The realities associated with criminal enforcement depend only in part on the content and interpretation of criminal statutes. Instead such enforcement –– and ultimately, criminal justice –– is also powerfully shaped by regulatory rules, civil penalties, and the detection strategies that investigators and prosecutors use to learn about offenses. Together these components can interact to produce a distribution of punishments starkly disconnected from the justifications given for the enactment of criminal statutes. This article examines the fight against money laundering as a case study illustrating this dynamic. To launder money is to hide its illegal origin. The fight against money laundering is supposed to disrupt laundering in its various forms –– especially what is done by third party launderers and leaders of criminal organizations. In the process, the fight is supposed to interfere with the activities of people who finance and profit from crime. Yet this fight delivers less than what it promises. Like many other enforcement systems, the fight against money laundering involves three major components: statutes with criminal penalties charged by prosecutors, rules administered by regulators, and detection systems primarily run by investigators. A close analysis of its three components reveals the fight to have quite a limited scope, involving (1) the disproportionate imposition of severe penalties on predicate offenders who are easily detected; (2) lax and narrowly-focused regulatory authority; (3) limited capacity to detect a range of chargeable domestic and international offenses; and (4) global diffusion of a fight against money laundering that leaves implementing authorities plenty of room for discretion and lax enforcement. These limitations probably arise not because of blindness or bad intentions, but because the major players involved in running and funding the system –– including legislators, prosecutors, investigators, and regulators –– face a tangle of incentives that enable dilutions in the intensity and scope of enforcement against some targets and cut in favor of accepting de facto enhancements in the sanctions faced by other targets. While there is some evidence that suspicious activity reporting may help identify the placement of illicit drug proceeds in banks, the system as a whole seems ill-suited to detecting and disrupting the larger universe of criminal financial activity that is so often vilified by the rhetoric justifying the fight against money laundering. All of this makes it hard to detect and target systems of terrorist financing, for example, using the anti-laundering system –– even as it remains easy to freeze assets allegedly linked to terrorism. Some changes in the system, such as enhancing audit trails and strengthening suspicious activity analysis, could be defended in the name of making the system work, though pressures affecting implementation would make their ultimate consequences hard to predict. In the meantime, any inequities in the detection of predicate crimes seem likely to continue being reproduced in money laundering prosecutions, and the system's most compelling objectives –– detecting crimes in a new way, and targeting third-party launderers and leaders of criminal networks –– seem mostly beside the point.


The effect of chronic ethanol feeding was determined on parameters of hepatic collagen metabolism in the monkey. Four monkeys of the species Macaca radiata received a nutritionally adequate diet containing 50% of the calories as ethanol, while four others were pair‐fed a diet in which ethanol was isocalorically substituted by carbohydrate. Liver biopsies were obtained at 3, 12, and 24 months, and the animals were killed between 40 and 48 months after initiation of the diets. The ethanol‐fed animals developed various degrees of fatty infiltration, but no necrosis, inflammation, or fibrosis. The amount and distribution of collagen Types I, III, and IV demonstrated by immuno‐histochemical techniques was not altered after ethanol feeding. No changes were found in hepatic protein‐bound hydroxyproline or in collagen prolyl hydroxylase activity at the various time intervals. Liver free proline and the incorporation of labeled proline into protein‐bound hydroxyproline by liver slices were not altered after 40 to 48 months of ethanol feeding. This study shows that prolonged feeding of ethanol together with an adequate diet results in fatty infiltration but not deposition or alteration of hepatic collagen metabolism.


The computerized tomography picture of anophthalmia syndrome permits an accurate calculation of the orbit volume in this syndrome. These data are valuable for prosthesis. Computerized tomography helps objectively estimate the quality and position of the stump and implant after enucleation, fixation of the rectus muscles, relations between the prosthesis and the stump. Computerized tomography is a highly informative method for examinations in anophthalmia syndrome.


A genetic analysis of samples from the Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) Prohibited Species Catch (bycatch) of the 2016 Gulf of Alaska (GOA) trawl fisheries for walleye pollock (Gadus chalcogrammus) and rockfish (Sebastes spp.), was undertaken to determine the stock composition of the sample sets. Samples were genotyped for 43 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) DNA markers and results were estimated using the Alaska Department of Fish and Game SNP baseline. In 2016, genetic samples were collected from Chinook salmon taken in the bycatch of the GOA pollock trawl fisheries using a simple random sample protocol with trip being the primary unit. This was the third year for this sampling protocol and which resulted in the largest available genetic sample set to date with 24% of the estimated salmon bycatch from the pollock fishery successfully genotyped. Based on analysis of 4,962 Chinook salmon bycatch samples, British Columbia (42%), West Coast US (40%), and Coastal Southeast Alaska (15%) comprised the largest stock groups, at an estimated 8,602, 8,301, and 3,080 Chinook salmon, respectively, out of 20,589 fish total. In 2016, genetic samples from the bycatch of the GOA rockfish CV fishery were collected by the fishing industry using a census sampling protocol. Based on the genotyping of 493 Chinook salmon bycatch samples collected from this fishery in NMFS Statistical Areas 620 and 630, West Coast US stocks represented the largest stock group (62%) with smaller contributions from British Columbia (27%), Coastal Southeast Alaska (7%), and Northwest GOA (4%) stock groups.


ABSTRACT Roseiflexus sp. strains were cultivated from a microbial mat of an alkaline siliceous hot spring in Yellowstone National Park. These strains are closely related to predominant filamentous anoxygenic phototrophs found in the mat, as judged by the similarity of small-subunit rRNA, lipid distributions, and genomic and metagenomic sequences. Like a Japanese isolate, R. castenholzii, the Yellowstone isolates contain bacteriochlorophyll a, but not bacteriochlorophyll c or chlorosomes, and grow photoheterotrophically or chemoheterotrophically under dark aerobic conditions. The genome of one isolate, Roseiflexus sp. strain RS1, contains genes necessary to support these metabolisms. This genome also contains genes encoding the 3-hydroxypropionate pathway for CO2 fixation and a hydrogenase, which might enable photoautotrophic metabolism, even though neither isolate could be grown photoautotrophically with H2 or H2S as a possible electron donor. The isolates exhibit temperature, pH, and sulfide preferences typical of their habitat. Lipids produced by these isolates matched much better with mat lipids than do lipids produced by R. castenholzii or Chloroflexus isolates.


There is a considerable amount of information about the normal structure of the trabecular meshwork.* However, little is known about its pathological reactions.2,12,39,40This paper is an attempt to study the morphological behavior of chamber angle tissue under 3 different conditions: (1) after perfusion of the anterior chamber with various solutions; (2) after autologous implantation into the anterior chamber, and (3) after experimentally elevated intraocular pressure. Material and Methods Because of great differences in the structure of the trabecular meshwork between primates and other mammals described previously,37,41human and monkey eyes only were used in this study. A total of 28 eye-bank eyes and 43 freshly enucleated monkey eyes (Macaca mulatta and Cercopithecus aethiops) were studied. 1. Perfusion Experiments. —Eighteen monkey and 28 autopsy eyes were perfused with a polyethylene tube fixed to a hypodermic needle. It was thrust through the anterior chamber so that a double perforation


Nanotechnology is an emerging technology that has the potential to improve community resilience. Improving resilience begins in the pre-disaster phase of the disaster management cycle. This phase is located between disaster events and is where mitigation and prevention activities occur. A brief survey was conducted of relevant literature to identify the role that nanotechnology could potentially fill in disaster preparedness. Three primary uses for nanotechnology to build community resilience that stand out as the most practical and eminent are in the areas of building materials, sensors, and medicine. Applications of nanotechnology to building materials include the development of concrete that is stronger and would require less steel-reinforcement, thus making safer buildings, dams, and bridges. In regards to sensors, nanotechnology could be used to develop detection systems that could sense trace amounts of chemical and biological agents before they reached lethal concentrations and could lead to earlier evacuations of residents. Medical applications of nanotechnology include improvements in rapid diagnostics and vaccines that would improve public health decision-making and reduce the spread of disease. Stronger infrastructure, early warning, and better medical response have the potential to significantly reduce injuries, illness, and deaths. The integration of nanotechnology into the disaster management cycle, particularly in the pre-disaster phase, could revolutionize how disasters are managed and how community resilience can be strengthened.


The academic achievement of students has been a focus of social research for decades. Yet little attention has been paid to social capital and its importance as a university context factor for academic success. We examine whether social capital has effects on students' academic achievement. The population of this study consisted of all senior agricultural students of Razi University at Iran (N=257), that 154 of them were selected as the sample using the proportionate stratified sampling method. The main instrument in this study was a questionnaire which its validity was confirmed by a panel of experts and its reliability was established by Cronbach's Alpha coefficient (α>0.70). Data was analyzed by SPSS Win22 and LISREL 8.80 software in two phases of descriptive and inferential statistics. Results of structural equation modeling indicated that social capital was the main predictor of agricultural students' academic achievement. Findings of this study can have practical implications concerning agricultural students' academic achievement for higher agricultural education mangers, planners and educators.


The rapid digitalization across industries comes with many challenges. One key problem is how the ever-growing and volatile data generated at distributed locations can be efficiently processed to inform decision making and improve products. Unfortunately, wide-area network capacity cannot cope with the growth of the data at the network edges. Thus, it is imperative to decide which data should be processed in-situ at the edge and which should be transferred and analyzed in data centers. In this paper, we study two families of proactive online data replication strategies, namely ski-rental and machine learning algorithms, to decide which data is processed at the edge, close to where it is generated, and which is transferred to a data center. Our analysis using real query traces from a Global 2000 company shows that such online replication strategies can significantly reduce data transfer volume in many cases up to 50% compared to naive approaches and achieve close to optimal performance. After analyzing their shortcomings for ease of use and performance, we propose a hybrid strategy that combines the advantages of both competitive and machine learning algorithms.


OBJECTIVE
To examine differences in employment outcomes among Hispanics and Caucasians with Spinal Cord Injuries at one year post-injury.

DESIGN
Retrospective study.

SETTING
Longitudinal dataset of the SCI Model Systems.

PARTICIPANTS
11,424 Individuals diagnosed with spinal cord injury (1369 Hispanics and 10055 Caucasians) that were enrolled in the National Spinal Cord Injury Statistical Center (NSCISC) database and interviewed during their scheduled one-year post-injury follow-up evaluation between 1975 and 2006.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Employment status (competitively employed, unemployed and other).

RESULTS
After adjusting for age, gender, marital status, education level, employment status at admissions, cause of injury, category of neuro-impairment, and ASIA impairment scale, race/ethnicity has a significant effect on employment status at 1 year post-injury. Specifically, the odds of unemployment versus employment were 1.864 times greater for Hispanics than for Caucasians (95% CI = 1.478, 2.349) and the odds of unemployment versus other were 1.980 times greater for Hispanics than for Caucasians (95% CI = 1.625, 2.413).

CONCLUSIONS
Racial disparities do exist in successful employment after 1 year post SCI, particularly between Caucasians and Hispanics. Future research should focus on what factors contribute to this disparity, along with forming new education and rehabilitation strategies to improve return-to-work outcomes for Hispanics after SCI.


Mast cells are connective tissue cells, present in all vertebrates and characterized by the metachromatic stain of their granules. Nowadays mast cells have been recognized as a potent cellular source of multiple cytokines, suggesting an important role in Immunoregulation and host defense. These cells have been described as preferentially located around blood vessels but more recently close spatial relationship between mast cells and nerves has been reported mostly in mammalian species. The microanatomy of nerve tissue and associated mast cells in the toad Bufo marinus tongue have been studied here by means of high resolution light microscopy. Mast cell population was identified by the metachromatic staining of their cytoplasm granules in Epon embedded semithin sections counterstained with Toluidine Blue and Azure A. Numerous mast cells were observed scattered throughout the submucosal region, adjacent and/or within of nerve bundles and nerve ganglia, near skeletal muscle fibers and adjacent of blood vessels. Additionally, mast cells adjacent to single but conspicuous myelinated nerve fibers were seen under endothelia of lymphatic vessels wall and this is apparently a unreported event. Results suggest nerve-mast cell associations are functionally important in the toad tongue.


With the advantages of low cost, low power consumption, high reliability and potential for large scale integration, CMOS monolithically integrated active pixel chips have significant application in optical sensing systems. The optical front end presented in this thesis will have application in Optical Scanning Acoustic Microscope System (O-SAM), which involves a totally non-contact method of acquiring images of the interaction between surface acoustic waves (SAWs) and a solid material to be characterized.

In this work, an ultra fast optical front-end using improved regulated cascade scheme is developed based on AMS 0.35mm CMOS technology. The receiver consists of an integrated photodiode, a transimpedance amplifier, a mixer, an IF amplifier and an output buffer. By treating the n-well in standard CMOS technology as a screening terminal to block the slow photo-generated bulk carriers and interdigitizing shallow p+ junctions as the active region, the integrated photodiode operates up to 4.9 GHz with no process modification. Its responsivity was measured to be 0.016 A/W. With multi-inductive-series peaking technique, the improved ReGulated-Cascade (RGC) transimpedance amplifier achieves an experimentally measured -3dB bandwidth of more than 6 GHz and a transimpedance gain of 51 dBW, which is the fastest reported TIA in CMOS 0.35mm technology. The 5 GHz Gilbert cell mixer produces a conversion gain of 11 dB, which greatly minimized the noise contribution from the IF stage. The noise figure and input IIP3 of the mixer were measured to be 15.7 dB and 1.5 dBm, respectively. The IF amplifier and output buffer pick up and further amplify the signal for post processing. The optical front end demonstrates a typical equivalent input noise current of 35 pA=pHz at 5 GHz, and a total transimpedance gain of 83 dB ohm whileconsuming a total current of 40 mA from 3.3 V power supply. The -3 dB bandwidth for the optical front end was measured to be 4.9 GHz. All the prototype chips, including the optical front end, and the individual circuits including the photodiode, TIA, mixer were probe-tested and all the measurements were taken with Anritsu VNA 37397D and Anritsu spectrum analyser MS2721A.


Digital technologies are being used as part of international efforts to revolutionize healthcare in order to meet increasing demands such as the rising burden of chronic disease and ageing populations. In Scotland there is a government push towards a national service (Living It Up) as a single point of reference where citizens can access information, products and services to support their health and wellbeing. The aim of the study is to examine implementation issues including the challenges or facilitators which can help to sustain this intervention. We gathered data in three ways: a) participant observation to gain an understanding of LiU (N=16); b) in-depth interviews (N=21) with stakeholders involved in the process; and c) analysis of documentary evidence about the progress of the implementation (N=45). Barriers included the need to "work at risk" due to delays in financing, inadequate infrastructure and skill-set deficiencies, whilst facilitators included trusted relationships, champions and a push towards normalisation. The findings suggest that a Scottish ehealth service is achievable but identifies key considerations for future large scale initiatives.


Abstract. The Wikipedia database is a data source of immense richness and variety. Included in this database are thousands of geotagged articles, including, for example, almost real-time updates on current and historic natural hazards. This includes usercontributed information about the location of natural hazards, the extent of the disasters, and many details relating to response, impact, and recovery. In this research, a computational framework is proposed to detect spatial patterns of natural hazards from the Wikipedia database by combining topic modeling methods with spatial analysis techniques. The computation is performed on the Neon Cluster, a high performance-computing cluster at the University of Iowa. This work uses wildfires as the exemplar hazard, but this framework is easily generalizable to other types of hazards, such as hurricanes or flooding. Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) modeling is first employed to train the entire English Wikipedia dump, transforming the database dump into a 500-dimension topic model. Over 230,000 geo-tagged articles are then extracted from the Wikipedia database, spatially covering the contiguous United States. The geo-tagged articles are converted into an LDA topic space based on the topic model, with each article being represented as a weighted multidimension topic vector. By treating each article's topic vector as an observed point in geographic space, a probability surface is calculated for each of the topics. In this work, Wikipedia articles about wildfires are extracted from the Wikipedia database, forming a wildfire corpus and creating a basis for the topic vector analysis. The spatial distribution of wildfire outbreaks in the US is estimated by calculating the weighted sum of the topic probability surfaces using a map algebra approach, and mapped using GIS. To provide an evaluation of the approach, the estimation is compared to wildfire hazard potential maps created by the USDA Forest service.


One of the most influential arguments in contemporary philosophy and cognitive science is Chomsky's argument from the poverty of the stimulus. In this response to an essay by Chandra Sripada, I defend an analogous argument from the poverty of the moral stimulus. I argue that Sripada's criticism of moral nativism appears to rest on the mistaken assumption that the learning target in moral cognition consists of a series of simple imperatives, such as "share your toys" or "don't hit other children." In fact, the available evidence suggests that the moral competence of adults and even young children is considerably more complex and exhibits many characteristics of a well-developed legal code, including abstract theories of crime, tort, contract, and agency. Since the emergence of this knowledge cannot be explained by appeals to explicit instruction, or to any known processes of imitation, internalization, socialization and the like, there are grounds for concluding it may be innate. Simply put, to explain the development of intuitive jurisprudence in each individual, we must attribute unconscious knowledge and complex mental operations to her that go well beyond anything she has been taught.


The current acid-catalyzed conversion of biomass feedstocks yields substantial quantities of undesired by-products called humins, for which applications are yet to be found. This work aims to provide a starting point for valorisation of humins via preparation of humin-based iron oxide catalytic nanocomposites from humins and thermally treated humins (foams) via solvent-free methodologies including ball milling and thermal degradation. The prepared materials were found to be active in the microwave-assisted selective oxidation of isoeugenol (conversions >87%) to vanillin, proving the feasibility to use humin by-products as template/composite materials.


Abstract. This study deals with the problem of turbulence measurement with small remotely piloted aircraft (RPA). It shows how multi-hole probes (MHPs) can be used to measure fluctuating parts of the airflow in flight up to 20 Hz. Accurate measurement of the transient wind in the outdoor environment is needed for the estimation of the 3-D wind vector as well as turbulent fluxes of heat, momentum, water vapour, etc. In comparison to an established MHP system, experiments were done to show how developments of the system setup can improve data quality. The study includes a re-evaluation of the pneumatic tubing setup, the conversion from pressures to airspeed, the pressure transducers, and the data acquisition system. In each of these fields, the steps that were taken lead to significant improvements. A spectral analysis of airspeed data obtained in flight tests shows the capability of the system to measure atmospheric turbulence up to the desired frequency range.


An acute respiratory disease caused by a new coronavirus (Severe acute respirotary syndrome-coronavirus-2, previously known as 2019-nCoV), coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), appeared in December 2019 and then has spread rapidly throughout the world starting from China, Japan and South Korea As of January 30, 2020, the World Health Organization has officially declared the COVID-19 outbreak Considering the clinical symptoms of COVID-19, it has many symptoms such as high fever, cough, and fatigue It is reported that this disease is very severe and causes serious consequences such as cytokine storm and acute respiratory distress syndrome in the elderly and those with chronic diseases Currently, scientists are trying to find a specific antiviral treatment strategy Various medications such as hydroxychloroquine, lopinavir/ritonavir, ribavirin, remdesivir and favipiravir are currently being applied in clinical trials to test their efficacy and safety worldwide in COVID-19 treatment, and some promising results have been achieved so far In this review, agents with potential efficacy against COVID-19 are presented in summary


Pythium root rot caused by Pythium aphanidermatum is one of the most important diseases of greenhouse tomatoes. Hydroponic culture exacerbates the problem. Both nutrient film technique (NFT) and recirculating growing systems pose a challenge in the control of this disease, because the pathogen, especially the zoospores, can spread easily in the recirculating solution to the whole growing system. Fortunately, hydroponically grown plants are easier to manipulate than soil grown plants, proper manipulation of root environments can lead to excellent disease control. This paper reports the development of an effective integrated control measure for pythium root rot of tomato by integrating pH, bioagent, and ultra-violet irradiation in a specific manner. This integrated control consists of three operations: a) before transplanting, the UV system is connected to sterilize the recirculating solution using 100 mJcm-2; b) after transplanting, the nutrient solution is delivered at pH 5.0 regime for five weeks followed by adjusting pH to 5.8 to 6.2 regime for one week; and c) bacterial bioagent, such as Pseudomonas is introduced into the root zone at 100 mL per plant at 10(8) bacteria mL-1 or added to the nutrient solution to arrive at 10(6) bacteria mL-1 in the solution. This report also discusses the advantages and limitations of this measure in the control of pythium root rot.


Responsiveness and accountability constitute the process of democratic representation, reinforcing each other. Responsiveness asks elected representatives to adopt policies ex ante preferred by citizens, while accountability consists in the people's ex post sanctioning of the representatives based on the policy outcomes. However, the regulatory literature tends to interpret responsiveness narrowly between a regulator and regulatees: the regulator is responsive to regulatees' compliance without considering broader public needs and preferences. Democratic regulatory responsiveness requires that the regulator should be responsive to the people, not just regulatees. We address this theoretical gap by pointing out the perils of regulatory capture and advancing John Braithwaite's idea of tripartism as a remedy. We draw out two conditions of democratic regulatory responsiveness from Philip Selznick — comprehensiveness and proactiveness. Then we propose overlapping networked responsiveness based on indirect reciprocity among various stakeholders. This mechanism is the key to connecting regulatory responsiveness with accountability.


Punta Guanos, at the Northern coast of Matanzas province, 90 km East from Havana, Capital of Cuba, shows a particular karst and cave development in carbonate Upper Miocene-Quaternary rocks. This coastal landscape has been controlled by the combined effects of the neotectonic activity of a Cretaceous-Paleogene fault system dominantly oriented 120o that became active again during Quaternary times and others more recent clearly of Plio-Quaternary age as well as by the sea level fluctuations during glacial times. Three main features are the product of these combined effects: a) Abandoned phreatic passages above present sea level; b) Elevated abrasive (marine) caves and c) Submarine springs. Neotectonics is still active. The effect of the present rise of sea level due to Climate Change introduces important restrictions to the environmental management of an ecotone and vulnerable coastal zone that has to combine oil and gas exploration & production, beach and sun tourism, water supply to small communities and the preservation of a protected area with strict floral endemic species.


This paper studies the distributed H∞ control problem of identical linear time invariant multi-agent systems subject to external disturbances. A directed graph containing a spanning tree is used to model the communication topology. Based on the relative states of the neighbor agents and a subset of absolute states of the agents, distributed static H∞ controllers are proposed. The concept of an H∞ performance region is extended to the directed graph situation. Then the results are used to solve the leader–follower H∞ consensus problem. Sufficient conditions are proposed based on bounded real lemma and algebraic graph theory. The effectiveness of the theoretical results is illustrated via numerical simulations.


This paper describes a multi-scale thermal analysis approach for the design of an air-cooled 1.7-kV SiC MOSFET-based medium-voltage variable-speed motor drive. The scope of the models and required efficient and flexible thermal models to be developed. Two modeling techniques are described that significantly reduced model run time and enabled more complex models to be run faster while retaining needed accuracy. The first technique uses the effectiveness-NTU method to extract convection boundary conditions from a CFD model that can be applied to a fast-running FEA model. The second is a porous media technique that enables system-level CFD simulations that incorporate effects from heat exchangers (e.g., pin fin heat sinks) that run in a fraction of the time required for fully resolved CFD simulations. The multi-scale approach to the thermal analysis enabled fast and accurate simulation for the converter design ranging from the die level up to the full system with 36 submodules. The modeling results were validated against experimental data from system tests performed by OSU.


Two series of polyimides containing oxadiazole rings in the main chain were studied and compared with regard to their thermal properties and the ability to form thin films. The polyimides are based on aromatic diamines containing preformed oxadiazole ring which reacted with benzohenonetetracarboxylic dianhydride or with hexafluoroisopropylidene diphthalic dianhydride. The behavior of thin films in dynamomechanical analysis and their photoluminescence have been investigated.


In many egg‐laying species, females avoid ovipositing at sites where the predation risk is high. Previous studies have mainly focused on the risk for offspring. The effect of predation risk for the females has been considered in some taxa in which parents spend much time at an oviposition site for parental care or mating (e.g., birds, amphibians). In species in which females do not perform activities other than oviposition at sites, the effect of predation risk for females on oviposition site selection has been rarely investigated. We examined whether the predation risk for ovipositing females affects the decision on oviposition in the water strider Aquarius paludum insularis (Motschulsky) (Heteroptera: Gerridae). Adult A. paludum are preyed upon by a backswimmer, Notonecta triguttata (Motschulsky) (Heteroptera: Notonectidae), but N. triguttata does not prey upon eggs or early instars of A. paludum. We allowed female A. paludum to oviposit under one of three conditions: in presence of N. triguttata, in presence of its chemicals, and in absence of the predator or its cues (control). Female A. paludum less frequently oviposited in presence of N. triguttata than in its absence. Oviposition frequency did not differ between females in presence of chemicals of N. triguttata vs. those in the control. Female A. paludum recognized the predation risk upon themselves from the presence of N. triguttata and avoided ovipositing. This study is the first to directly show that the predation risk upon ovipositing females changes oviposition site selection in species in which the time spent at an oviposition site is short.


In this research, applications of different TiO2 electrode structures on Dye-Sensitized Solar Cell were investigated. The different TiO2 electrode structures include: (1) synthesis of TiO2 nano-particles and TiO2 film electrode by sol-gel and spin-coating method; (2) fabrication of the TiO2 film electrode by RF Sputtering; (3) fabrication of the rod TiO2 electrode by photo lithography. X-ray diffraction patterns show that the best sintering temperature of nano-TiO2 thin film is 500oC, at which TiO2 anatase phase forms best and the smallest particle-size (8-10 nm) can be obtained. Ultraviolet-visible absorption spectra reveal that the rod TiO2 electrode with TCPP sensitizer adsorbed on has the best optical absorption from 400 nm to 700 nm. The results of current-voltage analyses reveal that the solar cell with rod TiO2 electrode has higher conversion efficiency than the others. This result also provides clear evidence for the contact area between TiO2 electrode and TCPP sensitizer plays an important role on the efficiency of dye-sensitized solar cell.


The design and evaluation of a compact C-band orthomode transducer for dual polarisation satellite communications is presented, covering the bands 3.7-4.2 GHz and 5.925-6.425 GHz (54% of fractional bandwidth separation). Over such a broadband, the main difficulty is to obtain a compact structure able to fulfil the stringent satellite specifications with minimum longitudinal length. The proposed configuration, validated with a tested prototype, also reduces the number of connections and parts in the fabrication, decreasing the passive intermodulation risk and the mass and volume.


The lightning surges being considered the most dangerous events in power distribution systems, knowledge of the same allows to obtain a better selection and coordination of protection devices. Moreover, a better knowledge of lightning surges permits to optimize the location of device protection, to reduce the insulation costs of the installations, and to operate with risks of failure that are well known. The development of a computer application allowing determination of the optimal position of the surge arrester in power systems minimizes the risk of failure, thus permitting the selection of appropriate protection schemes for each network. As a consequence, protection costs are being reduced in accordance with the costs of the elements actually protected and the continuity of service to be achieved.


The cytopathology of 47 cases of metastatic carcinoma of the lung and of 28 cases of recurrent or metastatic bronchogenic carcinoma is reviewed. The diagnostic yield was better for recurrent than for metastatic carcinoma but overall was comparable to that of primary bronchogenic carcinomas. The metastatic tumors were located in all areas of the lung and included single as well as multiple lesions. The positive yield did not differ significantly in relation to any of the pathologic features but was somewhat higher if the metastases were large and centrally located. A definite differentiation of the metastatic tumors, usually adenocarcinomas, from new primary bronchogenic carcinomas is often possible particularly if the cytopathology can be compared with that of the primary lesion. Specific cytologic features include the relative lack of cohesion and the formation of columns in metastatic breast carcinomas, the formation of larger cohesive well circumscribed nodules composed of tall columnar cells in metastatic colon carcinomas, clear cell features in some metastatic adenocarcinomas of the kidney, and the small cell size and uniform, regular nuclear features in the often cytologically well differentiated metastatic carcinomas of the prostate.


Background Benign esophageal anastomotic strictures often require repeat dilation to relieve dysphagia. Little is known about the factors that affect their remediation. The purpose of this article was to retrospectively evaluate the long-term clinical results of endoscopic dilation in the treatment of benign anastomotic strictures after esophagectomy, and to identify factors associated with stricture recurrence. Methods A single-center retrospective analysis (using electronic records) was performed on patients who underwent endoscopic dilation for esophageal anastomotic strictures. Long-term clinical effectiveness, including technical and clinical success, and complication rate were assessed. Factors independently related to recurrence were evaluated. Results Between January 2014 and December 2017, a total of 35 patients who had benign anastomotic strictures after esophagectomy underwent 182 endoscopic dilation procedures. Technical success was 100%. Thirty-two patients (91%) had initial relief of dysphagia. The clinical success, defined as resolution of dysphagia and achieving luminal patency of 13 mm or more, was achieved in 24 patients (69%). Strictures recurred in 43% of patients, and refractory strictures were identified in 10/35 (29%). Proximal anastomosis and the presence of anastomotic foreign bodies were found to be risk factors for refractory strictures. The complication rate was low (4%) and adverse events were mild. No major complications (perforations, severe bleeding) or treatment-related deaths occurred in this series. Conclusions Endoscopic dilation has a high technical and a good clinical success rate. However, anastomotic strictures are often refractory and frequently recur.


Reports indicate increasing economic inequality in Nepal during the era
 of parliamentary democracy begun in 1990. The extent and the mechanisms by which this increase
 has occurred are not fully understood, however. Using micro level survey data on consumption
 expenditures, incomes, and wealth, this paper finds large and slightly increasing economic
 inequality between 1996 and 2004. Income from house rental, employment, businesses, and
 remittances as well as the stock of wealth in real estate and housing and businesses are the
 leading sources of inequality. Horizontal and vertical inequalities have increased along the
 caste/ethnic and spatial lines, providing a strong impetus to the ongoing political instability
 in the country. These dimensions of inequality have important social, political, and policy
 implications in the country.


We extend the classical approach in supervised classification based on the local likelihood estimation to the functional covariates case. The estimation procedure of the functional parameter (slope parameter) in the linear model when the covariate is of functional kind is investigated. We show, on simulated as well on real data, that classification error rates estimated using test samples, and the estimation procedure by local likelihood seem to lead to better estimators than the classical kernel estimation. In addition, this approach is no longer assuming that the linear predictors have a specific parametric form. However, this approach also has two drawbacks. Indeed, it was more expensive and slower than the kernel regression. Thus, as mentioned earlier, kernels other than the Gaussian kernel can lead to a divergence of the Newton-Raphson algorithm. In contrast, using a Gaussian kernel, 4 to 6 iterations are then sufficient to achieve convergence.


The hfr and autostructure atomic structure codes are used to compute complete data sets of level energies, wavelengths, A-values, and radiative and Auger widths for K-vacancy states of the Ne, Mg, Si, S, Ar, and Ca isonuclear sequences. Ions with electron number N > 9 are treated for the first time. Detailed comparisons with previous measurements and theoretical data for ions with N ≤ 9 are carried out in order to estimate reliable accuracy ratings.


Abstract Background: Aged horses make up an important portion of the equine industry in Australia but have not been the subjects of detailed research. Issues relating to aged horse health, management and welfare are still largely unknown. Horses live up to 40 years, but many are retired before reaching twenty years of age thus making a large discrepancy between productive verses unproductive life. Based principally on reviews of veterinary hospital records, there has been a reported increased occurrence and severity of a range of diseases in aged horses. The increased prevalence of disease, potential for reduced perceived value and lack of regular riding may contribute to reduction in the type and quality of management practices utilised in this population resulting in compromised welfare of aged horses. Aims: By way of an owner-based survey, the first aim was to examine the demographics of aged horses, their management, the prevalence of clinical signs of disease and owner reported health or welfare issues. Using a detailed veterinary clinical examination and appropriate laboratory tests, the second aim was to investigate the prevalence and risk factors of more common health disorders, prevention or management of these disorders and how diseases or other factors affect survival. Further, this study aimed to determine owners' opinions relating to euthanasia of aged horses and to correlate these opinions with the personalities of the owners themselves. Methods: Owners of horses aged 15 years and older were contacted via equestrian organisations in Queensland, Australia and asked to complete a questionnaire on key information about the horse (e.g. age, breed, sex, and colour), use, management strategies, use of equine health care providers, clinical signs that the horse may be demonstrating, known diseases that the horse may have experienced or be experiencing, and identify any health or welfare issues they believed were important for horses aged 15 years or greater. From this population, a subsample was selected with these horses subjected to a thorough clinical examination, dental and ocular examination and blood tests for routine haematology, serum biochemistry, ACTH, α-MSH and insulin concentrations. Owners of the subsample of horses were asked to complete a questionnaire on their opinions of euthanasia of aged horses as well as complete a self assessment personality test. One to four years after the original survey, owners were contacted to gather additional information about the horses' survival/death and if death had occurred the events and causes related to it. Analysis: Data was managed in Microsoft Access and Excel. Descriptive, univariate and multivariate analyses were performed using SPSS, Minitab and Stata. Univariable and multivariable regression modelling and survival analysis were performed where appropriate. Results: Horses aged 15 years or greater in Queensland represented ⅓rd of the total horses owned in the population. The median age of the horses was 20.7 years (IQ range 17-23, min 15, max 44). Owners were able to identify many clinical signs exhibited by their horses, with 83% of horses having at least one reported clinical sign of disease. But, many signs had apparently been overlooked, with only 35.2% of horses reported by the owners to have a known disease or disorder. Further, there was a large disparity between the prevalence of disease by owner reports compared to veterinary examination. For example, owner reported dental disease was 0.5% while moderate to severe dental disease occurred in 46% horses examined. Univariable and multivariable analysis identified many associations between disease and horse factors, management factors and clinical signs, with many diseases significantly related to increasing age. There was considerable variation in the level of owner reported professional and other health care strategies. In the preceding 12 months, 90% had received hoof care, 67% had received dental care, and 50% were vaccinated, while only 39% had received veterinary care. Despite this owners expressed concern about the health and welfare of their horses. The majority of owners, 91.6% (491/536), responded with at least one reply to a question about which they thought were the most important health issues in aged horses. Owners were most concerned about weight loss (maintaining the horse's condition), arthritis/lameness and teeth and dental care. The major influences on the decision to euthanase involved animal welfare and quality of life and owners were cognizant and concerned about these factors relative to their horses. Of the 766 horses that were followed for survival, 13.2% had died. The median survival time was 777days. Age, breed of horse, region of residence, diagnosis of equine Cushing's syndrome, being owned by Riding for the Disabled and reported history of difficulty eating were all significantly associated with decreased survival. Conclusions: This is the first major population study of aged horses in Australia. The aged horse population is a large sub population of the Australian horse population. This study has highlighted many aged related diseases and their specific risk factors. Owners demonstrated concern for the health and welfare of aged horses, but a lack of appropriate identification of many diseases by owners and limited veterinary care suggest a need for increased client communication and veterinarian-client interaction.


Internet has played a vital role in this modern world, the
possibilities and opportunities offered are limitless. Despite all
the hype, Internet services are liable to intrusion attack that
could tamper the confidentiality and integrity of important
information. An attack started with gathering the information
of the attack target, this gathering of information activity can
be done as either fast or slow attack. The defensive measure
network administrator can take to overcome this liability is by
introducing Intrusion Detection Systems (IDSs) in their
network. IDS have the capabilities to analyze the network
traffic and recognize incoming and on-going intrusion.
Unfortunately the combination of both modules in real time
network traffic slowed down the detection process. In real time
network, early detection of fast attack can prevent any further
attack and reduce the unauthorized access on the targeted
machine. The suitable set of feature selection and the correct
threshold value, add an extra advantage for IDS to detect
anomalies in the network. Therefore this paper discusses a new
technique for selecting static threshold value from a minimum
standard features in detecting fast attack from the victim
perspective. In order to increase the confidence of the
threshold value the result is verified using Statistical Process
Control (SPC). The implementation of this approach shows
that the threshold selected is suitable for identifying the fast
attack in real time


This paper investigates the problem of robust H∞ fault-tolerant control for a class of uncertain nonlinear networked control system (NCSs) with external disturbance. A T-S fuzzy model is employed to represent the nonlinear controlled plant in the NCSs. Both networked-induced delay and packet dropout in transmission are addressed. By using Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional, introducing some slack matrices, the less conservative robust H∞ integrity design for NCSs against failures of actuator and sensor is analyzed based on a delay-dependent approach, and the robust H∞ fault-tolerant controller gain can be obtained via solving several linear matrix inequalities (LMIs). Finally, an example is used to illustrate the effectiveness and the feasibility of the proposed approach.


We propose a pointwise inference algorithm for high-dimensional linear models with time-varying coefficients. The method is based on a novel combination of the nonparametric kernel smoothing technique and a Lasso bias-corrected ridge regression estimator. Due to the non-stationarity feature of the model, dynamic bias-variance decomposition of the estimator is obtained. With a bias-correction procedure, the local null distribution of the estimator of the time-varying coefficient vector is characterized for iid Gaussian and heavy-tailed errors. The limiting null distribution is also established for Gaussian process errors, and we show that the asymptotic properties differ between short-range and long-range dependent errors. Here, p-values are adjusted by a Bonferroni-type correction procedure to control the familywise error rate (FWER) in the asymptotic sense at each time point. The finite sample size performance of the proposed inference algorithm is illustrated with synthetic data and an application to learn brain connectivity by using the resting-state fMRI data for Parkinson's disease.


In this article, the authors provide empirical evidence concerning real returns for stocks and bonds in order to consider their impact on spending rules for large portfolios. Their analysis of the data supports the argument that 5% (or higher) real returns are not sustainable in the long run. Therefore, an endowment fund that is invested in equities, spends 5% a year, and earns the real return on stocks will, in all likelihood, see its market value decline below the beginning value at some point, absent new contributions. The actual record, shown in the article from probability standpoint, could lead institutional investors in particular to reformulate their expectations about real returns, and may also influence individual investors' expectations about future real returns.


: Biomarkers for anorexia nervosa (AN) which reflect the pathophysiology and relate to the aetiology of the disease, are warranted and could bring us one step closer to targeted treatment of AN. Some leads may be found in the biochemistry which often is found disturbed in AN, although normalization in many aspects is seen at recovery from undernutrition. Recent genome-wide association studies support that genetic factors play a role in the pathophysiology of AN, of which some are independent of BMI-related mechanisms. In this review, an update on blood-based biomarkers of AN is presented.


More recently researchers have turned to analyze how the tax structure, rather than the overall tax level, affects economic performance. For instance, several papers have investigated how taxation on corporate and individual (labor) income influences growth. Taxation of dividend income may also influence growth via its impact on investments and firm behavior. Within the academic community there is conflicting views about the impact taxation of dividends has on firm behavior and, hence, on economic performance. According to the "traditional view", taxation of dividends is distortionary and increases the cost of equity. According to the "new view", taxation of dividends does not influence the marginal cost of capital and consequently has no impact on investment decisions. To our knowledge, this paper is the first study to explore how tax rates on dividends affect economic growth, by using panel data from 1990 till 2008 for 18 European countries. We find that taxation of dividend income negatively influences economic growth, a result that corroborates the old view of dividends taxation as distortionary and also has some policy implication for the European countries in question. JEL classification: H21 ; H24 ; H25 ; O40


We propose a MAC protocol for use in multihop wireless networks that deploy an underlying UWB (ultra wide band)-based physical layer. We consider a multiband approach to better utilize the available spectrum, where each transmitter sends longer pulses in one of many narrower frequency bands. The motivation comes from the observation that, in the absence of a sophisticated equalizer, the size of a slot for transmitting a UWB pulse is typically dictated by the delay spread of the channel. Therefore, using a wider frequency band to shorten the transmission time for each pulse does not increase the data rate in proportion to the available bandwidth. Our approach allows data transmissions to be contiguous and practically interference free, and, thus, highly efficient. For practicality, we ensure the conformance of our approach to FCC-imposed emission limits. We evaluate our approach via extensive simulations, and our results demonstrate the significant advantages of our approach over single-band solutions: the throughput increases significantly and the number of collisions decreases considerably. Finally, we analyze the behavior of our MAC protocol in a single-hop setting in terms of its efficiency in utilizing the multiple bands


This paper proposes new MAC layer based back-off and retransmission strategies for throughput enhancement, in broadcast transmissions of inter vehicular communication. We present adaptive back off strategy which is based on the concept that there exists an optimum contention window (CW) period in a broadcast CSMA/CA system, given the fixed number of users. We also propose a simple probabilistic approach for retransmission which is based on analyzing the local information. Simulation results shows the improvement in the throughput using adaptive back-off and probabilistic retransmission strategies compared to fixed back-off strategy.


Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) enables a large number of object monitoring since semi/passive tags are independent of batteries. In our previous work, the possibility of using different wireless technologies such as Wireless Sensor Network (WSN), Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) and Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) to determine the moisture content in rice was investigated. Finding from our previous work suggest that RFID can be used to determine the moisture content of rice. While numerous research have been conducted for moisture content of grain, however, to author's knowledge, there is only a few studies conducted on the localization of grain hostpot. Therefore, this study aims to investigate if the passive RFID array can be used to localize the location of the wet spot of grain. Prior, the experiment, a suitable setting for the RFID system were determined. In addition, a simple test was conducted to select a suitable operating frequency. From the investigation, the result indicates that only frequency channels 865, 866, 867, 868 and 869 MHz can detect all 30 tags. Meanwhile, frequency channel in the range 902 to 928 MHz detects 26 to 29 unique tags. Hence, 868 MHz was selected as the operating frequency throughout the experiment. The findings indicate that the RSSI value measured by the RFID reader decreased as the moisture of the sample increased when the tags were blocked by the sample placed at the designated location during the test.


Tunisian use of credit cards for payment purposes is acutely misused. This research investigates explaining factors. It builds on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) to propose a theoretical model to explain Tunisian customers' intention to use credit card. Influencing effects of perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, subjective norms, perceived behavior control, and attitude are examined. Data was collected using a face-to-face administered survey. The proposed model was tested by mean of PLS-SEM approach. Results show that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, subjective norm, perceived behavior control, and attitude are prominent predictors of the behavioral intention to use credit card for payment purposes. The findings may provide Tunisian companies' decision makers information that could be useful in creating a positive attitude toward credit card and attracting customers to use it more frequently.


Image feature matching is an integral task for many computer vision applications such as object tracking, image retrieval, etc. The images can be matched no matter how the image changes owing into the geometric transformation (such as rotation and translation), illumination, etc. Also due to the successful application of the deep learning in image processing, the deep learning method has an advantage in feature extraction of images. In this paper, we adopt a deep Convolutional neural network (CNN) model, which attention on image patch, in image feature points matching. CNN obtains the feature by convolution kernel which parameters are achieved by learning. So it has strong ability to express feature. Compared with other methods, experimental results indicate the proposed method has higher accuracy and completed efficiently.


Supercritical and near supercritical fluids are considered green solvents of the future because they decrease the need for toxic organic solvents and are easily recyclable. Consequently, supercritical fluid chromatography, SFC, has emerged as an environment-friendly technique especially for analytical and preparative scale enantiomeric separations. In order to separate a wide range of analytes with differing polarities, most SFC systems employ super- or subcritical carbon dioxide mixed with 5–40% organic solvents. More than 40 chlorinated or non-chlorinated co-solvents have been employed in SFC so far. However, methanol is far and away the dominant SFC mobile phase component as it outperforms most of the other solvents. Given the relatively high cost, non-renewable source of manufacture, and toxicity of methanol in humans, we propose elimination of methanol as a component of the SFC mobile phase by replacing with a biomass derived solvent, i.e., minimum boiling azeotropic ethanol. Azeotropic ethanol contains ∼4.6% water (aka '190 proof'). It is less expensive and easy to recycle as it distills off at constant composition. This work demonstrates, for the first time, that one can obtain better chiral SFC separations by using '190 proof' ethanol instead of methanol. This solvent choice is shown to be favorable and compatible with a wide range of macrocyclic and chiral polysaccharide column chemistries. In chiral analyses, we show efficiency enhancement up to an order of magnitude and reduced retention by using azeotropic ethanol. In general, SFC separations with azeotropic ethanol can provide enhanced separation performance in a more economical and environmentally friendly format and hopefully change the status quo of current analytical and preparative SFC.


This paper will attempt to read how history and space are informed and transformed by each other specifically in the prose narratives of the German writer, W. G. Sebald. In the course of reproducing history in a non-synoptic manner in these prose narratives, there are several ways in which space and history are connected with each other. This paper will explore these myriad relations and connections between space and history. Drawing from these links, the paper will go on to demonstrate how various incompatible elements of history and space are juxtaposed on one particular site creating a heterotopia. Sebald's innovative fiction is exceptional in its narrative technique, employment of sources and incorporation of the multiple points of views of the narrators along with their interlocutors. The specific mode of narration Sebald employs, this paper contends, treats neither space nor history as foundational categories but instead tries to posit a historico-geographical framework within which many volatile moments of heterotopia develop. The paper begins with an analysis of how history and its constituent, memory, are related to space and spatial encounters. Having established the nexus between these two categories, it goes on to examine how Sebald's narratives offer a critique of cartographic space and how identities are established through a politics of space. All these arguments culminate to demonstrate that these narratives are constituted by heterotopic moments due to the juxtapositions and multiplicities that arise from the historico-geographical scheme Sebald brings into play.


The Black–Scholes model has been acknowledged as a brilliant breakthrough in asset pricing theory. But in applying it to real world options, problems immediately arose, because the volatility that make an option's model value consistent with its market price is different for different strike prices: the wellknown "volatility smile." Over time, the smile evolved into a more monotonic, downward-sloping "skew," and traders became comfortable with the idea of modeling its behavior and describing option market conditions in terms of the level and skew of implied volatilities. A standard explanation for the skew is that the return distribution is not lognormal; in particular, it generally has a negative third moment (i.e., negative skewness). The similarity of the terms and the (potential) connection between the volatility skew and statistical skewness is one source of confusion. Another is that (unlike skewness) there is no standard measure for the volatility skew. Mixon explores these issues and reviews a number of common skew measures. One significant result is that most of them vary strongly with the level of volatility, making comparisons across different underlying assets or over time difficult. After examining several performance measures, Mixon suggests that the most useful measure of the volatility skew is the difference between the implied volatilities for a 25 delta put and a 25 delta call, divided by the implied volatility for a 50 delta option.


Survival of the sclerotial parasite Coniothyrium minitans in soil, when applied as spore suspension or colonised solid substrate (maizemeal-perlite) inocula, and ability to infect Sclerotinia sclerotiorum sclerotia incorporated into the soil after different times was assessed over 6 months. Unambiguous detection of the C. minitans isolate from the indigenous C. minitans soil population was achieved using a hygromycin B resistant transformant (T3), which was similar in behaviour to the wild type LU112. Coniothyrium minitans was recovered from soil by dilution plating at all assessment times, with higher recovery from spore suspension compared with maizemeal-perlite amended soil. Coniothyrium minitans was able to infect and reduce viability of sclerotia incorporated into the amended soil over the 6 month experiment, with spore suspension significantly increasing infection compared with maizemeal-perlite inoculum. Hygromycin B amendment of the agar significantly increased C. minitans recovery from sclerotia, especially when the population of secondary fungal colonisers was high.


This chapter examines the nature of ethics and economics as a single subject of investigation, and uses a complex systems approach to characterize the nature of that subject. It then distinguishes mainstream economic and social economic visions of it, where the former assumes that market processes encompass social processes, and the latter assumes that market processes are embedded in social processes. For each vision, strong and weak theses are compared. Both visions are first explained in terms of their respective views of the positive-normative distinction, then in terms of a central normative principle, and then in terms of their policy strategies. The chapter closes with comments on the future status of ethics and economics as a single subject of investigation.


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We present methods to study the effect of phenol soluble modulins (PSMs) and other toxins produced and secreted by Staphylococcus aureus on neutrophils. To study the effects of the PSMs on neutrophils we isolate fresh neutrophils using density gradient centrifugation. These neutrophils are loaded with a dye that fluoresces upon calcium mobilization. The activation of neutrophils by PSMs initiates a rapid and transient increase in the free intracellular calcium concentration. In a flow cytometry experiment this rapid mobilization can be measured by monitoring the fluorescence of a pre-loaded dye that reacts to the increased concentration of free Ca(2+). Using this method we can determine the PSM concentration necessary to activate the neutrophil, and measure the effects of specific and general inhibitors of the neutrophil activation. To investigate the expression of the PSMs in the intracellular space, we have constructed reporter fusions of the promoter of the PSMα operon to GFP. When these reporter strains of S. aureus are phagocytosed by neutrophils, the induction of expression can be observed using fluorescence microscopy.


The purpose of this paper is to convey the need for research that brings a human face to foster youth in higher education. It is important is to understand their low educational outcomes as a social justice issue. It is important to emphasize the research on Black foster youth needs to value experiential knowledge (Solorzano & Yasso, 2009). Experiential knowledge of people of color is legitimate, and critical to understanding and analyzing racial subordination (Solorzano & Yasso, 2009). In the traditional critical race theory methodology, I use poetry and narratives to make meaning of this pervasive issue. Lastly, this paper offers several recommendations for research to humanize and celebrate Black foster children in the educational setting.


This study uses nationally representative data on the marketing of local foods to assess the relative scale of local food marketing channels. This research documents that sales through intermediated marketing channels, such as farmers' sales to local grocers and restaurants, account for a large portion of all local food sales. Small and medium-sized farms dominate local foods sales marketed exclusively through direct-to-consumer channels (foods sold at roadside stands or farmers' markets, for example) while large farms dominate local food sales marketed exclusively through intermediated channels. Farmers marketing food locally are most prominent in the Northeast and the West Coast regions and areas close to densely populated urban markets. Climate and topography favoring the production of fruits and vegetables, proximity to and neighboring farm participation in farmers' markets, and good transportation and information access are found to be associated with higher levels of direct-to-consumer sales.


The growth kinetics and modeling of ethanol production from inulin by Pichia caribbica (KC977491) were studied in a batch system. Unstructured models were proposed using the logistic equation for growth, the Luedeking-Piret equation for ethanol production and modified Leudeking-Piret model for substrate consumption. Kinetic parameters (X0, μm, m, n, p and q) were determined by nonlinear regression, using Levenberg-Marquart method implemented in a Mathcad program. Since the production of ethanol was associated with P. caribbica cell growth, a good agreement between model predictions and experimental data was obtained. Indeed, significant R2 values of 0.91, 0.96, and 0.95 were observed for biomass, ethanol production and substrate consumption, respectively. Furthermore, analysis of variance (ANOVA) was also used to validate the proposed models. According to the obtained results, the predicted kinetic values and experimental data agreed well . Finally, it is possible to predict the development of P. caribbica using these models. Key words : Pichia caribbica, inulin, bioethanol, numerical simulation.


This paper is focused on the neoclassical approach in economics and its fundamentals as they are coming from the philosophy of science. However, the author does not want to be treated as an advocate of this approach; this paper is an attempt to popularize several relevant features of neoclassical economics. In addition, he presents some evidence on neoclassical economics as an application of a set of logical arguments in favor of an instrumentalist research methodology. One of the sections of the paper explains the differences between the interwar neoclassical approach and the postwar approach of Arrow and Debreu. Another section deals with selected problems of the neoclassical versus neokeynesian business cycle theories. The author demonstrates that a frequently proclaimed superiority of the neokeynesian approach to business cycles may be only illusionary. Further, the author calls into question superficial criticisms of neoclassical economics that label its subject as "economics of Dr. Pangloss".


Allergic asthma is an inflammatory lung disease thought to be initiated and directed by type 2 helper T cells responding to environmental Ags. The mechanisms by which allergens induce Th2-adaptive immune responses are not well understood, although it is now clear that innate immune signals are required to promote DC activation and Th2 sensitization to inhaled proteins. However, the effect of ongoing Th2 inflammation, as seen in chronic asthma, on naive lymphocyte activation has not been explored. It has been noted that patients with atopic disorders demonstrate an increased risk of developing sensitivities to new allergens. This suggests that signals from an adaptive immune response may facilitate sensitization to new Ags. We used a Th2-adoptive transfer murine model of asthma to identify a novel mechanism, termed "collateral priming," in which naive CD4 (cid:1) T cells are activated by adaptive rather than innate immune signals. Th2 priming to newly encountered Ags was dependent on the production of IL-4 by the transferred Th2 population but was independent of Toll-like receptor 4 signaling and the myeloid differentiation factor 88 Toll-like receptor signaling pathway. These results identify a novel mechanism of T cell priming in which an Ag-specific adaptive immune response initiates distinct Ag-specific T cell responses in the absence of classical innate immune system triggering signals. The Journal of Immunology, 2004, 172: 4527–4534.


Patch-based texture synthesis has been widely used in computer graphics and computer vision due to simplicity and efficiency. The basic idea is to add one patch of the sample texture at a time to the target texture. Much work has been done to minimize the appearance of seams in the overlap region of two adjacent patches. Among various approaches to blending, stitching two patches along the minimum error boundary cut is considered to be one of the most efficient. However, in real textures, especially the semi -stochastic ones, perfect cuts do not exist; therefore, the defects due to the inconsistency between the patches become an important problem for the synthesized texture quality. In our paper, two novel models that have not been considered in the previous approaches are proposed to overcome these difficulties. We show that the texture quality can be improved by performing multi-resolution operations on the overlap region of adjacent patches in the wavelet domain.


Microstructure and properties of Forging high Cr cast iron were investigated according to the requirements for production and application of engine valve seat. It is found that the microstructure of Forging high Cr cast iron consists of tempering martensite, M7C3 carbide and austenite. The strength ,and plasticity and hardness of Forging high Cr cast iron after heat treating is higher than that of centrifugal casting high Cr cast iron. So the Forging high Cr cast iron can meet the application demand of the engine valve seat.


Problem statement: This thesis aimed to examine the following issues of the pulpits: (1) background of the model and structure, (2) current conditions and problems of pulpit construction using participation of Phu-thai people in northeast Thailand and (3) model of conservation of revitalization of pulpits by participation of Phu-thai people. Approach: Data were collected from documents and field study in the provinces of Sakon Nakhon, Nakhon Phanom, Mukdahan, Kalasin and Amnat Charoen by survey, observation, interview, focused group discussion and workshop. Results: The results of thesis were presented by means of Phu-thai people in northeast Thailand, their ancestors moved from the left bank of the Mekhong River. Most of them came from Mueang Bok and Mueang Wang towns. The model and structure of the pulpits are from beliefs in village pillar spirits in harmony with faith in Buddhism. The pulpits were constructed for use in performing religious affairs as the architectural symbol. They are single-pillar pulpits to be used in conventional and traditional festivals in each of the twelve lunar months. The current conditions and problems of single-pillar pulpit construction include must of the raw materials for pulpit construction are wood which is damage, lack of taking care of, wood diseases from mold and breaking, expansion, bending, lack of pulpit repairers and builders lacking transferring knowledge to next generation. The preaching hall shape has changed from wood to be high-shaped wood. For models of conservation and revitalization, all sectors must participate in conserving and revitalizing pulpits. These sectors are community leaders, informants, state sector, constructors, provincial sector and the community for pulpit conservation and revitalization according to the elements. The model of single-pillar pulpit structure has these structures: base or pillar is 140 cm from the floor. There are base to support or 4 nagas to support. Each naga is 140 cm long. The pulpit shape is in the shape of multisided lotus with 4 holes on the walls. There must be conservation of traditions and culture according to the traditions in each of the twelve lunar months of the year from all sectors in a concrete form. Conclusion: The results of this study can be used for pulpit conservation and revitalization to be in existence. To solve problems of decay and loss, there must be a committee for pulpit conservation and revitalization. All sectors must participate in utilization of pulpits which have cultural values of Phu-thai people in the future.


An adaptive mesh solute transport model is presented. The adaptive mesh scheme is implemented in a one-way multiply nested version of the hydrobiological model DIVAST (Depth Integrated Velocity and Solute Transport). The scheme allows the inner meshes of finer resolution to follow physical features such as solute plumes, thereby minimising the fine resolution coverage and thus the computational cost. If a physical feature moves during the course of a simulation, the fine resolution meshes move with it. Mesh movement can be either specified or automatic. The model was tested using a model of Galway Bay to simulate the discharge of a conservative tracer from a wastewater treatment plant. Results show that the model is capable of predicting solute transport to a high degree of accuracy and that adaptive meshing provides an efficient alternative to the classical zoom nesting techniques.


The graduate employment market is competitive; graduate jobs are available, but with an
increasing student population nearly 1 in 5 recent graduates remain unemployed. Sandwich
placements provide students with an integrated, structured period of work experience that
produces recognised benefits in terms of academic achievement and employability. This
paper evaluates the impact of sandwich placements on employability amongst undergraduate
management students from 2009 onwards; analysing destinations data for levels of
employment before qualitatively evaluating student experiences in gaining graduate
employment. Differences in employment patterns between placement and non placement
students are identified; placement students exhibit more focused career strategies, confidence
in applying for graduate schemes and an ability to articulate their skills and experience in
relation to the requirements of an employer. Completing a sandwich placement continues to
be a beneficial experience for undergraduate students, contributing towards their
employability and a successful first step on the career ladder.


Intensive Care Unit (ICU) telemedicine can be considered as the transmission of large volumes of continuous and noisy physiological data generated by the ICU monitors attached to patients from one site to another using computer and telecommunication technology for purpose of remote assistance. A common form of telecommunication is broadband which presents 2 major challenges in rural areas: bandwidth demand can easily outstrip the revenue realizable that is needed to pay for the network infrastructure investment so lower (cheaper and slower) bandwidth is normal; a consequence of restricted bandwidth on access pipes is service contention at the customer site, even if core bandwidth exists to deliver the services. In this paper we propose data wavelets as a data compression technique to transform the ICU monitor data into trends to address the challenges of broadband in rural areas for data transmission and allow qualitative reasoning at the receiving site for clinical decision support.


Resistance of Banksia species to Phytophthora cinnamomi was determined under plantation conditions for 39 Western Australian and 10 eastern Australian Banksia spp. Plants were inoculated twice using millet seed inoculum, at the start of the study and 95 days later. To test for intraspecific variants or escape from disease, surviving individuals were stem-inoculated with P. cinnamomi. Infection in plant tissues was confirmed by reisolation with selective media. Horticulturally exploited species including B. hookerana, B. coccinea, B. prionotes, B. occidentalis, B. baxteri, B. sceptrum, B. speciosa, B. grandis, B. menziesii and B. victoriae were found to be suscep- tible to P. cinnamomi. Eight eastern Australian species showed resistance (95% survival). Seven West- ern Australian species including all prostrate species tested were found to have low susceptibility. There was a poor correlation between levels of susceptibility and taxonomic series in the genus, particularly in eastern and western component species of the pan-Australian series Orthostylis and Spicigerae. Banksia spp. from uniform or summer maximum rainfall regions were resistant or of low susceptibility while those from dominantly winter rainfall areas, especially with free draining soils, were highly sus- ceptible. Stem inoculation confirmed that one plant each of B. coccinea and B. hookerana was resistant among the P. cinnamomi-susceptible, horticulturally exploited species. Thus stem inoculation proved a useful diagnostic tool, and girdling rather than longitudinal fungus growth through stem tissue is more appropriate as a measure of species' resistance.


In this work, quartz crystal microbalance humidity sensor was fabricated by inkjet printing technique. Poly (3, 4- ethylenedioxythi ophene)/poly-sty rene-sulfonic acid (PEDOTI PSS), one of the most widely used polymer composites, was printed on QCM electrode as sensing layer using Dimatrix material inkjet printer. The main advantage of this coating method is its high precision of solution coating with accurately controlled volume and area. The printed layer was varied from 1 to 20 layers. With 20 PEDOT/PSS printed layers, the humidity sensitivity is found increased by more than three orders of magnitude compared to uncoated QCM. In addition, the PEDOT/PSS coated QCM exhibits fast humidity detection with short response and recovery times. Thus, the PEDOT/PSS printed on the QCM electrode is an effective way to improve humidity-sensing characteristic of QCM.


ABSTRACT
Prolotherapy is widely used in pain control and tissue repair in pain medicine. The classical mode is injection with hypertonic dextrose in muscle or perimysium. However, the analgesic mechanism is still not known. Here we successfully established dextrose-mediated antinociception in a mouse model of fibromyalgia. The antinociceptive effects of dextrose injections were evaluated in a mouse model of fibromyalgia, in which bilateral chronic mechanical hyperalgesia was induced by unilateral intramuscular acid injection. The injectant (dextrose), dose (≥ 5%) and volume (>10 μL) but not osmolarity were essential for the prolotherapy. Further studies showed that activation of acid-sensing ion channel 1a (ASIC1a), neural activation, and the release of substance P from muscle afferents were required in the dextrose-induced reduction of mechanical hypersensitivity. Both pharmacological blockade and genetic deletion of ASIC1a or substance P as well as lidocaine abolished the dextrose-induced antinociception in mice with chronic hyperalgesia. Moreover, intramuscular dextrose injection induced phosphorylated extracellular signal-regulated kinase (pERK) expression in dorsal root ganglia neurons expressing substance P; the pERK expression was inhibited by the ASIC1a antagonist PcTx1. The optimal settings for prolotherapy in fibromyalgia-like pain are dextrose- and volume-dependent, and the peripheral antinociception involves ASIC1a and substance P signaling in muscle afferents. This study suggests a possible mechanism of action of dextrose prolotherapy in non-inflammatory muscle pain such as fibromyalgia and provides insights for treating other types of chronic pain.


Magnetic catalyst was made of magnetic core and surface coating layer and obtained a core-shell complex materials. The magnetic γ-Fe2O3 core has a relatively higher saturation magnetization, coercivity and good thermal stability even at 500°C. In order to prevent magnetic core forming spinel structure and migrating of Fe3+, a layer of silicon dioxide was coated by sol-gel method. During the process iron atoms scattered in –Si-O-Si- network and produced a γ-Fe2O3@SiO2 structure. Finally, the γ-Fe2O3@SiO2 powder was put into the alumina sol and evenly sprayed into a column of oil, after calcination the carrier of alumina layer was prepared.


The International Law Commission held its sixty-eighth session in Geneva from May 2 to June 10, and from July 4 to August 12, 2016, under the chairmanship of Pedro Comissário Afonso (Mozambique). Notably, the Commission completedonsecond reading a full set of eighteen draft articles with commentaries on the protection of persons in the event of disasters and recommended to the United Nations General Assembly that it elaborate a convention based on the draft articles. Additionally, the Commission adopted on first reading a complete set of draft conclusions, with commentaries, for two topics: identification of customary international law; and subsequent agreements and subsequent practice in relation to the interpretation of treaties. As such, both topics might be completed by the Commission on second reading in 2018. Progress was also made in developing draft articles on crimes against humanity; draft guidelines on protection of the atmosphere; draft conclusions on jus cogens; and draft principles on protection of the environment in relation to armed conflicts. The Commission commenced a debate on a proposed draft article on "limitations and exceptions" to the immunity of state officials from foreign criminal jurisdiction, but, due to insufficient time, the debate will continue in 2017. Furthermore, an additional proposed guideline on the provisional application of treaties was sent to the drafting committee. The Commission decided to add two new topics to its long-term work program: the settlement of international disputes to which international organizations are parties; and succession of states in respect of state responsibility.


: The influence of culture density and genotype on the polyteny degree of giant chromosomes (PDC) in Drosophila melanogaster was investigated. The reliable depression of the polytene chromosomes endoreduplication function under increased culture density was revealed. The essential dependence of the PDC on the genotype was shown. Correlation between the PDC and the number of adaptive features was established. The certain parallelism between the increased heterosis effect on the number of quantitative characters and the superiority of the hybrids above the inbred lines on the PDC in conditions of high culture density was found out. The sex-dependent distinctions and maternal effect at the inheritance of the PDC in drosophila were shown.


Economy-wide institutional deficiencies causing factor misallocation have been emphasized as essential determinants of aggregate TFP differences. This paper argues that production flexibility at the micro-level is an economic characteristic that should be given priority in TFP aggregation exercises. We investigate a heterogeneous firms model with two distinct notions of flexibility: (i) the firm-specific capacity to optimize over a set of production techniques that serve to organize capital and labor; and, (ii) the industry-specific substitutability between efficient units of capital and labor. We show the presence of a strong interaction between "ability to choose techniques" and "input substitutability": high complementarity at the industry-level amplifies imperfections associated with techniques choice at the firm-level. Using the micro-founded structure, we develop measures for factor, output and technique distortions across a distribution of firms and quantify their TFP effects. For a broad range of U.S. manufacturing industry clusters, technique distortions generate more TFP losses than misallocation resulting from capital and output distortions, with larger TFP gains from removing technique distortions in industries that exhibit high degrees of factor complementarity. Our key quantitative results are robust to outliers, production function specification, mismeasurement and parameterization of the model and are strongly present in developing country datasets.


A common question when analyzing supply chains is how much a change in input costs at one stage in the supply chain affect prices downstream. To address this question, research has been conducted that examines the extent that changes in prices are "passed-through." Much of the pass-through research that has been conducted has been focused on changes in prices at the beginning of supply chains - at the commodity-level. To date, however, there is no known research analyzing the effect of changes of cotton fiber prices on cotton textile goods, neither at different stages in the cotton supply chain, nor at the retail level. While pass-through analysis of the cotton supply chain presents certain challenges in terms of data collection, it also presents great opportunity in terms of understanding the many relationships involved in the manufacture of cotton apparel. The purpose of this paper is to develop a greater understanding of price relationships throughout the cotton supply chain and to inform interested parties about the extent that changes in cotton prices influence changes in yarn, fabric, and apparel prices. Findings suggest that the sharp increases in cotton fiber prices in the 2010/11 have resulted in increases in yarn and fabric prices, but have yet to influence prices for assembled garments or retail prices for cotton apparel.


SIR,-We read with interest the unusual presentation of anorectal carcinoma reported by Mr J Drumm and others (13 November, p 1393) and were surprised at the suggestion that the association between ischiorectal abscess and underlying carcinoma of the rectum had not been previously reported. The association of the rare pelvirectal type of abscess with rectal carcinoma is referred to in standard surgical texts such as that by Goligher,' and rectal cancer was found in two of 183 patients with anorectal abscesses other than those of the pelvirectal type in the report by Buchan and Grace.2 In addition, McConnell3 has reported the association of perianal abscess with squamous cell carcinoma of the anus. We would certainly agree, however, that thorough examination of the rectum at the time of incision of an anorectal abscess is important not merely to seek malignant disease but also to find evidence of any other aetiological factor-for example, inflammatory bowel disease. To emphasise these points we report the case of a 45 year old man who presented in 1981 with an ischiorectal abscess. The abscess was incised and drained, and because of the extent and severity of the perianal sepsis and suspicions about irregularity of the rectal mucosa a sigmoid colostomy was performed. Biopsy specimens confirmed the presence of a low rectal carcinoma, and subsequent abdominoperineal resection was undertaken. The patient has returned to work and has remained clinically free from recurrent disease for 15 months.


In the field of fault diagnosis for rotating machines, the conventional methods or the neural network based methods are mainly single symptom domain based methods, and the diagnosis accuracy of which is not always satisfactory. To improve the diagnosis accuracy a method that combines the multi-class support vector machines (MSVMs) outputs with the degree of importance of individual MSVMs based on fuzzy integral is presented. This provides a sound basis for integrating the results from MSVMs to get more accurate classification. The experimental results with the recognition problem of a blower machine show the performance of fault diagnosis can be improved.


BACKGROUND
The objective of this study was to evaluate the role of secondary cytoreductive surgery in the outcome of patients who had recurrent epithelial ovarian carcinoma that was limited to <or=5 recurrence sites within the abdomen or pelvis on preoperative imaging studies and attempt to define selection criteria associated with improved survival, with specific attention to the number of lesions suspicious for recurrent disease.

METHODS
: Patients who underwent secondary surgical cytoreduction for recurrent epithelial ovarian cancer between September 1997 and March 2005 were identified retrospectively from tumor registry databases. Study inclusion criteria required a complete clinical response to primary therapy, >or=12 months between initial diagnosis and recurrence, and <or=5 recurrence sites on preoperative imaging studies. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses were used to evaluate the effect of clinicopathologic variables on overall postrecurrence survival.

RESULTS
Fifty-five patients met the study inclusion criteria. The median patient age at recurrence was 57.7 years, and the median diagnosis-to-recurrence interval was 32 months (range, 12-164 months). Complete cytoreduction was achieved in 41 patients (74.5%). On multivariate analysis, the statistically significant and independent predictors of overall survival were a diagnosis-to-recurrence interval >or=18 months (median survival, 49 months vs 3 months; P < .01), the number of radiographic recurrence sites (median survival, 50 months for patients with 1 or 2 sites vs 12 months for patients with 3 to 5 sites; P < .03), and residual disease (median survival, 50 months for patients with no macroscopic residual disease vs 7.2 months for patients with macroscopic residual disease; P < .01). Age, tumor grade, histology, CA-125 level, ascites, and tumor size were not associated significantly with survival.

CONCLUSIONS
: The current data supported the definition of localized recurrent ovarian cancer as patients with 1 or 2 radiographic recurrence sites. In this select population, a diagnosis-to-recurrence interval >or=18 months and complete secondary surgical cytoreduction, which was achievable in the majority of patients, were associated with a median postrecurrence survival of approximately 50 months.


Purpose: Caveolin-1(CAV1), a membrane constituent protein, exhibits tumor suppressor activities in multiple malignancies, whereas the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. The current study aimed to determine the significance of CAV-1 in regulating cancer metabolism and its relation to breast cancer stem cells (CSCs). Experimental Design: The anti-carcinogenic function of CAV1 was evaluated by in vitro cell model, CAV1 knockout mice and MMTV-PyMT spontaneous breast cancer xenografts. Glycolysis activity and mitochondrial metabolism were assessed by immunoblotting, oxygen consumption and mitotacker staining analysis. Mammosphere formation, tumorigenic ability, reattachment differentiation and signaling pathway analysis were applied to study the regulation effects of CAV1 on breast CSCs. The clinical significance of CAV1 was also analyzed by human tissue microarray. Results: In both mammary transformed cells and spontaneous breast cancer xenografts, CAV1 is found significantly downregulated and positively correlated to increased glycolysis activity and impaired mitochondrial metabolism. Cav1 knockout results in increased ductal hyperplasia, associating with increased stem cell population and glycolysis metabolism. Breast CSCs exhibits glycolytic phenotype and decreased CAV1 expression compared to normal mammary stem cells, and CAV1 overexpression significantly limits CSCs' self-renewal via inhibiting c-myc induced glycolysis. Clinical investigation suggests that high CAV1 expression is revealed with better overall survival and decreased CSCs population. Conclusions: CAV1 loss facilitates mammary carcinogenesis via enhancing glycolytic activity in breast CSCs, and CAV1 based therapy might become a novel strategy for breast cancer prevention. Note: This abstract was not presented at the meeting. Citation Format: Zhiyu Wang, Neng Wang, Shengqi Wang, Yifeng Zheng. Caveolin-1 inhibits mammary carcinogenesis via suppressing c-myc-induced metabolism reprogramming in breast cancer stem cells [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 1924. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-1924


Chapter 9 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code has many shortcomings. One of the most persistent, yet understudied, problems judges face in chapter 9 is also a problem that exists in other areas of bankruptcy law: the sheer difficulty of applying generalized plan confirmation standards to wildly different, highly specialized entities. In practice, judges have turned to experts—individuals well-versed in municipal finance, mediation, and the particular debtor community—to help them overcome this problem in chapter 9. These experts often perform critical roles in a municipal bankruptcy case, including conducting mediations, investigating the municipality's finances, and even helping to craft the municipality's plan of debt adjustment.

Despite the important roles experts play in bankruptcy, in chapter 9, their appointment and selection process is given little attention, and the scope of their role is often ill-defined. This Article highlights the concerns that arise due to the lack of procedures surrounding experts in municipal bankruptcy. After exploring the benefits and pitfalls associated with using experts in chapter 9 and elsewhere, this Article provides detailed guidance for designing formal procedures for selecting, appointing, and using experts in chapter 9.


Glucocorticoid hormones have important effects on brain function in the context of acute and chronic stress. Many of these are mediated by the glucocorticoid receptor (GR). GR has transcriptional activity which is highly context-specific and differs between tissues and even between cell types. The outcome of GR-mediated transcription depends on the interactome of associated coregulators. Selective GR modulators (SGRMs) are a class of GR ligands that can be used to activate only a subset of GR-coregulator interactions, thereby giving the possibility to induce a unique combination of agonistic and antagonistic GR properties. We describe SGRM action in animal models of brain function and pathology, and argue for their utility as molecular filters, to characterize context-specific GR interactome and transcriptional activity that are responsible for particular glucocorticoid-driven effects in cognitive processes such as memory consolidation. The ultimate objective of this approach is to identify molecular processes that are responsible for adaptive and maladaptive effects of glucocorticoids in the brain.


The earlier a gastro-intestinal cancer is treated the better will be the prospects of cure for the patient. It is therefore important to study the early clinical stages of the pathway which leads to the diagnosis of gastro-intestinal cancer in order to make this pathway short and quick. This paper identifies the delays which happen before the symptomatic patient sees the specialist and before the diagnosis is confirmed. If these delays were reduced the early cancers would be treated earlier and with greater prospect of success. It is suggested that research centred on patients referred to hospital is unlikely to greatly improve the survival rates of patients with gastro-intestinal cancers. If the research resources deployed in primary care on the study of symptoms were to match those centred on hospitals, successful treatment would be more likely.


A new solution methodology for the constant matrix, decoupled power flow problem is presented in this paper. The proposed method uses the conjugate gradient method instead of the traditional direct solution of Ax = b for updating the power flow variables. The conjugate gradient method is accelerated with an approximate inverse matrix preconditioner obtained from a linear combination of matrix-valued Chebyshev polynomials. The new method has been tested on several systems of different sizes. In terms of speed, the method is comparable to the fast decoupled load flow in serial environments, but it is more amenable to parallel and vector processing since it contains only matrix-vector multiplications.


Obfuscation algorithms are now widely used to prevent software reverse engineering. Binary code virtualization is one of the most powerful obfuscations technics. Another obfuscation method known as "dispatching" can be used to transform application control flow similarly to virtual machine insertion. Our research was aimed at reconstruction of control flow graph in case of both code virtualization and dispatching. To achieve this goal, we implemented de-obfuscation tool which keeps track of virtual program counter used by virtual machine emulator and reconstructs the application control flow. This paper describes experimental results of test application de-obfuscation via dynamic analysis. Both obfuscating and de-obfuscating tools were independently developed by two different teams of ISP RAS – the LLVM-based obfuscating compiler and the software environment for dynamic analysis of binary code. The paper briefly introduces both software tools and then describes results of experimental research on recovering of control flow graph of obfuscated application. Application was initially protected by specialized obfuscating LLVM-based compiler. Next, TrEx environment was used to analyze program execution trace, to find the dispatcher-protected part of application and to recover its control flow. Additionally, some software code complexity metrics for test applications were calculated to estimate obfuscation resilience provided by different versions of obfuscating compiler.