Performance Management practices are significant in the assessment of the total production by an organization. It is critical to evaluate each employee's skills and knowledge, to secure increased productivity in the work place that reverberates to achieve organizational goals. Similarly, the feedback for performance of employee is significant in learning as well as ensuring that the employees understand the required standards, as compared to his or her performance. This study assessed the effect of performance management practices on employee productivity at the State department of Labour. The performance management practices were comprised of employee's appraisal as well as provision of feedback on employee's performance. The study undertook a descriptive research design, where primary data was collected through structured questionnaires on the targeted population of middle and lower level employees. A population of 278 respondents was identified and random stratified sampling was undertaken to come up with a sample size of 68 respondents. 46 questionnaires were answered and returned, which comprised of 67.6% response rate. Data analysis was done by the use of mean, percentages, standard deviation and regression analysis where the effect of independent variables; employee appraisal, and employee performance feedback was determined on employee productivity. The study found that there was a strong positive correlation of both employee appraisal and employees performance feedback on employee productivity. The study therefore recommended that organizations to undertake both appraisal for their employees as well as offer feedback on their performance as it increased the productivity of the employees. 1.1 Background of the Study Performance management entails actions that ensure that the firm's goals are achieved constantly in an efficient and valuable way. Fowler (1990) observes that management of performance ensures that a firm is in a position to attain the best outcome. On the other hand The Institute of Personnel Management (2002)undertakes performance management as an approach that relate to many organizations' activities, positioned in the framework of procedures, traditions, style and system of communication of the human resource . Baron and Armstrong (2007) viewed performance management as a process that involved a decisive approach that help in improving the firms productivity and employees by uplifting employee performance through teamwork and personal capabilities. There are people who argue that by using performance management practices that involves recruitment of employees, training and developing them, employee's appraisal and developing a feedback system can increase the knowledge, skills and the capability of a firms employee meanwhile enhancing their motivation, cutting down malingering and improving maintenance of top performing employees and their productivity. Productivity measure the workers efficiency, it can be determined by the results that employee gives at certain duration of time. Normally, certain employee productivity is measured in relation to results expected if an average employee undertook a similar task. Since achievement of a firm is seen though it work force, productivity of employees is of much concern to any business to assess therefore performance management in any given way check on how individuals are motivated and to what level are they of use to a firm. This research is going to have a clearer view of employees' appraisal and feedback on production. The goal setting and the expectancy theory influences this study. Edwin Lock, the founder of this theory said that when a firm or individual sets difficult goals, there is a better performance. There is always a decrease in performance of an individual and a firm when performance goals are easy to achieve (Lock & Latham 2006). This theory developed in a study of psychology of a firm. Organizations goals and aids in improvement of an action plan which intended to help individuals and firms. Therefore, this assists in creating an important element of individual development and literature management. It is also clear that setting of goals increases the productivity in a firm as the theory of goal setting entails all aspect of having efficient firm (Koppes, 2014). ISSN 2162-1357 (Print), 2162-1381 (Online) ©Center for Promoting Ideas, USA www.ijbhtnet.com 21 Expectancy theory on the other hand was based through the works of Vroom (1965) where he suggested that people conduct themselves in a certain way since they are motivated by desirable outcomes. The performance of an individual need to be aligned to his/her personal goals by the firm in order to enhance success for the organization (Salamanet al. 2005). The motivation that makes someone to conduct him/herself in a certain way over the forms of conduct is purely because of personal goals, or individual expectations. This expectation concerns their preferred behavior (Oliver 1974; Salaman et al 2005). The reorganization of government in May 2016 necessitated the establishment of the State Department of Labour, which stemmed from the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection. Prior to the establishment of the department, it existed in various forms since the independence of the country in 1963; the two ministries that hosted the department were Ministry of East African Community and the ministry of Labour and Social Services. The main goal for the state department of Labour is to ensure that the country has attained economic development through the promotion of harmonious industrial relations, ensures that there is strict adherence to safety and health standards at the work places; industrial training; planning for human resource development and utilization, productivity management, as well as registration and regulation of trade unions. The State department of Labour has five technical departments that assist in implementation of goals and objectives. There are a number of bodies allied to the state department that are vital in execution of duties for the ministry. Autonomous Government Agency (AGA), The National Social Security Fund (NSSF), National Industrial Training Authority (NITA) and National Employment Authority (NEA), National Labour Board and National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (NACOSH) (State Department for Labour, 2019). The strategic objective of this department is to encourage a balanced industrial labour relation, social dialogue and labour practices, which are fair, and the second objective is to promote the basic values and rights at work. The department vision is to ensure it is the leading organization in the promotion of good work for everyone, its mission is to plan, direct and put into practice sound labour and employment guidelines for the achievement of social justice, business peace, and ensuring there is a good environment for creation of employment. The state department of labour ensures that everyone is in a working environment that is free from any sexual harassment, no employment discrimination by ensuring that labour officers encourage equality of chance, no assistance will be needed in recruiting, good employee remuneration, therefore this promote high employee productivity (Baron& Armstrong, 2004). 1.1.1 Performance Management Practices Performance management practices are systematic ways of communicating to employees on what performance and productivity parameters are expected of them (Marsor, 2011). In different studies conducted by Bead well (2007) and thereafter another study conducted by Jackson (2009), they envisioned performance management as activities such as knowing what goals are and how they should be measured, performance evaluation, performance feedback, incentivebased performance, planning of career, motivation, training and development. The attributes of defining measurable individual goals for employees, performance appraisal, feedback, incentives tagged to performance, planning as well as motivation and training and development. There are put in place so as to provide better outcome by having a better knowledge and management of various performances by employees as compared to the set goals. These goals and objectives offer direction, control, encourage and examine personal performance. This improves the choosing of goals that are precise, achievable, as well as goals owned by the employees. In order for employees to own these goals, then the organizational goals aligned to the employees' individual goals. This reduces conflicts in the organization and increases the speed with which the organizational goal are achieved (Armstrong, 2008). Appraisal of employees is vital as it helps in identifying individual contribution towards achievement of organizational goals and the strength as well as the weakness of individual employees. It therefore creates an avenue that makes it possible to focus on improving employees' weaknesses and encouraging the development of employees' strengths. Appraisal is also important as it provides a platform that can be used to reward employees depending on individual contribution towards achievement of the organizational goals. A study presented by Bloom et al. (2017) on improving employee performance through appraisal and coaching; concluded that only through strong and effective management practices being in place is when the organization is able to replicate some code of conduct and harmonize on the diversity of their work force. In relation to the culture, social status, economic position, region and diversity as evidenced in multinational firms and large corporations. Feedback is the reflection on past performance against the objectives set and results given by the supervisor or manager to the employee. It is the process by which managers as well as the supervisors have the opportunity to reflect on the performance by employees, discuss the gains as well as the shortfalls, and avail


Bachelor work is focused on problems of homelessness, description sanctuary home, their morage in The Law about social servicers. The work further describes division haven houses. Independet chapter is devoted to description servises, which are offered in sanctuary home. The work is related to low - treshold daily centres, dormitories and The Association of sanctuary home. Research in practical part have to do with findings socio - demographic analyses of havens houses clients living in these houses and also finds offers of suitable employment for these men.


The feasibility study of iron ore concentrate pipeline transportation of an iron ore mine in Xinjiang province is explained which is referential to similar mines.


The commercialization of sports events can not be separated from sponsorship,in order to attract sponsors,the interests of sponsors is needed to be protected.By the principle of exclusivity in the major sports events sponsorship deal,sponsors can enjoy exclusive market development in the exclusive rights.Combining with analysis of major sports events sponsorship deal,exclusive and relevant concept,the meaning and features of exclusive right in major sports events sponsorship deal were analyzed.In accordance with the rights of the constituent elements,the constituent elements(including the subject,object and content) of the exclusive rights of were studied.Finally,based on studying the source of exclusive rights,the status of right and the legal effect of exclusive rights,the strategies to protect the exclusive rights were proposed in order to protect the sponsors' interest and promote sport sponsor and sport development..


This coat-antibody-count PAP IRMA is a solid-phase immunoradiometric assay based on two strains of monoclonal antibodies, designed for the quantitative measurement of prostatic acid phosphatase(PAP) in serum. The minimal detectable concentration is 0. 1 μg/L. The intra and inter coefficients of variation are 8. 8%-9. 6% and 7. 7%-12. 3%, respectively. The recovery is 96. 3%-105. 0% and the range of detection is 2. 5 - 200. 0μg/L.


The purpose of this thesis is to establish what specific forces influence whether or not a democratic setback within one nation will diffuse to peripheral states. Past studies devoted to this topic have largely suggested that diffusion essentially functions like a contagious disease, where the likelihood of "infection" is primarily based upon the level of interaction between states. This thesis however proposes that the interaction of the signal generated from a democratic state's collapse and the receptiveness of neighboring nations to this signal ultimately determines when and where diffusion will occur. In order to test the validity of this thesis' claims, the level of democracy within the neighboring states of all failed democratic governments spanning the years 1842-2002 are examined during the first years following such system breakdowns within a large-N quantitative research design. Ultimately this study leads to the conclusion that the interaction of signals and receptivity play a major role in the diffusion of democratic setbacks.


The European Union is currently in the process or re-elaborating consumer protection legislation and moving towards some degree of harmonization of the rules of Contract Law that would govern economic transactions {including, and probably most particularly, consumer transactionsacross European borders. Legal scholars are hotly debating the constitutional {in the EC Treatiesbasis for such processes, and also the legal status and the content of the bodies of rules that would � = �


Process descriptions are used to create products and deliver services. To lead better processes and services, the first step is to learn a process model. Process discovery is such a technique which can automatically extract process models from event logs. Although various discovery techniques have been proposed, they focus on either constructing formal models which are very powerful but complex, or creating informal models which are intuitive but lack semantics. In this work, we introduce a novel method that returns hybrid process models to bridge this gap. Moreover, to cope with today's big event logs, we propose an efficient method, called f-HMD, aims at scalable hybrid model discovery in a cloud computing environment. We present the detailed implementation of our approach over the Spark framework, and our experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method is efficient and scalable.


This paper deals with the chemical preparation and magnetic characterization of nanoparticles of magnetite. A new hydrothermal synthesis of magnetite is adopted to prepare samples with different particle sizes and magnetic measurements are performed in two different laboratories adopting two different measurement methods. The saturation region is investigated by a vibrating sample magnetometer, while the behavior of minor cycles is mainly studied via an inductive method. An investigation is carried out on the magnetic behavior of a commercial magnetite together to an analysis of its crystal structure by X-Ray diffraction method and TEM micrographs. Some critical aspects relevant to the characterization of nanopowders by the two measurement methods are discussed throughout the paper.


To know the effect of trabeculectomy on controlling intraocular pressure (IOP) and thus glaucoma progression and the final visual outcome of the patient. A descriptive study of trabeculectomies performed for different types of glaucoma, during a period of three years (from Jan 2000 to December 2002) in Eye unit LRH, Peshawar was carried out. Trabeculectomies performed on all ages were included. A proforma was made showing name, age, sex file number and diagnosis. preoperative and postoperative visual acuity and IOP. recorded. Any postoperative complication was also noted. The use of Mitomycin C was also noted which was restricted only to failed trabeculectomy and younger patietns. Trabeculectomy is still one of the most used approaches for surgical reduction of IOP. Primary trabeculectomy is a better method for cases in which a larger redcution in IOP is the aim of the treatment, especially in glaucoma patients who can not afford costly medicines, having poor compliance and still having high IOP despite maximum tolerable and glucoma medication.


The coelenterates have been extensively investigated for biological activity, especially the order Alcyonacea (Soft corals) and Gorgonacea. Although many chemical studies on the Pennatulacea order (Sea pens) have been carried out, the Veretillidae family has been comparatively little investigated (1). The metabolites that have been isolated from Sea pens are all diterpenes (2). In the course of our sUIVey on physiologically active substances (3-4) in marine organisms, we found that certain Sea pen members (§) contain potentially important antineoplastic constituents. We now have isolated three new 21-membered-ring lactones l, Zand J., named Lituarines A, B, and C, from extracts of the New Caledonian Sea pen : Lituaria australasiae . As Lituarines could not be obtained in crystalline state suitable for X-ray crystal structure determination, unequivocal assignment of structures l, Zand J. was perfonned by ID and 2D 1H and BC NMR studies. NMR multipulse sequences used were COSY, TOCSY, NOESY, ROESY and DEPT. Lituarines are the first macrocyclic lactones with two fused tetrahydropyran rings reported from marine sources.


Jaron loves music, but he is scared of his piano teacher, Miss Thackery, who never smiles. Then one day, Jaron arrives for his piano lesson, and finds Miss Thackery trembling with fear at the sight of a bee in her apartment. He helps her, and finds that Miss Thackery isnt so frightening after all.


The paper is devoted to the concept of a priori and a priori knowledge within the framework of the classical model of science proposed for conducting research on the history of concepts, and in particular, the concept of "science" by digital humanities [de Jong, Betti, 2010]. In the first part of the article, I refer to the concept of model and (1) consider the classical model of science in terms of its heuristic potential for philosophical (and in particular, epistemological) research, and (2) define the main structural parts of the model for studying the concept a priori. In the second part, I consider the theoretical aspects of the classical model science in the context of a priori functional and historical concepts and the possibility of its adaptation to the analysis of the a priori in the history of science In the third part I propose a possible model for research of a priori in the classical model of science in two aspects: (1) a priori as universal principles underlying all sciences and (2) a priori as a set of propositions for a specific scientific discipline.


Abstract : Significant changes in political, security and economic affairs are taking place in Europe. They will have tremendous influence on the future order in this part of the world. Europe is especially discussing a new cooperative security structure. This study is designed to provide a overview of possible developments of the OSCE, its functions, and consider its future as Europe moves into the XXI Century. It does not deal with the historical and political background of CSCS and OSCE.


Delamination is recognized as one of the most critical defects that can result from the machining of composites. Delamination is a major problem associated with drilling fiberreinforced composite materials that, in addition to reducing the structural integrity of the material, also results in poor assembly tolerance and has the potential for long-term performance deterioration. Delamination due to drilling has been a major research for many years and a considerable amount of work has been done to reduce it. This thesis work has involved the determination of different factors affecting the hole quality and cause of delamination in a glass fiber reinforced plastic. The various process parameters like different twist drill bits of different point angle and different materials have been taken. The thrust forces and torque were measured for different machining conditions. The piezoelectric dynamometer has been used for measuring thrust forces and torque on varying the feed rate, speed, point angle and drill materials. The different materials of drill bit has been used like Tungsten carbide, High speed steel and M50(high speed steel) The optimum value has been determined with the help of main effect plot and ANOVA Tables to findout which parameter has affected most for increasing thrust force and torque. The mathematical modeling has been carried out sing Minitab 15 software and different models has been analysed with help of the taguchi design using orthogonal array. The Universal microscope has been used which determines delaminated diameter in GFRP specimens. The finite element method has been done by applied using Ansys11.0 software which helped to find out delaminated diameter with different control factors like point angle, drill material etc. The failure criteria has been applied in ansys software for finding delamination occurring glass fiber composite around the drilled holes.


Introduction. The Romanian verb can be accompanied by a number of morphemes which stack to its left, cf. (1). These morphemes do not bear primary stress and may be optionally reduced in fast speech. Pre-verbal pronominals, however, are obligatorily reduced in certain environments, regardless of speech rate. The resulting alternations in their surface forms have been analyzed as allomorphy (Barbu 1998) conditioned by the morphosyntactic status of each morpheme (Monachesi 2005), or as the result of clitic-specific phonological constraints (Popescu 2000). I argue for a more general analysis that derives these patterns from independently motivated phonological processes of Romanian. Descriptive generalizations. Pre-verbal pronominals are unlike other pre-verbal particles in their rich patterns of alternation. I summarize these patterns in A-C. A. Hiatus resolution: 1SG.ACC pronoun mʌ (2a) undergoes ʌ deletion before a vowel-initial auxiliary in (2b); 1PL.ACC pronoun ne (2c) forms a diphthong [e̯ a] with the vowel-initial auxiliary in (2d); B. High-vowel reduction: 1SG.DAT pronoun mi (shown before a consonant-initial pronominal in (3a)) surfaces as [mj] before vowel-initial pronominals and auxiliaries (3b), and [m j ] elsewhere (3c); C. ɨ insertion: 1SG.DAT mi (3a) surfaces as [ɨm j ] when not followed by a pronominal or auxiliary (3c). Analysis. Popescu's analysis appeals to clitic-specific constraints of structural economy and syllable markedness to derive patterns A-C. In contrast, I propose that these patterns are predictable from the general phonological grammar of Romanian. The relevant phonological processes are: i) word-internal hiatus resolution, whereby a vowel is deleted or diphthongizes when followed by another vowel. Thus, the feminine desinence /ʌ/ (4a) is deleted before the affixal definite article /a/ (4b), while the feminine desinence /e/ (4c) diphthongizes in the same environment (4d). This parallels the process in A. It follows that both i) and A. can be subsumed under a general constraint *HIATUS. ii) word-final high-vowel reduction, whereby the plural marker /i/ surfaces as a glide after a vowel (4e), as palatalization after a consonant (4f), or as a full vowel (4g). This is the same process as in B and can be captured by a constraint *V[+HIGH])PWORD. Crucially, the domain of both i) and ii) is the Prosodic Word (Chitoran 2002). This strongly suggests a prosodic constituent in the pre-verbal complex: the pronominals form a Prosodic Word with a following auxiliary, which adjoins to the PWord of its verbal host (see (5a-c)). Establishing this pre-verbal PWord further enables us to account …


We study the notion of class refinement in a concurrent object-oriented setting. Classes, defining attributes and methods, serve as templates for creating objects. For expressing concurrency, actions are added to classes and methods with guards are considered. A class can be defined by inheriting from a given class. Class refinement is defined to support algorithmic refinement, data refinement, and atomicity refinement. Behavioral class refinement is defined in terms of trace refinement of action systems. A simulation-based proof rule for class refinement using a refinement relation is given. The special case of atomicity refinement by early returns is considered. The use of the class refinement rule is illustrated by examples.


In this work, new customized heat treatments for selective laser melted (SLM) parts in IN718 alloy were analyzed. This was done through the evaluation of the mechanical properties and advanced characterization of the phases and microstructure obtained in as-built condition and after the application of standard and tailored heat treatments. The microstructure and mechanical properties were compared and discussed with results reported in the literature. Finally, strengthening mechanisms of IN718 alloy processed by SLM and its differences with mechanisms that occur in investment casting were analyzed. Both processes generate quite different microstructures, investment casting is composed mainly by a dendritic structure, and SLM is characterized by columnar and cellular structures with very thin cells. Due to the fine and homogeneous microstructure obtained from SLM processing and its specific strengthening mechanisms, it is not necessary to apply homogenization and solution stages as in standard heat treatment used for this type of alloy in casting or wrought. The pre-heating and process parameters selected, in combination with a direct stepped aging (at 720 °C/620 °C), provide the material with its best mechanical properties, which are superior to those obtained by standard heat treatment (AMS 5383F) applied to investment casting of IN718 alloy.


The utility model discloses a tool charged for replacing double strings of insulators of double bundle conductors of a straight line pole. The tool comprises a fixing subassembly, and a connecting subassembly, wherein the fixing subassembly is connected with two yoke plates at the side of a cross arm of an insulator string; the connecting subassembly is connected with the two yoke plates of the double bundle conductors of the insulator string; an insulated connecting rope is arranged between the fixing subassembly and the connecting subassembly; the fixing subassembly comprises two connecting plates, a yoke plate clip, an insulating pulley, and a shackle subassembly; the insulating pulley and the shackle subassembly are orderly connected between the two connecting plates from top to bottom; the connecting subassembly comprises two fixing plates, an insulating pulley subassembly, and four yoke plate grab members; the insulating pulley subassembly is connected between the two fixing plates and is arranged at the center of the length direction of the fixing plates, and the yoke plate grab members are symmetrically connected to two ends of each fixing plate two by two. A worker on the ground can achieve replacing of the insulator string by elevation of the insulated connecting rope after the fixing subassembly is fixed together with the two yoke plates at the side of the cross arm, and the tool has the advantage of being reliable, rapid and safe to install.


Polyaniline base was protonated by blending with camphorsulfonic and picric acids in the solid state. The electrical conductivity of the equimolar mixture was more than 107 times higher compared with the conductivity of components used for blending. The electrical conductivity still increased several times after heating of mixtures to 85 °C. The protonation is reflected by the changes in the infrared spectra. The dependences of the electrical conductivity on the composition of blends differ for the partly protonated polyaniline and mixtures of protonated polyaniline with an excess acid.


For the first time, large single crystals of the compound CoSb sub3 were grown from antimony rich melts by the Bridgman gradient freeze technique.


This work consists of analyzing the spatial distribution of rainfall in the months of March, April and May 2014 along the Poti River Basin. The data used are taken from ANA National Water Agency and ArcGIS 10.1 software were spatialized the location of rainfall stations. The maps generated attested a higher rainfall rate in the northwestern part of the Poti River Basin, which corresponds to the vicinity of the city of Teresina, and pointed to the southeast region of the basin as the region with the lowest levels of rainfall.


This article studies the classroom teaching performance evaluation index system of higher education in Chinese cultural background through a questionnaire survey in which 251 undergraduate students are involved.Exploratory factor analysis was used to process the data.The results show that the higher education classroom teaching evaluation index is constituted by three dimensions: teaching ability,teaching attributes,teaching materials and curriculum load.The set of indicators has a good reliability and validity that can be used to evaluate the quality of higher education teaching.


Background and Objectives: Smoking cessation campaigns aim to raise awareness on the dangers of tobacco use and provide help for successful abstinence. Fourth year students of the UP College of Pharmacy implemented activities to promote smoking cessation among patients and clients at a tertiary government hospital. This paper aimed to describe the students' experiences on their project at the hospital during their Hospital Pharmacy course. Key learnings, challenges, and recommendations for the project's improvement, as well as their perceptions on current smoking cessation programs of the government were, likewise, determined. Methods: The students' activities were documented and described. A descriptive quantitative design using a self-administered online questionnaire was used to determine challenges, key learnings, and recommendations while content analysis was applied on open-ended questions to determine the frequency of responses in common themes identified. Perceptions on current smoking cessation campaigns were also summarized using frequency statistics. Results: The five approved projects implemented by the students were (1) setting up of smoking cessation booths, (2) display of posters within the hospital premises, (3) distribution of leaflets and reading materials, (4) playing of smoking cessation campaign videos, and (5) the creation of a social media page. Most of the students were challenged in scheduling and delegation of tasks (81.4%) and delays in project implementation (57.6%). They also realized the difficulty of stopping smoking (74.6%) and that it has various root causes (72.9%) that need to be addressed. To improve the project, students recommended collaborations with the hospital (79.7%) and the Department of Health (84.7%) to further smoking cessation programs. Lastly, they perceived that the current smoking cessation program is inadequate or underutilized. Conclusion: Smoking cessation programs require a multi-sectoral approach to be effective and sustainable, and students can be active partners in their implementation. Pharmacy student smoking cessation-led activities can complement government programs on smoking cessation. Moreover, students can apply what they have learned about smoking cessation while preparing them for their future role as pharmacist-counsellors.


Considering cost model and convergence speed of the minimum norm unwrapping, a highly efficient two-dimensional global phase unwrapping method optimized with L0 norm is proposed. As analysing features of cost model in phase unwrapping with minimum norm, a cost function definition is provided in line with the L0 norm, which impose a stronger constraint in the tangent direction of phase discontinuity boundary than that in normal direction, in order to preserve integrity of discontinuity during iterative unwrapping processing for continuous phase. For the sake of slow speed of low-frequency error convergence during linear solving, a data partitioning strategy is introduced into unwrapping processing. Due to independence of minimum norm method in blocks, linear solving only focus on high-frequency information and improve efficiency of iterative work, and the low-frequency processing part is transferred to offsetting-aligning between blocks. With experiments and analysis, reliability and efficiency of the novel phase unwrapping method are certified comparing to existing methods.


The invention relates to a corundum-spinelle lithical concreting material containing nano magnesium carbonate and a preparation method. In the method, the corundum-spinelle lithical concreting material containing nano magnesium carbonate is prepared by taking the currently and commonly used corundum-spinelle lithical concreting material as the base, adding nano magnesium carbonate powder, and adopting high efficient dispersant and proper mixing technique. With the method adopted, not only the adverse impact of magnesium oxide hydration on the concreting material workability caused by adding magnesia to generate spinelle in situ is avoided, but also the dreg resistance and thermal shock resistance of the existing corundum-spinelle lithical concreting material are improved. The corundum-spinelle lithical concreting material containing nano magnesium carbonate prepared by the invention can be widely used in high temperature industries such as steel, nonferrous metal, ceramic, petrochemical and the like, and can also be used for refractory material products such as air bricks which are baked after concreting moulding.


Consider a graph with n nodes V = {1, 2, . . . , n} and let d(i, j) denote the distance between nodes i, j. Given an ordering π : {1..m} → V , the back-walk-free latency from node π(1) to node π(j) is defined by `π(j) = `π(j − 1) + min{d(π(k), π(j)) | 1 ≤ k ≤ j − 1}, while `π(1) = 0. Each vertex i is associated with a nonnegative weight w(i). The (weighted) backwalk-free latency of an ordering π is defined by `(π) = ∑m i=1 w(i)`π(i). Given k servers S = {s1, s2, . . . , sk} ⊂ V , a feasible tour is a set of k orderings, {π1, π2, . . . , πk} such that πi(1) = si and ∪i=1V (πi) = V . Finally, the minimum backwalk-free latency problem (MBLP) with multiple servers S is to find a feasible tour such that the total back-walk-free latency ∑k i=1 `(πi) is minimized. In this paper, we show an O(n) time algorithm for the MBLP with multiple servers when the given graph is a path.


Liang and Zeger proposed a generalized estimating equations approach to the analysis of longitudinal data. Their models assume that missing observations are missing completely at random in the sense of Rubin. However, when this assumption does not hold, their analysis may yield biased results. In this paper, we develop a simple and practical procedure for testing this assumption. The proposed procedure is related to that of Park and Davis.


Materials and Methods: Prospective, cross-sectional, descriptive study, carried out in term pregnant patients, carried out in a second level of care in December 2018 to July 2019, the population was divided into group 1 (it included 15 patients with evolution abnormal labor in which no ultrasound was performed to detect position abnormalities) and group 2 (15 patients with abnormal evolution of labor and ultrasound detection of position anomaly were included) to determine the usefulness of diagnosis by ultrasound and its association with maternal-fetal morbidity and mortality.


By using a modified model of calculating solid fraction,the solid fraction in the solid/liquid interface zone can be expressed by a second order equation with one variable based on cal- culating phase diagram,instead of assumptions of the position and shape of the solid/liquid interface. Using the model,the solidification microstructure and solute microsegregation of U-6%Nb (mass frac- tion) binary alloy are simulated.The simulated results show that Nb concentration is the highest at the initially nucleated position.With solidifying,Nb concentration at the nucleus decreases continuously, and at the end of the solidification,poor Nb zones (<3%) appeared on the grain boundary.


To the Editor.— Cutis laxa is a rare condition in which the skin hangs in loose folds, suggesting clothing too large for its wearer. All of the classic mendelian patterns of inheritance have been described in different kindreds. By their teens, affected children may appear older than their parents. This letter describes the clinical course and laboratory evaluation of a male infant with congenital cutis laxa, probably of the autosomal recessive type. This patient also exhibited congenital dislocation of the hips (as well as shoulders and radial heads) and general laxity of the joints. A curious finding was oligohydramnios detected by sonography, which may have begun as early as 15 weeks' gestation. Report of a Case.— The patient was born at 351/2 weeks' gestation to a 25-year-old woman (gravida 2, para 1, abortus 0) and her 28-year-old husband. The pregnancy was complicated by an appendectomy at seven weeks and by


Considerable research on greenhouse energy conservation has been conducted since the escalation of fuel prices began in 1973. A variety of conservation techniques such as air-inflated polyethylene over glass (17) and thermal curtains (8, 24, 25) have been studied. Alternative energy sources such as solar energy (7, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19), waste heat from power plants (26) and deep mine air (23) have been examined. Unfortunately, commercial application of these techniques frequently results in reduced light transmission, growing area or precision of environmental control, offsetting the conservation potential.


A method of producing a crystal of (R) -2 - [[[3-methyl-4- (2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy) -2-pyridinyl] methyl] sulfinyl] -1Hbenzimidazole or (S) -2- [ [[3-methyl-4- (2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy) -2-pyridinyl] methyl] sulfinyl] -1H-benzimidazole, which comprises crystallization at a temperature of about 0 ° C to about 35 ° C, from a C1-4 alkyl acetate solution containing (R) -2 - [[[3-methyl-4- (2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy) -2-pyridinyl] methyl] sulfinyl] -1H-benzimidazole or ( S) -2 - [[[3-methyl-4- (2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy) -2-pyridinyl] methyl] sulfinyl] -1H-benzimidazole at a concentration of about 0.1 g / ml at about 0 , 5 g / ml.


ABSTRACT Hormone-mediated maternal effects generate variation in offspring phenotype. In birds, maternal egg testosterone (T) exerts differential effects on offspring traits after hatching, suggesting that mothers experience a trade-off between contrasting T effects. However, there is very little information on T pre-natal effects. In the yellow-legged gull (Larus michahellis), we increased yolk T concentration within physiological limits and measured the effects on development and oxidative status of late-stage embryos. T-treated embryos had a larger body size but a smaller brain than controls. Males had a larger brain than females, controlling for overall size. T treatment differentially affected brain mass and total amount of pro-oxidants in the brain depending on laying order. T-treatment effects were not sex dependent. For the first time in the wild, we show contrasting T pre-natal effects on body mass and brain size. Hence, T may enforce trade-offs between different embryonic traits, but also within the same trait during different developmental periods. Summary: Increased yolk testosterone concentration in yellow-legged gulls promotes body mass growth of embryos but reduces brain size. Moreover, sex differences in brain size exist among control embryos.


To examine the effect of early-climacteric (postripening) 1 -methylcyclopropene (1-MCP) exposure on the shelf-life and quality of green Cavendish bananas (Musa acuminata cv. Williams) from the middle section of the bunch, bananas were harvested bimonthly and treated with 100 μL L -1 ethylene for 2 consecutive days prior to exposure to 0, 100, 300, 1000, 3000 or 10 000 nL L -1 1-MCP for 24 h prior to storage at 22°C. 1-MCP treatment at a concentration of 300 nLL -1 or above increased banana shelf-life significantly compared with the control, regardless of the month in which fruit were harvested except March where a higher concentration was needed (3000 nL L -1 ). Fruit harvested in May were the most responsive with a greater than twofold increase in shelf-life. To examine the effect of fruit position in the bunch on 1-MCP efficacy, green fruit from the top or bottom of bunches were treated with 100 μL L -1 ethylene for 2 consecutive days prior to early-climacteric 1-MCP (300 nL L -1 ) exposure for 24 h at 22°C. In spring and autumn but not in summer, application of 1-MCP to early-climacteric fruit was more effective in fruit from the top than in those treated from the bottom of the bunch, increasing shelf-life. Firmness of 1-MCP-treated fruit was up to 19% greater than that of the control across the year, except in fruit from the bottom of the bunch. Given that 1-MCP is less effective in extending the shelf-life of summer-harvested fruit (particularly those from the bottom of the bunch), we conclude that preharvest conditions and fruit position in the bunch affect their responsiveness to ethylene and their behaviour during the ripening process.


This essay deals with the residue of the past in the present, in the small country town of Ceduna. Empirical historical detail about the history of this isolated place is interwoven with ethnographic material about people—Aboriginal and white—making sense of that past.


Original Research Article Progeria is a rare syndrome, with an estimated incidence of 1 per 250,000 births. It is a fatal, genetically determined disease of childhood characterized by dramatic, premature aging that occurs at about 8 to 10 times the normal rate of aging. Because of this accelerated aging, a child of ten years will have similar respiratory, cardiovascular, and arthritic conditions that a 70-year-old would have. Progeria is the most radical of the ageing illnesses. Although children with progeria has the appearance of premature aging or senility, the term is misleading because reported cases of progeria has not manifested most physical or biochemical aspects of old age. Many children with progeria appear normal at birth and then progressively, and rather rapidly, develop the characteristic features during early childhood. Although first described in the 1880s, only approximately 100 cases of progeria are reported in the international literature. Most of the classical clinical features of progeria as seen 4 or 5 years old age. In a few study there has been a history of maternal illness during pregnancy is main causes of progeria but no specific illness appearing to be significant. The goal of this study was to determine sign and symptoms, investigate mechanisms that cause of HGPS and how to treat the occasional illness of progeria.


Hydrogenation of TiFe is hindered by amorphous oxide layers on the surface. We explored the energetics of oxide-layer hydrogenation as well as the nature and evolution of surface oxide phases for the informed utilization of TiFe for hydrogen storage.


Spina Bifida, a rare congenital disorder with an incidence of 7.85 per 10,000 births in Mexico. It  results from the failed closure of the neural tube leading to the incomplete development of the  neural arches. This case series is part of the Yucatan Crippled Children's Project that began in 1996  by Charles Southerland, Doctor of Podiatric Medicine and former professor of Barry University's  School of Podiatric Medicine. All patients in this study were assessed and treated at the Red Cross  hospital in the city of Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. Attendings, residents and medical students travel to  the Yucatan Peninsula four times a year for a period of one week. Given that this study was built  from reports of medical mission trips that occur four times a year with limited resources and time,  the lack of documentation of treatment plans and follow-ups made it difficult to identify surgical   procedures and assess the success of surgeries. Additionally, we did not have access to the patients  birth records or their mothers medical records to accurately determine the etiology of their  deformities. Based on our data, we conclude that intervention should be considered as early as  possible in any flexible deformity to prevent them from becoming rigid.


The field oriented control scheme of an induction motor drive is presented. It operates in the fundamental speed range as well as in the field weakening range. The control scheme is completely adapted to meet the requirements of an electric vehicle, a good dynamic performance and a high efficiency in steady state operation. The latter is assured by an appropriate selection of the reference current components. A high performance overcurrent protection is realized by reducing the reference current for the torque in case of inverter overload.<<ETX>>


Abstract Deferoxamine (DFO)-induced urinary iron excretion was evaluated as a test for the measurement of iron stores. Iron stores were assessed by both phlebotomy and histologic techniques or by h...


XNe can find ill seve.ral places an assert・ion that G6del's second incompletcncss theorein del'eat,ed IIilbert,'s program. But, (tms M. Detlefsen argued iix his book [3]) iii order to esLablish this assertion, we need to address additional issues. First wc l'ormulate IIilbert's program. Second we rcconstruct a, standard argtiment for the clairn that G6del's second incompleteness theorem defeated Hilbcrt)s prograin. Ill doing s.o, we forinulat,c a criLical, and problematic assuniption which we call "DCIT" (Derivabilit,y Conditions [[]hcsis). Finally・ we cxamine three arguTrieuts whosc aims are to justtfy D(],T. N'V'e shew that the flrst and the secoiid a,rgument are 'not valid, and discuss thc thi]'d argument, which is based on Krciscl's idea. W'e identify a difllculty in this argument as wcll. After examining the die ficult・y, we conclude that we carillot claji'n that G6del's second incorriplctcmess theorem defeats IIilbert's program. Moreover we ciarify wl]at is essentially needed for such an argurrieTit to succeed,


Hydrothermal etching method was employed to fabricate four iron-passivated porous silicon( IP-Si) samples on two silicon wafers with different crystal orientations.The morphology of the samples was observed by scanning electron microscope( SEM),and no correlation between the porous structures and the crystal orientation was found.Under 300 nm excitation,the samples emitted strong orange light with a peak at ~ 618 nm and FWHM of ~ 132 nm.Furthermore,Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was employed to characterize the chemical bonds on the surface of porous structures.Finally,the physical mechanism for the photoluminescence of IP-Si was interpreted by using the quantum confinement-luminescence center model,and the tiny difference in PL can be ascribed to the small inconsistency of non-bridging oxygen hole center distributed in IP-Si.


The enormous ductility of SHCC as compared to conventional cement-based materials is due to multi crack formation in the cementitious matrix. The crack width is controlled by PVA fibres. If SHCC is exposed to aggressive environment liquids and gases may penetrate through the micro-cracks. Durability will then depend on the crack width distribution. In this contribution experiments on dumbbell specimens are described. The crack width distribution has been determined as function of the imposed strain under tension. It could be shown that the distribution of crack width can be described reasonably well by a lognormal distribution. It was found that the mean or expectation value of the crack width distribution measured on a formed surface is higher than the corresponding value on a finished surface. The expectation value hardly depends on the imposed strain, but the probability to find wider cracks increases. It is concluded that the permeability of SHCC can be predicted by means of a weighted lognormal distribution. The weight function, however, is yet to be determined. It is suggested that SHCC should be optimized with respect to the crack width distribution.


Caffeinated product consumption is the world most widely consumed psychoactive drug. The consumption of caffeinated product is highly prevalent among Asian countries. This study aimed to assess knowledge attitude and practice towards caffeinated product consumption. A cross sectional descriptive study was conducted through online Questionnaire through the social media platform. We assessed demographic characteristics and intake of caffeine from different products like tea, coffee, energy drinks and soft drinks. Both genders were included in the study and above 18 years old, repeated and incomplete data submission were excluded from the study. A total of 273 participants replied to the survey. Out of 273 participants; 148(54.22%) were female, 125(45.78%) were male, among them 241(88.30%) participants were under the age group of 18-28 years. Multiple choice procedure was carried out to assess the different products, most preferred products are 156(59.77%) consuming coffee, 146(55.93%) consuming tea, 106(40.99%) consuming chocolate, 47(18.00%) consuming carbonated drink, 26(9.96%) consuming energy drinks and 7(2.68%) consuming caffeine from other products. The major reason for intake of caffeinated products for refreshment was 163(62.45%) and most of the participants intake while studying 115(44.06%). The Most common symptom occurred due to excessive consumption of caffeine is vomiting 30(11.49%), the study participants faced difficulties faced missing a regular intake of caffeine is headache 71(27.20%). Out of 273 participants,the majority of the participants has lack knowledge and a positive attitude towards caffeine consumption. The Majority of the study participants believe the merits of caffeinated product consumption outweigh its demerits. It was found that side effect due to the usage of caffeinated products raising exceedingly it is essential to educate the consumption product in a recommended limit in their daily life style. This study result will give an idea for upcoming research on the consumption of caffeinated products.


In accordance with the problems which are in applied chemistry experiments' teaching, we raise an experiment course system that develop students' experimental ability and fit to teaching to im-prove the quality of the experiment teaching.


Is medicine an art or a science? The question was being asked 30 years ago and I hope it will continue to be asked in 30 years time. Today's climate of evidence based medicine, research, and ever demanding and demanded counting of patients, staff, time, trolleys, and operations suggests that medicine is a science. A few brave people, often working in the field of palliative care, suggest otherwise.

Jodi Halpern, psychiatrist, medical ethicist, and philosopher, argues that the traditional medical stance of detached concern—that is, "not being moved or influenced emotionally …


The incidence of bronchiectasis is increased in the worldwide recently.Since it is a very heterogeneous condition,we still know little about the etiologic factors,pathogenesis and treatment of bronchiectasis.The main factors are immune dysfunction and bacterial colonisation.Recent evidence has shown the efficacy of macrolides in the treatment of bronchiectasis.This review focuses on the recent advances in the prevalence,etiology,pathogenesis,and treatment of non-cystic fibrosis bronchiectasis.

Key words:
Bronchiectasis ;  Pathogensis ;  Treatment


Abstract Coercive closed forms on L 2 -spaces are studied whose associated L 2 -semigroups are positivity preserving. Earlier work by other authors is extended by further developing the potential theory of such forms and completed by proving an analytic characterization of those of these forms which have a probabilistic counterpart, i.e., are associated with (special standard) Markov processes. Examples with finite and infinite dimensional state spaces are discussed.


Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is the effort of capturing carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and storing it into a porous rock formation. An injection well is needed to inject CO 2 deep underground into rock formations. During injection of CO 2 , the injection well will face corrosion problems because the CO 2 reacts with the casing or tubing. One candidate to inject the CO 2 is an existing temporary abandoned exploration well. Further studies should be conducted to prevent well problems during CO 2 injection with a predetermined injection rate. This study is focused on the integrity of the temporary abandoned exploration well as a CO 2 injection well. The integrity of the existing temporary abandoned exploration well will be evaluated with the competitive standing of the Norwegian offshore sector) D-010, which is the standard developed by the Norwegian petroleum industry that defines guidelines and minimum requirements relating to the well integrity in drilling and well operations. This paper modeling the corrosion rate that will occur at the existing abandoned exploration when of the casing or tubing evaluated by the ECE TM . The results of this study can be used to determine whether the existing temporary abandoned exploration well can be modified as a CO 2 injection well or not. Furthermore, the study provides recommendations for the temporary abandoned exploration well that will be applied as CO 2 injection well for CCS application based on the NORSOK D-010 evaluation and corrosion rate model.


Particulate silicon carbide reinforced aluminium matrix composites (Al‐SiC) have a high potential for advanced engineering materials beeing developed for use in traction, automotive, aviation and space applications. Especially high volume composites with up to 70 vol.% reinforcement of silicon carbide particles in a cast AlSi metal matrix (AlSi7Mg/SiC70p) show most interesting characteristics for application in high power electronics (IGBTs). To characterize such MMCs respectively reasons for failure, different non‐destructive material investigations were carried out among them Acoustic Scanning Microscopy, X‐Ray and Neutron Diffraction. Acoustic Scanning Microscopy delivers information about lateral density differences respectively material inhomogeneities integrated over sample thickness. Diffraction methods are used for a non‐destructive evaluation of absolute and phase specific residual stresses, whereas X‐Ray Diffraction provides near surface information (several tens of micrometers). High Energy Synchrotron and Neutron Diffraction on the contrary provide bulk information of several millimeters up to several centimeters. Important for the understanding of the deformation behaviour and dimensional stability is the understanding of the residual stress state and inhomogeneities in the composite and its change under operating conditions respectively under dynamic thermal load.


The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) it is a unique forum, where the governments of the member countries work together to respond to economic and social challenges. Its purpose is to shape policies that promote a better life. The analysis of health expenditures in OECD member countries presents a comparison of a comprehensive set of key indicators regarding the health system performance across OECD member countries and key emerging economies. The analysis is based on the latest comparable data, that come from official national statistics and other sources, illustrating differences across countries and over time in terms of access to and quality of care, and health resources. A special focus is given to the health impact and major trends. This international comparison of the expenses of various health systems offers the possibility of sharing the best practices implemented in the respective countries.


The purpose of this study is to find how the childcare teacher aptitude of students majoring in childcare and education influences their perception of teacher professionalism. To achieve that, a questionnaire survey was conducted with 216 early childhood preservice teachers living in A city. For data processing and analysis, SPSS program was used so as to conduct frequency analysis and calculate the mean and standard deviation. In addition, to test reliability and find relations between variables, Cronbach's α, correlation analysis, and multiple regression analysis were conducted. As a result, firstly, in terms of the childcare teacher aptitude perceived by the students majoring in childcare and education, they highly perceived an affinity with young children and a sense of calling of their job; in terms of their perception of teacher professionalism, they highly perceived social necessity and vocational ethics. Secondly, early childhood preservice teachers' childcare teacher aptitude had a statistically significant correlation with their perception of teacher professionalism. Thirdly, the sub factors of early childhood preservice teachers' childcare teacher aptitude all positively influenced the sub factors of the perception of teacher professionalism. Given the study results, the students majoring in childcare and education perceived the importance of their aptitude of childcare teacher. In order to provide high-quality childcare service and create the positive aptitude of childcare teacher, it will be necessary to conduct a variety of basic research.


Experimental investigation of the effect of sweep on slat noise has been performed for small-scale (1:18) models, which indicates that sweep can significantly modify airframe noise spectra. The new method of airframe noise mitigation based on the concept of chevron geometry for the slat's lower egde, which has been previously proved efficient for 2D wing models, has been assessed for the swept wing. It has been demonstrated that the method is effective for narrowband peak mitigation both for swept wing and 2D wing.


Based on the analysis of the Split Ring Resonators (SRR) cell structures, a dual-band microwave resonator was designed in this paper, with FDTD as a numerical simulation method (utilizing commercial simulation software CST). We analyzed the transmission characteristics of electromagnetic waves in the rectangular waveguide loaded with this device, and a summary of the electromagnetic field variation regularity in its dual-band resonant frequency points was also given in the paper. The test validation was completed on the standard rectangular waveguide excitation conditions. The data manifested that the test results coincided with the device simulation: there exists two resonance behavior at the frequency of 15.8G and 22.1G, with the stopband bandwidths of 900M and 330M respectively, which well proved and realized the dual-band resonant features.


Motivated by the work of Baras-Goldstein (1984), we discuss when expectations of the Feynman-Kac type with singular potentials are divergent. Underlying processes are Brownian motion and $\alpha$-stable process. In connection with the work of Ishige-Ishiwata (2012) concerned with the heat equation in the half-space with a singular potential on the boundary, we also discuss the same problem in the half-space for the case of Brownian motion.


We previously reported cross tolerance between nicotine and ethanol and attenuation of ethanol ataxia by intracerebellar (ICB) nicotine. Using rotorod and direct ICB infusion in cannulated mice, we studied the role of nAChR subtypes á4â2 and á7. RJR‐2403 [32.25, 62.5, 125 ng] a á4â2 agonist, markedly attenuated ethanol (2g/kg; i.p) ataxia dose dependently. Dihydro‐â‐erythroidine, DHâE, á4â2 antagonist, (500ng) significantly attenuated RJR's and nicotine‐induced attenuation of ethanol ataxia reinforcing the role of á4â2 subtype in nicotine‐ethanol functional interaction. Also, ICB infusion of PNU 282987 (250ng–2.5ug), a novel á7 subtype selective agonist reduced ethanol ataxia thus indicating the probable role of á7 nAChR subtype in this context. Moreover, pretreatment with methyllylcaconitine (MLA; 3–12ng; ICB), a á7‐subtype selective antagonist, effectively prevented PNU and nicotine attenuation of ethanol ataxia confirming the contribution of á7 subtype in ethanol's ataxia. Both DHâE and MLA per se had no effect on ethanol's ataxia precluding any tonic role of nAChR subtypes. Taken together, our results support a comparable role of nAChR á4â2 and á7 subtype in nicotine‐induced attenuation of ethanol ataxia. Future treatment strategies for ethanol ataxia might require manipulation of these nAChR subtypes to lessen alcohol related motor impairment.


Exact, closed-form and general expressions of the marginal and joint moments as well as-of the correlation coefficient of the instantaneous powers of two Hoyt (Nakagami-q) signals are derived. All provided statistics are expressed as finite sums of simple functions of the model parameters. The model allows for environments where the variances of the quadrature components of a signal are different from their counterparts of the other signal. Some numerical results illustrate the generalized power correlation coefficient provided in this work, simulations support the theoretical results, and an approximation to the envelope correlation coefficient of the Hoyt Model is proposed


Maintaining health of the elderly people needs more attention. They tend to get injured easily due to age factors. When they are alone and if any accident happens, the situation becomes more critical. Usage of technology can help to handle these situations. An automated system that detects the human fall can be installed at home to monitor the elderly people. Many researchers have proposed many methods to identify human fall. This paper gives the survey of such kind of systems and algorithms. Generally fall detection systems are implemented in two ways. One is sensors based method and other one is vision based method. This paper presents review on the method based on vision inputs.


A specific coating was sprayed on the external surface of brass tube with design surface division form. The characteristics of heated liquid films flowing over a vertical coated division tube were experimentally investigated with a highly sensitive infrared camera, THERMOVISION™ A40. For different flow conditions, the temperature fluctuation and the flow patterns of falling film were determined. It was found that the temperature fluctuation on the coated division tube was larger than that on the smooth tube. The disturbance of falling liquid film was strengthened from the existence of a surface tension gradient that was induced by the coated region, resulting in stronger mixing occurred and drove the liquid particles from internal of liquid film to surface. The interfacial effect could therefore strongly affect the flow characteristic and thus the transfer process of falling liquid films.


An analytical model of the recording process is used to examine the factors that influence the recorded magnetization. If the ''switching'' occurs at the top of the medium, the magnetizaton is influenced mostly by the head‐medium separation. If the ''switching'' occurs at the middle of the medium, the magnetization is influenced by the head‐medium separation, the slope loop of the M‐H at M=0, and the medium thickness. The magnetization is asymmetrical in both cases and the asymmetry translates into asymmetrical readback waveforms.


Objective: to identify the symptoms and the performance status in patients with gastric cancer, who have undergone a gastrectomy and the influence of the symptom groups on their performance status. Methods: 240 patients with gastric cancer where included, who had been practiced gastrectomy with some time longer than 30 days after the oncologic surgery, and even 48 months in two centers in Bogota, Colombia. A structured instrument, which measures symptoms and Karnofsky's scale were used. Results: 5 clusters of symptoms were identified: Physical complaints associated with treatment of gastric cancer; emotional suffering in relation to self; physical complaints-independence and energy; emotional suffering in relation to others; physical complaints that particularly affect the identity. Two of the five clusters have influenced the performance status. Conclusion: this study contributes to the need of creating assistance in hospital staying and leaving in adult patients with gastric cancer, who have gone gastrectomy, which includes as the central focus the assessment and intervention of emotional and physical symptoms.


Abstract Using life story interviews with 10 Sri Lankan Tamil refugees resettled in Australia, this article shows how family separation in experiences of civil war and resettlement produce long-lasting and emotional memories of fear and determination. The findings explore how young Tamil people gave meaning to family when they interacted with key individuals and negotiated cultural practices in different spaces. Moreover, intergenerational family narratives emerged as a key practice through which Tamils preserved the family identity. The analysis demonstrates how and when family separation can manifest in personal memories to reveal stories of agency and resilience. A critical engagement of the past can help to better understand concepts of childhood in relation to family and family separation in war affected diaspora communities.


Background: Body image is an individual's self-perceptions and attitudes about his or her physical appearance, leading to either satisfaction or dissatisfaction. These self-perceptions can affect lifestyle of both men and women of all ages.
 Objectives: The purpose of the study is to determine the relationship between body image satisfaction and healthy lifestyles among adults (men and women).
Methods: A sample of 400 participants (221 women and 179 men) aged between 18-64 years were randomly recruited for analysis. Anthropometric measurements were collected and the body mass index (BMI) was calculated. Participants completed a questionnaire about body image, health-promoting lifestyle, and physical activity. Results: 60% of participants were of normal BMI, 56% underweight, with 34% were overweight and obese. Men tended to be more overweight and obese than women who were mostly of normal BMI (72%), and 9% only were underweight (p<0.001). 59% of participants were satisfied with their body image compared to 41% who were not satisfied. 19% of participants were physically active and 81% were not. Men reported more days of physical activity than women (p=0.005). Body image was inversely related to healthy lifestyle. Correlation was not moderately strong but significant (p=0.037). Conclusion: This study showed that the relation between body satisfaction and healthy lifestyle behaviors was not strong due to the fact that body image is multifactorial construct that depends on many factors other than healthy lifestyle behaviors. More studies among body image perception and effect on life domains are still under focus. Health care providers are encouraged to assess and discuss weight, shape, and aging-related concerns with all mature women and men, and to maintain sensitivity when talking about weight management. Exercise may be a primary mechanism for enhancing body image, and future studies should explore best practices for how to incorporate exercise and physical activity into body image interventions. Detailed longitudinal studies are needed to understand body satisfaction in diverse populations and by weight status.


Target detection based on hyperspectral image (HSI) representations has drawn wide attention given its wide variety of features. The matrix-based approach inevitably loses spatial information and fails to explore the intrinsic multimodal structure of an HSI cube. In this letter, we propose a regularized tensor-based model without altering the data structure. We assume that an observed third-order HSI tensor is decomposed into the sum of a total variation (TV)-regularized low-rank background tensor and a sparse (TVLrS) target tensor. The two tensors are represented as the mode-3 product of a third-order tensor, called the tensor representation coefficient (TRC), and a spectra dictionary matrix. Then, the model is coined as TVLrS-TRC. The background TRC has a low-rank property, contributing to the low-rankness characterization in our model. Moreover, as the size of the background TRC term is smaller than the background tensor, characterizing its local smoothness via TV regularization reduces the computational cost compared with that of the background tensor. Extensive experiments on two real hyperspectral datasets demonstrate the advantage of the proposed method compared with the state of the art.


The prevalence of uterine fibroids of the female genital tract varies from 20-50% in women of reproductive age. Surgical management by myomectomy is usually reserved for the non pregnant uterus. The complication rate in fibroids coexisting with pregnancy may be 10-30%, which are preferably often managed conservatively. Red degeneration of fibroid during pregnancy is common, which respond to conservative management in majority of the cases. Those not responding to conservative treatment, myomectomy may be an option. Myomectomy in pregnancy remains a controversial issue. Counselling and comprehensive peri-operative preparations are mandatory to minimise complications We present a case of a multiple symptomatic uterine fibroids diagnosed during pregnancy which was successfully managed by antenatal myomectomy.


We study the short-range nucleon-nucleon interaction in a nonrelativistic chiral constituent quark model by diagonalizing a Hamiltonian containing a linear confinement and a Goldstone boson exchange interaction between quarks. A finite six-quark basis obtained from single particle cluster model states was previously used. Here we show that the configurations which appear naturally through the use of molecular orbitals, instead of cluster model states, are much more efficient in lowering the six-quark energy.


Background: Cucumber is one of the popular vegetables of the cultivated cucurbits. Different insect species harbored with cucumber plant and they influence on its production, but little have been studied in Bangladesh. This study investigated the abundance of the insect species and the impact of insect pollinators on cucumber yield. Methods: Investigation was conducted in summer and rainy seasons at Gazipur, Bangladesh. Insects were collected and categorized as pest, predator, pollinator and casual visitor. Occurrence of the insects at different hours of the day and impact of supplemented insect pollinators on fruit and seed set compared to natural and hand pollination were studied. Result: In total thirty species of insects were found with cucumber plants and their relative abundances ranged from 0.4 to 13.7%. We found ten species of insects as pest, ten species as predator, four species as pollinator and six species as casual visitor. The red pumpkin beetle, epilachna beetle and fruit fly were found as the major pests. The red pumpkin beetle revealed the top ranks among the insects and the highest abundance of the insects occurred at 09:00 h of the day. Supplemented insect pollinators revealed higher yield, which indicated the significant for conserving insect pollinators.


The track etch detector, CR-39, in common usage, is highly sensitive to recording charged particles. CR-39 polymer samples were irradiated with alpha particles at different energies (2.17 MeV and 3.95 MeV) followed by chemical etching with different times (1.50, 3.00 and 6.00 h).  The tracks formed in CR-39 due to irradiations were visualized by using etching technique. The optical properties of the CR-39 polymer before and after the etching processes were studied with ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) spectroscopy. The optical band gap energy was calculated for the CR-39 polymer samples. The average value of the track diameter of irradiation at 2.17 MeV and etching time 1.5 h is fairly large compared with its value at 3.95 MeV. This is due to the production of defect levels in the band gap of polymer at the 2.17 MeV. The results revealed that the CR-39 samples at 3.00 h are insensitive to the optical variations in the fundamental absorption edge. doi: 10.14456/WJST.2014.94


In recent years, wavelet theory applied to image, and audio and video compression has been extensively studied. However, only gaining compression ratio without considering the underlying networking systems is unrealistic, especially for multimedia applications over networks. In this paper, we present an integrated approach, which attempts to preserve the advantages of wavelet-based image coding scheme and to provide robustness to a certain extent for lost packets over packet-switched networks. Two different packetization schemes, called the intrablock-oriented (IAB) and interblock-oriented (IRB) schemes, in conjunction with wavelet-based coding, are presented. Our approach is evaluated under two different packet loss models with various packet loss probabilities through simulations which are driven by real video sequences.


Abstract Background Structural abnormalities in first episode psychosis (FEP) tend to be subtle and widespread. Most studies investigating structural abnormalities in this clinical population have used small samples, and therefore may be under-powered. In addition, most studies have examined participants at a single research site, and therefore the results may be specific to the local sample investigated. Consequently, findings from existing studies have often been heterogeneous. This study aimed to overcome these issues by testing for neuroanatomical abnormalities in individuals with FEP relative to healthy controls that are expressed consistently across five independent datasets. Methods Structural Magnetic Resonance Imaging data were acquired from a total of 572 patients with FEP and 502 age and gender comparable healthy controls (HC) at five sites - London (UK), Utrecht (Netherlands), Chengdu (China) and two independent sites at Santander (Spain). Voxel-based morphometry (VBM) as implemented in Statistical Parametric Mapping software (SPM12) was used to investigate differences in gray matter volume (GMV) between the two groups. The statistical analysis was carried out using an analysis of variance (ANCOVA), with diagnostic group and scanning site as factors, and age and gender as covariates of no interest. Neuroanatomical alterations in patients with FEP relative to HC common to the five datasets were identified by comparing the total FEP group against the total HC group, and then using the inclusive masking option (at p<0.05 uncorrected) to identify those regions that survived the comparison between FEP and HC within each dataset. Individual clinical scores from each site were normalised and then used to examine their association with GMV in the total sample. Statistical inferences were made at p<0.05 after family-wise error correction for multiple comparisons. Results Relative to HC, FEP showed a widespread pattern GMV reduction in fronto-temporal regions bilaterally, including the gyrus rectus, orbitofrontal, temporal, fusiform, precentral and lingual gyri, anterior cingulate and insula as well as in the parietal lobe in the precuneus gyrus. The largest GMV reduction was found in the left gyrus rectus which is part of the inferior frontal lobe. Negative correlations were found between this region and positive symptoms severity (r=-.2, p<.001) and duration of illness (r=-.1, p<.012), but not with negative symptoms (r=.0, p=.991). Patients also showed GMV increases in the temporal gyrus bilaterally, left inferior frontal gyrus and right cerebellum relative to HC. Discussion This study identified a common pattern of fronto-temporal-parietal reductions in five independent FEP samples; in addition, some of these reductions were more pronounced in patients with more severe positive symptoms and longer duration of illness. This pattern of results suggests the presence of symptom- and stage-dependent neuroanatomical alternations in FEP that are expressed above and beyond site-related differences in recruitment criteria and scanning parameters.


Along with the going forward of the times and the development of education, life insurance planning has received much attention in recent years. And among the life insurance, medical insurance is the most important one. Medical insurance is one kind of intangible goods. When purchasing intangible goods, customers often pay more attention to the intangible factors. This study has investigated the relationship between dependent variables (service quality, brand image and price fairness) and independent variables (customer satisfaction and customer loyalty). Furthermore investigating the relationship between dependent variables and customer loyalty via the inclusion of customer satisfaction. In this study, using structural equation modeling (SEM), and the result shows that service quality, brand image has directly positive effect on customer satisfaction. Service quality, brand image has no directly positive effect on customer loyalty. Results also indicate that customer satisfaction does play a mediating role in the effect of service quality on customer loyalty and in the effect of brand image on customer loyalty. Customer satisfaction has directly positive effect on customer loyalty. And results indicate that price fairness has no significant effect on customer satisfaction and customer loyalty.


This study evaluated the feeding behavior of the milkfish (Chanos chanos Forsskal) in extensively managed brackishwater lagoons on South Tarawa, Kiribati (Central Pacific) in August 1998. Feed intake, dietary overlap, fish condition and morphometric intestine parameters were determined. The daily ration of fish was estimated using the "modified Bajkov model". Fish stomach content did not differ significantly between samples from day and night, but prey preferences showed significant differences (p < 0.05). Results were compared with a data set of juvenile milkfish from the Philippines raised under similar conditions.


Byline: T. Sathyanarayana Rao, K. Jacob, K. Shaji, M. S. V. K. Raju, Ajit. Bhide, G. Rao, Gautam. Saha, Mukesh. Jagiwala The World Health Organization (WHO) recently uploaded the International Classification of Diseases-11 (ICD-11)(beta version) on its website.[sup][1] The draft had a major shock for the mental health and psychiatric community. The ICD-11 version has moved the syndromal diagnosis of dementia from the chapter on mental and behavioral disorders to the chapter on diseases of the nervous systems. The sudden and unexpected change in the WHO's position on diagnosis and coding was a clear departure from its previously stated position on the subject and its previous classifications. The new scheme is a sharp deviation from the long-standing consensus and approach employed by the WHO and international psychiatry. Many national and international psychiatric associations, including the Indian Psychiatric Society, have sent their serious concerns and arguments against the move. This editorial highlights the arguments and position of the Indian Psychiatric Society. The earlier beta versions of the ICD-11 and that of the ICD-10[sup][2] and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-5[sup][3] included syndromal codes for dementia and its associated behavioral and psychological symptoms under the chapter on mental and behavioral disorders with diagnosis of dementia with specific neurological etiologies included in the chapter on diseases of the nervous system. The current approach suggested in the latest beta version of ICD-11 is problematic for psychiatrists, particularly for those working in low-resource settings in India and low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) for the following reasons: The general population in many LMICs often consider cognitive impairment and decline in older people as part of normal aging.[sup][4],[5] Consequently, the majority of people who are brought to medical attention have behavioral psychological symptoms of dementia and consult psychiatrists and mental health workers, only when their relatives have behavioral and psychological problems associated with dementia. The removal of syndromal codes for dementia and its associated behavioral and psychological symptoms is problematic as psychiatrists and mental health professional play a crucial role in the management of majority of people with dementia in LMICs.[sup][6] The suggested system is clearly disadvantages for clinical care. The shortage of neurology specialists and their limited expertise in managing behavioral and psychological symptoms does not help. The neurologists could always use specific codes for dementia in the ICD-10, and a similar system can be continued in the ICD-11. The diagnostic facilities and resources in LMICs may not always allow for elucidating specific etiologic diagnosis/categories of dementia, and so the syndromal approach is useful and should be retained in the chapter of mental and behavioral disorder, while specific dementias are listed in the chapter on diseases of the nervous system. This new approach is inconsistent with the fact that behavioral disorders secondary to general medical conditions are included in the chapter on mental and behavioral disorders in the beta version of ICD-11.[sup][1] Behavioral disorders secondary to endocrine, cardiovascular, infectious disease, and a diagnosis of delirium have codes in the chapter on mental and behavioral disorders. For example, delusional, psychotic, and depressive disorders secondary to general medical conditions continue to have codes in the chapter on mental and behavioral disorders. The current beta version goes against the explicit aims of the WHO and the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-5's attempt harmonization of the two approaches. The new approach will also create problems related to insurance reimbursement for psychiatrists working in LMICs as insurance companies may insist on a neurologist's assessment, if syndromal codes for dementia are exclusively in the chapter on diseases of the nervous system. …


The growth of cracks under the influence of high voltage cyclic electric field in 8/65/35 lanthanum lead zirconate titanate samples was studied. The remanent polarization, coercive field and complex dielectric constant were measured as a function of the number of switching cycles. During the measurement the salt water solution was penetrating through the sample.


A novel metal–organic particle (MOP) based nanodrug formed by mild self‐assembly of chemotherapeutic drugs, including banoxantrone and doxorubicin, through Cu(II)‐mediated coordination effects, is reported. In this nanodrug, Cu(II) acts as a bridge to join AQ4N and DOX, and then, self‐assembly of [‐AQ4N‐Cu(II)‐(DOX)2‐Cu(II)‐]n complexes forms nanosized MOPs (referred to as ADMOPs) through multiple interactions including host–metal–guest coordination, hydrophobic interactions, π‐stacking, and van der Waals force. The ADMOPs reported here have several important features over conventional drugs, including tumor microenvironment pH‐sensitive drug release that can be tracked by "turning on" the fluorescence of AQ4N or DOX through proton competition with Cu(II) to break the coordination bonds and much deeper penetration into solid tumors via microvesicle‐mediated intercellular transfer. Most strikingly, the ADMOPs can serve as stimuli‐responsive nanocarriers to efficiently load the photosensitizer phthalocyanine due to their inherent highly porous characteristics. Thus, the ADMOPs significantly enhance the chemotherapeutic efficacy by "on‐demand" photodynamic therapy, which further induces a hypoxic environment that enhances the reduction of AQ4N to systematically increase the therapeutic efficiency. Taken together, the designed ADMOPs composed of chemotherapeutic drugs may serve as a potential programmable controlled synergistic agent for cancer therapy.


In this paper, we describe how some key Semantic Web technologies can be used to gather in a single distributed knowledge environment several music-related sources of information, from digital archives to feature extractors or personal music collections. Such knowledge can then be used for a wide range of purposes, such as aggregation and information retrieval, visualisation and enriched access, or cross-repository interlinking. We also describe on-going efforts aiming at bootstrapping such a data-space, as well as preliminary results.


Each of the national language has a irreplaceable value on ethnic individual thinking,personality,temperament,emotional development and formation of knowledge system.Also it's a key for the individual to understand himself,know the world and adapt to the world.However,with the impact of the mainstream language and culture on the ethnic language,expansion of the rational tools of modern society,there is a very pop narrow view that 's "ethnic language is useless",which make more and more students blindly give up the ethnic schools.This article focus on the importance of the ethnic language from perspective of individual development,in order to change the narrow viewpoints about the language and education.


Abstract Altogether 57 patients were included in the related kidney transplantation program. Forty‐four recipients were mixed lymphocyte culture (MLC) negative or slightly positive (SI < 7) against their mother/father donor, and most of them showed Fey RII [erythrocyte antibody inhibition (EAI)] blocking antibody in their sera as the consequence of previous random transfusion. Thirteen patients showed significantly high MLC reactivity against their prospective parent donor (SI < 7) and had no EAI blocking antibody in their sera. The latter group was immunized either by buffy coat or purified platelets obtained from their donor in general two or three times at biweekly intervals. The indication for transplantation of donor‐specific transfusion (DST)‐treated patients was based on the appearance of EAI antibody and a significant reduction in the MLC reactivity (9 patients). DST patients had 100% kidney graft survival for 5 years and the DST untreated ones 75 %. Suggested responsible factors for this observation are the haploidentity in HLA and the induction of suppressive immune regulation by DST.


Photobleaching of eosine in methanol, ethanol, isopropanol and n-butanol in vacuo was investigated and it was concluded that the primary process is the dehydrogenation of alcohols by the metastable excited eosine molecule. In the presence of oxygen, the photobleaching is suppressed completely, but the sensitized photooxidation of alcohol takes place. When a small amount of oxygen is added to the evacuated alcoholic solution of eosine, the induction period appears, after which the photobleaching proceeds with almost the same rate as that in the evacuated state. Both the quantum yield for the consumption of oxygen during the induction period (γ) and that of the photobleaching in vacuo (k) were determined and the ratio γ/k was found to be ca. 3. This result and the reaction products detected (aldehyde in vacuo, acid and hydrogen peroxide in the presence of oxygen) were satisfactorily explained by the mechanism proposed by Bolland and Cooper. Further results somewhat important from the general standpoint of p...


The paper outlines the development and design of a speech driven control for a personal in-car navigation system which runs on a standard Pocket PC. The modified system enables speech driven menu navigation, speech shortcut commands and interactive dialogues. The speech recognition method is presented, sources of inaccurate recognition are identified, and solutions are presented. Speech recognition accuracies of 96% and 88%, depending on the task, are achieved in an in-car environment. One draw back is the time taken to perform the recognition. The speech driven control module which interfaces with the in-car navigator is designed to be flexible. These features are discussed.


Special attention is directed to those who define the behavior, not to those who exhibit it. The organization is considered as a framework in which the defining process occurs, and how, in turn, the interpretation of it produces the rates of deviance. For the rates of such behavior are not produced by the behavior itself, but by the defining process and actions taken by persons within the system thus defining it as deviant. The author investigates what they observe, their conception of it, and their social definition of it. Shoplifting was selected for the point of study because it represented a vague type of behavior, ambiguous in nature, not clearly defined, and accompanied by varying degrees of punishment. This empirical setting of supermarkets was selected not only because they represent a comparatively new phenomenon but little is known concerning shoplifting in this realm. It is an intreesting facet to be studied in this setting rather than in other retail establishments because supermarkets are more frequented by the same customers, the items handled


Studies that have examined negative environmental factors have focused predominately on perceptions of environmental impacts caused by either recreation use or tourism activity. For instance, several studies have examined perceptions of litter at campgrounds and other wilderness settings (e.g., Merriam and Smith 1974). A related stream of research, reviewed in Wall (1989), has looked at negative environmental factors arising from mechanized versus non-mechanized forms of recreation activity. For example, there have been several investigations of differences in the experiences sought and conflicts arising between groups such as snowmobilers and cross-country skiers (Jackson and Wong 1982); and canoeists versus power-boaters (Lucas 1964). The impact of tourism development and tourist activity on the environment has been a frequent topic in tourism texts (e.g., Fridgen 1991; Nickerson 1996; Williams 1994; Wyllie 2000) and the subject of a considerable amount of empirical research (reviewed in Ap and Crompton 1998; Mathieson and Wall 1990). For example, Wang and Miko (1997) examined the significance of environmental concerns – such as water quality problems, air quality problems, vegetation (flora) or wildlife (fauna) problems, and coastline/shoreline problems – associated with tourist activity at U.S. National Parks.


We prove a monotonicity formula for minimal or almost minimal sets for the Hausdorff measure Hd, subject to a sliding boundary constraint where competitors for E are obtained by deforming E by a one-parameter family of functions yt such that yt(x) ∈ L when x ∈ E lies on the boundary L. In the simple case when L is an affine subspace of dimension d-1, the monotone or almost monotone functional is given by F(r) = r-d Hd (E∩B(x, r)) + r-d Hd (S∩B(x,r)) where x is any point of E (not necessarily on L) and S is the shade of L with a light at x. We then use this, the description of the case when F is constant, and a limiting argument, to give a rough description of E near L in two simple cases.


De Witte (1934) by Jan Vanderheyden is commonly considered to be a milestone in the Flemish cinematic history. However, there has been little research into the production and meaning of this classical Flemish movie. This, apparently innocent, pre-war film based on the novel by Ernest Claes is still a common point of reference and an icon of the popular cinematic culture in Flanders. In this article, which shows De Witte as an interesting example of the growth of the European regional popular cinema after the introduction of sound, we concentrate on the ideological struggle of the meaning of this picture. Through a historical reception study (press, original correspondence, journal entries and other material) and the film itself we will relive the controversy that surrounded the meaning and production of De Witte. When the film had its premiere seventy years ago it was a 'media event' of the biggest order. More than anything, producer and director Vanderheyden was a smart businessman who, as no other, knew to bring his first film production into the spotlights. Even before the first scene was shot, De Witte was already a media event, which made the film into a play ball of commercial and ideological influences from outside. Our analysis shows that the film, more than the original work by Ernest Claes, presents a conservative and nostalgic image of Flanders. The film shows how a traditional community is being threatened in the background by a modernistic urban culture.


Occupational health and safety is one of the important aspects to be considered by human resource management, because remembering human being is an important asset in a company that play a role for progress of company in getting profit. In order to create safe and comfortable conditions and situations in the workplace, every company needs to provide adequate facilities for its workers, in order to protect their physical and mental safety from accidents and illness due to the work they do. So how much attention the company to the safety and health of employees interesting to investigate. Therefore this study aims to analyze the effect of the application of health and safety (K3) programs to increase employees productivity at PT. Kereta Api Indonesia (Persero) area operation 3 Cirebon. This research is a quantitative research with survey method, using questionnaire instrument. Testing the instrument using validity test and reliability test. The sample size of 100 people was obtained from the entire population by using the Slovin formula. Data analysis techniques used by the authors in this study is a simple linear regression analysis with F test and t test, to measure the effect of independent variables on dependent variable that is health and safety program as independent variable (X) and employee work productivity as dependent variable (Y). Based on the calculation of coefficient of determination (KD) is known that the value of R square of 0.10, this means the percentage contribution of variables K3 program (health and safety) to work productivity employees at PT. Kereta Api Indonesia (Persero) Operation Area 3 Cirebon of 10% while the remaining 90% influenced by other variables not examined in this study.


The RGBW pixel pattern uniquely enables the tradeoff of color gamut for power consumption. A mechanism for achieving these tradeoffs and its application for reducing power consumption by more than 25% for typical images and 10% for typical web pages is discussed.


I read somewhere that writers, or perhaps all artists, are haunted or hunted by unusually vivid memories of their early lives – as are the old, whose useful daily memories are decaying. Certainly I remember being obsessed as a child by a kind of 'glittering' quality about certain experiences, usually without deep importance in what I thought of as the narrative of my life – experiences excessively bright, strongly outlined, recognized so to speak as important, even when they were met for the first time. ( Re-cognized implies memory, the existence of a former cognition.) It is not too much to say that these experiences were as tormenting as they were delightful, until I, the person who underwent them, formed the project of being a writer – because only the act of writing gave them a glimmer of the importance they had in life, and thus gave them a place, a form and an order which made sense of them. And which they seemed to ask for. Proust, at the beginning of A la Recherche du Temps Perdu , speaks of certain experiences which forced him to look at them – 'a cloud, a triangle, a belltower, a flower, a pebble' – and gave him, as a child, a sense of duty towards them, a feeling that they were a symbolic language which he ought to decipher.


The practical applications and limitations of four methods for extracting the effective channel length (L/sub eff/) and series resistance (R/sub ext/) parameters for MOS devices are studied. The methods are: GD (gate drive) using fixed-current V/sub t/ or GD(I/sub ds/); SBGD (substrate-bias GD) using fixed-current V/sub t/ or SBGD (I/sub ds/); GD using maximum slope V/sub t/ or GD (G/sub m/); and SBGD using maximum slope V/sub t/ or SBGD (G/sub m/). Conventional and two LDD (lightly doped drain) structures fabricated in a submicrometer CMOS process are used. The results indicate that all the extraction methods are applicable to both n-channel and p-channel devices, although some are only valid over a small range of gate biases. Inconsistencies in applying V/sub t/ calculations to the extraction equations set a lower limit for V/sub gst/ of approximately 0.5 V, while the upper limit of 2.0-4.0 V arises due to imprecision in R/sub ds/ measurements influencing the double regression steps involved in the techniques. The SBGD (I/sub ds/) method was applicable over a wider range of bias conditions than the other techniques analyzed and is easier to implement. >


60% of all cancer treatment requires radiation therapy and the fundamental goal is to deposit sufficient energy in a tumor to irreparably damage its DNA. Unlike high energy photons which pass through the body, charged particles such as protons deposit the majority of their energy at a specific depth, the location of the Bragg peak. In theory, this allows high radiation doses to be delivered in submm proximity to critical organs such as the spinal cord (see Fig. 34.1.1). Unfortunately, mm-scale prediction of the in vivo Bragg peak location is challenging because particle energy loss and scattering are highly path-dependent and patient-specific, largely due to anatomical heterogeneity which drifts from day to day. Given this, clinicians usually reduce therapeutic doses or adjust treatment margins to avoid harming healthy, vital tissue in proximity to the tumor site. To alleviate this constraint, in vivo dosimeters (IVD) have been developed to report in situ radiation doses to clinicians, enabling more effective and safer closed-loop treatment. However, conventional IVDs can only measure the total accumulated energy deposited, i.e. the total dose [1]–[5]. Given this, conventional IVDs cannot distinguish between single high energy particle depositions and those due to the combined contributions from several lower energy depositions, which have significantly different biological effect on tissue [6]. Furthermore, these conventional lVDs employ a single large detector and thus suffers from low spatial resolution. Here, we present a mm-scale real-time single-particle dosimeter array for charged particle cancer therapy that solves these problems.