In recent years the SEC has repeatedly stressed the importance of holding gatekeepers accountable in order to promote effective corporate governance. In spite of these assertions, the Commission has failed to use two powerful tools at its disposal to pursue gatekeepers. Section 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act provides for liability against "control persons." This Section imposes liability upon any person who controls another liable person to the same extent as such controlled person, unless she can establish that she acted in good faith and did not directly induce the violation. Sections 15(b)(4)(E) and 15(b)(6))A) of the Exchange Act give the Commission power to institute administrative proceedings against broker-dealers and associated persons for their failure to reasonably supervise another person who commits certain enumerated securities law violations. Although these enforcement mechanisms seem ripe for use, the Commission has refused to allege claims against control persons or based upon a failure to supervise in cases against big banks and large publicly regulated companies, such as those responsible for the financial crises and subsequent instances of large-scale misconduct. Instead, the SEC agrees to large monetary settlements with these companies without holding corporate miscreants liable. The objective of this article is to propose an enforcement regime which holds executives, directors, and other fiduciaries responsible for misconduct occurring at their enterprises when such misconduct can be attributed to their lack of control or failure to supervise their employees. We will show that by using Sections 20(a) and 15(b)(6)(A), the Commission incentivizes those in charge to actively sniff out misconduct or face the sobering reality of being named in an SEC enforcement action. In order to accomplish this task, this article will: 1) discuss the legal authority giving the SEC power to use these provisions, and explain the provisions' advantages over the SEC's frequently used enforcement tools; 2) outline recent misconduct resulting in large monetary settlements with such financial institutions as JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and Bank of America; 3) showcase the SEC's refusal to implement these tools against big players; 4) set forth rationales as to why the Commission has cast these provisions aside, and 5) recommend an enforcement policy in this context that seeks to effectuate law compliance and enhanced corporate governance practices.


The prospect of a new facility for plasma-surface interaction studies is presented. The unique features of this facility named GDMT-T are ability to generate both stationary plasma flux and transient events which simulate ITER ELM-mode operation and strong magnetic field on the target important for studies of dust and impurity migration. The experimental program of GDMT-T will include testing of plasma-facing components at ITER-relevant conditions and investigations of electron beam generation and beam-plasma interaction for application in the next generation of linear fusion facilities.


The Sixties: From Memory to History. David Farber, editor. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994. Studies of the 19670s keep on proliferating, with many of the best so far written by those who were participants or observers. David Farber's collection of ten new essays on the period, however, is specifically a work not of memory but of historical interpretation, not nostalgia, self-criticism, and/or self-justification by hippies, yippies, or flippies (in Mayor Daley's rhyming contribution to the verbal music of the time), but a well-researched and sensibly planned collective account by a group of scholars very much aware of their analytical role as later commentators. For this alone, the book is extremely valuable. The Sixties is in fact an attempt to remove the period from retro fashion and recombinant fad, from the songs, stories, explosions, tribal fests, and we blew it's that make up the specifics in the rich cultural storehouse of icons, legends, and sensory images of a period at once still too much with us but nonetheless sufficiently distant in the past to demand critical detachment and scholarly breadth. Farber and his team of essay writers focus their attention on the cultural and political life of America in what they conceive of as a period of change that, though it might have been particularly dramatic, nonetheless forms an integral part of the complex patterns and continuing flux of post-World War II America. As the editor notes in his introduction, two intertwined considerations provide dual topoi throughout the volume. Thus the issues and events of the sixties, including the war, the nature and influence of federal government, the various political and social movements (civil rights, the New Left, women's rights, even the new right), prosperity and consumer desire, self-styled radicalism in all its variety, were in Farber's words "shaped and contested through the changing nature of cultural authority and political legitimacy." The result of this double focus is a book that in perspective shifts compellingly from the specifics of popular culture and temporally local political events to wider understandings; not infrequently, background summaries of one, two, three or more decades of political, economic, and societal change provide the substance of essays. Sometimes this seems to result in a skewed attention, as if a closer illumination might put history too deeply in shadow. The problem is of course inherent in an age perhaps overdetermined for its future readings--and thus unwieldy, multifarious, too thickly textured, consequently indeterminate. For instance, the Vietnam War, while present in many references throughout the ten essays (and especially as mirrored in the even-handed summary by Chester J. Pach, Jr., of its treatment in network news), is discussed directly in no more than half a dozen pages in Mary Sheila McMahon's contribution on the war itself. In this, the longest study in the book, the war as historical event is presented less as a sixties occurrence than as an unfortunate accidental misfortune visited upon a strategically marginal geographical locale by a long-fermenting domestic American ideological dispute (and spat among political elites) between traditional values and the newly powerful activist state with its apparatus. Interesting, illuminating, but much knowledge about the war and the period is assumed. And personally, I found it also a bit unsettling--intentionally so, no doubt--that what we still loosely call the Movement (the decade's social activism in general, and particularly the New Left) is likewise never confronted head-on. …


The effect of amending soil with chitin on Meloidogyne arenaria (Neal) Chitwood was studied in a greenhouse experiment using silt loam [pH 6.5, org. matter 1% (w/w)] from an infested peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.) field. Chitin was added to soil at rates of 0.5-4.0% (w/w). The chitin was allowed to decompose for 3 weeks, then the soil was planted with summer crookneck squash (Cucurbita pepo L.). After 6 weeks of growth, squash plants were examined to determine the level of root galling and the soil was analyzed for soil enzymic activity and microbial populations. No galls were found on plants from soil with 1% or more of chitin. Soils with 0.5 to 2.0% chitin produced plants which were significantly taller and with heavier shoots than those from untreated soil or from soil with 4.0% chitin. Chitin treatments of 2.0% or higher significantly reduced germination of seed, and chitin at rates above 1.0% resulted in a significant reduction in root weight. Chitin amendments resulted in incre


Although Hannah Mather Crocker (1752-1829) apparently presented a prescription against women's political oratory in her Observations on the Real Rights of Women (1818), she provided philosophical and historical challenges to this conventional rule of early nineteenth-century feminine propriety elsewhere in the first American treatise on women's rights. By analyzing new archival findings of two of her oratorical works from the early 1810s — her 1813 "Fast Sermon" against the War of 1812 and her 1814 "Address" to the advisory board of the School of Industry for poor girls in Boston's North End — I argue that Crocker also provided a personal challenge to this conventional rule. In philosophically, historically, and personally redefining women's political oratory as compatible with feminine propriety — during the post-revolutionary backlash against women's rights — Crocker helped pave the way for the strategic use of the constitutional rights of speech and association in the nineteenth-century American women's rights movement and beyond.


With globally increasing recognition of environmental sustainability, now businesses are also acknowledging the requirement of incorporating green practices into their company operation. The study aims in exploring the relation in between the concepts of some sustainability elements such as "green human resource management practices" (GHRMP) and variables like "environmental performances", with the examination of environmental strategy and green innovation playing as a mediator. The study of GHRMP with respect to its elements such as green recruitment refers to selecting and hiring an employee who has significant knowledge about environmental sustainability.  It also consists of an element named green training that refers to teaching and developing a set of skills in employees to take action while protecting the environment within the organization The author specifically examines the connection between them by using the resource-based view theory. They also tested their relationship using the manufacturing firm's ability, motivation, and opportunity (AMO) theory. A survey questionnaire research strategy was used in this study along with a simple random sampling of 247 managers from large manufacturing firms in Punjab of Pakistan. For data analysis, this research used the p-test based on PLS-SEM. The findings showed that the study elements have a direct and major influence on each other especially the GHRMP and strategic environmental approach complement each other in the presence of the sustainable innovative product by the organization. Additionally, environmental strategy (ES) also partially mediated the influence of sustainable innovative products can be termed green innovation (GI), and it has an impact on environmental performance. The result revealed significant suggestions for legislators and manufacturing industries, to promote environmentally responsible actions, manufacturing goods, plus some production methods through a successful incentive program to increase loyalty. To apply the analysis and apply the study variables in the selected large sample sizes that can also be retested for future research, further research can exclude the novelty and unique issue by replicating the same research in other regions of the world.


In this paper we develop a coherent framework that integrates both traditional measures of b-convergence and s-convergence within a study of cross-country income dynamics. To do this we exploit the close links that exist between studies of income convergence and studies analysing the progressivity of the tax system. Our framework offers a simple algebraic decomposition of s-convergence as the combined effect of b-convergence and leapfrogging among countries. We illustrate our approach using data for the period 1960-2000.


In this survey research, I examined teacher educators' perspectives regarding music integration in their music methods courses for pre-service classroom teachers. Previous researchers have defined music integration levels and styles. In the current study, half of the teacher educators defined music integration in terms that reflected the highest levels of integration, focusing on authentic relationships between disciplines, while 44% defined music integration in ways that evoked the lowest levels, placing music in a secondary role. Most participants indicated that they integrated music with other areas of the elementary curriculum, and many shared circumstances that promoted or inhibited the inclusion of music integration strategies. Among the circumstances that teacher educators saw as promoting music integration were individual course content and design, overall program structure, and buy-in from various stakeholder groups. Conversely, lack of faculty interest or expertise, limited instructional time, and concerns about students' musical confidence and expertise were among the reported barriers to prioritizing music integration in their coursework. This article concludes with a discussion of these findings and suggestions for future research.


Innervation of the kidney includes both afferent and efferent fibers of the renal plexus. This plexus is a combination of fibers originating from the celiac plexus, intermesenteric plexus, and lumbar splanchnic nerves. Nerves from these plexuses attach along the renal artery and vein, entering the hilus of the kidney. The afferent innervation is essential for nociception recognition. Efferent innervation is primarily sympathetic and receives input from each contributing plexus. Little evidence exists for parasympathetic innervation of the kidney.


Abstract. In the aqueous phase, fine particulate matter can form reactive species (RS)
that influence the aging, properties, and health effects of atmospheric
aerosols. In this study, we explore the RS yields of aerosol samples from
a remote forest (Hyytiälä, Finland) and polluted urban locations
(Mainz, Germany; Beijing, China), and we relate the RS yields to different
chemical constituents and reaction mechanisms. Ultra-high-resolution mass
spectrometry was used to characterize organic aerosol composition, electron
paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectroscopy with a spin-trapping technique was
applied to determine the concentrations of ⚫OH,
O2⚫-, and carbon- or oxygen-centered organic radicals, and
a fluorometric assay was used to quantify H2O2. The aqueous
H2O2-forming potential per mass unit of ambient PM2.5
(particle diameter < 2.5 µm) was roughly the same for all
investigated samples, whereas the mass-specific yields of radicals were
lower for sampling sites with higher concentrations of PM2.5. The
abundances of water-soluble transition metals and aromatics in ambient
PM2.5 were positively correlated with the relative fraction of
⚫OH and negatively correlated with the relative fraction of
carbon-centered radicals. In contrast, highly oxygenated organic molecules
(HOM) were positively correlated with the relative fraction of
carbon-centered radicals and negatively correlated with the relative
fraction of ⚫OH. Moreover, we found that the relative fractions
of different types of radicals formed by ambient PM2.5 were comparable
to surrogate mixtures comprising transition metal ions, organic
hydroperoxide, H2O2, and humic or fulvic acids. The interplay of
transition metal ions (e.g., iron and copper ions), highly oxidized organic
molecules (e.g., hydroperoxides), and complexing or scavenging agents (e.g.,
humic or fulvic acids) leads to nonlinear concentration dependencies in
aqueous-phase RS production. A strong dependence on chemical composition
was also observed for the aqueous-phase radical yields of
laboratory-generated secondary organic aerosols (SOA) from precursor
mixtures of naphthalene and β-pinene. Our findings show how the
composition of PM2.5 can influence the amount and nature of
aqueous-phase RS, which may explain differences in the chemical reactivity
and health effects of particulate matter in clean and polluted air.


Scene recognition systems which attempt to deal with a large number of scene categories currently lack proper knowledge about the perceptual ontology of scene categories and would enjoy significant advantage from a perceptually meaningful scene representation. In this work we perform a large-scale human study to create "SceneNet", an online ontology database for scene understanding that organizes scene categories according to their perceptual relationships. This perceptual ontology suggests that perceptual relationships do not always conform the semantic structure between categories, and it entails a lower dimensional perceptual space with "perceptually meaningful" Euclidean distance, where each embedded category is represented by a single prototype. Using the SceneNet ontology and database we derive a computational scheme for learning non-linear mapping of scene images into the perceptual space, where each scene image is closest to its category prototype than to any other prototype by a large margin. Then, we demonstrate how this approach facilitates improvements in large-scale scene categorization over state-of-the-art methods and existing semantic ontologies, and how it reveals novel perceptual findings about the discriminative power of visual attributes and the typicality of scenes.


In this paper we propose a Modified rounding based approximate multiplier (MROBA) which is more accurate than the conventional multiplier (ROBA). The main concept of multiplier depends on rounding of numbers. This multiplier can be applied for both signed and unsigned numbers. Three hardware implementations are proposed in which one implementation for unsigned and two for signed operations. The accuracy of the multiplier is compared with the conventional rounding based approximate multiplier (which are in 2 n ) where the modified rounding based approximate multiplier gives an exact output for the given inputs (irrespective of 2 n ) and various parameters like area, power delay, error significance, pass rates are been calculated and compared with conventional multiplier where, MROBA gives better results and with the MROBA MAC unit is implemented. KeywordsApproximate multiplier; accuracy; MAC unit.


Background: The purpose of this paper was to evaluate the long-term impact of a childhood motor skill intervention on adolescent motor skills and physical activity. Methods: In 2006, we undertook a follow-up of motor skill proficiency (catch, kick, throw, vertical jump, side gallop) and physical activity in adolescents who had participated in a one-year primary school intervention Move It Groove It (MIGI) in 2000. Logistic regression models were analysed for each skill to determine whether the probability of children in the intervention group achieving mastery or near mastery was either maintained or had increased in subsequent years, relative to controls. In these models the main predictor variable was intervention status, with adjustment for gender, grade, and skill level in 2000. A general linear model, controlling for gender and grade, examined whether former intervention students spent more time in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity at follow-up than control students. Results: Half (52%, n = 481) of the 928 MIGI participants were located in 28 schools, with 276 (57%) assessed. 52% were female, 58% in Grade 10, 40% in Grade 11 and 54% were former intervention students. At follow-up, intervention students had improved their catch ability relative to controls and were five times more likely to be able to catch: ORcatch = 5.51, CI (1.95 – 15.55), but had lost their advantage in the throw and kick: ORthrow = .43, CI (.23 – .82), ORkick = .39, CI (.20 – .78). For the other skills, intervention students appeared to maintain their advantage: ORjump = 1.14, CI (.56 – 2.34), ORgallop = 1.24, CI (.55 – 2.79). Intervention students were no more active at follow-up. Conclusion: Six years after the 12-month MIGI intervention, whilst intervention students had increased their advantage relative to controls in one skill, and appeared to maintain their advantage in two, they lost their advantage in two skills and were no more active than controls at follow up. More longitudinal research is needed to explore whether gains in motor skill proficiency in children can be sustained and to determine the intervention characteristics that translate to subsequent physical activity. Published: 29 July 2009 International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 2009, 6:48 doi:10.1186/1479-5868-6-48 Received: 16 January 2009 Accepted: 29 July 2009 This article is available from: http://www.ijbnpa.org/content/6/1/48 © 2009 Barnett et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 2009, 6:48 http://www.ijbnpa.org/content/6/1/48


Lakoff (1975) says that women use language which reinforces their subordinate status: They are colluding in their subordination by the way they speak. Therefore, Lakoff proceeds to draw up a list of features which supposedly represent typical female discourse, as distinct from male talk. Based on her opinion, those speech features express uncertainty and lack of confidence. This study is held to verify the use of women?s speech features by female VJs of MTV Indonesia. The reason of choosing MTV Indonesia?s female VJs is because they are totally different from the eastern women in general, and the differences seem to be very interesting to be noted.This study of women?s language is elaborated into the dominant and the least features used. In this study, the writer notes and takes records the conversations between two female VJs of Mtv Indonesia while they are presenting the programs. From this observation, by separating each utterance, the writer is able to identify the kinds of speech feature, the most common features and the least feature used by female VJs of MTV Indonesia. From the findings, the writer found that both VJ Nirina and VJ Denise adopted women?s speech features. The most common feature used by VJ Nirina and VJ Denise is lexical hedges or fillers. The least features used by VJ Denise are tag question, "superpolite" form and avoidance of strong swear words. The least feature used by VJ Nirina was "empty" adjectives. From the findings, the writer can conclude that both of them might have tendency to be lack of self-confidence. The findings show that Robin Lakoff as the pioneer in the finding of women?s speech features theory in 1975, still can be considered as appropriate used until now on. It shows that Robib Lakoff is a smart and diligent person.


Genetically engineered or transgenic trees can play a major role in providing the feedstock for an energy sector that relies increasingly on renewable energy. Biomass energy sources such as wood, both in the form of direct combustion and in the production of liquid biofuels for transport, are being viewed as a major energy source of the near future. Worldwide there is a growing emphasis to shift from fossil fuel to renewable energy sources largely in recognition of the GHG emissions associated with fossil fuels. The potential exists for customizing trees to provide energy, both as a feedstock for liquid biofuels and for direct combustion either as raw wood chips or a wood pellets. However, in the U.S. all transgenic plants, including trees, automatically come under regulation and must be deregulated if they are to be grown in large commercial operations. Although there is a process for deregulating transgenic plants through the US Department of Agriculture – Animal Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) and other government agencies, the process has become increasingly slow and cumbersome, particularly for perennial plants including trees. Indeed, it is argued that the obstacles to deregulation have been increasing. This paper looks at that situation and identifies some of the elements that contribute to the slowing of the process. It notes some inherent conflicts and social tradeoffs between a timely deregulation process and concerns about environmental obstacles given current legal decisions.


Recent experimental data seem to indicate that there is significant structure in the cosmic ray spectrum above 1018 electron volts (eV). Besides a dip at ∼5 × 1018 eV, two events above 2 × 1020 eV have been observed. The implications for the existence of the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin cutoff, a long-lasting and still open question in cosmic ray physics, are discussed. This cutoff at a few times 1019 eV, caused by energy losses in the cosmic microwave background, has been predicted to occur in most acceleration models involving extragalactic sources. An acceleration origin of particles above 1020 eV within a few megaparsecs cannot be ruled out yet. However, persistence of the apparent gap in the existing data at a quadrupled total exposure would rule out many acceleration models at the 99 percent confidence level for any source distance. Particles above 1020 eV might then be directly produced by decay from some higher energy scale in contrast to acceleration of charged particles.


We present simultaneous XMM-Newton UV and X-ray observations of the quadruply lensed quasar SDSS J1004+4112 (RBS 825). Simultaneously with the XMM-Newton observations we also performed integral field spectroscopy on the two closest lens images A and B using the Calar Alto PMAS spectrograph. In X-rays the widely spaced components C and D are clearly resolved, while the closer pair of images A and B is marginally resolved in the XMM-EPIC images. The integrated X-ray flux of the system has decreased by a factor of 6 since it was observed in the ROSAT All Sky Survey in 1990, while the X-ray spectrum became much harder with the power law index evolving from $\Gamma=-2.3$ to $\Gamma=-1.86$. By deblending the X-ray images of the lensed QSO we find that the X-ray flux ratios between the lens images A and B are significantly different from the simultaneously obtained UV ratios and previously measured optical flux ratios. Our optical spectrum of lens image A shows an enhancement in the blue emission line wings, which has been observed in previous epochs as a transient feature. We propose a scenario where intrinsic UV and X-ray variability gives rise to line variations which are selectively magnified in image A by microlensing. The extended emission of the lensing cluster of galaxies is clearly detected in the EPIC images, we measure a 0.5–2.0 keV luminosity of 1.4 $\times$ $10^{44}~{\rm erg/s}$. Based on the cluster X-ray properties, we estimate a mass of $2{-}6$ $\times$ $10^{14}~M_\odot$.


portion of HbA, was high in carriers and normal in controls. HbF determined by cellogel electrophoresis was present in three carriers. HbA, was measured by a column chromatographic method6 in blood samples drawn after about 12 hours' fasting and immediately tested at 23-C. The HbAj concentration in carriers of 5 thalassaemia trait was higher than that in controls (9-3 (SD 1-7)')0 v 7 1 (0 8)o; t test for unpaired data: p<0 001). This difference remained significant even when carriers with HbF were excluded from the comparison. We found no direct relation between HbA2 and HbAj. The cause of our results remains a matter of speculation. Nevertheless, we think it is important to be aware that the usual column chromatographic method of measuring HbAj might give high results in carriers of P thalassaemia trait. GIOVANNI SAITTA CARLO CATALANO ALFREDO CARDUCCI ARTENISIO


This study was aimed at investigating whether repeated SCUBA diving might induce long term cardiovascular and autonomic modifications. In 11 military mine clearance diving students, arterial compliance (ultrasound scan study of brachial artery and ratio of stroke volume to pulse pressure: SV/PP), resting spectral analyses of heart rate and blood pressure variability, and a cold pressor test were performed before and after a 15-week military diving training course. After the diving training, arterial compliance was improved, as indicated by the significant increase in brachial arterial compliance (from 24+/-10 to 37+/-14 ml.mmHg (-1)) and SV/PP (from 1.7+/-0.2 to 1.9+/-0.2 ml.mmHg (-1)), and by the significant decrease in systolic, diastolic and pulse pressures (from 130+/-8 to 120+/-7; from 71+/-4 to 67+/-4; and from 58+/-8 to 53+/-5 mmHg, respectively). The peak oxygen uptake increased significantly from 54.3+/-2.0 to 56.8+/-4.0 mL.kg (-1).min (-1). Finally, the vasoconstrictive response during the cold pressor test increased (p<0.05). These findings point to a positive effect of a 15-week military diving training course on vascular function, and for a concomitant development of some peripheral vascular acclimatization to cold.


Polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) data are sequentially acquired and usually large scale. Fast and accurate classification is particularly important for their applications. By introducing online learning, the PolSAR system can learn a classification model incrementally from a stream of instances, which is of high efficiency for newly arrived samples processing, strong adaptability for a dynamically changing environment, and excellent scalability for rapidly increasing data. In this paper, we propose an Online Multi-view Passive-Aggressive learning algorithm, named OMPA, for PolSAR data real-time classification. The polarimetric, color, and texture features are extracted to characterize PolSAR data, and each type of features corresponds to one view. In order to exploit the consistency and complementary property of these views, we give a new optimization model that ensembles the classifiers of multiple distinct views and enforces the agreement between each predictor and the combined predictor. The corresponding algorithms for both binary and multiclass classification tasks are derived, and the update steps have analytical solutions. In addition, we rigorously derive a bound on the number of prediction mistakes of the method. The proposed OMPA algorithm is evaluated on two real PolSAR datasets for built-up areas extraction and land cover classification, respectively. Experimental results demonstrate that OMPA consistently maintains a smaller mistake rate with low time cost and achieves about 1% and 2% accuracy improvements on the datasets, respectively, compared with the best results of the previously known online single-view and multiview learning methods.


Motion compensated prediction (MCP) error image has significant amplitudes mainly along the boundaries of moving objects, correspondingly its wavelet coefficients contain large energy in high frequency bands. This greatly reduces the coding efficiency of embedded zerotree wavelet (EZW) coding. In this paper, we first provide the correspondence between the significant amplitudes area of the MCP error image and the wavelet coefficient significant map, then encode the significant map efficiently using the quadtree approach, followed by bit-plane coding the significant coefficients to produce an embedded data stream. Experiment result shows that compared to EZW and ZTE, the proposed algorithm is more efficient and has better performance in very low bit rate applications.


Energy saving of iron-making system and secondary energy recovery are the main approaches for the Chinese steel industry's sustainable development. The theoretical analysis of secondary energy generation of four typical BF-BOF steel manufacturing processes showed that improving the resource and energy efficiency, and strengthening recovery and rational utilization of by-product gases are the main way of energy saving for steel industry. According to the status of secondary energy recovery of Chinese steel industry, the technological development tendency energy saving, greenhouse gas emission reduction for Chinese steel industry are presented.


This study deals with 272 Megachiroptera from the People's Republic of Congo, belonging to 13 taxa: Eidolon helvum helvum (Kerr), Rousettus aegyptiacus unicolor (Gray), Lissonycteris angolensis angolensis (Bocage), Myonycteris torquata (Dobson), Hypsignathus monstrosus Allen, Epomops franqueti franqueti (Tomes), Epomophorus cf. labiatus (Temminck), Epomophorus wahlbergi haldemani (Halowell), Micropteropus grandis Sanborn, Micropteropus pusillus (Peters), Scotonycteris zenkeri zenkeri Matschie, Scotonycteris ophiodon Pohle, and Megaloglossus woermanni Pagenstecher. Of these, Epomophorus cf. labiatus and Micropteropus grandis are recorded from this country for the first time. The known ranges of Epomophorus cf. labiatus and Micropteropus grandis are greatly extended towards the west. In morphology and zoogeography ten species correspond with populations to the north and, with the possible exception of both Scotonycteris species, to the south; towards the east the distribution of Rousettus aegyptiacus and both Scotonycteris species is possibly discontinuous. The two Epomophorus species and Micropteropus grandis are linked with populations towards the south and east only. Seasonal biannual reproduction is assumed for Epomophorus wahlbergi Epomops franqueti, and Micropteropus pusillus. Data on reproduction in other species are scarce or lacking.


Linda Aiken, PhD MSN, is director of the Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research and The Claire M. Fagin Leadership Professor of Nursing and Professor of Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Dr. Aiken's other appointments at the University of Pennsylvania include senior fellow at the Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics and research associate in the Population Studies Center. Before joining the University of Pennsylvania faculty in 1988, Dr. Aiken served as vice president of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. She is a member of the Institute of Medicine, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the National Academy of Social Insurance, a former president of the American Academy of Nursing, a distinguished fellow of the Academy for Health Services Research and Health Policy (now AcademyHealth), and a member of the Council on the Economic Impact of Health System Change. Dr. Aiken served on the Medicare Physician Payment Review Commission for 6 years and was a member of the 1982 Social Security Advisory Council and of President Clinton's National Health Reform Task Force. Her recent work, for which she received the Sigma Theta Tau International Clinical Research Award in 1999, has focused on accounting for variation in hospital patient outcomes in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Germany. Dr. Aiken received her bachelor's and master's degrees in nursing from the University of Florida, Gainesville, and her doctorate in sociology and demography from the University of Texas at Austin.


Twenty-two normal lower eyelids were studied microscopically to examine the normal anatomy of the lower eyelid retractors. Eight lower eyelid specimens from patients with involutional entropion and five from patients with involutional ectropion were studied also. In the normal eyelids, the inferior tarsal muscle consisted of scattered smooth-muscle fibers and did not insert on the tarsus. The orbital septum fused with the capsulopalpebral fascia 5 mm beneath the lower tarsal border to form a single, complex fascial layer. In the involutional entropion and ectropion cases, the fused capsulopalpebral fascia-orbital septum complex was attached to the tarsus in all specimens. The first identifiable smooth-muscle strands of the inferior tarsal muscle averaged 3.9 mm from the lower tarsal border in entropion cases, 4.5 mm in ectropion cases, and 2.5 mm in the normal eyelids.


We discuss object classification for a multicolor survey of high-latitude fields from the Digitized Second Palomar Observatory Sky Survey (DPOSS) and the resulting Palomar-Norris Sky Catalog. Two methods are used to perform automated image classification for star-galaxy separation in DPOSS. As a source of classifier training/testing data, we employ an unprecedented 500 field collection of CCD photometry in the Thuan & Gunn gri system obtained with the Palomar 60 inch (1.5 m) telescope. We have trained artificial neural network (ANN) and decision tree (DT) image classifiers using images of ≈4000 galaxies and ≈3000 stars classified with FOCAS on 52 deep CCD images. We assess the systematic errors in our classifiers as a function of apparent magnitude. To model the loss of galaxies through misclassification and the contamination of our galaxy samples by misclassified stars, we compare the DPOSS ANN+DT image classifications with image data from 46 CCD fields on 21 POSS-II fields not used in the initial training/testing process. We assess these same functions in a more stringent manner by comparing classifications of DPOSS images common with different fields via the plate overlaps. These tests are combined to derive analytic descriptions of sample incompleteness and contamination for future use in our assessment of multicolor galaxy number counts and the two-point angular correlation function. Finally, we derive star and galaxy number counts from 341 DPOSS fields covering a total of 7756 deg2 in both the north and south Galactic hemispheres. These data are used to establish a final correction for stellar contamination in our galaxy samples and to demonstrate the level of classification homogeneity in the DPOSS g and r catalogs drawn from a wide range of Galactic latitudes.


Responsiveness to customer needs is an important goal in agile and lean software development. One major aspect is to have a continuous and smooth flow that quickly delivers value to the customer. In this paper we apply cumulative flow diagrams to visualize the flow of lean software development. The main contribution is the definition of novel measures connected to the diagrams to achieve the following goals: (1) increase throughput and reduce lead‐time to achieve high responsiveness to customers' needs and (2) to provide a tracking system that shows the progress/status of software product development. An evaluation of the measures in an industrial case study showed that practitioners found them useful and identify improvements based on the measurements, which were in line with lean and agile principles. Furthermore, the practitioners found the measures useful in seeing the progress of development for complex products where many tasks are executed in parallel. The measures are now an integral part of the improvement work at the studied company. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


Contents and AbstractsIntroduction: Anxious Parents in Global Times chapter abstractThis chapter starts with vignettes that demonstrate a variety of class-specific practice Chinese parenting across the Pacific and situates this study in three sets of literature: parenting and ethnic culture, immigrant parenting, and parenting and social class. The chapter introduces the approach of transnational relational analysis to examine how parents develop strategic actions and emotional experiences of childrearing in relation to other parents. It also proposes the concept of global security strategy to examine how parents reflect upon their class experience in relation to globalization and immigration to evaluate the challenges in the family's present and their children's future their particular views of globalized risk direct them to engage in spatial and cultural (im)mobility to create and maintain their perceived ideas of family security. 1Transpacific Flows of Ideas and People chapter abstractChapter 1 overviews the transpacific movement of ideas and resources that facilitated the spatial and cultural mobilities of Taiwanese and immigrant parents across historical periods: the geopolitical and immigration links between Taiwan and the United States after World War II, Taiwan's changing scripts of parenting and transnational cultural circuits since the 1990s, immigration from postreform China to Taiwan and the United States, and the current global economy and the increase of "ancestral homeland migration" among the second generation. Transnationalism from both above and below alters the family lives of those who move overseas and of those who stay in the country of origin. Repertoires of childrearing are changing as a result of time-space compression and global-local entanglements, but these changes reach parents unevenly across the class spectrum. 2Taiwanese Middle Class: Raising Global Children chapter abstractChapter 2 describes the global security strategies of middle-class parents who have achieved intergenerational mobility and enjoyed material gains and flexible mobility in the globalized economy. They lament their own loss of childhood in the past and worry about uncertainties in their children's future. To safeguard their children's happiness and creativeness, these privileged parents mobilize their economic and cultural capitals to exit the local education system or to advocate for reform. Many adopt the strategy of cultivating global competitiveness by choosing elite schools and cultivating Western cultural capital, and some pursue a strategy of orchestrating natural growth by seeking out a Western model of alternative education as a form of cultural mobility. 3Taiwanese Working Class: Affirming Parental Legitimacy chapter abstractChapter 3 looks into the security strategies of working-class parents. Less-educated Taiwanese men have encountered stagnant mobility in the globalized economy some seek transnational unions to escape their disadvantaged status in the local marriage market. With the new middle-class ideals of parental competency promoted by Taiwan's government and school, working-class parents, including immigrant mothers, suffer from a decline in parental legitimacy. Some parents reinforce harsh discipline to claim legitimacy while others outsource education to improve their children's opportunities for class mobility. 4Immigrant Middle Class: Raising Confident Children chapter abstractUS immigration is generally viewed as a pathway to social mobility by people in Taiwan and China, but many immigrants experience otherwise. Even highly educated professionals, men in particular, may encounter racial discrimination and blocked mobility at American workplaces. Chapter 4 describes the security strategies of highly educated immigrants who share a narrative of declining cultural confidence. Their security strategies center on how to protect or achieve a sense of confidence among second-generation youth in a context of racial inequality. Some parents arrange "Americanized" extracurricular activities to orchestrate children's "competitive assimilation," whereas the others mobilize their homeland culture and transnational educational resources to cultivate ethnic cultural capital among the second generation. 5Immigrant Working Class: Reframing Family Dynamics chapter abstractChapter 5 describes the cultural negotiation and security strategies of working-class Chinese immigrants who lack English skills, local ties, and US-recognized degrees and thus suffer from some degree of downward mobility. Their narratives of parenting insecurity center on a decline in their parental authority, especially because corporal punishment is not recognized as a legitimate tool of child discipline in many parts of the United States. Some try to project an "American" outlook on their family lives by either interpreting the reversed dynamics of parent-child relations as an indicator of cultural assimilation or attending parenting seminars to learn about American knowledge and techniques of childrearing. The others seek resources from immigrant communities or transnational kin networks to sustain the ethnic practices of education, care, and discipline. Conclusion: In Search of Security chapter abstractThe conclusion compares the global security strategies among Taiwanese and immigrant parents across the class spectrum and identifies visible and invisible social connections between these four groups of parents. It ends by discussing the theoretical and practical lessons we can learn from this research: why and how the global security strategies of childrearing unwittingly magnify parental insecurities and class injustice.


The present research examines how warmth communications shape class-based patterns of political candidate support. Drawing on theory and evidence that lower-class individuals are more attuned to others, we predicted that, relative to upper-class individuals, they will modulate their trust and support in response to communications of warmth generated by and about political figures. In Experiment 1, lower-class compared to upper-class participants reported less trust and support for a political candidate who communicated his warmth in a campaign video, while no class differences emerged when he communicated competence or hostility to an opponent instead. In Experiment 2, lower-class compared to upper-class participants reported greater trust and support for a political figure whose warmth was communicated by a lower-class member, but no class difference emerged when the same communication was by an upper-class member. Implications for eliciting trust through warmth communication in cross-class interactions are discussed.


Parties contemplating power-asset purchase and sale deals need to take into account the disheveled state of regulation in the current environment that has the potential to create institutional transactional barriers and obscure transaction valuation as well. Because the measuring rods for the significance of evolving legal/regulatory requirements are time, cost, and possible long-term impediment to success, the key issues are: 1) Which regulators are in charge? 2) Have the standards that these regulators apply in the approval process remained constant? 3) Are the applicable standards consistent and clear in formulation? The safe approach appears to be to assume FERC's reluctance to permit a transaction with the potential of marginal pricing power, to develop financing whose credit support does not depend on parent cross-subsidies, to evaluate all pricing on both MBR (market-based-rate) and non-MBR pricing assumptions, and to simplify corporate capital structures.


Three surface refraction seismic profiles were conducted in a site targeted for huge construction in an underdeveloped area in Opolo, Yenagoa city to portray some of the subsurface soil engineering characteristics for the purposes of construction. The Generalized Reciprocal Method (GRM) was used to interpret the acquired P and S-wave. Various shallow rock engineering parameters such as Oedometric modulus, Concentration Index, Material Index, Lame's constant, Density Gradient, Stress Ratio, Shear modulus, Bearing capacity, and N-value were calculated in other to assess the strength of the subsurface  from a geophysical and engineering perspective. The values from the seismic velocity and strength parameters indicates that the bedrock layer (layer 3) of the area studied is characterized by more competent rock quality than layer 1 and 2. Hence, the Opolo site is suggested for construction activities with percussive measures.


Introduction: Scientific advances made to understand the molecular regulation of tooth morphogenesis, biology of stem cells and biotechnology provide opportunities that will enable tooth regeneration in the near future. Stem cells are capable of stimulating tissue regeneration and, as a consequence, present many therapeutic perspectives, which make them feasible to be applied in Dentistry. Their applicability in the regeneration of oral structures becomes nearer and nearer every day; however, additional studies are warranted to further comprehend the best method for storing stem cells and the adequate laboratorial procedures that shall be applied when those cells are used. Furthermore, it is necessary to know all cell subdivisions, according to their place of origin. Methods: The method employed for conducting the present study was the search for scientific articles in journals, books as well as in the following databases: BIREME, LILACS, PubMed and SciELO. Conclusion: This literature review aimed at exemplifying the main groups of cells, their functions and difficulties in order to provide basic knowledge that may be used


It is often assumed that blacksmiths and ironworkers in Viking Age occupied important roles in their communities. However, the nature and source of this social role and the significance attributed to it is seldom explored or questioned. These assumptions are questioned by examining the social role and status of smiths, the archaeological expressions of those social aspects, and the cultural pressures which influenced the position of ironworkers in the Viking Age.
 This thesis begins by exploring the literary expressions of smiths in Viking Age myths, legends, and sagas. These sources provide information about the contemporary social perspectives connected to smiths and their role, and provide a basis for how best to examine smithing through theoretical perspectives such as status, material expressions of status, value and technology in value ascription. The use of such theoretical terminology provides a way to examine the material culture associated with ironworking, and means of explaining the social relationships which acted upon and reacted with Viking Age material culture. Applying the theories of value and value ascription through technological processes to the current archaeological understanding of Viking Age smelting and smithing technologies imparts a practical understanding of the processes and technological actors which produced iron and iron objects as socially valuable objects. The interaction between symbolically charged iron objects and the social interactions in which they played a role suggests that examining the consumption patterns associated with iron objects is a route to examine those social meanings and test the research questions.
 This work contains a comparison between two case studies, the Viking Age cemetery in Luistari, Finland and the Viking Age urban centre at Kaupang, Norway. The comparison between evidence of these sites provides complementary information for examining the general trends surrounding iron object use in differing regional contexts. Discussing these trends with supplementary examples of smithing material culture from the wider Viking world extends the ideas of smiths being valuable, venerated members of Early Medieval Scandinavian societies to the wider Viking Age sphere.
 Examining the evidence from the case studies and supplementary information with respect to the theoretical applications of the terminology suggests that the smiths of the Viking Age were valued as the producers of valuable, symbolically charged objects. This appears to have been true for the producers of simple farm-tools as well as the producers of highly prized weapons. This important social role, and the role of the smith within the technological processes which were responsible for value and symbolic ascription, would have enhanced the prestige of the smith as a member of Viking Age societies in which they lived.


PURPOSE
To determine whether efaproxiral, an allosteric modifier of hemoglobin, improves survival in patients with brain metastases when used as an adjunct to whole-brain radiation therapy (WBRT).

PATIENTS AND METHODS
Patients with brain metastases from solid tumors and a Karnofsky performance score of > or = 70 were randomly assigned to receive WBRT with supplemental oxygen and either efaproxiral at 75 or 100 mg/kg (efaproxiral arm) or no efaproxiral (control arm). The primary end point was survival.

RESULTS
The study consisted of 515 eligible patients (efaproxiral arm, n = 265; control arm, n = 250). The median survival time (MST) was 5.4 months for the efaproxiral arm versus 4.4 months for the control arm (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.87; P = .16). For the subgroup of patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) or breast cancer, the MST was 6.0 and 4.4 months, respectively (HR = 0.82; P = .07). Cox multiple regression analysis demonstrated a significant reduction in the risk of death for the efaproxiral arm in both primary populations. Further analysis indicated that the benefit may be restricted to the subgroup of patients with breast cancer. Response rates (radiographic complete response plus partial response) improved by 7% (P = .10) and 13% (P = .01) for all patients and for NSCLC and breast cancer patients in the efaproxiral arm, respectively. The most common severe adverse event in patients treated with efaproxiral was hypoxemia, which was reversible and effectively managed with supplemental oxygen in most patients.

CONCLUSION
The addition of efaproxiral, a noncytotoxic radiation sensitizer, to WBRT may improve response rates and survival in patients with brain metastases, particularly metastases from breast cancer. A confirmatory trial for breast cancer patients has been initiated.


The research on photovoltaic/thermal (PV/T) solar collector tends to focus on either water or air as the working fluid. Thus this study aims to investigate the feasibility of incorporating two types of working fluid (air and water) under the same PV/T solar collector. In addition to the electricity generated, this type of collector enables the production of thermal energy in the form of heated air and water. The use of both fluids (bi-fluid) also creates a greater range of thermal applications and offers options in which three modes of fluid operation namely: the air mode, the water mode, and the simultaneous mode (air and water) can be produced depending on the energy needs and applications. To investigate this type of collector, an improved design of a single pass PV/T solar collector which integrates both water and air as the working fluids (bi-fluid) into the system with the commercially available PV module as the thermal absorber was designed and fabricated. Heat transfer enhancement technique to the air flow has been introduced with the use of a series of low-cost fins. To test the fabricated collector, test-rig facilities were fabricated for indoor and outdoor testing with calibrated and reliable data acquisition tools were set-up. The performance of a PV/T solar collector is strongly influenced by the environmental factors, operating conditions and design parameters of the collector. Therefore mathematical modelling is crucial in order to predict the collector performance for further energy optimization purposes. In this study, when both fluids are operated simultaneously, 2-D steady-state analysis is used in modelling the performance of the designed collector. Thus energy balance equations using finite difference method were developed and solved using the inverse matrix solution procedure, with the Newton Raphson iteration implemented to compute the unknown temperature nodes using MATLAB. Even though the model was developed for the simultaneous mode of fluid operation, it can be implemented for the independent mode by setting the mass flow rate of one of the fluids at stagnant condition (0 kg/s). Experimental studies were conducted to analyse the collector performance for both thermal and electrical characteristics. The total efficiency of the PV/T design was computed by considering the 'primary energy saving efficiency' for both indoor and outdoor testing. For the independent mode, at average wind speed of 1 m/s, air and water mass flow rate ranging from 0.0074-0.09 kg/s, and 0.0017 - 0.0265 kg/s respectively, the experimentally obtained primary energy saving efficiency for air and water are ranging from 34.87% to 72.59%; and 4135% to 64.79% respectively. Meanwhile for the simultaneous mode of fluid operation, higher range of primary energy saving efficiency was computed such that when air and water is fixed at flow rate of 0.0262 kg/s and 0.0066 kg/s respectively, the computed efficiency are ranging from 64.02% to 77.90%; and 64.01% to 77.03% respectively. The developed model was then validated against the experimental results by conducting error analysis using the mean absolute percentage error (MAPE), and root mean squared percentage deviation (RMSD) methods. From the analysis, the theoretical and experimental results are concluded to be in good agreement and hence the model is proven valid. Using the validated model, parametric studies were conducted. To conclude, this study has significant contributions to the knowledge of PV/T technology in which the computer simulation and experimental results have proven the feasibilities of integrating both fluids into the same collector.


OBJECTIVE
The present study describes 5 cases of large-cell neuroendocrine carcinoma (LCNEC) of the uterine cervix, evaluating their clinical features and pathological profiles.

METHODS
Clinical data were obtained from the patients' clinical files at the combined gynaecological-oncology unit of Johannesburg Hospital and the University of the Witwatersrand Medical School, Johannesburg, South Africa. A histopathological diagnosis was obtained after biopsy material from all 5 patients was examined microscopically and subjected to immunohistochemical staining with MNF116 (pankeratin) synaptophysin and chromagranin A, all of which are neuroendocrine markers. Two patients received pelvic radiotherapy only. None of the 5 patients in this series received chemotherapy or underwent surgery.

RESULTS
All 5 patients were adult females, with an average age of 57.3 years. The majority were multiparous, with the most common presenting complaint being vaginal bleeding. Three of the 5 patients presented with advanced-stage cervical carcinoma, with evidence of metastases in 2 of them. Treatment responses and long-term survival in our series proved to be disappointing as 3 of the 5 patients died in less than 6 months. On histopathological examination, all 5 tumours showed features of a high-grade poorly differentiated malignant neoplasm with ulceration and extensive tumour necrosis including trabecular and organoid growth patterns. All 5 neoplasms also showed strong immunoreactivity for MNF116, while their endocrine nature was confirmed by staining for synaptophysin in all cases. None of the tumours showed positive straining for chromagranin A.

CONCLUSIONS
LCNECs are rare tumours and distinct from other neoplasms of the uterine cervix. The results of this study reaffirm the biologically aggressive nature of this uncommon tumour and its very unfavourable prognosis.


Due to its powerful capability of representation learning and high-efficiency computation, deep hashing has made significant progress in large-scale image retrieval. However, deep hashing networks are vulnerable to adversarial examples, which is a practical secure problem but seldom studied in hashing-based retrieval field. In this paper, we propose a novel prototype-supervised adversarial network (ProS-GAN), which formulates a flexible generative architecture for efficient and effective targeted hashing attack. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first generation-based method to attack deep hashing networks. Generally, our proposed framework consists of three parts, i.e., a PrototypeNet, a generator and a discriminator. Specifically, the designed PrototypeNet embeds the target label into the semantic representation and learns the prototype code as the category-level representative of the target label. Moreover, the semantic representation and the original image are jointly fed into the generator for flexible targeted attack. Particularly, the prototype code is adopted to supervise the generator to construct the targeted adversarial example by minimizing the Hamming distance between the hash code of the adversarial example and the prototype code. Furthermore, the generator is against the discriminator to simultaneously encourage the adversarial examples visually realistic and the semantic representation informative. Extensive experiments verify that the proposed framework can efficiently produce adversarial examples with better targeted attack performance and transferability over state-of-the-art targeted attack methods of deep hashing.


Making ethical decisions related to the protection of human research participants is often complex and fraught with uncertainty and conflict. Awareness of the basic principles outlined in the Belmont Report as well as in federal regulations and guidelines can provide a useful framework for such decisions, although the ultimate responsibility for ensuring ethical research practices rests with the individual investigator. Ongoing dialogue and discussion about these ethical issues will provide a basis for strengthening nursing research and practice while ensuring the maximum protection for research participants who make possible the advancement of nursing science.


Abstract Recent studies directed to the design of compounds targeting the bc1 protein complex of Plasmodium falciparum, the parasite responsible for most lethal cases of malaria, identified quinolones (4-oxo-quinolines) with low nanomolar inhibitory activity against both the enzyme and infected erythrocytes. The 4-oxo-quinoline 3-ester chemotype emerged as a possible source of potent bc1 inhibitors, prompting us to expand the library of available analogs for SAR studies and subsequent lead optimization. We now report the synthesis and structural characterization of unexpected ethyl 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-(3-iodo-4-methylphenoxy)-quinoline-3-carboxylate, a 4-aryloxy-quinoline 3-ester formed during attempted preparation of 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-oxo-quinoline-3-carboxylate (4-oxo-quinoline 3-ester). We propose that the 4-aryloxy-quinoline 3-ester derives from 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-hydroxy-quinoline-3-carboxylate (4-hydroxy-quinoline 3-ester), the enol form of 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-oxo-quinoline-3-carboxylate. Formation of the 4-aryloxy-quinoline 3-ester confirms the impact of quinolone/hydroxyquinoline tautomerism, both on the efficiency of synthetic routes to quinolones and on pharmacologic profiles. Tautomers exhibit different cLogP values and interact differently with the enzyme active site. A structural investigation of 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-oxo-quinoline-3-carboxylate and 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-hydroxy-quinoline-3-carboxylate, using matrix isolation coupled to FTIR spectroscopy and theoretical calculations, revealed that the lowest energy conformers of 6-methyl-7-iodo-4-hydroxy-quinoline-3-carboxylate, lower in energy than their most stable 4-oxo-quinoline tautomer by about 27 kJ mol−1, are solely present in the matrix, while the most stable 4-oxo-quinoline tautomer is solely present in the crystalline phase.


Complex networks (CNs) have gained much attention in recent years due to their importance and popularity. The rapid growth in the size of CNs leads to more difficulties in the analysis of CNs tasks. Community Detection (CD) is an important multidisciplinary research area where many machine/deep learning-based methods have been applied to map CNs into a low-dimensional representation for extracting information similarity among members of CNs. Currently, Deep Learning (DL) is one of the promising methods to extract knowledge and learn information from high dimensional space and represent it in low dimensional space. However, designing an accurate and efficient DL-based CD method especially when dealing with large CNs is always an on-going research endeavor to pursue. Meta-Heuristic (MH) algorithms have shown their potentials in improving DL models in terms of solution quality and computational cost. In addition, parallel computing is a feasible solution for building efficient DL models. The algorithmic principle of MH is parallel in nature; however, its computation framework in DL training that is reported in the literature is not really implemented in a parallel computing setup. In this paper, we present a systematic review of CD in CNs from conventional machine learning to DL methods and point out the gap of applying DL-based CD methods in large CNs. In addition, the relevant studies on DL with parallel and MH approaches are reviewed and their implications on DL models are highlighted to prospect effective solutions to overcome the challenges of DL-based CD methods. We also point out research challenges in the field of CD and suggest possible future research directions.


Because conventional switching converters are usually using unbalanced circuit topologies, parasitic capacitance between the drain of an MOS-FET and the frame ground through its heat sink may generate the common-mode conducted noise. We proposed a concept of balanced switching converter circuit, which is an effective way to reduce the common-mode conducted noise of a switching converter by current cancellation. In this paper, the path of the noise current in a balanced boost converter circuit is investigated using a current probe. By measuring current waveforms and frequency spectra of the parasitic capacitances and the frame ground line, the mechanism of the common-mode noise reduction by current cancellation is clarified.


The aim of the present study was to improve the solubility and bioavailability of a poorly water-soluble drug in human body, using a solid dispersion technique. Solubility and dissolution rate is an important physicochemical factor affecting absorption of drug and its therapeutic effectiveness. Consequences of poor aqueous solubility would lead to failure in formulation development. The poor solubility of drug substances in water and their low dissolution rate in aqueous G.I.T fluid often leads to insufficient bioavailability. In the present investigation, an attempt was made to improve the solubility and dissolution rate of a poorly soluble drug, Eprosartan by solid dispersion method using skimmed milk powder as carrier. Four different formulations were prepared with varying drug:carrier ratios viz.1:1, 1:3, 1:5 and 1:9 and the corresponding physical mixtures were also prepared. The formulations were characterized for solubility parameters, drug release studies and drug-polymer interactions by using phase solubility studies, dissolution studies; XRD analysis, FTIR spectrum, TLC analysis and UV overlay spectra. All the formulations showed marked improvement in the solubility behaviour and improved drug release. Formulation containing drug: polymer ratio of 1:9 showed the best release with a cumulative release of 82.67 % as compared to 6.919 % for the pure drug. The interaction studies showed no interaction between the drug and the carrier. It was concluded that skimmed milk powder as a carrier can be very well utilized to improve the solubility of poorly soluble drugs.


Xenoestrogens can affect the healthy functioning of a variety of tissues by acting as potent estrogens via nongenomic signaling pathways or by interfering with those actions of multiple physiological estrogens. Collectively, our and other studies have compared a wide range of estrogenic compounds, including some closely structurally related subgroups. The estrogens that have been studied include environmental contaminants of different subclasses, dietary estrogens, and several prominent physiological metabolites. By comparing the nongenomic signaling and functional responses to these compounds, we have begun to address the structural requirements for their actions through membrane estrogen receptors in the pituitary, in comparison to other tissues, and to gain insights into their typical non-monotonic dose-response behavior. Their multiple inputs into cellular signaling begin processes that eventually integrate at the level of mitogen-activated protein kinase activities to coordinately regulate broad cellular destinies, such as proliferation, apoptosis, or differentiation.


The efficacy of the powder of a natural plant product ( Acorus calamus L.) and two synthetic insecticides (i.e. Pirimiphos methyl and Rotenone ) was compared in the laboratory for the control Sitophilus oryzea (L), Rhizopertha dominica (F) and Tribolium castaneum (Herbst) in stored wheat grains. Seven concentrations of the test chemicals (i.e. 1.25, 2.5, 5.0, 10.0, 15.0, 20.0 and 25g per kilogramme of wheat grains) were used. The control treatment consisted of 1kg untreated wheat grains. Percentage mortality was recorded cumulatively at 48h intervals for 16 days. Pirimiphos-methyl at 5g/kg of wheat grains gave 100% mortality of S. oryzea as against A. calamus powder and Rotenone that gave 46.56% and 26.44%, respectively. Mortality observed on R. dominica indicated that 25g of A. calamus powder resulted in significantly (P 0.05) higher percentage mortality 83.22% than pirimiphos-methyl that gave 56.65% and Rotenone with 36.4%. Only pirimiphos-methyl and Rotenone was toxic to T. castaneum , A. calamus powder was not. KEY WORDS: Natural chemicals, synthetic insecticides, wheat grains, cereals. Global Journal of Agricultural Sciences Vol.2(2) 2003: 94-97


Land use changes have a significant impact on soil properties and in some cases they are considered to be among the main threats to soil quality. The present study focuses on the relationship between soil chemistry and land use in a karstic region in Romania, where forests were converted to agricultural land 190 years ago by Czech settlers in the Banat Region. Out of several villages founded by the Czech settlers the study was done around the village of Sfinta Elena. The uniqueness of this study is that traditional agricultural practices using low intensity farming (fallow period, organic fertilizers) have been used continuously since the village was founded. Nowadays the landscape is a mosaic of different land uses. Sixty soil samples from 6 land uses, analysed for pH (active and exchangeable), total cation exchange capacity (CEC), base saturation, amount of Ca2+, Mg2+, K+, accessible P, total N, and soil organic carbon, showed very low concentrations of analysed elements and very low values of CEC and base saturation in soils. Current arable land use exhibited the lowest values especially of soil organic C. Surprisingly, forest soils differed significantly from agricultural soils only in C/N ratio and soil organic C concentration.


As Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) exports to the United States increased over time, some of those countries became subject to antidumping duties by the United States from 1985. The cumulation proviso introduced in the Trade and Tariff Act of 1984 made the relatively smaller exporters like the ASEAN countries exposed to the antidumping measures of the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC). By industry, iron and steel shared about half of the decisions against ASEAN. The percentage of the U.S. ITC Commissioners' affirmative antidumping decisions against the ASEAN member countries was a little higher than that against the other countries. The Democrat Commissioners tended to take more affirmative antidumping decisions against ASEAN than the Republican Commissioners. I. Introduction The reductions in tariffs over the past half century have led the contracting parties and Members of the GATT/WTO to resort to practices other than tariff imposition which constrain trade. The restriction that came to be most often applied is antidumping, which is allowed under certain conditions by the GATT/WTO. In 1995, for instance, antidumping actions reported by the Members to the WTO Committee on Antidumping Practices reached some 352. In the same year, the United States completed 57 preliminary and final antidumping injury investigations on products imported from 16 different countries (U.S. International Trade Commission [ITC], 1996). Although the United States has been one of the largest users of administered protection like antidumping, the ASEAN members were not subject to the U.S. antidumping neasures until the first half of the 1980s. The United States began to take antidumping measures against some of the ASEAN members from 1985. Being highly dependent on international trade, they have been concerned with such measures. Even when the ASEAN members successfully defended themselves against the antidumping petitions, time and resources were wasted. This article intends to show the characteristics of the U.S. antidumping measures against ASEAN, which have rarely been studied in the literature. For this purpose, the WTO regulations on antidumping as well as the U.S. antidumping laws and policies are explained. With this background, the reasons for the upsurge in the U.S. antidumping actions against the ASEAN members are revealed. Furthermore, the U.S. ITC Commissioners' antidumping decisions are investigated to check whether they show partisan or sectoral characteristics. The structure of the article is organized as follows. In the next section, the WTO regulations on antidumping are briefly described. In section III, the U.S. antidumping law and the procedure of its implementation are explained. In section IV, the characteristics of the U.S. antidumping decisions against the ASEAN members are revealed. The U.S. ITC Commissioners' behaviour is also analysed depending on their affiliation with the parties. The final section summarizes the overall results. II. The WTO Regulations on Antidumping Although most international economists do not refute the superiority of free trade over protection in improving national welfare, policy makers in most countries actively practised some form of trade protection. Multilateral trade negotiations have brought down average tariffs to alleviate the trade barriers. The Tokyo Round in the 1970s began to alleviate the non-tariff barriers practised by the then GATT contracting parties. Important advances were made in the Uruguay Round negotiations to guarantee the freer and more transparent trade policies of the WTO Members: mandatory, not voluntary, nature of various Agreements on the non-tariff barriers; strengthening the dispute settlement mechanism; and comprising new areas such as trade in agricultural goods, trade-related intellectual properties, and trade in services.' However, despite the successive, multilateral trade negotiations, the uses of contingent protection such as antidumping certainly have been on the increase. …


The extent of brain tumor resection affects survival. Second-look surgery (resection of residual tumor before radiographic progression) may improve survival by reducing the tumor burden, but the morbidity of the procedure is not known. On chart review of 280 patients with two or more brain tumor operations treated between January 1985 and June 1998, we identified 47 patients with second-look surgery. Lansky and Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) performance scores, as well as perioperative complications were recorded. There were 21 gliomas (6 malignant), 12 medulloblastomas, 3 craniopharyngiomas, 3 ependymomas and 8 miscellaneous tumors. Median time to second surgery was 50 days. Perioperative complications occurred in 45% of patients. There was no significant change in the mean Lansky and ECOG scores 4 and 24 weeks after surgery. Gross total resection (GTR) was achieved in 62% of patients and near total resection (NTR) in 23%, and 15% of patients had subtotal resection. GTR or NTR was achieved in 66% of medulloblastomas and 100% of gliomas. We conclude that second-look surgery by experienced pediatric neurosurgeons has an acceptable morbidity and should be considered in patients with residual tumors.


Sudden cardiac death consists in a sudden cardiac collapse or heart failure secondary to arrhythmia, which unexpectedly occurs within the first hour after the onset of symptoms. Fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia are two arrhythmias responsible for most sudden cardiac arrest events. Others arrhythmias that produce this is asystole and pulseless electrical activity. The backbone in the treatment of sudden cardiac death is the immediate activation of the Chain of Survival with de early implementation of CPR and defibrillation, thus improving the prognosis of survival of patients. The automated implantable cardioverter defibrillator is a device with a high chance of reverting events caused by these arrhythmias to a sinus rhythm. We report a case of a 40-year old man who presented symptoms 20 minutes before being admitted to emergency services. An electrocardiogram was obtained, showing presence of QRS complex overlap in DI, DII and aVF. A skull computerized axial tomography scan showed no evidence of cerebral edema or located injuries. An echocardiogram showed normal heart size, left ventricle ejection fraction of 70%, valves without injuries, and no data regarding pulmonary arterial hypertension. Five days after the cardiac arrest event, an AICD was implanted as primary prevention strategy.


SUMMARY
We have developed a web-based query tool, Whole-Genome rVISTA (WGRV), that determines enrichment of transcription factors (TFs) and associated target genes in sets of co-regulated genes. WGRV enables users to query databases containing pre-computed genome coordinates of evolutionarily conserved transcription factor binding sites in the proximal promoters (from 100 bp to 5 kb upstream) of human, mouse and Drosophila genomes. TF binding sites are based on position-weight matrices from the TRANSFAC Professional database. For a given set of co-regulated genes, WGRV returns statistically enriched and evolutionarily conserved binding sites, mapped by the regulatory VISTA (rVISTA) algorithm. Users can then retrieve a list of genes from the query set containing the enriched TF binding sites and their location in the query set promoters. Results are exported in a BED format for rapid visualization in the UCSC genome browser. Flat files of mapped conserved sites and their genomic coordinates are also available for analysis with stand-alone software.

AVAILABILITY
http://genome.lbl.gov/cgi-bin/WGRVistaInputCommon.pl.


Abstract Theoretical considerations and empirical regressions show that, in the magnitude range between 3 and 5, local magnitude, M L , and moment magnitude, M w , scale 1:1. Previous studies suggest that for smaller magnitudes this 1:1 scaling breaks down. However, the scatter between M L and M w at small magnitudes is usually large and the resulting scaling relations are therefore uncertain. In an attempt to reduce these uncertainties, we first analyze the M L versus M w relation based on 195 events, induced by the stimulation of a geothermal reservoir below the city of Basel, Switzerland. Values of M L range from 0.7 to 3.4. From these data we derive a scaling of M L ∼1.5 M w over the given magnitude range. We then compare peak Wood–Anderson amplitudes to the low-frequency plateau of the displacement spectra for six sequences of similar earthquakes in Switzerland in the range of 0.5≤ M L ≤4.1. Because effects due to the radiation pattern and to the propagation path between source and receiver are nearly identical at a particular station for all events in a given sequence, the scatter in the data is substantially reduced. Again we obtain a scaling equivalent to M L ∼1.5 M w . Based on simulations using synthetic source time functions for different magnitudes and Q values estimated from spectral ratios between downhole and surface recordings, we conclude that the observed scaling can be explained by attenuation and scattering along the path. Other effects that could explain the observed magnitude scaling, such as a possible systematic increase of stress drop or rupture velocity with moment magnitude, are masked by attenuation along the path.


The revolutions of the Arab Spring are twisting and turning on a troubled course. After an uprising overthrew Mubarak last year, elections were held in June in which the Muslim Brotherhood dominated—only to have the military once again assert its authority over any new parliament and constitution. What is at stake is whether Egypt will remain a secular state like Turkey, or take on a moretheocratic bent if ruled by Islamists.

In this section, the Arab world's only Nobel laureate in science offers his views about Egypt's future. The Turkish president argues for a secularism that tolerates all religions in Egypt. The CIA's former top analyst on the Muslim world questions whether Islamist parties can deliver once in power instead of opposition.


We studied various aspects of heat‐shock response with special emphasis on the expression of heat‐shock protein 70 (hsp70) genes at various levels in two congener species of littoral endemic amphipods (Eulimnogammarus cyaneus and E. verrucosus) from Lake Baikal which show striking differences in their vertical distribution and thermal tolerance. Although both the species studied demonstrate high constitutive levels of Hsp70, the thermotolerant E. cyaneus exhibited a 5‐fold higher basal level of Hsp70 proteins under normal physiological conditions (7 °C) and significantly lower induction of Hsp70 after temperature elevation compared with the more thermosensitive E. verrucosus. We isolated the hsp70 genes from both species and analysed their sequences. Two isoforms of the cytosolic Hsp70/Hsc70 proteins were detected in both species under normal physiological conditions and encoded by two distinct hsp/hsc70 family members. While both Hsp70 isoforms were synthesized without heat shock, only one of them was induced by temperature elevation. The observed differences in the Hsp70 expression patterns, including the dynamics of Hsp70 synthesis and threshold of induction, suggest that the increased thermotolerance in E. cyaneus (compared with E. verrucosus) is associated with a complex structural and functional rearrangement of the hsp70 gene family and favoured the involvement of Hsp70 in adaptation to fluctuating thermal conditions. This study provides insights into the molecular mechanisms underlying the thermal adaptation of Baikal amphipods and represents the first report describing the structure and function of the hsp70 genes of endemic Baikal species dwelling in thermally contrasting habitats.


Consolidation of workloads has emerged as a key mechanism to dampen the rapidly growing energy expenditure within enterprise-scale data centers. To gainfully utilize consolidation-based techniques, we must be able to characterize the power consumption of groups of colocated applications. Such characterization is crucial for effective prediction and enforcement of appropriate limits on power consumption-power budgets-within the data center. We identify two kinds of power budgets: 1) an average budget to capture an upper bound on long-term energy consumption within that level and 2) a sustained budget to capture any restrictions on sustained draw of current above a certain threshold. Using a simple measurement infrastructure, we derive power profiles-statistical descriptions of the power consumption of applications. Based on insights gained from detailed profiling of several applications-both individual and consolidated-we develop models for predicting average and sustained power consumption of consolidated applications. We conduct an experimental evaluation of our techniques on a Xen-based server that consolidates applications drawn from a diverse pool. For a variety of consolidation scenarios, we are able to predict average power consumption within five percent error margin and sustained power within 10 percent error margin. Using prediction techniques allows us to ensure safe yet efficient system operation-in a representative case, we are able to improve the number of applications consolidated on a server from two to three (compared to existing baseline techniques) by choosing the appropriate power state that satisfies the power budgets associated with the server.


This thesis is concerned with Intelligent Tutoring Systems. It investigates the architecture of an Intelligent Knowledge Based Tutoring System in terms of three knowledge models: that of the domain, the student and the tutor, and examines the interrelatedness and interconnectedness of these three knowledge models. Existing Knowledge Based Tutoring Systems are reviewed, and the relationship between their behaviour and architecture is analysed by evaluating them against Wenger's model of a didactic operation. Two such systems, PROUST, a tutoring system for Pascal program debugging skills, and micro-SEARCH, a tutoring system for mathematical transformations skills, are used in the study. This evaluation serves two purposes: to unravel the requirements for interrelatedness and interconnectedness between the three knowledge models in order to develop a true Knowledge Based Tutoring System with a full-scale didactic operation, and to uncover the limitations of the current generation of Knowledge Based Tutoring Systems and how they fail to fully encompass these requirements. On this basis the thesis goes on to propose a hybrid model made up of Artificial Intelligence and Hypertext concepts which helps to overcome the limitations of existing Knowledge Based Tutoring Systems. This model in particular addresses the requirements for the development of an Intelligent Tutoring Systems with a full-scale didactic operation. The model integrates Hypertext's explicit information nodes and linking properties with Artificial Intelligence's logical inferencing on knowledge representation schemes. The thesis finally shows how to use this model to design a generic Intelligent Tutoring System that supports a full-scale didactic operation.


Land-use conflicts arise if land is scarce, land-use types are mutually exclusive, and vary in their effects with regard to more than one incongruent policy objective. If these effects depend on the spatial location of the land-use measures the conflict can be mediated through an appropriate spatial allocation of land use. An example of this conflict is the welfare-optimal allocation of wind turbines (WT) in a region in order to achieve a given energy target at least social costs. The energy target is motivated by the fact that wind power production is associated with relatively low CO2 emissions and is currently the most efficient source of renewable energy supply. However, it is associated with social costs which comprise energy production costs as well as external costs caused by harmful impacts on humans and biodiversity. We present a modelling approach that combines spatially explicit ecological-economic modelling and choice experiments to determine the welfare-optimal spatial allocation of WT in Western Saxony, Germany. We show that external costs are significant. The welfare-optimal sites are therefore not those with the highest energy output (i.e., lowest production costs). However, they show lower external costs than the most productive sites. A sensitivity analysis reveals that the external costs represent about seven percent of the total costs (production costs plus external costs). Increasing the energy production target increases both production and external costs. The absolute (percentage) increase of production costs is higher (lower) than that of external costs.


The main aim of this paper is development of renewable energy sources in distributed generation (DG) systems. A fuel cell (FC) is considered as a promising power generating sources for DG system. In this paper, a mathematical analysis of Solid Oxide Fuel Cell is carried out for extensive MATLAB/Simulink modeling. For the transient analysis of SOFC distributed generation system, a AC/DC load is taken. A detailed study on solid oxide fuel cell modeling has been done. Furthermore, a novel research work is required to enhance the performance and its cost. The performance of designed system is investigated for predicting the fuel cell operating behaviour with more accurately and it is found satisfactory.


Abstract In this paper a finite-element analysis was carried out using Plaxis2D software to model a vertical cut reinforced by nails. Optimization of the effect of three input parameters on stability design is a key element of the analysis. We compare results obtained by three techniques of design optimization; Taguchi's Design of Experiment (DOE), Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO). The effect of three input factors on stability design was considered: nail length to wall height ratio (A), nail inclination (B) and vertical spacing (C). By altering the parameter variables, the design served to build and acquire a statistically significant mathematical model for optimizing soil nailing wall parameters. The aim is to minimize a single objective function of safety factor and identify the optimal parameters of design among all possibilities. DOE method and result analysis were carried out using MINITAB 18 software, while GA and PSO algorithm analysis were implemented by coding in MATLAB. According to the results, it was found that 9m of length, 2m of vertical spacing and 10° of inclination is the optimal combination minimizing safety factor. The results produced from this study show that all three techniques arrive at the same optimal combination of minimum response.


This paper describes a 3 to 5 GHz frequency synthesizer for MB-OFDM (multi-band OFDM) UWB (Ultra-Wideband) application using 0.13 um CMOS process. The frequency synthesizer operates in the band group 1 whose center frequencies are 3432 MHz, 3960 MHz, and 4488 MHz. To cover the overall frequencies of group 1, an efficient frequency planning minimizing a number of blocks and the power consumption are proposed. And, a high-frequency VCO and prescaler architecture are also presented in this paper. A new coarse tuning scheme that utilizes the MIM capacitance and the varactor is proposed to expand the VCO tuning range. The single PLL and two SSB-mixers consume 75 mW from a 1.5 V supply. The VCO tuning range is 500 MHz. The simulated phase noise of the VCO is -110 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset. The die area is 3 x 2 mm2.


In this thesis, design and analysis of energyand spectral-efficient communication and cellular systems in micro wave and millimeter wave bands are considered using the following system performance metrics: i) Energy efficiency; ii) Spectral efficiency; iii) Spatial spectral efficiency; iv) Spatial energy efficiency, and v) Bit error rate. Statistical channel distributions, Nakagami-m and Generalized-K, and path loss models, Line of Sight (LOS) and Non-Line of Sight (NLOS), are used to represent the propagation environment in these systems. Adaptive M -QAM and M -CPFSK communication systems are proposed to enhance their efficiency metrics as a function of Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) over the channel. It is observed that in the adaptive M -QAM system energy efficiency can be improved by 0.214 bits/J whereas its spectral efficiency can be enhanced by 40%, for wide range of SNR compared to that of conventional M -QAM system. In case of adaptive M -CPFSK system, spectral and energy efficiencies can be increased by 33% and 76%, respectively. A framework for design and analysis of a cellular system, with omni and sectorized antenna systems at Base Station (BS), using its efficiency metrics and coverage probability is presented assuming wireless channel is Nakagami-m fading coupled with path loss and co-channel interference. It is noted that sectorized antenna system at BS enhances energy and spectral efficiencies by nearly 109% and 1.5 bits/s/Hz, respectively, compared to conventional omni antenna system. A Multi-User MIMO cellular system is then investigated and closed-form expressions for its uplink efficiency metrics are derived for fading and shadowing wireless channel environment. It is observed that increasing number of antennas in MIMO system at BS can significantly improve efficiency metrics of cellular system. Finally, a framework for design and analysis of dense mmWave cellular system, in 28 and 73 GHz bands, is presented for efficient utilization of spectrum i and power of the system. The efficiency metrics of the system are evaluated for LOS and NLOS links. It is observed that while 28 GHz band is expedient for indoor cellular systems, the 73 GHz band is appropriate for outdoor systems.


Health psychology is the study of
psychological and behavioral processes in health, illness, and healthcare. It
is concerned with understanding how psychological, behavioral, and cultural
factors contribute to physical health and illness. Psychological factors can
affect health directly. For example, chronically occurring environmental
stressors affecting the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis, cumulatively, can
harm health. Behavioral factors can also affect a person's health.


Abstract Substantial ice loss has occurred in the Russian High Arctic during the past decade, predominantly on Novaya Zemlya, yet the region has been studied relatively little. Consequently, the factors forcing mass loss and the relative contribution of ice dynamics versus surface melt are poorly understood. Here we evaluate the influence of atmospheric/oceanic forcing and variations in fjord width on the behaviour of 38 glaciers on the northern ice cap, Novaya Zemlya. We compare retreat rates on land- versus marine-terminating outlets and on the Kara versus Barents Sea coasts. Between 1992 and 2010, 90% of the study glaciers retreated and retreat rates were an order of magnitude higher for marine-terminating outlets (52.1 ma-1) than for land-terminating glaciers (4.8ma-1). We identify a post-2000 acceleration in marine-terminating glacier retreat, which corresponded closely to changes in sea-ice concentrations. Retreat rates were higher on the Barents Sea coast, which we partly attribute to lower sea-ice concentrations, but varied dramatically between individual glaciers. We use empirical data to categorize changes in along-flow fjord width, and demonstrate a significant relationship between fjord width variability and retreat rate. Results suggest that variations in fjord width exert a major influence on glacier retreat.


: The biosynthesis of glycopeptide antibiotics such as vancomycin and other biologically active biaryl-bridged and diaryl ether-linked macrocyclic peptides includes key enzymatic oxidative phenol macrocyclization(s) of linear precursors. However, a simple and step-economical biomimetic version of this transformation remains underdeveloped. Here, we report highly efficient conditions for preparing biaryl-bridged and diaryl ether-linked macrocyclic peptides based on multicopper(II) catalysts. The selective syntheses of ring models of vancomycin and the arylomycin cyclic core illustrate the potential of this technology to facilitate the assembly of complex antibiotic macrocyclic peptides whose syntheses are considered highly challenging. The unprecedented ability of multicopper clusters to chelate tethered diphenols and promote intramolecular over intermolecular coupling reactions demonstrates that copper clusters can catalyze redox transformations that are not accessible by smaller metal catalysts.


The electrochemical reaction of solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) was reviewed in terms of mass and charge transports of reaction species around the electrode/electrolyte interfaces. Oxygen reduction and fuel oxidation were analyzed by isotope labeling and secondary ion mass spectrometry as well as conventional electrochemical method. The SIMS images after 18O2 (stable isotope oxygen) labeling suggested that the O2/cathode/electrolyte interfaces were the most active parts for oxygen reduction and incorporation. The widths of active parts of oxygen reduction were about several 100 to some 1000 nm different depending on the cathode materials and reaction mechanism. The isotope labeling-SIMS technique was also applied to visualize the active parts for CH4 decomposition and carbon deposition around the anode metal/electrolyte oxide interfaces. The active parts for carbon deposition were only on the Ni surface on YSZ electrolyte. The effect of substrate oxide on the carbon deposition was also examined at the mesh-shaped metal/oxide interfaces.


Engineers work collaboratively most, if not all, of the time. Yet even the most successful among them can be hindered by suboptimal teamwork. Successful collaboration is often seen as a matter of luck or innate talent. This paper describes a project that attempts to teach its essential components, in an academic setting, in a meaningful way that translates to a lasting increase in effectiveness. MIT undergraduates in team-based engineering and science courses were given a combination of lecture, workshop, introspection, and game activities woven into their collaborative technical work. Survey data indicate that more than 70% of the respondents reported useful learning about such essential collaborative behaviors as speaking up effectively in a group, learning about others' points of view, and functioning well together under pressure. In a reflective writing exercise, students expanded upon these findings, describing concrete improvements in their teamwork. The strength of these results suggests that students not only learned information about collaboration, but more importantly that they began to put that information into practice in circumstances that directly affected the success of their engineering work. Further work will include developing more robust outcome data and longitudinal followup.


In modern computing environments, hardware resources are commonly shared, and parallel computation is more widely used. Users run their services in parallel on the same hardware and process information with different confidentiality levels every day. Running parallel tasks can cause privacy and security problems if proper isolation is not enforced. Computers need to rely on a trusted root to protect the data from malicious entities. Intel proposed the Software Guard eXtension (SGX) to create a trusted execution environment (TEE) within the processor. SGX allows developers to benefit from the hardware level isolation. SGX relies only on the hardware, and claims runtime protection even if the OS and other software components are malicious. However, SGX disregards any kind of side-channel attacks. Researchers have demonstrated that microarchitectural sidechannels are very effective in thwarting the hardware provided isolation. In scenarios that involve SGX as part of their defense mechanism, system adversaries become important threats, and they are capable of initiating these attacks. This work introduces a new and more powerful cache side-channel attack that provides system adversaries a high resolution channel. The developed attack is able to virtually track all memory accesses of SGX execution with temporal precision. As a proof of concept, we demonstrate our attack to recover cryptographic AES keys from the commonly used implementations including those that were believed to be resistant in previous attack scenarios. Our results show that SGX cannot protect critical data sensitive computations, and efficient AES key recovery is possible in a practical environment. In contrast to previous attacks which require hundreds of measurements, this is the first cache side-channel attack on a real system that can recover AES keys with a minimal number of measurements. We can successfully recover the AES key from T-Table based implementations in a known plaintext and ciphertext scenario with an average of 15 and 7 samples respectively.