Island operation of distributed generation source without possibility of regulation of the generation power, with part of local network grid, is unwanted operation situation which can happen when one of the switching devices switches out and disconnects part of local grid, including distributed generation source, from the main grid supply. Such unwanted operation situation imposes danger for personnel safety, prevents the fault arc to extinguish during automatic re-closing dead time, allows switching onto unsyncronized part of network, and reduces power quality. Typical example for distributed generation source without regulation, which requires some kind of islanding protection, are power plants composed of grid connected inverter units, like photovoltaic power plants. Standardized islanding protections are integrated within inverters. Probability of island operation depends on balance of generation power and load power, where neither one of the values is constant. Both load power and generation power are independent variables, i.e. probability functions which can be derived from long-term measurements in operation. Real example of one of the largest solar power plants in Croatia is used for risk probability assesment of island operation and to justify the need for further research of this phenomenon and for investment in additional island protection.


Report presenting the aerodynamic characteristics of the NACA 0012 airfoil section at a range of angles of attack from 0 to 180 degrees. Data were obtained at two different Reynolds numbers depending on whether the airfoil surfaces were smooth or had roughness applied at the leading and trailing edges. After the stall with the rounded edge of the airfoil foremost, a second lift-coefficient peak was obtained at an angle of attack of about 45 degrees.


The antlions are members of the family Myrmeleontidae, the most diverse family within Neuroptera. The antlions are known by their unique behavior of the predatory larvae, such as hiding under loose sand and soil or building conical pitfalls to ambush and capture prey. The antlion tribe Myrmeleontini is a diverse tribe within Myrmeleontidae consisting of only pitfall builders. Recent phylogenetic works of Myrmeleontidae all suggest an unclear relationship among species within Myrmeleontini, with a species-rich genus Myrmeleon being paraphyletic. The present study focuses on the Myrmeleontini species in Taiwan, furthermore explore the diversity of Myrmeleontini in Taiwan, also the first to explore the diversity of several associated islands: Kinmen, Penghu and Lanyu. By collecting specimens throughout Taiwan and examine materials in collections, a total of nine species of Myrmeleontini are identified, belonging to two genera: Baliga and Myrmeleon, two additional species that was previously recorded in Taiwan: Baliga brunneipennis (Esben-Petersen) and Myrmeleon bore (Tjeder), are not collected or examined in collections. Of the nine species, Myrmeleon bimaculatus Yang is recorded in Taiwan for the first time, as well as a first recording of the larval stage. Both adults and larvae of the nine species are redescribed, also provided with detailed images and identification keys. Baliga alticola comb. nov. is proposed by comparing morphological characters. A DNA analysis of COI gene of the Taiwanese species and additional sequences from GenBank are conducted, supporting the monophyly of the Taiwanese species, as well as suggesting Myrmeleon heppneri Miller Stange being a possible synonym of Myrmeleon solers Walker and the distribution of Baliga asakurae (Okamoto) in China and Vietnam. In addition, several morphological characters of Myrmeleontini are compare for the first time, such as the arrangement of the larval abdominal digging setae, wing shape, terminalia and male genitalia. As combination of these characters can separate the Taiwanese species into groups, I proposed these characters can be useful in discriminating the relationship among species within the tribe Myrmeleontini and to define different species groups or genera in future phylogenetic works.


The article analyzes the present construction market and indicates the problem of demanding an excessive low price during the public bidding process and the series of questions caused by it.Then it puts forward the countermeasures to overcome it.It will definitely guide the practical work.


Abstract The purpose of this experiment was to determine the effect of expert knowledge and metacognitive knowledge on strategy acquisition using an ecologically valid task. Fourth- and fifth-grade boys were poor readers and baseball experts were trained in the use of a reading strategy (asking why questions), with instruction being embedded in either baseball or nonbaseball stories. The boys were tested for strategy use, recall, and accuracy of monitoring 1 to 3 days after training, then again after 2 to 3 weeks later. Boys trained using baseball stories demonstrated greater strategy use at both post-tests than boys trained using nonbaseball stories, indicating that knowledge base aided in the acquisition of a reading comprehension strategy. Boys with higher declarative metacognition scores demonstrated better strategy acquisition and increased literal recall. All types of recall were higher for baseball stories.


Investigations into the effects of systemic and local factors in diseases of the periodontium have been numerous and comprehensive. The part that local irritating factors play in leading to periodontal diseases has been discussed by such authors as Glickman,1 Orban,2 Robinson,3 and Thoma.4 The role of such systemic factors in periodontal disease as hormonal disturbances, avitaminoses, diabetes, blood dyscrasias, and nutritional deficiencies have been reported by Boyle,5 Radusch,6 Orban,7 Sandler and Stahl,8-9 Robinson,3 Baird,10 and Laurenza."1 Selye12, 13 introduced the theory of stress as a determining factor in the causation of diseases, and his work has been supported by Graham, Stern, and Wenokur,14 Schottslaedt,15 Hawkins, Monroe, and Sandifurl6 Ax,17 and Gellhorn.18 Selye's theory of the elaboration and action of ACTH, STH, phlogistic and anti-phlogistic corticoids, adrenalin, and noradrenalin under stress conditions has found much experimental support. The presence of these substances in the blood stream causes vascular changes, altered respiration, and temperature changes of tissue surfaces. Henry and Ebeling19 have reported that blood calcium and phosphorus levels decline in agitated persons, and Neilson20 found low sugar tolerance and glycosuria common in emotionally upset individuals. Kerr21 and Dreyfuss and Feldman22 noted that the eosinophil leukocyte count declines considerably in persons under mental stress. Fedi,23 studying Syrian hamsters, Ratcliff,24 studying the rat, and Pearson,25 studying the guinea pig, confirmed that stress plays a role in the development or progress of periodontal disease. Bernier,26 making reference to Selye's LAS (local irritating factors) and GAS (general adaptation syndrome), describes the interaction between local stress and general stress as related to the periodontium. In discussing the psychosomatic aspects of periodontal disease, Kanterman27 says: "The psyche, when subjected to emotional conflicts over long periods becomes an important factor in causing a chain of somatic reactions that result in pathologic changes. Such changes affect neural, vascular, and endocrine systems which play a very important role in maintaining the health of the oral tissues." So far, the importance of a relationship between oral diseases and mental stress has not been documented in man. This study attempted to determine the correlation between psychological measures of stress and periodontal disease in the human.


The voluminous biometric databases make it computationally difficult to match a query against each enrolled image in the database as is required in identification. To make the process efficient, various indexing techniques have been developed. We propose a novel fingerprint indexing scheme using dynamic clustering and m-ary trees in this paper. We construct a triangle spiral for each fingerprint image from which we obtain O(n) triangles unlike many other indexing approaches. These triangles are used to extract robust translation and rotation invariant features. Experiments with the benchmark databases confirm the superiority of our approach to the other existing techniques.


A 50nA quiescent current asynchronous digital-LDO (DLDO) integrated with the PLL-modulated switching regulator (SWR) exhibits the hybrid power management operation. The proposed bidirectional asynchronous wave pipeline (BAWP) in the asynchronous DLDO realizes the Fast-DVS (F-DVS) operation within tens of nano-seconds. The SWR with the leading phase amplifier achieves on-the-fly DVS and 94% peak efficiency, as well as improves 5.6 times MIPS performance through hybrid operation. The fabricated chip occupies 1.04mm2 in 40nm CMOS.


Abstract : In the wake of the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, it was clear that the Defense Intelligence Community was not entirely prepared to meet the challenges posed by terrorists. This Strategic Research Project is an attempt to investigate the status of the Defense Community's Civilian Intelligence Workforce ability to meet the rigorous demands of the 2lst Century. Based on a survey of personnel officers at the Defense Intelligence Agency, National Imagery and Mapping Agency, National Security Agency, CENTCOM, JFCOM, SOCOM, and SOUTHCOM, it concludes that while there are strengths in the Defense Intelligence Community there are also glaring weaknesses in recruiting, training, retention, evaluation, promotion, and rewarding the workforce, but especially in the lack of torporateness" among the Defense Intelligence Community's institutions. This SRP recommends the formation of a national Defense Intelligence Service that would include all civilian intelligence community officers. It further recommends that the civilian workforce be centrally managed, that a separate career track for technicians and specialists be established, and that an "up or out" system be adopted.


In 2016, the Ministry of Health (MOH) Malaysia has introduced a new programme to prevent and reduce the occurrence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) as well as related risk factors in the work place environment known as KOSPEN Plus. This study aims to evaluate the awareness and perception of KOSPEN Plus programme after 3 years of implementation in MOH health facilities, government and private agencies in Malaysia. A cross sectional study design was employed in the study. All health facilities, government and private agencies which had implemented KOSPEN Plus programme between 2016 and 31 December 2018 in all states in Malaysia were invited to participate in the study. The computer assisted self-interview (CASI) using the pre-tested self-administered questionnaire in the electronic form was used. A total of 362 health facilities, government and private agencies which had implemented KOSPEN Plus programme was involved in this study. Overall, more than 80% of facilities/agencies in this study implemented six out of the eight scopes of KOSPEN Plus. The survey was planned with the goal of obtaining data to support the Ministry of Health in reviewing the present health activities related to workers health in Malaysia and make necessary improvement to the programme.


In this paper, the problem of analysis and design o f large-scale multiple beamforming system is considered by system theory approach. We consider the response of system parameters by set of objective functions in a critical conditi on, which is unable to access measurement data or the data size is large. The reduced-order model is built and the robust solution is found for a multiple beamforming system. The Monte Carlo simula tion results show that the proposed multiple beamforming system yields significant perf ormance against over existing methods.


Objective
To investigate the clinical manifestation, MRI imaging features and visual function prognosis of sphenoid wing meningioma in the eyes.

Methods
A retrospective analyzed of 11 patients with sphenoid wing meningioma diagnosed by surgery, the clinical manifestations, the shape and size of lesions in MRI, the relationship with adjacent tissues, as well as postoperative vision, eyeballs and vision recovery.

Results
Eleven cases of sphenoid wing meningioma patients, the clinical manifestations of ipsilateral visual acuity decreased in 9 cases, 7 cases of eye protrusion, visual field defect in 6 cases. MRI showed 7 cases of orbital cranial tumor, 4 cases of intracranial tumors, the largest diameter of the tumor 2.3cm-8.2cm. T1WI showed moderate and low signal, T2WI showed moderate and high signal, all tumors were evenly enhanced. Tumor and peripheral brain tissue boundary in 9 cases, border blur in 2 cases. Invasion of the optic nerve caused by optic nerve density, location changes in 7 cases. Surgical approach, including the cranial orbital zygomatic approach and pterional approach, as far as possible during the removal of tumor, postoperative follow-up, visual impairment in postoperative visual acuity improved in 2 cases; in the patients with prominent eyes,3 cases returned to normal after operation,and 4 cases had decreased eyes prominence; 3 cases of postoperative vision improved.

Conclusions
Sphenoid wing meningioma can occur in all age groups, eye symptoms to vision loss, eyeballs, visual field defects, MRI imaging of T1WI mostly moderate and low signal, T2WI is medium and high signal. The tumor density is more consistent. Postoperative visual acuity depends on the preoperative residual vision, the better the prognosis of vision, the better eyeballs and visual field defects, the better prognosis.

Key words:
Sphenoid ridge meningiomas; MRI; Clinical Features; Visual function prognosis


Three‐component recordings provide access to the particle trajectory due to seismic events. This three‐dimensional picture shows successions of complex phenomena. Nevertheless, this trajectory has predominant directions of polarization. A method of spatial directional filtering is described to calculate the polarization direction of parts of the trajectory. The application of this method provides means to reject trajectory parts for which the angular gap between their polarization axis and a reference direction, for example X, Y, or Z, is greater than a given threshold angle. Real data are submitted to this method, leading to a color‐coded display showing the direction of polarization of each wave train. The same noise spread, used in conjunction with two different seismic sources, was recorded with triphone groups. The two sources were an SH‐wave vibrator and Marthor®. Using spatial directional filterings with threshold angles varying from 0 to 90 degrees, the corresponding quantities of energy emitted i...


Submitted for the MAR12 Meeting of The American Physical Society Measuring interfacial viscosity using macroand micro-rheology JAMES SEBEL, KENNETH DESMOND, ERIC R. WEEKS, THIBAUT DIVOUX, Emory University — We measure the viscous moduli of thin films using two different methods. First, we use a magnetic needle viscometer. Our apparatus employs Helmholtz coils to control the position and orientation of the needle in the film. By driving the needle we can produce a response in the film which allows us to probe the bulk viscous properties of the film. Second, we use single particle microrheology to probe the local properties of the film. Tracking the mean-squared displacement of particles as they undergo Brownian motion probes the local viscous properties of any heterogeneous domains. Coupling this technique with the magnetic needle viscometer provides information on the effect local viscous properties have on the bulk properties. James Sebel Emory University Date submitted: 21 Nov 2011 Electronic form version 1.4


Three new highly efficient green‐emitting heteroleptic phosphorescent iridium(III) complexes are designed and synthesized for the fabrication of solution‐processable phosphorescent organic light‐emitting diodes (PHOLEDs). Their photophysical, thermal, and electroluminescent (EL) properties are systematically investigated. The Ir(III) complexes comprise an amide‐bridged trifluoromethyl (CF3)‐substituted phenylpyridine unit as the main ligand and picolinic acid (pic) and tetraphenylimidodiphosphinate (tpip) as ancillary ligands. In addition, the 2‐ethoxyethnol (EO2) solubilizing group is attached to the 4‐position of pic ancillary ligand via tandem reaction, which improved the absolute photoluminescence quantum yields (PLQYs) and EL performance. The high‐performance solution‐processable PHOLEDs based on the bis[5‐methyl‐8‐trifluoromethyl‐5H‐benzo(c)(1,5)naphthyridin‐6‐one](4‐(2‐ethoxyethoxy picolinate) iridium(III) (Ir1) complex exhibit a maximum external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 24.22% and a maximum current efficiency (CE) of 92.44 cd A−1, with the latter being among the best reported CEs achieved though solution processing. In contrast, PHOLEDs with the bis[5‐hexyl‐8‐trifluoromethyl‐5H‐benzo(c)(1,5)naphthyridin‐6‐one] (tetraphenylimidodiphosphinato)iridium (Ir3) complex show extremely low efficiency roll‐off, with an EQEmax of 19.40% and an EQE of 19.29% at 10 000 cd m−2.


GM-CSF is a cytokine that regulates proliferation and survival of myeloid progenitor cells and stimulates dendritic cell (DC) differentiation. The Src-like adaptor protein (SLAP) has been implicated in the negative regulation of the GM-CSF receptor and downstream signaling in DC, although the mechanism of SLAP action remains unknown. We hypothesized that SLAP regulates GM-CSFR by recruiting CBL to the receptor, where it can ubiquitylate and target it for degradation. In this investigation we found that SLAP interacts with both SHP2 and CBL in a GM-CSF dependent manner and that SLAP and CBL over-expression alters GM-CSFR trafficking. SLAP is also important in regulating GM-CSF-stimulated DC development. In this study we determined that the role of SLAP in regulation of GM-CSF signaling is specific to differentiation in DC and we identified differentially expressed genes in Slap knock-out DC that may be important for maturation.


A method, system and circuit arrangement exchange data and supply power to at least one current sink connected via at least one data line pair to a fire alarm control unit. A pulsed voltage is used as the supply voltage for the current sink connected via at least one data line pair. Useful data is transmitted to the fire alarm control unit between two voltage pulses. The voltage required to transmit the useful data to the fire alarm control unit is used by a capacitor of a circuit arrangement in the current sink charged beforehand by the supply voltage.


In order to study the toxicity mechanisms of naphthalene(NAP) on Ceratophyllum demersum,1/10 Hoagland nutrient solution hydroponics was used in this study.The contents of chlorophyll,soluble protein,glutathione(GSH) and malondialdehyde(MDA),and the activities of superoxide dismutase(SOD) and peroxidase(POD) in C.demersum were investigated under the treatments of six NAP concentrations(1.25,2.5,5,10,20 and 40 mg/L).Results showed that there was no difference on all measured characteristics for C.demersum with the concentrations of 1.25 and 2.5 mg/L NAP(P0.05).However,the physiological activity of C.demersum was affected significantly(P0.05) as the concentration of the NAP reached 40 mg/L.At the late stage(the fifth and seventh days) of NAP stress,as NAP concentration increased,the contents of chlorophyll,soluble protein and the activity of SOD decreased,while GSH and MDA increased which indicated the increases of lipid peroxidatio.Thus,the contents of chlorophyll,MDA,and the activities of SOD could be characterized the toxicity response of C.demersum to NAP.


This article argues that the narrative structure of autobiographical narratives about gay and lesbian life typically posits a radical break between 'closetedness' and 'outness'. I contend that this bifurcated structure leads to a monolithic representation of 'closeted' lesbian and gay adolescence as predicated merely upon a lack of power, knowledge and freedom. I then suggest that a more nuanced approach to the temporality of individual narratives, analogous to the approach of some recent gay and lesbian historians, would enable us to recognise the positive forms of power, knowledge and freedom that are proper to adolescent homosexuality.


This feel-good picture book assures kids there's plenty of love to go around-the-clock. This is a book that is generous with love, and full of the sweetest illustrations you've ever seen. It is suitable for children age 5 and under. When is it time for a hug? Anytime! This feel-good picture book assures kids there's plenty of love - a caring hug always feels just right. This is a book that is generous with love, and full of the sweetest illustrations you've ever seen.


Macy Lai Fu is a transliteration word translated from Uyghur. Its first name was Arabic, and in Arabic it meant "the place where it was cultivated." Today in Uyghur, meaning "assembly, gathering", Macy Lai Fu is a Uighur people handed down from ancient times, Including entertainment activities, leisure activities, cultural education, moral education, comprehensive quality training and dinner and other content of the integrated activities. Macy Lai Fu not only to give people a kind of audio-visual enjoyment, its social function should not be underestimated.


Intel believes nanotech materials and structures hold great promise for both the ultimate scaling of CMOS devices as well as the discovery of new information processing beyond CMOS. We feel that the FET device and the CMOS implementation is a very robust and sophisticated structure that operates at close to theoretical optimum for charge based devices. Intel believes it can be scaled for at least another 15 years by introducing a variety of techniques such as strained Si channels, metal gated-high k, parasitic reduction, non-planar FET such as trigate, and high mobility channel materials including InSb, Ge and SiGe. Beyond that, CMOS technology will become the integration platform for alternative logic technologies that will begin to emerge in the 2020 time frame. These technologies are currently being investigated in many research institutions around the world. This presentation will survey the prospects for the emerging alternative logic technologies, based on the work of the Emerging Research Device (ERD) group of the International Technology Roadmap for Silicon (ITRS). The ERD section of the new 2005 International Technology Roadmap for Silicon (ITRS) has catalogued and analyzed six alternative logic technologies based on alternative state variables that might be available in the 2020 timeframe. The Critical Assessment section of that document concluded that none of the alternative logic devices currently being investigated had risk/performance ratio sufficient to justify a large scale investment at this time. In parallel to ITRS evaluation effort, other groups have been systematically working to identify critical nanotechnology research needs relating to move beyond the current research portfolio and achieve "the next logic switch" beyond CMOS. The result of the later effort is an emerging consensus around five important research vectors that simultaneously contain enormous scientific challenges and are also immediately applicable to the semiconductor industry. This presentation will discuss the five research vectors and outline some initial research programs in this area. Bio: Dr. Bourianoff is a senior progr mrSaatager at a,Itel Corporation. He manages their exteroalresearch program ing the Emerging Research Technologies an Optoelectronlics. lH[e is also a mremrber of the Semniconductor Inldustry Associationl and the International Technology Roadmap for Semxiconlductors (ITRS). lHe has published extenlsively xin the areas of beyonld CMOS scaling approaches and the need for revolutionlary materials anld device research in several peer-reviewed journlals. Dr. Bourianoff is the chair of the ITRS Emrerging Logic Device Working group and the Inlternlationlal Plannrling Group for Nanoelectronlics. lHe serves onl the Technology Planning Group of the Nanoelectronlic R;esearch Initiative anld coauthored the white paper defining the scope of that activity. lHe received his PhD in Physics fromr the Un;iversxity of Texas,


A review has been performed of past studies on external corrosion sponsored by the PRCI Corrosion Technical Committee (TC) with the aims of (a) providing a resource to current and future TC members, (b) identifying gaps in current understanding, and (c) to assist in future road-mapping exercises. In support of these aims, the current report is structured in a similar manner to current and past Corrosion TC road maps, namely in terms of the assessment, mitigation, and prevention of external corrosion. The review is limited to reports associated with external corrosion, and does not include discussion of either internal corrosion or stress corrosion cracking. With the exception of a small number of seminal reports, studies published prior to 1990 have also been excluded from the review. In addition to studies specifically sponsored by the Corrosion TC, reports issued by other PRCI TC's and by PHMSA that are related to the above topic areas have also been reviewed.


Our present work was focused on the effect of grain size on the emanation coefficient, mass and area exhalation rate in different grain size of the soil, phosphate and building material samples. These samples were fractionated into seven-grain sizes each (2000-1800, 1800-1000, 1000-560, 560-425, 425-200, 200-80 and < 80 μm) and employing AlphaGUARD to determine the radon exhalation rate in these samples. The data analyses were performed to determine emanation coefficient, mass and area exhalation rate. Results revealed an inverse relationship between radon exhalation and grain size in soil and building materials (sand, granite and marble) samples while the trend is not clear in the phosphate and limestone samples. The emanation coefficient of Rn-222 was constant in different grain sizes of all samples.


This paper presents data from a 1993 self-completion questionnaire survey of primary schools in Wales on the organisation and provision of health education teaching, the implementation of health-related policies and the involvement of outside agencies and professionals in the planning and delivery of health promotion. The results from the 308 schools (62 per cent) which returned questionnaires show a widespread commitment to, and a sound base for the further expansion of, health promotion activity. It is recommended that greater attention should be given to the continuing education of primary school teachers in health promotion, the develop ment of policies on smoking, nutrition and sex education and the planned integration of community resources into school health promotion programmes.


to enhance their sense of the presence of the god. No deity is more manifold in his aspects than Dionysus. First and foremost he is the god of ecstasy. Life, energy, fertility, vegetation are his special province. In alternate years he disappears from mankind to dwell in the under world, being the lord of all souls. To celebrate his 'epiphany' (£1iLcpáVEta) trieteric (1'.e., taking place every other year) festivals were held. Thus Dionysus was a nether as well as an upper god, and by communion with him his votaries strove with frenzied longing to attain immortality, for only by becoming themselves divine could mortals escape death. The dancers might descry the god in their midst in animal form, especially as a bull, or else Dread voices as of bulls bellow, whence coming none / can see' (aeschylus, describing Thracian Dionysus [frag. 57 [Nauck]). Or, again, they might fall on


Digital displays and off-the-shelf smartphone cameras are the most common and promptly available electronic devices which have also been recently applied for data transmission and reception through optical medium in a wireless manner. In this paper, we propose a data embedding technique in display to camera communication (D2C) where the data is inserted into the mid-frequency region of a discrete cosine transform (DCT) domain image. The intended data in the form of modulated symbols are first multiplied with the predetermined embedding factor and then exponentially multiplied with the vector coefficients of the selected region. Extensive experiments considering receiver orientation, capture distance and angle were conducted in a real-world environment with the help of off-the-shelf smartphone camera and a digital display. We showed that the proposed technique offers fair peak signal to average ratio (PSNR) with robust bit error rate (BER) performance, while the data embedded on the image was not perceptible to human vision.


Kinetic studies of carbon dioxide absorption into aqueous potassium alaninate (PA) solutions were performed using a stirred-cell reactor at concentrations ranging from 1.0 to 3.0 M and temperatures from 293.15 to 313.15 K. In the present work, the potassium salt of alanine was suggested as an energy-efficient absorbent for CO2 capture. Densities and viscosities of the aqueous PA solution and physical solubilities of CO2 in the solution were also measured to evaluate the reaction rate constant. The reaction rate was determined as the following equation:−rCO2=4.518×108exp(−3845T)exp(0.5706Cs)CsCCO2(−rCO2: rate of reaction between absorbent and CO2 gas [mol dm–3s–1]; T: temperature [K]; Cs: concentration of PA solution [mol dm–3]; CCO2: concentration of CO2 in PA solution [mol dm–3]). Furthermore, the effect of the sterically hindered structure of PA was studied by comparing the diffusivity, physical solubility, and reaction rate constant with literature values of potassium glycinate.


The interleukin (IL)‐12/IL‐23‐mediated Th1/Th17 signaling pathway has been associated with the etiopathogenesis of primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC). To address the cytokine microenvironment specifically in the liver, we examined the localized expression of cytokine subunits and their corresponding receptors using previously optimized immunohistochemistry with an extensive panel of antibodies directed at IL‐12p70, IL‐12p35, interferon‐gamma (IFN‐γ), IL‐12RB2, IL‐23p40, IL‐23p19, IL‐17, and IL‐23R using liver from PBC (n = 51) and non‐PBC (n = 80) control liver disease patients. Multiple portal tracts in each patient were blindly evaluated and individually scored. We report herein that although IL‐12/Th1 and IL‐23/Th17 staining was detected in all of the liver sections, they were primarily localized around the damaged interlobular bile ducts in PBC. Most important, Th17 skewing was prominent in advanced PBC patients with intensive secretion of IL‐23p19 by inflamed hepatocytes around IL‐23R, IL‐12RB2, and IFN‐γ expressing degenerated cholangiocytes. Our novel finding on the direct association of Th17 skewing and disease severity illustrates the significance of the IL‐23/Th17 pathway in the perpetuation of IL‐12/Th1‐mediated immunopathology in PBC. Furthermore, localized IL‐23p19 production by hepatocytes may enhance profibrotic Th17 signaling and proinflammatory IFN‐γ production that contribute to PBC pathology. Conclusion: Our data emphasize the pathogenic relevance of IL‐12/Th1 and IL‐23/Th17 in the evolution of PBC. Of significance, however, the shift from a Th1 to a Th17 imbalance at advanced stages of the disease suggests the necessity to consider modulation of the IL‐23/Th17 pathway as a potential target for therapeutic intervention. (Hepatology 2014;59:1944–1953)


An experiment intended to provide a precise estimation of the electromagnetic energy deposition in a sphere of simulated brain tissue placed in close proximity of a half-wave dipole antenna, has been carried out to support the IEEE SCC-34, SC-2 efforts to determine the accuracy of computational techniques versus experiments in predicting the human exposure to cellular phones. The experimental set-up features a canonical configuration where a spherical phantom is filled up with a mixture whose dielectric permittivity and conductivity simulate those of the brain tissues. A robotized system is employed to perform an accurate mapping of the SAR (specific absorption rate) inside the mixture.


The aim of this information sheet is to remind you about how we can manage our stress using laughing therapy. Every working women and men are faced with stress in their work place daily but they never knew how to cope up and deal with the stressors and sources of stress. Stress has harmful psychological and physiological effects on our body. Laughter therapy is very effective to reduce the stress level. Laughter is universally well accepted phenomenon. Laughter therapy relaxes the muscles and improves breathing. It increases friendliness, collaboration and facilitates group identity, harmony and cohesiveness by decreasing stress-causing hormones in the blood. Eventually, laughter enhances quality of life by reducing the level of stress. Laughter can be effective self- care tool to cope with stress. An ability to find laughter therapy gives as a sense of perception on our problem. Laughter provides a release for accumulated tension.


Abstract In this article, we generalize Haglund and Wise's theory of special cube complexes to groups acting on quasi-median graphs. More precisely, we define special actions on quasi-median graphs, and we show that a group which acts specially on a quasi-median graph with finitely many orbits of vertices must embed as a virtual retract into a graph product of finite extensions of clique-stabilizers. In the second part of the article, we apply the theory to fundamental groups of some graphs of groups called right-angled graphs of groups.


In this article, I explain the demanding creative challenges that Robert Helpmann had to face regarding Miracle in the Gorbals (1944) and Adam Zero (1946) by examining the difficulties presented by the concepts behind the scenarios and Helpmann's own artistic commitments. In relation to the reception of these ballets, I explore the controversies surrounding Helpmann's choices of subject matter as well as the perceived imbalance between the theatrical and the choreographic aspects of these works. I argue that Arthur Bliss' scores for both ballets show him as an ideal collaborator for Helpmann. Bliss' creative personality made him a sympathetic and effective composer for these ballets, given their dramatic requirements. Finally, I contend that only an awareness of the theatrical reality of these ballets will allow us a proper assessment of Bliss' scores for Helpmann.


The present paper is both an update and revision of the catch reconstruction by Kuo and Booth (2011) for the marine fisheries of Taiwan. Total reconstructed catch within FAO Area 61 by Taiwan (excluding large pelagics) was 55% higher than the 23.2 million tonnes of catch FAO reported on behalf of Taiwan from 1950-2010. The difference of 12.8 million t between the two time series is predominantly composed of unreported commercial landings (63.8%), followed by discards (26.5%), subsistence catch (9.5%), and recreational catch (0.2%). A similar relationship is evident between Taiwanese reconstructed catch within the EEZ, which is 65% of the total FAO Area 61 catch, and approximately 57% higher than the portion of catch reported by the FAO on behalf of Taiwan which was deemed to be taken within the EEZ. INTRODUCTION Taiwan, Republic of China (ROC), is located in the South China Sea, with neighboring countries of China, Japan, and the Philippines to the west, east, and south, respectively (Figure 1). After WWII, the ROC faced food shortages, a growing population, and simultaneously exploitation in the coastal fisheries within 12 nm from shore, leading the Taiwanese government to heavily fund and subsidize the growth of distant water fishing fleets (Kuo and Booth 2011). This trend is captured in the catch reconstruction of marine fisheries by Kuo and Booth (2011) which estimates total marine fishery removals by Taiwan from its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), i.e., waters 200 nm from shore, and outside its EEZ by distant water fisheries (DWF). The present paper is both an update and revision of the catch reconstruction by Kuo and Booth (2011) for the marine fisheries of Taiwan. The primary work includes catch estimates from 1950-2007, while the present paper adds data for the years 2008-2010. Furthermore, the present paper makes revisions and updates in the methodology of its predecessor, most notably adding estimates of recreational and subsistence fisheries to the study, although revisions in other sectors are also presented. Figure 1: Map of Taiwan with its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).


The invention provides a vehicle monitoring system based on a CTCS-3 level train control system and a terminal thereof; the system comprises a vehicle monitoring terminal, a ground access server and an operation and maintenance terminal; the vehicle monitoring terminal is arranged on a locomotive and is used for collecting the data of vehicle I interface, thus obtaining monitoring data and downloading the monitoring data to the ground access server by a GPRS and/or WLAN network; the ground access server is used for analyzing, counting and memorizing the monitoring data so as to be queried and analyzed by a user and transferring the analyzed and counted monitoring data to the operation and maintenance terminal; and the operation and maintenance terminal is used for carrying out real-time display on the monitoring data. The system and the terminal can position the communication signal equipment failure points, and realize the real-time monitoring and early-warning on the working state of the vehicle communication and signal equipment.


This research investigates the attitudes of future teachers of Serbian as the mother tongue and English as a foreign language (EFL) regarding online teaching during the coronavirus pandemic. Although teaching has continued in virtual classrooms, university teachers have encountered numerous challenges related to teaching the invisible generations: motivation, interaction, and the role of students in online classes, as well as the functionality of methods, techniques, and online tools. The conducted research shows that future teachers of Serbian as the mother tongue and future EFL teachers perceive online teaching as an alternative or a supplement to traditional teaching applied in specific social circumstances. During the period of a year and a half, their attitudes towards online teaching have changed, ranging from acceptance to indecisiveness, and including an inclination to return to traditional classrooms. It should be stated that the bachelor students studying Serbian accepted this way of teaching to a higher degree than the EFL bachelor students. A statistically significant difference is evident in the respondents' replies with respect to their field of study, but not with respect to the respondents' gender or the current year of study.


25%, severe global hypokinesis, and moderate mitral regurgitation. The patient also had a history of hypertension, atria1 fibrillation (AF), and noninsulin-dependent diabetes. His preoperative medications included digoxin, furosemide, enalapril, nitroglycerin patch, and glyburide. He had no known drug allergies. On physical examination, the patient was 180 cm in height and weighed 62 kg. Heart rate (HR) and blood pressure (BP) were 74 bpm and 120/70 mm Hg, respectively. Head and neck evaluation was significant for a Mallampati class II airway and decreased range of motion of the neck. The cardiac examination revealed an irregularly irregular heart beat with a grade 3/6 systolic murmur. The lungs were clear to auscultation. The electrocardiogram (ECG) revealed AF with a ventric


Abstract This article focuses on the phenomenon in which fashion functions as play in digital media. It delves deeper than fashion's functional purposes of decoration or physical protection and examines its emergence as an independent tool for creating play culture. This article discusses the four characteristics of play in the context of the digital space—free activity, departure from space–time, pretending, and order—then applies each characteristic based on the marketing strategies of fashion brands and social media culture. These representative topics include the pretending multi-persona, a fashion meme based on social media, voluntary play in a brand platform, and sensory expansion and departure from space–time through brand experience. This article highlights contemporary fashion as a tool for play that also functions to satisfy one's high-order desires, such as self-expression, with digitalized clothing, having fun and getting extended sensation with a brand in any time or space, and adding a layer of emotion through social interaction in digital space. This suggests that fashion, in itself an aesthetic object in everyday life, can enhance the characteristics and values of play, when applied in the digital space.


The choose of cage guide wirerope and the calculation of pulling force are very important to the security production of mine.The calculation formulary of pulling force was presented and illustrated,which can be taken as the important reference of mining enterprise.


ABSTRACT In this paper, a methodology which integrates data mining (DM) and ant colony optimization (ACO) is proposed for process parameters determination of the chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) processes in semiconductor manufacturing. In the proposed method, an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) is first studied to realize the training process between inputs and outputs of network. However, due to the invisibility in the solution procedures of ANN, the decision tree approach of Data Mining is adopted to analyze and provide the necessary information for ACO. The simulation results demonstrated the proposed method provides an efficient tool for parameters selection for the initial CMP process.


Back-to-back voltage source converters are normally preferred for interfacing squirrel cage induction generators (SCIG) with loads in stand-alone wind power generation applications as they allow for maximum power point tracking. However, the total converter losses tend to be very high, especially near the rated wind speed. Therefore, to reduce the power converter related losses, a Vienna rectifier is utilized as the machine-side converter in this article to interface the SCIG. Owing to the limited reactive power handling capability of the Vienna rectifier, a fixed capacitor bank is also required to provide the excitation VAR for the variable speed SCIG. In this article, a new computational method is proposed to calculate the value of this fixed capacitance based on maximizing the yearly energy output from the wind energy conversion system. A voltage sensorless vector control scheme for the Vienna rectifier-fed SCIG with the reference frame oriented along the machine terminal voltage is also proposed, which adheres to the operating limits of the Vienna rectifier and gives much better dynamic performance under load and wind speed transients compared to similar Vienna rectifier based variable speed constant frequency generating systems reported earlier in the literature.


A 61-year-old man with poorly controlled type 2 diabetes mellitus presented to our clinic with a 5-month history of right foot drop and severe excruciating pain in the right leg that progressed to the right and left buttocks and left leg, resulting in left foot drop. Prior to the visit, a neurologist had diagnosed him with diabetic amyotrophy and GM1 antibody–mediated autoimmune neuropathy. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain was unremarkable. Nerve conduction studies showed absent sural, ulnar, and radial potentials with a right peroneal motor nerve conduction velocity of 19.6 m per second and a right posterior tibial conduction velocity of 32.9 m per second. The patient could walk a few steps using a cane but mainly used a wheelchair. He complained of numbness and burning sensations in the feet and legs. Pain control was inadequate using duloxetine (Cymbalta, Lilly) 60 mg per day, pregabalin (Lyrica, Pfizer) 75 mg in the morning and 150 mg in the afternoon and evening, gabapentin 300 mg as needed, tramadol 50 mg 3 times daily, and hydrocodone/ acetaminophen 7.5/750 mg as needed. An examination revealed quadriceps/foot wasting, thigh adduction, and leg extension weaknesses, and a total loss of ankle dorsiflexion and great toe extension bilaterally. Knee and Achilles reflexes were absent. A sensory exam showed a bilateral decrease in soft touch perception to 30 cm as measured from the great Case 1: A Novel Treatment for Pain In Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy


Abstract 2738 Introduction: In targeted therapy using tyrosine kinase (TK) inhibitors (TKIs), measurement of TK activity could help in diagnosis, identification of potential responders, and monitoring of treatment efficacy. Here we evaluated the feasibility of measuring circulating TK (cTK) activity in plasma in patients with BCR-ABL1-positive leukemia. Patients and Methods: Study subjects included 46 patients with newly diagnosed chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML), 24 with multidrug-resistant CML, 24 with BCR-ABL1-positive acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL), as well as 38 healthy donors. Plasma cTK activity was measured using a chromogenic universal TK assay in which plasma samples and standards were added to wells of a microtiter plate that were coated with synthesized poly(Glu-Tyr) peptide substrates. Specific TK activity was measured by spectrophotometry, with or without addition of TKIs. Results: cTK activity was significantly higher in CML (median 801.93 U/mL, range 18.10–3932.30 U/mL) and BCR-ABL1-positive ALL patients (median 659.55 U/mL, range 0–1626.90 U/mL) than in healthy donors (median 82.85 U/mL, range 0.63–852.80 U/mL) (P P P =0.003). However, cTK activity was independent of BCR-ABL1 transcript level and BCR-ABL1 mutation type. Plasma cTK activity was inhibited by imatinib and dasatinib in ex vivo studies; this inhibition was severely diminished in patients harboring T315I mutations. Conclusions: cTK activity is readily detectable in plasma or serum samples without pre-cleaning or enrichment. Ex vivo testing measuring the effect of TKIs on plasma cTK activity thus hold promise as drug sensitivity tests for predicting and monitoring response to specific TKIs. Disclosures: Yeh: Quest Diagnostics Inc.: Employment. Abdool: Quest Diagnostics Inc.: Employment. Bruey: Quest Diagnostics Inc.: Employment.


Recent studies involve various approaches to establish a generating set for cyclic codes of arbitrary length over the class of Galois rings. One such approach involves the use of polynomials with minimal degree corresponding to specific subsets of the code, defined progressively. In this paper, we extend this approach to obtain a set of generators of cyclic codes over finite chain rings. Further, we observe that this set acts as a minimal strong Gröbner basis(MSGB) for the code.


Student teachers' beliefs about teaching are arguably important to their learning and development as teachers. One aspect of these beliefs is that of a focus on the learners. In the study presented in this paper, we use two approaches to content analysis in order to learn more about student teachers' beliefs from transcripts of focus-group discussions. The analyses reveal that the student teachers focus less on the mathematical content and more on characteristics of pupils in their discussions. These characteristics were mainly related to the pupils' behaviour, their cultural background or their certain needs.


the main issue in water management is how to meet the needs of a growing population without sacrificing the sustainability of freshwater resources, which are both limited and vulnerable. The development of new technologies for groundwater exploitation consequent to increased demand has led to the overdraft of groundwater resources and thus, many environmental problems. Similarly, Rafsanjan Plain has faced extensive groundwater extraction, most of which is used for pistachio as the only crop produced in the area. Therefore, the agricultural sector has a crucial role in a water crisis. The purpose this study was to investigate the role of agriculture in Rafsanjan's groundwater governance. Necessary information for this purpose was collected through interview and observation techniques as well as studying statistics and relevant documents. The method used in this research was a focus group to answer questions. A total of a number of 15 agricultural experts from public and private sectors were selected by purposive sampling method and categorized into four groups to respond the survey questions. Study results show that currently, Rafsanjan plain, the first step to achieving local governance is to form local organizations that are linked to the government, the members of which are selected by local leaders and from people who are dependable by the public. These organizations need education and support from the government in order to strengthen their activities.


This paper elaborates on the development of laboratory project modules in the Industrial manufacturing and systems engineering department at The University of Texas El Paso based on Four-Dimensional (4D) printing technology. These modules are aimed at introducing the students to interdisciplinary manufacturing and emerging dimensions in manufacturing technology. 4D printing is a new dimension in additive manufacturing wherein, the 3D printed structures react to the change of parameters within the environment such as temperature, and humidity, resulting in shape change or in functionality such as electricity output, and self-healing. Recently 4D printing of simple devices for pressure sensors application were identified and show high feasibility for commercialization due to low cost, freedom of design, and agile manufacturing process. This enables a high interdisciplinary platform for research and project modules suitable to be used in the academic environment for hands-on students training. Laboratory Modules based on 4D printing of pressure sensors is developed for student training that includes: 1) Design of piezoelectric nanocomposites; 2) 3-D model design of pressure sensor devices; 3) Using 3-D printers for 4-D printing, and involved post-processing techniques by which students can experience emerging manufacturing technologies, and; 4) Testing for piezoelectric properties. Introduction & Background In 2013, Skylar Tibbits from Massachusetts Institute of Technology introduced Fourdimensional (4D) printing where a component is created by Three-dimensional (3D) printing but a later time transforms into another shape or configuration [1]. Typically multi-composites materials (i.e. shape memory polymers) are used to offer different characteristics (functionalities) and performances to 3D structure such as, shape changing upon humidity or temperature change [2]. Emergence of the 4D printing technology is bringing many applications in several application areas. Nowadays, dynamic multi-functionality materials are being developed such as shape memory polymers using smart materials composites for sensor, energy storage, and harvesting [3]. Using piezoelectric materials and 4D printing technology, Kim (2017) studied on design of piezoelectric nanocomposites with a combination of polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF), barium titanate (BT), and multiwall carbon nanotubes (CNT) and fabricated using material extrusion (ME) 3D printing technique [4-7]. Piezoelectric materials have long been investigated due to their unique characteristic of converting mechanical stress to electric charges and vice versa [8, 9]. Of the piezoelectric polymers and ceramics, PVDF and BT have seen wide applications in electronics, sensing/energy harvesting, and bioengineering [10-12]. The combination of these two materials yields both excellent mechanical and piezoelectric properties so that BT/PVDF nanocomposites are attractive for energy harvesting and sensor applications due to their simple and convenient fabrication process, low cost, and excellent properties [13, 14]. However, it has an intrinsic low direct piezoelectric coupling coefficient which is a drawback with regard to the piezoelectric effect and sensor applications [1416]. Therefore, graphitic carbon such as MWCNT was utilized to enhance both electric and stress transfer to the ceramic particles and uniform dispersion [5]. It is reported that the ME based 3D printing process significantly improves homogeneous dispersion of BT nanoparticles in the PVDF matrix, enhancing piezoelectric properties [4]. In addition, the ME 3D printing technique is integrated with corona poling, which is one of the traditional poling processes, to simplify fabrication of piezoelectric PVDF films through sequential processes [17]. Kim et. al invented a 3D printing technique to optically fabricate photosensitive polymer based-BT nanocomposites with surface modification [18]. A photopolymer was induced to encapsulate piezoelectric nanoparticles during photo-polymerization. This technique can produce 3D structure of piezoelectric nanocomposites but is limited to combination with photosensitive polymers. Different types of 3D printing techniques were applied to many researches related to piezoelectric materials for sensing applications to enable low cost fabrication and mass production process. This emerging 3D/4D printing techniques will be combining more and more with other domain of knowledge and moving toward future mainstream occupying industry. Therefore, it is a great teaching tool for college students to be able to learn not only the concept and operation on 3D/4D printing but also understanding of smart materials in class as lab project module. In addition, college students will be exposed to basic knowledge of material science, manufacturing, and mechanical engineering to understand 4D printing of piezoelectric pressure sensor device. We developed modules for laboratory project consisting of 1) design of piezoelectric nanocomposites where materials engineering background can be taught, 2) 3D model design of pressure sensor devices and testing for piezoelectric property where mechanical engineering skills can be trained, and 3) operation of 3D printer and post-processing where students can experience emerging manufacturing technology. Nanocomposites Synthesis and Fabrication For synthesis of nanocomposites and continuous filament, commercial PVDF powder (MW~534,000; Sigma-Aldrich, USA), BT powder (700nm; Inframat®, USA), and multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) powder (Diameter: 8-15 nm, length: 10-50 μm, Cheaptubes®, USA) were mixed with N-Dimethylformamide solvent (DMF, OmniSolv®) via the solvent-casting method. As schematic illustration of the synthesis process is shown in Figure 1. The BT and CNTs powder were introduced to DMF solvent and this solution was then placed in a bath sonication for 30 min in order for uniform distribution of nanoparticles. The solution is prepared by dissolving PVDF powder (1:10 weight ratio in PVDF:DMF solvent). The solution is then placed in a water bath at 80°C and is stirred using a magnetic stir bar at 300rpm for approximately 30 minutes. After the PVDF powder fully dissolves for approximately 15 minutes, BT and CNTs built up at the bottom of solution is addressed by ultra-sonication (Branson Sonifier 450) for 20 minutes. DMF solvent is then evaporated by dispersing nanocomposites solution onto a glass substrate and heated to a temperature of 90°C for 12 hrs. The procedure yields a thin sheet of CNT/BT/PVDF nanocomposite. The casted nanocomposites were sliced down to be easily extruded by filament extruder machine. The nanocomposite filament is used to 3D print a thick film by a fused deposition modeling 3D printer for a pressure sensor. Figure 1. Synthesis procedure of CNT/BT/PVDF nanocomposites.


Adjoining the temple is a large monastery. These Bhikkhus, having completed the recitation of the rules of conduct, are returning to their monastery for their noon meal, the last of the day.


The mechanical characteristics of high-pressure frozen ice are a basis for the design of deep underground frozen walls, the drilling of thick permafrost and ice sheets, and the probing of extraterrestrial ice. The continuous control of the sample stress state from freezing to testing is essential for the experimental study of in situ mechanical response of high-pressure frozen ice. In the context, we developed a preparation technique for freezing pressurized water into a standard cylindrical ice sample in a triaxial cell. Through theoretical analysis, a cylindrical water sample with precise dimensions and strong sealing was fabricated using heat shrinkable tubing, sectional end caps, and an assembly cylinder. A mounting device was designed to insert the water sample into the triaxial cell without deformation. In order to deal with the lateral surface irregular of the resulting ice sample caused by freezing expansion, we proposed a pressurization method in which the volume of the confining medium is controlled to restrict the radial deformation of the sample, and the axial pressure on the sample is kept constant; thus, the freezing expansion will develop along the height direction through releasing the expansion pressure. Based on the analysis of sample deformation and finite element numerical simulations, the control method of the temperature fields of the sample and the confining medium was obtained, and the standard cylindrical ice sample which satisfies the geometric accuracy requirements was produced. The comparison of ice samples frozen by different freezing methods showed that the control of the confining medium mean temperature and the sample unidirectional freezing is necessary to improve the dimensional precision of the ice sample.


The present study addresses to the indigenous issue by discussions involving ethnicity and political struggle. Through the experience of the Tapuia people from Lagoa do Tapará, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil, I intend to investigate the indigenous resistance in this community, analyzing their history, memory, social relationships and sociopolitical structure articulated with their political claims. My intention is to understand how the political organization process of the Tapuia has been happening and its possible connection with the group's ethnicity. For this purprose, I tried looking for the relations of the members between themselves and the other indigenous and nonindigenous groups be it through partnerships or conflicts, as well the elements used to delimit their differences. The anthropological research made possible to understand how the Lagoa do Tapará's Tapuaias (re)build their socio-political organization, rework their culture, give them a new significance to their values and fortify their mobilization strategies in the present context of the struggle for civil rights.


Background Creatinine clearance has been reported to be inaccurate for the estimation of glomerular filtration rate (GFR) in patients with sickle cell anaemia (SCA). Inulin clearance, the reference method for GFR estimation, is impractical for routine use in these patients, and 51Cr-EDTA measurements of the GFR have been rarely reported in this disease. Methods In order to obtain reference 51Cr-EDTA values in this disease, we studied 70 patients (40 females; 13–59 years of age, mean: 31.6 years) with homozygous SCA, normal serum creatinine and urinary albumin excretion <or=200 μg·min−1. All patients were submitted to single-injection 51Cr-EDTA GFR, urinary albumin and haematocrit measurements. 51Cr-EDTA clearances were calculated in different age groups (<20, 20–29, 30–39, 40–49 and>50 years). Results The mean GFR (±standard deviation) obtained for the 70 patients was 111.5±23.1 ml·min−1. Analysis of variance for evaluation of the possible interaction effect between 51Cr-EDTA clearance and sex, age, urinary albumin and haematocrit demonstrated patient age as the only factor influencing 51Cr-EDTA clearance (P<0.001). The Spearman correlation coefficient showed a significant relationship between 51Cr-EDTA clearance and patient age (r=−0.44, P=0.0001), but not between 51Cr-EDTA and urinary albumin (r=−0.17, P=0.1546) or haematocrit (r=0.079, P=0.5121). The group aged 20–29 years presented the highest 51Cr-EDTA clearance mean value (126.7±20.4 ml·min−1), with a progressive reduction in the older groups. Conclusion Young adults with homozygous SCA, normal serum creatinine and micro-albuminuria or normo-albuminuria present supranormal 51Cr-EDTA GFR values. These values rapidly decrease after 30 years of age. We did not find association between urinary albumin and GFR in these patients.


In order to enhance the resilience of the Nation and its ability to protect itself in the face of natural and human-caused hazards, the ability of the critical infrastructure (CI) system to withstand specific threats and return to normal operations after degradation must be determined. To fully analyze the resilience of a region and the CI that resides within it, both the actual resilience of the individual CI and the capability of the Emergency Services Sector (ESS) to protect against and respond to potential hazards need to be considered. Thus, a regional resilience approach requires the comprehensive consideration of all parts of the CI system as well as the characterization of emergency services. This characterization must generate reproducible results that can support decision making with regard to risk management, disaster response, business continuity, and community planning and management. To address these issues, Argonne National Laboratory, in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Sector Specific Agency - Executive Management Office, developed a comprehensive methodology to create an Emergency Services Sector Capabilities Index (ESSCI). The ESSCI is a performance metric that ranges from 0 (low level of capabilities) to 100 (high). Because an emergency services program has a high more » ESSCI, however, does not mean that a specific event would not be able to affect a region or cause severe consequences. And because a program has a low ESSCI does not mean that a disruptive event would automatically lead to serious consequences in a region. Moreover, a score of 100 on the ESSCI is not the level of capability expected of emergency services programs; rather, it represents an optimal program that would rarely be observed. The ESSCI characterizes the state of preparedness of a jurisdiction in terms of emergency and risk management. Perhaps the index's primary benefit is that it can systematically capture, at a given point in time, the capabilities of a jurisdiction to protect itself from, mitigate, respond to, and recover from a potential incident. On the basis of this metric, an interactive tool - the ESSCI Dashboard - can identify scenarios for enhancement that can be implemented, and it can identify the repercussions of these scenarios on the jurisdiction. It can assess the capabilities of law enforcement, fire fighting, search and rescue, emergency medical services, hazardous materials response, dispatch/911, and emergency management services in a given jurisdiction and it can help guide those who need to prioritize what limited resources should be used to improve these capabilities. Furthermore, this tool can be used to compare the level of capabilities of various jurisdictions that have similar socioeconomic characteristics. It can thus help DHS define how it can support risk reduction and community preparedness at a national level. This tool aligns directly with Presidential Policy Directive 8 by giving a jurisdiction a metric of its ESS's capabilities and by promoting an interactive approach for defining options to improve preparedness and to effectively respond to a disruptive event. It can be used in combination with other CI performance metrics developed at Argonne National Laboratory, such as the vulnerability index and the resilience index for assessing regional resilience. « less


1. 1. Isolated photophores of Maurolicus muelleri , maintained in saline at 20 °C, consume oxygen at a mean rate of 1.25 ± 0.07 nmol O2 min−1 ( N = 50).

2. 2. In the presence of 5 × 10−6 mol l−1 KCN, seven preparations did not luminesce while two showed only dim luminescence. In all nine preparations, the resting oxygen consumption decreased by about 50%.

3. 3. In the presence of 5 × 10−5 mol l−1 KCN, all of the photophores produced a slow, low luminescence and their oxygen consumption decreased by about 75%.

4. 4. In the presence of 5 × 10−4 mol l−1 KCN, all of the photophores produced a slow, high luminescence and their oxygen consumption decreased rapidly by about 92%.

5. 5. It is suggested that the oxygen needs for light production by the isolated photophores of the mesopelagic fish, Maurolicus , differ from those of the epipelagic fish, Porichthys.


This dissertation concerns the design and implementation of SemCom, an interpreter generator for arbitrary languages, which compiles a two-level operational semantics (in either bigor small-step style). Input to SemCom is expressed in a purpose-designed Semantic Description Language (SDL). An SDL file contains the definition of an evaluation and typing relation, and can express type systems up to polymorphism. The SemCom compiler performs a sequence of analyses on this input, and generates a lexer, parser, and interpreter (in both OCaml and F#) for the user's language. SDL itself is typed, and a number of consistency checks are performed, producing comprehensive debugging output and useful error messages. Non-deterministic semantics are supported.


Objective: This prospective study was done to detect whether serum levels of glutamate, aspartate, glycine or nitric oxide could be used as early biochemical predictors for poor outcome in patients with acute ischemic stroke. Subjects and Methods: Sixty two patients with first supra-tentorial ischemic stroke presented within 24 hours from onset of symptoms were included in the study. They were 38 (61.3%) males and 24 (38.7%) females. Their age ranged from 39 to 79 years (mean 55.8±9.5). On admission, all patients were subjected to assessment of: stroke severity by Scandinavian Stroke Scale, infarction volume by brain computed tomography and serum levels of glutamate, aspartate, glycine and nitric oxide. All subjects were followed up for three months. After three months stroke outcome was assessed by Glasgow Outcome Score. Results: After 3 months 9 patients (14.5%) had good recovery, 25 patients (40.4%) had moderate disability, 15 patients (24.2) had severe disability, no vegetative patient (0%) and 13 patients (20.9%) were dead. There was a significant relation between elevated admission serum levels of glutamate, glycine and nitric oxide and poor ischemic stroke outcome, stroke severity and infarction volume. There was no significant relation between admission serum aspartate level and ischemic stroke outcome stroke severity or infarction volume. Conclusion: Elevation of glutamate, glycine, and nitric oxide serum levels in the early onset of ischemic stroke can predict poor stroke outcome. (Egypt J. Neurol. Psychiat. Neurosurg., 2007, 44(1): 38-48)


Motivated by an advertising scenario in which a luxury sports sedan races against a similar car falling under the influence of gravity, a calculation using undergraduate physics and calculus is performed to theoretically predict the outcome.


Citizens of McKinney This plan was made for the citizens of McKinney, with the help of the citizens of McKinney. The continuous dedication of time and effort displayed by members of the community is endlessly appreciated. Mayor and City Council George Fuller, Mayor Tracy Rath, Mayor Pro Tem La'Shadion Shemwell, Council Member Rainey Rogers, Council Member Scott Elliott, Council Member Chuck Branch, Council Member Charlie Philips, Council Member Planning & Zoning Commission Bill Cox, Chairman Brian Mantzey, Vice-Chairman Janet Cobbel, Commission Member Deanna Kuykendall, Commission Member Cameron McCall, Commission Member Mark McReynolds, Commission Member Pamela Smith, Commission Member City Manager's Office Paul Grimes, City Manager Jose Madrigal, Deputy City Manager Barry Shelton, Assistant City Manager Steve Tilton, Assistant City Manager ACKNOWLEDGMENTS


In this paper compares Gini regression (using the non-parametric approach of weighted average of slope, instead of the parametric approach) with OLS and other robust regression methods, the type L (LAV, linear combinations of order statistics), the type M (M Huber, based on the concept of maximum likelihood) and the type MM (based on the minimization of an estimator M). The comparison of the methods is performed via simulation under different scenarios. The results show that the Gini regression has a higher degree of robustness compared with the OLS regression to estimate the regression coefficients in the presence of outliers, but their robustness is less than robust estimation methods LAV, M Huber and MM.


The banded fruit weevil (BFW), Phlyctinus callosus (Schönherr) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), is a polyphagous pest, feeding on a number of plant groups, like grasses, weeds, herbs, and woody plants. Phlyctinus callosus is indigenous to South Africa and has a limited distribution throughout the world. The weevil was only reported in the Western Cape, South Africa, New Zealand and Australia. Where the BFW occurs, it is a major insect pest of grapes and deciduous fruit, causing damage by feeding on the leaves and fruit, including the fruit stalks and shoots. The BFW adults, especially, cause fruit damage by means of feeding on the skin and the underlying flesh, which results in the formation of shallow lesions with phytosanitary implications. Other damage includes foliage damage, berry scarring and ringbarked stems, due to feeding activity. Control has mainly been achieved through the use of trunk barriers, which are effective in preventing the weevil from reaching the fruits, although such use is labour-intensive. Biocontrol agents, like entomopathogenic nematodes (EPNs) and entomopathogenic fungi (EPF), are preferred alternatives, because they have no negative effect on the environment, and because they leave no residues in the fruit intended for export. Using biological control agents in combination to control insect pests emphasises the importance of knowing the biology of the target insect pest, as well as that of the biocontrol agents, such as EPNs and EPF.


The language features of job advertisements are in the form of simple sentences and complex nominal groups so that a job advertisement can cause different perceptions between one reader and another. Therefore, carefulness in understanding job advertisements is a matter of urgency. One characteristic of a complex nominal group is the use of a post-nominal modifier which functions to give a clear meaning to the nominal group itself. This study examines the use of post-nominal modifiers which aim to identify the constituent elements and types of circumstantial elements in post-nominal modifiers contained in English language job advertisements. The job advertisements were obtained from one of the largest job market websites in Indonesia, jobstreet.com. This study used descriptive qualitative method through the Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) approach. From this study, it was found that all post-nominal modifiers consisted of prepositional phrases with the preposition "in" (60%), "of" (14.3%), "with" (11.4%), "As" (4.3%), and "at", "for", and "to" (1.4%). Meanwhile, the types of circumstantial elements found in the post-nominal modifier were the type of matter (80%), manner-means category (7.1%), accompaniment-comitative category (4.3%), location- place category (4.3%), and the role-guise category (4.3%).


We discuss the challenges of devising a useful shared data cache service as a part of the cloud platform. Outside the cloud, such a service appeals to developers for two main reasons. Most importantly, data caches reduce the response latency experienced by users. For example, rendering a content page with various personalized boxes as part of a user web session often involves numerous database lookups. Therefore, if the content generation involves cheap memory accesses to a data cache instead of actual database queries, the user experiences will improve. Moreover, data caches are simple to use: they normally expose a simple get/set interface akin to key/value stores and a rudimentary mechanism to expire values [2], thus allowing result-based caching to be seamlessly integrated with existing database-driven code.


The number of older people in the population is rising and
 so is the number of older patients in the Emergency Department (ED). Older
 patients often have complex problems which leads to an increased change of
 repeat ED visits, longer length of stay, higher chance of hospital admission
 and higher chance of negative health outcomes. Cognitive impairment is a
 frequent problem in older ED patients but often remains unrecognized and
 little is known about the association between cognitive impairment and
 adverse outcomes in older ED patients.
 In this thesis we show that cognitive impairment is associated with adverse
 outcomes in acutely presenting older patients. Secondly, we show that
 routinely collected parameters in addition to cognitive impairment can be
 used to screen for high risk of adverse outcomes in older ED patients. We
 investigated two delirium screeners and showed the CAM-ICU might not be
 suitable for early detection of delirium in the ED. Finally, vital signs that
 associate with decreased brain perfusion and oxygenation, such as low
 systolic blood pressure, were associated with cognitive impairment in older
 ED patients. Next steps would be to investigate if optimal resuscitation might improve
 cognition and decrease risk of subsequent delirium and adverse outcomes.


A non-aqueous capillary electrophoresis(NACE) method was developed for separation and determination acidic herbicides residues,including 2,4-D,dicamba and 2,4,5-T,in two hundred actual tobacco leaf samples based on orthogonal experiment design.Effect of experimental factors,such as organic solvent,system of electrolyte,pH value and separation potential on separation efficiency of NACE was investigated.The optimal NACE condition was obtained as follows:running buffer:40.0 mmol/L ammonium acetate in 90% acetonitrile(apparent pH 9.7),separation potential:-25 kV,capillary column:50 μm i.d.×46 cm(effective length of 37.5 cm),detection wavelength:200 nm.Under the optimal condition,the linear ranges of the UV response at 200 nm were observed over the concentration range from 1.0 to 50 mg/L for 2,4-D,dicamba and 2,4,5-T.Limit of detections(LODs) for 2,4-D,dicamba and 2,4,5-T were found to be 0.50,0.60 and 0.50 mg/L,respectively,whereas the overall recoveries ranged from 81%to 84%.Three acidic herbicides residues were successfully separated in 15 min.A rapid,effective method for separation acid herbicide was established by less experiments and much simple statistic data.


Bounded Model Checking (BMC) is incomplete without a completeness threshold (CT) bound. Previous methods, using recurrence diameter for obtaining CT, check for existence of a longest loop-free path at every depth k. For terminating software programs, we propose an efficient method for obtaining CT that requires solving a formula of size O(k) at some depths only, as compared to previous methods that require solving a formula of O(k2) (or O(klogk)) size at every depth. We augment previous methods for BMC simplifications using model transformation and control flow information, with context-sensitive analysis. This results in more BMC simplifications and further reduction in the number of CT checks. We have implemented our techniques in a Satisfiability Modulo Theory (SMT)-based BMC framework. Our controlled experiments on real-world software programs show that our proposed formulation provides significant improvements over previous approaches.


Pharmaceuticals have been widely found in wastewater. Among them, diclofenac was detected at the highest frequency; in this study, the commercial activated carbon was used to remove diclofenac from synthetic wastewater. Various testing methods were applied to evaluate the efficiency of the activated carbon for removing diclofenac from residues wastewater such as scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Brunauer, Emmett and Teller (BET), and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS). the operating conditions were determined by using a batch reactor with various parameters such as different pH, diclofenac concentration, and different mass of activated carbon. the result of operations conditions was: pH 5, diclofenac concentration is 1000 mg/l mass of activated carbon is 500gm/L, While, the difference of initial Ibuprofen concentration, flow rate, and bed depth was determined by packed bed reactor, it was found 2cm for bed height, and flow rate 25 l/hr, Diclofenac concentration, 625mg/l. from adsorption equilibrium and with Langmuir and Freundlich models, the kinetic constants were determined, also shown the pseudo-first-order gave the best result, and more suitable for the removal of Diclofenac by adsorbed activation carbon.


Today many software systems need to take into account security considerations. While Software Engineering has been quite successful in ensuring that systems satisfy non-functional requirements such as dependability, less work has been done wrt. security requirements.In this work we present a software engineering method aiming to facilitate secure systems development, which is based on an extension of UML called UMLsec.


Abstract : An activity analysis in a high activity Flight Service Station (Millville) was performed to describe in detail the duties of operating specialists. Data were collected by continuous 4-hr kymograph recordings of both the Air/ground, or A Position, and the Interphone, or B Position, under both moderate and high load co ditions. The records were analyzed to determine the frequency and duration of each of the specialists' activities and what percentage of time they required. Diary data on the non-control position, the Teletype or C Position, were also collected. These observations were supplemented by intensive interviews with the operating personnel in Millville and other Flight Service Stations. Process charts were prepared showing the flow of information between the station with other facilities and the aircraft for 4 of the stations' principal functions: information relay, preflight and in-flight briefing, weather information dissemination, and emergency assistance. Findings indicated that the workload was directly related to the number of reports rather than to the number of aircraft in the area and that probably excessive delays occurred during the high load, IFR conditions. (Author)


Advantages of using computer programs over traditional teaching methods. Functional potentialities of electronic educational resources. special features of using informational communicative technologies at Russian language lessons in secondary school.


Purpose - – Housing is a composite asset comprising land and improved components varying as proportions of total value over space and time. Theory suggests land and improvements (structures) are unique goods responding differently to economic stimuli. This paper aims to test the expectation of different overall house price changes in response to variation in land and improved components. Design/methodology/approach - – House price dynamics are decomposed to analyse the influence of land and structure components for the city of Perth, Australia both at aggregate level and for spatially defined housing sub-regions, sample period 1995-2010. Findings - – Values of land and improvements on that land evolve differently over time and are significantly influenced by the magnitude of land leverage. The study extends previous research through extensive spatial disaggregation of a larger more detailed data set than previously used in studies of this type confirming significant variation in land leverage ratios, overall price change and growth rates for land and improvements in sub-regional markets defined by spatial criteria. Research limitations/implications - – The results suggest an important role for policy development with respect to housing affordability and supply side regulation of land in large urban housing markets. Practical implications - – The results suggest important implications for hedonic price analysis of housing markets. The inclusion of land leverage variables in hedonic regression could remove coefficient bias associated with omitted location amenity variables. Originality/value - – The paper adapts methodology from previous studies but extends previous literature through detailed analysis of a large Australian housing market (Perth) enabling extensive spatial disaggregation of the sample and providing greater insight to spatial variation of land leverage than in previous studies.


This paper deals with key issues of the coating technology applied to plant materials prior to osmotic dehydration and convective drying. Coatings created with solutions of starch products and pectin were examined. It was shown that coating of foods to be dehydrated influences mass transfer in a plant tissue during osmotic pre-treatment as well as during convective drying. Each coating should be individually examined. The properties of coatings depend on their composition and the method used for the fabrication of a coating. Coating of foods with an artificial barrier on the surface may efficiently hinder the penetration of solute inside the food, not affecting much the rate of water removal. The coated plant materials had a greater water loss/solids gain ratio then the uncoated ones. Osmotic dehydration seems to be one of possible pre-treatment methods before drying. The conditions of convective drying are changed upon osmotic dehydration of plant materials. It was shown that changes in drying rate depend on the kind of coating substance. Bigger differences were observed at higher water content and these differences narrowed as water content in dried material decreased. The positive effect of coatings on the physical properties of dried fruits was found.


In this paper a simple damage function for the relative assessment of the material degradation is presented. The damage function is based on the analysis of temperature and moisture content fields in the investigated material together with its pore size distribution function. In this way the relative assessment of frost induced damage can be provided. The application of the damage function is demonstrated on several wall assemblies exposed to several environmental loads in the Czech Republic and the comparison of weather year severity to the studied constructions is presented.


"Range riding takes a lot of watching, waiting, and understanding," according to Stanley uniform forage use. The basis for his plan is simple. Salt is placed in timbered areas where grazing is desired and is progressively moved to unused areas as the season continues. When an area is used properly, salt is moved to an un"Bun" Anderson, rider for the Starkey Cattle Association. "Bun" rides a national forest range in the Blue Mountains of eastern Oregon. A former top hand in rodeo circles, he now concentrates his efforts on getting uniform use of the range forage on a 27,000-acre ponderosa piiie summer range. Although Anderson has ridden the Starkey range only two years, he has demonstrated that he is as good on the range as he was in the arena. The Starkey Experimental Forest and Range is typical of many summer ranges in the Northwest. Some parts are rough with deep canyons, steep slopes and timbered ridges without water. Other parts are open grassland flats, small meadows, and " jungled-up" lodgepole pine thickets. 'Since 1940 this range has been used as a demonstration area for well-known grazing management practices. Improvement in range condition and research results show that range riding is the key to good range management. Water has been developed on this allotment so that cattle seldom have to go farther than R/ of a mile to water. This is a great help to "Bun's" job of getting even forage use, but good cattle distribution is still difficult because of the topography and intermingled grassland and forested range.


A study of the courtship of Ambystoma laterale provided several new observations not previously reported. These observations are important in interpreting the activities of the sala- manders during courtship and, in some instances, in understanding the observations of earlier workers (Kumpf and Yeaton 1932). Evidence is provided that suggests that interspecific breeding isolation and sexual recognition are based on chemical and, possibly, tactile clues. The interspecific breeding isolation mechanism is discussed with particular reference to A. jeffersonianum, a species with which A. laterale has hy- bridized in the past. A possible sequence of events is proposed leading to the present breeding iso- lation between these two species. An intraspecific isolating mechanism is proposed based on the observation of males competing for a female. The competitive response of the males may tend to isolate breeding pairs from other members of the species, with the result that the female involved may be fertilized by only one male in any breeding season. Since fertilization by one male, as op- posed to fertilization by several males, results in reduced zygote variability, an explanation of the evolution of such an intraspecific mechanism is needed. My observations suggest that the responsi- ble selective force was the success of the courtship. * * *


e20533 Background: Bexarotene (Bex) is an oral retinoid X receptor agonist with activity against cutaneous T cell lymphoma and currently under investigation for other malignancies. In patients receiving this agent for acute myeloid leukemia (AML), we noted increases in platelet counts. We therefore reviewed the available clinical trial data on Bex and its effects on platelet counts.

METHODS
We analyzed platelet count data from 3 Bex clinical trials encompassing non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and AML.

RESULTS
In two phase III trials of Bex in NSCLC, patients underwent carboplatin + paclitaxel (CarP, n=587) or cisplatin + vinorelbine (CisV, n=613) and were randomized to receive concurrent Bex or placebo. More patients on Bex than on placebo had an increase in platelet count of at least 50 K/uL (55% vs. 27% for CarP, p<0.0001; 81% vs. 66% for CisV, p<0.0001) over pre-treatment baseline. The median increase in platelet count was higher on Bex than on placebo (69 vs 0 K/uL for CarP, p<0.0001; 168 vs. 95 K/uL for CisV, p<0.0001) and was maintained while on treatment. In both NSCLC trials, the median time to platelet increase >50 K/uL on Bex was 22 days. Similar findings were seen in a phase I monotherapy trial in AML where 5/18 (28%) patients achieved platelet transfusion independence with peak platelet counts of 40-91 K/uL.

CONCLUSIONS
Clinically significant increases in platelet counts were seen in all 3 clinical trials examined. These data suggest that Bex improves platelet counts in patients with a variety of cancer types, both as monotherapy and with concurrent chemotherapy. Its effect on megakaryopoiesis and its potential role as a supportive care measure should be further evaluated. [Table: see text].


A 5-week-old infant boy presented to the dermatology department with a 3-week history of annular plaques. The patient had multiple papules and annular plaques with a raised border on his scalp and face ([Figure 1][1]). His mother had an uncomplicated pregnancy, although she had a history of systemic


well as the decorative tech-nique used, known as "green and manganese" or "green and purple", relate this piece to the palace production of Madinat al-Zahra. The unusual figurative decoration, mainly anthropomorphic, in the Islamic repertoire, united to the lack of ceramic-made examples, since this thematic is just a bit more frequent in ivories, accentuate the importance of the very few cases that join to the known ones.


The massive increase of spam is posing a very serious threat to email and SMS, which have become an important means of communication. Not only do spams annoy users, but they also become a security threat. Machine learning techniques have been widely used for spam detection. Email spams can be detected through detecting senders' behaviour, the contents of an email, subject and source address, etc, while SMS spam detection usually is based on the tokens or features of messages due to short content. However, a comprehensive analysis of email/SMS content may provide cures for users to aware of email/SMS spams. We cannot completely depend on automatic tools to identify all spams. In this paper, we propose an analysis approach based on information entropy and incremental learning to see how various features affect the performance of an RBF-based SVM spam detector, so that to increase our awareness of a spam by sensing the features of a spam. The experiments were carried out on the spambase and SMSSpemCollection databases in UCI machine learning repository. The results show that some features have significant impacts on spam detection, of which users should be aware, and there exists a feature space that achieves Pareto efficiency in True Positive Rate and True Negative Rate.


The principle of the Training System for Power Substation (TSPS) based information technology of power company is introduced in this paper.According to operation rules for power substation,a new TSPS is designed using advanced information technology and power system simulation tools,which takes physical element simulation as operation platform and provides computer digital simulation as data support.The test report from local application shows that TSPS can meet the requirements for training the operator of power system.


Electron Energy Loss Spectroscopy (EELS) is used to probe the chemical environment of materials at the nanometer scale. This analysis becomes challenging when dealing with embedded nanostructured materials, where small regions of interest residing in thick matrices yield noisy data. The data analysis can benefit from modeling the core loss spectra with the available reference peaks, using the experimental peak positions and ratio of the fitted peak areas to gauge the chemical binding in a material.


Virtualization of products means the representation of some of their properties by models. In a stronger digitalized world, these models will gain a much broader use than models had in engineering so far. Even for one modelling aspect different models of the same product will be used, depending on the specific need of the model user. That need may change in the course of product life, between first product concepts till over the different phases of development, to product use, maintenance, or even recycling. Since a digitalized world use of these diverse models will not be limited to experts model consistency will play a much stronger role. Model hierarchies will play a stronger role and can serve also as means for teaching product users a deeper understanding of product properties. A consistent model hierarchy leading from a simple to a more advanced property representation can support this learning process. In this paper perturbation methods are analyzed as a means for setting up model hierarchies in a consistent manner. This is studied by models for the behavior of a electrohydraulic drive, which consists of a variable speed motor, a pump, a double stroke cylinder and a counterbalance valve. Model hierarchy is achieved by model reduction in the sense of perturbation theory. The use of these different models for different questions in a system design context and their interrelations are exemplified.


introduction The cooling of a crystal in combination with the use of a protecting oil facilitates the handling and transfer to a diffractometer of even very sensitive material. The method is explained and the required device is described in this work. Basic advantages of the technique are simplicity and freedom of access to the sample without the need for sophisticated glassware. Therefore, this technique, suitable for crystal manipulation in the temperature range between room temperature and 193 K, is much more efficient than those involving the use of capillaries. © 1993 international Union of Crystallography Printed in Great Britain all rights reserved The advantages of crystal structure determination at low temperature, compared to conventional room-temperature measurements, are well known (Rudman, 1976; Veith & Frank, 1988; Luger, 1989). Crystals that are unstable under ambient conditions, as well as liquids or gases, can be studied in the solid state. Many compounds cocrystallize with solvent. The vapor pressure of crystal solvent is still high and allows diffusion out of the lattice. Normally this destroys the crystal or, at least, causes changes in the intensities of the reflections during data collection. Cooling Journal of Applied Crystallography ISSN 0021-8898 ~i 1993 616 SHORT COMMUNICATIONS of the crystal prevents the solvent from escaping from the lattice. Moreover, the problem of intensity decay with increasing sin 0/2 is less severe when the crystal is cooled and so the quality of the data set is improved, resulting in a more accurate structure determination. At low temperature, the atoms vibrate more isotropically (Brock & Dunitz, 1990) and the residual electron-density map is less contaminated by the diffuse electron density arising from anharmonic behavior. Thus, the location of hydrogen atoms and electron-deformation-density work are facilitated. There exist several home-made devices for maintaining the crystal in a cold environment while data are collected (Altona, 1964; Danielsson, Grenthe & Oskarsson, 1976; Bellard & Sheldrick, 1978; Hajdu, McLaughlin, Helliwell, Sheldon & Thompson, 1985; Zobel & Luger, 1990). Some devices are commercially available [Cosier & Glazer (1986) describe one and Enraf-Nonius, MSC and Siemens diffractometers can be obtained from their manufacturers with low-temperature devices]. However, to get the most out of low-temperature data collection, it is essential to handle the compounds at low temperature 'all the time', i.e. from crystallization up to and including data collection. Method The overall aim of developers of crystal-handling techniques should be to keep operations as simple as possible, so that they can readily be taught to beginners. This is the only way of guaranteeing that know-how will stay in an X-ray laboratory even though specialists may leave. Many methods of selecting a crystal and transferring it to a diffractometer below room temperature have been employed by crystallographers EVeith & B~irnighausen (1974), Seebach, Amstutz, Laube, Schweizer & Dunitz (1985), Boese & Bl~iser (1989); the 'Hilgenberg apparatus' (The Hilgenberg Company, W-3509 Malsfeld, Germany)]. In addition to these techniques, that of in situ crystallization in a capillary on the diffractometer has been developed (van Nes & van Bolhuis, 1978; Brodalla, Mootz, Boese & Osswald, 1985; Blake, Cradock, Ebsworth & Franklin, 1990). One might get the impression that every crystallographer has a different way of handling crystals in a glove box and/or below ambient temperatures. In our opinion, the sealing of crystals in capillaries at low temperature does not accord with the overall aim of simplicity. The manipulation of capillaries at low temperature requires sophisticated glassware that is not commonly available to the working synthetic chemist. Furthermore, these manipulations need months or years of practice. Because of this, we have not used capillaries at all in the last five years. Instead, we constructed, from easily available parts, a low-temperature device which, combined with the oil-drop mounting technique pioneered by Hope (1987, 1988), enables the crystallographer to investigate the crystal quality using a polarizing microscope, as well as to mount the crystal at a fixed temperature ranging from room temperature to 193 K. Fig. 1 shows the device. Boil-off from liquid nitrogen is directed through glass tubing towards the microscope slide on which the sample resides. At the beginning of crystal manipulation, the sample is located in an ordinary Schlenk flask, as generally used in a chemical laboratory. The whole batch of crystals in their mother liquor and the flushing gas is cooled down. The Schlenk flask, with the sample, is almost entirely immersed in the cooling agent (normally ethanol/dry ice), which prevents the vessel from icing on the outside. Through the neck of the flask, a small spoon is allowed to cool down in the mother liquor. Afterwards, a portion of crystals is scooped up and covered with cold inert oil from a syringe. (If the crystals dry up very quickly, this can be done even within the mother liquor, preventing the crystals from being dried by the cold Schlenk gas.) In Fig. 2, the nozzle of the mounting device can be seen in more detail. The microscope slide is provided with a small depression. This indentation is filled with oil and cooled by the gas stream. The crystals on the small spoon are now rapidly transferred to the microscope and immersed in the oil. The cold inert gas atmosphere and the surrounding oil prevent the crystals from being attacked by moisture and/or oxygen. The oil allows washing, splitting and selection of crystals of suitable quality. When a suitable crystal has been selected, an electrical pistol drill is used to drill a hole into a dry-ice block. With a fibre that is already fixed on a goniometer pin, the crystal is picked out of the oil, captured on the tip of the fibre and transferred into the hole in the dry-ice block (Fig. 3). At 195 K, most crystals survive the transportation over 2 m to the low-temperature nozzle at the diffractometer. There, the crystal mount can easily be detached from the dry-ice block and screwed onto the goniometer head. If