Introduction: Citizenship and International Migration As there are various forms and types of international migration, there is a corresponding variety of statuses of immigrants and hence citizenships. (1) For instance, regarding the relationship between citizen status and immigration, Baubock historically categorizes three typologies, namely dependent immigration, colonizing immigration and citizen immigration (Baubock, 1991: 26-32). In dependent immigration, the immigrants lack the right to immigrate and settle in the country for an extended period. In most cases of dependent immigration, neither the sending country nor the receiving country entitles individuals the rights of immigration, but when they enter the receiving state, for instance as guest workers, these immigrants find themselves under a reduced citizenship status within the new country's legal and political system. In colonizing immigration, the sovereignty of the country of immigration is severely restricted by the country of emigration, as in the colonization schemes of sub-Saharan Africa. In citizen immigration, individuals hold an independent right to immigrate, generally by obtaining an internationally valid passport. The countries of immigration grant these individuals immigration rights, even to people who have not been formally registered citizens before immigration. The best-known cases of such countries are Germany and Israel, both of which grant immigration rights to people who meet certain criteria of ethnic origin (Baubock, 1991: 26-32). Apart from the status of formal citizens, citizen immigration-type immigrants may be given the status of dual citizens or denizens. Dual citizenship in citizen immigration may be granted to immigrants if both of the states in question legally allow dual citizenship. Prior to recent decades, dual citizenship was generally legally prohibited by most states, and corresponding measures were taken to discourage it. Despite these international efforts to limit dual citizenship, the number of people holding more than one citizenship has climbed in recent decades, with international migration being one of the key reasons for this. The opposition to dual citizenship is rooted in conceptions of the well-ordered international world as follows: every person belongs to one and only one state; dual citizenship is to be avoided in order to protect the unity, cohesion and strength of the state; dual citizenship is incompatible with loyalty to the state; dual citizenship may cause problems in cultural and national identification; dual identifications may threaten both national unity and nations themselves; and dual citizenship threatens national security and democracy. Traditional antipathy to dual citizenship springs from a tendency to evaluate the relationship between citizens and the state from the latter's point of view. From the point of view of individuals, however, it is contended that the inconveniences of dual citizenship are minimal and outweighed by its advantages (Hammar, 1989: 86-93). Another status category of immigrants in cases of citizen immigration is denizens. Citizens are members of a state who have certain rights and duties in their relationship with it. However, apart from formal citizens, there may be other individuals in the society who have rights and duties similar to those of other citizens, yet may not be endowed with formal citizenship status. In some cases, either the sending or the receiving countries may not allow dual citizenship. In order not to lose their citizenship rights in the sending country, these immigrants may opt for permanent residency. They may have the right to enter the state's territory from abroad, to settle in the country, to take up work there, to receive social benefits and to vote in local elections. These "privileged non-citizens" are called, in Tomas Hammar's definition, "denizens" who have certain work, residence and welfare rights just like ordinary citizens (Hammar, 1989: 83). …


Background/aims The aim of our study was to investigate the associations between driving self-regulation and glaucoma severity, and between driving self-regulation and glaucomatous visual field (VF) defect patterns. Methods In 247 patients with primary open-angle glaucoma included in this prospective observational study, a battery of ophthalmic examination was performed, including visual acuity (VA) and VF. Integrated binocular VF was constructed and mean of total deviation (mTD) values in four sectors was calculated (mTDsup-peri, mTDsup-centre, mTDinf-peri and mTDinf-centre). In addition, all participants answered seven questions regarding their avoidance in driving. (1) at night, (2) in rain, (3) in fog, (4) on freeways, (5) lane changing, (6) at high speed and (7) close to the car in front. The associations between these driving behaviours and 10 variables (age, gender, best VA, worst VA, the four sectorial average TD values, years holding a driver's licence and distance driven per week) were analysed using the generalised linear model with binomial distribution, followed by the model section method using the corrected Akaike information criterion. Results As a result of the model selection, it was suggested that deterioration of mTDsup-peri was associated with (1) avoiding driving at night and (2) avoiding driving in rain. On the other hand, mTDsup-centre was related to (3) avoiding driving in fog. Conclusion Damage in visual function was related with driving behaviours in patients with glaucoma.


We consider a scenario where an artificial agent is reading a stream of text composed of a set of narrations, and it is informed about the identity of some of the individuals that are mentioned in the text portion that is currently being read. The agent is expected to learn to follow the narrations, thus disambiguating mentions and discovering new individuals. We focus on the case in which individuals are entities and relations and propose an end-to-end trainable memory network that learns to discover and disambiguate them in an online manner, performing one-shot learning and dealing with a small number of sparse supervisions. Our system builds a not-given-in-advance knowledge base, and it improves its skills while reading the unsupervised text. The model deals with abrupt changes in the narration, considering their effects when resolving coreferences. We showcase the strong disambiguation and discovery skills of our model on a corpus of Wikipedia documents and on a newly introduced data set that we make publicly available.


• A fluid nutriment (Sustagen) of known carbohydrate, fat, protein, mineral, vitamin, and known caloric content was tested to determine whether its effects on gastric acidity might render it useful in patients with various gastric secretory disturbances. Sustagen provoked less secretion of acid than did a test meal of crackers and water in 10 patients. It suppressed the secretion of free acid in response to histamine in four patients. A group of four patients took it alternately with milk on successive days; gastric analyses showed that the Sustagen caused more complete and prolonged reduction of acidity than did the milk. A group of six patients who had been suffering from the distressing symptoms of prolonged nocturnal hyperchlorhydria received Sustagen by continuous intragastric drip, which completely abolished the free acidity during the night.


The report of paraplegia following epidural analgesia (Anuesthesiu I98 1; 3 6 952-3) infers an extremely serious allegation about the most significant method of obstetric analgesia currently practised; moreover, thc report is so deficient in obstetric, anaesthetic, neurological, psychiatric and medical details that the diagnosis must be questioned-indeed, if the diagnosis was correct then the case as described is most atypical, for an epidural haematoma constitutes a true emergency in which neurosurgical help must he sought without The details of the case, which are provided are insufficient to conclude that an epidural haematoma caused the neuropathy. The diagnosis could just as easily be an 'obstetric palsy'3 due to injury of the lumbosacral trunk; yet there is no mention of this not uncommon lesion. The characteristics of obstetric neuropathies3 must he considered before any final diagnosis can he made. An epidural haematoma generally produces a cauda equina syndrome as the references cited in the report clearly indicate; yet the clinical data presented d o not fully support this diagnosis. Blood in the cpidural space and catheter is common. as suggested and, where this is accompanied by evidence of a narrowing of the lumbar spinal canal. a myelogram should he done as a matter of routine as Bromagez points out. The fact that this patient recovered from her paralysis suggests that the neuropathy was not due to haematoma formation. The title of the report is also very misleading. although semantically correct. The term 'paraplegia', when used in this context, should be reserved for permanent loss of motor function in the lower part of the body: after all, patients who receive regional or general anaesthesia, all exhibit a 'ncuropathy' but such paralysis is rarely, if ever, referred to as a 'plegia'. Dcpurtment of Anuesihesiu, Royal Women's Hospital, Grutten Street, Curlton, Vicioriu, Australia 3053 J.A. CROWHUKST


A novel compressive sampling scheme suitable for highly scalable hardware implementations is presented. The scheme utilizes an identical pseudo-random sequence for every image column, therefore reducing in-pixel hardware complexity and allowing measurement matrix generation in a single clock cycle. As a result, high frame rates and low power consumption are achievable with an acceptable reduction in raw image quality for many practical video applications. Physical IC design issues such as device mismatch, noise and non-linearity, are analyzed and their effects on compressed image acquisition are presented and discussed. As a proof-of-concept, specialized pixels, Comparator-Based Switched Capacitor readout and Column-Parallel Differential Cyclic-ADCs are designed in a 0.18μm standard CMOS technology. The simulation results of the proposed circuit show that a 256×256 pixels architecture consumes 1.45mW at 250fps and 26.2mW at 8000fps. The proposed scheme can easily be applicable in different circuit design solutions and scaled towards newer technology nodes and higher image resolutions.


This study investigated the firing patterns of striatal and cortical neurons in rats in a temporal generalization task. Striatal and cortical ensembles were recorded in rats trained to lever press at 2 possible criterion durations (10 s or 40 s from tone onset). Twenty-two percent of striatal and 15% of cortical cells had temporally specific modulations in their firing rate, firing at a significantly different rate around 10 s compared with 40 s. On 80% of trials, a post hoc analysis of the trial-by-trial consistency of the firing rates of an ensemble of neurons predicted whether a spike train came from a time window around 10 s versus around 40 s. Results suggest that striatal and cortical neurons encode specific durations in their firing rate and thereby serve as components of a neural circuit used to represent duration.


We describe two examples of three-dimensional Filippov-type flows in which multiple attractors are created by grazing–sliding bifurcations. To the best of our knowledge these are the first examples to show multistability due to a grazing–sliding bifurcation in flows. In both examples, we identify the coefficients of the normal form map describing the bifurcation, and use this to find parameters with the desired behaviour. In the first example this can be done analytically, whilst the second is a dry-friction model and the identification is numerical. This explicit correspondence between the flows and a truncated normal form map reveals an important feature of the sensitivity of the predicted dynamics: the scale of the variation of the bifurcation parameter has to be very carefully chosen. Although no detailed analysis is given, we believe that this may indicate a much greater sensitivity to parameters than experience with smooth flows might suggest. We conjecture that the grazing–sliding bifurcations leading to multistability remained unreported in the literature due to this sensitivity to parameter variations.


Introduction In modern society, obesity is an increasingly prevalent, and now widely recognised, risk factor for almost all cardiovascular diseases, exerting independent adverse effects on the cardiovascular system. Despite this, the effects within adult congenital heart disease are not well documented but are becoming increasingly important. Methods We collected data from 155 patients (aged 7–76 years) with repaired tetralogy of Fallot (rTOF), scanned between 2004 and 2018 in OCMR. Anthropometric data (height, weight, age) were recorded. All patients had CMR imaging (1.5T) to determine right ventricular (RV) cavity size (end diastolic volume; EDV; ml) and phase contrast flow imaging to determine pulmonary regurgitation severity (PR, %). The association of obesity with RVEDV in rTOF was determined by linear regression and compared to the relationship seen in the normal heart (n=722) using dummy variable regression. Results Comparing rTOF patients scanned in the period 2013–2018 (n=67) to those of 2002–2012 (n=88) showed a substantial increase over time in the proportion of rTOF patients who were either overweight (19.4% to 28.4%) or obesity (9.4% to 13.6%, figure A). In parallel, the proportion of patients who were underweight declined (19.4% to 6.8%). As height (167±13 vs 166±11cm, p=0.66) and age (32±15 vs 28±14 yr, p=0.16) did not differ between the groups, the 6 kg greater average weight in the later population can be attributed to fat mass. Strikingly, 42% of rTOF patients scanned in the last five years were either overweight or obese, highlighting this is a significant clinical problem. In rTOF, RV dilatation was associated with increased BMI, regardless of the presence or severity of PR (figure B). Although dilatation of the RV was associated with higher BMI in the normal population, the degree of RV cavity dilatation is over four-fold greater in rTOF (RVEDV rTOF +21 ml, vs. normal heart +5 ml per 10 BMI points increase, p<0.01, figure C). In comparison, although obesity results in LV cavity dilation in both rTOF and normal hearts, there was no difference in the degree of cavity dilatation (LVEDV rTOF +8 ml vs +6 ml per 10 BMI points increase, p=0.79 for comparison). This suggests that the RV dilatory response to obesity in rTOF is disproportionate, being not only over two-fold greater than the dilatory response of the LV within rTOF patients, but also four-fold higher than that seen in the normal heart. Abstract 140 Figure 1 Conclusion Obesity is becoming more prevalent in rTOF patients and is related to disproportionate dilatation of the RV, at all levels of pulmonary regurgitation. The reasons for this are unknown but are likely to be related to the additional stroke volume demands of obesity imposed in the setting of a congenitally pathological ventricle. Chronic PR and existing RV dilatation contribute too. Given the relationship between RV dilatation, symptoms and the need for surgical intervention, this should logically be detrimental in rTOF. It follows then that treatment strategies that reduce RV cavity size in rTOF may be beneficial. As such, obesity is a promising and modifiable therapeutic target in rTOF. Conflict of Interest None


It is possible to control the transmission of microwave power in a waveguide via external control of the dc bias on a semiconductor diode mounted across the waveguide in a direction parallel to the E field. The combination of a microwave detector with such a modulator affords a means whereby RF power in one waveguide can be made to control RF power in a second waveguide. In order to test the applicability of this circuit to binary logic functions, a regenerative memory loop has been constructed. Traveling-wave tubes were employed to raise the level of a controlled signal to that required by the detector. Using an X-band carrier, binary pulse stability was observed at pulse repetition rates of 685 mc.


This study used a sample of 314 British athletes (170 male, 144 female) to examine whether social-contextual and personal motivation variables proposed by self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 2002) can predict reported levels of sportspersonship and antisocial moral attitudes in sport. Structural equation modeling analysis showed that perceptions of coach autonomy support were positive predictors of athletes' satisfaction of their psychological needs for competence, relatedness, and autonomy. In turn, the three needs were positive predictors of autonomous motivation. Autonomous motivation positively predicted sportspersonship and negatively predicted antisocial moral attitudes in sport. The opposite pattern of results was observed between controlled motivation and the sportspersonship and antisocial moral attitudes variables. The findings emphasize the importance of autonomy supportive environments, psychological need satisfaction, and autonomous motivation for fostering sportspersonship in sport.


DNA barcodes (COI) of Troglocobitis starostini, endemic to a single site in Turkmenistan, were analysed and put into the taxonomic context of the large group of nemacheilid loaches known from Western and Central Asia. All applied phylogenetic tree-based analyses place the species into the genus Paracobitis. This finding supports previous morphological studies. While the exact position of Troglocobitis starostini within Paracobitis was not resolved unambiguously, it was constantly recovered within Paracobitis, irrespective of the tree reconstruction method applied. With a minimum interspecific K2P distance of 7.19% P. persa was the closest hit in our dataset, which comprised a total of ten species of Paracobitis, which showed an average interspecific K2P distance of 5.43% (range 2.78-9.44%).


Determination of the temperature at which Austenite is formed is one of the important parameters in the heat treatment process. Chemical composition is an effective factor on these temperatures, particularly in steels that are used in various industries. In this research we have made an attempt to determine these temperatures based on the chemical composition of the steel. The technique used for this purpose is feedforward Artificial Neural Network (ANN) with the Back Propagation (BP) learning algorithm. A comparison is made between Ac1, Ac3 temperatures predicted with this model and those from the empirical equation as well as the experimental values obtained from costly and time-consuming tests in scientific and industrial centers for various steels. This comparison indicates that at Ac1, a better agreement exists between the ANN-predicted results and experimental values than the results from the empirical equation and experimental values. At Ac3, the results from the empirical equation are closer to those of the experimental than those predicted from the ANN. This was due to the dispersion of the data set used.


An electrochemical process provides a cheap and simple route to layer-by-layer growth of metal films. The growth of ultrathin films is generally hindered by roughening and three-dimensional mound formation. Atomic layer deposition (ALD), in which atomic layer control and conformal growth are achieved through sequential, self-limiting surface reactions (1), can eliminate or reduce such roughening. One application of ALD is to deposit ultrathin layers of expensive metals such as Pt that are used, for example, as the catalyst in protonexchange membrane fuel cells (2). Besides the economic incentives to produce ultrathin films (3), there are also scientific payoffs—they often have catalytic, electronic, or magnetic properties that are not found in the bulk material (4–6). Although ALD processes are usually conducted in the vapor phase, Liu et al. (7) show on page 1327 of this issue that they can sequentially electrodeposit two-dimensional Pt layer by layer by simply pulsing the applied electrochemical potential in a single plating bath. The process is inexpensive and rapid. Because each layer is produced by cycling the potential rather than by exchange of reactants, electrochemical ALD could be orders of magnitude faster than vapor-phase ALD.


: A retrospective chart review was undertaken to determine the natural history of repaired umbilical hernias in patients with and without a history of ascites. Eighty-five patients underwent umbilical herniorrhaphy during the interval from January 1973 to March 1983. The length of hospital stay was significantly longer for the 22 patients who had a history of ascites; however, the complication rate of elective repair of umbilical hernias that were caused by ascites was not different from that of the 63 patients without a history of ascites. There was no operative mortality in either group. Sixty-eight patients were reevaluated at least 1 month postoperatively. Of the 51 patients who had never had ascites, six (12%) developed a recurrent hernia. Of the 17 patients whose hernias were caused by ascites, eight (47%) developed recurrences. Of the 11 herniorrhaphies performed when ascitic fluid was present, eight (73%) resulted in a recurrence, whereas only one (17%) patient had a recurrence among the group of seven patients who underwent herniorrhaphy at a time when the ascitic fluid was no longer present. Umbilical hernias caused by ascites can be repaired with acceptable morbidity and probably should be repaired after the fluid has been medically removed.


The purpose of this study was to investigate faculty members' job satisfaction according to some socio‐demographic variables and their views of the university for which they work. Participants were 392 faculty members working at various colleges of Hacettepe (193 participants‐ 49.2%) and Cukurova (199 participants‐50.8%) universities. The Job Satisfaction Scale for Academics (Kelecioglu, Bilge and Akman, 2006) and an accompanying survey developed by the researchers to inquire information on independent variables were used for da‐ ta collection. The results showed that faculty job satisfaction had significant relationships with the following variables: marital status, objectivity in academic promotions, access to computers and the Internet, social opportunities of the university and the degree of the university's promotion of a sense of belonging as valued members. The results and recommendations for future research were also discussed within the body of this research.


Teaching is an art of assisting students to learn. All good teaching is characterized by proper teaching method. This study was undertaken to investigate the effectiveness of teaching methods in the subject of social studies. The study was experimental in nature and a pretest/posttest control group design was used. The sample of the study consisted of 62 students of grade 10 th . The students were grouped into control and experimental groups equally. Both groups were pre-tested. Two teaching methods (discussion and lecture method) were used in the study. The experimental group was taught with discussion method along with lecture while the control group was taught with lecture method only. Four lessons were selected in the subject of social studies. Duration of each period was 45 minutes. The experiment was continued for one month. Pretests and Posttests were developed for each topic. The results of pre-tests revealed that there was no significant difference in the performance of both groups. While the results of post-tests revealed that there was significant difference in the mean score of both experimental and control group. The results of the study indicated that mean score of the experimental group was higher than the control group. It was concluded that discussion method was more effective than lecture method. The study recommended that teachers may prefer discussion method in teaching of social studies.


The last forty years have seen a marked rise in legal malpractice lawsuits. Recent numbers show that no abatement is in sight; instead the number of large legal malpractice claims is steadily increasing. Although lawyers have a personal interest in limiting liability, they also have a professional one in protecting clients from harm arising due to malpractice. But how can the legal profession curtail and manage malpractice liability while also providing relief to injured clients? Applying existing tort scholarship on no-fault alternative systems to professional legal services, this Article argues that no-fault may be a viable option in many common malpractice circumstances, particularly those involving true mistake and inevitability. In particular, I examine the infrastructure already in existence in current state bar systems of "lawyers' funds for client protection" as a possible nesting ground for a more expansive and innovative alternative to traditional malpractice suits. The paper concludes that while expanded no-fault coverage is a feasible alternative to current practices in certain areas, increased fact-finding is needed to support the political will for reform.


Heme proteins are found in all living organisms, and perform a wide variety of tasks ranging from electron transport, to the oxidation of organic compounds, to the sensing and transport of small molecules. In this work we review the application of classical and quantum-mechanical atomistic simulation tools to the investigation of several relevant issues in heme proteins chemistry: (i) conformational analysis, ligand migration, and solvation effects studied using classical molecular dynamics simulations; (ii) electronic structure and spin state energetics of the active sites explored using quantum-mechanics (QM) methods; (iii) the interaction of heme proteins with small ligands studied through hybrid quantum mechanics-molecular mechanics (QM-MM) techniques; (iv) and finally chemical reactivity and catalysis tackled by a combination of quantum and classical tools.


In this paper, we propose necessary and sufficient conditions for a scalar function to be nonincreasing along solutions to general differential inclusions with state constraints. The problem of determining if a function is nonincreasing  appears in the study of stability and safety, typically using Lyapunov and barrier functions, respectively. The results in this paper present infinitesimal conditions that do not require any knowledge about the solutions to the system. Results under different regularity properties of the considered scalar function are provided. This includes when the scalar function is lower semicontinuous, locally Lipschitz and regular, or continuously differentiable.


Most collaborative filtering models assume that the interaction of users with items take a single form, e.g., only ratings or clicks or views. In fact, in most real-life recommendation scenarios, users interact with items in diverse ways. This in turn, generates complex usage data that contains multiple and diverse types of user feedback. In addition, within such a complex data setting, each user-item pair may occur more than once, implying on repetitive preferential user behaviors. In this work we tackle the problem of building a Collaborative Filtering model that takes into account such complex datasets. We propose a novel factor model, CDMF, that is capable of incorporating arbitrary and diverse feedback types without any prior domain knowledge. Moreover, CDMF is inherently capable of considering user-item repetitions. We evaluate CDMF against stateof- the-art methods with highly favorable results.


Weekly treatment with low-dose oral methotrexate (MTX) was compared with daily auranofin (AUR) treatment in a 36-week double-blind, randomized, multicenter study of 281 patients with active, adult-onset rheumatoid arthritis. Both treatment groups showed significant improvement by the usual measures of clinical efficacy. The response with MTX occurred earlier and was consistently greater than that with AUR. An intent-to-treat analysis showed significantly greater improvement (P less than 0.01) with MTX for painful and swollen joint counts and physician and patient global assessments of disease activity. Adverse reactions were reported more frequently in the AUR group, and more AUR-treated patients were withdrawn from the study because of toxicity. MTX was thus more effective and better tolerated than AUR in this study.


Abstract Purpose: The recent guidelines published in 2011 suggest the use of only one imaging method for the final imaging diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma. To evaluate the methods in the context of the available literature evidence, this systematic review aimed at assessing the relative performance of different imaging techniques currently used in clinical practice. Materials and Methods: MEDLINE and EMBASE were searched from January 1996 to June 2011, with no language limitation. Eligible trials had to be conducted in patients with suspicion or diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma; compare at least two of the following imaging modalities: magnetic resonance imaging, computed tomography, ultrasound; have pathological findings as a reference standard. An analysis also including non-comparative studies was performed as a validation of the main comparison results. Results: Of 5,144 screened papers, 16 studies fulfilled the eligibility criteria for the comparative analysis and 65 were eligible for the non-comparative analysis. The overall sensitivity and specificity derived by the pooled analysis were 0.78 and 0.77 for computed tomography, 0.84 and 0.84 for magnetic resonance imaging and 0.86 and 0.77 for ultrasound, respectively. In the pair-wise comparisons, ultrasound showed a statistically better specificity than magnetic resonance imaging (0.86 vs. 0.78; p = 0.014) and a statistically better sensitivity than computed tomography (0.88 vs. 0.78; p = 0.030). Conclusion: The present systematic review did not show an obvious superiority of one imaging method. Since their accuracy is not completely overlapping, the possibility of reaching better performance by combining methods should be considered in future prospective trials.


The theoretical basis of reactive oxygen species and their impact on health issues are relatively easy to understand by biomedical students. The detection of reactive oxygen species requires expensive equipment, the procedures are time consuming and costly, and the results are hard to interpret. Moreover, cause-and-effect relationships in the living system are not so evident. In this report, we adapted a twostep procedure to detect anion superoxide radicals and hydrogen peroxide generation in lymphocytes exposed to paraquat by using nitroblue tetrazolium salt and dihydrorhodamine, respectively. Also, a twostep assay was performed to evaluate lymphocyte viability and nuclei morphologic changes on paraquat exposure for 1 and 24 hours incubation time by using trypan blue exclusion assay and acridine orange/ ethidium bromide staining technique, respectively. Vitamin E was used as antioxidant to inhibit the deleterious effects of paraquat on cells. Students learned how to (i) design and perform experiments in the laboratory, (ii) read critical scientific literature, and (iii) discuss and contrast relevant information about reactive oxygen species as causative agents of cell death phenomenon.


The procedures for measuring the blood pressure cause emotional reactions, which in turn influence, in a manner which is not to be disregarded, the blood pressure values. In order to evaluate the degree and type of such influence the blood pressure was determined for 3 consecutive days by the same doctor using the same technique in 242 children (150 boys and 92 girls) of a primary school in Bari. The systolic and diastolic values obtained allowed us to categorize the children in to 3 groups in accordance with their individual reactions on occasion of the second and third determination: a) children whose blood pressure went down; b) children whose blood pressure went up; c) children whose blood pressure remained unchanged. The differences of the values obtained between the first and third determination were the most evident; in particular, the PAs had an average reduction of 11.3 mmHg in 68.6% of the subjects, an average increase of 7.7 mmHg in 14.9%, whereas in the remaining 16.5% was unchanged. The PAd had un average reduction of 9.5 mmHg in 51%, an average increase of 7.6 mmHg in 19% and the remaining 30% was unchanged. The heart rate shows a statistically significant reduction of about 4 beats/min. between the first and subsequent determinations, and it is connected with the blood pressure. No correlation was found with the PAd. The variable reactions as a consequence of the repeated determinations could cause an error not to be disregarded, in view of the results obtained from the programs concerning the screening of the PA and of the identification of normal values age related.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)


Internet user behavior models characterize user browsing dynamics or the transitions among web pages. The models help Internet companies improve their services by accurately targeting customers and providing them the information they want. For instance, specific web pages can be customized and prefetched for individuals based on sequences of web pages they have visited. Existing user behavior models abstracted as time-homogeneous Markov models cannot efficiently model user behavior variation through time. This demo presents DECT, a scalable time-variant variable-order Markov model. DECT digests terabytes of user session data and yields user behavior patterns through time. We realize DECT using Apache Spark and deploy it on top of Yahoo! infrastructure. We demonstrate the benefits of DECT with anomaly detection and ad click rate prediction applications. DECT enables the detection of higher-order path anomalies and provides deep insights into ad click rates with respect to user visiting paths.


The article deals with the main tasks of health-care provision to the rescue and other emergency operations (ROEO) and organization of medical evacuation system FMBA of Russia in case of radiation accidents. The risk (threat) for workers engaged in ROEO, depending on the level of exposure of the radiation factor, is analyzed and recommendations for protective measures are considered. The authors showed the important role of the practical skills and knowledge of staff of institutions of FMBA of Russia and emergency response teams of radiation-hazardous facilities for address issues of healthcare provision to ROEO.


Abstract Stratigraphic, structural, volcanological and geochemical data allow a detailed reconstruction of the geological history of the island of Salina (central Aeolian sector). Its subaerial volcanism (c. 244 ka to 15.6 ka) developed through six successive Eruptive Epochs interrupted by major quiescence periods, volcano-tectonic collapses and recurrent episodes of marine terrace formation during MIS 7 and MIS 5. Several stratovolcanoes were constructed by strombolian and effusive (Pizzo Capo, Monte Rivi, Monte Fossa delle Felci, Monte dei Porri) to hydromagmatic and subplinian (Monte dei Porri, Pollara) activity, with a general east–west shift of active vents, controlled primarily by the dominant NNW–SSE and minor NE–SW regional tectonic trends, and a progressive chemical differentiation of the erupted products from calc-alkaline basalts to rhyolites. The magma compositions and variations through time are the result of contamination of primary magmas derived from a subduction-modified mantle source with the Calabro–Peloritano lower crust and subsequent differentiation dominated by polybaric fractional crystallization. Magma mixing and mingling processes occurred during individual eruptions. The early basalts were fed from deep reservoirs located near the crust–mantle boundary, whereas the later andesitic to dacitic and, ultimately, rhyolitic magmas originated through combined assimilation and fractional crystallization processes in magma reservoirs at mid- to upper-crustal levels. DVD: The 10 000 scale geological map of Salina is included on the DVD in the printed book and can also be accessed online at http://www.geolsoc.org.uk/Memoir37-electronic. Also included is a full geochemical dataset for Salina.


Shenzhen Metro line no.5 is the longest metro line of Shenzhen in one-time investment which met with complex geological conditions, great technical difficulties and short construction period. According to the characteristics of the project, Shenzhen government broke the traditional mindset to use the BT construction model through ' Investment and Financing-Building Delivery with Design and Construction Return' creatively, and built the structure of project management matching the mode. Exploration and innovation of the management mode focused on the integration of design and construction in the construction process of the metro line No.5 have been done by China Railway Group. Under the BT mode, design management phase should be involved early in the project. Meanwhile, effective work should be done such as technical preparation, design schedule, design modification, quality control, safety control and investment control. The construction practice of the Shenzhen Metro line No.5 indicated that the integration of design and construction is good to condense construction period, ensure the safety and quality of project and investment control.


Ultrasonography and Doppler ultrasound have undergone an impressive metamorphosis since their appearance and now occupy a pivotal role at the forefront of radiological imaging, as qualitative or quantitative tools for functional characterization of the vascular system. Ultrasonic methods that have developed throughout the years are used routinely in the investigation and treatment of many pathologic situations. One of the numerous medical branches that ultrasonography has been applied to is ophthalmology, being a fundamental choice for non-invasive ocular examination for the evaluation of a possible eye disease. The ultrasound revolution has mainly been due to technological advances in electronics and computing and is responsible for the diversity of imaging modes at the sonographer�s disposal. Microbubble contrast agents have dramatically extended the clinical and research applications of ultrasound and allow the microcirculation to be imaged as well as providing functional data, being safe and effective vascular echo enhancers. The aim of our study was to identify and evaluate possible differences between two separate conditions in the retrobulbar vascular system of our group of patients, using Doppler ultrasound in conjunction with the use of microbubble contrast agents. For the complete comprehension of the experimental part of this project, we present extensively the indicated theoretical background of ultrasound in general and of course the fundamental properties of Doppler ultrasound and microbubble contrast agents, that are closely related to the subject of this work. Each one of the patients that participated in this study had undergone vitrectomy for various pathologic reasons. We inserted the appropriate gas inside the vitreous cavity of each study eye for the treatment of the pathologic eyes. The study was conducted when there was 20-30% repletion of gas in the vitreous cavity and it was repeated when the vitreous cavity took up with aqueous humour. After the Colour Doppler analysis there was not found any statistical differences between PI or RI, neither between study eyes, nor between control eyes in both conditions (before-after). On the contrary, we found a statistical significant difference (p=0.0145) in blood perfusion rate between the bulbar vascular regions of the two different conditions in the Power Doppler part of our study. Finally, there was no statistical significant difference between the retrobulbar vascular regions (p=0.759).


Porcine deltacoronavirus (PDCoV) is a newly identified virus that has been detected in swine herds of North America associated with enteric disease. The aim of this study was to demonstrate the pathogenicity, course of infection, virus kinetics, and aerosol transmission of PDCoV using 87 conventional piglets and their 9 dams, including aerosol and contact controls to emulate field conditions. Piglets 2–4 days of age and their dams were administered an oronasal PDCoV inoculum with a quantitative real-time reverse transcription (qRT)-PCR quantification cycle (Cq) value of 22 that was generated from a field sample having 100% nucleotide identity to USA/Illinois121/2014 determined by metagenomic sequencing and testing negative for other enteric disease agents using standard assays. Serial samples of blood, serum, oral fluids, nasal and fecal swabs, and tissues from sequential autopsy, conducted daily on days 1–8 and regular intervals thereafter, were collected throughout the 42-day study for qRT-PCR, histopathology, and immunohistochemistry. Diarrhea developed in all inoculated and contact control pigs, including dams, by 2 days post-inoculation (dpi) and in aerosol control pigs and dams by 3–4 dpi, with resolution occurring by 12 dpi. Mild to severe atrophic enteritis with PDCoV antigen staining was observed in the small intestine of affected piglets from 2 to 8 dpi. Mesenteric lymph node and small intestine were the primary sites of antigen detection by immunohistochemistry, and virus RNA was detected in these tissues to the end of the study. Virus RNA was detectable in piglet fecal swabs to 21 dpi, and dams to 14–35 dpi.


The O and early B star winds show empirical corre- lations between X-ray (Lx) and Bolometric (LBol) luminosity as well as wind properties such as wind momentum and wind kinetic energy. Wolf-Rayet stars do not. We discuss scaling rela- tions to qualitatively explain this lack of correlation among the WR winds and to quantitatively reproduce the observed ratio of X-ray luminosities between the N-rich WN types and C-rich WC types. If (a) the filling factor of hot X-ray emitting gas varies as ( u M/v1) 1 for stars of different mass loss and terminal speed and (b) the ambient Wolf-Rayet wind component is optically thick to the hot gas X-rays, then a lack of correlation between Lx and wind parameters is to be expected. The emergent X-ray emission then depends only on factors relating to relative abun- dances and ionization. The observed ratio LX(WN)/LX(WC) is consistent with our scaling analysis using typical WN and WC abundances.


AIM
The aim of the present study was to assess risks prior to third molar removal. A 2-D panoramic radiograph or a 3-D cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) scan can be used to visualize the proximity of the third molar to the mandibular canal. We aimed to correlate panoramic indicators of risk with the incidence of contact between these two structures on CBCT scans.

METHODS
Patients were selected from a Western Australian population if they had a panoramic radiograph that illustrated signs of risk of inferior alveolar nerve injury and had a CBCT scan on file. Statistically-significant relationships between the relative position and distance between the mandibular canal and third molar were investigated using χ2 -test and Fisher's exact test in Stata version 13.

RESULTS
Within the Western Australian sample (N = 100), of six possible panoramic indicators of risk, two were significantly associated with contact between the tooth and mandibular canal on CBCT: (a) interruption of the radiographic white line of the canal; and (b) darkening of the root(s).

CONCLUSIONS
Two panoramic radiograph risk signs are significantly more likely to indicate contact on the CBCT scans: interruption of the white line and darkening of the root(s). Further research is required to develop CBCT prescription guidelines for surgical planning.


The paper presents empirical evidence regarding asset substitution in Bolivia in the 1990-2002 period. Using an ARCH-M/TARCH specifica-tion, the exchange rate depreciation is modeled in a crawling-peg re-gime with a real exchange rate target. The model is also used to esti-mate a proxy for the depreciation risk. Real interest rate differentials between dollar and time deposits denominated in domestic currency, expected currency depreciation and the depreciation risk are found to be statistically significant determinants of asset substitution. However, their explanatory power is very low, compared to that obtained for the variable used to capture inertia. This suggests the presence of the "peso problem" in the Bolivian economy.


The semi-arid region of China's Loess Plateau is characterized by fragile ecosystems and a shortage of water resources. The major natural forest type in this region is the secondary forest with the flora dominated by the Liaodong oak (Quercus liaotungensis Koidz.). To understand its transpiration water use in relation to environmental factors, we applied Granier-type thermal dissipation probes to monitor stem sap flows of 21 sample trees, representing different classes of diameter at breast height in a permanent plot. The stem- and stand-scale transpiration values during the 2008–2010 growing seasons were estimated using measurements of sap flux densities and corresponding sapwood areas. The dominant factors affecting stand-scale transpiration varied with time scales. Daily stand transpiration correlated with daily solar radiation and daytime average vapor pressure deficit. Seasonal and interannual changes in stand transpiration were closely related to leaf area index (LAI) values. No obvious relationship was observed between monthly stand transpiration and soil moisture or precipitation during the period, probably as a result of both the hysteretic effect of precipitation on transpiration, and changes in LAI throughout the growing season. Stand transpiration during the three growing seasons ranged from 75 to 106 mm, representing low to normal values for the semi-arid forest. The proportion of transpiration by oak trees in the stand was stable ranging from 60% to 66% and corresponded to their basal area proportion of approximately 59%. The results suggest that the natural forest consisting mainly of oak trees is in a formal stage of forest development that maintains a normal magnitude of annual water consumption.


Inflow discharge and outflow stage estimates for hydraulic flood models are generally derived from river gauge data. Uncertainties in the measured inflow data and the neglect of rainfall‐runoff contributions to the modeled domain downstream of the gauging locations can have a significant impact on these estimated "whole reach" inflows and consequently on flood predictions. In this study, a method to incorporate rating curve uncertainty and local rainfall‐runoff dynamics into the predictions of a reach‐scale flood model is proposed. The methodology is applied to the July 2007 floods of the River Severn in UK. Discharge uncertainty bounds are generated applying a nonparametric local weighted regression approach to stage‐discharge measurements for two gauging stations. Measured rainfall downstream from these locations is used as input to a series of subcatchment regional hydrological model to quantify additional local inflows along the main channel. A regional simplified‐physics hydraulic model is then applied to combine these contributions and generate an ensemble of discharge and water elevation time series at the boundaries of a local‐scale high complexity hydraulic model. Finally, the effect of these rainfall dynamics and uncertain boundary conditions are evaluated on the local‐scale model. Accurate prediction of the flood peak was obtained with the proposed method, which was only possible by resolving the additional complexity of the extreme rainfall contributions over the modeled area. The findings highlight the importance of estimating boundary condition uncertainty and local rainfall contributions for accurate prediction of river flows and inundation at regional scales.


Abstract In the premontane rain forests of northwest Costa Rica, patches of secondary forest can contain high densities of large Vriesea spp. bromeliads. Such patches contain an average of 6,470 ± 1,080 (s.e.) larvae ha-1 of the bromeliad-dwelling pseudostigmatid, Mecistogaster modesta, ca 3 6× higher than larval densities that we previously reported for adjacent primary forest. Using a new method to partition landscape variation in populations, we show that secondary forest has higher larval densities than primary forest because of higher bromeliad abundance (13% of effect), greater bromeliad size (33%), and greater larval abundance in bromeliads of similar size (54%). The last effect reflects additional effects of forest type after accounting for differences in the quantity of larval habitat. We use surveys of prey communities in bromeliads and adult densities in the two forest types to show that these additional effects of forest type are more likely due to adult behaviour, not larval resource limitation. This study demonstrates that certain areas of secondary forest can be disproportionately important for M. modesta populations, and has implications for estimating effects of forest loss and conversion on M. modesta.


Exposure to indoor allergens contributes significantly to asthma morbidity, with children raised in inner-city areas particularly affected by such exposures. Most inner-city homes have evidence of mouse infestation,1 with a linear dose-response relationship between mouse allergen exposure and asthma morbidity among mouse-sensitized children and adolescents.2 Furthermore, a threshold exposure level of greater than 0.5 μg of the major mouse allergen (Mus m1) per gram of house dust has been identified as clinically relevant. Preschool children with asthma living in inner-city Baltimore, Maryland, who were sensitized to mouse allergen and exposed to greater than 0.5 μg/g of Mus m1 experienced 50% more symptom days, 80% more days of β-agonist use, and increased risks of emergency department visits and hospitalizations compared with children with lower levels of exposure.3


In today's society, the increasing consumption and its impact on the environment is a relevant issue. The global market situation and varying environmental standards makes it even more complicated. Therefore, a focus on the life cycle of products including material flows in the society is necessary to improve environmental work and reduce environmental impacts. In this thesis, the shoe consumption in Sweden and its environmental impacts was analyzed between 2000 and 2010 with a model approaching life cycle assessment, product flow analysis and material flow alysis. The consumption was defined as the net inflow of shoes into Sweden during one year, no life time was considered. The shoes were categorized according to the CN system used for trade and statistics, which generated six shoe groups involving waterproof, rubber & plastic, leather, textile, others and shoe parts. Four impact categories involving acidification, eutrophication, global warming and POCP were included.
According to this study, the shoe consumption in Sweden increased by 20% during 2000 and 2010. In 2010, the total consumption was dominated by rubber & plastic shoes, 36%, leather shoes, 24%, and textile shoes, 22%. Most shoes consumed in Sweden are imported from Asia, while an increase in Asian import from 56% to 63% can be seen during 2000 and 2010. The shoes contributing most to the environmental impact of the Swedish shoe consumption in 2010 were leather shoes, up to 50%, rubber & plastic shoes, up to 26% and textile shoes, up to 17%. For the included impact categories, one pair of leather shoes show up to 3 times higher impact compared to an average shoe.
The results show that material production corresponds to the highest impact with 80% of the total life cycle. The most contributing materials per kilogram included leather, wool, nylon, aluminium, synthetic rubber, PET plastic, PU plastic and viscose. For the Swedish shoe consumption, the environmental impact of leather was dominating for all impact categories followed by synthetic rubber, natural rubber, cotton, wool and various plastics. The impact changes according to the net inflow, but is also affected by conditions in import countries and material content in shoes. Natural textile and wood materials are preferable compared to leather, rubber and synthetic fibers with regard to environmental impact. Thus, an increase in consumption of some shoe groups such as leather shoes might then generate higher impact than others.


Abstract. The taxonomy of the freshwater shrimps Caridina (Atyidae) is very complex and confused mostly because the morphological characters that have traditionally been used for species delimitation and identification are highly plastic. There is thus a need for an integrative approach to their taxonomy. In total, 42 specimens belonging to either Caridina buehleri Roux, 1934 or Caridina gueryi Marquet, Keith & Kalfatak, 2009 were examined. We combined here morphological data from 12 specimens from the whole distributional range of the species, including type specimens with 16S mtDNA analyses from seven freshly sampled specimens, to verify the specific status of Caridina buehleri from Papua New-Guinea, Central Sulawesi, Western Samoa and the Solomon Islands, and C. gueryi from Vanuatu. The comparison of 24 morphological characters showed that morphological variations of character traits between C. gueryi and C. buehleri are widely overlapping and that no morphological feature can effectively split specimens into two clear groups. Molecular characters corroborated these results, as specimens from both groups were only separated by a 2% p-distance, a genetic distance that is coherent with their potentially high dispersal abilities. We thus consider C. gueryi as a junior synonym of C. buehleri. Finally, C. buehleri is characterised mainly by a styliform and characteristically indented rostrum and a long stylocerite. Detailed re-descriptions of the type specimens of C. buehleri and C. gueryi are given, as well as their geographical and ecological distribution.


Chlorophyll destruction by Calanus spp. grazing on phytoplankton (diatoms and Phaeocystis) was assessed at stations in the Labrador Sea and off Labrador and Newfoundland (Canada). Copepods were fed at natural or diluted food concentrations over several (4 to 8) sequential 12 h feeding periods. Initial chlorophyll concentrations were between 0.2 and 19 pg I ' , and degrees of chlorophyll destruction were between 20 and 100%. For replicate incubations, degrees of chlorophyll destruction were similar. Over all experiments degrees of destruction were generally high and variable at low ingestion rates (<50 ng chl mg-' h-'), decreasing to a limit of about 4 5 % at higher ingestion rates. The relationship between ingestion rate and degree of chlorophyll destruction was not obviously affected by differences in in situ conditions (e.g. stage of the spring bloom). Filtration rates, by contrast, did vary, decreasing in the presence of an apparently noxious food (Phaeocystis) and sometimes increasing during experiments, perhaps in response to increasing hunger. Faecal pellets, collected from copepods fed at natural food concentrations, did not leak pigment over a 4 d period, and neither chlorophyll nor phaeopigment was lost as copepods with food in their guts were alloived to defecate for 3 h in filtered seawater. These results suggest that most chlorophyll destruction occurs at an early stage of feeding, and that phaeopigments are not intermediates. When we assumed in a simple model that the 'bleaching' reaction was enzymatically mediated, we found that enzyme activity varied linearly with initial ingestion rate, with a positive y-intercept. One interpretation of this is that there are 2 pools of enzyme activity: one associated with the copepods and the other with the phytoplankton. The algal enzymes are normally latent, but are activated by the physical break-up of cells during ingestion. At low ingestion rates the copepod enzyme can destroy all, or most, of the ingested chlorophyll, whereas at higher ingestion rates more of the destruction is due to the algal enzymes. The high variability in degrees of chlorophyll destruction reported here and elsewhere can be explained partly by differences between algal foods (e.g. differences in levels of the bleaching enzyme), partly by differences in copepod behaviour (e.g. effects on filtration rates), and partly by differences in experimental conditions, which affect the range of ingestion rates exhibited during an incubation (e.g. density of copepods, duration of incubation).


Shear collapse of reinforced concrete (RC) members is catastrophic and occurs suddenly with no advance warning of distress. In several occasions existing RC beams have been found to be deficient in shear and in need of strengthening. Conventional shear strengthening method such as external post tensioning, member enlargement along with internal transverse steel, and bonded steel plates are very costly, requiring extensive equipment, time, and significant labor. Conversely, the relatively new alternative strengthening technique using advanced composite materials, known as fiber reinforced polymer (FRP), offers significant advantages such as flexibility in design, ease of installation, reduced construction time, and improved durability. The overall objective of this study was to investigate the shear performance and failure modes of RC T-beams strengthened with externally bonded GFRP sheets. In order to achieve these objectives, an extensive experimental program consisting of testing eleven, full scale RC beams was carried out. The variables investigated in this study included steel stirrups, shear span-to-depth ratio, GFRP amount. The experimental results indicated that the contribution of externally bonded GFRP to the shear capacity is significant and depends on the variable investigated. The failures of strengthened beams are initiated with the debonding failure of FRP sheets followed by brittle shear failure. However, the shear capacity of these beams has increased as compared to the control beam which can be further improved if the debonding failure is prevented. An innovative method of anchorage technique by using GFRP plates has been used to prevent these premature failures, which as a result ensure full utilization of the strength of FRP. A theoretical study is also proposed by using ACI guidelines for computing the shear capacity of the strengthened beams.


The support vector machine (SVM) is a well-established classification method whose name refers to the particular training examples, called support vectors, that determine the maximum margin separating hyperplane. The SVM classifier is known to enjoy good generalization properties when the number of support vectors is small compared to the number of training examples. However, recent research has shown that in sufficiently high-dimensional linear classification problems, the SVM can generalize well despite a proliferation of support vectors where all training examples are support vectors. In this paper, we identify new deterministic equivalences for this phenomenon of support vector proliferation, and use them to (1) substantially broaden the conditions under which the phenomenon occurs in high-dimensional settings, and (2) prove a nearly matching converse result.


The latest advances in electric and electronic aircraft technologies from the point of view of an "all-electric" aircraft are presented herein. Specifically, we describe the concept of a "more electric aircraft" (MEA), which involves removing the need for on-engine hydraulic power generation and bleed air off-takes, and the increasing use of power electronics in the starter/generation system of the main engine. Removal of the engine hydraulic pumps requires fully-operative electrical power actuators and mastery of the flight control architecture. The paper presents a general overview of the electrical power generation system and electric drives for the MEA, with special regard to the flight controls. Some discussion regarding the interconnection of nodes and safety of buses and protocols in distributed systems is also presented


Introductory mechanics courses use the bouncing ball model to familiarize students with the principles of binary inelastic collisions. Nonetheless, in undergraduate courses, the modeling of binary systems typically disregards the time of contact and the effects of gravity, which yields to a constant coefficient of restitution (COR) and, as a consequence, prevents students from elucidating the real dependence of COR with impact speed. In this work, we proposed a simple experimental setup to investigate the impact dynamics of a spring-mass body that bounces on a rigid plate as well as a theoretical framework that captures the velocity dependence of the COR for low-impact speeds. Our analytical expression for the COR highlights the role-played by gravity, impact speed and collision time on the collision dynamics. Our results suggest that the inclusion of gravity force allows an adequate estimation of the critical impact speed and maximum deformation distance, crucial parameters to differentiate between repulsive and attractive interaction regimes. Our experimental setup enables the clarification of several key concepts of mechanics while it is easy to be performed in most undergraduate laboratories.


Background In October 2011 a shortage of Phosphoneuros became apparent. This oral solution containing phosphorus is prescribed in the treatment of diseases where phosphorus intake is essential. None of the available drugs was suitable for paediatric needs. Literature searches were conducted to identify formulas in national formularies and pharmacopoeias or already developed in other compounding hospitals, but no consensus 'Potion Joulié' formula was found. Purpose To provide patients with a concentrated oral solution of phosphorus. A feasibility study was performed. The aim was to give an expiry date of 3 months. Materials and Methods A batch of 3 bottles was produced. Visual appearance, pH, phosphorus and sodium contents were determined. At M0, M1 and M3 a microbiological assay was performed according to the Ph Eur (5.1.4). Results The formula we adopted consists of (for 100 ml): 20.40 g of phosphoric acid 50 per cent, 16.5 g of sodium phosphate dibasic anhydrous, 50 mL of sterile water and simple syrup. The phosphorus strength of 67.4 mg/mL is close to that of Phosphoneuro. For 12 weeks, the solution appeared unchanged, clear and colourless. pH about 4.14 remained constant. Sodium and phosphorus contents were stable and the observed values were within 10% of the theoretical values. Microbiological results were in accordance with European Pharmacopeia: viable aerobic bacteria ≤ 103 (CFU/ml), fungal ≤ 102, no E.coli. Conclusions Microbiological compliance and physicochemical stability were verified at 12 weeks according to the standards of the European Pharmacopeia. After users had insisted, the French Regulatory agency urged Bouchara Recordati to produce Phosphoneuros again, effective in May 2012. This is an example of the hospital pharmacist's role in compounding drugs to allow patients to continue their treatment in case of shortages of commercial products. No conflict of interest.


An investor who purchases shares in a corporation, at a price that has been inflated by misleading information, suffers when the truth comes to light and the share price falls. A consumer seeking financing to buy a home suffers if a lender misleads the consumer about the cost and features of a mortgage that the consumer subsequently obtains. In the United States, investor protection regulations, as administered by the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"), aim to address the first scenario by providing remedies for fraud in connection with the purchase or sale of a security. To address the latter scenario, a slew of federal consumer protection legislation exists that seeks to protect the consumer from unfair, deceptive, abusive and discriminatory practices. Since the enactment of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act ("Dodd-Frank"), these consumer protection statutes have largely been administered by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ("CFPB"). In both of these examples, the primary focus is on the harm that individual investors and consumers can suffer at the hands of unscrupulous actors. However, both investors and consumers are – collectively – hurt more by the economic disruptions that follow a financial crisis than they are from individual instances of misconduct. Despite this, a shared characteristic of the SEC and CFPB is that both agencies typically discharge their protector functions from a direct perspective. Unfortunately, such an approach neglects the indirect harm that consumers and investors suffer as a result of financial instability. That is not to say that the SEC and the CFPB are currently discharging their functions in identical ways: there are certainly striking differences in culture and approach that are evident when we compare the agencies, and when we compare investor- and consumer-targeted laws more generally. A more detailed analysis of such distinctions, and the design and purpose of the SEC and CFPB, can be found in the other contributions to this Symposium. The aim of this Article, however, is to illustrate the depth of harm that can befall both investors and consumers in the aftermath of a financial crisis, and in doing so, make the case that financial stability regulation – which aims to prevent such crises – should be conceptualized as a vitally important, albeit indirect, form of consumer protection and investor protection regulation.


Series Editor's Preface. Preface. Acknowledgments. Part I: Origins of a Theoretical Project: 1. From Functionalism to Neofunctionalism: Creating a Position in the Field of Social Theory. 2. Traditions and Competition: Preface to a Postpositivist Approach to Knowledge Cumulation. Part II: Reinventing Parsons/Reconstructing His Tradition: 3. Neofunctionalism Today: Reconstructing a Theoretical Tradition. 4. Parsons's Structure in American Sociology. 5. Formal Sociology Is not Multidimensional: Breaking the Code in Parsons's Fragment on Simmel. 6. On Choosing Ones Intellectual Predecessors: Why Charles Camic is Wrong About Parsons's Early Work. 7. Structure, Value, Action: What Did the Early Parsons Mean and What Should He Have Said, Instead? Part III: After Neofunctionalism: Its Contribution to Theory Creation Today: 8. The New Theoretical Movement. 9. Action, Culture and Civil Society. Name Index. Subject Index.


Abnormal returns have been found on days near the turn of the calendar months. Previous studies have linked the phenomenon to month-end paychecks, of which a sizable proportion goes into employees' retirement accounts and is then automatically invested in the market. Since many institutions adopt a semi-monthly pay schedule, we test the hypothesis that the market should exhibit detectable mid-month abnormal movement. Our results indicate that the 16th day of the month statistically and economically outperforms all other calendar days except the 1st and 2nd. As more and more institutions transition into bi-weekly pay schedule, however, the mid-month payday anomaly becomes less prominent.


Since the development of interventional radiology, the number and complexity of procedures has increased significantly and continues to grow. Interventional radiology procedures offer substantial health care benefits. However, associated with the increasing complexity as well as a lack of quality control programmes and specific training in radiation protection, there is an increase in the occurrence of deterministic effects in both patients and staff. There is a growing literature of case reports describing deterministic effects. A review of some case reports and the response of various international organisations is presented. It is important that workers in interventional radiology are aware of the potential for deterministic effects and the dose threshold for their onset, so that patients can be followed up appropriately.


Broodstock development, spawning, fertilization, embryonic development, fecundity, "hatching rate and deformation rates" of five species (Amphiprion ocellaris, A. percula, A. melanopus, A. clarkii and A. nigripes) of anemone fish were studied in captive condition. The egg diameter, parental care, fecundity rate, fertilization rate, hatching rate, deformation rates and size of eggs were quantified. In addition, the courtship behaviors and parental care of each broodstock were noted. The day wise embryonic developments from 1st day to 8th day were observed under microscope and major morphological and functional features of embryos were documented. The egg size ranged from 2.2 to 3.1 mm in length and width of 1.1 to 1.3 mm. The numbers of spawned eggs were varied between 405 to 810 numbers. Spawning was achieved in every 15 to 20 days of interval in summer and in monsoon it was increased ranging from 20 to 40 days. The clutch diameter ranged from 5.2 to 14. 3 cm in length and width of 4.8 to 11.5 cm.

 Key words: Anemone fish, embryonic development, fecundity, fertilization, hatching, deformation.


A frequency hopping scheme (1 bit per chip) is proposed and studied in some detail for channels in the HF-band. This band is subject to interference that varies with time and frequency, due to varying transmission and channel propagation conditions. To make efficient use of the available channel resource an adaptive frequency hopping algorithm has been implemented by means of a neural network to make use of the available channel information from the link quality analysis (LQA) in selecting the frequency slot in contrast to having a uniformly distrinuted selection process. The algorithm proposed combines the advantages of low probability of detection during transmission and reduced fading and interference disturbance when detecting transmitted signals. The disturbances not eliminated by the channel selection is further reduced by using block codes with first order soft decision decoding. The results on residual bit error rate and average signal to interference ratio are promising with an overall reduction in bit error rate of more than two orders of magnitude at moderate signal to noise and signal to interference ratios for a course channel model based upon the results by P. J. Laycock et al. (1988).<<ETX>>


The wide-spread adoption of system defenses such as the randomization of code, stack, and heap raises the bar for code-reuse attacks. Thus, attackers utilize a scripting engine in target programs like a web browser to prepare the code-reuse chain, e.g., relocate gadget addresses or perform a just-in-time gadget search. However, many types of programs do not provide such an execution context that an attacker can use. Recent advances in data-oriented programming (DOP) explored an orthogonal way to abuse memory corruption vulnerabilities and demonstrated that an attacker can achieve Turing-complete computations without modifying code pointers in applications. As of now, constructing DOP exploits requires a lot of manual work—for every combination of application and payload anew. In this paper, we present novel techniques to automate the process of generating DOP exploits. We implemented a compiler called STEROIDS that leverages these techniques and compiles our high-level language SLANG into low-level DOP data structures driving malicious computations at run time. This enables an attacker to specify her intent in an application-and vulnerability-independent manner to maximize reusability. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our techniques and prototype implementation by specifying four programs of varying complexity in SLANG that calculate the Levenshtein distance, traverse a pointer chain to steal a private key, relocate a ROP chain, and perform a JIT-ROP attack. STEROIDS compiles each of those programs to low-level DOP data structures targeted at five different applications including GStreamer, Wireshark and ProFTPd, which have vastly different vulnerabilities and DOP instances. Ultimately, this shows that our compiler is versatile, can be used for both 32-bit and 64-bit applications, works across bug classes, and enables highly expressive attacks without conventional code-injection or code-reuse techniques in applications lacking a scripting engine.


Solution processed technologies are more and more used to lower the manufacturing prices in solar cell industry. This paper shows that silicon nanoparticles dispersion has the potential to be used as raw material for microcrystalline silicon thin-film thus opening a route for solution processed silicon devices. Restoring of functional properties of deposited film by classical thermal annealing and microwave annealing is led. Both recovering techniques are studied in terms of morphology as well as electrical and optical properties. Surface chemistry of the nanoparticles is shown to have a major role on the stability of the dispersion, the deposition and sintering processes.


The ACA Marketplaces are designed to make the nongroup market more accessible and affordable (including with federal subsidies) and to ensure the coverage sold meets basic standards. For the ACA to succeed, however, Marketplace plans must enroll a much higher proportion of the adult target population?nonelderly persons with family incomes above the Medicaid eligibility cutoff (138 percent of the federal poverty level) who are currently uninsured or are purchasing nongroup insurance coverage?than the nongroup market has previously attracted. This brief addresses how difficult this goal may prove to be, given the high proportion of people who have had negative experiences with the nongroup market of the past?even though the ACA includes major provisions to improve consumers? knowledge of and ability to select the appropriate plan for themselves and their families.


Decays of η and η ′ within a chiral unitary approach Various decays of η and η ′ are investigated within the framework of U(3) chiral effective field theory in combination with a relativistic coupled-channels approach. Final state interactions are included by deriving sand p-wave interaction kernels for meson-meson scattering from the chiral effective Lagrangian and iterating them in a Bethe-Salpeter equation. Very good agreement with experimental data is achieved.


Desktop Grid is increasing in popularity because of relatively very low cost and good performance in institutions. Data-intensive applications require data management in scientific experiments conducted by researchers and scientists in Desktop Grid-based Distributed Computing Infrastructure (DCI). Some of these data-intensive applications deal with large volumes of data. Several solutions for data-intensive applications have been proposed for Desktop Grid (DG) but they are not efficient in handling large volumes of data. Data management in this environment deals with data access and integration, maintaining basic properties of databases, architecture for querying data, etc. Data in data-intensive applications has to be replicated in multiple nodes for improving data availability and reducing response time. Peer-to-Peer (P2P) is a well established technique for handling large volumes of data and is widely used on the internet. Its environment is similar to the environment of DG. The performance of existing P2P-based solution dealing with generic architecture for replicating large volumes of data is not efficient in DG-based DCI. Therefore, there is a need for a generic architecture for replicating large volumes of data efficiently by using P2P in BOINC based Desktop Grid.

Present solutions for data-intensive applications mainly deal with read only data. New type of applications are emerging which deal large volumes of data and Read/Write of data. In emerging scientific experiments, some nodes of DG generate new snapshot of scientific data after regular intervals. This new snapshot of data is generated by updating some of the values of existing data fields. This updated data has to be synchronised in all DG nodes for maintaining data consistency. The performance of data management in DG can be improved by addressing efficient data replication and consistency. Therefore, there is need for algorithms which deal with data Read/Write consistency along with replication for large volumes of data in BOINC based Desktop Grid.

The research is to identify efficient solutions for data replication in handling large volumes of data and maintaining Read/Write data consistency using Peer-to-Peer techniques in BOINC based Desktop Grid. This thesis presents the solutions that have been carried out to complete the research.


Background Hypnic headache (HH) is a rare primary headache disorder that is characterised by strictly sleep-related headache attacks. Purpose Because of the low prevalence of this headache disorder, disease information is mainly based on case reports and small case series. This review summarises current knowledge on HH in regard to clinical presentation, pathophysiology, symptomatic causes and therapeutic options. Method We review all reported HH cases since its first description in 1988 by Raskin. Broadened diagnostic criteria were applied for patient selection that slightly deviate from the current ICHD-II criteria. Patients were allowed to describe the headache character to be other than dull. Additionally, accompanying mild trigemino-autonomic symptoms were permitted. Conclusions Mainly elderly patients are affected, but younger patients and even children might also suffer from HH. Headache attacks usually last between 15 and 180 minutes, but some patients report headache attacks up to 10 hours. Almost all patients report motor activity during headache attacks. Cerebral MRI and 24-hour blood pressure monitoring should be performed in the diagnostic work-up of HH. Other primary headache disorders such as migraine and cluster headache may also present with sleep-related headache attacks and should be considered first. Caffeine taken as a cup of strong coffee seems to be the best acute and prophylactic treatment option.


We previously proposed a general framework for nonlinear multi-grid inversion applicable to any inverse problem in which the forward model can be naturally represented at differing resolutions. The method has the potential for very large computational savings and robust convergence. In this paper, multigrid inversion is further extended to adaptively allocate computation to the scale at which the algorithm can best reduce the cost. We applied the proposed method to solve the problem of optical diffusion tomography in a Bayesian framework, and our simulation results indicate that the adaptive scheme can improve computational efficiency in this application.


For decades, the standard deviation of investment returns and beta have been the dominant risk metrics and guideposts for building portfolios of risky assets, but these risk measures have provided little help in explaining the cross-asset and cross-market volatility experienced over the last two years. The most recent spate of selling-contagion arose largely as a result of fund flows across asset classes. These flows were related to the urgent and large need to reduce risk and leverage by those investors who found themselves on the brink of financial ruin as a result of losses incurred. The author explores a common source of tail risk—specifically, episodes of extreme liquidity scarcity associated with horizon uncertainty—as well as the correlation across the cash flow demands of market participants and the short-run constraints on market-making capital. Liquidity risk is often high after a long period of abundant liquidity driven by low fundamental volatility, rising economic growth, and returns with trending patterns. Long option positions provide a natural hedge for liquidity risk, generating profits and losses based on the underlying security's price movement without any need to trade as well as from the likely increased volatility premium.


The purpose of this research is to explain the effect either directly or indirectly directly from the brand love mediation variables on the relationship of brand trust variables consisting of Brand Excellence, Brand Strength and Brand Uniqueness on Brand Loyalty to Car customers in Aceh. Method data collection used is to spread the questionnaire to as many as 400 respondents, with sampling technique that is Purposive Random Sampling Based on result of data analysis, hence can be concluded that variable of brand image proved to have partially and simultaneous, positive and significant influence to brand love. This condition means that the better image of mrek will affect the increasing of brand love to car customers in Aceh. Keywords: Brand Image, Brand Love, Brand loyalty


The Hosen-1 vein has a symmetrical banded structure within the Hishikari epithermal gold deposit in Japan. The vein can be divided into four macroscopic bands. We used 40Ar/39Ar dating of adularia by incremental step heating to determine the duration of mineralization in the individual bands of the vein and the history of vein formation. Plateau ages were obtained from all adularia samples, and no significant excess 40Ar is recognized from inverse isochrons. The derived age spectra suggest that thermal overprinting of the epithermal system did not affect the plateau ages, although early bands must have been reheated by the thermal pulses associated with later bands.

The 40Ar/39Ar ages of adularia indicate that vein formation occurred episodically in distinct periods separated by intervals of about 30,000 to 110,000 yr. The Hosen-1 vein grew in at least six increments at the −20-m level and at least four increments at the +62.5-m level. The total duration of mineralization from the margin to the center of the Hosen-1 vein was about 260,000 yr, during which time the temperature of the hydrothermal fluid decreased from 190° to 210°C to less than 170°C.


Teeth are reported to be suitable indicators of heavy metals exposure from environment and nutritional status. Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) is used to compare the trace element content of children's primary teeth and permanent adult teeth. Primary teeth were collected from 64 children and permanent teeth collected from 112 adult with age range of 40-60 years. The data were assessed statistically using t-tests. The permanent teeth contained significantly greater concentrations of Na, Mg, Al, Fe, Ni, Cu, Sr, Cd, Ba, Pb  and U, and significantly less Mn, Co, As, Se, Mo and Bi than the children teeth. Moreover, comparison between heavy element concentrations in healthy and caries teeth pulps show that the mean concentrations of Na, Al, K, Cr, Mn, Co, Cu, Zn, Mo, Ag, Bi and U are lower in caries than healthy teeth pulps. On the other hand, the mean concentrations of Mg, Cd and Pb are higher in caries samples than healthy teeth pulps.

 Key words: ICP-MS, teeth, heavy metals.


This paper reports the characterization and sorting of cells based on stiffness contrast. Cell stiffness is characterized in terms of elastic modulus, deformability index and hydrodynamic resistance. For different cell types, elastic modulus is measured using nanoindentation experiments on AFM and deformability index of cells is measured by hydrodynamic stretching of the cells in a flow focusing microchannel device. Hydrodynamic resistance of cells is obtained by measuring the excess pressure drop across a segment of a microchannel and correlated with cell size ρc and elastic modulus using a large set of experimental data. The highly-invasive malignant breast cancer cells MDA MB 231, non-invasive malignant breast cancer cells MCF 7, human promyelocytic leukaemia cells HL60 and the cervical cancer cells HeLa are considered in the present study. A microfluidic device with focusing and spacing control for stiffness based sorting of cells was designed and fabricated. Experiments were performed to demonstrate cell sorting and characterize the device performance in terms of sorting efficiency, which was found to depend on the stiffness contrast. The proposed device has potential to be used as a lab on chip diagnostic tool for sorting of diseased cells from healthy cells based on stiffness contrast.


PURPOSE
Clinical research program managers are regularly faced with the quandary of determining how much of a workload research staff members can manage while they balance clinical practice and still achieve clinical trial accrual goals, maintain data quality and protocol compliance, and stay within budget. A tool was developed to measure clinical trial-associated workload, to apply objective metrics toward documentation of work, and to provide clearer insight to better meet clinical research program challenges and aid in balancing staff workloads. A project was conducted to assess the feasibility and utility of using this tool in diverse research settings.

METHODS
Community-based research programs were recruited to collect and enter clinical trial-associated monthly workload data into a web-based tool for 6 consecutive months. Descriptive statistics were computed for self-reported program characteristics and workload data, including staff acuity scores and number of patient encounters.

RESULTS
Fifty-one research programs that represented 30 states participated. Median staff acuity scores were highest for staff with patients enrolled in studies and receiving treatment, relative to staff with patients in follow-up status. Treatment trials typically resulted in higher median staff acuity, relative to cancer control, observational/registry, and prevention trials. Industry trials exhibited higher median staff acuity scores than trials sponsored by the National Institutes of Health/National Cancer Institute, academic institutions, or others.

CONCLUSION
The results from this project demonstrate that trial-specific acuity measurement is a better measure of workload than simply counting the number of patients. The tool was shown to be feasible and useable in diverse community-based research settings.


Curcuma zanthorrhiza Roxb., a wild relative of turmeric belongs to the family Zingiberaceae, is an important under exploited rhizomatous herb. Inspite of its medicinal uses, the traditional benefits extends to the isolation of starch powder from its rhizomes, and could be used as nutritional supplement like arrowroot powder. In the present study, the crude starch powder was isolated from the rhizomes of C . zanthorrhiza, was subjected to various characterization and acute oral toxicity study. The results showed that the starch recovery percentage of C. zanthorrhiza as 10.40±3.65 and the presence of the coumarin and natural colourant curcumin content on the isolated crude starch powder. Relatively very small amount of moisture, crude protein, fat, fibre, and ash content was noticed. Acute oral toxicity studies of the starch powder in Swiss Albino Mice showed non-toxic and there were no significant change in body weights, food and water consumption by the animals from all dose groups (50-6400 mg/kg bw). Observations against various physico-chemical parameters and granular morphology were also noticed. The present work substantiates the usefulness of the starch powder isolated from this wild turmeric and supports its nutritional significance and non-toxic effect. This underutilized minor tuber crop is potential in many food and non-food applications based on their physico-chemical characteristics.


In this little essay I describe recent advances in understanding the problem of salt sensitivity and salt resistance involved in the control of blood volume and blood pressure. Genetic evidence links the recently characterized epithelial sodium channel (ENaC) and the potassium channel (ROMK-1) to monogenic diseases in humans, characterized by a renal salt-losing syndrome. A loss of function mutations in ROMK-1 gene causes in some pedigrees the syndrome of Bartter, characterized by metabolic alkalosis and a severe salt-losing syndrome. A loss of function mutations in ENaC genes causes pseudohypoaldosteronism-type 1, characterized by hypovolaemia, hyperkaliaemia, metabolic acidosis and hypotension. ENaC and ROMK-1 are expressed in the apical membrane of principal cells of the cortical collecting duct and their role in Na/K balance is briefly reviewed.


Performing both security vulnerability assessment and configuration processes are heavily reliant on expert knowledge. This requirement often results in many systems being left insecure due to a lack of analysis expertise and access to specialist resources. It has long been known that a system's event log provides historical information depicting potential security threats, as well as recording configuration activities. In this paper, a novel technique is developed that can process security event logs on a computer that has been assessed and configured by a security professional, and autonomously establish causality amongst event log entries to learn performed configuration tasks. This extracted knowledge can then be exploited by non-professionals to plan steps that can improve the security of a previously unseen system.


Abstract : This thesis evaluates the variability of two tropical climate phenomena over the past 20,000 years. The first phenomenon is the migration of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (lTCZ) within the tropical Atlantic region. Using both a coupled ocean-atmosphere general circulation model and phytoplankton biomarkers contained within Cariaco Basin sediments, we find that the lTCZ migrates southward in response to Northern Hemisphere cooling. The second phenomenon examined is the Indian Monsoon. We find that terrestrial plant waxes within Arabian Sea sediments can be used to reconstruct southwest monsoon winds. In addition, we use planktonic foraminiferal Mg/Ca ratios to reconstruct sea surface temperature (SST) patterns associated with monsoon-induced upwelling. We find that summer monsoon upwelling was reduced during the last glacial period and enhanced during the Early Holocene. The SST changes associated with variability in upwelling are, however super-imposed upon larger-scale temperature changes, reflecting the competing effects of global and local climate processes.


The measurement of student learning is becoming increasingly important in U.S. higher education. One way to measure learning is through longitudinal testing, but this becomes especially difficult when applied to cumulative learning within programs in situations of low persistence. In particular, many Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) find themselves in such situations. Cross sectional testing is a pragmatic alternative, so long as maturity and selection effects can be estimated. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the utility and mechanics of measuring learning through cross sectional testing.


It is not I believe generally known to English geologists, that we have now within the limits of the British dominions perhaps the finest example in the world of extinct volcanic action—I allude to Aden, our new settlement on the coast of Arabia, where I had an opportunity of spending a short time in the early part of the present year. Imperfect as the following description, the result of hasty examination, may be, it will still embrace a few principal facts respecting this interesting locality, and serve at the same time to direct towards it the attention it so well deserves. The promontory of Aden is situated about eighty miles eastward of the Straits of Bab-el-Mandel, in latitude 13° north; and it consists of a bold cluster of volcanic rocks rising into lofty and jagged peaks, which are connected with the main land of Arabia by a low sandy isthmus. The extreme length of the promontory may be about six miles, the breadth half as much. The loftiest and most prominent portions of the whole mass are volcanic, and the lower portions are partly volcanic also, but exhibit many beds of consolidated sea-sand, which have been more or less elevated above the general level of the ocean. The most interesting portion of the promontory is however an immense volcanic crater, which is situated at the extremity next the main land, and in the very centre of which the town of Aden with the British cantonment stands. This magnificent crater


The relation between gender problems and the need for gender counseling of high school students is an unidentified issue which should be paid more attention in Vietnam. This study is performed to verify the hypothesis that whether there is no connection between gender problems and gender counseling's need for Vietnamese high school students. The survey on 1,200 high-school students in Vietnam, from grade 6 to grade 12, shows that the average point of gender problems is 2.39 equivalent to under average. Different school levels result in different gender problems. The average point of students' need for gender counseling is 2.86 equivalent to optional. Differences in gender and school levels results in differences in the needs of gender counseling. There is a close connection between gender problems and gender counseling's need for Vietnamese high school students. This data proves that the more gender problems the students face, there is a higher need for gender counseling.


Biocontainment methods for genetically modified crops closest to commercial reality (chloroplast transformation, male sterility) would be compromised (in absolute terms) by seed-mediated gene flow leading to chloroplast capture. Even in these circumstances, however, it can be argued that biocontainment still represses transgene movement, with the efficacy depending on the relative frequency of seed- and pollen-mediated gene flow. In this study, we screened for crop-specific chloroplast markers from rapeseed (Brassica napus) amongst sympatric and allopatric populations of wild B. oleracea in natural cliff-top populations and B. rapa in riverside and weedy populations. We found only modest crop chloroplast presence in wild B. oleracea and in weedy B. rapa, but a surprisingly high incidence in sympatric (but not in allopatric) riverside B. rapa populations. Chloroplast inheritance models indicate that elevated crop chloroplast acquisition is best explained if crop cytoplasm confers selective advantage in riverside B. rapa populations. Our results therefore imply that chloroplast transformation may slow transgene recruitment in two settings, but actually accelerate transgene spread in a third. This finding suggests that the appropriateness of chloroplast transformation for biocontainment policy depends on both context and geographical location.


Pinky and Rex are going to camp for the first time. Rex keeps telling Pinky how much fun they're going to have, but Pinky just wants to stay home where he belongs. Can the "Dear Arnie" column in the newspaper help Pinky figure out what to do? Arnie give Pinky some good advice, and so does Pinky's mother. But it's his best friend Rex who tells Pinky what he really needs to know.


Abstract Background: In developing countries, diarrhoea is the most common cause of death for children under five years of age, with Giardia lamblia, Cryptosporidium and Entamoeba histolytica as the most frequent pathogenic parasites. Traditional microscopy for stool parasites has poor sensitivity and specificity, while new molecular methods may provide more accurate diagnostics. In poor regions with sample storage hampered by uncertain electricity supply, research would benefit from a method capable of analysing dried stools. Methods: A real-time multiplex PCR method with internal inhibition control was developed for detecting Giardia lamblia, Cryptosporidium hominis/parvum and Entamoeba histolytica directly from stool specimens. Applicability to dried samples was checked by comparing with fresh ones in a small test material. Finally, the assay was applied to dried specimens collected from Guinea-Bissauan children with diarrhoea. Results: The PCR's analytical sensitivity limit was 0.1 ng/ml for G. lamblia DNA, 0.01 ng/ml for E. histolytica DNA and 0.1 ng/ml for Cryptosporidium sp. In the test material, the assay performed similarly with fresh and dried stools. Of the 52 Guinea-Bissauan samples, local microscopy revealed a parasite in 15%, while PCR detected 62% positive for at least one parasite: 44% of the dried samples had Giardia, 23% Cryptosporidium and 0% E. histolytica. Conclusions: Our new multiplex real-time PCR for protozoa presents a sensitive method applicable to dried samples. As proof of concept, it worked well on stools collected from Guinea-Bissauan children with diarrhoea. It provides an epidemiological tool for analysing dried specimens from regions poor in resources.


The steady state fluorescence quenching of 5-methyl-2-phenylindole by carbon tetrachloride in different solvents viz. dioxane, benzene, toluene, butanol, methanol and acetonitrile, and time dependent study in butanol solvent has been carried out at room temperature with a view to understand the quenching mechanisms. The experimental results show positive deviation in the Stern-Volmer plot in all the solvents. The quencher concentration dependence data were analyzed using ground state complex formation and sphere of action static quenching models in order to interpret the results. The various rate parameters have been determined and the magnitudes of these rate parameters suggest that the ground state complex formation model is not applicable in this case but the sphere of action static quenching model agrees well with the experimental results. Hence, both the static and dynamic quenching processes are responsible for the observed positive deviation in the Stern-Volmer plots. Further, with the use of finite sink approximationmodel, it is concluded that these bimolecular quenching reactions are diffusion limited, and also the dependence of Stern-Volmer constant on dielectric constant of the solvents suggest the charge transfer character of the excited complex.