An innovative technology designed to re- move waterborne pathogens using an environmentally neutral antimicrobial filter media is described. Analytical results of independent laboratory and field tests are pro- vided. The filter media uses an EPA-registered water so- luble quaternary amine organosilane antimicrobial solu- tion (3-trihydroxy silyl propyl dimethyl octadecyl ammo- nium chloride) that covalently bonds to perlite. Treatment is instantaneous as an antimicrobial "sword" physically pierces the outer membrane of the microorganism on con- tact, providing for total pathogen destruction. Destroyed pathogens easily pass through the filter media with mini- mal reduction in flow rate. The antimicrobial media does not rely on physical trapping, leaves no chemical residue, requires no external energy source, contains no moving parts, and is non-toxic. Independent 48-hour acute toxicity testing yielded zero mortality of fathead minnows and Ceriodaphnia dubia test organisms, confirming that the antimicrobial agent does not leach. A series of laboratory tests achieved >99% efficacy against E. coli from simu- lated stormwater runoff with influent concentrations of 150 to 36,000 col/100ml, loading rates of 9 to 30 gpm/ft 2 , and simulated flows of 52,000 to 173,000 gpd. Field test- ing in an ultra-urban setting in Los Angeles achieved an average efficacy of 97.5% efficacy against E. coli and 99.6% against enterococci with influent concentrations ranging from 1,800 to 170,000 col/100ml at 19 gpm/ft 2 . Long term field tests were performed at three northwest Georgia facilities in separate 200, 300 and 640 ton cooling towers. These tests demonstrate that total coliforms and total aerobic bacteria suppression was maintained below the maximum acceptable level of 10 4 col/ml for the dura- tion of the tests. Water volumes up to 80 million gallons were treated. The antimicrobial filtration technology can provide treatment for a wide variety of water protection programs and pathogenic conditions.


See also page [E398][1] and [www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.140401][2]

A 65-year-old woman of African descent presents to a primary care clinic for routine follow-up. She has not noted any change in her vision. Her last eye examination was six years earlier. Her mother had been given a


At least circuit arrangement from a signal (Vs) to obtain an output signal (Va) comprising one alternating component, and the signal source supplies (Vs), the signal first obtaining the maximum value (Vmax) of (Vs) a peak value detection device, and the second peak value detection device for determining the minimum value of the signal (Vs) and (Vmin), the following rules, namely, V1 = K1 · {Vs- (Vmax + Vmin) / 2} And a signal (Vs) and the first signal linking device for obtaining a maximum value (Vmax) and minimum value (Vmin) first resulting signal by additive linking of the (V1) according to, in the above equation, K1 is a freely first constant factor selectable, circuit apparatus, the following rules, namely, V2 = (Vmax-Vmin) · K2 Further comprising a second signal linking device for obtaining a second resulting signal (V2) by additive linking of the maximum value (Vmax) and minimum value (Vmin) according to, in the above equation, K2 is chosen freely a second constant factor possible, further circuit device, a first squaring element for squaring the signal (V1) as a first result, the second resulting signal to (V2) a second squaring element for squaring, the following rules, namely, Va = K3 · {(1/8) · (K1 / K2) 2 · (V2) 2 - (V1) 2} Squared first resulting signal according to ((V1) The invention further include a method for obtaining an output signal with further including rotational speed measurement device comprising such circuit devices, to achieve the resolution or increasing the unaltered output signal from the signal containing an alternating component resolution is constrained it can.


Catarina Sjolin considers the format the Home Secretary's inquiry into historical child abuse should take in order to truly find answers.


Background:  Tuberculosis (TB) remains an important and evolving health problem worldwide. Acute respiratory failure, the most severe form of pulmonary tuberculosis, is associated with a high mortality rate. Adjunctive corticosteroid therapy has been reported as an effective treatment in extrapulmonary TB. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of adjunctive corticosteroid therapy on outcomes in pulmonary tuberculosis patients with acute respiratory failure.

Methods: This retrospective cohort study enrolled newly diagnosed pulmonary tuberculosis patients with acute respiratory failure who were admitted to Siriraj Hospital (Bangkok, Thailand) during January 2011 to December 2013. Patients that received corticosteroid as an adjunctive treatment for pulmonary TB were assigned to the steroid group. The control group consisted of patients that did not receive corticosteroid. Collected data included age, gender, body mass index (BMI), Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II (APACHE II) scores, sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) scores, vital signs, PaO2/FiO2 ratio, chest X-ray abnormality pattern, and TB treatment strategies, including antituberculosis agents and adjunct corticosteroid treatment. The primary outcome was hospital mortality rate. The secondary outcomes were hospital length of stay and duration of mechanical ventilation.

Results: Thirty-eight patients were included. There were 18 patients in the steroid group and 20 in the control group. No significant difference was observed between groups for age, gender, BMI, APACHE II score, vital signs, or PaO2/FiO2 ratio. Patients in the steroid group had a significantly higher mean SOFA score than controls (5.7±4.5 vs. 3.3±2.6, respectively; p=0.046). Almost all patients in this study (97.1%) had positive culture for M. tuberculosis from sputum. The mean corticosteroid dose was equivalent to hydrocortisone 329.7±146.0 mg/day. Patients in the steroid group had higher hospital mortality than control group patients, but the difference did not achieve statistical significance (66.7% vs. 45.0%, respectively; p=0.21). Adjunctive corticosteroid therapy did not significantly reduce hospital length of stay or duration of mechanical ventilation when compared between the steroid and control groups (12.0±13.3 vs. 14.6±19.3 days, respectively; p=0.636 and 7.2±10.6 vs. 8.0±8.3 days, respectively; p=0.801).

Conclusion: Adjunctive corticosteroid therapy had no significant positive effect on outcomes in pulmonary tuberculosis patients with acute respiratory failure.


Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disorder in which antibodies are formed against post-synaptic nicotinic acetylcholine receptors that lead to impeded muscle contraction and commonly affects the oculomotor muscles. Takotsubo cardiomyopathy (TTC) is a dilated cardiomyopathy that can mimic a myocardial infarction and causes reversible systolic dysfunction. This is a case of a 66-year-old Caucasian male with a known history of ocular myasthenia gravis that presented to the emergency room with worsening dyspnea secondary to a myasthenic crisis. One day, following admission, his shortness of breath failed to improve and was found to meet the diagnostic criteria for takotsubo cardiomyopathy. A brief review of 31 previous cases summarizes the current case reports, patterns, and mortality associated with the myasthenic crisis associated with TTC.


This paper exploits the connection between minimum-distortion perfect counterforensics and maximum-rate perfect steganography in order to provide the optimum solution to the first of these problems, in the case in which the forensic detector solely uses first-order statistics. The solution relies on Slepian's variant I permutation codes, which had previously been shown to implement maximum-rate perfect steganography when the host is memoryless (equivalently, when the steganographic detector only uses first-order statistics). Additionally, we demonstrate a blind counterforensic strategy made possible by permutation decoding, which may also find application in image processing.


The REX-ISOLDE radioactive ion beam facility at CERN makes great demands also on the experimentalists due to its specific duty cycle and the time structure with short beam pulses and large intensities. This paper describes the experimentalist's point of view, how to obtain sufficient and correct statistics under the special circumstances arising from the beam time structure. In particular, the case of Coulomb excitation experiments, where a large total cross section is ultimately desired, is studied in greater detail.


This article reports on a small-scale study of non-English–major students using bilingual dictionaries for reading comprehension.It investigated the cognitive processes and skills involved in dictionary consultation and where the subjects needed training in order to acquire more effective strategies.It reveals a range of inappropriate strategies resulting in the failure of dictionary consulting.The findings show that learners need systemic instruction in dictionary use and three areas for strategy training are proposed.


On the basis of the brief introduction to theory of uncooled infrared thermal imaging system and the infrared image processing algorithms, the key technologies to real-time image enhancement was studied, which driving a 160×120 Infrared Focal Plane Arrays (IRFPA) imaging system. In this article, an uncooled infrared thermal imaging system with real-time image processing and image enhancement was designed and developed, most importantly, a better result was achieved. Aiming at the Infrared Focal Plane Arrays (IRFPA), the hardware system used flexible design approach and efficiently developed tools on System-on-a-Programmable-Chip(SOPC)with two SDRAMs memories used as frame buffers. By this means, the 160 × 120 of IRFPA realized image acquisition. In this article, the structure of the system and the software realization of infrared images to achievement of the non-uniformity correction and image enhancement algorithm for parallel operation On the SOPC were described in details.The results showed that the design of SOPCbased real-time infrared image processing system could simplify system hardware and software design while ensuring the computing abilitiy. To the IRFPA imaging system of 160 × 120, processed infrared image quality was improved significantly to meet the real-time dynamic detection and tracking needs. Finally a system of uncooled infrared thermal imager with high price quality and convenient reconfiguration condition was implemented.


The widespread adoption of new energy vehicles has resulted in a significant increase in charging demand, and it has become a key problem to deeply understand the charging demand and reasonably develop electric/hydrogen charging station. However, insufficient consideration of charging behavior uncertainty in existing approaches for optimal charging station configuration could result in poor performance. This paper presents a methodology for optimizing the configuration of electric/hydrogen charging stations by taking into account the user behavior characteristics. Firstly, a comprehensive mathematical model of the electric/hydrogen charging station that integrates wind, solar, storage, and charging is established. Secondly, a mixed utility-regret decision model is developed to account for the uncertainty in user travel and charging behavior, which incorporates the travel chain and user psychology. Finally, the optimization objective is solved with the lowest comprehensive cost of the charging station. By comparing the three cases, the proposed method can obtain a reasonable configuration scheme, which can improve the economy and flexibility of the electric/hydrogen charging station.


For far too long, chart chasing was the best methodhealth plans had to improve HEDIS® measures and Medicare Star ratings. Now, there isa better way.


In this paper, optimal design of PID controllers has been proposed for time delay systems using various soft computing algorithms. Time delay systems exist in several real world applications, and the delay is generally caused by the time taken by the sensor to sense the parameter, communication delay etc. Hence such characteristics lead to instabilities and make it difficult to control the system. Classical control theory methods fail for designing stable controller time delay systems. So, in order to address this problem, in this paper, the design of PID controller has been posed as an optimization problem and solved using genetic algorithm and simulated annealing. As per the obtained results, the designed controllers offer a stable response.


The curing process and curing technics of poly-isocyanate/epoxy resin were investigated by the DSC technology. The influence of curing agent amount on curing reaction and the relationship of curing degree and curing temperature were considered. The results show that the curing agent amount has a great influence on curing reaction heat which increases with increasing polyurethane amount first, then reaches a peak at 1.2. The relationship of curing temperature and heating rate was also investigated,from this,the activation energy and the order of curing reaction are gained with kinetics calculation,43.31kJ/mol and 1.17 respectively. Base on the kinetics results,curing technics was discussed:the best curing temperature is and the curing times under this temperature is 6~8h.


The social focus problem of old-age security of the old people,especially the solitary elders in the country side in the aging trend is discussed.Basic ideas are proposed to formulate the positive policy to guarantee the old-age security to the solitary elders in the countryside,consolidating the achievement of countryside reformation and achieving the social harmony and healthy development.


Abstract : This is the final technical note for the 'Hardware Performance Analysis of the Basic Narrow Microwave Landing System (MLS) at Washington National Airport (DCA) in the Service Test and Evaluation Program (STEP)' for the period January 1,1981 through June 30, 1983. The MLS configuration, limits of signal operation, system and subsystem operation, data collection and analysis are described. Equipment and environmental problem areas uncovered during the test and evaluation are discussed in the Results section of this report. Chargeable failures are identified and listed and engineering investigations are discussed. Remote Maintenance Monitoring System (RMMS) data analysis are presented. Conclusions and recommendations are listed. Keywords include: Microwave Landing System (MLS), Service Test and Evaluation Program (STEP), MLS Hardware Performance Analysis, and MLS Basic Narrow System.


Dilute emulsified oil in water (50-500 ppm) was removed by electrocoagulatin and electroflotation process. Effects of various parameters such as current density, initial pH, sodium chloride concentration, different electrodes material, gap, temperature, electrodes surface area, and treatment time on the removal efficiency were studied in batch and continuous mode.It was found that the higher removal efficiency (99%) achieved at pH of 7.5 for Al/Al electrodes while for iron electrodes at pH 8 in the batch mode. The removal efficiency increased and the treatment time decreased with increasing the current density and decreasing the gap distance between electrodes. The removal efficiency was (99%) at 10 min for Al/Al electrodes, (98.6%) at 12 min for Al/St.St. electrodes, and (97.4%) at 12 min for Fe/St.St. electrodes. The present results showed that the best temperature was 60oC .The best concentration of sodium chloride was found to be (400 ppm) when the oil concentration was (500 ppm). Also it was found that a vertical Al/Al electrode was the best type with an electrical energy consuming (3.36 kWh/m 3 ). In the continuous experiments, the removal efficiency enhanced with increasing flow rate. A multiple linear regression model was used in order to relate experimental data to a statistical model with a correlation coefficient of (0.909) and variance (0.827).


The curing behavior,thermal stability of the epoxy systems using dicyandiamide,diamino diphenyl sulfone and linear phenolic resin as curing agent respectively and 2-methylimidazole as curing accelerator and the properties of the epoxy power coatings prepared from them were investigated by DSC,TGA analysis and the mechanical property tests.The theoretic curing temperature of different curing systems was calculated using extrapolation methods.The results showed that the comprehensive properties of dicyandiamide/2-methylimidazole systems was the best and the values were as followed : theoretic curing temperature 142 ℃,initial decomposition temperature 410 ℃,impact resistant 50 cm,luster at 60°83,surface resistance 1.33×1012Ω.


Geografhy and Chronology.The Old Enzmire The First Interim.Rise of the Middle Emnzire, the Feudal state.The Second Interim.The Hyksos.The rise of the new Empire; the Military state; the conquest of Palestine, Syria, and Nubia; reform of Amenhotef IV, loss of the Asiatic pfrovinces; wars of Ramses II; Libyan invasions, Southern movement of the Northern feoples.Rise of the Priests and Mercenaries; Permanent overthrow of the native Pharaohs.


Milk is a product rich in nutrients and is part of the population's diet. Milk production in Brazil has great importance in the economy, and the prospects for increased production and consumption in the coming years are high. Rio Grande do Sul is a large producer, and much of the milk produced in the state comes from small producers and family farming systems. Due to the large consumption of milk and dairy products, there must be a concern on the part of producers with the quality of the milk produced, since, nowadays consumers are increasingly concerned with the quality of the products consumed, in addition, the issue of quality it is a requirement of legislation and industry. For this to happen, a series of requirements for Good Agricultural and Production Practices must be taken. Thus, the objective of the research was to verify the microbiological and physical-chemical quality of the milk produced in the city of Santana do Livramento-Rio Grande do Sul. With the results obtained, we can observe that in relation to the physical-chemical standards, almost all the producers met the parameters required by the legislation. Regarding the Standard Plate Count, 73.33% of the producers have low count standards with values of 4,200 UFC / mL up to 200,000 UFC / mL, which indicates good hygiene conditions and good practices in their processes. It is concluded that the milk of the analyzed producers meets, in its majority, the physical-chemical and microbiological requirements established by the legislation, which indicates a concern on the part of these producers with quality.


In this study, MIKE NAM, artificial neural networks (ANNs), and a hybridization of ANNs and Particle Swarm Optimization (ANN-PSO) are utilized to predict the Dak Nong runoff. ANNs are trained by the back-propagation (BP) procedure [1] which is based on the gradient descent algorithm and an incorporating algorithm of PSO and BP [2]. Moreover, to improve the performance of ANNs, a common method of time series analysis, so-called partial autocorrelation function (PACF), is collaboratively used. The experimental results are conducted on a dataset collected in the Dak Nong basin for the duration of 1981–2007. The experiments demonstrate that PACF significantly impacts the performance of ANNs. Although ANN-PSO is not superior to ANNs trained by BP (ANN-BP) in this study, ANN-PSO outperforms ANN-BP in terms of capturing the peaks of the Dak Nong runoff. In addition, both ANN-BP and ANN-PSO outperform MIKE NAM.


We study the recently introduced deletion on trajectories operation in the case when the set of trajectories is associative and complete. We deene a congruence relation associated with a language L and a set of trajectories T and the corresponding factor monoid is called the syntactic (L; T)-monoid. We prove that the syntactic monoid is nite if and only if the commutative closure of L is regular.


The present invention relates to a ball grid array type semiconductor package and the module substrate and the semiconductor package module including the same. Module board comprising a plurality of signal lines on the upper surface of the semiconductor package module according to the present invention; It is disposed on the module substrate, a package substrate including a surface and the other surface being the one side and the counter; A semiconductor chip disposed on the one surface; And the other surface is disposed on, comprising a plurality of external connection terminals electrically connected to the semiconductor chip, and the other surface comprises a plurality of external connection terminal formation regions and a plurality of external connection terminal non-forming region, and a plurality of external connection terminals is are disposed one on one in a plurality of external connection terminal formation regions, by connecting a plurality of signal lines and one-on-one, and output a high-speed signals, respectively, a plurality of external connection terminal non-forming areas are separated from one another, to periodically adjacent to the edge of the package substrate positioned and, between the adjacent edges of the package substrate periodically a plurality of external connection terminal non-forming region disposed, a portion of the plurality of external connection terminal formation regions are arranged, a plurality of external connection terminal non-forming region a plurality of signal lines formed on the dog of at least two passes.


The development of the internet in business very quickly. Companies can use the Internet to help its operations. One of the marketing is an e-marketing. Proper marketing can help companies to gain a lot of better prospect customer.Therefore in this study the authors attempt to analyze internal and external company processes and designing web-based e-marketing to support the right marketing of the MANTAP (Martabak and Pasta House) so company can expand its marketing and can create competitive advantages from their competitors.In analyze internal and external processes, the authors use a SWOT analysis so as to know the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Moreover, the authors use the analysis of Stage 7 of Internet Marketing for analyzing and designing the right e-marketing for MANTAP. Based on the results of the analysis has been done there is still a degree of importance of marketing that can not be met by the company against its competitors. Therefore the application of e-Marketing is the solution of solving the problem.


With the crazy tempo of life and fierce competition for talented people,female teachers in universities bear greater physical and emotional stress which impede their own personal development and have a great effect on the healthy and harmonious development of high education to a certain extent.This paper deals with how to reduce and remove mental stress on female teachers in universities by using some permanent value and intelligence of Taoism,and provide a better method for mental adjustment.


The present research work was carried out to evaluate the antioxidant potential and phytochemical analysis of methanol root extract of Naregamia alata. Standard methods were adopted to screen antioxidant and phytochemical nature of the plant. Antioxidant and radical scavenging activity were determined by using different in vitro assays including DPPH (2, 2 –diphenyl -1-picryl hydrazyl radical) free radical scavenging assay, Hydroxyl radical scavenging assay, Nitric oxide scavenging assay, reducing power and superoxide free radical scavenging assay. Ascorbic acid was used as standard. The methanol root extract of the plant at concentrations of 12.5, 25, 50, 100 and 200 μg/mL were studied. The root extract of Naregamia alata showed significant antioxidant activity in a dose-dependent manner in all these assays. In Vitro antioxidant activity of the methanolic root extract showed good antioxidant power in DPPH assay (91.39%), Hydroxyl radical (76.90%) and Superoxide free radical scavenging assay (80.00%) with IC50 values 7.5μg/ml, 45μg/ml, and 20μg/ml respectively which is almost comparable to standard antioxidant ascorbic acid. The other two assays such as Nitric oxide scavenging (55.44%) with IC50 82.5 μg/ml and Ferric reducing power (0.618) showed moderate scavenging activity. Results of phytochemical screening of the extract showed the presence of alkaloids, glycosides, terpenoids, phenols, tannin, flavanoids and coumarin.


AbstractWhen unalloyed or dilute-alloyed white cast iron is held at subcritical temperatures, in particular at 400–500°C, fine ferrite particles are found to precipitate as platelets from the eutectic cementite. The ferrite particles precipitate preferentially on the lattice imperfections in the cementite. As a result of the precipitation, the eutectic cementite approximates to stoichiometric Fe3C, which is in equilibrium with the ferrite at subcritical temperatures. The orientation relationship between the precipitated ferrite and the parent cementite is expressed as (101) c ‖(112)α and [010] c ‖[111]α, these planes and directions lying on the interface between the two phases.


Digital computers, through their capability for accurate simulation of complex phenomena, have permitted new insights into a number of important problems arising in sound transmission in reverberant spaces. (1) Starting with reverberation‐free speech or music signals as inputs, computers can add echoes and reverberation with specified delays, spectral content, and decay characteristics. The computer produces several output signals that—when radiated from loudspeakers in an anechoic chamber—produce, at a listener's ears, sound‐pressure waves resembling those in real halls. To ensure "externalization" and proper directions of echo arrivals, the computer program is based on the measured sound diffraction around the listener's head. This digital simulation method is useful to "pre‐audit" architectural designs before construction and to investigate subjective correlates of a wide variety of reverberation processes. (2) Digital computers have made possible the simulation of frequency and space response of stati...


character flaw: he could not brook equals.&dquo; He was a &dquo;loner&dquo; who &dquo;could be remarkably insensitive to his colleagues&dquo; and was, much like Yeltsin, prone towards &dquo;excessive mistrust&dquo; and &dquo;love of power.&dquo; Steele never quite makes it clear how much weight he assigns to these &dquo;flaws&dquo; of Gorbachev and Yeltsin, as opposed to the obstacles presented by social structures and attitudes. Thus, some of his comments about political leaders seem like the carping of a Monday morning quarterback-if only political leadership were this easy. Despite this, Steele's work stands as one of the best available works documenting events in Russia since the late 1980s. Along with David Remnick's Lenin's Tomb, Steele's book provides a superb feel for how events unfolded and contains many sound judgements about a wide variety of aspects of life in contemporary Russia. Thus, it will serve as a rich source of material for those who wish to engage in conceptually more rigorous forms of comparative analysis.


This investigation examines how different Communicator Style (CS) variables (contentious, dominant, friendly, impression leaving, open, and precise) are perceived in both non-computer mediated communication (non-CMM) and computer mediated communication (CMM) and how CS variables with non-CMM are related to CMM uses and CMM volume in organizational communication. Specifically, this study is an examination of the differences between the CS variables invoked when communication is computer mediated and CS variables invoked when communication is not computer mediated.
Confidential and open-ended interviews were conducted.
Content analyses of interview data reveals four distinct clusters of interviewees. The "old faithful" believe that the CS variables adopted in face-to-face communication are more effective than those adopted with CMM. The "new-generation" believe the exact opposite, that the CS variables adopted with CMM are more effective than those adopted in face-to-face interactions. The "balancers" believe that the media of choice dictates the CS variables, and that different communication needs demand different CS variables. Unlike the prior groups they do not place any comparative values on either situation. The final group, the "untouchables", believe that the CS variables invoked are independent of the medium. Results show significant differences between communicant's perception of five Communicator Style variables (contentious, friendly, impression leaving, open and precise) when communication is computer mediated and when communication is not computer mediated. This suggests that the CS variables used in CMM and non-CMM are different. None of the discriminant tests was significant suggesting that communicants may perceive themselves as not maintaining the same consistent pattern. Therefore, it does not matter whether the content is task-related or social, nor does it matter if communication volume is high or low. Only friendly style and level of education yield is a significant result for the demographic tests, suggesting that those who are less educated probably perceive themselves as sending more friendly messages. Finally, there is no significant difference between questionnaire responses on volume and the hard data which is spooled from the computer. (Abstract shortened with permission of author.)


The invention relates to a freeze-drying apparatus comprising: - an evaporation chamber (5) and a condensation chamber (10) connected to said evaporation chamber (5), - said evaporation chamber (5) and said chamber condensing (10) being mounted on an axle (30), - an input and / or output of products (1, 8) connected to said evaporation chamber (5) by flexible connectors, and - a motor (12 ) connected to said axis (30) and configured to cause said pin (30) two complementary movements: - a first movement leading said axis (30) in a first direction of rotation with an angle of rotation smaller than 180 °; and - a second motion causing said pin (30) in a second direction opposite the first direction of rotation with a rotation angle of less than -180 °.


This paper examines the effect of age-specific mortality on the pattern of investment and economic development. In the presence of mortality risk, altruistic parents have an incentive to invest more in tangible assets (physical capital) that are readily transferable to future generations compared to their own intangible human capital. They also invest in the human capital of their children. The model is calibrated to the US and South Africa. The effect a mortality shock is shown to have strong distributional effects across cohorts and aggregate effects. The loss of human capital from an HIV/AIDS shock sets back economic development; advanced economies, more reliant on human capital, suffer more.


A note to the reader: I wrote this essay as a talk at the banquet at the Illinois State Historical Society Annual Meeting, December 1998. As such, it has a certain informality of tone that varies considerably from the usual academic presentation. I decided, as I revised it for publication, to retain the original talk, and to provide the amplifying scholarly references in extended footnotes. I'm inspired to do this by the new work with hypertext formats made possible by the World Wide Web. Think of the note numbers as hypertext links. One day, a while after I'd begun field work in Union County, I struck up a conversation with a woman in the shoe store in Anna. I told her I was interested in the history of the area, and particularly old farm houses. She reminisced about the farm she'd grown up on. It turns out the old house was gone; they'd built a new one when she was a young child, back in the fifties. There was a story: Her mother had long nagged her father for a new house. He invested in all kinds of other things for the farm, but the house stayed decrepit. Finally, one day, her mother had enough. While the father was in town, she recruited her son and together they chopped down one wall of the house. Needless to say, she got her new home. I had long known that women did not have first call on the farm's resources. My mother had told me about a neighbor woman who threatened to divorce her husband if he didn't take some of the money he was spending on big farm equipment and build her a new house. But when I began to research the changing farm life in southern Illinois, I knew very little about farm women. I was born during World War II and grew up during the period when farming changed from horse to tractor, from largely self-provisioning to completely dependent on purchased inputs. One of my earliest memories is watching electric lines being strung to the house - the single biggest technological change in farming. The women I knew cooked and gardened and canned and sewed, and they worked in the factories and offices in town. But agricultural producers were men. The story my shoe store acquaintance told me was not inconsistent with this division of labor. Men were producers, responsible for the cash income, while women were consumers, responsible for caring for the family's needs in the home.' But, I was to find out, this story was flawed. It was the present read into the past - the worst mistake a historian (or an anthropologist) can make. I know that many of you are only vaguely interested in farming. The great wars which mobilized the passions of the citizenry often seem more significant in leaving imprints on the present. In the twentieth century, popular movements in labor, civil rights, and women's rights have reshaped the contours of daily life. Nonetheless, a nostalgia for an agrarian past permeates much of our culture. Go into any small town cafe, and even some chain family restaurants, and you will see icons of our agricultural history decorating the walls. Relics of the past - sad irons, harness pieces, iron kettles - fetch outrageous prices at auctions, causing old folks to shake their heads in wonder at the junk younger people value. Many of those who buy these old things are professional antiquers, who search the backroads for artifacts to sell to upscale city folk. So I know the story I sought to understand was broadly interesting, not just the province of people living in a "backward," dying culture.2 There are highly practical reasons for trying to understand agricultural history, as well. Farmers produce the raw materials for virtually everything we eat, and agricultural products provide a major part of our international trade. Rural areas also preserve much of the wildness that remains, and the uses of these lands are one of the most contested areas of environmental politics. Farming and rural life are, therefore, central to our future, as much as they have formed our past. …


Schistosomiasis, or bilharzia, is a common tropical disease caused by a parasitic fluke carried by an aquatic snail vector. More than 300 million people are infected, and another 500 million are probably exposed (McJunkin 1975, Wright 1972). In Africa the disease is endemic in all countries except Lesotho. In rural areas where domestic water supplies, sanitary facilities, and medical care are minimal, infection is virtually guaranteed. The prevalence of the disease is closely correlated to water resource development (hydroelectric dams and irrigation schemes) and its associated population increase. Irrigation has alleviated problems caused by drought and flooding, but it has also created or improved snail habitats and conditions suitable for schistosomiasis transmission (Cantrell 1981, Coates and ReddingCoates 1981, Kloos and Thompson 1979, Logan 1983, Wen and Chu 1984).


Regularization parameter selection is the key of particle size inversion of photon correlation spectroscopy(PCS) by Tikhonov regularization method.In order to obtain the optimal regularization parameter,according to regularization parameter selection strategy of Morozov discrepancy principle and based on differential evolution algorithm,an optimization method of regularization parameter within the global range is proposed.This method begins from a solution set of regularization parameter,iteratively calculated by three kinds of operation rules.According to the objective function value of each solution,gradually the search process is guided to approach the optimal solution.Computer simulation data of unimodal,bimodal and wide distribution particles were inversed by this method respectively.The results show that this method has strong tolerance of noises,when the noise level is 0.000 0-0.001 0,results of unimodal and wide distribution particles agree with the theory distribution,the double-peak feature of bimodal distribution particles is clear,and the maximum error of the inversion peak is less than 5%.Therefore,it is an effective optimization method for regularization parameter in particle size inversion of PCS.


On‐chip high‐frequency frequency sources suffer from quality (Q)‐factor degradation of varactors.Injection‐locked frequency multipliers allow the design of oscillators running at a frequency lower than required to take the advantage of higher Q‐factor varactor. This article proposes a fully integrated CMOS LC‐tank injection‐locked frequency quadrupler fabricated in the TSMC 90 nm RF‐CMOS process and describes the circuit design, operation principle, and measurement results of the quadrupler. The injection‐locked frequency quadrupler comprises a first‐harmonic injection‐locked oscillator with dual‐injection ports, two frequency doublers and a transformer balun. At the supply voltage of 0.7 V, the dc power consumption is 9.1 mW. At the incident power of 0 dBm, the injection‐locked frequency quadrupler can provide an output signal with the frequency from 24 to 29.6 GHz, while the frequency of the injection signal varies from 6 to 7.4 GHz. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 55:266–269, 2012; View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com. DOI 10.1002/mop.27291


Interest in urinary 8i-glucuronidase has recently developed from the work of Boyland, Wallace, and Williams (1955), who found high levels of this enzyme in the urine of patients with carcinoma of the bladder. The method used by these authors was modified from that of Talalay, Fishman, and Huggins (1946). After a careful study of the following points, however, it was found necessary to reinvestigate and modify this method.


Chen, W., Hoitink, H. A. J., and Madden, L. V. 1988. Microbial activity and biomass in container media for predicting suppressiveness to damping-off caused by Pythium ultimum. Phytopathology 78:1447-1450. Predictive guidelines, based on general microbial activity and biomass, extractible phospholipid phosphate content in the container media. A were developed for the formulation of container media suppressive to preliminary mathematical model for predicting Pythium damping-off cucumber damping-off caused by Pythium ultimum. Disease severity severity, based on both microbial activity and biomass, is proposed, and correlated negatively with microbial activity, based on the rate of possible applications and potential limitations are discussed. hydrolysis of fluorescein diacetate, and with microbial biomass, based on Container media used for the production of greenhouse and described before (3). The composted hardwood bark and sludge nursery crops vary in their effects on Pythium diseases. Those media were prepared and stored up to 4 wk before use to ensure amended with peat as the sole source of organic matter generally that they were fully colonized by mesophilic microorganisms and are conducive to seedling disease (3,12,19-21,26). However, a suppressive to Pythium damping-off (4). The rate of percolation in suppressive source of light sphagnum peat from Finland has been all container media was > 2.5 cm/ min. Air-filled pore space levels described that may remain suppressive to diseases caused by were > 15% at container capacity (10-cm-tall column). Physical Pythium for several weeks after potting (27). Conversely, container properties related to drainage in these container media, therefore, media amended with composted tree barks or other types of were assumed to be similar and not to affect disease development compost suppress those diseases at potting and up to more than a differentially. year thereafter (11). Suppressiveness bioassays. Suppressiveness of container media The mechanisms of suppression of Pythium diseases in both the to Pythium damping-off was determined with the cucumber suppressive peat and compost-amended media are biological in seedling bioassay (3). Container media were placed in plastic bags nature (3,7,9,27). Seed and root exudates are the principal sources (2 L/bag). After 10 subsamples were taken for microbial biomass of nutrients affecting activity of Pythium ultimum Trow in and activity assays (see below), the container media were infested container media (4). This agrees with similar but earlier findings with inoculum of P. ultimum (0.75 g/L). The inoculum was for field soils (24,25). Chen et al (4) showed that coexistence of prepared in a chopped potato soil mix (3). The infested container large populations of mesophilic microorganisms, high microbial media then were distributed into five pots (about 400 ml per pot). activity and biomass, low concentrations of extractible nutrients, Each pot was planted with eight cucumber seeds (1 cm deep). The and a high degree of microbiostasis characterized bark compost pots were completely randomized in a temperature-controlled media suppressive to Pythium damping-off. In this paper, growth chamber (20 C) and watered daily. Disease severity was correlations were established between disease severity and determined 10 days after planting, according to the following scale: microbial activity and biomass in a wide range of container media, I = symptomless; 2 = emerged, but diseased seedling (wilted or with the expectation of developing predictive guidelines for with visible lesions on the hypocotyl); 3 = preemergence, and 4 = formulation of container media suppressive to Pythium dampingpostemergence damping-off. A mean disease severity of eight off. seedlings in a pot was calculated to represent one replication (five replicates per treatment). This experiment was performed three MATERIALS AND METHODS times. The sludge medium was used only once due to unavailability. Container media. Container media used were peat medium I, Microbial biomass and activity. Samples for microbial biomass consisting of Canadian sphagnum peat, vermiculite, perlite, and and activity assays were taken immediately before the container granite sand (Metro Mix 200, W. R. Grace Co., Cambridge, MA); media were infested with inoculum of P. ultimum and before peat medium 2, consisting of Canadian sphagnum peat and perlite suppressiveness bioassays were set up. Four 10-g samples were (Pro Mix, Premier Brands, Inc., New Rochelle, NY); a pine-bark taken for extraction and determination of microbial biomass. One ash medium, consisting of processed pine-bark ash, Canadian 10-g sample was taken for dry-weight determination and five 5-g sphagnum peat, vermiculite, and granite sand (Metro Mix 350, samples were taken for estimation of microbial activity (including W. R. Grace Co.); composted pine-bark medium, consisting of one sample as a blank). Thus, four replicates were used in each composted pine bark, vermiculite, Canadian sphagnum peat, and microbial biomass and activity assay. perlite (Growing Mix 2, Pro-Gro Products, Inc., Elizabeth City, Microbial biomass in container media was assessed by NC); composted hardwood bark medium, consisting of composted extractible phospholipid phosphate, as proposed by White et al hardwood bark, Canadian sphagnum peat, and perlite (4); and (30). This procedure, that also was used previously to determine composted municipal sludge medium, consisting of composted biomass in container media and in composts (4,18), consists of municipal sludge, Canadian sphagnum peat, and perlite, as extraction, separation, and phosphate determination essentially as described before (4). However, the phase separation step was © 1988 The American Phytopathological Society modified to accommodate the large number of samples. Phase Vol. 78, No. 11, 1988 1447 separation was carried out by centrifugation (5,000 g, 10 min), laboratory over the past 2 yr, including data on these container rather than in separatory funnels. media that were published previously (4). Forty-nine samples, Microbial activity in container media was expressed as the rate ranging from highly conducive to highly suppressive, were used in of hydrolysis of fluorescein diacetate (FDA) (4,23). Because the analyses. Disease severity for all data was significantly and container media varied in their fluorescein adsorption negatively correlated with microbial biomass (r = -0.593, characteristics, standard curves were constructed for each P < 0.001) (Fig. 3). Disease severity also was significantly and container medium by the procedure described previously (4). Both negatively correlated with microbial activity (r = -0.770, microbial activity and biomass were expressed on a per cubic P < 0.001) (Fig. 4). An alternative analysis of the relationship centimeter (cc) of container medium at container capacity rather between disease severity and microbial activity, which excludes the than on a dry-weight basis because the media varied in their bulk four data points with the highest activity, is indicated by the broken density by a factor of two or more. The relation of dry weight to line in Figure 4. Multiple regression of disease severity on volume at container capacity for each container medium was microbial activity and biomass for all data points yielded the established previously. following equation: To determine the relationship between disease severity and microbial biomass and microbial activity, as well as the Y= 4.20 2.44 X1 7.76 X2 relationship between microbial biomass and activity, regression analyses were performed with the MINITAB computer program. where Yis disease severity in the I to 4 rating scale; X, is microbial Regression lines, equations, and correlation coefficients are activity in microgram hydrolyzed FDA mincc-'; and X2 is presented with scattergrams. microbial biomass in micromoles phospholipid phosphate per cubic centimeter container medium. The residual plot after the RESULTS regression analysis showed a random distribution (Fig. 5). The multiple correlation coefficient equaled 0.81. Relationship between disease severity and microbial biomass and microbial activity. The six container media varied in their suppressiveness to Pythium damping-off. Peat media 1 and 2 and 0 the bark ash medium were conducive, with mean disease severity 0o0 0 Y = 3.76 20.5 X values of 3.7, 3.3, and 3.7, respectively (Table 1). The composted 0 r = -0.834 pine-bark medium, the composted hardwood bark, and the sludge 0_ media were suppressive to the disease, with disease severity values 3of 1.3, 1.5, and 1.1, respectively (Table 1). F 0 Peat medium I and the bark ash medium had the lowest > amounts of biomass (Table 1). Highest biomass values were found W in the bark and sludge compost media. Microbial biomass levels in W 0 peat medium 2 and in the composted pine-bark medium were < intermediate. The composted hardwood bark medium had the w 2 highest microbial activity (Table 1). The bark ash medium had the lowest microbial activity. The results of the trial with six container media are shown in Table 1. The other two trials in which only five 0 container media were used are not included in the table. All data 0 points were used in regression analyses. 0 Regression analysis showed that disease severity was negatively 0.00 .02 .04 .06 .08 .1 .12 .14 correlated with microbial biomass (r = -0.834, P< 0.01) (Fig. 1) MICROBIAL BIOMASS (pmole phospholipid phosphate/cc) and with microbial activity (r = -0.780, P < 0.01) (Fig. 2). A Fig. 1. Relationship of disease severity to microbial biomass based on positive correlation was found between microbial activity and extractible phospholipid phosphate in six container media. Each data point biomass (r = 0.839, P< 0.01) (not presented). Residual plots after represents the mean of five replications of disease severity and the mean of the three regression analyses showed random


The cement sheath is paramount for wellbore integrity which provides zonal isolation (i.e. severance of fluids including gas, water, and oil), protection against corrosive fluids, and mechanical support. Failure of the cement sheath can result in damaging environmental impacts, lost revenue from production, and hazardous rig operations. The purpose of this study is to develop a novel fiber hybridized cement class "H" mixture, embedded with alumina nanofibers (ANF's) and sol-gel treated micro-synthetic polypropylene (PP) fibers. This study involves curing the cement samples at 170°F with 3,000 psi for 24 hours and measuring the unconfined compressive strength (UCS) and dynamic modulus of elasticity (MOE) shortly after samples are demolded. The optimum concentrations of fibers consisted of 0.15% ANF's by weight of cement (BWOC) and 0.09% PP fibers (BWOC). Due to the lack of PP fibers to resist cracks before they appear, there was minimum contribution towards obtaining ultimate UCS. ANF's were primarily responsible for reaching UCS due to their increased strength properties on the nanoscale level. However, PP fibers and ANF's simultaneously contributed towards enhancing the MOE on the nano and microscale levels. Cement samples remained in the elastic regions as the flexibility of both fibers were simultaneously utilized.


The devastating conditions of the Great Depression forced manufacturers to rethink their approach to workplace control, economic policy, and production practices. Although we know a great deal about how industries responded to the depression, we know very little about the changes implemented by firms. This is unfortunate as firms in the same industry face quite different problems, possess dissimilar work cultures, construct an array of production formats, and have access to a range of financial resources. Based on a literature that documents the variety of strategies devised by industries and firms, this paper shows how four Canadian textile firms—two cotton and two hosiery and knitting—reacted to the economic crisis of the Great Depression. In the face of a different array of conditions, each firm devised different restructuring strategies. The large cotton corporations responded by combining mechanization, product line change, and a new division of labor. The smaller, more competitive hosiery and knitting firms, on the other hand, imposed either a harsh regime of scientific management or conservative, piecemeal changes. In the midst of restructuring the workplace, manufacturers reasserted their prerogatives of managerial authority, selectively took advantage of the opportunities opened up by economic crisis, and created a new regime of industrial-state regulations.


Very high energy gamma-rays are expected to be absorbed by the extragalactic background light over cosmological distances via the process of electron-positron pair production. However, recent observations of cosmologically distant emitters by ground based gamma-ray telescopes might be indicative of a higher-than-expected degree of transparency of the universe. One mechanism to explain this observation is the oscillation between photons and axion-like-particles (ALPs). Here we explore this possibility, focusing on photon-ALP conversion in the magnetic fields in and around gamma-ray sources and in the magnetic field of the Milky Way, where some fraction of the ALP flux is converted back into photons. We show that this mechanism can be efficient in allowed regions of the ALP parameter space, as well as in typical configurations of the Galactic Magnetic Field. As case example, we consider the spectrum observed from a HESS source. We also discuss features of this scenario which could be used to distinguish it from standard or other exotic models.


The present invention relates to a method and system for detecting the activation of the pressure relief device connected to the storage tank for storing the compressed gas. The method includes, based on the input information set that calculates a pressure relief unit discharge amount, the input information set of the storage tank volume, pressure relief setting, the orifice size of the pressure relief device, the gas density, and the pressure relief the material of the mounting point for the device includes at least one. The method further includes monitoring the pressure in the storage tank, and calculates the differential pressure reading amount according to time, and comparing the differential pressure reading amount according to the time and the pressure release unit discharge amount, and the pressure release device is activated on the basis of the comparison result and a step of detecting.


Nanoporous CuO/Cu composite materials with a bicontinuous structure are prepared by corroding a Cu–Al alloy. The obtained nanoporous CuO/Cu composites exhibit excellent performance as anodes for lithium ion batteries, which show a capacity of 600 mA h g−1 at a current density of 500 mA g−1 and maintain the capacity for 200 cycles and 445 mA h g−1 at 1000 mA g−1. The excellent electrochemical performance is attributed to the nanoporous and Cu-doped structure.


points • Consumer wearables can provide patients with personalized health data, which could assist with self-diagnosis and behaviour change interventions. • There are a number of concerns about the safety, reliability and security of using consumer wearables in healthcare. • Practitioners and researchers should consider how these technological advances may impact healthcare in the 21 century.


A ridge pattern is formed on a [111] oriented Gd3Ga5O12 (GGG) substrate using an argon ion-beam etching at various ion incident angles between 90° and 45°. The relation between the ridge shapes and the ion incident angles is studied. The applicability of a phosphoric acid treatment after the ion-beam etching to smooth the ridge side wall is also examined. The ridge shape strongly depends on the ion incident angle. The phosphoric acid treatment causes a noticeable change of ridge shape dependent on the GGG crystal structure.


Stress analysis of accumulated, individual, and removed layer stress was performed for the Si/SiO/sub 2//Ta/Pt/PZT/Pt stack consisting of sol-gel deposited lead zirconate titinate (PZT 52/48) thin films. The final accumulated stress of the stack normalized to a tensile value of 175 MPa. The as-deposited condition of the individual layers SiO/sub 2/, top and bottom Pt layers were initially compressive but changed to tensile after annealing. The stress of the removed layer (induced stress) was relatively high for the bottom Pt layer.


The traffic flow management function of the National Airspace System, which acts to balance demand on airports and airspace with the capacity of those entities, is discussed. The structure and process of traffic flow management at the local, regional, and national levels are described.<<ETX>>


In recent years, new sensor-based technologies have been developed to meet the demand for rapid and accurate analysis of food and environment, as food safety and environmental monitoring are very important concerns nowadays. In this context, considerable attention has been paid to the development and design of electrochemical sensors, as these offer a number of advantages, such as portability, ease of use, low costs and fast response times. Molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) are robust synthetic polymers with special cavities designed for a target molecule, and they are used as selective tools through a mechanism of molecular recognition. Graphene is a 2D crystalline carbon that forms either a single or a coupled layer of hexagonally arranged carbon atoms and is referred to as a "wonder material". The use of these two structures in the development of electrochemical sensors gives the newly created analytical tool enhanced properties, such as improved sensitivity and selectivity, low detection limit, good stability and reusability. This review presents an overview of the recent research regarding the use of MIPs and graphene in the development of electrochemical sensors for food and environmental analyses, critically discusses the pros and cons, and gives perspectives for further developments in this field.


The observation of internal transport barriers (ITBs) in which ion thermal diffusivity is reduced to a neoclassical level has been made for the first time in tokamak plasmas fueled with deuterium and tritium ions using a broad current density profile. The heating and current profiles required to obtain an ITB are similar in D-T and D-D plasmas. Central ion temperatures of 40 keV and plasma pressure gradients of ${10}^{6}\mathrm{Pa}/\mathrm{m}$ were observed in a D-T plasma, leading to a fusion triple product ${n}_{i}{T}_{i}{\ensuremath{\tau}}_{E}{\phantom{\rule{0ex}{0ex}}=\phantom{\rule{0ex}{0ex}}1.10}^{21}{\mathrm{m}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}\mathrm{keV}\mathrm{s}$ and 8.2 MW of fusion power. There is potential for further optimization as a step towards the development of efficient tokamak fusion reactors.


State-of-the-art monolithically integrated, multi-channel InP-based system on chip (SOC) photonic ICs have been developed to implement Tb/s class coherent transmitters and receivers with extended C-band tunability. A 14-channel PIC architecture is demonstrated enabling 4.9 Tb/s total capacity using 44 Gbaud 16-QAM coherent modulation. Furthermore, multi-channel coherent transmitter PIC with hybrid integrated with SiGe drivers capable of operating up to 1.0 Tb/s per wave, utilizing 100 GBaud, 32QAM modulation are demonstrated. OCIS codes: (250.0250) Optoelectronics; (060.0060) Fiber optics and optical communications; (250.5300) Photonic integrated circuits; (060.1660) Coherent Communications


A time-dependent density matrix renormalization group method with a matrix product ansatz is employed for explicit computation of non-equilibrium steady state density operators of several integrable and non-integrable quantum spin chains, which are driven far from equilibrium by means of Markovian couplings to external baths at the two ends. It is argued that even though the time evolution cannot be simulated efficiently due to fast entanglement growth, the steady states in and out of equilibrium can be typically accurately approximated, with the result that chains of length of the order of n≈100 spins are accessible. Our results are demonstrated by performing explicit simulations of steady states and calculations of energy/spin densities/currents in several problems of heat and spin transport in quantum spin chains. A previously conjectured relation between quantum chaos and normal transport is re-confirmed with high accuracy for much larger systems.


Mental disorders are a serious and increasingly relevant public health issue. NLP methods have the potential to assist with automatic mental health disorder detection, but building annotated datasets for this task can be challenging; moreover, annotated data is very scarce for disorders other than depression. Understanding the commonalities between certain disorders is also important for clinicians who face the problem of shifting standards of diagnosis. We propose that transfer learning with linguistic features can be useful for approaching both the technical problem of improving mental disorder detection in the context of data scarcity, and the clinical problem of understanding the overlapping symptoms between certain disorders. In this paper, we target four disorders: depression, PTSD, anorexia and self-harm. We explore multi-aspect transfer learning for detecting mental disorders from social media texts, using deep learning models with multi-aspect representations of language (including multiple types of interpretable linguistic features). We explore different transfer learning strategies for cross-disorder and cross-platform transfer, and show that transfer learning can be effective for improving prediction performance for disorders where little annotated data is available. We offer insights into which linguistic features are the most useful vehicles for transferring knowledge, through ablation experiments, as well as error analysis.


Objective To assess the clinical value of prenatal ultrasound in diagnosing fetal digestive tract atresia. Methods Prenatal ultrasound images and anatomic characteristics of 22 fetuses with digestive tract atresia were retrospectively analyzed. Results Twenty-four digestive tract atresia in 22 fetuses (2 fetuses with esophagus and anal atresia simultaneously) were proved with autopsy,whereas 3 esophagus atresia,4 duodenal atresia,3 jejunal-iliac atresia and 3 anal atresia were detected with prenatal ultrasound,and the ultrasonic detectable rate was 54.17%. Four esophagus atresia,1 pyloric atresia and 6 anal atresia were not diagnosed with prenatal ultrasound. Conclusion Prenatal ultrasound is a convenient method to diagnose fetal digestive tract atresia. Dynamic examination,especially in third trimester and systemic observation are helpful to reduce misdiagnosis.


The authors analyze major factor influencing the vehicle starting and shifting character of electronic-control AMT. By taking the mini-vehicle of Chan'an Star as carrier, electronic-control hydraulic AMT is developed, comprehensive shift-control strategy and clutch joint-control strategy are constitued, and related factors affecting clutch joint disciplinarian are complemented. The authors also put forward control aim of engine speed in the process of vehicle start and shifting, and automatic control to engine speed is realized by adopting electronic throttle. A last tests on prototype vehicle start shift are made under different working conditions. The result shows newly-developed automatic transmission system is of more satisfactory control effect.


This paper presents a novel patch antenna using circular split ring resonator for ultra-wideband applications. The radiating element of the proposed antenna is a split-ring resonator (SRR). The geometrical parameters are optimized to reach the best electromagnetic properties, with a small size (30 mm × 39 mm) and a simple geometry. Its electromagnetic parameters are calculated by CST and HFSS software's. The obtained results show that the proposed antenna operates in the UWB band from 3.6 GHz to 44 GHz. The gain is relatively high (above 3 dB in the entire frequency band) and the antenna has an acceptable quasi-omnidirectional radiation pattern.


Abstract : The human features prominently in the design of manned systems. However, engineering curricula do not typically address mental and physical characteristics of the human. Without this knowledge, design engineers do not have the tools to quantify the characteristics of the human and therefore often neglect the centrality of the human to systems design. Such human characteristics must be taken into account in the design, testing, and implementation of new technology and are central to human systems integration (HSI).


Among adults the causal 'drinking bonus' and 'smoking penalty' have been estimated to be as large as 12% and 24%, respectively. The magnitudes of these effects compare in size with many active labour market programs targeted at low-income young adults. This article extends the literature by examining these relationships in such a group. Somewhat surprisingly the data indicate that just as in the greater population young drinkers have more favourable labour market outcomes than nondrinkers. However, when a fixed-effects approach is used to identify causal impacts there is no evidence that drinking has a positive impact on labour market outcomes and some evidence for negative returns to drinking. The smoking penalty is estimated to be much smaller among this group and not statistically significant. Finally, estimates suggest that the observed correlations between consumption and labour market outcomes are biased by unobserved characteristics of the individual as well as unobservables that change over time that are likely causing the treatment decision.


The riboflavin tetraacetate was synthesized starting from riboflavin and acetic anhydride, and the solid superacid ZrO_2- SO_4~(2-) as catalyst. The yield of riboflavin tetraacetate reached up to 76. 9% by slowly adding 0. 01mol (3. 76g) riboflavin to 4g (8% of system loud mass) solid superacid ZrO_2 - SO_4~(2-) in 0. 4mol (40. 8g) acetic anhydride and stirring for 2. 5 hours at 80. The solid superacid catalyst ZrO_2 - SO_4~(2-) was synthesized by adding 4. 0g ZrO_2 to 30ml 1mol/L H_2SO_4, immersing 24 hours at 30, baking 3 hours at 600.


(морской, предгорной или степной). Наиболее гиона, что связано тёплой Ключевые In 66 patients with cystic fibrosis (82% of children), the clinical and anamnestic, laboratory, genetic and functional characteristics were studied depending on the climatic zones of residence in the Republic of Crimea (marine, foothill or steppe). The most favorable course of cystic fibrosis was observed in patients of the steppe region, which is associated with warm year-round weather, low relative humidity and stable atmospheric pressure. The results can be used in the development of differentiated rehabilitation measures.


Objective:Fracture of early catheter removal after spontaneous voiding of the impact of.Method: Fractures in patients with indwelling catheter selected 170 cases were randomly divided into experimental and control group of 85 cases.Experimental group within 12 hours after catheter removal after conventional training,the control group after 24 to 48 hours after catheter removal for regular training.Two groups were compared in patients with self-voiding after catheter removal.Results: Experimental group was significantly higher success rate of self-voiding,P0.01,statistically significant difference.Conclusion:Early removal of urinary catheter can reduce the stimulation of spontaneous urination.


A dynamic regroup arithmetic about the C2 Nodes of the SAM tactical units in its dynamic regroup system is researched,the idea of the arithmetic foundation is discussed,and the excellent selection arithmetic about the C2 nodes of the same and different SAM weapon system tactical units is presented.According to the complication analysis,the arithmetic is feasible in the situation of lesser member nodes.


Simply introduced the serval protocol TCP/IP, IP, MAC, ARP etc. Analyzed the work theory of ARP and the realizing process of network spoofing based on ARP, and gave a network spoofing example based on ARP. Gave some detecting methods and some precaction tactics of network spoofing based on ARP.


A detection system reaction time to determine a reaction at the output of an athlete, such detection system, a unit of susceptible detection be attached to a plug or fixed platform against which supports an athlete in a previous position comprising output, wherein the detection unit includes an accelerometer mounted in said unit to move said plug or fixed platform and produce a signal indicative accelerometer movement thereof, and a processor for processing said accelerometer signal to detect time reaction output athlete.


In this paper, two nonlinear circuits are constructed based on the HP‐type flux‐/ charge‐controlled memory elements in parallel and series connections. Then, the phasor method is utilized to analyze and verify the frequency doubling mechanism between pinched hysteresis loops and the applied sinusoidal excitation. The expressions of equivalent admittance (denoted as YM) and impedance (denoted as ZM) for memory elements connected in parallel and series and the unified forms of which are also derived, respectively. Moreover, the mathematical models for the parallel‐/serial‐connected circuits are obtained and their characteristics are described. Meanwhile, the dual relationships, which come from the reciprocal relationship between YM and ZM, are also discovered based on their models. Furthermore, the gradual steady‐state oscillation and temporal behaviors are demonstrated for two nonlinear circuits. Finally, the experimental verification shows a good agreement between theoretical analysis and experimental results.


A low-cost, low-density protein microarray on nitrocellulose membrane was developed for the detection of human cytokines. The microarray was derived from chemiluminescent sandwich-type immunoassay. Anti-human IL-2 and anti-human IL-4 polyclonal antibodies were arrayed and immobilized on the membrane. After the membrane was blocked and then incubation with human cytokines IL-2 and IL-4, biotinylated anti-human IL-2 and anti-human IL-4 monoclonal antibodies were added to form complexes with the cytokines and the immobilized polyclonal antibodies. Streptavidin-horseradish peroxidase conjugate was applied to detect the level of biotin. Finally, substrates for peroxidase were added to initiate chemiluminescence. The printed spots were uniform and consistent in size. Under optimized conditions, the limits of detection for human IL-2 and IL-4 were 0.5 and 0.125 ng/ml, respectively. The linear range of the calibration curves spanned over two orders of magnitude. The application of 10 ng/ml streptavidin-peroxidase polymer was found to facilitate the analysis process.


The objective of this study is to identify the opium abuse history in Iran historicanalytic method is used in current study. The history of the exact time of poppy finding and opium usage is not clear. There is not any indication of hop or opium in Avesta .AboAliSina and Mohammad Zakaria Razi were two doctors who prescribed opium as medicine. Opium abuse has started from Safavie and has had an increasing process up to now. In spite of Republic Islamic of Iran fight against drug producing distribution and abuse dilemma is continue us.


Engineering of nuclear fuels using monolithic plates of uranium-molybdenum and Al-6061 cladding is the current challenge for research and test reactors. The main drawback of the manufacture of monolithic nuclear fuel was analyzed using two surface coating methods: aluminum sputtering and transient liquid phase bonding (TLPB). Coating was done with a commercial alloy of Al-Si (R-4047). These techniques were used to improve the metallurgical bonding between the UMo and the cladding by rolling. Finally, design parameters and manufacture of UMo plate fuels were established. Mechanical tests were used to characterize the plates, resulting in UTS values of about 700 and 1000 MPa for the UMo alloys. These results are complemented with metrological analyses, X-Ray diffraction (XRD), thermal analyses, and metallography. X-rays and ultrasound scanners were used to monitor bonding and the co-rolling effects. These initial results show the main obstacles to the engineering development of UMo monolithic plate fuels with Al-6061 cladding, and these are discussed herein.


АСТМА ТА АЛЕРГІЯ, No 3 • 2013 Respiratory tract pathology is most common in adults [13] in the developed world. Despite last year's success in diagnoses and treatment of respiratory diseases, the whole world is facing an increase in pulmonary diseases [12]. The number of patients with bronchial asthma suffered from concomitant extrapulmonary pathology, including subjects with bronchial asthma associated with gastroesophageal reflux disease, is also increasing. Combination of these diseases, from multiple sources [2, 3, 9], is observed in 34–89% of patients, however, in 24 % of patients, reflux could not be recognized by clinical observation. The rate of severe asthma episodes occurring after eating the food has been estimated to be notably higher in patients suffered from bronchial asthma with concomitant gastroesophageal reflux disease rather than in patients with bronchial asthma without gastroesophageal reflux disease [1, 4]. Multiple studies have shown that asthma attacks can be triggered by hypersensitivity of respiratory tract to different irritants, which act to cause and aggravate swelling of bronchial mucus, mucus distention and bronchospasm [4,9]. Asthma attacks may occur at any time of day, but people reported nocturnal attacks more common; it appears to be due to an increase (prevalence) in the parasympathetic tone of the vegetative nervous system as well as due to a reduction in the regulation effect of the cerebral cortex on subcortical vegetative centers. These changes appear to be caused by association of asthma attacks with gastroesophageal reflux [5]. In daily therapeutic practice, the following factors indicate a probable role of gastroesophageal reflux disease in the development and aggravation of asthma symptoms: late clinical stages of asthma, aggravation of asthma symptoms occurring after eating the food, especially after overeating, in supine position, angular position, after exercise, worsening of asthma symptoms at night, concordance of cough attack, rales, dyspnoea with symptoms of gastroesophageal reflux disease (heartburn). Several pathogenic mechanisms have been proposed to explain the etiology of asthma attacks with concomitant gastroesophageal reflux disease. They are induced: 1) by activation of vagal pathways of gastroesophageal reflux-induced broncho-obstruction by esophageal contents [14]; 2) by direct activation of esophageal contents which leads to exudative inflammation of bronchial mucus [15]. Other investigators believe that bronchial asthma [1, 10] initiates a "vicious cycle" leading to development and maintenance of gastroesophageal reflux probably by increasing the pressure gradient between the thorax and abdomen. Progression of bronchial asthma usually leads to manifestation and further development of extensive bronchial tree obstruction of varying severity [4]. Data on the intensity of effects of bronchoconstriction in patients with reflux esophagitis reveal about the possibility of using vagal receptors in the pathogenesis in the presence of esophageal inflammation. A number of authors suggest that there are specific esophageal mucosal damage receptors, so called nociceptors [9]. Clinical experience with fenoterol–ipratropium bromide combination product in complex therapy of bronchial asthma with concomitant gastroesophageal reflux disease


A mantra of statistics is "All models are wrong, but some are useful." We therefore welcome Dr. Fofffani's challenge to our multistep model of Parkinson's disease (PD) pathogenesis. As we stated, our model's ability to fit the data well is not sufficient to imply that it truly explains the underlying processes. As Foffani shows, an alternative exponential function also fits the data. Both approaches perform quite well in that regard, so we contend that the real test of the competing models' usefulness is not statistical, but more broadly scientific. That is, how interpretable are the model coefficients, how well do they account for knowledge beyond the incidence data from which they were generated, and do they generate new testable hypotheses? On those grounds, we continue to prefer a discrete multistep model of PD pathogenesis, compared to an exponential model that relates it to a continuous aging-related process. Foffani begins by applying multistep modeling to age-related mortality in the general population, contending that such models can too easily be used in situations where they clearly do not have validity. Although both models fit the data reasonably, tellingly his Bayesian model comparison showed that an exponential process was decisively better at accounting for age-at-mortality (Bayes factor [BF] = 2518). This is what one would expect, as a multistep model is a straw person in this situation and, a priori, an exponential process should provide a better explanation. Rather than showing that multistep models can be applied in any setting, we contend this actually demonstrates that when clearly inappropriate, they can be discounted by comparison to more credible alternatives. We were less convinced by the comparison suggesting an exponential process also provides a better fit to our PD ageof-incidence data. Foffani limited his analysis to age 75 years, whereas if the comparison is performed over the original range, and accounting for the uncertainty in the underlying data, there is no evidence for one model over the other (BF = 0.98). Furthermore, Foffani's model postulates a uniform exponential time constant across all ages, whereas we found strong evidence favoring a process that varies by age (BF in favor of the original multistep broken-stick model over the uniform exponential model = 2.9). This is consistent with evidence of a greater genetic predisposition in early-onset PD. The multistep approach also allowed us to test specific hypotheses about factors underlying the robust finding of lower PD incidence in women, whilst Foffani did not extend his model to address these sex differences. Foffani did extend his exponential model to account for the incidence drop-off at older ages, but again did not include all data points (ie, those >90 years). Visual inspection suggests that the exponential susceptibility model would not have produced such a close fit if the full data range was included. Furthermore, the coefficients of this model do not correspond well with other evidence. For example, the estimated 2.6% of the population with a pre-existing susceptibility to PD seems low, given that 2.3% of people in their late eighties will be living with PD and presumably many other susceptible individuals will have died earlier from competing causes. We welcome further competition between models that seek to explain PD pathogenesis from population age-specific-incidence. However, the ability to statistically account for variability in the data is a necessary but not a sufficient criterion for model credibility. The true contest lies in their explanatory power. We look forward to attempts to extend models (whether Fofffani's, our own, or another) to match or exceed the current multistep approach in that regard.


Day care is an important service for some people with dementia and their carers. In Ireland, day care services for people with dementia are delivered by a mix of dementia specific day-care centres and generic centres that cater for people with dementia to various degrees. In this paper we map the geographic variation in the supply of day care services for people with dementia relative to potential need.

 Using a national HSE survey of day care centres, we estimate the current supply of day care services for people with dementia in both generic and dementia specific centres by combining a number of qualitative and quantitative measures. To identify the variation in supply, we map day care provision at local and regional levels to the number of people with dementia in the area. To consider geographic accessibility, we map and analyse the population living outside the catchment area of the day care centres.

 There is significant variation across the country in the existing capacity of day care centres to cater for people with dementia. The number of places per 100 persons with dementia varies from 9 to 16 across the Community Health Organisation areas. We show that 20 per cent of people with dementia are not living within a 15km radius of a day care centre that caters for people with dementia.

 Day care has a place in the menu of service for people with dementia living in the community. As the number of people with dementia grows, investment in day care centres needs to be targeted to areas of greatest need. In many parts of the country, the current day care centres have limited capacity to provide a service for people with dementia that live in their catchment area. There is considerable geographical inequity in day care provision for people with dementia across the country.


Computer usage is increasing, for both social and business areas, and it will continue to do so. This naturally leads to an increase in the way in which we as individuals and organizations we work for may be attacked.Increase of cy- ber-crime has compelledto re-think for a secure communication medium in our day-to-day life. Protecting the information during transmission is a foremostchallenge against eavesdroppers. Encryption is one of the widely used techniques that ensure the security of the message. However, sending encrypted messages often draw eavesdropper's attention. Steg- anography is a method of letteringsecret messages in a way that nobody except for the sender and the recipient would suspect the existence of the hidden message. In other words, it's an art/science of hiding messages. Steganography is often combined with cryptography so that even if the message is discovered it cannot be read.Historical steganography involved techniques such as disappearing ink or microdots. Modern steganography involves in computer files such as images, audio, video files and even in text documents. However, each stereographic technique is focused in just one medium; such as image or audio file and etc. And each steganographic algorithms had independent implementation; as a resultthere is no generic framework or application that will produce stegano medium for an end-user. In this paper, a generic framework is presented, which provides generic steganographic functionality via well-defined Application Programming Interface (API). So that the ad- vanced developers can develop framework modules, this can be used by the end-users directly as stegangraphicapplication. And also this paper describes a newly invented steganographic technique which utilizes the inter-character spacing of a Rich-Text-Format (RTF) document. This technique can be used to transmit concealed messages in multi-language or com- bination of languages, which can be represented in Unicode. As an additional optimization technique; user defined code based (UDC) technique is also proposed to achieve compression of Unicode languages. Another advantage is that this technique can be used to send multi different language secret messages through the communication channel.


This paper studies the effects of teaching popular rural folk dance on junior high school female students,in the aspects of the interests in sport exercise,the attitudes towards learning,and mental and physical health condition,by experimental comparison.The result shows that the teaching of popular rural folk dance could arouse girl students' interest in sport exercise,excite their learning initiative,and construct a delighted atmosphere for study,so as to promote students' sport abilities and their health,both mentally and physically.


This paper intends to discuss and prove the asymptotic behaviour of mean point in the mean value theorem of integral in concessional terms.


Experimental data combined with numerical simulations suggest that fast-subducting oceanic slabs are cold enough to carry a significant amount of H2O into the deep mantle in antigorite; with increasing depth, this mineral undergoes solid–solid transitions to phase A and then to phase E and/or wadsleyite. Ice VII and clathrate hydrates can also be stable under pressure and temperature (PT) conditions of cold slabs and represent other potential phases for water transport into the deep mantle. Cold slabs are expected to stagnate in the mantle transition zone. With time, they are heated to the temperature of the ambient transition zone and release excess water as a H2O-bearing fluid. This may cause voluminous melting of overlying upper mantle rocks. If such a process operates in nature, magmas geochemically similar to island-arc basalts are expected to appear in places relatively remote from active arcs at the time of their emplacement. Dolerites of the southeastern margin of the Siberian flood basalt province, located about 700 km from suggested trench, were probably associated with the fast (cold) subduction of the Mongolia–Okhotsk oceanic slab, and originated by the dehydration of the stagnant slab in the transition zone. We show that the influence of the subduction-related deep water cycle on Siberian flood basalt magmatism gradually diminished with increasing distance from the subduction zone. Thus, the unique size and volume of the Siberian flood basalt province could have originated due to long-term underflow beneath Siberia with or without the existence of a lower mantle plume.


Objective To develop measurement of reference air kerma for192Ir sources with NE 2570 electrometer,2571 ion-chamber and machining measured holder.Methods The measuring holder was placed at the distance of 1 m from the walls,the floor and ceiling,the ion-chambet was insert into the oolymethyl methacrylate(PMMA)jig of the measuring holder,lhe optimum distance is 16 cm from the source centre to ionchamber centre.The source was transmitted by the afterloding system to the plastic pipe to measure reference air kerma of the source.According to calibration factors from60Coγrays and 250 kV X rays with air exposure to calculated the air kerma calibration factor,the air kerma calibration factor of 192Ir soHree was calculated bv60Co γ rays and the effective energy of the 250 kV X ray beam.The scatter correction factor was giverl by the shadow shield experiment for the wails,the floor,the air and the measuring holder,the correction factors were given for the attenuation of primary photons in air and the electrons entering the air cavity are mainly generated in the innerwall of the chamber by 1079 report in IAEA.Results Two measuring methods were used for192Ir source undersame environment condition,the ion-chatuber and well-type chamber values are 1.584×1011Bq and 1.561×1011Bq respectively,and the relative deviation from them is within 1.4%,Conclusions The air kerma measurement of 192Ir source the ion-chamber with is not depended on the source geometry(point seurce,line source etc),the size.and the material of shell,the shape,the quality of materials and the size of the chamber.The uncertainty error of the air kerma is lessin comparison to the air exposure.

Key words:
Mterloding therapy unit; The ion-chamber;  192Ir 80urce air kemm


Reducing citizen's anti-social behaviour has become a major problem that must be faced by governments in various countries of the world, including Indonesia, since the past few days. The establishment of collective efficacy is intended as an overview of community capacity to enforce the social regulation in order to achieve citizen participation in activities (collective action) should be one of the goals of anti-social behaviour prevention policies. In the socio-economic structure are very heterogeneous community, realizing it is becoming a big challenge. This article examines the relationship between socio-economic structure (SES) of the community with the creation of collective efficacy. In contrast to some studies on the same theme, this paper raises the quality of the influence of religious leaders as a construct of collective efficacy. In this context, harmony and enforcement of common rules is a form of collective efficacy can be initiated by religious leaders (ulama) as informal leaders at the community level itself. Furthermore, continued with the analysis of the impact of collective efficacy in the community against efforts to create public goods such as security through collective action, by and at the level of the community itself. Analyses were performed using socio-economic data analysis unit based community with about 400 districts/cities of 33 provinces in Indonesia in cross-section in 2011. This study found that the socio-economic structure of stable communities, especially in determining the formation of collective efficacy and quality and local leaders, especially religious leaders turned out to encourage collective action play an important role in the prevention of anti-social behaviour.


This article presents the advances related to the territorial community classification to Vision of basins of the microbasin Galeras, Queretaro, Mexico. The whole effected process took form, since, investigations, participative community workshops, legal framework and the analysis of the information systems geographical (SIG). Was observed that diverse interests and actors exist since are ejidatarios ,farmers, manufacturers, authorities, private messes and population in general, which are to the expectation of the urban growth by what there was realized the current, wished and possible design of scenes in parallel to the analysis of aptitude of the microbasin of what elaborated as product of this work an environmental offer of classification designing the strategies, criteria and limits for every unit of environmental management.


A formalism is described which permits calculation of the low frequency response of a resistive plasma with non-circular cross-section in magnetohydrodynamic equilibrium to an externally imposed current field in the direction of the ignorable co-ordinate. This formalism is limited to slow variations on the resistive penetration or 'skin' time-scale and eliminates rapid motions at the hydrodynamic rate. It is useful for calculating the effectiveness of low frequency Ohmic heating and for the study of feedback stabilization. It also determines stability criteria and gives estimates of growth rates. The presence of a hyperbolic axis in the Doublet configuration makes the incorporation of a finite resistivity in the treatment important.


Simultaneous delivery of therapeutic agents and energy by magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) at targeted sites can boost cancer therapy and alleviate side effects. To achieve this goal, however, the magnetic fluid hyperthermia (MFH) usually exhibits the unsufficient thermal efficiency due to their narrow magnetization curves. Besides, an inappropriately large administration concentration also causes health deterioration as shown in an animal model. In this study, the core–shell cube that enhances the coercivity and magnetization related to single‐compositional MNPs by elaborately tuning their interface relaxation via the magnetocrystalline and surface anisotropy is developed. Néel and Brownian relaxation can be adjusted by the particles' structures to maximize the hyperthermia efficacy upon an alternating‐magnetic‐field (AMF). Furthermore, temozolomide and lactoferrin‐coated CoFe2O4@Fe3O4 core–shell cubes are rapidly internalized by targeting cancer cells and penetrate into tumor spheroids while subjecting to AMF. The targeted cubes with the capabilities of enhanced coercivity, AMF‐induced drug penetration into tumors, and magnetothermal ablation for cancer therapy display potentials for clinical uses.


In this paper, we proposes and analyzes the mixed 4th-order Runge-Kutta scheme of conditional nonlinear perturbation (CNOP) approach for the EI NiñoSouthern Oscillation (ENSO) model. This method consists of solving the ENSO model by using a mixed 4th-order Runge-Kutta method. Convergence, the local and global truncation error of this mixed 4th-order Runge-Kutta method are proved. Furthermore, optimal control problem is developed and the gradient of the cost function is determined. AMS subject classifications: 65M06, 65M12


Wet deposition data spanning the years from 1978 to 1986 are now available in National Atmospheric Deposition Program/National Trends Network (NADP/NTN) data reports and summaries. This information is complemented by quality assurance summaries that report various measurements of bias and precision or that address possible sources of sampling bias in the NADP/NTN data. Measurements of bias that accrue from the sampling container, a plastic (LPE) bucket; fugitive dust that enters the bucket while it is installed in the collector; laboratory handing of the sample; and analytical measurement of the sample have been reported. By integrating data from these various sources, this paper evaluates bias in the measurement system and thus a lower limit to which NADP/NTN data can be quantified.


The recent massive changes in the outlook for crude oil supplies related to the downturn in prices make it prudent to re-examine the reasons for considering the production of alcohol from crops. Costs, relative to existing fuel prices, are one important consideration. Others are fuel self- sufficiency, balance of payments, employment, agricultural and other benefits, the meeting of special needs, and the impact of energy crops on land use and food production. Requirements to promote crop- based fuels are considered and some of these aspects are illustrated by summarising current research work. Assessment of the national support needed for implementation of a crops to alcohol programme is discussed. This paper is No. 83007. (TRRL)


One significant challenge in cognitive radio networks is to design a framework in which the selfish secondary users are obliged to interact with each other truthfully. Moreover, due to the vulnerability of these networks against jamming attacks, designing anti-jamming defense mechanisms is equally important. In this paper, we propose a truthful mechanism, robust against the jamming, for a dynamic stochastic cognitive radio network consisting of several selfish secondary users and a malicious user. In this model, each secondary user participates in an auction and wish to use the unjammed spectrum, and the malicious user aims at jamming a channel by corrupting the communication link. A truthful auction mechanism is designed among the secondary users. Furthermore, a zero-sum game is formulated between the set of secondary users and the malicious user. This joint problem is then cast as a randomized two-level auctions in which the first auction allocates the vacant channels, and then the second one assigns the remaining unallocated channels. Simulation results show that the distributed algorithm can achieve a performance that is close to the centralized algorithm.


Why do people accept or reject some information technology? Social norms are the most general and important kinds of influential factors in predicting or explaining user acceptance of IT. Aiming at the limitations in prior researches, this study clarifies the two distinct components of social norms, i.e., compulsive component and inductive component, puts forward the two theoretical mechanisms of social norms on user perception and actual use behavior, i.e., compulsive mechanism and inductive mechanism, which build on the background of IT applications. And results from the field study demonstrate significant evidence in support of our propositions.


After discussing the relevance of (singular) Berwald spacetimes for the description of classical gravity, a method to construct Finsler spacetimes with control on the isometry group is sketched. The method is applied at two different levels of generality. First, a family of flat, maximally symmetric singular Berwald spacetimes is obtained. Then in the framework of a further generalization, an extension of the method to a class of non-maximally symmetric singular, non-flat Berwald spacetimes is discussed. As application, we discuss Bogoslosvky's metric related to General Very Special Relativity.


The Peruvian Government decided to use Public-Private Partnerships as a tool in its infrastructure policy. However, the constant amendments to the legal framework, the delays in the execution of projects and the frequent addend to concession contracts (specifically, those which are co-financed) have created distrust in society and affected the credibility of this model. This article analyses the main causes foref renegotiation of concession contracts awarded by ProInversión and the derived costs of excessive renegotiation. Our data shows that the benefits that the Peruvian Government obtains by acting opportunistically: i.e., by awarding projects that lack sufficient studies or an adequate risk assignment, are countered by the impact on the legitimacy of Public-Private Partnerships and by the delays in the completion of projects destined to attend public needs. However, our research shows that the Government is prone to prioritize the benefits it receives in the short term disregarding the long term costs that a premature awarding of projects entails.