The move towards multidisciplinary approaches to health care has been encouraged by a number of government reports ( DoH 1986 , 1989 ) in order to support the increase in community care and improve the quality of the service. Such approaches to care are dependent on a high level of co-operation between members of different professions within the multidisciplinary team. Inherent in the concept of such a team is the assumption that each team member has a clear understanding of the role of all other members. This project set out to test this assumption by examining the knowledge and perception of nurses and podiatrists with regard to each other's role.


Deep neural networks (DNNs) have shown vulnerability to adversarial attacks, i.e., carefully perturbed inputs designed to mislead the network at inference time. Recently introduced localized attacks, Localized and Visible Adversarial Noise (LaVAN) and Adversarial patch, pose a new challenge to deep learning security by adding adversarial noise only within a specific region without affecting the salient objects in an image. Driven by the observation that such attacks introduce concentrated high-frequency changes at a particular image location, we have developed an effective method to estimate noise location in gradient domain and transform those high activation regions caused by adversarial noise in image domain while having minimal effect on the salient object that is important for correct classification. Our proposed Local Gradients Smoothing (LGS) scheme achieves this by regularizing gradients in the estimated noisy region before feeding the image to DNN for inference. We have shown the effectiveness of our method in comparison to other defense methods including Digital Watermarking, JPEG compression, Total Variance Minimization (TVM) and Feature squeezing on ImageNet dataset. In addition, we systematically study the robustness of the proposed defense mechanism against Back Pass Differentiable Approximation (BPDA), a state of the art attack recently developed to break defenses that transform an input sample to minimize the adversarial effect. Compared to other defense mechanisms, LGS is by far the most resistant to BPDA in localized adversarial attack setting.


ABSTRACT: A catalytic enantioselective synthesis of heterocyclic vicinal fluoroamines is reported. A chiral Brønsted acid promotes aza-Michael addition to fluoroalkenyl heterocycles to give a prochiral enamine intermediate, which undergoes asymmetric protonation upon rearomatization. The reaction accommodates a range of azaheterocycles and nucleophiles, generating the C–F stereocenter in high enantioselectivity, and is also amenable to stereogenic C–CF3 bonds. Extensive DFT calculations have provided insight into the reaction mechanism and the origin of catalyst selectivity. Crystal structure data shows the dominance of non-covalent interactions in the core structure conformation, enabling modulation of the conformational landscape. Ramachandran-type analysis of conformer distribution and protein data bank mining has indicated benzylic fluorination using this approach has potential for improved potency in several marketed drugs.


Blood culture, although represents the gold standard in detecting the ethiological agent of sepsis, is rather rarely required in relation to the real diagnostic importance. The result of this test depends in fact on many factors (sample volume, time of collection, accuracy, antibiotic therapy, contamination, number of drawings, drawing site, interpretation difficulties, etc.) that are often considered by many clinicians so limited as to doubt about their actual value. The disadvantages are therefore represented by the lack of standardization but also by the low sensitivity and above all by the technical times too long for the clinical needs. Blood culture begins with the drawing of samples from the "septic" patient followed incubation of the bottles in automatic thermostated systems. In case of positive result (36 hours), the culture is Gram stained and streaked on solid media in order to obtain isolated colonies for the identification and the susceptibility testing (48 hours from positive result). The long time required for pathogen identification and susceptibility testing involves empirical broad spectrum antibiotic therapy that can promote the increase of bacterial resistance but also patient management costs. A clinically useful report should be available on short notice in order to guide the clinician to choose the most appropriate antibiotic. The microbiologist has therefore the hard work of reviewing the organization and the management of the procedures.We have therefore started to consider the possibility of treating the blood as an biological liquid in order to quickly determine the susceptibility of bacteria to antibiotics.


Selenium is an essential micronutrient that suppresses the redox-sensitive transcription factor NF-κB-dependent pro-inflammatory gene expression. To understand the molecular mechanisms underlying the anti-inflammatory property of selenium, we examined the activity of a key kinase of the NF-κB cascade, IκB-kinase β (IKKβ) subunit, as a function of cellular selenium status in murine primary bone marrow-derived macrophages and RAW264.7 macrophage-like cell line. In vitro kinase assays revealed that selenium supplementation decreased the activity of IKKβ in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-treated macrophages. Stimulation by LPS of selenium-supplemented macrophages resulted in a time-dependent increase in 15-deoxy-Δ12,14-prostaglandin J2 (15d-PGJ2) formation, an endogenous inhibitor of IKKβ activity. Further analysis revealed that inhibition of IKKβ activity in selenium-supplemented cells correlated with the Michael addition product of 15d-PGJ2 with Cys-179 of IKKβ, while the formation of such an adduct was significantly decreased in the selenium-deficient macrophages. In addition, anti-inflammatory activities of selenium were also mediated by the 15d-PGJ2-dependent activation of the peroxisome proliferator-activated nuclear receptor-γ in macrophages. Experiments using specific cyclooxygenase (COX) inhibitors and genetic knockdown approaches indicated that COX-1, and not the COX-2 pathway, was responsible for the increased synthesis of 15d-PGJ2 in selenium-supplemented macrophages. Taken together, our results suggest that selenium supplementation increases the production of 15d-PGJ2 as an adaptive response to protect cells against oxidative stress-induced pro-inflammatory gene expression. More specifically, modification of protein thiols by 15d-PGJ2 represents a previously undescribed code for redox regulation of gene expression by selenium.


The optimal performance of an absorption refrigerator operating between four temperature levels with the losses of heat resistance and internal irreversibility is analyzed first by taking the total heat transfer area of heat exchangers as an objective function. The minimum total heat transfer area is described in terms of the rate of the entropy changes of four heat reservoirs, and the generally optimal relation among the cooling load, the coefficient of performance and total heat transfer area is achieved. Then, an ecological optimization criterion is proposed for the best mode of operation of the absorption refrigerator. We investigate the ecological optimization performance and derive the corresponding cooling load, coefficient of performance and entropy production rate at the maximum ecological criterion for the absorption refrigerator. A comparison of an absorption refrigerator performance under maximum ecological function and maximum cooling load conditions is presented. Effects of the cycle parameters on the ecological performance have been discussed.


It has been suggested that the cardiac allograft becomes less compliant either because of repeated episodes of rejection, chronic hypertension, or as a direct consequence of immunosuppression. A corollary to this hypothesis is that this reduction in compliance should be a progressive, rather than a static, change. To test this hypothesis, rest and exercise filling pressures, cardiac outputs, and radionuclide ventriculographic systolic and diastolic indices were measured in 20 patients at 1 and 2 years after heart transplant by means of identical protocols at both study times. Between studies 10 of 20 patients had no rejection, five of 20 had one rejection episode, and five of 20 had more than one rejection episode. There were no significant differences in resting or exercise heart rates, pulmonary wedge pressures, cardiac outputs, left or right ventricular ejection fractions, left ventricular peak filling rates, or time to peak filling between the studies at 1 and 2 years. Only resting right atrial pressure increased between year 1 and year 2 (6 +/- 2 mm Hg vs 8 +/- 4 mm Hg, p = 0.035). These data demonstrate that cardiac allograft function is unchanged between 1 and 2 years after transplantation, despite episodes of intervening rejection and continued immunosuppression. The data further suggest that the previously reported decrease in cardiac allograft compliance does not appear to be caused by a progressive intrinsic abnormality in the allograft, and that other mechanisms for "restrictive" allograft physiology should be sought.


Gate violations during train crossing events by truck drivers at highway-rail grade crossings in two cities were investigated. About 22% of the collected observations involved gate violations by truck drivers. Analysis showed that the frequencies of gate violations increased with higher truck traffic during crossing events and drivers of single-unit trucks displayed a greater propensity for gate violations compared with drivers of trucks with trailers. Violations were more frequent with longer times between the onset of flashing lights and train arrivals at the crossings. Options for reducing truck drivers' gate violations at gated crossings are provided.


We study laser-assisted photodetachment time delays by attosecond pulse trains from the closed-shell negative ions F− and Cl−. We investigate the separability of the delay into two contributions: (i) the Wigner-like delay associated with one-photon ionization by the attosecond pulse train and (ii) the delay associated with the exchange of an additional laser photon in the presence of the potential of the remaining target. Based on the asymptotic form of the wave packet, the latter term is expected to be negligible because the ion is neutralized, leading to a vanishing laser-ion interaction with increasing electron-atom separation. While this asymptotic behavior is verified at high photoelectron energies, we also quantify sharp deviations at low photoelectron energies. Further, these low-energy delays are clearly different for the two studied anions, indicating a breakdown of the universality of laser-ion-induced delays. The fact that the short-range potential can induce a delay of as much as 50 as can have implications for the interpretation of delay measurements also in other systems that lack long-range potential. (Less)


Author(s): Wu, Guoyuan; Zhao, Zhouqiao; Wang, Ziran; Barth, Matthew J. | Abstract: With on-board sensors such as camera, radar, and Lidar, connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) can sense the surrounding environment and be driven autonomously and safely by themselves without colliding into other objects on the road. CAVs are also able to communicate with each other and roadside infrastructure via vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications, respectively, sharing information on the vehicles' states, signal phase and timing (SPaT) information, enabling CAVs to make decisions in a collaborative manner. As a typical scenario, ramp control attracts wide attention due to the concerns of safety and mobility in the merging area. In particular, if the line-of-the-sight is blocked (because of grade separation), then neither mainline vehicles nor on-ramp vehicles may well adapt their own dynamics to perform smoothed merging maneuvers. This may lead to speed fluctuations or even shockwave propagating upstream traffic along the corridor, thus potentially increasing the traffic delays and excessive energy consumption. In this project, the research team proposed a hierarchical ramp merging system that not only allowed microscopic cooperative maneuvers for connected and automated electric vehicles on the ramp to merge into mainline traffic flow, but also had controllability of ramp inflow rate, which enabled macroscopic traffic flow control. A centralized optimal control-based approach was proposed to both smooth the merging flow and improve the system-wide mobility of the network. Linear quadratic trackers in both finite horizon and receding horizon forms were developed to solve the optimization problem in terms of path planning and sequence determination, and a microscopic electric vehicle (EV) energy consumption model was applied to estimate the energy consumption. The simulation results confirmed that under the regulated inflow rate, the proposed system was able to avoid potential traffic congestion and improve the mobility (in terms of average speed) as much as 115%, compared to the conventional ramp metering and the ramp without any control approach. Interestingly, for EVs (connected and automated EVs in this study), the improved mobility may not necessarily result in the reduction of energy consumption. The "sweet spot" of average speed ranges from 27–34 mph for the EV models in this study.View the NCST Project Webpage


The experimental study of damping in a time-varying inertia pendulum is presented. The system consists of a disk travelling along an oscillating pendulum: large swinging angles are reached, so that its equation of motion is not only time-varying but also nonlinear. Signals are acquired from a rotary sensor, but some remarks are also proposed as regards signals measured by piezoelectric or capacitive accelerometers. Time-varying inertia due to the relative motion of the mass is associated with the Coriolis-type effects appearing in the system, which can reduce and also amplify the oscillations. The analytical model of the pendulum is introduced and an equivalent damping ratio is estimated by applying energy considerations. An accurate model is obtained by updating the viscous damping coefficient in accordance with the experimental data. The system is analysed through the application of a subspace-based technique devoted to the identification of linear time-varying systems: the so-called short-time stochastic subspace identification (ST-SSI). This is a very simple method recently adopted for estimating the instantaneous frequencies of a system. In this paper, the ST-SSI method is demonstrated to be capable of accurately estimating damping ratios, even in the challenging cases when damping may turn to negative due to the Coriolis-type effects, thus causing amplifications of the system response.


Vegetated riparian buffer strips have been established in Southern Quebec (Canada) in order to intercept nutrients such as nitrate (NO3−) and protect water quality near agricultural fields. Buffer strips may also favour denitrification through a combination of high soil moisture, NO3− and carbon supply, which could lead to the production of nitrous oxide (N2O), a greenhouse gas. Denitrification could be further amplified by the presence of earthworms, or by plant species that promote earthworm and bacterial activity in soils. Soils from four farms, comprising maize fields and adjacent buffer strips, were sampled in the fall of 2008. A total of six earthworm species were found, but average earthworm biomass did not differ between buffer strips and maize agroecoecosystems. Nitrate concentrations and net nitrification rates were higher in the maize fields than in the buffer strips; there was no difference in N2O production in soils collected from the two sampling locations. Potential denitrification, measured by acetylene inhibition, varied by two orders of magnitude, depending on experimental conditions; when amended with H2O or with H2O + NO3−, potential denitrification was higher (P < 0.05) in soils from buffer strips than from maize fields. Potential denitrification was highest in soils amended with H2O + glucose, or with H2O + NO3− + glucose. Using microcosms, we tested the effect of litter–soil mixtures on earthworm growth, and the effect of earthworm-litter–soil mixtures on potential denitrification. Based on four categories of chemical assays, litters of woody species (oak, apple, Rhododendron) were generally of lower nutritional quality than litter from agronomic species (alfalfa, switchgrass, corn stover). Alfalfa litter had the most positive effect, whereas apple litter had the most negative effect, on earthworm growth. Potential denitrification was 2–4 times higher in earthworm–litter–soil mixtures than in plain soil. Litter treatments that included corn stover had lower potential denitrification than those that included alfalfa or switchgrass, whereas litter treatments that included oak had lower potential denitrification than those that included apple or Rhododendron. Results suggest that potential N2O emissions may be higher in riparian buffer strips than in adjacent maize fields, that N2O emissions in buffer strips may be amplified by comminuting earthworms, and that plant litters that reduce earthworm growth may not be issio best at mitigating N2O em


With 750 producers, 2750 tables for breeding, 13 000 tons of oysters and 2 500 tons of mussels marketed every year, the shellfish production of the Thau lagoon represents at least 10 % of the national French production and a direct turnover of 33 millions € (Rey Valette, 2004). The Thau lagoon is a semi-enclosed coastal system sensitive to faecal inputs from the watershed (280 km2). In June 2004, the Autorithies classified the Thau lagoon as a « class B » area, from which live bivalve molluscs can be marketed for human consumption only after depuration. Until then, shellfish used to be collected for direct human consumption. The sanitary monitoring of the Thau lagoon shellfish growing area is conducted by the Ifremer french microbiological monitoring network for shellfish harvesting areas (Remi). The aim of the sudy is to determine the evolution of microbiological quality of the Thau lagoon's shellfish and the impact of meteorogical conditions, with an analysis of Remi data collected during a 10 years period.


Mice and rats express two nonidentical insulins from a pair of unlinked genes. We have applied a nuclease protection assay, which can sensitively quantify each of the mouse insulin mRNAs, to the resolution of the following questions concerning their expression. First, it has not been established whether alterations in expression of one or both of these genes cause differing total insulin biosynthetic capacity noted between several inbred mouse strains. These studies showed that the relative abundance of mRNAs encoding mouse insulins I and II was identical in four separate mouse strains. In spontaneously obese, hyperinsulinemic (db/db)C57BL/KsJ mice, both proinsulin I and proinsulin II mRNAs were increased relative to the levels in normal (+/db) C57BL/KsJ mice, but again the ratio of the two mRNAs did not differ. The ratio was nearly identical to that for the orthologous mRNAs in rats, indicating that the mechanisms which regulate insulin mRNAs in rodents are conserved in both genes in several mouse strains and between rodent species. This finding suggests that differences between mouse strains in insulin biosynthetic capacity result from differences in the glucose sensing/signalling mechanism at a point before coordinate gene transcription. Second, low levels of insulin synthesis have been suggested as an explanation for relatively high levels of insulin in several nonpancreatic tissues. We showed that the ribonuclease protection assay, sufficiently sensitive to measure 1/2000th the amount of insulin mRNA present in pancreas, was unable to detect insulin mRNA in salivary gland. This result indicates that the high levels of radioimmunoassayable insulin detected in salivary glands are not the result of insulin synthesis in situ.


Older adults experience a selective associative memory deficit by demonstrating intact item memory relative to impaired associative memory when compared with younger adults. Age-related deficits in associative memory have been suggested to arise from declines in attentional resources, and the role of attention during encoding and retrieval in associative memory for words and their spatial locations was investigated in the current experiment. Additionally, the tendency of younger and older adults to use knowledge acquired during encoding to improve their associative memory judgments through a strategic associative memory process was also investigated. Younger and older adults studied a list of words with each word belonging to one of four categories, which followed one of four mathematical probability structures for their presentation. Older adults exhibited intact item memory and impaired associative memory relative to full attention younger adults. In addition, both older and younger adults demonstrated an ability to engage in strategic associative memory, by learning and later using the probability structure introduced at study to guide their associative memory judgments. In contrast, dividing the attention of younger adults during encoding impaired item memory, associative memory and strategic associative memory, whereas dividing attention at retrieval did not result in similar deficits. These data add to a growing body of literature demonstrating older adults to exhibit a selective associative memory deficit that is not simulated by dividing the attention of younger adults at encoding or retrieval. Furthermore, younger and older adults maintain the ability to use new knowledge to guide their associative judgments.


Depending on the loading conditions, geometry and material characteristics, the ductility of thin metallic films is controlled either by the resistance to plastic localization or by the resistance to internal damage. New on-chip tensile tests performed on submicron aluminium films show significant strain hardening capacity leading to relatively good resistance to necking, while damage occurs through void nucleation at grain boundaries followed by their growth and coalescence. These results are discussed in the light of several other studies presented in the recent literature in order to unravel the origins of the frequently reported poor ductility of thin metallic films, and the various means existing to improve it.


Surveys using rRNA-targeted probes specific for the 3 domains of life (Eucarya, Archaea, and Bacteria) indicated the presence, and at times high abundance, of archaeal rRNA in a variety of water masses surrounding Antarctica. Hybridization signals of archaeal rRNA contributed significantly to that of total picoplankton rRNA both north and south of the Polar Front in Drake Passage. Late winter surface water populations collected around the South Shetland Islands also yielded relatively high archaeal rRNA hybridization signals, approaching 10% or greater of the total rRNA. Summer samples collected in the western region of the Antarctic Peninsula and at McMurdo Sound in the Ross Sea region of Antarctica yielded lower amounts of archaeal rRNA in the surface waters, and higher levels of archaeal rRNA at depth (150 to 500 m). The hybridization data were compared to biological, chemical, and hydrographic information when possible. In surface waters, archaeal rRNA and chlorophyll a varied inversely. The data presented here further supports the hypothesis that planktonic archaea are a common, widespread and likely ecologically important component of Antarctic picoplankton assemblages. The presence of these archaea in circumpolar deep water suggests a conduit for their circumpolar transport around Antarctica via the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, as well as their export to the deep sea, or to intermediate waters of the South Atlantic via mixing at the polar front.


Complex zygomaticomandibular syngnathia is an extremely rare condition with an unknown etiology. The main goal of the surgery is to release the ankylosis, establish good functioning mandible, and prevent reankylosis, if possible. In our case, we offer a new solution to have an adequate oral opening and to prevent reankylosis. After the release of bony syngnathia, we placed a distractor between mandibular segment and maxillozygomatic complex. To our best knowledge, this is the only syngnathia case in the literature treated using distraction techniques. There is a major improvement in the patient's status. Distraction may broaden our horizons in this rare and difficult-to-treat deformity.


ABSTRACT The phosphoenolpyruvate phosphotransferase system (PEP-PTS) and adenylate cyclase (AC) IV (encoded by BB0723 [cyaB]) are well conserved in different species of Borrelia. However, the functional roles of PEP-PTS and AC in the infectious cycle of Borrelia have not been characterized previously. We examined 12 PEP-PTS transporter component mutants by needle inoculation of mice to assess their ability to cause mouse infection. Transposon mutants with mutations in the EIIBC components (ptsG) (BB0645, thought to be involved in glucose-specific transport) were unable to cause infection in mice, while all other tested PEP-PTS mutants retained infectivity. Infectivity was partially restored in an in trans-complemented strain of the ptsG mutant. While the ptsG mutant survived normally in unfed as well as fed ticks, it was unable to cause infection in mice by tick transmission, suggesting that the function of ptsG is essential to establish infection by either needle inoculation or tick transmission. In Gram-negative organisms, the regulatory effects of the PEP-PTS are mediated by adenylate cyclase and cyclic AMP (cAMP) levels. A recombinant protein encoded by B. burgdorferi BB0723 (a putative cyaB homolog) was shown to have adenylate cyclase activity in vitro; however, mutants with mutations in this gene were fully infectious in the tick-mouse infection cycle, indicating that its function is not required in this process. By transcriptome analysis, we demonstrated that the ptsG gene may directly or indirectly modulate gene expression of Borrelia burgdorferi. Overall, the PEP-PTS glucose transporter PtsG appears to play important roles in the pathogenesis of B. burgdorferi that extend beyond its transport functions.


We have developed a strategy for efficient sequence analysis of the genome of E. coli K-12 using insertions of a Tn5-derived mini-transposon into overlapping ordered lambda phage clones to provide universal primer-binding sites, and PCR amplification of DNA segments adjacent to the insertions. Transposon-containing clones were selected by blue plaque formation on a dnaBamber lacZamber E. coli strain. Insertion points every 0.5-1 kb were identified by 'analytical PCR' and segments between the transposon inserts and phage arms were amplified by 'preparative PCR' using one biotinylated and one non-biotinylated primer. Single strands of amplified DNA fragments were coupled to Streptoavidin-coated paramagnetic beads (Dynabeads M280) through their biotin tails, purified magnetically, and used as templates for fluorescence-based automatic nucleotide sequencing.


Eudiplozoon nipponicum (Monogenea) is a blood-feeding parasite
from the gills of carp, which due to its unique biological
properties, represents an ideal model for studies on diverse
biological interactions. Parasite's developmental stages were
investigated using combined microscopic approach to identify
explicit adaptations to the ectoparasitic life. Diplozoids have
evolved a complex mechanism dedicated to attachment to the host
and localization on host body that is advantageous for feeding
and reproduction. The main attachment system comprises
prominent buccal suckers at the ventral site of the parasite's
forebody along with the two well-developed muscular haptors,
each with four pairs of clamps in two rows and two central
hooks, located on the hindbody. Complicated structure of
parasite's tegument, including folds and lobular extensions in
the middle part of hindbody, supports its firm fixation to the
host gills by locking to the gill lamellae. The complex
digestive tract is well-equipped for the hematophagous feeding
and consists of a mouth opening, eversible pharynx with
adjacent glandular structures and a blind-ending gut with
caecal lining. The buccal suckers seem to assist in the
parasite's translocation while searching for an optimal niche
and we speculate about their temporary attachment function
during feeding as well. They appear to be located in a buccal
capsule and probably evert when needed (e.g. while feeding).
Structures of unknown function, so called the glandulo-muscular
organs, which are located apically and opened into the mouth
corner, are considered to be a part of digestive tract. These
structures seem to be specific for this species. The
possibility of extracorporeal digestion of this parasite is
discussed.


G-I transfer denotes an increase in individual performance due to group interaction, for example, because of acquiring certain skills or knowledge from the other group members. Whereas such G-I transfer has been successfully shown for problem-solving tasks, evidence for G-I transfer on quantitative estimation tasks is scarce. We address this research gap with a focus on how often a group has to interact in order to fully exploit the benefit of this learning effect. Results from two experiments support the idea that a single group interaction is sufficient to induce a stable G-I transfer, which reduces group members' metric error. Smaller metric errors indicate that people improved their representation of the correct upper and lower boundaries, or what range of values is plausible. In contrast to nominal groups, both members of continuously interacting groups and members of groups with only one initial interaction exhibited stable G-I transfer, and the size of this transfer did not significantly differ between the latter two conditions. Furthermore, we found evidence for differential weighting of group members' individual contributions that goes beyond sheer individual capability gains under certain circumstances, namely in tasks with a population bias.


To understand and interpret human motion is a very active research area nowadays because of its importance in sports sciences, health care, and video surveillance. However, classification of human motion patterns is still a challenging topic because of the variations in kinetics and kinematics of human movements. In this paper, we present a novel algorithm for automatic classification of motion trajectories of human upper limbs. The proposed scheme starts from transforming 3-D positions and rotations of the shoulder/elbow/wrist joints into 2-D trajectories. Discriminative features of these 2-D trajectories are, then, extracted using a probabilistic shape-context method. Afterward, these features are classified using a k-means clustering algorithm. Experimental results demonstrate the superiority of the proposed method over the state-of-the-art techniques.


Group-III nitrides are expected to be used in future photocatalytic materials. InGaN is expected to be used for photocatalytic applications in the visible light region. Photocatalytic materials are used primarily in coatings and powders, and powdered photocatalysts are expected to be formed from group-III nitride powders. In this study, we produced GaN powders by nitriding Ga precursors at high temperatures under an atmosphere of NH3. The photocatalytic characteristics of the GaN powder were dependent on nitrization temperature. In addition, the crystallinity of the GaN powders and the photocatalysis were rapidly improved at nitrization temperatures over 1000°C.


The lipid A moiety of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) is the main constituent of the outer leaflet of the Gram-negative bacterial outer membrane (OM) and is essential in many Gram-negative pathogens. An exception is Acinetobacter baumannii ATCC 19606, where mutants lacking enzymes occurring early in lipid A biosynthesis (LpxA, LpxC or LpxD), and correspondingly lacking LPS, can grow. In contrast, we show here that LpxH, an enzyme that occurs downstream of LpxD in the lipid A biosynthetic pathway, is essential for growth in this strain. Multiple attempts to disrupt lpxH on the genome were unsuccessful, and when LpxH expression was controlled by an isopropyl β-d-1-thiogalactopyranoside (IPTG) inducible promoter, cell growth under typical laboratory conditions required IPTG induction. Mass spectrometry analysis of cells shifted from LpxH-induced to uninduced (and whose growth was correspondingly slowing as LpxH was depleted) showed a large cellular accumulation of UDP-2,3-diacyl-GlcN (substrate of LpxH), a C14:0(3-OH) acyl variant of the LpxD substrate (UDP-3-O-[(R)-3-OH-C14]-GlcN), and disaccharide 1-monophosphate (DSMP). Furthermore, the viable cell counts of the LpxH depleted cultures dropped modestly, and electron microscopy revealed clear defects at the cell (inner) membrane, suggesting lipid A intermediate accumulation was toxic. Consistent with this, blocking the synthesis of these intermediates by inhibition of the upstream LpxC enzyme using CHIR-090 abrogated the requirement for IPTG induction of LpxH. Taken together, these data indicate that LpxH is essential for growth in A. baumannii ATCC19606, because, unlike earlier pathway steps like LpxA or LpxC, blockage of LpxH causes accumulation of detergent-like pathway intermediates that prevents cell growth.


Design of Argumentation Techniques for Learning Engineering Statics Dr. Tim Foutz P.E., University of Georgia Dr. Foutz is a Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor of Engineering at the University of Georgia. He was the inaugural director of the First-Year Odyssey program, classes designed to introduce freshmen to the academic life of the University. Dr. Foutz has received federal funding to integrate humanities and social science topics into his course materials. For over 28 years, he has taught fundamental engineering courses as well as advanced design courses. Christopher Ward


The surface sensitivity (in the sub-nanometre regime) of reflection spectroscopies is discussed. Simulations are used to illustrate the strengths and limitations of 45 degree reflectometry (45DR). Particular emphasis is placed upon the comparison with spectroscopic ellipsometry.


Glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP) and glucagon-like peptide (GLP)-I-(7-36) are probably the most important "incretins," but there is controversy as to their relative insulinotropic activities. The effects of natural (np) and synthetic porcine (sp) GIP, synthetic human (sh) GIP, and GLP-I-(7-36) on insulin secretion from the perfused rat pancreas were compared using gradient perfusion. Insulin secretion was increased by both spGIP and GLP-I-(7-36) at concentrations of approximately 16 pM. Maximal responses to GLP-I-(7-36) in the presence of 16.7 mM glucose were slightly greater than with npGIP or spGIP, but with 10 mM glucose spGIP and GLP-I-(7-36) exerted equivalent effects. Responses to shGIP were greatly reduced compared with spGIP. In the presence of 50 pM spGIP or GLP-I-(7-36) the glucose threshold was 4.5 +/- 0.11 mM. The data indicate that GLP-I-(7-36) and porcine GIP are equally insulinotropic and share the same glucose threshold for activity, whereas shGIP is less active. At the concentrations found postprandially, however, GIP is likely to be the more important incretin.


In seismic reflection prospecting for oil and gas a key step is the ability to estimate the seismic wavelet (impulse response) traveling through the Earth. Such estimation enables filters to be designed to deblur the recorded seismic time series and allows the integration of "downhole" and surface seismic data for seismic interpretation purposes. An appropriate model for the seismic time series is a noisy-input/noisy-output linear model. The authors tackle the estimation of the impulse response in the frequency domain by estimating its frequency response function. They use a novel approach where multiple coherence analysis is applied to the replicated observed output series to estimate the output signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at each frequency. This, combined with an estimate of the ordinary coherence between observed input and observed output, and with the spectrum of the observed input and cross-spectrum of the observed input and output, enables estimation of the frequency response function. The methodology is seen to work well on real and synthetic data.


We consider the "standard" spectrum of the active neutrinos (characterized by strong mass hierarchy and small mixing) with additional sterile neutrino, νs. The sterile neutrino mixes strongly with the muon neutrino, so that νμ ↔ νs oscillations solve the atmospheric neutrino problem. We show that the parametric enhancement of the νμ ↔ νs oscillations occurs for the high energy atmospheric neutrinos which cross the core of the Earth. This can be relevant for the anomaly observed by the MACRO experiment. Solar neutrinos are converted both to νμ and νs. The heaviest neutrino (≈ ντ ) may compose the hot dark matter of the Universe. Phenomenology of this scenario is elaborated and crucial experimental signatures are identified. We also discuss properties of the underlying neutrino mass matrix.


An imidazolium based ionic liquid, 1-methyl-3-(3-triethoxysilylpropyl) imidazolium chloride, could be immobilized on the surface of silica-coated ferrite nanoparticles (Fe3O4@SiO2-IL) and could be evaluated as a recyclable catalyst for the N-formylation of amines using formic acid under solvent-free conditions. The prepared organic–inorganic hybrid material could be characterized by various techniques such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectroscopy (EDS) and Vibrating Sample Magnetometer (VSM) studies. Utilizing the ferromagnetic nature of Fe3O4, the prepared catalyst could be easily recovered after completion of the reaction by using an external magnetic field. The catalyst could be reused for up to five runs with remarkable catalytic activity. The described methodology has various advantages when compared with other methods that rely on homogeneous catalysts.


In rats receiving a low oral dose (0.35 mg/kg p.o.) of trifluoperazine (TFP), a potent neuroleptic phenothiazine, the parent drug distribution was separate from that of its metabolite trifluoperazine sulfoxide (TFP-SO). This was not seen after intraperitoneal administration (i.p.) of the same or high dose (5mg/kg). TFP-SO was not detected in the brain, wheras TFP was significantly associated with microsomes when its brain level was highest. Absorption, distribution, metabolism, and dose dependent excretion procedded rapidly with 97% of a dose recovered 24 hr after p.o. treatment, only 6% in the urine and the remainder in feces with 87% of this metabolized to compounds other than TFP-SO. TFP and its metabolites arrived in feces via two pathways, largely the bile plus another route. The excretion pattern was unchanges with other drugs or after treatment for 3 wk, although excretion differed on the first day after i.p. and p.o. administration.


Since oxidative stress is implicated in the pathogenesis of liver diseases, this study was carried out to evaluate the hepatoprotective, hematoprotective and hypolipidemic effects of Pleurotus ostreatus (Oyster mushroom) in Carbon Tetrachloride (CCl4) induced liver injury in wistar rats. Thirty rats were used for this study. The rats were divided into five groups of six rats per cage. Group I that served as the normal control received distilled water only. Groups II to V served as test groups. Group II received CCl4 at a dose of 1 ml/kg body weight on the 14th day and 28th day only. Groups III, IV and V received CCl4 at a dose of 1 ml /kg body weight on the 14th day and 28th day, then, silymarin (100 mg/kg), 25% w/w and 50% w/w of powdered Oyster mushroom respectively. The results revealed that CCl4 caused a significant (p<0.05) increase in lipid peroxidation judging from the significant (p<0.05) elevated level of malondialdehyde MDA in the hepatic tissues whereas the level or activities of reduced glutathione (GSH), catalase (CAT), suproxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and glutathione S-transferase (GST) in the liver tissues were significantly (p<0.05) reduced. Liver peroxidation was followed by disruption of proper functioning of the hepatocytes as indicated by the significant increase of liver biomarker enzymes (AST, ALT, and ALP) and decreased serum levels of albumin and total protein. Dyslipidemia and hematotoxicity were also manifested via a significant (p<0.05) increase in the serum levels of triglyceride TG, total cholesterol TC, very low-density lipoprotein cholesterol VLDL-C, low density lipoprotein cholesterol LDL-C and white blood cells count. These were accompanied by significant (p<0.05) reduction in the serum level of high density lipoprotein cholesterol HDL-C and RBC count and its differentials. Supplementation of powdered Oyster mushroom daily for a period of 28 days to rats led to reversal of these signs of toxicities. The ability of the powdered Oyster mushroom to mitigate against CCl4-induced hepatotoxicity is probably due to its antioxidant and enzyme modulatory effects.

 Key words: Hepatoprotective, hematoprotective, hypolipidemic, Pleurotus ostreatus, carbon tetrachloride, peroxidation.


ABSTRACT Introduction: Mucopolysaccharidosis type III (MPS III) is a rare disorder characterized by progressive neurocognitive impairment. No disease-modifying treatment is yet available but many are currently under study. The aim of this review is to report on the results of the first clinical trials in MPS III and to discuss specific challenges and recommendations in trial design. Areas covered: Gene therapy, enzyme replacement therapy and substrate reduction therapy for MPS III. Expert opinion: Although some trials have been stopped because of lack of effect, several other phase I/II studies have reported data suggesting a positive effect of treatment. A number of treatment options will enter phase III trials in the very near future. However, several challenges have emerged. The rarity of the disease limits the number of potential patients per trial and competition for eligible patients is imminent. Furthermore, high quality natural history data will be essential to serve in trials as a comparator arm. This can only be achieved by rapid publication, full transparency and sharing of all available natural history data. Also, the broad phenotypic spectrum may complicate assessment of treatment efficacy, and phenotypic prediction is therefore essential. Finally, as early initiation of treatment is needed to demonstrate maximal, or even sufficient, treatment effect, newborn screening for MPS III will, in the end, be needed.


This report provides an overview of the progress made in 2017 in implementing the Africa Climate Business Plan (ACBP), a blueprint for climate action in Sub-Saharan Africa that the World Bank launched during the 21st meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP21) to the United NationsFramework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris in November 2015. This report provides an update on resource mobilization, describes the climate co-benefits provided by the ACBP portfolio, and details implementation progress by ACBP cluster and component. In addition, to better measure and monitor results and inform future project design, it reports on two new pieces of analysis undertaken this year: a review of the ACBP contribution to implementation of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) of Sub-Sharan Africa's countries; and a review of the ACBP portfolio from the perspective of its contribution to resilience building (following the resiliencepathways approach).


We present an analysis of the barriers and opportunities for incorporating air quality co-benefits into climate policy assessments. It is well known that many strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions also decrease emissions of health-damaging air pollutants and precursor species, including particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur dioxide. In a survey of previous studies we found a range of estimates for the air quality co-benefits of climate change mitigation of $2-196/tCO2 with a mean of $49/tCO2, and the highest co-benefits found in developing countries. These values, although of a similar order of magnitude to abatement cost estimates, are only rarely included in integrated assessments of climate policy. Full inclusion of these co-benefits would have pervasive implications on climate policy including: optimal policy stringency, overall costs, distributional effects, robustness to discount rates, incentives for international cooperation, and the value of adaptation, forests, and climate engineering relative to mitigation. Under-valuation results in part from uncertainty in climatic damages, valuation inconsistency, and institutional barriers. Because policy debates are framed in terms of cost minimization, policy makers are unlikely to fully value air quality co-benefits unless they can be compared on an equivalent basis with the benefits of avoided climatic damages. While air quality co-benefits have been prominently portrayed as a hedge against uncertainty in the benefits of climate change abatement, this assessment finds that full inclusion of co-benefits depends on – rather than substitutes for – better valuation of climate damages.


The current study was designed to identify the morbidity pattern of out-patients attending Urban Health Training Centre in an urban area of a medical college in Srinagar, Pauri Garhwal district, Uttarakhand, North India. The present study record-based retrospective study was conducted among the out-patients attending the regular clinic at the Urban Health Training Centre, of a medical college in Srinagar city of Uttarakhand State of North India during the study period of one year in 2014. Data was retrieved from the OPD registers maintained at the clinic. Data was collected pertaining to socio-demographic profile, morbidity details and treatment pattern. Diseases were identified using the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) code. Descriptive analysis was done. During the study period, a total of 9343 subjects attended the OPD. Among them, majority of them (60%) were females. More than half (56 %) belonged to the age group of 35-65 year age-group. The association of disease classification was found to be statistically significant with respect to gender. The leading morbidity of communicable disease was found to be certain infectious and parasitic diseases especially Typhoid whereas musculoskeletal system and connective tissue disorders were the most common cause among morbidity due to NCDs. Out of all, typhoid was found to cause maximum of morbidity among the subjects. The present study highlights the morbidity pattern of communicable and NCDs among the population of hilly areas of Garhwal, Uttarakhand India. Priority should be preferred for the regular tracking of diseases in terms of preventive and promotive aspects. Morbidity in the out- door clinics reflects the emerging trend of mixed disease spectrum burden comprising communicable and non-communicable diseases.


The use of English loanwords in different languages has been discussed from various perspectives by several scholars (e.g. Takashi, 1990; Kay, 1995; Takashi Wilkerson, 1997; Smead, 1998; Friedrich, 2002). Although this phenomenon has been regarded as enriching and/or creative by some (e.g. Crystal, 2003; Friedrich, 2002), it has encountered opposition in many parts of the world. Phillipson (1992: 7), for instance, views it 'as a phenomenon that has offended users of other languages for more than a century.' He explains how some governments (in France and Slovenia, for example) have adopted measures to prevent the use of loanwords from English. This issue of whether or not the incorporation of loanwords is offensive to the borrowing language became a topic of much debate in Brazil after Projected Law #1676/1999, which aims to limit the use of foreign words (mainly from English) in Brazilian Portuguese (hereafter, BP). As Rajagopalan (2005) explains, many popular movements, politicians, and traditional grammarians have expressed concern that BP is 'under an imminent threat from English' (101). Several linguists (e.g. Faraco, 2001) have opposed the proposition, based on issues such as linguistic prejudice and the lack of language expertise of the proponents and supporters of the projected law. Still, the proposition was approved by the Brazilian Senate in 2003. It now awaits further approval by the Chamber of Deputies before a final decision is made. One possible way of investigating whether loanwords are offensive to BP is to approach it from a linguistic perspective. Hence, in the present study, I explore the issue of borrowing by BP speakers through a linguistic analysis of loanwords from English that are currently used as slang in Brazil. The definition of slang used here is that proposed by Eble (1996: 11): 'an ever changing set of colloquial words and phrases that speakers use to establish or reinforce social identity or cohesiveness within a group or with a trend or fashion in society at large.'


Background The ENEAS study points out that the 37.4% of the adverse events detected in admitted patients are directly caused by drugs. Elderly patients constitute a group susceptible to suffering adverse effects related to their medicines, due to comorbidity and polypharmacy. Purpose To analyse the ratio of patients included in a medicines reconciliation project, who were admitted with drug overdose. The type of drugs involved was also analysed. Materials and methods Retrospective observational study of patients belonging to a medicines reconciliation project admitted with drug overdose. The patients included in this project were older than 75 years, were taking at least 6 drugs a day and were living in nursing homes. The data collected from the clinical history of each patient were: age, sex, cause of admission, overdosed drug, INR and drug blood level at admission. Results 565 patients were analysed; 48 (8.5%) were admitted with pharmacological overdosing. The mean age of the overdosed patients was 85.5 years, (75% women). The most frequent drug overdosed was acenocoumarol: 40 (22.5%) out of 178 patients anti-coagulated, followed by digoxin overdose in 3 (4.41%) out of 68 patients. Another 3 patients had concomitant acenocoumarol and digoxin overdose. Finally, 1 phenytoin and 1 opiate toxicity were also observed. The mean digoxin blood level of patients with digoxin toxicity was 3.93 ng/mL. The mean International Normalised Ratio (INR) of patients with acenocoumarol toxicity was 6.51 (3.32–16.36). In these patients, acenocoumarol was suspended until a proper INR value was reached. Administration of phytomenadione was assessed depending on the INR and bleeding risk. Conclusions The proportion of elderly patients admitted with pharmacological overdosing is significant in relation to the overall patient number in this study. The drug causing the majority of toxicity cases was acenocoumarol, followed by digoxin. Both drugs could cause serious adverse effects associated with overdose. Therefore their use in elderly patients should be tightly monitored and pharmacists could play an important role in this. No conflict of interest.


We analyze here the consequence of local rotational-symmetry breaking in the quantum spin (or phase) glass state of the quantum random rotor model. By coupling the spin glass order parameter directly to a vector potential, we are able to compute whether the system is resilient (that is, possesses a phase stiffness) to a uniform rotation in the presence of random anisotropy. We show explicitly that the O(2) vector spin glass has no electromagnetic response indicative of a superconductor at mean-field and beyond, suggesting the absence of phase stiffness. This result confirms our earlier finding [Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 027001 (2002)] that the phase glass is metallic, due to the main contribution to the conductivity arising from fluctuations of the superconducting order parameter. In addition, our finding that the spin stiffness vanishes in the quantum rotor glass is consistent with the absence of a transverse stiffness in the Heisenberg spin glass found by Feigelman and Tsvelik [Sov. Phys. JETP 50, 1222 (1979)].


IgM RF is known to react with many species of IgG. This study examined nine species of IgG to determine which was the most sensitive and specific to detect IgG RF by radioimmunoassay. For 19 IgM RF-positive sera, horse IgG was significantly more sensitive than all IgG preparations tested except rabbit IgG. The IgG used include sheep, swine, goat, bovine, and chicken as well as human and baboon Fc. For 22 IgM RF-negative sera from patients with rheumatoid arthritis, only one was positive for IgG RF with rabbit IgG, whereas five were positive with horse IgG. Analysis after preparative ultracentrifugation of a variety of sera positive and negative for IgM RF indicated that horse IgG was more sensitive, whereas rabbit IgG was more specific for the detection of IgG RF by our radioimmunoassay. IgM RF, on the other hand, was more sensitively detected by human Fc than by any preparation other than whole human IgG.


In dynamical systems examples are common in which two or more attractors coexist and in such cases the basin boundary is non-empty. The purpose of this paper is to describe the structure and properties of basins and their boundaries for two-dimensional diffeomorphisms. If a two-dimensional basin has a basin cell (a trapping region whose boundary consists of pieces of the stable and unstable manifolds of a well-chosen periodic orbit), then the basin consists of a central body (the basin cell) and a finite number of channels attached to it and the basin boundary is fractal. We prove the following surprising property for certain fractal basin boundaries: a basin of attraction B has a basin cell if and only if every diverging path in basin B has the entire basin boundary \partial\bar{B} as its limit set. The latter property reflects a complete entangled basin and its boundary.


One cannot study poverty in Tanzania without understanding the agricultural sector, which employs more than two-thirds of the population and accounts for nearly a quarter of national GDP. This thesis examines three themes that focus on the difficulties that rural Tanzanians face in achieving a reasonable livelihood: the adverse legacy of a failed historical policy, a difficult climate, and market failures.

The first empirical chapter examines the legacy of the villagization program that attempted to transform the predominantly agricultural and rural Tanzania. Between 1971 and 1973, the majority of rural residents were moved to villages planned by the government. This essay examines if the programs e↵ects are persistent and have had a long-run legacy. It analyzes the impact of exposure to the program on various outcome measures from recent household surveys. The primary finding of this study is that households living in districts heavily exposed to the program have worse measures of various current outcomes.

The second empirical chapter examines the role of reliability of rainfall, which is important in Tanzania as agriculture is predominantly rain-fed and a small fraction of plots are irrigated. This chapter investigates if households cope with this major risk to income by re-allocating their labor supply between agriculture, wage labor, and self-employment activities. This chapter combines data on labor allocation of households within and outside of agriculture from the National Panel Survey with high-resolution satellite-based rainfall data not previously used in this literature. The primary finding of this study is that households allocate more family labor to agriculture in years of good rainfall and more labor to self-employment activities in years of poor rainfall.

Market failures are often cited as a rationale for policy recommendations and government interventions. The third chapter implements four tests of market failures suggested in the literature, all of which rely on the agricultural household model but di↵er in how market failures are manifested. The common finding of these tests is that market failures exist in agricultural factor markets in Tanzania, although significant heterogeneity exists. Markets are more likely to fail in rural areas, remote locations, and are more likely to affect female-headed households. Households are also more likely to face market failure when they try to supply labor to the market than when they try to hire labor from the market.


An active-feedback frequency-compensation (AFFC) technique for low-power operational amplifiers is presented in this paper. With an active-feedback mechanism, a high-speed block separates the low-frequency high-gain path and high-frequency signal path such that high gain and wide bandwidth can be achieved simultaneously in the AFFC amplifier. The gain stage in the active-feedback network also reduces the size of the compensation capacitors such that the overall chip area of the amplifier becomes smaller and the slew rate is improved. Furthermore, the presence of a left-half-plane zero in the proposed AFFC topology improves the stability and settling behavior of the amplifier. Three-stage amplifiers based on AFFC and nested-Miller compensation (NMC) techniques have been implemented by a commercial 0.8-/spl mu/m CMOS process. When driving a 120-pF capacitive load, the AFFC amplifier achieves over 100-dB dc gain, 4.5-MHz gain-bandwidth product (GBW) , 65/spl deg/ phase margin, and 1.5-V//spl mu/s average slew rate, while only dissipating 400-/spl mu/W power at a 2-V supply. Compared to a three-stage NMC amplifier, the proposed AFFC amplifier provides improvement in both the GBW and slew rate by 11 times and reduces the chip area by 2.3 times without significant increase in the power consumption.


During infection of its hosts, Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium (S. typhimurium) enters the epithelial cells of the small intestine. This process requires a number of invasion genes encoded on Salmonella pathogenicity island 1 (SPI1), a 40 kb stretch of DNA located near minute 63 of the S. typhimurium chromosome. Expression of S. typhimurium SPI1 invasion genes is activated by the transcription factor HilA. hilA is tightly regulated in response to many environmental conditions, including oxygen, osmolarity and pH. Regulation of hilA expression may serve to limit invasion gene expression to the appropriate times during Salmonella infection. We have mapped the transcription start site of hilA and identified regions of the promoter that are required for the repression of hilA expression by conditions unfavourable for Salmonella invasion. We have also identified two SPI1‐encoded genes, hilC and hilD, that can independently derepress hilA expression. HilC and HilD are both members of the AraC/XylS family of transcriptional regulators. A mutation in hilD significantly reduces the ability of S. typhimurium to enter tissue culture cells, whereas a mutation in hilC only modestly affects Salmonella invasion. Based on these results, we have updated our model of Salmonella SPI1 invasion gene regulation. We also speculate on the possible significance of this model for Salmonella pathogenesis.


Interactions between a virtual actor and its virtual environment involve many aspects. An important one is hand interactions. In a virtual scene depicting everyday life, the actor will need to grasp and hold objects, in such a way that both skeleton motion and body deformation have a realistic visual aspect. It will also need to interact with other virtual actors sharing the same virtual world, shaking hands when meeting for example. The authors present an efficient and realistic method combining automatic hand motion generation with hand deformation simulation. The resulting system is integrated in an interactive human simulation application. It adds the ability to simulate hand interactions between actors and their environment, in combination with traditional human animation techniques. The skeleton is animated by a heuristic motion control and multi-sensor based technique. The final free-form surface hand model is produced by a three-layer deformation model. The intermediate muscular layer is based on a geometric deformation tool, where deformations are considered as interpolating control point displacements


There is a crucial need for developing clinically useful approaches to measure pancreatic islet mass and function. Islets represent a small percentage of the tissue located in the abdominal cavity. They remain difficult to study in vivo by non-invasive techniques due to the lack of a specific probe. Also, it is difficult to correlate imaging signals and changes in beta-cell mass. Development of new and reliable cell markers are currently in progress. A major issue for the immediate future, is to gain a better understanding of the mechanisms leading to diabetes, and to increase the possibilities for studying islet function in vivo. Once diabetes occurs, islet transplantation is an option. However, the fate of the graft over time remains difficult to follow, due to the lack of tools to monitor rejection and inflammation before islet graft loss. The aim of this workshop was to gather the current knowledge on beta-cell imaging, including cross-linking to other field as oncology and neuroimaging.


Size, position and stability of the synchrotron radiation source BESSY are determined at present by imaging optical systems and wire monitors in the beamlines and by electrostatic position monitors in the storage ring. Since the size of the source has been brought down to FWHM-values Δy = 0.15 mm in vertical and Δx = 0.4 mm in horizontal directions for stored currents of IR = 200 mA, the requirements with respect to the stability of position and size have increased considerably. Vertical position changes of 0.1 mm lead to apparent energy shifts of up to 100 meV on monochromators without entrance slits. Even when entrance slits are used, the intensity and degree of polarization of the radiation depend on the stability of the position of the source. All monitors in the beam lines and the monochromators themselves are sensitive to thermal expansion of their optical components. This means, that slow shifts occur during the life time of one filling of the storage ring and sudden shifts during each injection (between closing and opening of the beam shutters). Apart from these long time effects, flaring of the image of the source in the frequency range of a few Hz becomes visible on the optical system from time to time. In order to separate ring problems from beam line problems, such monitor systems are indispensable. Improvement of the monitors and measurements with a random access camera will be presented and discussed.


A wide variety of disciplines engage in Smart Cities as the scope and breadth of it is broad. Within the built environment, there is much discussion on how planning and construction phases influence Smart Cities. There is little discussion on the role of Facilities Management (FM). However, there has been much work on the influence FM has on design phases to ensure functional and usable buildings. Neglecting to scale up the influence of FM from individual buildings to city scale may have long term consequences on sustainability of cities. Taking a mindset of including an FM perspective early in the development of a Smart City is considered here in terms of social aspects of required services. The work draws on ideas of Urban FM to operationalize local needs which also responds to the need to link to broader city sustainable strategies. The starting point is from the development of two districts in Trondheim, Norway. In a three-day workshop, students interpret the needs of the area based on their own knowledge-based perspective, guidance from tutors of Urban FM and through engagement with local users of the area. The work highlights the potential of including an FM perspective in the development of cities.


The observed linear correlation of surface heat flux in continental regions with the radioactive heat release in the surface rocks is consistent with an exponential depth dependence of the concentration of the heat sources. We suggest that this depth dependence can be explained as an equilibrium distribution of the heat-producing elements in a gravitational field. The eflective mean mass range of the elemental assemblies being differentiated is predicted, and it appears that potassium, uranium, and thorium diffuse upward in ionic complexes with other elements. Similar considerations should apply to the distribution of other elements in the crust and mantle.


The administration of inorganic Cd and Hg in vivo has been shown to result in markedly different metal concentrations in rat liver. Primary cultures of rat hepatocytes were utilized to gain insight into the dispositional differences between these chemically similar metals. Hepatocyte monolayer cultures were exposed to several concentrations of Cd or Hg (3, 10 and 30mum) in serum-containing medium for 30min. The cells were then washed and incubated in fresh medium for the remainder of the experiment. Hepatocytes exposed to Cd accumulated significantly more metal than hepatocytes exposed to equimolar concentrations of Hg. In cells exposed to 3mum-Cd there was an initial loss of Cd from the hepatocytes when placed in fresh medium, followed by a gradual re-uptake of metal, concomitant with increased binding to metallothionein. In hepatocytes exposed to 3 and 10mum-Cd, 87 and 77% of the intracellular Cd was bound to metallothionein within 24h. Loss of Hg from hepatocytes pulsed with 30mum-Hg was also observed upon the addition of fresh medium and continued for the duration of the experiment. No time-dependent increase in Hg binding to metallothionein was observed. A maximum of about 10% of the intracellular Hg was found associated with metallothionein in hepatocytes exposed to 30mum-Hg. Studies utilizing [(35)S]cysteine incorporation indicated significant increases in the amount of metallothionein synthesized in hepatocytes exposed to 3 and 10mum-Cd (300% of control value) and 30mum-Hg (150% of control value) 24h after metal pulsing. Time-course studies revealed a 6-12h lag in metallothionein synthesis, followed by a significant elevation in [(35)S]cysteine incorporation into metallothionein between 12 and 24h. These studies suggest that (a) isolated hepatocytes differentiate between Cd and Hg and preferentially accumulate the former, and (b) Cd strongly stimulates the induction of, and preferentially binds to, metallothionein, whereas Hg induces weakly, and does not preferentially bind to, metallothionein.


A network of common pyroelectric motion sensors that can track and identify human targets has been developed using low-cost, commercially available components. Significantly cheaper than deploying infrared imaging systems and considerably more advanced than typical motion sensing systems, this system consists of a small number of sensor nodes distributed across a medium sized room. Each node contain up to eight pyroelectric detectors and provides limited computation and communication capabilities. These detectors use structured lenslets to extract frequency components of targets for classification and the location and orientation of the sensors is used to track targets as they move through the space. This system has demonstrated multiple target tracking and the ability to differentiate between multiple people.


A long-standing debate surrounds the source of hydrothermal fluids that form gold lodes late in the metamorphic history of orogenic belts. 40 Ar/ 39 Ar dating of hydrothermal muscovite shows that gold lodes in the northwestern Alps formed from 31.6 to 10.6 Ma. The deposits young progressively along the orogen, parallel to field gradients showing decreasing age of peak metamorphism, increasing metamorphic grade, and increasing extent of exhumation of the host rocks. These correlations suggest that the ore-bearing fluid was produced by a 20 m.y. history of prograde metamorphic devolatilization of calc-schists at depth. The age trend of mineralization reflects continuous ascent of fluid and vein formation in retrograding rocks during extreme differential uplift and denudation of the Alpine orogenic wedge. The intimate correlations between collisional orogenesis, metamorphism, and gold mineralization in the Alps suggest that similar genetic scenarios may apply to late orogenic gold lodes elsewhere.


Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is the most common form of chronic lung disease in infancy. The clinical, radiological, and pathological features of BPD were first described a little more than three decades ago. The disease was then seen in large preterm infants with severe respiratory distress syndrome who had been treated with high inspired oxygen concentrations and prolonged mechanical ventilation with high positive airway pressures resulting in inflammation, fibrosis, and smooth muscle hypertrophy in the airways. Despite advances in the prevention and management of respiratory distress syndrome (including the widespread use of antenatal steroids and surfactant treatment), neonatal chronic lung disease is still one of the major complications in mechanically ventilated premature infants. Acceptance of modest hypercapnia with less aggressive application of positive pressure ventilation and reduction of the use of high oxygen concentrations led to a decrease in the incidence of BPD in newborn infants with a birth weight above 1500 g. However, with increased survival of extremely premature infants (24–26 weeks gestation, birth weight <1000 g), who are most likely to develop BPD, the overall incidence has remained high or has even increased, albeit with wide variations between institutions. Clearly, the risk of developing BPD increases with decreasing birth weight and gestational age, ranging from 50% in neonates with birth weights of 700–900 g to 5% in those with birth weights >1250 g. Apart from diVerences in patient populations and management, the reported variation in the incidence of BPD might also be due to the use of diVerent criteria to define it. 11 12 "Classic" BPD, as described by Northway and colleagues, is a severe form of chronic lung disease that has become less common and has been replaced by less severe forms which are observed in very small premature infants who survive after prolonged mechanical ventilation. 13 As a result of these changes in epidemiology, the terms "neonatal chronic lung disease" or "chronic lung disease of prematurity" have been coined to describe either the less severe forms or the complete spectrum of BPD. 15 Thus, the term "chronic lung disease" remains vague and implies a wide spectrum of disorders and severity ranging from marginally significant to fatal. The milder forms of chronic lung disease are frequently seen in very low birth weight infants with mild or no initial respiratory distress syndrome; in this population a patent ductus arteriosus and nosocomial infection have been found to play an important role in the development of chronic lung disease. Thus, the two major forms of BPD—"classic" or severe and "new" or mild—appear to have diVerent pathogenic mechanisms within the widely varying clinical presentation of chronic lung disease.


Risning fuelcosts, energy consumption and environmental conserns is directly linked with the built environment and transportation habits. This paper will outline a number of methoods which will examine how these issues can be contained. Several concepts has been introduced to give cityplanners, architects among others instrument and guiedelines of how to adress these issues. The Compact city and Walkability is Both consepts that introduces guidelines counter modernistic guiedlines of how the urban environment should be formed. This paper will test how these consepts can be taken down from the abstract level, interpreted and implemented within a case study. The case study chosen is Belfast central because it is situated within a context which is not cohearent with the compact city and Walkability. Where the city of Belfaast beeing one of the most cardepandant cities in Europe and the Central station beeing situated within an area which is undeveloped and close to the citycentre. The puropse is therefore to examine the concept of the Compact city and Walkability, their guidelines and abstract recomendations for how a new development should be conducted. First guidelines of the compact city has been analysed and discussed with comparason to other reasearchers with the aim to extract relighable theoretical guiedlines. Walkability as a idea is also analysed t o explore what urban design guidelines are related to Walkability. Theese more broad guidelines are taken into considerat ion when the si te-analysis is conducted. Walkability is further anlysed to extract physical elements down to a detailed level of measurements. Which is sumerrised in the Walkability guide for urban design? Its funcuntion is to serve practical implementation of walkability in new devlopments. To be able to implement the idea of Walkability and The compact city a current status analysis has been conducted to examine factors which is important for walkability and The compact city derived from the guideline analysis of the conepts. First a superficial Lynch analysis was conducted to identify important paths, nodes and the areas intergration to the citycentre. This analysis resulted in a view on which buildings are important to preserve, paths important to analyse further. To analyse building layout and continuancy in path networks will affect how intergrated the area is with the citycentre today. Transportation networks and building layout are critcal to the consepts of Walkablity and The compact city, pedestrain, bycycle paths and public transport was mapped. The findings was failiur of walkability and The compact city guideines. For example there was servere connectivity issues wihin the pedestrain, bycycle network and boundaries that limited connections to and from the river of Lagan, City centre and The Central station. I wanted to furrther test my above mentioned findings by cunducting an observation of movement and compare it to two interviews with key persons with in the community. The observation showed that there was less usage of North-south paths in particular the connection between East bridge street and the river of Lagan. The interviews also confirmed the path limiting finings from my analysis. Now to be able to devlope the area with the concept of the compact city and walkability guidelines the site anlysis seres as where and what issues will need to be corrected. The Development of the site is set through the Compact City and Walkability, with high density, enclosure, path continuency, path context and intergration with the surrrounding cityscape. The abstract level of guidelines from the theory chapter is implemented to solve the issues which was found in the site analysis especially intergration issues and pedestrain path netoworks. Since East bridge street was identified within both the Lynch analysis, observation survey and the interviews to be critcal within the area a more detailed implementatin of Walkability indicators was done. This was done by using the Walkabi l i ty guide for urban design by implementing most o f t h e e x t r a c t e d measurments. This is sowed on several renderings and to scale sektions. The questions of how the conspets can be iplemented can therefore be considered answered.


Hemodynamic forces, namely shear stress and cyclic strain, have been well characterised as modulators of vascular endothelial function, and have been assigned an important role in the maintainence of vascular tone, haemostasis, and regulation of vascular growth and health. They exert their influence in part by effecting changes in the production and release of vasoactive compounds by the endothelium, and by effecting changes in the levels and activity of various enzymes. Thimet oligopeptidase (EC184.108.40.206, EP24.15) and neurolysin (EC184.108.40.206, EP24.15) are closely related zinc metalloendopeptidases that have been shown to be expressed and active in the vascular endothelium. Their substrates include the vasoactive peptides bradykinin and angiotensin I, which have been identified as important regulators of both blood pressure and angiogenic processes. Other related peptidases, namely endothelin converting enzyme (ECE) and angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE), have been shown to be regulated by hemodynamic forces in the vascular endothelium. As such EP24.15 and EP24.16 are likely candidates for regulation by hemodynamic forces.

In this regard we have investigated the effect of cyclic strain on the expression and activty of EP24.15 and EP24.16 in cultured bovine aortic endothelial cells (BAECs). We have shown that exposure to cyclic strain significantly increases the mRNA expression as well as both the cellular and secreted activity of both enzymes. We have demonstrated that up-regulation of both enzymes is dependent on Gi-protein mediated signalling, although with varying Gia/G(3y subunit specificity for either enzyme. Using immunocytochemistry, we have also demonstrated a strain-dependent increase in EP24.15 protein expression within the nucleus and cytoplasm in parallel with an increase in membrane associated EP 24.15

The effects of strain on the ability of BAECs in culture to cleave both Ang I, and BK in an EC24.15/EC24.16 specific manner was also studied. We observed that exposure to cyclic strain induces a significant increase in the EP24.15 specific hydrolysis of both exogenously added BK and Ang I.

The potential of the observed effects of cyclic strain on EP24.15 to effect changes in endothelial cell function were also examined. Use of the dual EP24.15/EP24.16 inhibitor, cFP-AAF-pAB, and the EP24.15 specific antisense, FLIP, was seen to significantly attenuate cyclic strain-induced endothelial cell tubule formation and migration. We also found that the effects of FLIP transfection on cyclic strain-induced endothelial cell tubule formation could be largely reversed by addition of exogenous Ang-(l-7). Taken together these results suggest that strain-induced endothelial cell angiogenesis and migration putatively involves EP24.15 cleavage of vasoactive peptide substrates.


In the article the issues of environmental, sanitary and hygienic safety of medical waste management are considered. Recently, for the treatment of certain types of medical waste thermal methods using small plants not equipped with a proper flue gas cleaning system are widely used. In this article the potential danger of supertoxicants generation when applying thermal methods of neutralization of medical waste that contains polyvinyl chloride (PVC) is justified by thermogravimetric and mass spectrometric studies. This research shows the necessity of introducing technologies of separate collection of PVC medical waste and its' thermal recycling in compliance with special requirements.


This popular, topically organized, and thoroughly updated child and adolescent development text presents you with the best theories, research, and practical advice that developmentalists have to offer today. Authors David R. Shaffer and Katherine Kipp provide you with a current and comprehensive overview of child and adolescent development, written in clear, concise language that talks "to" you rather than "at" you. The authors also focus on application showing how theories and research apply to real-life settings. As a result, you will gain an understanding of developmental principles that will help you in your roles as parents, teachers, nurses, day-care workers, pediatricians, psychologists, or in any other capacity by which you may one day influence the lives of developing persons. Available with InfoTrac Student Collections http: //gocengage.com/infotrac.


Chromosomal aberrations are often assumed to be deleterious to cells. However, we have found that many metastases are populated by cells with chromosomal recombinants induced by radiation of the original tumor population. The tumor, K-1735-M2, was already capable of metastasis so that the recombinant chromosomes were not necessary for this property of the tumor. Stable recombinants, like other aberrant forms, could be disadvantageous or, alternatively, could confer selective advantage to some tumor cells. We investigated these possibilities by irradiating the parental tumor line and examining the formation and persistence of chromosomal markers in cell culture and in s.c. tumors. The karyotype of the K-1735-M2 parental tumor is composed entirely of telocentric chromosomes, and recombinant forms are relatively easy to recognize. Unstable forms of chromosome damage were lost rapidly. The frequency of stable recombinants after two weeks in culture was higher than that in tumors growing in primary inoculation sites. In contrast, secondary (spontaneous metastatic) foci showed a far greater frequency of chromosomal markers, suggesting a positive association between markers and acquisition of properties benefiting growth and metastasis.


For the fatigue design of a large scaled welded structure, the readily accessibility of various engineering tools is required for the static, fatigue, dynamic analysis and parametric study. In this paper, a multi-agent system is suggested for the development of distributed, open and intelligent design system. The developed design system is applied to assess cumulative fatigue damage on the welded bogie frame of railway vehicles. The engineering tools for fatigue durability analysis are chosen as I-DEAS, ANSYS and BFAP, in which iterative analysis is performed automatically caused by geometrical changes of transom support bracket attached in the bogie frame. The prototype of design system is implemented successfully for the assessment of cumulative fatigue damages of the welded bogie frame.


The five proteins programmed in a cell-free system by a mouse kappa light chain messenger RNA were labeled with [3H]leucine and subjected to amino acid sequence analyses. In all five proteins, 20 amino acid residues precede the amino terminus of the mature protein, indicating that there is one major point for the initiation of messenger RNA translation. The abundance (30 percent) of leucine residues in the extra piece (leucine at positions 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, and 13) indicates that this moiety is hydrophobic. Furthermore, it seems that the precursor may have an additional extra piece at the carboxyl terminus.


In primary molars with root perforations of endodontic origin, tooth extraction and space maintainer are recommended. Calcium-enriched mixture (CEM) cement is a new biomaterial demonstrating favorable sealability/biocompatibility. This report presents a novel treatment modality for cases of primary molar teeth with root perforations associated with a periodontal lesion due to extensive inflammatory root resorption, whereby CEM was used as a perforation repair/pulpotomy biomaterial. Three cases of primary molar root perforations due to inflammatory resorption were selected; all cases were associated with furcal lesions of endodontic origin. Pulp chambers were accessed/irrigated with NaOCl; the root canal orifices were filled with CEM and restored with stainless steel crowns. Clinical/radiographic examinations up to 17 months revealed that all teeth were functional and free of signs/symptoms of infection and all had complete bone healing. Further trials are suggested to confirm CEM use for management of root perforations in primary molars exhibiting root perforation.


Abstract In the past, divergent results have been reported based on different methods and conditions used for enzymatic activity measurements of cytochrome c oxidase (CytOx). Here, we analyze in detail and show comparable and reproducible polarographic activity measurements of ATP-dependent inhibition of CytOx kinetics in intact and non-intact rat heart mitochondria and mitoplasts. We found that this mechanism is always present in isolated rat heart mitochondria and mitoplasts; however, it is measurable only at high ATP/ADP ratios using optimal protein concentrations. In the kinetics assay, measurement of this mechanism is independent of presence or absence of Tween-20 and the composition of measuring buffer. Furthermore, the effect of atractyloside on intact rat heart mitochondria confirms that (i) ATP inhibition occurs under uncoupled conditions [in the presence of carbonly cyanide m-chlorophenyl hydrazone (CCCP)] when the classical respiratory control is absent and (ii) high ATP/ADP ratios in the matrix as well as in the cytosolic space are required for full ATP inhibition of CytOx. Additionally, ATP inhibition measured in intact mitochondria extends in the presence of oligomycin, thus indicating further that the problem to measure the inhibitory effect of ATP on CytOx is apparently due to the lack of very high ATP/ADP ratios in isolated mitochondria.


Migrant remittances can play a critical role in the development (human development and poverty eradication) of households (HHs) in the country of origin. There is however still a lack of understanding on the developmental outcomes of remittance inflows given the limited number of micro-level analysis at the sub-national levels for migrant sending countries in South Asia. The Punjab province in Pakistan provides an excellent laboratory for a detailed case study on the sub-national developmental impacts of migrant remittances for the following reasons: First, it is the largest province of Pakistan, which houses 36 districts. Second, it is the largest recipient of remittance inflows to Pakistan, reflecting the nature of migrant-based HHs. The objectives of the study are threefold: First, to construct a new household-based human development index (HHDI), comprising sub-indices of education, health and housing. Second, to empirically examine the interactions between remittances and HHDI. Third, to empirically assess the impact of remittances on the incidence and severity of poverty. The remittance-HHDI and remittance-poverty nexuses are compared across districts, and at the intra-district urban-rural context. The study employs high quality household survey data based on the latest Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey (MICS, 2014-15) for Punjab. A sample of 36,400 HHs were chosen for the study. The key findings of the study are summarized herein. The HHDI reveals that not all districts in Punjab can be categorized as 'low development' as alluded to by the national human development index (HDI). Instead, medium levels of human development are noted for districts with high and low remittance inflows. The results also support the importance of decomposing the HHDI into its sub-indices. In examining differences in human development between migrant HHs and non-migrant HHs, the results indicate that the core sub-index that should not go unnoticed is the housing environment (considered as material wealth or assets and standard of living). Non-migrant HHs seem to be worse off or deprived in terms of their housing environment (facilities and conditions) relative to remittance receiving HHs. Further, the empirical results on the remittance-HHDI nexus suggest that migrant HHs are relatively better-off than non-migrant HHs across most of the districts in Punjab, after controlling for HH characteristics and features specific to the HH head. Disaggregated estimations of HH development again indicate that remittances matter for development in terms of housing for most of the districts in Pakistan. Additionally, the remittance-poverty analysis implies that the probability of being poor among migrant HHs is significantly lower than the non-migrant HHs in all districts of Punjab. The implications that follow from the findings are: First, the study supports the feasibility of quantifying human development at the sub-national HH-level, as the newly constructed HHDI confirms the varying levels of human development across the districts of Punjab. Second, the study suggests that migrant remittances are most likely to increase inequalities in the development of housing and poverty disparities between migrant- and non-migrant HHs in all districts of Punjab. The government therefore needs to balance its focus on education and health with housing, when providing developmental assistance to the HHs in Punjab. The target group of HHs to be given priority should be those located in districts with the highest incidence of poverty and lowest HHDI, namely HHs in South Punjab.


Two new species, Inocybe nrytiliodora Stangl & Vauras and Inocybe urceolicystis Stangl & Vauras, are described from Finland. Both are smooth-spored and have metuloid cystidia. I. nrytiliodora is characterized by a smell reminiscent that of Mytilus, and short, broad and thin-walled hymenium cystidia. The stipe of this species is not pruinose. The best differentiating character of I. urceolicystis is found in the microscopy: the cystidia are nearly unique to the smooth-spored species in the genus in being rounded basally. That species has pruinose stipe apex and spennatic smell. Both rare species are described and discussed, and the descriptions are completed with photographs, and habitus and microscopical drawings. Inocybe appendiculata Kuhner and I . nematoloma Joss. are reported as new to Finland.


Adoption of new health information technology is shown to be challenging. However, the degree to which new technology will be adopted can be predicted by measures of usefulness and ease of use. In this work these key determining factors are focused on for design of a wound documentation tool. In the context of wound care at home, consistent with evidence in the literature from similar settings, use of Speech Recognition Technology (SRT) for patient documentation has shown promise. To achieve a user-centred design, the results from a conducted ethnographic fieldwork are used to inform SRT features; furthermore, exploratory prototyping is used to collect feedback about the wound documentation tool from home care nurses. During this study, measures developed for healthcare applications of the Technology Acceptance Model will be used, to identify SRT features that improve usefulness (e.g. increased accuracy, saving time) or ease of use (e.g. lowering mental/physical effort, easy to remember tasks). The identified features will be used to create a low fidelity prototype that will be evaluated in future experiments.


Comb-like terpolymers with a polymethacrylate backbone, carrying short pendant poly(ethylene)oxide (PEO) side chains (Mn = 300 g mol−1, 5 EO units), carboxylic acid groups and a few styrene (S) units [P(PEOMA300-co-MAA-co-S)-SG1], were synthesized by nitroxide-mediated polymerization, and used to initiate the emulsion polymerization of n-butyl methacrylate and styrene at 85 °C. The macroalkoxyamine initiators were shown to display a pH/temperature double responsive behavior. Above pH 5.7, the incorporation of MAA units in the copolymers shifted the solubility transition to higher temperatures whereas below pH 5.7, the cloud points decreased with increasing MAA content due to the increased hydrophobicity of non-ionized MAA units and also possibly because of inter- or intrapolymeric H-bonding between the carboxylic acid groups of MAA and the oxygen atoms of PEO. Chain extension of the comb-like terpolymers with an immiscible poly(n-butyl methacrylate-co-styrene) block, carried out above or below the lower critical solution temperature (LCST) of the macroinitiator, resulted in electrosterically self-stabilized nano-objects with spherical, worm-like or vesicular nanostructures. The effect of the composition of the hydrophilic block, the pH and the macroinitiator concentration on the control of the polymerization, the polymerization kinetics and the particle morphology was studied in detail. Compared to their P(PEOMA300-co-S)-SG1 or P(PEOMA950-co-S)-SG1 homologues, the macroalkoxyamine terpolymers displayed significantly different stabilizing properties which directly influenced the phase diagram. Lastly, hybrid nanostructures consisting of silica particles decorated by self-assembled block copolymers were also reported using the macroalkoxyamine initiator containing 14 mol% of MAA. Interestingly, the polymerization performed at pH 9 resulted in partially coalesced short worms radially expanding from the silica core in a sea urchin-like morphology.


The legacy of human activity is recorded in natural archives such as ice cores and lake sediments. Together these reveal that humans have impacted the global carbon and metal cycles for thousands of years. However little is known about human-environmental change in the United States before European contact. This dissertation uses sorbed metals and stable isotopes of nitrogen measured in lake sediments to reconstruct past human-environmental change from two study regions: the Michigan Copper Districts and Cahokia (a Pre-Columbian city) near modern day East St. Louis, Illinois. Results from eight lakes suggest that distinct physical, geochemical, and isotopic changes associated with human impacts can be detected in lake sediments from the two study regions spanning from 9600 to 600 years before present (yr BP). These changes are consistent with the archeological record and occur at different times and magnitudes at each lake, indicating that the disturbances shifted through time. Sediments from seven lakes in the Michigan Copper District indicate that emissions from copper mining occurred from 9600 to 5000 yr BP when the archeological record suggests that hunter-gatherer societies known as the Old Copper Complex inhabited the region. Results from a lake near Cahokia in Illinois span the last ~1500 years when agricultural people lived in settlements and constructed earthen mounds along the Mississippi River. Sorbed metal concentrations and nitrogen isotope increases in the sediment after 1808 AD and from 1150 to 1350 AD. Changes after 1150 AD coincide with higher human populations during the height of Cahokia (i.e. Stirling and Moorehead Phases) inferred from the archeological record. Overall, the data presented here provide a new window in which to document the responses of lake systems in the United States to human impacts in prehistory.


Bifunctional Fe-SBA-15-SO3H mesoporous materials with different Si/Fe molar ratios (3, 5, and 7) have been synthesized via a simple direct hydrothermal method and characterized by XRD, N2-adsorption/desorption, TG/DTG and FT-IR techniques, and used as solid acid catalysts in the esterification of lactic acid with methanol. XRD and N2 sorption characterizations show successful iron doping within the mesoporous channels of SBA-15-SO3H. The FT-IR and TG/DTG characterizations also reveal the presence of iron. With the incorporation of Fe ions into the SBA-15-SO3H, the acid sites substantially increased because of the selfseparated acidity of the hydrolysis of Fe 3+ solutions. However, in the Si/Fe = 3 molar ratio, the catalytic conversion decreased which is caused by the reduced cooperation effect between the acid pairs due to the weakened hydrogen bonds and collapse of the pore structure. This further suggests that the mesoporous structure decreases with the decrease in Si/Fe ratio.


OBJECTIVE To assess signalment and concurrent disease processes in dogs with aortic thrombotic disease (ATD). DESIGN Retrospective case-control study. ANIMALS Dogs examined at North American veterinary teaching hospitals from 1985 through 2011 with medical records submitted to the Veterinary Medical Database. PROCEDURES Medical records were reviewed to identify dogs with a diagnosis of ATD (case dogs). Five control dogs without a diagnosis of ATD were then identified for every case dog. Data were collected regarding dog age, sex, breed, body weight, and concurrent disease processes. RESULTS ATD was diagnosed in 291 of the 984,973 (0.03%) dogs included in the database. The odds of a dog having ATD did not differ significantly by sex, age, or body weight. Compared with mixed-breed dogs, Shetland Sheepdogs had a significantly higher odds of ATD (OR, 2.59). Protein-losing nephropathy (64/291 [22%]) was the most commonly recorded concurrent disease in dogs with ATD. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE Dogs with ATD did not differ significantly from dogs without ATD in most signalment variables. Contrary to previous reports, cardiac disease was not a common concurrent diagnosis in dogs with ATD.


Australian terrestrial flatworms number more than 137 known species of which 70% are described. The total fauna is estimated to be in excess of 300 species. The flatworms mostly occur within hyper-humid to sub-arid moisture regions, and are assigned to two principal families. In the Rhynchodemidae: Rhynchodeminae 35 species are accommodated in Cotyloplana, Digonopyla, Dolichoplana, Platydemus, Rhynchodemus, and new genera. The 84 species in the Geoplanidae: Caenoplaninae are assigned to Artioposthia, Caenoplana, Australoplana, Parakontikia, Reomkago, Fletchamia, Lenkunya, Tasmanoplana, and new genera. There are eight introduced species. Two major flatworm faunal units are recognised in Australia. A northern element dominated by rhynchodemid genera including taxa which also occur in Papua New Guinea - Irian Jaya and Indonesia. The southern element is dominated by geoplanid genera including some with as yet poorly defined Gondwanan affinities. These flatworm faunal units broadly accord with the Torresian (northern) and with the Tasmanian, South-western and Kosciuskan (southern) zoogeographic subregions.