The authors present Viking observations of energetic electrons and ions which move upward along the magnetic field lines with energies of the same order of magnitude. The field-aligned particles are associated with a strong broadband low-frequency turbulence in the electric field and with downward Birkeland currents. They suggest that both ions and electrons are accelerated by a time-varying field-aligned electric field component. The downward field component accelerating the electrons upward is experienced as quasi-static by the electrons while they remain in the height-limited acceleration region. For the ions the fluctuating field is a wave field which has only a small translational effect on them.


p53, known as a tumor suppressor gene, is a transcription factor that regulates various cellular functions. Recently, several growth factor gene promoters, including that of transforming growth factor α (TGF‐α), were shown to be direct targets of p53‐mediated transcription. Hepatic p53 mRNA is up‐regulated during liver regeneration in rats. The aim of this study is to examine the role of p53 in hepatocyte proliferation. p53 protein levels were examined in rat hepatocytes cultured in the medium containing hepatocyte growth factor (HGF). p53 levels began to increase after 6 hours of incubation, reached a maximum at 18 hours, and decreased thereafter. DNA synthesis increased at 12 hours and peaked at 30 hours. When hepatocytes were incubated with p53 antisense oligonucleotide in addition to HGF, increases of p53 and TGF‐α levels were suppressed, and DNA synthesis was reduced. The increases of TGF‐α levels and DNA synthesis were also suppressed by a chemical inhibitor of p53, pifithrin‐α. In rats after two‐thirds partial hepatectomy, hepatic p53 increased and reached maximal levels around 16 hours when hepatic HGF levels have been shown to reach a maximum followed by an increase in hepatic TGF‐α levels or hepatocyte proliferation. In contrast, sham‐operated rats showed minor elevations of hepatic p53 levels. In conclusion, p53 production is stimulated by HGF and may contribute to the proliferation of rat hepatocytes. Considering previous findings indicating the importance of endogenous TGF‐α for the proliferation of hepatocytes stimulated by HGF, TGF‐α might play a role in HGF‐p53 mediated hepatocyte proliferation.


The objective of this paper is to provide with new insights the discussion of anthropological questions of religion, focusing on the roles of myths and rituals on the human relationship with the environment, culture and heritage. By providing a deconstruction of concepts such as myths of creation and ritualistic performances, this work will discuss this human behaviours in spaces not primordially designated for sacred enactments. During the discussion, examples of ritualistic acts in public spaces will arise, mostly based on events occurred in museums and art exhibitions.


A mathematical model of the PAC-UF membrane flux through a number of factors and quantitative characterization, based on Darcy's law, has been derived. Meanwhile, PAC-UF combined process was applied to treat Gan River micro-polluted raw water. Validity of the mathematical model is verified with the experiment. Furthermore, for different operation pressure and running time, the result shows that the model can exactly predict the membrane flux, water production, time to achieve amount of needed water and a chemical cleaning of the membrane. These parameters can be used in guiding the engineering design and operation to treat Gan River micro polluted raw water with PAC-UF combined process.


The conference was organised as a response to the need to explore the relationship between existing services for young people who sexually abuse and the policy by which they are guided. It was a working event from the perspective that it presented the opportunity to debate what the gaps are and stimulate discussion around how these gaps need to be filled. Outlined are the broad recommendations. There was overwhelming agreement that the lead responsibility needed to lie with the Department of Health and Social Services and Public Safety. This is, after all, the department that has a statutory responsibility for the provision of welfare and child protection services. It is also the department that carries the responsibility for public safety issues. Those employed within this department and within the services provided by this department are the best-placed and best-trained individuals to take on this responsibility. Such responsibility will then be operationally devolved to the Health and Social Services Boards and Trusts.


The provinces along the Silk Road Economic Belt in China section is undergoing a rapid economic development, but meanwhile poses a severe situation for the ecological environment. In this paper, we involved the pollution discharge account to analyse the pressure of natural capital depletion on the ecological environment from 2005 to 2016 with combination of improved ecological footprint and scissors difference. The results show that: (1) The ecological footprint (EF) in this region almost doubled over the past 12 years, while the ecological capacity (EC) was rather low and experienced a slightly decrease. With increase of ecological deficit (ED), the capital flow could not maintain economic and social development recently, and the depletion of the natural capital stock has become general. (2) Spatially, the variation of EF varies greatly in different provinces, but as a whole, the per capita EF in Northwest region was much higher than that in Southwest. The provinces with high EF depth concentrated in the east and north margin with relatively better economy, while the provinces with high EF size concentrated in northwest region with abundant resources and low population density. (3) The decrease of scissors difference between EF depth and EF size indicates that positive effects of ecological restoration projects have been exerted and the conflict between supply and demand of natural resources tends to be eased to some extent. These findings could provide specific policy implications for this region to improve the efficiency of natural capital utilization and promote the coordinated development of economy and environment.


The project aims at designing a Robot which is controlled through Android phone over Wi-Fi technology. The Robot can be controlled in all the four directions (front, back, left and right). It can also monitor sensor parameters such as temperature, distance of an obstacle etc. It can be monitored through predefined buttons assigned in the android application.


Reaction time (RT) to the second of two stimuli presented in rapid succession was examined as a function of the intensity of the first stimulus (S1). It was found that the delay in RT2 was greater following a dim first stimulus than following a bright first stimulus. The magnitude of this increase corresponded to the difference in RTs to the two intensity levels of S1. These results support the prediction of a single channel model of response selection. Examination of mean first RTs revealed a general elevation in latency of RT. However, since this increase was not influenced by the inter-stimulus interval (ISI) or by the intensity of the second stimulus (S2), and since the same increase was found on "catch trials" where no S2 was presented, this increase is considered to be a function of change in set in the double response situation.


Among the majority of scholars who work on "Paul and the Law," there is an assumed interpretation of Rom 8:4a today—Paul refers to the new Christian obedience that fulfills the "righteous requirement" of the law.1 Many recent commentators have argued for this reading as well.2 Historically, however, the majority of Protestant interpreters have read the verse as a reference to Christ's obedience which fulfills the law's requirement,3 primarily because


For a graph G, we construct two algebras whose dimensions are both equal to the number of spanning trees of G. One of these algebras is the quotient of the polynomial ring modulo certain monomial ideal, while the other is the quotient of the polynomial ring modulo certain powers of linear forms. We describe the set of monomials that forms a linear basis in each of these two algebras. The basis elements correspond to G-parking functions that naturally came up in the abelian sandpile model. These ideals are instances of the general class of monotone monomial ideals and their deformations. We show that the Hilbert series of a monotone monomial ideal is always bounded by the Hilbert series of its deformation. Then we define an even more general class of monomial ideals associated with posets and construct free resolutions for these ideals. In some cases these resolutions coincide with Scarf resolutions. We prove several formulas for Hilbert series of monotone monomial ideals and investigate when they are equal to Hilbert series of deformations. In the appendix we discuss the abelian sandpile model.


the Santa Rita Experimental Range, 1937-1968. J. Range Manage. 24:17-21. Canfield, R H. 1941. Application of the line interception method for sampling range vegetation. J. Forest. 39:388-394. Glendening, G. E., and H. A. Paulsen. 1955. Reproduction and establishment of velvet mesquite as related to invasion of semi-desert grasslands. U.S. Dep. Agr. Tech. Bull. 1127. 50 p. Haskell, H. S. 1945. Successional trends on a conservatively grazed desert grassland range. J. Amer. Sot. Agron. 37:978-990. Humphrey, R. R. 1937. Ecology of the burroweed. Ecology 18: 1-9. Humphrey, R R. 1949. Fire as a means of controlling velvet mesquite, burroweed, and cholla on southern Arizona ranges. J. Range Manage. 2:175-182. Martin, S. C., and D. R. Cable. 1974. Managing semi-desert grass-shrub ranges: vegetation responses to precipitation, grazing, soil texture, and mesquite control. U.S. Dep. Agr. Tech. BulL 1480. 45 p. Nichol, A. A. 1952. The natural vegetation of Arizona. Univ. of ArizonaTech. Bull. 127. p. 188-230. Parker, K. W., and S. C. Martin. 1952. The mesquite problem on southern Arizona ranges. U.S. Dep. Agr. Circ. 908. 70 p. Reynolds, H. G., and J. M. Bohning. 1956. Effects of burning on a desert grassland shrub range in southern Arizona. Ecology 37:769-777. Reynolds, H. G., and S. C. Martin. 1968. Managing grass-shrub cattle ranges in the Southwest (Revised). U.S. Dep. Agr. Agr. Handbook 162.44 p. Smith, H. V. 1956. The climate of Arizona. Arizona Agr. Exp. Sta. Bull. 279. 99 p. Tschirley, F. H., and S. C. Martin. 1961. Burroweed on southern Arizona ranges. Arizona Agr. Exp. Sta. Tech. Bull. 146. 34 p.


In order to study the signal integrity at high frequency, the system in packaged design RF power amplifier is carried out in this paper, and the three-stage cascade structure is adopted. Based on the finite element model, this paper explores the influence of BGA solder joint, transmission line and via structure on the insertion loss and return loss. Based on the orthogonal experimental design, the influence of various factors on the transmission path insertion loss and return loss is sorted by using range analysis and variance analysis. In addition, the response surface method is used to obtain a better combination of parameters in which the insertion loss and return loss of the transmission path meets the design requirements. Through the simulation and analysis of the model, the influencing factors of insertion loss range analysis are as follows: microstrip width > via pad radius > via radius > BGA solder joint maximum radial radius, and return loss range analysis is: microstrip line width > via radius > BGA solder joint maximum radial radius > via radius. The conclusion is obtained by analysis of variance that microstrip line width has a significant effect on transmission path insertion loss and return loss, while via pad radius, via pad and BGA solder joint maximum radial radius have no significant effect on transmission path insertion loss and return loss. The insertion loss of the optimized transmission path structure optimized by the response surface method increases and the return loss decreases, and the optimal parameter combination that meets the requirements of the package design is selected.


The experiment attempted to measure whether there was an improvement in physical fitness through varying degrees of exercise which had a duration of only 10 days. Forty-four untrained young men act...


The distribution of glycogen has been studied in P. minutus by means of histochemical methods. The strongest staining for glycogen was detected in the proboscis, the radial layer of the body wall and the non-contractile parts of the muscles. Histochemical methods have also been used to study the localization of the activity of ten oxidoreductase enzymes. The enzymes are situated in the mitochondria of P. minutus, the distribution of which corresponds closely with that of glycogen. I am grateful to Dr P. Tate for helpful discussions, and to Drs D. L. Lee and F. P. B. Wooding for criticizing the manuscript. Thanks are also due to Mr D. Barnard for technical assistance.


The subjective measurement of the Stiles-Crawford effect is uneasy in the retinal periphery with inexperienced subjects; so an objective method for determining the direction of the human photoreceptors is presented. Interference fringes are projected onto the retina in Maxwellian view, then the beam reflected by the retina is bounded by a small diaphragm in the exit pupil. The modulation depth of the fringes in the plane conjugate with the retina is measured: this modulation varies greatly when the angles of incidence and reflection on the outer segments are modified, hence giving the direction of the photoreceptors.


A method is developed and introduced into simulation of waveforms scattered by a spherical shell covered by a visco-elastic layer. Both forward and backward scattered waveforms are investigated. Comparisons of the results and those without the visco-elastic layer show that the forward scattering strength is hardly affected by the visco-elastic layer no matter in a low or a high incident frequency, while the backward scattering strength is significantly reduced due to the visco-elastic layer at a high frequency.


List of contributors Foreword F. R. Palmer 1. Polysemous relations Adam Kilgarriff and Gerald Gazdar 2. Fields, networks and vectors Adrienne Lehrer and Keith Lehrer 3. Syntax, semantics, pragmatics Peter Matthews 4. Natural-language interpretation as labelled natural deduction Ruth M. Kempson 5. Three levels of meaning Stephen C. Levinson 6. Does spoken language have sentences? Jim Miller 7. Grammaticalisation and social structure: non-standard conjunction-formation in East Anglian English Peter Trudgill 8. German Perfekt and Prateritum: speculations on meaning and interpretation Bernard Comrie 9. The possessed John Anderson 10. Complement clauses and complementation strategies R. M. W. Dixon 11. Grammar and meaning John Lyons John Lyons: publications Index.


Introduction In this work we show a methodology that will be implemented by Istat to produce stochastic forecasts of the Italian population for the period 2014-2065 at regional level. In recent years stochastic (or probabilistic) population forecasting has, finally, received a great attention by researchers. In the literature on stochastic population forecasting, three main approaches have been developed (Keilman et al., 2002). The first approach is based on time series models. The second approach is based on the extrapolation of empirical errors, with observed errors from historical forecasts used in the assessment of uncertainty in forecasts (e.g., Stoto, 1983). Finally, the third approach referred to as random scenario defines the probabilistic distribution of each vital rate on the basis of expert opinions. In this study we follow the latest approach, applying the method proposed by Billari et al. (2012), where the full probability distribution of forecasts is specified on the basis of expert opinions on future developments of the main components of the demographic change. The main aim of this work is to exploit the results on national forecasts, obtained in the context of the above mentioned expert-based approach, as a reference to those relating to regional forecasts. As foreseen in the National Statistical Plan, Istat has the responsibility to produce, more or less regularly over time, the official regional population projections for Italy. Closely linked to this need, our reference model is therefore a multiregional one, where the twenty-one Italian regional populations are projected simultaneously and where, coherently, the number of internal in-migrants must always be equal to the number of internal out-migrants.


Recent advances in Unsupervised Neural Machine Translation (UNMT) has minimized the gap between supervised and unsupervised machine translation performance for closely related language-pairs. However and the situation is very different for distant language pairs. Lack of overlap in lexicon and low syntactic similarity such as between English and IndoAryan languages leads to poor translation quality in existing UNMT systems. In this paper and we show that initialising the embedding layer of UNMT models with cross-lingual embeddings leads to significant BLEU score improvements over existing UNMT models where the embedding layer weights are randomly initialized. Further and freezing the embedding layer weights leads to better gains compared to updating the embedding layer weights during training. We experimented using Masked Sequence to Sequence (MASS) and Denoising Autoencoder (DAE) UNMT approaches for three distant language pairs. The proposed cross-lingual embedding initialization yields BLEU score improvement of as much as ten times over the baseline for English-Hindi and English-Bengali and English-Gujarati. Our analysis shows that initialising embedding layer with static cross-lingual embedding mapping is essential for training of UNMT models for distant language-pairs.


General Considerations A comparator senses a differential input and generates a logical output according to the polarity of the input difference. In an ADC environment, we are interested in the following comparator design parameters: input offset, speed, power consumption, metastability, kickback noise, and input-referred electronic noise. The design begins with the selection of target values for some of these parameters. Here, we aim for an input offset lower than 5 mV; a clock rate, fCK, of 5 GHz; and a power consumption of 1 mW. After the design meets these requirements, we examine the remaining parameters and decide whether they are adequate. For this article, we selected the StrongArm latch as the comparator core. Readers are referred to [1]–[4] for the properties and operation details of the circuit. Shown in Figure 1, this topology offers several desirable attributes: it requires a singleclock phase; draws no static power; exhibits an input offset that arises primarily from the input pair, M1 and M2; and delivers rail-to-rail output swings [4]. A brief overview of the StrongArm latch's operation proves helpful here. As explained in [4], the circuit of Figure 1 begins by precharging nodes P, Q, X, and Y to VDD. We denote the capacitances at these nodes by , , , C C C P Q X and CY, respectively, and assume that C C P Q = and . C C X Y = When CK goes high, M1 and M2 act as a differential pair with capacitive loads, and VP and VQ fall from VDD while yielding a differential component proportional to . V V 1 2 in in This mode continues until VP and VQ drop to roughly , V V 3,4 DD TH creating a voltage gain approximately equal to / , g V I 2 , m1 2 3,4 TH SS where g , m1 2 denotes the transconductance of M1 and M2, and ISS is the tail current [3]. At the end of this mode, M3 and M4 turn on, causing VX and VY to fall until M5 and M6 are activated. One output is then pulled back to VDD by M5 or M6 while the other falls to zero. As examined in [4], the role of M3 and M4 is to cut the current path from VDD to the ground after the comparator has made a decision. The circuit's power consumption in the signal path is given by f C V f C V 2 P X 2 2 CK DD CK DD + [4]. Additionally, the clock path draws a power of , f C V CK CK DD where CCK is the sum of the gate capacitances of M7 and the four PMOS switches, S1–S4. The precharge action in the StrongArm latch offers two benefits. First, it enables VP and VQ in Figure 1 to begin from VDD, thus keeping M1 and M2 in saturation for some time. This allows the input transistors to provide gain. Second, after each comparison, the four internal nodes recover from the states developed on them and are "equalized." This ensures that the states in one clock cycle are not inherited by the next, suppressing "dynamic" offsets. As depicted in Figure 2, if, at the end of the precharge mode, VP and VQ do not become exactly equal and bear a difference of , V D the subsequent amplification mode begins with such a difference stored on CP and CQ, suffering from offset. The Design of a Comparator


This presentation focuses on the recent development of the scaled boundary finite element method and its application with quadtree/octree mesh generation algorithm to achieve a fully automatic and adaptive procedure for engineering analysis. The process includes the mesh generation from CAD models or digital images, stress analysis of the numerical models, error estimation and adaptive remeshing. The scaled boundary finite element method was originally developed for elastodynamic analysis of unbounded domains. It was later applied successfully to solve stress singularity problems in fracture mechanics. In these situations, the problem domains are often modelled as one or a few subdomains. Mesh refinement is typically performed by increasing the number of elements at the boundary. Most of the studies were limited to problems of simple geometry. The scaled boundary finite element procedure has recently been extended to develop polytope (polygon in 2D and polyhedron in 3D) elements. The polytope elements may have arbitrary number of faces/edges as long as the scaling requirement is satisfied. They provide a much higher degree of flexibility in mesh generation than standard finite elements do. The semi-analytical solution of the displacement and stress fields leads to the development of a simple error estimator. The quadtree/octree algorithm for mesh generation complements ideally the polytope elements based on the scaled boundary finite element technique. The octree algorithm provides an efficient approach for automatic mesh generation of CAD models and images and for adaptive refinement. The existence of finite number of unique octree cells reduces significantly the computational cost on element analysis. The use of polytope elements overcomes the difficulties faced by octree mesh on treating hanging nodes and curved boundaries. Numerical examples will be presented to demonstrate the accuracy, efficiency and robustness of the proposed procedure. Potential applications and extensions will be discussed.


This chapter uses analysis of aggregate data, a theoretical model, and a review of the empirical literature to examine the relationship between contraceptive availability and fertility. A correlation analysis shows that as contraceptive use rises, fertility rates fall, thus supporting the main rationale for investments in family-planning programs. These aggregate data on contraception and fertility are consistent with a theoretical model of women's reproductive health decisions. The model can be used to predict the effects of an increase in the cost of contraceptives as might occur under the global gag rule. Higher prices and decreased availability of contraceptives are predicted to lower the intensity with which women use contraception, which results in a higher risk of unintended pregnancies. Depending on the relative costs of having an abortion and giving birth, more unintended pregnancies will lead to higher abortion rates or birth rates or both.


This article intends to discuss subjectivity as a concept used in oral history. For that, the ideas of collective memory and identity are articulated to mediate the relationship between subject and collectivity.


Objective: To describe the epidemiology of sexual assault in adolescents and to compare this group with sexual assault victims over 20 years of age. Methods: Charts were reviewed of 405 women presenting for sexual assault evaluation between January 1, 1990 and December 31,1993, and demographic, historical, and laboratory data were extracted. Results: The median age of the study population was 21 years. Adolescent victims (less than 20 years old, N=178) were more likely to be assaulted by an acquaintance or relative (77 versus 56%; P<.0001) and to delay medical evaluation (11 versus 7 hours; P<.02) than were women 20 years of age and older (N=227). Conclusions: The epidemiology of sexual assault in adolescents is unique and poses special challenges to the health care provider and the sexual assault evaluation team. Clinicians evaluating adolescents should be familiar with the epidemiology of sexual assault in this age group and the widespread problem of acquaintance rape. Adolescents should be offered preventive strategies to help them avoid future violence in dating relationships and the sequelae of sexual assault, such as unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.


Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is predicted to be implemented in future broadcasting and Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) systems due to its robustness in transmitting a hi gh data rate. With the rapid growth of digital communication in recent years, the need for high speed data tra nsmission is increased. OFDM is a promising solution for achievi ng high data rates in mobile environment, due to it s resistance to ISI, which is a common problem found in high speed ata communication. A multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communication System combined with the orthogonal f requency division multiplexing (OFDM) modulation technique can achieve reliable high data rate transmission ov er broadband wireless channels. Differential M-ary Phase Shift Keying (Mary DPSK) modulation scheme such as Differ ential Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (DQPSK) in additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel and multilev el quadrature amplitude modulation (M-QAM) in flat Rayleigh fading channel have been implemented in the propose d MIMO-OFDM. This paper presents the design and implementation of an MIMO-OFDM transceiver system for high speed Wireless Local Area Network (LAN) usi ng MATLAB simulation. In this paper we aim to investigate the effect of fading channel on the performanc e of the MIMOOFDM system with different code rate and modulation schemes using the bit-error rates (BER). The performance of MIMOOFDM is evaluated on the basis of Bit Error Rate (BER).


This study evaluates how different feeding systems impact ruminal fermentation, methane production, 2 and microbiota of Hanwoo steers native to Korea. In a replicated 2 × 2 crossover design over 29 days per 3 period, eight Hanwoo steers (507.1 ± 67.4 kg) were fed twice daily using a separate feeding (SF) system 4 comprising separate concentrate mix and forage or total mixed rations (TMR) in a 15:85 ratio. The TMR-5 feeding group exhibited a considerable neutral detergent fiber digestibility increase than the SF group. 6 However, ruminal fermentation parameters and methane production did not differ between two feeding 7 strategies. In addition, TMR-fed steers expressed elevated Prevotellaceae family, Christensenellaceae R-7 8 group, and an unidentified Veillonellaceae family genus abundance in their rumen, whereas SF-fed steers 9 were rich in the Rikenellaceae RC9 gut group, Erysipelotrichaceae UCG-004, and Succinivibrio . Through 10 linear regression modeling, positive correlations were observed between the Shannon Diversity Index and 11 the SF group's dry matter intake and methane production. Although feeding systems do not affect 12 methane production, they can alter ruminal microbes. These results may guide future feeding system 13 investigations or ruminal microbiota manipulations as a methane-mitigation practice examining different 14 feed ingredients.


The underactuated characteristic of surface vessel motion in horizontal plane creates new direction in the research field of ship steering. Based on the kinematic and dynamic equations of surface vessel in horizontal plane, a set of second-order dynamic equations are given. Due to its underactuated characteristic, two sub-systems are obtained based on the diffeomorphism transformation and input transform. The state feedback control laws to form a smooth time-varying feedback stabilization law with exponentially convergence rate for original system are then derived. The proposed smooth time-varying feedback stabilization law guarantees all the states of original system to converge to the equilibrium point exponentially. The stabilization law could be used in the cases of dynamic positioning and auto-mooring for underactuated vessels. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is illustrated by simulation tests.


Hypothesis / aims of study Chronic water avoidance stress (WAS) induces sustained bladder hyperalgesia and urinary frequency in rats, lasting over a month after exposure to stress[1,2]. WAS rats also show a decreased response threshold to mechanical stimulation of hind paw suggestive of referred hyperalgesia [1,2]. Thus this model seems to be valuable for studying BPS/IC in rats. Interestingly, chronic stimulation of alpha 1A adrenoceptors (AR) expressed in bladder primary afferents and urothelial cells increased both pain response to suprapubic mechanical stimulation and the number of voiding contractions. This study aims to investigate whether WAS induces bladder pain and increases voiding frequency by chronic stimulation of bladder alpha1A AR.


Objective: To determine the frequency of neural tube defects (NTDs) among Low risk pregnancies on folic acid supplementation in periconceptional period. Study design: Cohort study Place and duration of study: Military Hospital Rawalpindi over a period of 6 months from July 2010 to December 2010. Materials and methods: A total of 372 low risk pregnant ladies presenting to Gynaecology and Obstetric department of Military Hospital Rawalpindi (MH RWP) were carefully selected according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria. In group A, 186 patients on folic acid supplementation were included while in group B 186 patients who did not took folic acid in periconceptional period were included. At 18-20 weeks of gestation these patients were subjected to anomaly scan and overall frequency of NTDs detected on mid trimester anomaly scan was measured. Results: There was significant difference in frequency of NTDs in two groups of patients i.e on folic acid supplementation and without folic acid i.e. 2.7% vs. 7.5% (p = 0.034). Conclusion: Correct periconceptual folic acid supplementation is quite effective in


The paper focuses on the recent social housing practices in the Northern Italian context. The phenomenon of social housing residualisation took place from the 80s in all the European countries. The paper explores the main features of the Italian social housing: its characteristics and its different typologies. The sector developed during the last ten years, it changed thanks to different government's orientation and public policy. The analysis of two case studies (the cities of Turin and Milan) allowed the recognition of trends and dynamics in the current practices. The analysis considered both the European context (and inner variety) and the concept of social innovation. In the last part of the paper are explained the opportunities and threats of social housing sector


The content of ureides took on low-high-low dynamic changes in the leaves and stems in all experiment materials except the MSD. The dynamic changes of the content of ureides took on"M" in the MSD, and the content in stems increased gradually. The ureides content of pod shells had the low-high-low dynamic changes in DN42, while decreased in other varieties. The contents of uredies in DN42 and HN35 (high protein) were higher than that of DN46 and KF9 (high oil) in the same stages. The nutrition organs had much differences in the contents of uredies in the same stages.


UITTREKSEL * UNSATURATED FATS IN FOODS As a result of the recent practice of advertising the presence of unsaturated fats in foods, the Food and Drug Administration of the United States of America has declared, in its Federal Register, that any claim, direct or implied (in the labelling of fats and oils or other fatty substances offered to the general public) that these substances will prevent, mitigate, or cure diseases of the heart or arteries, is false or misleading and constitutes misbranding within the meaning of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.


10 There has been increased salinization of fresh water over decades due to the use of road salt 11 deicers, wastewater discharges, saltwater inundation, human-accelerated weathering, and 12 groundwater irrigation. Although salinization can mobilize bioreactive elements (carbon, 13 nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur) chemically via ion exchange and/or biologically via influencing 14 of microbial activity, its effects on biogeochemical cycles are still not well understood. We 15 investigated potential impacts of increased salinization on fluxes of bioreactive elements from 16 stream ecosystems (sediments and riparian soils) to overlying stream water and evaluated the 17 implications of percent urban land use on salinization effects. Two-day incubations of 18 sediments and soils with stream and deionized water across 3 salt levels were conducted at 8 19 routine monitoring stations across a land-use gradient at the Baltimore Ecosystem Study 20 Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) site in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Results 21 indicated: (1) salinization typically increased sediment releases of labile dissolved organic 22 carbon (DOC), dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), total dissolved Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) 23 (ammonium + ammonia + dissolved organic nitrogen), and sediment transformations of 24 nitrate; (2) salinization generally decreased DOC aromaticity and fluxes of soluble reactive 25 phosphorus (SRP) from both sediments and soils; (3) the effects of increased salinization on 26 sediment releases of DOC and TKN and DOC quality increased with percentage watershed 27 urbanization. Biogeochemical responses to salinization varied between sediments and riparian 28 soils in releases of DOC and DIC, and nitrate transformations. The differential responses of 29


The invention relates to a method for the probe microscopic examination of a sample, in particular a scanning probe microscopy, in which a sample is examined probe microscopy by means of a multi-part probe formed with a probe member and a probe element in the probe microscopic examination leading guide member, said method further comprising the steps comprises: detecting noise measurement signals of the measuring probe in non measuring configuration in which the probe member is separated from the guide element is arranged, detecting measurement signals for the measurement probe in a measuring configuration in which the probe element is guided by the guide member, and evaluation of the measurement signals by the measuring signals are at least partially associated with the noise measuring signals. Furthermore, the invention provides an apparatus for the probe microscopic examination of a sample.


The successful pacification of Fallujah in 2007 during the Anbar Awakening movement was due to the coordinated efforts of US and Iraqi forces to physically and psychologically separate the people from the insurgency. Efforts along security, political, and development lines along with a robust tribal effort eliminated the armed insurgency and set the basis for victory in the area. But a synchronized delivery of these resources was insufficient to defeat the insurgency by itself absent the population's decision to turn against the insurgents. This process began to occur in 2006 and was successfully capitalized upon by Coalition Forces in Fallujah in 2007.


This paper presents the types of video laryngoscopy, used in the pediatric population and their role in securing the airway in children. The benefits of video-laryngoscopy are outlined, which are generally associated with better visualization of the glottis. On the other hand, video laryngoscopy lasts longer, especially if done by inexperienced anaesthesiologists, and does not provide protection from desaturation or other complications in high-risk patients and problematic airway. In the literature there is still not enough evidence regarding the question whether advantages or disadvantages of video laryngoscopy prevail over conventional laryngoscopy in the management of the airway in children.


Lightwave transmitters providing an amplitude-modulated light output from injection lasers have been designed and tested. Six transmitters were assembled using GaAlAs double-heterostructure lasers and displaying (i) third-order intermodulation products >26 dB below the fundamental at 80-percent modulation index and 0.6 to 0.8 m W average optical output, (ii) excess noise ratios <1.5 dB; and (iii) frequency response within ±0.6 dB from 0.1 to 100 MHz. These transmitters were burned-in at room temperature for 300 h and used with entrance links in a satellite experiment.


We report a patient who experienced colonic necrosis after laparoscopic high anterior resection for sigmoid colon cancer, and review the literature to evaluate the clinical features of colonic necr...


The Biological Activity of Phytotoxic Extracts from Corynebacterium sepedonicum" (1971). Open-Access* Master's Theses from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Paper 40. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The author wishes to express his sincere appreciation to Dr. Ellen M. Ball whose guidance and support made this study possible. Special acknowledgment must be given to Mr. Bill Haag and Dr. Anne K. Vidaver whose encouragement and discussions on the subject were valuable. Many of the experiments would not have been possible without the interest and help given by Dr. J. S. Semancik who supplied quantities of nucleic acid. Appreciation must also be extended to


The difference in the objective of civial and criminal lawsuits results in very big gap in aspect of the admissibility of evidence,probative force,mode of proof,object of proof,principles of evidential investigation,duty of proof,material scope of judge's judgement as well as standard of proof.The evidence statute book,must be formulated which adapts with various lawsuits,or completes corresponding content in three procedural laws,but not the unified evidence statute book.


Many Internet applications need high bandwidth but are not time sensitive. This motivates a congestion control "scavenger" that voluntarily yields to higher-priority applications, thus improving overall user experience. However, the existing scavenger protocol, LEDBAT, often fails to yield, has performance shortcomings, and requires a codebase separate from other transport protocols. We present PCC Proteus, a new congestion controller that can behave as an effective scavenger or primary protocol. Proteus incorporates several novel ideas to ensure that it yields to primary flows while still obtaining high performance, including using latency deviation as a signal of competition, and techniques for noise tolerance in dynamic environments. By extending the existing PCC utility framework, Proteus also allows applications to specify a flexible utility function that, in addition to scavenger and primary modes, allows choice of hybrid modes between the two, better capturing application needs. Extensive emulation and real-world evaluation show that Proteus is capable of both being a much more effective scavenger than LEDBAT, and of acting as a high performance primary protocol. Application-level experiments show Proteus significantly improves page load time and DASH video delivery, and its hybrid mode significantly reduces rebuffering in a bandwidth-constrained environment.


1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Importance of Separation Technology A report on Separation and Purification conducted by the National Research Council (NRC) emphasizes the necessity for more economically efficient technologies in the area of separation.1 Separations (solid-liquid, liquid-gas, and liquid-liquid) are essential to most manufacturing operations in chemical processing industries in the United States. The efficiency of a given separation method is often a major factor in the cost of a manufactured product. This cost is in the form of equipment, energy, and time required to effect the separation. For example, in biotechnology, the separation of the final products from dilute aqueous solutions is a critical part of the process. In the area of strategic metal mining, the majority of domestic sources are dilute; they often contain low grade ores and produce process wastes that must be separated. In the area of waste treatment, as allowable pollutant release levels are reduced, the concept of removing pollutants...


This article presents design of a Fresnel lens antenna using true-time-delay (TTD) metamaterial structure for millimeter-wave multibeam antenna implementation. It is shown that a relatively large millimeter-wave lens antenna (D>18λ) with very low profile (F/D<0.36) can be achieved using a thin multilayered TTD metamaterial structure, provided that unit cell structure has sufficiently large frequency bandwidth.


Quasi-cyclic codes form an important class of algebraic codes that includes cyclic codes as a special subclass. This chapter focuses on the algebraic structure of quasi-cyclic codes, first. Based on these structural properties, some asymptotic results, a few minimum distance bounds and further applications such as the trace representation and characterization of certain subfamilies of quasi-cyclic codes are elaborated. This survey will appear as a chapter in "A Concise Encyclopedia of Coding Theory" to be published by CRC Press.


Ray, C. E. (Department of Paleobiology, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C. 20560) 1976. Geography of Phocid Evolution. Syst. Zool. 25:391-406.-Phocid distribution suggests origin in and primary radiation from the North Atlantic-Paratethyan region. Phocines and monachines are equally old groups, known first from the lower middle Miocene Calvert Formation. Phocines dominated Paratethys in semi-isolation. Both groups dispersed freely around the margins of the North Atlantic in Miocene and Pliocene time. Phocines entered the North Pacific, probably from the north, in Pliocene time, and have modernized and radiated in latest Cenozoic time, exclusively in the cold waters of the northern hemisphere. Monachine distribution receded southward in the North Atlantic during latest Cenozoic time, and in the Pliocene they spread into both the southern hemisphere, where they radiated in the empty Antarctic, and into the Pacific via the middle American seaway. At least four forces acting independently over the past decade or so combine now to make a fresh look at the geography of marine mammals and its interplay with their systematics rewarding: 1. ITe revitalization of paleogeography resulting from the new dynamism in concepts of crustal evolution. Plate tectonics and sea floor spreading are a general theme in geology today, but most of us in the United States who finished our formal schooling as little as 15 years ago were reared scholastically on the supposedly solid foundation of stable continents, with at most a dutiful if not derisive bow toward continental drift, followed by quick dismissal. The impact of colliding continents is now being felt throughout geology. 2. The development of a cosmopolitan time frame for the Cenozoic Era, through long distance correlation by planktonic foraminifera and nannoplankton, and by magnetic and radiometric techniques. The integration of these lines of evidence, with increasingly rigorous application of stratigraphic principles, has provided a comprehensive working hypothesis against which the fit of patterns of marine mammal relationships may be


Method to deal flight test data on take-off performance for light aircrafts was provided in this paper. Firstly, the corresponding flight test requirements of regulation CCAR23 and impact factors were analyzed. Then, subsection coefficient method, which divides take-off phrase into three sections with different mathematical model, was adopted and relevant characteristic parameters were developed by simplified these math model. Finally, the parameters which were identified and proved valuable by analyzing their feasibility were used to calculate the aircraft take-off performance, and main factors influencing take-off performance were provided. The data processing method on flight test is also applicable to analyze landing performance by constructing proper theoretical model.


Purpose – To evaluate the inhibition efficiency of 1‐methyl 2‐mercapto imidazole (MMI) in controlling the corrosion of carbon steel in sulphuric acid and to study its action mechanism.Design/methodology/approach – The effect of concentration, immersion time and temperature on the behaviour of this inhibitor has been studied using weight loss, d.c. polarisation and a.c. polarisation techniques.Findings – The results show that MMI is a mixed type inhibitor. Changes in impedance parameters (charge transfer resistance, Rt; and double layer capacitance, Cdl) were indicative of adsorption of MMI on the metal surface, leading to the formation of a protective film that grew with the increasing exposure time. Adsorption of MMI on the carbon steel is found to obey the Langmuir adsorption isotherm. The inhibition efficiency of MMI is temperature‐independent and its addition leads to a small increase in activation corrosion energy.Research limitations/implications – Surface analytical techniques such as X‐ray photoel...


This special issue of the Canadian Journal of School Psychology examines the vision and the capacity of schools to be strategically positioned as a hub for service delivery in meeting the mental health needs of Canada's children and youth. Canada's leading researchers and practitioners are represented in this contribution that addresses issues ranging from the extent of the need and the stigma of mental health challenges to the critical role of teachers in program and service implementation. It concludes with contributions of the current status of Canadian school-based mental health services along with a commentary on a vision for a holistic service delivery model for children and youth at risk. As the guest editors, we trust that this compilation will serve as a signpost for the future of school-based mental health service advocacy and development.


The optical properties of graphene are among its remarkable characteristics. Measurements have found that the opacity of a single graphene layer for infrared and visible light is simply equal to $\ensuremath{\pi}$ times the fine-structure constant. Explanations of this beautiful relation have tended to view it as a consequence of the material's Dirac-like band structure. However, in this paper the authors emphasize that the interband absorption rate must be treated by using the underlying nonrelativistic Hamiltonian, not the quasimomentum state label of the bands. They employ both a straightforward model and a tight-binding calculation to show that the opacity of graphene follows not from its celebrated linear dispersion relation but from the fact that it is a two-dimensional material. The same characteristic is therefore present in semiconductor membranes (as revealed by recent experiments) and other two-dimensional systems. This work focuses attention on the universality that reduced dimensionality bestows on optical absorption.


The present invention discloses a kind of transparent OLED device, comprising a plurality of pixels, each pixel comprising an organic functional layer, the organic functional layers on both sides provided with a first transparent electrode and second transparent electrode, the organic functional layer side further provided with a reflective electrode, the reflective electrode area smaller than the area of the organic functional layer. Transparent OLED device according to the present invention, by providing the reflective electrode, a light emitting device formed in combination with the transparent light-emitting device of a top domains, respectively, such that the present invention can emit light both sides of a transparent OLED device to adjust the brightness, so that both sides as needed brightness induced or without, or may be applied to the transparent display field illumination.


A silicon microsystem was developed which functions as a miniaturised DNA-amplification device. The system represents a technology platform for performing a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with reduced volumes of 7 µL. The silicon microreactor was fabricated using silicon bulk micromachining, and a platinum heater was fabricated on a Pyrex substrate. A miniaturised DNA-amplification system permitted rapid heating and cooling, and shorter reaction times of 30 min were achieved. In this work, biocompatibility issues are addressed; conditions for efficient PCR in a silicon-based microreactor are established for the amplification of 500 bp DNA from the Escherichia coli bacteriophage Lambda; and the conditions are verified by amplifying a 255 bp region from the Mycobacterium tuberculosis rpoB gene. This work describes the PCR volume scale down experiments that were conducted and concentrations of the reactants; Taq polymerase, oligonucleotides, MgCl2 and template DNA were determined for DNA-amplification reactions with this novel device.


Simultaneous Localisation and Mapping (SLAM) implementations are typically based upon integration of multiple sensors. One of the most common configurations for SLAM is the combination of odometry and range sensors. However, these sensors usually capture measurements at different times and thus introduce additional time synchronisation error when their data are fused together directly. As a robot moves faster, this error becomes more significant. The overall aim is to allow the robot to travel quickly and yet still be capable of obtaining accurate localisation and mapping results. This paper presents techniques for time synchronisation of multiple sensors taking into account clock drifts, inaccuracy of timestamps, and other unexpected communication and operating system delays. This paper also introduces a method of calibrating odometry and range sensors to ensure an accurate data fusion. Experimental results with and without synchronisation are shown to illustrate and validate the improvements.


Abstract Knowledge regarding interactions between predators and their prey is fundamental for understanding underlying links between climate change and ecosystem responses, including predator demographics, in the Southern Ocean. This study reports data on reproductive performance, total population size and diet composition for macaroni and chinstrap penguins breeding at Nyrøysa on Bouvetøya during the summers of 1996–97, 1998–99, 2000–01 and 2007–08. The breeding populations of these two species at Nyrøysa decreased significantly over the study period, with an 80% decline for chinstraps and a 50% decline for macaroni penguins, despite relatively high levels of chick production. During this period macaroni penguins at this site ate a diverse diet, dominated by myctophid fish and two krill species, whereas chinstrap penguins were Antarctic krill specialists. The population changes are probably primarily due to the expanding Antarctic fur seal population, and also to landslides that are the result of increased melting on the island which have destroyed penguin breeding sites. Additional impacts from global warming of the ocean might also be playing a role and could exacerbate the decline in these penguin populations if krill and other prey are negatively impacted in the future in this region. The local chinstrap penguin population would probably be most heavily affected given its narrow feeding niche and small current population size.


Despite the emphasis on viral load testing, current HIV testing guidelines consider CD4 T-cell count measurement as an important criterion for assessing disease progression, making decisions about anti-retroviral therapy regime changes, and treating HIV infected individuals with opportunistic infections. The CD4 counting by established methods (e.g., flow cytometry) presents challenges not only in resource-scarce settings due to cost and lack of skilled technicians but also in resource-rich areas where it is limited to centralized facilities.

 Current options for Point-Of-Care (POC) CD4 enumeration are few and labor-intensive, prompting the need for newer technological methods that can overcome the aforementioned challenges.

 The novel and patented flow-through cell counting assay (FTCA) described previously (Bystryak et al., 2019) was developed further into a point-of-care CD4 testing system using a disposable cartridge device and a portable imaging instrument. A pilot study with ~100 samples using this device was conducted to assess the validity of FTCA as a POC test for the measurement of CD4 count.

 The FTCA signal was found to be linear over a wide range (17 - 1540 cells/μL) of CD4 T-cell concentration. The FTCA method also exhibits a strong agreement with flow cytometry, with very low bias (− 7 cells/μL) towards CD4 count measurement.

 The cartridge-based FTCA method has great potential to be a fully quantitative method with low complexity, portability, low-cost, and wide applicability in clinical practice.


Urban development has increased the need to redevelop a contaminated land. This has encouraged in-situ remediation approaches, for which Stabilization/ Solidification (S/S) technique is particularly suitable for treating metal contamination. In this study, Zinc contaminated soil sample was produced by mixing zinc with uncontaminated soil. This soil was then mixed with Portland cement as a binder and cured for 7 and 14 days. The solidified samples were tested for toxicity according to TCLP approach. This test is to determine the effectiveness of cement as an additive material to contain the toxicity of the solidified samples. The result indicates that by adding 15% of cement to the contaminated soil, there is a significant reduction of contaminant up to almost 99% after 14 days. This shows that cement is very effective material in containing the toxicity of contaminated soil using S/S technique.


Foreword to the English edition. List of illustrations. Abbreviations. Prolegomena . 1. Religion in the Ancient World. 2. From the She-Wolf to Caesar: historical foundations. 3. Gods and Men. 4. Religious Action. 5. Thinking about Religion. Part II: Religion in Action . 6. Social Rules: sacrifice and feasting. 7. Managing Lines of Communication: vows and curses. 8. Control of Space: communication and boundaries. 9. Co-ordination: time and the calendar. Part III: Social Reality . 10. Religion in the Metropolis. 11. Specialists and Professionals. 12. From Caesar to the Lamb of God: historical perspectives. Bibliography. Bibliographical note. Secondary literature cited. Indexes. General. Gods and cults. Names of persons. Names of peoples and places


User engagement and tie strength are fundamental and important components in social networks. The model of k-truss not only captures actively engaged users, but also ensures strong tie strength among these users. It motivates us to utilize the model of k-truss in preventing network unraveling, which simultaneously considers both of the basic components. In this paper, we propose and investigate the anchored k-truss problem to reinforce a network by anchoring critical users who can significantly stop the unraveling. We prove the problem is NP-hard for k ≥ 4. A fast edge deletion order based algorithm, named AKT, is proposed with efficient candidate exploration and pruning techniques based on the order. Comprehensive experiments on 10 real-life graphs demonstrate the effectiveness of our model and the efficiency of our methods.


AbstractThe shear strength of reinforced concrete (RC) elements can be improved by applying externally bonded (EB) fiber-reinforced cementitious matrix (FRCM) composites. FRCM composites are genera...


In this paper, a two-parameter Weibull statistical distribution is used to analyze the characteristics of the wind from the Saharan area, located in the Tantan province, Morocco, for 08 years at 10 m. During those 08 years (2009-2017) the frequency distribution of the wind speed, the wind direction, the mean wind speed, the shape and scale (k & c) Weibull parameters have been calculated for the province. The mean wind speed for the entire data set is 6.4 m/s. The parameters k & c are found as 1.9 and 2.52 m/s in relative order. The study also provides an analysis of the wind direction along with a wind rose chart for the province. The analysis suggests that the highest wind speeds that vary (vm = 5.1m/s; vmax = 18.5m/s) prevail between sectors 165-175 ° with an average frequency of 1.4% and lower wind speeds (vm = 2.5m/s; vmax = 9.7m/s) occur between sectors 245-255° with an average frequency of 0.6%. The results of this document help to understand the wind power potential of the province and serve as a source of wind power projects. From a perspective, the wind energy system is an alternative to the future of the Sahara province of Morocco.


SUMMARY (1) The relationship between the morphology and the role of the hygroscopicallyawned diaspores of six species of grasses is investigated. (2) There is little experimental evidence to substantiate the frequently-implied view that the hygroscopically-active awn serves to drill the diaspore into an unbroken soil surface. (3) The hygroscopic awn causes the diaspore to move across the soil surface and to become lodged in a microsite in an attitude that promotes germination; in some species a rigid passive awn interacts mechanically with the hygroscopically-active awn to facilitate this locomotion. There is no evidence, however, that long hairs on the body of the diaspore and a hard pointed base bearing backwardly-directed bristles assist in the movement of awned diaspores into microsites. (4) The hygroscopic awn has an independent influence on establishment by pushing the diaspore firmly into the microsite. The backwardly-directed bristles on the base anchor the diaspore and counter the force of the radicle pushing into the soil. (5) Species vary in their ability to locate different types of microsite, and these variations can be related to the morphology of their diaspores. (6) While one soil may promote more germination than another, the proportion of seedlings that becomes established may not necessarily differ on the two soils. The precise pattern of behaviour with respect to germination and establishment on four different soil surfaces varied amongst species. (7) Differences in the morphology of diaspores of grasses may be of advantage in reducing the competition for similar microsites amongst species living together in one community. (8) The morphology of the diaspore shows a compromise between the conflicting


The morphological structure of dark-humus soils (Haplic Phaeozems) was studied in old-growth oakdominated forests in the Southern area of the Kaluzhskie Zaseki Nature Reserve (the Kaluga region). Darkhumus soils are mainly confined to areas with ravine relief, both on the flat surfaces (placors) and on the slopes. They form small patches within vast areas of sod-podzolic and grey soils (Luvisols). The structure of three trenches from 2.5 to 5 meters long was analyzed and the radiocarbon age of 15 soil samples was determined. Profiles of the studied dark-humus soils have the structure AU-C, where AU is a dark-humus horizon and C is a bedrock (clay loam). The proportion of organic carbon at the depth of 0–10 cm is from 4.4 to 8%, with depth its content in AU varies from 1 to 3%. Two main morphological levels can be distinguished in the profiles: (1) a background horizon up to 40–60 cm thick and (2) ancient pits (cauldrons) resulting from rotational treefalls up to 120–130 cm thick with the dark-humus material. Humus profiles of the studied soils in the Kaluzhskie Zaseki reserve are the deepest among the described noncarbonate soils with darkhumus horizons within the Russian Plain. The age of dark humus soils in the Kaluzhskie Zaseki reserve in general corresponds to the age of other forest-steppe soils of the Russian Plain. The humus age in the upper part of the AU horizon varies from 230±150 to 2690±110 cal. years BP; in the lower part it is about 6000 cal. years BP. Age of humus in the ancient pits varies from 4320±130 to 8170±140 cal. years BP; in most cases it exceeds the age of humus in the lower part of the background AU horizon. We assume that the initial depth of pits caused by treefalls did not exceed 60 cm; deeper pits (up to 150 cm deep) are younger. This hypothesis is supported by (i) the results of analysis of the structural features of the profiles including the crack network in the C (BC) horizon; (ii) the age of humus formed on the material of Сturb after treefalls and (iii) the difference in ages of humus «buried» in the pits and the «background» humus. The estimated age of treefalls ranges from 700 to 2700 cal. years BP (the late Holocene). post-graduate The studied soils in the Kaluzhskie Zaseki reserve are the example of continuous formation of forest soils, with resulting deep dark-humus profile. At the same time, no traditional features of the chernozem «steppe» and podzolic «forest» stages of soil formation during the Holocene were found in these soils.


China entered the aging society,the "old before getting rich" and "not prepared before old" has become increasingly prominent,the elderly faced poverty,disease,mental care and many other issues,physical and mental health facing a severe test.According to the elderly in the central nervous,cardiovascular,respiratory,physical characteristics of the motor system,analyze the causes for the elderly exercise cycle,endocrine,respiratory,nervous system function of its attention to the problem.Older people exercise should be individualized,to pay attention to physical exercise intensity, frequency of physical activity and exercise rationality and related links,as far as possible in the form of exercise prescription for exercise,strength exercises to strengthen targeted exercise prescription for the elderly,the effect of exercise is obvious. Elderly active scientific exercise,can improve the function of each system to achieve physical and mental health,improve quality of life,reduce the social and family pressure.


Disclosed is a reflex camera having a range finder assembly consisting of a focussing disk, field lens, pentaprism and eyepiece and having an electronic range finder wherein the imaging lens of the reflex camera projects an image of the object to be photographed onto a grating which is arranged in an image plane of the imaging objective lens and which acts as a spatial frequency filter. This image is projected through the pentaprism by means of a fully reflecting concave mirror ground onto the lower edge of the exit surface of the pentaprism. A photoelectric receiver system is associated with the grating, and a reflecting grooved grating is provided as the spatial frequency filter. The groove plane is arranged parallel or obliquely with respect to the image plane, so that the partial beams created by the splitting of the principal beam on the reflecting grooved grating are reflected back in the direction of the top edge surfaces of the pentaprism.


The growth of technological firms is based on the exploitation of innovative products and services thus forcing them to strongly invest in research and development (R&D). If the R&D expenditures announce the strategic positioning of firms, they can also significantly decrease the financial performances in terms of net income, return and risk. With the IAS 38 standard, the R&D expenditures can be accounted as expenses or assets. This choice has an impact on financial performances but this effect is difficult to forecast because these expenditures increase the information asymmetry between shareholders and managers. We demonstrate that it is preferable to capitalize the R&D expenditures if the firm is able to draw an immediate commercial exploitation from them or to adopt a swarming strategy of innovative projects (spin-off) as the benefits arise in the future. JEL: G32, G14, L19, O33


Nursing students are under considerable stress during clinical practice periods, putting their education and health at risk. Introducing interventions to support development of professionalism, social skills and coping capacity for clinical practice should be considered. Participatory action research was conducted with 35 bachelor degree nursing students, Prince of Songkla University from July to December 2010, Thailand. The data were collected by interactive biofeedback aura imaging system computer, Suanprung Stress Test-20, and focused group discussions for storytelling. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistic, t-test, and content analysis. The finding showed: 1) Continuous practice of Reiki and mindfulness meditation program found nursing students' aura color were orange-yellow, and the percent of an average balance level of nursing students' aura were increased. 2) The participants demonstrated significant decreasing of stress score 3) Focused group storytelling described nursing students' experience of holistic health. The main themes include body balance, relaxing and improving mind, progressive interaction, and inner self growth and understanding outside world. The finding suggested Reiki healing and mindfulness meditation program can be introduced as interventions to reduce stress and promote balance of health in nursing students.


We consider an optimal control problem of the quantum driftdiffusion equation. The existence and uniqueness of solutions to the state system is shown. The control problem is then formulated as a constrained optimization problem and the existence of a minimizer is proven. The adjoint equations are derived and allow for an easy calculation of the gradient of the reduced cost functional. The existence and uniqueness of solutions for the adjoint system is also investigated. Numerical results for different cost functionals show the feasibility of our approach.


The selectivity of reactant rotational and vibrational energy upon reactive cross sections for the reaction OH + Cl2 → HOCl + Cl is investigated in detail by performing quasiclassical trajectory (QCT) calculations on a six-dimensional, analytically constructed potential energy surface (PES). The construction of the PES was based on ab initio molecular orbital calculations of the HOClCl system using the unrestricted second-order Moller−Plesset perturbation theory approach. The quantum mechanical investigation produced three stationary points relevant to the title reaction, a transition-state configuration and two HOCl···Cl-type complexes. Geometries, energies, and vibrational frequencies are reported for these structures. The analytical functional form for the PES has been developed following the Schatz−Elgersma formulation incorporating the Sorbie−Murrell potential energy term for the HOCl molecule. Extended three-dimensional QCT calculations at low and moderate collision energies covered several rotation...


Summary and Discussion 1. Embryonic chicks are apparently not susceptible to infection with this avian virus, although birds just hatched are. This is a strikingly reversed state from that which prevails in the case of certain other viruses, 5 which multiply readily in the undifferentiated tissues of the developing embryo but are inactive in the hatched chick. Whatever the reason may be, a fact of epidemiological significance emerges: the disease-agent is probably not transmissible by way of the egg, thus supporting the prior finding of Jones. 1 2. The virus multiplied in minced whole-embryo tissue-cultures in vitro only under certain indicated conditions. The method in its present state, however, is not favorable for obtaining large yields of highly potent virus for use in immunizing procedures. No multiplication of virus was noted in this medium when chick-embryo brain was used instead of whole-embryo tissue. It is of interest in this connection that mammalian embryo-brain cultures have been found suitable for the multiplication of the neurotropic viruses of poliomyelitis 6 and of rabies. 7


In this article I examine current discussions about the governance of agro-biotechnology in Latin America, Europe, and the USA, based on a comparative reading of critical scholarship about the topi...


The article considers the aspects of the physical fitness of 6-7 year old children, studying in preschools to the introduction of All-Russian physical complex "Ready for Labor and Defense". During the monitoring the authors analyzed the accordance of the physical fitness of the preschool children comparing to the results of the conducted most mass sports event of the regional significance "The Governor's competitions among the preschool children of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area".


In this paper, the structure of titanium-silicon pentasil type molecular sieve which we synthesized has been studied with different methods.
IR and Laser Raman spectral analyses indicate that the Ti—O—Si vibration occurs in the molecular sieve. It has been proved by ESR analysis that Ti~(4+) is situated in the environment of distorted tetrahedron. The study on the surface in Ti-Si pentasil type molecular sieve by XPS further verifies that Ti~(4+) in the framework is present as (TiO_4)~(4-) tetrahedron. The results of the electron probe micrograph analyses indicate thai Ti has entered the framework of molecular sieve. X-ray powder diffraotometer has determined the unit cell parameters of Ti-Si pentasil type molecular sieve accurately. By using titanium content as a function, as compared with silicalite, we found that the unit cell volumes of Ti-Si pentasil type molecular sieve increased linearly with increasing the content of titanium which is in accord with the longer Ti—O bond distance as compared to the Si—O bond.


With corn embryo of coproduct from corn starch produced with wet method as material, superoxide dismutase(SOD) was extracted through sonication after supercritical CO2 fluid extraction for defating and low temperature crushing. The results showed that optimum conditions are solid to liquid 1:25, the time 6 s, the times 40 and the interval time 2 s. The crude extract was purified through thermal denaturation and acetone sediment and Sephadex G-75 column chromatography. The enzyme obtained activity recovery was 40.56%, the removal rate of protein was 99.36%, the specific activity was 3079.41 U/mg, and pure the purify multiple was 63.09. The scanning results of ultraviolet spectrophotometer showed that the peak of ultraviolet absorption of SOD from corn embryo was at 260 nm, the same to standard preparation. It was that the superoxide dismutase pure of corn embryo is Cu/Zn-SOD.


Power in American and German multi-chamber legislation is determined either by an inter-institutional or an internal coalition problem of all inter-linked chambers. Hence, the complexity of multi-chamber systems relies on different subgames, different types of decision rules and different types of actors. Since collective actors such as parliaments or parliamentary chambers may not act as unitary actors, we examine the power distribution in both types of multi-chamber legislation by a game-theoretical method with regard to institutional settings and specific legislative schemes. We argue that the Shapley index is the most appropriate method for the comparative analysis of multi-chamber power. Our `parallel' research strategy is, thus, based on individual and corporate Shapley power shares which are subsequently added to collective chamber power. Our comparison of American and German legislation starts with an analysis of two-chamber parliamentary bargaining. Whereas this application corresponds to the bicameral parliamentary decision stage of conciliation and amending, our second application of Policy Leadership studies the checks-and-balances of all executive and legislative chamber actors. A third application is related to the situation of unified and divided government, and here we examine the power effects of institutional settings and party-oriented strategies in both types of multi-chamber legislation. In Germany, unified government excludes opposition actors, whereas American unified and divided government refers to the president's role in multi-chamber legislation.


This paper describes a new method for determining the prompt fraction of in-core neutron detectors in CANDU reactors. The method is based on noise analysis, and thus does not require any perturbation of the reactor operation. This method is therefore very well suited to on-line monitoring, and could detect early detector degradation as the detectors age. The prompt fraction estimation of the in-core neutron detectors is of prime importance in CANDU reactors, since these detectors are used by the reactor shutdown systems, and should consequently respond very quickly to any flux change. This new method is based on the fluctuations of the light water levels in the water compartments at a frequency of roughly 0.25 Hz. These fluctuations are due to the control cycle of the regulating system of the reactor, and are equivalent to a spatially-distributed noise source of variable strength. The induced neutron noise can be monitored by the in-core neutron detectors, but only the prompt component of these detectors is able to follow these fluctuations at 0.25 Hz. Comparing the measured detector signals to the neutron noise estimated by core calculations allow determining the prompt fraction of the detectors.


Performance measurement is a critical enabler for better understanding, managing, and improving performance. The ultimate success of any performance measurement development effort is primarily a function of mastering the three "Ds" of design, data, and display. It should always be remembered, however, that the real goal of any performance measurement system is to provide performance-based data that can be easily converted into actionable performance-based knowledge, thus enabling users to understand, manage, and improve what they measure.


Jerry B. Fiddler directs the Reading Clinic at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and is a doctoral candidate at the State University of New York at Buffalo. | Two common complaints are often aired by adults attending reading improvement courses who can read quite well, yet who are concerned with the effectiveness of their reading: 1) they feel that they read too slowly, and 2) they feel that their minds wander too much while they read.


An inventory of the vascular plants of Kerr Wildlife Management Area, Kerr County, Texas, was conducted from 2006 to spring 2009. The area consists of 21 natural plant community associations and three land use classes. The Sawgrass-Spikesedge-Beakrush-Black Bogrush-Aparejograss Herbaceous Vegetation Association, and Ashe Juniper-Bastard Oak-Plateau Live Oak Woodland Association is reported as new to the state. The checklist reports 719 taxa from 106 families and 410 genera, with 27 of the species being endemic to the state. The largest families were Asteraceae (113 species), Poaceae (109 species), Fabaceae (38 species), and Euphorbiaceae (34 species). Non-native species comprised 9.04% (65 species) of the flora. Among the more unusual plant records for the area, which consists of a mixture of eastern and western species, are Rhynchospora capillacea, Petrophytum caespitosum, and Echeandia flavescens. Statistics on the adequacy of sampling and a comparative vegetation analysis are also presented.


Authority is an important component of adult-youth relations. Little work has been done exploring authority outside of families and classrooms. This article consolidates findings from two studies of urban after-school programs. The article examines youths' experiences of authority in after-school programs, compares those with their reports of authority relations at school and explores how adult-youth relationships in these settings influence those experiences. A relational climate exists in the after-school programs which informs youths' experiences of authority. Respect emerged as an important construct which influences youths' perceptions of and relations to adult authority. This may be particularly salient for racial minority youth. Youth differentiate respecting rules from respecting people and highlight the importance of bidirectional respect. Findings suggest that as educators and youth practitioners attempt to balance adolescents' needs for autonomy with adults' needs for authority, they should be cognizant of how respect can work to enhance authority.


Theories of school learning consistently point to variables such as ability, time (e.g., homework), quality of instruction, motivation, and academic coursework as important influences on learning. In this study, path analysis was used to test the direct and indirect effects of these variables on high school learning, with learning measured by both achievement test scores and high school grades. Relevant background characteristics were controlled and a longitudinal sample was used. The sample consisted of 25,875 high school students s,:tlected from the base year (1980) and the first follow-up (1982) of the Department of Education's High School and Beyond Longitudinal Study. Subjects were in 10th grade in 1980 and in 12th grade in 1982. The results suggest that ability, academic coursework, and homework all have important direct effects on achievement test scores, whereas the effects of quality of instruction and motivation were primarily indirect, chiefly through coursework and homework. When grades wer,1 used as the criterion, each of the potentially manipulable variables of interest, with the exception of homework, had a stronger effect relative to that of intellectual ability. Fmework, however, had only inconsistent effects. The results offer support for these variables as important influences on school learning, and also support their inclusion in theories of school learning. (AutPor/NB) * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * CV C) CD Cr) School Learning


Description of a right angle sound with balloon and collar to effectuate barium enemas with double contrast on colostomized patients. This atraumatic, watertight catheter can be used for examination in all incidences even in procubitus.


In recent years, we have become aware of the benefits of using the World Wide Web (WWW) in the classroom (see Swain, Bridges, & Hresko, 1996, for more information). We have learned that using computers is motivating to students (Cosden, Gerber, Semmel, Goldman, & Semmel, 1987) and that using the WWW enhances the learning environment of all students, including students with disabilities (Giagno-


Due to grand size of some websites and their complicated structures, prioritizing the various structures turns to be a decision making problem incorporating large uncertainty in judgment. Finding a response to such a need, the ordinary ELECTRE III method could heal some of shortcomings of uncertainties in decision making. Howeve there are still lots of occasions in which ordinary ELECTRE III method can not reach a full ranking among the website structures. As a sensible response to this drawback, in this paper, we utilize a brand-new extension of ELECTRE III method with ability to reach a full ranking in contrast to the ordinary ELECTRE III.


* I am very grateful .to Itziar Laka, Howard Lasnik, Jon Ortiz de Urbina, Juan Uriagereka and Myriam Uribe-Etxebarria for interesting comments and discussion. This research has been economically supported by afellowship from the Department of Education, Universities and Investigation of the Basque Government. (1) I v.rilllimit the exa~ples to the verb nahi (want); however, the same basic facts hold, with some slight differences, of other verbs like behar (have to), ahal (can), ezin (cannot),... . (2) Following former works in the literature, I adopt the following conventions: A = Absolutive case; D = Dative case; E = Ergative case; PL = Plural number. -TZEA stands for the infinitival affix. As is well known, Basque inflection shows Agreement not orily with subjects but also with objects and indirect objects. This agreement is represented by assigning a number for the person (1 = first person, ... 4 = first person plwal, ... ) followed by the case to which it corresponds.


Although in the literature comparisons of the effectiveness of MPEG-2 coding on interlaced and progressive sources have been reported, we think some very important aspects are missing in the research sofar. Particularly, the differences in resulting blocking artifacts are neglected, while usually only scenes with abundant vertical detail are evaluated. From our experiments, we conclude that the general opinion concerning the effectiveness of MPEG-2 coding on interlaced picture material is likely biased by the focus on challenging sequences only, while the omission of blockiness metrics in the evaluation significantly increases this bias further.


The effects of short-and long-term diabetes mellitus(DM) on urethral dysfunction were investigated,which may worsen voiding dysfunction in diabetic cystopathy.The DM rat were gotten by injecting 65 mg/kg of STZ in female Sprague-Dawley rat(250—275 g),5 and 10 weeks after DM induction with streptozotocin,female Sprague-Dawley rats and their age-matched controls were studied under urethane anesthesia.Isovolumetric bladder pressure,anterograde urethral perfusion pressure(UPP),and external urethral sphincter electromyography(EUS-EMG) activity were measured using a preparation that functionally separated the urethra from the bladder.The responses of the urethra to intravenous administration of the skeletal muscle blocker α-bungarotoxin(BGT) were determined.The isovolumetric peak bladder pressure and contraction amplitude were significantly decreased in both 5-and 10-wk DM rats.Whereas control rats showed high-frequency oscillations(HFOs) of UPP with uniform frequency and amplitude,DM rats had an irregular pattern of HFOs with variable amplitude.Detrusor-sphincter dyssynergia(DSD) occurred in 3/11 and 3/10 of 5-and 10-wk DM rats only.BGT treatment caused a greater reduction of baseline UPP in 5-and 10-wk DM rats than in controls.The study demonstrated remarkable striated EUS dysfunction,which may cause the increase of urethral resistance and worsen the voiding dysfunction in DM.Early intervention may be important in preventing permanent damage to the voiding function in DM.


Sea mammals are known to contain high concentrations of mercury and selenium especially in the liver with no apparent symptoms of poisoning. We examined the chemical form of mercury and sele- nium in the liver of striped dolphin, Stenella coeruleoalba. Neither mercury nor selenium could be extract- ed with acetone, 80% ethanol or 0.2 M ammonium acetate. The residue after extraction was digested most effectively with alkaline protease, resulting in solubilization of almost all the material (99% by weight) but still leaving a small amount of insoluble material (1%), which contained 80% of mercury and 66% of sele- nium of the original amount. This insoluble material was subjected to transmission electron microscopic analysis, X-ray microanalysis, X-ray diffraction analysis and elemental analysis, which revealed that the material contained spherical crystals of Hg(S~ .34, Seo 66) with 5-10 nm in diameter as a major component. These crystals may be the final detoxification product of mercury.


Awaz Raoof, international research officer at Coram Children's Legal Centre, takes a look at two recent judgments of the Family Division of the High Court regarding councils' handling of care proceedings


In this paper I describe a simple numerical procedure to compute synthetic horizon altitude profiles for any given site. The method makes use of a simplified model of local Earth's curvature, and it is based on the availability of digital elevation models describing the topography of the area surrounding the site under study. Examples constructed using the Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission (SRTM) data (with 90m horizontal resolution) are illustrated, and compared to direct theodolite measurements. The proposed method appears to be reliable and applicable in all cases when the distance to the local horizon is larger than ~10 km, yielding a rms accuracy of ~0.1 degrees (both in azimuth and elevation). Higher accuracies can be achieved with higher resolution digital elevation models, like those produced by many modern national geodetic surveys.


The polymerization of methyl methacrylate (MMA) in bulk is initiated with FeCl3 · 6H2O or FeCl3/PPh3 at 90 °C without the addition any conventional radical initiator to the polymerization system. Although the elucidation of the detailed mechanism of the initiation needs further investigation, it is likely that redox-type reactions are involved in the generation of initiating species. Once the initiating radicals are produced, the polymerization proceeds via reverse atom-transfer radical polymerization (RATRP). It was found that the polymerization is controlled up to a molecular weight of 12 900 at 92% conversion for the system using FeCl3 · 6H2O/PPh3. The chain extension experiment was carried out to confirm the controlled manner of the polymerization system. In both polymerization systems, polydispersity index and the initiator efficiency were found to be <1.4 and 0.6–0.9, respectively.


In The All Ci Poetry Collections of the Song Dynasty·Zhang Xian's Ci Poetry,there is a Ci Poem of Zhang Xian,Qin Yuan Chun(a tune to which ci poems are composed)· Send to Zhao Yuedao Governing Du Cheng Prefecture.It is not "Ducheng Prefecture "but "Chengdu Prefecture "that Zhao Yuedao governs.


For pt.I see ibid., vol.6, no.4, p.33-9 (1990). Options for detecting and characterizing the signal generated by a partial discharge (PD) within a test piece or test configuration are examined. Important parameters considered include minimum detectable signal (PD sensitivity), circuit time constants that limit PD waveform characterization (where this may be desirable), and general applicability of the detection scheme. In general, it is found that detection schemes that are most sensitive tend to be somewhat application specific, whereas detection schemes that are of general applicability tend to sacrifice some sensitivity.<<ETX>>


I enjoyed Philip Ball's article about the Mpemba effect (April p19), which investigated whether hot water freezes faster than cold.


This paper proposed a trajectory planning scheme combining the robot dynamics and constrained joint torque. With the objective of the robot′s steady movement, the trajectory is sampled equably and each segment is considered as uniformly variable motion. To guarantee tracking precision, the relation between the tracking control error and the output torque of the controller is analyzed from the point of engineering. Then an effective replanning scheme is presented, where fuzzy logic is used to weight the maximum joint torque according to the control error. The experiments on a robot show the feasibility of the scheme.


Two passages in the sermons of Bishop Caesarius of Arles († 542) have aroused the special interest of philologists and students of the history of religion alike. The first passage is found in the concluding section of a sermon in which the bishop scathingly criticizes some superstitions and heathen customs which, to all appearances, were still rife among the common people of his day.


A blind linear receiver for multi-antenna impulse radio ultra-wideband(UWB)communication systems was proposed.Without the need of channel information,specific properties of the received data imposed by the precoded space-time block codes(STBC)could be exploited to estimate the coefficients of the receiver,which subsequently recovered the transmitted symbols.Simulations show that,with the increasing of the data block for estimation,the performance of the blind receiver approaches that of the coherent one.


New Zealand or Aotearoa (in Māori: land of the long white cloud) is situated in the South Pacific Ocean, south-east of Australia (Figure 1). The three main islands (North Island, South Island and Stewart Island) cover an area of 264,537 km2. In 2016 the population was estimated at 4,790,371. The majority of the people are of European heritage; other ethnic groups are Maori, Pacific Islander, and Asian. New Zealand has three official languages: Te Reo Māori, English and New Zealand Sign Language. https://doi.org/10.7175/747.ch11


Extensive work on the determination of age of epiphyseal union has been carried out in different states of India as well as abroad, and from the findings of different workers, it is evident that there are not only differences in the age of epiphyseal union in India and abroad but also in the different states of India. The present study has been conducted on 100 candidates of Mewar region of Rajasthan who were in the age group of 14–20 years of either sex. They were clinically examined and their wrist, elbow & Pelvis were x-rayed to know the different stages of epiphyseal union according to their actual age which was verified by birth certificate or school records. The study showed that epiphyseal union takes place almost at the same age in females and little later in males. The union in females occur earlier by about 1 year to two years as a whole. No difference in the socio-economic denominator has been found.


SUBTITLE: HARMONISED COMPETITION RULES WOULD BE ESSENTIAL TO EU-US OPEN SKIES AND THE GROWING LINK BEING MADE BETWEEN US ANTITRUST IMMUNITY FOR MULTINATIONAL ALLIANCES AND THE CONCLUSION OF OPEN SKIES AGREEMENTS WITH INDIVIDUAL COUNTRIES IS INCREASING THE URGENCY.


To the Editor: In the October 2002 issue of the Journal of Applied Physiology , Lundblad et al. ([18][1]) described experimental work that concluded with criticism of the use of the enhanced pause (Penh) variable to estimate airway resistance. In the same issue, an editorial by Hantos and Brusasco


The interaction of a stellar jet with a molecular cloud is investigated using a computational approach in which the hydrodynamics, chemistry, and thermal behaviour are simultaneously and self-consistently integrated. The model incorporates the chemistry of 102 species whose abundances are coupled through a total of 1514 reactions. The dynamical and chemical structures are presented when the dynamics have achieved near steady-state. The results show that large variations in both density and temperature occur throughout the interaction region, and that these variations enable the identification of specific tracers of the various zones of interaction to be made. These tracer species are predicted to have detectable column densities and will have characteristic velocities and line profiles that should make them distinct from species in the ambient gas. Regions that should be chemically identifiable include the double shock structure at the jet head, the expansion of dense material from the jet head into the wake, the warm gas excited by the outer bow shock, and the mixing in the wake region.


Why would the UK government fund Cambridge University and a Manchesterbased production company to make a series of children's animation? After all, professional-quality animation doesn't come cheap. The answer is that this new animation has been designed to be both entertainment (for preschoolers) and educational: to help children learn to recognise emotions.

The government body in question is Culture Online, part of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, set up five years ago. Their brief was to create innovative new applications of the new multimedia, with the specific mission of 'reducing exclusion' in society. Their commissioning executive, Claire Harcup, considered children with autism to be a group who remain excluded from society, because of their neurologically based difficulties in forming social relationships. Claire contacted us at the Autism Research Centre in Cambridge University to discuss a project.

We had already developed a DVD for teaching emotion-recognition to people aged eight and above on the autistic spectrum, called Mind Reading: The Interactive Guide to Emotion (1). Research has shown that using the DVD for two hours a week over a 10- week period leads to significant improvement in emotion recognition among people with autism spectrum conditions (2). So our experience on that earlier project persuaded us that there are methods that can make a difference to people with this disability. Just as a child with dyslexia can be helped significantly by using tailored educational software to ease them into reading words, so a child with autism can be helped in the same way to understand emotions and read them from faces. Despite dyslexia being a form of wordblindness, and autism being a form of mind-blindness (3), neither of these conditions is beyond remediation.

We took up the challenge offered by Culture Online by proposing to make an animated series called The Transporters. Whereas Mind Reading required children to be able to play a computer game, clicking a mouse, or to be supervised by a teacher or adult who could help them do this, The Transporters was aimed at relatively neglected ('excluded') people on the autistic spectrum: those with significant learning difficulties, and preschoolers. Neither of these two groups may have the ability or interest to use a computer, but both of these two groups enjoy watching animated films about vehicles.

So why do they love watching films about vehicles? According to one theory, children and adults with autism spectrum conditions are strong systemisers (4,5). They are drawn to predictable, rule-based systems, whether these are repeating mathematical patterns, or repeating electrical patterns (e.g. light switches), or repeating patterns in films. They love lawful repetition.

It is ironic that Kanner, who first described autism in 1943, drew attention to this feature of autism (what he called their 'need for sameness' and their 'resistance to change') and yet it has been the social difficulties they have which have been the main focus of psychological research. At the core of autism is an ability to deal effortlessly with systems because they do not change and they are the same every time, and a disabling difficulty in dealing with the social world because it is always changing unpredictably and is different every time. It is worth noting that the two other major theories of autism that try to explain the non-social factors in autism – the weak central coherence theory (6) and the executive dysfunction theory (7) – have no parsimonious way of explaining this love of lawful repetition that is a hallmark of autism.

According to the hyper- systemizing theory (5), vehicles whose motion is determined only by physical rules (such as vehicles that can only go back and forth along linear tracks) would be much preferred by children with autism over vehicles like planes or cars, whose motion could be highly variable, moving at the whim of the human driver operating them. So we proposed to make a children's animation series based around eight characters who are all vehicles using such physical, rule based motion. Such vehicles would grab the attention of both preschoolers with autism and those so-called 'low functioning' children with autism with significant learning difficulties. Onto these vehicles we would graft real-life faces of actors, validated for the emotion that they were meant to be conveying, and contextualise them in entertaining social interactions between the toy vehicles.

Culture Online loved the idea and found a leading production company for us to work with. We created a whole family of different toy vehicles running on tracks or cables, who have limited freedom of motion: two trams, two cable cars, a chain ferry, a funicular railway, a coach and a tractor. Since all of the characters were depicted as toys in a child's bedroom, motion of the latter two was constrained in a Scalextric- like manner.

Each of the 15 episodes lasts five minutes, and opens with a sequence panning around the boy's bedroom where he plays with his toy vehicles. We then see the boy going off to school, and the vehicles 'coming to life', caught up in dramatic stories that enable the child watching to see different key emotions on the faces of the vehicles. The Transporters aims to teach not just some basic emotions (happy, sad, angry, disgust, fear, surprise) but also some more complex ones (ashamed, joking, jealous, proud, tired, sorry, kind, excited, worried, unfriendly and grumpy). Each short story is narrated (by actor Stephen Fry), but the series hopefully works even for a child without language, because the actions speak for themselves.

The DVD is widely and freely available (see box). The hope is that through hours of repetitive TV watching, children with autism will tune into faces without even realising they are doing so. Why? Because unlike faces on the people in their own homes, which are attached to human bodies that move unpredictably and are therefore stressful and confusing, the faces in The Transporters are attached to mechanical bodies that move beautifully predictably. The wheels turn. Round and round and round. The gears on the wheels lift, up and down and up and down. The vehicles move, back and forth and back and forth. Beautifully soothing for a child with autism who has a 'need for sameness'. Such systems, far from being confusing, are easy to understand because they are 100 per cent lawful, following the laws of mechanics, cause and effect. All you need in order to understand such mechanical motion are concepts like causality, temporal sequence, and contingency (If A, then B). And if you are a child who has difficulties with theory of mind or empathy, who finds it puzzling when a facial expression suddenly changes, the hope is that you could become familiar with how people look when they are surprised or afraid or proud through massive exposure to these patterns.