IgE sensitization profiles to single birch allergens in birch-sensitized patients differ among European countries. The aim of this study was to determine the distribution of specific IgE antibodies to major and minor birch pollen allergens in a population of allergic Norwegian individuals by using a birch allergic blood donor population as a surrogate sample. Sixty blood donors were recruited and sampled based on birch allergy symptoms such as rhinitis, rhinoconjunctivitis and/or mild asthma in previous seasons. All sera were collected before start of the pollen season and tested using a line blot assay (Euroimmun AG, Lübeck, Germany) for IgE to birch and timothy pollen. Both extracts, single allergens, and cross-reacting carbohydrate determinants (CCD) were analysed. Only donors with specific IgE to birch and/or timothy grass were further evaluated. Specific IgE to birch pollen extract was found in 52 sera, and sensitization to timothy grass in 40 sera. Specific IgE to Bet v 1 was predominant in contrast to Bet v 4 which was absent. However, sensitization to the minor allergens Bet v 2 and 6 was always found together with high levels of IgE to Bet v 1. Subjects sensitized to the profilin Bet v 2 from birch were also sensitized to Phl p 12 from timothy grass. In conclusion, there was predominantly Bet v 1 sensitization in this cohort and low sensitization to minor allergens and cross-reactive allergens (Bet v 2, Bet v 4, Phl p 7 and Phl p 12).


complications in 38 of these patients. The complications became manifest between six months and nine and a half years after treatment (mean delay 5 5 years) and were divided into three types. Twenty three patients developed dysphagia or airways obstruction, six of whom required a permanent gastrostomy or pharyngostomy for intractable aspiration or severely impaired pharyngeal motility. The details of other swallowing difficulties have been reported previously.2 Two other patients required a tracheostomy for airways obstruction. The second complication was tissue necrosis. Osteoradionecrosis occurred in eight patients, affecting the mandible in seven and the maxilla in one. Cervical skin necrosis occurred in three other patients; this failed to heal in one despite multiple attempts to resurface the neck over seven years. A spontaneous salivary fistula developed in two patients, and a laryngectomy was necessary, for severe perichondritis in another. The third type of complication arose from surgery for residual or recurrent disease. Three patients developed orocutaneous fistulas and four developed pharyngocutaneous fistulas after surgery for recurrent disease. Rupture of the carotid artery and death occurred as a direct result of tissue necrosis in three of these patients. After our initial experience it became clear that for successful healing after surgery in patients who had received neutron irradiation the volume of the resection had to include the entire three dimensional region of treated tissue. Evaluation of the resection volume was facilitated by review of photographs of the patients taken shortly after completion of their treatment. We would concur with the conclusion of the Edinburgh group and would like to stress that it is not only mortality after treatment that is increased in these patients. In our experience morbidity from fast neutron therapy is considerable, both in its incidence and in its severity.


Purifying and recycling process water is a way to minimize the use of potable water and the production of wastewater in the food industry. Water recycling should, however, never affect the quality of the final products. Therefore, a model has been developed to investigate the possibilities of water recycling in a potato factory. One problem that could arise in a water recycling system is the accumulation of dissolved components, such as salts, in the process water loop, which would affect the product quality. Therefore, the quality of the potato products can be related to the amount of chloride ions present in the final product. The model described in this article is based on mass balances and transient diffusion theory is used to calculate the amount of chloride ions present in the process water and in the final product. The calculations show that chloride ions do accumulate in the water and in the potatoes during recycling, because of the addition of salts to the system. The approach used proved to be useful to obtain quantitative information on the process and to find critical points in the system.


This paper critically unravels the themes of Jhumra folk dance-songs of Dangaura Tharu of Nepal. On its interpretation, it discusses the imaginative representation of nature and human relationship in Jhumra songs appropriating the notions of the folklore performance of Richard Schechner and Alan Dundes. The paper appropriates Tharu Jhumra dance songs: Chhaila To, Jone Panah Gaili, Baigam Ture and Karam Lage Aag voiced by Mani Ram Tharu. The songs reflect the romantic fantasy and the suffering of the folks. Jhumra serves as the distinct dance repeatedly performed by the community throughout the year. Along with this, the brief reference of Robert Burns has also been fetched to spell out the modern revival and revisualization of folklores by the medium of YouTube and other commercial online platforms. Jhumra songs comprise the lyrics that romanticize and de-romanticize nature with the human–nature union. I have used Schechner's idea of performance as the way of life to signify the eco-centric romance of Tharu community. Schechner believes that performance is embedded in everydayness of each activity that a folk performs. This research will help to assimilate the eco-friendly nature of Tharu ethnicity and other different ethnicities of Nepal urging us to be more eco-conscious individuals.


Summary The microfibril angle of rattan fibers was determined using the iodine staining method and the X-ray diffraction technique. The two were compared to assess the applicability of the X-ray technique in estimating the actual microfibril angle (MFA) of the fiber walls. Likewise, longitudinal Young's modulus and longitudinal shrinkage were evaluated to determine the influence of MFA on the properties of the cane. The X-ray technique gave an accurate and objective estimate of the actual MFA of the fiber walls. A nonlinear relationship existed between MFA and longitudinal Young's modulus while a curvilinear relationship was observed between MFA and longitudinal shrinkage. This pattern is similar to the behavior of wood. Thus, it was deduced that the influence of microfibril angle on the properties of rattan cane is similar to its influence on the properties of wood.


Background Immunization of mice with the Trypanosoma cruzi trans-sialidase (TS) gene using plasmid DNA, adenoviral vector, and CpG-adjuvanted protein delivery has proven highly immunogenic and provides protection against acute lethal challenge. However, long-term protection induced by TS DNA vaccines has not been reported. The goal of the present work was to test whether the co-administration of a plasmid encoding IL-15 (pIL-15) could improve the duration of protection achieved through genetic vaccination with plasmid encoding TS (pTS) alone. Methodology We immunized BALB/c mice with pTS in the presence or absence of pIL-15 and studied immune responses [with TS-specific IFN-γ ELISPOT, serum IgG ELISAs, intracellular cytokine staining (IFN-γ, TNF-α, and IL-2), tetramer staining, and CFSE dilution assays] and protection against lethal systemic challenge at 1 to 6 months post vaccination. Mice receiving pTS alone developed robust TS-specific IFN-γ responses and survived a lethal challenge given within the first 3 months following immunization. The addition of pIL-15 to pTS vaccination did not significantly alter T cell responses or protection during this early post-vaccination period. However, mice vaccinated with both pTS and pIL-15 challenged 6 months post-vaccination were significantly more protected against lethal T. cruzi challenges than mice vaccinated with pTS alone (P<0.05). Improved protection correlated with significantly higher numbers of TS-specific IFN-γ producing total and CD8+ T cells detected>6 months post immunization. Also, these TS-specific T cells were better able to expand after in vitro re-stimulation. Conclusion Addition of pIL-15 during genetic vaccination greatly improved long-term T cell survival, memory T cell expansion, and long-term protection against the important human parasite, T. cruzi.


To identify risk factors for complications after rotator cuff repair, all repairs (open and arthroscopic, single row and double row, primary and revision) performed by a single surgeon over a 4-year period were reviewed. Complications were classified as minor or major. Minor complications included serous drainage, local erythema resolving with observation or oral antibiotics, and associated shoulder girdle tendinitis. Major complications included wound or deltoid dehiscence, recurrent rotator cuff tear with clinical decompensation, and deep infection requiring surgical treatment. Ninety-two patients (96 repairs, 31 open and 65 arthroscopic, 87 primary and 9 revision) met inclusion criteria. The overall complication rate at 12 weeks was 10.5% (3 minor and 7 major complications). The complication rate with open repair (26%) was significantly higher than with all-arthroscopic repair (3%). Large/massive tears had a 21% complication rate compared with 5% in small/medium tears. There was no statistically significant difference in complication rates between single-row (9%) and double-row (25%) repairs or between revisions (22%) and primary repairs (9%). Open repair, large/massive tear size, tobacco use, and preoperative narcotic use were statistically significant predictors of complications in the early (<12 wk) postoperative period after rotator cuff repair.


Fetus in fetu (FIF) in the scrotal sac is often overlooked in the differential diagnosis of other scrotal swellings in infants and children. Unlike  teratoma, FIF is a benign disorder. Scrotal FIF is extraordinarily rare and has been reported only twice in the international literature. We describe the case of a 15-day-old neonate who presented with scrotal swelling since birth. Radiography and ultrasound revealed a FIF. On surgical removal and pathological evaluation, the anencephalic fetus had limb buds, male external genitals, and vertebral column, supporting the diagnosis of FIF. FIF in the scrotum is a very rare entity. It should be  differentiated from other scrotal swellings such as teratoma because of the malignant potential of the latter. Preoperative diagnosis is based on radiologic findings. The treatment is complete excision. Keywords : fetus in fetu, pluripotent cells, scrotal swelling, scrotal teratoma


The effect of heat treatment on magnetic rotation in sputtered cobalt films. The films were prepared in a special depositing chamber, the main feature of which was an arrangement for keeping the films cool during the process of sputtering.Magnetic rotation measurements were made over the wavelength range .6μ to 2.3μ on such cathodically sputtered cobalt films before and after heating for a number of hours at about 300°C in low pressure palladium-pure hydrogen. The result of this heat treatment was to increase several-fold the rotations at 2μ for both the Faraday (transmission) and Kerr (reflection) effects, while towards the visible the change was small.Conclusions drawn from this are based on the assumption that heat treatment coalesces the granules of which the film is composed into larger units. Then since the magnetic rotation is seen to depend on the size and character of the particles, it should be regarded in this case as a molar rather than molecular or atomic property, the effects being determined by conducting electrons even for wavelengths as short as 1μ.Experiments on a nickel film and on colloidal iron yielded results in agreement with this conclusion.


The primary aim of this project is to investigate if various every day human activities can be replaced by autonomous intelligent systems. Robotics, initially designed for assisting people, turned out to be much expensive for small but time consuming home activities. The challenge in this project is to prove that even with low cost gear an intelligent lawn mower could be built in order to save time and effort of humans by taking care of yards automatically without human's surveillance. Main concerns to implement the project are the movement scenario of the device, an efficient control algorithm, appropriate sensors selection, while the cost of electronic and mechanical parts should be kept low. In the conclusions section, the outcomes referring to problems that appear during the experimentation with the vehicle will be presented as well as the methodology to overcome them. In addition, all future extensions and improvements of the device will be discussed in the same section that forms the rest of this paper body.


Batch/semi-batch processes are highly nonlinear and involve complex reaction mechanisms. Model-plant mismatch always exists. The lack of rapid direct or indirect measurements of the properties to be controlled makes the control task difficult. It is the usual practice to follow the prespecified setpoint profiles for process variables for which measurements are available, in order to obtain the desired product properties. Modeling error can be the cause of bad performance when the optimal profiles computed for the model are implemented on the actual plant. In this paper, a state estimation model based algorithm is presented for online modification of the optimal profile and control with the goal of obtaining the desired properties at the minimum batch time. The effectiveness of the algorithm is demonstrated by its application to bulk polymerization of styrene.


In order to increase the electrical breakdown strength and treeing inception voltage of cross-linked polyethylene (XLPE) insulated power cable, surfactant in combination with titanate coupling agent, as an additive, has been mixed with the semiconducting layer, which is surrounded by polyethylene insulation, to chemically improve the dielectric properties of polyethylene interface. By means of infrared and X-ray diffraction spectra analyses, a change in the crystalline orientation angle and the density of polyethylene is observed inside the improved polyethylene interfacial layer. Additionally, it is assumed that a thin diffusion layer is formed, that results in a decrease in the electric field stress on the polyethylene interface and then an increase in the withstand voltage of polyethylene.


ABSTRACT
Data on the etiological factors underlying the co-occurrence of common adolescent pain with anxiety and depression symptoms are very limited. Opioid prescriptions for adolescent pain problems are on the rise in North America and constitute a risk factor for diversion, misuse and substance use. In this study, we aimed to investigate the phenotypic and etiological association among pain, depression, and anxiety, and to test their link to substance use in adolescents.By taking advantage of the Italian National Twin Registry and of the relatively low incidence of opioid prescriptions in Italy, we applied multivariate modelling analyses to 748 Italian adolescent twins (374 pairs, mean age 16+1.24 years). Twins' responses to the Achenbach Youth Self-Report questionnaire (YSR) were used to build a composite adolescent pain index, and to measure anxiety, depression and substance use.All monozygotic within-pair correlations were higher than the dizygotic correlations, indicating genetic influences for adolescent pain, anxiety and depressive problems. A common latent liability factor influenced by genetic and environmental elements shared among pain, depression and anxiety provided the best fit to explain the co-occurrence of adolescent pain, anxiety and depression problems. A common phenotypic factor capturing all three phenotypes was positively associated (β=0.19, p<0.001, CI: 0.10-0.27) with substance use.These findings indicate that several intertwined mechanisms, including genetic factors, can explain a shared liability to common adolescent pain, anxiety and depression problems. Their association with substance use remains traceable even in societies with relatively low prevalence of opioid prescriptions.


Abstract Frogs in the genus Cycloramphus are endemic to the Brazilian Atlantic Forest domain and many are threatened or endangered. Cycloramphus species lay eggs either on moist rocks or in moist soil cavities on the ground. Tadpoles of only 8 of the 28 recognized Cycloramphus species are known. Herein we describe the tadpole of C. rhyakonastes on the basis of specimens collected at the type locality in southern Brazil. Cycloramphus rhyakonastes is an aquatic breeder with semiterrestrial tadpoles that live on moist rocks within the splash zone of high gradient streams. We compare the C. rhyakonastes tadpole with all congeneric tadpoles described to date and discuss adaptations in this specialized tadpole and those of other species that adhere to rocky substrates.


Purpose: The aim of this phenomenological study was to qualitatively classify the experience of spouses caring for patients with schizophrenia. Methods: Data were gathered using 2 hour in-depth, unstructured interviews with nine spouses of patients with schizophrenia. The data collection period was 2012 to 2013. Colaizzi's phenomenological method was used to analyze the resulting data. Results: Five clusters of themes were identified. These were termed according to the experiences described by the spouses, as: suffering from falling into the abyss of despair; deepening heartbreak, clouds of misery hanging over one's family; possibly of losing the bond between family members; getting over one's hurt and stepping forward to the future. Participants experienced many burdens while caring for their spouse, however, they showed the ability to overcome difficulties positively and actively. Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that the spouse of a patient with schizophrenia experiences multiple sources of distress, and suggests a process to overcoming them. Recommendations include helping nurses be aware of the sufferings of both the patient and the spouse and to plan and provide for psychological interventions, such as stress management programs and informational support on social welfare programs.


Background Atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases (ASCVD) and dyslipidemia are associated to a higher risk of cardiovascular events, mortality, use of healthcare resources and costs. In Spain, the evidence about the administration of lipid-lowering treatments in clinical practice, and their clinical effectiveness in patients with ASCVD and hypercholesterolemia and patients with FH is scarce. Therefore, a multidisciplinary working group of cardiologists, family physicians, internal medicine specialists and neurologists was gathered for the Reality study. The aim of this study is to describe the demographic and clinical characteristics, comorbidities, and concomitant medication of patients with ASCVD and hypercholesterolemia and of patients with familial hypercholesterolemia (FH). The use of healthcare resources and costs associated to the management of these diseases after their diagnosis were also considered. Methods This is an observational and retrospective study, based on the BIG-PAC® database, which includes the electronic medical registries (EMRs) of 1.8 million people from 7 Autonomous Communities in Spain (including public primary care centers and hospitals). The study includes patients who had a new or recurrent episode of ASCVD during the recruitment period (from 01/01/2017 to 31/12/2018). The index date will be defined as the date of the ASCVD event, and the follow-up period will be 24 months. According to their first diagnosis in the database, patients will be classified as ASCVD (5 groups: stable/unstable angina, acute myocardial infarction, ischemic stroke, transient ischemic attack, and peripheral arterial disease) or FH. Discussion This study aims to analyze the treatment patterns and use of healthcare resources of ASCVD and FH in Spain. The prevalence of these disorders will also be estimated. Due to the high morbidity and mortality associated with these diseases, it is expected that our study will provide useful information for healthcare systems and decision makers to improve the management of these disabling diseases.


The aim of this paper is to develop an axysimmetric numerical procedure, easily extendible to 3-D configurations, based on the Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes equations coupled with a turbulence model to compute the external flow of a plug nozzle. The governing equations are discretized in the physical domain according a finite-volume technique with second order accuracy. The turbulence equation written in integral form is solved together with the flow equations. Complex shock-slip surfaces, shock-boundarylayer interactions appear in the flowfield and all the flow discontinuities will be numerically cap


Basal plane stacking faults (BSFs) with density of ∼1 × 106 cm−1 are identified as the dominant defect in the annealed ZnO thin films grown on c-plane sapphire by atomic layer deposition. The dominant peak centered at 3.321 eV in low-temperature photoluminescence measurements is attributed to the emission from the BSFs. The emission mechanism is considered to be the confined indirect excitons in the region of quantum-well-like structure formed by the BSFs. The observed energy shift of 19 meV with respect to the BSF-bounded exciton at low temperature may be caused by the localization effect associated with the coupling between BSF quantum wells.


Mobiluncus, a member of the anaerobic vaginal flora typical for bacterial vaginosis, is a strikingly mobile, curved, rod-shaped bacterium forming a bacterial genus that has thus far not been assigned with certainty to higher bacterial taxa. Two species, M curtisii and M mulieris, are well recognised, but atypical strains do occur. A normal residence for Mobluncus in the indigenous human bacterial flora might be the rectum or large intestine. Investigations during the last 20 years have not come up with a definite individual role for Mobiluncus in the pathogenesis of bacterial vaginosis. Its possible role in obstetric and gynaecological infections that are strongly suspected to be linked to bacterial vaginosis, and its role in extragenital infections, remain elusive. Mobiluncus is thus a conspicuous member of the mixed anaerobic flora that is so characteristic of bacterial vaginosis. The role of Mobiluncus in the pathogenesis of bacterial vaginosis will probably be resolved only when new insight is attained into the complex interrelationships of mixed anaerobic infections.


The GOCE (Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer) satellite mission, launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2009, aims to map the Earth's gravity with unprecedented detail (1°x1° at global scale). It provides a new class of gravity observations (gradiometric measurements) that can be used to investigate the lithospheric structures and processes from regional to global scales. The African continent is characterized by ancient cratons as well as more recent orogenic belts and large basins which, in place, are affected by recent to actual intraplate volcanism, rifting or hotspots. This complex geology attests for past and on-going tectonic and geodynamic processes which affect the African plate at the lithospheric scale. Such patterns are well known to provide a large variety of density contrasts, so gravity data gathered from ground or airborne surveys are extensively used since several decades to investigate the crustal or lithospheric structures of the African plate. We present here the first gravity maps computed from GOCE datasets shortly delivered and discuss their use for understanding the main structural patterns of the African lithosphere and the geodynamic processes. Comparison of the model deduced from the 2 first months GOCE data with EGM2008 model based on ground surveys and satellite data shows significant differences over Africa mainly related to the heterogeneous ground data distribution. Our aim is to investigate the crustal gravity signature of the entire African plate in order to 1- better discriminate between mantle and crustal gravity signatures and 2- bring constraints on the crust itself. For this purpose, we realized a first 3D forward model in which the African crust is discretized in spherical prisms, by jointly using two global seismological models: CRUST 2.0 and the global digital map of sediment thickness. Our model consists of three sedimentary and three crystalline crust layers and has a spatial resolution of 1°x1°. We computed the gravity and tensor component effects of our model using a dedicated software based on a discretization into spherical prisms developed by Uieda et al. We substracted this gravity effect to a Bouguer map that we derived from the first GOCE-based free air anomalies. Short wavelength residuals attest for shortcomings in the input crustal seismological model. Long wavelength residuals highlight mantellic gravity components which reflect deep thermal/compositional variations, such as the effect of the African Superplume. Then, we will take full advantage of the availability of the gravity gradients by incorporating them in the inversion process to improve the crustal density structure of our model.


Background High mutation rates of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) allows escape from T cell recognition preventing development of effective T cell vaccines. Vaccines that induce diverse T cell immune responses would help overcome this problem. Using SIV gag as a model vaccine, we investigated two approaches to increase the breadth of the CD8 T cell response. Namely, fusion of vaccine genes to ubiquitin to target the proteasome and increase levels of MHC class I peptide complexes and gene fragmentation to overcome competition between epitopes for presentation and recognition. Methodology/Principal Findings Three vaccines were compared: full-length unmodified SIV-mac239 gag, full-length gag fused at the N-terminus to ubiquitin and 7 gag fragments of equal size spanning the whole of gag with ubiquitin-fused to the N-terminus of each fragment. Genes were cloned into a replication defective adenovirus vector and immunogenicity assessed in an in vitro human priming system. The breadth of the CD8 T cell response, defined by the number of distinct epitopes, was assessed by IFN-γ-ELISPOT and memory phenotype and cytokine production evaluated by flow cytometry. We observed an increase of two- to six-fold in the number of epitopes recognised in the ubiquitin-fused fragments compared to the ubiquitin-fused full-length gag. In contrast, although proteasomal targeting was achieved, there was a marked reduction in the number of epitopes recognised in the ubiquitin-fused full-length gag compared to the full-length unmodified gene, but there were no differences in the number of epitope responses induced by non-ubiquitinated full-length gag and the ubiquitin-fused mini genes. Fragmentation and ubiquitination did not affect T cell memory differentiation and polyfunctionality, though most responses were directed against the Ad5 vector. Conclusion/Significance Fragmentation but not fusion with ubiquitin increases the breadth of the CD8 T vaccine response against SIV-mac239 gag. Thus gene fragmentation of HIV vaccines may maximise responses.


In vitro oxygen consumption (VO2), histochemical fiber type, capillary arrangement, and muscle fiber geometry were measured in three hamster striated muscles. These muscles varied markedly in their histochemical fiber type composition (% by number): retractor (70% FG, fast-twitch, glycolytic; 16% FOG, fast-twitch, oxidative-glycolytic; 14% SO, slow-twitch, oxidative); soleus (57% FOG, 43% SO), and sartorius (98% FG, 2% FOG). Sartorius VO2 [0.80 +/- 0.034 (SE) ml O2 X min-1 X 100 g-1] was significantly different (P less than 0.01) from VO2 of retractor (0.89 +/- 0.038) and soleus (1.00 +/- 0.048). The number of capillaries around a fiber and the surface area/volume were greater for FOG and SO fibers than for FG fibers. Fibers of all types appeared to be roughly elliptical in shape. Capillaries were uniformly distributed around fibers in the soleus, but they were located more toward the ends of the major diameter in the retractor and sartorius. The results suggest a relationship among a fiber's oxidative capacity (based on its histochemical staining pattern), number of surrounding capillaries and surface area/volume. Furthermore, results suggest that VO2 and capillary spacing around a fiber may depend on fiber type.


cephalosporinase activity that is resistant to ceftazidime (10), the strain isolated from our patient was susceptible to cephalosporins and aminoglycosides. Our exper ience suggests that H. alvei peritonitis can be successfully treated with appropriate intraperitoneal antibiotics and removal of the Tenckhoff catheter may not be necessary. Other adjunctive measures include improvement of nutritional status with parenteral feeding. Given its gastrointestinal origin, sigmoid diverticulitis has been reported linked to Hafnia bacteremia (1). We therefore believe that it might also be worthwhile to look for intestinal pathology in patients with Hafnia peritonitis.


Artificial spin ices (ASIs) are nanoscale geometrically engineered arrays of magnetic bars or islands that display magnetic frustration and provide a fertile system for modeling and testing many complex statistical mechanics theories and emergent phenomena. Aperiodic ASIs display spatially varying magnetic frustration as a result of the aperiodicity. We have explored the magnetization reversal of quasicrystalline ASIs (QC-ASIs) patterned on P2 and P3 Penrose tilings, using a statistical graph-theory approach that enables quantitative comparison between the two tilings. Our approach offers insight into the QC-ASIs. We show that the P2 tiling leads to enhanced topological frustration compared to the P3 tiling, and we elucidate the emergence of local antiferromagnetic ordering as well as disordered states in these ferromagnetic aperiodic lattices. Our method enables quantitative exploration of frustration behavior on any periodic or aperiodic lattice, thereby opening pathways to study collective behavior in various topologically frustrated systems.


Oxide films produced from plasma electrolytic oxidation are porous in structure. While they have some passivating effect in Mg alloys, the pores still lead to corrosion over long periods of exposure. In this study, spray pyrolysis was used to seal the porous oxide layer developed through the plasma electrolytic oxidation method on Mg alloy AZ31. The PEO coating acted as a good base for the application of spray pyrolysis due to its morphology. Three different kinds of coatings were obtained using different precursors: zinc acetate for ZnO, phosphoric acid for phosphate (P), and a mixture of zinc acetate and sodium phosphate for ZnO+P. The corrosion performance of all three coatings was studied by performing electrochemical impedance and polarization tests on the samples. Mass loss over a duration of 1 week was measured in 3% NaCl solution using immersion gravimetry. The coating with only phosphate (P) was found to be most corrosion-resistant with 52 times lower rate of corrosion and 50 times more polarization potential. The chemical composition of the corrosion products was studied using XRD and SEM-EDS analysis. Mass loss in ZnO+P was the highest, at up to 1.4 and 5.1 times higher than ZnO and P, respectively.


In this paper we present the smoothed piecewise-linear (SPWL) model as a useful tool in the device modeling field. The SPWL model is an extension of the well-known canonical piecewise-linear model proposed by Chua, which substitutes the abrupt absolute value function for a smoothing function (the logarithm of hyperbolic cosine), thus providing the model with several interesting properties. In particular, this function makes the model derivable, which is important to predict the intermodulation distortion behavior. Moreover, it allows one to control the smoothness of the global model by means of a single smoothing parameter. The parameters of the model are adapted to fit the nonlinear function, while the smoothing parameter is selected according to derivative constraints. The applied learning algorithm is a second-order gradient method. The proposed SPWL model is successfully applied to model a microwave HEMT transistor under optical illumination using real measurements. The model receives as input the bias voltages of the transistor, the instantaneous voltages, and the optical power and provides the drain to source current. The performance and computational burden of the SPWL model is compared with an empirical model and with some neural networks-based alternatives.


Bare-root treatment of chilli (Capsicum annuum) seedlings with extracts of decomposed and undecomposed oil-cakes and leaves of neem (Azadirachta indica) and castor (Ricinus communis) provided protection against root-knot disease caused by Meloidogyne incognita. A curative effect was also noted when roots of pre-infected seedlings were given a similar treatment. Suppression of root-knot development was greater in pre-infected (therapeutic use) seedlings than in those inoculated after dir treatment (prophylactic use). Extracts of decomposed materials were more effective than those of undecomposed ones. Moreover, oilcakes and neem were more effective than leaves and castor.


In e-beam projection lithography (EPL) systems, the relativistic focus condition was derived and compared with the nonrelativistic focus condition to investigate the effect of a large acceleration field related to the initial energy and emission angle of an electron emitted from a cathode. The difference in confusion disk between the relativistic and nonrelativistic limits was 180 nm when 1 eV was used as the initial energy of the electron. The variation in the initial energy of the electron was more sensitive to change the confusion disk than the acceleration field. In this comparison, the focusing parameters are used as follows: axial magnetic field, 0.5 T, distance between the mask layer and the workpiece, 2 mm and emission angle of the electron, 30°.


We propose a neural network for unsupervised anomaly detection with a novel robust subspace recovery layer (RSR layer). This layer seeks to extract the underlying subspace from a latent representation of the given data and removes outliers that lie away from this subspace. It is used within an autoencoder. The encoder maps the data into a latent space, from which the RSR layer extracts the subspace. The decoder then smoothly maps back the underlying subspace to a "manifold" close to the original inliers. Inliers and outliers are distinguished according to the distances between the original and mapped positions (small for inliers and large for outliers). Extensive numerical experiments with both image and document datasets demonstrate state-of-the-art precision and recall.


The importance of capital accumulation for economic growth and hence development was widely recognized long time ago. However, developing countries especially Sub-Saharan African countries, are still trapped in 'vicious circle of poverty' and failed to finance desired level of investment from their own domestic savings. Earlier models of development argued that these countries would come out of stagnation only if they got assistance from the developed world (Rodan 1961, and Chenery and Strout 1966). The two-gap model of Chenery and Strout (1966) showed that these countries are constrained with little domestic savings and foreign exchange earnings. The model predicted that foreign aid is an optimal means to break the circle and solve the two gaps (saving and foreign exchange gaps) simultaneously. However, their results were criticized both theoretically and empirically, and there has been a growing concern that foreign aid can be a substitute for domestic saving (foreign aid displacing domestic savings instead of supplementing it). This was mainly due to its negative impact on governments' tax collection effort resulting in reduced tax revenue and its allocation for consumption rather than investment. The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the impact of foreign aid inflows on governments' revenue collection and expenditure behaviors (fiscal response) using pooled data from Sub-Saharan Africa countries. To this effect we extend the neoclassical utility maximization approach of Heller (1975) by treating foreign aid as one of the endogenous variables. The reason we do this is because public policy makers anticipate foreign aid and formulate their policy accordingly. We hypothesize that different types of aid (grants and loans) and aid from different sources (bilateral and multilateral) have different impact on the recipient governments' revenue collection and expenditure behavior. The structural equations derived from maximization problem of policy-makers' utility function subject to financing constraints are estimated using 3SLS estimation technique. The finding of this study shows that grants and aid from bilateral sources are pro-consumption and hence have little effect on long run growth. On the other hand, loans and aid from multilateral sources are pro-investment. This research would make contributions to the existing literature as there is no other study made regarding this issue in the context of Sub-Saharan Africa countries. JEL Classification: F35 – Foreign Aid


A group of Angus X Holstein cattle were determined to have allergic rhinitis. Clinical signs included nasal discharge, tearing, sneezing, and nasal pruritus. The diagnosis was made on the basis of intradermal skin testing of affected and clinically normal cattle. The affected cattle had positive test results to various tree, grass, weed, and mold allergens. The clinical signs and seasonal occurrence were similar to those features for allergic rhinitis in man. Breeding data indicated an inherited mode of transmission, although only females were affected.


The prediction of multiphase transport properties of reservoir rocks has been undertaken. This was done by numerical flow simulation of relative permeability and capillary pressure curves from pore network models extracted from Pore Architecture Models (PAMs). These PAMs are three-dimensional images obtained from 3D image reconstruction of 2D micro-computer tomographic images of the rock structures. Results obtained showed relative permeability depends on pore size distribution; the higher the pore size variability, the higher the wetting characteristics in preference for one of the phases, and the higher is the relative permeability to the non-wetting phase. A uniform pore size structure resulted in more favorable two-phase relative permeability distribution, with the relative permeability depending greatly on the phase saturations. Capillary pressure, on the other hand, was found to increase with image resolution. Keywords: Network Model, Computer Tomography, Relative Permeability, Capillary Pressure Journal of the Nigerian Association of Mathematical Physics , Volume 19 (November, 2011), pp 351 – 358


To confirm an individual's identity accurately and reliably iris recognition systems analyse the texture that is visible in the iris of the eye. The rich random pattern of the iris constitutes a powerful biometric characteristic suitable for biometric identification in large-scale deployments. Identification attempts or deduplication checks require an exhaustive one-to-many comparison. Hence, for large-scale biometric databases with millions of enrollees, the time required for a biometric identification is expected to significantly increase. In this study, the authors analyse techniques to accelerate Hamming distance-based comparisons of binary biometric reference data, i.e. iris-codes, in large-scale iris recognition systems, which preserve the biometric performance. The focus is put on software-based optimisations, an efficient two-step iris-code alignment process referred to as TripleA, and a combination thereof. Benchmarking the throughput and identifying potential bottlenecks of a portable commodity hardware-based iris recognition system is of particular interest. Based on the conducted experiments the authors point out practical boundaries of large-scale comparisons in central processing unit-based iris recognition systems, bridging the gap between the fields of iris recognition and software design.


Here we show how a heat generating domain can be gained self-cooling capability with embedded cooling channels and with and without high-conductivity fins. The volume of the heat generating domain is fixed, so is the overall volume of the cooling channels and high-conductivity inserts. Even though the coolant volume decreases with embedded high-conductivity fins, the peak temperature also decreases with high-conductivity inserts. The peak temperature is affected by the location, shape and complexity of the fins and the volume fraction. This paper documents how these degrees of freedoms should be changed in order to minimize peak temperature. This paper also discusses how the volume fraction affects each fin shape in order to minimize the peak temperature. This paper uncovers that the fins should be distributed non-equidistantly, and that high-conductivity material should be inserted as fins (bulks of high-conductivity materials) rather than uniform distribution in the domain. This paper concludes that the overall thermal conductance of a heat generating domain can be maximized by freely morphing the shape of the high-conductivity material. The optimal design exists for given conditions and assumptions, and this design should be morphed when conditions and assumptions change. This conclusion is in accord with the constructal law. Each optimal design for given conditions and assumptions is the constructal design.


Abstract We extend Pearl's criticisms of principal stratification analysis as a method for interpreting and adjusting for intermediate variables in a causal analysis. We argue that this can be meaningful only in those rare cases that involve strong functional dependence, and even then may not be appropriate.


With the publication of the pamphlet The Situation of European Jurisprudence, Schmitt reinvented himself as an author after 1945 and prepared the ground for his work The Nomos of the Earth, which appeared a few months later. The following book offers a productive approach to this hermeneutically demanding and strategic text by providing a translation of the 1950 version and commenting on its historical and philological context. This book then offers plural confrontations, adaptations, and transformations that Schmitt's text implies for European jurisprudence today. It thus departs from the usual form of a commentary by clearly separating explication and transformation and proposes to employ an actualisation for the twenty-first century.
With contributions by
Oren Gross, Adeel Hussain, Reinhard Mehring, Michael Stolleis, Christian Tomuschat and Armin von Bogdandy.


The linearized theory of free-surface gravity flow past submerged or floating bodies is based on a perturbation expansion of the velocity potential in the slenderness parameter e with the Froude number F kept fixed. It is shown that, although the free-wave amplitude and the associated wave resistance tend to zero as F → 0, the linearized solution is not uniform in this limit: the ratio between the second- and first-order terms becomes unbounded as F → 0 with ε fixed. This non-uniformity (called 'the second Froude number paradox' in previous work) is related to the nonlinearity of the free-surface condition. Criteria for uniformity of the thin-body expansion, combining ε and F, are derived for two-dimensional flows. These criteria depend on the shape of the leading (and trailing) edge: as the shape becomes finer the linearized solution becomes valid for smaller F. Uniform first-order approximations for two-dimensional flow past submerged bodies are derived with the aid of the method of co-ordinate straining. The straining leads to an apparent displacement of the most singular points of the body contour (the leading and trailing edges for a smooth shape) and, therefore, to an apparent change in the effective Froude number.


Spherocytosis is a hereditary disease. It results from mutations in genes that encode proteins participating in the attachment of the membrane skeleton to the plasma membrane bilayer of the erythrocyte. In affected cells, interaction between the spectrin-actin meshwork and integral membrane proteins is altered. This results in the weakening of plasma membrane mechanical resistance and diminishing its elasticity. Since defective cells are prone to mechanical destruction and phagocytosis in the spleen, the fraction of morphologically-altered erythrocytes is rather small; this in turn means such an examination is prone to errors. In this paper, we describe a simple method which could be useful in the identification of red blood cells with altered osmotic properties. The method is based on the measurement of the amount of light scattered by a suspension of the red blood cells, during which cells are exposed to osmotic stress in the stopped-flow regime. The obtained plots are fitted to a mathematical formula, the parameters of which can be used as quantitative indicators of the changes in red blood cells' osmotic features. Two types of spherocytotic samples were examined: those with a proven deficiency in ankyrin and those with a decrease in the band 3 anion transporting protein. The presented data show that this method gives a reliable indication of altered osmotic properties of the spherocytic cells.


Southern blot hybridization analysis of clonal antigen receptor gene rearrangements has proved to be a valuable adjunct to conventional methods for diagnosing lymphoid neoplasia. However, Southern blot analysis suffers from a number of technical disadvantages, including the time necessary to obtain results, the use of radioactivity, and the susceptibility of the method to various artifacts. We have investigated an alternative approach for assessing the clonality of antigen receptor gene rearrangements in lymphoid tissue biopsy specimens. This approach involves the amplification of rearranged gamma T-cell receptor genes by the polymerase chain reaction and analysis of the polymerase chain reaction products by denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis. By use of this approach, clonal rearrangements from neoplastic lymphocytes constituting as little as 0.1-1% of the total cells in the tissue are detected as discrete bands in the denaturing gel after the gel is stained with ethidium bromide and viewed under ultraviolet light. In contrast, polyclonal rearrangements from reactive lymphocytes appear as a diffuse smear along the length of the gel. Our findings suggest that polymerase chain reaction combined with denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis may offer a rapid, nonradioactive, and sensitive alternative to Southern blot analysis for the diagnostic evaluation of lymphoid tissue biopsy specimens.


Purpose: To disclose effectiveness of substitution of conformal radiotherapy (CRT) with intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) in combined with 125I permanent seed brachytherapy(BT) in reducing a rectal dose-volume parameter recently proven to be correlated with late rectal bleeding after the combined radiotherapy. Materials/Methods: A CT image set obtained a month after BT was used for CRT and tentative IMRT planning as well as dosimetry of BT (post plan). Physical dose of each DICOM-RT was converted to biologically effective dose under α/β of 3(Gy3) for three dimensional summation of rectal volume exposed to 150 Gy3 (rV150 (3)). Alteration of the value along BT, BT combined with CRT (BT+CRT), and BT combined with IMRT (BT+IMRT) was traced individually, and the mean value were statistically compared between the modalities. Results: The elevation rate of rV150 (3) from BT to BT+CRT is proportional to their rV150 (3) of BT. All rV150 (3) was decreased from BT+CRT to BT+IMRT except 3 cases with smaller rV150 (3) at BT+CRT. The mean rV150 (3) values of BT, BT+CRT, and BT+IMRT were 0.06 ± 0.09 cc, 1.41 ± 0.88, and 1.18 ± 0.75 cc, respectively, showing significant differences between all values. Conclusions: The substitution of CRT with IMRT in conjunction with seed implant brachytherapy reduces the rectal dose predisposing bleeding. Avoiding rectal exposure to high doses during BT is important even in BT+IMRT. Short Communication Intensity-Modulated vs. Conformal Radiotherapy after Prostate Seed Implant Brachytherapy Regarding Summed Rectal Dose Ryuji Nakamura1*, Koyo Kikuchi1, Satoshi Yamaguchi1, Hisao Kakuhara1, Jun Sugawara2, Hirobumi Oikawa1, and Hisanori Ariga1 1Department of Radiology, Iwate Medical University, Japan 2Department of Radiology, Iwate Prefectural Chubu Hospital, Japan


Frequency conversion is one of the main components of the frequency-time domain intelligent semor, and the converter directly affects measure capability.Take the frequency to unicode conversion mode based on proportional counting as an example,the paper introduces the conversion process and the optimized control process based on PCM frequency to unicode conversion by PCM.


Trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (TMP-SMX) is a fixed-dose antimicrobial agent used in a variety of infections. Hyponatremia secondary to the syndrome of inappropriate secretion of antidiuretic hormone is an uncommon complication of treatment with TMP-SMX. The risk seems to be higher in patients with AIDS, elderly and concomitant use of diuretics. A n 88-year-old female was admitted to the hospital because of malaise and progressive confusion, 3 days after starting TMP-SMX for urinary tract infection. On physical examination the patient was euvolemic and had no evidence of malignancy, renal, cardiac, adrenal, hepatic or thyroid disease. Laboratory tests results revealed hyponatremia, low serum osmolality, urine hyperosmolarity and an elevated urine sodium concentration, leading to the diagnosis of inappropriate secretion of antidiuretic hormone. TMP-SMX was discontinued and fluid restriction was instituted. The patient was discharged after serum sodium increased from 124 mmol/L to 134 mmol/L. Two weeks after discharge the patient denied any malaise or confusion. TMP-SMX is very popular among elderly that presents with UTI. This paper is the first to emphasize this complication and the need of greater awareness among elderly population and suggest the sodium serum levels should be monitored closely during therapy with TMP-SMX. J Med Cases. 2014;5(5):283-284 doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.14740/jmc1547w


The shoot apical meristem (SAM) is at the origin of all the plant above-ground organs (including stems, leaves and flowers) and is a biological object of interest for the understanding of plant morphogenesis. The quantification of tissue growth at a cellular level requires the analysis of 3D microscopic image sequences of developing meristems. To address inter-individual variability, it is also required to compare individuals. This obviously implies the ability to process inter-individual registration, i.e. to compute spatial and temporal correspondences between sequences from different meristems. In the present work, we propose a spatial registration method dedicated to microscopy floral meristem (FM) images, and the identification, for a given still image of a meristem, of its best corresponding time-point in a sequence of an other individual (temporal registration).


This essay centers on the concepts of catfishing and online impersonation. Utilizing the Manti Te'o catfishing hoax and the Texas Tech football coaching staff's admittance of using fake profiles on social media to follow their players as a basis, this piece will examine past instances of athletes and catfishing and the connection between collegiate athletics and catfishing. Past legal incidents that focus specifically on catfishing, as well as specific laws that could have ramifications on catfishing and fake online personas will be discussed. Finally, the legal considerations that may have a potential effect on the various communication elements within social media platforms will be explored. Recommendations for future research will also be presented.


The management of proton conductivity in the protic ionic liquid imidazolium bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide ([Im][TFSI]) is investigated via the use of quasi-elastic neutron scattering (QENS) and pulsed-field gradient NMR. The introduction of excess neutral imidazole to [Im][TFSI] leads to enhanced conductivity. We find that proton dynamics in [Im][TFSI] with excess imidazole are characterized by proton hopping that is encompassed in the slower of two translational processes, as identified by QENS. This relatively slow process contributes to long-range diffusion more than the faster process. NMR diffusion measurements show that proton hopping decreases with increasing temperature, but significant proton hopping persists even at the maximum experimental temperature of 120 °C. This, in combination with minimal ion aggregation, leads to high proton conductivity and a high proton transference number over a wide temperature range.


In nature, optical structures in the subwavelength range have been evolved over millions of years. For example, in the form of 'moth‐eye' structures they show a strong anti‐reflective effect on the compound eyes of night‐active insects and therefore offer a successful protection over predators. In this contribution the advantages and challenges to transfer this natural concept of subwavelength structured optical interfaces to high‐end optical systems are discussed. Here, in comparison to alternative conventional multilayer systems, the bioinspired anti‐reflective structures offer a wide wavelength range and a broad angle dependency. Additionally, adhesion problems are reduced drastically. Simultaneously to the theoretical consideration of the best profile form of the subwavelength structures, appropriate realization technologies have been developed in recent years, where both top‐down and bottom‐up approaches have been investigated. Depending on the choice of the structuring technique, anti‐reflective subwavelength structures are applicable to a wide spectrum of optical elements ranging from micro‐optical components to aspheres for applications in imaging and also illumination setups of high‐end optical instruments.


Citrate lyase from Klebsiella aerogenes inactivated by reaction in the presence of substrate or by treatment with hydroxylamine can be reactivated with acetic anhydride only if its sulfhydryl groups are reduced. Alkaline hydrolysis of pure citrate lyase yields about 3 mol of phosphopantothenate per mol of enzyme.


The readability of two different types of electronic identifiers (EID) were evaluated under pastoral production system in North-Eastern Kenya. Physical verification and reading was done at day 0, and 1, 2, 4, 8 and 12 months respectively on a total of 1943 beef cattle of which 934 were tagged using ear button tags and 1009 with rumen boluses. The retention rates were recorded and readability determined using a hand-held reader and subsequently compared using a non parametric survival analysis. The results showed that, rumen boluses were more effective with retention and readability of 100% after the one-year period. The retention rate for ear button tags deteriorated after day 120 to 94.6%. This implied that rumen boluses are safe and tamper-proof and are thus recommended for use in pastoral production systems. When tested within the model Livestock Identification and Traceability System (LITS), the use of RFID identifiers were able to substantially contribute to better record keeping, and proof of credible livestock certification. However, due to cost considerations, undertaking a benefit-cost analysis and provisional analysis of the institutional and organisational infrastructure may be critical for successful implementation.


Antibodies directed against citrullinated proteins and peptides (ACPAs) are the most specific serological markers available for diagnosing rheumatoid arthritis (RA). ACPAs may be detected several years before symptoms of RA appear, and their presence at disease onset is a good predictor of the development of erosive joint lesions. RA patients can be classified into two major groups: those who have ACPAs and those who do not. The presence of ACPAs at early stages of RA predicts the development of earlier and more widespread joint erosions, and low remission rates.Synthetic peptides can replace cognate proteins in solid-phase assays for specific autoantibody recognition in RA patients. The use of synthetic peptides instead of proteins represents an advantage in terms of the reproducibility of such immunoassays. Proteins also contain non-citrullinated epitopes that are recognized by non-RA sera and this could reduce the specificity of the test. The use of synthetic citrullinated peptides gives absolute control over the exact epitopes presented. Furthermore, it is difficult to prepare sufficient amounts of high-quality antigenic proteins with a well-defined degree of citrullination. Synthetic citrullinated peptides, in contrast, are easily obtained in a pure form with a well-defined chemical structure and the epitopes can be precisely oriented in the plate by covalent binding of the peptides.Chimeric peptides bearing different citrullinated protein domains have recently been used in the design of RA diagnosis systems. The results of the application of those systems indicate that more than one serological test is required to classify RA patients based on the presence or absence of ACPAs. Each of the target molecules reported (fibrin, vimentin and filaggrin) helps to identify a particular subset of RA patients.


Lithography is facing unprecedented difficulties to go beyond the 65-nm node with 90-nm half pitch. This presentation shows the types of lithography combined with necessary resolution enhancement techniques to handle the 65-, 45-, 32-, and 22-nm nodes. The pros and cons, feasibility for manufacturing, and economical impacts of these technologies will be compared


The author addresses the minimum density switchable segment assignment (MINDESSA) problem, which arises during the global routing of standard cell integrated circuits. A switchable segment is a portion of a net that can be routed in one of two adjacent channels. The MINDESSA problem is the problem of assigning switchable segments to one of the two possible channels so that the total channel density of the IC is minimized. The author presents an algorithm for calculating a lower bound on channel density for the MINDESSA problem. >


Transferring representations from large supervised tasks to downstream tasks has shown promising results in AI fields such as Computer Vision and Natural Language Processing (NLP). In parallel, the recent progress in Machine Translation (MT) has enabled one to train multilingual Neural MT (NMT) systems that can translate between multiple languages and are also capable of performing zero-shot translation. However, little attention has been paid to leveraging representations learned by a multilingual NMT system to enable zero-shot multilinguality in other NLP tasks. In this paper, we demonstrate a simple framework, a multilingual Encoder-Classifier, for cross-lingual transfer learning by reusing the encoder from a multilingual NMT system and stitching it with a task-specific classifier component. Our proposed model achieves significant improvements in the English setup on three benchmark tasks - Amazon Reviews, SST and SNLI. Further, our system can perform classification in a new language for which no classification data was seen during training, showing that zero-shot classification is possible and remarkably competitive. In order to understand the underlying factors contributing to this finding, we conducted a series of analyses on the effect of the shared vocabulary, the training data type for NMT, classifier complexity, encoder representation power, and model generalization on zero-shot performance. Our results provide strong evidence that the representations learned from multilingual NMT systems are widely applicable across languages and tasks.


This researcher was motivated to conduct this study because of the less ability of the leaener to write poetry. It coud be seen from the average score of the pretest of poetry writing which only reached 73. The purpose of the study was to improve motivation and the learning result of poetry writing in the students of VIIIA of SMPN 3 Sragi, Pekalongan by applying Timlo aplication of Copy the Master Technique. The method used in this Class Action Research was using two cycles. The subjects were 32 students of class VIII A. The result showed that there was a significant improvement in learning the technique of poetry wriring. The average score of pretest was 73. After the applying Timlo technique, the average score of the cycle I was 79.88 and it increased in the cycle II to 84.00. The increasing score from the pretest to the first cycle was 68.8%. Meanwhile, the increasing score from cycle I to cycle II was 41.2%. In addition, there was an increasing motivation of the students for learning to poetry writing. Thus, it was suggested for Indonesian subject's teacher for using this model in teching and learning process.


Using self-supervised learning methods to pre-train a network on large volumes of unlabeled data followed by fine-tuning for multiple downstream tasks has proven vital for advancing research in natural language representation learning. However, the speech processing community lacks a similar setup that systematically measures the quality of learned representations across a wide range of downstream speech applications. To bridge this gap, we introduce the Speech Understanding and Performance Benchmark (SUPERB). SUPERB is a leaderboard to benchmark the performance of learned speech representations on ten speech processing tasks. We present a complete framework for learning and evaluating specialized prediction heads for each task given the pre-trained speech representations. Our results on many publicly-available self-supervised models demonstrate their generalization abilities to multiple speech tasks with limited supervised and minimal architecture changes. All the materials are open-sourced and reproducible in the s3prl toolkit to facilitate future research in speech representation learning.


European policy makers have shown a keen interest in the success of 5G because ubiquitous and high capacity electronic communication infrastructure is recognized as a cornerstone of economic development and productivity growth. The second generation, GSM, is considered the leading example, reaching its peak in deployment in 2015 with 3.83 billion subscribers served through over 700 operators in 219 countries and territories.
With 5G rapidly shaping up in the R&D and standardization environment, what are the lessons to be learned from 1G through 4G that should be taken into account to ensure a leadership role? What does 5G have in common with previous generations and where is it different? Is the path towards the future predetermined or are there alternative routes? When there are multiple futures with different outcomes which one is more desirable? In summary, what would be the policy and regulatory framework required to enable leadership with 5G in Europe?
To respond to these questions this contribution identifies first the policy and regulatory lessons to be drawn from the success of GSM. Secondly, this contribution describes two stylized images of possible futures of 5G, 'Evolution' and 'Revolution'. These reflect two extremes in terms of possible futures of 5G. 'Evolution' follows the pattern of previous generations and current trends. 'Revolution' represents a clear break with these trends and a path towards leadership with 5G, as it exploits the opportunities of standardized APIs for service creation, being enabled by network virtualization as an architectural foundation of 5G. These open APIs allow the market entry of a multitude of virtual mobile network operators (VMNOs) serving particular industry verticals or economic sectors with tailored feature sets and qualities of services.


We present an estimate for the composition of the depleted mantle (DM), the source for mid‐ocean ridge basalts (MORBs). A combination of approaches is required to estimate the major and trace element abundances in DM. Absolute concentrations of few elements can be estimated directly, and the bulk of the estimates is derived using elemental ratios. The isotopic composition of MORB allows calculation of parent‐daughter ratios. These estimates form the "backbone" of the abundances of the trace elements that make up the Coryell‐Masuda diagram (spider diagram). The remaining elements of the Coryell‐Masuda diagram are estimated through the composition of MORB. A third group of estimates is derived from the elemental and isotopic composition of peridotites. The major element composition is obtained by subtraction of a low‐degree melt from a bulk silicate Earth (BSE) composition. The continental crust (CC) is thought to be complementary to the DM, and ratios that are chondritic in the CC are expected to also be chondritic in the DM. Thus some of the remaining elements are estimated using the composition of CC and chondrites. Volatile element and noble gas concentrations are estimated using constraints from the composition of MORBs and ocean island basalts (OIBs). Mass balance with BSE, CC, and DM indicates that CC and this estimate of the DM are not complementary reservoirs.


Amalgam is widely used for posterior restoration because of its strength compare to the other restorative materials. However, the mercury released in amalgam still becomes a controversy and its harmfull effects to human. Researches show that the mercury released occurs when mercury ion is dissolved in acid or oxidizing solutions. In dentistry, a disinfectant that is used for sterilizing instruments, such as hand instrument and handpiece previously used during the replacement process of amalgam restoration can make mercury dissolving from amalgam residue in the instruments. The number of mercury ion dissolving in disinfectant solution depends on disinfectants pH, concentration, contact time, redox potential, and Sn content in amalgam matrix phase Ag-Hg. The process of mercury released from amalgam to disinfectant solutions is caused by the ability of disinfectant in oxidizing mercury metal (elemental) to become the dissolvable mercury ion. Therefore, dentists and clinicians should be carefully certain procedures of disinfectant waste disposal that contain mercury ion, in order to avoid toxic contamination of mercury ion that can be dangerous to the environment.


Abstract A new coelurosaurian theropod, Alnashetri cerropoliciensis, is reported here based on articulated hind limbs of a single individual discovered at the locality of La Buitrera (Candeleros Formation, Cenomanian–Turonian), Río Negro Province, Argentina. The new taxon differs from other coelurosaurs in the possession of a low ridge that separates the rostral tibial surface from the outer face of the lateral malleolus, and which extends proximally beyond the tip of the ascending process of the astragalus, and in the possession of ventral notches on the hemicondyles of the distal articulations on pedal phalanges III-1 and III-2. Alnashetri is easily distinguished from the dromaeosaurid Buitreraptor, the only other known small theropod from La Buitrera. Phylogenetic analysis supports alvarezsauroid affinities. The evidence supporting this relationship comes from the detailed anatomy of the ankle, however, and this concentration of character support within a single anatomical region may bias our results. If our proposed phylogenetic placement is accurate, Alnashetri antedates all other Argentinian alvarezsaurids and indicates that alvarezsaurids were present in the Neuquén Basin throughout the entire Late Cretaceous.


The performance of heritage takes place in prestigious institutions such as museums and archives, in officially sanctioned spaces such as jubilees and public monuments, but also in more mundane, ephemeral and banal cultural practices, such as naming of phenomena, viewing exhibitions or walking in the countryside. This volume examines the performance of Nordic heritage and the shaping of the very idea of Norden in diverse contexts in North America, the Baltic and the Nordic countries and examines the importance of these places as sites for creating and preserving cultural heritage.Offering rich perspectives on a part of Europe which has not been the centre of discussion in the Anglophone world, this volume will be of value to a wide readership, including cultural historians, museum practitioners, policy-makers and scholars of heritage, ethnology and folkloristics.


Passwords are an integral part of modern digital life, but their effectiveness has been repeatedly challenged. This paper explores the role of password authentication in modern information systems, the changes it has experienced over time, as well as new alternative approaches to authentication and their interactions with classical password-based systems. Technical and organizational recommendations are formulated based on security research and modern trends in information technology, and an application of Markov processes to assessing password quality is presented, as a quantitative measure of password system security and effectiveness.


Taking some snapshots from everyday religious life in Austria as a starting point, my contribution is a theoretical reflection on women' s religious identity in the area of tension between belonging, authority and autonomy. Following postmodern concepts of identity I describe women' s religious identity as "threshold identity" resp. as fluid and fragile. This description requires a clarification of the relation between secular and religious identity on one side and religious and moral identity on the other. It becomes evident that the experience of God as a constituent of religious identity exceeds by far the moral identity of the religious self, comprising a special potential of emancipation for women. However, realizing this potential in the sense of empowerment and personal autonomy results in conflicts with male authorities, who as the guardians of religious traditions, have a key function in the construction and demarcation of religious identity. If women' s threshold identity goes along with a substantial concept of autonomy, entailing the call for institutional gender justice, it is the challenge of our time in all religious traditions, especially in Christianity and Islam. Here is the crucial point to decide what the religious landscape of the future will look like and whether women of the 21st century will find a home in their religious traditions.


The emergence of a relatively new genre, `reality television', has helped to break down the division between text and audience in significant ways, and this presents us with interesting questions for cultural studies. In this article we consider one such text, the enormously successful `reality gameshow' Big Brother, and explore the extent to which it challenges or helps to reconfigure current conceptualizations of the audience and the `television text'. We outline some of the issues involved in analyzing Big Brother and situate the program within the context of the complex history of cultural studies' attempts to `think the audience' for popular media.


Future intelligent robots are expected to be able to adapt continuously to their environment. For this purpose, recognizing new objects and learning new words through interactive learning with humans is fundamental. Such setup results in ambiguous teaching data which humans have been shown to address using cross-situational learning, i.e., by analyzing common factors between multiple learning situations. Moreover, they have been shown to be more efficient when actively choosing the learning samples, e.g., which object they want to learn. Implementing such abilities on robots can be performed by latent-topic learning models such as non-negative matrix factorization or latent Dirichlet allocation. These cross-situational learning methods tackle referential and linguistic ambiguities, and can be associated with active learning strategies. We propose two such methods: 1) the maximum reconstruction error-based selection and 2) confidence base exploration. We present extensive experiments using these two learning algorithms through a systematic analysis on the effects of these active learning strategies in contrast with random choice. In addition, we study the factors underlying the active learning by focusing on the use of sample repetition, one of the learning behaviors that have been shown to be important for humans.


The structure of the gaseous tetraborane(10) molecule, B4H10, has been redetermined by electron diffraction. The new analysis confirms not only that the structure comprises a folded diamond of boron atoms bridged by four hydrogen atoms, but also (i) that the B–H–B bridges are unsymmetrical, the H2B–Hb distance being 17 pm longer than the HB–Hb distance, and (ii) that the bridging hydrogen atoms are situated 5.6 pm above the plane defined by the three boron atoms of each H2B(HB)2 moiety to fall within the fold of the tetraboron framework. Other salient parameters are (distances correspond for ra; figures in parentheses are the estimated standard deviations of the last digits) : r[B(1)–B(2)] 185.6(0.4), r[B(1)–B(3)] 170.5(1.2), r[B(1)–Ht] 122.1 (1.4), r[B(2)–Ht] 119.4(0.7), r[B(1)–Hb] 131.5(0.9), r[B(2)–Hb] 148.4(0.9) pm; Ht–B(2)–Ht′ 122.7(3.5), Ht″–B(1)–B(3) 111.2(3.5), and the dihedral angle between the two planes B(1)B(2)B(3) and B(1)B(3)B(4) 117.1(0.7)°(t = terminal, b = bridging).


This paper presents ForestQB, a SPARQL query builder, to assist Bioscience and Wildlife Researchers in accessing Linked-Data. As they are unfamiliar with the Semantic Web and the data ontologies, ForestQB aims to empower them to benefit from using Linked-Data to extract valuable information without having to grasp the nature of the data and its underlying technologies. ForestQB is integrating Form-Based Query builders with Natural Language to simplify query construction to match the user requirements. Demo available at https://iotgarage.net/demo/forestQB


Reducing the lattice thermal conductivity (κL) comprises one of the crucial aspects of thermoelectric research. Ternary intermetallic half Heusler compounds have revealed properties promising for thermoelectric applications. Studies have shown that self doping with Ni in Ni based half Heuslers leads to unprecedented lowering in the κL. Although the underlying physical mechanisms have not been explored in detail, with ZrNiSn as a case study, we experimentally investigate the change in κL with increase in the Ni concentration in Ni based n-type half Heusler alloys. We observe that at excess Ni doping of 3% in the half Heusler lattice, the thermal conductivity reduces by more than 60%. Our density functional theory based analysis on the ongoing phenomena reveals that at ultralow Ni doping, the localized modes of the antisite Ni defect hybridize with the acoustic modes and this plays the most dominant role in scattering of the thermal phonons leading to significant lowering in κL. Our theoretical analysis can be employed for predicting a suitable dopants that may reduce the κL prior to the synthesis of the compound in the laboratory.


Currently, there are very few options for salinity management in low rainfall environments (less than <350mm annual rainfall). The challenge for salinity management in traditional farming systems, is to balance the profitability of annual crop based systems with sustainable high water using options and engineering solutions. This paper reviews literature on the potential profitability and water use of two developing perennial plant based systems (oil mallees and saltland pastures) and deep drainage, and the trade-off between water use and profitability objectives within these options as potential salinity management techniques.


The Pigmented Lesion Assay (PLA, sensitivity 91-95%, specificity 69-91%, negative predictive value ?99%) is a commercially available, non-invasive gene expression test that helps dermatologists guide pigmented lesion management decisions and rule out melanoma. Earlier studies have demonstrated high clinical utility and no missed melanomas in a 3-6-month follow-up period. We undertook the current investigations to provide 12-month follow-up data on PLA(-) tests, and to further confirm utility. A 12-month chart review follow-up of 734 pigmented lesions that had negative PLA results from 5 US dermatology centers was performed. Thirteen of these lesions (1.8%) were biopsied in the follow-up period and submitted for histopathologic review. None of the lesions biopsied had a histopathologic diagnosis of melanoma. The test's utility was studied further in a registry (N=1575, 40 US dermatology offices, 62 participating providers), which demonstrated that 99.9% of PLA(-) lesions were clinically monitored, thereby avoiding a surgical procedure, and 96.5% of all PLA(+) lesions were appropriately biopsied, most commonly with a tangential shave. This long-term follow-up study confirms the PLA's high negative predictive value and high utility in helping guide the management of pigmented lesions to avoid unnecessary surgical procedures.


Communicating results to research participants is an issue frequently discussed in terms of ethics. It has specific features when involving large‐scale paediatric cohorts. High‐throughput biological explorations reveal also incidental findings of medical relevance. This work analyses existing frameworks for managing such issues and proposes a policy grounded in the experience acquired in the FP7 EU project MeDALL – Mechanisms of the Development of ALLergy.


The 7DL.7Ag translocation from Lophopyrum elongatum that carries Lr19, a leaf rust resistance gene, was found to be associated with a significant increase in grain yield under irrigated, disease-free conditions, but a generally lower yield under moisture stress conditions. These studies, however, involved a limited number of genetic recipients and environments, and the effect of the translocation on physiological traits was not considered. We examined the translocation effect in six different recipient genotypes and under five environmental conditions, including drought and heat stress. The increase in grain yield under irrigated conditions was associated with a higher rate of biomass production in the 7DL.7Ag lines and may be attributed to higher sink strength. Effect of the translocation on physiological traits was noted only under heat stress and was not associated with difference in yield. Under moisture stress conditions, 7DL.7Ag lines yielded less than their corresponding recipients, possibly because of a longer growing cycle. It is concluded that the effect of the 7DL. 7Ag translocation may very much depend on the phenological adaptation of the recipient genotype and the translocation may be useful for enhancing yield, mainly under favourable conditions.


Volunteer campaigns for data collection make it possible for non-profit organizations to extend their ability to monitor and respond to critical environmental and societal issues. Yet mobile data collection technologies that have the potential to lower the costs and increase the accuracy of volunteer-collected data are not commonly used in these campaigns. In this paper we conduct a series of studies that reveal the complex issues affecting technology adoption in this domain. First, we surveyed and interviewed existing volunteering campaigns to map out current technology usage within volunteer campaigns. Next, we provided two organizations with a customizable tool for data collection (Sensr) and studied its use and non-use across six real volunteer-driven campaigns over six months. Our study explored success and failure across the first few phases of the campaign lifecycle (campaign creation, initial deployment, and adoption). Our results highlight the impact of resource constraints, cognitive factors, the depth of volunteer engagement, and stakeholders' perspective on technology as important factors contributing to the adoption and usage of mobile data collection technologies. We use these findings to argue for specific design features to accelerate the adoption and use of such tools in volunteer data collection campaigns.


Summary

1
Patterns of connectivity influence pest population system dynamics, and it is essential to consider connectivity when planning effective management strategies. Traditional connectivity models often consider populations embedded in a matrix of unsuitable habitat. This approach is unlikely to be applicable to those pest species that can utilize most of the landscape in which they live. There is therefore a need for a simple and flexible tool to assess connectivity in such systems.

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In this study, we developed a new model in which contiguous resource patches that differ in quality, and landscape elements that impede dispersal, impact on connectivity within a population system. The model was applied to a wild rabbit population system, a well-studied pest species in Australia. An independent population genetic data set was used to validate the model.

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There was a highly significant association between pairwise population connectivity and the genetic data (Mantel test, r=−0·502, P= 0·002). As predicted, two populations that showed very low connectivity were strongly isolated genetically. These sites appeared to be substantially isolated because of forests, which acted to impede rabbit dispersal. When these sites were excluded from analysis, connectivity indices again explained the pattern of genetic data (Mantel test, r=−0·46, P= 0·037). This showed that both spatial variation in resource quality and forests influenced connectivity in this system. Sensitivity analyses confirmed that the distribution and extent of forests was important in limiting connectivity to some sites. The model was relatively robust to changes in population parameters.

4
Synthesis and applications. Connectivity among wild rabbit populations in this system was strongly influenced by habitat heterogeneity, rather than factors such as geographical distance or major landscape elements such as rivers, both of which are traditionally considered to influence system dynamics. This may have substantial implications for many pest systems, and suggests that the impact of habitat heterogeneity on connectivity should be considered when planning efficient management strategies.


Objective: Investigate the effects of diabetes and treatment with quercetin on the maternal reproductive performance and impact on foetal growth. Study design: A total of 32 female Wistar rats were distributed into four groups: non-diabetic (G1); non-diabetic treated with quercetin (G2); diabetic (G3) and diabetic treated with quercetin (G4). At day 21 of pregnancy, each rat was anesthetized and humanely killed for laparotomy; was observed reproductive performance, foetal and placental weights and the placental index. Maternal and foetal data were analysed by ANOVA followed by the Tukey test. Foetal weight classification was assessed by Goodman's test. Results: Diabetes and diabetes treated with quercetin caused placentomegaly an increased placental index and small foetus rates for pregnancy age. Conclusion: Quercetin, administered to pregnant diabetic rats, controlled glucose levels and promoted weight gain compared to untreated diabetic rats, but it did not improve reproductive performance or foetal or placental development.


Objective  To investigate the effect of recipient immature dendritic cells (imDCs) loaded with PUVA-treated donor apoptotic splenic lymphocytes (PUVA-SP DC) on IL-10+CD19+regulatory B cells (Breg) and the survival duration of skin allograft in mice. Methods  Bone marrow-derived DCs of C57BL/6 mice were obtained from bone marrow cells by co-culturing with recombinant mouse IL-4 and GM-CSF. Spleen lymphocytes (SP) of BALB/c mice were isolated and prepared as PUVA-SP by treating the cells with 8-methoxypsoralen plus ultraviolet A irradiation. The bone marrow-derived imDCs of C57BL/6 mice were co-cultured with PUVA-SP of BALB/c mice to obtain PUVA-SP DCs. The skin allograft model was then established. Animals were randomly grouped according to different pretreatments as follows: the control group was iv. introduction of PBS (0.2ml) alone 7 days before skin transplantation, the PUVA-SP DC group received an iv. injection of PUVA-SP DCs, the maDC (mature DC) group received recipient maDCs, and the imDC group was given recipient imDCs. Mice were monitored daily from day 6 after transplantation for signs of rejection of skin graft. The recipients' peripheral blood serum samples were then collected and the level of cytokines were measured by using ELISA kits. The survival time of skin allograft was evaluated every day. The expression of IL10+CD19+regulatory B cells was analyzed by flow cytometry. Results  After transplantation, the proportion of IL-10+CD19+Breg in the peripheral blood of PUVA-SP DC group was 7.48%, which was obviously higher than that of imDC group (4.12%), maDC group (3.01%) and control group (2.37%). The serum level of cytokine IL-10 in PUVA-SP DC group was 58.2±0.9ng/ml, and it was significantly higher than that in maDC group (20.1±1.6ng/ml), imDC group (26.2±1.3ng/ml) and control group (19.0±0.6ng/ ml, P<0.01). The survival time of allograft in PUVA-SP DC group was 62.3±2.6d, and it was markedly longer than that in maDC group (20.7±1.9d), imDC group (12.1±1.0d) and control group (11.0±1.3d, P<0.01). Conclusions  Administration of PUVASP DCs, in the absence of an immunosuppressant, may significantly delay allograft rejection. This effect is associated with up-regulation of circulating regulatory B cells with preferential IL-10 secretion.


ABSTRACT Terminus calving of icebergs is a common mass-loss mechanism from water-terminating glaciers globally, including the lake-calving glaciers in New Zealand's central Southern Alps. Calving rates can increase dramatically in response to increases in ice velocity and/or retreat of the glacier margin. Here, we describe a large calving event (c. 4.5 × 106 m3) observed at Tasman Glacier, which initiated around 30 min after the MW 6.2 Christchurch earthquake of 22 February 2011. The volume of this calving event was equalled or exceeded only once in a subsequent 13-month-long study. While the temporal association with the earthquake remains intriguing, the effects of any preconditioning factors remain unclear.


Distributed Sensor networks (DSN) is an emerging technology and have great potential to be employed in critical situations like battlefields and commercial applications such as process management, health care monitoring, environmental/earth sensing, industrial monitoring and many more scenarios. One of the major challenges distributed sensor networks face today is security. While the deployment of sensor nodes in an unattended environment makes the networks vulnerable to a variety of potential attacks, the inherent power and memory limitations of sensor nodes makes conventional security solutions unfeasible. The sensing technology combined with processing power and wireless communication makes it profitable for being exploited in great quantity in future. The wireless communication technology also acquires various types of security threats. This paper discusses a wide variety of security, research, computational and design issues along with


Plastic profile produced by extrusion die should be cooled down and calibrated by calibrator, so the proper design of the cooling channels in calibrator was very important to the profile quality. The cooling channels in calibrator were preliminarily designed according to target function, and peculiar heterotype optimum designs of the local cooling channels were carried out by means of numerical simulation, the cooling effect was improved obviously, Based on enterprise resource planning ERP system and parallel project computer aided design/computer aided manufacturing CAD/CAE intellectualized data-base network, the design for the cooling channels was more reasonable, and could meet the demands of customers much better.


Analyses a multiround flow control algorithm that attempts to minimize the time required to multicast a message to a group of recipients and receive responses directly from each group member. Such a flow control algorithm may be necessary because the hurry of responses to the multicast can overflow the buffer space of the process that issued the multicast. The condition that each recipient directly respond to the multicast prevents the use of reliable multicast protocols based on software combining trees or negative-acknowledgments. The flow control analysed algorithm directs the responding processes to hold their responses for some period of time, called the backoff time, before sending them to the originator. The backoff time depends on the number of recipients that respond, the originator's available buffer space and buffer service time distribution, and the number of times that the originator is willing to retransmit its message. This paper develops an approximate analysis of the service time distribution of the limited-buffer preemptive queuing process that occurs within the protocol processing layers of a multiprogrammed operating system. It then uses this model to calculate multicast backoff times. The paper reports experimental verification of the accuracy of this service time model and discusses its application to the multicast flow control problem. >


To anticipate technological progress, one tool often used by company strategists is the technology s-curve. Proposed about a quarter of a century ago by Richard Foster, the s-curve is based on a fairly straightforward concept. It tracks the progress of a base technology as a function of the R&D effort or, if R&D is constant, of time. The s-curve has been used in plotting technologies as diverse as computer processors, jet engines, fertilizers, and incandescent lamps. It can be described by mathematical models such as the Pearl function, which incidentally has its roots in the description of population growth. Besides optimizing technical productivity, the basic concept of the s-curve has been extended to the area of product and technology substitution. But to make the s-curve method useful for decision making in a commercial product environment several business issues must also be considered. >


How successfully an improved solar cell concept is transferred to mass production depends not only on the realized cell efficiency, but crucially on the stability of the fabrication process, i.e., on the distribution of the current-voltage (I-V) parameters. To model such distributions, we use three-dimensional (3-D) full-size device simulations of passivated emitter and rear cells (PERCs). The number of these time-consuming simulations is drastically reduced by changing all input parameters concurrently in a design of experiment approach. A simple polynomial response surface methodology (RSM) model is obtained from these simulations by regression analysis. The RSM contains all the mutual nonlinear interactions between the device parameters, and is therefore called a metamodel. The metamodel is applied: 1) to find maximum efficiency; 2) to compute how sensitively each device parameter influences the I-V parameters; 3) to explain, predict, and manipulate the distribution of the I-V parameters in mass production; and 4) to find an optimum starting point for experiments. For example, we demonstrate how the choice of the distance between the rear local point contacts leads to either maximal median efficiency but with a broad distribution, or to a slightly reduced median cell efficiency but with a narrow distribution and a reduced number of bad cells.


This paper is a summary of the algorithms for deep learning and a brief discussion of its future development. In the first part, the concept of deep learning and the advantages and disadvantages of deep learning are introduced. The second part demonstrates several algorithms for deep learning. The third part introduces the application areas of deep learning. Then combines the above algorithms and applications to explore the subsequent development of deep learning. The last part makes a summary of the full paper.


Thermoelectric properties of Au/Pd thermocouple in various atmospheres are investigated at the Ag, Al and Zn fixed points in order to find the optimum conditions of use. Gas compositions are selected as pure argon, argon oxygen, pure nitrogen and nitrogen oxygen. In pure argon and nitrogen atmospheres, Au/Pd thermocouple shows smaller fixed point EMFs and poorer reproducibilities and immersion characteristics than in oxygen mixture. When thermocouples in pure argon and nitrogen are exposed to air, their properties become the same as those of oxygen-containing thermocouples. It is confirmed that any oxygen existing in oxide form on the palladium wire surface is sufficient to stabilize the Au/Pd thermocouple. It is believed that oxidized palladium has a more negative Seebeck coefficient than oxide-free palladium. Based on the experimental results, it is recommended to oxidize the palladium wire during the preparatory heat treatment stage before use in order to obtain a stable and reproducible thermal EMF. The use of the Au/Pd thermocouple in air can also be recommended.


Antihydatid cyst antibodies from sera of infected Yemeni patients were detected using indirect haemagglutination assay (IHA). Antihydatid cyst antibodies were detected in 34 out of 38 serum samples (89% sensitivity). The specificity of the assay was defined to be 97.0% as cross reactivity only noticed with serum from one patient with Schistosoma mansoni out of 11 Schistosoma positive patients examined. Results were discussed.


Introduced method that used multi-layer open grid services architecture (OGSA) to construct grid-based fault diagnosis expert system (GFDES) based on multi-model. Designed the grid service layer based on OGSA, and developed the programs of public service and parallel service in the server. Formulated data grid market-based architecture (DGMA) was made up of independent distributed grid nodes, corresponding to a faults diagnosis expert system. The data transfer adopted grid FTP and was implemented through the API functions provided by Java cog kit.


Every pilgrims hope to getting Hajj Mabrur. One effort to commercialize the Hajj Mabrur is able to run all the pilgrimage circuit and perfect in it, while also maintaining a good relationship with others, or in terms of the law called hablun minallah and hablun minannas. One effort to be able to maintain good relations with others is to understand and interact with a language that can be understood by both sides, in this case is Arabic language. With naturalisik methods, and qualitative analysis, the core of this paper would like to state that the Arabic Amiyah still used and continues to grow until now; learning Arabic Amiyah for pilgrims can be regarded as complementary needs; there are various constraints experienced in learning Arabic Amiyah by KBIH for pilgrims; and the state of Arabic language books for pilgrims are still rare and that there is still very simple.


In recent years, there has been an unprecedented level of interest in the climate and environmental conditions of the polar regions. The discovery of the Antarctic ozone hole, record low levels of Arctic sea ice, loss of ice from the Greenland ice sheet, the disintegration of a number of floating ice shelves around the Antarctic Peninsula and the high levels of aerosols reaching the Arctic, have all been reported by the media. Moreover, climate model predictions
indicate that high-latitude areas will warm more than any other region over the next century as a result of increasing levels of greenhouse gases. It remains to be seen, however, whether the rapid climatic fluctuations
in the polar regions over the last few centuries and millennia are in fact a result of natural climate variability. It is important, therefore, to try to separate the impacts of natural climate variability from those of
human activity.


Despite effective gene silencing in vitro, in vivo delivery and transfection of siRNA remain challenging due to the lack of carriers that protect siRNA stably in the body. This study is focused to elucidate the correlation between complex stability and transfection efficiency of siRNA carriers. The carriers were prepared by using polymer nanoassemblies made of a cationic branched polymer [poly(ethylene imine): bPEI] to which hydrophilic poly(ethylene glycol) polymers were tethered covalently. These polymer tethered nanoassemblies (TNAs) were further modified with lipophilic chains (palmitate: PAL) in the core to stabilize siRNA TNAs complexes through ionic and hydrophobic interactions in combination. The effects of PAL in the core of TNAs were investigated with respect to in vitro transfection, intracellular gene delivery, and toxicity of the complexes, using a human colon cancer HT29 cell line stably expressing a luciferase reporter gene. A commercial transfection agent (RNAiMax) was used as a control. TNAs entrapping siRNA showed the greatest complex stability in the absence of PAL although TNAs with a greater PAL content induced effective intracellular siRNA delivery, while luciferase expression decreased as the amount of PAL increased in the core of TNAs. These results demonstrate that lipophilic components in carriers affect not only complex stability but also intracellular distribution and transfection of siRNA in cancer cells.