Summary Hematologic studies of an infant who was admitted for shock and was treated with a large volume of pooled aged plasma disclosed striking prolongation of a variety of coagulation tests, including the prothrombin time, partial thromboplastin time, and thrombin time. The aged plasma produced a marked anticoagulant effect on normal plasma in vitro with the results suggesting inhibition of the thrombin-fibrinogen reaction. Similar results were obtained with 24 different lots of aged plasma from 5 different sources. The inhibitory factor of aged plasma behaved as a competitive inhibitor of the conversion of fibrinogen to fibrin, as compared with heparin which is a noncompetitive inhibitor. Infusion of aged plasma into rabbits produced a defect similar to that found in the patient. Biochemical and immunologic studies revealed that the plasma was devoid of fibrinogen but contained large amounts of a fibrinogen degradation product. Treatment of the plasmas with protamine or with rabbit IgG anti-human fibrinogen removed the anticoagulant activity. Development of anticoagulant activity during plasma aging did not appear to be related to fibrinolysis, as it was unaffected by addition of a fibrinolytic inhibitor. Because of the anticoagulant activity of aged plasma, it must be used with caution in patients having underlying hemostatic disorders. Coagulation screening tests in patients who have received recent infusions of aged plasma may lead to misinterpretation unless specific coagulation factor assays are performed.


Uromyces alyxiae var. australiensis is newly described on Alyxia ruscifolia, a species endemic to Australia, and compared with U. alyxiae var. alyxiae, previously described on A. olivaeformis, a species endemic to Hawaii.


This paper introduced a problem of the modified Bayer pattern color filter array (CFA). A demosaicking method is also known as color interpolation, which is a digital camera process employed to restore a full-color imagery from an image with missing color information. In general, a CFA pair contains two green pixels and one red and blue pixel (RGGB). However, there exist alternatives such as RRGB or RGBB. In this paper, we study the effect of three different color arrays. Simulation results show that the obtained filters give good performance.


[1] This paper presents a climatology of the stratospheric aerosol produced with our look-up table (LUT) technique using data from the Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment (SAGE II) and the Cryogenic Limb Array Etalon Spectrometer (CLAES) instruments. The LUT climatology spans the period from December 1984 to August 1999. It includes values and uncertainties of measured extinction and optical depth at four SAGE II wavelengths (0.385–1.02 μm) and supplements these with results from the CLAES 12.82 μm wavelength during the key period January 1992 through May 1993, when the large particle sizes from the Pinatubo volcanic injection made many SAGE II extinction and optical depth spectra wavelength independent. Also included are retrieved values of effective radius Reff, distribution width σg, surface area S, and volume V. Aerosol retrievals show notable increases in all these parameters after major volcanic eruptions, with increases in Reff lagging increases in the others. Postvolcanic increases in σg, indicative of broader size distributions, are consistent with sudden increases in numbers of both small and large particles that exceed increases in intermediate-size particles. After Pinatubo, retrieved Reff and σg took nearly 5 years to return to pre-eruption values, while slightly shorter recovery times were obtained for S and V. During low-aerosol-loading periods, size distributions narrow in going from the tropical core to higher latitudes at altitudes between 20 and 22 km. Seasonal variations in S and V are observed at high latitudes for several altitude bands, but are less obvious in Reff. With some exceptions, LUT retrievals agree well with most previous climatologies. For example, agreement is good between LUT retrieved surface area and results from balloon-borne measurements, where available. However, there are a few noteworthy discrepancies. For example, values of surface area from principal component analysis of SAGE II data are less than LUT retrievals during near-background periods (e.g., 1989 to mid-1991, and after 1996) and greater than LUT retrievals in the peak of the Pinatubo plume. The smaller LUT-derived surface areas during the Pinatubo peak result from the constraint provided by the CLAES 12.82 μm extinction measurements.


The basic requirement for many high-rate insertion battery materials is that they are prepared in a nanostructured form. However, if we try to prepare the active material in a form of nanopowder (with particle size approaching 10 nm or even smaller), there will be a huge tendency towards particle agglomeration, either during the synthesis itself and/or during further steps of electrode preparation. Of course, agglomerated particles do not allow access of electrons and/or ions to the whole surface of individual primary nanoparticles which annihilates the very concept of nanostructuring.


Summary

In this study poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) nanocomposites with 1wt % of zinc oxide (ZnO) and 1wt % of silanized ZnO nanoparticles were prepared through cross-linking reaction. The prepared samples were irradiated under vacuum at room temperature with a 2 MeV proton beam with fluences in the 1013–1015 cm−2 range. The influence of nanoparticles on the cross-linking processes and structural degradation of irradiated PDMS nanocomposites was investigated using Raman and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR). The analysis of vibrational spectra has shown that prepared PDMS nanocomposites have higher resistance to proton irradiation in comparison to pristine PDMS. Under the highest proton irradiation fluence (1015 cm−2) PDMS with 1 % ZnO provided the best radiation protection.


Significance Amino acids are basic building blocks for all organisms and are essential for cell growth and proliferation. Cells use a set of protein machines to sense the availability of amino acids to carry out basic responses. In particular, the mTORC1 pathway is a central sensor of amino acids in mammalian cells. Residing on the lysosomal surface upon activation, mTORC1 processes signals from the upstream Rag GTPases and stimulates downstream effectors through phosphorylation cascades. Ragulator and SLC38A9 are key components of the lysosomal branch of the amino acid-sensing machinery upstream of the Rag GTPases, but how they regulate the Rag GTPases at the molecular level remains poorly understood. Here we used kinetic analyses to define their functions. The mechanistic target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) growth pathway detects nutrients through a variety of sensors and regulators that converge on the Rag GTPases, which form heterodimers consisting of RagA or RagB tightly bound to RagC or RagD and control the subcellular localization of mTORC1. The Rag heterodimer uses a unique "locking" mechanism to stabilize its active (GTPRagA–RagCGDP) or inactive (GDPRagA–RagCGTP) nucleotide states. The Ragulator complex tethers the Rag heterodimer to the lysosomal surface, and the SLC38A9 transmembrane protein is a lysosomal arginine sensor that upon activation stimulates mTORC1 activity through the Rag GTPases. How Ragulator and SLC38A9 control the nucleotide loading state of the Rag GTPases remains incompletely understood. Here we find that Ragulator and SLC38A9 are each unique guanine exchange factors (GEFs) that collectively push the Rag GTPases toward the active state. Ragulator triggers GTP release from RagC, thus resolving the locked inactivated state of the Rag GTPases. Upon arginine binding, SLC38A9 converts RagA from the GDP- to the GTP-loaded state, and therefore activates the Rag GTPase heterodimer. Altogether, Ragulator and SLC38A9 act on the Rag GTPases to activate the mTORC1 pathway in response to nutrient sufficiency.


Valve-regulated lead-acid batteries (VRLA batteries) nowadays are commonly used for standby applications. They offer quite a number of advantages compared to their flooded counterparts. There are, however, some limitations which should be noted. Water loss, for example, is an aging factor that cannot be compensated for by refilling. Even when a perfect internal-oxygen cycle is established, a certain water loss remains because of the unavoidable secondary reactions of hydrogen evolution and grid corrosion. The design of the battery and the operating conditions must aim to minimize this water loss. Beyond that, the rates of hydrogen evolution and grid corrosion have to be in a certain balance, because the polarization of the positive and negative electrodes is determined by this balance. If it is disturbed by a too high hydrogen evolution, it may happen that the negative electrode gradually will be discharged, even while the cell is floated at the correct voltage. Past experience has shown that such a balance cannot always be achieved. The insertion of a catalyst is an effective remedy to stabilize the polarization of the negative electrode.


Context In observational studies, postmenopausal hormone therapy has been associated with lower fasting glucose levels. No prospective, controlled trial has evaluated the effect of postmenopausal hormone therapy on the development of diabetes mellitus. Contribution Among the 2029 women in the Heart and Estrogen/progestin Replacement Study who had coronary disease but no diabetes at baseline, 6.2% of those receiving 0.625 mg of conjugated estrogen plus 2.5 mg of medroxyprogesterone acetate and 9.5% of those receiving placebo developed diabetes. Implications Recommendations about combination postmenopausal hormone therapy should consider that for every 30 women treated for 4 years, therapy might prevent one case of diabetes. The Editors Several clinical studies have evaluated the effect of postmenopausal hormone therapy on glucose metabolism and have had disparate results. Results from randomized, controlled trials performed primarily in women without diabetes have found decreased mean fasting glucose or insulin levels among those assigned to hormone therapy (1-5) or no difference between those assigned to hormones and those assigned to placebo (6-10). Fewer clinical trials have evaluated the effect of postmenopausal hormones on fasting glucose and insulin levels among women with type 2 diabetes mellitus, but again, the results have been mixed (11-16). Observational studies have more consistently found that postmenopausal women taking hormone therapy have lower fasting glucose or hemoglobin A1c levels than those not taking hormones (17-24). In addition, some (25, 26) but not all (24, 27) observational studies have noted a decreased incidence of diabetes among users of postmenopausal hormone therapy. No randomized, controlled trial has evaluated the long-term effect of hormone therapy on diabetes incidence. To determine the effect of hormone therapy on subsequent diabetes, we analyzed data from the Heart and Estrogen/progestin Replacement Study (HERS), in which 2763 postmenopausal women with documented coronary heart disease (CHD) were randomly assigned to daily estrogen plus progestin therapy or to placebo. We evaluated the effect of hormone therapy on fasting glucose levels and incident diabetes over 4 years of follow-up. Methods Study Setting, Participants, and Design The design, methods, baseline characteristics (28), and main findings (29) of HERS have been published elsewhere. Briefly, HERS was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial performed to evaluate daily doses of 0.625 mg of conjugated estrogen plus 2.5 mg of medroxyprogesterone acetate for the prevention of coronary events in postmenopausal women with established CHD. The trial enrolled 2763 women at 20 clinical centers in the United States between January 1993 and September 1994 and followed participants for a mean of 4.1 years. To be included in the trial, women had to be younger than 80 years of age and have CHD, as evidenced by previous myocardial infarction, coronary artery bypass graft surgery, mechanical revascularization, or angiographic evidence of coronary stenosis. Women who reported a CHD event within 6 months of randomization or who had used postmenopausal hormone therapy within 3 months of the initial screening were excluded. Those with serum triglyceride levels of 3.39 mmol/L or greater ( 300 mg/dL), fasting blood glucose levels of 16.5 mmol/L or greater ( 300 mg/dL), or uncontrolled hypertension (systolic blood pres sure 200 mg Hg or diastolic blood pressure 105 mm Hg) were also excluded. Computer-generated random numbers were used to specify the allocation sequence. Women were randomly assigned to the two treatment groups by use of a tamper-proof blocked randomization stratified by clinical center. Participants, investigators, and staff at the clinical centers; Wyeth-Ayerst Research; and those adjudicating study outcomes were blinded to medication assignment. Additional details about sample size calculations, randomization, and blinding procedures have been published elsewhere (29). For our analysis, women were classified as having diabetes at the baseline visit if they reported a physician diagnosis of diabetes, were taking diabetes medication, or had a fasting plasma glucose level of 6.9 mmol/L or greater ( 126 mg/dL). Women were classified as having impaired fasting glucose if they had a fasting glucose level of 6.0 to 6.9 mmol/L (110 to 125 mg/dL) at baseline. The remaining women were considered to have normal glucose metabolism. Data Collection At baseline, participants completed a questionnaire to ascertain age, race or ethnicity, education, smoking habits (current, former, or never), alcohol consumption (drinks per week), and exercise or walking activity. Physical examination variables measured at baseline were body weight, height, waist and hip circumference, and systolic and diastolic blood pressure. At baseline, at year 1, and at the end-of-trial visit, participants had fasting blood tests for levels of total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides, and lipoprotein(a) measured by the Lipoprotein Analytical Laboratory at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Maryland. Fasting serum glucose level was measured at baseline, at year 1, and at the end-of-trial visit. Venous blood was obtained in the morning after a 12-hour fast, and SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratory, Van Nuys, California, analyzed the samples using the hexokinase enzymatic method. We determined coefficients of variation by using ChemTrac (Medical Analysis Systems, Inc., Camarillo, California) control. The coefficient of variation for serum glucose level was 1.6% at a mean value (SD) of 4.2 0.05 mmol/L (77 1.0 mg/dL) and 1.1% at a mean value (SD) of 14.6 0.16 mmol/L (266 3.0 mg/dL). Adherence to study medication was reassessed every 4 months, at each visit. Ascertainment of Outcomes Diabetes incidence was not a secondary end point of the main HERS trial, but blood glucose level was prespecified as a variable that may mediate the effects of hormone therapy on CHD outcomes. We defined incident cases of diabetes by the presence of a fasting glucose level of 6.9 mmol/L or greater ( 126 mg/dL) at year 1 or at the end-of-trial visit, self-report of new diabetes or a complication directly related to diabetes, or initiation of hypoglycemic medication at any point during follow-up. Self-reported complications included diabetic neuropathy, diabetic retinopathy, diabetic foot ulcer, and diabetic renal disease. Hypoglycemia was considered a complication of diabetes if a participant taking an antidiabetic medication reported it to the study staff as an adverse event. Statistical Analysis To compare fasting glucose levels by treatment assignment at baseline, at year 1, and at the end-of-trial visit, t-tests were used. In addition, mixed linear models for repeated measures were used to assess treatment effects on fasting glucose level measured at year 1 and at the end-of-trial visit. Since mean values changed little after the year 1 visit, treatment effects were modeled by using the interaction between treatment assignment and an indicator for follow-up compared with baseline. These analyses were repeated after stratification by baseline diabetes status (diabetes, impaired fasting glucose, or normal glucose metabolism). We calculated the number needed to treat for benefit by taking the inverse of the absolute risk reduction of incident diabetes between the treatment groups. The effect of treatment assignment on incident diabetes was assessed by using Cox proportional-hazards models. Primary analyses used unadjusted intention-to-treat models; in supplementary analyses, we adjusted first for age and then for a range of potential confounders selected a priori, including age; ethnicity; education; current smoking; alcohol use; exercise; body mass index; waist circumference; and baseline use of diuretics, -blockers, angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors, and statins. In addition to intention-to-treat analyses, we also performed as treated analyses to determine whether the observed effect of hormone therapy on glucose levels and incident diabetes was also seen among women who adhered to the study medication. In these analyses, follow-up was censored at the beginning of the first 2-week period in which participants did not adhere to medication. To minimize potential confounding, these analyses were adjusted for baseline variables that differed between adherent and nonadherent women. We hypothesized that certain characteristics (body mass index, waist circumference, weight change, smoking, triglyceride level, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol level, hypertension, and certain cardiac medications) may mediate the effect of hormone therapy on fasting glucose level and diabetes incidence. To test this theory, we added postrandomization values of one or more hypothesized mediators as covariates to Cox regression models for incident diabetes. All analyses were conducted by using SAS software, version 8.02 (SAS Institute, Inc., Cary, North Carolina). A P value less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Role of the Funding Sources The funding sources had no role in the design or conduct of this analysis or in the decision to submit the paper for publication. Results Characteristics of women enrolled in HERS did not differ substantially between the hormone therapy group and the placebo group (Table 1). At the baseline examination, 734 women (26.6%) were classified as diabetic based on self-report of diagnosis or medication use (n = 640 [87.2%]) or by a fasting serum glucose level of 6.9 mmol/L or greater ( 126 mg/dL) (n = 101 [13.8%]). Impaired fasting glucose (fasting serum glucose level, 6.0 to 6.9 mmol/L [110 to 125 mg/dL]) was noted in 218 women (7.9%), and 1811 women (65.5%) were classified as nondiabetic (Table 2). Women with diabetes had higher body mass index, waist circumference, systolic


Aim To explore the infectivity of human cytomegalovirus(HCMV) in vascular smooth muscle cells and provide a cellular model to the mechanism research of atherosclerosis and transplant vasculopathy induced by this virus. Methods Vascular smooth muscle cells were isolated from umbilical arteries,and HCMV with 1 MOI was co-cultured with these cell,the proliferation of virus in these cells was assured by cytopathic effect,the expression of HCMV IE gene,and virus particles observed by electric microscope. Results Cytopathic effect was observed three days post-infection,and HCMV immediate early(IE) gene was expressed in these cells post-infection by RT-PCR,the correctness was assured by DNA sequencing.With electronic microscope technique,the virus particles were observed in these cells. Conclusion HCMV can infect vascular smooth muscle cells and establish proliferating infection.The work provide a model for the research of mechanisms of atherosclerosis and transplant vasculopathy induced by human cytomegalovrirus.


Objective: The present research has been undertaken with the aim to develop a topical gel formulation of Itraconazole. Itraconazole is an imidazole derivative and used for the treatment of local and systemic fungal infection. The oral use of Itraconazole is not much recommended as it has many side effects. Commercially Itraconazole topical gel preparation are not available in the market, thus this formulation is made for better patient compliance and to reduce the dose of the drug and to avoid the side effects like liver damage and kidney damage.Methods: The gel was formulated by changing the polymer ratio. Various formulation (F1, F2, F3, F4, F5) were developed by using a suitable polymer (carbopol 934p and HPMC). The formulation was evaluated for % yield, spreadability, extrudability, wash ability and viscosity in vitro drug release study, skin irritation study, stability testing.Results: Viscosity studies of various formulations revealed that formulation F3 was better to compare to others. From among all the developed formulation, F3 shows better drug diffusion, did good Rheological properties. pH of the F3 formulation is sufficient enough to treat the skin infections. Results indicated that the concentration of carbopol-934 and HPMC K4M significantly affects drug release and rheological properties of the gels.Conclusion: It was concluded that formulation F3 was the best formulation among this formulation. Hence formulation F3 should be further developed for scale-up to industrial production.


Introduce the method of the pit elevator main spind le's reliability design For example,the type of elevator is XKT2×3.5×1 .7 type the reliability design about this kind of elevator


The paper analyzes experience of organizing teaching activities in physics students of technical universities. The author gives survey data with participation of students.


Older adults are at greater risk of both infection with and mortality from COVID‐19. Many U.S. nursing homes have been devastated by the COVID‐19 pandemic, yet little has been described regarding the typical disease course in this population. The objective of this study is to describe and identify patterns in the disease course of nursing home residents infected with COVID‐19.


Minority Rights Group International (MRG) is the only worldwide organisation that works on minority rights, and, more generally, on the spectrum of minorities issues as well as on indigenous peoples. Forty-two years after its founding, MRG recently decided to transform its approach to become a campaigning organisation, combining a variety of methods with the one goal of bringing about real change in the lives of minorities and securing them the rights to which they are entitled. MRG decided to focus its work around five major themes, which themselves became the long-term campaigns. The five were chosen after extensive consultation with minorities on the most important issues affecting them, and with MRG and other experts own knowledge, and are: conflict and genocide prevention; education; land and property rights; gender; and development. Keywords: campaigning approach; campaigning organisation; indigenous peoples; minority rights group international (MRG)


We identify the algebra of regular functions on the space of quartic polyno- mials in three complex variables invariant under SL(3, C) with an algebra of meromorphic automorphic forms on the complex 6-ball. We also discuss the underlying geometry.


Modern distance education,as an innovative instruction pattern that differs from the conventional one is evolving with the development of on-line media.The new media have changed not only the traditional teaching approaches but also the educational modes of thinking.To construct the field of education distinct from the traditional in-class work,the educators are to have a full understanding of the characteristics of the new media,change the modes of thinking and expression,transform the traditional teacher-student relationship,and make efforts in basic areas such as the designing of course books.


The article states that the average worker is a 24-hour-biopsychosocial being, who lives within a family, interacts with the organization and the environment, and his health should be watched over a risk factor-exposition-effect axis. This development research is based on the systematization of knowledge with pertinence, consistent internal structure and stability. Its use is encouraged by taking as reference its theoretical conception to improve the quality of life of the worker.


Leptin, the adipocyte-secreted hormone that centrally regulates weight control, is known to function as an immunomodulatory regulator. We investigated the signaling pathway involved in IL-6 production caused by leptin in microglia. Microglia expressed the long (OBRl) and short (OBRs) isoforms of the leptin receptor. Leptin caused concentration- and time-dependent increases in IL-6 production. Leptin-mediated IL-6 production was attenuated by OBRl receptor antisense oligonucleotide, PI3K inhibitor (Ly294002 and wortmannin), Akt inhibitor (1L-6-hydroxymethyl-chiro-inositol-2-((R)-2-O-methyl-3-O-octadecylcarbonate)), NF-κB inhibitor (pyrrolidine dithiocarbamate), IκB protease inhibitor (l-1-tosylamido-2-phenylenylethyl chloromethyl ketone), IκBα phosphorylation inhibitor (Bay 117082), or NF-κB inhibitor peptide. Transfection with insulin receptor substrate (IRS)-1 small-interference RNA or the dominant-negative mutant of p85 and Akt also inhibited the potentiating action of leptin. Stimulation of microglia with leptin activated IκB kinase α/IκB kinase β, IκBα phosphorylation, IκBα degradation, p65 phosphorylation at Ser276, p65 and p50 translocation from the cytosol to the nucleus, and κB-luciferase activity. Leptin-mediated an increase of IκB kinase α/IκB kinase β activity, κB-luciferase activity, and p65 and p50 binding to the NF-κB element was inhibited by wortmannin, Akt inhibitor, and IRS-1 small-interference RNA. The binding of p65 and p50 to the NF-κB elements, as well as the recruitment of p300 and the enhancement of histone H3 and H4 acetylation on the IL-6 promoter was enhanced by leptin. Our results suggest that leptin increased IL-6 production in microglia via the leptin receptor/IRS-1/PI3K/Akt/NF-κB and p300 signaling pathway.


Colleges and universities collect a great deal of data about student learning and experiences but many do very little with it. At best, the data is shared with administrators and faculty. At worst, it sits on a dusty bookshelf or hidden in electronic folders in an assessment office. But, chances are it's not being used as evidence to inform the changes that lead to improved student learning. In a recent survey of institutional leaders the top reported needs and supports for student learning outcomes assessment are 1.) more faculty using the results of the student learning assessment and 2.) more professional development for faculty and staff (Janowski, Timmer, Kinzie, & Kuh, 2018).


The Trefftz method pioneered by Trefftz [71] in 1926 is described as follows: The particular solutions or the fundamental solutions are chosen, a linear combination of those functions is regarded as an approximate solution of partial differential equations (PDEs), and their expansion coefficients are sought by satisfying the interior and exterior boundary conditions. When the solution domain is not rectangular or sectors, the piecewise particular solutions may be chosen in different subdomains, and some coupling techniques must be employed along their interior boundary conditions. In Li et al. [49], the collocation method is used for the Trefftz method, to lead to the collocation Trefftz method (i.e., the indirect Trefftz method). In this paper, we will also discuss other four coupling techniques: (1) the simplified hybrid techniques, (2) the hybrid plus penalty techniques, (3) the Lagrange multiplier techniques for the direct Trefftz method, and (4) the hybrid Trefftz method of Jirousek [23] and Qin [62]. Error bounds are derived in detail for these four couplings, to achieve exponential convergence rates. Numerical experiments are carried out, and comparisons are also made.


Print media retains a significant role in shaping social discourses about mental health. Recent Australian studies have identified a significant social stigma and poor mental health literacy concerning anxiety disorders which prevents individuals from seeking help. No studies to date have explored the representation of anxiety in Australian print media. Targeting this research gap, our study explores models of disability present in 83 articles specifically covering anxiety disorders and published by The Australian newspaper between 2000 and 2015. Using a critical approach to content analysis, the analysis identified the presence of established traditional and progressive media models of disability. Our analysis also identified further supplementary discourses of awareness, nature and risk, thereby extending existing models identified by Clogston (1990) and Haller (2000). These discourses can be seen to both support and challenge traditional discourses of mental ill health according to the context in which the discussion of anxiety is presented. As this study reveals an ongoing potential for newspaper discussion of anxiety to increase stigma, it is important that students, journalists and editors (where necessary) work to challenge dominant discourses which promote traditional stigmatizing discourses of mental ill health.


Video streaming scheme in heterogeneous wireless networks has to consider a vertical handover in which the network bandwidth is varied drastically. TCP-friendly rate control scheme provides a congestion control function to support the requirements of video streaming application. When a vertical handover occurs, however, it does not guarantee the quality of video streaming service due to the bursty packet loss and the throughput degradation. In this paper, we propose a handover-aware rate adaptation scheme to guarantee the quality of video streaming service in heterogeneous wireless networks. The proposed scheme based on TCP-friendly rate control method appropriately adjusts the transmission rate of video stream to the network bandwidth varied with vertical handover. To expedite the response to the bandwidth variation, we also propose the vertical handover notification mechanism. Video streaming system based on our mechanism separately adjusts the sending rate of video by using media characteristics and by classifying the handover situation according to handover notification event. Through the simulation, we prove that our scheme guarantees the quality of video streaming by minimizing packet loss caused by vertical handovers and by quickly utilizing the available bandwidth of network after a vertical handover.


Determination of polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons in air was carried out in two monitoring sites of 'Program Teplice' throughout the year 1993. The town of Teplice is located in an industrialized region of the Northern Bohemia, Prachatice, a small town in Southern Bohemia, was chosen as reference. Measurement for PAHs was done in air at both locations and in bulk deposition at Teplice. Analysis of PAHs was done in air by HPLC with fluorescence monitor and in bulk deposition by CGC‐MS. Difference in the mean PAHs levels in air is not significant; particularly when taking benzo(a)pyrene as an indicator compound. Higher concentrations of PAHs were observed during the winter heating period at both locations.


This article is contained within the collection of abstracts "Abstracts Of Papers Presented At The Summer Scientific Meeting Of The Astronomical Society Of The Pacific At The University Of California, Berkeley, California 21-23 June 1989" Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 101 877. Please see the collection for a copy of this article's PDF.


Objective:To construct an anti caries DNA vaccine containing immumostimulatory oligonucleotide CpG motif for preventing Streptococcus mutans from binding to the tooth furfaces.Methods:According to the sequence of the plasmid pSBR CTA 2B,a pair of primers specific for amplifying the DNA fragment encoding saliva binding region(SBR)in surface protien AntigenⅠ/Ⅱ(AgⅠ/Ⅱ)molecule from S.mutans were designed and synthesized.With PCR,the target DNA fragment encoding SBR was amplified from plasmid pSBR CTA 2B.Through T A cloning,the target DNA fragment was first inserted into plasmid intermediate vector pMD18 T,and then subcloned from the recombinant plasmid pMD 18 T SBR to the eukaryotic expression vector pcDNA 3 1 into which the immunostimulatory oligonucleotide CpG motif had been incorporated.Results:Through restriction enzyme mapping analysis and DNA sequencing,the construction of the eukaryotic expression recombinant plasmid pcDNA 3 1 SBR with expected open reading frame was confirmed.Conclusion:By T A cloning,the DNA fragment encoding SBR can be cloned to vector pcDNA 3 1 bearing immunostimulatory sequence to construct the recombinant plasmid pcDNA 3 1 SBR possissing the property of immunogenic enhancement,and the recombinant plasmid can be further used as a novel and more effective anti caries vaccine.


On basis of experimental analysis and theoretical research on coal blend, we receive a conclusion that the relationship between the coal blend properties and compose coals is nonlinear, which is initially regarded as linearity. This feature can be finely described by the way of neural network and fuzzy mathematics etc. in an effort to develop the computer based expert system for coal blend successfully. Figs 2 and refs 4.


4-hydroxyacetophenone monooxygenase (HAPMO) from Pseudomonas fluorescence ACB and phenylacetone monooxygenase (PAMO) from Thermobifida fusca are Baeyer-Villiger monooxygenases that oxidize aromatic organic compounds such as ketones and sulfides. The products of these compounds are known to have various interesting properties for pharmaceutical applications. In this chapter we describe the biocatalytic properties of the newly identified PAMO, revealing its reactivity with a large range of sulfides and ketones. In addition, we studied the enantioselective oxidation of several prochiral compounds using PAMO and HAPMO. These enzymes were found to oxidize a number of phenyl sulfides with high enantioselectivity. In addition, HAPMO showed to be an excellent biocatalyst for the synthesis of enantiopure benzyl sulfoxides and an aromatic ester.


Non-equilibrium steady states are a focal point of research in the study of open quantum systems. Previous variational algorithms for searching these steady states have suffered from resource-intensive implementations due to vectorization or purification of the system density matrix, requiring large qubit resources and long-range coupling. In this work, we present a novel variational quantum algorithm that efficiently searches for non-equilibrium steady states by simulating the operator-sum form of the Lindblad equation. By introducing the technique of random measurement, we are able to estimate the nonlinear cost function while reducing the required qubit resources by half compared to previous methods. Additionally, we prove the existence of the parameter shift rule in our variational algorithm, enabling efficient updates of circuit parameters using gradient-based classical algorithms. To demonstrate the performance of our algorithm, we conduct simulations for dissipative quantum transverse Ising and Heisenberg models, achieving highly accurate results. Our approach offers a promising solution for effectively addressing non-equilibrium steady state problems while overcoming computational limitations and implementation challenges.


Abstract The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of motor coordination (MC), physical fitness (PF) and physical activity (PA) on the development of subcutaneous adiposity in a sample of children followed longitudinally from 6 to 10 years of age. Participants were 142 girls and 143 boys. Height, weight, and the triceps and subscapular skinfolds were measured annually between the ages of 6 and 10 years. PA was estimated with the Godin–Shephard questionnaire. MC was evaluated with the Körperkoordination Test für Kinder (KTK) test battery, and PF was assessed with four Fitnessgram tests: curl-ups (CU), push-ups (PU), trunk-lifts (TL) and one mile run/walk (MRW). Hierarchical linear modelling with MC, PF items and PA as predictors of the sum of two skinfolds (SKF) was used. The results showed that boys and girls differed significantly in SKF at baseline (girls: 19.7 mm; boys: 16.6 mm). Three PF items (CU, PU and MRW) and MC had a positive influence on SKF. For each unit improvement in CU, PU, MRW and MC, SKF was reduced by 0.06, 0.04, 0.06 and 0.12 mm, respectively. In conclusion, motor coordination, muscular strength and endurance, and aerobic endurance attenuated the accumulation of subcutaneous adipose tissue during childhood.


Collaborative intrusion detection has several difficult subtasks to handle. Large amount of data generated by intrusion detection probes has to be handled to spot intrusions. Also, when correlating the pieces of evidence, the connection between them has to be revealed as well, as it may be the case that they are part of a complex, large-scale attack. In this article, we present a peer-to-peer network based intrusion detection system, which is able to handle the intrusion detection data efficiently while maintaining the accuracy of centralized approaches of correlation. The system is built on a distributed hash table, for which keys are assigned to each piece of intrusion data in a preprocessing step. This method allows one to make well-known correlation mechanisms work in a distributed environment. Keywords-collaborative intrusion detection; attack correlation; peer-to-peer; distributed hash table.


Corpus analysis is a form of text analysis which allows you to make comparisons between textual objects at a large scale (so-called 'distant reading'). It allows us to see things that we don't necessarily see when reading as humans. If you've got a collection of documents, you may want to find patterns of grammatical use, or frequently recurring phrases in your corpus. You also may want to find statistically likely and/or unlikely phrases for a particular author or kind of text, particular kinds of grammatical structures or a lot of examples of a particular concept across a large number of documents in context. Corpus analysis is especially useful for testing intuitions about texts and/or triangulating results from other digital methods.


ERA5 is the latest generation atmospheric reanalysis produced by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). ERA5-Land (ERA5L) is derived by running the land component of ERA5, Tiled ECMWF Scheme for Surface Exchanges over Land with a revised land surface hydrology (HTESSEL), at an increased resolution of 0.1°. This study evaluates ERA5L soil temperature in permafrost regions based on observations and published permafrost products. We find that ERA5L overestimates soil temperature in northern Canada and Alaska but underestimates it in mid–low latitudes, leading to a near-zero overall bias (−0.08 ˚C). The warm bias of ERA5L soil is more pronounced in winter than in other seasons. As calculated from its soil temperature, ERA5L overestimates active-layer thickness and underestimates near-surface (< 1.89 m) permafrost area.This is thought to be due in part to the shallow soil column and coarse vertical discretization of the land surface model and to warmer simulated soil.

The soil temperature bias in permafrost regions correlates well with the bias in air temperature and with snow height. A review of the ERA5L snow parameterization in the code and a simulation example comparison with permafrost-specific processes rich model (GEOtop) both point to an error in snow metamorphism of HTESSEL leading to a low bias in ERA5L snow density as a possible cause for the warm bias in soil temperature. The apparent disagreement of station-based and areal evaluation techniques highlights challenges in our ability to test permafrost simulation models. While global reanalyses are important drivers for permafrost simulation, we conclude that ERA5L soil data are not well suited for informing permafrost research and decision making directly. To address this, future soil temperature products in reanalyses will require permafrost-specific alterations to their land surface models.


The qualification of erbium-doped fibers for space applications is made complex because they exhibit enhanced low-dose-rate sensitivity. We demonstrate a new assessment method that allows these optical fibers to be tested over a short time, which can be extended to any photonic device.


Cocaine use disorder is a psychiatric condition affecting millions of people worldwide. Up till now, there are no FDA approved medications reported against this disorder. Previous pharmacological studies suggested that, simultaneously targeting all types of opioid receptors, some agonistically while others antagonistically have been proven a much useful strategy for the treatment of cocaine addiction. Recent evidence indicated that a novel agonist cebranopadol has a high binding affinity towards Nociceptin opioid receptor (NOP) and Mu opioid receptor (MOP), and partial affinity with Kappa opioid receptor (KOP) and Delta opioid receptor (DOP). Interestingly, in vivo studies revealed that cebranopadol blocked the cocaine seeking in animal models. In the present study, quantum chemical calculations were performed to calculate various thermodynamic parameters of cebranopadol using density functional theory. Flexible docking was performed to rationalize the molecular basis of cis and trans isomers of cebranopadol. Further, the atomistic description of activation mechanism of MOP receptor by cebranopadol investigated by sub‐microsecond timescale molecular dynamic (MD) simulation. Our results revealed that the operating mode of the activation switch composed of Trp2936.48 and Asn3287.45 residues, was accountable for down‐ and up‐regulation, respectively, of the β‐arrestin signaling. This particular conformational change in turn affected the G‐protein‐biased activation of MOP receptor. Cebranopadol stabilized the Asn3287.45 by mediating halogen bond formation. According to best of our knowledge, this is the first mechanistic study of cebranopadol with MOP receptor using the quantum mechanical calculations and MD simulations to explain the inhibition of cocaine addiction.


Recent research trends are shifting toward Internet of Things (IoT) networks based on cognitive radio (CR) technology to provide dynamic spectrum access to numerous IoT nodes. Spectrum sensing is an essential task of CR-IoT node which allows cognitive uses to identify vacant frequency bands. In this article we propose a CR-IoT node using Raspberry Pi single board computer and an ultra low cost software defined radio called RTL-SDR. Real time energy detection spectrum sensing is performed on such a CR-IoT node and results are compared to the theory. Results show close correspondence between theoretical and experimental results.


An infinite-horizon perfect-information "centipede" game is studied. The unique subgame-perfect Nash equilibrium (SPNE) in pure strategies has each player choose, at each opportunity, to terminate the game. In contrast, mixed strategies can yield equilibrium cooperation described as follows: for all but finitely many periods players randomize between terminating and continuing the game. These continuation probabilities are explicitly calculated. If both players' payoff functions are unbounded, then there exist SPNE exhibiting such cooperation. Conditions are also derived under which such cooperation does not arise.


A classical result in complex geometry says that the automor phism group of a manifold of general type is discrete [Mat63]. It is more generally tru e that there are only finitely many surjective morphisms between two fixed projective mani folds X andY of general type [KO75]. Rigidity of surjective morphisms, and the failure of a morph ism to be rigid have been studied by a number of authors, the most general results being those of Borel and Narasimhan [BN67]. For target manifolds Y with Chern numbersc1(Y ) = 0 and cdim Y (Y ) 6= 0, rigidity has been shown by Kalka, Shiffman and Wong [KSW81] . These results have recently been generalized by Hwang [Hwa03] to t he case where Y is a compact Kähler manifold withc1(Y ) = 0. Although in Hwang's setup deformations need not be rigid, he is able to give a good description of the space of s urjective morphisms. In this paper we give a complete description of the space of su rjective morphisms in the general setup where Y is a normal projective variety that is not covered by rationa l curves. Our main result, Theorem 1.2, states that surjective morphi sms are rigid, unless there is a clear geometric reason for it.


Abstract For an irreducible character χ of a finite group G, the codegree of χ is defined as . In this paper, we characterize the nonnilpotent groups in which all nonlinear irreducible characters have the same codegree.


This paper addresses the problem of analyzing sentiment on a social media platform called Twitter; that is to identify and classify whether a tweet expresses a positive sentiment or a negative sentiment. Twitter is an online social networking and micro-blogging website where people from around the world communicate and write short updates, called as "tweets" without exceeding the character limit of 140 characters. It is a continuously expanding web service, having an average of 330 million monthly active users as of the fourth quarter of 2017. This large number of users results in enormous amounts of publicly available data that may be used to gather insight and to reflect the public sentiment by analyzing the tweets. There are many applications to performing sentiment analysis in today's world in various fields and industries such as gathering market research insights, predicting political campaigns' outcomes etc. Performing sentiment analysis with traditional techniques of writing manual rules and conditions becomes complex as the number of rules to be written, keep increasing to tackle the raw natural language. The aim of this paper is to investigate further into the sub-domain of natural language processing called sentiment analysis, and develop a statistics based functional classifier and incorporate it with other machine learning models to create a vote based classifier algorithm, for automating and performing accurate sentiment classification of desired tweets.


To make high quality decisions, decision-makers must have high quality information pertinent to the decision at hand. The effects of information quality and the importance of information have been reported in the Information Systems (IS) literature. However, little has been learned about the impact of data quality (DQ) on decision performance. This study explores the effects of contextual and representational DQ, as defined by the framework of DQ (Wang and Strong, 1996), on decision performance. To examine the effects of contextual and representational DQ on decision performance, a laboratory experiment was conducted. Based on two levels of contextual and representational DQ and two levels of task complexity, this study had a 2 x 2 x 2 factorial design. The dependent variables used to measure the outcomes of the problem-solving performance were problem-solving accuracy and solution time. The application used in the experiment was a Web-based data access tool developed for this study. Eighty subjects participated in the experiment.
The results demonstrated that the effects of contextual and representational DQ on problem-solving performance were significant. In addition, this study found that problem-solving accuracy with low contextual DQ and high representational DQ was superior to problem-solving accuracy with high contextual DQ and low representational DQ. That means, for problem-solving accuracy, the advantages of representational DQ outweighed the advantages of contextual DQ, especially for complex symbolic tasks. However, the results of this study showed that problem-solving time with low contextual DQ and high representational DQ was inferior to problem-solving time with high contextual DQ and low representational DQ. That means, for problem-solving time, the advantages of contextual DQ outweighed the advantages of representational DQ, especially for complex symbolic tasks.
The findings suggest that the task type, task complexity, and DQ must be matched to achieve the best results, and that decision-makers can expect to improve their decision-making performance by enhancing contextual and representational DQ. The findings extend a body of research examining the effects of factors that can be tied to human decision-making performance. They also provide empirical evidence to validate and extend the cognitive fit theory (Vessey, 1991) and the IS success model (DeLone and McLean, 1992).


Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) play an important role in economic development However, due to the prevalence of information asymmetry, MSMEs are hard to borrow money and banks have difficulties in accurately assessing credit risks of MSMEs. In order to solve these problems in credit decision, we establish a credit risk assessment model for MSMEs based on the principle of back propagation (BP) neural network learning algorithm. After iteratively solve the nonlinear programming problem with the interior point method, a credit decision model is obtained. As the production and operation of enterprises and economic benefits may be affected by some unexpected factors, following that, the credit strategy is adjusted according to the enterprise's own business condition and market influencing factors.


Abstract We use data from 33 countries to study how a fund's affiliation with large families shapes the flow–performance relationship internationally. Our results show that the effect of family size on the fund flows' response to performance depends on the sophistication of investors in a country. While less sophisticated investors are persuaded by the great visibility and strategies of funds that are affiliated with large and established families, more sophisticated investors are not. Affiliation with a large family increases the convexity of the flow–performance relationship in countries where investors are less sophisticated, but decreases this convexity in countries with more sophisticated investors. These results are important for investors, mutual fund companies and regulators because the flow–performance sensitivity determines the assets under management, the level of fees, risk–taking, and the performance of the fund.


As supply voltage is reduced, a power constrained test clock can be sped up in spite of the increased delay of the circuit. However, a large reduction in voltage makes the operation structurally constrained, requiring the clock to slow down. We determine an optimum supply voltage that allows fastest clock speed for a given power limit. Examples show that the test time can be reduced by as much as 63% from the nominal voltage test time. In a typical application, this technique can reduce the cost of wafer sort.


The vertical profile of horizontal snow mass flux is a fundamental structure of drifting snow. It is widely recognized that most of drifting snow particles are transported within the saltation layer near the snow surface. However, little is clarified about the dependencies of the vertical mass flux profile in the saltation layer on conditions such as snow particle diameter, snow surface hardness, etc. In this study, cold wind-tunnel experiments were carried out to measure vertical profiles of mass flux for different particle diameters over hard snow surfaces. Compacted snow was sieved to make a flat snow bed on the floor of the wind-tunnel. The snow bed was left for a night to become hard enough, by sintering, not to be eroded by drifting snow particles. Mass flux measurements in drifting snow by a snow particle counter showed that mass flux at each particle diameter decreased exponentially with increasing height. Previous studies showed that saltation height decreased with increasing particle diameter over loose snow surfaces. On the contrary, present study showed that saltation height increased with increasing particle diameter over hard snow surfaces. This opposite dependence is probably due to differences in particle collision processes on the loose and hard snow surfaces.


ABSTRACT The profit performance of food chains over the last few years is reviewed. Poor performance is seen to have led to caution on one hand and a move to construct capital-intensive megastores on the other. Corporate decoupling, the handing over of marginal outlets to owner-managers who continue to buy merchandise from the former owner and also pay a licensing or franchising fee is recommended as an additional strategy appropriate in many cases.


Palm oil has become the world"s leading vegetable oil in terms of consumption and production with 45.3 million tons (t) produced worldwide in 2009. The biggest producer, with a 47.6% share in production in 2009, was Indonesia, followed by Malaysia (38.8%) and Thailand (2.9%). 1 Global production of palm oil and thus the plantation of oil palm have been increasing tremendously in the last decade with average annual growth rates of 9.7% between 1998 and 2008. 2 Palm oil is versatile in its uses in the food and chemical industry and increasingly as a feedstock for biofuels, which is another reason for the rising popularity of palm oil. Other factors include the increasing demand for vegetable oils in general and the comparably low prices of palm oil.


The report discusses experimental work. Based on the experiment, an approach is proposed that allows modeling the engine operating process. When designing industrial engines running on alternative fuels, measurement systems are used. They allow you to store information obtained during tests from various types of sensors and measuring systems. They process the information on implemented algorithms.


Provided is a light beam parallelism measuring device that is able to measure the parallelism of a light beam radiated from an incoherent light source, with few measurements. The light beam parallelism measuring device (1) has: a lens section (20), which forms an image of the light components contained in a light beam (9) at a location distant from an optical axis, K, by a distance of only L according to the angle of incidence, θ, with respect to the optical axis, K; and a two-dimensional detector (22), which detects the image formation position, P, of the light beam (9). The light beam parallelism measuring device (1) is equipped with an analyzer (12) that converts the distance, L, from the optical axis, K, to the image formation position, P, to the angle of incidence, θ, and which outputs the distribution of the angles of incidence of the light components contained in the light beam (9).


This study examines if intellectual capital influences the financial performance of banks listed in Bahrain by using data drawn from 18 banks listed in Bahrain Stock Exchange for a period of three years from 2005 to 2007. Pulic's Value Added Intellectual Coefficient (VAIC) is used as the efficiency measure of capital employed and intellectual capital. By using correlation and regression analysis, the results support the hypothesis that firms' intellectual capital has a positive impact on financial performance of banks listed in Bahrain. In addition, when it is classified into major components, it is found that there is a positive relationship between capital employed efficiency (CEE) and human capital efficiency (HCE) and banks` financial performance. On the other hand, empirical findings fail to find any strong association between structural capital efficiency (SCE) and financial performance of the banks listed in Bahrain. In general, empirical findings suggest the efforts to improve intellectual capital base of the banks listed in Bahrain still appear limited. Banks listed in Bahrain still appear to place greater weight on corporate performance based on physical capital assets. A possible policy implication of these findings from this study may be that policy makers may have to adjust or intensify initiatives to encourage greater acceptance and understanding of the concept of intellectual capital, and the development of related assets.


Abstract A comparison of the current status of measurement with that in 1981 when the predecessor of the Program Evaluation Standards was published reveals a number of changes, the most fundamental of which is the way in which we look at validity. The evolution of the changes made to validity is briefly traced beginning with Guilford (1946) and ending with the writings of Cronbach (1989), Messick (1989a), Kane (1992), and Shepard (1993). Pragmatic and continuous in nature, the validity inquiry process outlined in the Standards calls for the types of data and information identified by Cronbach (1971, 1989) and Messick (1989a). But, like Shepard (1993) and, to some degree, Kane (1992), the process is clearly focused in terms of the evaluation questions to be addressed. This close fit between what is called for in the Standards and what appears in the current literature is not surprising given the influence of this literature. Further, that the validity inquiry is clearly focused in terms of the evaluation q...


Qu Qiubai's research on new theory of Chinese revolution is not only very important to guiding the Communist Party to take the new way of revolution practically, but also greatly constructive to the consummation of Mao's new theory-seizing the rural area before capturing cities.


Aquaculture is a generic term that covers a wide variety of culture techniques and cultured species under different conditions and in different geographical localities. It is typically a littoral and rural activity, and is rapidly expanding. An assessment of available literature concerning the interaction of aquaculture and the environment was conducted using the Aquatic Science and Fisheries Abstract (ASFA) database from 1978 to December 1991, incorporating a variety of definitive key word strategies together with a classical search of the available literature. Of the 2692 references collected, 70% were made up of publications from the ASFA database, while 30% consisted of «grey» publications (i.e. Government reports, Working Group reports and publications not included in the ASFA database), The literature gleaned from the ASFA database tends to refer to specific interactions of environment and a given culture species in a given location, while the grey literature tends to deal with the broader implications. Most of the research focuses on the most commonly cultured species in developed Western countries. Consequently, information on extensive aquaculture is based on the interactions arising from cyprinid (12%), oyster (13%) and mussel culture (8%), while information on intensive culture is concerned mainly with trout culture in fresh water (20%) and salmonid culture in shallow marine localities (6%). There is a general lack of information on the waste output of commercial farming systems of marine finfish species new to the aquaculture industry and on their basic biological requirements in cultivation, as well as their environmental interactions. Other gaps in the literature relate to the discharge of chemicals into the environment and the effects on the immediate environs and adjacent ecosystems and the accidental or intentional release of cultured species


The software designed for the computer aided experiment of the laser holography is introduced in this paper.The main work is displaing of the displacement and processing of laser holography isoline interference fringes,including their acquiring,storing and thinning.Based on computer graphics technique,the image and operation interface can be displayed on computer's screen simultaneously.The system has good user's interface and can be be mastered and used easily.


This paper presents a deterministic approach to schedule patients in an ambulatory surgical center (ASC) such that the number of postanesthesia care unit nurses at the center is minimized. We formulate the patient scheduling problem as new variants of the no‐wait, two‐stage process shop scheduling problem and present computational complexity results for the new scheduling models. Also, we develop a tabu search‐based heuristic algorithm to solve the patient scheduling problem. Our algorithm is shown to be very effective in finding near optimal schedules on a set of real data from a university hospital's ASC. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2003


After the publication of the article, readers raised concerns about several aspects of the presentation as well as the methodological aspects of the study and the conclusions drawn. Follow-up with the authors and consultation with editorial board members, identified the following concerns: • The manuscript was copyedited on submission at the request of the editorial office yet language errors were reintroduced during the evaluation process. The quality of the language of the published article is not in line with the criteria for publication in the journal. • Fragments of text overlap with text from the "Hospital-acquired infection" entry on Wikipe-• Evidence that pathogens were detected in the samples is not sufficient. • Data from MG-RAST have not been validated, either via other bioinformatics methods or independent approaches such as PCR or culture. How the potential non-specificity in the matching to taxons was addressed is not clear. • For certain genera and species, metagenomics abundance is compared to CFU/mL. No information is provided on how the different species on the agar culture plate were counted or confirmed, or how the normalization steps in library preparation and sequencing were accounted for when measuring metagenomics abundance. • Whether the results for PhiX174 originate from library preparation or contamination from elsewhere is not reported. The human endogenous retroviruses that are reported are likely reads from the human genome and should be classified as such. • The accuracy of the taxonomic assignments for the metagenomics reads In Table 7 is unclear. Several of the bacteria listed should not be classified as pathogens. The Editors consider that the concerns outlined above compromise the integrity of the work and the validity of the conclusions reported and as a result retract this publication. an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.


In November 2002 a group of researchers in the field of restorative justice from 2 1 European countries met for the first time in Brussels. That was the start of the European Concerted Research Action "Restorative Justice Developments in Europe", the so-called COST-network on Restorative Justice, funded mainly through the 6th Framework Programme of the European Union and administered by the European Science Foundation. The proposer, Professor Ivo Aertsen, University of Leuven in Belgium, wrote in his proposal: Taking into consideration that the issue of victim-offender mediation and other restorative justice practices is an innovating area of research, not being covered explicitly by any other EU research programme, the establishment of a COST Action on restorative justice developments in Europe would be significant in order to provide scientific grounding and support for new and promising practices in the field of criminal justice and to further implement the EU policy decisions. The aim of this COST Action was "to enhance and deepen knowledge on theoretical and practical aspects of restorative justice in Europe, with a view to supporting implementation strategies in a scientifically sound way"l. One of the key strategies delineated in the Memorandum of Understanding was to develop an evidence base regarding current restorative justice practices in Europe. Restorative justice, in its various guises, promises a novel approach to dealing with the needs of offenders, victims and the wider community. Presently, knowledge regarding these initiatives is fragmented. Aertsen further wrote: More precisely, the Action is focused on analysing: * the process and the effects of victim-offender mediation and conferencing, * national recording systems, * national legislation in relation to victim-offender mediation, * the relation between criminal justice and restorative justice practices and agencies, * training models and the experience of training legal professionals in the restorative justice area * new restorative justice models and applications * theoretical concepts, approaches and frameworks on restorative justice This is precisely what we did in the next 4 years of work and cooperation. The network divided into three groups on Restorative Justice (R]): 1. Evaluatory Research; 2. Policy Oriented Research 3. Theoretical Research. In 2005, by the inspiration of two new research members who came from Israel, a fourth group was started by some of us on the issue of restorative justice in gross violence conflicts. It is the work of the group on evaluatory research which is reported in this special issue of the British Journal of Community Justice. The COST Action funds the meetings of the researchers, the travelling and the lodging but not funding of the research in itself and the time to meet: the researchers must organise themselves separately, which none of us have been capable of doing. We soon realised that our cooperation would partly be a voluntary initiative, based upon our free weekends and holidays. This restricted our opportunities for carrying out larger comparative studies. I encouraged everyone to carry on what s/he already were doing (and funded to do! ) and then use the group for what was individually useful. Some of us (including myself as a social anthropologist) would report on the world we see unfolding and peoples' images on and of this world and nothing else, whereas researchers from other fields have other approaches to ordering information and testing it. We tried to meet the different demands of our different methodological fields in a diversified attempt to use each others' skills and knowledges. During our work an event of profound historical significance took place with the accession of many eastern European countries to the European Union. Young eastern European researchers, who saw the importance to start cooperating with colleagues from south, central or north Europe, now had the opportunity to join our COST Action. …


When generating 3D maps with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), it is important for the mapping algorithm to have good coverage of the environment. It is also important, especially when planning paths for multiple agents, to have loop closures along each flight path and with other agents. Because multirotor UAVs are limited in flight time, the flight paths must be limited in length. Generating a good flight path to map a new environment can be difficult and tedious because of the free-form nature of a flight path. To solve this problem, we propose using a genetic algorithm designed to maximize total area coverage while minimizing flight time and enforcing sufficient loop closures. The natural ability of genetic algorithms to rapidly explore a design space is advantageous when solving complex free-form problems like path planning.


Chapter 1 1 Context and Critical Methodologies Chapter 2 2 Agent and Scene Chapter 3 3 Act: The Redemption of the Audience's Guilt Chapter 4 4 Purification and Redemption Chapter 5 5 Metaphoric Analysis Chapter 6 6 Evaluation of the Theory of Guilt-Purification-Redemption Chapter 7 7 Evaluation of "I Have a Dream" and Its Legacy Chapter 8 8 Conclusion Chapter 9 References Chapter 10 Index Chapter 11 About the Author


Paul Gilroy's The Black Atlantic challenged black nationalism's fixation with roots and exclusive ownership of cultural production, suggesting instead that black diasporic identity is the result of 'a process of movement and mediation […] more appropriately approached via the homonym routes'. The recordings of Concha Buika, born in Spain to Equatoguinean parents, expose deficiencies in Gilroy's thesis for a comprehension of the experiences of those Europeans born in Africa or to parents born there. Developing Gilroy's ship chronotope, I posit that Buika's musical inspirations and alliances are analogous to periods of leave. As the daughter of immigrants – rather than the descendent of slaves – Buika does not predicate her identity solely upon membership of a black diaspora; she also regularly draws on genres that originated in the land of her birth. I conclude my analysis of the issue of agency by reflecting on the extent to which material and other factors might influence Buika's work.


All the Letters to the Editor in this issue are in the same PostScript or PDF file. Contents Special relativity from Maxwell's Equations A M Beattie 72 Burnet Avenue, Burpham, Guildford GU1 1YF, UK Physics and its fans P Glaister Department of Mathematics, University of Reading, PO Box 220, Whiteknights, Reading RG6 2AX, UK


Onion skin is a waste produced in thousands of tons annually in the European Union. It is a rich natural source of flavonoids and its water extracts (as an environmentally friendly solvent) could be used as an antioxidant material for meat products. Therefore, antioxidant properties of onion skin water extracts (OSWEs) were tested on cooked pork patties. Pork patties were divided into five treatments: control (no antioxidant), 10 and 20% (w/w) of yellow OSWE, and 10 and 20% (w/w) of red OSWE. Antioxidant activity, total polyphenols, thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS), and sensory analysis were assessed. Patties with added antioxidants showed significantly (P < 0.05) higher antioxidant activity and total polyphenol content. Samples with OSWEs, after 5-day storage (5°C), had significantly (P < 0.05) lower TBARS values compared to control. Two main phenolic compounds were identified in OSWEs by liquid chromatography – mass spectrometry using electrospray ionisation in negative mode: quercetin (m/z 301) and quercetin monoglucoside (m/z 463). OSWEs demonstrated the potential to be used as a source of natural antioxidants with strong antioxidant activity in meat products.


Vertical profiles of solar and terrestrial radiative fluxes are key research needs for global climate change research. These fluxes are expected to change as radiatively active trace gases are emitted to the earth`s atmosphere as a consequence of energy production and industrial and other human activities. Models suggest that changes in the concentration of such gases will lead to radiative flux divergences that will produce global warming of the earth`s atmosphere. Direct measurements of the vertical variation of solar and terrestrial radiative fluxes that lead to these flux divergences have been largely unavailable because of the expense of making such measurements from airplanes. These measurements are needed to improve existing atmospheric radiative transfer models, especially under the cloudy conditions where the models have not been adequately tested. A tethered-balloon-borne Radiometric Sounding System has been developed at Pacific Northwest Laboratory to provide an inexpensive means of making routine vertical soundings of radiative fluxes in the earth`s atmospheric boundary layer to altitudes up to 1500 m above ground level. Such vertical soundings would supplement measurements being made from aircraft and towers. The key technical challenge in the design of the Radiometric Sounding System is to develop a means of keeping the radiometersmore » horizontal while the balloon ascends and descends in a turbulent atmospheric environment. This problem has been addressed by stabilizing a triangular radiometer-carrying platform that is carried on the tetherline of a balloon sounding system. The platform, carried 30 m or more below the balloon to reduce the balloon`s effect on the radiometric measurements, is leveled by two automatic control loops that activate motors, gears and pulleys when the platform is off-level. The sensitivity of the automatic control loops to oscillatory motions of various frequencies and amplitudes can be adjusted using filters.« less


O-H stretching vibrations of the two formic acid rotamers were studied using a static approach, based on calculation of th e corresponding 1D vibrational potential and subsequent solution of the vibrationa l Schrödinger equation, and with a dynamic approach, based on Born-Oppenheimer molecul ar dynamics simulations, followed by computation of partial autocorrelation functions and their subsequent Fourier transformation. All calculations were perfo rmed at second-order Møller-Plesset perturbation theory level, using the 6-311++G(3 df, pd) basis set for orbital expansion. Emphasis has been put on the usage of these results in the course of spectroscopic detection of this compound, with unique atmospheric chemistry significance, under realistic conditions.


In order to extract change information automatically from the different time remote sensing images and to ensure the efficiency,a new automatic extraction method which is combined with the object-oriented image analysis technology based on the decision tree is presented in this paper.This method uses the feature index and shape,spectral,texture of the image as a feature set to establish the decision tree model for automatic classification.Organize and analyze the synthesized attributes of image objects classified above,then use it as the decision rule to make classification the second time.We can bring about the automatic extraction of image change information by 'double classification' which is based on the object-oriented image analysis.This method offers a new thought for automatic extraction of change information from remote sensing images.


Modern broadcast audio production methods have a great legacy to live up to. For the last half a century broadcast audio has had a most useful production, transport and archiving system, analogue tape. Now that new technology has invaded the broadcast radio market, the author examines how digital audio systems have countered the in-built advantages of the old production format. The first digital audio workstations were well outside the budget of most radio productions. However, workstations such as SADiE are now common in the commercial and public sector and are used by producers and audio engineering specialists alike. Various methods have been devised to counter the immediacy of tape editing. Many systems are now able to load audio material onto the hard disk drive as a background operation. This allows pre-loading of material during the completion of a prior task or in more sophisticated editors the ability to start editing audio whilst still dubbing it into the machine. Some machines allow the use of audio compatible SCSI DAT drives which can upload audio at twice normal speed.


The mechanism of intensive venting pulverized coal to prevent coal burst was studied through laboratory tests and numerical simulation. The methods of determining the parameters such as the spacing and diameter of boreholes and controlling the coal burst were presented. It is found that the main functions of the spacing of boreholes for coal burst control is a function of borehole diameter,coal thickness,spill-over coefficient,is positive correlated with the spill-over coefficient or the borehole diameter,and is negative correlated with the coal seam thickness or the safe-raising deformability. The intensive venting pulverized coal applied at the stage of pre-depressurizing is to reduce the elastic modulus and raise the deformability and at the stage of relieving danger is to absorb the energy and increase the resistance. The ideas are applied to working front of number 1302 of Xinjulong Mine with a good result.


The degradation of the cross-linked cationic poly(amino acid)-glutaraldehyde (GA) hydrogels by some proteolytic enzymes has been investigated using lysine (Lys)- and ornithine (Orn)-containing homo- and copolypeptides. From the experimental results, the following findings were obtained. The polylysine (PLL)-glutaraldehyde (GA) gels are degraded by trypsin, but not by chymotrypsin and papain. Optimal conditions for degradation of the PLL-GA gels are trypsin units over 500, pH 7-11, 0.5-2 M salts, and higher reaction temperatures. A pH region below 5 and a salt concentration over 4 M inhibit trypsin activity toward the PLL-GA gels. Copoly(Lys 1 -Tyr 1 )-GA gels are degradable by trypsin, chymotrypsin, and even papain. Polyornithine (PLO) gels behave like PLL gels but exhibit no degradation by enzymes. Copoly(Lys 1 -Orn 1 ) gels are degradable by trypsin, suggesting potential for a controlled biodegradation. The results might offer some clues to the understanding of the degradation of natural protein adhesives.


In this article pre-conditions of origin and reasons of development of Ukrainian ware-house service's market have been determined, the modern state of ware-house economy of country has been analyzed. A market capacity has been appraised, his elements and structure have been determined, the dynamics of changes has been analyzed, correlation of ware–house power's demand and supply has been set, and the basic «players» of market (operators of logistic services) have been identified. In the article specific of Ukrainian ware–house economy and its problems have been defined. The prospects of development of this market's type and the factors of influence on market's growth have been considered. In the article the features of price policy in the segment of Ukrainian ware–house real estate as compared to the European countries have been determined.


Technologies of organization of educational process that helps pupils training to the Unified State Examination and the State total certification that give the possibility to pass final exams successfully are described in the article. Needs of allocation of elements of physical knowledge and kinds of activity which should be acquired during studying of concrete subjects of physics school course are also proved


The clinical, radiological, electrocardiographic and haemodynamic features of the 45 patients undergoing closure of atrial septal defects at the University Hospital of the West Indies from 1968 to 1978 were reviewed and found to be similar to those reported from other centres. Surgical treatment was effected with acceptable operative mortality and morbidity and good long-term functional results (AU)


This research conducts a cost-benefit analysis of the implementation of lean logistics to the repair of aircraft structural components at the Air Force Material Command's (AFMC) Warner Robins Air Logistics Center (WR-ALC). A literature review identifies new business practices in the automotive industry, collectively 'termed "lean production," that were translated by the RAND Corporation into a modified Air Force logistics system-the "lean logistics" model. Theoretical costs and benefits from the lean logistics model are translated into empirical costs and benefits associated with aircraft structural repair. The cost-benefit analysis results clearly demonstrate that express distribution costs for the sizable aircraft structural components significantly contribute to costs exceeding benefits for this specific depot logistics subsystem process.


Commercial chick starter diets containing 4 ppm Hg added as mercuric chloride or 5 ppm Hg added as methylmercuric chloride were fed to chicks starting at 1 day of age and continuing for 4 wk. The intracellular and total mercury levels of liver and kidney from birds fed each diet and the effects of treatments with NaOH, with HCl, with perchloric acid, and with ammonium sulfate and of dialysis on protein-bound cytoplasmic methylmercury were determined. Livers and kidneys from chicks fed mercuric chloride contained three times more mercury than the control, whereas those from chicks fed methylmercuric chloride contained 15 times greater concentrations than controls. The microsomes and cytoplasm from chicks fed all diets contained approximately 5 and 55% of the total tissue mercury, respectively. Dialysis of kidney cytoplasm removed 50% of the total mercury. No appreciable dissociation of an ammonium sulfate-precipitated protein–mercury complex occurred when this was dissolved in water and treated with ammoni...


Defines racism and traces its usage. Looks at the roots of racist attitudes towards Maori in NZ, and racist immigration policies. Distinguishes personal, institutional and aversive racism. Describes the function of the Race Relations Office.


Although the Born-von Karman treatment of the dynamics of crystal lattices is superior to that of Debye, the conABSTRACTS tinuum model of Debye is more amenable to computation; therefore the Debye treatment is used to obtain frequencies at a maximum energy. From the classic Hamiltonian of the solid, quantization is carried out by the Schroedinger method. The thermodymamic functions are obtained, and the mean square displacement is derived. (J.S.R.)


This paper presents a feasibility study of glass tempering using mist cooling. First, transient tests of mist cooling were conducted to investigate the effects of the thermal properties of cooling surface. To do this, test plates were made of silver, nickel, stainless steel (SUS304), and fused quartz. The experimental conditions of mist flow were as follows : the air velocity was Va=20 m/s, the temperature of the water droplets Tl=21°C, and the volumetric-droplet-flow-rate D=0.0003-0.01m3/m2s. The experimental data show that both the plate temperature corresponding to the minimum heat flux (TM) and the heat transfer coefficients at wall temperatures above TM increase for decreasing thermal conductance of the surface material. Second, tempering tests of soda-lime glass plates of 2.95 and 3.90 mm thicknesses were conducted using mist cooling. The initial temperature of glass plates was about 690°C. The plates were cooled only from one side. Test results indicate that thin and low-cost tempered glass plates can be made by mist cooling without fracture.


In the article the author analyzes the problems of crime qualification provided by the Article 300 of Russian Federation Criminal Code. The major attention is paid to interpretation complexity of some parts of crime structure, passed in the disposition of specified article of Russian Federation Criminal Code because they combine criminal and procedural definitions.


Significance
 He also announced a constitutional reform process, without elaborating. Mirzioyev was returned to office on October 24 in a carefully choreographed competition without genuine opponents. Since coming to power in 2016, he has pursued an ambitious reform agenda, but this is confined to economic and administrative changes designed to create a more prosperous society that supports the old political system.

 Impacts
 Mirzioyev will build Uzbekistan's reputation as an impartial mediator with the Afghan Taliban.
 Uzbekistan will capitalise on friendlier ties with all its Central Asian neighbours.
 Moscow will continue courting Uzbek accession to its regional economic and security blocs.


In sociology it has been much debated whether the normativist-culturalist or the rational choice perspective better explains social phenomena. Since each has received considerable empirical support, an integrated account of norms and rationality is much needed. The Model of Frame Selection offers such an integration. In this model, cost-benefit calculus is replaced by unconditional norm conformity if norms are strongly internalized. We test this proposition in three fields of application: the rescue of Jews in WWII, electoral participation, and the decision among secondary school tracks. In line with the predictions of the Model of Frame Selection we find that strong helping norms, intense norms of civic duty, and high educational aspirations lead actors to disregard the risk of helping Jews, the incentive to express political preferences, and the prospects to complete school tracks.


Diels-Alder cycloaddition of an appropriately substituted 1,4-oxizin-2-one with vinylene carbonate followed by the chemical manipulation of the bridged bicyclic lactone cycloadduct affords a heavily functionalised azasugar ring.


In multivariate data analysis, it is often important to estimate a graph characterizing dependence among (p) variables. A popular strategy uses the non-zero entries in a (p\times p) covariance or precision matrix, typically requiring restrictive modeling assumptions for accurate graph recovery. To improve model robustness, we instead focus on estimating the {\em backbone} of the dependence graph. We use a spanning tree likelihood, based on a minimalist graphical model that is purposely overly-simplified. Taking a Bayesian approach, we place a prior on the space of trees and quantify uncertainty in the graphical model. In both theory and experiments, we show that this model does not require the population graph to be a spanning tree or the covariance to satisfy assumptions beyond positive-definiteness. The model accurately recovers the backbone of the population graph at a rate competitive with existing approaches but with better robustness. We show combinatorial properties of the spanning tree, which may be of independent interest, and develop an efficient Gibbs sampler for Bayesian inference. Analyzing electroencephalography data using a Hidden Markov Model with each latent state modeled by a spanning tree, we show that results are much more interpretable compared with popular alternatives.


In this proposal we describe our intent to build a directional hearing aid under the guidance of Professor Erik Cheever and E. Carr Everbach. Currently, there is a need for reliable and effective hearing aid designs and we will attempt to implement one given our undergraduate background in engineering. This project will demonstrate our interdisciplinary education at Swarthmore College through the construction of a directional hearing aid. This senior project will serve mainly as an educational demonstration of sound engineering principles and practice. Introduction The unavoidable presence of hearing loss and other aural impairments presents an opportunity for engineers to conceive solutions to benefit that segment of the population. In the past, many solutions have been implemented in analog circuitry. In 2003, Emily Eddy developed such a prototype that allows the wearer to receive more audibility in the direction she faces. Our goal is to further the design in a digital landscape that has several advantages over its analog equivalent, ultimately increasing the functionality of the device. This project is concerned with the robust design and implementation of a digital directional hearing aid. This proposal begins with a technical discussion of the underlying theory, processes, and benefits behind the device. It highlights the project progression and decisions made in the implementation. The project plan subsection further illustrates the proposed tasks in detail, and provides a timeline for anticipated completion. This is organized in the Critical Path Method (CPM) of project planning. The authors then list the relevant qualifications needed for a successful project completion. Finally a summary of required parts and their costs are provided. Technical Discussion Hearing loss impairment has long affected many people of all ages. Without sufficient hearing, people lose a valuable sense that can negatively affect their daily experiences. Examples include the exclusion from active family conversations, symphonic experiences, and limited awareness of surroundings. Thus the development of affordable and, more importantly, effective hearing aids is essential. First, one must have a sophisticated understanding of hearing perception and the effects at play in hearing loss. The frequency range of normal human hearing roughly spans from 20 to 20,000 Hertz. When one suffers from hearing loss, tiny hair follicles in the ear canal wear away, and decrease the upper end before the lower end of that range. This is typical of elderly people exhibiting normal hearing loss from increasing age.


We present optical spectroscopy of EX Hya during its 1991 outburst. This outburst is characterized by strong irradiation of the front face of the secondary star by the white dwarf, an overflowing stream which is seen strongly in He II λ 4686 and by a dip in the light curves, which extends from 0.1 to 0.6 in the binary and spin phases. Strong irradiation of the accretion curtain and that of the inner regions of the disc led to strong emission of He II λ 4686 and to the suppression of the Hy and Hβ emission. Disc overflow was observed in quiescence in earlier studies, where the overflow stream material was modulated at high velocities close to 1000 km s- 1 . In outburst, the overflowing material is modulated at even higher velocities (∼1500 km s -1 ). These are streaming velocities down the field lines close to the white dwarf. Evidence for material collecting near the outer edge of the disc and corotating with the accretion curtain was observed. In decline, this material and the accretion curtain obscured almost all the emission near binary phase 0.4, causing a dip. The dip minimum nearly corresponds with spin pulse minimum. This has provided additional evidence for an extended accretion curtain, and for the corotation of material with the accretion curtain at the outer edge of the disc. From these observations we suggest that a mechanism similar to that of Spruit and Taam, where outbursts result due to the storage and release of matter outside the magnetosphere, triggers the outbursts of EX Hya. This is followed by the irradiation of the secondary star due to accretion induced radiation.


With the number of cores increase in systems-on-chip (SoC), bus-based approach began facing challenges to support internal communication. An alternative that has been explored is the network-on-chip (NoC), an approach that proposes to use common network knowledge on SoC projects internal communication. The standards non-adoption in the NoC components development however has delayed its wide diffusion. This paper focuses on providing a complete NoC architecture, configurable and customizable following the Ethernet standard. The three NoC basic modules, Network Adapter (NA), Link and Switch, are implemented. The results were obtained using a Stratix IV FPGA. The evaluation metrics used for NoC validation are silicon area and latency. The experiment using two NAs, two cores and one Switch needed 7310 FPGA ALUTs which corresponds to 4% of their logical resources. The Ethernet frame (64 Bytes) transmission spent 422 clock cycles on FPGA.


THE difficulties in consistently prolonging survival after orthotopic liver transplantation have been documented by us1 and by Calne.2 In this report we describe a new trial of orthotopic liver tra...


The time-dependent behavior of soft rock is very important in tunnel construction through soft rock. There is always a chance of creep failure due to sustained loading along the crest of the tunnel. In this research, a three-component elasto-visco-plastic framework is used to develop a time-dependent double hardening model to predict the behavior of soft rock both in compression and shear. Due to the limitation of time-dependent single yield hardening model in predicting the behavior of soft rock in compression direction (volumetric deformation) of loading, another time-dependent yield surface is added to the compression direction. The intersection of two-yield surface usually gives rise to singularity phenomenon, which is avoided by using Koiter's generalization principle. A new formulation of the stress-integration of incremental stress-strain equations is proposed. A series of triaxial compression tests were carried out at different strain rates to calculate the model parameters. Then, the model is used to simulate the various behavioral features of soft rock.


Few would disagree with the opinion stated in the preface of this book that "although a sound knowledge of the facts is essential, a good doctor differs from a bad doctor more by his attitude and craftsmanship than by his knowledge." Most often patient dissatisfaction stems from the uncaring and unsympathetic approach of the doctor rather than from deficiencies in his medical knowledge. Yet, until recently, few textbooks have attempted to modify the doctor's behaviour during the consultation. Those that have, have concentrated mainly on doctors' decision making skills and have indicated how lessons may be learnt from the analysis of audio and video records of interviews with patients. Proper Doctoring is based on its author's many years of clinical experience as consultant physician in a London teaching hospital: it aims at clarifying and modifying the attitudes of doctors to what they do. The enthusiasm with which Dr Mendel has approached this difficult task is clearly reflected in the pages of his book, yet I remain sceptical about the extent to which he will achieve his aims. For no matter how honestly and courageously one exposes one's own attitudes, this in itself is unlikely to lead to modifications in the attitudes of others. It takes more than reading a book to change a doctor's behaviour, and telling what and what not to do is not the best technique for helping young doctors to acquire the important skills that will help them to be more sensitive to the needs of their patients. I found the patronising style of Proper Doctoring irritating, and I resented having views thrust at me in such a dogmatic way-and especially views on issues that will ever remain grey rather than black and white. For me, this is a book about striking attitudes rather than analysing them. Throughout the doctor is urged to be emotionless and coldly efficient: to prepare for his role in the consulting room as the actor does for his on stage. This, like much in the book, made me feel uncomfortable, for the doctor's relationship with the patient is not a charade; it is not role play. The drama of the consulting room is for real; the emotions that we feel in trying to help our patients are true ones. We lose a great deal if they pass us by unrecognised, hidden away behind a mask of clinical aloofness. Surely the ability to recognise and to use one's feelings for each patient is a skill to be developed, for such feelings can be important clinical signs-clues that may help plan future care. The view that doctor knows best pervades the book and is underlined by the concept of knowledge flowing down a concentration gradient from doctor to patient. The suggestion is made that a great deal of what doctors do depends on illusion, and that such illusion should be maintained, since patients depend on it. Yet perhaps the doctor's dependency on illusion is the greater one, and possibly in the end it is he who may be deceived most by it. I read Proper Doctoring shortly after Sir John Nabarro's leading article on "Unrecognised psychiatric illness in medical patients" was published (15 September, p 635). In the correspondence that followed (6 October, p 918) Peter Tomson suggested that the teaching of medical students inhibits their natural ability to converse. Dr Mendel's book suggests to me how this might come about, for he places considerable emphasis on "patient handling," on asking questions, and on history taking. The patient is seen as a problem rather than a person; it is the doctor's job to find out what is wrong and to tell his patient what to do about it. The patient's ideas of what might be wrong, and how he could best be helped, are given little credence. During vocational training for general practice, much time and effort has to be spent in helping young doctors to adopt a more patient centred approach to their behaviour during the consultation and to be sensitive to the ways people feel and to the more covert forms of their communications. It is never too early in a medical career to develop such an approach to the consultation. Indeed, many of the skills are more easily acquired in the first medical student days. The attributes for effective patient centred consulting are best learnt by analysing, with a small group of peers, one's own performance with real patients or role playing patients, if possible with audio or video recorded consultations. Books on the subject can be seen only as adjuncts to such critical self review; changes in attitudes are more easily brought about by working in small groups. The activities of some groups wax and wane-some get stuck and are uncertain in which direction to move forward. Proper Doctonrng is a book that should jerk such a group into life very quickly indeed, for it is a book about which it is difficult to feel neutral. WILLIAM STYLES


A convenient synthesis of 6H-1-benzopyrano[4,3-b]quinolin-6-one derivatives was reported using 4-chloro-2-oxo-2H-chromene-3-carbaldehyde with different aromatic amines using silica sulfuric acid. The compounds were tested for their anticancer activity against colon (HCT-116 and S1-MI-80), prostate (PC3 and DU-145), breast (MCF-7 and MDAMB-231) cancer cells. These com-pounds showed more selectivity and potent cytotoxic activity against colon cancer cells. 3c was tested against five other colon cancer cell lines (HT-29, HCT-15, LS-180, LS-174, and LoVo), which had similar cytotoxicity and selectivity. 3c did not induce PXR-regulated ABCB1 or ABCG2 transporters. In fact, 3c induced cytotoxicity in HEK293 cells over expressing ABCB1 or ABCG2 to the same extent as in normal HEK293 cells. It was cytotoxic approximately 3- and 5-fold to resistant colon carcinoma S1-MI-80 cells. 3c also produced concentration-dependent changes in HCT-116 colon cancer cells, in mitochondrial membrane potential, leading to apoptosis, and sub-micromolar concentrations caused chromosomal DNA fragmentation.