Computational lithography is a critical research area for the continued scaling of semiconductor manufacturing process technology by enhancing silicon printability via numerical computing methods. Today's solutions for these problems are primarily CPU-based and require many thousands of CPUs running for days to tape out a modern chip. We seek AI/GPU-assisted solutions for the two problems, aiming at improving both runtime and quality. Prior academic research has proposed using machine learning for lithography modeling and mask optimization, typically represented as image-to-image mapping problems, where convolution layer backboned UNets and ResNets are applied. However, due to the lack of domain knowledge integrated into the framework designs, these solutions have been limited by their application scenarios or performance. Our method aims to tackle the limitations of such previous CNN-based solutions by introducing lithography bias into the neural network design, yielding a much more efficient model design and significant performance improvements.


4,6-Dinitro-N,N'-di-n-octylbenzene-1,3-diamine, C(22)H(38)N(4)O(4), (I), 4,6-dinitro-N,N'-di-n-undecylbenzene-1,3-diamine, C(28)H(50)N(4)O(4), (II), and N,N'-bis(2,4-dinitrophenyl)octane-1,8-diamine, C(20)H(24)N(6)O(8), (III), are the first synthetic meta-dinitroarenes functionalized with long-chain aliphatic amine groups to be structurally characterized. The intra- and intermolecular interactions in these model compounds provide information that can be used to help understand the physical properties of corresponding polymers with similar functionalities. Compounds (I) and (II) possess near-mirror symmetry, with the octyl and undecyl chains adopting fully extended anti conformations in the same direction with respect to the ring. Compound (III) rests on a center of inversion that occupies the mid-point of the central C-C bond of the octyl chain. The middle six C atoms of the chain form an anti arrangement, while the remaining two C atoms take hard turns almost perpendicular to the rest of the chain. All three molecules display intramolecular N-H...O hydrogen bonds between the amine and nitro groups, with the same NH group forming a bifurcated intermolecular hydrogen bond to the nitro O atom of an adjacent molecule. In each case, these interactions link the molecules into one-dimensional molecular chains. In (I) and (II), these chains pack so that the pendant alkyl groups are interleaved parallel to one another, maximizing nonbonded C-H contacts. In (III), the alkyl groups are more isolated within the molecular chains and the primary nonbonded contacts between the chains appear to involve the nitro groups not involved in the hydrogen bonding.


We theoretically investigate the impact of the excited state quantum phase transition on the adiabatic dynamics for the Lipkin-Meshkov-Glick model. Using a time-dependent protocol, we continuously change a model parameter and then discuss the scaling properties of the system especially close to the excited state quantum phase transition where we find that these depend on the energy eigenstate. On top, we show that the mean-field dynamics with the time-dependent protocol gives the correct scaling and expectation values in the thermodynamic limit even for the excited states.


Systematic and individual qualification improvement in a professional context is a challenging task, which is based on a complex knowledge supply chain. Human as well as virtual actors contribute to this supply chain and have to be supported by adequate system services. The authors believe that a qualification management portal that integrates support for all qualification-related activities like course production, content provision, teaching, and learning, into an open system enables the flexibility, responsiveness, and community-orientation that is necessary for modern qualification support. The coupling of the involved processes and roles enables synergies and innovative communication opportunities. A flexible, extensible, and standard-compliant framework for such integrated qualification management portals has been developed in the eQualification project. By integrating user-friendly and task-oriented application authoring tools for qualification portal design and evolution into the Web application itself, users are empowered to act as application co-designers.


Project HOTSPOT, the Snake River Scientific Drilling Project (International Continental Scientific Drilling Program), tested for deep geothermal resources and examined the petrology of volcanic rocks with three drillholes in the central and western Snake River Plain (western USA). The MH-2 drillhole targeted fractured crystalline and hydrothermally altered basalt in the area of the Mountain Home Air Force Base (Idaho) to a total depth of 1821 m. At 1745 m depth the drillhole encountered flowing artesian hydrothermal fluids of at least 150 °C. We integrate geological analyses of core, image log, and borehole geophysical data, and in situ stress analyses to describe the structural environment that produces permeability for artesian flow. The rocks in the lower 540 m of the drillhole consist of basalt flows as much as 30 m thick, altered basalt, and thin sedimentary horizons. The mechanical stratigraphy is defined by nine mechanical horizons that are in three ranges of rock strength on the basis of experimentally determined strength data, core logging, and geophysical log signatures. Hydrothermal alteration products and mineralization in the core are associated with three highly faulted sections; the lowermost section is associated with the zone of flowing thermal water. Shear slip indicators on faults observed in core indicate slip ranging from pure strike slip to normal failure mechanisms in the stronger horizons. The borehole breakouts indicate that the maximum horizontal stress, SH, is oriented 047° ± 7°, and drilling-induced tensile fractures indicate that SH is oriented at 67° ± 21°. The in situ stress orientations exhibit little variation over the depth of the measured interval, but the SH magnitude varies with depth, and is best explained by an oblique normal fault stress regime. The geomechanical model indicates that if pore pressures at depth are elevated above the normal hydrostatic gradient, as observed here, the system has the potential to deform by mixed normal and strike-slip failure. Our observations and interpretations suggest that the MH-2 borehole was drilled into oblique normal faults that intersect a buried 300°-trending fault block masked by the basaltic volcanic complex. These data indicate that the transition from the central to western Snake River Plain is characterized by complex structures developed in response to a transitional stress state related to Snake River Plain and western Basin and Range stress regimes. The western Basin and Range stress and tectonic regime may extend from northern Nevada into western Idaho and may enhance the potential for geothermal resources by creating interconnected fracture and fault-related permeability at depth.


in order to optimize the air-pod shape, this paper details work conducted using the commercial CFD software package ANSYS: Fluent to simulate the aerodynamic of air-pod. In our research, the results as followed: 1) In the benchmark, our comparative analysis of the flow over the NASA 0012 airfoil from the Experimental Data Base for Computer Program Assessment (AGARD-AR-138, 1979) implies that the ANSYS: Fluent software package numerical method simulates the airfoil viscous flow with the same accuracy as the wind-tunnel experiment. We can use it to finish our research. 2) We build the 3-D model to compute the aerodynamic of the air-pod. We choose the cylinder at first step. From the results we can see the pressure and wall shear concentrate at the side face of the cylinder. The pressure at the side faces is about twice than the direct side. Next step we will compute different models, such as spherical and drop-shaped, et al. then we can compare the pressure and wall shear field value for different models at different conditions. This work gives us best way to optimize the aerodynamic shape of air-pod.


How is knowledge of position-role mappings in natural language learned? We explore this question in a computational setting, testing whether a variety of well-performing pertained language models (BERT, RoBERTa, and DistilBERT) exhibit knowledge of these mappings, and whether this knowledge persists across alternations in syntactic, structural, and lexical alternations. In Experiment 1, we show that these neural models do indeed recognize distinctions between theme and recipient roles in ditransitive constructions, and that these distinct patterns are shared across construction type. We strengthen this finding in Experiment 2 by showing that fine-tuning these language models on novel theme- and recipient-like tokens in one paradigm allows the models to make correct predictions about their placement in other paradigms, suggesting that the knowledge of these mappings is shared rather than independently learned. We do, however, observe some limitations of this generalization when tasks involve constructions with novel ditransitive verbs, hinting at a degree of lexical specificity which underlies model performance.


Young people, ethnicity and constructing lived citizenship in SwedenThis study concerns participation in the Swedish society among young people from ethnic minorities, the opportunities open to them and the constraints they face. It addresses the issue of how they construct lived citizenship in a medium-sized Swedish town. Drawing on the empirical material from an interview study the aim is to reveal strategies for taking advantages of opportunities and for overcoming constraints in everyday life related to full membership of society. The constraints experienced in everyday life are expressed in terms of restricted social citizenship caused by ethnically minoritizing and discrimination. The main question is: What strategies do ethnically minoritized young women and men develop to construct lived citizenship? Subjective aspects of citizenship are stressed. Additionally the concepts of location, positionality and translocational positionality are used and related to the social categories of ethnicity, gender, age and period of residence in Sweden. I will argue that these aspects intersect when young people in the study construct lived citizenship. The study presented explores how young women and men from ethnic minority backgrounds experience social citizenship in terms of constraints at a structural level and at an inter-personal level due to ethnicity. They create alternative strategies to overcome these obstacles for full social citizenship.


Al-Farabi and Ibn Rushd interpreted religion and philosophy as two forms of knowledge which complete rather than nullify each other. This point of view was unique and novel. In this regard, both of them emphasized that, if philosophy were an instrument of a select few people for the comprehension of the meaning of existence, then religion is what gives the general populace a way to express their understanding of life. Ibn Rushd strove to draw the attention of representatives of religious teaching to philosophy, and aimed together with them at the understanding of the world which surrounds humankind. While al-Farabi tried by means of logical arguments to establish the priority of philosophy with reference to religion, Ibn Rushd did not restrict himself to the harmonizing of religion and philosophy, but attempted to use religion for the popularization of philosophy, as well as the raising of its prestige. Ibn Rushd fully realized that it was not necessary for science to argue with religious orthodoxy.


Evolution and growth of parallel systems requires continued advances in the tools to measure, characterize, and understand parallel performance. Five recent developments in the TAU Performance System are reported. First, an update is given on support for heterogeneous systems with GPUs. Second, event-based sampling is being integrated in TAU to add new capabilities for performance observation. New wrapping technology has been incorporated in TAU's instrumentation harness, increasing observation scope. The fourth advance is in the area of performance visualization. Lastly, we discuss our work in Eclipse Parallel Tools Platform.


This thesis comprises a regional synthesis of the diversity of the human experience in West Central Scotland during the Mesolithic period (c.7875-c.4200BCE). The research area incorporates the modern local authorities of Ayrshire, Dunbartonshire, Glasgow City, Inverclyde, Lanarkshire and Renfrewshire. The regional profile has been constructed from a comparison of the lithic assemblages from mainland coastal and inland sites in a transect (c.2550km2) from Ballantrae and Girvan on the Ayrshire coast inland to Loch Doon, South Ayrshire and beyond to the Daer Valley in South Lanarkshire. Three other sites from South Lanarkshire outwith the transect have also been included in the study, namely Climpy, Powbrone and Weston. Reference has also been made to sites on the islands of the Firth of Clyde and at Loch Lomondside. The archaeological and environmental evidence from the Ayrshire coast has been considered, supporting the interpretation of probable sedentism at Girvan during the Late Mesolithic.
The theoretical structure can be distilled into two main themes, namely variation and technology which are folded into a cohesive framework by reference to the philosophies of Gilles Deleuze, and in particular his 1968 work Difference and Repetition. The concepts of repetition, difference and becoming have given meaning to variation as something more profound than a mere contradiction. In this thesis, these concepts have been recast to incorporate the chaine operatoire. Firstly, variation in people and things are forged in the social dimension through repetition. Secondly, technology is understood as inseparable from the agent, where the people and things are both subject and object, and things may be understood as detached parts of people. It is by conjoining these enhanced constructs of variation and technology that people and things as technology inscribe the landscape to create a meaningful taskscape; referring to the notion proposed by Ingold in 1993. These concepts as becoming have been used to explore notions of identity, group identity, social boundaries and taskscape as inseparable qualities of Mesolithic lifeways.

Detailed technological analysis of the surface collections and excavated assemblages comprised within this study has confirmed the continuity of lithic practice across the greater part of the Mesolithic period. Subtle nuances have been recorded in technological choices made, and also in the composition of the lithic assemblages. The main variation lies in the choice of raw materials. The distinctions are more profound than the dominant use of flint at the coast and chert inland. Marked variations in both the colour and original cortical surface of raw materials are identified suggesting differentiated resources across the landscape and different groups of hunter-gatherers. The presence of flint at the inland sites is interpreted as representative of pioneer incursions. The variations in the assemblages of West Central Scotland, together with the cautious use of ethnographic analogy allow consideration of the cosmological significance of raw materials and the materiality of stone. The notion that the use of specific raw materials is culturally proscribed has been instrumental in the interpretation of hunter-gatherers groups who are either predominantly practising sedentism at the coastal lagoonal habitats of Girvan, or creating new group identities and adopting more mobile lifeways inland.


Guatemala is a mega diversity country because it has several ecosystems and the physiography has a high diversity. However, the local population uses this biodiversity as a natural resource of food mainly. The country had three main drainage slopes for their rivers and aquatic reservoirs with several basins (the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea, and the Pacific Sea). In these slopes, crayfish, freshwater prawns, and crabs compose the aquatic biological resources. Several fieldtrips were performed around these slopes in order to identify the species which were used as natural aquatic resources and verify if the diversity supports the food needs of the local population. Our findings were that the country has at least four crayfish species of genus Procambarus spp., those living in the high and middle altitude areas. Five freshwater prawn species with abbreviated larval development of genus Macrobrachium, that is, Macrobrachium cemai were also found. The bigger species of Macrobrachium was also identified on the three slopes as Macrobrachium americanum, Macrobrachium tenellum, Macrobrachium occidentale, and Macrobrachium digueti on the Pacific slope, while on the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, Macrobrachium carcinus, Macrobrachium acanthurus, Macrobrachium heterochirus, Macrobrachium olfersii, and Macrobrachium hobbsi were recorded, and therefore, the nonnative species Macrobrachium rosenbergii; with respect to other shrimps, Palaemon pandaliformis, Palaemonetes octaviae, and atyids as Atya scabra and Potimirim glabra were found. According to the freshwater crabs, the Pseudothelphusidae family is the best to represent in comparison with Trichodactylidae where only one population was recorded. Also, we register the uses of these species around the main markets in the country and we found two main ways: the first one is for the bigger species of freshwater prawns and crabs that are offered very expensive in kilogram and are almost offered in restaurants as exclusive dishes. The second one is more for the local consumption, and many families of fishery species that include crayfishes, freshwater prawns with abbreviated larval development, and smaller crabs, and so on, are sometimes found in the markets, with the prices being cheaper and can be bought only © 2018 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. by the local people. Our findings show that Guatemala has an enormous potential in the crustaceans decapods for use as natural aquatic resources as protein sources at low cost, especially for the families with low economical level.


STUDY OBJECTIVE
The Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) has been used to detect patients with potential sleep disordered breathing (SDB). Recently, a 4-Variable screening tool was proposed to identify patients with SDB, in addition to the STOP and STOP-Bang questionnaires. This study evaluated the abilities of the 4-Variable screening tool, STOP, STOP-Bang, and ESS questionnaires in identifying subjects at risk for SDB.

METHODS
A total of 4,770 participants who completed polysomnograms in the baseline evaluation of the Sleep Heart Health Study (SHHS) were included. Subjects with RDIs ≥ 15 and ≥ 30 were considered to have moderate-to-severe or severe SDB, respectively. Variables were constructed to approximate those in the questionnaires. The risk of SDB was calculated by the 4-Variable screening tool according to Takegami et al. The STOP and STOP-Bang questionnaires were evaluated including variables for snoring, tiredness/sleepiness, observed apnea, blood pressure, body mass index, age, neck circumference, and gender. Sleepiness was evaluated using the ESS questionnaire and scores were dichotomized into < 11 and ≥ 11.

RESULTS
The STOP-Bang questionnaire had higher sensitivity to predict moderate-to-severe (87.0%) and severe (70.4%) SDB, while the 4-Variable screening tool had higher specificity to predict moderate-to-severe and severe SDB (93.2% for both).

CONCLUSIONS
In community populations such as the SHHS, high specificities may be more useful in excluding low-risk patients, while avoiding false positives. However, sleep clinicians may prefer to use screening tools with high sensitivities, like the STOP-Bang, in order to avoid missing cases that may lead to adverse health consequences and increased healthcare costs.


Background Cervical dystonia (CD) is a focal dystonia characterized by sensorimotor integration abnormalities and proprioceptive dysfunction. Since proprioception is essential for bodily awareness, we hypothesized that CD patients may have an impairment in dystonic posture awareness. More information on this issue could be useful to better understand whether dystonic posture affects bodily perception in CD and could help in the development of specific rehabilitation strategies based on proprioceptive input manipulation to restore bodily awareness. Objectives The aim of our study was to investigate dystonic posture and head tremor awareness in CD patients by comparing evaluations performed by CD patients with those performed by a neurologist expert in movement disorders. Methods We enrolled 25 CD patients. We investigated dystonic posture and head tremor awareness in CD patients using a standardized protocol in which patients were asked to describe the type of dystonic pattern, both while viewing standardized images of different CD subtypes (torticollis, laterocollis, anterocollis, and retrocollis) and after watching a video recording of their dystonic posture and head tremor. Results We found that 72% of CD patients correctly recognized their dystonic posture when viewing standardized images, whereas 84% of CD patients were able to identify their dystonic pattern when watching a video recording of themselves. CD patients also displayed a preserved awareness of their head tremor. We did not find any associations between dystonic pattern awareness and clinical or demographic features. Conclusion Contrary to our hypothesis, the majority of CD patients have a preserved awareness of their dystonic pattern and tremor.


Maximal lung volume or total lung capacity in experimental animals is dependent on the pressure to which the lungs are inflated. Although 25-30 cm H2O are nominally used for such inflations, mouse pressure-volume (P-V) curves show little flattening on inflation to those pressures. In the present study, we examined P-V relations and mean alveolar chord length in three strains (C3H/HeJ, A/J, and C57BL/6J) at multiple inflation pressures. Mice were anesthetized, and their lungs were degassed in vivo by absorption of 100% O2. P-V curves were then recorded in situ with increasing peak inflation pressure in 10-cm H2O increments up to 90 cm H2O. Lungs were quickly frozen at specific pressures for morphometric analysis. The inflation limbs never showed the appearance of a plateau, with lung volume increasing 40-60% as inflation pressure was increased from 30 to 60 cm H2O. In contrast, parallel flat deflation limbs were always observed, regardless of the inflation pressure, indicating that the presence of a flat deflation curve cannot be used to justify measurement of total lung capacity in mice. Alveolar size increased monotonically with increasing pressure in all strains, and there was no evidence of irreversible lung damage from these inflations to high pressures. These results suggest that the mouse lung never reaches a maximal volume, even up to nonphysiological pressures >80 cm H2O.


This paper presents an advancement to an approach for model-independent surrogate-based optimization with adaptive batch sampling, known as Adaptive Model Refinement (AMR). While the original AMR method provides unique decisions with regards to "when" to sample and "how many" samples to add (to preserve the credibility of the optimization search process), it did not provide specific direction towards "where" to sample in the design variable space. This paper thus introduces the capability to identify optimum location to add new samples. The location of the infill points is decided by integrating a Gaussian Process-based criteria ("q-EI"), adopted from Bayesian optimization. The consideration of a penalization term to mitigate interaction among samples (in a batch) is crucial to effective integration of the q-EI criteria into AMR. The new AMR method, called AMR with Penalized Batch Bayesian Sampling (AMR-PBS) is tested on benchmark functions, demonstrating better performance compared to Bayesian EGO. In addition, it is successfully applied to design surface riblets for bio-inspired passive flow control (where highfidelity samples are given by costly RANS CFD simulations), leading to a 10% drag reduction over the corresponding baseline (i.e., riblet-free aerodynamic surface).


Abstract
Introduction: Diabetes mellitus, as a chronic metabolic disease, is associated with a wide range of kidney and liver disorders. The goal of this study was to indicate the effects of selenium nanoparticles on the function of kidney and liver enzymes in stereptozocin induced diabetic rats.

Methods: In this study, 35 male wistar rats were divided into five groups (n=7): control, diabetic control and three experimental groups receiving selenium nanoparticle solutions at doses of 0.1, 0.2 and 0.4 mg/kg/BW respectively. To induce diabetes in rats, a single dose of streptozocin (60 mg/kg/BW) was injected intraperitoneally. After the experimental period, blood samples were collected from all groups and the blood factors associated with the liver enzymes and kidney factors were measured and analyzed.

Results: The results indicated that the levels of fasting blood sugar in all groups treated with selenium nanoparticles had a significant reduction compared to the diabetic group (P=0.05). Aspartate amino transferase had a significant reduction at the maximum dose compared to the diabetic group (P=0.05). Also a significant decrease in the level of albumin was seen in the group treated with selenium nanoparticle (P=0.05). Selenium nanoparticle treatment made a significant decreases in the levels of urea and ceratinine at the maximum dose (P=0.05).

Conclusion: The consumption of selenium nanoparticles in proper dosages may have beneficial effects on diabetic complications by lowering blood sugar as well as reducing the increased levels of the liver enzymes and kidney factors, albumin and cratinine resulting in the better function of kidney and liver.


Deep-sea mounds can have a variety of origins and may provide hard-substrate features in depths that are normally dominated by mud. Orphan Knoll, a 2 km high bedrock horst off northeast Newfoundland, hosts more than 200 mounds, or mound complexes, of unknown composition, in water depths of 1720–2500 m. Most mounds are 10–600 m high, with average mound height 187 m, and 1–3 km wide. The study objective was to characterize the size, shape, orientation, and composition of the enigmatic Orphan Knoll mounds, in order to determine their age and origin. Archival ship-based side-scan sonar, multibeam sonar, airgun, high-resolution sparker and 3.5 kHz acoustic sub-bottom profiling, and newly acquired ship-based multibeam sonar, video transects by remotely operated vehicle (ROV), rock samples, and near-bottom multibeam sonar data were analyzed. Four mounds were studied during two ROV dives. Archival sidescan sonar data show > 200 mounds. Sparker profiles show that the mound crests are covered by condensed stratified Quaternary sediment and airgun seismic data show faults reaching near the seafloor. New multibeam sonar data show mounds are dominantly conical to elliptical in shape, but without preferred orientation or alignment. Remotely operated vehicle (ROV) transects and near-bottom multibeam showed that three mounds were rounded and symmetrically arranged, while a fourth was more asymmetrical, with steep faces on the southwestern and southeastern flanks, where finely bedded to massive sedimentary bedrock outcropped dipping 15–45°SW. Rock samples from the mounds include Eocene calcareous ooze and mid-Miocene bedded pelagic limestone. Thick ferromanganese crusts were found on many surfaces, obscuring possible outcrops from physical sampling. Polymetallic nodules were found on the slope of one mound. Ice-rafted detritus, including igneous and metamorphic rocks and Paleozoic limestone and dolostone, was common in the sediments immediately surrounding the mounds. Quaternary sub-fossil solitary scleractinian corals accumulated over a span of at least 0.18 Ma at the base of one mound. The presence of uplifted condensed Eocene-Miocene rocks on the mounds and faulting in seismic profiles suggest uplift during reactivation of old rift-related faults during the Neogene, with seabed mass wasting creating residual mounds, which were then draped by Quaternary proglacial muds. Sculpting of hemipelagic Quaternary sediment by bottom currents probably contributed to mound morphology.


Highly pathogenic avian influenza A H5N1 viruses remain a significant health threat to humans given the continued rare occurrence of human cases with a high case fatality rate. This brief literature review summarizes available evidence of risk factors for H5N1 infection in humans and updates a recent systematic review published in early 2011. Several epidemiologic studies have been published to evaluate the risk factors for H5N1 infection in humans, including contact with poultry and poultry products and non-poultry-related contact such as from H5N1-contaminated water. While most H5N1 cases are attributed to exposure to sick poultry, it is unclear how many may be due to human-to-human transmission. The collective results of published literature suggest that transmission risk of H5N1 from poultry to humans may be highest among individuals who may have been in contact with the highest potential concentrations of virus shed by poultry. This suggests that there may be a threshold of virus concentration needed for effective transmission and that circulating H5N1 strains have not yet mutated to transmit readily from either poultry to human or from human to human. However, the mode of potential transmission can be quite varied throughout different countries and by study with exposures ranging from visiting a wet market, preparing infected poultry for consumption, to swimming or bathing in ponds frequented by poultry. Several important data gaps remain in the understanding of the epidemiology of H5N1 in humans and limit our ability to interpret the results of the available H5N1 seroepidemiologic studies.


The work of nouvelliste Annie Saumont constantly explores the phenomenon of memory, and of memories. This article identifies and nuances the various forms that this exploration takes. An introductory contextualization of author and theme is followed by the presentation of a short story, 'Meandres', which embodies the first quality of memory to be examined: its capacity not only to recall but also to re-evaluate a past which is thus shown to be as hypothetical as the future. Memory as guilt that moulds or puts its indelible stamp on lives is then evoked by means of examples from other stories, illustrating the gradations Saumont achieves in her investigation of the power of this complex faculty. The next section turns to her portrayal of involuntary memory. Unlike for Proust, the instances of spontaneous remembering that are experienced by her characters lunge at them down the years almost exclusively to wound or disorientate. Depictions of the memory which conserves, and is thus burdened by, secrets are then considered, and finally Saumont's evocation of characters who have different reasons to analyse the way their own and other people's memories work. The conclusion to be drawn is that for Saumont, we are our memories; the ability to master a 'judicious interpretation' of memory – or indeed, to forget – is, in her stories, overwhelmingly a quality to be envied.


As for the difficulties in the water injection profile controlling in the offshore oilfields, a kind of polyacrylamide emulsion and its relative profile controlling system were developed in this study. Laboratory experiments have shown that the dissolution time of the emulsion polymer into the sea water is less than 15 minutes, and the viscosity of the polymer solution is larger than 15 mPa·s when the polymer concentration is 2000 mg/L under the temperature of 70°C. The viscosity of the polymer crosslinking system is larger than 150 mPa·s, and the modulus elasticity of the crosslinking system is larger than 500 mPa. A pilot test on two wells from the Shengli Chengao Oilfield was conducted to verify the practical application performance of the emulsion polymer. The pilot test shows that after 2 months emulsion polymer injection, the bottomhole pressure of the production wells has increased by 1.48-1.79 MPa, the oil production from one correspondent well has increased from 28.67 t/d to 35.8 t/d, and the water content in the production flow has decreased from 52.3% to 41.7%. It is believed that the developed emulsion polymer and its crosslinking system have a wide application to the development of Shengli offshore fields.


Context Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is the leading cause of incident blindness among working-age adults in the United States. Federally designated safety-net clinics (FDSC) often serve as point-of-contact for patients least likely to receive recommended DR screenings, creating opportunity for targeted interventions to increase screening access and compliance. Study design and methods With such a goal, we implemented and assessed the longitudinal performance of an FDSC-based telemedicine DR screening (TDRS) network of 22 clinical sites providing nonmydriatic fundus photography with remote interpretation and reporting. Retrospective analysis of patient encounters between February 2014 and January 2019 was performed to assess rates of pathology and referral. A generalized estimating equation logistic regression model was used for subset analysis from audits of pre- and post-implementation screening rates. Finally, patient surveys were conducted and assessed as a measure of intervention acceptability. Results Of the 13,923 individual telescreening encounters (4327 female, 4220 male, and 5376 unspecified; mean [SD] age, 54.9 [12.5] years) studied, 10,540 were of adequate quality to identify 3532 (33.5%) patients with ocular pathology: 2319 (22.0%) patients had some level of DR with 1604 (15.2%) requiring specialist referral, and 808 (7.7%) patients required referral for other ocular pathologies. The mean screening rate for audited clinics in the year prior to program implementation was 29.9% (641/2147), which increased to 47.7% (1012/2124) in the program's first year, doubling patients' odds of being screened (OR 2.2; 95% CI: 1.3–3.7; P = .003). These gains were sustained over four years following implementation (OR 1.9; 95% CI: 1.1–3.1; P = .018) despite varied clinic screening performance (4-year averaged range, 22.9–55.1%). Odds of early detection likewise doubled for patients with consecutive screenings (OR 2.2, 95% CI: 2.0–2.4; P < .001). Finally, surveyed patients preferred TDRS to specialist exams (82.5%; 776/941) and would recommend the service to friends (92.7%; 868/936). Conclusion and relevance A statewide, FDSC-centered TDRS network was successfully established and sustained in a medically underserved region of the United States. Our results suggest that large TDRS networks in FDSCs can increase screening access and compliance for otherwise unscreened populations, but outcomes can vary greatly among clinics. Further work to optimize program implementation is needed to maximize this model's impact.


Blastocystis hominis is one of the most common intestinal protozoan parasites
in human and various animals which has a worldwide distribution and is often isolated from fecal
samples in the parasitology laboratory. Given the relatively high prevalence and emphasis on
pathogenic of Blastocystis hominis especially in immunocompromised patients in recent studies, this
study was performed to investigate the prevalence of Blastocystis hominis in Tabriz in 2009-2010.
Materials & Methods: In this descriptive cross-sectional study, the sample size was calculated 558
samples based on a statistical formula. stool samples from each of the cases were examined 3 times
using direct examination with saline and lugol, staining with trichrome and formalin-ethyl acetate
concentration method.
Results: A total of 558 cases, 146 (%26.17) had Blastocystis hominis positive and 412 (%73.83) had
negative. The most common symptoms in cases that showed only Blastocystis hominis were
abdominal pain (49.4%), anorexia (35.8%) and nausea (33%).
Conclusion: Accordingly, Blastocystis hominis infection was the most common parasitic infection that
in case of neglect can cause many problems for patients. Therefore, the use of appropriate diagnostic
laboratory procedures in hospitals and medical centers can provide effective and accurate diagnosis
that it will play an important role in the promotion of community health


In this paper, we present the design, analysis, and experimental results on the integration of 2D photonic crystals in thin film photovoltaic solar cells based on hydrogenated amorphous silicon. We introduce an analytical approach based on time domain coupled mode theory to investigate the impact of the photon lifetime and anisotropy of the optical resonances on the absorption efficiency. Specific design rules are derived from this analysis. We also show that, due to the specific properties of the photonic crystal resonances, the angular acceptance of such solar cells is particularly high. Rigorous Coupled Wave Analysis simulations show that the absorption in the a-Si:H active layers, integrated from 300 to 750 nm, is only decreased from 65.7% to 60% while the incidence angle is increased from 0 to 55°. Experimental results confirm the stability of the incident light absorption in the patterned stack, for angles of incidence up to 50°.


Polyimide is a potential material for high-performance printed circuit boards because of its chemical stability and excellent thermal and mechanical properties. Flexible printed circuit boards must have a low static dielectric constant and dielectric loss to reduce signal loss in high-speed communication devices. Engineering the molecular structure of polyimides with large pendant groups is a strategy to reduce their dielectric constant. However, there is no systematic study on how the large pendant groups influence electrical energy loss. We integrated all-atomic molecular dynamics and semi-empirical quantum mechanical calculations to examine the influence of pendant groups on polymer chain anisotropy and electrical energy loss at high frequencies. We analyzed the radius of gyration, relative shape anisotropy, dipole moment, and degree of polarization of the selected polyimides (TPAHF, TmBPHF, TpBPHF, MPDA, TriPMPDA, m-PDA, and m-TFPDA). The simulation results show that anisotropy perpendicular to chain direction and local chain rigidity correlate to electrical energy loss rather than dipole moment magnitudes. Polyimides with anisotropic pendant groups and significant local chain rigidity reduce electrical energy loss. The degree of polarization correlated well with the dielectric loss with a moderate computational cost, and difficulties in directly calculating the dielectric loss were circumvented.


While end-to-end neural machine translation (NMT) has made remarkable progress recently, it still suffers from the data scarcity problem for low-resource language pairs and domains. In this paper, we propose a method for zero-resource NMT by assuming that parallel sentences have close probabilities of generating a sentence in a third language. Based on the assumption, our method is able to train a source-to-target NMT model ("student") without parallel corpora available guided by an existing pivot-to-target NMT model ("teacher") on a source-pivot parallel corpus. Experimental results show that the proposed method significantly improves over a baseline pivot-based model by +3.0 BLEU points across various language pairs.


The recruitment stage in clinical trials is key in ensuring enrollment of a large and diverse number of participants. Recent trends in clinical trials recruitment strategies have leveraged social media, mobile, and web-based platforms to advertise trials to a broader and more diverse set of potential participants. We develop a method to improve clinical trials enrollment rates through novel models of communication that provide accurate and unbiased information about the clinical trials and provide awareness to target participants. The contributions of this paper are two-fold. First we propose a model to generate abstractive summaries for clinical trials based on sequence to sequence networks with attention policies. Second, we present a preliminary evaluation of the model in terms of learning, vocabulary development, choices of attention policies, and summarization outputs. Finally, we generate a dataset consisting of multi-sentence clinical trials summaries to be used for bench-marking and in future work.


The HIV/AIDS pandemic has become one of the most important public health problems in recent times and it is having a profound impact on the lives of infected people and their families. There is an acknowledged burden of HIV/AIDS in Nigeria. As the prevalence of HIV/AIDS infection rises, health care professionals worldwide can expect greater clinical exposure to infected patients. The care of people living with AIDS presents a significant challenge to the health care sector. This study seeks to explore the relationship between sources of HIV/AIDS information and knowledge, and the relationship between knowledge of HIV/AIDS and care for people with AIDS among health care providers in three different levels of health care institutions in the southern region of Nigeria. Health care workers from two states in southern Nigeria completed a questionnaire that was designed to assess knowledge, attitudes and practices about HIV/AIDS. The sample was composed of 277 (65%) females and 135 (31.7%) males. The results showed a fair level of knowledge among all health care professionals, with the highest level of knowledge among the doctors and the lowest among laboratory workers. There was a significant gender difference in the level of knowledge but the data suggested that knowledge did not differ by hospital settings. There were generally negative feelings and views about the care of HIV/AIDS patients among the professionals, these views being worst at the community health centers and best at the government hospital. The greatest source of information for the majority of professionals was health talks/seminars, and those respondents who got their information from school scored the highest on the items on general knowledge of HIV/AIDS incidence, cause, transmission, and clinical treatment. This has important implications for future interventions designed for health care professionals including doctors, nurses and laboratory workers.


BACKGROUND: In childhood, cerebral arteriopathy causes cerebral ischaemia and infarction via two related mechanisms. The first, thrombotic vaso-occlusive stroke is the more typical mechanism of stroke in childhood. The second mechanism of infarction related to arteriopathy and not seen in other forms of ischaemic stroke is that of chronic hypoperfusion of the brain. The infarcts in this case are typically located in watershed zones and can accumulate gradually over time. Moyamoya is the prototypic arteriopathy representing the hypoperfusion injury. It is characterized by chronic progressive narrowing of the distal internal carotid, proximal middle cerebral and anterior cerebral arteries; chronic low flow infarction with accumulating 'string of pearls' in the white matter (Fig 1). It is this chronic hypoperfusion of the brain that is the subject of my PhD thesis. Cerebrovascular reactivity is a marker of cerebrovascular reserve and has been shown to be a biomarker of ischaemic risk in adults. OBJECTIVES: The primary objectives were to, in a group of children with moyamoya: 1) Validate the use of a qualitative measure of cerebrovascular reactivity as a biomarker of ischaemic risk, namely, hypercapnic challenge BOLD MRI CVR (hBOLD CVR) via two methods: a) breath-holding and b) induced hypercapnia during general anaesthesia as reliable and repeatable for use in the paediatric population 2) Assess the utility of qualitative assessment of cerebrovascular reactivity using hBOLD CVR as a tool for the identification of the risk of ischaemia in children with arteriopathy Method Hypercapnic challenge hBOLD CVR studies were obtained in children with steno-occlusive arteriopathy prospectively enrolled in The Hospital for Sick Children Stroke Registry. Semi-quantitative methods of measuring CVR were devised and used for the purpose of analysis. hBOLD CVR studies were analysed for reliability and reproducibility of the method of analysis. Clinical and radiologic data were collected and hBOLD CVR findings described for all children enrolled. Exploratory analysis of hBOLD CVR as a potential biomarker of ischaemic risk in the paediatric population were conducted. In particular association of hBOLD CVR with clinical symptomatology; parenchymal and vascular indicators of arteriopathy; neuropsychological outcome and cortical thickness were examined. Results Forty seven children (37 Bilateral or unilateral Moyamoya arteriopathy, 6 Unilateral Non-moyamoya arteriopathy [Transient Cerebral Arteriopathy] and 4 Bilateral Non-moyamoya arteriopathy [2 PHACE(S), 1 Takayasu arteritis, 1 Sickle Cell Disease]) were enrolled and had hBOLD CVR studies. The mean age of diagnosis of arteriopathy across all groups was 8.1 years (SD 4.2) (range 7 months - 18 years). Clinical and radiographic features differed across arteriopathy groups. Most presented with acute stroke, however, among children with NF1-MM most (almost 50%) were asymptomatic and diagnosed on screening MRIs. Infarction patterns differed, with deep watershed infarction being the typical pattern in the moyamoya group in contrast to thrombotic vaso-occlusive infarction pattern in the Non-moyamoya groups. Qualitative hBOLD CVR abnormalities were concordant with moyamoya laterality, and in unilateral moyamoya demonstrated tissue level microvascular dysfunction in the contralateral unaffected hemisphere. Qualitative hBOLD CVR abnormalities demonstrated concordance with clinically important manifestations of ischaemia including stroke, transient ischaemic attacks, cortical thinning and IQ. There was a lack of concordance with indices of executive function. In addition the moderate to severe steno-occlusive arteriopathy seen in the children with Transient Cerebral Arteriopathy was not associated with abnormality of hBOLD CVR. Conclusion The thesis studies demonstrated that qualitative assessment of hBOLD CVR using breath-hold or general anaesthetic is feasible, reproducible and reliable in paediatric population. The utility of hBOLD CVR as a measure of tissue level microvascular dysfunction and thus a biomarker of ischaemic risk was demonstrated. However, larger longitudinal studies are required to characterize this further.


Treatment options in locally advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) have evolved considerably over the past few years with the recent approval of multiple systemic therapies and significant advances in locoregional therapy. Given the poor prognosis for patients with unresectable HCC, there is significant interest in rationally designed combination therapies. This article reviews the treatment options available to patients with locally advanced HCC and discusses the rationale, ongoing trials, and future prospects for combining locoregional and systemic therapy in both the definitive and neoadjuvant settings.


Objective: As repetitive behaviours in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) can significantly interfere with one's daily functioning, continued research on these behaviours is needed. Methods: This study examined the occurrence of repetitive motor movements in toddlers (17–37 months) with ASD and atypical development and the relationship between stereotypies and sensory impairment. Results: Children with ASD (n = 13) exhibited significantly more repetitive behaviours than the non-ASD group (n = 12). Greater percentages of endorsement were evident for the ASD group on nearly all items of the Behaviour Problems Inventory-01 (BPI-01) Stereotypy subscale. More repetitive behaviours tended to co-occur with other stereotypies for the ASD group. A moderate correlation was found between stereotypy severity and sensory deficits. Conclusion: These findings suggest that stereotyped behaviours can be identified at very young ages, negatively affect the behavioural presentation of those with ASDs and should be considered when developing treatment plans.


Potential-field anomalies can be transformed into special functions that form peaks and ridges over isolated sources. All special functions have a common mathematical form over an isolated source, which leads to a common equation for estimating the source depth from the peak value and the curvature at the peak. Model-specific special functions, usually calculated from a transformed version of a potential field, are used to estimate the locations of very specific source types. Model-independent special functions calculated from an observed or transformed potential field can be used to estimate the locations of a variety of source types. Vertical integration is a particularly useful transformation for reducing the effects of noise and increasing the coherency of solutions from model-independent special functions. For gridded data, the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the curvature matrix associated with a quadratic surface that is fitted to a special function within 3 × 3 windows can be used to locate the sources and estimate their depths and strikes. Discrete source locations estimated in this manner can be connected into lines that follow contacts, faults, and other mappable features based on distance and azimuth criteria. These concepts are demonstrated on aeromagnetic data from the Albuquerque basin of New Mexico, USA.


Emily Pilloton is the founder and executive director of Project H Design, a non-profit design agency founded in 2008 to use design and hands-on building for community and educational benefit. Trained in architecture and product design, Emily now spends most days in rural Bertie County, North Carolina, teaching her high school Studio H design/build curriculum, in which students design and build full-scale architectural projects for their hometown. She is the author of the book Design Revolution: 100 Products That Empower People, a compendium and call-to-action for design for social impact, and has appeared on the TED Stage as well as The Colbert Report.


One of the key parameters in the flour milling process is roll differential, the relative speeds at which the rolls rotate. The roll differential causes the shearing action on the grain that removes bran from the endosperm. The aim of this study is to evaluate the recycle system at second break with the effects of roll differential. The effects of roll differential on a recycle grinding process in flour milling were investigated using a Satake STR-100 test roller mill. Differentials of each break-roll pair were adjusted to target differentials ratio (RD) of 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 by changing the velocity of the slow roll. Fast rolls were set at a velocity of 550 rpm. Weight percentages for each particle size and ash content from the second break rolls to recycle system were examined. The results show of that changing the roll differential does affect the recycle grinding performance. Roll differential ratio 2.5 had significantly produced higher yield compared to 2.0 and 3.0 roll differential ratio. It was also concluded that the recycle grinding system was successful introduce at break system and could potentially produce the target production without compromising the quality of the finished product.


. In this work, we define the notion of algebraic distance in algebraic cone metric spaces defined by Niknam et al. [A. Niknam, S. Shamsi Gamchi and M. Janfada, Some results on TVS-cone normed spaces and algebraic cone metric spaces, Iranian J. Math. Sci. Infor. 9 (1) (2014) 71–80] and introduce some its elementary properties. Then we prove the existence and uniqueness of fixed point for a Banach contractive type mapping in algebraic cone metric spaces associated with an algebraic distance and endowed with a graph.


To develop surfactant based metallodrugs, it is important to know the role of the tail part of the surfactant–metal complexes in their hydrophobicity, micellization behaviour, interaction with biomacromolecules and cell penetration. Here, we have taken a new series of single and double chain surfactant–cobalt(III) complexes with alkylamine ligands of different chain length, [Co(dien)(DA)Cl2]ClO4 (1), [Co(dien)(HA)Cl2]ClO4 (2), [Co(dien)(DA)2Cl](ClO4)2 (3) and [Co(dien)(HA)2Cl](ClO4)2 (4), where dien = diethylenetriamine, DA = dodecylamine and HA = hexadecylamine. The complexes were characterised by elemental analysis, NMR, ESI-MS, UV-visible and FTIR techniques. In addition, the average size distribution and morphology of self-assembled surfactant–cobalt(III) complexes were examined by DLS and SEM, respectively. The hydrophobicity, critical micelle concentration (CMC) values, thermodynamics of micellization (ΔG°m, ΔH°m and ΔS°m) and the nature of the interaction of these complexes with bovine and human serum albumins (BSA/HSA) were evaluated. The obtained CMC values were in the order 1 > 2 > 3 > 4, indicating that double chain systems have lower CMC values compared to single chain systems due to the increase in the hydrophobicity of the alkyl amine ligands. The thermodynamics of micellization indicated that the process is spontaneous, exothermic and entropy driven. The interaction of complexes 1–4 with serum albumins indicated that the quenching process follows a static mechanism, and the extent of quenching and binding parameters were in the order 1 < 2 < 3 < 4. Interestingly, on increasing the temperature, the protein–complex stability decreased for the single chain systems, and increased for the double chain systems, probably due to the involvement of electrostatic and hydrophobic interactions. This was further supported by the thermodynamics of protein interaction and synchronous fluorescence studies. Moreover, the results from UV-vis, synchronous and circular dichroism (CD) showed the occurrence of conformational and micro environmental changes in BSA/HSA. It is also noted that BSA has more binding affinity with surfactant–metal complexes compared to HSA. Furthermore, the antimicrobial effects of these complexes were investigated by disk diffusion method; complex 4 has a better antimicrobial activity due to the ease of bacterial cell penetration due to its more hydrophobic nature.


The thickness of the dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration boundary layer and the external mass transfer in a biofilm system were investigated using a microelectrode technique. Theoretical analysis was conducted to elucidate the mechanisms of the technique and to interpret the experimental measurements. The measured thicknesses of dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration boundary layers under different conditions demonstrated directly the effect of several factors on external mass transfer resistance. The experimental results indicated that (a) increasing substrate loading rate, (b) increasing fluid streamwise velocity and (c) increasing the roughness of the biofilm surface would decrease the external mass transfer resistance. The measured thickness of the DO concentration boundary layer was not in full agreement with theoretical correlations because the nonuniform biofilm created velocity and concentration fluctuations which resulted in the compression of concentration boundary layers. The microelectrode technique is a useful tool to study the external mass transfer resistance.


The employee engagement model for Thai hotel industry was developed based upon JD-R model of work engagement and grounded in Social Exchange Theory. A self-administered questionnaire was used as a research tool, a total of 429 hotel employees in Thailand were used as a sample. The structural equation modeling techniques was applied to develop suitable model for employee engagement. The findings indicated the goodness of fit among five driving factors (perceived organizational support, optimism, co-worker relations, conscientiousness and career opportunities and advancement) and four consequences (job performance, organizational citizenship behavior, job satisfaction and turnover intention) of employee engagement. The results suggested that perceived organizational support and optimism demonstrated powerful influences on employee engagement. Practical implication and limitation were also discussed in our study.


The models of teaching social sciences and clinical practice are insufficient for the needs of practical-reflective teaching of social sciences applied to health. The scope of this article is to reflect on the challenges and perspectives of social science education for health professionals. In the 1950s the important movement bringing together social sciences and the field of health began, how- ever weak credentials still prevail. This is due to the low professional status of social scientists in health and the ill-defined position of the social sciences professionals in the health field. It is also due to the scant importance attributed by stu- dents to the social sciences, the small number of professionals and the colonization of the social sci- ences by the biomedical culture in the health field. Thus, the professionals of social sciences applied to health are also faced with the need to build an identity, even after six decades of their presence in the field of health. This is because their ambiva- lent status has established them as a partial, in- complete and virtual presence, requiring a com- plex survival strategy in the nebulous area between social sciences and health.


We propose a method to test for liquidity constraints which relies on using the within period marginal rate of substitution condition as a benchmark to evaluate the intertemporal Euler equation. If spot markets for nondurable goods exist, but financial markets either do not exist, or are imperfect, we show how the comparison of first order conditions involving the relevant spot and intertemporal prices can be used to detect the imperfection. We apply our methodology to a large sample of U.S. households, drawn from twelve years of the Consumer Expenditure Survey, allowing for a general nonseparable preference structure. Our estimates of first order conditions do not indicate the presence of liquidity constraints, with the possible exception of young households.


The following lipophilic spin-labeled cytochrome P-450 analogs were synthesized: 2-octyl-4-(3-iodine-2-oxopropylidene)-2,3,5,5-tetramethylimidaz olidine-1-oxyl (RIII), 2-nonyl-4-(3-iodine-2-oxopropylidene)-2,3,5,5-tetramethylimidaz olidine-1-oxyl (RIV), 2-hepta-decyl-4-(3-iodine-2-oxopropylidene)-2,3,5,5-tetramethyl imidazolidine-1- oxyl (RV). The distribution coefficients, k, in water--lipid and water--octanol systems as well as the theoretical estimates of k for these and previously synthesized analogs, i.e., 4-(3-iodine-2-oxo-propylidenyl)-2,2,3,5,5-pentamethylimidazolid ine-1-oxyl (RI) and 2-hexyl-4-(3-iodine-2-oxopropylidene)-2,3,5,5-tetramethylimidaz olidine- 1-oxyl (RII) were determined. It was shown that RIII and RIV bind as type I substrates to cytochrome P-450 from rat microsomes induced with phenobarbital or 3-methylcholanthrene as well as to those from control rats. Radicals RIII and RIV inhibit the oxidation of aniline, aminopyrine and benzphetamine. RIII-RV strongly inhibit the O-deethylation of 7-etoxyresorufin. The inhibitory activity of the radicals increases in the following order: RV less than RIV less than or equal to RI less than or equal to RIII less than RII. The experimental results suggest that the inhibitory properties are nonmonotonuesly related to the lipophility. The high lipophility of RIII and its strong inhibitory properties permit to render the latter to the class of inhibitors which can be transported by liposome membrane vehicles to the liver, inhibit the in vivo activity of the microsomal system and thus prolong the effects of drugs oxidized by cytochrome P-450.


When we use MathSciNet, a comprehensive bibliographic database for mathematical sciences, we can find a number of mathematical journals published in Japan. However, it is uncertain how many different titles of mathematical journals are published and how many articles appeared in them. For example, about 10 titles of major mathematical journals, which are supported by SPARC Japan, IR of Kyoto University Library, and IR of the University of Tokyo Library, account for approximately 5 to 10 percent of articles in certain research fields in the world based on mathematics subject classification. Figures in the poster show the detail. Furthermore, Japanese mathematician has made a major contribution in those research fields. Also, we can note that the number of articles published in Japan is not far behind the number published by Springer and Elsevier. From these facts, it is clear that SPARC Japan and institutional repositories play an important role for mathematical publications in the world. These major journals contain about 1000 articles each. However, according to MathSciNet, there are over 100 titles of mathematical journals and university bulletins containing less than 200 articles each. Including these titles, contributions of Japanese mathematical publication to the world will achieve more recognition. From this viewpoint it is important to recognize institutional repositories as a platform of university bulletins and academic journals in Japan. In the poster the author would like to show the results of our analysis and the future plan in detail.


This paper presents some experiences with class of service (CoS) translation in IP and MPLS based networks. IP provides CoS in the form of eight priority classes that can be used to distinguish between a variety of traffic types. Since most of the layer-2 technologies provide support for strict QoS, an appropriate translation from the coarse grained IP CoS to the fine-grained layer-2 QoS is fundamental to obtaining desired end-to-end throughput. Multiprotocol label switching (MPLS), residing in between IP and layer-2 in the protocol stack, provides an interface to translate IP CoS to appropriate layer-2 QoS. This paper presents some of the results obtained by using MPLS CoS with relative and fixed bandwidth allocation to MPLS classes. Experiments were conducted to observe the effects of per-CoS weighted fair queuing (WFQ) and class based queueing (CBQ) inside the MPLS cloud on fixed size high bandwidth traffic and bursty traffic. It was found that MPLS CoS did relative allocation of bandwidth and prevented starvation of lower priority flows inside the MPLS core. This paper also discusses some of the experiments conducted to evaluate the effects of improper CoS mapping, as a packet traverses multiple networks.


In this paper, we discuss quantization effects in rigid formation control systems when target formations are described by interagent distances. Because of practical sensing and measurement constraints, we consider in this paper distance measurements in their quantized forms. We show that under gradient‐based formation control, in the case of uniform quantization, the distance errors converge locally to a bounded set whose size depends on the quantization error, while in the case of logarithmic quantization, all distance errors converge locally to zero. A special quantizer involving the signum function is then considered with which all agents can only measure coarse distances in terms of binary information. In this case, the formation converges locally to a target formation within a finite time. Lastly, we discuss the effect of asymmetric uniform quantization on rigid formation control.


THE IMPACT OF STATE EQUITY STANDARDS ON LEADERS ESPOUSED BELIEFS ABOUT SOCIAL JUSTICE Amanda Hadgraft Old Dominion University Director: Dr. Steve Myran School leaders are tasked with greater responsibilities than ever before. Today's school leaders are expected to act as social justice leaders, ensuring all students have an equitable environment to learn in. State departments of education hold leaders accountable by comparing standardized test scores of students in majority and minority groups. The problem is these assessments measure the outcome of learning, but fail to measure the environments learning occurs in. The purpose of this study was to understand, within the context of the accountability climate, school leaders' espoused beliefs about social justice, and the practices they employ to those ends. Using the dual lenses of epistemic injustice and critical race theory, in this qualitative research study, I sought to understand the complex bidirectional and reciprocal relationship between the accountability climate and school leaders' espoused beliefs and practices regarding social justice. After conducting my study with seven school leaders from six different school districts in Southeastern Virginia, I discovered school leaders believed social justice was a concern, however struggle with their role in eradicating societal injustices. My findings indicated how complex that relationship between the accountability climate and leaders practices are. I uncovered a schism between leaders' personal beliefs and unofficial practices when it came to social justice and the official practices required by central office supervisors. Although participants believed social justice was an issue they struggled to understand the role they should play in ending the cycle. THE IMPACT OF STATE EQUQTY STANDARDS ON LEADERS iii Copyright, 2019, by Amanda Hadgraft, All Rights Reserved. THE IMPACT OF STATE EQUQTY STANDARDS ON LEADERS iv


Introduction: Postoperative wound complications for women undergoing cesarean delivery constitute a major cause of morbidity. Data on wound healing based on the type of cesarean wound closure is limited. In this study, we assess the outcome of stapler versus absorbable sub-cuticular suture for skin closure of the cesarean wound.
Method: Prospective observational study. All cesarean section patients during the period of six months (Dec 2019 to May 2020) at Patan Hospital, Nepal, whose skin closure was done by sub-cuticular suture or stapler technique were recruited in the study. Ethical approval was obtained. These patients were followed up postoperatively on the 10th day for wound outcome (redness, edema, hematoma, seroma, discharge, gaping). Number and proportion were calculated, chi-square test, and Fisher's exact test at 95% confidence interval were used to see the association and p<0.05 was considered significant.
Result: Out of 379 patients, 26(6.9%) were lost to follow-up. Among 353 patients, an unhealthy wound was seen in 7(1.98%) during follow-up. Of these unhealthy wounds, closure with stapler technique was 5(71.4%) and by sub-cuticular technique, 2(28.6%), statistically significant with a p-value of 0.014.
Conclusion: Cesarean wound closure by sub-cuticular technique had a better wound outcome compared to closure by staplers.


The main objective of this study was to demonstrate the effect of seminal plasma ovulation inducing factor (OIF) on ovulation in female camels. Seminal plasma was fractionated using gel filtration chromatography, and two protein peaks were obtained and analysed by western blotting. The effect of the bioactive protein fraction (OIF/β-NGF) was tested by intramuscular injection (1 ml) in synchronized females with the following treatments: PBS (negative control group, n = 3); 20 µg Buserelin (GnRH analogue, positive control group; n = 3); and purified OIF with doses of 1 and 2 mg (n = 5, each treatment). Blood samples were collected every two days from day 0 until 14 days post-treatment, and the progesterone concentration was assessed. The obtained results showed that the OIF is highly present in the seminal plasma of dromedary camels as a protein with a molecular mass of approximately 14 kDa. It was detected as a beta-Nerve Growth Factor, named Cam-β-NGF. The effect of this molecule on ovulation was clearly demonstrated by the significant increase of the plasma progesterone concentration in the treated female groups (1 and 2 mg of Cam-β-NGF) as observed in Buserelin group. In summary, intramuscular injection of β-NGF isolated from dromedary camel seminal plasma induces ovulation in females with similar rate to Buserelin treatment.


In the model formulation, data banks on coal supply, transportation, and demand are used in a linear optimization procedure which derives potential coal supply systems under alternative future demand scenarios. Insights into such policy areas as coal production, cash flows, employment, land use, and environmental quality may also be gained.


The purpose of this study was to determine if health locus of control and social network are predictors of adolescent risk-taking. FINDINGS demonstrated that 12% of the variance in risk-taking could be explained by 2 of the 3 dimensions of health locus of control (internal and powerful other health locus of control subscales), and social network. Language: en


ABSTRACT The Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC) conducted a mercury-sampling program to provide data on the quantity and forms of Hg emitted and on the Hg removal efficiency of the existing air pollution control devices at two North Dakota power plants—Milton R. Young Station and Coal Creek Station. Minnkota Power Cooperative, Great River Energy, the North Dakota Industrial Commission, and EPRI funded the project. The primary objective was to obtain accurate measurements of Hg released from each plant, as verified by a material balance. A secondary objective was to evaluate the ability of a mercury continuous emission monitor (CEM) to measure total Hg at the stack. At both plants, speciated Hg measurements were made at the inlets and outlets of both the electrostatic precipi-tators (ESPs) and the flue gas desulfurization (FGD) systems. A Semtech Hg 2000 (Semtech Metallurgy AB) mercury CEM was used to measure the total Hg emissions at the stack in real time. Using these measurements and plant data, the measured Hg concentrations in the coal, FGD slurries, and ESP ash, a Hg mass flow rate was calculated at each sampling location. Excellent Hg mass balances were obtained (±15%). It was also found that the Hg was mostly in the elemental phase (~90%), and the small amount of oxidized Hg that was generated was removed by the FGD systems. Insignificant amounts of particulate-bound Hg were measured at both plants. However, 10-20% of the elemental Hg measured prior to the ESP was converted to oxidized Hg across the ESP. The data show that, at these facilities, almost all of the Hg generated is being emitted into the atmosphere as elemental Hg. Local or regional deposition of the Hg emitted from these plants is not a concern. However, the Hg does become part of the global Hg burden in the atmosphere. Also, the evidence appears to indicate that elemental Hg is more difficult to remove from flue gas than oxidized Hg is.


The relationship between exposure of pneumococci to antibiotics and appearance of beta hemolysis (rather than the usual alpha hemolysis) was studied in 100 isolates. All strains were capable of producing beta hemolysis. This occurred at the edge of inhibition zones produced by methicillin and other antibiotics, but only if grown anaerobically and subsequently exposed to air at reduced temperatures. Autolysis of the pneumococci was necessary for the beta hemolysis to be produced. Beta hemolysis was optimal at pH 6.8; none occurred at pH 7.4. The concentration of red cells influenced the reaction: at 4% the extent of beta hemolysis was drastically reduced, which suggests that the lysin is not an enzyme.


Historically, air transport has developed under the auspices and control of national authorities. In Europe, this largely meant monopolistic national carriers and publicly owned/managed airports. International air transport, which is based on inter-state bilateral agreements, has expanded accordingly – with strict control of, in particular, market access and carrier ownership regimes. This fragmentation into national markets and the absence of real competition were less and less at one with increasing standards of living and the resulting growing demand for air transport. From the mid-1970s, civil aviation had to switch from an administered economy to a market economy. Thus, the 1978 Airline Deregulation Act completely liberalised the US market.


Abstract : We applied the Wigner Distribution Function, a distribution function of time and frequency based on an initial function of either of those variables, to a series of time based correlation functions. These time based correlation functions were the result of a 1-dimensional free particle wave packet, the reactant wave function, which had propagated through a quantum potential well and then had components of the reactant wave function that exited the opposite side of the well auto-correlated in time with a stationary 1-dimensional free particle wave packet, the product wave function. This process was undertaking in order to generate a 3-dimensional depiction, in time and frequency, of the reactant wave functions interaction with the quantum potential well. Fortran 77 code was utilized to generated the time propagation of the reactant wave function by means of the Split Operator Method, which was given the following initial set of conditions; x sub 0 = -20 (Bohr radii), k sub 0 = 3 (atomic units), and = 1 (Bohr radius). A series of potential wells with variable depths were implemented into the code. The code then computed the correlation in time of the exiting reactant wave function with a stationary wave function before applying the Wigner Distribution Function. When Wigner Distribution Function was applied to the time correlation function many recognizable features on the potential well were observed from the 3-dimensional plot generated including transmission resonance energy levels. The classical time of arrival was also captured by the Wigner Distribution Function. As a useful tool the Wigner Distribution Function provides more insight into the quantum interactions of chemical reactions in terms of time and frequency than traditional spectrographic analysis.


The mammalian order Xenarthra includes the armadillos, sloths and anteaters, and the extinct glyptodonts; the mammalian order Pholidota comprises the pangolins or scaly anteaters. Although they were once thought to be closely related, Xenarthra is now generally considered to represent one of the four primary divisions of placental mammals, with pangolins placed in a separate division. Xenarthrans are united by a suite of unusual anatomical features, primary among them the presence of extra joints in their backbones, whereas pangolin's most notable feature is their external covering of overlapping, horny scales. Both xenarthrans and pholidotans are typified by adaptations for digging and for feeding on ants and termites, though climbing forms are also common, and sloths and their relatives are herbivorous. Both orders are relatively small, with Xenarthra comprising 31 living species and Pholidota only 8, but Xenarthra also includes a very extensive extinct radiation of highly unusual mammals, including giant herbivorous sloths and the massively armoured, herbivorous glyptodonts. Xenarthrans are found in a variety of habitats throughout Central and South America, as well as southern North America, whereas pangolins are confined to the Old World tropics, from sub-Saharan Africa to southeast Asia, mostly in forested habitats.

Key Concepts:

The order Xenarthra includes the living armadillos, sloths and anteaters, along with unusual extinct forms like ground sloths and glyptodonts; the order Pholidota is comprised of the living pangolins or scaly anteaters.

Xenarthra and Pholidota were once considered close relatives, but are now thought to be only distantly related among placental mammals.

Xenarthrans are united by their possession of a suite of unusual anatomical features, in particular extra joints found in the thoracic and lumbar vertebrae; each subgroup has its own unique anatomical adaptations, for example, the complex bony carapace of the armadillos.

Pholidotans are characterised by an external covering of overlapping, horny or keratinous epidermal scales.

Both Xenarthra and Pholidota are small in terms of the living diversity of species, but Xenarthra is more diverse, with three very different subgroups.

Xenarthrans and pholidotans are found in a variety of habitats throughout the New World and Old World tropics respectively, but both contain a significant number of threatened species, due largely to hunting pressure and habitat destruction.

Most of the species in Xenarthra and Pholidota are characterised by adaptations for digging and for eating ants and termites, though both groups include climbing forms, and Xenarthra also includes a radiation of arboreal herbivores, the sloths.

The modern xenarthran fauna is only an impoverished remnant of a once much more diverse radiation, one that included such extraordinary creatures as giant ground sloths, pampatheres (giant herbivorous armadillos) and glyptodonts (heavily armoured, herbivorous relatives of armadillos).

Palaeanodonts are an extinct group of digging, ant-eating or insect-eating specialists that may be related to pangolins.

Keywords:

armadillo;
sloth;
anteater;
pangolin;
glyptodont;
phylogeny;
fossils;
diversity


Multiple-Input Multiple-Output Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (MIMO-OFDM) is a promising technology for high data rate transmission in wideband wireless systems for achieving high downlink capacities in future cellular systems. In this paper subcarrier and power allocation to each user at base-station is allocated to maximize the user data rates, subject to constraints on total power and bit error rate (BER). The chow-campello algorithm has been introduced and analyzed, and a low complexity algorithm has been proposed. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can achieve similar performance with much lower computational complexity, which indicates that the proposed algorithm is effective when compared to the existing algorithms.


The use of distances based on optimal transportation has recently shown promise for discrimination of power spectra. In particular, spectral estimation methods based on ℓ1 regularization as well as covariance based methods can be shown to be robust with respect to such distances. These transportation distances provide a geometric framework where geodesics corresponds to smooth transition of spectral mass, and have been useful for tracking. In this paper we investigate the use of these distances for automatic target recognition. We study the use of the Monge-Kantorovich distance compared to the standard ℓ2 distance for classifying civilian vehicles based on SAR images. We use a version of the Monge-Kantorovich distance that applies also for the case where the spectra may have different total mass, and we formulate the optimization problem as a minimum flow problem that can be computed using efficient algorithms.


Durability design of piles is usually carried out based on AS 2159 and AS 3600. It is widely known that the durability of concrete in acid sulphate environments is significantly influenced by the type of binder; however this is not recognised in AS 2159 or AS 3600. Also little supporting information is available in AS 2159 and AS 3600 to give confidence that a pile complying with these standards would provide a design life of 100 years. Some information is available about the comparative performance of concrete prepared from various binders in acid sulphate environments. However the quantification of the service life in such environments is not available. Also very little data on the field performance in acid sulphate conditions is available due to the difficulty in obtaining such data. A bridge at Banora Point was recently de-commissioned and provided a unique opportunity to access a pile and procure concrete samples. The concrete was examined to assess the extent of deterioration due to acid sulphate soil as those piles were known to be located in acid sulphate ground conditions. The microstructure of the concrete was studied to examine any changes due to deterioration caused by the acid sulphate environment. Thereby the extent of degradation to the concrete could be assessed and provide an estimate of its expected service life. Such information would be valuable in future durability design of concrete for piles in acid sulphate environments and will also increase the confidence of achieving a design life of 100 years. The adequacy of AS 2159 and AS 3600 will also be assessed.


The IRAC ultradeep field and IRAC Legacy over GOODS programs are two ultradeep imaging surveys at 3.6 and 4.5 μm with the Spitzer Infrared Array Camera (IRAC). The primary aim is to directly detect the infrared light of reionization epoch galaxies at z > 7 and to constrain their stellar populations. The observations cover the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF), including the two HUDF parallel fields, and the CANDELS/GOODS-South, and are combined with archival data from all previous deep programs into one ultradeep data set. The resulting imaging reaches unprecedented coverage in IRAC 3.6 and 4.5 μm ranging from >50 hr over 150 arcmin2, >100 hr over 60 sq arcmin2, to ∼200 hr over 5–10 arcmin2. This paper presents the survey description, data reduction, and public release of reduced mosaics on the same astrometric system as the CANDELS/GOODS-South Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) data. To facilitate prior-based WFC3+IRAC photometry, we introduce a new method to create high signal-to-noise PSFs from the IRAC data and reconstruct the complex spatial variation due to survey geometry. The PSF maps are included in the release, as are registered maps of subsets of the data to enable reliability and variability studies. Simulations show that the noise in the ultradeep IRAC images decreases approximately as the square root of integration time over the range 20–200 hr, well below the classical confusion limit, reaching 1σ point-source sensitivities as faint as 15 nJy (28.5 AB) at 3.6 μm and 18 nJy (28.3 AB) at 4.5 μm. The value of such ultradeep IRAC data is illustrated by direct detections of z = 7–8 galaxies as faint as HAB = 28.


Flagellar filaments were isolated from Helicobacter pylori by shearing, and flagellar proteins were further purified by a variety of techniques, including CsCl density gradient ultracentrifugation, pH 2.0 acid disassociation-neutral pH reassociation, and differential ultracentrifugation followed by molecular sieving with a Sephacryl S-500 column or Mono Q anion-exchange column, and purified to homogeneity by preparative sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and transfer to an Immobilon membrane. Two flagellin species of pI 5.2 and with apparent subunit molecular weights (Mrs) of 57,000 and 56,000 were obtained. N-terminal amino acid analysis showed that the two H. pylori flagellin species were related to each other and shared sequence similarity with the N-terminal amino acid sequence of Campylobacter coli, Bacillus, Salmonella, and Caulobacter flagellins. Analysis of the amino acid composition of the predominant 56,000-Mr flagellin species isolated from two strains showed that it was comparable to the flagellins of other species. The minor 57,000-Mr flagellin species contained a higher content of proline. Immunoelectron microscopic studies with polyclonal monospecific H. pylori antiflagellin antiserum and monoclonal antibody (MAb) 72c showed that the two different-Mr flagellin species were located in different regions of the assembled flagellar filament. The minor 57,000-Mr species was located proximal to the hook, and the major 56,000-Mr flagellin composed the remainder of the filament. Western immunoblot analysis with polyclonal rabbit antisera raised against H. pylori or Campylobacter jejuni flagellins and MAb 72c showed that the 56,000-Mr flagellin carried sequences antigenetically cross-reactive with the 57,000-Mr H. pylori flagellin and the flagellins of Campylobacter species. This antigenic cross-reactivity did not extend to the flagellins of other gram-negative bacteria. The 56,000-Mr flagellin also carried H. pylori-specific sequences recognized by two additional MAbs. The epitopes for these MAbs were not surface exposed on the assembled inner flagellar filament of H. pylori but were readily detected by immunodot blot assay of sodium dodecyl sulfate-lysed cells of H. pylori, suggesting that this serological test could be a useful addition to those currently employed in the rapid identification of this important pathogen.


The farming systems in the mountain areas of Kyrgyzstan are primarily characterised by small-scale crop and livestock activities. Farmers are faced with several environmental, socio-economic and political challenges and constraints that result in significant uncertainties affecting their operations. This paper attempts to model how various sources of uncertainty collectively affected the smallholders' farm incomes during a mid-term horizon using Monte Carlo simulation. The analyses were based on data collected through a survey of 235 smallholder farms in the medium and high-elevation mountains ranges and expert interviews. We defined a static and a dynamic scenario, the latter of which incorporating likely adjustments in land use and production methods by farmers in response to changing prices and factor costs. Our results suggest that to benefit from improving market opportunities, farmers should adjust and modify their farm management by expanding cash crops in the medium-elevation ranges or increasing herd sizes and fodder cultivation in high-altitude ranges. Results also indicate that farmers in the medium elevations benefit more from these opportunities than farmers in higher altitudes. The paper concludes with some practical recommendations for agricultural policy making in Kyrgyzstan.


This paper presents applications of HyCon, a framework for context aware hypermedia systems. The HyCon framework encompasses annotations, links, and guided tours associating locations and RFID- or Bluetooth-tagged objects with maps, Web pages, and collections of resources. The user-created annotations, links and guided tours, are represented as XLink structures, and HyCon introduces the use of XLink for the representation of recorded geographical paths with annotations and links. The HyCon architecture extends upon earlier location based hypermedia systems by supporting authoring in the field and by providing access to browsing and searching information through a novel geo-based search (GBS) interface for the Web. Interface-wise, the HyCon prototype utilizes SVG on an interface level, for graphics as well as for user interface widgets on tablet PCs and mobile phones.


Any water supply system can be conceptualized as consisting of three components--source development fac il ides (inc1ud ing treatment), transmission facilities, and a distribution network. The scope of this report is limited to the first two--the source related facilities upstream from the distribution network. In the mathematical modeling of regional rural systems, the number of variables, and hence the size of the model, increases rapidly as the number of system components and their alternative designs increase. Regardless of the method of solution, manual preparation of I arge models is cumbersome and is vul nerable to human error both in the computations of the matrix coefficients as well as in the format requirements. This research is aimed at developing a flexible matrix generator for the general rural water supply problem and alternative solution methods that can be used for especially large problems. The Mixed Integer Programming (MIP) method is particularly expensive to use for large problems and is not pract ical if the number of variables approaches a hundred or so, while the alternative solution methods can handle hundreds of variables. A real-world application problem is solved using the MIP and the three alternative methods developed during this research. These include the continuous, the nonl inear discrete, and the objective bounding methods. The solutions are compared and conclusions drawn as to the conditions under which the different methods are recommended.


Emotion is a complex emotional state, which can affect our physiology and psychology and lead to behavior changes. The spreading process of emotions in the text-based social networks is referred to as sentiment spreading. In this paper, we study an interesting problem of sentiment spreading in social networks. In particular, by employing a text-based social network (Twitter) , we try to unveil the correlation between users' sentimental statuses and topic distributions embedded in the tweets, then to automatically learn the influence strength between linked users. Furthermore, we introduce user interest to refine the influence strength. We develop a unified probabilistic framework to formalize the problem into a topic-enhanced sentiment spreading model. The model can predict users' sentimental statuses based on their historical emotional status, topic distributions in tweets and social structures. Experiments on the Twitter dataset show that the proposed model significantly outperforms several alternative methods in predicting users' sentimental status. We also discover an intriguing phenomenon that positive and negative sentiment is more relevant to user interest than neutral ones. Our method offers a new opportunity to understand the underlying mechanism of sentimental spreading in online social networks.


CongressionalMonitor.org, the companion site to this JPS section, provides in-depth summaries of all bills and many resolutions listed here. Published annually, the Congressional Monitor summarizes all bills and resolutions pertinent to Palestine, Israel, or the broader Arab-Israeli conflict that are introduced during the previous session of Congress. It is part of a wider project of the Institute for Palestine Studies that includes the Congressional Monitor Database (CongressionalMonitor.org). The database contains all relevant legislation from 2001 to the present (the 107th Congress through the 112th Congress) and is updated on an ongoing basis. The monitor identifies major legislative themes related to the Palestine issue as well as initiators of specific legislation, their priorities, the range of their concerns, and their attitudes toward regional actors. Material in this compilation is drawn from www.thomas.loc.gov, the official legislative site of the Library of Congress, which includes a detailed primer on the legislative process entitled "How Our Laws Are Made."


Over the last ten years, Chinese enterprises have become more multi-national in nature. China's outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) has been growing at a phenomenal rate. In 2012, China became the third largest investor, after the US and Japan; and the largest investor among developing countries. How can host governments attract more of this Chinese capital? What are some short to medium term policies that host governments can initiate to make their respective nations attractive to Chinese investors? We consider these questions by utilizing a best-worst choice exercise among 114 senior corporate decisionmakers of Chinese companies who have planned or are planning to globalize. Using the maximum difference scaling methodology, we rank 19 most common determinants that influence FDI location choice. We propose five "low hanging fruits" that policy-makers should consider that could ensure their countries come within the radar of Chinese multi-nationals.


Background Community-based cluster-randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are increasingly being conducted to address pressing global health concerns. Preparations for clinical trials are well-described, as are the steps for multi-component health service trials. However, guidance is lacking for addressing the ethical and logistic challenges in (cluster) RCTs of population health interventions in low- and middle-income countries. Objective We aimed to identify the factors that population health researchers must explicitly consider when planning RCTs within North-South partnerships. Design We reviewed our experiences and identified key ethical and logistic issues encountered during the pre-trial phase of a recently implemented RCT. This trial aimed to improve tuberculosis (TB) and Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) prevention and care for health workers by enhancing workplace assessment capability, addressing concerns about confidentiality and stigma, and providing onsite counseling, testing, and treatment. An iterative framework was used to synthesize this analysis with lessons taken from other studies. Results The checklist of critical factors was grouped into eight categories: 1) Building trust and shared ownership; 2) Conducting feasibility studies throughout the process; 3) Building capacity; 4) Creating an appropriate information system; 5) Conducting pilot studies; 6) Securing stakeholder support, with a view to scale-up; 7) Continuously refining methodological rigor; and 8) Explicitly addressing all ethical issues both at the start and continuously as they arise. Conclusion Researchers should allow for the significant investment of time and resources required for successful implementation of population health RCTs within North-South collaborations, recognize the iterative nature of the process, and be prepared to revise protocols as challenges emerge.


To correct market failures due to the presence of negative externalities associated with energy consumption, governments have adopted a variety of policies, including taxes, subsidies, regulations and standards, and information-based policies. For example, labels that clearly convey energy consumption rates, associated costs, and emissions of conventional pollutants and CO2, have been devised and used in the last two decades to promote rational decisions, but it is unclear whether labeling schemes have realigned consumer and producer behaviors. In 2003, Switzerland introduced a system of fuel economy labels, based on grades ranging from A to G, where is A best and G is worst, to assist consumers in making decisions that improve the fleet's fuel economy and lower emissions. We use a dataset documenting all passenger cars approved for sale in Switzerland each year from 2000 to 2011 to answer three key research questions. First, what is the willingness to pay for fuel economy? Second, do Swiss drivers—or Swiss auto importers—appear to do a one-to-one tradeoff between car purchase price and savings on fuel costs over the lifetime of the car? Third, does the label have an additional effect on price, all else the same, above and beyond that of fuel efficiency alone? Hedonic pricing regressions that exploit the variation in fuel economy across make-models, and over time within make-models, suggest that there is a (modest) capitalization of fuel economy into car prices. The Diesel premium, however, exceeds the future fuel cost savings made possible by Diesel cars, even at zero discount rates. An alternate calculation suggests that the fuel economy premium is consistent with a very low discount rate (2.5%). We use matching estimators and a sharp regression discontinuity design (RDD) based on the mechanism used by the Swiss Federal Office of Energy to assign cars to the fuel economy label to see if the label has an independent effect on price, above and beyond that of the fuel economy. The matching estimator indicates that the A-label effect on car price is approximately 5%. The RDD approach estimates the effect to be 6-11%.


Our main objective was to determine whether various genetically improved reproductive materials of Scots pine ( L.) differ in growth rhythm, autumn cold acclimation and resilience from unimproved materials. The study consisted of two successive indoor experiments with Scots pine seedlings representing four levels of genetic gain (unimproved natural stands, first-generation seed orchards, 1.5-generation seed orchards and seed orchards established with freezing-tested parents) and a wide range of geographical origins within Finland. The seedlings were assessed for terminal shoot elongation, growth cessation, bud set, freezing injuries and bud flushing over the first growth period. All the adaptive traits showed a latitudinal trend regardless of the genetic level. Seed orchard progenies and natural stand progenies did not differ significantly in the timing of growth cessation, bud set, and the flushing rate of the frost-injured seedlings, after the trait variation was adjusted to the latitude of origin. The differences in autumn frost hardiness were insignificant, too, except for the somewhat higher injury rate displayed by the first-generation seed orchard materials. The finding was not conclusive due to ambiguous results from the two experiments. Overall, we did not find evidence of alarming compromises in the adaptive performance of genetically improved materials.Pinus sylvestris