Whether competition helps or hinders small firms' access to finance is in itself a much debated question in the economic literature and in policy circles, especially in the developing world. Economic theory offers conflicting predictions and empirical contributions provide mixed results. This paper considers the consequences of interbank competition on credit constraints using firm level data covering 70 developing and emerging countries. In addition to the classical concentration measures, competition is assessed by computing three non-structural measures (Lerner index, Boone indicator, and H-statistics). The results show that bank competition alleviates credit constraints, while bank concentration measures are not robust predictors of a firm's access to finance. Findings highlight that bank competition not only leads to less severe loan approval decisions but also reduces borrowers' discouragement. In addition, a secondary result of this paper documents that banking competition enhances credit availability more by reducing prices than by increasing relationship lending.


Background Moving clinical guidelines into practise requires the development of clinical knowledge products to aid family practitioners. A variety of product types and formats may need to be used to suit different needs by career-stage. Methods To evaluate the sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections (STBBI) knowledge product needs of practitioners, information was elicited from a convenience sample (N = 207) of family medicine practitioners at a national Canadian family medicine forum in Toronto between November 15 and 17, 2013. Analysis was stratified by years of practise to identify ways to reach different generations of practitioners concerning STI and HIV clinical recommendations. The Fishers exact and chi-square test was used to determine statistical significance. Data was collected on preferences on clinical aids; methods used to update clinical knowledge; and preferred formats of accessing STI guidelines. Results All practitioners expressed preferences for concise clinical aids such as algorithms (64.2%) and abbreviated pocket guides (35.3%), in addition to prompts on electronic medical records (32.9%). On-line training and education were preferred by early-career practitioners (< 5-yrs: 53.3%), compared to their mid-to-late career (≥ 5yrs) counterparts (26.1%; p = 0.004). More mid-to-late-career practitioners preferred classroom style workshops (73.9%) than their early-career counterparts (46.7%; p = 0.004). There were differences (p = 0.04) by years of practise concerning guideline format preferences. Early-career practitioners preferred mobile applications (38.5%) compared to hard-copy materials (17.6%). Mid-to-late-career practitioners appeared to prefer hard-copy materials (31.2%) in addition to mobile applications (37.7%). Conclusions These findings demonstrate generational differences in preferred formats and methods of accessing STI and HIV clinical information; public health programmes may wish to deliver information using different approaches to reach different practitioners.


Background/Aims: Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) is a common gastrointestinal disease. This study was designed to examine current epidemiology, diagnosis, management, and treatment of patients diagnosed with GERD by surveying physicians in several East Asian countries. Methods: A questionnaire-based survey was completed in six countries including China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand between July 2008 and December 2008. Results: In total, 876 physicians participated in the study. Most physicians in all countries, except Japan, frequently used international guidelines for the care of GERD patients, whereas approximately half of Japanese physicians did not use such guidelines. GERD was common among many patients, but Barrett's esophagus, particularly the long-segmental type, was rare. The incidence of esophageal cancer, particularly adenocarcinoma, was high in China, but low in other countries. Most physicians diagnosed GERD based on symptoms, followed by endoscopy in Japan and Korea, or in other countries, by the proton-pump inhibitor (PPI) test. Heartburn was recognized as the chief complaint in all countries except Korea. Most physicians in all countries used PPI as the first-line of treatment for GERD. Increasing the PPI dose was the treatment of choice for PPI-refractory erosive esophagitis in Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand. In contrast, in other countries, physicians used a combination of PPI and other drugs to treat PPI-refractory erosive esophagitis. Prescription of antidepressant drugs increased for PPI-refractory nonerosive reflux disease compared with PPI-refractory erosive esophagitis. Conclusion: The findings in the present survey are useful to understand the current epidemiology, diagnosis, and treatment of GERD in East Asian countries.


Sonic Interaction Design (SID) is an emerging field that is positioned at the intersection of auditory display, ubiquitous computing, interaction design, and interactive arts. SID can be used to describe practice and inquiry into any of various roles that sound may play in the interaction loop between users and artifacts, services, or environments, in applications that range from the critical functionality of an alarm, to the artistic significance of a musical creation. This field is devoted to the privileged role the auditory channel can assume in exploiting the convergence of computing, communication, and interactive technologies. An over-emphasis on visual displays has constrained the development of interactive systems that are capable of making more appropriate use of the auditory modality. Today the ubiquity of computing and communication resources allows us to think about sounds in a proactive way. This workshop puts a spotlight on such issues in the context of the emerging domain of SID.


Author(s): Lemberg, Joseph Aaron | Advisor(s): Ritchie, Robert O | Abstract: Further development of ultra-high structural applications requires new materials that can withstand the extreme environments found in power-generation turbines. Highly refractory materials capable of high strength at temperatures in excess of 1100°C are either inherently brittle (Al2O3, Si3N4) or cannot survive at such temperatures in oxidizing atmospheres (Mo, Nb). Brittle materials may be toughened with the addition of a more ductile phase. Materials that do not form protective oxide layers can be alloyed with Si to form more protective silicate scales. A problem still remains as to how dissimilar materials like Al2O3 and Si3N4 can be joined. A brief discussion of the fracture behavior of ductile-phase-toughened nanocrystalline Al2O3 and functionally-graded material joints of Al2O3 and Si3N4 will precede an in-depth exploration of fracture in two Mo-Si-B intermetallic alloys. Al2O3-based nanocomposites were fabricated and consolidated via spark plasma sintering. The influence on the fracture behavior of nanocrystalline Al2O3 of single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) and Nb additions were examined by in-situ bend testing within a scanning electron microscope. The addition of 10 vol.% Nb to nanocrystalline Al2O3 provided substantial improvement of fracture toughness (6.1MPa-m½)--almost three times that of unalloyed nanocrystalline Al2O3. Observation of cracks emanating from Vickers indents, as well as bend specimen fracture surfaces, reveal the operation of ductile phase toughening in the Nb-Al2O3 nanocomposites. Further addition of 5 vol.% SWCNTs to the 10 vol.% Nb-Al2O3 revealed a more porous structure and less impressive fracture toughness. The SWCNTs, initially added to form uncracked ligament bridges spanning the crack which would carry load and shield the crack tip from the full extent of the remotely-applied load, acted as crack initiation sites and overwhelmed any toughness gains afforded by the ductile Nb grains.Nominally crack-free Al2O3- Si3N4 joints, comprised of 15 layers of gradually differing compositions of Al2O3/Si3N4, have been fabricated using SiAlON polytypoids as functionally graded materials (FGM) bonding layers for high-temperature applications. Using flexural strength tests conducted both at room and at elevated temperatures, the average fracture strength at room temperature was found to be 437 MPa; significantly, this value was unchanged at temperatures up to 1000°C. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) observations of fracture surfaces indicated the absence of any glassy phase at the triple points. This result was quite contrary to the previously reported 20-layer Al2O3/Si3N4 FGM samples where three-point bend testing revealed severe strength degradation at high temperatures. Consequently, the joining of Al2O3 to Si3N4 using functional gradients of SiAlON polytypoids can markedly improve the suitability of these joints for high-temperature applications.New alloys based on borosilicides of molybdenum have been considered as potential replacements for current Ni-base superalloys, as they show promise as highly oxidation- and creep-resistant materials while still maintaining a moderate level of damage tolerance. Two alloys, each composed of Mo-3Si-1B (wt.%) with nominally similar fine-grained microstructures, have been developed utilizing markedly differing processing routes. Here, we study the influence of processing route on the fracture toughness of alloys containing ~55 vol.% ductile α-Mo and ~45 vol.% brittle intermetallics (Mo3Si and Mo5SiB2 (T2)). The room-temperature toughness of these two alloys is significantly lower than that previously evaluated coarser-grained Mo-Si-B alloys with similar composition; however at 1300°C, the crack-initiation toughness of the fine- and coarse-grained alloys are nearly identical. At lower temperatures, the current finer-grained materials behave in a brittle manner as the smaller grains do not provide much impediment to crack extension; cracks can advance with minimal deflection thereby limiting any extrinsic toughening. Plastic constraint of ductile α-Mo grains from the hard intermetallic grains also serves to lower the toughness. At 1300°C, the increased ductility of α-Mo allows for significant plasticity; the correspondingly much larger contribution from intrinsic toughening results in significantly enhanced toughness, such that the finer grain morphology becomes less important in limiting crack-growth resistance. Optimization of these alloys is still required, however, to tailor their microstructures for the mutually-exclusive requirements of oxidation resistance, creep resistance and damage tolerance.


We present Spectral Inference Networks, a framework for learning eigenfunctions of linear operators by stochastic optimization. Spectral Inference Networks generalize Slow Feature Analysis to generic symmetric operators, and are closely related to Variational Monte Carlo methods from computational physics. As such, they can be a powerful tool for unsupervised representation learning from video or pairs of data. We derive a training algorithm for Spectral Inference Networks that addresses the bias in the gradients due to finite batch size and allows for online learning of multiple eigenfunctions. We show results of training Spectral Inference Networks on problems in quantum mechanics and feature learning for videos on synthetic datasets as well as the Arcade Learning Environment. Our results demonstrate that Spectral Inference Networks accurately recover eigenfunctions of linear operators, can discover interpretable representations from video and find meaningful subgoals in reinforcement learning environments.


BACKGROUND & AIMS
Altered gut microbiota is implicated in development of colorectal cancer (CRC). Some intestinal bacteria have been reported to potentiate intestinal carcinogenesis by producing genotoxins, altering the immune response and intestinal microenvironment, and activating oncogenic signaling pathways. We investigated whether stool from patients with CRC could directly induce colorectal carcinogenesis in mice.

METHODS
We obtained stored stool samples from participants in a metagenome study performed in Hong Kong. Conventional (male C57BL/6) mice were given azoxymethane to induce colon neoplasia after receiving a course of antibiotics in drinking water. Mice were gavaged twice weekly with stool from 5 patients with CRC or 5 healthy individuals (controls) for 5 weeks. Germ-free C57BL/6 mice were gavaged once with stool from 5 patients with CRC or 5 controls. We collected intestinal tissues from mice and performed histology, immunohistochemistry, expression microarray, quantitative polymerase chain reaction, immunoblot, and flow cytometry analyses. We performed 16S ribosomal RNA gene sequencing analysis of feces from mice.

RESULTS
Significantly higher proportions of conventional mice fed with stool from individuals with CRC than control stool developed high-grade dysplasia (P < .05) and macroscopic polyps (P < .01). We observed a higher proportion of proliferating (Ki-67-positive) cells in colons of germ-free mice fed with stool from patients with CRC vs those fed with stool from controls (P < .05). Feces from germ-free and conventional mice fed with stool from patients with CRC vs controls contained different microbial compositions, with lower richness in mice fed with stool from patients with CRC. Intestines collected from conventional and germ-free mice fed with stool from patients with CRC had increased expression of cytokines that modulate inflammation, including C-X-C motif chemokine receptor 1, C-X-C motif chemokine receptor 2, interleukin 17A (IL17A), IL22, and IL23A. Intestines from conventional and germ-free mice fed with stool from patients with CRC contained higher proportions of T-helper 1 (Th1) cells (2.25% vs 0.44%) and Th17 cells (2.08% vs 0.31%) (P < .05 for each) than mice fed with stool from controls. Real-time polymerase chain reaction arrays revealed up-regulation of genes involved in cell proliferation, stemness, apoptosis, angiogenesis, invasiveness, and metastasis in mice fed with stool from patients with CRC.

CONCLUSIONS
We fed stool samples from patients with CRC and heathy individuals to germ-free mice and conventional mice with azoxymethane. We found stool from patients with CRC to increase the numbers of polyps, levels of intestinal dysplasia and proliferation, markers of inflammation, and proportions of Th1 and Th17 cells in colon, compared with stool from individuals without CRC. This study provides evidence that the fecal microbiota from patients with CRC can promote tumorigenesis in germ-free mice and mice given a carcinogen.


Phytoplankton have evolved different strategies to minimize the potential damage caused by solar ultraviolet radiation (UVR), including the synthesis of UV-absorbing compounds that act as sunscreens and carotenoids that provide protection against photooxidative stress. The concen- tration and qualitative composition of mycosporine-like amino acids (MAAs) and photoprotective carotenoids (PPCs) were investigated in natural phytoplankton assemblages of 26 lakes located below and above the treeline in the Alps and the Pyrenees. Among these lakes, exposure to UV varied because of differences in the incident spectral dose, water column transparency, stratification, and maximum depth. Seven MAAs were identified, but the most abundant were shinorine (λmax = 334 nm) and palythine (λmax = 320 nm). The highest concentrations of MAAs (up to 9.6 µg (µg chl a) -1 ) and PPCs (up to 0.6 µg (µg chl a) -1 ) were found in the clearest and shallowest lakes, while phyto- plankton from lakes with low UV transparency generally presented low values. However, phyto- plankton of some clear lakes located at high altitude did not have high concentrations of these com- pounds. Consequently, underwater downwelling UVR, UV water transparency, or lake altitude explained only a low percentage (< 26%) of the variability among lakes in MAA and PPC concentra- tion. Within the water column, the concentration of MAAs decreased in most cases with depth, sug- gesting their photoprotective role. Our results indicate that MAAs and PPCs are widespread among lake phytoplankton assemblages and suggest that other environmental factors besides UV exposure are important in regulating their synthesis.


PurposeThis research examines whether a shift to a hybrid classroom, which replaces some face-to-face classroom time with online instruction, adversely affects student learning if the structure and incentives that are characteristic of a flipped classroom are already in place.Design/methodology/approachThis study features a quantitative analysis of individual student data collected over multiple sections of a single course with the same instructor. In all seven sections, over two semesters, principles of microeconomics used a flipped classroom format that features preclass video lectures, daily quizzes and highly interactive class time. In three of the seven sections, the time spent in class was reduced by one-third. For this experiment, student scores on the cumulative final exam evaluate student learning. Students took a survey at the end of the semester to provide feedback on time use during the course and to make observations about the class format.FindingsResults from this study suggest that despite accountability for the work done outside of class, students score 4.4% points lower on the final exam in the class format that features reduced face-to-face time. However, student comments also suggest that this is a worthwhile tradeoff as they balance work, internships and other nonacademic demands on their time. Student evaluations of the course and instructor are statistically unchanged.Practical implicationsEfficiency in educational delivery is an ongoing concern for students and faculty. This research demonstrates that a classroom that is both flipped and hybrid makes better use of student and faculty time, provides a richer learning experience and only modestly reduces student learning. It is notable that students report a preference for the hybrid classroom model, despite modestly lower levels of learning.Originality/valueWhile research has been done on flipped and hybrid classrooms separately, this is the first paper to isolate the effect of seat time within the flipped classroom context. This research addresses the flipped classroom design's ability to mitigate the documented reduction in student learning that often results from reduced class time or an increase in online learning.


Structural and metabolic changes were explored in 68 main bronchial mucosal biopsy specimens from 31 patients with fibrocavernous pulmonary tuberculosis. It was shown that He-Ne laser endobronchial therapy induced proliferative and metabolic processes (as judged from the level of DNA and RNA syntheses) in the damaged epithelium, which restored its structure and differentiation into celiary and goblet cells with normal ultrastructure having undergone a number of transitional forms. The proliferative and metabolic activity of endotheliocytes and stromal cells increased in the intrinsic layer of the mucosa, which was accomplished by formation of soft fiber connective tissue.


We show by construction that every rhombic lattice $\Gamma$ in $\mathbb{R}^{2}$ has a fundamental domain whose symmetry group contains the point group of $\Gamma$ as a subgroup of index $2$. This solves the last open case of a question raised in a preprint by the authors on fundamental domains for planar lattices whose symmetry groups properly contain the point groups of the lattices.


In the mid-ninth century, an earthquake triggered a landslide that blocked the narrow gorge of the Jhelum River where it exits the Kashmir Valley. The landslide impounded a lake that extended ≈100 km along the floor of the valley, implying an impounded volume of ≤21 km3, flooding the capital, Srinagar, and much agricultural land. An engineered breach of the landslide was contrived by a Medieval engineer resulting in the catastrophic release of flood waters. Using reasonable assumptions we calculate the probable minimum drainage time of this Medieval flood (<4 days) and maximum downstream surge velocities (≈12 m/s). These would have been sufficient to transport boulders in the bed of the Jhelum with dimensions of ≈6 m, consistent with those currently present in some reaches of the river. Given the morphology of the Jhelum gorge we consider that landslide outburst floods may have been common in Kashmir's history. Ancient shorelines indicate that paleo-lake volumes in the Kashmir Valley may have exceeded 400 km3 which, were they released in catastrophic floods, would have been associated with potential downstream outburst velocities >32 m/s, able to transport boulders with dimensions ≈40 m, far in excess of any found in the course of the Jhelum or in the Punjab plains. Their absence suggests that Kashmir's ancient lakes were not lowered by outburst mechanisms much exceeding those associated with Suyya's flood. Present-day floods have been many tens of meters shallower than those impounded by landslides in the Jhelum in the past several thousands of years. A challenge for future study will be to date Kashmir's ancient shorelines to learn how often landslides and major impoundment events may have occurred in the valley.


The chemical composition of essential oil (1.18% yield) from celery seeds by hydrodistillation extraction method was analyzed by GC-MS. A total of 23 constituents were detected, in which 18 compounds that account for 91.38% were identified. The main constituents were limonene (31.15%), β-selinene (22.28%) , p-cresyl isovalerate (14.94%), α-2-propenylbenzenemethanol (9.872% ), β-myrcene (4.32%) and α-selinene (4.32%). The abilities of scavenging DPPH radical of the essential oil and hydrodistillation residue were studied. The result indicated that the maximum scavenging rates was 98.1% when 0.20 mL of the oil was used. The extracts of residue by methanol, ethanol and acetone also has remarkable scavenging activity. The result showed that the scavenging rates of the methanol, ethanol and acetone extracts of the residue were 91.5%, 91.2% and 56.2% respectively, when 0.10 mL of the extract solutions was used.


We propose the first practical and secure way to integrate the iris biometric into cryptographic applications. A repeatable binary string, which we call a biometric key, is generated reliably from genuine iris codes. A well-known difficulty has been how to cope with the 10 to 20 percent of error bits within an iris code and derive an error-free key. To solve this problem, we carefully studied the error patterns within iris codes and devised a two-layer error correction technique that combines Hadamard and Reed-Solomon codes. The key is generated from a subject's iris image with the aid of auxiliary error-correction data, which do not reveal the key and can be saved in a tamper-resistant token, such as a smart card. The reproduction of the key depends on two factors: the iris biometric and the token. The attacker has to procure both of them to compromise the key. We evaluated our technique using iris samples from 70 different eyes, with 10 samples from each eye. We found that an error-free key can be reproduced reliably from genuine iris codes with a 99.5 percent success rate. We can generate up to 140 bits of biometric key, more than enough for 128-bit AES. The extraction of a repeatable binary string from biometrics opens new possible applications, where a strong binding is required between a person and cryptographic operations. For example, it is possible to identify individuals without maintaining a central database of biometric templates, to which privacy objections-might be raised


We present 42 cases of infectious mononucleosis caused by the Epstein-Barr virus in children. Patients were divided into two groups: those less than 4 years old and those 4 to 16 years of age. Splenomegaly was more frequent in young patients. Treatment with amoxicillin was associated with cutaneous rash. Heterophil antibodies were more frequent in patients older than four years of age. In 93% of the cases anticapside antibodies of IgM class were present. Complications were rarely encountered. Pneumonia and haemolytic anemia were present. We believe that anticapside antibodies of the IgM class should always be determined in patient younger than four years of age. If heterophil antibodies (Paul-Bunnell) and IgM are negative, we recommend that other specific serology related to the Epstein-Barr virus be determined in any age group.


More than 95% of testicular cancer are cured but they are at increased long‐term risk of cardiovascular disease. The risk of cardiovascular disease and treatment intensity was reported, but it is unknown whether this effect of cancer therapy is direct or indirect, mediated through androgen deficiency. Our aim was, therefore, to evaluate whether testicular cancer patients have increased the prevalence of risk factors of cardiovascular disease and if these risk factors are associated with hypogonadism and/or the cancer treatment given. In 92 testicular cancer patients (mean 9.2 years follow‐up) and age‐matched controls, blood samples were analysed for lipids, total testosterone, luteinizing hormone (LH), glucose and insulin. An estimate of insulin resistance, HOMAir was calculated. Hypogonadism was defined as total testosterone < 10 nmol/L and/or LH > 10 IU/L and/or androgen replacement. In testicular cancer men with hypogonadism, compared with eugonadal patients, higher insulin (mean difference: 3.10 mIU/L; p = 0.002) and HOMAir (mean difference: 0.792; p = 0.007) were detected. Hypogonadism group presented with increased risk (OR = 4.4; p = 0.01) of metabolic syndrome. Most associations between the treatment given and the metabolic parameters became statistically non‐significant after adjustment for hypogonadism. In conclusion, testicular cancer patients with signs of hypogonadism presented with significantly increased risk of metabolic syndrome and investigation of endocrine and metabolic parameters is warranted in these patients.


Lumia are an art form that permits visual artists to play images in the way that musicians play with sounds. Though the idea of creating lumia has a long historical tradition, modern graphicallybased computers make it possible to design instruments for creating lumia that are more flexible and easier to play than at any previous time in the history of art. In designing and playing lumia, three principal dimensions require attention: color, form, and motion. By organizing the design of lumia and instruments for creating them along these dimensions, it is possible to learn a great deal from art theory and history, as guidelines have been devised for the effective use of each of these dimensions.


Glutathione S-transferases (GSTs) are important phase II drug-metabolizing enzymes that play a major role in protecting cells from the toxic insults of electrophilic compounds. Curcumin, a promising chemotherapeutic agent, inhibits human GSTA1-1, GSTM1-1, and GSTP1-1 isoenzymes. In the present study, the effect of three series of curcumin analogues, 2,6-dibenzylidenecyclohexanone (A series), 2,5-dibenzylidenecyclopentanone (B series), and 1,4-pentadiene-3-one (C series) substituted analogues (n = 34), on these three human GST isoenzymes, and on human and rat liver cytosolic GSTs, was investigated using 1-chloro-2,4-dinitrobenzene (CDNB) as a substrate. Most of the 34 curcumin analogues showed less potent inhibitory activities towards GSTA1-1, GSTM1-1, and GSTP1-1 than the parent curcumin. Compounds B14 and C10 were the most potent inhibitors of GSTA1-1 and human liver cytosolic GSTs, with IC50 values of 0.2–0.6 μM. The most potent inhibitors of GSTM1-1 were C1, C3 and C10, with IC50 values of 0.2–0.7 μM. Similarly, GSTP1-1 was predominantly strongly inhibited by compounds of the C series C0, C1, C2 C10 and A0, with IC50 values of 0.4–4.6 μM. Compounds in the B series showed no significant inhibition of GSTP1-1. Molecular Operating Environment (MOE) program-based quantitative structure–activity relationship (QSAR) analyses have also suggested the relevance of Van der Waals surface area and compound lipophilicity factors for the inhibition of GSTA1-1 and GSTM1-1 and partial charge factors for GSTP1-1. These results may be useful in the design and synthesis of curcumin analogues with either more or less potency for GST inhibition.


BACKGROUND
Patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have well-documented symptoms that affect quality of life. Professional societies recommend palliative care for such patients, but the optimal way of delivering this care is unknown.

OBJECTIVE
To describe an outpatient palliative medicine program for patients with COPD.

DESIGN
Retrospective case series.

SETTING/SUBJECTS
Thirty-six patients with COPD followed in a United States academic outpatient palliative medicine clinic.

MEASUREMENTS
Descriptive analysis of sociodemographic data, disease severity and comorbidities, treatments, hospitalizations, mortality, topic discussion, and symptom assessment.

RESULTS
Thirty-six patients (representing 5% of the total number of patients with COPD seen in a specialty pulmonary clinic) were seen over 11 months and followed for 2 years. Seventy-seven percent of patients were Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) stage 3-4 and 72% were on oxygen at home. No patients had documented advanced directives at the initial visit but documentation increased to 61% for those who had follow-up appointments. The most commonly documented topics included symptoms (100%), social issues (94%), psychological issues (78%), and advance care planning (75%). Of symptoms assessed, pain was the least prevalent (51.6%), and breathlessness and fatigue were the most prevalent (100%). Symptoms were often undertreated prior to the palliative care appointment. During the 3-year study period, there were 120 hospital admissions (median, 2) and 12 deaths (33%).

CONCLUSIONS
The patients with COPD seen in the outpatient palliative medicine clinic had many comorbid conditions, severe illness, and significant symptom burden. Many physical and psychological symptoms were untreated prior to the palliative medicine appointment. Whether addressing these symptoms through a palliative medicine intervention affects outcomes in COPD is unknown but represents an important topic for future research.


Three well-established issues for educational reform to insert middle schooling into the traditional primary-secondary tiers are (a) lack of preservice training of specialist middle school teachers, (b) the absence of clear positive educational outcomes linked to the promotion of middle schooling policy as a philosophy of teaching, and (c) the ad hoc approach to professional development for teachers working within middle schools. Persistent uncertainties about whether middle schooling is an educationally distinctive and developmentally helpful phase of schooling have operated in conjunction with the informal preparation for middle school teaching typical in all western systems of education. These issues can be applied to the recent experiences of Education Queensland teachers with primary and secondary training who have worked within the new middle school environment. A single site investigation at an Education Queensland trial of middle schooling addressed teacher perceptions of how eco-organisational features of a middle school were facilitating or hindering their practice. After individual teachers were primed to be alert to five aspects of middle school ecology, six teams of teachers (n = 21 teachers) discussed summaries of their Likert data and written comment on these categories. Analysis of data indicated ongoing struggles about 'how' to implement middle schooling practice across these eco-organisational features. For such trials of middle years in Queensland to become sustainable educational reform, the experience of these teachers suggests that progressive and integrated approach to micropractice generation needs to temper the open-ended approach to macropolicy advocacy.


The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence o f headteachers leadership styles on pupils' performance in KCPE examination in public primary schools of Miharati Division, Kipipiri District, Kenya. The study had the following objectives: To establish headteachers' leadership styles as perceived by the teachers in public primary schools in Miharati Division, Kipipiri District, to determine the extent to which headteachers' autocratic leadership style influences performance of pupils in KCPE in Miharati Division, Kipipiri District, to determine the extent to which the headteachers' democratic leadership style influences performance of pupils in KCPE in Miharati Division, Kipipiri District and to determine the extent to which the headteachers' laissez-faire leadership style influences performance of pupils in KCPE in Miharati Division, Kipipiri District. Ex-post facto research design was used. The sample size for the study was 168 teachers and 28 headteachers.The researcher collected data using questionnaires with both open and closed ended questions to head teachers and teachers.Head teachers' questionnaires had two sections A and B. Section A contained demographic details of the respondents, Section B contained questions aimed at obtaining the influence of head teachers' leadership styles on pupil's performance in National examinations. Similarly, teachers' questionnaire had two sections A and B where section A contained demographic details of the respondents while section B contained questions on leadership style. To determine reliability of the instruments, a pilot study was carried in two pilot schools, split half technique was used. The Pearson Product Moment correlation formula was used and a correlation score of 0.9 was obtained. Descriptive statistics was used to analyze data to give percentage (%), frequencies (f) and means. Data presented helped to explain the relationship between the variables of the study. The findings revealed that majority of the teachers (53.5%) perceived their headteachers' leadership style as autocratic while majority of the headteachers (65%) perceived their leadership style as democratic.In the schools where democratic style was exhibited, performance was slightly higher than in the other schools where the other styles were practiced. Performance was very poor in the schools where laissez-faire leadership style was exhibited. Performance was not also good in the schools where autocratic style was practiced. From the study results, the researcher concludes that headteachers leadership styles influences pupil's performance in KCPE in Miharati Division Kipipiri District. The researcher concluded that autocratic leadership style was the one which was mainly employed by most of the head teachers. From the findings of the study, it was recommended that, the Ministry of Education should support headteachers by providing frequent and vigorous training programmes aimed at increasing efficiency and effectiveness in


Micro-facial expressions are fast, subtle movements of facial muscles that occur
when someone is attempting to conceal their true emotion. Detecting these movements
for a human is di�cult, as the movement could appear and disappear within
half of a second. Recently, research into detecting micro-facial movements using
computer vision and other techniques has emerged with the aim of outperforming
a human. The motivation behind a lot of this research is the potential applications
in security, healthcare and emotional-based training. The research has also
introduced some ethical concerns on whether it is okay to detect micro-movements
when people do not know they are showing them.
The main aim of this thesis is to investigate and develop novel ways of detecting
micro-facial movements using features based in the spatial and temporal domains.
The contributions towards this aim are: an extended feature descriptor to
describe micro-facial movement namely Local Binary Patterns on Three Orthogonal
Planes (LBP-TOP) combined with Gaussian Derivatives (GD); a dataset
of spontaneously induced micro-facial movements, namely Spontaneous Activity
of Micro-Movements (SAMM); an individualised baseline method for micromovement
detection that forms an Adaptive Baseline Threshold (ABT); Facial
Action Coding System (FACS)-based regions are proposed to focus on the local
movement of relevant facial areas.
The LBP-TOP with GD feature was developed to improve on an established
feature and use the GD to enhance the facial features. Using machine learning,
the method performs well achieving an accuracy of 92.6%. Next a new dataset,
SAMM, was introduced that improved on the limitations of previous sets, including
a wider demographic, increased resolution and comprehensively FACS coded.
An individualised baseline method was the introduced and tested using the new
dataset. Using feature di�erence instead of machine learning, the performance increased
with a recall of 0.8429 on the maximum thresholding and a further increase
of the recall to 0.9125 when using the ABT. To increase the relevance of what
is being processed on the face, FACS-based regions were created. By focusing
on local regions and individualised baselines, this method outperformed similar
state-of-the-art with an Area Under Curve (AUC) of 0.7513.
The research into detecting micro-movements is still in it's infancy, and much
more can be done to advance this �eld. While machine learning can �nd patterns
in normal facial expressions, it is the feature di�erence methods that perform the
best when detecting the subtle changes of the face. By using this and comparing
the movement against a person's baseline, the micro-movements can �nally be
accurately detected.


Many calibrated hydrological models are inconsistent with the behavioral functions of catchments and do not fully represent the catchments' underlying processes despite their seemingly adequate performance, if measured by traditional statistical error metrics. Using such metrics for calibration is hindered if only short-term data are available. This study investigated the influence of varying lengths of streamflow observation records on model calibration and evaluated the usefulness of a signature-based calibration approach in conceptual rainfall-runoff model calibration. Scenarios of continuous short-period observations were used to emulate poorly gauged catchments. Two approaches were employed to calibrate the HBV model for the Brue catchment in the UK. The first approach used single-objective optimization to maximize Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE) as a goodness-of-fit measure. The second approach involved multiobjective optimization based on maximizing the scores of 11 signature indices, as well as maximizing NSE. In addition, a diagnostic model evaluation approach was used to evaluate both model performance and behavioral consistency. The results showed that the HBV model was successfully calibrated using short-term datasets with a lower limit of approximately four months of data (10% FRD model). One formulation of the multiobjective signature-based optimization approach yielded the highest performance and hydrological consistency among all parameterization algorithms. The diagnostic model evaluation enabled the selection of consistent models reflecting catchment behavior and allowed an accurate detection of deficiencies in other models. It can be argued that signature-based calibration can be employed for building adequate models even in data-poor situations.


In January and February 2007 Oxford Archaeology (OA) carried out an archaeological field evaluation and building survey at Hall's Croft garden and attic in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire (NGR SP 202 546) on behalf of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

The test pit evaluation within the garden revealed a medieval pit or garden planting feature, a build up of garden soils containing materials dating from 13th/14th to the 19th centuries and evidence of levelling and landscaping. One test pit contained quantities of medieval roof tile suggesting the presence of a building(s) in the vicinty, possibly to the north-east of the site. Overall, the concentration of archaeology in the garden appears low - based on the (admittedly small) sample of the garden that was excavated, it is possible that the area was not built up either in the medieval or later period.

The building survey within the attic examined a tool fixed to a roof timber. The device was interpreted as a grinding machine although it is not clear what was processed through the machine. It was not located in its original position and dating remains uncertain. An examination beneath the present floorboards revealed an earlier floor surface but one which had not been part of the original early 17th century phase of the building. Environmental samples were taken of deposits beneath the floorboards. Analysis of these has revealed evidence of storage and preparation of vegetables and fruit for consumption possibly dating to the Victorian period but which could have accumulated over a longer period of time.


Many patients with severe infections receive inappropriate empirical treatment and rapid detection of bacterial antibiotic susceptibility can in this context improve clinical outcome and reduce mortality. We have to this end developed a high-throughput fluidic chip for rapid phenotypic antibiotic susceptibility testing of bacteria. A total of 21 clinical isolates of Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae and Staphylococcus aureus were acquired from the EUCAST Development Laboratory and tested against amikacin, ceftazidime and meropenem (Gramnegative bacteria) or gentamicin, ofloxacin and tetracycline (Gram-positive bacteria). The bacterial samples were mixed with agarose and loaded in 8 separate growth chambers in the fluidic chip. The chip was thereafter connected to a reservoir lid containing different antibiotics and a pump used to draw growth media with or without antibiotics into the chip for generation of diffusion-limited antibiotic gradients in the growth chambers. Bacterial microcolony growth was monitored using darkfield time-lapse microscopy and quantified using a cluster image analysis algorithm. Minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values were automatically obtained by tracking the growth rates of individual microcolonies in different regions of antibiotic gradients. Stable MIC values were obtained within 2-4 hours and the results showed categorical agreement to reference MIC values as determined with broth microdilution in 86% of the cases. Importance Prompt and effective antimicrobial therapy is crucial for the management of patients with severe bacterial infections but is becoming increasingly difficult to provide due to emerging antibiotic resistance. The traditional methods for antibiotic susceptibility testing (AST) used in most clinical laboratories are reliable but slow with turnaround times of 2-3 days, which necessitates the use of empirical therapy with broad-spectrum antibiotics. There is a great need for fast and reliable AST methods that enable start of targeted treatment within a few hours to improve patient outcome and reduce overuse of broad-spectrum antibiotics. The high-throughput fluidic chip for phenotypic AST described in the present study enables data on antimicrobial resistance within 2-4 hours allowing for an early initiation of appropriate antibiotic therapy.


AI Crucis is a short-period semi-detached massive close binary (P = 1:41771 d , Sp.=B 1.5) in the open cluster NGC 4103. It is a good astrophysical lab- oratory for investigating the formation and evolution of massive close binary stars via case A mass transfer. Orbital period variations of the system were analyzed based on one newly determined eclipse time and the others compiled from the literature. It is discovered that the orbital period of the binary is continuously increasing at a rate of dP=dt = +1:00(§0:04) £ 10 i7 d yr i1 . After the long-term increase is subtracted from the O i C diagram, weak evidence indicates the presence of a cyclic oscilla- tion with a period of 30.1 yr, which may reveal a very cool stellar companion in the system. The long-term period increase can be explained by mass transfer from the less massive component to the more massive one. This is in agreement with the semi- detached configuration of the binary, indicating that the system is undergoing a slow mass-transfer stage on the nuclear time scale of the secondary. However, it is found that the slow mass transfer is insufficient to cause the observed period increase, which suggests that the stellar wind from the hot component should contribute to the amount of period increase dP=dt = +0:54£10 i7 d yr i1 that corresponds to a mass loss rate of _ M1 = 2:72 £ 10 i7 Mfl yr i1 . It is estimated that the hot component lost a total mass of 4.1Mfl during the slow mass-transfer stage and, thus, the evolution of the binary system should be changed greatly by the mass loss.


Grid computing provides integration of different environments, creating a unified system, where organizations might share, manage and access different resources regardless where they are localized. However, the lack of integration among different grid computing systems does not provide total exploitation of resources. This work investigates and develops an interface for integration of two heterogeneous grid computing environments: Globus and InteGrade. Such integration increases the computational power, transparently. Users will be able to submit jobs through both grid environments and applications will be executed into Globus, or into InteGrade or into both systems.


According to the different fellower structure and general simple trapezoid motion law of cam mechanism, this paper established a mathematic model for the motion of fellower structure of cam mechanism. The design method of motion law of the fellower structure was introduced, and the law of motion transition of fellower system and the related issues with program design were studied. A design system was developed using VB code based fellower structure and general motion laws. And the system could solve the curve of motion law for the fellower system and the eigenvalue of the curve, and finally realize parametric design of motion law for the fellower structure of cam mechanism. And the system could calculate and output the coordinate of cam configuration, and improve the digitized design process of cam parametric. The interface of the designed system is friendly and convenient, and the system could be used in both engineering and teaching.


1. Ethanol induces a decrease in GSH (reduced glutathione) concentration is isolated hepatocytes. Maximal effects appear at 20 mM-ethanol. The concentration-dependence of this decrease is paralleled by the concentration-dependence of the activity of alcohol dehydrogenase. 2. Pyrazole, a specific inhibitor of alcohol dehydrogenase, prevents the ethanol-induced GSH depletion. 3. Acetaldehyde, above 0.05 mM, also promotes a decrease in GSH concentration in hepatocytes. 4. Disulfiram (0.05 mM), an inhibitor of aldehyde dehydrogenase, potentiates the fall in GSH concentration caused by acetaldehyde. 5. The findings support the hypothesis that acetaldehyde is responsible for the depletion of GSH induced by ethanol. 6. Methionine prevents the effect of alcohol or acetaldehyde on GSH concentration in hepatocytes.


Figure 3 of the article, "Computerized bibliographic services for biomedicine," by L. Karel et al. (7 May, p. 769), is a composite of two sets of data. The cards (lower right), both labeled "National Library of Medicine," should have been designated to set them off from data on "Therapy of Chromoblastomycosis." The last item under "Therapy of Chromoblastomycosis" is incomplete.


Marine and inland pollution by non-degradable plastic bags and other plastic articles is a topic of great concern. Natural degradation processes based on oxidation of plastic pollutants could possibly contribute to limit the extent of pollution. Thermal degradation of polyolefins in the absence of light by non-polluting pro-oxidants has not been presented before. In this study, we show that two amines, stearyl amine and [(3-(11-aminoundecanoyl) amino) propane-1-] silsesquioxane (amino-POSS) in combination with ferric stearate (FeSt3) tremendously accelerate the thermal oxidation of polyolefins compared with reference samples. Both amines and FeSt3 are to a large extent based on renewable resources. Polyethylene and polypropylene samples containing less than 100 ppm of iron and 1% of amine were extremely brittle after 10 days in a circulation oven in the absence of light. No significant degradation could be seen with samples containing iron but no amine. In a different application, the initial oxidation of polyethylene can be used in order to increase its adhesion to cardboard. Excellent adhesion between polyethylene and cardboard is important for liquid packaging based on renewable resources. Amino-POSS has been chosen for food packaging applications due to its expected lower leakage from polyethylene (PE) compared with stearyl amine. Film samples of PE/amino-POSS/FeSt3 blends were partly oxidized in a circulation oven. The oxidation was documented by increased carbonyl index (CI) and melt flow index (MFI). The limited extent of oxidation has been proved by unchanged tensile strength and only moderate changes in elongation at break when compared to reference polyethylene films containing no FeSt3 or amino-POSS. The PE/amino-POSS/FeSt3 blends were compression moulded to paperboard. The adhesion of non-aged blends to paperboard decreased with increasing amino-POSS content which is in good compliance with an earlier reported lubricant effect of high amounts of POSS in PE. Thermal ageing of PE/amino-POSS/FeSt3 films prior to coating however led to a significant increase in adhesion. Improved physical interlocking due to increased MFI and interaction between C=O of the blends and OH of paperboard can explain the adhesion improvement. The films were not brittle after thermal ageing, which makes their use in industrial packaging feasible. A mechanism explaining the role of amines during thermal oxidation of polyolefins in the presence of iron is proposed.


We present the first near-global set of correlated measurements of stratospheric HCl and ClONO2 concentrations. These data, obtained from the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) between August 1992 and March 1993, are analyzed using the Goddard trajectory mapping technique. These data indicate that, between 20 and 30 km altitude and 60°N to 60°S latitude, total inorganic chlorine (Cly) is fairly evenly distributed between ClONO2 and HCl, with HCl the slightly more dominant reservoir. The sum of UARS measurements of HCl and nighttime ClONO2, which approximates Cly at these altitudes, closely agrees with Cly derived from a tracer-Cly relation originally derived from aircraft data, increasing confidence in the UARS data. Comparisons between these data and two-dimensional model results suggest that models underpredict ClONO2 (overpredict HCl) near 20 km and overpredict ClONO2 (underpredict HCl) near 30 km, although the 20-km underprediction is not as large as analyses of aircraft measurements have indicated.


Streptococcus pyogenes infects over 700 million people worldwide annually. Immune evasion strategies employed by the bacteria include binding of the complement inhibitors, C4b-binding protein (C4BP) and Factor H in a human-specific manner. We recently showed that human IgG increased C4BP binding to the bacterial surface, which promoted streptococcal immune evasion and increased mortality in mice. We sought to identify how IgG promotes C4BP binding to Protein H, a member of the M protein family. Dimerization of Protein H is pivotal for enhanced binding to human C4BP. First, we illustrated that Protein H, IgG, and C4BP formed a tripartite complex. Second, surface plasmon resonance revealed that Protein H binds IgG solely through Fc, but not Fab domains, and with high affinity (IgG-Protein H: KD = 0.4 nM; IgG-Fc-Protein H: KD ≤ 1.6 nM). Each IgG binds two Protein H molecules, while up to six molecules of Protein H bind one C4BP molecule. Third, interrupting Protein H dimerization either by raising temperature to 41°C or with a synthetic peptide prevented IgG-Protein H interactions. IgG-Fc fragments or monoclonal human IgG permitted maximal C4BP binding when used at concentrations from 0.1 to 10 mg/ml. In contrast, pooled human IgG enhanced C4BP binding at concentrations up to 1 mg/ml; decreased C4BP binding at 10 mg/ml occurred probably because of Fab-streptococcal interactions at these high IgG concentrations. Taken together, our data show how S. pyogenes exploits human IgG to evade complement and enhance its virulence. Elucidation of this mechanism could aid design of new therapeutics against S. pyogenes.


The photoredox conversion of organic functional groups into useful products without the reliance on expensive transition metal-based catalysts has been a major challenge. Here we report the photocatalytic conversion of N-hydroxy-carbamates into N-hydroxy-oxazolidinones using simple metal organic frameworks (MOFs) such as MIL-125-NH2 and UiO-66-NH2 as catalysts in aerobic conditions, with efficiencies and yields comparable to those performed using ground state catalysts. Through sampling increasingly complex structures of carbamates, we found that MOFs induce diasteroselectivities similar to those obtained in solution, which is pivotal in synthesizing natural products and pharmaceuticals, and that the photo-conversion occurred on or near the surface of MOF particles. To provide better mechanistic interpretations on these observations, kinetics studies, quantum yield measurements, and the determination of the photogenerated reactive species were performed. The temperature dependency in the kinetic studies enabled us to identify the photo-redox process as the rate-limiting step of the reaction, a trend that is consistent with using non-porous heterogeneous catalysts like TiO2. The structural traits of the studied MOFs explain how porosity and light absorption can be tuned for better photocatalysts for achieving high yields and selectivities.


Export of textiles used to occupy commanding heights in Indian economy. Cotton is an important fiber crop of India which plays a dominant role in the country's economy by meeting the domestic and export demands and supporting the livelihoods of millions of poor households. India contributes as much as 8 per cent to total merchandise exports and more than 2 percent to total GDP. It contributes significantly to both agriculture and industry in terms of farm income, employment and export earnings. India, despite being the second largest producer of cotton in the world, the present level of exports is not consistent and exhibits high variations in volume and revenue earnings. Cotton the most important commercial crop of India, often referred as the White Gold consumes more than 45% of the total pesticides used in our country.  Exports of cotton have been restricted by quotas, and the mill industry has been subject to such regulations as the obligation to supply hank yarn for Indian handlooms. These interventions have led to stagnating cotton yields, rent-seeking activities, manipulation of cotton statistics, and low profitability in cotton mills offsetting the short-run benefits of inexpensive cotton in India. If the data of last ten years are seen, lot of fluctuations can be observed, though export of textile used to make a formidable presence in Indian economy. In this context, this paper analyzes the trend of export from 2001 onwards. This paper will help to know the changing patterns of India's textiles exports.


Out-of-distribution (OOD) detection has received much attention lately due to its importance in the safe deployment of neural networks. One of the key challenges is that models lack supervision signals from unknown data, and as a result, can produce overconfident predictions on OOD data. Previous approaches rely on real outlier datasets for model regularization, which can be costly and sometimes infeasible to obtain in practice. In this paper, we present VOS, a novel framework for OOD detection by adaptively synthesizing virtual outliers that can meaningfully regularize the model's decision boundary during training. Specifically, VOS samples virtual outliers from the low-likelihood region of the class-conditional distribution estimated in the feature space. Alongside, we introduce a novel unknown-aware training objective, which contrastively shapes the uncertainty space between the ID data and synthesized outlier data. VOS achieves competitive performance on both object detection and image classification models, reducing the FPR95 by up to 9.36% compared to the previous best method on object detectors. Code is available at https://github.com/deeplearning-wisc/vos.


Enzyme catalyzed various biochemical reactions under relatively mild conditions in living cells. Enzymes are generally not stable under pH, heat or other factors and are difficult to recover and reuse. Therefore, immobilization techniques have been developed to make the most of the purified enzymes, that have been utilized to prepare durable, resuable, high-performance and economically-applicable biocatalysts [1]. The immobilized enzymes can be used repeatedly and continuously and they are catalyzed a number of very complex chemical transformations [2]. In this study, we determinated whether or not the immobilized the carrot onto TiO2- and γ-Fe2O3 nanoparticules. Carrot contains high levels of phenolic and flavonoid compounds. Superparamagnetic nanocomposite, TiO2- and γ-Fe2O3 phenolic/flavonoid-carrot was prepared by using phenolic or flavonoid groups of carrot. Fruits and vegetables cell protective effect against oxidation of the oxidative deterioration of foods and preventing or retarding compounds are rich in antioxidants. These natural substances are picking up free radicals that shows antioxidant properties. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) (Figure 1) and Fourier transform infrared spectra (FT-IR) were used to characterize the TiO2 and γ-Fe2O3-phenolic/flavonoid-carrot nanocomposite, and confirming that carrot was immobilized onto the TiO2 and γ-Fe2O3 by phenolic/ flavonoid of carrot [3,4]. This study can provide a big boost for prospective studies in the medical practice of diseases.


We discuss the general formalism for the calculation in light-front quark models of the fully unintegrated, off-diagonal quark-quark correlator of the nucleon, parametrized in terms of generalized transverse momentum dependent parton distributions (GTMDs). By taking specific limits or projections, these GTMDs yield various transverse-momentum dependent and generalized parton distributions, thus providing a unified framework to simultaneously model different observables. The corresponding distributions in impact-parameter space are the Wigner functions which provide multidimensional images of the quark distributions in phase space. We present results within a light-front constituent quark model, discussing some of the complementary aspects encoded in the different distributions and the relation to the quark orbital angular momentum of the proton.


The overall aim of the research was to contribute to further elucidation of the immune-pathogenesis of atopic dermatitis (AD) in the dog. Findings described in this PhD thesis indicated putative alterations occurring in, or inherent to the AD skin. The altered lipid composition and organization observed in both lesional and non-lesional AD skin in dogs, may support the "outside-in" hypothesis, that states that abnormalities in the skin barrier may contribute to the pathogenesis of AD. Alternatively, potentially in addition, the pathogenesis of AD is immunologically driven initially, as postulated by the "inside-out" hypothesis. The microbiome of canine skin varied between individuals and was influenced by the topical antimicrobial treatment. In general, significant differences in the microbiome composition were not observed, between AD and healthy dog skin, although the microbial diversity tended to be lower in affected compared to healthy skin. The microbiome and AD are likely to influence each other. The inflammatory state of the AD skin, partly due to infection, results in expression of both antimicrobial peptides (AMP) and further cytokines, likely to be influenced by anatomical sites and topical treatment. Distortions of the skin homeostasis may lead to significant changes in skin barrier lipid, skin microbiome, AMP and inflammatory cytokines as shown in this thesis. Study of each of these subjects not only led to a more comprehensive understanding of canine AD, but may in future contribute to design of diagnostic and therapeutic strategies.


We conducted a molecular study of MRSA isolated in Swiss hospitals, including the first five consecutive isolates recovered from blood cultures and the first ten isolates recovered from other sites in newly identified carriers. Among 73 MRSA isolates, 44 different double locus sequence typing (DLST) types and 32 spa types were observed. Most isolates belonged to the NewYork/Japan, the UK-EMRSA-15, the South German and the Berlin clones. In a country with a low to moderate MRSA incidence, inclusion of non-invasive isolates allowed a more accurate description of the diversity.


OBJECTIVE: To determine whether axillary block with nerve stimulation involving the location of four motor responses is more effective than other techniques using fewer locations, without increasing patient discomfort or the rate of complications. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Prospective, randomized single blind study enrolling 100 patients undergoing orthopedic surgery under axillary block with nerve stimulation. Patients were randomly assigned to five groups of 20 patients: in group A, 4 motor responses were located; in group B three were located (musculocutaneous nerve and two more); in group C two responses, the musculocutaneous nerve and one more; in group D two non-musculocutaneous responses; and in group E only one non-musculocutaneous response was located (medial, cubital or radial). We used 40 ml of 1% mepivacaine. Data collected were location of responses, duration of blockade, adverse events occurring during the technique; level of motor and sensory block; tolerance to the tourniquet; level of patient discomfort; and presence of complications. RESULTS: A full sensory block was achieved for 100% in group A, 90% in group B, 60% in group C, 75% in group D and 40% in group E. Patient discomfort was similar in all groups. One patient continued to suffer postoperative neurologic dysfunction three months after the block. CONCLUSIONS: Locating 4 responses gives the greatest degree of assurance of obtaining full sensory block without increasing patient discomfort or rate of complications.


The sensitivity of ion concentration distribution models to three key model assumptions, the pore-size distribution of clay media, the distance of closest approach of ions to the clay surface, and the accessibility of sub-nanometer-wide clay mineral interlayer spaces to anions, was explored by solving the Poisson-Boltzmann equation for swelling and non-swelling clay materials. Our calculations show that all three model assumptions significantly impact values predicted for the anion accessible porosity. As a consequence, macroscopic measurements of anion exclusion in clay media cannot be used to test any of the three model assumptions independently of the two others. Information gained at the nanoscale,in particular, a detailed characterization of pore size distribution, is necessary to develop accurate predictive models of the anion accessible porosity of clay media.


Resistivity surveying with combined profiling and sounding, also called continuous vertical electrical sounding, has been carried out along large parts of the planned railway tunnel through Hallandsas using multi-electrode data acquisition equipment. The measured data was processed by means of inverse numerical modelling. (Dahlin 1996) The first surveying was carried out over the Southern Marginal Zone in 1995 as part of complementary investigations of the rock quality (Dahlin et al. 1999). Due to the good results achieved, the technique has since been applied along most of the 8.6 km long tunnel line. In the surveys carried out in 1998 larger electrode separations, with 800 metre cable layouts, were used for increased depth penetration. Expanded measurement protocols were also employed for enhanced resolution. The results (see figure 1) display a strong variation in modelled resistivities along the line, where in particular the Southern Marginal Zone and the Mollebacken Zone stand out as low resistive zones. Apart from these, several low resistive zones of smaller extent are evident, which can be interpreted as fractured or weathered zones. Limited parts of the tunnel stretch exhibit the high resistivities that are normally expected for crystalline rock of low fracture density below the groundwater level. The resistivity models were used, along with other available geophysical data, as a basis for creating conceptual models of the structural geology and the variation in quality of the rock. These models were used as a basis for siting test drillings, to verify and refine the conceptual models. A comparison with core drilling data shows that the resistivity results give a good overview of the structural geology and variation in relative rock quality. It was, however, not possible to correlate e.g. Q-values with resistivity on a detail level. This is partly dependent on the differences in scale and resolution of the two types of data, but there may also be a lack of a simple connection between Q-value and resistivity. It is quite possible that a better correlation could be achieved with a different parameter as measure of the rock quality. Furthermore, the resistivity models as well as drilling data and documentation from the tunnelling (Dahlin and Sturk 1998) shows a strong inhomogeneity of the rock in Hallandsas, which means that the individual boreholes are probably only representative for a very small volume in their vicinity.


This paper presents an improved cluster-based Mesh architecture called Mesh of Tree. The intra-cluster interconnect has an optimized Tree topology allowing to connect external signals and local feedbacks to logic blocks inputs. Unlike the well known VPR cluster-based Mesh architecture, the depopulated local interconnect allows to consider sizeable clusters. Moreover density is improved and interconnect switches requirement is reduced by 42% compared to the VPR-based architecture.


Partition models based on the octanol-air partition coefficients and associated quantitative structure-activity relationships (QSARs) have been developed to describe the triggering of odor detection, nasal irritation, and narcosis by common volatile organic compounds (VOCs). This study made use of the QSARs developed by Hau and Connell (1998), Indoor Air 8, 23-33) and Hau et al. (1999a, Toxicol. Sci. 47, 93-98; 1999b, Environ. Toxicol. Pharmacol. 7, 159-167) to predict the odor thresholds, nasal pungency thresholds, and anesthetic potency in humans for four groups of VOCs, namely, alkanes, alcohols, ketones, and acetates. The predicted outcomes with their estimated variability were used to evaluate the relevant guidelines on the airborne concentrations of these test groups. Threshold limit values (TLVs) for the test compounds were found to be generally capable of offering adequate protection against nasal pungency and narcosis, except for the higher alcohols (C6-C8) and sec-amyl acetate. The QSARs can also be used to set tentative guidelines for those compounds not having a TLV; values of 5 and 75 ppm were proposed for heptan-1-ol and dibutyl ketone respectively as examples.


Purpose of Review: This article discusses the neurobiology, clinical features, and treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), as well as its association with psychiatric and neurologic disease. Recent Findings: OCD can be associated with various neurologic disorders. Recent studies have better elucidated the neurobiology of OCD, and this new knowledge promises to have a significant impact on future treatments. Summary: OCD is a syndrome characterized by obsessions and compulsions, as well as other neuropsychiatric features, and is often associated with primary psychiatric disorders and various neurologic conditions. If severe, OCD can seriously interfere with the patient's quality of life. The mainstay of treatment is psychotherapy, especially cognitive-behavioral therapy, and pharmacologic interventions, especially with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). Unfortunately, a significant proportion of patients are refractory to these treatment modalities. New understanding about the neurobiology of OCD has led to novel investigational treatments, especially neuromodulation techniques.


Precipitation behavior of intermetallic phases in ferrite matrix is investigated by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) in Fe-10Cr-1.4W-4.5Co (at%) alloys with and without 0.3at%Si. It is intended to provide basic information for the alloy design of ferritic heat resistant alloys strengthened by intermetallic compounds. In the alloy containing Si, icosahedral quasicrytalline phase (I-phase) is found to precipitate during aging at 873K. It is confirmed that selected area diffraction (SAD) patterns of the precipitates exhibit two-, three- and five-fold symmetry and have diffraction spots in the positions related to the golden section. In the Si-free alloy, the R-phase precipitates instead of I-phase at 873K, and the Laves phase precipitates in both alloys during aging at higher temperature, 973K. The Laves phase formed at 973K transforms to the I-phase in the Si-added alloy but to the R-phase in the Si-free alloy during subsequent aging at 873K. The factors in controlling the phase stability of I-phase, R-phase and Laves phase precipitates in Fe-based alloys are discussed by the atomic size ratio and electron concentration factor (e/a).


Waste generation and its management present universal challenges related to negative impacts on the environment. Municipal solid waste generation in large quantities on daily basis constitutes serious environmental problems. This paper presents a review of extant literature in the management of municipal waste across a range of countries alongside waste management hierarchy that guide legislations and policies for developed and developing countries. This paper assesses the environmental consequences emanating from the influence of either the presence or absence of contaminants-based diverse management options for municipal solid waste; thereby facilitating policy makers and waste management companies informed choice(s) for the management of municipal waste sustainably. The outcome from the evaluation of environmental effect reveals that incineration; the most common waste-to-energy implementation for municipal solid waste is accompanied with the emission of greenhouse gases, Nitrogen oxides, ammonia, sulphur dioxide contributing to climate change and air acidification. Environmental concern is a critical indicator for determining the best appropriate waste management option(s). The need to encourage the increasing recycling of municipal solid waste to facilitate a global sustainable environment as well as boosting the circular economy and green cities is recommended.


In this paper we analyse data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 to investigate whether experiencing parental divorce during adolescence reduces measured cognitive ability. To account for the potential endogeneity of parental divorce we employ a difference-in-differences model that relies on observing teenagers' outcomes before and after divorce. We find that parental divorce does not negatively affect teenagers' cognitive development. Our results also suggest that cross-section estimates overstate the detrimental effect of parental divorce.


Tourism and creative economy in Indonesia can develop properly if there is a goodsynergy among all stakeholders to contribute to GDP, employment, and foreign exchangereserves. Telecommunication networks and e-tourism support is necessary for tourismmarketing and electronic ticketing. Tour operators in the country, direct flights, visa-free,and the organization of MICE in the tourist destinations are very effective to attractforeigners who travel on business and have a very large multiplier to boost tourism andcreative economy in Indonesia.


ApoA-1 (apolipoprotein A-1) is the main component of HDL (high-density lipoprotein) and stabilizes PON-1 (paraoxonase-1), which prevents lipid peroxidation and oxLDL (oxidized low-density lipoprotein) formation. Autoantibodies against apoA-1 [anti-(apoA-1) IgG] have been found in antiphospholipid syndrome and systemic lupus erythematosous, two diseases with an increased risk of thrombotic events, as well as in ACS (acute coronary syndrome). OxLDL levels are also elevated in these diseases. Whether anti-(apoA-1) IgGs exist in other prothrombotic conditions, such as APE (acute pulmonary embolism) and stroke, has not been studied and their potential association with oxLDL and PON-1 activity is not known. In the present study, we determined prospectively the prevalence of anti-(apoA-1) IgG in patients with ACS (n=127), APE (n=58) and stroke (n=34), and, when present, we tested their association with oxLDL levels. The prevalance of anti-(apoA-1) IgG was 11% in the ACS group, 2% in the control group and 0% in the APE and stroke groups. The ACS group had significantly higher median anti-(apoA-1) IgG titres than the other groups of patients. Patients with ACS positive for anti-(apoA-1) IgG had significantly higher median oxLDL values than those who tested negative (226.5 compared with 47.7 units/l; P<0.00001) and controls. The Spearman ranked test revealed a significant correlation between anti-(apoA-1) IgG titres and serum oxLDL levels (r=0.28, P<0.05). No association was found between PON-1 activity and oxLDL or anti-(apoA-1) IgG levels. In conclusion, anti-(apoA-1) IgG levels are positive in ACS, but not in stroke or APE. In ACS, their presence is associated with higher levels of oxLDL and is directly proportional to the serum concentration of oxLDL. These results emphasize the role of humoral autoimmunity as a mediator of inflammation and coronary atherogenesis.


This paper provides an overview of the first steps in the professionalization of manual drilling in Ghana with the initial training of two manual drilling businesses. The training follows the approach outlined in the "Toolkit for the Professionalization of Manual Drilling in Africa" (UNICEF, 2010) and began with the selection of appropriate businesses followed by training in basic hydrogeology and rotary jetting. These business will be used by the USAID funded Ghana WASH Project to drill forty addition boreholes for the project under the supervision of trained well drillers. In addition to the well drilling businesses project staff and staff from a local NGO also received training so that they can act as supervisors and coaches to ensure that that quality of the drilled wells is maintained. Furthermore a local workshop has been trained to make the drilling tools to make sure that replacement tools will be available in Ghana.


Abstract The crystal structures of two binuclear iron(III) complexes with linear μ-oxo bridge, Fe2OCl2 (tfpy)2 (ClO4)2 ·2CH3CN and Fe2OCl2(epy)2(ClO4)2 were determined, where (tfpy) and (epy) represent N,N-bis(2-pyridylmethyl)-tetrahydrofurfurylamine and N,N-bis(2-pyridylmethyl)-2-ethoxyethylamine, respectively. Their structural features are essentially the same as that of the corresponding linear binuclear complex with (tpa)-complex, Fe2OCl2(tpa)2(ClO4)2, where (tpa) is tris(2-pyridylmethyl)amine; the ligands (tfpy) and (epy) act as a tetradentate tripod-like ligand, and Fe-O (ethereal oxygen atom; these are located at the trans-position of bridging oxo-oxygen atom) distances are 2.209(4) and 2.264(2) Å for (tfpy) and (epy) compounds, respectively. These two (tfpy) and (epy) complexes exhibited much higher activity for the oxygenation of cyclohexane in the presence of hydrogen peroxide than that of the (tpa) complex. In contrast to this, the former two complexes exhibit negligible activity for the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide, whereas the catalase-like function of the (tpa) compound is remarkable. These are indicating that an active species for oxygenation of cyclohexane, which is assumed to be an iron(III)-hydroperoxide adduct with η1-coordination mode, should be different from that is operating for decomposition of hydrogen peroxide; for the latter case formation of a (μ-η1:η1-peroxo)diiron(III) species being stressed. The EHMO calculation showed that electronic interaction between the monodentate hydroperoxide adduct of the binuclear iron(IIl)-(tfpy) compound and the tetrahydrofuran ring of the ligand system may lead to facile peroxide-tetrahydrofuran linkage formation, and the interaction described above should promote the O-O cleavage of the peroxide ion heterolytically. Based on these discussions, it was concluded that heterolytic O-O bond cleavage of the iron(III)-hydroperoxide adduct caused by electronic interaction with organic moiety containing an ethereal-oxygen and by approach of the substrate which donates electron to the peroxide adduct should play an important role in producing a high-valent iron-oxo species in these systems. In the case of (tpa) complex, formation of a hydroperoxide adduct linking with the ligand system seems to be unfavorable because of both the steric and electronic reasons.


Tehran-Shomal freeway was constructed to have a safer and shorter travel route. However it causes degradation of valuable natural resources along the constructed freeway. There is a paradox between a safer route and natural resource degradation. The traffic accidents are the second factor for Iranian death. There are 235 million thousands of fatal traffic accidents in Iran. There is a serious need for a safer and shorter travel route between Iranian people. On the other hand, Iran forest area is very poor. There are many concerns about very valuable and fragile natural resources along Tehran-Shomal freeway.
We attempt to estimate the economic values of natural resources along Tehran-Shomal freeway in this study. First specific objective is to investigate community awareness and attitudes towards supporting the natural resources. Second specific objective is to determine effect of socio-economic characteristics of the community on willingness to pay (WTP). Third specific objective is to estimate the willingness to pay (WTP) of the natural resources conservation along the Tehran-Shomal freeway. The last specific objective is to determine the benefits and costs of the Tehran-Shomal freeway construction.
The contingent valuation method (CVM) was used to estimate the economic values of the natural resources along the Tehran-Shomal freeway. It is only approach accessible for estimation non-use values. We also applied close-ended CVM survey. The format of the close ended was a dichotomous choice (DC) question. Respondents give a "Yes" or "No" answer to wheatear or not they would pay.
Our results indicated that the community has sufficient awareness about environmental issues such as endangered species or natural resources conservation. They had adequate attitude about the natural resources along Tehran-Shomal freeway. For example, 62% of individuals manifested varying levels of worriment about the natural resources along the freeway. Gender, environmental sensitiveness,
education and income variables are all significant explanatory variables in the WTP model. The cost-benefit analysis (CBA) suggested that the benefits of the Tehran-
Shomal freeway construction are more than its costs. The estimated mean WTP was US$1.84. The total WTP of supporting natural resources along Tehran-Shomal freeway was estimated at US$77 million per year which is about 0.23% of Iranian
GDP. The individuals were generally willing to pay up to 4% of their income for conservation of natural resources along the Tehran-Shomal freeway.
Tehran-Shomal freeway has been started sixteen years ago but has not completed yet,because its benefits had been never estimated. We make sure policy makers for completion the Tehran-Shomal freeway construction. According our results most of people were concern for natural resources in part one and three of the Tehran-Shomal freeway. Policy makers can continue construction operations in the part two and three of the freeway. We recommend environmental management plan (EMP) reexamined in the part one and four which have more valuable natural resources.


Increasing UVB radiation at the earth's surface might have adverse effects on in vivo immunologic responses in humans. We prospectively randomized subjects to test whether epicutaneous immunization is altered by prior administration of biologically equalized doses of UV radiation. Multiple doses of antigens on upper inner arm skin (UV protected) were used to elicit contact sensitivity responses, which were quantitated by measuring increases in skin thickness. If a dose of UVB sufficient to induce redness (erythemagenic) was administered to the immunization site prior to sensitization with dinitrochlorobenzene (DNCB), we noted a marked reduction in the degree of sensitization (P less than 0.0006) that was highly dose responsive (r = 0.98). Even suberythemagenic UV (less than a visible sunburn) resulted in a decreased frequency of strongly positive responses (32%) as compared to controls (73%) (P = 0.019). The rate of immunologic tolerance to DNCB (active suppression of a subsequent repeat immunization) in the groups that were initially sensitized on skin receiving erythemagenic doses of UV was 31% (P = 0.0003). In addition, a localized moderate sunburn appeared to modulate immunization with diphenylcyclopropenone through a distant, unirradiated site (41% weak responses) as compared to the control group (9%) (P = 0.05). Monitoring antigen presenting cell content in the epidermis revealed that erythemagenic regimens induced CD1a-DR+ macrophages and depleted Langerhans cells. In conclusion, relevant and even subclinical levels of UV exposure have significant down modulatory effects on the ability of humans to generate a T-cell-mediated response to antigens introduced through irradiated skin.


Abstract Identifying climates favoring extreme weather phenomena is a primary aim of paleoclimate and paleohydrological research. Here, we present a well-dated, late Holocene Dead Sea sediment record of debris flows covering 3.3 to 1.9 cal ka BP. Twenty-three graded layers deposited in shallow waters near the western Dead Sea shore were identified by microfacies analysis. These layers represent distal subaquatic deposits of debris flows triggered by torrential rainstorms over the adjacent western Dead Sea escarpment. Modern debris flows on this escarpment are induced by rare rainstorms with intensities exceeding >30 mm h−1 for at least one hour and originate primarily from the Active Red Sea Trough synoptic pattern. The observed late Holocene clustering of such debris flows during a regional drought indicates an increased influence of Active Red Sea Troughs resulting from a shift in synoptic atmospheric circulation patterns. This shift likely decreased the passages of eastern Mediterranean cyclones, leading to drier conditions, but favored rainstorms triggered by the Active Red Sea Trough. This is in accord with present-day meteorological data showing an increased frequency of torrential rainstorms in regions of drier climate. Hence, this study provides conclusive evidence for a shift in synoptic atmospheric circulation patterns during a late Holocene drought.


The COVID-19 pandemic is a global crisis that has put a local spotlight on sub-Saharan Africa's socio-economic challenges. This paper presents real time survey evidence on the labour market effects of COVID-19 in Senegal, Mali, and Burkina Faso. We investigate how informality exacerbates the immediate effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on job loss, decrease in earnings, and difficulties for individuals to support their basic needs. We document a reduction in economic activities and find that workers in the informal economy tend to be more hard-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. Informal workers are more likely to lose their jobs and tend to experience decrease in earnings. These findings also hold for those who work in high-risk sectors. Informal workers equally appear to be more likely to struggle to meet their basic needs in the midst of the pandemic. We discuss the policy implications of these findings.


Modeling a reliable electrical equivalent circuit to simulate the output I–V characteristics of organic solar PV (OPV) cells still prevails as a challenging task. This is because, estimating unknown parameters from the transcendental current equation determining the nonlinear OPV characteristics is extremely difficult. More importantly, predicting the parameters for dynamic changes in irradiation profile demands reliable optimization-based models. Therefore, this article proposes the application of adaptive wind-driven optimization (WDO) algorithm for a three-diode electrical equivalent model to estimate the OPV circuit parameters. Application of WDO algorithm has produced precise PV parameters to reproduce the exact I–V characteristics. In particular, the ability to replicate the kink effect in OPV characteristics is a noticeable improvement. Compared to its counterparts, various factors that enable WDO to enhance its compatibility towards nonlinear OPV modeling are: i) unique velocity update strategy via Coriolis and Gravitational forces, ii) excellent tradeoff between exploration and exploitation of control variables, iii) adaptive capability to maintain solutions within the search space even if the limits are breached, and iv) easiness in parameter tuning. For the validation, extensive testing has been conducted to reproduce the widely used characteristics of nav100 OPV cell at various operating conditions. Quantitatively, WDO method showcases excellent accuracy with an individual absolute error value in the order of 10−6 and convergence within the first 50 iterations itself, demonstrating its supremacy to solve OPV parameter identification problem.


In this study, phytochemical screening, antioxidant and antimicrobial activities of ethanolic (80%) extracts from leaf and stem of Pistacia lentiscus and Phyllanthus anderssonii and leaf of Cinnamomum verum and their fractions were evaluated. Antimicrobial activity was performed by disc diffusion method. The antioxidant activity was determined by stable 1, 1-diphenyl-2-picryl hydrazyl (DPPH) free radical method. Fractionation improved the antimicrobial activity of P. lentiscus and C. verum. The ethyl acetate fraction of P. lentiscus leaf showed higher activity against Bacillus subtilis (19 mm), Staphylococcus aureus (18 mm), Escherichia coli (20 mm), and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (22 mm) than that obtained from the crude ethanolic extract and the aqueous fraction displayed the highest activity against S. aureus (21 mm). Fractionation also improved the antimicrobial activity of the stem against B. subtilis (19 mm from ethyl acetate, butanol and aqueous fractions), P. aeruginosa (18 mm from ethyl acetate fraction) and Candida albicans (20 mm from ethyl acetate fraction). Although crude ethanolic leaf extract of C. verum did not show antifungal activity against Aspergillus niger, however, upon fractionation, the ethyl acetate and aqueous fractions displayed high antifungal activity (20 and 19 mm, respectively); it also improved its activity against C. albicans (21 mm) and B. subtilis (20 mm) from the ethyl acetate and aqueous fractions, respectively. Fractionation of P. anderssonii stem ameliorated only the antibacterial activity against S. aureus (20 mm) and E. coli (21 mm) where the aqueous fraction exhibited the highest activity. Results of antioxidant activity showed that leaf of P. lentiscus (95%) and stem of P. anderssonii (93%) displayed the highest DPPH scavenging activity. Fractionation improved mainly the antioxidant potentiality of C. verum leaf where the ethyl acetate (78%) showed the highest activity. The different polarities of solvents yielded different fractions with different chemical composition and thus displayed different levels of antimicrobial and antioxidant activity.

 Key words: Pistacia lentiscus, Phyllanthus anderssonii, Cinnamomum verum, antimicrobial activity, antioxidant activity.


This thesis describes the development of a knowledge-based system to evaluate forested land for availability of wildlife habitat. NED is an acronym derived from "Northeast Decision Model". The NED DSS, a collection of software products, was created to help resource managers to build up goals, access current and potential conditions, and create long-term, landscape-level management plans for forest properties in the eastern United States. An initial version of NED had been released, which achieved only part of the functions we hope eventually to capture in NED. Throughout this thesis, I will focus on the wildlife component of NED and its successors. I will describe the weakness of first version in four aspects: 1) intelligent module manager, 2) data management, 3) reporting utility, and 4) knowledge representation. Then, I will discuss how we implement solutions to these problems.


Background Poor self-rated health (SRH) is associated with increased mortality. However, most studies only adjust for few health risk factors and/or do not analyse whether this association is consistent also for intermediate categories of SRH and for follow-up periods exceeding 5–10 years. This study examined whether the SRH-mortality association remained significant 30 years after assessment when adjusting for a wide range of known clinical, behavioural and socio-demographic risk factors. Methods We followed-up 8,251 men and women aged ≥16 years who participated 1977–79 in a community based health study and were anonymously linked with the Swiss National Cohort (SNC) until the end of 2008. Covariates were measured at baseline and included education, marital status, smoking, medical history, medication, blood glucose and pressure. Results 92.8% of the original study participants could be linked to a census, mortality or emigration record of the SNC. Loss to follow-up 1980–2000 was 5.8%. Even after 30 years of follow-up and after adjustment for all covariates, the association between SRH and all-cause mortality remained strong and estimates almost linearly increased from "excellent" (reference: hazard ratio, HR 1) to "good" (men: HR 1.07 95% confidence interval 0.92–1.24, women: 1.22, 1.01–1.46) to "fair" (1.41, 1.18–1.68; 1.39, 1.14–1.70) to "poor"(1.61, 1.15–2.25; 1.49, 1.07–2.06) to "very poor" (2.85, 1.25–6.51; 1.30, 0.18–9.35). Persons answering the SRH question with "don't know" (1.87, 1.21–2.88; 1.26, 0.87–1.83) had also an increased mortality risk; this was pronounced in men and in the first years of follow-up. Conclusions SRH is a strong and "dose-dependent" predictor of mortality. The association was largely independent from covariates and remained significant after decades. This suggests that SRH provides relevant and sustained health information beyond classical risk factors or medical history and reflects salutogenetic rather than pathogenetic pathways.


The development of romantic relationships is a complex process by which previously autonomous individuals come to perceive themselves as a social unit. We propose that the transition from casual dating to serious involvement coincides with relational turbulence in courtship, and we identify relational uncertainty and interference from partners as mechanisms that may explain why this turmoil occurs. We test our model by examining people's appraisals of irritating circumstances as a marker of relational turbulence. We conducted a cross-sectional study in which individuals evaluated the degree of severity and relationship threat of potential irritations that had occurred recently in their dating relationship. Although the effect size was small, results consistent with our predictions indicated that negative appraisals were curvilinearly associated with intimacy. Also as anticipated, we documented positive associations between negative appraisals and both relational uncertainty and interference from partners. Contrary to our expectations, however, neither relational uncertainty nor interference from partners mediated the curvilinear trajectory between negative appraisals and intimacy. We discuss the implications of these findings for understanding relational turbulence in dating relationships.


Objectives: This study was done to establish the normal values of various haematological parameters for healthy adult of Western Rajasthan (males and females) and to compare these values with those obtained for other population in both India and tropical countries. Methods: This study was under taken in reference adult Western Rajasthan Population in the area of Jodhpur, India. A total 1000 healthy volunteers whose ages ranged between 20–50 years, were
investigated. All laboratory analysis was conducted under standardized conditions atL.N. Memorial Hospital & Research Centre, Jodhpur.Results:In Males, the mean Haemoglobin concentration (Hb) of 14.03 g/dl and Haematocrit (HCT) ratio of 44% were significantly higherthan femalevalue of 12.50 g/dl and 40% respectively. The mean Red Blood Cell (RBC)
countof 4.90 x 106/μL in males was also significantly higher than the corresponding value of 4.50 x 106/μL infemales (p<0.05). The value of Mean Corpuscular Volume (MCV) in males (88.12 fL) wassignificantly higher than in females (86.32 fL), (p<0.05). Similarly the Mean CorpuscularHaemoglobin (MCH) was significantly higher in males than corresponding values in females (p<0.05). Mean Corpuscular Haemoglobin Concentration (MCHC) was significantly higher in females than corresponding values in males (p<0.05). On the other hand,the mean White Blood Cell count (WBC) of 7.76x 103/μL in males was lower than mean value of7.95 x 103/μLin females (p<0.05). Similarly the values for Platelet count of 211 x 103/μL in males werealso significantly lower than corresponding values of 278 x 103/μL in females (p<0.05).
Conclusions: This study has established baseline values for haematological parameters in healthy Western Rajasthanadults and surrounding areas. The sex difference of measured levels of all of theseparameters has attained statistical significance. When the observed values of this study werecompared with those quoted for the methods in use and those drawn from different populations,significant differences were revealed. Such differences are of accurate clinical
interpretation ofhaematological investigation of patients.


Speech signals recorded in real environments may be corrupted by ambient noise and reverberation. Therefore, noise reduction and dereverberation algorithms for speech enhancement are typically employed in speech communication systems. Although microphone arrays are useful in reducing the effect of noise and reverberation, existing methods have limited success in significantly removing both reverberation and noise in real environments. This paper presents a method for noise reduction and dereverberation that overcomes some of the limitations of previous methods. The method uses a spherical microphone array to achieve plane-wave decomposition (PWD) of the sound field, based on direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation of the desired signal and its reflections. A multi-channel linearly-constrained minimum-variance (LCMV) filter is introduced to achieve further noise reduction. The PWD beamformer achieves dereverberation while the LCMV filter reduces the uncorrelated noise with a controllable dereverberation constraint. In contrast to other methods, the proposed method employs DOA estimation, rather than room impulse response identification, to achieve dereverberation, and relative transfer function (RTF) estimation between the source reflections to achieve noise reduction while avoiding signal cancellation. The paper includes a simulation investigation and an experimental study, comparing the proposed method to currently available methods.


Analysis of population evolutionary dynamics using realistic models is a challenging task requiring access to huge resources. Estimates for simple models of population growth under different mutation and selection conditions yield running times of CPU years. As mutations are stochastic events, experiments can be split into many separate jobs reducing to a large Monte Carlo-like problem that is embarrassingly parallel and thus maps perfectly on the Grid. We have been able to run simulations with realistic population sizes (up to 1.000.000 of individuals) and growth cycles using the Grid with a ~190x efficiency gain, thus reducing execution time from years to a few days. This speedup allows us to accelerate the simulation cycle and work on data analysis and additional model refinements with minimal delays and effort. We have taken measures at various steps in the process to study the efficiency gains obtained. While our simple approach may arguably be far from achieving optimum efficiency, we were able to achieve significant gains. We conclude analyzing Grid efficiency and discussing which benefits can be realistically expected with the current technology and provide useful advice for future Grid developers. All the tools described are available under GPL from http://ahriman.cnb.csic.es/sbg/tiki-download_file.php?fileId=16.