Abstract in inglese

The redefinition of the teacher's competences is an issue which has raised in the educational system in the last decades following socioeconomic changes imposed by the learning society (Hutchins, 1968; Husen, 1974; Argyris & SchOn, 1998; Tomassini, 1993; Quaglino,1999). At the same time the educational research on the school system shifts its key interest on teachers due to issues relating the changes of the knowledge required by the contemporary society and the discontent towards the results of the previous approach to the educational research, considering the teaching as the direct cause of learning (Altet, 2008; Damiano, 2006; Groppo, 1975). The teacher factor, with his ideas and transformation of knowledge effecting his thought and action, has been left on the background for too long. Specifically the teacher's knowledge of the subject taught had almost not interested the research until the late 80s, when Shulman (1986. 1987) in his well known seminal papers considered the issue of the kind of subject-matter knowledge of teachers as the key issue in order to understand the pedagogy/learning processes. The new competences required from teachers by the contemporary society of knowledge cover also a more explicit and clear assumption of typical competences on the subject taught (Baldacci, 2010; Magnoler e Sorzio in corso di stampa). In order to obtain information on the subject-matter knowledge of the teachers of mathematics at the primary school, this investigation addressed two fields of research: the research relating the pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) of mathematics and the research relating the teacher's belief on the mathematics and on teaching and learning mathematics. Very seldom are combined this kinds of researches because they pertain to different fields and also are not clearly defined by the educational research (Graeber & Tirosh, 2008). The knowledge gained, however, is that there exist a relationship between the two fields and they interact between each other (Mason, 2001, 2006, Philipp, 2007, Handal, 2003).
The investigation on the subject-matter knowledge addressed on the knowledge of the teachers of mathematics in the primary school, based on the fact that nowadays mathematics are a key subject for the education of citizens (UMI, 2001; NRC, 2001). Moreover the mathematics conception of the specialists is still distant, though variegated, from the kind of mathematics taught at school (Schoenfeld, 1988; 1991; 1992). We believe that a starting point to better define the teacher's competences and mathematical knowledge for teaching is to know the position of those specialist in mathematics who can provide an epistemological view of that kind of knowledge (Ernest, 1988; Speranza, 1996). The issue of the research was defined around the following question: the description of which is the pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) of mathematics by the teachers of mathematics in the primary school e how they use it in view of their personal ideas on this subject and its teaching.
In order to address this basic question, more detailed questions have been formulated to which the employed investigation tools could provide appropriate answers.
The research involved nine teachers of primary school and one teacher of secondary school, first grade, working in three different schools in different provinces in Friuli Venezia Giulia. The teachers have been interviewed twice on issues relating the PCK of mathematics and their beliefs on mathematics, its teaching and its learning.
Moreover the teachers took part in the research on the basis of a research project of education developed from the undersigned which included also the videorecording of lessons, held but not used in this doctoral research, and workshops addressed to all the teachers of mathematics of the schools which contributed to this project. Moreover, in the course of the investigation, meetings have been organized aiming at discussing some of the results of the first step of the interviews. Thanks to this the participant teachers could be more aware of the scope of the research.
The interviews on the PCK of mathematics were based on hypothetic scenarios of classroom useful for investigating the thought of the teachers on the mathematical thought of the students through the interpretation of their mistakes or difficulties when facing the mathematical issues of the primary school (Markovitz & Even, 1999; Biza & al.2007). The second set of interviews were organized semi-structurally in order to bring to light the subjectivity of the teachers in relation to their beliefs and attitudes on the teaching and learning of mathematics (Trinchero, 2002; Sorzio, 2005).
The analysis of the interviews on PCK was based on the PCK concept known in literature, particularly in relation to the area of interpretation of the student's thought by teachers (Even & Tirosh, 1995; Peng & Luo, 2009). The analysis of the semi-structured interviews was based on a coding process conducted by issues which have been the subject matter of investigation aiming at formulating categories best representing the beliefs and attitudes of the teachers(Soldana, 2009).
Moreover a hypothetic scenario on PCK has been expressly developed in order to investigate the beliefs of teachers on the mathematics as subject matter (Markovits & Even, 1999b)..
The scenarios of hypothetic teaching situations are tools used not only in the investigation on the thought of teachers but also in the education of the teachers of mathematics, because they help to get in the teacher's thought in relation to situations which are ideal but plausible and give the opportunity to organize a consideration on the proposed issues not possible during the practical activities in the classroom (Markovitz & Even, 1999; Biza & al.2007).
The results of the investigation pointed out that the teachers are not likely to go deep to the thought of the students through an analysis of their mistakes or specific corrective measures. Instead they tend to use rapid schemes of resolution of the mistakes which apply to broad class of mistakes. A very common scheme is the presentation of the practical example in order to link mathematics to the real life of the students, considering this an easier way to learn. To make the learning easier is one of the concerns of the teachers, who consider the inclination towards the mathematics essentially innate. The learning skills can improve mainly thanks to the cognitive maturity of the students. The teacher factor only affects less skilled students. The mathematics is perceived often as procedural and not always the conceptual aspect is appreciated in its pedagogical aspects. Evidently teachers express slightly different positions on the issues investigated; however a constant element for the teachers is the conflict between try to change the way to teach mathematics and the fear that this can bring to a lack of interest or learning deficiencies for the students. In order to partially solve said conflict, some proposals relating to education have been suggested.


Knowledge of the effectiveness of the Louisiana Models for Change reform efforts has, in large part, been attributable to the implementation of local data driven programs that monitor and track the impact of both the reform efforts and the youth served. Two types of outcomes were measured across the state. System level outcomes focused on the effectiveness of changes made to policies and programs, while youth outcomes measured how reform efforts directly affected the youth involved within the juvenile justice system. Five data collection tools that were developed to measure the effectiveness of LaMfC reform efforts are discussed. The data obtained from these innovations have provided key empirical evidence, supporting the need for these data driven programs state-wide.


The Henry semianalytical solution for salt water intrusion is widely used for benchmarking density dependent flow codes. The method consists of replacing the stream function and the concentration by a double set of Fourier series. These series are truncated at a given order and the remaining coefficients are calculated by solving a highly nonlinear system of algebraic equations. The solution of this system is often subject to substantial numerical difficulties. Previous works succeeded to provide semianalytical solutions only for saltwater intrusion problems with unrealistic large amount of dispersion. In this work, different truncations for the Fourier series are tested and the Levenberg‐Marquardt algorithm, which has a quadratic rate of convergence, is applied to calculate their coefficients. The obtained results provide semianalytical solutions for the Henry problem in the case of reduced dispersion coefficients and for two freshwater recharge values: the initial value suggested by Henry (1964) and the reduced one suggested by Simpson and Clement (2004). The developed semianalytical solutions are compared against numerical results obtained by using the method of lines and advanced spatial discretization schemes. The obtained semianalytical solutions improve considerably the worthiness of the Henry problem and therefore, they are more suitable for testing density dependent flow codes.


CLSI, Inc. has signed a contract with two libraries, Superior Public Library and Montclair Library, for the LIBS 100plus (CLSI's second‐generation automation system). The library has purchased software modules for the automation of circulation, cataloging and acquisitions, and for an online public access catalog.


Recently there has been a development of theories related to invariant Planck Voltages [3, 4, 5]. This is part of a larger trend in extending special relativity by postulating additional invariants of nature, another prominent example being doubly special relativity [1, 2, 6]. In a previous paper, we showed that postulating an invariant voltage at the Planck Scale can lead to unification by automatically producing the Poisson equation for gravitation from the Poisson equation for electrostatics. In this paper, we further develop the theory from a Lagrangian standpoint. We derive a modified electrostatic Lagrangian for a single dimension, and we demonstrate that the resulting field equations produce a hyperbolic tangent function for the potential. This function has horizontal asymptotes at the positive and negative Planck Voltages. It is shown that the new leading corrective term in the Taylor series for the new electrostatic potential is in fact the classical gravitational potential. We then discuss how this Lagrangian could be derived from a version of calculus in which the derivatives are formulated to be consistent with a non-additive field space. It is then discussed how the modified derivatives may allow this theory to be generalized beyond electrostatics to produce a unified theory of electricity, magnetism, and gravitation. We then discuss corresponding modifications for the Dirac equation and its implications for quantum gravity. The basic theory advanced in this paper is a unique form of unified field theory that does not assume the existence of extra dimensions, in contrast to nearly all leading theories on this subject to date.


Objective: To study detection and quantify stentgraft migration with RSA in-vivo as compared with CT and to evaluate the application and detection of a nitinol endovascular clip as an aorta reference marker for RSA. Design: experimental animal model. Materials and Methods: A model of a stentgraft was positioned in the thoracic aorta of two pigs. Tantalum aortic reference markers were attached to the adventitia for CT and RSA analysis. Nitinol endovascular clips (NEC) were inserted in the aortic wall for RSA analysis. Stentgraft migrations were measured with CT and RSA. CT images acquired with 64×0.5-mm beam col-limation were analyzed with Vitrea postprocessing software using a standard clinical protocol and central lumen line reconstruction. RSA images were analyzed using standard Medis RSA software. Results: The standard deviation of the measurements by RSA using tantalum markers was 0.33mm . The standard deviation of the measurements by CT with 3D reconstruction was 0.47mm. Placement of the clips was performed without difficulty or adverse effects but radiopacity of the clips was insufficient to allow detection with the RSA software. Conclusion: RSA to measure stent-graft migration in vivo is feasible and very precise. Precision of RSA was superior to CT with 3D image reconstruction if a well defined aortic reference marker was applied for CT analysis. Placement of an aortic reference marker may facilitate CT surveillance for migration after EVAR. RSA has several other advantages over CT. Therefore, it may be a valuable tool for EVAR surveillance. The nitinol clip tested in this study as an aortic reference marker needs to be modified to increase radiopacity to enable RSA analysis.


This paper describes a new approach in modelling transport policy measures in regional context. The most common cordon zone based practice raises some concerns when the planned transport measures are of different nature and their impact area is larger than the typical urbanized region. The paper describes two slightly different approaches which were used in the recent feasibility studies in the practice of FOMTERV Ltd.


Noroviruses are recognized as the most common cause of nonbacterial gastroenteritis worldwide. In this study, we investigated the molecular epidemiology of noroviral isolates in Canada from 2004 to 2005 by sequencing the RNA polymerase gene and capsid N-terminal/shell (N/S) domain. Norovirus genogroups I and II were thus found to have co-circulated in Canada during the studied period, with a higher incidence of genogroup II (95.7%). The GII-4 or Lordsdale subgroup was the predominant genotype, suggesting that norovirus genogroup II is the major cause of viral gastroenteritis in Canada, as it is in many other countries. Phylogenetic analyses of the RNA polymerase gene and the capsid N/S domain indicated different genotypes for 2 strains, suggesting probable genetic recombination. Sequencing of the norovirus polymerase gene may reflect actual classification but should be supported by sequence information obtained from the capsid gene.


The ability to recognize quickly and reliably non cooperative targets is a primary issue in modern radar systems. The use of a multistatic radar has already been demonstrated to improve sensibly the recognition capacity of a radar system, through the exploitation of its inherent spatial diversity, given by the presence of multiple observation channels. In this paper, we evaluate the performance of a multistatic radar, which uses a correlation based classification algorithm for each channel of the multistatic system and a suitable fusion rule that combines the decisions coming from different channels. This fusion rule, referred as SELX (SELection of tX and rX), takes into account that each channel decision is influenced by a number of parameters, including the relative positions between target, transmitter and receiver. As a consequence, a suitable selection is made to favour the channels which show better performance with respect to the other ones. The performance evaluation of the SELX rule is carried out and compared with a straight method that takes into account only the SNR. In both the cases the performance are carried out by considering complex targets, each of them modelled as a set of independent scatterers, according to type, form and structure of the target. Four different types of targets are modelled, which emulate real targets. The evaluation demonstrates the ability to classify the targets by means of our methods and algorithms, with a very high probability of correct classification.


Silicon micro-strip detectors have been widely used in the world-famous nuclear physics laboratories due to their better position resolution and energy resolution.Double-sided silicon micro-strip detectors with a position resolution of 0.5 mmx0.5 mm,have been fabricated in the IMP(Institute of Modern Physics,CAS) by using microelectronics technology.These detectors have been used in the ETF(External Target Facility) of HIRFL-CSR,as AE detectors of the AE-E telescope system and the track detectors.With the help of flexibility printed circuit board(FPCB) and the integrated ASIC chips,a compact multi-channel front-end electronic board has been designed to fulfill the acquisition of the energy and position information of the Silicon micro-strip detectors.It is described in this paper that the build-up of the Silicon micro-strip detector array in ETF of HIRFL-CSR,the determination of the energy resolution of the detector units,and the energy resolution of approximately 1%obtained for 5~9 MeV a particles in vacuum.


Introduction: Iloperidone is an investigational mixed D 2 /5-HT 2 antagonist antipsychotic with affinity for 5-HT 1A , 5-HT 2A , and 5-HT 6 receptors. This profile predicts clinical efficacy for schizophrenia with reduced extrapyramidal side-effects. We investigated the exposure-response relationship for iloperidone through PK-PD modeling analysis. Methods: Iloperidone plasma levels were obtained at steady state after dose administration during two phase 3 trials. Only patients who reached target dose and were maintained at that dose level ≥5 days (reaching steady state) were included in PK-PD analysis. Trial data were combined with those of a previous PK study, which found that the PK of iloperidone was dose linear from 2 to 12 mg bid, to build a population PK model. C avg = 0 was assigned to placebo-treated patients as baseline for comparison. After modeling, predicted or simulated values of C avg at last steady state dose for patients from the two phase 3 studies were made and correlated with last available efficacy measurements using multiple regression analysis. Results: Schizophrenia symptom improvement was associated with higher iloperidone C avg after baseline adjustment (study drug ranges, 12-24 mg/d). Statistically significant greater proportions of responders (≥20% improvement from baseline) in iloperidonetreated patients had C avg ≥5 ng/mL (n = 43) compared with those with C avg <5 ng/mL (n = 224) for 4 out of 5 efficacy scales (P < .05) (Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale [PANSS] total, PANSS positive, PANSS general psychopathology, and Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale [BPRS]). Conclusions: Iloperidone showed an exposure-response relationship, suggesting that the minimal effective exposure level for iloperidone is 5 ng/mL. Therefore, full therapeutic iloperidone benefit should be assessed once steady state is achieved. Therapy with iloperidone has the potential to be patient individualized through consideration of this PK-PD relationship and tolerability/adverse effects.


An increasing trend toward delayed childbearing for professional, personal, and so - cioeconomic reasons has been recently described. Accordingly, breast cancer incidence in women who have not yet completed their family is growing, with a steady mortality reduction due to im - proved diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Breast cancer survivors have many concerns about conceiving after breast cancer, but recent lit - erature is globally reassuring and the historical contraindication to pregnancy in patients with pre - vious history of breast cancer should be dropped out. Miscarriages and pregnancy complications are not increased in breast cancer survivors and breastfeeding is safe and feasible. All patients with newly diagnosed breast cancer should receive information about fertility and pregnancy issues, but not all physicians are ready to face this task. Here we provide evidence-based answers to the main questions breast cancer patients may ask.


This paper explores the articulation of tectonic as a potential basis for developing and understanding architectural programme in the context of architectural education. The piece delivers a reflective discussion that puts tectonic beyond the art of joining. Instead, tectonic, which informs the way material performs, insinuates a capacity in supporting the students to generate the spatial programme and atmospheric quality for the development of their architecture project. In particular, the study suggests the importance of tectonic articulation in generating the above spatialities. The study investigates such tectonic articulation by reflecting through a second-year design studio project in Universitas Indonesia, which focuses on developing dwellings designs driven by tectonic-based architectural design method. Through reflecting the students' projects this paper put forward three aspects of tectonic articulation, each of which explores the formal iteration, the tectonic-programme relationship, and the tectonic-atmosphere relationship. The study demonstrates contribution in understanding how tectonic is explored throughout the design process, informing multiple stages of design.


The Returned Sample Science Board (RSSB) was established in 2015 by NASA to provide expertise from the planetary sample community to the Mars 2020 Project. The RSSB's first task was to address the effect of heating during acquisition and storage of samples on scientific investigations that could be expected to be conducted if the samples are returned to Earth. Sample heating may cause changes that could ad-versely affect scientific investigations. Previous studies of temperature requirements for returned mar-tian samples fall within a wide range (-73 to 50 degrees Centigrade) and, for mission concepts that have a life detection component, the recommended threshold was less than or equal to -20 degrees Centigrade. The RSSB was asked by the Mars 2020 project to determine whether or not a temperature requirement was needed within the range of 30 to 70 degrees Centigrade. There are eight expected temperature regimes to which the samples could be exposed, from the moment that they are drilled until they are placed into a temperature-controlled environment on Earth. Two of those - heating during sample acquisition (drilling) and heating while cached on the Martian surface - potentially subject samples to the highest temperatures. The RSSB focused on the upper temperature limit that Mars samples should be allowed to reach. We considered 11 scientific investigations where thermal excursions may have an adverse effect on the science outcome. Those are: (T-1) organic geochemistry, (T-2) stable isotope geochemistry, (T-3) prevention of mineral hydration/dehydration and phase transformation, (T-4) retention of water, (T-5) characterization of amorphous materials, (T-6) putative Martian organisms, (T-7) oxidation/reduction reactions, (T-8) (sup 4) He thermochronometry, (T-9) radiometric dating using fission, cosmic-ray or solar-flare tracks, (T-10) analyses of trapped gasses, and (T-11) magnetic studies.


The present invention relates to a unit (1), the unit for the electromagnetic radiation generated by the plurality of different types of light sources incident on the unit (1), (2) determined the dominant type of light source. Said unit having at least a first photodiode (10), the first photodiode is configured to detect electromagnetic radiation in the visible spectral range and to generate a first output signal (11). Said unit having at least one second photodiode (20), the second photodiode is configured to electromagnetic radiation in the infrared spectral range for detecting and generating a second output signal (21). The unit has at least one computing unit (30), as a result of the calculation unit configured for deriving a ratio of said first output signal (11) and the second output signal (21) from (23) and a frequency results (13). The results of the frequency (13) descriptive information about the presence or absence of signal components in the predetermined frequency range contained in the said electromagnetic radiation. Said unit having at least one evaluation unit (40), the evaluation unit of the type constituted (13) deriving the light source is led to and from the result of the frequency ratio (23) results.


Pomegranate (Punica granatum L.) is an important fruit crop cultivated in arid and semi-arid regions, serving nutritional, medicinal and aesthetic purposes. It belongs to genus Punica and family Punicaceae. It is grown in Iran, Spain, Moracco, Egypt, Afghanistan, Arabia, West Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Burma, China, California and Japan. It is found from Kashmir to Kanyakumari. In India, it is regarded as a "vital cash crop" grown on an area of 1.5 lakh ha with a production of 11.0 lakh tons (Jadhav and Sharma, 2009).Its cultivation has spread all over the country due to its hardy nature, high yield with low maintenance cost and good keeping quality (Khodade et al., 1990).


A spectroscopic study has been made of electronic temperatures and electronic excitation in flames from an analysis of the intensity distribution of selected parts of the iron spectrum. The iron was added to the flames in the form of ferrocene to serve as a temperature and excitation ``indicator.'' The flames investigated were the stoichiometric H2–O2 and C2H2–O2 flames at atmospheric pressure, a stoichiometric C2H2–O2 flame at low pressure (2.1 mm) and a N+CO atomic flame (3.7 mm). This study shows that the iron spectrum can be used as a spectroscopic ``thermometer'' to determine electronic temperatures in good agreement with adiabatic flame temperatures and OH rotational temperatures in flame regions at thermal equilibrium. The reaction zones of the C2H2–O2 and N+CO flames showed a marked departure from equilibrium as indicated by the nonthermal excitation of the added iron, the observed iron spectrum resembling that of an iron arc. This nonthermal excitation of the iron spectrum, which is readily evide...


Abstract This report describes a technique for the analysis of eye-movement recordings. The recordings themselves are described first; this is followed by a description of our methods of analysis. Throughout, an attempt is made to focus on the features of this technique and the analytic methods that can be used with it, as these relate to studies of a clinical neuropsychological nature that can be carried out with adults as well as with children.


Processing of Landsat-5 TM thermal images for lake surface temperature determination is addressed. A specific preprocessing algorithm to reduce sensor noise is presented and calibration and atmospheric correction is discussed. The atmospheric impact on thermal radiation measurements is modelled using Lowtran-7 utilizing radiosonde data. Comparing ground truth measurements acquired for 21 images between 1987 and 1994 with satellite derived temperatures yielded a mean square error of 0.53 deg K. A systematic overestimation or underestimation of Landsat derived temperatures was not found. The emissivity effect upon the accuracy of the derived surface temperature is discussed as well as effects of using alternate atmospheric profile data.


In the summer of 1944, George Orwell used his column in Tribune to launch a ferocious assault on arguments advanced by the peace campaigner Vera Brittain in her pamphlet Seed of Chaos, published that year by the Bombing Restriction Committee. By doing so, Orwell raised publicly a topic the wartime coalition sought anxiously to conceal from the public – the deliberate killing of German civilians in RAF bombardment of German cities – and he took advantage of the government's preparedness to tolerate controversy in weekly political publications which it worked carefully to exclude from mass market newspapers and BBC broadcasts. The controversy serves as an excellent example of the way in which weekly political publications were used to burnish Britain's democratic credentials in wartime. It also annoyed Vera Brittain so greatly that she would lie about it after Orwell died.


The electromagnetic field within the Crab Nebula is shown to comprise low-frequency waves generated by the spin of the pulsar. The particles responsible for the continuous emission of the nebula are relativistic electrons and positrons ejected from the pulsar. The electron and positron energy spectra should differ by no more than a few percent.


ABSTRACTThis paper reports the results from a citation analysis of five economics journals between 1993 and 1997. The main contribution of the paper is to provide some insights into which journals Australian economists cite. The findings suggest that there is a core of important journals which Australian economists use; however, some of the most cited titles differ from those identified in previous overseas studies. This has important implications for academic libraries faced with a choice between competing titles in the economics area, when most are being forced to cut subscriptions to overseas periodicals.


In a new linear twisted 1,3-diene, an anomalously high reactivity of the vinyl hydrogen rather than the allyl hydrogen towards singlet oxygen is observed.


Passive attitude control systems are discussed. Attention is paid to the gravitational attitude control systems and, specifically, to the problem of efficient damping of the small oscillations in the vicinity of the equi- librium position in a circular orbit. The problem of determining the maximal damping rate is considered, and corresponding numerical and analytical methods are discussed. The results of optimization of several specific systems are reviewed. The analytical approach is extended to investigate the satellite-stabilizer system in a spe- cial case when there is no spring resistance in the hinge connecting the bodies.


This paper presents the design and manufacturability of SOI RF integrated circuits, from SOI technology understanding to the integration of high-performance passive devices for a wireless system-on-chip (SoC) application. A. In the technology section, we show that the ability of SOI NMOS transistors to function as high-bandwidth amplifiers continuously improves as gate length shrinks below 50nm. F T of 196GHz is achieved at Lpoly = 47nm. We also present four features of an aggressively scaled 120nm partially-depleted SOI CMOS technology that show its suitability for high-frequency circuit applications as compared to bulk CMOS and III-V technologies. B. In the integrated-passive section, a symmetrical STP (single-turn and multiple metal level in parallel) inductor exhibits a Q of 52, by a High-Resistivity Substrate (HRS) and an inductance density of 5302 fH/μm 2 is achieved for a 42nH MTS (Multi-turn, multiple metal layers in Series) inductor. The capacitance density of the Vertical Native Capacitor (VNCAP) in a 90nm SOI CMOS improves by 28%, without any extra cost due to the scalability of the metal pitches as compared to a 120 nm SOI CMOS. A capacitance density of 1.8fF/μm 2 is obtained for only 6 metal layers. Also, a quality-factor of 105 at 4GHz is measured for a 1pF UNCAP. C. In the RF circuit design section, four 5GHz LC-tank VCOs were fabricated, the measured frequency tuning range is 22% and the phase noise is -126dBc/Hz at 1MHz offset of the 4.5GHz carrier. Oscillation was achieved at 5.4GHz at a minimum power consumption of 500μW. The 40-50 GHz VCOs for embedded RF integrated circuits exhibits wide tuning range, which is a key aspect of VCO manufacturability. We achieved up to 15% frequency tuning range from 43.5 to 50.5GHz and -90.2dBc/Hz phase noise performance at 1 MHz offset from 50.1GHz operating frequency. The total power dissipation is 15mW at 1.8V. A 9-stage distributed amplifier exhibits a gain of lldB with a 90GHz 3dB cut-off frequency is measured, which is equivalent to a 320GHz gain bandwidth product (GBW). The measured 1dB output compression point (PIdB) is 12dBm at 20GHz, the output IP3 (OIP3) is 15.5dBm at 50GHz, and the noise figure is 5.5dB at 18GHz. A 2:1 static frequency divider exhibits a maximum operating frequency of 33GHz.


Significant efforts in identification and management of transportation assets ranging from the infrastructure to the effect of transportation on society are under way to improve quality service delivery. The challenge for Highway Transportation Asset Management (HTAM) is to identify which areas of transportation the public would like to receive prompt investment and attention. This article studies a recently improved two-lane highway corridor in rural Illinois to determine how well highway transportation asset management (HTAM) are meeting stakeholder needs. Only by knowing what the customers consider an asset and what influences the performance measure of that asset can HTAM actually be customer focused. Customer focus (CF) has historically not been the goal, particularly for highways that already exist. The results of this preparatory study provide recommendations to help transportation agencies develop programs and service delivery to improve the effectiveness in meeting the needs and goals of customers.


An experimental study was carried out for the cyclic behavior of U71Mn rail steel and 316L stainless steel subjected to uniaxial strain and stress cycling at room temperature. The effects of cyclic strain amplitude, mean strain and their loading histories on the strain cyclic characteristics were studied. In the meantime, the effects of stress amplitude, mean stress and their histories on the ratcheting of the asymmetrical stress cycling were also analyzed. The interaction of strain cycling and stress cycling was discussed, too. In the study, the strain cyclic behavior and ratcheting of the two steels were compared especially. The results show that, under the strain cycling, U71Mn rail steel features almost no cyclic hardening or softening and its strain cyclic characteristics hardly depend on the loading history. However, 316L stainless steel characterizes significantly cyclic hardening and its strain cyclic characteristics depends not only on current load case, but also greatly on the load history. 316L stainless steel has an obvious memorization for the maximum strain amplitude of the load history. These phenomena must be taken into account in the constitutive modeling. The mean strain and its history have almost no effect on the strain cyclic behaviors of the two researched metals. Ratcheting is a special characteristic of the material presented in the asymmetrical stress cycling. Under the stress cycling, the ratcheting behaviors of the two metals depend not only on current load case, but also on the previous history. The ratcheting strain and its rate increase with the increase of mean stress and stress amplitude. The prior higher mean stress and stress amplitude cycling can restrain the ratcheting behavior of subsequent lower mean stress and stress amplitude cycling. A prior stress cycling results in not only a mean strain in the subsequent strain cycling, but also some variation of strain cyclic properties. After the prior stress cycling, U71Mn rail steel presents obvious cyclic softening, but 316L stainless steel still presents cyclic hardening. However, a prior strain cycling restrains the ratcheting behavior of subsequent stress cycling for the two metals. The ratcheting strain rates of the materials in stress cycling without prior strain cycling are higher than that with prior strain cycling. These conclusions are useful to establish constitutive model for the cyclic behavior of the materials.


During the 1990s, record companies were looking for the next big alternative rock breakout and focused a lot of attention on Chapel Hill, where bands like Superchunk, Archers of Loaf, and Polvo resided. Two Chapel Hill bands would hit it big, but they were the last two anyone would have expected -- the hot-jazz band Squirrel Nut Zippers and piano-pop trio Ben Folds Five.


The reaction of 18 corn genotypes (FepagroRS 21, FepagroRS 22, AM4001, AM4002, AM4003, AM4004, AM4005, BRS4103, BRS1002, BRSCaimbé, BRSMissões, BRSPlanalto, Fundacep 35, SCS 154 Fortuna, SCS 156 Colorado and SCS155 Catarina, PMS1641A08 and PMS1635A08) to Meloidogyne graminicola (VS1) was evaluated at green house conditions. Seedlings of the different genetic materials grown in pots with sterilized soil, were inoculated with 5.000 eggs + J2 of M. incognita/plant. Seedlings of 'Santa Cruz' tomato plants were used as controls. The experiment was carried out under a randomized design with six replications. Fifty-five days after the inoculation, the plant resistance was evaluated by counting the gall number egg number and nematode reproduction factor (RF = final population / initial population) determination. The host reaction of each cultivar was rated according to RF, as immune RF = 0,00, resistant RF < 1,00 and susceptible RF > 1,00. No galls were found at corn roots on none of the evaluated genotypes. The 'AM 4001', 'BRS 1002', 'SCS154Fortuna', and 'BRS 4103', genotypes were resistant to M. graminicola, and the other genetic materials behaved as immune to the nematode, whereas the control presented a great number of galls in the roots and permitted a high nematode reproduction factor (RF = 73,54).


DBM1Ac-R strain of Plutella xylostella was selected with Cry1Ac in laboratory and showed 356-fold resistance to Cry1Ac compared with a susceptible strain(DBM1Ac-S).The relative expression of synthetase gene of Glycosphingolipid(GSLs) bre-3 and bre-5 mRNA of DBM1Ac-S and DBM1Ac-R strains were determined using real-time qPCR,from 2nd-instar to mature larvae,pupa and midgut of 4th-instar.The results showed that both bre-3 and bre-5 mRNA were found to express in different development stages and midgut;The relative expression of bre-3 mRNA in DBM1Ac-S strain was significant higher than DBM1Ac-R strain,exhibiting 2.36,5.54 and 2.68 times in 3th-instar,4th-instar and mature larvae respectively;The relative expression of bre-5 mRNA in DBM1Ac-S strain were 1.19,3.13,1.78,1.75 and 1.65 times respectively compared with DBM1Ac-R strain from 2th-instar to mature larvae.The results suggested that there may be a correlation between the lower relative expression of bre-3 and bre-5 mRNA in DBM1Ac-R from 3th to mature larvae and the long-term Cry1Ac toxin selection to DBM1Ac-R strain.In the same stage of DBM1Ac-S and DBM1Ac-R strains,the mRNA level expression of bre-5 was higher than bre-3,showing obvious advantage of gene expression.These findings will provide important basis for further study on GSLs,one of the receptors of Bacillus thuringiensis crystal proteins.


The data acquisition system is designed on embedded PC104 platform Single Board Computer (SBC) with running Windows XP Embedded operating system. This is a multi channel system which consists of 12 Bit, 10 MSPS Analog to Digital Converters with on board FIFO memory for each channel. The digital control and PC104 bus interface logic are implemented using Very High Speed Hardware Description Language (VHDL) on Complex Programmable Logic Device (CPLD). The system has provision of software, manual as well as isolated remote trigger option. The Client Server based application is developed using National Instrument CVI for remote continuous and single shot data acquisition for basic plasma physics experiments. The software application has features of remote settings of sampling rate, selection of operation mode, data analysis using plot and zoom features. The embedded hardware platform can be configured to be used in different way according to the physics experiment requirement by different top level software architecture. The system is tested for different physics experiments. The detailed hardware and software design, development and testing results are discussed in the paper.


In this discovery laboratory, students performed electrophilic aromatic substitution reactions between 1,4-dimethoxybenzene and either 2-methyl-2-butanol or 3-methyl-2-butanol with sulfuric acid as a catalyst. The carbocation from 3-methyl-2-butanol undergoes a hydride shift, and hence, both reactions afford 1,4-bis(1,1-dimethylpropyl)-2,5-dimethoxybenzene in high yields. NMR spectroscopy, infrared spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, and the melting point all indicate identical products from both reactions. Students determine the product identity from the spectroscopy results. Melting point and gas chromatography confirm that the products are identical, promoting discussion of carbocation stability and the hydride shift mechanism.


In the HEIFE area at the northern foot of the Tibetan Plateau, a marked wet period which seems to be accompanied by a monsoon from the Indian Ocean was found in summer. The wet period was often accompanied by precipitation. An noticeable phenomenon is that the precipitation area moves in association with an anticyclone.


Bat species are an integral part of our ecosystem and their monitoring can provide important insights into conservation and tracking viruses like Covid-19. Given the difficulty and high cost of manually monitoring bats in their natural habitats, this paper proposes an Artificially Intelligent Internet of Things (AIoT) system that uses audio-based Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to monitor bat species using their echolocation calls. The system uses Long Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN) to send the classified species to an application server in real-time. The paper compared the performance of three different edge devices, Raspberry Pi Model (RPI) 3B+ (RPi), NVIDIA Jetson Nano, and Google Coral and two deep learning frameworks (TensorFlow Lite and TensorRT). Although all edge devices were able to do the real-time inference (< 0.5 seconds/inference for a 3-second audio segment), Google Coral appears to be the best choice because it was the fastest (0.3917 seconds/audio segment) and required the least resources (maximum %CPU Utilization = 29.2%). However, if cost was a concern then even the RPI was more than adequate for the task.


We consider the problem of synthesizing optimal linear feedback policies subject to arbitrary convex constraints on the feedback matrix. This is known to be a hard problem in the usual formulations (ℋ2;ℋ∞;LQR) and previous works have focussed on characterizing classes of structural constraints that allow efficient solution through convex optimization or dynamic programming techniques. In this paper, we propose a new control objective based on eigenvalues of the covariance matrix of trajectories of the system and show that this formulation makes the problem of computing optimal linear feedback matrices convex under arbitrary convex constraints on the feedback matrix. This allows us to solve problems in distributed control (sparsity in the feedback matrices), control with delays and variable impedance control. Although the control objective is nonstandard, we present theoretical and empirical evidence that it agrees well with standard notions of control. We numerically validate the our approach on problems arising in power systems and simple mechanical systems.


Harold Rosen's essays on narrative, published by NATE in 1985 under the title Stories and Meaning, affirm the centrality of story-telling in people's lives and thereby offer a powerful rationale for reconceptualising 'the whole school curriculum from the point of view of its narrative possibilities' (1985, 19). Such a 'project', as he calls it, involves not only the transformation of curriculum and pedagogy in order to enable children to exercise their 'story-telling rights' (1985, 26), but also a compelling vision of professional engagement. Rosen affirms the potential of story-telling as a medium for teachers continually to review the values and beliefs that shape their dayto-day practices. He models this process himself by presenting and critically reflecting on an account of his own experiences as a school student, including 'the usual crimes' (p. 41) which he and his friends perpetrated 'in defiance of' the dull regimentation of schooling. These essays thus anticipate many of the attempts over the past two decades to argue the role that narrative might play in educational research, in contradistinction to more traditional forms of inquiry. Yet it would hardly do justice to these essays to treat them simply as a precursor to more recent attempts to affirm the importance of narrative, especially the empty claims made by Clandinin and Connelly about the potential of narrative to access 'life' and 'experience', as distinct from other types of 'knowledge' (Clandinin and Connelly 2000, 17). In his analysis of the policy environment at the time that he was writing, Rosen identifies many emerging features of the standards-based reforms (cf. Darling-Hammond 2004) that have since radically transformed language and literacy education in Anglophone countries. So called 'evidence-based' research has been used to control both the education of young people and the professional learning of teachers (Delandshere 2006). Teachers are constrained by learning continua, by centrally generated statements about what all students should know and be able to do at certain levels of schooling, rather than what they might do, given the opportunity to share their experiences and jointly explore the complexities of language and meaning. Story-telling and the imagination are now arguably under greater threat than they were when Rosen was writing (see Goodson 2003; MacLure


In the last twenty years there has been a dramatic resurgence in the creation, sales, and use of hand-crafted objects in the United States. However, the craft media workers of today no longer serve their local community creating utilitarian objects, but work in diverse styles according to diverse stan dards. Becker (1978) has proposed that three largely distinct segments exist among craft media workers: an art segment, an art/craft segment, and a craft segment. These segments can be distinguished from each other by their differing con ventions and orientations. These conventions and orienta tions then serve as the basis for cooperative activity and result in the segments not only creating different styles of objects but uAth different institutional links and audiences. This study, utilizing data from a national survey of craft media workers conducted for the National Endowment for the Arts, tests Becker's propositions by examining whether craft media workers who have different conventions and orientations constitute different segments having different training, involvements, markets, goals, satisfactions, and problems.


This chapter develops a system of livelihood assessment that integrates cash flow and time use data of any household into a single indicator that expresses how much time the household adults have left after satisfying the household ' s basic needs (e.g. physiological, social, food, fuel, shel-ter) that they need to provide. This ' freely disposable time ' (FDT) may be put to any use such as work for extra consumables, leisure, savings or to invest in the future (education, soil conservation etc). Therefore, FDT is a key condition for any out-of-poverty strategy and for a household ' s resilience to adapt to changing circumstances. The universally applicable FDT indicator is tested on peri-urban farming livelihoods in India and some typical Dutch households. Used as a poverty indicator, FDT is intrinsically superior to monetary or food-based indicators. Re-submitted as: Hobbes, M., Van der Voet, E. and Sarkhel, S. Freely disposable time: A system for time and cash integrated livelihood assessment. Re-submitted after revisions to World Development , April 2009. nature, based on the household ' s actual behavior. Households are not always efficient FDT maximizers, however, e.g. when they choose to spend much time with their children or grow much of their own food in lieu of heading full-steam to the most attractive labor market and hire a nanny. The empirical FDT will therefore tend to be somewhat lower than a potential FDT that would be calculated if all ' ineffi-ciencies ' would be removed. Potential FDT assessment would result in a more foundational poverty assessment, e.g. if potential FDT = 0, people cannot improve their situa- tion anymore by fine-tuning the efficiency of their behaviors. The same difficulty, by the way, is encountered by the monetary indicators. Households that voluntarily grow their own food are assessed as poorer (less income) than if these households had worked more on the labor market and bought their vegetables in the supermarket. The income analogue of potential FDT is potential income, i.e. what a household could earn if it would put all its energies to maximum income generation. than exact empirical grounding. FDT is sensitive, for instance, to sleep and self-care require- ments of humans. Setting the basic need at 8 or at 9 hours per day makes a full hour difference in the FDT. Apart from what is actually true or not, it is important that FDT studies make the same choice.


Few-shot classification is a challenging problem that aims to learn a model that can adapt to unseen classes given a few labeled samples. Recent approaches pre-train a feature extractor, and then fine-tune for episodic metalearning. Other methods leverage spatial features to learn pixel-level correspondence while jointly training a classifier. However, results using such approaches show marginal improvements. In this paper, inspired by the transformer style self-attention mechanism, we propose a strategy to cross-attend and re-weight discriminative features for fewshot classification. Given a base representation of support and query images after global pooling, we introduce a single shared module that projects features and cross-attends in two aspects: (i) query to support, and (ii) support to query. The module computes attention scores between features to produce an attention pooled representation of features in the same class that is later added to the original representation followed by a projection head. This effectively re-weights features in both aspects (i & ii) to produce features that better facilitate improved metric-based metalearning. Extensive experiments on public benchmarks show our approach outperforms state-of-the-art methods by 3%~5%.


(57) Abstract: having non-thrombogenic properties, the body vascular system for prosthetic materials. The material and the base layer made of suitable material, with substantially amorphous or partially amorphous consisting suitable metal covering at least a portion of the base layer, preferably has a discontinuous layer. The metal layer is made of a suitable metal to make a electrode potential not substantially positive relative to the blood flow in contact with the metal layer. The metal layer may be adapted to provide unpaired blood flow surface of the prosthetic material, a patch, a suitable component for the prosthesis other vasculature.


Widespread mandatory testing for the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) has been proposed by some as a way to curb the transmission of the virus. O'Brien examines the possible uses and limits of HIV testing to determine in what instances the potential public health benefits of testing outweigh its burdens and limitations. She subjects proposals for mandatory testing of three populations -- hospital patients, surgery patients, and prisoners -- to ethical analysis, and then formulates ethical guidelines for rational and morally defensible HIV antibody testing policies in hospital and prison settings.


Community level physiological profiles (CLPP) and molecular diversity of bacteria in soil under rice-rice (RR), rice-fallow (RF), rice-wheat (RW), legume (LG), mango orchard (MO), and grass land (GL) cropping systems occurring in South West Bengal, India (22°22'N latitude and 86°26'E longitude) were studied. The soils were mostly acidic (pH 5.4 to 6.85). The GL soil recorded the highest organic carbon (20.23 g kg -1 ) and total nitrogen (1.96 g kg -1 ). The RF soil was the most acidic and had the poorest nutrient contents. The CLPP, as studied by carbon source utilization in BIOLOG Ecoplates, revealed that the bacteria in soils under different cropping systems could differentially utilize all the groups of carbon sources viz. carbohydrate, amino acid, carboxylic acid, polymer, amine/amide, and phenolic compound. Carbohydrate was most utilized and amine/amide and phenolic compound were least utilized. Bacterial communities in RF soil utilized the highest amount of carbohydrate and carboxylic acid and also utilized a balanced amount of other individual carbon substrates. Molecular diversity was studied by polymerase chain reaction followed by amplified ribosomal DNA restriction analysis (ARDRA) of soil DNA. Variations in ARDRA banding pattern followed by cluster analysis and the resulting dendrogram indicated that the cropping systems induced changes in soil bacterial communities. The grouping of uncultivated soils (MO and GL) in a separate cluster clearly indicated the presence of different bacterial communities.


Purpose – We believe that live studies in which individuals, organisms, ecosystems and human societies appear are flawed due to the inadequacy of conceptual structures with which their quantitative results should relate in order to generate new hypotheses which can be examined.Design/methodology/approach – The entities that make up systems and the connections between them will be determined by all existing binary relations. These binary relations may in some cases be replaced by functions, for which we may use tools inherent to differential calculus to calculate the dependence and independence relations between entities. Dependence and independence between entities have been developed using a few mathematical tools such as partial derivatives, the Wronskian and the Chain Rule.Findings – From a representation of the entities via mathematical functions we have analysed functional dependence. In this paper, we will present issues relevant to systems, analysing the causal structure of entities (systems, subsy...


Kinetic research on the pyrolysis of lignin was carried out with thermo gravimetric analyzer(TGA)-coupled with a fourier Transform infrared spectrometry(FTIR) system.The typical microstructure of lignin was analyzed by infrared equipment coupled with tabletting pretreatment.Experimental results show that TG and DTG curves moved slightly towards higher temperature with the increase of heating rate,while the main reaction area widened.Lignin pyrolysis was divided into two stages,corresponding with 58.41 kJ/mol and 119.98 kJ/mol for activation energy,respectively.Compared with cellulose pyrolysis,online infrared analysis shows that the volatile produced by the lignin pyrolysis had more complicated composition distribution.CO,CH4 and furan appeared to release out during the whole pyrolysis process.


Correlating Residual Stress with Personal and Professional Characteristics in Aircraft Pilots by Erik H. Eckblad MBA, Bristol University, 1994 BA, Concordia College, 1989 Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Public Policy and Administration


This thesis examines ways in which the writings of Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-1873), Wilkie Collins (1824-1889) and George Eliot (1819-1880) anticipate aspects of the works of Sigmund
Freud (1856-1939). It argues that psychoanalytic theories were a product of their time, finding their ancestry in Victorian psychological, philosophical, scientific and social thought, aspects of which also informed the work of Le Fanu, Collins and Eliot.

I foreground Freud's work of the 1890s, especially his Project for a Scientific Psychology (1950; written in 1895), the forerunner of The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), The Unconscious (1915), Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920) and The Ego and the Id (1923). The
energy-filled psychical system the Project outlines is informed by nineteenth-century ideas on force. I discuss systemic equilibrium in Le Fanu's short stories, the tendency to inertia in Eliot's Romola (1862-3) and the mechanics of satisfaction in Middlemarch (1871-2) and Daniel
Deronda (1876); all these concepts find roots in nineteenth-or pre-nineteenth-century spiritual or scientific thought, and prefigure Freud's Project. The association of ideas, a basic foundation of psychoanalysis, is discussed with reference to Collins's Basil (1852), The Woman in White
(1860), No Name (1862) and Armadale (1866). I suggest how Collins's knowledge of the work of W. B. Carpenter (1813-1885) and Frances Power Cobbe (1822-1904), and Eliot's
engagement with the ideas of George Henry Lewes (1817-1878) and Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) are evident in their fictions. Throughout, I show that unconscious mental processes were discussed decades before Freud.


Abstract : The results of the developmental research leading to the design and fabrication of a short-time, electronic sensor to monitor the bacteriological quality of reprocessed water aboard spacecraft are reported. The basic sensing capability is furnished by a Coulter Counter that selectively detects and counts particles of bacterial size. Detection is accomplished by comparing the number of bacteria-size particles in the reprocessed water sample at some point in time with a particle count at some future point in time, i.e., following the establishment of conditions necessary to allow growth and multiplication of bacteria. A significant difference between the two counts strongly implies bacterial replication, and therefore the presence of viable organisms in the raw reprocessed water. (Author)


Applying problem solving oriented lesson structure in Swedish lower secondary school : With a viewpoint of the anthropological theory of didactics (ATD)


The fact of the increase can be seen from the National Narcotics Agency (BNN) which was launched by Kompas (25/1/2012). Drug users in 2008 has reached 3.6 people, an increase in 2011 to 3.8 million people. Meanwhile, the number of drug cases increased from 23,531 cases in 2010 to 26,500 cases in 2011. Some of the above cases have made it clear that Pancasila as the state of ideology is no longer used as a guide to attitude. At this time, the noble values of Pancasila begin to be abandoned. Those condition needs a serious effort in reconstructing the moral of students in this nation in order to create an intellectual and competitive generation related to the character of Pancasila. Therefore, it is deemed necessary to instill the values of Pancasila through KOMALA (Kotak Amalan Pancasila) to the children so they will be familiar with and practice the noble values of the Pancasila.


SUMMARY Severe common bile duct injury (SCBDI) is the most serious complication in both open (OC) and laparoscopic cholecistectomy (LC). This is a retrospective and descriptive review of 8 SCBDI observed in 1.980 OC and 5.650 LC operated on at our department since 1992 to 2000, and managed by the autorhs in the same period. The objective is to analize type of lession, circunstances and clinical presentation, diagnosis and management, morbimortality and early and longterm results. There were 4 sections and 4 resections, 5 observed in open cholecistectomy (OC) and 3 in laparoscopic one (LC), 5 patients were diagnosed and repaired in the same operation and 3 in postoperatory. Four cases were repair was done with end to end anastomosis and in other 4 cases with an t-I Roux en Y hepaticjejunoanastomy. Four patients presented early surgical complications (50%), 1 of 4 end to end anastomosis and 3 of 4 HYA; one patient died with abdominal sepsis and multiple organic failure (12.5%), and 2 of 8 patients (25%) presented anastomosis stricture. With this small series we couldn't identify early nor late prognostic factors. we conclude SCBDI is observed more frequently in open cholecystectomy than in laparoscopic one.


An educational quadruped robot is presented in this paper.By establishing and transforming three coordinations,also calculating the coordinations of the foot and the angles of the joints,the kinematics equation and its inverse kinematics is given in this paper.


In this paper the example of improvement of hybrid rocket engine for achievement of thrust deep controlling is shown and two-stage centrifugal atomizers of a liquid supply system component were analyzed. Two construction of two-stage centrifugal atomizers were that are intended to implement thrust deep controlling were analyzed and the features of the work of these injectors with the presence of deep-flow control were shown. The efficiency and advantages of two-stage centrifugal atomizers in comparing with regular centrifugal atomizers were shown. The system of equations including the equation of conservation of momentum fluid and continuity equation with closing dependence of flow through the nozzle and the geometrical characteristics were examined. Features of work include changing the angle of spraying in a wide range (60-120°) depending on the operating mode with deep throttling flow through a nozzle, which leads to unstable operation of the engine, namely the unstable combustion, pressure fluctuations and quality of the spraying process. Methods aimed on reducing the range of the angle of the spray on the deep flow control mode were shown. The construction of modernized two-stage centrifugal atomizers with circular groove that are able to reduce the diapason of changing the spraying angle with deep throttling flow through a nozzle were shown. The main conditions for designing of the circular groove were identified, as well as the technique of calculation in the form of a flowchart of the program for calculating the two-step upgraded injectors with a reduced range of variation of the angle of the spray.


Cloze procedure, a technique not originally intended for measurement purposes, has come to be known as the most widely experimented upon testing tool in English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL/EFL). Testing experts have indeed used up their energy by constructing and working on various forms of cloze, with the unhappy result that not one person knows what it is that cloze tests measure. Notwithstanding this assertion, cloze tests are still widely used for research purposes and as a component of some high-stakes international tests. This paper intends to formally introduce a new version of cloze, that is, 'phrase-cloze,' and report the findings of a relevant study with Iranian EFL learners on the validity of phrase cloze as a measure of EFL reading comprehension. To test the null-hypotheses of whether phrase cloze is a valid measure of EFL reading comprehension as measured by the First Certificate in English (FCE) and the Certificate of Advanced English (CAE) Reading Papers, 53 candidates (university students majoring in English) filled in an FCEor a CAE-dependent phrase cloze along with taking the relevant reading tests. The findings suggest that, as far as correlational validation can be trusted (Sadeghi, 2010, 2013), phrase cloze is no better than its traditional counterparts such as classical or standard cloze for testing reading comprehension. Further results and implications are discussed in the paper.


We describe a general technique for modeling and identifying biological signals, such as the start of protein translation in eukaryotic &A. The usual techniques for this problem either assume that each position of the signal is independently distributed, or allow for limited dependencies among different positions. We provide a statistical model that generalizes earlier methods, and captures all signi&& high-order dependencies among different base positions. Additionally, re describe two techniques that allow reliable estimation of the signal in-spite of limited data. First, we formulate a combinatorial problem whose solution gives the "most informative" signal given limited amount of data. Next, we describe an experimental sampling technique to reliably determine the statistically signi6cant correlations in the data. We combine these tie techniques to describe an e&Sent algorithm for the special case of all (inchrding nonadjacent) pair-wise dependencies. An algorithm for analyzing all higher-order dependencies will be included in the full paper. We also provide preliminary experimental results for the translation initiation signal based on 2,993 f&length human mRNA sequences.


The procedure of signalling monitoring on Uu interface protocol stack in TD-SCDMA system is deeply researched. A brief introduction to structure of the user plane of Node B and control plane of Uu interface as well as the way to get transport format on common transport channel is presented. Furthermore, the procedure of segmentation and reassembly of RLC message in Uu interface stack is analyzed. Then, on the basis of it, the algorithm for getting Uu data from FP data frames of Iub interface and implementing signalling monitoring is proposed. The program module of this algorithm is tested in practical environment and the result shows that it is capable of monitoring and analyzing signalling messages of Uu through Iub monitoring.


A better understanding of organic nitrogen(N)fractions in soils under long-term fertilization is critical to the regulation of N fertilizers and eco-environmental quality. In this study, a organic N fractionation method by Bremner was used to examine the characteristics of soil organic N fractions under long-term applications of different fertilizers. Compared to no fertilizer(CK)treatment, total N and organic-N in soils increased under long-term fertilization. About half of the increased organic-N was acid-hydrolysable N and the rest was non-acid hydrolysable N. Of the increased acid hydrolysable N, hydrolysable unidentified N, amino acid N, amino sugar N and ammonia N accounted for about 69.0%, 21.0%, 6.6%, and 3.4%, respectively. Total N and organic-N in the soils applied with organic fertilizers plus chemical fertilizers were higher than those with chemical fertilizer alone. However, organic-N fractions changed differently under different organic fertilizers. In the soils applied with cattle manure combined with chemical fertilizers(NPKM), about 60.0% of the increased organic-N was acid-hydrolysable N, while 71.7% was non-acid hydrolysable N in the soils with straw plus chemical fertilizers(NPKS). These results indicate that the composition of organic materials would have great impact on the fractions and availability of organic N in soils.


This article recounts the neglected story of a group of radical-right intellectuals based in Montreal, who mobilized during the 1930s for the establishment of a new Canadian state. Inspired by Ukrainian ultraconservative thought, the Italian School of Elitism, and fascist corporatism, this diverse group founded an interwar movement called the Classocracy League of Canada. Their vision framed Canadian identity in Christian and European supremacist terms, while its leading members were engaged with other Canadian and transnational fascistic organizations, such as the Christian National Social Party and the Friends of National Spain. Although the Classocracy League of Canada remained ultimately marginal, its vision of racially restricted pluralism represented a novel form of exclusionary politics at the basis of which was fascist ideology.


Introduction: Levosimendan is a calcium sensitive inotrope and ATPsensitive potassium channel opener that is effective in the prevention and treatment of low cardiac output syndrome (LCOS) after cardiac surgery. The purpose of this study was to investigate the need for inotrope during ICU admission, the incidence of myocardial infarction within 3 days after surgery, the need for insertion of intra-aortic balloon pump within 3 days after surgery, and examining the time of extubation of the endotracheal tube and the time of discharge from the ICU. Methods: In this randomized clinical trial, 60 patients with mean age of 65 years with left ventricular ejection fraction (% 30 ≥) (LVEF), who were candidates of off pump coronary artery bypass graft surgery were examined. Patients were screened for 20 days before surgery and those with renal insufficiency or liver failure as well as those who simultaneously needed to use inotropic or vasopressor drugs or were candidates for cardiac surgery using a cardiopulmonary pump were excluded. Patients were randomly divided into experimental and control groups. After insertion of the arterial catheter and simultaneously with the skin incision in the experimental group, intravenous prophylactic levosimendan (0.1μg / kg / min) was used from the start of surgery to 24 hours after surgery. The control group did not receive any inotrope. For statistical analysis of data U Mann-Whitney test and Chisquare test were used (P< 0.05). Results: The use of levosimendan had no significant effect on the time of extubation of the endotracheal tube in the ICU (p = 0.336); Also, levosimendan had no significant effect on the time of discharge of patients from ICU (p = 0.292). However, the use of levosimendan had a significant effect on the need for insertion of intra-aortic balloon pump (IABP) (p = 0.038) as well as the incidence of myocardial infarction (p <0.001), and reduced the incidence of myocardial infarction (p=0.001) and the percentage of need for insertion of intra-aortic balloon pump (IABP).) (p = 0.038). Conclusion: According to findings of the present study, it is recommended to use levosimendan to reduce the incidence of myocardial infarction and reduce the need for insertion of intra-aortic balloon pump in patients with left ventricular dysfunction in off pump coronary artery bypass graft surgery.


These essays, drawn from the author's work since 1964, address three themes in American history in the century preceding the 1760s: authority in colonial British America; the political and constitutional development of these colonial entities; and shifting constitutional tensions within the empire.


We present two results on maximal antichains in the strict chain product poset $[t_1+1]\times[t_2+1]\times\cdots\times[t_n+1]$. First, we prove that these maximal antichains are also maximum. Second, we prove that there is a bijection between maximal antichains in the strict chain product poset $[t_1+1]\times[t_2+1]\times\cdots\times[t_n+1]$ and antichains in the nonstrict chain product poset $[t_1]\times[t_2]\times\cdots\times[t_n]$.


The exact time-dependent solution is obtained for a magnetic field growth during a spherically symmetric accretion into a black hole (BH) with a Schwarzschild metric. Magnetic field is increasing with time, changing from the initially uniform into a quasi-radial field. Equipartition between magnetic and kinetic energies in the falling gas is supposed to be established in the developed stages of the flow. Estimates of the synchrotron radiation intensity are presented for the stationary flow. The main part of the radiation is formed in the relativistic region r ≤ 7 r g , where r g is a BH gravitational radius. The two-dimensional stationary self-similar magnetohydrodynamic solution is obtained for the matter accretion into BH, in a presence of a large-scale magnetic field, under assumption, that the magnetic field far from the BH is homogeneous and its influence on the flow is negligible. At the symmetry plane perpendicular to the direction of the distant magnetic field, the dense quasi-stationary disk is formed around BH, which structure is determined by dissipation processes. Solutions of the disk structure have been obtained for a laminar disk with Coulomb resistivity and for a turbulent disk. Parameters of the shock forming due to matter infall onto the disk are obtained. The radiation spectrum of the disk and the shock are obtained for the 10 M ⊙ BH. The luminosity of such object is about the solar one, for a characteristic galactic gas density, with possibility of observation at distances less than 1 kpc. The spectra of a laminar and a turbulent disk structure around BH are very different. The laminar disk radiates mainly in the ultraviolet, the turbulent disk emits a large part of its flux in the infrared. It may occur that some of the galactic infrared star-like sources are a single BH in the turbulent accretion state. The radiative efficiency of the magnetized disk is very high, reaching ∼ 0.5 M ˙ c 2 . This model of accretion was called recently as a magnetically arrested disk (MAD). Numerical simulations of MAD and its appearance during accretion into neutron stars, are considered and discussed.


A new species of laevicaudatan branchiopod, Lynceus grandirostris, is described. This new species is so far known only from a single locality near Yellowknife, Canada, and is morphologically distinguished from all other known Lynceus species by the elongated form of the female rostrum, which would appear to preclude copulation. Three collections made over several years have yielded 55 females, but only three males. Males of this species are thus far extremely rare. The large size of the female rostrum coupled with the relative rarity of males suggests that this species may be parthenogenic. A key to the female Laevicaudata of North America is presented.


Motivated by string theory, we propose that non-local quantum corrections to large extremal black holes must be suppressed by local higher-derivative terms (classical corrections). We show that this condition implies the species bound in all even dimensions, is motivated by Weak Gravity Conjecture, and is necessary for the mild form of the Weak Gravity Conjecture in supersymmetric theories with more than supercharges.


We present the exact solution of a two-dimensional directed walk model of a drop, or half-vesicle, confined between two walls, and attached to one wall. This model is also a generalization of a polymer model of steric stabilization recently investigated. We explore the competition between a sticky potential on the two walls and the effect of a pressure-like term in the system. We show that a negative pressure ensures the drop/polymer is unaffected by confinement when the walls are a macroscopic distance apart.


moral philosophy in a different way from that used by philosophers. Health professionals are more practically orientated, being limited by their practice and by their professional goals. This text faces the difficult questions that arise in intensive care situations, opening them up, examining the relevant literature and helping the reader to understand such situations more fully. Excerpts from Melia's own research and that of others provide a continuous practical link to the developing discussion. Melia's writing is crisp and clear, and will provide light for both new health care practitioners and those who have experienced the many dilemmas presented.


The action of lead on the enzyme -aminolaevulinate dehydratase (ALA-D; porphobilinogen synthase, EC 22.214.171.124) in erythrocytes is manifested by an apparent shift in the pH of maximum enzyme activity to lower pH values and by an overall decrease in enzyme activity (1). These effects are readily measurable. For the purpose of assessing exposure to lead, measurements are usually performed at pH 6.4 in phosphate buffer (2, 3) and lead concentrations in blood and concomitant decreases in enzyme activity are correlated. The assay at pH 6.4 thus provides clinicians with a sensitive and early biological index of exposure to this ubiquitous environmental and industrial pollutant (4-7)) Several methods proposed for measuring ALA-D activity in erythrocytes are based upon the enzyme's conversion of two molecules of aminolevulinic acid (ALA) to porphobilinogen, which is then measured spectrophotometrically by reaction with Erlich's reagent (2-4, 8-11). In general, these have involved modifications of the original Bonsignore method (8) and usually suggest a change in the buffer system, for better control of the reaction pH. Assay methods vary from study to study, making intercomparison of results almost impossible. In an effort to achieve some uniformity in the assay of the enzyme, Berlin and Schaller (3) in 1974 proposed the "European Standardized Method," which has since become widely accepted. The methodology as it stands, however, has several drawbacks, one of which is the requirement for venipuncture to obtain a sufficient quantity of blood. In some instances, it may be substantially preferable to collect blood for ALA-D assay by skin puncture than by venipuncture, such as when there is: a need for frequent blood sampling to monitor occupational exposure to heavy metals; reticence on a donor's part to submit to venipuncture; or veins difficult to tap, owing to their size and location. With children or infants, venipuncture can be distressful and excessively hazardous (12) and skin puncture is definitely preferable (/3). There may be other reasons to opt for finger-prick blood collection, such as difficulties encountered in collecting, transporting, storing, and shipping large numbers of blood samples from remote and relatively inaccessible sites. For several of these reasons and because several other microtests could be performed on the same 250-tL blood sample, we considered it important to develop


In this paper, I study the effect of suspensions on liquidity of stocks in the same industry or province in the Shanghai Stock Exchange A-share market from 1997 to 2017. I find that each additional suspended stock has a significant and positive effect on the bid-ask spread of non-suspended stocks in the same industry or province. Besides, suspensions lasting for a longer period of time have weaker impact on the liquidity of informationally and regionally related stocks than suspensions lasting for a short period. What's more, suspensions caused by different reasons have different impact on liquidity of related stocks. For suspensions due to limit hit, they are significantly and negatively related to the spread of non-suspended stocks in the same industry or province. This is due to the fact that according to the regulation that stocks hitting price limits for several continuous days will be suspended what leads to higher predictability of this type of suspension. But suspensions caused by negative news and neutral news have a significant and positive impact on illiquidity of other non-suspended stocks in the same industry or province. Thereby suspensions caused by negative news have a larger impact on the liquidity of informationally and regionally related stocks than suspensions caused by neutral news.


Assessment procedure of aircraft crash events in siting for nuclear power plants,and the methods of probability determination in two different stages of preliminary screening and detailed evaluation are introduced in this paper.Except for general air traffic,airport operations and aircraft in the corridor,the probability of aircraft crash by military operation in the military airspaces is considered here.


Thesis Ph. D. Michigan State University. Packaging 2014.%%%%In the past decade, applications of nanocomposites consisting of polymers and engineered nanoparticles have been significantly expanded, causing increasing concern about the release of nanoparticles and their by-products which may impact human health and the environment. This research aims to evaluate the release of nanoclay and surfactant (organo-modifier of nanoclay) from nanocomposites into food simulants.A graphite furnace atomic absorption spectrometry (GFAAS) method was developed for rapid measurement of organo-modified montmorillonite (O-MMT) concentration in water-ethanol solutions with Si and Al as markers of the nanoclay. Special precautions were taken to ensure the stability of O-MMT in water-ethanol solutions. A solution with an ethanol concentration higher than 70 % (v/v) was preferred to obtain a good dispersion of O-MMT in the sonicated solutions, while the dispersion in water was improved by the addition of an organic surfactant. The correlation between Si and Al concentrations and O-MMT concentrations in solution gave the composition of O-MMT which was in agreement with the results obtained by an X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF) method. A liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method was developed to measure the surfactant released from O-MMT into food simulants. Two types of O-MMT containing different quaternary alkylammonium surfactants were used. The release of surfactant from O-MMT was evaluated as a function of temperature, sonication and simulant type. There was more surfactant released at a higher temperature than at a lower one. More surfactant was released when sonication was applied to the nanoclay suspension. A substantial amount of surfactant was released into ethanol, while much less was released into the water/ethanol mixture (1:1, v/v) or pure water. The affinity between the solvent and the surfactant was discussed based on solubility parameters and correlated with the surfactant release into different solvents.Release assessment of O-MMT nanoclay and surfactant was performed on two types of polymer-clay nanocomposites: polypropylene (PP) and polyamide 6 (PA6) with O-MMT. The release experiment was carried out in accordance with ASTM D4754-11 with the nanocomposite films exposed to ethanol as a fatty-food simulant at 22, 40 and 70 °C. A GFAAS method was developed to measure the release of nanoclay. Both nanocomposites released small amounts of nanoclay particles (μg L-1 level) into ethanol. There were more nanoclay particles released from PP-clay films than PA6-clay films. There was no difference in the amount of nanoclay released from PP-clay films with different film thicknesses, revealing that the release mainly occurred at the film surface. A LC-MS/MS method was developed to identify and quantify the surfactant released into ethanol from the two nanocomposite systems. A substantial amount of surfactant in ethanol (mg L-1 level) was detected, indicating changes in the nanoclay structure within…


ALL MODERN CITIES have a good deal in common. Whether it be the diversity of their inhabitants, the need for better transportation systems, the problems of air and water pollution, the elimination of sub-standard housing, the need to combat the sense of alienation and anonymity felt by many residents, or the desire to improve local schools and art galleries-all seem to be shared by any large and complex city, at least in the developed sections of the world. For many urban historians, however, the real appeal in studying cities is not in showing how all cities reflect minor variations from a standard model, but rather in seeing how each city has a unique development and existence, quite unlike that of any other city. Although at long range two cities may appear to be quite similar in their geographical setting, population makeup, industrial structure, and historical background, when examined at close range they show a host of distinctive characteristics which make them unique. Seattle, Washington, and Vancouver, British Columbia, are a pertinent case in point. These cities share much in common. Both are seaports far removed from national centers of population; both got their start in the late nineteenth century as logging and lumbering communities; both developed very slowly in their early years; and both began growing rapidly during the great railroad boom of the 1880s when the Northern Pacific and the Canadian Pacific reached


We define a new topology, weaker than the gap topology, on the space of selfadjoint operators affiliated to a semifinite von Neumann algebra and define the real-valued spectral flow for a continuous path of selfadjoint Breuer-Fredholm operators in terms of a generalization of the winding number. We compare our definition with Phillips' analytical definition. Furthermore we prove the homotopy invariance of the real-valued index. We also prove that the real-valued spectral flow of a path of invariant symmetric elliptic differential operators on a Galois covering with coefficients depending continuously on the parameter is well-defined.


Synonycha grandis has strong predatory capacity on main pests in Dendrocalamopsis oldhami forest such as Pseudoregma bambusicola,Bambusaspis notabile and B. miliaris. To understand the predatory behavior of the predators is the key to the success of the biological control by natural enemies.The study of S. grandis behavior and behavior time distribution showed that the predatory behavior of S. grandis was characteristic with 6 events,i. e. hunting,feeding,cleaning,resting,wing neatening and excreting. The main predatory tactics were positive seeking and sporadically waiting for the target pest.The larva had not the behavior of spreading wings and cleaning,and a little excreting and resting happened. The time occupied by each behavior of the starved adult in the predatory process from long to short was feeding time,seeking time,resting time and cleaning time. The feeding time accounted for47. 02% of the total observation time. The feeding time of the larvae was obviously longer than their seeking time,and the feeding time prolonged with the increase of the age while the chewing time shortened with the increase of the age. The chewing time of the adult was obviously shorter than that of the larva.


herb distributed in Yunnan, Guangxi, Sichuan, and Guizhou provinces in China. The whole plant or pseudobulb is used as a folk medicine for the treatment of cough, rheumatism, stomachache, and trauma. In previous investigations on this plant, five triterpenes together with n-nonacosane, n-dotriacontanoic acid, n-octacostyl ferulate, and b-sitosterol were reported. The 60% ethanol extract of the air-dried whole plant of P. yunnanensis showed inhibitory effects on nitric oxide (NO) production in murine macrophages (RAW 264.7) activated by lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and interferon (IFN)-g in our preliminary screening (inhibition % 92.1%, 30 mg/ml). Therefore the study of its chemical constituents was undertaken to identify the NO production inhibitors. The 60% ethanol extract of P. yunnanensis was suspended in H2O and partitioned with CHCl3, EtOAc, and n-BuOH successively. The CHCl3 layer (inhibition % 90.3%, 30 mg/ml) and EtOAc layer (inhibition % 97.1%, 30 mg/ml) that showed NO production inhibitory activity were isolated by repeated column chromatography on silica gel, ODS, Sephadex LH-20, and preparative HPLC (ODS), respectively, to afford four new stilbenes (3—6) and two new stilbenoids (1, 2). In this report, we describe the isolation, structural elucidation, and inhibitory effects on NO production by activated murine macrophages of these new compounds.


The need for teachers who are prepared to work with the increasingly diverse population of special education students in urban areas has become critical. Accordingly, teacher educators must seek to improve the effectiveness of their programs. Urban trainees will need to be competent in a wide range of research-based instructional practices, and teacher educators can introduce these practices to trainees by modeling them in teacher education courses. In order to investigate current practice, this study examined urban trainees' (N=249) perceptions of the frequency and importance of teaching methods modeled in their professional training. The results of a survey suggested that little variety of instructional practices was erycployed and that trainees tended to value most those approaches most frequently used. The expansion of research and training efforts in this area is recommended.


To improve the acidic pellets metallurgical properties,by the way of adding magnesia additive and enhancing the content of MgO in spheric agglomeration,we can improve the metallurgical properties of spheric agglomeration.The result shows that:by adding additive,the reductive dilatability of pellets improved 4.89%,temperature range reduced 16℃,and softening property was obviously improved.As a result,the daily average yield of BF was increased 85.5t.


Abstract A maximum likelihood confirmatory factor analysis was performed by applying LISREL VII to the Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning standardization sample (N = 2363). Analyses were designed to determine which of nine hypothesized oblique factor solutions could best explain memory as measured by the WRAML. Competing latent variable models were identified in previous studies and monographs on memory. Models were tested separately in two samples of children used in the standardization of the scale, providing a cross-validation of results. Findings supported a three-factor model including Verbal Memory, Visual Memory, and Attention/Concentration factors. Our results are consistent with previous characterizations of attention as an important component of memory as measured by the WRAML. A distinct Learning Index was not empirically supported in the current analysis.


High turnover for small and medium enterprises is always a central issue in the field of human resources.The paper discusses the relationship between transaction-cost and the turnover preference of stuffs in small and medium enterprises,provides a frame of turnover based on transaction-cost and profit.The transaction-cost influences the turnover selection in the small and medium enterprises by the degree of asset specificity,uncertainty and transaction frequency.In order to stabilize the personnel mechanism of enterprises,small and medium enterprises should enhance the construction of core technology,improve the special-purpose degree of human capital and increases the investment to the special-purpose talented person.


The invention provides a power distribution device. The power distribution device comprises at least one circuit breaker and a junction station, each circuit breaker among the at least one circuit breaker comprises a shell, a protrusion is arranged on a first surface of each shell, the first surface of each shell and a first surface of each protrusion form L-shaped space, and the junction station is disposed in at least one L-shaped space which the at least one circuit breaker corresponds to. According to the power distribution device, the junction station is put in the L-shaped space formed by each protrusion structure of each shell of the at least one circuit breaker, own space of each shell of the at least one circuit breaker is fully utilized, the space utilization ratio is increased, the number of circuit breakers and connecting loops is increased, and the integration level of the power distribution device can be improved.


The main challenges for the implementation of a full scale Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) in India are the lack of automated traffic data collection systems and lack of theoretical models suitable for the Indian traffic conditions. Thus, automated real time traffic data collection and development of models to characterize the heterogeneous and less lane disciplined traffic conditions are the immediate requirements for ITS implementations under Indian scenario. This talk will elaborate on these two challenges and will discuss some of the initiatives taken to tackle these problems with specific emphasis on the Advanced Public Transportation Systems (APTS) and Advanced Traveller Information Systems (ATIS) applications. APTS and ATIS are two main functional areas of ITS which are popularly deployed in countries where ITS solutions are widely employed for traffic management. APTS mainly deal with improving public transport facilities, where as ATIS concentrate on traveller information systems for the entire traffic stream.


The post-modern challenge the transformation of the new Left from green to red post-modern politics and the Greens post-modern anti-modernism the politics of discontent - right-wing radicalism in West Germany the dialectics of post-modern politics the future of post-modern politics.


In November 1813 Napoleonic rule in the Dutch provinces collapsed after the defeat of the imperial armies near Leipzig. The Prince of Orange returned from England, where he had been exiled. The establishment of the monarchy is falsely presented as a national liberation after a period of foreign domination. Furthermore it is a myth that King William built his state from scratch.


The study aimed to determine the level of consumer attitudes towards purchasing organic food, by conducting a statistical analysis of the data collected from the questionnaires collected from a sample of consumers in Amman Governorate in 2018 distributed to a sample of 384. The analytical descriptive approach was used in this research to study the relationship Between the variables, the results of the study showed that the average degree of consumers to purchase organic foods was 3.69 degrees, which is a high level according to the scale used. The independent variables of consumers were also distinguished by its clear impact on their attitudes towards the purchase and consumption of organic foods. Through the study, it was found that there is a positive and important relationship between consumers attitudes towards organic foods and some factors that affect their attitudes. Considering this, importance the researcher recommends the importance of conducting awareness programs on the importance of organic foods and to do other relevant studies in different regions of Jordan.


The eff ectiveness of the Optimal Homotopy Asymptotic Method (OHAM) is tested for nonlinear fourth-order boundary-value problems associated with the deformation of beams, with the plate defl ection theory, and viscoelastic and inelastic fl ows. Exact solutions are in complete agreement with the results of OHAM. The results demonstrate that the method is quite effi cient, eff ective, implicit, and easy to implement.


The following paper contains the investigation of the mass-motion of viscous and imperfectly elastic spheroids, as modified by a relative motion of their parts, produced in them by the attraction of external disturbing bodies; it must be regarded as the continuation of my previous paper, where the theory of the bodily tides of such spheroids was given. The problem is one of theoretical dynamics, but the subject is so large and complex, th at I thought it best, in the first instance, to guide the direction of the speculation by considerations of applicability to the case of the earth, as disturbed by the sun and moon.


BACKGROUND
Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) is an important growth factor modulating development, homeostasis, and aging. However, whether and how circulating IGF-1 concentrations influence early death risk in the general population remains largely unknown.

METHODS
We included 380,997 participants who had serum IGF-1 measurement and no history of cancer, cardiovascular disease (CVD) or diabetes at baseline from UK Biobank, a prospective cohort study initiated in 2006-2010. Restricted cubic splines and Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to assess the association between baseline IGF-1 concentrations and all-cause and cause-specific mortality.

RESULTS
Over a median follow-up of 8.8 years, 10,753 of the participants died, including 6110 from cancer and 1949 from CVD. Dose-response analysis showed a U-shaped relationship between IGF-1 levels and mortality. Compared to the fifth decile of IGF-1, the lowest decile was associated with 39% (95% CI: 29%-50%), 20% (95% CI: 8%-34%), and 39% (95% CI: 14%-68%) higher risk of all-cause, cancer, and CVD mortality, respectively, while the highest decile was associated with 17% (95% CI: 7%-28%) and 38% (95% CI: 11%-71%) higher risk of all-cause and CVD mortality, respectively. The results remained stable in detailed stratified and sensitivity analyses.

CONCLUSIONS
Our findings indicate that both low and high concentrations of serum IGF-1 are associated with increased risk of mortality in the general population. Our study provides a basis for future interrogation of underlying mechanisms of IGF-1 in early death occurrence and possible implications for mitigating the risk.


Abstract Nitrate has been identified as a major source of water pollution and eutrophication. The use of modified chicken feathers (MCFs) as an adsorbent has not been fully explored. The study therefore assessed the use of MCFs for the adsorption of nitrate. Fresh chicken feathers, obtained from a commercial poultry farm, were first hydrolyzed with sodium hydroxide and activated with HCl to give modified chicken feathers, MCFs. Experimental constraints were varied in a series of batch tests including concentration, pH, adsorbent dosage and contact time. FTIR was used to monitor the adsorption processes (before and after) of the polluted water. The outcome showed increase in specific surface area and the favorable formation of adsorption sites of MCFs. For the understanding of adsorption mechanism, experimental data were assessed by Langmuir, Freundlich, Temkin and Sips isotherm equations. Pseudo-first and pseudo-second order models were used to evaluate time characteristics of adsorption. The optimum parameters for adsorption are found to be initial ion concentration, initial pH, adsorbent dosage and contact time 300 mg/L, 8, 10 and 480 min, respectively. This study also reveals adsorption fit the chosen isotherm models in the following order: (Sips >Langmuir > Freundlich > Temkin). Sips isotherm having the best fit infers adsorption took place on heterogeneous surface. Pseudo-second-order is suited for explaining nitrate removal based on statistical R2 coefficient. The use of MCFs as an eco-friendly, cost-effective and renewable bio-sorbent for wastewater treatment is very possible due to its adsorption ability in the removal of nitrate.


Transketolase mutant of bacillus subtilis can produce D-ribose in medium using D-glucose as carbohydrate. We describe a method of transketolase activity determination, in the same time, we also purify two enzymes which were necessary for transketolase activity determination.


So far, the definitions of slope debris flow are cinders and divergent, even, some scholars equate it with the hill slope debris flow/landslide-induced debris flow and other similar terms. This article summarizes research on the slope debris flow, from the definition and classification of debris flow, study on the classification of slope debris flow , analyzes the formation conditions, properties and characteristics of slope debris flow, at last, use the definition method of attribute and kind, tentatively give the preliminary definition of the slope debris flow .


Despite both the economic success and shear spectacle of television shopping, very little research has looked at what keeps millions of viewers tuned in to what could be considered nothing more than networks devoted to a constant stream of advertisements. Building on the theoretical framework of parasocial interactions, this article devises a typology of television shopping viewers based on in-depth interviews conducted with audience members that range from heavy to light in terms of their viewing patterns. Audience members fall into 3 different categories of viewer-shoppers: skeptical-ironic, practical-hesitant, and expert-compulsive. Each of these categories of viewer-shoppers negotiated different meanings of television shopping programming that challenge ideas about isolated individuals who turn to television shopping networks primarily for companionship.