This article present about studying on effect heat treatment and strain on mechanical properties of Cu-7Ni-7Sn alloy. This alloy is high elasticity alloy, advance characteristics of this alloy can obtain when associate heat treatment and deformation. The article ejected advance heat treatment and deformation behavior for its. Before processing hardness, strength, the elastic limit of this alloy have a small value. The hardness obtains about 90 95HB; the strength obtains about 200MPa; the elastic limit obtain about 100MPa.After heat treatment and deformation, hardness, strength, elastic limit of alloy ascend to multiple; the hardness obtains 294 – 302HB; the strength obtains 1000MPa; the elastic limit obtains 600 – 700MPa. This fact could explain by two mechanisms: deformation mechanism and spinodal transition. Deformation mechanism is to pull small grain lichen, increasing the strength of this alloy. Spinodal decomposition is a mechanism by which a solution of two or more components can separate into distinct regions (or phases) with distinctly different chemical compositions and physical properties. This mechanism differs from classical nucleation in that phase separation due to spinodal decomposition is much more subtle, and occurs uniformly throughout the material not just at discrete nucleation sites. The fineness of spinodal structures is characterized by the distance between regions of identical composition, which is of the order of 50 to 1000 Ao.


Background: Available in the market as replacements to conventional cigarettes, the evidence regarding the efficacy of electronic cigarettes (E-cigarettes) in smoking cessation is unclear, while potentially harmful health effects have been reported. Public health dentists in dental colleges are likely to encounter E-cigarette users as they are involved in tobacco cessation counseling. Aim: The aim was to assess the knowledge and awareness about E-cigarettes among dental public health faculty and postgraduate students in dental colleges of Bengaluru. Materials and Methods: Dental public health faculty members and postgraduate students in all dental colleges of Bengaluru participated in this population-based, cross-sectional, questionnaire study. Questionnaires were handed out after written consent was obtained. Questions included the participants' details and ten knowledge questions with sub-questions on E-cigarettes. Data analysis was done by computing descriptive statistics and Chi-square test to determine its associated factors using SPSS v. 22. Level of significance was kept at 5%. Results: A total of 129 public health dentists were a part of the study, with 60.5% being postgraduate students and the rest comprising faculty members. One hundred and seven participants had previously heard of E-cigarettes. The mean knowledge score of the whole study population was 5.813 (standard deviation –1.83) out of a maximum score of 14 and was considered fair. This was statistically significantly associated with participants' smoking status (P = 0.05). Conclusions: This study concluded that most participants were aware of E-Cigarettes. Their knowledge level ranged from poor to fair and was significantly associated with their smoking status.


Participatory research approaches have gained popularity within the natural resource management domain, particularly irrigation management since 1980s. Some of these methods allow the examination of values and emotions with regard to the management of natural resources and hence can supplement other ways of eliciting community responses to policy change. This article discusses the methodology and findings of an image-based participatory research project called PhotoStory. The project was conducted with members of stressed and conflicted irrigation communities in rural Australia. Participants were provided with cameras to record their views about different issues related to sustainable water management and conflicts and were also able to record their emotions and values on these topics. Findings of this project – PhotoStory – give a two-dimensional narration (visual and written) about complex issues related to water policy such as the creation of regional water allocation plans. This method answers how plans and a widespread drought have been experienced and interpreted by people living in two communities. The article concludes with some pros and cons of using this technique with an irrigation community and reflects on the use made of the work by the community and policy-makers. Corresponding author: Ganesh B Keremane, Centre for Comparative Water Policies and Laws and National Centre for Groundwater Research and Training, School of Commerce, University of South Australia, City West Campus, GPO Box 2471, Adelaide, SA 5001, Australia Email: email@example.com at University of South Australia on December 8, 2013 arj.sagepub.com Downloaded from


Debates on higher education assert that a university mission should foster a campus environment that nurtures exploration and critical thinking. Today, inquiry and investigation are viewed as activities central to undergraduate programs. This paper advocates the integration of research into undergraduate architectural education by arguing for the exposure of students to primary source materials that enable them to get as close as possible to the realities being studied. The paper generates a critical discussion on idiosyncrasies and misconceptions about knowledge acquisition and production. It explores the status of research methods courses in selected undergraduate architecture programs from the Middle East. An attempt at integrating evaluation research and experiential learning into architectural pedagogy is presented as a case from King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM). A framework toward a transformative architectural pedagogy is introduced to complement traditional teaching techniques. It outlines a number of related concepts together with the supporting learning mechanisms, activities, and settings. It is suggested that this framework would invigorate the capabilities of future architects to be more culturally and environmentally responsive, critical thinkers, and engage in the production of knowledge.


In recent years, important research on crowdsourcing in the cultural heritage sector has been published, dealing with topics such as the quantity of contributions made by volunteers, the motivations of those who participate in such projects, the design and establishment of crowdsourcing initiatives, and their public engagement value. This article addresses a gap in the literature, and seeks to answer two key questions in relation to crowdsourced transcription: (1) whether volunteers' contributions are of a high enough standard for creating a publicly accessible database, and for use in scholarly research; and (2) if crowdsourced transcription makes economic sense, and if the investment in launching and running such a project can ever pay off. In doing so, this article takes the award-winning crowdsourced transcription initiative, Transcribe Bentham, which began in 2010, as its case study. It examines a large data set, namely, 4,364 checked and approved transcripts submitted by volunteers between 1 October 2012 and 27 June 2014. These data include metrics such as the time taken to check and approve each transcript, and the number of alterations made to the transcript by Transcribe Bentham staff. These data are then used to evaluate the long-term cost-effectiveness of the initiative, and its potential impact upon the ongoing production of The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham at UCL. Finally, the article proposes more general points about successfully planning humanities crowdsourcing projects, and provides a framework in which both the quality of their outputs and the efficiencies of their cost structures can be evaluated.


Wysok B., Wojtacka J., Karczmarczyk R., Wiszniewska-Łaszczych A., Gomółka-Pawlicka M., Szteyn J., Liedtke K. (2017): Honey sold directly by producers in the Silesian region of Poland as a source of Clostridium botulinum types A, B, E, and F. Czech J. Food Sci., 35: 194–199. The level of contamination of honey with Clostridium botulinum spores is considered as an indicator of the adequacy of hygienic practices during collection, extraction, and subsequent processing. A total of 39 honey samples purchased direc tly from beekeepers at outdoor markets and from small amateur apiaries in Silesia were analysed for Clostridium botulinum spores. The samples were prepared using a dilution centrifugation method and cultured in parallel in cooked meat medium (CMM) and tripticase peptone glucose yeast (TPGY) enrichment broths. Identification of C. botulinum toxin types A, B, E, and F was performed with the use of a multiplex PCR method. The analysis showed six (15.4%) samples to be contaminated with C. botulinum spores. The major serotypes detected were type A – in two (5.1%) and type B – in two (5.1%) honey samples, respectively. Types E and F were found in 1 (2.6%) and 1 (2.6%) positive honey sample analysed, respectively.


Symmetry is such a conspicuous feature of life that asymmetries draw our immediate attention. While not uncommon in bilateral organisms in general, asymmetry in spiders is rare. Here I report the first case of antisymmetry in external female genitalia in spiders, in the new genus Asygyna (Theridiidae: Araneae) from Madagascar. In the nearly 39 000 species of spiders described to date, the external structure of the female genitalia is symmetric. In entelegyne spiders paired external copulatory openings each lead to an internal copulatory duct, whose roughly symmetrical trajectories terminate in paired receptacles, the spermathecae. In Asygyna, here exemplified by two new species, A. huberi and A. coddingtoni, laterality is evident in the internal and external female genitalia. A single copulatory opening leads (either to the left or right depending on the individual) to a single copulatory duct with a distinctly asymmetric trajectory. The duct splits terminally shortly before entering the two spermathecae. The males are symmetric, but possibly only one palp can be used in copulation with each female. If adaptive, the selective forces behind this asymmetry are perplexing, as male access to females seems reduced. However, if males are plentiful, asymmetry may benefit the female by reducing insertion times and thus shortening copulation time, and by tightening her control over which males sire her offspring. Asygyna has a range of other bizarre sex-related morphologies, including prosomal pits and a well developed stridulatory mechanism in both sexes, a male proboscis, and simplified palps. A phylogenetic analysis, including 63 taxa and 242 morphological characters, places Asygyna in Pholcommatinae, sister to the enigmatic genus Carniella. © 2006 The Linnean Society of London, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2006, 87, 211–232.


Torsion problems for two rods bonded each other by an adhesive layer are investigated. It is assumed in analyses that the mechanical behavior of the adhesive layer is approximated by that of shear springs, and hence the shear stress τθz in the adhesive layer can be proportional to the difference of the displacements υθ between the upper and the lower surface of the adhesive layer. Making use of the series expansion techniques, we reduce the problems to the infinite systems of linear equations which can be solved numerically. Then, the stress distributions are obtained for various values of mechanical properties of the rods and the adhesive layer. We also investigate the special case of these problems i. e. the torsion of a half space by an adhered rigid rod.


In order to obtain a quantitative test for measuring exposure to nitrobenzene, experiments on men were done, in which nitrobenzene vapours (5 to 30 μg./l.) were absorbed into the lungs only. During an exposure of six hours the retention of nitrobenzene in the lungs diminished from approximately 87 to 73%. p-Aminophenol was not detected in the urine by the method used. Another metabolite, p-nitrophenol, was estimated in the urine of the exposed subjects; the quantities present represented about 13% of the inhaled dose of nitrobenzene. It was found that the determination of p-nitrophenol in urine could be used as a quantitative test when a single exposure to nitrobenzene occurred with a precision of approximately ± 8 mg. nitrobenzene. p-Nitrophenol is excreted in urine very slowly and therefore it may accumulate in the body. To evaluate the results of the proposed test in the case of a repeated exposure further investigations are necessary.


The response of wetland vegetation to management can only be interpreted by considering an intricate mix of physiological, ecological, and temporal factors. Because cattail management is important for many freshwater marshes, the purpose of this leaflet is to present autecological principles for such management. A 50:50 ratio of open water and vegetation is a frequent objective when managing cattail marshes in North America. When a particular marsh has been extensively flooded for some time and few cattails remain, managers may wish to foster more cattails to develop such hemi-marsh conditions. The reverse is followed when a marsh is dominated by cattails. Hemi-marsh conditions are optimal for breeding migratory birds, including most waterfowl, black and Forster's terns, American coots, and yellow-headed blackbirds. During the nonbreeding season, the life history requirements of migratory birds are not as closely tied to the hemi-marsh conditions. However, such wetlands still provide excellent habitat. Cattails are prolific and can quickly dominate a wetland plant community. Monotypic stands of cattails have reduced overall habitat value but do benefit some species of wildlife. They provide excellent habitat for wintering white-tailed deer and ring-necked pheasants and habitat for breeding marsh wrens, least bitterns, and various species of blackbirds. However, hemi-marshes also are habitat for these species, too. Cattails also provide excellent roosting habitat for blackbirds that can severely damage adjacent crops, especially sunflowers in the prairie states. Elimination of the cattail stand removes roosting habitat and can reduce local damage, but the damage is often simply shifted to other areas where the displaced birds create new roosts. Although the vegetation cycle in prairie marshes is based on the cycle of wet and dry years on the prairies, its basic principles apply to cattail management elsewhere. The cycle of a semipermanent marsh has four stages: dry, regenerating, degenerating, or lake marsh. Identifying the existing stage of a wetland is the first step toward determining the appropriate direction of subsequent management. Generally, all wetlands with cattails in their flora mimic aspects of this prairie marsh cycle. However, certain hydrologic conditions can lengthen the duration of any stage to such an extreme that no cycle is apparent. W A T E R F O W L M A N A G E M E N T H A N D B O O K


Frailty threatens the quality of life of seniors. As the leading cause for the disproportionate use of health care resources, frailty is a serious threat to the sustainability of the health care system. Mounting evidence suggests frailty can be prevented with early assessment and management. Primary care providers are well positioned to identify "at risk" seniors and enact care plans to prevent frailty from progressing. The Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) has repeatedly demonstrated value in the clinical setting for enhanced outcomes for seniors. The Frailty Index (FI) is a reliable and sensitive measure of frailty that can be generated from the CGA (FI-CGA). Implementing the FI-CGA into the electronic medical records of primary care can enable the use of a reliable and valid measurement of frailty at point of service. Using the electronic FI-CGA in the clinic setting guides healthcare providers to make more meaningful and comprehensive healthcare decisions. Based on the degree of frailty, health coaching aims to both support the seniors competence in their self-management as well the adoption of health promoting behaviors like exercise and improved nutritional choices. The Community Actions and Resources Empowering Seniors (CARES) collaborative model in primary care aims to provide substantial healthcare cost savings over time by addressing frailty at early stages and decreasing costly hospital admissions. CARES further aims to improve the quality of life of seniors by generating a sense of empowerment and control over their risk for frailty through health coaching to adopt healthy aging strategies.


Deals with the identification of linear systems using input-output response data. Specifically we focus on nonparametric (finite impulse or step response, FIR or FSR) models widely used in model predictive control. A polynomial model is proposed to reduce the number of parameters needed to represent the model. This leads to parsimonious, yet extremely robust models. The time delay and response time of the process can be explicitly included as parameters in the model. Various properties of this model including the variance of parameter estimates are given in the paper. Simulation and experimental results show the superiority of this approach over conventional methods especially at low signal/noise ratios, when other conventional techniques fail. Most remarkably, no prefiltering of the noise is necessary using this method. The polynomials act as an adaptive filter to remove the noise.


To reduce energy costs and help protect the environment, the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) assists Federal agencies in becoming more energy efficient and using more renewable energy. FEMP's renewable energy program has identified three technology pathways to this goal: (1) purchasing and installing cost-effective renewable energy technologies at Federal sites; (2) purchasing a portion of Federal facilities' electricity from renewable power sources; and (3) incorporating the principles of low-energy design in new construction. To support these pathways, FEMP has also identified three overarching actions that need to be taken: (1) partnering with others to develop clear messages about renewable energy that resonate with the public; (2) coordinating agency programs to leverage resources and emphasize renewables; and (3) securing commitments and support from Federal leadership. This paper describes FEMP's progress in each pathway and supporting action and includes examples of recent Federal projects.


Introduction/background:

Clonal TP53 aberrations (del(17p) and/or TP53 mutations) in patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) correlates with a poor prognosis. Similar outcome has been demonstrated for patients with subclonal TP53 aberrations (Rossi, Blood, 2014). In order to guide novel targeted therapies approved in frontline treatment of TP53 aberrated ( TP53 +) CLL, development and clinical validation of robust assays for subclonal TP53 aberrations is warranted.

Methods :

DNA extracted from peripheral blood of CLL patients were diluted 1:5 in DNA derived from a cell line containing a known, but rare TP53 point mutation. TP53 exons 2-10 were PCR amplified from undiluted and diluted DNA in parallel using Phusion proofreading DNA polymerase and subsequently sequenced by targeted Next Generation Sequencing (tNGS) on Illumina MiSeq and HiSeq 2500. Sensitivity and specificity of the assay was tested by serial dilution of patient samples with known TP53 insertions, deletions or substitutions. Consecutive biobanked samples from CLL patients at a single institution were used for validation of the clinical impact of subclonal TP53 aberrations. Nucleotide variants were called by CLC Biomedical Genomics Workbench 3.0. An algorithm for detection of true mutations was developed based on comparison of the diluted and undiluted samples analyzed in parallel. Overall survival (OS) was analyzed using Kaplan-Meier.

Results :

The sensitivity and specificity of the assay was validated by detection of all 8 known TP53 aberrations in serial dilutions with the threshold of the assay established at 0.2% allelic burden. Known mutations were still detectable at 0.02% at the highest dilution. A test sample of patients with known del(17p) demonstrated TP53 mutations in 6 out of 7 patients (5 clonal and 1 subclonal TP53 +) in accordance with previously reported frequencies of TP53 mutations among patients with del(17p).

In total, 92 samples from 46 consecutive patients were analyzed. With a median coverage of 93,272 reads (98% above 20,688 reads, range: 5,153-720,025), 27 TP53 aberrations were found in 10 (22%) of the patients. Twenty-six (96%) mutations were subclonal with a median allelic burden of 0.9% (range: 0.2-97.5%). Seven patients had a single aberration. In two previously treated patients, 8 and 10 subclonal aberrations were detected. One patient with a known del(17p) also had subclonal TP53 mutations. Three patients had solely subclonal mutations below 1% allelic burden. Considered the hot spot region of TP53 in CLL, exons 4-8 harbored 93% of the detected mutations.

The median (IQR) survival for TP53 + patients and patients with wild type TP53 (wt- TP53 ) was 37.5 (range: 2-106) and 104 (range: 9-113) months, respectively. In Kaplan-Meier analyses, TP53 + patients had a significantly poorer OS versus patients with wt- TP53 (p=0.00002, Figure 1). The two TP53 + long-term survivors both had an allelic burden below 1%, and the only other TP53 + patient with less than 1% allelic burden survived for 53 months, indicating that the prognostic impact of very low allelic burden TP53 aberrations needs further investigation.

Conclusion:

We have developed a robust assay for TP53 aberrations with a sensitivity of 0.2% allelic burden based on an algorithm including a dilution step. In an initial test cohort of 46 patients, 10 patients demonstrated TP53 mutations as low as 0.2% allelic burden that significantly affected OS. Validation of the clinical impact of subclonal TP53 aberrations is ongoing based on our consecutive biobank with 600+ patients. Establishment of a new cut-off for clinical treatment decisions based on subclonal TP53 aberrations is warranted.

![Figure 1][1]

Figure 1
Overall survival in 46 consecutive CLL patients based on TP53 mutation status shows significant difference (p=0.00002) between patients withwild type TP53 (wt- TP53 ) and TP53 mutations ( TP53 +) as low as 0.2% allelic burden.

Disclosures Niemann: Gilead: Consultancy; Abbvie: Consultancy; Roche: Consultancy; Janssen: Consultancy.

 [1]: pending:yes


The Banting Medal for Scientific Achievement is the highest scientific award of the American Diabetes Association (ADA). Given in memory of Sir Frederick Banting, one of the key investigators in the discovery of insulin, the Banting Medal is awarded annually for scientific excellence, recognizing significant long-term contributions to the understanding, treatment, or prevention of diabetes. Philipp E. Scherer, PhD, of the Touchstone Diabetes Center, The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, received the prestigious award at the ADA's 75th Scientific Sessions, 5–9 June 2015, in Boston, MA. He presented the Banting Lecture, "The Multifaceted Roles of Adipose Tissue—Therapeutic Targets for Diabetes and Beyond," on Sunday, 7 June 2015. A number of different cell types contribute to the cellular architecture of adipose tissue. Although the adipocyte is functionally making important contributions to systemic metabolic homeostatis, several additional cell types contribute a supportive role to bestow maximal flexibility on the tissue with respect to many biosynthetic and catabolic processes, depending on the metabolic state. These cells include vascular endothelial cells, a host of immune cells, and adipocyte precursor cells and fibroblasts. Combined, these cell types give rise to a tissue with remarkable flexibility with respect to expansion and contraction, while optimizing the ability of the tissue to act as an endocrine organ through the release of many protein factors, critically influencing systemic lipid homeostasis and biochemically contributing many metabolites. Using an example from each of these categories—adiponectin as a key adipokine, sphingolipids as critical mediators of insulin sensitivity, and uridine as an important metabolite contributed by the adipocyte to the systemic pool—I will discuss the emerging genesis of the adipocyte over the past 20 years from metabolic bystander to key driver of metabolic flexibility.


The evolution of mobile devices, especially the integration of sensors, is fostering the development of context aware visualization applications. The adaptation to usage contexts is crucial to overcome the diverse limitations that exist in a mobile device, namely the screen size. However, most of the currently develop applications focus on specific contexts. In this paper we propose an adaptive visualization framework that has the goal of enabling the development of applications that use a diverse set of contexts and adaptation methods.


This study evaluated the validity and reliability of the visual assessment of tooth color using a commercial shade guide. Ninety-two individuals were randomly selected from subjects enrolled in a randomized controlled trial comparing two formulations of carbamide peroxide. Initially, each individual had the color of his or her six maxillary anterior teeth (n=552) determined by one examiner using a digital spectrophotometer (Vita Easyshade). Then, a visual assessment was made by two calibrated examiners using a shade guide (Vitapan Classical). Reliability was evaluated either by kappa coefficient when all the colors were grouped into two categories (dark and light) or by weighted kappa when all 16 colors of the shade guide were considered. The digital spectrophotometer (Vita Easyshade) was used as the gold standard to calculate sensitivity and specificity of the visual assessment. The reliability of the visual assessment using two color categories was "substantial" (k=0.69). When all colors of the shade guide were considered, the reliability was "mild" (kw=0.33). Sensitivity and specificity of the visual assessment with respect to the gold standard was 86.9% and 81.9%, respectively. Despite its subjectivity, visual assessment of tooth color using the Vitapan Classical shade guide is a valid method, with good reliability for differentiating between dark and light colors.


" Teucrium (Lamiaceae) is a large and polymorphic genus distributed mainly in the Europe, North Africa and in the temperate parts of Asia. In Iran, 12 species are native. In this study, the anatomical features of the leaf and stem Teucrium polium are investigated. T. polium belonging to sect. Polium is a perennial herb growing on Lorestan province. The anatomical studies on T. polium revealed that the stem shares the general characteristics of the Labiatae family. The leaves clearly exhibit xeromorphy due to features such as the thick cuticle layer, thick outer epidermal cell wall, a high density of trichomes and thick palisade layer of the mesophyll."


A fundamental step towards broadening the use of real world image-based visual servoing is to deal with the important issues of reliability and robustness. In order to address this issue a closed loop control law is presented that simultaneously accomplishes a visual servoing task and is robust to a general class of external errors. This generality allows concurrent consideration of a wide range of errors including: noise from image feature extraction, small scale errors in the tracking and even large scale errors in the matching between current and desired features. This is achieved with the application of widely accepted statistical techniques of robust M-estimation. The M-estimator is integrated by an iteratively re-weighted method. The Median Absolute Deviation is used as an estimate of the standard deviation of the inlier data and is compared with other methods. This combination is advantageous because of its high efficiency, high breakdown point and desirable influence functions. The robustness and stability of the control law is shown to be dependent on a subsequent measure of position uncertainty. Furthermore the convergence criteria of the control law are investigated. Experimental results are presented which demonstrate visual servoing tasks which resist severe outlier contamination.


This study aimed to evaluate the seroprevalence and risk factors associated with Toxoplasma gondii infection in goats from micro-regions of the state of Piauí (Brazil). From six randomly selected properties, 145 goats were examined. Serum samples of the animals were analyzed by ELISA for the presence or absence of antibodies against T. gondii. Of these, 22% were seroreactive for T. gondii. Individual records were also taken for each property. These analyses showed that factors such as sex, age, water source, and presence of cats were associated with animal seropositivity. In addition, there was also a positive correlation (p > 0.04) between animal sex and T. gondii contamination. The presence of cats in the facilities and animal pasture fields appeared to be a risk factor for the contamination of goats in the assessed properties (p > 0.03). The parasite Toxoplasma gondii is present in the goat herds of southern Piauí state, and females are more likely to be contaminated.


We estimate a farm-level cost function for Belgian crop farms using FADN data over the study period 1996-2006. We rely on an estimation of farmers' expected yields at the time cropping decisions are made rather than actual yields observed in the FADN data. The use of an ex ante cost function improves the cost function estimation. We subsequently suggest how our cost function can be used in simulations to analyze farmer response to changes in output price risk.


When investigating tire rolling noise it is imperative that driving safety must not be neglected. For this reason, noise measurements with a single-wheel measuring trailer on very different dry and wet road surfaces are accompanied by skid coefficient measurements in wet conditions using the Stuttgart friction meter. Included in the investigations are a large number of tires with standard and special tread patterns (steel-belted tires for passenger cars). The hydroplaning behavior of these tires is additionally examined by traction coefficient measurements in wet conditions on an inside drum tester. The results indicate that, particularly on a dry road surface, the often-quoted conflict of goals between lowering tire rolling noise on the one hand and reducing driving safety on the other does not exist since it is possible for comparatively quiet road surfaces to have excellent grip in the wet. Furthermore, the results on the inside drum tester show when compared with the on-the-road noise measurements that there is a distinct correlation between improving the hydroplaning behavior and reducing the rolling noise of the tires investigated.


Several samples of Black and White students were drawn from the 1970 PSAT administration in Georgia and studied for item x race interaction on both the verbal and mathematical sections of the test. When subsamples of candidates were drawn from their respective racial groups, matched on mathematical for the study of verbal items and matched on verbal for the study of mathematical items, there was an observable decrease in the size of the item x race interaction, suggesting that one factor contributing to that interaction was simply the difference in performance levels on the test shown by the two races. Further analyses demonstrated a moderate item x group interaction for Blacks native to different cities and a moderate item x group interaction for Blacks native to areas of different population density.


The Critique of Pure Reason is Kant's acknowledged masterpiece, in which he tackles the question of how we can possibly have knowledge that does not rest on experience (a priori knowledge). The first half of the Critique advances a constructive theory of human cognition and defends the possibility of human knowledge against the skeptical empiricism of Hume. These sections of the Critique are difficult for beginners and for advanced students alike. While there exist many scholarly works discussing the Critique on an advanced level, this book is explicitly designed to be read alongside the text by first-time readers of Kant. Dicker makes Kant's views and arguments as accessible as possible without oversimplifying them, and synthesizes the views of contemporary scholars. Kant's Theory of Knowledge will be useful to both undergraduate and graduate students struggling with this notoriously difficult yet deeply influential thinker.


We present BlockBERT, a lightweight and efficient BERT model for better modeling long-distance dependencies. Our model extends BERT by introducing sparse block structures into the attention matrix to reduce both memory consumption and training/inference time, which also enables attention heads to capture either short- or long-range contextual information. We conduct experiments on language model pre-training and several benchmark question answering datasets with various paragraph lengths. BlockBERT uses 18.7-36.1% less memory and 12.0-25.1% less time to learn the model. During testing, BlockBERT saves 27.8% inference time, while having comparable and sometimes better prediction accuracy, compared to an advanced BERT-based model, RoBERTa.


The main purpose of this study is to measure the level of the shadow economy in Norway following the demand for currency approach. The question analysed is how well does this approach capture the level of shadow economy in front of a decreasing level of currency in circulation and an increasing use of electronic payment system. In this study is found a decreasing level of the shadow economy in Norway since mid 1990s starting with 8,8 percent of the shadow economy relative to GDP in 1991, up to 10.2 percent in 1995 and there after declining to a level of 5.6 percent of GDP in 2002. The explanation for the decline of the level of shadow economy relative to GDP could be the fact of a decreasing demand for currency for transaction going along with an increase of electronic payments instruments. Also, in Norway, a broad tax reform was implemented in 1992 with the purpose of reducing tax-induced distortions by lowering the tax rates and broadening the tax base. One of the main causes of the shadow economy, is considered to be the burden of direct and indirect tax to the individuals, but the complexity of the tax system is also an important factor that may have an impact on the level of shadow economy.


The reliable operation of power transmission networks depends on the timely detection and localization of faults. Fault classification and localization in electricity transmission networks can be challenging because of the complicated and dynamic nature of the system. In recent years, a variety of machine learning (ML) and deep learning algorithms (DL) have found applications in the enhancement of fault identification and classification within power transmission networks. Yet, the efficacy of these ML architectures is profoundly dependent upon the abundance and quality of the training data. This intellectual explanation introduces an innovative strategy for the classification and pinpointing of faults within power transmission networks. This is achieved through the utilization of variational autoencoders (VAEs) to generate synthetic data, which in turn is harnessed in conjunction with ML algorithms. This approach encompasses the augmentation of the available dataset by infusing it with synthetically generated instances, contributing to a more robust and proficient fault recognition and categorization system. Specifically, we train the VAE on a set of real-world power transmission data and generate synthetic fault data that capture the statistical properties of real-world data. To overcome the difficulty of fault diagnosis methodology in three-phase high voltage transmission networks, a categorical boosting (Cat-Boost) algorithm is proposed in this work. The other standard machine learning algorithms recommended for this study, including Support Vector Machine (SVM), Decision Trees (DT), Random Forest (RF), and K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN), utilizing the customized version of forward feature selection (FFS), were trained using synthetic data generated by a VAE. The results indicate exceptional performance, surpassing current state-of-the-art techniques, in the tasks of fault classification and localization. Notably, our approach achieves a remarkable 99% accuracy in fault classification and an extremely low mean absolute error (MAE) of 0.2 in fault localization. These outcomes represent a notable advancement compared to the most effective existing baseline methods.


BACKGROUND
The incidence of end-stage renal disease is increasing, placing a tremendous burden on health care resources. Peritoneal dialysis (PD) is cheaper than hemodialysis and has many potential advantages and few contraindications as an initial modality selection. This study examined differences in patient PD attempt rates between nephrologists using technique survival and mortality as outcomes.

METHODS
We performed a retrospective review of the Manitoba Renal Program databases from January 2004 to January 2010. Analysis of 630 patients who commenced dialysis and had demographic data available was performed. A genetic matching algorithm was used to balance potential differences between patient characteristics. Each nephrologist was then compared against their peers to calculate a PD attempt rate. The highest attempt rate group was compared with the lowest.

RESULTS
When comparing PD attempt rates between groups, all the results were significant. PD technique survival at >90 days showed no significant differences (P = 0.42). Patient mortality at >90 days was also not significant when comparing groups (P = 0.14).

CONCLUSIONS
Our data suggest that when comparing the low- with high-attempt groups, the factors limiting PD utilization do not include on-site availability of PD, case mix, funding, patient location or reimbursement. Aggressive approaches of starting more patients on PD did not lead to lower technique survival or higher mortality rates. If the PD attempt rate was maximized, a significant amount of money and resources could be saved or directed toward helping a larger population without significant harm to patients.


Green growth has gained ground in environmental governance deliberations and policy proposals in the last decades. It was initially presented as a fresh and innovative agenda centred on the deployment of engineering sophistication, managerial acumen, and market mechanisms to redress the environmental and social derelictions of the existing development model. But can the green growth project deliver environmental sustainability, social justice and the achievement of economic life upon a materially finite planet? The article argues that green growth has several theoretical flaws and empirical limitations. Even though economic growth has brought tremendous benefits to society, continued economic growth in rich countries faces difficulties, and growth per se is not delivering the benefits for the wider society in terms of quality of life, happiness and health, and environmental sustainability. Unlimited growth poses tremendous challenges to the planetary health, with implications in the long term. Within this context, the article ends with a discussion about the merits and demerits of alternative strategies and policies, asking the vital question: If not green growth, then what? Capitalism, Ecological modernization, Environmental Kuznets Curve, Green growth, Neoclassical economics


Background Intracranial atherosclerotic disease is a well-known cause of ischemic stroke. Following the SAMMPRIS trial, medical treatment is favored over stenting. Drug-eluting balloons (DEB) are widely used in coronary angioplasty, showing better results than bare-surface balloons. There is little evidence of DEB employment in intracranial stenosis, especially of paclitaxel-eluted balloons (pDEB). The Neuro Elutax SV (Aachen Resonance) is the first CE certificated pDEB for intracranial use. Objective To compare pDEB Neuro Elutax SV (ElutaxDEB) with the Wingspan/Gateway stent system (WingspanStent). Materials and methods A single-center, open-label, retrospective cohort study of 19 patients with symptomatic atherosclerotic intracranial high-grade stenosis treated with either ElutaxDEB or WingspanStent from a tertiary stroke center in Switzerland. Results Eight patients (42%) received ElutaxDEB. Median clinical follow-up was 10 months for the WingspanStent and 9.5 months for ElutaxDEB (P=0.36). No differences were found in the clinical baseline characteristics, with a median stenosis grade of 80% for the WingspanStent and 81% for the ElutaxDEB (P=0.87). The compound endpoint 'ischemic re-event and/or restenosis' was significantly lower for ElutaxDEB (13% vs 64%; P=0.03, OR 0.08 (95% CI 0.007 to 0.93; P=0.043) than for the WingspanStent. Conclusions The ElutaxDEB may be a promising alternative treatment for patients with symptomatic high-grade intracranial stenosis showing a significantly lower rate of ischemic re-events or restenosis in comparison with the WingspanStent-treated patients with a similar safety profile. Further studies will be needed to definitively elucidate the role of pDEB in the management of symptomatic intracranial high-grade stenosis.


Neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) is a common autosomal dominant disease caused by various types of mutations in the NF1 gene. We have previously developed a locus‐specific DNA microarray for detection of copy number changes at the NF1 locus by comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) analysis. The original array contains 183 probes pooled from 444 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) products. In the current work, we have used 493 probes derived from single PCR products (200–998 bp in size) to construct a higher resolution array with a smaller average probe size for molecular diagnosis of NF1. This has improved the average resolution from 12.6 kb in the previous array to 4.5 kb in the current version. The performance of the newly constructed microarray was validated with 14 well‐characterized NF1 mutations for CGH analysis. These mutations represent deletions from ∼7 kb to over 2 Mb in size. Using this array, we examined a total of 55 NF1 patients for copy number changes at the NF1 locus, detecting deletions in four of them. These results demonstrate that a locus‐specific microarray constructed from single PCR products can efficiently detect copy number changes at the NF1 locus, providing a simple method for the molecular diagnosis of NF1.


Conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) measures of multiple sclerosis patients provide limited information about the nature and the extent of brain damage and repair. We established a clinically compatible protocol including quantitative MRI techniques (qMRI, T1, T2, T2* relaxometry) and semiquantitative Magnetisation Transfer Imaging to provide a comprehensive MRI fingerprint (CMF) of lesions that is more adherent to the real underlying pathology and to assess the CMF contribution to clinical performances in patients. Lesions characteristics, revealed by combination of q/sq MRI, highly correlated with patients clinical performance and more severe lesions appeared to drive the clinic-radiological correlations.


Production of ammonia via electrochemical nitrogen reduction reaction (NRR) has recently attracted much attention due to its potential to play a vital role in producing fertilizers and other chemicals. High throughput screening of electrocatalysts for the NRR requires numerous calculations in the search space, making the computational cost a bottleneck for predicting eligible electrocatalysts. Here we used a deep neural network (DNN) to predict efficient electrocatalysts for the NRR among boron(B)-doped graphene single atom catalysts (SACs). This model can noticeably reduce the time of computation by removing non-efficient catalysts from screening. Also, the adsorption energy and free energy can be predicted by the feature-based light gradient boosting machine (LGBM) model. These features represent the geometrical structure as well as bonding characteristics. Among the catalysts evaluated, three candidates were identified as very promising catalysts, offering excellent selectivity over the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). CrB3C1 exhibited a minimal overpotential of 0.13 V for the NRR. This study provides a new pathway for the rational design of catalysts for nitrogen fixation by employing the most important features involved in the NRR by using machine learning methods.


The most important characteristics of building frames can be abbreviated in stiffness, strength and ductility. Moment frames have ductile behavior and low stiffness; Therefore, the main reason in using the lateral bracing systems is their considerable stiffness. Eccentric bracing systems are considered as ductile frames, while satisfying the required stiffness. The lateral stiffness of conventional eccentric configurations have been calculated previously. In this research, the lateral relative stiffness of eccentrically braced frame with dual vertical links (EBF-DVL) is calculated analytically. EBF-DVL has two parallel vertical links which are welded to the floor beam at the top and to one horizontal link at the bottom. In order to provide the required equations for obtaining the stiffness, the slope-deflection equations are used by considering the effects of shear deformations. The results show that EBF-DVL has a high relative stiffness and by adjusting the lengths of vertical and horizontal links, it is possible to achieve the stiffness even more than the stiffness of eccentric bracing with horizontal link between two diagonal braces. Although an increase in either the moment of inertia or shear area of the vertical link leads to an increase in the lateral stiffness of the system, the effective interval for increasing the moment of inertia of the vertical links is to be limited to approximately half of the column moment of inertia and the corresponding value for increasing the shear area is approximately 60% of the shear area of the column. Review History: Received: 16 September 2013 Revised: 10 May 2015 Accepted: 25 January 2016 Available Online: 6 November 2016


This paper proposes a voice morphing system for people suffering from Laryngectomy, which is the surgical removal of all or part of the larynx or the voice box, particularly performed in cases of laryngeal cancer. A primitive method of achieving voice morphing is by extracting the source's vocal coefficients and then converting them into the target speaker's vocal parameters. In this paper, we deploy Gaussian Mixture Models (GMM) for mapping the coefficients from source to destination. However, the use of the traditional/conventional GMM-based mapping approach results in the problem of over-smoothening of the converted voice. Thus, we hereby propose a unique method to perform efficient voice morphing and conversion based on GMM,which overcomes the traditional-method effects of over-smoothening. It uses a technique of glottal waveform separation and prediction of excitations and hence the result shows that not only over-smoothening is eliminated but also the transformed vocal tract parameters match with the target. Moreover, the synthesized speech thus obtained is found to be of a sufficiently high quality. Thus, voice morphing based on a unique GMM approach has been proposed and also critically evaluated based on various subjective and objective evaluation parameters. Further, an application of voice morphing for Laryngectomees which deploys this unique approach has been recommended by this paper.


Drug and alcohol misuse among young people is a major problem, although overall use is starting to decline. The UK has one of the highest rates of young people's cannabis use and binge drinking in Europe, with some 13,000 hospital admissions linked to young people's drinking each year. In recent years the number of specialist services for drug and alcohol misuse has increased so that young people can get the treatment they need. In 2010-2011 the number of under-18s accessing these services was 21,955.

The new standards have been developed by the Royal College of Psychiatrists' Centre for Quality Improvement (CCQI) in partnership with substance misuse organisations, paediatricians, psychologists and nurses.They are aimed at all staff in contact with young people aged 18 or under (in universal, targeted and specialist services) across health, social care, education, youth justice system, and the voluntary and community sector.

The standards propose that services invest in the psychosocial development and well-being of young people with substance misuse problems to give them the best chance of a normal life through:
 engagement of the young person, and their family where possible
 skilled initial analysis of the young person's difficulties, including mental disorders and developmental problems such as learning disability, and life circumstances
 engaging local systems so that they work together
 co-ordinated, well-led interventions that mobilise the resources of local communities as required, including safeguarding, education, training, mental health and accommodation
 active follow-up to detect further episodes of support or intervention
 prioritising and delivering the training and support of staff

Dr Dickon Bevington, of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: "Many of our most vulnerable young people have their lives further blighted by substance misuse. From a position just a decade ago of having minimal evidence for effectiveness, substance use disorder services for young people are now guiding many young people toward fuller lives. These standards should be read as the next chapter in a conversation that has been gathering pace, where genuine collaboration between experts, agencies, and different professional groupings has been a founding principle."

Martin Barnes, chief executive of DrugScope, said: "These practice standards have a vital role to play in supporting the development of procedures, interventions and services that are both efficient and effective. I hope they will become a key reference resource for everyone working with young people affected by substance misuse problems, and will be used to inform workforce development, strategic planning and development, and delivery of care and treatment."


Scalp reconstruction is a challenging problem requiring attention to the etiology, size, and condition of the defect to formulate an optimal reconstructive plan. Although many "conservative" options have been described even for large wounds, the use of local flaps or split-thickness skin grafts (STSG) may actually result in the need for multiple procedures, prolonged wound care, increased patient discomfort, and an unsatisfactory aesthetic result. We reviewed 37 patients who had received a total of 38 free flaps for scalp defects >or=100 cm(2) secondary to a broad range of etiologies. There were 24 males and 13 females, with a mean age of 47.4 years (range, 7 to 83 years). The mean scalp defect size was 356.2 cm(2) (range, 130 to 675 cm(2)). More than half the patients had undergone prior local flaps or STSG that had failed (n = 20; 54.1%). Latissimus dorsi muscle or myocutaneous flaps were the most commonly used free flaps in our series. Rectus abdominis muscle, scapular, radial forearm, and omental donor sites were also used. There were a total of 10 complications among 10 patients (27%). Two patients (5.4%) had major complications, and 8 patients (21.6%) had minor complications. Four of our complications (40%) were in patients who had received radiation therapy. We achieved definitive closure using free tissue transfer in 95% of patients who had previous attempts at closure using local options. These results demonstrate that free tissue transfer is a safe and highly efficient reconstructive option to manage large scalp defects under a variety of conditions. In large complex scalp wounds, especially in those patients receiving radiation, microsurgical reconstruction should be the preferred method of management.


Background. The prevalence of overweight and obesity is increasing and represents a primary health concern. Body composition evaluation is rarely performed in overweight/obese subjects, and the diagnosis is almost always achieved just considering body mass index (BMI). In fact, whereas BMI can be considered an important tool in epidemiological surveys, different papers stated the limitations of the use of BMI in single individuals. Aim. To assess the determinants of body composition in overweight and obese subjects. Methods. In 103 overweight or obese subjects (74 women, aged 41.5 ± 10 years, and 29 men, aged 43.8 ± 8 years), a multidimensional evaluation was performed including the assessment of body composition using Dual Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry (DXA), anthropometry, bioimpedance analysis (BIA), and biochemical parameters (total cholesterol, triacylglycerol, HDLand LDL-cholesterol, free fatty acids and glycerol, glucose, insulin, C-reactive protein, plasma acylated and unacylated ghrelin, adiponectin, and leptin serum levels). Results. BMI does not represent the main predictor of FM estimated by DXA; FM from BIA and hip circumference showed a better association with FM from DXA. Moreover, models omitting BMI explained a greater part of variance. These data are confirmed by the predictive value analysis where BMI showed a performance similar to a "coin flip."


Abstract Since their emergence just a decade ago, nearly 2% of scientific research is now published by megajournals, representing a major industrial shift in the production of knowledge. Such high-throughput production stresses several aspects of the publication process, including the editorial oversight of peer-review. As the largest megajournal, PLOS ONE has relied on a single-tier editorial board comprised of ∼7000 active academics, who thereby face conflicts of interest relating to their dual roles as both producers and gatekeepers of peer-reviewed literature. While such conflicts of interest are also a factor for editorial boards of smaller journals, little is known about how the scalability of megajournals may introduce perverse incentives for editorial service. To address this issue, we analyzed the activity of PLOS ONE editors over the journal's inaugural decade (2006–2015) and find highly variable activity levels. We then leverage this variation to model how editorial bias in the manuscript decision process relates to two editor-specific factors: repeated editor-author interactions and shifts in the rates of citations directed at editors – a form of citation remuneration that is analogue to self-citation. Our results indicate significantly stronger manuscript bias among a relatively small number of extremely active editors, who also feature relatively high self-citation rates coincident in the manuscripts they handle. These anomalous activity patterns are consistent with the perverse incentives and the temptations they offer at scale, which is theoretically grounded in the "slippery-slope" evolution of apathy and misconduct in power-driven environments. By applying quantitative evaluation to the gatekeepers of scientific knowledge, we shed light on various ethics issues crucial to science policy – in particular, calling for more transparent and structured management of editor activity in megajournals that rely on active academics.


Finite-state discrete-time channels with equiprobable M-ary inputs are considered. The generating function bound, which is ubiquitously applied to upper-bound the error probability of uncoded signaling over these channels, is used here to lower-bound the corresponding generalized symmetric cutoff rate, which lower-bounds the practically achievable rates and error exponents in these channels with symmetric signaling. The bound accounts for general additive metrics. For the special case of the optimal maximum-likelihood metric, the corresponding bound is shown to be asymptotically tight in the region where the symmetric cutoff rate approaches its maximum value of log/sub 2/ M (bits-per-channel use). For a finite-state additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel this feature is used to relate the minimum Euclidean distance of an uncoded symmetric system to the corresponding symmetric cutoff rate. The results are demonstrated for AWGN channels corrupted by linear and nonlinear intersymbol interference. They are also used to assess the efficiency of concatenated coding over the 4-ary AWGN channel where the finite-state mechanism is defined by simple rate 1/2, four-state Ungerboeck 4-AM trellis code. >


During the apartheid era, many South Africans were forcibly relocated to 'bantustans' and other decentralized regions with little economic basis. The only manufacturing employment was provided by industries attracted to the areas by selective incentives and low wages. After the transition to democracy, the remaining incentives were removed and minimum wages were extended to these (previously exempt) areas. This study of workers and managers in the clothing industry in Phuthaditjhaba, the old capital of the QwaQwa homeland, indicates that such developments may exacerbate unemployment and poverty in the region. Taiwanese export-oriented firms (the largest employers) are most threatened by the changes as they prefer to pay new employees low wages, and then increase them in line with experience and productivity. Falling employment will translate directly into rising poverty as very little welfare support is available for the unemployed in South Africa. Given that people (whether employed or unemployed) consistently rank increases in employment over wage increases, this suggests that minimum wage determination should be particularly sensitive to local conditions and potential employment losses. Copyright Joint Editors and Blackwell Publishers Ltd 2000.


This paper argues that a reduced workweek offers a way to alleviate work-family conflict without exacerbating the sex-based division of labor in paid work and unpaid family work. We distinguish our position from two other approaches: (1) one that compensates unpaid family work directly (through such policies as traditional welfare provision, or alimony), policies we argue can discourage women from labor force attachment and contribute to sex-stereotyping and sex-segregated employment; and (2) an approach that spurs employers to accommodate workers' family responsibilities (through such policies as part-time work for parents), policies workers often avoid out of a well founded fear that they will be penalized unless all workers take advantage of them. Although there is room for supplemental policies such as paid leave, we argue that it is only by reducing the long hours required for many higher-paying full-time jobs - and increasing the hours associated with many lower-paying non-standard jobs - that post-industrial societies can actually create opportunities for both men and women to participate fully in paid employment and parenting. Requiring employers to pay premium wages or compensatory time, plus proportionally additional benefits, to people who work more than 30 to 35 hours a week could help eliminate current legal incentives for employers to overwork full-time employees, who are disproportionately male. Similarly, requiring employers to pay equal wages and proportional benefits to people who work less than 30 to 35 hours a week could eliminate the incentive for employers to create the part-time and contingent jobs in which women are disproportionately concentrated. Other policies, such as an expanded earned-income tax credit, could help men and women converge toward a more moderate workweek norm. Drawing on experience in Europe and the United States, we evaluate the likely effectiveness of various regulatory approaches. Although the matter is complex, the evidence suggests that it is possible to design policy approaches that could help achieve a more moderate workweek in the U.S. We conclude that, even though doing so would alleviate gender inequalities around paid work and unpaid family work, the current political and economic climate is not conducive to achieving such change. We call upon scholars, policymakers, and activists to study and press this issue further.


OBJECTIVES
To investigate the prevalence of bla(NDM-1) in Gram-negative bacilli in China.

METHODS
A total of 11 298 clinical Gram-negative bacilli, covering Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii and Pseudomonas aeruginosa, were collected for PCR-based surveillance of bla(NDM-1) from 57 hospitals representing 18 provinces in China. For bla(NDM-1)-positive isolates, antibiotic susceptibilities were assessed and molecular typing was performed using PFGE. The genetic location of bla(NDM-1) was determined by analysis of PFGE profiles of S1 nuclease-digested genomic DNA and Southern blot hybridization. Plasmid transfer to E. coli recipients was investigated using filter mating and electroporation.

RESULTS
Four A. baumannii isolates with bla(NDM-1) were identified in four different provinces in China: no positive isolates were detected among E. coli, K. pneumoniae and P. aeruginosa. These bla(NDM-1)-positive A. baumannii were resistant to all carbapenems and cephalosporins, and three remained susceptible to fluoroquinolones, aminoglycosides and colistin. The four NDM-1-producing A. baumannii were clonally diverse and carried bla(NDM-1) on different plasmids. Plasmids carrying bla(NDM-1) were successfully transferred from three of the four isolates to E. coli recipients, although the transconjugants and transformants were prone to lose the transferred plasmids after passage in the absence of ampicillin selection.

CONCLUSIONS
We describe the emergence of A. baumannii producing NDM-1 in China. Systemic surveillance network should be established for monitoring these resistant bacteria.


Super-resolution mapping (SRM) is a promising technique to generate a fine resolution land cover map from coarse fractional images by predicting the spatial locations of different land cover classes at subpixel scale. In most cases, SRM is accomplished by using the spatial dependence principle, which is a simple method to describe the spatial patterns of different land cover classes. However, the spatial dependence principle used in existing SRM models does not fully reflect the real-world situations, making the resultant fine resolution land cover map often have uncertainty. In this paper, an example-based SRM model using support vector regression (SVR_SRM) was proposed. Without directly using an explicit formulation to describe the prior information about the subpixel spatial pattern, SVR_SRM generates a fine resolution land cover map from coarse fractional images, by learning the nonlinear relationships between the coarse fractional pixels and corresponding labeled subpixels from the selected best-match training data. Based on the experiments of two subset images of National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 2001 and a subset of real hyperspectral Airborne Visible/Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS) image, the performance of SVR_SRM was evaluated by comparing with the traditional pixel-based hard classification (HC) and several existing typical SRM algorithms. The results show that SVR_SRM can generate fine resolution land cover maps with more detailed spatial information and higher accuracy at different spatial scales.


Mildmay Uganda (MUg), an HIV treatment centre near Kampala, the capital of Uganda, has entered into a memorandum of understanding to collaborate with Canadian researchers at the University of Ottawa to develop their research programme and develop an observational cohort database (the MUg observational cohort). The primary objectives of the MUg observational cohort are to monitor clinical care and outcomes of HIV among patients on treatment and to bring awareness to trends that are functional and dysfunctional in HIV care in Uganda. The MUg observational cohort comprises 8835 individuals who initiated combination antiretroviral therapy at MUg between January 2004 and October 2011. There are considerably more women (63.2%) than men in the cohort, and age spans from newborn to 92 years old. The low median age of 31 years (interquartile range: 18-38 years) can be explained by the 24.9% of the cohort aged <18 years. The median baseline CD4 cell count among the entire cohort is 172 cells/mm(3) (interquartile range: 73-249 cells/mm(3)). Data are routinely completed at treatment initiation, and follow-up data are collected routinely through physician visits and laboratory results. Data comprise demographic, behavioural and clinical variables. Collaborations and enquiries relating to the MUg observational cohort are encouraged, and can be addressed to Dr Edward Mills at firstname.lastname@example.com.


Observation and documentation are integral to the early childhood classroom. Observation provides the information necessary for adults to build meaningful relationships with individual children. Documentation panels including photographs, teacher's notes, transcriptions, and artifacts, artfully and prominently displayed, serve as a visual archive of children's learning (Helm, Beneke, & Steinheimer, 1998). Carefully designed panels provide an array of authentic assessment artifacts of children's exploration, while also providing a vehicle for preservice teachers to showcase their understanding of the teaching-learning process. As candidates capture and collect significant moments of learning and reflect on data collected, they develop the practice-teaching inquiry. Inquiry prepares teacher candidates to recognize the value of revisiting previous thinking to help them see relationships between teaching and learning. It is a reflective, intellectually challenging process that is the essence of teacher self-reflection (Hong & Forman, 2000). The Making Learning Visible project described in this article provides opportunities for teacher candidates to observe children at work and play; formulate questions about what they have seen; advance opinions about meaning; analyze issues; confront biases; and develop ideas for future practice. The project may be used as one of the eight assessment tools required in the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education/National Association for the Education of Young Children (NCATE/NAEYC) program accreditation process.


Calculations by others of the preindustrial deposition of inorganic nitrogen from the atmosphere in the area of Narragansett Bay compared with recent measurements suggest that this flux has increased almost 15 times over natural background. On the basis of modern studies of the export of nitrogen and phosphorus from temperate forests, the prehistoric watershed also probably contributed very little reactive N or P to the bay. New information from undisturbed old-growth forests suggests that most of the N that was exported from the watershed was probably associated with refractory dissolved organic matter and thus contributed little to the fertility of the bay. The largest source of reactive dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) and phosphorus (DIP) for Narragansett Bay under prehistoric conditions was the coastal ocean water entrained in the bay in estuarine circulation. The total input of DIN to this estuary has increased about five-fold and the input of total DIP has approximately doubled as a result of human activities. Recent ecosystem-level experiments using large (13 m3, 5 m deep) mesocosms designed as living models of Narragansett Bay showed that the primary production of phytoplankton in the bay is limited by the supply of DIN and that annual phytoplankton production is strongly correlated with the rate of input of DIN. The relationship between DIN input and annual phytoplankton production in the mesocosms is consistent with observations published by others working in 10 different natural marine systems, and a functional regression of the field and experimental data provides a tool to calculate the rate of prehistoric phytoplankton production that would have been associated with the prehistoric DIN input estimates. The result of this calculation suggests that phytoplankton production in the bay has approximately doubled (from about 130 g C m−2 yr−1 to 290 g C m−2 yr−1 for a baywide average) since the time of European contact. It also seems likely that seagrasses and macroalgae once made a much larger contribution to total system production than they do today.


ABSTRACT The purpose of this article was to investigate how pregnant and non-pregnant women use various coping techniques when attempting to refrain from smoking. Eighty women with subgroups formed by the variables of pregnant/not pregnant and quitting/not quitting smoking were studied over a 2-week period. The general strategy was to follow smokers who had stated an intention to quit smoking. Smokers, pregnant and non-pregnant, who did not intend to quit were also followed with respect to the coping techniques they would hypothetically be using if they were trying to quit. Pregnant women used coping strategies more often than non-pregnant women. Differences found between pregnant and non-pregnant women were evenly distributed for behavioral and cognitive methods. The goal of becoming a non-smoker, especially during pregnancy, needs to be addressed to include psychological and physical factors. In these efforts, the framework introduced by the study involving a time-related approach could be useful.


In this short paper I celebrate the life of Lidia Barbanera. Lidia was among the historical colleagues from my own old institute (Laboratorio di Astrofisica Spaziale, CNR). We started to collaborate directly beginning in 1984 when I organized the first historical Frascati Workshop on "Multifrequency Behaviour of Galactic Accreting Sources". Lidia was the workshop secretary, and the factotum during the preparation and administration of the event. Only Lidia and I were involved in the organization of such "new multifrequency workshops".
This brief remembrance does not list the many important contributions of Lidia within the many activities of my institute, but simply paints his humanity through a few episodes of daily life that will stay in my mind forever.


Increased survival of premature infants with severe bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) has led to new challenges in optimizing both clinical management and neurodevelopmental outcomes. Numerous studies have shown a strong association between severe BPD and neurocognitive dysfunction at follow-up. Data demonstrate substantial differences between similar centers within the same neonatal network in the United States. Presumably, variations in outcome are related to differences in care practices, which suggests that improvements in care practices could result in improvement in respiratory and/or neurocognitive outcomes. Emerging questions regarding optimal management include the following: 1) What is the optimal respiratory strategy? 2) What is the optimal timing for undergoing tracheostomy placement? 3) What is the best way to address comfort needs? 4) What is the optimal environment for promoting neurodevelopmental progress? Here we discuss the benefits of achieving and maintaining a progrowth, prodevelopment state in infants with severe BPD. It is increasingly clear that growth and development overlap considerably, and each are related to a number of physiologic, nutritional, and environmental factors. A progrowth, prodevelopment state is best reached by achieving a complex balance of adequate respiratory support, consistent oxygenation, and positive, age-appropriate social and developmental experiences. Moreover, optimal management is achieved by minimizing pain and stress, inflammation, infection, and medications that suppress lung and brain growth. Because the care of these infants is chronic and progressive, it is important to use an interdisciplinary team model, with consistent feedback loops to monitor and maintain these goals.


Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBDs) have emerged as a public health problem worldwide with a limited number of efficient therapeutic options despite advances in medical therapy. Although changes in the gut microbiota composition are recognized as key drivers of dysregulated intestinal immunity, alterations in bile acids (BAs) have been shown to influence gut homeostasis and contribute to the pathogenesis of the disease. In this review, we explore the interactions involving BAs and gut microbiota in IBDs, and discuss how the gut microbiota–BA–host axis may influence digestive inflammation.


Christina Rossetti (1830 – 1894) has usually been recognized as one of the most prominent Victorian female poets both by her contemporaries and present scholars since her rediscovery in the 20 century. Nevertheless, not all her works have received the same attention, being most of them shadowed by her fairy tale masterpiece Goblin Market (1862). In addition, she has quite often been undervalued or misinterpreted due to the extent religion has influenced almost every of her poems. Although her sonnet sequence 'Monna Innominata: A Sonnet of Sonnets' from her poem collection A Peagant and Other Poems (1881) has long been neglected, some scholars have lately been interested in it due to the recuperation of woman voices in recent gender studies. Here the attempt is to provide some other possible interpretations of the poems of this sonnet sequence by analysing the themes of love, longing and hope in the third, the eight and the last sonnet. For that purpose, it seems necessary to give some background information such as the historical context and C. Rossetti's religious influences, preceding and contemporary women poets, and Pre-Raphaelitism, together with a brief biography of this poetess. Then, we will turn to the sonnet sequence suggesting an interpretation of the title regarding unnamed ladies and the way in which they are given voice in the sequence, highlighting some facts about the sonnet itself and finally referring to C. Rossetti's introduction to her work. There is no need to say that thee quotations by Dante and Petrarch which precede each poem are important and closely knit with the poems themselves. The meaning of each stanza, tone, mood, syntax, punctuation, texture and imagery will be analysed. To conclude, the decrease of hope and longing, the acceptance of reality, and the strength of the several manifestations love will be suggested as the link of the sonnets chosen from 'Monna Innominata'.


Knowledge graphs (KGs) have emerged as a prominent data representation and management paradigm. Being usually underpinned by a schema (e.g. an ontology), KGs capture not only factual information but also contextual knowledge. In some tasks, a few KGs established themselves as standard benchmarks. However, recent works outline that relying on a limited collection of datasets is not sufficient to assess the generalization capability of an approach. In some data-sensitive fields such as education or medicine, access to public datasets is even more limited. To remedy the aforementioned issues, we release PyGraft, a Python-based tool that generates highly customized, domain-agnostic schemas and knowledge graphs. The synthesized schemas encompass various RDFS and OWL constructs, while the synthesized KGs emulate the characteristics and scale of real-world KGs. Logical consistency of the generated resources is ultimately ensured by running a description logic (DL) reasoner. By providing a way of generating both a schema and KG in a single pipeline, PyGraft's aim is to empower the generation of a more diverse array of KGs for benchmarking novel approaches in areas such as graph-based machine learning (ML), or more generally KG processing. In graph-based ML in particular, this should foster a more holistic evaluation of model performance and generalization capability, thereby going beyond the limited collection of available benchmarks. PyGraft is available at: https://github.com/nicolas-hbt/pygraft.


Bintaro plants grow naturally in Sumatera swamplands, yet people have not utilized this plant because of the lack of knowledge. Bintaro seeds have high oil content which makes it potential as a source of vegetable oil and can be developed as fuel too. The purpose of this research is to know the effect of different maturity level and treatment on the quality of bintaro seed oil content using soxhlet method with n-hexane solvent and also to determine the treatment process to obtain the best quality of bintaro seed oil. The research was conducted in Agricultural Processing Laboratory and Agricultural Product Analysis Laboratory of Faculty of Agriculture, Riau University of Pekanbaru from June to August 2017. From several parameters used, it was found that fruit maturity and extraction method had significant effect on free fatty acid content, iodine number, saponification number, peroxide number, and yield. However, the maturity and extraction methods have no significant effect on oil viscosity. High levels of fat and iodine number in bintaro seeds cause it potential to be developed into a source of vegetable oil.Finally, it is found that the best treatment for bintaro seed oil is by deriving it from 100% ripe fruit extracted using n-hexane solvent with yield of 52,93%, free fatty acid content 3,28%, iodine number 73.52 g I2 / 100 g, peroxide value 14.23 mg O2 / g, saponification value 203.67 mg KOH / g, and a viscosity value 63.28 cP. Keyword: Bintaro seeds, Soxhlet method, Free fatty acid, Saponification number,


Cerebral microbleeds (CMBs) are an increasingly common neuroimaging finding in the context of ageing, cerebrovascular disease and dementia, with potentially important clinical relevance. Perhaps the most pressing clinical question is whether CMBs are associated with a clinically important increase in the risk of intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH), the most feared complication in patients treated with thrombolytic or antithrombotic (antiplatelet and anticoagulant) drugs. This review will summarize the evidence available regarding CMBs as an indicator of future ICH risk in stroke medicine clinical practice.


Though the title of this article may well have roots elsewhere, I read it on the men's room wall in the Student Union Building at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Appearing with it were other "seventyisms" such as: "Incest is Relative," "Minnie Mouse wears stretch pants" and "Monday will be cancelled 'cause of lack of interest." They led me to believe that graffiti of this kind might be a key to the genre of the age? August Mau, in his epoch work, Pompeii, Its Life and Art, described a Pompeiian wall on which was inscribed, Romula hic cum Staphylo moratur, "Romula tarried here with Staphylus," and another, Restitutus multas decepit saepe puellas, "Restitutus has many times deceived many girls. Somehow, the Pompeiians appear more human when these remarks are added to the petrified remains of what was once an important society.

 There is certainly something (I almost said some essence) to be gleaned from the walls of today's toilets. When I first read, "Who wants the truth if it's boring," I laughed. After serious reflection (I was at the time in an ideal setting for contemplation), I was left with the feeling that an historian some two thousand years hence might give his eye teeth for these quotes. Since the wall of the men's room will be long gone, I thought I'd better try to see them published. The rest of this article can be left out of the time capsule.


Biopsy specimens of lymph nodes or bone marrow taken from two cases, which seemed to have received intravenous infusions of polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) more than 15 years ago, were examined histopathologically, histochemically or electron microscopically. In the lymph nodes, proliferation of foam cells, often with multinuclear giant cells, and basophilic vacuolar massive deposition were found markedly in the lymphatic sinuses and sporadically in the parenchyma. In the bone marrow, basophilic foam cells predominated, together with infrequent appearance of multinuclear giant cells and basophilic vacuolar deposits. The basophilic materials stored in the foam cells and multinuclear giant cells, as well as basophilic vacuolar massive deposits, were histochemically proved to stain with the special stains for demonstration of PVP. Electron microscopically, storage inclusions observed in the cytoplasm of PVP-storing macrophages were comprised of electrondense, amorphous substances or of vacuolar, fine reticulogranular, flocculent materials and were bounded by a single delimitating membrane. Most of the inclusions, particularly osmiophilic ones, showed intense acid phosphatase activity, while larger, vacuolar inclusions had a reduced or no enzyme activity. Extracellularly, vacuolar storage inclusions with no enzyme activity were found. The possible mechanism of long-term PVP storage in the tissues was briefly discussed.


Biodiversity conservation science and policy largely ignores the majority of species: the microbes and invertebrates. This biodiversity contains most genetic, metabolic and chemical diversity on Earth and underpins a wide variety of ecosystem services, an unexpected diversity of major industries and, ironically, conventional conservation. Its exclusion, often explained by inadequate scientific technologies, is no longer tenable. On the other hand, its inclusion in biodiversity science and policy will: 1) enhance understanding of the processes and mechanics of ecosystem services, 2) place biodiversity at the core of all economies, 3) realise a vast array of new biological resources, 4) extend responsibility for conservation into industrial sectors that depend on biodiversity, 5) generate a new interest in the workings of the planet through the 'Attenborough Effect'.


Hepatitis B virus is the major cause of liver infection that includes hepatocellular carcinoma and liver cirrhosis. Globally 350 million peoples have been suffered from chronic infection of Hepatitis B Virus. The current study was conducted with the main aim to determine the epidemiology of hepatitis B virus in Temporary Displaced Persons (TDPs) during army operation against terrorism in North Waziristan. Blood samples from 1837 TDPs were collected that were migrated to District Bannu. Blood samples were collected from both sexes (male & Female) having age range from 160 years. All the collected blood samples were first diagnosed with ICT method and then with ELISA method at the study places during the mentioned period. The assessed variables included gender, age and risk factors. Out of 1837 samples, 237 (12.90%) were found positive for HBsAg and were declaredpositive while the remaining 1600 (87.09%) were found negative. The collected samples were all processed through ELISA in which 249 (13.55%) samples were found to be positive for HBsAg while 1588 (86.44%) were found negative. Males (14.70%) were found to be more infected than females (11.67%) and similarly, high rate of infection (28%) was found in the old age peoples. HBV has been reported in the TDPs and population of the host district is at high risk. Diagnosis through ELISA is more accurate and sensitive than ICT method. Further proper screening and molecular diagnosis is needed in the area to control the dreadful disease.


This study was conducted in Mbeya City, Mbeya Region (Tanzania), with the general objective of finding out the extent to which married men were involved in
the choice of the use of family planning methods used by couples in Forest Ward. Specifically, it explored the extent to which men participated, advantages and factors
hindering participation of men in decision making pertaining to choice of methods of family planning to be used by the couple. A survey research design was adopted and
questionnaires, interview and direct field observations were used to collect data from 165 respondents who were randomly sampled in the ward.
Findings showed that the extent to which males participated in the decision making about family planning was minimal in Forest ward which was the area of the study, although the heads of households had knowledge on the use and availability of family planning methods. The factors identified to hinder men's participation in the
decision making about family planning methods included; men being busy with a lot of activities, dissatisfaction with sexual intercourse and consideration of family planning
as women concern. In the light of these findings, it is recommended that government in collaboration with other stakeholders should establish adults' family planning clinics to enhance adults' participation in family planning decisions as well as establishment of mobile family planning clinics for easy accessibility to both.


Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery is the fully updated third edition of the essential guide for all of those working towards the Intercollegiate Fellowship of the Royal Colleges of Surgeons Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery exit exam or the Diploma of Membership of the Faculty of Dental Surgery assessment, as well as a handy quick reference for consultants working in the field. Providing a concise and structured overview of the current oral and maxillofacial practice, the handbook covers the diagnosis and surgical treatment of diseases affecting the mouth, jaws, face, and neck. Including a combination of clinical photographs and line drawings to aid understanding, the text has been bought in line with new evidence, practice, and revised guidelines, while maintaining the clear, user-friendly layout and expert tips of the previous editions.


Introduction:Despite of growing developments in surgical techniques, ureteral injuries are still a potential complication relating to general surgery, urology and gynecology. This study aims to evaluate the symptoms, etiology, diagnosis and management of non-endourologic iatrogenic uretral injuries. Methods: This study was retrospectively performed on female patients with of non-endourologic uretal injuries who were referring to Ghaem hospital, Mashhad between 1997 and2007. In this study, the type of their previous operation (which had caused the injury), diagnostic approach, treatment modality and outcomes were evaluated. The total number of 17 patients were studied (including 20 solitary uretral injuries). Results: The age of patients were between 26-67 years old (mean 43.14 yr). Patients' symptoms included flank pain in 88.23, true incontinence in 41.17, fever in 29.41, anuria in 11.76, illeus and abdominal distension in 11.76, prolonged nausea in 5.88 and acute abdomen in 5.88. Previous surgeries which caused ureteral injuries were gynecologic procedures in 15 patients (88.23), including hysterectomy in 8 patients (47.05) and caesarian section in 4 cases (23.52), Wertheim surgery, resection of ovarian cyst and pelvic endometriosis surgery 1 case in each (5.88). In 2 cases the injuries were occurred during non-gynecologic surgeries. Modified lich re-implantation was performed in 11 lower injuries of ureter. In one case the anastomosis were performed with Politano-Ledbetter method. Boari flap technique was used for repair of two lower injuries of ureter. Left to right trans-uretro-uretrostomy (TTU) was performed in one case. Also one case with middle uretral injury was treated with uretro-uretrostomy. Auto-transplantation was applied in one case with upper injury. Conclusion: In our cases, the most common cause of iatrogenic ureteral injury was simple hysterectomy and the most common presented symptoms were flank pain and true incontinence. Most of the patients needed relevant surgeries particularly uretroneocystostomy. In upper injuries the minimally invasive techniques instead of nephrectomy or Auto-transplantation should be considered.


Over the last decade there has been a global effort to eco-engineer urban artificial shorelines with the aim of increasing their biodiversity and extending their conservation value. One of the most common and viable eco-engineering approaches on seawalls is to use enhancement features that increase habitat structural complexity, including concrete tiles moulded with complex designs and precast "flowerpots" that create artificial rock pools. Increases in species diversity in pits and pools due to microhabitat conditions (water retention, shade, protection from waves, and/or biotic refugia) are often reported, but these results can be confounded by differences in surface area sampled. In this study, we fabricated three tile types (n=10): covered tile (grooved tile with a cover to retain water), uncovered tile (same grooved tile but without a cover) and granite control. We tested the effect of these tile types on species richness (S), total individual abundance (N), and community composition. All tiles were installed at 0.5 m above chart datum along seawalls surrounding two island sites (Pulau Hantu and Kusu Island) south of Singapore mainland. The colonising assemblages were sampled after eight months. Consistent with previous studies, mean S was significantly greater on covered tiles compared to the uncovered and granite tiles. While it is implied in much of the eco-engineering literature that this pattern results from greater niche availability allotted by microhabitat conditions, we further investigated whether there was an underlying species-individual relationship to determine whether increases in S could have simply resulted from covered tiles supporting greater N (i.e. increasing the probability of detecting more species despite a constant area). The species-individual relationship was positive, suggesting that multiple mechanisms are at play, and that biodiversity enhancements may in some instances operate simply by increasing the abundance of individuals, even when microhabitat availability is unchanged. This finding underscores the importance of testing mechanism in eco-engineering studies and highlights ongoing mechanistic uncertainties that should be addressed to inform the design of more biodiverse seawalls and urban marine environments.


Batang-Takung River empties into Batang-Pangian River in Sijunjung Regency, West Sumatra Province. The downstream of Batang Takung is frequently flooding in the rainy seasons. The water-surface level at the intersection between Batang Takung and Batang Pangian is higher than that in the Batang-Takung downstream. This situation is then getting worse since the river bed of the Takung downstream is relatively flat. As a result, backwater phenomenon occurs along the Takung downstream and then it floods up to the surrounding residential and plantation areas. The present study is devoted to overcome the flood in the Batang-Takung downstream by numerical simulations using the existing software of HEC-RAS 4.10. In the present study, the software is applied to predicting the flow depths in both the uniform and varied flows and in the one-dimensional, steady-state condition for all simulation scenarios. In the first scenario, Batang Takung, Batang-Pangian Hulu (Batang-Pangian part from the intersection upward) and Batang-Pangian Hilir (Batang-Pangian part from the intersection downward) are in the existing condition. Similar to the first scenario but Batang-Pangian Hulu is put aside in the second scenario. The third scenario is the same as the first one but Batang Takung is put aside. The fourth scenario is the same as the first one but the upstream of Batang-Pangian Hilir around 1013 m long is straightened. In the fifth scenario, an additional intersection of Batang-Pangian Hulu and Batang-Pangian Hilir is made about 1762 m downward of the existing intersection. This is done by making a new trace in the downstream of Batang-Pangian Hulu. The simulation results show that straightening the river trace or normalizing the river is not effective in overcoming the flood in the Batang-Takung downstream. However, by making an additional intersection between the Batang-Pangian Hulu and the Batang-Pangian Hilir located about 1762 m downward, the flood in the Batang-Takung downstream could be solved.


This paper presents a contribution to programming by human demonstration, in the context of compliant-motion task specification for sensor-controlled robot systems that physically interact with the environment. One wants to learn about the geometric parameters of the task and segment the total motion executed by the human into subtasks for the robot, that can each be executed with simple compliant-motion task specifications. The motion of the human demonstration tool is sensed with a 3-D camera, and the interaction with the environment is sensed with a force sensor in the human demonstration tool. Both measurements are uncertain, and do not give direct information about the geometric parameters of the contacting surfaces, or about the contact formations (CFs) encountered during the human demonstration. The paper uses a Bayesian sequential Monte Carlo method (also known as a particle filter) to do the simultaneous estimation of the CF (discrete information) and the geometric parameters (continuous information). The simultaneous CF segmentation and the geometric parameter estimation are helped by the availability of a contact state graph of all possible CFs. The presented approach applies to all compliant-motion tasks involving polyhedral objects with a known geometry, where the uncertain geometric parameters are the poses of the objects. This work improves the state of the art by scaling the contact estimation to all possible contacts, by presenting a prediction step based on the topological information of a contact state graph, and by presenting efficient algorithms that allow the estimation to operate in real time. In real-world experiments, it is shown that the approach is able to discriminate in real time between some 250 different CFs in the graph


Purpose: The TomoTherapy thread effect is a longitudinal pitch‐dependent dose‐ripple artifact caused by helical radiation delivery. It has been observed and studied before. However, previously empirically identified optimal pitches, 0.86/n, are only for the jaw width 5 cm and off‐axis distance 5 cm. Through theoretical analysis and simulation, we were able to identify optimal pitches for various jaw widths at various off‐axis distances. We further investigated the effect of optimization in reducing this ripple artifact. Methods: As the ripple in the dose profile is essentially a 1D problem, we set up a 1D model that account for the contributing factors, including profile divergence, the inverse square law, attenuation, and the cone effect, to study the thread effect. Based on the 1D model, we analyzed individual and combined factors theoretically and numerically to identify optimal pitches. We further set up optimization to reduce ripples in the 1D cases and simulate 3D cases using TomoTherapy's optimization. Results: The 1D model captures the thread effect found in 3D. At the off‐axis distance of 5 cm, for the jaw width of 5 cm, the derived optimal pitches agree with 0.86/n. However, for other jaw widths or off‐axis distances, the optimal pitches do not follow 0.86/n. For a fixed jaw width, the optimal pitches shift downward as the off‐axis distance increases. Optimization in both 1D and 3D show consistent results, and the ripples are largely suppressed by optimization through intensity modulation. Conclusions: With optimized intensity modulation, the optimal pitches tend to move toward the ones for the profile divergence factor, as optimized modulation is expected to compensate for the intensity‐related factors up to the restriction of modulation factor and optimization iterations. Choosing a good pitch, though further improves the thread effect, may not be as critical, as optimization already bring down the thread effect considerably.


The Internet has become an accessible place for teens to seek help, support and information if they are experiencing mental illness. The feeling of being anonymous can be an important reason to why teens are using internet and social media for this purpose. However, it appears through earlier studies that there may be risks involving social media as utilities for these matters. In this study we therefore examine both the risk- and protective factors that impacts on teen's mental illnesses in relation to their use of social media as a tool for help, support and information, but also how professional social workers can increase their use of social media as a tool in their work with these teens. To be able to do this we conducted a literature review of the current available research in this field. The results presented have been analyzed with the developmental psychopathology perspective and with the theory of digital social capital. The results indicates that there are both negative and positive outcomes with the use of social media as a tool when teens are experiencing mental illness, and that there is a lack of professional social workers in social media even though they are both needed and desired.