insight generation from qualitative data. This research will also show that the current design pedagogy approach of separating data analysis from data gathering may be premature, and that, in fact, the analysis of data should intertwine with the gathering. What will be shown is that the process of asking questions and rigorous meaning making is what helps designers and anthropologists to frame research problems and make sense of the large amounts of data that go into any project, and that many of the methods used in both disciplines are of use to designers learning research methods.
Keywords: Qualitative research methods; Design research methods; Iterative design; Participant observation


SUMMARY A central component of therapeutic change involves facilitating the capacity to move and be moved by the other. Another way of saying this might be that change entails experiencing a greater freedom of relational movement. The question of who and what actually changes in the process of therapy is the focus of the three vignettes that follow. They highlight, among other things, the recognition and acknowledgment of mutuality as an essential force within the relational matrix and the ever-changing landscape that this creates. Each of these examples of a change process bears, as well, a particular stamp of its own, and thus speaks to the unique personality of every therapeutic dyad.


A hospital-based study was carried out in Gedarif town, an area of markedly unstable malaria transmission in eastern Sudan during the two malaria transmission seasons (2000-2002),. Among the 2488 diagnosed malaria patients, 110 fulfilled the WHO (2000) criteria for severe malaria (SM), and seven died of cerebral malaria (CM). The predominant complication was severe malarial anemia (SMA, 45.45%), followed by convulsions associated malaria (CAM, 20.9%), cerebral malaria (16.4%) and hypotension (HTN, 11.8%). DNA was extracted from 616 parasites obtained from 231 donors with asymptomatic submicroscopic malaria (ASUM), uncomplicated malaria (UM) and SM. The MSP2 locus was exploited for determination of parasite genotype. 51 parasite genotypes were detected. There was no correlation between the number of infectious clones and initial parasite count or patient age. In all infections, the mean clone number (MCN) was 1.5 clone/infection, and it was comparable between SM and UM. However detailed analysis revealed that; individuals with ASUM had significantly lower MCN compared with UM, SMA, and non-fatal CM. The frequency of IC1 and FC27 allele families was comparable between SM and UM and the distribution of the individual allele sizes was correlated. Further analysis showed that, 1. FC27 was associated with the mildest form of malaria and was not recognized in fatal CM, 2. Faster clearance of IC1 genotype in the multi-clone infections after quinine treatment 3. Multi-clone infections with different genotype families (IC1 and FC27) were far more frequent than that with the same genotype family, suggesting stronger cross-immunity within rather than between MSP2 gene families. The diversity of infection (DOI) was estimated by using different molecular markers (pfcrt76, pfmdr1 86, glurp and MSP2) separately and by considering them together to generate a multilocus genetic profile for each isolate. pfcrt and pfmdr1, are not usually used for parasite genotyping, here they revealed DOI of 0.043 and 0.064, respectively. However, when used in combination with the most polymorphic markers (MSP2 and GLURP) they disclosed a hidden diversity that would have not been detected. The DOI as estimated by MSP2 and GLURP was, 0.553 and 0.435, respectively. However, combining all 4 molecular markers (multi-locus genetic profile), had revealed a finger print pattern of diversity, DOI of 0.936, which almost indicated that there were one unique strain for each patient, and that was comparable between SM and UM (although for UM, GLURP was not analyzed). Not only, the genetic make up of parasites were different, but clinical data suggest that the virulence markers should also be extremely diverse. Another hospital-based study was carried out in New Halfa town, where 120 individuals were enrolled in the study, including febrile patients with and without microscopically detectable parasitemia, and apparently healthy individuals. PCR for parasite detection and ELISA tests for measuring serum antibody levels were carried out on all blood samples. A majority of the febrile patients, who were parasite negative by microscopy, showed the presence of a P. falciparum infection by PCR. The occurrence of P. falciparum infection with parasitemia below the detection level of microscopy was recognized more often in patients with CM symptoms than SMA, and in older rather than younger patients. Patients clinically suspected to have cerebral malaria (CM) mostly had a single clone infection and a large proportion of them acquired antibodies against MSP antigens. The therapeutic response to quinine treatment was comparable between patients with CM and CM. In a 28-days in-vivo study of pyrimethamine/sulfadoxine (SP) and SP plus chloroquine (CQ) efficacy, 260 patients with uncomplicated P. falciparum malaria were enrolled in rural Eastern Sudan. The results revealed a comparable treatment failure (TF) for SP alone (32.99%) or with CQ (31.7%). Patients who achieved adequate clinical response (ACR), were significantly older than patients who had TF. Regarding gametocytogenesis; a. the microscopic gametocyte productivity was significantly higher in patients with TF when compared to ACR. Thus, gametocytemia was more associated with younger age b. gametocyte counts were comparable between TF and ACR groups of patients until Day7 of follow up, thereafter, at D14, D21 and D28, gametocytes count was significantly higher in patients with TF. However, the longevity of gametocytes in patients with TF and ACR were comparable. Parasite isolates from 168 patients (including all patients with TF) were genotyped at the dhfr, dhps and pfcrt loci. The molecular image of the in-vivo phenotype, revealed the following findings: the prevalence of dhfr mutations c51-I, c108-N, and double mutant c51I/108N, were estimated to be 91.9%, 92.3% and 79.7%, respectively, while only one isolate (0.6%) was found carrying c59R and no c164L mutation was recognized. The dhps mutations; c437G, c540E and double mutant c437/c540 had a prevalence rate of 90.2%, 79.3% and 58.5%, respectively, while those of c436F and c581G were, 0.6% and 13%, respectively. For pfcrt gene at c72-76, 92.26% were the mutant type CVIET, only 6.55% were the wild type CVMNK and 2 patients harbored mixed infection. Based on the multiplicity of mutation score (MOM) ranging from 1 to 5, the prevalence according to the MOM score were; 0.97, 0.931, 0.866, 0.719, 0.121, respectively.


Regional cerebral blood flow (CBF) has been measured in eight anaesthetized, exteriorized, fetal sheep between 58 and 62 days gestation; four were controls, four were hypercapnic (PaCO2 = 78 +/‐ 5 mmHg, mean +/− S.E.M.). Blood flow values were calculated from quantitative autoradiography following the infusion of [14C]iodoantipyrine into a cannulated fetal placental vein, for the cerebellum, medulla, and five layers of the developing neocortex: cortical plate (CP), subplate zone (SP), intermediate zone (IZ), subventricular zone (SV), and the ventricular zone (VZ). The highest control CBF rates were recorded in the cortical plate (49.3 +/‐ 7.4 ml min‐1 (100 g)‐1, mean +/− S.E.M., posterior cortex) and in the ventricular zone (40.5 +/− 4.8, posterior cortex), which at this stage of development are the regions of greatest cell density. The lowest CBF rates were recorded in the subplate zone (23.8 +/− 6.8, anterior cortex) and in the intermediate zone (23.4 +/− 7.6, anterior cortex), which are the regions of lowest cell density. Experimentally induced hypercapnia increased CBF in all brain regions and enhanced the regional pattern of flow. The results provide evidence that CBF in the immature fetal sheep brain (at 58–62 days gestation) is heterogeneous under both control and hypercapnic conditions (especially in the neocortex). Blood vessels of the fetal sheep brain at this early stage of development are clearly responsive to CO2.


In modern cities, complaining has become an important way for citizens to report emerging urban issues to governments for quick response. For ease of retrieval and handling, government officials usually organize citizen complaints by manually assigning tags to them, which is inefficient and cannot always guarantee the quality of assigned tags. This work attempts to solve this problem by recommending tags for citizen complaints. Although there exist many studies on tag recommendation for textual content, few of them consider two characteristics of citizen complaints, i.e., the spatio-temporal correlations and the taxonomy of candidate tags. In this paper, we propose a novel Spatio-Temporal Taxonomy-Aware Recommendation model (STAR), to recommend tags for citizen complaints by jointly incorporating spatio-temporal information of complaints and the taxonomy of candidate tags. Specifically, STAR first exploits two parallel channels to learn representations for textual and spatio-temporal information. To effectively leverage the taxonomy of tags, we design chained neural networks that gradually refine the representations and perform hierarchical recommendation under a novel taxonomy constraint. A fusion module is further proposed to adaptively integrate contributions of textual and spatio-temporal information in a tag-specific manner. We conduct extensive experiments on a real-world dataset and demonstrate that STAR significantly performs better than state-of-the-art methods. The effectiveness of key components in our model is also verified through ablation studies.


Wildland firefighters in the US are mandated to identify areas that provide adequate separation between themselves and the flames (i.e. safety zones) to reduce the risk of burn injury. This study presents empirical models that estimate the distance from flames that would result in a low probability (1 or 5%) of either fatal or non-fatal injuries. The significant variables for the fatal injury model were fire shelter use, slope steepness and flame height. The separation distances needed to ensure no more than a 1 or 5% probability of fatal injury, without the use of a fire shelter, for slopes less than 25% were 20 to 50 m for flame heights less than 10 m, and 1 to 4 times the flame height for flames taller than 10 m. The non-fatal injury model significant variables were fire shelter use, vehicle use and fuel type. At the 1 and 5% probability thresholds for a non-fatal injury, without the use of a fire shelter, the separation distances were 1 to 2, 6 to 7, and 12 to 16 times greater than the current safety zone guideline (i.e. 4 times the flame height) for timber, brush and grass fuel types respectively.


The increasing scale of urbanization and human activities has resulted in the fragmentation of natural habitats, leading to the reduction of ecological landscape connectivity and biodiversity. Taking Nanping as the study area, the core areas with good connectivity were extracted as ecological sources using a morphological spatial pattern analysis (MSPA) and landscape connectivity index. Then the ecosystem service functions of the ecological sources were evaluated based on the InVEST model. Finally, we extracted the potential ecological corridor based on the land type, elevation and ecosystem service functions. The results showed that the ecological source with higher landscape connectivity is distributed in the north and there are clear landscape connectivity faults in the northern and southern regions. Moreover, the areas with high habitat quality, soil retention and water production are mainly distributed in the northern ecological source areas. The 15 potential ecological corridors extracted were distributed unevenly. Among them, the important ecological corridors formed a triangle network, while the general ecological corridors were concentrated in the northwest. Therefore, it is suggested that the important core patches in the north be protected, and the effective connection between the north and south be improved. These results can provide a scientific basis for ecological construction and hierarchical management of the ecological networks.


Preventive maintenance is a broad term that encompasses a set of activities aimed at improving the overall reliability and availability of a system. Designers of the preventive maintenance schedules attempt to minimize the overall cost of system operation. There is no substitute for perfection in maintenance to ensure zero breakdowns in machine; therefore it is necessary to get a machinery breakdown insurance against the risks that might occur at business. Previous researches didn't consider the effect of engineering insurance on maintenance scheduling while it affect the cost function of maintenance scheduling seriously. Engineering insurance pays for all repair costs of machinery, therefore the cost function of maintenance scheduling is affected. This paper presents a new cost function for maintenance scheduling by considering the effects of engineering insurance. Due to the uncertainty in the cost parameters related to the cost function which are very common in application, the paper proposed the application of the scenario-based approach for robust design of maintenance scheduling. Then, genetic algorithm is developed for obtaining the optimal solution of the proposed robust model and the effectiveness of this model is illustrated through a numerical example.


This paper discusses the Lean methodology of Value Stream Mapping (VSM) in a handicraft enterprise with Make to order environment. Within a case study of a wood craft company, the method is applied and improved. The purpose of VSM is to initialize the lean transformation and to understand the value streams of a company as a basis for further improvements. The paper explores the current literature about VSM and also discusses the specific characteristics of an MTO environment and its limitations regarding the application of the current VSM methodology. Based on this, an adapted VSM procedure with a special focus on MTO or ETO small and medium craft enterprises is presented. This paper contains a simple guided steps to build a current VSM in this environment with a new formulation to calculate the metrics point such as cycle times and setup times.


NuSMV is a well-known tool for system verification that permits to verify both CTL and LTL properties. Although the tool is very powerful, it offers a minimal support for the editing and validation (e.g., by simulation) of models and of requirements specified as temporal properties. In this paper, we propose NuSeen, a framework that assists a designer during the modeling and V&V activities when using NuSMV. In addition to an editor furnished with syntax highlighting, autocompletion, and outline, NuSeen also provides some tools for visualizing the variable dependencies, and graphically visualizing the counterexamples. It helps the designer in validating the model by checking certain qualities like minimality and completeness. Moreover, the framework also provides facilities for model-based testing by means of a test suite generator that is able to generate tests achieving value and decision coverage for NuSMV models.


The reliability of the solder joints on dog bone pads with hot air solder levelling (HASL) finish was found to be statistically different and less reliable than other combinations. The reliability of all other combinations was not significantly different. Both pad geometries and surface finishes evaluated in this study produced excellent, reliable solder joints. The selection of the pad geometry and surface finish will not have significant impact on CBGA solder joint reliability. Since the study was based on mechanical deflection system (MDS) test technology, the limitations for MDS will apply. Additional accelerated thermal cycling (ATC) tests to verify the conclusion will definitely be of value.


Background and Aim: Hospital disaster-management planning and preparedness are essential, considering earthquake threats in Iran. The objective of this study was to assess preparedness of hospitals affiliated to Iran University of Medical Science (IUMS) in Tehran against earthquakes in 2007 (1386 Iranian year). Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional, descriptive-analytical study, involving 21 governmental and private hospitals affiliated to IUMS selected by random sampling. Data were gathered using checklists, questionnaires, interviews, and observation. The SPSS software was used for analysis of the data, and the Fisher exact test was employed for statistical analysis. Results: The data showed that, on the whole, 28.6 %, 61.9 %, and 9.5 % of the hospitals were at a weak, moderate, and good preparedness level, respectively. The hospitals preparedness level with regard to equipment safety and hazardous materials planning increases with their degree of specialization, the association being statistically significant (p = 0.038). The findings also show that there is a significant relationship between the hospital preparedness level (as regards planning for building dangers reduction) and crisis management training courses (p = 0.034). Conclusion: Training courses are very effective for creating hospital preparedness against earthquakes. Language: fa


1. The oral absorption and the rate of loss from the body of radioactive iron were measured by whole-body monitoring in patients with functioning renal homografts. The incorporation of radioactive iron into erythrocytes was also measured. 2. The results were compared with corresponding values in normal subjects and in non-dialysed and dialysed patients with chronic renal failure. 3. The mean oral absorption and incorporation into erythrocytes of radioactive iron was intermediate between that of normal subjects and of both non-dialysed and dialysed patients with chronic renal failure. 4. The mean rate of loss from the body was not significantly different from that in normal subjects and non-dialysed patients with chronic renal failure but it was significantly less than that in dialysed patients.


Brachycephalic obstructive airway syndrome (BOAS) is an important health and welfare problem in several popular dog breeds. Whole-body barometric plethysmography (WBBP) is a non-invasive method that allows safe and repeated quantitative measurements of respiratory cycles on unsedated dogs. Here respiratory flow traces in French bulldogs from the pet population were characterised using WBBP, and a computational application was developed to recognise affected animals. Eighty-nine French bulldogs and twenty non-brachycephalic controls underwent WBBP testing. A respiratory functional grading system was used on each dog based on respiratory signs (i.e. respiratory noise, effort, etc.) before and after exercise. For development of an objective BOAS classifier, functional Grades 0 and I were considered to have insignificant clinical signs (termed here BOAS-) and Grades II and III to have significant signs (termed here BOAS+). A comparison between owner-perception of BOAS and functional grading revealed that 60 % of owners failed to recognise BOAS in dogs that graded BOAS+ in this study.WBBP flow traces were found to be significantly different between non-brachycephalic controls and Grade 0 French bulldogs; BOAS- and BOAS+ French bulldogs. A classifier was developed using quadratic discriminant analysis of the respiratory parameters to distinguish BOAS- and BOAS + French bulldogs, and a BOAS Index was calculated for each dog. A cut-off value of the BOAS Index was selected based on a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value of the classifier on the training group (n=69) were 0.97, 0.93, 0.95, and 0.97, respectively. The classifier was validated using a test group of French bulldogs (n=20) with an accuracy of 0.95. WBBP offers objective screening for the diagnosis of BOAS in French Bulldogs. The technique may be applied to other brachycephalic breeds affected by BOAS, and possibly to other respiratory disease in dogs.


Information systems security (ISS) is an increasingly critical issue for companies worldwide. In 2013 cybercrime has caused losses worth US $113 billion affecting 378m victims (Norton Symantec Cybercrime Report 2013). Besides criminal attacks and system malfunctions, human error is the major reason for information security incidents. Hence, refining our understanding how employees' behavior regarding information security can be explained and influenced is a top priority in academia and business practice (D'Arcy et al. 2009; Siponen and Vance 2010). In this respect, numerous studies have examined the role of deterrence mechanisms such as monitoring or sanctioning on individual security compliance. A perspective largely neglected by prior research is the role of endogenous motivations (Siponen and Oinas-Kukkonen 2007), although studies in adjacent fields have shown the effectiveness of motivational intervention strategies (Wunderlich et al. 2013). Our study seeks to close this gap by examining how endogenous motivations influence individual ISS-related behavior. Our proposed model integrates the theory of planned behavior (TPB) and the organismic integration theory (OIT) ‐ a sub-theory of the self-determination theory (SDT). We empirically test the model using a sample of 444 employees from different organizations. The results show that when employees' personal values and principles are congruent with their employer's ISS-related prescriptions and goals their intention to comply with security policies significantly increases. On the contrary, we find no impact on compliance intention when employees perceive their actions as a result of external pressures and coercion. The study's findings advance our understanding of the motivational processes underlying security compliant behavior and provide numerous implications for researchers and practitioners.


Tall, powerful athletes surge toward the goal in the last seconds of a fiercely fought game, providing excitement to an arena full of basketball fans. Increasingly, challenging games like this are being played by women's college teams. With the passage of Title IX and the success of the WNBA (Women's National Basketball League), women's college teams have received more support and attention both from academic institutions and basketball fans. One of the primary reasons for the growing interest in women's college basketball is the dedication of the women who coach these student athletes to personal and athletic success. Women currently coach nearly 65 percent of the women's basketball teams in all divisions of the NCAA. Their commitment to their sport and to their athletes has resulted in a game and a generation of athletes unlike any other.This analysis of the role of women coaches in college basketball provides a detailed history of women's involvement in college sports, as well as insights into the work of the great women coaches of the past and present, all highlighted through interviews with some of the most important women coaches of today.


To model complex mixed continuous/discrete, hybrid, systems, the continuous part can be described by differential and algebraic equations using an object-oriented modeling language such as Modelica. It is shown how a discrete formalism such as Petri nets can be incorporated by describing all components by strictly local equations. This allows a unifying treatment since both the continuous and the discrete part of a system are described by equations. The resulting Petri net library is applied to model the redundancy management control of the elevator subsystem of an aircraft.


The Berliner Ensemble was founded by Bertolt Brecht and his wife Helene Weigel in 1949. The company soon gained international prominence, and its productions and philosophy influenced the work of theatre-makers around the world. David Barnett's book is the first study of the company in any language. Based on extensive archival research, it uncovers Brecht's working methods and those of the company's most important directors after his death. The book considers the boon and burden of Brecht's legacy, and provides new insights into battles waged behind the scenes for the preservation of the Brechtian tradition. The Berliner Ensemble was also the German Democratic Republic's most prestigious cultural export, attracting attention from the highest circles of government, and from the Stasi, before it privatised itself after German reunification in 1990. Barnett pieces together a complex history that sheds light on both the company's groundbreaking productions and their turbulent times.


S. Q. Sun writes: The recent description and discussion by Allen & Underhill (1989) of the swaley cross-stratification of the Bencliff Grit (Upper Jurassic), Dorset coast, is an interesting attempt to explain the observed sedimentary structures and lithofacies association. They provide a very thorough description of the Bencliff Grit and conclude that the sedimentary structures in the Bencliff Grit example are a variety of hybrid bedforms, containing elements of both large (metre) scale trough cross-stratification and the decimetre-scale hummocky cross-stratification, produced by essentially unidirectional flows. However, from my own work (Sun 1989), I disagree with their identification of bedforms and mechanism producing them in this specific example. First, they clearly demonstrate that swaley cross-stratification can be distinguished from trough cross-stratification in a number of ways: (1) swale margins have lower inclinations than do those of troughs, (2) swales are wider and shallower than troughs, (3) laminae drape swale margin concordantly rather than exhibiting discordant relationship with respect to the lower bounding surface, and (4) swaley cross-stratification looks the same in all vertical sections regardless of orientation, as opposed to the heterogeneous geometry of trough cross-stratification. I fully agree with their suggestion that the bedforms in the Bencliff Grit are extremely good candidates for interpretation as swaley cross-stratification on the basis of the first two criteria. Their widely-dispersed palaeocurrent pattern and notice of the conspicuous absence of angle of repose cross-strata are also consistent with my field observations. With respect to the last two criteria, it is highly unlikely to test


Cumulative entropy regularization introduces a regulatory signal to the reinforcement learning (RL) problem that encourages policies with high-entropy actions, which is equivalent to enforcing small deviations from a uniform reference marginal policy. This has been shown to improve exploration and robustness, and it tackles the value overestimation problem. It also leads to a significant performance increase in tabular and high-dimensional settings, as demonstrated via algorithms such as soft Q-learning (SQL) and soft actor-critic (SAC). Cumulative entropy regularization has been extended to optimize over the reference marginal policy instead of keeping it fixed, yielding a regularization that minimizes the mutual information between states and actions. While this has been initially proposed for Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) in tabular settings, it was recently shown that a similar principle leads to significant improvements over vanilla SQL in RL for high-dimensional domains with discrete actions and function approximators.
Here, we follow the motivation of mutual-information regularization from an inference perspective and theoretically analyze the corresponding Bellman operator. Inspired by this Bellman operator, we devise a novel mutual-information regularized actor-critic learning (MIRACLE) algorithm for continuous action spaces that optimizes over the reference marginal policy. We empirically validate MIRACLE in the Mujoco robotics simulator, where we demonstrate that it can compete with contemporary RL methods. Most notably, it can improve over the model-free state-of-the-art SAC algorithm which implicitly assumes a fixed reference policy.


To the Editor:

We would like to thank Dr. Leng and colleagues for their interest in our work. Our report focused on the modulation of T cell activity by 1,25(OH)2D3, with an emphasis on Th17 and T cell cytokine expression. Our findings demonstrated that 1,25(OH)2D3 has a suppressive effect on human IL-17A and IL-17F production. Importantly, we noted a direct (monocyte-independent) inhibitory effect of 1,25(OH)2D3, but not dexamethasone, on human Th17 polarization and human Th17 cytokine production in patients with early RA. We fully agree with Leng and colleagues that the precise molecular mechanism of how vitamin D modulates Th17 activity and corticosteroid-induced osteoporosis needs further investigation. Leng et al suggest that the vitamin D–induced IL-10 pathway may be critical and that 1,25(OH)2D3 treatment may be insufficient to prevent corticosteroid-induced osteoporosis in patients with early RA who have a defect in the IL-10/IL-10R pathway.

The question is whether the 1,25(OH)2D3 effect is completely IL-10 dependent. We found an increase in IL-10 expression by 1,25(OH)2D3-treated peripheral blood mononuclear cells from healthy volunteers and patients with early RA. However, in fluorescence-activated cell sorted memory T cells from patients with early RA, 1,25(OH)2D3 did not up-regulate IL-10 expression although lower IL-17A levels were found (Lubberts E, et al: unpublished observations). This suggests that IL-10 can help in the suppressive effect of 1,25(OH)2D3 on human T cell activity, but that the suppressive effect on IL-17A is not completely IL-10 dependent and that other pathways may be involved as well. Further research is needed to unravel the precise molecular mechanism, including the role of the IL-10/IL-10R pathway in the suppressive behavior of 1,25(OH)2D3 on T cell biology and corticosteroid-induced osteoporosis, before it can be concluded that 1,25(OH)2D3 may be insufficient to prevent corticosteroid-induced osteoporosis in RA.


A new crate-based front end system has been built which features low cost, compact packaging, command capability, 16 bit dynamic range digitization, and a high degree of redundancy. The crate can contain a variety of instrumentation modules, and is designed to be situated close to the detector. The system is suitable for readout of a large number of channels via parallel multiprocessor data acquisition.


The United States (U.S.) has enormous potential offshore wind energy resources in the Atlantic, Pacific, Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. However, progress in developing these resources has lagged behind that in Western Europe and no offshore wind farms have been built to date in the U.S. Continental Shelf. Uncertainties in U.S. siting and design criteria, specific regulations and standards, along with a lack of experience have challenged development by increasing both cost and the time to deployment. The reliability of offshore wind turbine farms is critical to industry success and should be secured efficiently with respect to cost. The ability to employ probabilistic risk management and decision theory in the design process of support structures would afford more transparent system reliabilities and more flexibility in design compared with prescriptive design standards. A general framework for risk informed design of offshore wind turbine structures is demonstrated on a typical monopole support structure. The structural parameters are adjusted to adjust the risk and to achieve the desired wind turbine performance at acceptable cost. In order to implement such a design procedure in practice, regulations must stipulate clear performance requirements in terms of system reliability for project approval.


The management of frontal sinus fractures has evolved in the endoscopic era. The development of functional endoscopic sinus surgery (FESS) has been incorporated into management algorithms proposed by otolaryngologists, but the extent of its influence on plastic surgeons and oral and maxillofacial surgeons is heretofore unknown. A cross-sectional survey was performed to assess the practice pattern variations in frontal sinus fracture management across multiple surgical disciplines. A total of 298 surveys were reviewed. 33.5% were facial plastic surgeons with otolaryngology training, 25.8% general otolaryngologists, 25.5% plastic surgeons, and 15.1% oral and maxillofacial surgeons. 74.8% of respondents practiced in an academic setting. 61.7% felt endoscopic sinus surgery changed their management of frontal sinus fractures. 91.8% of respondents favored observation for uncomplicated, nondisplaced frontal sinus outflow tract fractures. 36.4% favored observation and 35.9% favored endoscopic sinus surgery for uncomplicated, displaced frontal sinus outflow tract fractures. For complicated, displaced frontal sinus outflow tract fractures, obliteration was more frequently favored by plastic surgeons and oral and maxillofacial surgeons than those with otolaryngology training. The utility of FESS in managing frontal sinus fractures appears to be recognized across multiple surgical disciplines.


We have developed a web-based platform for distance education. The platform supports efficient creation and maintenance of online distance courses, only requiring an Internet connection and a web browser from teachers and students. All tools that are necessary to run a distance course are integrated in the platform and accessible via a regular web browser, such as such as Internet Explorer, or Mozilla Firefox. This means that students and teachers can access the course from any computer with Internet connection, just as any other regular web page. After logging in to the course home page, teachers can easily create student accounts, upload their learning material, add course assignments, correct turned assignments, add news and FAQs, and much more, just by using a regular web browser, no other tools are needed. The similar applies for the students; they log in to their personal course account via the course home page, and once logged in, they can turn in their solutions to the course assignments and find corrected reports with grades and corrections done by the teacher. The platform has been successfully used in several courses at the Malardalen University. Its functions are continuously extended to cover diverse user's requirements.


Background Waldenstrom's Macroglobulinaemia (WM) is an IgM secreting lymphoplasmocytic lymphoma characterized by involvement mainly in the bone marrow, and occasionally in the lymph nodes and spleen. Central nervous system involvement of WM, known as Bing-Neel syndrome (BNS), is very uncommon and as such the clinical characteristics and treatment outcomes remain to be clarified.

Methods We evaluated the incidence, clinical characteristics, and treatment outcome of BNS among patients with WM who were diagnosed at our Institution.

Results We identified 13 patients with BNS from our database of 1,523 patients diagnosed with WM from 1999 -2013. The median age at diagnosis of BNS was 60 (range 51-75 years). The median time to development of BNS after WM diagnosis was 6.3 (range 0.3-11.9 years). Patients presented with a variety of neurological signs and symptoms including seizures, hearing loss, cognitive impairment, gait instability and lower extremity weakness. The diagnosis of BNS was confirmed by MRI in 11, and by examination of the CSF in 12 patients. CSF cytopathologic analysis demonstrated definitive evidence of malignant lymphoplasmacytic cells in 6 patients, and was suspicious for malignant cells in 2 patients. CSF flow cytometry was positive in 8, and a clonal immunoglobulin heavy chain gene rearrangement was identified in 6 patients. MYD88 L265P was identified in CSF sample of two patients in whom this examination was undertaken, and who demonstrated malignant disease by flow cytometry and cytological examination. Seven patients were treated with high-dose methotrexate (HD-MTX), 2 with intrathecal liposomal cytarabine, 1 with rituximab and intrathecal methotrexate, and 1 with rituximab and bendamustine. One patient was recommended treatment with HD-MTX and was lost to follow-up, 1 has been initiated on HD-MTX. Of 11 patients, 5 had a response in CSF and/or MRI, 4 had stable disease and 1 progressed following therapy. Of the responders, 2 patients had received HD-MTX, 2 intrathecal liposomal cytarabine and 1 rituximab-bendamustine. Four patients with stable disease had received HD-MTX. One patient who received intrathecal MTX developed treatment related "chemical meningitis", and was subsequently treated with HD-MTX to which she had a CSF response. The median overall survival was not reached. Eleven patients are alive, 1 died and 1 was lost to follow-up.

Conclusions BNS is an uncommon late complication of WM. MYD88 L265P may help in the diagnosis of BNS, and may represent a novel approach for targeted therapy of WM. HD-MTX is active in the treatment of BNS, though prospective studies are required to standardize treatment and improve outcomes.

Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.


The applied pressure and suspension height during consolidation of a 15 vol% Al2O3 suspension (0.15 μm α-Al2O3 particles, isoelectric point pH 7.8) at pH 3 - 10 in a closed cylinder were continuously recorded using a pressure filtration apparatus. The apparent viscosity decreased with decreasing suspension pH. The final packing density of the dispersed acidic suspensions at pH 3.2 and 5.6 reached 62 – 63% at 19 MPa of applied pressure. The viscous basic suspensions at pH 7.8 and 9.6 were consolidated to 52 – 54 % density. Because of the release of the stored elastic strain energy, the height of the consolidated Al2O3 compact increased after releasing the pressure. The energy required to consolidate 1 cm3 of Al2O3 particles was in the range from 3.0 to 15.9 J, and became larger for the dispersed acidic suspensions. The energy applied between two colloidal particles during consolidation (W) was compared to the interaction energy (Ei) between two particles in a suspension.