Abstract Several trematode species infect the eyes of fish as second intermediate hosts. In most cases the definitive host is a piscivorous bird. Studies of a few species have shown an increase in transmission due to decreased visual acuity of the fish host. However, this may vary depending on trematode microhabitat choice within the eye. Some trematode species are found in the lens, some are found in the vitreous humor, and others have been reported from the retina. Here we report 3 genera of eyeflukes in 3 locations of the eye in the intermediate fish host, Gambusia affinis. Clinostomum metacercariae were found attached to the outer sclera within the eye orbit, and Diplostomum metacercariae were found in the lens. Posthodiplostomum metacercariae were confirmed by histology to reside between the choroid and pigmented retina. Posthodiplostomum metacercariae were found in both eyes of all 20 fish examined and in high intensities (up to 27 metacercariae per eye). High trematode intensities between the choroid and pigmented retina found in this study may disrupt vision in this fish host. Our study is the first to document the microhabitat of all 3 trematode metacercariae within the eye of G. affinis.


Abstract Enchytraeus albidus is a terrestrial earthworm widespread along the coasts of northern Europe and the Arctic. This species tolerates freezing of body fluids and survives winters in a frozen state. Their acclimatory physiological mechanisms behind freeze tolerance involve increased fluidity of membrane lipids during cold exposure and accumulation of cryoprotectants (glucose) during the freezing process. Gene regulatory processes of these physiological responses have not been studied, partly because no gene expression tools were developed. The main aim of this study was to understand whether the freeze tolerance mechanisms have a transcriptomic basis in E. albidus. For that purpose, first the transcriptome of E. albidus was assembled with RNAseq data. Second, two strains from contrasting thermal environments (Germany and Greenland) were compared by mapping barcoded RNAseq data onto the assembled transcriptome. Both of these strains are freeze tolerant, but Greenland is extremely freeze tolerant. Results showed more plastic responses in the Greenland strain as well as higher constitutive expression of particular stress response genes. These altered transcriptional networks are associated with an adapted homeostasis coping with prolonged freezing conditions in Greenland animals. Previously identified physiological alterations in freeze‐tolerant strains of E. albidus are underpinned at the transcriptome level. These processes involve anion transport in the hemolymph, fatty acid metabolism, metabolism, and transport of cryoprotective sugars as well as protection against oxidative stress. Pathway analysis supported most of these processes, and identified additional differentially expressed pathways such as peroxisome and Toll‐like receptor signaling. We propose that the freeze‐tolerant phenotype is the consequence of genetic adaptation to cold stress and may have driven evolutionary divergence of the two strains.


We analyzed the effects of 100 mg/day sitagliptin and a switch to mitiglinide calcium hydrate/voglibose compound tablets (MIT/VOG) in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) treated with 50 mg/day sitagliptin. Five patients with T2DM treated with 50 mg/day sitagliptin and hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) of ≥6.5% were switched to MIT/VOG, or the dose of sitagliptin was increased to 100 mg/day. The effects of the changes in therapy were compared in a crossover fashion by continuous glucose monitoring. The primary endpoint was mean amplitude of glycemic excursions (MAGE), and the secondary end points were 24-hour mean blood glucose level and mean blood glucose level from 0:00 a.m. to 7:00 a.m. and from 7:00 a.m. to 0:00 a.m., percentage of time with blood glucose level of ≥200 mg/dl and <70 mg/dl, maximum and minimum blood glucose levels, and increases in postprandial blood glucose levels. MAGE was significantly lower with MIT/VOG (P = 0.016), whereas mean blood glucose levels were lower between 0:00 a.m. and 7:00 a.m. with 100 mg/day sitagliptin. The percentage of time with blood glucose level ≥200 mg/dl was significantly shorter with MIT/VOG (P = 0.041). The maximum blood glucose level was significantly lower with MIT/VOG (P = 0.043), and the minimum was significantly lower with 100 mg/day sitagliptin (P = 0.043). Blood glucose levels after dinner and mean increases in postprandial blood glucose levels were significantly lower with MIT/VOG (P = 0.090 and P = 0.045 respectively). In patients with T2DM, treatment with MIT/VOG improves MAGE and postprandial hyperglycemia and 100 mg/day sitagliptin lowers early morning glucose levels. This trial was registered with the University Hospital Medical Information Network (UMIN) (No. UMIN R000008274).


In domestic air conditioning system the most widely used refrigerant is R22 has a high Global Warming Potential (GWP) of 1700 and a ozone depletion potential (ODP) of 0.05. Hence a new solution for this refrigerant is to be identified. R152a is identified as an alternative to R12 and R22 refrigerants. In this paper an experimental investigation was made to reduce the usage of R22 with the Hydrocarbon Refrigerant mixtures (HCM) of R22 and R152a refrigerants in the ratio of 30:70, 50:50, and 70:30 by mass. Experiments were conducted by continuous running tests under an ambient temperature of 32°C. The overall performance of the system proved that the HCM could be a long term substitute for R22 (chlorodifluoromethane).


The present study analyzes residential models in coastal areas with large influxes of tourism, the sustainability of their planning and its repercussion on urban values. The project seeks to establish a methodology for territorial valuation through the analysis of externalities that have influenced urban growth and its impact on the formation of residential real estate values. This will make it possible to create a map for qualitative land valuation, resulting from a combination of environmental, landscape, social and productive valuations. This in turn will establish a reference value for each of the areas in question, as well as their spatial interrelations. These values become guidelines for the study of different territorial scenarios, which help improve the sustainable territorial planning process. This is a rating scale for urban planning. The results allow us to establish how the specific characteristics of the coast are valued and how they can be incorporated into sustainable development policies.


In this paper the conditions for blind identifiability of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) channels under orthogonal space-time block coded (OSTBC) transmissions are studied. Specifically we prove that, regardless of the number of receive antennas, any real or complex OSTBC transmitting an odd number of real symbols permits the blind identification of the MIMO channel by only exploiting the second order statistics (SOS) of the received signal. This result extends to complex OSTBCs and provides an alternative proof of an identifiability theorem previously proved only for real OSTBCs in N. Ammar and Zhi Ding (2002). Furthermore, this sufficient condition suggests that any non-identifiable OSTBC can be made identifiable simply by not transmitting one real symbol of each block (either the real or imaginary part of a symbol in the case of complex OSTBCs). In order to minimize the reduction in the transmission rate, several OSTBC blocks are grouped before erasing one real symbol. It is shown in the paper that the proposed rate-reduction technique outperforms the differential OSTBC scheme in terms of capacity for a wide range of SNRs


PURPOSE
It is often assumed that phonological awareness only reflects children's phonological skill. However, orthographic representations have been found to be automatically involved during phonological awareness tasks, which we refer to as automatic orthographic activation. Although previous longitudinal neural studies have addressed how phonological processing during phonological awareness tasks is bidirectionally related to reading skill in developing children, we do not know how automatic orthographic activation plays a role in reading skill.

METHOD
To address this gap, we measured 40 children's reading skill and brain activity during an auditory phonological task at two time points using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Children were 5.5 to 6.5 years old at the first time point and were followed up approximately 1.5 years later when they were 7 to 8 years old.

RESULTS
We found that earlier reading skill predicted children's later functional connectivity during onset processing between the left superior temporal gyrus, a phonological region, and the left posterior ventral occipitotemporal cortex, an orthographic region representing letters.

CONCLUSION
This finding, together with previous studies, suggests that learning to read influences phonological awareness not only by refining phonological representations but also via strengthening the automatic mapping between phonemes and letters during spoken language processing.


Vaccine- and vaccination-related crises require a communication response that is different from the communication strategies used to promote the benefits and importance of vaccines in general. This document presents the technical guidance needed to develop a communication plan that is appropriate for managing crises related to vaccine safety. This guidance will be useful for managers in the areas of immunization and vaccine and vaccination safety. They will also help preparedness and response teams working in safety crises to optimize their communication plans in order to regain, maintain, or strengthen trust in vaccines, vaccination, and immunization programs in general. Each chapter presents a phase (preparation, implementation, and evaluation) with suggested actions and support tools to prepare, implement, and evaluate a communication response in a crisis situation. Also, some sections can also be used to strengthen routine national communication activities such as interaction with media, message generation, spokespeople preparation among others. The current document complements the Manual for the surveillance of events supposedly attributable to vaccination or immunization (ESAVI) in the Region of the Americas. This document is published within the framework of a joint project that aims to promote communication-related to safe vaccination in the Region of the Americas and support health authorities that need to develop a communication plan to manage crises related to vaccine safety. Some of the sections in this publication are based on the guidance documents available in the WHO Regional Office for Europe's virtual library and can be consulted on their website.


In the search for treatment schemes of COVID-19, we start by examining the general weakness of coronaviruses and then identify approved drugs attacking that weakness. The approach, if successful, should identify drugs with a specific mechanism that is at least as effective as the best drugs proposed and are ready for clinical trials. All coronaviruses translate their non-structural proteins (∼16) in concatenation, resulting in a very large super-protein. Homo-harringtonine (HHT), which has been approved for the treatment of leukemia, blocks protein elongation very effectively. Hence, HHT can repress the replication of many coronaviruses at the nano-molar concentration. In two mouse models, HHT clears SARS-CoV-2 in 3 days, especially by nasal dripping of 40 ug per day. We also use dogs to confirm the safety of HHT delivered by nebulization. The nebulization scheme could be ready for large-scale applications at the onset of the next epidemics. For the current COVID-19, a clinical trial has been approved by the Ditan hospital of Beijing but could not be implemented for want of patients. The protocol is available to qualified medical facilities.


Naturalistic and anti-humanist accounts of early Lǎo-Zhuāng (老莊) Daoism and of the uncanny or terrifying sublime suggest that the everyday life and conventional personality of the individual is interrupted and displaced by overwhelming impersonal powers that reveal the "human" to be a false construction and the world an aesthetic, natural, or mystical play of forces. This is often portrayed as entailing an either/or between anthropocentric humanism, with all of its questionable assumptions about "the human" as distinct from animals and the natural world, and an impersonal naturalism that seems to depersonalize and de-individuate the person. I will examine whether there is an alternative to both of these onesided perspectives and argue that human beings can be individuated within and in the context of their natural world. Such a natural and yet still ethical individuation can be glimpsed in the work attributed to the ancient Chinese thinker Zhuāngzi (莊子), the Zhuāngzi, and in Immanuel Kant's Critique of Judgment.According to standard readings,


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Objective: Mucopolysaccharidosis II (MPS II), also known as Hunter syndrome, is a rare, recessive, X-linked lysosomal storage disorder caused by a deficiency of lysosomal enzyme iduronate-2-sulfatase (IDS), encoded by IDS gene. I2S plays an important role in the lysosomal degradation of dermatan sulfate and heparan sulfate, with I2S deficiency leading to the accumulation of these glycosaminoglycans in the tissues. Materials and Methods: Exon-specific analyses of IDS exon 8 from eight Indonesian patients with MPS II from Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital, Jakarta, Indonesia, were performed using polymerase chain reaction and sequencing-based methods. Results: Two novel mutations and a deletion variant of exon 8 were identified among the patients. A single-nucleotide deletion variant (c.1023delA), causing a frameshift in the corresponding amino acid sequence (p.Glu341AspfsTer19), was observed in all patients. In addition, a novel missense mutation (c.1033T>C) resulting in a tryptophan to arginine substitution (p.Trp345Arg), along with a single-nucleotide deletion (c.1041delA) resulting in a second frameshift in the amino acid sequence (p.Lys347AsnfsTer13), was also observed in one patient. Conclusion: This study provides the first mutation analysis of exon 8 of IDS and successfully identified mutations within the IDS gene that may be associated with MPS II. These findings will be added to the IDS gene profile database and may help in the diagnosis of MPS II in future.


This paper evaluates two recently implemented strategies to control land use conflict and overgrazing in Kajiado district of southern Kenya, stressing the importance of analyzing attempts to alter traditional pastoralist production systems in terms of the "complex ethno-ecological mosaic in which political power allocates access to strategic resources". A situation, structure, performance paradigm is applied to the problem. Factors central to the situation which underlie the issue of overgrazing are grounded in the ecological and historical context. Highly unpredictable rainfall, repeated drought, and an increasingly constricted resource base form the primary constraints of the Masai production system. In response, complex cultural adaptations and herd management strategies have evolved to provide maximum security and support for the institution of the family. It is these social factors which must be kept in mind as the evaluation of intervention strategies proceeds. Two intervention strategies designed to address the issue of overstocking from slightly different perspectives are described in detail and then evaluated in terms of their likely performance outcomes. These strategies are land adjudication into group ranches, and the payment of Wildlife Utilization Fees to group ranches bordering on the national parks. For a number of reasons; especially those related to property rights, and the costs of obtaining information, reaching agreement, and enforcing decisions; it appears unlikely that either strategy will be very effective in changing herd management practices such as mobility or the stocking of large numbers.


This paper evaluates the technical efficiency performance of Vietnamese manufacturing small and medium enterprises (SMEs) over the period 2002 to 2007. Using firm level data from three surveys in 2002, 2005 and 2007 with a total of 5,204 observations of domestic non-state manufacturing SMEs the paper assesses the technical efficiency level of SMEs for the aggregate manufacturing sector and separately for nine subsectors including: (i) Food and Beverages; (ii) Textiles, Garments and Footwear; (iii) Electrical and Electronic Equipment (iv) Wood and Furniture Products; (v) Chemical, Rubber and Plastic Products; (vi) Paper, Printing and Publishing; (vii) Metal Products; (viii) Non-metallic Products; and (ix) Machinery and Equipment. Results from the estimation of a stochastic frontier production function, an econometric approach to evaluate technical efficiency, reveal that Vietnamese non-state manufacturing SMEs in aggregate have relatively high average technical efficiency. Their technical efficiency reached an average level of 89.71 percent for the three surveys in 2002, 2005 and 2007. They have mean technical efficiencies of 84.25 percent, 92.55 percent, and 92.34 percent of the best practice frontier in 2002, 2005 and 2007, respectively. The results indicate that these firms can increase their current level of output by almost 15.7 percent in 2002, by about 7.5 percent in 2005 and by 7.7 percent in 2007 with the same level of inputs. The sub-sector analysis shows that technical efficiency ranges from 70 percent to 100 percent or full technical efficiency, across sub-sectors in the 2002 – 2007 period. It is found that the high-tech Electronics and Electrical Equipment subsector has the lowest mean technical efficiency level of around 80 percent for the three surveys. The low-tech Wood and Furniture sub-sector consistently performs with full technical efficiency. Although the period examined is limited to only 5 years, there is evidence that technical efficiency increased over the 2002 – 2007 period. The findings from this study provide empirically-founded policy recommendations to improve efficiency and competiveness of Vietnamese manufacturing SMEs.


This article is an assessment of the role of African Americans in effecting democratic African politics and leadership. Assessments of African development provide the basis for explaining African contemporary leadership challenges and a survey of U.S. foreign policy toward Africa is used to evaluate the domestic political environment that elicited African Americans' political activism on behalf of Africa. Two historic case studies, of Italy's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935 and the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa during the 1980s, are used to identify, characterize, and assess African Americans' political influence on African development and leadership. The article assesses the means, motivation, and impact of African American political activity on behalf of Africa to explain how democratic movements may improve African leadership. The article concludes that African Americans most effectively contribute to democratic development in Africa when they interact directly with African social and political organizations to encourage responsive, effective leadership.


As a relatively new concept in terms of theoretical research, special dart is the dart that not only fits the curves of human body, but also satisfies the demands of clothing design. By studying the inherent characters and designing methods of special dart as well as by summarizing innovative designing concepts and methods, this thesis attempts to serve as a beneficial complement to the modern design of fit women's wear. It begins with an elaboration on the concept of special dart. Then, through a study of fit women's wear and fabric, the author summarizes the relationship between special dart and fabric. Finally, the author comes to conclude several designing methods of special dart adopted in women's wear.


In complex systems, it has been observed that the parts within the system are "loosely coupled". Loose coupling means that the parts of the system interact in some way, and as long as this interaction is maintained the parts
can evolve independently. Detrimental evolutionary changes within one part of the system do not negatively affect other parts. Overall system functionality is maintained, leading to faster evolution.

In swarm robotic systems there are multiple robots working together to achieve a shared goal. However it is not always obvious how to program the actions of the robots such that the desired aggregate behaviour emerges. One solution is to use a genetic algorithm to evolve robot controllers, this
approach is called "Evolutionary Swarm Robotics".

This thesis makes the case that swarm robotic systems are complex systems, and hypothesises that loose coupling between the robots in a swarm would lead to faster evolution. Robot swarms are investigated where robots
describe environmental features to each other as part of a foraging task. Multiple descriptions can be used to describe a feature. The mappings between feature descriptions, and the signals used to express those descriptions, are manipulated. By doing this, the interactions between robots can change over time or stay the same.
Results show that loose coupling leads to higher swarmfitnesses because it makes the communicated information easier to interpret. However there are some subtleties in its working. We also observe that if some of the information is not useful for completing the task, this negatively affects swarm fitness regardless of coupling. This problem can be mitigated by using loose coupling.
This research has implications for the design of communication within robot swarms. Before evolution, it is difficult to know what information is relevant.
This research shows that sharing unnecessary information between robots is detrimental to swarm fitness because the cost of interpreting information can be greater than the benefit gained from the information. Loose coupling
can reduce, but not eliminate, the evolutionary cost of interpreting multiple pieces of information in exchange for slower message transmission.


A hallmark of modern large language models (LLMs) is their impressive general zero-shot and few-shot abilities, often elicited through in-context learning (ICL) via prompting. However, while highly coveted and being the most general, zero-shot performances in LLMs are still typically weaker due to the lack of guidance and the difficulty of applying existing automatic prompt design methods in general tasks when ground-truth labels are unavailable. In this study, we address this by presenting Universal Self-Adaptive Prompting (USP), an automatic prompt design approach specifically tailored for zero-shot learning (while compatible with few-shot). Requiring only a small amount of unlabeled data and an inference-only LLM, USP is highly versatile: to achieve universal prompting, USP categorizes a possible NLP task into one of the three possible task types and then uses a corresponding selector to select the most suitable queries and zero-shot model-generated responses as pseudo-demonstrations, thereby generalizing ICL to the zero-shot setup in a fully automated way. We evaluate USP with PaLM and PaLM 2 models and demonstrate performances that are considerably stronger than standard zero-shot baselines and often comparable to or even superior to few-shot baselines across more than 40 natural language understanding, natural language generation, and reasoning tasks.


It is important to understand how people perceive the impact of oral diseases on their quality of life. Oral health-related quality of life (OHRQOL) is a relatively new but rapidly growing notion. The concept of OHRQOL is particularly significant to 3 areas - clinical practice of dentistry, dental research and dental education. There are different approaches to measure OHRQOL; the most popular one uses multiple item questionnaires. OHRQOL should be the basis for any oral health programme development. Moreover, research at the conceptual level is needed in countries where OHRQOL has not been previously assessed, including the Eastern Mediterranean countries.


KAPPA is a type system for safe concurrent object-oriented programming using reference capabilities. It uses a combination of static and dynamic techniques to guarantee data-race freedom, and, for a certain subset of the system, non-interference (and thereby deterministic parallelism). It combines many features from previous work on alias management, such as substructural types, regions, ownership types, and fractional permissions, and brings them together using a unified set of primitives. In this extended abstract we show how KAPPA's capabilities express variations of the aforementioned concepts, discuss the main insights from working with KAPPA, present the current status of the implementation of KAPPA in the context of the actor language Encore, and discuss ongoing and future work.


The root crops consumed in Trinidad and Tobago that are of significant economic importance are cassava, sweetpotato, yams, and dasheen. The Ministry of Agriculture, Land and Marine Resources provides education and training courses for farmers and research programmes in agronomy, crop protection, and post-harvest handling. Two significant aspects of the Government's policy that have continued to provide a strong basis for the sustainable production of root crops are the on-going maintenance of its plant genetic resource base and the training programmes both in-house and in the field. Root crops are generally manually harvested in quantities that are saleable within two days in the markets minimizing the need for storage. Processed products include frozen cassava, chips, and farine which are consumed locally. Export and processing operations have fluctuated because of inconsistent supplies. However, there is a marketing thrust to stimulate production via increased utilization locally through the school-feeding programme. Root crops, therefore, will continue to significantly contribute to sustainable food security in the next millennium.


In composite agricultural materials such as grass, tee, medicinal plants; leaves and stems have a different drying time. By this behavior, after leaving the dryer, the stems may have greater moisture content than desired, while the leaves one minor, which can cause either the appearance of fungi or the collapse of the over-dried material. Taking into account that a lot of grass is dehydrated in forced air dryers, especially rotary drum dryers, this research was developed in order to establish conditions enabling to make a separation of the components during the drying process in order to provide a homogeneous product at the end. For this, a rotary dryer consisting of three concentric cylinders and a circular sieve aligned with the more internal cylinder was proposed; so that, once material enters into the dryer in the area of the inner cylinder, stems pass through sieve to the middle and then continue towards the external cylinder, while the leaves continue by the inner cylinder. For this project, a mixture of Ryegrass and White Clover was used. The characteristics of the components of a mixture were: Drying Rate in thin layer and in rotation, Bulk density, Projected Area, Terminal velocity, weight/Area Ratio, Flux through Rotary sieve. Three drying temperatures; 40°C, 60° C and 80° C, and three rotation speeds; 10 rpm, 20 rpm and 40 rpm were evaluated. It was found that the differences in drying time are the less at 80 °C when the dryer rotates at 40 rpm. Above this speed, the material adheres to the walls of the dryer or sieve and does not flow. According to the measurements of terminal velocity of stems and leaves of the components of the mixture, the speed of the air should be less than 1.5 m s-1 in the inner drum for the leaves and less than 4.5 m s-1 in middle and outer drums for stems, in such way that only the rotational movement of the dryer moves the material and achieves a greater residence time. In other hand, the best rotary sieve separation efficiencies were achieved when the material is dry, but the results are good in all the moisture contents. The best rotary speed of sieve is within the critical rotational speed, i.e. 20 rpm. However, the rotational speed of the dryer, including the sieve in line with the inner cylinder should be 10 rpm or less in order to achieve the greatest residence times of the material inside the dryer and the best agitation through the use of lifting flights. With a finite element analysis of a dryer prototype, using an air flow allowing speeds of air already stated, I was found that the best performance occurs when, through a cover, air enters the dryer front of the Middle cylinder and when the inner cylinder is formed in its entirety through a sieve. This way, air flows in almost equal amounts by both the middle and external cylinders, while part of the air in the Middle cylinder passes through the sieve towards the inner cylinder. With this, leaves do not adhere to the sieve and flow along drier, thanks to the rotating movement of the drums and the showering caused by the lifting flights. In these conditions, the differences in drying time are reduced to 60 minutes, but the residence time is higher for the stems than for leaves, therefore the components of the mixture of grass run out of the dryer with the same desired moisture content.


Surgical treatment of patients with aortic aneurism dissection type I according to DeBakey classification still remains a chal-lenge for surgeons and represents still unresolved problem in respect of a choice of ideal strategy. The best results in treatment of this pathology are reached by multidisciplinary approach with use of a hybrid method. This message shows successful application of a hybrid method in treatment of the aortic aneurism dissection type I according to DeBakey classification.


Promoting the application potential of graphenes in biomolecule
adsorption and detection is of great significance in the field of
nanobiotechnology. In this paper, the density functional theory
calculation was used to study the adsorption and sensing of L-cysteine
on graphene-based compounds, single-vacancy and double-vacancy graphenes
(XSV and XDV) doped with 3p-bolck elements (Al, Si, P, and S). Along
with the dopant changing from Al to S, XSV exhibits decreasing
exothermical chemisorption to endothermical chemi-sorption, while XDV
exhibits decreasing exothermical chemisorption to endothermical
physisorption. L-cysteine adsorption on XDV is weaker than corresponding
adsorption on XSV. Valence electron number, and atomic ionization
potential, modulated by the 3p-block dopant, and X-C interaction,
modulated by the vacancy type, contribute to adsorption mechanism of
L-cysteine on XGs. The study could facilitate applications of Al, Si, P
and S doped graphenes in biosensing technology, biomolecule
immobilization, bioseparation and other fields.


This paper examines corporate credit risks in the Netherlands at the industry-level, addressing two key questions. First, to what extent are corporate credit risks driven by idiosyncratic financial factors or systematic macroeconomic factors? Second, did debt financing in the late 1990s indeed push a large number of firms into bankruptcy in the subsequent years? To this end, bankruptcy rates are regressed on a number of industry-specific financial ratio's and macroeconomic variables in a panel-regression framework covering six industries from 1992 to 2005. I find that an industry's bankruptcy rate rises with an increase in leverage and a decrease in profitability and liquidity. Adding macroeconomic variables shows that lower GDP growth, higher interest rates, and an appreciating currency raise credit risks. Applying a model with parameter heterogeneity illustrates that systematic factors primarily account for the overall rise in bankruptcy rates between 2000 and 2003, but that idiosyncratic factors dominate in the worst-affected industries. This includes the IT industry where the build-up of debt was most pronounced and compounded losses.


Incorporation of guest materials into semiconducting single crystalline hosts leads to the formation of semiconducting single-crystal composites. However, limited efforts have been made to comprehensively investigate the property of these potential functionalized single-crystal composites. Herein, PbI2/gel single-crystal composites have been successfully prepared. Diffuse reflectance spectra show a clear increase in the band gap of PbI2 after gel incorporation. The band gap is further increased through expanding the area of host/guest interfaces or enhancing the interatomic forces at the interfaces. The interatomic forces (electrostatic interaction) at the host/guest interfaces are attributed to this band gap shift. As such, this study provides a novel and facile way for band gap engineering by gel incorporation.


Significance A foundational question in art and aesthetics is if there are culturally and temporally transcendent characteristics in the organizing principles within art and if yes, how these principles evolve over time. We propose a simple yet coherent information-theoretic framework that captures compositional proportion as used for dissecting landscape paintings by artists. The analysis of 14,912 landscape paintings representing the canonical historiography of Western art uncovers that the preferred compositional proportion within the historiography of landscape paintings systematically evolves over time. The network analysis of similarity distributions reveals clear clustering structures of individual artist's artworks, absolute time periods, and conventional style periods, suggesting meaningful supergroups of art historical concepts, which remained so far nonintuitive to a broader audience. Painting has played a major role in human expression, evolving subject to a complex interplay of representational conventions, social interactions, and a process of historization. From individual qualitative work of art historians emerges a metanarrative that remains difficult to evaluate in its validity regarding emergent macroscopic and underlying microscopic dynamics. The full scope of granular data, the summary statistics, and consequently, also their bias simply lie beyond the cognitive limit of individual qualitative human scholarship. Yet, a more quantitative understanding is still lacking, driven by a lack of data and a persistent dominance of qualitative scholarship in art history. Here, we show that quantitative analyses of creative processes in landscape painting can shed light, provide a systematic verification, and allow for questioning the emerging metanarrative. Using a quasicanonical benchmark dataset of 14,912 landscape paintings, covering a period from the Western renaissance to contemporary art, we systematically analyze the evolution of compositional proportion via a simple yet coherent information-theoretic dissection method that captures iterations of the dominant horizontal and vertical partition directions. Tracing frequency distributions of seemingly preferred compositions across several conceptual dimensions, we find that dominant dissection ratios can serve as a meaningful signature to capture the unique compositional characteristics and systematic evolution of individual artist bodies of work, creation date time spans, and conventional style periods, while concepts of artist nationality remain problematic. Network analyses of individual artists and style periods clarify their rhizomatic confusion while uncovering three distinguished yet nonintuitive supergroups that are meaningfully clustered in time.


PURPOSE
To evaluate the sealing ability of Class II Scotchbond Multi-Purpose/Z100 composite restorations placed under in vivo and in vitro conditions.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
For the in vivo part, Class II preparations were cut in posterior teeth which were scheduled for extraction for periodontal reasons. The cervical margins ended in dentin-cementum, 1 mm below the CEJ. The teeth were extracted after 2-3 months of clinical service. The in vitro part was performed in extracted posterior teeth, free from restorations and caries, following the same in vivo protocol. The in vivo and in vitro samples were processed and evaluated for marginal leakage.

RESULTS
Leakage by dye penetration was observed at the cervical margins in 70% of the in vivo and in 50% of the in vitro specimens. All in vivo samples with no leakage at the cervical margin were restored where the adjacent interproximal tooth was missing. In more than 40% of the restorations placed in vivo, leakage was also found at the occlusal margins. Statistically significant differences were found at the cervical margins between in vivo and in vitro groups (P < 0.05). The in vitro samples can be of only limited value in predicting clinical performances of an enamel-dentin bonding system in Class II restorations.


This study's purpose was to investigate the public perception of institutional efficacy to provide specialized care for elderly people and its influence on the uptake of institutional care in Nakuru County, Kenya. Specifically, the study examined perceived institutional efficacy in taking care of the aged and socio-cultural factors on the one hand and their influence on the uptake of institutional care for the elderly. A pilot study was carried at Kericho County to determine the validity and reliability of the study. The study engaged 400 respondents, who were selected through purposive and stratified random sampling. Data for the study was collected with questionnaires and in-depth interviews. The results indicate that uptake of care homes is positively influenced by physical facilities and negatively affected by staff. Thus, the availability of proper physical facilities for accommodation and physical exercise was a positive factor. It was, however, unexpected to find that the availability of competent staff negatively influenced the uptake of institutionalized care. The legality of the care homes was not a non-issue for the society in terms of influencing their decision to enroll their relative to the care homes. It is, therefore, necessary to sensitize the society about the efficacy of staff in the care homes as well as the importance of the legal status of the care homes.


Original title: LHBT-monitor 2018

This report examines the life situation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. The following question is central: 'To what extent does the life situation of LGBT? people differ from that of cisgender (non-transgender) heterosexual people, and to what extent has there been a change in their life situation in recent years?' Various aspects of life are examined, such as the areas of safety and health. The LGBT Monitor 2018 is based exclusively on large-scale, representative population studies: the SCP Life Situation Index, the Safety Monitor, the National Health Survey, the National Survey on Employment Conditions, the Sex Survey among people aged 25 years and under, and on registration data.


Purpose

Presently, loyalty programs often offer preferential treatment to the firm's best customers, and recently, service firms started to incorporate corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives into the loyalty reward programs (e.g. Starwood's "Make A Green Choice"). However, academic research advancing the understanding of the effectiveness of CSR-focused loyalty programs is lacking. To bridge that gap, this paper aims to examine the influence of a "green" loyalty program on members' and bystanders' service encounter satisfaction in light of preferential treatment. Furthermore, this paper investigates the psychological mechanisms (prosociality perceptions and status perceptions) that underlie these effects.

Design/methodology/approach

This study used a 2 (loyalty program: green vs standard) × 2 (customer type: member vs bystander) × 2 (observability of preferential treatment: low vs high) between-subjects experimental design. Respondents were asked to read a hotel check-in scenario and then completed scales that measured their perceptions and evaluations of the service encounter.

Findings

Results from this study suggest that a green loyalty program can buffer the negative effect of preferential treatment on bystanders' service encounter satisfaction. An examination of the underlying mechanism reveals that prosociality perceptions of the firm mediate the impact of loyalty programs on bystanders' satisfaction. As expected, the results show that a green loyalty program is as effective as a standard program in elevating members' satisfaction. Furthermore, findings from a moderated mediation analysis indicate that status perceptions mediate the impact of customer type on satisfaction. However, status perceptions have a greater leveraging power in satisfaction when observability of preferential treatment is high.

Originality/value

The results of this study have significant implications for service firms with loyalty programs and customer prioritization practices. By incorporating CSR into their loyalty programs, firms may be able to mitigate the negative bystander effect while maintaining the positive effects of preferential treatment on members' service encounter satisfaction.


Summary Shoulder dystocia is an obstetric emergency that currently affects 0.6% of all deliveries in the UK. This potentially serious obstetric emergency requires early recognition and prompt involvement of appropriately trained personnel to deliver the baby safely and without delay. Failure to do so may result in significant neonatal and maternal morbidity, with ensuing litigation. As part of clinical governance, hospital trusts are under pressure to continually improve the quality of service provided to their patients. Meticulous and accurate documentation is the crucial first step. The second step is preparedness and practice. Although we are still not very good at being able to prevent or predict shoulder dystocia, when it occurs, we must be ready and able to deal with it effectively. This can best be accomplished through re-education and re-training of obstetric staff and the updating of Trust management protocols. By promptly acting in accordance with established evidence-based guidelines, we will improve our ability to carefully and competently manage deliveries complicated by shoulder dystocia. However, failing to do so will inevitably have dire repercussions for all.


In the present study, we analysed the association of mutations of a BRCA1-associated gene, ABRAXAS1, with the risk of development of breast cancer (BC) in BRCA1-negative women from North-Central Poland. A hundred women with consecutively diagnosed BC and 100 women belonging to the control group were screened for new mutations predisposing to breast cancer. The first step was a test carried out in order to find one of the three Polish founder mutations in the BRCA1 gene. In 96 BRCA1-negative patients two missense variants: c.422C>T and c.1042G>A as well as two intronic variants: IVS3-34G>A, IVS3-44T>C were detected in the ABRAXAS1 gene. The c.422C>T mutation was detected in one of 96 women diagnosed with breast cancer (1.04%); it was not associated with increased risk of disease in this group, compared to the controls (p = 0.49), but the odds ratio was 3.314; 95% CI: 0.122-75.352. IVS3-44T>C was found more frequently in the control group (15/93) than in the tested group (1/85), OR 0.062; 95% CI: 0.008-0.480, p = 0.007, which may suggest protective properties of this variant against tumorigenicity. The data obtained from the present study suggest the necessity for further research to be conducted on the ABRAXAS1 gene in relation to hereditary predisposition to breast cancer.


We propose a conceptual framework that decomposes the overall acquisition integration process into four sequential and co-evolving processes: (i) formulating the integration logic and performance goals, (ii) establishing the integration planning approach, (iii) executing operational integration, and (iv) executing strategic integration. Managing the strategic dynamics of acquisition integration in fast changing competitive environments requires attention to all four processes and the feedback loops between them. Our analysis of the HP-Compaq merger, however, suggests that creating a strong feedback loop between the operational integration process and the process of formulating the integration logic and performance goals is difficult, yet is needed to timely revise the initial assumptions in light of changing market realities and responses of key customers to the new corporate strategy. It also suggests that establishing a strong feedback loop between the strategic integration process and the process of formulating the integration logic and performance goals is difficult, yet is needed to maintain sustained top management attention to the multi-year strategic activities necessary to meet the dynamic competitive challenges. Our analysis, furthermore, suggests that top management should be cautious at the outset in stating long-term goals for the new company, not declare victory too soon, and reduce the opportunity costs of acquisition integration by augmenting its own bandwidth for managing large-scale strategic change.


A steady inductive helicity injection (SIHI) method is described that has the following properties: (a) helicity is injected at a nearly constant rate; (b) neither magnetic energy nor helicity flow out of plasma at any time; (c) no open field lines penetrate the walls; (d) the equilibrium is produced in a close-fitting flux conserver; (e) a rotating magnetic structure is produced directly; and (f) in the frame of the rotating field, the current profile is nearly time independent and nearly optimum for the application discussed. SIHI can be applied to any toroidal plasma. Application of SIHI to a high-beta spheromak is described.


Background There are no prospective studies that would have compared the relationships of different types of physical activity (PA) and sedentary behavior (SB) with academic skills among children. We therefore investigated the associations of different types of PA and SB with reading and arithmetic skills in a follow-up study among children. Methods The participants were 186 children (107 boys, 79 girls, 6–8 yr) who were followed-up in Grades 1–3. PA and SB were assessed using a questionnaire in Grade 1. Reading fluency, reading comprehension and arithmetic skills were assessed using standardized tests at the end of Grades 1–3. Results Among all children more recess PA and more time spent in SB related to academic skills were associated with a better reading fluency across Grades 1–3. In boys, higher levels of total PA, physically active school transportation and more time spent in SB related to academic skills were associated with a better reading fluency across the Grades 1–3. Among girls, higher levels of total PA were related to worse arithmetic skills across Grades 1–3. Moreover, total PA was directly associated with reading fluency and arithmetic skills in Grades 1–3 among girls whose parents had a university degree, whereas these relationships were inverse in girls of less educated parents. Conclusions Total PA, physically active school transportation and SB related to academic skills may be beneficial for the development of reading skills in boys, whereas factors that are independent of PA or SB may be more important for academic skills in girls. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT01803776


Electric power generator is an essential household facility particularly in developing countries. It exists in various capacities and makes in shops, offices, workshops and factories. The attendant environmental risks of this source of power supply are major challenges to users both at household and industrial level. Efforts through research and development are still on-going to mitigate the prevailing health hazards. This study investigates noise level of typical portable generator (2 kW/220 V) and the sound absorbance capacity of an acoustic enclosure developed from a multilayer panel made of locally sourced galvanized metal sheet (0.90 mm), Polyurethane acoustic foam (7.50 mm), Particle board (35.0 mm) and plywood (10.0 mm). The noise produced by the generator when on load and no load were considered for cases of it being placed inside and outside the enclosure and compared with acceptable OSHA safe thresholds noise level for the school environment where the study was carried out. The result shows a significant reduction of noise produced indicating a shift from very laud threshold (average of 86.23 dB (A)) for no load and no enclosure to moderately low region (average of 69.34 dB (A)) for the case of no load using enclosure. Likewise considering loaded scenario similar trend was recoded with average acoustic capacity of the enclosure of 23.20 dB (A). The effect of the enclosure is positive and the potential benefits of improved noise absorption panels to enhance better performance of the developed enclosure for office and household generators was established. Keywords: Electric Generator, Enclosure Panel, Noise control, Load, Household.


Particles in secondhand vapour from e-cigarettes have the potential to damage the health of non-smokers, a study by environmental scientists presented at the e-cigarette summit in London on 13 November has found.

Researchers presented the first results from chamber experiments that measured the concentration, size, and composition of particles in e-cigarette vapour, and how these parameters changed over time, to determine their potential effects on non-smokers.

Roy Harrison, professor of environmental health and risk management at the University of Birmingham, and Gordon McFiggans, professor of atmospheric multiphase processes at the University of Manchester, presented the results. Harrison said that although the data were preliminary, they "provide evidence for a possible exposure risk to passive smokers in …


We demonstrate a method for unmanned aerial vehicle based structure from motion mapping and show it to be a viable option for large scale, high resolution terrain modeling. Current methods of large scale terrain modeling can be cost and time prohibitive. We present a method for integrating low cost cameras and unmanned aerial vehicles for the purpose of 3D terrain mapping. Using structure from motion, aerial images taken of the landscape can be reconstructed into 3D models of the terrain. This process is well suited for use on unmanned aerial vehicles due to the light weight and low cost of equipment. We discuss issues of flight path planning and propose an algorithm to assist in the generation of these paths. The structure from motion mapping process is experimentally evaluated in three distinct environments: ground based testing on man-made environments, ground based testing on natural environments, and airborne testing on natural environments. Ground based testing on natural environments was shown to be extremely useful for camera calibration, and the resulting models were found to have a maximum error of 4.26 cm and standard deviation of 1.50 cm. During airborne testing, several areas of approximately 30,000 m 2 were mapped. These areas were mapped with acceptable accuracy and a resolution of 1.24 cm.


Semiconductor nanoparticles (quantum dots) were studied in the context of liquid scintillator development for upcoming neutrino experiments. The unique optical and chemical properties of quantum dots are particularly promising for the use in neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments. Liquid scintillators for large scale neutrino detectors have to meet specific requirements which are reviewed, highlighting the peculiarities of quantum-dot-doping. In this paper, we report results on laboratory-scale measurements of the attenuation length and the fluorescence properties of three commercial quantum dot samples. The results include absorbance and emission stability measurements, improvement in transparency due to filtering of the quantum dot samples, precipitation tests to isolate the quantum dots from solution and energy transfer studies with quantum dots and the fluorophore PPO.


Objective. To compare the rate of biochemical and hepatic decompensation after viral breakthrough (V-BT) caused by lamivudine (LMV)-resistant HBV mutants and during rescue treatment for patients with liver cirrhosis (LC) and chronic hepatitis B (CHB). Material and methods. We reviewed the medical records of 205 CHB patients who developed V-BT with LMV-resistant HBV mutants (134 in the CHB group, 71 in the LC group). Results. Sixty-five of the 205 patients had an alanine aminotransferase (ALAT) flare-up (32%) and 21 (10%) had hepatic decompensation. The ALAT flare-up among the CHB and LC groups occurred in 43 (32%) and 22 patients (31%), respectively, and there was no significant difference between the two groups. Hepatic decompensation occurred in 5 (4%) and 16 (23%) patients with CHB and LC, respectively, and these differences were significant (p=0.001). A total of 187 patients were treated by rescue therapy (CHB 121, LC 66) and 13 cases with hepatic decompensation occurred only in LC patients during rescue therapy. Among them, 11 patients had serum ALAT levels two times higher than the upper normal limit (UNL) and the HBV-DNA was more than 107 copies/ml at the baseline of rescue therapy. In contrast, the cumulative ALAT normalization and viral response rates were reached significantly earlier in patients with a serum HBV-DNA of ≤107 copies/ml compared with those with an HBV-DNA >107 copies/ml (p=0.0221 and 0.0002, respectively). Conclusion. Earlier rescue therapy for cirrhotic patients with genotypic resistance due to LMV-resistant mutants may improve patient outcome.


For concurrent I/O operations, atomicity defines the results in the overlapping file regions simultaneously read/written by requesting processes. Atomicity has been well studied at the file system level, such as POSIX standard. We investigate the problems arising from the implementation of MPI atomicity for concurrent overlapping write access and provide two programming solutions. Since the MPI definition of atomicity differs from the POSIX one, an implementation that simply relies on the POSIX file systems does not guarantee correct MPI semantics. To have a correct implementation of atomic I/O in MPI, we examine the efficiency of three approaches: I) file locking, 2) graph-coloring, and 3) process-rank ordering. Performance complexity for these methods are analyzed and their experimental results are presented for file systems including NFS, SGI's XFS, and IBM's GPFS


Demographic inference methods in population genetics typically assume that the ancestry of a sample can be modeled by the Kingman coalescent. A defining feature of this stochastic process is that it generates genealogies that are binary trees: no more than two ancestral lineages may coalesce at the same time. However, this assumption breaks down under several scenarios. For example, pervasive natural selection and extreme variation in offspring number can both generate genealogies with "multiple-merger" events in which more than two lineages coalesce instantaneously. Therefore, detecting multiple mergers is important both for understanding which forces have shaped the diversity of a population and for avoiding fitting misspecified models to data. Current methods to detect multiple mergers in genomic data rely on the site frequency spectrum (SFS). However, the signatures of multiple mergers in the SFS are also consistent with a Kingman coalescent with a time-varying population size. Here, we present a new method for detecting multiple mergers based on the pointwise mutual information of the two-site frequency spectrum for pairs of linked sites. Unlike the SFS, the pointwise mutual information depends mostly on the topologies of genealogies rather than on their branch lengths and is therefore largely insensitive to population size change. This statistic is global in the sense that it can detect when the genome-wide genetic diversity is inconsistent with the Kingman coalescent, rather than detecting outlier regions, as in selection scan methods. Finally, we demonstrate a graphical model-checking procedure based on the point-wise mutual information using genomic diversity data from Drosophila melanogaster.


Background/Aims Litter size is one of the most important reproductive traits in pig breeding, which is affected by multiple genes and the environment. Ovaries are the most important reproductive organs and have a profound impact on the reproduction efficiency. Therefore, genetic differences in the ovaries may contribute to the observed differences in litter size. Although QTLs and candidate genes have been reported to affect the litter size in many pig breeds, however, the findings cannot elucidate the marked differences of the reproductive traits between breeds. The aim of present work is to elucidate the mechanisms of the differences for the reproductive traits and identify candidate genes associated with litter size in Xiang pig breed. Methods The changes in ovary transcriptome and alternative splicing were investigated at estrus between Xiang pigs with large and small litter size by RNA-seq technology. The RNA-seq results were confirmed by RT-qPCR method. Results We detected 16,219 - 16,285 expressed genes and 12 types of alternative splicing (AS) events in Xiang pig samples. A total of 762 differentially expressed genes were identified by XL (Xiang pig group with large litter size) vs XS (Xiang pig group with small litter size) sample comparisons. A total of 34 genes were upregulated and 728 genes were downregulated in XL ovary samples compared with the XS samples. Alternative splicing (AS) rates in XL samples were slightly lower than that observed in XS samples. Most of differentially expressed genes were differentially regulated on AS level. Eleven candidate genes were potentially identified to be related to Xiang pig fecundity and litter size, which may be closely related to the gonad development, oocyte maturation or embryo quality. Conclusion The significant changes in the expression of the protein-coding genes and the level of alternative splicing in estrus ovarian transcriptome between XL and XS groups probably are the molecular mechanisms of phenotypic variation in litter size.


Useful information about affects and affective states can be extracted form the physiological signals, even under difficult lighting and pose conditions. Little work has been done on using physiological signals in automated affect recognition systems. We employed measurements of facial skin temperature variations for developing a non-intrusive automated facial expression classification system. Variances in thermal intensity values recorded at thermally significant locations on human faces were used to discern between normal, pretended happy and pretended sad facial expression of affective states. A three-step algorithmic approach was used to construct the classifier. Employed approach involved derivation of principal components, stepwise selection of optimal and most discriminating features, and linear discriminant analysis within the reduced optimal eigenspace. The resulting classifier performed at an impressively low (16.2%) error rate


Introduction Photochemotherapy includes use of exogenous photosensitizer along with exposure to ultraviolet radiation {P- psoralen (photosensitizer) + UVA (ultraviolet radiation A)} which can be administered in form of oral or topical solution. Bath PUVA involves delivering psoralen through immersion in water containing methoxasalen (photosensitizer) followed by exposure to UVA radiation. We carried out this study in patients with psoriasis vulgaris to find the difference in response, adverse effects profile and duration of remission in patients treated with lower dose versus standard dose being used. Aim This was a prospective, randomized, double blinded study to compare the efficacy and side effects of low concentration i.e. 2.5mg/L versus standard concentration i.e. 3.75mg/L in patients suffering from psoriasis vulgaris with more than 20% body surface area involved. Methods Total of 19 patients were included, they were divided using block randomization technique into two groups; group A and group B consisting of 9 patients and 10 patients respectively. Group A patients were exposed to low dose of psoralean (2.5 mg/L) while group B patients were given 3.75 mg/L of methoxasalen. Phototherapy sessions were done at an interval of 48-72 hours for a total of 14 sessions and PASITUL (TUL) (TUL- Trunk, upper limb and lower limb) was calculated at every 4th session. Analysis of PASITUL was done using 3 point scale for PASI and any side effects during the therapy were noted. Results All the patients in both the groups achieved complete remission and there was no significant difference between cumulative UVA dose and duration of therapy as well. All the 19 patients irrespective of the concentration of 8-MOP (8-methoxypsoralean) achieved complete remission. 6 out of 19 patients had recurrence of psoriasis and 4 of these patients belonged to low concentration group while 2 were treated with high concentration and also remission was longer for patients in high concentration group. Conclusion 2.5 mg/L concentration of psoralen is as efficacious as 3.75mg/L with no significant difference in terms of side effects, number of sessions and cumulative dose of UVA radiation but treatment with 3.75mg/L leads to longer duration of clinical remission as compared to 2.5 mg/L.


The paper is concerned with a study into the mechanisms of renal interstitial lesions of the secondary character seen in patients afflicted with chronic glomerulonephritis. 120 patients with mesangioproliferative and membranous proliferative glomerulonephritis were examined. The patients were distributed into groups depending on the disease acuity, the degree of glomerular sclerosis and the disease stage. Three major mechanisms of the augmentation of changes in the renal interstice have been revealed: 1) exacerbation of the underlying process; 2) the degree of fibroplastic and sclerotic lesions in the glomerulus; 3) drug sensitization.


Abstract Background: The origin and prevalence of cerebral palsy can hardly be considered fully understood. The relationship between orthopedic and neuropsychiatric disorders in children with cerebral palsy in the available literature is also insufficiently presented. Material/Methods: Authors conducted a clinical and epidemiological analysis and examined the nature of motor disorders in 267 children with cerebral palsy aged from 3 to 16 years old. The monitoring period of patients ranged from 3 to 7 years. They underwent clinical neurological examination, radiography of the spine and joints, ultrasound examination of the joints and periarticular structures, electroencephalography and electroneuromyography in dynamics, with the help of a variational cardiointervalography characterized by an autonomic dysfunction (Veyn AM, 2000), studied the biomechanical parameters of walking, using scorecards, questioning and evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment using the special system to cerebral palsy (Pinchuk D Yu, Dudin MG, 2002). Results: In 80% of cases, brain damage occurred during fetal development. The authors distinguished primary and secondary disorders of movements. 71 persons (26.6%) had neurogenic and myogenic contractures, and in 196 people (73.4%) contractions were exacerbated by bone deformities. In the rehabilitation system 163 people (61 %) had a need for a surgical operation. Conclusions: The efficiency ratio of the functional status after rehabilitation in different age groups has improved by 10-22% more than before the treatment. It was shown objectively that improvement in the motor capacity in patients with cerebral palsy due rehabilitation has a positive effect on the function of the cerebral cortex. Abstract Background: The origin and prevalence of cerebral palsy can hardly be considered fully under-stood. The relationship between orthopedic and neuropsychiatric disorders in children with cerebral palsy in the available literature is also insufficiently presented. Material/Methods: Authors conducted a clinical and epidemiological analysis and examined the nature of motor disorders in 267 children with cerebral palsy aged from 3 to 16 years old. The monitoring period of patients ranged from 3 to 7 years. They underwent clinical neurological examination, radiography of the spine and joints, ultrasound examination of the joints and periarticular structures, electroencephalography and electroneuromyography in dynamics, with the help of a variational cardiointervalography characterized by an autonomic dysfunction (Veyn AM, 2000), studied the biomechanical parameters of walking, using scorecards, questioning and evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment using the special system to cerebral palsy (Pinchuk D Yu, Dudin MG, 2002). Results: In 80% of cases, brain damage occurred during fetal development. The authors distinguished primary and secondary disorders of movements. 71 persons (26.6%) had neurogenic and myogenic contractures, and in 196 people (73.4%)


Triphala is categorized as a rejuvenator and antioxidant‐rich Ayurvedic herbal formulation and has traditionally been used in various gastric problems including intestinal inflammation. The aim of the present study was to examine the comparative enteroprotective effect of Triphala formulations against methotrexate‐induced intestinal damage in rats. Triphala formulations were prepared by mixing equal (1:1:1) and unequal (1:2:4) proportions of Terminalia chebula Retz., Terminalia belerica (Gaertn.) Roxb. and Emblica officinalis Gaertn. Intestinal damage was induced by administering methotrexate (MTX) in a dose of 12 mg/kg, orally for 4 days to albino rats. The intestinal damage response was assessed by gross and microscopical injury, measuring the intestinal permeability to phenol red and tissue biochemical parameters. Triphala equal and unequal formulations at the dose of 540 mg/kg significantly restored the depleted protein level in brush border membrane of intestine, phospholipid and glutathione content and decreased the myeloperoxidase and xanthine oxidase level in intestinal mucosa of methotrexate‐treated rats. In addition, Triphala unequal formulation showed significant decrease in permeation clearance of phenol red with significant attenuation in the histopathological changes, level of disaccharidase in brush border membrane vesicles and lipid peroxidation content of intestinal mucosa. Based on the data generated, it is suggested that Triphala unequal formulation provides significantly more protection than Triphala equal formulation against methotrexate‐induced damage in rat intestine. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


This paper describes a microcomputer-controlled precision tester designed to evaluate a number of factors crucial in the development of a high performance disc drive. The tester is intended for use in head development, head-to-disc interface characterization, and analog read/write channel development. Issues considered in the design of the tester are the precision of head positioning, the accuracy of spindle rotational speed, the ease of read/write channel substitution, and the degree of program control required to meet key test parameters. The basic tester may be modified to permit conversion of this device to such task-oriented devices as servowriters.


This paper examined the association between the frequency of morphological alterations in fish and the physical and chemical parameters often used in monitoring water quality, with the aim of determining which places show most environmental degradation and which species are most affected. Fish samplings were standardized and carried out seasonally, using seine nets, in eleven locations in the catchment area of the Guaiba Lake. A total of 53,408 specimens were collected. Eight species were found to be constant in the samples and were therefore considered to be potential bioindicators. The highest frequency of morphological alterations was observed in the areas where the quality of water was the worst. Deformations of the opercular bones and of fin rays and spines were the most frequent alterations found. The repeated spatial pattern of the occurrence of deformations of fin rays and spines during two periods of study, points to this alteration as a good indicator of environmental quality


Abstract Improved IT products and services are continually being introduced around the world. However, although an increasingly common approach in many industries, little is known of the characteristics of flexible IT infrastructure associated with its successful construction industry implementation. To rectify this situation, this study aimed to identify the critical success factors (CSFs) involved in the delivery of Information Technology Infrastructure Flexibility (ITIF) to the construction industry. An initial list of 38 potential factors divided into technical, people, and management dimensions and associated elements were identified by literature review and preliminary interviews with seven Malaysian companies representing a variety of construction industry participants and IT experts. This was followed by a main study comprising a questionnaire survey of 211 construction industry practitioners in Malaysia. Eighteen critical factors contributing to successful ITIF delivery are identified. Of these, two CSFs of hybrid skill and willingness to change appear to be unique to the Malaysian construction industry. Further research is recommended to assess the opinions of a wider variety of experienced practitioners to validate the findings and its applicability in the Malaysian context and beyond.


We recently showed that chronic inhibition of NO synthesis by N(omega)-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME) causes coronary vascular remodeling (ie, vascular fibrosis and medial thickening) in rats. To test the hypothesis that the inhibition of NO synthesis induces inflammatory changes in the heart, we characterized the inflammatory lesions that occurred during L-NAME administration and determined whether inflammation involved the induction of monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) in vivo. During the first week of L-NAME administration to Wistar-Kyoto rats, we observed a marked infiltration of mononuclear leukocytes (ED1-positive macrophages) and fibroblast-like cells (alpha-smooth muscle actin-positive myofibroblasts) into the coronary vessels and myocardial interstitial areas. These inflammatory changes were associated with the expression of proliferating cell nuclear antigen and MCP-1 (both mRNA and protein). The areas affected by inflammatory changes, as well as the expression of MCP-1 mRNA, declined after longer (28 days) treatment with L-NAME and were replaced by vascular and myocardial remodeling. Our results support the hypothesis that the inhibition of NO synthesis induces inflammatory changes in coronary vascular and myocardial tissues and involves MCP-1 expression. Results also suggest that the early stages of inflammatory changes are important in the development of later-stage structural changes observed in rat hearts.


The analysis of conversations maintained during the design activity can help to gain a better insight into design thinking and its relation to creativity. A semantic analysis approach was employed to inspect the content of communications and information exchange between students and instructors. The goal was to explore design conversations in terms of Abstraction, Polysemy, Information Content and Semantic Similarity measures, and analyse their relation to the creativity of final design outcomes. These were assessed according to their Originality, Usability, Feasibility, Overall Value and Overall Creativity. To this end, design conversations from the 10th Design Thinking Research Symposium (DTRS10) dataset were used. Main results show a significant relationship between Information Content and Originality and Overall Creativity. For instructors, Semantic measures were mainly related to Feasibility, whereas for students the focus was set on the Overall Value of the final solutions.


We study the representations of the infinite symmetric group induced from the identity representations of Young subgroups. It turns out that such induced representations can be either of type I or of type II. Each Young subgroup corresponds to a partition of the set of positive integers; depending on the sizes of blocks of this partition, we divide Young subgroups into two classes: large and small subgroups. The first class gives representations of type I, in particular, irreducible representations. The most part of Young subgroups of the second class give representations of type II and, in particular, von Neumann factors of type II. We present a number of various examples. The main problem is to find the so-called spectral measure of the induced representation. The complete solution of this problem is given for two-block Young subgroups and subgroups with infinitely many singletons and finitely many finite blocks of length greater than one.


The purpose of this laboratory study was to evaluate caries-like lesion formation in occlusal enamel adjacent to a light-cured resin-modified glass ionomer utilized as a pit and fissure sealant and a conventional light-cured, fluoride-releasing sealant. Fluoride-free prophylaxis was done on occlusal surfaces of 12 caries-free mandibular molar teeth that had not been exposed to the oral cavity. Occlusal surface morphology was examined by SEM on the uncoated specimens. Each tooth was then sectioned into 2 portions buccolingually, producing mesial and distal tooth halve. Occlusal surfaces of mesial tooth halves were prepared for an experimental light-cured resin-modified glass ionomer (RMG) sealant (PH-SE II, ESPE), and for comparison, a light-cured fluoride-releasing pit and fissure (PFS) sealant (Helioseal F, Ivoclar) was placed on occlusal surfaces of the corresponding distal tooth halves. The sealed occlusal surfaces were examined uncoated by SEM to compare RMG and PFS adaptation. After thermocycling in artificial saliva, caries-like lesions were formed in the occlusal surfaces adjacent to RMG and PFS. Longitudinal sections were taken for comparison of lesion formation adjacent to RMG and PFS. Mean lesion depths in occlusal surfaces were 64 +/- 17 mm for RMG, and 116 +/- 27 mm for PFS (p < 0.05, paired t-test). Occlusal lesions terminated at the point where bonding occurred between the occlusal enamel and RMG or PFS. SEM surface topography demonstrated adequate adaptation of the materials with obliteration of the typical pit and fissure surface morphology by both RMG and PFS. While both the resin-modified glass ionomer and fluoride-releasing sealant materials protected the pit and fissure enamel from caries development, the resin-modified glass ionomer reduced the extent of caries involvement in the adjacent unsealed occlusal incline enamel, when compared with the resin sealant.


This work addresses the problem of improving the convergence and the accuracy of a Bussgang blind equalization scheme, by imposing a set of linear constraints to the equalizer coefficients. As indicated in [G. Jacovitti et al. (2001)], these constraints are obtained exploiting a property of second order statistics (SOS) of the fractionally sampled received signal. While in [G. Jacovitti et al. (2001)] an estimation of the channel autocorrelation is needed, here we obtain a different set of linear constraints without any preliminary channel autocorrelation stage. Numerical results show the improvement of the convergence of the Bussang algorithm that incorporates SOS based constraints, particularly in communications schemes that present high cardinality constellations or small number of available samples.


The purpose of this research is to explore Service Quality from the perspective of the Muslim consumer. There is growing evidence that culture influences buying-habits and behaviours' of customers in a service context. The fact that most cross-cultural consumer research in Asia has focused on the dimension of Chinese-Confucian beliefs provides this research opportunity to investigate other religious-cultural aspects in an Asian context and service quality. In this study, the key attributes/factors of quality of services according to Muslim customers are explored using the verbal protocol method. The verbal protocol is followed by in-depth probing of respondents. Interviews were conducted in Indonesia with a sample of Javanese-Muslim customers of airline, retail, hotel and restaurant industries. Preliminary analysis suggests some distinct outcomes which will be presented and position culture as a fertile field for future research in service quality. The research provides important insights for service providers who will target the Muslim consumers. This research also has potential to enrich SQ conceptualization, theory, and measurement.


A technique for the design of broadband microwave transistor power amplifiers is presented that utilises the powerful methods of network synthesis to achieve optimum large-signal performance. Only two large-signal transistor measurements per frequency are required to achieve a good analytic model of the transistor's variation of added power with load impedance, and a mapping function is presented that translates this added-power characteristic into an equivalent linear-circuit reflection-coefficient characteristic. With this representation, methods of linear-network synthesis are used to obtain circuits which optimise the amplifier's added-power efficiency over a broad range of frequencies. The design technique has been experimentally verified by the characterisation, design and construction of a b.j.t. amplifier of near-octave bandwidth centred at 1 GHz, with the large-signal performance in good agreement with that predicted by the design theory.


The past few decades have seen an accelerating increase in the numbers and proportion of older people in the populations of many countries. Population ageing will have a profound impact on the societies, politics, and economies of countries. In particular, ageing is associated with alterations in private and public expenditure patterns, due to differing needs and preferences of older versus younger consumers. It has been argued that the compensating effects of simultaneous increases in numbers of the older population and decreases in the young would lead to little overall change in macro-level private consumption (Richter, 1992). Social expenditures, however, can be expected to change dramatically; it has been estimated that public spending components sensitive to age structure – including old-age pension programmes, health and long-term care, family/child benefits, and education – comprise 40% to 60% of total public spending (Dang et al., 2001), with total social outlays per capita being higher for older than younger populations (Richter, 1992). Chapter 2 presents a study of age-specific expenditures for Hospital and Community Health Services (HCHS) and Family Health Services (FHS) in the National Health Service (NHS) England and Wales, which finds that the age-expenditure relationship has not stayed constant over time. Chapter 3 surveys the current epidemiologic and economic literature on ageing to propose an alternative influence for health care expenditures. Chapter 4 examines the effects of proximity to death and age on hospital expenditures in the Oxfordshire region of England using a longitudinal, 29-year dataset. Chapter 5 integrates the analyses of the proximity to death model to devise alternative projection methods of the impact of demographic change on health expenditures.


OBGYN.net Conference Coverage SLS, Society of Laparoendoscopic Surgeons Annual Meeting 13th International Congress and Endo Expo September 29-October 2, 2004 - New York, New York


This thesis explores an extreme form of gender dysphoria: that experienced by transsexuals. The thesis focuses especially on issues concerning identity. It begins by developing a theoretical framework which can encompass the relevant contributions from various academic fields and different levels of analysis. This framework identifies four levels:the cross-cultural and historical the group and institutional\ the situational\ and the biographical. The literature relevant to issues of identity as these pertain to transsexuals is reviewed in terms of this framework. From this review two central points emerge: that gender dysphoria is a multi-faceted phenomenon that can only be adequately grasped within a multi-dimensional frame of reference\ and that the identity of transsexuals needs to be viewed from a developmental perspective, in terms of the differing demands, both social and psychological, which are imposed on transsexuals at different points in their- life-cycle. Some policy implications are noted. The thesis ends with a discussion of some limitations of the present study, and with some suggestions for future research on identity in relation to gender dysphoria.


Background: Starting from February 2020, in Italy most organizations have had a forced transition to flexible working practice - called "smart working in emergency" – due to the Covid-19 epidemic outbreak. This allowed to continue work activities and services and contributed to contain the risk of infection in different sectors, particularly in the public administration. Objectives: This follow up study focussed on a panel of 187 workers from the Italian Workers' Compensation Authority taking part to a pilot project "Smart Working in INAIL" from January 2019 to December 2019. The aim was to investigate the effects of work organization on work attitudes, work-life balance and health outcomes before and after the introduction of the smart working. Methods: The data were collected at two time points through a web-based questionnaire. The first wave aimed to collect information up to one month before the implementation of the smart working. The second wave aimed to collect information about potential changes occurred after one year of smart working. Results: This study showed that high demands, low control and low social support might lead to reduced well-being and less satisfaction with work, and have an effect on work engagement and work-life balance. Particularly, improving social support can moderate the negative impact of high strain on well-being, preventing work-life imbalance and risk of isolation. Discussion: Findings and future perspectives are discussed to support stakeholders in defining policies and practices concerning health and wellbeing at work while preserving productivity, for a successful implementation of smart working in the public administration.


An enucleated left eye from a 15-year-old female spayed Labrador Retriever was received by the Comparative Ocular Pathology Laboratory of Wisconsin (COPLOW) for histopathologic evaluation. Routine histologic preparation included staining with hematoxylin and eosin, and with alcian blue periodic acid-Schiff (PAS). At necropsy 9 months later, all grossly abnormal tissues (ipsilateral orbit and lung) were submitted to the COPLOW for histopathologic evaluation. Histopathologic evaluation of the globe revealed extensive invasion of the uvea and sclera by a pleomorphic cell population that formed disorganized cords and exhibited PAS-positive basement membrane material. Necropsy revealed a morphologically similar tumor in the ipsilateral orbit and lung. On immunohistochemical examination, the intraocular tumor stained diffusely immunopositive for vimentin, S-100, and neuron-specific enolase and multifocally, sparsely immunopositive for cytokeratin AE1/AE3. The orbital and thoracic tumors stained positively for vimentin but negatively for cytokeratin AE1/AE3. There are few reports of canine metastatic iridociliary adenocarcinoma in the literature; this is the first with immunohistochemical analysis.


We report the first complete population based study of childhood deaths due to asthma. All deaths ascribed to asthma in New Zealand children aged 0-14 were investigated as part of a two year national study of mortality from asthma. The 16 children who died from asthma all developed asthma by the age of 4; 15 had a family history of asthma, and 12 had associated atopic disorders. Disturbed pyschosocial relationships were evident in eight families. Seven children died in less than three hours from the onset of their final attack. All children died outside hospital. Mortality from asthma in Maori children (3.14 per 100 000) was five times that of European children. With hindsight, factors which if avoided could have led to a different outcome were identified in eleven cases. The circumstances surrounding these deaths were similar to those described for adults with asthma; this study, however, underlines the importance of parental care and knowledge in the management of children with asthma. Inadequate long term medical care, underassessment of severity by family and doctors, failure of the family to call for help when required, and inadequate responses of medical services contributed to the fatalities. Excess beta2 sympathomimetic dosage or overreliance on home nebulisers were uncommon. Most childhood deaths from asthma should be prevented by increased family awareness, better assessment of severity, improved long term treatment, and rapid access to emergency medical care.


Malnutrition is a consequence of consumption of dietary nutrient either insufficiently or exclusively by especially children. The aim of this study was to carry out a review of malnutrition-dependent factors among under-five children in developing countries.  The study was carried out by reviewing publications on researches on malnutrition conducted in Africa and Asia with particular reference to factors associated with malnutrition.  It was found that, of the 162 million children under five years who were stunted, 36% of them resided in Africa while 56% were found in Asia.  It was also observed that an estimated 60 million under-five children in developing countries were found to be stunted out of which 11 million were Nigerian children.  The severity of childhood malnutrition was observed to steadily increase from 11% in 2003 to 18% in 2013 for wasting; 24% in 2003 to 29% in 2013 for underweight, although there was a decline from 42% in 2003 to 37% in 2013 for stunted children.  It was  observed that high rates of mortality of malnourished children in Sub-saharan Africa result from factors such as low intake of calories, high rates of Human Immuno Virus/Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS), political instability, conflicts among groups and poor  implementation of government policies.  For instance, 50% mortality of malnourished children in Malawi, Burundi and Madagascar were stunted as a result of poor dietary intake or poor consumption of vital nutrient.  Other major factors observed were poverty, absence of exclusive breastfeeding, maternal factors such as poor nutrition during pregnancy, lack of appropriate weight gain, poor consumption of vitamin supplement, illness, environmental factors, and socio-economic/household factors, all of which affect the nutritional status of children.  In conclusion, governments of developing countries and the global community should work together to remove these factors.


This paper describes a case study involving third-year undergraduate computing students and their conduct of a patient journey modeling project for the Ambulatory Care department of a Regional Hospital in New South Wales, Australia. The goal of the research was to determine if students, given minimal training in an emerging patient journey modeling tool known as Essomenic, could be an effective vehicle for the diffusion of innovation to operational staff involved in a healthcare improvement project. Under academic supervision, students interacted directly with staff to develop models of the current system of care from GP referral to the completion of the patient consultation. The methodology also included model validation, identification of opportunities for improvement, investigation of alternative solutions and solution recommendations. Outcomes of the project, conducted over a 14 week semester, demonstrate that the students found the technique quick and easy to learn and that they could transfer their new found knowledge of this innovation to healthcare staff for the purposes of developing true and accurate representations of the current state patient journey. Staff were then able to interact directly with the student team, using the models as a communication medium, to identify opportunities for improvement and understand more deeply, how changes would impact their daily tasks and increase patient satisfaction in service delivery.


Make believe? The early modern Catholic catechism. Somewhere between educational exuberance and pastoral pessimism . A wealth of historical research has been carried out in the field of religious education; studies of religious writings, particularly catechisms and other manuals, have proved to be very productive. However, the impact of catechism teaching has been studied less intensively. This article focuses on the high hopes the Catholic Reform movement had for systematic religious education. The specific grammar of schooling, which was the result of this ambition, left a strong mark on religious life in the southern Netherlands. The impact on the way ordinary people experienced their belief is hard to measure. However there is strong evidence that, in spite of the educational exuberance of some priests, many others were rather pessimistic about the outcome of their pastoral work.


A convenient method for the chlorination of p-methoxybenzyl 2-(3- phenylacetamido-4- benzenesulfonylthio-2-azetidinone-1-yl)-3-methyl-3-butenate from penicillin G with sulfuryl chloride ( SO2Cl2) , which is subsequently converted to p-methoxybenzyl 2-(3- phenylacetamido-4- benzenesulfonylthio-2-azetidinone-1-yl)-3-chloromethyl-3-butenate, versatile intermediates for the synthesis of cephalosporin antibiotics was developed. The method has the advantage of cheap reagents, mild reaction conditions and convenient operation. The quantity and the feeding rate of the chlorination reagent can be controlled easily. The method is particularly suitable for the chlorination in an industral process.


New technologies, such as Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), are transforming facilities and vehicles into intelligent systems that will significantly modify logistic deliveries in any organization. With the appearance of automated vehicles, drones offer multiple new technological solutions that might trigger different delivery networks or boost new delivery services. Differently from the related works, where a single specific delivery system model is typically addressed, this paper deals with the use of UAVs for logistic deliveries focusing on a multi-criteria analysis of trendy drone-based system architectures. In particular, using the cross-efficiency Data Envelopment Analysis approach, a comparative analysis among three different delivery systems is performed: the classic system based on trucks only, the drone-only system using a fleet of drones, and the hybrid truck and drone system combining trucks and drones. The proposed technique constitutes an effective decision-making tool aimed at helping delivery companies in selecting the optimal delivery system architecture according to their specific needs. The effectiveness of the proposed methodology is shown by a simulation analysis based on a realistic data case study that pertains to the main logistic service providers.


OBJECTIVE
We examined the mediating role of self-criticism in the relation between childhood maltreatment and both depressive symptoms and body dissatisfaction in patients with binge eating disorder (BED).

METHOD
Participants were 170 BED patients who completed measures of childhood maltreatment, self-criticism, self-esteem, depressive symptoms, and body dissatisfaction.

RESULTS
Specific forms of childhood maltreatment (emotional abuse, sexual abuse) were significantly associated with body dissatisfaction. Path analyses demonstrated that self-criticism fully mediated the relation between emotional abuse and both depressive symptoms and body dissatisfaction. Specificity for the mediating role of self-criticism was demonstrated in comparison to other potential mediators (low self-esteem) and alternative competing mediation models.

DISCUSSION
These results highlight self-criticism as a potential mechanism through which certain forms of childhood maltreatment may be associated with depressive symptoms and body dissatisfaction in BED patients.


Every major national tobacco legislation proposed in the past two years has called for significant increases in the price of cigarettes as a way to discourage youths from smoking. One argument used to oppose these bills is that increases in the price of cigarettes would cause youths to substitute marijuana for cigarettes. Although it has long been believed that cigarettes are a gateway drug,' no economic research has been done to determine whether cigarettes and marijuana are economic complements or substitutes. This paper begins to fill the void in the current research by examining the contemporaneous relationship between the demands for cigarettes and marijuana among a nationally representative sample of 8th, 10th and 12th graders from the 1992-1994 Monitoring the Future Project. Two part models are used to estimate reduced form demand equations. Examination of the cross-price effects clearly shows that higher cigarette prices will not increase marijuana use among youths. In addition to reducing youth smoking, we find that higher cigarette prices significantly reduce the average level of marijuana used by current users. Cigarette prices also have a negative effect on the probability of using marijuana findings are not significant at conventional levels.


For certain reasons I wished to train a young chimpanzee to choose from two similar boxes the one characterised by the ticking of a metronome inside it. My subject was a young male chimpanzee (Pan leucoprymnus Lesson), approximately three years old, Tommy by name. He was a good-natured chap, quite tame, and already for some years in captivity. When we knew each other a little better, he would welcome me every morning with a hearty "uhuh", as soon as he heard my steps, and after the experiments of the day we would take leave by shaking hands as old friends. Tommy was rather lazy and not so playful as most young chimpanzees, but this quality made working with him easier and more regular. With a few exceptions it did not give much trouble to make 50—60 trials with him each day.


Background and Aim: To assess the efficacy of hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) in patients with hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy (HIE). Design: Non-randomized case-control observational study. Setting: Tertiary level neurorehabilitation unit. Population: Twenty-five patients with HIE seen between 1 to 12 months after the injury and having a coma recovery scale-revised (CRS-R) score less than 7 at entry were recruited. Methods: Out of the patients who received HBOT, 20 received 20 sessions of HBOT at two absolute atmosphere pressure (ATA), and two received 60 sessions at 2 ATA over three different treatment intervals. We compared the outcomes between cases (who received HBOT) and controls (who did not receive HBOT).Cases and controls were allocated to three groups based on the time interval after injury following which they were recruited to the study: 1–3 months (9 cases and 16 controls), 4–8 months (9 cases and 9 controls) and 9–12 months (8 cases and 3 controls). Outcome Measures: CRS-R, Karnofsky performance scale, and change in disorder of consciousness (DOC) at admission and discharge were assessed. Results: We observed a significant difference in CRS-R favoring the HBOT group at time intervals of 1–3 and 4–8 months. More patients in the HBOT group improved in DOC than the control group. Conclusions: HBOT given in the first nine months post-HIE can result in a better recovery and functional outcome.