In this article, an arc discharge nanofluid synthesis system with complex ultrasonic orthogonal vibration and vortex stirring is proposed and developed for a Ag∕Fe nanocomposite fluid. For this, one of the electrodes and the ultrasonic vibrator are assembled together to form an orthogonal model with the other electrode and together installed inside the vacuum chamber of the arc discharge system, with de-ionized water as the dielectric liquid. In the fabrication process, the positive electrode uses a Ag rod and the negative electrode uses an Fe rod to apply electrical energy, producing a heating source to generate an adequate arc with a high temperature that can melt and vaporize the two electrodes. The vaporized metal is then rapidly quenched by the designed cooling system, thus nucleating and forming nanocomposite fluid. During arc discharge, through the vibration of the ultrasonic vibrator, disturbance occurs to the insulating liquid. Thus, the vaporized metal can leave the high-temperature gap zone eas...


Received 10th December, 2016 Received in revised form 8th January, 2017 Accepted 5th February, 2017 Published online 28th March, 2017 This paper examines the nomenclature of the Dagara people in northwestern Ghana. There are two main categories of Dagara nomenclature. The study is narrowed down to human beings with the main focus on traditional Dagara societies of Nandom. The spelling of words is derived from Dagara, the variety of Dagaare spoken in Nandom. I have clarified the identity of the Dagara as part of the MABIA speakers. Next, the study elaborates the two categories of nomenclature: stereotyped names and freely chosen names. Stereotyped names are customary names and fall into five categories. Freely chosen names give a wide scope of naming among the Dagara people. In this category, there are theophoric names. Most of the names depict certain literary features such as metaphor, paradox, hyperbole, various images and symbols. Certain thematic values are associated with some of the names linked to peculiar events. The methodology employed in the study was a sampling of a variety of names from the five categories of stereotyped or customary names from collection of names done by previous Dagara scholars who undertook studies on Dagara traditional practices. In fact, the study reveals how the Dagara society is closely bound with its language, tradition and culture.


THE MISSIOLOGY OF T. G. JOHN SULLIVAN WITH IMPLICATIONS ON CONTEMPORARY SOUTHERN BAPTIST STATE CONVENTION WORK Michael Allen Tatem, Ph.D. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2014 Chair: Dr. Adam W. Greenway This dissertation analyzes the missiology of T. G. John Sullivan, executive director-treasurer of the Florida Baptist State Convention since 1989, and provides implications of his missiology on contemporary Southern Baptist State Convention work. Chapter 1 introduces the need for this dissertation and provides the thesis, background, methodology, and limitations of the dissertation. Chapter 2 provides a brief biography of the life of T. G. John Sullivan. Sullivan was born on October 20, 1936, in Ansted, West Virginia. His early life, conversion and call to ministry, education, pastorates, and denominational work at the state and national levels are highlighted. Chapter 3 provides the biblical and theological foundations of T. G. John Sull v . Sull v ' v w h bl h b l b u G , h c m , and the atoning work of Christ are examined. Also presented are his beliefs about salvation, the Christian life, and doctrine of the church. Chapter 4 presents the missiology of T. G. John Sullivan and the practical l c h m l gy Sull v ' u g h G mm . Th ch cu Sull v ' priorities of evangelism, church planting, and church health in the context of his views on church growth principles, cooperation, and partnership missions. h 5 g v h m l c Sull v ' m l gy c m y Southern Baptist state convention work. Special attention is given to the implications of the future of state convention work in light of the Great Commission Resurgence and the Imagine If . . . Great Commission Resurgence Task Force. Chapter 6 draws conclusions from the previous chapters. The conclusion provides a model of emphases of state convention work that will accomplish a Great Commission Resurgence among Southern Baptist churches. VITA Michael Allen Tatem EDUCATIONAL Diploma, Miami Southridge Senior High School, Miami, Florida, 1983 A.A., Miami-Dade Community College, 1985 B.B.A., Florida International University, 1992 M.Div., New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, 2003 MINISTERIAL Youth Pastor, First Baptist Church of Cutler Ridge, Miami, Florida, 1994-98 Pastor, First Baptist Church of Cutler Ridge, Miami, Florida, 1998-2006 Pastor, Parkview Baptist Church, Lake City, Florida, 2006ACADEMIC Adjunct Professor, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary Extension Center, Miami, Florida, 2003-06 Adjunct Professor, Baptist College of Florida Certificate Program, Lake City, Florida, 2009-10


The research discussed in this paper focused on the analysis and identification of organic residues either preserved as visible or absorbed organic remains on Neolithic and Eneolithic pottery from various archaeological and geographical contexts. These are connected with various food preparation strategies and past human activities, i.e . cave burials in Ajdovska jama (food as a grave good/offering), the rock shelter at Mala Triglavca (meat and dairy animal husbandry practices) and Moverna vas, which had a long occupation sequence (complex farming and animal management). The preservation of biomarkers mirrored past human activities and different pottery uses at various types of sites. The carbon stable isotope ratios of primary fatty acids in lipid pottery extracts confirmed the presence of adipose and dairy fats as well as biomarkers of plant fats, beeswax and birch bark tar.


ABSTRACT This article investigates the conflicted relationship that exists between practices of memorial commemoration and contemporary calls for the decolonization of public space. Drawing on the example of the Rhodes Must Fall movement that originated in Cape Town, South Africa, this article demonstrates how the spatiality of commemoration is affected by decolonizing interrogations of memorial structures. Within a postcolonial context, commemorations of Cecil John Rhodes (1853–1902), the iconic British businessman and politician who was well known for his race-based prejudices and who played such an important role in the history of South Africa, have become sites where lingering colonial and racist discourses are unearthed and explored. As such, the practices and spaces of memorialization have come under severe criticism for the distorted historical narratives they have long upheld. This article demonstrates how decolonizing practices and ideologies affect public perceptions of those commemorative structures that have long served to memorialize Rhodes.


PURPOSE: A dry etching device is to provide an upper electrode which is prevented from being contaminated with an impurity, has a sufficient adhesive strength between the pedestal and electrode plate of silicon, secures high-precision parallelism with the lower electrode, and hence the etching characteristics and silicon wafer yield improves. CONSTITUTION: An upper electrode for dry etching devices comprises an electrode plate of silicon supported by a pedestal in which (a) the pedestal is made of graphite, and (b) the electrode plate of silicon is joined to the pedestal by an organic adhesive containing a filler having a Young's modulus of 6x109 to 68x109N/m2.


Immunotherapy
Although immunotherapy has transformed the cancer therapeutics landscape, a number of problems remain to be solved, from improving efficacy to limiting side effects. Wang et al. engineered nanoparticles that could be activated specifically in tumors. They conjugated antibodies against programmed death ligand 1 (PDL1) with matrix metalloproteinase protein 2 (MMP-2)–sensitive nanoparticles carrying a photosensitizer. MMP-2 is highly expressed in tumors, and delivery of the nanoparticle to tumors elicited release of the antibody from the nanoparticle. When used in conjunction with localized near-infrared radiation that activated the photosensitizer to produce reactive oxygen species, the nanoparticles outperformed systemic anti-PDL1 in limiting growth and metastasis of murine tumors.

Sci. Immunol. 4 , eaau6584 (2019).


The concept of political culture is not a particularly new one in the social sciences. Defined-one of several possibilities-as the historically formed patterns of political belief and behavior of the members of a political system, whether a state or a smaller group, it has informed approaches to the study of politics since the time of Montesquieu and Rousseau, if not the Greeks, and has been applied to the politics of a wide variety of states as a means of pointing to the existence of long-term continuities as well as changes in the beliefs and behavior patterns of their members.' In recent years the use of the concept has been extended still further to the political experience of the Communist states, in which the issue of continuity versus change is raised in a particularly sharp form. These, after all, are states in which the ruling authorities claim to have broken decisively with the political beliefs and behavior-not just the institutions--of the pre-revolutionary past and in which it is asserted that new political cultures, characterized by collectivist, Marxist-Leninist values, and high levels of political knowledge and activism, have come into being in place of those of the pre-revolutionary period. The nature and extent of these changes have frequently been queried in the western academic literature. What is not, I think, in doubt is that the Communist states, precisely because of their claim to have broken so decisively with the patterns of political belief and behavior of their pre-revolutionary past, provide a particularly promising though admittedly difficult context in which to test for the explanatory utility of a political-cultural approach.2 It is to this task that the present paper is directed. At least two main reasons may be suggested for the increasing use that has been made of the concept of political culture in recent years. In the first place, it has stemmed from a renewed interest in the stability and instability of regimes and in the relationship between regimes and societies more generally, prompted by the overthrow of liberal-democratic by Nazi and later Communist regimes in Europe and more particularly by the failure of western-style political institutions in many newly independent countries in Africa and Asia during the 1960s and 1970s. In most cases the adequacy of the constitutional framework itself was not in doubt; rather, it appeared, an underlying pattern of attitudes towards and expectations of government, often of historical origin, was involved, which appeared to require more direct and explicit consideration if the performance of these political systems was properly to be understood. In the case of the Communist states more particularly, the greater degree of attention paid to the notion of political culture sprang from the


Main design features and operating experiences of the first domestic manufactured 300 MW circulating fluidized bed(CFB) boiler are being presented.The fact that the fuel used has a high CaO content,shows that the boiler has a strong self-desulfurization potentiality.


The chief purpose of this work is to report the successful development of strainfree preparation techniques that do not require the prehardening of the crystals by fast neutrons. Other methods of preparation are briefly reviewed. The special problems arising in handling faultless metal crystals are investigated. The delicate problem of holding thin samples has been overcome by using grease for mounting. A novel technique for making precision cuts without introducing lattice strains is described. The working principle is the superposition of immiscible fluids. It is possible to cut slices of only 05 mm thickness. Following the cutting process, the samples are flattened by a new electrolytical technique involving mechanical passivation of the sample, which is brought about by choosing a suitable electrolyte and by a superposed alternating current. In combining the cutting and flattening techniques it is possible to prepare crystal faces plane to within ±5 μm over a circular area of 9 mm diameter. The strainfree preparation is described of thin single crystal foils which are required for transmission x-ray investigation. By a special technique foils can be made less than 100 μm thick. Copper foils free of dislocations (8 mm diameter) have been prepared and investigated.


The proliferation of mobile phones and other portable devices with increased storage and local wireless communication capability creates a new networking environment for peer-to-peer applications. In such mobile opportunistic networks, users can take advantage of local contacts to exchange content (e.g., using Bluetooth or WiFi), potentially improving the coverage and capacity offered by an infrastructure to delay tolerant applications. However, to live up to this promise, such approach needs to cope with the rate at which online content is updated and accessed today. We study the peer-to-peer dissemination of dynamic content (e.g., news, blogs, mutable documents) over the mobile networks created by users encounters. To this effect, models and measurement results are presented aiming at assessing the scalability, the effect of the social topology of contacts between users, as well as the injection algorithm used for such content dissemination. We prove that these applications remain scalable under general topological conditions, that large networks approach a deterministic regime entirely characterized, and that the optimal injection strategy follows a convex optimization problem. This survey is also an occasion to discuss of some related open problems. (Joint work with S. Ioannidis, N. Ristanovic, J.-Y. Le Boudec, L.Massoulie) Bio: A. Chaintreau joined the Thomson Paris Research Lab soon after graduating in 2006 from Ecole Normale Superieure de Paris, working at INRIA under the supervision of Francois Baccelli. During his PhD he worked in collaboration with Alcatel Bell, as well as the IBM Watson T. J. Research Center in New York. He spent the last year visiting Intel Research Cambridge to work on opportunistic mobile networking and wireless networks.


The current measurement of development only considers the achievement of each dimension of development, making it difficult to analyze the success level of sustainable development models. This study provides a development measure based on social, economic and environmental factors for a composite index of development. This composite index was developed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. After undergoing a reduction process using factor analysis, 16 variables were obtained, which can be used to determine the index of sustainable development. The 16 variables selected form three factors, namely social-economic-environment; economic-environment; and social-economic factors. Social-environment has been indicated as a weak point, enhanced sustainable development in Indonesia doesn't run smoothly. In the future, it is necessary to develop an environmental education curriculum, so that it can create an environmentally conscious culture.The current measurement of development only considers the achievement of each dimension of development, making it difficult to analyze the success level of sustainable development models. This study provides a development measure based on social, economic and environmental factors for a composite index of development. This composite index was developed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. After undergoing a reduction process using factor analysis, 16 variables were obtained, which can be used to determine the index of sustainable development. The 16 variables selected form three factors, namely social-economic-environment; economic-environment; and social-economic factors. Social-environment has been indicated as a weak point, enhanced sustainable development in Indonesia doesn't run smoothly. In the future, it is necessary to develop an environmental education curriculum, so that it can create an environmentally conscious culture.


Drought, salinity and extreme temperature are major adverse environmental factors that limit plant productivity. Sensors initiate a signaling cascade to transmit the signal and activate nuclear transcription factors to induce the expression of specific sets of genes. Ionic and osmotic stress signal transduction triggers the ionic and osmotic homeostasis signaling pathways, detoxification response pathways, and pathways for growth regulation. The ionic stress is signaled via the SOS pathway where an SOS3-SOS2 complex controls the expression and activity of ion transporters. Osmotic stress activates several protein kinases which mediate osmotic homeostasis and/or detoxification responses. Understanding the mechanisms by which plants perceive and transduce the stress signals to initiate adaptive responses is essential for engineering stress-tolerant crop plants. Genetic engineering strategies rely on the transfer of one or several genes that are either involved in signaling and regulatory pathways, or that encode enzymes present in pathways leading to the synthesis of functional and structural protectants, or that encode stresstolerance-conferring proteins. Certain techniques have been described to identify the gene whose expression is differentially regulated in response to various environmental stresses in higher plants. Such methods include differential display- polymerase chain reaction, suppression subtractive hybridization, serial analysis of gene expression, DNA microarray and cDNA-amplified fragment length polymorphism.


The Migrant Integration Policy Index (MIPEX) began as a pilot project in 2004 and expanded in 2007 to establish a reliable biannual standard-setting and monitoring tool for governmental integration policies. This chapter briefly explains the construction of the MIPEX and its methodology. It specifies the adopted and proposed legal instruments that informed the selection of MIPEX strands, dimensions, indicators, and answer options. The chapter explains how legal provisions were turned into numbers enabling quantitative comparisons by taking readers through the example of the family reunion policy strand. MIPEX can be used to monitor policy developments as a result of domestic change, the transposition of European directives, or ratification of international conventions, for pointing to the necessity to address important issues for immigrants and for bringing policies more in line with international human rights standards and equality principles. Keywords: equality standards; European integration standards; family reunion policy; Migrant Integration Policy Index (MIPEX)


A theory is presented for construction of sequences of phase-shifted radiation pulses for coherently inverting populations over a broad band of transition frequencies. Such sequences have applications in nuclear magnetic resonance and coherent optics. Examples of sequences are derived, together with computer simulations of their inversion properties.


County crop yield data from USDA-NASS are extensively used in the literature as well as practice. In many applications, yield data are adjusted for the first two moments then assumed independent and identically distributed. For most major crop-region combinations, yield data exist from 1955 onwards and reflect significant innovations in both seed and farm management technologies. These innovations have likely changed the yield distribution raising doubt regarding the identically distributed assumption. We consider the question of how much historical yield data should be used in empirical analyses. First, we use distributional tests to assess if and when the adjusted yield data result from different DGPs. Second, we consider the application to crop insurance by using an out-of-sample rating. Third, we estimate DGPs and then simulate to quantify the additional error. Overall, the results indicate that using yield data more than 30 years old can substantially increase estimation error. Given that discarding data is unappetizing, we propose three methodologies that can re-incorporate the discarded data. Our results suggest gains in efficiency by using these methodologies. While our results are most applicable to the crop insurance literature, we certainly feel they suggest proceeding with caution when using historical yield data in other applications. Acknowledgement :


The team found that three methods (spray Roundup and direct seeding in the spring, fertilizer application, and broadcast seeding with aerate/spike in the spring) had consistently higher forage yield over control treatments (range: 18 to 90%). Legume composition was as much as 29% for spray Roundup and direct seeding in the spring compared with 2–17% for other methods including the control. The Roundup and direct seeding in the spring resulted in the most profit compared with the control ($380/ha).


Research purposes: Magnetorheological damper is a high performance and intellectual damping device. The purposes of this paper are to make the research trend of(magnetorheological) damper known by the people concerned.Research methods:An introduction is given to the present situation of research on semi-active control technolgy of magnetorhelogical damper and summaries are made of the features of magnetorheological fluid,mechanics model of(magnetorhelogical) damper and tactics of semi-active control in this paper.Research results:Since magnetorhelogical damper can offer adjustable damping force,it is an ideal semi-active control device and can be applied further in engineering.


The influence of electronically nonadiabatic transitions in the C+CH reaction on the ground and first excited states is investigated by using time-dependent wave packet method. With initial wave packet on one single potential energy surface, and the diatomic CH having different internal states, we obtain the total reaction probabilities of the 2 electronic states respectively for the total angular momentum J=0. Calculations for J>0 are currently running, as they are so time consuming.


5000 word essay published online in La Furia Umana: 'an online multilingual quarterly of theory and history of cinema fire, daydreams, and drifts'.


To improve the ability of the scaled boundary finite element method (SBFEM) in the dynamic analysis of dam–reservoir interaction problems in the time domain, a diagonalization procedure was proposed, in which the SBFEM was used to model the reservoir with uniform cross‐section. First, SBFEM formulations in the full matrix form in the frequency and time domains were outlined to describe the semi‐infinite reservoir. No sediments and the reservoir bottom absorption were considered. Second, a generalized eigenproblem consisting of coefficient matrices of the SBFEM was constructed and analyzed to obtain corresponding eigenvalues and eigenvectors. Finally, using these eigenvalues and eigenvectors to normalize the SBFEM formulations yielded diagonal SBFEM formulations. A diagonal dynamic stiffness matrix and a diagonal dynamic mass matrix were derived. An efficient method was presented to evaluate them. In this method, no Riccati equation and Lyapunov equations needed solving and no Schur decomposition was required, which resulted in great computational costs saving. The correctness and efficiency of the diagonalization procedure were verified by numerical examples in the frequency and time domains, but the diagonalization procedure is only applicable for the SBFEM formulation whose scaling center is located at infinity. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


FIELD: fishery. SUBSTANCE: apparatus has casing made from unsinkable material and provided with handle. Cord receiving hole is made in handle. Casing has numbered notches. EFFECT: increased efficiency and provision for preventing apparatus from sinking. 1 dwg


The article describes the course and practical application of the control system in coiler of hot rolling mill,which is transformed from the constant tension control into variable tension control,as well as analyzes the coiler of hot rolling mill from the aspects of the variable tension control principle,winding diameter memory and measurement and dynamic tension compensation.


In this technical note we present the features of the XGT-9000, the new X-ray microscope from HORIBA. We show its versatility through some examples of the application domains which could benefit from a micro X-ray fluorescence analysis.


Previous work has shown that children tend to trust embodied conversational agents such as social robots. Also, that children have difficulty assessing the credibility of information. The study reported in this paper addresses how children's attitudes toward and trust in a robot affect their acceptance of information provided by the robot. We conducted a within-subjects study (N=30) where children engaged with a 'trustworthy' versus an 'untrustworthy' robot. Due to the pandemic period, this interaction was carried out via video call. The children played a quiz with the robot where we measured whether they accepted the information provided by the robot. Results show that the manipulation of trustworthiness was successful. We did not find evidence for a causal relationship between trust in the robot and acceptance of the information. Furthermore, semi-structured interviews offered a more in-depth understanding of how children perceived the two different robots and their preference for the trustworthy robot.


N-lauroyl alanine was prepared by reactions of alanine with chlorides under alkali solution,and its structure was characterized by IR.The effect of N-lauroyl alanine as a new lubricationg additive on biodegradation of HVI350 mineral base oil was studied by the designed method,and the mechanism of biodegradation was discussed.


The concentration of four types of gaseous pollutants were semiquantitatively determined in samplings of cabinets from three mineral collections. The pollutants measured included: acidic vapours (thought to be primarily carboxylic acid vapours), mercury vapour, sulfur dioxide, and silver-tarnishing gasses (thought to be primarily hydrogen sulfide). These pollutants were monitored using simple and inexpensive monitors and/or dosimeters. Some of the monitors and dosimeters were commercially available, whereas others were specially fabricated and calibrated. The three investigated collections provided examples of three material combinations: metal drawers in metal cabinets, wooden drawers in metal cabinets and wooden drawers in wooden cabinets. Interpretation of pollutant concentrations as functions of position within the crystal- chemical classification system used to organise collection storage generally showed anticipated patterns. Several exceptions to these patterns, which have significant implications for collection care, were also noted. -- CCI


Local autonomy in end of Qing and early Min is the result that the west autonomy culture had been introduced China and blend with China culture. It was always in hot water because of the system dissimilation and nation modernization that make nation power into local society and suppress the living space of local autonomy. The system dissimilation lead to relation strain between the local autonomy and nation. As the autonomy organ out of the system, it is difficult to be in harmony with the system of nation, and determine its frustrated destiny in China. However, local autonomy was successful in one or two regions and make autonomy culture become one part of citizen value concept and action custom which become the important part of society memory when local autonomy wither away or edge.


The association of sinapine with the fishy or crabby odour present in eggs laid by certain brown egg laying hens when fed diets containing rapeseed meal indicates the desirability of removing sinapine from the original rapeseed. A method is presented whereby seeds and cotyledons of Brassica napus and B. campestris may be selected for low levels of sinapine. The method, based on microextraction, rapid chromatographic separation of sinapine and visual estimation of its fluorescence allows detection of 0.025 μg sinapine and enables 300-400 seed samples to be screened daily.


— We propose a new optically written watermarking technique that can protect the portrait rights of real objects. It produces a watermarking pattern in the illumination light by modulating color differences. The illumination light that contains such watermarking is projected onto an object. An image of the object taken by a camera contains the same watermarking, which can be extracted by image processing. Therefore, this technique can protect the portrait rights of real objects. We discovered three findings through simulation where binary data were embedded as watermarking and we evaluated the accuracy with which the binary data were read out. The first was that the accuracy when color differences were modulated was higher than that when brightness was modulated. The second was that errors in reading out embedded binary data particularly tended to occur in dark areas, yellow areas, and areas that contained fine textures. The third was that we could satisfy both the invisibility and readability requirements of embedded data by using appropriate amplitudes of modulation.


This comprehensive and accessible guide provides an introduction to teaching this topic, with practical advice on classroom approaches and reference to key critical and theoretical writing. Using examples from TV sitcoms in Britain and the US, it explores sitcom conventions, types of sitcom and issues such as representation of gender. This book is part of a series particularly aimed at teachers new to media studies post-16. The series provides information and ideas for teachers involved with the teaching of AS and A level media studies 9OCR, AQA and WJEC), AS and A level film studies (WJEC), GNVQ/AVCE, Btech, Scottish Highers/Advanced Highers, and Lifelong Learning courses. Each title consists of a detailed teaching guide which provides essential information and guidance on how to cover each topic effectively, with reference to assessment objectives. Additional support materials, including photocopiable worksheets for students, are available online.


Gallium verum, lady's bedstraw is an herbaceous annual plant belonging to the genus Rubiaceae; it possessed antioxidant, cytotoxic for cancer cells, antimicrobial, protective and endocrine effects. This work aimed to investigate the curative effects of G. verum extract on gastric ulcers following absolute ethanol administration in the healthy rat. Eighteen rats were randomly divided into three main groups; rats were fastened for 24 hours before ethanol administration. All groups except control administered ethanol (5 ml/kg body weight; orally). The rats were administrated distilled water (Ulcer group) or G. verum extract (100mg/kg) one hour later. G. verum extract caused a significant decrease in ulcer index, gastric juice volume, malondialdehyde, and nitric oxide, while gastric juice pH, glutathione, glutathione-S-transferase, and catalase increased significantly. The histological lesion score showed a significant enhancement in group G. verum compared to the ulcer group that scored the highest pathological destruction score. Immunohistochemical markers of NF-κB p65 and TNF-α showed a significant decrease in G. verum group. G. verum extract is a promising treatment modality against gastric injury through its powerful antioxidant, acid neutralizing, healing promotion, and ant-inflammation effects.


Volvo Group is one of the world's leading manufacturing companies of transport with a total of 12 brands whose ambition is to produce efficient transport and infrastructure solutions. This bachelor's* thesis focuses on Volvo Trucks and therefore the study has been carried out at the Volvo Group Trucks Operations factory in Tuve Gothenburg. The company is currently working actively to implement a comprehensive change in the production system in line with industry 4.0. Before the truck manufacturer implements a new costly production system, it is essential to ensure that contemporary problems are solved. One aspect the company considers within the framework of the Industry 4.0 project is whether the quality problems are going to be solved when introducing a new system. The purpose of the bachelor's* thesis is to map the root causes of Volvo's current quality problems on the pilot stations 26-29 in order to assess if the implementation of the new production system will solve the company's quality problems. In addition to this, the purpose is to establish a calculation of the costs that the quality deficiencies generate. Thus the result of the study will thus contribute to an increased understanding of the quality issues' root causes on Volvo's manufacturing process and give a insight into the field of quality within the industry. The report has been based on literature studies, observations and semi-structured interviews with assemblers and employees at Volvo Group Trucks Operations. The results of the study shows that the human factor is the largest source of quality problems in terms of percentage. The root causes associated with the human factor are mainly that the assemblers are unfocused, stressed or have low motivation. The current system itself also causes a relatively high failure rate and some variation in the type of failure. The report also states that the company's annual quality deficiency costs approximately 2,600,000 SEK for the pilot stations and 26 million SEK annually for the entire factory. This type of data, such as the different quality problems that occur, the root causes of these quality problems and the cost quality problems generate is important for future projects. It can also be the basis for assessing whether investment should be made, but the data can also be used to perform a benchmarking with other car manufacturing companies that hypothetically can have similar outcomes. The survey has been delimited to only include the pilot stations 26-29 and the quality problems that arise during the time of the data collection, which was twice a week for 5 weeks. In addition, the delimitation has been made to only include failures that occurred during the day shift and on the line or in connection to the line.


4000Background: T-DXd is an antibody-drug conjugate composed of an anti-HER2 antibody, cleavable tetrapeptide-based linker, and topoisomerase I inhibitor payload. Early studies have shown promising...


Formation flying is a key technology enabling a number of missions which a single satellite cannot accomplish: from remote sensing to astronomy and fundamental physics. The design of relative navigation and control systems of the spacecraft is certainly one of the most challenging topic. In order to ease the tasks of these subsystems, a proper reference trajectory must be conceived, and a relative motion, which shows no drift even in presence of a large disturbance as the J2 effect, could be a very attractive solution. This paper describes the research activities for finding invariant relative orbits under J2 effect. Numerical tools as genetic algorithms enabled the discovery of two special inclinations which represent the necessary conditions for periodicity of the motion. These results generated interest, and analytical explanations for the numerical evidence have been proposed: on-going studies face this problem from different points of view, and basic results are reported.


The first market-oriented reform of the Brazilian Electricity Supply Industry, carried out in the nineties, failed to attract investment in the levels required to keep the economy growing and remained incomplete, because the trading arrangements set in place did not emit adequate investment signals and the market organisms themselves became paralyzed. In consequence, a new direction for reform was set up in March 2004. This reform of the reform, besides several structural purposes, is aimed at attracting private investment to the expansion of electricity generation supply, in view of growing demand and restrictions on the State capacity to invest. From an analysis of the governance structure here is a survey done about the market design and rules of the Brazilian Electricity Sector with the aim of presenting the whole process of change and major advances in governance since the major structural and institutional changes of the Brazilian Electric Sector from the 1990s to 2004, to duly analyze the possible effects of these changes on the strategic actions of the economic agents (generation, traders, consumers and distribution companies). This work also aims to identify eventual fragilities in the market rules and in the market design in this period and how they were mitigated by the last reform that took place in 2004 and introduced new structural changes to the Brazilian Electricity Institutional Model (BEIM).


ObjectiveTo evaluate the long-term survival outcomes of a large cohort of liver transplant recipients, especially retransplant ones, and to identify static and changing factors influencing these outcomes over time. The study population was divided into era A, era B and era C based on the date of the first transplant. MethodsFour thousand consecutive patients who underwent liver transplantation between February 1981 and April 1998 were included in this analysis and were followed up to March 2000. There were 774 cases of retransplantation in these patients. ResultsIn the follow-up period, 774 patients (19.4%) received a second transplant, 148 (3.7%) a third transplant, 20 (0.5%) a fourth transplant and 5 (0.13%) more than four allografts. The causes of retransplantation in various eras were mainly primary nonfunction, hepatic artery thrombosis and rejection. The overall rate of retransplantation has significantly declined in each subsequent era: from 33.4% in era A to 23.7% in era B and 13.4% in era C (P=0.001). ConclusionsThe survival of retransplanted patients has been significantly promoted through selecting indications, timing of retransplantation and recipients and improving operative techniques.


OBJECTIVE To investigate the influence of combine salmeterol fluticasone with tiotropium bromide in COPD patients and systemic inflammatory response. METHODS 48 stable COPD patients were selected in our hospital, patients were divided into two groups, the observation group combined salmeterol fluticasone with tiotropium bromide, and the control group combined salmeterol fluticasone with ipratropium bromide, compared lung function, MMRC, 6MWT, IL-8, TNF-a, hs-CRP in two groups during treatment. RESULTS After treatment, PVC, PEV1, PEV1 / PVC, MMRC, IL-8, TNF-a and hs-CRP in two groups had significantly differences with before treatment, P﹤0.05. The observation groups' PVC, PEV1, PEV1 / PVC, MMRC, 6MWT, IL-8, TNF-a and hs-CRP had significantly differences with control group. CONCLUSION Our research shows combined salmeterol fluticasone with tiotropium bromide can significantly improve COPD patients' lung function, reduce the breathing difficulty, improve the patients' exercise tolerance and reduce the systemic inflammatory response.


Chain mobility in a near surface region at a polystyrene/vacuum interface was investigated by embedding of noble metal nanosized clusters. The embedding process was monitored in situ by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The embedding of nanosized clusters needs long-range chain mobility of the polymer. Therefore, the embedding process is a probe for the glass transition in a near surface region. The clusters used in this study are formed by the dewetting of evaporated noble metals onto the polymer surface. First, methodical influences on the embedding process were investigated. An onset embedding temperature T* was defined. T* increases with a heating rate comparable to Tg(bulk) determined with a differential scanning calorimeter. Furthermore, T* increases with nominal metal coverage which results in increasing average cluster radius. The cluster size distribution was investigated by transmission electron microscopy. It is shown that T* is an upper limit for Tg in a near surface region with a depth of a f...


A substrate loading device including a frame part forming a loading space in which a plurality of substrates are loaded, and having an inlet surface in which the substrates are inserted, and a rear surface opposite to the inlet surface, a main support protruding from the rear surface of the frame part to support a rear side of the loaded substrates and a sub support mounted at the inlet surface of the frame part and protruding from the inlet surface to support a front and opposite side of the loaded substrates.


Two-component silicone encapsulation materials show a higher transmission in the short wavelength region compared to EVA (ethylene vinyl acetate) encapsulation material. This property leads to an enhanced blue response of the encapsulated solar cells and therefore an increase in Jsc (short circuit current density) is expected. Selective emitter and homogeneous emitter solar cells have been encapsulated with silicone materials as well as with EVA, and the IQE (internal quantum efficiency) of all cells before and after encapsulation was determined. A significant gain in IQE for wavelengths below 380 nm was observed for cells encapsulated with silicone compared to those with EVA. We estimate that that the improved blue response of the cells encapsulated with silicone results in a possible gain in Jsc of up to 1.3 % for the selective emitter cells.


On Thursday, 16 May 2013, my graduate school mentor and dissertation advisor, Dr William Edward Nelson, Jr, passed away. "Nick," as he was affectionately known, was an internationally recognized professor, scholar, administrator, advisor, mentor, and community activist. Professor Emeritus, Dr Nelson, retired from The Ohio State University in 2009 after 40 years of distinguished service in the Departments of African American and African Studies and Political Science. He came to Ohio State University in 1969. Within a year of his arrival, he helped to establish one of the first and most comprehensive programs in black studies in the nation, the Department of African American and African Studies. He chaired the department from 1972 to 1986 (formerly Black Studies). DrNelson also spearheaded the creation of theDepartment ofAfricanAmerican andAfrican Studies Community Extension Center to enhance community access to the university and its resources. During his long career, hementored, advised, and nurtured a countless number of students, including myself, helping make The Ohio State University's Department of Political Science one of the top programs producing black PhDs (Schoch 2002; The Ohio State University 2013). Dr Nelson's professional and community accomplishments are extensive, including serving as president of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists, president of the African Heritage Studies Association, chair of the National Council for Black Studies, and vice president of the American Political Science Association. He also served as president of the Columbus Chapter of the National Black Political Assembly, member of the Executive Council of the International Peace Research Association, Editorial Board of the Journal of Black Studies, The National Political Science Review, and Urban Affairs Quarterly (The Ohio State University 2013). Dr Nelson taught and lectured at colleges on five continents, wrote numerous articles, and was the author of several books including a book he co-authored with Phillip J.Meranto,Electing Black Mayors: Political Action in the Black Community. Among his many academic awards and accomplishments is the 2000 Best Book on comparative racial and ethnic politics, The American Political Science Association, section on race, ethnicity, and politics for his book, Black Atlantic Politics: Dilemmas of Political Empowerment in Boston and Liverpool (2000); Lifetime Scholarly AchievementAward, TheAmerican Political ScienceAssociation; Fulbright Research scholarship; and The Distinguished Service Award, Office of Minority Affairs, The Ohio State University (The Ohio State University 2013). Electing Black Mayors is a seminal book in the field of American politics, foundational for research on black politics and urban politics, and is Dr Nelson's magnum opus. Accordingly,


In the last decade, extensive academic and industrial efforts have been devoted to developing efficient conjugated polymers (CPs) for organic electronics. Specifically, the relationship between the molecular structures, properties, and...


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Based on joint-innovation patent data from 2000 to 2016 in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei region of China, the purpose of this paper is to analyze how technological proximity affects university–industry...


Maduo county located in the source region of the Yellow River, and its eco-environment and its significance for the hydrology have a strong influence on the hydrological conditions and the eco-environment of the middle and lower river reaches, but its eco-environment is very fragile for the especial geographic location in recent years, and the eco-environment degrades very quickly influenced by natural factor together with human being factor, in which desertification is main aspect of environment changing in this region. The eco-environmental information system in Maduo county grassland is worked out supported by GIS and RS, as well as field investigation and indoor analysis, based on knowledge the classification is worked out and multi-source data is gathered. The result indicated that the total desertified land area increased to 2 388.06 km~2 in 2000 from 1 592.89 km~2, with annually increasing rate of 4.1%, among which the light degree desertification land increased from 564.53 km~2 to 827.57 km~2, occupied 34.67% of the whole desertified land; the middle degree increased from 479.86 km~2 to 971.28 km~2, occupied 41.05%; the serious degree increased from 398.83 km~2 to 420.63 km~2,occupied 17.61% and the very serious increased from 149.67 km~2 to 168.58 km~2, occupied 6.67%. Thus it can be seen that desertification extended very quickly in this region, especially the middle and the light degree. There are many reasons contributed to the desertification process, of which the main ones included the geological environmental evolution, regional climatic change, human irrational activities (the main is excessive stock-raising) and rodent damage.


Since 1994, the Chinese government has been seeking to adopt a social insurance system (shehui baozhang zhidu). The aim has been to move from the care that had traditionally been provided by the family and then the work unit, to a system covering the entire population. The government has set 2020 as the target year to achieve this. As of now the system is fragmented and unequal, varying according to workers' schemes and provinces. A clear law would constitute a major step forward and remove the many inegalities. (1) That, in fact, was the objective of the social insurance law aims to do (shehui baoxian fa) finally adopted after its fourth reading on 28 October 2010. (2) It is to enter into force from 1 July 2011.


Many communities around the country have adopted regulatory, administrative, and financial practices designed to promote and fund safe pedestrian facilities and activities. The objective of this study is to document various tools and strategies used by municipalities to improve the safety, convenience, and accessibility of the pedestrian experience. Information used in this study was acquired through a review of the literature and interviews with key staff in local agencies that have implemented practices designed to support pedestrian-friendly environments.


Abstract : This research product presents and M16/A1 rifle marksmanship training program for U.S. Army units. It is compatible and fully integrated with recent revisions made in the basic and advanced rifle marksmanship training programs. The usefulness of the unit marksmanship program has been demonstrated through field testing and/or implementation within selected units in West Germany, Korea, Alaska, Hawaii, and within units located at Forts Benning, Bragg, Campbell, Hood, Lewis, Polk, Riley, and Stewart.


Celastrus paniculatus Willd, a vulnerable important woody liana with high medicinal value and limited reproductive capacity has been over exploited due to its demand in the pharmaceutical industry. In the present study, an efficient micropropagation protocol was developed from nodal explants on Murashige and Skoog and woody plant medium. The effect of various strengths of WP and MS medium (total, half strength) and different concentrations of plant growth regulators including cytokinins [6-benzylaminopurine (BAP) and Kinetin) and auxins (α-naphthaleneacetic acid (NAA) and (IBA) indole-3-butyric acid] on proliferation and rooting was investigated. C. paniculatus shoots showed maximum proliferation in WP medium supplemented with BAP (0.5 mg l-1). Best rooting frequency and higher root number and length were attained in medium fortified with NAA in combination with 0.2% activated charcoal. Seventy percent of the plantlets were successfully acclimatized to ex vitro conditions, exhibiting normal development. These plantlets can be used to replenish the declining populations in the wild. Molecular profiling of the in vitro developed plantlets was done using RAPD to confirm their genetic uniformity.


The US Department of Energy's (DOE's) Office of Industrial Technologies (OIT) is considering a future funding increase for programs charged with wasted materials reduction in US industry. To aid DOE, Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) has begun to consult with chemical firms about that kind of research and development programs that the industry would find helpful in its effort to reduce wasted material. The results of the consultations are presented in this draft program plan. Argonne expects that this ongoing interactive and iterative process, which involves government and industry, will yield additional insights into industry research and development needs. 1 fig., 1 tab.


Aims: Obstetric hemorrhage, especially during the 3rd trimester of pregnancy, causes maternal, fetal and neonatal mortality and morbidity. We attempted to characterize its clinical features in Guinea. The objectives of this study were to describe the socio-demographic characteristics of the patients, identify the causes and contributing factors, describe the management and evaluate the maternal-fetal prognosis in such patients. Methods: We retrieved and analyzed patients with 3rd trimester hemorrhage whom we managed at Ignace Deen National Hospital, Guinea during 1-year period (1 st of December 2019-30 th of November 2020). Results: We experienced recorded 401 patients with 3rd trimester obstetric hemorrhage out of 5468 deliveries during the corresponding period; the rate being 7.33%. The main causes were as follows: placental hematoma (65.33%), placenta previa (27.68%) and uterine rupture (6.99%). The socio-demographic profiles were as follows: the age group of 25 - 29 years (28.42%), married (94.51%), uneducated (50.12%), and with a liberal profession. (43.64%) and pauciparous (30.42%). The conditions were considered to be preventable by managing risk factors during the prenatal consultation (PNC): 7.73% underwent no PNC. Cesarean accounted for 84.78% of patients. Prognosis was as follows: 14 maternal deaths (3.45% of a fatality), 34.66% of anemia, and 16.95% of hemorrhagic shock. Fetal/neonatal prog-noses were poor. Conclusion: Obstetric hemorrhage during 3rd trimester remains the main cause of poor outcomes in Guinea. This study identified that this type of hemorrhage still represents an important cause of maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality in developing countries.


Atlan-Tech, Inc. has performed several calibrations of ISO 6980 Series 1 reference beta sources over the past two to three years. There were many problems encountered in attempting to compare the results of these calibrations with those from other laboratories, indicating the need for more standardization in the methodology employed for the measurement of the absorbed dose rate from ISO 6980 Series 1 reference beta sources. This document describes some of the problems encountered in attempting to intercompare results of beta dose-rate measurements. It proposes some solutions in an attempt to open a dialogue among facilities using reference beta standards for the purpose of promoting better measurement quality assurance through data intercomparison.


The relation between three factors,thai is time,temperature,and ratio of mushrooms and water,and polysaccharides contents in the processing of extracting mushrooms was studied.Single factor experiments were done,and results indicated that basic processing of extracting mushrooms polysaccharides is time 5hours,temperature 85,and ratio of mushrooms and water is 1:30.Anova indicated that time,temperature,and ratio of mushrooms and water are all affect the polysaccharides contents of extracting mushrooms significantly.The relation between every factors and extracting contents of mushrooms polysaccharides can be indicted by drawing figure.


Collisions at intersections account for about 40% of all car accidents and for about 20% of all traffic fatalities in the United States. The main cause is human error in recognition and decision making. Active safety systems have thus a great potential for increasing vehicle safety at intersections. They may issue warnings to the driver or assume control of the vehicle in critical situations. Most approaches in current research rely on the assumption that all vehicles at the intersection are controllable, and/or they can be coordinated by a central intersection manager. This paper considers the case of a single controllable ego vehicle surrounded by several uncontrollable target vehicles, without communication. Only a map with the current position and velocity of the target vehicles are assumed to be known, but no pre-defined crossing order is given. A Robust Model Predictive Control strategy is designed for finding safe gaps in the crossing traffic, and for planning optimal trajectories to maximize the ego vehicle's efficiency and driver comfort. It is shown that its performance can be enhanced by Affine Disturbance Feedback. The algorithm is tested in several simulation scenarios and implemented on a test vehicle for experimental validation.


Joyce, Aristotle and Aquinas examines the pervasive presence of Aristotle and Aquinas in the writings of James Joyce. Joyce was a philosophical writer, with a keen sense of primordial and perennial questions such as diversity and unity, identity, permanence and change, and the reliability of knowledge; in his writings he engaged creatively with these questions. Aristotle and Aquinas were his dominant influences, providing both significant content for his work, as well as important principles of artistic creation. O'Rourke illustrates the decisive and extensive influence of Aristotle and Aquinas by copious reference to Joyce's writings. The biographical facts of Joyce's education, and his initiation into the intellectual world of Aristotle and Aquinas, are charted in detail. Aristotle equipped Joyce with fundamental principles regarding reality, knowledge, and the soul, which allowed him to shape his literary characters. Without his study of Aristotle's Metaphysics and On the Soul, he could not have created the intellectual character of Stephen portrayed in the early chapters of Ulysses. The debate in 'Scylla and Charybdis' between Stephen, Eglinton and Russell would have been impossible. The Aristotelian concepts of act and potency, form and entelechy, are indispensable for Stephen's reading of the world and his sense of selfhood. Besides relying on Aquinas as an authority for his realist outlook, Joyce appropriated Thomistic concepts to elaborate his own aesthetic theory; he diverged widely, however, from his credited source.


Smart environments equipped with IoT devices are increasingly under threat from an escalating number of sophisticated cyber-attacks. Current security approaches are inaccurate, expensive, or unscalable, as they require static signatures of known attacks, specialized hardware, or full packet inspection. The IETF Manufacturer Usage Description (MUD) framework aims to reduce the attack surface on an IoT device by formally defining its expected network behavior. In this paper, we use SDN to monitor compliance with the MUD behavioral profile, and develop machine learning methods to detect volumetric attacks such as DoS, reflective TCP/UDP/ICMP flooding, and ARP spoofing to IoT devices. Our first contribution develops a machine for detecting anomalous patterns of MUD-compliant network activity via coarse-grained (device-level) and fine-grained (flow-level) SDN telemetry for each IoT device, thereby giving visibility into flows that contribute to a volumetric attack. For our second contribution we measure network behavior of IoT devices by collecting benign and volumetric attacks traffic traces in our lab, label our dataset, and make it available to the public. Our last contribution prototypes a full working system (built with an OpenFlow switch, Faucet SDN controller, and a MUD policy engine), demonstrates its application in detecting volumetric attacks on several consumer IoT devices with high accuracy, and provides insights into cost and performance of our system. Our data and solution modules are released as open source to the community.


Indonesian government established tin commodity exchange as a r eference for world's tin price. Currently, there are three commodity exchanges in the world. This research aims to analyze relationship of tin commodity exchanges between London Metal Exchange (LME), Kuala Lumpur Tin Market (KLTM) and Indone sian Tin Exchange (INATIN). Daily data were obtained since August 23 rd , 2013 to December 31 st , 2015. We utilized Granger Causality and verified through interviews with tin's experts. The result indicates that price alterations in I NATIN influence the price in other commodity exchanges and not vice versa. The experts consider it yet to be optimized in infl uencing other commodity exchanges, especially with regard to Alternative Delivery Procedure sy stem in Indonesia Commodity an d Derivatives Exchanges (ICDX).


For many years the ubiquitous PID controller has been the mainstay of industry. Whatever its limitations, particularly with non-linear plant, its advantages and the lack of suitable alternatives made it the controller of choice. However, all this is changing. Advanced control techniques such as predictive control, fuzzy logic control, model-based control and neural networks are individually and in combination providing a very effective challenge. It is with this background in mind that Professor George Page, formerly of Liverpool John Moore University, began inviting papers for this issue of the Transactions. The first four papers are the results of his efforts. When considering these papers it is the combination of techniques used that first makes the collection interesting. Gomm et al use neural network modelling and predictive control, Bremner and Postlethwaite model-based fuzzy control, Moro and Bonavita modelpredictive control and Lisboa et al neural networks for both identification and control. However, the papers are more than just an interesting collection of techniques. since they are addressing practical control problems ranging from an industrial grain dryer to an underwater vehicle.


The main objective of this paper is to realize a review of literature about use of Interactive Digital Whiteboard, as a tool for improving the quality of education. We intend to show some results already reported in several studies in this area, and thus contribute to the systematization of knowledge about this resource. We found that the positive impacts of digital interactive whiteboards are specific and depend on the model followed in its implementation. Although the literature on this technology still emerging, there is evidences of good practice and positive results in all areas of the curriculum. The outcome of this research shows that to get potential benefits of digital whiteboard will be necessary, at first, to understand the process implementation and appropriation. If hardware and software of Interactive Digital Whiteboard not available and adequately used all their potential benefits not will take effect.


Highly ordered mesoporous Fe–Ni bimetal oxide (m-FeNi) catalysts synthesized using KIT-6 as a hard-template by a nanocasting method were investigated for an alternative high-temperature water-gas shift (HT-WGS) reaction.


Abstract This research aims to study the structure and composition of forest tree vegetation in the protected forests of Mount Mahawu and Mount Masarang. Line Method was used to study the changes in tree distribution based on the topography and elevation. Plots measuring 20 x 20 m2 are made following topographic lines (mountain slopes). The results show that the structure and composition of the dominant trees in the Mahawu Protection Forest are different from that of the Masarang Protection Forest. The dominant species in the Mahawu Protection Forest are Diospyros celebica, followed by Ficus septica and Anthocephalus chinensis; while in the Masarang Protected Forest Artocarpus sp. followed by Ficus septica and Lansium sp. Keywords: forest tree structure, forest tree composition, Mount Mahawu, Mount Masarang, protected forest


In this paper we prove that for any hyperbolic 4-manifold M , which is R 2 bundle over surface , the absolute value of the Euler number e() of the bration : M ! is not greater than exp(exp(10 8 j(()j)). This result partially corroborates a conjecture of Gromov, Lawson and Thurston that je()j j(()j.


Although large-volume plastic scintillation detectors have been widely used in Homeland Security applications for the detection of potential radiological and nuclear threats using cargo portals, they generally provide little or no spectroscopic information. Such information is key to the achievement of reduced nuisance-alarm rates. This paper outlines the improvements that have been achieved in the design and performance capability of large-volume PVT scintillation counters. In particular, they have an improved light-collection efficiency and uniformity of response. This improvement has been important in making it feasible to use Symetrica's spectrum-processing algorithms in order to provide an accurate estimate of the gamma-ray spectrum that is incident on the detectors. Such spectra have then been used as the input to an isotope-identification algorithm. This paper provides an indication of how the certainty of the isotope identification depends both on the number of lines in the spectrum and the total number of counts recorded. In view of this progress, we believe that large PVT detectors will soon be able to provide a very useful degree of isotope specificity in addition to their high detection-sensitivity.


During the interval from seed set to advanced shedding in a crop of S24 perennial rye-grass, a study was made of: seed drying, the increase in germinating capacity and weight of seed, and the shedding of florets. The seed in early-emerged heads dried more rapidly than that in later heads, and the seed in the upper parts of each spike was drier than in the lower parts. Seeds in early heads attained maximum germination values about 18 days after anthesis. The maximum value was lower in later heads and was not reached until approximately 26 days. Seed in early heads was 67% heavier than that in late heads and the basal florets in each spikelet contained heavier seed than more distal ones. The maximum weight of individual seeds was reached at about the same time in early-emerged and intermediate heads, at about 22 to 26 days after anthesis. Seed in late heads continued to inerease during the whole interval studied. Shedding began before seed reached maximum dry weight and continued at a constant rate. The combination of these processes led to the maximum yield of seed, of 100% germination, being obtainable over a period between 20 and 26 days after anthesis. Criteria are given which would permit this stage to be recognized.


Abstract: In this research a questionnaire was applied on 176 Forest Products (industries) coneerning their production activities, and 138 of them answered the questionnaire. This questionnaire was administered to large-scale businesses in timber, furniture and paper industries, and to all in the chipboard, fiberboard and plywood industries. According to the results obtained from the research 56% of forest products industries make mass-production, 38% order-based production and 6% batch production. Of these industries, 23% supply their products to workshops, and 39% to the buildings and 33% other. 5% residences. And raw meterial, labour and energy costs are most effective factors in determining the prices of products produced by forest products industries. While 31% of the businesses in tins sector have no problems at production stage, 68% of them report that they do have problems. The problem of low quality raw materials takes the first place with 38% and it is followed by lack of qualified labour with 31.5%. Key Words: Forest Products Industry. Production Activities. Research. Questionnaire. Ozet: Bu arastirmada 176 Orman Urunleri Endustri Isletmesine uretim faaliyetleri ile ilgili olarak anket calismasi yapilmis, bunlarin 138 'i ankete cevap vermistir. Anket calismasi buyuk olcekli kereste isletmelerine, mobilya ve kagit endustrisi ile butun yonga levha, lif levha ve kaplama endustri isletmeierjne uygulanmistir. Arastirma sonucuna gore orman urunleri endustri isletmelerinin %56 'si seri uretim yaparken %38 "i siparise gore uretim, %6 'si her ikisini birlikte yapmaktadir. Bu endustrilerin %23 'u diger isletmelerin hammadde urunlerini uretirken %39 'u insaat sektorune, 33% "u diger sektorlere, 5% 'i konutlara uretim yapmaktadir. Orman urunleri endustrisinde uretilen urunlerin fiyatlarinin belirlenmesinde hammadde, isgucu ve enerji maliyetleri en etkili faktfiflerdir. Ankete katilan isletmelerin %31 'i bu sektorde uretim problemlerinin olmadigini. %69 'i ise uretimde problemlerinin oldugunu hclirtmislcrdir. Bu prohlemlerin basinda %38 ile ilk sirayi dusuk kalitedeki hammaddeler alirken, bunu %31.5 ile kaliteli isgucu eksikligi izlemektedir. Anahtar Kelimeler: Orman Urunleri Endustrisi, Uretim Faaliyetleri, Arastirma Anket


Extensive ossification in a bladder tumor is extremely rare. A case of bladder leiomyosarcoma with extensive osseous metaplasia is reported in a 84 years old Libyan male. The patient underwent radical cystectomy and ureterosigmoid urinary diversion for muscle invasive bladder tumor. The patient died three months after surgery with local tumor recurrence, inter current sepsis and metabolic complication of urinary diversion.


Background  Although some paternal components to the predisposition to pre‐eclampsia have been demonstrated recently, it is not known whether such paternal factors play a role to thrombophilia‐related perinatal mortality.


In this paper, two unsaturated alicyclic nitrogen heterocyclic crownethers were synthesized by phase transfer reaction .The structure was identified by means of IR, NMR and MS. Especially, their mass spectra were discussed in detail by using the high resolution mass spectrametry, collision induced dissociation(CID) and Mass Analysed Ion Kinetic Energy Spectroscopy(MIKES). The possible fragmentation pathway was presented. The results revealed that there were some differences between the mass spectrometric behavior of these two compounds because of the effect of the size of ring and different substituted group attached to ring such as toluenesulfonyl, furyl and phenyl.


In this study, several chemical treatment techniques were verified for releasing cytoplasmic cephalosporin C deacetylase (CAH) from recombinant Escherichia coli (E. coli) cells. Among all the chemical treatment methods, using cationic detergent, organic solvents and chelating agents as permeabilizing reagents exhibited limited capacities for extraction of cytoplasmic CAH from cells. Combined use of 5.0 % (v/v) Triton X-100 and 0.3 mol L –1 NaCl achieved better effect on CAH extraction, and the release yield of CAH reached approximately 88 %. The extraction parameters such as temperature, ionic strength, Triton X-100 concentration and time were separately optimized to enhance the process of CAH release. The optimal permeabilization conditions (Triton X-100: 2.0 %, v/v; extraction temperature and time: 30 °C and 14 h) resulted in 103 % of relative CAH yield when compared with an optimized sonication process. Release yield of more than 100 % indicated that sonication could inactivate a few CAH molecules in the extraction process. This chemical treatment method could avoid the inactivation of CAH caused by sonication, and thus improve the CAH extraction process.


This is an application study 1 of Functionalism from the perspective of communicative translation. Translation in its nature introduces a foreign culture into a local one, and Functionalism deals with how the communicators adapt the foreign attributes to the local culture. The paper will examine a total of three prefaces and one postscript attached to the Chinese translations of The Making of a Hero and Gone with the Wind. Through text analysis, typical communicators, including initiators, commissioners, editors, and translators in a translational activity, will be identified, and their roles as cultural ambassadors will be explained. The conclusion is that Functionalism puts a translational activity into the socio-cultural context where it occurs, and regards it as a cross-cultural activity. Like other cross-cultural communications, a translational activity involves the key elements in a successful communication between cultures. The purpose of this cultural translation is often pre- determined, and all participants in the translational activity work together to realize the purpose in the target culture. Keywords: Functionalism, communicative purpose, Gone with the Wind, Nikolai Ostrovsky, preface, postscript, translation Skopos


The embeding relations between Banach-space-valued martingale spaces and and and the duals of martingale Hardy spaces and Dr(X) with small index are studied, the results obtained here are connected closely with the convexity and smoothness of the Banach space which the martingales take values in.


s reviewed: 146 Excluded = 101 references Comparison: 66 Intervention: 1 Systematic review: 7 Review/editorial: 19 Protocol: 8 Total title screened: 390 Excluded: 244 Excluded = 23 references Intervention: 6 Comparison: 3 Small sample size: 1 Not original research: 1 Duplicate: 11 Unavailable: 1 Clinical outcomes: 20 Clinical outcomes and cost: 1 Cost only: 1 Full-text review: 45 Robot-assisted Esophagectomy for Cancer Evidence Synthesis Program 14 KEY QUESTION 1 – What is the clinical effectiveness of robotassisted esophagectomy compared to thoracoscopic/laparoscopic or open esophagectomy for cancer? Intra-operative Outcomes Intra-operative: RAMIE compared with VAMIE Figure 2 presents 3 intra-operative outcomes: OR time, LN harvest, and EBL. For the RCT,15 OR time was not longer for RAMIE as compared to VAMIE. The number of LNs harvested was greater for RAMIE, and EBL was not different. For the observational studies, OR time was reported as longer for RAMIE in 4 of the matched studies18,20,23,26 and as no difference in 3 of the other matched studies.16,17,22 One matched study reported shorter OR time24 for RAMIE. For the unmatched observational studies, 1 reported longer OR time with RAMIE27 and 4 reported no difference.29-31,34 Two of the matched studies reported a greater number of LNs harvested for RAMIE,18,19 whereas 6 reported no difference.16,17,20,23,24,26 For unmatched observational studies, 2 reported greater number of LNs harvested with RAMIE,27,31 and 3 reported no difference.29,30,34 None of the matched or unmatched observational studies reported differences in EBL for RAMIE as compared to VAMIE.16-18,20,23,24,26,27,30,31,34 Intra-operative: RAMIE compared with Open Esophagectomy For the RCT,14 OR time was significantly longer for RAMIE compared to the open approach. The number of lymph nodes harvested was not different in the RAMIE arm. EBL was less for RAMIE. For the observational studies, there was a signal of longer OR time for RAMIE (4 reported significantly longer;25,27,32,34 3 no difference21,28,33). Seven studies reported on the number of LNs harvested and of these, 3 reported higher numbers removed by the RAMIE approach.19,27,32 More than half of the observational studies reported less EBL with RAMIE27,28,32,33 whereas 3 reported no difference.21,25,34 Robot-assisted Esophagectomy for Cancer Evidence Synthesis Program 15 Figure 2. Intra-operative Outcomes 1Dotted line separates RCT from the observational studies 2Solid line separates the studies comparing RAMIE with VAMIE or RAMIE with open esophagectomy Robot-assisted Esophagectomy for Cancer Evidence Synthesis Program 16 Short-term Post-operative Outcomes Figure 3 presents 6 short-term post-operative outcomes: anastomotic leak, recurrent laryngeal nerve palsy/hoarseness, pulmonary complications, duration of hospitalization, total complications, and mortality. Twelve studies compared RAMIE vs VAMIE,15-18,20,22-24,26,29-31 6 studies compared RAMIE with open esophagectomy,14,21,25,28,32,33 and 3 studies compared RAMIE with both VAMIE and open esophagectomy.19,27,34 Short-Term: RAMIE compared with VAMIE Of the studies comparing RAMIE with VAMIE, 14 assessed anastomotic leak, and there was no significant difference between study arms or trend favoring RAMIE or VAMIE in either the RCT or the 8 matched and 5 unmatched observational studies.15-18,20,22-24,26,27,29-31,34 Cervical anastomoses were used in 9 studies, including 8 studies primarily or exclusively utilizing the McKeown approach15-18,20,24,31,34 and 1 utilizing a transhiatal approach.29 Three studies directly compared intrathoracic anastomoses with an Ivor-Lewis approach in both study arms.22,23,26 One study was from a large database and compared robot-assisted Ivor-Lewis with an unspecified "transthoracic" MIE, suggesting at least 1 study arm had an intrathoracic anastomosis.27 Another study reported a transthoracic approach for both study arms but did not specify whether an intrathoracic or cervical anastomosis was performed.30 There was no clear difference favoring RAMIE or VAMIE when evaluating studies with a cervical or intrathoracic anastomosis separately. The RCT found no difference in recurrent laryngeal nerve (RLN) palsy between study arms.15 Of the 6 matched observational studies assessing RLN injury, 1 reported lower RLN palsy with RAMIE,17 1 reported lower RLN palsy with VAMIE,24 and 4 reported no difference.16,19,20,26 For the 3 unmatched studies, 1 reported lower rate of RLN palsy as compared to RAMIE,30 and 2 reported no difference.31,34 The RCT15 did not report a difference in pulmonary complications for RAMIE as compared to VAMIE. One propensity matched study reported fewer pulmonary complications24; however, the other 7 studies did not.16-18,20,22,23,26 None of the 4 unmatched observational studies reported a difference between RAMIE and VAMIE approaches.27,30,31,34 Most of the studies had a point estimate of effect falling within the 95% confidence interval of the RCT, which may suggest a possible signal that there may be fewer pulmonary complications in RAMIE compared with VAMIE. None of the 4 US observational studies assessing LOS found a significant difference between RAMIE as compared to VAMIE; 2 were matched and 2 were unmatched studies.19,22,27,29 One of these studies compared robot-assisted and laparoscopic transhiatal esophagectomy, which had no difference in LOS.29 Nine non-US studies evaluated LOS, of which none demonstrated differences between RAMIE and VAMIE (see Appendix G. Evidence table).15-18,20,23,24,26,34 All but 1 of the 9 non-US studies had a LOS with a central tendency (mean or median) greater than 10 days in both study arms,26 whereas all US studies had a measure of central tendency of 10 days or less. Ten studies assessed outcomes for total complications.15,18,20,22,24,26,27,29,31,34 One study compared robot-assisted transhiatal and laparoscopic transhiatal esophagectomy.29 The remaining studies Robot-assisted Esophagectomy for Cancer Evidence Synthesis Program 17 compared a robot-assisted transthoracic approach to a thoracoscopic approach. Neither the RCT nor the matched and unmatched observational studies found a difference in complications. Mortality was assessed in 14 studies.15-20,22-24,26,27,29,31,34 Mortality was not different in the RCT or the matched and unmatched observational studies. In general, mortality rate was low across all studies. Short-Term: RAMIE compared with Open Esophagectomy Eight studies comparing RAMIE and open esophagectomy assessed anastomotic leak rate.14,21,25,27,28,32-34 The RCT, 2 matched observational studies, and 5 unmatched observational studies reported no difference in leak rate. One observational study utilized the robot for the abdominal portion combined with thoracotomy, which did not demonstrate a difference in anastomotic leak rates, as the technique for creating the anastomosis was the same in both arms of the study.33 Of the 2 matched21,25 and 3 unmatched observational studies28,32,34 assessing RLN palsy, none found a difference between RAMIE and open esophagectomy. Eight studies assessed pulmonary complications.14,21,25,27,28,32-34 The rate of pulmonary complications was lower for RAMIE and open esophagectomy in the RCT.14 One matched observation study and 2 unmatched observational studies also reported a lower rate for RAMIE.25,27,28 The largest difference was seen in the RCT14 but significance was also achieved in the 1 matched observational study25 and 2 unmatched observational studies.27,28 One matched observational study and 3 unmatched observational studies did not report a difference in pulmonary complications.21,32-34 Three US studies evaluated LOS.19,27,28 One matched observational study19 and an unmatched observational study28 demonstrated a shorter time to discharge with RAMIE. The third study (unmatched observational) did not find any differences in LOS between the study arms.27 Of the 6 non-US studies that assessed LOS,14,21,25,32-34 2 demonstrated a shorter hospital stay for RAMIE compared with open esophagectomy (see Appendix G. Evidence Table).32,33 The central tendency for LOS was greater than 10 days in both arms of the non-US studies except for one.33 One out of the 3 US studies had LOS with a central tendency greater than 10 days.28 Six studies assessed total complication rate.14,21,27,28,33,34 The RCT demonstrated a lower total complication rate with RAMIE.14 Additionally, 1 matched observational study21 and 1 unmatched study33 showed reduced rates of total complications with RAMIE. Of note, the unmatched study compared the utilization of the robot for the abdominal portion with laparotomy (thoracic portion was performed via thoracotomy in both study arms). Three additional unmatched studies reported no difference total complications with RAMIE as compared to open esophagectomy.27,28,34 Mortality was assessed in 9 studies.14,19,21,25,27,28,32-34 The RCT reported no different in mortality for RAMIE compared with open esophagectomy.14 One matched observational study found that Robot-assisted Esophagectomy for Cancer Evidence Synthesis Program 18 RAMIE was associated with a lower mortality compared with open esophagectomy.25 The remaining studies did not show a difference in mortality between study arms. Figure 3. Short-term Post-operative Outcomes 1Dotted line separates RCT from the observational studies 2Solid line separates the studies comparing RAMIE with VAMIE or RAMIE with open esophagectomy Robot-assisted Esophagectomy for Cancer Evidence Synthesis Program 19 Long-term Outcomes Long-term: RAMIE compared with VAMIE or Open Esophagectomy Figure 4 presents graphically the results of long-term outcomes for recurrence and cancer-free survival. These outcomes were less frequently reported than the intra-operative and short-term post-operative outcomes. These were evaluated in 2 RCTs14,15 and 3 observational studies.24,25,31 One study reported overall survival instead of cancer-f


The concept of public service bargain (PSB) has been reintroduced in recent times to the study of public administration to analyse the division of roles between ministers and the civil service in the context of public service reforms (Hood 2000, 2001, 2002; Hood and Lodge 2006). The empirical investigation of the concept of PSB in general and changes in PSBs in particular is, however, limited. This article addresses this limitation by investigating what causes changes in public service bargains, particularly with respect to the provision of advice. As argued by Hood, we demonstrate how changes in PSBs can be explained by a combination of changes in the environments of ministries as well as the interests of the political actors. Furthermore, we point to the professional qualifications of civil servants as well as their interests as causes of change which, until now, have not received sufficient attention in the PSB literature. The article is based on a longitudinal case study of PSB between ministers and the permanent civil service in Denmark.


This paper is to examine how an Adornian moral philosophy could be conceived, in defiance of the ascertainment by Adorno himself that the realisation of such a practical philosophy has been made impossible today. At its heart is the idea of a reflexive subjectivity able to fully apprehend its object, and thus capable of ethical acts that are an expression of resistance through the execution of particular negation.


The doctor of political sciences, professor, a full member of the Russian Academy of the political sciences, the head of the social and psychological disciplines subdepartament of the Urals institute of economics, management and law Vasily Nikolaevich Rudenkin published his monography «The Fight against Corruption: experience of the USA» in May 2009 in the publishing house of the institute.


An amidinonaphthyl derivative represented by the following general formula (I) which has a platelet aggregation inhibiting action based on the activated blood coagulation factor X inhibiting action and is useful as an anti-thrombus agent and the like, a salt thereof, an intermediate thereof and a pharmaceutical composition which comprises the amidinonaphthyl derivative. An amidinonaphthyl derivative represented by the following general formula (I) or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof. (symbols in the formula have the following meanings; R : a hydrogen atom or a group represented by the formula -A-W-R , A: a group represented by the formula a group represented by the formula or a group represented by the formula -SO2-, X: an oxygen atom or a sulfur atom, W: a single bond or a group represented by the formula -NR -, R : a hydroxyl group, a lower alkoxy group, etc., not a hydroxyl group or a lower alkoxy group, R : a hydrogen atom, a carbamoyl group, a lower alkoxycarbonyl group, etc., R : a lower alkyl group, R : a hydrogen atom, a halogen atom, a carboxyl group, B: a lower alkylene group or a carbonyl group, and n: 0 or 1).


Detection of fish pathogens is crucial for premium aquaculture species with a high economic value. The current study therefore presents a new microfluidic system for detection of aquaculture pathogens. Pathogen DNA was first purified by using specific nucleotide probes, followed by amplifying pathogen-specific DNA fragments by adopting the loop-mediated-isothermal-amplification (LAMP) process. Furthermore, it can carry out four LAMP reactions for multiple detection of pathogens. Successful demonstration for detection of aquaculture fish pathogens has been achieved by using the proposed microfluidic system.


A process for preparing a product adsorbent VOC compounds comprising activated carbon and acetoacetamide. activated carbon is prepared in the form of granules and acetoacetamide, and melted acetoacetamide and then hot added the activated carbon granules to acetoacetamide in the molten, liquid, until that the acetoacetamide is fixed to the granules and then allowed to cool the mixture of activated carbon granules coated with acetoacetamide to recrystallize acetoacetamide on activated carbon granules.


. 36) Ookuma Y ・ Histopathological study of the intrahepatic bile ducts in biliary atresia. J J ap Soc Pediatr Surg 8: 189-202, 1972 (written in Japanese). 37) Sappy PC: Traite d'anatomie descriptive. Adrien Delahage & Cle, Paris, 1877, p331. (written in French) 38) Shiraki K: Histopathology of the liver in cholestasis in infancy. In Cholestasis in Infancy, Tokyo, University of Tokyo Press, 1980, p 99 109. 39) Sterling J A: Biliary tract morphology and prognosis of biliary atresia. Am J Gastroent 45: 261-266, 1956. 40) Suruga K, Nagashima K, et al: A clinical 'and pathological study of congenital biliary atresia. T Pediatr Surg 7: 655-659, 1972. 41) Suruga K, Kono S, et al: Treatment of biliary atresia: microsurgery for hepatic portoenterostomy. Surgery 5: 558-562, 1976. 42) Suruga K: Our operative procedure and operative results of biliary atresia. Jap J Pediatr Surg 10: 659663, 1978 (English abstract). 43) Tanaka K, Satomura K, et al: A new operation for treatment of biliary atresia. jejunal interposition hepatic portoduodenostomy with intestinal valve . J Jap Soc Pediatr Surg 16・227-235,1980 (English ab-


Cloud computing and Internet of Things (IoT) are two different developing technologies that become part of ourlife. Their adaption and usages are expected to be more and more effective. Railways are providing Eco-Friendly transportsystem for the mankind.The main objective of this paper is to make a simple, effective and portable robot for the identification of major railway track damages using Raspberry pie and Internet of things. It also uses a GPS system to get the exact location of the damaged track. A robot will move across the railway track with IR sensors placed on it to detect flaw on the track. Its location will be traced and will be transmitted to the main server.


The present invention discloses a stereoscopic display system, comprising a plurality of projection means and a screen module. Projection means for projecting a plurality of image light beams respectively. Module arranged in front of the screen projection device, wherein the image beam toward the screen transfer module. Screen module includes a light diffusion layer and a light-splitting layer. At least one light diffusion layer having diffusion direction, the light diffusion layer is adapted to the image beam at an angle corresponding to the diffusion of the diffusion along the direction of diffusion diffusion direction. Light diffusing layer is disposed between the beam layer and the projection device, wherein the light diffusion layer diffusing light beams of each image is divided into a plurality of sub-image beam after the beam splitter layer, and the sub-image beam at each image light beams of different transmission angle, so that the light beams forming a plurality of images of the stereoscopic image after passing through the viewing area in the region of the screen module.


CCN1 (CYR61) is a secreted matricellular protein capable of regulating various cellular activities through interaction with distinct integrin receptors in a cell type-and context-dependent manner [1]. Although CCN1 is essential for cardiovascular development during embryogenesis, in adulthood its functions are associated with inflammation and wound healing [2]. Several recent studies have identified surprisingly diverse yet critical roles of CCN1 in multiple aspects of hepatobiliary injury repair, including bile duct regeneration, resolution of liver fibrosis, and suppression of carcinogen-induced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). These functions are mediated through distinct mechanisms targeting disparate cell types, underscoring the versatility of matricellular signaling through various integrin receptors.

Liver fibrosis occurs as a wound-healing response to chronic hepatic injuries, irrespective of the underlying etiology, and may progress to life-threatening cirrhosis. Although deposition of extracellular matrix (ECM) can promote injury repair by enhancing tissue integrity and cell proliferation, chronic injuries often result in excessive ECM accumulation, leading to fibrosis and loss of organ function. The liver is a regenerative organ and summons robust repair mechanisms upon injury. The repair response to biliary injuries includes cholangiocyte proliferation, expansion of bile ducts, and differentiation of hepatic progenitor cells (HPCs) into cholangiocytes. A recently publication has shown that CCN1 is greatly elevated in hepatocytes and cholangiocytes in response to hepatic injuries, and is indispensable for biliary regeneration [3]. CCN1 induces bile duct expansion through engagement of integrins αvβ5 and αvβ3 in cholangiocytes, thereby activating NFκB to induce Jag1 expression, leading to Jag1/Notch signaling and cholangiocyte proliferation [3]. In addition, CCN1 also induces Jag1 expression in hepatic stellate cells, which drive the differentiation of HPCs into cholangiocytes. Consistent with an essential role for CCN1-αvβ5/αvβ3 interaction in biliary repair, knockin mice (Ccn1D125A/D125A) expressing a CCN1 mutant with a single amino acid substitution that disrupts its αvβ5/αvβ3-binding site are severely impaired in bile duct regeneration, resulting in massive hepatic necrosis and rapid mortality upon cholestasis induced by bile duct ligation (BDL). By contrast, wild type mice survive well within the same experimental period owing to expanded bile ducts that shield bile acids from the parenchyma. Wild type mice suffer defects similar to the knockin mice in bile duct regeneration after BDL when subjected to blockade of integrins αvβ5/αvβ3, NFκB activation, or Notch signaling, whereas activation of Jag/Notch signaling in livers of Ccn1D125A/D125A mice ameliorates the mutant phenotypes [3]. These findings identify CCN1-αvβ5/αvβ3-NFκB-Jag1 as a critical axis for biliary injury repair.

Remarkably, CCN1 also functions to dampen and limit liver fibrosis. In fibrogenesis due to hepatotoxic and cholestatic injuries, hepatic stellate cells and portal fibroblasts, respectively, are the major precursor cells that transdifferentiate into myofibroblasts responsible for the production of ECM. CCN1 restricts and resolves fibrosis by triggering senescence in these myofibroblasts, whereupon the senescent cells express an anti-fibrotic program that includes secretion of matrix-degrading enzymes, thus converting these ECM-producing cells into ECM-degrading cell [2, 4]. Mechanistically, CCN1 acts by engaging integrin α6β1 to induce sustained accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) through the RAC1-NADPH oxidase 1 complex, triggering senescence. Mice with hepatocyte-specific deletion of Ccn1 (Ccn1ΔHep) or knockin mice expressing an α6β1-binding defective CCN1 mutant (Ccn1dm/dm) sustain exacerbated fibrosis with concomitant deficit in myofibroblast senescence, whereas overexpression of Ccn1 in hepatocytes reduces liver fibrosis with enhanced senescence [4]. Moreover, tail vein delivery of purified CCN1 protein in mice accelerates resolution of established fibrosis and adenoviral expression of Ccn1 attenuates BDL-induced liver fibrosis [4, 5], further establishing the anti-fibrotic effects of CCN1.

Yet another activity of CCN1 inhibits the formation of HCC during hepatic injury repair. Hepatocarcinogens such as diethylnitrosoamine (DEN) induce HCC by causing DNA damage and apoptosis in hepatocytes, thus triggering hepatocyte proliferation to compensate for the cell loss. However, this compensatory proliferation may stimulate the expansion of damaged and mutated hepatocytes that are at risk of oncogenic transformation, thereby promoting carcinogenesis. CCN1 suppresses DEN-induced HCC by inhibiting epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-dependent hepatocyte compensatory proliferation through integrin α6β1, leading to ROS-dependent activation of p53 and cell cycle block [6]. Consequently, Ccn1ΔHep and Ccn1dm/dm mice exhibit elevated tumor multiplicity in DEN-induced HCC. Furthermore, a single dose of the EGFR inhibitor erlotinib delivered prior to DEN exposure blocked compensatory proliferation and obliterated HCC formation, indicating that the CCN1-inhibitable EGFR-dependent hepatocyte compensatory proliferation play a critical role in the development of HCC [6].

These findings reveal key functions of CCN1 in diverse aspects of liver injury repair ranging from biliary regeneration, resolution of fibrosis, and suppression of hepatocarcinogenesis through distinct mechanisms. Moreover, recent discovery shows that CCN1 enhances the resolution of inflammation by promoting phagocytic clearance of apoptotic neutrophils [7], and this activity may also play a role in hepatic wound repair. Further studies are needed to elucidate the possible functions of CCN1 in other modes of hepatic injuries, including nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, viral infections, autoimmune disorders, and in repair mechanisms that may invoke the participation of HPCs. Insights into the diverse functions of CCN1 in hepatobiliary injury repair may prompt explorations on their potential therapeutic value in treating chronic liver diseases.


The headteacher training courses in Britain offer a series of tailor-made leadership cultivation courses and aim at turning one from a mid-level manager to a school headteacher.The courses include Leading from the Middle Level,Leadership Pathways,National Professional Qualification for Headship,Head for the Future,Team Programs,and so on.Three of the principles followed to design these courses are individuality,comprehensiveness,and school-based.The courses intend to elevate both the school and its leadership.Chinese educationalists can draw lessons from their British counterparts.


Flexible small-pore zeolites are interesting candidates for flue and natural gas processing due to their high sorption capacity and selectivity. It is generally accepted that their high CO2/CH4 sel...


Objective To investigate the effect and mechanism of octreotide on the proliferation of human hepatocellular carcinoma cells solely and together with transforming growth factor-alpha (TGF-α). Methods The proliferative activity of human hepatocellular carcinoma cells was evaluated by MTT assay, plotting and flow cytometry(FCM). The expression of TGF-α in the cells was determined by radioimmunoassay and reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction(RT-PCR). Results Octreotide had a dose-dependent and time-dependent antiproliferation effect on human hepatocellular carcinoma cells. There were strong inhibition of octreotide (1μg/ml) on TGF-α (1μg/L、5μg/L) stimulated cells proliferation for 48h treatment. Growth curve was shifted downward and proliferative index (PI) was obviously lower in the cells by octreotide and TGF-α , compared with the cells by TGF-α (P0.01). The content of TGF-α was significantly attenuated by octreotide and the inhibiting rate was 15.02%~26.71%. TGF-α mRNA index was decreased by octreotide. Conclusion Octreotide can inhibit the proliferation of human hepatocellular carcinoma cells, and also can exert an inhibitory effect on TGF-α-induced cells proliferation. Its mechanism may be related to the inhibitory influence of octreotide on TGF-α secretion.


Social service programs are nowadays required to operate efficiently and effectively. In order to insure that this occurs, service delivery must be documented and evaluated like never before. Nonetheless, at the same time, clients are reporting in ever greater numbers to receive services. Computer technology can assist practitioners to deal with this apparent conflict. For example, computers facilitate documentation, encourage the uilization of advanced research techniques, and free practitioners from paper work, so that increased services can be offered. Accordingly, this technology can be used to improve the delivery of social services. With human service programs seeking increased accountability, manageability and visibility, the need to measure and evaluate services becomes critical. Equally important is the need to monitor the service rendered, as well as maintain accurate, updated rules on clients and programs within selected geographical areas. Such activity increases the proficiency of programs, integrates service delivery systems, enhances benefits to recipients, and creates reliable information banks. Thus the use of computer technology In human services warrants serious


Hansteen, I.-L., Jelmert, o., Torgrimsen, T. and Forsund, B. 1584. Low human exposure to styrene in relation to chromosome breaks, gaps and sister chromatid exchanges. —Hereditas 100: 87–91. Lund, Sweden. ISSN 0018–0661. Received May 30, 1983

Measurements of styrene concentration in air and determination of urine metabolites were performed each day for one week prior to taking blood samples for cytogenetic investigation, in order to compare these findings with the cytogenetic results. The results showed levels of styrene exposure well below the recommended level of 50 ppm for all the 18 workers tested. No increase in number of chromosome breaks and SCE's was found in the workers for this low level of styrene exposure compared to a control group. A significant increase in gaps was found in the workers, however, and the possibility of using gaps as an indication of low level exposure is discussed. When the material was grouped according to smoking habits, a significant increase in chromosome breaks was found in the smokers, but no increase in SCE was found, indicating that the SCE method must be applied with caution and on a large number of individuals when used for monitoring purposes.