Economic theory alone cannot predict the impacts of government payments on farm structure. We estimate a 5-equation model for the 1978-96 period to measure the impacts using state micro and macro data sets. We found that government payments were positively associated with farm size and farm exits, but negatively associated with the extent of consolidation in farm production and the off-farm work of operators.


Analysis of Islamic Cooperatives Soundness The purpose of this study is to investigate and assess the level of health Islamic financial services cooperatives as Islamic microfinance institutions and to measure its overall performance, so the sharia cooperative can continue to improve to improve its quality. This study uses qualitative and quantitative methods. This assessment tool is an adaptation of the method of CAMEL customized with a few extras such as aspects of sharia. The object of this study is a cooperative financial services BMT Sharia al Munawwarah. The findings from this study that the co-operative Financial Services Syariah BMT Al Munawwarah categorized as cooperative healthy enough. But there are some things that do not meet the criteria of soundness. Weaknesses that need to be improved on the aspects of sharia supervisory function, but can be addressed by improving the quality of human resources both supervisors, administrators and managers. Thus the assumption Cooperative sharia was unprofessional and not well manajemenya is the assumption that less precise DOI: 10.15408/ess.v6i1.3124


This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 24th International Conference on Computer Aided Verification, CAV 2012, held in Berkeley, CA, USA in July 2012. The 38 regular and 20 tool papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 185 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on automata and synthesis, inductive inference and termination, abstraction, concurrency and software verification, biology and probabilistic systems, embedded and control systems, SAT/SMT solving and SMT-based verification, timed and hybrid systems, hardware verification, security, verification and synthesis, and tool demonstration.


Cocrystals have gained a lot of consideration regarding its superior role in enhancement of solubility and dissolution of the included API. Cocrystals could be converted to coamorphous systems via different techniques like milling and quench cooling; however, the use of spray-drying technique has not been investigated before. So, the aim of this study was to explore the effect of spray drying on the amorphization of indomethacin/nicotinamide, INDNIC, as model cocrystals. Spray-drying operating parameters were optimized using the Taguchi design of experiment for maximum powder yield and low moisture content. The obtained INDNIC spray-dried cocrystals were characterized for their degree of crystallinity, morphology, moisture content, and dissolution performance. In addition, stability study was performed at different temperature and humidity conditions. Experimental design results delineate that spray-drying inlet temperature and cocrystal concentrations as the most influential factors for maximum powder yield and low moisture content. Powder X-ray diffraction and differential scanning calorimetry studies revealed the conversion of INDNIC cocrystals to a partial coamorphous or coamorphous structure without dissociation of INDNIC molecular structure. INDNIC coamorphous powders showed a significantly higher release of IND compared with cocrystals and remain physically stable for 2 months when stored in the refrigerator.


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In semiconductor processing, test wafers are used as particle monitors, film thickness monitors for deposition and oxide growth measurements, dry/wet etch rate monitors, CMP monitors, as well as characterizing new and existing equipment and processes. Depending on fab size and capacity, monthly test wafer usage can be tens of thousands or more. Due to the ever increasing demand for silicon between the IC and solar markets and the high cost of 300mm wafers, chip manufacturers are increasing their efforts to reduce overall spending on silicon - currently by far the largest non equipment related cost [1]. One approach taken by many chip makers is the concept of extending the usable life of test wafers by re-using them as many times as possible through a reclaim process.


The method of minimization face expression influence for evaluation of head orientation in space is proposed and investigated. In our previous works 18 characteristic face points were selected for the head orientation evaluation. It is difficult to track all 18 points in real time. It was found by way of mathematical simulation that number of points 7 is optimal number for head orientation tracking. The points were selected at the face places which obtain minimal changes because of face expression. Mathematical simulation helped to establish that errors for head rotations could reach value 13 degrees (for surprised expression), and mean error is about 6-8 degrees. After correction of face specific points coordinates by mean value of change caused by face expression the errors were reduced until range 0.1-0.3 degrees. Intervals of possible errors for every expression and some head orientation angles were calculated. The method was tested using CMU PIE database of face images. The obtained interval for head orientation angles errors is 1.5-2.8. The correspondence of 78-90% was obtained between results of experimental errors and results of mathematical simulation. Ill. 6, bibl. 7 (in English; summaries in English, Russian and Lithuanian).


The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) Extension for Event State
Publication describes a mechanism for a User Agent Client (UAC) to
publish event state information to a User Agent Server (UAS).
Generally, the UAC is free to monitor certain resources at a certain
rate and publish changes of their event state, for instance with the
presence event package. However, for a UAC on a mobile device, this
can be very costly in terms of battery, computing, and network
resources. Although some mechnisms exist for a UAC to deduce whether
event state publication is needed and at what rate publish messages
may be sent, these are rather coarse and reactive in nature. This memo
defines a solution for a UAS to regulate monitoring and publications
by providing detailed information to the UAC regarding which resources
to monitor, at what rate, whether urgent and with what delta.


Hospital acquired infection is a major cause of morbidity and mortality and regimes to prevent infection are crucial in infection control. These include decolonisation of at-risk patients of carriage of MRSA which is commonly achieved by protocols that include the use of chlorhexidine, or octenidine as biocidal agents. There is however no standardised single decolonisation regime agreed upon in the UK or other countries and protocols include a variety of active agents. Antibiotic resistant bacteria cause major problems in hospital medicine and concern has been raised regarding the development of biocide resistance which would cause decolonisation regimes to become unreliable. In this study, we assembled a panel of isolates of S. aureus including isolates collected before the development of chlorhexidine and octenidine through to a contemporaneous panel of isolates from a major hospital trust in the UK during a period when the decolonisation regime was altered. We observed significant increases in the MIC and MBC of chlorhexidine in isolates collected from periods of high usage of chlorhexidine. No isolates had a significantly altered MIC or MBC of octenidine apart from those collected after octenidine was introduced into the trust where isolates with four-fold decreases in susceptibility emerged. There was no suggestion of cross-resistance between the two biocidal agents. A combination of VNTR, PCR for qac genes and whole genome sequencing was used to type isolates and examine possible mechanisms of resistance. The typing data showed no expansion of a single strain was associated with decreased biocide tolerance and isolates with increased chlorhexidine MIC and MBCs were found from different clonal complexes; CC8, CC22 and CC30. Biocide susceptibility did not correlate with carriage of qac efflux pump genes – carriage of qacA and qacB was detected but, with one exception was restricted to isolates of CC8. Analysis of genome sequence data for closely related pairs of strains with differential biocide susceptibility revealed no common mutations or carriage of accessory elements that correlated with biocide tolerance. Mutations with the NorA or NorB efflux pumps, previously associated with chlorhexidine export were identified suggesting this may be an important mechanism of biocide tolerance. The clinical relevance of decreased biocide tolerance in terms of efficacy of decolonisation therapies remains to be established but we present evidence here that isolates are evolving in the face of biocide challenge in patients and that changes to decolonisation regimes are reflected in changes in susceptibility of isolates. More work is needed to assess the impact of these changes to ensure effective and robust decolonisation protocols remain in place.


Experimental auction and discrete choice experiment are two popular value elicitation methods. Theoretically they should yield the same results but empirical results have been mixed (e.g., Lusk and Schroeder 2004, 2006; Corrigan et al. 2010.) This study uses both methods to determine consumers' willingness to pay (WTP) for rice with improved insect control and for rice stored using Integrated Pest Management (IPM). This study investigates two potential reasons – anchoring and information – for why some studies have found apparent inconsistencies between auction and choice experiment results. Results indicate that consumers' WTP derived in the auction and choice experiments are significantly different. Consumers' average bids in the auction are higher than their willingness to pay calculated from the choice experiments. Further, anchoring in the choice experiment appears to be an explanation for the discrepancy. Providing consumers with more product information help consumers behave more consistent in terms of having same preference ranking for different rice samples in the auction and the choice experiments, but their average does not substantially affect the discrepancy.


The public notion that science must be strictly objective and documentaries must contain exact truth limits engagement in higher scientific topics important to human and environmental health. In order for people to believe scientific findings, they must trust those presenting the studies. A person's trust is not related to his or her education level, but to perceived values of the scientists themselves. This occurrence affects not just scientific studies, but nonfiction films and literature, as well. To understand this phenomenon of scientific distrust, I studied successful nonfiction films and literature, as discussed in the body of the paper and case study. I produced a website to show how medical information and storytelling techniques can exist together. The site seeks to gather the Microtia community and dispel myths about this congenital deformity affecting hearing and ear development. The popularity of documentaries opens a dialogue of scientific discussions among experts and laypeople, as long as a filmmaker's values align with viewers' values. When documentary filmmakers design captivating characters that viewers can easily relate to, the scientific message is clear. Authors and filmmakers promote positive social changes when communicating science through storytelling.


Some new, rapid methods were used in this study for tomato products as
alternatives to the traditional Howard mould count. This method proved to be
a fastidious but subjective method and therefore inaccurate for use in tomato
quality control and/or for legislative purposes.
The Apizym system was used to assess fungal presence in tomatoes, tomato
juice and crushed tomato, where different patterns of extracellular enzymes
were obtained for the different mould species. Growth medium was also found
to have an effect. This suggested the possibility of using this method to
assess fungal presence in tomato products and tentatively identify them using
their enzymic profile. Use of this method may not only apply to assessing raw
material quality, but also as a possible monitoring test for assessing heat
treatment adequacy or post process contamination.
ATP photometry was found to be suitable for assessing mould contamination
in tomato juice, but erroneous results were obtained with crushed tomato. This
may be related to various difficulties associated with the separation of
microbial ATP from the food material, or with its extraction from the fungal
hyphae, in some mould species.
The Direct Epifluorescent Filter Technique (DEFT) despite slightly
overestimating the total viable count, possibly due to the effect of heat
treatment on acridine orange staining characteristics, proved useful because
of its rapidity in detecting fungal presence in tomato juice. Therefore, it could
be used to assess quality during tomato juice production or to predict the
shelf-life of the product.
Impedance microbiology was used to detect mould presence in tomato
juice. In this study it proved very useful in assessing tomato juice sterility
using the relationship between impedance detection time and contamination
levels. lt also had the advantage of enabling rapid rejection of tomato juice
contaminated with mould. This involved the use of a calibration curve based on
the above relationship for which a cut-off point corresponding to the minimum
detection time was determined.


Health-care systems (patient monitoring and diagnosis systems) have recently attracted the interest of researchers. Intelligent software has been used as an agent in this field where research addresses the areas of electronic health (E-health) to develop and improve health care systems and to reduce the effort and time on health users (physicians, nurses) and to follow up on the condition of patients, especially the elderly, and also Intelligent software agents are using a result when most hospitals are out of capacity.  The major goal of this study is to learn how we may use intelligent software for  E-Health to assist physicians, nurses, and other health practitioners in collecting and tracking patient data on a daily basis in order to enhance treatment decisions. How can we achieve this in real-time in a dynamic and non-deterministic environment? As a result, we have built a model-based system such as the Extensible Beliefs Desires and Intentions (EBDI) model as architecture for located autonomic software agents in run-time under dynamic and non-deterministic environments circumstances in this study. We have formalized the EBDI agent in E-Health as an online observer to monitor the state of a  patient linked to sensors (thermometer, glucose meter, oxygen meter, etc.). This agent filters the data (sensor readings) and determines which readings are normal or abnormal before sending the patient's information to the administrative agent, which is a different type of EBDI agent. In addition, the system proposes a treatment plan based on the sensor readings and necessitates the participation of a human doctor in emergency situations. This study proposes developing a monitoring system to follow up (monitor) the health status of patients based on a multi-agent-system (MAS) with the Clustering process (using the K-mean Algorithm), where the system is designed to support warnings and alerts in abnormal health conditions and to call for a doctor's intervention in emergencies (when it is necessary).


The study assessed the role of personality on burnout in prison officers. About 120 U.K. prison officers completed questionnaires assessing three dimensions of burnout, the "big five" personality variables, and locus of control. Neuroticism predicted emotional exhaustion and personal accomplishment, and locus of control predicted all burnout dimensions. Prison officers higher in neuroticism and with an external locus of control might be at greater risk for burnout. Future studies might examine whether stress-management interventions alleviate officer burnout, with particular attention to officers whose personality profile places them "at risk."


We are living in a globalizing society. The development of communication and transportation technology has shrunk the world, in which the global interdependence for people and cultures becomes a norm of life. As a result, the increasing frequency of face-to-face interaction among people from different cultural, ethnic, social, and religious backgrounds demands that we develop intercultural/global communication competence, by which we know how to see things through the eyes of others and add their knowledge to our personal repertoires. In other words, only through global communication competence can people from different backgrounds communicate effectively and successfully in the globalizing society. Therefore, global communication competence becomes a critical ability for adjusting people to the demand of the 21 st century. This paper attempts to delineate a model of global communication competence, which consists of four dimensions: developing the global mindset, unfolding the self, mapping the culture, and aligning the interaction. (China Media Research. 2005;1(1):3-11).


The Charleston transverse zone of north-central Utah is an east-west–trending corridor of faults and folds that forms the boundary between the Provo salient of the Sevier fold-thrust belt and the Uinta-Cottonwood arch. The zone trends nearly 90° to the regional structural grain of the fold-thrust belt. Structural analysis and mapping in American Fork Canyon, near the western margin of the Charleston transverse zone, demonstrates that the zone contains an array of low-angle thrust faults and high-angle reverse and normal faults. Crosscutting relations indicate that the low-angle thrust faults formed first, followed by the reverse faults and possibly selected normal faults, and then by the majority of normal faults. Locally, normal faults reactivate reverse faults. The overall pattern of faulting and folding in the Charleston transverse zone suggests that the zone is a left-lateral strike-slip flower structure superimposed on an imbricate thrust fan. Trends of normal faults in the transverse zone suggest that many formed during a later phase of oblique extension that had a component of right-lateral shear. Our results support a tectonic model in which the Charleston transverse zone initiated during the Sevier orogeny to accommodate along-strike changes in the geometry of the thrust belt, caused in turn by along-strike changes in thickness of the stratigraphic sequence involved in thrusting. Thrust sheets in the Provo salient to the south of the Charleston transverse zone moved farther toward the foreland than did thrust sheets to the north of the zone, so the Charleston transverse zone evolved into a left-lateral strike-slip accommodation zone. Preliminary paleomagnetic data support this proposal: they suggest that fault blocks within the Charleston transverse zone locally rotated counterclockwise about a vertical axis. Laramide uplift of the Uinta-Cottonwood arch tilted structures of the Charleston transverse zone to the south and may have locally reactivated faults within the zone. Subsequent extensional tectonism reactivated the Charleston transverse zone with an oblique component of right-lateral shear.


Ever since 1996, J.-J. Blanc, the author, made an extensive research on "Systems science" that induced to his developing a new systemic paradigm in terms of a transdisciplinary approach to "Living systems" that he named "The Bioethism" (see note 1). It is meant to support the acquisition of a large understanding of living systems' origin, of their natural structure and their adaptive behaviors meanings. Their species bonds and evolution trends, while permanently interacting with environmental events for survival, require actions-reactions from ago-antagonistic signals and stimuli. Endogenous within their body milieu and exogenous while confronted with conditions of ecosystemic and sociosystemic environments, living beings are closely linked with and affected by a) cosmo-planetary and terrestrial meta-dynamic forces, b) their specific biological individuality and social traits and statuses accounting for the biodiversity of species behavioral and evolutionary trends emerging from the set of the biological metadynamics systemicity. For example the drastic extinction of species, except some bacteria, when the Earth became a "snowball" from a nearly total glaciation (-600 Mo/y) and, on the contrary, an extraordinary explosion of marine species bearing new functions (545Mo/y) The survey in the different scientific disciplines concerned with the actual "Science of Systems", shows too many scientists developing the living systems' knowledge of reality in the strict philosophy of human "reason" (logic and metaphysics) under an anthropocentric practice. Excepted are, of course, those works directly concerned with biological disciplines, biochemistry and physicochemical physiology and when individual and societal emotions are taken into consideration so as to support a paramount and pragmatic understanding of survival rules and necessities. An adequate learning for a sustainable development of societies, respecting the required survival diversity needs, is here based on a new general theory the author called "The general theory of meta-dynamics systemicity". A new theory that relies on the whole body of forces and dynamics that made and makes physicochemical and biological moves and objects to exist and sustain at the different dynamics levels of the Universe. By essence, the dynamics levels are: atomic and cosmic, galactic, stellar, planetary, terrestrial and biological. Though diverse in structure and mechanism, they are all interrelated and provoke intricate moves and fluxes of differential retroactions from 1 Systemic (adj.): nature of a dynamic and retroactive process pertaining to or affecting an organ or the body of an organism. The General Theory of Systemicity which emerge various object "postures" (behaviors). Bound to adapting their behaviors to permanent environmental changes, objects (eg. the planet Earth) and living beings survive within the constraints and effects of dynamics differential retroactivity. These feedbacks, in cycles, induce to the repetition of moves and fluxes, the "meta-dynamics systemicity", a term analogous to "velocity", referring to dynamical behaviors. However, systemicity must be understood as successive and/or parallel retroactive ago-antagonistic, convergent differentials moves making emerge whole bodies of adaptive results while confronted and coevolving with environmental changes. At Life's level, the set of meta/intra-dynamics systemicity sustains survival at biological, physiological and psychological intricate sublevels. Consubstantial and interrelated with the cosmic, galactic, stellar, planetary and terrestrial meta-dynamics, the biological "metadynamics systemicity" is participating in the whole of universal systemic effects feedbacks. Thereby, universal forces and fluxes permanently influence physicochemical reactive dynamics and permanently affect the biological world within its intra-dynamics systemicity moves. A world that is retroactive from emergent results affecting living creatures' survival choices so as to adapt their behaviors supporting their temporal sustainability. Consequently, an overview upon the entire body of universal interdependent biophysicochemical mechanisms, moves, processes and streams, interwoven within "3D networks", shows that survival abilities and performances are epigenetically provided with meta-dynamics resulting effects of systemicity. The convergence of cosmoplanetary forces (thermodynamic, magnetic, gravitational...) and terrestrial conditions (geologic, geochemical, geophysical, geo-climatic...) is retroactively sustaining the Earth and the living's own meta-dynamics survival means (biotope equilibrium, local ecosystems biodiversity, food chains,... sustainable behaviors, reproduction , ...) thanks to processes that have a "re-seeding" ability. Furthermore, the biological world of individuals and societal systems (family, group,...) cannot survive but within dynamic equilibriums that are inevitably interdependent. Social groups are subject to chaotic effects of the thermodynamic entropy and by their meta-dynamics, intradynamics and subdynamics drives, which make permanently emerge and temporally sustain differential behaviors. This work, having required several communications, describes largely here the general systemicity of principles that support living beings survival. A large work that refers to the complexity of cosmo-planetary, terrestrial and (in this part three) the biological meta-dynamics systemicity, a meta-driver that participated in the origin of Life. And, for billion of years, participated in the building up of the Earth's and a Life's adaptable sustainability confronted with fluxes and moves of universal forces. The set of meta-drivers with synergetic moves sustaining systemicity cycles, were and are permanently adapting to changing environmental events occurrence, which values have to be viewed in the short and long term. At the stage of this work process, the communication stands for "The biological meta-dynamics systemicity" and, in the conclusion, assumes the fundamental objectivity and realism of a "General Theory of Systemicity".


Comparative genomics approaches are broadly used for analysis of transcriptional regulation in bacterial genomes. In this work, we identified binding sites and reconstructed regulons for 33 orthologous groups of transcription factors (TFs) in 196 reference genomes from 21 taxonomic groups of Proteobacteria. Overall, we predict over 10 600 TF binding sites and identified more than 15 600 target genes for 1896 TFs constituting the studied orthologous groups of regulators. These include a set of orthologues for 21 metabolism-associated TFs from Escherichia coli and/or Shewanella that are conserved in five or more taxonomic groups and several additional TFs that represent non-orthologous substitutions of the metabolic regulators in some lineages of Proteobacteria. By comparing gene contents of the reconstructed regulons, we identified the core, taxonomy-specific and genome-specific TF regulon members and classified them by their metabolic functions. Detailed analysis of ArgR, TyrR, TrpR, HutC, HypR and other amino-acid-specific regulons demonstrated remarkable differences in regulatory strategies used by various lineages of Proteobacteria. The obtained genomic collection of in silico reconstructed TF regulons contains a large number of new regulatory interactions that await future experimental validation. The collection provides a framework for future evolutionary studies of transcriptional regulatory networks in Bacteria. It can be also used for functional annotation of putative metabolic transporters and enzymes that are abundant in the reconstructed regulons.


This paper combines an atmospheric transport model and a terrestrial ecosystem model to estimate gross primary productivity (GPP) and net ecosystem productivity (NEP) of the land biosphere. Using atmospheric CO2observations in a Carbon Cycle Data Assimilation System (CCDAS) we estimate a terrestrial global GPP of 146 ± 19 GtC/yr. However, the current observing network cannot distinguish this best estimate from a different assimilation experiment yielding a terrestrial global GPP of 117 GtC/yr. Spatial estimates of GPP agree with data‐driven estimates in the extratropics but are overestimated in the poorly observed tropics. The uncertainty analysis of previous studies was extended by using two atmospheric transport models and different CO2 observing networks. We find that estimates of GPP and NEP are less sensitive to these choices than the form of the prior probability for model parameters. NEP is also found to be significantly sensitive to the transport model and this sensitivity is not greatly reduced compared to direct atmospheric transport inversions, which optimize NEP directly.


Applications in additive manufacturing technologies for bone tissue engineering applications requires the development of new biomaterials formulations. Different three-dimensional (3D) printing technologies can be used and polymers are commonly employed to fabricate 3D printed bone scaffolds. However, these materials used alone do not possess an effective osteopromotive potential for bone regeneration. A growing number of studies report the combination of polymers with minerals in order to improve their bioactivity. This review exposes the state-of-the-art of existing 3D printed composite biomaterials combining polymers and minerals for bone tissue engineering. Characterization techniques to assess scaffold properties are also discussed. Several parameters must be considered to fabricate a 3D printed material for bone repair (3D printing method, type of polymer/mineral combination and ratio) because all of them affect final properties of the material. Each polymer and mineral has its own advantages and drawbacks and numerous composites are described in the literature. Each component of these composite materials brings specific properties and their combination can improve the biological integration of the 3D printed scaffold. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res B Part B, 2019.


While traditional teaching methods (e.g., real‐time, synchronous lectures) have proven effective for training future engineers, the Internet provides an avenue to reinforce the material and augment student learning, comprehension, and retention of material. This paper presents the integration and assessment of a library of interactive instructional modules specifically for a senior‐level undergraduate elective course in civil engineering. An ongoing, comprehensive assessment process was implemented in the fall 1999 semester. The results of this quantitative assessment indicate that the use of well designed and pedagogically sound Internet‐based supplemental modules provide students with a better understanding of course material. However, when Internet‐based content does not promote critical thinking, little increase in the student performance and understanding of the material is realized. Interactive Web‐based instruction should not be viewed as a "replacement" to traditional instruction, but rather a tool that provides a broader and more dynamic environment for students with a variety of learning styles.


We are aiming at a semantics of logic programs with preferences defined on rules, which always selects a preferred answer set, if there is a non-empty set of (standard) answer sets of the given program. It is shown in a seminal paper by Brewka and Eiter that the goal mentioned above is incompatible with their second principle and it is not satisfied in their semantics of prioritized logic programs. Similarly, also according to other established semantics, based on a prescriptive approach, there are programs with standard answer sets, but without preferred answer sets. According to the standard prescriptive approach no rule can be fired before a more preferred rule, unless the more preferred rule is blocked. This is a rather imperative approach, in its spirit. In our approach, rules can be blocked by more preferred rules, but the rules which are not blocked are handled in a more declarative style, their execution does not depend on the given preference relation on the rules. An argumentation framework (different from the Dung's framework) is proposed in this paper. Argumentation structures are derived from the rules of a given program. An attack relation on argumentation structures is defined, which is derived from attacks of more preferred rules against the less preferred rules. Preferred answer sets correspond to complete argumentation structures, which are not blocked by other complete argumentation structures.


This guide suggests resources for students completing a senior thesis in HIST 481. Emphasis is on visual resources relevant to world history.


A 19-year-old male suffering from crushed injury on the neck and anterior upper chest with suspected laceration of the trachea underwent emergent operation for surgical restoration of the trachea. First and second degrees of electric burns over the neck and upper back regions(4%) were accidentally caused by electrocautery during surgery. Short circuit due to over-wetting of the sheet and EKG leads may be responsible for this avoidable accident.


The effects of contents of fat, thickener and emulsifier in salad dressing were investigated. Twelve types of dressings were produced according to a full factorial design, whereby the fat content was set at three levels, the thickener and the emulsifier contents at two levels. The dressings were analysed by a sensory panel, using both quantitative descriptive profiling and time-intensity (TI) evaluation, and by instrumental/rheological measurements. The two sensory methods were related to each other and the instrumental results were related to the sensory results.

All design parameters had a significant influence on the properties of salad dressing, mainly on texture and mouthfeel. Fat content was the most influencing parameter. Interaction effects were found and it can be concluded that the content of the emulsifier was less critical when the fat and thickener contents increased.

Dynamic and descriptive sensory analyses were mainly related to each other in the fattiness attribute. There were strong relations between instrumental and sensory analysis according to rheological and texture attributes, ∣r∣≥0.7 (Pearson correlation coefficient) for most texture attributes.


Application of chitosan bead as a low-cost adsorbent for removing Reactive Brown 10 (RB 10) from aqueous solution was investigated. The presence of -NH2 and -OH functional groups on chitosan beads were evident from the Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectrum. The changes on the surface morphology of the chitosan beads before and after sorption were analysed. Dye sorption was found higher with a longer contact time, lower dye concentration and greater adsorbent dosage. The optimum pH and adsorbent dosage for the adsorption of RB10 were pH 4–6 and 0.04 g, respectively. Both Langmuir and Brunauer, Emmett and Teller (BET) isotherm were determined as the appropriate model to describe the behaviour of the adsorption process. The maximum adsorption capacity was about 22 mg g–1. The significant variables in affecting the RB 10 uptake was identified using the Plackett-Burman (PB) program.


BACKGROUND/AIMS
The hydrating properties of three moisturising preparations, commonly recommended for the treatment of dry skin, were compared by utilising non-invasive measuring methods.

METHODS
The preparations were Decubal®/Abitima® cream, Dumex Ltd; pH5-Eucerin® ointment, Beiersdorf; and Essex® cream, Schering Plough. Skicon-200® and a Corneometer CM 420® were used for assessment of skin hydration. Readings of the transepidermal water loss (TEWL) and skin temperature were also taken. The study was conducted in 2 parts, each with 12 women. The preparations were applied to a designated area on the forearms 2× a day for 7 days; the 4th, untreated, area served as control. Readings were taken before the start of treatment and every morning during the treatment period and the following week.

RESULTS
Both electrical measuring methods showed that hydration of the stratum corneum increased after a few days of treatment, especially after the application of Decubal®/Abitima®. TEWL was not affected by any of the treatments.

CONCLUSIONS
The two electrical methods ranked the products consistently, i.e. Decubal®/Abitima® >pH5-Eucerin® >Essex®. Conductance (Skicon-200) was more discriminative than capacitance (Corneometer CM420). However, these methods are not water specific. TEWL was not affected by the treatments.


Background: The etiology and pathogenesis of Behcet's Disease (BD) remain unknown. The primary aim of this study was to determine the relation between humoral immunity and BD. We especially evaluated humoral immunity in Behcet's patients with mucocutaneous involvement. Material and Methods: The study population comprised of 50 patients with BD and 53 healthy controls. Plasma IgE, IgG, IgM, IgA, C-reactive protein (C-RP), anti-streptolysin O titers (ASO), and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) were measured for patients and control group. Results: The mean ASO, C-RP and ESR levels were significantly higher in Behcet's patients than in control subjects. The mean IgA level in BD was significantly higher than in control subjects (268 ± 16.5 mg/dl vs 172,9 ± 16 mg/dl respectively p<0.001). The IgG and IgM levels were also significantly higher than that of control subject. There was no significant IgE level difference in study groups. Conclusion: We have shown that humoral immune response has a role in patients with BD being highest in IgA, and being mild in Ig G and IgM levels. We thought that the high significance relation with IgA level in groups may be due to our patients clinical presentations because all of them had mucocuteneous involvement.


Nine out of ten parliamentarians in India are men. Such dismal figures reveal the lasting grip of unfavourable social norms. Women's disadvantage on a complex set of social and economic factors effectively keeps them at the margin of political life. Six decades have gone by since Independence brought hopes that democracy would equilibrate gender representation; two decades ago, reservations opened local bodies to women. Major parties have since championed a bill that would extend reservations to the Lok Sabha, and the state legislative assemblies; the proposed law even made it through the Rajya Sabha. But the gender imbalance at higher political levels remains unaddressed. After decades of delays and posturing, it is time to pass the Women's Reservation Bill. Experience at local level and in other countries provides enough evidence to challenge the most frequent criticisms against the bill and address some of the foreseeable roadblocks in its implementation.


Who is able to overcome adversity and experience upward mobility? Using cumulative inequality theory, which posits that the disadvantage or advantage associated with one's social location impacts life trajectory and perceptions of such, I propose that level of optimistic outlook in individuals from low-income backgrounds increases their chances of financial success in adulthood. Analyzing data from the 2016 General Social Survey, a nationally representative survey administered to randomly sampled adults in the U.S., I examine a subset of 1,269 individuals from backgrounds of far below average or below average family income levels. In doing so, I determine how optimistic attitudes, regarding matters such as personal agency and success, influence whether the individual may obtain a higher degree of financial success in adulthood compared to those of their families. Findings indicate that higher levels of optimism are associated with greater family income levels, with level of education and marital status as the biggest predictors of adult financial standing. With higher educational attainment, optimistic outlook increases, perhaps due to an increase in career opportunities and pathways to success. These findings show how influential education may be on intergenerational income mobility, however, they also provide insight on how disadvantage, including being a person of color; being divorced, separated or a single-parent; as well as how many children one has, may create limitations on educational attainment and effects on outlook. Such findings call attention to the need for greater financial and educational assistance programs, due to their impact on outlook and subsequent life course.


PURPOSE: To evaluate the long-term outcome of trabeculotomy-trabeculectomy as the primary surgical treatment for primary congenital glaucoma. METHODS: Twenty-two eyes of 14 consecutive patients with primary congenital glaucoma who underwent combined trabeculotomy-trabeculectomy as the initial procedure between 1981 and 2005 were selected for review. Records of ocular family history, age at onset of glaucoma, symptoms and signs, corneal integrity, intraocular pressure (IOP), gonioscopy, surgery, postoperative complications, visual acuity, refractive error, endothelial microscopy, axial length, visual fields and final status of the optic nerve head were entered into a computer database. The outcome, in terms of IOP obtained, was evaluated using Kaplan-Meier survival analysis. RESULTS: Cumulative probabilities of success, after performing combined trabeculotomy-trabeculectomy as the initial operative procedure, were 95.5% after 12 months and 78.2% after 24 months, with this rate being maintained during 15 years of follow-up. Four eyes (18.1%) required more than one operative procedure because of persistent raised IOP. Postoperative complications were rare. At the time of the last follow-up, of 12 eyes from 8 co-operative patients, the final best spectacle-corrected visual acuity was 0.5 (20/40) or better, in 75% (9 eyes). CONCLUSION: Combined trabeculotomy-trabeculectomy as the primary surgical procedure offers long-term high efficacy in the control of IOP without medical treatment, is rarely associated with surgical complications, and a low need for re-operations


Teenagers are the time to mature with the rapid development of physical, cognitive, emotional and social. Not all adolescents get through smoothly. Emotional, social problems marked aggressiveness and delinquency during 2016 in DIY recorded 43 cases of student brawl, perpetrators of children aged 14-18 years. One of the factors that influence is peers. Teens spend a lot of time hanging out with their peers, so peers are influential in emotional-social development. To know the relationship of peer role with emotional-social development of students at SMK Negeri 2 Sewon Bantul Yogyakarta. The design of this research is analytic descriptive with a cross-sectional approach — the sampling condition used cluster random sampling method with 107 student sample. The research instrument used is a peer role questionnaire and emotional, social development questionnaire — bivariate statistical test using Pearson. The majority of respondents were women of 81 people (75.7%), 16 years of age 77 people (72%), peer role was 81 people (75.7%), and emotional, social development both 101 people (94.4 %). The role of peers is with emotional-social development, both 76 (71.0%). Result of bivariate test analysis obtained p-value = 0,028 and correlation coefficient value 0,213. There is a significant relationship between the role of peers with emotional-social development in the students at SMK Negeri 2 Sewon Bantul Yogyakarta


Wildland fire is the dominant disturbance agent of the boreal forest of Alaska. Currently, about 80% of the population of Alaska resides in communities potentially at risk from wildland fire. The wildland fire threat to these settlements is increasing because of increased suburban construction in or near forested areas.  The primary objective of this research was to assess the effectiveness of maturing treatment projects in terms of previously defined risk reduction and fire behavior objectives in order to better understand the contribution of fuel treatments to the broader economics of wildfire management in Alaska.  Along with contributing to our knowledge on the ecological maturation of existing fuel treatments we also examined what influence publicly funded fuel treatments had on wildland fire suppression costs in Alaska, whether suppression resource ordering is affected by the presence of a fuel treatment, and what role fuel treatments play in encouraging homeowners in WUI locations to reduce wildfire risk on their property.  We found that fuel treatments in boreal black spruce induced surface layer species composition changes due to moss die-off without exposure of mineral soil, and to destabilization of soils and melting of frozen layers. Modeled fire behavior at the selected sites (BEHAVE 6.0) mostly indicate that shaded fuelbreaks still retain most benefits of reduced fire behavior potential (due to the reduction of canopy density and ladder fuels) for at least 14 years.  This finding fits with limited experiential evidence from prescribed and natural burning of fuelbreaks. Findings from a discrete choice experiment (DCE) suggest that responding homeowners were more willing to incur the additional costs associated with private wildfire risk mitigation when a thinned/shaded fuel treatment was present on nearby public lands.  This outcome does not hold in the presence of a cleared fuel break.  Drawing on treatment site field data collected as part of this effort a set of four wildland fire scenarios were modelled and presented to Alaskan wildland management professionals as part of an elicitation exercise designed to examine suppression resource ordering behavior. As expected suppression resource ordering depended on both current fire weather conditions and whether a fuel treatment was present.  Smaller initial attack packages were ordered when a fuel treatment was present and winds were 10 MPH and less in the scenario. Finally, State of Alaska wildfire suppression cost data was collected from a review of accounting records from over 200 fires and matched against fuels treatment data.  The analysis identifies 14 wildfires of greater than 50 acres where a fuel treatment was found within 5km of the final reported fire perimeter. No statistically significant relationship between fuel treatments and wildfire suppression costs was identified. We argue that the geographic scale of the state and low population densities have an unobserved impact in the likelihood of a fuel treatment being present near or adjacent to a fire.


This paper deals with the impacts of the current economic crisis on the temporal variation of urban traffic (during 2008-11) and consequently, the impacts on the urban air pollutant levels using as case study the city of Thessaloniki, Greece. The important temporal variations of the main economic indicators like the annual decreasing trend of the gross domestic product (GDP), the continuous decrease of wages and the labor cost index, the annual increase of unemployment and hence, the decreasing trend of consumption and domestic demand during the current recession period in Greece affect the vehicle traffic. A considerable decreasing trend of vehicle traffic volume has been observed in all examined intersections of Thessaloniki urban area. The highest temporal decrease of traffic volume is occurred in the morning hours. The traffic volume decrease determines decisively the concentrations of urban air pollutants and especially, the concentrations of NO2 (nitrogen dioxide), which has mainly traffic emissions origin and the concentrations of PM10 (suspended particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter less than 10 μm), which has mainly diesel cars emissions origin. The correlation between traffic and air pollution decreasing trend shows that the air pollutant concentrations decrease is more significant in relation to the traffic decrease due to the fact that, even a small traffic decrease leads to a significant amelioration of the traffic conditions, which lead to significant lower car emissions and therefore, to significant lower pollutant concentrations in the air of the urban area. The economic crisis did not lead to an increase of the public transport use. It seems that, the traffic decrease of the passenger cars and taxis is due to the trips decrease because of unemployment, the trips decrease connected to lost work positions and the elastic importance trips decrease (shopping, entertainment, etc) during 2008-11.


OBJECTIVE
To determine the normal osmole gap for 18 previously published formulae used to estimate serum osmolality in dogs.

DESIGN
Prospective study.

SETTING
University veterinary medical teaching hospital.

ANIMALS
Two hundred and fifty client-owned dogs.

INTERVENTIONS
None.

MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS
Serum samples were saved and frozen at -80°C after routine biochemical analysis as ordered by attending clinicians. An Advanced Micro Osmometer 3300 was used to measure serum osmolality. Eighteen distinct formulae previously reported in the medical literature were used to calculate the osmolality from the biochemical analysis results. The calculated osmolality was then subtracted from the measured osmolality to determine the osmole gap. Osmole gaps for azotemic and hyperglycemic dogs were compared to those of dogs without azotemia or hyperglycemia using each formula. The median measured osmolality for all dogs in the study was 302 mOsm/kg (interquartile range 297-307). The osmole gaps varied widely depending on the formula used to calculate osmolality and the presence or absence of hyperglycemia or azotemia. Eleven formulae led to calculated osmolality and osmole gaps that were not statistically different when hyperglycemia or azotemia was present. Four out of these 11 formulae resulted in osmole gaps near zero.

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE
Multiple formulae reported to calculate serum osmolality can be used in the clinical setting, but they result in significantly different normal osmole gaps. Clinicians should be aware of the specific reference interval for the formula being used. The authors recommend the formula 2(Na(+) ) + [glucose/18] + [BUN/2.8] because it is easy to use and is reliable even when hyperglycemia or azotemia are present.


The management of supplies, purchase orders, and equipment is of critical importance to the operation of the clinical laboratory. The InvMan software program has reduced hands-on time for performing the counting of inventory and the time required to generate purchase orders. These changes save the laboratory about $11,170 per year in personnel costs. While the use of a structured system does impose some constraints on the user, the program has helped the laboratory organize all of its supply, vendor, location, PO, and equipment data. It has allowed the laboratory to respond more rapidly and accurately to inquiries related to inventory. The varied functions of InvMan provide flexibility to the laboratory and permit it to define the inventory as best fits a particular situation. The application is well suited to its target audience. The program has performed well, allowing the laboratory to make significant improvements to its material management system.


The objective of the study was to analyze the genetic variability at agronomic and molecular level of apomictic genotypes of the genus Paspalum obtained by interspecific crosses of Paspalum plicatulum (sexual famale genitor) and Paspalum guenoarum (apomictic male genitor) to predict promising combinations with the sexual genitor using characters related to forage production. The study was conducted in two environments in 2010 and 2011 in Eldorado do Sul and Augusto Pestana, State of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. The experiment followed a randomized block design with four replicates at both locations. Seven interspecific hybrids, the two genitors (sexual "4c-4x" P. plicatulum and apomictic cultivate "Rojas" P. guenoarum ) and two native genotypes of Paspalum guenoarum and cultivate Pensacola of P. notatum were used. Analysis done inagronomic and molecular levels were able to detect genetic variability among interspecific hybrids of Paspalum . Moreover, the results suggested that the hybrids H12, H13 and H20 are recommended for further hybridizations with female sexual parent obtaining elite recombinant. Additional keywords: apomixes; forage species; genetic variability; plant breeding.


Tuning the optical and electrical properties of two-dimensional (2D) hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) is critical for its successful application in optoelectronics. Herein, we report a new methodology to significantly enhance the optoelectronic properties of hBN monolayers by substitutionally doping with sulfur (S) on a molten Au substrate using chemical vapor deposition. The S atoms are more geometrically and energetically favorable to be doped in the N sites than in the B sites of hBN, and the S 3p orbitals hybridize with the B 2p orbitals, forming a new conduction band edge that narrows its band gap. The band edge positions change with the doping concentration of S atoms. The conductivity increases up to 1.5 times and enhances the optoelectronic properties, compared to pristine hBN. A photodetector made of a 2D S-doped hBN film shows an extended wavelength response from 260 to 280 nm and a 50 times increase in its photocurrent and responsivity with light illumination at 280 nm. These enhancements are mainly due to the improved light absorption and increased electrical conductivity through doping with sulfur. This S-doped hBN monolayer film can be used in the next-generation electronics, optoelectronics, and spintronics.


The Federal Communications Commission's Notice of Inquiry in GN 09-157 Fostering Innovation and Investment in the Wireless Communications Market is a significant event at an opportune moment. Wireless communication has already radically changed the way that not only Americans, but people the world over communicate with each other and access and share information. In this article, we review the wireless industry's past performance in three dimensions: (i) the rate of innovation, (ii) how competitive the industry is, and (iii) how competitive wireless innovation is. We do so by examining the record of three key layers in the industry's vertical chain: software applications, devices (handhelds), and the core wireless distribution networks. We find that all three markets exhibit very high rates of innovation, that the markets are competitive, and that this competition has driven innovation. As in previous work (Faulhaber, 2009a) we argue that, absent market failure, regulatory intervention is not appropriate. A customer-centric perspective should govern the FCC's actions in the wireless ecosystem: let customers decide what they want in this competitive market.


ISLAM IN EGYPTIAN POLITICS: FROM ACTIVISM TO ALIENATION Review Article by Jon B. Alterman Egypt, Islam and Democracy: Critical Essays, with a New Postscript, by Saad Eddin Ibrahim. Cairo and New York: American University in Cairo Press, 1996 and 2002. xi + 269 pages. $19.95. Passion for Islam: Shaping the Modern Middle East: The Egyptian Experience, by Caryle Murphy. New York: Scribner, 2002. vii + 359 pages. Notes to p. 337. Gloss. to p. 340. Index to p. 359. $27. Mobilizing Islam: Religion, Activism and Political Change in Egypt, by Carrie Rosefsky Wickham. New York: Columbia University Press, 2002. xvi + 306 pages. Notes to p. 267. Bibl. to p. 293. Index to p. 306. $22.50 paper. Ten years ago, some observers thought that the Egyptian government was on the brink of collapse. Sectarian violence that had begun in Upper Egypt had morphed into terror attacks in the center of Cairo. Government tanks had rumbled into the slum of Imbaba to retake the area from Islamist militants. Muslim charitable organizations had proven so effective delivering aid after a 1992 earthquake, and government organs so inept, that the government had banned such organizations from relief work. Egypt's frail Nobel Prize winning author, Naguib Mahfouz, narrowly survived having been stabbed in front of his home by a young militant armed with a cheap kitchen knife. Political emotions in Egypt were boiling, while political participation was reaching its nadir. In retrospect, it appears that the Egyptian government was never close to collapse. In addition, it proved reasonably effective in stemming the growth of organizations actively plotting its overthrow. In recent years, imprisoned leaders of the Gama'a Islamiya have written books recanting their views, and attacks on both government forces and innocent civilians have faded away. Yet it was not always clear this was the way the story would turn out, and all three of the books under review have their roots in a much more uncertain phase of Egyptian history. Each in its own way considers the challenges that faced the Egyptian state, and the state's responses to those challenges. Even more importantly, each of these books explores the Egyptian public's responses to Egyptian government pressure. Throughout a period of increased state intervention in their daily lives, Egyptians carved out areas of autonomous activity. Equally importantly, many Egyptians established structures and value systems that gave meaning to their lives in the face of a system that many found dehumanizing. The fact that this process was colored by religion was not coincidental, and was perhaps inevitable. All three books help us understand why. Saad Eddin Ibrahim's Egypt, Islam and Democracy is a collection of essays written over almost two decades. It was originally published in 1996, and reissued in 2002 with a brief postscript. In recent years, Ibrahim has emerged as a government gadfly, and more recently as an internationally recognized sometime political prisoner. Before that, however, Ibrahim had written pioneering sociological studies of Islamist militants long before they were in the headlines. Indeed, he had conducted groundbreaking surveys of more than 30 imprisoned activists even before the Iranian revolution in 1979 and the assassination of President Anwar Sadat in 1981 put militant Islam on many people's radar screens. The first essay in this collection presents the preliminary results of that research. Such work appears dated now, but serves to remind us how little we had known about radical Islamist movements in this period. There had been little to go by besides Richard Mitchell's The Society of Muslim Brothers,1 which in any event concentrated on an earlier generation of Islamist-inspired activism. Ibrahim lays out the now-familiar ideology of Islamist rejectionists: the perception of weakness and moral decay, and the desire to create a true Muslim society. …


Sigmund Freud's role in the history and development of psychoanalysis continues to be the standard by which others are judged. One of the most remarkable features of that history, however, is the exceptional caliber of the men and women Freud attracted as disciples and coworkers. One of the most influential, and perhaps overlooked, of them was the Hungarian analyst Sndor Ferenczi. Apart from Freud, Ferenczi is the analyst from that pioneering generation who addresses most immediately the concerns of contemporary psychoanalysts. In Ferenczi's Turn in Psychoanalysis fifteen eminent scholars and clinicians from six different countries provide a comprehensive and rigorous examination of Ferenczi's legacy. Although the contributors concur in their assessment of Ferenczi's stature, they often disagree in their judgments about his views and his place in the history of psychoanalysis. For some, he is a radically iconoclastic figure, whose greatest contributions lie in his challenge to Freudian orthodoxy; for others, he is ultimately a classical analyst, who built on Freud's foundations. Divided into three sections, Contexts and Continuities, Disciple and Dissident, and Theory and Technique, the essays in Ferenczi's Turn in Psychoanalysis invite the reader to take part in a dialogue, in which the questions are many and the answers open-ended.


Time-resolved NMR spectroscopy is used to studychanges in protein conformation based on the elapsed time after a change in the solvent composition of a protein solution. The use of a micromixer and a continuous-flow method is described where the contents of two capillary flows are mixed rapidly, and then the NMR spectra of the combined flow are recorded at precise time points. The distance after mixing the two fluids and flow rates define the solvent-protein interaction time; this method allows the measurement of NMR spectra at precise mixing time points independent of spectral acquisition time. Integration of a micromixer and a microcoil NMR probe enables low-microliter volumes to be used without losing significant sensitivity in the NMR measurement. Ubiquitin, the model compound, changes its conformation from native to A-state at low pH and in 40% or higher methanol/water solvents. Proton NMR resonances of the His-68 and the Tyr-59 of ubiquitin are used to probe the conformational changes. Mixing ubiquitin and methanol solutions under low pH at microliter per minute flow rates yields both native and A-states. As the flow rate decreases, yielding longer reaction times, the population of the A-state increases. The micromixer-NMR system can probe reaction kinetics on a time scale of seconds.


Tablet devices have made a dramatic impact in the computing industry, and have been widely adopted by consumers, including tertiary students. Published research surrounding the use of tablet computers in tertiary settings appears to be largely centred on the advantages of integrating tablets into university pedagogies. However, there appears to have been very little research into the current level of ownership and use amongst students beyond university-sponsored adoption programs. This paper sets out to provide baseline data on the level of ownership and the current usage of tablets by students at an Australian university. A survey of 200 undergraduate and postgraduate students and interviews with five students showed high tablet ownership and significant engagement with educational uses. The findings of this study have implications for the incorporation of tablets into university education.


The purpose of this article is to share a general idea of the Total Physical Response-Storytelling method, the principles upon which it arises, and how it works in an EFL classroom. We offer, on the one hand, a historical background review of the TPR-Storytelling method, this helps to contextualize it and understand its focus as well as its influence on children or adult learners' oral production and fluency development. On the other hand, we show a contrast in the methodological development of this method, highlighting some partial findings achieved in this on-going research project, based particularly on the steps followed within the American and Colombian didactic foreign language learning contexts. This article is based on a research study developed by the authors of this article, carried out with children as well as with adults, including university students majoring in English in a Language Licensure Program, and particularly with primary school teachers bound to teach English to children, despite the fact that they are not formally qualified to do so. The theoretical review of this project includes the consideration of both cognitive and affective factors in human learning.


Recently, it was shown that a significantly higher T1ρ is found in compact myocardial fibrosis after chronic myocardial infarction. In this study, we investigated the feasibility of native T1ρ‐mapping for the detection of diffuse myocardial fibrosis in patients with dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM).


Online advertising has transformed the advertising industry with its measurability and accountability. Online software and services supported by online advertising is becoming a reality as evidenced by the success of Google and its initiatives. Therefore, the choice of a pricing model for advertising becomes a critical issue for these firms. We present a formal model of pricing models in online advertising using the principal–agent framework to study the two most popular pricing models: input-based cost per thousand impressions (CPM) and performance-based cost per click-through (CPC). We identify four important factors that affect the preference of CPM to the CPC model, and vice versa. In particular, we highlight the interplay between uncertainty in the decision environment, value of advertising, cost of mistargeting advertisements, and alignment of incentives. These factors shed light on the preferred online-advertising pricing model for publishers and advertisers under different market conditions.


Importance
Diversity in the medical workforce is critical to improve health care access and achieve equity for resource-limited communities. Despite increased efforts to recruit diverse medical trainees, there remains a large chasm between the racial and ethnic and socioeconomic composition of the patient population and that of the physician workforce.

Objective
To analyze student attrition from medical school by sociodemographic identities.

Design, Setting, and Participants
This retrospective cohort study included allopathic doctor of medicine (MD)-only US medical school matriculants in academic years 2014-2015 and 2015-2016. The analysis was performed from July to September 2021.

Main Outcomes and Measures
The main outcome was attrition, defined as withdrawal or dismissal from medical school for any reason. Attrition rate was explored across 3 self-reported marginalized identities: underrepresented in medicine (URiM) race and ethnicity, low income, and underresourced neighborhood status. Logistic regression was assessed for each marginalized identity and intersections across the 3 identities.

Results
Among 33 389 allopathic MD-only medical school matriculants (51.8% male), 938 (2.8%) experienced attrition from medical school within 5 years. Compared with non-Hispanic White students (423 of 18 213 [2.3%]), those without low income (593 of 25 205 [2.3%]), and those who did not grow up in an underresourced neighborhood (661 of 27 487 [2.4%]), students who were URiM (Hispanic [110 of 2096 (5.2%); adjusted odds ratio (aOR), 1.41; 95% CI, 1.13-1.77], non-Hispanic American Indian/Alaska Native/Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander [13 of 118 (11.0%); aOR, 3.20; 95% CI, 1.76-5.80], and non-Hispanic Black/African American [120 of 2104 (5.7%); aOR, 1.41; 95% CI, 1.13-1.77]), those who had low income (345 of 8184 [4.2%]; aOR, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.15-1.54), and those from an underresourced neighborhood (277 of 5902 [4.6%]; aOR, 1.35; 95% CI, 1.16-1.58) were more likely to experience attrition from medical school. The rate of attrition from medical school was greatest among students with all 3 marginalized identities (ie, URiM, low income, and from an underresourced neighborhood), with an attrition rate 3.7 times higher than that among students who were not URiM, did not have low income, and were not from an underresourced neighborhood (7.3% [79 of 1086] vs 1.9% [397 of 20 353]; P < .001).

Conclusions and Relevance
This retrospective cohort study demonstrated a significant association of medical student attrition with individual (race and ethnicity and family income) and structural (growing up in an underresourced neighborhood) measures of marginalization. The findings highlight a need to retain students from marginalized groups in medical school.


ABSTRACT White adipose tissue (WAT) stores energy in the form of triglycerides, whereas brown tissue (BAT) expends energy, primarily by oxidizing lipids. WAT also secretes many cytokines and acute-phase proteins that contribute to insulin resistance in obese subjects. In this study, we have investigated the mechanisms by which activation of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ) with synthetic agonists induces a brown phenotype in white adipocytes in vivo and in vitro. We demonstrate that this phenotypic conversion is characterized by repression of a set of white fat genes ("visceral white"), including the resistin, angiotensinogen, and chemerin genes, in addition to induction of brown-specific genes, such as Ucp-1. Importantly, the level of expression of the "visceral white" genes is high in mesenteric and gonadal WAT depots but low in the subcutaneous WAT depot and in BAT. Mutation of critical amino acids within helix 7 of the ligand-binding domain of PPARγ prevents inhibition of visceral white gene expression by the synthetic agonists and therefore shows a direct role for PPARγ in the repression process. Inhibition of the white adipocyte genes also depends on the expression of C/EBPα and the corepressors, carboxy-terminal binding proteins 1 and 2 (CtBP1/2). The data further show that repression of resistin and angiotensinogen expression involves recruitment of CtBP1/2, directed by C/EBPα, to the minimal promoter of the corresponding genes in response to the PPARγ ligand. Developing strategies to enhance the brown phenotype in white adipocytes while reducing secretion of stress-related cytokines from visceral WAT is a means to combat obesity-associated disorders.


This guide is for the DIS9904 course. It contains resources available in the NCU Library as well as open access websites.


Agricultural expansion and intensification have resulted in strong declines in farmland biodiversity across Europe. In many intensively farmed landscapes, linear landscape elements such as field boundaries, road verges and ditch banks are the main remaining green infrastructures providing refuge for biodiversity, and as such play a pivotal role in agri-environmental policies aiming at mitigating biodiversity loss. Yet, while we have a fairly good understanding of how agricultural intensification influences biodiversity on farmland, little is known about whether and how local land-use intensity affects biodiversity in nearby linear landscape elements and how this affects their role as biodiversity refuge. Focussing on pollinating insects, we examined the effects of local land-use intensity on biodiversity in agricultural fields and adjacent green infrastructures. In an intensively farmed area in south-western France, we selected 23 agricultural grasslands and nearby field boundaries along a gradient in grassland cutting frequency which acted as a proxy for land-use intensity. We analysed how grassland cutting frequency affects species richness, abundance and community composition of wild bees and hoverflies in the grasslands and neighbouring field boundaries, and whether these effects differ across habitat types and species groups. Grassland cutting frequency negatively affected pollinator species richness and abundance in the grasslands, whereas pollinators in the neighbouring field boundaries were unaffected. These responses reflected the effects of cutting frequency on floral resources, with flower cover and richness decreasing in grasslands but not in field boundaries. As a result, the proportion of the local pollinator community supported by field boundaries increased with the increasing cutting frequency of the adjacent grassland. Common and rare pollinator species generally showed similar responses. Furthermore, communities of plants and pollinators in field boundaries next to intensively farmed grasslands were fairly similar to those next to extensively farmed ones. Synthesis and applications. Our results suggest that, as nearby land use intensifies, flower-rich field boundaries become increasingly important as pollinator refuge habitats. Conserving field boundaries and other green infrastructures, and maintaining or enhancing their quality, therefore constitute important tools to conserve and promote pollinators in intensively farmed landscapes.


Background Antibiotic prescription rates have decreased steadily since 2011 in Wales. The most recent Welsh Antimicrobial Resistance Programme (WARP) report on antibiotic use in primary care found significant variations between Health Boards in gross antibiotic use in 2014. It is however not clear whether there is widening gap in prescribing volumes between the most and least deprived neighbourhood as well as hospitals across the country. The aim of this study was to evaluate the association between socioeconomic deprivation and antibiotic prescribing volumes in Wales. Methods Welsh General Practitioner (GP) antibiotic prescribing data for years 2013 to 2016 for patients' resident in Wales were extracted from the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage GP tables. Deprivation was assessed by linking prescribing events to the Welsh Index of Multiple Deprivation score for the patient's neighbourhood area. The association between deprivation area and antibiotic prescribed (items per 1000 persons per day) was stratified according to the patient's age, sex, prescription year and antibiotic class. A three-level multilevel Poisson regression model of 1.58 million patients nested within 349 GP practices, nested with 67 GP clusters, was specified to assess the associations. Results Just over 7.97 million antibiotic items were prescribed between 2013 and 2016. Patients in the most deprived WIMD quintile had an overall prescription rate that was 25.2% higher than those in the least deprived WIMD quintile. The final model revealed that residing in the most deprived WIMD quintile (incidence rate ratio [IRR]=1.1769, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.1768 to 1.1770, being female (IRR=1,2699, 95% CI 1.2698 to 1.2700), being aged ≥90 (IRR=2.0687, 95% CI 2.0683 to 2.0690), and prescription year being 2013 were associated with significantly higher rate of antibiotics prescription. There were significant primary cares clustering of antibiotics prescription in Wales. Conclusion This study provides evidence that patients in areas of higher socioeconomic deprivation are more likely to be prescribed antibiotics in primary care in Wales. Population health prevention strategies aimed at reducing high antibiotic prescription rates should consider targeting areas of high deprivation.


Vocabulary learning is one of the most important factors that foreign language learners encounter during the process of learning a foreign language. Vocabulary learning used to be a neglected aspect of language learning. In recent years, however, interest in this area has grown enormously. Language teachers have been keen in searching for effective approaches to enhance vocabulary learning. Vocabulary learning is more important than familiarity with the form and meaning of a word. This paper has suggested reciprocal teaching strategy as a main factor to improve students' vocabulary learning in a foreign language. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether 'reciprocal teaching strategy improves students vocabulary learning or not. Reciprocal teaching consists of four basic reading strategies: predicting, questioning, clarifying, and summarizing. Cognitive and meta-cognitive strategies are the reciprocal teaching strategies used to enhance students' vocabulary learning. The lack of good vocabulary learning skills is a main obstacle in a foreign language. One solution to this problem of poor vocabulary skill is the explicit teaching of vocabulary learning strategy. Researcher is going to define the key words, explain the models of vocabulary process, follow reciprocal teaching strategies, discuss cognitive and meta-cognitive strategies and elaborate the related research on reciprocal teaching, and state relationship between reciprocal teaching and vocabulary learning. The findings indicated that reciprocal teaching had a significantly positive effect on the foreign language learning. Keywords: Vocabulary learning, Reciprocal teaching, cognitive strategy, meta-cognitive strategy


Garlic (Allium sativum) root tips were induced to regenerate shoots through callus culture and somatic embryogenesis to obtain plantlets. The experiment was designed to investigate the regeneration potentiality of two garlic verities and also to develop an efficient protocol for regeneration of garlic via callus culture. Higher percentage of callus was initiated from the combination of 5 mg l Kinetin and 1.5 mg l 1 1 2,4-D. Embryogenic callus produced higher number of shoots in MS medium supplemented with 10 BAP . Rooting of individual shoots was induced after transfer to medium without growth regulator. The plantlets were established in the soil after acclimization. Cultivar differences in regeneration from root tips were observed.


Introduction: Tetrameric Ig are produced and secreted by plasma cells. However, it is well documented that plasma cells also produce and secrete Ig-free light chains (FLC; and ). Recent studies in animal models for allergy suggest the existence of an IgE-independent hypersensitivity response involving antigen-induced mast cell activation, mediated by FLCs. In this study we aimed to explore the relation between serum FLC and IgE in various patients with high levels of specific IgE for food and respiratory allergens. Materials and Methods: 20 subjects with food allergy, 21 subjecs with respiratory allergy and 15 controls were selected and serum was collected for determination of kappa and lambda FLCs, total IgE and specific IgE. Total IgE, FLCs were determined by ELISA. Specific food and respiratory allergens was determined by Improvio C Blotting Methods. Results: The results show that FLC are significantly increased in patients with high allergen-specific IgE as detected by immunoblotting (for 30 food and 30 respiratory allergens). Among the food allergens, the highest specific IgE was detected for celery, carrot, cheese mix, and milk and spelt flour, Derm.farinae, Acarus siro, cockroach, mixed grasses and rye pollen for the respiratory allergens. Milk allergic subjects show significant higher increases in than FLCs, while in others -for example celery allergics- this augmentation was reverse. No significant association between and FLCs with others was seen. Conclusion: FLC subunits may be considered as unique markers for allergic sensitization. λκλκλκ


Sustainability is receiving increasing attention from issuers, investors and regulators. The desire to understand issuer sustainability practices and their relationship to economic performance has resulted in a proliferation of sustainability disclosure regimes and standards. The range of approaches to disclosure, however, limit the comparability and reliability of the information disclosed. The Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) has solicited comment on whether to require expanded sustainability disclosures in issuer's periodic financial reporting, and investors have communicated broad-based support for such expanded disclosures, but, to date, the SEC has not required general sustainability disclosure. This Article argues that claims about the relationship between issuer sustainability practices and risk management, business plan and economic vulnerability, as well as the need for investors and regulators to evaluate those claims, warrant incorporating sustainability information into SEC-mandated financial reporting. Drawing upon the existing narrative disclosure frameworks in SEC-mandated reporting requirements, the Article offers an innovative proposal sustainability disclosure -- a sustainability discussion and analysis or SD&A section of the annual report. The Article identifies critical components necessary to make mandated sustainability disclosure both practical and effective and offers a workable first step for integrating sustainability disclosure into issuer financial reporting.


We present results from co-ordinated measurements with the low altitude REIMEI satellite and the ESR (EISCAT Svalbard Radar), together with other ground-based instruments carried out in February 2006. The results mainly relate to the dayside cusp where clear signatures of so-called ion-dispersion are seen in the satellite data. The cusp ion-dispersion is important for helping to understand the temporal and spatial structure of magnetopause reconnection. Whenever a satellite crosses boundaries of flux tubes or convection cells, cusp structures such as ion-dispersion will always be encountered. In our case we observed 3 distinct steps in the ion energy, but it includes at least 2 more steps as well, which we interpret as temporal features in relation to pulsed reconnection at the magnetopause. In addition, fast variations of the electron flux and energy occurring during these events have been studied in detail. The variations of the electron population, if interpreted as structures crossed by the REIMEI satellite, would map near the magnetopause to similar features as observed previously with the Cluster satellites. These were explained as Alfven waves originating from an X-line of magnetic reconnection.


Introduction: Diabetes mellitus (DM) and hypertension (HTN) are considered as the leading causes of CKD all around the world. But the causes of CKD differ from region to region. In developing countries the population is heterogeneous therefore regional causes of CKD need to be evaluated.
Material and method: This cross sectional study included all adult CKD patients, who visited to nephrology service in two tertiary care hospitals in metropolitan city Karachi in Pakistan. The sociodemographic data was collected by interview through a structured questionnaire while laboratory data was collected from patients records.
Results: Diabetic nephropathy (DNP) was the main cause of CKD (37.5%) followed by hypertensive nephropathy (17.1%) and obstructive nephropathy (ONP) (12.7%). ONP and hereditary disorders (HD) were more prevalent in males than females (70. 1% vs. 29.9%) and (75% vs. 25%) respectively, while urinary tract infection (UTI), drug induced kidney disease and tubulointerstitial nephritis (TIN) were more common in females than in males (87.5% vs. 12.5%), (75.8% vs.24.2%) and (64.7% vs. 35.3%) respectively. Gender, area of residence and socioeconomic status were the factors which affect the cause of CKD (p ≤ 0.05).
Conclusion: DNP and hypertensive nephropathy were more prevalent in urban, educated males with high socioeconomic background. On the other hand CKD of unknown etiology and stone diseases were more common in rural, uneducated, males with low socioeconomic background.


We have synthesized and done an extensive chemical-physical analysis of the behavior of a new compound, named MBET306, a synthetic precursor of the recently discovered tartrate-based inhibitors of the protein Tumor Necrosis factor-α Converting Enzyme (TACE). Experimental and theoretical data have shown that in water solution MBET306 is overwhelmingly found as a monoanion at physiological pH, in a conformation that differs substantially from that detected in the known co-crystal structures of MBET306 derivatives bound to TACE. The body of collected experimental and theoretical data indicates that the monoanionic species binds Zn(ii) inducing a strong stabilization of the crystal-like arrangement of the central tartrate zinc-binding group, lending support for a two step TACE docking mechanism via a zinc-bound intermediate. The thorough chemical-physical characterization of the conformational behavior of free and zinc-bound MBET306 in water bulk solution opens new avenues for the rational drug design of tartrate-based highly specific TACE inhibitors.


The paper contrasts the verbs plyt'/plavat' in Russian and plynąc/plywac in Polish with their correspondences in Dutch, English and Swedish against a broader typological background. The three Germanic languages use several verbs for what is covered by a pair of derivationally related verbs in each of the two Slavic languages. The Germanic languages lexicalize the activity/passivity of motion, but vary considerably as to how they carve up the conceptual space. Russian and Polish, on the other hand, use plavat'/plyt' independently of the activity/passivity of motion and focus on the uni- or non-unidirectionality of the motion. Nonetheless, it appears that the different lexicalizations in the Swedish-English-Dutch systems of aquamotion verbs are reflected in constructional differences in the Russian-Polish systems.


where y, X, /3, and e are n x 1, n x k, k x 1, and n x 1 matrices, respectively, and where X has full column rank k. The m = n — k recursive (or other LUS) residuals generated by this model are independently normally distributed with zero means and variance a. Show that nonlinear transformations of these residuals can be found that yield a set of m — 1 variates that are independently uniformly distributed on the unit interval [0,1]. Outline some of the possible uses of these transformed residuals.


Self-supervised learning models have been shown to learn rich visual representations without requiring human annotations. However, in many real-world scenarios, labels are partially available, motivating a recent line of work on semi-supervised methods inspired by self-supervised principles. In this paper, we propose a conceptually simple yet empirically powerful approach to turn clustering-based self-supervised methods such as SwAV or DINO into semi-supervised learners. More precisely, we introduce a multi-task framework merging a supervised objective using ground-truth labels and a self-supervised objective relying on clustering assignments with a single cross-entropy loss. This approach may be interpreted as imposing the cluster centroids to be class prototypes. Despite its simplicity, we provide empirical evidence that our approach is highly effective and achieves state-of-the-art performance on CI-FAR100 and ImageNet.


Interpolation of digital elevation models becomes necessary in many situations, for instance, when constructing them from contour lines (available e.g., from nondigital cartography), or from disparity maps based on pairs of stereoscopic views, which often leaves large areas where point correspondences cannot be found reliably. The absolutely minimizing Lipschitz extension (AMLE) model is singled out as the simplest interpolation method satisfying a set of natural requirements. In particular, a maximum principle is proven, which guarantees not to introduce unnatural oscillations which is a major problem with many classical methods. The authors then discuss the links between the AMLE and other existing methods. In particular, they show its relation with geodesic distance transformation. They also relate the AMLE to the thin-plate method, that can be obtained by a prolongation of the axiomatic arguments leading to the AMLE, and addresses the major disadvantage of the AMLE model, namely its inability to interpolate slopes as it does for values. Nevertheless, in order to interpolate slopes, they have to give up the maximum principle and authorize the appearance of oscillations. They also discuss the possible link between the AMLE and Kriging methods that are the most widely used in the geoscience literature.


Previous research suggests a relationship between neuroticism (N) and the speed-accuracy tradeoff in speeded performance: High-N individuals were observed performing less efficiently than low-N individuals and compensatorily overemphasizing response speed at the expense of accuracy. This study examined N-related performance differences in the serial mental addition and comparison task (SMACT) in 99 individuals, comparing several performance measures (i.e., response speed, accuracy, and variability), retest reliability, and practice effects. N was negatively correlated with mean reaction time but positively correlated with error percentage, indicating that high-N individuals tended to be faster but less accurate in their performance than low-N individuals. The strengthening of the relationship after practice demonstrated the reliability of the findings. There was, however, no relationship between N and distractibility (assessed via measures of reaction time variability). Our main findings are in line with the processing efficiency theory, extending the relationship between N and working style to sustained self-paced speeded mental addition.


Highly interactive web applications that offer user experience and responsiveness of standard desktop applications are becoming prevalent in the web application domain. However, with these benefits come certain drawbacks. For example, the event-based architectural style, and poor support for code organization, often lead to a situation where code responsible for a certain behavior is intermixed with irrelevant code. This makes development, debugging and reuse difficult. One way of locating code implementing a certain behavior is program slicing, a method that, given a subset of a program's behavior, reduces the program to a minimal form that still produces that behavior. In this paper we present a semi-automatic client-side web application slicing method, describe the web page dependency graph, and show how it can be used to extract only the code implementing a certain behavior.


The use of a tracking method for developing a directional-view display system with directional sound is described. The proposed system allows an individual to experience directional sound in a multi-view display environment. A projection-type display system is used, because a high definition display and large size display screen can be easily realized. We implemented a tracking system with an infrared camera and infrared light emitting diodes to track the viewers' positions. A viewing zone analysis that permits complete separation between neighboring view images to be calculated and experimental results for two observers are presented.


This new work form Jon A. Maguire provides an in-depth examination of personal flight clothing and equipment used by United States Army Air Force flyers in World War II. Included are: flight helmets, oxygen masks, goggles, clothing, boots, gloves, flak armor, paper items and emergency equipment such as parachutes and "Mae Wests." In addition to U.S. issue items, the book also covers R.A.F. gear used by American airmen. The original items are presented in full color photographs, including detail shots and labels. Also included are hundreds of World War II era photographs showing the items in use, as they were worn. Portions of actual USAAF instructional manuals are provided as well. This book is a valuable reference to historians, collectors, and modelers. It is also a source of memories and reflection for the many USAAF veterans. Jon Maguire has been collecting and researching the uniforms and flight gear of the USAAF for more than twenty years. He is also the author of Silver Wings, Pinks & Greens: Uniforms, Wings & Insignia of USAAF Airmen in World War II, and American Flight Jackets, Airmen & Aircraft: A History of U.S. Flyers' Jackets from World War I to Desert Storm (with John Conway). Both books are available from Schiffer Publishing Ltd. Jon lives in Oklahoma City, OK.


Most ofus wonder regularly why we went into the medical profession and how we manage to sustain the almost daily onslaught ofour psyche. In our more rational moments, we acknowledge how lucky and privileged we are! This little volume (the 14th edition) contains everything that is required by the aspirant in medical training and also answers questions which probably would not be thought about. Particularly valuable are the details of specialisation and the requirements for this. This little volume is a must for all students (and their parents!). C.D. Forbes


Previous studies have found a significant effect of pupil's month of birth on their school- and sports performances. The current study investigates whether this so-called relative age effect also exists in a rather unexplored domain, namely popularity among adolescents in school classes. Whereas prior studies examined relative age related to the cut-off date at primary school entry, we also study possible relative age effects regarding the age composition within pupils' current school class. Data are from nationally-representative surveys among 14–15 year-old pupils from the Netherlands, Sweden and England. Results indicate a statistically significant positive relation of both types of relative age with popularity status in classes. The relation of past relative age is particularly strong in England, which has a system of social promotion, whereas current relative age is strong in the Netherlands, with its system of grade retention. These findings underscore the importance of education policy.


The N fertilizer or organic resources alone may not provide sufficient amounts or may be unsuitable for improving specific constraints to crop production. In view of this, a field trial was conducted at Woreta ATVET College horticultural farm, Ethiopia to determine integrated effect of nitrogen and vermicompost levels on yield and yield components of carrot, nantes type, during 2017 main rainy season. Nine treatments comprising a factorial combination of three levels of nitrogen (0, 50, and 100 kg N ha−1) and vermicompost (0, 3 and 6 ton vermicompost ha−1) were laid out in a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. Data were collected on growth factors, root yield and yield components. The results revealed that the main and interaction effects of treatments did not have any significant (P >0.05) effect on plant height and root length. However, main effects of nitrogen affected leaf number and total fresh biomass. Combined application of 50 kg N ha-1 and 6 ton vermcompost ha-1 significantly (P 0.05) increased total root yield (t/ha), dry root weight (g/plant), harvest index and fresh root weight (g/plant). At this combination, highest total root yield (60 t/ha), harvest index (51%) and fresh root yield (79.8 g/plant) were recorded. It can, thus, be concluded that maximum yield of  carrot can be obtained from the combined application of 50 kg N ha-1 and 6 t vermicompost ha-1.

 Key words: Carrot, nantes, nitrogen, vermicompot, root yield, interaction effect.


Rapid in-flight reduction of fine iron ore transported with CO, H2 and/or CH4 gas has been studied for direct use of fine iron ore in iron-making process. In this work, the mechanism and the kinetic of the reduction by CH4 gas were accurately investigated with spherical wustite fine particles. The spherical wustite fine particle as fine iron ore was prepared to simplify the reduction rate analysis. Reduction temperature was varied from 1373 to 1573 K. As the result, fractional reduction of spherical wustite by CH4 gas reached over 80% at 1573 K within 1 s. From the cross section observation of the particle after reduction, it was found that the periphery of the wustite particle was metallized by reducing reaction and un-reacted wustite core remained inside. Therefore, it was indicated that the reduction progressed topochemically in this experimental condition. In the reduction rate analysis, it was found out that the reduction rate by CH4 was higher than that by H2 or CO. From the carbon concentration analysis, it was found that the phase of the metallic shell during reduction was not only solid state but also liquid state. From the above-mentioned kinetic analysis, it was concluded that the reduction rate determining-step by CH4 was chemical reaction on Fe–FeO interface and the reduction of wustite was preceded by the carbon dissolved into metallic shell from CH4 gas.


Biofilms are slowly becoming recognised as a cause of wound infection. Typically, the biofilm delays healing without inducing a dramatic host response. Biofilms may be unperturbed by antimicrobial or neutrophil attack and can survive in a relatively harsh environment, resisting attempts at removal. Their presence is often associated with chronic wounds but they can also be involved in acute wound infection. Acknowledging their presence as a potential cause of surgical site infection may explain the sometimes disappointing response obtained from traditional approaches such as promoting drainage, systemic antibiotics or delayed closure.


There exists strong correlation between the extended polyglutamines (polyQ) within exon-1 of Huntingtin protein (Htt) and age onset of Huntington's disease (HD); however, the underlying molecular mechanism is still poorly understood. Here we apply extensive molecular dynamics simulations to study the folding of Htt-exon-1 across five different polyQ-lengths. We find an increase in secondary structure motifs at longer Q-lengths, including β-sheet content that seems to contribute to the formation of increasingly compact structures. More strikingly, these longer Q-lengths adopt supercompact structures as evidenced by a surprisingly small power-law scaling exponent (0.22) between the radius-of-gyration and Q-length that is substantially below expected values for compact globule structures (∼0.33) and unstructured proteins (∼0.50). Hydrogen bond analyses further revealed that the supercompact behavior of polyQ is mainly due to the "glue-like" behavior of glutamine's side chains with significantly more side chain-side chain H-bonds than regular proteins in the Protein Data Bank (PDB). The orientation of the glutamine side chains also tend to be "buried" inside, explaining why polyQ domains are insoluble on their own.


Recognizing that the scientific method is as critical to cancer control as it is to basic laboratory research, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) established a well-defined, systematic strategy for attaining its cancer control goals and objectives. This strategy, operationalized in the early 1980s as a five-phase process, emphasized cancer control as a research science rather than a demonstration science. The five phases of NCI's cancer control research strategy progress from hypothesis development, to methods development, to controlled intervention trials, to defined population studies, and finally to demonstration and implementation programs. This research base provides the foundation for nationwide prevention and health services programs. The application of this five-phase approach to NCI's efforts to reduce morbidity and mortality attributable to tobacco use is described, and some of the challenges that faced the Institute in this process are identified. These experiences provide an important framework for other disciplines faced with the challenge of translating science into practice.