Green chemistry and chemical environmental safety management are the two important techniques and management means to implement sustainable development policy.They are also the two basic tools to carry out headstream depollution and environmental protection.This paper reviewed the principle of green chemistry and main contents of chemical environment safety management from the point of management toxicity,pointed out the same aim of these two techniques and management measures,and described the foreground of those two sustainable development environmental methods in China.


Computational approaches are significant in the analysis of events that are multi-factorial. Parkinson's Disease (PD) is the cumulative result of system malfunctioning that leads to severe degeneration in the Substantia nigra (SN), a locus in the mid-brain. Traditional approaches tend to focus on isolated subcomponents of the pathogenic pathways. However, such an approach may be inadequate to describe the pathogenesis.


An overview of working with digital X–ray sensor equipment digital intraoral sensors (See Figure 1, opposite page) and this has given me the opportunity to develop and hone a vast array of tips and techniques to help make capturing images with digital intraoral sensors more comfortable and more consistent than ever before. Before we get into specific sensor placement tips, here are some general best practices dental professionals should know. Positioning Devices: Holder sets help keep the sensor in place and guarantee a good image every time. I recommend using a paralleling device such as the arm and ring positioning system for accuracy and consistency in placement. Eye-balling is not recommended. Sensor Size: Patients' mouths come in all different sizes. Make sure to choose the correct sensor size for comfort and maximum diagnostic imaging. We want to adhere to the ALARA principal at all times. Exposure Settings: Make sure the exposure settings are correct on the X–ray source (65–70 KVP suggested). You will need to adjust exposure times (or pulses), depending on the X–ray source, the physical size of the patient, and the region of the oral cavity to be imaged. Remember that maxil-lary molar images need the most exposure time to penetrate the zygomatic arch and mandibular anterior images need 'll never forget the day the doctor I was working for announced " we're getting digital X–ray sensors. " I had mixed emotions about it; this was a progressive office and I knew I had to give it my best shot. Little did I know that this transition into technology would not only put the fun back into dentistry for me, but that it would also change my professional life forever. I have been a clinical product trainer and sensor placement specialist for 16 years and have had the unique opportunity to watch digital imaging grow into an essential part of an ever–increasing number of dental practices. More and more dental professionals are discovering that digital radiography offers better patient comfort, increases patient understanding and acceptance, and is easier and faster to use than taking film X–rays. Today more than half of all general dentists in the United States use digital imaging—and that number is much higher in certain areas of the country. We are living in a technology–oriented society and it is now expected in a dental office as the standard of care. I have experienced dentistry practiced …


In this paper, we propose a learning-based method for searching the 1 optimal feedback control policy of a class of nonlinear systems. This method 2 is implemented in a model-free framework, thus is more applicable in real con3 trol problems compared with the naive deep forward-backward stochastic optimal 4 controller, which is model-based due to the explicit computation using model dy5 namics. Specifically, by introducing some exploration noise, the original control 6 problem is reformulated to solving decoupled forward-backward stochastic differ7 ential equations whose forward solution can be estimated with samples. In addi8 tion, the optimal control policy is represented with a sequence to sequence model 9 in deep learning, and a new loss function derived from dynamic programming is 10 utilized to perform policy improvement purely with samples. 11


Traditionally, whole grains were consumed but most current foods are derived from refined fractions of cereal and pulse crops. Consumption of processed or refined products may reduce the health benefits of food. In wheat-based processed foods, for example, the removed 40% of the grain (mainly the bran and the germ of the wheat grain) contains the majority of the health beneficial components. These components, particularly non-essential phytochemicals such as carotenoids, polyphenols, phytosterols/ stanols, and dietary fibers, have been shown to reduce the risk of major chronic diseases of humans, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and Parkinson's disease.


The spherical harmonics (P/sub L/) and double P/sub L/ approximations to the Boltzmann transport equation in slab geometry are developed in a matrix differential equation formalism. A series of two region problems were solved in the P/sub L/ approximations up to P/sub 15/ and the DP/sub L/ approximations up to DP/sub 3/. Angular distributions near the material interface and spatial distributions of the scalar fluxes are presented graphically. (auth)


Developing hierarchical electrocatalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is of great importance for electrochemical hydrogen production. Here, we describe the development of a hierarchical CuO@NiCo layered double hydroxide core–shell nanoarray on copper foil (CuO@NiCo LDH/CF) as a 3D OER electrocatalyst. When tested in 1.0 M KOH, such CuO@NiCo LDH/CF offers superior catalytic activity with a geometrical catalytic current density of 20 mA cm−2 at an overpotential of only 256 mV. It also shows strong long-term electrochemical durability to retain its activity for at least 24 h.


Muscle stem (satellite) cells are relatively resistant to cell‐autonomous aging. Instead, their endogenous signaling profile and regenerative capacity is strongly influenced by the aged P‐Smad3, differentiated niche, and by the aged circulation. With respect to muscle fibers, we previously established that a shift from active Notch to excessive transforming growth factor‐beta (TGF‐β) induces CDK inhibitors in satellite cells, thereby interfering with productive myogenic responses. In contrast, the systemic inhibitor of muscle repair, elevated in old sera, was suggested to be Wnt. Here, we examined the age‐dependent myogenic activity of sera TGF‐β1, and its potential cross‐talk with systemic Wnt. We found that sera TGF‐β1 becomes elevated within aged humans and mice, while systemic Wnt remained undetectable in these species. Wnt also failed to inhibit satellite cell myogenicity, while TGF‐β1 suppressed regenerative potential in a biphasic fashion. Intriguingly, young levels of TGF‐β1 were inhibitory and young sera suppressed myogenesis if TGF‐β1 was activated. Our data suggest that platelet‐derived sera TGF‐β1 levels, or endocrine TGF‐β1 levels, do not explain the age‐dependent inhibition of muscle regeneration by this cytokine. In vivo, TGF‐β neutralizing antibody, or a soluble decoy, failed to reduce systemic TGF‐β1 and rescue myogenesis in old mice. However, muscle regeneration was improved by the systemic delivery of a TGF‐β receptor kinase inhibitor, which attenuated TGF‐β signaling in skeletal muscle. Summarily, these findings argue against the endocrine path of a TGF‐β1‐dependent block on muscle regeneration, identify physiological modalities of age‐imposed changes in TGF‐β1, and introduce new therapeutic strategies for the broad restoration of aged organ repair.


Thismodi-fied scanningmodelallows forinitiation at sites downstreamfrom the first AUGin some mRNAs.Aprediction of this model is that specific sequences inmRNA5' noncodingregions (except nucleotides immediate-ly surrounding the AUG [see above]) are not required forefficient translation (20, 22). Evidence for this prediction isfound in the observation that


This chapter summarizes and assesses the evidence for the early Enochic traditions in Aramaic amongst the Dead Sea materials. As is well known, this tradition, commonly associated with a document that in modern times has been designated as "1 Enoch" or "Ethiopic Enoch", is preserved in its fullest form in Ethiopic manuscripts, the earliest of which go only as far back as the fourteenth century CE. As such, 1 Enoch consists of seven main parts which, in turn, are comprised by a number of further compositions or independently composed units: (1) the Book of the Watchers, (2) Book of Parables, (3) the Astronomical Book, (4) the Book of Dream Visions, (5) the Epistle of Enoch and the Apocalypse of Weeks, (6) the Birth of Noah, and (7) Another Book that Enoch Wrote, a description of eschatological judgement and reward, respectively, on the wicked and the righteous. Keywords: 1 Enoch; Apocalypse; Dead Sea scrolls; Enochic traditions; eschatological judgement; Ethiopic manuscripts; Noah


: Designing, implementing, and operating microservices is known to be complex and costly, mainly due to the multitude of heterogeneous software services forming a microservice-based application. Such tasks can be simpler if a specification of the microservice-based architecture (MSA) of an application is available. At the same time, due to the number of services and service interactions in a MSA, manually generating a specification of such MSA is complex and costly. For this reason, in this paper we present a novel technique for automatically mining the specification of a MSA from its Kubernetes deployment. The obtained MSA specification is in µ TOSCA, a microservice-oriented profile of the human- and machine-readable OASIS standard TOSCA. We also present a prototype implementation of our technique, which we use to assess it by means of case studies based on third-party applications.


This study was conducted to manufacture MDF panels bonded with PF resins which provide excellent durability and dimensional stability with panels, and to identify benefits and weaknesses of using PF resins for MDF panels that have been manufactured with urea-formaldehyde (UF) resins for interior applications due to its low dimensional stability under moisture conditions. The results showed that the performance of PF-bonded MDF panels satisfied the performance requirement. A six-cycle aging test also revealed that PF-bonded MDF panels had high durability. Thickness swelling after 24 hours submersion in cold water was less than 2 percent, showing good dimentioanl stability. The identified weaknesses of using PF resins were relatively high resin content and long hot-pressing time. An acceptable resin content appeared to be 8 percent which can increase the production cost of PF-bonded MDF panels. The hot-pressing time (7 minutes) used in this study is relatively long compared to that of UF-bonded MDF panels. This result also indicates that hot-pressing process has to be optimized to control various pressing variables.


Abstract Older adults frequently turn to informal caregivers for support to age independently in their home as long as possible. Yet, many evidence-based programs designed to support aging in place do not include caregivers, including the well-known Community Aging in Place, Advancing Better Living for Elders (CAPABLE) program. The purpose of this qualitative study was to adapt CAPABLE to include caregivers using a grounded theory approach. Data collection occurred with stakeholders from an Area Agency on Aging (AAA) in Pennsylvania. Two, 60-minute focus groups were conducted with frontline providers (n=7) and administrators (n=7). Eight, 30-minute individual interviews were conducted with AAA consumers including older adults and their caregivers. Constant comparative analysis of the data were completed using NVivo 12 Pro. Stakeholders described three considerations for adapting CAPABLE to include caregivers: older adult preference and caregiver willingness, clear guidelines and expectations, and hands-on training. Older adults and caregivers recognized the need to "allow them to decide when and why family should be involved in the program." Frontline providers and administrators explained the importance of "determining whether older adults and caregivers should have shared or separate goals for the program." All stakeholders expressed that including caregivers would "reaffirm the hands-on training like fall prevention." These perspectives shed light on how and why to include caregivers in CAPABLE. Information gleaned from this study may help researchers think about ways in which to adapt other evidence-based programs to include caregivers, and help healthcare providers target and support caregivers in the delivery of their services.


Includes descriptive metadata provided by producer in MP3 file: "Vanderbilt Athletics Podcast - Hamilton with 104.5 - Post-Ole Miss 09/20/08 - Listen to junior safety Ryan Hamilton talk with 104.5 the Zone following Vanderbilt's 23-17 win over Ole Miss." By CSTV.


This brief paper discusses the role of information and communication technologies in gathering, storing and disseminating indigenous knowledge, the various community-based structures to be used in order to safeguard and transfer indigenous knowledge and the best practices around the world in using IK systems for development. The paper discusses the link between indigenous knowledge and global knowledge systems and some of the lessons from knowledge for development initiatives. The paper concludes with recommendations for enhancing the role of information and communication technologies in general and knowledge management in particular to collect, preserve and exchange indigenous knowledge in Ethiopia. The aim is not come up with scientific and detailed treatment of these issues but rather to raise salient points around the intersection between information and communication technologies and IK systems.


Introduction: Fungal infections are a major cause of morbidity and mortality in immune compromised individuals and Candida are among the most common pathogens in these patients. Candida species belong to the normal microbiota of an individual and are responsible for various clinical manifestations from mucocutaneous overgrowth to blood stream infections. The potential clinical importance of species level identification has been recognized as candida species differ in the expression of putative virulence factors and antibiotic susceptibility. Aims &Objectives: The aim of the present study is to identify the spectrum of candida species in clinical infections and evaluation of the Antifungal Susceptibility profile to initiate prompt, early and definitive treatment. Materials and Methods: A total 112 Isolates of Candida obtained were recruited for the study. Gram staining, wet mount was performed. Culture on Blood agar and SDA was done. Growth on this media was subjected to species identification test. The Kirby Bauer disk diffusion method was used to test the susceptibility of Candida isolates following the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) guidelines M44-A. Results: A total of 112 isolates, the highest Candida isolates were observed to be from the age group above 60 years (38.39%). Candida was highest in patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (36.63%). 75(66.96%) isolates were predominantly from male patients. Candida albicans 53(47.32%) were the maximum isolated species followed by Candida tropicalis 40(35.71%). Isolation of Candida non albicans species was more. Maximum Antifungal resistance was observed for Fluconazole. Conclusion: As various underlying risk factors are responsible for the Candida infection, most commonly being Chronic Obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) as reported in our study, it should always be evaluated clinically by the treating physician. The present study showed that prevalence of Non Candida albicans was higher from various clinical specimens.


This paper reviews approaches taken to the inclusion and focus of food and beverage studies in hospitality degree programs. This is achieved by tracking the evolution of food and beverage studies in the curriculum of one of Australia's longest running undergraduate hospitality programs, offered by The University of Queensland School of Tourism (UQST). A convenience sampled content analysis approach was adopted to review the program's evolution over the past 35 years. This determined the proportion of food and beverage content relative to the overall program, ascertained the teaching modes, and identified course objectives at various stages of the program development. Findings suggest the emphasis of food and beverage studies in the UQST program has shifted downwards in quantity, evolved from a practical delivery mode to classroom based learning, and changed from an operational to business management teaching focus. This study should be of interest to industry managers, hospitality educators, and tourism/hospitality undergraduate program directors. It contributes to the debate highlighting how shifting priorities in food and beverage studies reflect internal priorities and broader environmental debates regarding hospitality education, thus informing interpretation of the various educational paradigms and models currently employed by institutions delivering hospitality programs.


Conditions for sequential adsorption of polyelectrolyte multilayers (PEM) onto pulp fibres were investigated in terms of appropriate addition levels and adsorption times. The objective was a techni ...


This study examines the effects of "San Fen Kai" Policy on the board composition and leadership for the firms who went IPO before the end of 1998.The major findings include: 1) More firms controlled by central government and its branches carried out this policy than other firms,the firms who went IPO in 1998 were more likely to performed this policy than the firms going IPO before 1998.2) the board chairman of the firms carrying out the policy would not serve as CEO,the portion of internal director deceased,but the portion of controlled shareholders' di- rector increased.A parent company more likely appointed its parent's chairman as the chairman of the listed firm.


Modern technology consisting of high yielding crop varieties, fertilisers, pesticides, and irrigation facilities, has changed the economics of small peasant farming, and opened up the potential of once below subsistence and subsistence farmers to become viable, that is, to provide subsistence plus some commercial production [IBRD (1975) pp. 99-165]. The new technology requires the farmers to substitute the traditional inputs with comparatively large quantities of modern inputs which are needed to be purchas ed with money. A much larger cash outlay is now needed to produce a given quantity of output, and consequently, a larger amount of agricultural credit is needed to finance the new cash-intensive form of agriculture [Myint (1976)].


Let K be the field of Laurent series with complex coefficients, let R be the inverse limit of the standard-graded polynomial rings K[x1, . . . , xn], and let R ♭ be the subring of R consisting of elements with bounded denominators. In previous joint work with Erman and Sam, we showed that R and R (and many similarly defined rings) are abstractly polynomial rings, and used this to give new proofs of Stillman's conjecture. In this paper, we prove the complementary result that R is a polynomial algebra over R.


The activated carbon was pretreated with different concentrations of HNO3 (from 0.5 to 67%). The amount and type of oxygen-containing groups on the activated carbon were determined with the adsorption neutralization method and temperature-programmed desorption (TPD) of CO and CO2; furthermore, the density of total acidity (DTA) has been proposed. The Pd particle size of Pd/C catalysts was measured by X-ray diffraction patterns (XRD), CO chemisorption, and TEM. The experimental results indicated that the amount of oxygen-containing groups and the total acidity on the activated carbons, the Pd particle size and catalytic activity of Pd/C catalysts are highly dependent upon the HNO3 concentration used in the pretreatment. The pretreatment of activated carbon with a low concentration of HNO3 can increase the structure parameters due to removal of the impurities, will be beneficial to create an appropriate DTA environment, and will further improve the Pd dispersion and the catalytic activity of Pd/C catalysts....


Atmospheric-pressure plasma, which was generated with electrical RF power, was fed to a tetramethyldisiloxane/argon gas mixture to prepare bioinert organosilicon coatings for 316 stainless steel. The surface characteristics of atmospheric-pressure-plasma-deposited nanocoatings were evaluated as a function of RF plasma power, precursor gas flow, and plasma working distance. After surface deposition, the chemical features, elemental compositions, and surface morphologies of the organosilicon nanocoatings were examined. It was found that RF plasma power and plasma working distance are the essential factors that affect the formation of plasma-deposited nanocoatings. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy spectra indicate that the atmospheric-pressure-plasma-deposited nanocoatings formed showed inorganic features. Atomic force microscopy analysis showed the surface roughness variation of the plasma-deposited nanocoating at different RF plasma powers and plasma working distances during surface treatment. From these surface analyses, it was found that the plasma-deposited organosilicon nanocoatings under specific operational conditions have relatively hydrophobic and inorganic characteristics, which are essential for producing an anti-biofouling interface on 316 stainless steel. The experimental results also show that atmospheric-pressure-plasma-deposited nanocoatings have potential use as a cell-resistant layer on 316 stainless steel.


Objective Complications frequently occur in patients with breast cancer after surgery. Anesthesia nursing plays an important role in decreasing complications for such patients. Thus, this study investigated the effects of anesthesia with intensive care nursing (AICN) on complication rates in patients with breast cancer after surgery. Methods Eighty-two patients with breast cancer were recruited in this study. Complications were compared between the anesthesia with usual nursing care (AUCN) and AICN groups. Results The results demonstrated that AICN decreased the rates of incision infection, drug extravasation, and catheter exposure, as well as pain and inflammation scores, compared with the findings in the AUCN group. AICN improved the time to orientation and decreased the incidence of nausea, anxiety, depression, and vomiting versus AUCN. In addition, AICN shortened the time to awakening after anesthesia compared with the effects of AUCN. Furthermore, AICN shortened hospital stay and increased survival rates. Notably, AICN improved health-related quality of life as measured using the EORTC QLQ-C30 questionnaire. Conclusion AICN provided more benefits and better postoperative outcomes than AUCN, suggesting its utility for minimizing complications in patients with breast cancer after surgery.


This project-based dissertation described, in detail, a seven-step research and development (R&D) process used to create, and bring to operational use, an educational tool that supported the academic use of the assessment loop: the Guidebook For Student Learning Outcomes & The Assessment Loop. The dissertation established the problem that this product solved, provided relevant research, including a literature review, and the process and methods that led to the development of this useful product. It described the purpose of this specific guidebook and for guidebooks in general. This project was informed by research of instructional design of text-based teaching materials, R&D-focused field-testing procedures, assessment theory and practice, programmatic and online course assessment needs and practices, and use of Moodle as an assessment tool and evidence repository. About the product: The guidebook is designed for use by Community College department chairs (DCs) and faculty members. It describes, from the viewpoint of a practitioner, each step in the process of assessment: from creating and measuring student learning outcomes (SLOs) to using assessment for improvement. It is hoped that use of the Guidebook by its intended audience will lead to more comprehensive assessment practices at the colleges where it is used.


The alteration of minerals in rocks and the availability of elements for plant nutrition require long periods of time, and microorganisms are thought to induce the release of potassium and phosphate from rocks. In this context, this work evaluates the role of the yeast Torulaspora globosa, isolated from the sugar cane rhizosphere, in the solubilization of potassium from alkaline ultramafic rock powder. The experiments were performed in liquid medium, with or without agitation, at 30°C with the following treatments: culture medium + alkaline ultramafic; culture medium + yeast suspension; and culture medium + yeast suspension + alkaline ultramafic. The results showed that as much as 38% of the total potassium in the rock was released in the medium with the yeast during a 15-day period of incubation. Acid production may be the mechanism by which the yeast solubilizes potassium because the total acidity increased during the sampling period. Agitation (which increased oxygen availability) resulted in approximately 20% more biosolubilization of the alkaline ultramafic rock than with the static culture. These data indicate the potential for this yeast in biosolubilization processes and biofertilizer production.


Abstract : America's commitment of warfighting units of the Army to Humanitarian Assistance Operations is eroding capabilities in the areas of readiness, manning, funding and making the transition to a Force XXI design. Accordingly, this paper recommends the Army undertake a major study to examine the feasibility of establishing a permanent stability force to relieve pressure on maneuver units. The paper examines the impact of Humanitarian Assistance Operations using Somalia and Haiti as the primary vehicles for analysis. Additionally, the paper analyzes the Canadian Department of National Defence's response as they faced a similar dilemma in the early 1990s. Finally, it weighs the potential advantages and disadvantages of creating a permanent stability force and defines the major parameters that should be included in an Army study.


4. Specific sports shoulder injuries: In certain sports, shoulder injuries are more common than in other sports. For instance, in rugby and football direct contact and indirect forces causing shoulder dislocations are not uncommon. In rugby the most common shoulder injuries are to the AC (acromio-clavicular) joint. This can usually be treated conservatively without surgical intervention. 5. In throwing sports like baseball and cricket, the repetitive nature of the injury leads to failure of certain structures like the rotator cuff and labrum (cartilage in the joint). This may lead to "acquired instability" of the joint and "SLAP lesions"


Since Cadmium thin films have been sputtered and thermally oxidized for the first time in 1907 (Chopra, et al., 1983) the technological innovation in transparent conductive oxides (TCO) has developed rapidly and substantially during the last years. Indium-tin-oxide (In:90:Sn:10, ITO) is today the most important TCO material due to the potential combinations of high electrical conductivity in the range of 104 S/cm and high transparency in the visible range of 90 % with a layer thickness of 100 nm.


PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a hard disk drive in which a nonusable time period can be eliminated by preventing dew condensation before the dew condensation occurs in important components inside the hard disk drive. SOLUTION: A dew condensation sensor 2 to detect a dew condensation state is provided in the vicinity of the inner side of a pinhole 1a for atmospheric pressure adjustment provided in a main body 1. A supply circuit 4 is controlled by a control circuit 3 on the basis of the detection results of the dew condensation sensor 2, and the dew condensation is prevented by rotating a magnetic disk 1d to raise the temperature of the entier main body 1 by the wind caused by the rotation of the magnetic disk 1d or the heat generation of the motor when the dew condensation is detected.


The role of a secretary is required in assiting to complete the whole works. As a secretary, the most important skill is managing time and choosing work priorities so that the main work can be completed on time. At the same time, there are a number of jobs beside of the main jobs should be completed. It affects the load of secretary's jobs were fulled. This study aims to find out how the roles and responsibilities of the sales secretary who are concurrently as sales admins, as well as what are the obstacles faced in carrying out the tasks. Data was collected through observation, interview and documentation techniques. The data analysis technique used in this research is descriptive qualitative. The results of the study showed descriptively that the sales secretary is very instrumental in supporting the management system of sales at Kuta Paradiso Hotel, Bali. The problems was encountered by a secretary was lack of communication skills, lack of human resources that affect the load of secretry's responsibilities was over.


Miniflaps at the trailing edge of airfoils, that is, Gurney flaps, change the Kutta condition and thereby produce higher lift. Unfortunately, because of the flow separation downstream of such trailing edges, the drag also increases. Investigations are described with the aim to stabilize the wake flow to achieve drag reduction. When hot-wire anemometry is used, a tonal component in the spectrum of the velocity fluctuations downstream of the Gurney flap is shown. This points to the existence of a von Karman vortex street. Modifications of the Gurney flap can reduce this flow instability, which results in a drag reduction. Trailing-edge modifications, such as slits or holes in Gurney flaps and vortex generators, were tested in experiments. The experiments were carried out using straight wings and a swept wing at a Re = 1 × 10 6 At lower angles of attack of the airfoils with geometrical modifications a drag reduction was observed. This drag reduction was determined through force measurements. The flowfield behind the Gurney flaps was also investigated numerically, using methods based on Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes and detached eddy simulation


In this paper, we report the growth of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) ferroelectric thin films, formed by means of the electrochemical reduction. In our experiment, the electrolyte was prepared by lead nitrate (Pb(NO3)2), zirconium oxide chloride (ZrOCl2-8H2O) and titanium chloride (TiCl3) solution. A graphite plate with 1 cm of width was employed as the anode, and a stainless steel plate was employed as both cathode and substrate. The controlled current that was supplied by a DC power supply passed through the electrolyte to deoxidize PZT precursor films on the surface of the stainless steel at room temperature. The results indicate that the atomic ratio of compositions in the film can be controlled by controlling the molar concentration of electrolytic solution, current density and reaction time. The perovskite PZT thin films can be obtained when the precursor films are heated to a certain temperature for sintering.


A formula is deduced to calculate the time for a water vapour front to come into contact with a steel surface by diffusion. The data of the diffusion coefficients required can be calculated by absorption measurements using different methods of evaluation. Moreover, it was predicted and confirmed by measurements that in case of filled elastomers the diffusion coefficient can be determined faster by a special evaluation method without the knowledge of water saturation data. It is supposed that this effect is due to the accumulation of water clusters bonded as immobile water molecules to the filler surfaces in the early stages of absorption.


Bacterial cellulose (BC) based hydrogels (BC-PVP and BC-CMC) are modified with β-tri-calcium phosphate (β-TCP) and hydroxyapatite (HA) to improve the structural and functional properties of the existing hydrogel scaffolds. The modified hydrogels are then biomineralized with CaCO3 following liquid diffusion technique, where salt solutions of Na2CO3 (5.25 g/100 mL) and CaCl2 (7.35 g/100 mL) were involved. The BC-PVP and BC-CMC are being compared with the non-mineralized (BC-PVP-β-TCP/HA and BC-CMC-β-TCP/HA) and biomineralized (BC-PVP-β-TCP/HA-CaCO3 and BC-CMC-β-TCP/HA-CaCO3) hydrogels on the basis of their structural and rheological properties. The Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectral analysis demonstrated the presence of BC, CMC, PVP, β-TCP, HA in the non-mineralized and BC, CMC, PVP, β-TCP, HA and CaCO3 in the biomineralized samples. Interestingly, the morphological property of non-mineralized and biomineralized, hydrogels are different than that of BC-PVP and BC-CMC based novel biomaterials. The Sc...


Terahertz (THz) spectroscopy is a powerful technique for identification of dangerous materials like drugs and explosives, especially when hidden under optically opaque concealments. Multiple-reflections within such sample systems lead to additional spectral features which could be misinterpreted as artificial material absorption bands. We show that combinations of different chemometric tools help reducing such misinterpretations. However, an angle-depending detection scheme leads to a much more powerful artifact suppression. We received experimental data which are in good agreement with our numerical predictions. Hence, the overall false alarm rate of our pattern-recognition algorithm is significantly reduced.


Book Review: World Film Locations: Mumbai Issue Editor: Helio San Miguel Series Editor and Design: Gabriel Solomons Pages: 128. Price: $18 (on Amazon) Publisher: Intellect Books, 2012


Transverse relaxation time (T2) mapping with MRI has a plethora of clinical and research applications. Current T2 mapping techniques are based primarily on spin‐echo (SE) relaxometry strategies that rely on the signal magnitude, and often suffer from lengthy acquisition times. In this work, we propose a phase‐based T2 mapping technique where T2 information is encoded into the signal phase of rapid gradient echo (GRE) acquisitions.


Objetive:to discuss the manifestation in imaging and differential diagnosis between tubercu- loma and peripheral carcinoma of the lung,Methods:clinical symptoms,chest X—ray films,CT manifes- tation as well as laboratory data of 23 cases of pulmonary tuberculoma pathologically proved were thor- oughly reviewed.All the radiological appearances were compared with pathological findings in order to find important sings of differential diagnosis.Results.shallow lobulated comtour,spurlike shadow forma- tion,vacuole sign,satellite lesions,pleural involment,calcified spots were found very important for differ- ential diagnosis of these diseases.Conclusions:By paying special attention to the above mentioned appear- ances,evaluating them very carefully and considering them with positive laboratory findings,it might be helpful to differentiate pulmonary tuberculoma from peripheral carcinoma of the lung.


This paper deals with the development of a smart multi-hole probe for aircraft air data parameters. The system aims at the calculation of static and total pressures, and the angle-of-attack and angle-of-sideslip (fine output data) starting from the elaboration of the pressure measurements on holes (raw input data). The probe, characterized by fault-tolerant capabilities with respect the loss of one pressure data, is developed as an embedded system that includes MEMS pressure/temperature sensors and a control electronics implementing multiple reconstructions of the flow measurements, up to obtain fault-tolerant output data. The basic idea for the reconstruction algorithm is that, in the normal envelope of aircraft flow angles (≤15° for both attack and sideslip), the shape of the pressure field around the stagnation point of a hemispherical body is essentially independent from the flow angles. Thus, once characterised the aerodynamic flow at the aircraft installation for zero angle of attack and sideslip, the reconstruction is performed by minimising the errors between the five pressure measurements on the probe tip and the predictions of models imposing a set of locations of the stagnation point. The external geometry of the probe is designed and validated by CFD simulations. In particular, CFD simulations have been performed to verify both the basic concept and the capability of the algorithm to provide the flow angles even if one of the pressure measurements is not available. The work describes the reconstruction algorithm and the system development, from the conceptual phase, up to the manufacturing of the first prototype to be used for the experimental tests.


When the idea for an International Year of Physics to mark the centenary of Einstein's five great papers was first mooted, it was not hard to imagine that publishers would want to get in on the act. Sure enough, 2005 has seen a steady flow of new and re-released books about the great physicist, ranging from Einstein's Miraculous Year to Einstein for Dummies. But of all the books about Einstein that have passed through the Physics World office during the last 12 months, Einstein: A Hundred Years of Relativity is by far and away the most appealing.


This study, covering 12 cultivations, was carried out at Embrapa Rice & Beans Research Center, Santo Antonio de Goias, Goias, Brazil, in an Oxisol, under center pivot, for six consecutive years. The effects of four soil tillage systems and six crop rotations on bulk density and soil porosity were evaluated. The experiment was conducted in a completely randomized design, using a splitplot arrangement, with three replications. The tillage treatments were: moldboard plough/harrow disc, moldboard plough, harrow disc, and no-tillage. Tillage treatments constituted the main plots and rotation treatments, the subplots. The crop rotations were: (a) upland rice-common bean, (b) corn-common bean, (c) soybean-wheat, (d) soybean-wheat-soybean-common bean-upland rice-common bean, (e) upland rice associated to calopogonium-common bean, and (f) corn-common bean-corn-common bean-upland rice-common bean. Crop rotations a, b, c, and e were annuals and d and f were of three years'duration. The soil under no-tillage at the surface layer (0-10 cm) showed the highest bulk density value and the lowest total porosity and macroporosity values. Whereas the soil under harrow treatment showed the lowest bulk density and the highest total porosity values. Under moldboard plough, the 10-20 and 20-30 cm soil layers had the lowest bulk density values and the highest total porosity and macroporosity values. On the surface layer, crop rotations composed by soybean and wheat showed the highest bulk density and microporosity values and the lowest macroporosity values while the crop rotation composed by upland rice associated to calopogonium and common bean showed the highest macroporosity value and the lowest microporosity value .


Simple Summary Symbiotic bacteria and fungi facilitate the acquisition of nutrients to their animal hosts, protect them against predators, parasites and diseases, and, in some ways, modulate complex animal behavior, including communication, by means of chemical signaling. However, odors of symbiotic bacterial origin would not only inform conspecifics of their animal host, but parasites and/or predators may also use those odors to detect their victims. We here review the role of bacterial symbionts on animal communication, and on interactions of their animal hosts with parasites and predators. Moreover, because microbial symbionts can have negative effects on their hosts facilitating predation and parasitism, these enemies could modulate the microbial community of animals, and we reviewed the available evidence supporting this idea. The inclusion of microorganisms in scenarios of communication, parasitism, and predation opens up new avenues of research that will contribute to understanding such interactions. We here elaborate some predictions and provide some guidance for future research. Abstract Microbial symbionts are nowadays considered of pivotal importance for animal life. Among the many processes where microorganisms are involved, an emerging research avenue focuses on their major role in driving the evolution of chemical communication in their hosts. Volatiles of bacterial origin may underlie chemical communication and the transfer of social information through signals, as well as inadvertent social information. We reviewed the role of microorganisms in animal communication between conspecifics, and, because the microbiome may cause beneficial as well as deleterious effects on their animal hosts, we also reviewed its role in determining the outcome of the interactions with parasites and predators. Finally, we paid special attention to the hypothetical role of predation and parasitism in driving the evolution of the animal microbiome. We highlighted the novelty of the theoretical framework derived from considering the microbiota of animals in scenarios of communication, parasitism, and predation. We aimed to encourage research in these areas, suggesting key predictions that need to be tested to better understand what is one of the main roles of bacteria in animal biology.


The paper constitutes a discussion of the trend around the rise of art as an alternative investment. With financial markets in turmoil, art as an alternative asset class is being incorporated into portfolios in the interest of diversification. Art's low correlation with the equities market and desirable risk and reward ratio, as price appreciation defies all logic, makes it an attractive investment. The volatility, irrationality and illiquidity of the art market make it hard to compare to more conventional investments. The paper will look at how investors are treating art as an asset class and how art compares to more traditional assets such as equities and bonds.


The construct of emotional availability (EA) refers to the capacity of a dyad to share an emotional connection and to enjoy a mutually fulfilling and healthy relationship. The EA Scales were designed to assess multiple components of a relationship from the perspective of both partners. The four caregiver components include sensitivity, structuring, nonintrusiveness, and nonhostility; two scales measure the child's responsiveness to the caregiver and involvement of the caregiver. We describe the EA construct and introduce the papers in this issue, focusing on the contributions of this Special Section to a developmental psychopathology framework. The construct of emotional availability (EA) refers to the capacity of a dyad to share an emotional connection and to enjoy a mutually fulfilling and healthy relationship. Mahler, Pine, and Bergman (1975) first used the term EA to describe a mother's supportive attitude and presence in the context of infant/toddler explorations away from her. Healthy mother– child relationships allow exploration and autonomy, at the same time recognizing the importance of physical contact and emotional "refueling." Other theorists (e.g., Emde, 1980; Sorce & Emde, 1981) recognized the importance of EA including not merely physical presence, but also emotional signaling and receiving. For Emde (1980, 1983, 2000), EA in a parent–child relationship refers to the adult's "receptive presence" to the child's emotional signals. Further, it connotes a type of presence and availability that has a great deal in common with the way a psychotherapist "is there" for a patient. Emde and Easterbrooks (1985) stated that EA is an affective barometer of the relationship between a parent and a young child and emphasized affective attunement to a broad spectrum of negative and positive emotions as an important aspect of EA. According to Emde (1980, p. 80), Emotional availability, then, refers to an individual's emotional responsiveness and "attunement" to another's needs and goals; key to the construct is the acceptance of a wide range of emotions rather than responsiveness solely to distress. Emotional expression, of both negative emotions (such as distress, anger, sadness, and disgust) and positive emotions (such as interest, satisfaction, joy, and surprise), provides the parent with information about the child's feelings and needs (Emde, 1980, p. 97): Crying, for example, gives a message of "come change something," a message that is species-wide and peremptory, while smiling gives a species-wide message something like "keep it up, I like it." Origin of the Concept Certainly, the construct EA has a great deal in common with ethological attachment theory, and much in the conceptualization and operationalization of EA is derived from research. Bowlby (1969/1980, 1973) and Ainsworth (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978) utilized the concept of sensitivity to describe the clarity with which the mother perceives her child's signals and communications and to the way in which she responds to them. Sensitivity as a concept has become the centerpiece in attachment research (van IJzendoorn, 1995). Another major influence on the conceptualization of EA comes from systemic theories (e.g., Guttman, 1991), which recognize the importance of seeing relationships as units, rather than as individual qualities. One member of the family Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Zeynep Biringen, Family and Developmental Studies Program, Colorado State University, 413 Behavioral Sciences, Fort Collins, CO 80523; E-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com. Development and Psychopathology 24 (2012), 1–8 # Cambridge University Press 2012 doi:10.1017/S0954579411000617


ways in which neoliberal economics have come to refashion the contemporary world as radically as the imperialist energies of the late Victorian period ever did. There is little consideration of the ways in which this has resulted in huge swathes of the global population (including many Americans) being refashioned as monetised aggregates of bare life. The book falls short, in other words, in failing to address fully the ways in which the transnational corporation, global finance and worldwide entertainment and news conglomerates, alongside repeated cycles of boom and bust and mass disinvestment in the public sector, have impacted up on the material conditions of everyday American life, ideas of American selfhood and the depiction of both in contemporary gothic texts. And this, in turn, reduces the scope and complexity both of Höglund's conceptualisation of American imperialist discourse and of his analysis of the gothic texts that participate in its dissemination. Perhaps this is a subject to which the author will return, for such topics are indeed signalled in his conclusion. I for one would be extremely interested to read such a work by a critic who has made here an impressive contribution to theorisation of the gothic mode whilst encouraging non-specialists to look with new eyes on a large number of culturally significant books, films and games.


The paper aims to examine Serbian translations of Whitman and Poe published by the representatives of the 1920s avant-garde movements and to point to the place of these translations in the context of the developing Serbian modernism. A special focus is on the book series "Albatross", a short-lived but important project of Belgrade avant-gardists, which significantly influenced the course of Serbian literature.


A new case of Poland-Moebius syndrome in a male is report and developmental field and developmental field defect is debate.


Let Ω⊂ℝn be a C1 domain, or more generally, a Lipschitz domain with small local Lipschitz constant. In this paper it is shown that if u is a function harmonic in Ω and continuous in Ω¯ , which vanishes in a relatively open subset ∑⊂∂Ω ; moreover, the normal derivative ∂νu vanishes in a subset of ∑ with positive surface measure; then u is identically zero. © 2021 The Authors. Communications on Pure and Applied Mathematics published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.


Various properties of Keplerian orbits traced by satellites that are launched from one and the same spatial point with different initial velocities are discussed. Two families of elliptical orbits are investigated, namely the sets of orbits produced by a common direction but different magnitudes of the initial velocities, and by a common magnitude but various directions of the initial velocities. For the latter family, the envelope of all the orbits is found, which is the boundary of the spatial region occupied by the orbits.


We use Keck/NIRSPEC to survey a sample of of young (<1 Gyr), short-period mini-Neptunes orbiting nearby K dwarfs to measure their mass loss via the metastable helium line. We detect helium absorption from all four of the targets in our initial sample. The first detection, around TOI 560b, was announced in a previous paper. We now announce three additional detections around TOI 1430.01, 2076b, and 1683.01. All four planets show an average in-transit excess absorption of 0.7%–1.0%. However, the outflows differ in their kinematic properties. Object TOI 1430b exhibits preingress absorption, while TOI 2076b's outflow is exceptionally optically thick and shows significant postegress absorption. For all four planets, the width of the measured helium absorption signal is consistent with expectations for a photoevaporative outflow (10–30 km s−1, 5000–10,000 K). Unless broadening mechanisms other than thermal velocity and the bulk outflow velocity are significant, our observations disfavor core-powered mass-loss models, which predict much slower (1–3 km s−1) outflows. We utilize both an isothermal Parker wind model and an order-of-magnitude method to estimate the mass-loss timescale and obtain ∼a few hundred megayears for each planet. We conclude that many, if not all, of these planets will lose their hydrogen-rich envelopes and become super-Earths. Our results demonstrate that most mini-Neptunes orbiting Sun-like stars have primordial atmospheres, and that photoevaporation is an efficient mechanism for stripping these atmospheres and transforming these planets into super-Earths.


A default server strategy is a very popular scheme for managing location and state information of mobile hosts in cellular networks. But the communication cost increases if the call requests are frequent and the distant between the default server and the client is long. Still more any connection to a mobile host cannot be established when the default server of the destination mobile host fails. These problems can be solved by replicating default server and by letting nearest replicated default server process the query request which is sent from a client. It is important to allocate replicated default servers efficiently in networks and determine the number of replicated default servers. In this paper, we suggest and evaluate a default server replication strategy to reduce communication costs and to improve service availabilities. Furthermore we propose and evaluate an optimized allocation algorithm and an optimal replication degree for replicating: dofault servers in nn grid networks and binary tree networks.


This paper presents the findings of a laboratory study that aimed to evaluate the effects of recycled tire rubber on the properties of dense asphalt mixtures. It was considered two ranges of rubber particle sizes, which substituted part of mineral aggregates in the mixture gradation. The rubber-modified asphalt mixtures ("dry process") were compared to a control mixture without rubber. For the evaluation of mechanical properties, the asphalt mixtures were submitted to three laboratory tests: dynamic indirect tension for the determination of the resilient modulus; tensile strength under indirect tension; and resistance to rutting in a wheel-tracking device. The results show that smaller rubber particles increase the resistance to rutting. The rubber-modified asphalt mixtures presented smaller values of resilient modulus and tensile strength than the control mixture. The tests results show that the size and percentage of rubber particles affect the mixture properties: the higher the rubber size and the rubber content, the smaller the resilient modulus; the higher the rubber content, the smaller the tensile strength. The performed tests also show that the binder content and the digestion time significantly affect the results. The use of tire rubber in the asphalt paving industry can contribute to minimize the problems related to the disposal of used tires and, at the same time, improve some engineering properties of asphalt mixtures.


This paper studies connections among observable sets, the observability inequality, the Hölder-type interpolation inequality and the spectral inequality for the heat equation in R. We present the characteristic of observable sets for the heat equation. In more detail, we show that a measurable set in R satisfies the observability inequality if and only if it is γ-thick at scale L for some γ > 0 and L > 0. We also build up the equivalence among the abovementioned three inequalities. More precisely, we obtain that if a measurable set in R satisfies one of these inequalities, then it satisfies others. Finally, we get some weak observability inequalities and weak interpolation inequalities where observations are made over a ball.


This work developed meta-learning control policies to achieve fast online adaptation to different changing conditions, which generate diverse and robust locomotion. The proposed method updates the interaction model constantly, samples feasible sequences of actions of estimated state-action trajectories, and then applies the optimal actions to maximize the reward. To achieve online model adaptation, our proposed method learns different latent vectors of each training condition, which is selected online based on newly collected data from the past 10 samples within 0.2s. Our work designs appropriate state space and reward functions, and optimizes feasible actions in an MPC fashion which are sampled directly in the joint space with constraints, hence requiring no prior design or training of specific gaits. We further demonstrated the robot's capability of detecting unexpected changes during the interaction and adapting the control policy in less than 0.2s. The extensive validation on the SpotMicro robot in a physics simulation shows adaptive and robust locomotion skills under changing ground friction, external pushes, and different robot dynamics including motor failures and the whole leg amputation.


Emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOCs), including the highly transmissible Omicron and Delta strains, has posed constant challenges to the current COVID-19 vaccines that principally target the viral spike protein (S). Here, we report a nucleoside-modified messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine that expresses the more conserved viral nucleoprotein (mRNA-N) and show that mRNA-N vaccination alone can induce modest control of SARS-CoV-2. Critically, combining mRNA-N with the clinically proven S-expressing mRNA vaccine (mRNA-S+N) induced robust protection against both Delta and Omicron variants. In the hamster models of SARS-CoV-2 VOC challenge, we demonstrated that, compared to mRNA-S alone, combination mRNA-S+N vaccination not only induced more robust control of the Delta and Omicron variants in the lungs but also provided enhanced protection in the upper respiratory tract. In vivo CD8+ T cell depletion suggested a potential role for CD8+ T cells in protection conferred by mRNA-S+N vaccination. Antigen-specific immune analyses indicated that N-specific immunity, as well as augmented S-specific immunity, was associated with enhanced protection elicited by the combination mRNA vaccination. Our findings suggest that combined mRNA-S+N vaccination is an effective approach for promoting broad protection against SARS-CoV-2 variants. Description An mRNA vaccine encoding the nucleocapsid and spike proteins induces protection against SARS-CoV-2 Omicron and Delta variants in preclinical models. Doubling up on antigens As additional SARS-CoV-2 variants evolve, vaccines that maintain efficacy across these variants become increasingly important. Here, Hajnik et al. tested whether an mRNA vaccine encoding the more conserved nucleocapsid (N) protein of SARS-CoV-2 can elicit responses that protect against SARS-CoV-2 challenge in vivo. mRNA-N vaccination alone elicited immune responses that could control SARS-CoV-2. Furthermore, combining mRNA-N vaccination with an mRNA vaccine encoding the spike protein (mRNA-S+N) induced better viral control than mRNA-S vaccination alone, including against the Omicron variant. Thus, incorporating the N protein into SARS-CoV-2 vaccines may promote protection against existing and future variants.


Highly resistive hydrogenated amorphous‐silicon film has been fabricated and examined as blocking‐type photoconductive target of a vidicon‐type image pickup tube. The results indicate that this novel silicon vidicon has many advantages over conventional ones.


Always keeping a certain distance between vehicles in a platoon is important for collision avoidance. Centralized platoon systems let the leader vehicle determine and notify the velocities of all the vehicles in the platoon. Unfortunately, such a centralized method generates high packet drop rate and communication delay due to the leader vehicle's limited communication capability. Therefore, we propose a decentralized platoon network, in which each vehicle determines its own velocity by only communicating with the vehicles in a short range. However, the multiple simultaneous transmissions between different pairs of vehicles may interfere with each other. Directly applying current channel allocation methods for interference avoidance leads to high communication cost and delay in vehicle joins and departures (i.e., vehicle dynamics). As a result, a challenge is how to reduce the communication delay and cost for channel allocation in decentralized platoon networks? To handle this challenge, by leveraging a typical feature of a platoon, we devise a channel allocation algorithm, called the Fast and Lightweight Autonomous channel selection algorithm (FLA), in which each vehicle determines its own channel simply based on its distance to the leader vehicle. We conduct experiments on NS-3 and Matlab to evaluate the performance of our proposed methods. The experimental results demonstrate the superior performance of our decentralized platoon network over the previous centralized platoon networks and of FLA over previous channel allocation methods in platoons.


One of the activities that can be done in improving the quality of Early Childhood or in Indonesia we called PAUD teachers is through drawing training. Teachers really need this skill training. Based on the results of interviews with a number of PAUD teachers in Padang City, it is known that PAUD teachers have very minimal drawing skills. Their students also really need drawing activities as a means and effort to foster creativity in fine arts. Drawing skills are a much-preferred area for developing children's spatial skills. Thys type of research was a Research and Development (R&D) using instructional Model of ADDIE. This model encompassed of five phases, such as Analisys Phase, Design Phase, Development Phase, Implementation Phase, and Evaaluation Phase. The pictures are designed to train the teacher's hands in drawing, thereby making the teacher's wrists flexible. A flexible wrist makes for an attractive and creative image. Besides that, the pictures are designed to give the teacher a sensation when holding a pencil and scratching it onto the drawing paper.


Background: Patient with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) can have recurrent exacerbations and acute respiratory failure (ARF) triggered by air pollution. Aim: The aim was to investigate the short-term association between particulate matter 2.5 (PM2.5) in urban air and the emergency room visits (ERV) for mechanical ventilation (MV) in acute exacerbation of COPD (AECOPD). Methods: We conducted an ecological time-series study. Daily counts of AECOPD ERV using ventilators from 2015 to 2018 were obtained from the hospital located in urban area in Taipei. Generalized linear models extending Poisson regression were used to explore the AECOPD of PM2.5 after controlling for time trend, seasonal variations, temperature, relative humidity, and days of the week. Results: A total of 628 AECOPD receiving MV were recorded, which 524 patients used noninvasive ventilation and 104 patients needed invasive ventilatory support. The ERV for AECOPD with ARF were significantly associated with PM2.5 1.45% increase per 10 μg/m3 (95% CI: 0.28%-2.67%). Interquartile range increase in 27.6 μg/m3 was associated with the increase of 18% in ERV. PM2.5 had a stronger effect on AECOPD with ARF in spring (>23.5℃), with a 1.39% (95% CI: 0.56%-1.92%) increase in admissions per 10 μg/m3 increase in same-day PM2.5. Conclusion: This is the first study providing quantitative estimates of the short-term effects of PM2.5 on ERV for AECOPD with ARF. Adverse effects of PM2.5 on AECOPD for MV are evident, especially in the spring during long-range transported Asian dust storms. To reduce PM2.5 below various thresholds is urgently needed.


..................................................................................................... 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................ 4 CHAPTER ONE: THE PROLOGUE ........................................................... 7 THE FOCUS OF THE RESEARCH.............................................................. 7 POSITIONALITY AND ETHICAL ISSUES .............................................. 12 STRUCTURE OF THE STUDY ................................................................. 16 CHAPTER TWO: THE LIFE HISTORY APPROACH .......................... 19 POSITIONALITY ........................................................................................ 19 THE LIFE STORY ....................................................................................... 19 LIFE HISTORY ........................................................................................... 21 LIFE STORY, LIFE HISTORY AND PROFESSIONAL LIVES .............. 23 LIFE NARRATIVES & IDENTITY ........................................................... 26 LIFE NARRATIVES, LIFE HISTORY & PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY IN A POSTMODERN ERA ......................................................................... 29 CHAPTER THREE: THE CONTEXT ....................................................... 31 GEOGRAPHICAL LOCATION AND ETHNIC PROFILE OF BARBADOS ................................................................................................ 32 REVIEW OF A HUNDRED YEARS OF EMANCIPATION .................... 32 BARBADOS IN THE NINETEEN THIRTIES TO SIXTIES .................... 36


This study proposes the optimal total plan for incinerator plants (IPs) in an urban area, which includes a method to decide plant number and capacity of IPs. At IPs, power generation is realized as re-covery of energy. Municipal refuse that include many biomasses is taken as carbon neutral energy, too. Power generation by waste, however, has weakness of generation e ffi ciency and low generation output due to smaller capacity of IPs. To overcome above weakness, high e ffi ciency power generation is necessary with total integration and scaling up of IPs. Regarding total integration and scaling up, the operation in wider area is fa-vorable from the view point of refuse volume and collection. In the planning stage, both cost of IP and cost of refuse collection which is important for the refuse disposal should be totally considered. The optimal total plan of IPs can be solved at two stages. First, disposal capacity of IP, G k , has to be decided as following conditions for each plant number K . G k is more than 300(t / d) and K is more than two. G k is about same capacity at each K considering operation and maintenance. Di ff erence of G k is less than 100(t / d). Each IP has 2 furnaces. In a future electric power system with high penetration photovoltaic power generation system (PVS), the surplus power may oc-cur during the daytime in the middle season. Suppressing the PVS power output as well as the surplus power with electric storage facilities is one of the measures. Unlike the output suppression for mitigating voltage rise, the output suppression for surplus power must be done simultaneously by a number of PVSs, because the frequency as a measure of power balance does not change only with the output suppression of single PVS.


The invention relates to the technical field of water collection and particularly discloses a rainwater collection device. The rainwater collection device comprises a barrel, a rainwater collection chamber, an initial rainwater chamber, a water storage chamber and a trigger mechanism. The initial rainwater chamber is communicated with the rainwater collection chamber, the water storage chamber is communicated with the rainwater collection chamber through a first passage, the trigger mechanism comprises a first slide, a first retaining plate, a first elastic element, a second slide, a floating rod and a second retaining plate, the first retaining plate is slidably mounted in the first slide and provided with a clamping slot, the floating rod is mounted in the second slide slidably and provided with a clamping protrusion, the clamping protrusion is clamped in the clamping slot, and the second retaining plate closes the first passage; when the floating rod floats upwards, the first retaining plate is ejected out to close the initial rainwater chamber, as well as impacts on the second retaining plate to enable the first passage to be communicated. As the trigger mechanism is arranged in the rainwater collection device, when the trigger mechanism is not triggered, initial rainwater can be prevented from flowing into the water storage chamber so as to avoid polluting the water storage chamber.


Kinetic evidence is presented to demonstrate that α-acylamino esters and N-acyl-dipeptide esters exhibit unusually high reactivities toward neutral and alkaline hydrolysis. The authors infer that the same must be true for other typical chymotrypsin substrates such as dipeptide amides, higher peptides and proteins, the peptide carbonyl acting in each case as a rate-enhancing neighbouring group. They conclude that, quite generally, the peptide bond in enzyme proteins does not merely serve as a backbone to support the functional groups but that, on the contrary, the amide groups may themselves participate both as nucleophilic and as electrophilic centers in the enzymatic reactions.


This paper addresses the coexistence and local stability of multiple equilibrium points for fractional-order Cohen–Grossberg neural networks (FOCGNNs) with time delays. Based on Brouwer's fixed point theorem, sufficient conditions are established to ensure the existence of ∏i=1n(2Ki+1) equilibrium points for FOCGNNs. Through the use of Hardy inequality, fractional Halanay inequality, and Lyapunov theory, some criteria are established to ensure the local Lagrange stability and the local Lyapunov asymptotical stability of ∏i=1n(Ki+1) equilibrium points for FOCGNNs. The obtained results encompass those of integer-order Hopfield neural networks with or without delay as special cases. The activation functions are nonlinear and nonmonotonic. There could be many corner points in this general class of activation functions. The structure of activation functions makes FOCGNNs could have a lot of stable equilibrium points. Coexistence of multiple stable equilibrium points is necessary when neural networks come to pattern recognition and associative memories. Finally, two numerical examples are provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the obtained results.


We consider a reduced dimensionality representation based on multiple views of the same underlying process. These multiple views can be obtained, for example, using several different modalities, measured with different instrumentation or generated based on different methods of feature extractions. Our framework is based on a cross-view random walk process which is restrained to hop between the different views in each time step. The random walk model is constructed using the intrinsic relation within each view as well as the mutual relations between views. Within this framework, multiview diffusion distances are defined which lead to reduced representations for each view. The reduced representations are exploited to perform clustering. The applicability of the multiview approach for clustering is demonstrated on both artificial and real data.


Electron‐paramagnetic‐resonance linewidths at the M=+1/2↔−1/2 transition of the Fe3+ spectrum of Fe/MgO single crystals have been examined at 9 GHz and 300 K before and after ion bombardment. The nominal ion concentrations ranged from 310 to 4300 ppm. Specimens were bombarded at 150 keV with argon ions for up to 12 min. The ion‐bombardment produces reductions in the peak‐to‐peak linewidth of ΔHpp, which occurred in two stages for all the specimens examined.


It has been shown that the sign and magnitude, of the Weissenberg effect in a viscoelastic liquid depends on the method of observation, namely, through the shape of the free surface or through the height difference of radial tappings. The Oldroyd A and the Walters A′ fluids display the negative Weissenberg effect as far as the free surface is concerned, but they display the positive effect in radial tappings. The Oldroyd B as well as the Walters B′ fluid display identical positive effect in both types of observations. The second order fluid displays the positive effect in radial tappings, but may display either effect when the free surface is observed.


The mechanism of discharge of the Li/LiAsF{sub 6}-propylene carbonate/FeS battery system has been studied by {sup 57}Fe Moessbauer spectroscopy of the cathode. The only product identifiable in the cathode reduction appears to be iron, some of which is present as small particles that exhibit superparamagnetism. There is no evidence for macroscopic amounts of a lithiated intermediate.


Was investigate the effect anomalous properties of seawater on the characteristics of sound in it. And conversely, acoustic waves of different frequency range -on the physical properties of water that forming, Very long phenomenon of sound in the ocean. Sonar technology used for navigation and for other tasks that require an understanding of the physical principles underlying the phenomena forming the main underwater sound channel and very long propagation in the marine environment. This was considered possible cause some anomalous properties of water, conducted a critical analysis of the characteristics of the marine environment, which affect the transfer of sound energy in it. It is shown that the temperature, salinity and pressure used in the calculation of the speed of sound in water by known formulas affect not directly but indirectly, through the formation of certain structures in the aquatic environment (mono-, nanoand supramolecular), which define those " abnormal "features of sound that recorded experimentally. Negative anomaly absorption of sound energy at low frequencies can be created on condition synchronization in space and time effects of changes in the structure of water while passing acoustic wave with the properties of the phenomenon itself (sound). The theory of Very long sound distribution should also take into account the effect of resonance, as a mechanism to reinforce a sound signal by coherent vibration process in the marine environment. At first sight, this may be due to coincidence acoustic wave periods and the period of natural oscillations compressibility of sea water.


A 32-year-old woman presents with a swollen, painful fourth digit on the right hand. While housecleaning, a traumatic erosion developed on the ipsilateral hyponychium.


Establishing links between models are a fundamental issue in model driven engineering (MDE) practices. There are many situations where it is necessary to create links between models, for instance traceability, transformation specification, composition operations, model evolution, etc. Every application scenario may require the creation of different types of links. The existence of many application scenarios and link types motivates the development of sets of DSLs (Domain Specific Languages) to capture links between model elements. We propose using weaving models [1] to do this. A weaving model conforms to a weaving metamodel. The creation of weaving models requires adapted user interfaces, for example with link management primitives, or matching algorithms. Eclipse EMF (Eclipse Modeling Framework) [3] is a plugin for Eclipse [2] that provides basic model management primitives, such as reading, updating, inserting, serialization, as well as and a standard user interface. However there is no specific support for creating weavings models. In this paper we present an adaptive workbench for developing weaving architectures, calling AMW (ATLAS Model Weaver) [1]. It is based on a generic weaving metamodel that supports basic link management (a generic weaving DSL). The workbench uses the dynamic model management API of EMF. It is based in the contribution mechanism [5] of Eclipse: we develop an extensible workbench where other developers can contribute to it with other plugins. We define extension points to handle with specific requirements for creating adaptive weaving plugins. This paper is organized as follows. Section 2 presents a set of requirements to implement a weaving workbench. Section 3 describes a weaving metamodel as a core DSL. Section 4 presents the adaptive weaving workbench based on the Eclipse contribution mechanism. Section 5 concludes.


Results from a direct numerical simulation of transitional flow over a surface with spherical roughness elements of height k and a surface with random roughness of maximum height {+-}k{sub max} are presented. Periodic boundary conditions in the streamwise and spanwise directions simulate an infinite array of roughness elements, while a body force, designed to yield the streamwise Blasius velocity in the absence of roughness, maintains the flow. At k/{delta}* = 0.72, the mean velocity field in the spherical roughness domain contains secondary flow patterns within the region below 2k, for Reynolds numbers, U{sub k}k/{nu}, between 90 and 225. The streamwise vorticity at these low Reynolds numbers is simply a result of the fluid`s continuity and does not indicate rotating fluid or effects of inertia. The spheres distort the original Blasius profile into a mildly inflected layer containing low-momentum regions behind each sphere. These regions engender unsteady disturbances near the wall; however, the distribution of body force with vertical position above the wall is such that growth is suppressed in this region. Growth does occur in the unstable layer above the spheres where the body force is larger. The disturbance frequency is fixed by both the mean, streamwise velocity in themore » most unstable layer and the spacing between spheres; it is not the blunt-body vortex-shedding frequency expected for isolated bodies. When an oscillating component was added to the steady, Blasius body force, the response was independent of both forcing frequency and amplitude and, once again, depended on the mean velocity and the spacing between spheres. At k{sub max}/{delta}* = 0.5, the random roughness flow field contains oscillation frequencies near the Tollmien-Schlichting band, which is also the passing frequency associated with the domain`s streamwise length and the local advection velocity, for Reynolds numbers, U{sub k{sub max}}k{sub max}/{nu}.« less


It has been experimentally found that the carbon surface contamination influences strongly the spectrum signals in reflection electron energy loss spectroscopy (REELS) especially at low primary electron energy. However, there is still little theoretical work dealing with the carbon contamination effect in REELS. Such a work is required to predict REELS spectrum for layered structural sample, providing an understanding of the experimental phenomena observed. In this study, we present a numerical calculation result on the spatially varying differential inelastic mean free path for a sample made of a carbon contamination layer of varied thickness on a SrTiO3 substrate. A Monte Carlo simulation model for electron interaction with a layered structural sample is built by combining this inelastic scattering cross-section with the Mott's cross-section for electron elastic scattering. The simulation results have clearly shown that the contribution of the electron energy loss from carbon surface contamination incre...


INTRODUCTION: Electrocardiogram is a fundamental tool for diagnosis, identification, prognosis and also managing the patients with suspected myocardial infarction (chest pain). METHOD: Electrocardiography is used to localizing the culprit vessel in acute ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) and to diagnose the accuracy of electrocardiogram (ECG) findings by comparing them with the coronary angiographic findings. In acute ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). RESULTS: Correlation of ST segment elevation on the 12 lead ECG with the affected coronary artery is established in patients with ST elevation myocardial infarction. AWMI with LAD obstruction has proximal, mid and distal which is highly elevated when compared with IWMI of RCA obstruction, LCX obstruction with IWMI+RVMI. CONCLUSION: Overall, ECG is still a valuable tool in acute Blessy et al (2020): Correlation between ECG change and coronary angiographic localization in MI Nov 2020 Vol. 23 Issue 20 Annals of Tropical Medicine & Public Health http://doi.org/10.36295/ASRO.2020.232219 myocardial infarction for localization of culprit vessels.


The MCR of rat GH (rGH) was determined by a single injection method with [l25I]rGH in young, postweaning, Long-Evans male rats through experimental growth retardation and 28 days of growth recovery. The three experimental models used were 1) fast for 48 h, 2) sc injections of cortisone acetate in a dose of 5 mg/rat-day for 4.days, and 3) feeding 6-propylthiouracil (PTU), added to the stock diet in a concentration of 0.1% for 20 days. The MCR decreased during fasting and hypothyroidism. During cortisone treatment, however, the MCR remained normal. During recovery, the MCR returned to normal by 7 days after the fast and to near normal by 21 days after the end of PTU feeding. In the cortisone-treated animals, the MCR dropped below the control value by recovery day 7 and remained lower than in controls throughout the remaining period of observation. The persistently reduced MCR during recovery in the cortisone model, which does not have catch-up growth acceleration,: may result from reduced tissue mass and a ...


This paper discusses the contribution of theology to the building of a civilizing democracy, i.e. a democratic society where a life of justice to all is advanced. A society is only "civilized" where justice to especially the most vulnerable is advanced. Justice rests in dignity and co-exists with equality and equity, as well as with freedom. Theology makes a threefold contribution towards a society of justice. Theology reveals the deeper meaning-giving framework, and forces of social cohesion and moral living without which a liberal democracy cannot flourish. Theology offers richer descriptions of notions like justice, which advance the implementation and fulfilment of these features. Theology makes a contribution towards the mobilization of an activist civil society and citizenship in search of a civilizing society of justice.


Objective:To study the preparation of the compound aciclovir eye dro p and its quality control.Methods:Aciclovir and lomefloxacin hydrochloride were used as basic remedy,HCl was used to control PH,0.1%NaOH was used as solution.Fi nally the contents of aciclovir and lomefloxacin hydrochloride were determined by UV-spectrophotometric method,the detecting wave lengths were 283nm and 254nm. Results:The average rate of recovery of aciclovir was 100.20%,RSD=0.97%(n=6).Th e average rate of recovery of lomefloxacin hydrochloride was 101.43%,RSD=0.67%(n =6).Conclusion:The preparation has a simple preparation technique and reliable q uality control.


A maintenance planning framework is developed in this study to reduce and stabilize the maintenance costs of the manufacturing companies. The framework is based on fuzzy technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution(TOPSIS) and failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) techniques and supports maintenance planning decisions in a dynamic way. The proposed framework is general and can easily be adapted to a host of manufacturing environments in a variety of sectors. To determine the maintenance priorities of the machines, fuzzy TOPSIS technique is employed. In this regard, 'risk priority number' obtained by FMEA and 'current technology', 'substitutability', 'capacity utilization', and 'contribution to profit' are used as the criteria. Performance of the resulting maintenance plan is monitored, and maintenance priorities of the machines are updated by the framework. To confirm the viability of the proposed framework, a real‐world implementation in an international food company is presented. The results of the application reveal that the proposed maintenance planning framework can effectively and efficiently be used in practice. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


The utility model relates to a laser ranging component which comprises a supporting device and a laser ranging device which is positioned on the supporting device, and further comprises a balance mechanism for automatically regulating the levelness of the laser ranging device, and a control key area which is positioned on the supporting device and allows a user to manually operate. The laser ranging component can automatically regulate the levelness of the laser ranging device through the balance mechanism, thereby increasing the accuracy of the laser ranging device; in addition, since the control key is arranged on the supporting device, the problem that the laser ranging device shakes and fails to remain level due to the user's manual operation during the process of measurement is overcome, thereby further increasing the accuracy of the laser ranging device.


Never before has so much evidence pointed to the importance of diet and lifestyle behavior as influencing risk for cardiovascular disease. The National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP) recently released its Third Expert Panel Report on the Detection and Treatment of Cardiovascular Disease in Adults (ATP III). This report, along with policy guidelines related to obesity, hypertension, diabetes, and other chronic diseases, provides strong recommendations for lifestyle interventions—modified diet, physical activity, and weight control—as key factors in the prevention of disease. The current evidence surrounding these recommendations is summarized, and translational examples are presented. The strength of the evidence and the practical significance of the resulting recommendations are discussed.


An efficient and simple methodology for the conversion of aryl aldehyde 3-(p-chlorophenyl)-1,8-naphthyridin-2-ylhydra-zones 1 to N-aroyl-N'(3-p-chlorophenyl-1,8-naphthyridin-2yl)hydrazines 3 using m-chloroperbenzoic acid (m-CPBA) under solid conditions is described.


Neuronal networks can generate burst events. It remains unclear how to analyse interburst periods and their statistics. We study here the phase-space of a mean-field model, based on synaptic short-term changes, that exhibit burst and interburst dynamics and we identify that interburst corresponds to the escape from a basin of attraction. Using stochastic simulations, we report here that the distribution of the these durations do not match with the time to reach the boundary. We further analyse this phenomenon by studying a generic class of two-dimensional dynamical systems perturbed by small noise that exhibits two peculiar behaviors: 1- the maximum associated to the probability density function is not located at the point attractor, which came as a surprise. The distance between the maximum and the attractor increases with the noise amplitude $\sigma$, as we show using WKB approximation and numerical simulations. 2- For such systems, exiting from the basin of attraction is not sufficient to characterize the entire escape time, due to trajectories that can return several times inside the basin of attraction after crossing the boundary, before eventually escaping far away. To conclude, long-interburst durations are inherent properties of the dynamics and sould be expected in empirical time series.


Pregnancy entails a large negative balance of iron, an essential micronutrient. During pregnancy, iron requirements increase substantially to support both maternal red blood cell expansion and the development of the placenta and fetus. As insufficient iron has long been linked to adverse pregnancy outcomes, universal iron supplementation is common practice before and during pregnancy. However, in high-resource countries with iron fortification of staple foods and increased red meat consumption, the effects of too much iron supplementation during pregnancy have become a concern because iron excess has also been linked to adverse pregnancy outcomes. In this review, we address physiologic iron homeostasis of the mother, placenta, and fetus and discuss perturbations in iron homeostasis that result in pathological pregnancy. As many mechanistic regulatory systems have been deduced from animal models, we also discuss the principles learned from these models and how these may apply to human pregnancy. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Nutrition, Volume 43 is August 2023. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.


To understand the dynamics of spatially structured populations, we need to know the level of movements at different spatial scales. This paper reports on Aphodius dung beetle movements at two scales: movements between dung pats within pastures, and movements between pastures.
First, I test an assumption common to many recent models of spatially structured populations – that the probability of an individual moving between habitat patches decreases exponentially with distance. For dung beetles, I find sufficient evidence to reject this assumption. The distribution of dispersal distances was clearly leptokurtic, with more individuals moving short and long distances than expected on the basis of an exponential function. In contrast, the data were well described by a power function. I conclude that dung beetle movements include an element of non-randomness not captured by the simplistic exponential model. The power function offers a promising alternative, but the actual mechanisms behind the pattern need to be clarified.
Second, I compare several species of Aphodius to each other. Although these species occur in the same network of habitat patches, their movement patterns are different enough to result in a mixture of different spatial population structures. Movements between pastures were more frequent the larger the species, the more specific its occurrence in relation to pat age, and the more specialized it is on cow dung and open pasture habitats. Within pastures, all species form "patchy" populations, with much movement among individual pats.


We consider multirate digital control systems that consist of an interconnection of a continuous-time nonlinear plant (described by ordinary differential equations) and a digital lifted controller (described by ordinary difference equations). The input to the digital controller consists of the multirate sampled output of the plant, and the input to the continuous-time plant consists of the multirate hold output of the digital controller. In this paper we show that when quantizer nonlinearities are neglected, then under reasonable conditions (which exclude the critical cases), the stability properties (in the Lyapunov sense) of the trivial solution of the nonlinear multirate digital control system can be deduced from the stability properties of the trivial solution of its linearization. We also point out that certain results involving quantization effects and stabilizing controllers can be established which are in the spirit of some existing results.


Wastewater from acrylic fibre production with two step process contains a lot of low polymers, acrylonitrile and sodium thiocyanate etc. and CODCr of the wastewater is high. The processes including micro-electrolysis, biomembrane filtration and biomembrane contact oxidation were employed to treat the water. The data of the treated water were as follows: CODCr 750 mg/L, acrylonitrile 5 mg/L,sodium thiocyanate 35 mg/L, pH=6~9. The treated water meets the requirements of further treatment.


Soluble receptors for TNF (sTNF-R) are present at elevated concentrations in the synovial fluid of patients with rheumatoid arthritis. They are presumably released by cells of the synovial membrane, including the monocyte-derived synovial macrophages. Cytokines from the synovium, including IL-1 and TNF-α, may stimulate release. We therefore examined the release of sTNF-R from monocytes exposed to IL-1 and TNF-α. Elutriator-purified human blood monocytes spontaneously released both the p75 and the p55 sTNF-R (1011 ± 199 and 177 ± 20 pg/106 cells, respectively, mean ± SEM) during 48 h of in vitro culture. TNF-α and IL-1α induced time- and concentration-dependent increases in the release of sTNF-R75 from monocytes, but neither had a measurable effect on the release of sTNF-R55. The release of sTNF-R75 was inhibited by cycloheximide. Neither lymphocytes nor polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) released measurable sTNF-R spontaneously or in response to stimulation with IL-1α, but TNF-α stimulated the release of ...


This theoretic-methodological research aims to consider sociocultural framework appropriation by research in science teaching. This papper took into account that: (1) there is some marxism underlying Vygotsky s studies – which is claimed as a key-author in the sociocultural framework; (2) poor appropriation of many theoretical frameworks amid research in science teaching – in particular, the sociocultural framework – constitutes a real problem for this field of study. Starting from these assertions, two tipes of questions have been raised: (1) Which is the meaning of asserting that Vygotsky is marxist? Which is the relevance of marxism in his most important researches? (2) Which benefits and risks an emphasis on marxism would present to research in science teaching? This study kept focus on the first group. Aiming to reach an answer for the very first questions, it was carried out an analisis of the books: Pensamento e Linguagem (VYGOTSKY, 2005) and Formacao Social da Mente (VYGOTSKY, 2003). This analysis attempted to describe how marxist worldview had influence over Vygotsky s theoretic-empirical construction. This analysis pointed concrete reasons that support dialetic materialism as constitutive of every relevant assertion in Vygotsky s framework. Therefore, marxist worldview can t be just omited.


This is an important book. It tells the story of one cricketer who went on to play a significant role in fighting racism and prejudice in Britain and, some might say, in 'decolonizing' British cult...


REBCO coated conductors (CCs) are expected to be applied to high field magnets due to their high longitudinal tensile strength and excellent critical current characteristics in high fields. For large scale magnets with large stored energy, quench protection is a key issue. Although various quench protection methods have been proposed for REBCO magnets, the most traditional and straight forward approach is to increase the copper stabilizer and reduce the current density. This approach leads to a significant increase in conductor length to generate a required magnetic field in case a small bore diameter magnet, while the conductor increase would not be serious in case a large bore diameter one. Based on this approach, we have successfully fabricated a practical cryogen-free superconducting magnet (CSM) with a large bore of 200 mm-diameter and a central field of 5 T using REBCO CCs laminated with 0.3 mm-thick copper tapes. For further study, we designed a MJ-class 10 T-CSM with the same inner-diameter as the 5 T-CSM and investigated the feasibility of the magnet through quench tests in this study. We conducted quench tests on short samples of copper-plated REBCO CCs with copper tape soldered on different surfaces, and quench tests on a small coil assuming an energy recovery method with external resistance. In the short sample tests, it was found that the temperature rise was suppressed regardless of the position of the copper tape lamination, and the normal zone propagation velocity was improved when the copper tape was laminated to the substrate side. In the small coil tests, the decay time constant after shutdown was varied to find the conditions that can protect the magnet with high stored energy. We confirmed that quench protection of 10 T-CSM was feasible under practical conditions.


Language, Culture, Discourse Language, Identity and Cultural Politics Tools for Discourse Analysis The Name of the Father Performing Masculine Identities The Language of Ethnicity The Unbearable Lightness of Being Polish? Intersections


The accuracy of measured traffic flow on a roadway is highly depends on correctness of PCUs used for converting traffic volume. Field data for the present study was collected from the mid-block road sections of different divided multilane highways in India. Video graphic method was used for collecting the field data. PCUs are estimated from the available methods as given in the literature by using traffic flow data observed in the field. Present study describes a modified methodology for estimation of PCU value of subject vehicles that includes the time headway as influencing parameter. The approach used in the present study is inspired from the method of dynamic PCU estimation where a PCU is expressed as the ratio of speed ratio and area ratio of standard cars to the subject vehicle type. Unlike dynamic PCU method, this method includes time headway factor for PCU estimation. The method found more realistic and logical as it provides relatively higher values of PCUs than those obtained from dynamic PCU method. Simulation of traffic flow was also performed through microscopic simulation model VISSIM for generating congestion and for comparing estimated PCU values at the level of maximum traffic volume. The methodology adopted in this study will be extended for development of comprehensive PCU model by including more numbers of influencing factors under varying traffic and roadway conditions.


Winery wastewater compositions are highly variable and differ significantly from season to season. Heavy metals, such as Cd, Pb, Cu, Ni, Zn, Mn and Mg are present in the wastewater. The quantity of heavy metals in winery wastewater can be reduced by an adsorption process with good efficiency. For our comparative adsorption efficiency study, four adsorbents, such as neem leaf, orange peel, coconut husk and saw dust were used. All the adsorbents were sieved through a 0.25mm pore size sieve. Polypropylene bottles with 300mL capacity were filled with 50mL of the winery wastewater and 2g of each adsorbent. The bottles were shaken for 1hour at 180rpm on a rotary shaker at room temperature and after shaking, the samples were filtered and analyzed for their elemental concentrations of heavy metals on AAS, to verify the adsorption capacities of the adsorbents. The results show that saw dust and coconut husk can be used for Cu, for Zn saw dust and orange peel, for Mn coconut husk and orange peel and for Mg orange peel and coconut husk as adsorbents for a partial removal of these metals from the wastewater. The method is simple and cheap and may be applied on a large scale for the removal of heavy metals from industrial wastewaters.


In this paper, ZnCo2S4 nanomaterial with a unique structure were synthesized by static and hydrothermal method and applied to the field of electrochemical sensing. Based on the advantages of metal-organic frameworks (MOF) materials with large specific surface areas, multiple active centers, and synergistic effect of multi-metals, we choose Zn and Co bimetallic MOF as the precursor material and synthesized ZnCo2S4 nanomaterials with large active area and multiple active centers after vulcanization. In addition, we verified the excellent electrochemical sensing performance of the prepared ZnCo2S4 nanomaterial through the catalytic oxidation experiment of glucose. The results showed that ZnCo2S4 nanomaterials with bimetallic MOF as a precursor had higher electrocatalytic activity for glucose oxidation than ZnCo2S4 nanomaterials without precursor and single metal sulfide. According to the analysis of the electrochemical performance of the material, the detection limit is extremely low (0.007 μM)and two linear range (3 ∼9 μM) and (10 ∼100 μM)for glucose. Therefore, we believe that the method of preparing polymetallic sulfides with MOF as a precursor is of great significance in electrochemical sensing.


Obstruents are the key landmark events found in the speech signal. In this paper, we propose use of spectral transition measure (STM) to locate the obstruents in the continuous speech. The proposed approach does not take in to account any prior information (like phonetic sequence, speech transcription, and number of obstruents in the speech). Hence this approach is unsupervised and unconstraint approach. In this paper, we propose use of state-of-the-art Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients (MFCC)-based features to capture spectral transition for obstruent detection task. It is expected more spectral transition in the vicinity of obstruents. The entire experimental setup is developed on TIMIT database. The detection efficiency and estimated probability are around 77 % and 0.77 respectively (with 30 ms agreement duration and 0.4 STM threshold).