This paper deals with the presence of East German manufacturers in foreign product markets. The following questions are discussed: Which factories sell their products abroad? What influences the export activities? Hypotheses are built on the basis of different trade theories, such as the relative position of the enterprises in their home market, the cumulation of learning effects in production and sales, the saturation of the domestic market and others. Individual data sets from industrial surveys for 1995 and 2000 are used to reveal the relationship between the company's technical as well as institutional characteristics and their participation in export activities. Bivariate and multivariate approaches are applied. Additionally, a sample of enterprises has been asked to assess their export activities.


Our early work to develop a basis for quantitative ultrasound (QUS) imaging started with live animal studies wherein the ultrasonicbackscattered coefficient (BSC) was estimated and from the BSC estimate, QUS parameters were estimated. Even earlier (some 5 decades earlier), significant through‐transmission quantitative studies of ultrasonictissue properties were undertaken (absorption and speed). It was our view, based on the significant early echo‐based work by Lizzi et al., Zagzebski et al., Insana et al. and Hall et al., that QUS imaging technology had the potential to be a new imaging capability that could be used to augment standard B‐mode imaging. QUS imaging utilizes the frequency‐dependent information, and thus the backscattered signals are dependent on the tissue properties (size, shape, number, compressibility, density). Estimating QUS parameters requires a model that incorporates a form factor (FF), that is, a mathematical description/model of the backscattered signal of a single scattering structure as a function of frequency; the better the FF describes anatomical scatterers, the more realistic will be the estimates. We initiated our studies by examining in vivo three solid tumor types (fibroadenoma, mammary carcinoma, soft‐tissue sarcoma). Initially the Gaussian FF was used. Good agreement between processed ultrasound data and pathologic assessments were obtained, but also important questions were being raised. The questions lead to a new approach to identify more accurate FFs as well as new strategies to extract quantitative parameters from the envelop‐detected echo data. The current QUS studies are in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Wisconsin‐Madison, Iowa State University, University of Illinois at Chicago, Brown University and Riverside Research. The presentation will provide the basis for QUS based on our early work as well as our on‐going work. Research sponsored by NIH CA111289 Learning objectives: 1. Understand backscattered coefficient (BSC) QUS parameters and their relations to tissue properties 2. Understand how to acquire QUS parameters from BSCs 3. Understand the basic concept of QUS and BSC analyses 4. Understand QUS parameters and their relations to tissue properties


Faecal sludge (FS) management is a serious problem in developing countries which has caused environmental pollution and health risks. Hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) is an alternative technology that can be used to treat FS and convert it into a valuable solid product called hydrochar. This study evaluated the technical feasibility of hydrochar production from FS, determined the reaction kinetics of HTC of FS, and developed an empirical model which could estimate energy content of the produced hydrochar using the relevant parameters such as temperature ( T ), reaction time ( t ), moisture content ( M ), and volatile solid concentration (VS) in FS. The experiments were conducted with a 1-L high pressure reactor operated at the following conditions; T of 180–250 °C, t of 0.5–10.0 h, M of 70–95%wt, and VS of 40–340 g/L, which could produce at the energy content and hydrochar yield of 17–20 MJ/kg and 65%–80%, respectively. From these experimental data, an empirical model for determining energy content of the produced hydrochar was developed and validated satisfactorily with the literature data. Feasibility of applying the HTC process for FS treatment was discussed.


Recently, it was pointed out [1] that classic models for the evolution of anisogamy do not take into account the possibility of parthenogenetic reproduction, even though sex is facultative in many relevant taxa (e.g. algae) that harbour both anisogamous and isogamous species. Here we complement the analysis of [1] with an approach where we assume that the relationship between progeny size and its survival may differ between parthenogenetically and sexually produced progeny, favouring either the former or the latter. We show that the findings of [1], that parthenogenesis can stabilise isogamy relative to the obligate sex case, extend to our scenarios. We additionally investigate two different ways for one mating type to take over the entire population. First, parthenogenesis can lead to biased sex ratios that are sufficiently extreme that one type can displace the other, leading to de facto asexuality for the remaining type that now lacks partners to fuse with. This process involves positive feedback: microgametes, being numerous, lack opportunities for syngamy, and should they proliferate parthenogenetically, the next generation makes this asexual route even more prominent for microgametes. Second, we consider mutations to strict asexuality in producers of micro- or macrogametes, and show that the prospects of asexual invasion depend strongly on the mating type in which the mutation arises. Perhaps most interestingly, we also find scenarios in which parthenogens have an intrinsic survival advantage yet facultatively sexual isogamous populations are robust to the invasion of asexuals, despite us assuming no genetic benefits of recombination. Here equal contribution from both mating types to zygotes that are sufficiently well provisioned can outweigh the additional costs associated with syngamy.


The Student's Academic Literacy Tool (SALT) project has brought together academic staff and students to develop an accessible and useful tool to enable students to recognise the characteristics of academic writing which need to be developed in order to be successful in written assessments. Crucial to the success of the project so far has been the involvement of student research partners, who teamed up as co-creators and owners of the tool around 18 months ago (Becker, Kennedy, Shahverdi & Spence, 2015). The project initially received £3,650 from Teesside University Learning and Teaching fund to create and user test the SALT in booklet format. The project was also designed to provide student researchers with opportunities to present at regional conferences and collaborate with national organisations as well as experience the research publishing and dissemination process. Since its dissemination, interest in SALT has grown through a series of successful publications, conference presentations, and national media coverage following the team's success in winning the Joint Information Systems Council Summer of Student Ideas competition 2015. This has led to the Student's Academic Literacy Tool being used across a number of Science and Technology disciplines at Teesside University and in addition it is being used in a number of other Universities across the U.K. With the support of JISC a mobile application of the tool has recently been launched and the project is now overseen by a steering committee which includes members of the original team and continues to provide opportunities for current students to engage in ongoing evaluation and enhancement projects. The launch of the mobile application also provides ongoing opportunities for students to engage in work around developing additional features and ancillary content as well as engaging with industry to develop partnerships to maintain and extend the functionality of the application.


The breast cancer susceptibility gene 1 (BRCA1) plays a key role in mammary tumorigenesis. However, the reasons why silencing the Brca1 gene leads to tumorigenesis are not clearly understood. We report here that BRCA1 deficiency activates the AKT oncogenic pathway, one of the most common alterations associated with human malignancy. Mutation of Brca1 gene increases the phosphorylation and the kinase activity of AKT. The BRCA1-BRCT domains bind to phosphorylated AKT (pAKT) and lead to its ubiquitination toward protein degradation. BRCA1 mutant cells lacking the BRCT repeats accumulate nuclear pAKT and consequently inactivate the transcription functions of FOXO3a, a main nuclear target of pAKT. Our results show that BRCA1 is a negative regulator of the AKT pathway and imply the significance of the BRCA1/AKT pathway in tumorigenesis.


Semantic searching seeks to improve search accuracy of the search engine by understanding searcher's intent and the contextual meaning of the terms present in the query to retrieve more relevant results. To find out the semantic similarity between the query terms, WordNet is used as the underlying reference database. Various approaches of Learning to Rank are compared. A new hybrid learning system is introduced which combines learning using Neural Network and Support Vector Machine. As the size of the training set highly affects the performance of the Neural Network, we have used Support Vector Machine to reduce the size of the data set by extracting support vectors that are critical for the learning. The data set containing support vectors is then used for learning a ranking function using Neural Network. The proposed system is compared with RankNet. The experimental results demonstrated very promising performance improvements. For experiments, we have used English-Hindi parallel corpus, Gyannidhi from CDAC. F-measure and Average Interpolated Precision are used for evaluation.


Purpose: Approximately 5–10% of patients who undergo genetic testing of BRCA1 and BRCA2 receive a variant of unknown significance (VUS) result. The ambiguous nature of a VUS may increase difficulty in patient understanding and decision making regarding risk reduction and surveillance options, including cancer risk-reducing surgeries. VUS reclassification to benign or deleterious may occur in time; however, clinical decisions may need to be made expeditiously, and some patients may pursue irreversible treatments before VUS reclassification.Methods: We reviewed the surgical decisions of 107 women postdisclosure of a BRCA VUS result counseled at our institute between 1998 and 2009.Conclusion: Among women receiving a BRCA VUS result at our center, 11 of 107 (10.3%) pursued cancer risk-reducing mastectomy and 22 of 107 (20.6%) pursued cancer risk-reducing bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy. Reclassification of VUS occurred up to 9 years after testing, and 5 of 22 (22.7%) women followed up for 8 or more years continue to have a VUS result. We discuss considerations for providers of genetic services to discuss with patients who receive a VUS result.


ABSTRACT This article develops a framework for conceptualising authoritarian governance and rule in the Lao People's Democratic Republic. After introducing the national and academic context, which go a significant way towards understanding the paucity of comparative political work on Laos, we propose an approach to studying post-socialist authoritarian and single-party rule that highlights the key political-institutional, cultural-historical and spatial-environmental sources of party-state power and authority. In adopting this approach, we seek to redirect attention to the centralising structures of rule under the Lao People's Revolutionary Party, illustrating how authoritarian institutions of the "party-state" operate in and through multiple scales, from the central to the local level. At a time when the country is garnering greater attention than at any time since the Vietnam War, we argue that this examination of critical transitions in Laos under conditions of resource-intensive development, intensifying regional and global integration, and durable one-party authoritarian rule, establishes a framework for future research on the party-state system in Laos, and for understanding and contextualising the Lao People's Revolutionary Party regime in regional comparative perspective.


This article uses independently develops micro-oxidation installment, systematically studied and optimized the silicate system solution,the silicate and the different recombiner composition compound system solution that are used in SJDM-1 rare earth magnesium alloys micro-oxidation and different electrical parameters that affect corrosion resistance of ceramic coating through the condition experiment and the orthogonal experiment.Using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) , X-ray diffraction (XRD) , coat thickness tester and drip experiment, the surface morphology of ceramic layer of SJDM-1 rare earth magnesium alloys are observed,and composition, thickness and corrosion resistance of SJDM-1 rare earth magnesium alloys in different solution are tested. Meanwhile combining the micro-oxidation solution and electrical parameters that are optimized, the difference of corrosion resistance between the hydration seals hole and solvent seals hole are compared after micro-oxidation. In addition, corrosion resistance of MAO ceramic layers between the two different materials RE magnesium alloys (casting SJDM-1, deformation SJDM-2)under the same conditions. Finally, micro-oxidation solution failure and the process of the ceramic layer corrosion are analysed. Mechanism of the discharge breakdown that influence the corrosion resistance of the micro-oxidation ceramic coating is explored, come to the internal and external factors that affect corrosion resistance of the micro-oxidation ceramic layer.


A thirteen-year-old female German Spitz dog was referred to Veterinary Hospital of the Universidade Estadual de Londrina, with acute paraplegia and pain in pelvic limbs for two days. The clinical sings, as lack of femoral pulse and cold distal limbs, were consistent with ischemic neuromyopathy due to aortic thromboembolism. Soon after the examination, she had a severe epistaxis and died. On postmortem examination it was observed a thrombus adhered to the aorta trifurcation and a mass occupying the position of the right adrenal gland, which was diagnosed as pheochromocytoma on histological and immunohistochemistry examinations.


Rationale: cAMP and cGMP are intracellular second messengers involved in heart pathophysiology. cGMP can potentially affect cAMP signals via cGMP-regulated phosphodiesterases (PDEs). Objective: To study the effect of cGMP signals on the local cAMP response to catecholamines in specific subcellular compartments. Methods and Results: We used real-time FRET imaging of living rat ventriculocytes expressing targeted cAMP and cGMP biosensors to detect cyclic nucleotides levels in specific locales. We found that the compartmentalized, but not the global, cAMP response to isoproterenol is profoundly affected by cGMP signals. The effect of cGMP is to increase cAMP levels in the compartment where the protein kinase (PK)A-RI isoforms reside but to decrease cAMP in the compartment where the PKA-RII isoforms reside. These opposing effects are determined by the cGMP-regulated PDEs, namely PDE2 and PDE3, with the local activity of these PDEs being critically important. The cGMP-mediated modulation of cAMP also affects the phosphorylation of PKA targets and myocyte contractility. Conclusions: cGMP signals exert opposing effects on local cAMP levels via different PDEs the activity of which is exerted in spatially distinct subcellular domains. Inhibition of PDE2 selectively abolishes the negative effects of cGMP on cAMP and may have therapeutic potential.


The demand for systems using artificial intelligence has substantially boosted in recent times, especially with Machine Learning (ML) techniques. Systems that use ML supervision techniques need representative and correctly categorized data to ensure its quality. In this context, a data labeling step plays a fundamental role during the development of such systems. The labeling is performed by users specialized in the data domain and aims to generate a database to enable a supervised ML model. However, labeling is exhausting for users, which can compromise the quality of the ML system, especially if the labeling is being done on systems that were not designed to assist the user in this activity. On the one hand, it can be difficult for a software engineer to design these kinds of systems. Depending on the type of data to be labeled, the interface needs different graphics and strategies to present and request user feedback. Aiming to help software engineers develop these kinds of systems, this work proposes the LabelUX guidelines. These guidelines aim to support software engineers in designing data labeling systems, defining a design with quality that provides a better user experience during the labeling task. We developed these guidelines from studies carried out in the literature and industry. We selected software engineers working on ML projects to participate in a feasibility study to evaluate the use of guidelines. The qualitative results obtained through the interview improved that the LabelUX guidelines supported a better design of textual type data labeling systems.


Analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) are key design blocks and are currently adopted in many application fields to improve digital systems, which achieve superior performances with respect to analog solutions. With the fast advancement of CMOS fabrication technology, more and more signal-processing functions are implemented in the digital domain for a lower cost, lower power consumption, higher yield, and higher re-configurability. Wide spread usage confers great importance to the design activities, which nowadays largely contributes to the production cost in integrated circuit devices (ICs). This has recently generated a great demand for low-power, low-voltage ADCs that can be realized in a mainstream deep-submicron CMOS technology. Various examples of ADC applications can be found in data acquisition systems, measurement systems and digital communication systems also imaging, instrumentation systems. Hence, we have to considered all the parameters and improving the associated performance may significantly reduce the industrial cost of an ADC manufacturing process and improved the resolution and design specially power consumption . This paper presents a 4 bit Pipeline ADC with low power dissipation implemented in <0.18μm CMOS technology with a power supply of 1.2V


We prove the existence and uniqueness of solutions to the time-dependent
 incompressible Navier-Stokes equations with a free-boundary governed by surface tension.
 The solution is found using a topological fixed-point theorem for a nonlinear iteration
 scheme, requiring at each step, the solution of a model linear problem consisting of the
 time-dependent Stokes equation with linearized mean-curvature forcing on the boundary. We
 use energy methods to establish new types of spacetime inequalities that allow us to find a
 unique weak solution to this problem. We then prove regularity of the weak solution, and
 establish the a priori estimates required by the nonlinear iteration process.


Have you heard of the ITEP/TOEIC/TSE/BULLATS/TOEFL/CELTA/DELTA exams? Among many others, these exams are currently being promoted not only by educative institutions, but by a large number of local governments and even international relationship instances (Bunce, 2016). On this regard, it is imperative to wonder and analyze how the idea of taking language exams became into fashion and at what moment in history it became into a necessity, a requirement, or as synonym of social and academic status. On such basis this study aims at determining how the implementation of English international tests have contributed in the spread of English globally.
The spread of the English language globally has occurred because of different factors. Clyne (2008) regards the demographic aspect as an important element for the growth and rapid evolution of this language. The effect of the use of the English language has reached almost all the areas of human domain such as the educational. The spread in this area has determined the future of many countries.
On the field of education, a standardized visible system is clearly set. Most of the books and material used to teach English are based on the Common European Framework. This framework stablishes the standardization of teaching contents and methodologies which are later used and applied into exams to evaluate students´ English language proficiency around the world.
CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) programs have been implemented in schools in many countries of the world like Asia, Australia and Europe. "In recent years, LAC and CLIL are gaining intense attention particularly in context where English is learnt as a foreign language or as an international language" (Lin, 2016, p.1). Lin regards this implementation to the desire of countries like the Asian for becoming modern and take part in the development of a global economy.
When comparing English with other languages it can be said that it is the pioneer in standardizing a language. According to Mulcaster (as cited by Crystal, 2003, p. 73) the English language had no competence internationally. If we take a look at other languages trying to do the same, it can be seen that they have not become as successful as English.   It does not matter if those systems are better, they simply have not been able to reach that level of internationalization. The important fact here is that those countries in these case languages do not have the economic, political power, and the influence that The United States has.
According to Sharifian (2010, p.192) the English language dominance originated along the colonialism period. Phillipson (as cited in Sharifian, 2010) explains that "many elites in society have strong links with the inner circle because they have been educated in inner circle countries". The inner circle is referred to countries where the English language is spoken as a mother tongue.
To conclude, this essay presents an analysis of the way standardized exams have contributed widely to the internationalization of English around the world. This standardized examination system has influenced in many aspects like education, negotiation, culture, ideology and public policy.  It will present an overview about every aspect mentioned as well as the causes and effects of these factors which have influence in a positive and negative way in society. Besides, there will be presented examples in a general way about percentages of people who have taken standardized exams and how it has contributed to the expansion of English around the world.


. With the rapid development of scientific technology, the current skills and knowledge has become more and more important. Engineering technical personnel need long-life learning to improve them for competitiveness. Therefore, long-life learning should be enhanced in engineering education. This paper explains the meaning of long-life learning, analyzes the reasons long-life learning being enhanced in engineering education, the influence on engineering education and engineering technical. Some suggestions about enhancing long-life learning in engineering education and keeping good habits of long-life learning are also put forward.


N-finder algorithm (N-FINDR) has been widely used for endmember extraction in hyperspectral imagery. Due to its high computational complexity, developing fast computing N-FINDR has received considerable interest, specifically to take advantage of field-programmable gate array (FPGA) architecture in hardware implementation to realize N-FINDR. However, there are two severe drawbacks arising in the nature of N-FINDR design, the number of endmembers, p, which must be fixed once its value is determined in FPGA design and inconsistency in final extracted endmembers caused by different selections of initial endmembers. This paper investigates a progressive version of N-FINDR, previously known as simplex growing algorithm for its FPGA implementation which can resolve these two issues.


This technical note uses a system theoretic approach to show that classical linear time invariant controllers cannot generate steady state entanglement in a bipartite Gaussian quantum system which is initialized in a Gaussian state. The technical note also shows that the use of classical linear controllers cannot generate entanglement in a finite time from a bipartite system initialized in a separable Gaussian state. The approach reveals connections between system theoretic concepts and the well known physical principle that local operations and classical communications cannot generate entangled states starting from separable states.


In recent years, thinking among public administrators and civic leaders has shifted from reliance on hierarchy and control in policymaking to a desire for collaboration and empowerment. With this shift have come new calls from civic reformers and public-minded officials for public participation in governance. This emphasis on participation by members of the public has necessitated the creation of novel venues for citizens and officeholders to meet. But do both lay and professional participants have the communicative attitudes and aptitudes conducive to effective collaboration in these new public meetings? In order to answer this question, we need first to take a look at public meetings in general. Here we develop a framework for examining the connections between key elements of such meetings, including goals, communication strategies, and task and relational outcomes. This essay, the first in a two-part series, provides a conceptual grounding that will facilitate the development of a typology of public meetings.


In the Watchman Route Problem (WRP), the task is to find a path for a watchman agent such that all locations in the given map will be visually seen by the watchman at least once during the path traversal. Recently, the problem has been optimally solved on a grid map using heuristic search. In this paper, we extend this work to the case of multiple agents. We call this problem the Multiple Watchman Route Problem (MWRP). In MWRP, the task is to find a path for each watchman such that each location on the map will be seen by at least one watchman. We optimally solve MWRP with heuristic search for two different objective functions with a number of A*-based variants, including an enhanced branching mechanism. We then provide an experimental study on these methods and on other attributes of this problem.


BACKGROUND
It has been conformed that active smoking is an established risk factor for pancreatic cancer, but the role of environmental tobacco smok (passive smoking) in pancreatic cancer remains unclear. We intended to study the relationship between passive smoking and pancreatic cancer.

METHODS
From Oct. 1991 to Sep. 2014, A hospital-based case-control study on pancreatic cancer was conducted from the inpatient of five hospitals. 1076 cases pancreatic cancer patients. History of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke was assessed through questionnaires. Relative risks (RR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were estimated using Cox proportional hazards models.

RESULTS
During 23 years of follow-up (1991-2014), 1076 patients were diagnosed with pancreatic cancer (686 men and 390 women). Compared to paternal smoking (RR, 0.97; 95% CI, 0.77-1.21; P = 0.084), maternal smoking significantly increased the risk of pancreatic cancer (R, 1.56; 95% CI, 1.13-1.98; P = 0.018). Although the risk associated with maternal smoking remained elevated compared to the never smokers (RR, 1.49; 95% CI, 1.07-2.27), there was no statistical significance.

CONCLUSIONS
The positive association with maternal smoking suggests that environmental tobacco smoke, potentially in utero or in early life, may be associated with pancreatic cancer.


Military occupation affects educational space and places, transforming them into politicized, sexed, gendered, and racialized ones. The uncontrolled political violence in conflict zones causes psychological trauma, internal displacement and economic stagnation, and intersect to shape the gendered nature of education. This article is based on data collected from young Palestinian women in the Occupied Palestinian Territories between 2004–2007. Its theoretical background departs from the perspective that women's education in conflict zones is simultaneously a site of empowerment, resistance, and victimization. As such, the article demonstrates that the personal is political, and highlights how education can be both a source of consciousness‐raising and a powerful mobilizing force for young women while simultaneously being oppressive in nature. The results show that the covert and overt acts of political violence against Palestinians has transformed Palestinian gender relations in complex, contradictory, and diverse ways while both militarizing and violating their right to education. In addition, the article argues that the study of gender and education requires close attention to women's words and acts in order to identify revolutionary modes of resistance that are capable of promoting social justice. It concludes by arguing that the daily terror facing young women on their way to school, the systematic denial of school permits, and other actions that interfere with their right to obtain an education not only necessitates the re‐conceptualization of education conceived as a neutral zone and separated from the politics of the state, but also requires a close scrutiny of the gendered nature of education under siege.


This paper attempts to give a general overview of the Universal Basic Education (UBE) Scheme in Nigeria. It ranges from the purpose of its establishment, its objective, the framework for its operation, its implementation so far and the challenges the scheme is currently facing. The paper suggests the way forward for the Universal Basic Education Scheme in Nigeria. This was followed lastly by critiquing based on personal conviction of the writer as to the UBE scheme in Nigeria.


From 1849 to 1851, Canada's first international literary celebrity, the Mississauga writer Kahgegagahbowh, or George Copway, travelled the United States, Great Britain and Europe promoting his vision for the future of Indigenous peoples in the United States. Building on a theological critique of settler colonialism, he called for the creation of a new Indigenous territory west of the Mississippi led by a legislature made up of English-speaking Indigenous Christians. Copway believed that through the establishment of this territory he called Kahgega, European settlers would be able to atone for the sins committed against Indigenous North Americans, thus escaping the impending wrath of God. More importantly, believing that Indigenous peoples faced imminent extinction, he saw Kahgega as a permanent means of preserving his people and safeguarding their shrinking lands and political agency. Though Kahgega failed to impress the public, Copway's vision offers a fascinating window into an early attempt at reconciling the Indigenous and non-Indigenous halves of North American society. Using the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada's definition of 'reconciliation', this article shows that past, often failed, Indigenous political visions reveal the complexities and tensions inherent in dialogue surrounding reconciliation.


Mineral liberation is one of the key parameters driving the effectiveness of valuable material extraction. On-line analysis of the liberation is a challenging task requiring the characterisation of mineral particles at the micrometer level. A reliable on-line measurement of mineral liberation is yet to be successfully resolved. A device capable of measuring mineral liberation on-line would be a world's first. Recently, semiconductor pixel detectors, originally designed for applications in high energy physics, have become available for other scientific, medical and industrial applications. These detectors offer exceptionally good spatial resolution, single particle counting, unlimited dynamic range and other advantages. Their properties are opening up the possibility to apply them to on-line mineral liberation measurement. This work used the Medipix2 detector to measure the X-ray fluorescent energy of samples to determine elements present and by analysing the spectra in each pixel, spatial information of the elements in the sample are also obtained. One of the major drawbacks using a pixel detector in this manner is the issue of charge sharing and a unique method to compensate for this problem is also presented. The results of this work are extremely promising with both simple and complicated samples returning identification of minerals down to the 110x110 μm size.


An industrial Ethernet based motion control system is presented in the paper. The first slave node in the line topology is responsible for the precise cyclic communication, and it will reduce the real-time requirement on the main controller. The communication protocol is implemented as Windows NDIS protocol driver, and provides higher priority than normal user mode application. In addition, the development environment and process are also discussed, through which the developer can debug the system software at a single computer in both simulated mode and real mode.


Abstract Positioning solutions need to be more precise and available. The most frequent method used nowadays includes a GPS receiver, sometimes supported by other sensors. Generally, GPS and GNSS suffer from spreading perturbations that produce biases on pseudo-range measurements. With a view to optimize the use of the satellites received, we offer a positioning algorithm with pseudo range error modelling with the contribution of an appropriate filtering process. Extended Kalman Filter, The Rao- Blackwellized filter are among the most widely used algorithms to predict errors and to filter the high frequency noise. This paper describes a new method of estimating the pseudo-range errors based on the PSO-RBF model which achieves an optimal training criterion. This model is appropriate of its method to predict the GPS corrections for accurate positioning, it reduce the positioning errors at high velocities by more than 50% compared to the RLS or EKF methods.


Abstract Typically not assisted by proofreading, the RNA-dependent RNA polymerases (RdRPs) encoded by the RNA viruses may need to independently control its fidelity to fulfill virus viability and fitness. However, the precise mechanism by which the RdRP maintains its optimal fidelity level remains largely elusive. By solving 2.1–2.5 Å resolution crystal structures of the classical swine fever virus (CSFV) NS5B, an RdRP with a unique naturally fused N-terminal domain (NTD), we identified high-resolution intra-molecular interactions between the NTD and the RdRP palm domain. In order to dissect possible regulatory functions of NTD, we designed mutations at residues Y471 and E472 to perturb key interactions at the NTD–RdRP interface. When crystallized, some of these NS5B interface mutants maintained the interface, while the others adopted an 'open' conformation that no longer retained the intra-molecular interactions. Data from multiple in vitro RdRP assays indicated that the perturbation of the NTD–RdRP interactions clearly reduced the fidelity level of the RNA synthesis, while the processivity of the NS5B elongation complex was not affected. Collectively, our work demonstrates an explicit and unique mode of polymerase fidelity modulation and provides a vivid example of co-evolution in multi-domain enzymes.


Background The urgent and emergency care review advocates new models of care to provide safer, faster and better care. Available evidence highlights scope for improvement in the delivery of care for patients calling 999 with mental health problems. The purpose of this abstract is to describe an ongoing initiative in Yorkshire Ambulance Service utilising specialist triage by mental health nurses in the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) since December 2014. Methods An exploratory mixed methods evaluation was conducted. Interviews (n=12) with key stakeholders in the ambulance service were conducted to explore their experiences of service provision for patients with mental health problems and the impact of introducing Mental Health Nurse triage in the EOC. Interview data was coded and thematically analysed to identify key issues around service delivery for patients with mental health problems. Routine data from ambulance service computer aided dispatch was used to examine impact on patient care and resource allocation. Results Initial findings indicate that access to mental health nurses in the EOC reduced the ambulance response rate by clinically triaging calls for patients with mental health problems and only sending a resource where appropriate. Staff interviews revealed the developmental process and challenges involved in implementing the mental health triage initiative, for example, recruitment, training and governance. Staff perceptions of the initial positive impact of the mental health nurses include the delivery of more appropriate patient care and reduced anxiety for staff managing calls that now have access to specialist support. Conclusions Despite the relatively short time period since the inception of this initiative, the preliminary findings from this pilot evaluation suggest a positive impact on service delivery from a patient and organisational perspective. Lessons learned from the implementation of this initiative and its progression are potentially informative for other Ambulance Service Trusts considering adopting a similar approach.


Experiments were performed in rats to test the hypothesis that adrenal mRNA levels of tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) and the norepinephrine transporter (NET) would be modified by water deprivation via activation of the sympathetic nervous system. TH and NET mRNA levels were measured using the ribonuclease protection assay. Adrenal TH mRNA was higher (P < 0.001) in water-deprived (921 +/- 39 fg/microgram total RNA) compared with the water-replete rats (657 +/- 45 fg/microgram total RNA). In contrast, water deprivation decreased (P < 0.01) adrenal NET mRNA levels (275 +/- 66 vs. 433 +/- 63 fg/microgram total RNA). The dehydration-induced increase in TH mRNA was prevented by prior splanchnicectomy, but the decrease in NET mRNA was produced even in the absence of adrenal nerves. Water deprivation also increased (P < 0.05) plasma adrenocorticotropic hormone (84 +/- 16 vs. 42 +/- 14 pg/ml) and corticosterone (358 +/- 87 vs. 44 +/- 15 ng/ml) levels. Interestingly, the corticosterone response was reduced (P < 0.05) by unilateral adrenal denervation. These results suggest that water deprivation increases both adrenal medullary and adrenocortical activity at least in part by stimulation of sympathetic nerve activity.


The induced mutagenesis method for deriving pigment mutants of a green microalga, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii CC-124 and their pigment composition as well as ability to assess mutability of contaminated aquatic ecosystems were studied. In the present study, 14086 mutants (colonies) were obtained by exposure of the wild strain, C. reinhardtii CC-124 , to 1, 2, 3, 5 min of ultraviolet (UV) irradiation. After screening, these mutants (colonies) revealed four pigmented mutants ( 124y-1, 124p-1, 124y-2 and 124p-2 ). Compared to the wild CC-124 , these mutants are characterized by a decrease in chlorophyll a & b content and an increase in carotenoids. The lowest decrease in chlorophyll a was 3 to 4 folds, while the highest increase in carotenoids was 2 to 4 folds. The result of bio-test, using the resulting pigment mutant of C. reinhardtii 124y-1 showed that mutagenic activity was observed significantly in both Tekeli River and Pavlodar Oil Refinery in Kazakhstan; the waste water of the Pavlodar Oil Refinery had hightoxicity while the water of the Tekeli River had medium-toxicity. Keywords: Ultraviolet (UV) mutagenesis, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, biotesting African Journal of Biotechnology , Vol. 13(2), pp. 274-279, 8 January, 2014


In our increasingly connected world, computation is everywhere and we are generating ever more data about everything. These trends will profoundly change the ways in which we work with computers. Specifically, we need the machines to be smarter and more helpful. Central to this vision is the means by which we can forge effective partnerships with such artificial intelligence (AI) systems. Until now, humans have generally been the masters and technology the slave. This needs to change. Today's AI systems can act on high-level human commands and achieve complex goals in a flexible manner. But, while such systems are good at solving narrowly defined tasks, they don't know how to collaborate with humans or how to operate as part of a problem-solving team. This talk will explore how humans and AI systems can work together. In such partnerships, the humans and the AI systems complement each other's strengths and weaknesses, leading to a rise in the humans, as well as in the machines. Drawing on multi-disciplinary work in the areas of AI, autonomous systems, machine learning, crowd sourcing and ubiquitous computing, this talk explores the scientific underpinning of such systems, the applications they have been applied to, and the societal implications of their widespread adoption.


Autogenous breast reconstruction is frequently carried out with abdominal tissue, since a better and lasting aesthetic result is obtained, providing a new breast that is very similar in texture, consistency and ptosis to the contralateral breast. The main problem presented by this type of reconstruction is the sequel at the level of the donor abdominal area. Perforator flaps are being developed as the main resource for solving this problem, as they hardly damage the muscle and its fascia. The DIEP flap (deep inferior epigastric perforator) has proved itself to be an alternative for reconstruction for many women, with low rates of local complications, due to the absence of any sacrifice of the abdominis rectus muscle, and a significant level of satisfaction with the result obtained. One drawback is its greater technical difficulty and the need for a surgical team that is expert in vascular microsurgery. However, the DIEP flap is a surgical technique for which there is growing demand.


ABSTRACT AbstractThe engineering purpose of a site-specific response analysis is to estimate the uniform hazard acceleration spectrum on the ground surface for a selected hazard level. One of the mandatory components for site response analyses is one or more representative acceleration time histories that need to be scaled with respect to the calculated seismic hazard level for the selected site. The selection and scaling procedures of earthquake acceleration records play an important role in this approach. The effects and differences in using two different scaling approaches are studied: scaling with respect to ground motion parameters and response spectrum scaling. A set of homogeneous ground motion prediction relationships are developed for peak ground acceleration, peak ground velocity, root-mean-square acceleration, Arias intensity, cumulative absolute velocity, maximum spectral acceleration, response spectrum intensity, and acceleration spectrum intensity based on a uniform set of acceleration records for ground motion parameter scaling. The uncertainties associated with site response analysis are considered as epistemic and aleatory uncertainties in source characteristics, soil profile, and soil properties. Aleatory variability is due to the intrinsic randomness of natural systems; it cannot be reduced with additional data (Passeri et al. 2020), however; its variability may be modeled by probability distribution functions. Thus, one possibility is to determine the probability distribution of the acceleration spectrum calculated on the ground surface for all possible input acceleration records, site profiles, and dynamic soil properties. The variability in the earthquake source and path effects are considered using a large number of acceleration records compatible with the site-dependent earthquake hazard in terms of fault mechanism, magnitude, and distance range recorded on stiff site conditions. Likewise, a large number of soil profiles may be considered to account for the site condition variability. The uncertainties related to dynamic soil properties may be considered as possible variability of maximum dynamic shear modulus in site response analyses. A methodology is proposed to estimate a uniform hazard acceleration spectrum on the ground surface based on the probabilistic assessment of the factors involved in site response analysis. The uniform hazard acceleration spectra obtained from a case study are compared with the spectra calculated by probabilistic models proposed in the literature.


ABSTRACT Li, J.; Lu, J.; Wang, J.; Wang, Y.; Lai, J., and Yu, K., 2021. Do diploid and haploid solitary cells of Phaeocystis globosa support the same copepod grazing, survival, egg production, and hatching success? Journal of Coastal Research, 37(1), 113–121. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. The food quality of phytoplankton affects the reproductive success of predators. Phaeocystis globosa blooms have negative effects on marine environments. However, the quality of P. globosa cells for predators is still under debate. The hypothesis that the nutritional value of diploid and haploid solitary cells would be different for the calanoid copepod predator Parvocalanus crassirostris was tested. The fatty acid compositions of diploid and haploid solitary cells and the effects of these cells on copepod grazing, survival, egg production, and hatching success were evaluated. In contrast to haploid solitary cells, diploid solitary cells did not contain C20:5ω3 (EPA) and C22:6ω3 (DHA) and were deficient in polyunsaturated fatty acids. Parvocalanus crassirostris individuals ingested more diploid than haploid cells. Egg hatching success was similar between the diets with diploid and haploid cells. Copepod survival and egg production were strongly inhibited by feeding on diploid cells. In contrast, they were high when copepods fed on haploid cells, reaching levels as high as those observed when the copepods fed on optimal diets of Isochrysis galbana and the diatom Thalassiosira weissflogii. The results suggest that diploid solitary cells of P. globosa are a poor food, whereas haploid solitary cells of this species are a nutrient-rich food for copepods.


This research aim to know nitrogen fertilizer dose influence and goat manure to growth and result of corn crop ( Zea Mays L) variety Pioneer. Writing of this skripsi based on research from date of 23 Februari 2008 until date of 7 June 2008 in countryside Kedokan Sayang, subdistrict Tarub, district Tegal with place height ± 25 m dpl. Grey alluvial soil type of stripper. Research method applied is factorial method with Rancangan Acak Kelompok Lengkap (RAKL), consisted of two medium treatment factors of treatment firstly composes kinds of second nitrogen fertilizer dose and treatment is goat manure . As for its(the factor is as follows : First factor of nitrogen fertilizer dose, consisted of 4 level : N0 : Fertilizer dose Urea ( Nitrogen) = 0 kg/ha, N1 : Urea fertilizer dose ( Nitrogen) : 200 kg/ha, N2 : Urea fertilizer dose ( Nitrogen) : 300 kg/ha. N3 : Urea fertilizer dose ( Nitrogen) : 400 kg/ha. Second factor of goat manure dose consisted of 3 level K1: goat manure : 10 ton/ha, K2 : goat manure : 15 ton/ha, K3 : goat manure : 20 ton/ha thereby is got 12 combinations to treat. Result of this research nitrogen fertilizer influential very differing in reality to plant height, wet weight overall of crop, drought weight overall of crop, number of seeds per cob, weight pipilan drought per crop, weight pipilan drought per check and heavy 100 seeds. Only line amounts per cob having an effect on differs in reality. Weight pipilan per highest check reached at combination of fertilizer dose N2 : 300 kg/ha with goat manure dose 15 ton/ha that is ( 9329,2 ton/ha). result of this research as according to Hipotesis that is with best result of N2K2.


Aflatoxins are polyketide-derived, toxic and carcinogenic secondary metabolites produced by some species of Aspergillus and other fungi on food crops and feed. Aflatoxin B1 is classified as the most toxic of the aflatoxins, responsible for not only great economic loss but is also the most potent naturally occurring chemical liver carcinogen known. Random samples of groundnut, maize, beans and rice were collected from the Kumasi Central Market and analyzed for their aflatoxin levels using High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). Furthermore, molecular assessment of aflatoxin-producing fungi in the grain samples involving five pairs of universal and eight specific aflatoxin primers were carried out. The contamination levels found ranged from trace amount to 31.11 ppb, with groundnut registering the highest aflatoxin content. A further microbial culture examination revealed that most of the crop samples, especially groundnut and maize were susceptible to various species of aflatoxigenic, A. flavus, A. paraciticus, A. tamarii, P. expansum, Mucor hiemalis, A. niger, P. citrinum, Moniliellaspp. and other toxigenic fungi. Colony forming units per gram (CFU/g) from the microbial cultures ranged from 4.3×10 6 to 2.1×10 3 . However, a poor correlation existed between the aflatoxin contamination level and the CFU/g per sample. A consistent correlation could not be made between the molecular analysis and microbial results. Just as in A. versicolor, four universal primers, 0817F/1196R, U1/U2, FF2/FR1 and ITS1/IST2, and one specific aflatoxin producing fungi primer, Nor1/Nor2, was able to show positive bands on A. versicolor. These suggest that particular fungi have the gene to produce aflatoxin; however, it could not produce detectable aflatoxin by the HPLC. The results showed the aflatoxin levels were within acceptable limit for consumption and exportation (0-20 ppb) by Codex.


The case study on strong temperature inversion event in Armenia has been presented in this paper using observed temperatures and simulations from both global (ERA-Interim) and regional high-resolution (WRF) models. According to the observations the December of 2013 was ranked as the second coldest since 1961. Monthly mean temperature anomaly for entire Armenia consisted of -4.4 °C in December, while that for inversion affected basins such as Ararat valley was -9-7 °C. The persistent temperature inversion in Ararat valley lasted more than two weeks resulted in unprecedented cold wave events. The ability of the global ERA-Interim and regional WRF models to simulate this dramatic temperature event in Armenia has been examined. The results show that high resolution WRF model has a clear advantage over ERA-Interim model in representation of spatial temperature pattern in Armenia. The small-scale variations of temperature and surface inversion basins are simulated by WRF model while ERA-Interim model provides very coarse results underestimating the spatial variability and influence of topography. However, it should be noted that there are significant uncertainties and errors in WRF temperature forecasts. Significant RMSE values and negative correlation coefficients obtained for the area covering inversion basin indicate that WRF model fails to capture the temporal variability of temperature during the inversion event. It is worth noting the significant positive bias for daytime WRF temperatures during the strongest phase of the inversion.


As consumer Internet of Things (IoT) devices become increasingly pervasive in our society, there is a need to understand the underpinning security risks. Therefore, in this article, we describe the common attacks faced by consumer IoT devices and suggest potential mitigation strategies. We hope that the findings presented in this article will inform the future design of IoT devices.


This paper describes the balance sheet adjustments of debt and equity financed firms over the business cycle. A model is developed that describes a representative firm with a stochastic diminishing returns technology and a set of financial contracts that resolves a conflict of interest problem between differentially risk-averse bondholders and stockholders. The contractual resolution of this conflict of interest problem is shown to shape certain stylized facts of business cycles ignored in Keynesian and Classical models. Changes in the market value of equities trigger investment decisions and can cause business cycles. Bond covenants then have the firm adjusting its financing decisions so as to offset any risk-shifting associated with the investment decisions. Stockholders manage the asset side of the firm's balance sheet while bondholders (regulators in the case of banks) manage the financing side. In this way the welfare of both investors is coalesced over the business cycle. Evidence presented here and elsewhere fails to reject these predictions for the U.S. non-financial and financial corporate sectors.


†The hyperglycaemic state seen in diabetes mellitus i s associated with the development of diabetes-specific microvascular complications and accelerated macrovascular disease. Evidence implicates the fo rmation and subsequent effects of advanced glycation endproducts (AGEs) as a contributing cause. AGEs exert their effects through interaction with the Rece ptor for AGE (RAGE) which upregulates expression of the receptor and induces a cascade of cytotoxic pat hways. Accumulation of AGE/RAGE can be seen at sites of vascular disease in both animal models of diabetes and human diabetic subjects. Blockade of RAGE in animal models of diabetes suppresses development of dysfunction in the vasculature and atherosclerosis development. Genetic studies of RAGE reveal that a number of allelic variants of RAGE occur in key protein and regulatory domains. A Gly to Ser change at position 82 and two 5 ′ ′ flanking polymorphisms at position –374 and –429 lead to altered function and expression of RAGE which may impact on diabetic vascular disease development. Therapy aimed to block RAGE upregulation may prove to be useful in treating individuals with diabetic vascular disease.


This paper presents a droplet-ejection-based technique for synthesizing deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequences on different substrates, such as glass, plastic, or silicon. Any DNA sequence can be synthesized by ejecting droplets of DNA bases by a self-focusing acoustic transducer (SFAT) that does not require any nozzles. An SFAT can eject liquid droplets around 3-5 /spl mu/m in diameter, which is significantly smaller than those ejected by commercial ink jet printers and reduces the amount of reagents needed for the synthesis. An array of SFATs is integrated with microchannels and reservoirs for delivery of DNA bases to the SFATs. Poly-l-lysine-coated glass slide is patterned, and is used as a target substrate for in situ synthesis of multiple T bases. The significant advantage of this scheme over some of the existing commercial solutions is that it can allow geneticists to synthesize any DNA sequence within hours using a computer program at an affordable cost in their own labs. This paper describes the concept and scheme of the on-demand DNA synthesis (with an acoustic ejector integrated with microfluidic components) along with the results of an actual DNA synthesis by an SFAT. Note to Practitioners-Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) microarrays allow geneticists to monitor the interactions among thousands of genes simultaneously in a chip. There are commercial systems for producing DNA microarrays, but none of them give flexibility to synthesize DNA microarrays on-demand in the geneticist's own lab. Affymetrix's GeneChip technology produces DNA probe sequences premade at Affymetrix with a set of 4n photomasks for n-mers. Other techniques transfer premade DNA sequences to a substrate (glass, plastic, or silicon) through ink-jet printing or contact dispensing. Agilent and Rosetta use their ink-jet printing technology to produce DNA probe sequences at their factories. The ink-jet print heads used for printing microarrays use either piezoelectric or thermal actuation, and eject liquid droplets through nozzles. Thus, the smallest droplet size ejected from these devices depends on the size of the nozzle. The small nozzles are difficult to construct with good uniformity and tend to get clogged. The idea presented in this paper is to develop a microelectromechanical-system (MEMS)-based portable system for synthesizing DNA on different substrates, using nozzleless, heatless, lensless, acoustic droplet ejectors. The future research is to synthesize longer DNA sequences with a combination of different bases, using directional droplet ejectors.


Introduction Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is well recognised to be a multi system inflammatory condition with systemic manifestations, including co morbidities such as diabetes, ischaemic heart disease and osteoporosis. Patients with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency (A1ATD) have a similar spectrum of lung disease and increased levels inflammation and recognised associations with vasculitis and panniculitis. Our aim was to characterise the co morbidities of the UK cohort of patients with A1ATD. Methods A retrospective review of the notes of patients with the ZZ phenotype was undertaken for patients who attended the Alpha-1-Antitrypsin Deficiency Assessment and Programme for Treatment (ADAPT) Project in Birmingham, between the years 2001 and 2011. Results 764 sets of notes were reviewed. Of the patients included, 75 had died. The most common known co morbidity encountered was hypertension (94 patients, 12.3%), followed by depression (34 patients 4.5%) and osteoporosis (40 patients 5.2%). Interestingly, 10 patients in the cohort had been diagnosed with ulcerative colitis (UC), 4 had proven factor V Leiden deficiency and 25 were hypothyroid. Conclusion Depression and osteoporosis are recognised co morbidities in usual COPD, and are among the most common findings in the A1ATD patients, together with hypertension. The figures are lower than reported in usual COPD. There were more patients than expected who had Factor V Leiden deficiency (56 in 12 000 vs 10 in 12 000 of the UK adult population) and 11 potential patients on long-term anticoagulation in whom it was no longer possible to measure factor V Leiden. UC has a prevalence of 3–9 cases per 10 000 in the UK but our figures suggest 130 per 10 000. Finally, thyroid disease is usually more common in women, affecting 15 in 1000 in the UK. In our patient group, the incidence is double (32 in 1000). Overall, the incidence of several inflammatory/autoimmune diseases was higher than predicted for the UK population and a potential link to a coagulopathy was identified.


BACKGROUND
Transmission of malaria in an area of hypoendemicity in the highlands of western Kenya is not expected to lead to rapid acquisition of immunity to malaria. However, the subpopulation of individuals with asymptomatic Plasmodium falciparum infection may play a significant role as an infection reservoir and should be considered in malaria-control programs. Determination of the spatiotemporal dynamics of asymptomatic subpopulations provides an opportunity to estimate the epidemiological importance of this group to malaria transmission.

METHODS
Monthly parasitological surveys were undertaken for a cohort of 246 schoolchildren over 12 months. The prevalence of P. falciparum infection among 2,611 blood samples was analyzed by both microscopy and polymerase chain reaction, and infection durations were determined.

RESULTS
Infection prevalence and duration (range, 1-12 months) decreased with age and altitude. The prevalence was high among pooled blood samples recovered from children aged 5-9 years (34.4%) and from those aged 10-14 years (34.1%) but was significantly lower among blood samples obtained from older children (9.1%). The prevalence decreased from 52.4% among pooled blood samples from children living at an altitude of approximately 1,430 m to 23.3% among pooled samples from children living at an altitude of 1,580 m.

CONCLUSIONS
The prevalence of asymptomatic P. falciparum infection was high, with polymerase chain reaction analysis detecting a significantly greater number of infections, compared with microscopy. Our results are consistent with gradual acquisition of immunity with increasing age upon repeated infection, and they also show that the risk of malaria transmission is highly heterogeneous in the highland area. The results provide strong support for targeted malaria-control interventions.


Though several approaches have already been proposed in the literature to evolve neural network topologies for solving a wide range of machine learning tasks, this paper presents an alternative one, capable of evolving arbitrarily connected feed forward neural networks (ACFNNs), including linear and nonlinear neurons. A genetic algorithm is conceived to adjust the topology and also to perform variable selection. The weights of the obtained neural networks, with arbitrary topologies, are adjusted using a simple descent gradient algorithm. The purpose is to obtain high-quality and parsimonious predictors for two real-world and one synthetic time series. The obtained results are compared with the ones produced by traditional MLP models and Mixtures of Heterogeneous Experts (MHEs).


In 1999, we continue to be faced with difficulties in treating prostate cancer, which remains the leading cause of cancer and the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths in men. In the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) era, we must also determine which therapies, if any, are appropriate for the treatment of a biochemical or PSA relapse. In view of the limited number of efficacious and durable treatments for prostate cancer recurrence, the medical community has had to investigate nontraditional therapies. In the recent past, an expanding body of evidence has implicated certain nutrients in carcinogenesis and cancer progression. This article discusses the role of diet in prostate carcinogenesis and the rationale for dietary manipulation as a treatment strategy for the prevention of primary and secondary (recurrent) prostate cancer.


Today Siemens Industrial Turbomachinery AB (SIT AB) installs operator-stations manually. This is a tedious and time consuming process. In this report several different approaches is researched and presented for an automated solution. Because automated installation is not a widely researched area, an exploration of different approaches and technical difficulties has been made to use as a base when finally arriving at a recommendation for SIT AB. The result of this report shows that an approach using the Windows Registry is the best solution for implementation of an automated solution, and that other approaches either is too time consuming or technically challenging to be feasible. This report is meant as a decision basis for SIT AB in their automation of operator-station installations.


Purpose

Environmental Management Accounting (EMA) information has become synonymous with win-win decision settings, but this paper aims to consider how EMA support can be extended to company managers who face the dynamics of win-wins and trade-offs.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on extant literature, the paper suggests an important extension of the use of EMA in support of management decision-making. The need for extended consideration and use of EMA to help overcome trade-offs is illustrated using the case of a wine bottling plant location decision by an Australian company in a global supply chain transporting wine from Australia to North America and Europe.

Findings

Results confirm the need to add to the broader use of EMA to assist managers attempting to solve real world trade-off problems between economic performance, carbon equivalent emissions reduction and water risk reduction.

Research limitations/implications

Generalisation of the single wine company case illustration to other companies and similar industry settings remains to be investigated.

Practical implications

Trade-offs are considered between economic benefit and two environmental performance matters of concern to the company, carbon equivalent emissions reduction and water risk reduction.

Originality/value

The paper introduces the notion of extending the use of EMA as a pragmatic way for managers to assess trade-off situations with environmental alternatives where no optimal solution is available. Value is added through the real case study of an Australian wine company.


The objective of this study was to prepare ibuprofen enteric-coated sustained-release pellets (IB-SRPs) and codeine phosphate immediate-release pellets (CP-IRPs) to play a synergistic role in analgesia. The pellets were developed by extrusion-spheronization and fluidized bed coating technology. The single-factor investigation was used to determine the optimal prescription and process. The sustained-release membrane of IB-SRPs was water-insoluble ethyl cellulose (EC), triethyl citrate (TEC) was used as plasticizer, and hydroxypropyl methylcellulose (HPMCP) was chose as porogen. Besides, the immediate-release layer of CP-IRPs was gastric-soluble coating film. The ibuprofen and codeine phosphate compound capsules (IB-CP SRCs) were prepared by IB-SRPs and CP-IRPs packed together in capsules with the optimum doses of 200 and 13 mg, respectively. The prepared pellets were evaluated by scanning electron microscopy and dissolution test. Pharmacokinetic studies in beagle dogs indicated that the optimized IB-CP SRCs had smaller individual differences and better reproducibility comparing with commercial available tablets. Additionally, IB-CP SRCs achieved consistency with in vivo and in vitro tests. Therefore, IB-CP SRCs could play a great role in rapid and long-term analgesic.


Most developing countries, like Nepal, are expected to experience the greatest impact of climate change (CC) sooner and on a greater magnitude than other developed countries. Increase in the magnitude and frequency of extreme rainfall events is likely to increase the risk of flooding in rivers. The West Rapti River basin is one of the most flood prone and also one of the most dynamic and economically important basins of Nepal. This study elicits the willingness to pay (WTP) from the local people in the basin to reduce risks from possible floods due to CC. The WTP for flood mitigation in different flood hazard zones and flood scenarios were determined using referendum method and a face to face questionnaire survey. From a total of 720 households across all flood zones, a stratified randomly selected sample of 210 households was surveyed. The sample included households from a range of socio-economic backgrounds. The average WTP varied by flood hazard zone and within each zone, by CC-induced flood scenarios. The average WTP of respondents was highest for the critical flood prone zone, followed by moderate and low flood prone zones. Similarly, within each zone, the average WTP increased with increasing flood magnitudes due to CC. The variation of average WTP of respondents in different flood prone zones and scenarios indicate different levels of perceived severity. Moreover, the introduction of the concept of 'man-day' or 'labour-day' in WTP research is a novel and applicable methodological approach, particularly in the South Asian region. The findings of this study are useful for policy implications for the design of participatory flood management plans in the river basin.


Recent studies provide theoretical models for kinetically limited isotope exchange during fluid flow; however, few have attempted to apply these models to natural systems. In this paper, we interpret stable isotopic data from fossil hydrothermal systems in two different tectonic settings by using combined equations of mass transport and kinetically limited isotope exchange. Our models provide alternative interpretations for the geometry of flow responsible for the development of 18 O depletion annuli surrounding epizonal intrusions and for the geometry of flow in shallow-level normal faults. Our models also provide information about relative isotope exchange rates and, by extension, mechanisms of isotope exchange. Our results indicate that dynamic recrystallization in fault zones promotes exchange by surface reaction, whereas exchange in chemically nonreactive and undeformed minerals may be limited by solid-state diffusion.


Many organizations understand the benefits of a longer-term approach to staffing: reduced turnover and hiring costs, improved efficiency and morale, and ultimately greater profits. Unfortunately, traditional approaches to staffing are often more effective on paper than in the workplace. Completely updated, this new edition of Strategic Staffing shows how to identify staffing needs and opportunities through qualitative and quantitative measures, and presents several effective, nontraditional approaches to their hiring needs. Featuring full case studies and dozens of examples, the book is both enlighti¾ ening and practical. And to help readers create their own staffing plans, the online forms offer a trove of invaluable tools, including: customizable Excel spread sheets assessment and evaluation forms * calculai¾ tions and analyses * sample staffing plans, Powerpoint slide presentations, and much more. This book is a detailed, process-oriented guide that offers all the tools staffing professionals need.


We study the roles of value congruence and trust in increasing online shoppers' intention to purchase goods and their reservation prices for these goods. Hypotheses are developed and a controlled experiment is conducted to measure subjects' value congruence with and their trust in online sellers with disparate values, along with their purchase intention and willingness to pay price premiums. Using social exchange theory, we find that, for business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce, value congruence increases consumer online trust, and both value congruence and online trust have direct effects on purchase intention and reservation prices. In particular, in the positive value congruence vs. value neutral case, trust has a greater effect than value congruence on purchase intention, but value congruence has a greater effect than trust on reservation price. These findings suggest that trust is essential to a consumer's intention to purchase online but value congruence can induce price premiums from potential buyers for online sellers. This implies that trust is essential to B2C e-commerce, but value congruence can be a more effective instrument for online sellers to achieve competitive advantage through value-based differentiation in the virtual marketplace.


A variety of methods of surface wave inversion, which enables us to investigate detailed images of the upper mantle on a regional scale, are reviewed. The study of surface wave tomography beginning in the 1980's has brought us with a significant jump in our understanding of the Earth's interior, particularly the upper mantle. Most of the studies of surface wave tomography have been based upon a geometrical ray theory, working with either dispersion curves or waveforms of surface waves. Such a simple representation of surface wave propagation has allowed us to treat a greater number of data sets, which are indispensable for obtaining high resolution tomography models. However, the ray theory, which is relying upon the high-frequency approximation, is no longer valid when the scale-length of heterogeneity is comparable to the wavelength of waves to be considered. The e#ects of finite frequency are particularly important for the higher-frequency surface waves, which mainly sample the crust and uppermost mantle where very strong lateral heterogeneity is likely to exist. Recent development of the 3-D sensitivity kernels allows us to treat the e#ects of finite frequency in the tomographic inversions. The use of such finite frequency theory will further advance the methods of surface wave tomography.


the smallest obstacle to the actual impact comes from the decision making itself concerned. The obstacle that most often appears is education, the role of the inability of someone to act alone or not firmly. Often a manager talks about himself being chosen by doubts that are so master of the way of thinking and acting. A manager who is hesitant in acting will cause him to give up his decision to his subordinates who are often justified by the exercise of authority. He raised the issue of authority more so that the leadership in the hierarchy that is more resistant then made a decision. He looks for reasons in such a way that the role of making decisions shifts horizontally to other managers on a level


OBJECTIVE
To summarize the techniques of the total hip arthroplasty in the treatment of osteoarthritis secondary to developmental dysplasia of the hip joint (DDH).

METHODS
Between February 1986 and November 2004, a total of 32 hips in 24 patients with advanced osteoarthritis secondary to DDH underwent the total hip arthroplasty. Among the patients, 4 were male and 20 were female, with their ages ranging from 33 to 59 years and an average age of 47 years. The bilateral arthroplasty was performed in 8 patients and the unilateral arthroplasty in 16 patients. The patients mainly suffered from pain and claudication. According to the Hartofilakidis classification, semidislocation occurred in 2 hips, low-dislocation in 21 hips, and high-dislocation in 9 hips; and the Harris scores before operation were 56.70 +/- 2.75, 36.09 +/- 4.16, and 29.45 +/- 2.16, respectively.

RESULTS
All the patients were followed up for 6 months to 8 years (averaged 3 years and 4 months). The Harris scores after operation were 93.10 +/- 2.10, 92.7 +/- 3.20, and 88.09+/- 3.67, respectively. The differences between preoperation and postoperation were significant (P < 0.01). All the patients were pain-free and there was no sign of aseptic loosening and subsidence.

CONCLUSION
The total hip arthroplasty is an effective method for the treatment of osteoarthritis secondary to DDH. The key techniques for the total hip arthroplasty are as follows: deepening the medial wall of the acetabulum, improving the techniques of the bone graft, and firmly placing the acetabular component in the true acetabulum.


Port and supply chains are closely connected to each other as a port is considered as an important node of the global supply chain. Sothe efficiency level of port has an impact on the performance of supply chain operations. Chittagong port is the principal seaport of Bangladesh and it provides a major gateway to the outside world. The cost of doing business is increasing as a result of the inefficiency in the main seaport of the country. In this paper, an effort has been taken to examine the efficiency of Chittagong Port and the causal factors of inefficiency. The impact of inefficiency at Chittagong port on the supply chain of Bangladesh has also been identified. To do this, at first a relationship has been built between port efficiency and supply chain in respect of Bangladesh.
Relevant data has been gathered through extensive review of the literature, field surveys, interacting with top management of different business entities such as shipping agency, freight forwarder, logistics companies, exporter, importer as well as Government regulatory and monitoring bodies using both the structured and unstructured questionnaires.
The study has revealed that theinefficiency at Chittagong port causes serious consequences on the supply chain of exporter and importer and lead to loss and disruption of trade and ultimately incur extra costs and time. This paper, therefore, recommends a substantial infrastructure improvement to Chittagong port along with other related measures in order to facilitate the supply chain of exporter and importer.


Due to the complexity and large dimensions of the task of digital system design debugging decomposition by method of modeling as a whole, algebraic models of decomposition methods are proposed, namely, methods of vertical and horizontal structure decomposition, functional decomposition, decomposition based on error types. An algebraic model of the digital systems software is presented. The software is considered as a semi group of operators.


When in 2007, China shot down an old weather satellite of its own this was the first test of an anti-satellite weapon since the 1980s. Many observers saw this as a reaction to an increasing investment of the United States in advanced technology for the "control" of space and warned of an arms race in space. Such an arms race would indeed have negative consequences for space safety and for the security of all space-faring nations. An exchange of violence in space would strongly restrain the usability of space and it could escalate to
war on earth. But even below the threshold of a space war, space debris resulting from space weapon testing, could severely affect space safety. Currently, there are more than 21,000 pieces of trackable space debris in orbit that endanger other space objects such as satellites. Further testing of anti-satellite weapons would increase this number significantly. Keeping in mind that a lot of money is earned with space applications – the global revenue of the space industry in 2009 amounted to $261.61 billion – an arms race
in space would have negative economic consequences, too.
Then how can we keep space safe? This is the central question, this report wants to answer. One recent initiative in this regard is the EU proposal to make the major spacefaring states agree on a Code of Conduct for behavior in space. While the establishment of "rules of the road" for space would be a first step into the right direction, it does not ban space weapons and hence cannot prevent an arms race in space. This report argues that the establishment of an international arms control regime for space would be a better
instrument to keep space safe and that the EU should therefore combine its Code of Conduct approach with an initiative to establish such a regime. Of course, an arms control regime for space cannot be established overnight. This report outlines a long-term strategy that maps out the central problems that must be solved to reach arms control in space. In order to do so, it draws on theoretical considerations on the establishment of international regimes.
The finding of this analysis is that in order to be able to agree on arms control in space, states must solve two classical problems of international cooperation, namely cheating and the unequal distribution of gains. This is possible, though, by drawing upon classical solutions to these problems, namely verification and issue-linkage. A first problem that prevents states from agreeing to arms control in space is the fear that other states would
not stick to their commitment. This fear is reflected in the American concern for effective verification and, indeed, drawing up mechanisms for verification must be part of any arms control agreement for space. This is possible, though. Although not every action that could lead to the development of space weapons can be verified, testing space weapons under real conditions can. Since space weapons cannot be developed overnight, states can make use of a strategy of reciprocity, a kind of space weapons testing tit-for-tat. A second
problem results from the fact that states tend to cooperate only, if the gains from this cooperation are distributed equally. This is not easy in the case of space weapons where the U.S. clearly has the technological lead. However, a general ban of space weapons provides for a compromise between the U.S. – that chiefly would benefit from a ban on ground-based anti-satellite weapons – and Russia and China who mainly seek to restrict the placement of more sophisticated weapons in orbit.
However, before these problems can be tackled, the major space-faring states have to "learn" that due to the interdependent character of space, unilateral strategies, i.e. developing space weapons, do not further their security. By drawing a parallel between the case of space weapons and nuclear arms control during the Cold War, this report argues that the emergence of a transnational epistemic community of space experts from the major space-faring states that produces consensual knowledge on the dangers of warfare in space would be an important step to foster learning in space. The EU could facilitate such a process of knowledge building by initiating a series of conferences among
scientists from the major space-faring nations on the dangers of war in space.


The concentrations of Cd, Pb, Ni and Hg were determined in gill, liver and muscle of Barbus xanthopterus in down streams of Karoon and Dez Rivers during summer 2009. Heavy metal concentrations varied significantly, depending on the types of the tissue in fish species. The levels of heavy metals such as Cd, Pb, Ni and Hg in the Barbus xanthopterus of Karoon River were higher than in Barbus xanthopterus of Dez River (P liver>muscle. The concentration of Hg in Karoon River was in the sequence liver> gill> muscle but, in Dez River, it was in the sequence liver> muscle > gill. Among heavy metals (Cd, Pb, Ni and Hg), the accumulation of Pb was more than other heavy metals in fish (P<0.05). In both rivers, the accumulation of heavy metals in muscle of fish was higher than the world health organization (WHO) standard.


During a 20-year period the author observed 40 newborn infants with congenital hydronephrosis. In 28 patients hydronephrosis of the normally developed kidney and in 12- of the abnormal organ was noted. Twelve patients were hospitalized for developmental anomalies that necessitated urgent surgical intervention, the diagnosis of hydronephrosis in them being established at autopsy. Twenty eight children were admitted to the clinic with symptoms of hydronephrosis. All children were operated upon, nephrectomy was performed in 18 cases, in the remainder-organ-preserving and corrective operative procedures were performed.


Background: Entamoeba gingivalis was the first commensal parasite detected in the oral cavity of humans, and a high incidence has been reported in patients with poor oral hygiene. The current study aimed to investigate the association of Entamoeba gingivalis with gingivitis and periodontitis among Egyptian subjects. Methods: A total of 120 plaque samples were collected for this case-control study and were divided as follows: 40 plaque samples from gingivitis patients (group 1), 40 from stage II grade A and B periodontitis patients (group 2), and 40 samples from healthy volunteers (group 3). Diagnosis of parasitic stages relied on direct microscopic detection using permanent stains, trichrome stain, and hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stain, in addition to ocular micrometry to confirm the diagnosis. Results: The occurrence of Entamoeba gingivalis within the gingivitis group was significantly higher (40%) than that observed in the control group (22.5%), whereas the occurrence within the periodontitis group was 15%. Samples from diseased subjects, regardless of immune status, were found to be moderately to severely affected with numerous parasitic nests, in contrast to a moderate near mild occurrence that was recorded in the healthy control group. Moreover, Entamoeba gingivalis occurrence was significantly higher (77.4%) in subjects with bad oral hygiene. Conclusion: The results of the present study suggest a potential role for the neglected oral parasitic Entamoeba gingivalis, especially the intensively multiplying forms, in the pathogenesis of periodontal diseases. This certainly needs further elucidation on a larger scale to explore the basis behind such multiplication, which may be related to genetic variation or may be pathophysiological in origin.


Background New technologies are introduced frequently in healthcare and change professionals' perceptions of quality of life. Purpose To assess the impact on professionals' quality of life in a hospital pharmacy department, 2 years after transfer to a new hospital which involved a functional and structural reorganisation with the introduction of new technologies in the medication use process. Material and methods This was a descriptive cross sectional study. Internal mail was used to send all professionals in the hospital pharmacy department the CVP35 self-administered questionnaires, which measured perceived professional quality of life, understood as the balance between work demands and the capacity to cope with them. This questionnaire was validated in different settings related to health professionals in Spain. The instrument consists of 35 items that evaluate three dimensions: perception of demands, emotional support received from superiors and intrinsic motivation. Each item was scored on a quantitative scale (1–10). 2013 results were compared with those obtained in 2016, 2 years after the transfer. Results The number of completed questionnaires was 35 in 2016 and 42 in 2013. In 2016, the item with the highest score was 'amount of work' (9.2±1.0), in 2013 it was 'pressure to perform the work' (8.9±2). In 2016, the lowest scored item was 'my employer tries to improve the quality of life for my position' (2.9±2.19) and in 2013 it was 'opportunities to be creative' (3.2±1.8). In 2016, the group most satisfied was administrative staff and in 2013 it was nursing assistants. The group with the highest pressure to carry out their work were nursing assistants. In 2016, 38% were quite satisfied with the work developed, which was the same value as in 2013. In 2016, 40% considered that they had no recognition of their work compared with 52% in 2013. In 2013, 50% were very motivated and in 2016 only 14%. Conclusion CVP35 questionnaire application has allowed the assessment of the impact of organisational changes in professionals' quality of life. The introduction of new technologies did not reduce the perception of workload but the satisfaction level of the work done was maintained although motivation had decreased. Professionals perceive greater recognition of the work done. References and/or acknowledgements Thanks to all professionals of the hospital pharmacy department. No conflict of interest


With accelerated aging in China, the degree of poor mental problem of the elderly is especially significant. In order to identify the mental problems of the elderly, this paper takes 62 elderly females (31 persons as standard group and 31 persons as treatment group) from first-class cities as study object with literature method, questionnaire method, interviewing method, statistical method, comparative analysis method, logical reasoning method and other methods. They are first subject to mental test and following-up survey and then grouped reasonably into standard group (31 persons) and treatment group (31 persons) and finally subject to a comparative analysis. The conclusion is drawn that poor mental health indexes of elderly females are all relatively serious mental health problem, lonely mentality and conceited mentality are serious problem; after treatment with square dance, significantly improved indexes in two observations are lonely mentality and conceited mentality, significantly improved indexes in one observation are inferiority mentality, emptiness mentality, selfish mentality and guess mentality, significantly improved indexes in two observations are vanity mentality and rivalry mentality and significantly improved indexes in one observation are blundering mentality and jealous mentality


Slavery, Disease, and Suffering in the Southern Lowcountry. By Peter McCandless. Cambridge Studies on the American South. (New York and other cities: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Pp. [xxvi], 297. $90.00, ISBN 978-1-107-00415-3.) Scholars studying the American South often focus their attention on dramatic themes such as slavery and race, revolution, war, and secession, but in doing so they risk losing sight of more commonplace experiences that may have been at least as significant to the people they study. As Peter McCandless shows in Slavery, Disease, and Suffering in the Southern Lowcountry, disease played a central role in the history of the early South. From the late seventeenth century until the Civil War, McCandless demonstrates, disease pervaded every aspect of life in the Southeast, influencing economic decisions, shaping cultures and identities, dictating geographical organization, and inflicting emotional as well as physical wounds. Despite the title, McCandless has written a book that is about disease much more than it is about slavery or suffering. As the author acknowledges, because of the bias of source materials, all but a few of the book's fourteen chapters focus primarily on the free population. Nor does McCandless consider suffering that was unrelated to disease or deal much with the southern Lowcountry beyond South Carolina. McCandless makes no attempt to cover his broad topic comprehensively, but each of the book's short chapters focuses on an important aspect of the role of disease in the Lowcountry. He also divides the book into two thematic but also partly narrative sections, giving separate attention to perceptions of the disease environment and to responses to illness. The book's parameters may be different than one might expect from the title, but they enable McCandless to take a careful, well-thought-out, and well-researched look at how South Carolinians understood and responded to disease. Moreover, as he points out, attitudes toward disease in the early southern Lowcountry "affected a culture that enormously influenced the development of the South and the United States" (p. xvi). McCandless reveals that, despite the power that disease exerted in the southern Lowcountry, southerners could ignore stark and brutal realities about health. Instead, they often accepted dubious theories about illness that served their own interests or reinforced their image of themselves. Many readers will be most familiar with the example of Lowcountry plantation owners' contention that their slaves faced no danger from disease in rice swamps. …


Forkhead box protein A1 (FOXA1) is a ''pio- neer factor'' that plays a role in controlling nearly 50% of estrogen receptor target genes. FOXA1 expression corre- lates with estrogen receptor (ER)-positivity especially in luminal subtype A breast cancers. The aim of this study was to investigate the precise role of FOXA1 in breast cancer using a large population-based cohort. Nuclear expression of FOXA1 was analyzed in a tissue micro- array of 4,444 invasive breast cancer cases using immunohistochemistry and correlated with clinicopatho- logic variables using previously described methods and cutoff points. The entire cohort was equally divided into a training and validation set. All survival analyses were performed using a previously defined cutoff (3) for vali- dation. Additional X-tile analysis performed to analyze prognostic effects of low and high FOXA1 levels identified 24 as a cutoff. Bonferroni-Holmes test was used as appropriate. FOXA1 expression significantly correlated positively with markers of good prognosis or ER-positivity, and negatively with tumor size, tumor grade, nodal status, Ki67, HER2 expression, and basal subtype (each P value \0.0001). In both survival analyses, FOXA1 was a sig- nificant predictor of breast cancer-specific survival (P \ 0.0001) and relapse-free survival (P \ 0.0001). FOXA1 was also an independent predictor of breast can- cer-specific survival at 10 years using both cutoffs. Among the ER-positive subgroup treated with tamoxifen, FOXA1 was an independent prognostic marker using the 24 cutoff (P = 0.030). FOXA1 is a significant marker of good prognosis in breast cancer; it also identifies a subset of ER-positive tamoxifen treated patients at low risk of recurrence.


This review addresses the effectiveness and safety of human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines, the current status of its introduction in the National Immunization Programmes (NIPs) and its relevance to India, which contributes a fifth of the global burden of cervical cancer. The vast literature on efficacy, acceptability and safety of HPV vaccination and its impact after population level introduction was reviewed and discussed. The efficacy of HPV vaccines in preventing high-grade precancerous lesions caused by vaccine-targeted HPV infections was 90 per cent or higher in HPV naïve women in randomized clinical trials. Two doses at 6 or 12 months apart are recommended for 9-14 yr old girls and three doses over six months to one year period for those aged above 15 yr. More than 80 countries or territories have introduced HPV vaccination in their NIPs, of which 33 are low- and middle-income countries (LMICs); in addition, 25 LMICs have introduced pilot programmes before a phased national expansion. Significant reductions in the frequency of HPV 16 and 18 infections, genital warts and cervical premalignant lesions in vaccinated cohorts and herd immunity in general populations have been reported from countries that introduced vaccination in NIPs as early as 2007. More than 280 million doses of HPV vaccines have been administered worldwide with the excellent safety profile with no serious adverse events linked to it. The high burden of cervical cancer and the high efficacy and safety of HPV vaccination justify its introduction in the Indian NIP at the earliest possibility to substantially reduce the cervical cancer burden in future.


Survivability becomes increasingly critical in managing high-speed networks as data traffic continues to grow in both size and importance. In addition, the impact of failures is exacerbated by the higher data rates available in optical networks. It is therefore imperative to address network survivability in an efficient manner in order to design and operate reliable networks. Transparent optical networks (TONs) provide several advantages over optically opaque networks for supporting the growing communication demands, but suffer from several drawbacks that reduce the efficacy of most applicable capacity-efficient survivability techniques. In this paper, we present a protection algorithm (for single link and/or node failures) called Streams. Streams protection is identical to 1:1 dedicated path protection in terms of recovery speed, but requires significantly less capacity. We study both online non-dynamic routing as well as (online) dynamic provisioning scenarios to compare Streams with dedicated and shared path protection in terms of capacity, blocking probability, path lengths, and recovery time/data loss, and report the relative tradeoffs between the different protection schemes in detail. Our results show that our simple heuristic for Streams under online provisioning scenarios offer attractive tradeoffs in terms of blocking, recovery speed, data loss and implementation overhead. We also briefly cover simple ILP solutions to address static offline routing problems, and show that the Streams protection scheme is also efficient under offline routing scenarios as well.


Prevalence of obesity and its related morbidity have increased to alarming levels in adults and children in the United States and globally. Weight loss results in improvement of much of the obesity-related morbidity. Lifestyle changes such as dietary modifications, increased physical activity, and behavioral therapy form the crux of weight management. However, many individuals need additional assistance (pharmacologic or surgical) to initiate or sustain weight loss. Pharmacologic therapy consists of a number of agents that work by decreasing appetite, gastric emptying, or nutrient absorption or by increasing satiety. Five classes of drug are currently approved for adults, including sympathomimetics (with and without an antiepileptic agent topiramate), gastrointestinal lipase inhibitors, serotonin agonists, glucagon-like peptide 1 agonists, and antidepressant/opioid antagonist combination. Pharmacologic options for children with obesity are minimal (lipase inhibitor orlistat is the only approved medication for children aged >12 years); however, all adult medications are approved by the Food and Drug Administration for children aged >16 years old. While side effect profiles of these medications are far superior to older medications, their use is limited by lack of long-term cardiovascular safety data, costs of medications and variable insurance coverages, and the need for continued usage for sustainable benefits. Weight loss medications may induce complacence, on part of both the patient and the provider, regarding lifestyle modifications, without which the drug therapy is almost certain to be of minimal benefit. Several novel drugs are in the pipeline targeting brown fat, energy expenditure, appetite suppression, and satiety.


Cloud Service providers must comply with data protection regulations, like European Union (EU) General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), to ensure their users' personal data security and privacy. Hence, the service privacy policies and terms of service documents refer to the rules it complies with within the data protection regulation. However, these documents contain legalese jargon that requires significant manual effort to parse and confirm compliance. We have developed a novel methodology, Textual Fuzzy Interpretive Structural Modeling (TFISM), that automatically analyzes large textual datasets to identify driving and dependent factors in the dataset. TFISM enhances Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) to analyze textual data and integrate it with Artificial Intelligence and Text extraction techniques. Using TFISM, we identified the critical factors in GDPR and compared them with various Cloud Service privacy policies. In this paper, we present the results of this study that identified how different factors are emphasized in GDPR and 224 publicly available service privacy policies. TFISM can be used both by service providers and consumers to automatically analyze how close a service privacy policy aligns with the GDPR.