OF THESIS DOES OPTIMISM EXPLAIN HOW RELIGIOUSNESS AFFECTS ALCOHOL USE AMONG COLLEGE STUDENTS? Alcohol use, because of its many negative consequences, is the number one health problem facing college students. Because of this, researchers have looked for factors associated with reduced drinking. Religiousness is one such factor. Religiousness is a complex, multidimensional construct, and while it tends to be negatively associated with alcohol use, research progress has been slow due to the tendency of researchers to poorly operationalize this construct and to design studies that fail to go beyond the bivariate relationship of religiousness and alcohol use. In order to address these shortcomings, this study will assess two dimensions of religiousness, religious commitment/motivation and religious consequences, and will test a model, presented by Koenig et al., (2001), that postulates religiousness works through mental health in order to reduce alcohol use. More specifically, this study will test optimism as a possible mediator and moderator of the relationship between religiousness and alcohol use. This study used archival data from 260 (202 female and 58 male) Caucasian, Christian, undergraduate college students who completed a battery of surveys that included measures of religiousness, optimism, and alcohol use. A factor analysis was conducted on one measure of religiousness, the short form of the Faith Maturity Scale. Also, optimism was tested as both a mediator and a moderator for both dimensions of religiousness in predicting alcohol use. Findings indicated optimism is not a significant mediator of the religiousness-alcohol use relationship because optimism did not meet the preconditions for a mediator as it was not associated with alcohol use in this sample. Also, optimism was not a significant moderator of religious commitment/motivation, but it did moderate the relationship of religious consequences and alcohol use. Finally, the two dimensions of religiousness interacted in predicting alcohol use. While both dimensions of religiousness were negatively associated with alcohol use throughout the findings, gender was a significant moderator in all significant interactions. Several implications follow from this study. First, greater specificity is needed regarding Koenig et al.'s (2001) model specifically in regards to which third variables are associated with which health outcomes and to whom the model applies. Second, this study highlights the importance of a multidimensional assessment of religiousness. Finally, this study indicates specificity is needed regarding what religious interventions will be helpful for which genders.


The advanced capitalist societies have arrived at an impasse: dramatic problems require social solutions. Democracy itself, which should serve to develop these, is in crisis. Given this disastrous state of affairs, we need to ask particularly what ideas democratic theory has contributed that might help us out of the impasse. I do not mean the kind of democratic theory that practices 'business as usual' in the belief that there is no alternative to representative democracy, and insists that the system is not in a crisis. Rather, I am referring to radical democratic theory. Some of its ideas are closely linked to social movements, inspire them, or seek to draw conclusions based on their experiences. In my understanding, the radicalization of democratic theory since the 1960s, which has been partly informed by a close dialogue with social movements, and partly by a distanced and critical one, essentially evolved in two steps. I will therefore distinguish between 'Radical Democracy I' and 'Radical Democracy II'. Before addressing these concepts, I will briefly reiterate the assumptions of conventional democratic theory. The essay will also take up the relationship between socialism and radical democracy.  The socialist tradition expected that once capitalist property relations were overcome through revolution, the immediate consequences would be the demise of class antagonisms, a rational management of nature, and the end of racism, sexism, and of the division of labour. Correspondingly, there would no longer be any political conflict nor need for democratic coordination mediated by the state. From this, it was possible to further conclude that any residue of conflict was down to historical vestiges (e.g. the petty bourgeoisie, experts), confused and pathological individuals, or provoked by external forces. Both versions of radical democratic theory reject the notion of such a harmonic and transparent society. Both accuse the left, particularly the Marxist tradition, of reducing politics to a superstructural phenomenon of the economy and therefore lacking any political or democratic theory. Radical democratic and socialist perspectives are not easily reconciled. Radical Democracy I is critical of socialism because it contains the notion that society as a whole creates itself through politics. Politics, according to this theory, is merely a subsystem of society; it would therefore be overburdened if it were to manage society as a whole. The positions of Radical Democracy II contain arguments for socialism, although they subordinate socialism to democracy. I want to reverse this perspective and make clear that democracy is an aspect of socialism.


OBJECTIVE To investigate the course of microalbuminuria during the 1980s in type I diabetes patients. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS This was a 10-year follow-up of 109 patients in whom type I diabetes was diagnosed between 1961 and 1980 before 15 years of age and who were initially investigated between 1977 and 1983 after a diabetes duration of ≥ 3 years. Microalbuminuria was defined as an albumin excretion rate (AER) of 20-200 μg/min in two of three consecutive urine samples. RESULTS At the initial investigation, 81 patients had normal AER, 27 had microalbuminuria, and 1 had macroalbuminuria. Between 1989 and 1992, 99 (91%) patients were reinvestigated. Only 5 (19%) of the initially microalbuminuric patients developed macroproteinuria during the 10-year follow-up period, and in 15 (58%) patients, AER decreased to normal. Three (4%) of the normoalbuminuric patients developed microalbuminuria but none macroproteinuria. The initially microalbuminuric patients, in whom AER normalized, improved their glycemic control from 1980-1983 to 1989-1991 (mean ± SE HbA1c 7.5 ± 0.2 to 6.6 ± 0.3%; P = 0.01). CONCLUSIONS In the majority of patients with microalbuminuria in whom it is possible to obtain good glycemic control, microalbuminuria will disappear and the risk of developing nephropathy will be markedly reduced.


Abstract : This study examines the history of an emergent class of weapons known collectively as precision guided munitions (PGMs). Arising from historical antecedents in the First and Second World Wars, the specific technologies that made precision guidance a reality in the late 196Os were, nevertheless, the unique product of concerted actions taken within the U.S. military, the federal government, and civilian industry. Precision weapons did not emerge as a natural consequence of technological change, but were consciously constructed in response to the purposes, ethics, and values of American society. Certainly the creation of important enabling technologies, notably lasers and semiconductor integrated circuits, played a decisive role in the development of these advanced weapons. However, the emergence of guided weapons is inexplicable without also considering America's evolving defense policy; the military doctrine that translated that policy into specific weapon systems; and twentieth-century wartime demand, which stimulated research and development by providing added urgency, requirements, and resources. Entering America's arsenal at the height of cold war tensions, PGMs provided an appealing alternative to the largely impotent nuclear bombs and missiles that had become the centerpiece of U.S. military strategy. Post-Vietnam military operations highlighted a marked shift in emphasis away from mass destruction in favor of inflicting precise, controlled damage. Reliance upon this technological innovation has produced a remarkable three-tiered revolutionary transformation in munitions technology, armed conflict, and U.S. national security policy.


Hybrid compositeMaterials have extensive engineering application where strength toweight ratio, lowcost and ease of fabrication are required.Hybrid composites provide combination of properties such as tensile modulus, compressive strength and impact strength which cannot be realized in composite materials. In recent times hybrid composites have been established as highly efficient, high performance structural materials and their use is increasing rapidly. Hybrid composites are usually used when a combination of properties of different types of fibres have to be achieved, orwhen longitudinal aswell as lateralmechanical performances are required. The investigation of the novel applications of hybrid composites has been of deep interest to the researchers for many years as evident from reports. This paper presents a review of the current status of hybrid composite materials technology, in terms of materials available and properties, and an outline of some of the trends, obvious and speculative, with emphasis on various applications including some details of smart hybrid composites.


About 25% of the Jewish population in Israel consists of "secular believers." They self-identify as secular but also believe in God or some kind of higher/deeper power(s). Their identity conflicts with the conventional identification of secularism with atheism, as do post-secular theologies, whose theological ideas reject traditional religion while adopting concepts of faith. Western feminism proved especially conducive to the development of post-secular theology. This study addresses both Israeli Judaism and feminist theology from a post-secular perspective. It analyses two academic fields of discourse—feminist Jewish theology and feminism in Israel—to determine whether, how and why they are developing a Jewish post-secular feminist theology. The study reveals that such theologies are rare and suggests that discursive field structure limits their development.


The aim of this study was to examine the possible relationship between physical and psychological aggression suffered in the workplace and professional burnout, depression and anxiety suffered by healthcare professionals of the emergency services. Methods: 315 physicians, nurses, orderlies and ambulance drivers of Critical Care and Emergency Devices (CCED) in the Andalusian Public Health System, in the province of Granada (Spain) participated. They were interviewed about the exposure to violence at work and answered a battery of questions that measured burnout, depression and anxiety. Results: Physical aggression was significantly related to emotional exhaustion, personal accomplishment at work, depression and anxiety. Psychological aggression was associated with personal accomplishment. Logistic regression showed that the CCED professionals who have suffered physical aggression were 4.2 and 2.6 times more likely to have suffered anxiety and reduced personal accomplishment, respectively, than those who did not suffer physical aggression. On the other hand, feelings of anxiety and reduced personal accomplishment increase the professionals' risk (3.4 and 2.1 times more likely, respectively) of suffering from physical aggression. Conclusion: The results suggest that exposure to violence is related to the other psychological problems tested: emotional exhaustion and personal accomplishment (two components of burnout), depression and anxiety. In addition, physical violence is a risk factor for anxiety and diminished personal accomplishment of the CCED professionals.


What is rape? What are the harms, risks and values that the criminal prohibition on rape attempts to promote? How should criminal law properly conceptualize the offense of rape? Does submission to sexual demands in light of threats to inflict non-physical harms, such as economic and professional harms including firing or demotion, constitute rape? Scholars have been grappling with these questions for several decades, attempting to better align society's perceptions about the criminal regulation of sexual misconduct with the ever-evolving social perceptions about sexuality and gender norms. This Article argues that while rape law reform has accomplished significant changes in the past decades, it has since stalled. What might account for this stagnation is the turn to consent. This move is conceptually misguided, failing to effect instrumental change both in the courts as well as in social norms. The result is that rape, as defined by our criminal justice system, bears little resemblance to the various forms of sexual abuses that are inflicted on victims. Statutory definitions of rape are inept and require an overhaul to better capture the harm and wrongdoing of rape that many victims still experience. To address these drawbacks, this Article advocates the adoption of an alternative conceptual framework for rape as an act of abuse of power and exploitation of dominance and control. This approach is not only more responsive to the complainants' narratives and the harms inflicted upon them, but also better captures the wrongdoing in the perpetrator's conduct. This Article's innovation lies in suggesting not only that consent ought not to be an element of rape, but also that the theoretical understanding of what rape is ought to fundamentally change by adopting a conceptual overhaul that captures the offense based on an abuse of power construct. The Failure of ConsentTable of


Neural abstractive summarization systems have achieved promising progress, thanks to the availability of large-scale datasets and models pre-trained with self-supervised methods. However, ensuring the factual consistency of the generated summaries for abstractive summarization systems is a challenge. We propose a post-editing corrector module to address this issue by identifying and correcting factual errors in generated summaries. The neural corrector model is pre-trained on artificial examples that are created by applying a series of heuristic transformations on reference summaries. These transformations are inspired by an error analysis of state-of-the-art summarization model outputs. Experimental results show that our model is able to correct factual errors in summaries generated by other neural summarization models and outperforms previous models on factual consistency evaluation on the CNN/DailyMail dataset. We also find that transferring from artificial error correction to downstream settings is still very challenging.


Given the health, social, and economic upheavals of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is understandable anxiety about another virus, monkeypox, quickly emerging in many countries around the world. In West and Central Africa, where the disease has been endemic for several decades, monkeypox transmission in humans usually occurs in short, controllable chains of infection after contact with infected animal reservoirs. Recent monkeypox infections have been identified in non-endemic regions, with most occurring through longer chains of human-to-human spread in people without a history of contact with animals or travel to endemic regions. These seemingly different patterns of disease have prompted public health investigation. However, ending chains of monkeypox transmission requires a better understanding of the social, ecological and scientific interconnections between endemic and non-endemic areas. This brief is intended to be read in conjunction with the companion brief entitled 'Social Considerations for Monkeypox Response'.1 In this set of briefs, we lay out social considerations from previous examples of disease emergence to reflect on 1) the range of response strategies available to control monkeypox, and 2) specific considerations for monkeypox risk communication and community engagement (RCCE). These briefs are intended to be used by public health practitioners and advisors involved in developing responses to the ongoing monkeypox outbreak, particularly in non-endemic countries. This brief on RCCE strategies for monkeypox response was written by Megan Schmidt-Sane (IDS), Syed Abbas (IDS), Soha Karam (Anthrologica), and Jennifer Palmer (LSHTM), with contributions from Hayley MacGregor (IDS), Olivia Tulloch (Anthrologica), and Annie Wilkinson (IDS). It was reviewed by Will Nutland (The Love Tank CIC/PrEPster) and was edited by Victoria Haldane (Anthrologica). This brief is the responsibility of SSHAP.


Between 1852 and 1900, several hundred Native Hawaiians engage in mission work in Micronesia and the Marquesas. Through the postmillennial worldview brought by their New England "makua" (parents), foreign mission work allowed them to support the expansion of Christ's kingdom while pushing back against the paternalism and racism of American missionaries in Hawai'i and in the field. If the most important measure of a people came from their dedication to expanding Christ's kingdom, the Hawaiians could claim full equality with the Americans and Europeans through their commitment to mission work. Yet an examination of Hawaiian missionary interactions with and treatment of other islanders provides a stark counterpoint to this somewhat celebratory account of Hawaiian religious agency. The same rigid theological division of the world and eagerness to expand Christ's kingdom also led to and justified their denunciation and even persecution of the islanders they worked among.


Recent years have shown an increasing interest in low frequency response of offshore floaters in current. Spar VIM behavior and Semi Submersible flow induced behavior is known from calm water tow tests. Recent tow test projects have also shown low frequency TLP response in steady current. The motions from the model tests are used in the global analysis of the mooring systems and risers for these platforms. This paper discusses the dynamic behavior in current of multi column floaters and the associated complex flow patterns. Shielding between columns is addressed as well as the effect of mass ratio (i.e. floater mass divided by displacement). It is shown that lower mass ratios such as for conventional TLP's may result in larger sway response than for deep draft semi submersibles. The motion behavior is discussed as well as the increase in total mean current loads due to transverse motions.Copyright © 2007 by ASME


A hand-held spectrometer was used to collect above-water spectral measurements for measuring optically active water-quality characteristics of the Wabash River and its tributaries in Indiana. Water sampling was undertaken concurrent with spectral measurements to estimate concentrations of chlorophyll (chl) and total suspended solids (TSS). A method for removing sky and Sun glint from field spectra for turbid inland waters was developed and tested. Empirical models were then developed using the corrected field spectra and in situ chl and TSS data. A subset of the field measurements was used for model development and the rest for model validation. Spectral characteristics indicative of waters dominated by different inherent optical properties (IOPs) were identified and used as the basis of selecting bands for empirical model development. It was found that the ratio of the reflectance peak at the red edge (704 nm) with the local minimum caused by chl absorption at 677 nm was a strong predictor of chl concentrations (coefficient of determination (R2) = 0.95). The reflectance peak at 704 nm was also a good predictor for TSS estimation (R2 = 0.75). In addition, we also found that reflectance within the near-infrared (NIR) wavelengths (700–890 nm) all showed a strong correlation (0.85–0.91) with TSS concentrations and generated robust models. Results suggest that hyperspectral information provided by field spectrometer can be used to distinguish and quantify water-quality parameters under complex IOP conditions.


WS-30581 A and B are antiplatelet agents produced by a strain of Streptoverticillium xaksmanii. The compounds were purified by solvent extraction and column chromatography, and identified as new pimprinine analogs on the basis of their physico-chemical properties. The producing organism produced pimprinine along with these compounds. Pimprinine and the two new analogs have potent inhibitory effects on platelet aggregation.


A private cloud is maintained by an enterprise forits internal use. In such a scenario instead of buying the resources the enterprise can acquire the resources from a public cloud such as the ones provided by Amazon and Microsoft. On conventional systems rigorous analysis of the system and its workload is performed for determining the appropriate number of resources to be deployed on the private cloud. This paper presents a middleware framework that avoids this step of a priori capacity analysis and allows such private cloud owners to provision resources automatically such that a specified grade of service is maintained. The proposed framework performs dynamic resource provisioning that also leads to a reduction of operational cost. Additional resources are acquired during high traffic periods and released during low traffic periods such that the desired grade of service is always maintained. The paper describes the architecture of the framework and the experience gained from a prototype implementation including a preliminary analysis of its performance.


In this work, we report the fabrication of an all-polymer multimaterial optical fiber based on two different grades of cyclo-olefin polymers (known as Zeonex) and the highperformance thermoplastic polysulfone (PSU) with glass transition temperature (Tg) of 189°C. The core/cladding structure using the Zeonex polymers (E48R/480R, respectively) was developed using a co-extrusion method followed by a rod-in-tube approach to form the final preform. The fiber materials were characterized in terms of their Tg, viscosity as well as refractive index profiles. The final preform was thermally drawn down to a fiber with ∼300 μm and ∼70 μm total and core diameter, respectively. We thermally characterized and compared our step-index fiber with a commercially available polymer (Cytop) as well as a purely Zeonex single-mode step-index fiber. The proposed multimaterial fiber exhibited stable operation at temperatures as high as 180°C being ∼35°C higher than any polymer fiber reported so far to the best of our knowledge. Therefore, we believe that our results constitute a significant step forward for the polymer optical fiber community making the proposed polymer multimaterial fiber an efficient route towards truly heat-resistant applications. © 2021 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement


A successful developmental effort frequently is defined as one that produces a deliverable that is satisfactory to the client, on time, within budget, and has had no adverse impact on ongoing business operations. This article describes through a case study approach the activities that one project used to ensure a successful development effort. The author advocates a hybrid methodological approach to systems analysis and design that is tailored for the specific project. The article also describes the project and people management practices used to support the developmental effort.


Single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) has grown massively in scale since its inception, presenting substantial analytic and computational challenges. Even simple downstream analyses, such as dimensionality reduction and clustering, require days of runtime and hundreds of gigabytes of memory for today's largest datasets. In addition, current methods often favor common cell types, and miss salient biological features captured by small cell populations. Here we present Hopper, a single-cell toolkit that both speeds up the analysis of single-cell datasets and highlights their transcriptional diversity by intelligent subsampling, or sketching. Hopper realizes the optimal polynomial-time approximation of the Hausdorff distance between the full and downsampled dataset, ensuring that each cell is well-represented by some cell in the sample. Unlike prior sketching methods, Hopper adds points iteratively and allows for additional sampling from regions of interest, enabling fast and targeted multi-resolution analyses. In a dataset of over 1.3 million mouse brain cells, we detect a cluster of just 64 macrophages expressing inflammatory tissues (0.004% of the full dataset) from a Hopper sketch containing just 5,000 cells, and several other small but biologically interesting immune cell populations invisible to analysis of the full data. On an even larger dataset consisting of ~2 million developing mouse organ cells, we show even representation of important cell types in small sketch sizes, in contrast with prior sketching methods. By condensing transcriptional information encoded in large datasets, Hopper grants the individual user with a laptop the same analytic capabilities as large consortium.


Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine backsourcing, which refers to the full or partial re-internalization of a firm's previously outsourced activity. Researchers have primarily focused on the drivers of backsourcing, but this paper builds on that prior research to develop a typology of backsourcing.

Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on transaction cost economics and the resource-based view (RBV), the paper posits that firms backsource because of two factors – changes in their short-run total costs and changes in their internal capabilities for re-internalization. By using the interactions between these two factors, the authors propose four types of backsourcing.

Findings
The paper presents a typology for backsourcing: profitability-backsourcing, operational-backsourcing, strategic-backsourcing and failure-backsourcing. Only one (failure-backsourcing) of these four types of backsourcing suggests failure, while the other three indicate strategic flexibility. The authors also present mini-cases to support the typology.

Research limitations/implications
The paper presents a conceptual model of backsourcing. This is a limitations of the study and further research is needed to empirically test the proposed model.

Practical implications
From a managerial perspective, this framework can be used as a decision-making tool for firms that are considering backsourcing. Given the complexity involved and the perceived stigma, decision-makers may find it difficult to backsource. Thus, a framework to avoid biases leading to decision-making errors, as well as to understand if backsourcing is a viable option, is needed.

Originality/value
This paper is one of the first to present a typology of backsourcing which can be used to understand when it is a failure of the outsourcing strategy and when it is a signal of strategic flexibility. This paper contributes to the growing stream of research on backsourcing by moving the literature beyond determinants and bringing attention to the outcomes of backsourcing. Additionally, the proposed framework can be used as a tool by decision-makers to examine whether backsourcing is favorable for their firm based on costs and capabilities for re-internalization.


Lipid peroxidation and some parameters of hemostasis were studied during exposure to various hyperoxia schemes combined with heparin therapy before and after treatment in 124 patients aged 16 to 69 with CNS involvement which developed as a result of atherosclerosis and essential hypertension, 60 of whom presented with initial manifestations of cerebral circulation insufficiency (IMCCI), 33 with posthypoxic encephalopathies (PE), and 31 with ischemic stroke (IS). Hyperoxia mechanisms were differently directed in the studied groups of patients, this necessitating a differentiated approach to the choice of schemes of hyperbaric oxygenation. Use of a short course of hyperbaric oxygenation (up to 3 sessions at 1.2 to 1.25 atA) is recommended for patients with IMCCI and PE. For patients with IS in the acute period hyperbaric oxygenation at 1.4 atA is advisable combined with heparin therapy in doses of 150 to 300 U/kg b.w. a day.


AbstractThis study aimed to understand how the introduction of Cichla kelberi in Rosana Reservoir (Paranapanema River) affected the native ichthyofauna. Data on the structure of the small fish fauna assemblage were obtained before and after the introduction of this carnivorous species. Samplings were carried out in February and September of 2004, previously to the register of Cichla kelberi in the reservoir, and after its introduction, November of 2004, January, March, May and August of 2005, February and June of 2006, February and July of 2007, February and October of 2008 and February of 2009. A total of 4,693 fish, belonging to 43 different species was sampled between 2004 and 2009. The order Characiformes was the most abundant, followed by Perciformes and Siluriformes. Comparative analyses, before and after the introduction, could not demonstrate significant changes in composition, richness, abundance, biomass, mean length and diversity of fish. Aquatic insects were the main feeding item of C. kelberi, followed by tetragonopterinae fish. Cannibalism was recorded during the whole study period. The results showed that Cichla cannot deeply affect the ichthyofauna assemblages of a large Neotropical reservoir, at least in a short or medium term period after its introduction. The results also allowed concluding that the introduction of C. kelberi in the reservoir is in the phase 3. In this phase, the specie can survive and reproduce in the new environment; however it is not totally established and disseminated. The reasons for the fact that Cichla is still not dominant in Rosana Reservoir could be related to feeding competition, high rate of cannibalism and the presence of large amount of aquatic macrophytes (refuge zones). In spite of the results, the continuous monitoring of the role of non-native species on the local fish fauna is absolutely necessary because the impacts caused by colonization of this undesirable species can be magnified by complex processes, usually correlated with other environmental disturb, especially the negative effects of damming.


For years now, developed countries face an epidemic of high blood pressure, diabetes and high cholesterol, risk factors related to heart and circulatory disease, and a suite of psychological disorders ranging from depression, anxiety, to compulsive behaviours. These health risks have traditionally been associated with affluence however by 2008 there is no clear link between national income and these diseases. E.g. according to Danaei, there was no relationship between national income and blood pressure in men, and in women blood pressure was even higher in poorer countries. Therefore, this paper provides deepen analysis of this correlation applying spatial econometrics tools. The spatial aspect of the prevalence of western diseases does not seem to be obvious and, to our knowledge, is not widely explored in the literature. In particular, the paper investigates the spatial processes of selected diseases of affluence in regions of the European Union. The research covers 261 NUTS 2 regions for the period 2003-2010. This study provides the spatial analysis of Circulatory and Mental diseases. In our opinion, the presented spatial econometric approach may constitutes an important contribution to the field of epidemiology.


Using the example of the Saxon jurist Dietrich von Bocksdorf the book examines the legal practice of a jurist and the precise significance of learned jurisprudence in late medieval Germany. It thereby provides new insights into a fundamental change in european history: The emergence of a scientific mode for the administration of justice.


Proteases with an aspartate cleavage specificity are known to contribute to programmed cell death (PCD) in animals and plants. In animal cells this proteolytic activity belongs to caspases, a well-characterized family of cysteine-dependent death proteases. Plants, however, lack caspase homologs and thus the origin of this type of proteolytic activity in planta was poorly understood. Here, we review recent data demonstrating that a plant serine-dependent protease, phytaspase, shares cleavage specificity and a role in PCD analogous to that of caspases. However, unlike caspases, regulation of phytaspase-mediated cleavage of intracellular target proteins appears to be attained not at the level of proenzyme processing/activation, which occurs, in the case of phytaspase, autocatalytically and constitutively. Rather, the mature phytaspase is excluded from healthy cells into the apoplast and is allowed to re-enter cells upon the induction of PCD. Thus, PCD-related proteases in animals and plants display both common features and important distinctions.


Aims: Meningitis is an infectious disease. In case it spreads to the military personnel living in dormitories in large numbers, it can cause high mortality. The present study was an attempt to examine the number of Meningitis cases, their types, and effective factors in its spread among Iranian Ground Forces (IGF). The distribution pattern of Meningitis in different parts of Iran was also examined. Method: In this cross-sectional research, records of patients with meningitis from mid2006 to 2011 (5.5 years) were checked. All cases reported to IGF Health Office were included in the study. Variables such as age, military status (formal or conscripted), meningitis type, month and year of disease occurrence, recovery status, educational status of patient's military unit, and place of disease occurrence were checked. In addition, the distribution map of the disease was prepared using ArcGIS 9.3. Results: Totally, 59 cases were reported to IGF Health Office. The mean age of patients was 20.09. 86.4% of the reported cases were in conscripts. Meningococcal meningitis was the most frequent type, and pneumococcal and viral types stood next. 63% of cases had occurred in training units. The highest and lowest incidences of disease were observed in 2006 and 2010 respectively. The number of Meningitis cases was highest in February. The death rate was 10.2 %. The highest number of cases was reported in Tehran, Kerman, and Khouzestan provinces respectively. Conclusion: Since all the patients were conscripts or formal trainees, permanent residence in military dormitories was one of the most important risk factors of meningitis morbidity. Meningitis incidence trend has been descending over the past few years, and hygiene programs have reduced the number of reported cases. GIS map of the case distribution was not concordant that much to GIS map of cumulative incidence mostly due to the differences in the number of military personnel in different provinces. However, disease mortality was similar to other references.


The major goals in the management of diabetes are to maintain optimum control of high blood glucose level or hyperglycemia. Dietary modification is one of the most recommended treatment modalities for diabetic patients. The use of foods sweetened with sugar alcohols (also known as polyols) such as xylitol, sorbitol, mannitol, maltitol, lactitol, isomalt and erythritol has brought an escalating interest in the recent years since some sugar alcohols do not rise plasma glucose, as they are partially digested and metabolised. Diet composition and adequacy may be altered by replacing carbohydrates with sugar alcohols. It has been established that these polyols are appropriate sugar substitutes for a healthy lifestyle and diabetic foods. The present review focuses on the evidence supporting the use of sugar alcohols in the management of diabetes, by evaluating their physical and chemical properties, metabolism, absorption, glycemic and insulinemic responses. Although documentation on the glycaemic and insulinemic response of polyols is evident that these compounds have beneficial effects on the better management of hyperglycemia, the possible side effects associated with their normal or higher dosages warned their use according to the relevant Food & Drug Administration guidelines. For the same reason, future studies should also focus on the possible toxicity and side effects associated with the consumption of sugar alcohols in order to define their safety.


This paper discusses several competing proposals for general normative frameworks that would encompass non-standard models of choice. Most existing proposals equate welfare with well-being. Some assume that well-being flows from the achievement of well-defined objectives, and that those objectives also guide choices; the trick is to formulate a framework in which less-than-completely coherent choice patterns reveal the unobserved objectives. Others are predicated on the contention that well-being, and hence welfare, is directly measurable. Both of those approaches encounter serious conceptual difficulties. An alternative approach, developed by Bernheim and Rangel [2009], defines welfare directly in terms of choice. It entails a generalized welfare criterion that respects choice directly, without requiring any rationalization involving potentially unverifiable assumptions concerning underlying objectives and their relationships to choice. Because useful behavioral theories generally envision a substantial degree of underlying coherence in behavior, that criterion leads to a rich and tractable normative framework.


Abstract. In the process of groundwater recharge, surface water usually enters an
aquifer by passing an overlying unsaturated zone. Little attention has been
given to the development of analytical solutions to a coupled
unsaturated–saturated flow model due to localized recharge up to now. This
paper develops a mathematical model to depict three-dimensional transient
unsaturated–saturated flow in an unconfined aquifer with localized recharge
on the ground surface. The model contains Richards' equation for unsaturated
flow, a flow equation for saturated formation, and the Gardner constitutive
model describing the behavior of unsaturated soil properties. Both flow
equations are coupled through the continuity conditions of the head and flux
at the water table. The semi-analytical solution to the coupled flow model is
derived by the methods of Laplace transform and Fourier cosine transform. A
sensitivity analysis is performed to explore the head response to the change
in each of the aquifer parameters. A quantitative tool is presented to assess
the recharge efficiency signifying the percentage of the water from the
recharge to the aquifer. We found that the effect of unsaturated flow on the
saturated hydraulic head is negligible if two criteria associated with the
unsaturated soil properties and initial aquifer thickness are satisfied. The
head distributions predicted from the present solution match well with those
from finite-difference simulations. The predictions of the present solution
also agree well with the observed data from a field experiment at an
artificial recharge pond in Fresno County, California.


A control structure is described which is more APL-ish than the currently implemented keywords. It is much more in the spirit of APL because it merges all conventional control concepts into one single concept represented by one single symbol "∇". The result is more simple and yet more powerful. Various paragraphs will show how to do all the conventional control structuring with this new primitive. The theoretical exposition concludes with a practical paragraph that summarises how much of the proposal is currently available in the APL implementation APL2C.


We study identification in a class of linear rational expectations models. For any given exactly identified model, we provide an algorithm that generates a class of equivalent models that have the same reduced form. We use our algorithm to show that a model proposed by Jess Benhabib and Roger Farmer is observationally equivalent to the standard new-Keynesian model when observed over a single policy regime. However, the two models have different implications for the design of an optimal policy rule


Cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) remains the de-facto method of choice to evaluate and compare medical interventions. Standard approaches to CEA use the average (mean) outcomes from clinical effectiveness studies such as randomized controlled trials. This paper generalizes standard methods to include uncertainty in clinical outcomes and proposes a generalized version of the quality-adjusted life-year (QALY), referred to as a quality- and risk-adjusted life-year (QRALY). Our approach requires new information from clinical studies – not only means and variances of health outcomes, but also skewness. With that added parameter, this paper shows how Taylor Series expansions of expected utility can account for two distinct effects of uncertainty: the "insurance value" of reducing overall risks to health, and the "value of hope" produced by the presence of positively skewed outcomes. Simulations demonstrate that stochastic terms are particularly important when baseline disease severity is high, and mean treatment effects are low. They also demonstrate that the variance-based term has the greatest importance among the stochastic terms, although skewness- and kurtosis-based terms can be significant in some situations.


p-Nitroanilides of amino acids and peptides were used to study the specificity of cathepsins H and B from human and bovine brain, respectively. The specific activity of cathepsin H decreased in the following order: Arg-pNa greater than or equal to Leu-pNa greater than Ala-pNa greater than or equal to Phe-pNa greater than Pro-pNa greater than Glu-pNa; Arg-pNa was split by the enzyme 12 times as fast as Bz-Arg-pNa. Among other oligopeptide p-nitroanilides tested (Ala-Ala, Ala-Leu, Ala-Ala-Ala, Ala-Ala-Leu, Gly-Gly-Leu, Gly-Gly-Phe, Gly-Leu-Phe, pGlu-Phe-Leu, pGlu-Phe-Ala, pGlu-Phe), PGlu-Phe-Leu and pGlu-Phe-Ala appeared to be the best substrates for cathepsin B; Km for hydrolysis were 0.1 mM and 0.165 mM, respectively, kcat were 5.1 and 8.3 s-1, respectively. A comparative study of substrate specificity of cathepsin D and high molecular weight aspartic peptidase with the use of fluorescent substrate with inner fluorescence quenching, Abz-Ala-Ala-Phe-Phe-pNa, revealed that both peptidases hydrolyzed the single bond between two phenylalanine residues, resulting in the increase of fluorescence (4.5-5-fold) of anthraniloyl tripeptide. The Km values for the substrate hydrolysis by cathepsin D and high molecular weight aspartic peptidase were 6.2 microM and 11.2 microM; kcat were 7.2 s-1 and 1.3 s-1, respectively.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


Uncertainty, insufficient information or information of poor quality, limited cognitive capacity and time, along with value conflicts and ethical considerations, are all aspects that make risk management and risk communication difficult. This paper provides a review of different risk concepts and describes how these influence risk management, communication and planning in relation to forest ecosystem services. Based on the review and results of empirical studies, we suggest that personal assessment of risk is decisive in the management of forest ecosystem services. The results are used together with a review of different principles of the distribution of risk to propose an approach to risk communication that is effective as well as ethically sound. Knowledge of heuristics and mutual information on both beliefs and desires are important in the proposed risk communication approach. Such knowledge provides an opportunity for relevant information exchange, so that gaps in personal knowledge maps can be filled in and effective risk communication can be promoted.


: Multinational companies face competition and challenges in the global market in a constant battle to prosper, profit, and sustain. The challenge is real, and it affects the managerial, economic and workforce levels. Subsidiaries are subject to economic and cultural influences and pressures and home country managers are constantly burdened when crucial decisions should be taken. The resources are scarce, and all products and services should be globalized which needs a staff that is competent, resourceful, and incentivized. In this article, we define management style as the method path that corporations follow to steer their businesses, exercise authority and direct their personnel in order to achieve their national and global targets. There are three management styles discussed in the article revealing their main traits and procedures and showing their advantages and disadvantages. The case of PepsiCo management style practices and operations will be illustrated evidencing how its orientation led to success in the Lebanese market.


The increasing complexity of IT environments urgently requires the use of analytical approaches and automated problem resolution for more efficient delivery of IT services. In this paper, we model the automation recommendation procedure of IT automation services as a contextual bandit problem with dependent arms, where the arms are in the form of hierarchies. Intuitively, different automations in IT automation services, designed to automatically solve the corresponding ticket problems, can be organized into a hierarchy by domain experts according to the types of ticket problems. We introduce a novel hierarchical multi-armed bandit algorithms leveraging the hierarchies, which can match the coarse-to-fine feature space of arms. Empirical experiments on a real large-scale ticket dataset have demonstrated substantial improvements over the conventional bandit algorithms. In addition, a case study of dealing with the cold-start problem is conducted to clearly show the merits of our proposed algorithms.


Mesoporous 2-line ferrihydrite was synthesized through a facile precipitation method and was characterized by X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, and nitrogen adsorption–desorption isotherms. The surface area of the obtained mesoporous 2-line ferrihydrite was 331.0 m2 g−1. The fluoride adsorption performance was investigated. Batch adsorption experiments were conducted to study the influence of various factors such as contact time, initial fluoride concentration, temperature, pH value and co-existing anions on the adsorption of fluoride. The fluoride adsorption process fitted well with the Langmuir model, and the maximum adsorption capacity was 23.89 mg g−1 at pH 7.0. It is worth mentioning that this adsorbent performed well over a considerably wide pH range of 3–9. The fluoride adsorption kinetics over the adsorbent can be well described by a pseudo-second-order kinetic model. Thermodynamic parameters including the Gibbs free energy, standard enthalpy and standard entropy were calculated, and the results suggested that the adsorption of fluoride on the mesoporous 2-line ferrihydrite was thermodynamically favorable and exothermic in nature. Furthermore, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy analyses revealed that the surface hydroxyl groups play an important part in the fluoride removal process.


Natural ventilation is attractive due its potential to lower energy consumed by healthcare environments but maintaining steady/adequate airflow rates and thermal comfort is challenging in temperate countries. Although many contemporary hospitals use traditional windows for natural ventilation, there are alternative strategies that are largely under-utilised probably due to lack knowledge of their ventilation performances. Each alternative has design implications and airflow characteristics – both of which affect thermal comfort and heating energy. This study evaluates the performance of buoyancy-driven airflows through four selected natural ventilation strategies suitable for single-bed hospital wards. These strategies are: single window opening, same side dual-opening, inlet and stack as well as ceiling-based natural ventilation (CBNV), a new concept. These strategies have been explored via dynamic thermal simulation and computational fluid dynamics, using a new ward of the Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) London as a case study. Results reveal that 25% trickle ventilation opening fraction is required to achieve required airflow rates and acceptable thermal comfort in winter, and with exception of window-based design, other strategies minimise summer overheating to different extents. The CBNV concept uniquely shields fresh air and delivers it to isolated parts of wards or directly over patients (i.e. personalisation). This provides higher air quality at such locations and creates mixing which aids comfort and dilution. The findings demonstrate how quantitative data from simulations can be used by designers to meet qualitative or sensory design objectives like airflow direction and thermal comfort with respect to the energy consumed in space and time.


The exchange of heat and water vapor between land surface and atmosphere over the Third Pole region (Tibetan Plateau and nearby surrounding region) plays an important role in Asian monsoon, westerlies and the northern hemisphere weather and climate systems. Supported by various agencies in the People's Republic of China, a Third Pole Environment (TPE) observation and research Platform (TPEORP) is now implementing over the Third Pole region. The background of the establishment of the TPEORP, the establishing and monitoring plan of long-term scale (5-10 years) of it will be shown firstly. Then the preliminary observational analysis results, such as the characteristics of land surface energy fluxes partitioning and the turbulent characteristics will also been shown in this study. Then, the parameterization methodology based on satellite data and the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) observations has been proposed and tested for deriving regional distribution of net radiation flux, soil heat flux, sensible heat flux and latent heat flux (evapotranspiration (ET)) and their variation trends over the heterogeneous landscape of the Tibetan Plateau (TP) area. To validate the proposed methodology, the ground measured net radiation flux, soil heat flux, sensible heat flux and latent heat flux of the TPEORP are compared to the derived values. The results showed that the derived land surface heat fluxes over the study areas are in good accordance with the land surface status. These parameters show a wide range due to the strong contrast of surface feature. And the estimated land surface heat fluxes are in good agreement with ground measurements, and all the absolute percent difference in less than 10% in the validation sites. The sensible heat flux has increased slightly and the latent heat flux has decreased from 2001 to 2016 over the TP. It is therefore conclude that the proposed methodology is successful for the retrieval of land surface heat fluxes and ET over heterogeneous landscape of the TP area. Further improvement of the methodology and its applying field over the whole Third Pole region and Pan-Third Pole region were also discussed.


In early 1953, eight blocks of the Southwide Pine Seed Source Study (SPSSS) featuring two geographically based series of shortleaf pine (Pinus echinata) were planted in Compartment 46 of the Crossett Experimental Forest (CEF). These shortleaf pines originated from Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Texas seed sources. Their survival, fusiform rust (Cronartium quercuum f. sp. fusiforme) resistance, and height growth performance were tracked closely until the late 1960s, when the original effort to monitor these blocks for the SPSSS was discontinued. Remeasured into the 1980s, these outplantings were largely forgotten until recently, when interest in shortleaf pine reemerged. Although some unplanned harvests and other losses have occurred, enough surviving SPSSS shortleaf pines remained in the latter half of 2018 to reassess their diameters, heights, and derived merchantable volumes. After 65 years in the ground, some significant differences in height, diameter at breast height, and volume by seed source have persisted. In addition to assessing these shortleaf pines for long-term, seed source-based success, the remaining outplantings also present opportunities to further investigate species-based DNA markers useful for describing the genetic variation of this declining yet still important southern pine species. Better documentation of the growth performance and genetic attributes should also help silviculturists hone their strategies for the restoration of shortleaf pine.


For mobile robots to become ubiquitous, they need to be able to navigate in dynamic environments in a safe and efficient way. This is a challenging problem due to the added time dimension in the search space and the subtle interactions between dynamic agents that are extremely difficult to model. In this thesis, we will address both of these challenges. The challenge of dimensionality is addressed by proposing a novel path planning algorithm in environments with dynamic agents with quick planning times. We apply the idea of adaptive dimensionality to speed up path planning in dynamic environments for a robot with no assumptions on its dynamic model. Specifically, our approach considers the time dimension only in those regions of the environment where a potential collision may occur, and plans in a low-dimensional state-space elsewhere. We show that our approach is complete and is guaranteed to find a solution, if one exists, within a cost sub-optimality bound. We experimentally validate our method on the problem of 3D nonholonomic vehicle navigation in dynamic environments. Our results show that the presented approach achieves substantial speedups in planning time over 4D heuristic-based A*, especially when the resulting plan deviates significantly from the one suggested by the heuristic. We tackle the challenge of modeling interactions by presenting a novel statistical model to capture cooperative behavior in human crowds. Previous approaches have used handcrafted functions based on proximity to model human-human and human-robot interactions. However, these approaches can only model simple interactions and fail to generalize for complex crowded settings. We develop an approach that models the joint distribution over future trajectories of all interacting agents in the crowd through a local interaction model that we train using real human trajectory data. The interaction model infers the velocity of each agent based on the spatial orientation of other agents in his vicinity. During prediction, our approach infers the goal of the agent from its past trajectory and uses the learned model to predict its future trajectory. We demonstrate the performance of our method against a state-of-the-art approach on a public dataset and show that our model outperforms when predicting future trajectories for longer horizons. Finally, we lay out future directions of research in the domain of robot navigation in dynamic environments, and the challenges remaining. We plan to verify and validate the proposed work in this thesis on a robot placed in a real human crowd. Other challenges include more accurate long-term prediction, uncertainty associated with predictions and real-time incremental planning algorithms.


Enantioselectivity remains one of synthetic chemistry's most formidable problems. It arises due to the formation of diastereomeric species in a reaction, either in the form of diastereomeric intermediates or a set of diastereomeric transition states. Without control a racemic mixture is formed. A resolution method is then required to separate the enantiomers. Any given resolution method will rely on the differing energies of diastereomers to allow for their separation. Experimentally there are a myriad of different options that may be used to induce separation; for example chromatography and/or crystallisation. The actual process that occurs through- out this separation has not, however, been fully investigated in all cases. A better understanding of the process is able to provide an understanding of how resolution methods work i.e. when diastereomers occur and how great their energy differences are. This is vital in increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of any given resolution method. This theoretical study completed an investigation of the reaction pathway between the enantiomers of 2-formyl-3-hydroxyl[2.2]paracyclophane (FHPC) with (S)-valyl-(S)-valine. A subsequent investigation of an alternative resolution method, involving (R)-α-PEAM, was also conducted. This latter resolution method was proposed experimentally as a simpler method that could aid in improving the separation of the enantiomers. This investigation was carried out using Density Functional Theory (DFT) with the PBE0 functional and the triple-ζ TZVP basis set. The complete reaction profile was determined and diastereomeric intermediates and transition states for both resolution methods along two different pathways were determined; the 'N-deprotonation Pathway' and the 'O-deprotonation Pathway'. The inadequacy of the first resolution method was found to be due to the presence of copper(II). Furthermore it was discovered that the re- action for both pathways would most likely proceed through the 'O-deprotonation Pathway' due to the barriers being lower in energy.


For decades, the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down campaign finance limitations by arguing that deregulation promoted more speech. As Justice Roberts opined in Citizens United, "it is our law and our tradition that more speech, not less, is the governing rule." But in Arizona Free Enterprise Club's Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett (2011), the Court struck down a state effort to increase the communicative capacities of certainly publicly funded candidates.Prior deregulatory campaign finance jurisprudence — strained as it was — at least paid lip service to the ideal of promoting more speech. In Bennett, the Court announced that even speech-promotion could be trumped by another, higher purpose: freezing into place extant disparities in communicative resources. But just as the 14th Amendment does not enact Mr. Herbert Spencer's Social Statics, this principle of power entrenchment should have no place in the American constitutional order. The narrow majority opinion in Bennett should be treated with the same degree of respect for precedent that it gave to milestones of speech-promoting campaign finance jurisprudence.


Open-shell singlet diradicaloids display unique electronic, nonlinear optical, and magnetic activity and could become novel molecular materials for organic electronics, photonics, and spintronics. However, design and synthesis of diradicaloids with a significant polyradical character is a challenging task for chemists. In this Article, we report our efforts toward a tetraradicaloid system. A series of potential tetraradicaloids by fusion of two p-quinodimethane (p-QDM) units with naphthalene or benzene rings in different modes were synthesized. Their model compounds containing one p-QDM moiety were also prepared and compared. Their ground-state structures, physical properties, and chemical reactivity were systematically investigated by various experimental methods such as steady-state and transient absorption, two-photon absorption, X-ray crystallographic analysis, electron spin resonance, superconducting quantum interference device, and electrochemistry, assisted by density functional theory calculations. It was found that their diradical and tetraradical characters show a clear dependence on the fusion mode. Upon the introduction of more five-membered rings, the diradical characters greatly decrease. This difference can be explained by the pro-aromaticity/antiaromaticity of the molecules as well as the intramolecular charge transfer. Our comprehensive studies provide a guideline for the design and synthesis of stable open-shell singlet polycyclic hydrocarbons with significant polyradical characters.


The time course for the closure of linear wounds produced in cultured cell monolayers following either mechanical debridement or excimer laser photoablation were compared. Wounds were produced in the central zone of a confluent layer of bovine corneal epithelial cells, keratocytes, or endothelial cells, and the residual area of the wound measured at regular intervals. Differences in the rate of wound closure between cell types were demonstrated. For epithelial cells the rate of resurfacing after mechanical or excimer laser damage was similar; for keratocytes there was a lag period before cell slide began after laser injury, but the subsequent rate of resurfacing was then similar to mechanical wounds; only for endothelial layers was a significantly reduced rate of closure observed after photoablation as compared to mechanical wounding. In this model of wound healing it appears that it is the mechanism of removal of the extracellular matrix formed by endothelial cells that produces the major difference in the rate of wound closure between mechanical injury or photoablation.


In what concerns extreme values modeling, heavy tailed autoregressive processes defined with the minimum or maximum operator have proved to be good alternatives to classical linear ARMA with heavy tailed marginals (Davis and Resnick [8], Ferreira and Canto e Castro [13]). In this paper we present a complete characterization of the tail behavior of the autoregressive Pareto process known as Yeh-Arnold-Robertson Pareto(III) (Yeh et al. [32]). We shall see that it is quite similar to the first order max-autoregressive ARMAX, but has a more robust parameter estimation procedure, being therefore more attractive for modeling purposes. Consistency and asymptotic normality of the presented estimators will also be stated.


The capital of New South Wales and the most populous city in Australia, Sydney has been represented onscreen since the earliest days of cinema. An eclectic combination of tough inner-city suburbs, beachside communities, and green outlying exurbs, Sydney offers many intriguing possibilities to filmmakers. The tensions and differences found among its many multicultural inhabitants, poorer and wealthier suburbs, and central business district and beaches are reflected, exaggerated, and critiqued in memorable movies such as The Last Wave, Puberty Blues, Strictly Ballroom, and Little Fish, among many others. Sydney is a city where sun, sports, and surf rub shoulders with crime, racial tensions, and class divides. The contributors to this collection take readers on a virtual tour of Sydney, from Kings Cross, the city's red light district and frequent film location, to the famous beaches to explore how representations in movies have both played into and influenced how we think of these spaces and those that frequent them. Essays also consider the experimental film group UBU Films, who shot shorts and features in and around Sydney's inner city suburbs during the 1960s and early 1970s, and the Sydney Opera House, one of the world's most recognizable landmarks, and its role in movies both Australian and international. Packed with full-color photographs, this is the first book of its kind to deal specifically with Sydney and film. It will find a grateful audience among film lovers, casual viewers, tourists, and film historians.


Abstract Background Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) precisely and non-invasively delivers ablative radiation dose to tumors in early-stage lung cancer patients who are not candidates for surgery or refuse it. The aim of research was to evaluate local control, overall survival (OS), local progression free survival (LPFS), distant metastases free survival (DMFS), disease free survival (DFS) and toxicity in early-stage lung cancer patients treated with SBRT in a single tertiary cancer centre. Patients and methods We retrospectively evaluated medical records and radiation treatment plan parameters of 228 tumors irradiated in 206 early-stage lung cancer patients between 2016 and 2021 at the Institute of Oncology Ljubljana. Results After 25 months of median follow up, 68 of 206 (33%) patients died. Median OS was 46 months (CI 36–56), 1-year, 2-year and 3-year OS were 87%, 74% and 62% and 5-year OS was 31%. A total of 45 disease progressions have been identified in 41 patients. Local progress only was noticed in 5 (2%) patients, systemic progress in 32 (16%) and combined systemic and local in 4 (2%) patients. Local control rate (LCR) at 1 year was 98%, at 2 and 3 years 96% and 95% at 5 years. The 1-, 2- and 3-year LPFS were 98%, 96% and 94%, respectively and 5-year LPFS was 82%. One, 2-, 3- and 5-year DFS were 89%, 81%, 72% and 49%, respectively. Among 28 toxicities recorded only one was Grade 4 (pneumonitis), all others were Grade 1 or 2. No differences in LCR, LPFS, DFS were found in univariate analysis comparing patient, tumor, and treatment characteristics. For OS the only statistically significant difference was found in patients with more than 3 comorbidities compared to those with less comorbidities. Conclusions Early lung cancer treated with SBRT at single tertiary cancer centre showed that LCR, LPFS, DFS, DMFS and OS were comparable to published studies. Patients with many comorbidities had significantly worse overall survival compared to those with less comorbidities. No other significant differences by patient, tumor, or treatment characteristics were found for DMFS, LPFS, and DFS. Toxicity data confirmed that treatment was well tolerated.


Anthropologists in the world of insects; Swedish entomology 1880-1920Karin DirkeMy contribution will focus on how the scientific and popular view of animals was formed primarily in Swedish entomology and to show how this view is related to the perception of society.I will discuss a certain historical period; between the breakthrough of Darwinism and the work of the great names in ethology such as Niko Tinbergen and Konrad Lorenz. The context is the study of animal behaviour, and the popularization of such studies, in entomology. Anthropomorphism played an important part in this context in several ways. It was of course necessary in the popularization of entomology, which was surprisingly widespread at the time. It also points towards a change of interest in entomology itself. Previously entomology was primarily concerned with the Linnaean categorization of insects. However at the end of the nineteenth century the entomologists were increasingly interested in the behaviour of insects. In fact at the end of the century the behaviour of insects was better understood than the behaviour of mammals. The interest in insects was both popular and learned. The likeness of humans and (social) insects also became a strategic argument for Darwinism.Animals seem untouched by human social categories such as gender, class or race yet the descriptions of animals to a great extent reproduce the categories. Therefore the study of anthropomorphism is central. Our language is built on the notion of a relationship with the non-human through continuous comparison. In recent years, in the wake of postmodernism, anthropomorphism as a cultural phenomenon has begun to evoke interest among scholars.Since Francis Bacon's days anthropomorphism has been understood as a scientific flaw and as a misguided judgement. To anthropomorphize has been to wrongly ascribe human traits to something nonhuman. Yet the notion that anthropomorphism is wrong is in itself a statement about what is human and what is not. This paradox is an integral part of the history of anthropomorphism however it is rarely considered. The boundaries of humanity have seldom been questioned in this way.This makes anthropomorphism important in connection with the breakthrough of Darwinism in the second half of the nineteenth century. When the boundaries of humanity were no longer self-evident the attitude towards animals and anthropomorphism changed. This aspect of the history of anthropomorphism has been noted in recent studies.Anthropomorphism is highly interesting to study in relation to the growth of the study of animal behaviour as a scientific discipline. It is not seriously questioned until the breakthrough of behaviourism in the early twentieth century. At the same time Darwin's anecdotal and anthropomorphic language of science is an evident point of departure. At this point the use of anthropomorphism in entomology becomes interesting. What does it say in relation to Darwinism? What do the entomologists have to say about categories such as gender, class and race? How do they relate to concepts like society, war and gender concerning insect-societies? What does this tell us about the view of humanity?


The development of computational data science techniques in natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning (ML) algorithms to analyze large and complex textual information opens new avenues to study intricate processes, such as government regulation of financial markets, at a scale unimaginable even a few years ago. This paper develops scalable NLP and ML algorithms (classification, clustering and ranking methods) that automatically classify laws into various codes/labels, rank feature sets based on use case, and induce best structured representation of sentences for various types of computational analysis. The results provide standardized coding labels of policies to assist regulators to better understand how key policy features impact financial markets.


Relationship between P300 findings and neurological soft signs in patients with first episode schizophrenia Objective: In this study, the relationship between neurological soft signs and P300 components was explored in patients with schizophrenia. Method: 22 first-episode schizophrenia patients who were evaluated according to DSM-IV criteria and whose disease lasted at least six months, and a group of 22 healthy controls were included in this study. In both groups, neurophysiological measurements were performed to investigate the P300 potentials and Neurological Evaluation Scale (NES) was applied to detect neurological soft signs. Scale for the Assessment of the Negative Symptoms (SANS) and Scale for the Assessment of the Positive Symptoms (SAPS) were applied only to the schizophrenia group. Results: Results revealed that first episode schizophrenia group had higher NES total and subscale scores, lower P300 amplitude and longer P300 latency compared to healthy controls. NES scores with the highest significant difference from healthy controls were Total NES and NES motor sequencing subscale. When the first-episode schizophrenia group is compared with the control group by the P300 components, difference of P300 amplitude was more significant than difference of P300 latency. It was also found that NES scores and P300 values were not correlated with clinical variables in the patient group. Conclusion: These findings indicate that pathology of these biological markers was found at the beginning of the disease and was not effected by clinical variables. This result can be interpreted as the pathologies exhibited with NES and P300 measurements could not be state but trait characteristics. Within soft neurological signs the most pathological results were obtained from motor sequencing subscale and its relationship with P300 amplitude was statistically significant. These findings indicate that the high scores of motor sequencing subscale which is thought to be sign of prefrontal pathology can be better explained with problems about attention.


Although many researchers have investigated voltage life characteristics of XLPE cables, the voltage life curve of XLPE insulation has not been made clear because of large deviations in the obtained data. Moreover, the voltage life curve of a XLPE cable, which is significantly affected by defect size and shape, cannot be applied to another cable having different defects. The authors obtained an intrinsic stress life curve of XLPE which included no defects. The intrinsic stress life curve demonstrates the existence of a threshold stress, which causes no degradation in the insulation. The application of the intrinsic stress life curve makes possible to estimate the voltage life curve of any cable with known defects. A method for calculating the defect size that would not initiate any degradation in XLPE insulation under a given electrical stress is proposed.


This thesis examines the changing role of housing authorities within the wider context of the restructuring of the British welfare state. Between the years 1979 and 1997, four successive Conservative administrations attempted to eliminate the municipal ownership and management of the social housing sector. Central to this restructuring was the notion of 'enabling' and this crystallised the Conservatives' vision for the future role of housing authorities as non-providers. Instead, local authorities were expected to facilitate housing provision through the private or voluntary sectors. At the time this research began, it was clear that, whilst the magnitude of this reorientation of local government's traditional role generated significant discussion at the conceptual level, there remained a paucity of empirical research examining the actual practice of enabling at the local level. The research on which this thesis draws, therefore, helps to address the imbalance between the theorisation of enabling and detailed empirical work. It explores the way in which housing authorities have responded to the enabling challenge and the resultant implications this has for the delivery of housing services. In the UK, the conceptual discussion of enabling was most clearly articulated in the enabling typology developed by Leach et al. (1992) and this formed the theoretical underpinnings of the present study. A two-part research strategy was adopted in which, first, a postal survey was administered to 100 housing authorities. This provided a scientific sampling framework from which three case-study housing authorities were selected for the second part of the data collection. Here, qualitative interviews were undertaken with senior policy-makers from the housing departments and their housing association and voluntary sector 'partners'. There was variation between the three case-study authorities in their transition to the enabling role and, in this context, the prominent research findings are as follows. The analysis of the data gathered from the first case-study authority highlights the way in which resistance to change and institutional inertia prevented the housing department from shifting to the enabling role. Hence, it continued to operate according to the traditional role. In the other two case-study authorities, the research findings show: (a) the variation between central and local government in their interpretation of enabling, particularly in the context of the compulsory competitive tendering of housing management functions; (b) the shift towards partnership working and the way in which the housing authorities retained a dominant role amongst the plethora of agencies that are now involved in policy formation and service delivery; (c) the decline in direct provision was precipitating the 'reinvention' of new roles centred around 'community governance'; (d) the implications that all these developments had in relation to the internal organisational structure and management processes of the two authorities.In examining the practice of enabling housing authorities, this thesis contributes to an understanding of the way in which the wider role and function of local government has been restructured from its position under the post-war consensus.


Healthcare workers (HCWs) and healthcare students are at increased risk of becoming infected with and being a vector of transmission of COVID-19. Vaccination efforts amongst this group of persons have been hampered in some countries by hesitancy to uptake the COVID-19 vaccine. The factors related to vaccine hesitancy have been reported in several systematic reviews. However, a comprehensive overview of barriers and facilitators of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy is greatly needed to address effective interventions in this population. Understanding and designing effective strategies to promote vaccination among HCWs is pivotal to secure an appropriate and safe healthcare provision. The current protocol describes the methodology for an Umbrella Review that explores the barriers and facilitators of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy for HCWs and healthcare students. The databases that will be searched are CINAHL, MedLine, Cochrane Library, PubMed, ProQuest, Web of Science, Science Direct, IBSS, Google Scholar, and Epistemonikos. Studies will be eligible for inclusion if they: (i) conducted a systematic review (with or without meta-analysis); (ii) included primary sources utilizing a quantitative methodology; (iii) investigated factors related to COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy; (iv) and included a sub/population of HCWs or healthcare students aged 18–65. The screening processes and data extraction will be conducted independently by two reviewers. The Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) Critical Appraisal Checklist for Systematic Reviews and Research Syntheses will be used to assess the methodological quality of the included reviews. The degree to which the included reviews contain the same primary studies will also be assessed and reported. The outcomes of this review will have wide-reaching implications for the research area, healthcare systems and institutions, and governments worldwide.


Santmire's much-acclaimed The Travail of Nature: The Ambiguous Ecological Promise of Christian Theology documented the unfortunate legacy of many Christian theological notions in the use, abuse, and destruction of the natural world, along with its positive aspects. This new brief, but penetrating, look at Christian theological concepts of nature returns to the fray, this time to reclaim classic, mostly pre-modern Christian themes and re-envision them in light of the global environmental and cultural crisis. This revisionist work-"to revise the classical Christian story in order to identify and to celebrate its ecological and cosmic promise"-mines Christian cosmology (the Great Chain of Being), Christology, Creation, and Eucharist, so that the Christian "story" can be then rediscovered (history), reshaped (theology), re-experienced (spirituality), and re-enacted (ritual).


Background. Several studies indicated that children seem to be less frequently infected with SARS-CoV-2 and potentially less contagious. To examine the spread of SARS-CoV-2 we combined both RT-PCR testing and serology in children in the most affected region in France, during the COVID-19 epidemic. Methods. From April 14, 2020 to May 12, 2020, we conducted a cross-sectional prospective, multicenter study. Healthy controls and pauci-symptomatic children from birth to age 15 years were enrolled by 27 ambulatory pediatricians. A nasopharyngeal swab was taken for detection of SARS-CoV-2 by RT-PCR and a microsample of blood for micro-method serology. Results. Among the 605 children, 322 (53.2%) were asymptomatic and 283 (46.8%) symptomatic. RT-PCR testing and serology were positive for 11 (1.8%) and 65 (10.7%) of all children, respectively. Only 3 children were RT-PCR-positive without any antibody response have been detected. The frequency of positivity on RT-PCR for SARS-CoV-2 was significantly higher in children with positive serology than those with a negative one (12.3% vs 0.6%, p<0.001). Contact with a person with proven COVID-19 increased the odds of positivity on RT-PCR (OR 7.8, 95% confidence interval [1.5; 40.7]) and serology (15.1 [6.6; 34.6]). Conclusion. In area heavily affected by COVID-19, after the peak of the first epidemic wave and during the lockdown, the rate of children with positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR was very low (1.8%), but the rate of positive on serology was higher (10.7%). Most of PCR positive children had at the same time, positive serology suggesting a low risk of transmission.


INTRODUCTION
This study was aimed to investigate the effects of raloxifene on intact parathyroid hormone (PTH) level and bone mineral density (BMD) for 8 months in women on hemodialysis and women with chronic kidney disease stage 5 not dependent on dialysis to determine its effect on secondary hyperparathyroidism and osteoporosis.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Fifty-one women on hemodialysis and 9 with chronic kidney disease stage 5 were randomly assigned to receive oral raloxifene, 60 mg/d, or placebo for 8 months. Baseline blood determinations and BMD were done and repeated after 8 months. Serum levels of total calcium, phosphorus, alkaline phosphatase, and intact PTH were measured.

RESULTS
Serum levels of intact PTH significantly decreased in both groups, and there was no difference between the two groups after 8 months (P = .37). Serum phosphorus levels also decreased by 1.8% in the two groups. After 8 months of treatment, the BMD of the lumbar spine and femural neck decreased by 1.9% in the control group, while an increase in BMD was observed in the raloxifene group,with an average increase in both BMDs of the lumbar spine and the femural neck by 2% (significant in the lumbar spine; P = .01).

CONCLUSIONS
Raloxifene has proven to be an effective medication in terms of improving BMD, with no adverse effects. However, it had no effect on controlling hyperparathyroidism in our patients. Long-term studies should be done to investigate the effects of raloxifene in chronic kidney disease and dialysis patients.


In Italy the worsening of the economic crisis has led to a general deterioration in households' economic conditions, with more intense effects in the South and among younger people. This work aims at providing an assessment of the social protection tools used in Italy during the crisis to support households as well as of the way policymakers chose to strengthen and improve them, putting more attention on the most disadvantaged categories and geographical areas. The analysis shows the inadequacy of the Italian social protection system, where social safety nets are still based today on the protection of open-ended contracts, while welfare focuses its resources on the elderly. The recent reform of social safety nets has reduced the imbalance between standard and atypical workers, although differences remain considerable. Against the risk of poverty a national and universal instrument still lacks. The result is an unequal impoverishment, in which young people and the South pay the highest price.


The presence of deeply erosive, conglomeratic sandstone-filled channels around the Permian–Triassic (P–Tr) boundary in East Greenland has been widely cited as evidence for a major, late Permian eustatic lowstand. Facies analysis of such channels and their associated strata in fact suggests that they record part of an intrinsic style of basinal deposition (that persisted into Early Triassic time). Their origin can be explained without the need to invoke eustatic sea-level fall. Active faulting and hinterland elevation is envisaged to have generated powerful sediment-gravity flows that were capable of submarine erosion of fine-grained, unconsolidated strata. Stacked, turbidite-sandstone-filled lenses also occur beneath fan delta sandbodies and probably record infill of channels or chutes cut into the subaqueous slopes of such deltas. Shale successions developed between the incised channel locations record complete P–Tr transitions in which a rapid onset of anoxic deposition is seen in latest Permian time. This is the local manifestation of a global anoxic event. Unusual aspects of the Lower Triassic sequence in Greenland include the presence of well-oxygenated intervals, stromatolite bioherms and red algae.


Detection and tracking of moving obstacles is central to collision free navigation of autonomous rovers in dynamic environments. Template matching based methods for obstacle tracking have been proposed in literature. These methods have limitations in tracking dynamic obstacles owing to scale and rotation variations. These variations arise due to relative velocity between the rover and the obstacle to be tracked. Due to the relative velocity, the correlation between the template of the obstacle and the region in the image corresponding to the obstacle in successive frames degrades. In this paper we present three schemes targeted at improving robustness of template matching based tracking technique using monocular vision. The algorithms presented account for the geometric constraints posed on an image captured from a fixed camera mounted on a mobile platform. We present experimental results comparing the performance of our technique with the existing template matching based techniques. Also, we present two real-time applications in the form of object following behavior and obstacle avoidance behavior to demonstrate its efficacy and computational feasibility.


Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a common arrhythmia in patients with aortic stenosis. When these patients are treated medically or by surgical aortic valve replacement, AF is associated with increased risk of adverse events including death. Growing evidence suggests a significant impact of AF on outcomes also in patients with aortic valve stenosis undergoing transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). Conversely, limited evidence is available regarding the optimal management of this condition. This review aims to summarize prevalence, pathophysiology, prognosis, and treatment of AF in patients undergoing TAVI.


Postural correction of regional pulmonary function increases markedly the treatment efficacy of patients with fresh destructive pulmonary tuberculosis. Practically all patients with an unburdened anamnesis showed abacillation and healing of the cavities under the effect of this treatment. Patients cured by this method showed no exacerbations and recurrences in the future as well as the development of cor pulmonale.


187 © 2 01 5 M A H ea lth ca re L td Abstract Radiotherapy is a highly effective cancer treatment that not only offers cure but also excellent palliation of disease related symptoms and complications. Although radiotherapy is primarily an outpatient treatment, delivered within specialist centres, a diverse range of health professionals may be involved in the treatment pathway before, during and after treatment. Radiotherapy can, and does, make a significant contribution to improving a patient's wellbeing through effective symptom management. However, treatment-related side-effects do occur, with an acute skin reaction being one of the most common. It is imperative that radiotherapy-induced skin reactions are correctly assessed and appropriately managed in promoting patient comfort, treatment compliance and enhanced quality of life. This article describes how the use of a recognised assessment tool and evidence-based guidelines can facilitate consistent, high-quality care in the management of radiotherapy-induced skin reactions.


The deterioration of the transportation infrastructures in the United States is proceeding at an alarming rate. Therefore, it becomes increasingly urgent to determine the feasibility of utilizing high performance composite materials for the fabrication of new structures as well as for the retrofitting of existing ones. It was estimated that almost 30 percent of 600,000 highway bridges in the US are either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete and repair costs are estimated to start at $90 billion [Dunker, KF and Rabbat, BG, 1993]. In 1997, Salim et al. reported that 42 percent of the nation's bridges are considered deficient.Fiber Reinforced Polymer (FRP) bridge decking holds out great promise for partially ameliorating this unsatisfactory condition. However, to be properly used in modern bridge decking application, FRP decks must be made to act compositely with underlying stringers (this work focuses on steel stringers). To behave compositely, a sufficiently robust shear transfer interface at the FRP to steel transition zone is required. While some efforts to achieve such interfacial shear transfer have been undertaken current understanding is weak and existing theories inadequate. The current research aims to contribute to our evolving understanding of this complex and important interface.The research reported herein find that FRP deck and the underlying steel beam on both specimens tested as part of this work are interacting in a partially composite way at large load; as evidence by the discontinuity in strain at the FRP-to-steel interface. This result means that there was observed to be significant slip between FRP deck and underlying steel beam. It is also noted that at service load (e.g. 0-30 kips), even though the strain variations are relatively small, the FRP deck and steel beam are not acting in a fully composite fashion. It appears from the results presented herein that effective width approaching 75% of beam spacing (the overall width of the FRP deck).


The continental crustal growth has been a great interest to geoscientists and its importance is self-evident. Any models trying to reveal how it works must be able to explain 1) how the continental crust gains its andesitic bulk composition with juvenile isotope signatures; 2) how the volume of the crust increases episodically. Granitoids with the juvenile isotopic signatures in the collision zones provide the special insights into the nature of the continental crust and a unique opportunity to investigate the mechanism of crust growth. This thesis reports results from major and trace element data, whole rock Sr-Nd-Hf-Pb isotopic data, zircon geochronology and in situ Hf isotopes of granitoids as well as, if any, the enclosed mafic magmatic enclaves (MMEs) from the three ancient collision zones crossing the Northern Tibetan Plateau.
I-type granitoids and their MMEs from the East Kunlun Orogenic Belt (EK) in the Northern Tibetan Plateau are dated as 250 Ma years old. They are cal-alkaline in nature with compositions resembling the bulk continental crust (BCC). Whole rock Sr-Nd-Pb-Hf isotopes reveal that they are products of partial melting of the 'trapped' subducted oceanic crust at the onset of the collision and the MMEs are the aggregated early cumulates in the parental magma rather than the mafic endmember involved in the magma mixing as previously suggested.
I- and S-type granitoids from the Qilian Block (QB) further north in the Great Plateau are dated as 450 Ma. Their lithological and geochemical heterogeneity and isotopic changes with time are inferred to correspond to the collision. The abundant inherited zircons with ages as old as Archean reveal the presence of the Archean basement underneath the Qilian Block and indicate that the Qilian Block may have been a micro continent during its drift in the ancient ocean.
Granitoids and their enclosed cumulates from Kekeli Batholith further north in the plateau are 500 Ma years old. They have decoupled whole rock Nd and Hf isotopes and discrepancy between whole rock Hf and zircon in situ Hf isotopes. These inconsistences are understood to result from different mineral crystallization timings during mixing between endmembers with distinct isotopes. This highlights the need for detailed whole-rock or non-zircon phases Hf isotopic investigation in order to develop a comprehensive understanding of the granitoids of hybrid origin.


Aimed to evaluate response of ecosystem service value to land use change in coastal zone of Bohai sea in last 30years, Series satellite remote sensing images obtained in 1988, 1998 and 2007 were employed to surveyed land use change integrated field surveying,firstly.Then an unit table of ecosystem services function value of main land use type was created. The response of ecosystem service value to land use change in 13 coastal zone regions of the Bohai sea in last 30 years was assessed. The result showed: the ecosystem service value lost 60.74×108RMB in coastal zone of Bohai sea caused by land use change in last 30years. Amony the 13 coastal zone region, the ecosystem service value increased only in Yantai coastal zone region and Dalian coastal zone region, there are 0.36×108RMB and 0.20×108RMB,respectively. While the ecosystem service value reduced in 11 coastal zone regions, such as Yingkou coastal zone region, Panjin coastal zone region, Binzhou coastal zone region, et al.the total lost value is 60.30×108RMB.


Purpose of study To study risk factors associated with obstetric brachial plexus injuries (OBPI) and to study outcomes of OBPI. Methodology Retrospective audit study. All neonates with OBPI that were diagnosed in a tertiary maternity and neonatal unit over a 6 year period were identified and data about associated factors was collected from electronic health records and patients' case notes. Results A total of 68 patients were identified between 2004 and 2009 averaging 2 per 1000 live births. 55% of mothers had body mass index (BMI) more than 25. In the general obstetric population, 40.5% of mothers had BMI >25 at booking. 85% of neonates with OBPI were over 4.5 kg. 51% of babies had shoulder dystocia. 95% of OBPIs were unilateral. 15% of OBPIs had associated injuries such as clavicle and humerus fractures. 7% of babies with OBPI were referred to a tertiary nerve injury unit. 69% of OBPIs resolved completely at 3 months of age, 22% between 3 and 12 months and 4% resolved after 12 months. 4% of the babies with OBPI needed ongoing follow-up after 12 months of age. Conclusion OBPI is more likely to be associated when maternal BMI is more than 25 and birth weight of infants more than 4.5 kg. Complete resolution of OBPI within 3 months of age was observed in more than 2rd/3rd of the patients. The risk of sustaining OBPI should be individualised depending on antenatal risk factors. Most injuries resolve completely.


: Three patients developed renal failure a few days after onset of sulfinpyrazone administration. In two the renal dysfunction was reversible, while the third died of a second myocardial infarction. The clinical picture of renal failure was uncharacteristic. It is recommended that renal function be tested two to four days after starting sulfinpyrazone, and to discontinue the drug immediately if there is a rise in blood urea nitrogen and creatinine. Since in two of the patients the creatinine values were elevated before sulfinpyrazone had been administered, it is clear that even minor pointers to impaired renal function should be considered as contraindications to the use of sulfinpyrazone.


Mass Media Laws and Regulations of the Philippines, 2d ed. Luis V. Teodoro Jr. and Rosalinda V. Kabatay. Singapore: Asian Media Information and Communication Centre, 2001. 490 pp. $25 pbk. When asked to name a country showcasing adoption of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abroad, few journalism and mass communication scholars will likely mention the Philippines. Even those media law scholars with a sophisticated international and comparative outlook have difficulty tracing the freespeech pedigree of the Philippines directly to the U.S. Constitution. This should come as little surprise because the Southeast Asian nation is indelibly etched in their memory for its "people's power" revolution that overthrew President Ferdinando Marcos's authoritarian regime in 1986. Mass Media Laws and Regulations of the Philippines shows how pervasive U.S. constitutional law has been in its impact on freedom of speech and the press there. Professor Luis V. Teodoro Jr. of the University of the Philippines and Professor Rosalinda V. Kabatay of the University of Asia and the Pacific in Manila report the free-expression guarantee to the Philippine Constitution came as the result of U.S. President William McKinley's Instructions to the Second Philippine Commission in 1900. Teodoro and Kabatay focus on a number of primary and secondary laws, as well as the constitutional clauses, affecting the Philippine media. The term "media" encompasses newspapers, magazines, broadcasting, film, advertising, and book publishing, as well as the Internet, cell phones, and telecommunication. The authors provide the requisite overview of the nation's law and judicial system, freedom of expression, and the press, before placing freedom of expression in constitutional perspective by highlighting several provisions of the Philippine Constitution, including those on privacy and the right to information. They pay close attention to the penal and civil codes that affect the Philippine media when national security, reputation, or privacy collide with news reporting. Likewise, they duly note other statutes with media implications such as the nation's shield, copyright, election, and advertising laws. The authors consider the Philippine "shield law" more expansive than the journalist's privilege in American law because the Philippine law protects journalists from compelled disclosure of their sources "unless the court of a House or Committee of Congress finds that such revelations are demanded by the security of the State." Especially noteworthy is the book's succinct discourse on the statutory protection of the school press in the Philippines. The Campus Journalism Act of 1991, which reflects the Philippine government's avowed commitment "to promote the development and growth of campus journalism" and the Philippine Supreme Court's liberal interpretation of the law, stand in sharp contrast to the U.S. Supreme Court's constrictive decision in Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier (1988), in which school officials were given considerable authority over school-- sponsored expressive activities. …


The bottleneck of all cryptosystems is the difficulty of the computational complexity of the polynomials multiplication, vectors multiplication, etc. Thus most of them use some algorithms to reduce the complexity of the multiplication like NTT, Montgomery, CRT, and Karatsuba algorithms, etc. We contribute by creating a new release of NTRUencrypt1024 with great improvement, by using our own polynomials multiplication algorithm operate in the ring of the form Rq = Zq[X]/(X + 1), combined to Montgomery algorithm rather than using the NTT algorithm as used by the original version. We obtained a good result, our implementation outperforms the original one by speed-up of a factor up to (X10) for encryption and a factor up to (X11) for decryption functions. We note that our improved implementation used the latest hash function standard SHA-3, and reduce the size of the public key, private key, and cipher-text from 4097 bytes to 2049 bytes with the same security level.