The constellation of BeiDou navigation satellite system(BDS)is composed of geostationary earth orbit(GEO)satellites and non-geostationary earth orbit(Non-GEO)satellites.In consideration of the huge difference between GEO satellites altitude and Non-GEO satellites altitude,the global nonlinear least squres algorithm(Bancroft algorithm)is applied for BDS single point positioning.A new algorithm to get the BDS observation weight is introduced by transforming Lorentz inner product into error equation,and then weight of the error equation is deduced.In order to testify the method,a code-minus-phase combination(CC)of BDS measurements is used to determine the code noise of GEO and Non-GEO satellites.A multipath combination(MP)is introduced to extract the multipath of pseudorange and improve the accuracy of single point positioning.The result indicates this algorithm can improve the accuracy of BDS single point positioning.


Knowledge economy has raised new demands to higher education, but the present situation of Chinese higher education is far from satisfying. To meet the demands, Chinese higher education should take the road of creation. The creative development should take its own factors and its law into full consideration, and it should deal well with problems concerned.


The October 6/2000 Tottori earthquake that occurred in central Japan was an intermediate size strike-slip event that produced a very large number of near field strong motion recordings. The large amount of recorded data provides a unique opportunity for investigating a source asperity model of the Tottori earthquake that, combined with a hybrid strong motion simulation technique, is able to reproduce the observed broadband frequency near-fault ground motion. We investigated the optimum source asperity parameters of the Tottori earthquake, by applying a Genetic Algorithm (GA) inversion scheme to optimise the fitting between simulated and observed response spectra and Peak Ground Acceleration (PGA) values. We constrained the initial model of our inversion by using the heterogeneous slip distribution obtained from a kinematic inversion of the source of previous studies. We used all the observed near-fault ground motions ( 100 m) from the borehole strong motion network of Japan (KiK-Net), which are little affected by surficial geology (site effects). The calculation of broadband frequency strong ground motion (0.1–10 Hz) is achieved by applying a hybrid technique that combines a deterministic simulation of the wave propagation for the low frequencies and a semi-stochastic modelling approach for the high frequencies. For the simulation of the high frequencies, we introduce a frequency-dependent radiation pattern model that efficiently removes the dependence of the pattern coefficient on the azimuth and take-off angle as the frequency increases. The good agreement between the observed and simulated broadband ground motions shows that our inversion procedure is successful in estimating the optimum asperity parameters of the Tottori earthquake and provides a good test for the strong ground motion simulation technique. The ratio of background stress drop to average asperity stress drop from our inversion is nearly 50%, in agreement with the theoretical asperity model of Das and Kostrov [Das, S., Kostrov, B.V., 1986. Fracture of a single asperity on a finite fault: a model for weak earthquakes? Earthquake Source Mechanics, AGU, pp. 91–96.], and an empirical ratio of asperities to rupture area [Seismol. Res. Lett. 70 (1999) 59–80.]. The simulated radiation pattern is very complex for epicentral distances within half the fault length, but it approaches the radiation of a double-couple point source for larger distances.


Solid phase extraction (SPE), is a widely used sample preparation method that is currently experiencing a surge in research interest, clever architecture/format development, and stationary phase characterization. SPE devices commonly exist in syringe, cartridge, disk, and micropipette tip formats. Micropipette tip SPE has enhanced the determination of proteins by electrospray ionization (ESI) and matrix assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI) mass spectrometry (MS) by handling micro-liter volumes of sample and buffer removal/solvent exchange. Buffers have deleterious effects on ionization taking place in MS sources due to preferential ionization, ion suppression effects, and the formation of adduct species competing for ionization in MS. Using micropipette tip SPE, proteins can be selectively extracted from biological buffers and exchanged into a solvent more conducive to MS; thereby improving signal and sensitivity. Capillary channel polymer (C-CP) fibers have been used for reversed phase separations of proteins with a number of positive attributes realized. The highly efficient fluid transport, low material cost, wide range of chemical diversity, and robust fiber materials make the C-CP fibers excellent candidates for various separation formats. Presented here is the introduction of polypropylene (PP) and polyester (PET) C-CP fibers as a stationary/support phases for the SPE of proteins from defined buffered solutions prior to ESI-MS


We present a continentwide study of 600 glaciers located on and near 37 ice-clad volcanoes in South America. Results demonstrate glacier sensitivity to volcanic heat. We distinguished between "volcanic glaciers" (≤1 km from volcanic centers; n = 74), and "proximal glaciers" (1−15 km; n = 526) and calculated their equilibrium line altitudes (ELAs). For each ice-clad volcano, we compared the ELAs of its volcanic glaciers to those of its proximal glaciers, which showed that the ELAs of the former are higher than the ELAs of the latter. ∆ELAmean, defined as the offset between the mean ELA of the volcanic glaciers compared with that of the proximal glaciers, was calculated for each ice-clad volcano. ∆ELAmean was positive for 92% of the 37 volcanoes, and a quantitative relationship between ΔELAmean and volcanic thermal anomaly was established. Results highlight the impact of volcanic heat on glacier elevation; emphasize the need to exclude glaciers on, or near, volcanoes from glacier-climate investigations; and demonstrate the first-order potential for glaciers as "volcanic thermometers." Volcanic-glacier monitoring could contribute to our understanding of magmatic and thermal activity, with changes in glacier geometries potentially reflecting long-term fluctuations in volcanic heat and unrest.


The zoonotic potential of the circulating influenza subtypes in avian species underscore the importance of surveillance of influenza virus in the avian population. So far there is only one published study in the Caribbean region on the presence of Avian Influenza Virus (AIV) in Barbados. A screening approach based on blood and cloacal and tracheal swabs to study the prevalence of influenza A in the avian population of Grenada was carried out in 2009-2010. We collected 230 blood samples and 230 mixed tracheal and cloacal swabs from backyard chicken (143), ducks (45), turkey (10), guinea fowl (1) and pigeon (31). Samples were screened by RT-PCR, embryo inoculation and ELISA for AIV. Neither AIV RNA was found by RTPCR nor could virus be isolated in embryonated eggs. 27 blood samples from backyard chickens were positive for AIV antibodies.


The Internet of Things (IOT) is integrated with supply chain management process to track the product. To track the product smart tags is used. The smart tags like QR code and NFC is used. But with the technology enhancement the block chain is introduced into the supply chain management process. The block chain is the great revolution that data in the centralized form is transformed in to a decentralized manner. The distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) is one of the method used in ethereum block chain. The main advantage of using DLT is, it offers decentralized, privacy-preserving and verifiable process in the smart tags. In existing system only single server was used to maintain all the process like supplier, manufacturer and distributor. In this application we are using different server which was more secure than existing system. The proposed solution in this paper is it checks the product evidence during the entire lifecycle of the product by using the smart contract. The data can be immutable by using smart contract with ethereum block chain. The duplication is manipulated by the block chainserver.


The report of the 17th national congress of CPC mentioned again to emphasis on special education.In March 2008,the CPC central committee proposed to develop special education and promote the comprehensive development of the disabled,in the document "Opinions to Promote the Development of Works on Disabilities".At present,compared with the rapid development of the whole education,level and quality of education for the disabled still need to be improved.In modern society,NGOs as "the third sector" play an active and irreplaceable role in the education for the disabled.The government should play a "leading" role in the delivery of public service for the disabled.In order to allocation resources more efficiently,it should cooperate with NGOs to achieve win-win situation.Based on the analysis of the current situation of education of the disabled,this paper discussed the cooperation necessity of government and NGO to highlight the rationality of NGO in the development of education for the disabled.Also it analyzed the specific methods and the.limitations of NGOs'involvements in disability service and put forward corresponding suggestions.


During the 17ㆍ18th century Chosen dynasty, silver was widely circulated owing to both ceaseless silver's importation of silver from Japan and exportation to china. HoJo, the Ministry of Finance, made an effort to control the currency and converted the financial policy on silver according to varying degree of currency usage. The circulation of silver was banned in the early Chos?n period. but the ban was lifted during the Hideyoshi Invasion(Imjin war) and currency usage was put under government control. HoJo gradually increased its control on taxation of silver mines and importation of silver from Japan during the late 17th century. In addition, HoJo ran Silver loaning system(대여은제大輿銀制) thereby controlling the trade that took place during Chosen's tributary mission to China. This form of trade operated for the benefit of the official interpreters (역관譯官), who gained economic profits in the process. In order to both aid and control this trade. Chosen government devised a system of loaning silver to these official interpreters. So doing, government was able to levy taxes on these official interpreters. Despite the governmental efforts to enforce the trade quantity, the governmental limit was often exceeded and because a chronic problem. This problem, however, was not grave because silver circulated smoothly in this period. Beginning in the 18th century, however. the circulation of silver currency changed. The amount of silver diminished and the price accordingly increased, and greatly damaged the government silver possession. HoJo's silver possessions, especially, decreased and the silver loaning system exaggerated this situation. Yet the silver loaning system was maintained by the government for the sake of the controlling the trade. HoJo chose to transfer silver from the other ministries of government to supplement its insufficiency. This practice regularly took place during the 18th century, through which HoJo maintained its control over trade and manage its finance.


The degree of approximation of uniform bounds positive linear operators in Lψ spaces is studied.The quantitative Korovkin's approximation theorem is obtained.


During the 1850s, the Jacksonian party system broke down in the North and a new sectional party, the Republicans, succeeded the Whigs in the nation's two party system. Using demographic, voting, and other statistical analysis,as well as the more traditional methods and sources of political history, William Gienapp powerfully demonstrates that the organization of the Republican party was a difficult, complex, and lengthy process, and explains why, even after an inauspicious beginning, it ultimately became a potent political force.


Metal cutting is one of the most commonly occurring manufacturing processes in the industry and major effort is made to improve its processes. Cutting tools are expensive and have a life length mea ...


The purpose of thisstudywas to Determine the effect of brand image on consumer satisfaction, to Determine the effect of brand image and customer satisfaction on repurchase intention and Determine the role of customer satisfaction in mediating the effect of brand image on repurchase intention on M. AboeTalib'stavernproducts in Tabanan City. The population in thisstudyisM.AboeTalib'stavern consumer in Tabanan. This study uses 100 respondents the whichis the product of 10 indicatorsMultiplied by 10, the whichmeanstheymeet the criteria. The technique of data analysisusedispathanalysis. The analysis shows that brand image has a positive and significanteffect on customer satisfaction; Brand image has a positive and significanteffect on repurchase intention; Consumer satisfaction has a positive and significanteffect on repurchase intention. Consumer satisfaction is Able to mediate the influence of brand image on repurchase intention.


The purpose of this study explore the directions experience of Taekkyon directions orientation and present what to right direction. so investigate in depth. Result is as in the following. Firstly, Taekkyon trainers who participated in this study were making an effort to overcome the difficulties in multiple sides and individual instructions were parallel with interest. Secondly, the foundation course as well as the trainee's personality education was emphasized. Thirdly, Taekkyon trainers had difficulty teaching youth sport at first. teaching method had changed with accumulated experience. Lastly, there are many difficulties being a Taekkyon trainer but having the pride of keeping the traditional culture of South Korea in spite of low, unstable income, and social acknowledge extent rate is not high enough.


The electric dipole transition matrix element of a molecular crystal in the presence of an electric field is calculated. It is found to be proportional to the matrix element of the zero‐field Hamiltonian between nearest neighbors and inversely proportional to the electric field strength for the limit of strong fields.


The isolation of anaerobic cellulolytic bacteria and their enzymatic properties were studied.In the experiments 4 strains of cellulolytic bacteria were screened from the rumen of the Mongolian sheep.Based on morphology,physiological and biochemical characteristics,ecological characteristics and genotype studies,strains WHQ,LYQ,LBG-1 and NDF-3 were identified as Butyrivibrio fibrisolvens,Ruminococcus flavefaciens,Fibrobacter succinogenes,Clostridium Polysaccharolyticum.Filter paper disappearances of WHQ , LYQ,LBG-1 and NDF-3 were also tested.2 week filter paper disappearance of WHQ,LYQ,LBG-1 and NDF-3 were 25.1%,14.3%,21.0% and 20.6%,respectively.In this study,the filter paper enzyme activity, β-glucosidase activity and CMCase activity of each strain were determined.


A study was conducted to estimate the soil organic carbon pool in different land uses in Pauri Garhwal district of Uttarakhand. Soil samples were collected from three land uses viz. Forests, Plantations and Horticulture up to 30 cm depth. Under forests land use, soil organic carbon (SOC) pool was estimated in Sal (Shorea robusta), Deodar (Cedrus deodara), Quercus (Quercus leucotrichophora), Chir (Pinus roxburghii) and Miscellaneous forests. Under horticulture land use SOC was estimated in Apple, Guava, Mango and Litchi orchards and under plantation land use SOC was estimated in block plantations of Eucalyptus and Teak. Maximum SOC pool was observed in the soils under Deodar up to 30 cm depth (94.07 t ha-1) followed by Quercus (78.09 t ha1), Sal (56.60 t ha-1), Chir (49.80 t ha-1) and the least was under Miscellaneous (49.20 t ha-1). SOC pool under Deodar was significantly different from the SOC pool under Quercus, Sal, Chir pine and Miscellaneous and SOC pool under Quercus was also significantly different from Sal, Chir and Miscellaneous species. SOC pool under Sal, Chir pine and Miscellaneous did not differ significantly from each other. SOC pool in the soil under Teak plantation was 55.65 t ha-1 and under Eucalyptus it was 41.77 t ha-1. Apple orchards have maximum SOC pool i.e. 33.80 t ha-1 while all other orchards viz. Mango, Guava and Litchi have not much variation in the amount of SOC pool and have 23.60, 21.62 and 20.98 t ha-1 respectively. Major increase was observed in SOC pool under forests (236.44 %) as compared to plantation and 88.39 % as compared to horticulture land use.


Driving ability may be negatively impacted by prolonged sitting and lack of sleep. Therefore, knowing a driver's objective sitting and sleeping patterns might assist to lessen potential dangers. Study participants' raw accelerometry information was collected throughout a simulated driving activity, and deep learning was used to categories participants' sitting and sleeping habits. The students work in the lab for a whole week. During a 20-minute simulated drive, raw accelerometry data was acquired via a device worn on the thigh. Accelerometry data was trained on two convolutional neural networks to create four distinct categories. Five-fold cross-validation was used to assess accuracy. Using class activation mapping, researchers were able to identify class-specific differences in the dynamics of movement and posture. Results from a simulated drive using a thigh-mounted accelerometer show that CNN isa viable option for categorization. The results of this method might help in the detection of potentially impaired drivers due to exhaustion.


The invention discloses high-temperature resistant plastic. The high-temperature resistant plastic is composed of a plastic body, synthetic fibers and a non-intermetallic compound, wherein the synthetic fibers are high temperature nylon, the plastic body accounts for 40-50% by weight of the high-temperature resistant plastic, the synthetic fibers account for 30-35% of the high-temperature resistant plastic, and the non-intermetallic compound accounts for 20-25% of the high-temperature resistant plastic. The high-temperature resistant plastic provided by the invention has the advantages of high heat resistance.


This study reveals the general tendency of cognitive style of non-English majored college students and the difference of different academic background students.Also the research finds out the correlation between cognitive style and learning achievement.It will be of great help to English teachers in their teaching to know well their students' different cognitive style and also will offer a scientific base to develop individual language teaching and improve learner's automatic learning ability.


Reinforcement learning is the learning of a mapping from situations to actions so as to maximize a scalar reward or reinforcement signal. The learner is not told which action to take, as in most forms of learning, but instead must discover which actions yield the highest reward by trying them. In the most interesting and challenging cases, actions affect not only the immediate reward, but also the next situation, and through that all subsequent rewards. These two characteristics—trial-and-error search and delayed reward—are the two most important distinguishing features of reinforcement learning. In this paper I present a brief overview of the development of reinforcement learning architectures over the past decade, including reinforcement-comparison, actor-critic, and Q-learning architectures. Finally, I present Dyna, a class of architectures based on reinforcement learning but which go beyond trial-and-error learning to include a learned internal model of the world. By intermixing conventional trial and error with hypothetical trial and error using the world model, Dyna systems can plan and learn optimal behavior very rapidly. 1 Reinforcement Learning The reinforcement learning problem is summarized in Figure 1. On some short time cycle, a learning agent receives sensory information from its environment and chooses an action to send to the environment. In addition, the learning agent receives a special signal from the environment called the reward. Unlike the sensory information, which may be a large feature vector, or the action, which may also have many components, the reward is a single realvalued scalar, a number. The goal of learning is the maximization of the cumulative reward received over time. Reinforcement learning systems can be defined as learning systems designed for and that perform well on this problem. Informally, we define reinforcement learning as learning by trial and error from performance feedback—i.e., from feedback that evaluates the behavior generated by the learning agent but does not indicate correct behavior. The term "reinforcement learning" appears to have been coined by Minsky (1961), and independently in control theory by Waltz and Fu (1965). The idea of course comes originally from animal-learning psychology. One might object to the problem formulation in Figure 1 on the grounds that all possible goals have been reduced to a scalar reward. Although this appears limiting, in practice it has proved to be a useful Figure 1. The Reinforcement Learning Problem. The goal is to maximize cumulative reward. way of structuring the problem. Some examples of goals formulated in this way are: • Foraging: Reward is positive for finding food objects, negative for energetic motion, slightly negative for standing still. • Pole-balancing (balancing a pole by applying forces to its base): The reward is zero while the pole is balanced, and then becomes -1 if the pole falls over or if the base moves too far out of bounds. • Towers of Hanoi: Reward is positive for reaching the goal state. • Recycling Robot: Reward is positive for dropping soda cans in the recycling bin, negative for bumping into things, more negative for bumping hard into things, most negative for being yelled at or for running down the battery, etc. • Video Game Playing: One unit of reward for every point scored. Another reason one might object to the problem formulation in Figure 1 is that the goal of learning is defined solely in terms of something (the reward) arising from the external environment, not from the learning agent itself. Often goals do concern the evolution of the the learning agent's internal state, e.g., its energy reservoirs. Fortunately, it appears that most goals, perhaps all, can be put in the "external reward" form simply by redrawing the boundary between agent and environment. For example, if the goal concerns the agent's energy reservoirs, then these are considered part of the environment; if the goal concerns the positions of the agent's limbs, then these too can be considered part of the environment—the learning agent's boundary is drawn at the interface between the limbs and their control systems. Roughly speaking, things are considered part of the learning agent if they are completely, directly, and with certainty controllable; things are considered part of the environment if they are not. Since the goal is always something over which we have imperfect or uncertain control, it is placed outside the learning agent. 2 Overview of Reinforcement Learning Architectures In this section we review the major steps in the development of reinforcement learning architectures over the last decade. These steps are illustrated by the four architectures shown in Figures 2-5. All reinforcement learning involves the learning of a mapping from a representation of a situation or state to an appropriate action (or a probability distribution over actions) for that situation. This mapping is called the policy; it specifies what the agent will do in each situation at its current stage of learning. The simplest reinforcement learner that one might imagine, then, would consist only of a policy and a way of adjusting it based on reward, as shown in Figure 2. Such architectures, in which the policy is the only modifiable data structure (and, indeed, the only structure at all) are here called policy-only architectures. Figure 2. The Policy-Only Architecture. The policy can be implemented in any of a number of ways. It can be a connectionist neural network, or a symbolic learning structure such as a decision tree or lisp program, or a conventional set of statistics such as is used by maximum-likelihood or nearestneighbor techniques. Any of these methods can be used—with varying advantages and disadvantages— to implement this and the other modifiable structures shown in Figures 2-5. The learning algorithm for the policy must be of a slightly unusual type. Standard supervised learning methods such as backpropagation are not sufficient here, but must be modified, at least slightly, to take into account the fact that a "target" action is not directly available. Instead, a form of correlation must be done between the reward received and the actions taken by the agent, all with respect to the sensory input. Actions correlated with high reward have their probability of being repeated increased, while those correlated with low reward have their probability decreased. Examples of such algorithms for policy-only architectures can be found in (Farley & Clark, 1954; Widrow, Gupta & Maitra, 1973; Barto & Sutton, 1981; Barto & Anandan, 1985). Policy-only architectures really only work well when it is clear a priori what constitutes a high reward and what constitutes a low one—for example, if all high rewards are positive and all low rewards are negative. Often, however, rewards are not distributed around a baseline of zero, but around some other, unknown value. Worse yet, the baseline may change from state to state. A low reward value in one state may be the highest attainable in another. To handle such variations, a baseline value must be learned that is a function of the state; the actual reward is then compared with the current state's baseline. This is what is done in reinforcement-comparison architectures (Figure 3). As a baseline, these architectures usually use a prediction of the reward. The prediction error—the difference between predicted and actual reward—is used both as an enhanced, zero-balanced reward sigFigure 3. Reinforcement-Comparison Architecture. Figure 4. Adaptive-Heuristic-Critic Architecture. The symbol z−1 indicates a one-time-step delay, and the symbol ⊗ indicates multiplication. nal for adjusting the policy and as an ordinary error for learning the reward predictions. A variety of reinforcement-comparison algorithms have been explored and compared (Barto, Sutton & Brouwer, 1981; Sutton, 1984; Williams, 1992). Reinforcement comparison architectures are effective at optimizing immediate rewards, but not at optimizing total reward in the long run. The problem is that actions have two kinds of consequences—they affect the next reward and they affect the next state, but reinforcement-comparison architectures only take the first of these into account. Suppose an action produces high immediate reward but deposits the environment in a state from which only low reward can be obtained? In order to optimize long-term reward, these delayed affects of action must be taken into account. The adaptive heuristic critic (AHC) architecture, shown in Figure 4, was designed to take such delayed effects into account. The predictor of immediate reward has been replaced with a predictor of return, a measure of long-term cumulative reward. For any state x, the return is formally defined as the expected value of the sum of all future rewards, discounted by their delay, given that the systen starts in x:


Steam driven delamination between molding compound and substrate is analytically modeled. Pressure based delamination criterion and steam evaporation based criterion are examined as a function of crack size. Comparison with reported experimental trends revealed that steam based delamination criterion N/sub c/ is more descriptive of the stable and fast fracture regimes in steam driven delamination in electronics packages during solder reflow heat treatment. Following the establishment of the criterion, the driving force for delamination N/sub s/ is modeled. Delamination occurs when N/sub s/ equals or exceeds N/sub c/. Parametric investigations on the influence of molding compound thickness, defect size, elastic modulus, and critical strain energy released rate with and without humidity pre-conditioning were conducted using the analytical model. The study revealed that the critical delamination temperature is controlled by the defect size and the decrease in the critical strain energy released rate resulting from exposure to a humid environment. To minimize steam driven delamination, defect size and water degradation of critical strain energy released rate should be minimized.


Based on the materials collected in 2021, the catch, some features of herring biology and behavior inhabiting the northern part of the Sea of Okhotsk are considered. The problems encountered in the herring fishery are shown, and measures to optimize the fishery are proposed.


Abstract : The long and intermediate length Josephson tunnel junction oscillator with overlap geometry of linear and circular configuration, is investigated by computational solution of the perturbed sine-Gordon equation model and by experimental measurements. The model predicts the experimental results very well. Line oscillators as well as ring oscillators are treated. For long junctions soliton perturbation methods are developed and turn out to be efficient prediction tools, also providing physical understanding of the dynamics of the oscillator. For intermediate length junctions expansions in terms of linear cavity modes reduce computational costs. The narrow linewidth of the electromagnetic radiation (typically 1 kHz of a line at 10 GHz) is demonstrated experimentally. Corresponding computer simulations requiring a relative accuracy of less than 10 to the -7th power are performed on supercomputer CRAY-1-S. The broadening of linewidth due to external microradiation and internal thermal noise is determined. Keywords include: Cavity mode; Chaos; Fiske steps; Hysteresis; Intermittency, Josephson fluxon oscillator; Josephson ring oscillator; Josephson tunnel junction; Noise rise; Perturbation theory; Radiation line-width; Sine-Gordon equation (perturbed); Solition (fluxon); SQUID; Subharmonics; and Zero field stages.


Purpose: The human carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) is expressed in several tumor types, including colorectal cancer, and is a tumor-associated antigen used as a target for antigen-specific immunotheraphy. CEA is a self-antigen associated with development, expressed in fetal cells and rarely expressed in normal colorectal epithelial cells. The induction of immune response to CEA is very difficult. In this study, we attempted to increase the tumor immunity specific to CEA by using dendritic cells pulsed with fusion proteins of CEA and Tat (transactivator of transcription), which transduces extracellular proteins into cytoplasm and causes antigens to be presented with MHC class I pathway. Methods: The Tat gene was amplified in the PNL4-3 HIV plasmid and then inserted into PCEP4 plasmid vector. The CEA gene was cloned from cDNA from LoVo human colorectal cell line and then amplified through polymerase chain reaction method. After cloning of PCEP4 plasmid vector, the dendritic cell was sensitized and internalized with CEA and Tat-CEA protein. Then the Western blot analysis of the expression of CEA in the gene-modified dendritic cell and the immunofluorescent staining of the expression of CEA in CEA or Tat-CEA-pulsed dendritic cell were performed. A detection of IFN--releasing CD8+ cell and a cytotoxicity of T-cell were was assesed using ELlSPOT assay. The Immunoglobulin (Ig) G isotypes were analyzed with enzyme-linked immuuosorbent assay. The statistical significance was assessed using Students t-test. Results: CEA pulsed in dendritic cells was distributed over the cell surface and TatCEA was observed in the cytoplasm. The cellular immune responses by immunization with dendritic cells pulsed with TatCEA (322/ lymphocytes) were significantly increased comnared with those with CEA (244/10 lymphocytes) by IFN- ELlSPOT assay (P2.75% (E : T=1 : 100) in the CEA group and 22.92.23% (E : T=1 : 100) in the TatCEA group. In ELISA analysis of the IgG isotype, the titer of IgG2a and IgG3, representing Thl immune response, was lower than that of IgGl, representing Th2 immune response, in both the CEA group and the TatCEA group. Conclusions: These results suggest that TatCEA could be used for the development of a tumor vaccine and cellular immunotherapy using CTLs induced in vitro.


tion patterns showed that while there were three different peptidic compound classes (anabaenopeptin, cryptophycin, and nostocyclopeptides), there were no signs of the presence of anatoxin-a, homoanatoxin-a, hassallidin or microcystins. Moreover, a remarkable antifungal activity was identified in the methanolic extracts. Based on the results, this study suggests that three diverse groups of potentially bioactive compounds might account for the death of these animals. This case is the first documented incident of toxicity from aquatic cyanobacteria related intoxication in dogs, mice, and aquatic organisms in Iran.


Objective To investigate the efficacy and safty of piperacillin/tazobactam(PIP/TAZ) in the treatment of severe craniocerebral injury complicated pulmonary infection.Methods 52 patients with severe craniocerebral injury complicated pulmonary infection were given PIP/TAZ for 7~10d according to bacteria culture and drug sensitive test.Examinations such as blood and urinary pictures,hepatic and renal functions were done before and after the treatment.Results Total efficacious rate was 86.1%(44/52).No severe adverse reactions were found.Conclusions Gram negative bacteria still act as major pathogens in the severe craniocerebral injury complicated pulmonary infection.PIP/TAZ can be the first selective drug suitable for empiric use in severe craniocerebral injury complicated pulmonary infection.


Expressed sequence tag (EST) sequencing and analysis is a primary research tool to identify and characterize the Schistosoma mansoni transcriptome. As part of our gene discovery effort, a total of 5,793 ESTs have been generated from clones selected randomly from complementary DNA (cDNA) libraries constructed from male and female adult worms. Assembly analysis of all the 16,813 public S. mansoni ESTs has identified 1,920 distinct tentative consensus sequences (TCs) and 5,571 nonover- lapping ESTs (singletons). Of these, 376 TCs (20%) and 1,449 singletons (26%) are unique to the SUNY/TIGR sequencing effort. Tentative consensus sequences and singletons were distributed into various categories of biological roles associated with cell structure, metabolism, protein fate, signal transduction, transcription, protein synthesis, transporters, and cell growth. The TCs and singletons represent transcripts that can be used as a resource for functional annotation of genomic sequence data, comparative sequence analysis, and cDNA clone selection for microarray projects. The utility of EST analysis is demonstrated by identifying new protease genes, which may be involved in hemoglobin degradation. Schistosomiasis is a parasitic disease that occurs worldwide and is a major cause of morbidity in tropical and subtropical countries. It is estimated to afflict more than 300 million people worldwide (Bergquist, 1990). There has been only limited suc- cess in eradicating this parasitic disease despite intensive efforts involving chemotherapy, vector elimination, sanitation, and health education. Schistosomes have a complex life cycle in- volving several distinct developmental stages of vertebrate and invertebrate hosts. Although many investigators have undertak- en the difficult task of unraveling the biochemistry and physi- ology of schistosomes, our understanding of the complex bi- ology of these parasites is still in its early stages. In recent years, the technology for large-scale DNA sequencing has made feasible the sequencing of prokaryote and eukaryote genomes (Adams et al., 1991). Gene discovery by partial sequencing of complementary DNAs (cDNAs) to generate expressed sequence tags (ESTs) has proven to be a rapid and efficient way to define new genes expressed in eukaryotic organisms. Identifying genes by sequence similarity circumvents direct biochemical analysis and provides a rapid mechanism to predict aspects per- taining to the physiology of the organism. It has been estimated that the Schistosoma mansoni genome is approximately 270 megabases in size and contains 15,000 to


FIELD: process engineering. SUBSTANCE: invention relates to metallurgy. For casting composite ingot at least two flows of fused metal are fed into two or more chambers of direct-cooling continuous casting plant mould. Inlet temperatures of said flows are measured nearby casting chamber inlet whereto flow is fed. Inlet temperatures are compared with preset temperature setting for said flow to detect possible deviation. Then, casting process variable is corrected, for example, casting rate affecting the fused metal temperature at inlet of or inside casting chambers by magnitude calculated proceeding from the difference between measured temperatures. Preferably, correction is selected to make measured temperature to be set to setting magnitude. EFFECT: ruled out negative effects on casting from deviation of inlet temperature from setting. 15 cl, 7 dwg, 2 ex


OBJECTIVE: To explore the working pattern of clinical pharmacists being fitting with Chinese condition and characteristics of cardiology department. METHODS: Experience and practice of clinical pharmacists in cardiology department were summarized. RESULTSCONCLUSION: The suggestions which were put forward by clinical pharmacists were adopted by doctors, but advice, ward round record and medication history of clinical pharmacists haven't been accepted by hospital and law.


Effects of Oral Administration of CoenzymeQ10 to Nonenal in Skin Gas of Elderly Women Masako KATSUYAMA, Yumiko HISADA SHISEIDO Global Innovation Center To evaluate the impact of coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10) intake on body odor, two studies that focused on 2-nonenal contained in the gases emanated from the skin were conducted. The first study targeted 20 healthy women aged 65–74 years in a placebocontrolled cross-comparison study. Subjects were divided into two groups using blood CoQ10 concentration as an index, with ubiquinol (QH) or placebos administered every 4 weeks (5-week washout). On measuring concentrations of CoQ10 in blood and 2-nonenal in skin gas before and after continuous use, CoQ10 level of QH intake group increased significantly, whereas 2-nonenal level reduced significantly. In the second study, 24 healthy women aged 65–74 years were divided into four groups. QH, ubiquinone, vitamin E and placebos were administered in 4 weeks, and each concentrations of 2-nonenal in skin gas were measured. QH and ubiquinone reduced 2-nonenal in skin gas; however, changes in vitamin E were not observed. Therefore, CoQ10 intake reduced 2-nonenal emanation from the body.


This paper is the first to demonstrate that a pure nonphonon mechanism can quantitatively explain all isotope effect experiments in YBa2Cu3O7−𝛿 (YBCO) and to conclude that the influence of zero-point oscillation on the two local spin-mediated interaction (TLSMI) causes the isotope effects in YBCO. This paper is the first to calculate the doping dependence of exponents
of oxygen isotope effect for all quantities of YBCO, such as 𝑇𝑐, T∗, pseudogap at 𝑇𝑐, gap at 0 K, and number density of supercurrent carriers at 0 K. This paper points out that the observed inverse isotope effect of 𝑇𝑐 comes also from zero-point oscillation.


The efficacy of five fungicide seed treatments as a management tool against blackleg on spring canola was evaluated under greenhouse and field conditions in North Dakota. Blackleg, caused by Leptosphaeria maculans, inflicts the greatest yield losses when infecting seedlings before they reach the six-leaf growth stage. In greenhouse studies, 10-day-old seedlings were inoculated with L. maculans spore suspensions and evaluated 12 days later and at maturity or inoculated 12, 20, or 28 days after planting and evaluated at maturity. In field trials conducted in 2017 and 2018, severity was assessed at maturity. In the greenhouse, all fungicide seed treatments reduced (P = 0.05) disease severity at the seedling stage, but only the protection provided by Obvius (fluxapyroxad + pyraclostrobin + metalaxyl) and Helix Vibrance (mefenoxam + fludioxonil + sedaxane + difenoconazole + thiamethoxam) reduced (P < 0.05) severity at the adult stage; however, none of them provide effective protection when plants were inoculated 20 days after planting or later. In field trials, none of the treatments significantly (P > 0.05) improved plant stand and yield or reduced disease incidence and severity. Although fungicide seed treatment is a valuable tool, it should not be used as the only method to manage blackleg disease.


An in vitro method for measuring barley protein digestibility is presented. Samples were first incubated with pepsin in HCl; pancreatin was then added concomitantly with a bacteriostatic borate buffer. After TCA-precipitation, soluble nitrogen was measured. The digestion was unaffected by accumulated free amino acids. There were no free amino acids following pepsin treatment, but the essential ones were well liberated by pancreatin. Results for barley grown in the field or in pots, and for decortified barley fractions agreed with true digestibility values determined with rats. Of these samples, the field-grown barleys per se differed too little for the accuracy to be confirmed. The other cereals tested, oats, rye, maize, wheat, and rice, gave unsatisfactory results with pepsin/pancreatin, and also with pepsin, pancreatin, or pronase used separately. The ranking of the cereals according to in vitro digestibility depended on the type of enzyme and on the enzyme-to-substrate ratio.


Due to their characteristic advantages, ionic liquids
(ILs) are gaining considerable attention as replacement solvent
systems in organic chemistry as well as separation/extraction media
in analytical chemistry. ILs possess a variety of unique properties
including negligible vapor pressure, high thermal stability, wide
viscosity range, and can undergo a multitude of different solvation
interactions. In addition, the structural tuneability of these
compounds allows for them to be tailor-made for specific
applications. However, it is currently not well-understood how the
structural make-up and composition of ILs affect their overall
solvation properties. In this research, the development of a
structural model based on the solvation parameter model for
pyridinium and imidazolium-based ILs was demonstrated. In
particular, the IL solvation properties were analyzed and compared
utilizing various substituents on the imidazolium and pyridinium
ring while studying ILs employing different anions with fixed
cation structures. Furthermore, the gas chromatography stationary
phases containing binary mixtures of ILs were examined and the
effect of the IL structure and composition on the solvation
properties were reported. The quantitative evaluation of ILs were
used as a basis in the study of cellulose
dissolution.


Contents: Preface Part I Guillaume Farel's Theology and Spirituality: Guillame Farel in early French reform Farel's Summaire: theology in early French reform Farel's upward spirituality: leading in prayer: (1524: Farel's upward spirituality: unceasing prayer: (1529a "1545). Part II Texts of Guillaume Farel in Translation: The Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' Creed (1524) Summary and Brief Exposition (1529/34) 'The Reason for which This Work was Written and Had to be Revised and Why it Was Lengthened' (appended to 1542 Summaire) Liturgical Practices and Forms (1533) Bibliography Index.


PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To make D2 proximity service available without reducing radio resources usable in cellular communication.SOLUTION: The present communication control method includes a step of, when a user terminal is interested in transmission and reception of a discovery signal in a discovery procedure for discovering a proximate terminal, notifying a base station of a message including information indicating that the user terminal is interested in reception of the discovery signal and information on a desired frequency in the discovery procedure. The user terminal notifies the base station of a request on a gap to receive the discovery signal.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 11


[ANNOUNCER:] From the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The 2008 Holiday Lectures on Science. This year's lectures, "Making Your Mind: Molecules, Motion, and Memory," will be given by Dr. Eric Kandel, Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Columbia University, and Dr. Thomas Jessell, Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator also at Columbia University. The fourth lecture is titled "Memories are Made of This." And now to introduce our program, the Grants Program Director of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Dr. Dennis Liu.


Background: Regional odontodysplasia is a rare abnormality of unknown aetiology affecting dental tissues derived from the mesoderm and ectoderm. It occurs mostly in women, with no racial predilection. It is often located in the upper jaw and tends to affect a single quadrant. It can involve the temporary as well as the permanent dentition. The aetiology is unknown; however, local, systemic or genetic factors may be involved. The affected teeth are clinically hypoplastic and hypocalcified, radiographically demonstrating the appearance of "ghost teeth".


Numerous studies suggest that high levels of circulating immunoglobulin (Ig)A tissue transglutaminase (TTG2) antibodies predict coeliac disease with high specificity. Accordingly, it has been suggested that duodenal biopsy may not be required routinely for diagnostic confirmation where quantitative serology identifies the presence of high antibody titres. However, defining a cut‐off TTG2 threshold is problematic, as the multiple available assay methods are not harmonized and most studies have been focused on the paediatric population. Recent paediatric guidelines proposed a TTG2 antibody diagnostic cut‐off at 10 × the upper limit of normal (ULN) for the method; however, concerns remain about errors of generalization, between both methods and laboratories. In this study, we used retrospective laboratory data to investigate the relationship between TTG2 antibody levels and Marsh 3 histology in the seropositive population of adults and children at a single centre. Among 202 seropositive patients with corresponding biopsies, it was possible to define a TTG2 antibody cut‐off with 100% specificity for Marsh 3 histology, at just over 10 × ULN for the method. However, UK National External Quality Assurance Scheme returns during the study period showed a wide dispersion of results and poor consensus, both between methods and between laboratories using the same method. Our results support the view that high‐titre TTG2 antibody levels have strong predictive value for villous atrophy in adults and children, but suggest that decision cut‐offs to guide biopsy requirement will require local validation. TTG2 antibody assay harmonization is a priority, in order to meet the evolving requirements of laboratory users in this field.


Transportation gives to the economic, industrial, social and cultural development of any country. Transportation by road is the only mode which could give maximum service to one and all. Due to the increase in population, number of vehicles is increasing day by day which leads to the increase in road network. It has been estimated that over 30,000 persons die and over 10 to 15 million persons are injured every single year in road accidents throughout the world. The present work intended in identifying various black spots (accident prone location) in Vadodara (fatepura area). The road traffic accident data were collected from city police station of the last 5 years (2013 to 2017) and the causes of accidents are studied and suggested different remedial measures to reduce number of accidents in the selected area. Index Terms – Black spot; Accidents; Road network ________________________________________________________________________________________________________


The main purpose of this study is to discover the impact of the use of peer tutoring in helping students to analyse business case studies in a Business English course. 10 Advanced Diploma in Financial Accounting students with mixed proficiency in English from an institution of higher learning formed 2 peer tutoring groups in this study. Data was collected using video recordings, interviews, diary entries and observations. The results of this study indicated that peer tutoring has positive results on both tutors and tutees. The characteristics of the tutors, the level of confidence of the tutors and the element of trust from the tutees were significant factors affecting peer tutoring. Due to the diverse perceptions and viewpoints created in the process of case study analysis, tutors need to be flexible in their level of acceptance towards the different interpretations of situations produced by the tutees. It is recommended that debriefing sessions between the tutors and researchers be conducted when the former lack confidence in decision making in the course of tutoring. Reciprocal Peer Tutoring is encouraged to be used as an approach in analysing case studies instead of having a tutor solely in charge of disseminating information to increase the effectiveness of tutoring. Normal 0 false false false EN-US ZH-CN X-NONE /* Style Definitions */
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Objective To study the effect of soybean lecithin on the level of serum lipid. Methods Male SD rats were random divided into five groups:normal control, hyperlipidemia control, and three experimental groups feeding with soybean lecithin orally at a dose of 0.2 g/kg,0.4 g/kg,and 1.2 g/kg daily.Thirty days later,the levels of TC, TG and HDL-C in serum were measured. Results Compared with the hyperlipidemia control group,the levels of TC and TG in the three experimental groups were significantly decreased (P0.05 to P0.01). Conclusion Soybean lecithin can reduce the level of serum lipid.


Objective To understand the cognitive function of children with schizophrenia.Methods Seventy-six children with first episode of schizophrenia were investigated with Chinese Wechsler intelligence scale for children(C-WISC).The spoken language intelligence quotient(VIQ),the operation intelligence quotient(PIQ) and the entire meter intelligence quotient(FIQ) were used to express the evaluation results.And these were compared with the norm,and undertook the correlation analysis with C-WISC.Sample rate and overall rate difference indicating statistical significance in examination were used to compare the difference of mold C-WISC unusual formation rate between study group and the norm,using Pearson correlation analysis to evaluate relation between C-WISC and PANSS meter grading.Results There were 39 patients(51.32%) whose VIQ minus PIQ was equal to or more than 14,and 36 patients(47.43%)was equal to or more than 18.There was no patient whose PIQ minus VIQ was equal to or more than 14.The range between VIP and PIQ varied from-11 to 58,and their average was 16.49.The patients of FIQ,VIQ,PIQ were equal to or less than 79 and 89,and the percentage was apparently higher than norm(u=3.0-20.44 Pa0.01).The patients whose FIQ,PIQ were equal to or less than 69,and the percentage was apparently hig-her than norm(u=4.27,14.62,21.45 Pa0.05;u=2.30 P0.01).Negative symptom score was significantly negatively correlated with the core of comprehension and vocabulary and picture completion and picture arrangement and the total score of performance test(r=-0.244,-0.254,-0.248,-0.235,-0.227 Pa0.05).The score of comprehension was significantly negatively correlated with general pathologic score and total score of PANSS(r=-0.246,-0.271 Pa0.05).Conclusions Childhood schizophrenia has significantly cognitive impairment,and the cognitive impairment has relation with negative symptoms.Both cognitive impairmend and negative symptoms have similar basis of the potential brain damage.


Being the constant wanderer for the lost identity in the polyethnic land of America, African Americans bear striking resemblance to the figure of flâneur with dialectical image of local and cosmopolitan citizen of the universe. The spirit of flânerie proves its geographical historical expansion in both postmodern and African American context while its performative action navigates it in dramatic texts. Hence, Wilsonian characters identical with constant existential quest for the lost self can be African American incarnations of flâneur. Drawing on Baudelaire's definition and Benjamin's theory of
flâneur, this study seeks to demonstrate possible manifestations of African American flâneur in August Wilson's Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1986). Moreover, through Deleuze and Guattari's postmodern theoretical concept of rhizome in A Thousand Plateau (1987), the study aims to explore the postmodern manifestation of flâneur and consequently manifest how it functions to be the means for Wilsonian postmodern recursive dramatic vision that represents mysterious aspects of African Americans life. Flâneur's versatility appropriates it to be the quintessential manifestation of African
Americans inasmuch as the latter's multifaceted African nature can accommodate the former's flexibility


Cellular telecommunication network (10) comprises a satellite (12) in the base station and any number of subscriber units (26). Each satellite cell cluster table (54), the table (28) at a predetermined period and is effective for the satellite to the earth is projected mesh. Each cell comprises a target cell cluster table entry (60) for identifying a local cell (28) working in a subscriber unit can request the switch to the mesh (28). The table identifier associated with the target cell of the target communication channel, the communication channel impending changes is indicated as the same cell (28) separate entry (60). Receiving user unit table (54) and the estimated local cell and the target cell of a communication channel to determine handoff.


It is now universally recognized that the development of new technologies for early detection and quantitative monitoring of dental decay at an early stage of formation could provide health and economic benefits ranging from timely preventive interventions to reduction in the time required for clinical trials of anticaries agents. The use of technologies as adjunct to clinical visual examination for caries diagnosis will facilitate preventive care in dentistry to lower treatment cost as well as reduce the cost and time for testing potential anticaries agents. This article describes the various technologies available to aid the dental practitioners in detecting dental caries at the earliest stage of its formation, assessing the activities of the detected carious lesion, and quantitatively or qualitatively monitoring of the lesion over time. The need and the importance of these technologies were also discussed. The data discussed are primarily based on published scientific studies and reviews from case repo...


Embedded software provides a flexible and powerful means to differentiate products and achieve competitive advantage. However, the design of embedded software tends to be difficult to manage. This paper describes the use of model-based design to help manage the design of embedded control systems. It presents typical design configurations, such as rapid prototyping, software-in-the-loop, processor-in-the-loop, and hardware-in-the-loop, and discusses their differences and usages. Finally, an overview of some of the aspects typical in developing embedded control systems using model-based design is given.


The reconfigurability of FPGA devices allows designers to evaluate, test and validate a new control algorithm; a new component or prototypes without damaged the real system with the so-called hardware co-simulation. The present paper uses the Xilinx System Generator (XSG) environment to establish and validate a new nonlinear estimator for the rotor time constant inverse that will be exploited to improve the indirect rotor field control of induction motor.


Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in adolescence has largely been overlooked in the literature in terms of the experience of those so diagnosed. In clinical practice there is an understanding that this population experiences profoundly painful interpersonal difficulties, but at an empirical level the experience of the adolescent is poorly understood. In this psychoanalytically-informed qualitative study, five adolescents, aged 16–17, with a diagnosis of ADHD took part in three interviews. The material was analysed in keeping with the psychoanalytically-informed method. Three inter-related themes emerged: 'not being able to "let out" difficult emotion,' which reflected participants' struggle with overwhelming and unmanageable affect; '(un)soothing experience with self and other,' which described the relationship between care-seeking and care-giving behaviours in the lives of these youths; and 'being in and out of control,' which relates to the complex relationship that participants have with self-control as well as the control of others. In the lives of these adolescents, the search for containment in interpersonal relationships is explored, as well as a discussion of a substitute for soothing in the absence of a 'good enough' object in early interactions.


A rice straw milling unit manufactured in local workshop and the experimental evaluation was carried out in rice straw assembly station. The obtained result data indicated that the manufactured rice straw unit created solutions for all the problems faced the regular hammer mill machines in dealing with rice straw. The operation parameters under investigation and evaluation were air suction velocity of (1.97, 3.61, 5.37 and 6.91m/s), Number of hammers (54, 81 and 108 hammers) and Hammers thickness (2 and 5mm).The obtained results were for production the very low milled rice straw particle size applications such as MDF, papers making, silica jell and ethanol production must use air suction velocity of 5.37 m/s with number of hammers of 108 hammers with hammer thickness of 2mm. As this operation parameters obtained the following results 1.17 Mg/h main production rate in first cyclone, 43.95 kg/h, very fine product (straw dust) in second cyclone , 29.17 kW.h/Mg specific energy (SE), 153.63kg/m3 milled straw bulk density,0.43% losses in machine chamber, 1.93%losses with air blower output and particle size distribution percentage of 36.41% , 25.97% and 9.33% for particle size of (<2.00->1.00mm), (<1.00->0.60mm) and (<0.60mm) respectively. The results showed also for milling the rice straw as raw material for animal feed pellets or bio fuel as thermal energy better use air suction speed of 5.37m/s , 54 hammers number with 2mm hammer thickness, this operation parameters obtained the following results 0.83 Mg/h main production rate in first cyclone, 32.45 kg/h very fine product (straw dust) in second cyclone , 32.18kW.h/Mg specific energy (SE),112.29kg/m3 milled straw bulk density,5.94% losses in machine chamber, 1.23 %losses with air blower output and particle size distribution percentage of 32.43% ,37.07% for particle size of (<3.75>2.80mm) and (<2.80>2.00 mm) respectively.


Discusses the basics of writing poetry including finding a subject, using sound, understanding rhythm and meter, and going public with the finished results.


The life and work of Dante, particularly the Comedy and The New Life, are to Ramos Sucre a quarry of images that leaves cultural imprints and resonances throughout his writings. Since the poet's death in 1930, many critics have inquired into that spiritual and aesthetic family relation. In this article, we review their contributions, rather superficial at the beginning, but increasingly revealing of new means and critical visions. These contributions refer to the evocative inventions of Dante, by analogy or by contrast, to style and taste inclinations and to central and recurring motifs (the woman, death, evil, pain, journey, exile, flight...) in the works of the Cumana born poet, Ramos Sucre.


This report investigates the dependence of customer satisfaction among diabetes patients using a specific insulin pump on the level of usage of a remote control used together with the insulin pump and the different features of this remote, as well as what factors influence the level of usage of the remote. The report uses survey data from 437 insulin pump users and parents of children using insulin pumps, collected by the consulting firm Opticom. Linear regression analysis is used to conduct statistical inference. The investigation shows that increased levels of usage of the remote are associated with higher customer satisfaction. Further investigations show that only the feature that allows the patient to administer bolus via remote has a positive and statistically significant effect on customer satisfaction. Finally, usage of the remote is investigated and it is found that parents of children using the insulin pump, pump users over the age of 65 and pump users previously using insulin pens use the remote to a greater extent than other groups.


Since sight is the most precious sense for man, he has developed various electronic devices for its study, including the Pentacam, which is used to study the cornea. This work had the purpose of analyzing the results obtained from the Pentacam exams carried out in the Laser Treatment Center of the city of Quito, during the period from January to June 2018, through a descriptive cross-sectional study with a quantitative approach; supported by the methods of scientific observation, bibliographic review, analytical-synthetic and statistical. The sample consisted of 150 patients, who had their right eye examined. The most significant results obtained were: greater presence of corneal pathologies in ages between 11 and 30 years; male predominance; keratometric progression more reliably identifies a pathology; decrease in pathological cases from the age of 40; the frontal elevation and posterior elevation did not show difference when identifying the presence of a pathology; TKC (Keratoconus) is not directly dependent on the Pq and prevalence of oblique axes of astigmatism.


Color Image edge detection is very basic and important step for many applications such as image segmentation, image analysis, facial analysis, objects identifications/tracking and many others. The main challenge for real-time implementation of color image edge detection is because of high volume of data to be processed (3 times as compared to gray images). This paper describes the real-time implementation of Sobel operator based color image edge detection using FPGA. Sobel operator is chosen for edge detection due to its property to counteract the noise sensitivity of the simple gradient operator. In order to achieve real-time performance, a parallel architecture is designed, which uses three processing elements to compute edge maps of R, G, and B color components. The architecture is coded using VHDL, simulated in ModelSim, synthesized using Xilinx ISE 10.1 and implemented on Xilinx ML510 (Virtex-5 FX130T) FPGA platform. The complete system is working at 27 MHz clock frequency. The measured performance of our system for standard PAL (720x576) size images is 50 fps (frames per second) and CIF (352x288) size images is 200 fps.


The paper is an attempt to understand and analyze the problems and errors made by the students whose L1 is Hindi and other Indian languages and trying to learn English as a second language in India. The errors made during the test are categorized and analyzed on the basis of a score sheet and PRAAT software. It is realized that the proficiency and effective communication can be developed among the learners if they are instructed correctly.


SVM(Support Vector Machine) is a structural risk minimization principle based on classification algorithm,and it has achieved higher generalization performance with small number of samples than other classification algorithms due to its perfect theoretical properties.Semantic Role Labeling is a shallow semantic parsing method.In order to deepen the understanding of a question sentence,it is necessary to label the role of the query focus of the question.We regard the focus labeling as a classification problem,and propose a SVM based on labeling method for it.Experiment on HIT's(Harbin Institute of technology) question collection,we achieve the 91.4% precision in close test and 71.6% in open test respectively.The result shows that the method is effective.


An exemplary fire suppression sprinkler includes a housing (22) that establishes a flow path for discharging fire suppression fluid. A water seat (28) is configured to block the flow path. A polymer seal (30) is supported within the housing (22) and engages the water seat (28) for sealing an interface between the flow path and the water seat (28). A spring member (40) biases the polymer seal (30) into engagement with the water seat (28).


in infinite-dimensional linear spaces is not defined in general. Therefore, the properties of the generating functional (1) remain elusive what becomes essential when describing nonperturbative phenomena. The problem lies in constructing representations of topological -algebras of quantum fields which are not normed [1, 5]. These difficulties may be overcome if we restrict our consideration only to chronological forms on quantum field algebras. In this case, since chronological forms of boson fields are symmetric, the algebra of quantum fields can be replaced with the commutative tenzor algebra of the corresponding infinite-dimensional nuclear space Φ. This is the enveloping algebra of the abelian Lie group of translations in Φ. The generating functions of unitary representations of this group [4] play the role of Euclidean generating functionals in algebraic QFT. They are the Fourier transforms of measures in the dual Φ to the space Φ [3, 9, 10]. To describe realistic field models, one can construct these measures in terms of multimomentum canonical variables when momenta correspond to derivatives of fields with respect to all world coordinates[11, 12, 13]. In the present work, we spell out the algebraic aspects of the above-mentioned approach. As a test case, scalar field is examined. By analogy with the case of boson fields, the corresponding anticommutative algebra of fermion fields is defined to be the algebra of functions taking their values into an infinite Grassman algebra [8].


Abstract This paper analyzes the effect of the insufficient synchronization (carrier frequency offset, timing offset) on hexagonal multicarrier transmission (HMT) systems for doubly dispersive channel. Exact SINR and demodulated symbol expressions for HMT systems in the presence of insufficient synchronization transmission conditions over doubly dispersive channel with exponential delay power profile and U-shape Doppler power spectrum and uniform delay power profile and uniform Doppler power spectrum are derived, respectively. Theoretical analysis shows that similar degradations on symbol amplitude and phase caused by insufficient synchronization are incurred as in traditional cyclic-prefix orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (CP-OFDM) transmission. HMT systems outperform traditional OFDM systems with respect to signal to interference-plus-noise-ratio (SINR) against inter-symbol interference (ISI) and inter-carrier interference (ICI) caused by insufficient synchronization and doubly dispersive(DD) channel. The BER performance of the HMT systems using Monte Carlo simulation match with the conclusion given by the proposed exact SINR expression.


A proposed regulation to expand access to controversial health insurance plans is raising alarms among public health advocates and insurance experts.


This essay analyzes the effect of non-intellectual-factors on English learning, and the features of internet websites, thus tells us that the network-teaching is the right approach for students' learning. The teacher should give a consideration to these factors when doing the web page designing.


Abstract : Six men with labyrinthine defects and eleven normal subjects were exposed to flight stress in an AD5 aircraft in an effort to determine the role of the vestibular organs in the excretion of catechols and steroids. Chemical measurements revealed that a significant increase in excretion of these stress hormones occurred in response to flight stress in case of the normal but not of the L-D subjects which must have been attrib utable to the presence and absence, respectively, of the sensory organs of the inner ear. No significant changes in release of uropepsin were observed for either group. It is concluded that the vestibular organs must be taken into account in evaluating the effects of actual and simu lated flight stresses where the gravitational inertial force environment is a variable. (Author)


The intersection between digital information worlds and vulnerable communities within our societies is a critical area of research and practice within the iSchools movement, because there have been concerns about issues regarding bias, social exclusion, cyber-racism, cyberbullying, misinformation, and other information sharing hazards in the information experience of vulnerable communities. We seek to bring together a community of researchers and information professionals researching in this important area of our society. We will cover research across disciplinary borders, explore new opportunities for collaboration, and lay the groundwork for a journal special issue centered on vulnerable groups. The iSchools community provides an excellent place to discuss this crucial topic at the intersection of information, society, and technology.


ABSTRACT The Food and Drug Administration Modernization Act of 1997 (FDAMA) amends the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDC Act) to allow the use of certain "health claims" and certain "nutrient content claims" in food labeling without requiring manufacturers to obtain U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval. FDAMA authorizes the use in labeling of certain "nutrient content claims" that are the subject of a "published … authoritative statement" by "a scientific body" of the United States Government or the National Academy of Sciences. The FDA, however, is accepting such limiting interpretations of this regulation that it may reduce greatly the potential usefulness of the "authoritative statement" mechanism as an alternative means for the food industry to rely upon for the use of "health claims" (or "nutrient content claims") in food labeling.


Maleimide derivatives (C 4 H 3 O)-CH=N-R-(C 4 H 2 NO 2 ) (R = PhCH 2 Ph, PhOPh, PhSO 2 Ph, Ph) and (C 4 H 3 O)-CH 2 -(C 4 H 2 NO 2 ) (2) and their maleamic acid precursors were prepared and their curing behavior was studied by DTA and correlated with chemical structure. Diels-Alder polymerization of monomers occurred at the temperature range of 113-120°C. Thermal stability of monomers was evaluated; it was found that thermal stability of the polymer derived from maleamic acid precursor of maleimide 2 was dramatically improved upon curing at high temperatures due to the formation by dehydration of a stable aromatic structure.


A field experiment was conducted on annual moringa (Moringa oleifera Lam.) cv. PKM 1 to elucidate the influence of canopy management and chemical manipulation to induce off season flowering. Among the various treatments, the plants mulched with 50 micron polyethylene mulch, pruned during the month of July and sprayed with 50 ppm Uniconazole (one and two months after pruning) combination resulted in early induction of off season flowering and subsequent fruit set. The result indicated that the plants grown with above mentioned treatment produced more number of flowers per panicle, more panicle per plant, higher fruit set (%) and fruit yield per tree when compared with other treatments during off season.


Cell proliferation of tissue explants of different organs from marine fish has been achieved in a nutrient solution composed of Medium 199 plus 10% human serum. Fin, spleen, heart, kidney, liver, gonad, brain, uterus, and thymus tissues have been cultured. The tissues were obtained from sexually mature Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua), white perch (Roccus americanus) winter flounder (Pseudopleuronectes americanus), thorny skate (Raja radiata), American goosefish (Lophius americanus), pollock (Pollachius virens), and shorthorn sculpin (Myoxocephalus scorpius). An actively dividing cell culture of flounder kidney cells prepared by mechanical disruption of the kidney tissue was maintained through serial transfers over several months. Heart explants from the cod vigorously pulsated in tissue culture.


A variety of fire blocking materials through the material were commonly used at home and abroad,such as cables,wires,duct,pipe,etc.through the wall or floor when the formation of a variety of openings,holes,to prevent fire spread and toxic gas diffusion,to control the fire within a certain range,and to reduce fire losses.A novel foam sealing material was introduced,its performance indicators were listed,and the sealing material of the formula and construction technology were presented.


Urticaria is the inflammation of the skin due to a reaction to allergens, which presents itself as swollen pale red bumps or plaques. Urticaria is a very common type of allergic reaction, which can be triggered by food, dust, medicine, irritants, etc. Though the causes may seem infinite, the trigger is specific to an individual. The scientific research method of observation was followed to collect qualitative and quantitative data. The experiment or test element was a single patient with Urticaria. The patient was monitored and data were collected for a year and a half. The case experiment considered two categories, namely: 1. reaction to meat and dairy products were identified and appropriate measures were designed to eliminate all oral intake of said factors and replace it with neutral restorative foods, i.e. a vegan diet. 2. Understanding the mental impact of the patient with regular bodily functions, stress and anxiety stimulants such as peer pressure, were identified and other alternative life-style adaptations were designed and introduced to eliminate or minimize urticaria causes. The method of dietary doses and anxiety stabilization were administered regularly to find a cure for one and a half years. Findings show a major factor that alleviated the effects of diet and anxiety and increased dependence on God by spending more time on learning from the Holy Bible. Gradual implementation of the remedies gradually decreased the outbreaks. The patient stopped medication (Antihistamine) and is on a better lifestyle. One could further study on moderate life-style and its significance to avoid extreme living both on positive and negative aspects of life. Discussions on other factors like situation, demographics, food, lifestyle, and others could be different from time to time and from one individual to another.


The Federal Railroad Administration is sponsoring a research project at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) to develop state of the art modeling and simulation capabilities for railroad vehicle systems. This involves the development of a general purpose code for the dynamic simulation and performance evaluation of railroad vehicle systems. During development of the beta version, SAMS/Rail (Systematic Analysis of Multibody Systems/Rail), a number of simplified models have been constructed to validate the program. These examples include single wheelset models, truck models, full vehicle models and industry recognized benchmarks. In each of these cases, comparisons have been made to available solutions. These results are described in this paper.Copyright © 2009 by ASME


E-commerce is very rapidly growing in various parts of the globe, not only in developed countries but also in the fastest developing economy like India. It is really a powerful tool to inform about latest products, to communicate and to give access to customers and to sell and complete transaction. However, it is observed that consumers prefer to go in for traditional way of purchase. This paper will be a research work to find out level of use of E-commerce in case of purchase of selected products like Books, readymade garments, shoes in Ahmednagar city. It will also highlight problems and reasons of not accepting this as a way to purchase. It will also show the level of perceived satisfaction of consumers in different segments in Ahmednagar City and will give remedial measures to overcome problems.


C SP -C ASL is but one of the many languages for which Bernd Krieg-Brueckner (BKB) had a great deal of influence throughout its development process: from the initial idea of working towards an integration of the process algebra C SP with the algebraic specification language C ASL , to the design of the concrete syntax, and also to tool support for C SP -C ASL , where the theorem prover Isabelle should provide the common platform. In all this, BKB provided inspiration and guidance, funding, and also a helping hand when needed. This paper provides a survey on the technology developed so far for C SP -C ASL , covering results of a theoretical nature, an industrial case study, theorem proving support as well as a testing approach. In honour of BKB's 60th birthday, this survey documents what has become out of one of BKB's visions.


With annual proceeds that exceed the movie industry, the popularity of entertainment video games is stunning. In January 2007, Blizzard Entertainment announced that their massively multi-player online role-playing game (MMORPG), World of Warcraft, had more than 8 million subscribers (Blizzard Entertainment, 2007). The result has been a call by many, including the Federation of American Scientists (2006), to explore digital games as a viable approach for teaching in K-12 and higher education. An increasing number of game-based learning environments are currently under development or AbstrAct


Maize (Zea mays L.), one of the most important agricultural crops in the world, which can be devastated by lodging, which can strike maize during its growing season. Maize lodging affects not only the yield but also the quality of its kernels. The identification of lodging is helpful to evaluate losses due to natural disasters, to screen lodging-resistant crop varieties, and to optimize field-management strategies. The accurate detection of crop lodging is inseparable from the accurate determination of the degree of lodging, which helps improve field management in the crop-production process. An approach was developed that fuses supervised and object-oriented classifications on spectrum, texture, and canopy structure data to determine the degree of lodging with high precision. The results showed that, combined with the original image, the change of the digital surface model, and texture features, the overall accuracy of the object-oriented classification method using random forest classifier was the best, which was 86.96% (kappa coefficient was 0.79). The best pixel-level supervised classification of the degree of maize lodging was 78.26% (kappa coefficient was 0.6). Based on the spatial distribution of degree of lodging as a function of crop variety, sowing date, densities, and different nitrogen treatments, this work determines how feature factors affect the degree of lodging. These results allow us to rapidly determine the degree of lodging of field maize, determine the optimal sowing date, optimal density and optimal fertilization method in field production.


Three inexpensive and air-/moisture-stable Salen-Cu complexes 1-3 were evaluated to be a novel class of catalysts for the N-arylation of imidazoles with aryl halides. A variety of aryl iodides, bromides underwent the coupling with imida-zoles, promoted by the complex 3, in moderate to excellent yields without the protection by an inert gas.


OF THE DISCLOSURE A flexible explosive of high power made essentially from a high explosive; a plasticizer which includes a liquid organic nitric acid ester, trimethylolethane trinitrate; and a high-viscosity nitrocellulose, and methods for making said flexible explosive. The invention described herein may be manufactured and used by or for the Government for governmental pur poses without the payment to us of any royalty thereon. This invention relates to an explosive composition and more particularly concerns a flexible, self-supporting, water-resistant explosive and methods of making therefor. Our composition comprises a particulate explosive em ploying a plasticized binder wherein the plasticizer for the binder contains a liquid organic nitric acid ester, the com position being useful in explosive metal-forming processes and admirably suited for demolition purposes. The com position is characterized further by safety in handling and may readily be formed into any desired shape as by rolling, extrusion, compression-molding, etc. into strips, blocks, sheets, and the like. It is therefore an object of this invention to provide an explosive having the aforementioned characteristics. Another object of this invention is to provide a flexible explosive of high power (up to at least 25% greater than that of TNT) and high brisance (rate of detonation up to at least 75,000 m./sec.) based on a finely divided ex plosive such as PETN, or preferably cyclotrimethylene trinitramine (RDX) and/or cyclotetramethylenetetrani tramine (HMX). Still another object of this invention is to provide an explosive which, in the form of sheets one-quarter inch or more thick, possesses sufficient flexibility so that it may be made to conform to the contour of uneven sur faces with a minimum of manipulation, thus aiding in the complete destruction of the device to be demolished. A further object of this invention is to provide a flexi ble explosive having high resistance to impact and friction while retaining good cap-sensitivity characteristics. A still further object of this invention is to provide a flexible explosive which is more heat-stable than similar materials currently available. Yet another object of this invention is to provide a flexible explosive which is not adversely affected by water. A final object of this invention is to provide an ex plosive of sufficient resilience so that when made in block or other massive form it will resist breaking up upon impact with a hard surface when striking such a surface with a velocity of at least 150 feet/second. Other and further objects of this invention will become apparent as the invention is further described hereinafter. We have found that the foregoing objects may be at tained through provisions of an explosive composition comprising about 43-68% (preferably about 63%) of a particulate explosive such as PETN, RDX, HMX, or mixtures thereof, and having an average particle size of up to about 25 microns, preferably not over 13 microns. One hundred percent of the aforementioned particulate explosive must pass through a #200 U.S. Standard sieve, 5


Development of reliable imaging polarimeters and the models that predict their performance is dependent on the ability to assess their accuracy. Field tests frequently result in contradictory data and laboratory measurements are often not representative of materials in the field. To address these concerns, we have built a device with which the calibration of imaging polarimeters (both stationary and moving) can be verified and the polarimetric properties of materials in the field can be measured with accuracy. The device is a handheld, non-imaging polarimeter that is capable of highly calibrated phenomenology measurements in both the lab and field. Multiple optical heads enable monitoring of samples from a variety of angles in order to characterize polarimetric signatures as a function of source, sample, and sensor geometry. The device may also be used in unattended diurnal monitoring of polarimetric signatures of the sky, backgrounds, and targets of interest, providing a correlation between observed polarization phenomenology and weather conditions. The handheld device and the associated data acquisition system is small and portable enough that it can be taken to the field readily and is simple enough that calibration and system performance is predictable and verifiable. In this paper, we describe the design and performance of the non-imaging handheld polarimeter, performance specifications, and measurement results to date.


Summary Thiabendazole was the first of several benzimidazole anthelmintics and was superior to previously available drugs in both-efficiency and safety. Of the "second generation" of benzimidazoles, mebendazole and cambendazole are widely used inhorses and provide wider efficacy spectra and lowerdose rates compared with thiabendazole. Thiabendazole has proven activity against larval strongyles, but requires high dose rates. Two organophosphates, dichlorvos and haloxon have been formulated as horse anthelmintics. Pyrantel and its analogue morantel, are reported as efficient equine anthelmintics, but only in-feed and pasteformulations are recommended by the manufacturer as suitable for horses. Strains of small strongyles tolerant to benzimidazoles have been reported in U.S.A. and U.K. The addition of a piperazine salt to approximately half recommended dose rate, or the use of pyrantel, removed the tolerant nematodes.


Given the Common Core's dual emphases on mathematical modeling, there is a need to understand modeling as a practice and content standard to develop students' mathematical modeling skills. This study of 12 students from differing levels of mathematics instruction and English Language proficiency includes analysis of their modeling with mathematics and a focus on their transitions through a mathematical modeling cycle. Findings suggest that students were engaging in critical processes that support mathematical modeling. We posit that conventional word problems can augment the benefits of using mathematical modeling tasks and can help educators explore a process-oriented approach to mathematical modeling.


The utility model discloses an automatic teller machine. According to the technical scheme, the automatic teller machine mainly comprises an operating panel, a displayer and an automatic teller main machine, and the operating panel is provided with an iris recognition device which is connected with the automatic teller main machine. The automatic teller machine is simple in structure, good in safety, strong in confidentiality, and capable of effectively avoiding unnecessary economical loss of clients and enabling criminals to have no chance to commit a crime.


Citizenship education oriented by rights priority and responsibility priority both have their advantages,meanwhile puzzled with their limitations.It's necessary for modern citizenship education to keep the balance between rights priority and responsibility priority.Based on the traditional idea of natural rights and freedom,analyzing the social reality of weak rights consciousness and responsibility superior in China,a possible method is to construct a citizenship education system based on rights priority which can protect students' rights and cultivate students' responsibility.


A report exploring alternative methods of extending coverage to the self-employed and to agricultural and domestic employees was recently published by the Division of Tax Research of the Treasury Department? Because of the pertinence of its subject, the Bulletin is reproducing here the introductory section of the report. 1 The Extension of Old-Age and Survivors Insurance to Agricultural and Domestic Service Workers and to the Self-Employed, November 1947. The study does not discuss the question of public policy involved in extending coverage or offer specific recommendations. United States for the first time with a general old-age insurance program and shifted this country from among the more backward to the more advanced countries in the field of social security. Its comprehensive character notwithstanding, the 1935 act provided old-age insurance coverage for only part of the country's population; It left large groups of people outside the program. The principal groups excluded from the benefits of the old-age insurance program were agricultural workers, domestic service workers, self-employed persons, government employees , employees of educational, religious , and charitable organizations, and persons employed in the railroad industry. In 1946, these categories included about 30 million people and represented approximately 40 percent of the country's paid employment. The exclusion of the several groups from the program was prompted by different reasons. Railroad employees were covered by a separate system established by the Railroad Retirement Act of 1935. Government employees were excluded partly because some were covered under existing pen


In his latest book, We Wanted Workers, Harvard economist George Borjas provides an account of immigration to the United States based on the premise that immigrants are not, in his words, the "army of worker robots" economists too often assume. Borjas's evidence suggests that the most economically rational immigration policy would be to exclusively admit high-skilled immigrants, who only contribute to the economy. Borjas's emphasis on immigration allows him to ignore questions that should be at the forefront of any assessment of American work. Borjas's silence on these questions is particularly frightening given how his views feed into the connection Trump has drawn between his anti-immigration stance and commitment to his working-class base. Abigail Fradkin reviews We Wanted Workers: Unraveling the Immigration Narrative by George J. Borjas.


The thin film capacitor includes a capacitor part 20, which is formed over a base substrate 10 and a first capacitor electrode 14, a capacitor dielectric film 16 formed over the first capacitor electrode 14 and a second capacitor electrode 18 formed over the capacitor dielectric film 16 includes; lead-out electrodes 26a, 26b which are led out of the first capacitor electrode 14 or the second capacitor electrode 18 and are formed of a conductive barrier film that prevents the diffusion of hydrogen or water; and external connection electrodes 34a, 34b for connecting with the outside, which are connected to the leadout electrodes 26a, 26b.


Improve access and efficiency, and your patients and staff will have something to smile about. Here's how some medical offices are doing it.


© 2020 Indian Journal of Medical Research, published by Wolters Kluwer Medknow for Director-General, Indian Council of Medical Research The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has overshadowed developmental activities across the world. The global political, financial and technical resources have been mobilized to contain COVID-19 pandemic. Impact of this pandemic shall be long-lasting, influencing all spheres of human lives and slowing all developmental activities including ambitious and aspirational Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). SDGs were adopted by the global community in 20151 to improve the quality of life of all citizens and to carry forward unfinished agenda of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Of the 17 SDGs2, SDG 3 focuses on health (Ensure Healthy Lives and Promote Well-being for All at All Ages).


Drivers of ecosystem stability have been a major topic in ecology for decades. Most studies have focused on the influence of species richness on ecosystem stability and found positive diversity‐stability relationships. However, land use and abiotic factors shape species richness and functional composition of plant communities and may override species richness‐stability relations in managed grasslands. We analysed the relative importance of land‐use intensity (LUI), resident plant species richness and functional composition for recovery of plant communities (plant species richness, plant cover, above‐ and below‐ground biomass) and release of soil nutrients after a severe mechanical disturbance. Experimental sward disturbance was applied to 73 grassland sites along a LUI gradient in three German regions. We considered relative (ln(disturbance/control)) and absolute (disturbance − control) treatment effects. Using structural equation modelling, we disentangled direct effects of LUI and resident species richness on recovery and indirect effects via changes in functional richness. Community‐weighted‐mean traits rarely mattered for recovery or nutrient release, while functional richness especially increased relative recovery of plant communities but also relative release of NO3‐N and NH4‐N. These effects were enhanced by increasing resident plant species richness and decreasing LUI. Next to these indirect influences of LUI and resident plant species richness via functional community composition, grasslands of high compared with grasslands of low resident plant species richness generally showed decreased recovery of plant communities. In grasslands of high LUI, absolute recovery of some aspects of plant communities was decreased. We did not find consistent differences between the relative importance of the different drivers of recovery after the first and the second season. Overall, resident species richness seemed most important for relative recovery and less important for absolute recovery, where direct effects of LUI were more common. Synthesis. The stability of ecosystems in managed grasslands depends on more than species richness. Thus, drivers that directly affect species richness and functional community composition have to be considered when studying the stability of real‐world ecosystems. More specifically, in managed grasslands high resident species richness but also high land‐use intensity (LUI) decreased the stability of ecosystem functions, which was partially buffered by increases in functional richness.


Background: Infectious keratitis after refractive surgery is uncommon, and mycobacterium abscess has never been observed in corneal infections in China. Purpose: To propose an unusual presentation of two cases about Mycobacterium abscess infection after laser in situ keratomileusis (LASIK). Participants: Both cases 1 and 2 were females who exhibited a corneal ulceration after LASIK in the same hospital. Methods: The first patient in the study was a 28-year-old woman who underwent Epi-LASIK surgery in both eyes. She developed an infectious corneal ulcer in one eye after 50 days post-surgery. She was referred to our out-patient clinic 3 months post-surgery with corneal perforation, and was treated with a therapeutic penetrating keratoplasty. The second patient was a 27-year-old woman who developed infectious keratitis in one eye after 2 months after bilateral LASIK and was referred to us 3 months later. Results: Cultures in both the cases were identified as a Mycobacterium abscess, and case 1 was treated with penetrating keratoplasty eventually, while case 2 recovered after sensitive treatment. Conclusions: Infectious keratitis after refractive surgery is uncommon, and Mycobacterium abscess has never been observed in corneal infections. An accurate diagnosis and identification of the causative agent is very important.


This paper, proem to a book entitled «The new wars of the 21st Century», argues that it is necessary to make a triple epistemological change: a change in our critical perspective leading to a new interpretation of war-like confrontations, a further change in the dimension of the economy politics of globalization that exists as a transversal and excluding process, and, lastly, a change arising from the fracture of the normative character of politics.


This chapter describes how in the globalized era, the need for learning a foreign language has increased the unquenchable thirst of students to attain success globally. Though English enjoys all privileges the same as the regional languages of India, it is no longer considered a foreign language. After the successful completion of engineering courses, a majority of students are placed in IT sectors, and a few, with a keen interest on research, go abroad for higher education. Language is an important part of culture and civilization, and students, by learning foreign languages, get a wide cultural and linguistic exposure. Language is a major aspect of globalization and is closely connected with waves of migrant students.