Serotonin is an important neurotransmitter that regulates a range of processes within the brain and is implicated in several psychiatric disorders. In addition, serotonin acts as a developmental signal during critical periods of prenatal development, influencing processes such as neuronal proliferation, migration, and synaptogenesis (Gaspar et al., 2003). The serotonin transporter (5- HTT) plays a key role in regulating extracellular serotonin levels and is the main target of selective-serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), a class of drugs that have anti-anxiety and anti- depressive activity. SSRIs cause an acute increase in extracellular serotonin and are commonly prescribed as a treatment for depression and anxiety during pregnancy (Tran & Robb, 2015). Given that these drugs alter serotonin transmission and can pass to the developing fetus via the placenta, it is vital that the outcomes of prenatal SSRI exposure are investigated. In humans, a genetic variant of the gene that codes for the 5-HTT (SLC6A4) has been linked to increased risk for developing depression and anxiety (Caspi et al., 2003). The functional consequences of this genetic polymorphism are life-long alterations in 5-HTT activity, resulting in increased extracellular levels of serotonin (Nakamura et al., 2000). Given prenatal SSRI exposure results in a time-locked blockade of 5-HTT during critical periods of development, it follows that alterations in serotonin during development might similarly result in enhanced risk for depression and anxiety later in life. Outcomes in children prenatally exposed to SSRIs are difficult to study due to confounds of pre- existing maternal depression. Therefore, the current thesis presents two experiments that aimed to further investigate the role of altered extracellular serotonin levels during development in an animal model. Experiment one aimed to develop a method of voluntary oral administration of the SSRI fluoxetine to pregnant rat dams. This method was then applied in experiment two to create a time-locked blockade of 5-HTT during critical periods of development in an animal model of life-long 5-HTT blockade. The aim of experiment two was to directly assess the contribution of short- and long-term 5-HTT blockade on anxiety and depression phenotypes in adult male offspring. In addition, maternal behaviour was assessed to determine whether fluoxetine treatment had an influence on mother-pup interactions that could confound results. To test for anxiety and depression phenotypes, the novel affective disorder test (ADT) was used to assess anxiety behaviour and the deficits in anticipatory pleasure indicative of anhedonia. In the current study, fluoxetine treatment did not have an effect on litter outcomes or mother-pup interactions. Crucially, no significant group differences were found indicating that neither short- nor long- term blockade of 5-HTT resulted in increased anxiety- or depressive-like behaviours in the current experiment. However, limitations with methodological design limit the translatability of these results to the broader literature, and validation of the ADT is required before these results can be generalised beyond this thesis.


Although you can find it just about everywhere, the twenty-first century supermarket is hard to define. Consumers have no need to define them They tend to visit these huge and efficient emporia weekly or more often, and they know they can buy what they need there. That's all they need to know. Transactional lawyers who specialize in lease negotiations can't think of the supermarket solely as a place where they can buy food and other things. Defining the supermarket and distinguishing supermarkets from other kinds of stores that do business in shopping centers are essential skills for them. To a large degree, a shopping center's success depends on the diversity of its tenant-mix. Consumers are drawn to shopping centers that offer a wide variety of merchandise, and shopping centers that can't do that are left behind in this competitive world. That's why shopping center landlords and tenants alike favor contractual arrangements to assure tenant mix diversity. We find these contractual arrangements in leases in the form of clauses called use clauses that regulate the business conducted in the leased stores and exclusive clauses that regulate the business conducted in the other stores of the shopping center. A use clause might prohibit the tenant from conducting any business in its leased premises other than a supermarket, and an exclusive clause might prohibit the landlord from leasing any other space in the shopping center to a competing supermarket. It follows then that a lease negotiator must understand what a supermarket is - especially if he or she proposes or accepts a use clause limiting the use of a store to a supermarket or an exclusive prohibiting other stores from being used a supermarket. Only uncertainty, disappointment, and bitter litigation can result from a failure to understand just what kind of a store a supermarket is. This article, the first in a series of five articles, defines the supermarket by exploring the industry's historic roots. It reviews the innovative business plan conceived by the industry's founding father. It illustrates how the founding father's plan was modified by feisty entrepreneurs who followed in his footsteps and added their own improvements to the institution destined to completely revamp the world's food distribution system.


Using a special property of dynamic complementary-suppression-modulated transmission (DCSMT) in the bacteriorhodopsin (bR) film, we have demonstrated an all-optical time-delay relay. To extend our work, the relationship between the delay time of the all-optical time-delay relay and parameters of a bR film is numerically studied. We show how the delay time changes with the product of concentration and thickness (PCT) of a bR film. Furthermore, the shortest and longest delay times are given for the relay of 'switch off'. The saturable delay time and maximum delay-time of 'switch on' are also given. How the wavelengths (632.8, 568, 533 and 412 nm) and intensities of the illuminating light influence the delay time is also discussed. The simulation results are useful for optimizing the design of all-optical time-delay relays.


IL-17-producing T helper (Th17) cells have been shown to play an important role in many liver diseases. The aim of this study is to investigate changes in the frequency of Th17 cells in peripheral blood of chronic hepatitis C (CHC) patients. The Th17 frequencies of 36 chronic hepatitis C patients were compared with those of 20 normal controls. All samples were quantitatively analyzed by flow cytometer. Serum IL-17 levels were evaluated using the ELISA assay. There was a higher frequency of circulating Th17 cells and IL-17 levels in CHC patients than controls (3.46±1.53% and 2.05±0.88% for Th17 cells, 86.21±29.28 pg/ml and 58.05±14.17 pg/ml for IL-17 levels) (P < 0.01). There were no significant differences in Th17 frequency and IL-17 levels between the groups of CHC patients with HCV RNA genotype 1b and 2a. The percentage of circulating Th17 cells increased significantly, correlating positively with ALT and negatively with HCVRNA. After 4 weeks of pegIFNα-2a treatment, the patients who acquired rapid virological response (RVR) had a higher pretreatment Th17 frequency compared with that of patients without RVR. During the 24 weeks of treatment with peg-IFNα-2a, Th17 cell frequency increased during the initial 4 weeks, then subsequently declined. In conclusion, Th17 cells and IL-17 were significantly increased in CHC patients and they were a positive correlation with ALT but a negative correlation with HCV RNA. Results suggest that an increase in Th17 cells is associated with inflammatory liver damage and persistent infection of HCV. The characteristics of Th17 variation during peg-IFNα-2a treatment imply that Th17 cells may serve as potent immunological markers for evaluating the efficacy of peg-IFNα anti-viral treatment. 


Background There is a significant body of adult congenital patients born with transposition of the great arteries (TGA) who have undergone Mustard or Senning procedures requiring follow up. Long-term complications relating to the intra atrial baffles are frequent and baffle leaks may cause significant desaturation, exercise intolerance and increased risk of paradoxical emboli. However the clinical consequence of a baffle leak is often poorly understood and in some cases their presence may prove beneficial to the patient. We describe four cases in whom the decision to eliminate an atrial baffle leak was not clear-cut. Findings Four male patients, mean age 27 years, with a history of TGA underwent a Senning procedure in infancy (mean age 8 months). All patients were NYHA class 1, in sinus rhythm with no history of embolic events. Significant baffle leaks were identified on MRI and confirmed at cardiac catheterisation. Calculated Qp:Qs ranged from 1.5–3:1. Pulmonary artery pressure was normal in all cases. All 4 patients had a dilated left ventricle with well-preserved function and, interestingly, had a systemic right ventricle of relatively normal size with good function. Discussion A significant baffle leak, which behaves like an atrial septal defect, places a volume load on the posterior subpulmonary left ventricle. We postulate that this may actually be beneficial in supporting systemic right ventricular function. For a subset of patients intervention to abolish the leak could potentially precipitate right ventricular dysfunction. This must be offset against the potential implications of a significant left to right shunt. Careful investigation is required to appropriately diagnose, counsel and follow this patient group.


In considering the theoretical ideal for an artificial intraocular lens implant to be used in the correction of aphakia it has always been taken for granted that Nature's bioconvex lens is best. But there is some evidence that other configurations may be an improvement. We also have to decide how large it should be and whether it should be placed in front of the iris or behind it. Moreover we have to consider the management of eyes which are already aphakic when first seen and cataractous eyes requiring lens extraction before the pseudophakos can be inserted.


Flexible endoscopes that have not been properly serviced, cleaned and disinfected, are major infection risks in endoscopy. There are numerous references to this fact in literature. Manual and fully automatic servicing, cleaning and disinfecting flexible endoscopes are described and assessed in respect of patient and staff protection. The district physician (known as «Amtsarzt» = officially appoined doctor within the german Health Care and Health Insurance system) can discover hygienic deficits in endoscope maintenance when inspecting the hospitals in his district; the present article helps him to discover such deficits. The recommendations in this article are based on the guidelines issued by the Federal German Health Bureau dealing with hospital hygiene and how to prevent infections


Chapter I contains an adequate account of the chemistry of the plasma proteins. This section could, of course, have been expanded, but to have done so would have upset the balance of the book. Study of this chapter would be a good introduction to the more detailed original literature. The chemical methods of determining proteins are described in Chapter II. Chapter III-' Methods of Examination '-describes the procedures such as salting-in, salting-out, precipitation by various combinations of organic solvents at low concentration and electrolytes (cf. the studies of E. J. Cohn and his colleagues), electrophoresis (in free solution and on supporting media), immunoelectrophoresis and ultracentrifugation, which have provided so much of the present body of knowledge concerning the plasma proteins. Chapter IV, 'Clinical Chemical Methods ', and Chapter V, ' Clinical Significance of the Plasma Proteins ', deal with the practical details and the interpretation of the results of the various ' empirical' tests which depend upon changes in the composition and stability of the plasma proteins. The reviewer was left with the impression that more attention is paid to these tests in the author's departments than is usually done in Great Britain. Chapter VI, 'Clinical Significance of the Dysproteinaemias and Paraproteinaemias', reduplicates some of the material given in the earlier chapters but is, in the present writer's opinion, the best in the book.


There are many marketing methods used to attract customers' attention and customers search for special discounts and conduct research to get products cheaper. Using discount coupons is one of the widely used methods for obtaining discounts. With the development of technology, classical paper-based discount coupons become e-coupons and then turn into mobile coupons (m-coupons). It is inevitable that retailers will use m-coupon technology to attract customers while mobile devices are used in daily life. As a result, m-coupon technology is a promising technology. One of the significant problems with using m-coupons is security. Here it is necessary to ensure the safety of the seller's and retailer's data and to prevent unnecessary loss of income. In this study, a new m-coupon protocol is proposed and analyzed against well-known attacks: impersonation, man-in-the-middle, eavesdropping, replay, data modification, unauthorized coupon copying/generation, and multiple cash-in attacks. Then, to show that both the client and the retailer's data are at the highest level of security, the protocol is subjected to security analysis with a powerful protocol analysis tool, Scyther. Thus, the proposed protocol is proved to meet all safety criteria. To the best of our knowledge, this protocol is the first m-coupon protocol for which formal security analysis is conducted by the protocol's developers.


Spelling normalisation is a useful step in the study and analysis of historical language texts, whether it is manual analysis by experts or automatic analysis using downstream natural language processing (NLP) tools. Not only does it help to homogenise the variable spelling that often exists in historical texts, but it also facilitates the use of off-the-shelf contemporary NLP tools, if contemporary spelling conventions are used for normalisation. We present FREEMnorm, a new benchmark for the normalisation of Early Modern French (from the 17th century) into contemporary French and provide a thorough comparison of three different normalisation methods: ABA, an alignment-based approach and MT-approaches, (both statistical and neural), including extensive parameter searching, which is often missing in the normalisation literature.


Much more than its domestic analogues, the contest over international rules and procedures is essentially confined to a small elite of agents—multinational corporations, industry associations, banks, hedge funds, billionaires—who can effectively influence the negotiating positions of the most powerful governments, foremost that of the United States. Lesser constituents are marginalized through the exclusivity and intransparency of international negotiations, the high costs of successful lobbying and the routine dismissal of moral concerns as inappropriate to the jungle of international relations.

We find the fingerprints of this global elite all over the workaday parts of our system of international rules and procedures.

 Many resource-rich countries are suffering economically because their rulers are internationally recognized as entitled to borrow in the country's name and to confer ownership rights in its natural resources, regardless of how these rulers came to power and regardless of how badly they rule. These international rules secure the flow of resources into the industrialized countries while facilitating oppression and corruption, and encouraging coups and civil wars in the developing world.

 Poor countries are drained of badly needed capital and tax revenues through an international tax and financial system that enables their richer citizens to hide assets in foreign secrecy jurisdictions and enables multinational corporations to shift their profits to tax havens through trade mis-invoicing and other gimmicky transactions among subsidiaries of the same corporation.

 Under the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement, the developing countries were forced to agree to grant 20-year pharmaceutical product patents on pains of being excluded from the World Trade Organization. As a result, important medicines that could be cheaply manufactured domestically are sold at prices exceeding manufacturing costs by a factor of 100 or more. The TRIPS Agreement enables the pharmaceutical, software, entertainment and agro industries to extend their …


This thesis deals with empirical modeling of symmetrical Field-Effect Transistors (FETs). It covers three distinct topics within the areas of modeling and parameter extraction of microwave FETs. First, the symmetry of FET devices is addressed. Such devices are often used in transceivers as a building block for switches. These devices are intrinsically symmetrical around the gate. Hence, their source and drain terminals are interchangeable. For these devices, the extraction of small signal model parameters is addressed. It is shown that the commonly used small-signal FET model does not translate the intrinsic symmetry of the device into its equivalent circuit. Thus, a big opportunity of reducing the number of measurement points and the complexity of modeling is overlooked. Therefore, a new small-signal model is proposed to address the intrinsic symmetry present in such devices. Second, the small-signal parameters of the symmetrical model are further improved using a modified optimizer based extraction and a new error expression. This new error function improves the extraction result, and ensures that the symmetry of the device is taken into the account. Finally, the symmetrical small-signal model is extended to find the symmetry in a large-signal model. This leads to the reduction of the intrinsic model so that one current and one charge expression is sufficient to represent its nonlinear behavior. While the modeling procedure is inspired from switch FETs, commonly available devices are symmetrical except for high power transistors. Hence, the modeling procedure which is not limited to switch FETs, can be applied across various device technologies e.g., MOSFET, GaAs pHEMTs/mHEMTs, InP transistors, etc. The applications are also not limited to switches, but include resistive mixers, switch mode oscillators etc.


The cellular network evolution has generally focused on improving system and edge user throughput while reducing latency. Recently, a new class of service involving the communication of short packets has emerged wherein scale, coverage, reliability, and energy efficiency has greater importance than the rate or latency at which the information is delivered. This delay tolerant class of communication may include keep alive application messages from our smart phones or messages for the Internet of Things (IoT) and machine type communications (MTC). In this paper, we propose autonomous transmissions paired with interference cancellation to improve coverage, reliability, scale, and energy/spectral efficiency for delay tolerant short packet communications. Simulation results demonstrate that up to 2x improvement in spectral efficiency can be achieved.


1. Habitat loss and modification are hallmarks of anthropogenic ecosystems, but the consequences for ecosystem functioning and service provisioning often remain unclear. Understanding these links in cities is complicated by strong but fine‐scale differences in habitat structure among green space patches, and a high variance in habitat amount across urban landscapes.
2. We used airborne laser scanning data to disentangle the effects of 3D woody habitat heterogeneity of urban home gardens, and woody habitat amount at four landscape spatial scales (50, 100, 250, and 500 m), on the predation risk of artificial sentinel prey by birds and arthropods.
3. In both predator groups, and at all the investigated spatial scales, cross‐scale interactive effects between garden habitat heterogeneity and habitat amount in the urban landscape were the main drivers of predation. Risk of predation by birds was highest in heterogeneous garden habitats, but only in densely built urban landscapes where habitat amount was low to intermediate (10%–20%) at large spatial scales (250–500 m). It dropped independently of garden habitat heterogeneity when habitat amount became too low (<10%) at small (50–100 m) spatial scales. In contrast, risk of predation by arthropods mostly peaked in homogeneous garden habitats when habitat amount was intermediate (20%) at large spatial scales.
4. Our findings show that the ability of urban green space patches, such as gardens, to sustain ecosystem functions in cities mainly depends on cross‐scale interactive effects with larger scale habitat amount. In birds, predation activity can increase when high patch‐scale habitat heterogeneity contrasts with reduced larger scale habitat amount, suggesting concentration effects. Yet, thresholds exist under which ecosystem functioning drops independently of habitat structure.
5. Synthesis and applications. The potential of small‐scale interventions to enhance habitat heterogeneity (e.g., by planting native trees with understorey shrubs) for restoring ecosystem functions, such as bird predation, in urban areas is dependent on wider landscape habitat structure. Urban planning should therefore adopt a multiscale approach to sustain and restore ecosystem functions and services; a simple but still not broadly recognized finding. Airborne laser scanning is a useful tool to infer habitat structure across a hierarchy of scales in spatially heterogeneous anthropogenic ecosystems.


Surface mapping, dating and radar image study of strata in southern Sabah (northern Borneo) have made it possible to revise the stratigraphy and reinterpret the structure and tectonic evolution of the area. Early Miocene regional unconformity may be equivalent to the Deep Regional Unconformity recognised offshore, below which the succession can be resolved into an Eocene accretionary complex age overlying an ophiolitic basement, and an upper Paleogene deep-water succession which formed in a forearc. The Paleogene deposits underwent syn-depositional deformation, including the development of extensive melanges, all of which lie below the unconformity. Localised limestones were deposited followed after a period of uplift and erosion in the Early Miocene, followed by an influx of clastic sediments deposited in delta and pro-deltaic environments in the Middle Miocene. These deltaic to shallow marine deposits form two coarsening-upward successions, mapped as the Tanjong and Kapilit Formations. The total thickness of these two formations remaining in the southern Sabah Basin amounts to 6,000 m, about half of previous estimates. The Early Miocene unconformity is interpreted to be the result of deformation and uplift following underthrusting of continental crust of the South China Sea which terminated Paleogene subduction beneath North Borneo. Renewed subsidence led to the development of a major Miocene depocentre above the older forearc accretionary complex. A new tectonic model is proposed for southern Sabah whereby a major transpressional deformation probably occurred during the Late Pliocene and the Tanjong. and KapilitFormations were deformed into broad NW-SE-trending synclines separated by narrow anticlines. The anticlines are sub-parallel to major faults and associated with high angle reverse faults, and positive flower structures. Secondary fold-faults formed oblique to the major faults. The structural style suggests that the NW-SE trending faults acted as major left-lateral transpressional zones and possibly produced large scale contractional duplexes. The faults may in part be reactivated basement structures. This deformation uplifted the area and is termed here the Meliau Orogeny. Renewed extension during the Quaternary caused some sequence repetition and widened the original synclines. The 'subcircular- to· elliptical-shaped basins' of the Meliau, Malibau and Tidung areas are structurally controlled synclines and interpreted as remnants of a single large basin, deformed in the NW -SE trending transpressional fault zones.


Immunity against the pre-erythrocytic stages of malaria is the most promising, as it is strong and fully sterilizing. Yet, the underlying immune effectors against the human Plasmodium falciparum pre-erythrocytic stages remain surprisingly poorly known and have been little explored, which in turn prevents any rational vaccine progress. Evidence that has been gathered in vitro and in vivo, in higher primates and in humans, is reviewed here, emphasizing the significant role of IFN- g , either as a critical immune mediator or at least as a valuable surrogate marker of protection. One may hope that these results will trigger investigations in volunteers immunized either by optimally irradiated or over-irradiated sporozoites, to quickly delineate better surrogates of protection, which are essential for the development of a successful malaria vaccine.


The purpose of this study was to test the relationship between Buddhist religious practices and blood pressure. A cross-sectional survey of Buddhist religious practices and blood pressure was conducted with 160 Buddhist elderly in rural Uttaradit, northern Thailand. After controlling for the variables of gender, status, education, salary, underlying hypertension, exercise, salt intake, and taking antihypertensive medications, it was found that lower systolic and diastolic blood pressure is associated with the Buddhist religious practice of temple attendance. The Buddhist older people who regularly attended a temple every Buddhist Holy day (which occurs once a week) were found to have systolic and diastolic blood pressure readings lower than people who did not attend as regularly. It is recommended that nurses advocate for temple attendance in the care protocols for older Buddhist hypertensive patients both in Thailand and internationally.


Respondents in the 1988 General Social Survey (GSS) were asked to scan their acquaintance networks to identify all those who had been a victim of a homicide or had acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Estimates of the sex, race, age, and regional breakdowns for homicides in the last year and for people with AIDS were compared with official statistics. The GSS estimates for the distribution of homicide victims replicate the official statistics quite well. The GSS estimates for AIDS cases suggest that the data provided to the Centers for Disease Control may underestimate by a substantial margin the prevalence of AIDS in the white population of higher socioeconomic status, overstate the relative prevalence of the disease in the minority populations, underestimate the prevalence of the disease in the Midwest, and overstate it for the East.


Designing a call admission control (CAC) algorithm that guarantees call blocking probabilities for arbitrary traffic distribution in CDMA networks is difficult. Previous approaches have assumed a uniform traffic distribution or excluded mobility to simplify the design complexity. We define a set of feasible call configurations that results in a CAC algorithm that captures the effect of having an arbitrary traffic distribution and whose complexity scales linearly with the number of cells. To study the effect of mobility and to differentiate between the effects of blocking new calls and blocking handoff calls, we define a net revenue function. The net revenue is the sum of the revenue generated by accepting a new call and the cost of a forced termination due to a handoff failure. The net revenue depends implicitly on the CAC algorithm. We calculate the implied costs which are the derivatives of the implicitly defined net revenue function and capture the effect of increases in the number of calls admitted in one cell on the revenue of the entire network. Given a network topology with established traffic levels, the implied costs are used in the calculation of a CAC algorithm that enhances revenue and equalizes call blocking probabilities. Moreover, our algorithm provides guaranteed grade-of-service for all the cells in the network for an arbitrary traffic distribution.


The effect of hydrostatic argon pressure equal to 105 Pa and 1.1 GPa applied to processing at up to 1270 K (HT) of Si:Cr samples prepared by Cr+ implantation (dose 1x1015 cm-2, 200 keV) into (001) oriented Czochralski silicon, has been investigated by Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry, photoluminescence, X-ray and SQUID methods. Cr+ implantation at this energy and dosage produces amorphous silicon (a-Si) near the implanted ions range. Solid phase epitaxial re-growth (SPER) of a-Si takes place at HT. The Cr profile does not depend markedly on HP applied during processing at 723 K. Si:Cr processed at up to 723 K indicates magnetic ordering. Annealing under 105 Pa at 873 K, 1070 K and 1270 K results in a marked diffusion of Cr toward the sample surface. In the case of processing under 1.1 GPa this diffusion is less pronounced, SPER of a-Si is retarded and the a-Si/Si interface becomes enriched with Cr. The Cr concentration in Si:Cr sample processed at 1270 K under 1.1 GPa forms two distinct maxima, the deeper one at 0.35 μm depth.


Part III. Section 3. Autonomy and Feminine Socialization: Having agreed with Beauvoir that narcissism and altruism contribute to women's lack of autonomy, Meyers examines Beauvoir's account of autonomy in light of her own conception of autonomy competency and argues that Beauvoir's conception of autonomy is too stringent. Autonomy competency, in contrast, allows for degrees of autonomy and variations in degree as viewed over a life-time, as well as for a distinction between programmatic and episodic autonomy. Meyers concludes by characterizing minimal, medial, and full autonomy


Even though image retrieval is considered as one of the most important research areas in the last two decades, there is still room for improvement since it is still not satisfying for many users. Two of the major problems which need to be improved are the accuracy and the speed of the image retrieval system, in order to achieve user satisfaction and also to make the image retrieval system suitable for all platforms. In this work, the proposed retrieval system uses features with spatial information to analyze the visual content of the image. Then, the feature extraction process is followed by applying the fuzzy c-means (FCM) clustering algorithm to reduce the search space and speed up the retrieval process. The experimental results show that using the spatial features increases the system accuracy and that the clustering algorithm speeds up the image retrieval process. This shows that the proposed system works with texture and non-texture images.


Montreal choreographer Dave St-Pierre's La Pornographie des âmes (2004) launched his controversial dance-theatre trilogy, Sociology and Other Contemporary Utopias. His signature abecedery from Pornographie (A for Affect, B for Bruise, etc.) is remobilized to deploy the affective commotion of his remappings of social relations in provocative stagings of queerness, dis/ability, and desire.


Ewa Domańska, Professor at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań (Poland)
and Stanford University (USA), historian of historiography and methodologist of
history, formulated interesting comments about the state of humanities and social
sciences. The development of interdisciplinary research causes the interpenetration
of different disciplines. Although this kind of research is promising, inspiring as
well as influencing the development of science, careless research may cause some
threats in the longer term. According to Domańska, the lack of qualifications and
reliability in this area (especially in the area of theory and methodology) undermines
the authonomy of the main disciplines and decline in the professionalism of research.
This led the author to create the project, which aims to defend the independence
of the threatened disciplines as well as their 're-professionalisation'. It can be
achieved by strongly emphasizing the role of theory in science; a strong embeddement
of a discipline in the theory. Domańska's concept can be a recipe, which is
a dichotomic project. Firstly, it supposes a 'practical methodology', which is a constructing
of the theory thanks to empirical research material. Secondly, it supposes
a 'virtue epistemology', which is the ethical aspect of the researcher's attitude and
his work.
The aim of the paper is to discuss Domańska's project and underline the originality
of her concept in the context of economic and social sciences. The economic
history is a specific discipline which develops at the crossroad of history and economics.
It lets me put forward the thesis that Domańska's suggestions are relevant
to the research of economic history. I will show what cognitive chances are the
result of the ontology of economic history. I will question what the possible threats
are for the main disciplines (history and economics) as a result of the lack of professionalism
in the interdisciplinary research of the economic past, and ask if Domańska's
project is attractive for the economic history research thanks to the strong
setting in the 'practical methodology' in the theory. I also ask what the role of new
theoretical approaches in that area is, and whether it is possible to formulate innovatory
conceptions in the economic history. Finally, I question the role of 'virtue
epistemology' or the ethical aspect of an economic historian's work.


Management of zoonotic disease is necessary if countryside users are to gain benefit rather than suffer harm from their activities, and to avoid disproportionate reaction to novel threats. We introduce a conceptual framework based on the pressure–state–response model with five broad responses to disease incidence. Influencing public behaviour is one response and requires risk communication based on an integration of knowledge about the disease with an understanding of how publics respond to precautionary advice. A second framework emphasizes how risk communication involves more than information provision and should address dimensions including points-of-intervention over time, place and audience. The frameworks are developed by reference to tick-borne Lyme borreliosis (also known as Lyme disease), for which informed precautionary behaviour is particularly relevant. Interventions to influence behaviour can be directed by knowledge of spatial and temporal variation of tick abundance, what constitutes risky behaviour, how people respond to information of varying content, and an understanding of the social practices related to countryside use. The frameworks clarify the response options and help identify who is responsible for risk communication. These aspects are not consistently understood, and may result in an underestimation of the role of land-based organizations in facilitating appropriate precautionary behaviour.


Oleuropein content in olive leaves dried at ambient temperature, and at elevated temperature (50°C) from Palestinian olive trees collected from West Bank in the middle of November was determined by HPLC and compared to naturally dry olive leaves (collected dry from the tree). Results showed that higher concentration was obtained from olive leaves dried at room temperature (10.0 mg per gram of dry olive leaves), compared to those dried at 50°C (1.7 mg/g), and those that collected dry from the tree (2.5 mg/g). Oleuropein content of dried olive leaves was compared with leaves that chopped and extracted fresh, and results show that fresh leaves showed the lowest oleuropein content (<0.1 mg/g) denoting that drying of leaves is required for high oleuropein recovery.


Background Reversible cerebral vasoconstriction syndrome (RCVS) is characterized by thunderclap headache and reversible cerebral vasoconstriction, with other neurologic signs and symptoms. To the best of our knowledge, there were only a few cases of RCVS presenting both as both convexity subarachnoid haemorrhage (cSAH) and posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome (PRES). Case presentation Herein, We report a case of a 32-year-old woman with RCVS who presented with recurrent thunderclap headaches that occurred 50 days after delivery, with cSAH and PRES on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). She had significant clinical and radiological recover with 3 months' follow-up. Conclusions The clinical coexistence of cSAH and PRES in our case with RCVS is quite rare. This case further raises the importance of the early diagnosis of RCVS, and clinical physicians should be well recognized when initial brain and vascular imaging are normal.


Beyond the Articles of Agreement of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (1944), which is the treaty establishing the World Bank and associated procedural rules, the activities of the Bank are governed by numerous soft law instruments. Primary among these are the operational policies and procedures (OPPs). These consist mainly of Operational Policies (OPs), which are norms for how the Bank's Management is to carry out operations, and Bank Procedures (BPs), which are more procedurally oriented instructions setting out how World Bank policies are to be implemented. The World Bank Inspection Panel (IP), which was established by a resolution of the World Bank in 1993, has generated significant interest among legal scholars due to its characteristics. It functions as an organ reviewing acts and omissions of the Management of the World Bank as a response to requests from private parties (hereinafter 'requesters') affected by World Bank projects. Such requests are based on the OPPs adopted by the Board of Executive Directors of the World Bank. As of April 2012, the panel had received requests in 70 different cases. Of the 61 cases in which it so far has made a final recommendation concerning investigation, it has recommended investigation in 32, of which investigation was subsequently rejected by the Board of Executive Directors in four cases. Of the remaining 28, it has finalized investigation reports in 26 cases. All these reports concluded that there had been non-compliance with the OPPs. The main purposes of this article are to study the normative characteristics of the OPPs upon which the IP bases its decisions, and to examine whether and how the IP has contributed to 'hardening' the legal characteristics of the OPPs. The latter task involves a critical examination of the view that the IP is to be regarded as a bottom-up accountability instrument essentially internal to the World Bank. My main underlying hypothesis is that the OPPs in combination with the IP have contributed to 'harden' the 'soft' characteristics of the World Bank. Such a process of hardening 'soft law' can be termed a process of 'legalization'.


'Stereotype threat' refers to the state of psychological discomfort people experience when confronted by an unflattering reputation in a situation where that reputation can be confirmed by one's behavior. Once aroused, stereotype threat can have a number of disruptive effects, among them the short-term impairment of intelligent thought and academic achievement. Over time, it can prompt defensive adaptations that have far-reaching effects, such as disengagement from activities or domains where the stereotype is relevant, which in turn can lead to impaired intellectual development. Stereotype threat thus can result in a self-fulfilling prophecy whereby a person comes to resemble his or her reputation, living up or down to social expectations. This article reviews the development of the stereotype threat construct from Steele and Aronson's (1995) original demonstration to investigations of its generality and mediators and to more recent studies focusing on strategies for reducing its negative effects.


We analyze the propagation of soliton trains with small initial separation in the presence of third-order dispersion. We show that both the amplitudes and the positions can be stabilized, provided that phase modulation is applied and adjacent pulses are initially out of phase.


In this paper the author describes her particular perspective in doing analytic work. She stresses working in the here and now. For example, making interpretations that grow out of what the patient says or does in the sessions, keeping the patient's history in mind, but not letting it lead interpretations. The analysis tries to understand why something is being said now, in this way, and what impact it may have or be designed to have in the analytic relationship. The term 'here' refers to what is going on between patient and analyst in the room while not leaving out the patient's immediate reality in the outside world, his everyday life. The word 'now' implies awareness of time that is not just of the past and future but of the patient's situation at the moment in analysis, which is constantly shifting.The author believes that by working primarily in the present the patient will feel more anchored, both patient and analyst can observe what is going on, for example how anxiety arises or decreases, how defences are mobilised or lessen. Both analyst and patient experience movement and change rather than relying on more theoretical explanations.


Different methods have been proposed for assessing important emerging properties for species conservation induced by biological networks connectivity. Graph theory has recently been used to investigate species persistence conditions from different measures of connectivity in this kind of networks. In this study, for the first time,we compare a set of metrics defined in graph theory to a metapopulation modelling approach. These approaches are confronted to evaluate the persistence of soft bottom polycheates populations in the Gulf of Lion,relying on the same connectivity matrices derived from larval dispersal simulations. Various classical graph analysis methods are tested while new descriptors are derived and evaluated. Most outstanding input of this work is the introduction of a novel metric for measuring the distance between nodes in a graph in order to correct an overlooked difficulty in previous literature, when dealing with connectivity matrices containing larval transfer probabilities. This metric ensures a physically meaningful interpretation of shortest paths and consequently betweenness. The comparison with metapopulation model enables to single out the interpretation for species persistence of the graph descriptors.Graph theory complements the results of the metapopulation model by adding an exhaustive analysis of the spatial information. In particular,modularity and bridging centrality are shown to quantify clusters of strongly interconnected nodes (communities) and to distinguish the rescuing sites and the sink sites. The sites bringing species' regional persistence seem better indicated by bridging centrality and shortest cycles lengths.


Hybrid electric vehicles employ a hybrid propulsion system to combine the energy efficiency of electric motor and a long driving range of internal combustion engine, thereby achieving a higher fuel economy as well as convenience compared with conventional ICE vehicles. However, the relatively complicated powertrain structures of HEVs necessitate an effective power management policy to determine the power split between ICE and EM. In this work, we propose a deep reinforcement learning framework of the HEV power management with the aim of improving fuel economy. The DRL technique is comprised of an offline deep neural network construction phase and an online deep Q-learning phase. Unlike traditional reinforcement learning, DRL presents the capability of handling the high dimensional state and action space in the actual decision-making process, making it suitable for the HEV power management problem. Enabled by the DRL technique, the derived HEV power management policy is close to optimal, fully model-free, and independent of a prior knowledge of driving cycles. Simulation results based on actual vehicle setup over real-world and testing driving cycles demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed framework on optimizing HEV fuel economy.


The contribution describes the experimental results obtained from the combined loading of the specimens in the field of high-cycle fatigue. Those specimens were manufactured from common construction steel 11523.1, melt T31052. The following experiments were performed: The first set of the specimen was loaded by the alternating bending amplitude. The second set was loaded by the amplitude of the bending in combination with constant inner overpressure. The results were evaluated by the conjugated strength criterion and another generally used multiaxial fatigue criteria. The stress-strain analysis of the specimens by FEM was performed to determine parameters (constants) of particular strength criteria.


Introduction Large vessel occlusions have been successfully treated with mechanical thrombectomy in recent years. Reducing the time between symptom onset and revascularization has the potential to significantly improve patient's outcome. As intrahospital transfer from CT to the angiosuite can delay revascularization therapy by up to 60 min, recent cone-beam CT based stroke imaging software for the angiosuite has been developed in an attempt to create a 'one-stop-shop stroke suite' in angio. The purpose of this study is to evaluate this stroke imaging acquired in the angiosuite and compare to standard CT. Materials and methods We included in this study patients who received endovascular mechanical thrombectomy (EVT) treatment that performed standard CT and CT perfusion (CTP) imaging within 90 min before arrival to the angiosuite. Upon arrival, patients were imaged using two unique conebeam CTs: 1) a non-enhanced XperCT 'mask' image, followed by 2) a dual-phase (DP) IV contrast enhanced XperCT. Fluoroscopy was used to determine arrival of contrast in the circle of willis and initiate the DP scans. DP scans provide volumetric images of two phases referred to as 'early' and 'late' brain perfusion phases. The specialized stroke analysis software (Philips, Best) then performs a subtraction of these two phases to highlight brain regions of delayed filling. Using a 5-point quality assessment questionnaire, the perfusion XperCT imaging acquired in the angio-suite was evaluated by an experienced interventional neuroradiologist and compared to previously acquired standard CT and CTP imaging and follow-up CT imaging acquired 24 hours later. Results We included currently 20 patients. Preliminary results demonstrated that the XperCT stroke imaging software in the angiosuite sufficiently provides the necessary diagnostic information required for treatment decision-making, including detection of ischemic core (ASPECTS score), collaterals (good, moderate or bad) and vessel patency (occluded vessel and baseline TIMI). More specifically, core definition compared to baseline CT, CT perfusion and follow-up CT demonstrated good predictability of the final infarct in cases with complete revascularization in less than 60 min after baseline imaging. Data analysis and statistics will be presented at the conference as well as images examples for comparison and illustration. Conclusion Currently, stroke patients must first visit the CT department for imaging to confirm LVO before going to the angiography suite for EVT treatment. Preliminary results from analysis of this cone-beam CT assessment suggests that in the future eligible patients can bypass CT and go straight to the angiosuite for imaging and treatment. Disclosures N. Cancelliere: None. T. Grunhagen: 5; C; Philips. J. Bracken: 5; C; Philips. F. Nijnatten: 5; C; Philips. T. Krings: None. V. Mendes Pereira: 1; C; Philips.


Observation‐based and modeling studies have identified the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East (EMME) region as a prominent climate change hotspot. While several initiatives have addressed the impacts of climate change in parts of the EMME, here we present an updated assessment, covering a wide range of timescales, phenomena and future pathways. Our assessment is based on a revised analysis of recent observations and projections and an extensive overview of the recent scientific literature on the causes and effects of regional climate change. Greenhouse gas emissions in the EMME are growing rapidly, surpassing those of the European Union, hence contributing significantly to climate change. Over the past half‐century and especially during recent decades, the EMME has warmed significantly faster than other inhabited regions. At the same time, changes in the hydrological cycle have become evident. The observed recent temperature increase of about 0.45°C per decade is projected to continue, although strong global greenhouse gas emission reductions could moderate this trend. In addition to projected changes in mean climate conditions, we call attention to extreme weather events with potentially disruptive societal impacts. These include the strongly increasing severity and duration of heatwaves, droughts and dust storms, as well as torrential rain events that can trigger flash floods. Our review is complemented by a discussion of atmospheric pollution and land‐use change in the region, including urbanization, desertification and forest fires. Finally, we identify sectors that may be critically affected and formulate adaptation and research recommendations toward greater resilience of the EMME region to climate change.


This article presents a unified bijective scheme between planar maps and blossoming trees, where a blossoming tree is defined as a spanning tree of the map decorated with some dangling half-edges that enable to reconstruct its faces. Our method generalizes a previous construction of Bernardi by loosening its conditions of applications so as to include annular maps, that is maps embedded in the plane with a root face different from the outer face.
The bijective construction presented here relies deeply on the theory of \alpha-orientations introduced by Felsner, and in particular on the existence of minimal and accessible orientations. Since most of the families of maps can be characterized by such orientations, our generic bijective method is proved to capture as special cases all previously known bijections involving blossoming trees: for example Eulerian maps, m-Eulerian maps, non separable maps and simple triangulations and quadrangulations of a k-gon. Moreover, it also permits to obtain new bijective constructions for bipolar orientations and d-angulations of girth d of a k-gon.
As for applications, each specialization of the construction translates into enumerative by-products, either via a closed formula or via a recursive computational scheme. Besides, for every family of maps described in the paper, the construction can be implemented in linear time. It yields thus an effective way to encode and generate planar maps.
In a recent work, Bernardi and Fusy introduced another unified bijective scheme, we adopt here a different strategy which allows us to capture different bijections. These two approaches should be seen as two complementary ways of unifying bijections between planar maps and decorated trees.


In 1973, Michael Lesy published his first book, a collection of photographs, newspaper accounts, records from an insane asylum, literary excerpts, and other materials that together provide a portrait of the town of Black River Fails, Wisconsin, from 1885 to 1900. He called the book Wisconsin Death Trip, and it has remained in print as something of a cult classic ever since. Lesy provides an introduction and conclusion, and Warren Susman a preface, but otherwise the images and text speak for themselves, with no connecting narration or explanation. Lesy would go on to publish a number of other books, and is currently a professor of literary journalism at Hampshire College. In December of 2006, he was named a United States Artist Fellow, and in a statement he prepared for the program, Lesy says that in his work he uses "historical photographs from public archives--utilitarian images made for every purpose except art--to tell a variety of difficult truths about our country and our shared pasts." (1) This emphasis on archival photography certainly is evident when considering the body of his work as a whole--twelve books, including titles like Bearing Witness: A Photographic Chronicle of American Life, 1860-1945, Visible Light, and, his most recent, Murder City: The Bloody History of Chicago in the Twenties. Yet even among these other inventive projects, Wisconsin Death Trip stands out. (2) This odd collage of information and imagination focuses on the historical, but reasonably could also be referred to as art, a novel of sorts, a collective psychological portrait, or even a scrapbook, as Wisconsin Death Trip has no page numbers. In another of his works, The Forbidden Zone, Lesy notes that "those who read the book couldn't decide if it was poetry or history, a fabrication or a discourse, a hoax or a revelation. The book took on a life of its own. It bred other books; it bred plays and ballets, concertos and an opera. It made me famous and notorious; honored and suspect." (3) As Lesy implies, knowing what to call a work often determines how the work, as well as its creator, are evaluated. If an agreement about form--that is, a classification tending toward broad terms like art, history, film, and photography, rather than narrower distinctions between, for example, the genres of comedy and horror--guides our interpretive acts, then different forms entail different understandings about the nature of truth and the way that truth finds proper expression. Of particular interest are works representing violence and war that include overt truth-claims about their content, claims that are then deliberately complicated by the work's ambiguous form. Lesy's Wisconsin Death Trip as well as Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five and Michael Herr's Dispatches all make explicit claims to truth about life in rural America at the turn of the century, about the firebombing of Dresden, and about the experience of Vietnam, respectively, though none of these works are easily classifiable as a single form or method of expression. They do so, I argue, to push against more established, collective histories of violence and war, ones which necessarily negate the truths of individual experience, truths which often lack resolution and conclusion, which resist theraputic assimilation into one's life story, and which cannot--and should not--be "domesticated" by traditional narrative. In opening the space for historical and narrative resistance, these works have the potential to voice political resistance as well, writing against, for instance, the possibility of "another Dresden" or "another Vietnam." But in avoiding adherence to a particular form, they leave such potential implicit, and as such, perhaps more powerful. The concerns and challenges of "telling violence" have been addressed by trauma scholars like Judith Herman and Cathy Caruth, and may seem similar to what we saw with reader-response critics like Wolfgang Iser, and his concern with the fundamental asymmetry between the reader and any kind of text. …


The mitochondria are the major cellular site of energy production and respiration. Recent research has focused on investigating the role of mitochondria in disease development and it has become increasingly evident that mitochondrial dysfunction contributes to a variety of human diseases. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) quantity is very important for maintaining mitochondrial function and meeting the energy needs of the body. We have measured mitochondrial content in 1259 Mexican American individuals (from 42 extended families) and have shown that mtDNA quantity (a surrogate measure of mitochondrial integrity) has a large genetic component. We performed a genome scan and a genome-wide quantitative transcriptomic scan to identify QTLs influencing mitochondrial content. A variance components linkage-based genome scan utilizing 439 STR markers was used to localize a QTL for mitochondrial content on chromosome 10q (LOD = 3.83). Significant linkage to the mitochondrial genome was also detected for mitochondrial transmission (LOD = 3.39). For replication, we measured mitochondrial content in an independent Caucasian population (1088 individuals) finding evidence for linkage in these same regions. As part of the San Antonio Family Heart Study, we obtained genome-wide quantitative transcriptional profiles from 1240 individuals. Using lymphocyte samples, we quantitated 20 413 transcripts and examined correlations between the expression levels of these transcripts and mitochondrial content using the variance components method. Using regression analysis allowing for residual genetic components, we identified 829 transcripts (including many novel genes) influencing mitochondrial content that vary in their general biological actions, from cell signaling to cell trafficking and ion binding.


Background Bisphosphonate-related osteonecrosis is an infrequent but potentially serious complication. Its treatment remains complex, and in some cases can be mutilating. Prevention, a correct diagnosis and opportune management are crucial. Material and Methods A cross-sectional study was made, interviewing 410 dentists with the aim of assessing their knowledge of the subject. Results Practically all of the dental professionals (99.7%) were found to lack sufficient knowledge of the prevention, diagnosis and management of bisphosphonate-related osteonecrosis. Conclusions Actions including increased diffusion in the professional media and inclusion of the subject in training programs are needed in order to enhance the knowledge of bisphosphonate-related osteonecrosis among dentists and thus prevent complications in this group of patients. Key words:Knowledge, mexico, osteonecrosis, bisphosphonates.


In one of the more intriguing chapters of the four-year-old Dodd–Frank saga, the potential impact of the so-called Volcker Rule on collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) finally became clearer. The results are decidedly mixed. The bottom line? As issued, the Final Rules, while permitting CLO managers to issue new loan-only CLOs, will force banks to divest or restructure a significant number of legacy CLO notes by July 21, 2017, potentially forcing them to recognize significant losses. How we got to this result, and what it means for the CLO market, are the focuses of this article. It seems that the CLO Volcker Rule saga will play out with some wins (new CLO issuance is continuing unabated) and some losses (debt securities of CLOs that have securities baskets will be considered ownership interests in covered funds). As the conformance period gets closer, it will be interesting to see what banks holding CLO notes do, whether legacy CLOs can be amended or refinanced, and how many, and at what price, CLO notes will be divested in order to comply with the Volcker Rule.


BACKGROUND
Paclitaxel embedded in cationic liposomes (EndoTAG™-1; ET) is an innovative agent targeting tumor endothelial cells. This randomized controlled phase II trial evaluated the safety and efficacy of ET in combination with gemcitabine (GEM) in advanced pancreatic cancer (PDAC).

PATIENTS AND METHODS
Chemotherapy-naive patients with locally advanced or metastatic disease were randomly assigned to receive weekly GEM 1000 mg/m(2) or GEM plus twice-weekly ET 11, 22 or 44 mg/m(2) for 7 weeks. After a safety run-in of 100 patients, a second cohort continued treatment. End points included overall survival (OS), progression-free survival (PFS), tumor response and safety.

RESULTS
Two hundred and twelve patients were randomly allocated to the study and 200 were treated (80% metastatic, 20% locally advanced). Adverse events were manageable and reversible. Transient thrombocytopenia and infusion reactions with chills and pyrexia mostly grade 1 or 2 occurred in the ET groups. Disease control rate after the first treatment cycle was 43% with GEM and 60%, 65% and 52% in the GEM + ET cohorts. Median PFS reached 2.7 compared with 4.1, 4.6 and 4.4 months, respectively. Median OS was 6.8 compared with 8.1, 8.7 and 9.3 months, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS
Treatment of advanced PDAC with GEM + ET was generally well tolerated. GEM + ET showed beneficial survival and efficacy. A randomized phase III trial should confirm this positive trend.


The prevalence of HCV genotypes in four republics of the former Soviet Union (Russia, Belarus, Moldova, and Uzbekistan) was investigated. Overall, 197 HCV isolates from 66 blood donors and 131 patients with chronic hepatitis were typed. Viral sequences from sera of infected subjects were amplified by nested RT‐PCR using primers from the core region and typed by one or two techniques: (1) DNA enzyme immunoassay (DEIA) and (2) PCR with a set of type‐specific primers. Only three major HCV genotypes were identified in this study population. HCV 1b was found to be the predominant virus type both among blood donors and chronic hepatitis patients, followed by 3a, 2a, and 1a (chronic hepatitis patients: 1b‐82%; 3a‐10%; 2a‐4%, 1a‐5% and 2c‐1%; blood donors: 1b‐77%; 3a‐17%; and 2a‐6%). No significant difference in genotype distribution was observed between different countries or between blood donors and chronic hepatitis patients within the same country. Results of the genotyping procedures were confirmed by direct sequencing of 216 nt PCR fragments corresponding to part of HCV core gene. Phylogenetic analysis of HCV 1b sequences from this study and from the Genbank demonstrated that the sequences from the former Soviet Union do not form evolutionary lineage(s) different from those of strains of the same subtype circulating in other geographical regions. J. Med. Virol. 53:36–40, 1997. © 1997 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


The 2-D IIR Spatially Bandpass (SBP) beam filters are used for directional filtering of temporally broadband bandpass space time plane waves. These filters have applications in radio astronomy, seismic signal processors, radar navigation, space science and wireless communications. If filter coefficients are represented in Canonic Signed Digit (CSD) space, the multiplier circuit can be replaced with adders/ subtractors and shifters. In this paper, a multiplierless realization of 2D IIR SBP beam filter is proposed and the realization is done on Zedboard xc7z020. Multiplierless 2-D IIR SBP beam filter has low complexity compared to 2D IIR SBP beam filter. Circuit complexity analysis is also presented.


There is a growing interest in discovery of internet topology at the interface level. A new generation of highly distributed measurement systems is currently being deployed. Unfortunately, the research community has not examined the problem of how to perform such measurements efficiently and in a network-friendly manner. In this paper we make two contributions toward that end. First, we show that standard topology discovery methods (e.g., skitter) are quite inefficient, repeatedly probing the same interfaces. This is a concern, because when scaled up, such methods will generate so much traffic that they will begin to resemble DDoS attacks. We measure two kinds of redundancy in probing (intra- and inter-monitor) and show that both kinds are important. We show that straightforward approaches to addressing these two kinds of redundancy must take opposite tacks, and are thus fundamentally in conflict. Our second contribution is to propose and evaluate Doubletree, an algorithm that reduces both types of redundancy simultaneously on routers and end systems. The key ideas are to exploit the tree-like structure of routes to and from a single point in order to guide when to stop probing, and to probe each path by starting near its midpoint. Our results show that Doubletree can reduce both types of measurement load on the network dramatically, while permitting discovery of nearly the same set of nodes and links.


. The use of mobile devices such as smartphones still increases over last years. Smartphone hardware capabilities are comparable with average personal computers. Thanks to the increasing computing power, their application is focused on more and more sophisticated and complex tasks. These includes among others augmented reality (AR) applications, which support precise GNSS localization and use signals from such devices like accelerometer or gyrocsope. They are able to create interactive, immersive real-time visualisation of any kind. The article presents a prototype Mobile Augmented Reality (MAR) Application for visualization of the building facades. It allows to support the original look of the building with the additional information from database. Software of this kind, can be used for overviewing, inspecting or work planning carried out on the facade of the building. As a part of the test, a prototype of the MAR application for Android has been prepared. Rest of the solution components have been presented in form of a concept, implementation of which is planned in near future. Basic technical assumptions are already developed, but details may change. The paper mentions also some important AR problems, especially positioning in urban environment and accurate registration of digital objects in the real world.


We summarize our current understanding of the neutrino flavor conversions inside a core collapse supernova, clarifying the important role played by the "collective effects" in determining flavor conversion probabilities. The potentially observable νe and ν̄e spectra may help us identify the neutrino mixing scenario, distinguish between primary flux models, and learn more about the supernova explosion.


It is estimated that more than 6 million pet dogs are diagnosed with cancer annually in the USA. Both primary care and specialist veterinarians are frequently called upon to provide clinical care that improves the quality and/or quantity of life for affected animals. Because these cancers develop spontaneously in animals that often share the same environment as their owners, have intact immune systems and are of similar size to humans, and because the diagnostic tests and treatments for these cancers are similar to those used for management of human cancers, canine cancer provides an opportunity for research that simultaneously helps improve both canine and human health care. This is especially true in the field of radiation oncology, for which there is a rich and continually evolving history of learning from the careful study of pet dogs undergoing various forms of radiotherapy. The purpose of this review article is to inform readers of the potential utility and limitations of using dogs in that manner; the peer-reviewed literature will be critically reviewed, and current research efforts will be discussed. The article concludes with a look toward promising future directions and applications of this pet dog "model."


Background The whitefly Bemisa tabaci is a species complex of more than 31 cryptic species which include some of the most destructive invasive pests of crops worldwide. Among them, Middle East-Asia Minor 1 (MEAM1) and Mediterranean have invaded many countries and displaced the native whitefly species. The successful invasion of the two species is largely due to their wide range of host plants, high resistance to insecticides and remarkable tolerance to environmental stresses. However, the molecular differences between invasive and indigenous whiteflies remain largely unknown. Methodology/Principal Findings Here the global transcriptional difference between the two invasive whitefly species (MEAM1, MED) and one indigenous whitefly species (Asia II 3) were analyzed using the Illumina sequencing. Our analysis indicated that 2,422 genes between MEAM1 and MED; 3,073 genes between MEAM1 and Asia II 3; and 3,644 genes between MED and Asia II 3 were differentially expressed. Gene Ontology enrichment analysis revealed that the differently expressed genes between the invasive and indigenous whiteflies were significantly enriched in the term of 'oxidoreductase activity'. Pathway enrichment analysis showed that carbohydrate, amino acid and glycerolipid metabolisms were more active in MEAM1 and MED than in Asia II 3, which may contribute to their differences in biological characteristics. Our analysis also illustrated that the majority of genes involved in 'drug metabolic pathway' were expressed at a higher level in MEAM1 and MED than in Asia II 3. Taken together, these results revealed that the genes related to basic metabolism and detoxification were expressed at an elevated level in the invasive whiteflies, which might be responsible for their higher resistance to insecticides and environmental stresses. Conclusions/Significance The extensive comparison of MEAM1, MED and Asia II 3 gene expression may serve as an invaluable resource for revealing the molecular mechanisms underlying their biological differences and the whitefly invasion.


This paper reports two investigations on the edge chipping in rotary ultrasonic machining using finite element analysis (FEA). The first FEA investigation establishes a relationship between edge chipping thickness and cutting force. The second FEA investigation is to understand the effects of three parameters (cutting depth, support length, and pre-tightening load) on edge chipping thickness. The investigation results showed that the edge chipping thickness could be reduced by increasing support length and decreasing cutting force.


An experiment at Egerton University in Kenya studied effects of vermicomposts and bioslurry on growth, yield and postharvest quality in statice. Three vermicomposts prepared from Kitchen waste (V1), mowed lawn grass (V2) and Weed biomass (V3) were mixed at a rate of 40% by volume with garden soil and tested against the untreated control (V0). Bioslurry from a digester at Tatton Agricultural Park in the university was applied at 7.8 tons/ha (B1) alongside untreated control (B0). The results showed significant differences at P≤0.05 between treatments, where vermicomposts and bioslurry were separately applied compared to the controls. V1 and B1 had the most stems per plant (22.9, 26.0) and (18.7, 19.8) compared to the control (15.2, 18.1) in season 1 and 2 respectively. The number of stems per plant increased to 26.3 in season 1 and 27 in season 2 in the plots treated with both Kitchen waste vermicompost and bioslurry (V1 × B1). The flower stem lengths were higher under V1 treatment (80.9 and 95.8) cm but similar to V3 which recorded 78.9 and 92.2 cm in season 1 and 2 respectively. In season 1 and 2 respectively, bioslurry treatment (B1) recorded flower stem length of 80.0 and 92.8 cm, compared to the control (53.4 and 64.7 cm). Combined treatment V1 × B1 increased flower stem lengths to 104.1 and 121.1 cm in season 1 and 2 respectively. In season 1 and 2 respectively, V3 × B1 had the longest vase life (22.2 and 22.9 days) when compared to V1 × B1, V2 × B1, V1, V2, V3 and B1 (15.4 to 20.1 days) but all exceeded the untreated plots (11.2 and 12.2 days).

 Key words: Statice, bioslurry, vermicompost, growth, postharvest.


Gene expression analyses with cDNA microarray technology identified distinct groups of breast cancers. Tumors with no ER expression could be divided into three subgroups: "basal-like" subtype, HER2-positive subtype, and "normal breast-like". "Basal-like" subtype was characterized by high expression of keratins 5 and 17, laminin and fatty acid binding protein 7. In the present study, we analyzed the usefulness of immunohistochemistry for separation of the distinct subtypes of the breast ductal carcinomas and provided further characterization of "basal-like subtype". A consecutive series of 195 primary operable invasive breast carcinomas was immunostained for HER2, ER, PGR, CK5/6 and CK17. CK5/6 or CK17 were expressed in 72 cases (36.9%), and 41 cases (21%) presented expression of CK5/6 or CK17 without ER/PGR or HER2. ER/PGR was present in 109 cases (55.9%), but in this group there were 8 cases with HER2 overexpression and 17 cases with basal-cytokeratin positivity. Similarly, in 17 out of 72 "basal-like" tumors there was ER/PGR positivity, and also in 17 of them there was HER2 overexpression. Three of these cases belonged to all three groups, representing expression of all markers. Tumor grade differed significantly (p < 0.001) between luminal and basal cytokeratin- or HER2-positive tumors. Differences for tumor size and lymph node status were not statistically significant. Our study showed that immunohistochemistry is useful for dividing breast cancers into separate subgroups, but further analyses for better characterization of cases presenting two or three markers should be performed.


In an Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) environment, it is paramount to perform intelligent allocation of shared resources. Placement is the problem of choosing which virtual machine (VM) should run on which physical machine (PM), whereas Scheduling is the problem of sharing resources between multiple colocated VMs. An efficient placement and scheduling is one, that in addition to satisfying all constraints, increases the overall utilization of physical resources such as CPU, storage, or network. Determining an efficient placement and scheduling is a very challenging problem, especially in face of conflicting goals and partially available information about workloads. In order to reason about placement, we first tackle the problem of performance interference that may affect co-located VMs—when there is more demand by multiple VMs for a resource than is available at a given instant of time. We thus characterize the performance of Hadoop in a shared and virtualized setting.


The purpose of this study was to investigate what influences employees' acceptance and resistance to a corporate e-learning initiative provided by a large retail chain. The research used a survey design to gather interview and survey data to examine the factors affecting learner interest in, and resistance to, training and e-learning. The results provided insight into the attitudes and perceptions of employees in a large retail chain about the training and identified areas for further attention to facilitate a best-practices approach for increasing participation. The research asked: What barriers and enticers in relation to e-learning are present in a group of employees offered an e-learning training opportunity? The driving and restraining forces that influence an individual's fields (also defined as an individual's life space) as indicated in Lewin's (1997) Force Field Theory were examined and used as a framework for analysis of the findings to gain a clearer understanding of which factors support or deter these employees from participation in e-learning in the workplace. Lewin suggested that consideration of what encourages learners to embrace new methods for learning is important but equally, the factors that cause resistance to learning must be thoroughly examined. Supporting factors such a the rationale for the training being well understood and detractors like insufficient time to complete the modules were identified. Findings indicate that time, meaningful recognition for participation, and personal and technical support need to be provided for the successful implementation of e-learning initiatives.


This paper suggests robot citizenship as a design perspective for attending to the sociality of humanrobot interactions (HRI) in the near future. First, we review current positions regarding robot citizenship, which we summarize as: human analogy, nonhuman analogy and socio-relationality. Based on this review, we then suggest an understanding of citizenship that stresses the socio-relational implications of the concept, and in particular its potential for rethinking the way we approach the design of robots in practice. We suggest that designing for robot citizenship (in the terms suggested by this paper) has the potential of fostering a shift from a logic of functionality to one of relationality. To illuminate the direction of this shift in design practice, we include and discuss three robot concepts designed to address and rethink present HRI challenges in the urban environment from a relational perspective.


In Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR), the value of trade has risen rapidly over the last decade with both imports and exports increasing by average annual rate of 24 percent. This report examines the trade logistics of Lao PDR. A trade and transport facilitation assessment was performed using a standardized toolkit and methodology developed by the World Bank to evaluate the quality of the logistics services. The assessment focused on the services used by these trades and the corridors used by these services. The assessment gave specific attention to two constraints on trade, the location of the country and the size of the trade. The study is organized in three interrelated parts: assessing the performance of the logistics sector; the international trade corridors linking Lao PDR to trade gateways in Thailand; and the supply chains used for distribution of exports. This report is presented in four sections. The first part examines the foreign trade of Lao PDR, the opportunities for growth and the logistics services in the movement of imports and exports between the country and its major gateways. The second section evaluates the performance of the corridors connecting the major origins and destinations in the country and the principal seaport used for international trade. The third section analyses the structure and performance characteristics of the supply chains used for selected trades and the implications for restructuring to support growth in the export trade. The final section presents a series of recommendations for improving the competitiveness of the exports through improvements in the structure of the supply chains, the logistics services used by these supply chains, and the corridors used by these supply chains.


Marc Jacobs is a self-described postmodern fashion designer who is believed to give a downtown New York allure to everything he touches, even though he now lives and works in Paris and routinely taps into the value-adding sources and innovative energies of far-away places such as Tokyo. Here I present Jacobs as one of the emerging global tastemakers whose relatively less place-bound and powerfully global experiences have significant implications for the arguments around the sociology and geography of creativity. More specifically, I argue that the transterritorial nature of Jacobs' creativity points to a more complicated geography of creativity than has been acknowledged in the literature.


Stone Mastic Asphalt (SMA) is a tough, stable, rut-resistant mixture that takes advantage of the stone-to-stone contact to provide strength and durability for the material. Besides, the warm mix asphalt (WMA) technology allows reducing emissions and energy consumption by reducing the production temperature by 30–50 °C, compared to conventional hot mix asphalt technology (HMA). The dynamic modulus |E*| has been acknowledged as a vital material property in the mechanistic-empirical design and analysis and further reflects the strains and displacements of such layered pavement structures. The objective of this study is twofold, aiming at favoring the potential use of SMA with WMA technique. To this aim, first, laboratory tests were conducted to compare the performance of SMA and HMA through the dynamic modulus. Second, an advanced hybrid artificial intelligence technique to accurately predict the dynamic modulus of asphalt mixtures was developed. This hybrid model (ANN-TLBO) was based on an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) algorithm and Teaching Learning Based Optimization (TLBO) technique. A database containing the as-obtained experimental tests (96 data) was used for the development and assessment of the ANN-TLBO model. The experimental results showed that SMA mixtures exhibited higher values of the dynamic modulus |E*| than HMA, and the WMA technology increased the dynamic modulus values compared with the hot technology. Furthermore, the proposed hybrid algorithm could successfully predict the dynamic modulus with remarkable values of R2 of 0.989 and 0.985 for the training and testing datasets, respectively. Lastly, the effects of temperature and frequency on the dynamic modulus were evaluated and discussed.


A case of livedo reticularis symptomatica is described with the hitherto unreported association of systemic lupus erythematosus. Livedo reticularis is characterized by a reticular reddish-blue discoloration of the skin, which blanches on pressure and is independent of temperature changes. The designation ``symptomatica'' denotes the association of the lesion with another disease. The livedo reticularis remained constant in this patient and was not influenced by changes in the associated systemic lupus erythematosus.


Background and Purpose: With the increased adoption of the electronic health record, data mining emerges as an important technique for the empirical discovery of new knowledge from health data. Itemset sequence mining is a technique that enables the discovery of temporal (ordered) associations between entities in a database. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate the use of itemset sequence mining to discover factors associated with good and poor HIV prognosis amongst a cohort of HIV patients in rural Uganda. Methods: We obtained a de-identified and date-shifted OpenMRS-based medical dataset from the Millennium Villages Project site in Ruhiira Uganda. The dataset contained the records of 129,080 patients with 5,825,579 observations made in 335,000 encounters between 2008 and 2011. We extracted relevant demographic and clinical variables for all HIV positive patients in the dataset. The extracted cohort was stratified into good and poor prognosis groups. The good prognosis group comprised patients whose modal stages over the duration of follow-up were either WHO stage I or II. The poor prognosis group comprised patients whose modal stages were either WHO stage III or IV. We applied the Sequential Pattern Discovery Equivalence classes (SPADE) algorithm via the arulesSequences package in R (programming language) to discover frequent sequence rules in each group. Pruning strategies were used to filter out sequence rules that were insignificant. Internal validation was done using 10-fold repeated random sub-sampling and only sequence rules common to all folds were assumed to be representative findings. External evaluation was done by two independent researchers who assessed the relevance of the generated sequence rules. Results: A total of 3,353 records pertaining to HIV positive patients were extracted from the dataset. The good and poor prognosis groups contained of 1,441 patients and475 patients respectively. 18 sequence rules in the good prognosis group and 14 sequence rules in the poor prognosis group were obtained. The external evaluation of these sequence rules was conflicted, with an inter-rater agreement by Cohen's Kappa being 32% (poor) for the good prognosis rules and 57.1% for the poor prognosis rules. The good prognosis group was associated with having a normal body mass index, being single or married, being diagnosed with urinary tract infections, and having signs and symptoms of fever and headache. The patients in this group were more likely to be newly diagnosed and less likely to be on antiretroviral therapy. The poor prognosis group was associated with being underweight, being widowed or divorced, and being diagnosed with respiratory tract infections. The patients in this group were more likely to be in the WHO stage III and reported the HIV status of their partners as either positive or unknown. Conclusions: Our study suggests that sequence mining may indeed substantiate known associations as well as generate useful hypotheses concerning HIV prognosis. Further investigations using larger and more diverse datasets are warranted. Keywords: HIV Prognosis, Sequence Mining, Rural Uganda


G protein‐coupled receptors (GPCRs) are cell membrane associated signaling hubs that orchestrate a multitude of cellular functions upon binding to a diverse variety of extracellular ligands. Since GPCRs are integral membrane proteins with seven‐transmembrane domain architecture, their function, organization and dynamics are intimately regulated by membrane lipids, such as cholesterol. Cholesterol is an extensively studied lipids in terms of its effects on GPCR structure and function. One of the possible mechanisms underlying modulation of GPCR function by cholesterol is via specific interaction of GPCRs with membrane cholesterol. These interactions of GPCRs with membrane cholesterol are often attributed to structural features of GPCRs that could facilitate their preferential association with cholesterol. In this backdrop, cholesterol interaction motifs represent putative interaction sites on GPCRs that could facilitate cholesterol‐sensitive function of these receptors. In this review, we provide an overview of cholesterol interaction motifs found in GPCRs, which have been identified through a combination of crystallography, bioinformatics analysis, and functional studies. In addition, we will highlight, using specific examples, why mere presence of a cholesterol interaction motif at a given site may not directly implicate its role in interaction with membrane cholesterol. We therefore believe that experimental approaches, followed by functional analysis of cholesterol sensitivity of GPCRs, would provide a better understanding of the role played by these motifs in cholesterol‐sensitive function. We envision that a comprehensive knowledge of cholesterol interaction sites in GPCRs would allow us to develop a better understanding of GPCR structure‐function paradigm, and could be useful in future therapeutics.


Glioblastoma (GBM) is a type of brain tumour with a very high fatality rate. Owing to the presence of the blood–brain barrier (BBB), it is difficult for drugs to reach the tumour site; thus, there has been little progress in GBM chemotherapeutics. Furthermore, the malignant growth of tumours largely depends on the tumour microenvironment. GBM is especially prevalent in slightly acidic, hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)-rich, hypoxic, and immunosuppressive microenvironments. Tumour-supporting macrophages (M2 macrophages) are a type of immune cell that promote tumour growth. Therefore, targeting M2 macrophages and repolarizing them into tumour-suppressor macrophages (M1 macrophages) are important strategies for GBM treatment. Salinomycin (SAL) is an anti-tumour drug that can improve the tumour immune microenvironment. Interestingly, we found that SAL promoted the expression of M1 macrophages in vitro, but its ability was limited in vivo because of the presence of the BBB. In this study, we combined SAL and MnO2 to design bovine serum albumin–MnO2–SAL (BMS), a nanoparticle that responds to acidic and H2O2-rich microenvironments. Our experimental results showed that BMS reduced GBM growth efficiency and had the ability to penetrate the BBB. It also enhanced the repolarization ability of SAL owing to the production of Mn2+ after decomposition, which could be applied in Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). This study demonstrated that the multifunctional nanoparticle BMS is of great significance in inhibiting orthotopic GBM growth and improving immunosuppressive microenvironments.


An accurately inferred phylogeny is important to the study of evolution. Factors affecting the accuracy of an inferred tree can be traced to several sequential steps leading to the inference of the phylogeny. We have examined here the impact of some features of nucleotide sequences in alignments on phylogenetic (topological) accuracy rather than any source of error during the process of sequence alignment or choice of the method of inference (as is usually done). Specifically, we have studied (using computer simulation) the implications of changing the values of the following five parameters, individually and in combination: sequence length (l), nucleotide substitution rate (r), nucleotide base composition (?), the transition-transversion rate ratio (?), and the substitution rate heterogeneity among the sites (?). An interesting, and unexpected, result was that ? has a strong positive relationship with phylogenetic accuracy, especially at high substitution rates. This simulation-based work has implications for empirical researchers in the field and should enable them to choose from among the multiple genes typically available today for a more accurate inference of the phylogeny being studied.


With the increasing appeal of Korean popular culture known as the Korean Wave or hallyu , fans in Israel among Korean studies students have joined—and even replaced—ethnic Koreans in performing nationalism beyond South Korea's borders, creating what I call hallyu fan-nationalism. As an unintended consequence of hallyu, such nationalism enables non-Korean hallyu fans to take on the empowering roles of cultural experts, educators, and even cultural ambassadors to promote Korea abroad. The symbolic shift from diasporic to hallyu nationalism brings to the fore nonnationalist, nonessentialist, and transcultural perspectives in fandom studies. In tracing the history of Korea Day from the 2000s to the 2010s, I found that hallyu fan-students are mobilized both by the macro mission to promote a positive image of Korea in their home societies and by the micro motivation to repair their own, often stigmatized, self-image.


Introduction and Objectives Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a progressive and invariably fatal disease. Historical cohort studies have reported a median survival of 2.8–3.2 years1. The UK has seen a number of important developments for IPF patients in the last year which it is hoped will translate to improved outcomes for individuals with this devastating disease. These include: the licensing and approval by NICE of the first anti fibrotic therapy, pirfenidone; specialist commissioning of ILD services; and publication of NICE IPF guidelines. If the impact of these important developments is to be measured it is vital that current IPF disease burden is understood. Methods The incidence and mortality of IPF-Clinical Syndrome, using broad and narrow disease definitions, was assessed via the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) GOLD dataset. Results The incidence of broadly defined IPF-CS between 2000–2012 was 8.65 (95% CI 8.40–8.90) per 100,000 person years and significantly increased over time (incidence rate ratio adjusted by gender, region and age category = 1.02, p for linear trend <0.0001). Kaplan-Meier survival estimates show no significant survival difference by year of diagnosis (log rank test for equality of survivor functions, p = 0.17) with a median survival of 3.0 years (95% CI 2.8–3.1). There was no significant survival difference for broad and narrow definitions (log rank test for equality of survivor functions, p = 0.06) validating the definition of IPF-CS. Conclusions In keeping with previous data the incidence of IPF-CS continues to rise and the survival time from diagnosis remains unchanged. The mortality burden of IPF-CS is therefore increasing. The results of this study provide an important benchmark against which the effects of changes in the management and delivery of care for individuals with IPF can be measured. References Navaratnam V, Fleming KM, West J, Smith CJ, Jenkins RG, Fogarty A, Hubbard RB. The rising incidence of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis in the U. K. Thorax. 2011;66:462–7.


Interaction of electrons with a focused laser field combined with a static magnetic field is considered. The gain of energy acquired by the electron after crossing the laser focus is found. Optimal conditions for efficient acceleration of electrons are determined. The efficiency of acceleration is shown to be maximal in the case of almost, but not exactly, coinciding directions of a static magnetic field and of propagation of the laser radiation (almost collinear geometry). A small optimal angle between these two directions is shown to be on the order of the inverse relativistic factor 1/ gamma . An optimal ratio of the 'transverse to longitudinal' electron energy in a static magnetic field and optimal conditions of light focusing are found. The optimized electron energy gain Delta epsilon /sub opt/ is shown to be a linear function of gamma . It is shown that Delta epsilon /sub opt/ can be rather large at a moderately high intensity of the laser radiation in the focus. >


Four Tn5-transposon LPS mutants of Sinorhizobium meliloti (Tb9, Tb29, Ts22 and Ts32) have been studied. Each of four mutants has been established to contain a single insertion of Tn5-transposon in its genome. All mutations are located on a chromosome. Nodulation competitiveness (NC) of mutants towards the parent strain of S. meliloti CXM1-188 was investigated by resistant method using coinoculation of mutant and parent strain in the ratio 1:1. It was shown that NC was only 19-31% and 8-10%, for two strains Tb29 and Ts22, respectively which had lost the capability to synthesize higher molecular weight form of lipopolysaccharide (LPS1). Nodulation competitiveness of two other strains (Tb9 and Ts32) which retained the capability to synthesize LPS1 although in modified form varied from 49 to 62% and did not differ from NC of strain CXM1-188. The investigation of nodule formation rate has shown that four LPS-mutants did not differ from the parent strain by the number of root nodules. However the appearance of nodules induced by the mutant Tb29 was registered 7 days later than the nodules formed by other LPS-mutants and CXM1-188 strain. Obtained data concerning a single Tn5-insertion in genome of each of four S. meliloti LPS-mutants testify to the fact that both the disturbance of lipopolysaccharide synthesis and change of nodulation competitiveness in mutants Tb29 and Ts22 are results of a single mutation.


Aiming at the water quality characteristics of low turbidity and low temperature of the Reservoir Water derived from Yellow River(RWDFYR), the technology of micro-flocculation direct filtration for RWDFYR was studied. The effluent index such as CODMn, UV254, TOC and turbidity was investigated under the different filtration rate conditions of 4m/h, 5m/h, 6m/h, 8m/h and 10m/h. The results show that the value of removal efficiency of turbidity reached at 98%, and the value of removal efficiency of organic matter was 40% also. In this study, the removal effect was good under the filtration rate of 6m/h. Moreover, the removal effect of different filter layers was also carried out. Finally, it concluded that the backwashing cycle of filter layer should not exceed 3days.


Water is essential for our existence on this planet - critical to countless physical, biological, geological and chemical processes - it has defied scientific understanding. Exhibiting peculiar properties such as increased density upon melting and high surface tension, water is one of the most intriguing problems in condensed matter and chemical physics. Current research at SSRL, however, is illuminating the nature of H-bonding, presenting exciting new avenues of research and challenging existing models of water's structure.


Diabetes and heart failure (HF) often co-exist, and since the number of people with either diabetes or HF is increasing worldwide, the number of diabetic HF patients is expected to grow exponentially. Patients with diabetes and HF have a poorer clinical outcome compared to diabetic patients without HF. Also, HF patients with diabetes have different characteristics compared to HF patients without diabetes. This observation suggests that diabetes might contribute to the onset and progression of HF. Several other findings support the concept that diabetes is a driver for HF. Diabetes might increase the risk of developing HF through the increased risk of atherosclerotic disease. In addition, diabetes directly influences function and structure of the heart—for example, through altered insulin signalling and mitochondrial dysfunction, increased (deposition of) advanced glycation end products (AGEs), oxidative stress, and lipid accumulation. Several treatment guidelines exist for diabetes and HF, but the specific treatment suggestions for diabetics with HF are sparse. Moreover, some treatment options for diabetes are not recommended for those with concomitant HF. This article provides an overview of the current knowledge and understanding regarding the epidemiology, pathophysiology, and treatment of patients with HF and diabetes.

### Prevalence of HF in patients with diabetes

In the general population the prevalence of patients with both HF and diabetes is estimated at 0.5% in men and 0.4% in women.1 In patients with diabetes the prevalence of HF is between 9–22%, which is much higher compared to the general population. In a hospital discharge database of the Kaiser Permanente Northwest Division the prevalence of HF was 11.8% in patients with diabetes compared to 4.5% in patients without diabetes (n=1566).w1 The prevalence is highest in women aged 70 years and older.w2 The prevalence of asymptomatic diastolic dysfunction in patients with diabetes is probably higher, and estimated to be between 52–60%.w3 w4 Not all …


Index der Sternörter 1900-1925 :—This is not a star catalogue ; it does not give the position of a single star. It is simply an index, but it vastly increases the usefulness of all star catalogues that have been issued in the first quarter of the present century by showing precisely what stars each catalogue contains. There has been great activity among meridian observers as is evident from the fact that no less than 401 lists of star places are included in the Index before us ; many of these might easily be overlooked by one who is in search for accurate observations of a particular star. Everyone in search of such information is greatly indebted to Professor Schorr for this convenient Index. ■,