This paper presents a review and systematic study on the moving object detection and surveillance of the video as it is an important and challenging task in many computer vision applications, such as human detection, vehicles detection, threat, and security. Video surveillance is a dynamic environment, especially for human and vehicles and for specific object in case of security is one of the current challenging research topics in computer vision. It is a key technology to fight against terrorism, crime, public safety and for efficient management of accidents and crime scene going on now days. The paper also presents the concept of real time implementation computing task in video surveillances system. In this review paper various methods are discussed were evaluation of order to access how well they can detect moving object in an outdoor/indoor section in real time situation.


Macrophages are an important part of the innate immune system that provides defence to our body from different matter (pathogens, cellular debris, cancer cells, and so on) and support tissue repair. Depending on their microenvironment, macrophages can follow two different pathways. This leads to their polarization into two subpopulations with antagonistic properties: 1) classically activated macrophages (M1) that inhibit cell proliferation and cause tissue damage and 2) alternatively activated macrophages (M2) that promote cell proliferation and tissue regeneration. The balance in this polarization is key in an effective immune response, but dysregulation can cause or aggravate disease. In particular, some cancers, such as malignant melanoma, can induce polarization turning the macrophages against the healthy tissues. The development of malignant melanoma has been attributed to the presence of specific macrophage subpopulations, which can be found adjacent to tumor tissue. Such "tumor associated macrophages" (TAMs) belong to the subtype M2 which exhibit anti-inflammatory activities. TAMs can boost tumorigenesis by supporting proliferation, invasion and metastasis, stimulate angiogenesis, and inhibit antitumor immune response. Accordingly, TAMs are an emerging target for diagnostic purposes and prognosis of disease clinical course. Thus, the development of platforms for selective capture that enable studying the behavior of specific subpopulations of


The utility model relates to a bellows type oil conservator used for a transformer, which fundamentally solves the problems of non-intuitive oil level indication and the like in the current bellows type oil conservator, and comprises a conservator body with an oil level gauge and metal bellows assembled in the conservator body; the technical key points are as follows: the metal bellows is formed by that U-shaped bellows with dense corrugation are sealed and assembled together by a groove-shaped support ring, middle guiding supporting wheels are uniformly distributed at the periphery of the groove-shaped support ring, rear guiding supporting wheels are distributed at the outer side of a rear sealing plate sealed in the metal bellows, a driving wheel is fixed at the end part of a pointer transmission shaft of the oil level gauge by utilizing a return spring, and a pulling cable wound on the driving wheel is connected on the metal bellows by a transmission wheel and a reverse wheel on a reversing bracket of the conservator body. The bellows type oil conservator has matched and reasonable structure design, has the advantages of large compensation dosage and prolonged service life of the current bellows type oil conservator, also realizes stable operation and no occurrence of clamping stagnation, and has intuitive and accurate oil level indication, thus guaranteeing operation safety of a power transformer.


The invention relates to a lithium/thionyl dichloride battery, which is characterized in that lithium is taken as an anode, carbon is taken as a cathode carrier, a thionyl dichloride solution of anhydrous lithium aluminum tetrachloride is taken as an electrolyte, and an active material of the battery contains calcium metal halides. The lithium/thionyl dichloride battery can improve voltage hysteretic properties and be used under the condition of intermediate-rate and high-rate discharge at a low temperature.


Abstract : A new application of Widrow's Adaptive Noise Cancelling (ANC) algorithm is presented. Specifically, the ambient environment is generalized to include the case where an acoustic barrier exists between the primary and reference microphones. By updating the coefficients of the noise estimation filter only during silence, it is shown that the ANC technique can provide substantial noise reduction with little speech distortion even when the acoustic barrier provides only moderate attenuation of acoustic signals. The use of the modified ANC method is evaluated using an oxygen facemask worn by fighter aircraft pilots. Experiments demonstrate that if a noise field is created using a single source, 11 dB signal-to-noise ratio improvement can be achieved by attaching the reference microphone to the exterior of the facemask. The length of the ANC filter required for this particular environment is only about 50 points long.


Provided is a simulation method and system for real-time broadcasting. A simulation method may include identifying an action set for a mechanical object, and displaying a movement of the mechanical object in response to the action using a line that connects a start location of the movement and an end location of the movement.


Optical emission spectroscopy (OES) and multipole resonance probe (MRP) are adopted to characterize low-pressure microwave (MW) and radio frequency (RF) discharges in oxygen. In this context, both discharges are usually applied for the deposition of permeation barrier SiOx films on plastic foils or the inner surface of plastic bottles. For technological reasons the MW excitation is modulated and a continuous wave (cw) RF bias is used. The RF voltage produces a stationary low-density plasma, whereas the high-density MW discharge is pulsed. For the optimization of deposition process and the quality of the deposited barrier films, plasma conditions are characterized using OES and MRP. To simplify the comparison of applied diagnostics, both MW and RF discharges are studied separately in cw mode. The OES and MRP diagnostic methods complement each other and provide reliable information about electron density and electron temperature. In the MW case, electron density amounts to ne = (1.25 ± 0.26) × 1017 m−3, and kTe to 1.93 ± 0.20 eV, in the RF case ne = (6.8 ± 1.8)×1015 m−3 and kTe = 2.6 ± 0.35 eV. The corresponding gas temperatures are 760±40 K and 440±20 K.


It has recently been reported by Hirano [Jap. J. Appl. Phys. 8,399 (1969) and J. Phys. Soc. Japan Suppl. 28, 90 (1970)] that the dc half‐wave voltage in lithium niobate increases appreciably with any departure from a melt stoichiometry (Li/Nb)m=1.00. Our measurements of the low‐ and high‐frequency half‐wave voltages indicate no variation over the range of melt stoichiometries originally considered. We have also measured the effect of compositional variations upon the low‐ and high‐frequency dielectric constants and we find a smaller change and in the opposite sense from that reported by Hirano. We discuss the indirect evidence which argues against any special importance being attached to the particular composition (Li/Nb)m=1.00. Theoretical estimates of the anticipated changes in the half‐wave voltages with composition support our experimental conclusions.


A 40-year-old Chinese woman was admitted for investigation of recurrent episodes of melaena, which had required multiple admissions to other hospitals over a 6-year period. Repeated upper gastrointestinal endoscopies and barium meals, a recent small bowel follow-through examination and a 99Tcm Meckel's scan had all been negative. A barium enema and colono-scopy were also normal. The patient was referred for selective coeliac and mesenteric angiography, with a suggested diagnosis of angiodysplasia.


Is the use of Facebook in schools like opening a box full of treasures or traumas? Social networking tools need to be considered within the context of a whole school approach to technology use. Schools need to choose tools on the basis of improving learning outcomes. However, if schools do not teach digital citizenship, then who will? Tools, like Facebook, create opportunities for libraries to better connect with patrons, but are they a worthy use of library resources? School librarians must consider carefully which tools work best in their own circumstances. Such choices are best made from an informed perspective.


For electronic devices, temperature is a limiting factor. Packing technology, driven by constant consumer demand and competitive pressure, allows higher power density than current cooling technology can handle. Sustained elevated temperatures act to not only reduce component efficiency, but also to reduce product life. We present a unique platform Simcenter TM that enables predictive engineering analytics by bringing a strong alignment between 1D simulation and 3D computer-aided engineering (CAE).


Abstract : NROTC State Selection Committees are convened annually to select from applicants to the NROTC program those who are deemed most likely to become effective and career motivated naval officers. Statistical analyses of the selections made indicated the weight given to the variables in the applicants' records is not proportional to the actual validity of these variables, as revealed by follow-up research. The purpose of this report is to provide selection committees of the available research evidence concerning the validity of various predictors in identifying applicants disposed toward a naval career. During the past decade a number of research studies on the predictive validity of career motivation interviews, the Strong Vocational Interest Blank, background and sports information, as well as an analysis of earlier Selection Board actions, have been completed. Graphs and charts illustrating the relevant conclusions of previous studies are presented in conjunction with information on the selection decisions of the 1967 NROTC State Selection Committees. (Author)


In this paper,by means of Mawhin's continuation theorem,we study a kind of fourth-order p-Laplacian differential equation with delay as follows: (p(x″(t)))″+f(x′(t))+β(t)g(t,x(t),x(t-ι(t))),x′(t))=e(t) A new result on the existence of periodic solution is obtained.Our results are different from the previous literaturest,he equation considered is more general,which make the results have much more profound meaning.


Motors are the driving force of our industrial world, as they power approximately 85% of all rotating machines. This revolutionary invention has been through radical changes before entering into the commercial industries, and their present forms are very reliable, to say the least. However, despite being so robust, induction motors are not entirely fault-proof and are more vulnerable to the internal faults than the external ones. Among the internal faults, certain types of bearing faults are more frequent, and their effects range from various performance-related issues to hard motor breakdowns. Fortunately, the recent advancements in the fields of Digital Signal Processing and Machine Learning allow us to detect these bearing faults and Figure out their origins, which in turn enables us to preserve their health and take measures against breakdowns. Through vibration analysis, this paper proposes a powerful method to detect these faults and differentiate among them based on the location of their occurrence within the bearing. Utilizing a well-known signal processing technique called Discrete Cosine Transform and Decision Tree classifier, this method is capable of classifying the motor bearing states with a 99.4% accuracy.


Pennylvania; SECTION 1. That the Township Manager is authoried to sign on behalf of the Board of Commissioners any and all agreements with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Deparment of Agriculture, Bureau of Farand Preservation pertaining to the sale of an "Agriculture Conservation Easement" for the property known as the Boys' Home Park.


In this work, by using two kinds of viologen ligands three POM-based compounds were obtained under hydrothermal conditions, namely [AgI(bmypd)0.5(β-Mo8O26)0.5] (1) (bmypd·2Cl = 1,1'-[Biphenyl-4,4'-bis(methylene)]bis(4,4'-bipyridyinium)dichloride), [AgI2(bypy)4(HSiW12O40)2]·14H2O (2) and [AgI(bypy)(γ-Mo8O26)0.5] (3) (bypy·Cl = 1-Benzyl-4,4'-bipyridyinium chloride). The structures were characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), Powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and single crystal X-ray diffraction. Compounds 1-3 show excellent photochromic ability with fast photoresponse under the irradiation of ultraviolet light with different degrees of color changes. So compounds 1-3 can be used as visible ultraviolet detectors. Compounds 1-3 also possess the photoluminescence properties with fast and excellent fluorescence quenching effect. Compounds 1-3 also can be used as inkless and erasable printing materials with the suspensions of 1-3 applied to filter paper. Compounds 1-3 can also produce color changes in the amine vapor environment, especially in the NH3 atmosphere. Compounds 1-3 can be used as organic amine detectors.


Large IP networks cannot be possible without routing protocols providing the appropriate paths between end sites. Many interior gateway routing protocols have been developed based on well known algorithms for IP networks in order to prevent routing loops. Some of these interior gateway routing protocols are RIP, OSPF and EIGRP. Each one of them has its benefits and drawbacks, and the best election depends on many parameters such as the network features, network hardware, few bandwidth wastage, scalability, costs, etc. In this paper we present a survey and a test performance of the main interior gateway IP routing protocols (although some of them can work with other non-IP protocols) that are used inside the Autonomous Systems. We will see which one provides the lowest delay path, the lowest number of hops, the lowest convergence time, and how the traffic sent through the network have different behavior depending on the routing protocol running in it, among others. Finally, we will conclude our paper providing some advises to the IP network designers and administrators. This work will help them to take the best election depending on their case.


The results of the experiment showed that seed and stalk yield were significantly higher in all the treatments as compared to control. The highest seed (15.35 q ha −1) and stalk yield (58.37 q ha −1) was recorded in the treatment where 50% NPK was applied With 10 t compost ha −1. Similarly, maximum energy yield (200.5 t MJ ha −1), protein content (33.15%), oil content (47.15%) and oil yield (723.7kg ha −1) was obtained in this treatment, NPK and S uptake was significantly raised due to different treatments compllred to control and the highest value of uptake i.e. 96.2, 28.76, 104.5 and 9.81 kg ha −1 respectively was obtained in above treatment combination. Availability of NPK and S was found, to have increased due to use of organic manures whether used alone or in combination with fertilizers (50% NPK) as compared to inorganic sources and control. The highest cost of cultivation (Rs. 7134 ha −1), gross return (Rs.11142 ha −1) and cost of production (Rs.5. 76kg −1) was found in the treatment where recommended dose of 100% NPK was added Without organic manures. While the maximum net return (Rs.7461 ha −1) and cost benefit ratio (1:2.17) was achieved in the treatment where only 50% of recommended dose of NPK was given in conjunction with 10 t compost ha −1.


Stagflation can be defined as a phenomenon whereby high or rising rates of inflation coexist with high or rising rates of unemployment and low or falling rates of output growth. Stagflation is a phenomenon of the 1970's. Its existence poses economists with a theoretical problem and policy makers with a practical dilemma. For traditional macroeconomic theory, stagflation means the break-down of the Phillips Curve. And for conventional demand managers it means that fighting inflation might produce more stagnation and fighting stagnation more inflation. In this paper we offer an explanation of stagflation which will subsequently be tested against the Dutch facts. Following that we briefly discuss the role which economic policy can play in preventing stagflation and reversing it.


This project was a research study to determine the effectiveness of replacing soybean meal by sesame paste in quail diets. The purpose of this research was to know the nutritional benefits of this oilseed reflected in feed intake and feed conversion, as well as in the increase of the poultry weight gain.
This experiment consisted of four portions formulated with different percentages of sesame paste (0 %, 25 %, 50 % and 75 %) to replace soybean meal. Each treatment was comprised of 50 quail (1 day old) that were offered the same quantity of meal food that was increasing over the weeks. Using a completely randomized design (DCA) with a factorial arrangement (4x5). Also, three variables were measured: feed intake, weight gain and feed conversion.
Treatment 2 (25% sesame paste) had the highest feed intake with average of 108.33 grams per bird during the five weeks of experimentation. The control treatment -1 (0 % sesame paste) showed the greatest increase in weight approximately 21.74 grams per bird during the weeks studied. Also, the control treatment was the most efficient in terms of feed - meat conversion with 3.15 grams per bird though ranked second in food intake. Finally, treatment 3(50 % sesame paste) and treatment 4 (75 % sesame paste) took third and fourth place respectively in feed intake, feed conversion and weight gain.


In this paper, we unify the attractive properties of shift invariance and good directional selectivity of dual tree complex wavelet transform (DTCWT), analyze motion and complex texture block for embedding according to human visual system (HVS) and MPEG motion encoding theory. Simulation results show that the algorithm is robust to AWGN, MPEG coding at high compression ratio, frame drop, frame average and frame swap.


The quantity of protein in human milk is believed to be important for growth and development of breastfed infants. This study, in support of the Global Exploration of Human Milk (GEHM) collaboration, reports total protein concentration as a weight to weight percentage based on Dumas combustion in longitudinal samples collected from three global cohorts (Mexico, China, and USA) at 4, 13, 26, and 52 weeks lactation. Average total protein decreased rapidly from 4 to 13 weeks of lactation (1.40 ± 0.14% to 1.16 ± 0.16%) and then remained relatively stable to 52 weeks (1.17 ± 0.13%). Similar trends have been reported and are further strengthened by data generated from these samples collected using standardized techniques. Since some components of human milk, including protein, are known to vary diurnally, samples for the GEHM study were collected in the morning by emptying an entire breast via electric pump. Additionally, commercially available human milk standards (HMS) and NIST Standard Reference Material (SRM) 1849a were incorporated into analyses to further verify the accuracy of Dumas combustion for determination of total protein in human milk. The HMS analyzed by combustion all fell within protein certified ranges determined by Kjeldahl methodology. SRM was analyzed before, during, and after each analytical run as a check sample. These added assessments of accuracy, as well as the integration of samples from different geographical populations across multiple points of lactation, strengthen the foundation of knowledge into total protein concentration in human milk. This research was supported by Mead Johnson Pediatric Nutrition Institute.


In 2007, a small survey was held among teaching staff of the Master of Geo-information curriculum at Wageningen University. The objective was to find out if an overview of entry and exit mastery levels per teaching subject would provide a basis for judging the quality of the curriculum. Findings were, that this approach gave insight into some quality aspects. A conclusion was that specifically the connectivity between curriculum components can be strongly influenced by subjective concepts held by members of staff about on the contents of components. This may result in cliffs, gaps and overlaps with regard to knowledge and contents between consecutive curriculum components. Where that happens, the chain of components that constitute a Learning Path can be improved.


The article considers approaches to the realization of humanitarian technologies of supportive and accompanying educational work on forming environmental culture in social and spacial sphere of microdistrict.


Curation and catalogue (published by Honolulu Academy of Arts 2006, ISBN 0-937426-74-1, DOI 10.1080/03087290600810904). Hammond was commissioned by the Honolulu Academy of Arts to guest-curate an exhibition of Ansel Adams's photographs (never before shown in Hawaii) of Japanese Americans interned at Manzanar War Relocation Center during World War II. The exhibition demonstrated Adams's commitment to the reintegration of Japanese Americans into American communities, within the terms of an ethical conviction, shared with the Japanese Americans, of the spiritual importance of the natural environment and mountain landscape.

The exhibition was based on research towards an earlier exhibition, Paul Strand and Ansel Adams: Native Land and Natural Scene, with Dr Mike Weaver, for the Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona, Tucson, 1990, and a comprehensive study of Adams's photographs made at Manzanar in the collections of the Center for Creative Photography; the Special Collections department of the Young Research Library, UCLA; and the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

An invited lecture, "Ansel Adams at Manzanar", was delivered (10 and 13 September 2006) at the Luce Theater, Honolulu Academy of Arts; the Center for Creative Photography, Tucson, Arizona (24 October 2006); and the Japanese American National Museum (12 November 2006). The exhibition was reviewed by Wayne Muromoto in the Hawai'i Herald (1 September 2006). A 29-page catalogue, Ansel Adams at Manzanar (14 illustrations) with a 5,000-word essay by Hammond was published by the Honolulu Academy of Arts (ISBN 0-937426-74-1, DOI 10.1080/03087290600810904). A longer version, "Ansel Adams at Manzanar War Relocation Center, 1943-44", with expanded footnotes, was published in History of Photography volume 30, number 3 (Autumn 2006).


This paper presents an approach to the commercialization of Magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) technology from the perspective of an equipment manufacturer. It discusses and recommends actions to be taken in solving technical problems and mitigating risk for the first commercial MHD power plant.


high-dimensional tensor spaceandrecognition methods operating directly onthis space suffer fromthecurse ofdimenThispapersolves thegait recognition problem inamultilin-sinalityc[4] ow th eentrof gais uete sequenc earprincipal component analysis (MPCA)framework. Gait areoften highly correlated withsurrounding entries andthese sequences arenaturally described astensor objects andfea- gaitsequences arehighly constrained. Theywill infact be tureextraction fortensor objects isimportant incomputer vi- confined toagait (tensor) subspace. sionandpattern recognition applications. Classical principalDimensionality reduction iscommonly usedtotransform component analysis (PCA)operates onvectors anditisnotdi- ahigh- dimensional datasetinto alow- dimensional subspace rectly applicable togait sequences. Thisworkintroduces an while retainin mostoftheunderlyin structure inthedata MPCA framework forfeature extraction fromgait sequencesg. y g. a byseeking amultilinear projection ontoatensor subspace of [5.PicplCmoetAays(C)isalsialin


The article is devoted to the peculiarities of agriculture in Uzbekistan and the problems of agrarian reforms and institutional transformations, the search for new organizational forms and management methods capable of ensuring the effective use of land, water, material and financial resources, as well as prospects for the development of the agricultural sector of the republic.


Combinatorial dimensions play an important role in the theory of machine learning. For example, VC dimension characterizes PAC learning, SQ dimension characterizes weak learning with statistical queries, and Littlestone dimension characterizes online learning.
In this paper we aim to develop combinatorial dimensions that characterize bounded memory learning. We propose a candidate solution for the case of realizable strong learning under a known distribution, based on the SQ dimension of neighboring distributions. We prove both upper and lower bounds for our candidate solution, that match in some regime of parameters. In this parameter regime there is an equivalence between bounded memory and SQ learning. We conjecture that our characterization holds in a much wider regime of parameters.


In this paper we present new parallel versions of sequential Goertzel and Reinsch algorithms for calculating trigonometric sums. The new algorithms use a recently introduced, very efficient BLAS-based algorithm for solving linear recurrence systems with constant coefficients. To achieve their portability across different shared-memory parallel architectures, the algorithms have been implemented in Fortran 77 and OpenMP We also present experimental results performed on a two processor Pentium III computer running under Linux operating system with Atlas as an efficient implementation of BLAS. The new algorithms are up to 60-90% faster than the equivalent sequential Goertzel and Reinsch algorithms, even on one processor.


In this work, experimental tests of a full analog fiber optic monitoring system are reported. The proposed concept is conceived to satisfy the constraints imposed to be used for safety application, in terms of robustness and reliability, due to full passive optical devices and analog-based circuitry. Moreover, it is compatible with the stringent requirements imposed by the detector safety system (DSS) of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment at CERN. From the optical side, the main device is the arrayed waveguide grating (AWG), with the aim to filter and address the optical signal through a determined output channel, that is then transduced in electrical by means of a photodiode. From the electronic side, the designed board has the purpose to manipulate the signal in order to have an increasing monotone output current, in the range of 4–20 mA, a standard widely employed in a safety system environment. In this way, the circuit gain can be set in order to match the value to the physical quantity under the monitoring threshold. To give proof of its characteristics, the system is subjected to many tests led at CERN, in which two fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors are under test in a custom climate box. Step temperature variation, as well as fast oscillating test and long-term stability measurement are reported, confirming its key strength and field-validating it.


Aim of my thesis is to remind the reader of the fundamental historical influence of the book illustration on the final appearance of the book, and to show its contemporary form in the science fiction genre. The practical part is devoted to the process of creating a personal set of illustrations for a selected work of the science fiction genre, with ephasis on its con-tribution to the depth of the characters.


Water requirements for drip irrigated vegetables have been shown to be linear with insolation, while photovoltaic pumping systems provided very variable water outputs (Sutton, 1985). Experiments have established the causes to be non-linear pump output with insolation and the high levels of insolation required for pump start. A multi-stage and single-stage centrifugal pump have been tested. The multi-stage pump with peak power tracking was the most successful in producing linear water output for insolation ranging from 400 - 1000 W m{-2} for clear and cloudy weather. By matching pump output to insolation, the system design may then become independent of site location. The low insolation non-linearity is to be further optimised.


Submitted for the DAMOP12 Meeting of The American Physical Society Improved data analysis for verifying quantum nonlocality and entanglement YANBAO ZHANG, University of Colorado at Boulder and National Institute of Standards and Technology, SCOTT GLANCY, EMANUEL KNILL, National Institute of Standards and Technology — Given a finite number of experimental results originating from local measurements on two separated quantum systems in an unknown state, are these systems nonlocally correlated or entangled with each other? These properties can be verified by violating a Bell inequality or satisfying an entanglement witness. However, violation or satisfaction could be due to statistical fluctuations in finite measurements. Rigorous upper bounds, on the maximum probability (i.e., the p-value) according to local realistic or separable states of a violation or satisfaction as high as the observed, are required. Here, we propose a rigorous upper bound that improves the known bound from large deviation theory [R. Gill, arXiv:quant-ph/0110137]. The proposed bound is robust against experimental instability and the memory loophole [J. Barrett et al., Phys. Rev. A 66, 042111 (2002)]. Compared with our previous method [Phys. Rev. A 84, 062118 (2011)], the proposed method takes advantage of the particular Bell inequality or entanglement witness tested in an experiment, so the computation complexity is reduced. Also, this method can be easily extended to test a set of independent Bell inequalities or entanglement witnesses simultaneously. Yanbao Zhang University of Colorado at Boulder and National Institute of Standards and Technology Date submitted: 31 Jan 2012 Electronic form version 1.4


education about his teaching approach. His book, The Unfolding of Artistic Activity, contains an introduction to his theory of visual conceiving (based on the Gustaf Britsch theory) and reports of his research for the Russell Sage Foundation (1948). His essay "The Mental Foundation of Art Education in Childhood," in the book, Child Art, reports on the stages of artistic development and on his theory (SchaeferSimmern, 1966, pp. 47-68). However, neither publication gives the reader a clear idea of the teaching or guidance methods which he used. As one of SchaeferSimmern's former students within his


The voice assistants are important input devices in future smart homes. Thanks to the great performance that is provided by current voice recognition systems, current voice assistants can understand various commands in different language from users and connect with other devices in the same local network to perform corresponding actions. However, the voices are not secure due to its nature. Even if we secure voice assistant using the voiceprint, attackers can still steal the victim's voices and replay them to voice assistants for attacking purpose. In this paper, we propose a new voice liveness detection system that is specifically designed for voice assistants. The key insight behind our system is that users will open their mouth when they say some phonemes. Such opening mouth activities will impact the air pressure in the ear canal if the ear canal is an enclosed space. Therefore, we can detect the liveness of the voices on the side of voice assistants by cauterizing the correlations between each sentence and the air pressure. Experiments with ten volunteers show that our system can accurately accept voice commands from legitimate users with accuracy of 94.8% and 97%. Moreover, our system can effectively defend current voice assistant devices from replay attacks with accuracy of 99.25% and 99.5%.


THE SUB-LETHAL AND TRANSGENERATIONAL EFFECTS OF FLUOXETINE AND SERTRALINE ON DAPHNIA MAGNA Kelsey Halliwushka Advisor: University of Guelph, 2016 Dr. Andreas Heyland With pharmaceutical use on the rise, there is a growing concern over the release of pharmaceuticals into the aquatic environment. The purpose of the present study was to determine the lethal and sub-lethal effects of two pharmaceuticals fluoxetine and sertraline on the life history traits of Daphnia magna. While environmentally relevant concentrations did not increase mortality in D. magna, acute exposures did alter heart rate, swimming ability, and reproductive output. Acute exposures had lasting transgenerational effects on swimming and reproductive output. However, no transgenerational effects on heart rate were found. These findings indicate that the current levels of fluoxetine and sertraline found in the environment are causing lasting effects on D. magna. Because of the short reproductive period of daphnia and their integral role in the food web, these lasting effects may have population-level implications in a rapid period of time.


At least two laser light sources emitting different laser light (bodies 5a to 5c) wavelengths (2 a to 2 c), respectively associated with the laser light source (2 a to 2 c), suitably a plurality of adjusting the optical path of the laser beam a beam focusing unit (3 a to 3 c), the laser beam and the beam superimposition device for superimposing (bodies 5a to 5c) each other (6), an imaging optical system (8), said imaging optical system (8) of each focus at a focal point on the workpiece (12) by associating with the laser beam (bodies 5a to 5c), the imbricated laser light (bodies 5a to 5c) the on workpiece (12) comprising an optical system that images and (8), said beam focusing means, laser wherein each focal point in a predetermined arrangement capable of changing with the beam focusing means (3 a to 3 c) the laser processing apparatus for imaging the light (bodies 5a to 5c) It is disclosed. According to the present invention, so that the intensity of the focal point in the focal point of the imaging optical system (8) is changed in a predetermined manner, can change the output of each laser beam (bodies 5a to 5c) by a high-frequency an electronic control unit (4 a to 4 c) are provided. Thus, high frequency control of a conventional laser processing parameters can be combined modulation techniques is realized. .FIELD 8


In this paper we it is presented a self similar image model based on Fractional Brown Motion
(FBM), in which the various structure functions and scale dependent Hurst parameters can be
choosed to simulate the scale dependent textures. The method is quite efficient for generation
of realistic nature textures and synthesis of digital holograms. The synthesized digital
holograms can be used in laser anti counterfeiting field.


The Countryside in 1980 Conference was extraordinarily successful as an impetus for subsequent action. It was less successful as a look into the future.


The article analyses dispute questions of property definition as the social-economic and legal categories on the scientific literature analysis basis.


In researches on mature rats it is shown that the electroactivated aqueous solutions can brake process of aging and reduce a natural mortality of animals.


A spacetime consisting of parallel electric/magnetic fields held together by its own gravity in the presence of a cosmological constant $\Lambda$ is derived as a limit of the de Sitter/anti-de Sitter C-metric. The limiting procedure is similar to the $\Lambda=0$ case where the Melvin universe is derived from the C-metric. Under an appropriate coordinate transformation, we show that this solution is equivalent to the solution obtained by Astorino. Some physical and geometrical properties of the solution are studied, as well as its geodesics. For $\Lambda<0$, the solution is asymptotically locally anti-de Sitter, and can be derived as a double-Wick rotation of a charged anti-de Sitter black hole with a planar horizon.


This paper proposes the advection-diffusion equation for modeling the bipolar memristor. The model identifies limiters to switching speed, reproduces general experimental results including those relating temperature dependence of I-V curves, and abstracts the contemporary dual variable resistor model. The model also reveals implicit complex resistors that cause the fleeting negative resistance characteristic in the memristor, as observed by Chua. Elegant closed-form solutions with remarkable scope are produced even under simplified modeling conditions. Numerical methods verify the closed form model. The proposed model uniquely derives all memristive behavior from a single governing advection-diffusion equation and bridges the vacancy and circuit domain abstractions.


A cross sectional study was conducted in West Belessa Wereda Veterinary Clinic from November, 2018 to March, 2019 with the objectives of investigating the prevalence of major reproductive health problems in cows. Animals which were brought to the clinic as a case with different abnormalities were diagnosed and reproductive health problems were identified and recorded. The study was carried out on a total of 384 local and cross breed cows. From these 384 diagnosed animals, 45 cows with an overall prevalence of 11.7% were found with reproductive health problems. The major reproductive health problems identified in the present study were dystocia, abortion, retained placenta, uterine prolapsed and vaginal prolapsed with the prevalence of 2.6%, 2.1%, and 5.2%, 1.3% and 0.5% respectively. Age, management system, body mass condition and types of breed were taken as risk factors in order to assess their significance relation with the problems. From these risk factors, Age, management system and body mass condition with their pvalue (.000, .026 & .000) respectively were statistically significant while animals' breed (local and cross breed with jersey) were not significantly associated (p>0.05). The prevalence of major reproductive health problems for age was 20% and 6.6% respectively for age 2-4 years and >4 years. Cows' management systems were found 12.3% and 9.7% prevalence for extensive and semi intensive management systems. Poor body mass condition cows were more exposed to reproductive health problems than good and medium body mass condition with their respective prevalence of 15.5%, 10.7% and 7.6%. The prevalence for local and cross breed (local breed cross with jersey) was found 12.3% and 7.7% respectively. In conclusion, reproductive health problems are one of the major reasons for decreased reproductive efficiency in cattle. Therefore further detailed studies on the major reproductive health disorders and disease control & prevention methods should be applied in the area.


Canonical methods of quasiclassical dynamics make it possible to go beyond a strict background approximation for cosmological perturbations by including independent fields such as correlation degrees of freedom. New models are introduced and analyzed here for cosmological dynamics in the presence of quantum correlations between background and perturbations, as well as cross-correlations between different modes of a quantum field. Evolution equations for moments of a perturbation state reveal conditions required for inhomogeneity to build up out of an initial vacuum. A crucial role is played by quantum non-locality, formulated by canonical methods as an equivalent local theory with non-classical degrees of freedom given by moments of a quantum state.


We examined the correlation of angiographic collaterals in acute stroke with the presence, extent, and distribution of white matter changes, so‐called Leukoaraiosis, in an effort to determine if Leukoaraiosis indicates chronic cerebral hypoperfusion and/or is associated with the development of cerebral collateral circulation.


China has become one of the world's four largest manufacturing countries,but not a great power of manufacture.The backwardness of management pattern and the lack of innovation capacity are the most important factors that hinder the development of China's manufacturing enterprises.After analyzing the gap between the laggard management pattern of China's manufacturing enterprises and the advanced patterns of that of abroad countries at current stage,this paper proposed some directions of innovation on management pattern for China's manufacturing enterprises,combined with the new requirements on management pattern in the strategic-oriented period of time.


At present, the development process of Chinese society is in a strong momentum, and now only by constantly innovating the existing technical level can the competitiveness of construction enterprises be improved. After the reform and opening up, people's quality of life has undergone a qualitative leap and the situation of electricity consumption in daily life is very common. In the whole power system, transmission line belongs to one of the more important parts, so the construction of transmission line requires relatively high construction technology, because the whole project involves a lot of workload, has certain complexity and is easily affected by many external factors in the actual operation process, so the construction workers must pay attention to it To effectively implement the technical management of transmission line construction, so as to fundamentally guarantee the construction quality of power engineering and promote the orderly development of power engineering construction work.


Under the pressures of global competition, response to changes in evolving international transport from processing and marketing system. Enterprises are forced to pace their supply according to the requirements of customers. Many enterprises attempt to manage their supply chain effectively. The international transportation of the products, which involved in valuable goods, may cause the happening of transportation risk. Therefore, this study explores the feasibility of applying an integrated inventory model with the consideration of incorporating production programs and maintenance to an imperfect process. We also consider the transportation risk between manufacturers, suppliers and retailers, building a two-echelon inventory and transportation risk model.


INTRODUCTION Evaluation of welfare in breeding animals is one of the main topic of both the European and national legislation. Whenever a stress status becomes chronic, all the non adaptive immune system is involved, thus resulting in evident conditioned pathologies. This innate part of the immune system is easily influenced from environmental stress. In this work we monitored in an intensive breeding herd on outdoor growing and finishing, and in an outdoor pig farm to evaluate whether and to what extent the breeding system may affect the non adaptive immune system.


The output of acid gastric juice secreted during the period between 10 and 30 minutes after the intramuscular injection of pentagastrin 6 ,ug/kg body weight gives an estimate of maximal acid output comparable with that by other methods (Multicentre Study, 1969). We report an assessment of the value of this test in gastric disease. The results have been compared with maximal acid outputs estimated in a different population of patients with similar disease states by the histamine infusion test. Intramuscular pentagastrin tests were carried out by the method of Johnston and Jepson (1967). After an overnight fast, a 14 or 16F nasogastric tube was passed into the stomach with the patient in the left lateral position. The position of the tube was not checked radiologically, but before each test was started the tube position was adjusted until a satisfactory flow of gastric juice was obtained. Continuous aspiration was used employing a low-pressure pump with frequent interrup-tion and injection of a small volume of air. The stomach was emptied, and following a 15-min basal collection, 6 gg/kg pentagastrin was injected into the deltoid muscle. Gastric juice was collected at 10 and 30 minutes after injection. That produced between 10 and 30 minutes was used for the determination of acid output. The volume (ml) was measured, the concentration of acid was


Introduction. Andrunakijevic and Rjabuhin have shown in [i] that every Kurosh-Amitsur radical for associative rings can be described in the language of modules in much the same way as the Jacobson radical. An examination of Andrunakijevic and Rjabuhin's arguments shows that all but one of their results can be obtained by omitting one of their conditions. Since that condition is the most difficult one to verify in practice, this raises the question of whether one can obtain all the results in [1] without it. In this note we show that this will not be possible in general. We also give a new and short proof of the main result in [1].


Dissolution testing of dosage forms has become a recognized method for assessing the effects of formulation on drug release and as a routine quality control procedure for controlled release preparations. Numerous dissolution methods have been reported (Hersey & Marty 1975) including the rotating bottle systems of Wruble (1930) and Souder & Ellenbogen (1958). Such systems ensure that the flow of dissolution medium across the surface of the solid is streamlined and reproducible, conditions which Wood (1967) suggests are essential requirements for dissolution tests. In the rotating bottle systems, flow is controlled by the solid falling through the medium rather than by external agitation. However, the systems described in the literature suffer from the disadvantages of requiring intermittent sampling and providing a limited volume. The former causes interruption of rotation and hence of the dissolution process and the latter may not provide sink conditions which are necessary for reproducibility (Groves & Alkan 1975). An automated dissolution apparatus based on the rotating bottle has been developed to follow the release of drug substances from pellets and granules, especially sustained-release products which do not disintegrate but release their drug by erosion or diffusion. The equipment consists of a glass chamber through which dissolution medium is pumped for analysis. The chamber itself consists of a Pyrex heavy walled tube with hemispherical ends 150 mm in length and 25 mm in outer diameter. The internal volume of the tube is 50 ml. Fused centrally into the side of this tube is a sidearm terminating in a screwthread joint (Quickfit, Corning Ltd, Stone, Staffs) suitable for 7 mm (outer diameter) glass tubing. A glass lip is formed on the inner surface of the fused union (Fig. 1). Two lengths of 2 mm diameter polyvinyl chloride (PVC) tubing (Portex Ltd, Hythe, Kent) protrude from either end of a length of 7 mm diameter Pyrex glass tubing bent at a right angle with the length of the longer arm being sufficient to allow clearance of the surface of a constant temperature water bath. At the end of the shorter length of tubing a silicone rubber seal is made around the PVC tubes terminating in a rubber '0'-ring. With the apparatus set up, the shorter arm of the right angled tube is secured in the screwthread joint through a Teflon washer and silicone rubber ring with the '0'-ring forming a liquid-tight mobile seal on the lip a t the tubesidearm boundary. This system effectively seals the dissolution chamber whilst providing a means of rotation, continuous sampling, and isolation from the water bath fluid. The chamber is rotated at a controlled speed about the short arm of the right angled tube (which forms a horizontal axis) on a brass bearing which is immersed in the water bath and is driven from outside the bath by a timing belt system (Fenner (Power Transmission) Ltd, Marfleet, Hull) from an electric motor. With this motion, a 'tumbling' action is achieved with the pellets repeatedly falling through the dissolution medium. The rate of rotation can be varied by changing the pulleys on the drive and motor shafts. Solution to be sampled is pulled through a short length of the PVC tubing penetrating the dissolution chamber with the second, longer length of tubing


The present invention for sterilization and remove sources are UV sterilizer for the filtered air in the pre-filter and the pre-filter that configures the front air intake remove floating dust in the impurity or air contaminated large particles in the air with ultraviolet rays lamp, and the reflective plate acting to reflect the ultraviolet rays of the ultraviolet lamp in a direction at right angles with the air flow, the UV light to consist of a carbon filter for the remaining odor in the air sterilization by the lamp for sterilization and deodorizing, such as the through it will be effective to completely eliminate microorganisms and removes odor causing substances in the air.


The goal of this essay is to explicate Martin Heidegger's metaphysical critique and interpretation of G. W. F. Hegel's thought. This explication will include a discussion of Heidegger's view on Hegel's conceptions of subjectivity, dichotomy, and self-consciousness. For the sake of presenting a concise essay, I will present only a few of Heidegger's major texts concerning Hegel. Two of the most essential texts analyzed in this essay are from Heidegger's later years. These texts include the "Four Seminars" and "The Onto-theo-logical Constitution of Metaphysics". The most important issue will be to demonstrate the fundamental dilemma that Heidegger finds in the thinking of Hegel. Though Hegel brings metaphysics to its highest achievement, Hegel still lacks the ability to demonstrate the grounds of metaphysics because of his own entanglement in the history of subjectivity.


The Living Consensus framework includes five key teaching and learning strategies that are facilitated through student-centred learning. This means that students are involved in activities and discussion during their programme of study. The students are involved in many decisions with the teacher about how we should work together as a class.

This way of working with students helps develop personal skills and attitudes that can be transferred to other learning experiences and their future workplaces. These skills include: Independent learning skills that help the students learn to think and act for themselves and show initiative in the workplace. Problem solving skills that help students to think through and solve problems they may see in the work place.

Team work will help students to learn to work in teams like they will do in the workplace. Developing an understanding of different cultures and world views will help the students to work with people from other countries and understand customers from around the world. Developing ethical practice will help students think about and agree on how they should conduct themselves in a global workplace. This will help prepare them for business with people from around the world. Developing self-awareness will help students to notice when they could be doing something better and enable them to self-correct their practice or behaviour when necessary. Self-direction will help students to set and achieve their own goals for learning and the workplace.

Employers in New Zealand look for graduates with these skills and attitudes. During this presentation we will talk about the five key strategies that help students to develop them.


Quantitative brain tissue volumes from neonatal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) offer the possibility of improved clinical decision making and diagnosis. However, the neonatal brain presents specific challenges to automated segmentation algorithms. We developed a new method for automatic labeling of neonatal brain MR images. The method uses a new sparsity-based atlas selection strategy that requires a very limited number of atlases 'uniformly' distributed in the low-dimensional data space, combined with a machine learning based label fusion technique. The performance of the method for brain labeling from data of 66 newborns is evaluated and compared with results obtained using majority vote. The proposed method provides accurate brain labeling results with a mean Dice coefficient of 91%. As the proposed method can learn from partially labeled datasets, it can be used to segment large-scale datasets efficiently.


A consultant colorectal surgeon accused of bringing "disruption and demoralisation" to a Scarborough Hospital unit by repeatedly using profanity and sexual innuendo has been allowed to stay on the UK medical register.

Serban Gheorghiu has instead been suspended from the register for nine months, after a medical practitioners tribunal said that its "finely balanced decision" between erasure and suspension had been swayed by a last minute positive testimonial from his subsequent employer.

Gheorghiu, who moved to the UK in 1992 after qualifying in Romania, did not attend the Manchester hearing. The tribunal considered letters he had previously sent to the General Medical Council laying out his view of the case.

Against him were arrayed five nurses from the endoscopy unit he worked in, all of whom provided in-person testimony that the tribunal described …


One of the ways of thinking about how to finish the learning task is through self-dialogue. Doing so enables learners to ask themselves what should they do and evaluate whether it is appropriate from another point of view. However, learners might have difficulties imagining the scenario and interacting with an imaginary person. They may need a scaffolding tool or a person as a partner to practice the self-dialogue. Besides, the ventriloquist phenomenon in education has been noted as beneficial for learning as it could make the learners understands the idea through dialogue. This study proposed a learning approach that allows the learners to use a robot as a ventriloquist doll for practicing self-dialogue and knowledge application to enhance their learning effectiveness. The experiment was conducted by participating 104 undergraduate learners who enrolled in a Japanese Hospitality Management course. The results showed that the approach used a ventriloquist robot to facilitate learning through self-dialogue exhibited significant effects on motivation, anxiety, and better learning outcomes. This study provides a novel area of insight into the use of robots in learning, by integrating digital technology with pedagogical approaches to create an immersive intelligent learning environment and offer a self-dialogue mechanism to foster collaborative learning tasks.


The purpose of this study was to describe the development of a new intervention for jobseekers and to assess its efficacy using a naturalistic, pre-post intervention design. In contrast to existing work-based interventions, the Work Intervention Network (WIN) intervention targets multiple intersecting domains through four modules and via six group sessions: deepening and sustaining relationships; fostering social awareness and reducing self-blame; building emotional resilience and self-care; and planning, exploring, and engaging in the job search. To evaluate the intervention, we first recruited a sample of 33 jobseekers to provide feedback on the program. Integrating their feedback into the design of the program, we then recruited a sample of 108 jobseekers who filled out surveys before and after the six-session intervention, which assessed work and mental health functioning across the four domains. Results revealed that participants were highly satisfied with the intervention and reported large increases in social support, belonging, psychological well-being, job search engagement, and work hope as well as decreases in isolation and self-blame. This study provides strong support for the WIN intervention and has implications for how to support jobseekers in an increasingly precarious labor environment.


Regulatory T cell (Treg) abundance associates with diminished anti-tumour immunity and poor prognosis in human epithelial cancers, underscoring their value as an immunotherapy target. There has been limited clinical success in targeting this cell population likely due to a lack of consensus on the most selective targets for depletion of Treg cells, and the limited mechanistic insight into the activity of these antibodies in vivo. Recent work from our lab (Vargas et al., 2017) demonstrates that CD25 (the high affinity alpha receptor subunit for IL-2) is a selective target for the depletion of regulatory T cells in mouse and human malignancies. However, despite being a selective target, aCD25PC61 lacks single agent activity against tumours. Based on this, two projects were developed, both focusing on CD25 as a target for Treg depletion. The first project focused on the development of a bispecific antibody targeting both CD25 and PD-L1, with the rationale being that Treg depletion would be targeted to the tumour (due to PD-L1 upregulation in the tumour microenvironment). The bispecific antibody was developed in the lab, and its production, characterisation and activity in vitro and in vivo is discussed in depth in Chapter 4. The second project was initiated as a hypothesis that the in vivo activity of available anti-CD25 mAbs targeting human and mouse Treg cells, is likely limited by their IL-2 blocking activity. By developing a CD25 antibody which does not block IL-2 signalling, this hypothesis was tested in vivo in various mouse tumour models. The work presented in this thesis demonstrates the critical importance of endogenous IL-2 to the function of the CD4 and CD8 effector compartments in the context of Treg depletion and that this is key for the superior anti-tumour activity of aCD25NIB.


Aims: The management of leachate has become to one of the main focuses for the environment management. The aim of this study was a complementary treatment of leachate using sequencing batch reactor (SBR). Materials and Methods: A bioreactor was fed by effluent with 70-1360 mg/L chemical oxygen demand (COD) concentration. The values of pH and dissolved oxygen (DO) were monitored routinely. However, analysis of 5-days biochemical oxygen demand (BOD 5 ), COD, and total suspended solid (TSS) was done in feed and effluent whenever the system reached steady state twice a week for 280 days. Results: The pH values in the influent were 7.4-8.16 that increased slightly up to 8 in the effluent. COD removal efficiency increased in bioreactor with time in all experiments up to 70%. The removal efficiency was 40-80% depending on the feeding values. TSS concentration in influent was ranged between 100 and 1860 mg/L that was decreased to 30-398 mg/L in the bioreactor effluent. In most cases, TSS values were below the standard limit. Conclusions: The acceptable performance of the SBR under different conditions suggests the promising capability of a full-scale, on-site SBR as efficient and versatile treatment system in handling the fluctuating nature of both the quantity and quality of composting leachate.


The relationships between heart rate (HR) and several parameters of somatic activity were evaluated in human subjects when shuck avoidance was made contingent on either increases or decreases in HR. In order to depict any influence of the contingency specific 10 HR, somatic activity was controlled to varying degrees by instructions and the use of non-contingent control groups. When increases in HR were reinforced, the contingency we found to influence somatic activity but an effect specific to HR was also observed. When decreases in HR were reinforced, there was no evidence that HR were influenced independently of somatic activity. The result are discussed with respect to several current issues.


In this paper, a dual-polarized frequency selective absorber (FSA) with wide notch band based on circuit analog (CA) is proposed. The proposed FSA is composed of a two-layered structure with an air layer in between according to the circuit topology. At the top layer, meander lines and interdigitated capacitors are used to replace the inductance and capacitance in the corresponding circuit, and metalized vias are adopted to connect the two in parallel. The bottom layer is just a layer of dielectric substrate and a metal plate on its backside. The overall structure exhibits two absorption bands over the frequency ranges of 3.3 to 6.7 GHz and 11.7 to 14 GHz, whereas a reflective band is obtained from 7.62 to 11.05 GHz (36.9%). The simulation results show that the proposed absorber has ultrawide absorption band and flat notch. Furthermore, good agreement is obtained between the simulation results and circuit analysis.


Abstract The author argues that Sufficient attention has not been paid by economists and statisticians to the fact that, given the way productivity indicators at sector and country-level are defined and determined by statistical agencies, the resulting figures—for comparisons among countries, or among sectors within a country, as well as for comparisons over time ("productivity growth")—do not actually have the assumed meaning: that is, an increase of the index indicates that the country's (sector's) companies have become more productive, in the sense of producing more products or services with the same quantities of resources, or producing the same with fewer quantities of resources, etc.


ach June International Men's Health Week has a different focus and the topic for this year was men's emotional wellbeing. In England events were held at both local and national levels with a well-attended conference, entitled Mind your Head, at which the Men's Health Forum's 2006 policy document on men's emotional wellbeing and the Haynes Brain Manual (Banks, 2006) were launched. The latter has contributions from 46 organisations including the National Institute for Mental Health in England, the Department of Health, the Football Association, the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Papyrus, the Mental Health Foundation, Water UK, Age Concern, the Samaritans, the Stroke Association and the Royal Mail. The main importance of these events is the recognition that men's mental health warrants more attention than it receives at present. Next year the Gender Equality Act 2006 comes into force with a general duty that applies to all public and private bodies providing a public service which, in practice, will 'require public authorities – as employers or service providers – to actively consider whether they are treating women and men fairly and meeting their different needs' (DTI, 2005). Within this paper I wish to explore whether men do experience and express their emotional wellbeing differently to women and, if so, why this may be the case. I will then go on to discuss how the mental health services can become more sensitive to the needs of men and develop more appropriate responses. E Men and their mental wellbeing


Abstract Objective To test whether improvement in household coal stoves affected the incidence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in Xuanwei County, China. Design Retrospective cohort study (follow-up 1976-92) comparing incidence of COPD between groups with and without chimneys. Participants 20 453 people born into homes with unvented coal stoves;16 606 (81.2%) subsequently changed to stoves with chimneys. Intervention Installation of a chimney in households in which unvented stoves had been used previously. Results Installation of a chimney was associated with distinct reduction in the incidence of COPD. Compared with people who did not have chimneys, the Cox-modelled risk ratio (relative risk) was 0.58 (95% confidence interval 0.49 to 0.70, P < 0.001) in men and 0.75 (0.62 to 0.92, P = 0.005) in women. Modelled risk ratios were robust to different Cox model specifications. Relative risks decreased with time since stove improvement. In both sexes, the reduction in risk became unequivocal about 10 years after stove improvement. Conclusions In Xuanwei, incidence of COPD decreased markedly after household coal stoves were improved.


Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a very common functional disorder of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract that is associated with significant healthcare costs and disability. Despite this, our understanding of this syndrome is yet limited and our treatment methods only modestly effective. The aim of this article is to review the epidemiology and pathophysiology of IBS and subsequently discuss the various treatment methods available, including current, novel and potential future therapies.


Abstract : Pyrolysis and Hydropyrolysis of Kentucky oil shale using super-critical toluene as the solvent was studied in a 300 c.c. stirred batch reactor. Organic carbon conversions in excess of 160% Fischer Assay were obtained in less than 30 minutes for those reactions occurring above 400 C with hydrogen atmospheres. It was found that the overall conversion of organic compound to oil and gas products could be adequately modeled using a second order irreversible rate expression. Reactions occurring at 460 C and 300 psig hydrogen partial pressure could be considered instantaneous, yielding organic carbon conversions of 185% Fischer Assay. The effects of hydrogen partial pressure was found to be significant for reactions occurring above 400 degrees C. The selectivity for total carbon conversion to oil was shown to be high, however this value was dependent on the reaction temperature and reaction time. A characterization comparison between a pyrolysis oil produced by Dravo Engineers, Inc. and the oil produced from a run performed at 440 C for 10 minutes demonstrated that the oils were remarkably similar in their chemical make-up.


—Mobile Ad hoc Network (MANET) is a type of Ad hoc network. General properties of MANET open the network to various security threats. Network layer-based Active attacks are widespread and destructive. Available security solutions contain complex calculations. Therefore, the objective of this research is to propose a lightweight security mechanism to enhance the security of data communications between source and destination nodes in a MANET from network layer-based active attack. Blackhole is used as a network layer-based Active attack. The network performance is evaluated using Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR), Average End-to-End Delay (AEED), Throughput, and Simulation Processing Time at Intermediate Nodes (SPTIN). The controller network was used to compare the performance of each network. During the experiment due to the impact of the blackhole attack, compared to the controller network, the PDR was found to be 0.28%, AEED was infinity and Throughput was 0.33%. The performance of the proposed security mechanism was compared with that of the controller network, and the values of PDR, AEED, Throughput, and SPTIN were found to be 98.0825%, 100.9346%, 99.9988%, and 96.5660%, respectively. The data packet delivery ratio was 100.00% compared to that of the controller network. The network that was affected by a blackhole attack showed a higher amount of ADDR than the controller network and the lowest amount of PDR. The network that was affected by the blackhole showed underperformance compared to the controller network. The proposed security mechanism performs well in PDR, AEED, and Throughput compared to the controller network. The AEED and SPTIN values prove that the proposed solution is free from complex calculations. The scope of the solution can be expanded into a lightweight Intruder Detection System to handle different types of security attacks in MANETs.


Estimating the Effect of a Prognostic or Risk Factor after Selection of an "Optimal" Cutpoint Norbert Holländer, Willi Sauerbrei and Martin Schumacher 1 Institute of Medical Biometry and Medical Informatics, University Hospital Freiburg, Stefan-Meier-Straße 26, D-79104 Freiburg, Germany 2 Freiburg Center for Data Analysis and Modelling, University of Freiburg, Eckerstraße 1, D-79104 Freiburg, Germany * email: firstname.lastname@example.com http://www.imbi.uni-freiburg.de


: This study was aimed at identifying the fish habitat that harbors O. niloticus with higher nutrients and availing these findings for nutritional guidance. Amino acid and proximate compositions of O. niloticus from Lower Benue River and UAM fish farm were determined monthly for a 3month period, using methods of Benitez (1989) and AOAC (2006) respectively. The mean of Glutamic acid (12.51±0.64 and 11.85±0.67) and Alanine (5.40±0.23 and 4.50±0.41) varied significantly (p<0.05) between the wild and cultured while other amino acids were not. In October, ash (4.62±0.02 and 3.69±0.02), fat (4.71±0.06 and 3.61±0.02), protein (14.62±0.07 and 9.98±0.02) and moisture (75.67±0.07 and 79.65±0.15) varied significantly between the wild and cultured O. niloticus . Crude protein (20.46±0.01 and 18.75±0.04) and moisture (69.32±0.02 and 73.35±0.20) significantly varied in November between the samples respectively. Only crude protein (18.89±0.04 and 20.31±0.06) varied statistically in December between wild and cultured. The mean of crude protein (17.99±1.22 and 16.34±1.86) and the mean moisture (72.53±1.16 and 74.94±1.52) differed significantly between the wild and cultured. From these results. O. niloticus wild expressed superiority over the cultured, however, both River Benue at Makurdi and the UAM fish farm harbor nutritious O. niloticus which is good for human consumption based on our daily amino acid and protein needs.


These lectures give a self-contained introduction to supersymmetry from a modern perspective. Emphasis is placed on material essential to understanding duality. Topics include: central charges and BPS-saturated states, supersymmetric nonlinear sigma models, N=2 Yang-Mills theory, holomorphy and the N=2 Yang-Mills beta function, supersymmetry in 2, 6, 10, and 11 spacetime dimensions.


In computing measures of the market risk of a portfolio, such as Value at Risk, portfolio managers typically rely on estimates of correlations between returns on the financial instruments in the portfolio and on the volatility of those returns. This task is relatively simple if the correlations and volatilities do not change over time, and if there are sufficient data to allow them to be estimated fairly precisely. The task is vastly more difficult if the correlations change abruptly as a result of structural breaks in the mechanisms that determine asset returns – perhaps owing to the impact of contagion on the links between markets, changes in the sources of shocks, or new market structures or practices. However, changes in correlation patterns may be no more than the natural and predictable effects of fluctuations in asset return volatility. In such cases, the problem facing risk managers should be less difficult, as the empirical challenge then consists of modelling the time-varying nature of asset return volatilities. In periods of heightened market volatility, correlations between returns on financial assets tend to increase relative to correlations estimated during periods of normal volatility. For example, the average correlation between yield spreads for selected fixed income securities rose to 0.37 following the Russian crisis in August 1998 from 0.11 in the first half of 1998 (Committee on the Global Financial System (1999), Table A18). The increased correlation of returns during periods of high volatility is often explained as resulting from changes in the underlying relationships that determine returns.13 Yet, probability theory shows that correlations between asset returns depend on market volatility even if the underlying relationships between returns have not changed; variations in correlations measured over different periods of time may merely be the consequence of variations in realised volatility.


The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of a cognitive– behavioral, biofeedback-assisted intervention to impart skills for coping with stressful encounters in a nonclinical adolescent population. Israeli Arab and Israeli Jewish participants completed pre- and postintervention questionnaires assessing state anxiety, test anxiety, behavior symptoms, hostility, and selfesteem. Electrodermal activity was recorded using biofeedback. From pre- to postintervention, scores of state anxiety, test anxiety, behavior symptoms, and self-esteem, but not hostility, changed significantly in the intervention group as compared with the control group. A significant Group School effect was evident for state and test anxiety and behavior problems, indicative of higher reductions in the Arab group. The cognitive– behavioral program proved an effective preventive intervention for adolescents.


. We have searche d the Faint Sky Variability Survey data for gamma-ray burst afterglowss that, due to collimation of the prompt 7-ray emission, are not preceded by an observabl ee burst of gamma rays: so-called orphan afterglows. We find one object which iss fading and not detected after a year, but its colours sugges t that it is a supernova att late times. We simulate jetted 7-ray bursts, randoml y distributed on the sky, to determinee the expected number of orphans that would have been detected in the survey basedd on the following two models: (A) a model in which the Lorentz factor T and energy perr unit solid angle E are uniform acros the face of the jet, and (B) a model where both rr and 8 decreas e as a power law function of angle away from the jet axis. For model A, wee would have expected to detect a number of orphans far less than unity (0.07), and aree therefore unabl e to constrai n this model . For model B our non-detection of orphans impliess that the gamma-ray jet half-opening angle needs to be larger than 3-4°. This lowerr limit correspond s to a maximum beaming factor of 410-730, which is the ratio of thee intrinsic rate over the observed gamma-ray burst rate. Changing the circumburst densityy paramete r from n = 0.1 cm to n — 100 cm, the limit on the half-opening anglee increases to 8-9°, correspondin g to a maximum beaming factor of 80-100.


Fifteen dabb-lizard, Uromastyx aegyptius microlepis of both sexes were caught from the arid area of the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. The alimentary canal was found to be infected with helminthes nematode at rate of 86%, 9% and 5% for the stomach, the small intestine and the large intestine respectively. The nematodes were identified as Aplectana species.


Critical to accurate reconstruction of sparse signals from low-dimensional Poisson observations is the solution of nonlinear optimization problems that promote sparse solutions. Theoretically, non-convex ℓp-norm minimization (0 ≤ p <; 1) would lead to more accurate reconstruction than the convex ℓ1-norm relaxation commonly used in sparse signal recovery. In this paper, we propose an extension to the existing SPIRAL-ℓ1 algorithm based on the Generalized Soft-Thersholding (GST) function to better recover signals with mostly nonzero entries from Poisson observations. This approach is based on iteratively minimizing a sequence of separable subproblems of the nonnegatively constrained, ℓp-penalized negative Poisson log-likelihood objective function using the GST function. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, called SPIRAL-ℓp, through numerical experiments.


The paper describes an accelerator scenario of a Pulsed Spallation Neutron Source made of an Induction Linac injecting into a Fixed-Field Alternating-Gradient Accelerator (FFAG). The motivations underlying the proposal deal with the concern of removing technical risks peculiar to other scenarios involving RF Linacs, Synchrotrons and Accumulator Rings, which originate, for example, from the need of developing intense negative-ion sources and of multi-turn injection into the Compressor Rings. The system proposed here makes use of a positive-ion source of very short pulse duration, and of single-turn transfer into the circular accelerator.


In the framework of our doctoral research on youth paternity in popular neighborhoods, in this article we present some findings and reflections on the care practices that young men develop in their homes, based on their own testimony. We investigate especially in the decisions and practices of taking care of their children, as well as in the distribution of tasks and their daily domestic practices. With that purpose, we conducted 40 semi-structured interviews with young resident parents of a popular neighborhood of Gran La Plata, Buenos Aires (Argentina) during the period 2013-2015. Although the responsibility for care continues to be focused on women, we maintain that the interviewees perform care practices (which we will call administrative and / or playful care). observing a greater involvement in parenting compared to their own parents.


A dominant media narrative of "getting better" over time is often projected onto LGBTQ people's personal life experiences. In this research study, I examine this narrative's role in transgender people's emotional well-being throughout transition. A "getting better" narrative was pervasive in my qualitative analysis of 240 Tumblr transition blogs and 20 interviews with bloggers, signaling that it impacted people's self-concept both as presented on social media and when talking about their experiences. This narrative causes undue emotional harm given contrast between one's post-transition reality, which may involve distress (despite greater congruence between one's body and identity), and a dominant cultural expectation of happiness. I argue that an intersectional approach to understanding trans people's emotional well-being—by considering multiple salient identity facets and life transitions—makes trans lives more livable by complicating the cultural imperative to feel better, and to present a unilaterally positive self-image online, post-transition. Even though trans people on average feel better after gender transition, everyday realities are often in contrast to the dominant narrative's positioning of gender transition as a process with a single, simple goal of feeling better. Challenging the "getting better" narrative gives trans people the freedom to live and exist in their post-transition identities, whether or not they feel "better."


A series of stable and transparent glasses with the composition 59B 2 O 3 –10Na 2 O–(30 − x) CdO–xZnO–1CuO (0 ≤ x ≤ 30) (where x = 0, 7.5, 15, 22.5, and 30 mol%) were prepared by conventional melt-quenching technique. These glasses were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) and Raman spectroscopes, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), optical absorption, and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR). XRD and DSC analysis confirmed the glassy nature of the prepared samples. The physical properties such as density (ρ), molar volume (V m ), oxygen packing density (OPD), and the molar volume of oxygen (V o ) were calculated and discussed. FTIR and Raman studies showed that the glass network consists of BO 3 and BO 4 units in various borate groups. From DSC, it was found that the glass transition temperature (T g ) varies nonlinearly with the addition of ZnO content in place of CdO. Both EPR and optical absorption results have confirmed that the Cu2+ ions are in octahedral coordination with a strong tetrahedral distortion. The changes in various spectroscopic properties of Cu2+ ions in the glasses such as spin-Hamiltonian parameters ( ) and bonding coefficients (α2, β 1 2, and β2) were understood with the help of FTIR and Raman studies.


Rats receiving a single dose (10 mg/100 g body wt) of PAN develop severe proteinuria and acute interstitial nephritis. To investigate the mechanisms involved in interstitial leucocyte accumulation, we examined the expression of adhesion molecules on kidney tissue sections as well as on endothelial cell cultures. We also performed in vivo treatments with antibodies against adhesion molecules. Enhanced expression of intercellular adhesion molecule‐1 (ICAM‐1) was found on day 7 of the disease, when interstitial nephritis was first detected. Also, rat endothelial cells in culture showed maximal expression of ICAM‐1 in the presence of 10−9–10−11 m PAN. Adhesion of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) on kidney sections from PAN‐treated rats was highest on day 7 (3.05±0.7 (mean±s.e.m.); controls 0.75±0.5). Such increased adhesion was notably blocked after PAN‐treated rat kidney sections were incubated with anti‐ICAM‐1 MoAb (0.9±0.4). In addition, adhesiveness of PBMC to PAN‐stimulated endothelial cells in culture was enhanced (25±2.5%; non‐stimulated cells 13±3.1%). The addition of specific MoAbs against ICAM‐1 and lymphocyte function‐associated antigen‐1 (LFA‐1) produced a high blockage of adhesiveness induced by exposure to PAN (inhibition 58±3%; non‐stimulated cells 40±7%). Simultaneous administration to PAN‐treated rats of anti‐LFA‐1 and anti‐ICAM‐1 MoAbs reduced the number of interstitial cells by 70% compared with the 30% of reduction obtained when anti‐very late antigen‐4 (VLA‐4) MoAb and anti‐vascular cell adhesion molecule‐1 (VCAM‐1) antibodies were used. Our results suggest that the LFA‐1/ICAM‐1 pathway plays a principal role in the interstitial nephritis occurring in rats with PAN‐nephrosis.


Objective. The World Health Organization concluded that the tobacco would be the cause of death of 10 millions people and that is more then any other individually cause would done. The most of people start to smoke before age of 18. The young in the time of growing up are much more liable on different effects and experiments including usage of tobacco. There is a large risk that adolescent would pass from experiment phase and phase of periodical usage into the phase of regular usage and dependence of tobacco. Therefore, an investigation was conducted among boys and girls from secondary school in Cuprija with intent to determine prevalence of tobacco users among secondary-school pupil. The purpose of experiment was to determinate is there a difference in frequent of usage for girls and for boys.


Haemaphysalis (Kaiseriana) borneata sp. n., described from a single male collected from a sambar deer in northern Borneo in 1913, is related to H. (K.) aculeata Lavarra and H. (K.) cuspidata Warburton, which parasitize the mouse deer and small-size carnivores in Ceylon and India. The H. (K.) aculeata group is remarkable for its elongate palpi and large spurs. The single specimen of Haemaphysalis (Kaiseriana) borneata sp. n., taken from a sambar deer in Borneo in 1913, has been stored as II. (K.) aculeata in the Nuttall collection in the British Museum (Natural History). With the hope of stimulating search for additional samples and information on this unusual species before completing a monographic review of the genus Haemaphysalis, we describe the Borneo specimen. Related species, H. (K.) aculeata Lavarra and H. (K.) cuspidata Warburton, parasitize the mouse deer and small-size carnivores in Ceylon and India. The elongate palpi of these 3 species are exceptional among structurally advanced haemaphysalids and some spurs of the capitulum, coxae, and trochanters are remarkably developed. Thus, the functional anatomy of these species on the host should be interesting to investigate. Received for publication 22 October 1970. * From Research Project MF12.524.009-3010, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, Department of the Navy, Washington, D. C. The opinions and assertions contained herein are those of the author and are not to be construed as official or as reflecting the views of the Department of the Navy or of the naval service at large. The illustrations in this report were prepared under the auspices of contract 03-005-01 between the NIAID (NIH) and NAMRU-3. Haemaphysalis (Kaiseriana) borneata sp. n. Borneo deer haemaphysalid (Figs. 1-9)


In today's emerging and technological era Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is the essential requirement because of its attractive performance and low cost. It is a network of sensor nodes, each node communicates and co-ordinate with each other through a wireless network to transfer data to a base station (having greater power and greater energy).Like other communication equipment sensor node (use in WSN) also have processing, storing and communicating capability. It also have energy/power unit,but because of limited energy WSN suggest to use it in an efficient way. In this paper we are going to study the applications, limitations, different units and operations of WSN.


ABSTRACT: Since 1989, the government of Pierce County, Washington, has prepared four watershed action plans. The watersheds cover almost 800,000 acres and include about 600,000 residents and diverse land uses, from the city of Tacoma to Mount Rainier National Park. The primary purpose of these plans was to address water quality impacts from nonpoint sources of pollution and to protect beneficial uses of water. Pierce County has experienced problems such as shellfish bed closures and the Federal Clean Water Act Section 303(d) listing of local water bodies as a result of declining water quality. Pierce County achieved improvements by engaging diverse groups of stakeholders in generating solutions to nonpoint sources of water pollution through our watershed planning process. Using participatory methods borrowed from private industry, Pierce County was able to reach consensus, build trust, maximize participation, facilitate learning, encourage creativity, develop partnerships, shorten time frames for the planning processes, and increase the level of commitment participants had to implementing the plans. As a result, the earliest plans have a high rate of voluntary implementation. This indicates that the process and methodology used to develop watershed plans has a significant, if not critical, impact on their success.


The vestibulo‐ocular reflex (VOR) is usually evaluated by whole‐body rotary chair oscillation in darkness, but is limited to ambulatory patients. In order to develop a portable method of VOR assessment, eye movements from 10 normal subjects were studied under three conditions: 1. whole‐body rotary chair oscillation in the dark and in the light with a head mounted blank field, 2. passive head‐on‐body rotation in the light with a blank field, and 3. active head‐on‐body rotation in the light with a blank field. The influence of visual fixation, neck rotation, and volition on VOR gain was to be assessed. Head oscillations were maintained at 0.5 and 1.0 Hz, 50°/s peak velocity.


An expanded CEC offering, combining the depth of intensive institutes with the scope of a conference format, will be presented by CEC in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on the topic of Individualized Education Program (IEPJ Planning. The institutes are scheduled for January 30 and 31,1978, and are by preregistration only. The conference will follow on February 1-3. Attendance at the conference is by preregistration or on-site registration. Interested persons may attend either the institutes or the conference or both. Be sure to fill out separate preregistration forms for each. Following is detailed information on both the IEP institutes and the conference together with housing information and preregistration forms for each.


Heterogeneous reconfiguration enables the flexible implementation of baseband wireless functions at energy levels between 50 and 100 MIPS/mW, 8 times lower than traditional DSP processors. A 5.2×6.7 mm prototype processor, targeted for voice compression is implemented in a 0.25 μm 6-metal CMOS process, and consumes 1.8 mW at an average operation rate of 40 MHz. It combines an embedded microprocessor with an array of computational units of different granularities, connected by a hierarchical configurable interconnect network. ISSCC Subject Area: Signal Processing Zhang, Prabhu, George, Wan, Benes, Abnous, Rabaey ISSCC Subject Area: Signal Processing A 1V Heterogeneous Reconfigurable Processor IC for Baseband Wireless Applications Hui Zhang, Vandana Prabhu, Varghese George, Marlene Wan, Martin Benes, Arthur Abnous, and Jan M. Rabaey University of California at Berkeley Broadcom Corporation Introduction The advent of the third generation of wireless application creates a need for processing modules that simultaneously display high computational performance, ultra low-energy consumption and a high degree of flexibility and adaptability. The flexibility and adaptability is a necessity in the presence of multiple and evolving standards, and helps to increase quality-of-service in the presence of dynamically evolving conditions. (Re)configurable processors offer the advantage of combining flexibility and low-energy by providing a direct spatial mapping from algorithm to architecture, hence reducing the control overhead typically associated with instruction-set processors. General Concept The Pleiades processor approach [1] combines an on-chip microprocessor with an array of heterogeneous programmable computational units of different granularities (called satellite processors) connected by a reconfigurable interconnect network (Figure 1). The Zhang, Prabhu, George, Wan, Benes, Abnous, Rabaey microprocessor supports the control-intensive components of the applications as well as the reconfiguration, while repetitive and regular data-intensive loops (henceforth referred to kernels) are directly mapped on the array of satellites by configuring the satellite parameters and the interconnections between them (Figure 2). Synchronization between the satellite processors is accomplished by a data-driven communication protocol in accordance with the data-flow nature of the computations performed in the kernels. A generalized interface wrapper is placed around each satellite processor to comply with the communication protocol. This spatial programming approach results in energy dissipation levels of 50-100 MIPS/mW, at least an order of magnitude better than what can be accomplished in comparable DSP processors by exploiting the locality of the computations and the correlations within data streams, and by distributing the control. Processor Architecture A prototype processor has been implemented targeting the domain of voice processing (and related applications) for wireless applications. The Maia processor (Figure 3) combines an ARM8 core with 21 satellite processors: two MACs, two ALUs, eight address generators, eight embedded memories (4 512×16 bit, 4 1K×16bit), and an embedded low-energy FPGA array [3]. Through an interface control unit, ARM8 configures the memory-mapped satellites using a configuration bus, and communicates data with satellites using 2 pairs of IO interface ports and direct memory reads/writes. Connections between satellite modules are accomplished through a 2-level hierarchical mesh-structured reconfigurable interconnect network. The 210-pin chip contains 1.2 Zhang, Prabhu, George, Wan, Benes, Abnous, Rabaey million transistors and measures 5.2×6.7mm in 0.25 μm 6-metal CMOS technology (Figure 4). The embedded ARM8 core is optimized for low-energy operation, and can operate under variable supply voltages [2]. Both the dual-stage pipelined MAC (including shift/round/saturate functions) and the ALU can be configured to handle a range of operations. The address generators and embedded memories are distributed to supply multiple parallel data streams to the computational elements. The address generator features a small local instruction memory, and can be programmed to support various types of addressing patterns and nested loops with loop counters and stride counters. It behaves as the local controller of data-flow kernels by initiating the data-flow threads, and by signaling the end of the data-flow threads to the ARM8. The embedded FPGA supports a 4×8 array of 5-input 3-output CLBs, optimized for arithmetic operations and data-flow control functions. It contains 3 levels of interconnect hierarchy, superimposing nearest-neighbor, mesh and tree architectures. Its energy-efficiency has been measured to be 70 times higher than equivalent industrial solutions [3]. The interface control unit coordinates synchronization and communication between the synchronous ARM8 core and the asynchronous reconfigurable data-paths, most importantly helping the core perform the reconfiguration of satellites by mapping all the configuration memories to the ARM8 memory space. Communication Network The data-driven synchronization between the processing elements employs a 2-phase self-timed handshaking scheme with REQUEST and ACKNOWLEDGE signals (Figure Zhang, Prabhu, George, Wan, Benes, Abnous, Rabaey 5a), realized in a globally-asynchronous locally-synchronous implementation fashion. This approach not only reduces power consumption by ensuring that a module is only activated when data is ready, but also allows various modules to operate at different and dynamically varying rates. Each module includes a network interface controller to coordinate communication and synchronization. Data links combine 16-bit fixed-width data words with 2-bit control tokens that serve as tags of the different data structures (scalar, vector, or matrix) that are supported by the network (Figure 5b). Keeping the energy of the reconfigurable communication network as low as possible is crucial to the success of the approach. This is realized by a combination of architecture and circuit optimizations. The network itself is implemented as a 2-level hierarchical mesh. Several clusters of tightly connected modules are formed according to the communication locality. Each cluster has a local mesh with 2 buses-per-channel, and a universal switchbox at every intersection point (Figure 6a). Global interconnections are supported by a 2 level larger-granularity mesh (implemented on the higher metal layers) with 2 buses-per-channel and hierarchical switchboxes, located at the key connection points. The hierarchical switchbox (Figure 6b) contains a universal switchbox for each mesh-level, as well as a number of cross-level interconnect switches. This hierarchical network architecture requires only a limited number of buses to achieve sufficient connection flexibility for our target applications, and cuts the interconnect energy cost by a factor of 7 compared to a straightforward crossbar network implementation. Communication energy is further reduced by employing a low-swing (0.4V) pseudodifferential signaling scheme (Figure 7a). The capacitance loads are also reduced by Zhang, Prabhu, George, Wan, Benes, Abnous, Rabaey simplifying the switch network with NMOS-only switches. The circuit uses a single wire for each data bit while still retaining most advantages of differential signaling such as high common-mode noise rejection, low input-offset, and good sensitivity. It employs an NMOS-only push-pull driver with a very low voltage supply. The receiver is a clocked sense amplifier followed by a static flip-flop. It contains double pairs of input transistor, with the gates of P1 and P3 connected to d, while the gates of P4 and P2 biased at GND and REF respectively. Figure 7b shows the signaling waveforms. Initially, A and B are discharged to GND, and n1 and n2 are equalized. The receiver is enabled by a negative pulse, which is generated from the handshaking signals. If d is low, the current drive of P3 is same as that of P4, while the current drive of P1 is larger than that of P2. Consequently B and A are pulled high and low, respectively, by the cross-coupled inverter pair. An opposite transition is triggered if d is high. The following static flip-flop will retain the data value even after the sense amplifier is reinitialized. The low-swing signaling reduces the interconnect energy with a factor 3.4 compared to a full-swing CMOS implementation. Results and Data Measurements The overall chip characteristics are summarized in Table 1. Table 2 shows the performances of different chip components (based on a per-block analysis). The energy dissipation of the processor when programmed for a VCELP voice coder (with 1.8mW total power consumption) is presented in Table 3, including a breakdown of the energy over the major functions. Dominant kernels are directly mapped onto hardware satellites, and their run-time reconfiguration is performed by the ARM core. Therefore, the kernel energy presented in the table incorporate contributions from both satellite and ARM8 Zhang, Prabhu, George, Wan, Benes, Abnous, Rabaey configuration. The program control part of the algorithm is completely mapped to the software. The total measured energy efficiency is a factor of 8 better than the best reported in literature [4]. Acknowledgments The research was funded by the DARPA ACS, and the California MICRO program. The support from Philips, Atmel, and Conexant is greatly appreciated. The authors also wish to thank SGS-Thompson for providing fabrication facilities of the integrated circuits. References [1] Arthur Abnous and Jan Rabaey, "Ultra-Low-Power Domain-Specific Multimedia Processors", IEEE VLSI Signal Processing Workshop, October 1996. [2] Tom Burd et al, "A Dynamic Voltage Scaled Microprocessor System", submitted to ISSCC 2000. [3] Varghese George et al, "The Design of a Low-Energy FPGA", P


This thesis concerns the compatibility of inhomogeneous cosmologies with our present understanding of the universe. It is a problem of some interest to find the class of all relativistic cosmological models which are capable of providing a reasonable `fit' to the universe. This thesis, in some respects, is part of this process. We consider Stephani models, which are a generalisation of the standard Friedmann-Lemaitre-Robertson-Walker (FLRW) models, which can be thought of as FLRW models with acceleration and pressure gradients. Thus these models generalise the `dust' assumption of standard cosmology.
The crucial aspect of this work is the retention of the Copernican principle -- an assumption regarded by many as crucial to cosmology. It states that we are not at a special location in the universe. This is a vital aspect of the original work in this thesis: consideration of an inhomogeneous model, while retaining the Copernican principle has, as far as the author is aware, not been considered in detail before.
We start by generalising the Ehlers-Geren-Sachs Theorem to identify the class of inhomogeneous spacetimes which allow an isotropic radiation field for all observers in the spacetime. We then investigate observational and physical aspects of these models from all observer locations. We conclude that there exist spacetimes which conform to present observational constraints (especially anisotropy constraints) for any location in the spacetime, while at the same time being significantly inhomogeneous; ie, not `almost-FLRW'.