ABSTRACT Supply chain management, is the active management of supply chain activities to maximise customer value and achieve sustainable competitive advantage. It represents a conscious effort by the supply chain firms to develop and run supply chains in the most effective and efficient ways possible. Supply chain activities cover everything from product development, sourcing, production, and logistics, as well as the information systems needed to coordinate these activities. Currently, supply chain management has evolved into a complex system where there is a need for redesign and integration into the corporate strategy for strategic fit. The study focuses on: • establishing and analysing corporate strategies used by select FMCGs in KZN South Africa; • examining the challenges impacting on achieving competitive advantage; and • determining performance measures for ensuring consistency between customer satisfaction and the supply chain capabilities (strategic fit). The study followed an exploratory case study design and employed a descriptive, evaluative quantitative analysis method. The results showed that across supply chain companies, the ultimate goal of integration has still to be achieved. There is a lack of trust and companies operate in separate silos. A major recommendation is that supply companies should revisit their supply chain designs to synchronise with intra-intercompany integration built on achieving competitiveness and sustainable profitability through incremental continuous improvement and customer satisfaction. The study concluded that it is imperative that all the elements of McKinsey's 7- s resource capability model stay interconnected as a web to ensure the successful implementation of integration for strategic fit and superior business performance


An independent task force has recommended that NASA continue to participate in a space life sciences program with Russia that has drawn fire from animal-rights activists and some members of Congress. The panel praised the quality of the research and dismissed accusations that the effort mistreats rhesus monkeys and is of dubious scientific value. At the same time, it suggested that NASA look at the ethical issues raised by the use of animals in all its life sciences research before participating in a second flight.


In Deliverable 3.1 of Workpackage 3, we discuss the methodology developed and applied in the European ITERATEproject (IT for Error Remediation And Trapping Emergencies). This methodology has as its objective to design experiments that will provide data to seed the ITERATE model. In the ITERATE project a high-level theoretical model of vehicle operator behaviour has been developed in Workpackage 1, specifying the factors that play a role in the influence of innovative support systems on vehicle operation in potentially dangerous situations. Themodel isapplicable for different surface transport modes: road vehicles, rail transport and ships. Themodel will be calibrated by experiments investigating how the different factors interact. One hundred and sixty car drivers and 160 train drivers in five countries will drive with a static driving simulator, and 64 drivers (both train and car) with full motion simulators. Finally an executable simulation model will be constructed with the aim to predict the effects of support systems on operator behaviour and risk.


This paper proposes a novel face detection algorithm which extracts a local image structure (LIS) feature and adopts a boosting approach to construct a cascaded face detector. Due to the locality of LIS, the extracted feature is not only robust to lighting variation but also is invariant to small degrees of rotation. With this robust property a multiple-template cascaded detection algorithm has been developed which can avoid rotating the image and also keep the ability to detect slanted faces. Because the multiple templates are constructed in the initialization stage, the proposed face detector can be executed very fast. Experiments on the BioID face database have shown the efficiency of this method.


Megaprosthesis is used to restore the form and function of massive skeletal defects, but it is accompanied by risks of failure, mainly due to perimegaprosthetic infection (PMI). In practice, the diagnosis of infected megaprosthesis among patients with a high index of clinical suspicion, elevated serological markers, and multiple negative or inconclusive imaging can be very challenging and poses a diagnostic conundrum to many orthopaedic surgeons. We present the case of a symptomatic 26-year-old female with large B-cell lymphoma who developed cellulitis with suspected complication of PMI 15 months post-implantation. The combination of advanced nuclear medicine imaging strategies, i.e., 99mTc-besilesomab/99mTc-sulfur colloid scintigraphy with hybrid single-photon emission computed tomography/computed tomography (SPECT/CT) scanning helps to characterise and delineate both infections. Invasive procedures such as joint aspiration and biopsy were avoided, and the patient was successfully treated with antibiotics. Hence, we report a case where advanced imaging modalities were decisive in the investigation of PMI.


Among contemporary philosophers who have, in many different ways, turned to the study of
religion, one often finds an interesting tendency: the tendency to rescue religion, however minimal or
reticent this rescue operation might be. They try to save something of/in religion that should be kept
'safe' in their view from the immense criticism that religion has been subjected to in modern thinking,
with which they otherwise – apart from this small remainder to be saved, this 'rest' as some of the
authors in question call it – fully agree. My hypothesis is that this saving-something-of/in-religion
usually follows the ambivalent structure and discourse of kenosis. Kenosis can be described as one of the key notions that evoke the complex relationship between God
and humanity, between transcendence and immanence, between the sacred and the profane, between
the Other and the Self - in short, the religious relationship, or the specific and enigmatic relationship
we call religion. Kenosis, originally an ancient Christian notion
derived from Paul's letter to the Philippians (2: 6-8), is used to refer to two entirely opposite meanings
with regard to the religious relationship. It is this ambiguity of kenosis that interests me in particular in
what follows.


Attitudes toward posthumous harvesting of reproductive material and beliefs about medical professionals' obligation to assist were examined using a multiple segment factorial vignette survey design with 407 randomly selected respondents from a southern state. Attitudes and beliefs were primarily shaped by the vignette couple's marital status, parental support, and evidence of the deceased's wishes, as well as by respondents' religiosity and level of education. Three primary groups of respondents were identified: libertarians emphasized the survivor's rights, consentualists were skeptical until hearing that the deceased approved of the procedure, and persistent dissenters retained their negative attitudes despite the deceased's known wishes in favor of posthumous harvesting. Overall, attitudes and obligation beliefs were primarily in favor of posthumous harvesting when contextual circumstances deemed suitable were portrayed.


We report on XMM-Newton observations of the " Black Widow pulsar " , PSR B1957+20. The pulsar's X-ray emission is non-thermal and best modeled with a single powerlaw spectrum of photon index 2.03 +0.51 −0.36. No coherent X-ray pulsations at the pulsar's spin-period could be detected, though a strong binary-phase dependence of the X-ray flux is observed for the first time. The data suggest that the majority of the pulsar's X-radiation is emitted from a small part of the binary orbit only. We identified this part as being near to where the radio eclipse takes place. This could mean that the X-rays from PSR B1957+20 are mostly due to intra-shock emission which is strongest when the pulsar wind interacts with the ablated material from the companion star.


Cyclin-dependent kinase-6 (CDK6) is required for early thymocyte development and tumorigenesis. To mechanistically dissect the role of CDK6 in thymocyte development, we generated and analyzed mutant knock-in mice and found that mice expressing a kinase-dead Cdk6 allele (Cdk6(K43M)) had a pronounced reduction in thymocytes and hematopoietic stem cells and progenitor cells (Lin⁻Sca-1⁺c-Kit⁺ [LSK]). In contrast, mice expressing the INK4-insensitive, hyperactive Cdk6(R31C) allele displayed excess proliferation in LSK and thymocytes. However, this is countered at least in part by increased apoptosis, which may limit progenitor and thymocyte expansion in the absence of other genetic events. Our mechanistic studies demonstrate that CDK6 kinase activity contributes to Notch signaling because inactive CDK6 kinase disrupts Notch-dependent survival, proliferation, and differentiation of LSK, with concomitant alteration of Notch target gene expression, such as massive up-regulation of CD25. Further, knockout of CD25 in Cdk6(K43M) mice rescued most defects observed in young mice. These results illustrate an important role for CDK6 kinase activity in thymocyte development that operates partially through modulating Notch target gene expression. This role of CDK6 as a downstream mediator of Notch identifies CDK6 kinase activity as a potential therapeutic target in human lymphoid malignancies.


Two regioisomeric pairs of heptahelical mono- and biscoumarins that are differentiated by "inward" and "outward" disposition of the pyran-2-one moiety have been synthesized and investigated to understand the influence of helicity on excited-state and chiroptical properties. A slight variation in the helicities is found to manifest in contrasting excited-state properties of the coumarin-annelated heptahelicenes; in addition to the intramolecular charge transfer (ICT), structural relaxation in the excited state is shown from theoretical calculations to cause decrease in the fluorescence quantum yield for a system with higher helicity. The optically pure enantiomers of heptahelical coumarins exhibit helicity-dependent chiroptical properties, namely, specific rotations, molar ellipticities, Cotton effects and anisotropic dissymmetry factors. Theoretical calculations point to factors that are not readily explicable.


We use new data on security-level portfolio holdings of institutional investors and households in the euro area to understand the impact of the ongoing asset purchase programme of the European Central Bank (ECB) on the dynamics of risk exposures and on asset prices. We develop a tractable measurement framework to quantify the dynamics of euro-area duration, sovereign and corporate credit, and equity risk exposures as the programme evolves. We propose an instrumental-variables estimator to identify the impact of central bank purchases on sovereign bonds on sovereign bond yields. Our results suggest that the foreign sector sells most in response to the programme, followed by banks and mutual funds, while the purchases of insurance companies and pension funds are positively related to purchases by the ECB.


Latinxs in the United States are disproportionately affected by HIV and present with more advanced disease than their non-Latinx peers, due to numerous barriers to care including HIV stigma. We describe the adaptation, implementation, and reach of Sólo Se Vive Una Vez (You Only Live Once), Baltimore's first social marketing campaign promoting HIV screening among Spanish-speaking Latinxs. The 6-month campaign promoted free HIV testing by addressing HIV stigma. The campaign included a website, a social marketing campaign, community outreach events, and advertisements via radio, billboards, local partners, and buses. During the campaign, there were 9,784 unique website users, and ads were served to over 84,592 people on social media platforms. Among Latinx HIV testers at the Baltimore City Health Department, 31.6% reported having seen or heard of Sólo Se Vive Una Vez and 25.3% of Latinx HIV testers reported that the campaign influenced them to get tested.


Soccer simulation is an effort to motivate researchers and practitioners to do artificial and robotic intelligence research; and at the same time put into practice and test the results. Many researchers and practitioners throughout the world are continuously working to polish their ideas and improve their implemented systems. At the same time, new groups are forming and they bring bright new thoughts to the field. The research includes designing and executing robotic soccer simulation algorithms. In our research, a soccer simulation player is considered to be an intelligent agent that is capable of receiving information from the environment, analyze it and to choose the best action from a set of possible ones, for its next move. We concentrate on developing a two-phase method for the soccer player agent to choose its best next move. The method is then implemented into our software system called Nexus simulation team of Ferdowsi University. This system is based on TsinghuAeolus[1] team that was the champion of the world RoboCup soccer simulation contest in 2001 and 2002. Keywords—RoboCup, Soccer simulation, multi-agent environment, intelligent soccer agent, ball controller agent.


A detailed high-resolution spectroscopic analysis is presented for the carbon-rich low-metallicity Galactic halo object CS 22964–161. We have discovered that CS 22964–161 is a double-lined spectroscopic binary and have derived accurate orbital components for the system. From a model atmosphere analysis we show that both components are near the metal-poor main-sequence turnoff. Both stars are very enriched in carbon and in neutron-capture elements that can be created in the s-process, including lead. The primary star also possesses an abundance of lithium close to the value of the "Spite plateau." The simplest interpretation is that the binary members seen today were the recipients of these anomalous abundances from a third star that was losing mass as part of its AGB evolution. We compare the observed CS 22964–161 abundance set with nucleosynthesis predictions of AGB stars, discuss issues of envelope stability in the observed stars under mass transfer conditions, and consider the dynamical stability of the alleged original triple star. Finally, we consider the circumstances that permit survival of lithium, whatever its origin, in the spectrum of this extraordinary system.


Highlights • The currency crisis that started in Russia and Ukraine during 2014 has spread to neighbouring countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The collapse of the Russian ruble, expected recession in Russia, the stronger US dollar and lower commodity prices have negatively affected the entire region, with the consequence that the European Union's entire eastern neighbourhood faces serious economic, social and political challenges because of weaker currencies, higher inflation, decreasing export revenues and labour remittances, net capital outflows and stagnating or declining GDP. • The crisis requires a proper policy response from CIS governments, the International Monetary Fund and the EU. The Russian-Ukrainian conflict in Donbass requires rapid resolution, as the first step to return Russia to the mainstream of global economic and political cooperation. Beyond that, both Russia and Ukraine need deep structural and institutional reforms. The EU should deepen economic ties with those CIS countries that are interested in a closer relationship with Europe. The IMF should provide additional assistance to those CIS countries that have become victims of a new regional contagion, while preparing for the possibility of more emerging-market crises arising from slower growth, the stronger dollar and lower commodity prices.


To elucidate the working mechanism behind anthropomorphism, this study investigated whether human participants would anthropomorphize a robot more if they move synchronously versus non-synchronously with it, and whether this is affected by which of the two initiates the movements. We tested two competing hypotheses. The feature-overlap hypothesis predicts that moving in synchrony would increase perceived self-other feature overlap, which in turn might spread activation to codes of features related to humans—which should increase anthropomorphization. In contrast, the autonomy hypothesis predicts that unpredictability increases anthropomorphization, and thus that whenever the robot initiates movements, or when the human initiates movements to which the robot moves non-synchronously, there is an increased perception of the robot as a more human-like, intentionally acting creature, which in turn should increase anthropomorphization. We performed a study with synchrony as within-subjects factor, and initiator (robot or human) as between-subjects factor. To study the impact of synchrony on self-other overlap and perception of human likeness, participants completed two tasks that served as implicit measures of state anthropomorphization, and two questionnaires that served as explicit measures of state anthropomorphization toward the robot. The two implicit measures were the joint Simon task and one-shot Dictator Game. Additionally, participants filled in a trait anthropomorphization questionnaire, to enable correction for baseline tendencies to anthropomorphize. The synchrony manipulation did not affect the joint Simon effect, although there was an effect on average reaction time (RT), where in the group in which the robot initiated the movement, RTs were slower when the human and robot moved non-synchronously. The Dictator Game offer and the state anthropomorphization questionnaires were not affected by the synchrony manipulation. There was, however, a positive correlation between current anthropomorphization of the robot and amount of money offered to it. Given that most measures were not systematically affected by our manipulation, it appears that either our design was suboptimal, or that synchronization does not affect the anthropomorphization of a robot.


This paper summarizes the results of experimental studies in which the aluminum alloy AW7075-T651 was friction stir welded (FSW) using various combinations of process parameters (rotational - R and travel speed - T). Mechanical properties of the test welds were assessed by using static tensile test and Vickers hardness measurement. The temperature of the welded plates was monitored during welding by means of thermocouples placed on both sides of the joint line, 15 mm from the weld axis as well as by using thermo camera. The microstructure, chemical composition and phase identification of the welding joints were examined using optical and scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and X-ray diffractometry (XRD). Investigations revealed that the temperatures at the weld center can reach values close to 550 °C and raised with R/T ratio increasing. It was found that tensile strength of welded joints is not correlated with R/T ratio and averages about 60% to 80% of tensile strength of a base material AW7075-T651. XRD analysis demonstrated that there is also deformation texture in the nugget (WN) and the thermo-mechanical affected zone (TMAZ) with strong dependence on process parameters.


We investigate how cognitive capacity limits the number of group relations that a person can maintain. The simulation experiment's results using ACT-R and its memory equations replicated an effect similar to that of Dunbar's (1998) number, or the average total number of group ties capable of being supported in memory. In our study, we also examined the influences of two spatial factors (navigation strategies and map configurations) on the growth of generative networks. Our results suggest three interesting conclusions: (a) a fixedpath navigation strategy increases the speed that networks can form; (b) a higher grid ratio (connectivity of the agents' world) provides more chances for agents to build relations, and thus increases the network generation speed; but (c) neither factor influenced the total relations that an agent could maintain, which implies that Dunbar's number primarily depends on internal cognitive factors and less on external factors.


EU-Russia relations are in desperate need of legislative and institutional reform given the fragmented legal infrastructure regulating energy trade between these two powers. The paper will argue that the energy partnership is a highly strategic relationship that has profound implications for the international arena as far as energy security and stability are concerned, for which a solid over-arching legal framework is required. Other simmering issues include the absence of reciprocity in energy market access and the lack of coherence in external EU energy relations which has resulted in bilateralism emerging as the default approach of engagement. These issues are interrelated and closely affiliated to the need for a revised bilateral and international legal framework, as diverse positions and a lack of cooperation amongst Member States undermine collective EU actions and legislative initiatives. In this respect the paper advocates that the Energy Union may be a comprehensive solution to these challenges, by implementing a cohesive and fully functioning energy policy that will strengthen EU solidarity and coherence in the Union's external relations, thereby bolstering EU energy security.


One of the largest expenses in CO2 capture is the transport and disposal of waste from the amine reclaimer, and top up of fresh amine [KIP]. The main reason for this is because the waste stream contains quite large amounts of fresh amine, and the sheer volume of waste. If amount of MEA in waste could be reduced, both the volume of waste would be reduced, which lowers the transport and disposal cost, and the amount of amine for top up would be reduced. In other words, the total operational cost of the system could be considerably lowered. This study investigated the possibility of reducing the amine (MEA) in the waste stream by looking at a two stage reclaiming process. A model based on the work done by Linn Christine Loe Haaversen was developed to include several new features, including a second stage. This model was the basis of cost optimization. The cost optimization took several factors into account. The cost of waste transportation and handling, top up amine cost, cost of compressing low pressure lean amine to the pressure of main system and heat input to reclaimer vessels all were included the objective function subject to minimization. The unconstrained variables in this optimization were heat entered into both stages, and pressure in second stage. From the results of the optimization, a second low pressure stage is beneficiary from an operating cost perspective. A cost minimum was detected where 63.9 % of the MEA fed into the system was returned to the main carbon capturing plant, 36.5 % in first stage, and 27.4 % in second stage. At optimum, the pressure of the second stage was 65.1 kPa. The optimization is only for steady state. Start-up and shut-down is not included. This can be looked at for future work. There are uncertainties linked to properties of compounds, and the model output have not been compared to actual values from a carbon capturing plant. This is due to low availability of information. This study is only looking on operation cost, so there should also be a investment cost analysis before concluding that a second stage is profitable or not.


To better understand human movements, biomechanical models must be developed that accurately describe human physiology and control strategies. Typically, biomechanical models must be adapted or hand tuned to study the countless unique users and tasks caused by human diversity and pathologic movement dysfunctions. The convergence of optimization theories, biomechanical models, and computational systems promises to alleviate these manual processes. We describe a computational technique called spacetime constraints that can be used to automatically solve for both optimal movement trajectories and joint activation torques as befitting the subject, environmental constraints, and objectives. We demonstrate the success of this technique on bipedal downhill walking by comparing our results to optimal movements and joint torques published in the literature. With this contribution to computational biomechanics, we outline a modeling framework that uses easily configurable physical models, constraints, and objective functions to determine movements and control actions.


recast, driven pile groups represent a robust and cost-effective piling solution for many civil engineering and infrastructure projects. When appropriately applied, these foundations can offer a number of benefits over existing methods currently used in bridge abutment design (e.g. large diameter cast in situ concrete piles). This article outlines the benefits, challenges and ongoing research into the use of precast, driven piles as part of pile groups in bridge abutment design where complex loading conditions arising from construction on compressible soils are encountered. Issues surrounding installation, ultimate capacity, of both vertical and inclined piles, and long-term serviceability are addressed. Initial studies indicate that pile groups combining both raking and vertical precast piles can require beneficially lower amounts of natural resources over traditional design methods for a range of scenarios offering both commercial and carbon benefits. However, it is recognised that concerns remain in the engineering community over the use of precast, driven piles in particular design scenarios. These concerns are explored herein.


In this article, I argue that in the search for the essence of matter and reality we become more and more aware that "matter does not matter". Matter is one of the created realities from our consciousness. The creation of the reality of space and time is a direct interaction between our non-causal consciousness and the Primal Source - the origin of origins. In order to get a better control of our created reality, we have to continue to expand our understanding of this ultimate Primal Source as an asymptotical quest.


THE MAJORITY of strictures of the bile ducts are of traumatic origin, that is, injuries that occur during operation on the biliary tract. There are a number that occur as a result of inflammatory conditions, or they may be caused by the presence of a stone in the common duct. A benign or malignant tumor also may cause stricture or even complete obstruction. If the segment of the duct involved in a stricture or tumor is small, excision of the segment with end to end anastomosis will usually give good results. When there is involvement of a fairly long segment of the duct, other operative measures must be used. I refer especially to cases in which the stricture extends upward, so that it involves a good deal of the common hepatic duct. In this type of case, anastomosis of the duct to the duodenum or jejunum has to be performed.


With the advent of Industry 4.0 era, employing a team of robots within a factory floor or a warehouse is pretty prevalent today as robots can perform a known task with higher accuracy and efficiency if its capability permits. Efficiency and throughput of such a setup depend on careful task assignment and scheduling, which further depend on utility calculation. Though there exists a number of techniques to perform efficient task allocation, they assume the utility values are available and static. They neither consider all the relevant parameters nor the dynamic changes that may occur during task execution. Moreover, methods of automating such dynamic utility calculation (both at the start and at runtime) based on knowledge and semantics are not present and this is a hindrance to building a fully automated robotic workforce. In this article, we explore an avenue of semantic-based dynamic utility calculation and showcase its application for a use-case.


We thought that the limit of deriving in according to single-or-double and other limits not only had an extensive effect,but also deal with some conflicts between different interest groups.At the same time,the positive point and the negative point whether the limit measure continued are more unilateral.Today,in the course of implement the rule of law in China,the problem is resolved through the idea of rule of law and human rights properly.Therefore,we invited four scholars respectively from different fields of jurisprudence,constitutional law,administrative law and civil law discuss the problem focused by the whole society.


Background and Purpose Flow diverters are increasingly used for treatment of complex intracranial aneurysms. The goal of this study was to compare the Pipeline Embolisation Device (PED) and traditional embolisation strategies in terms of fluoroscopy and procedure time. Methods Fluoroscopy and procedure times in minutes were retrospectively analysed and compared between 127 patients treated with PED, 86 patients treated with single-stage SAC, and 16 patients treated with Onyx HD 500 at our institution. A multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed to determine independent predictors of fluoroscopy and procedure time. Results The 3 groups were comparable with respect to patient age, gender, and ruptured/ unruptured aneurysm status. Aneurysms treated with PED were significantly larger than stent-coiled aneurysms and aneurysm location distribution differed significantly between the 3 groups. Mean fluoroscopy time was significantly increased in the SAC (55 ± 31 min, p>0.001) and Onyx HD 500 (91 ± 36 min, p>0.001) groups relative to PED (34 ± 23 min). Likewise, mean procedure time was significantly longer in SAC (155 ± 50 min, p>0.001) and Onyx HD 500 patients (176 ± 65 min, p>0.001) compared to PED (131 ± 36 min). Mean fluoroscopy and procedure times remained significantly longer in SAC and Onyx HD 500 patients compared with those who underwent placement of more than 1 PED. In multivariate analysis, SAC/Onyx HD 500 vs PED independently predicted both longer procedure and fluoroscopy times. Conclusion PED treatment requires significantly shorter fluoroscopy and procedure times compared with SAC and Onyx HD 500. The results of this study may be used by advocates of flow diverters as an additional argument for using this treatment modality to treat intracranial aneurysms. Disclosures N. Chalouhi: None. J. McMahon: None. L. Moukarzel: None. R. Starke: None. P. Jabbour: None. A. Dumont: None. S. Tjoumakaris: None. R. Rosenwasser: None. L. Gonzalez: None.


you hereby accept the Terms. Non-commercial uses of the work are permitted without any further permission from Dove Medical Press Limited, provided the work is properly attributed. For permission for commercial use of this work, please see paragraphs 4.2 and 5 of our Terms Early detection of neonatal group B streptococcus sepsis and the possible diagnostic utility of IL-6, IL-8, and CD11b in a human umbilical cord blood in vitro model Background: Group B streptococcus (GBS) infection remains a major cause of neonatal morbidity and mortality, and GBS III is the predominant strain in early-onset GBS neonatal sepsis. To avoid both over-and undertreatment of infants with nonspecific signs of infection, early diagnostic tools are warranted. The aim of this study was to identify biomarkers with high sensitivity and specificity in an early stage of GBS infection. A secondary aim was to assess the utility of a human umbilical cord blood (HUCB) model system of early-onset neonatal sepsis. Methods: Umbilical cord blood samples from 20 healthy term pregnancies were stimulated for 2 hours with a GBS III isolate from a patient and a commercially available GBS Ia strain. Nonstimulated samples served as controls. Leukocyte surface markers (CD11b, CD64, toll-like receptor [TLR] 2, TLR4, and TLR6) were analyzed by flow cytometry and soluble biomark-ers by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (interleukin [IL]-6 and-8; interferon-γ-inducing protein [IP]-10; and S100b). The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) was calculated for the markers. Results: GBS III gave the highest responses and AUC values for all biomarkers. Only IL-6 and IL-8 displayed an AUC approaching 0.8 for both GBS serotypes (P<0.001). IL-8 >5,292 pg/mL had both a sensitivity and a specificity of 1.00. IL-6 >197 pg/mL had both a sensitivity and a specificity of 0.95 for GBS III stimulation. CD11b on granulocytes and monocytes was the leukocyte surface marker with the highest AUC values for both GBS serotypes. Conclusion: In agreement with previous studies, IL-6, IL-8, and potentially CD11b could be useful in diagnosing neonatal GBS infection in an early stage. Our HUCB early-onset neonatal sepsis model may be useful for evaluating biomarkers of neonatal sepsis. The HUCB of neonates with risk factors for sepsis might even be used for diagnostic purposes, but requires further study.


Pt/PZT/PbO/Si with the MFIS structure was deposited on the p-type (100) Si substrate by the r.f. magnetron sputtering method with Pb1.1Zr0.53Ti0.47O3 and PbO targets. From the X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) results, we could confirm that the partial pressure ratio during PbO deposition affects the interface condition of PbO/Si and the chemical state of Pb existing at the surface of the PZT thin film. The maximum value of the memory window is 3.0 V under the applied voltage of 9V for Pt/PZT (200 nm 400°C)/PbO (80 nm, 300°C)/Si structures with the PbO buffer layer deposited at the partial pressure of 7:3. From these results, we could assume that the PbO buffer layers play a role of the diffusion barrier between the PZT thin film and the Si substrate as well as the seed layer.


The minichromosome maintenance (MCM) family of proteins is conserved from archaea to humans, and its members have roles in initiating DNA replication. MCM8 and MCM9 are minimally characterized members of the eukaryotic MCM family that associate with one another and both contain conserved ATP binding and hydrolysis motifs. The MCM8-9 complex participates in repair of DNA double-strand breaks by homologous recombination, and MCM8 is implicated in meiotic recombination. We identified a novel alternatively spliced isoform of HsMCM9 that results in a medium length protein product (MCM9M) that eliminates a C-terminal extension of the fully spliced product (MCM9L). Quantitative real-time reverse transcriptase PCR (qRT-PCR) of the relative mRNA isoform abundances across cell lines reveals MCM9L transcript is more abundant than MCM9M. The expression of both isoforms is cell cycle regulated, as they are most abundant in S-phase. Wild-type MCM9L forms DNA damage-dependent nuclear foci, while MCM9M is cytoplasmic and MCM9Cterm is diffuse throughout the nucleus. We have identified and verified a putative nuclear localization signal (NLS), and Rad51-interacting motif (BRCv) in the C-terminus of MCM9. GFP-tagged MCM9 NLS- is solely cytoplasmic, GFP-tagged MCM9 BRCv- is diffuse throughout the nucleus. A combination of SNP arrays, comparative genomic hybridization arrays, and whole-exome sequencing analyses identified homozygous pathogenic variants in MCM8 (MCM8 c.446C>G; p.P149R) and MCM9 (MCM9 c.1732.2T>C and MCM9 c.394C>T; p.R132*), all located within regions of homozygosity in women afflicted by premature ovarian failure (POF). The MCM9 c.1732.2T>C variant alters a splice donor site, resulting in abnormal alternative splicing and truncated forms of MCM9 that are unable to be recruited to sites of DNA damage. In the second family, MCM9 c.394C>T (p.R132*) results in a predicted loss of functional MCM9. Compared with fibroblasts from unaffected family members, chromosomal break repair was deficient in fibroblasts from all affected individuals, likely due to inhibited recruitment of mutated MCM8 or MCM9 to sites of DNA damage. Our cumulative results suggest that MCM8-9 have evolved to act late in both mitotic recombination pathways to aid in crossover migration and/or strand resolution.


Inhibition of granulopoiesis was studied using the diffusion chamber (DC) technique. When mature granulocytes from human blood or syngeneic mouse peritoneal fluid were added to mouse bone marrow cells cultured in DC, a significant depression of granulopoiesis took place, and a stimulation of macrophage formation was observed in 7-day cultures. Human granulocytes had a stronger inhinitory capacity than mouse granulocytes. The inhibition appeared to be tissue-specific and caused by a diffusible factor. A time study showed that the added granulocytes had no observable effect on the growth of proliferative granulocytes and CFU-C during the first days of culture. A rapid decrease of proliferative granulocytes after day 5 was preceded by a similar reduction of CFU-C 1 day earlier. The effect of CFU-S was more variable. In one strain of mice, there was a consistent increase in the granulocyte co-culture group, whereas in another strain a significant increase was observed only on day 2. Hislotologic examination showed that mature granulocytes changed the colony distribution, so that a significant relative decrease of granuloid colonies occurred. The nature of this delayed suppression of granulopoiesis is not evident from these data. A possible explanation is that factors released by mature granulocytes prevent recruitment of CFU-C and granulocyte precursors from the CFU-S compartment by blocking the granulopoietic pathway. Leukemic (CML) granulocytes isolated from blood were less able to inhibit granulopoiesis than normal granulocytes with mouse bone marrow as well as human bone marrow as target cells.


This paper presents an analysis of everyday understandings of the law, within the context of a dispute between colonial and indigenous land interests in New Zealand. The analysis is informed by developments in the areas of critical legal studies, methodological critique of legal psychology, the social constructionist movement within social psychology, and the application of discursive psychology to understandings of racism. Data for this work was drawn from a corpus of letters to the editor of a newspaper, published in the city where the land dispute took place. Writers constructed the dispute as a legal issue and deployed two divergent constructions of the law. When the 'primacy' of the law was invoked, indigenous interests and the protesters were positioned as lawbreakers. When 'the law in context' was the resource used, protesters became positioned as seekers of justice. These variable constructions are discussed in terms of the social practices they engender and their wider contribution to debates regarding indigenous and colonial interests. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


The period before the Spanish Civil War witnessed some translations into Catalan of North-American authors such as Walt Whitman, Mark Twain, Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is over the 1930s, however, that other big names of North-American literature –such as William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway- reach high levels of popularity on Spanish soil. What happens much later with the reception of these authors? Our article will explore the translations of these and other North-American authors which appeared over the end of the Spanish Civil War to the end of the 1950s, a period of cnsolidation of the United States as a global economic power. Our proposal is to research the selection of titles edited and translated over these two decades (40s and 50s) with a view of demonstrating that they conform an intricate wave of thought on the part of vocational editors who took care of every single detail in the editing process, and who had to confront serious logistic and ideological problems to boot. In order to carry out our research, we have been working with the catalogues of Janés, Caralt, Seix Barral and Destino.


Tuberculosis (TB) is still a global problem that has not currently been resolved, due to it rapid transmission through droplet nuclei released when TB patients cough, sneeze, or even talking. One of the TB comorbidities is Diabetes Mellitus (DM) that makes it necessary to do HbA1c screening in patients with TB DM and TB non-DM to prevent further disease complications.This was a cross-sectional descriptive analytic study conducted in 2018 on a total sample of 248 TB-DM and TB non-DM patients in Aceh Besar District and Banda Aceh City, Indonesia with 29.8% of the subjects were TB-DM patients and the remaining 70.2% were TB Non-DM patients. The.HbA1c levels in TB patients varied, with the average HbA1c level of 10.738 in people with TB DM and 5.426 in TB non-DM. The HbA1c level in patients with TB DM was two times higher than in TB non-DM patients. Around 21% of TB patients who were not diagnosed with DM by health care workers showed an HbA1c level that was in line with the level in the DM category. Therefore, it is recommended that each TB patient undergoes screening HbA1c in order to prevent TB non-DMpatients from becoming TB DM patients.


Introduction Child and maternal health are key to overall human life expectancy, implying an urgent need for medicines that keep (unborn) children and mothers healthy and alive. Unfortunately, medicines may bring harm as well. For example, limb malformation due to the use of thalidomide by pregnant woman, or renal failure due to the use of paracetamol solutions or cough syrups that turned out to be contaminated with the toxic, but cheap solvens dietylenglycol. Availability A study in the Netherlands by the University of Utrecht, the University Medical Center Utrecht, the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) and the Medicines Evaluation Board (MEB) showed that only half of the commercially available and authorised medicines for use in adults were also available for use in children of any age between birth and 18 years. Moreover, the study indicated that authorised medicines were generally more scarce for younger than for older children and that some of the authorised medicines were not adequately addressing the needs of the child (e.g. inadequate dosing flexibility, too large tablet, too much ethanol per single dose). In addition, it turned out that some industries had not updated the medicines' product information (SmPC) according to the current standards. As a result, it may not be fully clear to health care professionals and patients for which age group the medicine has been approved. The lack of authorised and well-designed i.e. age-appropriate or child friendly medicines is currently no longer considered ethical. Therefore, the US government, European Union and World Health Organization have implemented incentives to improve this situation. Although it is still too early to come to a final conclusion, the Dutch study indicated that the European Regulation is likely to reach its goal. Pharmaceutical design The study also indicated that fundamental knowledge on the pharmaceutical development of medicines for children is still scarce and fragmented. In order to obtain essential information, the acceptability of and preference among four different types of oral formulations was investigated in infants and preschool children between 1 and 4 years of age. The children and parents generally preferred a small 4-mm tablet (also referred to as mini-tablet) and syrup over a suspension or powder. Usability of paediatric medicines Although it was not recommended, some of the parents choose to administer the formulations with a smaller or larger portion of food or drink. Parents were more likely to do so when child acceptability was low. Child acceptability was generally increased when the formulations were administered with (a larger portion) of food or drink. Acknowledging that tablets are commonly broken to lower the dose or to ease swallowing, the study also evaluated the suitability of tablet splitters as an alternative to breaking tablets by hand. The results indicate that tablets are best broken by hand and that the dosing accuracy of tablet splitters highly varies per trademark. In fact, the application of the worst trademark could have resulted in 40% over- or underdosing. Moreover, a kitchen knife turned out to provide more accurate doses than 3 of the 6 tablet splitters investigated.


Bosons of a feather flit together Bosons are a type of particle that likes to congregate. This property has a major effect on the behavior of identical bosons. Kaufman et al. demonstrated quantum interference of two bosonic Rb atoms placed in two neighboring quantum wells (see the Perspective by Thompson and Lukin). They prepared the atoms in exactly the same state so that there would be no way to tell them apart except for which well each atom was in. They then monitored the probability of the two atoms still being in separate wells. At certain times, the probability had a characteristic dip signifying that the bosons preferred to be in the same well. Science, this issue p. 306; see also p. 272 Two bosonic rubidium atoms in coupled quantum wells are prepared in a symmetrical state and allowed to interfere. [Also see Perspective by Thompson and Lukin] The quantum statistics of atoms is typically observed in the behavior of an ensemble via macroscopic observables. However, quantum statistics modifies the behavior of even two particles. Here, we demonstrate near-complete control over all the internal and external degrees of freedom of two laser-cooled 87Rb atoms trapped in two optical tweezers. This controllability allows us to observe signatures of indistinguishability via two-particle interference. Our work establishes laser-cooled atoms in optical tweezers as a promising route to bottom-up engineering of scalable, low-entropy quantum systems.


The operational sex ratio (OSR; ratio of sexually available females to sexually available males) is a social environment that greatly influences mate choice, but how it concurrently affects mate choice in both sexes in species with mutual mate choice remains poorly understood. In this thesis, I experimentally investigated the potential influence of variation in the local OSR (male-biased, even sex ratio, and female-biased) on which sex is the choosiest in the Jamaican field cricket, Gryllus assimilis. I also tested the consistency of individual mate choice as quantified using a dichotomous mate choice test and a full-interaction choice test under different OSR levels. OSR did not influence female or male choice of the field crickets, but did influence how potential mates interact. There was no significant consistency between the two types of mate choice tests used, and the OSR did not affect the likelihood of crickets consistently choosing the same mate.


Context. Stars are often observed to form in clusters and it is therefore important to understand how such a region of concentrated mass is assembled out of the diffuse medium. The properties of such a region eventually prescribe the important physical mechanisms and determine the characteristics of the stellar cluster. Aims. We study the formation of a gaseous protocluster inside a molecular cloud and associate its internal properties with those of the parent cloud by varying the level of the initial turbulence of the cloud with a view to better characterize the subsequent stellar cluster formation. Methods. We performed high resolution magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations of gaseous protoclusters forming in molecular clouds collapsing under self-gravity. We determined ellipsoidal cluster regions via gas kinematics and sink particle distribution, permitting us to determine the mass, size, and aspect ratio of the cluster. We studied the cluster properties, such as kinetic and gravitational energy, and made links to the parent cloud. Results. The gaseous protocluster is formed out of global collapse of a molecular cloud and has non-negligible rotation owing to angular momentum conservation during the collapse of the object. Most of the star formation occurs in this region, which occupies only a small volume fraction of the whole cloud. This dense entity is a result of the interplay between turbulence and gravity. We identify such regions in simulations and compare the gas and sink particles to observed star-forming clumps and embedded clusters, respectively. The gaseous protocluster inferred from simulation results presents a mass-size relation that is compatible with observations. We stress that the stellar cluster radius, although clearly correlated with the gas cluster radius, depends sensitively on its definition. Energy analysis is performed to confirm that the gaseous protocluster is a product of gravoturbulent reprocessing and that the support of turbulent and rotational energy against self-gravity yields a state of global virial equilibrium, although collapse is occurring at a smaller scale and the cluster is actively forming stars. This object then serves as the antecedent of the stellar cluster, to which the energy properties are passed on. Conclusions. The gaseous protocluster properties are determined by the parent cloud out of which it forms, while the gas is indeed reprocessed and constitutes a star-forming environment that is different from that of the parent cloud.


OBJECTIVES: Evaluate patients with breast cancer undergoing chemotherapy with respect to their epidemiologic and clinical variables as well as performance at work or at home. METHODS: this was a cross-sectional study including 52 women interviewed during breast cancer chemotherapy, stratified in two groups: those who continued to work and do household tasks, and did not continue to work or do household tasks. Patients were from two public hospitals in the State of Sao Paulo, one in Santo Andre and the other in Sao Bernardo do Campo. The WPAI - GH (Work Productivity and Activity Impairment) questionnaire was used to evaluate work and household performance of professionals or housewives, respectively. RESULTS: Mean age of the patients was 55.7 (SD=13.8), most were Caucasian (88.5%), married (55.8%), employed (65.3%) and the majority had to stop working because of treatment (51.0%), at more advanced stage (p<0.05), fatigue and nausea (p<0.05). Mean WPAI - GH was 67.04 (|SD = 5.62) for patients who stopped working and 49.17 (SD = 6.89) for those who continued to work (Mann-Whitney U test: p = 0.04). CONCLUSION: Chemotherapy leads to a decrease in performance of a sizable fraction of women with breast cancer undergoing chemotherapy. A more advanced stage of neoplasia was positively associated with withdrawal from these activities probably due to side effects such as fatigue and nausea.


This paper uses cross sectional data which were collected from 200 smallholder rice producers in Ghana, to examine the factors influencing the adoption and extent of use of NERICA rice varieties in Ghana. About 57.93 per cent of the sampled rice producers allocated 35.77 per cent of their land to NERICA accounting for about 33.13 per cent of seeds planted. The Tobit regression model suggests fertilizer use, existence of other complementary projects in the area, proportion of active persons in household, access to alternative income sources, distance to seed source and education as key factors influencing the quantity of seeds planted as well as the proportion of land allocated to the NERICA varieties. With the exception of distance to seed source, all the other factors positively influenced the extents of adoption. The findings suggest the need to ensure availability of NERICA seeds within acceptable distances to farming communities. This could be achieved through identification of certified rice seed growers in strategic locations throughout the country and supported with necessary logistics to produce NERICA seeds at reasonable proximities to rice producing communities. This could also be enhanced through establishment of linkages with existing institutions and projects to compliment promotional efforts


The overall objective of this study was to study the impact of change of land use / land cover on catchment runoff response using FEWS-Flood Model as the rainfall-runoff conversion model in Nzoia basin, Kenya. Land use / land cover grid data were processed for the years 1986 and 2000 in IDRISI Kilimanjaro environment while both soil data and necessary meteorological data inputs were processed in necessary formats in ArcView. The study revealed that loss of forest cover between the year 1986 and 2000 equaled gain in acreage under cropland land/ woodland mosaic in the same period. Analysis of impact of change of land use/ land cover between 1986 and 2000 also revealed increased peaks in resulting hydrographs as a result of increased acreage under crops and reduced forest cover for same storm characteristics. This has given a rationale to recent increased flood disaster in the basin. Key Words: Nzoia, Integrated watershed management, USGS SFM, land use, land cover


The R package quantreg.nonpar implements nonparametric quantile regression methods to estimate and make inference on partially linear quantile models. quantreg.nonpar obtains point estimates of the conditional quantile function and its derivatives based on series approximations to the nonparametric part of the model. It also provides pointwise and uniform confidence intervals over a region of covariate values and/or quantile indices for the same functions using analytical and resampling methods. This paper serves as an introduction to the package and displays basic functionality of the functions contained within.


Abstract Objective: To test whether adherence to mentalization-based treatment (MBT) principles predict better patient in-session mentalizing. Methods: Two sessions for each of 15 patients with borderline personality disorder and comorbid substance abuse disorder were rated for MBT adherence and competence. Individual patient statements were rated for Reflective Functioning (RF), therapist statements were rated as demanding RF or not. Data were analysed using multilevel modelling. Results: MBT adherence and competence predicted higher session RF (β = .58–.75), even while controlling for pre-treatment RF. In addition, therapist interventions directed toward exploring mental states predicted higher RF of subsequent patient responses (β = .11–.12). Conclusions: MBT adherence and competence were significantly related to patient in-session mentalizing, supporting the validity of MBT principles. Results point to the importance of supervision for therapists to become adherent to MBT principles. The small number of patients and sessions limits generalizability of results.


This article is, a proposition of strategie to follow to analice de actual situation of sporting phenomenon in our society. At the same time this study, that it appears like a grant iniciative from Granada County Council in her Sport Area, has a double objective, in the first place, to know the reality in Granada and his province ahout sport subject and in the second place, to realice after the data analysis, a suitable policy to the necessities and request. The questionaire was designed with 272 items, was aplied to 2.400 subject, with a confidence level +95%. For them, we have made a "conglomerados polietapicos" model by aged, sex and stratum population. The study's dimensions discuss about: sport image, sport habit, free time take up, sport competition and association, sport scholastic, public and private sport proposal and instalation. We can emphasize like the first results, the positive image in existence about the sport for all in the county of Granada, the higher percentage in the men than in the women of sport practice, the importance that the physical education and sport have for the parents, the increase of the physic and sport activities outdoor and the interest to realice physic activity to have get healthy and entertainment. KEY WORDS: Sports habit, sport proposal, questionaire.


Growth mindset continues to be a popular topic of conversation in the field of education. The purpose of this study was to observe and analyze the impact growth mindset intervention can have on student's performance as well as their self-efficacy in physical education. This study took place in an elementary school in the northwest suburbs of Minneapolis, using four different 4 grade classes. For this study, the author collected data in the form of preand postLikert scale surveys as well as preand postpresidential fitness tests. Classes were randomly selected to receive growth mindset intervention or be in a control group. Students in the growth mindset intervention group received and participated in different growth mindset lessons, feedback, and instruction throughout the time of the study. Constant comparison method as well as descriptive statistics was used to analyze survey and fitness test data, resulting in a couple different themes.


In this study, we evaluated the activity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC), isolated from treated and untreated lepromatous leprosy patients, from lepromatous leprosy patients during and after reactional episodes (erythema nodosum leprosum (ENL) and reversal reaction (RR)), and from normal healthy individuals. We determined reactive oxygen intermediate (ROI) production, procoagulant activity (PCA) and HLA-DR antigen expression of monocytes, besides lymphoproliferation, both in the presence and absence of various stimulatory agents. Phorbol myristate acetate (PMA) stimulated ROI production by monocytes from all the groups studied, with patients during reactional episodes (ENL and RR) showing a significantly higher response (p < 0.009 and p < 0.00001). Irradiated Mycobacterium leprae, although having little effect when added alone, strongly suppressed PMA-stimulated ROI production. Muramyl dipeptide (MDP) had no influence on either basal or on PMA-induced ROI production. Basal monocyte PCA, as well as M. leprae or concanavalin A (ConA)-induced monocyte PCA was comparable in monocytes from all the groups studied. ConA was able to induce mitogenic activity in mononuclear cells isolated from all the groups studied. M. leprae, although stimulatory for normal individuals, did not induce lymphoproliferation in lepromatous leprosy patients, except for cells from patients during RR, which responded equally to M. leprae and to ConA. The absence of M. leprae-induced lymphoproliferation in lepromatous leprosy patients is not caused by the lack of basal HLA-DR expression, as PBMC from all individuals studied showed the same level of this antigen. Our results suggest an increase of spontaneous or PMA-induced monocyte activity, as detected by ROI production, during the reactional episode; addition of M. leprae suppressed this response. The increase in monocyte activity could be correlated with the increase of lymphoproliferation response to M. leprae during RR, but not during ENL. The importance of a possible immune suppressive action of M. leprae is discussed.


The "Evidence-based Telemedicine - Trauma & Acute Care Surgery" (EBT-TACS) Journal Club performed a critical review of the literature and selected three up-to-date articles on the management of splenic trauma. Our focus was on high-grade splenic injuries, defined as AAST injury grade III-V. The first paper was an update of the 2003 Eastern Association for the Surgery of Trauma (EAST) practice management guidelines for nonoperative management of injury to the spleen. The second paper was an American Association for the Surgery of Trauma (AAST) 2012 plenary paper evaluating the predictive role of contrast blush on CT scan in AAST grade IV and V splenic injuries. Our last article was from Europe and investigates the effects of angioembolization of splenic artery on splenic function after high-grade splenic trauma (AAST grade III-V). The EBT-TACS Journal Club elaborated conclusions and recommendations for the management of high-grade splenic trauma.


During the great earthquake event of M9.0 Tohoku earthquake on 11 March 2011 in Japan, previous studies detected the horizontal wave structure of ionospheric total electron content (TEC) disturbances by a dense ground-based GPS receiver network. These results suggested that the ionospheric TEC disturbances could be caused by the earthquake-triggered seismic surface, acoustic-gravity, and tsunami waves, which are distinguished by the different propagation velocities, durations, and periods. In order to further investigate the vertical coupling effect for the ionospheric plasma density disturbances, this study employed a three-dimensional, non-linear, compressible numerical model. This model simulated the disturbances of neutral mass densities from the surface to lower, upper atmosphere and the ionosphere, by specifying the surface displacement triggered by the earthquake, such as the rayleigh waves, at the model lower boundary. The results show that the TEC disturbances have two types of the propagation waves, first horizontal waves and slow co-centric waves. These might be caused by the neutral wind dynamo effect and the ion-neutral collision along the magnetic field.


Decades after the fall of apartheid, South Africa continues to face problems such as racism, heterosexism, sexism, ableism, xenophobia, and gender-based violence leading to feminicide, which undermines all efforts being made to achieve social justice. Every Christian mission begins or flows out from missio Dei and has a common endeavour to achieve its goal. This article examines missio hominum as the new fundamental paradigm from the perspective of Nico Smith. It believes that when Smith saw the need for missio hominum, social justice was thought of as a prerequisite for the accomplishment of missio Dei's goal. It examines how he developed the missio hominum paradigm with the aim of advocating for social justice in South Africa. It perceives a potential and a fundamental element for social justice in this new paradigm. Significantly, missio hominum represents a fundamental theological paradigm by which human action is integrated or linked with divine action in order to achieve the goal of the missio Dei. It provides an overview of the literature relating to the featured works on Christian mission and social justice. To the best of the author's knowledge, little or no work has been published on missio hominum as a missiological paradigm on the way to social justice.Contribution: Missio hominum from the perspective of Nico Smith is described here as a new fundamental missiological paradigm aimed at bringing social justice to South Africa. This paradigm integrates the active participation of all people in the broader discourse of the missio Dei and its fulfilment. Adoption of this paradigm will enrich the field of theology in general and missiology in particular as it expands human participation in missio Dei.


Net Na+ absorption in microperfused rabbit cortical collecting ducts (CCDs) is low during the 1st wk of postnatal life, increasing substantially thereafter [L. M. Satlin. Am. J. Physiol. 266 (Renal Fluid Electrolyte Physiol. 35): F57-F65, 1994]. To establish whether the low rate of Na+ absorption observed immediately after birth is due to a low apical Na+ permeability of the neonatal principal cell, we used the patch-clamp technique in split-open CCDs isolated from maturing rabbits to estimate conductance, number (N), and open probability (Po) of apical Na+ channels in principal cells. With LiCl in the pipette and a NaCl or potassium gluconate solution, warmed to 37 degrees C, in the bath, inward currents with a conductance of approximately 11 pS (n = 23) were observed in 17% of cell-attached patches at 1 wk, 41% of patches at 2 wk, and 43% of patches at 5 wk. The mean N per patch in the 1st wk (0.22 +/- 0.09; n = 36) was significantly less than that observed in the 2nd (1.38 +/- 0.39; n = 34) and 5th (1.24 +/- 0.37; n = 21) wk of life. Po, studied at positive pipette voltages, was significantly lower in the 1st wk (0.085 +/- 0.035; n = 5) than in the 2nd wk (0.345 +/- 0.063; n = 9) and 5th wk (0.291 +/- 0.058; n = 4). To confirm that the 11-pS channel represented the amiloride-sensitive apical Na+ channel, cell-attached patches in CCDs isolated from 2-wk-old rabbits were studied with 0.5 microM amiloride added to the LiCl pipette solution. Amiloride led to > 90% reductions in mean open and closed times of the 11-pS conductance, consistent with blockade of the channel. These data indicate that N and Po of apical amiloride-sensitive Na+ channels in principal cells increase significantly after birth.


This essay examines the results of a pilot study undertaken at George Mason University as a joint effort between the Psychology Department and the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution. The authors discuss the task of behavioralizing tactics commonly used in conflict situations, defining particular conflict styles often used by participants in conflicts, and the ability of the participants in the study to identify and agree upon the tactics and styles when viewed in a film. The authors also examine the relationship of shame, guilt, and anger in the conflict setting as it relates to the tactics used.


m- Phenylenediamine (MPD) is used for manufacture of thin film composite reverse osmosis (RO) membrane in polyamide thin film formation by interfacial polymerization. The used m- phenylenediamine solution has to be discarded as effluent. Granular activated carbon is found to be an efficient adsorbent for removal of m- phenylenediamine from aqueous solution. Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area of the granular activated carbon is 446 m 2 /g and micropore volume 0.15 cc/g. A systematic study of adsorption of m- phenylenediamine over granular activated carbon with different loading of adsorbent in given m- phenylenediamine solution concentration and different concentration of m -phenylenediamine solution in given adsorbent quantity has been carried out. Adsorption isotherms have been developed in each case. It is found that at 28% w/v concentration of adsorbent, the total MPD present in the 2% aqueous solution is adsorbed. It is found that adsorption of MPD over granular activated carbon follows Freundlich isotherm x/m = k c 1/n , where k =0.4576 and n = 4. Moreover, the study involves kinetics of adsorption of m- phenylene diamine over granular activated carbon at different temperatures and it is found that the kinetics of MPD adsorption over granular activated carbon follows Elovich Model. The kinetic study indicates that the optimum temperature of adsorption is 40°C as the MPD adsorption efficiency improves from 30 to 40°C and subsequently drops drastically for 45°C. The optimum temperature for adsorption has been found. It is found that granular activated carbon is an efficient adsorbent for removal of m- phenylenediamine from aqueous solution.


A rapid focus-detection technique based directly on the spectral content of digital holograms is developed. It differs from previous approaches in that it does not need a full reconstruction of the image. The technique uses l(1) norms of object spectral components associated with the real and imaginary parts of the reconstruction kernel. Further, the l(1) norms can be computed efficiently in the spatial frequency domain using a polar coordinate system, yielding a drastic speedup of approximately 2 orders of magnitude compared with image-based focus detection. Significant computational savings are achieved when subsequent image reconstructions are done selectively over the detected focus distances. Focus-detection results from holograms of plankton are demonstrated that show the technique is both accurate and robust.


What effect do International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank programs have on collective labor rights? Labor rights advocacy networks and organized labor groups have long been critical of neoliberal policy prescriptions attached to loans by international financial institutions (IFIs), claiming that they harm the interests of workers. IFIs dispute these claims, noting that they work with relevant labor organizations and that many of their arrangements call for compliance with core labor standards. Yet very little research has been devoted to whether IFI programs affect labor laws and the actual labor practices of recipient countries. We argue that IFI programs undermine collective labor rights. Specifically, recommended policy reforms, as well as the broader signals connoted by participation in the programs, undermine labor organizations and the adoption of protective laws. To substantiate these claims, we use time-series cross-national data for a sample of 123 low- and middle-income countries for the years 1985 to 2002. Our findings suggest that programs from both IFIs are negatively and significantly related to labor rights, including laws designed to guarantee basic collective labor rights as well as the protection of these rights in practice.


Rehabilitation medicine, aka Physical medicine and Rehabilitation (PM & R), is the medical specialty which focuses on optimizing function, ability, participation and life satisfaction in the light of noncurable disability and/or chronic disease. It is primarily geared towards the "so what" (i.e. consequences) than towards "what" (i.e. causes). PM & R is holistic and patient-centred, thus comprising a well-suited arena for dialogue and patient participation. Many patients experience a severe crisis reaction in the aftermath of major trauma or disease. This "existential rupture" calls for a fundamental revaluation of many aspects of daily life. Crisis management will not merely be a matter of mourning and then back to "business as usual," as this often is either not possible or not the optimal choice given altered life circumstances. We propose that philosophical practice (PP) may be an important addition to the rehabilitation process, by facilitating "lifeworld analyses" and thereby making it possible for the patient to find sources of meaning in life despite disability. This "therapy for the sane" (albeit disabled) comprises PP rather than psychiatric or psychotherapeutic interventions, and may come to be seen as a key aspect in the training of future physiatrists and other rehabilitation specialists.


To better inform policies on talent flow in emerging countries, this article evaluates the determinants of return migration among Brazilian researchers and post-graduate students in Britain, as well as, their personal and professional ties to Brazil. Most participants were inclined to engage in return migration (67%). The perception of the job market and career values were associated to their willingness to return, particularly, to receive job advertisements from EU institutions (OR=0.32, p=0.03) and to identify high income as professional success (OR=0.35, p=0.05). Personal ties to Brazil were both more frequent and influential in return migration plans than professional ties. Only 19% of participants were actively involved in research partnerships between the two countries. A series of policy implications were discussed at the institutional, national and international level. Evidence-based policies to engage with the scientific diaspora and to foster international partnerships are both critical to maximize social benefits and to secure equitable development worldwide. Keywords: scientific diaspora, international mobility of researchers, brain drain, migration, international research partnerships.


By identifying the Higgs with Primitive Idempotents of the Cl(8) real Clifford algebra, the Higgs is not seen as a simple-minded fundamental scalar particle, but rather the Higgs is seen as a quantum process that creates a fermionic condensate with which it interacts to make the fermions appear massive. The Primitive Idempotent Higgs is part of my E8 Physics model in terms of which the Primitive Idempotent Higgs is seen to do all the nice things that the fundamental scalar particle Higgs needs to do, and to be effectively a Higgs-Tquark system with 3 mass states (i.e., the LHC should see events that look like 3 standard model Higgs mass states at around 140 GeV and 200 GeV and 250 GeV with the total standard model cross section being divided up among those three states. In particular, the LHC should see a Higgs around 140 GeV but with a lower cross section than expected.) (References are included in the body of the paper and in linked material.)


The dramatically increased incidence and poor survival rates of esophageal adenocarcinoma (EAC) underscore the need for novel targets useful for risk assessment and therapeutic intervention. Altered expression of cyclin D1 has been proposed as an early predictor for malignant transformation in EAC; however, the mechanisms underlying cyclin D1 deregulation have not been identified. A single nucleotide polymorphism, A870G, of the cyclin D1 gene has been associated with the preferential encoding of a protein with an extended half-life. We investigated the association of the cyclin D1 A870G polymorphism with cyclin D1 protein expression and clinical characteristics and outcome in 124 patients treated at our institution for EAC. Our results indicate that the cyclin D1 AA/AG genotype is associated with earlier age of cancer onset, cyclin D1 protein deregulation in the primary tumors, and increased frequency of distant metastasis. Our findings suggest that cyclin D1 status could be useful to assess risk of progression to EAC, and strategies directed to modulate cyclin D1 expression may prove useful for interventions to slow or interrupt the EAC tumorigenesis process.


Chapter six argues that in working to avoid the draft, men during the Vietnam War did not behave terribly differently from men during World War II or the Korean War. Rather, it was the context of their actions that changed. This chapter affirms that the historical conditions of the Vietnam War, particularly the advent of draft counseling, made it easier for men to engage in draft avoidance behavior. But it also argues that the military manpower policies of the previous decades influenced their choices. Because policies and practices privileged men with the resources to attend college, gain admittance to the National Guard or Reserves, find sympathetic doctors, or write reasoned belief statements in conscientious objector applications, white, middle-class men were the most successful at avoiding the draft. For them, military service was a decision more than a fait accompli. Working-class and minority men had fewer tools for draft avoidance.


Objective: The volume-outcome relationship between isolated surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) and mortality in patients with aortic valve stenosis remains unclear. This study aimed to assess this relationship using a large-scale study conducted in Japan. Methods: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of adult patients with aortic valve stenosis hospitalized between April 1, 2012 and March 31, 2015. Hospitals were categorized into 3 groups based on SAVR volume: low volume (≤49 cases), intermediate volume (50–99 cases), and high volume (≥100 cases). A multiple logistic regression analysis was performed with in-hospital mortality as the dependent variable and hospital volume groups as independent variables. Results: The low-volume group, intermediate-volume group, and high-volume group comprised 7383 patients from 330 hospitals, 5253 patients from 76 hospitals, and 3411 patients from 23 hospitals, respectively. The regression analysis accounted for patient sex, height, weight, activities of daily living, and comorbidities as covariates. Relative to the intermediate-volume group, the odds ratios for in-hospital mortality were 1.32 (95% confidence intervals: 1.07–1.61; P<0.01) in the low-volume group and 0.65 (0.48–0.87; P<0.01) in the high-volume group. Conclusion: Higher hospital volume was significantly associated with reduced mortality, and patients with aortic valve stenosis may benefit from care in high-volume hospitals.


Int J Exerc Sci 4(2) : 86-92, 2011. Minority and low socioeconomic status groups have the highest rates of overweight and obesity. Children from these families face a greater risk for weightrelated health problems such as diabetes, heart disease and cancer as compared to their nonminority and more affluent peers. Factors from the larger physical, social, and cultural environments, and within families, influence weight status among children. Many of these factors are yet to be identified and relationships among known factors are complex and not well understood. The National Institutes of Health and U.S. Department of Agriculture have proposed a research agenda for social and behavioral scientists to "examine how social contexts influence health and elucidate the mechanisms through with those mechanisms operate", and to "develop ways to intervene on those factors for preventing obesity." This editorial presents a social ecological view of child obesity and proposes several steps necessary to identify how community and family domain factors affect the weight-regulating behaviors of children. An empiricallybased, theoretically-driven approach will lead to efficacious interventions which can be translated and widely disseminated into community-based programs, thus increasing the probability of success of population-based obesity prevention and control interventions.


Greater international economic interconnectedness over recent decades has been changing inflation dynamics. This paper presents evidence that the expansion of global value chains (GVCs), ie cross-border trade in intermediate goods and services, is an important channel through which global economic slack influences domestic inflation. In particular, we document the extent to which the growth in GVCs explains the established empirical correlation between global economic slack and national inflation rates, both across countries and over time. Accounting for the role of GVCs, we also find that the conventional trade-based measures of openness used in previous studies are poor proxies for this transmission channel. The results support the hypothesis that as GVCs expand, direct and indirect competition among economies increases, making domestic inflation more sensitive to the global output gap. This can affect the trade-offs that central banks face when managing inflation.


Software inspection has proven to be an effective way to increase the quality of software products. A new reading technique suggested for software inspection, usage-based reading (UBR), has been tested in previous studies, where it showed good defect detection efficiency during inspection of design documents. This study addresses the question whether this is true also for inspections of requirements documents. The idea behind UBR is to let prioritized use-cases direct the reviewer's focus on important parts of the document. Using graduate students as subjects, the UBR approach for inspection of requirement specification was compared with a checklist approach. All defects were classified according to their severity for the function of the final software. The result shows that reviewers using UBR do not find more defects and use more time than those using a checklist. In conclusion, in comparison with a checklist approach, UBR does not make the inspection of requirements specifications more efficient. (Less)


Short-term, transient population dynamics can differ in important ways from long-term asymptotic dynamics. Just as perturbation analysis (sensitivity and elasticity) of the asymptotic growth rate reveals the effects of the vital rates on long-term growth, the perturbation analysis of transient dynamics can reveal the determinants of short-term patterns. In this article, I present a completely new approach to transient sensitivity and elasticity analysis, using methods from matrix calculus. Unlike previous methods, this approach applies not only to linear time-invariant models but also to time-varying, subsidized, stochastic, nonlinear and spatial models. It is computationally simple, and does not require calculation of eigenvalues or eigenvectors. The method is presented along with applications to plant and animal populations.


This paper solves an empiricaly parameterized model of households' optimal demand for nominal and inflation indexed annuities. The model incorporates mortality, inflation, and real interest rate risk. The model draws some interesting predictions. First, the welfare calculations on the access to annuities markets show that nominal annuities are welfare improving even when sold at the empirically parameterized cost, which is above fair value. Real annuities are welfare improving over nominal annuities when sold at a fair price, but when we incorporate the empirically parameterized annuity premium the gains become negative at all wealth levels. Second, the simulation of the model for the British population wealth distribution shows that an important explanation for the little interest in annuities comes from the fact that annuities are extremely expensive, compared with the total accumulated assets held by households. In other words many households can not afford even to enter the annuity market. The paper also compares the simulated annuity demand to the actual demands reported in the Family Resources Survey. For those individuals who buy annuities, the simulated demands are not very different from those observed in the survey.


Precise performance evaluation at design and off-design operations is needed for a correct management of power plants. This need is particularly strong in gas turbine power plants which can quickly react to load variations and are very sensitive to ambient conditions. The paper aims at presenting a simple tool to determine the values of the thermodynamic quantities in each point of the plant and the overall plant performances of a real gas turbine plant. Starting from experimental data, a zero-dimensional model is developed which properly considers the effect of ambient conditions and water injection for pollutant abatement at different load settings under the action of the control system. An emission model taken from the literature is also included, after tuning on experimental data, to predict carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide pollution.Copyright © 2002 by ASME


On May 18, 1995, Brevard County, Florida, one of two counties containing Canaveral National Seashore, passed ordinance 95-21 prohibiting public nudity. The law was aimed specifically at the national seashore, a unit of the national park system that draws 1.4 million visitors per year. This followed a publicity campaign by the Christian Coalition of Florida and others. Within months, members of several naturist societies tested the ordinance, were arrested by county deputies, and filed a lawsuit against both Brevard County and the National Park Service. Thus ended an uneasy truce between the federal agency and naturists that attempted to use spatial segregation to minimize conflicts between parties visiting the public beach (Newkirk 1999).


Abstract Seasonality is a natural feature of wild caught fisheries that introduces variation in food supply, and which often is amplified by fisheries management systems. Seasonal timing of landings patterns and linkages to consumption patterns can have a potentially strong impact on income for coastal communities as well as import patterns. This study characterizes the relationship between seasonality in seafood production and consumption in the United States by analyzing monthly domestic fisheries landings and imports and retail sales of farmed and wild seafood from 2017 to 2019. Analyses were conducted for total seafood sales, by product form, by species group, and by region of the United States. The data reveal strong seasonal increases in consumption around December and March. Seasonal increases in consumption in Spring and Summer occurred in parallel with domestic fishing production. Domestic landings vary by region, but most regions have peak fishing seasons between May and October. Alaska has the largest commercial fishery in the United States and seasonal peaks in Alaska (July/August, February/March) strongly influence seasonality in national landings. Misalignment between domestic production and consumption in some seasons and species groups creates opportunities for imports to supplement demand and lost opportunities for domestic producers.


The work described in this thesis was based on applications of the combined technique of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) to a variety of topics in organic chemistry and biochemistry. The research included studies of the scope of the technique (based on model compounds) and applications to actual analytical problems. Following the introduction, a section of the thesis is devoted to work on steroids. Results obtained with progesterone and testosterone analogues confirm The value of GC-MS in distinguishing isomers. The use of trimethylsilyl (TMS) ether derivatives in GC-MS is well established, but the advantages of (chloromethyl)dimethylsilyl ethers as derivatives for GC-MS have been little explored. The utility of these derivatives is illustrated and discussed for the example of 1/alpha-alkyl-17beta-hydroxy steroids. The mass spectral fragmentations of TMS ether derivatives of androst-5-en-3beta-ol analogues and of other unsaturated 3beta-hydroxy steroids have been investigated. The results of this survey have been applied to the characterisation of yeast sterols, sterols from a bacterium (Methylococcus capsulatus) grown on methane, steroidal drug metabolites, and a steroidal enzyme-reduction product. Corticosteroids cannot be examined directly by GC-MS because of References cited in this summary are restricted to publications incorporating work described in the thesis. the low thermal stability of the side chain. Earlier work has shown that their boronate derivatives are quite stable. The mass spectra (recorded by GC-MS) of representative corticosteroid boronates are discussed in respect of their use in structural assignments. Similar difficulties are encountered in GC-MS of beta-hydroxy amines because of their relatively high polarity and low thermal stability. The use of boronate derivatives in the characterisation of catecholamines and related beta-hydroxy amines by GC-MS is discussed, and a more detailed investigation of the mass spectral fragmentations of the derived 1,3,2-oxazaborolidines has been carried out. O-methyloxime (MO) derivatives are of value in the analysis by GC-MS of aldehydes and ketones. Salient features of the spectra of MO derivatives of aliphatic aldehydes and ketones are enumerated. Aldehydes from the cuticular leaf waxes of Chenopodium album L. and Lolium perenne L. have been identified by GC-MS of their MO derivatives. Unsaturated aliphatic hydrocarbons from the green form of the freshwater alga Botryococcus braunii have been ozonised and cleaved to form aldehydes which have been identified as their MO derivatives. The structures of the hydrocarbons have thus been inferred. An exploratory study of the use of GC-MS in the analysis of air pollutants has been carried out. The gas chromatographic and mass spectrometric properties of some polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons have been surveyed and a number of these compounds have been tentatively identified in dust collected from air conditioner filters. Perfluorodecalin has been found to be a convenient mass calibration standard for low resolution mass spectra. The need for, and problems associated with, computer-assisted data handling in GC-MS are discussed. The development of an on-line real-time data acquisition system is described.


Friedreich's ataxia (FRDA) is an autosomal recessive inherited disorder involving progressive damage to the central and peripheral nervous systems and cardiomyopathy. FRDA is caused by the silencing of the FXN gene and reduced levels of the encoded protein, frataxin. Frataxin is a mitochondrial protein that functions primarily in iron‐sulfur cluster synthesis. Skin disorders including hair abnormalities have previously been reported in patients with mitochondrial disorders. However, to our knowledge, ultra‐structural hair alterations in FRDA were not demonstrated. The purpose of this study was to determine ultra‐structural alterations in the hairs of FRDA patients as well as carriers. Hair specimen from four patients, who are in different stages of the disease, and two carriers were examined by scanning electron microscope. Thin and weak hair follicles with absence of homogeneities on the cuticular surface, local damages of the cuticular layer, cuticular fractures were detected in both carriers and patients, but these alterations were much more prominent in the hair follicles of patients. In addition, erosions on the surface of the cuticle and local deep cavities just under the cuticular level were observed only in patients. Indistinct cuticular pattern, pores on the cuticular surface, and presence of concavities on the hair follicle were also detected in patients in later stages of the disease. According to our results, progression of the disease increased the alterations on hair structure. We suggest that ultra‐structural alterations observed in hair samples might be due to oxidative stress caused by deficient frataxin expression in mitochondria. Microsc. Res. Tech. 78:731–736, 2015. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


NdFeB magnet waste is one of the important secondary resources from which rare-earth elements (REEs) can be recovered. Herein we present an electrochemical route to selectively extract REEs from the magnet waste at room temperature. First, the magnet waste was partially leached with HCl. The partial leachate along with undissolved magnet waste was taken in the anolyte side of a two compartment reactor separated by an anion exchange membrane whereas the catholyte consisted of sodium chloride solution. The Fe(II) present in the leachate was oxidized and precipitated as Fe(OH)3 while more than 95% of REEs were extracted into the solution. Subsequently, oxalic acid was used to selectively precipitate REEs as rare-earth oxalates. Hydrochloric acid liberated during the oxalic acid precipitation process could be directly reused in the partial leaching step. Sodium chloride was the only chemical consumed during the electrolysis. The effect of the NaCl concentration in the anolyte and catholyte on the extraction of metals was investigated. From magnet waste to rare-earth oxides, the developed recycling process is environmentally friendly and consumes only electricity, NaCl and oxalic acid.


Increased knowledge, and modern developments in technology, have given birth to several techniques for interventional closure of atrial septal defects. During the last few years, at least five different devices have been the subject of clinical trials. These are various generations of the Sideris' buttoned device; the ASDOS [250}; the self-centring AngelWings [around 325]; CardioSEAL, the modified Clamshell device, [approaching 500]; and the nitinol Amplatzer plug [over 500}. The numbers in brackets refer, according to their manufacturers, to the world-wide implants in atrial septal defects or the oval foramen as of February 1998 for the four less-published devices. These numbers may not only mirror the general acceptance by cardiologists, but also the clinical compliance of the different devices. Only the buttoned device is well documented in the literature,although certainly a great part of the literature on the clamshell device might be considered relevant also for CardioSEAL. The other devices are presented in few, smaller series,' or by their complications, representing serious setbacks in the implementation of a new method. Much of the present information is preliminary, and represents personal communications between investigators. It is now increasingly important to publish results with the use of different devices. I welcome, therefore, the articles in this issue of Cardiology in the Young.' The optimal device should be easy to handle. Implantation should be feasible through a small introducer sheath. The device, when inserted, should be safe, retrievable, compatible with most atrial defects, and produce high rates of closure and


This study investigated the perceptions of soft skills among employers and graduates in Sarawak, using descriptive quantitative research methodology to determine if there is a significant difference between the employers and graduates; to compare differences in ranking of soft skills, and thus the occurrence of a skills gap between both parties. The literature reviews in this study emphasized, firstly, the perceptions of graduates and employers on soft skills about employability, a topic which had been studied over the decades across the world, since the skills gap or mismatch arose from the different perceptions is an ongoing phenomenon, that affected the curriculum of the higher education institutions and the labour market in the industries. Second, soft skills development has evolved; it has been referred to as 21st-century skills; a critical component of today's graduates' employability. Then, this study examined the perception of stakeholders involved in graduate employability, in particular, employer and graduate. The skills gap existed as a result of the disparities in perceptions between graduates and employers as the findings revealed there are differences in ranking orders, and frequency analysis confirmed the mean score comparisons of the ranking options between both parties. In terms of employers' demographic characteristics, significant differences were spotted after analysing a one-way ANOVA. These findings aimed to provide useful information to the stakeholders involved in assisting with the reduction of the skills gap and hence improve the graduate employability in Sarawak.


Abstract. A new particle-based reduced-complexity model to simulate sediment transport and channel morphology in steep streams in presented. The model CAST (Cellular Automaton Sediment Transport) contains phenomenological parameterizations, deterministic or stochastic, of sediment supply, bed load transport, and particle entrainment and deposition in a cellular-automaton space with uniform grain size. The model reproduces a realistic bed morphology and typical fluctuations in transport rates observed in steep channels. Particle hop distances, from entrainment to deposition, are well fitted by exponential distributions, in agreement with field data. The effect of stochasticity in both the entrainment and the input rate is shown. A stochastic parameterization of the entrainment is essential to create and maintain a realistic channel morphology, while the intermittent transport of grains in CAST shreds the input signal and its stochastic variability. A jamming routine has been added to CAST to simulate the grain–grain and grain–bed interactions that lead to particle jamming and step formation in a step-pool stream. The results show that jamming is effective in generating steps in unsteady conditions. Steps are created during high-flow periods and they survive during low flows only in sediment-starved conditions, in agreement with the jammed-state hypothesis of Church and Zimmermann (2007). Reduced-complexity models like CAST give new insights into the dynamics of complex phenomena such as sediment transport and bedform stability and are a useful complement to fully physically based models to test research hypotheses.


A growing body of scholarship demonstrates that parents with psychiatric disabilities and their families experience a range of inequalities that families with nondisabled parents do not suffer. Parents with psychiatric disabilities contend with pervasive discrimination within the child welfare and family law systems, often resulting in the removal of their children and loss of custody. Moreover, some children of parents with psychiatric disabilities experience worse outcomes than their peers, while others do not. Yet, despite extensive legal and social science scholarship focused on parents with psychiatric disabilities and their families, no studies have empirically examined the legal needs of parents with psychiatric disabilities as perceived by parents themselves.

This Article responds to the scholarly void and offers new and much-needed data on the real world-experiences of these parents. This study draws qualitative data from in-depth interviews with twelve former clients of a legal services program in Massachusetts that provides representation to parents with psychiatric disabilities. First, this study shows that the legal profession lacks understanding of mental health, which some parents believe negatively affects representation and case outcomes. Second, attorneys may need to provide parents with psychiatric disabilities assistance beyond litigation, including taking more time to explain the legal process, assisting with administrative tasks, and coordination with and referrals to other supports and services. Third, our data suggest that parents with psychiatric disabilities may have ongoing legal needs that require access to additional legal services beyond those related to the child welfare and family law systems. This Article concludes by identifying critical areas for further research and discussing the policy implications of the findings.


General formulation of practically applicable fundamental approach for development of engineering applications in systems with dynamically appearing and disappearing fractal structures is proposed. The approach is illustrated on the low-temperature pyrolysis of butane/propane mixture being pumped via the liquid tin and bismuth alloy preserved at the temperature 200 ± 20°C in the U-shaped test glass. Other prospective engineering applications of the approach are proposed on the base of analysis of selected experiments described in literature.