Although vaccines have had a tremendous impact in public health they are questioned by certain groups that consider them unnecessary or unsafe and argue in favor of the right to decide to be vacci nated or not. However vaccines must have special considerations because unlike other medical deci sions, not vaccinating has consequences not only for the individual but also for other members of the community. Immunizing a high proportion of the population limits the circulation of an infectious agent attaining what is called community or herd immunity that protects the susceptible members of the group. For this reason many countries consider vaccination mandatory as a responsibility of every citizen. This committee agrees with this view but thinks other strategies should be implemented as well, such as special educational efforts for the public and parents addressing benefits and real risks of vaccinating. Also health care professionals should be trained in vaccines. The notification system for adverse events currently available should be improved and be more accessible. Persons truly affected by adverse events due to vaccination should receive on time responses and be offered psychological and financial support. Finally all stakeholders should make coordinated efforts to work together to deliver messages that answer concerns on vaccines and bring confidence back to the public.


The success of a pilot milling operation is dependent on the mill design, adherence to correct milling parameters and precise location of stabilizing members in the bottomhole assembly (BHA), especially while milling through large casings such as 20 inch inside 30 inch conductor. This paper discusses the importance of correct mill design and stabilization of the BHA, along with field results from milling with under-gauged mill and stabilizers.
 Pilot milling interventions to facilitate open-hole side-tracking can be very effective and cost-efficient, especially in cases where retaining the original borehole size is necessary for further workover operations, for example, when liner is milled for this purpose. Pilot milling is a suitable option where sidetracking with a whipstock is not viable, as when casing has collapsed, with internal diameter restrictions, or situations where irreparable surface damage to conductor pipe and casing have occurred due to corrosion. Such situations might result in losing an offshore platform slot, which is a huge cost to operators.
 One such situation was encountered where 30 inch conductor pipe parted at the water line due to corrosion. Prolonged exposure to corrosion further led to 20 inch casing parting at the water line as well. Surface repairs were attempted but were unable to arrest annulus leakage. In order to recover the slot, an improved and specially designed pilot mill was used. A stabilized milling bottom-hole assembly with precise sizes and locations of stabilizers was incorporated. This new mill design resulted in milling 585.6 feet of 20 inch casing with an average rate of penetration (ROP) of 2.6 ft/hr. The new mill design resulted in good mill life and only two mill runs were made in the entire milling operation. Results of torque and drag simulations to study the bending stresses and torsional stresses on mill string components while milling are discussed. Catastrophic effects of using under-gauged mill and stabilizers were also examined.
 This improved mill and stabilized bottom-hole assembly design offers optimum ROP, improved mill life, reduced surface vibrations and a fine metal cutting structure that eases metal debris handling at surface.


Objective:
 To characterize admission trends, length of stay, and hospital costs for transient ischemic attacks (TIAs) in the United States over a five year period.

 Introduction:
 Transient ischemic attacks are relatively common, affecting an estimated 200,000 to 500,000 Americans annually. Rates of admission and characteristics of hospitalized patients with suspected or diagnosed TIA are unknown.

 Design/Methods:
 We searched the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) for adults discharged with a diagnosis of TIA (diagnosis related group 524) between January 1, 2005 and December 31, 2009; this database represents approximately 20% of all inpatient admissions in the United States. Data reviewed included patient demographics, hospital and regional characteristics, length of stay, and costs associated with admission.

 Results:
 Over the five year period, the number of patients hospitalized for TIA did not vary significantly by year or demographics (38,451 per year; mean age 70.5 years; 59.1% female) though the proportions with hypertension (68.8% to 76.2%) and who were admitted to teaching hospitals (30.1% to 38.4%) increased significantly. Elective admissions also decreased over time from 5.0% to 3.4% (P < 0.001). While the proportion of weekend admissions did not vary, it was slightly less than predicted (25.4% vs. predicted 28.6%). The median length of stay declined slightly per year (2005: 2.89 to 2009: 2.53 days) while hospital total charges increased from $14,341 in 2005 to $18,806 in 2009 (average annual increase: 6.2%). Length of stay was not lower at teaching hospitals compared to non-teaching hospitals (2.73 vs. 2.71 days) while costs were higher ($17,753 vs. $15,945, P < 0.001).

 Conclusions:
 Based on these data, we estimate that over 190,000 TIA patients are hospitalized each year in the United States. Despite the common rationale that TIA evaluation is expedited, average length of stay exceeds 2 days and costs exceeded $18,000 per patient in 2009. Teaching hospitals account for an increasing proportion of TIA admissions and are associated with higher costs. Further study is needed on cost-effective strategies (including expedited outpatient evaluation) for TIA patients.


Wave energy convertors have the potential to generate a sizeable proportion of Ireland's energy needs. Such platforms will be susceptible to bio fouling over their design life with marine growth capable of altering the hydrodynamic loading. Marine growth causes member effective diameter, mass, drag coefficients, force and hydrodynamic added mass to increase. In this paper, marine growth of various thickness and surface roughness is numerically modelled on two torus shaped point absorbers moving against a monopile in operational conditions using combined potential flow boundary element method and Morison equation viscous drag. Marine growth thickness and surface roughness have a notable effect on the platform hydrodynamic forces. However, the power matrix remains generally similar. The smaller WEC shows the greatest change with a 20 % increase in draft and 5 % increase in power.


Voyager disk-resolved images of Triton in the violet (0.41 μm) and green (0.56 μm) wavelengths have been analyzed to derive the photometric characteristics of terrains on Triton. Similar conclusions are found using two distinct but related definitions of photometric units, one based on color ratio and albedo properties (A. S. McEwen, 1990, Geophys. Res. Lett. 17, 1765-1768), the other on albedo and brightness ratios at different phase angles (cf. P. Lee et al.; 1992, Icarus 99, 82-97). A significant diversity of photometric behavior, much broader than that discovered so far on any other icy satellite, occurs among Triton's terrains. Remarkably, differences in photometric behavior do not correlate well with geologic terrain boundaries defined on the basis of surface morphology. This suggests that in most cases photometric properties on Triton are controlled by thin deposits superposed on underlying geologic units.

Single scattering albedus are 0.98 or higher and asymmetry factors range from -0.35 to -0.45 for most units. The most distinct scattering behavior is exhibited by the reddish northern units already identified as the Anomalously Scattering Region (ASR) by Lee et al., which scatters light almost isotropically with g = -0.04. In part due to the effects of Triton's clouds and haze, it is difficult to constrain the value of θ , Hapke's macroscopic roughness parameter, precisely for Triton or to map differences in θ among the different photometric terrains. However, our study shows that Triton must be relatively smooth, with θ less than 15-20°, and suggests that a value of 14° is appropriate. The differences in photometric characteristics lead to significantly different phase angle behavior for the various terrains. For example, a terrain (e.g., the ASR) that appears dark relative to another at low phase angles will reverse its contrast (become relatively brighter) at larger phase angles.

The photometric parameters have been used to calculate hemispherical albedos for the units and to infer likely surface temperatures. Based on these results, we determine that all but the most southerly regions (≃south of the equator) of the reddish northern terrains are likely to have been covered with deposits of nitrogen frost at the time of the Voyager flyby, in agreement with the suggestion from the photometry that these units are overlain by a thin veneer of material.


occasional comments on th4 fulness. The figures are clear and f by their legends so as to be i3 the text. They are mostly cull nal publications but some i produced. The layout is e chapter has a summary and uI of numbered headings and Each section lists the contents index is valuable and gives ren headings under which the re; something useful. The book is ally suited for quick reference e clinical use-


Background A previous study has shown a high proportion of visual impairment and blindness in the adults of Southwest Sumba, Indonesia due to ultraviolet-radiation (UVR)- related ocular problems, such as cataract and pterygium. Currently, there is no data regarding the effect of ultraviolet (UV) exposure on children and its future implications.
Objective To seek the predisposing factors of UVR ocular problems in the children of Southwest Sumba.
Methods A population-based cross-sectional study was conducted in Perokonda Village, Southwest Sumba in May 2017. A total of 337 children <16 years old were examined for ocular problems by ophthalmologists. Subjects with ocular problems were then treated accordingly.
Results Visual acuity was normal in 98.2% of subjects. Visual impairment and blindness were found in 1.2% and 0.3% of subjects, respectively. Ocular problems were found in 38%, consisting of conjunctival pigment deposits (60.2%), pinguecula (15.6%), and pterygium (13.3%). The UVR ocular problems constituted 33.8% of all ocular problems, comprising conjunctival pigment deposits (22.8%), pinguecula (6%), and pterygium (5%).
Conclusion The proportion of UVR ocular problems in the children of Perokonda village is 34.5%, the most common of which being conjunctival pigment deposits. Such deposits may be early signs of UVR ocular problems. This study serves as a platform to highlight the possible relationship between pigment deposits and future UVR ocular problems, which warrants further study.


Despite the growing interest in unsupervised learning, extracting meaningful knowledge from unlabelled audio remains an open challenge. To take a step in this direction, we recently proposed a problem-agnostic speech encoder (PASE), that combines a convolutional encoder followed by multiple neural networks, called workers, tasked to solve self-supervised problems (i.e., ones that do not require manual annotations as ground truth). PASE was shown to capture relevant speech information, including speaker voice-print and phonemes. This paper proposes PASE+, an improved version of PASE for robust speech recognition in noisy and reverberant environments. To this end, we employ an online speech distortion module, that contaminates the input signals with a variety of random disturbances. We then propose a revised encoder that better learns short- and long-term speech dynamics with an efficient combination of recurrent and convolutional networks. Finally, we refine the set of workers used in self-supervision to encourage better cooperation.Results on TIMIT, DIRHA and CHiME-5 show that PASE+ significantly outperforms both the previous version of PASE as well as common acoustic features. Interestingly, PASE+ learns transferable representations suitable for highly mismatched acoustic conditions.


INTRODUCTION
Hantaviruses are the etiological agents of hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome in Europe and Asia, and hantavirus pulmonary syndrome in America. Approximately 150,000 cases are reported annually worldwide. In Spain, some hantavirus infection cases have been described. Besides, rodents that have been described as hantavirus reservoirs are present. The aim of the present study was to determinate the seroprevalence of hantavirus in humans in the northeast of Spain.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
During a 5-month period, 217 serum samples were collected. The study population was stratified by age, gender, and residential area. Age, gender, residential area, contact with pets, contact with wild animals, contact with farm animals, and occupation were surveyed. Immunoglobulin G antibodies to Hantaan virus, Seoul virus, or Puumala virus were examined by immunofluorescence assay. Titles ≥1/32 against any of the hantavirus were considered positive.

RESULTS
Four (1.8%) positive samples were detected. Age ranged from 14 to 67 years. Two subjects were male. Three samples reacted to both Puumala virus and Hantaan virus. The other one reacted against all three hantavirus surveyed. Titles ranged from 32 to 1024. The highest titles were found against Seoul virus.

CONCLUSIONS
Our data show serological evidence about hantavirus infection among population of Catalonia, northeast of Spain. Seroprevalence rate was (around 2%) similar to other regions of Spain.


Many novice programmers view programming tools as all-knowing, infallible authorities about what is right and wrong about code. This misconception is particularly detrimental to beginners, who may view the cold, terse, and often judgmental errors from compilers as a sign of personal failure. It is possible, however, that attributing this failure to the computer, rather than the learner, may improve learners' motivation to program. To test this hypothesis, we present Gidget, a game where the eponymous robot protagonist is cast as a fallible character that blames itself for not being able to correctly write code to complete its missions. Players learn programming by working with Gidget to debug its problematic code. In a two-condition controlled experiment, we manipulated Gidget's level of personification in: communication style, sound effects, and image. We tested our game with 116 self-described novice programmers recruited on Amazon's Mechanical Turk and found that, when given the option to quit at any time, those in the experimental condition (with a personable Gidget) completed significantly more levels in a similar amount of time. Participants in the control and experimental groups played the game for an average time of 39.4 minutes (SD=34.3) and 50.1 minutes (SD=42.6) respectively. These finding suggest that how programming tool feedback is portrayed to learners can have a significant impact on motivation to program and learning success.


To increase individual male fitness, males of various species remain near a (potential) mating partner and repel their rivals (mate-guarding). Mate-guarding is assumed to be mediated by two different types of motivation: sexual motivation toward the opposite sex and competitive motivation toward the same sex. The genetic/molecular mechanisms underlying how mate presence affects male competitive motivation in a triadic relationship has remained largely unknown. Here we showed that male medaka fish prominently exhibit mateguarding behavior. The presence of a female robustly triggers male-male competition for the female in a triadic relationship (2 males and 1 female). The male-male competition resulted in one male occupying a dominant position near the female while interfering with the other male's approach of the female. Paternity testing revealed that the dominant male had a significantly higher mating success rate than the other male in a triadic relationship. We next generated medaka mutants of arginine-vasotocin (avt) and its receptors (V1a1, V1a2) and revealed that two genes, avt and V1a2, are required for normal mate-guarding behavior. In addition, behavioral analysis of courtship behaviors in a dyadic relationship and aggressive behaviors within a male group revealed that avtmutant males displayed decreased sexual motivation but showed normal aggression. In contrast, heterozygote V1a2mutant males displayed decreased aggression, but normal mate-guarding and courtship behavior. Thus, impaired mate-guarding in avt and V1a2 homozygote mutants may be due to the loss of sexual motivation toward the opposite sex, and not to the loss of competitive motivation PLOSGenetics | DOI:10.1371/journal.pgen.1005009 February 26, 2015 1 / 25 a11111


With the implementation of the European Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), European environmental law has become experimental ground. A new instrument has been introduced to regulate the emission of greenhouse gases. Tradable permits, a market-based instrument and favoured by economists, has replaced the traditional regulatory instruments. Economic theory suggests that the potential of the EU ETS to solve problems of climate protection is comparatively high. It is the cornerstone of European climate protection policy, and has also qualified as the prototype of architecture for a global climate regime. One main question is how the trading scheme should be shaped and executed in order to respect legal criteria. The first lessons were learned after the first and in the early stages of the second trading period under the EU ETS. However, it is undecided how this instrument can be improved. The starting point for such considerations must be the implementation of the ETS and therefore Directive 2003/87/EC (ETS Directive). As a result of balancing various interests, the Directive is a compromise and lacks specificity in many sections. The Directive is currently about to be revised for the third trading period, starting in 2012. Additionally, since this European pioneer project shall be instructive for an eventual worldwide system, it is time to put the EU ETS to the test. The article puts several elements of the trading scheme to the test: the legal framework; the experience obtained with certificate systems at the national level (the US, the UK and Denmark); conflicts between the EU ETS and the fundamental rights in relation to European law and finally, possible conflicts with international trade law.


Abstract There is pragmatic encroachment on some epistemic status just in case whether a proposition has that status for a subject depends not only on the subject's epistemic position with respect to the proposition, but also on features of the subject's non-epistemic, practical environment. Discussions of pragmatic encroachment usually focus on knowledge. Here we argue that, barring infallibilism, there is pragmatic encroachment on what is arguably a more fundamental epistemic status – the status a proposition has when it is warranted enough to be a reason one has for believing other things.


The Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) has been used as intravesical immunotherapy for superficial urothelial bladder carcinoma in preventing its recurrence. Prosthetic joint infections due to those instillations are very rare and few practitioners know this side effect. We report the case of a 77-year old male with a medical history of right hip replacement and super- ficial urothelial bladder carcinoma treated with BCG-instillations. He presented with a painful hip joint and extreme difficulty at walking. Because of high suspicion of prosthetic joint infection, a 2-stage arthroplasty was performed. Microbiological culture revealed Mycobacterium bovis so he was kept on antituberculous therapy for twelve months. Remarkable is the delay between the instillations and the acquisition of the prosthetic joint infection. A medical history of BCG instillations should warrant the practitioner for a possible joint infection. There are no current guidelines concerning the therapy.


Given the lack of significant federal criminal prosecutions stemming from the 2008 financial crisis, state enforcement — in particular, by the New York State Attorney General through Section 352-c of the General Business Law, known as the 'Martin Act' — could play a larger role. Were the Martin Act to become a more significant means of criminal prosecution however, its heightened use would inevitably magnify two major problems with the statute. First, it is widely believed that the statute's culpability standards are weaker than those required for prosecution under federal law. Specifically, the consensus view is that the Martin Act establishes strict liability for misdemeanor securities fraud crimes. Yet there has been almost no analysis of whether it is 'appropriate' to prosecute securities fraud as a strict liability crime, at least under this provision. Second, in part because there have been so few Martin Act decisions, New York courts have provided scant justification for their interpretation of mens rea under the felony provisions of the statute. As a result, they have never thoroughly explained exactly what showing of culpability is required for felony liability, or how their holdings comport with the Martin Act's text and legislative history.This Note demonstrates that the mental state requirements for Martin Act misdemeanor and felony liability need to be clarified and more thoroughly supported, especially because the statutory text and legislative history are so ambiguous, and the subsequent jurisprudence has failed to provide a coherent explain for the current state of the doctrine. Nonetheless, the Martin Act's text, history and underlying policy rationale can be interpreted to support strict liability prosecution for misdemeanor securities fraud, and to impose felony liability for reckless violations of the statute.


Iron storage proteins are essential for maintaining intracellular iron homeostasis and redox balance. Iron is generally stored in a soluble and bioavailable form inside ferritin protein compartments. However, some organisms do not encode ferritins and thus rely on alternative storage strategies. Encapsulins, a class of protein-based organelles, have recently been implicated in microbial iron and redox metabolism. Here, we report the structural and mechanistic characterization of a 42 nm two-component encapsulin-based iron storage compartment from Quasibacillus thermotolerans. Using cryo-electron microscopy and x-ray crystallography, we reveal the assembly principles of a thermostable T = 4 shell topology and its catalytic ferroxidase cargo. We show that the cargo-loaded compartment has an exceptionally large iron storage capacity storing over 23,000 iron atoms. These results form the basis for understanding alternate microbial strategies for dealing with the essential element iron.


This essay explores the notion of temporality in Bonhoeffer's thought. After an
introductory reference to an early text of Bonhoeffer that reveals his passion for
movement and the moment, the essay comments briefly on the direction of
Emmanuel Levinas's reflections on temporality. It is argued that both Levinas and
Bonhoeffer link their understanding of temporality to otherness and death. The main
part of the essay traces Bonhoeffer's understanding of the timeful nature of reality,
with special reference to his Berlin dissertations, Sanctorum Communio and Act
and Being, two of his Barcelona sermons, his Ethics and his Prison writings. The
last section of the essay offers Bonhoeffer's timeful engagement with life as a
challenge to a reductive economization of time.


This paper presents the number of k-stage integer recurrence relations (IRR) over the ring  Z 2 which generates sequences of maximum possible period (2 k -1)2 e-1 for e > 1. This number corresponds to the primitive polynomials mod 2 which satisfy the condition proposed by Brent and is2 (e-2)k+1 (2 k-1 -1) for  e > 3 . This number is same as measured by Dai but arrived at with a different condition for maximum period. Our way of counting gives an explicit method for construction of such polynomials. Furthermore, this paper also presents the number of different sequences corresponding to such IRRs of maximum period.


Modern database management systems (DBMS) have been designed to efficiently store, manage and perform computations on massive amounts of data. In contrast, many existing visualization systems do not scale seamlessly from small data sets to enormous ones. We have designed a three-tiered visualization system called ScalaR to deal with this issue. ScalaR dynamically performs resolution reduction when the expected result of a DBMS query is too large to be effectively rendered on existing screen real estate. Instead of running the original query, ScalaR inserts aggregation, sampling or filtering operations to reduce the size of the result. This paper presents the design and implementation of ScalaR, and shows results for an example application, displaying satellite imagery data stored in SciDB as the back-end DBMS.


: Recent changes in the regulatory guidelines of the Freedom of Information Act have allowed greater public access to hospital specific data concerning Medicare patients. The result has been a significant increase in media attention to hospital outcomes, particularly death rate data. This article outlines the changes and potential problem areas, discusses how hospitals in Birmingham, Alabama were affected, and how they responded. Proactive strategies for managing the public release of hospital specific death rates are proposed as part of an ongoing quality management program.


This book comprehensively discusses design considerations for the truly energy efficient data center. Scott Davis, Chief Data Center Architect, Office of the CTO, VMware, Inc. This Book Isnt About Evangelizing Green It: Its About Getting Down in the Trenches and Making It Work In Foundations of Green IT, a team of leading Green IT consultants presents the detailed technical information data center professionals need to systematically identify the right improvements, implement them, maximize savings, and accurately calculate business value. Marty Poniatowski and his team present comprehensive case studies reflecting their unsurpassed Green IT experience, complete with detailed implementation diagrams and performance information. Youll find independent, detailed coverage of solutions from HP, VMware, EMC, Cisco, and other leading vendors, with optimized sample designs and realistic ROI projections. Whether youre a CIO or IT director, architect or administrator, if you want to improve IT efficiency, this is your definitive resource. Three comprehensive, start-to-finish case studies Analyze current environments, set goals, define implementation plans, and calculate ROI for: Server and desktop consolidation and virtualization Data center backup/recovery/archiving, including replication Networking, including VoIP background Plus practical coverage of these Green IT topics: Designing data centers for greater efficiency and lower power usage Leveraging cloud computing Consolidating Microsoft SQL Server instances Reducing PC-related power usage and waste About CDI, the company behind this book: This book was written collaboratively by many CDI technical experts, led by Marty Poniatowski. CDI is an infrastructure services firm with practices focusing on virtualization, storage, networking, data center design, and other green services. It has clients in all industries, notably financial services, pharmaceuticals, and healthcare.


Constitutional doctrine is typically "rule-dependent." Typically, a constitutional litigant will not prevail unless she can show that a particular kind of legal rule is in force, e.g., a rule that discriminates against "suspect classes" in violation of the Equal Protection Clause, or that targets speech in violation of the First Amendment, or that is motivated by a religious purpose in violation of the Establishment Clause. Further, the litigant must typically establish a violation of her "personal rights." The Supreme Court has consistently stated that a reviewing court should not invalidate an unconstitutional governmental action at the instance of a claimant whose personal rights are not violated by that action (with a special exception for those unusual cases where the "personal rights" requirement is set aside, such as First Amendment overbreadth cases). In this Article, I argue that rule-dependence and the personal rights requirement - these two familiar features of modern constitutional law - are inconsistent. If the purpose of constitutional adjudication were really to vindicate the personal rights of litigants, constitutional doctrine would not be rule-dependent in the way I have just described. (This is true, I claim, on any plausible conception of a "personal right.") Further, I suggest that the tension between rule-dependence and personal rights should be resolved by abandoning the personal rights requirement. Constitutional courts should be seen as oversight bodies whose task is to repeal or amend legal rules that violate constitutional norms; and litigants should be seen as the "private attorneys general" who initiate the enforcement of these norms. This paper is an extension of arguments first presented in my article "Rights Against Rules: The Moral Structure of American Constitutional Law," 97 Michigan Law Review 1 (1998).


Because of increasing of vehicle usage throughout the world, the safety driving in traffic is gaining importance. There are many automatic auditing mechanisms to decrease the number of traffic accidents. In a public road that has lanes,possibility of a traffic accident caused by drivers who uses the wrong lane or changes the lane frequently or changes the lanes when it is forbidden, is fairly high. In this study, image processing techniques are applied to detect vehicles that changes lanes hazardously and uses different lanes from its lane to go according to its classified vehicle type.


It is well known that combining spatial and spectral information can improve land use classification from satellite imagery. Human activity on the ground, such as construction, induces changes in both the photometric structure of the image and in its spectral content owing to, primarily, changes in vegetation density and surface materials. This paper introduces a novel approach to combine spatial (more precisely, structural) information extracted from (1-m resolution) panchromatic Ikonos imagery with the multispectral response (4-m resolution) available from the same sensor. Of the prior work combining spatial and spectral information, none has extracted structural features as we do, and none has combined these information sources as early in the process. The classifier we describe here, discriminating urban and rural regions, is a front-end component of a fairly complete satellite image analysis system that identifies suburban residential areas and extracts their street networks and single-family houses. We extract structural information in the form of photometric straight lines and their spatial arrangement over relatively small neighborhoods. To capture the multispectral information, we turn to the well-known normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and an improved linearized version of our own development (details of the structural analysis and the theoretical development of the linearized NDVI appear elsewhere). This paper addresses the novel combination of these types of features (hybrids) by using the structural features, straight line support regions based on gradient orientation, as cue regions for multispectral analysis. We test the hybrid features in a range of parametric and nonparametric classifiers. We also implement and test a probabilistic relaxation algorithm followed by the maximum a priori decision rule. We report extensive results that indicate significant improvements in classification accuracy using the hybrid features.


A wave energy converter has been constructed and its function and operational characteristics have been thoroughly investigated and published. The wave energy converter was installed in March of 2006 approximately two kilometers off the Swedish west coast in the proximity of the town Lysekil. Since then the converter has been submerged at the research site for over two and a half years and in operation during three time periods for a total of 12 months, the latest being during five months of 2008. Throughout this time the generated electricity has been transmitted to shore and operational data has been recorded. The wave energy converter and its connected electrical system has been continually upgraded and each of the three operational periods have investigated more advanced stages in the progression toward grid connection. The wave energy system has faced the challenges of the ocean and initial results and insights have been reached, most important being that the overall wave energy concept has been verified. Experiments have shown that slowly varying power generation from ocean waves is possible.Apart from the wave energy converter, three shorter studies have been performed. A sensor was designed for measuring the air gap width of the linear generator used in the wave energy converter. The sensor consists of an etched coil, a search coil, that functions passively through induction. Theory and experiment showed good agreement.The Swedish west coast wave climate has been studied in detail. The study used eight years of wave data from 13 sites in the Skagerrak and Kattegatt, and data from a wave measurement buoy located at the wave energy research site. The study resulted in scatter diagrams, hundred year extreme wave estimations, and a mapping of the energy flux in the area. The average energy flux was found to be approximately 5.2 kW/m in the offshore Skagerrak, 2.8 kW/m in the near shore Skagerrak, and 2.4 kW/m in the Kattegat.A method for evaluating renewable energy technologies in terms of economy and engineering solutions has been investigated. The match between the technologies and the fundamental physics of renewable energy sources can be given in terms of the technology's utilization. It is argued that engineers should strive for a high utilization if competitive technologies are to be developed.


We use a standard general equilibrium trade model to show that export and import policies are not symmetric in the equilibrium of a strategic game with quotas. We assume N (identical) large countries non-cooperatively set their import (or export) quotas to maximize domestic welfare. We show that the equilibrium in which all countries use import quotas differs from, and is superior to, the equilibrium in which countries use export quotas. The difference arises because the elasticity of the residual foreign export supply schedule differs between the two equilibria. We also study the properties of the sequential equilibrium of the game. In a simultaneous move game, each country is indifferent as to whether it uses an import or export quota, given the policy of the other country. However, in a sequential move game, the first mover will prefer to use an import quota rather than an export quota.


"Pain control during the first 24 hours after laparoscopic surgery is of particular importance. Different methods for this purpose are listed that include the intraperitoneal administration of Morphine, Bupivacaine, Lidocaine, etc. The aim of this study is prevalence of intraperitoneal administration of Lidocaine on pain and shoulder pain in the postoperative, in patients undergoing elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy surgery. This study was a double blind clinical trial on 80 patients that were for elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy surgery. They were divided randomly into two groups of 40 numbers that in the first group after laparoscopy and before leaving the trocar, 100 cc Normal Saline containing 200 mg of Lidocaine in the diaphragm, and peritoneal cavity was sprayed and in the second group only 100 cc of Normal Saline was sprayed into the abdomen. After the surgery abdominal pain and shoulder pain ruler of patients with pain (10.1) hours, 1, 2, 4, 6, 12, 18 and 24 were measured. The mean age in the saline group was 40.92±14.28 and in Lidocaine group was 43.95±17.79 (P=0.404). The mean weight in the saline group was 67.58±12.92 and in Lidocaine group was 68.65±11.7 (P=0.698). Results did not show the difference between the two groups in terms of sex, age and weight. The mean pain in 24 hours in normal saline group was 4.15±1.22 and in Lidocaine group was 1.52±0.63 (P=0.194). Nausea, vomiting, dizziness, Tinnitus and numbness around the mouth in both groups, at different times did not show a statistically significant difference. Tranquilizer intake for 1, 4, 6, 12 and 24 days after surgery in Lidocaine group compared with Normal Saline group was less but the difference was not significant. Intraperitoneal administration 200 mg Lidocaine in patients undergoing surgery elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy is not effective in reducing pain and shoulder after surgery."


This work consists of discussions as well as practical examples about potentials and challenges for regional managers in Indonesia en-routing to the 3rd World Development Model. The model emerged as a critique to the old schemes of government collaborations and partnerships in which the participation of the end-users is not proportionally given. This work aims to understand the relationships among actors, the divisions of their roles, the pattern of participation as well as the advantages of "end-users" participation in the development project. This concept is a Constructive Model of Collaborative, a meeting point between Participatory and Collaborative Governance concept. This study is conducted through post-positivistic approach and qualitative methods by using cases and theoretical studies. Furthermore, through this article, the authors focused on the two major issues in the development nowadays. Firstly, the issue of decreasing public finance, particularly in the case of financial deficit in national health insurance program known as JKN-KIS. Secondly, the issue of public participation in regional and urban development planning through case of Bandar Kayangan City Development Project in North Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara. Hence, this work drives a finding which offers solutions for the challenges on how to run the development project without depending on State or Local Budget at the same time to leverage the public supports and participation in government's development agenda. Finally, it is concluded that there are needs to understand the tendencies of conflicting visions and goals, power or influence asymmetric and resources imbalance among the involved actors in the new model of collaborative governance.


Ample empirical evidence has found that access to childcare for preschool children increases mothers' labor force participation and employment. In this paper, we investigate whether increased childcare for primary school children improves the quality of jobs mothers find by estimating the causal effect of a school schedule reform in Chile. Combining plausibly exogenous temporal and spatial variations in school schedules with a panel of individual mothers' employment between 2002 and 2015, we estimated a fixed-effects model that controlled for unobserved heterogeneity. We found a positive effect of access to full-day schools on several measures of 'the quality of mothers' jobs, which were correlated to working full-time. We also found small, positive effects on quality of fathers' jobs. Our evidence suggests that the mechanism driving the effect was the effect of the reform's implicit subsidy to the cost of childcare on the opportunity cost of mothers' time. We also found that less educated mothers benefited most from the reform. Thus, childcare can increase household welfare by improving parents' jobs and can play a role in reducing inequality.


Cancer development and progression are demarcated by transcriptional dysregulation, which is largely attributed to aberrant chromatin architecture. Recent transformative technologies have enabled researchers to examine the genome organization at an unprecedented dimension and precision. In particular, increasing evidence supports the essential roles of 3D chromatin architecture in transcriptional homeostasis and proposes its alterations as prominent causes of human cancer. In this article, we will discuss the recent findings on enhancers, enhancer–promoter interaction, chromatin topology, phase separation and explore their potential mechanisms in shaping transcriptional dysregulation in cancer progression. In addition, we will propose our views on how to employ state-of-the-art technologies to decode the unanswered questions in this field. Overall, this article motivates the study of 3D chromatin architecture in cancer, which allows for a better understanding of its pathogenesis and develop novel approaches for diagnosis and treatment of cancer.


Short- to mid-term magnetic phenomena on the stellar surface of M-type stars cannot only resemble the effects of planets in radial velocity data, but also may hide them. We analyze 145 spectroscopic HARPS-N observations of GJ 3942 taken over the past five years and additional photometry to disentangle stellar activity effects from genuine Doppler signals as a result of the orbital motion of the star around the common barycenter with its planet. To achieve this, we use the common methods of pre-whitening, and treat the correlated red noise by a first-order moving average term and by Gaussian-process regression following an MCMC analysis. We identify the rotational period of the star at 16.3 days and discover a new super-Earth, GJ 3942 b, with an orbital period of 6.9 days and a minimum mass of 7.1 Me. An additional signal in the periodogram of the residuals is present but we cannot claim it to be related to a second planet with sufficient significance at this point. If confirmed, such planet candidate would have a minimum mass of 6.3 Me and a period of 10.4 days, which might indicate a 3:2 mean-motion resonance with the inner planet.


Background Globalization and environmental changes have intensified the emergence or re-emergence of infectious diseases worldwide, such as outbreaks of dengue fever in Southeast Asia. Collaboration on region-wide infectious disease surveillance systems is therefore critical but difficult to achieve because of the different transparency levels of health information systems in different countries. Although the Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases (ProMED)–mail is the most comprehensive international expert–curated platform providing rich disease outbreak information on humans, animals, and plants, the unstructured text content of the reports makes analysis for further application difficult. Objective To make monitoring the epidemic situation in Southeast Asia more efficient, this study aims to develop an automatic summary of the alert articles from ProMED-mail, a huge textual data source. In this paper, we proposed a text summarization method that uses natural language processing technology to automatically extract important sentences from alert articles in ProMED-mail emails to generate summaries. Using our method, we can quickly capture crucial information to help make important decisions regarding epidemic surveillance. Methods Our data, which span a period from 1994 to 2019, come from the ProMED-mail website. We analyzed the collected data to establish a unique Taiwan dengue corpus that was validated with professionals' annotations to achieve almost perfect agreement (Cohen κ=90%). To generate a ProMED-mail summary, we developed a dual-channel bidirectional long short-term memory with attention mechanism with infused latent syntactic features to identify key sentences from the alerting article. Results Our method is superior to many well-known machine learning and neural network approaches in identifying important sentences, achieving a macroaverage F1 score of 93%. Moreover, it can successfully extract the relevant correct information on dengue fever from a ProMED-mail alerting article, which can help researchers or general users to quickly understand the essence of the alerting article at first glance. In addition to verifying the model, we also recruited 3 professional experts and 2 students from related fields to participate in a satisfaction survey on the generated summaries, and the results show that 84% (63/75) of the summaries received high satisfaction ratings. Conclusions The proposed approach successfully fuses latent syntactic features into a deep neural network to analyze the syntactic, semantic, and contextual information in the text. It then exploits the derived information to identify crucial sentences in the ProMED-mail alerting article. The experiment results show that the proposed method is not only effective but also outperforms the compared methods. Our approach also demonstrates the potential for case summary generation from ProMED-mail alerting articles. In terms of practical application, when a new alerting article arrives, our method can quickly identify the relevant case information, which is the most critical part, to use as a reference or for further analysis.


Blood microbiome is important to investigate microbial-host interactions and the effects on systemic immune perturbations. However, this effort has met with major challenges due to low microbial biomass and background artifacts. In the current study, microbial 16S DNA sequencing was applied to analyze plasma microbiome. We have developed a quality-filtering strategy to evaluate and exclude low levels of microbial sequences, potential contaminations, and artifacts from plasma microbial 16S DNA sequencing analyses. Furthermore, we have applied our technique in three cohorts, including tobacco-smokers, HIV-infected individuals, and individuals with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), as well as corresponding controls. More than 97% of total sequence data was removed using stringent quality-filtering strategy analyses; those removed amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) were low levels of microbial sequences, contaminations, and artifacts. The specifically enriched pathobiont bacterial ASVs have been identified in plasmas from tobacco-smokers, HIV-infected individuals, and individuals with SLE but not from control subjects. The associations between these ASVs and disease pathogenesis were demonstrated. The pathologic activities of some identified bacteria were further verified in vitro. We present a quality-filtering strategy to identify pathogenesis-associated plasma microbiome. Our approach provides a method for studying the diagnosis of subclinical microbial infection as well as for understanding the roles of microbiome-host interaction in disease pathogenesis.


To evaluate the virulance of 11 isolates of native entomopathogenic fungi as biocontrol agent of Boophilus annulatus, in this study, 4 three months old calves were used for tick rearing. Different developmental stages of the ticks, Boophilus annulatus were inoculated by 10 7 conidia/ml dilution of the fungal isolates in the presence of control groups. The mortality, egg hatchability and reproductive efficiency were determined in different treatments and control groups and the results were analized statisticaly. Metarhizium anisopliae strains DEMI001 and IRAN437C, Beauveria bassiana strain IRAN403C, and Lecanicillium psalliotae strain IRAN468C were the most virulent strains in comparison with their relative strains and caused 80 -100%, 20 - 80%, 0 - 40% and 0- 40% mortality for engorged females respectively. All 11 tested fungi reduced egg laying capability of the ticks several days before their death. The obtained data showed that the entomopathogenic fungi can affect all developmental stages of Boophilus annulatus, but their efficiency varies considerably according to the fungal species and strains. It is demonstrated for the first time the pathogenic effect of Lecanicillium psalliotae against Boophilus annulatus.


In recent years, X-ray detectors used and developed at synchrotron sources and Free Electron Lasers (FELs) have become increasing powerful and versatile. However, as the capabilities of modern X-ray cameras grew so did their complexity and therefore their response functions are far from trivial. Since understanding the detecting system and its behavior is vital for any physical experiment, the need for dedicated powerful simulation tools arose. The HPAD Output Response fUnction Simulator (HORUS) was originally developed to analyze the performance implications of certain design choices for the Adaptive Gain Integrating Pixel Detector (AGIPD) and over the years grew to a more universal detector simulation toolkit covering the relevant physics in the energy range from below 1 keV to a few hundred keV. HORUS has already been used to study possible improvements of the AGIPD for X-ray Photon Correlation Spectroscopy (XPCS) at the European XFEL and its performance at low beam energies. It is currently being used to study the optimum detector layout for Coherent Diffration Imaging (CDI) at the European XFEL. Simulations of the charge summing mode of the Medipix3 chip have been essential for the improvements of the charge summing mode in the Medipix3 RX chip. HORUS is universal enough to support arbitrary hybrid pixel detector systems (within limitations). To date, the following detector systems are predefined within HORUS: The AGIPD, the Large Pixel Detector (LPD), the Cornell-Stanford Pixel Array Detector (CSPAD), the Mixed-Mode (MMPAD) and KEKPAD, and the Medipix2, Medipix3 and Medipix3 RX chips.


The EU-funded TeSLA project - Adaptive Trust-based e-Assessment System for Learning (http://tesla-project.eu) has developed a suite of instruments for e-Authentication. These include face recognition, voice recognition, keystroke dynamics, forensic analysis and plagiarism detection were designed for integration within a university's virtual learning environment. These tools were trialed across the seven partner institutions: 4,058 participating students, including 330 Students with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND); 54 teaching staff.
This paper describes the findings of this large-scale study where over 50% of students gave a positive response to the use of these tools. In addition, over 70% agreed that these tools were 'to ensure that my examination results are trusted' and 'to prove that my essay is my own original work'. Teaching staff also reported positive experiences of TeSLA: the figure reaching 100% in one institution. We show there is evidence that a suite of e-authentication tools such as TeSLA can potentially be acceptable to students and staff and be used to increase trust in online assessment. Also, that whilst not yet perfected for SEND students it can still enrich their experience of assessment. We find that care is needed when introducing such technologies to ensure the building of the layers of trust required for their successful adoption.


Large sparse linear systems of equations are ubiquitous in science and engineering, such as those arising from discretizations of partial differential equations. Algebraic multigrid (AMG) methods are one of the most common methods of solving such linear systems, with an extensive body of underlying mathematical theory. A system of linear equations defines a graph on the set of unknowns and each level of a multigrid solver requires the selection of an appropriate coarse graph along with restriction and interpolation operators that map to and from the coarse representation. The efficiency of the multigrid solver depends critically on this selection and many selection methods have been developed over the years. Recently, it has been demonstrated that it is possible to directly learn the AMG interpolation and restriction operators, given a coarse graph selection. In this paper, we consider the complementary problem of learning to coarsen graphs for a multigrid solver, a necessary step in developing fully learnable AMG methods. We propose a method using a reinforcement learning (RL) agent based on graph neural networks (GNNs), which can learn to perform graph coarsening on small planar training graphs and then be applied to unstructured large planar graphs, assuming bounded node degree. We demonstrate that this method can produce better coarse graphs than existing algorithms, even as the graph size increases and other properties of the graph are varied. We also propose an efficient inference procedure for performing graph coarsening that results in linear time complexity in graph size.


Steel cables play an indispensable role in a number of rather diverse fields of applications. They are extensively used in suspension and stay cables bridges. It is important to be able to detect as precociously as possible the defects affecting their performance. They can present a healthy aspect over their observable lengths and be damaged in the hidden parts (anchorages). In this present study, Acoustic Emission (AE) is used in order to detect and to locate broken wires in the anchorage zones. The study of the behaviour of a broken wire in a cable under dynamic bending contribute to understand the origin of AE source and to discuss the necessary conditions of vibrating for detection. In this case, the phenomene source of AE is related to interwire friction caused by the redistribution of elastic energy on the recovery length of the broken wire and the repetition of the process joining-slip between wires. AE parameters are very influenced by the change of surface conditions, contact strength between wires and the recovery length of the broken wire. Several cables are evaluated in different surface conditions i.e. corroded, dry and oiled.


ABSTRACT The behavior of technetium at ultra-trace (<10−10 mol l−1) concentrations in bioreducing sediment column experiments was investigated using 99mTc γ-camera imaging. Four flowing sediment columns were biostimulated for varying periods of time, using acetate as an electron donor, such that on the day of imaging they represented oxic, early metal-reducing, Fe(III)-reducing and sulfate-reducing conditions. Prior to imaging, columns were spiked with 9.6 MBq of 99mTc(VII)O4−, which is relevant to the 99Tc mass concentrations observed at nuclear facilities, run under site relevant flow conditions, and imaged using γ-camera imaging at 20 min intervals over 12h. In the oxic column 99mTc behaved as a conservative tracer and did not interact significantly with the sediment. In all of the biostimulated columns 99mTc associated with the sediment although the spike was least mobile in the order sulfate < Fe(III)-reducing < early metal-reducing columns, confirming higher reactivity for 99mTc under increasingly reducing conditions. Columns were destructively sampled after 99mTc decay (5 days storage), and 0.5 N HCl extractable Fe as Fe(II) was measured at 2 cm intervals along the column length. The Fe(II) measured in all electron donor amended columns was present in stoichiometric excess to the 99mTc. Geochemical modelling and aqueous geochemical data from the different biostimulation treatments suggested that the elevated pH observed in the more reduced columns lead to increased sorbed and mineral associated Fe(II), both stronger reductants for Tc(VII) than aqueous Fe(II). In the sulfate reduction column the presence of FeS lead to the fastest rates of 99mTc immobilization. The results are the first to show the variable but significant retention of 99mTc at ultra-trace levels relevant to conditions at many nuclear sites in a range of biostimulated sediment columns and present a positive outlook for the treatment of 99Tc contaminated groundwater through in-situ biostimulation.


AbstractThe purpose of this study is to investigate how the company Viking Sewing Machines (VSM) should handle the storing of its sewing machines bought from the Far East. Should VSM continue to store the machines in assistance with Schenker, or should the company handle the process by itself and store the machines in its own warehouse.This question is interesting at the same time as it is complex. There are several aspects to consider prior to a decision can be made. It demands a thorough forecast planning, due to the three to four months long lead-time from the Far East. The company needs to consider this aspect carefully in order to keep a high quality delivery service during the sale fluctuations. The trade with sewing machines is highly dependent on the season, with increasing sales during the winter. To be able to maintain the leading position on the market VSM has been forced to make changes in its structure of products, where the simpler machines have been taken away from the production. The advanced machines are still produced by VSM, these machines have an impressive capacity that manages the most advanced sewing and patterns. The machines that have been taken away from production have been replaced with low-priced machines traded from the Far East. This change has resulted in that parts of VSM's production are outsourced to low paid countries. We have conducted a case study, and our information consists of primary and secondary data. This study is done in order to collect data that is necessary for answering our research questions, and find a result for a decision. The primary data consists of the results received during the interviews, and the secondary data are based on the literature study.We have done calculations of how much of the space in the warehouse will be occupied by the trading machines, calculating safety-stock and the total warehouse has attained this.The study illustrates that by using an external part that handles the warehouse will result in increased costs for VSM. The result of the study is accomplished by comparing the cost of having the machines at "home" to the cost of using Schenker. The calculations demonstrate that it is much more expensive for VSM to make use of an external part. VSM has a fully automation system and at Schenker costs of handling the machines will be added, these costs consists of input and output of the products, besides the cost of renting the warehouse. The differences of having the machines on shelves, so-called "bratt", at VSM are therefore considerably beneficial. It would also lead to a rationalization when handling the machines when they are sold and the pallets are to be loaded to respective dispatch note. At VSM the machines are registered in the computer system and they already have a functional packing system. The numbers that the report not have bin taken in consideration are the investment costs that are required for making the introduction of the machines at VSM´s warehouse possible. The problem are as said earlier a complex decision variable and to make a decision you have to estimate the global approach and not only to one cost unit. It is therefore from only this report hard to come by a 100% resolution.


Myocardial cell damage caused by myocardial ischemia results from several factors that include the duration of ischemia, oxygen demand by cardiomyocytes at the time of ischemia, and the presence and entity of collateral blood flow to the ischemic area. Importantly, myocardial cell injury may derive not only from ischemia itself but also from detrimental phenomena occurring during the restoration of myocardial blood flow after the ischemic episode (reperfusion damage). In the last decades a lot of studies have demonstrated that cardiomyocytes have several mechanisms that provide them protection against the damage deriving from ischemia-reperfusion, also allowing a prolongation of survival in the most severe cases. In this article we review some of these mechanisms, also discussing their present and/or potential therapeutic applications in the clinical setting. The topics include the interventions aimed at reducing cardiac work through a reduction of oxygen demand by myocardial cells or at optimizing the utilization of energetic resources by myocardial cells in situations of ischemia, the importance of phenomena such as ischemic preconditioning (early and delayed) and postconditioning of myocardial cells, and, finally, the theoretic possibility of interventions aimed at preventing cell death consequent to apoptosis.


Fine aggregate has been extensively used in the construction industry as a key component of concrete production. Although river sand is one of the major sources of fine aggregate, different sources exhibit different properties by virtue of the geological formation of the drainage basin. Further, the use of river sand as the source of fine aggregate has resulted in over-exploitation leading to depletion and environmental degradation. This has led to exploration of alternative sources to safeguard depletion and reduce the negative impacts on the environment. This research was conducted on a variety of river sands and alternative fine aggregates to assess their suitability for concrete manufacture. A quantitative experimental approach was adopted to test the Physical, chemical and mineralogical properties of fine aggregates sourced from Machakos, Mwingi, Naivasha and Kajiado and the resultant concrete strength after 7, 14 and 28 days recorded. The fineness modulus of all the material samples ranged from 1.92 to 3.66, specific gravity 1.73 to 2.27 and silt content 2.06% to 11.9%. All the samples fell within the overall grading envelope. The silicon dioxide concentration ranged from 65% to 80%, Aluminium oxide 9% to 19% and Calcium oxide 1.3% to 2.5%. Machakos sand had the highest Silicon dioxide and calcium oxide concentration of 80% and 2.5% respectively, while quarry dust had the highest aluminium oxide concentration of 19%. It was observed that concrete produced from natural river sand obtained from Mwingi , Kajiado and Machakos achieved strengths of 41.899N/mm2 , 37.173N/mm 2 and  33.645N/mm 2 respectively comparative to 30 N/mm2 target  characteristic strength after 28 days. On the other hand, concrete  produced using fine aggregates obtained from Mlolongo rock sand,  Naivasha sand and Mlolongo Quarry dust achieved strengths of 28.682  N/mm 2 , 28.411 N/mm2 and 27.661 N/mm2 respectively falling short of the requisite compressive strength after 28 days. Keywords— Concrete mix design, Concrete strength, Fine aggregates.


Transfer reactions in inverse kinematics using the radioactive ion beams provided by the REX- ISOLDE facility at CERN are very good tools to gain insight into the single-particle properties of exotic nuclei. The new silicon particle detector setup T-REX, optimized for these transfer reactions, is presented in this article. T-REX consists of position sensitive ΔE-E telescopes in a compact configuration that covers up to 66% of the solid angle. The setup allows the identification of the light reaction products and the measurement of their angular distribution for a large range of polar angles. Simultaneous detection of the elastically scattered target-like nuclei enables the determination of the optical model parameters used in the analysis of the experiments.


Abstract Conglomerate sequences over 700 m thick were deposited subsequent to ophiolite emplacement during Late Cretaceous time in north Oman. The conglomerates were deposited by streams draining the allochthonous ophiolite and Hawasina complex after their obduction onto autochthonous Mesozoic and older Oman shelf sequences and subsequent uplift. The conglomerates belong to the Qahlah Formation of Late Cretaceous age, which is sandwiched between the Semail Ophiolite/Hawasina complex and Maastrichtian–Palaeogene carbonate rocks. The siliciclastics of the Qahlah Formation are the first sediments deposited over the obducted oceanic crust sequence of ophiolite and Hawasina lithologies. In five locations studied in north Oman, the thickness of the formation varies from 140 m to over 700 m and comprises interbedded conglomerate, sandstone and siltstone. The sediments were deposited in isolated segmented depressions each characterized by its source terrain depending on lithologies exposed in the source area. Lithofacies associations, clast sorting and grain roundness suggest deposition in stream-dominated alluvial fans. Clasts in the conglomerates range from subangular to subrounded pebbles to boulders with both grain and matrix (sandstone) support. Cross-bedded fining-upwards sequences in channelized conglomerate and sandstone suggest deposition by high-energy flows in the proximal to distal reaches of alluvial fans. High proportions of chert and ophiolite fragments in the conglomerates suggest rapid erosion of obducted oceanic crust. The presence of Loftusia-bearing carbonate beds and bivalve-bearing conglomerate beds in different sections indicates occasional interruption of alluvial deposition by marine transgressions.


Short-term power spectra of the fluctuations in the precipitable water vapor measured with a dual-channel microwave radiometer are presented. The spectra, taken over 34-hour sampling periods, encompass periodicities from I day to about 10 minutes. The fluctuation power is associated with the average precipitable water vapor for the sampling period. The background noise spectrum of the radiometric instrument is also discussed.


The cumulative resource constraints of the resource-constrained project scheduling problem (RCPSP) do not treat the resource demands as geometric rectangles, that is, activities are not necessarily assigned to the same resource units over their processing times. In spite of this fact, most papers on resource-constrained project scheduling mainly in the motivation phase use a strip packing of rectangles (SPR) like visualization to illustrate the resource allocation. A novice researcher inspired by the "artistic" SPR visualization may think that the "rectangles" are essential elements of the RCPSP, and that the RCPSP is a special counter-intuitive strip packing problem (SPP) which can be solved without explicitly defined strip packing constraints. In this context "artistic" means, that we have to use a "drawing tool" to produce a SPR like visualization, because the standard model of the RCPSP knows nothing about the rectangles. In the RCPSP, the rectangles can be torn vertically and horizontally, which is absurd in the SPP, and the existence of a cumulative solution is only a necessary but not sufficient condition of the existence of the SPR like visualization, as proven by several researchers. Therefore the popular SPR visualization is theoretically wrong and misleading, and hides a real problem, which is connected to the dedicated resource assignment. In this paper, we prove that replacing the rectangles with a set of strips with unit height we can always generate a theoretically correct strip packing of strips (SPS) like dedicated assignment, where dedicated means that each demand unit is served by exactly one resource unit over its duration without "hidden" transfer time and cost.


Soft matter (e.g., biomaterials, polymers, sediments, oil, emulsions) has become an important bridge between physics and diverse disciplines. Its fundamental physical mechanism, however, is largely obscure. This study made the first attempt to connect fractional Schrodinger equation and soft matter physics under a consistent framework from empirical power scaling to phenomenological kinetics and macromechanics to mesoscopic quantum mechanics. The original contributions are the fractional quantum relationships, which show Levy statistics and fractional Brownian motion are essentially related to momentum and energy, respectively. The fractional quantum underlies fractal mesostructures and many-body interactions of macromolecules in soft matter and is experimentally testable.


OBJECTIVES
The aim of this study was to compare the eating habits and weight ranges of 27 women who refused to participate in a semistructured interview on eating with 25 women who agreed to participate, to determine if there were any systematic differences between the two groups.

METHOD
The women had previously completed a general psychiatric interview that also included a lifetime DSM-III-R diagnosis of eating disorders. About 2 years after this interview, the women were asked to participate in an interview that would specifically examine eating behaviors.

RESULTS
In contrast to the results of previous studies, this study found that there was no difference between women who refused or agreed to participate in an interview about eating, in terms of their eating problems or weight ranges.

CONCLUSIONS
It seems that eating or weight problems need not be overrepresented in groups who refuse to participate in surveys about eating, thereby undermining the accuracy of prevalence rates in the general population. Suggestions for achieving this representation are discussed.


This is the sixth in a series of 10 articles dealing with the different types of loss that doctors will meet in their practice

After five years of study, newly qualified doctors may find it hard to realise that much of their future development will involve loss. They will go on gathering information and acquiring skills, but if they are to retain their enthusiasm and to mature as people, they will be learning to live with various losses.

#### Summary points

Reality often disappoints the expectations of young doctors, who become tired and disillusioned with themselves and with the health care system

A plateau in middle life is often associated with loss of further opportunities, and high achievers may interpret this as failure

To enjoy medicine we must achieve a balance between meeting the needs of our patients and maintaining our own resources of strength, energy, and commitment

Doctors who can acknowledge their own fallibility, accept their own wounds, and accept help from colleagues or others may emerge warmer and more humane

New doctors should enjoy the initial enthusiasm, the ideals and the sense of omnipotence and invulnerability, the buoyant feeling of being able to contribute to the general good, because it may not last for long. Very likely a few months of broken nights will blur the ideals and push the ambitions into the distance. The immediate objective becomes to get through the job.

The grinding tiredness teaches them a lot: about their limitations, that sleep matters, and that it is difficult to be a good doctor when their eyes will not stay open. They become impatient over explanations, and tiredness comes up like a barrier so that they can no longer reach out to anxious and grieving patients.

They are learning that they cannot meet the ideals they set for themselves …


The goal of our study was to close gaps in knowledge regarding Carabidae distribution and activity in response to microclimate. We aimed to characterise the spatiotemporal distribution of Carabidae species along multiple gradients, and explain the activity-abundance of assemblages and their indicator species using microclimatic measurements to identify key determinants of Carabidae activity-abundance and distribution. We sampled 32 alpine sites using pitfall traps and data loggers, and identified species assemblages linked to distinct habitat types that follow the snow-cover patterns and dynamics. Moreover, we linked the activity-abundance and distribution of assemblages and characteristic species to different temperature thresholds using mixed models and spatial cross-validation to assess variable importance. Our results demonstrate that alpine Carabidae species show markedly different responses to thermal thresholds, which reflect the patterns of snow cover. The importance of snow cover for species distributions should thus be considered a hypothesis for future studies.


An in-depth analysis of 11 cases is used to provide insight into the neglected area of the dynamics of boards in academic spin-offs. Drawing on stage-based, resource dependence, and social network theories, we explore board formation and changes in board composition occurring in Norwegian and US spin-offs. We find that these theories are important complements to earlier research on boards in technology-based new ventures. The process of board formation is mainly driven by social networks of the founders. Although we find differences in the initial board compositions in Norwegian and US spin-offs, there is convergence over time in subsequent board changes, which are mainly driven by the social networks of the board chair. Additions of key board members are associated with the progress of a spin-off developing from one stage to another. Several avenues for future research and implications are discussed.


This research project aims to evaluate the potential reduction of environmental impacts from circular economy strategies on an industrial sector at a regional scale with a case study on Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions in Quebec's steel industry and its value chain. To do so, an integrated model has been created based on the matrix approach, building on material flow analysis (MFA) tracking flows and stocks and on life cycle assessment (LCA) to compute direct (from the activity, e.g., combustion process) and indirect (from the supply chain, e.g., production of raw material inside or outside of region) emissions. This theoretical model is designed to be applied to any emissions or environmental impacts from a specific sector in a given region and enable to model the effects of circularity strategies to both flows and related environmental impacts. The overall mitigation potential of individual or combined circular economy strategies on a specific sector could thus be evaluated across its entire value chain. In the case study, a set of the most promising circular strategies applicable in the Quebec context were identified, and the GHG reduction potential within and outside the province is calculated and compared with actual emissions. Six circular strategies were analyzed acting at three different levers, namely, GHG/material (increase iron recycling rate, switch to hydrogen-based reduction production), material/product (reduce weight of vehicle, limit over-specification in building construction), and product/service (increase buildings and cars lifetime, increase car-sharing), and therefore impact rather direct or indirect emissions on different stages of the steel life cycle. Combining these six strategies into a consolidated scenario shows that a circular-driven economy allows to cut down GHG emissions of the cradle-to-gate steel industry value chain by −55%, i.e., 1.67 Mt CO2e. Taking into account use phase of steel, overall reductions are estimated at −6.03 Mt CO2e, i.e., −30% of the whole life cycle.


Insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) has been demonstrated to exert a nitrogen sparing effect, both experimentally and in patients after abdominal surgery. IGF-I is a major mediator for the anabolic effects of growth hormone (GH). Whether elevated circulating IGF-I levels are the sole mediator of the anabolic effects following GH has not been clarified. IGF-I influences glucose metabolism, both through its own specific receptor and by activating the insulin receptor, and has also been proposed to influence pancreatic islet secretion directly. In the present study, the postoperative effects of IGF-I on plasma levels of other gastrointestinal and pancreatic islet hormones and growth factors were measured in patients after abdominal surgery. Fifteen patients who were candidates for large bowel resection were randomly divided into two groups: IGF-I-treated (n=8) and placebo-treated (n=7). The IGF-I group received daily two s.c. injections of human recombinant IGF-I (80 microg/kg body weight) for five days, beginning on the morning of the first postoperative day. The other group received placebo injections. Fasting plasma levels of gastrointestinal growth factors (epidermal growth factor, transforming growth factor-alpha, IGF-II), gastrointestinal hormones (gastrin, enteroglucagon, peptide YY), and islet hormones (insulin, islet amyloid polypeptide (IAPP) and pancreatic glucagon) were determined by RIA preoperatively and after five days of treatment. No significant effects of IGF-I on other growth factors or gastrointestinal hormones were seen. A marked increase in plasma insulin postoperatively compared with the preoperative levels (42+/-3 vs 61+/-5 pM, P<0.05) was seen in the placebo group, whereas the postoperative levels in the IGF-I-treated patients remained unchanged (44+/-3 vs 45+/-4 pM). A similar pattern was observed for IAPP and cortisol concentrations. No differences in glucagon concentrations were seen. In conclusion, these results suggest that IGF-I does not influence production of other gastrointestinal hormones thought to be involved in alimentary growth or pancreatic glucagon. In contrast, IGF-I caused a marked reduction of insulin and IAPP secretion. The inhibition of beta-cell secretion could be direct or, alternatively, could involve an improvement in postoperative insulin resistance, perhaps by reducing serum cortisol.


AIM
The surgical resection rate in childhood neuroblastoma (Stage III and IV) is relatively low and influences the prognosis greatly. This study analyzes the primary resection rate neuroblastoma in children.

METHODS
The tumors are shrunk with pre-operative chemotherapy and surgical resection beginning from the iliac vessels is performed to skeletalize the large retroperitoneal vascular. Using this method, 22 cases of childhood neuroblastoma received resections and the outcomes were analyzed.

RESULTS
The tumors were completely removed in 21 out of the 22 cases (95.45% in total). There were no serious complications and perioperative deaths.

CONCLUSION
Using proper surgical methods and skeletalizing the large retroperitoneal vessels significantly increases the resection rate.


A spherical coordinate system is typically used to quantify the directional characteristics of doubly hemispherical scattering of bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) entailing an incident angle or cone angle from surface normal, and a heading or azimuthal angle from the incident plane. An alternate angular coordinate system is described entailing two dihedral angles. One component is a dihedral angle from the incident plane, simply out-of-plane, and the second component is a dihedral angle from the specular beam to the detector direction projected onto the incident plane, or simply degrees off specular. The suggested system is believed easier to convey scattering characteristics, and to compute the scattering from complex surfaces such as mountains with exposed rocks, or buildings. This communication presents an example of an experimental configuration to measure a doubly hemispherical BRDF, a mathematical formulation to relate the angular coordinate systems, and a computational example. >


Epitaxial graphene on SiC that provides wafer-scale and high-quality graphene sheets on an insulating substrate is a promising material to realize graphene-based nanodevices. The presence of the insulating substrate changes the physical properties of free-standing graphene through the interfacial phonon, e.g., limiting the mobility. Despite such known impacts on the material properties, a complete and microscopic picture is missing. Here, we report on atomically resolved inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy (IETS) with a scanning tunneling microscope for epitaxial graphene grown on $4H$-SiC(0001). Our data reveal a strong spatial dependence in the IETS spectrum, which cannot be explained by intrinsic graphene properties. We show that this variation in the IETS spectrum originates from a localized low-energy vibration of the interfacial Si atom with a dangling bond via ab initio electronic and phononic state calculations. This insight may help advancing graphene device performance through interfacial control.


The paper explores the relationship between financial sector reforms and savings mobilization in Zambia. Although there exists an extensive literature on financial sec tor development and savings levels in developing countries, there does not seem to exist satisfactory work on the above nexus for sub-Saharan African countries, parti cularly Zambia. Along these lines, the paper examines the linkages between the finan cial reforms of the early 1990s and savings mobilization. It considers the characteri stics of banks and non-bank financial institutions, especially micro finance institutions, and savings levels and identifies problems associated with the relatively poor perfor mance of savings in recent years and concludes with a set of policy guidelines for strengthening savings mobilization, highlighting the expected effect on poverty-redu cing growth.


[1] The Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation (CRaTER) measures linear energy transfer by Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCRs) and Solar Energetic Particles (SEPs) on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) Mission in a circular, polar lunar orbit. GCR fluxes remain at the highest levels ever observed during the space age. One of the largest SEP events observed by CRaTER during the LRO mission occurred on June 7, 2011. We compare model predictions by the Earth-Moon-Mars Radiation Environment Module (EMMREM) for both dose rates from GCRs and SEPs during this event with results from CRaTER. We find agreement between these models and the CRaTER dose rates, which together demonstrate the accuracy of EMMREM, and its suitability for a real-time space weather system. We utilize CRaTER to test forecasts made by the Relativistic Electron Alert System for Exploration (REleASE), which successfully predicts the June 7th event. At the maximum CRaTER-observed GCR dose rate (∼11.7 cGy/yr where Gy is a unit indicating energy deposition per unit mass, 1 Gy = 1 J/kg), GCRs deposit ∼88 eV/molecule in water over 4 billion years, causing significant change in molecular composition and physical structure (e.g., density, color, crystallinity) of water ice, loss of molecular hydrogen, and production of more complex molecules linking carbon and other elements in the irradiated ice. This shows that space weathering by GCRs may be extremely important for chemical evolution of ice on the Moon. Thus, we show comprehensive observations from the CRaTER instrument on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter that characterizes the radiation environment and space weathering on the Moon.


We present here X-ray specular reflectivity (XRR) characterization of the ordering of Langmuir-Blodgett films of the liquid crystalline phthalocyanine (Pc) 2,3,9,10,16,17,23,34-octakis(2-benzyloxyethoxy)copper(II) phthalocyanine, 1, on Si(100) wafers with a native oxide layer and these same substrates modified with monolayers of varying percentages of methyl- and phenyl-terminated silanes. The central copper atom in these Pc's provides for high contrast in X-ray reflectivity for single-bilayer films of 1. The XRR data are modeled as arising from multiple layers of organic material, above and below the rows of copper atoms in the aligned Pc cores; variations in the total thickness of these films, and the spacing between the rows of copper atoms, are attributed to changes in the interaction with the substrate, and changes in the Pc orientation and side chain packing. The most pronounced effect on these parameters comes from variations in the ratio of the phenyl-silane versus methyl-silane content of the substrate modifiers and annealing of these films past their crystalline (K) --> liquid crystalline (LC) mesophase transition temperature. Transfer of multiple bilayers of this Pc leads to additional changes in the thickness of each layer, eventually forming a hexagonal close-packed array, reminiscent of bulk fibers of this material, as revealed by X-ray diffraction (XRD).


Consciously applied sustainable principles of building emerge in architecture since 1973. The cause was the oil crises. It forced a re-evaluation and an abandonment of the previous energy wasting building concepts and triggered the need to seek a new and more efficient architecture, sources of energy and materials. Years 1973 to 1982 can be described as a period of searching for more efficient building concepts, new energy sources and a radical re-assessment of traditional building technologies and energy sources. The period of utilization of alternative energy sources, mainly from solar power and from wind followed. In the 80s, the economics of the developed countries stabilized, which, to some extent, attenuated the development of ecologically conscious architecture. It ascended to the centre of interest only in the last decade of the 20th century, after the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro and the World Congress of the UIA in Chicago in 1993. Sustainability in architecture and construction began to acquire a significant position. Currently, projects and urban complexes implementing ecological ideas are being built while getting a significant attention from critics of architecture. After the year 2000, significant documents exalting sustainable architecture to general principles of building are being issued. Perhaps the most important document adopted at the European level is the European Directive on the Energy Performance of Buildings and the European Strategy 20-20-20.Forming thoughts about sustainability in architecture reached Slovak architectural scene with a slight delay. While in abroad first projects focusing on new sources of energy originated in late 70s of the 20th century, in our territory these thoughts came in the centre of interest only in the 90s. The period before the change of political situation in our country in 1989 can be characterized by numerous discussions and forming thoughts on reducing energy consumption of buildings and on utilizing alternative energy sources. Already in the first half of the 80s interesting projects were designed, but unfortunately they remained just paper projects. However, this beginning of ecologically conscious architecture was the essential for its later development. The decade of the 90s enabled to apply a sustainable design approach more intensely and triggered the construction of various architectural projects. The interest focused mainly on the solar energy and in the late 90s back on traditional natural building materials used in vernacular architecture in the past. The aim to reduce the energy consumption of buildings was the driving force in the construction of first experimental houses and public buildings and also in urban structures. Slovakia took part in international projects, such as Brundtland City Project. Abrupt building boom in our country since the beginning of the new century evolved the market of energy efficient buildings. Monitoring of energy savings, inevitable according to the adopted ambitions of the European Union was the starting point of architectural designs especially of low-energy and passive houses. The usage of traditional natural building material remains still up to date. Except of technologically and materially sophisticated constructions, the uniqueness and the quality of architectural design are currently strongly emphasized. The awards-winning outstanding and sustainable architecture serves as a proof.Up to now, most of sustainability in architecture has been performed on a scale of the object. At present, it transforms to the dimension of a city district. This is what we endeavor also at the Faculty of Architecture, STU in both research and teaching practice, mainly in the sustainable design studio.Current ambitions of the European Union in the constructions of sustainable architecture force us to reflect the progress of sustainable architecture. To achieve these ambitions it is necessary to monitor the development of ecologically conscious architecture in Slovak architectural scene. This is the subject of our research "Mapping of ecologically conscious architecture in Slovakia". Partial outcome of this research is the content of our conference paper.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.sace.12.3.13001


his book features ten critical essays on ecodocumentaries written by eminent scholars from India, USA, Ireland, Finland and Turkey in the area of ecocriticism and ecocinema studies. Situating social documentaries with explicit ecological form and content, the volume takes relational positions on political, cultural and conservational aspects of natures and cultures in various cultural contexts. Documentaries themed around issues such as electronic waste, animal rights, land ethics, pollution of river, land grabbing, development and exotic plants are some of the topics ecocritiqued in this volume.


Objective Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) is associated with hypertension, coronary artery disease, heart failure and stroke. We investigated whether OSA represents an additional independent risk factor for preclinical atherosclerosis, vascular dysfunction and cardiac remodelling as assessed by CMR. We also examined the effect of OSA severity as expressed by Oxygen Desaturation Index (ODI) on MR derived cardiac and vascular markers. Methods In total, 58 patients with OSA and 39 control subjects without sleep apnoea underwent Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance (CMR) scanning.42 OSA patients were meticulously matched for demographics, body size and cardiovascular risk factors to the 39 controls. CMR protocol: Our assessment included carotid and aortic atheroma burden quantification, central aortic distensibility assessment and left ventricular (LV) as well as right ventricular (RV) diastolic mass and volumes measurements. Multiple weighting, high resolution, imaging of the carotid vessels was used for carotid atheroma composition characterisation. Pulmonary artery (PA) acceleration time, a non invasive pulmonary artery pressure marker, was derived from velocity-encoded pulmonary artery flow imaging. Results Carotid (p<0.05 (abstract 080 figure 1a)) and aortic (p<0.001 (abstract 080 figure1b)) wall thickness were increased in OSA patients in comparison with controls. Through multivariate regression analysis, ODI emerged as an independent predictor of both carotid (β=0.41(0.15)(p<0.01)) and aortic wall thickness (β=0.61(0.21)(p<0.01)). Carotid plaques, advanced carotid disease and "high risk" of carotid atheroma were all more prevalent among individuals suffering from OSA (p<0.05)(abstract 080 figure 2). Aortic distensibility was decreased in OSA (p<0.05)(abstract 080 figure 3). Although ODI correlated with aortic distensibility (r=−0.35, p<0.01), this association was not significant after adjustment for age and systolic blood pressure. LV mass (p<0.05) and volume (p<0.01) as well as RV mass (p<0.05) - all indexed to body surface area - were increased in OSA (abstract 080 figure 4). On multivariate regression analysis, ODI emerged as an independent predictor of LV mass (β=0.41(0.17)(p<0.05)), LV volume (β=0.34(0.16)(p<0.05)) and RV mass (β=0.16(0.07)(p<0.05)) in OSA. PA acceleration time was significantly shortened in OSA (p<0.005)(abstract 080 figure5) and significantly correlated with ODI (r=−0.38, p<0.05), RV volume (r=−0.47, p<0.01) and RV mass, even after adjustment for ODI (β=−0.13(0.05)(p<0.05)). Abstract 080 Figure 1 Abstract 080 Figure 2 Abstract 080 Figure 3 Abstract 080 Figure 4 Abstract 080 Figure 5 Conclusions OSA is associated with increased atheroma burden and complicated atheromatic lesions. Increased central aortic stiffening, that appears to be dependent on an increase in systolic blood pressure, is detected in OSA. An independent association between OSA and eccentric LV remodelling and hypertrophy is demonstrated by CMR. CMR reveals for the first time an association between the presence and severity OSA and RV hypertrophy, which may be dependent on an concomitant increase in pulmonary arterial pressure.


This study investigates the biogeochemical controls on the release of phosphorus (P)

from riparian wetland sediments to solution, and the subsequent delivery of P to

receiving waters. The research was conducted at Strumpshaw Fen, a riparian wetland in

the floodplain of the River Yare in the UK. Novel mesocosm work identifies the

reductive-dissolution of iron-bound P as the dominant control on P release to solution.

The timing of P release to pore water and surface water is also influenced by the

concentration of nitrate-nitrogen in floodwater, because redox potential is poised above

the level necessary for the reduction 0 f ferric iron whilst nitrate remains in solution.

Field-based hydrochemical monitoring confirms the findings from laboratory mesocosm

work on the controls on P release to solution, and indicates that P concentrations

indicative of hyper eutrophic conditions may be established in the pore water and surface

water of this riparian wetland. Sequential filtration establishes that the vast majority of

the MRP fraction in 0.45 J.1m filtrates may be composed of free orthophosphate.

An investigation of hydrological connectivity between the shallow peat and (i) the

underlying mineral aquifer and (ii) the adjacent open-water network is used to indicate

whether P in solution might be exported from the peat in large quantities. Reliable

characterisation of the hydraulic conductivity (K) of the peat deposits at Strumpshaw

Fen is achieved after a thorough evaluation of the piezometer technique, and the

application of a novel laboratory-based method. K is found to be relatively high,

indicating a potential for substantial flows of water between the near-surface peat and

the ditch network at the site, given suitable hydraulic gradients. Field-based

hydrological monitoring suggests that lateral exchanges between the peat and adjacent

open-water bodies are more important than vertical exchanges between the peat and the

underlying mineral aquifer. It is shown that the combination of P availability and

hydrological connectivity between the peat and open water, will result in bioavailable P

reaching the ditch network at Strumpshaw. In the light of these findings, riparian fen

wetlands should not be assumed a priori to be 'protectors' of the chemical and

ecological quality of receiving waters, but may in fact be sources for significant

quantities of P that have the potential to be exported from the fen system.


This section gives you access to links of information on Aboriginal rights, agreements and treaties as they pertain to issues such as fishing and forestry.


Background: The Streptomyces albus J1074 strain is one of the most widely used chassis for the heterologous production of bioactive natural products. The fast growth and an efficient genetic system make this strain an attractive model for expressing cryptic biosynthetic pathways to aid drug discovery. Results: To improve its capabilities for the heterologous expression of biosynthetic gene clusters, the complete genomic sequence of S. albus J1074 was obtained. With a size of 6,841,649 bp, coding for 5,832 genes, its genome is the smallest within the genus streptomycetes. Genome analysis revealed a strong tendency to reduce the number of genetic duplicates. The whole transcriptomes were sequenced at different time points to identify the early metabolic switch from the exponential to the stationary phase in S. albus J1074. Conclusions: S. albus J1074 carries the smallest genome among the completely sequenced species of the genus Streptomyces. The detailed genome and transcriptome analysis discloses its capability to serve as a premium host for the heterologous production of natural products. Moreover, the genome revealed 22 additional putative secondary metabolite gene clusters that reinforce the strain's potential for natural product synthesis.


Many scientists either working on the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) problem or its many applications have not been trained in both the equatorial ocean and atmospheric dynamics necessary to understand it. This book seeks to overcome this difficulty by providing a step by step introduction to ENSO, helping the upper level graduate student or research scientist to learn quickly the ENSO basics and be up to date with the latest ENSO research. The text assumes that the reader has a knowledge of the equations of fluid mechanics on a rotating earth and emphasizes the observations and simple physical explanations of them. Following a history of ENSO and a discussion of ENSO observations in Chapters 1 and 2, Chapters 3-5 consider relevant equatorial ocean dynamics, Chapters 6 and 9 relevant atmospheric dynamics, and Chapters 7 and 8 the main paradigms for how the Pacific Ocean and atmosphere couple together to produce ENSO. Chapter 8 also discusses the old mystery of why ENSO tends to be locked in phase with the seasonal cycle. Successful dynamical and statistical approaches to ENSO prediction are discussed in Chapters 10 and 11 while Chapter 12 concludes the book with examples of how ENSO influences marine and bird life.* Quick reference guide and step by step introduction to El Nino/Southern Oscillation dynamics* Keep informed and up to date on El Nino/Southern Oscillation research and how El Nino and the Southern Oscillation can be predicted* Understand how El Nino can affect marine and bird life


Information security is currently one of the most important issues in information systems. This concerns the confidentiality of information but also its integrity and availability. The problem becomes even more difficult when several companies are working together on a project and that the various documents "go out of" their respective information systems. We propose an architecture in which the documents themselves ensure their security and thus can be exchanged over uncontrolled resources such as cloud storage or even USB flash drives. For this we encapsulate within the document itself some security components (e.g. access control, usage control) to achieve an autonomic document architecture for Enterprise DRM (E-DRM). Using such self-protecting documents, a company can ensure security and privacy for its documents when outsourcing storage services (e.g. cloud).


The fundamental rights provisions in our various Constitutions of the Commonwealth Caribbean, being reflections of overarching principles of international human rights, have opened up our domestic law in a major way to the influences of international law. Decisions from the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) show that Commonwealth Caribbean jurisprudence is now fully in step with developments in the wider world and not only draws upon, but contributes to these developments.