The 2001 Mw7.7 Bhuj mainshock seismic sequence in the Kachchh area, occurring during 2001 to 2012, has been analyzed usingmono-fractal andmulti-fractal dimension spectrum analysis technique. This region was characterized by frequent moderate shocks of Mw ≥ 5.0 for more than a decade since the occurrence of 2001 Bhuj earthquake. The present study is therefore important for precursory analysis using this sequence. The selected longsequence has been investigated first time for completeness magnitude Mc 3.0 using the maximum curvature method. Multi-fractal Dq spectrum (Dq ∼ q) analysis was carried out using effective window-length of 200 earthquakes with amoving window of 20 events overlapped by 180 events. The robustness of the analysis has been tested by considering the magnitude completeness correction term of 0.2 to Mc 3.0 as Mc 3.2 and we have tested the error in the calculus of Dq for each magnitude threshold. On the other hand, the stability of the analysis has been investigated down to the minimum magnitude of Mw ≥ 2.6 in the sequence. The analysis shows the multi-fractal dimension spectrum Dq decreases with increasing of clustering of events with time before a moderate magnitude earthquake in the sequence, which alternatively accounts for non-randomness in the spatial distribution of epicenters and its self-organized criticality. Similar behavior is ubiquitous elsewhere around the globe, and warns for proximity of a damaging seismic event in an area. OS: Please confirm math roman or italics in abs. © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.


Recent developments of research activities in photographic optics in Japan are briefly reviewed in this paper. The fields covered here are photographic lens designing, studies on the optical transfer function, and optical thin films.


Canna edulis Ker are abundant in starch and can be used for ethanol fermentation.The properties of liquefaction and saccharification were investigated under mild conditions.Adding water to the powder of the tubers at first,and heating to a certain temperature,then adding α-amylase to the slurry and holding the temperature for certain time,after than,falling the temperature to 60℃ and adjusting the pH value,then adding glucoamylase and holding temperature in order to let starch transform to glucose completely.The results of single factor tests showed that the optimal liquefaction conditions were that the size of Canna edulis Ker particle 60 mesh,ration of materials to water was 1∶5(w/w),the amount of α-amylase 10U/g,90℃ holding 30min,and the optimal saccharification conditions were as follows: pH 4.0~4.5,the amount of glucoamylase 60U/g,60℃ holding 90min.The results suggest that conversion of starch in Canna edulis Ker using enzyme is feasible and effective.


Research pertaining to the development of a college learning skills program is reviewed. The program is based upon an information processing paradigm with additional inputs from learning theory. Data is presented to show the success of the program in terms of increased mean grade point averages for participating students. In addition, a subsection of the learning skills program that deals with input and reading skills is also reviewed. Data indi cating the interaction of personality variables with reading program output are presented; as are data indicating the superiority of instrumental or op?rant based programming as opposed to traditional programming. AS PUBLIC participation in terms of the num- I ber of students in institutions of higher education has increased, the heterogeneity of students in terms of previous training and natural ability has also increased. This increase in diversity of student backgrounds is also true with regard to the secondary education system. Parallel with this development, there have been gross increases in the information input that students are expected to master. Both the raw quantity and the quali tative span of material offered to students are now broader. Thus it becomes of greater impor tance that students be able to discriminate be tween information that is useful and necessary and information that is of lesser functional and intellectual importance. Teaching the general rules of differentiation between useful and non useful information is an area of instruction that is not usually treated either at the secondary or the university level. Within the prospective of geometric growth in the educational system and parallel growth in the informational content of curriculum, the question of discrimination skill becomes of great importance. The answer to this question is central in assuring the educational progress of many students who have been taught different skills of differing functional value. The purpose of this paper is to review the design and format of a learning skills program that has as its goal the teaching of methods of information handling that are of value across subject areas.


Recently, Xiamen University and Flying Information Technology Co., Ltd worked together and completed the development of The Online Custom-Built WEB3D Middleware System for Arts and Crafts, which will perform as a product 3D design and display center, its main features include the product demonstration background change, 3-Dimension design, 3-Dimension product display, product component reorganization and product material replacement.


Mojave fringe-toed lizards, Uma scoparia, occur only on desert sand dunes and associated mosaics of small sand ramps. Consequently, the distribution is naturally discontinuous and geographically complex. Many populations are vulnerable to local extirpation, and some are now gone. We synthesized genealogical and paleoecological data to explain the geographic relationships among populations of U. scoparia based on mitochondrial DNA sequence data. The species appears to have arisen from a common ancestor with U. notata by a vicariance event, associated with the formation and development of the Lower Colorado River. Within U. scoparia, two major maternal lineages are associated with the development of river drainage systems. The northern lineage is from the Amargosa River. The southerly lineage includes the Mojave River basin, Bristol Trough, Clark's Pass, and Colorado River sand transport systems. The northernmost lineage of U. scoparia, isolated in the vicinity of Plio-Pleistocene Lake Tecopa, has the greatest amount of DNA sequence divergence. The southern populations exhibit little local genetic differentiation. A small population near Red Pass Lake contains haplotypes from both the northern and southern lineages. We define two distinct population segments (DPSs), one associated with the Amargosa River lineage, and the other with Red Pass Dune. r 2006 Published by Elsevier Ltd.


The present invention provides a suspension device capable of obtaining the steering stability of the vehicle. In the vehicle width direction from the vehicle body outer side sequentially the upper arm (14), the damper unit (16), the stabilizer (17) is connected to the knuckle (13). Reaction force torque stabilizer is formed camber direction, interference occurs in the camber direction. Thus, compared with the change in camber of the same motion phase, the camber changes during phase motion becomes large, thereby improving the turning performance of the vehicle.


Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs), surface-treated via chemical functionalization, i.e., oxidation and amidation, were used to reinforce diglycidylether of bisphenol F (DGEBF) epoxy resin. The effects of the functionalization on the dispersion stability, rheological properties, and fracture toughness of DGEBF/MWCNT composites were investigated. The dispersion homogeneity of the MWCNTs in the epoxy matrix improved after functionalization. In addition, isothermal rheology measurements revealed that the DGEBF/dodecyl amine-functionalized MWCNT (D-MWCNT) composite had a longer gel time and higher activation energy of cross-linking than the DGEBF/acid-treated MWCNT (A-MWCNT) composite. The fracture toughness of the former was also significantly higher than that of the latter; this resulted from the relatively high dispersion stability of the D-MWCNTs in the epoxy matrix, owing to the presence of alkyl groups on the D-MWCNT surface. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 55:2676–2682, 2015. © 2015 Society of Plastics Engineers


This paper presents a dynamic skylight, for daylighting and ventilation in a medium size room. The device includes an heliostat with variable geometry, which can exploits direct or sky diffuse solar radiation as function of season and weather conditions. During winter the direct radiation, if present, is re-directed inside the room on diffusing ceiling. During summer device's configuration is modified to allow the entrance of lone sky diffuse radiation that is required for daylighting. The direct radiation impinging on the exposed side of the device is used to create a solar stack effect, that contributes to air extraction and natural ventilation. Size of opening on roof, device's geometry and control logic have been optimised by means of computer simulations for two Italian sites: Venezia and Trapani. Room's energy balance takes into account of solar and internal gains. Optimisation is aimed to minimise the total annual energy demand for climatisation and illumination.


In this second lecture we will finish the discussion of the basic cooking recipes and discuss a few of the consequences like the uncertainty relation, the existance of wave packages and the Ehrenfest theorem. In the first lecture (Jendrzejewski et al.) we discussed briefly the basic principles of quantum mechanics like operators, state vectors and the Schrödinger equation. We will finish this discussion today and then introduce the most important consequences. We will continue to closely follow the discussion of the introductory chapter of Ref. (Jean-Louis Basdevant, 2006) 1 Composite systems It is actually quite rare that we can label the system with a single quantum number. Any atom will involve spin, position, angular momentum. Other examples might just involve two spin which we observe. So the question is then on how we label those systems. We then have two questions to answer: 1. How many labels do we need for a system to fully determine its quantum state ? 2. Once I know all the labels, how do I construct the full state out of them ? We will actually discuss the second question first as it sets the notation for the first question. 1.1 Entangled States In AMO we typically would like to characterize is the state of an electron in a hydrogen atom. We need to define its angular momentum label L, which might be 0, 1, 2 and also its electron spin S, which might be {↑, ↓}. It state is then typically labelled as something like |L = 0, S =↑〉 = |0, ↑〉 etc. Another, simple example is that of two spins, each one having two possible states {↑, ↓}. This is a standard problem in optical communication, where you send correlated photons with a certain polarization to different people. We will typically call them Alice and Bob . We now would like to understand than if we can disentangle the information about the different labels. Naively, we can now associate with Alice one set of outcomes and describe it by some state |ψA〉 and the Bob has another set |ψB〉: |ψA〉 = a↑ |↑A〉+ a↓ |↓A〉 (1) |ψB〉 = b↑ |↑B〉+ b↓ |↓B〉 (2) 1And if someone wants to listen the person is called Eve


Objective: To determine the frequency of brain abscess and its common bacteria in patients presenting with highly suspected clinical features.Material and Methods: It was a Descriptive (cross sectional) Study conducted in the Department of Neur-osurgery Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar. Duration of study was 1 year, from Jan 2011 to Jan 2012. Total number of patients with highly suspected clinical features were 134. CT brain and MRI brain was done for these patients. SPSS version 17 was used for data analysis.Results: Among 134 cases, 93 (63%) were male and 41 (3.60%) were female. Majority 49% (n = 66) were between 21 – 30 years of age. Frequency of brain abscess was revealed in 12.69% (n = 17), common bacteria was Streptococcus Viridians having 41.18% (n = 7) cases, Staphylococcus Aureus 29.41% (n = 5), Bacteriods fragilis was 17.65% (n = 3) and Peptostreptococcus 11.76% (n = 2).Conclusion: The results of the study reveals frequency of brain abscess is still higher in our population while Viridians streptococci and Staphylococcus aureus are most common bacteria.


Along with the recent tendency to the increase in size of oil tankers, the scantlings of hull structural members, especially primary supporting members, have become very large. Also, these members are subjected to great loads, and a considerably high stress may occur locally if the scantlings of the structure are not sufficient.As one of the series of studies to cope with the increase in size of oil tankers, the authors try to investigate the strength of horizontal girders of a 120, 000 DWT tanker by comparing the stress measured on an actual ship with the stress calculated by an electronic computer.The results of stress analysis coincide considerably well with the stress measured on an actual ships, showing that the calculation method described below is fairly good.This paper also discusses the strength of horizontal girders in various loading conditions, the effectiveness of center line vertical web and the effect of transverse rings neighboring watertight bulkheads on horizontal girders.


A microcontroller based advanced technique was designed and developed to protect the house hold appliances, such as water-pump from fluctuation of line voltage. This device was tested with upper and lower cutoff voltages set at ±10% of the normal supply voltage (220V, AC) and with an over-load current up to 10A. The current sensor's output was monitored by the PIC12F675 microcontroller and used analog to digital protocol. A 'C' language program was developed to control the function of microcontroller, using PCWH compiler.


A 335 P 22 steel made super thick pipe is used for main steam tube of Yangquan No.2 Power Plant 300 MW unit .Because of the large scale of the specification and high content of Cr and Mo alloy element,the welding joint is inclined to be quenched and produce flaw.A group of well matched technical specification parameter is deduced through theory analysis and welding practice and is applied to the super thick pipe weiding process at worksite.As a result the satisfactory weld joint quality is obtained.


How to win the very challenging adhesion game. Jean-Pierre Bleus, Marc Decaux, Gaia Franzolin, Michel Philips. Industrial wood parquet is generally finished with UV varnish for aesthetic reasons as well as to protect against chemical attack and mechanical damage. The first coat applied to the wood is very important: it needs to give a good natural wood appearance and the adhesion necessary to get good mechanical properties. UV curable partially water soluble products, UV curable polyurethane dispersions and UV curable epoxy acrylate containing 100% solids have been compared. The results obtained with this broad choice of materials should enable the user to select a product to meet technical requirements and fit into their production line configuration. The use of radiation curing technology in the field of coatings and inks has been growing since the seventies; this growth is expected to continue. The major factors for this success are the excellent performances of the coating, the speed of curing, the low cost per square metre of the finished material, the stability on application equipment and the low space requirement of finishing lines. Among the different existing types of floor covering (PVC, Linoleum, ceramic tiles, carpet) wood parquet is appreciated for its aesthetics, comfort and hygiene. The wood coatings industry (parquet and furniture) was one of the first industries to use UV technology and it is still the most important. Roller coater is the main application technique and the flat structure of wood parquet is perfectly suited to this technique.


Radon is a natural radioactive gas known to be the main contributor to natural background radiation exposure and the major leading cause of lung cancer second to smoking. Indoor radon concentration levels of 200 and 400 Bq /m are reference values suggested by the 90/143/Euratom recommendation, above which mitigati on measures should be taken in new and old buildings, respectively, to reduce exposure to rado n. Despite this international recommendation, Italy still does not have mandatory regulations or guidelines to deal with radon in dwellings. Monitoring surveys have been undertaken in a number of western European countries in order to assess the exposure of people to this radioactive g as and to identify radon prone areas. However, such campaigns provide concentration values in each single dwelling included in the sample, while it is often necessary to provide measures of the po llutant concentration which refer to sub-areas of the region under study. In this paper, we propose a g ostatistical simulation approach in order to solve this problem and to identify radon prone area s which may be proposed for national guidelines.


Abstract Agricultural pests cause huge loss to agricultural production. Their control using biopesticides is gaining importance. Entomopathogenic nematodes (EPNs) are most promising biopesticides in agriculture. EPN like other biopesticides has a very specific action on one species or related species as against chemical insecticides. In addition, the median lethal time for EPNs is also lower. Hence there is a need for novel virulent EPN which is effective against wide range of insects and has a low median lethal dose. In this study, we isolated different strains of EPN using modified insect bait method from 10 different soil samples. Six nematode strains were isolated and tested for pathogenicity against Spodoptera litura egg, larvae, and pupae. Agricultural corn field (AC) strain showed very high virulence against other strains. AC strain 18S rDNA sequencing was done and phylogenetic tree constructed to evaluate its relatedness to other species. The AC strains were identified as Panagrolaimus spp. and the sequence was submitted to Genbank. This species was found to be very effective against all the developmental stages of S. litura


With the increasing population aging,the aged support problem of one-child family has been more serious.The "4-2-1" family structure,smaller size of one-child families in urban areas,and the families of loss one-child make the parents of the only child face more problems in their old age.Based on some research material,this paper discusses different pension requirements according to the age of parents of the only child,their family living form,and their family structure.


The phosphoric acid production in the world generates a large amount of phosphogypsum beside the emission of toxic acid fluorine gas into the atmosphere, which can cause a several environmental problems. To remedying these problems, an environmental procedure permit recycling phosphogypsum waste by NaF into valuable products, was presented in this work. According the obtained results, the proposed process is feasible and leads preparing a relatively pure CaF2 and Na2SO4. This last is recommended in detergent and glass industry, while the resulting CaF2 can be utilized in metallurgical industry. The optimum conversion conditions were achieved with the exact stoichiometric phosphogypsum and NaF at reaction duration of 90 minutes under room temperature.


The demand for accessing services while on the move, at any place and anytime, has led to the current efforts towards integration ofheterogeneous wireless networks. In particular, interoperability of cellular networks and Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), as complementarysystems in providing capacity and coverage, has drawn a lot of attention. Next Generation Wireless Networks (NGWNs) are expected to be heterogeneous networks which integrate different Radio Access Technologies (RATs) such as 3GPP's Long Term Evolution (LTE) andWLANwhere a transmission is supported if the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) at the receiver is greater than some threshold. It is based on the fact that several competing technologies, which have different requirements and capabilities, can co-exist. This approach tries to select always the best network according to a set of requirements and perform the inter-system handover between them, when those requirements are not fulfilled. In this article, we analyze the interference in heterogeneous wireless networks and determinethe capacity, in a study based on Markov chains, by taking into considerationthe class of traffic of each call and considering both intra-network interference and inter-network interference. Our analysis approach is based on modeling of the system as a multi-dimensional Markov chain which represents the current number of ongoing calls of different classes of services in the system. This analysis allows us to simplify the estimation of capacity under SINR interference constraints in different wireless networks. Based on this analysis, we derive performance evaluation results regarding blocking of real-time and non-real-time calls in each RAT and under different network sizes


The dissertation is concerned with the multi-layer porous wall model which is proposed to simulate the drug transfer mechanism in the arterial wall when treat with the cardiovascular diseases. It is an interface problem with two types of interface points: the imperfect contact interface point at the first layer and the rough coefficient interface points at other layers. We firstly consider the linear and quadratic immersed finite element (IFE) methods to solve the steady-state problem. Then, we investigate fundamental properties of these IFE spaces. Through interpolation error analysis, we prove that these IFE spaces have optimal approximation capabilities. In addition, we get the optimal convergence rate by using both linear and quadratic IFE methods to solve the multi-layer porous wall model. Furthermore, we analyze the long time stability and the asymptotic behavior of the IFE method for the multi-layer porous wall model for the drug-eluting stents (DES). With the help of the IFE methods for the spatial descretization, and the implicit Euler scheme for the temporal discretization, respectively, we deduce the global stability of fully discrete solution. Then, we investigate the asymptotic behavior of the discrete scheme which reveals that the multi-layer porous wall model converges to the corresponding elliptic equation if the body force approaches to a steady-state. In addition, we use these IFE spaces to solve the unsteady problem. We prove that the backward Euler scheme has the optimal convergence rate in both the L and H norms. We also do some numerical experiments to verify the theoretical results.


This paper develops the fundamental figures of merit of vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL) with the goal to use them on the Radio-over-Fiber (RoF) link study. Different analogue properties like frequency response, noise and spurious-free dynamic range (SDFR) were studied. Optical-Microwave quantities allowing to express the gain, the noise factor, the IP3 and the SFDR were defined and measured. This work allows to separate the contribution from the laser and the detector. The VCSEL tested presented at 5GHz and 8mA: a 1 dB compression point of +7.6dBm at the input; an opto-microwave OIP3 of -3.5 dBm; an optical-microwave noise factor optical-microwave of 41.4 dB and optical-microwave SFDR of 95.1 dBHz2/3.


Students at SMPN 27 Padang tend to be passive when the learning process takes place which results in low learning outcomes of students in natural science subjects. This study aims to determine the effect of giving home assignments in the form of Mind Map prior to the application of the Giving Question and Getting Answer (GQGA) active learning model on science learning competencies in the aspects of knowledge and attitudes of students in class VIII of SMP Negeri 27 Padang. This research is a Quasi-Experimental study and uses the Control Group Posttest Only Design. The study population was all students of Class VIII SMP Negeri 27 Padang. The technique used is Purposive Sampling. The control class uses the Direct Intruction learning model and the experimental class uses the active learning model Giving Question and Getting Answer by giving home assignments in the form of a Mind Map. The research instrument used was a test of learning outcomes and attitude assessment in the form of an observation sheet. T test results are known that the knowledge competency of tcount>ttable (4.99>1.67), and the results of the t test of competency attitude known tcount>ttable (6.36>1.67). This shows that the hypothesis is accepted. So, it can be concluded that the assignment of homework in the form of Mind Map prior to the application of the active learning model Giving Question and Getting Answer (GQGA) significantly influences the science learning competence in the aspects of knowledge and attitudes of students.


Wireless power transfer (WPT) via near-field magnetic coupling is an enabling technology for many applications including consumer electronics and electric vehicles. A few WPT standards have been established with frequencies ranging from kHz to MHz. MHz operation offers smaller size and higher tolerance to coil misalignment, and kHz operation offers higher efficiency and higher power rating. This paper presents a WPT architecture with new transmitter and receiver topologies that are reconfigurable for dual-band operation. On the transmitter side, we developed a novel architecture based on the reactance steering network (RSN) which can seamlessly compensate an arbitrary load impedance for radio-frequency (RF) power amplifiers. It can transmit power at two frequencies (kHz and MHz range) with decoupled power modulation. On the receiver side, we developed a reconfigurable dual-band rectifier that can achieve a power density of 300 W/inch3 at both 100 kHz and 13.56 MHz with very low component count. A dual-band reconfigurable WPT system comprising a dual-band transmitter and multiple dualband receivers has been built and tested. The RSN-based dualband transmitter can efficiently and simultaneously deliver 15 W of power to multiple receivers at both 100 kHz and 13.56 MHz.


Class II malocclusion is one of the most commonly seen orthodontic problems in daily orthodontic practice. Forsus FRD has been used to correct class II malocclusion. However, like other fixed functional appliances, proclination of the mandibular anteriors is an unfavorable effect of Forsus which could limit the skeletal correction. This presentation will address the effectiveness of using miniscrew-anchored Forsus on lower incisor inclination changes


Novel finite impulse response architectures for wide passband droop compensation of cascaded integrator-comb filters are presented. Compared with the recent wide-band compensators introduced in the literature, the proposed systems achieve better passband droop correction with lower power dissipation, lower hardware utilisation and higher maximum frequency of operation, as validated with post-place-and-route information from FPGA-based implementations.


The regional inequalities continue to attract the attention of researchers and the policy makers. The heterogeneous nature of the Indian economy has resulted in wide inequalities despite positive interventions by the governments at various levels. There is also an explicit fear that the liberalisation policies might have resulted in further divergences. The present study aims at analysing the trends in inequalities in the levels of income and growth of the major seventeen state economies of India for the period 1980-81 through 2000-01. An adjusted series of NSDP data was constructed by adopting a specific methodology for the purpose of inter-temporal comparison. The analysis reveals divergence of state incomes, especially after the initiation of economic reforms since 1990-91. The income inequalities at aggregate as well as per capita level have increased as is evident in the increasing values of the co-efficient of variation (CVs). Different measures of Convergence/Divergence have also been estimated. The study makes many policy recommendations for realising better regional balance in the economy.


An option is a contract between two parties where the holder has the option to buy or sell some underlying asset after a predefined exercise time. Options where the holder only has the right to buy or sell at the exercise time is said to be of European-style, while options that can be exercised any time before the exercise time is said to be of American-style. Asian options are options where the payoff is determined by some average value of the underlying asset, e.g., the arithmetic or the geometric average. For arithmetic Asian options, there are no closed-form pricing formulas, and one must apply numerical methods. Several methods have been proposed and tested for Asian options. For example, the Monte Carlo method is slow for European-style Asian options and not applicable for American-style Asian options. In contrast, the finite difference method have successfully been applied to price both Europeanand American-style Asian options. But from a financial point of view, one is also interested in different measures of sensitivity, called the Greeks, which are hard approximate with the finite difference method. For more accurate approximations of the Greeks, researchers have turned to the finite element method with promising results for European-style Asian options. However, the finite element method has never been applied to American-style Asian options, which still lack accurate approximations of the Greeks. Here we present a study of pricing Europeanand American-style Asian options using the finite element method. For European-style options, we consider two different pricing PDEs. The first equation we consider is a convection-dominated problem, which we solve by applying the so-called streamline-diffusion method. The second equation comes from modelling Asian options as options on a traded account, which we solve by using the so-called cG(1)cG(1) method. For American-style options, the model based on options on a traded account is not applicable. Therefore, we must consider the first convection-dominated problem. To handle American-style options, we study two different methods, a penalty method and the projected successive overrelaxation method. For European-style Asian options, both approaches give good results, but the model based on options on a traded account show more accurate results. For American-style Asian options, the penalty method give accurate results. Meanwhile, the projected successive over-relaxation method does not converge properly for the tested parameters. Our result is a first step towards an accurate and fast method to calculate the price and the Greeks of both Europeanand American-style Asian options. Because good estimations of the Greeks are crucial when hedging and trading of options, we anticipate that the ideas presented in this work can lead to new ways of trading with Asian options.


Wireless power transmission within a given working area is required or enabling for many NASA Exploration Systems. Fields of application include robotics, habitats, autonomous rendezvous and docking, life support, EVA, and many others. In robotics applications, for example, the robots must move in the working area without being hampered by power cables and, meanwhile, obtain a continuous and constant power from a power transmitter. The development of modern technology for transmitting electric power over free space has been studied for several decades, but its use in a system has been mainly limited to low power, 1–2 Vdc output voltage at a transmission distance of few meters for which relatively less than 0.5 mW/cm2 is required (e.g., Radio frequency identification RFID). Most of the rectenna conversion efficiency research to date has concentrated in low GHz frequency range of 2.45 to 10 GHz, with some work at 35 GHz. However, for space application, atmospheric adsorbtion is irrelevant and higher frequen...


With the advent of big data era, complex optimization problems with many objectives and large numbers of decision variables are constantly emerging. Traditional research about multi-objective particle swarm optimization (PSO) focuses on multi-objective optimization problems (MOPs) with small numbers of variables and less than four objectives. At present, MOPs with large numbers of variables and many objectives (greater than or equal to four) are constantly emerging. When tackling this type of MOPs, the traditional multi-objective PSO algorithms have low efficiency. Aiming at these multi-objective large-scale optimization problems (MOLSOPs) and many-objective large-scale optimization problems (MaOLSOPs), we need to explore thoroughly parallel attributes of the particle swarm, and design the novel PSO algorithms according to the characteristics of distributed parallel computation. We survey the related research on PSO: multi-objective large-scale optimization, many-objective optimization, and distributed parallelism. Based on the aforementioned three aspects, the multi-objective large-scale distributed parallel PSO and many-objective large-scale distributed parallel PSO methodologies are proposed and discussed, and the other future research trends are also illuminated.


In an active distribution grid with high renewable penetration, thermal rating of critical lines could be a major constraint for bulk power routing during high generation periods. The loading of the lines are generally fixed based on electrical characteristics, physical arrangement and ambient conditions of the conductor. Dynamic Line Rating establishes dynamic loading values defined for a period of time based on line temperature and ambient environmental conditions. The authors have proposed a novel approach for estimating the line temperature without heat equation or thermodynamic approaches. Accurate estimates of real-time resistance of the line could hold the key to determine the temperature of the conductors. In the past, algorithms have been developed to estimate the line parameters of transmission lines. In this paper, an attempt has been made to analyze the applicability of a parameter estimation method to estimate the temperature of a medium voltage line. Case of overhead-line and underground cable were considered for analysis. Accuracy of the parameter estimator was investigated by implementing it in a simulated medium voltage distribution grid in presence of practical real-field challenges like ratio and phase errors of current and voltage transformers. Effects of random errors associated with measurement on the accuracy parameter estimation are also studied.


We present a classification of energy flow variables for highly collimated jets. Observables are constructed by taking moments of the energy flow and forming scalars of a suitable Lorentz subgroup. The jet shapes are naturally arranged in an expansion in both angular and energy resolution, allowing us to derive the natural observables for describing an N-particle jet. We classify the leading variables that characterize jets with up to 4 particles. We rediscover the familiar jet mass, angularities, and planar flow, which dominate the lowest order substructure variables. We also discover several new observables and we briefly discuss their physical interpretation.


Results of pulmonary rehabilitation programs (PRP) are evaluated using patient-centered outcomes. Since patient-centered outcomes (exercise capacity and quality of life) can be largely subjective, we hypothesized that they may fit to different subgroups of COPD patients. We studied 81 COPD patients (58 males; 70.0±7.6 years; FEV1 1.17±0.44 L, 47.3±15.4% predicted), attending an outpatient PRP. After a baseline evaluation (anthropometrics, Medical Research Council – MRC – dyspnea score, pulmonary function test – PFTs, 6-minute walk test – 6MWT, cardiopulmonary exercise test – CPET, Saint George Respiratory Questionnaire –SGRQ, BODE index), results of the PRP were evaluated according to the minimal important difference (MID) for 6MWT and SGRQ. We had 4 groups based on PRP results: group 1: concordant negative (none MID reached; 24% of whole sample); group 2: concordant positive (both MID reached, 18.7%); group 3: discordant SGRQ (MID for SGRQ only reached, 37.3%); group 4: discordant 6MWT (MID for 6MWT only reached, 20%). The 4 groups did not differ for anthropometrics, PFTs, CPET, while group 4 showed higher BODE index and MRC scores and lower exercise capacity than groups 1 and 3.
 In conclusion, 6MWT could be more useful in evaluating PRP benefits in more severe patients (according to both baseline symptoms and exercise capacity), while SGRQ may better perform in patients with mild-to-moderate impairment.


"Slippery bitch of a city," mutters Makina, seconds after the street has imploded, the underground tunnels of "five centuries of voracious silver lust" giving way, as periodically they do, in The Little Town. In a span of seconds, Makina says, not once but twice, "I'm dead," but her body is having none of it. Unlike the guy walking near her, she survived, and takes in the improbability with simultaneous expressions of historical critique ("some poor soul accidentally discovered just what a half-assed job they'd done of covering over [the colonial mines]"), flinty empathy ("poor soul on his way to hell"), and the need to "get on with [her] errand." In the spare opening paragraphs, Herrera signals that his brief novel is actually enormous—in historical scope, contemporary reference, and linguistic reach. And he gives us the heroic Makina—young, attractive, "schooled," and street-smart, who runs the switchboard in her indigenous Mexican village, and who is embarked on an errand into hell. At the loving but imperious behest of her mother, Cora, she has a paper to give to her brother, who years ago went "to the other side" to investigate some land the family believes it rightfully owns. Before she can even get to the near bank of the Rio Grande (after an odyssey of a bus ride), she needs to run the gamut patrolled by the local kingpins who are locked in battle over control of illegal border crossings, drugs, dirty cops, and politicians, and who drink at a bar named for Dostoevsky's Raskolnikov. This is a world of "dogs," "top dogs," "coyotes," and other animals of the so-called human variety. Makina is wise to them all, and steely enough to use her fear as reliable information. And she can be violent, as when a guy Review: Literature and Arts of the Americas, Issue 91, Vol. 48, No. 2, 2015, 268–270


In both, metropolitan optical networks (MON) and long haul optical networks (LHON) the signal quality is often influenced by the physical impairments, therefore proper impairment constrained routing decisions are needed. In this paper we propose two new approaches that jointly perform, on the one hand, routing and wavelength assignment (RWA) and, on the other hand, either tuning the signal power of certain wavelength division multiplexed (WDM) channels or grooming the traffic of some WDM channels in nodes that are grooming capable. We evaluate the proposed optimization methods for both, single and multilayer networks. In the first case we assume that no signal regeneration is allowed along the path, only re-amplification, while in the more complex two-layer case we assume grooming in the electronic layer that implicitly performs 3R signal regeneration and wavelength conversion as well.


Marketers are interested in the knowledge, opinions, attitudes and behaviours of today's young consumers. This paper explores the nature of child-orientated survey research by means of an unstructured observational study. A total of 376 children between the ages of 7 and 12 participated in a study that examined consumer knowledge and behaviour. Participant's behaviour was observed during the questionnaire administration process with four primary issues being noted: group management, peer interaction, the ability to maintain interest and the desire to be 'correct'. When using a self-completed questionnaire, it is suggested that the administration group size should be limited to eight children, questionnaire length should be limited to approximately 100 items or 10 to 15 minutes' completion time, and questionnaires should be collected immediately after completion.


A data server (S) with an administration module (AM) of a relational database (DB) comprising a set of tables and deployed on at least one hard disk drive (HDD). The module has - analysis means of determining for each table, at least one value representative of a quantity of access to this table for a predetermined period, - means for selecting a list of tables, based this / these value (s); - Means for moving at least some of the tables in the list from the hard disk to a fast memory (FM), transparently vis-a-vis the structure of the database (DB)


A case of nodular renal blastema developing into nephroblastomatosis is presented. Definitions and histopathology of these entities is given, and it is suggested that they represent a developmental spectrum with natural progression to Wilms' tumor.


The first stage of the positron-electron-proton (PEP) colliding-beam system which has been under joint study by a Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory-Stanford Linear Accelerator Center team for the past two years, will be the electron-positron storage ring. The physics justification for the e/sup +/e/sup minus/ ring is summarized briefly and the proposed facility is described. The ring will have six arcs having gross radii of about 220 m and six interaction regions located at the centers of straight sections about 130 m long. The longitudinal distance left free for experimental apparatus at the intersection regions will be 20 m. The range of operating beam energies will be from 5 GeV to 15 GeV. The design luminosity at 15 GeV will be 10/sup 32/cm/sup minus 2/s/sup minus 1/, and the luminosity will vary approximately as the square of the beam energy. Alternative methods under consideration for adjusting the beam cross-section are discussed. The designs of the storage ring subsystems and of the conventional facilities including the experimental halls at the interaction regions are described.


By analysing on the applicating condition,material selections,metallographical structures,properties and service life of the asw blades for cutting large scale stone timber.It was find that Cu and Co,as cementation,can improve wetting and sintering properties of WC solidus.At the same time,when adding a little of Fe and Ni,the properties can be improved further.WC which is fine and uniformly can distribute on the base of the alloy,on which the size of carborundum particles is about 25μm.The structure,WC and carborundum hard phase distributing on the tough base,can improve the wear resistance,hardness,strength and tenacity of the saw blades.


Dr. Diego Esparza, Assistant Professor Political Science at the University of North Texas in Denton, is a specialist on issues involving the police, public security reform, intelligence, and civil–military relations. He is currently at work on a book comparing the evolution of police in Chile, Colombia, and Mexico that investigates the correlation between organizational structures within each police system and the malfeasant practices. A graduate of California Polytechnic State University at San Lius Obispo with a B.A. in Political Science, he received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of California at Riverside, also in Political Science. His work has been published in Comparative Political Studies, Democracy and Security, and the Annual Review of Political and Military Sociology.


This study investigated the effects of laser irradiation on the exposed pulp and the possibility of direct pulp capping with the laser. Results were obtained from the observation of the residual pulpal healing process. Class V cavities on 48 anterior teeth from 8 adult dogs were prepared and pulp chambers were intentionally opened with dental explorer. The control group consisted of 16 teeth. (Caulk Co., U.S.A.) was applied to exposed site once bleeding was stopped. Cavities were sealed with . In the experimental group 1 (16 teeth), laser(LASERSAT , Satelec Co.) was irradiated on the exposed pulp. The laser procedure followed the manufacturers recommendations for the treatment of human pulp(1.5 Watts, 0.2 seconds, unfocused), and cavities were sealed with . In the experimental group 2 (16 teeth), laser was irradiated on the exposed pulp in a more powerful dosage(5.0 Watts, 0.2 seconds, unfocused), and cavities were sealed with . Two dogs were sacrificed immediately after experiment and the others were sacrificed at intervals of one, three, and eight weeks respectively. All teeth were routinely processed and the pulpal tissues and odontoblastic layers were observed by the light microscope. The results were as follows; 1. In the control group, the initial mild inflammation had improved to normal by week eight. An active formation of reparative dentin was observed at week three, and at week eight, a firm dentin bridge was present beneath the with no inflammatory responses in the remaining pulp. 2. In the experimental group 1, immediately following irradiation, the superficial shape of the exposed pulp was crater-like. And it was lined with the coagulated layer, in width. Moderate inflammatory pulpal conditions existing at week one were improved to mild at week eight. And from the week three specimens, a reparative dentin formation was observed in the adjacent odontoblastic layer of the exposed site. A dentin bridge at the exposed site, however, did not form during the experimental period. 3. In the experimental group 2, the width of the coagulation layer lining the crater was . Beneath the coagulated layer, severe inflammatory pulpal responses were observed at week one, and conditions did not improve during the experimental period.


This paper describes three types of silicane performance differences and finds the reasons for differences.It calls for product improvement and develop new product to meet lead free requirements.


toneal flstulre, ten of which are recorded in the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital records. 10. Most of our biopsiesare of the transitionalor mid-ripe variety. Many of these Z キ セ イ ・ 」 ィ 。 セ ァ ・ 、 after the radium to the ripe or keratinizedvariety. This may be due to the section being taken from the centreof the growth, as-thepathologisthas the whole uterus. 11. We have not yet made up our minds which, the anaplastic (unripe) or the keratinized (ripe), is the more radio-sensitiveor radio-resistant. 12. We have found that many growths display unripe, mid-ripe and ripe characteristics,セ ョ 、 that even an adeno-carcinomaofthe body WIll show foci of squamouscells. Whether these originated in the' cervix or arose from the fact that the epithelium that initiates the growth can differentiate into columnaror squamouscells at will must be left for the future to say.


This essay reads Derrida's Geschlecht III: Sex, Race, Nation, Humanity in the context of the philosophical and political legacies associated with the motif of leaping. Surveying the philosophical and textual 'politics' of this figure of the leap in the work of Kierkegaard, Hegel, Marx, Freud, Heidegger and others, the essay tracks its connection to the question of philosophical nationalism (and associated images of place, ground and gathering) explored by Derrida in Geschlecht III, speculating on the ambivalent resonances that 'leap' across the political spectrum.


In order to detect the disease law of the ankle injury in basketball, the preventive measure has taken. The investigation was made in the 204 students from the grade 99 and 2000 of the physical education discipline of Jishou University. The results show: The major reasons of the injury are that the players hadn't stable falling to the ground and hadn't enough warming-up exercise;The nature of the injury is the acute soft tissue,about 84.72%;The degree of the injury is middling;The students who suffered twice or more are about 65% . So it will have very important significance to prevent the injury to reduce its effect on teaching and practice in the basketball.


Method for preheating a first (461, 761, 862) molding surface of a mold, which mold includes an open position and a closed position and delimiting according to this closed position a closed cavity between said first (461, 76 5 1, 862) preheated molding surface and a second (462, 762, 861) molding surface, comprising the steps of: a. heating (315) an induction part, called nucleus (470, 670, 872); b. introducing (320) said core between the molding surfaces (461, 462, 761, 762, 861, 862) of said mold in open position; c. performing (330) preheating the first (461, 761, 862) molding surface thermal transfer between said core and said molding surface; d. removing (340) the core and closing (350) the mold; characterized in that: - the core is heated outside the mold placing said core inside a coil (430, 830) by passing an alternating current.


In the gravure printing machine, the register accuracy is the most important performance. In order to improve the control accuracy of register system, an accurate mathematical model of the register error should be researched. Register error is defined as two dimensional errors: print-direction register error and cross-direction register error. In general, cross-direction register error is stable and small because the lateral jitter of a moving web is very small. Therefore, the mathematical model of the print-direction register error is studied for the four-color gravure printing machine in this paper. According to definition of the register error, the mathematical model is established, and then it is validated by the numerical simulation and experiments carried out in the experimental setup of the four-color gravure printing machine. The results show that the established register error model is accurate and reliable.


In order to curb the decline of current economic,the central authorities decided to invest 4 trillion yuan to expand domestic demand and promote economic growth. However,it is clearly not enough that only to relying on investment to stimulate domestic demand,economic growth. We must connect investment with consumption so as to promote and boost consumption by investment,at last we can achieve to expand domestic demand and promote economic growth. As a result,the government must enhance the project management of investment,focus on nurturing and expanding the middle-income class and increase the support of SME financing.


Numerous studies attest to the pride, melancholia, nostalgia, guilt, and shame felt by the French or the British after the loss of their colonies in the twentieth century: such feelings were prompted, in part, by recollections of empires that once existed. National traditions, ceremonies, and archives are frequently built around such memories of the imperial past. But construe the genitive in a subjective rather than an objective sense and you grasp a different implication of the term "memories of empire," and in this meaning, empire itself is said to have memories. What memories does empire have? Empire has a memory of empire. Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, the French and British empires all looked back to older empires and recalled them in distinctive ways. These traces and recollections are worth exploring in order to understand how empires affect the lives of those who lived through them or came after.


Circulation current through parallel strands in a multi-strand cable results in large AC loss, which is called large time constant ee) inter-strand coupling loss. The Joule heating at the contact point between strands attributes to the loss. This kind of AC loss had been observed in the poloidal field coil ofLHD and other large magnets wound with cable in conduit conductors (CICC). Basically, in the CICC, the strands are transposed perfectly by means of multiple-stage twisting. This design philosophy is aiming at balancing induced voltages along the parallel strands and current distribution is expected to be uniform. When the circulation current is superposed on the transport current, non~uniform current appears among strands. In spite of the transposition, the large T losses have been observed. We suspected that the mechanism of this kind ofloss is based on the irregularity of the trucks of the strands and have performed some numerical simulations [1),[2). Fig. 1 shows the numerical models. The conductor in the LHD poloidal field coil (Fig. I a) is made into the numerical models: b) d). Size of the conduit is 20.5mm X 24.8mm. Number of strands is 486. The combination of twist pitches is lsI: 70 mm, 2nd: 120 mm, 3rd: ISO mm, 4th: 270 mm and 5th: 400 mm. b) is the modified numerical model concerning the trucks of 54 sub-cables. c) shows the conventional numerical model, which is composed of sinusoidally waving strand-trucks. d) is the modified numerical model with 486 strands; however, it is difficult to solve this kind of complicated network circuit. To calculate the inter-strand coupling loss, electrical contact between parallel strands must be considered. In this study, we assumed the conductance between two neighboring sub-cables as 107 S/m. Fig. 2 presents the frequency dependent of normalized onc cycle AC loss under alternative transverse magnetic field. Basically, the loss in the multi-strand cable is governed by the twist pitch of the final twist stage. The time constant Tc in Fig. 2 corresponds to that of the final stage. The model shown in Fig. I b) and the similar 54 sub-cable model with rational twist pitch combination are compared. Here, rational means the combination of twist pitches is 3rd-100 mm, 4th-200 mm and 5th-400 mm, respectively. The rational combination and the large model length result in large T loss (thick solid line). Here, the time constant TCL is 200 s and the fractionjis 0.003. This phenomenon is caused by the unbalance of induced voltages along parallel sub-cables and this unbalance is significant for rational combination model. In the actual conductor, we should consider the circulation current in the lower stage sub-cables shown in


SAWIDIS Th., ELEFTHERIOU E. P. & TSEKOS I. 1987. The floral nectaries of Hibiscus rosa-sinensis L. II. Plasmodesmatal frequenties. Phyton (Austria) 27 (1): 155-164, with 6 figures. English with German summary. Plasmodesmatal frequencies in all walls of the secretory hairs and the subglandular tissue of floral nectaries of Hibiscus rosa-sinensis L. have been estimated by means of electron microscopy. Results indicate that transversely oriented walls of the secretory hairs bear more plasmodesmata than longitudinally oriented ones. The greater numbers of plasmodesmata occur around the basal cell implying an important role for this cell in the collection and conveyance of pre-nectar from subglandular tissue towards the secretory hair. Great densities of plasmodesmata also occur in the walls of stalk cell, which provides a barrier to apoplastically carried substances but favours symplastically moving fluxes. The results are discussed in relation to findings in similar tissues of other plant species and are considered to support the view that pre-nectar follows a symplastic pathway from the phloem to secretory cells.


The digital revolution and the communication platforms provided by the web 2.0 virtual space era, such as social media, social networks, other tools and channels, create new opportunities for better marketing decisions based on user-generated data analysis. Every day customers of social media and other virtual tools are creating huge amounts of their actions caused data, and business lack management tools for the support of this process, which could create knowledge in the area of customer profiles and preferences deeper cognition. Growing numbers of social media users indicate the popularity of these communication tools among the information society, but science today lacks a deeper knowledge of social media generated data and other algorithms for this data usage. Therefore, the purpose of the article is defined as the development of the conceptual model of big data generated by social media usage in business. The formation of the conceptual model is based on the analysis of big data assumptions and application possibilities, social media classification peculiarities and different channel specifics, identification of big data analysis methods and analysis of large data applications generated by social media. The conceptual model creates preconditions for deeper knowledge of user-generated big data in nowadays widely used communication platforms, as well as creation of the decision support tool for marketing specialists in order to use big data from social media in deeper customer profile and preferences cognition. Methods employed in this research are: literature and other references analysis, synthesis and logical analysis of information, comparison of information, systemization and visualization.


Need of increase of professional level of heads of the coal-mining enterprises is proved. The term «professionalism» is analysed, the structure of professionalism of a head is opened.


$\eta_c$- and $J/\Psi$-nucleus bound state energies are calculated for various nuclei. Essential input for the calculations, namely the medium-modified $D$ and $D^{*}$ meson masses, as well as the density distributions in nuclei, are calculated within the quark-meson coupling (QMC) model. The attractive potentials for the $\eta_c$ and $J/\Psi$ mesons in the nuclear medium originate, respectively, from the in-medium enhanced $DD^{*}$ and $D\bar{D}$ loops in the $\eta_c$ and $J/\Psi$ self energies. Our results suggest that the $\eta_c$ and $J/\Psi$ mesons should form bound states with all the nuclei considered when they are produced at rest inside the nucleus.


Delineation of drainage networks is an essential task in hydrological and geomorphological analysis. Manual channel definition depends on topographic contrast and is highly subjective, leading to important errors at high resolutions. Different automatic methods have proposed the use of a constant threshold of upslope contributing area to define channel initiation. Actually, these are the most commonly used for the automatic-channel network extraction from Digital Elevation Models (DEMs). However, these methods fail to detect an appropriate threshold when the basin is made up of heterogeneous sub-zones, as they only work either lumped or locally. In this study, the critical threshold area for channel delineation has been defined through the analysis of dominant geometric and topologic properties of stream network formations. In addition, a hierarchical classification approach has been integrated in order to verify landscape units in relation to dominant intrinsic properties. Such approach provides various critical thresholds as much as necessary in relation to DEM-data resolution as well as homogeneity or heterogeneity of the dominant landforms. The study has been carried out in two controlled drainage basins with different lithology and geomorphic processes. High-resolution DEMs (1m) were used to obtain the best detailed drainage network that the algorithm can generate in a homogeneous landscape, whereas a medium-resolution DEM (30m) was applied in a heterogeneous complex landscape. Validation results revealed that the above approach is adequate for describing terrain dissection, since its function depends on intrinsic properties of the drainage network, being at the same time objective and easy to implement. Likewise, it provides an enhanced approximation to empirical geomorphometric parameters used to describe stream network dimensions.


The mechanism displacement analysis is the basic problem of the motion analysis.The equation of the mechanism displacement analysis is generally nonlinear.The function expression between the input variable and the output variable can only be set out in the situation of the simple second class mechanism,but the method of the mathematics solution is needed to get the solution of the equation in other situations.Taking the six bar mechanism of the press machine as research object,this paper deduces the theoretical equation of the solutions to the multi-displacement matrix iteration and the single displacement accurate solution.The two approaches are applied to the mechanism displacement simulation comparative study of the six bar mechanism of the press machine.It is comparatively simple and convenient to choose the single-displacement accurate solution,and unnecessary to engage oneself on complex derivation in the whole process.As soon as the single displacement is determined,it can go on to derive the accurate solution of other displacement with minor accumulative errors.It may be useful for the mechanism displacement simulation and can be applied to the motion design of the mechanism.


The paper firstly introduces requirement of material in ATB,after a series of experiments,it can determine an appropriate blend of aggregate and optimized asphalt content with ATB-25,in last makes generalizes for the construction control of spreading,rolling and joint seam,to improve the engineering quality of the dense gradation asphalt stabilized crushed stone,prolong the service life of the road.


Gaps by thinning can have different microclimatic environments compared to surrounding areas, depending on the size of the gap. In addition, gaps can play important roles in biological dynamics, nutrient cycling, and seedling regeneration. The impacts of gap size on soil microbial communities and enzyme activities in different soil layers in Chinese pine plantations are not well understood. Here, we created gaps of 45 m2 (small, G1), 100 m2 (medium, G2), and 190 m2 (large, G3) by thinning unhealthy trees in an aged (i.e., 50 years old) monoculture Chinese pine plantation in 2010. Soil samples were collected in 2015. The total, bacterial, Gram-positive (G+), and Gram-negative (G−) phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA) profiles were highest in medium gaps in both the organic and mineral layers. These indicesdecreased sharply as gap size increased to 190 m2, and each of the detected enzyme activities demonstrated the same trend. Under all the gap size managements, abundances of microbial PLFAs and enzyme activities in the organic layers were higher than in the mineral layers. The soil layer was found to have a stronger influence on soil microbial communities than gap size. Redundancy analysis (RDA) based on the three systems with different gap sizes showed that undergrowth coverage, diversity, soil total nitrogen (TN), total organic carbon (TOC), and available phosphorus (AT) significantly affected soil microbial communities. Our findings highlighted that the effect of gap size on soil microenvironment is valuable information for assessing soil fertility. Medium gaps (i.e., 100 m2) have higher microbial PLFAs, enzyme activity, and soil nutrient availability. These medium gaps are considered favorable for soil microbial communities and fertility studied in a Chinese pine plantation managed on the Loess Plateau.


An early component of the Joint Fuel Cycle Study (JFCS) between the United States and the Republic of Korea is a test of gram scale electrochemical recycling of spent fuel which is to be performed at Idaho National Laboratory (INL). Included in this test is the development of Nondestructive Assay (NDA) technologies that would be applicable for International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards of the electrochemical recycling process. Of upmost importance to safeguarding the fuel cycle associated with the electrochemical recycling process is the ability to safeguard the U/TRU ingots that will be produced in the process. For the gram scale test, the ingots that will be produced will have an expected thermal power of approximately 130 mW. To ascertain how well the calorimetric assay NDA technique can perform in assaying these ingots, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has characterized and calibrated a small solid-state calorimeter called the Small Sample Calorimeter (SSC3) to perform these measurements at LANL. To calibrate and characterize the SSC3, a series of measurements were performed using certified {sup 238}Pu heat standards whose power output is traceable back to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) electrical standards. The results of these measurements helped establishmore » both the calibration of the calorimeter as well as the expected performance of the calorimeter in terms of its accuracy and precision as a function of thermal power of the item that is being measured. In this report, we will describe the measurements that were performed and provide a discussion of the results of these measurements.« less


The article is devoted to the actual guestions valeological competence of the modern teacher, is explored the structure valeological competence teacer, which is developed on the basis of priority spiritual-valued gualitties teacher, that is deaten back on forming vital jurisdictions undent.


A first principles derivation is given of the evolution equation for nonlinear pulse propagation in an optical fibre. It avoids many of the difficulties encountered in some other theories and emphasises that waveguide effects can be included in a natural and logical manner. It is preceded by a brief review of the principal features of solitons in optical guides, and a critical discussion is given of previous theoretical descriptions of them. The numerical results reported here include an investigation of the competitive roles of waveguide and material dispersion and some examples of the behaviour of solitary wave solutions of the nonlinear Schrodinger equation.


THE PLACE OF PSYCHOANALYTIC and psychodynamic treatments within psychiatry is controversial. Although some evidence supports the efficacy of short-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (STPP) for specific disorders, convincing research on the outcome of long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (LTPP) has been lacking. Evidence suggests that short-term psychotherapy is sufficiently effective for most individuals experiencing acute distress. Evidence, however, also indicates that short-term treatments are insufficient for a considerable proportion of patients with complex mental disorders, ie, patients with multiple or chronic mental disorders or personality disorders. Some studies suggest that long-term psychotherapy may be helpful for these groups of patients. This is true not only of psychodynamic therapy but also of psychotherapeutic approaches that are usually short-term, such as cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). Evidence-based treatments for these patient groups are particularly important. Personality disorders, for example, are quite common in both general and clinical populations. They show a high comorbidity with a wide range of Axis I psychiatric disorders and are significantly associated with functional impairments. Furthermore, a high proportion of patients in clinical populations expeFor editorial comment see p 1587. Author Affiliations: Department of Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, University of Giessen, Giessen (Dr Leichsenring); and Department of Medical Psychology, Univers i ty Medica l Center HamburgEppendorf, Hamburg (Dr Rabung), Germany. Corresponding Author: Falk Leichsenring, DSc, Department of Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, University of Giessen, Ludwigstrasse 76, 35392 Giessen Germany (email@example.com .uni-giessen.de). Context The place of long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (LTPP) within psychiatry is controversial. Convincing outcome research for LTPP has been lacking.


differences in the development, and later function, of particular organs or tissues? In the 1970s it was suggested that the level of nutrition in infancy might determine the replication rate of fat cells, and thus determine the adult complement of fat cells and the liability of the adult to obesity. There is nothing theoretically implausible about this hypothesis but the available evidence does not support it. Now attention is chiefly fixed on the suggestion of Barker and colleagues in Southampton, that restraint of growth and development in fetal life and infancy 'programme' cardiovascular disease (and other diseases) in adult life. If this is true, it is of very great public health importance. It is well known that certain geographical areas in Britain have much higher rates of cardiovascular mor-


For prayer and praise of early days, For Bradford's volce, who said: "Rejoice!" For men who fought and freedom bought. For LIncoln's call to praise by all. For Godlike power In need's dark hour. For foes withheld In battle quelled, For dally bread whence all are ted, For 1Iock and herd and beast and bird. For spring and fall and seasons all. For rain and sun and duty done. For kith and kin, our folds within. For trlendshlp dear and all good cheer. Our thanks shall be to only Thee, Through all our coasts. 0 Lord ot Hosts. ••••••• lUGNIFY UPPER GRADES.


The technological integrative innovation can help Small and medium enterprises(SMEs) to obtain resource superiority of technological innovation that only large enterprises hold when retaining their behavior superiority of technological innovation,so it is an effective model of SMEs technological innovation.The selection of integrative subject is the key question in applying this model.This paper analyses the deficiency of the traditional selection methods of integrative subject.On this base,it regards the method of gray relative analysis as the selection method of integrative subject,presents at length the theoretical foundation of the gray relative analysis method with an analytic demonstration.


The article is devoted to the development and analysis of diagnostic vocal and choral skills of boys-cadets in the choir of Tyumen presidential cadet school. Based on the consideration of the concepts "skill", "vocal skills", "choral skills" introduces a working definition of the concept of "vocal and choral skills" of cadets. Describes some psychological and physiological characteristics of vocal-choir of boys-choristers. Taking in consideration specific professional orientation of cadets defines the components of vocal and choral skills, which are to be developed: first, pure tone, without which unison is impossible, and hence the choral tune, too; the command of different types of breathing and clear diction, which are necessary for the cadets for the development of command voice as well. Describes the diagnostic tools: performance, diagnostic tasks, levels of development of choral vocal skills; provides the analysis of the qualitative and quantitative characteristics development of choral vocal skills of the cadets at the initial and final stages of diagnosis. Defines the factors for the increased development of choral vocal skills in the boys choir of Tyumen presidential cadet school.


Submitted for the DPP07 Meeting of The American Physical Society Ballooning Modes for Hall-MHD Plasmas with Shear Flow ELIEZER HAMEIRI, New York University — Our past work on ballooning modes in MHD plasmas with shear flow1 has shown that such modes do exist but, rather than being stationary, they drift along the magnetic field line at a poloidal angular velocity equal to the ratio of the toroidal shear flow to the magnetic shear. In the present work we show that the ballooning modes also exist in a Hall-MHD plasma with shear flow, a fact which was in doubt up to now. The mode also drifts along a field line, as in MHD. But it should be noted that in order to go to the ballooning limit (n →∞), one must also scale the Hall term parameter (the ion skin depth) to be comparable to the width of the mode, with both shrinking to zero. In order to investigate further the properties of the ballooning mode, the equations of which are rather complicated, we use a simplified configuration where the drift of the mode can be removed by transforming to a coordinate system moving along a field line, in a way that leaves a time-independent equation being analyzable by eigenvalues instead of Floquet behavior. So far we have worked out the MHD limit as a basis for comparison, since this case allows for very precise results. The Hall-MHD case is being pursued. 1E. Hameiri and S.T. Chun, Phys. Rev. A 41, 1186 (1990). Eliezer Hameiri New York University Date submitted: 19 Jul 2007 Electronic form version 1.4


«Dynamic Axiology» of contemporary popular culture represents a pivotal apparatus for deconstructing deeply-embedded processes that underpin the value paradigms of the modern sociocultural matrix. This conceptual framework elucidates the mechanisms of value interaction, adaptation, and transformation within the milieu of dynamic sociocultural modifications. An astute interpretation of this logic facilitates a profound comprehension of the multidimensionality and intricacy of global human history. Cultural identifiers, propagated through global communicative networks, can augment their primordial context, yet when integrated into new sociocultural environments, often exhibit transformed connotations. Concurrently, what is observed is not merely a nonlinear cultural influence, but a dynamic value exchange that conceptually enriches both interacting facets. A significant concern in axiological analysis is the commodification of values. Amidst globalization and technological advancements, popular culture emerges as the primary conduit for transmitting standardized values, leading to the homogenization of cultural landmarks and the reinforcement of hedonistic tendencies. Popular culture confronts the quandary of value ephemerality. Phenomena that rapidly gain traction also swiftly diminish, engendering a «disposable» culture. Axiological instability results in individuals losing bearings in a world dominated by randomness and unpredictability. Among other axiological dissonances, the conflict between authenticity and simulacrum stands out. In a realm where images and symbols eclipse reality, discerning authentic experiences from their imitations becomes challenging. The informatic-technological dimension is pivotal in the discourse of «dynamic axiology», highlighting the acceleration, intricacy, and modification of value interactions, revealing new horizons and issues for both individual subjects and collective identities. Explicating these processes is imperative for the intellectual scrutiny of axiological dynamics in contemporary contexts. The economic component, notably the advertising industry, as a formidable influence mechanism on public consciousness, plays a significant role in shaping the axiological foundations of contemporary popular culture. It is evident that this influence isn't always beneficial or positive, considering the potential deleterious ramifications for individual and collective value systems.


A method for making a microelectronic assembly includes providing a microelectronic element with first conductive elements and a dielectric element with second conductive elements. At least some of either the first conductive elements or the second conductive elements may be conductive posts and other of the first or second conductive elements may include a bond metal disposed between some of the conductive posts. An underfill layer may overly some of the first or second conductive elements. At least one of the first conductive elements may be moved towards the other of the second conductive elements so that the posts pierce the underfill layer and at least deform the bond metal. The microelectronic element and the dielectric element can be heated to join them together. The height of the posts above the surface may be at least forty percent of a distance between surfaces of the microelectronic element and dielectric element.


The growing importance of anaemia in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) let us to analyze the problems connected with etiopathology and diagnosis of this disease. The main attention was put on iron metabolism disturbances in the pathomechanism of the anaemia in RA.


This paper provides a summary of the main features of U.S. financial and banking data during the period of the National Banking System (1863–1914). The purpose of the paper is to provide an overview of the stylized facts associated with the era, with an emphasis on those impinging on national bank behavior. The paper takes a detailed look at key elements of national bank balance sheets over time, over the seasons, and during panic periods. The interesting and puzzling patterns of interest rate movements during the era also are examined. The paper introduces a new set of disaggregated data on the national bank era that has not been examined by prior research. As data are presented in the paper, some of the key puzzles associated with the era are introduced.


The impact of global climatic change on agriculture as well as livestock has recently become a subject of increasing importance particularly in coastal ecosystem. The present study was designed to assess climate induced vulnerability at household level among the livestock rearers of eastern coastal region. Total 480 livestock rearers were randomly selected from the 4 coastal districts of 2 eastern coastal states of India as respondents. An exclusively "Social Vulnerability to Climate Change" index was developed by considering 40 indicators. The study revealed that average index score of vulnerability of livestock rearers of each studied districts as well as coastal states were negative with overall mean value -15.503±0.214. It was also found that livestock rearers of South 24 Parganas district were comparatively most vulnerable followed by Bhadrak, Ganjam, and Purba Medinipur districts. In overall, 41.667% of the livestock rearers were in medium vulnerability category followed by 35% and 23.333% in lower and higher vulnerability category, respectively.


Objective:The technology of extracting Acteoside by ethanol from Cistanche deserticol was studied in this article.Methods:The optimum extraction conditions were investigated by orthogonal test.Results:The optimal extraction process is as follows:phase ratio of solid to liquid(g∶mL) of 1∶10 extraction time of 2 h,ethanol to whole extraction system in volume of 60%.Conclusion:The extraction yield reached 0.397%.


For an integer (cid:2) at least three, we prove that every Hamiltonian P (cid:2) -free graph G on n > (cid:2) vertices has cycles of at least 2 (cid:2) n − 1 different lengths. For small values of (cid:2) , we can improve the bound as follows. If 4 ≤ (cid:2) ≤ 7, then G has cycles of at least 12 n − 1 different lengths, and if (cid:2) is 4 or 5 and n is odd, then G has cycles of at least n − (cid:2) + 2 different lengths.


Multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWNT) junctions are fabricated in three-dimensional space by positioning MWNTs with nanorobotic manipulators, connecting them together with van der Waals forces, and/or fixing them with electron-beam-induced deposition (EBID) or chemical bonding them through mechanochemical nanorobotic assembly. Contact state, connection force/strength, and bonding types of the junctions are investigated through nanorobotic manipulations.


This paper designs and implements a high-quality distributed network-attached storage system, and introduces it′s work principle,design flow and main program segment in detail.


A rapid and sensitive liquid chromatographic method is developed and validated for the simultaneous estimation of various curcuminoids. The method was used for the estimation of curcuminoids in commercially available dosage forms, bulk and naturally available root and rhizome extracts. The separation was performed on a Phenomenex ODS 2 C18 (5 µm, 15 cm × 4.6 mm) column. The composition of mobile phase is 50:50 % (v/v) of acetonitrile and water containing 2 % v/v glacial acetic acid operated on isocratic mode at a flow rate of 1.2 mL/min. Quantitation was achieved by HPLC-UV detection at 425 nm. The specificity of the method (blank interference, interference from degradation products and interference from formulation excipients) was established. Degradation studies were performed in acid, alkaline, oxidative and photolytic stress conditions. The results showed that curcumin is prone to degradation in all aqueous media irrespective of pH of the solution. Also, in comparison to the standard curcuminoid composition (83.5 % curcumin, 14.5 % dimethoxycurcumin and 1.5 % bis- dimethoxycurcumin), large variation was observed in the root and rhizome powder extracts that were collected from commercial and crop samples.


Samples of hydroxyapatite with differing crystal sizes were prepared from solutions containing labeled calcium and strontium. Analysis of these preparations and the results of digestion studies showed a discrimination against strontium in crystal formation which was related to the rate of crystal growth. The discrimination was greater in the slowly grown, larger crystals than in the smaller, rapidly formed crystals. (auth)


Actions pour la Protection des Droits de l'Homme (APDH) v. Republic of Côte d'Ivoire (Application No 1/2014) (Merits) 129 Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia (Application Nos 11157/04 and 15162/ 05) 224 Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia (Execution of the Judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in the Case of, Re) (Judgment No 12-P/2016) 260 Re Application by Finucane for Judicial Review 648 Avotiņš v. Latvia (Application No 17502/ 07) 294


This paper describes a robust modeling method to handle inverse problems with missing data. The modeling method is applied to aircraft fuel measurement considering sensor failure. Neural Networks that are tolerant to noisy data are adapted to approximate the nonlinear physical process. Unlike previous algorithms that use gradient information to search input space in inverse problems, the proposed method thoroughly explores the input space using particle swarm optimization. The comparison results show the effectiveness of our method in dealing with missing data.


Purpose-designed circuits can accelerate the speed of scientific calculation.Multiple data accumulation is a common operation in scientific calculation.It is easy to meet pipeline data hazards during designing the hardware accumulator.Our design is dividing those data into two kinds of modules according to pipeline level,and different modules using different accumulation methods.Based on a multilevel pipeline adder,this design is implemented on a FPGA.It has less hardware resources and higher pipeline utilization,and the control is relatively simple.Especially for large-scale data,its advantages can be fully taken on.


keeping faith and loyalty is the quintessence of the Ningbo Group Spirit and the Ningbo Industrialists always pay great attention to faith and loyalty in their business, which brings the rapid development of their industry and commerce.


Abstract In this article, we present and analyse phonaesthemic alternations as they appear in Flemish dialects of Dutch, that is when a root-initial consonant or consonant cluster is replaced by a post-alveolar affricate /ʧ/ or /ʤ/ in order to create a phonaesthemically marked variant of a neutral base word. Although no longer productive in Flemish dialects, we show that such phonaesthemic alternations exhibit strong functional similarities to those found in other languages, in particular the evaluative notions of diminutivity and augmentativity. We also show that, formally speaking, Flemish phonaesthemic alternations differ from those attested in other languages in only targeting a single consonant or consonant cluster. We then put forward the hypothesis that Flemish speakers may have copied this mechanism to produce phonaesthemic alternations from Picard speakers, corroborating the notion that phonaesthemic alternations may emerge from language contact.


Heat treatment practices used by steel foundries have been carefully studied as part of comprehensive heat treatment procedure development trials. These studies highlight the relationships between critical heat treatment process control parameters and heat treatment success. Foundry heat treatment trials to develop heat treatment procedure qualification have shed light on the relationship between heat treatment theory and current practices. Furnace load time-temperature profiles in steel foundries exhibit significant differences depending on heat treatment equipment, furnace loading practice, and furnace maintenance. Time-temperature profiles of the furnace control thermocouples can be very different from the time-temperature profiles observed at the center of casting loads in the furnace. Typical austenitrization temperatures and holding times used by steel foundries far exceed what is required for transformation to austenite. Quenching and hardenability concepts were also investigated. Heat treatment procedure qualification (HTPQ) schema to demonstrate heat treatment success and to pre-qualify other alloys and section sizes requiring lesser hardenability have been developed. Tempering success is dependent on both tempering time and temperature. As such, furnace temperature uniformity and control of furnace loading during tempering is critical to obtain the desired mechanical properties. The ramp-up time in the furnace prior to the establishment of steady state heat treatment conditions contributes to the extent of heat treatment performed. This influence of ramp-up to temperature during tempering has been quantified.


The mechanisms of response and adaptation of the body's regulatory systems to stress factors is an urgent fundamental task and the goal of this study. The study used four experimental models of stress: acute stress, chronic stress, and their sequences. An acute stress response was induced in a 60-minute forced swimming test model in a pool. Chronic stress was simulated by restricting mobility (hypokinesia), which was done by placing the rats into special AE1001-R1 rat retainers, made of transparent polypropylene (OOO OpenScience, Russia), in which they were kept for 10 days, 20 hours a day. The levels of biogenic amines (adrenaline, norepinephrine, serotonin), melatonin and nitric oxide in blood serum were determined by a method of enzyme-linked immunosorbent. the results obtained provide fair evidence of an increased functional activity of both stress-response (sympathoadrenal system) and stress-limiting systems (ST, MT, NO) in stress reactions of the body, the severity of which depends on the duration and sequence of stress stimuli on animals.


The life historiesofmanyspeciesofthe orderLaminariales in the Phaeophyceae have been examined morphologically and, in all cases except Chorda tomentosa (10), it has bcen shown that an alternation of heteromorphic generations exists, incorporating dioecious gametophyte generations. A £ew species have been examined cytologically; others have not been studied at all. The taxonomy of the genus Alaria GREVILLE, a member of the Laminariales, has been investigated (12)The definition of the separate species of the genus has, however, been based purely on their gross morphology. Meiosis has been described for A. marginata^ A. A, tenitifolitt) A, fistulosa^ A. taeniata and A. gr and approximate haploid chromosome nurnbers have been obtained from meiotic configurations (8)* The present project was undertaken to study the microscopic gametophyte generation, fertilization and the establishment of the young sporophytes of several Alaria species. The species examined were those native to the shores of British Columbia and South West Alaska.


Multi-heterojunctions are more promising than single-heterojunctions in photocatalysis due to the availability of more interfaces between each component. However, photocatalytic activity is highly dependent on the contact mode of individual components. In this work, we assemble TiO2–WO3–Pt multi-heterojunction microspheres using ultrasonic spray pyrolysis and focus on their contact mode governed photocatalytic activity. The results reveal that using highly crystalline WO3 nanosheets as building blocks could particularly enhance the photocatalytic activity of a TiO2/WO3 system toward the degradation of gaseous acetaldehyde and isopropyl alcohol. Furthermore, loading Pt nanoparticles onto WO3 nanosheets could facilitate a more prominent enhancement of activity than that of TiO2/Pt, benefiting from the two-electron reduction of oxygen at the interface of WO3/Pt. Meanwhile, the high crystallinity of WO3 nanosheets allows for a loading amount of Pt as low as 0.04 wt% in the TiO2–WO3–Pt system, which reduces the catalyst cost in comparison with that of the conventional amount of 1 wt%.


The article is dedicated to the relevant for the contemporary society problem of the development of the skill to learn, the development of readiness for the self-education. The grounds of the difficulties in the mastery of scientific learning text are identified, and the dynamics of the introduction into the practice of instruction in primary school of the effective methods of work with the scientific learning text is suggested, the examples of the use of the methods in the practical work are given.


The benefits of IT-based innovation and collaborative workspaces are well recognised in the construction industry to improve its productivity. Enterprises realised their need for sophisticated ICT based working environments to overcome geographical barriers separation between teams and promote social interactions providing appropriate design tools and intuitive interfaces to assess design from various perspectives. Since then, such demands became the drive for companies to adopt new forms of workspaces to promote social interaction between team members and allow efficient collaborative working. These new technologies such as networking, Virtual Reality, collaborative interfaces started influencing the way enterprises work. A futuristic scenario was developed in the course of the on-going CoSpaces European project with a vision of using new technologies to create workspaces with intuitive collaborative interfaces. The expected benefits are fewer meetings are required, with more design alternatives to discuss and better shared viewpoints among the various competencies of the meeting. This will improve communication, increase collaboration among the project teams and eventually improve the industry's productivity. The work does not only demonstrate the technological requirements to develop such collaborative interfaces as the CoSpaces platform for collaboration but it is further extended to evaluate the effective use of implementing this framework by a group of end users to achieve better collaborative solutions in the construction industry. The design review scenario implemented in a living lab setting, reveals the outcomes of the end users' experience using the human-centric technologies developed in CoSpaces project to review and solve design problems in construction.


Nitromethane (CH3NO2) ingestion is not known to cause significant morbidity or mortality. Nitromethane is a common component of model airplane fuel or rocket fuel along with methanol. It has been reported that nitromethane exposure can cause false elevation of the serum creatinine level when using the common Jaffe reaction method of analysis [1,2]; however this is not clinically well known. The standard assay for the measurement of creatinine is based on the Jaffe reaction, in which alkaline sodium picrate reacts with creatinine to form an orangered color. There are many substances known to interfere with the Jaffe assay, the most important being acetoacetate, cephalosporins, bilirubin, ascorbic acid pyruvate and dopamine.


This paper explores cancer survival experiences and offers the Heideggerian concept of temporality as a way of acknowledging and understanding the complex and pervasive nature of survivorhood. Firstly, despite demographic indicators, the process of cancer survival is under-reported in the research literature. Secondly, and embedded throughout this paper, is the notion that cancer survival is not an illness and requires its own analytic frameworks. Thirdly, this paper suggests temporality can assist to extend understanding of cancer survival beyond extant psychiatric diagnostic, disease trajectory, coping and adaptation, and illness narrative frameworks.


The self-energy, spectral functions and susceptibilities of 2D systems with strong ferromagnetic fluctuations are considered within the quasistatic approach. The self-energy at low temperatures T has a non-Fermi liquid form in the energy window w >(T/vF)^(-1/3) are obtained.


The present invention provides a multimedia file titles with the method of an electronic device to skip, the method comprising: obtaining a first portion wherein the first multimedia file; According to this first feature section to obtain a second portion of the second multimedia file start time; skip a first part of the second multimedia file before the start time point of the second portion, the second portion of the second play multimedia files.


Equation-free approaches have been proposed in recent years for the computational study of multiscale phenomena in engineering problems where evolution equations for the coarse-grained, system-level behavior are not explicitly available. In this paper, we study the dynamics of a diffusive particle system in a laminar shear flow, described by a two-dimensional Brownian motion; in particular, we perform coarse projective integration and demonstrate the particle-based computation of coarse self-similar and asymptotically self-similar solutions for this problem. We use marginal and conditional inverse cumulative distribution functions (ICDFs) as the macroscopic observables of the evolving particle distribution.


x Input Signals, t x i t y j Dendrite Axon Synapses Post-synaptic signal Axon-Hillock Cell Body (Soma) Activation potential Figure 2–1: Conceptual structure of a biological neuron Basic characteristics of a biological neuron: ¯ data is coded in a form of instantaneous frequency of pulses ¯ synapses are either excitatory or inhibitory ¯ Signals are aggregated (" summed ") when travel along dendritic trees ¯ The cell body (neuron output) generates the output pulse train of an average frequency proportional to the total (aggregated) post-synaptic activity (activation potential).


In this paper a new No-Reference (NR) image quality assessment (IQA) method based on the point wise statistics of local normalized luminance signals using region of interest (ROI) processing is proposed. This algorithm firstly extracts the ROI which is relative to human subjectivity by using the image gradient and phase congruency, and then extracts the image quality feature in spatial domain. Particularly, most of the present IQA methods mainly focus on predicting the image quality with respect to human perception, yet, in some other image domains, the final receiver of a digital image may not a human. Thus, we propose a method which can assess the image quality relative to edge detection algorithm. In addition, experimental results on LIVE database are provided to justify the superior compared to the significant image quality metrics.


The disorder, sparseness, irregularity, noise, and background of point clouds cause significant challenges in point cloud classification tasks. In such tasks, deep learning methods based on raw point cloud data have recently achieved good performance on simulated data. However, many methods experience problems when applied to realistic data containing much noise and complex background information. This paper proposes an end-to-end dual-input network (DINet) point cloud classification model based on deep learning. In the proposed model, a feature extractor obtains high-dimensional features, a feature comparator aggregates and disperses homogeneous and heterogeneous point clouds, respectively, in the feature space, and a feature analyzer completes the task. The two-channel data input facilitates a universal DINet framework that is flexible and extends to other models generalized across different datasets. DINet brings improvements in performance, presenting an overall accuracy value of 81.3% and average accuracy value of 79.6% in experiments conducted on the real-world ScanObjectNN dataset. The code for the proposed point cloud classification model is available at https://github.com/zhairf/DINet.


OBJECTIVE
To identify the relationship between admission hyperglycemia and outcome in children with severe brain injury at hospital discharge and 6 months later.

METHOD
A retrospective analysis of blood glucose levels was conducted in 61 children with severe brain injury admitted to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit between November 1, 2005 and October 30, 2009. Hyperglycemia was considered for a cut off value of > 150 mg/dL, based on literature. Outcome was measured with the Glasgow Outcome Scale at hospital discharge and 6 months after discharge. Death was also analyzed as an outcome measure.

RESULTS
Mean admission blood glucose of the patients was 251 mg/dL (68-791). Hyperglycemia was noted on admission in 51 (83.6%) patients. A moderately significant positive correlation was found between admission blood glucose and severity of head trauma according to Abbreviated Injury Score (r = 0.46). Mean admission glucose level of non-survivors was significantly higher (207 mg/dL vs. 455 mg/dL, p < 0.001). Mean blood glucose level of the patients in bad outcome group was found significantly higher compared to that of the patients in good outcome group at hospital discharge and 6 months after discharge (185 mg/dL vs. 262 mg/dL, p < 0.15 and 184 mg/dL vs. 346 mg/dL, p < 0.04, respectively).

CONCLUSIONS
Hyperglycemia could be considered as a marker of brain injury and, when present upon admission, could reflect extensive brain damage, frequently associated with mortality and bad outcome. Further studies are needed to investigate the effect of strict glycemic control on mortality and outcomes.


Reinhold Niebuhr used the concept of irony to analyze the ethical issues presented by the cold war and to propose a realistic way to counter communism in keeping with fundamental American values. This article suggests that Niebuhr's concept of irony can be a valuable tool in dealing with the global war on terror and rethinking ideas of political ethics in light of new threats. Like the cold war, the war on terror requires an examination of the ethical grounding of the use of power to combat a foe whose illusions often mirror those of the United States. The Christian grounding of Niebuhr's concept is a possible impediment to incorporating it in the secular setting of public administration. A form of realism that combines Niebuhr's irony-based realism with a realism derived from ethical ideas of prudence is suggested.