Equity and inclusion are fundamental to WaterAid's mission as part of a rights based approach. WaterAid collaborated with the Water, Engineering and Development Centre (WEDC), Loughborough University, to design and run an equity and inclusion practitioner training course. It was designed and piloted in 2010, funded by WaterAid and WEDC. An external evaluation found that the training increased the knowledge, skills and confidence of participants to implement equity and inclusion in their own work. Recommendations were made for improvements, which were incorporated into a second course in 2011. This paper describes the training course, its strengths and weaknesses, and its impact, in terms of what staff in country programmes have put into practice since the training, and discusses further lessons learnt about the training content, the format, and its impact.


ABSTRACT Medulloblastoma, one of the most malignant brain tumors in children, is thought to arise from undifferentiated neural stem/progenitor cells (NSCs) present in the external granule layer of the cerebellum. However, the mechanism of tumorigenesis remains unknown for the majority of medulloblastomas. In this study, we found that many human medulloblastomas express significantly elevated levels of both myc oncogenes, regulators of neural progenitor proliferation, and REST/NRSF, a transcriptional repressor of neuronal differentiation genes. Previous studies have shown that neither c-Myc nor REST/NRSF alone could cause tumor formation. To determine whether c-Myc and REST/NRSF act together to cause medulloblastomas, we used a previously established cell line derived from external granule layer stem cells transduced with activated c-myc (NSC-M). These immortalized NSCs were able to differentiate into neurons in vitro. In contrast, when the cells were engineered to express a doxycycline-regulated REST/NRSF transgene (NSC-M-R), they no longer underwent terminal neuronal differentiation in vitro. When injected into intracranial locations in mice, the NSC-M cells did not form tumors either in the cerebellum or in the cerebral cortex. In contrast, the NSC-M-R cells did produce tumors in the cerebellum, the site of human medulloblastoma formation, but not when injected into the cerebral cortex. Furthermore, the NSC-M-R tumors were blocked from terminal neuronal differentiation. In addition, countering REST/NRSF function blocked the tumorigenic potential of NSC-M-R cells. To our knowledge, this is the first study in which abnormal expression of a sequence-specific DNA-binding transcriptional repressor has been shown to contribute directly to brain tumor formation. Our findings indicate that abnormal expression of REST/NRSF and Myc in NSCs causes cerebellum-specific tumors by blocking neuronal differentiation and thus maintaining the "stemness" of these cells. Furthermore, these results suggest that such a mechanism plays a role in the formation of human medulloblastoma.


Background: Fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC), a cheap screening technique, has helped reduce the diagnostic turnaround time of palpable swellings from different anatomical sites. In light of the technique increasingly being used as a definitive diagnostic tool, it is thus important to evaluate its accuracy in making specific diagnosis beyond just being a screening tool. Objective: To determine the concordance rate between cytological and histological diagnosis Materials and Methods: Cytology and corresponding histology reports for lesions from patients with maxillofacial, lymph node, and abdominal swellings, where both were available, were compared for the concordance of specific cytological diagnosis with final histological diagnosis. Results: In the 10-year (2006–2015) studied, there were 177 complete cases in which specific diagnoses were made on cytology; of these, 135 (75.3%) were in concordance with histological diagnoses. Concordance for intra-abdominal, maxillofacial, and lymph node aspirates was 90.2%, 85.5%, and 62.9%, respectively. Cytological concordance of specific diagnosis for benign and malignant lesions was 70.7% and 79.5%, respectively. Concordances for lymphomas, carcinomas, and sarcomas were 84.1%, 68.2%, and 66.7%, respectively. The specific cytologic diagnosis was enhanced by preaspirate ultrasound scan while the absence of immunocytochemistry hampered accuracy in specific diagnosis of nodal non-Hodgkin's and Hodgkin's lymphoma (66.7% and 42.9%), respectively. Conclusion: This study concludes that FNAC is a simple technique with fairly reliable utility in proffering specific diagnosis on suitable lesions. However, in developing countries where repertoire of antibodies for immunocytochemistry may be limited, the accuracy will be improved by good clinical history and preaspirate ultrasound where necessary.


Searching for sustainable regional trade agreements (RTAs) for East Asia, we quantitatively evaluated the likely impact of proposed East Asian RTA strategies─(i) the AFTA (a being-leftalone strategy), (ii) an ASEAN Hub RTA (a hub-and-spoke type of overlapping RTA strategy), (iii) the AFTA vs a China-Japan-Korea RTA (a duplicating or competing RTA strategy), (iv) an ASEAN+3 RTA (an expansionary RTA strategy)─on the East Asian economies and the world economy with respect to consumption, production, volume of trade, and terms of trade effect by applying a multi-country and multi-sector CGE model. We found that there was no perfectly Pareto improving RTA strategy among the four different scenarios proposed for East Asia relative to the existing AFTA. However, the expansionary ASEAN+3 RTA can be a sustainable Pareto efficient policy option because the members' gains were significantly positive enough with more evenly distributed gains between members. The effects on world welfare were also positive enough and the negative effect on nonmembers was not very significant. More interestingly, if the East Asian countries are willing to cooperate with their Pacific Basin partners to form an APEC level of RTA, the evolution toward a global trade bloc can be counted as a Pareto improvement for East Asian economies in every aspect we measure.


\noindent The Chinese competition authority announced a sanction against Qualcomm, a leading semiconductor manufacturer in the United States. This study investigates whether Qualcomm's pricing strategy limited competition with its rivals. The study estimated two demand functions for handsets and integrated circuit (IC) chips, as well as the marginal cost of smartphones. It then factored in the price of IC chips. Based on the estimated prices of chips and demand parameters, the study identified the competitive relationship regarding the IC chips at the product level. I found followings; the cost of smartphone handset that installed Qualcomm's chipset is lower than that installed its rivals' products. Meanwhile, Qualcomm's chip generates a higher willingness to pay via transactions with increasing numbers of handset assemblers. Qualcomm did not commit vertical foreclosures since its product is not exclusive, and increased number of customers and WTP and higher prices of their products. However, it committed horizontal foreclosures, as evident from the pricing of the license fee, where Qualcomm limits competition by raising the cost for rivals; this observation is consistent with the authority's judgment. This anti-competition conduct is most severe in the CDMA2000 market in China.


As use of non-TCP applications such as streaming media and network games increases, the potential for unfair, misbehaving flows and the threat of congestion collapse also increases. This paper introduces a statistical traffic filtering technique, stochastic fairness guardian (SFG), that effectively regulates misbehaving flows with minimal traffic state information. SFG can be used in conjunction with an active queue management (AQM) mechanism to improve both network protection and efficiency. Simulations are used to evaluated SFG and the integration of SFG with a proportional-integral (PI) controller in comparison with other similar statistical flow management mechanisms including RED-PD, SFB and CHOKe. The SFG-PI combination outperforms other mechanisms in terms of fairness, queuing delay, stability and TCP performance over a wide range of realistic traffic loads and conditions.


[Extract] Assamese, the majority language of Assam state in Northeast India, is not often included among "Southeast Asian" languages. An Indo-Aryan language, its closest genetic relatives are Bengali and Oriya, and its relation to Hindi is not thought to be remote (Pattanayak 1966; Grimes 1996). However, as the easternmost Indo-Aryan language, Assamese is also situated precisely at the western frontiers of Southeast Asia. Mainly spoken in the plains of the Brahmaputra river valley, it has long been in contact with speakers of the many Tibeto-Burman, Austro-Asiatic and Tai languages found throughout the plains and, particularly, throughout the surrounding hills (Kakati 1995). Assamese is spoken as a second or trade language by millions of Northeast Indians, and has been fully or partially creolized repeatedly throughout its history; the most well-documented example of this is "Nagamese", an Asssamese-based creole which many residents of Nagaland and neighbouring areas now speak as a first language (Bhattacharjya 2001).

As might be anticipated given these available influences, Assamese has shed some stereotypically South Asian features and taken on some features more commonly found in Southeast Asian languages. Modern Assamese has a greatly reduced segment inventory, with alveolar rather than the more usual Indic dental and retroflex stops and continuants. It has also lost earlier verbal cross-referencing of gender and number, and has a relatively reduced and pragmatically-sensitive set of case-forms (Goswami and Tamuli 2003; Edwards 2004). At the same time, Assamese has gained young but evidently robust systems of numeral classifiers and relator nouns (Benom MS), and can in general be said to have shifted towards a relatively more isolating morphological profile than its ancestors and Indic neighbors. 2 Another important feature of Assamese, potentially related to contact with Southeast Asian languages and/or shift toward a more isolating typology, is a construction which will be analyzed here as a variety of verb serialization.


Nonclassical congenital adrenal hyperplasia (NCAH) is an autosomal recessive imbalance in cortisol synthesis with adrenal androgen excess. Although rarely recognized in infants, it may cause premature adrenarche and pubarche, virilization in young women and variable symptoms in young men. It is commonly caused by mutations in CYP21A2, the gene for steroid 21-hydroxylase. Patients with the p.P30L allele tend to have pronounced evidence of androgen excess but are categorized as nonclassical. We used direct molecular detection of the p.P30L mutation in CYP21A2 in 11 Macedonian NCAH patients and in 17 members of their families using polymerase chain reaction/amplification created restriction site (PCR/ACRS) analysis and digestion with restriction enzymes. The p.P30L mutation was found in a homozygous state in seven (63.6%) and in a heterozygous state in four (36.4%) patients. Of the latter, one was also heterozygous for the p.Q318X mutation. The p.P30L mutation was found in a heterozygous state in 10 (58.8%) and in a homozygous state in one (5.9%) of the family members. These findings support a role of the p.P30L mutation in NCAH.


The branching ratios of ions and the angular distributions of electrons ejected from the Eu 4f76p1/2nd auto-ionizing states are investigated with the velocity-map-imaging technique. To populate the above auto-ionizing states, the relevant bound Rydberg states have to be detected first. Two new bound Rydberg states are identified in the region between 41150 cm−1 and 44580 cm−1, from which auto-ionization spectra of the Eu 4f76p1/2nd states are observed with isolated core excitation method. With all preparations above, the branching ratios from the above auto-ionizing states to different final ionic states and the angular distributions of electrons ejected from these processes are measured systematically. Energy dependence of branching ratios and anisotropy parameters within the auto-ionization spectra are carefully analyzed, followed by a qualitative interpretation.


Canada's Mackenzie River Basin (MRB) is one of the largest relatively pristine ecosystems in North America. Home to indigenous peoples for millennia, the basin is also the site of increasing resource development, notably fossil fuels, hydroelectric power resources, minerals, and forests. Three provinces, three territories, the Canadian federal government, and Aboriginal governments (under Canada's constitution, indigenous peoples are referred to as "Aboriginal") have responsibilities for water in the basin, making the MRB a significant setting for cooperative, transboundary water governance. A framework agreement that provides broad principles and establishes a river basin organization, the MRB Board, has been in place since 1997. However, significant progress on completing bilateral agreements under the 1997 Mackenzie River Basin Transboundary Waters Master Agreement has only occurred since 2010. We considered the performance of the MRB Board relative to its coordination function, accountability, legitimacy, and overall environmental effectiveness. This allowed us to address the extent to which governance based on river basin boundaries, a bioregional approach, could contribute to adaptive governance in the MRB. Insights were based on analysis of key documents and published studies, 19 key informant interviews, and additional interactions with parties involved in basin governance. We found that the MRB Board's composition, its lack of funding and staffing, and the unwillingness of the governments to empower it to play the role envisioned in the Master Agreement mean that as constituted, the board faces challenges in implementing a basin-wide vision. This appears to be by design. The MRB governments have instead used the bilateral agreements under the Master Agreement as the primary mechanism through which transboundary governance will occur. A commitment to coordinating across the bilateral agreements is needed to enhance the prospects for adaptive governance in the basin.


It is known that microbial model systems can be employed as good predictors of mammalian drug metabolism. Metabolites of phenytoin, a model drug for aromatic hydroxylation were isolated and characterized using HPLC and TLC after pre-incubation with some microbial cultures. Among different organisms screened, pseudomonas aeruginosa and Proteus vulgaris were found to metabolize phenytoin. Both produced a phydroxylated derivative of phenytoin which was the main metabolite observed in rabbits. Pseudomonas aeruginosa also produced one unknown metabolite of phenytoin which was not observed in mammalian systems. These two organisms could be used as microbial models of metabolism of other drugs whose metabolism is expected to be similar to that of phenytoin.


In this paper, we propose a novel out-of-core volume rendering algorithm for large time-varying fields. Exploring temporal and spatial coherences has been an important direction for speeding up the rendering of time-varying data. Previously, there were techniques that hierarchically partition both the time and space domains into a data structure so as to re-use some results from the previous time step in multiresolution rendering; however, it has not been studied on which domain should be partitioned first to obtain a better re-use rate. We address this open question, and show both theoretically and experimentally that partitioning the time domain first is better. We call the resulting structure (a binary time tree as the primary structure and an octree as the secondary structure) the space-partitioning time (SPT) tree. Typically, our SPT-tree rendering has a higher level of details, a higher re-use rate, and runs faster. In addition, we devise a novel cut-finding algorithm to facilitate efficient out-of-core volume rendering using our SPT tree, we develop a novel out-of-core preprocessing algorithm to build our SPT tree I/O-efficiently, and we propose modified error metrics with a theoretical guarantee of a monotonicity property that is desirable for the tree search. The experiments on datasets as large as 25GB using a PC with only 2GB of RAM demonstrated the efficacy of our new approach.


This work develops new algorithms with rigorous efficiency guarantees for infinite horizon imitation learning (IL) with linear function approximation without restrictive coherence assumptions. We begin with the minimax formulation of the problem and then outline how to leverage classical tools from optimization, in particular, the proximal-point method (PPM) and dual smoothing, for online and offline IL, respectively. Thanks to PPM, we avoid nested policy evaluation and cost updates for online IL appearing in the prior literature. In particular, we do away with the conventional alternating updates by the optimization of a single convex and smooth objective over both cost and Q-functions. When solved inexactly, we relate the optimization errors to the suboptimality of the recovered policy. As an added bonus, by re-interpreting PPM as dual smoothing with the expert policy as a center point, we also obtain an offline IL algorithm enjoying theoretical guarantees in terms of required expert trajectories. Finally, we achieve convincing empirical performance for both linear and neural network function approximation.


The incidence of nontasters for phenylthiocarbamide was found to be significantly higher in 27 athyreotic cretins than in normal adults and children. A significant increase of nontasters among the parents and siblings of these cretins was also found. These findings are discussed in relation to maldevelopment of the fetal thyroid in nontaster genotypes.


Highly-coordinated water molecules are frequently an integral part of protein-protein and protein-ligand interfaces. We introduce an updated energy model that efficiently captures the energetic effects of these highly-coordinated water molecules on the surfaces of proteins. A two-stage protocol is developed in which polar groups arranged in geometries suitable for water placement are first identified, then a modified Monte Carlo simulation allows highly coordinated waters to be placed on the surface of a protein while simultaneously sampling amino acid side chain orientations. This "semi-explicit" water model is implemented in Rosetta and is suitable for both structure prediction and protein design. We show that our new approach and energy - model yield significant improvements in native structure recovery of protein-protein and protein-ligand docking.


We have introduced a methodology for solving the tradeoff between accuracy and complexity in complex virtual systems directly at the system level. Such methodology can be inserted in an application-level compiler for transforming a high-level description of the application into a lower level. This can then be fed into a hardware/software codesign compiler for final system implementation. Off-line integration of constraints relaxes model accuracy by introducing the concept of neural networks equivalent according to accuracy. The complexity criterion help select the smallest neural network topology within this set. The methodology is the key element for an effective high-level synthesis where few or no application tuning parameters need to be set by the designer. Indirectly, the methodology supports a system level integration of the requirement for low-power consumption, a particularly appealing constraint for embedded system design.


Importance
Standard adverse event (AE) reporting in oncology clinical trials has historically relied on clinician grading, which prior research has shown can lead to underestimation of rates of symptomatic AEs. Industry sponsors are beginning to implement in trials the National Cancer Institute's Patient-Reported Outcomes version of the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (PRO-CTCAE), which was developed to allow patients to self-report symptomatic AEs and improve the quality of symptomatic AE detection.

Objectives
To evaluate the feasibility of implementing PRO-CTCAE in a prespecified correlative analysis of the phase 3 COMET-2 trial and enumerate statistically significant between-group differences in symptomatic AEs using PRO-CTCAE and the CTCAE.

Design, Setting, and Participants
This correlative study of 119 men in the randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase 3 COMET-2 trial with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer who had undergone at least 2 prior lines of systemic treatment was conducted from March 2012 to July 2014. Participants completed PRO-CTCAE items using an automated telephone system from home prior to treatment and every 3 weeks during treatment. Statistical analysis was performed from May 2018 to June 2019.

Main Outcomes and Measures
The proportion of patients who completed expected PRO-CTCAE self-reports was computed as a measure of feasibility.

Results
Among the 119 men in the study (median age, 65 years [range, 44-80 years]), 534 of 587 (91.0%) expected PRO-CTCAE self-reports were completed, with consistently high rates of completion throughout participation. Rates of self-report adherence were similar between groups (cabozantinib s-maleate, 286 of 317 [90.2%]; and mitoxantrone hydrochloride-prednisone, 248 of 270 [91.9%]). Of 12 measured, patient-reported PRO-CTCAE symptomatic AEs, 4 reached statistical significance when comparing the proportion of patients with at least 1 postbaseline score greater than 0 between groups (differences ranged from 20.1% to 34.1% with higher proportions in the cabozantinib group; all P < .05), and use of a method for accounting for preexisting symptoms at baseline yielded 7 AEs with statistically significant differences between groups (differences ranged from 20.5% to 41.2% with higher proportions in the cabozantinib group; all P < .05). In the same analysis using investigator-reported CTCAE data, no statistically significant differences were found between groups for any symptomatic AEs.

Conclusions and Relevance
PRO-CTCAE data collection was feasible and improved the accuracy of symptomatic AE detection in a phase 3 cancer trial. This analysis adds to mounting evidence of the feasibility and value of patient-reported AEs in oncology, which should be considered for inclusion in cancer trials that incorporate AE evaluation.

Trial Registration
ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT01522443.


The region of Oued Righ is considered as a poor region in terms of precipitation, which it receives less than 150 mm / year. The intensive use of groundwater has led to many problems of wastewater discharges and an excess of irrigation water, which makes an adverse impact on the environment and the rise of the water table. Applying the WEAP software "water assessment and planning", this paper aims to develop a decision support system (DSS) to model the water resources and their uses, assessing the balance-equilibrium resources needs and analyze the future situation of the water according to different scenarios. It is observed that water use is excessive which reflected by an unmet demand and significant discharges into the canal. Otherwise, comparison between the scenarios elaborated shows a remarkable reduction in water demand and return flows to the river channel Righ. The application has been developed under Arcgis that provides an easy access to the information and offer the most suitable solutions to meet the demand and to properly manage the discharges from the wastewater and irrigation. Key-words: WEAP, water table, Scenarios, model, ArcGIS * Auteur correspondant:firstname.lastname@example.com.


This study presents new zircon Hf isotopic results for 28 magmatic rocks of Jurassic-Oligocene ages in the Lut-Sistan region to better understand the magmatic evolution of eastern Iran before and after the Lut-Afghan collision. The Middle Jurassic (~168 Ma) granitoids yielded a wide range of zircon εHf(T) values from +8 to -1, revealing the similarity of variable isotopic feature of the coeval magmatic rocks forming along the Sanandaj-Sirjan zone, in agreement with the hypothesis of anti-clockwise rotation of the Lut block. The Early Cretaceous (113-107 Ma) gabbros that belong to the Birjand ophiolite indisputably show depleted mantle-derived zircon Hf isotope compositions of εHf(T) values from +16 to +12 and thus confirm their oceanic crustal origin. Another ~110 Ma diorite without ophiolitic affinity has relatively lower zircon εHf(T) values from +9 to +6, and it also contains abundant inherited zircons that show εHf(T) values between +5 and -2 at ~168 Ma, indicative of the widespread distribution of the Middle Jurassic magmatism in northern part of this region. In the Late Cretaceous, the emplacement of ~86 Ma granitoids also yielded depleted mantle-like zircon Hf isotopes of highly positive zircon εHf(T) values from +17 to +10, and the other granites yielded lower zircon εHf(T) values from +12 to +4 at 74-71 Ma. After the closure of the Sistan ocean during the Late Cretaceous (to Paleocene), the 57-53 Ma granitoids gave zircon εHf(T) values from +12 to +3 in the Early Eocene. Then, the zircon Hf isotopic results of extensive Eocene-Oligocene (46-24 Ma) magmatic rocks show a much variable signature of zircon εHf(T) values between +14 and -2, indicating the heterogeneity of widespread post-collisional magmas during this period. On the whole, the highly radiogenic zircon Hf isotopic features were mostly obtained from dated magmatic rocks in the Lut-Sistan region, similar to our recent observation on the magmatic rocks developed by the Neotethyan evolution in the Urumieh-Dokhtar magmatic arc, which suggest that the depleted-mantle component has played a critical role on the magmatic evolution since at least the Jurassic time.


In this article the influence of welding parameters such as electrical current, feed rate and stick out on crack growth energy was investigated. Therefore, prepared specimens were welded in various conditions. Using the Minitab software, 18 states of 36 possible states were chosen and applied. Then a crack was crated on the weld metal and the force-displacement diagram was plotted. Comparison of results shows that in high electricity current, the extra heat flux is the dominant factor, which causes coarse grains of microstructures. On the other hand, in low electricity current, lack of fusion and penetration reduce the crack propagation energy. Furthermore, the neural network could predict the amount of energy with high accuracy.


Scattered dose radiation to occupational in interventional cardiology cannot be neglected due to the long time for each procedure. The limit dose for occupational is 20 mSv per year or 0.01 mSv/h. The aim of this study is to calculate the effective dose of occupational and to analyse the optimization of radiation protection in the Cath lab. The simulation has been done using Rando phantom as a patient and Unfors Xi as scattered dose measuring instrument (in mGy/h). The data is collected in 6 different positions from altitudes 25 cm to 75 cm with a range of 15 cm without protective shielding. Field size of primary beam is varied to 20×20 cm and 25×25 cm, while gantry tilt is varied to caudal, cranial, and Left Anterior Oblique (LAO). The obtained data is multiplied by weighting factor base on its height. The result shows that the effective dose of occupational is in the range of 0.18-0.94 mSv/h, which is exceed the limit dose. To accommodate the limit dose for occupational, we propose the limitation of procedure time to 21-110 hours a year or the use of protective shielding as thick as 1-1.6 mm lead.


Interchange stations with their many connecting modes and lines are central for a high-quality public transport system. Bus access at the station needs to operate reliably and efficiently in order to prevent congestion and queues. To this end, a conceptual simulation model for evaluation of bus terminal operations is presented in this paper. It is based on discrete event simulation and able to describe the detailed movements and interactions that occur between vehicles at larger terminals. The model has a modular approach, where common spatial sections at terminals are represented by modules that can be easily combined into many different terminal layouts. An implementation of the model is presented and, as a first sensitivity test, applied in a numerical experiment representing Norrköping interchange station in Sweden. The results indicate that the model can be a useful tool in planning processes.


The current research focus on the northern Barents Sea and the adjacent Nansen Basin has highlighted a need for common reference terms when discussing water mass origins and modification processes. Several relevant water mass definitions have been proposed and applied over the years, but these often focus either on water masses in the southern and central part of the Barents Sea, or on the deep interior Arctic Ocean. This report provides suggestions for quite broad water mass definitions that can be applied throughout this region – supplied by additional, more specific definitions as needed.


In land plants, two distinct generations, gametophyte and sporophyte, alternate to complete the life cycle. Sporophytes undergo meiosis to produce spores, from which gametophytes develop. Gametophytes produce gametes, which participate in fertilization to produce the zygote, the first cell of the sporophyte generation. In addition to this sexual reproduction pathway, some fern species can undergo apospory or apogamy, processes that bypass meiosis or fertilization, respectively, to alternate between the two generations without changing the chromosome number. Apospory is inducible in the laboratory in various fern species simply by altering the sugar level in the media. In sporophytes induced to undergo apospory, sporophyte regeneration is also observed. The ratio of aposporous gametophytes to regenerated sporophytes varies, in a manner consistent with being dependent on sugar level. Whereas the sugar signaling pathway is yet to be elucidated in lower plants, in angiosperms it has been shown to play a regulatory role in controlling essential processes including flowering and embryo development, which give rise to the gametophyte and the next sporophyte generation, respectively. Here, we present evidence for the role of different sugar levels on the balance of apospory and regeneration in the fern Ceratopteris richardii. The demonstration of crosstalk between sugar signaling and the hormone ethylene signaling in angiosperms prompted us to test the effects of this hormone in combination with sugar on apospory vs. regeneration. These results provide insight into how a group of redifferentiating cells determines which generation to become and lay the groundwork for further analysis of this asexual pathway.


Client authentication on the web has remained in the internet-equivalent of the stone ages for the last two decades. Instead of adopting modern public-key-based authentication mechanisms, we seem to be stuck with passwords and cookies.

In this paper, we propose to break this stalemate by presenting a fresh approach to public-key-based client authentication on the web. We describe a simple TLS extension that allows clients to establish strong authenticated channels with servers and to bind existing authentication tokens like HTTP cookies to such channels. This allows much of the existing infrastructure of the web to remain unchanged, while at the same time strengthening client authentication considerably against a wide range of attacks.

We implemented our system in Google Chrome and Google's web serving infrastructure, and provide a performance evaluation of this implementation.


Increased international economic integration and skill-biased technological change are often regarded as the main drivers of the rising inequality in wages and employment witnessed in industrialized countries in recent decades as they are believed to emphasize differences between individuals in level of education. However, proponents of a task-based view of technological change and offshoring stress the evolving content of tasks as the major determinant of shifts in labour demand and argue that this does not necessarily imply a clear-cut match between the level of education and job opportunities. Belgian data from the Structure and Distribution of Earnings Survey for the period 1999-2004 suggest that the level of wages is significantly correlated with the level of education but wage growth is not. Occupation seems to explain a statistically significant part of the wage level as well as wage growth of workers. The analysis supports the view that the level of education provides less information than the occupation of workers in explaining changes in wages and employment. Overall, it appears that a policy that simply aims to increase the level of education of the active population is not warranted. In addition to the risk of over-education, such a policy is not likely to alleviate the mismatch which to some extent exists between the competencies required by employers and the competencies offered by workers and the unemployed. Jel Classification – I21, J24, J31


Estuaries are exposed to a number of threats and many South African estuarine systems are functionally and structurally altered. The extent to which fish are affected by these alterations is not fully understood. The estuarine round herring Gilchristella aestuaria is an appropriate species to use when examining such effects. The most widely used approaches to evaluating the nutritional condition of fish larvae are based on biochemical methods. In order to identify the most suitable technique for assessing body condition of fish larvae in estuaries, the nutritional condition of post-flexion larvae of G. aestuaria from the Sundays and Kariega estuaries on the south-east coast of South Africa was evaluated using three different biochemical techniques: (i) total lipid content analysis and the triacylglycerol/cholesterol (TAG/CHOL) ratio; (ii) protein content analysis; and (iii) the RNA/DNA ratio. Results from techniques (ii) and (iii) revealed that G. aestuaria larvae from the Kariega Estuary were in better condition than larvae from the Sundays Estuary, probably due to a recent plankton bloom. It is concluded that the individual RNA/DNA ratio can provide a reliable, sensitive and cost-effective method to assess the immediate effects of environmental changes on the nutritional condition of estuarine fish larvae.


Winner of the The Smith Prize Explores the shifting perceptions of the importance of individual rights and community responsibilities in interwar Italy What was the nature of justice in Italian Fascist society? Through the lens of the case of Luigia Paulovich, a legal appeal filed against the Prefect of Trieste in 1931, In the Name of Italy: Nation, Family, and Patriotism in a Fascist Court demonstrates the inconsistencies of the Fascist attack on traditional political liberties and the incomplete nature of Fascist legal reform. A compelling narrative of an elderly widow's successful challenge to the "italianization" of her surname, the book reveals institutional uncertainty, signs of underlying discontent, and legal opposition to Fascistization in the first decade of Mussolini's rule. It explores the world of Fascist justice in the halls of the Italian Administrative Court, highlighting the interplay of Italian law and the judiciary in the interpretation of Fascist expectations and the enforcement of Fascist policies against the backdrop of inherited cultural, political, and gendered beliefs. Fascist aims to create a "new" society clashed with conservative notions of family, church, and patriotism to affect the perception and practice of justice. Competing visions of nationalism from Italy's Adriatic borderlands, Dalmatia, and Rome show how the persistence of regional cultural and legal particularities impeded Fascist efforts to promote national standardization and enforce government centralization. Focusing on the proceedings of the case revealed in local documents and national court records, the account of the woman who pit Fascist officials against the national government engages legal scholars, historians, onomasticians, and theorists of Fascism, nationalism, and borderlands in debates over the nature of citizenship and the meanings of nationalism, patriotism, and justice. It explores Fascist legal reform and sheds light on the nature of Fascist authority, demonstrating the fragmentation of power, the constraints of dictatorship, and the limits of popular quiescence. The widow's triumph indicates that while Fascist dictatorship appeared in many guises, dissent adopted many masks.


We perform near-wall velocity measurements of a SiO2–water nanofluid inside a microchannel. Nanoparticle image velocimetry measurements at three visible depths within 500 nm of the wall are conducted. We evaluate the optical properties of the nanofluid and their effect on the measurement technique. The results indicate that the small effect of the nanoparticles on the optical properties of the suspension have a negligible effect on the measurement technique. Our measurements show an increase in nanofluid velocity gradients near the walls, with no measurable slip, relative to the equivalent basefluid flow. We conjecture that particle migration induced by shear may have caused this increase. The effect of this increase in the measured near wall velocity gradient has implications on the viscosity measurement for these fluids.


Predator effects on prey dynamics are conventionally studied by measuring changes in prey abundance attributed to consumption by predators. We revisit four classic examples of predator-prey systems often cited in textbooks and incorporate subsequent studies of nonconsumptive effects of predators (NCE), defined as changes in prey traits (e.g., behavior, growth, development) measured on an ecological time scale. Our review revealed that NCE were integral to explaining lynx-hare population dynamics in boreal forests, cascading effects of top predators in Wisconsin lakes, and cascading effects of killer whales and sea otters on kelp forests in nearshore marine habitats. The relative roles of consumption and NCE of wolves on moose and consequent indirect effects on plant communities of Isle Royale depended on climate oscillations. Nonconsumptive effects have not been explicitly tested to explain the link between planktonic alewives and the size structure of the zooplankton, nor have they been invoked to attribute keystone predator status in intertidal communities or elsewhere. We argue that both consumption and intimidation contribute to the total effects of keystone predators, and that characteristics of keystone consumers may differ from those of predators having predominantly NCE. Nonconsumptive effects are often considered as an afterthought to explain observations inconsistent with consumption-based theory. Consequently, NCE with the same sign as consumptive effects may be overlooked, even though they can affect the magnitude, rate, or scale of a prey response to predation and can have important management or conservation implications. Nonconsumptive effects may underlie other classic paradigms in ecology, such as delayed density dependence and predator-mediated prey coexistence. Revisiting classic studies enriches our understanding of predator-prey dynamics and provides compelling rationale for ramping up efforts to consider how NCE affect traditional predator-prey models based on consumption, and to compare the relative magnitude of consumptive and NCE of predators.


Targeting inflammation and necrosis pathways may prevent chemotherapy-associated retinal damage. Preventing a side effect of chemotherapy Chemotherapy kills cancer cells, but it is often also toxic to healthy tissues. Allocca et al. examined the mechanisms through which DNA-alkylating chemotherapies cause retinal degeneration (RD) and identified critical proteins (and potential therapeutic targets) that contribute to the death of photoreceptor cells in the retina. These include the alkylated DNA repair-initiating enzyme AAG, the necrosis and inflammation-associated kinase RIPK3, and various proinflammatory cytokines. For reasons that were unclear, female mice were less susceptible than males to RD in response to alkylating chemotherapy. These findings reveal previously unknown mechanisms of chemotherapy-induced RD and ways to potentially prevent it from developing in patients. DNA-alkylating agents are commonly used to kill cancer cells, but the base excision repair (BER) pathway they trigger can also produce toxic intermediates that cause tissue damage, such as retinal degeneration (RD). Apoptosis, a process of programmed cell death, is assumed to be the main mechanism of this alkylation-induced photoreceptor (PR) cell death in RD. Here, we studied the involvement of necroptosis (another programmed cell death process) and inflammation in alkylation-induced RD. Male mice exposed to a methylating agent exhibited a reduced number of PR cell rows, active gliosis, and cytokine induction and macrophage infiltration in the retina. Dying PRs exhibited a necrotic morphology, increased 8-hydroxyguanosine abundance (an oxidative damage marker), and overexpression of the necroptosis-associated genes Rip1 and Rip3. The activity of PARP1, which mediates BER, cell death, and inflammation, was increased in PR cells and associated with the release of proinflammatory chemokine HMGB1 from PR nuclei. Mice lacking the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10 exhibited more severe RD, whereas deficiency of RIP3 (also known as RIPK3) conferred partial protection. Female mice were partially protected from alkylation-induced RD, showing reduced necroptosis and inflammation compared to males. PRs in mice lacking the BER-initiating DNA glycosylase AAG did not exhibit alkylation-induced necroptosis or inflammation. Our findings show that AAG-initiated BER at alkylated DNA bases induces sex-dependent RD primarily by triggering necroptosis and activating an inflammatory response that amplifies the original damage and, furthermore, reveal new potential targets to prevent this side effect of chemotherapy.


Abstract Purpose To examine the acute and chronic effects of 10-weeks of progressive resistance training on sleep quality and sleeping heart rate variability in persons with Multiple Sclerosis (pwMS). Methods Eighteen pwMS (age = 44.8 ± 10.6 years; EDSS = 3.1 ± 1.7) completed a 10-week of resistance training, with three training sessions per week. Each session consisted of 4 lower body exercises, performing 2–4 sets of each exercise, with 8–15 repetitions each set, at an intensity ranging from 60 to 75% of 1-repetition maximum. Subjective and actigraphic sleep quality and sleeping heart rate variability were carried out at 4 different times: (1) Before the starting of the intervention on a rest day; (2) the night after training week 1 (3) the night after training week 10 and 4) after completing the resistance training program on a rest day. Results Regarding subjective sleep quality, significant main effects were observed on the variables of sleep quality, sleep comfort, easy of falling sleep, easy of waking up and felling of rest. Sleep quality, sleep comfort and easy of falling sleep were greater in rest night in week 1 vs. rest night in week 10. Actigraphic sleep quality also improved after the training program (rest night in week 1 vs. rest night in week 10). In the pair-wise comparison showed an acute effect in the session after the training program (rest night in week 10< training night in week 10) on HF, pNN50 and RMMSD. Conclusions Resistance training is a non-pharmacological treatment that has the capacity to improve the regulation of autonomic system and, consequently, the sleep quality in pwMS. Implications for rehabilitation 10 Weeks of resistance training improves the sleep quality of persons with multiple sclerosis. Resistance training can modulate autonomic cardiac control in this population. Improving the sleep quality is essential for persons with MS because of its close relationship to other variables, such as symptomatic fatigue.


In the recent years, Latin America has seen a large number of young adults who are neither engaged in formal education nor work, commonly dubbed as "nini" ("ni" trabajan "ni" estudian). This study tests the role household structure plays on becoming a nini in 12 Latin American countries. We explore the gender dynamic of human capital stagnation and intergenerational mobility by focusing on early family formation for women and men aged 2025 using censuses from the Integrated Public-Use Microdata Series (IPUMS-I). Countryspecific linear regression models reveal that the intersection of class and gender is a major determinant of labor force and educational disengagement in the region. Women from lower social origin who leave parental home to enter union and parenthood at younger ages are particularly disadvantaged. Moreover, among those who are active in the labor market, young mothers are less likely to experience upward intergenerational mobility in occupation compared to those who delay childbearing. This work highlights the importance of addressing economic and educational disengagement of early adulthood to foster economic growth and development in the region.


Background: There is evidence that repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) is efficacious against depression in bipolar disorder but there are less data for mania. Similarly it has been suggested that rTMS may be effective against depressive symptoms in mixed states, with fewer evidence regarding manic symptoms. Deep TMS (dTMS) has been reported to be efficacious in bipolar depression, but there are no data concerning mixed states.

Procedure: We report the case of a bipolar II patient, in which dTMS displayed acute and maintenance efficacy against the depressive and hypomanic symptoms of a depressive episode with mixed features.

Conclusion: Randomized-controlled studies should be conducted to assess the acute and maintenance efficacy of dTMS in depression with mixed features.


Computation of contact forces is essential for the simulation of mechanical systems with unilateral constraints, like bipedal robots. Most methods are based on the rigid body assumption. They can be categorized into constraint-based and penalty-based approaches. In the former, contact forces are computed by solving an optimization problem based on linear or nonlinear complementarity conditions. Unfortunately, these methods cannot be directly applied to articulated systems described in generalized coordinates. In the second approach, spring-damper models are used to minimize interpenetration between the surfaces in contact. The main criticism to penalty approaches are parameter tunning, static friction handling, and the difficulties to treat multiple simultaneous unilateral contacts. In this work we present a new compliant approach based on input-output feedback linearization. The main advantages of the proposed approach are, the spring-damper parameters are independent of the parameters of the system (i.e masses, inertias), no a priori-defined velocity thresholds are required to distinguish between dynamic and static friction, multiple simultaneous unilateral contacts are naturally handled. The proposition has been succesfully applied to the simulation of a 3D bipedal walking robot.


Thermoplastic phase-segregated multiblock copolymers with polydepsipeptides and PCL segments were prepared via coupling of diol and PCL-diol using an aliphatic diisocyanate. The obtained multiblock copolymers showed good elastic properties and a shape memory. Almost complete fixation of the mechanical deformation, resulting in quantitative recovery of the permanent shape with a switching temperature around body temperature, was observed. In hydrolytic degradation experiments, a quick decrease of the molecular weight without induction period was observed, and the material changed from elastic to brittle in 21 d. These materials promise a high potential for biomedical applications such as smart implants or medical devices.


Abstract Objective: To assess knowledge of human papillomavirus (HPV) and perceived barriers to being vaccinated against the virus. Participants: Three hundred ninety-six undergraduate women enrolled at Penn State University in Fall 2008. Methods: A random sample of students were invited to participate in a Web-based survey. Results: Awareness of HPV and the vaccine was high, but knowledge of HPV-related facts averaged only 65% overall. Knowledge was significantly predicted by frequency of media exposure and physician encouragement to be vaccinated, but not by the number of sex partners nor the frequency of condom/dental dam use. On average, women indicated that 2 of the 10 barriers listed applied to them. Physician encouragement negatively predicted barriers at p = .066. No other predictors approached significance. Conclusions: Serious misconceptions remain about specific aspects of the diseases and how they are acquired. Health education efforts are needed to improve knowledge in college populations and counteract perceived barriers.


Heat flow is characteristically high at the toe of the Nankai accretionary prism, off cape Muroto, and this is considered to be a consequence of the subduction of a hot and active ridge (e.g. Yamano et al., 2003). Despite present-day heat flow being known, how heat has changed over time in this area remains uncertain and is poorly constrained. To address this question, we have investigated palaeotemperatures using thermal maturity parameters measured on cores collected during IODP Expedition 370. Paleotemperature data were evaluated within the context of present-day heat flow and expected changes in temperature with respect to depth; e.g., numerical constraint whether present-day temperatures are too hot or cold to explain thermal maturity measurements, and whether there are anomalies with respect to depth. This is particularly important for Expedition 370 (T-limits) which selected the Muroto-site (Site C0023) because of its high heat flow and the chance this offers to investigate the habitability of the deep biosphere with respect to the temperature. Site C0023 is located 120 km from Cape Muroto, and is in the protothrust-zone of the Nankai accretionary prism. The hole encountered the décollement at 758-795 mbsf, and present-day temperatures were measured down to ~350 mbsf. Vitrinite reflectance was used to estimate maximum paleotemperatures and to look for thermal anomalies. The vitrinite reflectance increases with depth from 0.2 to 0.6 % from 200 to 700 mbsf, typical of conventional burial metamorphism, but changes little from 700 to 1000 mbsf (values stay about 0.6 %). There is a notable high value at 1090 mbsf (about 1%). There are anomalously high values of both vitrinite reflectance and sterane and hopane biomarker data at about 800 mbsf. For heating durations of 400, 4000, 40000 and 400000 years, and assuming thermal maturation using the EasyVit model of Burnham and Sweeny (1990), temperatures of 40~140 °C can explain data between 200 to 750 mbsf. To match measurements of vitrinite reflectance at 750 mbsf, a maximum paleotemperature of 140 °C is required. At 1090 mbsf, temperatures as high as ~200 °C could be needed. The difference between the paleoand present-day temperatures is the notably the greatest at the décollement, strongly suggesting an elevated heat flow at some time. A heating duration of 400 years, an elevated a heat flow of 130 ±90 mW/m and a temperature > 150 °C can explain the observations on the vitrinite reflectance. Considering the scales of space and time of thermal advection, a high-temperature fluid along the décollement zone is our currently preferred explanation.


There is a large demand for the development of portable easy-to-use on-chip biosensors capable of single molecule detection. In this paper, we propose a new ultrasensitive label-free optical refractive index sensor consisting of a Fabry–Perot resonator evanescently coupled to a microring resonator. The coupling between the Fabry–Perot standing wave mode and degenerate whispering gallery modes of the microring leads to a splitting of the resonances proportional to the coupling. Choosing the coupling region to be a microfluidic channel through which the analyte solution is pumped leads to a change in the splitting proportional to the index of refraction of the analyte that is immune to common-mode noise sources in the resonators such as thermal noise. The high sensitivity of the coupling to the analyte index combined with the reduced noise leads to significant improvement in the detection limit down to ∼10−9  RIU.


Retinitis pigmentosa (RP) is a major cause of blindness that affects 1.5 million people worldwide. Mutations in cyclic nucleotide-gated channel &bgr; 1 (CNGB1) cause approximately 4% of autosomal recessive RP. Gene augmentation therapy shows promise for treating inherited retinal degenerations; however, relevant animal models and biomarkers of progression in patients with RP are needed to assess therapeutic outcomes. Here, we evaluated RP patients with CNGB1 mutations for potential biomarkers of progression and compared human phenotypes with those of mouse and dog models of the disease. Additionally, we used gene augmentation therapy in a CNG&bgr;1-deficient dog model to evaluate potential translation to patients. CNGB1-deficient RP patients and mouse and dog models had a similar phenotype characterized by early loss of rod function and slow rod photoreceptor loss with a secondary decline in cone function. Advanced imaging showed promise for evaluating RP progression in human patients, and gene augmentation using adeno-associated virus vectors robustly sustained the rescue of rod function and preserved retinal structure in the dog model. Together, our results reveal an early loss of rod function in CNGB1-deficient patients and a wide window for therapeutic intervention. Moreover, the identification of potential biomarkers of outcome measures, availability of relevant animal models, and robust functional rescue from gene augmentation therapy support future work to move CNGB1-RP therapies toward clinical trials.


Abstract Vacuum insulation panel (VIP) is known to be the most effective insulation material. However, the usage areas of VIPs are restricted because of their high production costs. The core of VIP is the most important item affecting the cost of VIP. In this study, to obtain VIPs, which are provided with minimum thermal conductivity resistance value (R=5 m2 K/mW), was aimed for the optimal thickness of the panel (<40 mm). Therefore, 14 different core samples of VIP were produced by using various types of powders (fumed silica, precipitated silica, perlite, and diatomite), opacifiers (silicon carbide, carbon black, and titanium dioxide), and fibers (glass fiber, organic fiber, and cellulosic fiber). By using appropriate test methods, the physical properties of core samples such as unit weight, porosity, mass per volume and mechanical properties, their uniaxial compressive strength, tensile strength, and dimensional stability and also thermal conductivity coefficient in vacuum were determined. Results were compared with values of reference materials. The most appropriate compression pressure used in the manufacture of core sample was 27.5 kN. In addition, taking into account the benefit-cost relationship, the results of this study showed that the mix of fumed silica and precipitated silica (powder material), silicon carbide (opacifier), and glass fiber (fiber) was determined as the most suitable raw materials.


This article traces the history of the growth and regulation of banking services in the United States. That history will show how the existing regulatory structure was developed in response to demands of the Civil War and a populist crusade against the "money trust." That effort reached its zenith with the New Deal legislation of the 1930s, but began to fall apart as financial services consolidated. The article will then show how the financial services industries (banking, insurance, securities and derivatives) began to merge in their product base while at the same time separating on a fault line between institutional and retail customers. After reviewing this history, the article will discuss the future of banking regulation under the functional regulatory structure adopted by the recently adopted Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act for financial services holding companies.


The GEOdesic Dome Antenna is an interesting design for efficient satellite-tracking prototypes based on 45 elements active antenna arrays manufactured by the Radiation Group of the Technical University of Madrid. Extensive measurement campaign in RF laboratories and in an anechoic chamber was performed for complete calibration and characterization of those active antenna arrays, resulting in the proposal of a new efficient procedure. To accomplish the calibration procedure, the expansion of equations of the proposed calibration algorithms, based on the proposed active antenna array model and the derivation of the scattering matrix from the active element pattern, is presented. These algorithms deal with mutual coupling effect and gain and phase errors, and in general, the overall procedure leads to a significant reduction in time and costs associated to the measurements of the antenna under test and the proposed calibration algorithm. Significant measurement results from the Certified Laboratory of Tests and Standardization of Antennas (LEHA) located in the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid are presented to validate the procedure.


In off-axis digital holography, the Fourier transform-based algorithm is commonly used for signal processing. Here, we derive the theoretical phase sensitivity of this algorithm, which can be calculated from a single 2D hologram. This algorithm sensitivity represents the best achievable sensitivity of a system using this algorithm. Our derivation treats the signal in its most general form, considering non-uniform illumination and the effect of sideband filtering. As a result, phase sensitivity varies spatially, determined by local signal-to-noise ratio. Sensitivity expressions for both shot noise and uniform noise models are given. These results are validated with simulations and experiments. Significantly, this theoretical sensitivity can serve as a baseline metric for assessing performance of a phase-imaging system, such as experimental sensitivity and hardware stability, which are critical for high-sensitivity quantitative phase imaging. In addition, the results are equally applicable to other interferometric techniques with similar interferogram patterns and signal processing algorithms.


ABSTRACT The aim of this article was to identify and discuss ecosocial changes and community resilience mechanisms in a coastal fishing community of Sweden – Bönan. Data were collected through eight semi-structured interviews and field observations. An abductive thematic analysis was used to analyze data and background literature. The findings showed that Bönan has been exposed to a combination of ecosocial changes that have transformed the community, and therefore required community resilience interventions. This article concludes that social workers need to take an active part in ecosocial work for enhancing community resilience.


We propose Graph Priority Sampling (gps), a new paradigm for order-based reservoir sampling from massive graph streams. gps provides a general way to weight edge sampling according to auxiliary and/or size variables so as to accomplish various estimation goals of graph properties. In the context of subgraph counting, we show how edge sampling weights can be chosen so as to minimize the estimation variance of counts of specified sets of subgraphs. In distinction with many prior graph sampling schemes, gps separates the functions of edge sampling and subgraph estimation. We propose two estimation frameworks: (1) Post-Stream estimation, to allow gps to construct a reference sample of edges to support retrospective graph queries, and (2) In-Stream estimation, to allow gps to obtain lower variance estimates by incrementally updating the subgraph count estimates during stream processing. Unbiasedness of subgraph estimators is established through a new Martingale formulation of graph stream order sampling, in which subgraph estimators, written as a product of constituent edge estimators, are unbiased, even when computed at different points in the stream. The separation of estimation and sampling enables significant resource savings relative to previous work. We illustrate our framework with applications to triangle and wedge counting. We perform a large-scale experimental study on real-world graphs from various domains and types. gps achieves high accuracy with < 1% error for triangle and wedge counting, while storing a small fraction of the graph with average update times of a few microseconds per edge. Notably, for billion-scale graphs, gps accurately estimates triangle and wedge counts with < 1% error, while storing a small fraction of < 0.01% of the total edges in the graph.


Jeremy Bentham's career as a writer spanned almost seventy years, from the Seven Years' War to the early 1830s, a period contemporaries called an age of revolutions and more recent historians have seen as a world crisis. This article traces Bentham's developing universalism in the context of international conflict across his lifetime and in relation to his attempts to create a 'Universal Jurisprudence'. That ambition went unachieved and his successors turned his conception of international law in a more particularist direction. Going back behind Bentham's legacies to his own writings, both published and unpublished, reveals a thinker responsive to specific events but also committed to a universalist vision that helped to make him a precociously global figure in the history of political thought.


Effective deployment of ITS technologies depends in part on the knowledge of which technologies will most effectively address the
issues of congestion and safety. Thus, it is important to understand the benefits or risks of both existing and emerging technologies. Based on
documented experience locally and throughout the country, ITS deployments in urban areas have the potential to offer the following benefits:
• Arterial management systems can potentially reduce delays with the implementation of advanced control systems and traveler information
dissemination.
• Freeway management systems can reduce the occurrence of crashes, increase capacity, and decrease overall travel times.
• Freight management systems reduce costs to motor carriers with the implementation of the commercial vehicle information systems and
networks.
• Transit management systems may reduce travel times and increased reliability with automatic vehicle location and transit signal priority
implementation.
• Incident management systems potentially reduce incident duration and offer numerous other benefits.
There is a wide range of benefits that can be obtained from ITS deployments. For example, fuel consumption, travel time, and delay can be
reduced. ITS deployments can also result in higher travel speeds, improved traffic flow, and more satisfied travelers for all modes.


The reality for a woman agent working in the secret world of intelligence often leads to extraordinary obstacles and sacrifices. Melissa Boyle Mahle, a sixteen-year covert operative for the CIA in the Middle East, was the Agency's top-ranked female Arabist before she left in 2002. In Denial and Deception, Mahle not only describes the Agency's successes and failures, but details her life as a woman in one of the last professions that remain almost exclusively male-directed and dominated. The author has a unique vantage point from which to view the political and operational culture of the CIA in the post-Cold War climate, and reveals how it failed to anticipate the 9/11 attacks. From Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush, she provides a vivid narrative of how the agency became a rudderless organization, lost in the post-Cold War world. Afraid to take risks that might offend Congress and European allies after overstepping its legal bounds in the Iran-Contra era, gutted of the clandestine operators who knew how to run secret wars, demoralized by criticism and poor performance, the CIA simply became unable and unwilling "to get down and dirty to do the hard part to fight a real war on terrorism."


Entrepreneurs are considered as backbone for a country's economic development. Entrepreneurs are playing an important role in enhancing the standard of living of people and economic development of a country. In recent years economic growth has slowed down globally which reflect in the form of inflation and high rate of unemployment rate. To overcome this challenge most governments have taken different measures to alleviate these problems. In this study the author examined the role of entrepreneurship towards economic development in Botswana. Furthermore the author reviewed the economy of Botswana under different sectors like agriculture, mining, trade, tourism, private sector development and financial sector. This study also sought to find out the ways of diversifying the economy further to increase employment opportunities in Botswana. For this study the author analyzed published literature on the topics. Thematic analysis was used to identify the key themes guiding this study.


Brodie's abscess of the calcaneus is an uncommon benign lesion that has rarely been reported in the literature. This study presents a rare case of a Brodie's abscess of the calcaneus caused by Staphylococcus aureus in an adult patient. A 46-year-old immunocompetent man had undergone nonsurgical treatment since childhood owing to the diagnosis of a heel spur. Radiological evaluation revealed a benign radiolucent cystic lesion of the calcaneus surrounded by a sclerotic rim. This condition was accompanied by perilesional bone marrow edema. Thereafter, surgical treatment was planned. During surgery, the content of the lesion was observed to be purulent. Meticulous intralesional debridement was performed, and antibiotic-loaded bone cement beads were placed. Subsequent to microbiological and pathological examinations, the cystic lesion was confirmed to be a Brodie abscess; however, direct clinical evidence of an intraosseous infection was lacking. The patient was followed up for 14 months with no complications until recovery. A Brodie abscess may mimic bone tumors. The onset of a Brodie abscess is insidious, and the clinical findings of such lesions may be obscure. A Brodie abscess of the calcaneus should be considered in the differential diagnosis of patients with chronic heel pain when suspicious radiological findings are evident.


Airline ticket purchase timing is a strategic problem that requires both historical data and domain knowledge to solve consistently. Even with some historical information (often a feature of modern travel reservation web sites), it is difficult for consumers to make true cost-minimizing decisions. To address this problem, we introduce an automated agent which is able to optimize purchase timing on behalf of customers and provide performance estimates of its computed action policy based on past performance. We apply machine learning to recent ticket price quotes from many competing airlines for the target flight route. Our novelty lies in extending this using a systematic feature extraction technique incorporating elementary user-provided domain knowledge that greatly enhances the performance of machine learning algorithms. Using this technique, our agent achieves much closer to the optimal purchase policy than other proposed decision theoretic approaches for this domain.


Trustworthy information systems are information systems that fulfill all the functional
and non-functional requirements. To this end, all the components of an information
system, either human or technical, need to collaborate in order to meet its
requirements and achieve its goals. This entails that system components will show
the desired or expected behaviour once the system is put in operation. However,
modern information systems include a great number of components that can behave
in a very unpredictable way. This unpredictability of the behaviour of the system
components is a major challenge to the development of trustworthy information systems
and more particularly during the modelling stage. When a system component
is modelled as part of a requirements engineering model it creates an uncertainty
about its future behaviour, thus undermining the accuracy of the system model and
eventually the system trustworthiness. Therefore, the addition of system components
inevitably is based on assumptions of their future behaviour. Such assumptions are
underlying the development of a system and usually are assumptions of trust by the
system developer about her trust relationships with the system components, which
are instantly formed when a component is inserted into a requirements engineering
model of a system. However, despite the importance of such issues, a requirements
engineering methodology that explicitly captures such trust relationships along with
the entailing trust assumptions and trustworthiness requirements is still missing.
For tackling the preceding problems, the thesis proposes a requirements engineering
methodology, namely JTrust (Justifying Trust) for developing trustworthy information
systems. The methodology is founded upon the notions of trust and control
as the means of confidence achievement. In order to develop an information system
the developer needs to consider her trust relationships with the system components
that are formed with their addition in a system model, reason about them, and proceed
to a justified decision about the design of the system. If the system component
cannot be trusted to behave in a desired or expected way then the question of what
are the alternatives in order to build confidence in the future behaviour of the system
component raises. To answer this question we define a new class of requirements,
namely trustworthiness requirements. Trustworthiness requirements prescribe the
functionality of the software included in the information system that compels the
rest of the information system components to behave in a desired or expected way.
The proposed methodology consists of: (i) a modelling language which contains trust
i
and control abstractions; (ii) and a methodological process for capturing and reasoning
about trust relationships, modelling and analysing trustworthiness requirements,
and assessing the system trustworthiness at a requirements stage. The methodology
is accompanied by a CASE tool to support it.
To evaluate our proposal, we have applied our methodology to a case study, and
we carried out a survey to get feedback from experts. The topic of the case study was
the e-health care system of the National Health Service in England, which was used to
reason about trust relationships with system components and identify trustworthiness
requirements. Researchers from three academic institutions across Europe and from
one industrial company, British Telecom, have participated in the survey in order to
provide valuable feedback about the effectiveness and efficiency of the methodology.
The results conclude that JTrust is useful and easy to use in modelling and reasoning
about trust relationships, modelling and analysing trustworthiness requirements and
assessing the system trustworthiness at a requirements level.


In native conditions, cardiac cells must continuously comply with diverse stimuli necessitating a perpetual adaptation. Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) is commonly used in cell culture to study cellular response to changes in the mechanical environment. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of using PDMS substrates on the properties of spontaneous activity of cardiomyocyte monolayer cultures. We compared PDMS to the gold standard normally used in culture: a glass substrate. Although mean frequency of spontaneous activity remained unaltered, incidence of reentrant activity was significantly higher in samples cultured on glass compared to PDMS substrates. Higher spatial and temporal instability of the spontaneous rate activation was found when cardiomyocytes were cultured on PDMS, and correlated with decreased connexin-43 and increased CaV3.1 and HCN2 mRNA levels. Compared to cultures on glass, cultures on PDMS were associated with the strongest response to isoproterenol and acetylcholine. These results reveal the importance of carefully selecting the culture substrate for studies involving mechanical stimulation, especially for tissue engineering or pharmacological high-throughput screening of cardiac tissue analog.


An intelligent diagnostic tutor, DIAG 1, selects problems adaptively and generates all tutoring dialogs from its analysis of a model of the target system. The learner performs tests on a graphical representation of the target system and calls on DIAG for assistance when needed. During exercises, the tutoring functions can advise the learner about the implications of particular test outcomes, the rationality of suspecting particular replaceable units, and advisability of performing various diagnostic actions. After exercises, DIAG can critique the learner's testing strategy, and it can generate and explain an expert diagnostic strategy for the previous fault. A prototype application of a very complex system demonstrates the range of tutoring capabilities achieved by the system.


This study has as objective to investigate the influence of innovation on capital structure and financial slack of Brazilian companies. In order to conduct the study, four hypotheses are evaluated. The first three hypotheses on this study follow O'Brien's (2003) propositions. Besides, in an attempt to test the type of financial slack that the companies use to support their innovation strategy and to evaluate profitability, other hypotheses are also tested. H1: The more important the innovation to the company's strategy, the lesser the leverage. H2: The more important the innovation to the company's strategy, the lesser the relation between profitability and leverage. H3: There is a negative interaction between the leverage and the importance of innovation to the company's strategy, regarding its impacts on the firm's performance. H4: Enterprises that adopt an innovative strategy financed by equity have more financial slack. The results show that innovation does not explain variance of the leverage (Hypothesis 1 is not corroborated). Hypothesis 2 predicts that, when innovation becomes an important strategy, the lesser the company's tendency to follow the pecking order theory of capital structure, and the leverage will weaken. The interaction between the variables innovation and profitability was tested to support the model. In the present study innovation did not explain variance of leverage. Results suggest that the more innovative a company, the higher the leverage. This result seems to confront evidences that the higher risk of an innovative company should be accompanied by more equity. However, in Brazil some companies have access to governmental agency that lends money, with subsided interest rates, for companies in sectors that are considered strategic. Thus, innovative companies may have more leverage due to access to governmental funding. For Hypothesis 3, results are similar to those of O'Brien's (2003) work regarding the persistence of performance. It is important to highlight that O'Brien (2003) used market-to-book ratio to analyze performance, whereas this study did not use the same criteria, since we gathered data from private companies, which do not have market values. For Hypothesis 4, the results show that adoption of innovation strategy financed by equity imply financial slack. Thus, the result could indicate that firms innovate with the use of slack. Other important indication of these results would be the fact the resources used in the innovation strategy could come from special agencies. In Brazil, the Social and Economic Development National Bank (BNDES) has an important role in financing companies, sponsoring projects and charging lower interest rates. Thus, although not studied in this research, funding from the BNDES is attractive to the Brazilian enterprises and its lower rates may motivate debt by innovative companies.


The globalization of the semiconductor supply chain introduces ever-increasing security and privacy risks. Two major concerns are IP theft through reverse engineering and malicious modification of the design. The latter concern in part relies on successful reverse engineering of the design as well. IC camouflaging and logic locking are two of the techniques under research that can thwart reverse engineering by end-users or foundries. However, developing low overhead locking/camouflaging schemes that can resist the ever-evolving state-of-the-art attacks has been a challenge for several years. This article provides a comprehensive review of the state of the art with respect to locking/camouflaging techniques. We start by defining a systematic threat model for these techniques and discuss how various real-world scenarios relate to each threat model. We then discuss the evolution of generic algorithmic attacks under each threat model eventually leading to the strongest existing attacks. The article then systematizes defences and along the way discusses attacks that are more specific to certain kinds of locking/camouflaging. The article then concludes by discussing open problems and future directions.


There is no specification on the disaster prevention of and relief from a semiairtight underground ventilation equipment room. Based on the study of construction fire prevention at home and abroad, this paper carries on the analysis of personnel evacuation from an underground ventilation equipment room. It firstly conducts researches on the basic maxims, framework and procedure of disaster prevention, then sets the evaluation standards of safe evacuation and presents the major influential factors as well. Finally, this paper sets an evacuation model in the hope to reach the goal of safe disperse without any injury, i.e. RSET(x)


Point spread function (PSF) engineering is used in single emitter localization to measure the emitter position in 3D and possibly other parameters such as the emission color or dipole orientation as well. Advanced PSF models such as spline fits to experimental PSFs or the vectorial PSF model can be used in the corresponding localization algorithms in order to model the intricate spot shape and deformations correctly. The complexity of the optical architecture and fit model makes PSF engineering approaches particularly sensitive to optical aberrations. Here, we present a calibration and alignment protocol for fluorescence microscopes equipped with a spatial light modulator (SLM) with the goal of establishing a wavefront error well below the diffraction limit for optimum application of complex engineered PSFs. We achieve high-precision wavefront control, to a level below 20 mλ wavefront aberration over a 30 minute time window after the calibration procedure, using a separate light path for calibrating the pixel-to-pixel variations of the SLM, and alignment of the SLM with respect to the optical axis and Fourier plane within 3 µm (x/y) and 100 µm (z) error. Aberrations are retrieved from a fit of the vectorial PSF model to a bead z-stack and compensated with a residual wavefront error comparable to the error of the SLM calibration step. This well-calibrated and corrected setup makes it possible to create complex '3D+λ' PSFs that fit very well to the vectorial PSF model. Proof-of-principle bead experiments show precisions below 10 nm in x, y, and λ, and below 20 nm in z over an axial range of 1 µm with 2000 signal photons and 12 background photons.


The purpose of this study was to establish any statistical significance between weight, length and congenital defects in births occurred before and after fluoridation in Valparaiso-Chile. A review was performed over 4.899 controlled births occurred in the Naval Hospital of Valparaíso during both periods (Before = 1983-84 and after = 1987-88). The results were analysed statistically by mean significance test (alpha = 0.05). In contrary to other studies, no difference were determined between births weight mean and birth length mean, by sexes, before and after fluoridation. No congenital defects (Down's syndrome, intraventricular septal defects and cleft lips) were associated with fluoridated water.


The integration of leucaena into goat production systems in the tropics and subtropics is reviewed. Goats are well adapted to leucaena, and able to be productive on diets containing up to 100% leucaena as a result of bacterial and hepatic detoxification. Incorporation of leucaena into goat production systems can improve liveweight gains, milk production, worm control and reproduction. Successful feeding systems for goats can be based on both grazed silvopastoral systems and cut-and-carry intensive systems, although there is a lack of farming systems research examining the integration of leucaena into goat production systems, or documentation of the practicalities of these practices.


If modern cognitive psychology teaches us anything, it is that humans are vulnerable to some predictable kinds of processing errors. We appear to be subject to a variety of cognitive tunnels from which it is difficult to escape even when they lead to error. Many of those cognitive tunnels deal with probability judgments. This is well illustrated by the famous Monte Hall problem, and by the results of various studies by Daniel Kahneman, Amos Tverski and others. Some, most notably Gerd Gigerenzer, have responded that these results do not show a fundamental irrationality, but are merely the side effects of "fast and frugal" heuristics developed by evolutionary pressures to allow quick and generally accurate processing in informationally rich environments. However, modern social arrangements may make heuristics that were beneficial when they evolved generate seriously wrong decisions in the informational environment in which we now operate. For instance, credibility judgments concerning other humans that worked well in small bands of acquaintances may not work so well with strangers in the big city, as anyone falling prey to a Ponzi scheme could attest. As our information derives from less and less local environments, our hard wired heuristics become less and less secure guides. A simple mind experiment involving multiple roulette wheels spun simultaneously in two separate rooms, establishes that in any informationally rich environment, there are coincidences that appear to be rare and meaningful, but are neither. One form of supposed expertise sometimes offered in criminal proceedings, and more often used in criminal investigation, "linkage analysis," presents just such dangers. This asserted expertise, and the larger area from which it is derived, "offender profiling," are rife with claims for which little empirical evidence exists. The history and empirical record relating to "linkage analysis" and "offender profiling" is examined, and the dangers they present illustrated by reference to various actual cases, particularly the New Jersey case of State v. Fortin.


We investigate a special case of hereditary property that we refer to as {\em robustness}. A property is {\em robust} in a given graph if it is inherited by all connected spanning subgraphs of this graph. We motivate this definition in different contexts, showing that it plays a central role in highly dynamic networks, although the problem is defined in terms of classical (static) graph theory. In this paper, we focus on the robustness of {\em maximal independent sets} (MIS). Following the above definition, a MIS is said to be {\em robust} (RMIS) if it remains a valid MIS in all connected spanning subgraphs of the original graph. We characterize the class of graphs in which {\em all} possible MISs are robust. We show that, in these particular graphs, the problem of finding a robust MIS is {\em local}; that is, we present an RMIS algorithm using only a sublogarithmic number of rounds (in the number of nodes $n$) in the ${\cal LOCAL}$ model. On the negative side, we show that, in general graphs, the problem is not local. Precisely, we prove a $\Omega(n)$ lower bound on the number of rounds required for the nodes to decide consistently in some graphs. This result implies a separation between the RMIS problem and the MIS problem in general graphs. It also implies that any strategy in this case is asymptotically (in order) as bad as collecting all the network information at one node and solving the problem in a centralized manner. Motivated by this observation, we present a centralized algorithm that computes a robust MIS in a given graph, if one exists, and rejects otherwise. Significantly, this algorithm requires only a polynomial amount of local computation time, despite the fact that exponentially many MISs and exponentially many connected spanning subgraphs may exist.


We study the Bernstein-von Mises (BvM) phenomenon, i.e., Bayesian credible sets and frequentist confidence regions for the estimation error coincide asymptotically, for the infinite-dimensional Gaussian white noise model governed by Gaussian prior with diagonal-covariance structure. While in parametric statistics this fact is a consequence of (a particular form of) the BvM Theorem, in the nonparametric setup, however, the BvM Theorem is known to fail even in some, apparently, elementary cases. In the present paper we show that BvM-like statements hold for this model, provided that the parameter space is suitably embedded into the support of the prior. The overall conclusion is that, unlike in the parametric setup, positive results regarding frequentist probability coverage of credible sets can only be obtained if the prior assigns null mass to the parameter space.


Diabetes mellitus and its complications represent an increasing burden for healthcare. A large fraction of patients with diabetes mellitus develops diabetic nephropathy. The Akita mice strain is one of the few mouse models of diabetes mellitus that shows features of the human disease including hypertension and kidney damage. Previous reports have shown increased levels of reactive oxygen species in the kidneys of Akita mice. We previously showed that hydrogen peroxide is a potent stimuli for renin release from the juxtaglomerular cells, increasing plasma renin and blood pressure in mice. Thus, we hypothesized that hydrogen peroxide levels are higher in JG cells from Akita mice leading to increased renin release in this strain. Using Western Blot, we found that the NADPH oxidase isoforms NOX1 and NOX4 are expressed, but only NOX1 being upregulated in primary JG cells isolated from Akita mice, compared to JG cells from the control (C57) strain (C57=100%. Akita/NOX1= 147%±10; n=4; p<0.05). Confocal imaging showed the expression of NOX1 and NOX4 in JG cells where they both co‐localized with renin immunolabeling in renin‐containing granules. In addition, the expression of Catalase, which scavenges H202, was reduced in JG cells from diabetic Akita mice (C57=100%; Akita= 72%±7.2 of C57; n=4; p<0.05). We measured H202 levels by transducing JG cells with the fluorescent protein sensor Hyper under control of the renin1 promoter. We found that JG cells isolated from Akita mice had higher baseline levels of H202 (C57= 100, Akita=117±7%, p<0.05). Since we previously found that H202 stimulates renin release, we studied whether JG cells from Akita mice had higher total renin activity or release. For this, we measured baseline renin release to the media during 2 hours from primary JG cells cultured from Akita or control mice. JG cells were then lysed and total renin content measured. We found that in the absence of any stimuli, JG cells from Akita mice had ~2 fold higher renin release (C57= 100%, Akita=219.2±26%; p<0.04, n=6). We did not observe a significant difference in total renin content between strains. Transduction of replicate plates with adenovirus encoding Catalase (AD‐Cat) decreased baseline renin release by 35±8% (p<0.05) in JG cells from Akita mice whereas it did not affect renin release in control JG cells. We conclude that renin cells from diabetic Akita mice have higher endogenous H202 leading to increased renin release. The NADPH isoform NOX1 is enhanced in Akita mice and may be responsible for higher levels of H202 and renin release from JG cells. Our data suggest that direct stimulation of renin release by H202 could be potentially be involved in renal damage in diabetes mellitus.


The uncertainty of collected spectral data is one of the most important issues for the application of laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) quantitative analysis. The fluctuation of the target surface simultaneously affects both the focus depth of the laser beam and the relative collection position, either of which may lead to severe fluctuation of the spectral signal. Thus, in this study, for detecting and reducing the fluctuation, an imaging system was deployed to monitor the plasma, and a mathematical model was also built based on both spectral signal and positional information. An ICCD camera was used to record the image of the plasma so as to detect the plasma and acquire positional information. Furthermore, the relationship between plasma position and specific spectral line intensity was obtained by the fitting function. Five aluminium alloy samples were employed to validate the reliability of the proposed method. As a result, the average RSDs of the samples (with a position fluctuation range of about 2 mm) in different spectral lines (Si 288.15 nm, Fe 273.95 nm, Cu 324.75 nm, Mn 259.37 nm and Mg 280.27 nm) were reduced from 34.57%, 38.86%, 31.05%, 39.74%, and 36.91% (without normalization) to 4.63%, 6.84%, 5.64%, 7.64%, and 4.83% (with the combination method presented in this paper), respectively; the determination coefficients (R2) reached 0.996, 0.999, 0.989, 0.999, and 0.9999, respectively. These results prove that the proposed method can both improve measurement reliability and guarantee measurement accuracy.


3D object reconstruction from a single image is a highly under-determined problem, requiring strong prior knowledge of plausible 3D shapes. This introduces challenge for learning-based approaches, as 3D object annotations in real images are scarce. Previous work chose to train on synthetic data with ground truth 3D information, but suffered from the domain adaptation issue when tested on real data. In this work, we propose an end-to-end trainable framework, sequentially estimating 2.5D sketch and 3D object shape. Our disentangled, two-step formulation has three advantages. First, compared to full 3D shape, 2.5D sketch is much easier to be recovered from 2D image, and to transfer from synthetic to real images. Second, for 3D reconstruction from 2.5D sketch, we can easily transfer the learned model on synthetic data to real images, as rendered 2.5D sketches are invariant to object appearance variations in real images, including lighting, texture, etc. This further relieves the domain adaptation problem. Third, we derive differentiable projective functions from 3D shapes to 2.5D sketch, making the framework end-to-end trainable on real images, requiring no real-image annotations. Our framework achieves state-of-the-art performance on 3D shape reconstruction.


The Buyside and the Three Phase Evolution of Electronic Trading describes how the buyside's insourcing of the execution function is occurring at a time of seismic change for not only buyside firms, but also brokers and execution venues. It goes on to illustrate the reasons for the rapid adoption of electronic trading and how this new world will evolve in three distinct phases. It concludes by outlining why the best execution requirement will demand that the trading platforms of tomorrow be supplied by independent broker-neutral software companies.


Network virtualization allows multiple heterogeneous virtual networks (VNs) to coexist on a shared infrastructure. Efficient mapping of virtual nodes and virtual links of a VN request onto substrate network resources, also known as the VN embedding problem, is the first step toward enabling such multiplicity. Since this problem is known to be NP-hard, previous research focused on designing heuristic-based algorithms that had clear separation between the node mapping and the link mapping phases. In this paper, we present ViNEYard-a collection of VN embedding algorithms that leverage better coordination between the two phases. We formulate the VN embedding problem as a mixed integer program through substrate network augmentation. We then relax the integer constraints to obtain a linear program and devise two online VN embedding algorithms D-ViNE and R-ViNE using deterministic and randomized rounding techniques, respectively. We also present a generalized window-based VN embedding algorithm (WiNE) to evaluate the effect of lookahead on VN embedding. Our simulation experiments on a large mix of VN requests show that the proposed algorithms increase the acceptance ratio and the revenue while decreasing the cost incurred by the substrate network in the long run.


Objective. —To determine the incidence, predictors, and cost of atrial fibrillation and flutter (AFIB) following coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery. Design. —Prospective observational study (MultiCenter Study of Perioperative Ischemia). Setting. —Twenty-four university-affiliated hospitals in the United States from 1991 to 1993. Subjects. —A total of 2417 patients undergoing CABG with or without concurrent valvular surgery selected using a systematic sampling interval. Measurements. —Detailed preoperative, intraoperative, and postoperative data collected on standardized reporting forms. Results. —The overall incidence of postoperative AFIB was 27%. Independent predictors of postoperative AFIB included advanced age (odds ratio [OR], 1.24 per 5-year increase; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.18-1.31); male sex (OR, 1.41; 95% CI, 1.09-1.81); a history of AFIB (OR, 2.28; 95% CI, 1.74-3.00); a history of congestive heart failure (OR, 1.31; 95% CI, 1.04-1.64); and a precardiopulmonary bypass heart rate of more than 100 beats per minute (OR, 1.59; 95% CI, 1.00-.00-2.55). Surgical practices such as pulmonary vein venting (OR, 1.44; 95% CI, 1.13-1.83); bicaval venous cannulation (OR, 1.40; 95% CI, 1.04-1.89); postoperative atrial pacing (OR, 1.27; 95% CI, 1.00-1.62); and longer cross-clamp times (OR, 1.06 per 15 minutes; 95% CI, 1.00-1.11) also were identified as independent predictors of postoperative AFIB. Patients with postoperative AFIB remained an average of 13 hours longer in the intensive care unit and 2.0 days longer in the ward when compared with patients without AFIB. Conclusion. —Postoperative AFIB is common after CABG surgery and has a significant effect on both intensive care unit and overall hospital length of stay. In addition to expected demographic factors, certain surgical practices increase the risk of postoperative AFIB. Randomized controlled trials are necessary to determine if modification of these surgical practices, especially in patients at high risk, would decrease the incidence of postoperative AFIB.


The switching characteristics of Digital to Analog Converter (DAC) unit elements can limit DAC dynamic performance at high speeds [1]. Unbalances and mismatches in clock, data and output networks create a non-identical environment for every current cell. Together with mismatch in current cell switching transistors and other non-idealities, this causes the switching characteristics of the current cells to be non-identical. A new method for measuring the timing error is presented. The measurement method is shown to be insensitive to all important non-idealities in the DAC and the measurement circuit. Transistor level simulations show that the measurement accuracy is better than 125fs. Together with an ideal calibration loop, this measurement accuracy can lead to an average SFDR of more than 95dB when applied to an exemplary 12 bit 1GSps DAC.


Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to introduce and test a portfolio view of a firm's corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. Drawing from stakeholder theory and the dynamic capabilities literature, the authors introduce CSR portfolio diversity and dynamism as key portfolio characteristics that have differential impacts across short- and long-term performance contexts.

Design/methodology/approach
The study draws from the Kinder, Lydenberg and Domini database to examine CSR portfolio diversity and dynamism across seven dimensions of CSR activities. The authors test the direct and indirect relationships between CSR portfolio characteristics and both short- and long-term performance outcomes to assess the opportunities and challenges associated with managing a diverse and dynamic CSR portfolio.

Findings
The findings suggest that a diverse portfolio of CSR activities positively impacts long-term performance; however, CSR portfolio diversity yields negative performance outcomes in the short-term. The authors also find that CSR portfolio dynamism moderates the relationship between CSR level and firm performance, such that a dynamic portfolio of CSR positively moderates the relationship between a firm's CSR level and long-term performance; however, it negatively moderates the relationship between CSR level and short-term performance.

Originality/value
This study integrates insights from the literature that examine the independent effects of individual CSR activities and the broader perspective that assesses the aggregated summation of CSR activities in relation to firm performance. By taking a portfolio perspective, the present study provides a unique integration of these two research streams to examine the performance implications of engaging in a diverse and dynamic range of CSR activities.