Nearly 50 years after the Supreme Court's landmark ruling in Gideon v. Wainwright established indigent defendants' constitutional right to counsel, poor people throughout the country still remain without a lawyer when first appearing before a judicial officer who determines pretrial liberty or bail. Absent counsel, low-income defendants unable to afford bail remain in jail for periods ranging from 3-70 days until assigned counsel appears in-court. Examining Walter Rothgery's wrongful prosecution, the article includes a national survey that informs readers about the limited right to counsel at the initial appearance and the extent of delay in each of the 50 states. The article also analyzes the Justices' response to the wrongfully accused and unrepresented Walter Rothgery, and provides insight into how the Court will likely decide the constitutional claim to counsel when it next faces the issue. It suggests that the amicus community's participation will likely assume an important role in the Supreme Court's ultimate ruling.


This review paper is to explain the current technology of SPEEK-based direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) for automotive power systems. These green technology devices have received worldwide recognition and the product prototype was successfully tested in house. The primary objective of the review is to explain the production of SPEEK-based DMFC for automotive power systems, replacing a petrol and diesel used in a currently commercialize car fuel. The other objective is to produce SPEEK-based DMFC which has been proven via lab scale analysis to have better performance than commercially available Nafion® membrane for DMFC. The SPEEK-DMFC is a noiseless,
environmentally friendly device and possess longer lifetime compare to the available petrol or diesel currently available in petrol station.


Dendritic arborization is required for proper neuronal connectivity. SIRT1, a NAD+ dependent histone deacetylase, has been associated to ageing and longevity, which in neurons is linked to neuronal differentiation and neuroprotection. In the present study, the role of SIRT1 in dendritic development was evaluated in cultured hippocampal neurons which were transfected at 3 days in vitro with a construct coding for SIRT1 or for the dominant negative SIRT1H363Y, which lacks the catalytic activity. Neurons overexpressing SIRT1 showed an increased dendritic arborization, while neurons overexpressing SIRT1H363Y showed a reduction in dendritic arbor complexity. The effect of SIRT1 was mimicked by treatment with resveratrol, a well known activator of SIRT1, which has no effect in neurons overexpressing SIRT1H363Y indicating that the effect of resveratrol was specifically mediated by SIRT1. Moreover, hippocampal neurons overexpressing SIRT1 were resistant to dendritic dystrophy induced by Aβ aggregates, an effect that was dependent on the deacetylase activity of SIRT1. Our findings indicate that SIRT1 plays a role in the development and maintenance of dendritic branching in hippocampal neurons, and suggest that these effects are mediated by the ROCK signaling pathway.


Understanding Young Buddhists offers a rich analysis of young Buddhists' lived experiences. It explores their journeying into Buddhism, belief and practice, sexuality, and positioning in diverse social contexts. It demonstrates the resourcefulness of young Buddhists in developing ethics for life.


Restrained growth of a key root tip region involves an interplay between hormonal activation and transcription factor levels. The quiescent center (QC) within the root meristem plays a key role as a stem cell organizer to sustain the root stem cell niche. The QC cells execute a dual role: prevention of the differentiation of neighboring stem cells and maintenance of the root structure by undergoing only occasional cell division. The mechanisms that account for the low QC proliferation are unclear, although the anaphase-promoting complex/cyclosome (APC/C) E3 ubiquitin ligase is known to suppress QC cell division. Through a systematic functional analysis of APC/C-copurifying proteins, Heyman et al. characterized a transcription factor ERF115 as a rate-limiting factor for QC cell division. ERF115 needs to be destroyed to retain QC cells in a resting state. ERF115 operates in a brassinosteroid-dependent manner and controls QC cell division through transcriptional activation of phytosulfokine signaling. J. Heyman, T. Cools, F. Vandenbussche, K. S. Heyndrickx, J. Van Leene, I. Vercauteren, S. Vanderauwera, K. Vandepoele, G. De Jaeger, D. Van Der Straeten, L. De Veylder, ERF115 controls root quiescent center cell division and stem cell replenishment. Science 342, 860–863 (2013). [Abstract] [Full Text]


OBJECTIVE
To find how widespread incorrect inhalation techniques are in patients on long-term inhalation treatments, comparing different methods and the health control standard.

DESIGN
A descriptive crossover study.

SETTING
Three Health Centres in Burgos.

PATIENTS
People over 15 with at least a month on inhalation treatment.

MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS
A questionnaire was composed to find the characteristics of the patients and their illness. Then their inhalation method was qualified as correct, acceptable or incorrect, using a scale based on Newman's classic criteria. Average age was 63.8 +/- 15.6, with 66.5% men. 11.6% of patients were active smokers. The most common diagnosis was COPD (61.6%). 65% of the patients were monitored within primary care (PC). The most common inhalation method was pressurised aerosol (61%); 26.2% of patients used two or more different methods. Only 21.3% of patients correctly performed the technique of inhalation, with better results for patients under specialist care (SC) than PC. 10.5% of patients had never received instruction on an inhalation technique. The method with the best results was the dry dust one, with differences close to statistical significance.

CONCLUSIONS
There is widespread incorrect use of methods of inhalation. Most people use a pressurised aerosol. There are a large number of patients who have never been shown the correct way to inhale.


Creativity-fostered learning in higher education enhanced by social media is described. The fostering of creativity in teaching and learning is illustrated by three examples; a) a European project about experimental online learning in production engineering (PeTEX), b) a longitudinal study about informal learning supported by online forums in a computer science faculty (InPUD), and c) a mind mapping scenario supported by a Web 2.0 tool. Aspects and conceptions towards a framework about fostering creativity in higher education regarding Mediaenhanced education are illustrated.


The present text is an outgrowth of such a laboratory course given by the author at the University of Rochester between 1959 and 1963. It consisted of a one-year course with two 3-hour meetings in the laboratory and two 1-hour lecture meetings weekly; the students had access to the laboratory at all times and, in general, worked during hours of their own choice well in excess of the scheduled periods. The students worked in pairs, which in most cases provides a highly motivating and successful relationship. The material included in this course was selected from those experiments in atomic and nuclear physics that have laid the foundation and provided the evidence for modern quantum theory. The experiments were set up in such a fashion that they could be completed in a two- to four-week period of normal work taking into account the other demands on the student's time. Key Features * Teaches students the methods and procedures of experimental physics at an advanced level; and offers the confidence in their abilities to measure physical entities and relationships between them * Familiarizes students with modern research equipment and its use * Makes students aware of the most basic techniques presently used in widely varying fields of physics * Convinces students that the material they studied in their lecture courses can indeed be tested experimentally, and gives students the satisfaction of doing so themselves


Iris is an evenly highlighted radial membrane with complex patterns that are perceptible upon near inspection, which exists behind the cornea of the eye with a changeable circular opening called the pupil. Iris Recognition System is a technique of identifying people using those complex distinctive features in patterns. Generally, Iris recognition system is used in security allied applications such as, authenticating PCs, network and mobile devices, physical and logical premises access control, national border control, secure banking and financial transactions, national identity like AADHAAR in India etc. This paper reviews the state-of-art design and implementation of various iris recognition systems. The contributions of the paper include: 1) conferring the importance, applications and deployment of iris recognition system related to human identification; 2) providing an analysis on iris recognition methods in effect; 3, discussing the present research defies; 4) providing commendations for the future research on iris recognition system.


The hypothesis used for the initial Climax wintertime cloud seeding experiment and for subsequent Climax replication-type experiments are described and briefly discussed. More recent physical studies of Colorado orographic clouds and seeding hypotheses are briefly summarized. These later tests and studies of orographic cloud seeding hypotheses emphasized direct and remotely sensed cloud and precipitation measurements utilizing instrumentation and modeling capabilities not available during the Climax statistical experiments. The conclusions suggested from the hypothesis testing, considering both the statistical experiments and the later physical studies, are summarized.


Understanding the micromechanical processes that dictate the evolution of fault strength during the seismic cycle is a fundamental problem in earthquake physics. We report on laboratory experiments that investigate the role of water during repetitive stick‐slip frictional sliding, with particular emphasis on the grain‐scale and atomic‐scale mechanisms of frictional restrengthening (healing). Our experiments are designed to test underlying concepts of rate and state friction laws. We sheared layers of soda‐lime glass beads in a double direct shear configuration at a constant normal stress of 5 MPa. Shear stress was applied via a constant displacement rate from 0.3 to 300 µm/s. During each experiment, relative air humidity (RH) was kept constant at values of 5, 50, or 100%. Our data show a systematic increase in maximum friction (μmax), stick‐slip friction drop (Δμ), and frictional healing rate, with increasing RH. The highest values of interevent dilation occur at 100% RH. Postexperiment scanning electron microscope observations reveal details of contact junction processes, showing a larger grain‐to‐grain contact area at higher RH. We find that the evolution of contact area depends inversely on slip velocity and directly on RH. Our results illuminate the fundamental processes that dictate stick‐slip frictional sliding and provide important constraints on the mechanisms of rate and state friction.


The effect of 2-mercaptoethanol (2-ME) and alpha-thioglycerol (alpha TG) on proliferation and polyclonal activation of lymphocytes was studied in cultures of spleen cells from C3H mice. Inclusion in serum- free or serum-containing medium of the optimal concentration (5 x 10(- 5) M) of either 2-ME or alpha TG resulted in highly significant uptake and incorporation of tritiated thymidine ([3H]TdR) into DNA and in morphological blast transformation. These phenomena were dose- dependent, with both lower and higher doses causing less marked effects. The kinetic peak of these responses was found to occur at day 3 of culture. Improved cellular viability could not explain these results, because by day 3 there was no significant difference in viability between cells cultured in the presence or absence of 2-ME. 2- ME evoked a proliferative response in cultures of congenitally athymic (nu/nu) spleen cells that exhibited a similar but lower dose-response profile compared with that of heterozygous (nu/+) littermates. Cultures of bone marrow-derived (B) lymphocytes, generated by treatment of spleen cells with rabbit antithymocyte serum and complement, incorporated [3H]TdR to a degree at least equal to that of normal spleen cell cultures. Thymus-dependent (T) cells did not support significant 2-ME, alpha TG, or Concanavalin A responses in the absence of serum. However, when cultured in 5% fetal calf serum, definite T- cell responses occurred, though always of a lower magnitude than B-cell responses in this system. When the enriched B-cell and T-cell preparations were co-cultured, a synergistic response was noted. Macrophage dependency of the 2-ME and alpha TG effect was shown to be minimal. It is likely that the greater effectiveness of alpha TG relative to 2-ME is due to differences in the chemical structure of these two thiol compounds. The advantages of utilizing 2-ME and alpha TG as probes in the study of lymphocyte activation are evaluated and their possible mechanisms of action are discussed.


Background: Data on indication of Unicompartmental Knee Arthroplasty (UKA) in the Asian population are currently not available. The current paper evaluates patients undergoing knee replacement at a Chinese Orthopaedic Specialty Hospital to report the percentage of patients who meet radiographic and clinical indication criteria for UKA. Methods: Over a one-year period 463 consecutive patients (515 knees) underwent primary knee replacement surgery. Clinical data were recorded and preoperative radiographs were assessed. Patients were classified as suitable candidates for UKA based on the degree of deformity, preoperative ROM and radiographic appearance of osteoarthritis. The different indication criteria for body weight and extend of patellofemoral osteoarthritis as reported by Kozinn and Scott as well as the Oxford Group were applied. Results: 160 knees (31%) were excluded because of inflammatory and posttraumatic arthritis. 55 knees had to be excluded because of incomplete radiographs. Of the remaining 300 knees with osteoarthritis, 241 knees were excluded because of extend of deformity (n=156), decreased range of motion (n=119), advanced patellofemoral arthritis with bone loss (n=11) and AP instability (n=1). Of the remaining 63 knees, 54 knees (18%) met the modified Oxford criteria for mobile UKA and only 25 knees (8%) met the Scott and Kozinn criteria for fixed UKA. Conclusion: The current paper suggests that in comparison to Caucasian population, only a smaller percentage of patients at a Chinese Orthopaedic Specialty Hospital meet the indication criteria for UKA. Therefore, it might make sense to concentrate UKA surgeries in high volume centers.


The mucous membrane lining of uterus is known as decidua once it is implanted with a fertilized egg. A decidual cast forms under the influence of hormones while preparing uterus for implantation and it can shed by taking the shape of uterus. It has well known association with ectopic pregnancy. Also it can occur with incomplete abortion as mentioned in this case report. Other conditions are use of progesterone, standard dose of oral contraceptive pills. Our patient 25 year unbooked gravida 3 parity 2 with 12 week period of gestation presented to emergency department with incomplete abortion with excessive bleeding and anaemia. She was shifted for surgical evacuation in which she passed decidual cast, a very rare finding. The histopathology report suggest retained product of conception with chorionic villi.


A technology computer-aided design framework that can predict the phase noise spectrum of an oscillator using nonlinear perturbation analysis is developed. The device-circuit mixed-mode simulation technique based upon the shooting-Newton method is exploited to evaluate the periodic steady-state solution of the oscillator. The influence of noise sources inside the devices on the phase deviation is calculated in an efficient and accurate way using the perturbation projection vector. The period jitter and the output power spectrum can be easily obtained in this framework. As an application, the output power spectrum of a CMOS LC voltage-controlled oscillator is calculated


The classical view of multi-project management does not capture its dynamic nature. Current theory falls short in its ability to explain how the management of project-based companies evolves because of their need to be agile and adaptable in a changing environment. The purpose of this paper is therefore to present a descriptive model that elucidates the maturation processes in a project-based organisation as well as to provide an enhanced understanding of multi-project management in practice. The maturation model illustrates the way the management of project-based organisations evolves between structuring administration and managing uncertainties, and emphasises the importance of active individual actions and situated management actions that have to be undertaken in order to coordinate, synchronise and communicate the required knowledge and skills. The outcomes primarily reveal that, although standardised project models are used and considerable resources are spent on effective project portfolio management, the way information and communication are dealt with is vitally important in the management of project-based organisations. This is particularly true of informal and non-codified communication.


In the past, emerging countries like India and China relied on cheap labor to compete at the bottom of the pyramid. Not any longer. Their competitiveness is already reaching the high end, including knowledge-intensive sectors like biotechnology and information sciences. As a result, U.S. and Western European companies are finding it increasingly difficult to attract the best global talent, especially at the senior-executive level.

Nevertheless, the author contends that organizations can improve their ability to hire and retain top global talent by doing three fundamental things. First, they need to adopt a new mindset. Specifically, they need to be aware of the realities of the hottest emerging markets and the aggressive talent practices that are already taking place there. For example, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. in India has begun to make blanket offers to every individual in the graduating class of certain colleges. Second, companies need to cut the red tape. In the old world of low hiring needs and abundant candidates, businesses used to focus almost exclusively on making sure that they would not hire the wrong person. Now, because the best candidates are in very low supply and the demand for them is extremely high, they need to expedite their hiring processes. Third, companies need to implement best practices, particularly in the area of recruiting. Unfortunately, making people decisions is still one of the weakest of all key organizational processes.

Already, a number of multinational corporations like SAP and Nokia have begun to make the transition to competing for talent on a global basis. Given the numerous challenges, the edge will go to those companies that are proactive in mastering their people decisions so they can hire, develop and deploy the best talent on a worldwide basis. In the future, such organizations will be able to adapt faster and not only survive but prosper in this new environment of increased globalization.


Copolymerization of indene and dicyclopentadiene was studied in toluene solution under the action of the catalyst system Et2AlCl-TiCl4. It is established that in this case alternating copolymers formed, and the dicyclopentadiene is more active monomer in the mixture. It is concluded that the ratio of dicyclopentadiene to indene equal 0.58:0.42 corresponds to the azeotropic point in the curve of the copolymer, as well as the heat dissipation in the system extremely dependent on the content of dicyclopentadiene in the copolymer.


Primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) is a chronic and slowly progressive cholestatic liver disease of autoimmune etiology, characterized by injury of the intra-hepatic bile ducts that may eventually lead to liver failure. Many drugs have been performed for treatment, including agents with choleretic and immunosuppressive properties. Patients, particularly those who start ursodeoxycholic acid treatment at early-stage disease and who respond with improvement of liver biochemistry, have a good prognosis. Liver transplantation is usually an option for PBC patients with severe liver failure.


ABSTRACT A valuable extension of the single-rating regression discontinuity design (RDD) is a multiple-rating RDD (MRRDD). To date, four main methods have been used to estimate average treatment effects at the multiple treatment frontiers of an MRRDD: the "surface" method, the "frontier" method, the "binding-score" method, and the "fuzzy instrumental variables" method. This article uses a series of simulations to evaluate the relative performance of each of these four methods under a variety of different data-generating models. Focusing on a two-rating RDD (2RRDD), we compare the methods in terms of their bias, precision, and mean squared error when implemented as they most likely would be in practice—using optimal bandwidth selection. We also apply the lessons learned from the simulations to a real-world example that uses data from a study of an English learner reclassification policy. Overall, this article makes valuable contributions to the literature on MRRDDs in that it makes concrete recommendations for choosing among MRRDD estimation methods, for implementing any chosen method using local linear regression, and for providing accurate statistical inferences.


These groups have been characterized both positively and negatively in the popular press. A fresh understanding of the newer generations can help instructors better meet current students' educational needs. This article shares brief generational profiles based on recent research and then presents questions and recommendations for improving course assignments and their effectiveness. Ways of communicating about assignments and their benefits are also shared. The goal is to equip college-level instructors with ways to relate to and support the newest generation of learners.


As a rule, hepatocyte growth factor/scatter factor (HGF/SF) is produced by mesenchymal cells, while its receptor, the tyrosine kinase encoded by the met proto-oncogene, is expressed by the neighboring epithelial cells in a canonical paracrine fashion. In the present work we show that both HGF/SF and met are coexpressed by undifferentiated C2 mouse myoblasts. In growing cells, the autocrine loop is active as the receptor exhibits a constitutive phosphorylation on tyrosine that can be abrogated by exogenously added anti-HGF/SF neutralizing antibodies. The transcription of HGF/SF and met genes is downregulated when myoblasts stop proliferating and differentiate. The coexpression of HGF/SF and met genes is not exclusive to C2 cells since it has been assessed also in other myogenic cell lines and in mouse primary satellite cells, suggesting that HGF/SF could play a role in muscle development through an autocrine way. To analyze the biological effects of HGF/SF receptor activation, we stably expressed the constitutively activated receptor catalytic domain (p65tpr-met) in C2 cells. This active kinase determined profound changes in cell shape and inhibited myogenesis at both morphological and biochemical levels. Notably, a complete absence of muscle regulatory markers such as MyoD and myogenin was observed in p65tpr-met highly expressing C2 clones. We also studied the effects of the ectopic expression of human isoforms of met receptor (h-met) and of HGF/SF (h-HGF/SF) in stable transfected C2 cells. Single constitutive expression of h-met or h-HGF/SF does not alter substantially the growth and differentiation properties of the myoblast cells, probably because of a species-specific ligand–receptor interaction. A C2 clone expressing simultaneously both h-met and h-HGF/SF is able to grow in soft agar and shows a decrease in myogenic potential comparable to that promoted by p65tpr-met kinase. These data indicate that a met kinase signal released from differentiation-dependent control provides a negative stimulus for the onset of myogenic differentiation.


A macromodel has been developed for integrated circuit (IC) op amps which provides an excellent pin-for-pin representation. The model elements are those which are common to most circuit simulators. The macromodel is a factor of more than six times less complex than the original circuit, and provides simulated circuit responses that have run times which are an order of magnitude faster and less costly in comparison to modeling the op amp at the electronic device level. Expressions for the values of the elements of the macromodel are developed starting from values of typical response characteristics of the op amp. Examples are given for three representative op amps. In addition, the performance of the macromodel in linear and nonlinear systems is presented. For comparison, the simulated circuit performance when modeling at the device level is also demonstrated.


The quantification of evapotranspiration from irrigated areas is important for agriculture water management, especially in arid and semi-arid regions where water deficiency is becoming a major constraint in economic welfare and sustainable development. Conventional methods that use point measurements to estimate evapotranspiration are representative only of local areas and cannot be extended to large areas because of landscape heterogeneity. Remote sensing-based energy balance models are presently most suited for estimating evapotranspiration at both field and regional scales. In this study, we aim to develop a methodology based on the triangle concept, allowing estimation of evapotranspiration through the classical equation of Priestley and Taylor (1972) where the proportional coefficient α in this equation is ranged using a linear interpolation between surface temperature and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) values. Preliminary results using remotely sensed data sets from Landsat ETM+ over the Habra Plains in west Algeria are in good agreement with ground measurements. The proposed approach appears to be more reliable and easily applicable for operational estimation of evapotranspiration over large areas.


Abstract The exercise of administrative discretion by street-level workers plays a key role in shaping citizens' access to welfare and employment services. Governance reforms of social services delivery, such as performance-based contracting, have often been driven by attempts to discipline this discretion. In several countries, these forms of market governance are now being eclipsed by new modes of digital governance that seek to reshape the delivery of services using algorithms and machine learning. Australia, a pioneer of marketisation, is one example, proposing to deploy digitalisation to fully automate most of its employment services rather than as a supplement to face-to-face case management. We examine the potential and limits of this project to replace human-to-human with 'machine bureaucracies'. To what extent are welfare and employment services amenable to digitalisation? What trade-offs are involved? In addressing these questions, we consider the purported benefits of machine bureaucracies in achieving higher levels of efficiency, accountability, and consistency in policy delivery. While recognising the potential benefits of machine bureaucracies for both governments and jobseekers, we argue that trade-offs will be faced between enhancing the efficiency and consistency of services and ensuring that services remain accessible and responsive to highly personalised circumstances.


The overall surgical site infection (SSI) rate was low (1.4%) in patients with pediatric spinal deformity. The most common causative bacteria were methicillin-resistant followed by gram-negative rods. Independent risk factors for SSI in pediatric patients undergoing spinal deformity surgery were scoliosis etiology, American Society of Anesthesiologists class 3, and administration of antibiotic therapy twice daily. Study Design. A retrospective multicenter study. Objective. To determine the surgical site infection (SSI) rate, associated risk factors, and causative pathogens in pediatric patients with spinal deformity. Summary of Background Data. There have been no extensive investigations of the risk factors for SSI in Japan. Methods. Demographic data, radiographic findings, and the incidence of SSI were retrospectively analyzed in 1449 pediatric patients who underwent primary definitive fusion surgery for spinal deformity at any of 15 institutions from 2015 to 2017. SSI was defined according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guideline. Results. The incidence of all SSIs was 1.4% and that of deep SSIs was 0.76%. The most common pathogenic microbes were methicillin-resistant staphylococci (n = 5) followed by gram-negative rods (n = 4), methicillin-sensitive staphylococci (n = 1), and others (n = 10). In univariate analysis, younger age, male sex, a diagnosis of kyphosis, type of scoliosis, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) class ≥3, mental retardation urinary incontinence, combined anterior-posterior fusion, greater magnitude of kyphosis, three-column osteotomy, use of blood transfusion, and number of antibiotic administration were associated with the likelihood of SSI (all P < 0.05). Multivariate logistic regression analysis identified the following independent risk factors for SSI: syndromic scoliosis etiology (vs. idiopathic scoliosis; adjusted odds ratio [OR] 16.106; 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.225–116.602), neuromuscular scoliosis etiology (vs. idiopathic scoliosis; adjusted OR 11.814; 95% CI 1.109–125.805), ASA class 3 (vs. class 2; adjusted OR 15.231; 95% CI 1.201–193.178), and administration of antibiotic therapy twice daily (vs. three times daily; adjusted OR 6.121; 95% CI 1.261–29.718). Conclusion. The overall infection rate was low. The most common causative bacteria were methicillin-resistant followed by gram-negative rods. Independent risk factors for SSI in pediatric patients undergoing spinal deformity surgery were scoliosis etiology, ASA class 3, and administration of antibiotic therapy twice daily. Level of Evidence: 3


This work is focused on the study of the p-type organic semiconductor, vanadyl 2, 9, 16, 23-tetraphenoxy-29H, 31H-phthalocyanine (VOPcPhO) and n-type organic semiconductor of 3, 4, 9, 10-perylenetetracarboxylic dianhydride (PTCDA) as the possible candidates for organic photovoltaic cells (OPVC) fabrication. The initial phase of this work involved preparation and characterisation of organic semiconductor thin films. The VOPcPhO thin films were prepared by spin-coating method while the PTCDA thin films were deposited by thermal evaporation technique using a homebuilt thermal evaporator in Low Dimensional Materials Research Centre (LDMRC). The optical and structural properties of the deposited thin films were characterised by ultraviolet-visible (UV-VIS) spectroscopy, x-ray diffraction (XRD) spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, atomic force microscopy (AFM) and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM). The UV-VIS absorption spectra revealed that the absorption bands of VOPcPhO and PTCDA thin films are in complimentary to each other. PTCDA absorbs most light in the visible range between 450nm to 600nm, whereas VOPcPhO absorbs light in the UV range between 300nm to 400nm as well in the near infrared region of 600nm to 800nm. Therefore, by combining these two organic semiconductors of PTCDA and VOPcPhO to form a bilayer heterojunction, hence a good coverage of the solar spectrum can be explored. The estimated optical band gap, Eg determined for the single layer VOPcPhO and PTCDA thin films as well as bilayer VOPcPhO/PTCDA thin film are 1.6eV, 2.13eV and 1.62eV, respectively. Low optical band gap is favourable in OPVC because relatively low photon energy is required to excite the electron in the material to form exciton (bound electron-hole pair).
The second phase of this work involves the fabrication of OPVC using VOPcPhO and PTCDA thin films. Single layer and bilayer heterojunction structure OPVC were constructed and the performance of these devices were determined and compared by J-V curve. It was found that the single layer devices did not exhibit photovoltaic effect but the bilayer heterojunction devices clearly shown interesting photovoltaic effect when light beam shined upon them. This finding has indicated that the exciton dissociations can only take place at the VOPcPhO/PTCDA interface. However, the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the primitive OPVC was very low (0.16×10-3%).
The final phase of this work involved the improvements and optimisations of the OPVC. Insertion of hole transport layer, oxygen plasma treatment, thickness optimization, post thermal annealing and vapour treatments were performed in attempts to raise the PCE of the OPVC. Insertion of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene: poly(styrenesulfonic acid) (PEDOT: PSS) and oxygen plasma treatment are promising methods to improve the OPVC. However, post thermal annealing and vapour treatments were unsuccessful to improve the OPVC. The highest PCE determined for the bilayer heterojunction OPVC after went through the treatments is 3.71×10-3%. Attempts of multilayer heterojunctions OPVC was made in order to further prove the exciton dissociations can only take place at the VOPcPhO/PTCDA interfaces. The multilayer heterojunctions OPVC has a PCE of 5.40×10-3%.


In this research, a two-phase algorithm based on the artificial neural network (ANN) and a harmony search (HS) algorithm has been developed with the aim of assessing the reliability of structures with implicit limit state functions. The proposed method involves the generation of datasets to be used specifically for training by Finite Element analysis, to establish an ANN model using a proven ANN model in the reliability assessment process as an analyzer for structures, and finally estimate the reliability index and failure probability by using the HS algorithm, without any requirements for the explicit form of limit state function. The proposed algorithm is investigated here, and its accuracy and efficiency are demonstrated by using several numerical examples. The results obtained show that the proposed algorithm gives an appropriate estimate for the assessment of reliability of structures.


A new genre has emerged in contemporary literature: the 'novel in poems.' This genre hybridizes the novel and poetry in order to construct characters and a plot through relatively autonomous poems in series. The 'novel in poems' appears in different subtypes, which can be categorized according to the following criteria: (1) the presence of one speaker versus several speakers, (2) the presence of a speaker as lyric protagonist and/or narrator, and (3) the presence of a blend of distinct modes of lyric, narrative, and dramatic representation in various forms of combination. Specific characteristics of the 'novel in poems' are: 1) variation of constituent poetic forms with different degrees of semantic autonomy and brevity; 2) hyper-structuring through symmetries, holism, and equivalences; 3) a tendency to differentiate mediating instances within the text; 4) the reduction or elimination of the narrator or of narrative principles and the use of an omnipresent textual subject; 5) the presence of metapoetic reflections on topics such as poetry and creativity; 6) an emphasis on voice, person, and subjectivity; 7) episodic plot construction through montage techniques and a tendency toward chronological order; 8) the predominance of present speech and action; 9) contradictions between the speaker as subject and addresser, via the lyric fiction of performativity, and the function of narration; 10) a necessity imposed upon the reader to reconstruct the plot and characters. This essay establishes three subtypes within the proposed genre: a lyric 'novel in poems' with one speaker (Irina Ermakova), a polyphonically narrative 'novel in poems' that combines third-person narration with several alterior speakers (Lana Hechtman Ayers), and, finally, a dramatic 'novel in poems' with shifting primary speakers (Glyn Maxwell).


The Foxp subfamily of forkhead/HNF3 transcription factors has recently been recognized because of its involvement in autoimmune disease, speech and language disorders, and lung development. Domains unique to this subfamily include a divergent DNA-binding winged helix, a leucine zipper, a zinc finger, and a polyglutamine tract. Little is known about the properties of these proteins that are fundamental to their function as transcription factors nor how the Foxp sequence motifs regulate their transcriptional regulatory properties. We report here a structure/function analysis of the Foxp1 protein. We have analyzed the alternative splice isoforms 1A and 1C and also report the cloning and characterization of a novel isoform Foxp1D that lacks the polyglutamine domain. We have isolated the preferred DNA-binding sites for Foxp1 transcription factors. Foxp1A, C, and D isoforms and the related Foxp2 protein repress gene transcription via binding to this consensus site or to a naturally occurring site within the SV40 and the interleukin-2 promoters. In some cases the strength of Foxp1 repression is mediated by the polyglutamine domain. Unlike previously characterized forkhead factors, Foxp1 proteins can form homodimers or heterodimers with subfamily members. The dimerization domain was localized to an evolutionarily conserved C2H2 zinc finger and leucine zipper motif. Finally, we demonstrate that Foxp1, although broadly expressed, is further regulated by tissue-specific alternative splicing of these functionally important sequence domains. These results suggest that Foxp1 proteins have diverse functional roles in different cell and tissue types.


Vibration in centrifugal pump still remains a tough problem to solve. Many studied have been done to find the relationship between hydraulic design and vibration. Both experiments and numerical simulation methods have been proposed to make clear the influence of pump parameters related to vibration. It is evident that unsteady phenomena in centrifugal pump are the main factors causing vibration. Also motor-stator interaction of impeller and volute keeps predominant role considering hydraulic factors.Till now almost all reported researches consider pump geometry parameters, but the shape of volute is rarely proposed. To reduce interaction between impeller and volute tongue, a special volute with slope diffuser section is put forward in this paper. The relative position of volute tongue changes compared to the conventional spiral volute. Thus the effect of flow field striking with volute tongue can be receded effectively, and vibration will be reduced.As the developing of computer technology, it is possible for us to achieve the unsteady flow field inner pump by using numerical simulation methods. A commercial software Fluent was adopted to analyze pressure pulsation and radial load of model pump. Slant angle and clearance rate were optimized considering pressure magnitude. It is observed that pressure amplitude at blade passing frequency achieve the lowest level at slant angle 15°. Pressure magnitude decreases significantly with the increasing of clearance, but limited to radial size of volute, it is suggested to be in the range of 0.134∼0.250.Several monitor points are selected along the volute to have overall understanding of pressure pulsation characteristics. Pressure pulsation at blade passing frequency keeps the predominant in motor-stator interaction. Amplitude of both pressure and radial load increase rapidly when pump operating at off designed conditions.Copyright © 2013 by ASME


This research based on problems: 1. How does the game card media influence student motivation? 2. How does the game card media influence student learning outcomes? 3. How is the correct application of the game card media so that it can increase the motivation and learning outcomes of the sixth grade in SDN Mungkid 2 Magelang. The research held on 2 cycle. Each cycle consists of four stages: Planning, Action, Observation, Reflection. The target of this study was the sixth grade students of SDN Mungkid 2 Magelang . Data obtained based on the form formative test results, observation sheets of teaching and learning activities. The results of the research showed that the used of game card media can increase students' motivation and learning outcomes on "Perkembangbiakan Makhluk Hidup" mater. Motivation increased by 60% from the initial condition of 8 students (32%) to 23 students (92%) and science learning outcomes increased by 68% from the initial condition 6 students completed (24%) to 23 students complete (92%) were the average increased 24.76 from the initial condition 51.52 to cycle II in the final condition which had an average of 76.28.Keywords: motivation, learning outcomes, game card media


Globally there have been many challenges in establishing effective food safety control systems. Of particular interest to the Sultanate of Oman is the control of the safety and quality of seafood for its importance to the national economy, food security and trade. The research focused on the particular issue of food safety management systems (including the application of the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) system within the Omani seafood processors. To understand the whole context, a wider review was initially conducted which looked into the whole structure of food control in Oman including the
legal documents and the administrative structures. The evidence indicates that there is no unified national food safety agency and that current laws and regulations are shared across various governmental authorities. By investigating the various challenges, weaknesses and
strengths of the existing system it is noted that there are still deficiencies in comparison to international guidance. Subsequently the structure of the seafood supply chain was analysed and a survey was conducted to assess the issues pertinent to HACCP implementation in the seafood industry and the role of the regulatory authorities in governing the safety of seafood products. The survey identified more precisely the benefits and barriers of implementing the HACCP system for the HACCP processors and the non-HACCP processors, which are usually small industry. In conclusion, the research has shown the importance of adopting strategies to enhance
safety and quality requirements from farm to fork covering all aspects of seafood harvesting, processing and distribution regardless of the target markets. A legal requirement to adopt HACCP systems and the application of related food safety management systems (FSMSs) and their pre-requisites programmes is recommended. It should be imposed on all seafood processors regardless of their markets to ensure
conformity with national and international requirements.


BACKGROUND
Despite the growing awareness of the negative financial impact of traumatic injury on patients' lives, the association between financial toxicity and long-term health-related quality of life (hrQoL) among trauma survivors remains poorly understood.

METHODS
Patients from nine trauma centers participating in a state-wide trauma quality collaborative had responses from longitudinal survey data linked to inpatient trauma registry data. Financial toxicity was defined based on patient-reported survey responses regarding medical debt, work or income loss, non-medical financial strain, and forgone care due to costs. A financial toxicity score ranging from 0 to 4 was calculated. HrQoL was assessed using the EuroQol 5 Domain (EQ-5D) tool. Multivariable regression models evaluated the association between financial toxicity and hrQoL outcomes while adjusting for patient demographics, injury severity and inpatient treatment intensity, and health systems variables.

RESULTS
Among the 403 patients providing 510 completed surveys, rates of individual financial toxicity elements ranged from 21% to 46%, with 65% of patients experiencing at least one element of financial toxicity. Patients with any financial toxicity had worse summary measures of hrQoL and higher rates of problems in all five EQ-5D domains (p < 0.05 for all). Younger age, lower household income, lack of insurance, more comorbidities, discharge to a facility, and air ambulance transportation were independently associated with higher odds of financial toxicity (p < 0.05 for all). Injury traits and inpatient treatment intensity were not independently associated with financial toxicity.

CONCLUSION
A majority of trauma survivors in this study experienced some level of financial toxicity, which was independently associated with worse risk-adjusted health outcomes across all hrQoL measures. Risk factors for financial toxicity are not related to injury severity or treatment intensity, but rather to sociodemographic variables and measures of pre- and post-hospital healthcare resource utilization. Targeted interventions and policies are needed to address financial toxicity and ensure optimal recovery for trauma survivors.

STUDY TYPE/LEVEL OF EVIDENCE
Observational Cohort Study / Level III.


For more than a century, multiple sclerosis was viewed as a disease process characterized by oligodendrocyte and myelin loss, and research into the pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis was mainly focused on the mechanisms of inflammation. However, with development of more sophisticated neuroimaging and molecular biology techniques, attention has shifted to new aspects of pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis: axonal loss and neurodegeneration. Evidence is increasing that tissue destruction, primarily axonal loss and neurodegeneration, is a key element in the pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis. In addition, it is now known that brain and spinal cord atrophy begins early in the disease process of multiple sclerosis and advances relentlessly throughout the course of the disease. Cumulative data suggest that axonal loss is the major determinant of progressive neuro logic disability in patients with multiple sclerosis. Magnetic resonance imaging and magnetic resonance spectroscopy in patients with multiple sclerosis for < 5 years indicate brain atrophy and loss of axonal integrity. Neurodegeneration and axonal loss in patients with multiple sclerosis are initially accompanied by a local response from oligodendrocyte progenitor cells and some remyelination. However, these repair mechanisms eventually fail, and patients typically develop generalized brain atrophy, cognitive decline, and permanent disability. Although the exact mechanisms underlying central nervous system atrophy in patients with multiple sclerosis are largely unknown, evidence exists that atrophy may represent an epiphenomenon related to the effects of dynamic inflammation within the central nervous system, including demyelination, axonal injury, neuronal loss, Wallerian degeneration, and possibly iron deposition. This article summarizes the potential mechanisms involved in central nervous system atrophy in patients with multiple sclerosis.


The information stored in animal feed databases is highly variable, in terms of both provenance and quality; therefore, data pre-processing is essential to ensure reliable results. Yet, pre-processing at best tends to be unsystematic; at worst, it may even be wholly ignored. This paper sought to develop a systematic approach to the various stages involved in pre-processing to improve feed database outputs. The database used contained analytical and nutritional data on roughly 20 000 alfalfa samples. A range of techniques were examined for integrating data from different sources, for detecting duplicates and, particularly, for detecting outliers. Special attention was paid to the comparison of univariate and multivariate solutions. Major issues relating to the heterogeneous nature of data contained in this database were explored, the observed outliers were characterized and ad hoc routines were designed for error control. Finally, a heuristic diagram was designed to systematize the various aspects involved in the detection and management of outliers and errors.


SIR,-In my experience, which extends to nearly 30 years in general pracice, it is very rarely that the family doctor is informed even of the time at which a necropsy is to take place, let alone receives a report on the result-which in my case I can never remember happening. Is it not therefore time that someone was made responsible for seeing that this information was conveyed to the family doctor, for it is probably not always possible for him to attend in person ? After all, he is much concerned in the matter. He may have attended the patient for many years, and he was in all probability called when the death took place. Furthermore, it was probably his decision that led to a postmortem examination being carried out. Post-mortem examination would no doubt sometimes throw interesting sidelights on the accuracy or otherwise of our diagnoses. Recently, when a myxoedematous woman of 75 died suddenly, and when perhaps a diagnosis of cerebral haemorrhage or coronary thrombosis would not have been unreasonable, the extreme and unusual pallor of the face, even in the dim light of the little scullery in which she was lying, led me to suggest that a post-mortem would be desirable. This eventually showed that my patient had, in actual fact, died of a ruptured aneurysm of the abdominal aorta; and this aneurysm was, in some way, probably the cause of the abdominal pain of which she had complained to her family for a fortnight before her sudden death.


Background: Anaemia is one of the common complications associated with Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) liable for the increase in the morbidity and mortality in such patients. Numerous factors have been attributed to cause renal anemia, amongst which hyperparathyroidism is one of the less recognized reasons. The excess amount of Parathyroid Hormone (PTH) secondary to CKD has been suggested to be a contributing factor for anaemia. The introduction of erythropoietin considerably improved anaemia in patients with CKD by relieving symptoms and avoiding complications associated with blood transfusion. The aim of the study is to see the prevalence of the anemia severity among CKD patients who are on regular dialysis. Methodology: Prospective, Observational study was conducted at the Teaching Hospital Batticaloa, SriLanka. Results: Majority of the dialysis patients 26 (62%) had hemoglobin in the range of 7-9g/dl, 7(16.7%) patients had hemoglobin of more than 10g/dl and 4(9.5%) patients had hemoglobin below 7g/dl. This study is clearly shown that almost all (100%) dialysis population had anemia. Conclusion: The use of iron therapies and erythropoiesis stimulating agents (ESAs) has allowed improvement in patients with anemia of CKD.


A composite ice nucleus aerosol, AglCI-4NaCI, has been generated and characterized for nucleation efficiencies, rates of ice crystal formation, and mechanisms of nucleation, under water saturation and transient supersaturation conditions. The addition of NaCl to the highly efficient contact nucleus, AgI(0.8)-Cl(0.2) changed the nucleation mechanism to condensation-freezing at water saturation and increased the rates of ice crystal formation dramaticaily, while retaining the high efficiency of the AgICl nucleus aerosol. Under transient supersaturation conditions, this new aerosol demonstrated improved ice nucleation efficiencies at T > -12 C, and even faster ice crystal formation rates, suggesting a change of nucleation mechanism to forced condensation-freezing. This ice nucleation aerosol should be advantageous for use in weather modification field programs under conditions where low cloud droplet concentrations suggest the use of a condensation-freezing nucleant.


Anatomical terminology, which had become chaotic by the nineteenth century, was codified in the BNA of 1895, when some 5,000 terms were carefully selected from among approximately 50,000 names. The BNA and its three major revisions (BR, INA, PNA) are here reviewed and placed in historical perspective. It is emphasized that many anatomical terms are very ancient and that the various nomenclatures are not 'new terminologies' but rather, for the most part, selections of already existing names. This can be seen clearly in the naming of the cranial nerves. Another example, the carpal and tarsal bones, is analysed in detail. Of the 8 carpal bones, for instance, the current names for 7 of them are those proposed by Henle in 1855. All the nomenclatures are, as they should be, in Latin, but it is understood that translations of many terms into other languages are necessary. Although views pro and con have been expressed, current usage favours the erect posture and the anatomical position as a basis, as well as the elimination of eponyms. In both teaching and research, the Nomina has been of great benefit in reducing drastically the number of unnecessary synonyms and in providing a coherent, internationally accepted system that is now the standard in anatomical textbooks. Hence, further use of the Nomina should be encouraged.


Music throughout the world varies greatly, yet some musical features like scale structure display striking cross-cultural similarities. Are there musical laws or biological constraints that underlie this diversity? The "vocal mistuning" hypothesis proposes that cross-cultural regularities in musical scales arise from imprecision in vocal tuning, while the integer-ratio hypothesis proposes that they arise from perceptual principles based on psychoacoustic consonance. In order to test these hypotheses, we conducted automatic comparative analysis of 100 children's and adult songs from throughout the world. We found that children's songs tend to have narrower melodic range, fewer scale degrees, and less precise intonation than adult songs, consistent with motor limitations due to their earlier developmental stage. On the other hand, adult and children's songs share some common tuning intervals at small-integer ratios, particularly the perfect 5th (~3:2 ratio). These results suggest that some widespread aspects of musical scales may be caused by motor constraints, but also suggest that perceptual preferences for simple integer ratios might contribute to cross-cultural regularities in scale structure. We propose a "sensorimotor hypothesis" to unify these competing theories.


A total of 206 wheat and 200 barley farmers were interviewed in northeastern Syria to understand farmer perceptions and practice relating to modern varieties, seed sources and seed quality. Wheat farmers had better awareness and grew modern varieties (87%), applied fertilizers (99.5%), herbicides (93%), seed treatment (90%) or insecticides (41%). In contrast barley growers had low awareness (36%) and use (0.5%) of modern varieties, herbicides (4%), insecticides (3%) and fertilizers (56%). Grain yield, grain size, food quality and tolerance to lodging, drought and frost were the agronomic characteristics farmers sought from new wheat varieties. For barley, grain yield, grain size, grain color, feed quality, marketability and tolerance to diseases and drought were the key traits sought. The informal sector-seed retained from the previous harvest or obtained from neighbors or local traders/markets-was the main source of seed for both wheat and barley. Most farmers practiced onfarm seed selection, cleaning, treatment, separate storage or quality assessment of seed that was obtained locally. Farmers' perceptions and preferences of new varieties/technologies and their seed sources and seed management practices must be taken into account in any efforts to develop or to strengthen seed sector development.


This paper proposes a new motion planning method of a mobile robot avoiding moving obstacles. To avoid moving obstacles, the trajectories of the obstacles are predicted using a stochastic model of obstacle motion. The obstacle motion is modeled as a random walk process. The method plans robot motion by the unit of view-time and view-period. View-time is defined as the time instant at which the robot senses the obstacle position and velocity. View-period is defined as the time interval during which the robot performs sensing, predicting and planning for collision-free motion. From the position and velocity at a view-time, we predict the future position of the obstacle. The random walk process model of obstacle motion is used to calculate the probability density that the predicted position is reached during the view-period. From the probability density function of the predicted position, the probability that a position can be swept by the obstacle during the view-period is calculated. Then artificial potential is assigned at every position by considering the probability. The force induced by the artificial potential field repels the robot away from the probable obstacle trajectory. This method is a look ahead scheme, and effective for moving obstacle avoidance. This method is applied to collision-free motion planning for a mobile robot in a dynamic and unknown environment with several moving and stationary obstacles.


Advocates of online child protection and freedom of expression share a deep-seated belief in the importance of protecting basic human rights. Yet these beliefs are often clouded by perceived (and real) opposition in the actual practice of law, policy, and regulation. This has restricted the policy options available for dealing with threats to both child safety and free speech online, and has often resulted in these interests being portrayed as diametrically opposed. Advocates on both sides of this debate met in Oxford in October 2009 to explore their different perspectives on these fundamental rights and to identify possible areas of agreement. By defining a new framework to discuss online child protection that rejects the current moral panics that have dominated the debate, and focuses instead on accurately defining risks in line with the evolving capacity of the child, participants were able to find some common ground. The most fruitful avenues came from calls for precision and transparency in policy responses that touch on these issues. Participants discussed how, by working together, both sides could advance their agendas and defend the rights of children while preventing child protection from being used as a strategic pretext for broader goals of censorship and repression.


Time is of the essence. With each passing day, the options and alternatives available to the peoples of the world to stem the tide of man-made destruction to the Earth are steadily disappearing.  The Stockholm Treaty Lab challenged professionals from various disciplines to imagine and design strategies to mitigate and reduce the detrimental impact of human beings upon the planet. This article reflects the culmination of thought processes and ideas of one the participating teams. The team drafted a legal instrument within the currently existing U.N. infrastructure, and included a number of aspects advocating for its widespread adoption, seeking to incentivize parties with the power to effect environmentally sound change to be more active. Economists, business consultants, lawyers, and scientist sought to find solutions to three manmade issues, namely (1) food waste, (2) deforestation, and (3) lack of renewable energies. Each of these three categories represent a major exacerbating force upon climate change, yet are areas that could be drastically affected with cooperation among states and investors. Within each category, both general policies and specific solutions/incentives are outlined. Further, dispute resolution mechanisms and the imagined economic impact for investors financing these initiatives are discussed. It is the belief of the team that the problems considered by the article have little chance of being effectively addressed unless there is widespread cooperation, thus it is hoped that articles like this one can be the catalyst for that change.


We compare ground-based measurements of aerosol optical depth and Angstrom parameter at six Arctic stations in the period 2001–2006 with the results from two global aerosol dynamics and transport models, ECHAM-HAM and TM5. Satellite measurements from MODIS and the MACC reanalysis product are used to examine the spatial distribution and the seasonality of these parameters and to compare them with model results. We find that both models provide a good reproduction of the Angstrom parameter but significantly underestimate the observed AOD values. We also explore the effects of changes in emissions, model resolution and the parametrization of wet scavenging.


The authors investigate dynamic transaction routing strategies for locally distributed database systems in which the database is partitioned and distributed among multiple transaction-processing systems, and the incoming transactions are routed by a common front-end processor. If a transaction issues a database request referencing a nonlocal database partition, the request has to be shipped to the system owing the referenced partition for processing. Various dynamic strategies are studied. Their performance is compared with that of the optimal static strategy. A class of dynamic transaction routing strategies which take into account routing history and minimize the estimated response time of incoming transactions is proposed; they are found to provide a substantial improvement over the optimal static strategy. The robustness of the strategies is further studied through sensitivity analysis over various transaction loads, communication overheads, and database reference distributions. >


In addition to moving itself in a greener direction and leveraging other environmental initiatives, IT could help create green awareness among IT professionals, businesses, and the general public by assisting in building communities, engaging groups in participatory decisions, and supporting education and green advocacy campaigns. Along these lines, tools such as environmental Web portals, blogs, wikis, and interactive simulations of the environmental impact of an activity could offer assistance. Green IT is an economic, as well as an environmental, imperative. Greening IT is and will continue to be a necessity, not an option. Green IT represents a dramatic change in priority in the IT industry. So far, the industry has been focusing on IT equipment processing power and associated equipment spending. It's not been concerned with other requirements such as power, cooling, and data center space. However, going forward, the IT industry will need to deal with all of the infrastructure requirements and the environmental impact of IT and its use. The challenges of green IT are immense; however, recent developments indicate that the IT industry has the will and conviction to tackle our environmental issues head-on. The IT sector and users must develop a positive attitude toward addressing environmental concerns and adopt forward-looking, green-friendly policies and practices.


We are witnessing increasing interests in the effective use of road networks. For example, to enable effective vehicle routing, weighted-graph models of transportation networks are used, where the weight of an edge captures some cost associated with traversing the edge, e.g., greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions or travel time. It is a precondition to using a graph model for routing that all edges have weights. Weights that capture travel times and GHG emissions can be extracted from GPS trajectory data collected from the network. However, GPS trajectory data typically lack the coverage needed to assign weights to all edges. This paper formulates and addresses the problem of annotating all edges in a road network with travel cost based weights from a set of trips in the network that cover only a small fraction of the edges, each with an associated ground-truth travel cost. A general framework is proposed to solve the problem. Specifically, the problem is modeled as a regression problem and solved by minimizing a judiciously designed objective function that takes into account the topology of the road network. In particular, the use of weighted PageRank values of edges is explored for assigning appropriate weights to all edges, and the property of directional adjacency of edges is also taken into account to assign weights. Empirical studies with weights capturing travel time and GHG emissions on two road networks (Skagen, Denmark, and North Jutland, Denmark) offer insight into the design properties of the proposed techniques and offer evidence that the techniques are effective.


Employers are increasingly demanding graduates with industry-ready communication, leadership, emotional intelligence and social ethics skills. Community-based learning (CBL) is a pedagogical approach which has tremendous potential to produce graduates with these attributes. However, for many early-career lecturers, distilling the insights from the teaching and learning literature, and then producing a welldesigned CBL module, can be an intimidating task. What is missing is a primer which presents the core ideas of CBL in a way that is independent of subject-specific jargon. Ideally, this primer should provide the reader with the means of either drafting an initial project plan or, at the very least, knowing where to go to look for more answers. This article aims to meet this gap. The success of a CBL experience relies on considering a number of factors: thorough planning, critical reflection, effective project management, assessment and effective evaluation of the project. We provide the reader with the means of getting started and highlight the unique management aspects of a CBL project. We discuss the challenges that arise as a result of the interaction of many different parties. Finally, we explore available CBL assessment strategies and provide a roadmap for implementing CBL which integrates these issues. 1 Bedri et al.: Community-Based Learning: A Primer Published by ARROW@TU Dublin, 2017


The Bank of England?s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) sets UK interest rates to control inflation paying particular attention to earnings growth as measured by the Average Earnings Index (AEI). In October 1998, a revised AEI indicated that wage inflation had been overestimated bringing the conduct of monetary policy into question. This index was given credence by the popular belief that structural change in the labour market has reduced the earnings growth rate. However, a further revised AEI in March 1999 suggested wage inflation had been underestimated. This paper investigates why labour market changes have not suppressed earnings growth, assessing the influence of structural factors on the AEI. A new series of occupation-weighted, earnings indices from Labour Force and New Earnings Surveys? data is computed. The failure to adequately adjust for changes in UK labour market structure (in particular, increased service sector employment and greater female participation) is observed to have slightly underestimated earnings?growth.


Mobile devices offer access to our digital lives and thus need to be protected against the risk of unauthorized physical access by applying strong authentication, which in turn adversely affects usability. The actual risk, however, depends on dynamic factors like day and time. In this paper we discuss the idea of using location-based risk assessment in combination with multi-modal biometrics to adjust the level of authentication necessary to the situational risk of unauthorized access.


This paper examines the relationship between inflation and relative price variability (RPV) by using provincial level data from China. The data contains three different inflation regimes and evidence of smooth transition is statistically prominent and the province‐specific time‐varying marginal impact of inflation on RPV varies substantially across inflation regimes. The inflation-RPV linkage is stronger when inflation is moderately high, but tends to fade out and might eventually disappear when inflation is steadily low. The policy implication of this result is that inflation targets should be set within a range in which the inflation-RPV link is the weakest (i.e. low‐inflation regime) to minimize undesirable price dispersion induced by inflation.


Purpose

Faith-based organisations (FBOs) and secular NGOs provide important services to victims of trafficking, exploitation, and those involved in sex work, yet comparative analysis of their approaches to care has lacked attention in the literature. The purpose of this paper is to examine these two types of organisations, exploring the extent to which faith influences the ways FBOs work with their clients.

Design/methodology/approach

In total, 41 interviews were conducted with leaders of 13 Christian FBOs and 12 secular NGOs in Cambodia, and organisational mission statements were reviewed. An input-output conceptual model was used as a framework to gather and analyse data.

Findings

While all FBOs maintained a high regard for their clients' spiritual needs and operated with a faith-related approach to care, secular NGOs also, at times, included culturally embedded religious elements into their programming. The nature of FBOs' faith-related programming, however, clearly distinguished these organisations from their secular counterparts. Despite such distinctions, similarities were maintained among both types of organisations in the behavioural or recovery outcomes they sought in their clients.

Research limitations/implications

Limitations include the study's focus on organisations that serve a specific clientele in one development context. Research implications include the study pointing to the necessity of acknowledging the development context as critical to the ways in which religion may or may not influence the approaches to care of both FBOs and secular NGOs. The paper also contributes insight into the relationship between the non-resource input of faith, and services provided by FBOs.

Practical implications

Given that both types of organisations sought change in their clients, practitioners should ensure that their organisational approaches to care are conducive to the outcomes they seek. Though organisational policy may stipulate that clients are free to choose whether or not to participate in faith-related programming, FBOs should always ensure a care environment in which clients feel free not to participate in such programming.

Originality/value

Though FBOs and secular NGOs sought many similar behavioural or recovery outcomes from their clients, the development context in which these organisations worked – unlike some other contexts – and the role of faith "infusing" FBOs, led to clear, observable differences in their approaches to care. The study highlights the importance of taking into account these factors when seeking to decipher differences that may or may not exist between faith-based and secular non-state social policy actors.


In the north central Lhasa terrane of Tibet, two distinct structural levels of an east–west striking thrust system are exposed along the north trending late Cenozoic Xiagangjiang rift. Upper Paleozoic strata deformed by the south directed Langgadong La thrust, and Cretaceous strata involved in variably north and south directed thrusting characterize these lower and upper structural levels, respectively. These two structural levels are separated by the Tagua Ri passive roof thrust. Balanced cross section restoration suggests that the thrust system accommodated ∼103 km (∼53%) shortening. The 40Ar/39Ar results, together with an interpretation of synthrust deposition of Upper Cretaceous strata, suggest that the majority of shortening occurred during the Late Cretaceous–Paleocene. Cretaceous strata lie unconformable on Permian rocks; volcanic tuffs directly above the unconformity yield U‐Pb zircon ages of ∼131 Ma. Upper Cretaceous strata record a change from shallow marine to nonmarine deposition, indicating uplift above sea level during this time. The overall south directed vergence of the thrust belt is consistent with substantial crustal thickening in central Tibet by large‐scale northward underthrusting of Lhasa terrane basement beneath the Qiantang terrane prior to the Indo‐Asian collision. The documented decoupling of contractional deformation at shallow crustal levels appears to be a regional characteristic of Tibet from at least the Bangong suture in the north to the Tethyan Himalaya to the south. This style of deformation explains the absence of basement exposures and major denudation in this region despite substantial crustal shortening.


Studies on the generation time of P. shigelloides and its relation to incubation temperature have shown that this species in marked contrast to A. hydrophila does not multiply in temperature below 8 degrees C. These findings would explain the seasonal variations in the number of isolates from river-water observed in Japan. Colony counts of P. shigelloides organisms on IBG-agar from water of the river Main sampled during the month of August (water temperature 20 degrees C) have shown numbers of 10--100 c.f.u./ml. Thus P. shigelloides is present in surface water in Middle Europe. The presence of the germs could equally be demonstrated in the guts of many specimen of non-preying fish that had been caught during the months of July and August. When determining the bacterial species isolated from such material the possible presence of inositol-positive A. hydrophila strains has to be taken into account. Results of former studies on the suitability of Leifson-agar, Wilson-Blair- agar, SS-agar and IBG-agar then with pure cultures were confirmed by our work with faecal material from fish done this time. While favourable results were obtained on IBG- and SS-agar P. shigelloides could in no case be cultured on Leifson- and Wilson-Blair-agar.


Risk assessment is used to identify, estimate and prioritise risks that could impact organisations. Existing risk assessment methods are not particularly adapted to include dynamic systems such as the Internet of Things (IoT). Recently, IoT has been used to develop a natural extension of Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems that support industrial control in various sectors such as transportation, energy, and manufacturing. However, incorporating IoT systems without due attention to new risks posed could enable attacks, increase the cybersecurity concerns, and impact operations and safety. In this paper, special considerations for risk assessment methods in the context of converged IoT and SCADA systems are identified, and we present recommendations for the inclusion of the special considerations alongside standard methods for managing risks.


The costs of health care and medicines are a considerable and rapidly increasing part of the gross national product in Sweden. like in many other countries.The purpose of this study was to identify factors that influenced the we of health care and drugs in subjects aged 16 years and above in Habo, a Swedish municipality. The study population consisted of 827 men and women from a random age-stratified population sample of 1,312 subjects. A postal questionnaire was used to collect information on sociodemographic characteristics. well-being variables. symptoms and chronic disease, and on the use of health care (including alternative medicine), drugs (including herbal medicines) and self-care products.Several sociodemographic characteristics, such as as sex, marital status, household size, educational level and occupational status, were related to many of the well-being variables and symptoms. These sociodemographic characteristic were also independently related to the use of health care. drugs and self-care products.Well-being variables (particularly bad perceived health), a high number of symptom (six or more) and chronic disease were also independently related to the use of health care, drugs and self-care products. Combinations of certain independent variables could explain, or "predict", special patterns of health care and drug use. For example, the likelihood of consulting a physician frequently (three times or more per year] was very high in subjects with a certain profile, viz. high age. female sex, sick leave or disability pension bad perceived health. high number of symptoms and chronic disease. Indeed, 31-92% of appointments to a physician could be attributed to these factors, depending on the model used. The same combination of factors, except high age, explained 21 to 91% of the number of patients using prescribed pharmaceuticals. Between 6% and 85% of the number of days in hospital were attributable to the combination of sick-leave or disability pension and bad perceived health, chronic disease.Using information on the most important variables, i.e. those with the strongest independent relationships to the use of health care and drugs. in the population of a specific district may be of value in estimating the demand for health care resources in that district. and in the allocation of resources. It may also provide a basis for preventive efforts aiming at reducing the needs.


Message-Passing Neural Networks (MPNNs), the most prominent Graph Neural Network (GNN) framework, celebrate much success in the analysis of graph-structured data. Concurrently, the sparsification of Neural Network models attracts a great amount of academic and industrial interest. In this paper we conduct a structured, empirical study of the effect of sparsification on the trainable part of MPNNs known as the Update step. To this end, we design a series of models to successively sparsify the linear transform in the Update step. Specifically, we propose the ExpanderGNN model with a tuneable sparsification rate and the Activation-Only GNN, which has no linear transform in the Update step. In agreement with a growing trend in the literature the sparsification paradigm is changed by initialising sparse neural network architectures rather than expensively sparsifying already trained architectures. Our novel benchmark models enable a better understanding of the influence of the Update step on model performance and outperform existing simplified benchmark models such as the Simple Graph Convolution. The ExpanderGNNs, and in some cases the Activation-Only models, achieve performance on par with their vanilla counterparts on several downstream tasks, while containing significantly fewer trainable parameters. Our code is publicly available at: https://github.com/ChangminWu/ExpanderGNN.


International teaching assistants (ITAs) often receive specialized training because their spoken English is not easily comprehensible. Lack of comprehensibility may be influenced by grammatical issues (Tyler, 1994), incorrect or inadequate discourse structure (Tyler, 1992; Williams, 1992), or aspects of their pronunciation, such as unclear sentence focus (Hahn, 2004) or intonation (Pickering, 2001; Wennerstrom, 1998). Problems with comprehensibility may be compounded by ITAs having learned English through formal, written models. However, we do not know how ITAs change written text into an oral lecture, nor how their strategies differ from those of native teaching assistants (NTAs) doing the same task. This paper reports results of such a study. We video-recorded three different groups of engineering TAs (American, Chinese, and Indian) presenting information from a textbook passage. Each TA was asked to read the same passage taken from a first-year college physics textbook, and then to teach the content in spoken English. Presentations were transcribed and analyzed using a Systemic Functional Linguistics approach (Halliday, 1994; Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004; Mohan, 2007). Changes made by each group of TAs from the written to the spoken language were compared, and the strategies used by each group to mark their changes from written into spoken language were examined. The results provide a baseline measure of strategies for turning written into spoken texts used by the TAs in our study. Implications for TA training are discussed.


The way in which managers perceive their organization's intellectual and social capital has an impact in shaping their choices and how they lead change. The aim of the study was to explore how the managers of a trade union framed the role of its intangible assets in a context of organizational change. A qualitative approach was used; 30 semi-structured interviews were conducted with the leaders of a trade union and then analyzed using the method of thematic analysis. Particular attention was paid to the metaphors the managers used to narrate change. The hypothesis underlying this approach is that metaphors are a meaningful resource in that they can convey how organization and its intangible assets are framed. In the results, three "root metaphors" are illustrated—the trade union seen either as a system of domination, an organism, or a culture—together with the consequences of each of these images for the perception and value attributed to the trade union's intangible assets. In conclusion, implications for changing management practices and for further research are discussed.


Volume I: Thinking the Natural. Volume II: The Nature of 'Human Nature'. Volume III: From 'Nature' to Natures': Contestation and Reconstruction.Volume IV: Reconfiguring the Social/Natural Interface.


Most viscous‐plastic sea ice models use the elliptical yield curve. This yield curve has a fundamental flaw: it excludes acute angles between deformation features at high resolution. Conceptually, the teardrop (TD) and parabolic lens (PL) yield curves offer an attractive alternative. These yield curves feature a non‐symmetrical shape, a Coulombic behavior for the low‐medium compressive stress, and a continuous transition to the ridging‐dominant mode, but their published formulation leads to negative or zero bulk and shear viscosities and, consequently, poor numerical convergence with stress states at times outside the yield curve. These issues are a consequence of the original assumption that the constitutive equations of the commonly used elliptical yield curve are also applicable to non‐symmetrical yield curves and yield curves with tensile strength. We derive a corrected formulation for the constitutive relations of the TD and PL yield curves. Results from simple uni‐axial loading experiments show that with the new formulation the numerical convergence of the solver improves and much smaller nonlinear residuals after a smaller number of total solver iterations can be reached, resulting in significant improvements in numerical efficiency and representation of the stress and deformation fields. The TD and PL yield curves lead to smaller angles of failure that better agree with observations. They are promising candidates to replace the elliptical yield curve in high‐resolution pan‐Arctic sea ice simulations.


AbstractImmediate reconstruction of medium/large ptotic breasts can be performed by using expanders, definitive implants, or autologous flaps. If a skin-sparing mastectomy is feasible, excellent results can be achieved by planning Wise pattern incisions, using definitive implants. The authors suggest the use of a dermal-adipose flap, harvested from the ptotic part of the breast, rotated laterally, and interposed between the serratus fascia and the pectoralis muscle to close the inferolateral part of the pocket. We performed 23 immediate unilateral single-stage breast reconstructions, with simultaneous contralateral reduction. Preoperatively, all breasts showed grade II or III ptosis. There was no case of implant infection or failure of the reconstruction. The median follow-up was 21 months; however, some patients followed up for >4 years; in this period, no case of capsular contracture was observed. This technique has provided good shape, acceptable ptosis consistent with the healthy breast and symmetric scars.


Correspondence: Alan Kwok-hei Mok eye'ni G/F 63 Lee Garden road, Causeway Bay, hong Kong, People's republic of China Fax +852 2882 2959 email firstname.lastname@example.com Objectives: To investigate retrospectively the difference in myopia progression, over about 7 years, between two groups of Hong Kong Chinese myopic children who wore overnight orthokeratology lenses or single-vision spectacles. Methods: A total of 238 records of children wearing overnight orthokeratology lenses or single-vision spectacles from Eye'ni optical shop (Hong Kong) between January 1999 and December 2009 were reviewed. Refractive and central corneal curvature data with 6-year or a longer follow-up period of 70 patients were retrieved: 34 children (15 boys and 19 girls, aged 9.2 ± 1.8 years) wore orthokeratology lenses and 36 (20 boys and 16 girls, aged 10.2 ± 2.0 years) wore spectacles. Myopic progression was determined as the change of myopia from the baseline to the final visit. Results: No statistically significant differences (P . 0.05) in age, central flat corneal curvatures, baseline refractive error, or follow-up period were observed between the two groups. Average myopic progression of the overnight orthokeratology contact lens cohort (−0.37 ± 0.49 D) was significantly less (P , 0.001) than of the single-vision spectacle group (−2.06 ± 0.81 D) over about 7 years. Conclusion: Our preliminary 7-year data support the claim that overnight orthokeratology contact lenses may be a feasible clinical method for myopic progression control. Prospective and randomized investigations are warranted to overcome the limitations of this retrospective study.


Preserving, managing and improving the health of forest ecosystems worldwide will require equitable leadership and participation from both women and men. Understanding gendered motivations to conserve forest ecosystems may contribute to the design of programs that enable sustainable management and use of forest benefits. This study examines the motivations for willingness to participate in forest conservation activities in Lower Tana River forest. The study focuses on gender differentiated personal values for conserving the forest and uses the laddering technique. The study reveals that gender roles are important in choice of forest conservation practice. Women indicate that preserving the biodiversity is important as well as monitoring illegal harvesting of forest products. Easy access to fuel, agricultural production is of paramount important for women. On the other hand, men plant trees and control forest fires to increase their household income. However, tree planting is important for both women and men. The trees planted are for commercial purposes and less environment friendly. The study discusses policy implications. Although men and women have different roles and responsibilities, their desires or values are more or less similar. For instance, they both value security, comfortable and exciting life, good health, being helpful and happiness. Women are unique in the sense that they want to be independent in life while men want the sense of responsibility.


Between March 1992 and November 1994, 91 patients with stage III and IV ovarian carcinoma were enrolled in a randomized comparative study of cyclophosphamide 600 mg/m2 plus carboplatin 300 mg/m2 vs. cyclophosphamide 600 mg/m2 plus carboplatin 600 mg/m2, each regimen given monthly for six cycles. Patients on the intensive regimen also received 10 μg/kg of granulocyte macrophage colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF) (molgramostim) daily for 14 days following each chemo-therapy treatment. The study was closed prematurely because of very poor case accrual following the preliminary announcement (in May 1993) that paclitaxel appeared superior to cyclophosphamide in the platinum-based treatment of ovarian cancer. More than 4 years after our last case entry, we analyzed the survival results for the 44 eligible patients who received the conventional dose of carboplatin and the 43 eligible patients receiving our intensified dose of carboplatin. More than 90% of the treated patients receiving the conventional dose regimen received at least 75% of the planned doses at each of the six treatment intervals, whereas the percentage of treated patients able to receive at least 75% of the assigned intensive dose regimen had declined from 95% in cycle 2 to 53% by cycle 6. Furthermore, although 32 patients received all six planned cycles of treatment in the conventional regimen group, only 15 received all six cycles of the intensified regimen. Patients receiving the intensive regimen had more fever, dermatitis, lethargy, musculoskeletal pain, and pulmonary complications than did the conventional dose patients. Median survival times for the two treatment groups were very similar (38.5 and 38.1 months, respectively, for the conventional and intensive regimens), and we saw no evidence that the distribution of survival times differed between the treatment regimens (p = 0.95).


Computers are without doubt one of the most important invention of the last century, whose impact cannot be overestimated. Over the years they became powerfull, due to the constant optimization of their processors. With the growing need of computing power due to AI, processors have become faster then ever. However, since we are reaching the power wall, Moore's law is coming to an end. Therefore, a young research community called rebooting computing is looking for alternative computation architectures. In this work, we propose to use stochastic computing to build architectures dedicated to Bayesian inference aiming low-power consumption. We develop two machines, namely the Bayesian machine (BM) and the Bayesian sampling machine (BSM). In this thesis, we look at two signal processing applications: Sound Source Localization (SSL) and Source Separation (SS). For SSL, we introduce three methods using the BM. The first one is working in the time-frequency domain and hence uses the Fourier transform. The second one is running entirely in the temporal domain. The third one is a multi-source localization approach based on the previous method. We present a technique to speed up the stochastic computation by a factor of up to 10 3 . Moreover, we designed an on-chip likelihoods computation mechanism to reduce the memory needs of our machine. Furthermore, we ran simulations and real world experiments to validate our methods. We made ASIC simulations to evaluate the power consumption. For the second problem, the source separation, we introduce a more general machine, the Bayesian sampling machine, which is based on the Gibbs sampling approach. We present a sampling method to solve source separation and run simulations to show the effectiveness of this technique.


Chemical pneumonitis and carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning may be the etiologic factors in inhalation injury. Since the CO poisoning related with smoke inhalation has a much high mortality we tested the hypothesis that superimposed CO poisoning deteriorates hemodynamics and oxygen metabolism in acid inhalation injury. Ten anesthetized dogs were ventilated in room air to maintain normal PaCO2. Lung injury was produced with 2 ml/kg 0.1 N HCL intratracheally. Five dogs (ACID) were then ventilated with room air, while the others were exposed to 1% CO in air for 10 minutes to produce CO poisoning simultaneously with acid instillation (CO-ACID). Hemodynamic changes, oxygen metabolism and carboxyhemoglobin (COHb) were monitored for 4 hours. Thirty minutes following the challenge PaO2 in ACID and CO-ACID groups fell to 65 +/- 10 and 43 +/- 4 (p less than 0.05), respectively. Acid caused significantly decreased cardiac output and increased pulmonary vascular resistance. CO did not accentuate hemodynamic changes following acid inhalation. However, a significant increase of COHb in CO-ACID group resulted in deterioration of oxygen transportation. Though oxygen extraction increased markedly in both groups the oxygen consumption decreased significantly in CO-ACID group. A constantly depressed mixed venous oxygen tension in CO-ACID group suggests the deterioration of tissue oxygen metabolism.


Hydrogen is considered a secondary source of energy, commonly referred to as an energy carrier. It has the highest energy content when compared to other common fuels by weight, having great potential for further development. Hydrogen can be produced from various domestic resources but, based on the fossil resource conditions in China, coal-based hydrogen energy is considered to be the most valuable, because it is not only an effective way to develop clean energy, but also a proactive exploration of the clean usage of traditional coal resources. In this article, the sorption-enhanced water–gas shift technology in the coal-to-hydrogen section and the hydrogen-storage and transport technology with liquid aromatics are introduced and basic mechanisms, technical advantages, latest progress and future R&D focuses of hydrogen-production and storage processes are listed and discussed. As a conclusion, after considering the development frame and the business characteristics of CHN Energy Group, a conceptual architecture for developing coal-based hydrogen energy and the corresponding supply chain, is proposed.


We investigated the longitudinal associations among physical activity (PA), motor competence (MC), cardiorespiratory fitness (VO2peak), and body fatness across 7 years, and also analyzed the possible mediation effects of PA, MC, and VO2peak on the relationships with body fatness. This was a seven‐year longitudinal study with three measuring points (mean ages [in years] and respective sample size: 6.75±0.37, n=696; 9.59±1.07, n=617; 13.35±0.34, n=513). PA (moderate‐to‐vigorous PA—MVPA and vigorous PA—VPA) was monitored using accelerometers. MC was assessed by the "Körperkoordinationstest für Kinder—KTK" test battery. VO2peak was evaluated using a continuous running protocol until exhaustion. Body fatness was determined by the sum of four skinfolds. Structural equation modeling was performed to evaluate the longitudinal associations among PA, MC, VO2peak, and body fatness and the potential mediation effects of PA, MC, and VO2peak. All coefficients presented were standardized (z‐scores). MC and VO2peak directly influenced the development of body fatness, and VO2peak mediated the associations between MVPA, VPA, MC, and body fatness. MC also mediated the associations between MVPA, VPA, and body fatness. In addition, VO2peak had the largest total association with body fatness (β=−0.431; P<.05), followed by MC (β=−0.369; P<.05) and VPA (β=−0.112; P<.05). As PA, MC, and VO2peak exhibited longitudinal association with body fatness, it seems logical that interventions should strive to promote the development of fitness and MC through developmentally appropriate physical activities, as the synergistic interactions of all three variables impacted body fatness.


Osteogenesis imperfecta (OI) type I is characterized by bone fragility without significant deformity, osteopenia, normal stature, blue sclerae, and autosomal dominant inheritance. Dermal fibroblasts from most affected individuals produce about half the expected amount of type I collagen, suggesting that the OI type I phenotype results from a variety of mutations which alter the apparent expression of either COL1A1 or COL1A2, the genes encoding the chains of type I collagen. Short-pulse labeling of dermal fibroblasts with [3H]proline from affected individuals in 19 families indicates that most have alterations in the expected 2:1 synthetic ratio of pro alpha 1(I): pro alpha 2(I), with most having decreased production of pro alpha 1(I). Ratios of COL1A1:COL1A2 mRNA from these individuals, using slot-blot hybridization, indicate that they fall into different groups, but that most have decreased COL1A1 mRNA levels, compared with controls. These data suggest that most of our OI I families have COL1A1 mutations. Copy number and size of the COL1A1 gene by restriction endonuclease analysis of genomic DNA from affected individuals are normal in the families examined. We have identified one 3 generation family in which all affected members have one normal COL1A1 allele and another with a 5 base-pair deletion near the 3' end of the gene. The deletion creates a shift in the translational reading-frame and predicts the synthesis of an elongated pro alpha 1(I) chain. In a second family, a father and a son have a single exon deletion that results from a splicing mutation. Chemical cleavage analysis of amplified cDNA from affected individuals in different regions of the COL1A1 gene, including the promoter, suggests that several individuals have point mutations within the coding region of the gene, while one individual may have a small deletion within the alpha 1(I) carboxyl-terminal propeptide region. Our data provide evidence for significant molecular heterogeneity within the OI type I phenotype and indicate that a variety of mutations can result in decreased synthesis of type I collagen.


A high conversion efficiency rectenna at 2.45 GHz is proposed in this paper. Two layers low cost FR-4 substrate has been used to fabricate the rectenna. The proposed designs contain patch antenna and open stub rectifying circuits. The dimension for the proposed rectenna design is 100 x 100 x 5 mm3. The technique of air gap approach has been used in order to increase gain of the antenna. The ground plane is added with the triangular slot has eliminate second and third harmonics which results enhancement of the conversion efficiency. The measured conversion efficiency reaches 79.29% when the input power at 17 dBm. This rectenna takes advantages of low profile, easy integration, high gain and high power conversion efficiency from previous proposals.


In response to the COVID-19 epidemic, many education systems have relied on distance learning and educational technologies to an unprecedented degree. However, rigorous empirical research on the impacts on learning under these conditions is still scarce. We present the first large-scale, quantitative evidence detailing how school closures affected education in China. The data set includes households and teachers of 4,360 rural and urban primary school students. We find that although the majority of students engaged in distance education, many households encountered difficulties including barriers to learning (such as access to appropriate digital devices and study spaces), curricular delays, and costs to parents equivalent to between 3.5 and 6 months of income. We also find significant disparities across rural and urban households.