This paper is to set up the autoregressive distributed lag model in order to estimate factor elasticities of the service export in the medical and healthcare service industry and to analyze the determinants for its export performance during 1975-2015. The empirical results suggest that industrial markup, exchange rate, and interest rate have had more decisive effects on the industrial export performance in the medical and healthcare service industry, in particular, during the declining period in factor prices since the foreign currency crisis beginning in late 1997.


Image inpainting is a means of inferring the content of the missing information based on the remaining information of the image, and inpainting the missing information, requiring the inpainted image to meet the human eye perception to the greatest extent. The image inpainting method based on the weight function takes arbitrary points for inpainting during inpainting, which results in poor inpainting effect at the junction of objects. Therefore, this paper adds the priority values calculation of inpainting points to improve the inpainting effect. Finally, comparing the inpainted image based on the priority calculation with the previous one, the inpainting effect at the boundary of the object is significantly better than the image inpainting method based solely on the weight functions.


In the title compound, C18H21NO5, the dihydropyridine ring adopts a flattened-boat conformation and its planar part forms a dihedral angle of 84.60 (2)° with the benzene ring. In the crystal, intermolecular N—H⋯O and C—H⋯O hydrogen bonds result in the formation of zigzag layers parallel to (001). These layers are interconnected via C—H⋯π interactions.


In this thesis we study graph clustering on two well known families of graphs that arise in many applications, namely bipartite and chordal graphs. We study two speci c types of clustering problems. On the one hand we seek a partition of the vertex set of a graph into a bounded number of sets so that a prespeci ed function determined by the diameters of the induced subgraphs is minimized. On the other hand we seek one subset of the vertex set that has a xed number of vertices and induces the maximum possible number of edges. The rst problem type constitutes the main theme of this thesis. We de ne a class of functions on partitions of vertices, which we call monotone diameter functions, that will enable us to group many problems into one general problem. Examples of these problems are the following: partition the vertices of a graph into a limited number of subgraphs of bounded diameter, and partition the vertices of a graph into a limited number of subgraphs so that the sum of the diameters of the subgraphs is bounded. We prove that the problem of partitioning the vertices of a graph into subgraphs of bounded diameter is NP-complete on bipartite and chordal graphs. In contrast with these negative results, we give linear time sequential algorithms for the same problem on bipartite permutation and interval graphs, the rst being a subset of bipartite graphs and the second being a subset of chordal graphs. We also present e cient parallel algorithms for the general problem on biconvex and interval graphs. During the course of studying this problem on biconvex graphs, we prove that biconvex graphs have a certain ordering of the vertices, which we call a biconvex straight ordering, that has promising algorithmic potential. We present an e cient parallel algorithm for constructing a biconvex straight ordering for any biconvex graph. We also study the problem of nding a cluster of bounded size with the maximum possible number of edges, and present an e cient parallel algorithm for solving this problem on a class of unit interval graphs. Acknowledgements To God I owe everything. To everyone that helped make the completion of this thesis possible I o er my thanks. My supervisor, Lorna Stewart, provided me with expert guidance, many hours of discussion, and nancial support to complete the thesis and to attend conferences. I am grateful for her time, e ort, patience, and support. I am thankful to the other members of my committee: Stephen Hedetniemi, Jim Hoover, Joseph Culberson, and Andy Liu. Special thanks to Stephen Hedetniemi for suggesting many thoughtful improvements, to Jim Hoover for the time he spent with me discussing some of the parallel algorithms in this thesis, to Joseph Culberson for carefully reading the thesis, and to Andy Liu for pointing out a shorter proof for one of the theorems. To my parents, I am indebted with gratitude for their in nite support throughout all stages of the preparation of this thesis, and throughout all stages of my life. I am thankful to my husband, Ehab, for o ering me invaluable advice on thesis writing and for his patience and support. To my children, Aser and Salma, I am grateful for their love, smiles, laughter, and hugs.


This study proposes a novel framework to evaluate the real-time level of road safety based on connected vehicle technologies including in-vehicle sensors, and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) wireless communication. An integrated safety monitoring index (ISMI) that incorporates a crash risk estimation model and a method to analyze hazardous driving events using individual vehicle maneuvering data are developed. The methodology and field implementation presented in this study have potential value to highway traffic agencies for monitoring and evaluating traffic streams with a focus on road traffic safety. The outcomes of the proposed system can be used to analyze traffic conditions before or after a crash, and this analysis can inform effective countermeasures for preventing crash occurrences. In addition, ISMI data stored on a database in the traffic management center can be archived and further analyzed using reported crash data. Another possible application outcome would be to use the data as a resource to identify crash-prone locations in a more active manner, rather than waiting until after actual crashes occur.


Intravenous infusion of buphenine hydrochloride was admistered on 4 successive days to 8 pregnant women with imminent preterm labor. Serial blood samples taken before and throughout the study were assayed for lymphocyte β2‐adrenoceptor density and cyclic adenosine‐3′,5′‐monophosphate (cAMP). The lymphocyte β2‐adrenoceptor density declined significantly (p<0.01) during the treatment. The plasma cAMP concentration was highest 4 h after commencement of infusion and decreased thereafter. Despite the decrease in lymphocyte β2‐adrenoceptor density, the clinical response remained good and the parturients did not go into labor until several days after infusion was started.


The article analyzes the features of memory system and proves that attention principle should be used in incidental vocabulary learning process.It also provides support to Lexical Approach from psychological aspect and states the construction of lexical phrase and culture factors should be stressed in lexical teaching.


[Editorial Note.—This paper, together with the paper by Dr. Porter, concludes the symposium on obstetrics. In our last issue we published the papers of Dr. Ehrenfest, Dr. Crothers and Dr. Schroeder.] Infant mortality and morbidity in breech labor continue high enough to command the serious attention of all physicians doing obstetric work. It is perhaps needless to repeat figures or to enumerate the types of injuries common to breech labor, or even to review or continue the excellent pathologic studies made in this field. The factors making for mortality might be reduced, somewhat dogmatically, to three accidents: (1) compression of the cord; (2) occurrence of a nuchal arm, and (3) difficulty in birth of the after-coming head. In all of these an immediate mortality may arise from suffocation during the delay before delivery can be effected, or, as in the latter two, a delayed mortality from the injuries sustained


Let f, g : M1 → M2 be maps where M1 and M2 are connected triangulable oriented n-manifolds so that the set of coincidences Cf,g = {x ∈ M1 | f(x) = g(x)} is compact in M1. We define a Nielsen equivalence relation on Cf,g and assign the coincidence index to each Nielsen coincidence class. In this note, we show that, for n ≥ 3, if M2 = M2/K where M2 is a connected simply connected topological group and K is a discrete subgroup then all the Nielsen coincidence classes of f and g have the same coincidence index. In particular, when M1 and M2 are compact, f and g are deformable to be coincidence free if the Lefschetz coincidence number L(f, g) vanishes. 0. Introduction. In topological fixed point theory, the Lefschetz fixed point theorem states that the vanishing of the Lefschetz number L(f) of a self-map f : X → X on a compact manifold is necessary to deforming f to be fixed point free. The converse, however, is false in general. If X satisfies the so-called Jiang condition, L(f) = 0 is also sufficient. The essence of the Jiang condition is that all fixed point classes have the same index. Thus the Nielsen number N(f) divides L(f) which is easier to compute. A theorem of Anosov asserts that |L(f)| = N(f) for any self-map f on a nilmanifold. This result is recently generalized to coincidences independently by Jezierski [7], McCord [10], Brooks and Wong [3]. For nilmanifolds, coincidence classes have the same index. The technique used in [3] is a local version of the root theory developed by R. Brooks [1] (see also [9,V]). It is shown in [3] that if φ : N →M is a map from an oriented n-manifold N to an oriented triangulable n-manifold M such that the set of roots Rφ = {x ∈ N | φ(x) = e} is compact, then all the root classes have the same index. The purpose of this note is to use this fact about roots to show that (local) coincidence and hence (local) fixed point 1991 Mathematics Subject Classification: Primary 55M20.


Before Vespasian returned to Rome to take up the reins of imperial government, he reportedly had a vision in the Serapeum of Alexandria and, as the New Serapis, healed two men. These wonders came to define Vespasian's time in Egypt and yet, for modern readers, their prominence in the story of the emperor's rise to power creates an apparent inconsistency. The same man who on his deathbed joked about his impending divinization also apparently played the part of a god at the beginning of his reign. Such contradictions are to be expected in the colourful accounts of emperors' lives, but this particular one invites further investigation because of its significance to the historical development of the conception of the emperor's divinity. Through detailed consideration of the prospects for reception of these wonders both during and after the Flavian dynasty, this article seeks to demonstrate the predominance of Domitianic influence on the story of Vespasian's wonders. Domitian's reign saw a new emphasis on the living emperor's divinity, which diminished again under Trajan. Nevertheless, wonders were a means through which the charisma of the emperor was manifested in Flavian Rome and later.


Abstract:This essay proffers a response to three critical engagements with the author's 2019 Beyond Coloniality: Citizenship and Freedom in the Caribbean Intellectual Tradition. The author contextualizes Beyond Coloniality as a book that seeks to effect a challenging alliance between studies of the anglophone Caribbean's postindependence social and political order and scholarship on Caribbean thought. Ultimately, Beyond Coloniality engages in a quest for freedom beyond neocolonial citizenship.


ABSTRACT A technique utilizing a petrographic microscope with a flat stage for analysis of provenance has been developed. Procedure is to concentrate feldspar in the medium or coarser sand range by flotation techniques, then to separate this concentrate by means of heavy liquids into potash feldspar, albite, oligoclase-andesine, and calcic plagioclase. Thin sections of these plagioclase separations are examined for twin characteristics (C-twins, A-twins, and untwinned), and zoning characteristics (progressive, oscillatory, and unzoned). This leads to inferences about the presence of metamorphic, plutonic igneous, or volcanic-hypabyssal rocks in the source area. Only the predominant rock type usually can be detected. An exception to this is volcanic and hypabyssal rocks, which commonly yield pl gioclase with diagnostic properties.


The clinical features of Coats' disease and congenital retinoschisis (RS) are distinctly different. Therefore, finding changes consistent with Coats' disease and congenital RS in a single eye is an unusual occurrence. The following report describes two cases with a Coats' telangiectatic lesion in one region of the retina separated by normal retina and the presence of central and peripheral congenital RS. Molecular genetic analysis of the Norrie disease and RS genes failed to identify disease-causing or polymorphic mutations in either of the genes, suggesting that the above condition is clinically and genetically a different disorder. Further studies are needed to identify the genes responsible for the above disorder and associated ocular manifestations.


Regression Test Selection Technique attempt to reduce the cost of Regression testing by selecting and running a subset of an existing test suite. The goal of the Regression Test Selection Technique is to select the Reduced Test Suite for the modified version to minimize the cost of the maintenance phase. Total Statement Coverage approach involves ranking Test Cases from the Reduced Test Suite based on the number of Statements covered by the Test Case such that the Test Case covering the maximum number of Statements would be executed first. The test case prioritization process is done in three different approaches, the first approach is based on Instrumented code, in this the test case that covers maximum changed statements will execute first. The second prioritization method is based on Hill Climbing algorithm and the third prioritization method follows Tabu based metaheuristic search procedure. The validation of the three prioritization technique is evaluated with APSC(Average Percentage of Statement Coverage) and APDC(Average Percentage of Decision Coverage). Keywords-Regression Test, Metaheuristic Search, Average Percentage of Statement Coverage, Average Percentage of Decision Coverage


Abstract— We have investigated the temperature dependence of photosynthetic excitation transfer by quantum‐mechanical treatment. Our theoretical analyses predict that the temperature dependence of most excitation transfers is quite weak in the relatively high temperature range (kT 100cm‐1), whereas some excitation transfers exhibit complex temperature dependence in the low temperature range due to the environmental effect. The temperature‐independency in the high temperature range results from the fact that most excitation transfers among various Chi forms characterized by different absorption peaks almost satisfy the activationless condition where the energy gap for the excitation transfer matches with the nuclear rearrangement energy. This activationless condition, which has already been noticed in the electron transfers in the reaction center, is suggested to play central roles in the efficient energy conversion in the primary stage of photosynthesis.


In August 2019, a research workshop at the University of Melbourne brought together academics, practitioners, advocates, people with experience of living and working in confined settings to explore parallels between the spaces and practices of care and control in different places of confinement. A former immigration detention officer, later inspector and monitor of closed environments, joined the discussion. Along with other voices of 'lived experience', he offered a unique perspective on working in places where a 'duty of care' can mean less about how people should be treated or cared for, and more about guarding oneself and one's employer against personal and institutional criticism. In the following conversation (with one of the editors of this Special Themed Collection of papers that arose from that workshop) he shares experiences of working in immigration detention, in both operational and oversight roles, and the tensions between the two. He reflects on cultures of suspicion and silence, bearing witness to experiences of violence and suffering, and what it means to be human in conditions of confinement.


The motivations and attitudes that influence women's philanthropic behavior are explored through data drawn from focus group studies conducted by the Women and Philanthropy Program at the University of California, Los Angeles.


TiN/3Y-TZP ceramic composites are fabricated by doping TiN particles,whose average grain sizes are 2.7μm,into 3Y-TZP.The effects of TiN on mechanical properties,microstructure and low-temperature degradation of 3Y-TZP are investigated.The results show that there is a good physical and chemical compatibility between TiN and 3Y-TZP,and that 3Y-TZP is toughened and strengthened by doping TiN particles.The highest fracture toughness and flexural strength are 13.3MPa·m~(1/2) and 1410MPa,respectively.The resistance of low-temperature degradation of 3Y-TZP at 220℃ in air is also evidently improved by dispersing TiN particles.


We examine the homotopy theory of simplicial graded abelian Hopf algebras over a prime eld F p , p > 0, proving that two very diierent notions of weak equivalence yield the same homotopy category. We then prove a splitting result for the Postnikov tower of such simplicial Hopf algebras. As an application, we show how to recover the homotopy groups of a simplicial Hopf algebra from its Andr e-Quillen homology, which, in turn, can be easily computed from the homotopy groups of the associated simplicial Dieudonn e module. This paper is divided into two parts. The rst and larger part, is also the more abstract; in it we undertake a thorough examination of the homotopy theory of simplicial graded abelian Hopf algebras over F p , p > 0. The second part is a calculational application, relying heavily on the rst part and intended partly to demonstrate that the homotopy theory of simplicial Hopf algebras deserves consideration. In this second part we show that the homotopy groups of a simplicial abelian Hopf algebra support a very rich and rigid structure. This has implications for the cohomology spectral sequence of a variety of cosimplicial spaces. (See, for example, the work of the second author 20], or Dwyer's spectral sequence as explained in 2, x4].) To explain our results in more detail, x a prime p, and let HA be the category of graded, bicommutative Hopf algebras A over F p which are connected in the sense that A 0 = F p. The objects in HA are the abelian objects in the category CA of graded connected coalgebras over F p ; hence, we call an object in HA an abelian Hopf algebra. Let sHA be the category of simplicial objects in HA. If f : A ! B is a morphism in sHA there are two obvious ways to specify when f is a weak equivalence. On the one hand, if A 2 sHA, it is, among other things, a graded abelian group and, as such, has graded homotopy groups A = H (A; @), where We could demand that f be a weak equivalence if f is an isomorphism. On the other hand, HA is an abelian category with enough projectives, so sHA acquires a notion of weak


Financial literacy is very important to increase women's economic capacity through financial management. The research method used is qualitative with the type of case study. The research subjects were 15 women, and the informants were the head of the PKK and POKDARWIS. The research location is in Kampung AlamMalon, Gunungpati Village. Data collection techniques using source triangulation. The data analysis technique was carried out through three stages, namely data reduction, data presentation, and drawing conclusions or verification. The results of the study found that (1) women's economic conditions can meet the needs of food, clothing, housing, health, urgent needs, and children's education, while women with household financial conditions between Rp. 200,000-Rp. 4,000,000 do not prepare for future and unexpected needs due to inadequate financial conditions, (2) women with a minimum of high school education have knowledge and awareness of financial literacy. (3) Women's efforts to improve the family economy include obtaining loans, investing, smart shopping, financial management, planning, and financial bookkeeping. (4) Barriers and solutions in improving the family economy include education, employment, economic conditions, type of residence, income, and cultural background. Financial literacy is the shared responsibility of the central and local governments as well as women to create family economic stability.


The unique characteristics of prisons have important implications for treating clients in this setting. Though by no means exhaustive, this chapter highlights the most salient issues affecting the delivery of effective treatment to a variety of populations within the prison system. It describes the prison population as of 2003, reviews the treatment services available and key issues affecting treatment in this setting, and considers the question, "what treatment services can reasonably be provided in the prison setting?" The prison therapeutic community (TC) model is explored in depth and examples of in-prison TCs are described. The chapter also looks at the treatment options available for certain specific populations and at systems issues that affect all clients in prison settings. The chapter concludes with some general recommendations for substance abuse treatment in prisons.


Massive societal change will result from the rate of continuous technology advancement and the pace will increase. The enterprise will face operational and technical challenges and society will increasingly expect the highest ethical conduct. What strategy will allow the organization to remain innovative and thrive in these circumstances? To develop new insight, anticipatory skills, and better decision making, a case is made for the adoption of model building and simulation. In addition to the benefits of shared conceptual artefacts for communicating in the enterprise, modelling requires a deep understanding of the ethics and reflexivity needed to deal with complex issues and using a transdisciplinary framework for inquiry may increase understanding. For innovation to emerge, participatory and co-creative approaches for sense-making are proposed to shift the responsibility for ethical decisions to more actors in the enterprise. This approach allows leaders to engage with the informal coalitions in the enterprise and shape the required strategic direction.


In this paper we present an efficient approach of constructing a multidimensional index in distortion-free time-series subsequence matching. Index construction of previous distortion-free subsequence matching algorithms is a very time-consuming process since it generates a huge number of windows to consider all possible positions and all possible query lengths. According to the real experiment, the index construction time reaches approximately 100 minutes for a time-series of length 300K, and this means that the index construction itself is very difficult for very large time-series databases. To solve this problem, in this paper we first thoroughly analyze the index construction steps, then discuss how to improve the performance of each step, and finally propose two advanced algorithms of efficiently constructing an index. In particular, by exploiting dynamic programming techniques, we present the concepts of PAA-bucket and DF(distortion-free)-bucket, which store-and-reuse the intermediate results repeatedly computed. Through the store-and-reuse technique, the proposed algorithms construct a multidimensional index very faster than the previous algorithm. Through analytical and empirical evaluations, we showcased the superiority of the proposed algorithms.


ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv APPROVAL SHEET v SUBMISSION SHEET vi DECLARATION vii LIST OF TABLES xi LIST OF FIGURES xiii CHAPTER 1.0 INTRODUCTION 1 1.1 Child Abuse 2 1.2 Child Abuse in Malaysia 3 1.3 Newspaper and Child Abuse 3 1.4 Research Objectives 6 1.5 Research Questions 7 1.6 Research Hypotheses 8 1.7 Significance of Study 9 1.8 Scope of study 10 1.9 Theoretical Framework 10 1.9.1 Uses and Gratifications 10 1.10 Definition of Terms 12 1.10.1 Conceptual Definition 12 viii 1.10.2 Operational Definition 13 2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW 14 2.


Tuberculosis of the tongue is rare. The primary form, usually seen in children and adolescents, is characterized by a painless ulcer associated with regional lymph node enlargement. The secondary form, arising from auto-inoculation of the tongue with infected saliva in a person suffering from pulmonary tuberculosis, takes the form of a painless ulcer without regional lymph node enlargement I. Our case shows certain unusual features present in the primary form.


A Management and control of irrigation canals is a very important task whether for irrigation of agricultural land, to provide clean water, or to avoid floods. Irrigation canals are sometimes subject to intense variations due to climate change and inclement weather. For this reasons, a robust controller that allows dealing with large variation in operating conditions is proposed to control the water level of a multi-pool open irrigation canal prototype. The main objective of this study is to regulate the downstream level of each canal's pool at a constant value even with inflow disturbances.  The robust controller is designed and tested in simulation for different operating conditions. The results obtained show the good behavior and the effectiveness of the designed controller.


The paper analyzes the structure,work condition,bearing force and strength of the rim of 154t motorized -wheel dump truck of large-scale mine euquipment,and makes finit element model calculation,ist reliable basis is provided for designing and manufacturing


Summary Destructive chronic prostatitis does not respond to medical therapy and requires surgical treat-ment. Compared to open surgery, endoscopic trans-urethral resection (TUR) is more complete and is performed under direct visual control. For satisfactory results resection must include the most peripheral and caudal zones of the prostate. In our department 11 patients with destructive chronic prostatitis were treated with TUR with uniformly excellent results.


Abstract Icons, as core morphemes of interface design, have relatively standardised visual style definitions. However, little is known about the related metaphorical design method from the academic and industrial standpoints. We conducted comparisons based on Chinese character-creation and examined radical (root) forms and rules based on mainstream metaphorical designs, with a focus on the Airstar Bank icon. We adopted a practice-based design research method to continue to explore and evaluate the icon metaphor design method. We found similar approaches in icon metaphor design and ideographic Chinese character-creation. We further explored three icon metaphor design methods based on the ideographic design methods used for Chinese characters, including the single-body, variant, and compound-body modelling methods. An analysis of the Airstar Bank icon exemplifies an efficient, standardised icon morpheme, based on Chinese character-creation, which provides practical insight into systematic icon metaphor design.


The concept of computer networks and network safety are introduced and the solving methods forsafety problems of Internet are proposed in the paper. The more important safety method is firewall technology, therefore the varieties of firewall and realization of firewall technology are introduced as key points.


Ultralight bosons are promising dark matter candidates and can trigger superradiant instabilities of spinning black holes (BHs), resulting in long-lived rotating "bosonic clouds" around the BHs and dissipating their energy through the emission of monochromatic gravitational waves (GWs). We focus on the scalar bosons minimally coupled with both isolated stellar-origin BHs (SBH) and their binary merger remnants, and perform Bayesian data analysis to search for the stochastic GW background from all the unstable modes that can trigger the superradiant instabilities using the data of Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo's first three observing runs. We find no evidence for such signal, and hence rule out the scalar bosons within the mass range [1 . 5 , 15] × 10 − 13 eV, [1 . 8 , 8 . 1] × 10 − 13 eV and [1 . 3 , 17] × 10 − 13 eV at 95% confidence level for isolated SBHs having a uniform dimensionless spin distribution in [0 , 1], [0 , 0 . 5] and [0 . 5 , 1], respectively.


The Constituent Assembly of In dia that drafted the world's larg est democratic constitution began its work in 1946. This ended in November 1949 with the enact ment of a constitution that was supposedly based on 'consensus and accommodation', on diverse viewpoints of political leaders, and on the euphoric idealism of the post-independence era. The Constitution drew inspiration from three different sources: the Government of India Act 1935; other Constitutions like UK, USA, Ireland; and the Objectives Reso lution adopted during the De cember 1946 Assembly session, which itself drew from the Con


We develop a theoretical framework for analyzing and modeling activity choice by individuals and households. The theory assumes that activities are driven by a limited and universal set of human needs. The needs grow autonomously over time according to a logistic curve with parameters depending on the nature of the need. Activities may have an impact on several needs at the same time. We assume that the utility of an activity is equal to the sum of satisfied needs minus the sum of induced needs. The theory developed can explain substitution and complementary relationships between activities, the state-dependency of activity choice and variety seeking behavior. We show how utilities of discrete and continuous choice regarding duration, interval timing, task allocation, travel, location and other choice facets of activities can be derived from basic principles.


The introduction and diffusion of Italian Renaissance forms in sixteenth-century Netherlandish art has usually been described as a process initiated by artists who travelled south, adopted the new style and reaped success after their return to the Netherlands. In giving full credit to the artists and considering this phcnomenon to be a process of artistic exchange in the modern sense, art historians have wrongly disregarded the historical circumstances that caused patrons' preference for the new style. The earliest use of Renaissance forms in the Low Countries on a large scale may be observed in the triumphal decorations of the 1515 Joyeuse Entree of Charles of Hapsburg, the future emperor, in the town of Bruges. From that moment on, Renaissance forms were used abundantly in objects which served as a kind of propaganda for Hapsburg policy, such as church windows and chimney-pieces glorifying Charles v and the Hapsburg dynasty. Antique motifs fitted well in the imperialist visual language favoured by the Hapsburg dynasty and the Dutch nobles who supported its power politics. Derived from imperial Roman monuments, these forms unequivocally alluded to the absolute power of the ancient ancestors of the Holy Roman Emperor, thus legitimizing his authority. In the author's opinion this functional aspect is one of the main reasons for the ready acceptance and diffusion of the Renaissance style in the Low Countries. One of the first artists to travel from the Netherlands to Italy was the painter Michiel Coxcie (Malines 1499-1592). He stayed in Rome from about 1530 to 1538, painting several frescoes in Roman churches which brought him recognition among Italian colleagues. Only one example has survived: the fresco cycle in the chapel of St. Barbara in S. Maria dell'Anima, which he painted between 1532 and 1534. His mastery of the 'maniera italiana', which is evident in these paintings, is highly praised by Vasari, who met Coxcie in Rome in 1532. Vasari also states that Coxcie transferred the 'maniera italiana' to the Netherlands. Upon his return to Malines in 1539, Coxcie received several prestigious commissions, of which perhaps the most outstanding was to paint cartoons for the stained glass windows in the church of St. Gudule in Brussels, with its decoration of triumphal arches glorifying the Hapsburg dynasty. His ability to work in the high Renaissance style gained him the favour of Charles v and his sister, Mary of Hungary, governess of the Netherlands, who engaged him as a court painter. In the said series of Brussels windows, a remarkable change of style regarding the use of Renaissance forms is to be observed after Coxcie started supplying the cartoons in 1541. The windows completed between 1537 and 1540 had been made under the supervision of Bernard van Orley, allegedly Coxcie's teacher. They were rendered in an early Renaissance style characterized by the hybrid Italianate motifs that were in fashion during the 1520S and 1530s. Upon Orley's death in 1541, Coxcie was appointed his successor as cartoon painter for St. Gudule. The first window for which he was responsible, the window of John III of Portugal in the Chapel of the Holy Sacrament, exhibits a distinct caesura: the architectural decoration is high Renaissance in the Vitruvian or Serlian sense and the human faces and postures are derived directly from the examples of Raphael, Leonardo and Michelangelo. After careful perusal of the documents concerning the production of the windows and study of the stylistic differences between the windows made before and after 1541 (and the related preparatory drawings), one cannot but conclude that Michiel Coxcie was the initiator of the use of the high Renaissance style in the Brussels windows. Hitherto Bernard van Orley has been credited for this, on the assumption that he designed the whole cycle, including all its ornamental details and stylistic features. Although his contribution to the diffusion of the high Renaissance style in Netherlandish art was decisive, Michiel Coxcie's return to the Low Countries should not be regarded as the principal incentive for this process. The general predilection for this style to be found after 1540 could be a consequence of the impressive presence of Charles v and his retinue in the Netherlands during that year. The emperor, who came to quell the Ghent resurrection against the central government, brought with him the style that had been used in the triumphal decorations which accompanied his entries to Italian towns during the 1530S. The influence exercised on prevailing taste by the ephemeral monuments erected on the occasion of imperial entries must have been considerable, as the Brussels windows clearly show.


Increase in investment in fixed assets under the financial crisis was the only way to support high growth rates of the Chinese economy by compensating for slackening in exports. In the near future the strategy will be based on domestic demand boosting. Implementation of the stimulus package along with the Economic Recovery Plan led to high investment in the Northeast China's GRP generated by state-owned enterprises and the construction sector. In the middle term the Financial Crisis an influence on Northeast China's state-owned enterprises will be weak, because the output of the sector is intended for the domestic market.


Cross-sectional data on 2799 subjects from five different populations and longitudinal data on 113 older adults indicate continuing adult bone growth in the second metacarpal. Similar 6-decade increases in the size of the cranium confirm continuing bone growth as a general phenomenon not necesarily related to weightbearing or flexion stress and representing an increase of approximately 10% in skeletal volume concomitant with the major age-associated decrease in skeletal mass.


The various organic extracts from the leaves of Leucas aspera were screened for their antibacterial, antifungal and larvicidal activities against selected bacterial, fungal strains and mosquito larvae of Culex quinquefasciatus. Antimicrobial activity was carried out using disc-diffusion method and MIC of the extract was tested by the broth micro-dilution method. The results revealed that all the extracts showed antibacterial and antifungal activities against selected microbes at 1, 2.5, 5 and 10 mg/disc concentrations. The maximum zone of inhibitions were recorded in dichloromethane (DCM) leaf extract of L. aspera against S. aureus (23.4 ± 2.90 mm), E. coli (20.3 ± 1.56 mm), B. subtilis (17.1 ± 2.04 mm), P. aeruginosa (16.5 ± 1.05 mm), P. vulgaris (16.1 ± 2.56 mm) and K. pneumonia (15.1 ± 3.66 mm) at 10 mg/disc concentration. The DCM extract of L. aspera exhibited significant growth inhibition against T. viride (29.2 ± 2.00 mm), C. albicans (24.4 ± 0.80 mm), A. flavus (22.8 ± 0.36 mm) and E. floccosum (19.5 ± 2.17 mm). The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) ranges between 75.5-425.5 µg/mL and 125-425 µg/mL against bacterial and fungal pathogens, respectively. In addition, DCM extracts of L. aspera showed 100% larvicidal activity against C. quinquefasciatus at 1000 ppm concentration. The biological activities could contribute to the medicinal properties of the plants, and also provide more scientific authentication of traditional medicinal plants to fight against the various infectious diseases


The purpose of this meta‐analysis was to determine the efficacy of peri‐operative interventions in decreasing the incidence of postoperative delirium. An electronic search of four databases was conducted. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta‐Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines were adhered to. We included randomised controlled trials of non‐cardiac surgery with a peri‐operative intervention and that reported postoperative delirium, and identified 29 trials. Meta‐analysis revealed that peri‐operative geriatric consultation (OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.32–0.67) and lighter anaesthesia (OR 2.66, 95% CI 1.27–5.56) were associated with a decreased incidence of postoperative delirium. For the other interventions, the point estimate suggested possible protection with prophylactic haloperidol (OR 0.62, 95% CI 0.36–1.05), bright light therapy (OR 0.20, 95% CI 0.03–1.19) and general as opposed to regional anaesthesia (OR 0.76, 95% CI 0.47–1.23). This meta‐analysis has shown that peri‐operative geriatric consultations with multicomponent interventions and lighter anaesthesia are potentially effective in decreasing the incidence of postoperative delirium.


Analysis of largemouth bass scales, including those from 48 tagged and recaptured fish, revealed that many scales had more 'annuli' than possible for the age of Flint Creek Cooling Reservoir. The mark-recapture data indicated the formation of one supernumerary annulus per year for most bass. Time of formation of true and supernumerary annuli and the causative factors are discussed.

Growth of bass from this reservoir greatly exceeded that reported for thermally unaltered reservoirs of Northwest Arkansas, due to the existence of a nearly year-round growing season, a result of thermal enrichment. The relationship between the ratio of electric power output to reservoir surface area and growth offish was evaluated with reference to published data on cooling reservoirs.


By using the fixed index thoery,the existence of multiple positive solutions for the m-point boundary value problems is given and correspondence results are extended.


There are numerous experiments and systems dedicated to the surveillance of farm animals or pastures. However, many of them are concentrated on only one problem at a time - livestock health, animal movement, pastures classifications, animal predictions, etc. The systems that give solution to some of the problems are few and even they do not cover all of the aspects at once. The proposed information system is a combination of hardware and software components that enables the users, more precisely farmers and vets, to track the whole process of livestock farming. This paper explains the design and development of the software part of the system.


Even if according to all plausible theories of distributive justice, spending more on the care and cure of patients suffering from mental illness should be a priority rather than on marginal life extension, this will not happen. The reason has to do with fear of death and human irrationality. Does the fact that we will not abide by any one of the theories, even if we are convinced that it is true, mean that there is something wrong with it? Does our reluctance to act on the theories mean that they must be false? I think not. Here I avail myself in my argument of moral realism. If there is a truth in the matter, there is no reason to believe that the correct moral theory must be such that we abide by it, once we accept it (theoretically speaking) as true. This means that our unwillingness to live according to the theories does not show that they are unreasonable. The problem lies not with the theories themselves but rather with our unwillingness to abide by them. We are to blame, not abstract moral theory.


MIC-tests in replicate were performed on 286 Salmonella isolates (269 from Danish poultry, including 256 from broiler houses, and 17 from England, mainly from poultry) against five disinfectants used in the poultry industry (glutaraldehyde/benzalkonium chloride compound, formaldehyde, oxidising compound, tar oil phenol, iodophor). Generally, the small variations in MIC could not be associated with previous use of disinfectants, persistence or serotypes. Adaptation studies involving the five disinfectants did not alter the MICs beyond the normal biological variation, i.e. within one doubling dilution.


In Historia Animalium iv 531a3–5, Aristotle draws some sort of analogy between sea-urchins and lanterns–an analogy which, thanks to Jacob Klein, has found its way into the vocabulary of modern invertebrate zoology. At the close of the discussion in his Loeb edition, A. L. Peck observed: 'The Text of the Greek manuscripts therefore still awaits satisfactory interpretation'. Peck's note, his footnote to the translation, and his apparatus criticus went some way toward establishing an understandable text for the passage. What the passage still lacks is a scientifically sensible interpretation.


Wide publicity has been given in America during the past year to Schick's discovery of the skin reaction to diphtheria toxin. This reaction is of interest in the treatment of exposed individuals because of its bearing on the practice of passive immunization. Schick 1 in 1913 published his conclusions and results, which I summarize as follows: Diphtheritic children before a serum injection possess no protection bodies against the toxin of diphtheria. The prophylactic use of antitoxic serum supplies this lack. Many individuals without ever having shown symptoms of a diphtheria infection, already possess antibodies: in the new-born, 80 per cent.; older children, up to 50 and 60 per cent., and adults, up to 90 per cent. Children 2 to 5 years of age gave the highest percentage of positive reactions. For a great number of persons, therefore, the prophylactic injection could be abandoned. Schick finally adopted 0.1 c.c. of a


A classifier based on a syntactic approach is developed for High range resolution (HRR) radar target recognition. An attribute grammar is used to represent the structure of an HRR signature and an error-correcting parsing mechanism is implemented to extract peaks in the HRR profile and suppress the extraneous spikes. In the training phase, an error correcting grammatical inference technique is employed for structural inference of HRR signatures using a positive sample set. Recognition is done using a minimum distance classifier where Levenshtein error measure is used as the distance metric. The error-correcting parsing procedure for peak extraction is used to perform both inference and recognition. Experiments performed using public release MSTAR database indicate that this approach has sufficient discrimination power to perform target detection in HRR signatures.


Many studies have been proposed to improve the accuracy of Deep Neural Network based object detection. Some of them bring an increase in computation, which is a problem in tasks such as autonomous driving that requires high accuracy and low latency. Feature Pyramid Network (FPN) is a structure commonly used in improving the accuracy of object detection. However, it slows down the inference speed because of the high computation. To accelerate the inference while maintaining the accuracy of FPN, this paper proposes dynamic acceleration of object detection with FPN using temporal dependency of object sizes in a video. We modify FPN to have faster inference speed when targeting certain object sizes. By using the previous object sizes, the target object size is determined. The modified FPN is used in a dynamic manner, which speeds up the inference. In this method, we achieve 20.9% faster inference at the cost of a 0.06 mAP drop on the ImageNet VID validation dataset.


Note: Ideal Elementary doesn't yet exist. It is a "concept school" – an evolving model "template" that will be used to build a roadmap of priorities for the four elementary schools served by the Charleston Promise Neighborhood's School Infusion Strategy. The current version will undergo significant edits over the next two months as we receive feedback from the schools, the community, and our partners. –Laura Deaton


How to find balance of interests in patent disputes and technical trial is one of the important plaguing of patent litigation during judgement of patent infringement cases. The Terms Conditions in patent law such as Technical determination problem, specialization of patent trail and lack of professional judges in professional court leads to difficulty in judgment problems solving scientifically between technology and specialization. The tenor of article is providing a reasonable response path for building and exploring of integration technology surveying Identification system for our country in future by describing the gaming on trial of technology and specialization, and comprehensive reflection of technical Judges Source through comprehensive study on technical issues settlement of the United States, Germany and China's Taiwan.


This mixed-methods exploratory research was undertaken to gain insight into how social workers perceive, are affected by, and respond to situations in which they are not able to enact social work ethics, or are asked to facilitate perceived injustice because of workplace restrictions. Seventy-four social workers responded to my online mixed methods survey. In quantitative responses, Likert scaled responses rated participants' frequency and level of distress when encountering ethical dilemmas involving structural racism, classism, cultural insensitivity, sexism, heterosexism, protocols prioritizing funding over client care, protocols interfering with the treatment relationship, and protocols interfering with client self-determination. Participants also rated their sense of burnout related to structurally imposed ethical dilemmas. Both descriptive statistics were derived, and correlations were obtained between demographic information and quantitative response re: frequency and distress. Qualitative text boxes allowed descriptions of experiences with ethical dilemmas in more detail – e.g., information about roles and social work settings in which dilemmas took place, and descriptions of participants' suffering and action in relation to dilemmas. The study opens new avenues for social work as a profession to explore in the interest of preserving its loyalty to the social work code of ethics, and the individual social workers' well-being and professional satisfaction. ETHICAL DILEMMAS IN CLINICAL SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE: HOW ARE SOCIAL WORKERS AFFECTED AND HOW DO WE RESPOND?


This paper adapts and extends the previously published hierarchical modelling approach of multifunction radars as systems that speak a language. We propose Long Short-Term Memory neural networks for learning the emitters' grammar and predicting their emissions. The approach is demonstrated using simulations of an airborne multifunction radar with three different resource management techniques of varying complexity. A comparison with simple prediction strategies shows that a huge improvement in accuracy can be achieved by using Long Short-Term Memory networks for predicting complex radar emitter behaviour.


Small and smart devices are becoming part of man's everyday life. It is not that long time ago when people did't know what Internet is. Nowadays, most of them can not imagine their lives without it. They are creating and adapting different devices so they can keep them close and online. These devices help them to solve everyday tasks, or just keep them entertained during their spare time.

These devices possess invaluable information about their owners, they know their habits, what kind of music they like, their favorite places to go, who are they friends with and what they have in common, and many others. Possessing such information about somebody gives the opportunity to deduce his personally, what his mood is or even predict his future actions.

Big Internet companies such as Google, recognized this trend at the very beginning and started to use these information in their own advantage. On the other hand, it looks like the cognitive science audience fail to catch this early train. In 2012 G. Miller in his article [1] summarizes the use of smart phones in different surveys and predicts the future development of these surveys. Although first surveys using smart devices dates back to year 2001, they are just becoming more widespread in yer 2010. Until this day, the scientific community did not offer any solution to connect these devices, nor grant them the ability to make agreements.

We think, that the age of modern smart devices will develop into the age ambient intelligence, where devices work in concert to support people in carrying out their everyday life activities, tasks and rituals in easy, natural way using information and intelligence that is hidden in the network connecting these devices. Because of this, a multi-agent middleware that is able to run on such devices is needed.

Multi-agent system is a system composed of multiple interacting intelligent agents and their environment. They can be used to solve problems that are difficult or impossible for an individual agent.

The coordination between the agents depends on a sophisticated system of inter-agent communication. The language used by agents for this inter-agent communication is the Agent Communication Language (ACL). The main purpose of this language is to model a suitable framework that allows heterogeneous agents to interact and to communicate with meaningful statements that convey information about their environment or knowledge. Different Agent Communication Languages evolve around the key concept of communicative act from Speech Act Theory proposed by John R. Searle[2]. Speech Act Theory claims, that a communicative act is a special type of action, in this particular case realized by sending a message.

FIPA[3] was established in 1996 as an international non-profit association of companies that agreed to share efforts to produce standard specifications of generic agent technologies. Since then FIPA, has generated a set of specifications that went through three cycles of review: FIPA97, FIPA98 and FIPA2000. The last standardized review is called FIPA2002. The aim of these specifications is to make agent technologies usable across a large number of applications so that a high level of interoperability across applications is achieved. These specifications are focusing more on explicitly specifying how agents communicate and connect and less on specifying components such as agents, humans, data and services that transform, generate, process and store messages that are communicated.

There are several well known FIPA compliant multi-agent middlewares including JADE or SPADE. However, these middlewares have several important deficiency. Among others, they are not suitable for running on small devices and are not multi-platform. Therefore, we propose new multi-agent middleware that is able to run on embedded devices, computers, Macs, iPhones, etc. We implemented it in three very popular languages, Python, Java and C++ to ensure agents are able to work in heterogeneous environments. Agents are using FIPA-ACL language. Our multi-agent middleware is partially FIPA compliant to ensure agents are able to interact with agents from different platforms.

[1] - Miller, G. (2012). The Smartphone Psychology Manifesto. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(3), 221-237. doi:10.1177/1745691612441215
[2] - Searle, J. R. (1979). Expression and Meaning: Studies in the Theory of Speech Acts. essay collection (Vol. 49, p. 187). Cambridge University Press. doi:10.2307/2184707
[3] - www.fipa.org


Industrial clustering is seen by Porter (1990) as a dynamic process of national sectoral linkages and regional proximity that can systematically interact and reinforce each other, and which is central to international competitiveness. This article examines the extent to which • Porter-type industrial clustering is currently present in Irish manufacturing, and its association, if any, with industrial performance. It also comments on the implications for industrial policy. National linkages between manufacturing sectors are not substantial; and spatial concentrations in two urban centres is more an effect of general urban economies than of sectoral linkages. Little association has been found between the clustering that is currently present in Ireland and various aspects of industrial performance.


Our analysis based on the SVAR model of the relationship between the growth and inequality of income in rural China shows that the economic growth can reduce the inequality in income distribution,which is actually a cause of economic growth in rural areas.The IRFs suggest that inequality is conducive to the increase of human capital and investment but it can also cause greater inequality.The rural economic development itself demonstrates a weak trickle-down effect,which is mainly caused by investment outflow due to economic growth.Variance decompositions suggest that in the long run inequality exerts greater influence on economic growth than human capital and investment do.Income growth plays a role of check and balance automatically on income disparities,thus reducing the growth speed of inequality in rural regions.


Drawing heavily on theories about Russia's informal politics, American sanctions were designed to change Russian foreign policy by exploiting political conflict among oligarchs and the state elite; however, after nearly eight years of sanctions, Russian elites seem more united than ever. I propose that Russia's oligarchs—the ruthless self-interested economic elite in Russia's informal political system—might sometimes act as a cohesive oligarchy, particularly when their wealth is threatened from external rather than domestic sources, as has been the case under Western sanctions. Through an in-depth case study on the design and outcome of sanctions, this article seeks to develop a more dynamic theory of Russia's informal politics and explain the apparent cohesion among state and economic elites since 2014 as the result of a politics of wealth defense induced by Western sanctions.


The Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) first proposed the five development concepts of innovation, coordination, green, openness and sharing, and laid out a new blueprint for the development of China's 13th five-year plan and even longer period. Based Geographic Information System (GIS for short) practical, through collecting and reading extensively at home characters and trend of GIS development outlook from abroad well-known academic experts, it put forward the innovation and development of GIS, the coordinated development, green development, open development and the basic concept of Shared development. With the view of the academic community, GIS is closely combined with the characteristics of the development of the Times, and summarizes the development trend of GIS in the new era, so as to facilitate the exchange and learning of students from other professions and related majors.


Purpose: The era of real-time adaptive radiotherapy is here: patients are being treated by CyberKnife (since 2004), Vero (2011) and MLC tracking (2013) technology, with couch tracking planned to be clinical in 2015. We have developed a common set of tools for benchmarking real-time adaptive radiotherapy systems and to test the hypothesis that, across delivery systems and institutions, real-time adaptive radiotherapy improves the dosimetric accuracy over non-adaptive radiotherapy in the presence of realistic tumor motion. Methods: Ten institutions with CyberKnife, Vero, MLC or couch tracking technology were involved in the study. Common materials were anonymized lung and prostate CT and structure sets, patient-measured motion traces (four lung, four prostate) and SBRT planning protocols (lung: RTOG1021, prostate: RTOG0938). The institutions delivered lung and prostate plans to a moving dosimeter programmed with tumor motion. For each trace the plan was delivered twice; with and without motion adaptation, each measurement was compared to the static dosimeter dose and the percentage of failed points for γ-tests recorded. Results: Eleven measurement sets were obtained for this study; two CyberKnife, two Vero, five MLC and two couch tracking sets. For all lung traces all sets show improved dose accuracy from a mean 2%/2mm γ-failrate of 1.6% with adaptation and 14.7% with no motion correction(p<0.001). For all prostate traces the mean 2%/2mm γ-failrate was 1.6% with adaptation and 17.4% with no motion correction (p<0.001). The difference between the four adaptive systems was small with an average 2%/2mm γ-failrate of <3% for all systems with adaptation for lung and prostate. Conclusion: A common set of tools has been developed for benchmarking real-time adaptive radiotherapy systems and a multi-platform multi-institutional study performed. The results show the systems all account for realistic tumor motion accurately and performed to a similar high standard, with real-time adaptation significantly outperforming non-adaptive methods.


The interest in searching an alternative to the condition of "waste" for spent coffee is continuously growing in the scientific community. Indeed, the high content of polyphenols, caffeine, and tannins in this residue can potentially lead to pollution for water and soil, since they show toxicity for various plants, microorganisms, and aquatic organisms. Nevertheless, these same antioxidants find wide applications in the food, cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries, especially caffeine and chlorogenic acid, thanks to their ability to prevent or slow down the oxidation of the substrate.In the context of active packaging, the use of compounds recovered from spent coffee grounds is promising, since they allow extending the shelf-life of food while maintaining its sensory and nutritional properties.In this work, High Pressure and Temperature Extraction process was used to extract antioxidants from spent coffee grounds. The obtained extract was used for the fabrication of zein-based films intended for active packaging applications. Biopolymer films loaded with spent coffee grounds extract were prepared using two different techniques: solvent casting and electrospinning. Films were characterized in terms of morphology and antiradical power of the released active components.Considering the large amount of exhausted coffee produced annually and the global extension of the coffee industry, the proposed application could represent a profitable alternative to conventional waste disposal, as well as an advantage for the environment and the food industry.


NCI Library Guidelines for theses and final year projects This section contains information provided by the School of Business in relation to Thesis/Dissertation Submission


approved: ______________________________________________________ Dr. Lizhong Chen Urban green space is associated with multiple physical and mental health outcomes. Several benefits of green space, such as stress reduction and attention restoration, are dependent on visual perception of green space exposures. However, traditional green space exposure measures do not capture street-level exposures. In this project, we apply deep learning models to measure green space in street view imagery. We train Faster R-CNN model on PasadenaUrbanTree dataset and equip it with the ability to detect trees, which is then used to count the number of trees in the test images. We also employ a PSPNet model that pretrained on ade20k dataset to do semantic segmentation on street view images and compute the portion of green space. Combining the outcomes from object detection and semantic segmentation, the green space in street view imagery can be measured quantitatively.


The illiteracy of Prophet Muhammad always becomes academically controversy past and now. It causes some interpretation of ummiy definition. Al-Qur'an has talked about ummiy six times, in different redaction and context. It is either in singular form like ummiy or plural as ummiyyun/ummiyyin. It appears in QS. al-A'raf: 157-158, QS. ali Imran: 20/75, QS. al-Baqarah: 78, and the last QS. al-Jumu'ah: 2.
In this research, the researcher will use library research. In analyzing data, researcher only focuses on discussing the verses that explain ummiy. Furthermore, researcher wants to get deeply understanding of the meaning by using method comparative (muqoronah). The purpose is to know several aspects related to like asbab al-Nuzul, munasabah ayah, vocabulary, etc.
Moreover, here researcher will use the book of interpretation by three interpreters who have different era, background and method. The first one is Ibnu Katsir (1258-1286 M). He was famous as scholar of last period (mutaakhirin). In interpreting Al-Qur'an, he used tahlili method, muqarin and tafsir bil ma'tsur. Secondly is Sayyid Quthb (1906-1966M). His book—Tafsir Fi Zhilalil Qur'an—is often used as reference by scholars past and now. His ability in language and literature are the uniqueness of his book. The last is Quraish Shihab (1944). His famous interpretation in Indonesian, and so far considered as objective interpreter. From those three interpreters will make different result of term ummiy.
In general, the term of ummiy in al-Qur'an has some meaning. Firstly, about the invitation of faith, missionary follows prophet. Secondly is based on definition which means no ability in reading and writing. However, it does not mean uneducated. In other side, the root of term ummiy can be ummah, which means at that time Arab people rarely can read and write. Although, prophet is called as ummiy—no ability to read and write—his ability in science and knowledge is from Allah directly. Al-Qur'an which revealed to him, which the authenticity was guided.
We are required to follow the Prophet's character and the nature of the ummiy. Like hablumminallah, relationship to God, which we are required to continue always being in state of faith and keeping Aqidah. Then hablumminannas, human relations. We should always be an honest, trustworthy, keeping promises, and other goodness to fellow humans, as has been taught by Rasulullah PBUH. Both are in the field muamalah (buying and selling) and when socializing to the public


The purpose of this study was to analyze thequality of public services provided by the health center Bangkinang I Kampar regency. Theapproach taken by this research is a qualitative approach. The data collected is not the form ofnumbers, but the data comes from a script interviews, field notes, personal documents, notes,memos and other resumes, so that is the goal of this qualitative study was to portray the empiricalreality behind the phenomenon in depth, detailed and tutas. The results showed that in manyways the service provided does not seem to satisfy their customers. Still common complaints ofpatients every time they go to there.


The background of this research is that the independence of children aged 4-5 years is still low because of the teacher's lack of attention to the independence of children aged 4-5 years and the habits that are applied by the teacher are not consistent. The purpose of this study was to determine the independence of children aged 4-5 years, before and after the habituation method was applied and to determine the effect of the habituation method on children's independence. This research was conducted at Kindergarten Nurul Hikmah NW Pepao NTB, with a total of 25 children using the habituation method. The method used in this study is an experimental method with a one-group pretest-posttest pre-experimental design. Data collection techniques are through observation, and documentation. Data analysis was performed by normality test and hypothesis testing. The results of the pretest before the habituation method was applied were said to be still low, this was evidenced by the Kolmogorov Smirnov score of 0.196 > 0.05 which indicated that the independence of children aged 4-5 years was still relatively low in the three characteristics of independence found, namely having self-confidence, being responsible responsibility, and not depend on others. Posttest results after the habituation method was applied, the independence of children aged 4-5 years had increased with a Kolmogorov Smirnov value of 0.745 > 0.05 which indicated that the independence of children aged 4-5 years had increased in the three characteristics of children's independence, namely having self-confidence, responsible, and not depend on others. The results of the influence of the habituation method in training the independence of children aged 4-5 years can be seen from the habituation method coefficient value of 0.785 and a significant value of 0.021. While the results of the F hypothesis test are 6.136 > 3.39 the calculated F value is greater than the table F value. The coefficient of determination ( ) is 21%. From the results of these data it can be concluded that the habituation method has a positive and significant effect in training the independence of children aged 4-5 years in Kindergarten Nurul Hikmah NW Pepao NTB.


Fly ash is a kind of solid waste generated in high temperature combustion of coal at coal-fired power plants.Fly ash is also potential resource for extracting alumina,and for producing ceramics,glass-ceramics,temperature refractory matters and other high value-added products.The iron impurity in fly ash is one of the main factors to cause poor property and performance of the final products.This paper conducted experimental studies on decarburization and iron removal of high-aluminum fly ash of Jungar power plant in the Inner Mongolia.The results showed that carbon can be removed completely from fly ash after 2 h calcination at 900℃;the optimum iron removal condition,which gives more than 80% of iron removal rate,is 20% hydrochloric acid-leaching,liquid-solid ratio 5∶1,and stirring for 60 min at 80℃.


Abstract INTRODUCTION: Whilst most patients with PLGG will survive, varying morbidities derived from patient,tumour & treatment characteristics can afflict life-long disabling functional impairments. No PLGG studies have evaluated potential prognostic factors for important functional outcomes. METHODS: We performed retrospective analysis of all children diagnosed with PLGG at GOSH 1980-2021.Review of medical notes recorded patient demographics,tumour characteristics & treatment data.Functional outcomes included endocrine,educational,visual (in OPG),auditory & physical function.Multivariate regression analysis(p<0.05) examined associations between biological prognostic variables & functional outcomes. RESULTS: 814 patients were diagnosed with PLGG.731(90%) had 5-years follow-up from diagnosis & were included for functional analysis.Median age at diagnosis 7 years(0-17.9); 50.6%Male,12.2% NF1.Tumours were cerebral(27%),cerebellar(27%),hypothalamo-chiasmatic(19%),brainstem(7%),or other(20%);with disseminated disease in 5%.Pilocytic Astrocytoma constituted 46%.Molecular profiling of 133 revealed 5%BRAFV600E mutation,42%BRAF-KIAA1549 fusion.Treatments included: Surgery(70%),Chemotherapy(20%),& Radiotherapy(21%).20-year-OS 94%,PFS 76%;median follow-up 16 years(5-38). Documented neurocognitive deficiency(30%) associated with chemotherapy(HR2.36,95%CI 1.49-3.75,P<0.001), radiotherapy(HR 2.25,95%CI1.5-3.36,P<0.001) & male gender(HR 0.68,95%CI 0.49-0.95,P0.02)as independent poor-prognostic risk-factors.Chemotherapy(HR 5.7,95%CI1.4-22.3,P0.01) & radiotherapy(HR6.77,95%CI2.1-22.0,P0.001) were independent risk-factors for requirement of Educational-Health-Care-Plans(25%).9% attended specialised schools. Combined-limb-MRC-grade <18/20(6.4%) was independently-associated with receiving chemotherapy(HR 2.77,95%CI1.29-5.93,P0.01),& radiotherapy(HR 6.28,95%CI3.25-12.15,P<0.001).6% mobilised by wheelchair.Resolution of seizures occurred in 68% of 176 following PLGG treatment. Single/multiple endocrinopathies occurred in 9.3%/11%.Presence of 2+Endocrinopathies was associated with chemotherapy(HR6.82,95%CI4.0-14.4,P<0.001), radiotherapy(HR7.81,95%CI4.3-14.3,P<0.001),NF1(HR2.9,95%CI1.3-6,P0.01),OPGs(HR 1.3,95%CI1.2-1.5,P<0.001);with younger diagnostic-age(HR0.80,95%CI0.74-0.87,P<0.001) & initial surgical resection(HR0.3,95%CI0.15-0.7,P0.03) independent protective factors. Receiving chemotherapy/radiotherapy were independent prognostic-factors for Post-PLGG-treatment Brock grade 1+ hearing impairments(2.2%).Visual outcomes in 146 OPG patients:blindness in atleast 1 eye(4.8%),registered visual impairment(9.6%),& visual-aid use(6.2%). CONCLUSIONS: Whilst overall outcomes for PLGG are optimistic, some patients have significant functional impairments detrimental to quality-of-life.Further evaluation of longer-term functional outcomes and prognostic associations is justified.


Healthcare professionals recommending dietary changes to patients often find that institutional settings—businesses, universities, long-term care facilities, correctional institutions, among others—may not provide the healthful foods that healthcare professionals recommend. Moreover, such institutions encounter an increasing diversity of dietary restrictions, based on allergies, intolerances, religious mandates, or other reasons, that may be challenging to satisfy. To address these issues, experts in health, dietetics, culinary arts, religion, and ethics developed a simple set of guidelines that aim to meet the widest possible range of dietary needs. Three culinary teams then used these guidelines to create "Universal Meals"—simple recipes that were then adapted to larger production sizes for institutional use. The healthfulness of representative sets of meals drawn from these recipes was assessed using the Alternative Healthy Eating Index-2010 and found to be superior to that of a meal pattern based on National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data.


factors vary depending of the exposure to risk (ie, length of ventilation).8 Our opinion on antimicrobial prophylaxis for VAP has been clearly stated in a recent editorial,9 and a randomized clinical trial to assess the effect of single-dose antibiotic administration as prophylaxis for VAP is highly recommended. Unfortunately, such evidence is lacking. Dr. Schultz suggests not using antimicrobial prophylaxis for percutaneous tracheotomies. However, as indicated before, prophylaxis for surgical neck procedures in intubated patients with colonized tracheal mucosa has a level 1 evidence. Until such studies are available, the extremely high incidence of VAP in the first days after the procedure, the distribution of pathogens, and the low predictive value of tracheal aspirates prior to tracheostomy1 suggest that prescription of a single dose of an antipseudomonal agent prior to the percutaneous tracheotomy is the most pertinent policy.


The purpose of this study was to investigate Iranian EFL learners' opinions about effective oral corrective feedback practices with regard to their level of anxiety. To this end, two self-reporting questionnaires were used to collect the required data. The rating scale was a five point Likert scale. The results of chi-square test indicated that there were significant differences between the two groups regarding their opinions' about effective error treatment practices. The implications of this study can be that teachers should take into account EFL learners' perceptions along with their anxiety levels when they embark on correcting their oral errors.


A silicon MIS-structure prepared with thin layers of the super-ionic conductor LaF3 and Pd is used to detect hydrogen. The sensor is able to detect hydrogen in a concentration range from below one ppm to the lower flammable limit in air which is 4 vol.-%. The chip operates at room temperature which results in an extremely low energy consumption compared to other hydrogen sensors. Only once per day a short heating pulse is necessary to reactivate the sensor chip. In cooperation with the BAM, a long-term experiment was carried out. The duration of the measurement was about three months, with a hydrogen exposure every two weeks. The sensor signal remained stable over the measured period.


Bluetooth uses TDD (time division duplex) to arrange the transmission slots so that it can avoid collisions. Bluetooth has a master-slave configuration, called a piconet. The link polling policy adopted by a master may significantly influence the delay and throughput of a piconet. In this paper, we propose an enhanced efficient and QoS (quality of service)-aware MAC (medium access control) scheduling algorithm based on the bandwidth utilization. We consider Bluetooth packets of different type combinations (DHl/DH3/DH5/DMl/DM3/DM5) to be exchanged by a master-slave pair that can properly reflect the traffic of the pair. By selecting a link with high bandwidth efficiencies, the precious wireless bandwidth can be better utilized. Simulation results show that our algorithm demonstrates better performance and can be extended to satisfy QoS requirements of various applications.


In preparing the next generation of business professionals, educators need to take seriously the responsibility of empowering students with tools to assist them in their pursuits. One area of interest is leadership. There is an increase in demand for colleges and universities to develop leadership skills in students. Organizations value leadership skills in the workplace and they expect that colleges and universities will educate students in the area of leadership and provide them with necessary leadership skills. Despite the broad horizon of leadership for helping to develop future leaders, it may be crucial for educators to explore the idea of student gender differences within leadership. The purpose of this study is two-fold with respect to leadership. First the researches will explore the differences of leadership perceptions related to a student's gender. Secondly, the researchers will discuss the implications for educators, administrators, and researchers. Findings, conclusions, and recommendations will be presented.


LOVTE, a new epic project from members of Polish bands DESZCZ, MOJAPOŁOWA, and ASTRID LINDGREN, is a road map of all that works in the marriege of ...


In this paper a current controller based on space voltage vector PWM scheme is presented for induction motor drives. The design consists of a modified continuous state feedback control. This controller guarantees global asymptotic stability for the system as well as robustness against parameters variations and external torque disturbances. Complete theoretical analysis and a simulation example are given to illustrate our approach.


This thesis deals with the famous composer Richard Wagner. The writers Franz Werfel
and Friedrich Nietzsche wrote about him in his works. I would like to summarize the
criticismus of Friedrich Nietzsche and Franz Werfel and to compare their image of
Wagner in their works.


Coproporphyrin‐I (CP‐I) in plasma is a sensitive and specific endogenous probe for phenotyping organic anion transporting polypeptides 1B (OATP1B, encoded by SLCO1B). A few small‐scale studies suggested that plasma CP‐I concentration is affected by OATP1B1 polymorphism, but detailed studies are lacking. In this large‐scale study, we measured plasma CP‐I concentrations in 391 subjects from the Japanese general population, and evaluated the relationship between plasma CP‐I concentrations and OATP1B1 polymorphisms to further assess the utility of plasma CP‐I concentrations as an endogenous OATP1B probe. Plasma CP‐I concentrations were 0.45 ± 0.12, 0.47 ± 0.16, 0.47 ± 0.20, 0.50 ± 0.15, 0.54 ± 0.14, and 0.74 ± 0.31 ng/mL in participants with OATP1B1*1b/*1b (n = 103), *1a/*1b (n = 122), *1a/*1a (n = 40), *1b/*15 (n = 74), *1a/*15 (n = 41), and *15/*15 (n = 11), respectively, showing an ascending rank order with significant difference (P < 0.0001). Post hoc analysis revealed significant increases in plasma CP‐I concentration in OATP1B1*1b/*15 (P = 0.036), *1a/*15 (P = 0.0005), and *15/*15 (P = 0.0003) groups compared with the OATP1B1*1b/*1b group. There was no significant difference among OATP1B genotypes in plasma concentration of 3‐carboxy‐4‐methyl‐5‐propyl‐2‐furanpropanoic acid, a uremic toxin reported to decrease OATP1B activity in vivo. These findings confirm the utility of plasma CP‐I concentrations as an endogenous biomarker for phenotyping of OATP1B activity. Plasma CP‐I concentration is potentially useful for the study of drug‐drug interactions via OATP1B or individual dose adjustment of OATP1B substrates.


............................................................................................................................. iv Dedication ............................................................................................................................v Acknowledgments.............................................................................................................. vi Preface.............................................................................................................................. viii Chapter 1: Introduction 1. Researcher's Role ..................................................................................1 2. Statement of the Problem .......................................................................2 3. Purpose of the Study ..............................................................................2 4. Media Literacy .......................................................................................2 5. Media Education ....................................................................................3 6. New Media Literacy ..............................................................................3 7. Multimodality ........................................................................................5 8. International Students in Higher Education ...........................................5 9. Social Media ..........................................................................................6 10. Research Methodology ..........................................................................8 11. Research Questions ................................................................................9 12. Assumptions .........................................................................................10 13. Thesis Overview ..................................................................................12 Chapter 2: Review of the Literature 1. Student Benefits Inside and Outside the Classroom ............................14 2. Educator Benefits when Fostering Media Literacy .............................18 3. Educator Challenges when Fostering Media Literacy .........................22 4. Using Media Literacy to Increase Racial Awareness ..........................25 5. Ideas and Resources for Media Literacy Integration ...........................32 Chapter 3: Introduction to the Curriculum 1. Specific Areas of the Curriculum ........................................................40 2. Preface for Teachers ............................................................................41 3. Students Goals and Objectives.............................................................44 4. Description of Learners, Level and Purpose ........................................46 5. Goals of the Curriculum.......................................................................47 6. TESOL Video and Digital Media Statement of Purpose .....................48 7. NCTE Resolution on Promoting Media Literacy Background ............49 8. NCTE Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Media Literacy Education .............................................................................................50 9. NCTE Position Statement on Multimodal Literacies ..........................51 10. Book Rationale.....................................................................................52 11. Cultural Sensitivity ..............................................................................55 12. Theme ..................................................................................................55


This paper explores the important but neglected role of infectious diseases in shaping demographic and economic outcomes in historical times. It is widely appreciated in the development literature that the infectious disease burden has (1) a significant correlation with patterns of development and (2) a strong geographic structure, especially in the case of vector-borne diseases such as malaria. Yet, measuring the role of the infectious disease environment in the past is challenging due to the lack of reliable evidence. In consequence, an important variable in economic history remains underexplored. To address this challenge, we have compiled unique historical datasets that allow us to proxy for the malaria-specific mortality burden in pre-modern Italy and England at regional, sub-regional, and micro-scales. Further, we have been able to assemble historical data on female age at first marriage (FAFM) for these same regions. FAFM is a critically important demographic parameter; late FAFM is the central feature of the "European Marriage Pattern" (EMP), a fundamental contrast between the demographic patterns of northwestern European societies and the rest of the world in preindustrial times. We hypothesize that the disease environment was a significant determinant of marriage patterns, specifically that higher disease burdens required earlier FAFM. Our data show a strong correlation between malaria burden and FAFM and offer a novel theory for the origins of the EMP. To further isolate the causal relationship, we employ an exogenous topography-derived measure of the disease environment, as well as a model based on bordering parishes in Kent, England. These empirical analyses all show strong support for our hypothesis. Given the potential (though debated) implications of the EMP for economic growth, our results also demonstrate a mechanism through which infectious disease environment might help to account for patterns of economic development and divergence. JEL: N33, N93, Z1, J12, O57


Abstract An analysis to predict the transient run-up response of permanent magnet synchronous motors is drived based on the d and q axes model. It is based on the segmental reluctance approach with the addition of permanent magnets in the rotor. The computed simulation of the run-up characteristics are provided for variations in the values of stator resistance and permanent magnet excitation. A series of test results of a 3-phase, 2-pole, 1 hp permanent magnet motor are presented In order to verify the theoretical analysis. Effects of stator resistance on the air gap flux are also recorded experimentally. A reasonably close agreement between the measured and calculated values is obtained


Stock price is stock market price prevailing in the stock exchange where stock
prices will rise and decrease is influenced by the demand and supply of investors
to the shares. The high and low stock prices reflect the performance of the
company. This study aims to examine the effect of operating cash flows on stock
prices with earnings persistence as intervening variable and the effect of
operating cash flow and book tax differences on earnings persistence. The
population of this research is property, real estate and construction development
company which listed in Indonesia Stock Exchange during 2014-2016. The data
are collected using purposive sampling method. The data analysis method using
descriptive statistics, classical assumptions and multiple linear regressions
extended by path analysis. The test results show operating cash flow and book tax
difference does not influence the earnings persistence, operating cash flow does
not influence the stock price. The test result using path analysis show that
operating cash flow has no influence on stock price through earnings persistence
so that earnings persistence has no charge of information to stock price causing
no influence between operating cash flow to stock price with earnings persistence
as intervening variable and investors don't differentiate between the information
contained in the earnings and only see earnings in whole.
Keywords: Stock Price, Earnings Persistence, Operating Cash Flow and Book
Tax Difference.


Objective To disscuss the renoprotective actions of the sympathetic blocking agent and renal denervation in the rat renal ablation model.Methods 40 wistar rats were randomly devided into 4 groups.The first group served as negative control by sham operating.The second one as positive control by 5/6 subtotal nephrectomy(SNX).The third one was underwent SNX,The fourth group underwent SNX and resection of dorsal roots,i.e.rhizotomy.The negative control,the positive control group and the fourth group were administrated tap water,the third group was given sympathetic blocking agent for 8 weeks.Results At the end of the study,the blood pressure of the rats was 118.67±13.34 mmHg in the negative control group,173.49±16.48 mmHg in the positive control group,115.67±15.53 mmHg in the third group and 107.99±12.35 mmHg in the fourth group,respectively.Albuminuria was 6.19±2.70,35.35±4.58,16.49±3.77,14.23±0.69 mg/24 h,respectively.The glomerulosclerosis of the third and fourth group were better than that of the others.The lowest indices for collagen Ⅲ,collagen Ⅳ and AT1-R were found in the third and fourth group(P 0.05).Conclusion The sympathetic blocking agent and renal denervation can protect the remanent kidney injury.


The purpose of this work is to study the best number of layer with the higher impact energy using Glass Fibre Reinforced Polymer (GFRP). The number of layers used in this study was 25, 33, 41, and 49. The impact test was performed using Single Stage Gas Gun (SSGG) for each layers given above with different bullets such as blunt, hemispherical and conical bullets. The gas gun pressure was set to 5, 10, 15 and 20 bar. All of the signals captured from the impact test were recorded using a ballistic data acquisition system. The correlation between the impact energy in terms of number of layer and type of bullet from this test are presented and discussed. It can be summarise that as the number of layer increases, impact energy also increases. In addition, from the results, it was observed that by using different types of bullets (blunt, hemispherical, conical), there is only a slight difference in values of energy absorbed by the specimen.


The purpose of this paper is to project how tourism sector is strength for Indian economy. Developing countries like India tourism has become one of the inevitable sectors of the economy, contributing to a large proportion to GDP and employment opportunities. It is one of the fastest growing service industry in our country with great potentials for further expansion and diversification.Tourism industry plays a pivotal role in our country's economic growth. It helps significantly to the country for creatingemploymentopportunities to large number of people. Moreover, it is also one of the important engine to attract more foreign exchangeswith its potential. India should focus to have liberal policies, relaxation in taxes, comprehensive package and so on to triggertourist and foreign investment. There is also a need to increase government's role to make India sign in tourism and established in world market. Because India has rich source in tourism for the establishment of the brand. Moreover the backbone of India's tourism sector is Incredible India campaign which helps to make tourism better.


The flow of money from members of diasporas and their descendants back to their homelands is significant. In fact, such investments, when made in the form of loans aimed at sustaining entrepreneurship, can contribute to the economic development of the diaspora's home country. Given the increasing relevance of crowdlending as a method of entrepreneurial finance in developing countries, what are the factors that motivate diasporans to invest through online crowdlending instead of through more traditional options, and what barriers hinder them from doing so? We present a theoretical analysis that draws on the existing literature on crowdfunding and transnational entrepreneurship combined with field interviews with three founders of online diasporic platforms. We discuss the variables that must be taken into account when explaining the motivations of diasporans and the barriers hindering their engagement in online microlending. Several areas are highlighted for future theoretical and empirical research to study this largely under-researched phenomenon.


BACKGROUND
Very large pelvic cysts in young adolescents present a challenge in diagnosis and management. When such cysts present shortly after menarche, measure > 20 cm and appear simple on ultrasound or MRI, the diagnosis is likely a benign paraovarian cyst.

CASES
Three young adolescents within 2 years of menarche presented with abdominal distention and masses. On ultrasound and MRI each was confirmed to be a large simple cyst ranging from 20-26 cm in diameter. In each case the simple cyst was drained through a very small incision, allowing the decompressed cyst and adnexa to be externalized and a cystectomy to be performed. The final pathology in each case was consistent with a paraovarian cyst.

CONCLUSION
The peak incidence of paraovarian cysts is in the fourth and fifth decades of life; however, larger paraovarian cysts are more common in postpubertal teenagers. This is likely due to the fact that smaller asymptomatic cysts go unrecognized until later in life when they are found incidentally. Ultrasound is helpful in making the diagnosis in a young patient. Such cysts are unlikely to be malignant, and the least invasive approach possible in a young patient is preferable.


The purpose of this study was to know the implementation of Awig-awig as a rule of law towards protected forest management based on local wisdom in Selat Pandan Banten Village, Buleleng Regency. The method applied in this study was descriptive qualitative method, using data from villagers who live around protected forest areas, Pecalang Jagawana (man in charge of protecting the forest based on local wisdom), and Forest security officers of Forestry and Plantation Service of Buleleng Regency through observation and in-depth interviews. The results showed that the implementation of awig-awig in managing protected forest was realized through the formation of Pecalang Jagawana as the local wisdom in Selat Pandan Banten, Buleleng Regency that have responsibility for ensuring forest order and security from several human activities that destruction of forest sustainability. This in in accordance with Law No. 32 of 2009 on the Protection and Management of the Environment, Law No.41 of 1999 on Forestry, and Law No.18 of 2013 on Prevention and Eradication of Forest Destruction.


We have characterized the dynamic of carriers in photoconductors which are already located in microwave devices. We particularly examined the trapping time and trap emptying time of Low Temperature grown CdTe. A trapping time of 1.6 ps was found from both optoelectronic cross correlation and Time Resolved Reflectance measurements. Trap emptying time is usually investigated by pump and probe optical transmission technique that gives the dynamic of non linear absorption. We have used instead a new method called Time Resolved Reflectance Close to Brewster's Angle in order to study non linear absorption occurring in photoconductive material already processed in microwave structure. We developed a model to estimate the trap emptying time of LT CdTe. We found a trap emptying time of 0.58 ps which is lower than the trap time 1.6 ps. These parameters make CdTe a good candidate to optical/microwave conversion in high bit rate communications or as a sampling gate in a sample and hold circuits.


Although geothermal energy is one of the youngest types of renewable energy, it is certainly auspicious. While other renewable energy sources depend on the sun, geothermal energy originates in the earth's interior. This underground heat generation is caused mostly by the radioactive decay of persistent isotopes. On average, the temperature increases 3°C every 100 m of depth. This increase in temperature with depth is called the geothermal gradient. Therefore, 99 percent of Earth is hotter than 1.000°C, while 99 percent of the remaining 1 percent is even hotter than 100°C. At depths of about 1 kilometer, temperatures of 35 – 40°C can be achieved. In areas of geological anomalies, such as the Oberrheintalgraben or the Red Sea, geothermal gradients of about 6°C / 100 m can be found, which allows economically viable use of deep geothermal systems.


Abstract Internet marketing requires a personalized marketing strategy. In this study, the application of data mining in personalized Internet marketing was studied. Based on the mining algorithm, a personalized marketing method was designed. Through the calculation of frequent closed item sets and support counts of positive and negative samples, the interval with a high success rate for marketing was obtained. With performance analysis, it was found that the success rate of the marketing method proposed in this study improved 8% compared with the traditional marketing method and had a better performance under the smaller interval number and smaller minimum success number. After applying the designed method in telecommunication enterprise A, it was found that after adopting the marketing method of this study, the marketing success rate of enterprise A increased from 2.72 to 6.31%, which indicated the effectiveness of the method. The research results of this study verify the role of data mining algorithms in Internet marketing, which is conducive to the further application of mining algorithms in personalized marketing and innovation of business modes.


Premise of research. Change in base number of chromosomes per nucleus is usually believed to result from whole-genome duplication or from duplication or elimination of a single chromosome (aneuploidy). However, chromosome numbers can also change via mechanisms with no gain or loss of nuclear DNA, such as fusion or fission of chromosomes. Methodology. We previously determined amount of DNA per nucleus (2C values) using flow cytometry of leaf tissue. We tested whether Cycadales (cycad) chromosome numbers are correlated with these 2C values using ordinary least squares (OLS) and phylogenetic generalized least squares (PGLS) regression. Pivotal results. Regardless of branch length estimation technique and evolutionary model, OLS and PGLS yielded no statistically significant relationship between chromosome number and genome size in our analysis of 22 species, encompassing all 11 extant cycad genera. Conclusions. Within cycad genera, chromosomal fissions or fusions are much more likely than large additions or deletions of nuclear DNA.


Background: Empirical evidence shows that healthy individuals with high schizotypy (HS), who show schizophrenia-like characteristics, present similar but attenuated social and emotional disturbances to patients with schizophrenia. Altered glutamatergic neurotransmission in several limbic areas including the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) has been demonstrated in patients with schizophrenia and individuals at ultra-high risk for psychosis and is associated with abnormalities in brain activation during several cognitive tasks. However, despite animal models of psychosis suggesting an association between prefrontal glutamatergic function and corticolimbic response to stress/emotion, the interactions between these abnormalities in man remain unclear. We examined changes in brain glutamate in subjects with HS and whether any such changes are related to corticolimbic response to emotional processing. Methods: Healthy subjects (n = 48) were selected based on their Oxford and Liverpool Inventory of Feelings and Experiences (O-LIFE) rating. Functional response during an emotional perception task was measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging, and glutamate levels in the ACC using proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Results: While viewing emotional pictures, HS individuals showed greater activation than did subjects with low schizotypy (LS) in the caudate, and marginally in the ACC, hippocampus, medial prefrontal cortex, and putamen (P < .05 family-wise error corrected). Within the HS, there was a significant negative association between levels of ACC glutamate and striatal, amygdalar, and prefrontal response to emotion (P < .05 family-wise error corrected), which was not present in the LS group. Conclusion: Our results demonstrate that emotional hyperresponsivity in people with high schizotypy is related to changes in glutamate levels, adding to accumulating evidence that abnormal neurophysiology and neurochemistry within a prefrontal-temporal–striatal system associated with emotional dysfunction may be central to vulnerability for psychosis.