Papua will always be associated with violence, ignorance, nudity, poverty, backwardness and isolation. This paper would like to expose a viewpoint of Papua's issue comprehensively. The special autonomy policy given to the people of Papua at least raises new hope and amid political liability of integration in Papua. Specially It was granted to coincide with the special autnomy granted coincidentally an Christmas day only become a Christmas gift for the Christian community in Papua but it was also substantially realized. However, tragedies that were experienced by the people of Papua emphasized their suffering. Papua is a wounded territorry in agony due to the penetration of capitalism which was followed by civil penetration and state hegemony. The disharmony between Jakarta-Papua for over 50 years has not ended yet. It is claimed that the government has not been able to implement in earnest the four basic intention formulated by the Indonesian Institute of Sciences(LIPI) as Papua Road Map. Although LIPI has formulated four root problems in Papua, only two main issues really triggered the conflict in Papua; namely the traumatic history of human tragedy and the completion of economics as well as overcoming social disparities and culture.


In this paper, the static characteristics of two-lobe, three-lobe and four-lobe noncircular gas journal bearing systems are
studied in detail. The Reynold's equation governing the noncircular gas bearing systems are analyzed by using Radial Basis
Functions (RBF). The solutions are obtained numerically by solving systems of algebraic equations. The equilibrium position
of the rotor is obtained without using the trial and error method; which is the merit of our method.


Cosmic microwave background experiments make wide-area, sensitive, high-cadence maps of the sky at mm-wavelengths. Discoveries will include moving (solar system objects), time-variable (stars, active galactic nuclei), or transient sources (novae, tidal disruption events, gamma-ray bursts, nearby supernovae, gravitational wave events) .


Many people believe that the early development of sovereign debt depended on institutions, but there are two very different ways of presenting this narrative and two very different conclusions one might draw for sovereign debt today. According to the first, this was an impartial story involving executive constraints, shared governance, increased monitoring, and increased transparency in other words things that sound unambiguously good. According to the second narrative this was a story of distributive politics. States had the best access to credit when institutions gave government creditors privileged access to decision making while restricting the influence of those who paid the taxes to reimburse debts. This was a situation where institutions fostered commitment, but at a cost, and sometimes they may not even have been welfare enhancing. In this paper I present evidence from seven centuries of European history, and I suggest that available data support the distributive politics interpretation. I then attempt to draw implications for how we think about the politics of sovereign debt today.


Increasing our understanding of the heterogeneity of Precambrian crust continues to be a focus for deep seismic reflection studies. High-resolution two-dimensional (2D) seismic profiles and a high-resolution 3D seismic volume, all centered on Decatur (Illinois, USA), provide new insights on the structure and composition of Precambrian basement beneath the Illinois Basin of the central USA midcontinent. The new data reveal a pattern of strong and coherent reflections and associated diffractions deeply buried within the eastern Granite-Rhyolite Province. This pattern is dominated by a thick seismic stratigraphic sequence, which is wedge or bowl shaped in cross section and has an angular unconformity with the overlying Paleozoic section. Deeper intrabasement bowl-shaped sequences or series are also observed in the same area. We interpret these features to be a northward continuation of analogous basement sequences located 75 km to the south below the southern part of the Illinois Basin. This correlation indicates a vast Precambrian province with a north-south dimension of >200 km. Although multiple explanations are admissible for the Precambrian reflectivity, the most likely for our study area is igneous intrusion of broad mafic igneous (diabase?) sills possibly underlain by small plutons. The concentration of such mafic (or bimodal) igneous activity within or coeval with the eastern Granite-Rhyolite Province suggests an episode of Proterozoic crustal extension and rifting.


Chronic allograft nephropathy (CAN) still remains an important factor that affects the long-term survival of renal recipients. The aim of the study was to investigate synergistic effect of enalapril (an angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor, ACEI) and Cordyceps sinensis (Bailing capsule, fermented agent of C. sinensis) on CAN and pursue an effective therapy to control CAN progression. A total of 84 CAN patients who underwent transplantation (live related donor, no prisoners were used in this study) were involved in the study and randomized into four groups. Group A (n=22) received combined treatment of enalapril (10 mg/day) and C. sinensis (2.0 g/per times, three times per day), group B (n=20) was treated with enalapril (10 mg/day), group C (n=21) with C. sinensis (same dose as in group A) and group D (n=21) treated with immunosuppressive agents was set as control. Serum creatinine (SCr), blood urea nitrogen (BUN), creatinine clearance rate (CCr), urinary protein in 24 h (24 h Upro) and urinary transforming growth factor beta 1 (TGFß1) of all patients were measured before treatment, and at six months after treatment. After treatment for six months, SCr and CCr were improved while 24 h Upro and urinary TGF-ß1 decreased in group A, and SCr improved and 24 h Upro decreased in group C. Patients of group A obtained the highest degree of improvement, and more patients obtained renal improvement and stability than in the other groups. The results of the study show that combined use of enalapril and C. sinensis takes advantages of reducing excretion of urinary protein, improving renal function and retarding CAN progression for CAN patients compared with single use of enalapril or C. sinensis.


OBJECTIVE--To assess the value of emergency surgical standby for percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty. DESIGN--Retrospective review of the major complications of coronary angioplasty in a regional cardiac centre. SETTING--All angioplasties were performed in the cardiac catheterisation laboratory of Wythenshawe Hospital with surgical standby in an adjoining operating theatre. PATIENTS--1262 vessels were dilated in 1032 patients (mean age 53 years) between 1984 and 1989. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES--In-hospital mortality from emergency surgical revascularisation after angioplasty; the rate of myocardial infarction and overall morbidity. RESULTS--Coronary angioplasty achieved primary success in 90% of cases. Thirty eight (3.7%) patients (five women (mean age 55.8) and 33 men (mean age 53.0] were referred for urgent surgical revascularisation--36 direct to operation and two within 24 hours. All patients survived surgery. Five of the 38 had had a previous angioplasty to the same vessel and one had had previous coronary artery grafts. Four of the 38 had an angioplasty for unstable angina. Eighteen had single, 13 double, and seven triple vessel coronary artery disease. The target vessel was the left anterior descending in 25, right coronary artery in nine, circumflex in three, and the left anterior descending and circumflex coronary arteries in one. Five required external cardiac massage on the way to the operating theatre; two of them had a left main stem occlusion. Four internal mammary artery and 60 reversed saphenous vein grafts were implanted (1.6 per patient). Complete revascularisation was achieved in 36 (94.7%) patients. Q wave myocardial infarction occurred in six (15.8%). The final outcome was: none dead, three patients with angina, one late death, one cerebrovascular accident, one late operation for a new left anterior descending lesion, two patients on diuretics with or without an angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor. One orthotopic transplant was performed in a patient in whom cardiogenic shock developed after the left anterior descending coronary artery became occluded 72 hours after angioplasty. CONCLUSION--There was no surgical mortality and low morbidity among patients for whom immediate surgical cover was requested.


We present high-resolution adaptive optics (AO) corrected images of the silhouette disk Orion 218-354 taken with Magellan AO (MagAO) and its visible light camera, VisAO, in simultaneous differential imaging mode at Hα. This is the first image of a circumstellar disk seen in silhouette with AO and is among the first visible light AO results in the literature. We derive the disk extent, geometry, intensity, and extinction profiles and find, in contrast with previous work, that the disk is likely optically thin at Hα. Our data provide an estimate of the column density in primitive, ISM-like grains as a function of radius in the disk. We estimate that only ∼10% of the total submillimeter derived disk mass lies in primitive, unprocessed grains. We use our data, Monte Carlo radiative transfer modeling, and previous results from the literature to make the first self-consistent multiwavelength model of Orion 218-354. We find that we are able to reproduce the 1–1000 μm spectral energy distribution with a ∼2–540 AU disk of the size, geometry, small versus large grain proportion, and radial mass profile indicated by our data. This inner radius is a factor of ∼15 larger than the sublimation radius of the disk, suggesting that it is likely cleared in the very interior.


. Semantic technologies are recognized as crucial in those domains, which intensively exploit information and communication technologies (ICT) and automation technologies (AT). Ontology engineering means can facilitate new functionalities, organizational structures and processes. Intra- and inter-organizational integration of different layers, functions, domains and processes may be simplified or enabled. Knowledge-driven solutions can be also facilitat-ed. This paper investigates functional aspects of ontology-aided manufacturing and supply chain management by a literature review. The purpose is to assess potential for further research and to suggest its future key directions, aiming at novel solutions in terms of structures, controls, processes and functionalities.


We report a simple, cost-effective, scalable and efficient method for creating transgenic Caenorhabditis elegans that requires minimal hands-on time. The method combines biolistic bombardment with selection for transgenics that bear a hygromycin B resistance gene on agar plates supplemented with hygromycin B, taking advantage of our observation that hygromycin B is sufficient to kill wild-type C. elegans at very low concentrations. Crucially, the method provides substantial improvements in the success of bombardments for isolating transmitting strains, the isolation of multiple independent strains, and the isolation of integrated strains: 100% of bombardments in a large data set yielded transgenics; 10 or more independent strains were isolated from 84% of bombardments, and up to 28 independent strains were isolated from a single bombardment; 82% of bombardments yielded stably transmitting integrated lines with most yielding multiple integrated lines. We anticipate that the selection will be widely adopted for C. elegans transgenesis via bombardment, and that hygromycin B resistance will be adopted as a marker in other approaches for manipulating, introducing or deleting DNA in C. elegans.


The reliability of transportation networks, an emerging field of research, attracts numerous researchers around the world. This paper presents a literature taxonomy of research on the reliability of road networks and an assessment of existing road network evaluation methodologies from the viewpoint of practicability, and suggests a new road network evaluation methodology for the prioritization of links to be improved in response to network closure vulnerability. The literature taxonomy includes a subdivision of reliability studies based on a broad range of relevant criteria including conceptual studies, mathematical theory, network evaluation methodologies, descriptive studies, application or case studies and ways to improve reliability. A detailed assessment of existing network evaluation methodologies is presented along with their strengths and weaknesses from a practical perspective. A network performance index is proposed for the evaluation of links. An application of the proposed methodology to the Tohoku regional road network, where numerous links were closed after the Great East Japan Earthquake, is presented.


OBJECTIVE: To observe the therapeutic and prognostic effects and to evaluate the safety of Zhi-Xin-Fang on heart failure resulting from cardiomyopathy. METHODS: 62 patients with cardiomyopathy combined with heart failure were treated with standard western medical therapy as treatment group. The other 60 patients with the same diseases were administered with both Zhi-Xin-Fang and standard western medicines as control. Several parameters were observed to evaluate the effect of Zhi-Xin-Fang on the heart failure, containing the therapeutic effect of clinical symptom and physical signs, the improvement of heart function and the ultrasonic caridogram. We also observed the effect of Zhi-Xin-Fang to relieve the clinical symptom and improve the heart function and quality of life and prognosis. RESULTS: As the NYHA classify for heart failure, the effective rate for the treatment group was 95% , more effective than the control group (effective rate: 80.65%) (P<0.05). There was significant improvement for LVEF and LVDS for both groups. However, the treatment group was better than the control group (P<0.05). The clinical symptom was significantly improved compared to the untreatment in both groups. The treatment group was better than the control group for effective rate (P<0.05) but not for the total effective rate. There was no significant difference for the function of liver and kidney, blood routine method, electrolyte compared to before for the two groups. CONCLUSION: The standard western medicines combined with Zhi-Xin-Fang is a good therapy for treating heart failure resulting from cardiomyopathy. The combined therapy can relieve the cinical symptom of heart failure, improve the heart function and quality of life. It is also safer for the patients. However, its long-term prognosis should be further studied in the future.


In this study, we investigate couples' division of household labor and childcare tasks in France, eastern Germany, and western Germany. We examine whether differences between France and the two German regions in the division of housework already exist among couples who are as of yet childless, or if such differences emerge only upon entry into parenthood, and to what extent they depend on the age of the youngest child. We study to what extent differing divisions of housework can be explained by differences in maternal employment, relative income, gender values, and marital status, and whether there is convergence in housework allocation as children grow older and differences in maternal employment rates grow smaller. We employ data from the French and the German Generations and Gender Survey (GGS) and carry out our analyses using ordered logistic regression models. We find evidence that important differences in the division of household labor between France, eastern and western Germany emerge only upon entry into parenthood, and that the division of housework develops in different directions with the age of the youngest child in each of the countries or regions.


INTRODUCTION: Fibromyalgia affects 8% of the population over the age of 40 years, and 75% of the patients with fibromyalgia have poor sleep quality. OBJECTIVE: To assess the effects of hydrotherapy on the physical function and sleep quality of patients with fibromyalgia. METHODS: Patients were under clinical care at the UNASP Outpatient Clinic. This study assessed 60 female patients with fibromyalgia aged between 30 and 65 years. Out of the 60 patients assessed, 20 were excluded and 10 left the study because they could not comply with the time schedule. All patients completed the following questionnaires: Fibromyalgia Impact Questionnaire (FIQ); Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, and Epworth Sleepiness Scale. Training sessions were performed twice a week for two months, each session lasting 60 minutes. RESULTS: Patients' mean age was 45 years, 66% were active workers, and 34% had quit work. Right after the hydrotherapy program, the patients improved the following aspects assessed by use of the FIQ: physical function, work absenteeism, ability to do job, pain intensity, fatigue, morning tiredness, stiffness (P < 0.0001), anxiety (P = 0,0013), and depression (P < 0.0001). Sleep quality (P < 0.0001) and daytime sleepiness (P = 0.0003) also improved. CONCLUSION: Hydrotherapy improves sleep quality, physical function, professional status, psychological disorders and physical symptoms in patients with fibromyalgia.


MgO–La2O3 mixed oxide (MLx) supports with varying La2O3 content (x = 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 by wt) were synthesized by a co-precipitation method. A constant composition (20 wt%) of an active metal, cobalt, was loaded on MLx supports by the wet impregnation method. The physico-chemical properties of these solids were determined by BET surface area, ICP-OES, XRD, H2-TPR, CO2-TPD, FT-IR, H2-pulse chemisorption and CHN techniques. All the catalysts were evaluated for hydrogen production by vapor phase glycerol steam reforming at atmospheric pressure. Partial substitution of La in LaCoO3 with MgO has increased the reducibility of the perovskite, enhanced the dispersion of the active metal and played a vital role in carbon removal from the active site. The best catalytic activity with 100% glycerol conversion to gas products (H2, CO, CH4 and CO2) and a maximum hydrogen yield of 72.8% has been achieved for 20 wt% of the Co/1MgO : 3La2O3 catalyst at 700 °C. The catalyst activity also remained stable up to 35 h on stream analysis.


The formulation of reflection coefficients from an inhomogeneous lossy medium illuminated by TE and TM waves is approximately derived, in closed form, by using a microwave network method. From the formulation, a novel inverse scattering scheme to reconstruct simultaneously the permittivity and conductivity profiles, is proposed. This scheme is suitable for both continuous and discontinuous profiles, under both the weak scattering and strong scattering conditions. It has also been shown that when the conductivity of the medium equals zero, the reconstructed result of this scheme will reduce to the one formulated by Ladouceur and Jordan (1985). Numerical and closed-form reconstruction examples show the validity of the scheme. >


In this study, expressed sequence tags- simple sequence repeat (EST-SSRs) were surveyed in three cotton genomes (Gossypium arboreum, Ga; Gossypium raimondii, Gr and Gossypium hirsutum, Gh ). The frequency of EST-SSRs was highest in Gr, and motif type for hexanucleotide was obviously abundant in Gr. Trinucleotide repeats were the most abundant motif; AT and AG, AAG and ATC were the most frequent motifs for dinucleotide and trinucleotide, respectively. The repeat number was greatly diverse between the three genomes with the highest variation in Gh. AG and AAG had a high frequency both in homologue groups (HGs) with and without repeat number change between genomes. The range of repeat number change in each HG was wider in Gr-Gh. The annotation of the SSR-ESTs showed that more Gene Ontology (GO) items targeted by SSR-ESTs of Ga and Gr than those of Gh. This study gave us new insights into the difference between the three cotton genomes, which will be more helpful to understand the differentiation and evolution of the three genomes. Key words : Cotton, simple sequence repeat, expressed sequence tags, motif, gene ontology.


The National Football League (the NFL or the League), like the National Basketball Association (NBA) and Major League Baseball (MLB), has a long history of racial exclusion. And like these other long-standing American professional sport leagues, desegregation among players preceded desegregation among coaches. As slowly increasing numbers of minorities assumed NBA head coaching positions and MLB managing positions toward the end of the twentieth century, however, minority NFL coaches were less likely to receive head coaching opportunities than their basketball and baseball counterparts. Indeed, as of 2002, only two minorities held head coaching positions in the thirty-two team NFL, and only five, including those two, had held head coaching positions during the League's modern era. Four years later, however, the NFL had more than tripled its number of minority head coaches and shone as a model for other athletic institutions seeking to provide head coaching candidates equal employment opportunity. This article seeks to explore the history of racial exclusion in the NFL, the particular barriers minority coaches seeking NFL head coaching positions have faced, and the effort to level the playing field for such coaches.


Introduction: One of the main mechanisms by which diabetic complications occur is an alteration of the structure and function of proteins due to hyperglycemia. Aspirin (ASA) affects cellular pathways through different mechanisms, including glycation inhibition and antioxidant activity. The aim of the present study, as a follow up to our previous one, is to investigate the effect of long-term, high-dose ASA therapy on mitochondrial respiratory chain complexes in the kidneys and brain of streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats. Its effect on liver toxicity of the rats was also investigated. Materials and Methods: High dose of ASA (100 mg/kg in drinking water) was administered to streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats during the twelve-week study period. After that, the rats were sacrificed under anesthesia and the tissues were retained -80 °C. Then the activity of respiratory chain complexes and the mentioned enzyme were measured in the brain, kidney, liver and serum of rats. Results: Treatment of diabetic rats with ASA could significantly compensate for the decreased activity of complex III respiratory chain in the kidneys. In addition, the activity of the liver enzymes (ALT, AST, ALP and LDH) in the serum of diabetic rats was significantly reduced by administration of ASA. However, there were no other significant functional changes observed in the kidney and brain respiratory chains complexes and the mentioned enzymes in liver. Conclusion: In conclusion, ASA therapy has a beneficial effect on the mitochondrial complexes and some serum enzymes in diabetic rats.


Introduction: Cultivation of medicinal and aromatic plants has always had a special situation in the traditional system of agriculture and these systems have played a major role in the diversification and sustainability of agricultural ecosystems. Tend to produce medicinal and aromatic plants and demand for natural products, especially in terms of ecological culture in the world is increasing. Ajowan is an annual herbaceous plant from the Apiaceae family. Biological fertilizers produced by the activity of microorganisms are associated with nitrogen fixation or availability of phosphorus and other nutrients in the soil. Enrichment means increasing the concentration of nutrients in plants especially micronutrients. Application of biological fertilizers instead of using chemicals is one of the most important nutritional strategies in sustainable management of agro ecosystems. In this regard, the effect of enrichment with bio-fertilizers and micronutrients on Ajowan (Carum copticum L.) germination characteristics was studied at Birjand Agricultural Research Laboratory.
Materials and Methods: A factorial experiment based on a CRD (completely randomized design) was conducted with three replications at Birjand Agricultural Research Laboratory during 2011. Experimental treatments consisted of bio-fertilizer application with three levels including without inoculation, and seed inoculation with Azospirillum and Azotobacter and seed enrichment with ten different treatment levels including without enrichment, and enrichment using 1, 2 and 3 mM of Fe, Zn and Mn elements. Bacteria were provided by Soil and Water Research Institute of Tehran. Initially, the seeds were disinfected through immersing them in 1% sodium hypochlorite for 3 minutes and then washing them with the tap water for 2-3 times. For the Enrichment of seeds, depending on the treatments, Petri dishes were treated with 10 ml of micronutrients solution for 24 hours. Then for bacterial inoculation depending on the type of treatments, seeds were soaked in 7 ml of inoculums containing 108 alive and active bacteria per ml for 5 hours. In each treatment, 15 seeds were placed in Petri dishes sealed with parafilm and placed in a germinator set at 70% RH and 25/15 °C. The traits studied were: germination percentage, germination rate, root and shoot length, as well as root and shoot fresh and dry weight. Before analyzing the data, normality test was performed and analysis of variance was performed using Genstat and graphs were drawn using Excel software.
Results and Discussion: The Analysis of variances results showed that seed inoculation with biological fertilizers and micronutrients significantly increased germination rate, root and shoot length, root fresh weight and dry weight of root and shoot of Ajowan compared with the control. Results showed that there were not significant differences between treatments in terms of germination percentage. Using micronutrients for seed enrichment caused increased germination rate. The maximum germination rate value was obtained from the Mn 1mM treatment (2.164 seeds per day), and. its minimum value was obtained from Zn1 (1.55 seeds per day). The maximum and minimum values of root length were obtained from the combined treatments of azotobacter + Fe2 and Azospirillum + Zn3, respectively. The maximum and minimum values of shoot length were obtained from the combined treatments of azotobacter + Mn2 and Azospirillum + Zn3, respectively. The highest and lowest values of shoot dry weight were obtained from azotobacter + Fe3 and azotobacter, respectively. The highest and lowest values of root dry weight were obtained from Zn1 (2.35 mg) and Mn2 (0.4 mg), respectively. The highest and lowest values of root fresh weight were obtained from Azospriliium+ Mn3 and Azospriliium+ Zn2, respectively. The highest and lowest values of shoot fresh weight were obtained from Azotobacter+Mn2 and Mn3, respectively.
Conclusion: During the evaluation of the measured traits regarding to bio fertilizers application on ajowan, it was observed that all biological treatments were superior to the control (non-biological fertilizer) and Azotobacter was the most effective amongst them. Bio fertilizers applications used in this study showed significant effects on root and shoot length, as well as fresh weight of root and shoot. The use of micro-nutrients on ajowan, showed that the application of 1 and 2 mM of Mn and all three concentrations enhanced the examined characteristics, while the application of 1 mM of Zn was just effective on root and shoot dry weight. Overall,application of these micronutrients had significant effects on germination rate and root length and fresh weight of root and shoot as well as dry weight of shoot and root.


Dalbergia sissoo is an important timber tree facing mysterious die back and wilting problem. In case of die back, Dalbergia is facing the threat of destruction in its natural habitats due to lack of potential pathogenicity test which is the major bottleneck in pathogen assessment and tree improvement programmes. Isolation of protoplasts was attempted to produce an effective source for the pathogenicity test. This study described a procedure for the rapid isolation, in high yield, of photosynthetically active mesophyll protoplasts from young leaves of D. sissoo. The present study reports the isolation of protoplasts from leaf mesophyll of D. sissoo . Leaf strips were suspended in the enzyme solution for the isolation of protoplast. Different concentrations of enzymes were used to optimize the suitable combination for the protoplast isolation. Enzyme solution turned green after a gentle swirling motion, which indicates the release of protoplasts. Release of protoplast was checked in the solution under the microscope. A combination of filtration, centrifugation and washing was used to purify the protoplasts. The optimum combination of enzymes for protoplast isolation was 1.5% cellulase R-10+ 0.5 % pectinase R-1 after incubation for 6 hr at 28 o C. The isolated protoplasts were round and filled with chloroplasts. The size of protoplasts was 20~35 μm. The protoplast yield was 2 × 10 5 per g of leaf tissue. The protoplast viability as assessed by 0.01% Phenosaphranine staining was 77%. @JASEM Key words : Dalbergia sissoo, Leaf mesophyll, Protoplasts,  Phenosaphranine.


: An anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) rupture is a very common musculoskeletal injury. The number of ACL reconstructions is increasing, both in the Netherlands and worldwide. Substantial progress has been made in surgical technique: from open to arthroscopic procedures. An ACL reconstruction will not diminish the chance of osteoarthritis, and the biomechanical properties of the knee will never be the same as before the trauma. An ACL reconstruction does, however, reduce the chance of instability, or 'giving way', which is the most important indication for surgical intervention. There are insufficient long-term results described in the literature to indicate either surgery or conservative measures as the treatment of choice. Treatment should be individually determined, taking into consideration factors such as: pattern of symptoms, degree of instability, desire to practise sport, age and willingness to commit to a 9-month rehabilitation programme.


We consider the problem of rate-distortion optimal streaming of packetized media with sender-driven transmission over a single-QoS network using feedback and retransmissions. For a single data unit, we prove that the problem is NP-hard and provide efficient branch and bound algorithms that are in practice much faster than the best known solution. For a group of interdependent data units, we show how to compute optimal solutions with branch and bound algorithms. The branch and bound algorithms for a group of data units are slower than the current state of the art, the heuristic sensitivity adaptation algorithm, but provide a significantly better rate-distortion performance in many real-world situations.


Voice activity detection is an essential pre-processing component for speech-related tasks such as automatic speech recognition (ASR). Traditional supervised VAD systems obtain frame-level labels from an ASR pipeline by using, e.g., a Hidden Markov model. These ASR models are commonly trained on clean and fully transcribed data, limiting VAD systems to be trained on clean or synthetically noised datasets. Therefore, a major challenge for supervised VAD systems is their generalization towards noisy, real-world data. This work proposes a data-driven teacher-student approach for VAD, which utilizes vast and unconstrained audio data for training. Unlike previous approaches, only weak labels during teacher training are required, enabling the utilization of any real-world, potentially noisy dataset. Our approach firstly trains a teacher model on a source dataset (Audioset) using clip-level supervision. After training, the teacher provides frame-level guidance to a student model on an unlabeled, target dataset. A multitude of student models trained on mid- to large-sized datasets are investigated (Audioset, Voxceleb, NIST SRE). Our approach is then respectively evaluated on clean, artificially noised, and real-world data. We observe significant performance gains in artificially noised and real-world scenarios. Lastly, we compare our approach against other unsupervised and supervised VAD methods, demonstrating our method's superiority.


In France, the nuclear industry has developed a substantial program for decommissioning plants and nuclear installations, and for remediating and rehabilitating industrial sites. The Commission for the Establishment of Analysis Methods (CETAMA) is a unit of the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) whose main objective is to improve the quality of analysis and measurement results in the nuclear field. Analysis is the primary tool for monitoring the spread of nuclear material. This document shows that sampling, in close relation with measurement techniques, is a factor of potential gain and risk reduction for site remediation, decommissioning, and rehabilitation projects.© 2011 ASME


Pervasive systems are intended to make use of services and components that they encounter in their environment. Such systems are naturally spatial in that they can only be understood in terms of the ways in which components meet and interact in space. Rather than treating spatiality separately from system components, researchers are starting to develop computational models in which the entire structure of a pervasive system is modelled and constructed using an explicit spatial model, supporting multi-level spatial reasoning, and adapting autonomously to spatial interactions. In this paper we review current and emerging models of spatial computing for pervasive ecosystems, and highlight some of the trends that will guide future research.


Summary
In this work, the effects of initial morphology/crystalline form and the guest molecules used for the preparation of syndiotactic polystyrene (sPS) co-crystals, on the structural phase transitions of sPS upon the guest extraction process were systematically investigated. For that purpose, samples having two different initial morphologies such as amorphous and γ form were used as the starting materials and guests such as chloroform and toluene were used for the preparation of sPS co-crystals. Selective extraction of guest molecules resulted in complex phase transitions in the host structure. In the case of toluene-treated amorphous samples, the structure transformed into the δ (δe) form. On the other hand, the chloroform-treated amorphous samples transformed into the mixture of nanoporous δ (δe) and ϵ (ϵe) forms. When chloroform-treated γ form samples were used for the guest extraction, the ϵ (ϵe) form with channel-shaped cavities was obtained. In contrast, when toluene-treated γ form samples were for used guest extraction, the co-crystal structure transformed to its initial crystalline form, i.e., γ form, instead of forming nanoporous structure.


This thesis seeks to explore how management practices developed in the U.K. using three of the big four railway companies as case studies. It will be argued that the managers in the UK, whilst aware of the debates on "Systematic" management and US practices, pioneered their own approach. Many of these practices were begun before amalgamation in 1923, but were only fully developed afterwards. We begin by exploring the history of management with an outline in Chapter Two on management ideas from the turn of the 20th century to 1939. This is followed by an analysis of management practices from circa 1900 to the amalgamation of 1923 in Chapter Three. Chapter Four introduces the railway companies within the context of their commercial environment. Chapter Five addresses the problem of achieving control of conveyance operations was addressed using similar methods by all companies. The key difference lay in the extent to which techniques were applied: the LMS developed centralised Train Control which enabled a systematic analysis of information to be made. The GWR and LNER introduced localised Traffic Control which did not allow such systematic analysis. In Chapter Six we see how the LMS employed management consultants to study terminal work using Time and Motion studies. Both the GWR and LNER emulated LMS practice by 1939. However these techniques were not the only solution. The LMS identified particular problems after amalgamation which it was felt could be solved by such analysis. The GWR on the other had concentrated on the transhipment freight, with encouraging results. Chapter Seven examines how railways perceived and interacted with their external business environment. New services were offered on the basis of research directed at identifying customers and the services they required. Agents of all companies would investigate opportunities for business and advise customers on their best options. The LMS and GWR had sophisticated Research Departments dedicated to the collection of commercial and economic information regarding the traffic available. If we take the essence of what these were trying to achieve: a rational and scientific approach to management problems, then the railway companies appear in a favourable light. Whatever criticisms are made of the railways, it was not a failure to adopt new management methods.


Auroral roar, a radio emission occurring near the second and third electron cyclotron harmonics, has been monitored during a 51‐day interval in 1998 from three ground‐based high‐latitude observatories: Churchill (69° corrected geomagnetic latitude (cgm)), Baker Lake (74° cgm), and the Early Polar Cap Observatory (EPCO) at Resolute (84° cgm). These observations reveal a latitude dependence of the local time distribution of auroral roar events. In the auroral zone they occur predominantly in the premidnight‐midnight sector as previously reported, but in the polar cap they occur evenly throughout nighttime hours. Sorting the data by magnetic activity level confirms the effect; for example, the distribution of events at Baker Lake during times of extremely low activity (Kp < 1) is concentrated near magnetic midnight, consistent with Baker Lake lying in the auroral zone when the oval is contracted. The latitude dependence of the local time distribution may be explained by propagation effects, with inefficient propagation in the auroral zone causing only relatively locally generated emissions to be detected there, while stations well poleward of the auroral zone detect emissions from sources widely distributed in longitude and latitude. Statistics of the frequencies of auroral roar events detected at Resolute show evidence of an upper frequency cutoff near 2960 kHz. Ray‐tracing calculations suggest that it is plausible for auroral roar to reach Resolute from sources up to 1500 km distant in the auroral zone, but they do not provide an obvious explanation for the frequency cutoff.


The fullerene (C60) is economically significant due to its significant applications in diverse areas like nanochemistry, superconductivity, materials science, etc. The carbon allotrope fullerene C60 and C70 are identified within the thick sequence of black carbonaceous units belonging to the shungite suite of rock at the baryte mine, Mangampet, Andhra Pradesh. Since this is the first of its kind from India's geological material, the exploration of fullerenes enriched barytes from the mines at Mangampet in the Kadapa district is essential. In the present study, remote sensing techniques such as hyperspectral analysis followed by Mixture Tuned Matched Filtering (MTMF) and Support Vector Machine (SVM), and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) were used for exploring the presence of fullerene bearing baryte deposits in the Mangampet mine. The spectra measured for baryte samples were used as reference spectra for deriving true endmember from Landsat OLI and ASTER satellite data. The detailed characterisation of structure and chemistry of the baryte samples were carried out using techniques like Energy Dispersive X-ray Fluorescence (EDXRF), X-ray Powder Diffraction (XRD), X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), and Fourier-Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) techniques. The High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) and Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization (MALDI) mass spectrometry analyses confirm fullerene presence in baryte deposits. The retention time at 11.783–11.822 min obtained from HPLC and high-intensity rate m/z at 720.178 obtained from MALDI spectra suggest fullerene in baryte mine deposits. The remote sensing exploration of fullerene bearing shungite suite of rocks in baryte mineral deposits of Mangampet mine has opened up new research areas for converting this material into value-added products.


This list of databases and websites has been compiled by librarians at the D. Samuel Gottesman Library. Browse by title or search this guide for a specific resource.


Lassa fever is an acute immunosuppressive illness of increasing public health concern causing severe morbidity and significant mortality (Case fatality rate (CFR) ≥ 50%) especially in epidemic cases. Although Lassa fever has emerged (following its first detection (1969) in Lassa town, Nigeria) as one of the most prevalent and debilitating viral haemorrhagic fevers endemic in West Africa region (Nigeria inclusive), yet, the control/prevention of the regular outbreak of the disease has become an herculean task in the areas affected; there is inadequate healthcare facility (including Laboratory/diagnostic and care centres), poor socioeconomic environment, lack of awareness among the populace and presence of favourable ecologic niche for the survival and propagation of the natural host and reservoir mouse ( Mastomys natalensis ) of Lassa virus . Lassa fever is mainly transmitted by contact with excretions and secretions of infected rats via foods and water as well as exposure to other contaminated items. Lassa virus is a member of an Old World Arenariruses, of family Arenaviridae . It is an enveloped, single-stranded (SS) bisegmented RNA virus with ability to replicate very rapidly. It consists of 4 lineages; 3 members are identified as ancenstral strains found in Nigeria, while the fourth is domiciled in other West Africa Countries. Lassa virus infects almost every tissue in human body resulting in multisystemic dysfunction. The incubation period is generally between 6 to 21 days resulting in 3 stages of clinical manifestation viz: Acute phase characterized by flu-like, non-specific illness; haemorrhagic phase accompanied with gastrointestinal symptoms and cardiovascular/neurologic complications. Currently, there is no clinically certified Lassa fever vaccine thus complicating deterrent or preventive measures. Hence, there is need for intensification of educational programs for the populace on the useful control measures against Lassa fever. The stakeholders need to prioritize intervention and support program and also speed up the processes leading to the production of effective vaccine to limit the menace of Lassa fever outbreak and associated morbidity, fatality and high socio-economic cost. Keywords: Lassa fever, endemic, epidemic, reservoir rodent, West Africa


[1] Visible and near-infrared (VNIR) multispectral observations of rocks made by the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit's Panoramic camera (Pancam) have been analyzed using a spectral mixture analysis (SMA) methodology. Scenes have been examined from the Gusev crater plains into the Columbia Hills. Most scenes on the plains and in the Columbia Hills could be modeled as three end-member mixtures of a bright material, rock, and shade. Scenes of rocks disturbed by the rover's Rock Abrasion Tool (RAT) required additional end-members. In the Columbia Hills, there were a number of scenes in which additional rock end-members were required. The SMA methodology identified relatively dust-free areas on undisturbed rock surfaces as well as spectrally unique areas on RAT abraded rocks. Spectral parameters from these areas were examined, and six spectral classes were identified. These classes are named after a type rock or area and are Adirondack, Lower West Spur, Clovis, Wishstone, Peace, and Watchtower. These classes are discriminable based, primarily, on near-infrared (NIR) spectral parameters. Clovis and Watchtower class rocks appear more oxidized than Wishstone class rocks and Adirondack basalts based on their having higher 535 nm band depths. Comparison of the spectral parameters of these Gusev crater rocks to parameters of glass-dominated basaltic tuffs indicates correspondence between measurements of Clovis and Watchtower classes but divergence for the Wishstone class rocks, which appear to have a higher fraction of crystalline ferrous iron-bearing phases. Despite a high sulfur content, the rock Peace has NIR properties resembling plains basalts.


This study presents an investigation of the dynamic interactions between a surface structure lying on two different soil deposits and a square-shaped buried structure embedded in the soil. To this end, a large number of numerical models are generated by using a well-known Finite Element Method software, i.e., OpenSEES. The interaction phenomenon is assumed to be affected by six different parameters. In the parametric study, these parameters are assumed to have various values in accordance with the engineering practices. A total of 1620 possible combinations of the parameter values are addressed in this study. 30 different numerical models are also generated as the \'free-field cases\' to set a reference. The surface structure drift and acceleration amplifications are used as a measure to evaluate the dynamic interactions. The response (i.e., drifts and accelerations) amplifications are calculated as the ratio of the maximum surface structure response in any \'case\' to the maximum surface structure response in corresponding free-field case. Variation of the response amplifications with any of the investigated parameters is addressed in this paper. The results obtained from the numerical analyses clearly reveal that the presence of a buried structure in the vicinity of a surface structure can cause both amplification and de-amplification of the surface structure responses, depending on the case parameters.


ABSTRACT Purpose: To evaluate the trend of use of Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) for screening of prostate cancer (PC) among Brazilian doctors, from the beginning of its regular availability in clinical laboratories. Material and Methods: A serial cross-sectional study was performed using data obtained from a large database between 1997 and 2016. The general PSA screening trend during this period, adjusted for the total number of exams performed in men, was analyzed. Time-series analysis was performed through observation of the general regression curve using the generalized least squares method, and the impact of the recommendations was assessed with autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) models. Results: During the period studied 2,521,383 PSA determinations were done. The age of the participants ranged from 21 to 111 years, with an average of 56.7 ± 22.7 years. The relative number of PSA tests/100.000 exams in males showed a constant reduction since 2001, and this trend was more evident in the group aged 55-69 years. Although statistically significant, the impact of reduced PSA screening after the 2012 USPSTF publication was clinically irrelevant. Conclusions: Our results indicated a continuous reduction in the use of PSA screening over time, regardless of the publication of recommendations or clinical guidelines. The fact that this trend was more pronounced among those with a greater benefit potential (55-69 years), relative to groups with a greater damage potential due to overdiagnosis and overtreatment (aged >74 years and <40 years), is a matter of concern. Follow-up studies of these trends are advisable.


Eating and Drinking Ability Classification System (EDACS) describes the full range of eating and drinking abilities of people with cerebral palsy (CP) in 5 distinct levels, using key features of safety and efficiency. This study investigated the stability of EDACS using retrospective case‐record data.
Patients and method: Case‐records for 100 children with CP were examined to collect retrospective data about eating and drinking abilities, at four time‐points, minimum 2years between each time‐point. Gender, GMFCS level, presence of feeding tube and orthopaedic issues were also recorded. One speech and language therapist (SLT) classified eating and drinking ability using EDACS for all cases at all time‐points; a second SLT assigned EDACS levels for 25 cases at all time‐points. Stability over time and inter‐observer reliability were assessed using intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). Association between children's GMFCS and EDACS levels was calculated using Kendall's tau.
Results: Out of 100 children, 50 were male, 49 had feeding tubes, and 85 had orthopaedic issues. ICC across all time‐points was 0.97 (95% CI 0.96–0.98); changes in EDACS levels occurred infrequently and never by more than one level. ICC between the two SLTs was 0.95 (95% CI 0.91–0.97). Kendall's tau was 0.58, p<0.001 (GMFCS vs EDACS).
Conclusion: Children's eating and drinking abilities classified retrospectively using EDACS appear reliable and stable over 6 or more years. This study provides evidence to support use of EDACS to predict future outcomes. Some parents want to know what the future holds for their children when making decisions about supplementary nutrition including enteral feeding.


Abstract Objective To assess oil consumption, vitamin A intake and retinol status before and a year after the fortification of unbranded palm oil with retinyl palmitate. Design Pre–post evaluation between two surveys. Setting Twenty-four villages in West Java. Subjects Poor households were randomly sampled. Serum retinol (adjusted for subclinical infection) was analysed in cross-sectional samples of lactating mothers (baseline n 324/endline n 349), their infants aged 6–11 months (n 318/n 335) and children aged 12–59 months (n 469/477), and cohorts of children aged 5–9 years (n 186) and women aged 15–29 years (n 171), alongside food and oil consumption from dietary recall. Results Fortified oil improved vitamin A intakes, contributing on average 26 %, 40 %, 38 %, 29 % and 35 % of the daily Recommended Nutrient Intake for children aged 12–23 months, 24–59 months, 5–9 years, lactating and non-lactating women, respectively. Serum retinol was 2–19 % higher at endline than baseline (P<0·001 in infants aged 6–11 months, children aged 5–9 years, lactating and non-lactating women; non-significant in children aged 12–23 months; P=0·057 in children aged 24–59 months). Retinol in breast milk averaged 20·5 μg/dl at baseline and 32·5 μg/dl at endline (P<0·01). Deficiency prevalence (serum retinol <20 μg/dl) was 6·5–18 % across groups at baseline, and 0·6–6 % at endline (P≤0·011). In multivariate regressions adjusting for socio-economic differences, vitamin A intake from fortified oil predicted improved retinol status for children aged 6–59 months (P=0·003) and 5–9 years (P=0·03). Conclusions Although this evaluation without a comparison group cannot prove causality, retinyl contents in oil, Recommended Nutrient Intake contributions and relationships between vitamin intake and serum retinol provide strong plausibility of oil fortification impacting vitamin A status in Indonesian women and children.


The 16S rRNA sequence of Trichodesmium sp. strain NIBB 1067 was determined and used for the construction of a distance tree and bootstrap analysis. The tree shows that, among the available cyanobacterial 16S rRNA sequences, Trichodesmium NIBB 1067 has Oscillatoria PCC 7515 as its closest relative, presenting 94.9% of sequence similarity with the latter strain. This is in contrast to a difference of 9 mol% G+C in mean genomic DNA base composition between the two organisms. Nevertheless, the genotypic heterogeneity presented by a number of strains assigned to the genus Oscillatoria hinders a taxonomic decision on the separate existence of the genera Trichodesmium and Oscillatoria. The sequence of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) between the 16S and 23S rRNA genes was also determined, as a possible marker to study inter- and intraspecific variability. The ITS contains the genes coding for tRNA(Ile) and tRNA(Ala) and its total length is 547 nucleotides. In six out of eight sequenced clones, there is a duplication of 29 nucleotides, surrounding the 5' end of the tRNA(Ile).


A small amount of Zn or Sn was added to Mg-3%Al alloy to improve the formability of alloy. The elongation of as-rolled alloy was increased at both room temperature and 300oC by addition of Sn or Zn, even though the tensile strength at room temperature was remarkably increased only by Zn. When the as-rolled alloy was annealed to be fully recrystallized, the ductility at room temperature was significantly enhanced, however the elongation at 300oC was rather decreased probably attributed to the dynamic recrystallization occurred during the tensile test.


Context: Since software development is a complex socio-technical activity that involves coordinating different disciplines and skill sets, it provides ample opportunities for waste to emerge. Waste is any activity that produces no value for the customer or user. Objective: The purpose of this paper is to identify and describe different types of waste in software development. Method: Following Constructivist Grounded Theory, we conducted a two-year five-month participant-observation study of eight software development projects at Pivotal, a software development consultancy. We also interviewed 33 software engineers, interaction designers, and product managers, and analyzed one year of retrospection topics. We iterated between analysis and theoretical sampling until achieving theoretical saturation. Results: This paper introduces the first empirical waste taxonomy. It identifies nine wastes and explores their causes, underlying tensions, and overall relationship to the waste taxonomy found in Lean Software Development. Limitations: Grounded Theory does not support statistical generalization. While the proposed taxonomy appears widely applicable, organizations with different software development cultures may experience different waste types. Conclusion: Software development projects manifest nine types of waste: building the wrong feature or product, mismanaging the backlog, rework, unnecessarily complex solutions, extraneous cognitive load, psychological distress, waiting/multitasking, knowledge loss, and ineffective communication. Keywords-Software engineering waste, Extreme Programming, Lean Software Development


Aims: To determine the association of root caries with some risk factors among adult population in Mosul City (rural and urban). Materials and Methods: A sample of 231 subjects was selected, aged 20-70 years old, from rural and urban areas of Mosul City. For each subject, clinical examination was performed for root surface caries, pocket depth and tooth loss. The questionnaire forms were completed by the dentist. Root Caries Index (RCI) was used for detecting root caries. Billings Index was used to record the severity of root caries, while WHO Index was used to measure pocket depth. Results: From the total sample, the mean RCI was 19.37 in rural and 18.62 in urban areas; with no significant difference between them. The study revealed that for severity of the root caries lesion, grade I (incipient) was the most prevalent for both genders. Subjects of this study revealed correlation between some risk factors and the occurrence of root surface caries. The mean pocket depth in relation to root surface caries with not significant difference between urban and rural areas (p > 0.05). the mean number of the missing teeth increased with the increasing age in both rural and urban areas. Conclusion: Root surface caries is regarded to be high in both rural and urban population, especially those with old age. As such, management of a root caries in older population is predicted to be one of greatest challenges facing dental team in the future.


Twenty-nine patients with advanced leukemias (median age 34 years) received histocompatible sibling marrow that had been depleted of T cells by ex vivo incubation with anti-CD5 monoclonal antibody-ricin immunotoxin (T101-R) for the purpose of graft-versus-host disease prophylaxis. Donor cell engraftment was documented in 28/29 patients by DNA restriction fragment length polymorphisms. In this pilot study the dose of T101-R incubated with donor marrow was increased in a stepwise manner from 300 ng (10 patients) to 600 ng (5 patients) to 1000 ng immunotoxin (IT)/10(7) bone marrow mononuclear cells (14 patients) in an attempt to achieve more effective GvHD prophylaxis. A statistically significant reduction in acute GvHD was achieved for patients receiving marrow pretreated with 1000 ng of immunotoxin (34%) compared to recipients of BM treated with 300 ng immunotoxin (100%, P = 0.0004). T-depleted marrow samples were evaluated for residual T cell activity using several in vitro assays including proliferation to the purified mitogen PHA (HA-17) and in mixed lymphocyte culture (MLC), T cell cytotoxicity, a limiting dilution assay for detecting precursors of proliferating T cells (LDApPTL), and phenotypic analysis of viable T cells expanded in 16-day culture with interleukin 2. The extent of T cell depletion determined by LDA assay varied widely at each immunotoxin concentration used. Thus, there was no correlation between the dose of T cells infused and subsequent GvHD. Phenotyping of lymphocytes recovered from immunotoxin-treated marrow demonstrated that residual T cells were CD5 negative in all cases tested. The only in vitro parameter that predicted subsequent acute or chronic GvHD was the demonstration of viable CD5 negative lymphocytes with T cell phenotype (CD2, CD3, and/or CD7 positive) after 16-day culture with IL-2 of the T-depleted bone marrow. We observed that such CD5 negative cells expressing other T cell markers have cytotoxic function and speculate that these cells may be capable of mediating GvHD in allogeneic transplantation.


Stability of any structure depends on behavior of soil under it. In case of construction in soft soil, ground improvement by soil stabilization or soil reinforcement is usually adopted. Many organic natural fibers like rice husk, sisal, jute, bamboo, palm fibre and coir fibre etc. are used for stabilization purposes and different engineering properties are determined like liquid limit, plastic limit, specific gravity, OMC, MDD, UCS, CBR etc. The coir fibre being biodegradable material will decay under extreme environmental conditions such as polluted water, contact with leachate, cycles of wetting and drying, cycles of freezing and thawing and so on. In general, life of coir fibre in soil is expected to be 8-10 years. Therefore under different environmental conditions it may degrade fast. The gain in soil strength or decrease in swelling might be lost. This aspect is not studied so far. Hence in this work this is attempted.


Neighbourhood Planning is a form of small-scale, community-led land-use planning, introduced to England by the Localism Act 2011. It constitutes a radical shift for UK planning and a striking example of the participatory and localist turns in governance, allowing 'laypeople' to write their own statutory planning policies. Its promoters portray it as a straightforward transfer of power from state to community which prioritises local experiential knowledge and care for place. However, drawing on theoretical and methodological resources from Science and Technology Studies and four years of ethnographic fieldwork at two sites in the North West of England, my research suggests a more complex picture. I show how the practices of Neighbourhood Planning reproduce the category of the expert and the expert-agency coupling by producing a new subset of lay-experts. However, they occupy a precarious position, being reliant on established expertise to stabilise their expert identity, but also subject to displacement by that expertise. They must also perform other identities alongside that of the expert to establish and maintain their legitimacy, and powerful tensions arise between these identities. Successfully enacting this composite of identities enables them to draw on complex, hybrid forms of representative, participatory, and epistemological authority. This constrains their ability to represent the neighbourhood as experienced and forces them to reframe the issues that they want to address, but also enables them to make real differences to the ways in which the neighbourhood will change. Framing the production and evaluation of evidence in terms of 'matters of concern' (Latour) and 'matters of care' (Puig de la Bellacasa), situated in a narrative context, would enable the diversity of things that matter to these groups to be addressed more directly, and allow better critical consideration of both those knowledge claims labelled as 'objective' and those labelled as 'subjective'.


Electronic resources are becoming increasingly important to libraries of all types and sizes. The paper discusses present situation of the e-resource availability at the degree college libraries of Purulia District, West Bengal. This paper addresses the acquisition of electronic information resources and its collection development policy to guide the librarians at College Libraries in the selection of electronic reference-resources. Instead of focusing on how well a given publication/e-resource fits into or supports the collection, the policy gives general guidance on the selection of electronic resources. The general collection development guidelines for electronic information resources include relevance and potential use of the information, redundancy of the information contained in the product, demand for the information, ease of use of the product, availability of the information to multiple users, stability of the coverage of the resource, longevity of the information, cost of the product, predictability of pricing, equipment needed to provide access to the information, technical support, and availability of the physical space needed to house and store the information or equipment. This paper is based on exhaustive survey of college libraries in Purulia District, West Bengal. It was found that a majority of college libraries do not subscribe to e-resources. A three step strategy is put forward to introduce e-resources at all college libraries in Purulia District, West Bengal. The paper also lists a few openly available e-resources and benefits of joining library consortia. In the end, the paper lists best possible draft policy for e-resource acquisition. A few suggestions are also put forward for its implementation in the near future.


The chemical examination of Barleria longiflora Linn. F. is described for the first time. Extraction of stems and roots with solvents and column chromatography led to the isolation of four anthraquinones of which two are new. The known anthraquinones were identified as tectoquinone and 1,3,5-trihydroxy-4- methoxy-2-methylanthraquinone and the new anthraquinones characterised as 3,8-dihydroxy-4- methoxy-2 methylanthraquinone and 1,3,4-trihydroxy-5 (or 8)-methoxy-2-methylanthraquinone by chemical and spectral studies. Arnidiol, a pentacyclic triterpene, was isolated without admixture with its isomer faradiol which usually is the case with many plants. A sterol mixture was also isolated, the minor components of which were Identified as campesterol, stigmasterol and b-sitosterol by GCMS of the acetate mixture.


It is well established that exposure to threats causes citizens to prioritize security considerations and accept restrictions on civil liberties. Yet most studies on which these findings are based come from longstanding democracies and do not distinguish among types of threat. This article argues that the effects of internal and external threats are conditional on regime type. It tests the argument via an experiment embedded in an original survey of Georgia and Kazakhstan, countries that vary in regime type but face similar levels of threat. In authoritarian Kazakhstan, there is no difference in attitudes by threat type, whereas external threats produce greater support for security than internal ones in more pluralistic Georgia. Contrary to previous research, security preferences are not mediated by the triggering of anxiety. The findings contribute to literatures on the link between threats and authoritarian preferences, the rally-round-the-flag effect, and the ways that political institutions mediate psychological processes.


The general topic of this thesis is how to de ne and compute the index of discretized lattice versions of the Dirac operator coupled to a topologically nontrivial gauge eld. The famous Atiyah Singer Index Theorem, applied to the usual continuum Dirac operator, says that its index is equal to the topological charge of the gauge eld. This fact plays an important role in theoretical particle physics. However, in the physics context one often solves problems by discretizing the physical theory and simulating it on a computer. This raises the question of whether the Index Theorem (and its physical implications) can be maintained in the discretized lattice setting. This is a subtle mathematical issue since the usual de nition of the index of the Dirac operator breaks down in the discretized setting due to its nite-dimensional nature. This thesis reviews how the index can be extracted in another, indirect, way in the discretized setting, and then goes on to consider the index of a new discretization of the Dirac operator introduced recently by D. Adams. This new lattice Dirac operator has the virtue of being more computationally e cient for use in computer simulations of particle physics theory, but before it can be used with con dence a secure theoretical foundation needs to be established. One part of this is to show that its index correctly reproduces the continuum index in the continuum limit where the lattice spacing goes to zero. This is the main goal and new research contribution of this thesis. It is done here by adapting the methods and techniques used to establish this result previously for the standard discretization of the Wilson-Dirac operator, and invovles dealing with new issues speci c to the new discretization.


The bioavailability of iron in New Zealand beef either alone or as part of a 'typical' New Zealand meal was investigated. The solubility of iron and its in vitro absorption by mouse intestinal tissue were used to evaluate iron bioavailability. The solubility of haem and/or non-haem iron in meat (beef longissimus muscle), vegetables and meat-plus-vegetables was investigated. Samples were cooked and then subjected to in vitro gastrointestinal digestion with pepsin followed by a combination of pancreatic enzymes and bile. Cooking at 6S°C for 90 minutes reduced the soluble iron concentration in meat by 81 % and reduced the haem iron concentration by 27%, which coincided with a 175% increase in nonhaem iron concentrations. However, gastrointestinal digestion increased the solubility of iron in cooked meat (333%), vegetables (367%) and meat-plusvegetables (167%). A proportion (35%) of the haem iron in the meat was broken down by the action of pancreatic enzymes leading to a 46% increase in non-haem iron concentrations, although this was not the case for the meat-plus-vegetables. Validation studies showed that mouse intestinal segments mounted in Ussing chambers maintained integrity and viability, and were responsive to glucose, theophylline and carbachol. Intestinal tissue from iron deficient mice was then used in the Ussing chambers to investigate the absorption of iron from ferrous gluconate and the soluble fractions of meat, vegetables and meat-plus-vegetables after gastrointestinal digestion. Results indicated a trend towards a higher absorption of iron from meat and ferrous gluconate, compared to vegetables and meat-plus-vegetables. However, iron absorption results were difficult to interpret due to the wide variation in the data. This variation was possibly due to errors associated with the sample processing and the analysis of iron, which was by inductively coupled-mass spectroscopy. Overall, the present study showed that before estimations can be made on the bioavailability of food iron, the effects of the cooking and gastrointestinal digestion processes must be considered. Further, the use of in vitro gastrointestinal digestion followed by the use of Ussing chambers to assess intestinal absorption is a potentially valuable system for assessing mineral bioavailability.


Abstract A detailed ab initio quantum-mechanical characterization is presented of the vibrational properties of pyrope and majorite garnets, using the hybrid B3LYP functional and large all electron Gaussian type basis sets. Discussed quantities include infrared (both TO and LO) and Raman frequencies, normal mode coordinates, spectroscopic intensities, mode Grüneisen parameters, isotopic substitution, and infrared and Raman spectra. Comparison with data available in the literature demonstrates the accuracy of the adopted method. Main spectral features of the two garnets are interpreted in terms of either symmetry analysis or structural contributions to the vibrational modes. Missing peaks in the experiments are discussed in light of the simulated spectra. The present high-quality vibrational data can be used to compute thermal expansivities at high-pressure and high-temperature conditions. Calculated values for majorite at the bottom of the mantle transition zone (αV = 2.2 × 10−5 K−1 at T = 1500 K and P = 20 GPa) turn out to be sensibly greater (up to three times) than those currently adopted in geophysical thermodynamic databases, thus calling for a careful revision of the numerical models for thermo-chemical convection of the Earth's mantle.


Abstract Bacterioplankton comprises a highly diverse group of microorganisms, which are dominant in aquatic ecosystems, and play a central role in ecosystem functioning and biogeochemical cycles. Due to their high turnover and dispersal rates, as well as high adaptability and plasticity, microbes are likely to respond quickly to environmental changes and perturbations on their ecosystems. In this opinion paper, we reviewed some studies that addressed bacterial community's responses to anthropogenic impacts in their aquatic environments. Inorganic nutrients and organic matter inputs from the catchment areas are likely to increase due to changes in climate and land use. These changes will impact the microbial community composition and metabolism, as well the amount of energy and carbon flowing through aquatic food webs as mostly demonstrated in studies from temperate and boreal systems. However, due to the low number of studies on microbial communities in tropical ecosystems, our understanding of how they will respond to perturbations in this distinct environmental context is still limited. Research in microbial ecology in southern countries is still in its infancy and deserves more attention in the future, since tropical aquatic ecosystems are hotspots of biodiversity, host most of the world freshwater reserves, and play a key role in global biogeochemical cycles.


This thesis explores the early political career of the Scottish borderer Robert Carr [Kerr], earl of Somerset (1585/6–1645), a courtier and later administrator (1598-1615) in the reigns of James VI and I, King of Scotland, England, and Ireland. For the first time the pervasive contention Carr was a significant Jacobean figure will be challenged. To achieve this, cultural artefacts supplement archival sources to illustrate the era's ever-growing paranoia about royal favouritism. The first chapter explains how contemporaries and early historians of James' reign revived classical portrayals of tyranny to transform Carr's conventional pattern of advancement into something extraordinary. These authors obscured Carr's origin from the formidable Kerrs of Ferniehirst in favour of a narrative that James ignored his natural advisors and promoted a transgressive, pacifist court. The second chapter demonstrates Carr's role as a court broker and James' closest companion. While their friendship conformed to Renaissance norms, Carr struggled for legitimacy in an environment where favouritism was linked to sycophancy. Finally, apprehension about favourites merged with neo-Stoic concerns that James failed to understand or respect English liberties. There were attempts to present Carr as a prop for absolutism. Carr became a conduit for English frustrations about James' refusal to abandon the Anglo-Scottish union, and he attracted baseless claims of sabotaging the 1610 'The Great Contract' between King and Parliament. This thesis argues that Carr was an unremarkable figure in the milieu of the Jacobean Court. The research findings of this thesis demonstrate the deep-set prejudices against courtiers (especially Scots), which turned an inoffensive figure like Carr into one that threatened to destabilise the Commonwealth.


Oral administration of soluble protein Ag induces tolerance, a phenomenon that has hampered mucosal vaccine design. To provoke active immunity, orally administered Ag must be fed together with a mucosal adjuvant such as cholera toxin (CT). Unfortunately, CT is not suitable for clinical use because of its associated toxicity. There is, therefore, a need to develop alternative mucosal immunization regimens. Here we have attempted to alter the intrinsically tolerogenic nature of the intestine and improve immunization potential by expanding and activating intestinal APC in vivo. Previous studies have indicated that intestinal dendritic cells (DC) present oral Ag, but do so in a tolerogenic manner. In the present study we investigated whether DC can be converted from tolerogenic into immunogenic APC by treating mice with Flt3 ligand (Flt3L), a DC growth factor, and then immunizing with CT. We observed increased local and systemic responses to CT in the presence of elevated numbers of intestinal DC. In parallel, CT induced up-regulation of CD80 and CD86 on these Flt3L-expanded DC. In an attempt to develop a toxin-free adjuvant system, we investigated whether IL-1 could be used as an alternative DC-activating stimulus. Using a combination of Flt3L and IL-1alpha, we observed a potent active response to fed soluble Ag, rather than the tolerogenic response normally observed. These data suggest that Flt3L-expanded DC are well positioned to regulate intestinal responses depending on the presence or the absence of inflammatory signals. Flt3L may therefore be a reagent useful for the design of mucosal immunization strategies.


The trace element composition of planktic foraminifera shells is influenced by both environmental and biological factors ('vital effects'). As trace elements in individual foraminifera shells are increasingly used as paleoceanographic tools, understanding how trace element ratios vary between individuals, among species, and in response to high frequency environmental variability is of critical importance. Here, we present a three-year plankton tow record (2010–2012) of individual shell trace element (Mg, Sr, Ba, and Mn) to Ca ratios in the planktic species Globigerina ruber (pink), Orbulina universa, and Globorotalia menardii collected throughout the upper 100 m of Cariaco Basin. Plankton tows were paired with in situ measurements of water column chemistry and hydrography. The Mg/Ca ratio reflects different calcification temperatures in all three species when calculated using species-specific temperature relationships from single-species averages of Mg/Ca. However, individual shell Mg/Ca often results in unrealistic temperate estimates. The Sr/Ca ratios are relatively constant among the four species. Ratios of Mn/Ca and Ba/Ca are highest in G. menardii and are not reflective of elemental concentrations in open waters. The Mn/Ca ratio is elevated in all species during upwelling conditions, and a similar trend is demonstrated in Neogloboquadrina incompta shells from the California margin collected during upwelling periods. Together this suggests that elevated shell Mn/Ca may act as a tracer for upwelling of deeper water masses. Our results emphasize the large degree of trace element variability present among and within species living within a limited depth habitat and the roles of biology, calcification environment, and physical mixing in mediating how trace element geochemistry reflects environmental variability in the surface ocean.


Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods have been applied to the design of blind Bayesian receivers in a number of digital communications applications. The salient features of these MCMC receivers include the following: (a) they are optimal in the sense of achieving minimum symbol error rate; (b) they do not require knowledge of the channel states, nor do they explicitly estimate the channel by employing training signals or decision-feedback; and (c) they are well suited for iterative (turbo) processing in coded systems. We investigate the convergence behavior of several MCMC algorithms (both existing and new ones) in digital communication applications. The geometric convergence property of these algorithms is established by considering only the chains or the marginal chains corresponding to the transmitted digital symbols, which take values from a finite discrete set. We then focus on three specific applications, namely, the MCMC decoders in AWGN channels, ISI channels, and CDMA channels. The convergence rates for these algorithms are computed for small simulated datasets. Different convergence behaviors are observed. It is seen that differential encoding, parameter constraining, collapsing, and grouping are efficient ways of accelerating the convergence of the MCMC algorithms, especially in the presence of channel phase ambiguity.


This paper deals with a non-overlapping domain decomposition method involving additional augmented terms along the interface between the sub-domains. The goal of these additional terms is to prevent the singularity of the sub-domain matrix problems, such as rigid body motion in mechanics or resonance frequencies in acoustics. If the definition of these augmented terms requires minor intrusion inside an existing computational code, the sub-domain matrices are however assembled in parallel and the sub-domain meshes are required for this purpose. To cope with these requirements, a small modification of the algorithm is proposed, which helps to partition automatically every global assembly matrix and helps in the development of the method as a 'black box' package. Details of the algorithms, implementation aspects and computational cost are clearly described in order to help the reader to implement this new algorithm. New numerical results performed on interior and exterior acoustics problems illustrate the performance and efficiency of the proposed methods.


The following suggestions for the interpretation of Parmenides and Melissus can be grouped for convenience about one problem. This is the problem whether, as Aristotle thought and as most commentators still assume, Parmenides wrote his poem in the broad tradition of Ionian and Italian cosmology. The details of Aristotle's interpretation have been challenged over and again, but those who agree with his general assumptions take comfort from some or all of the following major arguments. First, the cosmogony which formed the last part of Parmenides' poem is expressly claimed by the goddess who expounds it to have some measure of truth or reliability in its own right, and indeed the very greatest measure possible for such an attempt. Second, the earlier arguments of the goddess prepare the ground for such a cosmogony in two ways. For in the first place these arguments themselves start from assumptions derived from earlier cosmologists, and are concerned merely to work out the implications of this traditional material. And, in the second place, they end by establishing the existence of a spherical universe: the framework of the physical world can be secured by logic even if the subsequent introduction of sensible qualities or 'powers' into this world marks some decline in logical rigour.


Many biodiversity researchers have responded to the financial constraints faced by policy makers to develop models based upon the "Noah's Ark" metaphor, implying that society can save only a limited amount of biodiversity. Unfortunately, as Herman Daly (Land Economics, 1991) pointed out, such microeconomic rules can allow an ark to sink albeit in some optimal fashion. So, I step back to look at the macroeconomic question, how big should the ark be? I start with Norgaard's (Ecological Economics, 2010) framework, which is based upon the concept of a production possibility frontier combined with a sustainability criterion. I develop a model from that starting point by shifting to an isoquant framework while maintaining the strong sustainability criterion. I demonstrate how this model allows for identifying and addressing the key biodiversity protection policy criteria at the macroeconomic level. One key conclusion from this modeling is that Daly's analysis remains remarkably prescient. Publication Status: Published in Theoretical Economics Letters, 2013, 3(5A):39-44.


ticular form. A number of patients are excluded from these results on the grounds of " advanced diseases or other reason." Those exclusions rise as high as 354 out of 892 patients seen with cancer of the hypopharynx (p. 33), so that a considerable element of selection appears to be taking place. If in future editions of this useful book figures are also given as described by Macdonald,' Berkson and Gage,2 or MacComb,' the appropriate corrections can be made when necessary to make these results comparable with other series.-I am, etc.,


Purpose Endogenous endophthalmitis is a severe intraocular infectious condition requiring rapid diagnosis and treatment. This study examines the incidence of fungal endophthalmitis in patients with elevated beta-D-glucan (BG) levels and those with positive blood culture and the utility of ophthalmology consultation in these patients. Methods Single center retrospective consecutive cohort study was conducted on patients at Beaumont Health from 2016–2021 who either had positive fungal blood cultures or an elevated BG level. Results A total of 147 patients were examined by the ophthalmology department where 30 patients had an elevated BG level and 100 patients had a positive fungal blood culture. Incidence of fungal endophthalmitis was 0% in the elevated BG group and 1.5% in the positive fungal culture group, corresponding to a relative risk ratio of 0.0 (p = 0.31). Conclusion BG testing may be useful in diagnosing isolated cases outside the standard screening paradigm, however the data within this study support the conclusion that there is no compelling evidence at this time to add or use BG as a surrogate for endophthalmitis screening. Further studies are required to further elucidate the role of BG in the care of critically ill patients.


Some new properties promoted by the formation of a supercomplex
between iron hexacyanometallates and the polyazamacrocycle
[32]aneN
 8
 (1,5,9,13,17,21,25,29-octaazacyclodotriacontane)
are described. In the presence of the polyazamacrocycle, thermal and
photoinduced electron transfer from iodide to
Fe(CN)
 6

 3-
 were observed in moderately acidic
media. The thermal reaction is slow
(k
 obs
 = 8.9 × 10

 -4
 s
 -1
, at 25 °C) and
proceeds to an equilibrium (K = 7
M
 -2
, at 25 °C). The reaction is
almost isoergonic, with favorable enthalpy and unfavorable entropy
changes (ΔG° = -4.8 kJ
mol
 -1
,
ΔH° = -160 kJ
mol
 -1
,
ΔS° = -0.54 kJ
mol
 -1
 K
 -1
). A photoinduced
electron-transfer process, leading to additional iodide oxidation, was
observed upon flash irradiation of equilibrated solutions. Following the
photoinduced process, the system reverts to the thermal equilibrium in
the dark. The promoting role of the macrocycle is thermodynamic for the
thermal process (anodic shift in the Fe
 II/III
 potential upon
supercomplex formation) and kinetic for the photoinduced process
[formation of ion-paired species between
hexacyanoferrate(III) and iodide upon supercomplex
formation]. The thermal reaction is reversible in basic media (where the
macrocycle deprotonates and supercomplex formation is prevented),
providing an example of on/off switching by pH changes of an
electron-transfer reaction.


We have cloned four novel members of the CLC family of chloride channels from Arabidopsis thaliana. The four plant genes are homologous to a recently isolated chloride channel gene from tobacco (CLC-Nt1; Lurin, C., Geelen, D., Barbier-Brygoo, H., Guern, J., and Maurel, C. (1996) Plant Cell 8, 701-711) and are about 30% identical in sequence to the most closely related CLC-6 and CLC-7 putative chloride channels from mammalia. AtCLC transcripts are broadly expressed in the plant. Similarly, antibodies against the AtCLC-d protein detected the protein in all tissues, but predominantly in the silique. AtCLC-a and AtCLC-b are highly homologous to each other (≈87% identity), while being ≈50% identical to either AtCLC-c or AtCLC-d. None of the four cDNAs elicited chloride currents when expressed in Xenopus oocytes, either singly or in combination. Among these genes, only AtCLC-d could functionally substitute for the single yeast CLC protein, restoring iron-limited growth of a strain disrupted for this gene. Introduction of disease causing mutations, identified in human CLC genes, abolished this capacity. Consistent with a similar function of both proteins, the green fluorescent protein-tagged AtCLC-d protein showed the identical localization pattern as the yeast ScCLC protein. This suggests that in Arabidopsis AtCLC-d functions as an intracellular chloride channel.


Based on the results of the operations of del, including the gradient, the curl, and the divergence obtained under nonorthogonal curvilinear coordinate transformations, we present a derivation of the scaling laws for electromagnetic waves, acoustic waves, and matter waves in a framework that is fully unified. Our derivation approach does not involve any tensor analysis or differential element analysis and may serve as an important supplement to those derivation methods established previously.


We have shown that protein restriction during lactation is associated with higher levels of serum and milk tri-iodothyronine (T(3)) with lower serum thyroxine (T(4)), suggesting an increased T(4) to T(3) conversion. To investigate this hypothesis, the activity of type 1 (D1) and/or type 2 (D2) iodothyronine deiodinases was evaluated on days 4, 12 and 21 of lactation in several tIssues of dams fed an 8% protein-restricted (PR) diet and controls fed a 23% protein diet. Serum TSH, T(3) and T(4) were measured by radioimmunoassay. Deiodinase activity was determined by the release of (125)I from (125)I-reverse T(3), under specific conditions for D1 or D2. PR dams had a transitory reduction in liver D1 activity (P<0.05) on day 12, and a small increase in thyroid D1 on day 12 followed by a small decrease on day 21. However, thyroid D2 activity was higher than controls (P<0.05) during the whole of the lactation period. Mammary gland D1 and D2 activities were lower on day 4 of lactation in PR dams (P<0.05), and D2 was higher on day 21 (P<0.05). Potentially, a lower conversion of T(3) to di-iodothyronine in the mammary glands of PR dams at the beginning of lactation may serve to provide more T(3) through the milk. Brown adipose tIssue (BAT) D2 activity was higher (P<0.05) in PR dams during all periods of lactation. PR dams showed higher skeletal muscle D1 activity only at the end of lactation, but no changes in D2 activity. Higher pituitary D1 and D2 activities in the PR group (P<0.05) at the end of lactation could have contributed to the lower serum TSH. These data suggest that the higher thyroid and BAT D2 activity during the whole of lactation and skeletal muscle D1 activity at the end of lactation may contribute to the higher serum T(3) in PR dams.


Engagement with the natural world is imperative to student learning in the geo- and environmental sciences. Immersion in the environment is particularly useful for complicated subjects like nutrient cycling and biogeochemistry. However, access to the outdoors is not ubiquitous, and often students living in urban and/or remote locations are unable to access geo-, bio- and environmental activities, and demonstrations, and this inaccessibility was exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. We created a remote learning activity to teach the carbon cycle to high school students enrolled in the University of Michigan ' s Earth Camp (summer 2020). These high school students were admitted to this summer program to facilitate their access to and inquiry of the natural world. Likewise, this program is designed to enable and encourage students from underrepresented minority groups to engage in STEM, and in particular, earth sciences. Students conducted at-home bio-centric experiments and collected hair from their pets and their pets ' foods (and for students without pets, favorite snack foods) and sent it to the University of Michigan for isotope analyses. Students recorded ingredients in their specimens and hypothesized what isotope values their specimens should have, based on C 3 /C 4 plant distribution. The students ' results allowed them to examine how the Earth ' s carbon cycle is reflected by common plants and animals living in their homes and to collect physical observations and analyze their own data. This activity received positive evaluations from students, and students felt their knowledge of isotopes and the chemistry behind their food increased from this exercise. Although Earth Camp recruitment was unrelated to student ' s desired major, almost ~20% of the participants in this activity listed earth sciences as a desired major upon application to college. We have attached this activity in the supplement for future use by other earth science educators in an adapted version that does not require the ability to measure stable isotopes.


Despite the vast research on project success and sustainability, little is known about managing
project sustainability, particularly Hong Kong's construction industry. Previous empirical
studies on construction project implementation success lack the ingredients of sustainability.
This sequential mixed methods research explores such a relationship from both project
maturity and process perspectives. The quantitative study on local construction project
managers identifies the status quo of project sustainability maturity. In addition, it identifies
sustainability success criteria and factors attributable to project implementation success. The
quantitative study results generate question for a subsequent qualitative e-Delphi study. The
follow-up e-Delphi study distinguishes the degree of impact related to economic
sustainability, environmental sustainability, and social sustainability on construction projects.
This study surveyed 55 local construction project managers and received consensus from 12
international experts in the field. First, the mixed methods study found that a discernible
construction project sustainability maturity level does not appear in the Hong Kong
construction industry. However, organisations generally value project sustainability. Second,
the study found four traditional success criteria to explain a majority of local construction
project implementation success. Third, two significant sustainability impact criteria
(economic and environmental constructs) contributed to local construction project
implementation success. However, criterion representing social sustainability impact was not
identified. Fourth, the traditional constituent success criterion for construction project
implementation success linked to certain sustainability impact elements. Fifth, the study
categorised important sustainability impact-related factors (economic: 3; environmental: 4;
and social: 3). Finally, e-Delphi experts believed that environmental sustainability was more
important than economic and/or social sustainability. This study contributes knowledge to researchers in the field. It also provides local construction project managers with management
practices in structuring sustainability-related success criteria and factors contributing to
project implementation success. Limitations of this study include not able to conduct
longitudinal study, limited judgmental sample size in the survey, clients and stakeholders'
view not being considered in the quantitative study, and that majority of the e-Delphi experts
in the qualitative study are not base in Hong Kong, etc. Such limitations may reduce the
reliability of the research findings.


Estimating action quality, the process of assigning a "score" to the execution of an action, is crucial in areas such as sports and health care. Unlike action recognition, which has millions of examples to learn from, the action quality datasets that are currently available are small-typically comprised of only a few hundred samples. This work presents three frameworks for evaluating Olympic sports which utilize spatiotemporal features learned using 3D convolutional neural networks (C3D) and perform score regression with i) SVR ii) LSTM and iii) LSTM followed by SVR. An efficient training mechanism for the limited data scenarios is presented for clip-based training with LSTM. The proposed systems show significant improvement over existing quality assessment approaches on the task of predicting scores of diving, vault, figure skating. SVR-based frameworks yield better results, LSTM-based frameworks are more natural for describing an action and can be used for improvement feedback.


The learning of attention is the problem this article is concerned with, assuming the notion of cognition as invention (KASTRUP, 1999). Within the context of contemporary cognitive sciences, we examine the investigations in which attention is conceived as the background of variation of cognition, rather than its manifestation as an act of paying attention. We analyze the relationship between attention and learning in the practice of becoming aware, as proposed by Depraz, Varela and Vermersch (2003), which includes the suspension of natural attitude, the redirection of attention to oneself, and modification in the quality of attention, which then, becomes an act of finding the virtual self, instead of an act of searching for information. The learning of attention is analyzed through a logic that is circular, temporal and collective. The differences between distraction and dispersiveness, and between concentration and focusing are discussed in relation to their role in inventive cognition.


Division of flood seasonal phases for reservoir can achieve reasonable adjustments in the flood control levels,and the purpose of improving water use efficiency. This paper refers the recent developments of the division of flood seasonal phases for reservoir research results, applications currently used three kinds of quantitative analysis method for reservoir flood phases. Tanghe Reservoir in Liaoning Province as an application example of the flood seasonal phases. The comprehensive analysis of 3 kinds of theoretical and computational methods based on the results obtained for the optimization of Tanghe Reservoir flood season program.


Eighteenth-century thinkers presume that literature has the power to affect the reader: literary works offer a model for identification and imitation, inducing the reader to experience similar emotions and even to take similar actions. This model-function of literature is particularly evident in works that depict lovers in the act of reading: by representing reactions to a text, they make explicit their intended manner of reception. First, the article contrasts the two major love models of the Enlightenment, i. e. sensitive and libertine love. After a brief digression on Dante's Francesca da Rimini, it then analyses 'reading scenes' of sensitive and libertine lovers in works of Rousseau, Goethe, Foscolo, La Morliere and Boyer; it argues that sensitive texts show emotions to imitate, while libertine texts not only try to create arousal but also presume analogous situations and actions. The conclusion points out the 'ars erotica' within the 'ars legendi' of the Enlightenment.


Tunicates, a group of marine animals, is gaining a lot of interests in case of medical, food market, water pollution, cellulosic nanomaterial, and biofuel production issues due to their consisting of chemical compounds such as cellulose, amino-sugars, and proteins or protein-polysaccharide complexes. In this work, two dominant species of Scandinavian tunicates have been investigated by extraction and characterization of their cellulose, and amino acids. Samples in different sizes, ages, place of growing (Distance to ocean's surface), and different chemical pretreatment, have been evaluated in their compositions to see the best conditions for extraction of cellulose and protein. For pure cellulose and bioethanol productions, the samples growing near to the ocean surface at the best harvesting time (after completion of metamorphosis), recommended to be explored. The highest amount of protein in tunicate body has been found in the internal organs with a total amino acid content of around 52 %. In addition, the larger and elder the sample is, the higher amount of protein it contains. Hence, for feed supplementing point of view, the internal organs of tunicates with higher size and age are favored to be considered. Eventually, a combination of both H3PO4 and Ba (OH)(2) might lead to a significantly high cellulose percentage (66.5%) and a high protein removal percentage (protein content of 6%) when aiming at cellulose extraction.