Abstract A network of seven thermographs has been operated continuously within the city of Edmonton, Alberta, since February 1968 by Geoscience Research Associates, Ltd., under contract to the Department of Health of the Government of Alberta. Data from these stations, together with hourly observations from two rural airports and one urban airport in the Edmonton area, are inadequate for mapping the temperature field, but provide an unusual opportunity for the study of some climatological characteristics of urban temperatures over relatively flat terrain undisturbed by lake or sea influences. Annual variations in maximum heat island intensity based on monthly mean data are ill-defined because of large variations in month-to-month frequencies of favorable nights. Stratified monthly samples consisting only of nights with intense heat islands show weak annual maxima in January and June. A well-defined diurnal cycle in heat island intensity is found with a maximum 3–4 hr after sunset in all seasons. The time ...


Patch-clamp recordings and glucagon release measurements were combined to determine the role of plasma membrane ATP-sensitive K channels (KATP channels) in the control of glucagon secretion from mouse pancreatic -cells. In wild-type mouse islets, glucose produced a concentration-dependent (half-maximal inhibitory concentration [IC50] 2.5 mmol/l) reduction of glucagon release. Maximum inhibition ( 50%) was attained at glucose concentrations >5 mmol/l. The sulfonylureas tolbutamide (100 mol/l) and glibenclamide (100 nmol/l) inhibited glucagon secretion to the same extent as a maximally inhibitory concentration of glucose. In mice lacking functional KATP channels (SUR1 / ), glucagon secretion in the absence of glucose was lower than that observed in wild-type islets and both glucose (0–20 mmol/l) and the sulfonylureas failed to inhibit glucagon secretion. Membrane potential recordings revealed that -cells generate action potentials in the absence of glucose. Addition of glucose depolarized the -cell by 7 mV and reduced spike height by 30% Application of tolbutamide likewise depolarized the -cell ( 17 mV) and reduced action potential amplitude (43%). Whereas insulin secretion increased monotonically with increasing external K concentrations (threshold 25 mmol/l), glucagon secretion was paradoxically suppressed at intermediate concentrations (5.6–15 mmol/l), and stimulation was first detectable at >25 mmol/l K . In -cells isolated from SUR1 / mice, both tolbutamide and glucose failed to produce membrane depolarization. These effects correlated with the presence of a small (0.13 nS) sulfonylurea-sensitive conductance in wild-type but not in SUR1 / -cells. Recordings of the free cytoplasmic Ca concentration ([Ca ]i) revealed that, whereas glucose lowered [Ca ]i to the same extent as application of tolbutamide, the Na channel blocker tetrodotoxin, or the Ca channel blocker Co in wild-type -cells, the sugar was far less effective on [Ca ]i in SUR1 / -cells. We conclude that the KATP channel is involved in the control of glucagon secretion by regulating the membrane potential in the -cell in a way reminiscent of that previously documented in insulin-releasing -cells. However, because -cells possess a different complement of voltage-gated ion channels involved in action potential generation than the -cell, moderate membrane depolarization in -cells is associated with reduced rather than increased electrical activity and secretion. Diabetes 53 (Suppl. 3):S181–S189, 2004


An efficient public bus transit service is critical to achieving sustainable urban transport. To design an efficient bus transit system, a fundamental requirement is the complete list of all bus stops in the city. Often the bus stops are owned and maintained by a different government entity from that which plans and operates the buses. As a result, bus stop information is incomplete, erroneous, and outdated leading to sub-optimal planning and operations and consequent reduction in the transit agency's ridership. In this work, we propose an algorithm to mine bus stops automatically from bus GPS trajectories. The proposed technique is powered by a novel combination of feature mining with classification algorithms to predict bus stops in a city. Our technique negates the need for manual field visits to annotate bus stops and saves time and cost for transit agencies. We perform extensive empirical analysis on real datasets from Chennai, India and firmly establish the reliability of our technique by achieving an accuracy of almost 99%.


Abstract Burrowing mammals often have considerable geomorphological impacts, and their tunneling activities may decrease the stability of landforms. We document the spatial distribution of Norwegian lemming burrows in a subarctic alpine meadow to determine the preferred locations for burrow entrances and to examine the potential for burrowing to decrease the stability of periglacial landforms at the site. Burrow entrances were disproportionately common into the base and sides of landforms (>68% of burrows), probably reflecting the lower energetic cost of moving soil horizontally, rather than vertically, out of burrows. Most burrow entrances (>60%) were also located under large rocks, which probably improve burrow stability by providing a firm ceiling to the entrance. Field observations show that these burrows are relatively stable, as only 3% were associated with any signs of increased erosion or landform instability. Therefore, in contrast to some previous studies, and despite burrowing being concentrated on landforms, we suggest that these rodents have little direct impact on landform integrity at this site.


Transbronchial needle aspiration (TBNA) for diagnosis and staging of bronchogenic carcinoma has evolved in the USA since the late 1970's. Initial reports advised that aspirated specimens be flushed into a container by normal saline or Hank's solution and processed in a cytology laboratory usually by Millipore filter and other techniques. A highly sophisticated cytology laboratory is the key to the success of this procedure. This study was designed to assess a simpler alternative method of processing the specimen by a direct smear technique. From June 1990 to September 1990, 40 procedures were performed on 34 consecutive patients. Seventy two paired direct smear and fluid specimens for cytology examination were collected. Fifty specimens were found to be negative in both types of specimen preparation. Fifteen were found to be positive in both types of specimens preparation, and six specimens were found to be positive only in the direct smear preparation. One of the 72 specimens was found to be positive in the Millipore and other preparation techniques. Based on our data, we conclude that the use of the direct smear for TBNA specimen preparation is an effective, simpler, and improved method. Proper use of it may increase the diagnostic yield and result in better acceptance of this new procedure.


Microscopic crowd simulators rely on models of local interaction (e.g. collision avoidance) to synthesize the individual motion of each virtual agent. The quality of the resulting motions heavily depends on this component, which has significantly improved in the past few years. Recent advances have been in particular due to the introduction of a short-horizon motion prediction strategy that enables anticipated motion adaptation during local interactions among agents. However, the simplicity of prediction techniques of existing models somewhat limits their domain of validity. In this paper, our key objective is to significantly improve the quality of simulations by expanding the applicable range of motion predictions. To this end, we present a novel local interaction algorithm with a new context-aware, probabilistic motion prediction model. By context-aware, we mean that this approach allows crowd simulators to account for many factors, such as the influence of environment layouts or in-progress interactions among agents, and has the ability to simultaneously maintain several possible alternate scenarios for future motions and to cope with uncertainties on sensing and other agent's motions. Technically, this model introduces "collision probability fields" between agents, efficiently computed through the cumulative application of Warp Operators on a source Intrinsic Field. We demonstrate how this model significantly improves the quality of simulated motions in challenging scenarios, such as dense crowds and complex environments.


The project aims to rebuild the landscape, the ancient road system and the anthropic development in the northern part of the ancient Lombard Duchy of Friuli. The first part of the work was about the study and the analysis of several aerial photographs. We recognized and identified several traces of anomalies on the terrain. Each photo was georeferenced on a GIS and each trace was digitalized to create a complete database connected to all the castra found in Paulus Diaconus' Historia Langobardorum and all the necropolis found during excavations from the 1800 century till our days. As a completion of this work, several flights with an ultra light plane were made to produce oblique aerial photography. Every anomaly found during the flights was photographed and georeferenced with a portable GPS device, in correlation with the airplane GPS. As a research on new technologies we tested a Unmanned Aerial Vehicle: the purpose was to test a low cost system for the creation of a 3D mesh regarding archaeological sites with open source program: Python Photogrammetry Toolbox, created by A. Bezzi and Meshlab, created by the University of Pisa. The second stage of this research aimed to try to reproduce local  traffics during the Lombard period using spatial analysis. A DTM  with a 5m resolution was created as a base-map and variables to get the cost model were added: slope, altitude above sea level, hydrographical network, the line of sight. To each variable a weight was given according to the influence it had on the model: the slope had the greatest weight, then the rivers, divided according to their water flow, last the analysis of visibility.  An anisotropic cost model was used where the cost dependent on both the direction of travel and the attributes of individual map cells. The roads reconstructed were compared with the hypothetical road network done with historical and archaeological studies. All results and data collected, were inserted into a WebGis created by Emanuel Demetrescu with open source programs. A prediction model for answer a specific problem was also created: in our region we know where the Lombard died but we don't know where they lived. For create this model we used as variables the slope, number of necropolis and castles  into the territory, distance of the river, elevation, sun exposure, the road network. This model was created with a commercial software but thanks to Augusto Palombini, researcher in CNR, we made a similar work with an open source software. The final part of the project was focused on the reconstruction of the landscape during the early medieval period in two samples sites, for which we have more information and archival data. To achieve this reconstructions historical maps and documents of excavations was used as well as pollen analysis which provide more detailed information in relation to the vegetative cover. All the archival data was inserted in a specific geographic software that generated the 3D reconstruction of the ancient landscape with a good approximation.


The new 2018 EBA EU-wide stress test exercise is similar to previous exercises for what concerns the employed methodology. The major change compared to the 2016 exercise is the inclusion of the new international accounting standards, which contributes to the increased severity of the exercise. The methodology incorporates several measures to guarantee internal consistency. However, despite all the progress made in designing the exercise, there remain critical areas concerning the application of a static-balance sheet assumption, the underrepresentation of liquidity risk and the implications of the lack of a fail-pass threshold. Improvements in these areas can enhance reliability of stress test results and empower their role as external and internal communication tools.


Abstract Objectives COVID-19 vaccines have been proven to be safe in the healthy population. However, gaps remain in the evidence of their safety in patients with systemic autoimmune and inflammatory disorders (SAIDs). COVID-19 vaccination related adverse events (ADEs) in patients with SAIDs and healthy controls (HC) seven days post-vaccination were assessed in the COVAD study, a patient self-reported cross-sectional survey. Methods The survey was circulated in early 2021 by > 110 collaborators (94 countries) to collect SAID details, COVID-19 vaccination details, and 7-day vaccine ADEs, irrespective of respondent vaccination status. Analysis was performed based on data distribution and variable type. Results 10900 respondents [42 (30-55) years, 74% females and 45% Caucasians] were analyzed. 5,867 patients (54%) with SAIDs were compared with 5033 HCs. 79% had minor and only 3% had major vaccine ADEs requiring urgent medical attention (but not hospital admission) overall. Headache [SAIDs=26%, HCs=24%; OR = 1.1 (1.03-1.3); p = 0.014], abdominal pain [SAIDs=2.6%, HCs=1.4%; OR = 1.5 (1.1-2.3); p = 0.011], and dizziness [SAIDs=6%, HCs=4%; OR = 1.3 (1.07-1.6); p = 0.011], were slightly more frequent in SAIDs. Overall, major ADEs [SAIDs=4%, HCs=2%; OR = 1.9 (1.6-2.2); p < 0.001] and, specifically, throat closure [SAIDs=0.5%, HCs=0.3%; OR = 5.7 (2.9-11); p = 0.010] were more frequent in SAIDs though absolute risk was small (0-4%). Major ADEs and hospitalizations (less than 2%) were comparable across vaccine types in SAIDs. Conclusion Vaccination against COVID-19 is relatively safe in SAID patients. SAIDs were at a higher risk of major ADEs than HCs, though absolute risk was small. There are small differences in minor ADEs between vaccine types in SAID patients.


IntroductionIn recent years, numerous commentators have called for the National Collegiate Athletic Association ("NCAA") to relax its rules prohibiting ath lete pay.1 This movement to allow athletes to share in the revenues of college sports arises from the belief that college athletes sacrifice too much time,2 personal autonomy,3 and physical health to justify their lack of pay.4 It further criticizes the NCAA's "no pay" rules for keeping the revenues derived from college sports "in the hands of a select few administrators, athletic directors, and coaches."5Nevertheless, opponents of "pay for play" cite to numerous problems that they believe will emerge from lifting the NCAA's "no pay" rules.6 Among these problems, opponents argue, is that granting college athletes the legal status of "employees" would convert the athletes' tax-exempt scholarships into taxable income-a result that may offset any economic benefits of "pay for play."7This article explains why a "pay for play" model of college sports would not necessarily require college athletes to pay taxes on their educational scholarships. Part I of this article discusses the economic and legal landscape of big-time college sports, and introduces the fallacious legal argument that "pay for play" would saddle college athletes with substantial tax liability related to their educational scholarships.8 Part II provides a brief primer on the U.S. tax code-exploring sections of the code that may allow for paid college athletes to enjoy a tax-free education.9 Finally, Part III explores how, with proper tax planning, colleges may provide their athletes with bona fide employment contracts that are unlikely to risk the taxexempt status of the athletes' college scholarships.10I. The Changing Economic Landscape of Big-Time College SportsA. Historic Treatment of U.S. College AthletesThe college sports industry represents a more than eleven billion dollar U.S. enterprise.11 At present, over fifty U.S. colleges generate upwards of seventy million dollars per year in athletic revenues.12 Meanwhile, twentyeight colleges generate annual athletic revenues that exceed $100 million.13 Most colleges with big-time sports programs focus their efforts on generating revenues in two sports: football and men's basketball.14 In these sports, the star athletes devote upwards of forty hours per week to team travel, play, and practice.15If U.S. colleges were for-profit entities, the most successful football and men's basketball programs would produce high shareholder distributions.16 Because the NCAA consists of exclusively non-profit colleges, however, the collegiate sports enterprise operates subject to a "non-distribution constraint."17 This means that colleges with big-time football and men's basketball programs either reinvest their revenues into other college programs, or they allocate their revenues as windfall payments to quasi-shareholders such as school administrators, athletic directors, and coaches.18Given the revenues brought in by these programs, one might expect colleges to allocate some of their athletic revenues to the athletes.19 Nevertheless, the NCAA Principle of Amateurism disallows colleges from paying athletes and threatens to ban any NCAA member college that engages in "pay for play."20 Thus, pursuant to the NCAA's bylaws, no NCAA member college would dare publicly offer any financial benefits to its athletes beyond a tax-exempt scholarship to cover the costs of tuition, books, and room and board.21B. Three Approaches to Reforming College SportsBased on the colossal disparity between the revenues derived from college sports and the college athletes' compensation, there is an emerging movement to reform the financial aspects of collegiate sports.22 Some advocates of reform have called for the NCAA to make voluntary changes to its Principle of Amateurism.23 Others have explored the potential for players to unionize under federal labor laws. …


AMITA GOYAL Over the course of history, women have slowly begun to hold influential roles in the computing industry, Although progress has been made, the precipitous journey is not yet complete. This paper presents a historical analysis of the entrance and role of women in the computing industry, a discussion on the existence and impact of the glass ceiling, and a detailed and informative collection of programs and opportunities established to abet women in succeeding in the industry. The information compiled in this work will prove useful not only to the women already employed in the industry but also to women contemplating entrance.


Abstract Overfishing and habitat loss have reduced Pseudopleuronectes americanus (Winter Flounder) populations within the Gulf of Maine (GOM), and despite strict management regulations, abundance is still low. As the GOM continues to warm, there is need to characterize Winter Flounder movements in estuaries to better understand essential habitat use. To characterize movements and habitat use of Winter Flounder, we tagged 17 juvenile flounder (115–170 mm) with acoustic transmitters (Vemco V7-2x) and monitored them using passive tracking over a 4-month period between July and November 2017 in the Saco River Estuary (SRE) in southern Maine. Movement within the SRE was highly variable, with cumulative movements of individual tracked flounder varying between 0 m (e.g., detected only at the release site) and 17,016 m. Tagged flounder were most often present in moderate (15–20 °C) temperatures and salinities (18–26 ppt), and were rarely observed in the highest temperatures (>20 °C) and salinities (>26 ppt). Movements upstream and downstream by flounder appeared to be tidally driven, with most downstream movements occurring during ebb tides and upstream movements during incoming tides. In addition, large flounder moved further away from freshwater, while small flounder either stayed within the river mouth's jetties or moved upstream. The speeds of flounder movements among receiver locations (mean = 4.49 body lengths per second, SE = 0.85) were much faster than expected for flatfish, potentially facilitated by use of tides. The GOM populations of Winter Flounder may benefit from management of juvenile habitat as environmental conditions change.


In the genomes of chromosomal organisms, cytological evidence from disparate sources suggests that each unit of information encoded as a DNA base sequence is serially repeated. Further cytological and genetical evidence suggests that among such serially repeated sequences a terminal unit serves as the 'master' sequence, within which recombinational events can occur, followed by 'slave' sequences which are not directly involved in recombination but which are made congruent to the master sequence once per life-cycle. The formation of lateral 'lamp-brush' loops in meiotic prophase, after synapsis, is claimed to represent the outcome of the master/slave matching process.


Automatic cloud detection and classification using satellite cloud imagery have various meteorological applications such as weather forecasting and climate monitoring. Cloud pattern analysis is one of the research hotspots recently. Since satellites sense the clouds remotely from space, and different cloud types often overlap and convert into each other, there must be some fuzziness and uncertainty in satellite cloud imagery. Satellite observation is susceptible to noises, while traditional cloud classification methods are sensitive to noises and outliers; it is hard for traditional cloud classification methods to achieve reliable results. To deal with these problems, a satellite cloud classification method using adaptive fuzzy sparse representation-based classification (AFSRC) is proposed. Firstly, by defining adaptive parameters related to attenuation rate and critical membership, an improved fuzzy membership is introduced to accommodate the fuzziness and uncertainty of satellite cloud imagery; secondly, by effective combination of the improved fuzzy membership function and sparse representation-based classification (SRC), atoms in training dictionary are optimized; finally, an adaptive fuzzy sparse representation classifier for cloud classification is proposed. Experiment results on FY-2G satellite cloud image show that, the proposed method not only improves the accuracy of cloud classification, but also has strong stability and adaptability with high computational efficiency.


We explore the relationship between the level of village inequality in 1986, and the subsequent growth of household incomes from 1986 to 1999. Using a detailed household-level data set from rural China, we find robust evidence that initial inequality is negatively related to subsequent household income growth. We are able to address a number of econometric issues that affect the use of aggregate data for this exercise, especially measurement error and aggregation: Our results strongly suggest that village inequality has an external adverse impact on household-level income trajectories. However, once we account for possibly fixed village-level unobserved heterogeneity, we find no evidence that changes in inequality are correlated with household income growth: Whatever factor drives the inequality-growth relationship only operates in the "long run." We explore several possible avenues by which initial inequality – or an unobserved variable correlated with it – affects household income growth. While we do not find the precise mechanism, our findings point toward a class of explanations based on collective choice (like the provision of public goods or determination of local taxes), and away from credit-market based explanations.


Advances in medical care depend on rigorous, reliable and reproducible basic, clinical and translational research. The scientific method used in medical research is predicated on testing a hypothesis using a well-thought-out study design with meticulous data recording and appropriate statistical analysis of the results. In addition, core scientific research values include truthful, objective, unbiased and complete reporting of the study results. Unfortunately, the veracity of research findings is sometimes called into question, typically after publication in a peer-reviewed journal. Sometimes the concern is simply suboptimal data presentation or statistical analysis, but other cases involve dubious or even fraudulent data.1–3 This type of research misconduct harms the scientific community and may harm patient care. Preventing research misconduct requires active participation and interaction between the researcher, the research institution and the medical journal.

We repeatedly see examples of research misconduct in clinical cardiology research, resulting in retraction of papers and potentially leading to suboptimal, or even detrimental, patient care. From the point of view of the research community, it is not enough to retract publications after scientific misconduct has been identified. Instead, we must prevent research misconduct—defined broadly to include publication of fraudulent data, inadequate record keeping, lack of full patient consent, plagiarism and poorly designed research protocols. Reviewing where things went wrong can be helpful, but we also need new strategies to prevent publication of research that fails to meet the highest standards of integrity. Research misconduct wastes research funding, damages the standing of the scientific community, undermines the altruistic contribution of subjects enrolled in the study and endangers patients subsequently receiving treatment based on fraudulent data.4

The basic principles of research integrity have been clearly articulated in numerous formats by professional organisations, research institutions and individual thought leaders. We know what we need to do; the challenge is …


The ratio of 3G users among wireless subscribers reached 95 %, and the ratio of fiat-rate users reached approximately 50 % in Japan, in 2009. This creates an ideal mobile broadband environment for rich media services. Constraints and diversity as well as the speed of changes, represent the challenges in the development of mobile services. There are several different stage views of the mobile service development in Japan such as constraint management and community management. The author highlights the evolution of mobile services from the viewpoint of community evolution and platform evolution. The community-based evolutionary view provides a framework for understanding that bridges the major chasms found in service development. The author also discusses the importance of stage-awareness in the development of mobile services.


OBJECTIVE
To find out some microscopically visible morphological differences in normal tongue manifestation between patients with primary liver cancer and healthy adults, and provide some beneficial evidences for microcosmic syndrome differentiation of tongue inspection.

METHODS
Microcirculations of the tongue tip, which represented the macroscopical normal tongue manifestation, were observed under an optical microscope in patients with primary liver cancer and healthy adults. Exfoliated cells from tongue coating were examined by hematoxylin-eosin staining.

RESULTS
The proportion of normal tongue manifestation was larger in healthy adults (38.89%) than that in patients with primary liver cancer (2.32%). The total score of microcirculation of tongue tip and the maturation index of exfoliated cells from tongue coating were both higher in patients with primary liver cancer than those in healthy adults with normal tongue manifestation (P<0.01, P<0.05).

CONCLUSION
Normal tongue manifestation, which is macroscopically visible, can be observed in both patients with primary liver cancer and healthy adults, but there exists obvious difference in microcosmic view.


Traditional methods for demand forecasting only focus on modeling the temporal dependency. However, forecasting on spatio-temporal data requires modeling of complex nonlinear relational and spatial dependencies. In addition, dynamic contextual information can have a significant impact on the demand values, and therefore needs to be captured. For example, in a bike-sharing system, bike usage can be impacted by weather. Existing methods assume the contextual impact is fixed. However, we note that the contextual impact evolves over time. We propose a novel context integrated relational model, Context Integrated Graph Neural Network (CIGNN), which leverages the temporal, relational, spatial, and dynamic contextual dependencies for multi-step ahead demand forecasting. Our approach considers the demand network over various geographical locations and represents the network as a graph. We define a demand graph, where nodes represent demand time-series, and context graphs (one for each type of context), where nodes represent contextual time-series. Assuming that various contexts evolve and have a dynamic impact on the fluctuation of demand, our proposed CIGNN model employs a fusion mechanism that jointly learns from all available types of contextual information. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first approach that integrates dynamic contexts with graph neural networks for spatio-temporal demand forecasting, thereby increasing prediction accuracy. We present empirical results on two real-world datasets, demonstrating that CIGNN consistently outperforms state-of-the-art baselines, in both periodic and irregular time-series networks.


The economic and social history of Jamaica has been dominated by a tradition of scholarship that has tended to focus on the study of the ruling sugar planter elite - the 'sugarocracy'- considered more socially significant than non-sugar producers. Indeed, non-sugar producers. Indeed, non-sugar producing units have been regarded as representing a 'divergent pattern' of social and economic development. Livestock, Sugar and Slavery broadens the economic and social history of Jamaica by turning the spotlight on those involved in raising livestock rather than sugar cane in colonial Jamaica. Devoted primarily to the slavery era, the book examines the evolution and expansion of the pen-keeping industry, the role and status of the pen-keepers and the experiences of enslaved labourers on pens. Above all, the book argues that the relationship between those who raised livestock and those who raised sugar cane, while symbiotic in one sense, was also conflict-ridden in another. Pens, though emerging in the pre-sugar era when they had an independent economic dynamic, had developed into virtual adjuncts of the sugar industry by the 18th and 19th centuries, leading to contests between sugar proprietors and pen-keepers over land, boundaries, enslaved labourers, and social and political status. This comparative study of pen-keepers and sugar planters also demonstrates that the 'ranking game' was intensely practised in the age of modernity.


An analysis of radiant interchange is made which takes account of possible surface variations in incident radiation flux, heat transfer, and leaving radiant flux. This represents a generalization of standard calculation methods which postulate that the radiant fluxes and heat transfer are uniformly distributed on a surface. Consideration is given to pairs of simply-arranged surfaces having different emissivities, one of which is essentially black. The surface temperatures may be arbitrarily different. The generalized analysis reveals that there may be significant variations in the local heat transfer along a surface, and this stands in contrast to the results of standard (and more approximate) calculation methods. The over-all heat transfer results are also compared with those predicted by the standard calculation procedure. For the surface which is essentially black the errors arising in the standard procedure are found to be tolerable as long as the net over-all heat transfer exceeds 20% of the radiant emission. For the nonblack surface the two methods are in agreement.


Zebrafish can regenerate their hearts. The role of the extracellular matrix in this process is largely unknown. We have analyzed the proteome in control hearts and at different times of regeneration. Decellularization of samples allowed for enrichment of extracellular matrix proteins, increasing their detection. The results reported dynamic changes in specific proteins associated with specific stages of the regenerative process. Biomechanical analysis by atomic force microscopy revealed concomitant changes in matrix stiffness during this process. Graphical Abstract Highlights We have developed a decellularization protocol for ECM protein enrichment. We have characterized the proteome of adult zebrafish heart ECM. We describe dynamic changes in heart ECM proteome during regeneration. We describe changes in heart ECM stiffness during regeneration. Adult zebrafish, in contrast to mammals, are able to regenerate their hearts in response to injury or experimental amputation. Our understanding of the cellular and molecular bases that underlie this process, although fragmentary, has increased significantly over the last years. However, the role of the extracellular matrix (ECM) during zebrafish heart regeneration has been comparatively rarely explored. Here, we set out to characterize the ECM protein composition in adult zebrafish hearts, and whether it changed during the regenerative response. For this purpose, we first established a decellularization protocol of adult zebrafish ventricles that significantly enriched the yield of ECM proteins. We then performed proteomic analyses of decellularized control hearts and at different times of regeneration. Our results show a dynamic change in ECM protein composition, most evident at the earliest (7 days postamputation) time point analyzed. Regeneration associated with sharp increases in specific ECM proteins, and with an overall decrease in collagens and cytoskeletal proteins. We finally tested by atomic force microscopy that the changes in ECM composition translated to decreased ECM stiffness. Our cumulative results identify changes in the protein composition and mechanical properties of the zebrafish heart ECM during regeneration.


In the context of the security of electricity generation supply problem, the electric power system firmness has been defined as the ability of already installed facilities to supply electricity efficiently in the medium term. In other words, the firmness represents the ability of the system to supply electricity efficiently within a time term in which the system cannot count on new investments to solve the security of supply problem, e.g. one or two years. This ability depends to a large extent on how generators carry out their medium-term resource planning (implying among others fuel provision, water reservoir management or maintenance scheduling). In this paper, on the basis of a stylized mathematical model developed specifically for this purpose, we contribute from the regulator's point of view to the theoretical analysis and discussion of the firmness dimension in a market environment. We focus on how generators' risk aversion coupled with generators' inability to efficiently hedge long-term positions (due to market incompleteness) may lead the system towards an inefficient (from the social perspective) outcome. In this context, we evaluate whether some kind of regulator's intervention could be recommended in order to lead the market towards a more efficient/adequate solution. This intervention, as already implemented in certain electric power systems, could (and in some power markets does) take the form of administratively setting minimum hydro reservoir levels or compulsory long-term contracting.


Aflatoxins are a group of natural contaminant produced by Aspergillus fungi. These mycotoxins are abundant in the area with high temperature and humidity, and have been classified as a carcinogenic agent to humans by IARC. Aflatoxin contamination could be found in food such as corn, nuts, rice, and milk. This review article suggests and discusses several methods that can be used to analyze aflatoxins in food and feed. These methods include ELISA, HPLC, and TLC Densitometry. This article was made with prior search of references from the internet and scientific journals. This review is aimed to compare the ability of these methods to analyze aflatoxin in food


Areas of expertise that cultivate specific sensory domains reveal the brain's ability to adapt to environmental change. Perfumers are a small population who claim to have a unique ability to generate olfactory mental images. To evaluate the impact of this expertise on the brain regions involved in odor processing, we measured brain activity in novice and experienced (student and professional) perfumers while they smelled or imagined odors. We demonstrate that olfactory imagery activates the primary olfactory (piriform) cortex (PC) in all perfumers, demonstrating that similar neural substrates were activated in odor perception and imagination. In professional perfumers, extensive olfactory practice influences the posterior PC, the orbitofrontal cortex, and the hippocampus; during the creation of mental images of odors, the activity in these areas was negatively correlated with experience. Thus, the perfumers' expertise is associated with a functional reorganization of key olfactory and memory brain regions, explaining their extraordinary ability to imagine odors and create fragrances. Hum Brain Mapp, 2012. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.


Most work in the area of nonlinear econometric modeling is based on a single equation and assumes exogeneity of the explanatory variables. Recently, work by Caner and Hansen (2004) and Psaradakis, Sola, and Spagnolo (2005) has considered the possibility of estimating nonlinear models by methods that take into account endogeneity but provide no tests for exogeneity. This paper examines the problem of testing for exogeneity in nonlinear threshold models. We suggest new Hausman-type tests and discuss the use of the bootstrap to improve the properties of asymptotic tests. The theoretical properties of the tests are discussed and an extensive Monte Carlo study is undertaken.


A greater heat load due to the miniaturization of electronic products causes the need for a new cooling system that works more efficiently and has a high thermal capacity. A synthetic jet is potentially useful for the cooling of electronic components. This paper reports the results of our experimental studies and the influence of orifice shape for Impinging Synthetic Jet cooling perfomance. The effect of shape of the orifice of an impinging synthetic jet assembly on the apparatus cooling of a heated surface is experimentally investigated. It will be seen that the characteristics of convective heat transfer will occur by moving the piezoelectric membrane. The prototype of the synthetic jet actuator is coupled with two piezoelectric membranes that operate by 5 volt electrical current and create a sinusoidal wave. The orifice shapes considered are square and circular. The results show the significant influence of orifice shape and sinusoidal wave frequencies on the heat transfer rate that were obtained. The temperature drop with a square orifice is found to be larger than that with circular shapes. A square orifice has a larger covered area if compared to the circular orifice at the same radius, thus resulting in a larger entrainment rate that leads to an increase of heat transfer performance.


Purpose: The CyberKnife roboticradiosurgery unit uses small circular beams that can be targeted from 117 node positions to obtain highly conformal dose distributions. Typically a large number of node positions, beams and monitor units (MUs) are used, resulting in long treatment times per fraction. The aim of this study was to develop and evaluate node reduction techniques to reduce the long treatment times for roboticradiosurgery.Method and Materials: Two node reduction techniques were implemented in our inverse planning algorithm developed in‐house. This algorithm uses 'resampling': repeated inverse optimization, each time replacing candidate beams with zero weight by new candidate beams. In the first reduction technique (passive reduction), node positions that were not ascribed any dose after inverse optimization were excluded from successive resampling iterations. This process was repeated until the number of node positions remained constant. In the second method (active reduction), node positions were reduced by forced exclusion of node positions with the lowest contribution until a valid solution could no longer be found. Both techniques were evaluated for two lung cases of different complexity, one prostate and one oropharynx case. Obtained plans were compared with plans without node reduction by the number of node positions, beams and MUs. All plans fulfilled the clinical dose constraints. Results: Compared to no node reduction, both passive and active node reduction resulted in a lower number of node positions (passive:−23%, active:−68%) and MUs (passive:−3%, active:−3%). The number of beams increased during node reduction (passive:+3%, active:+13%). Increasing complexity lowered the reduction in node positions. Conclusion: Results showed a dramatic reduction in the number of node positions while still fulfilling clinical dose constraints. The most efficient treatment plans were obtained by active node reduction. This technique could be used to shorten the treatment time per fraction.


Abstract 5203 AIDS-related primary pulmonary lymphoma (PPL) is defined as exclusive involvement of the lung by lymphoma with no evidence of extrapulmonary disease at the time of diagnosis and three months thereafter. It is an aggressive disease with a median survival time of four months. A 46 year old male patient with a seven year history of HIV/AIDS and CD4 count of 200/ul was hospitalized because of flank pain, hematuria and hemoptysis. Abdominal CT scan incidentally revealed multiple nodules in the lower lobes of both lungs. Serial chest CT scans demonstrated multiple nodular opacities in all lobes of the lungs that enlarged rapidly and coalesced together. Clinicians favored opportunistic infection due to rapid disease progression but included Wegener9s granulomatosis in the differential diagnosis because of hemoptysis. Open lung biopsy showed diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL), NOS, with an activated B cell phenotype (CD10−/BCL6−/MUM1+) and high proliferative index (Ki67 90%). CD79A expression confirmed B cell lineage. The diagnostic criteria for PPL were fulfilled because staging failed to detect extrapulmonary disease. Infarction due to the angiodestructive nature of the PPL and short doubling time accounted for hemoptysis and rapid disease progression, respectively. The patient died 45 days after admission because of shock, presumably due to superimposed infection. Unlike prior reports of AIDS-related PPL, our case was negative for CD19, CD20 and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV). Although PPL is a rare disease, it deserves consideration in the differential diagnosis of rapidly progressive lung nodules in AIDS patients. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first reported case of EBV-negative PPL. Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.


The impact of shallow water table depths on surface irrigation requirements of major crops was studies through a series of experiments conducted in 18 lysimeters situated in Lahore during 1975 to 2004. These lysimeters are of the size 3.05m x 3.05m at the surface and 6.1m deep filled with representative soil profile of the Punjab. Each lysimeter was equipped with tensiometers, soil water extractors and automatic arrangements for the quantitative measurement of up flux of water from water table into root zone or deep percolation losses occurring due to surface irrigation or heavy rainfall. Water table depths in these lysimeters were maintained from 0.9m to 4.5m with an interval of 0.9m in phase I; where as in phase-II water table depths were maintained from 0.3 m to 3.0 m with an interval of 0.3 m. The crops experimented were wheat, maize, sugarcane, sunflower, berseem and sorghum. In each experiment each treatment was replicated twice and repeated for three years. The results indicate that movement of water from the water table into root zone is negligible if the water table is located at 3 m depth or more. Groundwater contribution to crop water requirements increases as water table depth decreases. It was observed that crops can meat all their water requirements from water table if situated at a depth shallower than 1.2 m. This condition is generally detrimental to crop performance due to harmful semi-saturation conditions and accumulation of salts in the top layers due to upward movement of salts with the upflux of water. Periodic flushing of such salts is necessary to minimize toxic effect of salts for sustained crop production. Summarizing the results it was concluded that: 1) In the areas where water table is located at a depth shallower than 3 m, a considerable amount of surface irrigation water can be saved by making use of contribution of shallow water table. 2) Soluble salts also move upward with the water and accumulate in the top layers causing toxic condition for crop growth. 3) Periodic flushing of such salts is necessary for sustained crop production. 4) The optimum water table depth for most of the crop is about 2 m to 2.5 m. 5) In water logged areas, depth of tile drainage system should be selected such that at least 2 m well drained soil in available.


Separation of isoenzymes of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH, EC. 126.96.36.199) in extracts of heart, kidney, liver, spleen, lungs of nutrias, chinchillas by agar gel electrophoresis reveals a species specificity in ratio of electrophoretic fractions of the enzyme. The isoenzymes of LDH were seem to play an important role in adaptation of fur animals to environmental conditions. It has been shown that in semiaquatic mammals--nutrias, the relative content of the A-subunits in the isoenzymatic spectrum of LDH in organs was increased as compared with terrestrial animals--chinchillas, whereas relative content of B-subunits in these organs of chinchillas was very high. This is an example of subtle biochemical specialisation of function at molecular level to environmental conditions.


In this paper we investigate the decoding of parallel turbo codes over the binary erasure channel suited for upper-layer error correction. The proposed algorithm performs ldquoon-the-flyrdquo decoding, i.e. it starts decoding as soon as the first symbols are received. This algorithm compares with the iterative decoding of codes defined on graphs [1], in that it propagates in the trellises of the turbo code by removing transitions in the same way edges are removed in a bipartite graph under message-passing decoding. Performance comparison with LDPC codes for different coding rates is shown.


Abstract Remote Sensing (RS) data and techniques, in combination with GIS and landscape metrics, are fundamental to analyse and characterise Land Cover (LC) and its changes. The case study here described, has been conducted in the area of Avellino (Southern Italy). To characterise the dynamics of changes during a fifty year period (1954–2004), a multitemporal set of images has been processed: aerial photos (1954), and Landsat scenes (MSS 1975, TM 1985 and 1993, ETM+ 2004). LC pattern and its changes are linked to both natural and social processes whose driving role has been clearly demonstrated in the case study: after the disastrous Irpinia earthquake (1980), specific zoning laws and urban plans have significantly addressed landscape changes


 Abstract — The process of modification of ed-20 epoxy resin synthesized by vinyl-containing compounds is considered. It is shown that the introduction of vinyl-containing compounds into the composition based on epoxy resin ED-20 allows adjusting the technological and operational characteristics of the binder. For improvement of the properties of epoxy resin, following modifiers were selected: polyvinylformalethyl, polyvinyl butyral and composition of linear and aromatic amines (Аramine) as a hardener. Now the big range of hardeners of epoxy resins exists that allows varying technological properties of compositions, and also thermophysical and strength indicators. The nature of the aramin type hardener has a significant impact on the spatial parameters of the mesh, glass transition temperature, and strength characteristics. Epoxy composite materials based on ED-20 modified with polyvinyl butyral were obtained and investigated. It is shown that the composition of resins based on derivatives of polyvinyl butyral and ED-20 allows obtaining composite materials with a higher complex of deformation-strength, adhesion and thermal properties, better water resistance, frost resistance, chemical resistance, and impact strength. The magnitude of the effect depends on the chemical structure, temperature and curing time. In the area of concentrations, where the effect of composite synergy is appearing, the values of strength and stiffness significantly exceed the similar parameters of the individual components of the mixture. The polymer-polymer compositions form their class of materials with diverse specific properties that ensure their competitive application. Coatings with high performance under cyclic loading have been obtained based on epoxy oligomers modified with vinyl-containing compounds.


With the increasing demand in several industries, including aviation, aerospace, defense, automotive, energy, different materials for better performance, higher strength to weight ratio such as superalloys are started to be used. These newly used materials are needed due to their superior mechanical and chemical properties, which can be maintained at extreme conditions that also makes them strenuous for the machining procedures, thus being labeled difficult to machine alloys. Machining these materials with the conventional methods result in high cutting temperatures and stresses that lead to a problematic operation. The effects of these problems are seen in the form of higher cutting forces and higher cutting temperatures that mostly reflect on the tool life and the quality of the finished product. To overcome these problems in turning operation a different approach is taken by changing the tool instead of compromising the machining quality and productivity. Rotary cutting tools are introduced as a solution, as the tool has a continuous cutting edge that rotates around its axis and by this way ensuring that the tool is kept cooler. With the rotary movement, the tool distributes and reduces the heat, at every instant of the cutting process a cooler part of the tool comes in contact with the workpiece thus decreasing the temperature during the machining process. This leads to longer tool life and higher surface quality on the finished product. The main aim of this thesis is to understand and expand the knowledge on actively driven rotary turning (ADRT) tools and its mechanics. For this, a heat generation and distribution model is developed, to be able to define machining parameters for these tools in advance. The model is verified with experimental measurements with a thermal camera. Tool temperature for various different cutting conditions and workpieces were investigated. Results of the model are compared with experiments; effects of these conditions are examined and analyzed.


As our economies become more open and interlinked the regulatory regimes and the implementation of environmental regulations is required to adapt. Going form national economies to linked international economies the regulation of domestic emissions and natural recourses no longer reflects a control over the environmental impact of domestic consumption. This study explores the domestic fraction of environmental impacts generated in a case where two identical economies trade with each other. First a brief introduction to basic input output algebra is given. Then a reformulation of the model for a mirrored economy is derived. Through this the domestic fraction of economic activity generated and the domestic fraction of environmental impacts generated by a unit purchase of a commodity can be found. The suggested framework is then applied to the Norwegian IO tables. The results are presented and discussed in the context of regulatory policy.


ABSTRACT Quaternary deposits and landforms are an integral component of Scotland's geodiversity and natural heritage with intrinsic, scientific, educational, cultural, aesthetic and ecological values. Their conservation is founded on the assessment and safeguard of key protected areas principally for their scientific values. The evaluation of site networks for Quaternary deposits and landforms (including glacial, fluvial, coastal, mass movement, karst and cave features) has evolved since the late 1940s, culminating in the Great Britain Geological Conservation Review (GCR) site assessments undertaken principally between 1977 and the early 1990s. Significant scientific progress since then has arisen, for example, from re-investigation of existing sites and discoveries of new sites, developments in geochronology and the formulation and application of new concepts and models. Both the GCR site lists and the supporting site documentation now require updating in the light of this progress. Today there is greater emphasis on the wider, non-scientific values of geoconservation including, for example, on ecosystem services, links with biodiversity and cultural heritage, geotourism and the benefits for human health and wellbeing through improved understanding of dynamic landscapes, climate change and natural hazards. Involvement of wider public support beyond the geoscience community and fostering better integration of geoheritage within the developing nature conservation agenda, including a land systems approach, protected area planning and management, natural capital and connecting people and nature, will help further to protect our Quaternary geoheritage.


The Congressional Review Act (CRA) authorizes fast-track procedures for resolutions disap-proving agency rules. The near-universal assumption is that the CRA is relevant only when a new President seeks, with the support of Congress, to cancel regulations promulgated during the previous administration. Yet the CRA has substantially greater unrealized potential. When the agency, the President, and congressional majorities agree on their preferred interpretation of a statute, they can secure formal legislative endorsement of this interpretation through the following two-step maneuver: First, the agency promulgates an interpretive rule that construes the statute to have the opposite of the meaning the agency actually wants—for example, by interpreting a stat-ute to prohibit a regulation that the agency would like to adopt. Next, Congress and the Presi-dent use the CRA to disapprove that interpretive rule—thus establishing, via a formal exercise of legislative power, that the statute has the meaning the agency rule rejected. This double-negative maneuver would be a lawful way for the executive and legislative branches to clarify, or even to change, statutory law in a manner that bypasses the filibuster and other legislative road-blocks. This Article develops this legal argument, and also discusses the practical, political, and normative implications of this novel use of the CRA.


E-commerce sales have led to a considerable increase in the demand for last-mile delivery companies, revealing several problems in their logistics processes. Among these problems, are not meeting delivery deadlines. For example, in Chile, the national consumer service (SERNAC) indicated that in 2018, late deliveries represented 23% of complaints in retail online sales and were the second most common reason for complaints. Some of the causes are incorrectly designed delivery zones because in many cases, these delivery zones do not account for the demographic growth of cities. The result is an imbalanced workload between different zones, which leads to some resources being idle while others fail to meet their workload in satisfactory conditions. The present work proposes a hybrid method for designing delivery zones with an objective based on improving the quality of express delivery services. The proposed method combines a preprocess based on the grouping of demand in areas according to the structure of the territory, a heuristic that generates multiple candidates for the distribution zones, and a mathematical model that combines the different distribution zones generated to obtain a final territorial design. To verify the applicability of the proposed method, a case study is considered based on the real situation of a Chilean courier company with low service fulfillment in its express deliveries. The results obtained from the computational experiments show the applicability of the method, highlighting the validity of the aggregation procedure and improvements in the results obtained using the hybrid method compared to the initial heuristic. The final solution improves the ability to meet the conditions associated with express deliveries, compared with the current situation, by 12 percentage points. The results also allow an indicative sample of the critical service factors of a company to be obtained, identifying the effects of possible changes in demand or service conditions.


Computer networks have turned out to be a more and more indispensable way of electronic communication. Not only the internet with its vast number of networked computers but also local or regional high-speed data networks are on their way to replace any other classical communication equipment like telephone, video conferences, radio, television, magazines, newspapers but also sensitive control devices. This makes the user of electronic media increasingly dependent on the proper functioning of the devices and connections which build the basic components of communication networks. This dissertation contributes to optimizing the dependability of highperformance networks. Graph-theoretical considerations combined with examinations of real-world networks and their predicted developments lead
to a test framework which is used to analyze a novel high-speed restoration methodology which is capable of rapid calculation of network restoration paths. The methodology supports an arbitrary number of node and link failures in point-to-point or point-to-multipoint networks. Besides this universal approach, as far as the author knows, the algorithm reveals the lowest runtime of all currently presented restoration algorithms for general network graphs. Its operation is simulated on specially elaborated random graph models which can be tuned to represent most of the network topologies that currently exist. An additional chapter presents new methods for gaining a single similarity index, which allows the comparing of graph topologies. Finally the prediction of the structural development of existing network topologies is discussed. Models of this kind allow realistic performance and behavior tests in not yet existing network structures.


: The authors' own findings and the data available in the literature as to movement diseases (MD) in animals and man were reviewed in the context of P. K. Anokhin's theory of functional systems. The functional system of the human body's gravity center is detailed. There is evidence for that disintegration processes underlying MD first occur in the mnestic sphere since due to genetic and/or ontogenetic causes, memory has no preserved no motor programme required to achieve the end net efficiency of performance of this functional system,--to maintain the definite position of the gravity center of the body and its related vegetative status upon stress-induced vestibular exposures. Based on the above concepts of the pathogenesis of MD, its preventive measures have been proposed and tested, which include drug (nootropic agents) and non-drug (a special complex of physical exercises for children aged 2 to 7 years, which will form permanent motor programs in memory in definite periods of their ontogenesis) measures.


: By methods of histological investigation, plastic and graphic reconstruction, in 267 corpses of human embryos, prefetuses, fetuses and newborns, formation of extra- and intraorganic ovarian nerves has been studied. It has been stated that the neural fibres and trunklets grow into the ovarian anlage in prefetuses of 40-42 mm parietal-coccygeal length. The neural elements reach the ovarian anlage together with the ovarian artery and its branches. During the whole period of the intrauterine ontogenesis they concentrate in the mediastinum, albugineous membrane and in the ovarian interstitial connective tissue. As the gonads go down, the number of the extraorganic nerves increases, so does asymmetry in innervation of the right and left ovary. The number of the neural fibres and trunklets in the plexus around the left ovarian artery is greater than that of the right one.


In the domain of energy storage, electrochemical capacitors have numerous applications ranging from hybrid vehicles to consumer electronics, with very high power density at the cost of relatively low energy storage. Here, we report an approach that uses vertically aligned carbon nanotube arrays as electrodes in electrochemical capacitors. Different electrolytes were used and multiple parameters of carbon nanotube array were compared: carbon nanotube arrays were shown to be two to three times better than graphite in term of specific capacitance, while the surface functionalization was demonstrated to be a critical factor in both aqueous and nonaqueous solutions to increase the specific capacitance. We found that a maximum energy density of 21 Wh/kg at a power density of 1.1 kW/kg for a hydrophilic electrode, could be easily achieved by using tetraethylammonium tetrafluoroborate in propylene carbonate. These are encouraging results in the path of energy-storage devices with both high energy density and power density, using only carbon-based materials for the electrodes with a very long lifetime, of tens of thousands of cycles.


: Golden hamster (20 males, 8 females) were maintained in isolation boxes for 4-7 weeks. The animals had access to wheels and selected their own lighting by pressing one bar to turn light-on and another bar to turn the light-off. All hamsters maintained circadian rhythms of wheel-running activity. Seventeen of 28 hamsters selected lighting with a circadian periodicty. For 9 hamsters, there was a significant positive correlation between wheel-running activity and self-selected darkness, while this correlation was significantly negative for 10 hamsters. Four hamsters had regressed testes at the end of the experiment. These 4 had significant positive correlations between activity and self-selected darkness, while none of the hamsters with significant negative correlations between activity and self-selected darkness had regressed testes. Light in phase with activity seems to be more important to the prevention of testicular regression than is the total daily amount of light.


This paper demonstrates the benefit of FPGAs for better power and energy efficiency when exploited for non-instruction fetch-based architecture. By replacing load/store architecture by non-instruction fetch-based designs for matrix multiplication, we reduced almost 100 percent of the dynamic power. Hence reconfigurable computing is the potential key to saving energy in battery-powered embedded systems and to solve the dissipated power dilemma, as the heat becomes the bottleneck of traditional high frequency processors. If the same strategy is applied to mainstream computers and data center servers, we will not only reduce electricity bills but we will also contribute to greener computing by improving the IT sector's CO2 emissions. The work involves three different designs, which multiply two matrices A and B of nxn 32-bit items and store the result in C matrix of nxn 64-bit items. The first two designs employ a single-purpose processor with different number of storage registers 2n and 2n2 and the third design uses a computer system piloted by NIOS II/e processor with on-chip memory. The designs were captured in VHDL language and prototyped on an Alter a Cyclone II EP2C35F672C6 device. Both synthesis and place&route steps were performed with Quart us II 6.0 Web Edition. The experiments were made on Altera DE2 board. In this paper we have also clarified further the power estimation error of Alter a power estimation tools, which we have evaluated in [1].


Three DNA polymerase activities, A, B and C, were identified in extracts of exponentially growing synchronous cultures of Chlamydomonas reinhardii, and DNA polymerases A and B were characterized in detail. Both enzymes have the same binding affinity for DEAE-cellulose at pH 7.8, but can be distinguished from each other by their behaviour on phosphocellulose and DNA-agarose. 'Activated' calf thymus DNA was used as template, and the pH, K+ and bivalent-cation optima were measured. DNA polymerase A sediments at 5.3 S in glycerol gradients, with an apparent mol.wt. of 90000-100000. Polymerase B sediments between 8S and 10S in 100mM-KCl, the predominant species having an apparent mol.wt. of 200000. In 200mM-KCl, polymerase B dissociates to a single species, which sediments at 5.8S. A 3S species was found in aged preparations of both enzymes. The activity of polymerase B from cells harvested during nuclear DNA synthesis is twice that found in Chlamydomonas at other times during the cell cycle.


Background and Objective: Although corticosteroids have been widely used in the treatment of acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (AECOPD), few studies have evaluated the effectiveness of nebulized corticosteroids (NCS), systemic corticosteroids (SCS), and NCS plus SCS in the management of AECOPD in China. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of NCS, SCS, and NCS plus SCS in Chinese patients with AECOPD. Patients and Methods: This was a real-world study of AECOPD patients at 43 sites from January to September 2014. During hospitalization, patients treated with nebulized budesonide (NCS group, n=1091), SCS (SCS group, n=709), or both (NCS+SCS group, n=1846) were included. Propensity score matching (PSM) and subgroup analyses were performed. The primary outcomes were the length of hospital stay, mortality, and change in arterial blood gases from baseline. Results: Multivariable analysis showed that the three treatments at the same severity of AECOPD were not significantly different regarding intubation rates, rates of pneumonia improvement at discharge, rates of new-onset pneumonia in hospital, and mortality. Following PSM, NCS+SCS was associated with greater length of hospital stay than both NCS and SCS (in patients without respiratory failure [RF, P <0.001] and with type I RF [ P =0.022]), and more hospitalization costs than the other two treatments (in patients without RF [ P <0.001]). Conclusion: NCS is effective for patients with AECOPD, which may be an alternative treatment option. Further clinical trials are urgently needed to better understand the efficacy of NCS, SCS, and NCS+SCS in AECOPD management in China.


The binding of VWF to GpIb-α is a critical step for maintaining normal haemostasis. The interaction between VWF with GpIb initiates the adhesion and aggregation of platelets at an injury site in the blood vessel wall. This binding is specific to high shear conditions that are typically found in small arterioles where the shear rates vary between 500-5000 s-1 . However, excessive binding of GpIb-α and VWF under normal conditions can cause stroke or myocardial infarction (MI). The purpose behind blocking GpIb is to stop the initial adhesion and stimulation of platelets under high shear conditions. There have been several attempts to generate GpIb-α inhibitors, such as the monoclonal antibody H6B4, OS-1 peptide, and the snake venom anfibatide. However, only anfibatide has successfully reached the clinical trials. In this project, we aimed to design a novel GpIb inhibitor for the treatment of cardiovascular disease. We performed both high-throughput docking as well as pharmacophore based screening to identify lead compounds for development. We then performed platelet aggregation assays, high shear flow experiments to assess their function ex vivo, and ELISA assays to investigate the binding interaction between the tested compounds and GpIb. A pharmacophore was generated based on GpIb-α crystal structure and published mutagenic data. The cyclic peptide GKYFG from the pharmacophore screening inhibited the interaction between VWF and GpIb-α under high shear conditions at a concentration of 0.1 mM (P


The genetic diversity of Turkish watermelon genotypes selected from the watermelon genetic resource collection was evaluated by simple sequence repeat (SSR) and sequence-related amplified polymorphism (SRAP) markers. Most of the accessions were collected from various geographical regions of Turkey. Different Citrullus species, wild relatives, foreign landraces, open pollinated (OP), and commercial hybrid cultivars were also assessed for genetic relatedness. Fourteen SSR primers and 31 SRAP primer combinations were used in the experiment. Both SSR markers (100%) and SRAP markers (97.3%) generated high polymorphisms. Based on the SSR and SRAP data, the genetic similarity coefficients were calculated, and dendrograms were constructed using the unweighted pair-group method with arithmetic average (UPGMA). Cluster and principle coordinate analyses indicated that Citrullus lanatus var. Lanatus subspecies genotypes collected from the different regions of Turkey were closely genetically related. Overall, our results displayed low genetic variability within the Turkish watermelon germplasm in contrast with their high morphological diversity.


ABSTRACT A transcriptional regulator, Hes1, plays crucial roles in the control of differentiation and proliferation of neuronal, endocrine, and T-lymphocyte progenitors during development. Mechanisms for the regulation of cell proliferation by Hes1, however, remain to be verified. In embryonic carcinoma cells, endogenous Hes1 expression was repressed by retinoic acid in concord with enhanced p27Kip1 expression and cell cycle arrest. Conversely, conditional expression of a moderate but not maximal level of Hes1 in HeLa cells by a tetracycline-inducible system resulted in reduced p27Kip1 expression, which was attributed to decreased basal transcript rather than enhanced proteasomal degradation, with concomitant increases in the growth rate and saturation density. Hes1 induction repressed the promoter activity of a 5′ flanking basal enhancer region of p27Kip1 gene in a manner dependent on Hes1 expression levels, and this was mediated by its binding to class C sites in the promoter region. Finally, hypoplastic fetal thymi, as well as livers and brains of Hes1-deficient mice, showed significantly increased p27Kip1 transcripts compared with those of control littermates. These results have suggested that Hes1 directly contributes to the promotion of progenitor cell proliferation through transcriptional repression of a cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor, p27Kip1.


Traditional frame interpolation methods first estimate motion between two consecutive frames and then synthesize intermediate frames. This problem is challenging because of complex motion and video scenes. In this paper, we present an end-to-end deep network for frame interpolation problem. Based on a video synthesis method deep voxel flow (DVF), refinement modules are designed to increase the accuracy of voxel flow, which we call Refined DVF (RDVF). A deeper architecture with more convolution and deconvolution layers is also utilized to help extract motion. Our results greatly improve the performance of original DVF and compare favorably to state-of-the-art methods both quantitatively and qualitatively.


We present a method for simulating lower quality images starting from higher quality ones, based on acquired image pairs from different optical setups. The method does not require estimates of point (or line) spread functions of the system, but utilizes the relative transfer function derived from images of real specimen of interest in the observed application. Thanks to the use of a larger number of real specimen, excellent stability and robustness of the method is achieved. The intended use is exploring the influence of image quality on features and classification accuracy in pattern recognition based screening tasks. Visual evaluation of the obtained images strongly confirms usefulness of the method. The approach is quantitatively evaluated by observing stability of feature values, proven useful for PAP-smear classification, between synthetic and real images from seven different microscope setups. The evaluation shows that features from the synthetically generated lower resolution images are as similar to features from real images at that resolution, as features from two different images of the same specimen, taken at the same low resolution, are to each other.


Methotrexate is one of the most effective drugs that is commonly used in the treatment of cancer. However, its application is limited due to low solubility, high toxicity and rapid metabolism. Therefore, in the present study, worm-like polymeric nanoparticles as carrier of methotrexate were prepared using biodegradable copolymers (mPEG–PCL). The impact of nanoparticles' geometry on the loading, delivery and drug's anti-cancer activity was investigated. The di-block copolymer mPEG–PCL was being synthesized by a ring opening polymerization of ɛ-caprolactone in the presence of mPEG as the initiator and Sn(oct)2 as the catalyst. It was used for the preparation of worm-like micelles and coated with silica, so that their structures are stable after drying. The synthesized copolymers and nanoparticles were characterized by FTIR, HNMR, GPC, XRD, TGA, DLS, and FE-SEM analyses. The efficiencies of drug loading and release of nanoparticles as in vitro, was studied by high performance liquid chromatography. The MTT method was used to estimate the toxicity on MCF-7 cell category. The obtained results showed that the nanoparticles were worm-like particles with less than 150 nm diameter and about 1 µm length. The loading and encapsulation efficiencies of drug by the worm-like nanoparticles were 3.5 ± 0.14% and 65.6 ± 0.12%, respectively, while they were obtained as 2.1 ± 0.08% and 26 ± 0.10%, respectively, for spherical nanoparticles. The methotrexate diffusional behavior of worm-like nanoparticles was compared with that of the spherical ones. On the other hand, the anti-cancer activity of MTX-loaded nanoparticles was more than the free drug. The results of the MTT assay showed strong and dose-dependent inhibition of cell (MCF-7 category) growth by the nanoparticles compared with MTX. The inhibitory concentrations (IC50 i.e. reduction viability of cell to 50%) obtained for worm-like, spherical nanoparticles and free drug (incubation times 72 h) were 8.25 ± 0.20, 9.15 ± 0.17, 12.28 ± 0.15 µg/mL, respectively. It can be concluded that application of non-spherical nanoparticles is a better and more effective strategy for controlled and slow release of methotrexate in the treatment of cancer.


The effect of microfiber produced from recycled waste catalyst on microstructure and mechanical strength of cementitious complex binder was analysed. Complex binder reinforced with 1%, 3% and 5% fibers were exposed to 600, 800 and 1000°C for 3h. The influence of annealing temperature on morphology of fiber reinforced complex binder was analyzed applying SEM, XRD techniques. Experimental results showed that reinforcement with 1% of fiber had advantage on mechanical strength of complex binder up to 800°C. Meanwhile addition of 5% of fiber resulted in lowest values of strength and reduced bulk density of complex binder in all firing temperature range.


Because Puerto Rico has warmed in recent decades, ectotherms there should have shifted their elevational ranges uphill. However, by comparing historical versus recent distributional records of Anolis lizards, we found that three "montane-forest" species have instead moved downhill in recent decades, almost to sea level. This downward shift appears related to the massive regeneration of Puerto Rican forests – especially in lowland areas – which started in the mid-20th century when the island's economy began shifting from agriculture to manufacturing. The magnitude of local cooling caused by regenerated forests swamps recent climate warming, seemingly enabling cool-adapted "montane" lizards to track forests as they spread downhill from mountain refugia into abandoned plantations. Thus, contemporary distributional patterns are likely converging to those prior to the arrival of European settlers, who cleared most lowland forests for agriculture, thereby restricting forests and associated fauna to high-elevation remnants. In contrast with the montane species, three lowland species expanded their ranges to higher elevations in recent decades; but whether this movement reflects warming, land-use shifts, or hurricane-induced destruction of upland forests is unclear.


The main purpose of this research is to identify what determinants influence an individual consumer's intention to adopt online shopping. One of the main branches of Internet business is online shopping. In academic literature, online shopping is often studied as a new retailing channel in marketing literature. By viewing online shopping as a new kind of IT, this paper attempted to explain and predict customers' intention of adopting online shopping. Ten proposed hypotheses were then empirically tested by using data collected from survey. The results indicate that the relative advantage of online shopping, the compatibility of online shopping, the voluntariness of individual consumer's doing online shopping, customers' prior experience, and consumer innovativeness are positively correlated with individual consumer's intention of adopting online shopping. On contrary, both the transaction cost involved in purchasing goods online and a customer's sensitivity to risk have negative correlation relationship with his/her adoption intention. Two topics--adoption process and post sale service of online shopping were suggested for future research.


The anticancer antibiotic chromomycin A(3) is a transcription inhibitor which forms two types of complexes with Mg(2+): complex I (1:1 in terms of chromomycin A(3)-Mg(2+)) and complex II (2:1 in terms of chromomycin A(3)-Mg(2+)). These complexes are the DNA-binding ligands. With the broad objective of elucidation of the mechanism for action of this group of transcription inhibitors in eukaryotic systems, we have studied the interaction of the antibiotic with nucleosome core particles under different conditions. We have demonstrated and characterized the role of core histone proteins, particularly the N-terminal tail domains, in the association of nucleosome with both complexes of chromomycin. From a scrutiny of the spectroscopic features of the two bound complexes and comparison of the binding and associated thermodynamic parameters, we have shown the following. Core histone(s) stand(s) in the way of access of the ligand(s) to nucleosomal DNA. N-Terminal intact and chopped core particles interact differentially with the same complex. The modes of interaction of the two complexes, I and II, with the same system are different. Tryptic removal of N-terminal tail domains of core histones enhances the binding potential and access of both complexes of chromomycin to the nucleosomal DNA. Agarose gel electrophoresis of an equilibrium mixture containing either complex I or complex II and a saturating concentration of the core particle has demonstrated that both complexes have a tendency to disrupt the nucleosome structure, leading to a release of nucleosomal DNA. Compared to the N-terminal intact nucleosome, the N-terminal chopped nucleosome is more susceptible to disruption. Therefore, we suggest from the above results that the N-terminal tail domains, which have an important role in eukaryotic gene expression, stand in the way of a free access of external agents such as anticancer drugs to the eukaryotic genome. The significance of the results to understand the molecular basis of the transcription inhibitory capacity of chromomycin is discussed.


Peat water has a distinctive dark brown or yellow color, low pH, it tastes sour, high organic matter content, high levels of iron and manganese. One of the ways that can be used to reduce the levels of iron in peat water is doing adsorption process by using activated carbon coffee waste because the coffee waste included organic ingredients. The purpose of this research was to identify the influence of the concentration of activated carbon robusta coffee waste (Coffea robusta Lindl.) against the iron levels in peat water. This research uses the draft Posttest-Only Control Group Design. Manufacture of activated carbon robusta coffee waste (Coffea robusta Lindl.) consists of the processes of dehydration, carbonization, and activation, with the results 25.9% of rendemen, 14.05% water content, a rate of 9.9% ash, and iod absorbance 647.19 mg/g. Activated carbon coffee waste added to 100 ml of peat water as much as 3 gr, 4.5 gr, and 6 gr with the stirring speed 400 rpm for 60 minutes obtained early iron levels of 2.75 mg/L and dropped to 1.19 mg/L, 1.02 mg/L, and 0.95 mg/L. Conclusions This study is there is the influence of the concentration of activated carbon robusta coffee waste (Coffea robusta Lindl.) against the iron level of peat water iron and frequency of 6 gr as a concentration of the best efficiency adsorption of 65.4% because it can reduce the levels of iron in 100 ml of peat water from 2.75 mg/L be 0.95 mg/L. By regulation of the Minister of health RI No. 416/Menkes/PER/IX/1990 namely of 1.0 mg/L. Suggestions for further research to improve the heating temperature and concentration of the Activator to obtain active carbon absorption.


Iron, calcium, zinc and phytic acid contents in vegetable blends from wheat, corn and soy were determined. Wheat and corn substitution with soy in compound products, gave an important amount of iron and calcium to the blends, while the initial content of phytic acid in wheat and corn was not significantly modified. Dehulling and enzymatic inactivation technological processes denoted a rather low influence on soy mineral content. In a similar way, the extrusion-cooking process did not affect appreciably the soluble iron content in blends. Soy incorporation greatly decreased in vitro iron availability in vegetable blends, while fortification with mineral blends slightly interfered, decreasing iron availability with regard to iron-fortified vegetable blends.


Drug residue is an important aspect in food safety.Also antibiotics are one of the most important bioactive and chemotherapeutic groups of compounds made by microbiological synthesis. Use of antibiotics may produce residues in milk, and subsequently induce allergic reactions in humans. In addition, antibiotics give rise to an increase in the antibiotic resistance of pathogenic bacteria, which may result in health problems. In many countries, governmental authorities have established monitoring programs to determine amaximumresidual level (MRL) for them. So the aim of this study was to determine antibiotic presence in milk samples in Khorasan province in Iran.During 4months (September toDecember 2013), one hundred milk samples were collected from seven dairies. Antibiotic presence was determined using Delvo test, a broad-spectrum test capable of detecting different antibiotics. Results showed that Copanmilk test was positive for 9%of the samples (8 samples). In the other samples the antibiotic content has been below the detection limit of kit.


The colonic epithelial cell line T84 has been shown to be a good model to investigate the regulation of Cl- secretion by the adenosine 3',5'-cyclic monophosphate (cAMP)-mediated second messenger cascade. Regulated exocytic insertion and endocytic retrieval of transport proteins, or proteins that regulate transport proteins, is one mechanism proposed to regulate plasma membrane solute permeabilities. The aims of our studies were to characterize endocytic processes in T84 cells and to investigate their regulation by known activators of Cl- secretion that are mediated by the cAMP second messenger cascade. Forskolin, an activator of adenylate cyclase, caused a marked inhibition of endocytic uptake of the fluid-phase marker horseradish peroxidase (HRP) and the adsorptive marker wheat germ agglutinin conjugated to HRP. Similar inhibition was obtained with vasoactive intestinal peptide, a secretagogue whose receptor is coupled to adenylate cyclase, and 8-(4-chlorophenylthio)adenosine 3',5'-cyclic monophosphate, a membrane-permeable cAMP analogue. 1,9-Dideoxy-forskolin, a forskolin analogue that fails to activate adenylate cyclase, was without effect on endocytosis. Our data show that the net rate of endocytosis, as measured by fluid-phase uptake, is decreased by a cAMP-mediated mechanism. Because the number of Cl- channels or associated regulatory proteins in the plasma membrane reflects a balance between their exocytic insertion and endocytic retrieval, we propose that the cAMP-mediated decrease in endocytosis could contribute to the concomitant increase in plasma membrane Cl- permeability.


In 1997 the British Columbia Geological Survey (BCGS) initiated a project to identify prospective areas for sediment-hosted gold mineralization. The inspiration for the project came from presentations and articles by Howard Poulsen of the Geological Survey of Canada (1996a, 1996b). He pointed out that there is potential to find hypogene, sediment-hosted gold mineralization in Canada akin to deposits found in Nevada. He mentioned that if an intrusive association is important to generate the mineralization, then two different geological environments might host this style of mineralization. Accreted terranes with a basement containing carbonate lithologies intruded by Mesozoic or Cenozic plutonism would be a prospective geological setting, specifically the Stikine and Quesnel terranes. The second favourable environment is within the sediments deposited along the continental margin of ancestral North America which have been cut by Mesozoic magmas, such as are found in the Kootenay Arc and Selwyn Basin (Figure 1). Others have considered British Columbia as prospective territory for sediment-hosted gold. Early work by companies focused on the Insular Belt rocks exposed on Vancouver Island and the Queen Charlottes. These exploration programs were based largely on an epithermal-style model for the mineralization which was in favour at the time. The discovery of the Babe deposit (now called the Specogna or Cinola) in the Queen Charlotte Islands in 1970 increased the interest in this model because it was initially identified as a Carlin-type deposit (Richards et al., 1976; Champigny and Sinclair, 1982). Subsequent work showed that the Babe is a classic hot spring deposit and although some jasperoid occurrences were discovered on the Queen Charlottes, these programs did not result in any major sediment-hosted gold discoveries (Lefebure, 1998). Also in the early 1970s, Harry Warren of the


Intense damage to women caused by natural disasters urges the necessity of incorporating a
women's perspective into DRR. Gender mainstreaming has been demonstrated as a way of bringing a gender perspective into DRR as it could translate into identifying the different capacities and needs of different gender roles. Due to the criticality of the built environment's role in DRR, mainstreaming women into the built environment in order to reduce their vulnerability could be considered vital. The paper in this context, aims to investigate how women can be mainstreamed into DRR in the built environment based on case study on Sri Lanka. The process of mainstreaming women is distinguished into two sequential steps in the paper. It consists of identification of women's DRR knowledge and needs followed by the integration of the knowledge and needs into development within the built environment. Participatory methods, community feedback and complaints, expert knowledge, and relevant literature are identified as the most appropriate methods to identify women's DRR knowledge and needs whilst the identified knowledge and needs can be integrated into
development within the built environment through regulations, project documentation, and awareness,
expertise and commitment of the built environment professionals. The paper further outlines the
existing barriers, responsible parties, relevant protocols and ways of promoting the process in relation to mainstreaming women in DRR in the built environment.


Soil moisture characteristics (15 atm., 1/3 atm., etc.) were determined for 31 soil types representing the major great soil groups recognized in Illinois. In addition such physical properties as bulk density and mechanical analysis were also determined for the principal soil horizons. Available soil moisture and field capacity was shown to vary by textural classes for each soil group studied. For example it was found that silt loam soils of the Gray-Brown Podzolic averaged more available moisture in the A horizon than the Brunizems and Planosols. It was found that the available soil mositure was highly correlated with the 1/3-atm. percentage but not correlated with the 15-atm. percentage. The available moisture was controlled principally by the silt fraction.


Authors present the frequency, pathological disorders and consequences of fat microembolia of the lung. Peculiarities of fat embolia in patients with blunt traumas of the foot and shin were shown in the article. Rare cases (2) of SPE manifestation in patients with fat embolia of the lung, experience of pathogenetic therapy of complications and recommendations regarding diagnostics of complications in patients with this disease are given in the article.


To facilitate overall lay-out optimisation inexpensive dynamics simulation of automobile exhaust systems is desired. Identification of possible non-linearity as well as finding simplified component models is then important. A flexible joint is used between the manifold and the catalyst to allow for the motion of the engine and to reduce the transmission of vibrations to the rest of the exhaust system. This joint is significantly non-linear due to internal friction, which makes some kind of non-linear analysis necessary for the complete exhaust system. To investigate the significance of non-linearity and internal vibrations of other components a theoretical and experimental modal analysis of the part of a typical exhaust system that is downstream the flexible joint is performed. It is shown that non-linearity in this part is negligible. It is also shown that shell vibrations of the catalyst and mufflers as well as ovalling of the pipes are negligible in the frequency interval of interest. The results implies, for further dynamics studies, that the complete system could be idealised into a linear sub-system that is excited via the non-linear flexible joint, that the pipes could be modelled with beam elements and that the other components within the linear sub-system could also be modelled in a simplified way. Such simplified component models are suggested. The agreement between theoretical and experimental results is very good, which indicates the validity of the simplified modelling.


We describe demonstrations of remarkable robustness to instrumental noises by using a multiple delay externally dispersed interferometer (EDI) on stellar observations at the Hale telescope. Previous observatory EDI demonstrations used a single delay. The EDI (also called "TEDI") boosted the 2,700 resolution of the native TripleSpec NIR spectrograph (950-2450 nm) by as much as 10x to 27,000, using 7 overlapping delays up to 3 cm. We observed superb rejection of fixed pattern noises due to bad pixels, since the fringing signal responds only to changes in multiple exposures synchronous to the applied delay dithering. Remarkably, we observed a ~20x reduction of reaction in the output spectrum to PSF shifts of the native spectrograph along the dispersion direction, using our standard processing. This allowed high resolution observations under conditions of severe and irregular PSF drift otherwise not possible without the interferometer. Furthermore, we recently discovered an improved method of weighting and mixing data between pairs of delays that can theoretically further reduce the net reaction to PSF drift to zero. We demonstrate a 350x reduction in reaction to a native PSF shift using a simple simulation. This technique could similarly reduce radial velocity noise for future EDI's that use two delays overlapped in delay space (or a single delay overlapping the native peak). Finally, we show an extremely high dynamic range EDI measurement of our ThAr lamp compared to a literature ThAr spectrum, observing weak features (~0.001x height of nearest strong line) that occur between the major lines. Because of individuality of each reference lamp, accurate knowledge of its spectrum between the (unfortunately) sparse major lines is important for precision radial velocimetry.


Abstract This article is part of a research programme to study fundamental aspects of synovial fluid lubrication of artificial hip joints and focuses on the role of proteins (albumin and γ-globulin) in film formation. Friction and film thickness measurements have been carried out on a series of simple protein solutions (simulating synovial fluid SF) and bovine serum (BS). Protein solutions were prepared with different buffer solutions to simulate healthy and periprosthetic SFs. Simple bench-top tests using a ball-on-disc geometry were used to simulate hip joint articulation. All measurements were made under steady-state load and speed (5—50 mm/s) conditions. The friction results showed that BS and simple protein solutions demonstrate boundary properties by reducing friction in the slow-speed regime. The film thickness results with BS provide evidence of the formation of an adsorbed solid surface layer (<20 nm), which is augmented by a thicker hydrodynamic film. Film thickness was fairly constant over the speed range, but tended to decrease with increasing speed. The choice of buffer solution affected the lubrication properties; much thicker films were recorded for the phosphate-buffered saline compared to 2-amino- 2-(hydroxymethyl)-1,3-propanediol protein solutions. The friction and film thickness results were time and/or rubbing distance dependent, suggesting that the formation of the deposited film was pressure/friction related.


Bernard Lonergan's work is both original and comprehensive. It can be grasped only by working one's way slowly and carefully through his major writings. In order to make Lonergan's unique contribution to philosophy and theology accessible to students and teachers, the editors of The Lonergan Reader have brought together in a single volume selections that represent the depth and breadth of his thought. The full range of Lonergan's basic philosophical positions, the key transitional moments in the development of his thought, and the main elements of his innovative theological method are thoroughly represented. The Lonergan Reader includes an abridgment of Lonergan's massive foundational work, Insight, and extensive selections from his last major work, Method in Theology. In addition, the volume contains the complete texts of several articles that expanded and transformed his original positions and a broad range of shorter selections. The volume highlights not only Lonergan's essential philosophical writings, but also reveals the larger cultural and theological dimensions of his work.


A Monte Carlo simulation based on the classical binary collision approximation is performed to investigate the interaction of H + ions with the carbon target. The incident H + ion is characterized by its translational energy, eigenenergy and population of the vibrational state, and orientation of the ion with respect to the target surface. It is shown that experimentally determined energy resolved mass spectrum of H + can be nicely reproduced with the help of the proposed model. These simulations predict that translational to vibrational (T ! V ) energy transfer efficiency increases nonlinearly with translational energy of the incident ion. T ! V energy transfer efficiency along with the initial vibrational energy of the incident H + ion found to play an important role in dissociation. Our simulations also show that the fraction of absorbed, reflected, and dissociated ions depends on the translational energy. The average vibrational energy of reflected H + increases with its initial translational energy. Moreover, average number of collisions required for dissociation varies inversely with the initial translational energy of the H + .


Today's LCD-TVs reduce their hold time to prevent motion blur. This is best implemented using frame rate up-conversion with motion compensated interpolation. The registration process of the TV-signal, by film or video camera, has been identified as a second motion blur source, which becomes dominant for TV displays with a frame rate of 100 Hz or higher. In order to justify any further hold time reduction of LCDs, this second type of motion blur, referred to as camera blur, needs to be addressed. This paper presents a real-time camera blur estimation and reduction method, suitable for TV-applications.