A voice activity detection (VAD) system includes a first voice activity detector, a second voice activity detector and control logic. The first voice activity detector is included in a device and produces a first VAD signal. The second voice activity detector is located externally to the device and produces a second VAD signal. The control logic combines the first and second VAD signals into a VAD output signal. Voice activity may be detected based on the VAD output signal. The second VAD signal can be represented as a flag included in a packet containing digitized audio. The packet can be transmitted to the device from the externally located VAD over a wireless link.


Taking the An-Chu expressway engineering as an example,we have an analysis of the damage mechanism and the protection,strenthening technology of side slope wedge of red bed,and put forward the analysis method and the protection,strenthening measures.


Pinellia ternata (Thunb.) Briet. is a well-known traditional Chinese herbal medicine that has many beneficial effects such as anti-tumor, anti-fertility, blood fat-reducing, and liver-protective. The comprehensive utilization value of P. ternata is high and the development prospect is broad. However, low tuber production resulting from "sprout tumble" (ST) due to high temperature and light intensity has largely reduced its use. Therefore, it is necessary to explore the functional gene responses to high temperature and light. Real-time quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) is commonly used for accurately gene expression detection during gene function exploration. However, because the RT-qPCR results may vary depending on the conditions and environment, an internal reference gene (IRG) is needed to normalize the RT-qPCR data. Analyzing IRGs in P. ternata can help with subsequent functional characterization and verification of the genes regulating P. ternata growth. In this study, we screened 8 suitable IRGs, and determined the most suitable IRGs using the Ct value, GeNorm, NormFinder, and BestKeeper under shade and high-temperature conditions, and in different tissues. The results showed that 18S was a suitable IRG for P. ternata studies. This discovery has laid the foundation for further research on P. ternata , and is also beneficial for the exploration of more IRGs in medicinal plants.


Objectives:  To examine the utility of clinical findings, laboratory markers and X‐ray radiographs (X‐ray) in the assessment of children presenting with an acute non‐traumatic limp.


We investigate the transport properties of a modified interface by intentionally inserting a nanometer-scale undoped ${\mathrm{Ba}\mathrm{Sn}\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ spacer layer at the ${\mathrm{La}\mathrm{In}\mathrm{O}}_{3}$/${\mathrm{Ba}}_{1\text{\ensuremath{-}}x}{\mathrm{La}}_{x}{\mathrm{Sn}\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ interface, thereby creating remotely doped heterostructures. Both the carrier density $({n}_{s})$ and the Hall mobility $({\ensuremath{\mu}}_{H})$ continuously decrease as the thickness of the ${\mathrm{Ba}\mathrm{Sn}\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ spacer layer at the interface increases, indicating a changing electron-density profile as a function of the spacer thickness. We find the behavior is consistent with the recently proposed ``interface-polarization'' model by self-consistent one-dimensional Poisson-Schr\"odinger calculations. The decrease of ${n}_{s}$ makes it difficult to see the effect of the spacer layer on the mobility in the remotely doped structures due to the simultaneous decrease of $\ensuremath{\mu}$ caused by the ineffective screening of the remote Coulomb scattering from ionized donors in addition to the threading dislocation scattering. Hence, we control the band bending continuously via the field effect with a fixed spacer-layer thickness, leading to observation of enhanced mobility $({\ensuremath{\mu}}_{\mathrm{FE}})$ in the remotely doped 2DEG heterostructures in spite of high-density threading dislocations acting as the background charged impurities.


As there was a precipitous rise of housing price,a rise of vacancy rates of newly-built houses and an irrational structure of the housing system in real estate market in recent years,the Chinese government adjusted the macroeconomic regulation through land supply policies to control the over-heated development of housing industry. According to the conduction mechanism for land supply in real estate market,this paper reviewed the land supply control process on real estate through an empirical research,and made an Pearson correlation analysis of relation between land supply and real estate market.The result showed that,as real estate market was long-periodic and timelag, land supply had a strong relativity with real estate investment,while it had a weak relativity with its supply and price.Finally,relevant suggestions were put forward on land supply polices.


In this paper, we report on the research and recommendations of the CSTA (Computer Science Teachers Association) Teacher Certification Task Force, addressing the crisis in computer science teacher preparation and certification. This paper will address the importance of computer science as a scientific discipline, and provide a brief discussion of the relevant research and current existing certification models Primarily, however, this paper focuses on the Task Force's recommended models for teacher preparation and certification in computer science.


Objective To evaluate the casting marginal adaptation of Co-Cr based dental alloy.Methods 32 gypsum dies were fabricated from a master standard die and randomly divided into 4 groups.A metal crown was prepared on each die with a different metal material for each group:Co-Cr based dental alloy,Ni-Cr-Be based dental alloy,Ni-Cr based dental alloy and Au-Pt-Pd cast alloy.32 crowns were adhered to the corresponding model die with zinc polycarboxylate.All specimens were evaluated under a stereomicroscope at 100x magnification to measure the adhesive thickness after sectioned buccolingually in two planes.The results were statistically elaborated by means of analysis of variance.Results There is no difference in the marginal discrepancy between the crowns made of Ni-Cr based dental alloys and those made of Co-Cr base alloys.The marginal discrepancy of crowns made of base meta1 alloys was much larger than that of crowns made of noble alloys.Conclusion The Co-Cr based alloys had good casting marginal adaptation and could satisfy the clinical requirements.


A blocking high in the Ural Mountains, which is recognized as the third major blocking high area in the northern hemisphere, describes a deep warm high-pressure system superimposed on the westerly belt. Based on the ERA-5 daily reanalysis data (the fifth-generation European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts atmospheric reanalysis global climate dataset) and using the Tibaldi and Molteni (TM) method, we selected 43 blocking high events in the Ural Mountains during the extended winters of 1979–2020 and analyzed their atmospheric circulation characteristics and influencing factors. Our findings revealed a downward trend in the frequency of occurrence of blocking highs in the Ural Mountains in winter, most of them were short-lived; furthermore, the frequency and duration of these occurrences generally followed a 3–4 years oscillating cycle. The synthetic results of the geopotential height (HGT) anomaly field and the surface air temperature (SAT) anomaly field of these 43 extended wintertime blocking high events in the Ural Mountains region showed that during the development of a blocking high, the central intensity of the positive anomalies in the Ural Mountains region first increased and then weakened, while the central intensity and meridional span of the negative anomalies in the Eurasian mid-latitudes of the SAT anomaly field increased continuously. In addition, abnormally high sea surface temperature (SST) in the North Atlantic sea area and abnormal reduction of sea ice (SI) in the Barents-Kara Sea and the Chukchi Sea in autumn had a significant impact on the wintertime formation of Ural Mountains blocking highs. In contrast, in autumn, the abnormal reduction of SI in the Barents-Kara and Chukchi Seas might also have led to the westward positioning of Ural Mountains blocking highs.


Saskatchewan potash deposits are found in relatively uniform, flat-bedded strata with few irregularities. Potash mines are highly automated and efficient, taking advantage of the uniform strata. Ho...


Evolutionary algorithms for multi-criteria optimization fall into two major categories: Pareto and non-Pareto based techniques. Pareto techniques explicitly make use of the Pareto optimality concept in the assessment of individuals' quality. In this regard, the extracting of the non-dominated solutions is a costly procedure in terms of time, but with remarkable results. NonPareto techniques avoid the drawback of the Pareto ranking techniques but having weaker performance. We believe that the nonPareto fitness assignment in evolutionary multi-criteria optimization may be advanced. Therefore, the paper proposes a new procedure for fitness evaluation that accompanies a simple evolutionary algorithm for solving multiobjective optimization. The proposed evaluation procedure determines the potential of each solution to be non-dominated and does not identify the nondominated solutions, thus, the algorithmic efficiency in terms of time becomes superior to the Pareto-ranking based algorithms. The performance of a solution is given by the degree it may contribute to the improvement of the population and does not rely on its Pareto rank. Comparative analysis shows that the proposed evolutionary algorithm has lower complexity and provides better results than the state of the art algorithm.


Dense arrays of long and vertically-oriented silicon nanowires (SiNWs) were fabricated from p-type (100) silicon chips using both one-step and two-step silver-assisted chemical etching. Scanning electron microscope images of the samples confirmed the formation of nanowires. X-ray diffractometry and micro-Raman spectroscopy showed that the resulting SiNWs retained the crystal quality of the parent wafer. Certain differences between the samples fabricated using these two methods were noted.


Purpose: We evaluated the feasibility of non-invasive imaging of estrogen receptors (ER) in primary breast cancer with iodine-123-labeled ER specific ligand (17 , 20E)-21-[$^123$I] iodo-19-nonpregna-1,3,5-(10), 20-tetraene-3, 17-diol using conventional nuclear medicine technique. Methods: Before they underwent surgical management, planar scintigraphy and single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) were performed in 18 patients with proven primary breast cancer, after single IV injection of 510 mCi I-123-estradiol. The results were compared with those of immunohistochemical staining against ER of the surgical specimens. Results: Planar and SPECT imaging showed hot uptake in nine of eighteen (50%) breast cancer patients. The results of ER immunohistochemistry were all positive in these patients. In the 9 cases of negative scintigraphy, 8 showed negative staining results but one showed positive staining results. Therefore, the overall concordance rate of ER scintigraphy and ER immunohistochemistry was 94.4% (17/18). Conclusion: ER scintigraphy using 1-123-estradiol is a highly predictable in vivo technique to detect ER-positive breast cancer preoperatively. It has potential application as a reliable diagnostic modality and indicator of hormone therapy for breast cancer patients.


The World Health Organization,1 the Society of Critical Care Medicine,2 and Extracorporeal Life Support Organization (ELSO)3 recommended the use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) in severe cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) with refractory respiratory and/or cardiac failure and the development of proactive and early operational plans for ECMO deployment to face a possible healthcare system crush.4,5 However, since ECMO is a highly technical and resource-intense procedure and the first outcome data in COVID-19 patients were scarce and not encouraging,6–9 many physicians were reluctant to its use in this specific population. Ethical concerns were also raised on how to equitably distribute ECMO and maximize its benefit in a period of resource scarcity. Of note, both the uncertainty about patients' outcome and the psychological stress experienced by physicians dealing with a rapid increase in the number of COVID-19 patients requiring hospital admission, prompted a resource allocation strategy in favor of patients most likely to benefit.10 To overcome some of these ethical challenges, Ramanathan et al.4 in their ECMO action plan proposed that ECMO should be of benefit and limited harm to the patient (principle of beneficence/non-maleficence), should be part of a treatment plan "shared" with the patient's family (principle of autonomy) and, when demand is scaling, should be fairly and equally distributed (principle of justice). To grant sustainability in times of resource constraints, Prekker et al.5 also suggested that, as the surge in ECMO demand increases, resource conservation strategies should be considered. Among these, the diversion of medical resources to younger patients with severe illness rather than older patients (age ⩾ 65 years)3 or patients with important comorbidities (immunocompromised status, obesity-body mass index >40, and advanced chronic disease),3 the discontinuation of extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation programs, the postponement of elective surgeries or non-urgent transplants requiring postoperative ECMO, the use of ECMO only in patients with diagnosis associated with excellent outcomes and the centralization of all ECMO requests in order to allocate resources according to predetermined frameworks based on predicted survival and ECMO duration5,10,11 were the most commonly applied. Sustainability, in time of pandemic, means that new ECMO programs should not be developed for the sole purpose of treating COVID-19 patients; on the contrary, centralization to experienced ECMO centers should be advocated. Allocating ECMO machines to centers with limited or no experience, which is a common practice often driven by a mere populism, will not produce any benefit for the entire society and might destabilize and reduce resources to already consolidated networks. Allocating resources where ECMO programs are well established, instead, will improve the outcome not only of COVID-19 patients but also of the patient population needing ECMO for conventional indications. Unfortunately, a fair allocation of resources is often unsustainable even applying the previously mentioned principles of the Principlist Bioethics;12 therefore, a multivalue ethical framework aimed at maximizing benefits while maintaining equitability and sustainability should be adopted.10 According to Personalist Bioethics, even in time of outbreak, the main aim of physicians should be the protection of physical life12 despite patient age, gender, disability, or "quality of life" judgments. Thus, physicians, guided by the principle of beneficence, have the Ethics and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation during coronavirus disease 2019 outbreak


This chapter examines the basic doctrine of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). 'Doctrine' is a word the Court would rather avoid. The Court has preferred to develop 'formula' as a basis for discussing all relevant issues, formula which are repeated again and again, developed further in manifold scenarios, used as argumentation patterns, allowing to arrive at differentiated solutions, formula often linked to specific cases for which they were originally invented. With about 20,000 judgments, the case-law is rich and all-embracing and gives a lot of illustrative examples of how to understand these formula. What is called 'basic doctrine' is therefore something very specific. It cannot be compared to stare decisis in the British tradition or theoretical models in German constitutional law. Originating from a conglomerate of different legal cultures, the ECtHR has developed not only its own style, but also its own jurisprudential approach. If there is a 'doctrine', it denies being one. Yet, the non-doctrinal doctrine is very influential and has created notions such as 'margin of appreciation' and 'European consensus' which convey a certain message of the Court's mission and are widely discussed and disputed.


Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN) is a chronic kidney disease occurring predominantly in certain rural villages from Balkan Peninsula, including Romania. Peculiar environmental factors, such as drinking water, organic contaminants derived from coal, plant toxins, mycotoxins, heavy metals have been proposed to be causing the disease. Still, one of these etiological factors stands out: Aristolochia clematitis L., a plant that contains aristolochic acids (AAs) known as carcinogenic and nephrotoxic compounds. These phytotoxins are geochemically stable in BEN areas soils and could enter the human food chain after being accumulated by crop plants. The aim of the present study was to examine the composition of soil and soil organic matter (SOM) samples from BEN endemic and nonendemic areas, using a simple and rapid microwave methanolic extraction method followed by gas-chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis. The results indicated similarities across all samples, both from endemic and nonendemic areas. A common compound (aristolone) was detected in samples where Aristolochia plants were present nearby the collecting area or collected simultaneously with the soils, therefore we can assume that this compound was transferred from plant parts into the soil.


Electrode microstructures play a major role in the determination of performance and life span of a battery. Most commercial battery electrodes consist of four phases, active material, conductive additive, binders and electrolyte (see ). Active materials are responsible for hosting Li ions. Transportation of Li ions occurs through the electrolyte. Because of the presence of conductive additives and binders, entire surface areas of active particles do not have access to the electrolytes. Hence directional lithiation (or delithiation) happens to (or from) the active particles. Depending on the crystal microstructure, anisotropic diffusion of Li ions is also possible inside the particles. Microstructural grain-grain boundary orientation introduces irregularities in concentration gradient, which can impact stress generation and fracture of active particles.


A test was recently conducted on August 1, 2000 at the FHwA Non-Destructive Evaluation Validation Center, sponsored by The New York State DOT, to evaluate a graphite composite laminate as an effective form of retrofit for reinforced concrete bridge beam. One portion of this testing utilized Acoustic Emission Monitoring for Evaluation of the beam under test. Loading was applied to this beam using a two-point loading scheme at FHwA's facility. This load was applied in several incremental loadings until the failure of the graphite composite laminate took place. Each loading culminated by either visual crack location or large audible emissions from the beam. Between tests external cracks were located visually and highlighted and the graphite epoxy was checked for delamination. Acoustic Emission data was collected to locate cracking areas of the structure during the loading cycles. To collect this Acoustic Emission data, FHwA and NYSDOT utilized a Local Area Monitor, an Acoustic Emission instrument developed in a cooperative effort between FHwA and Physical Acoustics Corporation. Eight Acoustic Emission sensors were attached to the structure, with four on each side, in a symmetrical fashion. As testing progressed and culminated with beam failure, Acoustic Emission data was gathered and correlated against time and test load. This paper will discuss the analysis of this test data.


Air traffic disruptions can result in flight delays, cancellations, and passenger misconnections, which impose large costs to aviation stakeholders. These disruptions are amplified by the uncertainty and variability underlying airport operations. However, existing disruption recovery practices use static and deterministic decision-making schemes. We aim to design proactive approaches to airline disruption recovery, by considering explicitly future operating uncertainty at hub airports. This paper develops, implements, and evaluates an original dynamic paradigm for airline disruption management that integrates a stochastic model of congestion across a network of airports into an optimization model of disruption recovery. From a practical perspective, it provides more flexible and robust airline disruption recovery decisions by leveraging network-wide airport delay information, resulting in lower expected operating costs. We develop a novel stochastic optimization approach that combines a queuing model of airport congestion, an engineering model of flight planning and a large-scale optimization model for airline disruption recovery. This is formulated as a Stochastic Mixed Integer Program. We develop an online look-ahead algorithm that yields exact solutions in reasonable computational times. Results suggest that the integration of airport congestion scenarios can reduce expected recovery costs by 1% to 4%. These improvements increase with the concentration of flights at hub airports and congestion levels at hub airports. These benefits are driven by a decrease in flight cancellations, aircraft swaps and fuel burn, which can be partly offset by a comparatively small increase in flight delays. Airline operations can strongly benefit from the systematic elicitation of airport operating scenarios on a day-to-day basis, especially when flight networks are concentrated around hub airports, and where hub airports are subject to high levels of congestion. Significant benefits could be further gained through real-time information sharing between airline operators, airport operators, and air traffic managers.


Twenty-five years ago, when HIV still went by the names of HTLV-III and LAV, researchers recognized that the AIDS virus could lie dormant inside human chromosomes, which they erroneously suggested might explain the time lag between infection and disease. Today, with reservoirs of latently infected cells in the spotlight as the central obstacle to a cure (see main text), attention is focusing on the fine details of how HIV does this deep dive and stays submerged.


Abstract SnO2 nanocrystallites with regular shape have been successfully prepared by the liquid–solid–solution (LSS) process under hydrothermal conditions. The influences of hydrothermal reaction temperature and [Sn4+] concentrations on the phase composition and particle size of SnO2 crystallites have been particularly investigated. The as obtained crystallites were characterise by X-ray diffraction (XRD), nanoparticle size analyses (NSA) and field beaming scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Results show that the size of the as prepared sphericity SnO2 crystallite is about 9–11 nm. The agglutination of SnO2 nanocrystallites has been observed and the average grain size of the conglomeration was ∼300 nm. The size of as obtained SnO2 nanocrystallites increases with the increase in hydrothermal reaction temperature and [Sn4+] concentrations.


Being a leader of Wudoumidao,a kind of religious organization,Zhang Xiu was active for nearly thirty years long.Wudoumidao led by Zhang Xiu had much important influence on the early forming of Taoism,and held an important position in history.


Differential and integrated cross sections for the formation of antihydrogen by the impact of intermediate-energy (20--500 keV) antiprotons on positronium are calculated using the first Born approximation. The calculations are carried out for the formation of antihydrogen in ground and various excited electronic states (n = 1--3) when positronium, the target atom, is in the ground state, and for the formation of antihydrogen in the ground state when the positronium is in various excited electronic states (n = 1--2). The 1/n/sup 3/ behavior for the capture cross sections is used to calculate the total (that is, all states added together) integrated cross sections. The cross sections for the formation of antihydrogen presented here are obtained from those for the formation of positronium by the impact of positrons on hydrogen atoms by using charge invariance and the principle of detailed balance.


The dynamics of interaction of science and education in the context of the development of high technologies is discussed. The basic role of information technologies for the development of hi-tech is emphasized. The trends and development of information technology and its role in the transformation process of science and education are pointed out. The main priority directions of research and developments in the field of information technologies are described.


This chapter details Ernst Kantorowicz's life after the Nazis took power in Germany in the winter of 1933. His situation as a Jewish professor became precarious. In Frankfurt, the Nazis moved to take control of the university. The university Senate met to discuss ways of forcing out Jewish faculty members. To this end, it requested that Kantorowicz take an immediate leave of absence for the sake of "avoiding disruptions of his classes." In a draft of a response dated April 3, addressed to the dean of the philosophical faculty for forwarding to the newly installed Nazi commissar for education in the province of Hesse, Kantorowicz requested the suspension of his professorship for the indefinite future albeit with continuing pay.


The most common fungal infections associated with burn injury involve Candida spp., Aspergillus spp., and, more rarely, Fusarium and Rhizopus spp. We report here a patient who developed fungal brain abscesses caused by Pseudallescheria boydii that would have led to treatment failure had recommended therapy directed toward Aspergillus been used. A 50-year-old patient with 64% total body surface area (TBSA) burns resulting from an explosion and fire had a complicated hospital course. Inhalation injury was documented by pulmonary medicine evaluation within 24 h of admission. He developed ventilator-dependent respiratory failure and pan-sinusitis. An echocardiogram demonstrated a patent formina ovalis. Thirteen ring-enhancing brain abscesses were noted on computed tomography scan on the 25th post-burn day. Magnetic resonance imaging confirmed the diagnosis of brain abscesses (Fig. 1), and surgical drainage directed the selection of antifungal therapy. Intraoperative culture demonstrated Staphylococcus aureus and P. boydii. These abscesses were treated initially with an echinocandin, but echinocandins are not effective against P. boydii; and abscess culture directed treatment with voriconazole. The patient recovered after long-term intravenous and then oral antifungal therapy. Most central nervous system P. boydii infections occur in patients with predisposing conditions, immunosuppression, near-drowning, or trauma [1]. Chronic sinusitis may predispose individuals to infection with Aspergillus species and other filamentous fungi [2]. Multiple fungal isolates in broncheoalveolar lavage liquid, as was seen in this patient, are common in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis [3]. Fungal brain abscesses have been associated with a patent foramen ovale, as was noted in this patient [4]. Between 18% and 27% of persons in the community have this often-benign cardiac anomaly [4]. The importance of isolating P. boydii with aggressive drainage of brain abscesses cannot be overstated, as on the basis of bronchoalveolar lavage, the presumptive infecting


The article highlights challenges that face the tourism industry due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The analytical reports identified key negative trends and the impact of the tourism industry on socio-economic development indicators. The analysis of the historical facts of the development of crisis phenomena in the tourism sector provided an opportunity to state the fact of cyclical formation on the basis of biological threats in different regions of the world. In the context of this study, the main problems ofthe development of the tourism industry of Ukraine against the background of the pandemic and economic crisis are highlighted. Roadmap for overcoming the crisis presents innovative tools based on cognitive technologies such as neuromarketing, mobile marketing, blog marketing, event marketing, branding, as well as diversification of tourism entities, proposed to support small and medium-sized businesses operating in the tourism sector that have suffered the most from coronavirus measures. This article summarizes and analyses the successful examples of implementation of these tools for tourism enterprises in Ukraine and the world. It is concluded that the main condition to overcome the crisis, to develop successful tourism destinations, and to create sustainable development is the collaboration between businesses, community, and policymakers.


This paper discusses the concept of universality in classification, by examining universal classific ation within a single subject area (music). It examines the idea of a " universal classification scheme" using music classification discourse, and analyses the concept of "super-facets" through three example sets of music facets . The paper finds three dime nsions of universality within special classification schemes : coverage, mechanism and consumption. Furthermore, the "super-facet" is found to be a key part of universality, although its conception of universality is different from the universal classification scheme.


This essay is intended to appear in place of a review of two recent publications, one an English version of a famous work of medieval Hebrew poetry, published in this country, and the other a translation of a classic of the middle ages, a treatise in legal prose, issued in the United States. The first is Solomon Ibn Gabirol's (Avicebron's) great religious hymn Kether Malkhuth, The Kingly Crown; the second is Maimonides' Sepher Haphla'ah, The Book of Asseverations, the sixth of the fourteen sections of his halakhic code Mishneh Torah, or Yad hazaqah. The Kether was composed in the eleventh century in Arabic Spain and in the course of time became part of Jewish Synagogue liturgy; the Yad was compiled in the twelfth century in Egypt and soon came to be considered as the authoritative codification of Jewish religious law. Gabirol wrote his poem in the Hebrew idiom of the Bible, a style commonly employed by the poets of his era and area. Maimonides, dealing with talmudic law (and sources) used in his code the Hebrew diction of the post-biblical Mishnah, a literary innovation considering the fact that hitherto rabbinic works had been written in the Aramaic of the Talmud. His contemporary critics, therefore, occasionally also accused him of mistranslating (and halakhically misinterpreting) his Aramaic sources of the Talmud.


Ordered attributed grammars (OAGs) are extended for use on parallel computers. A partition of the attributes of a tree leads to parallel evaluation if each partition is taken care of by a separate process. Visit sequences for parallel ordered attribute grammars (POAGs) are constructed, and it is shown that the POAG class is of the same power as the OAG class. The construction always leads to deadlock-free attribute evaluators. The approach taken provides a uniform basis for a wide range of implementations on parallel computers, allowing fine-grain or coarse-grain parallelism, shared memory or distributed memory architectures, and synchronous or asynchronous communication. Several kinds of partitions are discussed, and some experimental results and experiences are described.<<ETX>>


We are studying electronic holography and have developed a real-time color holography system for live scene which includes three functional blocks, capture block, processing block, and display block. In this paper, we will introduce our developed system after describing basic idea that quickly calculates hologram from IP image. The first block, capture block, uses integral photography (IP) technology to capture color 3-D objects under natural light in real time. The second block, processing block, consists of four general personal computers to generate holograms from IP images in real time. Three half-zone-plated holograms for red, green and blue (RGB) channels are generated for all captured IP images by using fast Fourier Transform. The last block, display block, mainly consists of three liquid crystal displays to display the holograms and three laser sources for RGB to reconstruct the color 3-D objects. All blocks work in real time, i.e., in 30 color frames per second.


While much has been made of the problems of regulating alcohol and other drug promotion in the traditional media of print, radio and newspapers, the 'new media' and in particular the world wide web, provides new fertile ground for alcohol advertisers. In this Harm Reduction Digest Tom Carroll and Rob Donovan apply the voluntary standards of the Alcohol Beverages Advertising Code to six websites for alcohol products available in Australia. They conclude that the internet provides an opportunity for alcohol marketing targeted at underage consumers, that some alcohol-related web pages would be in breach of the Code if it applied to the internet, and suggest that web marketing practices of alcohol beverage companies should be monitored and a code of practice developed to regulate alcohol promotion on the web.


Bid price is one of the decisive factors in evaluation and awarding of concession schemes through competitive tendering. In conjunction with concession length and equity level, bid price defines promoters' profitability and competitiveness. Promoters, therefore, need to balance their own investment interest with that of the sponsors considering the abovementioned elements, which is even more challenging, since uncertainties are inherent in investment to concession schemes. This paper presents a novel optimization model to reveal a competitive bid price along with concession length and equity level, for maximization of promoters' bid-winning potential within uncertain concession investment opportunity, at the tendering stage. Fuzzy set theory and genetic algorithm are combined, and utilized as the building blocks for model development. Within the process of genetic algorithm-based optimization, uncertainties leading to imprecise estimation of investment parameters are accounted through fuzzy set theory. The model results enable promoter to offer a profitable, yet competitive financial proposal to sponsor. A real world concession scheme is used to demonstrate application of the proposed model.


The precipitation behaviour of Fe-Cr-Mo and Fe-Cr-W alloys during
aging has been experimentally studied. It was found that in the early stage of ag-
ing, a metastable R phase precipitated in both Fe-Cr-Mo and Fe-Cr-W alloys,
which transformed to stable μ-phase, Laves-phase, X-phase or σ-phase in the later
stage. The crystallographic structure of metastable R phase is rhombohedral with
lattice parameters α=0.9075nm, α=74.45°. The chemical composition of metastable
R phase is Fe-(27.5--34.9)Mo-(0--25.5)Cr and Fe--(28.9--33.0)W--(9.36--21.0) Cr
in at.-% in Fe-Cr-Mo and Fe-Cr-W system, respectively.


We read with great interest the article by Almagro et al 1 in this issue of CHEST (see page 972). In this article, the authors proposed a new index for short-and intermediate-term prognoses among patients with COPD: the CODEX (comorbidity, obstruction , dyspnea, and previous severe exacerbations) index. However, a few important points should be highlighted before this index is accepted into clinical practice. First, the most important component of the CODEX index (ie, the Charlson index) has several limitations in the context of patients with COPD. Although broadly based, it does not include comorbidities that are relevant to patients with COPD/smokers, such as cor pulmonale, lung cancer, osteoporosis, muscle weakness , depression, and so forth. 2 , 3 Second, it is not clear from the article whether all the comorbidities listed in the Charlson index were actively investigated, or whether the calculation of the index was based simply on patients' self-reporting or hospital records. The fi rst scenario implies the need for extensive investigations, whereas adoption of the second approach may have allowed several of these comorbidities to have been missed. Last, but not least, this study was designed to develop and validate a model for prognosis, taking associated comorbidities into account, that would perform better than the previous models (BODEX [BMI, airfl ow obstruction, dyspnea, and previous severe exacerbations], DOSE [dyspnea, airfl ow obstruction, smoking status, and exacerbation frequency], and updated ADO [age, dyspnea, and airfl ow obstruc-tion] indexes), which do not include comorbidities. The results of the study showed that the CODEX index has a larger area under the curve in predicting survival at 3 months and 1 year as compared with the other indexes. However, the Charlson index scores of the development and validation cohorts were 3 and 2, respectively , which implies that there were few associated comorbidities present among these patients. This fact becomes more apparent when we consider that all patients would have gotten at least 1 point for the presence of COPD and the rest of the points may have been for the age of the patients, because the mean age of the study cohort was. 70 years. Therefore, we suggest that the previously mentioned points be kept in mind before accepting the CODEX index as an advanced tool for determining the short-and intermediate-term prognosis of these patients. Financial/nonfi nancial disclosures: The authors have reported to CHEST that no potential confl icts …


Interactive mediation between the information world and the physical world is a key domain for innovation and a major challenge to building Cyber-physical systems. New approaches to how we interact with the worlds of information and cyber-observable reality whether it be global environment observatories, scientific experimentation, visualization, education, tourism, or entertainment require a combination of technologies akin to computer gaming, social computing, mobile and ubiquitous computing. In particular, the issues of representation, human-machine interfaces and metaphors, techniques to allow collaborations within scientific and cyber-physical related endeavors suggest radical rethinking of infrastructure, design and engineering. A global environmental observatory provides one inspiration for how we would like to interact with data intensive Cyber-Physical Systems. Imagine instrumenting an Antarctic colony of penguins with video, location, sound, temperature, and wind sensors, and in future, chemical and biological measurements as well. Then imagine mapping that environment into a next generation scientific version of Second Life where scientists form all over the world can visit the colony as a cyber environment: attach tracing streamers to birds, analyze which birds meet, what bird calls correspond to what communication, and how the birds react to threats. Then imagine how such environments could be scaled up to encompass the solar system, or scaled down to reveal the inner workings of an Ant colony. We see Cyber-Physical Systems as a part of a broad approach to data interaction and we propose the creation of an open source software infrastructure, a Cyber-Physical Environment, which will support this wider variety of interactions and applications. Much as the web supports a far wider community than the physicists originally imagined, so too, our proposed CPS environment will support communities that do not yet even exist. Limitations of existing CPS. We draw lessons from earlier work in ubiquitous computing, digital libraries, cyberinfrastructure for science, and arts and entertainment. In all these areas, we see a critical gap between the emerging Cyber-Physical infrastructure and user environments. Existing CPS have not yet made the leap from one of a kind experiment to generally useful infrastructure. While there are many limitations that stem from this lack of generality, the most important are the lack of sufficient flexibility and modularity. As new capabilities and concepts become available, they should be easy to integrate into the CPS. The third major limitation, also arising from not addressing CPS generally enough, is not to envision the wealth of new and diverse …


The objective of the study was to observe the presence of C. perfringens in various meat samples and characterization of the isolates with molecular typing. The samples were collected from different retail outlets in Jabalpur city and processed aseptically. The samples were enriched in alternative thioglycollate medium followed by selective isolation in tryptose sulfite cycloserine agar. Out of 200 samples screened (50 each of raw buffen, chevon, chicken and fish meat), C. perfringens were isolated from 46 samples (23%). The highest presence of C. perfringens was found in buffen (28%), followed by fish (24%) and chevon and chicken (20% each). Lecithinase activity was shown by all the isolates of buffen, chevon and chicken, while, 11 (91.66%) isolates from fish were positive for lecithinase activity. Likewise, 36 (78.28%) isolates of C. perfringens displayed stormy fermentation in IMM within 14 – 18 hrs. The molecular study showed that all the isolates 46(100%) were found to harbor the 16S rRNA and lecithinase (cpa) gene, while none of the isolates displayed enterotoxin (cpe) gene. The presence of C. perfringens in raw meat indicated that the meat wasn't processed hygienically and poor sanitary conditions in retail outlets. Therefore, consumption of such meat may produce infectious disease and is a public health threat as many food poisoning strains of C.perfringens are heat resistant.


The first observation of a long‐range magnetic order with planar anisotropy is reported in as‐deposited films of amorphous copper ferrite prepared by rf sputtering techniques. Data on the temperature dependence of the saturation magnetization, in‐plane anisotropy field, and gyromagnetic ratio were obtained on 1‐μm‐thick films sputtered in a 50% oxygen and 50% argon atmosphere. The films show a large magnetization and anisotropy field at room temperature. The low‐temperature magnetization, Curie temperature, and gyromagnetic ratio are in agreement with the values expected for crystalline copper ferrite. A paramagnetic‐to‐antiferromagnetic transition at 50 K is evident in the magnetization data. We propose that the films contain magnetically ordered clusters of copper ferrite and Fe2O3.


THE following seven papers were presented at a joint meeting of the Applied Mineralogy Group and the Petroleum Group of the Geological Society, held in Newcastle upon Tyne in April 1986. The theme of the conference arose from the considerable amount of interest in common between petroleum geologists and ore mineralogists, particularly with respect to both fluid inclusion studies and experimental studies of mineral-fluid reactions, and their application to geological problems, tn total, thirteen papers were presented at the meeting. In addition to those published here, Burley, Matter and Mullis (Bern) presented the results of a study of the Tartan field, relating diagenetic zoning to fluid flow via faults into the reservoir, deduced from combined petrographic and fluid inclusion data. Walgenwitz and Pagel (SNEA, Pau and CREGU, Nancy) then gave details of a fluid inclusion study of the Angola offshore basin, which was used to distinguish diagenetic brines in two reservoir rocks, and to deduce palaeotemperature gradients in the region. Further fluid inclusion data from calcite-filled fractures in the chalk of the Danish sector Skjold oilfield were presented by Jensenius (Copenhagen University), who inferred that the fluids responsible for the vein fills were derived from depth, and were associated with late Miocene-Pliocene salt movements. Gize and Richardson (Southampton and Iowa State Universities) then presented results of studies of


We consider compactly supported totally interpolating biorthogonal multiwavelet systems in this article. Necessary and sufficient conditions for such systems to have given approximation orders are stated. It is shown that the shorter nontrivial filter component that has the minimum possible length for a given approximation order is uniquely determined up to a discrete parameter. We provide an example of such system with approximation order 4. Although there is no symmetric or antisymmetric totally interpolating biorthogonal multiwavelet systems, one can find uniquely totally interpolating biorthogonal multiwavelet system having a suitable symmetry property in terms of coefficients of the shorter filter. When a high approximation order 11, an example having this symmetry property is provided.


A number of factors currently are combining to produce a rapid increase in demand for health care services. This is particularly true in medicine. The factors involved in this rise in demand are creating a need for more people to enter the profession at all levels. As new problems are identified, more research is needed to find solutions. As knowledge expands, more specialists are needed to cope with the complexities of each of the medical disciplines. And as more people begin to use the health care facilities, more generalists are needed to handle all of the "common" problems of patients. The increase in demand for services and the corresponding influx of people to the profession are creating a stress on the entire system. Questions are arising as to the kinds of additional facilities that must be provided, how those facilities should be allocated, what resources are available for their development, and finally, who shall pay for them. These are questions with no easy answers. Perhaps nowhere are these pressures being felt more acutely than in medical schools. The training needs of the profession are growing at an enormous rate. New and more complex roles are being required while traditional roles are becoming more demanding. At all levels, there is a need for broadened training programs. However, the number of medical schools is limited. There are only so many spaces for incoming students and there are only so many faculty members available to train them. Hence, it is necessary that schools become much more efficient and effective in their work with students. Materials and facilities must be economized and roles must be examined and changed where necessary. Every aspect of training must be considered-from pre-medicine courses all the way through residency training. Medical schools have already begun this process. Courses are being


Most commodities have been experiencing bear markets for years (as highlighted above). If traditional asset classes had experienced similar movements, most investors and investment managers would have possibly been teetering on the window sill.


We examined the dynamics of water-soluble pectin (WSP), specifically the content and molecular weight distribution, in tea leaves and tea infusions in relation to steaming time during unrefined tea processing. It was revealed that the fraction of higher-molecular weight (MW) WSP in tea leaves was infused at the beginning of unrefined tea processing at all steaming times, and lower-MW WSP was not infused during any processing steps. Moreover, by increasing steaming time, the increase of higher-MW WSP content in tea leaves was reflected by the increase in WSP content of corresponding size in the tea infusions.


SUBTITLE: TRAFFIC, CAPACITY, STAFF, FLEETS -- ALMOST EVERYTHING'S HEADING SOUTH IN NORTH AMERICA, WRITES GASEL CUSENIER. CURRENTLY THE ONLY EXCEPTION IS THE TALLY OF NEW AIRCRAFT ON ORDER. BUT THE AIRLINES ARE LOOKING FOR AN OUT AND IT CAN ONLY BE A MATTER OF TIME BEFORE THE MANUFACTURERS SHARE THEIR PAIN IN FULL.


This study aims to investigate and announce orally transmitted traditional plant-based therapies for pain relief in North Jeolla Province, Korea. Data was collected with semi-structured questionnaires through the participatory rural appraisal method. This study reveals that overall 23 pain ailments have been treated with a total of 82 species of medicinal plants belonging to 74 genera in 45 families. This study also reports 313 different modes of plant-based therapeutic application of medicinal material. The informant consensus factor for pleurodynia, slipped disk and frozen shoulder is 1.00, the highest among 23 different pain ailments, followed by lumbago, chronic myofascial pain, melosalgia, sinews and joints pain, arthralgia, carpal tunnel syndrome, etc. Medicinal plants with 100% fidelity level and above three mentions among informants were 15 species. This study can help to preserve the traditional knowledge and local health traditions of North Jeolla Province amidst rapid industrialization and urbanization. The findings of this study warrant follow-up clinical research to determine the most effective traditional remedies towards development of herbal medicinal products for integration into the Korean healthcare system. These results will help to prepare the way for advanced research such as new medicines and new therapies that could be of help clinically.


Most new venture founders are experienced and enculturated in existing organizations that may be seen as parents of their startups. Organizational culture is often seen as a source of success, rais...


e18140Background: More than 60% of cancer patients are older adults, and by 2020 the proportion of older adults with cancer will rise to 70%. Objective: To assess risk factors for overall survival ...


The invention discloses a magnetic sensor detection method and a magnetic sensor detection system. The method comprises the following steps: acquiring the background data of all the channels of a magnetic sensor; determining that the maximum value of the background data of every channel is smaller than a preset first threshold and the minimum value is greater than a preset second threshold, or determining that the number of random noise points in the background data of every channel is smaller than a preset number; determining that the difference parameter of the background data of the channels is smaller than a preset parameter; determining that the average difference coefficient of the background data of the channels is smaller than a preset coefficient; and detecting that the magnetic sensor is qualified. According to the invention, the background data of all the channels of the magnetic sensor is acquired, and whether the magnetic sensor is qualified or not can be detected according to the maximum values, minimum values, random noise points, difference parameter and average difference coefficient of the background data of all the channels.


Considerable progress to synthesize magnesium diboride (MgB2) films by electron-beam annealing has been made. A series of MgB2 films with a Tc higher than 35 K had been fabricated. MgB2 film superconductivity is affected by electron-beam accelerating voltage, beam current, annealing duration, beam spot size and Mg/B ratio. In order to fabricate better MgB2 films, these influence factors must be intensively studied. In this paper, the influence of e-beam current on superconductivity was investigated with an accelerating voltage of 32 kV, an annealing time of 0.26 s and different annealing beam currents of 9.9 mA, 10.7 mA, 12.8 mA, 13.3 mA and 14.0 mA. The results show the MgB2 film with 12.8 mA has the highest Tc and the densest structure. Its zero-field Jc at 15K has reached 3.2×106 A/cm2. The variation of the film superconducting properties with the beam currents was grasped, which will lay the foundation for the fabrication of high quality MgB2 thin films


The data of 35 years from 1980 to 2014 were analyzed to study the effect of genetic and non-genetic factors viz. period of calving, season of calving as fixed effect and sire as random effect on the reproduction trait (age at first calving) of Kankrej cattle maintained at Livestock Research Station, S.D. Agricultural University, Sardarkrushinagar, Gujarat. The least square mean of age at first calving in Kankrej cows was found to be 1376.0 9 ± 14.55 days. Heritability estimates was 0.44 ± 0.18 for the age at First calving. Genetic correlation of age at first calving (AFC) with first lactation 300 milk yield (F300Y), total milk yield (FLY) and lactation length (FLL) were 0.358 ± 0.218, 0.341± 0.216 and 0.661 ± 0.361, respectively while the phenotypic correlation were 0.055, 0.048 and 0.044, respectively. The effect of period of calving and sire was significant (P<0.01) on age at first calving. Season of calving did not affect significantly to this trait under study. Effect of season of calving was not significant on age at first calving indicated breed characteristic for adoption in particular environment. Age at first calving showed a significant variation over the period that indicated some selection measures for age at first calving.


Bandung Philharmonic is an international standard orchestra symphony with a varied presentation of masterpieces, from classical music masterpieces to the work of archipelago composers at each concert. In order to realize the international standard orchestra concert required a good management system to pre-production process, production, and post production run smoothly, which is supported by attention to several aspects such as planning, organizing, and controlling. This study aims to determine the operational management system and operational workflow in Bandung Philharmonic, with subvariables that include ten operational management decisions. This research is a qualitative research with descriptive presentation. Data obtained by interview, observation and documentation. The results show that the operational management at Bandung Philharmonic has not been fully implemented in accordance with the existing theory, from ten operational management decisions there are only a few that have been run accordingly, namely: product design, design process, supply chain management, inventory management, and location strategy. Based on the results of the research, then to realize a good professional orchestra concert can be done by improving its management system which includes human resources and job design, maintenance, and organizational workflow.


The H.264/AVC standard gives a few new slip flexible peculiarities to empower the dependable transmission of compacted feature motions over lossy bundle systems. Adaptable Macroblock Ordering (FMO) is a standout amongst the most fascinating strong peculiarities inside the H.264/AVC standard. Dissimilar to previous principles, in which cuts were built out of sequential raster check macroblocks, FMO recommends new cuts made out of spatially appropriated Macroblocks (MBs), and sorted out in a stirred up style. H.264/AVC points out seven sorts of FMO. The standard characterizes additionally an unequivocal FMO (Type 6), which permits expressly task of every MB inside the casing to any accessible cut gatherings. Subsequently new FMO sorts can be utilized and incorporated into H264/AVC without disregarding the standard. In this paper we propose another Explicit Chessboard-Wipe (ECW) Flexible Macroblocks Ordering (FMO) method, which beats all other FMO sorts. The new ECW requesting results in compelling blunder dissipating which augments the quantity of accurately got macroblocks placed around debased macroblocks, prompting better mistake disguise. Execution assessments show that the proposed Explicit FMO methodology beats all the FMO sorts. Both subjective and target visual quality similar study has been likewise completed keeping in mind the end goal to approve the proposed methodology.


Recently, it was predicted that if all one-electron states in a non-interacting disordered system are localized, the interaction between electrons in the absence of coupling to phonons leads to a finite-temperature metal-insulator trnasition. Here we show that even in the presence of a weak coupling to phonons the transition manifests itself (i) in the nonlinear conduction, leading to a bistable $I$-$V$ curve, (ii) by a dramatic enhancement of the nonequilibrium current noise near the transition.


By derivatization at the N‐terminus of amino acid‐based anticancer agents (e.g. melphalan and acivicin) to form a drug delivery system (TDDS), we demonstrate a change in the mechanism of brain uptake from the large neutral amino acid transporter (LAT) pathway to passive. An in situ rat brain perfusion technique was used to determine the brain capillary permeability–surface area (PA) product for [14C]l‐Leu as control (5.18 ± 0.32 × 10−2 mL/s/g), which was inhibited competitively (to 7–18% of control) by an excess concentration of the amino‐acid‐containing anticancer agents, acivicin and melphalan. However, TDDS did not compete for LAT‐mediated brain uptake of the radiotracer [14C]l‐Leu. Brain uptake of TDDS was determined after in situ brain perfusion followed by RP‐HPLC along with LC‐MS/MS detection of the analytes in brain samples. The PA product for CH3‐TDDS containing melphalan (5.09 ± 2.0 × 10−2 mL/s/g) shows that these agents rapidly cross the blood–brain barrier. Furthermore, competition studies of CH3‐TDDS with [3H]verapamil suggest that the TDDS interacts significantly with the multidrug resistant efflux system (P‐glycoprotein) at the blood–brain barrier. Therefore, TDDS were shown to lack LAT‐mediated brain uptake. The drug delivery systems, however, showed uptake predominantly via the passive route along with recognition by the multidrug resistant efflux protein at the cerebrovasculature.


One challenge for product development is the change from solely tangible products to more immaterial goods, such as services. This requires offering more than just a product, but opens new business models on the other side. This deferral is called the product-to-service-shift. Combining products and services to a product-service system (PSS) enable companies to better meet customers' requirements or to increase customer connectivity and to focus on own core competencies. Since PSS are more complex and more interrelated than stand-alone products, developing PSS requires different methods and frameworks. The planning phase for PSS is relevant for the market success, as most important decisions are made in early stages of product development. For this reason, planning PSS requires special methodical support to enable reliable decisions. In this paper, we built a decision methodology for PSS-planning by combining a process model with several methods from previous works. To evaluate its applicability, we conducted a case study from industrial practice and used the methodology for the planning phase of vehicles. The product's complexity and organizational requirements were high enough for needing methodological support. The case study reveals the need for the methodology and its benefits in a real application.


This paper wants to explain the relationship between forms of value net organization and competitive advantage realization in two- and multi-sided service markets. Based on these considerations organizational recommendations are developed. Therefore, the economic specificities of services in two- and multi-sided service markets are described and analysed. The core of the paper is a contingency analysis with regard to the impact of horizontal, vertical, and lateral forms of value net organization on the competitiveness of service platforms in two- and multi-sided service markets.


Being most well-known tumor suppressor that is inactivated in tumors more frequently than any other gene, p53 has been recently recognized as a major player in a variety of pathologies caused by acute stresses of tissues that is responsible for massive cell loss from apoptosis. This created a controversial situation when effective treatment of acute pathology requires inhibition of a major cancer preventive factor that has been traditionally viewed as a target for therapeutic activation. Here we briefly review specific aspects of this problem and discuss the ways of its pharmacological resolution based on detailed knowledge of molecular mechanisms of p53 regulation and activity.


Facing the opportunities and challenges of ESP education of port and ship majors as a result of CDS,Nantong institutions related need to make their best endeavors to cultivate ESP talents to serve port ship industries in Nantong.


Perianal skin lesions, such as skin tags, can be an early presenting sign of Crohn's disease. Surgical intervention on these lesions may increase the risk of fistula development and lead to worse outcomes. This case series examined 8 patients who underwent surgical intervention on what appeared to be benign perianal skin lesions, only to reveal fistulas leading to the diagnosis of Crohn's disease. This patient population comprised 20% of all pediatric patients with Crohn's disease who had perianal fistula present at diagnosis. The initial type of perianal lesion varied from case to case and included skin tags, hemorrhoids, and perianal abscesses. All of the patients had other presenting features that, in retrospect, may have been attributed to Crohn's disease. None presented solely with a perianal lesion. Four patients had weight loss or growth failure. Most of the remainder had abnormal laboratory test results. These findings should raise the awareness of primary care providers that perianal lesions can be the first presenting sign of possible Crohn's disease in otherwise healthy appearing children. Such children should undergo a thorough evaluation for Crohn's disease before surgical intervention on perianal lesions because surgical procedures may be associated with worse outcomes.


The activities produced in the bombardment of aluminium with protons in the energy range 200-980 MeV have been studied. The ratio of the cross section for the production of 11C from polythene to that for both 18F and 24Na from aluminium are given in this energy range while cross section ratios of 27Mg, 13N and 11C from aluminium are given at an energy of 980 MeV.


Tarnishing film was developed on the brass surface in Mattsson's solution at room temperature. The filmed brass was removed from the solution, dried, and subjected to a slow strain rate (loading speed = 0.5 mm/min) in air for studying the effect of the film on crack propagation in the brass substrate. It was observed that initial cracks started to emerge in the film and then propagated to the brass matrix in a brittle intergranular manner. However, it changed into a ductile mode after removing the deposited film. The galvanic current between platinum wire and filmed brass sample in Mattson's solution was investigated. The results showed that periodic current fluctuations were observed when the sample was under a constant applied load. These observations showed that the film rupture-formation occurred at cracks under the stress-corrosion cracking condition.


Existing deep inpainting methods often generate contents with blurry textures and distorted structures, which manifests to well fuse the high-level structures and the low-level textures remains challenging. Meanwhile, current inpainting networks just process features at the encoder side but neglect the strong generative abilities in decoder pathway. To address above challenges, we propose a novel Dual Path Cross-Scale Attention Network (DPCSAN). It adopts U-Net architecture as backbone. Based on contextual attention, a Cross-Scale Attention Module (CSAM) is designed to transfer high-level structure information to adjacent low-level features across scales. CSAMs are equipped between each encoder layer and the symmetric decoder layer at multiple levels. The purpose of this design is to fill holes in shallower feature maps and to refine features generated by upsampling (with higher resolution). Experiments on Facade and CelebA-HQ demonstrate that our model performs better than state-of-the-art methods, while generating richer details and keeping original structures.


The main objectives are to assess the impact of economic, social, and psychological outcomes of micro- enterprises on entrepreneurs in rural Kafr El-Sheikh Governorate, to investigate the determinants of the composite index of the total development impacts , and identifying major problems facing the micro-enterprise activities. Fifteen variables are postulated to be the determinants of the total development impact index. A questionnaire form is designed and a proportional stratified random sample is selected to collect the data from 365 entrepreneurs. The findings reveal that, micro enterprises have a positive impact on economic growth, standard of living; a significant impact of social capital such as social prestige, positive values. Besides, the participants hold positive satisfaction toward their communities. About 75,1% of the entrepreneurs fall in the intermediate and high categories of the total development composite variable. The fifteen independent variables combined explain 85.7 % of the total variance in the composite scores. Nine variables make significant contributions to the regression equation. They ranked according to their relative importance using Beta scores as fellow: Animal Ownership, full-time management, Living possession, problems intensity, community satisfaction, Agriculture land holding, satisfaction with enterprise operation, enterprise Investment value, and enterprise spatial size. The most frequently mentioned problems facing micro-enterprises are: Problems of selling products, complexity of obtaining a loan, lack of establishing exhibitions, Lack of training entrepreneur, Product price instability. The study recommends that government should play a vital role by giving entrepreneurs significant training and support, favorable environment which lead to success of entrepreneurship.


ImagePac is a new image analysis computer program that can be used for the routine determination of asphalt content, aggregate gradation, air void content, amount of flat/elongated aggregates, as well as orientation, shape and textural characteristics of individual particles in cross sections of compacted asphalt specimens. A new pseudo 3-D algorithm is introduced that shows significant improvement in the prediction of gradation curves at sizes as small as 1 mm. The code was verified using a set of gyratory and field core specimens from various paving projects in Honolulu. The predictions are considered good, although additional validation tests are needed to encompass a wider range of aggregates, asphalt contents and air void contents. ImagePac opens the door to more extensive quality control of pavements since it can be implemented at a fraction of the cost of equivalent standard tests, it is user friendly, and the predictions are robust.


Bicolor water level gauge is the important equipment for industrial boiler. Machine recognition of water level image makes the traditional video monitoring system more intelligent. In this paper, the recognition algorithms such as improved BP neural network and feature matching are studied and compared. Experiments show that the recognition rate of latter approach is up to 100% with high identifying speed. Furthermore, a digital video level measurement system is designed based on CCD and FPGA.


The Soviet Union's path through crises of collectivization, World War II, and postwar famine established important preconditions for Khrushchev's reforms to agriculture and associated changes in rural society. Early visionaries imagined highly productive industrial farms. Under Stalin, the government and Communist Party violently nationalized peasant farms, subordinating combined agricultural enterprises to a bureaucracy that forcibly requisitioned grain but lacked the means and wherewithal to facilitate increases in productivity. Farms and farmers struggled to make ends meet before, during, and after the war, when they faced harsh conditions that culminated in famine. Even privileged urban workers and officials remained reliant on farms for food and therefore faced lean times. When Stalin died in March 1953, his successors moved quickly to address this agrarian crisis. These conditions opened the way for Khrushchev to pursue his distinct version of industrial agriculture and launch his initiative to rapidly expand corn cultivation.


Objective To explove the clinical characteristics and correlated factors of dysphrenia after craniocerebralinjury.Method We collected 74 patients with dysphrenia after craniocerebral injury, a retrospective analysis was applied to the data.Results Among these cases,the most common type of dysphrenia was personality change,34 cases (45.95%);the second was psychogenia secondum of cerebral trauma,22 cases (29.73%);traumatic epilepsy and lightly cognitive handicap,18 cases (24.32%). The severe type of craniocerebral injury was 46 cases (62.16%);the minor type of craniocerebral injury was 18 cases (24.32%); the slight type of craniocerebral injury was 10 cases (13.52%). The time term which were done assessment of impairment,the most common was six months to twelve months after injury,the second was three months to sixmonths, above one year or below three months was rarely.The common type of defect of intelligence was borderline state intelligence and lightly degree of defect,total 55 cases (74.3%);supreme degree of defect was only 1.4%.Conclusions The data indicate that when we assess the degree of impairment of patients with dysp- hrenia after craniocerebral injury,we should consider the primary injury,the types of dysphrenia and it's effect of recognition function and capability,as well as result of determination of intelligence quotient.


In this paper ,the mechanism for bearing force and deformation of pile is discussed in detail. Then based on it ,the formulation for bearing capacity and settlement of the flexible single pile is derived by the soil mechanics and the displacement correspondence. At the end of the paper, an engineering example is discussed to test and verify these formulations.


We demonstrate Trp-containing PNA/Alexa Fluor 488 (AL488)-labeled DNA hybrid partitions preferentially into liquid-ordered (lo) microdomains of GUV. The Trp quenches the fluorescence of AL488 microscopically. The mechanism involved collisional and static quenching, both of which proceeded effectively. The static quenching indicates an AL488–Trp complex through a stacking interaction.


Introduction In The Virgin Birth of Christ, Machen sets out to demonstrate that the virgin birth is an integral part of the biblical witness to Christ. He responds to criticisms of the doctrine and examines alternative hypotheses that attempt to give an account for the doctrine's emergence. Machen canvasses comparative religions, Jewish antecedents, and critical biblical scholarship, but he also pays very careful attention to the data of the biblical texts themselves. He concludes with theological reflections on the importance of the doctrine.


In large applications like LCD panel back lighting, street lightning, lighting of tunnel etc LED driver is used because of its three major functions such as power factor corrections, constant current output and galvanic isolation. A single stage high frequency AC-AC converter using soft computing techniques are proposed in this paper. It is composed of LCL-T resonant rectifiers which act as a output. The main operation focussed in this paper is converting AC input voltage into a high frequency output voltage which is sinusoidal. Initially three stages of LED driver is presented followed by its topology derivation and its operating principle. Then its performance is analysed using soft computing technique such as neuro network. Index Terms – AC-AC converter, LED Driver, LCL-T rectifier, zero voltage switching I.INTRODUCTION Light Emitting diode (LED) has now become common in our daily lives because of its high efficiency in luminous and its long life. They are mainly used in applications where power consumption and maintenance of systems are get greatly reduced. The input power requires by LED street lamps is between 60W to 240W. Hence these LED drivers requires Power factor correction to meet high power factor. In LED driver, LED strings are connected in parallel to have enough luminance. Generally, in LED strings current sharing ability will be poor because of its negative temperature coefficient and its voltage-current characteristics.[1],[2] To overcome this problem, current balancing technique is used. Also for safety purpose, galvanic isolation is used. A block diagram of three stage multichannel constant current source is shown in Fig 1[3]. Fig 1 Three-stage multichannel constant current AC/DC LED driver In PFC stage, high power factor is analysed. Then the AC voltage gets converted into DC voltage which is stable. The obtained output from AC-DC converter is now converted into low output DC voltage so that low frequency voltage ripple in previous stage is reduced. The last stage of LED driver is constant current. Here constant current is achieved in LED strings and current balancing is done[4]. Galvanic isolation is provided by isolation transformer in the second stage. Although the performance of three stage constant current DC-AC converter id good, it carries the disadvantage of lower efficiency and complex circuit. To overcome above disadvantages and to have better efficiency, two stage constant current AC-DC LED driver is proposed. The block diagram of two stage AC-DC LED driver is shown in Fig 2. A two stage constant current ACDC LED driver is obtained by integrating DC-DC stage and constant current source. This multichannel constant current source is constructed by Asymmetrical Half Bridges (AHB) as LED strings. These AHB's undergoes galvanic isolation and these LED Strings are supplied with constant current by regulating the supply of AHB's. This structure is further complicated and cost is high since AHB's are used. These AHB's have separate power module and controller. A two stage constant current AC-DC LED driver is proposed with LCL-T resonant converter consists of multi transformer and voltage doubler. The block diagram is shown in Fig 3. Fig 2 Two-stage multichannel constant current AC/DC LED driver Fig 3 Two-stage multichannel constant current AC/DC LED driver In this structure all the output currents are balanced because of the transformers that are in the primary windings and dc block capacitors. Here the proposed structure is less complicated and also cost is further reduced. Moreover, to implement constant current source separate transformers are required. Two stage multichannel constant current source is also designed with one transformer that is based on dc block capacitors charging balancing principle. In this method the structure is simplified and reduces cost. Another proposed method in multichannel constant current is regulation of dynamic bus voltage. It is composed of LCLC series parallel resonant inverter. Its output channel is referred by LCL-T rectifiers. Without any control circuits, constant current is achieved using LCL-T resonant rectifier. It regulates the International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics Volume 117 No. 8 2017, 161-165 ISSN: 1311-8080 (printed version); ISSN: 1314-3395 (on-line version) url: http://www.ijpam.eu doi: 10.12732/ijpam.v117i8.32 Special Issue ijpam.eu


The bush assembly for vibration control herein disclosed includes an inner cylinder, an annular stop member encircling the middle portion of the inner cylinder and an outer cylinder which is smaller in length than the inner cylinder. The outer cylinder coaxially encircles the inner cylinder and is radially spaced apart therefrom to define a cylindrical clearance space encircling the inner cyclinder. A generally cylindrical impact absorbing member of vulcanized rubber is secured in the cylindrical space by injection molding and a pair of washers are secured to the outer ends of the inner cylinder. The impact absorbing member has a thin portion encircling the stop member, thick portions on both sides thereof and a wide portion at the end of one of the thick portions, while the outer cylinder has large portions encircling the thick portions, a small portion encircling the thin portion and defining a certain clearance therebetween and a flange at the end of one of the large portions in the direction the wide portion is provided. Also disclosed is a method of making the bush assembly.


The register of Paisley Abbey provides a wealth of information on the western Highlands and Islands of Scotland in the central and later Middle Ages. Among the grants that it records from the descendants of the great Somerled of Argyll (d. 1164) and from other prominent west-coast families, there is preserved one by Raonall (Reginald, Ranald), son of Somerled, who died some time in the first quarter of the thirteenth century.1 In this, Raonall granted Paisley Abbey eight oxen, two pence from every house in his lands from which smoke issued, and one penny per house per year thereafter, while his wife granted the abbey one tenth of all her possessions. One clause in the charter orders Raonall's 'friends and people' to aid the monks, with the certain knowledge that by St Columba if any of my heirs does harm to them, he shall have my malediction; or if peradven ture any evil should be done unto them or theirs by my people, or by any others whom it is in my power to bring to account, they shall suffer the punishment of death. The register actually contains two versions of this charter: one in late twelfth- or early thirteenth-century form, the other as it was copied in a notarial instrument dating from 1426.3 Appended to the 1 Although the date of Raonall's death is traditionally given as 1207, it has been demonstrated that this results from a misreading of the Book of Clanranald, and that the actual date could be as late as 1227: A. B. McEwen, 'The death of Regi nald son of Somerled', West Highland Notes and Queries, 2nd ser., vi (1990). 2 Paisley Registrum, 125, 148; translation based on I. F. Grant, The Lordship of the Isles (Edinburgh, 1935, repr. 1982), 331. 3 The initial charter cannot be dated with accuracy. I. F. Grant placed it around 1180, while A. A. M. Duncan and A. L. Brown suggest that it may be later than


Object of the present invention is to provide a cost-car bumper, a bumper to be used in place of EPP foam material, reduce production costs and process requirements. Car bumper features of the invention are as follows: The automobile bumper side facing the mesh-like body is a bumper, a bumper car bumper away from the side of the body is provided with mounting brackets for connecting member . The mesh reduces the overall density, which reduces the intensity, with the rear bumper body can crush a certain distance, play a role in collision energy-absorbing buffer. Automobile bumper according to the present invention production process is simple, low material cost, good cushioning properties, with good usability can substitute the bumper EPP foam material.


McDonald's held the second position in the Top Brand Index for five consecutive years from 2015 to 2020 conducted by Frontier Consulting Group, with participation from customers in eight major cities in Indonesia, including Semarang city. McDonald's experienced a decline in customer loyalty, which poses a challenge for the restaurant to maintain its customer base and attract new customers. Therefore, this research aims to examine the factors that influence Muslim customers' loyalty to McDonald's. The study focuses on Muslim customers with McDonald's subscriptions in Semarang City, with a sample of 144 respondents. The analysis technique used was the Structural Equation Model-AMOS. The study reveals that halal labeling, product quality, and Muslim customer satisfaction have a significant effect on Muslim customer loyalty. The quality and price of the product have a significant effect on Muslim customer satisfaction. Muslim customer satisfaction as an intervening variable cannot mediate all variables on Muslim customer loyalty. Hence, producers should focus on products of al-tayyibat.


The review of definitions of solution for the differential equations with discontinuous nonlinearities, differential inclusions, systems with hysteresis functions, pulse modulation and jumps is presented.


Because of the improving requirement, the wireless location has become the hot spot of research in the latest years. Although there are a large number of algorithms about the wireless location, most of them are on the basis of LOS environment. But in fact, wireless channel has NLOS generally. So, although the accuracy of the algorithms is very high, the accuracy of location is not high because of NLOS. Here we put forward an algorithm to mitigate the effect of NLOS. The algorithm uses the reduction factor and iterates gradually to mitigate the effect of NLOS. Simulation shows that the algorithm can improves the accuracy of location better than the general algorithm, and the computation is small.


This paper examines the prospects for the introduction of SHD trailing cable in mines in the USA. The type G, G-GC and W cables now in use present several safety hazards not encountered with SHD cable. Experiments conducted at the Pennysylvania State University are described. Whilst these tests show SHD cables are much safer than the rest, they also illustrate that SHD is more difficult to work with in the mine environment and it is considerably more expensive. Thus, it is thought unlikely that SHD cable will be adapted in the USA, despite pressure from the Mine Safety and Health Administration.


Local dynamics of para-substituted poly(1-chloro-2-phenylacetylene) (PCPA) derivatives was studied using quasielastic neutron scattering. Broadening of the dynamic scattering law (S(Q,ω)) was clearly observed for para-substituted PCPA derivatives even in the glassy state, and the observed S(Q,ω) was well fitted to a sum of narrow and broad Lorentzians, which represent the slow and fast motions, respectively. The half-width at half-maximum (Γ) of the narrow Lorentzian exhibited a positive correlation with the CO2 and CH4 permeability coefficients (P), while the Γ from the broad Lorentzian hardly changed despite of the variation of permeability coefficient, indicating that only the narrow component (i.e., the slow motion) contributes to the gas permeability. The Γ from the narrow component was approximately proportional to the diffusion coefficient (D) of the CO2 and CH4 gases, whereas it did not correlate with solubility coefficient (S). This implies that the local mobility affects the gas permeability thr...


In a reprinted text (1969), Fulford documents Town's activities as an essayist and illustrator, focusing on portraits of Canadian literary figures. Biographical notes. Bibl. 5 p.


Water-soluble CdS quantum dots(QDs) capped with three different thioalkyl acids(cysteamine,L-cysteine and glutathione) were respectively synthesized in aqueous solution.The effects of different oxidant systems on the chemiluminescence intensity of CdS QDs were studied.The results indicate that the capping ligands have a profound effect on the efficiency of the QDs CL system.This work gives a new path for further improving the efficiency of QDs CL by optimizing capping ligand for modification of QDs.


XML and the XPath querying language are global standards that are used in industrial settings. The high latency of queries over large XML databases remains a problem for many applications. While this latency could be reduced by parallel execution, issues such as work partitioning, memory contention, and load imbalance may diminish these benefits. To our knowledge, no previous attempt has been made to analyze the performance of multiple parallelization techniques on XPath queries. In this paper, we model the behavior of XPath queries and analyze the benefits of several parallel algorithms. Using synthetic XML databases, we model the query execution time using three quantifiable machine-dependent parameters. Our performance model allows us to estimate a lower-bounds of parallel execution time for arbitrary queries and databases on a given hardware environment. We propose five distinct XPath "query engines", including four parallel engines, and compare their performance on synthetic and realworld XML databases. These engines attempt to solve the issue of load-balancing while minimizing sequential execution time. We find that load-balancing is easily achieved for most synthetic data sets, though results on real-world data sets are inconsistent. Our two dynamic query engines (Dynamic Work Queue and Producer-Consumer) achieve the best results on all tests, with Producer-Consumer achieving near-ideal speedup on some queries on real-world data sets. Across two distinct multi-core hardware environments, we find that our models accurately estimate both sequential and parallel execution time of synthetic data sets, though our parameter estimation is not sufficiently precise to prove accurate estimates for real-world data sets.


BACKGROUND Although studies show that botulinum toxin type A (BoNTA) can positively influence one's first impression, little research has been conducted to measure the effect that BoNTA has on mental well‐being. OBJECTIVE To determine the effects that BoNTA injections for the treatment of facial wrinkles had on quality of life (QOL) and self‐esteem. METHODS AND MATERIALS One hundred participants received treatment with BoNTA or placebo saline in this double‐blind randomized placebo‐controlled survey. All participants completed a health outcomes survey consisting of Quality of Life Enjoyment and Satisfaction Questionnaire—Short Form and Heatherton and Polivy State Self‐Esteem measurements before injection and 2 weeks and 3 months after injection. RESULTS Statistically significant improvements (p<.05) in participants treated with BoNTA were observed in answers to QOL questions regarding physical health, mood, household activities, overall life satisfaction, body satisfaction, self‐consciousness, intellect, self‐worth, appearance, comprehension, weight satisfaction, attractiveness, and sense of well‐being. Increases in overall self‐esteem and appearance‐, social‐, and performance‐related self‐esteem were observed in participants treated with BoNTA. CONCLUSION Our findings showed that BoNTA injections result in improvements in QOL and self‐esteem. In addition, BoNTA‐naïve participants demonstrate greater improvements in QOL and self‐esteem than participants previously exposed to BoNTA. Moreover, BoNTA‐familiar participants demonstrated sustained improvement in QOL and self‐esteem relative to BoNTA‐naïve participants, even when injected with placebo. The authors have indicated no significant interest with commercial supporters.


Muskrats Ondatra zibethicus are semiaquatic herbivores experiencing long-term and widespread population declines across North America. Translocation may be a viable tool to bolster or reestablish local populations; however, subsequent effects of translocation on muskrats are unknown. We live-trapped and translocated radiomarked muskrats (n = 65) during the summers of 2018–2019 in Voyageurs National Park, MN, USA and assessed post-translocation effects on weekly survival probabilities and space-use patterns. We did not observe homing behavior, though individuals moved an average of 2.2 km (SE = 0.30 km) from release sites and established home ranges within ∼8 days (SE = 1.16 days) post-translocation. Weekly post-translocation survival probabilities (0.95, SE = 0.001) and average home-range sizes (2.52 ha, SE = 0.44 ha) were similar to other studies of non-translocated muskrats. Our most-supported known-fate survival model revealed muskrats using beaver Castor canadensis lodges had greater weekly survival probabilities. Additionally, weekly muskrat survival varied between years suggesting a positive response to a novel soft-release technique applied in 2019. Our study provides the first empirical assessment of translocation effects on muskrats and suggests translocation may be effective for establishing or enhancing local muskrat populations. Additionally, our study suggests beaver lodges may confer fitness benefits to sympatric muskrats particularly during dispersal.


The material of the study was thyroid gland preparations of 28 corpses of different somatotype. The methods of research were macromicropreparation, morphometry and statistical method. As a result of the research the variants of the anatomy, topography, and morphometric indices of the arteries and veins of the thyroid gland depending on the constitution and form of the organ were established.


▼ The effi cacy and safety of transplanting autologous mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), from granulocytecolony-stimulating factor (G-CSF)-mobilised peripheral blood, was investigated in diabetic patients with critical limb ischaemia (CLI). After 3 months, the transplanted group of patients (n = 7) showed a signifi cant improvement in ischaemia manifestations, including pain and neurological signs, wound healing and the rate of lower-limb amputation, compared to the control group of patients (n = 14). Pain was signifi cantly reduced in the transplanted group compared to controls (P = 0.014). The ankle-brachial index (ABI) and the pulse strength within ischaemic tissues of the transplanted group were signifi cantly improved (P = 0.035 and P = 0.01, respectively). Importantly, 50 % of the control group (7/14 patients) faced major amputation of a limb at the study's conclusion, compared to none of 7 patients in the transplanted group (P = 0.047).The safety of transplantation was confi rmed by observing no adverse reactions among the transplanted group, including infection and immunological rejection. Hence, this study provides further evidence that transplantation of autologous peripheral blood MSCs, mobilised by G-CSF, induces angiogenesis and improves the wound healing process in diabetic patients with CLI. Affi liations Affi liation addresses are listed at the end of the article 2 ECED/06-2011-0161-Dia/5.11.2012/Macmillan Article ECED/06-2011-0161-Dia 6.11.2012/Macmillan Mohammadzadeh L et al. Therapeutic Outcomes of Transplanting ... Exp Clin Endocrinol Diabetes 2012; 120: 1–6 ■ Proof copy for correction only. All forms of publication, duplication or distribution prohibited under copyright law. ■ Patients and Methods ▼ Study design and patients A randomised, controlled and parallel clinical trial was designed to assess the safety and practical effi cacy of transplanting autologous G-CSF-mobilised PBMCs in diabetic patients with CLI. 21 eligible volunteers attending the diabetes clinics of Shariati and Rasul Akram Hospitals, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, between December 2008 and December 2010, were randomly assigned into either a group for transplantation (7 patients) or the control group (14 patients). Eligible diabetic patients were between 18 and 75 years old, had an unilateral or bilateral diabetic CLI, together with a history of angioplasty failure (or else could not benefi t from angioplasty). All volunteers were expected to continue their cooperation throughout the study and needed to be negative for retinopathy, cystic infection, kidney dysfunction (i. e., a creatinine level = 2.5 mg/dL), severe heart failure (based on echocardiography), pregnancy or lactation, severe allergy, malignancies or a history of immunosuppressive therapy, coagulation disorders, acute or severe dyspnea, and a history of myocardial or brain infarction within the past 3 months. Any patients with intracerebral haemorrhage, myocardial infarction or stroke within the past 3 months ■ were excluded (due to risk of deterioration of health condition associated with bleeding for the purposes of the separation of stem cells). Foot ulcers were scored by Wagner's ulcer classifi cation system. Human experimentations were approved by the institutional ethics committee boards and conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki; written informed consent was obtained from all volunteers of this study. ● ▶ Table 1 shows demographic profi le of patients in both groups and their symptoms prior to treatment. Assessment of vascularity To evaluate the vascular status of a patient's diabetic limb, the ankle-brachial index (ABI) was determined using the Sonoline G40 Ultrasound System (Siemens Medical Solutions AG, Erlangen, Germany), as described previously ( Ono et al., 2003 ). ABI measurements of less than 0.9 were considered a marker of severe claudication and debilitating peripheral arterial disease. CLI classed as severe PAD was defi ned in this study according to criteria described previously ( Dorros et al., 2001 ), namely: i ) persistent and recurring rest pain requiring analgesia, and an ankle systolic pressure of 50 mmHg and/or toe systolic pressure of 30 mmHg, and/or ii ) non-healing wounds, ulceration or gangrene of the foot with ankle systolic pressure of 50 mmHg or toe systolic pressure of 30 mmHg. Angiographic analysis of peripheral vascular status in the dorsalis pedis and tibialis posterior arteries of the diabetic limb was performed before and after treatment using a Light Speed 16 Scanner (GE Medical Systems, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA). The peripheral vascular status was ranked as 0 for a non-palpable pulse, 1 for a weak pulse, and 2 for a natural pulse. The skin of the foot was examined for any redness, especially between the toes and under the metatarsal. The patient's limbs were also carefully examined for callus formation, bone deformity, limited joint mobility and balance disorders. Assessment of the ulcers Wagner's ulcer-classifi cation system was used to assess the limb ulcer status, according to guidelines described previously ( Oyibo et al., 2001 , Tateishi-Yuyama et al., 2002 ). Ulcer severity was scored from 0 to 5: grade 0, high-risk foot with no ulceration; grade 1, superfi cial ulcer without involvement of deep layers; grade 2, deep ulcer (cellulitis) in muscles and ligaments; grade 3, osteomylitis with ulceration or abscess; grade 4, localised and partial foot gangrene; grade 5, gangrene of entire foot. Peripheral neuropathy and pain examinations To detect peripheral neuropathy in the diabetic limb, a 5.07– 10 gram monofi lament examination was performed and the impairment of the patient's contact sensation was scored, as previously described ( de Win et al., 2002 ). Briefl y, a 10-gram monofi lament was placed on 10 diff erent points of the skin of the foot for 1–2 s and impairment of the patient's contact sensation was assessed. The pain-free walking distance test was performed by walking with a constant speed on the same road. Diff erentiation between the ischaemic and the neuropathic pain was performed based on the physical signs or angiographic patterns of ischaemia, including resting pain and lack of peripheral pulses or dystrophic nails. Parameter Control group (n = 14) Transplantation group (n = 7) P-value* age (mean ± SD), years 64.2 ± 7.8 63.5 ± 7.8 0.847 smoking ( % of patients per group) 21.4 (n = 3) 42.9 (n = 3) 0.610 diabetes duration (mean ± SD), years 14.2 ± 8.5 16.5 ± 8.7 0.574 peripheral neuropathy score † (mean ± SD) 5.9 ± 2.6 6.7 ± 2.2 0.529 wound duration (mean ± SD), months 3.4 ± 3.0 5.0 ± 3.9 0.333 wound size (mean ± SD), cm 2 15.8 ± 17.0 14.2 ± 4.1 0.817 ulcer score ‡ (mean ± SD) 2.9 ± 0.7 2.8 ± 0.8 0.847 Hb (mean ± SD), mg/dL 11.6 ± 1.5 11.5 ± 1.2 0.806 Cr (mean ± SD), mg/dL 1.2 ± 0.2 1.1 ± 0.01 0.555 history of CVA § , % 7.1 (n = 1) 14.3 (n = 1) 1.000 hyperlipidemia, % 42.9 (n = 6) 71.4 (n = 5) 0.361 hypertension, % 42.9 (n = 6) 71.4 (n = 5) 0.361 Hb, Hemoglobin; Cr, Creatinine * No signifi cant diff erences found between the 2 groups in outside factors aff ecting the wound healing process, including smoking, hemoglobin, creatinine levels, and degree of neuropathy. P-values were determined using Mann-Whitney, Chi-square and Fisher's


Part 1: General Concepts. Stages in the Development of Water Resources Management. Introduction to Flow Systems. REGISPRO, a Geohydrological Information System. Ecotope Typologies, Ecotope Groups of Plant Species and Ecotope Protection and Restoration in Hydrological Systems Analysis. Modelling Groundwater Flow Systems. Groundwater Flow Systems and Hydrocarbon Migration. Part 2: Case Studies. Major Types of Hydrological Systems in the Netherlands. National Hydrological Systems Analysis in the Netherlands. Numerical Modelling of Groundwater Flow Systems A Case Study in the SE Part of the Netherlands. Hydrological Systems Analysis of the Lake IJssel Area Regional Hydrological Systems Analysis Twente Eco-Hydrological Systems Analysis and the Protection and Restoration of Wetland Ecosystems in the Twente/Regge Catchment. Hydrological Systems Analysis Dinkel Valley/Borne Creek. Optimization of Water Management in the Wierden Area. Groundwater Situation Drenthe. Types of Hydrological Systems in the Major Geological/Physiological Terranes in Poland. Design of a Pilot Monitoring Network System for Groundwater in the Upper Notec Catchment in Poland. Regional Hydrological Systems Analysis and Water Systems Management at European Scale. Regional Hydrological Systems Analysis in the Northern Coastal Plain of Java, Indonesia.