Objectives Although both physical inactivity and poor sleep are deleteriously associated with mortality, the joint effects of these two behaviours remain unknown. This study aimed to investigate the joint association of physical activity (PA) and sleep with all-cause and cause-specific mortality risks. Methods 380 055 participants aged 55.9 (8.1) years (55% women) from the UK Biobank were included. Baseline PA levels were categorised as high, medium, low and no moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA) based on current public health guidelines. We categorised sleep into healthy, intermediate and poor with an established composited sleep score of chronotype, sleep duration, insomnia, snoring and daytime sleepiness. We derived 12 PA–sleep combinations, accordingly. Mortality risks were ascertained to May 2020 for all-cause, total cardiovascular disease (CVD), CVD subtypes (coronary heart disease, haemorrhagic stroke, ischaemic stroke), as well as total cancer and lung cancer. Results After an average follow-up of 11.1 years, sleep scores showed dose-response associations with all-cause, total CVD and ischaemic stroke mortality. Compared with high PA-healthy sleep group (reference), the no MVPA-poor sleep group had the highest mortality risks for all-cause (HR (95% CIs), (1.57 (1.35 to 1.82)), total CVD (1.67 (1.27 to 2.19)), total cancer (1.45 (1.18 to 1.77)) and lung cancer (1.91 (1.30 to 2.81))). The deleterious associations of poor sleep with all outcomes, except for stroke, was amplified with lower PA. Conclusion The detrimental associations of poor sleep with all-cause and cause-specific mortality risks are exacerbated by low PA, suggesting likely synergistic effects. Our study supports the need to target both behaviours in research and clinical practice.


Are futures prices exogenous to agricultural supply? It depends. We argue that crop yield shocks were predictable during the 1961-2007 period because high planting-time futures prices tended to indicate that yield would be below trend. This feature of the data implies that regressions of production on futures prices would underestimate the supply elasticity, i.e., endogeneity in the futures price biases the regression coefficient down. However, this predictability has only a small effect on planted acreage. Thus, estimating supply models with regressions of planted acreage on futures prices entails a small endogeneity bias. Moreover, this small bias is mitigated by adding the realized yield shock as a control variable to such a model as a proxy for the expected yield shock. The marginal contribution of an instrumental variable to bias reduction is thus small.


Because of the small amplitudes of event related potentials (ERPs), they are usually hidden in electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings. This is particularly a problem when analyzing single-trial data. A spatial filtering method for P300 detection in oddball paradigm is proposed in this paper which is based on the assumption that brain responses to the same stimulus look the same (or at least do not change significantly over trials). Therefore, the sequence generated by concatenating all the responses to the same type of stimulus has a hidden periodicity. Enhancing the periodic structure of this sequence, a transformation is found to project the data into a lower dimensional subspace. Experiments show that even with a small subspace of the projected data, the classification performance in single-trial P300 detection is still high.


A program of research is dedicated to development of a mathematical formalism that could provide, among other things, means by which living systems could be distinguished from non-living ones. A major issue that arises in this research is the following question: What invariants of mathematical models of the physics of systems are (1) characteristic of the behaviors of intelligent living systems and (2) do not depend on specific features of material compositions heretofore considered to be characteristic of life? This research at earlier stages has been reported, albeit from different perspectives, in numerous previous NASA Tech Briefs articles. To recapitulate: One of the main underlying ideas is to extend the application of physical first principles to the behaviors of living systems. Mathematical models of motor dynamics are used to simulate the observable physical behaviors of systems or objects of interest, and models of mental dynamics are used to represent the evolution of the corresponding knowledge bases. For a given system, the knowledge base is modeled in the form of probability distributions and the mental dynamics is represented by models of the evolution of the probability densities or, equivalently, models of flows of information. At the time of reporting the information for this article, the focus of this research was upon the following aspects of the formalism: Intelligence is considered to be a means by which a living system preserves itself and improves its ability to survive and is further considered to manifest itself in feedback from the mental dynamics to the motor dynamics. Because of the feedback from the mental dynamics, the motor dynamics attains quantumlike properties: The trajectory of the physical aspect of the system in the space of dynamical variables splits into a family of different trajectories, and each of those trajectories can be chosen with a probability prescribed by the mental dynamics. From a slightly different perspective, the mechanism of decision-making is feedback from the mental dynamics to the motor dynamics, and this mechanism provides a quantumlike collapse of a random motion into an appropriate deterministic state, such that entropy undergoes a pronounced decrease. The existence of this mechanism is considered to be an invariant of intelligent behavior of living systems, regardless of the origins and material compositions of the systems. This work was done by Michail Zak of Caltech for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.For more information, contact email@example.com. NPO-46085 Physical Invariants of Intelligence Current research involves a quantumlike aspect of mental-to-motor feedback. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California


There are three general classes of environmental implications from agriculture: (1) amenity implications; (2) habitat implications; and (3) ecological implications. Environmental "benefits" or "costs" from agriculture require a prior specification of the norm against which the status quo is to be compared. Agriculture is no longer simply an activity that produces commodities for local, regional, national, or international markets. Indeed, in the OECD countries, commodity abundance, not commodity scarcity, is the norm and so it is necessary to see agriculture as primarily a land management activity that provides (and supports) rural livelihoods, and that happens also to produce some marketable commodities. This fundamental redefinition of agriculture allows us to escape the conceptual trap that seems to prevail in many discussions about the environmental attributes of agriculture. That conventional view holds that there is some normal structure of agriculture in each ecological setting which gives rise to some "natural" level of costs of production. This thinking then allows a seamless transition into a discussion of subsidies and "distortions" that contravene some inherent comparative advantage. Recent preoccupation with revising world trade arrangements has tended to reinforce such thinking.


Industrial wood cutting is a highly demanding application for cutting tool materials as a wedge angle of ~50°, a tip radius in the 1 m range, and high wear, temperature and corrosion resistance are needed. For this application Si3N4 based ceramic matrix composites (CMC) were developed. Cutting tests showed that reinforcing Si3N4 with 30 wt.% SiC gives a good balance between fracture toughness and wear resistance. The use of an yttria / lanthana sintering aid system resulted in a fine-grained microstructure without degrading the fracture toughness. Post heat treatment was essential for the integrity of the cutting edge. Finally, cutting tests proved that the CMC cutting tips had a 3-fold lifetime compared to tungsten carbide.


Recent technological changes have affected translators' professional boundaries and status. However, scant attention has been paid to the new opportunities that have been created for professional literary translators. Our research focuses on ¡Hjckrrh!, a de facto non-profit self-publishing initiative led by three professional translators who are involved in the publishing of literary translations in ebook format – they share the same professional expertise, but assume different roles in the initiative. An ethnography-inspired qualitative method has been adopted by the researchers. This paper is based on fourteen interviews with participants who have collaborated with ¡Hjckrrh!, comprising eleven translators (including the three founding members of ¡Hjckrrh!), two proofreaders and a graphic designer. The paper aims at studying translators' roles, production teams and relationships, and pays special attention to the agency and visibility of translators. Our findings show that technology has had a positive impact on translator agency, status and identity among the founding members and collaborators of ¡Hjckrrh!. These translators have used the shifting professional boundaries and technological advances to develop their roles as cultural mediators. The article describes the work of the translators who collaborate in this digital initiative and discusses the ways they relate to each other, the roles they play and how they cross professional boundaries. The conclusions identify the relationships and opportunities created by this new work environment.


Developmental systems theory (DST) expands the unit of replication from genes to whole systems of developmental resources, which DST interprets in terms of cycling developmental processes. Expansion seems required by DST's argument against privileging genes in evolutionary and developmental explanations of organic traits. DST and the expanded replicator brook no distinction between biological and cultural evolution. However, by endorsing a single expanded unit of inheritance and leaving the classical molecular notion of gene intact, DST achieves only a nominal reunification of heredity and development. I argue that an alternative conceptualization of inheritance denies the classical opposition of genetics and development while avoiding the singularity inherent in the replicator concept. It also yields a new unit--the reproducer--which genuinely integrates genetic and developmental perspectives. The reproducer concept articulates the non-separability of "genetic" and "developmental" roles in units of heredity, development, and evolution. DST reformulated in terms of reproducers rather than replicators preserves an empirically interesting distinction between cultural and biological evolution.


In a continuous-time nonlinear driftless control system, a geometric phase is a consequence of nonintegrability of the vector fields, and it describes how cyclic trajectories in shape space induce non-periodic motion in phase space, according to an area rule. The aim of this paper is to shown that geometric phases exist also for discrete-time driftless nonlinear control systems, but that unlike their continuous-time counterpart, they need not obey any area rule, i.e., even zero-area cycles in shape space can lead to nontrivial geometric phases. When the discrete-time system is obtained through Euler discretization of a continuous-time system, it is shown that the zero-area geometric phase corresponds to the gap between the Euler discretization and an exact discretization of the continuous-time system.


Periodontal disease is characterized by both inflammation and bone loss. Advances in research in both these areas have led to a new appreciation of not only each field but also the intimate relationship between inflammation and bone loss. This relationship has resulted in a new field of science called osteoimmunology and provides a context for better understanding the pathogenesis of periodontal disease. In this review, we discuss several aspects of the immuno-inflammatory host response that ultimately results in loss of alveolar bone. A proposal is made that periodontal inflammation not only stimulates osteoclastogenesis but also interferes with the uncoupling of bone formation and bone resorption, consistent with a pathologic process. Furthermore, arguments based on experimental animal models suggest a critical role of the spatial and temporal aspects of inflammation in the periodontium. A review of these findings leads to a new paradigm to help explain more fully the impact of inflammation on alveolar bone in periodontal disease so that it includes the effects of inflammation on uncoupling of bone formation from resorption.


sites. The validation was conducted by comparing the results of developed NGS cancer panel-based HRD test to that of ' AmoyDx HRD test ' . Results In total, 155 patients were included in the development phase. High-grade serous was the most common histologic type (90.3%) and 28 patients (18.1%) had pathogenic BRCA1/2 mutations. Inaccurate estimation of HRD scores due to the rarity of targeted sequencing was calibrated using gap interpolation approach based on 1,558 pre-designed SNP sites. Nineteen specimens were used to validate the performance of a new algorithm. Of them, 26.3% had pathogenic BRCA1/2 mutations. Using the cut-off value of 42 for a new algorithm, the accordance rate between the two tests was 78.9%.


Abstract The Middle–Upper Ordovician represents a significant period in the early evolution of fishes. During this time, many of the major lineages, including jawless and putative jawed taxa, made their first appearance in the fossil record, marking a series of diversification events. As a number of studies have focused on the habitat of Laurentian fish during this interval, work has been undertaken at a number of known Gondwanan vertebrate localities in order to provide new perspectives on the ecological preferences of early fish from the Southern Hemisphere. Ichnological and sedimentological data collated from these localities enable reconstructions of the habitats of a number of Ordovician fish, most notably those of the arandaspid-bearing successions of the Anzaldo Formation of Bolivia, the Stairway Sandstone of central Australia, and the Amdeh Formation of Oman, from which articulated or macroscopic fragmentary fossil remains are recorded. These data indicate that the arandaspids were constrained to very shallow marine habitats and prone to seasonal influxes of freshwater and terrigenous sediment. It is proposed that this narrow paleoecological range may be used as a prospecting tool to search for other Ordovician vertebrate-bearing horizons.


Assessing the collapse load for complex masonry structures, such as historic monuments, is a very hard task and looking for a reliable and suitable procedure considering all the available numerical
techniques is still under debate. One interesting and simple approach for wide modelling capabilities is based on the discretization of the masonry structure as a system of truss elements with appropriate
constitutive law. According to this procedure, the inclusion of reinforcement elements is a simple operation of adding bars representing the reinforcement net.
This approach presents several favourable features. First of all, after cracking, masonry behaves as a system of thrust wedges which are very similar to a reticular frame. Secondly, shear and flexural mechanisms are clearly distinguished but derive from a single constitutive law valid for all the
elements composing the model. Finally, some specific problems, such as multiple leaf walls or curved shells, can be solved in the same way as ordinary in-plane loaded walls.
Initially, some very simple representation rules needed to construct the equivalent reticular model of common masonry structures are presented in detail. Some updated topics, such as adding FRP reinforcement to masonry models are also addressed. Next, the results obtained for some experimental tests are compared with those obtained by means of several numerical simulations, including the procedure proposed in this paper. Finally, some interesting conclusions are stated,
showing that the reticular simple model presented in this paper produces very good results.


In this paper we study the strengths and weaknesses of the matching-reservations mechanism introduced by Article 21 of the Vienna Convention. When states face asymmetric incentives, the rules introduced by the Vienna Convention may not discourage all reservations. We also analyze the welfare properties of the matching-reservations outcomes generated by Article 21 when such asymmetric incentives are at work. We show that Article 21 provides quite an effective solution to the prisoner's dilemma problem, but does not always induce socially optimal levels of ratification. A social optimum will be achieved under Article 21 only in the limited subset of cases where signatory states have homogeneous payoff functions, or when all states prefer full ratification, despite the differences in the incentives that they face.


ABSTRACT: We examine the cost-effectiveness, from the shareholders' perspective, of the accounting standards issued by the FASB during 1973–2009. We evaluate (1) the stock market reactions of firms affected by the standards surrounding events that changed the standard's probability of issuance; and (2) whether the market reactions are related, in the cross-section, to agency problems, information asymmetry, proprietary costs, contracting costs, and changes in estimation risk. The average standard is a non-event from the investors' perspective because 104 of the 138 standards examined are associated with no change in shareholder value. Nineteen (15) standards are associated with a decrease (increase) in shareholder value. Surprisingly, 25 standards are associated with an increase in estimation risk. In the cross-section, firms with higher levels of information asymmetry, lower contracting costs, and a decrease in estimation risk experience most positive returns.


Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) are used to ensure confidence among developers, to share information about software vulnerabilities, and to provide a baseline for security measures. Therefore, the correctness of CVE reports is crucial for detecting and patching software vulnerabilities. In this paper, we introduce the concept of "Vulnerability Zero" (VZ), the software where a vulnerability first originated. We then present V0Finder, a precise mechanism for discovering the VZ of a vulnerability, including software name and its version. V0Finder utilizes code-based analysis to identify reuse relations, which specify the direction of vulnerability propagation, among vulnerable software. V0Finder constructs a graph from all the identified directions and traces backward to the root of that graph to find the VZ. We applied V0Finder to 5,671 CVE vulnerabilities collected from the National Vulnerability Database (NVD) and popular Bugzilla-based projects. V0Finder discovered VZs with high accuracy of 98% precision and 95% recall. Furthermore, V0Finder identified 96 CVEs with incorrect information related to their respective VZs. We confirmed that the incorrect VZ causes prolonged patch updates of vulnerable software; the patch update of CVEs with the incorrect VZ information takes 2 years, while the patch update of CVEs with the correct VZ takes less than a year on average. Such incorrectly identified VZ hinders the objective of the CVE and causes confusion rather than "ensuring confidence" among developers. Our analysis shows that V0Finder can enhance the credibility of information provided by the CVEs.


This study aimed to explore tourists' general local food preferences, whether tasting local food was one of their major motivations for undertaking a recent trip, the emotions they associated with the experience, and what constituted a memorable local food experience. Data were collected
 using an open-ended questionnaire. Based on the survey responses of 210 tourists, almost all the respondents were Indian nationals. The majority of the respondents could be categorized as food neophiliacs, since they exhibited a tendency to seek new food tastes while traveling. For more than
 half the respondents, tasting local food was one of the main motivations for taking particular trips and was considered a primary activity. Experiencing novelty and local culture were the main motivations for tasting local food. In connecting local food consumption memories with emotions,
 respondents experienced the positive emotions of joy and love. This article proposes a new conceptual framework for memorable local food experiences, which comprises several components: taste, socializing with friends and family members, novelty, authenticity, ambience, affordable price, and
 interacting with locals. The findings provided little evidence of special occasions, hospitality, or food souvenirs contributing to a memorable food experience, as claimed by previous studies, suggesting that such factors are not inevitable components of all tourist food experiences.


SymTA/S is a system-level performance and timing analysis approach based on formal scheduling analysis techniques and symbolic simulation. The tool supports heterogeneous architectures, complex task dependencies and context aware analysis. It determines system-level performance data such as end-to-end latencies, bus and processor utilisation, and worst-case scheduling scenarios. SymTA/S furthermore combines optimisation algorithms with system sensitivity analysis for rapid design space exploration. The paper gives an overview of current research interests in the SymTA/S project.


The training of support vector machines (SVM) involves a quadratic programming problem, which is often optimized by a complicated numerical solver. In this paper, we propose a much simpler approach based on multiplicative updates. This idea was first explored in [Cristianini et al., 1999], but its convergence is sensitive to a learning rate that has to be fixed manually. Moreover, the update rule only works for the hard-margin SVM, which is known to have poor performance on noisy data. In this paper, we show that the multiplicative update of SVM can be formulated as a Bregman projection problem, and the learning rate can then be adapted automatically. Moreover, because of the connection between boosting and Bregman distance, we show that this multiplicative update for SVM can be regarded as boosting the (weighted) Parzen window classifiers. Motivated by the success of boosting, we then consider the use of an adaptive ensemble of the partially trained SVMs. Extensive experiments show that the proposed multiplicative update rule with an adaptive learning rate leads to faster and more stable convergence. Moreover, the proposed ensemble has efficient training and comparable or even better accuracy than the best-tuned soft-margin SVM.


The purpose of this project is to provide writing prompts as an intervention method for adolescents who have experienced family violence and have been placed in the safe environment of family-style orphan care. The paper provides a literature review of writing as healing, also known as written emotional disclosure, in therapeutic contexts. Writing prompts are then presented designed for adolescents who have experienced complex trauma in the form of family violence. Each prompt has a specific purpose, but all prompts share a focus on empowering the adolescents to consider their identity, rise above hardships, and engage their past through reflective writing and narrative pieces. After each prompt, a description of their intended purpose in the healing process is given, along with research that supports their construction, followed by recommendations for the facilitator. The literature in the discipline shows that in order for trauma victims to walk confidently into the future, they must face the past. As writing is a noninvasive form of processing, these writing prompts are tools to help the adolescents own their stories and begin to integrate their past into the overarching narrative of their lives.


Panturichthys fowleri (Ben-Tuvia, 1953) is redescribed on the basis of 27 specimens from the coasts of Israel, Lebanon, and Turkey. The species is recorded from Turkey for the first time. Morphological variation, especially in dentition and relative head–trunk length was found to be greater than previously recognized. The osteology is described from two cleared-and-stained specimens. A synopsis of the family Heterenchelyidae is presented, and a key to the known species is provided.


While the movement for open access (OA) has gained momentum in recent years, there remain concerns about the broader commitment to openness in knowledge production and dissemination. Increasingly, universities are under pressure to transform themselves to engage with the wider community and to be more inclusive. Open knowledge institutions (OKIs) provide a framework that encourages universities to act with the principles of openness at their centre; not only should universities embrace digital OA, but also lead actions in cultivating diversity, equity, transparency and positive changes in society. Accordingly, this leads onto questions of whether we can evaluate the progress of OKIs and what are potential indicators for OKIs. As an exploratory study, this article reports on the collection and analysis of a list of potential indicators for OKIs. Data for these indicators are gathered for 43 Australian universities. The results show evidence of large disparities in characteristics such as Indigenous employment and gender equity, and a preference for repository-mediated OA across the Australian universities. These OKI indicators provide high-dimensional and complex signals that can be widely categorised into three groups of diversity, communication and coordination.


: A new technically simple and procedurally easy model of discrimination learning in mice has been proposed. The model allows to reach a quick rate of learning; to use the various characteristics of objects (form, color, size, etc) within the same sensory modality as a conditional stimulus; to transfer discrimination from one signal characteristic to the other (for instance from a color to a size); and to assess behaviour in a situation closely approached to conditions of the natural environment.


Scant attention has been paid to the historical trajectory and effect of the United States' intellectual property regimes—patenting, copyrighting, and trademarking—as devices which implement racialized property grants and further income and social inequality. This article focuses on just that and argues that the United States Constitution was designed as a property-based and economically-driven social compact which identifies intellectual property interests through a racialized lens. From this view, it is further argued that the Intellectual Property Clause, which itself was designed to incentivize invention and innovation, protected the racialized property interests of the governing elites of the newly established government and country. This pattern of property protection extends into the present and continues to result in vast inequalities in personal incomes and social positions, and in our scientific and technological communities.


In this work, the stability of imidacloprid in fresh water and sludge was studied. The results revealed that the pesticide is unstable in both media. In fresh water, it underwent hydrolysis whereas a degradation to several metabolites has been observed in sludge. The rate constants for the hydrolysis and degradation at 25°C were 0.0.0067 and 0.0.0099 d–1, respectively. Monitoring the degradation of imidacloprid in sludge by high-pressure liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS) revealed that five metabolites have emerged during the study. These metabolites include imidacloprid urea, imidacloprid-guanidine, 6-hydroxynicotinic acid, an olefin, and 5-hydroxy, 1-(6-chloro-3-pyridylmethyl)-2-(nitroimino)-imidazolidin-5-ol. The efficiency of Al-Quds University Wastewater Treatment Plant towards the removal of imidacloprid indicates that the ultrafiltration-hollow fiber unit was insufficient, whereas the ultrafiltration-spiral wound, activated carbon, and reverse osmosis units were efficient for complete removal of the pesticide. Adsorption experiments of imidacloprid using either activated charcoal or micelle-clay complex were found to fit Langmuir isotherms better than Freundlich isotherm. The data demonstrate a higher Langmuir Qmax value for the activated charcoal (126.6 mg g–1) when compared to the micelle-clay complex (11.76 mg g–1). Filtration column experiments conducted with mixed micelle-clay complex and sand (using a ratio of 1/50 by mass) at a flow rate of 2 mL min–1 and influent concentration of 50 mg L–1 revealed that a sufficient removal of imidacloprid was achieved in the first fraction of 100 mL elution. These findings indicate that the adsorption technology using the micelle-clay complex provides efficient removal of imidacloprid in continuous flow mode.


A material description was established for oil palm empty fruit bunch (OPEFB) fibre waste for microwave absorber applications by determining its dielectric properties with respect to fibre size and frequency. The proposed OPEFB material was studied at frequencies from 1 to 4 GHz. The study was conducted using the open-ended coaxial probe (OECP) HP85071C technique. The effect of microwave frequency on complex permittivity properties for powdered OPEFB and compressed OPEFB with different particle sizes (100, 200, 300, 400, and 500 μm) were investigated. Results showed that the microwave frequency and particle size significantly influenced the complex permittivity (real and imaginary) properties of the samples. Moreover, the complex permittivity decreased as the powder fibre size increased. The complex permittivity of the smallest and largest powder fibre sizes (100 and 500 μm) were (2.050 − j 0.197) and (1.934 − j 0.137), respectively; and the complex permittivity of the smallest and largest compressed OPEFB fibre sizes (100 and 500 μm) were (3.799 − j0.603) and (3.326 − j0.486), respectively. The compressed OPEFB complex permittivity was higher than that of the OPEFB powder.


Author(s): Sass, Chodon | Advisor(s): Specht, Chelsea D | Abstract: Understanding patterns of speciation is of fundamental importance to evolutionary biologists. Species diversity can be maintained and generated through processes originating from interactions with climate, biota, and geography. In order to investigate the role of these factors on diversity in a species-rich group of plants, we developed a phylogeny of the core Bromelioideae including Aechmea and related genera with the specific goals of investigating monophyly of genera, biogeographic history, morphological trait evolution, and environmental niche diversification. The phylogenetic estimation encompassed 20 genera and 4 genomic regions including chloroplast, low-copy, and ribosomal nuclear genes. Subsequently, morphologies were re-explored to understand species relationships that had not been previously recognized and to determine if morphological synapomorphies could define well supported clades. Species were coded as present or absent in 16 geographic regions to reconstruct ancestral areas. Finally, to understand how species within this group divided climatic niche space, research was focused on two clades that diversified independently in Central America. Niche models were generated for each species and for the clades as a whole and were compared for overlap. The distribution of each environmental variable for all occurrence records was compared at each node of divergence within each clade to understand divergence in environmental conditions in a method free from model uncertainty. From these analyses we found: (1) Lack of monophyly in many genera and subgenera (2) Closely related species often were found in geographic sympatry (at the scale of co-occurrence in the same country or state) such that taxonomic groups that had been thought to include geographically disjunct species, actually were representative of distinct evolutionary histories (3) Morphological traits that had been used to assign species to genera were often homoplastic (through convergence or reversals of plesiomorphic states) (4) Although a single unique synapomorphy for each clade was not found, morphological traits were often consistent within clades, providing independent support for the molecular phylogenetic estimation and a basis for future taxonomic work (5) Most well supported clades diversified within one of eight geographic areas, although the ancestral areas for several larger clades remains uncertain (6) Both clades native to Central America are found in a unique environmental niche (i.e. environmental niche models of each clade do not overlap and there is significant divergence of climatic variables between the clades) (7) Species within the clade composed of species with greater morphological variation had more environmental niche overlap than the clade with little morphological variation. These findings add to the evolutionary knowledge of the Bromeliaceae and suggest that geographic range should be taken into account when assigning species to genera. Centers of diversity of the core Bromelioids are found within eastern and Amazonian Brazil, northern south America and Central America and each radiation could have been influenced by climate in a variety of ways. In the two studied examples, species divergence is coincident with divergence in environmental niche occupation. However, environmental niche evolution was limited such that each clade as a whole was not modeled in the niche of the other clade, suggesting either some degree of niche conservatism or competition preventing parapatric niche expansion.


Abstract. The fate and cycling of two selected legacy persistent organic pollutants (POPs), PCB 153 and γ-HCH, in the North Sea in the 21st century have been modelled with combined hydrodynamic and fate and transport ocean models (HAMSOM and FANTOM, respectively). To investigate the impact of climate variability on POPs in the North Sea in the 21st century, future scenario model runs for three 10-year periods to the year 2100 using plausible levels of both in situ concentrations and atmospheric, river and open boundary inputs are performed. This slice mode under a moderate scenario (A1B) is sufficient to provide a basis for further analysis. For the HAMSOM and atmospheric forcing, results of the IPCC A1B (SRES) 21st century scenario are utilized, where surface forcing is provided by the REMO downscaling of the ECHAM5 global atmospheric model, and open boundary conditions are provided by the MPIOM global ocean model. Dry gas deposition and volatilization of γ-HCH increase in the future relative to the present by up to 20% (in the spring and summer months for deposition and in summer for volatilization). In the water column, total mass of γ-HCH and PCB 153 remain fairly steady in all three runs. In sediment, γ-HCH increases in the future runs, relative to the present, while PCB 153 in sediment decreases exponentially in all three runs, but even faster in the future, due to the increased number of storms, increased duration of gale wind conditions and increased water and air temperatures, all of which are the result of climate change. Annual net sinks exceed sources at the ends of all periods. Overall, the model results indicate that the climate change scenarios considered here generally have a negligible influence on the simulated fate and transport of the two POPs in the North Sea, although the increased number and magnitude of storms in the 21st century will result in POP resuspension and ensuing revolatilization events. Trends in emissions from primary and secondary sources will remain the key driver of levels of these contaminants over time.


In this study, we sequenced both two mitochondrial genes (COI and 16S rRNA) and nuclear genes (28S rRNA and elongation factor‐1α) from 71 species of Odonata that represent 7 superfamilies in 3 suborders. Phylogenetic testing for each two concatenated gene sequences based on function (ribosomal vs protein‐coding genes) and origin (mitochondrial vs nuclear genes) proved limited resolution. Thus, four concatenated sequences were utilized to test the previous phylogenetic hypotheses of higher taxa of Odonata via Bayesian inference (BI) and maximum likelihood (ML) algorithms, along with the data partition by the BI method. As a result, three slightly different topologies were obtained, but the BI tree without partition was slightly better supported by the topological test. This topology supported the suborders Anisoptera and Zygoptera each being a monophyly, and the close relationship of Anisozygoptera to Anisoptera. All the families represented by multiple taxa in both Anisoptera and Zygoptera were consistently revealed to each be a monophyly with the highest nodal support. Unlike consistent and robust familial relationships in Zygoptera those of Anisoptera were partially unresolved, presenting the following relationships: ((((Libellulidae + Corduliidae) + Macromiidae) + Gomphidae + Aeshnidae) + Anisozygoptera) + (((Coenagrionidae + Platycnemdidae) + Calopterygidae) + Lestidae). The subfamily Sympetrinae, represented by three genera in the anisopteran family Libellulidae, was not monophyletic, dividing Crocothemis and Deielia in one group together with other subfamilies and Sympetrum in another independent group.


In this paper we analyze an ID-based key issuing protocol due to Gangishetti et al., designed for eliminating the need of secure channel between PKG and users and avoiding the key escrow problem. Their protocol consists of five sub-protocols, namely system setup, system public key setup, key issuing, key securing and key retrieving. We show that both the key issuing and the key securing sub-protocols suffer from impersonation attacks. Further, we present an improved key issuing protocol which is proved to be secure against adaptive chosen message attack in the random oracle model under the CDH assumption


$\stackrel{\ensuremath{\rightarrow}}{\ensuremath{\tau}}\ensuremath{\pi}\ensuremath{\pi}\ensuremath{\pi}{\ensuremath{\nu}}_{\ensuremath{\tau}}$ decays are analyzed within the framework of the resonance effective theory of QCD. We work out the relevant Lagrangian that describes the axial-vector current hadronization contributing to these processes, in particular the local ${a}_{1}(1260)\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\rho}(770)$-Goldstone interactions. The new coupling constants are constrained by imposing the asymptotic behavior of the corresponding spectral function within QCD. Hence we compare the theoretical framework with the experimental data, obtaining a good quality fit from the ALEPH spectral function and branching ratio. We also get values for the mass and on-shell width of the ${a}_{1}(1260)$ resonance. In this way we are able to provide the structure functions that have been measured by OPAL and CLEO-II and we find an excellent agreement.


Traumatic injury produces a profound immune response that mobilizes both innate and adaptive branches of the immune system. Patient recovery after a major trauma is highly variable. Protracted recovery after surgery -a major trauma- causes significant societal and economic costs. However, the mechanistic underpinning of recovery after surgery remains poorly understood. We recently applied high-parameter mass cytometry at the bedside for the deep immune profiling of patients undergoing orthopedic surgery1. The data revealed patient-specific immune responses in monocyte subsets that contained strong correlates of clinical recovery. In this study, we asked whether differences in patients' pre-surgical immune states determined recovery. Activation of canonical signaling pathways was elicited in vitro, in pre-surgical patient samples. Single-cell evoked immune responses were analyzed in cell subsets spanning the entire immune system using mass cytometry. Surprisingly, the magnitude of these responses varied significantly across patients, thereby defining patient-specific "immune states". Among these responses, signaling downstream of the TLR4 receptor in CD14+ monocytes strongly correlated with surgical recovery (R=0.64-0.69). The findings highlight a fundamental role for monocytes in the recovery process and provide the mechanistic basis for a pre-operative diagnostic test to predict the course of surgical recovery. 1.Gaudilliere et al., Sci Transl Med. 2014


Paper Presented at the University of Toronto Political Science Undergraduate Research Colloquium 2015 organized by the Association of Political Science Students on January 14, 2015 at the Hart House Debates Room
Submitted to T-Space on March 5, 2015


The accumulated reactor grade (RG)-plutonium as nuclear waste of conventional reactors is estimated to exceed 1700 tonnes. Laser Inertial Confinement Fusion Fission Energy (LIFE) engine is considered to incinerate RG-plutonium in stockpiles. Calculations have been conducted for a constant fusion driver power of 500 MWth in S8-P3 approximation using 238-neutron groups. RG-plutonium out of the nuclear waste of LWRs is used in form of fissile carbide fuel in TRISO particles with volume fractions of 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 %, homogenously dispersed in the Flibe coolant. Respective tritium breeding ratio (TBR) values per incident fusion neutron are calculated as TBR = 1.35, 1.52, 1.73, 2.02 and 2.47 at start-up. With the burn up of fissionable RG-Pu isotopes in the coolant, TBR decreases gradually. Similarly, blanket energy multiplications are calculated as M0 = 3.8, 5.5, 7.7, 10.8 and 15.4 at start-up, respectively. Calculations have indicated prospects of achievability of very high burn up values (> 400 000 MD.D/MT).


Topology optimization of the inner reinforcement for a vehicle's hood has been performed by evolutionary structural optimization (ESO) method. The purpose of this study is to obtain optimal topology of the inner reinforcement for a vehicle's hood considering static stiffness and natural frequency simultaneously. To do this, the multiobjective design optimization technique was implemented. From several combinations of weighting factors, a Pareto-optimal solution was obtained. Optimal topologies were obtained by the ESO method, i.e., by eliminating the elements having the lowest efficiency from the structural domain. As the weighting factor of the elastic strain efficiency goes from 1 to zero, it is found that the optimal topologies transmits from the optimal topology of static stiffness problem to that of natural frequency problem. Therefore, it was concluded that ESO method is effectively applied to topology optimization of the inner reinforcement of a vehicle's hood.


Deposition of noble metal and semiconductor nanocrystalline thin films has received much attention. CdS and CdSe are important semiconductors used in optical devices. A wet chemical route which uses the interface of two immiscible liquids to control the growth and deposition of nanocrystalline thin films forms the basis of the current study. In this method, a metal precursor dissolved in toluene or decane is held in contact with a water layer containing a reducing or sulphiding agent. The reaction proceeds at the interface of the liquids and results in deposits adhering to the interfacial region. The products of such reactions typically consist of nanocrystals forming a thin film. Stable sols of Au, Ag were found to metathesize on contact with alkylamine in oil to form monolayer films that spread across large areas at the water/oil interface. The nature and properties of interfacial thin films depend on the alkylamine. Nanocrystalline thin films consisting of CdS adhering to the interface starting with a polydispersed aqueous sol of crystallites and alkylamine were obtained. The optical band gaps of the films formed are dependent on the alkylamine chain length, with the shortest chain yielding the largest gap. A systematic increase in particle diameters following adsorption is responsible for changes in the electronic structure of films. The formation of nanocrystalline films of CdS adhering at the interface using a toluene solution of cadmium diethyldithiocarbamate and aqueous Na2S solution, in the presence of tetraoctylammonium bromide (TOAB) in the aqueous phase, was investigated under various reaction parameters, while CdSe was obtained using Na2SeSO3 solution and the influences of deposition temperature and solution concentration were studied. A ternary water/decane/2-butoxyethanol /salt system was used to grow deposits of CdSe and CdS. Nanostructured thin films were obtained at the upper interface of the ternary system, between the emulsive middle layer and oil rich top phase. The influence of deposition conditions such as precursor concentrations and temperature, as well as the nature of the medium on the properties of the deposits was studied. Deposits grown using the ternary system were compared with those obtained using water/decane and water/toluene systems. Reaction parameters such as temperature, solution concentration and the size of CdS and CdSe were controlled. A thin film of CdS and CdSe nanocrystals was formed at the interface. The grain size was found to be dependent on reaction temperature and solution concentration, with higher temperatures and solution concentration resulting in larger grains. The nature of thin films obtained at the interface of two immiscible liquids and of a water/decane/2-butoxyethanol/salt ternary system were studied using Scanning and Transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and UV-visible spectroscopy.


Micronutrient deficiencies may be common during human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection. Insufficient dietary intake, malabsorption, diarrhoea, and impaired storage and altered metabolism of micronutrients can contribute to the development of micronutrient deficiencies. Low plasma or serum levels of vitamins A, E, B6, B12 and C, carotenoids, Se, and Zn are common in many HIV-infected populations. Micronutrient deficiencies may contribute to the pathogenesis of HIV infection through increased oxidative stress and compromised immunity. Low levels or intakes of micronutrients such as vitamins A, E, B6 and B12, Zn and Se have been associated with adverse clinical outcomes during HIV infection, and new studies are emerging which suggest that micronutrient supplementation may help reduce morbidity and mortality during HIV infection.


To determine, in the acute form of African swine fever (ASF), the relationship between the appearance of pulmonary oedema and viral replication and expression of cytokines by pulmonary intravascular macrophages (PIMs), 14 pigs were inoculated intramuscularly with ASF virus (strain España'70) and killed in pairs on days 1-7 post-inoculation. Samples of lung were examined immunohistochemically and ultrastructurally. The immunohistochemical study was carried out with antibodies against interleukin-1 alpha (IL-1alpha), tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha), viral antigen of ASF (Vp73) and a myeloid marker (SWC3). Viral replication was observed mainly in PIMs, which at the same time showed intense activation, accompanied by the expression of IL-1alpha and TNF-alpha. The occurrence of interstitial oedema, neutrophil sequestration and fibrin microthrombi in septal capillaries coincided with high degrees of cytokine expression by infected PIMs. Alveolar macrophages did not show a significant change in cytokine expression as a result of ASF infection, and viral replication was detected in only a low percentage of these cells.


Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a severe recessive X-linked form of muscular dystrophy caused by mutations in the DMD gene located on the X chromosome,(Xp21). It is characterized by rapid progression of muscle degeneration, eventually leading to loss of ambulation and death. Dystrophin is the predominant DMD transcript expressed in striated muscle. DMD gene mutations, deletions or duplications most frequently result in loss of dystrophin expression in the muscle of these patients. Deletions are most commonly located in the 5' end and in the central region of the exons 44 to 52, of the gene. Application of Bone marrow derived mesenchymal stem cells represent a promising approach for supporting new clinical concepts of cell based therapy in regenerative medicine. The non hematopoietic component of bone marrow includes multipotent mesenchymal stem cells capable of differentiating into fat, bone, muscle, cartilage and endothelium. The present study was undertaken to assess the expression of Myogenin and CD105 in autologous bone marrow derived mesenchymal stromal cells of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy patients. Ten DMD patients between 12 yrs to 24 yrs and 10 healthy controls were enrolled. With informed consent the bone marrow mononuclear cells were harvested, cultured and assessed for the expression of Myogenin and CD105 using Flourescence Activated Cell Sorter (FACS analysis). A significant increase in expression of Myogenin and CD105 was observed in the cultured autologous bone marrow derived Mesenchymal stromal cells of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy patients. The expression of the above mesenchymal stem cell markers in patients with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy indicate that autologous transplantation of bone marrow derived mesenchymal stromal cells could be of therapeutic potential.


Background:

Acute pain control following elective essential all out knee substitutions (TKRs) and all out hip substitutions (THRs) is regularly poor and is related with long haul incessant torment disorder. Moderate to serious agony is regularly detailed in the initial 48 hours following medical procedure requiring diverse torment methodology the board methodologies, for example, persistent controlled absense of pain and multimodal tranquilize absense of pain. The Local Infiltration Anesthetic (LIA) strategy is at present a set up method to handle perioperative help with discomfort; nonetheless, considers have detailed clashing proof up until this point. In an ongoing survey of 29 examinations exploring the utilization of LIA in TKR, LIA developed as a protected procedure with improved agony control (Gibbs DMR 2012). We have built up the LIA method to incorporate an intra-articular catheter permitting an imbuement of Novel Mixture (NM) to be mixed persistently postoperatively. Preemptive absense of pain, an antinociceptive treatment, is the treatment which is started before the medical procedure with the goal that the torment sharpening evoked by the cut related and fiery wounds happening during medical procedure can be forestalled. Alongside directing before the medical procedure, Pre-Emptive absense of pain can be used in the early postoperative period. This defensive impact is given by pre-emptive absense of pain on the nociceptive framework. So as to hinder the agony sensation, writing has recorded a few methodologies including medications and courses.

Joint substitution medical procedures are considered as one of the most excruciating orthopedic techniques. This excruciating method is the aftereffect of lacking and inadequately rewarded postoperative torment after significant joint substitution medical procedure. This agony scene must be ideal tended to in light of the fact that not exclusively does this fundamentally drag out the restoration procedure, yet in addition purposes the expanded danger of different inconveniences. If not tended to inside time or without legitimate methodology, these postoperative excruciating scenes can advance into constant torment, which in the long run drags out the general length of hospitalization and cost. The excursion to accomplish the total and long haul help with discomfort starts before the medical procedure is performed. A significant premise to accomplish long haul help with discomfort and practical recuperation after the joint medical procedure includes adequate peri-employable absense of pain. One of the significant angles to accomplish effective result after joint medical procedure is the early joint preparation with the commencement of non-intrusive treatment. A few new medications and novel procedures to enhance the post-employable agony post-medical procedure are being presented each year, yet the greater part of the patients despite everything wind up experiencing extraordinary torment following medical procedure which frequently advances into constant torment.

Arthroscopic knee medical procedure has gotten progressively well known in present day orthopedics. In any case, the post-employable knee torment the board including early help and agony free postoperative consideration to the patient stays a test to a few clinicians. Now and again, torment the board in itself has become a need for the board as a childcare methodology. Tenacious agony after knee arthoplasty stays an uncertain issue for some patients. Torment is considered as an exceptionally emotional occasion since everybody has an alternate recognition and edge of agony. What's more, hence, it turns out to be hard to normalize any agony system for a specific medical procedure. A few factors that cause knee torment, which incorporate aggravation of free sensitive spots of the joint case, synovial tissue, front fat cushion.

The point of neighborhood penetration is to anesthetize sensitive spots in a limited territory of tissue by the infusion of neighborhood sedatives close by. This stands as opposed to fringe nerve obstructs, in which nerve axons are the objective and the infusion may occur in a region expelled from the careful site (eg, brachial plexus hinder for hand medical procedure). The profundity of the region to be worked on commonly decides the necessary degree of invasion. For shallow skin methods, for example, stitching of slashes and skin biopsies, subcutaneous or intradermal penetration is adequate. Increasingly broad tasks may request invasion into muscle, belt, and other profound tissues. Two general methodologies exist for anesthetizing skin and subcutaneous tissue. The first includes infusing neighborhood sedative legitimately into the line of cut and close by tissues, successfully flooding the individual nearby sensitive spots to deliver sedation. This can be exceptionally successful, yet may require huge volumes of neighborhood sedative to accomplish total inclusion.

Aims and Objectives:

In this study we find out the results on our experience using LIA in addition to the Novel Techniques and Proprietary NM developed in Leeds-Bradford and infiltrated at 4-5 mls/hour for 48 hours post surgery.

Materials and Methods:

Between October 2013 and October 2015, 62 patients undergoing primary TKR were prospectively followed up. Three groups of patients were studied. All patients studied had spinal anaesthesia (SA) with 300-400mcg diamorphine.

Group 1.  GA. No LIA and no NM. 20 patients.

Group 2.   SA plus NM for 48 hours post operatively with catheter placed anteriorly under the patella.  21 patients.

Group 3.  SA plus LIA plus NM for 48 hours post operatively with catheter placed posteriorly in the knee joint.  21 patients.

Between June 2011 and July 2014, 173 consecutive patients undergoing primary THR using the posterior approach were also prospectively followed up.

Results and complications:

The patients without LIA or NM required more morphine in the initial 12 hours postoperative period than different gatherings. 70% (n=14) of these gathering 1 patients required 10mg morphine following TKR contrasted with just 2% (n=1) of patients requiring 10mg of morphine when LIA and NM were utilized. The expanded morphine necessity proceeded for 48 hours postoperatively in bunch 1, while none of the patients in bunches 2 or 3 required morphine following 36 hours. Factual investigation uncovered no distinction of morphine necessities with various catheter situation. Less patients experienced sickness and heaving or urinary maintenance in the gathering with LIA and NM (p-esteem <0.05, Mann-Whitney test). There were no contaminations DVT or different difficulties in any of the gatherings.

Conclusion:

This investigation exhibits that patients following TKR rewarded with LIA and NM for 48 hours after required fundamentally less morphine during this time. This advantage was generally set apart in the initial 24 hours after medical procedure and the advantage was kept up for 48hours. Less patients required sedative absense of pain when LIA in addition to NM was utilized contrasted with different gatherings. The most noteworthy centrality was at 0-12 hrs for patients requiring up to 20mg morphine utilization (χ2(2) = 46.713, p = 0.000); and 0-12hrs for patients requiring 30mg morphine use (χ2(2) = 46.310, p = 0.000).


Nascent entrepreneurs are people who are (alone or with others) actively engaged in creating a new venture and who expect to be the owner or part owner of this start-up. Given that newly founded firms are important for the economic development of nations and regions, and that nascent entrepreneurs are by definition important for the foundation of new firms, information about nascent entrepreneurs is important for understanding crucial aspects of the economy. The relevance of detailed information on nascent entrepreneurs at the regional level, and the lack of it for Germany, let us start the research project Regional Entrepreneurship Monitor (REM) Germany in 2000. As part of this project, we performed a representative survey of the adult population in 10 German regions, plus a survey and interviews with local experts in the field of entrepreneurship in 2001. A second wave followed in 2003. This paper summarizes our findings using data from these surveys and interviews.


Crises often present complex, uncertain, and unstable situations where routine decision making is not enough. Crises are typically unpredictable yet leaders must prepare to make decisions using a variety of traits, tools and practices. While all leadership is dependent on many factors and subject to many variables, in a crisis, those variables are magnified. Effective decision making during a crisis is a key trait of crisis leaders and is developed over time and with practice. Using the classic Delphi Technique, the researcher obtained qualitative data from experts in crisis management concerning (a) the difference between non-crisis and crisis decision making, (b) the traits and tools of a crisis leader, and (c) evidence of effective crisis leadership practices. This research method was selected because of its flexibility, its use of experts, and the varied locations of those experts. Literature reviewed for this study considered traditional leadership as well as crisis leadership. Crisis leaders use traditional decision making strategies, tools and practices as well as those adapted to a crisis environment. This study seeks to capture some of that data and disseminate it to the community of practice as well as the research community. The goal of any research is to improve the field of practice, add to the body of knowledge, and increase awareness of an idea, concept, or theory. Recognizing the complexity of crisis environments, the researcher suggests recommendations that may assist the crisis management community to improve decision making and to share traits, tools, and practices of effective crisis leaders.


The developments in large-scale monitoring of gene expression have made the reconstruction of gene regulatory networks (GRNs) feasible. Before one can infer the overall structures of GRNs, it is important to identify, for each gene in a network, which other genes can affect its expression and how they can affect it. Many existing methods to reconstructing GRNs are developed to generate hypotheses about the presence or absence of interactions between genes so that laboratory experiments can be performed afterwards for verification. Since, they are not intended to be used to predict if a gene has any interactions with other genes from an unseen sample. This makes statistical verification of the reliability of the discovered interactions difficult. In addition, some of them cannot make use of the temporal evidence in the data and also cannot take into account the directionality of regulation. For these reasons, we propose an effective data mining approach in this paper. For performance evaluation, it has been tested using real expression data. Experimental results show that it can be effective. The sequential associations discovered can reveal known gene regulatory relationships that could be used to infer the structures of GRNs


Several types of cells use a sheet-like structure called lamellipodium for movement. The main structural components, actin filaments, are connected via cross-linking proteins. Adhesions allow for a connection with the substrate and the contraction agent myosin helps pulling the cell body forward. Additionally the cell has to regulate its filament number locally by nucleation (via branching) of new filaments and degradation (via capping and severing) of existing ones. I will present a continuous model of this structure including the forces created by the described molecular players. The non-linear PDE model is based on an variational approach and approximated using the finite element method with non-standard finite elements. The simulation can reproduce stationary and moving steady states, describe the transition between the two, mimic chemotaxis, describe interaction with an obstacle and simulate turning cells.


Aurthor's version of a chapter published in the book: Proceedings of the 18th IFAC World Congress 2011. Also available from the publisher at: http://dx.doi.org/10.3182/20110828-6-IT-1002.00284


Being able to recognize, understand and narrate one's own biography, in its incipit, ruit and exit , which define everybody's existential path, has become a dramatically difficult social emergency that must be addressed. In current times, in fact, it is possible to observe both a need/right to narrate one's own autobiography and a civil right/duty of being educated at doing it. Being capable of narrating one's own life history is not a spontaneous act anymore, because contemporary life swallows up all histories in addition to History itself. Understanding and elaborating the past, making oneself capable of narrating it and letting oneself be inspired by it to deepen the knowledge of the present as its possible outcome, is considered superfluous and useless. Why did this happen? We will try to list a series of complex, and often dramatic, factors behind it, even though we know well that they depend on endless reasons and on the perspective chosen to interpret them. Contemporary life needs new parameters to define identity and social rooting, which nowadays can neither be simply inherited, nor offered by a single territory or place. This rooting has become more like a dimension that must be "trained" inside oneself to turn into the ability of moving simultaneously in the various places of life and into the ability of opposing, in a dynamical way, one's own inner firmness to the constant external movement: in other words, the ability of "linking" the events in one's own life along a time continuum, while space is always changing. All this implies cultivating what we have defined as the inner citizenship , a proposal of secular ethics based on some "pieces of consciousness" (the consciousness of the complementary difference between male and female, the consciousness of the presence of History inside an individual's biography, the consciousness of the need of an education to democracy, etc.) that make the person ready to exercise his/her rights/duties in view of an active citizenship. In order to do this a person must first be convinced of his/her value.


Objective: Efforts to promote the cessation of harmful alcohol use are hindered by the affective and physiological components of alcohol withdrawal (AW), which can include life-threatening seizures. Although previous studies of AW and relapse have highlighted the critical importance of the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) subunit GluN2B and the detrimental role of stress, little is known about genetic risk factors. We therefore conducted genetic and neurobiological studies to identify and characterize novel risk loci. Methods: We performed a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of AW symptom count in uniformly assessed subjects with histories of serious AW, followed by additional genotyping in independent subjects, and bioinformatic analyses. We used genetically modified mouse neuronal cultures to conduct electrophysiological and pharmacological studies of neurobiological systems implicated by the GWAS. Results: The top association signal for AW severity was in sortilin-related gene SORCS2 on chromosome 4 (European-American meta-analysis n = 1,478, P = 4.3 x 10–9), and the same risk allele also predicted more severe clinical outcomes in seizure disorder patients participating in a randomized trial of anticonvulsant effectiveness (n = 654, P = 3.2 x 10–3). In humans, SORCS2 is most highly expressed in the nervous system, and bioinformatic analyses showed that the SORCS2 risk haplotype disrupts transcription factor (TF) binding motifs within a stress hormoneregulated enhancer element active in human hippocampus. In mouse hippocampal preparations, we demonstrate that SorCS2 is a key regulator of GluN2B-mediated synaptic responses. Conclusion: These translational findings identify new synaptic regulatory processes, and provide novel targets for managing the aversive consequences of abrupt alcohol cessation. PM297 High-dose zolpidem dependence and detoxification from withdrawal symptoms using diazepam St. Andrew's Hospital, Republic of Korea Abstract Objective of the study: Zolpidem is a nonbenzodiazepine hypnotic for the treatment of insomnia, and known as a relatively safe medication. However, there have been several case reports of zolpidem abuse and dependence these days. Even though some withdrawal symptoms like seizures can occur, there was no standard detoxification method until now. Methods used: We reviewed the previous researches about high-dose zolpidem addiction and proposed treatment, and the clinical case. Summary of results: A high dose of zolpidem has similar pharmacologic properties as the rest of benzodiazepines, even though the usual dose of zolpidem has a selectivity to type 1 benzodiazepine receptor. So, some cases of high-dose Zolpidem dependence can be treated by conventional benzodiazepines, such as diazepam. Actually, diazepam tends to be avoided because of complicated pharmacological properties and potential risks like respiratory suppression, iatrogenic dependence. But diazepam is still one of candidate medication for managing withdrawal symptoms of benzodiazepine dependence, and also, nonbenzodiazepine hypnotics in the clinical setting. Conclusions reaches: We report a rare case of high-dose addiction and successful detoxification by cross-titration with diazepam.


Background:The platelets used in oral, maxillofacial, and plastic surgery are generally grouped as concentrated platelet-rich plasma. The general principle of production consists of a centrifugation, making it possible to eliminate red blood cells, then acellular plasma, to preserve only the concentrated platelets. Objective:The aim of the present study was that micro porous tricalcium phosphate (&bgr;-TCP) mixed with autologous platelet-derived growth factors could be an alternative to fat and hyaluronic acid which are widely used for oral and maxillofacial soft tissue augmentation. Methods:Ten female, 6 to 8-week-old black-haired mice were selected. On 1 cheek was injected the gel of tricalcium phosphate/autologous platelet-derived growth factors, while on the other cheek, was left empty and was used as control. The animals were killed after 8 weeks. Investigator evaluation was based on microtomography observation and comparison of control and test. Results:The microtomography technique demonstrated amorphous radiopaque images projected in the soft tissue parts of each paramedian region of the right cheek, in those sites corresponding to the injection of the gel of tricalcium phosphate/autologous platelet-derived growth factor. Eight weeks after surgery, &bgr;-TCP granules were clearly visible with most remaining within the cheek. The margins of the &bgr;-TCP granules were clear and not diffused within the vicinity of the tissues. Conclusion:The results indicate that micro &bgr;-tricalcium phosphate Ca3(PO4)2 mixed with autologous platelet-derived growth factors material was able to create a lasting three-dimensional soft tissue augmentation and is a promising biomaterial for soft tissue augmentation as a scaffold for cells.


For the current solar tracking controller's poor immunity, poor tracking accuracy and the traditional sensor's form single issue, this paper propose a dual-mode solar tracking system which is based on PLC (Programmable Logic Controller). The system combined the fixed trajectory rough tracking with the photoelectric sensor accurate tracking effectively, and improved the controller's photoelectric sensor tracking mode. By comparing the results of experiments, it shows that the improved tracking controller can achieve tracking accuracy highly. So it can promote the utilization of solar energy.


In the course of the emic–etic debate in the scientific study of religion\s, two complexes—insider–outsider and emic–etic—have increasingly become entangled. Taken against this backdrop, this article argues that ethnomethodology provides a methodological and epistemological outlook on these two complexes that can support efforts to disentangle them. Based on the discussion of ethnomethodological studies, I trace this outlook back to ethnomethodology's focus on observable social interaction as dynamic, situational, and directed toward the public. This focus rejects the preoccupation with what is going on "inside people's heads," and thus underlines the methodological and epistemological redundancy of the insider–outsider distinction. Finally, I maintain that ethnomethodology and the majority of strands within the scientific study of religion\s are jointly rooted in an emic standpoint that concentrates on the study of specific contexts and interactions, and seeks to avoid generalized a priori classifications.


To best integrate management of available water one should coordinate the use of groundwater and surface water in time and space. This requires: data distributed in space and time; the ability to predict system response to stimuli; clearly formulated management goals, constraints, and optimization problem scenarios; the ability to compute optimal management strategies; and ways of implementing the strategies. A strategy is a set of controllable water flows, such as groundwater extraction and injection rates, surface water diversions, and reservoir releases. Simulation/optimization (S/O) models link simulators and optimizers to compute optimal strategies for user-specified management problems. S/O models are increasingly used for policy development, reconnaissance studies, planning, design, and management. S/O models can help determine the policies, plans, systems, and management that can yield the best consequences. 'Best' is defined by the manager/modeler via the formulated optimization problem to be solved. Best is usually defined in terms of water availability, sustainability, crop production, economic, social, or environmental criteria, or combinations. Developing optimal multi-objective solutions and tradeoff surfaces is simple with a powerful S/O model such as SOMOS. Examples demonstrate S/O model power for integrated water resources management. Capabilities of Simulation Optimization MOdeling System (SOMOS) are discussed.


Abstract. The paper evidences the importance of old aerial and satellite photos of ancient topography studies, with examples concerning archaeological and geo-archaeological research conducted in Italy and Turkey, during a cooperation between the Ancient Topography, Archaeology and Remote Sensing Laboratory (AnTAReS Lab) of the Institute for Archaeological and Monumental Heritage of the Italian National Research Council (IBAM-CNR) and the Ancient Topography and Photogrammetry Laboratory (LabTAF) of Salento University. The historical aerial photos, i.e. those before the big transformations of the 1950's and 1960's, and the space photos taken in the 1960's and 1970's, particularly useful for the Near East, represent a fundamental tool for the study of the territory. In many cases, in fact, they document landscapes that have been modified by urbanization, building of large infrastructures, transformations in the land use and diffusion of mechanized agricultural methods. Only through the detailed analysis of these aerial and space photos it is possible to recover a fundamental documentation concerning the existence, the location and the layout of archaeological evidence and paleo-environmental elements otherwise lost; so, their use during research is very important for the reconstruction of the ancient topography of urban and territorial contexts.


This paper presents a "standard" method that is being developed by ARESlab of Rome's La Sapienza University for the documentation and the representation of the archaeological artifacts and structures through automatic photogrammetry software. The image-based 3D modeling technique was applied in two projects: in Sarno and in Rome. The first is a small city in Campania region along Via Popilia, known as the ancient way from Capua to Rhegion. The interest in this city is based on the recovery of over 2100 tombs from local necropolis that contained more than 100.000 artifacts collected in "Museo Nazionale Archeologico della Valle del Sarno". In Rome the project regards the archaeological area of Insula Volusiana placed in Forum Boarium close to Sant'Omobono sacred area. During the studies photographs were taken by Canon EOS 5D Mark II and Canon EOS 600D cameras. 3D model and meshes were created in Photoscan software. The TOF-CW Z+F IMAGER® 5006h laser scanner is used to dense data collection of archaeological area of Rome and to make a metric comparison between range-based and image-based techniques. In these projects the IBM as a low-cost technique proved to be a high accuracy improvement if planned correctly and it shown also how it helps to obtain a relief of complex strata and architectures compared to traditional manual documentation methods (e.g. two-dimensional drawings). The multidimensional recording can be used for future studies of the archaeological heritage, especially for the "destructive" character of an excavation. The presented methodology is suitable for the 3D registration and the accuracy of the methodology improved also the scientific value.


We suggest that acute GVHD after marrow transplantation reflects (1) host injury due to the conditioning regimen followed by the production of inflammatory cytokines; (2) stimulation of mature donor T cells in the milieu of increased cell surface expression of leukocyte adhesion molecules and HLA molecules, followed by the autocrine production of IL-2; and, finally, (3) recruitment and activation of additional mononuclear effector cells from donor marrow progenitors, which produce additional inflammatory cytokines, thus sustaining the response. The second step is critical for the amplification of the systemic inflammatory response, and it is absence in autologous, syngeneic, and T-cell-depleted transplants. These T cells may also contribute to the inflammatory cytokine network. Acute GVHD can occur in the absence of primary tissue injury in such settings as transfusion-related GVHD; however, it is likely that a greater HLA disparity between donor and host is required. We propose that inflammatory cytokine production is the final common pathway of acute GVHD. If this model is correct, control of cytokine dysregulation at any of several points should control GVHD. Further studies of GVHD and investigations of cytokine antagonists (eg, IL-4 or IL-10) or combinations of antagonists such as IL-1ra and soluble TNF receptor or pentoxifylline will allow us to determine the validity of this hypothesis.


A texture measurement device was modified to measure the force required to pull pin bones from King salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha), snapper (Pagrus auratus), and kahawai (Arripis trutta). Pulled bones were also subjected to tension to measure the breaking force. For all fish, the pulling force depended on the size of the fish, and on the length of the pin bone (P < 0.05). In general, larger fish required greater pulling force to remove pin bones. For example, fresh small salmon (about 1500 g whole) required 600 g on average to pull pin bones, and large fish (about 3700 g whole) required 850 g. Longer bones required greater pulling force. The breaking force followed the same trend. In general, the breaking force was greater than the pulling force. This allows the removal of the bones without breaking them. There was no statistically significant (P > 0.05) difference between the forces (both pulling and breaking) from fresh and frozen/thawed samples, although in general frozen/thawed samples required less force to pull. With the quantification of pulling and breaking forces for pin bones, it is possible to design and build better, "more intelligent" pin bone removal equipment.


This study aims to determine the factors affecting the farmers"™ benefiting from forage crops production support in the Eregli district of Konya province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. Data were obtained by a questionnaire administered to 69 forage crops farms selected by stratified random sampling. Chi-square test was used to analyze the existence of association between "benefiting or not" and each of the socio-economic variables. The result of the analyses showed that education level, farming experience, size of total farm land, size of forage crops cultivation area, size of field crop cultivation area, membership of a cooperative, state of dealing with non-agricultural activity and certificate seed usage variables were significantly related with farmers"™ benefiting from forage crops production support. Considering all these results, it could be said that, increasing forage crops production was a major goal for developing sustainable livestock sector in Turkey. For this reason, cultivation area of forage crops should be increased and priority should be given to forage crops within the crop rotation system particularly in fallow areas. Present incentive support for cultivation of forage crops should be continued and increased. In addition to farmers"™ problems and requests into consideration should be given priority to policy applications in forage crops production.


Evaluation of the forces on the lumbar intervertebral discs (IVDs) is critically important since it closely relates to biomechanics, pathology, prosthesis design and tissue engineering. It remains a big challenge to noninvasively predict the in vivo forces on the IVD. Using our previously established dual fluoroscopic imaging system (DFIS) [1], motion of the vertebrae can be accurately obtained. We proposed to use the kinematics from DFIS as inputs into FE model to calculate the forces on the IVD. In this study, we validated the technique by testing an IVD on a 6DOF robotic system under applied loads and under DFIS. A subject specific FE model of IVD was built. Forces and moments were predicted and compared to the applied loads.Copyright © 2011 by ASME


There are various harmful physical factors in the passenger and work premises of the Moscow underground. Noise is the most common harmful factor. The normative documents regulating noise in the underground were found to have discrepancies, which in practice makes it difficult to define whether the level of the sound is in compliance with the existing specifications and hence to determine effective actions made to mitigate its negative impact on the underground passengers and personnel.


Testers are often characterized as the conscience of a project. This session will dive deeply and uncomfortably into the psyche of software testing and those of us who claim it as our profession. Attitudes that are deeply embedded in our testing culture and their effectiveness will be examined: 1. Our bug finding mandate is a wrecking ball, which we aim and swing at will 2. We haven't done our jobs until the developers are crying and the ship date has been extended by months 3. Developers live to write bad code and should be eyed cautiously at all times 4. Crunch time on a project is our signal to be as harsh and unforgiving as possible to everyone else on the software team. The positive role that emotions can play in testing is also discussed. Crucial conversations are also introduced to help testers understand how to argue their point without bullying. This presentation will show why testers must have and act with conscience and have an emotional fluency in order to test software effectively. We will show that despite being erroneously called soft skills, the effective care and handling of emotions is the hardest skill in testing.


Flame is a natural phenomenon and is a basic element of any combustion process. The majority of flames consist of a gas; there is, however, a small amount of ionisation occurring in the flame. Despite the increased focus on combustionfree energy production such as wind, air and water power, and the refocus on nuclear energy now considered to be carbon-free, nonetheless combustion will remain, for the next few decades, the major energy and heat production route worldwide. Apart from carbon dioxide, which is commonly considered to be the major pollutant, there are other gases like nitric oxide and nitrogen dioxide which, although found in significantly lower amounts in the exhaust gases from combustion units, still present a large environmental impact and are a concern. There are however well-established technologies for removing combustion products from the exhaust gas, and the combustion process can in general be made CO2 and environmentally neutral. Combustion optimisation is a route for further reduction of undesirable byproducts, fuel consumption minimisation and finally an overall energy and heat production enhancement. The key parameter in any combustion process is reliable flame and (post-) combustion gas temperature measurement and control. Various combustion environments such as waste incineration, internal combustion engines or solids explosions cause the appearance of various optical emission features in different spectral ranges not accessible to the human eye. A combination of modern and newly developed fast spectral optical techniques with extensive theoretical developments in spectral and heat radiative transfer modelling allows us to obtain detailed snapshots of what is happening in the combustion process. That also gives a possibility to establish a direct link to the industrial process control and pollutant emission reduction. In this article some examples of in situ flame and gas temperature measurements in various combustion environments and advanced spectral modelling are given and perspectives for further commercial instrumentation developments are discussed.


Aim Heart failure (HF) affects millions of older individuals in both developed and low/middle-income countries. Serum galectin-3 levels have been shown to have prognostic value. However, its use as a diagnostic biomarker has not been explored. The aim was to establish a saliva galectin-3 reference range and to demonstrate the potential diagnostic utility of salivary and serum galectin-3 levels in assessing HF. Methods Blood and saliva samples were collected from age-matched healthy controls (n=51) and patients with HF (n=63). Customised immunoassays were developed to quantify salivary galectin-3 levels. The diagnostic performances of these assays were evaluated by receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curves analysis. Results The galectin-3 concentrations were significantly elevated in saliva and serum samples of patients with HF compared with controls (p<0.001 and p<0.0001, respectively). Using ROC curve analysis, both serum and salivary galectin-3 gave area under the curve (AUC)=0.86 and AUC=0.73, respectively. There was also a significant correlation (r=0.4, p<0.01) between serum and salivary galectin-3 levels. Conclusions For the first time, we have quantified galectin-3 levels in human saliva and have demonstrated potential clinical utility in diagnosing HF. Further, larger multicentre clinical trials are needed before salivary galectin-3 levels can be implemented in a clinical setting.


Dynamic and static behaviors of a three-dimensional catenary system for a high-speed railway are analyzed by using the finite element method. Considering tensions in the contact wire and the messenger wire, we drive the equations of motion for the catenary system. These equations are for the longitudinal, transverse, vertical and torsional motions. After establishing the weak form, the weak forms are spatially discretized with newly defined two-node beam elements. With the discretized equations, a finite element computer program is developed for the static and dynamic analyses. The static deflections of the catenary system, which are important for good contact between the pantograph and the contact line, are computed when the gravity is applied. On the other hand, we analyze the natural frequencies and the corresponding natural modes of the catenary system. The dynamic responses of the system are also investigated when applying a load to the contact line. For verification of the developed finite element program, vibrations of the catenary system are measured and they are compared to computed time responses.


Adverse Events (AE) are harmful events resulting from the use of medical products. Although social media may be crucial for early AE detection, the sheer scale of this data makes it logistically intractable to analyze using human agents, with NLP representing the only low-cost and scalable alternative. In this paper, we frame AE Detection and Extraction as a sequence-to-sequence problem using the T5 model architecture and achieve strong performance improvements over competitive baselines on several English benchmarks (F1 = 0.71, 12.7% relative improvement for AE Detection; Strict F1 = 0.713, 12.4% relative improvement for AE Extraction). Motivated by the strong commonalities between AE-related tasks, the class imbalance in AE benchmarks and the linguistic and structural variety typical of social media posts, we propose a new strategy for multi-task training that accounts, at the same time, for task and dataset characteristics. Our multi-task approach increases model robustness, leading to further performance gains. Finally, our framework shows some language transfer capabilities, obtaining higher performance than Multilingual BERT in zero-shot learning on French data.


Key words: competitiveness, territorial unit, firms, bankruptcy, Greece, Dubai In the modern globalized economy there are some concepts which are very important for the current socio-economic system. One of them is competition. Though in classical political economy, the economic realm, with competition as its centerpiece, seems to be carrying it over all other fields, today competition appears as the sole immanent category imbuing all aspects of everyday life. So, in current globalised economic background, competition has been extended in fields of education, health, wealth fare and among them, the spatial sciences and economic geography - competition among territorial units (cities, regions or states) in order to attract financial and human capital. The concept of territorial competitiveness was introduced in scientific and policy affairs almost 30 years ago and mainly during the last 15 years it has been the basis of territorial development policy. The scientific discussion regarding this concept is very rich since many authors, councils and organisations have put forward an opinion having articulated three particular approaches: the defending one which supports it, the critical one which disputes it and the neutral approach. The deep review of the three approaches and the role of territorial competitiveness in current territorial development policy contribute to a global view of the concept. This paper makes efforts to examine thoroughly the concept of competition in its relationship with space, if it direct or not, evaluating the existing theoretical propositions, participating in the discussion which takes place about territorial competitiveness with many interesting opinions expressed by economists, planners and geographers, exercising influence in decision making. It first focuses on the question whether territorial units¢ competition is a self-reliant concept or a concept which is derivative of firms¢ competition. Secondly, one of the basic aspects regarding territorial competitiveness is the comparison between the way that the firms and the territories behave mainly in case of bad economic performance and even bankruptcy. Within this context the cases of Greece and Dubai present remarkable interest regarding their behaviour after their bad economic performance.


OBJECTIVE. The objective of this article was to study the effect of decreasing the time allowed an American Journal of Roentgenology (AJR) reviewer to consider an invitation to review on time for two invitees to accept an invitation and time for both reviewers to return reviews. MATERIALS AND METHODS. Neuroradiology manuscripts submitted between September 2015 and June 2017 were randomly assigned in a blinded manner to one of two groups. The groups allowed either a 3-day or a 1-day period for invited reviewers to accept the invitation to review. The AJR manuscript database was examined to determine the effect of the invitation acceptance period on time needed for two reviewers to accept an invitation, the number of reviewers who needed to be contacted before two accepted, and the period of time required for both reviewers to submit their review. The differences were then analyzed using a two-sample t test. RESULTS. A total of 87 manuscripts were sent to reviewers who had 1 day to respond to the invitation and 114 manuscripts were sent to reviewers with a 3-day invitation. The mean length of time for two reviewers to accept invitations was 6.65 days in the 1-day group and 10.24 days in the 3-day group (p = 0.04). The mean number of reviewers contacted before two accepted was 6.14 in the 1-day group and 6.36 in the 3-day group (p = 0.71). The mean number of days before two completed reviews were submitted by the 1-day group was 27.97 days, and the mean number for the 3-day group was 31.53 days (p = 0.04). CONCLUSION. The results suggest that allowing a shorter time for prospective reviewers to consider an invitation can decrease the time needed for the required number of reviewers to accept an invitation to review and for completed reviews to be submitted.


Logan described as the Grenville series a highly metamorphosed sedimentary series in the vicinity of Grenville, Quebec. His associates and geologists of a later generation mapped similar formations in adjoining areas and extended the distribution of rocks with Grenville series characteristics into southeastern Ontario and the Adirondack Mountains. These areas are surrounded by somewhat similar sediments, tentatively correlated with the Grenville series. They range from the Mendon series east of the Adiron-dacks, through the Bruce series northwest of the Haliburton-Bancroft area, to sediments in northern Quebec associated with volcanics considered to be a part of the Keewatin, Original evidence for these diversified correlations is analyzed, recent data collected in other work are applied to the correlation problem, and the Grenville series is tentatively dated as pre-volcanic in age.


AIM
To provide an update on the use of Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) in the field of implant dentistry (1); to compare PROMs for prostheses supported by one or more implants to alternative treatment options or a healthy dentition (2).

MATERIALS AND METHODS
The dental literature was searched on PubMed until December 31, 2014, using a general search algorithm. An overall quantitative analysis was performed, and a qualitative appraisal was made on the output of the last 6 years. Per type of edentulism and prosthetic treatment, the general search algorithm was refined in order to select controlled studies comparing PROMs for prostheses supported by one or more implants to alternative treatment options or a healthy dentition.

RESULTS
With nearly half of the output (300 of 635) published in the last 6 years, there is a growing interest in PROMs by the scientific community. When scrutinizing the 300 most recent publications, only 84 controlled studies could be identified among which 38 RCTs and 31 cohort studies. An "ad hoc" approach is commonly employed using non-standardized questions and different scoring methods, which may compromise validity and reliability. Overall, 39 eligible papers related to fully edentulous patients treated with an implant overdenture (IOD) and 9 to fully edentulous patients treated with a fixed implant prosthesis (FIP). There is plenty of evidence from well-controlled studies showing that fully edentulous patients in the mandible experience higher satisfaction with an IOD when compared to a conventional denture (CD). This may not hold true for fully edentulous patients in the maxilla. In general, fully edentulous patients seem to opt for a fixed or removable rehabilitation on implants for specific reasons. Data pertaining to partially edentulous patients were limited (FIP: n = 6; single implants: n = 16). In these patients, the timing of implant placement does not seem to affect patient satisfaction. Patients seem to prefer straightforward implant surgery over complex surgery that includes bone grafting.

CONCLUSION
There is an urgent need for standardized reporting of PROMs in the field of implant dentistry. Fully edentulous patients in the mandible experience higher satisfaction with an IOD when compared to a CD. All other types of prostheses have been underexposed to research.


A new porous structure as a bone tissue engineering scaffold was developed by a freeze-drying method. The porous nanocomposite was prepared from Biphasic Calcium Phosphate (BCP) which was a mixture of 70% hydroxy apatite and 30%ß-TCP (ß-Tricalcium Phosphate). Porogen was naphthalene and gelatin from bovine skin type B was used as polymer. Gelatin was stabilized with EDC (N-(3-dimethyl aminopropyl)-N´-ethyl carbodiimide hydrochloride) by a cross-linking method. The scaffold was characterized by scanning electronic microscope (SEM), Fourier-Transformed Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The biocompatibility of this nanocomposite carried out through MTT (3-(4, 5-Dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2, 5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide, a tetrazole) cell viability assay. Also other properties of scaffold such as morphology, grain size, bending strength were investigated. Highly porous structure with interconnected porosities, good mechanical behavior and high biocompatibility with bone tissue, were benefits of this porous nanocomposite for bone tissue engineering.


We make a very large realisation of a Gaussian white noise field, called PANPHASIA, public by releasing software that computes this field. Panphasia is designed specifically for setting up Gaussian initial conditions for cosmological simulations and resimulations of structure formation. We make available both software to compute the field itself and codes to illustrate applications including a modified version of a public serial initial conditions generator. We document the software and present the results of a few basic tests of the field. The properties and method of construction of Panphasia are described in full in a companion paper Jenkins 2013.


This article explores the outcomes of using community-engaged learning in a sustainability-focused social sciences research course titled Methods of Social Research. The integrated components of the course were designed to teach students about the research process while addressing sustainability issues at Utah State University. Throughout the course, students learned how to collect, analyze, and interpret data; work in research teams; write a grant; and write and present a final research paper. Student sustainability surveys and the final course evaluation were used to analyze student learning outcomes. We found that students demonstrated increased confidence in collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data and an improved effectiveness and enjoyment in working in teams toward a final product. Students also exhibited their knowledge of small- and large-scale sustainability challenges as well as a decisiveness in answering questions related to sustainability. These outcomes resulted in heightened student self-efficacy and critical thinking skills when performing research and engaging with issues related to sustainability.