Objective: This paper provides a systematic review of research findings published between 1989 and 1998 concerning non-pharmacological strategies to alleviate behavioural disturbances in elderly persons with dementia. Method: Data collection strategies included computer literature searches, manual searches of selected journals and checks of references listed in previous reviews. To warrant inclusion, studies were required to include some measure of behaviour before and after the introduction of an intervention. Papers were appraised in the following domains: design, sampling technique, setting, behaviours studied, measurement tools, data collection methods, type of interventions and feasibility. An overall validity rating was assigned to each article using predetermined rules. Results: Forty-three studies met criteria for inclusion including five randomised controlled trials. Validity ratings were as follows: one strong, 15 moderate, and 27 weak. Areas of scientific weakness included small numbers of subjects, inadequate descriptions of study participants, imprecise data collection methods, high attrition rates and insufficient statistical analysis. Despite this, there is evidence to support the efficacy of activity programs, music, behaviour therapy, light therapy, carer education and changes to the physical environment. The evidence in favour of multidis-ciplinary teams, massage and aromatherapy is inconclusive. Conclusions: It was easier to interpret the results of rigorously designed studies that focused on a single behaviour or single intervention tailored to the needs of individuals and carers. Future studies should seek to replicate the findings outlined here, improving methodologies where necessary and including outcome measures that encompass the interests of people with dementia, family caregivers and health professionals.


Fire is a major component of the disturbance regime and a critical determinant of competitive outcomes in many ecosystems. In forests dominated by coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens), fire was frequent and ubiquitous prior to European settlement, but fires have been exceedingly small and rare over the last 70–80 years because of aggressive fire prevention and suppression policies. As a result, many aspects of redwood fire ecology remain poorly understood. However, in 2008 a single storm ignited numerous fires throughout the redwood region, providing a rare opportunity to conduct replicated fire effects research. One year post-fire, we investigated competitive dynamics by quantifying bole survival and basal sprouting, for redwood and associated species, at four field sites that spanned much of the latitudinal range of redwood and encompassed (1) second-growth and old-growth stands, (2) burned and unburned areas, and (3) a wide range of fire severities. We employed a mixed effects analytical framework and found that: (1) the probability of bole survival was greater for redwood than for its primary competitor (tanoak; Notholithocarpus densiflorus), (2) this divergence was much more pronounced at higher fire severities, and (3) tanoak exhibited a slight advantage in terms of post-fire basal sprouting, but the dominance of tanoak basal sprouts in burned areas was reduced relative to unburned areas. For many disturbance types in many ecosystems, the empirical data necessary for effective management decisions are lacking, and studies incorporating vegetative tree regeneration are especially scarce. Our work demonstrates the importance of utilizing unique field research opportunities to test current theories, while unequivocally documenting that fires of all severities increased the abundance of redwood relative to tanoak, and that higher severity fires more strongly favored redwood.


The study was designed to look at the impact of divorce on academic performance of senior secondary students in Ilorin metropolis Kwara state. The study adopted a survey method of research. Purposive and simple random sampling techniques were used for the study. Six senior secondary schools were randomly selected from the lists of senior secondary schools in Ilorin metropolis. 20 students from divorced families were randomly chosen from each school, making total number of 120 students as a subject sample out of 170 target population of the students from divorced homes. The questionnaire was tagged Students of Divorce Family Questionnaire (SDFQ) and academic performance tests tagged (EMT). English Language and Mathematics Test [EMT] were conducted for SS1 and SS2 participating students. The 10item questions were set for both English Language and Mathematics. The finding indicates that there is significant negative correlation between student of divorce and academic performance. The finding also shows significant age difference among students of divorce based on academic performance. It was recommended that government should provide rehabilitative programme for the students of divorced family in schools so that they can adjust in their academic performance.


This paper presents a new deep clustering (DC) method called manifold-aware DC (M-DC) that can enhance hyperspace utilization more effectively than the original DC. The original DC has a limitation in that a pair of two speakers has to be embedded having an orthogonal relationship due to its use of the one-hot vector-based loss function, while our method derives a unique loss function aimed at maximizing the target angle in the hyperspace based on the nature of a regular simplex. Our proposed loss imposes a higher penalty than the original DC when the speaker is assigned incorrectly. The change from DC to M-DC can be easily achieved by rewriting just one term in the loss function of DC, without any other modifications to the network architecture or model parameters. As such, our method has high practicability because it does not affect the original inference part. The experimental results show that the proposed method improves the performances of the original DC and its expansion method.


Uranium-series dating on a 186-m core (DV93-1) drilled from Badwater Basin in Death Valley, California, and on calcareous tufas from nearby strandlines shows that Lake Manly, the lake that periodically flooded Death Valley during the late Pleistocene, experienced large fluctuations in depth and chemistry over the last 200,000 yr. Death Valley has been occupied by a long-standing deep lake, perennial shallow saline lakes, and a desiccated salt pan similar to the modern valley floor. The average sedimentation rate of about 1 mm/yr for core DV93-1 was punctuated by episodes of more-rapid accumulation of halite. Arid conditions similar to the modern conditions prevailed during the entire Holocene and between 120,000 and 60,000 yr B.P. From 35,000 yr B.P. to the beginning of the Holocene, a perennial saline lake existed, over 70 m at its deepest. A much deeper and longer lasting perennial Lake Manly existed from about 185,000 to 128,000 yr B.P., with water depths reaching about 175 m, if not 330 m. This lake had two significant "dry" excursions of 102–103yr duration about 166,000 and 146,000 yr B.P., and it began to shrink to the point of halite precipitation between 128,000 and 120,000 yr B.P. The two perennial lake periods correspond to marine oxygen isotopic stages (OIS) 2 and 6. Based on the shoreline tufa ages, we do not rule out the possible existence ∼200,000 yr ago of yet a third perennial lake comparable in size to the OIS 6 lake. The234U/238U data suggest that U in tufa owes its origin mainly to Ca-rich springs fed by groundwater that emanated along lake shorelines in southern Death Valley, and that an increase of this spring-water input relative to the river-water input apparently occurred during OIS 6.


Background: Despite adequate treatment, patients with bipolar disorder suffer from subsyndromal symptoms. This study has been done to see the association of subsyndromal symptoms with age of onset, duration of illness, duration of episodes, and number of episodes. Aims: To know the prevalence of subsyndromal symptoms and their relationship with age of onset, total duration of illness, number of episodes, and duration of episodes in patients with bipolar disorder in remission. Materials and Methods: The study was cross sectional and hospital based. One hundred patients, aged between 18 and 65 years, diagnosed as bipolar disorder according to Research Diagnostic Criteria of ICD-10, and with good compliance with the prophylactic medications, score of ≤5 on Beck's Mania Rating Scale (BMRS) and score ≤8 on Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) were recruited by the purposive sampling method. Descriptive statistics were used to describe various sample characteristics. Group differences for categorical variables were examined with the chi-square test, whereas an independent 't' test was used for continuous variables. Results: The most common manic symptom was a decrease in sleep (49%), followed by an increase in verbal activity (39%), hostility (37%), and increase in motor activity (33.33%). The subsyndromal manic group had a lower age of onset (58.8%), males (82.4%), unemployed (23.5%), educated (80.4%). There was no significant difference between with and without subsyndromal mania groups with respect to age, age of onset, duration of illness, number of episode, and average duration of episode. Conclusion: Subsyndromal manic symptoms are prevalent and have no relationship with current age, age of onset of illness, duration of illness, number of episode, and average duration of illness in patient with bipolar disorder in remission.


I. Introduction II. Generally, ERISA Pre-empts All State Laws That Relate to Employee Benefit Plans III. While Broad in its Reach and Scope, ERISA's Pre-emption Clause Is Not Unlimited IV. ERISA and the High Court's Own ERISA Pre-emption Jurisprudence Has Left Much to be Desired V. Conclusion I. INTRODUCTION The United States Supreme Court has often observed the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act is "a comprehensive and reticulated statute," (2) which the United States Congress adopted after a careful, decade-long study of private retirement pension plans. (3) Overall, the purpose of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, most commonly known as ERISA, was "to provide a uniform regulatory regime over employee benefit plans." (4) As such, ERISA was enacted as the center piece of federal substantive law to be enforced and, thereafter, developed by the courts, through a federal common law of rights and obligations under ERISA-regulated welfare benefit plans. (5) Although the U.S. Supreme Court has determined that "ERISA's definition of an employee welfare benefit plan is ultimately circular," it has applied a "common [sense] understanding of the word 'plan.'" (6) "The federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 ... as amended, 29 U.S.C. [section] 1001 et seq. (ERISA), comprehensively regulates employee pension and welfare plans." (7) An employee welfare-benefit plan or welfare plan is defined as one which provides to employees "medical, surgical, or hospital care or benefits, or benefits in the event of sickness, accident, disability or death," whether these benefits are provided "through the purchase of insurance or otherwise." (8) "In enacting ERISA, Congress's primary concern was with the mismanagement of funds accumulated to finance employee benefits and the failure to pay employees benefits from accumulated funds." (9) Effective January 1, 1975, (10) ERISA was intended to protect both the interests of participants in employee benefit plans and their beneficiaries. (11) "One of the principal goals of ERISA is to enable employers 'to establish a uniform administrative scheme, which provides a set of standard procedures to guide processing of claims and disbursement of benefits.'" (12) In fact, "ERISA requires every employee benefit plan to be established and maintained pursuant to a written instrument, specifying the basis on which payments are made to and from the plan." (13) Insofar as Congress's intent, the ERISA [F]ederal statute does not go about protecting plan participants and their beneficiaries by requiring employers to provide any given set of minimum benefits, (14) but instead controls the administration of plan benefits as by imposing reporting and disclosure mandates, participation and vesting requirements, funding standards and fiduciary responsibilities for plan administrators. (15) It is clear that ERISA was also intended to have a federal regulatory effect on "the health care industry, which is, by definition, the realm within which ERISA welfare benefit plans must operate," (16) even though Congress chose not to displace general health care regulation that has historically been a matter of state or local concern. (17) "To this end, ERISA includes expansive preemption provisions, which are intended to ensure that employee benefit plan regulation would be 'exclusively a federal concern.'" (18) "Therefore, any state-law cause of action that duplicates, supplements, or supplants the ERISA civil enforcement remedy conflicts with the clear congressional intent to make the ERISA remedy exclusive and is therefore pre-empted." (19) If a state law conflicts with the provisions of ERISA or operates to frustrate its object, that inquiry and affirmative answer, alone, will resolve the case. (20) "In the face of ... direct clash between state law and the provisions and objectives of ERISA, the state law cannot stand. …


We review issues stemming from current models regarding the drivers of cultural complexity and cultural evolution. We disagree with the implication of the treadmill model, based on dual-inheritance theory, that population size is the driver of cultural complexity. The treadmill model reduces the evolution of artifact complexity, measured by the number of parts, to the statistical fact that individuals with high skills are more likely to be found in a larger population than in a smaller population. However, for the treadmill model to operate as claimed, implausibly high skill levels must be assumed. Contrary to the treadmill model, the risk hypothesis for the complexity of artifacts relates the number of parts to increased functional efficiency of implements. Empirically, all data on hunter-gatherer artifact complexity support the risk hypothesis and reject the treadmill model. Still, there are conditions under which increased technological complexity relates to increased population size, but the dependency does not occur in the manner expressed in the treadmill model. Instead, it relates to population size when the support system for the technology requires a large population size. If anything, anthropology and ecology suggest that cultural complexity generates high population density rather than the other way around.


Impressive power densities have been demonstrated for GaN-on-SiC based high-power high-frequency transistors, although further gains can be achieved by further minimizing the device thermal resistance. A significant 10-30% contribution to the total device thermal resistance originates from the high defect density AlN nucleation layer at the GaN/SiC interface. This thermal resistance contribution was successfully reduced by performing systematic growth optimization, investigating growth parameters including: Substrate pretreatment temperature, growth temperature and deposition time. Interfacial thermal resistance, characterized by time resolved Raman thermography measurements AlGaN/GaN HEMT structures, were minimized by using a substrate pretreatment and growth temperature of 1200°C. Reducing the AlN thickness from 105 nm (3.3×10-8 W/m2K) to 35 nm (3.3×10-8 W/m2K), led to a ~2.5× interfacial thermal resistance reduction and the lowest value reported for a standard AlGaN/GaN HEMT structure.


CNNs are used extensively for computer vision tasks like activity recognition, image classification, segmentation etc. The large compute memory required in these applications restricts the use of high batch size during inference, thereby increasing the overall prediction time. Prior work addresses this issue through various model compression mechanisms like weight/filter pruning, quantizing the parameters/intermediate outputs, etc. We propose a complementary technique where we improve inference time by using variable batch sizes (VBS) across the layers of a CNN. This optimises the memory-time trade-off for each layer and leads to better network throughput. Our approach does not make any modifications to the existing network (unlike pruning or quantization techniques) and thus there is no impact on the model accuracy. We develop a dynamic program (DP) based algorithm that takes inference time and memory required by different layers of the network as input, and computes the optimal batch sizes for each layer depending on the available resources (RAM, storage space etc.). We demonstrate our findings in two different settings: video inference on K80 GPUs and image inference on Edge devices. On video networks like C3D, our VBS algorithm gives up to 61% higher throughput compared to a fixed batch size baseline. On image networks like GoogleNet, ResNet50 etc., we achieve up to 60% higher throughput compared to a fixed batch size baseline.


An error has been detected in the methodology for estimating batch melt compositions from plagioclase and spinel Iherzolites at mantle conditions presented by Kinzler and Grove (1992a,b) (hereafter referred to as K&G). In a mass balance calculation employed by K&G the melt fraction was not properly transformed from weight units to molar units, resulting in an overestimate of the effective melt fraction employed in the calculation of the Mg # (Mg/[Mg+Fe2+]) of the melt, at melt fractions greater than 0.01. In the batch melts estimated by K&G, the abundance of FeO increases then decreases in the melt with increasing melt fraction from 0.01 to 0.20. Using the corrected methodology described here, the abundance of FeO in melts produced via batch melting increases as melt fraction increases from 0.01 to 0.20 (up to the point of exhaustion of clinopyroxene). The correction has essentially no effect on the compositions of melts produced via the near-fractional melting processes described in K&G because melt fractions employed in the near-fractional melting calculations never exceeded 0.01. In addition we apply the methodology of K&G to estimate the mantle temperature, average pressure of melting and average extent of melting beneath a mid-ocean ridge segment from the FeO and Na2O content of a mid-ocean ridge basalt from that segment.


Sporopollenin
is a natural, highly cross-linked biopolymer composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, which forms the outer wall of pollen grains. Sporopollenin is resilient
to chemical degradation. Because
of this stability, its exact chemical structure and the biochemical pathways
involved in its biosynthesis remains a mystery and
unresolved.

We have identified and characterized the molecular structure of
the clean, intact sporopollenin using soft ionization mass spectrometric and
nuclear magnetic resonance techniques. These analyses showed that sporopollenin
contained a poly(hydroxyacid) dendrimer-like network, which accounted for the
sporopollenin empirical formula. In addition, the identified hydroxy acid
monomers contained a beta diketone moiety, which most probably accounts for the
known antioxidant activity of sporopollenin. Moreover, our elucidation studies allowed
us to identify a unique circular polyhydroxylated tetraketide polymer. This polymer acted as the rigid backbone on
which the poly(hydroxyacid) network can be built, forming the scaffold of the spherical sporopollenin exine.


Previous studies have demonstrated that extracorporeal shock wave therapy (ESWT) could accelerate diabetic wound healing and that the inhibition of glycogen synthase kinase-3β (GSK-3β) is involved in epithelial differentiation during wound healing. This study investigated whether the enhancement of diabetic wound healing by ESWT is associated with the GSK-3β-mediated Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway. A dorsal skin wounding defect model using streptozotocin-induced diabetic rodents was established. Rats were divided into 4 groups: group 1, normal controls without diabetes; group 2, diabetic controls without treatment; group 3, diabetic rats receiving ESWT; and group 4, rats receiving 6-bromoindirubin-3′oxime (BIO), a GSK-3β inhibitor, to trigger Wnt/β-catenin signaling. Tissue samples were collected and analyzed by immunohistochemical (IHC) staining and quantitative RT-PCR. The ESWT and BIO-treated groups both exhibited significant promotion of wound healing compared to the healing in controls without treatment. RT-PCR analysis of Wnt-1, -3a, -4, -5a, and -10 and β-catenin expression showed significantly increased expression in the ESWT group. The IHC staining showed that Wnt-3a and -5a and β-catenin levels were significantly increased in the ESWT and BIO treatment groups compared to the control groups. ESWT enhancement of diabetic wound healing is associated with modulation of the GSK-3β-mediated Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway.


Society is undergoing a relentless digital transformation process. This process is creating a digital copy of every entity present in the physical world and these digital goods will be inherited through centuries establishing a direct link between distant generations. Advances in artificial intelligence make the promise for future whole brain emulation enabling the possibility of uploading the human mind on a digital system. This would enable the possibility of interacting with immortal digital clones of deceased people. This paper wants to start investigating the consequences of the emergence of the concept of digital immortality.


A novel totem-pole bridgeless boost rectifier with ZVS operation is proposed for power factor correction. In the proposed rectifier, conduction losses are lowered by eliminating full-bridge diode rectifier. Moreover, the proposed rectifier can achieve zero-current-switching (ZCS) turn-off of diodes, which eliminates the reverse-recovery problems of the body diode. In addition, since MOSFETs can achieve zero-voltage- switching (ZVS) turn-on, the proposed rectifier has low switching loss. In this paper, a theoretical analysis and design considerations are presented in detail. Finally, the simulation results are discussed to verify validity of the proposed rectifier.


Products containing argan is a lever for sustainable development in the Souss-Massa-Drâa region of Morocco. Indeed, the argan cooperatives have achieved positive results on social, economic and environmental levels in the region, particularly for women of rural origin. But behind this apparent success, there are difficulties that impede the achievement of the objectives of the cooperatives, namely the failure of management and marketing, the scarcity of the raw material and its high price, the existence of a fragmented market, and illiteracy of the majority of women who are members of a cooperative. Within the framework of our research, we focused on the marketing practices of these cooperatives on the basis of the data and information collected during a survey of these socio-economic organizations. The aim of our article is to highlight the role and potential impact of the adoption of management practices in line with the sustainable development on the community, the environment, the competitiveness and prosperity of women's argan cooperatives.


Under the Financial Reporting Council's presumption that mandating new disclosure requirement in the audit report would provide information useful to investors, we examine whether the auditor disclosed materiality threshold is associated with the firm's earnings quality. We document that a lower threshold of materiality level is associated with a higher earnings quality, as measured by lower discretionary accruals, higher accruals quality, and less earnings smoothing. We also find some evidence that the negative association between auditor disclosed materiality threshold and earnings quality is more pronounced when the auditor is more independent, when management's incentive to manage earnings is higher, and when there is lower information uncertainty. Overall, our results are useful to investors who rely on the new audit report disclosures to gain insights into the audit process and more importantly to infer the quality of the firm's reported earnings. Our results could also be relevant to regulators, such as the PCAOB and IAASB, who are contemplating whether to impose similar materiality threshold disclosure requirements in audit reports.


Dialect constitutes an ecosystem in all languages that is by nature part of a broader and comprehensive environment that includes several dialects, each of which has its own distinct characteristics, and all of them are linked by a group of linguistic phenomena that facilitate the communication of members of these environments with each other and the understanding of what may take place from speech. It  is the term Its name ((language)) is the relationship between language and dialect is the relationship between the general and the specific, as it has been proven, and in light of the above, the research has dealt with an original scientific view of issues presented in the course of the research, including:
The view of Arab scholars to different forms of dialects.

 we can say that the interest in the dialectic lesson on the part of the Arabs stands the auditor's position at the beginning of the study of modern dialects that appeared at the hands of the Orientalists who came to the Arab world to research its conditions and culture, and most of these studies were modest based on collecting the material and studying it in a traditional way.


SIR,-Several points arise from the paper by Dr Marcia Shaw and colleagues (6 July, p 7) and from our experience in other clinical trials of topical acyclovir in cutaneous herpes simplex infections.'` The problems of a crossover trial design in the treatment of such infections are exemplified by the fact that only 27 patients of the 60 required by the protocol completed treatment for two episodes of herpes labialis, despite the entry of 72 patients. Reliance on patients' own assessments to analyse efficacy without the support of regular daily assessments by the investigator also requires validation. A further difficulty is the ability to get patients to start therapy early enough as shown by the recorded mean time to start of treatment (more than four hours) and the fact that over one third of patients had already developed vesicles by that time. There was therefore no chance that the development of lesions could be aborted in such patients as has been shown elsewhere.' We agree with the authors that a further larger scale, double blind, placebo controlled, parallel group trial is desirable and can report the recent completion of such a study in France (details to be published). An analysis of the time to healing of lesions was performed for all 154 patients and also for those treated within four hours (table). The increased benefit of early therapy is clearly shown.


Background Ultrasound (US)-guided classical and modified thoracolumbar interfascial plane (TLIP) blocks are often used to provide adequate analgesia after lumbar spinal surgery. Postoperative pro-inflammatory interleukin 6 (IL-6) blood concentrations after lumbar spine surgery are related to postoperative pain and inflammation. Objectives The purpose of this prospective randomized parallel controlled study was to assess postoperative pain and serum levels of pro-inflammatory IL-6 after posterior lumbar decompression and stabilization surgery with a classical and modified technique of TLIP block. Methods This prospective randomized, single-blinded controlled pilot study was conducted on eight patients who will undergo posterior lumbar decompression and stabilization surgery. After obtaining the ethical approval and an informed consent, all subjects were randomly allocated into the classic TLIP group and the modified TLIP group. Following general anesthesia induction, 20 mL bupivacaine 0.25% was injected on each side in interfascialis plane between m. longissimus and m. iliocostalis in modified TLIP group and between m. multifidus and m. longissimus in classical TLIP group. Intraoperative hemodynamic (blood pressure and heart rate) and noxious stimulation response level (qNOX), postoperative IL-6 level, 24-hour morphine consumption, and numerical rating score were recorded and analyzed. Results The median of IL-6 level was found to be lower in the modified TLIP group 12 hours postoperatively compared to classic TLIP (29.91 (8.56 – 87.61) vs. 46.87 (2.87 – 92.35)). The mean Numerical Rating Scale (NRS) in the modified TLIP block was comparable with the classic TLIP group, although it was lower than the classic TLIP group (2.75 ± 1.5 vs. 3.75 ± 1.7 at 6 hours and 3.5 ± 1.3 vs. 4 ± 1.6 12 hours postoperatively). However, there was no difference in intraoperative hemodynamic, Qnox value, and total postoperative morphine consumption between the two groups. Conclusions Our study showed that modified TLIP block resulted in lower IL-6 level and NRS 12 hours postoperatively compared to classical TLIP block. However, there were no differences in total postoperative morphine consumption between the two groups.


A very efficient parallel LU factorization and substitution algorithm for solving large sparse network equations on shared memory multi-processor parallel computers is presented. By rearranging the order of the computations, better parallelism is obtained out of the traditionally sequential method. Performance results on an actual parallel computer are presented and discussed. Parallel gains for the power flow solution using Newton's and fast decoupled methods are presented to demonstrate it's effectiveness. Better speedup gains are obtained for larger systems and speedup of over 13 for Newton's power flow on a 20 processor shared memory computer has been obtained. >


ABSTRACT Bovine immunodeficiency virus (BIV) and Jembrana disease virus (JDV) are closely related bovine lentiviruses that are difficult to distinguish by presently available diagnostic methods. Recently, in our laboratory, a monoclonal antibody (MAb; MAb 10H1) against the BIV Gag protein identified a differential epitope, located at the 6.4-kDa N terminus of a 29-kDa Gag capsid protein, which was absent in JDV. To define the essential amino acids of the epitope, a series of primers within the 163 bp of DNA corresponding to the 6.4-kDa protein were designed. The full-length 163-bp DNA fragment and the smaller DNA fragments with deletions were amplified by PCR and then cloned into pQE32 vectors for protein expression studies. The expressed proteins were analyzed with MAb 10H1 by Western blotting. The differential epitope has been narrowed to a 26-amino-acid region (R121 to R146), which includes 6 residues of p16MA (where MA represents the matrix protein) and 20 residues of p2L. A synthetic peptide corresponding to the putative 26-amino-acid epitope blocked MAb 10H1 binding to the expressed peptide. These experiments revealed that the epitope spans the cleavage site between p16MA and p2L and presumably will be valuable in distinguishing the two viruses.


Street Vending has been the bread winning profession for the urban poor which has existed since time immemorial all around the world and has also contributed significantly to economies. There have been number of studies describing the profile, problems and socioeconomic conditions faced by street vendors, this study looks at the street vendor as a businessman and assesses the viability of the trade. It is an exploratory and analytical study wherein data has been collected from primary and secondary sources. Purposive sampling was used as the number of units in the population are infinite and a sample size of 800 was chosen. The study found that street vending is a profitable business as majority of the respondents were able to meet their monthly expenditure, buy durable goods and some of them were able to buy fixed property like house and land. Hence Street Vending is an important profession to be examined carefully by policy makers.


The industry trend of Chip Multiprocessors (CMPs) architecture is to move from 2D CMPs to 3D CMPs architecture for obtain higher performance, more reliability, and reduced memory access latency. However, one key challenge in designing the 3D CMPs is the thermal issue as a result of maximizing the throughput . Therefore, applying Runtime Thermal Management (RTM) has become crucial for controlling thermal hotspots. In this thesis, two methods of run-time task migration are presented to balance the temperature and reduce the number of hotspots in 3D CMPs. The proposed techniques consider hotspots both in the core and the memory layers simultaneously to make the optimum run-time task migration decisions. The first proposed approach is divided into two algorithms working in parallel, which aim at maximizing the throughput on the 3D CMPs while satisfying the peak temperature constraints. Experimental results show that the proposed architecture yields up to 60% reduction in overall chip energy. The proposed architecture improves the IPC for canneal and fluidanimate applications by 18% and 14%, respectively. In the second method, the proposed technique migrates the hottest core with the optimal coldest core instead of the coldest core in the core layer. The optimal coldest core is selected by considering hotspots.


Since three years, the International Office for Water (IOW) has taken part in the installation of exchange information networks. On the strength of these experiences, the IOW, which provides the permanent technical secretariat of the International Network of Basin Organizations (INBO), has proposed the international development of AQUADOC-INTER. The "AQUADOC-INTER" project is now being continued with the operational development of the network in the countries which have decided to play an active role in water management, above all in Europe, Latin America and in Africa. In the Mediterranean area, its development is achieved through the Euro-Mediterranean Water Information System (EMWIS).


Consensus maximization is widely used for robust fitting in computer vision. However, solving it exactly, i.e., finding the globally optimal solution, is intractable. A* tree search, which has been shown to be fixed-parameter tractable, is one of the most efficient exact methods, though it is still limited to small inputs. We make two key contributions towards improving A* tree search. First, we show that the consensus maximization tree structure used previously actually contains paths that connect nodes at both adjacent and non-adjacent levels. Crucially, paths connecting non-adjacent levels are redundant for tree search, but they were not avoided previously. We propose a new acceleration strategy that avoids such redundant paths. In the second contribution, we show that the existing branch pruning technique also deteriorates quickly with the problem dimension. We then propose a new branch pruning technique that is less dimension-sensitive to address this issue. Experiments show that both new techniques can significantly accelerate A* tree search, making it reasonably efficient on inputs that were previously out of reach. Demo code is available at https://github.com/ZhipengCai/MaxConTreeSearch.


Summary Infectious diarrhoea is associated with a modification of the intestinal microflora and colonization of pathogenic bacteria. Tests were performed for seven probiotic yeast strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae var. boulardii, designated for the prevention and treatment of diarrhoea. To check their possible effectiveness against diarrhoea of different etiologies, the activity against a variety of human pathogenic or opportunistic bacteria was investigated in vitro. In mixed cultures with S. cerevisiae var. boulardii, a statistically significant reduction was observed in the number of cells of Listeria monocytogenes, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus aureus, by even 55.9 % in the case of L. monocytogenes compared with bacterial monocultures. The influence of yeasts was mostly associated with the shortening of the bacterial lag phase duration, more rapid achievement of the maximum growth rates, and a decrease by 4.4–57.1 % (L. monocytogenes, P. aeruginosa), or an increase by 1.4–70.6 % (Escherichia coli, Enterococcus faecalis, Salmonella Typhimurium) in the exponential growth rates. Another issue included in the research was the ability of S. cerevisiae var. boulardii to bind pathogenic bacteria to its cell surface. Yeasts have shown binding capacity of E. coli, S. Typhimurium and additionally of S. aureus, Campylobacter jejuni and E. faecalis. However, no adhesion of L. monocytogenes and P. aeruginosa to the yeast cell wall was noted. The probiotic activity of S. cerevisiae var. boulardii against human pathogens is related to a decrease in the number of viable and active cells of bacteria and the binding capacity of yeasts. These processes may limit bacterial invasiveness and prevent bacterial adherence and translocation in the human intestines.


Abstract. A new approach is developed to find the source azimuth of the ultra low frequency (ULF) electromagnetic (EM) signals believed to be emanating from well defined seismic zone. The method is test applied on magnetic data procured from the seismoactive region of Koyna-Warna, known for prolonged reservoir triggered seismicity. Extremely low-noise, high-sensitivity LEMI-30 search coil magnetometers were used to measure simultaneously the vector magnetic field in the frequency range 0.001–32 Hz at two stations, the one located within and another ~100 km away from the seismic active zone. During the observation campaign extending from 15 March to 30 June 2006 two earthquakes (EQs) of magnitude (ML>4) occurred, which are searched for the presence of precursory EM signals. Comparison of polarization ellipses (PE) parameters formed by the magnetic field components at the measurement stations, in select frequency bands, allows discrimination of seismo-EM signals from the natural background ULF signals of magnetospheric/ionospheric origin. The magnetic field components corresponding to spectral bands dominated by seismo-EM fields define the PE plane which at any instant contains the source of the EM fields. Intersection lines of such defined PE planes for distant observation stations clutter in to the source region. Approximating the magnetic-dipole configuration for the source, the magnetic field components along the intersection lines suggest that azimuth of the EM source align in the NNW-SSE direction. This direction well coincides with the orientation of nodal plane of normal fault plane mechanism for the two largest EQs recorded during the campaign. More significantly the correspondence of this direction with the tectonic controlled trend in local seismicity, it has been surmised that high pressure fluid flow along the fault that facilitate EQs in the region may also be the source mechanism for EM fields by electrokinetic effect.


Type I collagen is the main structural protein of the extracellular matrix, and is abnormally produced in many types of solid tumours. The presence of a thick and linearised collagen fibres constituting a dense network in a tumours microenvironment has been linked to high malignancy and chemoresistance of cancers. Rixova is a novel drug-candidate based on G-blocks that has demonstrated promising results in normalising the extracellular matrix, reducing tumour growth and enhancing drug delivery in preliminary clinical studies. This thesis investigates the modifications of collagen network structure and viscoelastic properties by treatment with G-blocks, which are highly defined and short, bioactive guluronate oligomers derived from alginate. The effect of G-blocks on the fibrillation of type I tropocollagen monomers was investigated by simultaneous timelapse confocal reflectance microscopy visualising the structure of the collagen network, and by multiple-particle tracking with meansquare displacementanalysis measuring the microrheology of the solution. This new method of monitoring the sol-gel transition combines two established techniques and has provided accurate information about the relation between structure and viscoelasticity of the collagen network during gelation. This tool can potentially be used to study the sol-gel transition of other biopolymer-systems. The study determined that short chained G-blocks with a DPn=12 had the strongest effect on collagen, accelerating the formation of initial aggregates in fibrillogenesis. The premature aggregation resulted in a final-network structure where fibers with larger diameters were organised in a more intertwined and densely connected network. Corresponding to the accelerated development of fibres, there was an accelerated development of viscoelastic properties of the gel. With increasing Gblock concentrations the suspended particles exhibited earlier sub-diffusive motion patterns due to increasing viscosity of the fluid within pores of the network and increasing confinement by the surrounding network-structures. In this thesis, G-blocks have been observed to interact with type 1 tropocollagen monomers, modulating the network-structure forming a stiffer and less penetrable matrix. This does not fully explain the beneficial effects seen in clinical studies of Rixova, so the mechanism behind the effect of G-blocks in vivo is yet to be determined. Further studies need to be performed to narrow down the knowledge gap between the results observed on in vivo and in vitro systems.


In this article, I defend the view that we can acquire factual knowledge – that is, contingent propositional knowledge about certain (perceivable) aspects of reality – on the basis of imaginative experience. More specifically, I argue that, under suitable circumstances, imaginative experiences can rationally determine the propositional content of knowledge-constituting beliefs – though not their attitude of belief – in roughly the same way as perceptual experiences do in the case of perceptual knowledge. I also highlight some philosophical consequences of this conclusion, especially for the issue of whether imagination can help us to learn something from fictions.


The main aim of this research study was to explore the purpose of diagnostic assessment in an FE College. In order to do this, I explored and analysed the views and perceptions from tutors from an FE College in the north of England. This case study research used semi-structured, focus group interviews and Teacher Perception of Courses to obtain views about initial and diagnostic assessment from FE tutors. In particular it firstly, identified the different types of diagnostic assessment that tutors use, not only in terms of their purpose, but also in terms of the differences between tutors. Secondly it explored the ways in which tutors use initial, diagnostic and summative assessment tools to guide student learning, needs, achievement and their own pedagogy. Thirdly, it analysed what tutors considered to be the most effective methods in ensuring that students achieve their goals or targets and also explored some of the constraints which tutors might face in implementing the strategies in the course of their duties. Fourthly, it analysed the impact that organisational cultures and policy has on the performativity and professional identity of tutors in an FE College. The findings of the study strongly suggest that more collaboration between SFL and vocational tutors is the key to ensuring that student progress is ensured as the data suggest that when an holistic approach is adopted students will make better progress.

It is well documented that good diagnostic assessment strategies will help students to achieve their goals, and this research study confirms this.

This study employed the social learning theory of community of practice (Wenger (1998) where learning is most productive when it takes place in the context and culture where it occurs as opposed to classroom instructional learning. In this way, Wenger, (1998) argue that the teacher is engaged in a 'community of practice' where learning is socially constructed. Teaching and learning communities, especially small groups, help to provide extensive support to teachers who are able to regularly meet together in order to explore their own practice. In order to gain 'deeper learning' the novice learner's aim is to move to the centre of the community where they become gradually more active and engaged as they become more knowledgeable and expert.


The objective of this work is to empirically assess the determinants used in global value chain governance trade through interfirm relationship and their effect on competitive advantage of horticultural value chains in developing economies. The paper is based on a Kenyan survey of 83 horticultural exporters of fresh fruits and vegetables accessed out of 120 exporters registered with Fresh Produce Association of Kenya (FPEAK) and Horticultural Crops Directorate (HCD). It employs a nonlinear principal component analysis procedure of categorical principal component analysis (CATPCA). From the CATPCA output, five components considered to be key food value chain governance determinants affecting the export oriented horticultural value chain in Kenya were extracted and named as standards & certification, nature of transactions, level of chain integration, nature of contract and relational characteristics. The current research shows that with prioritisation of requisite food safety standards & certification schemes and discernment of transactional demands of heterogeneous export markets, horticultural exporters may expect to be competitive by means of improved product differentiation, process flows, logistical advantage and promotion of marketing & organisation management innovativeness. The implication therefore to the chain managers that standards & certification schemes are taking a critical position in determining food value chain governance especially through remote governance or governance from a distance other than the governance structure continuum of markets and hierarchies previously defined by transactional cost economics.


Any large library of information requires efficient ways to organise it and methods that allow people to access information efficiently and collections of digital images are no exception. Automatically creating high-level semantic tags based on image content is difficult, if not impossible to achieve accurately. In this thesis a framework is presented that allows for the automatic creation of rich and accurate tags for images with landmarks as the main object. This framework uses state of the art computer vision techniques fused with the wide range of contextual information that is available with community contributed imagery.
Images are organised into clusters based on image content and spatial data associated with each image. Based on these clusters different types of classifiers are* trained to recognise landmarks contained within the images in each cluster. A novel hybrid approach is proposed combining these classifiers with an hierarchical matching approach to allow near real-time classification and captioning of images containing landmarks.


Public sensing is a new research area in the fields of wireless sensor networks and mobile computing. It leverages the mobile sensors and system resources readily available in mobile phones to execute sensing tasks. In order to plan, execute and adapt large-scale sensing tasks, applications need to query for the available resources, e.g. the density of certain sensors. We investigate how such information can be provided, and we propose a resource manager for public sensing. Our primary goal is to minimize the energy consumed by the mobile devices to make public sensing feasible without disturbing users. We propose a cluster-based protocol for collecting local views of the resource state using local ad-hoc communication since this is much more energy-efficient than long-range (e.g. cellular) communication. We compare our solution to a standard approach where mobile devices communicate their resource states using the cellular phone network. We show that 65% of the energy is saved and the communication load on the infrastructure is reduced by 90% while an average delivery ratio of 93% is retained.


Under the pandemic of COVID-19, people experiencing COVID19-related symptoms have a pressing need to consult doctors. Because of the shortage of medical professionals, many people cannot receive online consultations timely. To address this problem, we aim to develop a medical dialog system that can provide COVID19-related consultations. We collected two dialog datasets – CovidDialog – (in English and Chinese respectively) containing conversations between doctors and patients about COVID-19. While the largest of their kind, these two datasets are still relatively small compared with general-domain dialog datasets. Training complex dialog generation models on small datasets bears high risk of overfitting. To alleviate overfitting, we develop a multi-task learning approach, which regularizes the data-deficient dialog generation task with a masked token prediction task. Experiments on the CovidDialog datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach. We perform both human evaluation and automatic evaluation of dialogs generated by our method. Results show that the generated responses are promising in being doctor-like, relevant to conversation history, clinically informative and correct. The code and the data are available at https://github.com/UCSD-AI4H/COVID-Dialogue.


Arterial and venous vascular injuries are known but rare complications of severe multiple traumatised patients but are meanwhile more frequently induced iatrogenically. However there are only few reports about incidence, causes, surgical techniques and prognosis of these vascular emergencies. We have therefore analysed the causes, type of therapy, localisation of injury, primary dis-ease, morbidity and mortality of all vascular emergencies in patients without preexisting vascular disease. 2.9 % of all vascular repairs in our unit had to be performed for cases of iatrogenic (87 %) and non-iatrogenic (13 %) vascular complications. The overall mortality and major complication rate of these intrahospital iatrogenically aquired lesions were 4.8 % and 5 %, respectively, which are clearly below those of extrahospital vascular injuries. Thereby the observed increase of iatrogenic vascular injuries seems to be due to the increase in complex and even catheter-based techniques in modern therapy. The iliacofemoral region was affected in 45 % of the cases, in 50 % complex reconstructions and specific surgical skills were needed for the repair. This article on the incidence of and reasons for vascular iatrogenic lesions shows the importance of a planned management for the prognosis of these injuries.


The concept of Enterprise Content Management (ECM) represents integrated enterprise-wide management of the life cycles of all forms of recorded information content and their metadata, organized according to corporate taxonomies, and supported by appropriate technological and administrative infrastructures. Based on a case study of a Norwegian oil company (Statoil) we identify a wide range of issues related to management of content, infrastructure and change. The ECM perspective is found to integrate and extend the existing research areas of information resource management and document management, as well as "the repository model" of knowledge management. ECM may thus deserve further attention beyond the current market hype as a potential area of IS research.


The determination of chlorpyrifos at low ngL-1 levels in wastewater requires highly selective and sensitive analytical procedures. The removal of matrix components during sample preparation results in significant benefits towards reducing the matrix effects during GC analysis. Therefore this work describes a simple method to enrich and clean up chlorpyrifos from sewage water using molecularly imprinted solid phase extraction (MISPE). Final analysis was performed by gas chromatography. The performance of this method has been evaluated in water samples in terms of recovery, precision, and method quantification limit. Recovery for chlorpyrifos ranged between 99 and 105% with RSD values below 7.9%. The performance of the method was further emphasized by the study of different water samples. In these samples, chlorpyrifos were detected in concentration above method quantification limits ranging from 50 to 3000 ngL-1.


Urban density is considered a cornerstone of sustainable urban form, enhancing the potential for more sustainable lifestyles and fewer greenhouse gas emissions. To explore the relationship between urban density and residential property prices in Trondheim, Norway, this analysis first evaluates 23 distinct urban areas with regard to average square metre price and three density measures – built coverage density, dwelling unit density, and population density. Initial correlation results indicate that there is a positive relationship between the density measures and price per square metre. To investigate this first observation further, a simple hedonic pricing model was constructed based on 1,255 sales transactions from the period 2014 and 2015. The model includes property characteristics, such as property type and age of property; proximity measures, such as distance to the next school or bus stop; and the three density measures. It was run for the complete dataset as well as for the two subsets of the Trondheim periphery and the Trondheim centre. With regard to density, the model shows unexpected yet interesting results.


Learning mathematics in urban settings is often routine and decontextualized rather than inquiry- and culturally-based. Changing prospective teachers' attitudes about pedagogy in order to change this pattern is often tenuous. The purpose of this pilot study was to provide opportunities for teacher interns enrolled in a graduate certification program to interact with urban students in a community-based program called Math Links. Twelve interns completed 30 hours of fieldwork at church-based sites. Prior to fieldwork, the interns participated in a 3-hour professional development and education session, in addition to their education courses. Three interns' work with urban children and youth reveal that community-based experiences changed their attitudes about practice and their capacity to teach urban children mathematics in culturally sensitive ways. One in-depth case study of an Asian teacher reveals not only changes in her attitudes and beliefs about urban students but also changes in her pedagogy as she shifted from teaching by telling to guided inquiry.


Management Setting of Obstructive Sleep Apnea To the Editor Dr Chai-Coetzer and colleagues1 compared management models of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and found that primary care physicians and advanced practice nurses did not provide inferior screening and diagnosis of OSA vs physicians with specialized training in sleep medicine. I believe that several relevant issues suggest this conclusion is premature. First, more than twice as many patients in the primary care group than in the sleep specialist group withdrew from the study. Second, the primary care pathway included a telephone call to the patient 2 weeks after starting continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) and a total of 5 follow-up appointments. The follow-up with the sleep specialist group was unclear, which suggests the study methods may have been biased. Third, at 6 months, there was a nonsignificant trend showing 0.6 hours greater use of CPAP per night in the specialist group, a difference meaningful in clinical practice. In addition, not everyone who seeks sleep medicine services is a patient with moderate to severe OSA. This is evident in the data in this study showing that 39% of referred cases were excluded for not meeting eligibility criteria. Specialized training and comprehensive patient evaluation is the only way to ensure that all patients seeking sleep medicine services are well treated, and not just select cases as included in this trial. Both in-laboratory polysomnography and out-of-center sleep testing require the interpretation of a sleep specialist who has the training and expertise to make an accurate diagnosis of OSA, rule out common comorbid sleep disorders, and determine the most appropriate treatment plan. Studies have shown that both American Academy of Sleep Medicine accreditation and board certification in sleep medicine are associated with improved patient care, including increased CPAP adherence.2,3 Concerns about waiting lists are not valid in the United States where the number of accredited sleep disorders centers and certified sleep physicians is sufficient. The authors' attempt to generalize the results from Australia to the United States is misleading. The calculations for sleep center management only took into account in-laboratory polysomnography. However, an increasing number of centers are using portable monitors and autotitrating CPAP to evaluate and treat select patients, significantly reducing costs.4 I believe that it is unrealistic to expect an overburdened primary care system to take on the additional demands of OSA patients, and it is unnecessary when an extensive system of sleep centers is sufficiently meeting this need.


Tolerance information plays a critical role in many steps of the product life cycle and especially important due to the advances in Internet technologies and increasing integration requirements from industry. In this paper, geometric tolerances information in manufacturing process (IMP) is studied, and the layered conformance level of geometric tolerances is established according to ASME Y14.5-1994, STEP and DMIS. An EXPRESS-G data model of geometric tolerance information in IMP is established. The XML language is used to represent and program the geometric tolerances information in IMP.


Abstract. Aerosols may impact precipitation in a complex way involving their direct and indirect effects. In a previous numerical study, the overall microphysical effect of aerosols was found to weaken precipitation through reduced precipitable water and convective instability. The present study aims to quantify the relative importance of these two processes in the reduction of summer precipitation using temperature–precipitation scaling.
Based on a numerical sensitivity experiment conducted in central Europe aiming to isolate indirect effects, the results show that, all others effects being equal, the scaling of hourly convective precipitation with temperature follows the Clausius–Clapeyron (CC) relationship, whereas the decrease in convective precipitation does not scale with the CC law since it is mostly attributable to increased stability with increased aerosol concentration rather than to decreased precipitable water content.
This effect is larger at low surface temperatures at which clouds are statistically more frequent and optically thicker. At these temperatures, the increase in stability is mostly linked to the stronger reduction in temperature in the lower troposphere compared to the upper troposphere, which results in lower lapse rates.


In this paper, a numerical analysis to model the amplification of nonlinear surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) propagating along a metal active dielectric interface is presented. Nonlinearity of the medium with gain is considered through the full saturation susceptibility parameter of a two-level model. Above the linear threshold of the gain and loss balance, the nonlinear performance of the amplified SPPs is verified, which agrees well with the experimental results reported in the literature. An important feature of the proposed method is to predict an abrupt increase in output intensity due to amplified spontaneous emission.


OBJECTIVES
To investigate the predictive value of renal sonography for vesicoureteral reflux (VUR) and the efficacy of renal sonography, technetium Tc 99m–labeled dimercaptosuccinic acid (DMSA) scanning, and a combination of the two for VUR screening in children younger than 2 years with a first episode of febrile urinary tract infection.

METHODS
Thirty-eight patients younger than 2 years with a first febrile urinary tract infection were included in our study, which was conducted from April through October 2014. Each kidney was considered a separate renal unit. A retrospective review of clinical information and images (renal sonography, DMSA scanning, and voiding cystourethrography) was performed.

RESULTS
Of the 14 renal units (18.4%) with VUR, 4 (28.5%) had high-grade VUR. Among single findings, dilatation of the renal collecting system, wall thickening of the renal collecting system, and DMSA scans significantly predicted VUR (P= .038, .027, and .01, respectively). Dilatation was the most common single finding (46 of 76 renal units). The sensitivity values for dilatation, wall thickening, and DMSA scans were 85.7%, 64.2%, and 50.0%, and the negative predictive values were 93.3%, 89.7%, and 87.9%.

CONCLUSIONS
The negative predictive values indicate that normal renal sonographic and DMSA findings can predict the absence of high-grade VUR. We propose that renal sonographic findings of wall thickening as well as dilatation of the renal collecting system should be considered predictive of high-grade VUR.


State-led heritage conservation was first experienced in Tanzimat Period in Ottoman Empire. State continued being the major custodian of cultural heritage throughout the 1950s. The general approach towards conservation of these early years was the maintenance of symbolic buildings that had been regarded as monuments. Yet, we can speak of a selective ideal of determining which monument to conserve and which period to exhibit. Starting his career as the chief accountant and later the deputy director of the Museum of Antiquities, Tahsin Öz was among the people who dominated the field of heritage preservation in the early Republican years. He acted throughout his life as an influential figure in decision making processes of heritage conservation. As one of the most important roles in his career, Öz was appointed as the director of Topkapı Palace Museum, which became a museum in 1924 with the approval of the young parliament. Although much neglected and in need of urgent repair, the buildings of the palace were still witnesses of the 19th century Ottoman taste. Until 1953, he was responsible and in charge of some rather ambitious restorations, which favored to erase the traces of one period and return back to a specific one. This paper aims to introduce the controversial approaches of Öz in Topkapi Palace Museum with an overview of what he realized and wrote, and focus simultaneously on the atmosphere of preservation in Turkey until 1950s with voices of intellectuals and professionals supporting or disagreeing his decisions.


Abstract Aquatic dissolved organic matter (DOM) is a major reservoir of reduced organic carbon and has a significant influence on heterotrophic biological productivity and water quality in marine and freshwater environments. Although the forms and transformations of DOM in temperate aquatic and soil environments have been studied extensively, this is not the case for glacial environments. In this study, fluorescent excitation–emission matrices (EEMs), parallel factor analysis (PARAFAC) and cluster analysis were used to characterize the fluorescing components of DOM in ice and water samples from supraglacial, englacial, subglacial and proglacial environments of seven glaciers in the Canadian Arctic, Norway and Antarctica. At least five significant fluorescent DOM fractions were identified, which accounted for 98.2% of the variance in the dataset. These included four protein-like components and one humic-like component. The predominantly proteinaceous character of DOM from these glaciers is very different from the more humic character of DOM described previously from lacustrine, fluvial, estuarine and marine environments. DOM from the sampled glaciers is broadly similar in character despite their geographically distinct locations, different thermal regimes and inter- and intra-site differences in potential organic matter sources. Glacier ice samples had a relatively low ratio of humic-like :protein-like fluorescence while meltwater samples had a higher ratio.


Background Treetops Hospice, in partnership with University of Derby have commenced a research project exploring the outcomes of developing volunteers, in initiating conversations around quality of life. As a pilot site work for NHS England for Personal Health Budgets (PHB's), Treetops discovered that the 'conversations' around what's important right now to the patient/carer can be just as important, than the outcome of the PHB. This is a vital piece of work which directly could impact on improving individual's wellbeing, the new approach focuses around the mnemonic L.I.S.T.E.N (developed by Treetops Hospice). Policy drivers have acknowledged that there is a much greater need and demand for person centred care than professionals in health and social care can meet, the barriers around developing these conversations, possibly relate to lack of time and clarity to whose role it is. Volunteers and support workers may be advantageous in having these conversations with the right support and development. Methods There is a mixed methods approach to this research in two separate stages, involving 14 volunteers and support staff. First stage Face to face qualitative interviews prior to exposure of new training/model of developing these conversations and pre-training Likert questionnaire have been undertaken. Results Thematic analysis using NVIVO, to address study objectives from first stage, has identified variables in how participants engage with individuals prior to this support and training. Emerging themes are: discussions around whose role is it; feeling valued within their role; being given 'permission' and motivation around having these conversations. Conclusions Second stage is now being undertaken, emerging themes will be presented in APM Conference. This stage will focus on identifying whether a different approach has helped, and volunteers' feedback will inform training developments and dissemination about how to support volunteers in having honest conversations about quality of life.


The study aims to usability analysis the National Library of Indonesia home page based the results of Paramjeet and Gupta research. The method used was think-aloud. In this method, one user was observed when doing the assignment and asked to express choices, feelings, or thoughts when testing the website.  There are seven phases in this method, i.e 1) literature study of  usability, usability testing and think- aloud, 2) self-evaluation of the home page of National Library of Indonesia website, conducted by comparing the results of Paramjeet and Gupta study, 3) determination of assessment parameters, 4) determination of the number and criteria of the respondents, 5) analysis of home page usability by the respondents, 6) analysis of  the results, conducted based on the respondent transcripts, and 7) recommendations. There were ten respondents, with medium internet literacy skill. They expressed their thoughts and feelings when testing the home page. There were criteria used in the assessment :1) the main features consist of logo and name of organization, about us, contact us, and archive and archiving; 2)URL (Uniform Resources Locator); 3) window title; 4) date and time; 5) writing content; 6) navigation; 7) search; 8) graphic and animation.Based on the analysis, it shows that home page of the National Library of Indonesia website needs to be improved. The improvements needed are: the addition of about us feature on the main menu; contact us becomes part of about us in the main menu; the results of the archive and archiving is in the form of title, in order to facilitate the information retrieval; the moving boxes in the navigation are replaced with fixed boxes using different colors with the color news; the search is equipped with advanced search, and graphics and animation should also be improved not only as a home page ornament. Keywords :National Library of Indonesia, think-aloud, usability.


The use of dissection to study human anatomy is the foundation for educational excellence among future health professionals, as it offers an ideal opportunity to learn the body's morphology in three dimensions while also providing students with a more humanistic education. The shortage of bodies for dissection, combined with the Brazilian population's lack of knowledge concerning the possibility of voluntarily donating their own bodies, led to the creation of the Body Donation Programs for Education and Research in Anatomy at the Federal University of Health Sciences of Porto Alegre (UFCSPA). The program is based on three pillars: Informing the general public about the program, donor registration, and donation itself. Since the creation of the donor program in 2008, there has been an increase in both the number of donations made during donor's lifetime and the number of bodies received by the university. There has also been a shift in relation to the origin of these bodies, as before the creation of the program most bodies were unclaimed cadavers, while today most of the bodies are sourced from voluntary donations. The initial results regarding the public's acceptance of the possibility of making body donations have been encouraging, as shown by the annual growth in donor registrations. Consequently, the quality and quantity of the material available for educational purposes have greatly improved. Anat Sci Educ. © 2013 American Association of Anatomists.


Objective. The goal of this research is to demonstrate proof-of-principle for managing intrafraction motion via feedback control of delivered dose to achieve dosimetry comparable to respiratory gating without compromising delivery efficiency. Approach. We develop a stochastic control approach for step-and-shoot intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) in which the cumulative delivered dose and future trajectory of intrafraction motion are dynamically estimated by combining pre-treatment four-dimensional computed tomography imaging and intrafraction respiratory-motion surrogates. The IMRT plan is then re-optimized in real time to ensure delivery of the planned dose in the presence of free-breathing motion. We compare the performance of the proposed approach against traditional motion-management techniques, namely, respiratory gating and internal target volume (ITV) planning, using the four-dimensional extended cardiac-torso computational phantom. Main results. We simulate the delivery of treatment plans for a lung tumor in the presence of variable breathing amplitude, tumor size, and location. Results show that the proposed method reduces irradiated tissue volume compared to ITV treatment. Additionally, it significantly reduces treatment time compared to traditional respiratory-gated treatment, without compromising the dosimetric quality. Significance. Respiratory gating is a common technique to manage intrafraction motion. While gating supports reduced treatment volumes, it also prolongs the treatment delivery time. The proposed stochastic control approach can help improve the delivery efficiency of respiratory gating without compromising the dose quality.


: The effectiveness and merits of the dorsal and volar approaches for release of structures contributing to metacarpophalangeal joint stiffness were studied in 61 joints in 23 patients. Seventy-six percent of the joints in the volar group gained greater than 50 degrees passive motion compared to 29% in the dorsal group. Forty-four percent of the joints in the volar group gained greater than 50 degrees active motion compared to 16% in the dorsal group. Discussion of surgical technique and postoperative management reveals that the advantages of the volar approach are most evident during postoperative management, while the main advantage of the dorsal approach is better operative exposure.


This study investigates teacher attitudes about language and education. The purpose of the study is to help program designers develop professional development efforts that successfully address some of the major identified challenges teachers face when transitioning into Mother Tongue Based Multi-Lingual Education (MTBMLE), including negative attitudes. It also suggests protocols and issues that trainers should consider when designing professional development for MTBMLE teachers. The research question guiding this study is: 1. Do teachers' attitudes towards and knowledge about mother tongue-based instruction change after they participate in professional development that is consistent with good professional development practice? a. What were teachers' knowledge and attitudes about MTBMLE before the professional development program? b. Did teachers' knowledge and attitudes change after participating in the professional development program? c. Why did teachers hold particular attitudes towards MTBMLE prior to professional development and what factors influenced their change? I conducted this research during a three-month MTBMLE professional development program with a group of indigenous first grade teachers and their school principals in Save the Children's outreach areas in rural Mindanao in the Philippines. I used a Q sort methodology for initial interviews conducted with a subset of five first grade teachers followed by a second interview after the professional development program. The interview data showed that teachers came into the trainings with two distinct viewpoints; mother tongue supporters and one mother tongue resister. After the professional development program, however, teachers were all more positive about using the mother tongue as the language of instruction. Interviews revealed that teachers were more positive and confident in teaching the mother tongue when they had the opportunity to: 1) spend time learning about their own language, 2) create mother tongue teaching and learning materials, and 3) reflect on their early learning experiences and experience what it is like to learn in a language that is not familiar. This paper will discuss the research findings in depth and will provide a clearer picture of how to train and support teachers who are transitioning into MTBMLE.


Fine-grained structures in Fe-36mass%Ni Invar alloy have been investigated by using transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Particular attention has been paid on the role of deformation twinning in the formation of fine-grained structures and its influence on tensile stressstrain behaviours of rolled specimens. In Fe-Ni Invar alloy with a moderate stacking fault energy, deformation twin did not appear in usual cold-rolling at room temperature (RT), where a kind of cell walls was formed and the Cu-type texture was observed. On the other hand, twinning was occurred by rolling when specimens were cooled to liquid nitrogen temperature (LNT) immediately before the rolling. In such case, a fine lamellar structure was developed and the brass-type texture appeared. However, the lamella boundaries did not coincide with any crystallographic planes, and they were intersected with the bands of deformation twin. Specimens rolled by 90% in thickness reduction exhibited tensile stressstrain behaviours similar to those observed in specimens with SPD structures. In particular, specimens rolled at LNT showed high yield strengths and non-uniform deformation.


: Sodium azide (NaN3) has been used in many biological studies as a mutagen. In the present study, the morphological and cytogenetic effects of NaN3 on barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) seedlings were investigated. Seeds of barley were treated with different concentrations of NaN3 (0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 mmol/L) and applied for different periods of time (3 and 4 h). Parameters investigated, except for the mitotic index, were determined on Days 7 and 14. Increasing concentrations of NaN3 affected germination rates on Days 7 and 14 following application for 3 and 4 h. Although the length of the roots and leaves was affected by treatment with NaN3 on Day 14 of the germination period, coleoptile length was affected by NaN3 treatment on Day 7. Increasing concentrations of NaN3 and increased treatment period decreased the mitotic index compared with the untreated control. The inhibitory effects of NaN3 on the mitotic index indicate that NaN3 can have genotoxic and mutagenic effects on barley seedlings.

(Managing editor: Ping HE)


The induction threshold, and the magnitude and direction of changes in synaptic plasticity may depend on the previous history of neuronal activity. This phenomenon, termed "metaplasticity," could play an important role in integration processes by coordinating the modulation of synapses. Although metaplasticity has been analyzed extensively, its underlying cellular mechanisms remain largely unknown. Using in vitro electrophysiological and computer simulation approaches, we investigated the contribution of the slow Ca2+‐dependent afterhyperpolarization (sAHP) in the metaplastic control of the induction of long‐term potentiation (LTP) at convergent CA3‐CA1 pyramidal neuron synapses. We report that classical conditioning protocols may lead to the simultaneous induction of a sustained homosynaptic LTP and a potentiation of the sAHP that endured ≈1 h. The sAHP potentiation dramatically altered the spike responses of the CA1 pyramidal neuron. Of particular interest was the reduction of the CA1 neuron excitability and, consequently, of the capacity of a nonpotentiated synaptic input to elicit spikes while the sAHP was potentiated. This reduction in excitability temporarily prevented nonpotentiated synaptic inputs to exhibit an LTP induced by presynaptic tetanization. This metaplasticity was strongly resistant to increases in the magnitude of synaptic tetanization protocols. We propose that this heterosynaptic metaplasticity, mediated by intrinsic cellular mechanisms, triggered by brief periods of activity, and relying on changes of a slow Ca2+‐activated K+ current, may contribute to adjusting the efficacy of synaptic connections and shaping network behavior to regulate integration processes. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Given the controversial and indeed, ideological tenor of the various claims by many "patent systems" as to authorship of the patent system, this article engages in an historical reconstruction of the evolution and development of the modern juridical system of patents.In the analysis, various competing "histories" of the patent system are examined, evaluated and their veracity as the origin of the patent system are resolved. In my view, the competing claims to the origins of the patent systems can only be resolved on the basis of certain criteria which constitute the irreducible essence of a patent system. In other words, in determining whether any of the claimants is the undoubted progenitor of the modern patent system, regard must be paid to the following criteria: 1.Whether the patent grant was an exercise of governmental powers designed to provide the patentee exclusive right to the commercial exploitation of a clearly defined invention; 2.Whether the grant was premised on the criterion of novelty of invention rather than a grant of monopoly for already existing trade or business, or grant for exploitation of discoveries such as natural ores or substances; 3.Whether the grant was clearly designed to promote industrialization in the widest meaning of the term, and finally; 4.Whether the grant was predictable result of a legal system instead of a singular or ad hoc grant to an inventor


Bridges constructed with adjacent precast prestressed concrete box beams have been in service for many years and provide an economical solution for short and medium span bridges. A recurring problem with this type of bridge is the cracking in the longitudinal joints between adjacent beams, resulting in reflective cracks forming in the asphalt wearing surface or concrete deck. AASHTO (2014) states that the differential shrinkage due to differences in age, concrete mix, environmental conditions etc., have been observed to cause internal force effects that are difficult to predict at the design phase. The objective of this research is to develop an innovative design of the connection used in adjacent precast concrete box beam bridges to eliminate cracking and leakage in the longitudinal joints between adjacent boxes. To meet the research goal, a comprehensive review of relevant specifications and technical literature from the past twenty years has been conducted to study the design and construction attributes influencing the long-term performance of the box beam bridge joint and identify the reasons that cause cracking in the joint between the adjacent box beams. A three step evaluation of joint was conducted on the material level, small scale level and full scale level. In each level of evaluation, both experimental and analytical evaluation were conducted. The results indicated that the innovative connection can create a crack-free joint without the utilization of a shear key nor transverse post-tensioning. Both experimental and analytical results indicate that the innovative joint showed good performance in resisting joint cracks in both the early-age and the long-term service life of the bridge. The "compression-dominate-joint" created by the expansive joint material combined with transverse reinforcing steel across the interface is expected to overcome the difficulties in predicting the early-age internal forces during the design


Both inflammation and thrombosis can be orchestrated by the interactions between circulating cells, such as leukocytes and platelets, with vascular, endothelial and smooth muscle cells, which, during activation or apoptosis, can release circulating microparticles (MPs). Indeed, MPs are membrane vesicles with procoagulant and proinflammatory properties. MPs are present in blood from healthy individuals and in patients under several pathological states, for instance sepsis, preeclampsia, Crohn's disease and diabetes, strengthening the notion that MPs may play a role in these diseases. Circulating MPs or those generated in vitro from apoptotic T cells display deleterious effects on endothelial and/or vasomotor function. In contrast, MPs might be protective to endothelial cells. We have shown that MPs harboring the morphogen sonic hedgehog may represent a new therapeutic approach against endothelial dysfunction during acute severe endothelial injury. Indeed, these types of MPs induce NO release, decrease production of reactive oxygen species and induce angiogenesis from endothelial cells. This protective role for the endothelium was confirmed also by their in vivo injection in mice in which they were also able to reverse endothelial dysfunction in a model of heart ischemia/reperfusion. On the contrary, MPs from preeclamptic women compared to those from normal pregnant women showed pro-inflammatory properties in the vascular wall inducing vascular hyporeactivity in vessels from humans and mice. These effects were associated with complex interactions between NO and cyclooxygenase systems via endothelial cell activation. Altogether, these findings suggest that MPs can be considered as vectors of biological messages for vascular homeostasis, during immunity and inflammation.


The mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) control region I (CR1) of 138 wild and 36 captive grey partridges (Perdix perdix) was sequenced. Representing two major mitochondrial DNA lineages that differed by 15 nucleotide substitutions (3.7%), the Finnish lineage dominated in the wild, whereas the European lineage dominated in the captive stock. Most individuals represented a single haplotype in each lineage. Nucleotide and haplotype diversities were high in mixed subpopulations with individuals of both lineages. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) showed that when the captive stock was excluded, about 80% of the total variation could be explained by the variation within subpopulations. When captive stock was included, 67% of the variation was explained by the variation between subpopulations. According to Φ ST values, captive stock differed from the wild subpopulations. These results clearly show that the native stock in Finland differs in mtDNA CR1 from the farm stock. In the area of large-scale captive rearing and releasing, only one bird represented the same mitochondrial lineage as the farm stock. It is evident that released farm birds have left only minor marks in the native population in Finland.


Operational Risk (OR) is "the risk of losses resulting from inadequate or failed internal processes, people and systems, and external events". Although it is not new, its control and management have acquired increased importance for financial institutions to remain competitive. A new vision for Operational Risk Management (ORM) is emerging due to new regulatory and management requirements. Basel II, the New Capital Accord finally approved by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision on June 26, 2004, includes a regulatory capital charge for OR. The accord offers different management-oriented alternative methodologies to quantify capital. The more sophisticated the methodology, the lower the capital charge. This means that OR should be adequately managed in order to assume lower levels of capital. In this context, banks try to develop an effective ORM framework that allows them to identify, assess, monitor, report, control and mitigate their OR. Currently, our research focuses on the definition of the elements that constitute an effective ORM framework in financial institutions. With this end in view, we take as a theoretical and conceptual model the one proposed by the AS/NZS 4360 Australian standard, which was updated in 2004. We apply this model to ORM by reviewing and analysing world-wide best practices, regulations and proposals published by regulators and experts on the subject. To analyse the current situation of the Spanish financial sector and check the adapted model we surveyed the leading institutions in the industry. This paper presents the main results obtained from the questionnaire and shows the Spanish financial system has made great efforts in ORM in recent years. As a result, important progress has been achieved in very little time and it can be said, in general terms, to be on a par with the top leading international systems.


Preservation of porcine semen in long-term extenders at 15-18 degrees C for more than 5 days results in decreased farrowing rates and reduced litter size after artificial insemination, despite the high progressive motility rates of sperm. To improve this preservation system it is necessary to understand sperm physiology under storage conditions. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of storing diluted porcine semen (during 0, 2, 4, 6, and 8 days) on the sperm membranes status and the ability of sperm to respond to in vitro capacitation treatment. Ten semen samples from 5 adult boars were analyzed. Two aliquots were obtained from the sperm-rich fraction: one was used to assess fresh semen and the other was diluted in Reading extender and stored at 16 degrees C. Both semen samples were stained with chlortetracycline to assess the status of sperm membranes and with Hoechst 33258 to determine viability. Semen storage for 4-8 days increased the proportion of prematurely capacitated sperm. After 4 days of storage, in vitro capacitation treatment did not increase the percentage of capacitated sperm, but increased the percentage of acrosome reacted sperm. This phenomenon could explain the reduced fertilizing ability of porcine semen stored at 16 degrees C for over 4 days, in spite of the acceptable sperm viability and progressive motility.


In previous years, I've written a review of my years "in numbers," counting the number of keynotes, the number of cities I visited, the number


Introduction Despite growing evidence of the long-term impact of tuberculosis (TB) on quality of life, Global Burden of Disease (GBD) estimates of TB-related disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) do not include post-TB morbidity, and evaluations of TB interventions typically assume treated patients return to pre-TB health. Using primary data, we estimate years of life lost due to disability (YLDs), years of life lost due to premature mortality (YLL) and DALYs associated with post-TB cardiorespiratory morbidity in a low-income country. Methods Adults aged ≥15 years who had successfully completed treatment for drug-sensitive pulmonary TB in Blantyre, Malawi (February 2016–April 2017) were followed-up for 3 years with 6-monthly and 12-monthly study visits. In this secondary analysis, St George's Respiratory Questionnaire data were used to match patients to GBD cardiorespiratory health states and corresponding disability weights (DWs) at each visit. YLDs were calculated for the study period and estimated for remaining lifespan using Malawian life table life expectancies. YLL were estimated using study mortality data and aspirational life expectancies, and post-TB DALYs derived. Data were disaggregated by HIV status and gender. Results At treatment completion, 222/403 (55.1%) participants met criteria for a cardiorespiratory DW, decreasing to 15.6% after 3 years, at which point two-thirds of the disability burden was experienced by women. Over 90% of projected lifetime-YLD were concentrated within the most severely affected 20% of survivors. Mean DWs in the 3 years post-treatment were 0.041 (HIV-) and 0.025 (HIV+), and beyond 3 years estimated as 0.025 (HIV-) and 0.010 (HIV+), compared with GBD DWs of 0.408 (HIV+) and 0.333 (HIV-) during active disease. Our results imply that the majority of TB-related morbidity occurs post-treatment. Conclusion TB-related DALYs are greatly underestimated by overlooking post-TB disability. The total disability burden of TB is likely undervalued by both GBD estimates and economic evaluations of interventions, particularly those aimed at early diagnosis and prevention.


An LDAP URL Format Status of this Memo This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited. 1. Abstract LDAP is the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, defined in [1] and [2]. This document describes a format for an LDAP Uniform Resource Locator which will allow Internet clients to have direct access to the LDAP protocol. While LDAP currently is used only as a front end to the X.500 directory, the URL format described here is general enough to handle the case of stand-alone LDAP servers (i.e., LDAP servers not back-ended by X.500).


Bioavailable and bioaccessible fractions of sediment‐associated contaminants are considered as better dose metrics for sediment‐quality assessment than total concentrations. The authors applied exhaustive solvent extraction and nondepletive equilibrium sampling techniques to sediment samples collected along the Brisbane River in South East Queensland, Australia, which range from pristine environments to urban and industry‐impacted areas. The wide range of chemicals expected prevents comprehensive chemical analysis, but a battery of cell‐based bioassays sheds light on mixture effects of chemicals in relation to various modes of toxic action. Toxic effects were expressed as bioanalytical equivalent concentrations (BEQs) normalized to the organic carbon content of each sediment sample. Bioanalytical equivalent concentrations from exhaustive extraction agreed fairly well with values estimated from polydimethylsiloxane passive sampling extracts via the constant organic carbon to polydimethylsiloxane partition coefficient. Agreement was best for bioassays indicative of photosynthesis inhibition and oxidative stress response and discrepancy within a factor of 3 for the induction of the aryl hydrocarbon receptor. For nonspecific cytotoxicity, BEQ from exhaustive extraction were 1 order of magnitude higher than values from equilibrium sampling, possibly because of coextraction of bioactive natural organic matter that led to an overestimation of toxicity in the exhaustive extracts, which suggests that passive sampling is better suited in combination with bioanalytical assessment than exhaustive extraction. Environ Toxicol Chem 2013;32:2888–2896. © 2013 SETAC


The country brief provides an overview of tobacco legislation, use, and taxation in Kazakhstan. Tobacco taxation policy practiced in Kazakhstan in 2003-2013 resulted in increased tobacco excise revenues, but was not effective in terms of public health, as cigarette consumption did not decrease. Tobacco excise taxes were drastically increased in Kazakhstan from 1 January 2014; and thereafter, the tobacco affordability was substantially reduced resulting in the subsequent decline in tobacco sales and smoking prevalence in the country. Decline in consumption could have an effect on tobacco-related mortality in Kazakhstan. Mortality rates of some tobacco-related causes of death substantially declined in Kazakhstan in 2013–2015 among men and women aged 30 to 79 years: by about 20 percent for acute ischemic heart disease and stroke and by 30–40 percent for respiratory tuberculosis and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Kazakhstan returned to a policy of moderate tax increases in 2015-2019. The reduction in tobacco affordability in 2015 was caused not only by the excise increase but also by the tobacco industry pricing policy and a decline in real incomes. Tobacco consumption in Kazakhstan decreased in 2015, but the revenue increase was smaller than expected. A moderate excise rise in 2016- 2018 could not ensure a substantial reduction in tobacco affordability, and annual tobacco sales did not change much. The country experience shows that a policy of moderate (below 30 percent annually) excise increases cannot ensure either tobacco consumption reductions or substantial revenue increases. The planned annual cigarette excise increase for 2020–2021, however, is only 12–14 percent. In recent years, electronic cigarettes and heated tobacco appeared in the Kazakhstan market. The key consumers of such products are young adults, who follow modern trends, rather than dependent smokers looking for an effective means to quit. Heated tobacco products and liquids for electronic cigarettes will be taxed by excise from 2020, but the excise rates are very low and should be substantially increased. Kazakhstan has great potential to increase its excise rates for all kinds of tobacco products to contribute to health objectives by means of reducing tobacco consumption. The greater the excise tax increase, the larger the reduction in tobacco consumption and the higher tobacco excise revenue growth will be.


Objective This work aimed to highlight the role of color Doppler ultrasound in the assessment of lower limb arterial insufficiency in patients with diabetes as well as the characteristics of lower limb arterial disease in diabetic patients. Background Diabetic lower limb arterial insufficiency is a major health problem affecting the individuals and community health. Doppler ultrasound is a widespread relatively cheap examination with no health hazards of radiation. Hence, we considered studying the role of Doppler ultrasound in determining the characteristics of lower limb arterial diabetic insufficiency and its level of accuracy. Patients and methods One hundred diabetic patients with clinically suspected lower limb arterial insufficiency were examined using Doppler ultrasound and computed tomography angiography (CTA), and the characteristics of diabetic lower limb arterial disease and accuracy of Doppler results in relation to CTA were determined. Results Diabetic lower limb arterial disease was characterized by being bilateral and multisegmental in the majority of cases with more affection of the distal (below knee) arteries. There was no significant difference between Doppler and CTA results at the above knee arteries as regards detection of significant arterial stenosis (luminal narrowing ≥ 50% of artery diameter); P values were as follows: common iliac artery segment, 0.695; external iliac artery, 0.776; common femoral artery, 0.563; and superficial femoral artery, 0.599. Further, a low significant difference at below knee arteries was found; P values were as follows: popliteal artery segment, 0.033; anterior tibial artery, 0.025; posterior tibial artery, 0.019; and peroneal artery, 0.031. The overall sensitivity of Doppler in evaluating lower limb arteries was 90.46%, the specificity was 92.05%, and the accuracy was 91.81% when CTA was taken as a standard. Conclusion Duplex ultrasound provides high-resolution, precise anatomical and physiological information of the peripheral arteries. It should be first-line investigation for lower limb arterial assessment and also be combined with other arterial imaging modalities to obtain better diagnostic accuracy.


An artifact ascribed to the Anasazi culture (dated here to 920 ± 35 B.P.) is unique in its integrity, construction technique, style, and materials, including multiple yucca ropes with attached adult scarlet macaw feathers joined to a Sciurus aberti (tassel-eared squirrel) pelt and hide straps. We applied methods from anthropology and molecular biology to ascertain the origins of materials and manufacturing technique. The cytochrome b gene from the ancient DNA of the pelt was sequenced in its entirety. This gene was unique as defined by new nucleotide substitutions that distinguished it from the other S. aberti alleles. Phylogenetic trees constructed by both neighbor-joining and maximum parsimony methods are consistent with this unique allele being most closely related to genes from two extant American Southwest S. aberti subspecies and more distantly related to Mexican S. aberti genes. Our observations support the conclusion that the entire artifact was constructed in the American Southwest using native materials, including the squirrel pelt and scarlet macaw feathers. This contradicts a prior hypothesis that the feather rope component was assembled before being traded north from Mexico.