The creation of medical notes in software applications poses an intrinsic problem in workflow as the technology inherently intervenes in the processes of collecting and assembling information, as well as the production of a data-driven note that meets both individual and healthcare system requirements. In addition, the note writing applications in currently available electronic health records (EHRs) do not function to support decision making to any substantial degree. We suggest that artificial intelligence (AI) could be utilized to facilitate the workflows of the data collection and assembly processes, as well as to support the development of personalized, yet data-driven assessments and plans.


The significant influence of slot opening on the optimal stator and rotor pole combination and on the electromagnetic performance of the switched-flux permanent magnet (SFPM) machine is observed and investigated in this paper. A new SFPM brushless machine with remarkable slot opening relative to the magnet thickness is developed to reduce the magnet usage and to increase the slot area. Its stator slot opening is almost several times of that in the conventional SFPM machine, but its magnet usage is only half. However, the new machine exhibits ~ 40% larger back EMF and electromagnetic torque than those of the conventional machine, while its cogging torque and torque ripple are significantly lower.


Commonly known for their ability to echolocate, bats also use a wide variety of social vocalizations to communicate with one another. However, the full vocal repertoires of relatively few bat species have been studied thus far. The present study examined the vocal repertoire of the pale spear-nosed bat, Phyllostomus discolor, in a social roosting context. Based on visual examination of spectrograms and subsequent quantitative analysis of syllables, eight distinct syllable classes were defined, and their prevalence in different behavioral contexts was examined. Four more syllable classes were observed in low numbers and are described here as well. These results show that P. discolor possesses a rich vocal repertoire, which includes vocalizations comparable to previously reported repertoires of other bat species as well as vocalizations previously undescribed. Our data provide detailed information about the temporal and spectral characteristics of syllables emitted by P. discolor, allowing for a better understanding of the communicative system and related behaviors of this species. Furthermore, this vocal repertoire will serve as a basis for future research using P. discolor as a model organism for vocal communication and vocal learning and it will allow for comparative studies between bat species.


Cambodia is a country undergoing a major urbanization. The capital - Phnom Penh is growing rapidly, with numerous development projects. The city also has a large proportion of informal low-income settlers, squatting on private or public land.It is unavoidable that in this context many land related conflicts occur. The conflicts are most commonly solved through resettlement of the informal dwellers by allocating a land plot in one of relocation sites in the outskirts of Phnom Penh. However, many of the resettled families choose or are forced to sell their rights to the land. This thesis will explore the post-resettlement land transactions and tenure insecurity in PhnomPenh. Using a field study focused on one of the resettlement sites as a base, it will look into the reasons behind the emergence of the post resettlement land transactions, their mechanisms and subsequent displacement. The information obtained through interviews and surveys will point out the weaknesses in the current resettlement practice. The findings of this thesis will be used to make recommendations, which should be applied in the process of developing a comprehensive resettlement and poverty alleviation plan for Phnom Penh.


1 Designing Hierarchical Storage Systems for Interactive On-Demand Video Services S.-H. Gary Chan Fouad A. Tobagi Department of Electrical Engineering Stanford University Stanford, CA 94305 Abstract|A hierarchical storage system achieves scalable storage in providing on-demand video services. In such a system, video les are stored in a tertiary level (such as a library or jukebox), and transferred to a secondary level (such as magnetic disks) from which it is streamed to the users. In this paper, we study the design of such a system for interactive applications in which a movie has to be completely transferred (or \staged") to the secondary level before it is displayed to its user; thereby incurring some user delay. We specify the required storage and bandwidth to meet a delay goal, given application characteristics. We have developed an accurate and yet simple model for the system, which greatly facilitates the design process and allows us to extract important performance characteristics of the system. We provide some design examples, and study the in uence of video popularity. Keywords|Hierarchical storage systems, interactive video services, tertiary storage, secondary storage, storage system model


It is known that every linear method which determines the Hilbert transform from the samples of the function diverges (weakly). This paper presents strong evidence that all such methods even diverge strongly. It is shown that the common approximation method derived from the conjugate Fej'er means diverges strongly, and that all reasonable approximation methods with a finite search horizon diverge strongly. Moreover, the paper discusses the relation between strong divergence and the existence of adaptive approximation methods.


Railroad spikes represent a vital component of the rail track system, as they fasten the rail to the supporting crossties. Thus, it is important to understand its behavior and effect on the fastening assembly to mitigate any local failure, which, in turn, could lead to system deterioration or damage. Currently, alternative solutions to the traditional hardwood timber crossties are increasing being adopted by the railroad industry in the USA, with recycled plastic composite crossties being among the available alternatives. Their sustainably, environmental benefits, durability and ease of installation render them an attractive and competitive solution. Several research programs have studied this material and its fastening system in the past; however, additional research is required to fully understand the behavior of these materials and their interactions with the fastening system components. This paper presents an investigation that aims to understand and assess the performance of typical railroad spikes used for recycled high-density-polyethylene crossties. The study encompassed a comprehensive experimental investigation and analytical finite element modeling. The testing program evaluated railroad spikes using static testing methods recommended by the American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association (AREMA) manual. These tests addressed the rail spike pullout and lateral restraint for both screw and cut spikes. Finite element models were constructed and calibrated using the data obtained from the experimental program in order to extrapolate on the experimental results and predict the behavior of full-scale systems beyond the scale of the laboratory. The results observed in this study showed great promise, surpassing all the AREMA recommendations, which highlights the potential of these materials if properly optimized and engineered. Screw spikes exhibited a very good performance, surpassing the minimum recommendations by a significant margin (up to more than 200%) and are thus are highly recommended for future implementation.


Summary form only given. The dynamics of Magnetized Liner Inertial Fusion (MagLIF)1, a new and promising approach to pulsed power fusion, are presently under detailed study at Sandia National Laboratories. Alongside this, a comprehensive analysis of the influence of the specific liner design geometry in the MagLIF system on liner initiation is underway in the academic community.


Population in urban areas has been increasing at an alarming rate in the last decades. This evidence, together with the rising availability of massive data from cities, has motivated research on sustainable urban development. In this paper we present a GIS-based land use mix analysis framework to help urban planners to compute indices for mixed uses development, which may be helpful towards developing sustainable cities. Residential and activities land uses are extracted using OpenStreetMap crowd-sourcing data. Kernel density estimation is performed for these land uses, and then used to compute the mixed uses indices. The framework is applied to several cities, analyzing the land use mix output.


The rat aortic ring assay has been previously described as a useful ex vivo model for analyzing the biological activity of various inhibitors of angiogenesis. Rat aortic rings are exposed to antiangiogenic agents for a five-day incubation period. Then, the degree of microvessel outgrowth from the rings is analyzed and quantified. In contrast to most in vitro angiogenesis assays, the rat aortic ring model provides a unique microenvironment to evaluate the interaction of various cell types and biological factors for their influence on angiogenesis. Microarray analysis is an accepted method for the evaluation of gene expression profiles and can be used to better understand changes in gene expression that occur when rat aortic rings are exposed to a particular biological agent. Here we describe a method of using microarray technology to evaluate the modulation of gene expression in angiogenesis using the rat aortic ring assay.


In theory, vector quantization (VQ) is always better than scalar quantization (SQ) in terms of rate-distortion (RD) performance [33]. Recent state-of-the-art methods for neural image compression are mainly based on nonlinear transform coding (NTC) with uniform scalar quantization, overlooking the benefits of VQ due to its exponentially increased complexity. In this paper, we first investigate on some toy sources, demonstrating that even if modern neural networks considerably enhance the compression performance of SQ with nonlinear transform, there is still an insurmountable chasm between SQ and VQ. Therefore, revolving around VQ, we propose a novel framework for neural image compression named Nonlinear Vector Transform Coding (NVTC). NVTC solves the critical complexity issue of VQ through (1) a multi-stage quantization strategy and (2) nonlinear vector transforms. In addition, we apply entropy-constrained VQ in latent space to adaptively determine the quantization boundaries for joint rate-distortion optimization, which improves the performance both theoretically and experimentally. Compared to previous NTC approaches, NVTC demonstrates superior rate-distortion performance, faster decoding speed, and smaller model size. Our code is available at https://github.com/USTC-IMCL/NVTC.


ABSTRACT Speech therapy is an emerging profession in Vietnam, and there is an estimated 910 000 Vietnamese people who stutter. No research to date has examined Vietnamese speech therapists' reliability when measuring severity of stuttering in their native language (Vietnamese) and other languages (e.g. English, a common second language). Twenty-five Vietnamese speech therapists rated 20 speech samples (10 Vietnamese, 10 English) of adults who stutter using a 9-point severity rating (SR) scale on two occasions. Approximately half of the judges were able to measure severity of stuttering reliably in Vietnamese. Judges' performance in English was poorer than in their native language. Irrespective of language, judges showed greater variability of their use of the scale in the moderate range. Results highlight the need for judges to develop intra- and interjudge agreement when using the scale to measure stuttering in their native and other languages. Research into the development and evaluation of practice and/or training packages would be beneficial to this population, in all languages, with a focus in the moderate range of the scale.


Epileptic seizures may lead to changes in autonomic function. Among these, changes in heart rate (HR) constitute an easily measurable biomarker that may provide an extracerebral indicator of an ictal onset in some patients, whereby new stimulation therapies triggered by tachycardia detection are being developed. Understanding the prevalence and magnitude of HR changes associated with seizures, as well as their mode of presentation, especially, the timing of such changes relative to seizure onset is fundamental to the development of HR-based algorithms for seizure detection. Likewise, identification of groups of patients presenting more likely with ictal tachycardia is important since these patients can be good candidates for stimulation therapies triggered by tachycardia detection.

Ictal tachycardia has been assessed in several studies and has been found in average in 82% of patients and in 76% of seizures, both focal and generalised, occurring early from several seconds before to several seconds after the seizure onset, raising a possibility for intervention.1 ,2 Most studies refer to patients with temporal or frontal lobe epilepsy or to consecutive patients who underwent video-EEG monitoring (VEM), regardless the type of epilepsy.

Patients with hypothalamic hamartoma (HH) constitute a special group among patients suffering from epilepsy. Owing to high …


[1] A year (6-April–2008 to 14-April–2009) of particulate monitoring was conducted at a remote coastal station on the island of Crete, Greece in the eastern Mediterranean. Fifty-eight regional new particle formation events were observed with an Air Ion Spectrometer (AIS), half of which occurred during the coldest months of the year (December–March). Particle formation was favored by air masses arriving from the west that crossed Crete or southern Greece prior to reaching the site and also by lower-than-average condensational sinks (CS). Aerosol composition data, which were acquired during month-long campaigns in the summer and winter, suggest that nucleation events occurred only when particles were neutral. This is consistent with the hypothesis that a lack of NH3, during periods when particles are acidic, may limit nucleation in sulfate-rich environments. Nucleation was not limited by the availability of SO2 alone, as nucleation events often did not take place during periods with high SO2 or H2SO4 concentrations. The above results support the hypothesis that an additional reactant (other than H2SO4) plays an important role in the formation and/or growth of new particles. Our results are consistent with NH3 being this missing reactant.


Ocean heat transport is often thought to play a secondary role for Arctic surface warm16
ing in part because warm water which
ows northward is prevented from reaching the
17 surface by a cold and stable halocline layer. However, recent observations in various re18
gions indicate that occasionally, warm water is found directly below the surface mixed
19 layer. Here we investigate Arctic Ocean surface energy
uxes and the cold halocline layer
20 in climate model simulations from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase
21 5 (CMIP5). An ensemble of 15 models shows decreased sea ice formation and increased
22 ocean energy release during fall, winter, and spring for a high-emission future scenario.
23 Along the main pathways for warm water advection, this increased energy release is not
24 locally balanced by increased Arctic Ocean energy uptake in summer. Because during
25 Arctic winter, the ocean mixed layer is mainly heated from below, we analyze changes
26 of the cold halocline layer in the monthly mean CMIP5 data. Fresh water acts to sta27
bilize the upper ocean as expected based on previous studies. We �nd that in spite of
28 this stabilizing e�ect, periods in which warm water is found directly or almost directly
29 below the mixed layer and which occur mainly in winter and spring become more fre30
quent in high-emission future scenario simulations, especially along the main pathways
31 for warm water advection. This could reduce sea ice formation and surface albedo.
32 Plain Language


While post-war apartment neighbourhoods experienced drastic changes in their socio-demographic characteristics overtime, little has changed in terms of their built form. Despite housing Toronto's most socially diverse populations, the homogeneous towers are unable to fully accommodate the diversity of households that exist within them. Currently, the most common response to the increasing obsolescence of post-war towers is inaction, thus not contributing to Toronto's urgent lack of housing diversity. Alternatively, by renewing the existing towers so that residential units can be optimized and individualized to create a larger spectrum of socially inclusive housing, people with diverse needs and/or preferences can be accommodated without compromising their individuality. By focusing on a site within the St. James Town neighbourhood, this thesis explores how to accommodate user diversity and allow for residents to participate in determining their living environments.


The first stage of Pulkovo International Airport new terminal hall was put into operation in 4th December 2013. The second stage after complete transfer of the operations from the old Pulkovo-1 and Pulkovo-2 terminals will begin in early 2015. The striking new roof of the terminal building has been designed to accommodate the varied extremes of the Russian climate. It has been conceived in modular bays, expressive structural 'trees' being positioned such that it can support the weight of standing snow experienced in the winter months. Steel structures constitute a roof of the terminal hall, while supporting structures are made from reinforced concrete. Report describes the architecture, structure geometry, static scheme and main characteristics. Two independent calculations were compared and bearing capacity of the roof was checked.


The aim of this paper is overviewing a real picture of poverty in Serbia in the period 2006- 2010, using the data of the Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia (consumer price index - CPI) and the Social Inclusion and Poverty Reduction Unit (Cabinet of Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration of RS), as well as research results of relevant domestic and foreign literature. The percentage of the poor is categorized by: type of settlements, regional distribution, household type, age and participation of children and adults, level of education, and socio-economic status of the household. Survey results from 2010 pointed out that poverty is widespread among people living in rural area (13.6%), particularly among children under 13 years of age (13.7%), in Central Serbia (12.0%), in multi-member households (16.4%) and in households where the head has a lower educational level (14,2%) or is unemployed (17.9%). The fact that poor live in rural areas should not lead to deterioration of the principle of equality in the rights for all citizens of the Republic of Serbia.


Based on the theoretical analysis of the 4H-SiC Schottky-barrier diodes (SBDs) with field plate termination, 4H-SiC SBD with semi-insulating polycrystalline silicon (SIPOS) FP termination has been fabricated. The relative dielectric constant of the SIPOS dielectric first used in 4H-SiC devices is 10.4, which is much higher than that of the SiO2 dielectric, leading to benefitting the performance of devices. The breakdown voltage of the fabricated SBD could reach 1200 V at leakage current 20 μA, about 70% of the theoretical breakdown voltage. Meanwhile, both of the simulation and experimental results show that the length of the SIPOS FP termination is an important factor for structure design.


Reinnervation of host Purkinje cells by donor climbing fibers was observed in the following experiments. Medullary primordial tissue (from E14-E16) containing the inferior olive was grafted into a host rat cerebellum, in which the inferior olivary complex and climbing fibers had been destroyed by intraperitoneal injection of 3-acetylpyridine (3-AP). After 3 weeks, immature as well as mature types of climbing fiber terminals bearing packed round vesicles were found that had established synaptic contacts on dendritic spines of the host Purkinje cells. Quantitative analysis at the ultrastructural level has been carried out. The main results are as follows. (1) The number of preterminals that formed synaptic contacts with spines of the host Purkinje dendrites in the transplanted material increased by 3.4-fold compared to the control (3-AP-treated non-grafted material). (2) The number of mature climbing-type preterminals increased from 0.3-0.9% to 5% after grafting (cf. 22% in normal brain tissue), and the number of immature climbing-type preterminals also increased from 2-10% (control) to 20% after grafting. These changes were statistically significant (P less than 0.01). (3) The number of parallel-type preterminals increased from 13% (control) to 27% after grafting, which was also statistically significant (P less than 0.01). Thus, it appears that the donor climbing fibers grow and develop to find unoccupied spines on the host Purkinje dendrites and establish synaptic contacts, and also that the host parallel fibers may generate axonal sprouts to search their new targets and ultimately to form synaptic contacts with unoccupied spines. In the process of re-modeling the brain, competition for targets is likely to occur between the two kinds of axonal processes, i.e. the donor climbing fibers and the host parallel fibers.


Dropout is designed to relieve the overfitting problem in high-level vision tasks but is rarely applied in lowlevel vision tasks, like image super-resolution (SR). As a classic regression problem, SR exhibits a different behaviour as high-level tasks and is sensitive to the dropout operation. However, in this paper, we show that appropriate usage of dropout benefits SR networks and improves the generalization ability. Specifically, dropout is better embedded at the end of the network and is significantly helpful for the multi-degradation settings. This discovery breaks our common sense and inspires us to explore its working mechanism. We further use two analysis tools - one is from a recent network interpretation work, and the other is specially designed for this task. The analysis results provide side proofs to our experimental findings and show us a new perspective to understand SR networks.


The results of the Joint United States/Russia Internal Wave Remote Sensing Experiment (JUSREX'92) are presented. A Russian research aircraft, TU-134, equipped with both optical and microwave instruments participated in the experiment. In situ data were obtained from the "Akademik Ioffe", a research vessel equipped with contact and remote sensing instruments. To determine surface wind speed and direction, Ka-band nadir-viewing polarimeter was used. Sea surface temperature was measured by means of the S-band radiometer. Brightness temperature and wind vector data were related to true surface data. Wind and temperature fields retrieved from radiometer data were compared with side-looking radar images. The combined analysis of passive and active microwave instrument data has proved important for furthering our understanding of the ocean-atmosphere interaction.


Motivated by the unceasing interest in hidden Markov models (HMMs), this paper reexamines hidden path inference in these models, using primarily a risk-based framework. While the most common maximum a posteriori (MAP), or Viterbi, path estimator and the minimum error, or Posterior Decoder (PD) have long been around, other path estimators, or decoders, have been either only hinted at or applied more recently and in dedicated applications generally unfamiliar to the statistical learning community. Over a decade ago, however, a family of algorithmically defined decoders aiming to hybridize the two standard ones was proposed elsewhere. The present paper gives a careful analysis of this hybridization approach, identifies several problems and issues with it and other previously proposed approaches, and proposes practical resolutions of those. Furthermore, simple modifications of the classical criteria for hidden path recognition are shown to lead to a new class of decoders. Dynamic programming algorithms to compute these decoders in the usual forward-backward manner are presented. A particularly interesting subclass of such estimators can be also viewed as hybrids of the MAP and PD estimators. Similar to previously proposed MAP-PD hybrids, the new class is parameterized by a small number of tunable parameters. Unlike their algorithmic predecessors, the new risk-based decoders are more clearly interpretable, and, most importantly, work "out-of-the box" in practice, which is demonstrated on some real bioinformatics tasks and data. Some further generalizations and applications are discussed in the conclusion.


What does sport injury risk have to do with weather forecasting and predicting who will be the next President of the USA? Everything! The commonalities are that each occurs within a dynamic system. If you know how dynamic systems work, you will better predict sports injuries.

A dynamic system is an environment that depends on internal and external factors to attain stability.1 Organisms/participants/traits within a dynamic system adapt and change when factors within the system change. Scientists routinely predict risk in a variety of dynamic systems such as weather, political forecasting and projecting traffic fatalities. Ideally, the modelling for each forecasting model involves sophisticated statistical assessment, complex/multiple simulation studies, allowances of time-related changes and distinctly large sample sizes.

What about sports injuries? Predictive models used in dynamic systems identify predictors in a changing environment, in which outcomes are influenced by both the baseline characteristics (the predictors) and external environmental mediators (other factors, unaccounted for at baseline). Sports injuries occur within a dynamic system and our attempts at predicting injury have ignored the dynamic nature of the system (eg, changes in strength or accounting for factors such as physical contact injuries). We assumed that baseline characteristics such as strength, balance and flexibility would predict an injurious event, independent of their internally driven change and often independent …


Allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis (ABPA) is a debilitating lung disease which occurs as a result of interplay between a variety of host and environmental factors. It occurs in certain susceptible individuals who develop hypersensensitivity to the colonised Aspergillus species. ABPA is a complicating factor in 2% of patients with asthma and is also seen in patients with cystic fibrosis. Asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are known to share key elements of pathogenesis. It is well known that ABPA can occur in patients with asthma, but it has recently been reported in patients with COPD as well. We report a 55-year-old male ex-smoker who presented with complaints of exertional breathlessness and productive cough for five years and an episode of haemoptysis four days prior to presentation. Spirometery showed airflow obstruction which was not reversible with bronchodilators. Chest CT scan revealed paraseptal emphysema along with central bronchiectasis (CB) in the right upper lobe and bilateral lower lobes. A type I skin hypersensitivity reaction to Aspergillus species was elicited. He fulfilled the serological criteria for ABPA and was diagnosed as having concomitant COPD and ABPA-CB. The patient was initiated on therapy for COPD along with oral corticosteroids, on which he had remarkable symptomatic improvement.


Detecting targets in an image is a fundamental task in computer vision and robotic system. When only a trained detector (binary classifier) is at hand, the target detection problem becomes localizing the correct windows containing targets in the image and can be considered as a sampling problem. Exhaustive sliding window method is a common approach, but it is usually computationally expensive especially when the detection algorithm is time-consuming. In this work, we observe that detector's response scores of sampling windows fade gradually from the peak response window in the detection area and we approximate this scoring pattern with an exponential decay function. By exploiting this property, we propose an active sampling method for efficient target detection to avoid exhaustively searching all the window space. The method estimates the probability of windows containing the target by fusing information from sampled windows and their detector's scores and then decides the next window to be observed. Experiments have shown that our proposed method improves efficiency in human detection applications as it requires fewer windows to achieve similar performance compared to sliding windows and multi-stage particle window (MS-PW) method.


This paper presents an open contour tracking method that employs an arc-emission hidden Markov model (HMM). The algorithm encodes the shape information of the structure in a spatially deformable trellis model that is iteratively modified to account for observations in subsequent frames. As the open contour is determined on the trellis of an HMM, a dynamic programming procedure reduces the computational complexity to linear in the length of the structure (or contour). The method was developed for tracking general curvilinear structures, and tested on subcellular image sequences, where microtubules grow, shrink and undergo lateral motion from frame to frame. Microtubule length changes are modeled by the addition of appropriate transient and absorbing states to the HMM. Our results provide experimental evidence for the proposed algorithm's capability to track non-rigid curvilinear objects in challenging environments in terms of noise and clutter.


Material tracking is an important part of the automation control system which has a major impact on the product quality. This paper addresses a stand load identification in wire rod mill as a new algorithm added to existing control system. Tension control approaches are described and a modification of existing tracking system is proposed in order to eliminate tracking faults. Proposed method is based on dynamic torque calculation and its performance was experimentally verified on the industrial wire rod mill. Experimental results show significant reduction of the errors.


Author(s): Dulin, John Christopher | Advisor(s): Brenner, Suzanne; Robbins, Joel | Abstract: This dissertation examines movements between harmonic and antagonistic modalities of Muslim-Christian relations in a context of increasing religious plurality. In Gondar, Ethiopia, an educational and symbolic center of Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity, the Muslim minority has recently sought increased public parity with the Christian majority, taking advantage of the unprecedented provisions for religious freedom in Ethiopia's 1994 constitution. These developments helped fuel an episode of open antagonism, and some violence, between Muslims and Orthodox Christians in 2009. Most of the time, Gondare Muslims and Orthodox Christians coexist without issues, engaging in practices that construe intergroup relations as harmonic. They also work to manage latent antagonistic potentials through religious codes of silence, and are able to tolerate a mixture of affinity and vague antagonistic feeling for the religious other. In addition, many Gondare Muslims and Christians subscribe to a narrative of primordial Ethiopian tolerance, which asserts that both religious groups have lived together peacefully for centuries. However, an open "relation of antagonism" can form when latent, ambiguous tensions burst onto the social surface and become "clear" (gelsa). This dissertation argues that religious rituals in Gondar have a role both in facilitating mutual recognition across religious boundaries and "revealing" latent antagonisms, thus fueling interreligious conflict. The potential that is realized in any given situation depends in part on how Muslim and Orthodox rituals intersect—that is, how events and human actions bring different rituals onto the same scene, and whether or not this co-presence is seen as subversive to the high values the rituals perform. The project of interreligious coexistence in Gondar involves not only negotiating the co-presence of individuals with different religious identities, but also negotiating the co-presence of different ritual complexes. Relations between different ritual complexes are important because rituals have macrocosmic entailments, transvaluing the here-now to a higher scale, bringing actors into more direct relation with higher values, and, at times, linking lived time-space to distant historical events. In Gondar, ritual's propensity to link up with higher scales can evoke imaginaries of both macro-recognition and macro-conflict, typifying the religious other as a primordial friend or archetypical foe.


Introduction Human beta defensins (HBD1, 2.3) have antimicrobial and immunomodulatory properties and are components of the cervical mucus plug. Vaginal progesterone delays delivery in women with cervical shortening, but the mechanism(s) underlying this effect remain undetermined. This study describes the expression of HBDs by cervical epithelia in response to stimulation with classical infective and inflammatory agonists and progesterone. Methods The human endo-cervical cell-line End1/E6E7 and ecto-cervical cell-line Ect1/E6E7 were stimulated with bacterial (Lipopolysaccharide, LPS; Peptidoglycan, PGN) and inflammatory (Interleukin 1 beta, IL-1β; Interferon gamma, IFNγ) agonists and progesterone for up to 24 hours. HBD secretion was assessed by ELISA. Results End1/E6E7 HBD1 expression did not respond to stimulation. HBD1 secretion by Ect1/E6E7 cells more than doubled in response to IL-1β (p = 0.0002) and IFNγ (p = 0.02), and was suppressed by progesterone (p = 0.02). End1/E6E7 HBD2 release almost doubled in response to LPS (p = 0.02) and progesterone (p = 0.01). HBD2 expression by Ect1/E6E7 cells doubled in response to LPS (p = 0.005) and halved after stimulation with progesterone (p = 0.006). End1/E6E7 HBD3 expression increased in response to LPS (p = 0.0009), and almost doubled after stimulation with PGN (p = 0.0003) and IFNγ (p = 0.027). End1/E6E7 HBD3 secretion almost tripled in response to incubation with progesterone (p = 0.003). Conclusion Bacterial products elicited differential expression of HBDs in End1/E6E7 and Ect1/E6E7 cells. Progesterone mediated an increase in HBD2 and HBD3 secretion by endo-cervical cells but suppressed HBD1 and HBD2 secretion by ecto-cervical cells; this effect may augment cervical host defence, representing a novel mechanism by which progesterone may contribute to delaying the onset of preterm labour.


ABSTRACT We propose an optimal-transport-based matching method to nonparametrically estimate linear models with independent latent variables. The method consists in generating pseudo-observations from the latent variables, so that the Euclidean distance between the model's predictions and their matched counterparts in the data is minimized. We show that our nonparametric estimator is consistent, and we document that it performs well in simulated data. We apply this method to study the cyclicality of permanent and transitory income shocks in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. We find that the dispersion of income shocks is approximately acyclical, whereas the skewness of permanent shocks is procyclical. By comparison, we find that the dispersion and skewness of shocks to hourly wages vary little with the business cycle. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.


The uncertainty-based mine evaluation and optimization have been regarded as a critical issue. However, it has received less attention in the underground mines than in the open-pit mines due to the diversity of the underground mining methods, and the underground mining parameters' complexity. The grade and commodity price uncertainties play essential roles in mining projects. Mine planning by not incorporating these uncertainties is accompanied by risks. The evaluation and risk assessment of the mine plans is possible through evaluating the mineable reserve in the presence of such uncertainties. In the present work, we evaluate the effects of grade and commodity price uncertainties on the underground mining stope optimization and the resultant mineable reserve. In this regard, the stope boundary is studied both deterministically and stochastically in the presence of the grade and price uncertainties. For this purpose, in this work, we implement the conditional simulation in order to generate equally probable ore reserve models. Furthermore, we optimize the stope boundary using the floating-stope algorithm in each realization. Several decision support criteria including the 'mineable reserve,' 'metal-content,' 'profit,' and 'value-at-risk' are defined to assist the decision-maker in uncertain conditions. Finally, a procedure is defined in order to consider two types of uncertainty sources simultaneously in underground mining. It will guide the decision-maker toward the most appropriate stope boundary that best fits the mining company's requirements. The procedure is implemented in a bauxite mine, and the optimal stope boundary is determined concerning the different criteria.


Many lies that are intended to help others require the deceiver to make assumptions about whether lying serves others' best interests. In other words, lying often involves a paternalistic motive. Across seven studies (N = 2,260), we show that although targets appreciate lies that yield unequivocal benefits relative to honesty, they penalize paternalistic lies. We identify three mechanisms behind the harmful effects of paternalistic lies, finding that targets believe that paternalistic liars (a) do not have benevolent intentions, (b) are violating their autonomy by lying, and (c) are inaccurately predicting their preferences. Importantly, targets' aversion towards paternalistic lies persists even when targets receive their preferred outcome as a result of a lie. Additionally, deceivers can mitigate some, but not all, of the harmful effects of paternalistic lies by directly communicating their good intentions. These results contribute to our understanding of deception and paternalistic policies.


In today's challenging and complex world, organizations success depends on productivity, continuous improvement in all dimensions and reforming the pattern of resource utilization. Therefore, organizations, while considering restrictions, should focus on the most effective factors or so-called critical success factors. This paper intends to identify and prioritize the critical success factors, among other, factors influencing success of the organization, using hierarchical analysis and application of tools and related software. Analytic Hierarchy Process provides the possibility to compare the factors via creating matrix of paired comparisons. The case study in this research includes identifying the critical success factors and prioritizing them in Iran Argham Company. Finally, among the results presented, five critical success factors are identified from the forty influential factors. These five factors account for about seventy percent of the organization's success. It should be noted that most studies conducted in this area focuse on the certain processes and special systems rather than study on the organization as a whole unit. This model can also be generalized to all organizations, including SMEs, and would provide remarkably valuable approaches, especially in competitive markets.


The THz spectral regime provides a wide range of spectral lines that are invaluable probes of star formation and AGN activity in galaxies both in the local Universe and at the earliest times. We review the utility of these lines, give examples of the science they deliver, and detail the properties of successful low resolution direct detection spectrometers for work in the THz regime. We finish with a discussion of the exciting new science we expect with the next direct detection generation spectrometers on new facilities such as SOFIA, CCAT, SPICA, and ALMA.


Recent studies have shown evidence of a significant decline of the Posidonia oceanica (P.O.) meadows on a global scale. The monitoring and mapping of these meadows are fundamental tools for measuring their status. We present an approach based on a deep neural network to automatically perform a high-precision semantic segmentation of the P.O. meadows in sea-floor images, offering several improvements over the state-of-the-art techniques. Our network demonstrates outstanding performance over diverse test sets, reaching a precision of 96.57% and an accuracy of 96.81%, surpassing the reliability of labeling the images manually. Moreover, the network is implemented in an autonomous underwater vehicle, performing an online P.O. segmentation, which will be used to generate real-time semantic coverage maps.


Purpose: This paper reviews current literature and contributes a set of findings that capture the current state-of-the-art of the topic of green production. Design/methodology/approach: A literature review to capture, classify and summarize the main body of knowledge on green production and, translate this into a form that is readily accessible to researchers and practitioners in the more mainstream operations management community. Findings: The existing knowledge base is somewhat fragmented. This is a relatively unexplored topic within mainstream operations management research and one which could provide rich opportunities for further exploration. Originality/value: This paper sets out to review current literature, from a more conventional production operations perspective, and contributes a set of findings that capture the current state-of-the-art of this topic.


The removal of acetyl groups (O=C-CH3) from e-N-acetyl lysine amino acid on histone tails (histone deacetylation) plays a significant role for plants in response to stress conditions, leading to epigenetic modification related to somaclonal variation phenomenon. In spite of its importance, information about histone deacetylation activities in major tropical crops, such as pineapple (Ananas comosus variety MD2), remains obscure. Therefore, the main aim of this study was to investigate the changes of deacetylation in response to abiotic stresses in pineapple. Leaf base of the A. comosus var. MD2 was used as explants for shoot initiation. The regenerated plantlets were then used to create somaclonal variants. In this study, optimum regeneration media (OM) with the highest number of microshoots (6 ± 0.4) produced from leaf bases was Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium supplemented with 1.0 mg L-1 indole-3-butyric acid (IBA) and 2.0 mg L-1 6-benzylaminopurine (BAP). Somaclonal variants were induced from in vitro A. comosus through hormonal induction, NaCl, and abscisic acid (ABA) supplementation. Dwarfism was observed in regeneration media (RM) containing either 2.0 mg L-1 IBA and 4.0 mg L-1 BAP, 1.0 % (w/v) NaCl or 1.0 mg L-1 ABA. The histone deacetylase (HDAC) enzyme activity for dwarf and non-dwarf plantlets was also analyzed. The highest HDAC activity (109,333.33 ± 4.40 ng/min/mg) was recorded for dwarf plantlets grown on RM supplemented with 1.0 mg L-1 ABA. The dwarf variants underwent phenotypic recovery within 8 months after transferred to MS basal medium. No ploidy alteration was detected in these dwarf plantlets by a flow cytometry. The relative expression level of endogenous Ananas comosus histone deacetylase gene (AcHD2) was also evaluated to determine the transcripts level among the plantlets. Data analysis showed that the expression level of AcHD2 in the variants grown on RM 1.0 % (w/v) NaCl and RM supplemented with 1.0 mg L-1 ABA were higher compared to phenotypically normal plantlets grown on MS basal media and optimum regeneration media (OM). To confirm the dwarfism is caused by epigenetic modification, AtHD2 gene from Arabidopsis thaliana was synthesized and expressed in A. comosus. Morphological observation of the transgenic based on its height shows significant reduction (dwarf) as compared to the wild type. The histone deacetylase (HDAC) enzyme activity for the transgenic is also higher (5,902.00 ± 25.10 ng/min/mg) compared to the wild type (666.67 ± 22.07 ng/min/mg). Ploidy evaluation of transgenic shows no change occurred in the sample and remained as 2n. The relative expression level of AtHD2 in the transgenic plant was higher compared to the wild type plants. These evidences have supported the results of the incidence of somaclonal variation in the media after treated with different abiotic stresses. Collectively, these results depict the histone deacetylation activities in A. comosus and implied that the incidence of somaclonal variation in response to abiotic stress in A. comosus was epigenetically regulated.


ABSTRACT Although alteration in host cellular translation machinery occurs in virus-infected cells, the role of such alteration and the precise pathogenic processes are not well understood. Influenza A virus (IAV) infection shuts off host cell gene expression at transcriptional and translational levels. Here, we found that the protein level of eukaryotic translation initiation factor 4B (eIF4B), an integral component of the translation initiation apparatus, was dramatically reduced in A549 cells as well as in the lung, spleen, and thymus of mice infected with IAV. The decrease in eIF4B level was attributed to lysosomal degradation of eIF4B, which was induced by viral NS1 protein. Silencing eIF4B expression in A549 cells significantly promoted IAV replication, and conversely, overexpression of eIF4B markedly inhibited the viral replication. Importantly, we observed that eIF4B knockdown transgenic mice were more susceptible to IAV infection, exhibiting faster weight loss, shorter survival time, and more-severe organ damage. Furthermore, we demonstrated that eIF4B regulated the expression of interferon-induced transmembrane protein 3 (IFITM3), a critical protein involved in immune defense against a variety of RNA viruses, including influenza virus. Taken together, our findings reveal that eIF4B plays an important role in host defense against IAV infection at least by regulating the expression of IFITM3, which restricts viral entry and thereby blocks early stages of viral production. These data also indicate that influenza virus has evolved a strategy to overcome host innate immunity by downregulating eIF4B protein. IMPORTANCE Influenza A virus (IAV) infection stimulates the host innate immune system, in part, by inducing interferons (IFNs). Secreted IFNs activate the Janus kinase/signal transducers and activators of transcription (JAK/STAT) pathway, leading to elevated transcription of a large group of IFN-stimulated genes that have antiviral function. To circumvent the host innate immune response, influenza virus has evolved multiple strategies for suppressing the production of IFNs. Here, we show that IAV infection induces lysosomal degradation of eIF4B protein; and eIF4B inhibits IAV replication by upregulating expression of interferon-induced transmembrane protein 3 (IFITM3), a key protein that protects the host from virus infection. Our finding illustrates a critical role of eIF4B in the host innate immune response and provides novel insights into the complex mechanisms by which influenza virus interacts with its host.


High-resolution aeromagnetic data have recently been acquired for most of Minnesota under the sponsorship of the Minnesota Future Resources Commission, which also provided funds for test drilling of selected anomalies. The new data show that northwest-trending dikes and fractures are much more common in the Archean terranes than previously believed, and several epicenters are near such faults. The northeast-trending Great Lakes tectonic zone (GLTZ) was thought to be the chief source of seismicity in the state, because several epicenters were aligned with it. However, more recent seismic reflection profiling has demonstrated that the GLTZ has a moderate dip to the north. This dip is not compatible with the previously favored focal plane solution for a relatively large earthquake, which apparently confirmed the seismogenic role of the GLTZ. The alternative focal plane solution for this earthquake, however, is compatible with some northwest-trending structures in the region. We propose that the apparent alignment of epicenters with the GLTZ is related to stress buildup at places where it is intersected by northwest-trending faults, with subsequent movement occurring upon release. A similar model may explain seismicity along the northeast-trending Colorado lineament to the southwest.


Fibrolamellar carcinoma (FLC) is a rare, therapeutically intractable liver cancer that disproportionately affects youth. Although FLC tumors exhibit a distinct gene expression profile, the causative transcriptional mechanisms remain unclear. Here we used chromatin run-on sequencing to discover approximately 7,000 enhancers and 141 enhancer hotspots activated in FLC relative to non-malignant liver. Detailed bioinformatic analyses revealed aberrant ERK/MEK signaling and candidate master transcriptional regulators. We also defined the genes most strongly associated with aberrant FLC enhancer activity, including CA12 and SLC16A14. Treatment of FLC cell models with inhibitors of CA12 or SLC16A14 independently reduced cell viability and/or significantly enhanced the effect of MEK inhibitor cobimetinib. These findings highlight new molecular targets for drug development as well as novel drug combination approaches.


A method is described which makes possible the rapid screening of chemicals for mutagenic potential. Ten fold concentration gradients of test compound in agar are prepared in square petri dishes. Ten strains of bacteria including both histidine auxotrophs and tryptophane auxotrophs are then streaked on the surface. In the activated phase of the test an overlay of 9000 g liver homogenate in agar is applied to the gradient plate before the organisms are streaked. After incubation, the plates are scored by observing the concentration range over which the test compound produces mutant colonies in each of the ten organisms. With this technique it is possible to determine on only eight plates the mutagenic potential of a substance against ten different bacterial strains, both with and without microsomal activation and over a 10,000 fold concentration range. The minimum concentration at which growth of the auxotroph is inhibited is also noted. The method has been found to be very useful for preliminary screening of large numbers of chemicals.


This article develops the two forms of personalised network ties relevant in institutional transition and the evolution of business angel finance. Socially-embedded and institutionally-substituted network ties are characterised by rational conditions (e.g., cultural and institutional) rather than strength (e.g., strong/weak) and content (e.g., type of players). We argue that improved regulations render socially-embedded network ties more efficient and constrain the use of contracting institutions in selecting and monitoring angel investments when personalised network ties entail high level of trust and dependability, and that only socially-embedded network ties and improved regulatory institutions are key to further the development of angel finance.


The overarching objective of this research is to provide insight into how Thailand can
sustainably intensify its rice production. To achieve this aim, this research develops an
innovative approach for measuring agricultural environmental efficiency, which is called
"the directional nutrient surplus efficiency measure", which takes place within the
theoretical context of directional distance function. Thus, the study determines optimal rice
output and the combinations of inputs used for rice production that will minimise the nutrient
surplus. This is done using cross-sectional secondary data from 1,112 rice farms which were
divided into 9 categories for observation for the crop year 2008/09.
In order to estimate the technical efficiency of the 9 observed groups of Thai rice farmers,
the directional distance function was used, with different directions of improvement towards
the production possibility frontier. The results indicate that measuring technical efficiency
is robust in the context of the model choice for the technically efficient farms, implying that
different TE measurements (i.e. different directional vectors) do not change the status of the
technically efficient farms in the observation. 70%, 26%, 55%, 55%, 64%, 40%, 46%, 78%,
and 34% of the total observations of jasmine rice North, jasmine rice Northeast, jasmine rice
Central, non-jasmine rice North, non-jasmine rice Northeast, non-jasmine rice Central, nonjasmine
rice South, glutinous rice North, and glutinous rice Northeast, respectively, produce
on the PPF. The results also indicate that Thai rice farmers have average TE scores ranging
from 84.1% to 99%, depending on which directional vector is chosen.
Directional nutrient surplus efficiency measures with the directional vectors towards the
nitrogen and phosphorus surplus minimum points were applied to measure the nitrogen and
phosphorus surplus efficiency of Thai rice farming systems. The results indicate that the
amount of NS discharged into the environment by the observed Thai rice farmers averages
from 20.1 to 50.7 kg/ha, and the PS discharged into the environment averages from 11.0 to
28.7 kg/ha. The best practice farms of the 9 observed groups, according to this study, can
earn higher profits by using fewer inputs, especially inputs detrimental to the environment
like nitrogen and phosphorus fertilisers, than the average farms in their respective groups;
this also results in lower amounts of NS and PS being discharged into the environment,
compared to the average farms in their respective groups. Thus, the environmental problems
caused by Thai rice farming systems can be solved by adopting the methods of the best
practice farms, and imposing policies for environmental taxation and site-specific soil
nutrients testing.


Acoustic radiation force impulse (ARFI) imaging is a new and promising ultrasound-based diagnostic technique that, evaluating the wave propagation speed, allows the assessment of the tissue stiffness. ARFI is implemented in the ultrasound scanner. By short-duration acoustic radiation forces (less than 1 ms), localized displacements are generated in a selected region of interest not requiring any external compression so reducing the operator dependency. The generated wave scan provides qualitative or quantitative (wave velocity values) responses. Several non-invasive methods for assessing the staging of fibrosis are used, in order to avoid liver biopsy. Liver function tests and transient elastography are non-invasive, sensitive and accurate tools for the assessment of liver fibrosis and for the discrimination between cirrhotic and non-cirrhotic liver. Many published studies analyse ARFI performance and feasibility in studying diffuse liver diseases and compare them to other diagnostic imaging modalities such as conventional ultrasonography and transient elastography. Solid focal liver lesions, both benign and malignant, are common findings during abdominal examinations. The accurate characterization and differential diagnosis are important aims of all the imaging modalities available today. Only few papers describe the application of ARFI technology in the study of solid focal liver lesions, with different results. In the present study, the existing literature, to the best of our knowledge, about ARFI application on diffuse and focal liver pathology has been evaluated and results and statistical analyses have been compared, bringing to the conclusion that ARFI can be used in the study of the liver with similar accuracy as transient elastography in diagnosing significant fibrosis or cirrhosis and has got some advantages in respect to transient elastography since it does not require separate equipment, better displays anatomical structures and measurements can be successfully carried out almost in every patient.


This paper is aimed at introducing the organometallic chemist to the fascinating area of organometallic pharmaceuticals. It commences by identifying the properties of organometallic (transition metal) compounds that lend themselves to medical applications. Next, the specialized techniques and methods that are used to assess the medicinal properties of compounds are summarized, and although these techniques are not restricted to organometallic compounds, all examples are concerned with organometallic compounds. The design and evaluation of organometallic compounds for medicinal applications are described in context with the diseases they have been evaluated against, and areas are identified that may have most potential for organometallic pharmaceuticals. Some new results, including the first example of an organo-osmium compound that might exhibit effective anticancer properties, are also described. Copyright (C) 2004 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.


The Astropy Project supports and fosters the development of open-source and openly developed Python packages that provide commonly needed functionality to the astronomical community. A key element of the Astropy Project is the core package astropy, which serves as the foundation for more specialized projects and packages. In this article, we summarize key features in the core package as of the recent major release, version 5.0, and provide major updates on the Project. We then discuss supporting a broader ecosystem of interoperable packages, including connections with several astronomical observatories and missions. We also revisit the future outlook of the Astropy Project and the current status of Learn Astropy. We conclude by raising and discussing the current and future challenges facing the Project.


This paper outlines some facts of Tagalog prosody. The basic pitch excursions of Tagalog turn out to be remarkably similar to those of Irish, as described by Elfner (2012; 2015). After discussing in some detail the properties of Tagalog pitch rises and falls, and their sensitivity to the position of stress and of prosodic word boundaries, I make an observation about the interaction of word order with pitch peak height. It turns out that objects are generally higher-pitched than subjects would be in the same position, both in VOS and in VSO order; interestingly, this generalization is blind to the "Philippine-style voice" system, and makes reference only to thematic subjects and objects. I speculate that this generalization represents the Tagalog expression of nuclear stress: objects, no matter where they are in the Tagalog sentence, receive nuclear stress, realized as a heightened pitch peak. This article is part of Special Collection:  Prosody and Constituent Structure


Paul Aden, who has introduced dozens of new hostas into cultivation, wrote six chapters and contributed many photographs to this classic. Other contributors include John Elsley, Yoshimichi Hirose, Graham Stuart Thomas, and Andre Viette. This was the first contemporary book on hostas and played a role in helping to bring these versatile shade-lovers to their current level of popularity.


The The paper addresses the issues of designing onboard systems and complex digitalization of open-pit mining equipment. A generalized schematic diagram and composition of the On-Board Robotic Control System for open-pit equipment (OBRCS OPE) are provided. The option of the On-Board Robotic Control System for mining dump trucks (OBRCS MDT) and schematics of the on-board robotic system of the BELAZ dump truck are described in more detail. A layout option is suggested for an autonomous ready dump truck, a modification that meets all the requirements for the digital transformation (DT) generation of dump trucks i.e. the ability to operate as part of the mine fleet management systems and robotic control systems, as well as the availability of modern on-board industrial safety systems and remote diagnostics. The DT Generation of mining equipment will allow mining companies to achieve the up-to-date level in digital transformation of surface mining operations and will cut the amount of investments required in upgrading the mining transport system.


In this brief paper, I hope to provide some initial thoughts on two key issues raised by 'climate change tort'. The first is instrumental: whether tort can contribute to a meaningful response to climate change. The second issue, which is intimately connected with the first, is how climate change might affect the ways we think about tort: climate change adjudication, by asking us to look across established sub-disciplines in law, has the potential to provide different perspectives on familiar questions, and to raise completely fresh questions.


Web applications are widely disseminated, but, traditional development methods for this type of application still require a substantial amount of new modeling and programming. Current methods do not take significant advantage of reuse techniques, such as software product lines (PL). This paper presents the WIDE-PL environment focusing on its application generation process, called Application DEvelopment based on Services - ADESE. This environment is an evolution of WIDE - Waterloo Informatics Development Environment. The WIDE-PL environment supports the generation of Web applications based on the Service- oriented Architecture (SOA) and the product line approach. Our solution encompasses a general software architecture, an application generation process, and a set of mandatory and optional services. Examples of applications from two different domains were developed using ADESE to evaluate its feasibility. The results show that the process offers several advantages including an increase in reuse and an explicit separation between the services and the business process connecting those services.


Computational thinking (CT) is one of the skills that are critical for problem-solving in a technology-driven society. Although the importance of CT as a goal in education is increasingly acknowledged, there is scant research on developing pre-service teachers' CT competencies so that they can integrate CT in their lesson design. In this study, drawing from the experiential learning framework, we discuss the design of a module using a novel approach that is a hybridisation of plugged and unplugged CT approaches. The aim is to facilitate pre-service teachers in making connections between CT and their teaching contexts. Thirty-eight pre-service teachers attended the CT module for twelve weeks. The results indicated that the participants developed better CT competencies by integrating, justifying and reflecting CT in their lesson design. This study demonstrates the importance of providing a practical CT module to conduct unplugged activities for pre-service teachers, especially for those without prior computing knowledge, before introducing CT in the context of programming.


: A general review of the multiple up to date therapeutic trends in this field is intended based on new available technology and on a better knowledge of genetic disease physiopathology. Three possible systems to control patients with inheritable disease deduced of our own experience and on literature are analyzed. Cure by correction, replacement or genetic manipulation; Therapy by enzymatic manipulation, biochemical correction or surgical treatment Prevention by genetic counseling and discovery of pharmacogenetic patterns and higs risk populations. The wide perspectives opened to the next future compelled to an exhaustive diagnosis of patients, considering possibilities of reasonable therapy.


Hypertension is a complex, multifactorial disease, and its development is determined by a combination of genetic susceptibility and environmental factors. microRNAs have been implicated in numerous biologic processes. Moreover, several studies have demonstrated associations between diseases and specific microRNAs, especially in the cardiovascular system. The present study we assessed the microRNA system in a Portuguese population of hypertensive subjects and explored the potential of microRNAs as biomarkers for essential hypertension. Using Agilent Human miRNA Microarrays, Release 16.0 in combination with a one-color based hybridization protocol and bioinformatic analysis, we determined the microRNA signature of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from a total of 66 hypertensive subjects (divided into three classes: group 1, medicated HTA I and II; group 2, medicated HTA III; group 3, non-hypertensive with cardiac disease) and 13 non-hypertensive subjects. Bioinformatic analysis revealed 4 miRNAs (miR-4306, miR-146a, miR-22 and miR-146b-5pn) as upregulated not yet related to essential hypertension, and one (miR-186) previously described in myocardial infarction. Endothelial-specific miR-126, nephrosclerosis marker miR-192 and miR-98 (previously implicated in NO and ANP signaling) were found to be upregulated exclusively in group 1 comparing to control. Determining functions and identifying the specific targets of miR-4306, miR-146a, miR-22 and miR-146b-5pn, could determine their value as therapeutic targets for essential hypertension. Supported by FCT (PIC/IC/83204/2007)


Neutron production methods are an integral part of research and analysis for an array of applications. This paper examines methods of neutron production, and the advantages of constructing a radioisotopic neutron irradiator assembly using 252Cf. Characteristic neutron behavior and cost-benefit comparative analysis between alternative modes of neutron production are also examined. The irradiator is described from initial conception to the finished design. MCNP modeling shows a total neutron flux of 3 × 105 n/(cm2·s) in the irradiation chamber for a 25 μg source. Measurements of the gamma-ray and neutron dose rates near the external surface of the irradiator assembly are 120 μGy/h and 30 μSv/h, respectively, during irradiation. At completion of the project, total material, and labor costs remained below $50,000.


Human-wildlife conflict is a contentious issue and crop damage by wild animals is one of the major problems in Darjeeling Hills. A study on human-wildlife conflict was conducted in seven villages in the hilly region of Darjeeling District, West Bengal, India, from April 2018 to March 2022 to assess the crop damage by wild animals and the economic loss incurred to the marginal farmers. The study indicated that crop damage by wild animals has increased significantly in recent years to such a great extent that the farmers have to abandon agriculture totally or change their agriculture practices as an adaptation to the conflict. The key reasons are decreasing natural habitat and expansion of tea gardens, and also the significant decline of the key predator of this region, the leopard that checks the population of wild herbivores. Replacement of agricultural crops by the cultivation of medicinal plant species, which are not raided by wildlife, is suggested as a mitigation measure.


Using the case example of the crowd-funded YouTube documentary The Smash Brothers, this study explores how digital game culture is currently represented in social media. The units for a qualitative content analysis, as described by Krippendorf (2004), are defined through thematic distinction. The results refer to four major categories that represent digital game culture as a whole: game, gamer, gameplay and game community. The interaction between gamer and game (gameplay) is the most stressed element of game culture. Gameplay was depicted to be of varying nature and in opposition, considered both a sport and an art. The portrayal of the culture in our sample stresses both negative and positive aspects, remarking on features that increase the popularity of the game.


Success in law school is hard work and results from a combination of factors; such as, Memorization of Rules of Law, Application of FIRAC, Analytical Reasoning, and Diligence, Perseverance and Commitment. In this series, you will learn the FIRAC technique, the fundamental and foundational black letter rules of law for the first-year law school subjects, and the keys to sound analytical reasoning techniques. In law school civil procedure your primary focus is on the substantive principles of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. It is important to remember that in law school civil procedure the goal is not to teach you the practical principles of civil procedure but to teach you to think about issues and memorizing rules of law so that you can excel on law school exams, and ultimately the Bar exam.


Growing body of evidence suggests that intra-pancreatic fat is associated with diabetes but whether distribution of intra-pancreatic fat across the regions of the pancreas has a pathophysiologic role is unknown. The study aimed to investigate the differences in intra-pancreatic fat deposition between the head, body, and tail of the pancreas, as well as the relationship between regional intra-pancreatic fat deposition and diabetes status and insulin traits. A total of 368 adults from the general population underwent magnetic resonance imaging on a 3 T scanner and intra-pancreatic fat was manually quantified in duplicate. Statistical models were adjusted for age, sex, ethnicity, body mass index, and liver fat. Intra-pancreatic fat deposition in the head, body, and tail of the pancreas did not differ significantly in adjusted models, in both the overall cohort and the three subgroups based on diabetes status. HOMA-IR and fasting insulin were significantly positively associated with fat in the tail and body of the pancreas. There was no significant association between regional intra-pancreatic fat and HOMA-β. The association of increased intra-pancreatic fat deposition in the tail and body regions with increased insulin resistance may have an important role in the early identification of patients at risk for developing insulin resistance and diseases that stem from it.


In the large-scale image retrieval task, the two most important requirements are the discriminability of image representations and the efficiency in computation and storage of representations. Regarding the former requirement, Convolutional Neural Network is proven to be a very powerful tool to extract highly discriminative local descriptors for effective image search. Additionally, to further improve the discriminative power of the descriptors, recent works adopt fine-tuned strategies. In this article, taking a different approach, we propose a novel, computationally efficient, and competitive framework. Specifically, we first propose various strategies to compute masks, namely, SIFT-masks, SUM-mask, and MAX-mask, to select a representative subset of local convolutional features and eliminate redundant features. Our in-depth analyses demonstrate that proposed masking schemes are effective to address the burstiness drawback and improve retrieval accuracy. Second, we propose to employ recent embedding and aggregating methods that can significantly boost the feature discriminability. Regarding the computation and storage efficiency, we include a hashing module to produce very compact binary image representations. Extensive experiments on six image retrieval benchmarks demonstrate that our proposed framework achieves the state-of-the-art retrieval performances.


During 2010 a series of decisions by United States District Court judges appeared to mark a significant breakthrough in the ongoing struggle by sexual minorities in the United States to achieve legal equality through the removal of objectionable laws and policies. Almost as if a dam had broken, there was a sudden rush of developments on three highly contested fronts: (1) the statutory ban on military service by openly gay individuals, (2) the exclusion from federal recognition for lawfully contracted same-sex marriages, and (3) a popularly enacted California state constitutional amendment taking away same-sex marriage rights that had previously been granted by a state supreme court decision. In each of these cases, the district courts declared the contested policy to be unconstitutional and ordered injunctive relief, placing in doubt the willingness of courts to continue crediting traditional arguments that had been successfully invoked by the government when defending these and similar policies in past cases. In this comment, the author argues that these decisions may work a fundamental change in the analysis of LGBT constitutional claims that portends significant progress towards achieving legal equality for sexual minorities in the United States.


The advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) is a compulsory component of the future smart grid; it not only provides near real-time two-way communication between the consumers and the utility but also gives an opportunity to third parties to provide relevant value-added services to the consumers to improve the user satisfaction. However, existing services require the consumers share their private energy data with other parties, which has potential privacy risks. To better balance the excellent quality of the services and privacy guarantee, a novel differential private federated learning-based third-party service platform is proposed. Instead of sending the original energy data to the cloud server, the central server in the proposed scheme only collects the model parameters, which are trained locally inside the consumers' houses. Then the collected parameters are aggregated differential privately to eliminate the identity of individuals, and the aggregated parameters are used to update the central model and improve the model performance. Furthermore, a novel attention-based bidirectional long short-term memory neural network model is adopted to make predictions. In the case study, a residential short term load forecasting task is implemented to evaluate the performance of the proposed model; from the simulation results, the conclusion is made that the proposed model can achieve similar accuracy as the typical centralized model and better control the privacy loss flexibly at the same time.


ABSTRACT Disaster is a fruitful field of study for Native scholarship – and Indigenous Studies for disaster scholarship – because it happens in the medium of land, water and air, which is the original medium of oppression, or colonization, for Native people. Using a framework 'beyond disaster exceptionalism', this article examines recent changes in US tribal disaster policy to explore implications both for discrete disaster events that occur on reservations and for the ongoing disaster of colonization. I use the case of a recent wildfire on the Northern Cheyenne reservation in Montana to highlight the challenge of materializing government-to-government relations through federal tribal policy. During the course of the wildfire fieldwork, the Sandy Recovery Improvement Act was passed by Congress, giving tribes the right to request a disaster declaration directly of the US president. The events of the Ash Creek fire suggest that sovereignty requires economic justice, and that legislated sovereignty remains an oxymoron.


Background Analysis using publicly available algorithms predicts that X-ray repair complementing defective repair in Chinese hamster cells 2 (XRCC2), a key component in the homologous recombination repair pathway, is a potential target of micro-ribonucleic acid-7 (miR-7). Some studies have shown that both miR-7 and XRCC2 are associated with cancer development. For this purpose, we searched for the possible relationship between miR-7 and XRCC2 in the development of colorectal cancer (CRC). Methods miR-7 expression was assessed in CRC specimens and cell lines using real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Luciferase reporter assay was used to confirm the target associations. The effect of miR-7 on cell proliferation and apoptosis was confirmed in vitro by the methylthiazol tetrazolium (MTT) assay, colony formation assay, and flow cytometry. Gene and protein expression were examined using real time PCR and western blotting, respectively. Results miR-7 was downregulated in CRC specimens and cell lines, and targeted the 3′ untranslated region of XRCC2. miR-7 overexpression reduced cyclin D1 expression and increased p21, caspase-3, and BAX expression, which subsequently inhibited CRC cell proliferation and induced CRC cell apoptosis. However, XRCC2 can repress the inhibitory effects of miR-7 on proliferation. Conclusion Our findings suggest that miR-7 plays a protective role by inhibiting proliferation and increasing apoptosis of CRC cells. It may identify new targets for anti-cancer treatment.


Bozakova, N. & Ivanov, V. (2022). Opportunities for sheep welfare improvement by silymarin additive – a review article. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., 28 (3) , 502–509 Under grazing conditions, there are a number of stress factors that significantly impair the welfare of ewes and lambs - high and low temperatures, excessive solar radiation, poisonous plants, various endo- and ectoparasites, snake and insect bites, grazing infections, etc. The purpose of this publication is to summarize and highlight the possibilities of using silymarin and Silybum marianum products as a dietary supplement to improve the welfare of sheep under pasture rearing. A detailed analysis of numerous scientific articles related to the active ingredients, properties, and application of Silybum marianum products has been performed. Data on the antioxidant, hepatoprotective and detoxifying effects of silymarin have been summarized. The dual hepatoprotective effect of silymarin has been emphasized particularly for its antioxidant action, associated with reducing the reactive oxygen species content and malondialdehyde properties, and for stimulating the activity of the antioxidant enzymes- glutathione peroxidase, superoxide, and heat shock protein 70 (HSP70). The anti-stress effect of silymarin for lowering blood cortisol levels in animals is also briefly described, and pathways for silymarin detoxification of various toxins have been investigated. As and milk yield of ruminants is of the presented research, it can be concluded that silymarin and Silybum marianum -derivatives can be used successfully to improve sheep welfare under grazing conditions, due to their antioxidant, hepatoprotective, anti-stress, detoxifying activity, and to stimulate growth and milk production.


Speaker location estimation techniques based on time-difference-of-arrival measurements have attracted much attention recently. Many existing localization ideas assume that only one speaker is active at a time. In this paper, we focus on a more realistic assumption that the number of active speakers is unknown and time-varying. Such an assumption results in a more complex localization problem, and we employ the random finite set (RFS) theory to deal with that problem. The RFS concepts provide us with an effective, solid foundation where the multispeaker locations and the number of speakers are integrated to form a single set-valued variable. By applying a sequential Monte Carlo implementation, we develop a Bayesian RFS filter that simultaneously tracks the time-varying speaker locations and number of speakers. The tracking capability of the proposed filter is demonstrated in simulated reverberant environments


We examine an incentive scheme for a group of agents, where all agents are rewarded if the group meets its target. If the group does not meet its target, only the agents that meet their individual target are rewarded. In environmental policy, the EU burden sharing agreement and the UK Climate Change Agreements feature this incentive scheme. There is only a difference in outcome between group and individual rewards if emissions are stochastic. Group rewards generally lead to higher expected emissions than individual rewards. The attraction of the group reward scheme may lie in its fairness and its tough-looking targets.


Targeting leukemia initiating cells is considered to be an effective way to cure leukemia, for which it is critical to identify novel therapeutic targets. Herein, we demonstrate that CD244, which was initially reported as a key regulator for natural killer cells, is highly expressed on both mouse and human leukemia initiating cells. Upon CD244 knockdown, human leukemia cell lines and primary leukemia cells have markedly impaired proliferation abilities both in vitro and in vivo. Interestingly, the repopulation ability of both mouse and human hematopoietic stem cells is not impaired upon CD244 knockdown. Using an MLL-AF9-induced murine acute myeloid leukemia model, we show that leukemogenesis is dramatically delayed upon CD244 deletion, together with remarkably reduced Mac1+/c-Kit+ leukemia cells (enriched for leukemia initiating cells). Mechanistically, we reveal that CD244 is associated with c-Kit and p27 except for SHP-2 as previously reported. CD244 co-operates with c-Kit to activate SHP-2 signaling to dephosphorylate p27 and maintain its stability to promote leukemia development. Collectively, we provide intriguing evidence that the surface immune molecule CD244 plays an important role in the maintenance of stemness of leukemia initiating cells, but not in hematopoietic stem cells. CD244 may represent a novel therapeutic target for the treatment of acute myeloid leukemia.


In this paper, we argue that, as an enforcement mechanism, efficiency wages are intrinsically inferior to damages and to conditional bonuses – an alternative positive sanction system overlooked in the labor economics literature, under which rents are only paid if monitoring has effectively taken place (and the employee is not found shirking). While all three alternatives succeed in incentivizing agents and satisfy the participation constraint of non-shirking employees, damages (and negative sanctions in general) do so at lower costs because they do not require the payment of any rents. Of the two positive sanction systems, conditional bonuses are less expensive than efficiency wages because the latter also pay rents when no monitoring has taken place and may allow employees who are found shirking to keep some rents. Moreover, we find that monitoring levels are inefficiently low under efficiency wages. While efficiency wages (if they are completely non-retroactive) remove the employer's incentive to falsely sanction the employee, they solve this appropriation problem in a less rational way than some decoupling mechanisms that can be used under damages and conditional bonus regimes. Therefore, it seems extremely unlikely that employers would ever opt for efficiency wages on such a massive scale that structural unemployment would result, as Shapiro and Stiglitz (1984) suggested.


Abstract. The WFDE5 dataset has been generated using the WATCH Forcing Data (WFD) methodology applied to surface meteorological variables from the ERA5 reanalysis. The WFDEI dataset had previously been generated by applying the WFD methodology to ERA-Interim. The WFDE5 is provided at 0.5∘ spatial resolution but has higher temporal resolution (hourly) compared to WFDEI (3-hourly). It also has higher spatial variability since it was generated by aggregation of the higher-resolution ERA5 rather than by interpolation of the lower-resolution ERA-Interim data. Evaluation against meteorological observations at 13 globally distributed FLUXNET2015 sites shows that, on average, WFDE5 has lower mean absolute error and higher correlation than WFDEI for all variables. Bias-adjusted monthly precipitation totals of WFDE5 result in more plausible global hydrological water balance components when analysed in an uncalibrated hydrological model (WaterGAP) than with the use of raw ERA5 data for model forcing. The dataset, which can be downloaded from https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.20d54e34 (C3S, 2020b), is distributed by the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) through its Climate Data Store (CDS, C3S, 2020a) and currently spans from the start of January 1979 to the end of 2018. The dataset has been produced using a number of CDS Toolbox applications, whose source code is available with the data – allowing users to regenerate part of the dataset or apply the same approach to other data. Future updates are expected spanning from 1950 to the most recent year. A sample of the complete dataset, which covers the whole of the year 2016, is accessible without registration to the CDS at https://doi.org/10.21957/935p-cj60 (Cucchi et al., 2020).


This paper analyzes the patterns of incorporation of Latino/a immigrant generations into the American class structure. For that purpose, we use Current Population Survey data to construct a model of the American class structure and analyze the position of different Latino/a generations within that class structure. Our analysis reveals a complex picture that combines some intergenerational improvement and pervasive inequality. We find that the children of immigrants enter a racialized class system that features stable patterns of between- and within-ethnoracial-group inequality. Our study points to the centrality of the racial and class structures for the immigrant experience.


Conjugated linoleic acids (CLAs) are conjugated dienoic isomers of linoleic acid. Many people supplement their diets with CLAs to attempt weight loss, and the trans-10,cis-12 isomer (t10,c12-CLA) of CLA reduces adiposity in animal models and humans. However, CLA treatment in mice causes insulin resistance that has been attributed to the lipoatrophic state, which is associated with hyperinsulinemia and hepatic steatosis. Here, we investigated the effect of t10,c12-CLA on adipose tissue inflammation, another factor promoting insulin resistance. We confirmed that t10,c12-CLA daily gavage performed in mice reduces white adipose tissue (WAT) mass and adiponectin and leptin serum levels and provokes hyperinsulinemia. In parallel, we demonstrated that this CLA isomer led to a rapid induction of inflammatory factors such as tumor necrosis factor-α and interleukin-6 gene expression in WAT without affecting their serum levels. In vitro, t10,c12-CLA directly induced IL-6 secretion in 3T3-L1 adipocytes by an nuclear factor-κB–dependent mechanism. In vivo, however, the lipoatrophic adipose tissue of CLA-treated mice was notable for a dramatic increase in macrophage infiltration and gene expression. Thus, CLA supplementation directly induces inflammatory gene expression in adipocytes and also promotes macrophage infiltration into adipose tissue to a local inflammatory state that contributes to insulin resistance.


Dealing with legacy systems has been a challenge for the industry for decades. The pressure to efficiently modernise legacy assets to meet new business needs and minimise associated risks is increasing. Automated code transformation, which is associated with serious (long-known) risks, is a high priority in the industrial environment due to the cost structure, the effort required and the supposed time savings. However, little has been published about the long-term effects of successful migrations. This paper looks at three different cases of automated code transformation at different stages of their lifecycle, highlights the lessons learned and derives a number of recommendations that should be useful for planning and executing future transformations.


Urban gardens are spreading in many cities across Europe, with community gardening being a fundamental form of urban agriculture. While the literature reveals the essential role that community gardens can play in terms of learning and education, no studies have investigated the training needs for participants in community gardens to ensure their successful development. The goal of this article is to evaluate the training requirements of urban community gardens to ensure their successful implementation and their contribution to sustainability in European cities. Two questionnaires of users' needs analysis were designed and implemented in Berlin, Bologna, Budapest, and Cartagena. The results unveiled the need to re-enforce the training in the formation and community building phases of community gardens towards ensuring the creation of an engaged gardening community to maintain activity, particularly for top-down activities (e.g., research-related gardens). Users claimed their need for being trained on crop management skills (e.g., maintenance, bed preparation, organic practices) and on communication skills to further disseminate their activity, thereby increasing the potential for citizen engagement. Such requirements could be overcome with the creation of urban gardens networks, where experiences and knowledge are shared among practitioners. Policy recommendations are provided based on the outputs of this study.


The United States Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program has been monitoring national forest resources in the United States for over 80 years; presented here is a synthesis of research applications for FIA data. A review of over 180 publications that directly utilize FIA data is broken down into broad categories of application and further organized by methodologies and niche research areas. The FIA program provides the most comprehensive forest database currently available, with permanent plots distributed across all forested lands and ownerships in the United States and plot histories dating back to the early 1930s. While the data can be incredibly powerful, users need to understand the spatial resolution of ground-based plots and the nature of the FIA plot coordinate system must be applied correctly. As the need for accurate assessments of national forest resources continues to be a global priority, particularly related to carbon dynamics and climate impacts, such national forest inventories will continue to be an important source of information on the status of and trends in these ecosystems. The advantages and limitations of FIA's national forest inventory data are highlighted, and suggestions for further expansion of the FIA program are provided.


This thesis examines the meanings of memory for a group of interrelated Indian Tamil families, who belong to a Western-educated middle class, or "salariat" (Alavi 1987). Encouraged by the colonial authorities, these families migrated to Burma between 1890 and 1922, but were forced to return to India when the Japanese invaded in 1942. Despite their distinctive position - separated socially from their colonial masters, the Burmese people and from the mass of labouring Indians - these families belong to a group which, except for Chakravarti's (1971) political and economic study, has been ignored. Nowadays anthropology and history are recognised as supporting one another, yet memory, which is recognised as an important component of history, has largely been disregarded in anthropology. Following an introductory first chapter. Chapter 2 falls into two parts, which provide a necessary background to the whole work. Part 1 describes the three families with whom the thesis is chiefly concerned. These families have been migrants for generations, so Part 2 is on anthropology and migration. In Chapter 3 I define and discuss various ways of recalling the past. In addition to history, these include oral traditions, individual memory and social memory. I show how different kinds of memory are important in allowing people to put forward their own interpretation of the past. Taken together they allow for a "thicker" description than would be possible using only historical sources. Moreover, memory is selective; what is recalled gives meaning to the present and guidance for the future. In Chapters 4, 5 and 6 (Aspects of life in Burma, Relations between Burmese, Indians and British and The evacuation from Burma), I examine differences between written texts and memories of life in Burma. Thus, I offer an account of the social organisation and values of these families during their Burma years, contrasting their recollections with historical accounts written by British, Burmese and Indian writers. In Chapter 7, The return to India and after, I show how different kinds of memory continue to influence these families. Personal memories teach a pattern of individual behaviour which the families believe should be copied. I argue that social memory, by which information about appropriate behaviour for family members is transmitted, has been turned into cultural capital, through which the past is recreated and reinterpreted to transmit a paradigm for present behaviour which has enabled them to recover from the losses incurred in fleeing from Burma and also taught them how to cope to their own satisfaction with the contemporary experience of diaspora.


This paper presents P-RIO, a parallel programming environment that supports an object based software configuration methodology. It promotes a clear separation of the individual sequential computation components from the interconnection structure used for the interaction between these components. This makes the data and control interactions explicit, simplifying program visualization and understanding. P-RIO includes a graphical tool that helps to configure, monitor and debug parallel programs.


Rishiri volcano is an isolated polygenetic volcano that lies at a distance of about 200 km from Quaternary volcanic fields in Hokkaido. The volcanic activity has started abruptly since <0.2 Ma after∼9 My hiatus of volcanism and might have ended since several thousand years ago. The volcanic activity can be divided into three, initial, climactic and final stages in terms of its eruption rate. The climactic stage can be also subdivided into three, C-1, C-2 and C-3 stages in the ascending order.     The eruptive products span from basaltic to rhyolitic rocks (SiO2=49.2-73.8%) which can be distinguished by phenocryst assemblages and whole-rock chemistry. Judging from incompatible trace elements, felsic rocks from each stage cannot be formed by fractional crystallization of the basaltic magma and may be produced by crustal melting. Phenocryst assemblage, Ti contents in hornblende, and geological thermometers indicate that magmatic temperature of the dacitic and rhyolitic rocks increases from ∼800°C in the initial stage to ∼1050°C in the C-2 stage, and then decreases to ∼700°C in the final stage. On the other hand, chemical compositions of olivine and spinel suggest that the basaltic magma has also changed its source mantle with the volcanic activity. It can be estimated that the source mantle for the basaltic magmas has changed from fertile peridotites in the initial stage to depleted ones in the climactic stage, and finally changed to fertile ones in the final stage.     The variation in magmatic temperature of the felsic magmas indicates that the volcanic activity with higher eruption rate has produced magma with higher temperature. This suggests that the production of these magma can be explained by ascending and cooling of a mantle diapir which plays as a heat source to melt crustal materials. It can be concluded that the whole-life of Rishiri volcano may be explained by evolution of a single mantle diapir. Our petrological analysis could provide important constraints on modeling magma generation of a polygenetic volcano, because effect of preceding and/or adjacent volcanism is negligible in the case of Rishiri volcano.


During the last decades, smart tactile sensing systems based on different sensing techniques have been developed due to their high potential in industry and biomedical engineering. However, smart tactile sensing technologies and systems are still in their infancy, as many technological and system issues remain unresolved and require strong interdisciplinary efforts to address them. This paper provides an overview of smart tactile sensing systems, with a focus on signal processing technologies used to interpret the measured information from tactile sensors and/or sensors for other sensory modalities. The tactile sensing transduction and principles, fabrication and structures are also discussed with their merits and demerits. Finally, the challenges that tactile sensing technology needs to overcome are highlighted.


Background The first arrival of a sizable shipment of penicillin at the North African Theatre of Operations for USA military use in 1943 was a landmark that turned a new chapter of antibiotic use in Africa. Over the past decade the expansion of resources and the technological advances have meant that much larger quantities of drugs are available in developing countries than ever before. As a result, many more individuals are receiving necessary treatment or therapy than just ten years ago. This very welcome event is accompanied by the terrible irony that increases in drug availability and use can promote drug resistance and render the same life-saving drugs ineffective. Methods The study focused on bacterial pathogens. One hundred and three relevant literatures were identified from the PubMed online database. The coverage included research articles concerning antimicrobial resistance involving subjects of an African country. Results Resistant bacteria are on a war path and evidently have acquired an edge over us. Our actions are evidently fuelling the resistance. The indiscriminate use of antibiotics in humans and livestock, wrong and substandard prescriptions by unqualified 'medical personnel' together with poor diagnosis or lack of it are all adding fuel to the already fired train of resistant microbes. Conclusion To win the war and turn tables as we did with the discovery of penicillin and other antimicrobials in the 1940s, then we must all act now. Antimicrobial stewardship programs-Education, training of laboratory personnel and investment in laboratory infrastructure development are desirable in these situations