9-(2-phosphonylmethoxyethyl)guanine (PMEG) is an acyclic nucleoside phosphonate derivative that has demonstrated significant anticancer activity in a number of in vitro and in vivo animal model systems. In this study, we compared the cellular metabolism of PMEG and 9-(2-phosphonylmethoxyethyl)adenine (PMEA), a clinically active anti-HIV and antihepatitis agent, and the inhibitory activities of their putative active diphosphate derivatives, PMEGpp and PMEApp, respectively, toward human cellular DNA polymerases. PMEG was significantly more cytotoxic than PMEA against a panel of human leukemic cells. The diphosphate derivatives were the major metabolites formed in cells on both these agents, with PMEGpp reaching cellular concentration approximately 4-fold higher than that achieved for PMEApp. These differences in cellular accumulation of the diphosphate derivatives were not, however, sufficient to account for the 30-fold difference in cytotoxicity between the two analogs. PMEGpp was also at least a 7-fold more effective inhibitor of in vitro simian vacuolating virus 40 DNA replication system than that of PMEApp (IC50 = 4.6 microM). Studies with a defined primed DNA template showed that PMEGpp was a potent inhibitor of both human polymerases alpha and delta, two key enzymes involved in cellular DNA replication, whereas PMEApp inhibited these enzymes relatively poorly. From these studies, we can conclude that the factors that contribute to the enhanced antileukemic activity of PMEG derives both from its increased anabolic phosphorylation and the increased potency of the diphosphate derivative to target the cellular replicative DNA polymerases.


Background Disseminated intravascular coagulopathy (DIC) relates to the consumption of coagulation factors and platelets with bleeding and micro thrombosis events. Aim The aim of this study was to compare haemostasis parameters in critically ill patients with DIC versus patients without DIC, and in survivors versus non-survivors over time. Correlations between the DIC-score, the degree of organ failure and the haemostasis were assessed. Method Patients admitted to the intensive care unit with a condition known to be associated with DIC and with an expected length of stay of >3 days were included. Routine laboratory tests, prothrombin time, activated partial thromboplastin time, platelet count, fibrinogen concentration and D-dimer were measured. Coagulation and platelet function were assessed with two point-of-care devices; Multiplate and ROTEM. DIC scores were calculated according to the International Society on Thrombosis and Haemostasis and Japanese Association for Acute Medicine. Results Blood was sampled on days 0–1, 2–3 and 4–10 from 136 patients with mixed diagnoses during 290 sampling events. The point-of-care assays indicated a hypocoagulative response (decreased platelet aggregation and reduced clot strength) in patients with DIC and, over time, in non-survivors compared to survivors. Patients with DIC as well as non-survivors had decreased fibrinolysis as shown by ROTEM. DIC scores were higher in non-survivors than in survivors. Conclusions Patients with DIC displayed signs of a hypocoagulative response and impaired fibrinolysis, which was also evident over time in non-survivors. Patients with DIC had a higher mortality rate than non-DIC patients, and DIC scores were higher in non-survivors than in survivors.


Overuse syndrome in musicians To the Editor: Hunter Fry has done us all a great service by his exhaustive review of the literature on occupational cramp in musicians and the closely-related writer's cramp.' Nevertheless, I must strongly disagree with Fry's notion that occupational cramp and the commonly-recognized overuse syndrome however difficult to define are one and the same entity. The overuse syndrome, which Fry has identified in over 670 musicians and which he finds in more than 50070 of all symphony orchestra players! is characterized by pain and tenderness generally in one or several areas of muscle or at the musculotendinous junction. Many of these areas occur in the forearm, elbow, shoulder, neck and back! Pain with this disorder, which I prefer to characterize specifically as muscle-tendon overuse,' may occur with any activity although it is usually triggered initially by one, and is not characterized by involuntary movements. Occupational cramp, which many would consider a form of focal dystonia.v' may be painful (it is often described as a dull ache) but this not the major complaint in most patients. Rather, patients describe a loss of control, cramp, or some vague inability to perform. Tenderness is not a prominent feature of the affected limb. Usually, the complaints are remarkably task-specific for long periods of time, if not for the duration of the illness. Involuntary movements, which include tremor and posturing, are seen in the majority. The fingers and hand are affected predominantly; only rarely is the upper arm or neck involved in musicians. There may well be some persons who develop focal dystonia after, or in conjunction with, muscle-tendon overuse but I do not believe that this is the rule. Focal dystonia may also occur after other injuries" or in association with nerve-entrapment syndromes." However, the majority of my patients with focal dystonia have suffered this disorder from the onset of their complaints and, similarly, most patients with muscle-tendon overuse have complained of pain from the beginning. In both disorders, symptoms tend to appear sooner and sooner after the onset of the offending activity as the ailment progresses. The question here does not seem to be merely one of semantics nor does it seem to be a difference between "lumping" and "splitting". While I can only agree that both seem to be overuse syndromes," I believe that these are independent processes and that the pathology will prove to be quite different. Fry himself has built a strong case for a peripheral (muscular) lesion in the painful syndrome;' some alteration in the circuitry of the central nervous system for motor control is likely in the focal dystonias." From the point of view of treatment, I have been able to help more than 75% of those with muscle-tendon overuse." Results with focal dystonia in musicians have been as disappointing as those of others." Fry has provided an interesting and provocative hypothesis. As should all good hypotheses, it should stimulate us to test its validity. As a first step, we must define carefully the meaning of the clinical entities that we are attempting to understand. Richard J. Lederman, MD Department of Neurology and Medical Center for Performing Artists The Cleveland Clinic Foundation 9500 Euclid Avenue Cleveland, Ohio 44106, USA I. Fry HIH. Overuse syndrome in musicians 100 years ago: an historical review. Med J Aust 1986; 145: 620-625. 2. Fry HIH. Overuse syndrome of the upper limb in musicians. Med J Aust 1986; 144: 182-186. 3. Lederman Rl, Calabrese LH. Overuse syndromes in instrumentalists. Med Probl Perform Art 1986; 1: 7-11. 4. Sheehy MP, Marsden CD. Writers' cramp a focal dystonia. Brain 1982; 105: 461-480. 5. Newmark 1, Hochberg FH. Occupational focal dystonias: painless dyscoordination among 59 musicians. J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 1987 (in press). 6. Schott GD. Introduction of involuntary movements by peripheral trauma: an analogy with causalgia. Lancet 1986; 2: 712-716. In reply: Dr Lederman delineates two semidistinct groups of patients. These differences were clearly recognized also by 19th century writers. It was difficult to know whether they regarded the types to be quite distinct or whether they represent two ends of one spectrum. The detailed descriptions and subclassifications probably favoured the concept of a spectrum and in no way does this disagree with anything that Lederman writes, since he is indicating that both types (or both ends of the spectrum) are overuse syndromes. However, it was very evident that the muscular overuse end of the spectrum was infinitely more common and was written about more and that there was more general agreement about it. It is this group upon which I have concentrated in my historical review.' It was also evident that variation existed from one series to another. Gowers obviously saw both types of patients,' but probably saw a proportionately greater number of the "dystonic" type than did Poore, although he saw a mixture of patients also. 1 Gowers felt that all cases were of central origin, Poore probably felt that most were of peripheral origin, but most writers were prepared to accept mixed or alternative aetiologies. The terminology that was used 100 years ago (cramp or occupational neurosis) embraced the whole spectrum (or both types) in spite of the many attempts to subclassify. My concern for the most part has been with the major group of muscular overuse where pain usually predominates and loss of muscle function occurs later at the Grade-3 level or above, although transient weakness and loss of control can occur quite early. Therefore, I do not think that there are any basic disagreements with Lederman, whose views are compatible with those of the 19th century writers, except in his more restricted use of the term "occupational cramp". Hunter J.H. Fry, MS 16 Howard Street Kew, VIC 3101 1. Fry HIH. Overuse syndrome in musicians 100years ago: an historical review. Med J Aust 1986; 145: 620-625. 2. Gowers WR. A manual of diseases of the nervous system. Vol 2. London: Churchill, 1888: 656-676.


We look at innovative education through a global and local approach to the philosophy of existence, known as glocalization, and through the psychological Gestalt of experiencing a whole that is inevitably viewed within social science by a sociological holistic principle. Our glocal, holistic, aesthetic practice has been experienced and realized through intensive performative education that enhances the existential capacity in multi / media projects through the humanistic approach, affectively using digital framing. Performative projects are performed in the Media Culture course at the Faculty of Teacher Education in Osijek, Department in Slavonski Brod (FOOZOS), including vertical education of primary and secondary students. The education process is performed through lectures, intensified through e-learning, and finalized by group orchestration in a large project supported by the non-profit organization Culture, Media and Education – Arthea and the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia. Examples of successfully implemented glocal, holistic and performative education can be seen in the videos: Baroque in Postmodern Glocal Approach, (created for the European Schoolnet Academy, 2019), Situationally Performative Smartphone Orchestra (conducted performance, Slavonski Brod town square, 2018), Post-Modern Dystopic Deconstruction for Mobile Phones Orchestra (FOOZOS, Department in Slavonski Brod, 2017), Project with Mobile phones (mobile learning for the course Contemporary Media in Literature Lectures, FOOZOS, Department in Slavonski Brod, 2016), multimedia poem The Soul of the World (Music Biennale Zagreb, 2007) and New Education Model: Multimedia Art (Christmas in Musical Pictures, 2004, Concert Hall, Slavonski Brod).


Osteoporosis is the most common type of bone disease. Conventional treatments are based on the use of antiresorptive drugs and/or anabolic agents. However, these treatments have certain limitations, such as a lack of bioavailability or toxicity in non-specific tissues. In this regard, pleiotrophin (PTN) is a protein with potent mitogenic, angiogenic, and chemotactic activity, with implications in tissue repair. On the other hand, mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs) have proven to be an effective inorganic drug-delivery system for biomedical applications. In addition, the surface anchoring of cationic polymers, such as polyethylenimine (PEI), allows for greater cell internalization, increasing treatment efficacy. In order to load and release the PTN to improve its effectiveness, MSNs were successfully internalized in MC3T3-E1 mouse pre-osteoblastic cells and human mesenchymal stem cells. PTN-loaded MSNs significantly increased the viability, mineralization, and gene expression of alkaline phosphatase and Runx2 in comparison with the PTN alone in both cell lines, evidencing its positive effect on osteogenesis and osteoblast differentiation. This proof of concept demonstrates that MSN can take up and release PTN, developing a potent osteogenic and differentiating action in vitro in the absence of an osteogenic differentiation-promoting medium, presenting itself as a possible treatment to improve bone-regeneration and osteoporosis scenarios.


Compressed sensing can substantially reduce the number of samples required for conventional signal acquisition at the expense of an additional reconstruction procedure. It also provides robust reconstruction when using quantized measurements, including in the one-bit setting. In this paper, our goal is to design a framework for binary compressed sensing that is adapted to images. Accordingly, we propose an acquisition and reconstruction approach that complies with the high dimensionality of image data and that provides reconstructions of satisfactory visual quality. Our forward model describes data acquisition and follows physical principles. It entails a series of random convolutions performed optically followed by sampling and binary thresholding. The binary samples that are obtained can be either measured or ignored according to predefined functions. Based on these measurements, we then express our reconstruction problem as the minimization of a compound convex cost that enforces the consistency of the solution with the available binary data under total-variation regularization. Finally, we derive an efficient reconstruction algorithm relying on convex-optimization principles. We conduct several experiments on standard images and demonstrate the practical interest of our approach.


The transient response of a system of independent electrodes buried in a semi-infinite conducting medium is studied. Using a simple and versatile numerical scheme written by the authors and based on the Electric Field Integral Equation (EFIE), the effect caused by harmonic signals ranging on frequency from Hz to hundred of MHz, and also by lightning type driving signal striking at a remote point far from the conductors, is extensively studied. The value of the scalar potential appearing on the electrodes as a function of the frequency of the applied signal is one of the variables investigated. Other features such as the input impedance at the injection point of the signal and the Ground Potential Rise (GPR) over the electrode system are also discussed.


This paper invites the reader to revisit the accused individuals' response strategies in the Salem witchcraft trials from the perspective of pragmatic politeness. However, politeness, as used in this paper, refers to politeness to self, for the sake of one's face — a concept that is different from, yet not incompatible with, that of Brown and Levinson (1987). The paper argues that it is more realistic to examine the trials from this perspective because the accused's responses were in part driven by "what they thought others thought of them", which is part of their "face". As many as nineteen sub-strategies of self-politeness were found to be in operation. Such self-politeness strategies were critical in these trials because they helped the accused to achieve two goals: first, they could defend themselves, and, second, at the same time that the responses might have led them to being acquitted or to a partial and more lenient punishment (although it could not be guaranteed that the responses would work to a satisfactory end), the accused were able to enhance or restore, to a certain degree, their tarnished public image.


Polyphenols of fruits and vegetables form an important part of human dietary compounds. Relatively little is known about accumulation of phenolics during fruits ripening process. The goal of this work was to study the changes in antioxidant activity and in content of 30 polyphenols during ripening of tomato fruits. Five organically and conventionally grown tomato cultivars were investigated at three different ripening stages. Phenolic compounds were extracted with methanol and extracts were analyzed by HPLC-DAD-MS/MS. During ripening, four different changing patterns were observed: (1) high level in green fruits with minimal changes; (2) continuous increase with maximum level in red-ripe fruits; (3) decrease; (4) increase and achieving maximum level at half-ripe stage. Similar change patterns were found for organic and conventional fruits. The accumulation patterns of phenolic compounds were similar in standard-type tomatoes but differed in several cases in cherry-type cultivar. Although contents of some polyphenols decreased during ripening, total phenolics and free radical scavenging activity increased in all studied cultivars and in case of both cultivation modes. The changes in content of phenolic compounds during ripening were greatly influenced by cultivars, but cultivation mode had only minor impact on dynamics in polyphenols contents in tomato fruits.


We examine the efficiency of different genotyping and phenotyping strategies in inbred line crosses from an information perspective. This provides a mathematical framework for the statistical aspects of QTL experimental design, while guiding our intuition. Our central result is a simple formula that quantifies the fraction of missing information of any genotyping strategy in a backcross. It includes the special case of selectively genotyping only the phenotypic extreme individuals. The formula is a function of the square of the phenotype, and the uncertainty in our knowledge of the genotypes at a locus. This result is used to answer a variety of questions. First, we examine the cost-information tradeoff varying the density of markers, and the proportion of extreme phenotypic individuals genotyped. Then we evaluate the information content of selective phenotyping designs and the impact of measurement error in phenotyping. A simple formula quantifies the information content of any combined phenotyping and genotyping design. We ex-tend our results to cover multi-genotype crosses such as the (cid:0) (cid:1) intercross, and multiple QTL models. We find that when the QTL effect is small, any contrast in a multi-genotype cross benefits from selective genotyping in the same manner as in a backcross. The benefit remains in the presence of a second unlinked QTL with small effect (explaining less than 20% of the variance), but diminishes if the second QTL has a large effect. Software for performing power calculations for backcross and (cid:0) (cid:1) intercross incorporating selective genotyping and marker spacing is available from http://www.biostat.ucsf.edu/sen .


OBJECTIVE
To determine the prevalence of personality disorders in patients admitted to the general medical wards of the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI).

METHOD
Patients (n = 100) sequentially admitted to the general medical wards of the UHWI were assessed for the diagnosis of personality disorder using the gold standard of a consultant assessment based on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, text revision (DSM IV-TR) diagnostic criteria for personality disorder, the International Personality Disorder Examination Screening questionnaire (IPDE-S) and the Jamaica Personality Disorder Inventory (JPDI).

RESULTS
The three assessment instruments identified a prevalence of personality disorder in the cohort of patients of 21% consultant DSM IV-TR assessment, 28% JPDI and 70% IPDE-S. The prevalence rate identified by the IPDE-S was significantly higher than the local instruments used (p < 0.000).

CONCLUSIONS
The prevalence of personality disorder assessed by the JPDI and the IPDE-S and the consultant DSM IV-TR instruments in Jamaica is significantly higher than the prevalence rate of studies in other countries.


The long-term goal of Project Halo is to build an application called Digital Aristotle that can answer questions on a wide variety of science topics and provide user- and domain-appropriate explanations. As a near-term goal, we are focusing on enabling subject matter experts (SMEs) to construct declarative knowledge bases (KBs) from 50 pages of a science textbook in the domains of Physics, Chemistry, and Biology in a way that the system can answer questions similar to those in an Advanced Placement (AP) exam in the respective discipline. The textbook knowledge is a mixture of textual information, mathematical equations, tables, diagrams, and domain-specific representations such as chemical reactions. In this paper, we explore the following question: Can we build a knowledge capture system to enable SMEs to construct KBs from the knowledge found in science textbooks and use the resulting KB for deductive question answering? We answer this question in the context of a system called AURA that supports knowledge capture from science textbooks.


Systems management in any organization depends exclusively on the efforts of a system administrator. Every change in the IT infrastructure landscape requires changes in the systems configuration settings. We propose the use of enterprise registries for addressing the automation of systems configuration. Registries provide global view on the whole IT infrastructure of an enterprise, store a complete configuration data and maintain consistent record of systems state. The role of a registry in the automation of reconfiguration activities in an enterprise can either be passive with the registry being only a data store for configuration data, or an active one. We view the active approach much more suitable for facilitating automatic system management. Active registries serve not only for data keeping but also command and perform reconfiguration directly onto the enterprise systems. To facilitate the seamless interaction between registry and all systems we propose to extend them with Web service capabilities. To define and perform all the complex sequences of tasks according to the configuration rules defined in a registry we advocate the use of Web Service compositions. We call these process-based Web services "systems management rules". Furthermore, the development of systems management rules can be automated by using Web Service Flows templates.


Abstract This paper presents an integrative model for strategic local planning based on the concept of spatial capital. The model bridges the gap between vision and reality by stimulating actions that are directed at mitigating challenges to the vision. The model uses the concept of 'spatial capital,' which is based on the accumulated assets and capabilities of a region. In addition, 'development engines,' which are alternative macrostrategies designed to help achieve the major goals set by the plan's vision, are offered for use by the model. The developed model aims to achieve a better integration of the region's overall capital resources.


The apparent digestibility of crude nutrients and the amino acids in the varieties Fribo and Erfordia of horse bean (Vicia faba L.) was determined in a digestibility and N-balance experiment with 32 colostomised laying hen hybrids. For this purpose 4 rations each with a rising quota of horse beans (10%, 20%, 40%, 50%) were tested with 4 hens each in a 6-day collecting period; the digestibility values were determined according to the regressive method. The average apparent digestibility is (formula; see text) The values of the apparent digestibility of the 17 amino acids vary for the variety Fribo between 68.6% (methionine) and 90.6% (arginine) and for the variety Erfordia between 47.7% (cystine) and 89.5% (arginine).


The urine electrical conductivity is a practical guide to the ion-to-water ratio of urine. It may be used to assess the influence of urinary loss upon the total body ion-to-water ratio. It is suggested that the total body ion-to-water ratio is the object of control in water therapy, commonly administered as 5% dextrose. The total body ion-to-water ratio closely accords with the ratio in the extracellular fluid. Since sodium is the predominant extracellular cation, the plasma sodium concentration closely reflects the extracellular and total body ion-to-water ratio. As a consequence the urine electrical conductivity may be used as a continuous signal in the open or closed loop control of water balance as reflected by the plasma sodium concentration.


We describe a sketch-based system for constructing an illustrative visualization of the subsurface. An intuitive and rapid modelling tool is defined, which takes as input user's strokes and creates a 3D layer-cake model of the earth. Our tool enables users to quickly express and communicate their ideas directly using a 3D model. For sketching, we have created geometric operators that capture the domain specific modelling requirements. We have devised sketching operators for expressing folding and faulting processes. This makes it possible to produce a large span of scenarios. Moreover, for communicating layer properties such as rock type and grain size, our system allows for associating user defined texture to each layer which can be deformed with a few sketch strokes.


Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) consist of energy limited sensor nodes, which limits the network lifetime. Such a lifetime can be prolonged by employing the emerging technology of wireless energy transfer (WET). In WET systems, the sensor nodes can harvest wireless energy from wireless charger, which can use energy beamforming to improve the efficiency. In this paper, a scenario where dedicated wireless chargers with multiple antennas use energy beamforming to charge sensor nodes is considered. The energy beamforming is coupled with the energy consumption of sensor nodes in terms of data routing, which is one novelty of the paper. The energy beamforming and the data routing are jointly optimized by a non-convex optimization problem. This problem is transformed into a semidefinite optimization problem, for which strong duality is proved, and thus the optimal solution exists. It is shown that the optimal solution of the semi-definite programming problem allows to derive the optimal solution of the original problem. The analytical and numerical results show that optimal energy beamforming gives two times better monitoring performance than that of WET without using energy beamforming.


Background and Purpose— The association between combined oral contraceptives (OC) use and increased risk of stroke has been reported. While progestogen-only contraceptives (POC) are commonly used worldwide, their impact on cardiovascular disease remains unclear. Methods— A meta-analysis based on EMBASE and MEDLINE referenced literature corresponding to OCs marketed since 1960 was carried out. Eligible articles assessing the risk of stroke in relation to OC or POC were reviewed, and relevant studies were extracted. All types of POC and routes of administration were taken into account in the meta-analysis. Results— Six case–control studies were identified. The combined odd ratio (OR) showed no increase in the risk of stroke among POC users (OR=0.96; 95% confidence interval: 0.70 to 1.31). This result was similar according to the route of administration (either implant or injectable or oral POC). Conclusion— Data from observational studies show that POC use is not associated with an increased risk of stroke. However, these results are based on limited data. Further investigations are needed in women with risk factors of stroke.


A self-regulated high-copy number plasmid containing chloramphenicol resistant gene, for the production of recombinant proteins under the regulation of bacteriophage λpL promoter, was constructed. The designed 5024 base pair expression plasmid contained a heat sensitive repressor cI857 coding gene to regulate the function of λpL promoter under heat shock induction. Using the constructed vector, for the first time, periplasmic production of human granulocyte macrophage colony stimulating factor (hGM-CSF) under heat induction was demonstrated. The developed hGM-CSF expressing system in this study has potential for the secretion of nearly 100% of expressed proteins into the Escherichia coli periplasmic space upon temperature up-shift.


INTRODUCTION: Attenuated arterial elasticity is one of the earliest markers of atherosclerosis. OBJECTIVE: Our aim was to investigate the relationship of passive smoking and elastic properties of the aorta. METHODS: We studied 11-year-old healthy children (n = 386) from the randomized, prospective atherosclerosis prevention trial (STRIP). Aortic elasticity was analyzed by using M-mode ultrasound imaging on the basis of the measurement of blood pressure and arterial diameter changes during diastole and systole. Aortic compliance (AC) and aortic stiffness index (SI) were calculated. Exposure to tobacco smoke was measured by using serum cotinine concentration, which was analyzed with gas chromatography. RESULTS: Cotinine concentrations ranged from nondetectable (detection limit: 0.16 ng/mL) to 6.8 ng/mL. Cotinine values and aortic elasticity measures were similar between genders. Children were classified into 3 groups according to their cotinine concentration: the top-decile cotinine group (n = 39), the nondetectable cotinine group (n = 220), and the low cotinine group (n = 127). Conventional atherosclerosis risk factors were similar between the 3 cotinine groups. A decreasing trend in AC (P = .041) and an increasing trend in SI (P = .006) was observed across the cotinine groups with an increasing level of tobacco smoke exposure. In addition, systolic and diastolic blood pressure and BMI were independent predictors of the aortic elasticity indices. In multivariable models, cotinine level (P = .020) and systolic blood pressure (P < .001) were inversely associated with AC and directly related to SI (cotinine level, P = .005; systolic blood pressure, P = .0003). CONCLUSIONS: These data suggest that passive smoking is associated with decreased aortic elasticity in children, indicating early arterial changes.


I spent the evening quietly with Carrie, of whose company I never tire. We had a most pleasant chat about the letters on 'Is Marriage a Failure?' It has been no failure in our case. This was the confident opening passage in Charles Pooter's entry for 2 November in George Grossmith's famous satire, The Diary of a Nobody, serialized in Punch in 1888. Simultaneously it celebrated the lower-middle-class husband's eager commitment to domesticity and marital harmony and acknowledged, in its reference to an equally popular contemporaneous correspondence series running in the Daily Telegraph, avid lower-middle-class engagement with routine popular press debates on marriage and domestic issues. The Diary's readers are invited to relish the irony in Charles's characteristic exaggeration of his domestic felicity, since they know that before long Carrie's patience will again be tried by another of his pretentious and interfering domestic schemes and ineffectual efforts to assert his household mastery. Such tensions in the Pooter marriage were emblematic of wider insecurities in the lower-middle-class identity. For over a century Charles Pooter's transparent claim to a gentility, independence, and mastery far above his actual station of a struggling suburban bank clerk has provided the dominant metaphor for lower-middle-class pretension, weakness, and diminished masculinity. His bogus authority was exposed as much at home as at his workplace, the bank, where he paraded as the pompous chief clerk. Indeed it was that theme of false authority, both in private and public, palpable even in his dress, that satirists delighted in puncturing. Grossmith was gratified by the range of the Diary's readership, especially among upper-class personalities.


Fingerlings of the African catfish, C. gariepinus (mean weight 13.13±2.77g) were exposed to linear alkyl benzene sulphonate (0.0166mg/L) under laboratory conditions. The tissues (liver, gill, muscle and kidney) enzyme parameters were analysed after 0hr (initial) 2hr, 12hr and 24h exposure. The increased neutral and alkaline proteases activities in the different tissues of C. gariepinus indicates the damage caused due to impairment of energy supply and alkaline proteases activity indicates higher protein degradation. Therefore, the proteins are denatured leading to more activation of protease. During the toxic exposure of LAS, the aspartate aminotransfarase (AAT) and alaninetransfarase (ALAT) were enhanced which led to incorporation of amino acids into TCA cycle for energy production. Whereas, glutamate dehydrogenase activity similarly enhanced the elevated level of amino acids, transaminases which possibly suggest the utilization of protein under stress condition of fish. Possible Impaired respiration was evident due to the toxic insult of LAS to the gill which showed severe damage such as filaments with disjointed lamella. In the liver, there was mild vacuolation and congestion of the liver tissue. The kidney showed sequensiation of the kidney architecture with accumulation of hyaline droplets in the tubular epithelial cell. These changes occur predominantly in the 24hr exposure. LAS is toxic to fingerlings fish C. gariepinus are more susceptible to LAS, therefore their use on/near fish farm or in area close to aquatic environment should be discouraged. Keyword :  Linear alkyl benzene sulphonate, proteases, aminases, glutamate dehydrogenase, histopathology


Ultraviolet radiation (UV) is one of the main risk factors that increase a person's chance of developing skin cancer. UV is divided into three subtypes, called UVA, UVB and UVC. UVA and UVB both have the ability to cause different types of DNA damage. Our understanding of UVA and its mechanism of carcinogenesis is poorly understood due to UVB being the focus of research. The DNA damage response (DDR) detects DNA damage, and triggers a signalling pathway which results in cell cycle arrest, DNA repair or apoptosis. The DDR is important for preventing the persistence of UVinduced DNA damage in skin cells. This project used HaCaT cells to investigate UVA and its ability to generate double strand breaks, and how the DDR is activated as a result. Cells exposed to 100 KJ m-2 UVA displayed significant amounts of DSBs, which were largely repaired within 1 hour of irradiation. γH2AX was used as a biomarker of DNA damage, and investigated using Western blotting and immunofluorescence. UVA-induced γH2AX accumulation peaked between 1 and 2 hours, which was seen in the Western blotting. ATM was inhibited using KU-60019, which caused a delay in the accumulation of UVA-induced γH2AX following. UVA-induced CHK2 and p53 activation followed similar patterns in both ATM inhibited and uninhibited samples, and suggested that both components are linked to an ATM independent pathway. UVA-induced PNKP activation was delayed with the addition of an ATM inhibitor, and increased slightly 1 hour post irradiation, suggesting a greater dependence on ATM activity. 53BP1 foci formation was used to investigate NHEJ activation. There was a significant increase in the number of UVA-induced 53BP1 foci, while the addition of an ATM inhibitor prevented this increase, suggesting an ATM dependence for NHEJ activation. This data suggests that UVA generates double strand breaks, which result in the activation of the DDR which peaks within the first 2 hours following UVA irradiation. Furthermore, ATM is essential for the activation of NHEJ, but is not the only kinase responsible for the activation the DDR.


The monographs of this series from the " Committee on Medicine and the Changing Order " of the New York Academy of Medicine are of a very high standard. They are published in co-operation with the Commonwealth Fund, and each writer in turn has been invited to deal with some phase or activity of medicine and relate it to the fast-changing pattern of the life of the American people. In this book Dr. Stieglitz describes, as he sees them, many of the problems of how medical science can be applied to create a higher level of health as opposed either to curative medicine or to measures designed to avoid a specific infection or group of diseases. In his introduction he is careful to point to the indefinite article at the beginning of Lhe title, and he has succeeded in the book in striking a reasonable compromise between the dogmatic and the mere throwing out of suggestions. Nevertheless such a method has limitations, and in this case, while there are many most thought-provoking definitions and some of the best expositions of the aims of " human eubiotics" or "' social medicine " or " constructive medicine "-or by whatever phrase we express ourselves-the author has largely failed to put forward a scheme which is capable of application either by organized social effort or by the individual practitioner. Merely to " snipe " at this monograph in such a way would, however, be quite unfair. The following quotations indicate original thought and a power of simnple expression which so many gropers after truth in this subject sadly lack.


Extracted from text ... mnassa vol 65 nos 5 & 6 74
the astronomical traveller
Total Solar Eclipse - 29 March 2006
The first solar eclipse for 2006 happened on Wednesday, 29 March. The track of totality started at the very eastern tip of South America, crossed central North Africa and south-east Europe, ending in central Asia. From a few locations along this track, ASSA eclipse chasers enjoyed this most amazing show of nature.
From Ghana on the horn of Africa, a team of the SCIR set up a live web-cast and were joined by a party of four from Cape ..


This paper discusses the implementation of a guidance system based on mixed integer linear programming (MILP) on a modified, autonomous T-33 aircraft equipped with Boeing's UCAV avionics package. A receding horizon MILP formulation is presented for safe, real-time trajectory generation in a partially-known, cluttered environment. Safety at all times is guaranteed by constraining the intermediate trajectories to terminate in a loiter pattern that does not intersect with any no-fly zones and can always be used as a safe backup plan. Details about the real-time software implementation using CPLEX and Boeing's OCP platform are given. A test scenario developed for the DARPA-sponsored software enabled control capstone demonstration is outlined, and simulation and flight test results are presented


In the present work, the FGM monomorph actuator was developed and applied in the impedance pump. The actuator was fabricated using electrophoretic deposition (EPD). Two starting materials, pure PZT and doped PZT, were mixed to form four different compositions. The actuator was then fabricated by sequential deposition of the four compositions layer by layer on the substrate and followed by sintering to full density. The actuator shows both piezoelectric property and microstructural gradient across the layers. The actuator is able to achieve a bending displacement of nearly 2 mm at resonant frequency. It has been successfully applied to the impedance pump as the actuating component. The pumping action comes from the periodic compression by the actuator to induce a net flow. Maximum flow was observed at the resonant frequency of the actuator. A flow rate of about 9 ml/min was generated.


Financial market prediction is one of the most attractive research areas in financial data mining field because of its available data and potential profits. Financial market prediction has been paid much attention by many researchers and practitioners. Huge numbers of forecasting methods including judgmental methods and statistical methods have been proposed. In previous studies, judgmental methods mainly focus on expert judgments, which are waste of resources in some extent and may lead to lower accuracy, while statistical methods in terms of statistical models can achieve better performance, but when the unpredictable events appear, these models are ineffective and useless sometimes. In this paper, by incorporating online user's opinions, two novel paradigms are proposed for financial market prediction, which may overcome the aforementioned shortcoming. In the first paradigm, the opinions of several selective online users are extracted, and then their opinions are integrated to forecast financial market. In the second one, a data mining model is constructed by combining user's opinions and financial time-series data, and then the model is used for financial market prediction. Moreover, these paradigms are validated and compared using real financial market data. The empirical results show that our proposed paradigms are useful and feasible for financial market prediction, and furthermore, the combined model outperforms the traditional judgmental model. These findings imply that the proposed method is a promising alternative for financial market prediction.


The lepidopteran species of Duzce province were investigated. To collect specimens, a sweep net and light traps were used. A total of 109 species belonging to 17 families of the order Lepidoptera were identified. The family Geometridae was represented by the highest number of species (20), followed by Noctuidae (19), Lycaenidae (12) and Nymphalidae (12). This was the first study to determine the Lepidoptera fauna of Duzce.


Advances in information technology allow for remote working, leading to suggestions that remote individuals can work as well in virtual teams as in face-to-face teams. This paper considers the continued use of face-to-face communication in a European group of stock traders, despite the capabilities of information technology to individuate the work. The case illustrates that traders prefer to work in face-to-face settings for various reasons. Short term reasons arise from a need for instant and effortless communication in their manipulation of market prices and instant knowledge sharing, leading to both higher individual and collective profits. Long term reasons arise from a need for continuous learning across novices and experts, as stock markets and stock prices settle into behavioral patterns over longer periods of time. The implications for computing and work are discussed.


ABSTRACT The prologue of Paul's Epistle to the Romans (1: 1–7) and the doxology in the final chapter (16: 25–27) share core theological concepts about humankind's relationship with God. In what is only the limited space of three verses, the final doxology repeats all major concepts that were introduced in the prologue: God, gospel, Jesus Christ, an ancient divine plan coming true, God revealing himself and his will through holy scriptures, and an invited response of obedience of faith. This article concludes that there is basic conceptual unity of the prologue and final doxology, but also difference, particularly as the prologue explicitly introduces God as Father, a concept implied but not expressed in the doxology. Also the doxology stresses the mystery of the gospel for the gentiles in ages past, while the prologue suggests that within the Jewish context a lot was made known to and by the prophets already. On the basis of this conceptual unity of the prologue and the final doxology, this article follows Clement and Origen of Alexandria in their appreciation to the final chapters of Romans as part of the epistle. It uses a philological, source orientated method to explore the agreement and divergence between both passages and suggests that the author uses repetition of the main contents of the prologue in his final doxology to reinforce his overall message.


Older people living with frailty emphasize autonomy and function as acute healthcare outcome goals. Existing Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) measure function but do not comprehensively address autonomy. This initial development of a novel autonomy outcome measure used co-creation and cognitive interviews, working toward a PROM for Older People living with frailty receiving Acute Care ("PROM-OPAC"). Novel item question stems and responses considering autonomy were devised with lay research partners. Items were examined for content by lay volunteers, and then selected based on relevance, completeness, and accessibility. Retained items were cognitively tested with patient participants. Item selection considered content validity and feasibility and was undertaken collaboratively with lay research partners. The study involved 3 lay research partners and 4 further lay collaborators throughout all stages, and 14 patient participants were recruited for the cognitive interviews. Twenty-two novel items were appraised. Seven were selected for retention. This preliminary PROM-OPAC comprised 7 items to measure autonomy and was intended for administration alongside a function measure to capture meaningful acute healthcare outcomes. Development will continue with quantitative testing and validation.


Shear wave elastography (SWE) is the newer of the two methods of measuring tissue stiffness using ultrasound. We present the case of a 39-year-old patient with fibrocystic breast disease who presented with a left painful breast lump. The patient underwent a breast ultrasound that depicted a complicated cyst with a "pseudo-solid" content. When the SWE mode was turned on, the ultrasound share wave was observed on the gray-scale image, as surface undulations of the "pseudo-solid" component. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of the share wave visualization on a gray-scale image. The impact on patient management is discussed.


[Excerpt] This report provides background on factors contributing to changes in physician practice organization, including physician supply, lifestyle changes, and government incentives. Next it examines different types of integration, the legal intricacies of affiliation, and the possible implications for consumer and federal policy.


Temperature trends that are part of short-term climatic changes are often explained by a variety of theories, including changes in mean atmospheric pressure patterns. Seasonal 700 mb height data from grid points on the western (40° N, 120° W) and eastern side (40° N, 100° W) of the Great Basin, USA, were correlated with seasonal mean surface temperature data from Nevada and Utah, respectively, for a 41 yr period. Results from bivariate linear regression indicate that strong associations exist between height and surface data for all seasons except winter. The influence of persistent snow cover and topography may have a major influence on low wintertime associations. Trends in 700 mb height data are significantly correlated to seasonal temperature trends as measured by Spearman rank correlation. These results suggest that upper air trends are consistent with and supportive of the trends observed at the surface, and so lend credence to surface trend existence.


The composite infrared spectrometer (CIRS) instrument on board the Cassini Saturn orbiter employs two 1x10 HgCdTe detector arrays for mid-infrared remote sensing of Titan's and Saturn's atmospheres. In this paper we show that the real detector spatial response functions, as measured in ground testing before launch, differ significantly from idealized "boxcar" responses. We further show that neglecting this true spatial response function when modeling CIRS spectra can have a significant effect on interpretation of the data, especially in limb-sounding mode, which is frequently used for Titan science. This result has implications not just for CIRS data analysis but for other similar instrumental applications.


SUMMARY
A precise regulation of flowering time is central to plant species survival. Therefore, mechanisms have evolved in plants to integrate various environmental cues to optimize flowering time. In this study, we show that the product of the wheat gene TaFT, which integrates photoperiod and vernalization signals promoting flowering, interacts with bZIP proteins TaFDL2 and TaFDL6. We also show that TaFDL2 can interact in vitro with five ACGT elements in the promoter of the meristem identity gene VRN1, suggesting that TaFDL2 is a functional homologue of Arabidopsis FD. No direct interactions between the TaFT protein and the VRN1 promoter were detected. Transgenic wheat plants over-expressing TaFT showed parallel increases in VRN1 transcripts, suggesting that TaFT provides transcriptional activation of VRN1, possibly through interactions with the TaFDL2 protein. The same transgenic plants also showed increased transcript levels of TaFT2 (a TaFT paralogue), indicating that TaFT2 acts downstream of TaFT. The fact that TaFT2 interacts with another bZIP protein TaFDL13, which lacks the ability to interact with the VRN1 promoter, suggests that TaFT and TaFT2 have different gene targets. This observation agrees with the functional divergence observed for the TaFT and TaFT2 orthologous genes in rice. The temperate cereals analyzed so far show VRN1 transcripts in the leaves, a characteristic not observed in Arabidopsis or rice. The high levels of TaFDL2 transcripts observed in wheat leaves provide a simple explanation for this difference. We present a hypothesis to explain the conservation of VRN1 expression in the leaves of temperate cereals.


The existence of a particular semantic agreement strategy, what I will here call Atomic Homogeneity , has been argued to determine plurality in complex noun phrases. If the denotational properties of a complex noun phrase can be distributed to its smallest, atomic subset then plural agreement is the result. This paper explores this prediction using a large-scale experiment and demonstrates that Atomic Homogeneity is a highly significant statistical effect in the data, thus validating the prediction of this strategy. In addition, this paper serves a methodological purpose by exploring the utility of large-scale data collection by peer interview. Although it might be expected that the method is noisy, this is offset by the large amount of data collected and which is more amenable to statistical analysis than smaller-scale case studies. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2014, 32(1): 1–19


Goal: The main purpose of the present study was to propose a recognizing method to analyze characteristics of symmetric lifting of skilled logistic experts by center of pressure (CoP) trajectories. Although it has been known that good posture helps reduce the intradiscal loads on lumbar discs, the most significant problem was that most of logistic workers did not know whether the current posture was proper or not. Methods : The experiment of lifting was performed three times under 18 kg loads with closed eyes. Six skilled logistic experts and six unskilled beginners were participated in. The linear discriminant analysis (LDA) was designed by seven indices which were derived from measured CoP trajectories with the Wii Balance Board. The strong point of experimental system was practical, reliable, and cheap. Results : As a result, it was found that the designed LDA discriminated difference of symmetric lifting between skilled experts and unskilled beginners with the error rate of 0.005. Discussion : It was discussed that not only most of unskilled beginners had mainly characteristics of poor lifting posture, but also the proposed method showed a high possibility to self-evaluate the symmetric lifting in order to check whether the current posture of logistic worker is proper or not.


The objectives of this paper are to identify possible gaps in identification, evaluation, analysis, implementation and effectiveness of risk management approaches among home-based consulting Engineers in Nigeria vis-a-vis the implementation of such practices. Structured Questionnaire method was adopted as the survey instrument to collect data centred on issues on the subject matters. Out of 80 questionnaires distributed, 61 were returned and 6 of the returned responses rendered invalid leaving 55 valid questionnaires. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and Correlation methods were adopted for statistical analysis with respect to which four hypotheses based on the subject matter were formulated and evaluated using the F-and Correlation statistics. The first premised on risk identification resulted in comparative F-statistics of F cat = 0.057592 < F crit = 2.866081, the second on risk evaluation yielded F cat = 0.194683 < F crit = 2.866081 while the third based on risk management implementation resulted in F cat = 0.093474 < F crit = 2.866081. The results of the first three hypothesis indicted the home-based Consulting Engineers of not identifying, analysing/evaluating and implementing risk management approaches in project execution respectively. The fourth hypothesis premised on correlation between management approach and policy implementation yielded a correlation statistics of 0.501642 establishing a positive correlation between the two among the home-based Consulting Engineers. The study thus establishes risk management practices as key to successful project management and its neglect as major causal factor for project failures in Nigeria.


Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) is one of the technologies for third generation systems. In a CDMA system, all users interfere with each others, therefore the CDMA system is interference limited. The users, who suffer from a strong shadow effect or that are far away from the BS, need more power to reach it. In this case, the users may transmit at their maximum allowed power without satisfying their Quality of Service. Therefore, this would leave some mobiles in outage and also create too much interference to the neighboring cells. One-way to counter this problem and therefore to improve the capacity is to increase the number of BSs. But this solution cannot be efficient as it significantly increases the network infrastructure cost. Alternative techniques that involve less planning and are quick to deploy appear to be more advantageous. Relaying is one of these techniques and is growing in importance for future wireless systems. In this thesis, a new radio access network based on combinations of multi-hop and star-topology architectures is proposed. The main objective of this thesis is to demonstrate achievable capacity gains under various relaying criteria compared with no-relaying (conventional) cellular architecture. In this new architecture, some intermediate nodes (mobile or fixed) located between the originating terminal and the BSs are used for the purpose of retransmitting the original packets. We show that under specific criteria and conditions the multihop concept indeed yields capacity gains. A number of different scenarios are defined and their relative performances are fully evaluated using an accurate dynamic system-level simulator. The capacity gains are compared to the case of no relaying/hopping. To demonstrate the achievable capacity gains, we use UMTS FDD and TDD modes. The proposed concepts and criteria for relaying are generic enough to be used with current and future radio access technologies. The results show that under certain conditions an uplink capacity gain of 30-40% is readily achievable with the multihop architecture.


Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the provision of community pharmacy services to children and young people with a focus on advanced services such as medicines use review. Perceptions and experiences of community pharmacists, pharmacy staff, young people and their parents or carers on the provision of such services were also explored. Methods: Four different cross-sectional, self-administered questionnaires were distributed in parallel to pharmacists, pharmacy staff members, children and young people and parents in the United Kingdom. Results: An outline of pharmacist's current involvement with children and young people was provided by 92 pharmacists. A different group of 38 community pharmacists and 40 non-pharmacist members of pharmacy staff from a total of 46 pharmacies provided information and views on the conduct of Medicines use review with children and young people. Experiences of advanced pharmacy service provision were collected from 51 children and young people and 18 parents. Most pharmacists offered public health advice to children and young people (73/92; 79.3%) and even more (83/92; 90.2%) reported that they often interacted with children and young people with long-term condition. Despite their high levels of interaction, and a majority opinion that medicines use reviews could benefit children (35/38; 92.1%), the number of pharmacies reporting to have conducted medicines use reviews with children was low (5/41). Pharmacists perceived the main barriers to recruitment as consent (17/29; 58.6%), guideline ambiguity (14/29; 48.3%) and training (13/29; 44.8%). A considerable proportion pharmacists (12/29; 41.4%) and other personnel (14/33; 42.4%) working in community pharmacies were unaware that children were potentially eligible for medicines use reviews. Only 29.4% of the 51 children and young people participants had received advice about their long-term condition from a pharmacist and the majority (46/51; 90.2%) had not taken part in an advanced service focused on adherence. Conclusions: While general engagement with children and young people appears high from the pharmacist's perspective, advice specific to children and young people with long-term conditions and the provision of advanced services in this group remains a challenge.


Summary: We report the CT findings in a patient with a lateral neck mass histologically shown to be a schwannoma but having certain radiographic features commonly considered pathognomonic for a type III second branchial cleft cyst. Our case, therefore, represents an exception to this long-established rule.


The methods of pulse radiolysis, low temperature optical and electron spin resonance spectroscopy and chemical analysis of stable products have been applied to an investigation of the γ-radiolysis of liquid and glassy methanol. Processes induced by generation of presumed intermediates by photoionization of solutes have been studied using the same techniques. Electrons are trapped in glassy methanol after γ-irradiation at 77 K with a yield G(e¯t) = 2.7 ± 0.3 and on warming are rendered mobile, ultimately forming an amount of hydrogen equal to 1/2G(e¯t). In contrast, illumination of the irradiated sample at 77 K with visible light decomposes the trapped electron, forming hydrogen and CH2OH or CH2O- in yield equal to G(e¯t). The solvated electron in liquid methanol also reacts with the solvent, at a rate faster than the corresponding reaction in water. The addition of sodium methoxide to liquid methanol results in a marked increase in both the yield and lifetime of the solvated electron observed after 0.2 μs irradiation pulse. The optical absorptions and decay parameters of CH2OH and CH2O- in liquid methanol were obtained; the ultraviolet absorption observed in irradiated methanol glass after removal of the trapped electrons by photo-bleaching is probably due to these two species. Solutions of methanol glass containing silver perchlorate exhibit complex optical and e. s. r. spectra, which provide evidence for several different species, but a complete analysis has not been possible. The radicals expected from the initial ionization event are considered. The results of this work together with published data are used to predict the reaction of the free radicals CH3O. , CH2OH, CH2O-, H. and e¯s or e¯t in the systems of interest and the relevance of these reactions to some aspects of the radiation chemistry of methanol is discussed.


Across nations, large proportions of younger birth cohorts obtain no professional qualications. Using a structural dynamic approach, we analyze policies targeted adolescents who leave grade nine with a GPA in the bottom 20%. We find that preparatory courses, offered to young people who are unable to commence a qualifying degree, have no positive impact on future labor market outcomes. Unobservable noncognitive qualities are more important for this group than are cognitive skills. Education is a good option for some, but not for all. Implications for mechanism design and wage support schemes are discussed.


This document outlines a vision for "green computing for a clean tomorrow" [Feng06]. The first piece of the vision is a bit pedestrian – holistic energy-efficient computing "in a box" – but serves as a foundation to a more audacious (tongue-in-cheek) vision of holistic energy-efficient computing "in a world." As recently noted by IDC in an IBM presentation at the Gartner Data Center Summit, December 2006, the annual spending for power and cooling would match the annual budget for new server spending in 2007, as shown in the figure below. In addition to cost, energy-efficient (power- aware) computing can enhance the reliability and availability of ever-increasingly dense computing systems, such as blades; it can also provide additional computational headroom when an institution has reached the limits of its power and cooling infrastructure, particularly when the infrastructure cannot be expanded any further [Feng08].


The Danish energy system is undergoing a transition from a system based on storable fossil fuels to a system based on fluctuating renewable energy sources. At the same time, more of and more of the energy system is becoming electrified; transportation, heating and fuel usage in industry and elsewhere. This article investigates the development of the Danish energy system in a medium year 2030 situation as well as in a long-term year 2050 situation. The analyses are based on scenario development by the Danish Climate Commission. In the short term, it is investigated what the effects will be of having flexible or inflexible electric vehicles and individual heat pumps, and in the long term it is investigated what the effects of changes in the load profiles due to changing weights of demand sectors are. The analyses are based on energy systems simulations using EnergyPLAN and demand forecasting using the Helena model. The results show that even with a limited short-term electric car fleet, these will have a significant effect on the energy system; the energy system's ability to integrated wind power and the demand for condensing power generation capacity in the system. Charging patterns and flexibility have significant effects on this. Likewise, individual heat pumps may affect the system operation if they are equipped with heat storages. The analyses also show that the long-term changes in electricity demand curve profiles have little impact on the energy system performance. The flexibility given by heat pumps and electric vehicles in the long-term future overshadows any effects of changes in hourly demand curve profiles.


MOTIVATION
In silico prediction of functional regions on protein surfaces, i.e. sites of interaction with DNA, ligands, substrates and other proteins, is of utmost importance in various applications in the emerging fields of proteomics and structural genomics. When a sufficient number of homologs is found, powerful prediction schemes can be based on the observation that evolutionarily conserved regions are often functionally important, typically, only the principal functionally important region of the protein is detected, while secondary functional regions with weaker conservation signals are overlooked. Moreover, it is challenging to unambiguously identify the boundaries of the functional regions.

METHODS
We present a new methodology, called PatchFinder, that automatically identifies patches of conserved residues that are located in close proximity to each other on the protein surface. PatchFinder is based on the following steps: (1) Assignment of conservation scores to each amino acid position on the protein surface. (2) Assignment of a score to each putative patch, based on its likelihood to be functionally important. The patch of maximum likelihood is considered to be the main functionally important region, and the search is continued for non-overlapping patches of secondary importance.

RESULTS
We examined the accuracy of the method using the IGPS enzyme, the SH2 domain and a benchmark set of 112 proteins. These examples demonstrated that PatchFinder is capable of identifying both the main and secondary functional patches.

AVAILABILITY
The PatchFinder program is available at: http://ashtoret.tau.ac.il/~nimrodg/


This study uses a disaggregated input-output (IO) table of Sweden to assess the economic impacts of different production lines within Swedish agriculture. Focus has especially been placed on the differences between different types of livestock production and the differences between livestock and arable productions. Swedish agriculture was divided into the production lines, or sectors, cattle (milk and beef), pig, poultry and egg, sheep, mixed livestock production, cereals and mixed farm production, and the importance and potential of each one of them were assessed. To enable such a detailed analysis we first developed and applied a method for disaggregating the single agricultural account in the Swedish IO table. To do so we disaggregated the inputs and outputs of all production lines identified in the study. We used farm accounting data for Sweden together with sector specific data from Statistics Sweden and Agriwise to determine the purchases and sales of different farm types. Within the so called Make-Use framework of the IO table we allowed different farm types to produce more than one output to take the normal heterogeneity of farm production into consideration. Turning the IO table into an IO model we analyzed the various interdependencies in the economic system and determined the relative impact and potentials of different sectors. In particular, output, employment and income multipliers, together with elasticities were calculated and analyzed. In this process we developed the already existing measure of elasticities to better capture the relative importance of sectors with limited final demand. Livestock production lines are generally more integrated in the system of intermediate sales and purchases compared with cereal production. This means that these production lines offer a greater potential in generating output throughout the economy, if the final demand for these products was to increase exogenously. Among the livestock production lines, poultry and egg production seem to be the most input-intensive; however this production line uses labour to a small extent. Combining the multipliers with the relative size of production lines to derive measures of elasticities we find that significant production lines are cattle (milk and beef), cereals and mixed farming. The output, employment and income multipliers, as well as the elasticities, calculated in this study offer a basis for decisions related to sector priorities and regional and rural development. It is however utterly important that the results are interpreted in the right way and that the reader understands that production lines with great output generating potential might for example not perform as well in generating employment. Furthermore generating employment can be measured from different perspectives. That is, a sector can generate employment from one more person employed in the sector or from exogenous increase in the demand for the product of the production line. Results might differ substantially.


The phenomenon of photon upconversion, in which a system absorbs two or more photons of lower energy and emits a photon of higher energy, has been used in numerous applications, including non-destructive bioimaging, deep-penetrating photodynamic therapy, catalysis, and photovoltaic devices. To date, photon upconversion has been observed typically in inorganic nanocrystals, nanoparticles, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), supramolecular assemblies, and organic dyads. Herein, we have demonstrated a new strategy for harnessing photon upconversion-supramolecular upconversion-based on host-guest chemistry. We have identified a box-like fluorescent tetracationic host incorporating a thiazolothiazole emitter, which can accommodate a guest-sensitizer, 5,15-diphenylporphyrin inside its cavity and demonstrated that the host-guest inclusion complex displays triplet-fusion upconversion when the guest is excited with low energy light. The strategy of supramolecular upconversion has been employed successfully in two other host-guest complexes-with hosts comprised of anthracene emitters and a 5,15-diphenylporphyrin guest-corroborating the fact that this strategy is a general one and can be applied in designing a new family of host-guest complexes for photon upconversion. More importantly, supramolecular upconversion is accessible in solution under dilute conditions (μM) compared to most of the existing approaches that require significantly higher concentrations (mM) of emitters and/or sensitizers. Transient absorption spectroscopy and density functional theory have been employed in order to confirm a triplet-fusion upconversion mechanism. Host-guest complexation-mediated supramolecular photon upconversion eliminates multiple issues in relation to the existing systems related to high working concentrations, high incident laser power, and low optical penetration depths.


OBJECT
In this paper the authors describe the indications for and the results and complications of repeated transsphenoidal surgery (RTSS) to treat recurrent or residual pituitary adenoma.

METHODS
A retrospective review was conducted of 96 consecutive patients who underwent RTSS to treat recurrent or residual pituitary adenoma. Ninety-six patients underwent RTSS: 42 to treat a recurrent or residual pituitary mass and 54 to treat a recurrent or persistent hormone hypersecretion. There was no case of perioperative death and there was a 1% incidence of major complications. Postoperative endocrinological deficiencies were uncommon unless planned total hypophysectomy was performed to treat Cushing disease. Clinical remission occurred in 93% of patients undergoing RTSS to treat a tumor mass, and 15% of patients initially experienced remission only to face a relapse after a mean of 32 months. Endocrinological remission occurred in 57% of patients undergoing RTSS to treat hormone hypersecretion; most of these patients had Cushing disease. Thirty-five percent of patients with an initial endocrinological remission experienced a relapse of their symptoms after a mean of 31 months (thus, 37% of patients achieved sustained endocrinological remission). We failed to identify factors that accurately predicted initial symptom remission or delayed relapse following RTSS. Ten patients in our series eventually underwent a third transsphenoidal surgery without major complications.

CONCLUSIONS
Repeated transsphenoidal surgery is a more effective treatment for recurrent or residual mass than it is for hormone hypersecretion and has acceptable rates of morbidity and mortality. If hypophysectomy is not performed, endocrinological deficiencies are unlikely following RTSS.


The reductionist approach to biology has allowed us to understand the cell at a component level. But in recent years, with the deluge of genome‐derived and empirically obtained data, we must interpret biological complexity holistically. Thus, systems biology research allows us to connect the seemingly independent elements in biological networks. Protozoan parasites in the genus Leishmania cause clinically distinct diseases in humans with visceral, cutaneous, and mucocutaneous pathologies. In this article, we take the example of Leishmania parasites and their interactions with the vertebrate host as a model to generate a global view of molecular and biochemical processes in both spatial and temporal compartments, based on genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, and metabolomic data. Furthermore, we propose extending this approach to other pathogen‐host relationships, thus enabling us to identify novel therapeutic targets, vaccine candidates, and to develop immune monitoring and diagnosis. Drug Dev Res 70:296–302, 2009 © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Background: Indonesian's health care system is characterized by underutilized of the health-care infrastructure. One of the ways to improve the demand for formal health care is through health insurance. Responding to this potentially effective policy leads the Government of Indonesia to expand health insurance coverage by enacting the National Social Security Act in 2004. In this particular issue, understanding provider choice is therefore a key to address the broader policy question as to how the current low uptake of health care services could be turned in to an optimal utilization. Objective: To estimate a model of provider choice for outpatient care in Indonesia with specific attention being paid to the role of health insurance. Methods: A total of 16485 individuals were obtained from the second wave of the Indonesian Family Life survey. A multinomial logit regression model was applied to a estimate provider choice for outpatient care in three provider alternative (public, private and self-treatment). A policy simulation is reported as to how expanding insurance benefits could change the patterns of provider choice for outpatient health care services. Results: Individuals who are covered by civil servant insurance (Askes) are more likely to use public providers, while the beneficiaries of private employees insurance (Jamsostek) are more likely to use private ones compared with the uninsured population. The results also reveal that less healthy, unmarried, wealthier and better educated individuals are more likely to choose private providers than public providers. Conclusions: Any efforts to improve access to health care through health insurance will fail if policy-makers do not accommodate peoples' preferences for choosing health care providers. The likely changes in demand from public providers to private ones need to be considered in the current social health insurance reform process, especially in devising premium policies and benefit packages. Key words: health insurance, provider choice, Indonesia


The physical and physiological behavior of sickle cell trait carriers (AS) is somewhat equivocal under strenuous conditions, although this genetic abnormality is generally considered to be a benign disorder. The occurrence of incidents and severe injuries in AS during exercise might be explained, in part, by the lactic acidosis due to a greater lactate influx into AS red blood cells (RBCs). In the present study, the RBC lactate transport activity via the different pathways was compared between AS and individuals with normal hemoglobin (AA). Sixteen Caribbean students, nine AS and seven AA, performed a progressive and maximal exercise test to determine maximal oxygen consumption. Blood samples were obtained at rest to assess haematological parameters and RBC lactate transport activity. Lactate influxes [total lactate influx and monocarboxylate transporter (MCT-1)-mediated lactate influx] into erythrocytes were measured at four external [14C]-labeled lactate concentrations (1.6, 8.1, 41, and 81.1 mM). The two groups had similar maximal oxygen consumption. Total lactate influx and lactate influx via the MCT-1 pathway were significantly higher in AS compared with AA at 1.6, 41, and 81.1 mM. The maximal lactate transport capacity for MCT-1 was higher in AS than in AA. Although AS and AA had the same maximal aerobic physical fitness, the RBCs from the sickle cell trait carriers took up more lactate at low and high concentrations than the RBCs from AA individuals. The higher MCT-1 maximal lactate transport capacity found in AS suggests greater content or greater activity of MCT-1 in AS RBC membranes.


Leiomyomaare benign tumors commonly occurring in the uterus. Vaginal leiomyoma are rare with only about 300 reported cases. We report a case of 43-year-old multigravida who presented with something coming out of vagina more during defecation her clinical examination was done. Provisional diagnosis of anterior vaginal wall cyst was made. Ultrasonography (USG) of pelvis was normal. Transvaginal removal was done and postoperative diagnosis was anterior vaginal wall leiomyoma which was supported by histopathology report.


Stability has been a primary focus of the maritime industry and of immense interest to the IMO from the outset. Despite several attempts to resolve stability-related issues, the problem of stability remains one that has yet to be resolved. Reasons for this, range from the complexity of the problem itself to misconceptions in its very nature, particularly concerning intact or compromised conditions of the ship in question. Emphasis in this paper is placed on the latter. More specifically, whilst intact stability of ships is an extremely interesting scientific problem, to what extent is it a determining factor in the design and operation of passenger ships? Currently, intact stability and damage stability share the same stage from a regulatory perspective and, consequently, they have equal impact on design and operation-related decisions, an example of which is the use of combined intact and damage stability GM limit curves (e.g. IACS Rec 110 Rev1). However, in line with goal-based regulations and standards, design and operational decisions should be risk-informed in which case, matters relating to damage stability are of higher concern, simply by virtue of the fact that damage stability is by far the greater risk contributor. In fact, for passenger ships (>500GT), the level of risk associated with intact stability is indiscernible in contrast to that of damage stability. More importantly, in the operational loading conditions of such vessels, damage stability is a more dominant constraint. Hence, such ships can be designed on the basis of damage stability considerations alone. This paper delves in this direction by drawing on the current regulation-making process for risk estimation as adopted by IMO as well as current design and operational practice. Findings from European research and related studies are provided in order to substantiate the argument that intact stability for passenger ships is neither a safety issue nor a design concern.


Short-rotation coppice (SRC) Salix plantations have the potential to provide fast-growing biomass feedstock with significant soil and climate mitigation benefits. Salix varieties exhibit significant variation in their physiological traits, growth patterns and soil ecology—but the effects of these variations have rarely been studied from a systems perspective. This study analyses the influence of variety on soil organic carbon (SOC) dynamics and climate impacts from Salix cultivation for heat production for a Swedish site with specific conditions. Soil carbon modelling was combined with a life cycle assessment (LCA) approach to quantify SOC sequestration and climate impacts over a 50-year period. The analysis used data from a Swedish field trial of six Salix varieties grown under fertilized and unfertilized treatments on Vertic Cambisols during 2001–2018. The Salix systems were compared with a reference case where heat is produced from natural gas and green fallow was the land use alternative. Climate impacts were determined using time-dependent LCA methodology—on a land-use (per hectare) and delivered energy unit (per MJheat) basis. All Salix varieties and treatments increased SOC, but the magnitude depended on the variety. Fertilization led to lower carbon sequestration than the equivalent unfertilized case. There was no clear relationship between biomass yield and SOC increase. In comparison with reference cases, all Salix varieties had significant potential for climate change mitigation. From a land-use perspective, high yield was the most important determining factor, followed by SOC sequestration, therefore high-yielding fertilized varieties such as 'Tordis', 'Tora' and 'Björn' performed best. On an energy-delivered basis, SOC sequestration potential was the determining factor for the climate change mitigation effect, with unfertilized 'Jorr' and 'Loden' outperforming the other varieties. These results show that Salix variety has a strong influence on SOC sequestration potential, biomass yield, growth pattern, response to fertilization and, ultimately, climate impact.


An instrument designed to separate 2 midlevel traits within each of the Big Five (the Big Five Aspect Scales [BFAS]) was used to clarify the relation of personality to cognitive ability. The BFAS measures Openness to Experience and Intellect as separate (although related) traits, and refers to the broader Big Five trait as Openness/Intellect. In 2 samples (N = 125 and 189), Intellect was independently associated with general intelligence (g) and with verbal and nonverbal intelligence about equally. Openness was independently associated only with verbal intelligence. Implications of these findings are discussed for the empirical and conceptual relations of intelligence to personality and for the mechanisms potentially underlying both Openness/Intellect and cognitive ability.


A Content Delivery Network (CDN) aims to provide efficient movement of massive digital content (multimedia and files) across the Internet. This is achieved by putting the content in servers closer to the costumer. Video-On-Demand service is an application of CDN where videos have to be located strategically to avoid network congestion and servers saturation. Therefore, the problem of optimal placement of videos arises. This problem has a block diagonal structure with linking constraints on links and servers capacities. In this project, we solve huge instances of a video placement problem over three real network topologies with a specialized interior point solver named BlockIP. The evaluated instances range from 7 to 300 millions of variables and the difficulty of the instances depends on the size of servers, links bandwidth and network topology. Our results: 1) verified characteristics of BlockIP like regularization and the intensive computation in the last iterations and 2) showed that BlockIP found optimal solution in all the evaluated instances with a good optimality gap. On the contrary, state-of-art CPLEX cannot reach an optimal, feasible solution in some difficult instances and needs almost twice the memory of BlockIP. However, CPLEX solved most of feasible instances at least twice faster than BlockIP


Many problems in modern computing require a visual component. That is to say, it is fairly common for applications to have a need to see their environments. These applications will typically employ techniques designed specifically to solve the particular task needed for the application, and have little or no relation to the human visual system. Humans generally do not have difficulty interpreting the world around us. When traveling through known environments, we can easily recognize particular walls, doors and other objects in our view. We are not confused by the huge number factors that can complicate an image. The generalization and robustness of the human system would provide a huge benefit to any system that requires more advanced vision than is capable with the ad-hoc methods developed previously. If the underlying principles that make the human visual system so powerful can be identified and implemented programmatically, then a machine could reap the benefits obtained by humans. The purpose of this thesis is to demonstrate that a visual system modeled after the human visual system will be robust and accurate enough to solve real world problems - and to be useful in a non-trivial application. By developing neural networks that directly model the most primitive image processing cells of the human visual system, a platform can be built on which advanced vision systems can be developed.


OBJECTIVE
Description of the activities of daily living and the use of care in relation to several determinants in persons aged 85 years and over.

DESIGN
Cross-sectional survey.

SETTING
General population from the city of Leiden, the Netherlands.

METHOD
A representative sample from the inhabitants aged 85 years and over of the city of Leiden was enrolled. A physician visited 239 'oldest old' (response rate 83%) at their places of residence, in 1991/'92. Data were obtained on health (joint disorder, cardiovascular disease, diabetes mellitus, Parkinson's disease; disorders in cognition, eyesight, hearing; limitation of mobility), self care and household activities in daily living and the use of care (informal care by neighbours or family, (geriatric) home help, district nurse, private help). Statistical analysis was performed by non-parametric tests and logistic regression.

RESULTS
Of the 'oldest old' 111 (46%) lived independently, and 67 of them (28% of the total group) had no professional help. Almost all 'oldest old' had at least one health disorder. In all, 129 women (77%) and 43 men (61%) had restrictions in basic and (or) instrumental activities of daily living. These restrictions were strongly related to disorders in cognition, vision and mobility, less related to chronic disease and not related to hearing disorders. Restrictions in the activities of daily living were also related to the living condition. This relation was particularly strong for women. Men living without a partner were more likely to be institutionalised. Among the 'oldest old' who lived independently, restrictions in the activities of daily living were related to the use of care, with the exception of privately organised care.

CONCLUSION
One out of four persons aged 85 years and over lived without professional help. Marked differences between the sexes were found for the interrelation between activities in daily living and the use of care.


Corn (Zea mays L.) hybrids commonly grown in the lower Mississippi River valley often encounter heat and drought stress during reproductive growth, which impairs yield and increases preharvest mycotoxin contamination. Four short-season hybrids developed for production at ≥ 40° N latitude and two hybrids adapted to the Midsouth USA were grown at Stoneville, MS (33°26' N, 90°55' W), in 2002 and 2003 using N fertility treatments of 112 kg N ha - 1 preplant, 224 kg N ha - 1 preplant, or 112 kg N ha - 1 preplant + 112 kg N ha - 1 side-dress at growth stage V6 (six leaves). Growing degree units at 10°C base temperature required for growth stages R1 (silking) and R6 (physiological maturity) of the four short-season hybrids were 50 and 100 units greater, respectively, than when grown in their adapted environments. Yields of two of the short-season hybrids compared well with the adapted hybrids. Kernel weights and grain bulk density differed among hybrids but were not below levels subject to dockage. Aflatoxin and fumonisin levels were higher in 2002 than 2003. Three of the short-season hybrids did have aflatoxin levels in 2002 at least three times greater than the other three hybrids. Plots receiving 224 kg N ha - 1 preplant yielded more than the other N fertility treatments. Kernel weights were 10 mg greater for the higher N fertility treatments. Nitrogen fertility had no effect on mycotoxins. Short-season hybrids need to be individually evaluated for production potential in the lower Mississippi River valley.


Time-frequency analysis, such as the Gabor transform, plays an important role in many signal processing applications. The redundancy of such representations is often directly related to the computational load of any algorithm operating in the transform domain. To reduce complexity, it may be desirable to increase the time and frequency sampling intervals beyond the point where the transform is invertible, at the cost of an inevitable recovery error. In this paper we initiate the study of recovery procedures for noninvertible Gabor representations. We propose using fixed analysis and synthesis windows, chosen e.g., according to implementation constraints, and to process the Gabor coefficients prior to synthesis in order to shape the reconstructed signal. We develop three methods for signal recovery. The first follows from the consistency requirement, namely that the recovered signal has the same Gabor representation as the input signal. The second, is based on minimization of a worst-case error. Last, we develop a recovery technique based on the assumption that the input signal lies in some subspace of L2 . We show that for each of the criteria, the manipulation of the transform coefficients amounts to a 2D twisted convolution, which we show how to perform using a filter-bank. When the undersampling factor is an integer, the processing reduces to standard 2D convolution. We provide simulation results demonstrating the advantages and weaknesses of each of the algorithms.


Race has long been recognized as playing a critical role in policing. In spite of this awareness, there has been virtually no previous research attempting to quantitatively analyze the issue. In this paper, we examine the relationship between the racial composition of a city's police force and the racial patterns of arrests and crime. Increases in the number of minority police are associated with significant increases in arrests of whites, but have little impact on arrests of non-whites. Similarly arrests of non-whites, but do not systematically affect the number of white arrests. The race of police officers has a less clear-cut impact on crime rates. It appears that own-race policing may be more effective in reducing property crime, but no systematic differences are observed for violent crime. These results are consistent either with own-race policing leading to fewer false arrests or greater deterrence. In either case, own-race policing appears more "efficient" in fighting property crime.


This preprint has been reviewed and recommended by Peer Community In Evolutionary Biology (https://doi.org/10.24072/pci.evolbiol.100052). The cost of resistance, or the fitness effect of resistance mutation in absence of the drug, is a very widepsread concept in evolutionary genetics and beyond. It has represented an important addition to the simplistic view that resistance mutations should solely be considered as beneficial mutations. Yet, this concept also entails a series of serious difficulties in its definition, interpretation and current usage. In many cases, it may be simpler, clearer, and more insightful to study, measure and analyze the fitness effects of mutations across environments and to better distinguish those effects from 'pleiotropic effects' of those mutations.


Precipitation is a parameter that varies on many different spatial and temporal scales. Here we look at interannual variations associated with the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and the Southern Oscillation (SO), comparing the spatial and temporal changes as shown by three data sets. The Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) product is based upon satellite data, whereas both the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) and European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) climatologies are produced through reanalysis of atmospheric circulation models. All three products show a consistent response to the NAO in the North Atlantic region, with negative states of the NAO corresponding to increases in precipitation over Greenland and southern Europe, but to a decrease over northern Europe. None of the climatologies display any net change in total rainfall as a result of the NAO, but rather a redistribution of precipitation patterns. However, this redistribution of rain is important because of its potential effect on oceanic overturning circulation. Similarly, all three data sets concur that the SO has a major effect on precipitation in certain tropical regions; however, there is some disagreement amongst the data sets as to the regional sensitivity, with NCEP showing a much weaker response than GPCP and ECMWF over Indonesia. The GPCP and NCEP climatologies show that the various phases of El Nino and La Nina act to redistribute, rather than enhance, the freshwater cycle. Given that the models incorporate no actual observations of rain, and are known to be imperfect, it is surprising how well they represent these interannual phenomena.


Three sulfate-reducing bacterial strains (Desulfovibrio sp. strain SHV, Desulfococcus sp. strain WHC, and Desulfomicrobium sp. strain WHB) with the capacity to cometabolize 2-nitrodiphenylamine, 4-nitrodiphenylamine, and 2,4-dinitrodiphenylamine were newly isolated. Before breaking down the diphenylamine structure, these strains cometabolically reduce the nitrodiphenylamines to the corresponding aminodiphenylamines during anaerobic oxidation of the growth substrate lactate (Desulfovibrio strain SHV and Desulfomicrobium strain WHC) or benzoate (Desulfococcus strain WHB), leading to the formation of aniline and a smaller quantity of methylaniline. These compounds were not further metabolized by the sulfate reducers. The anaerobic metabolism of aminodiphenylamines also led to the formation of heterocyclic condensation products such as phenazine and acridine derivatives, provided that they contained an amino group in the ortho position of the diphenylamine (e.g., 2-aminodiphenylamine or 2,4-diaminodiphenylamine). In addition, low levels of indole and benzothiazole derivatives were identified, but these also were not further metabolized by the three sulfate-reducing strains.


We examined the benefits of animated scrolling using four speeds and three different document types in terms of task speed, accuracy and user preference. We considered reading tasks involving unformatted and formatted text documents, as well as counting tasks involving abstract symbol documents. We found that, compared with non-animated scrolling, animated scrolling significantly improves average task time, by up to 5.3% using 300 millisecond animations for reading documents and by up to 24% at 500 milliseconds for symbol documents. Animated scrolling also significantly decreases error rates for reading tasks by up to 54%, as well as improving satisfaction.


THE ROLE OF THE EMPLOYER IN REALIZING THE RIGHTS OF EMPLOYEES RELATED TO PARENTHOODOver the last ten years, the Labor Code has signifi cantly expanded employees' rights related to parenthood, and thus the role of the employer in the fi eld of their implementation has changed fundamentally.The employer remains obliged to fulfi ll the employee's basic rights enumerated in the Labour Code as a parent. However, the Polish legislator excessively burdens the employer with the role of the sole contractor of these general social principles related to the protection of motherhood and family, which causes a clear upset in the implementation of the constitutional obligations of the state towards its citizens.Looking at individual stages of employment from the period of pregnancy, in which protection is particularly strong, through the obligation to exercise parental leave and obligations imposed on the employer to employ an employee after taking leave, on protection during the period of custody, these are clearly noticeable limitations and burdens for the employer. The burden imposed on a particular employer often remains completely disproportionate to its capabilities. The employer bears the costs of social policy, which should be implemented by the state, thus it is fulfi lling the role of the guarantor in securing social interests. The solutions adopted by the Polish legislator stand in clear opposition to the regulation of international law.The burdens currently imposed on the employer resulting from the provisions of the Labor Code could be implemented to a large extent by relevant public insurance systems. De lege ferenda, the obligation to protect motherhood and the family as a constitutional social obligation should be carried out jointly by the state and the employer. De lege lata, the lack of proportionality is clearly visible in the regulations in force and it signifi cantly limits the principle of economic freedom and employer's property, in particular in relation to small entrepreneurs.


Plants are increasingly exposed to events of elevated temperature and water deficit, which threaten crop productivity. Understanding the ability to rapidly recover from abiotic stress, restoring carbon assimilation and biomass production, is important to unravel crop climate resilience. This study compared the photosynthetic performance of two Triticum aestivum L. cultivars, Sokoll and Paragon, adapted to the climate of Mexico and UK, respectively, exposed to one week water deficit and high temperatures, in isolation or combination. Measurements included photosynthetic assimilation rate, stomatal conductance, in vitro activities of Rubisco (EC 184.108.40.206) and invertase (INV, EC 126.96.36.199), antioxidant capacity and chlorophyll a fluorescence. In both genotypes, under elevated temperatures and water deficit (WD38°C), the photosynthetic limitations were mainly due to stomatal restrictions and to a decrease in the electron transport rate. Chlorophyll a fluorescence parameters clearly indicate differences between the two genotypes in the photoprotection when subjected to WD38°C and showed faster recovery of Paragon after stress relief. The activity of the cytosolic invertase (CytINV) under these stress conditions was strongly related to the fast photosynthesis recovery of Paragon. Taken together, the results suggest that optimal sucrose export/utilization and increased photoprotection of the electron transport machinery are important components to limit yield fluctuations due to water shortage and elevated temperatures.


Abstract In an uncertain economic decision environment, an expert's knowledge about discounting cash flows consists of a lot of vagueness instead of randomness. Cash amounts and interest rates are usually estimated by using educated guesses based on expected values or other statistical techniques to obtain them. Fuzzy numbers can capture the difficulties in estimating these parameters. Fuzziness is one aspect of uncertainty. It is the vagueness found in the definition of a concept or the meaning of a term. Fuzzy memberships represent similarities of objects to imprecisely denned properties, while probabilities convey information about relative frequencies. In this paper, two types of investment analyses are made. First, fuzzy parameters are used in the stochastic investment analysis. Then, another investment analysis is examined by using the concept of probability of a fuzzy event.