Background The advent of telemedicine has allowed physicians to deliver medical treatment to patients from a distance. Mobile apps such as WhatsApp Messenger, an instant messaging service, came as a novel concept in all fields of social life, including medicine. The use of instant messaging services has been shown to improve communication within medical teams by providing means for quick teleconsultation, information sharing, and starting treatment as soon as possible. Objective The aim of this study was to perform a comprehensive systematic review of present literature on the use of the WhatsApp Messenger app as an adjunctive health care tool for medical doctors. Methods Searches were performed in PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library using the term "whatsapp*" in articles published before January 2016. A bibliography of all relevant original articles that used the WhatsApp Messenger app was created. The level of evidence of each study was determined according to the Oxford Levels of Evidence ranking system produced by the Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine. The impact and the indications of WhatsApp Messenger are discussed in order to understand the extent to which this app currently functions as an adjunctive tool for telemedicine. Results The database search identified a total of 30 studies in which the term "whatsapp*" was used. Each article's list of references was evaluated item-by-item. After literature reviews, letters to the editor, and low-quality studies were excluded, a total of 10 studies were found to be eligible for inclusion. Of these studies, 9 had been published in the English language and 1 had been published in Spanish. Five were published by medical doctors. Conclusions The pooled data presents compelling evidence that the WhatsApp Messenger app is a promising system, whether used as a communication tool between health care professionals, as a means of communication between health care professionals and the general public, or as a learning tool for providing health care information to professionals or to the general population. However, high-quality and properly evaluated research is needed, as are improvements in descriptions of the methodology and the study processes. These improvements will allow WhatsApp Messenger to be categorically defined as an effective telemedicine tool in many different fields of health care.


Background or purpose: The purpose of this project is to provide optometry students with an additional means of learning the procedure of ophthalmoscopy. In addition, different learning strategies were investigated in attempt to come up with the best way to facilitate students in mastering the first year optometric procedures. Methods: A video of the entire ophthalmoscopy sequence was put together and made available to first year students in the procedures class. The same students were given a survey to evaluate the efficacy of the video in helping them learn the procedure of ophthalmoscopy. The survey also contained general questions about strategies used to learn first year optometric procedures. Results: The production of the DVD was successfully completed and distributed to current first year optometry students for a trial viewing before and during labs in which direct ophthalmoscopy was taught. After completion of the ophthalmoscopy section of the course, a brief survey was distributed to each student. Overall, comments and feedback were positive. Conclusions: With further editing and resolution a final copy will be available for purchase to all incoming first year students. In the future, we would like this DVD to be available to other faculty and teaching institutions. Degree Type Thesis Degree Name Master of Science in Vision Science Committee Chair J.P. Lowery


In this investigation, attempts have been made to solve two-dimension nonlinear viscous flow between slowly expanding or contracting walls with weak permeability by utilizing a semi analytical Akbari Ganji's Method (AGM). As regard to previous papers, solving of nonlinear equations is difficult and the results are not accurate. This new approach is emerged after comparing the achieved solutions with numerical method and exact solution. Based on the comparison between AGM and numerical methods, AGM can be successfully applied for a broad range of nonlinear equations. Results illustrate, this method is efficient and has enough accuracy in comparison with other semi analytical and numerical methods. Ruge-Kutta numerical method, Variational Iteration Method (VIM), Homotopy Perturbation Method (HPM) and Adomian Decomposition Method (ADM) have been applied to make this comparison. Moreover results demonstrate that AGM could be applicable through other methods in nonlinear problems with high nonlinearity. Furthermore convergence problems for solving nonlinear equations by using AGM appear small.


Differential privacy is a rigorous privacy condition achieved by randomizing query answers. This paper develops efficient algorithms for answering multiple queries under differential privacy with low error. We pursue this goal by advancing a recent approach called the matrix mechanism, which generalizes standard differentially private mechanisms. This new mechanism works by first answering a different set of queries (a strategy) and then inferring the answers to the desired workload of queries. Although a few strategies are known to work well on specific workloads, finding the strategy which minimizes error on an arbitrary workload is intractable. We prove a new lower bound on the optimal error of this mechanism, and we propose an efficient algorithm that approaches this bound for a wide range of workloads.


Slow-acting anti-rheumatic drugs exhibit a number of similar properties in treated patients that suggest that they may have a common mode of action in rheumatoid arthritis. In vitro evaluation of drug action suggests that each of the slow-acting agents possesses immunosuppressive activity that may explain its therapeutic efficacy in rheumatoid arthritis. Even though these agents appear to be able to suppress immune responses, the site of action of these agents differs. Thus, gold compounds and the antimalarials suppress the activity of mononuclear phagocytes, whereas D-penicillamine and other thiol-containing slow-acting agents inhibit the activity of helper T cells. These agents may therefore be effective by interfering with various specific aspects of the immunologic reactivity that drives the chronic inflammation of rheumatoid arthritis.


AIM
Notch1 expression remains incompatible and contradictory with previous findings on cervical cancer. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the association between Notch1 and cervical cancer.

METHODS
Available studies were searched from diverse databases and Review Managers 5.3 software was used to perform analysis.

RESULTS
A total of 798 samples were included in this meta-analysis. The Notch1 expression in cancer tissues was higher than that in precancer (p = 0.0003) and normal tissues (p < 0.02). However, the difference of Notch1 expression between cancer cases and precancer cases has no statistical significance (p = 0.35). Moreover, lymph node metastasis (p = 0.02) was associated with higher Notch1 expression in cervical cancer.

CONCLUSION
Notch1 over-expression indicated aggressive biological behaviors.


Kingsley Davis (1961) had argued that the reason that the ancient cities failed to survive was that they were too deadly. He suggested that "three of their (cities) main traits....the crowding of many people in little space, their dependence on widespread contacts (due to in-migration), and their wealth...laid them open to contagious diseases, environmental contamination, occasional starvation and warfare". Even in the medieval age, some European cities provide examples of such problems; but especially so following the Industrial Revolution. Do the events of the 1980s and the 1990s in Karachi suggest that the city may be heading in the same direction. Recently, The Times London in a lead article in November 1994, labelled Karachi as a "City of Riches and Shattered Dreams". It further said that Karachi had grown into a megalopolis where life moved fast and street violence had become a norm. Indeed, more than 65 percent of Pakistan's industries and 80 percent of its finance, banking, and business are concentrated in the city and people come to it from all over the country to find jobs and fulfil their dreams [Husain (1994)]. During the past decade, street violence in the form of ethnic clashes has become a sort of regular event in Karachi. At times, these clashes have been more frequent and even bloodier than the ones before. According to the local newspaper accounts, between 1985 and 1988 (in four years), about 400 people died in Karachi due to violence, which has increased substantially over time. Thus, while the number of violent deaths remained between 350–500 during 1991–93, in 1994 alone the number exceeded 1,100, and during the first three months of 1995, over 300 persons have died due to violence.


Accurate inventory of tropical peatland is important in order to (a) determine the magnitude of the carbon pool; (b) estimate the scale of transfers of peat‐derived greenhouse gases to the atmosphere resulting from land use change; and (c) support carbon emissions reduction policies. We review available information on tropical peatland area and thickness and calculate peat volume and carbon content in order to determine their best estimates and ranges of variation. Our best estimate of tropical peatland area is 441 025 km2 (∼11% of global peatland area) of which 247 778 km2 (56%) is in Southeast Asia. We estimate the volume of tropical peat to be 1758 Gm3 (∼18–25% of global peat volume) with 1359 Gm3 in Southeast Asia (77% of all tropical peat). This new assessment reveals a larger tropical peatland carbon pool than previous estimates, with a best estimate of 88.6 Gt (range 81.7–91.9 Gt) equal to 15–19% of the global peat carbon pool. Of this, 68.5 Gt (77%) is in Southeast Asia, equal to 11–14% of global peat carbon. A single country, Indonesia, has the largest share of tropical peat carbon (57.4 Gt, 65%), followed by Malaysia (9.1 Gt, 10%). These data are used to provide revised estimates for Indonesian and Malaysian forest soil carbon pools of 77 and 15 Gt, respectively, and total forest carbon pools (biomass plus soil) of 97 and 19 Gt. Peat carbon contributes 60% to the total forest soil carbon pool in Malaysia and 74% in Indonesia. These results emphasize the prominent global and regional roles played by the tropical peat carbon pool and the importance of including this pool in national and regional assessments of terrestrial carbon stocks and the prediction of peat‐derived greenhouse gas emissions.


Risk and vulnerability have been rediscovered as key features of rural livelihoods and poverty, and are currently a focus of policy attention. The poor themselves try to manage uncertainty using a variety of ex-ante and ex-post risk management strategies, and through community support systems, but these are both fragile and economically damaging. State interventions working through food, labour or credit markets have proved expensive and unsustainable in the past, though encouraging and innovative institutional partnerships are emerging. This article argues that the way forward lies in new approaches to social protection which underpin production as well as consumption: new thinking recognises the food security and livelihood-protecting functions of public interventions (such as fertiliser and seed subsidies) which were previously dismissed as 'market-distorting'.


A conceptual framework, drawn from an approach to poverty reduction known as the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA), is applied to understanding the role of freshwater prawn (Macrobrachium rosenbergii) marketing systems in southwest Bangladesh. Freshwater prawn marketing potentially provides economic returns and social benefits to the rural poor. Although the potential benefits are great, a number of constraints were identified for the long-term sustainability of prawn marketing systems. The study used the SLA framework as an analytical tool to identify ways to strengthen livelihoods of prawn traders and associated groups.


1 In isolated, stretched, flat‐sheet preparations of guinea‐pig distal colon, simultaneous intracellular recordings were made from pairs of circular muscle (CM) cells to map the region of smooth muscle at which spontaneous junction potentials (sJPs) were coordinated in both space and time. 2 Spontaneous inhibitory junction potentials (sIJPs) and excitatory junction potentials (sEJPs) were recorded from all animals with varying frequencies and amplitudes (up to 25 mV). 3 Large amplitude (≥ 9 mV) sIJPs or sEJPs with near‐identical amplitudes and time courses were recorded synchronously from two CM cells, even when the two electrodes were separated by up to 11 mm in the circumferential axis and ≤ 4 mm in the longitudinal axis. However, smaller (< 9 mV) sIJPs or sEJPs were less coordinated and exhibited greater variability in their times to peak. 4 The standard deviation (s.d.) for the time difference between the peaks of sJPs was related to the amplitude of the events and the distance between the electrodes. The s.d. for large amplitude JPs (≈30 ms), which was less than that for small JPs (≈150 ms), remained constant across the circumferential axis (at least up to 6 mm), but declined rapidly for distances ≥ 2 mm in the longitudinal axis. 5 Current injection (up to 8 nA) into a single CM cell elicited electrotonic potentials in neighbouring CM cells, only when the two electrodes were separated by less than 100 μm circumferentially. Beyond 50 μm electronic potentials were rarely detected. 6 Tetrodotoxin (TTX; 1 μm) abolished all sJPs, whereas hexamethonium (300 μm) either abolished, or substantially reduced all sJPs. 7 Nitro‐l‐arginine (l‐NA; 100 μm) abolished the slow repolarisation phase of sIJPs without any apparent effect on the amplitude of sIJPs. Apamin abolished the fast, initial component of sIJPs, suggesting synchronous release of two inhibitory neurotransmitters during the sIJP. Atropine (1 μm) abolished sEJPs. 8 No sJPs were recorded from the CM layer when it was separated from the myenteric plexus. 9 In conclusion, sIJPs and sEJPs in colonic CM occur synchronously over large regions of the smooth muscle syncitium. The results are discussed in relation to the idea that spontaneous junction potentials in colonic CM are not monoquantal events, but are generated by the simultaneous release of transmitter from many release sites, due to the synchronous activation of many enteric motor neurons.


Decarbonisation policies have recently seen an uncontrolled increase in local electricity production from renewable energy sources (RES) at distribution level. As a consequence, bidirectional power flows might cause high voltage/ medium voltage (HV/MV) transformers to overload. Additionally, not-well-planned installation of electric vehicle (EV) charging stations could provoke voltage deviations and cables overloading during peak times. To ensure secure and reliable distribution network operations, technology integration requires careful analysis which is based on realistic distribution grid models (DGM). Currently, however, only not geo-referenced synthetic grids are available inliterature. This fact unfortunately represents a big limitation. In order to overcome this knowledge gap, we developed a distribution network model (DiNeMo) web-platform aiming at reproducing the DGM of a given area of interest. DiNeMo is based on metrics and indicators collected from 99 unbundled distribution system operators (DSOs) in Europe. In this work we firstly perform a validation exercise on two DGMs of the city of Varaždin in Croatia. To this aim, a set of indicators from the DGMs and from the real networks are compared. The DGMs are later used for a power flow analysis which focuses on voltage fluctuations, line losses, and lines loading considering different levels of EV charging stations penetration.


The rising rate of population growth and industrial development mainly in urban areas have led to significant increase in municipal solid waste (MSW) production. It has been a challenge to materialise a sustainable solid waste management notably in many developing countries. Organic portion represents a significant component in the municipal solid waste across countries with different level of income, ranging from about 25 to 70 %. Composting can be a viable option to manage waste sustainably by transforming waste into value-added fertiliser. Large-scale operation of composting is confronted with concern over feasible economic performance, which varied following different mode of operation. This study aims to review the economic feasibility (EF) on two different composting systems, which are the in-vessel and windrow system, implemented in several developed and developing countries. The review considered the cost factors for both composting systems, including the capital cost and operating cost. The return on investment (ROI) is estimated for both composting systems based on the potential cost benefits from the compost sale and the saving of waste tipping fee. This review provides a better insight into the desirability and applicability of both composting systems as an alternative to the landfilling practice. It is expected that the review of the various composting system could be very useful for improving the sustainable composting technology in the developing countries.


Yangyinqingfei Decoction (YYQFD), a traditional Chinese prescription, is well known in the treatment of diphtheria and lung-related diseases in clinic. However, whether it can be used to block the lung injury caused by air pollutant remains unclear. In the present study, the effect of YYQFD was addressed using a PM2.5-induced lung injury mice model. It was shown that YYQFD significantly improved pulmonary functions of mice exposed to PM2.5, the levels of IL-6, TNF-α and MDA were decreased while SOD levels were increased in serum and bronchoalveolar fluid. The potential mechanism of YYQFD was then delved using metabolomic and proteomic techniques. The protein-metabolite joint analysis showed that YYQFD regulated the biosynthesis of unsaturated fatty acids, linoleic acid and arachidonic acid metabolism, causing a significant decrement of pro-inflammatory mediator arachidonic acid with its downstream metabolites like 20-HETE, prostaglandin E2, accompanied by the up-regulation of PTGES2, GPX2 and CBR3 in lung tissue. These data were used to construct a regulatory metabolic network map in terms of the therapeutic role of YYQFD in PM2.5-induced lung injury, thereby provided a novel insight into potential application in the respiratory diseases caused by air pollutants.


An experiment was carried out by a group of scientists to compare different tools and techniques for detecting duplicated or near-duplicated source code. The overall comparative results are presented elsewhere. This paper takes a closer look at the results for one tool, Dup, which finds code sections that are textually the same or the same except for systematic substitution of parameters such as identifiers and constants. Various factors that influenced the results are identified and their impact on the results is assessed via rerunning Dup with changed options and modifications. These improve the performance of Dup with regard to the experiment and could be incorporated into a postprocessor to be used with other tools.


Background: Breast cancer is among the most common life-threatening public health problems of global concern including Ethiopia. Knowledge and awareness about the disease will help to reduce the number of cases who present at late stages of the disease. The objective of this survey was to assess the knowledge, perception and risk awareness about breast cancer among female medical and health science students of University of Gondar, Ethiopia. Methods: A cross sectional survey was conducted from May 03 to June 01, 2017 at University of Gondar, Ethiopia. Three hundred students were proportionally selected from nine departments using simple random sampling method. Using a structured questionnaire data on risk factors, symptoms and perception about breast cancer and its management approach was collected. Data were entered to and analyzed using SPSS version 21. Results: A total of 300 students had fully completed the survey making the response rate 95.24. The participants' mean age was 21.4 years with the standard deviation (SD) of 2.13 years. The overall level of knowledge on breast cancer was low. Majority of the participants were unaware for complex risk factors such as first child after the age of 30 years (51%), early onset of menses (55.3%), and menopause after the age of 55 years (47.7%) are liked with breast cancer even though they acknowledged old age, family history, and smoking as possible risk factors for breast cancer. Pain in the breast region, change in the shape of the breast, and nipple discharge were the most frequently correctly identified symptoms of breast cancer. Majority of the study participants had also correct beliefs about breast cancer management and its outcomes. however, they had negative perception of breast cancer treatment by considering it to be a long-term and painful process. In binary logistic regression analysis department (p = 0.000) and year of study (p = 0.008) were found to be an independent predicting factors for knowledge among the study participants. Conclusions: The overall level of knowledge on breast cancer and clinical breast examination guidelines was found to be low even though majority had positive perception toward the treatment and its outcomes. Hence, intensive breast health awareness campaign, which should also stress on the importance of early detection and reporting, is necessary to improve the knowledge about breast cancer.


were not treated at Hammersmith Hospital. This feature of the trial arose from the collaboration with other hospitals to ensure an adequate total intake. When a patient, first seen at another hospital, was allocated at random to receive conventional treatment it was often difficult to justify giving that treatment at Hammersmith rather than at the hospital of origin. A comparison of the response of patients treated with photons at Hammersmith with those patients in the neutron series who would have received their treatment at Hammersmith, whichever form of treatment had been selected, was included in the first report on the trial.' The findings in this subtrial at September 1976 were as shown in the accompanying table. The findings in the subtrial are similar


A fatigue endurance limit has been postulated to exist in hot-mix asphalt pavement performance. It cannot be observed and studied with the use of traditional phenomenological approaches as seen by the totally different fatigue behavior at low strain–damage levels close to the fatigue endurance limit. The ratio of dissipated energy change succeeds in defining and investigating the existence of a fatigue endurance limit with a unique relationship between plateau value (PV) and fatigue life (Nf), regardless of strain–damage levels, mixture types, loading modes, and other testing conditions. To determine a fatigue endurance limit requires an extraordinarily long time to conduct testing. This paper applied the PV to the study of a fatigue endurance limit to validate a shortened laboratory testing procedure. Statistical analysis shows that the shortened test can predict the PV with sufficient accuracy. By applying the validated relationship between PV and Nf, the extremely long fatigue life under low strain–damage condition can be predicted without performing millions of loading cycles.


Lately the use of wireless sensor networks for monitoring seismic events has increased; however, these networks depends on the previous acknowledge of the infrastructure and topology. This topology can't be updated if any of the nodes is lost during a seismic event, in addition the orientation of the first seismic wave can't be predicted; because of this, it is necessary to use a type of dynamic network topology. Using ad hoc networks for this purpose could be the answer, but the routing algorithms used in these networks needs to fulfill some characteristics. This paper propose the implementation of a variant of flooding algorithm; evaluating its performance using OMNeT++ simulator; describing a scenario of a 24-floor building. The results are compared against a more commonly used protocol; proving the good performance of this variant and contributing to the state of art.


We measured the bit error rate (BER) of all-optical flip-flop operations using a 1.55-μm polarization bistable vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL). Polarization bistable flip-flop operations were obtained by injecting optical set and reset pulses with independently adjusted wavelengths toward the two VCSEL lasing modes, whose polarizations are orthogonal to each other. Acquired waveforms showed clearly opened eyes, and BERs less than 1 × 10-9 were measured up to 1 Gb/s although the optical set and reset pulse power was much lower than the VCSEL output power. We also demonstrated all-optical flip-flop operations by injecting optical set and reset pulses with the same wavelength, which were generated by a single laser diode. In this case, we obtained polarization bistable flip-flop operations up to 500 Mb/s with almost the same BER values that were obtained when the wavelengths of the set and reset pulses were adjusted independently. The optical input pulse powers were higher than for the case using input pulses with two different wavelengths, but still lower than the VCSEL output power.


Plasma insulin and glucagon responses to oral glucose loading were examined in rats with islet cell tumors induced by a single intravenous injection of streptozotocin (30 or 40 mg/kg body weight). Twenty-four macroscopic and six microscopic tumors occurred in 21 rats. In 15 of 21 tumor-bearing rats, there was exaggerated insulin release in response to oral glucose. Plasma glucose levels did not rise with the oral glucose load and were comparable to those seen in normal animals. Hence these rats are described as having "responsive tumors." In six rats with "nonresponsive tumors" there was no insulin response and the plasma glucose levels rose. No significant differences in plasma levels were observed between the two groups. Nonresponsive tumors as well as responsive tumors contained a significant amount of extractable insulin (17.68 +/- 8.60 and 35.07 +/- 10.05 mg/g wet weight, respectively) and detectable amounts of immunoreactive glucagon (1.47 +/- 0.61 and 2.24 +/- 0.67 micrograms/g wet weight, respectively). These results suggest that a small dose of streptozotocin produces two types of islet cell tumors. One is insulin producing and insulin secreting whereas the other is insulin producing but not insulin secreting.


Over past centuries, Cannabis sativa (Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol being the principal active ingredient) has been used extensively for both medicinal and recreational uses, and one widely reported effect is the onset of a ravenous appetite and eating behaviour. The pharmacological properties of such exogenous cannabinoids are mediated through the activation of two receptor subtypes, the CB(1) and CB(2) receptors. A number of endogenous ligands for these receptors, the endocannabinoids, have now also been identified allowing their effects on ingestive behaviour to be determined. In a number of species, including man, the administration of exogenous and endogenous cannabinoids leads to robust increases in food intake and can promote body weight gain. These effects are believed to be mediated through activation of the CB(1) receptor. Conversely, experiments with selective CB(1) receptor antagonists have demonstrated reductions in food intake and body weight with repeated compound administration. These reductions in body weight appear to be greater in obese animals and may be the result of a dual effect on both food intake and metabolic processes. Such findings have led to a number of pharmaceutical companies developing selective CB(1) receptor antagonists for the treatment of obesity. The most advanced compound is Sanofi-Synthelabo's inverse agonist, rimonabant (Acomplia; SR-141716), and early Phase III results have recently demonstrated significant reductions in body weight, waist circumference and improvement of lipid and glucose metabolism in overweight and obese humans. Accordingly, the cannabinoid system appears to have an important role in the regulation of ingestive behaviour in man and animals.


This study presents a methodology of a quantitative risk assessment for the scenario of an onboard hydrogen storage tank rupture and tunnel fire incident. The application of the methodology is demonstrated on a road tunnel. The consequence analysis is carried out for the rupture of a 70 MPa, 62.4-litre hydrogen storage tank in a fire, that has a thermally activated pressure relief device (TPRD) failed or blocked during an incident. Scenarios with two states of charge (SoC) of the tank, i.e., SoC = 99% and SoC = 59%, are investigated. The risks in terms of fatalities per vehicle per year and the cost per incident are assessed. It is found that for the reduction in the risk with the hydrogen-powered vehicle in a road tunnel fire incident to the acceptable level of 10−5 fatality/vehicle/year, the fire-resistance rating (FRR) of the hydrogen storage tank should exceed 84 min. The FRR increase to this level reduces the societal risk to an acceptable level. The increase in the FRR to 91 min reduces the risk in terms of the cost of the incident to GBP 300, following the threshold cost of minor injury published by the UK Health and Safety Executive. The Frequency–Number (F–N) of the fatalities curve is developed to demonstrate the effect of mitigation measures on the risk reduction to socially acceptable levels. The performed sensitivity study confirms that with the broad range of input parameters, including the fire brigade response time, the risk of rupture of standard hydrogen tank-TPRD systems inside the road tunnel is unacceptable. One of the solutions enabling an inherently safer use of hydrogen-powered vehicles in tunnels is the implementation of breakthrough safety technology—the explosion free in a fire self-venting (TPRD-less) tanks.


This article explores the political economy of social science research in the Global South by analyzing new bibliometric and survey data on Peru, a lower-middle income country with weak domestic funding and institutional support for scholarship. The results of the analysis show that although research in Peru is heavily dependent on foreign funding, the multiplicity of funding institutions gives scholars a surprising degree of autonomy. Still, dependence on foreign funding produces conditions with potentially harmful consequences for the quality and impact of research. Five conditions are considered: multiple institutional affiliations, hyperproductivity, forced interdisciplinarity, parochialism, and a weak national community of scholars.


Neurological and clinical evidence suggests that specialised processing pathways differ functionally in the way visual information is processed, whether the goal is perceptual representation or action, (Milner & Goodale, 1995). These pathways may differ in emphasis on the same information. While the visuo-motor pathway may need to represent aspects of the environment in relation to the self, the visuo-perceptual pathway may need to form enduring representations in such a way as to overcome changes in item appearance due to self-motion. A second point of difference concerns temporal durability within each pathway. The visuo-motor pathway may rapidly update information in order to "keep up" with changes in the relationship between self and environment but the visuo-perceptual pathway may not operate under such constraints. In normal subjects a two-second critical parameter on visuo-motor accuracy has been noted, (Elliott & Madalena, 1987) as have spatial dissociations between visuo-motor and visuo-perceptual errors, (Gentilucci & Negrotti, 1994). Three experiments further investigate temporal and spatial parameters surrounding response accuracy in normal adults and 6- to 10-year old children. Experiment one suggests that a two second pre-response delay induces a systematic distortion in the extent of visuo-motor responses while perceptual judgments retain accuracy. A loss of sensitivity accompanied all responses with delay, suggesting processing common to both pathways also occurs. The provision of reference lights in an otherwise dark workspace significantly reduced the effect of exceeding visuo- motor capacity, suggesting that pointing responses can utilise allocentric information where necessary. Experiment two focuses on response-modality differences in relation to continuous information of the target location, and finds that reliance on this information varies with eccentricity for visuo-motor but not visuo-perceptual responses. These results are consistent with requirements of force-control specific to visuo-motor behaviour and suggest that continuous visual information regarding target position crucially supplements proprioception in a manner distinguishable from the effect of pre-movement delay. The finding augments understanding of differences in the use of visual information between visuo-motor and visuo-perceptual modalities. Experiment three investigates visuo-motor accuracy in children and finds that a one-second delay systematically distorts accuracy but in a manner akin to that noted in adults. For children, distortion precedes loss in sensitivity and extent of response is more fragile than directional components. Seven to eight year olds' particular difficulties suggest deficits in movement force compensation which operate independently of visuo-motor processing.


Abstract : The investigator studied the effects of ethanol on the spontaneous activity of single neurons in functionally differentiated subnuclei of a posterior thalamic visual projection area, nucleus rotundus, in the anesthetized pigeon. Low doses of ethanol, 0.05 - 0.10 ml/kg (producing blood levels of about 0.005 - 0.010%) , inhibited activity in anterior rotundus but had complex excitatory-inhibitory effects on posterior rotundal cells. Nonvisual dorsal thalamic cells, and 'lateral geniculate' neurons were inhibited by ethanol but threshold doses (0.25 - 0.40 ml/kg) were far higher than those for the rotundal cells (0.05 ml/kg). These differing dose-response curves for visual and nonvisual thalamic neurons suggest: (1) low doses of ethanol may seriously impair peripheral visual functions; (2) The behavioral effects of ethanol are highly dose-dependent; (3) Effects of low doses of ethanol may not be extrapolated from high-dose effects since high-dose effects may 'mask' effects dominant at low doses; (4) The effects of a given dose of ethanol may vary widely and unpredictably among individuals. Thus, the notorious unpredictability of ethanol-induced changes in behavior or task performance may be the inevitable consequence of the reported differential dose-response effects on single neurons.


Covid-19 is a pandemic and the whole world is facing the loss in terms of morbidity and mortality of the human resources. Therefore, there is an urgent need for various therapeutic agents or drugs to treat the covid-19 patients. Although, vaccination process is under way, it is not possible to provide the vaccination to whole world in a short period. Therefore, it is an essential strategy to work on the various therapeutic aspects of covid-19 treatment. The present book chapter will discuss and review the various aspects of the treatment strategies of the covid-19. Further, we will provide an overview of the virus and host based potential therapeutic targets along with existing therapeutics which are effective against SARS-CoV-2 virus. Also, the novel vaccines are being developed against covid-19 deadly virus will be discussed.


An explosive, common-source outbreak of pneumonia caused by a previously unrecognized bacterium affected primarily persons attending an American Legion convention in Philadelphia in July, 1976. Twenty-nine of 182 cases were fatal. Spread of the bacterium appeared to be air borne. The source of the bacterium was not found, but epidemiologic analysis suggested that exposure may have occurred in the lobby of the headquarters hotel or in the area immediately surrounding the hotel. Person-to-person spread seemed not to have occurred. Many hotel employees appeared to be immune, suggesting that the agent may have been present in the vicinity, perhaps intermittently, for two or more years.


The identification of children with visual arts talent in the Hong Kong school setting presents a challenge to educators and practitioners because artistic talent could be manifested in many ways and in different visual arts media. A sequential identification procedure that involves nominations, behavioral ratings, and drawing tasks is then discussed in light of an overview of the origins of artistic talent, the characteristics of artistically talented children, and the developmental trajectory of artistic talent among children and adolescents. The possible adaptations of Clark's Drawing Abilities Test and the development of an impos.sible figures test for identifying visual arts talented students are also discussed.


Title: Is fat the new skinny? A study on weight and perception of models in green marketing. Date: 2018-05-22 Level: Bachelor Thesis in International Marketing Author: Oskar Wagrelius & Sara Eriksson Supervisor: Ulf Aagerup Problem formulation: How does the perceived weight and warmth/competence of a model in green marketing affect sales through perceived greenness and attractiveness? Purpose: The purpose of this study is to increase the knowledge, for brands being green, about how the choice of models in their advertisement will impact the brands perception and affect greenness, attractiveness and sales. The goal is to understand if the choice of a diverse model (considering weight) might be more effective considering green marketing and brands who wants to be perceived as warm and/or competent. Theoretical framework: In this thesis the theoretical framework is made up of existing theories on brand positioning, brand identity, consumer behaviour, perception of people and the usage of models. Methodology: This thesis is conducted with a deductive approach through a quantitative study made up of 131 respondents since, non coffee drinkers and and non coffee buying respondents as well as non swedish people were excluded from participating. A total of 160 people responded to the online survey. The groups were randomized as to which one of four different surveys they got to answer. Secondary sources are scientific articles and books, journals as well as websites since the topic is in a academic viewpoint under researched. Empirical findings: This thesis and its findings consists of analysis of the quantitative study which is presented through theoretical models, figures, diagrams and tables as well as text. Conclusion: The findings in this thesis shows that green products has a higher purchase propensity than neutral products. Therefore the first assumption is considered to be true. The second and third assumptions are however falsified through the findings that a brands (being either warm or competent) choice of model will not affect the perceived greenness, attractiveness or sales.


BACKGROUND: Osteoarthritis, a common disabling degenerative disease of freely moving joints, is often accompanied by high levels of persistent pain, as well as significant impairments of function and functional capacity. This comprehensive literature review specifically explores the extent to which there is support for the idea that subnormal proprioception, a sensory modality involved in mediating reflex and coordinated movements, is an important feature of the osteoarthritis disease process, and hence worthy of efforts to detect this abnormality at the outset of the condition, as well as to intervene to heighten or normalize joint proprioception in symptomatic cases. METHODS: All English language peer reviewed published data pertaining to the topic of osteoarthritis and proprioception were sought. Pertinent clinical studies as well as intervention studies on this topic were then reviewed systematically with respect to their findings and study conclusions and reported in narrative form. RESULTS: Although a considerable number of studies published over the last 45 years were found to support a role for impaired proprioception in the pathology of osteoarthritis, this conclusion is not universal. Moreover, even though many forms of intervention can heighten proprioception, these interventions do not always result in the desired proprioceptive improvements, especially in the presence of severe osteoarthritic dysfunction. CONCLUSIONS: Further research to more definitively examine the influence of proprioception in the osteoarthritis disability cycle, and at what point intervention may be more useful than not, using agreed upon terminology, methodology, outcome attributes, and careful sampling, is indicated.


Background: Dandruff is one of the most commercially exploited skin disease by the personal care industry all over the world, which affects 5% of the global population. Plant kingdom is a gold mine for novel and affordable skin care acting through novel mechanisms against skin pathogens. Identification of these remedies for such skin care is an important study for the preservation of traditional knowledge for the antimicrobial treatments. Semicarpus anacardium Linn. (Anacardiaceae) has been used for the skin care since ancient times. Aim of the Study: The aim of the present study was to investigate the antidandruff potential of S. anacardium seed extract and development of phytochemical, antimicrobial, and formulations. Materials and Methods: Antimicrobial activity of petroleum ether extract of S. anacardium seed was studied by agar well diffusion method using Escherichia coli , Staphylococcus aureus, and Candida albicans strains. Two herbal antidandruff shampoo formulations were developed and evaluated using parameters, physical evaluation, that is, color and consistency, pH, washability, homogeneity, spreadability, and skin irritation tests. The developed herbal shampoo formulations were assessed for their antidandruff potential manually on the human volunteers, respectively. One phenolic compound was isolated using preparative column chromatography, followed by thin layer chromatography. Results: Results of present studies revealed that there was a concentration-dependent antimicrobial effect compared with standard antibiotic disc, that is, gentamicin. S. aureus showed more zone of inhibition than E. coli . The inhibitory zone of all isolates was determined as 0-23 mm. The observed antimicrobial activity was due to the potent bioactive phytoconstituents present in the extract. Our formulations were found to be semisolid consistency, brownish black color with very slightly alkaline pH, that is, 7.3 and 7.1, which is compatible with normal skin physiology, easily washable, homogenous aggregations, good spreadabilty along with free from skin irritation. The developed antidandruff herbal shampoo formulations were manually checked for its safety and efficacy on human volunteers for a week and were found that complete irradication of dandruff within a time period of 7 days. These formulations were also softening the hairs. The preliminary phytochemical analysis of the petroleum ether extract of S. anacardium was showed the presence of phenolic compounds, tannins, saponins, flavonoids, steroids, glycosides, carbohydrates, and alkaloids. Further, two compounds were detected in the thin layer chromatographic analysis of extract of S. anacardium which having their R f values 0.9 and 0.6. One phenolic compound was isolated which has R f value 0.85. Conclusion: The petroleum ether extract of S. anacardium seed possessed a broad spectrum of activity against a panel of bacteria and fungi responsible for the most common microbial diseases. This plant can be used as a cheap source of active therapeutics. Further, exploration of plant derived antimicrobials as well as their identity is needed. However, further series of scientific studies are required to prove its clinical reliability, safety, and efficacy for the beneficial of mankind.


Ships small and large all battle the elements when crossing the worlds oceans. As such, ships are designed to operate in situations with high speed winds and heavy waves. There are however limits to what any ship can handle safely and it is thus important to avoid the worst weather systems as much as possible. To do this ships are routed using weather data, gathered as statistical seasonal averages or numerical forecasts, in a process called weather routing. With increased capabilities to model ship performance and seakeeping numerically, using computers, weather routing evolved to what is usually called route optimization. In route optimization weather forecasts are used to compute the most ecient route. How to determine which route is most ecient is up to the ship operator, usually some combination of fuel consumption and sailing time is used together with constraints related to safety. This thesis explores the implications of unreliability in weather forecasts on route optimization and howensemble weather forecastsmay be used to improve route optimization.In paper A a route optimization method that uses the ensemble weather forecast to compute routes is developed and tested against standard route optimization methods. The results show that routes optimized using the ensemble weather forecasts are more reliable in their predictions of fuel consumption and arrival time at the destination.In paper B the relationship between forecast reliability and the risk of late arrival is explored through the use of arobustnessmeasure based on the ensemble weather forecast.In paper C the research presented inpaper Bis continued and extended. The relationship between therobustnessof a route and the likelihood of late arrival is investigated. The eect of seakeeping constraints on the robustnessmeasure is explored. Finally a method of using the robustnessmeasure for route optimization is developed and tested. The results show that this method can reduce the risk of late arrival without increasing fuel consumption on average.


Abstract : In the past, robot operation has been a high-cognitive-workload task requiring human operators to dedicate a large amount of their cognitive resources to maintaining awareness about a robot s state and functioning. This technical report describes research of operator-knowledge-management aids, in the form of visual display-screen overlays, used to help increase performance and reduce perceived workload. The aids were overlays displaying what an autonomous robot perceived in the environment and the subsequent course of action planned by the robot. Eight active-duty, US Army Soldiers completed 16 scenario missions using an operator interface called the Warfighter Machine Interface. The simulated missions included various display configurations, with combinations with and without 3 operator aids: Travel Planner, Obstacle Map, and Rerouting Alert. During the simulations, participants managed the autonomously navigating robot, taking teleoperation control when needed, while completing a reconnaissance to detect simulated improvised explosive devices. Results of this study showed that the use of operator aids resulted in less use of manual teleoperation control, suggesting that operators were better able to predict robot actions, understand the projected robot paths, and have less need to manually intervene in autonomous robot behavior. The use of operator aids did not, however, contribute to improved target detection.


Objective: Oral health refers to the health of our mouth and ultimately, supports and reflects the health of the entire body. So this study is designed to assess the profile of oral lesions in patients attending an oral diagnosis clinic at a College of Dentistry, University of Basra, Iraq. Patients and methods: The study was conducted in an outpatient clinic of Oral Diagnosis Department, College of Dentistry. Total 13184 patients attended during a period of study from October 2014 to June 2016; among them, 494 patients have oral lesions. The examination was done by an oral medicine specialist. The questionnaire form was filled for each patient. Results: Among the 13184 dental patients, only 494 (3.74%) patients had oral lesions; 232 (47%) were males and 262 (53%) were females. The most frequent age group was 20-39 years for 50.2% of the total examined patients. The most common oral lesions diagnosed by this study were the ulcerative lesions found in 184 (37.2%) patients, while myofascial pain dysfunction syndrome (MFPDS) was found in 113 (22.9%) patients. The ulcerative lesions were more common in males than in females; while MFPDS were more in females than in the males. The most common site affected by oral lesions was Temporomandibular joint (TMJ) found in 115 (23.3%) patients and lower lip affected by oral lesions found in 108 (21.9%) patients; while buccal mucosa affected was found in 71 (14.4%) patients from the total patients. Conclusion: The routine examination of the oral cavity is essential in identifying several oral lesions and this helps to establish early diagnosis and accurate treatment to get a better prognosis, in addition to that it establishes the baseline data in oral diseases for future oral health programs.


Objective: The aim of this project was to clarify if there is an alteration in the expression profiles of five miRNAs (miR-1, miR-181a, miR-195, miR-210 and miR-584) in preeclamptic placentas versus normal placentas.Experimental design: Formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded placental samples from pregnancies complicated with preeclampsia (n=12) and from healthy pregnancies (n=10) were used in this study. The preeclampsia cases were all considered to be of early-onset (≤34 weeks of gestation) and five were considered to be severe. The assessment of relative miRNA quantities was performed by two-step quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction.Results: Three of the analysed placental miRNAs were revealed to be significantly under-expressed in preeclampsia (miR-1, miR-210 and miR-584). miR-195 did not show any significant change and miR-181a was not successfully assessed. Notably, the significance probability obtained for miR-1 when removing the severe cases from the statistical analysis dropped radically (from p-value=0.036 to p-value=0.002), in spite of the reduction in sample size. The result obtained for miR-210 contrasts with most published studies, performed in severe preeclampsia cases; but it is in concordance with the one study that performed this analysis in mild cases. miR-584 remained very significantly under-expressed whether severe samples were included or excluded from the analysis.Conclusion: The results lead us to conclude that miR-1, miR-210 and miR-584 are under-expressed in preeclamptic placentas. While some mechanisms appear to be common to preeclampsia as a whole (in this case, reflected by miR-584), some molecules seem to be specific for given subtypes of the syndrome (namely, miR-1 and miR-210). In addition, the widespread assumption that early preeclampsia is more severe is challenged by these results, which indicate different miRNA profiles within early cases of the syndrome. All in all, it seems that miRNA analysis can provide indication about the preeclamptic phenotype, and may provide further insight into the pathophysiology of preeclampsia and its distinct varieties.


Using both survey data and field research, we investigate the effects of employee involvement practices on outcomes for blue-collar workers in the auto supply industry. wages by 3-5%. The causal mechanism linking involvement and wages appears most consistent with efficiency wage theories, and least consistent with compensating differences. With respect to employment stability, we find that employee involvement has a knife-edge character. Plants with intensive programs have larger employment gains, but are also slightly more likely to go out of business. These results are consistent with employee involvement raising quality and productivity, but also increasing fixed costs for liquidity-constrained firms.


IMS Learning Design (LD) is the only available interoperability specification in the area of technology enhanced learning that allows the definition and orchestration of complex activity flows and resource environments in a multirole setting. IMS LD has been available since 2003, and yet it has not been widely adopted either by practitioners or by institutions. Much current IMS LD research seems to accept the assumption that a key barrier to adoption is the specification's conceptual complexity impeding the authoring process. This paper presents an empirical study to test this assumption. Study participants were asked to transform a given textual design description into an IMS LD unit of learning using 1) paper snippets representing IMS LD elements and 2) authoring software. The results show that teachers with little or no previous IMS LD knowledge were able to solve a design task that required the use of all IMS LD elements at levels A and B. An additional finding is that the authoring software did not facilitate people in producing better solutions than those who used paper snippets. This evidence suggests that conceptual complexity does not impede effective IMS LD authoring, so the barriers to adoption appear to lie elsewhere.


Protective clothing is essential for human existence in the Arctic, and caribou-skin clothing has played a pivotal role for millennia. Although people with northern experience often extol caribou-skin clothing, few scientific studies have investigated its properties. We used infrared thermal imaging in a pilot study to compare authentic caribou-skin clothing sewn by traditional Inuit seamstresses with two other types of cold-weather clothing: a standard-issue, Canadian army, winter uniform and an ensemble of modern retail clothing designed for extreme cold (a down anorak and snowmobile pants). To make the comparison, two subjects sequentially wore the three types of clothing—caribou skin, army uniform, and modern retail—in a still air, uniform thermal environment (where radiant temperatures of all environmental surfaces were equal to air temperature) at −21°C to −23°C (−6°F to −10°F). Thermal imaging quantifies the temperature of the outer surface of clothing, thereby providing key, functionally relevant information on the interface where clothing and environment meet. Under otherwise similar conditions, a low clothing surface temperature indicates superior clothing performance and a reduced rate of heat loss from the body to the environment. Caribou-skin clothing was similar to modern extreme-cold retail clothing: the whole-body composite surface temperature of our subjects wearing caribou-skin clothing was −22.1°C to −22.7°C, compared with −21.6°C in both subjects wearing the modern retail clothing. The army winter uniform (−18.9°C to −20.0°C) was inferior. These quantitative results were mirrored by the subjects' subjective impressions. A particular advantage of thermal imaging is that it pinpoints locations in clothing where heat leaks occur. Although the two types of modern clothing exhibited heat leaks at zippered structures (even though fully closed), the caribou-skin clothing evaded such heat leaks by lacking such structures, because it is donned over the head. The integral hood characteristic of a caribou-skin parka was also superior in comparison to the detachable hood of the army uniform.


The purpose ofthis study was to explore the communication ofpositive illusions (PIs) during big fights in dating relationships. A communicative analysis of PIs was investigated. Both members of dating couples individually completed a survey that measured PIs, communication of PIs, and communication satisfaction. The results suggest that partners' PIs are strongly associated with one another, individuals communicate their PIs to a moderate degree during big fights in dating relationships, and individuals' PIs are strongly associated with their communication of PIs during big fights. Only limited support was found for the hypothesis that increases in the communication ofPIs would be correlated with increases in communication satisfaction. Several implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.


Abstract Global Environmental Changes are dynamic and complex, crossing disciplines, sectors, regions, and populations and shaping the health of current and future generations. GECs present an unprecedented challenge demanding a response of equal scale and complexity involving unfettered collaboration beyond disciplines with implications for global health. At this critical point, health professions' education should have moved on from building consensus about the relevance of education for sustainable healthcare (ESH) to active implementation. In this commentary, we discuss why transdisciplinary problem-solving and interprofessional education should be considered in education for sustainable healthcare. We review types of collaborative educational practices, outline opportunities, challenges, and resources to enable implementation.


In Oceania, Papua New Guinea (PNG) appears large in the consciousness of exploring social life through the notion of sociality. Scholarship within the Melanesian region employs sociality to interrogate forms of social life and the different ways research methods account for the understanding of interactions between individuals and communities. Yet for the three PNG authors this assumed coherency between epistemes and method highlighted specific conceptual challenges for us as researchers and participants. We identified with two conceptual notions: "pasin" and "luksave" as distinct Austronesian language ideas derived from Tok Pisin—a creolisation of English utilized as a lingua franca throughout the country. We explored the development of pasin and luksave and the ways the conceptual claims served a dual function of developing a methodological and epistemic pathway toward an ethical assurance of meaningful relationality. We extend on current understanding in two ways. Firstly employing the methodology of story as critique of research assumptions and secondly, extend on the process of story work to suggest storying as a novel but relatable research methodology. Storying such research experiences as both method and epistemic accountability, guided our responsibility toward the relationships we hold to people, community and knowledge. Pasin and luksave embed an emancipatory and de-colonial intent through the guise of oral stories. These intentions in our scholarship fostered a form of coherent expressions of research claim and method assumption and also raised questions for us regarding what decolonizing Papua New Guinea ought to consider. Our paper also highlights a reformulation of the different ways research considers Oceania in particular Melanesia and the Papua New Guinean research context.


This article presents the basic principles of numerical atmospheric modelling. First, it explains how to move from general and continuous equations of fluid mechanics to a discretized version of these equations. Then it shows how they can be translated into high-performance computer programs, the atmospheric models, which calculate the future state of the atmosphere from an initial state constructed using meteorological observations. The atmospheric model is thus the heart of operational numerical weather prediction systems.


More than 20 million people are suffering from Alzheimer's disease, and the number of patients will dramatically increase with the arrival of an aging society unless preventive or curative medications are discovered. A fast and sensitive analytical method for β-amyloid (Aβ) aggregates was developed by the combination of CE-laser induced fluorescence and the fluorescence reagent, thioflavine T. The developed method separates two different fibrils within 5 min. The first peak, which migrated at ∼4 min, was supposed to be derived from a precursor of a fibril that migrated at ∼3.5 min. The developed method was also applicable to the high-throughput screening of the Aβ aggregation inhibitors, which was expected to be an effective therapeutic agent candidate of Alzheimer's disease. Three compounds (daunomycin, 3-indolepropionic acid (3-IPA), melatonin) were used for the assay. The order of the antiaggregation activity of these compounds was daunomycin > 3-IPA > melatonin, which was the same as that of the repor...


Gasification of biomass will likely play an important role in the production of energy and chemicals in a future sustainable society. However, during gasification impurities, such as tars, will be formed. Tars may cause fouling and blockages of equipment downstream the gasifier. It is therefore important to minimize the formation of tars, alternatively to remove the formed tars. These processes need to be monitored, which makes it necessary to develop tar analysis methods suitable for this task.This work describes the development of two tar analysis methods, an on-line method based on a photoionization detector (PID) and an off-line method based on solid phase microextraction (SPME). Both methods were successfully validated against the established solid phase adsorption (SPA) method.The method based on PID was shown to have a very fast response time. Furthermore, the PID method is selective towards tar, but only limited information will be obtained regarding the composition of the tar compounds. The PID method is suitable for applications where it is important to detect fast changes of the tar concentration, i.e. process monitoring.The SPME method was shown to be a very sensitive method for qualitative and quantitative tar analysis. The sampling temperature was shown to be crucial for obtaining analysis results with the wanted detection limit. The SPME method is suitable for applications where extremely low detection and quantification limits are needed, i.e. for syngas production.


The study aims to investigate the factors that affect users' intention to adopt mobile payment services. Drawing upon the Technology Acceptance Model, the study integrates use context and subjective norm to put forward a theoretical model. 375 valid survey responses were collected. The results show that use context is the strongest predictor of intention to adopt mobile payment services. It has both direct and indirect effects on behavioral intention, and the indirect effects are mediated by perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. Subjective norm and perceived ease of use significantly influence perceived usefulness. Both theoretical and practical implications are discussed.


Recent observations of an increase in energetic particle intensities on the Voyager 1 spacecraft, for several months in late 2002 to early 2003, suggest new phenomena associated with its approach to the termination shock of the solar wind. An important diagnostic used by the experimenters to interpret the event has been the radial anisotropy of the energetic particle distribution. In this Letter we consider the transport of energetic charged particles accelerated at the termination shock, both in the diffusion approximation and by directly integrating test particle trajectories in a turbulent magnetic field. We determine the radial anisotropy in a number of models. In general, we find that the radial anisotropy of the particles is complicated and that it cannot reliably be used to determine the radial velocity of the background plasma. In all cases considered, we find that the average radial anisotropy in the region upstream of the shock is directed toward the shock and is less than or equal to the Compton-Getting anisotropy in the slower wind downstream. We attribute the difference from the Compton-Getting anisotropy to the diffusive anisotropy, which is directed upstream away from the shock and which is part of the acceleration process. We suggest that the small radial anisotropy observed on Voyager 1 at low energies may actually be an indication that Voyager 1 was located upstream of the shock during the entire event. In addition, we find large fluctuating anisotropies along the magnetic field (nearly transverse to the radial direction).


The chemical structure of luteinizing-hormone-releasing hormone (LHRH) was discovered in 1971 after more than a decade of intensive effort. Subsequent physiologic studies in primates and humans showed that the biologic activity of LHRH depends on the way in which the hormone is administered. Pulsatile administration of LHRH which mimics the natural secretory pattern causes sustained secretion of the gonadotropins. This method of administration has been used to induce ovulation in women with hypothalamic amenorrhea and to induce puberty and spermatogenesis in men with hypogonadotrophic hypogonadism. Continuous infusion however produces only transient stimulation of gonadotrophin secretion followed by a desensitization response in which gonadotrophin secretion is inhibited. Thus LHRH can either augment or inhibit gonadotrophin secretion depending on the mode of administration. Recently long acting analogs of LHRH have been shown to desensitize the pituitary gland and inhibit gonadotrophin release when administered as a single daily subcutaneous injection. These synthetic analogs have proved highly effective in the treatment of prostatic carcinoma and central precocious puberty. They are also being studied as a new approach to contraception and to the treatment of endometriosis and polycystic ovary syndrome. (authors abstract)


Use of cytokines as biomarkers for disease is getting more widespread. Cytokines are conveniently determined by immunoassay, but interference from present antibodies is known to cause problems. In rheumatoid arthritis (RA), interference of rheumatoid factor (RF) may be problematic. RF covers a group of autoantibodies from immunoglobulin subclasses and is present in 65–80% of RA patients. Partly removal of RF is possible by precipitation. This study aims at determining the effects of presence of RF in blood and synovial fluid on cytokine measurements in samples from RA patients and finding possible solutions for recognized problems. IL-1β, IL-4, IL-6, and IL-8 were determined with multiplex immunoassays (MIA) in samples from RA patients prior to and after polyethylene glycol (PEG 6000) precipitation. Presence of RF does interfere with MIA. PEG 6000 precipitation abolishes this RF interference. We recommend PEG precipitation for all immunoassay measurements of plasma samples from RA patients.


This paper describes a technique that can be applied in certain situations to gain arbitrary code execution through software bugs that would not otherwise be exploitable, such as NULL pointer dereferences. To facilitate this, an attacker gains control of the top-level unhandled exception filter for a process in an indirect fashion. While there has been previous work[1, 3] illustrating the usefulness in gaining control of the top-level unhandled exception filter, Microsoft has taken steps in XPSP2 and beyond, such as function pointer encoding[4], to prevent attackers from being able to overwrite and control the unhandled exception filter directly. While this security enhancement is a marked improvement, it is still possible for an attacker to gain control of the top-level unhandled exception filter by taking advantage of a design flaw in the way unhandled exception filters are chained. This approach, however, is limited by an attackers ability to control the chaining of unhandled exception filters, such as through the loading and unloading of DLLs. This does reduce the global impact of this approach; however, there are some interesting cases where it can be immediately applied, such as with Internet Explorer. Disclaimer: This document was written in the interest of education. The authors cannot be held responsible for how the topics discussed in this document are applied. Thanks: The authors would like to thank H D Moore, and everyone who learns because it's fun. Update: This issue has now been addressed by the patch included in MS06051. A complete analysis has not yet been performed to ensure that it patches all potential vectors. With that, on with the show. . .


There seems to be a need for clarification on a number of issues that are seminal for the design community: for example, the constructs of invention, of creativity and of innovation (or innovative) appear to be used interchangeably. They are all a vital interest for design but they are different things. Furthermore there is a failure to distinguish between what design has a legitimate interest in or should contribute to and that which is its direct responsibility.

The authors of this paper will seek to clarify these and other issues. One of these interests is the increasing demand for sustainable practice: design has a crucial role here and this paper will explore how computer aids can be a powerful tool in this area and also more generally in both design and manufacture.


An integral equation for the propagation constant along an infinitely long Yagi structure is derived by expanding the vector potential function for such an array in terms of the spatial harmonic solutions of wave theory. This equation is shown to be identical with the integral equation derived on the basis of array theory and transformed by the Poisson summation formula. With the identity of array theory and this new wave theory formation established, the wave theory is used to discuss allowed wave solutions and the physical characteristics required of dipoles in order that they support a wave solution. The fundamental integral equation is solved by means of the array theory of King and Sandler; the numerical results are found to agree quite well with previously published data. Finally, the problem of two parallel nonstaggered Yagi arrays is considered, and it is shown that the propagation constant of the composite structure either decreases or increases over that of the isolated array depending upon whether the symmetric or the antisymmetric mode is excited. Some peculiar effects are noted with respect to this antisymmetric solution, and these lead to the existence of conditions under which no unattenuated wave solution is possible. This is referred to as the "cutoff condition." Numerical results are achieved which agree very well with experimental data obtained as part of this research.


With the end of the Cold War political returns on foreign aid diminished. Many countries came to recognise trade as a more development-friendly modality than aid. Internationalisation of higher education also shifted from aid related cooperation agreements to market mediated cross-border trade arrangements within the framework of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). This article examines the changing face of internationalisation of higher education with a focus on the Indian experience. It argues that while internationalisation and cross-border mobility are mediated by market processes and economic rationality in most countries, the Indian government's initiatives to internationalise Indian higher education are motivated by extending diplomatic relations to enable the country to play a more prominent role in global affairs.


Many organisational environments are far from equilibrium. The strategic flexibilities of modular product designs can help organisations prepare for an uncertain future, but managers must develop ways to imagine possible futures in order to use such flexibilities to respond to them. This paper discusses a scenario-based approach to anticipating and responding to uncertain futures by developing modular products that increase a firm's chances of succeeding in multiple alternative futures. After introducing the theoretical basis of this study, a structured approach to operationalising the generation of future scenarios and the development of modular product designs is developed. The approach consists of four stages: (1) the generation of scenarios about future market needs, (2) the translation of those needs into goals for modular designs, (3) the modular design process itself and (4) the evaluation of the modular design process. The modular design process we discuss is a function-based design approach that is form independent and thus allows joint consideration of future market needs and the product functions that can serve those needs. We illustrate our proposed approach by applying it to generate scenarios and modular design criteria for the Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) market in the security equipment sector in Turkey.


From the individual to species level, it is common for animals to have connections with one another. These connections can exist in a variety of forms; from the social relationships within an animal society, to hybridisation between species. The structure of these connections in animal systems can be depicted using networks, often revealing non-trivial structure which can be biologically informative. Understanding the factors which drive the structure of animal networks can help us understand the costs and benefits of forming and maintaining relationships. Multivariate modelling provides a means to evaluate the relative contributions of a set of explanatory factors to a response variable. However, conventional modelling approaches use statistical tests which are unsuitable for the dependencies inherent in network and relational data. A solution to this problem is to use specialised models developed in the social sciences, which have a long history in modelling human social networks. Taking predictive multivariate models from the social sciences and applying them to animal networks is attractive given that current analytical approaches are predominantly descriptive. However, these models were developed for human social networks, where participants can self-identify relationships. In contrast, relationships between animals have to be inferred through observations of associations or interactions, which can introduce sampling bias and uncertainty to the data. Without appropriate care, these issues could lead us to make incorrect or overconfident conclusions about our data. In this thesis, we use an established network model, the multiple regression quadratic assignment procedure (MRQAP), and propose approaches to facilitate the application of this model in animal network studies. Through demonstrating these approaches on three animal systems, we make new biological findings and highlight the importance of considering data-sampling issues when analysing networks. Additionally, our approaches have wider applications to animal network studies where relationships are inferred through observing dyadic interactions.


The evaluation of fiscal transparency impact on budget indicators performance is examined in the article according to the grouping of countries by the following features: budget transparency, income per capita, level of economic development and economic freedom. The main aim of the study is to determine the relationship between fiscal transparency indexes and indicators of countries' development. As the result of evaluation it was determined that the main indicators of budget execution under the influence of its transparency vary in different groups of countries. In particular, the studies have shown that the value of Open Budget Index causes the reduction of public debt and the increase in the share of public expenditure, but in countries with high and medium level of development the opposite effect of budget transparency on public debt is characteristic, and the positive impact of budget transparency on the share of public expenditure is characteristic only for countries with high economic freedom.


ABSTRACT Opioids, via the mu opioid receptor (MOR), can exacerbate bacterial infections and the immunopathogenesis of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infection. Recently, an HIV-1 transgenic (HIV-1Tg) rat model containing circulating HIV-1 gp120 was created. Using real-time reverse transcription-PCR, we found that MOR mRNA levels were significantly higher in the peritoneal macrophages of the HIV-1Tg rat than those in control animals. Lipopolysaccharide, a bacterial endotoxin, induced secretion of the inflammatory cytokines tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), interleukin-β (IL-β), and IL-10 in the HIV-1Tg rat and further increased MOR expression. Ex vivo studies showed that MOR expression was up-regulated in the peritoneal macrophages of F344 control rats by exposure to serum from HIV-1Tg rats and that MOR up-regulation was abolished by addition of gp120 antibody to the serum. In human TPA-differentiated HL-60 cells, which are macrophage-like cells, LPS-induced MOR mRNA up-regulation was greater in gp120-pretreated cells than in vehicle-pretreated cells. Our data suggest that in individuals infected with HIV-1, the MOR is up-regulated, possibly by circulating HIV-1 proteins such as gp120, and HIV-1 proteins may play a significant role in modulating the response to bacterial infection in opioid-using HIV-infected individuals. Furthermore, our results demonstrate that the new HIV-1Tg rat model can be a valuable tool with which to study MOR gene expression and its effects in the continuous presence of HIV viral proteins.


Over the past century, the pharmaceutical industry has been a major contributor of individual and population health and societal wealth. Its products and services have contributed to longevity of large groups of patients and symptom relief from major diseases. However, during the past 2 decades, the innovative capacity of the pharmaceutical industry has lagged behind, and there have been concerns and discussions on the prevailing business model of the industry, and whether it needs to be refined and altered. Development of a new drug is a time-consuming and complex undertaking, which involves elements of discovery as well as process development. Recently, the average cost of developing a new molecular entity (NME) was estimated to be around U$800 million for small molecules and around U$1,300 million for biologics. If post approval costs for Phase IV studies, costs to gain regulatory approval in various global markets and costs for obtaining additional label claims for new indications are included and adjusted for cost increases and inflation, the cost estimates per NME increase to U$1,754 million for small molecules and U$3,911 million for biologics. Revenue streams from global market sales are only able to offset these escalating costs to a limited extent. The present dissertation focusses on the on-going change processes in the pharmaceutical industry (Big Pharma). An important change process is related to open information and open intellectual property (IP) platforms. The work also relates to entrepreneurial orientation, inherent project uncertainty and decision modelling. In the biomedical field, there are an increasing number of stakeholders that collaboratively develop, package and build transactions around technology. Such open innovation model differs from the classical closed innovation model when openness is structured in open networks and business consortia. This thesis provides examples of how open innovation models function in the context of the pharmaceutical industry and how Life Science companies could design their IP-strategies to optimize the value extraction potential from open innovation in general and open IP platforms in particular. The present work also investigates perceptions of experts within the pharmaceutical industry and allied health sectors, with respect to entrepreneurial attitudes, intent and engagements during pharmaceutical innovation and new drug development. It was shown that positive attitudes and orientation towards entrepreneurship are perceived to be of high value for the early strategic selection and validation of the drug target area, for costs assessments and pharmacoeconomics, as well as for positioning and marketing of a new drug to patients and the public. Entrepreneurial traits were however judged to be less important for some major process steps during preclinical and clinical development. Based on real scenario cases, this thesis also investigates how employees make judgments in the pharmaceutical industry and allied health care sectors. Each case study relates to go/no-go decisions taken from the various steps in drug discovery through preclinical and clinical development (IND) on to market introduction (NDA) and treatment of the target population. Results revealed that there is a major inter-individual difference between experts in their individual intuitive go/no-go/recycle decisions during the drug discovery and development process. This lack of coherence and wide variability with respect to the drug development cases selected may reflect judgment in the real world. Accordingly, increased openness, entrepreneurial awareness and orientation towards entrepreneurial engagements and skills may help the pharmaceutical business sector to improve vital parts of its value creation processes. Also, by modelling decision-making in real cases from initial drug discovery to late development and marketing, in pharmaceutical industry R&D, we demonstrated that rational decision-making can commonly be managed by a group of 10 – 15 experts when mean group judgments over a series of decision points are clear go decisions. However, when mean group judgments from one decision point to another vary from go to stop in a specific case, i.e. involves a recycle component, there will be a need to expand R&D expert input substantially. In such cases, the drug development processes more or less takes on the form of an open innovation process. Thus, our findings may be used to construct a new model on how to plan and model the size of expert input in structured decision processes similar to those practiced in the pharmaceutical industry. Based on the findings in this thesis, it may be concluded that high-tech innovation in the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors show signs of movement from a closed to a more open innovation paradigm. This change is driven by several factors such as the possibility of rapid and unlimited communication through the Internet, the increasing global availability of experts for complex decision-making, the international reach of innovators and entrepreneurs, the need of the venture capital market to support appropriate investment cases, as well as the increasing possibility and interest of external suppliers and interest groups to participate in new product and service development.


Abstract NK-lysin is an antimicrobial and antitumor polypeptide that is considered to play an important role in innate immunity. Chicken NK-lysin is a member of the saposin-like protein family and exhibits potent antitumor cell activity. To evaluate the antimicrobial properties of chicken NK-lysin, we examined its ability to reduce the viability of various bacterial strains and two species of Eimeria parasites. Culture supernatants from COS7 cells transfected with a chicken NK-lysin cDNA and His-tagged purified NK-lysin from the transfected cells both showed high cytotoxic activity against Eimeria acervulina and Eimeria maxima sporozoites. In contrast, no bactericidal activity was observed. Further studies using synthetic peptides derived from NK-lysin may be useful for pharmaceutical and agricultural uses in the food animal industry.


In 1980--1983, 15 plastic reconstruction surgeries were performed at the Center's clinics. In 11 cases, one-stage reconstruction of the breast was carried out after mastectomy for cancer. 13 females were mastectomized after Halsted and 2--after Patey (radical mastectomy). Good results were obtained in 11 cases. The paper contains a description of a procedure for one-stage mammoplasty for cancer which produces a good uniform bed for silicone prosthesis fixation as well as the breast contour. A musculocutaneous flap from musculus vastus dorsi and a silicone prosthesis were used in all cases of primary reconstruction. Emphasis is placed on the role of plastic reconstruction surgery as a factor of medical and social rehabilitation of females operated on for breast cancer.


Electrification of vehicular technology (EVT) is promising technology of future transportation systems. Electrification of vehicles highly depends on high density energy sources system (ESS) and high power density electric propulsion system (EPS). Suitable power electronic interface to incorporate these systems is an essential requirement. In this paper, a bidirectional non-isolated multiple input DC-DC converter is proposed as an interface between energy source system and electric propulsion system. It has the capability to operate in buck, boost and buck-boost modes bidirectional and it can incorporate different sources for energy diversification. It offers simplicity and flexibility in control and has a low part count. The proposed concepts have been investigated through simulation and validated experimentally.


IN EARLY 1999, Nampa Charter School obtained approval under Idaho's Public Charter School Act of 1998 to open its doors for enrollment. On 1 August 1999, Nampa hired Ersilia DeLaPaz to be the school's receptionist and bookkeeper. Several months later, DeLaPaz enrolled her child, who has Down's syndrome, in Nampa's special education program. A few months thereafter, the school's principal, Rebecca Stallcop, notified DeLaPaz that her performance was unsatisfactory and needed improvement. In response, DeLaPaz allegedly attempted to discredit Stallcop and the special education program. (1) More specifically, she told a parent that she had information that would "take the charter down." She also made false statements concerning the principal's integrity and competence, implying that Stallcop had engaged in illegal behavior and claiming that she had accused several teachers of being "mean to students." She spread word that Stallcop intended to leave Nampa and to take four teachers with her to a new charter school. Finally, in April 2001, DeLaPaz told one of the teachers that Stallcop had misused grant money. On 30 April 2001, Nampa terminated DeLaPaz for refusing to follow directions and for demonstrating that she was not willing or competent to perform her bookkeeping duties. Shortly thereafter, DeLaPaz filed a complaint with the state education department asserting deficiencies in her child's special education services. Following a complaint investigation, the department ordered, and Nampa agreed to, some corrective actions. In September 2001, per the corrective action plan, a Nampa special education teacher initiated various school/parent communications, including invitations to meetings. DeLaPaz resisted or ignored the letters but made harassing calls to teachers. She also sent five letters to Nampa criticizing the special education program and the administrators and sent copies to Nampa's board and representatives of the governing school district. In January 2002, DeLaPaz filed a separate complaint with the state education department, accusing Nampa of violating her right to privacy with regard to her child's medical condition. The department rejected her complaint. In June 2002, DeLaPaz filed a complaint with the U.S. Office for Civil Rights, alleging discrimination and retaliation. OCR has not yet completed its investigation and resolution of this complaint. On 13 September 2002, Nampa filed suit in state court against DeLaPaz, alleging that she had used her "child's participation in the special education program in a manner ... calculated to accomplish [her] often stated purpose ... to 'bring down' [the school]." More specifically, Nampa claimed that De-LaPaz had tortiously interfered with Nampa's responsibilities to fulfill its legislative mandate, resulting in a loss in excess of $10,000, and that she had slandered and libeled the school in an effort to induce the governing school district to revoke or not renew Nampa's charter. In addition to money damages, Nampa sought an injunction barring De-LaPaz from making any further false statements concerning Nampa or its principal. DeLaPaz, through her attorney, filed a motion to dismiss both claims. On 28 April 2003, the trial judge granted DeLaPaz's dismissal motion, ruling that Nampa had failed to provide any legal support for recognition in Idaho of its tortious interference claim and that a government entity may not maintain an action for slander or libel against an individual. DeLaPaz then filed a motion for attorney fees under various state laws, and the court granted 20% of her attorney fees and court costs on the basis that the tortious interference claim was frivolous. Nampa filed an appeal, and DeLaPaz cross-appealed for a higher attorney-fees award. On 23 April 2004, Idaho's supreme court affirmed both the dismissal and the 20% attorney-fee award. (2) First, citing a classic U. …


This study explored relationships between intelligence and visual motor ability and patterns of impairment of visual motor ability in children prenatally affected by alcohol. Fourteen children (mean age 8.2 years) diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) and 50 children with possible fetal alcohol effects (FAE) were assessed with the Bender Visual Motor Test and a Wechsler IQ test. The group exhibited impaired performance (using Koppitz's emotional and developmental scores) relative to norms. Higher IQ predicted better visual motor performance. Performance IQ was marginally related to emotional indicators. Despite significantly lower IQs in the FAS group, both FAS and FAE groups performed equally poorly on the Bender. Examination of the types of errors made revealed distortion of shape to be the most frequently occurring error. The two diagnostic groups did not differ in tyres of errors made. (Contains 11 references.) (DB) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. * *********************************************************************** CHILDREN WITH FETAL ALCOHOL SYNDROME AND FETAL. ALCOHOL EFFECTS: PATTERNS OF PERFORMANCE ON IQ AND VISUAL MOTOR ABILITY Karen Kopera-Frye, Ph.D. a


The relationship among the composition, microstructure and strength of materials is always one of the hotspots for scholars of materials research. The influence of curing time on the compressive strength and flexural strength of the foam concrete with the cement, cement-slag and cement-steel slag as main binder respectively was studied in this paper. The microstructure of these foam concrete was analyzed by SEM and the mineral phases of the foam concrete was analyzed by XRD. The relationship among the binders, microstructure, mineral phases and strength of the foam concrete were explored and the reasons of why the strength of the cement foam concrete and cement-slag foam concrete is much higher than that of the cement-steel slag foam concrete are proposed.


Mankind has been in an unending search for efficient sources of energy. The coupling of lithium and oxygen in aprotic solvents would seem to be a most promising direction for electrochemistry. Indeed, if successful, this system could compete with technologies such as the internal combustion engine and provide an energy density that would accommodate the demands of electric vehicles. All this promise has not yet reached fruition because of a plethora of practical barriers and challenges. These include solvent and electrode stability, pronounced overvoltage for oxygen evolution reactions, limited cycle life and rate capability. One of the approaches suggested to facilitate the oxygen evolution reactions and improve rate capability is the use of redox mediators such as iodine for the fast oxidation of lithium peroxide. In this paper we have examined LiI as an electrolyte and additive in Li oxygen cells with ethereal electrolyte solutions. At high concentrations of LiI, the presence of the salt promotes a side reaction that forms LiOH as a major product. In turn, the presence of oxygen facilitates the reduction of I3− to 3I− in these systems. At very low concentrations of LiI, oxygen is reduced to Li2O2. The iodine formed in the anodic reaction serves as a redox mediator for Li2O2 oxidation.


Welfare is the state of an animal on a continuum, from poor to good, so many decisions about it are decisions of degree, such as how much feed, space or environmental enrichment should be provided. Other decisions are more discrete, such as whether animals should be kept in cages. However, in practice, many such decisions also involve a range of possibilities — such as whether laying hens should be kept in conventional cages, furnished cages, other housed systems or free range — so that decisions within the range are also of degree. Furthermore, in broader contexts, such as husbandry standards for farm animals, decisions are needed as to how many criteria are to be addressed, which are also decisions of degree. Similarly, decisions about which species to protect and from how early in individual development they need protection are to some extent categorical. This is sometimes referred to as 'line drawing.' However, this mainly refers to whether or not animals are sentient, and sentience is not clearly distinguished from other aspects of animals' cognition and responses, so there is no conclusive boundary between 'haves' and 'have nots.' So, these decisions are also of degree: is there sufficient evidence to 'move the line' further? When there are pressures against change, such as financial cost, should welfare advocates ask for small or large changes? The answer to this question will depend upon circumstances. But discussion of different circumstances suggests that compromise, realism, gradualism and pragmatism are all important in achieving improvements in animal welfare, while noting that other tactics also contribute in particular contexts.


As today enterprises have to face a competitive, complex and ever-changing business context, so business processes have to respond to the context changes in a fast and economic manner. This purpose implies that processes should be continuously maintained through a flexible modeling. This paper addresses this problem and provides an approach able to govern the high variability of the environment where the process performs. This approach is based on the well-known formalism of decision tables to link context parameters to process activities, so that it allows a fast process re-modeling when context parameters change. We have tested this approach in real contexts: results are encouraging and drive further investigations in such a way.


SCRAPPER, an F-box protein coded by FBXL20, is a subunit of SCF type E3 ubiquitin ligase. SCRAPPER localizes synapses and directly binds to Rab3-interacting molecule 1 (RIM1), an essential factor for synaptic vesicle release, thus it regulates neural transmission via RIM1 degradation. A defect in SCRAPPER leads to neurotransmission abnormalities, which could subsequently result in neurodegenerative phenotypes. Because it is likely that the alteration of neural transmission in Scrapper mutant mice affect their systemic condition, we have analyzed the behavioral phenotypes of mice with decreased or increased the amount of SCRAPPER. We carried out a series of behavioral test batteries for Scrapper mutant mice. Scrapper transgenic mice overexpressing SCRAPPER in the hippocampus did not show any significant difference in every test argued in this manuscript by comparison with wild-type mice. On the other hand, heterozygotes of Scrapper knockout [SCR (+/−)] mice showed significant difference in the contextual but not cued fear conditioning test. In addition, SCR (+/−) mice altered in some tests reflecting anxiety, which implies the loss of functions of SCRAPPER in the hippocampus. The behavioral phenotypes of Scrapper mutant mice suggest that molecular degradation conferred by SCRAPPER play important roles in hippocampal-dependent fear memory formation.


Recently, necessary and sufficient conditions for output synchronization of linear systems via diffusive couplings have been reported. In this paper, we study the case when such conditions are not satisfied and exact synchronization is impossible. In particular, we study two kinds of heterogeneous linear networks: (i) non-identical harmonic oscillators and (ii) double-integrators. We show that static diffusive couplings render heterogeneous networks of harmonic oscillators asymptotically stable. Networks of non-identical double-integrators, in contrast, are not asymptotically stable but synchronize with bounded synchronization error depending on the network topology and the heterogeneity in the agent dynamics. Numerical examples illustrate the results.


This study investigates the implicit financial incentives of individual Big 4 audit partners by examining the association between a partner's compensation and characteristics of the audit firm, audit partner, and individual partner clientele for Big 4 firms in Sweden. Using tax and financial data for individual audit partners and clients, our empirical findings indicate that there is significant variation in the implicit determinants that are associated with compensation across the Big 4. We find that audit partners' compensation is positively associated with the size of their clientele or the number of publicly traded clients, both of which represent revenue-generating opportunities. Similarly, compensation and developing an industry specialization are positively related. In three firms, gaining clients is clearly related to an increase in compensation, while losing a client is associated with a reduction in partner income in only one firm. We find that audit partner income is more sensitive to performance-related incentives, such as attracting new clients, as partners progress in their career. Finally, we find evidence that audit failures, proxied by reporting errors related to issuing a going concern opinion, are associated with lower compensation. These results should be of interest to the auditing profession, audit firms, and regulators when they consider the effects of implicit incentives of partner compensation on audit quality.