Insight into individual driving behavior and habits is essential in traffic operation, safety, and energy management. With Connected Vehicle (CV) technology aiming to address all three of these, the identification of driving patterns is a necessary component in the design of personalized Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) for CVs. Our study aims to address this need by taking a unique approach to analyzing bidirectional (i.e. longitudinal and lateral) control features of drivers, using a simple rule-based classification process to group their driving behaviors and habits. We have analyzed high resolution driving data from the real-world CV-testbed, Safety Pilot Model Deployment, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, to identify diverse driving behavior on freeway, arterial, and ramp road types. Using three vehicular features known as jerk, leading headway, and yaw rate, driving characteristics are classified into two groups (Safe Driving and Hostile Driving) on short-term classification, and drivers habits are categorized into three classes (Calm Driver, Rational Driver, and Aggressive Driver). Proposed classification models are tested on unclassified datasets to validate the model conviction regarding speeding and steep acceleration. Through the proposed method, behavior classification has been successfully identified about 90 percent of speeding and similar level of acute acceleration instances. In addition, our study advances an ADAS interface that interacts with drivers in real-time in order to transform information about driving behaviors and habits into feedback to individual drivers. We propose an adaptive and flexible classification approach to identify both short-term and long-term driving behavior from naturalistic driving data to identify and, eventually, communicate adverse driving behavioral patterns.


The chair was taken by Professor J. G. SCADDING (London), who in his opening remarks spoke of the great difficulty nowadays of carrying out trials of new antituberculous agents, since the initial treatment had become so effective and standardized that it was hard to find ethical justification for using a new drug except in heavily resistant cases. Each investigator was likely to have only a small number of such patients, and it therefore became important, at such a meeting as this, to pool the available experience. He was followed by Dr. E. M. SPROSTON, of Eli Lilly, who spoke of the dilemma of the pharmaceutical houses ; despite the difficulties described by Professor Scadding they were nevertheless required to collect information for bodies such as the Committee on the Safety of Drugs before a drug could be marketed. Dr. T. M. WILSON (Manchester) described his experience with 22 patients treated with Capreomycin. Ten of these were drugresistant to almost all other forms of therapy and the other 12 had been taken off conventional treatment because of allergic reactions. In all cases Capreomycin had been combined with other drugs, such as ethionamide, isoniazid, or P.A.S. The maximum period of follow-up was 15 months, and while it was too early for a final assessment the results appeared to be encouraging. Sputum conversion had occurred in all patients who had had over four months' treatment, and resistance to Capreomycin had developed in only one case. No toxic effects had occurred, but eosinophilia had been noted in six of the patients.


This paper reports the results of a Fall 2005 survey of US health economists, the first in over 18 years. Where appropriate, the results are compared with the earlier findings of Feldman and Morrisey (J. Health Politics Policy Law 1990; 15(3):627-646). The paper describes the demographics and training of health economists. It also describes how employers view the substitutability between a Ph.D. in economics and a Ph.D. in health services research, which is a key question because self-identified health economists increasingly include health services researchers trained in schools of public health or medicine. This study also reports the expectations of various, employers of health economists regarding external grant and contract support. It also reports health economists' perceptions of the processes that allocate resources and recognition: promotion review, journal refereeing, and grant review.


Experiments are described which confirm theoretical predictions of higher-efficiency, narrower-bandwidth microwave output of the reditron oscillator over simple vircator high-power microwave devices. The authors produced 1.6 GW of microwave power at 2.46 GHz. The conversion efficiency from beam power to microwave power was 5.5 to 6%, exceeding the usual 1 to 3% efficiency obtained with conventional vircators. The 1% bandwidth was about a factor of 10 less than the usual value for virtual cathode oscillators. Results of computer calculations in reasonable agreement with the experimental findings are presented. >


Abstract Objective: Inspections of 272 facilities were performed between May 1992 and October 1994 to determine compliance with applicable Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requirements for prevention of tuberculosis (TB) transmission. Design: Retrospective record review of two data sources: (1) OSHA's Computerized Integrated Management Information System and (2) an inspector-completed questionnaire on inspection results. Setting/Participants: Inspections of five types of facilities: healthcare institutions, correctional facilities, homeless shelters, long-term–care facilities for the elderly, and others, including drug treatment centers that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) identified as having a higher than expected rate of TB. Methods: The OSHA Compliance Memorandum, based on the 1990 CDC Guidelines, which outlined elements of a TB prevention program, was used in performing 272 inspections of facilities between May 1992 and October 1994. Elements of compliance were recorded and reviewed from the IMIS database and inspectors' questionnaires. Results: Regulated facilities were not fully compliant with OSHA guidance. Generally, healthcare facilities performed better than other facilities. Most facilities (79%) were compliant with administrative elements of a comprehensive TB control program, such as early identification of known or suspected infectious TB patients and skin testing of workers. Only 29% of inspected facilities were found to have acceptable respiratory protection programs for the prevention of occupational TB. Conclusion: Facilities have not been fully compliant with the OSHA memorandum describing protection of workers from TB. Facility compliance was better with some traditionally recognized TB infection control elements, but was weaker in the area of respiratory protection programs. This may reflect a lack of familiarity with the latter type of hazard protection.


In recent years, using video as a learning resource has received a lot of attention and has been successfully applied to many learning activities. In comparison with text-based learning, video learning integrates more multimedia resources, which usually motivate learners more than texts. However, one of the major limitations of video learning is that both instructors and learners must select suitable videos from huge volume of data. The situation is worsened by the fact that video content is usually displayed linearly. In order to solve this problem, we propose a multimedia content summarization and adaptable recommendation framework which is able to extract summaries from raw videos and recommend them to learners automatically. By following the characteristics of multimedia, the generated summary contains both important abstracts and corresponding images, and can be accessed online. Only suitable videos are selected for recommendation based on user profiles. The proposed system is evaluated and compared to text-based learning in terms of ARCS model. The results demonstrate that the proposed video summarization and recommendation framework was not only positive with regard to motivating learners, but also enhanced the video learning experience significantly. Positive results are also found in relation to system usage and satisfaction.


DNA-containing particles formed by the expression of the defect prophages of E. carotovora subsp. carotovora (Ecc) have been revealed for the first time. Two types of virus-like particles (VLP) occur in this phytopathogenic bacterium. Capsides of the first type VLP are weakly identified at agarose electrophoretic separation while DNA released from them are presented by distinct reflexes. Mobility of the second type particles is close to that of separate capsids of the temperate phage ZF40. DNA packed in these VLP are slightly mobile in agarose gels and are, most likely, typologically close to the open ring forms. Molecules of DNA particles of the both types possess the size equal to or more than 50 t.p.n. It is shown that DNA-containing VLP prevail in lysates obtained at lysogenic induction of cells by nalidixic acid, while the induction by mitomycin C is mainly characterized by formation of biologically active tails of defective temperate phages. The obtained result create preconditions for studying molecular-genetic organization of defective prophages and their significance in ecology of the important phytopathogen E. carotovora.


A Project Submitted to the Chandaria School of Business in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirement for the Degree of Global Executives Masters in Business Administration (GEMBA)


Sensitive investigations such as pulmonary function tests, broncho-alveolar lavage or computered tomography at high resolution enable pleuro-pulmonary disease to be detected in nearly 50% of those patients studied who had rheumatoid arthritis (PR). The prevalence of these manifestations is most usually elevated in male PR sufferers, those who are sero-positive or have associated extra-articular signs such as sub cutaneous nodules. More recently there has been evidence of genetic risk factors linked to HLA grouping or Pi phenotype. Amongst the usual manifestations, the pleurisies and above all necrobiotic nodules, which are most often asymptomatic, sometimes pose difficult problems in differential diagnosis, particularly when they precede the articular disease. The diffuse interstitial fibrosis remains the most worrying specific complication due to the fact of its potential seriousness. The pathophysiology of this form of fibrosis is better understood since the introduction of LBA. In the absence of any specific controlled studies its treatment remains impirical and is similar to that given for diffuse or idiopathic interstitial fibrosis. Pulmonary vascularity, the bronchiolitis obliterans with organising pneumonia and apical fibrosis, very similar to Hamilton's syndrome, are much rarer manifestations. On the other hand non specific respiratory infections are the cause of death in 10-20% of cases. Bronchiolitis obliterans induced by D Penicillamine is the most severe iatrogenic manifestation, since corticosteroid therapy associated with immunosuppressive drugs enables at best a stabilisation of the alveo bronchiolar lesions. More recently there have been twenty observations of hypersensitivity pneumonia to low dose methotrexate. The prevalence of these pulmonary disorders during the treatment of PR is around 5%. However the respiratory contraindications of these drugs which are being used more and more and the methods of pulmonary surveillance under treatment are not yet defined.


Alternating Direction Implicit (ADI) methods are very good smoothers for multigrid. Like multigrid itself, ADI propagates information very quickly across a grid. On parallel processors, ADI is very ine cient due to the tridiagonal solves in each of the spatial directions. In one direction, the data typically resides in one processor. In the other directions, the data spans processor memories on distributed memory machines. In this paper, a \transpose free" variant of ADI is considered which eliminates the drawback of ADI on parallel processors. In addition, it is quite useful on serial computers. We provide convergence rates for a model problem and numerical results for variable coe cient elliptic problems in two and three dimensions.


As holistic analysis of life-course sequences becomes more common, using optimal matching (OM) and other approaches the problem of missing data becomes more serious. Longitudinal data is prone to missingness in ways that cross-sectional is not. Existing solutions (e.g., coding for gaps) are not satisfactory, and deletion of gappy sequences causes bias. Multiple imputation seems promising, but standard implementations are not adapted for sequence data. I propose and demonstrate a Stata implementation of a chained multiple imputation procedure that "heals" gaps from both ends, taking account of the longitudinal nature of the measured information, and also constraining the imputations to respect this longitudinality. Using the sequence data alone, without auxiliary individual-level information, stable imputations with good characteristics are generated. Using additional information about the structure of data collection (which relates to mechanisms of missingness) gives better prediction models, but imputations that differ only subtly. Many sequence analysts proceed by cluster analysis of the matrix of pairwise OM distances between sequences. As a non-inferential procedure, this does not benefit from "Rubin's Rules" for multiple imputation in averaging across estimations. I explore ways of clustering with multiplyimputed sequences that allow us to assess the variability due to imputation. I compare the results with an existing approach that codes gaps with a special missing value that is maximally different from all other states, and show that imputation performs better. In an example data set drawn from BHPS work-life histories, imputation of short internal gaps ( 12 months) increases the available sample size by approximately 25 percent. Moreover, the gappy sequences have a distinctly different distribution, with higher numbers of transitions, so deletion of gappy sequences distorts the sample badly. For typical longitudinal data sets, we can expect missingness to be related to the amount of instability in the career, and to proceed without imputation will cause serious bias.


This explanatory multiple case study is an attempt to investigate the adaptability of accounting with the advancement of technology with a particular reference to two manufacturing organizations in Canada. The results of this study demonstrate that contemporary organizations have developed their own technology with an expectation to meet accounting standards and improve efficiency in a transitional period. Organizations are giving more importance on the reliability and flexibility with accounting technology due to some contemporary issues like US corporate scandals and the need to change Canadian accounting standards to IAS. Based on the empirical findings, some recommendations and research directions are given at the end of this paper.


In this manuscript, we develop a methodological approach towards the structural analysis of larger amounts of visual and multimodal data by conceptualizing more closely and systematically the workings of visual communication in the construction of meaning and the reproduction of institutions, as well as its interaction with verbal text. First, we briefly outline the conceptual basis for our methodological development. We introduce the concept of institutional registers in more detail and discuss pioneering research on visual registers before disentangling the visual mode from a social semiotic perspective and elaborating on textual metafunctions. At the core of our article, we develop an inventory of mechanisms realizing each metafunction visually and propose an operationalization of these mechanisms in the form of coding suggestions. We also touch upon ways in which such codes may be usefully integrated in the analysis of larger meaning structures. We illustrate selected aspects of our methodology with empirical data from the Austrian CSR discourse and conclude our article with an outline of its main contributions and promising directions for future research.


In this study, US and UK accident data were analyzed to identify parameters that may influence rollover propensity to analyze driver injury rate. The US data was obtained from the weighted National Automotive Sampling System (NASS-CDS), calendar years 1992 to 1996. The UK pre-roll data was obtained from the national STATS 19 database for 1996, while the injury information was collected from the Co-operative Crash Injury Study (CCIS) database.

In the US and UK databases, rollovers accounted for about 10% of all crashes with known crash directions. In the US and UK databases, most rollovers occurred when the vehicle was either going straight ahead or turning. The propensity for a rollover was more than 3 times higher when going around a bend than a non-rollover. In the UK, 74% of rollovers occurred on clear days with no high winds and 14% on rainy days with no high winds. In the US, 83% of rollovers took place in non-adverse weather conditions and 10% with rain. In the US and the UK, more than 50% of rollovers happened during daylight. However, compared with non-rollover incidents, US and UK rollovers had a higher propensity to occur with sleet/fog or snow and in the dark without streetlights. In the UK, 76% of rollovers took place on roads with a speed limit of 50 mph (80 kph) and above, while in the US, the rate was 51%. In the US, drivers were most often distracted by people inside and outside their vehicle or when eating and/or drinking, and falling asleep.

The results indicate that pre-rollover characteristics are somewhat similar in the US and in the UK. Rollovers were more likely to occur with sleet/fog or snow and in the dark than non-rollover crashes. Vehicles that were traveling straight on a highway or going around a curve were most likely to roll.

In this study, the overall injury distribution was similar in US and UK drivers. For belted and unbelted drivers, serious injuries were most frequent in the head and in the thorax, emphasizing the need to provide protection in both these areas. The pre-rollover and injury information obtained in this study may thus be useful for the development of global preventive measures.


This paper illustrates how breast tissue composition, modeled by different mixtures of adipose and glandular tissues, affects the accuracy of microwave breast imaging for different sizes of malignant lesions. To study this, the scattered field for different tissue composition and various tumour sizes was calculated using a Frequency Dependent Finite Difference Time Domain ((FD)2TD) approach. Images are generated from the scattered field, together with Genetic Algorithm (GA) optimization methods. The scattered field calculations show that it is strongly dependent not only on the dielectric properties and size of the breast tissue, but also on the specific tissue composition. The tumour response is the difference between scattered fields of a specific tissue composition with and without the tumour. The response of a 1.5cm tumour was found to be 6.7 times larger when it is embedded within homogeneously uniform fatty tissue than when embedded within homogeneously uniform fibro-glandular tissue. For a tumour inside a heterogeneously dense breast consisting of a mix of fi bro-glandular and fatty tissues, this value is 5.2. The consequences of the biological heterogeneity on the forward and inverse simulation, and on the accuracy of images obtained by microwave imaging using the proposed method were studied. The robustness of our approach to variations in the breast phantom was shown. This technique returned highly accurate results with millimetre resolution. The most rigorous test to date demonstrated that we are able to accurately reconstruct an image of the dielectric properties of a 7.5mm lesion embedded in fibro-glandular tissue at a depth of 6cm in a heterogeneous numerical breast phantom.


BACKGROUND
Antenatal fetal death is one of the most devastating complications of pregnancy.

OBJECTIVE
To identify socio-demographic and clinical risk factors for antenatal fetal death.

MATERIAL AND METHODS
A case-control study was carried out. Five hundred women were included: Two hundred fifty patients had a stillbirth (cases) and 250 women had a healthy live birth (controls). Stillbirths were considered as antenatal fetal death after 20 weeks of gestation. Seventeen socio-demographic and clinical risk factors for stillbirth were analyzed. Statistical analysis included: Student t test or Mann-Whitney U test for continuous data, and Chi-square or Fisher exact test for categorical variables. Multiple logistic regression analysis (backward stepwise procedure) was used to find significant predictors for stillbirth. Odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) were calculated. It was set an Alfa level of 0.05.

RESULTS
Six risk factors were significant in the final logistic regression model: Age (OR 1.07, 95% CI 1.03-1.1), smoking habits (OR 9.1, 95% CI 1.07-78.0), placental abruption (OR 51.9, 95% CI 6.8-393.9), cord entanglement (OR 5.0, 95% CI 2.5-9.7), nulliparity (OR 1.3, 95% CI 1.1-1.5) and antenatal care (OR 0.1, 95% CI 0.08-0.4). The whole model had a determination coefficient R2 = 0.234 (p < 0.001).

CONCLUSIONS
We developed a predictive model for antepartum fetal death appropriate at our population. The six significant risk factors for stillbirth could be diagnosed early during pregnancy. The antenatal care could be considered the cornerstone for the prevention of antenatal fetal death.


Magnesium salts have been used for many years to correct a wide variety of arrhythmias. A few experimental studies have been devoted to their electrophysiological effects, but these remain poorly documented in man, hence this study. An electrophysiological investigation was conducted in 24 patients before, and immediately after a bolus intravenous injection of magnesium sulphate in doses of 1.5 g to 12 patients (group I) and 3 g to 12 other patients (group II), followed by a continuous infusion at the rate of 1 mg/min. The drug had no influence on heart rate, duration of QRS, QT and QTc intervals and ventricular refractory period. A small, but statistically significant prolongation of HV (from 57 to 59 ms, p less than 0.05) was observed in group II. Analysis of the results in group I revealed a moderate but significant prolongation of the PR and AH intervals. The electrophysiological effects were distinctly more pronounced in group II patients, with significant prolongation of: PR and AH intervals, effective refractory period of the right atrium and AV node, Wenckebach's point, corrected sinus node recovery time and sinoatrial conduction time. These results demonstrate that magnesium sulphate principally acts on the sinus node, the AV node and the atrium, suggesting a blocking effect on calcium channels.


Objectives Treatment options for recurrent low grade serous ovarian carcinoma (LGSOC) are limited. Herein we describe the potential utility of next generation sequencing in identifying therapeutic targets for this rare tumour. Methods 3 patients were included in this study. DNA was extracted from ten FFPE tumour samples (5 from primary surgery and 5 from recurrences) and whole blood. Whole exomes sequencing (WES) was performed on Illumina's NextSeq platform to a depth of at least 10X. Sequence data were trimmed, aligned and single nucleotide variants and copy number alterations were called. Results All samples were microstatellite stable, 2 of the 3 patients had an elevated tumour mutational burden(TMB) (defined as >10 mutations/Mb). In the patient with low TMB we identified a class 3 'kinase-dead' BRAF variant, D594G with concordant near-whole chromosome 1 amplification, covering the NRAS proto-oncogene. Single gene testing confirmed wild type EGFR and KRAS. This lady did not respond to a trametinib. The second case identified a pathogenic NBN R43* mutation with associated non pathogenic mutations in other DNA damage response genes. This patient who had previously declined cytotoxic chemotherapy has had a partial response to platinum based chemotherapy. The third patient did not have a targetable mutation but is awaiting PD-L1 testing. Conclusions WES may be helpful in refractory LGSOC when standard treatment options have been exhausted. Two of our patients had an elevated TMB suggesting that the efficacy of immunotherapy in LGSOC should be investigated.


Recently, while looking for examples of Scandinavian themes and motifs in New Zealand literature, I encountered a cache of mostly out-of-print nonfiction books written about
the voyages of these hardy settlers to New Zealand in the nineteenth century. I have a personal interest as part of my own family story is in one of these texts, Johanna's
World, by Oystein Andressen.
In several of the books—some written for local rural New Zealand communities, others translated into English from Norwegian and Swedish, Danish and Finnish—the usual colonial themes of privation, struggle, poverty and hardship prevail. However, the books often go beyond historical record and the original documents and letters upon which they are based, to bridge the gap between history and imagination, as the authors articulate how their subjects feel and what motivates many of their decisions and responses—topics upon which most settlers had been stoically silent for a century. It is now over 40 years since Lee Gutkind gave us the term Creative Nonfiction, where writers immerse themselves in the field of research or write about their own experience, and yet these authors write about history subjectively, using documentation to recreate the ordinary lives of those who lived through historical events rather than making them.
This paper will consider the fictional devices, narratological and and rhetorical, by which the texts cross the threshold between fiction and nonfiction.


Operating system kernels are difficult to understand and monitor. Hardware virtualization provides a layer where security tools can observe a kernel, but the gap between operating system abstractions and hardware accesses limits the ability of tools to comprehend the kernel's activity. Virtual machine introspection (VMI) builds knowledge of high-level kernel state by directly accessing the memory of an executing kernel. We show that implementations of introspection-based tools unsafely rely on operating system level data structures to provide meaningful information about a guest. We evade XenAccess, an open source implementation of introspection developed for Xen. We then develop Wizard, a Xen-based kernel monitor cognizant of the semantic correlation between events at a high-level kernel service interface and events at a low-level hardware device interface. In contrast to VMI, Wizard trusts no guest OS data, but its semantic understanding still identifies kernel-level attacks that alter the kernel's execution behavior. Wizard's monitoring imposes modest overheads of 0%–25% on guest applications.


In this paper we present a detailed study in which the formation, by heavy ion impact, and thermal recrystallisation of individual amorphous zones have been studied using in-situ transmission electron microscopy. In agreement with previous work, we observe a reduction in the total volume of amorphous material contained within the amorphous zones following thermal annealing over a wide range of temperatures. When the evolution of the individual amorphous zones is followed, those with similar starting sizes are observed to recrystallise over a range of temperatures from 70 °C to 500 °C. The temperature at which an amorphous zone fully recrystallises does not appear to be correlated with initial size. In addition, zones are occasionally observed to increase in size temporarily on some isochronal annealing steps. Furthermore, observations during a ramp anneal show that many zones recrystallise in a stepwise manner separated by periods of stability. These phenomenon are discussed in terms of the I-V pair.


The life cycle of Belonolaimus longicaudatus was observed in vitro on excised roots of Zea mays. Roots were cultured on Gamborg's B5 medium in petri dishes with 1.5% agar adjusted to pH 5.8 and incubated at 28 degrees C in darkness. Second-stage juveniles (J2) fed on the roots and started the second molt (M2) to the third-stage juveniles 2 days after inoculation (DAI). The third molt (M3) to the fourth-stage juveniles occurred 7 DAI, followed by the fourth molt (M4) to males 13 DAI or to females 14 DAI. Nematode gender differences were observed by the end of the fourth molt. The first male appeared 15 DAI and the first female 17 DAI, after which mating occurred. Males were attracted to females, and mating was observed. Mating was required for reproduction. Fertilized females began to lay eggs 19 DAI and continued egg laying without the further presence of males during a 90-day observation. All of the eggs hatched. Unfertilized females rarely laid eggs, and none of the eggs were able to hatch. Feeding took place between each molt and before egg deposition occurred. The first-stage juveniles molted in the eggs 4 days after deposition, and J2 hatched from eggs 5 days after egg deposition. The life cycle from J2 to J2 was completed in 24 days.


BACKGROUND
We recently provided evidence that circulating autoantibodies against cardiac troponin I (cTnI) or the troponin complex cause negative interference in cTnI immunoassays. By comparing three cTnI immunoassays, we further explored the phenomenon of circulating autoantibodies and their consequences in patient samples.

METHODS
We developed a cTnI immunoassay with a novel assay design using three antibodies, two of which bind epitopes outside the stable, central part of cTnI. Samples from 541 chest pain patients were measured with the new cTnI assay and with a first-generation cTnI assay (Innotrac Aio cTnI) using a conventional midfragment assay design. Using another sample cohort, we also compared the new assay with a second-generation cTnI assay (Access AccuTnI).

RESULTS
The analytical detection limit of the new cTnI assay was 0.012 microg/L, and the lowest concentration giving a total imprecision (CV) of 10% was 0.060 microg/L. The mean difference (95% limits of agreement) between the new cTnI and Aio cTnI assays was larger in admission samples (21.0%; -107.8% to 149.7%) than in samples taken 6-12 h (12.8%; -61.5% to 87.2%) and 24 h after admission (3.0%; -71.3% to 77.4%; P <0.001). With the lowest concentrations giving 10% CV (0.22 microg/L for Aio cTnI) used as cutoffs, 14.3% (n = 76) of admission samples were positive only with the new assay, whereas 13.5% (n = 72) were positive with both assays. Of samples taken at 6-12 and 24 h, 10.2% (n = 31) and 8.3% (n = 29) were positive only with the new assay. ROC curve analysis of admission samples showed a significantly higher area under the curve for the new cTnI assay (0.940) than for the Aio cTnI assay (0.846; P <0.001). The new cTnI assay gave generally lower results than the AccuTnI assay; the mean (95% limits of agreement) differences were -58.9% (-151.8% to 34.0%) in admission samples. In samples with severe interference from autoantibodies, median ratios between the new assay and AccuTnI were higher than in samples with no apparent troponin autoantibodies (0.875 vs 0.481; P<0.001).

CONCLUSIONS
The new cTnI assay, which is based on a novel antibody combination different from the conventional midfragment antibody approach, offers improved detection of cTnI in samples containing troponin autoantibodies.


The invention provides a traditional Chinese medicine granular preparation with angelica extract and a preparation method thereof. Traditional Chinese medicine spheroidized particles are prepared by using a traditional Chinese medicine extract and a pharmaceutically acceptable carrier. The shapes of the traditional Chinese medicine spheroidized particles are spherical or similar to spheres, and the density of the traditional Chinese medicine spheroidized particles ranges from 0.6 g/ml to 1.3 g/ml. A single dose of the spheroidized particles is small, the medicine taking is convenient, and the granular preparation can be used as a semifinished product of capsules and can also be used for developing sustained and controlled release preparations of traditional Chinese medicine.


The long-term devastation caused by childhood sexual abuse among adult survivors has been well documented within the literature. Similarly, numerous studies have addressed efficacy of various treatment modalities targeting psychological sequelae associated with such abuse. However, despite the recent rise in popularity of mindfulness within the field of psychology, as well as indication of tremendous psychological benefits associated with such practice, few studies have sought to understand the connection between mindfulness and healing among abuse survivors. The current study attempts to bridge the gap in the literature by examining the experiences of clinicians using mindfulness as a framework for their treatment of adult childhood sexual abuse victims. Participants (N=6) were recruited from the Los Angeles area and the qualitative design utilized semi-structured interviews as a means of data collection. Grounded theory analysis of the data revealed a complex and dynamic interplay of elements that captured the nature of mindfully framed treatment with abuse survivors. Results suggested that core elements of mindfulness practice, along with therapeutic conditions and factors related to the therapist's way of being, allow growth and change within the client. However, it was further revealed that the interplay of such elements was surrounded by the tremendous impact of a clinician's personal mindfulness practice, which fostered essential healing elements. While the observed results provide no conclusive data, the importance of environmental conditions, as well as therapeutic presence, rather than a focus on specific techniques or interventions suggests implications for work with abuse survivors. Additionally, it is hoped that further research continues to observe mindfulness and provide support for its implementation as a viable and effective treatment for trauma survivors.


Adaptive human behavior builds on prior knowledge about stimulus relevance. Some environments cue such knowledge more than others. To behave adaptively, observers need to flexibly adjust sensory processing to the degree of contextual uncertainty. We hypothesize that the neural basis for these perceptual adjustments consists in the ability of the cortical network to switch back and forth between a rhythmic state that serves selective processing, and a state of elevated asynchronous neural activity that boosts sensitivity. To test this hypothesis, we recorded non-invasive EEG and fMRI BOLD dynamics while 47 healthy young adults performed a parametric visual attention task with varying numbers of relevant stimulus features. Drift-diffusion modeling of response behavior and electrophysiological signatures revealed that greater contextual uncertainty lowered the rate of evidence accumulation while increasing thalamocortical engagement, with concomitant increments in cortical excitability and pupil dilation. As predicted, uncertainty-related processing adjustments were expressed as switches between a state of phase-dependent excitability modulation in the alpha band and a state of increased irregularity of brain dynamics. We conclude that humans dynamically adjust sensory excitability according to the processing fidelity afforded by an upcoming choice, and that neuromodulatory processes involving the thalamus play a key role in adjusting excitability in the human brain. Highlights With increasing contextual uncertainty, human cortical networks shift from a state of phase-dependent excitability modulation in the alpha band into a state of elevated excitatory tone and asynchronous neural activity Evidence based on joint modeling of behavior, EEG, and BOLD suggests that neuromodulatory processes involving the thalamus regulate these shifts Theoretical and empirical considerations suggest contributions of both frequency-specific and aperiodic neural dynamics to human behavior


Ultrasonic energy is spotlighted as a skill which connects detailed parts accurately and safely. So we designed the horn needed for attaching Tubular type of metal parts such as slip ring used for providing electricity for a body of rotation. We considered mainly booster's size, slip-ring's size, and nature frequency of horn. This design fixed the frequency given from ultrasonic metal welder as 40,000Hz, so it decided the approximate length of horn which makes maximum vibration amplitude through formula. And we designed the horn as a step shape with fillet for increasing the amplitude and decreasing stress concentration. Horn's tip is designed 10mm length in view of the shape of slip-rings. And we calculated and analyzed the natural frequency by the modal analysis and harmonic analysis using Ansys that is analysis program. Through this study, we could examine the manufacturing possibility of the horn for ultrasonic metal welding of tubular type.


Abstract As consumer awareness increases in Poland, fish consumption is on an upward trend. While new technologies permit meeting increasing demand, they significantly increase the pressure on fish supplies. As a result, many fish stocks are over-exploited, which threatens marine ecosystems. Declining fisheries, increasing fishing operating costs, and the necessity of making longer fishing expeditions at greater distances that often end with catches of fewer or less valuable fish mean that in some fisheries sectors are currently running at the margins of profit or at a loss. At the same time, the European Union's fisheries policy aims to create more selective and sustainable fisheries, to implement limitations through fishing quotas, and to ban the recognition of discards. The aim is to ensure that individual fish species are protected while providing the European Union with stable, secure supplies of fresh fish. The FindFish Knowledge Transfer Platform project was launched to provide solutions for challenges facing commercial fisheries. Its purpose is to provide fishers with a knowledge transfer platform and a numerical forecasting system for the marine environment of the Gulf of Gdansk. By combining in-situ research, environmental data, fish catch data, and numerical calculations, this tool will improve the accuracy of targeted fishing while reducing by-catch. The system will provide more reliable data on fish stocks and facilitate more efficient resource management.


The Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau (QTP), known as "the Roof of the World", is one of the most unique and vulnerable biodiversity regions on Earth. However, the spatial patterns and determinants of vascular plant diversity on the QTP are still poorly documented, despite a number of publications focusing on its flora. Using extensively compiled data gathered from local flora and specimen records, we evaluated the relative importance of water, energy, and habitat heterogeneity‐related variables in shaping the distribution of vascular plant diversity (species, genus, family, herb, woody plants). We found that higher richness always occurred in the south and east of the QTP, especially along the Himalayas, and that habitat heterogeneity, water, and energy variables are important determinants of vascular plant richness patterns on the QTP. The explanatory power of most single predictors was obviously different across life forms, with woody plant richness generally more sensitive to most environmental factors than herb richness. In addition, the explanatory power of habitat heterogeneity models, combined water and energy models, and environmental models increased as the taxonomic level increased from species to family. The results highlight that correlations between plant richness and environmental variables vary with life form and taxonomic scale, and suggest that the explanatory power of variables will change in different spatial scales due to the proportion of life forms and the asymmetric effects of these drivers on life form richness.


Objective: To evaluate the value of umbilical venous Doppler compared to umbilical arteries (UA) and fetal middle cerebral arteries (MCA) Doppler in assessing fetuses diagnosed to have fetal growth restriction by conventional biometry. Methods: Consecutive cases with suspected fetal growth restriction in the third trimester were prospectively recruited from the antenatal clinic of a regional obstetric service over a 9-month period. Diagnosis of fetal growth restriction (FGR) was suspected from fetal biometry and confirmed when birth weight fell below 10th centile for that gestation. Results of Doppler measurements within 10 days from delivery were analysed. The results were correlated to immediate perinatal outcome parameters. Results: A total of 76 patients were recruited. The diagnosis of FGR was confirmed after birth in 56 (73.6%) (mean birth weight 2540 g SD 231 Vs 2780 g SD 180); p < 0.01). The mean gestation at delivery did not differ between the group with confirmed or unconfirmed FGR (37.2 weeks Vs 37.9 weeks). Abnormal UA waveforms and abnormal cerebral/placental ratio (MCA/UA index < 1) was demonstrable in 9 and 3 of these cases, all in the confirmed FGR group. The umbilical venous waveform was normal in all the fetuses examined, and none had pathological UV pulsations. The total umbilical venous flow (TUVF) was significantly lower in the fetuses confirmed to have FGR at birth (230 ml/min, SD 32.4) as compared to those without (249 ml/min, SD 30.6, p < 0.02). However, when the size of the fetus was taken into account, the TUVF flow per unit birth weight did not differ between the two groups (90.5 ml/min/kg Vs 89.5 ml/min/kg). There was no correlation between this parameter and immediate neonatal outcome. Conclusion: Umbilical venous flow pattern and mean umbilical venous flow did not add to the assessment of growth-restricted fetuses, particularly when umbilical and fetal middle cerebral Doppler values were within normal.


UNLABELLED
Used ventilation filters are a major source of sensory pollutants in air handling systems. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the net effect that different combinations of filters had on perceived air quality after 5 months of continuous filtration of outdoor suburban air. A panel of 32 subjects assessed different sets of used filters and identical sets consisting of new filters. Additionally, filter weights and pressure drops were measured at the beginning and end of the operation period. The filter sets included single EU5 and EU7 fiberglass filters, an EU7 filter protected by an upstream pre-filter (changed monthly), an EU7 filter protected by an upstream activated carbon (AC) filter, and EU7 filters with an AC filter either downstream or both upstream and downstream. In addition, two types of stand-alone combination filters were evaluated: a bag-type fiberglass filter that contained AC and a synthetic fiber cartridge filter that contained AC. Air that had passed through used filters was most acceptable for those sets in which an AC filter was used downstream of the particle filter. Comparable air quality was achieved with the stand-alone bag filter that contained AC. Furthermore, its pressure drop changed very little during the 5 months of service, and it had the added benefit of removing a large fraction of ozone from the airstream. If similar results are obtained over a wider variety of soiling conditions, such filters may be a viable solution to a long recognized problem.

PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS
The present study was designed to address the emission of sensory offending pollutants from loaded ventilation filters. The goal was to find a low-polluting solution from commercially available products. The results indicate that the use of activated carbon (AC) filters downstream of fiberglass bag filters can reduce the degradation of air quality that occurs with increasing particle loading. A more practical solution, yet comparably effective, is a stand-alone particle filter that incorporates AC. In either case, further testing under a variety of conditions is recommended before making design decisions regarding the type of filters best suited to efficient building operation.


ABSTRACT Reducing economic inequality and combatting climate change are two strongly supported policy goals, but they will require significant public investments. In times of limited fiscal resources, governments struggle to raise additional revenues needed to finance both, making trade-offs between generally supported policy goals likely. But how do citizens decide if they have to choose between goals they support in principle, such as spending on efforts to reduce inequality and channeling resources toward initiatives to protect the environment? We discuss three major factors that help explain this choice – information, self-interest, and ideological orientation. Our experimental study shows that information is not a significant determinant of such choices, and that ideology is only important as long as there are no conflicting goals. Once citizens have to decide between redistribution and environmental protection, myopic self-interest trumps all other theoretically relevant variables mentioned in the literature.


Several high-profile court fights, such as the SCO Group's pursuit of IBM regarding disputed Unix copyrights, have made software patents a top debate topic in the open source community. Open source companies have had to address fears raised by detractors who argue that a developer could inadvertently use a piece of open source code protected by a third-party patent, exposing his or her company and customers to intellectual property suits. For open source developers and customers seeking advice as they navigate the complicated waters of intellectual property law, more information is now available. SCO's chances of a lawsuit victory appear to be decreasing. IBM and Sun are sharing patents with the open source community, a move designed to spur innovation and offer protection.


Abstract We estimate the effects of part-time work on job and life satisfaction using new data for Chile. While part-time work is being promoted to increase female labour participation in many countries, there are concerns about its quality and the overall effect on well-being of such policies. We estimate models for job and life satisfaction addressing for endogeneity and selectivity bias. We found that part-time work has a negative effect on job satisfaction and well-being for men; however, when looking at just women, the negative effect is reversed. This should be considered when designing public policies oriented at increasing female labour participation through part-time work.


The WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WIPO Internet Treaties) recite a need for a digital copyright framework to facilitate 'adequate solutions to questions raised by new economic, social, cultural and technological developments.' It can hardly be contested that the social and cultural developments to which the Treaties refer do not derive from the cultural or economic conditions (much less technological developments) of the developing and least-developed countries. Consistent with their predecessors, the WIPO Internet Treaties marginalize collaborative forms of creative engagement with which citizens in the global South have long identified and continue in the tradition of assuming that copyright's most enduring cannons are culturally neutral. Recently, however, the rise of Web 2.0 and the salience of new forms of creativity mediated by digital technologies and social networking sites have exposed structural tensions in copyright laws of OECD countries similar to those which developing countries have historically raised in opposition to the Berne Convention. This Essay reviews the evolution of the WIPO Internet Treaties and argues that the framework established just over a decade ago is increasingly less relevant in addressing the challenges of creativity in the digital age. The Treaties do not provide a meaningful basis for a harmonized approach to encourage new creative forms in much the same way the Berne Convention fell short of embracing diversity in patterns and modes of authorial expression. The growing social and legal recognition of new forms of creativity enabled through digital technologies offers an important opportunity to challenge anew claims that globally mandated copyright norms can effect incentives to create that are relevant across geographical, cultural and technological boundaries.


: Cases of rodenticide poisoning (second-generation long-acting dicoumarin rodenticide, superwarfarin) have occasionally been reported. The main symptoms of bromadiolone poisoning are skin mucosa hemorrhage, digestive tract hemorrhage, and hematuresis. However, the symptoms of central nervous system toxicity have rarely been reported. Our case reports on a 41-year-old male who had no contact with bromadiolone. His main symptoms were dizziness, unsteady gait, and abnormal behavior. Laboratory test results revealed the presence of bromadiolone in his blood and urine, a longer prothrombin time, activated partial thromboplastin time, and a high international normalized ratio. Magnetic resonance imaging of the brain showed that the bilateral posterior limb of the internal capsule, splenium of corporis callosum, and bilateral centrum semiovale formed symmetrical patch distribution. The patient gradually recovered after treated with vitamin K1 and plasma transfusion. Our clinical study could pave the way to improve the detection of bromadiolone poisoning and avoid misdiagnosis.


End-to-end spoken language understanding (E2E SLU) systems predict the utterance semantics directly from speech. So far, to the best of our knowledge, E2E models have only been trained to recognize the semantics for a single language. In this work we introduce the first multilingual E2E SLU system and present results across three languages - English, Spanish and French. We propose a transformer-based, multilingual acoustic encoder to predict intents, that leverages pre-training for both acoustic and linguistic modalities of the SLU model. It learns a robust, cross-modal latent space using a pre-trained multilingual BERT as a semantic teacher. The best performing model achieves relative improvements of 7.2% in a single language setting, 5-6% in two, and 4-6% in three language settings. An intent-wise analysis shows that semantic supervision becomes more important for shorter utterances, while providing an explicit language identifier at the input leads to lower intent classification errors.


Epigenetic gene silencing by aberrant DNA methylation leads to loss of key cellular pathways in tumorigenesis. In order to analyze the effects of DNA methylation on prostate cancer, we established LNCaP-derived human prostate cancer cells that can pharmacologically induce global reactivation of hypermethylated genes by the methyl-CpG targeted transcriptional activation (MeTA) method. The MeTA suppressed the growth of LNCaP-derived cells and induced apoptosis. Microarray analysis indicated that PYCARD (PYD and CARD domain containing) encoding an apoptosis-inducing factor was upregulated by 65-fold or more after treatment with MeTA. We analyzed DNA methylation statuses using 50 microdissected primary prostate cancer tissues and found an extremely high frequency of tumor-specific promoter hypermethylation of PYCARD (90%, 45/50). Moreover, DNA methylation status was significantly associated with Gleason score (P = 0.0063); the frequency of tumor-specific hypermethylation was 96% (44/46) in tumors with Gleason score ≥ 7, whereas that in tumors with Gleason score 6 was 25% (1/4). Immunohistochemical analyses using these 50 cases indicated that only 8% (4/50) of cancerous tissues expressed PYCARD, whereas 80% (40/50) of corresponding normal prostate epithelial and/or basal cells expressed PYCARD. In addition, there was no relationship between PYCARD immunostaining and the Gleason score in cancerous tissue and surrounding normal tissue. Inducible expression of PYCARD inhibited cell proliferation by induction of apoptosis. These results suggest that aberrant methylation of PYCARD is a distinctive feature of prostate cancers with Gleason score ≥ 7 and may play an important role in escaping from apoptosis in prostatic tumorigenesis.


Loess in eastern Colorado covers an estimated 14 000 km 2 , and is the westernmost part of the North American midcontinent loess province. Stratigraphic studies indicate there were two periods of loess deposition in eastern Colorado during late Quaternary time. The first period spanned ca. 20 000 to 12 000 14 C yr B.P. (ca. 20‐14 ka) and correlates reasonably well with the culmination and retreat of Pinedale glaciers in the Colorado Front Range during the last glacial maximum. The second period of loess deposition occurred between ca. 11000 and 9000 14 C yr B.P. This interval may be Holocene or may correlate with a hypothesized Younger Dryas glacial advance in the Colorado Front Range. Sedimentologic, mineralogic, and geochemical data indicate that as many as three sources could have supplied loess in eastern Colorado. These sources include glaciogenic silt (derived from the Colorado Front Range) and two bedrock sources, volcaniclastic silt from the White River Group, and clays from the Pierre Shale. The sediment sources imply a generally westerly paleowind during the last glacial maximum. New carbon isotope data, combined with published faunal data, indicate that the loess was probably deposited on a cool steppe, implying a last glacial maximum July temperature depression, relative to the present, of at least 5‐6 °C. Overall, loess deposition in eastern Colorado occurred mostly toward the end of the last glacial maximum, under cooler and drier conditions, with generally westerly winds from more than one source.


In this paper, we propose a conceptually novel, efficient, and fully convolutional framework for real-time instance segmentation. Previously, most instance segmentation methods heavily rely on object detection and perform mask prediction based on bounding boxes or dense centers. In contrast, we propose a sparse set of instance activation maps, as a new object representation, to high-light informative regions for each foreground object. Then instance-level features are obtained by aggregating features according to the highlighted regions for recognition and segmentation. Moreover, based on bipartite matching, the instance activation maps can predict objects in a one-to-one style, thus avoiding non-maximum suppression (NMS) in post-processing. Owing to the simple yet effective designs with instance activation maps, SparseInst has extremely fast inference speed and achieves 40 FPS and 37.9 AP on the COCO benchmark, which significantly out-performs the counterparts in terms of speed and accuracy. Code and models are available at https://github.com/hustvl/SparseInst.


Abstract The Pseudomonas jinanensis has been isolated from soil and screened by antibioticgram assay and spermatogonial assay. It has certain antibiotic properties. The metabolite which has been produced is certainly effective against Staphylococcus aureus and some other positive germs. The preparation of Pseudomonas jinanensis vaccine, namely PJV. It's biological activity on the growth of tumor-bearing mice and the murine spermatogenesis cell. It is considered that enhancement of nonspecific immunologic function of the host might increase the efficacy of praziquantel on schistosomiasis in mice. PJV has certainly produced effectiveness against malignant pleural effusion (effective rate was 76.5%), cancer of lung (effective rate was 58.3%), many solid kinds of cancer (effective rate was 52.1%), and the total effective rate was 64.2%. It could increase the sensitivity of cancer cells to radiation. PJV could stimulate the animal (rabbit) to develop specific antibody. PJV might belong to the class of immunomodulating agents.


Zeolites are promising catalysts that are widely used in petrochemical, oil, and gas industries due to their unique characteristics, such as ordered microporous networks, good hydrothermal stability, large surface area, tunable acidity, and shape-selectivity. Nevertheless, the sole presence of microporous channels in zeolites inevitably restricts the diffusion of bulky reactants and products into and out of the microporous networks, leading to retarded reaction rates or catalyst deactivation. This problem can be overcome by developing hierarchical zeolites which involve mesoporous and macroporous networks. The meso- and macro-porosities can enhance the mass transport of molecules and simultaneously maintain the intrinsic shape selectivity of zeolite microporosity. Hierarchical zeolites are mainly developed through post-synthesis and pre-synthesis or in situ modification of zeolites. In this review, we evaluated both pre-synthesis and post-synthesis modification strategies with more focus on post-synthesis modification strategies. The role of various synthesis strategies on the intrinsic properties of hierarchical zeolites is discussed. The catalytic performance of hierarchical zeolites in important biomass reactions, such as catalytic pyrolysis of biomass feedstock and upgradation of bio-oil, has been summarized. The utilization of hierarchical zeolites tends to give a higher aromatic yield than conventional zeolites with microporosity solely.


The pipeline quality natural gas of Titas Gas (TG) contains approximately 96.12% (mol/mol) methane. Fugitive emissions are unintentional leaks emitted from sealed surfaces or leaks from underground pipelines resulting from corrosion or faulty connections. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas effect next to carbon dioxide. Reducing methane emission is an essential step toward reducing global warming. Inventory data on methane emission from natural gas transmission and distribution system of TG is absent in open literature. The objective of this paper is to explore the problems generated by gas leaks and to quantify the leaked methane gas from the above-ground facilities of the existing system of TG. Economic and environmental impacts for such fugitive emissions are also critically examined. In this study, leaks were detected using soap screening techniques and the Gasurveyor 500 series instrument. Leaked gas was quantified using either the Hi-Flow gas sampler or a bagging measurements system. The results show that approximately 2.1% of the purchased gas is leaked from the above-ground facilities of TG. Total estimated emission is approximately 4.214 MMTCO₂e per year that is approximately 4.74% of the total amount of methane emission from human activities and industrial methane production in Bangladesh during the year 2000. TG can save approximately USD 14.67 million per year by stopping these emissions. It is now a vital issue for TG to seize gas leakages for attaining the international standard of climate mitigation as well as upholding the image of TG.


The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) was established in 1975. IFPRI is one of 15 agricultural research centers that receive principal funding from governments, private foundations, and international and regional organizations, most of which are members of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). IFPRI's research, capacity strengthening, and communications work is made possible by its financial contributors and partners. IFPRI receives its principal funding from governments, private foundations, and international and regional organizations, most of which are members of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). IFPRI gratefully acknowledges the generous unrestricted Notices 1 Effective January 2007, the Discussion Paper series within each division and the Director General's Office of IFPRI were merged into one IFPRI–wide Discussion Paper series. The new series begins with number 00689, reflecting the prior publication of 688 discussion papers within the dispersed series. The earlier series are available on IFPRI's website at www.ifpri.org/pubs/otherpubs.htm#dp. 2 IFPRI Discussion Papers contain preliminary material and research results, and have been peer reviewed by at least two reviewers—internal and/or external. They are circulated in order to stimulate discussion and critical comment. Contents Acknowledgments v Abstract vi Abbreviations and Acronyms vii 1. Introduction 1


Datasets of mobile phone trajectories collected by network operators offer an unprecedented opportunity to discover new knowledge from the activity of large populations of millions. However, publishing such trajectories also raises significant privacy concerns, as they contain personal data in the form of individual movement patterns. Privacy risks induce network operators to enforce restrictive confidential agreements in the rare occasions when they grant access to collected trajectories, whereas a less involved circulation of these data would fuel research and enable reproducibility in many disciplines. In this work, we contribute a building block toward the design of privacy-preserving datasets of mobile phone trajectories that are truthful at the record level. We present GLOVE, an algorithm that implements k-anonymity, hence solving the crucial unicity problem that affects this type of data while ensuring that the anonymized trajectories correspond to real-life users. GLOVE builds on original insights about the root causes behind the undesirable unicity of mobile phone trajectories, and leverages generalization and suppression to remove them. Proof-of-concept validations with large-scale real-world datasets demonstrate that the approach adopted by GLOVE allows preserving a substantial level of accuracy in the data, higher than that granted by previous methodologies.


This paper builds a theory of the distribution of TFP across countries. The theory is based on the hypothesis that TFP improvements in a given country follow a Nelson-Phelps specification: they derive from past investments in the country itself and, through a spillover term, from past investments in other countries. Within a stochastic dynamic general equilibrium model of the world, each country invests in TFP and internalizes the dynamic effects of its investments, while ignoring any effects on others. Small symmetric idiosyncratic shocks can lead to large long-run differences in TFP levels and the world TFP distribution may become twin-peaked.


The status of the immune system was studied in 36 patients with the Itsenko-Cushing disease (10 at the initial stage, 12 in the period of recurrence, 14 during remission) and in 20 healthy persons comparing the corticotropin and hydrocortisone content in the plasma. The level of T lymphocytes was lowered at the initial stage of disease (40.6 +/- 3.4%) as well as during recurrence and remission (37.8 +/- 3.9 and 44.5 +/- 4.6%, respectively) as compared to this level in the healthy persons (60.5 +/- 3.6%). The content of B lymphocytes was lowered in all 3 groups (4.3 +/- 0.8,2.9 +/- 0.5 and 4.8 +/- 0.7%, respectively; in the group of healthy persons, it was 19.2 +/- 3.0%). The phagocytic activity of leukocytes was lowered at the initial stage of disease (39.0 +/- 7.6%) and during recurrence (36.7 +/- 4.5%) as compared to that of the healthy persons (44.6 +/- 1.5%). The hydrocortisone sensitive population of T lymphocytes was decreased 1.5-2 times. An increase in the corticotropin level (148.1 +/- 16.9 and 85.2 +/- 19.7 pg/ml, respectively; in health 47.9 +/- 3.8 pg/ml) and in the hydrocortisone level (142.5 +/- 11.1 and 181.3 +/- 20.5 ng/ml, respectively; in health 79 +/- 23 ng/ml) was marked simultaneously in the patients of these 2 groups. During remission (corticotropin and hydrocortisone normal levels), immunological indicators did not completely return to normal, thus suggesting a stable disorder of the cell immunity.


The International X-ray Project seeks to build an x-ray telescope using thousands of pieces of thin and flexible glass mirror segments. Each mirror segment must be bonded into a housing in nearly perfect optical alignment without distortion. Forces greater than 0.001 Newton, or displacements greater than 0.5 m of the glass, cause unacceptable optical distortion. All known epoxies shrink as they cure. Even the epoxies with the least amount of shrinkage (<0.01%) cause unacceptable optical distortion and misalignment by pulling the mirror segments towards the housing as it cures. A related problem is that the shrinkage is not consistent or predictable so that it cannot be accounted for in the setup (i.e., if all of the bonds shrunk an equal amount, there would be no problem). A method has been developed that allows two components to be joined with epoxy in such a way that reduces the displacement caused by epoxy shrinking as it cures to less than 200 nm. The method involves using ultraviolet-cured epoxy with a displacement sensor and a nanoactuator in a control loop. The epoxy is cured by short-duration exposures to UV light. In between each exposure, the nano-actuator zeroes out the displacement caused by epoxy shrinkage and thermal expansion. After a few exposures, the epoxy has cured sufficiently to prevent further displacement of the two components. Bonding of optical elements has been done for many years, but most optics are thick and rigid elements that resist micro-Newton-level forces without causing distortion. When bonding thin glass optics such as the 0.40-mm thick IXO X-ray mirrors, forces in the micro- and milli-Newton levels cause unacceptable optical figure error. This innovation can now repeatedly and reliably bond a thin glass mirror to a metal housing with less than 0.2 m of displacement (<200 nm). This is an enabling technology that allows the installation of virtually stress-free, undistorted thin optics onto structures. This innovation is applicable to the bonding of thin optical elements, or any thin/flexible structures, that must be attached in an undistorted, consistent, and aligned way.


BACKGROUND
Discharges against medical advice (AMA) occur in 1% to 2% of hospital stays and are associated with increased morbidity, readmission rates, and 30-day mortality. Risk factors associated with AMA have been investigated, but interventions at the time of discharge have not been carefully examined.

METHODS
We retrospectively reviewed the records of adult patients discharged AMA over a 2-year period from the general medical service of a university-affiliated tertiary care hospital. We assessed for presence of documentation addressing informed consent, patient decision-making capacity, health literacy, follow-up plans, whether medications were prescribed, and whether any warning indicators of impending AMA were apparent.

RESULTS
Two hundred ninety-one records were reviewed. AMA notes were present in 276 (94.8%) charts. Notes were authored by physicians in 163 (59.1%) and nurses in 110 (37.8%) encounters. Informed consent was present in 88 (30.2%) charts, mentioned in the note but not present in the chart in 111 (38.1%), and not signed in 92 (31.6%) charts. Decision-making capacity and health literacy were documented in 108 (37.1%) and 75 (25.8%) records, respectively. Warning of impending AMA was present in 217 (74.6%) charts. Medications prescribed and follow-up plans were documented in 71 (24.4%) and 91 (31.3%) charts, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS
Advance warning of impending AMA is often present, yet only a minority of cases have prescription of medications or development of follow-up plans. Medical documentation of AMA dispositions is frequently inadequate, suggesting missed opportunities to intervene as well as suboptimal medicolegal scenarios.


From 1983 to 1991, 214 patients (age 62 +/- 15 years; 72% male) with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest were resuscitated in the field and transported to the hospital with basic cardiac life support only (manual chest compression, assisted ventilation by bag-air-valve). In 64 patients (30%; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 24-36%) a stable circulation allowing admission to the intensive care unit was restored in the emergency room. 26 patients (12%; CI: 8-17%) survived to hospital discharge. 20 patients showed no or only mild neurological impairment, 4 had moderate cognitive deficits, and 2 patients were in a permanent vegetative state. Multiple logistic regression revealed bystander resuscitation before arrival of the ambulance (odds ratio [OR]: 4.7 [CI: 1.5-14.7]; p < 0.01) and ventricular fibrillation on arrival in the emergency room (OR: 42.8 [CI: 5.2-350]; p = 0.0005) to be statistically significant predictors of survival. These data justify continuation and extension of resuscitation efforts in the emergency room if patients were given only basic cardiac life support in the field and during transport. Patients who arrive in ventricular fibrillation and who were resuscitated by a bystander prior to the arrival of the ambulance team have a realistic chance of survival. Delegation of competence to defibrillate to trained, non-physician ambulance personnel may reduce the duration of cardiac arrest in patients with ventricular fibrillation and thus save lives.


To understand the genetic control of allelopathy in rice (Oryza saliva L.), quantitative trait loci (QTL) mapping was performed using a population of 142 recombinant inbred lines derived from a cross between cultivar IAC 165 (japonica upland variety) and cultivar CO 39 (indica irrigated variety). The map contained 140 DNA markers. The relay seeding technique, which is a laboratory bioassay measuring the inhibition in weed root growth due to the presence of rice seedlings, was used to evaluate the allelopathic effect of the rice lines. Cultivar IAC 165 showed strong and consistent allelopathic activity against barnyardgrass [Echinochloa crus-galli (L.) Beauv.], whereas CO 39 was weakly allelopathic. Transgressive segregation for allelopathic activity in both directions was observed in the population. No significant correlation was found between root morphology of the lines and their allelopathic potential, suggesting that allelopathy in rice was under genetic control independent from root morphology. Four main-effect QTLs located on three chromosomes were identified, which collectively explained 35% of the total phenotypic variation of the allelopathic activity in the population. One pair of digenic epistatic loci, not involving any of the main-effect loci, was also detected. Once confirmed, these QTLs may be useful for genetic improvement of allelopathy in rice using marker-assisted selection.


Accidents, such as storm surge, typhoon, non-normal impacting and other abnormal operating conditions will all cause damage to the structure of piled wharf. To improve the bearing capacity of structure and extend service life, it is need to detect, evaluate and reinforce the piled wharf. This paper analyzes different reasons and ways of destruction then puts up some detection methods for piled wharf's different components. The evaluation procedures and steps of piled wharf are also disused and mechanism of various reinforcement methods are researched in the same time. The results of this study can provide reference for the detection, assessment and reinforcement of piled wharf structures.


As a source of atmospheric carbon, biomass burning emissions associated with deforestation in the Amazon are globally significant. Once deforested, these lands continue to be sources of substantial burning emissions for many years due to frequent pasture burning. The objective of this research was to quantify biomass-burning emissions at a local scale. We estimated carbon emissions from three sources: fires associated with primary forest slash, regenerating forest slash, and pastures. The study was conducted on a 94370-ha section of land surrounding Jamari, RondGnia, Brazil. In the emissions com- putation, we integrated site-specific, ground-based data (biomass, emission factors for flam- ing and smoldering combustion, and combustion factors for land-cover types) with a Landsat TM land cover change map of the study area for 1984-1992. This map was used to ascertain changes in land cover based on TM image dates during a period of early colonization and rapid deforestation in Rond8nia. Emissions of CO, CO,, CH,, and other hydrocarbon trace gases were calculated. Between 1984 and 1992, we found CO, emissions generated by primary forest slash burning were 694 379 Mg C (920 kg C-ha-I-yr-I) and regenerating forest slash burning contributed 23 436 Mg C (31 kg C.ha-'.yr-l), whereas cumulative pasture burning produced 238 180 Mg C (316 kg C.ha-l.yr-l). CO and CH, folIowed the same trends by land cover type. Primary forest slash burns contributed 73% of the total C emissions whereas burning regenerating forest slash and pasture produced 2% and 2596, respectively. The major finding of this work is the identification of pasture burning as a potentially important source of pyrogenic emissions, but better data on biomass and com- bustion efficiency could confirm this finding. Further we demonstrated a novel method for estimating area burned that links land cover type and change to burn frequency.


MapBio is a project initiated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, which aims at integrating species distribution data from different sources and mapping the biodiversity of China to support biodiversity research and biodiversity conservation decisions. Species distribution data may be found in journal articles, books and different databases in various formats, and most species distributions are described in free text. MapBio is trying to build up a workflow for collecting this free text, parsing it into standardized data and projecting distributions onto a map for each species in China. A map module of MapBio is designed and implemented based on Web GIS to visualize species distributions on a map at different levels, e.g., occurrence points, county, province, distribution range, protected area, waterbody, biogeographic realm. Since the completeness of distribution data is very important for assessing biodiversity, we developed a tool in MapBio for analysis of the gaps in distribution data. Based on the species distribution data, especially the occurrence data, MapBio provides an integrated modeling tool for helping users to build species niche models. MapBio is an open access project. Users can get data and services from it easily for biodiversity research and conservation, and also can contribute their own biodiversity data to MapBio.


The structural evolution of nanostructured ?-Ni-28Fe alloy (n-Ni-Fe) (grain size d~30?nm), synthesized by the mechno-chemical method, was investigated by using the internal friction technique combined with differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) in the temperature range from 300?K to 670?K. An internal friction peak with typical characteristics of the first-order phase transition was observed in the vicinity of 620?K, which corresponds to a broad exothermic process revealed by using DSC. These results can be explained as the structural changes from the disordering to the ordering transition in the n-Ni-Fe sample.


We introduce a general method for building neural networks on quantum computers. The quantum neural network is a variational quantum circuit built in the continuous-variable (CV) architecture, which encodes quantum information in continuous degrees of freedom such as the amplitudes of the electromagnetic field. This circuit contains a layered structure of continuously parameterized gates which is universal for CV quantum computation. Affine transformations and nonlinear activation functions, two key elements in neural networks, are enacted in the quantum network using Gaussian and non-Gaussian gates, respectively. The non-Gaussian gates provide both the nonlinearity and the universality of the model. Due to the structure of the CV model, the CV quantum neural network can encode highly nonlinear transformations while remaining completely unitary. We show how a classical network can be embedded into the quantum formalism and propose quantum versions of various specialized model such as convolutional, recurrent, and residual networks. Finally, we present numerous modeling experiments built with the Strawberry Fields software library. These experiments, including a classifier for fraud detection, a network which generates Tetris images, and a hybrid classical-quantum autoencoder, demonstrate the capability and adaptability of CV quantum neural networks.


Objectives: Transposition of the great arteries is still one of the challenging cardiac defects to detect prenatally. The aim of the study was to ascertain whether 4D ultrasound (STIC) in combination with ultrasound tomography can be of help in facilitating the detection of fetuses with TGA. Methods: STIC volumes from 12 fetuses with TGA between 21 and 36 weeks were analyzed offline starting from the four-chamber view plane in a dorsoposterior fetal position and applying tomographic imaging evaluation (TUI). Results: In all 12 cases a demonstration of the known parallel course of both aorta and pulmonary trunk was possible using TUI. From the standardized four-chamber view plane this was achieved by performing a translation movement cranially and a rotation toward the right shoulder of the fetus. The translation distance was 4-mm (20–25 weeks), 5-mm (25–30 weeks) and 6-mm (30–36 weeks) depending on gestational age. The rotation was between 27◦ and 50◦ but did not depend on gestational age but on the position of the vessels to each other. Conclusions: STIC with TUI provides important information on the spatial relationship of the great vessels in fetuses with TGA. When TGA is suspected the examiner could move the transducer from the four-chamber view 4–6-mm toward the upper thorax before tilting the probe 25–50◦ to demonstrate whether the vessels are in parallel course or not. Whether this easy move can help in routine screening to detect fetuses with TGA remains to be shown.


BACKGROUND
Lesions in the avascular two-thirds of the meniscus do not heal well and are of concern clinically. Various growth factors promote the synthesis of matrix by meniscal cells and thus have the potential to augment healing. However, their clinical application is severely hindered by problems with delivery. An attractive approach to overcoming such problems is to transfer genes that encode the growth factors in question to the site of the injury. As a prelude to this, we evaluated methods for delivering genes to the meniscus.

METHODS
Gene transfer was evaluated in vitro and in vivo with a lacZ marker gene, which expresses the enzyme beta-galactosidase. Two types of vectors were tested: an adenovirus and a retrovirus. Monolayers of lapine, canine, and human meniscal cells, as well as intact lapine and human menisci, were used for the in vitro studies. Lesions were created in the menisci of rabbits and dogs for the in vivo studies. Gene transfer to the sites of the experimental meniscal lesions in vivo was accomplished in two ways. In the lapine model, a suspension of adenovirus carrying the lacZ marker gene was mixed with whole blood and the clot was inserted into the lesion. In the canine model, retrovirally transduced allogenic meniscal cells carrying the lacZ marker gene were embedded in collagen gels and transferred to the defects. The animals were killed at various time-points, and gene expression was evaluated by histological examination of sections stained with 5-bromo-4-chloro-indolyl-beta-D-galactose (X-gal), from which a blue chromagen is released in the presence of beta-galactosidase.

RESULTS
Monolayer cultures of lapine, canine, and human meniscal cells were susceptible to genetic transduction by both adenoviral and retroviral vectors. In vitro gene transfer to intact human and lapine menisci proved possible both by direct, adenoviral, delivery and indirect, retroviral, delivery. Gene expression persisted for at least twenty weeks under in vitro conditions. With regard to the in vivo studies, gene expression persisted within the clot and in some of the adjacent meniscal cells for at least three weeks in the lapine defect model. In the canine defect model, gene expression persisted within the transplanted, transduced meniscal cells for at least six weeks.

CONCLUSIONS
It is possible to transfer genes to sites of meniscal damage and to express them locally within the lesion for several weeks.


The study aimed to investigate the chemical and organoleptic characteristics of smoked tilapia fish fillets which were produced using different drying process and enriched with olive oil. Smoked fish were made using the following method: the fish were fasted overnight, shocked with cold water (4-5 oC) and then slaughtered and filleted. The fillets were soaked for 30 minutes in a brine solution containing spices and 5% (v/v) of liquid smoke. 5% (v/v) of olive oil was added into the solution and compared with control without olive oil addition. After 30 minutes, fish were cleaned from the spices using water and smoked at a temperature of 80 oC for 4-5 hours. The drying process was conducted in two different methods, i.e using oven-drying and traditional smoking. The smoked tilapia products were analyzed for proximate composition and sensory profiles. The result showed that addition of olive oil and methods of drying affected the proximate composition as well as sensory characteristics of the tilapia fillets. The fillets with addition of 5% olive oil and processed with oven-drying were considered as the best treatment due to low moisture content but high ash, fat and protein contents with 45.6±0.4%; 6.8±0.1%; 7.9±0.1% and 82±1.6%,  respectively. Based on panelist evaluation, the fillets with 5% olive oil and processed with oven-drying also had high performances in appearance and texture.


An important step in improving the efficiency of crop production is the development of scientifically valid technologies and technical means of presowing preparation and treatment of seeds. Among the various methods that have a positive impact on crop growth, early maturity and resistance to adverse conditions, one of the most promising is seed pelleting. (Research purpose) The reasonability of the use of pelleted seeds (dragees) was shown the shell composition of which includes the substances necessary for active growth and increase resistance to adverse effects, and, in addition, it provides a more accurate seeding. We substantiate the need for improvements to existing technologies and agricultural equipment (for example, seed pelleting machine). due to the significant lack of hightech means of mechanization of seed presowing preparation at domestic agricultural enterprises. (Materials and methods) Experimental studies have been carried out with the use of computer mathematical modeling. Results of experiments were processed by methods of mathematical statistics, statistical analysis and data processing package, research application package, filtering, analysis and modeling of technological processes. Physical and mechanical properties and quality indicators of seeds and fillers have been determined in accordance with the applicable state standards. (Results and discussion) Use has been made of a program that includes obtaining information about the processes to solve the problems of experimental studies carried out by machines for pre-sowing treatment of seeds in accordance with the developed models of their functioning; the choice of the most effective means of measuring, recording and processing information about the operation of machines and equipment in normal operating conditions; as well as checking the effectiveness of the developed methods and tools to ensure the quality of the process in case of accidental disturbances. (Conclusions) The authors have studied main parameters and operating modes of a seed pelleting installation. An average values of the process parameters of the presowing treatment of seeds have been calculated under the conditions of normal functioning of machinery and equipment taking into account the validity and reliability of the obtained characteristics. The authors have developed the technological fundamentals of the artificial coating of seed surface. The study results can be used as practical recommendations for the organization of presowing treatment of seeds in order to increase seed germination and crop yields.


Introduction: Chronic mesenteric ischemia is a pathophysiologic condition arising due to demand–supply mismatch of blood supply to bowel postprandially, resulting in chronic abdominal pain, food fear, and weight loss. The most common cause is atherosclerosis. Timely intervention in the form of mesenteric revascularization is the key to successful outcome. There are limited contemporary data on in-hospital outcomes of mesenteric revascularization via open versus endovascular therapy in a resource-challenged setting. Materials and Methods: This retrospective-prospective observational study included eight patients of chronic mesenteric ischemia who underwent open revascularization and were followed for a mean duration of 15 months. All patients were evaluated as per the institutional protocol, and retrograde mesenteric bypass with reverse saphenous vein graft was done in all cases. Outcomes were evaluated in terms of resolution of symptoms and confirmation of graft patency with duplex scan after 1 month and every 6 months thereafter. Results: Out of 8 patients, six patients were males. Predisposing factors for atheromatous diseases were present in all. All patients presented with postprandial abdominal pain and weight loss. Majority of patients ( n = 5) had involvement of all three mesenteric vessels (superior mesenteric artery, inferior mesenteric artery, and celiac axis). One patient was re-explored for bleeding in immediate postoperative period. One patient was admitted for small bowel obstruction in 1st month of follow-up after surgery and was managed conservatively. Two patients were lost to follow-up and six patients are symptom free and doing well on a close follow-up of 15 months. Conclusion: Open mesenteric revascularization, by reverse saphenous vein graft as conduit for bypass, performed by experienced surgeon gives promising results in terms of symptom-free duration and graft patency and can be preferred over endoscopic revascularization as a viable option in resource-challenged settings in developing nations.


Introduction. Medical students often describe the gross anatomy course as both stressful and a rite of passage. Research differs as to whether the stress it engenders is significant or transitory. This qualitative study of first year anatomy student reports on the use of optional creative projects to promote reflection and reduce stress. Methods. Over a three year period, 115 students, or 38.72% of all eligible students, opted to complete 1-2 arts or written creative projects during the anatomy course. Of these, 34 students gave us permission to analyze their projects, while 12 project completers and 12 project non-completers were interviewed to determine their views about the projects. Researchers developed coding schema and interview schedules that were used to assess and interpret the data. Findings. On average, over a three year period, a little less than 40% of students selected the creative project option, with approximately equal numbers of male and female students represented. Comparing types of projects, art works were more celebratory and less reflective than written works. Comparing phases of projects, initial projects appeared more conflicted, while later projects showed more desensitization, appreciation, and satisfaction. Students expressed anxiety and ambivalence about anatomy and employed various defense mechanisms to resolve their feelings. Students completing projects reported that they both reduced stress and caused them to develop a richer appreciation for both anatomy and medicine as a whole, while non-completers acknowledged that viewing the projects helped them to better understand their own experience of anatomy. Conclusions. For some students, creative projects may offer a more reflective and introspective way of wrestling with the ambivalent emotions anatomy raises than simple desensitization strategies of exposure.


RNA activation (RNAa) is a mechanism of gene activation triggered by promoter-targeted small double-stranded RNA (dsRNA), also known as small activating RNA (saRNA). p21 WAF1/CIP1 (p21) is a putative tumor suppressor gene due to its role as a key negative regulator of the cell cycle and cell proliferation. It is frequently downregulated in cancer including hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but is rarely mutated or deleted, making it an ideal target for RNAa-based overexpression to restore its tumor suppressor function. In the present study, we investigated the antigrowth effects of p21 RNAa in HCC cells. Transfection of a p21 saRNA (dsP21-322) into HepG2 and Hep3B cells significantly induced the expression of p21 at both the mRNA and protein levels, and inhibited cell proliferation and survival. Further analysis of dsP21-322 transfected cells revealed that dsP21-322 arrested the cell cycle at the G 0 /G 1 phase in HepG2 cells but at G 2 /M phase in Hep3B cells which lack functional p53 and Rb genes, and induced both early and late stage apoptosis by activating caspase 3 in both cell lines. These results demonstrated that RNAa of p21 has in vitro antigrowth effects on HCC cells via impeding cell cycle progression and inducing apoptotic cell death. This study suggests that targeted activation of p21 by RNAa may be explored as a novel therapy for the treatment of HCC.


Abstract : The Houston Ship Channel model, a fixed-bed model constructed to linear scale ratios of 1:600 horizontally and 1:60 vertically, reproduced a portion of the Gulf of Mexico adjacent to the Galveston Harbor Entrance, the Galveston Bay complex, including Trinity Bay in its entirety, East Bay, a portion of West Bay, the Houston Ship Channel to its upstream boundary in the City of Houston, Texas, and Buffalo Bayou from the Houston Ship Channel turning basin to the confluence of White Oak Bayou. The model was equipped with necessary appurtenances for the accurate reproduction and measurement of tides, tidal currents, salinity intrusion, freshwater inflow, density effects, shoaling, and other important prototype phenomena. The purpose of the model study was to determine if the present cost of maintenance dredging can be reduced by proposed plans involving channel realignments, partial or complete diking of connecting bays, sediment traps, dikes in Galveston Bay, local contractions, enlargements, and other remedial measures. (Modified author abstract)


This study provides a thourough and detailed analysis of the competitiveness of the Austrian service sectors. It combines several industry classifications reflecting different structural features and international regulatory regimes that might be relevant for a sector?s export potential and international competitiveness. These features are the skill and factor intensity, the intrinsic tradability and different regulatory regimes in international trade. For the first time this study applies a newly developed taxonomy of services which represents the different degrees of openness to services trade as reflected by the willingness of countries to submit full or partial commitments under the GATS. The analysis found a clear dominance of activities characterized by unfavourable sector characteristics in terms of skills and factor inputs. Furthermore, the structural change towards high-skilled labour intensive and knowledge intensive service sectors was found to be rather slow. At the detailed sector level, the analysis highlighted "consultancy, legal, accounting, book-keeping and market research services", the "renting of machinery and equipment sector", as well as "engineering, architectural activities and technical testing and analysis" as the most promising fields of activity in the group of high-skilled sectors already facing a relatively liberal international trade regime. The results were less favourable for the group of computer services. Within the group of sectors facing medium regulated trade regimes the R&D sector exhibited a very dynamic development paired with a good, but deteriorating competitive position. Insurance services were found to hold a weak and strongly deteriorating competitive advantage in terms of relative unit labour costs. At the same time the productivity gap to some of the European countries was found to be extremely wide. The growth performance of financial services which face the most regulated internationel trade regime was weak as was the competitive position.


The Tehachapi complex lies at the southern end of the Sierra Nevada batholith adjacent to the Neogene-Quaternary Garlock fault. The complex is composed principally of high-pressure (8–10 kbar) Cretaceous batholithic rocks, and it represents the deepest exposed levels of a continuous oblique crustal section through the southern Sierra Nevada batholith. Over the southern ~100 km of this section, structural/petrologic continuity and geochronological data indicate that ≥35 km of felsic to intermediate-composition crust was generated by copious arc magmatism primarily between 105 and 99 Ma. In the Tehachapi complex, these batholithic rocks intrude and are bounded to the west by similar-composition gneissic-textured high-pressure batholithic rocks emplaced at ca. 115–110 Ma. This lower crustal complex is bounded below by a regional thrust system, which in Late Cretaceous time tectonically eroded the underlying mantle lithosphere, and in series displaced and underplated the Rand Schist subduction assemblage by low-angle slip from the outboard Franciscan trench. Geophysical and mantle xenolith studies indicate that the remnants of this shallow subduction thrust descend northward through the crust and into the mantle, leaving the mantle lithosphere intact beneath the greater Sierra Nevada batholith. This north-dipping regional structure records an inflection in the Farallon plate, which was segmented into a shallow subduction trajectory to the south and a normal steeper trajectory to the north.

We combine new and published data from a broad spectrum of thermochronometers that together form a coherent data array constraining the thermal evolution of the complex. Integration of these data with published thermobarometric and petrogenetic data also constrains the tectonically driven decompression and exhumation history of the complex. The timing of arc magmatic construction of the complex, as denoted above, is resolved by a large body of U/Pb zircon ages. High-confidence thermochronometric data track a single retrogressing path commencing from widely established solidus conditions at ca. 100 Ma, and traversing through time-temperature space as follows: (1) Sm/Nd garnet ~770–680 °C at ca. 102–95 Ma, (2) U/Pb titanite ~750–600 °C at ca. 102–95 Ma, (3) Ar/Ar hornblende ~570–490 °C at ca. 94–91 Ma, (4) Rb/Sr biotite ~390–260 °C at ca. 90–86 Ma, (5) Ar/Ar biotite ~320–240 °C at ca. 88–85 Ma, and (6) (U-Th)/He zircon ~230–170 °C at ca. 88–83 Ma. Additional stratigraphic constraints place the complex at surface conditions in Paleocene–early Eocene time (ca. 66–55 Ma).

Integration of these results with thermobarometric and structural data, including published data on the underlying Rand Schist, reveals a profound tectonic event whereby rapid cooling and exhumation at rates potentially as high as 100s °C/m.y. and >5 mm/yr initiated at ca. 98 Ma and peaked between 96 and 94 Ma. Between 93 and 85 Ma, cooling rates remained high, but decelerated with or without significant exhumation. Subsequent cooling and exhumation rates are poorly constrained but were much slower and ultimately resulted in Paleocene-Eocene surface exposure. Initial rapid exhumation and cooling are hypothesized to have been driven by abrupt flattening in the corresponding segment of the Farallon plate and the resulting tectonic erosion of the underlying mantle lithosphere. Protolith as well as metamorphic pressure-temperature and age constraints on the Rand Schist indicate its rapid low-angle subduction between 93 and 88 Ma. Comparison of the Rand Schist and Tehachapi complex pressure-temperature-time paths in conjunction with structural relations strongly suggest that the schist ascended the equivalent of ~4 kbar relative to the Tehachapi complex by low-angle normal displacement along the Rand fault between 88 and 80 Ma to attain its current underplated structural position. Such extensional tectonism is hypothesized to have been driven by slab rollback during the demise of the southern California region shallow slab segment.


In contemporary high-choice media environments, people increasingly mix and combine their use of various news media into personal news repertoires. Despite this, there is still limited research on how people compose their individual news repertoires and the effects of these news repertoires. To address this and further our understanding of how media use influences political participation, this study investigates (a) how people combine the use of offline and online media into personal news repertoires and (b) the effects of different news repertoires on both offline and online political participation. Based on a two-wave panel study covering the 2014 Swedish national election, this study identifies five news repertoires, labeled minimalists, public news consumers, local news consumers, social media news consumers, and popular online news consumers. Among other things, the results show that social media news consumers are more likely to participate in politics both offline and online.