Evidence suggests that the vasodilator actions of S-nitrosothiols more closely resemble those of endothelium-dependent-relaxing factor (EDRF) than do those of nitric oxide (NO). S-nitrosothiols such as L-S-nitrosocysteine are thought to be stored within cytoplasmic vesicles in endothelial cells. Stimulation of endothelial cells with agonists or shear stress is thought to mobilize these vesicles by exocytotic mechanisms. We have shown that cytoplasmic vesicles exists in the endothelium of rat cerebral and basilar arteries, and in small rat pulmonary, mesenteric and femoral arteries. The presence of these vesicles suggests that a ubiquitous process, namely, vesicular exocytosis, may be involved in the ability of the endothelium to regulate vascular tone. This study demonstrates the presence of NADPH diaphorase positive vesicles, which may be a histochemical marker for S-nitrosothiols, rather than for NO synthase. We have demonstrated that endothelial cells contain fusion proteins necessary for vesicular exocytosis at the light level and ultrastructurally. Ultrastructurally, vesicle-associated membrane protein (VAMP) was shown to be closely associated with the vesicle membrane, while synaptosomal-associated protein of 25KDa (SNAP-25) and syntaxin were located in the endothelial cell membrane. The fusion proteins are therefore ideally located for core complex formation, which precedes exocytosis. We found that the endothelium-dependent agonist, acetylcholine, elicited a pronounced relaxation of small pulmonary, mesenteric and femoral arteries. This observation was paired with a significant increase in the number of fused vesicles at the endothelial cell membrane. In systemic arteries, hypoxia elicited relaxation and an increase in the numbers of fused vesicles at the endothelial cell membrane. In the small pulmonary artery, hypoxia elicited vasoconstriction and an increase in the number of fused vesicles. These results support the possibility that endothelium-dependent relaxation in response to stimuli such as shear stress and hypoxia is achieved by (1) mobilization of S-nitrosothiol-containing vesicles to the endothelial plasma membrane, (2) fusion of the vesicle to the plasma membrane and then exocytosis (release), and (3) S-nitrosothiolmediated relaxation of vascular smooth muscle.


To the Editor.— Hidradenitis suppurativa is a chronic, progressive disease with substantial morbidity that occurs chiefly in young adults and is topographically limited to the apocrine gland-bearing areas of the body. The usual sites of involvement are the axillae, perineum, buttocks, breasts, and umbilicus. However, it occasionally occurs in areas where apocrine glands are considered ectopic, such as the face and the eyelids (Arch Ophthalmol77:635,1967). There have been few reports in the literature concerning hidradenitis suppurativa in ectopic or unusual sites. In the following case, the patient had extensive hidradenitis suppurativa of the axillae, groin, and buttocks, as well as involvement of the right temporal and periorbital areas. Report of a Case A 57-year-old white man was institutionalized in a state mental hospital at the age of 22 with a diagnosis of chronic schizophrenia, simple type. He has remained in the institution for the past 35 years. He apparently


Computerized methods and visual assessment of computed tomography (CT) scans were compared in a subsample of a population based twin study to explore the relationships between emphysema, smoking, decreased pulmonary function, and elastin degradation products.

138 twins were investigated. Two radiologists classified the CT-scans by presence of Centrilobular Emphysema (CE). PD15 (i.e. the cut off value in Hounsfield units [HU] for the 15% darkest areas) as well as fixed HU limits were used in the computerized analyses. Lung function and urinary desmosines were measured by specialist laboratories.

There was no significant relationship between PD15 and current smoking or pack-years. Low C-reactive protein and body-mass-index were associated with low PD15 (p<0.01 for both). Also sex was significantly associated with PD15. Of the lung function measures, FEV1/FVC (low values) and FVC (high values) were associated with low PD15. Associations between these measures and CT findings were strongest for the upper third of the lung.

106 of the 138 twins had CE, 27 had not CE. Five subjects were omitted due to poor quality and technical problems. In the CE group FEV1 % pred. was lower (p=0.018), as was the FEV1/FVC-ratio and DLCO (both p<0.001), further, CRP was higher (p= 0.014) and U-desmosines showed a tendency to be higher (p= 0.054).The proportion with CE was associated with PD15.

In this population based study on mild COPD, the lung function and biomarker parameters of disease were closer associated to visual scoring of emphysema than to quantitative CT measurements. If quantitative measures should be used for staging and phenotyping smoking induced emphysema, such measurements should be focused on the upper third of the lungs.


The use of diamagnetic levitation for micromechanical bearings is discussed. The simple system of a magnetic sphere supported by a diamagnetic material has an analytic solution for the vertical force; this solution is used to illustrate the fundamental properties of diamagnetic levitation. Work by previous researchers to diamagnetically levitate magnets with masses as large as tens of grams using external fields, as well as micrometer-scale levitation of diamagnetic materials, is discussed. Calculations presented suggest modern magnets on the order of 100 to 300 mu m will self-levitate over diamagnetic materials without supporting external fields. This suggests a number of noncontact micromechanical bearing applications, such as for microrobotics and highly sensitive sensors. Diamagnetic bearing are typically limited to light-load applications. To alleviate this limitation, a noncontact, hybrid diamagnetic air bearing is proposed for light-load/low-speed to high-load high-speed use without the start-up problems normally associated with self-pumping air bearings. A preliminary analysis of the hybrid bearing concept suggests that squeeze film effects may allow virtually the full drive load to be applied at start-up, provided lateral acceleration is high.<<ETX>>


Musculocutaneous nerve is the nerve of anterior compartment of the arm & it supplies the muscles of front of the arm and skin on the lateral aspect of forearm. It is the terminal branch of lateral cord of brachial plexus. Variations of musculocutaneous nerve have been reported by previous authors. Here we present a case of unilateral anomalous origin of musculocutaneous nerve along with an additional nerve supply to biceps brachii and brachialis during routine undergraduate dissection in the left arm of 55 years old male cadaver. These variations should be searched during surgical reduction of fractures by orthopaedicians and should not be overlooked by surgeons during nerve repair to prevent damage to the additional branch which supplies muscles of anterior compartment of arm.

Keywords: Brachial Plexus, Lateral cord, Median nerve, Musculocutaneous nerve, Muscles of anterior compartment of arm


Research has shown that people inaccurately assess their own abilities on self-report measures, including academic, athletic, and music ability. Evidence suggests this is also true for singing, with individuals either overestimating or underestimating their level of singing competency. In this paper, we present the Melbourne Singing Tool Questionnaire (MST-Q), a brief 16-item measure exploring people's self-perceptions of singing ability and engagement with singing. Using a large sample of Australian twins (n = 996), we identified three latent factors underlying MST-Q items and examined whether these factors were related to an objective phenotypic measure of singing ability. The three factors were identified as Personal Engagement, Social Engagement, and Self-Evaluation. All factors were positively associated with objective singing performance, with the Self-Evaluation factor yielding the strongest correlation (r = 0.66). Both the Self-Evaluation factor and a single self-report item of singing ability shared the same predictive strength. Contrary to expectations, our findings suggest that self-evaluation strongly predicts singing ability, and this self-evaluation is of higher predictive value than self-reported engagement with music and singing.


Background: In human pregnancies HLA-G (Human leukocyte antigens G) is supposed that play a
main role in implantation. It is expressed on trophoblast cells that invades during pregnancy to the
uterus decidua and is introduced to induce maternal tolerance immunologically against the fetus.
Objective: The aim of this study was to find association between the HLA-G*0105N
polymorphism and recurrent abortion in women.
Methods: This case-control study was conducted on two groups of 108 women with history
recurrent abortion (RSA) as a case group or without history RSA as a control group in Cellular and
Molecular Research Center, Qazvin University of Medical Sciences in 2015. The frequency of null
allele of HLA-G*0105N was studied in two groups by PCR-RFLP method. Allele and genotype
frequencies of two group were compared using Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium and Chi-square test.
Findings: In case group, 54 (50%) and 17 (15.7%) were heterozygous and homozygous
respectively for HLA-G*0105N polymorphism. In control group, only 9 (8%) was homozygous for
HLA-G*0105N polymorphism. But there was no significant difference between case and control on
HLA-G*0105N allele with RSA (P=0.1004).
Conclusion: As the results, there was no significant association between HLA-G*0105N poly
morphism and RSA. Thus, it seems that this HLA-G*0105N polymorphism may effective in
relation with other genes or polymorphisms in RSA.
Keywords: HLA-G*0105N, Polymorphism, Recurrent spontaneous abortion


Since 2012 and the release of BDLISA, some River Basin Districts are engaged in the adjustment of their Water Framework Directive groundwater
bodies, based on this up-to-date hydrogeological knowledge.
For the next River Basin Management Plans (RBMP), WFD groundwater bodies are either adjusted for following River Basin Districts or retained from 1st RBMP for following River Basin Districts or created (Mayotte island).
The delineation methodology benefits from BDLISA. It consists first in cross-referencing between initial WFD groundwater bodies and BDLISA units. Then limit origins for each groundwater bodies are differenciated and each "hydrogeological" limits are replaced by the
BDLISA unit limits. Thus groundwater bodies are delineated according to the improved selected limits. Finally the new reference system
consistency is checked.


The interpretation, application and understanding of community participation in the South African local government discourse in particular, is ambiguous, thus, creating a more simplistic and superficial meaning for operationalization. This paper seeks to challenge the notion that community participation is a substitute in its ontological and epistemological form and connotation for public participation. Many scholars in public administration have jumped on the bandwagon of dispensation, thus creating a misnomer in relation to a distinct nature of community participation and public participation which clearly undermines the authenticity of conception within the discipline and scholarship in general. Using a variety of qualitative secondary data collection and analytical techniques, this paper interrogates the misnomer in public administration scholarship in relation to the use and application of community participation specifically in local government. To successfully demonstrate this misnomer regarding the use, application and understanding of the concepts and their impact on scholarship, five selected articles on community participation and five others on public participation on local government published in the Journal of Public Administration (JOPA) were reviewed. The paper therefore concludes that the influential role of public administration as a scientific discipline is to forge relations with public administration as a practice for the purposes of conceptualizing and operationalising concepts and terminologies. This will ensure conciseness and bypass the contradictions which have potency of denting both scholarship and practice.


One of the most important organizational developments in recent years has been the significant growth of project work in different economic sectors and industries (Winter, Smith, Morris, & Cicmil, 2006). Thus, projects have become a key strategic working form. Further, it has been shown that all industries can benefit from project-based working (OPSR, 2003). No longer just a sub-discipline of engineering, the management of projects -including program management and portfolio managementis now the dominant model in many organizations for strategy implementation, business transformation, continuous improvement and new product development (Winter et al., 2006). However, there is growing recognition that different types of projects require different approaches to their management (Müller & Turner, 2007). Furthermore, the increasing globalization of projects and project management adds intercultural challenges for project managers (Müller & Turner, 2004). There is no doubt that management's configuration of projects affects the project's evolution. There are also factors like virtual teamwork and team building processes that are relevant to that evolution. Since effectiveness in managing projects depends on these factors, the authors conducted this research to determine whether project performance varies according to project management and other factors. Thus, with a view to complementing other research to link project management to project success (Din, Abd-Hamid, & Bryde, 2011; Mir & Pinnington, 2014), this work considers factors such as virtual team configuration, team composition, knowledge competence, policy and strategy, project life monitoring and the level of detail implemented in managing projects that are undertaken in the learning process. The data for this research was provided by an educational framework that was specifically designed to facilitate the learning experience of project management engineering students. The main purpose of this learning experience was to highlight how to move from simply learning content by rote to understanding, discussing and sharing (Alba-Elías, González-Marcos, & Ordieres-Meré, 2014). In this case, practitioners learned and applied by means of an experimental learning approach, a defined project management methodology that enables them to manage projects better. Data mining and data analytics were used in this work to identify and understand the relationships between project performance and the analyzed factors. Data mining is widely applied in the educational area to predict students' performance Ana González-Marcos Universidad de La Rioja, Spain


This article discusses, with regards the case of Peru, the impact of the emergence of women in situations of power, particularly considering their influence on the extension (or no) of women's rights in general terms. After reviewing the variety of women in politics today, the article points out the virtues and the limitations of the pattern of including women in the personalized and authoritarian regime of President Fujimori. It also examines to what point the institutional weaknesses, lack of leadership and meagre channels of social and political participation that exist in Peru hinder a relation of negotiation between the State and society. http://www.iep.org.pe http://www.iep.org.pe


In the present state of the art, coherent optical receivers most often operate in the heterodyne mode. Here a photodiode-amplifier combination having bandwidth greater than twice the bit rate ( B ) is needed: indeed bandwidths considerably greater than 2B are preferably employed to ease design of the bandpass filter needed for noise limitation, and to avoid demodulator penalties in some modulation schemes. For the high bit rate systems now coming into service (560 Mbit/s-2.4 Gbit/s), the optical receiver design requirements become more stringent for coherent heterodyne operation. The various modes of "zero IF" operation, however, require only baseband receiver module bandwidth. The options available are either homodyne (phase locked) operation, or phase diversity (multiport) techniques. In this paper, we compare these options, and show that phase diversity techniques are capable of good performance for high bit rate coherent receivers. In phase diversity operation, not only is phase locking avoided, but also the necessary frequency locking does not have high stability requirements. Furthermore, there are advantages in operating with a small frequency offset from zero (of the order of 1 percent of the bit rate). An experimental receiver has been operated at 320 and 680 Mbit/s, demodulating both amplitude shift keying (ASK) and differential phase shift keying (DPSK). Operation with FSK is also possible. Sensitivities so far achieved of -47.5 dBm (320-Mbit/s ASK) and -42 dBm (680- Mbit/s ASK) with limited local oscillator power are capable of substantial improvement when higher power local oscillators and lower noise receive modules become available. Demodulation of DPSK at 320 Mbit/s has also been achieved and shows a measured receiver sensitivity improvement of over 4 dB over ASK at the same bit rate and local oscillator power. These practical results show clearly that phase diversity is a very realistic option for high bit rate systems.


Abstract. The generation, transport and characterization of supercooled
droplets in multiphase wind tunnel test facilities is of great importance
for conducting icing experiments and to better understand cloud
microphysical processes such as coalescence, ice nucleation, accretion and
riming. To this end, a spray system has been developed, tested and
calibrated in the Braunschweig Icing Wind Tunnel. Liquid droplets in the
size range of 1 to 150 µm produced by pneumatic atomizers were
accelerated to velocities between 10 and 40 m s−1 and supercooled to
temperatures between 0 and −20 ∘C. Thereby, liquid water contents between 0.07 and 2.5 g m−3 were obtained in the test
section. The wind tunnel conditions were stable and reproducible within
3 % standard variation for median volumetric diameter (MVD) and 7 %
standard deviation for liquid water content (LWC). Different instruments
were integrated in the icing wind tunnel measuring the particle size
distribution (PSD), MVD and LWC. Phase Doppler interferometry (PDI), laser
spectroscopy with a fast cloud droplet probe (FCDP) and shadowgraphy were
systematically compared for present wind tunnel conditions. MVDs measured
with the three instruments agreed within 15 % in the range between 8 and 35 µm and showed high coefficients of determination
(R2) of 0.985 for FCDP and 0.799 for shadowgraphy with respect to PDI data. Between 35 and 56 µm MVD, the shadowgraphy data
exhibit a low bias with respect to PDI. The instruments' trends and biases
for selected droplet conditions are discussed. LWCs determined from mass
flow calculations in the range of 0.07–1.5 g m−3 are compared to measurements of the bulk phase rotating cylinder technique (RCT) and the above-mentioned single-particle instruments. For RCT, agreement with the mass flow calculations of approximately 20 % in LWC was achieved. For PDI 84 % of measurement points with LWC<0.5 g m−3 agree with mass flow calculations within a range of ±0.1 g m−3. Using the different techniques, a comprehensive wind tunnel calibration for supercooled droplets was achieved, which is a prerequisite for providing well-characterized liquid cloud conditions for icing tests for aerospace, wind turbines and power networks.


Background: Although colonoscopy (CY) may be considered the best screening test for colorectal cancer (CRC), annual fecal immunochemical test (FIT), which quantifies fecal hemoglobin is a viable alternative. Countries and healthcare systems using FIT-based screening may need to prioritize which FIT positive persons requires CY sooner (e.g. within the same fiscal year). We conducted a systematic review of published literature to understand how the yield/positive predictive value (PPV) of FIT could be improved.
Study Design: We performed a search of electronic databases for articles published between 2015 and June 2020. Titles, abstracts, and full texts were independently screened. Included studies fulfilled predetermined criteria and had descriptive and quantitative data extracted. We identified studies comparing the yield of FIT for advanced colorectal neoplasia ([AN], CRC plus advanced adenomas) among FIT positive persons to the yield of AN when FIT is combined with risk factors (age, sex, BMI, etc.). Data were extracted to find yield and efficiency of FIT alone vs FIT plus risk factors among FIT positive persons.
Results: From 623 titles reviewed, 4 studies met inclusion criteria. The objective of the studies was to increase the yield of AN or CRC in FIT positive patients. The number needed to scope (NNS) among FIT positives to detect AN significantly decreased for each study when looking at high risk groups as yield/PPV increased. The yield with FIT alone ranged from 24% to 46% and the NNS from 2.2 to 4.1. With risk factors, yield and NNS among those at high risk were 33.2 % to 75.6% and from 1.3 to 3.0, respectively.
Conclusion and Potential Impact: This systematic review quantifies how risk factors improve the yield for AN in FIT positive persons, which is information required for countries and health care settings with limited resources that need to direct CY resources to FIT positive patients at high risk for AN.


Author(s): Benthall, Sebastian P | Advisor(s): Chuang, John; Mulligan, Deirdre | Abstract: The creators of technical infrastructure are under social and legal pressure to comply with expectations that can be difficult to translate into computational and business logics. This dissertation bridges this gap through three projects that focus on privacy engineering, information security, and data economics, respectively. These projects culminate in a new formal method for evaluating the strategic and tactical value of data: data games. This method relies on a core theoretical contribution building on the work of Shannon, Dretske, Pearl, Koller, and Nissenbaum: a definition of situated information flow as causal flow in the context of other causal relations and strategic choices. The first project studies privacy engineering's use of Contextual Integrity theory (CI), which defines privacy as appropriate information flow according to norms specific to social contexts or spheres. Computer scientists using CI have innovated as they have implemented the theory and blended it with other traditions, such as context-aware computing. This survey examines computer science literature using Contextual Integrity and discovers, among other results, that technical and social platforms that span social contexts challenge CI's current commitment to normative social spheres. Sociotechnical situations can and do defy social expectations with cross-context clashes, and privacy engineering needs its normative theories to acknowledge and address this fact. This concern inspires the second project, which addresses the problem of building computational systems that comply with data flow and security restrictions such as those required by law. Many privacy and data protection policies stipulate restrictions on the flow of information based on that information's original source. We formalize this concept of privacy as Origin Privacy. This formalization shows how information flow security can be represented using causal modeling. Causal modeling of information security leads to general theorems about the limits of privacy by design as well as a shared language for representing specific privacy concepts such as noninterference, differential privacy, and authorized disclosure. The third project uses the causal modeling of information flow to address gaps in current theory of data economics. Like CI, privacy economics has focused on individual economic contexts and so has been unable to comprehend an information economy that relies on the flow of information across contexts. Data games, an adaptation of Multi-Agent Influence Diagrams for mechanism design, are used to model the well known economic contexts of principal-agent contracts and price differentiation as well as new contexts such as personalized expert services and data reuse. This work reveals that information flows are not goods but rather strategic resources, and that trade in information therefore involves market externalities.


Background: This study aimed to assess health-related quality of life among Northern Jordanians. Methods: A cross-sectional design study was conducted at three shopping centres in northern Jordan. Respondents were invited to complete a questionnaire assessing their quality of life using the SF-36 health survey. Results: Data were obtained from 915 Jordanian adults with a mean age of 33.8 years (SD = 28.2). The total SF-36 score for the whole population was 71.2. Females reported lower SF-36 scores in both physical and emotional health (P < 0.001), and the elderly reported the lowest physical health scores (P = 0.05). Physical health was dramatically affected by health problems such as rheumatoid arthritis, obesity, back pain and asthma (P = 0.05). Conversely, emotional health was adversely affected by monthly income (P < 0.001). Conclusion: Quality of life among a northern Jordanian population was considered acceptable. Physical health worsened with ageing, obesity, back pain, rheumatoid pain, cardiovascular disease and asthmatic disease; however, emotional health was adversely affected by a lower socioeconomic level or chronic diseases. Young adults need more concern about their emotional health, which was highly affected by their economic level.


I look at portraiture in the context of its use in history, contemporary use and social practice: how and why to paint at a time when photography is ubiquitous. Some artists are happy to use photographs as studies and source material, while others prefer to work only from a live sitter or model. I prefer to work from life rather than photographs, but had to reassess my own working preferences and find ways to interpret and use photographic and other sources when I chose my family as a subject. (None of them lived close by, and I included some from previous generations who are now dead). In doing so I have developed practice in drawing on memory and emotion as part of the relationship between artist and sitter or absent motif, which I now find to be a core part of the endeavour. I learned to develop my judgment to distinguish between attempting simply to capture the features of the sitter (as a snapshot or passport photograph might do), and an insightful portrait. I have gained more awareness of social and political implications of who, how and why I and others try to depict or just record peoples' features, whether as works of art or the many other ways they are used, or mis-used, in modern society as in the past.
Portraiture has evolved as a genre in form and representation, from the earliest periods of human history through to the present, and now appears ubiquitous. In all its forms it is always a search for and acknowledgment of the person the artist perceives and wants to portray. Its basis in our interest in genealogy, familial and social groupings and the projection of rank and position remain a fascination across our cultures as well as time.


SUMMARY We present here a detailed analysis of a seismic data set recorded by a dense seismological network installed over 6 months in the southeast of France. This experiment was set-up at the boundary between the Ligurian basin and the southern subalpine thrust belt (the Nice arc), which is a complex tectonic region that undergoes low to moderate seismicity. We recorded more than 500 microearthquakes, among which 348 occurred exactly in the centre of the network during a very active seismic sequence that lasted mainly over 2 months. We performed an absolute location of all of the events and calculated the magnitudes. Then we applied a cross-correlation technique to gather similar events and to relocate relatively few of them. This method revealed a very clear alignment of 19 events in a direction N120 ◦ oblique to the N20 ◦ general trend of seismicity. Focal mechanisms were determined for the four largest events and composite solutions for 32 smaller ones. Both the alignments of the earthquakes and the focal solutions revealed that two oblique segments of the fault were activated during the crisis. The main segment (8 km long) that was oriented NNE with a left-lateral strike slip movement is called the Blausasc fault. Taking into account the tectonic evolution and the relationships between surface structures and the distribution of earthquakes, and through a paleaoreconstruction of the tectonic evolution, we propose that the Blausasc fault is the hidden root of the Peille-Laghet fault, which has a mapped length of at least 15 km. The smaller segment (0.6 km long) that was activated during the crisis could be interpreted as an antithetic Riedel fracture. The active Blausasc fault is located in a densely populated zone, at only 10 km from the crowded cities of Monaco and Nice. It is thus particularly interesting to analyse it for hazard assessment. In the last section, we present a simulation that is aimed at predicting what the ground motion in the city of Nice would be like if an earthquake of magnitude 5.7 occurs on this fault. For this, we used the recordings of the largest event of the seismic sequence (Ml = 3.2) and an empirical Green's function summation scheme to simulate the ground motion at two stations situated in urban environments. The values obtained show that especially on soft soil sites, the effects of such an earthquake would be considerable in the city of Nice.


A stability indicating high performance liquid chromatographic method has been developed for the determination of ciprofloxacin. Optimum separation was achieved in less than 10 minutes using Phenomenex ODS C18 (250x 4.6mm packed with 5µ) column. The analyte was resolved by using a mobile phase 20 mmol L-1 ammonium formate and acetonitrile (70:30) pH adjusted to 4.0 with formic acid at flow rate 1 ml/min on a high performance liquid chromatographic system at a wavelength of 280 nm. The method was validated according to the ICH guidelines with respect to specificity, linearity, accuracy, precision, ruggedness and robustness and can be successfully applied for determination of this drug in commercial tablets. For stress studies the drug was subjected to acid, alkali and neutral hydrolysis, oxidation, photolytic and thermal degradation. The degradation studies indicated the drug to be susceptible to acid, alkali hydrolysis and oxidative degradation. The analytical conditions and solvent developed provided good resolution within a short analysis time and economic advantages. The proposed method not required highly sophisticated and expensive instrumentation.


In this study, the development of second-order social cognition and its possible relationship with language and memory were investigated. For this reason two second-order false belief tasks (FBT_2), a short term memory task (WST), a complex working memory task (LST), a linguistic perspective-taking test (PTT) and a double-embedded relative clause task (REL_2) were used with 21 Turkish kindergarten children (aged 4-5 years), 47 primary school children (aged 6- 12 years) and 10 adults. A general developmental trend was found for all tasks. However, a multiple linear regression showed that once age was partialed out, none of the other tasks could predict FBT_2 scores. Our findings are consistent with the modularity view that Theory of Mind (ToM) is a faculty of the human mind that does not share intrinsic content with other faculties such as language and memory (Leslie et al., 2004) and also with Apperly's (2011) 'two- systems' account of Theory of Mind. However, it develops together with those other faculties which may constrain the expression of children's false belief reasoning as a manifestation of their social cognitive abilities.


1 The literature relating to the effects of benzodiazepines on psychomotor performance is critically reviewed. 2 The multiple and diverse psychomotor tests used are assessed according to their ability to demonstrate differences between drugs. 3 Three general conclusions are: (1) The speed with which simple acts of a repetitive nature are performed may be impaired by benzodiazepines. (2) learning and immediate memory will also be impaired. (3) there is relatively little indication that well established higher mental faculties are adversely involved.


• Vitreous hemorrhages were induced in rabbits by the intravitreal injection of 0.2 ml of autogenous whole blood, and the progressive reabsorption of the blood from the vitreous was followed by ophthalmoscopy, gross pathological examination, and histology. On gross examination, the blood clot remained as a discrete mass for four to six weeks, after which it became considerably reduced in size. The presence of blood exerted severe destructive effects on the gel structure of the vitreous, including posterior detachment of the solid vitreous, liquefaction of the gel, the appearance of prominent vitreous bands, and the formation of a pseudocapsule by the detached vitreous around the blood clot. Small blood deposits remained in several eyes for many weeks. The inflammatory response to intravitreal blood as seen by histology was unusual in several respects. The cellular reaction was low grade, and in particular no polymorphonuclear cells were observed, only mononuclear cells. Aggregates of round cells or multinucleate giant cells were found in association with intact unphagocytosed RBCs after many weeks, which may indicate that macrophages within the vitreous were inefficient. No fibrosis occurred in the rabbit vitreous even with long-standing residual vitreous blood deposits. It is suggested that fibrosis is an unusual sequel to vitreous hemorrhage and is associated with ocular diseases in which vitreous hemorrhage may be an incidental occurrence.


Machine learning algorithms aim at minimizing the number of false decisions and increasing the accuracy of predictions. However, the high predictive power of advanced algorithms comes at the costs of transparency. State-of-the-art methods, such as neural networks and ensemble methods, result in highly complex models with little transparency.
We propose shallow model trees as a way to combine simple and highly transparent predictive models for higher predictive power without losing the transparency of the original models. We present a novel split criterion for model trees that allows for significantly higher predictive power than state-of-the-art model trees while maintaining the same level of simplicity. This novel approach finds split points which allow the underlying simple models to make better predictions on the corresponding data. In addition, we introduce multiple mechanisms to increase the transparency of the resulting trees.


Introduction: Acute alcohol consumption leads to induction of lipid peroxidation in renal tissues, but its chronic consumption has moderate effects on biochemical and histological characteristics of this organ. Antioxidants have protective effects against ethanol-induced oxidative stress and tissue injury. The aim of this study was to assess antioxidant activity of Glycyrrhiza glabra leaf and stem extracts and the protective effect of its leaf extract on ethanol-induced nephrotoxicity. Materials & methods: Total phenol and flavonoid contents of leaf and stem extracts of G. glabra were measured by Folin Ciocalteu and AlCl3 assays, respectively. Antioxidant activity of both extracts was assessed using 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) free radical scavenging. In addition, protective effect of the leaf extract was assessed using biochemical and histological analyses of renal tissues of male Wistar rats, which were divided into four groups including group 1 or control (received 1 ml distilled water daily), group 2 or ethanol group (received 1 ml of 50% ethanol daily), group 3 or ethanol + leaf extract group (received 1 ml of 50% ethanol + 500 mg/kg leaf extract daily), and group 4 (received 500 mg/kg of leaf extract daily). All treatments are performed through intragastric administration. Biochemical and histological analyses were used for the evaluation of nephrotoxicity. For histological study, the samples were stained with Hematoxylin-Eosin and examined by light microscopy. Finally, all the data were analyzed by SPSS (Ver. 20) and grouped by Duncan's Multiple Range Test at P less-than 0.05 level. Findings: There was no significant difference between total phenol contents of the stem and leaf extracts. However, the stem extract showed a higher total flavonoid content than the leaf extract. Also, both the extracts showed higher antioxidant activities (86-93%) than that of ascorbic acid (71%). Results from biochemical analysis indicated a significant increase in superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity and H2O2 content in the renal tissues of ethanol-treated rats in comparison with other groups; however, there were no significant changes in total protein and malondialdehyde (MDA) contents. Results from histological examination showed that alcohol consumption intensity injured kidney tissues, which was effectively moderated by the studied extract. Discussion & Conclusions: Results from the present study showed that G. glabra extract has biological activity and can be used in future as a new natural antioxidant in food and drug industries.


Particle size distribution is one of the most important physical properties of a particulate sample. Traditional particle-sizing methods to estimate a geometrical particle size distribution employ a sieve analysis (or gradation test), which entails filtering the particles through a series of sieves and measuring the weight remaining on each sieve to estimate the number-weighted particle size distribution. However, these two quantities have the same value only if particles are perfectly spherical and round. On the other hand, a particle sizer such as the Malvern particle size analyzer, which uses laser diagnostics to measure the particle sizes, can be a hefty investment. Alternatively, imaging techniques can be applied to estimate the size of these particles by scaling a reference dimension to the pixel size, which in turn is used to estimate the size of the visible particles. The focus of this work is to present a simple methodology using a DSLR camera and an illuminated LED panel to generate enough contrast. Using the camera and lens properties, the scale, or size, of any image can be obtained based on the mounting distance of the camera with respect to the target. An analysis tool was developed in MATLAB where the images are processed automatically based on the prescribed camera and lens properties embedded within the same image file and requiring the user to only input the mounting distance of the camera. So far, results show a positive agreement when comparing to measurements using ImageJ imaging tools and a sieve analysis. Future tests will analyze different particle sizes and types, as well as using a Malvern particle size analyzer to corroborate the results.


Abstract. Decreasing concentrations of dissolved oxygen in the ocean are considered one of the main threats to marine ecosystems as they jeopardize the growth
of higher organisms. They also alter the marine nitrogen cycle, which is
strongly bound to the carbon cycle and climate. While higher organisms in
general start to suffer from oxygen concentrations < ∼ 63 µM (hypoxia), the marine nitrogen cycle responds to oxygen
concentration below a threshold of about 20 µM (microbial hypoxia),
whereas anoxic processes dominate the nitrogen cycle at oxygen
concentrations of < ∼ 0.05 µM (functional
anoxia). The Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal are home to approximately
21 % of the total volume of ocean waters revealing microbial hypoxia.
While in the Arabian Sea this oxygen minimum zone (OMZ) is also functionally
anoxic, the Bay of Bengal OMZ seems to be on the verge of becoming so. Even
though there are a few isolated reports on the occurrence of anoxia prior to
1960, anoxic events have so far not been reported from the open northern
Indian Ocean (i.e., other than on shelves) during the last 60 years.
Maintenance of functional anoxia in the Arabian Sea OMZ with oxygen
concentrations ranging between > 0 and ∼ 0.05 µM is highly extraordinary considering that the monsoon reverses the
surface ocean circulation twice a year and turns vast areas of the Arabian
Sea from an oligotrophic oceanic desert into one of the most productive
regions of the oceans within a few weeks. Thus, the comparably low
variability of oxygen concentration in the OMZ implies stable balances
between the physical oxygen supply and the biological oxygen consumption,
which includes negative feedback mechanisms such as reducing oxygen
consumption at decreasing oxygen concentrations (e.g., reduced respiration).
Lower biological oxygen consumption is also assumed to be responsible for a
less intense OMZ in the Bay of Bengal. According to numerical model results,
a decreasing physical oxygen supply via the inflow of water masses from the
south intensified the Arabian Sea OMZ during the last 6000 years, whereas a
reduced oxygen supply via the inflow of Persian Gulf Water from the north
intensifies the OMZ today in response to global warming. The first is
supported by data derived from the sedimentary records, and the latter
concurs with observations of decreasing oxygen concentrations and a
spreading of functional anoxia during the last decades in the Arabian Sea.
In the Arabian Sea decreasing oxygen concentrations seem to have initiated a
regime shift within the pelagic ecosystem structure, and this trend is also
seen in benthic ecosystems. Consequences for biogeochemical cycles are as
yet unknown, which, in addition to the poor representation of mesoscale
features in global Earth system models, reduces the reliability of estimates
of the future OMZ development in the northern Indian Ocean.


The investigations of a research team show clearly that Sanango racemosum is a member of the Gesneriaceae. Special emphasis is placed on the following features found in this odd species: the woody habit, the stomata grouped into "islands", the node with split-laterals, the solid siphonostele of the petiole, the pair-flowered cymes of the terminal inflorescence, the semi-inferior ovary position, the (axile)-parietal placentation, the oddly shaped nectary, and the presence of the chemical compounds conandroside and sanangoside. All of these are features found in the Gesneriaceae, and most of them are unknown in the rest of the Tubiflorae or Scrophulariales. Sanango may not look like a typical gesneriad at first glance, but it fits best into the Caribbean tribe Gesnerieae, as a companion for the genus Gesneria L. sensu lato.


In Aotearoa New Zealand, leadership within the early childhood education (ECE) sector is both positionally assigned and a required practice of all teachers. Within this context, distributed leadership – where all team members have the opportunity to lead – is increasingly seen as an effective leadership model (Thornton, 2010). The purported benefits of distributed leadership have significant overlap with professional learning: increased engagement, deeper learning, context-specific learning and improved pedagogical practices among teachers (Poekert, 2012). This study considers the relationship between distributed leadership and professional learning in ECE settings, and seeks to discover practices of effective positional leaders in facilitating both. A nationwide survey was carried out in Aotearoa New Zealand to capture a picture of current perceptions of ECE teachers and positional leaders about professional learning communities and, in particular, distributed leadership for professional learning. Subsequently, the leadership practices for distributed leadership and professional learning in three previously-identified high quality ECE services were investigated through individual and group interviews. The analysis of literature, survey and interview findings from this study led to a framework of effective leadership practice, consisting of six elements: inquiry and articulation of thinking; teachers enacting leadership; collaboration and dialogue; mentoring and coaching; fostering relational trust; and, creating vision and designing supportive structures.


The locomotion is said to be generated by the CPG (Central Pattern Generator) that is located at lower level of the nervous system. The CPG consists of some nervous oscillators, which is able to be regarded as an autonomous decentralized system. The gate patterns generated by these oscillators in CPG adapt to the environment and are high efficiency. We deal with an application of autonomous decentralized system to myriapod locomotion robot. In this algorithm, one subsystem consists of one leg and one oscillator. Though they only treat local informations and have functions for controlling one leg, they cangenerate harmonious gait patterns. Some simulations based on this algorithm show them.


A method of quantitating microbial cultures of homogenized sputum has been devised. Possible application of this method to the problem of determining the etiologic agent of lower-respiratory-tract infections has been studied to determine its usefulness as a guide in the management of these infections. Specimens were liquefied by using an equal volume of 2% N-acetyl-L-cysteine. The liquefied sputum suspension was serially diluted to 10(-1), 10(-3), 10(-5), and 10(-7). These dilutions were plated on appropriate media by using an 0.01-ml calibrated loop; they were incubated and examined by standard diagnostic methods. Quantitation of fresh sputum from patients with pneumonia prior to antimicrobial therapy revealed that probable pathogens were present in populations of 10(7) organisms/ml or greater. Normal oropharyngeal flora did not occur in these numbers before therapy. Comparison of microbial counts on fresh and aged sputum showed that it is necessary to use only fresh specimens, since multiplication or death alters both quantitative and qualitative findings. Proper collection and quantitative culturing of homogenized sputum provided information more directly applicable to patient management than did qualitative routine methods. Not only was the recognition of the probable pathogenic organism in pneumonia patients improved, but serial quantitative cultures were particularly useful in recognizing the emergence of superinfections and in evaluating the efficacy of antimicrobial therapy.


BACKGROUND
Intrathecal morphine (ITM) has been used in hopes of providing good postoperative analgesia in cardiac surgery. Little is known about its use in isolated aortic valve replacement surgery.

OBJECTIVES
To evaluate the effects of 7 µ/kg ITM administration in aortic valve replacement in regards to hemodynamics, pain score, and postoperative complications when compared to general anesthesia alone.

STUDY DESIGN
A randomized, double-blind trial.

SETTING
Academic medical center.

METHODS
Forty-four patients, who underwent aortic valve replacement, were randomly assigned to receive ITM, before the induction of general anesthesia (ITM group, n = 22) or no intrathecal injection i.e., general anesthesia alone (control group, n = 22). Induction of anesthesia was done with fentanyl, propofol, and isoflurane. Pain scores, determined by visual analog scale (VAS), were recorded immediately after extubation, at the first, sixth, twelfth, eighteenth, and twenty-fourth hour after extubation. Hemodynamics, heart rate, mean arterial pressure, central venous pressure, pulmonary capillary wedge pressure, and cardiac index were recorded intra-operatively and up to 24 hours post-operatively.

RESULTS
VAS scores were lower in the ITM group at each measured time than control group (P < 0.01). The cumulative fentanyl consumption during the first 24 hours after extubation was significantly reduced by 35% in the ITM group (951 µg /first 24 hours) as compared to the control group (1463.6 µg /first 24 hours), (P < 0.001). The mean time to first request for rescue analgesia was significantly prolonged in the ITM group (20.11 ± 4.24 hours, P < 0.001) compared with the control group (0.60 ± 0.44 hours). The mean tramadol consumption dose was significantly reduced in the ITM group (279.33 ± 61.35 mg), compared with the control group (895 ± 106.42 mg), (P < 0.001). Hemodynamic parameters exhibited a significant decrease in HR and MAP in the ITM group, but no significant difference was found in regards to CVP, PCWP, and CI. Glyceryl trinitrate consumption in the first 24 hours was significantly reduced by 43% in the ITM group (28.3 mg /first 24 hours) when compared to the control group (145.5 mg /first 24 hours), (P < 0.001). Extubation time (4.5 ± 7.5 vs. 5.3 ± 1.0 hours, P < 0.05) and intensive care unit length of stay (3.7 ± 1.0 vs. 5.6 ± 1.6 days, P < 0.01) were shorter in the ITM group.

LIMITATIONS
Small sample size.

CONCLUSIONS
In valvular heart disease patients undergoing aortic replacement surgery, ITM is a good adjunct to general anesthesia as a safe and effective analgesic alternative. It provides better hemodynamic control, earlier tracheal extubation, and shorter ICU stay.

KEY WORDS
Intrathecal, morphine, fentanyl, analgesia, aortic, cardiac, surgery.


Red blood cells or artificial vesicles may be conveniently represented by capsules, i.e. liquid droplets surrounded by deformable membranes. The aim of this paper is to assess the importance of viscoelastic properties of the membrane on the motion of a capsule freely suspended in a viscous liquid subjected to shear flow. A regular perturbation solution of the general problem is obtained when the particle is initially spherical and undergoing small deformations. With a purely viscous membrane (infinite relaxation time) the capsule deforms into an ellipsoid and has a continuous flipping motion. When the membrane relaxation time is of the same order as the shear time, the particle reaches a steady ellipsoidal shape which is oriented with respect to streamlines at an angle that varies between 45° and 0°, and decreases with increasing shear rates. Furthermore it is predicted that the deformation reaches a maximum value, which is consistent with experimental observations of red blood cells.


Wave energy, tidal energy and thermal energy are the three main categories of the ocean energy. The stored thermal energy in the ocean acts as a heat source and can be used to run a thermodynamic cycle. The paper presented here investigates the potential temperature gradient in southern Caspian Sea during summertime in Iran. The variation of extracted net power, heat rejection rate and efficiency of an ocean thermal energy conversion power plant are analyzed with different possible turbine inlet temperature. The analysis is performed by two popular Rankine cycle working fluids (ammonia and R-134a) for a 15MW OTEC power plant where the turbine inlet temperature varies between 17℃ and 23℃. The results showed that for the same power generation at turbine, R-134a requires more working fluid mass flow rate but the rejected heat at condenser is essentially remains constant. It is also concluded that increasing inlet temperature for 6℃ will cause the efficiency to change by factor of 2.


The global change of economy and production determined by the impact of advanced communication technology are re-launching the role of cities and regions from local to global scale. Global competition among cities induces new spatial dynamic, modifying the traditional territorial hierarchies and concentrating the management of economic, technological and cultural relationships in a few metropolitan areas.
Starting from this assumption, this paper gives a contribution for setting up strategies targeted to the promotion of competitive take-off of Italian districts –considered as the most suitable reference unit for this work– closely connected to the strategic resources of each district.
In order to pursue this aim, the research work has a twofold goal:
- to identify the strategic resources enabling regions to gain a competitive advantage at different territorial levels (international, national, local);
- to evaluate the Italian districts' competitive potential in the international, national and local context.
The research work deals with the problem of the international competition among cities with a focus on the territorial aspect of the competition. Therefore, in order to set up a procedure for determining the competitive potential of the Italian districts, we consider apart from variables related to economy and production, also variables related to infrastructure equipment, settlement's quality, human resources, etc.
The main finding of the research work is a subdivision of the 95 Italian "districts" into five classes, according to their present or potential role in the global, national or local competition.


Three daily samplings of the phytoplankton community were made at two consecutive days in March, April, May, September, October, November and December 1997, at Punta Morales, Golfo de Nicoya, Costa Rica. Samples were collected during each tide at depths of 50% and 10% of light penetration using a Niskin bottle. A total of 43 taxa were identified. Centric diatoms, pennates and flagellates represented 90% of total phytoplankton abundance. In the phytoplankton fraction (cells > 30 microm), diatoms were the most abundant group, and Skeletonema costatum (32%) dominated. In nannophytoplankton (cells < 30 microm), Chaetoceros (23.7%) was the most abundant taxon, followed by flagellates (23%) and Cylindrotheca closterium (13.1%). These results agree with previous surveys and suggest that a typical net phytoplankton community persist through time in the Punta Morales zone. The number of nannophytoplankton fraction cells varied seasonally and suggests quantitative changes in species abundance, with possible modifications of cellular size or chain length in filamentous species. The codominance between S. costatum and Chaetoceros spp. during the rainy season suggested the ocurrence of an early ecological sucession, and nutrients could be the factor generating such population changes.


This study examined the effect of the number of citations attributed to documents on third year psychology students' selection of bibliographical references. Our main assumption was that students would take high numbers of citations as accessible relevance cues and use them heuristically to facilitate decision making, potentially bypassing deeper relevance assessment based on semantic processing. Experiment 1 presented the students with a reference selection task while manipulating the number of citations attributed to references, and found that the number of citations had a strong impact on reference selection. Moreover, the effect was independent from topic familiarity and even from students' prior knowledge of what the number of citations meant. Experiment 2 used eye-tracking data to show that this "big number" effect was contingent upon the participants fixating the numbers of citations attributed to documents. Experiment 3 manipulated the semantic relevance of references to the search topic, and demonstrated that the less relevant references were 3 times more likely to be selected when they came with a high number of citations. Overall, the study shows that the number of citations significantly influences students' selections, competing with the semantic relevance of references. Implications for the teaching of online search skills are discussed.


Making holes in glass or ceramic with conventional twist drills is difficult because of the hard and brittle properties of the workpieces, but the drilling-grinding process with diamond core-tools has found application in the field due to its high efficiency and low cost. However, small hole drilling-grinding with the core tools is still a challenge because the small core tools have a limited strength and chip-removal capacity. In this paper, the small hole drilling-grinding in glass and ceramic by diamond core-tools with 4mm diameter is experimentally investigated, the drilling-grinding force and heat are measured and calculated, the performances of two types of electroplating diamond core tools are compared.


Positive student outcomes of undergraduate research experiences (UREs) have been well documented, however, many studies have neglected the logical relationship among outcomes, the processes through which they are achieved, and the contextual and participant factors at play in UREs. This study uses structural equation modeling to explore these issues in a URE program. The study tested a hypothesized model of the mediating effect of participant research self-efficacy on the relationship between their research skills and desire to persist in science. Results indicate that research skills and research self-efficacy predict student aspirations for research careers, and that the effects of research skills are partially mediated through self-efficacybeliefs.#2013WileyPeriodicals,Inc. J Res Sci Teach


This paper analyzes the performance of alternative versions of the New Keynesian Monetary (NKM) model in order to replicate the comovement observed between output and inflation in the U.S.and the Eurozone. Following Den Haan (2000), we analyze that comovement by computing the correlations of VAR forecast errors of the two variables at different forecast horizons. The empirical correlationsobtained show a weak comovement in the U.S. and the Eurozone. A simple NKM model under a standard parametrization provides a high negative comovementat any forecast horizon whenever the inertial parameter of Taylor rule is smaller than 0.90. However, a basic NKM model with an inertial parameter close to one or, alternatively, a generalized version including habit formation and a forward-looking Taylor rule is able to mimic the observed weak comovement. The good performance of these versions also extends to the case in which the policymaker is committed to following an optimal contingent plan under certain parametrizations.


Forming part of post-colonial discourse, Africanisation is often described as a renewed focus on Africa and entails salvaging what has been stripped from the continent. Applied to higher education it can be viewed as a call to adapt curricula and syllabuses to ensure that teaching and learning are adapted to African realities and conditions. Given the decontextualised state of curricula and dependent nature of knowledge production and dissemination in South African higher education, the concept of 'Africanisation' may be worth revisiting. This article reviews the literature in the debate on the Africanisation of higher education highlighting the strengths and weaknesses in the discourse; the paper also makes a case for endogenisation as an alternative to indigenisation.


We demonstrate how neural networks can be used in conjunction with simulation modeling for system design. This approach is used to achieve the opposite of what a simulation model can achieve: given a set of desired performance measures, the neural network outputs a suitable design to meet management goals. The methodology is presented using a real world application involving the test operation of a major semiconductor manufacturing facility.


Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the safety, biological activity, and feasibility of repeated doses of the dendritic cell (DC)-stimulating agent Flt3 ligand (FL) in patients with bone scan-negative hormone-refractory prostate cancer. Experimental Design: Thirty-one patients with hormone-refractory prostate cancer who had elevated prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels and negative bone scans were enrolled. Six cycles (28 days each) were planned. In the first cycle, patients were randomized to FL or placebo. All patients received open-label FL during the next five courses. DC, anti-FL antibody, and PSA levels were measured every 15 days to assess biological activity. Results: DCs increased markedly in FL-treated patients from precycle to day 15, and the increase was consistent in each cycle. Mean percentages of DCs in peripheral blood ranged from 1.4% to 1.9% precycle and from 10.1% to 13.9% on day 15, and after the first cycle, absolute counts on day 15 were approximately 29-fold higher than precycle levels. Natural killer cell counts (CD56+) were found to be elevated after cycle 1 (154% increase versus 2.8% decrease in placebo group at day 22). Twenty-two of 27 patients tested developed nonneutralizing anti-FL antibody. The most frequently experienced toxicity was injection site reaction, followed by asthenia, rash, and diarrhea. Although median PSA levels did not vary during any cycle, a significant slowing in velocity of PSA was observed while patients were on-study (relative velocity = 0.002) compared with prestudy PSA velocity (relative velocity = 0.007). Conclusions: FL was well tolerated. FL consistently produced an increase in DC count without any evidence of decreasing response with continued exposure. The expansion of DCs and the slowing of PSA velocity after administration of FL suggest potential clinical applications in the immunotherapy of prostate cancer.


Design is an inverted discipline. The concept of rigour, as understood within the natural sciences, cannot be applied to Design Practice. Rigour for the natural sciences is a quality assurance mechanism ensuring that the knowledge bases of the disciplines are developed to an accepted set of standards. Design's ontology is not like the natural sciences and as such an understanding of rigour for Design must proceed from an appropriate standpoint about the nature of Design Practice. This paper builds upon Harfield's [1] ontological assessment of Design, Schon's [2] [3] work on Reflective Practice and Spencer's [4] investigation into the experience and practise of designing to develop a standpoint about Design Practice and make a proposition about the relevance of rigour for Design Practise. This paper considers how individual Reflective Practice practitioners, within the context of Design Practice, manage and ensure quality control through the application of care and thoroughness. This paper argues that rigour for Design Practise is the personal and phenomenological quality control of a design inquiry: a process of managing expanding mental chaos and restricting order.


Silver nanoparticles (NPs) which could be kept in solid form and were easily stored without degeneration or oxidation at room temperature for a long period of time were synthesized by a simple and environmentally friendly wet chemistry method in an aqueous phase. Highly stable dispersions of aqueous silver NP inks, sintered at room temperature, for printing highly conductive tracks (∼8.0 μΩ cm) were prepared simply by dispersing the synthesized silver NP powder in water. These inks are stable, fairly homogeneous and suitable for a wide range of patterning techniques. The inks were successfully printed on paper and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) substrates using a common color printer. Upon annealing at 180 °C, the resistivity of the printed silver patterns decreased to 3.7 μΩ cm, which is close to twice that of bulk silver. Various factors affecting the resistivity of the printed silver patterns, such as annealing temperature and the number of printing cycles, were investigated. The resulting high conductivity of the printed silver patterns reached over 20% of the bulk silver value under ambient conditions, which enabled the fabrication of flexible electronic devices, as demonstrated by the inkjet printing of conductive circuits of LED devices.


ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to investigate if there are differences in symptom ratings and plasma concentrations of oxylipins as a measure of acute inflammation between individuals with building-related symptoms (BRS) and referents during exposure to rooms where people experienced BRS and rooms where they did not experience BRS. Medically examined individuals with BRS and healthy, age and sex matched referents working in the same building were exposed for 60 min. Ratings of symptoms and collection of blood to measure oxylipins in plasma were performed before and after each exposure. Individuals with BRS reported more symptoms (mostly mucosal) than the referents in the problem rooms and there was a tendency towards a difference between the groups in concentration of metabolites from the cyclooxygenase pathway (COX). The mean reported intensity of symptoms among all participants was also found to be positively correlated with both COX and lipoxygenase (LOX-15) oxylipins in problem rooms.


Lung cancer is the commonest fatal malignant disease worldwide causing more than 37 000 deaths in the UK per annum.1 The five year survival rate of 5% in the UK compares poorly with rates of up to 14% in some European countries.2 Serious concerns have also been raised about inequalities in patient access to oncology services related to the geographical location and age of the patients.3–6 The Calmann-Hine Committee report recommended a review of lung cancer services with increased emphasis on a multidisciplinary approach to care.7 Initial reports show that such multiprofessional teamwork improves coordination and patient support and reduces delays in diagnosis and treatment.8 In the British Thoracic Society (BTS) recommendations to respiratory physicians for organising the care of patients with lung cancer, emphasis was placed on reducing the delay in arranging investigations and the necessary treatment.9 In the new NHS Cancer Plan,10 the Department of Health has recommended that the maximum wait from urgent general practitioner referral to first treatment should be 62 days with a maximum wait of 31 days between diagnosis and first treatment for all cancers. Although there is little evidence to suggest that management delays adversely affect the clinical outcomes, anecdotal reports suggest that borderline resectable tumours at presentation may become unresectable if there is an inordinate delay in treatment planning. A multidisciplinary working group was established within our hospital trust to review the diagnostic journey of patients attending rapid access lung cancer clinics (RAC). The aim of the group was to rationalise this journey, to reduce waiting times, and improve the patients' experience of this often stressful process.

Our multidisciplinary team (MDT) coordinator visited Papworth Hospital, Cambridge, UK to review their tertiary diagnostic service, as described by Laroche et al .8 An away day …


Aim & Objectives: This study assesses the quantity of streptococcus mutans group and lactobacillus in interproximal contact of posterior teeth with proximal amalgam and resin composite restorations. Methods: Twenty patients were divided into two groups (n=10) according to the type of restorative material they presented: amalgam (AM) or resin composite (RC). In the same patient, one interproximal Class II amalgam or resin composite restoration and one interproximal contact without restorations (control group – C) were studied. The material was collected from the interproximal with the aid of a piece of sterilized dental thread, and stored in phosphate buffered saline solution. The material was seeded on plates containing Mitis Salivarius Bacitracin Sucrose agar and Rogosa agar culture medium and incubated at 37C for 48-72h. The colony forming units (Log10 CFU/mL) were counted and the data were submitted to the Student's-t test (5%). Results: There was significant difference between Groups C and AM (p=0.019) with regard to lactobacillus count. For streptococcus mutans group, there was significant difference between Groups C and RC (p=0.015). Conclusion: There is significantly greater growth of streptococcus mutans group in RC Class II restorations and lactobacillus in AM restorations when compared with interproximal contact without the presence of restorations.


The recent discovery of hypervariable VNTR (variable number of tandem repeat) loci has led to much excitement among population biologists regarding the feasibility of deriving individual estimates of relatedness in field populations by DNA fingerprinting. It is shown that unbiased estimates of relatedness cannot be obtained at the individual level without knowledge of the allelic distributions in both the individuals of interest and the base population unless the proportion of shared marker alleles between unrelated individuals is essentially zero. Since the latter is usually on the order of 0.1-0.5 and since there are enormous practical difficulties in obtaining the former, only an approximate estimator for the relatedness can be given. The bias of this estimator is individual specific and inversely related to the number of marker loci and frequencies of marker alleles. Substantial sampling variance in estimates of relatedness arises from variation in identity by descent within and between loci and, with finite numbers of alleles, from variation in identity in state between genes that are not identical by descent. In the extreme case of 25 assayed loci, each with an effectively infinite number of alleles, the standard error of a relatedness estimate is no less than 14%, 20%, 35%, and 53% of the expectation for full sibs and second-, third-, and fourth-order relationships, respectively. Attempts to ascertain relatedness by means of DNA fingerprinting should proceed with caution.


Based on principles of humanization design, through the Human-Machine interface, Man-machine engineering, mechanical esthetics aspects of Coal Mine Machinery for "person-machine-environment" coordinate design research. This article make " humanization" design idea got fully manifests, change the former design of coal mine machinery simply focusing on product function, which pay more attention to the core content of product design, lay emphasis on the user comfort requirements, ascending users simple and efficient operation mode, satisfy user physiological and psychological needs. And thereby give the humanistic concern, make the products of coal mine machinery to be more comfortable and pleasant, what's more, improve the added value of the heavy machinery products and showed the development direction of the modern coal mine machinery equipment.


Pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcoma is considered rare and controversial, especially in children. Although pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcoma has been observed in children, its sparcity has taken it out of current childhood rhabdomyosarcoma classifications. We report four pediatric cases of pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcoma, review morphologic, immunohistochemical, and ultrastructural features, and discuss the rare need to include this category in children. The Soft Tissue Registry of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology was searched for cases coded as "pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcoma" from 1970 to the present. Only cases in patients less than 21 years old were included. Clinical data, morphology, and immunohistochemical stains were reviewed and follow-up was obtained. Electron microscopy was performed on two cases. Molecular analysis by polymerase chain reaction was performed on one case with available material. Of four patients included, there were three boys and one girl. Patient ages ranged from 9 months to 10 years (median, 4.5 years). Tumors were located on the chest wall (n = 2) and one each on the upper and lower extremities. Tumor size ranged from 4.0 to 10.0 cm (median, 7 cm). Grossly, the tumors were lobulated and circumscribed. Microscopically, architectural patterns varied from solid to fascicular or storiform. All tumors had large, often multinucleated, polygonal, spindled or strap-like rhabdomyoblasts with abundant eosinophilic cytoplasm. Nuclear characteristics ranged from hyperchromatic to vesicular. Most tumor cells had large prominent nucleoli. Background rhabdomyoblasts varied from spindled to polygonal. No tumors displayed areas typical of embryonal or alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma. All tumors exhibited atypical mitotic figures. Immunohistochemistry revealed that the tumors were positive for the following markers: desmin (3/4), myoglobin (4/4), myoD1 (3/3), myf4 (3/3), and MSA (4/4). The two cases studied by electron microscopy both showed evidence for skeletal muscle differentiation. One case showed no evidence for a t(2;13) or t(1;13) translocation. Two patients were alive with no evidence of disease at 12 and 25 years. One patient was dead of disease at 9 years. Pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcoma is rare but exists in children. The diagnosis should be considered in pleomorphic sarcomas exhibiting skeletal muscle differentiation, which are otherwise devoid of typical areas or chromosomal changes of embryonal or alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma.


A multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) scaffold was covalently functionalized with a second-generation polyamidoamine (PAMAM) dendron, presenting four terminal amino groups per grafted aryl moiety. These reactive functions were alkylated to obtain a positively charged polycationic dendron/carbon nanotube system (d-MWCNTs⋅Cl), which eventually underwent anion exchange reaction with a negatively charged and highly luminescent Eu(III) complex ([EuL(4)]⋅NEt(4), in which L = (2-naphtoyltrifluoroacetonate)). This process afforded the target material d-MWCNTs⋅[EuL(4)], in which MWCNTs are combined with red-emitting Eu(III) centers through electrostatic interactions with the dendronic branches. Characterization of the novel MWCNT materials was accomplished by means of TGA and TEM, whereas d-MWCNTs⋅Cl and d-MWCNTs⋅ [EuL(4)] further underwent XPS, SEM and Raman analyses. These studies demonstrate the integrity of the luminescent [EuL(4)](-) center in the luminescent hybrid, the massive load of the cationic binding sites, and the virtually complete anion-exchange into the final hybrid material. The occurrence of the ion-pairing interaction with MWCNTs was unambiguously demonstrated through DOSY NMR diffusion studies. Photophysical investigations show that MWCNTs⋅[EuL(4)] is a highly soluble and brightly luminescent red hybrid material in which MWCNTs act as photochemically inert scaffolds with negligible UV/Vis absorption, compared with the grafted Eu complex, and with no quenching activity. The high dispersibility of MWCNTs⋅[EuL(4)] in a polymer matrix makes it a promising luminophore for applications in material science.


The aim of this study is to determine the number of base slatlons and capacity of each base station to satisfy the increased traffic demand and serving all traffic demand areas with a sufficient number of base stations, which is using a minimum number of base stations in order to minimize the total cost. The problem is formulated as a binary linear program ming problem, and is solved by a specific algorithm. For this reason, we have built a specific algorithm to solve the model, with programming this algorithm by using Microsoft Access using Visual Basic applications, which has ability to have a decision about any changes and fluctuations. Advantages of the algorithm can obtain best (optimum) solution with least steps. Computational results show that the proposed model is highly effective and it is applicable, as well. For (30) candidate base stations and (15) TDAs, we have applied the model with low costs differ by (10 unit $) with satisfying the required demand for all TDAs.


This report describes an internship performed at Orange Creatives. The internship was part of a product development project performed for the client Vitatools. The project assignment was to develop a human-powered juicing device.

In the analysis phase information relevant to the internship was extracted from earlier results within the project, most importantly the design brief. This included information about the slowjuicer used in the device, the main principle of how the product functions and the requirements related to the technical design.

In the concept phase a user test was performed to further specify the requirements. Subsequently, a number of technical solutions were investigated for various aspects of the design, of which the results were combined into a morphological chart, as well as a combination matrix, to display the compatibility of using solutions together. Part of these solutions were then used in the designs of three concepts. Of these concepts, the client selected the plug & play panels concept.

After the selection by the client, the concept was further developed during the detailed concept phase. For each of the modules, technical solutions were chosen to fulfil their required functionality. In turn, these solutions were developed further to form the initial general design of the modules.

After the concept was finalized in the detailed concept phase, the next step was to fully design the product, up to a production ready state. This was done in the engineering phase, where the geometry, dimensions, material and production processes were designed and selected for all components. Calculations were used to verify dimensions or the component selection of functional components and important load-bearing parts. From the completed CAD-model technical drawings were made, which were used to source production, receive production cost quotations and to receive feedback on the design. Subsequently, this information was used to further improve the design, resulting in a complete design. At the end of the engineering phase, the design was ready for the production of the first prototype to be ordered.

The resulting design is a juicer wall, which allows its user to create a healthy juice through human power. It consists of a chair and, a movement input module, two wall segments supporting a system of gears and pulleys, and a table supporting a slowjuicer. The system starts with the movement input module, with which a user powers the system through a skelter rowing motion. The movement input is positioned on the foot of the right wall segment. Both wall segments combined form the wall. Along the wall, the gears and pulleys transfer the human input motion to the slowjuicer output. The slowjuicer is mounted on the table, which itself is supported by the left wall segment. During use of the product an assistant feeds ingredients into the slowjuicer.

Unfortunately, it was not possible to manufacture the prototype during the internship, so the design could not be evaluated within this period, but has to be evaluated afterwards instead. The internship was finalized with a project transfer, to transfer data on the progression of the project thus far to a new employee and to evaluate the project.


This piece endeavors to provide context for state and local officials considering tasks around development, procurement, implementation, and use of risk assessment tools. It begins with brief case studies of four states that adopted (or attempted to adopt) such tools early on and describes their experiences. It then draws lessons from these case studies and suggests some questions that procurement officials should ask of themselves, their colleagues who call for the acquisition and implementation of tools, and the developers who create them. This paper concludes by examining existing frameworks for technological and algorithmic fairness. The authors offer a framework of four questions that government procurers should be asking at the point of adopting RA tools. That framework draws from the experiences of the states we study and offers a way to think about accuracy (i.e., the RA tool's ability to accurately predict recidivism), fairness (i.e., the extent to which an RA tool treats all defendants fairly, without exhibiting racial bias or discrimination), interpretability (the extent to which an RA tool can be interpreted by criminal justice officials and stakeholders, including judges, lawyers, and defendants), and operability (the extent to which an RA tool can be administered by officers within police, pretrial services, and corrections).


As process variations increase and devices get more diverse in their behavior, using the same test list for all devices is increasingly inefficient. Methodologies that adapt the test sequence with respect to lot, wafer, or even a device's own behavior help contain the test cost while maintaining test quality. In adaptive test selection approaches, the initial test list, a set of tests that are applied to all devices to learn information, plays a crucial role in the quality outcome. Most adaptive test approaches select this initial list based on fail probability of each test individually. Such a selection approach does not take into account the correlations that exist among various measurements and potentially will lead to the selection of correlated tests. In this work, we propose a new adaptive test algorithm that includes a mathematical model for initial test ordering that takes correlations among measurements into account. The proposed method can be integrated within an existing test flow running in the background to improve not only the test quality but also the test time. Experimental results using four distinct industry circuits and large amounts of measurement data show that the proposed technique outperforms prior approaches considerably.


Introduction: The EUROpean Bone Over 40 Sarcoma Study (EURO-B.O.S.S.) was the first prospective international study for patients 41-65 years old with high-grade bone sarcoma treated with an intensive chemotherapy regimen derived from protocols for younger patients with high-grade skeletal osteosarcoma. Methods: Chemotherapy based on doxorubicin, cisplatin, ifosfamide, and methotrexate was suggested, but patients treated with other regimens at the investigators' choice were also eligible for the study. Results: The present report focuses on the subgroup of 218 patients with primary high-grade osteosarcoma. With a median follow-up of 47 months, the 5-year probability of overall survival (OS) was 66% in patients with localized disease and 22% in case of synchronous metastases. The 5-year OS in patients with localized disease was 29% in pelvic tumors, and 70% and 73% for extremity or craniofacial locations, respectively. In primary chemotherapy, tumor necrosis ≥90% was reported in 21% of the patients. There were no toxic deaths; however, hematological toxicity was considerable with 32% of patients experiencing 1 or more episodes of neutropenic fever. The incidence of nephrotoxicity and neurotoxicity (mainly peripheral) was 28% and 24%, respectively. After methotrexate, 23% of patients experienced delayed excretion, in 4 cases with nephrotoxicity. Conclusions: In patients over 40 years of age with primary high-grade osteosarcoma, an aggressive approach with chemotherapy and surgery can offer the probability of survival similar to that achieved in younger patients. Chemotherapy-related toxicity is significant and generally higher than that reported in younger cohorts of osteosarcoma patients treated with more intensive regimens.


Perfect simulation of a class of Markovian queueing networks with finite buffers is examined in this monograph. The network processes defined are modelled by restricted multivariate birth and death processes with intensities depending on a random environment. The random environments are mainly a set of independent onoff processes. Several simulation experiments illustrate the use of the perfect sampling algorithm and properties of the networks. The class of networks is analysed by coupling techniques, and monotonic properties for network trajectories are established. The networks are simulated by embedding a coupling, which imposes an ordering of network trajectories, in a two-dimensional Poisson process, and by using a monotone Propp-Wilson algorithm. The effectiveness of the algorithm is examined by a series of simulation experiments and is found to be satisfactory. The defined networks can be extended to handle batch arrivals, rerouting of blocked units, buffer sizes varying over time, and other types of environments. The class of networks devised can be used as a model for a wide range of applications in which the Markovian assumptions are satisfied. Even for complex and large networks, samples are obtained in a reasonable amount of time although the simulation time is hard to predict beforehand. MSC 2000 subject classifications: 60K20, 60K25, 68M20, 90B22, 65C05, 60E15, 60J80


We present spectroscopy and orbital periods Porb of four relatively little-studied cataclysmic variable stars. The stars and their periods are: AF Cam, Porb=0.324(1) d (the daily cycle count is slightly ambiguous); V2069 Cyg (= RX J2123.7+4217), 0.311683(2) d; PG 0935+075, 0.1868(3) d; and KUV 03580+0614, 0.1495(6) d. V2069 Cyg and KUV 03580+0614 both show He iiλ4686 emission comparable in strength to Hβ. V2069 Cyg appears to be a luminous nova-like variable, and the strong He ii suggests it may be an intermediate polar. The period of KUV 03580+0614 is similar to members of the SW Sex-type nova-like variables, and it shows the phase-dependent absorption in the Balmer and He i lines typical of this subclass. AF Cam shows absorption features from a K-type secondary, as expected given its rather long orbital period. The secondary spectrum and the outburst magnitude both suggest that AF Cam is approximately 1 kpc distant. The spectrum of PG 0935+075 resembles that of a dwarf nova at minimum light, with a noticeable contribution from an M-dwarf secondary star. The secondary spectrum and a tentative outburst magnitude both suggest a distance near 500 pc.


An analysis was carried out of bodily functional status in miners engaged in basic mining occupations with known vibration-related health hazards (coal hewers, drifters), presenting with different stages of vibration pathology. Patterns were ascertained of chief components of both specific and unspecific bodily systemic reactions to a combined action of physical industrial factors (vibration, noise, dust, heating, microclimate). Important for those subjects engaged in occupations with vibration-related health threats are parameters characterizing labour conditions, such as, in the first place, integral-and-service duration-related exposure doses of industrial factors which are believed to be probabilistic risk factors for vibration pathology.


Discussion and Summary
The evidence herein presented indicates that anti-typhus vaccines of the inactivated type are of well-established value. While most of the evidence relates to Cox-type vaccines of yolk-sac origin, the conclusions to be drawn probably are also applicable to potent vaccines derived from infected lice or animal lungs. It is clear that adequate primary immunization will greatly modify such disease as may occur and will virtually eliminate fatality. The degree of reduction in morbidity remains undetermined but is undoubtedly significant. Data as to duration of real immunity after primary immunization do not exist (our small challenge experiments failed to reveal solid immunity at 9 and 21 months post-vaccination). However, serologic evidence indicates that administration of single booster inoculum from 9 months to as long as 6 years later results in effective restimulation of immunity. While repeated booster inocula will undoubtedly serve to maintain a good level of immunity, an appropriate schedule of inoculations has not yet been worked out.
Use of a living rickettsial vaccine offers obvious possible advantages in that a single inoculation should result in solid and long-lasting immunity. Nearly all previous efforts to use living rickettsiae involved, basically, the use of minute doses of agents of unmodified virulence, minute because of dilution or partial inactivation. The concensus is that such vaccines, when given to non-immune persons, either failed to infect and to immunize, or produced unmodified, inoculation typhus.
The evidence available with respect to strain E indicates that it is indeed a strain of R. prowazeki of greatly reduced virulence for man. Its primary safety is attested by its use in upwards of 17,000 persons with no single known instance of truly serious illness resulting. Further, it is unlikely that it could be picked up and spread by lice because of its apparent inability to invade the blood stream. Admittedly, reactions do follow the use of strain E. However, there is a dose range (4.0 to 5.5 log E.I.D.) which induces both a tolerable level of reactions and a satisfactorily uniform immediate seroimmune response. Available evidence, with respect to both seroimmunity and ability to resist virulent challenge, indicates that, while immunity induced by strain E infection may not be fully comparable to that following natural infection, it is solidly effective for at least 3 years and probably considerably longer.
There are, however, some problems remaining. That actual infection of man does occur is suggested on clinical grounds by the development of regional adenitis and of reactions of the delayed type. It also is suggested by the fact that the minimum immunizing dose of formol-inactivated rickettsiae is 2.5 logs greater than that of living strain E (Everritt et al., 1954). However, knowledge as to the fact and possible sites of persistence of the agent in man should be sought. Also, while strain E-induced immunity seems superior to that following primary immunization with Cox-type vaccine, a comparison also should be made with that in persons given in addition a booster inoculum of inactive vaccine. Again, while the considerable field use of the vaccine in Peru testifies to its practical applicability under field conditions, criteria as to minimum infectivity, recommended dosage and expiration dates of production lots of vaccine remain to be defined. Finally, although the results of the challenge experiments offer much promise as to effectiveness, there remains the crucial problem of obtaining definitive data as to the effectiveness of strain E vaccine in preventing the natural occurrence of disease.


Objectives: This Phase I study determines the maximum tolerated dose (MTD) of stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) for lung tumors. Methods: Eli- gible patients had biopsy proven cancer with a maxi- mum tumor size ≤ 5 cm. Total doses were escalated from 40 to 48, then to 56 Gy, delivered in 4 equal fractions administered 2 to 3 times per week on an IRB approved protocol. SBRT was administered us- ing 5 to 9 fixed beam arrangements with CT loca- lization. Internal target volumes (ITV) were based on breath hold scans or 4D CT simulation. The planning target volume (PTV) was defined as the ITV with a uniform 5 mm expansion. Dose limiting toxicity (DLT) was defined as any grade 3 or higher toxicity using the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) common toxicity criteria (CTC). Results: Between April 2004 and February 2008, 18 patients received the prescribed treatment (40 Gy n = 6, 48 Gy n = 7, 56 Gy n = 5). Seventeen of 18 patients had non-small cell lung cancer (1 with rectal cancer), four of whom were treated for an oligometastasis. The median age of the patients was 68, while the median Karnofsky performance status was 90. The mean tumor size was 2.6 cm (range 0.9 to 4.5 cm). One grade 3 pulmonary event occurred (at 48 Gy dose level) immediately following treatment with the onset of fever and shortness of breath that responded to antibiotics. No other DLTs occurred. Conclusions: SBRT utilizing patient specific target volumes without gating appears safe. The maximum tolerated dose was not reached.


Among the contenders in the new generation energy storage arena, all-solid-state batteries (ASSBs) have emerged as particularly promising, owing to their potential to exhibit high safety, high energy density and long cycle life. The relatively low conductivity of most solid electrolytes and the often sluggish charge transfer kinetics at the interface between solid electrolyte and electrode layers are considered to be amongst the major challenges facing ASSBs. This review presents an overview of the state of the art in solid lithium and sodium ion conductors, with an emphasis on inorganic materials. The correlations between the composition, structure and conductivity of these solid electrolytes are illustrated and strategies to boost ion conductivity are proposed. In particular, the high grain boundary resistance of solid oxide electrolytes is identified as a challenge. Critical issues of solid electrolytes beyond ion conductivity are also discussed with respect to their potential problems for practical applications. The chemical and electrochemical stabilities of solid electrolytes are discussed, as are chemo-mechanical effects which have been overlooked to some extent. Furthermore, strategies to improve the practical performance of ASSBs, including optimizing the interface between solid electrolytes and electrode materials to improve stability and lower charge transfer resistance are also suggested.


Introduction: Epidemiological studies on drug abusers with AIDS link abuse of cocaine, even more than other drugs, to increased incidence of HIV sero prevalence and progression to AIDS. In the era of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), although the incidence of HIV-associated dementia (HAD) has declined, HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND) remain a significant health problem. Literature Review: The neuroinflammation associated with HAND appears to be exacerbated by drugs of abuse, as demonstrated by brain autopsy studies revealing a higher prevalence of HIV encephalitis (microglia activation, presence of multinucleated giant cells, and blood–brain barrier) disruption in drug-abusing HIV-positive individuals in comparison with nonabusing HIV-positive controls. These findings suggest that drug abuse exerts an additive (if not synergistic) effect with HIV within the CNS. Additional studies on the molecular mechanisms underlying the interaction between cocaine and gp120 have demonstrated that exposure of rat primary neurons to both cocaine and gp120 resulted in increased cell toxicity compared to cells treated with either factor alone. The combinatorial toxicity of cocaine and gp120 was accompanied by an increase in both caspase-3 activity and expression of the proapoptotic protein Bax. Furthermore, increased neurotoxicity in the presence of both the agents was associated with a concomitant increase in the production of intracellular reactive oxygen species and loss of mitochondrial membrane potential. Conclusion: Thus, drugs of abuse, particularly cocaine, are strongly associated with enhanced brain injury in HIV positive individuals, which is expressed as enhanced risk for HAND and other neurologic complications.


Background Rivers and lakes are used for multiple purposes such as for drinking water (DW) production, recreation, and as recipients of wastewater from various sources. The deterioration of surface water quality with wastewater is well-known, but less is known about the bacterial community dynamics in the affected surface waters. Understanding the bacterial community characteristics —from the source of contamination, through the watershed to the DW production process—may help safeguard human health and the environment. Results The spatial and seasonal dynamics of bacterial communities, their predicted functions, and potential health-related bacterial (PHRB) reads within the Kokemäenjoki River watershed in southwest Finland were analyzed with the 16S rRNA-gene amplicon sequencing method. Water samples were collected from various sampling points of the watershed, from its major pollution sources (sewage influent and effluent, industrial effluent, mine runoff) and different stages of the DW treatment process (pre-treatment, groundwater observation well, DW production well) by using the river water as raw water with an artificial groundwater recharge (AGR). The beta-diversity analysis revealed that bacterial communities were highly varied among sample groups (R = 0.92, p  <  0.001, ANOSIM). The species richness and evenness indices were highest in surface water (Chao1; 920 ± 10) among sample groups and gradually decreased during the DW treatment process (DW production well; Chao1: 320 ± 20). Although the phylum Proteobacteria was omnipresent, its relative abundance was higher in sewage and industrial effluents (66–80%) than in surface water (55%). Phyla Firmicutes and Fusobacteria were only detected in sewage samples. Actinobacteria was more abundant in the surface water (≥13%) than in other groups (≤3%). Acidobacteria was more abundant in the DW treatment process (≥13%) than in others (≤2%). In total, the share of PHRB reads was higher in sewage and surface water than in the DW treatment samples. The seasonal effect in bacterial communities was observed only on surface water samples, with the lowest diversity during summer. Conclusions The low bacterial diversity and absence of PHRB read in the DW samples indicate AGR can produce biologically stable and microbiologically safe drinking water. Furthermore, the significantly different bacterial communities at the pollution sources compared to surface water and DW samples highlight the importance of effective wastewater treatment for protecting the environment and human health.