Spore forming bacteria are special problems for the dairy industry. Heat treatments are insufficient to kill the spores. This is a continuously increasing problem for the industry, but we should be able to control it. In this context, we investigated the combined effect of nisin, monolaurin, and pH values on three heat resistant spores in UHT milk and distilled water and to select an optimal combination for the maximum spore inactivation. The inhibitory effect of nisin (between 50 and 200 IU/ml), monolaurin (ranging from 150 to 300 µg/ml), and pH (between 5 and 8) was investigated using a central composite plan. Results were analyzed using the response surface methodology (RSM). The obtained data showed that the inactivation of Bacillus spores by the combined effect of nisin-monolaurin varies with spore species, acidity, and nature of the medium in which the bacterial spores are suspended. In fact, Terribacillus aidingensis spores were more resistant, to this treatment, than Paenibacillus sp. and Bacillus sporothermodurans ones. The optimum process parameters for a maximum reduction of bacterial spores (∼3log) were obtained at a concentration of nisin >150 IU/ml and of monolaurin >200 µg/ml. The current study highlighted the presence of a synergistic effect between nisin and monolaurin against heat bacterial spores. So, such treatment could be applied by the dairy industry to decontaminate UHT milk and other dairy products from bacterial spores.


The emergence of the human capital is one of the most important new characteristics of enterprise developing in general virtual economy.And human capital is the key point of enterprise in using the information resources to create virtual value.Human capital and material capital share ownership,which is the tendency in human capital accounting development.On the View of the General Virtual Economy this paper first elaborate the correct definition of human resource and human capital,then expand the accounting equation based on intangible assets and its creator human capital and the relationship between the accounting equation.The expanding accounting equation gives accounting basis of the material capital and human capital participate in income distribution.


The primary objective of this study is to assess the impact of a pharmacist-implemented protocol on number of post-operative alvimopan doses. The secondary objective of this study is to assess LOS (length of stay), in days, before and after protocol implementation. A retrospective chart review was conducted from October 2015 through March 2016 for all laparoscopic colorectal surgeries. Number of post-operative alvimopan doses received and LOS was recorded for each patient that received at least one dose of alvimopan. Comparative data, before protocol implementation, from November 2014 through June 2015 were analyzed against the study data. Number of post-operative alvimopan doses and LOS were recorded. The mean number of doses was 6.41 in the comparator group and 4.25 in the study group (probability size P < 0.001), which did meet statistical significance. Although the secondary objective was not statistically significant, LOS slightly decreased as the mean LOS was 5.01 days in the comparator group versus 4.49 days in the study group (P = 0.256). At the current price of $120 per capsule, close to $30,000 was saved during the study period, projecting an annual cost savings of approximately $68,000. Results from this study show that pharmacists can play a vital role in cost savings and ensuring appropriate use of certain high-risk medications, like alvimopan, without increasing overall length of stay.


In this study, Olios sericeus (Kroneberg, 1875) is introduced as a new record to the fauna of the spiders of Iran. Photos and a drawing of the male specimen are presented and its zoogeographic distribution is discussed.


Experiments on ternary distillation were made for a nitrogen-argon-oxygen system in a wetted-wall column under total reflux conditions for wide ranges of vapor concentrations and flow rates (especially turbulent flow region), and simultaneous heat and mass transfer was examined. Heights of transfer units for the intermediate component, argon, show discontinuity near the zero driving force region. The observed diffusion fluxes of each component in ternary distillation are found to be proportional to their concentration driving forces, whereas the observed mass fluxes are not. This is due to the convective mass fluxes caused by mass fluxes of the other components. The observed diffusion fluxes in the ternary distillation of air show good agreement with the previously developed binary correlation using Wilke's effective diffusion coefficients. The separation performance of cryogenic air distillation under total reflux conditions in a wetted-wall column is predicted by using the correlation for ternary diffusion fluxes. Predicted separation performance shows good agreement with the observed data. The effect of interaction between diffusion fluxes in air distillation is also discussed.


Objective:To evaluate the clinical value of echocardiography in the stent implantation for branch pulmonary artery stenosis.Methods:A retrospective echocardiography review of 13 patients with branch pulmonary artery stenoses confirmed by surgical operation was undertook.Results:All 13 patients with branch pulmonary artery stenoses were diagnosed correctly by Doppler echocardiography.The diameter of the branch pulmonary artery measured by echocardiograohy correlated well with that measured by digital subtracted angiography before procedure(0.49±0.19) cm vs(0.54±0.25) cm;(P0.01,r=0.94);the pressure gradient estimated by echocardiography correlated well with that measured by catheterization(62.25±26.41) mmHg vs(45.73±32.03) mmHg;(P0.05,r=0.88).Among 13 patients with branch pulmonary artery stenoses,16 stents were implanted successfully.After the procedure,the pressure gradient estimated by Doppler echocardiography(22.44±14.49) mmHg decreased significantly(P0.01).During a median follow-up of 1 month,14 stents were successfully placed in the target lesions,2 stents migrated to right ventricle.Conclusion:Doppler echocardiography was valuable for the diagnosis before the procedure,the monitor of implantation of stent during the procedure and evaluating the therapeutic effects,it was an effective guidance technique.


A 32-year-old male with progressive systemic sclerosis developed shoulder abduction contractures secondary to fibrous replacement of the central portions of his deltoid muscles. Surgical release of the fibrous bands resulted in prompt restoration of nearly full shoulder motion. One month later, however, a similar band developed in the triceps muscle. Although the association in this cases may have been coincidental, the neraly simultaneous onset of muscle fibrosis and cutaneous manifestations of progressive systemic sclerosis suggests a causal relationship.


Florists' hydrangea is a woody perennial that has been adapted to potted plant production. A major factor in a hydrangea forcing program is height control. Currently, daminozide is used for reducing internode elongation in hydrangeas, but high concentrations (5000 to 7500 mg-liter-1) are sometimes needed to control vigorous cultivars such as 'Rose Supreme' (Jung, 1964; Ulery, 1978). Uniconazole has been shown to be an effective height-controlling agent at low concentrations for woody perennials, including Forsythia, Ligustrum, Pyracantha, and Rhododendron spp. (Knox and Norcini, 1987; Vaigro-Wolff and Warmund, 1987). Therefore, uniconazole was examined as a potential height-controlling chemical for florists' hydrangea. Dormant plants of H. macrophylla 'Rose Supreme' were defoliated and placed into 4C dark storage for 6 weeks beginning 2 Dec. 1987. On 13 Jan. 1988, the plants were removed from the cooler, potted one per 1.3-liter plastic container, and placed into a 26/15C (venting/night) greenhouse. The growth medium consisted of a 1 soil : 2 sphagnum peat : 2 perlite (by volume) mixture amended with 890 g treble superphosphate, 593 g KNO3, 593 g MgS04, 4.75 kg ground dolomitic limestone, and 74 g Frit Industries Trace Elements No. 555 (Peters Fertilizer Products, W.R. Grace & Co., Fo-gelsville, Pa.) per cubic meter. The plants were fertilized at each watering with Ν and K, each at 200 mg-liter-1, supplied from 367 mg NH4NO3/liter and 517 mg KNO3/liter, respectively. Fertilizer solution was maintained at 6.0 pH by injecting 75% (w/w) technical grade H3PO4 into the system, supplying 37 mg P/liter at every watering. Each plant was pruned at potting, allowing only two shoots per plant to develop, and pots were spaced at 40 × 40 cm during forcing.


Abstract The present article revises key literature in regards of the importance of the role of senses for enhancing user interface and experience in products, particularly incorporating psychological methods for leveraging creativity among users. The current study reports practices of design theories such as 1) Multisensory Design, focusing in the overall awareness that users have with physical properties of objects, 2) Synesthetic Design, that concentrates on the systematic connection of cross-sensational modalities for selecting products features, and 3) Participatory Design, as a user-centred design method which brings users and stakeholders to actively get involved in the design process. The present study focuses on designing auditory displays and sonification techniques, as one main channel for conveying information during psychological applications. The relevance hereby stated, consists on design guidelines that seek to facilitate the exploration of information transfer between users, from an in-and-out bodily resonance experience by the use of non-speech sounds for human interaction. It consists of a descriptive, exploratory and experimental work based on a cross-disciplinary setup. The article explores on recent state-of-art design innovation methods, together with the potential of merging fields of psychology, sensory activity and divergent thinking.


Changing climate and weather patterns have the potential to cause malfunction and failure of engineering infrastructure (such as culverts and bridges). Hurricanes Sandy and Irene provide current examples of such random disruptions. The future of our ecosystems relies on sound engineering design, one that takes into account the changing frequency and seasonality of hydro-meteorological extremes (extreme rain events and floods). Our ongoing research involves a comprehensive analysis of historical rainfall data to assess the changes in extreme rainfall patterns, and the time-varying estimates of climate-related risk to infrastructure.  Appropriate statistical analysis—extreme value theory, circular statistics and mixed distributions—are used to explore and develop new methods to inform infrastructure design.  Preliminary results indicate significant changes in extreme rain event frequency in the state of Maine. The impacts from hurricanes are explored separately to understand and provide guidance regarding the nature and extent of future impacts on infrastructure.


This text is about the role played by the Cuban art-critic Jose Gomez Sicre, the Mexican artist Jose Luis Cuevas and the Argentine-Colombian art-critic Marta Traba in the consolidation of new-figurative painting as an artistic trend in Latin America in the period between the first exhibition of Cuevas in the Organization of American States (1954) and the publication of Marta Traba's book Los cuatro monstruos cardenales (1965). The article shows, in particular, how Gomez Sicre, Cuevas and Traba constitute a "common denominator" in the rise of neo-figurative tendency in Argentina (the Nueva Figuracion group, formed by Maccio, Noe, De La Vega), Colombia (Botero's "feista" period) and Mexico (the Interioristas group); and also stresses the importance of the exhibition "Neo-figurative painting in Latin America", curated by Gomez Sicre at the OAS in 1962, where for the rst time a "Latin American variant" of the European and U.S. new-figurative trend emerged. This trend had been outlined in 1959 at MoMA's crucial exhibition New Images of Man.


At the pathology department, rapid diagnostic pathways for cancer tissue are available. To facilitate this pathway, the processing of these tissues is prioritized over the regular tissue processing.
By prioritizing the processing of rapid diagnostic tissues, all other tissues are delayed. This reduces the performance of all other processes at laboratory in terms of throughput time, and negatively influences the workload. This brings us to the question: How can we integrate the rapid diagnostics and regular tissues processing, such that all tissues are timely examined and prioritizing is not needed anymore?
As shown by a prospective assessment using mathematical modeling, extended opening hours for the histopathology laboratory and introducing new defaults for tissue processing can facilitate the integration of rapid diagnostic and regular tissue processes. This will result in a more leveled workload and a reduction of throughput times.


The International Criminal Court (ICC or the Court) is currently suffering from an evidence problem. Since the time the ICC became functional, some judges have criticized the investigative practices of the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP), and some cases have crumbled due to the quality of evidence. This article tackles these problems from the perspective of third-party investigations and their role in ICC cases. It examines the difference between private and public investigators under the legal framework of the Rome Statute to find whether and how third-party investigations can be used in (and by) the ICC. Evidence collected by third-party investigators will likely face challenges of admissibility in being introduced into trial. Those challenges could, however, be overcome if third-party investigations are regulated within the legal framework of the ICC. Ultimately, this article aims to provide a legal framework to optimize the use of third-party investigations in the ICC.


While the U.S. residential solar market is growing quickly, costs for acquiring customers are high--and this indicates the value of efforts to identify new market segments and predict areas ripe for adoption. To better understand how the next wave of solar diffusion could occur, we explore the range of economic thresholds that households without PV would require to consider solar adoption, finding that these households require more attractive payback times by 1-3 years to achieve comparable market share as current adopters. In contrast, non-adopters indicate they would be satisfied with equal or lower returns when the benefits of solar are expressed in terms of their monthly bill savings—as is the case for third-party owned systems. If true, this suggests that the leasing model fundamentally inverts the assumption that later adopters require higher economic benefits. Adopters, both buyers and leasers, are compared to their non-adopting peers across a range of demographic and attitudinal factors. We find that leasers appear to be more highly influenced by installer advertising (radio, TV) and marketing, while buyers were more influenced by personal contacts. Environmental concern, once a preeminent reason for adopting is decreasing in relative importance, whereas lowering total electricity costs and protecting one's household from future increases in prices are now the two more important reasons. Understanding these dynamics, and how they are changing, offers installers low-cost opportunities to attract new customers and expand their market base.


The work presented here represents an examination of the effects of various drugs on the tone of vascular smooth muscle in isolated pulmonary artery rings mainly from Wistar rats and an investigation of contribution of endothelium- derived relaxing factor (EDRF, NO). The results obtained in these studies are summarised below: 1) The vasoconstrictors, 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT, 10-7 to 10-3M), phenylephrine (PHE, 10-9 to 10-4M), noradrenaline (NA, 10-10 to 10-6M), angiotensin II (Ang II, 10-11 to 10-7M) and the thromboxane A2 (TXA2) analogue, U46619 (10-9 to 10-6M), induced concentration-dependent contractions in main (MPA) and branch (BPA) pulmonary artery rings from Wistar rats. 2) Exposure of MPA and BPA rings for 30min or 1 hour to the concentration of 5-HT (10-4M), that produced the maximum response caused a marked desensitisation to 5-HT. 3) The endothelium-dependent vasorelaxants, ACh (10-9 to 3x10-6M) or carbachol (CARB, 10-8 to 10-4M) induced concentration-dependent relaxations in MPA rings and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE (EC70, 1.2x10-7M). 4) The endothelium-independent vasorelaxant, sodium nitroprusside (SNP, 10-12 to 10-5M) induced concentration-dependent relaxations in MPA and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE (EC70, 1.2x10-7M) or 5-HT (EC50, 10-5M). MPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE, were more responsive than BPA rings to low concentrations of SNP (10-11M) and also to high concentrations of SNP (10-7 to 10-6M). 5) The purine adenine nucleotides, ATP and ADP induced concentration-dependent relaxations (10-8 to 10-5M) in MPA and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE (10-7M). 6) Histamine (HIST, 10-6 to 10-3M) induced concentration-dependent relaxations in MPA and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE (10-7M). 7) The beta-adrenoceptor agonist, isoproterenol (ISO, 10-10 to 10-5M), induced concentration-dependent relaxations in MPA and BP A rings precontracted with PHE (10-7M). 8) 5-HT (10-4 to 5x10-4M) induced concentration-dependent relaxations in MPA and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE (EC75, 1.2x10-7M). 9) The muscarinic-receptor antagonist, atropine (AT, 10-8 to 5x10-6M) induced concentration-dependent relaxations in MPA and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE (10-7M) or 5-HT (10-5M) but not with KCI 3x10-2M). 10) Electrical field stimulation (EFS) induced frequency-dependent contractions in MPA rings. 11) In MPA and BPA rings, which had been precontracted with PHE; pretreatment with standard solutions of cigarette smoke extract (CSE, 1ml, for 10-15min), depressed vasorelaxant responses to ACh (10-9 to 10-5M) but had no effect on relaxant responses to SNP (10-11 to 10-5M). 12) Noradrenaline (NA) and 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) induced concentration-dependent contractions in MPA and BPA rings of sham operated and heart failure rabbits. There were no significant differences between responses of blood vessels from sham operated and EOF rabbits to these agonists. Acetylcholine (ACh) induced concentration-dependent relaxations in these rings from sham operated and HF rabbits. There were significant differences between the responses in BPA rings only at the lowest concentration of ACh (10-9M). (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.).


A torsion test has been devised that provides for plane strain constraint in small specimens during fracture toughness testing. This method has been extended for stress-corrosion cracking and a simple torsion load frame has been built to provide for step loading of the specimens. This paper describes using the torsion technique to measure KISCC for aluminum alloy 7075 having two thermo-mechanical treatments.Copyright © 2005 by ASME


Students' solution processes can offer significant insight into their misunderstandings. However, freeform solutions can be difficult to interpret, leading many educational technologies to examine only students' final answers or to structure problem solving to make it more interpretable. We develop a new approach using Bayesian inverse planning for diagnosing algebra skills that interprets students' step-by-step problem solving, placing no restrictions on how students transform equations to reach solutions. We formalize understanding as several distinct skills, allowing us to identify the causes of errors; for instance, arithmetic skills are separated from systematic misapplications of algebra rules. In simulation, the algorithm recovers the true parameters of simulated learners relatively accurately. Using human data, we show that the algorithm can interpret over 98% of people's actions and its inferences about arithmetic skills are consistent with an assessment of arithmetic ability in isolation. Our work demonstrates that Bayesian inverse planning can successfully scale to the space of algebra and provides new technical solutions that may be relevant in other complex educational domains.


Abstract Hand hygiene is well publicised as the most effective line of defence against infections in both veterinary and human hospitals, although there is better surveillance and more research in the human field. The whole veterinary team should be educated on the importance of hand hygiene, but there are barriers to implementing an establishment-wide hand hygiene policy. This article looks at those barriers and aims to give some solutions in order to help veterinary nurses (VNs) improve current policies in their own establishments.


Dissolved oxygen overproof after deoxidation is caused by the high dissolved oxygen in the water supply system of heat supply network,and the negative effectiveness of deoxidation affected by the malfunction of deaerator nozzle. By "operating the deaerator recirculating pump,and hydrazine treatment for the water supply after deoxidation",the problem of high dissolved oxygen content of water supply after deoxidation is resolved,the oxygen corrosion of the water supply system is reduced. The baffle of the water spray nozzle is found fallen off during the overhaul,proving that the previous judgement is accurate.


The visual green color degradation, as represented by the change of the −a value measured by a tristimulus colorimeter, was found to be caused by not only pheophytinization but also by nonenzymatic browning reactions in green peas at 100, 110, and 120 °C. Mathematical models were developed for predicting the change in the −a value as a function of time and temperature by knowing the kinetic parameters (rate constant and activation energy) of each mechanism. The rate of disappearance of greenness via pheophytinization followed a first-order kinetic model, while the rate of color loss due to nonenzymatic browning reactions followed a zeroth-order kinetic model after an initial lag period. The activation energies for pheophytinization and nonenzymatic browning were 20.4 and 22.3 kcal/mol, respectively. Keywords: Kinetics; visual green color; browning; colorimetry


This paper is devoted to the current status analysis with the foreigner enrollment to the post-graduate programs (Master and Doctor courses) in U.S. universities. The almost crisis situation with the enrollment is noted and its reasons are discussed. The loss level of thew American universities is estimated on the world education market and the possibility of "interception" of this money by Russian universities, which develop the post-graduate education programs, is described. The principal problems of the post-graduate programs development are considered on the example of Moscow Power Engineering Institute (Technical University). The recommendations on the programs of standard and new types are given.


The child's adjustment to a parent's parole is also significantly related to the presence and quality of protective factors and support systems that were available during the incarceration period and upon release. (Gaynes, 1994, Johnston, 1993) Finally, we know that the most damaging aspect of incarceration is recidivism (Johnston, 1994) and the child's adjustment will be seriously compromised by the parent's return to prison. Each of these factors are independently significant and warrant discussion.


Based on the fact that pesticides reach a new mass transfer balance between the water and organic phases at freezing temperature,a novel sample enrichment method was established for simultaneous determination of15pesticides(organochlorine,organophosphorus and pyrethroid)in water combining gas chromatography-triple quadropole mass spectrometry with low temperature enrichment liquid-liquid extraction.The following conditions were optimized,the extraction solvents,freezing temperature and time:extraction solvent was toluene(2.0mL),the freezing temperature was-40 ℃,and the freezing time was 1h.The detection limits(3S/N)and lower limits of determination(10S/N)found were in the ranges of 0.005-0.02μg·L-1 and 0.02-0.07 μg·L-1,respectively.The proposed method was applied to the analysis of water sample,giving values of recovery and RSD′s(n=5)in the ranges of 78.8%-124% and 0.9%-9.1%,respectively.


Introduction: Congenital webbing knee or popliteal pterygium is the tissue filling the posterior aspect of the joint limiting extension. It can be part of several syndromes including the popliteal pterygium syndrome (SPP). Purpose: To present the cases of patients suffering from Patient and Method: This is a description of epidemiologica, clinical and therapeutic aspects of clinical cases of webbing admitted to our unit over 10 years.


We examined the multidimensional concept of empowerment in the context of women primary school teachers in India. We conducted interviews and then a questionnaire survey. Using structural equation modelling, we found that empowerment has two components: one is 'latent empowerment' (consisting of meaning, competence and impact); and the other is 'action-oriented empowerment' or autonomy. In teachers' context, 'latent empowerment' affects both job satisfaction and innovative behaviour, whereas autonomy weakly influences only the innovative behaviour. 'Latent empowerment' mediates the relationship of workplace support with both job satisfaction and innovative behaviour. The role of information sharing in enhancing innovative behaviour through autonomy is weakly supported.


Historians have generally agreed that the United States has always been an extremely violent nation; however, since the 1950s they have been myopic in their treatment of violence in America and have not provided the American people with essential information about their society and culture. Those historians who focused on violence in America, until the 1990s, have focused on only one form of violence—collective social violence. Largely overlooked, and equally significant, are interpersonal violence (including criminal and domestic violence) and the effect of war. This deficiency helps explain why Americans seem genuinely at a loss to understand the nature, character, and frequency of violence in America's past and present, especially when a high-profile violent incident occurs. This article surveys the historiography of violence in America through the 1990s and examines the contributions of historians and legal scholars who have focused on interpersonal and criminal violence.


Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) Technology is one of the most interesting solutions for broadband wireless access, that provide multimedia traffic and applications through an appropriate QoS management for fixed and mobile devices. In this regard, we attempt to introduce a new distributed model to improve the performance of QoS over fixed WiMAX with respect to parameters including throughput, delay and application response time, to enhance the services that are provided to the end users by minimizing delay, application response time and increasing throughput. A Model was developed based on the proposed new distributed model (Master-Slave), the first scenario comprised of 3 Base Stations (BS) and thirty Subscriber Station (SS) with one Master BS selected by the designed algorithm (Nearest Neighborhood Algorithms). Simulations run while increasing the number of BSs, SSs and master BSs using point-to-multipoint connection with multicast transmission based on Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM). The design has been evaluated using the simulation tool OPNET modeler 16.0. The results obtained from the three Scenarios shows significant increase in the network throughput and drastic decrease in network delay and application response time. Furthermore, with help of the distributed Master BSs, the coverage area of WiMAX has been increased. Thus greatly enhances the performance of Quality of service (QoS).


As increasing numbers of stem cell transplant recipients become long-term survivors, interest in understanding their longterm immune status also assumes greater urgency. One important strategy for protecting patients against certain infections is the use of vaccinations. Just a few years ago, there were no published recommendations regarding this issue. Since then, both the European Group for Blood and Marrow Transplantation (EBMT) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have published recommendations. Drs. Goldberg, Cicogna, Rowley, and Pecora critically review the CDC recommendations in a nicely written article and provide important background information.


ABSTRACT Since the beginning of the 18th century bibliographic records exist which refer to the intense slope dynamics in the Tramuntana Range. During the years 2008-2010 followed a series of cold and rainy winters on the island of Mallorca that triggered 34 significant movements of different typologies. The existence of a previous inventory and the study opportunity offered by the event 2008-2010, determined that the Tramuntana Range was chosen as a pilot area within the framework of the European Projects DORIS (2013-2015) and LAMPRE (2013-2015). The present work includes much of the work carried out within the framework of both projects.
From previous studies (Mateos, 2001), the data provided by the Department of Highways and Emergency Department of the Balearic Government, together with the field work and aerial photography analysis, 934 landslides have been logged and characterized. The points logged in GIS have enabled the study of distribution and a detailed analysis of factors affecting movements has been carried out. This has shown that 65,5% of the movements in the mountains correspond to rockfalls and 25% due to landslides. 54% of inventoried events are located in the coastal strip of this mountain range.
The collaboration of different social agents of the island has allowed the assessment of economic losses caused by landslides during that period 2008-2010, which affected many homes and infrastructure, and especially the road network of the range. The economic losses during that period amounted to 11 M €, the 0.042% of the Balearic islands GDP.
Innovative tools have been applied in this research work, such as Advanced Radar Interferometry techniques and rockfall simulation software in order to analyse the dangers of landslides in the Tramuntana Range of the Island of Mallorca.
To this end, many processed radar images have been obtained by several satellites, covering a temporal space of 20 years. The set of images were selected corresponding to ALOS satellite for greater density of points, and also its temporary coverage covers the humid period 2008-2010. The processing method used has been technique Persistent Scattering (PSI). Overlapping data strain rate and inventory map, along with the geomorphological observations and in field tests, have identified the active landslides. The results are: (1) 22% of mapped landslides are active; (2) they have been 5 new landslides identified, (3) the geometry of 5 existing landslides have been redefined, and (4) the identification of new potentially dangerous areas throughout the Ma-10 highway.
To cover the study of rockfalls, we have exploited STONE(Guzzetti et al., 2002). The calibration have been carried out with reference to 40 well-characterised rockfalls, and performing a statistical estimate of the values obtained for each parameter, selecting the simulation that best fits reality. The parameters calibrated have been validated in a first stage, with 10 rockfalls triggered during the humid period 2008-2010 and, in a second stage, with 63 inventoried landslides along the Ma-10 road, which have occurred during the last 18 years. In the first stage of validation it shows that rockfalls with a preferential trajectory and shorter range are better represented. In the second stage it is observed that the rockfall with source area in rock massif escarpments present a degree of confidence that the rockfalls with the source area in the road cuttings. Finally, the results obtained have been used to design the main lines of action in the Ma-10 versus protection of rockfalls
This research aims to provide a series of calibrated and validated tools in the study area as a basis for future work to assess hazard and risk.


Abstract Based on recent work by Futer, Kalfagianni and Purcell, we prove that the volume of sufficiently complicated positive braid links is proportional to the signature defect Δσ = 2g−σ.


In this paper, we apply the theory of fuzzy sets to present a fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method for scientific and technical innovation ability of regions. This method is applied to analyze comprehensively Guangdong province's Scientific and Technical Innovation Ability in 2001.


Objective To investigate the relationship between angiotensin Ⅱ and pancreatic islet β cell secretion function under different glucose tolerance statuses. Method Forty-two patients with newly diagnosed type 2diabetes mellitus ( DM group), 38 subjects with impaired fasting glucose/impaired glucose tolerance ( IFG/IGTgroup) ,and 40 normal control subjects (NGT group) underwent intravenous glucose tolerance test. Fasting plasma angiotensin Ⅱ ( Ang Ⅱ ) and adiponectin were assayed by ELISA. Acute insulin response from 3 to 10 min( AIR3-10 ),the area under the curve( AUCⅠ ) and the peak concentration of the first-phase ( 0-10 min) insulin secretion, the area under the curve of the second-phase( 10-120 min) insulin secretion( AUCⅡ), homeostasis model assessment for β cell function index(HOMA-β) and homeostasis model assessment for insulin resistance index(HOMA-IR) were calculated to explore the relationship with Ang Ⅱ. Result ( 1 ) The levels of Ang Ⅱ in DM group and IFG/IGT group were significantly higher than that in NGT group( P<0.05 ). The AIR3-10, AUCⅠ and peak concentration, AUCⅡ ,adiponectin in DM group and IFG/IGT group were significantly lower than those in the NGT group ( P<0. 05), and these results were more significantly reduced in DM group compared with those in IFG/IGT group. (2) Ang Ⅱ was negatively correlated with AIR3-10, AUCⅠ and the peak concentration, AUCⅡ, adiponectin, HOMA-β ( P<0. 01 ), and positively correlated with fasting blood glucose,2 h blood glucose after glucose loading, fasting insulin, HOMA-IR (P<0. 05 ). (3)Multiple stepwise regression analysis showed that Ang Ⅱ was independently associated with AUCⅠ and AUCⅡ.Conclusion Ang Ⅱ was an independent factor that affected the insulin secretion function of pancreatic islet βcells. Ruling out the effect of blood pressure, body position, drugs, and other factors, high levels of Ang Ⅱ could predict the dysfunction of pancreatic islet β cell as well as insulin resistance in patients with type 2 diabetes.

Key words:
Angiotensin Ⅱ;  First-phase of insulin secretion;  Second-phase of insulin secretion; Intravenous glucose tolerance test;  Adiponectin;  Diabetes mellitus, type 2


Morphosynthesis and stabilization of pure framboidal vaterite microspheres using a salicylic acid–aniline dye as an additive has been reported in this paper. Formation and stabilization of vaterite crystals could be regulated by changing the dye concentration. Calcite rhombohedra were predominant species when no additive was added. As the concentration of dye was increased vaterite was more pronounced in the solution leading to the formation of pure framboidal vaterite (∼98% at 10 mM dye concentration). The size of these microspheres varied from 0.5 to 4.0 μm. Various instrumental analysis has been incorporated to study the dynamics of phase transformation throughout the process. Detailed analysis of TEM images reveals that vaterite microspheres were in turn aggregates of small vaterite nanospheres. The vaterite microspheres were stable up to a week in solution. The dissolution of the vaterite crystals to calcite was arrested by the presence of the dye at the nucleation process. The stability of the vaterite may be attributed to the strong electrostatic interaction of the Ca ions present on the surface of the crystal with the –COOH group of the dye. This finding opens up a new domain of organic additives to explore.


The purpose of this paper is to develop a modeling framework for analyzing the effect of price on the PCS (Personal Commununications Service) demand. To achieve this aim, a nonlinear regression model was derived to capture the income effect on the PCS demand and then was combined into an integrated Bass diffusion model. The model was then applied to the emerging PCS market in Korea and the market demands up to the year 2006 were estimated. The results were reviewed and evaluated in various aspects. Finally, the possibilities of model enhancement and model extensions were explored.


Video conferencing has the potential to open up the classroom for new educational experiences. Steve MacPhail explains what his school is doing


World net electricity generation is expected to increase by 84 percent from 19.1 trillion kWh in 2008 to 25.5 trillion kWh in 2020 and 35.2 trillion kWh in 2035. The high fossil fuel prices recorded between 2003 and 2008, combined with concerns about the environmental consequences of greenhouse gas emissions, have renewed interest in the development of alternatives to fossil fuels specifically, nuclear power and renewable energy sources. Energy efficiency is one of the most important approaches to reduce electricity consumption in the future. Information and communication technology plays an important role to achieve this target. In particular, Smart Grid can achieve energy efficiency by integrating information technology and interaction between suppliers and customers. The concept of grid market is already created for computing resources. In this paper, we tried to design a similar market for renewable energy resources and introduce future contracts for this market. At the first, we need to recognize the component of smart network. All components should have this capability to be managed by automation system. We should keep in mind that new technology to deploy smart control and management is required. By analyzing the incentives of customers to participate in smart network and by studying the structure of distributed energy resources in order to establish a market, there are 5 major restrictions to use renewable energy widely. The analysis of these objectives has indicated that a solution can be a market for trading renewable energy. This market is able to reduce the risk of using external resources which are unknown for the users. The market also has the capacity to provide support and consultancy services in order to help customers to integrate demand response program into their existing IT infrastructure. Considering that market mechanism is the core of market place, we defined different parameters like start time, unit of duration and unit of trade for optimal functioning of the marketplace. We explained our proposal for market mechanism. Futures contracts could be used in this market place for trading renewable energy resources with small size. By this mechanism, electricity is traded indirectly by the customers. There are certain advantages which make efficient this mechanism and prepare an environment in the market that all participants will be beneficial by trading.


Sample degeneracy is a major problem of particle filter which is based on the sequential importance sampling. In order to solve this problem, the resampling algorithm is introduced in particle filter. Regular resampling algorithm can solve the sample degradation, but it easily lead to sample depletion and increase the computing complexity The adaptive partial systematic resampling (APSR) algorithm adjusts the resampling time adaptively, before the resampling, classified the particles according to the weight, resampling is carries on the minority particles, The simulation result indicated that it increase the particle diversity and reduces the computation time.


Department of Economics University of Nigeria, Nssuka Department of EconomicsUniversity of Abuja, Abuja, Nassarawa State University, Keffi ABSTRACT: The indepth nature of the Nigeria agricultural sector and its resultant effect on the economy which have been moribund for years without meaningful gains. Thus, this study examined the impact of Agricultural policies and developments on the Nigeria economy. The study relied deeply on data from the CBN Annual Report and statement of Account, CBN Financial review, National Bureau of Statistics. The study adopted the Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) estimation in explaining the impact levels. The study found that Agricultural sector development has a significant effect on the Nigeria Economy and impacted Positively on it. The study among others recommend that Agriculture must be given a continued call and attention through policies and funding so as to enable the sector contribute meaningfully to the economy.


Approximate computing has been broadly investigated in the computing domain to maintain the benefits of technology scaling. Recently, it has been extended to the communication domain. The idea is to trade transmission quality for energy or/and performance efficiency. Exploiting the integer-value representation of the transmitted signals in parallel buses, we propose two memoryless encoding approaches for approximate communications in order to reduce the integer value deviation. First, restricted to area-constrained applications, we propose a Combined Integer-Value (CIV) coding technique based on the swap and inversion of the input signals. Second, a Crosstalk-Avoidance-based Integer-Value (CAIV) coding technique for applications with a more relaxed area constraint is presented. The optimal mapping of the data words and codewords combined with the selective inversion of the input signals minimize the error magnitude in this coding technique. A comprehensive experimental result using a 65 nm commercial technology evaluates the proposed coding approaches. For example, our proposed CIV coding scheme improves the quality of the received images and the sampled radio communication signals with different modulation up to factor of 28 and 27, respectively, as it compares with conventional transmission of signals with no coding. CAIV coder can improve the data transmission accuracy by about 218 as it compares with the conventional transmission. Furthermore, to assess the applicability of the proposed encoders, we carried out two case studies employing the scale-invariant feature transform algorithm and SOBEL edge detector.


How a corporation is governed has become in recent years an increasingly important element in how it is valued by the market place. McKinsey & Company in June 2000 published the results of an Investor Opinion Survey of attitudes about the corporate governance of portfolio companies. The survey gathered responses about investment intentions from over 200 institutions who together manage approximately $3.25 trillion in assets. Ranging from 17 per cent in the US and Britain to over 27 per cent in Venezuela, investors placed a specific premium on what was called "Board Governance". To put this into perspective, consider how greatly sales would have to increase, expenses be cut and margins improved to achieve a comparable impact on value.

"For purposes of the survey, a well governed company is defined as having a majority of outside directors on the board with no management ties; holding formal evaluations of directors; and being responsive to investor requests for information on governance issues. In addition, directors hold significant stockholdings in the company, and a large proportion of directors' pay is in the form of stock options." This correlation of governance with market value by one of the most respected consulting companies in the world creates the foundations of a new language for management accountability. McKinsey has great credibility as a value-adding advisor to corporate managements. Governance is not a cause or a theology for McKinsey; it is an important element in the value of an enterprise. By getting the opinion of what we call Global Investors with portfolios of holdings on every continent, McKinsey has importantly impacted the cost of capital for all corporations henceforth. Admittedly, McKinsey's criteria of "board governance" are blunt.

"Every organization attempting to accomplish something has to ask and answer the following question," writes Harvard Business School professor Michael C. Jensen in the introduction to his recent working paper: "What are we trying to accomplish? Or, put even more simply: When all is said and done, how do we measure better versus worse? Even more simply: How do we keep score... . I say long-term market value to recognize that it is possible for markets not to know the full implications of a firm's policies until they begin to show up.... Value creation does not mean succumbing to the vagaries of the movements in a firm's values from day to day. The market is inevitably ignorant of many of our actions and opportunities, at least in the short run...".

Surprisingly little attention is paid to what we all intuitively know, that talented people are not entirely motivated by financial compensation. Directors therefore must pay special attention to creating an appropriate environment for stimulating optimum management performance.


This work analyses the results of applying Triple Modular Redundancy (TMR) to the SHyLoC CCSDS-121 IP, a hardware implementation of the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS) 121.0-B-2 lossless compression standard, a universal compressor specifically thought for space applications. The results obtained in a radiation experiment performed at the North Area new facilities at CERN are presented. The objective is to evaluate the robustness applying TMR to the design, by comparing to the unhardened implementation of the SHyLoC CCSDS-121 IP, when it is working under Ultra High Energy radiation. Both TMR and unhardened implementations of the SHyLoC CCSDS-121 IP were implemented in a Xilinx Zynq XC7Z020 System-on-Chip and radiated with Pb ions. Compression results were compared against a golden reference, obtaining a Mean Time To Failure (MTTF) a 40% higher for the TMR design than for the unhardened one.


Steady state flow rates are reported for He, Ar, N2, Kr, methane, propane, and n-butane flowing through a microporous carbon rod at room temperature.


The matricellular protein Thrombospondin (TSP)-1, a potent angiostatic agent and crucial TGF-β activator, is markedly upregulated in animal models of obesity and diabetes and in tissues from diabet...


Fishermen society as a social system and Lempuing river basin ecosystem as an ecological system has been interacting and influencing each other. They interaction were producing a fishermen society poverty phennomena. Negative impacts on river basin ecosystem has been influencing fisheries activities. These impacts on river basin ecosystem namely loss energy and material sources were occuring. Than, prosperity of the fishermen society were decrease. In this case, selection and adaption concept of Rambo is useful to used in order to explanation that phennomena. Energy and material input from social system and other wise, any changes on social system or ecological system are discussion in this paper. At the end, the fishermen poverty, they adaptation, fish species tolerances to the Lempuing river basin ecosystem are also disscussed.


With the rapid evolution of documents on the World Wide Web which express opinions, there exists an increasing demand for developing such a sentiment analysis technique that can easily adapt to new domains with minimum supervision. This article introduces a novel weakly supervised approach for Chinese sentiment classification. The approach applies a variant of self-training algorithm on two partitions split from test dataset, and combines classification results of the two partitions into a pseudo-labelled training set and an unlabelled test set, then trains an initial classifier on the pseudo-labelled training set and adopts a standard self-learning cycle to obtain the overall classification results. Experiments on the four datasets from two domains show that our approach has competitive advantages over baseline approaches; it even outperforms the supervised approach in some of the datasets despite using no labelled documents.


Spectral analysis of the fur of different colour phases of Sciurus vulgaris: evidence for adaptive colouration. — Yu. Zizda. — The red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris L.) is one of the most variable mammals by its coat colouration, which allows to distinguish up to 40 subspecies. The distribution of four different subspecies in the region of the Eastern Carpathians, including Poland and Ukraine, based on coat colouration is described in literature sources. The accordance of colour phases to subspecies can be determined only if to place them in a row of individuals having similar colouration. Thus, in this paper, we present the results of research on two forms of the red squirrel having different coat colouration typical for Ukraine (light, or orange-red and dark, or blackbrown). The aim of the study was to describe the colour phases of the red squirrel by means of spectral analysis and digital ratios of the fur pigmentation (melanin). In order to achieve this goal, we measured the dependence of the light diffuse reflection on fur samples established with the help of standard chemical methods (using alkali, NaOH in different concentration levels). To conduct the research, fur samples of dark specimens (black, dark brown squirrels) were taken from the Zoological Museum of Uzhhorod National University, while specimens of the light phase (red, orange squirrels) were taken from the Zoological Museum of Ivan Franko Lviv National University. In total, 30 individuals were investigated. According to the rules of light reflection and its differentiation into colours, we expected to obtain distribution curves in the range from 400 to 560–800 nm. In the light forms, the diffusion reflection curve was expected to rise at 560 nm and at 610 nm in the red. With the darkening of the fur, the increase in diffusion reflection should have approached the infrared region of 800 nm. However, according to the obtained results, the reflection spectra for the dark individuals showed much less deviation of the curve's right side than the spectra for most of the red individuals. However, orange samples with the similar deviations of the spectra right side were also observed among the black samples. There was no clear distribution among different colour phases of the squirrel regarding fur colouration intensity. At the same time, it is obvious that different pigments influence the darkness of the squirrel's coat patterns. This fact may indicate the adaptive nature of colour in different colour phases.


This study is to know the response of the Blitar city community in the problematic of the new student admission system known as the zoning system. The zoning system policy has been implemented in Blitar city by providing 75% opportunity for prospective students in the school zone, about 25% is taken based on grades and 5% for special ways such as following the duties of parents as state officials. The problem in this research is related to the implementation of the school zoning system policy in Blitar city which has the aim so that researchers know the implementation of what has been done by the school by implementing the zoning system policy in Blitar city. This type of research is qualitative research conducted at SMPN in Blitar city. The process of collecting data in this study uses several alternatives including interviews, documentation and observation. The types of data used in this study are primary and secondary data. The results of the study mentioned that some people are still unfamiliar with the system being treated by the zoning system. The existence of pros and contract implementation because because students who have achievement being able to study only have 25% chance entering to the favourite school. .


The Kitaev model, which hosts a quantum spin liquid (QSL) in the ground state, was originally defined on a two-dimensional honeycomb lattice, but can be straightforwardly extended to any tricoordinate lattices in any spatial dimensions. In particular, the three-dimensional (3D) extensions are of interest as a realization of 3D QSLs, and some materials like $\beta$-Li$_{2}$IrO$_{3}$, $\gamma$-Li$_2$IrO$_3$, and $\beta$-ZnIrO$_{3}$ were proposed for the candidates. However, the phase diagrams of the models for those candidates have not been fully elucidated, mainly due to the limitation of numerical methods for 3D frustrated quantum spin systems. Here we study the Kitaev-Heisenberg model defined on a 3D hyperhoneycomb lattice, by using the pseudofermion functional renormalization group method. We show that the ground-state phase diagram contains the QSL phases in the vicinities of the pristine ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic Kitaev models, in addition to four magnetically ordered phases, similar to the two-dimensional honeycomb case. Our results respect the four-sublattice symmetry inherent in the model, which was violated in the previous study. Moreover, we also show how the phase diagram changes with the anisotropy in the interactions. The results provide a reference for the search of the hyperhoneycomb Kitaev materials.


This paper focuses mainly on decentralized intelligent tracking control for a class of high‐order stochastic nonlinear systems with unknown strong interconnected nonlinearity in the drift and diffusion terms. For the control of uncertain high‐order nonlinear systems, the approximation capability of RBF neural networks is utilized to deal with the difficulties caused by completely unknown system dynamics and stochastic disturbances, and only one adaptive parameter is constructed to overcome the overparameterization problem. Then, to address the problem from high‐order strong interconnected nonlinearities in the drift and diffusion terms with full states of the overall system, by using the monotonically increasing property of the bounding functions, the variable separation technique is achieved. Lastly, based on the Lyapunov stability theory, a decentralized adaptive neural control method is proposed to reduce the number of online adaptive learning parameters. It is shown that, for bounded initial conditions, the designed controller can ensure the semiglobally uniformly ultimate boundedness of the solution of the closed‐loop system and make the tracking errors eventually converge to a small neighborhood around the origin. Two simulation examples including a practical example are used to further illustrate the effectiveness of the design method.


In the February 2009 elections, the Israeli voter apparently swung to the right. Electoral change can be summed up as a net shift of 15 seats out of 120 towards the right‐religious bloc. While Kadima won the most seats as an individual party, when counted together with the five other left‐of‐centre parties, the left had only 55 seats in total. Likud on the other hand came in a close second in terms of seats won as an individual party, but counted together with the five religious and right‐wing parties they controlled a majority bloc of 65 seats. To this we must add the shift of control of the pivotal position to the right, from Kadima to Likud. These are the reasons why Netanyahu and his Likud party—who won one seat less than Kadima—formed the new coalition government.


This chapter aims to study the digital transformation strategies of public management and, within this, the analysis of the main aspects of the transformation of the public acquisition system. It is based on the new public management approach, its evolution towards post-new public management, as well as other strategic derived approaches, such as all government, good government, united government, or government of the digital age. The application of lean and agile methodologies is a great facilitator to support the digital transformation processes of public administration, and far from being incompatible, they are complementary and combinable. This work focuses on the design of strategies for the restructuring of public investment and procurement systems, a critical part of public management, making them more effective and efficient, seeking a greater rationalization of public spending, as well as avoiding waste and corruption.


This investigation examined the role of counselor trainees' self-efficacy on measures of career counseling process, "small o" outcome, and outcome with actual clients. Twenty-four counselor trainees saw 55 clients in 3 to 12 individual sessions. Results indicated that (a) career counseling self-efficacy increased by a standard deviation from prepracticum to postpracticum; (b) client scores significantly improved from pretest to posttest across multiple career outcome measures; (c) clients' working alliance, goal attainment, and decidedness indicated significant growth; (d) the significant growth on the process variable and small o outcome variables did not appear to be related to career counseling self-efficacy; and (e) career counseling self-efficacy apparently related to certain career counseling outcome measures in a manner suggesting much greater complexity than the "more self-efficacy is better" philosophy would imply. Counselor self-efficacy has been the subject of numerous investigations (Larson, 1998; Larson & Daniels, 1998); surprisingly, however, no studies have been reported that investigated the relationship between career counseling self-efficacy and process and outcome measures with real clients in naturally occurring counseling settings. There is little question that counselor self-efficacy is potentially an important variable in counselor training. Counselor training programs are invested in having their trainees perform efficaciously, to persist when difficult stages of counseling emerge, to expend effort so as to be effective with a complex array of clients, and to perform at high levels of competence with their clients. All of these critical behaviors have been demonstrated to relate to one's sense of self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977, 1982, 1991). Self-efficacy has been denned as "people's judgments in their capabilities to organize and execute courses of action required to attain designated types of performance" (Bandura, 1986, p. 391). The tremendous amount of attention that the construct of self-efficacy has been given in the counseling training literature (see Larson, 1998; Larson & Daniels, 1998) is understandabl e in that self-efficacy beliefs have been demonstrated to predict choice of behavioral activities, effort expended on those activities, persistence despite obstacles, and actual performance (Bandura, 1977). Clearly, these characteristics are all of vital importance to counselor trainees. Theoretically, if


This paper describes the design and analysis of a simplified data link control protocol for a low earth satellite network. The generic HDLC protocol affords a means of peer-to-peer communication. In our case the satellite payload initiates, controls and terminates all communication sequences between the user terminal and the satellite payload. Since resources are severely restricted on a micro satellite, the focus of the study is to assess the efficiency of the service in terms of the effective throughput, and the maximum number of users who can be served. The major change in the adopted protocol is the reduction in number of responses in both the random access and the connected modes. This reduces the handshake time needed, which is of prime importance as round trip delay increases. The inherent unreliability of a satellite (long distance wireless) link have been analysed and handled by reduction in number of types of frames, piggybacking critical information and simplified error handling.


This paper describes and calculates the number of times Ferb, from the Disney animated programme ' Phineas and Ferb ', speaks and with this, if given a single English penny for each spoken word, how much money Ferb would have made as a result. It was found that Ferb would gain a total of £25.98. In the year 2000, it was calculated that Ferb could buy 259 Freddos (4403 g of chocolate) with this money, however in 2018 it was found that Ferb could only afford 103 Freddos (1854 g of chocolate) in total. As a result of this, it would be recommended that for better value for money, Ferb travels back in time using their time machine if he ever wishes to bulk buy Cadbury's Freddos.


With the widespread accessibility of Internet, there have emerged countless numbers of websites for various fields, along with their users. This expands the range of information accessible according to users' diverse purposes, personal characteristics, faced problems, environmental elements, and so on. In case of online museum, for example, it is possible to offer customized information that each user needs, with its capability of infinite exhibitions and variety of contents only accessible online, which cannot be found in offline museums. On the other hand, most online users feel frustrated when they find it hard to search and obtain necessary information, due to poor accessibility and of information that each site provides. This paper attempts to achieve the following purposes: first, it decides critical information related to construction culture by examining its specialty, value and efficiency; second, it organizes the specific information on the history of construction culture and details of essential buildings & related technology; finally, it makes it easy for users to access the information with visualization and the state-of-the-art web technology, not just showing texts and images. This paper examines previous website researches to study various info-visualization categories such as searching procedures, searching methods and development of new contents. and suggests a method to improve user accessibility to the virtual construction culture museum.


At Beijing experimental site of Sino-German cooperative project,a field trial that included 3 different crop establishments was carried out in 1999 for investigating their grain filling characteristics.The result showed that(1)transplanted maize(T)had a relative lower grain filling rate compared with direct sowing(DS)and wowing after plowing(SP)treatments over the first 16 days after pollination.(2)Grain filling rate of T was significantly higher than that of the other two treatments during the following growth stages.(3)Effective grain filling period of T was 10~15 days longer than the other two treatments just due to its quickly and early development.


The problems of using widewidth tillage machines are considered. Shortcomings of the existing practice of reduction the traction resistance of tilling machines are pointed out. The way of using the vibratory contour of directional action on tillage machines allowing their traction resistance to be reduced is suggested. The operating principles of the device under different positions of the pendulum debalance are considered. The results of the study conducted and the prospects of the above way of solving the designated problem are described.


Abstract There are substantial areas of dallisgrass (Paspalum dilatatum Poir.)‐common bermudagrass (Cynodon dactylon (L). Pers.) summer‐type pastures in the Southeastern Central Plain, but little information is available on their response to P and K fertilization. The purpose of this study was to measure the response of dallisgrass‐common bermudagrass pastures to P and K fertilization with and with‐ out N. Phosphorus and K were applied to two soils in May each year for three years. Yield data were collected by clipping a swath through the length of the plots when the minimum forage height was approximately 30 cm. Responses to P and K applications were obtained when the soil test levels were low to very low, but not when they were medium as determined by the Mississippi Soil Test (MST). Forage P concentration of the control in the medium P and K soil was within the adequate range of 2.8 to 3.4 g/kg, but forage K concentration was below the critical range of 16 to 18 g/kg. Forage P and K concentrations of t...


Constraint-Based Testing was introduced fifteen years ago, in the context of mutation testing [1], to generate test cases by using constraint solving techniques. In our previous work [2, 3], we built a constraint-based model for generating automatically test data that cover all the decisions of a C program. Constraints are solved by using classical deductive methods such as domain reduction over finite domains and complete labelling. However, we found that some constraint systems cannot be solved in a reasonable amount of time with these techniques. Hence, we started looking at constraint-based local search (CBLS), a framework introduced by Michel and Van Hentenryck [4], to speed up the test data generation process in constraint-based testing. CBLS is a generic paradigm that proposes to implement multiple local search techniques such as Hill-climbing and simulated annealing by using the high-level concepts of invariants and differentiable objects. Invariants are simple relations expressed over incremental variables that must be maintained under assignments of new values while differentiable objects are relations that can be queried to evaluate the effect of local moves. Their significance comes from the many algorithms that evaluate the effect of various moves before selecting the neighbor to visit. Unlike invariants, a differentiable object can be queried through an interface shown below to evaluate the effect of local moves such as assignments and swaps.


We show that a well-known result on solutions of the Maurer--Cartan equation extends to arbitrary (inhomogeneous) odd forms: any such form with values in a Lie superalgebra satisfying $d\o+\o^2=0$ is gauge-equivalent to a constant, $$\o=gCg^{-1}-dg\,g^{-1}\,.$$ This follows from a non-Abelian version of a chain homotopy formula making use of multiplicative integrals. An application to Lie algebroids and their non-linear analogs is given.
Constructions presented here generalize to an abstract setting of differential Lie superalgebras where we arrive at the statement that odd elements (not necessarily satisfying the Maurer--Cartan equation) are homotopic\,---\,in a certain particular sense\,---\,if and only if they are gauge-equivalent.


This chapter provides an overview of how global virtual teams of undergraduates and graduates from three different countries are managed in order to achieve effective teaching-learning collaboration in the area of international business. The chapter uses evidence from a case study-based program used by a network of European business schools to discover and explore best practices when forming and leading collaborative student teams, working virtually and spatially. The study of this program suggests that there are particular challenges and opportunities in managing virtually international teams of students, which were amplified during COVID times in 2020. The study relates to the global virtual world of business education, where each tertiary institution is expected to embrace and manage the adapted and future design of programs and courses, where students necessarily had to deal with a wide variety of assignments whilst working virtually during times of national lockdowns.


The present study is the first report of a green iguana infested with Hirstiella sp., as a new mite genus recorded from Iran.


This article considers Ronald Akers' book, Social Learning and Social Structure: A General Theory of Crime and Deviance, in relation to knowledge about crimes against women and the relationship of gender to type, pattern and amount of crime. Contributions of the book are summarized, and shortcomings discussed. Specific criticisms are lack of integration with feminist theory in the areas of conceptualizing and measuring crime and deviance and a failure to consider gender structure. The final discussion focuses on implications for theory development.


Background: Endometrial biopsy or curettage is the gold standard technique for evaluation of abnormal uterine bleeding (AUB) after ruling out the possibility of medical causes. The objective of our study is to determine the frequency of various endometrial pathologies in different age groups with complaints of AUB. Methods: This study was conducted in Pathology Department of DG Khan Medical College and Multan Institute of Kidney Diseases. It was a retrospective, descriptive cross-sectional study done over two years from 1 Jan 2017 to 31 Dec 2018. Sampling technique was convenience sampling. Endometrial biopsies and curetting were parts of this study. Histopathological findings of biopsy and curetting specimens were noted. Results: Total cases were 148 and data was categorized in reproductive (12–39 year), perimenopausal (40–50 year) and postmenopausal (above 50 year) age groups. In reproductive age group, secretory endometrium 22% was the most frequent finding followed by proliferative phase endometrium (20%). In perimenopausal age group, proliferative phase endometrium was the most common histological finding (31%). This was followed by secretory endometrium (23%) and chronic endometritis (17%). In postmenopausal age group, most common histological finding was exogenous hormone effect seen in 43% cases followed by non diagnostic tissue, atrophic endometrium and chronic endometritis, each 14.2%. Conclusion: We observed diverse findings like benign entities, infectious aetiology and malignancy as well.
Pak J Physiol 2020;16(1):24–7


Optical characteristics of excitonic blue and green emission of Te-doped ZnSSe:Te epitaxial layers, grown by molecular beam epitaxy, were investigated by photoluminescence (PL) measurements. The Te-doped ternary specimen shows strong blue or green emission (at 300K) which is assigned to Te₁ or Te n (n≥ 2) cluster cluster bound exciton, respectively. Bright green and blue light emitting diodes (LEDs) have been developed using ZnSSe:Te system as an active layer. The green LEDs exhibit a fairly long device lifetime (>2000 h) when operated at 3 A/㎠ under CW condition at room temperature.


In this paper, the case for a MIMO radar have been considered. MIMO radar is advantageous over the other conventional radars such as higher resolution, improved angle estimation accuracy, the higher number of targets detection, increased array aperture, waveform diversity. Presence of multiple elements on the transmitter side has got its own advantages since multiple waveforms can be generated like a phased array radar which helps in beam-steering. MIMO radar surpasses phased array radar for the reason that all the waveforms on the transmit side in MIMO radar are independent of each other. Orthogonal waveforms are independent of each other and are defined as waveforms with a very low cross-correlation which ensures that the waveforms transmitted do not interfere with each other. Generating waveforms and formation of beams from transmitter side of MIMO radar is a basic problem in digital signal processing and this seeks the interest of scientists, research scholars and engineers. This paper aims to study various techniques for the generation of multiple independent waveforms and the formation of a beam on transmission. Further, the results obtained from the model are presented, studied and analyzed for team formation digitally that gives us further scope to the formation of multiple beams which are independent on transmission.


GPS-equipped vehicles are an effective approach for acquiring urban population movement patterns. Attempts have been made in the present study in order to identify the population displacement pattern of the study region using taxis' origin and destination data, and then model the parameters affecting the population displacement pattern and provide an ultimate model in order to predict pick-up and drop-off locations. In this way, the passenger pick-up and drop-off locations have been identified in order to obtain the population movement pattern. In this study, Moran's I index was used to measure the spatial autocorrelation, and hot spot analysis was used to analyze spatial patterns of pick-up and drop-off locations. Effective parameters modeling was performed using the Poisson regression. The results of the spatiotemporal distribution map for pick-up and drop-off locations indicated a similarity in patterns and equal results for some locations. Results also indicated different features of spatial distribution during different hours of the day. Spatial autocorrelation analysis results indicated a low probability of randomness in the general spatial distribution of the locations. The result of modeling the parameters shows the positive effect of the parameters on the pattern of population movement, and according to the p-value of 0.000, Poisson regression is significant for the pick-up and drop-off locations. The modeling results also highlighted the importance of movement patterns in recognizing urban hot spots, which is valuable for policymakers and urban planners.


Two Lu2O@C80 isomers have been successfully isolated and unambiguously assigned as Lu2O@C1(31876)-C80 and Lu2O@C2v(5)-C80, respectively, by X-ray crystallography. Interestingly, C1(31876)-C80 is an unprecedented cage with a pair of adjacent pentagons,...


This paper firstly introduces the concept of workflow technology,then proposes a new integration architecture of MISD (Management Information System for Documents,approved by the PLA Military Representative Office) based on workflow technology,and designs the information model of MISD.Particular realization and application of MISD is intro- duced at the end of this paper.


This chapter proposes some improvements on a method for eliciting speech errors, the so-called SLIP technique, including the use of multi-level logistic regression for data analysis. This is demonstrated in an experimental test of a new theory of self-monitoring as the main cause of lexical bias in phonological speech errors.


for x>0, y>0, θ1>0, θ2>0, and θ3>0. We have chosen this model because bivariate gamma distributions are some of the most popular models for hydrological processes Phatarfod (1976), Prekopa and Szantai (1978), Izawa (1965), Smith and Adelfang (1981), Yue (2001), Yue et al. (2001), Shiau et al. (2006). Ratios of random variables arise naturally with respect to drought modeling: if X and Y denote the drought duration and the successive non CHERIAN'S BIVARIATE GAMMA DISTRIBUTION AS A MODEL FOR DROUGHT DATA


Objective:To construct the expressive vecto r of angio statin and transform into E. coli BL21(DE3), to induce the expression of recombi nant angiostatin in prokaryotic system. Methods:The cDNA of Angiosta ti n was amplified by PCR, they were subcloned into vector, and transformed into th e E. coli BL21(DE3), and induced expression of recombinant angiostatin. Re sults:The recombinant clones were picked out by the restriction endonuclea se and sequence analysis. Recombinant angiostatin was highly expressed when the st rain was induced with IPTG(1 mmol/L), and angiostatin was successfully purified. Conclusion:The recombinant angiostatin can be used in further studi es.


'Unification' as a core national agenda for implementation should be prepared in a consistent manner without being affected by political affairs. The Park Geun-hye administration has put into motion 'unification preparations' in earnest by setting 'infrastructure establishment for peaceful unification' as one of her key policies and organizing the 'The Presidential Committee for Unification Preparation(PCUP).' Although practical steps are being taken, it is true that Korea still lacks competencies to prepare for unification. The public holds a negative view towards the Korean society's readiness to unify. With the ubiquitous perception that the Korean society lacks absolute capacity for inter-Korean social integration, discussions need to take place about how we perceive 'competency' coupled with 'unification preparation.' It is necessary to systematically evaluate our internal preparation competencies and dedicate specialized research on ways to strengthen our comprehensive competency for the unification process, unification realization phase, and the post-unification integration phase. Based on this stance, this paper seeks to look into the current status of legal, institutional and human competency focusing on the public sector(central government, local governments) and set forth competency building options via evaluation.


The choice of a routing protocol in a wireless sensor network (WSN) depends on the nature of the application and on its primary mission. Lot of works addressed the problem of routing mechanisms with more or less effectiveness, some of which pointed out the use of the link quality indicator (LQI) as a route selection criterion (metric). In a previous work, following an experimental study, we have shown [1], under some conditions, the inefficiency of the LQI based routing. In this paper, we propose a simple way, to improve reliability and efficiency of the LQI based routing in WSN. We also evaluate other route selection criteria including the "remaining energy level" and the "sensor proximity with respect to the Base Station (BS)". The proposed local load balancing routing protocol is aimed to help source nodes to exploit potential capabilities of their respective neighbors without having any knowledge of their properties such as the position or the energy level. Simulation results show that our adaptation of the LQI metric is among the best route selection criteria regardless of the performance criterion under consideration, and that the load balancing significantly improves the routing efficiency by lengthening the network lifetime while minimizing packet losses.


In this paper, we introduce a new approach to parametric snake method by using variable snake parameters. Adopting fixed parameter values for all points of the snake, as usual, constitutes by itself a limitation that leads to poor performances in terms of convergence and tracking properties. A more adapted choice should be the one that allows selection depending on the image region properties as on the contour shape and position. However, such variability is not an easy task in general and a precise method need to be defined to assure contour point dependent tuning at iterations. We were particularly interested in applying this idea to the recently presented parametric method [1]. In the work mentioned, an attraction term is used to improve the convergence of the standard parametric snake without a significant increase in computational load. We show here, that improved performances can ensue from applying variable parameter concepts. For this purpose, the method is first analyzed and then a procedure is developed to assure an automatic variable parameter tuning. The interest of our approach is illustrated through object segmentation results.


A light source in a three-dimensional photonic crystal has been realized by depositing CdTe nanocrystals on the inner surface of TiO2 inverted opal films. Two effects, the photonic band gap of inverted opal and the energy exchange between CdTe nanoparticles and the TiO2 framework, have been identified as major sources of emission spectrum modification. An analysis of input-output characteristics of the spontaneous emission demonstrates the saturation of the excitation-to-emission conversion in the emission band and the conversion efficiency improvement associated with the presence of the photonic band gap.


Seed coated with fungicide or insecticide active ingredients are very efficient in the cultivation of many crops. Seed treatment is a preventive measure, which makes post-emergence foliar treatments less necessary. Due to the target action, the technology should be seen as part of integrated pest management. Seed treatment is considered to be the most environmentally friendly form of chemical crop protection. The applied dose per hectare is limited to the seeds themselves, and is very low in comparison with leaf or soil spraying. Recently, seed treatment has been questioned because of possible side effects on bee. During this study, residue-analysis were carried out to detect the most common active substances used for seed treatment in the main crops (maize, beets and wheat). Based on these results, the impact of the use of treated seeds in the cultivation of the major crops in Flanders (maize, beets and wheat) on human and environment is examined.


The purpose of the present study was to obtain knowledge for improvement of the housing and life among radiation decontamination workers by examining the effect of housing type on anxiety over lack of privacy.


Saysomwong S, Fushida M. Rate of children prone to tuberculosis in remoted area, northeastern region of Laos: an epidemiological estimation. Adv Trop Med Pub Health Int. 2019; 9: 5 - 8.
ABSTRACT
 Tuberculosis is a preventable mycobacterial infection. At present, this disease is still observable in several poor developing countries. In Indochina, tuberculosis is endemic in many poor countries where the background sanitation is poor. In Laos, tuberculosis is still highly prevalent. The aim of the present study is to predict rate of children prone to tuberculosis in remoted area, northeastern region of Laos using an epidemiological estimation. It can observe that there is a high percentage of children prone to tuberculosis in this region.

Full text available at https://drive.google.com/file/d/12NvsbaoIvSnfrpdUCULtBpqS-4MPq0ch/view


Analytical formulas of noise parameters for inductively source-degenerated LNAs in single-/dual-band configurations were derived using noise transformation matrix recently. In the past, the design optimization of a single-band LNA was achieved by solving the noise equation explicitly in a tedious way. However, it is difficult to optimize LNAs of other configurations such as dual-band, multi-band and broadband topologies because it becomes formidable to solve the noise equation explicitly. Our recent research shows that the noise equation of an LNA can be solved implicitly using noise transformation matrix and an insightful design optimization of a dual-band LNA is thus obtained. The paper reviews all the previous work of single-band LNAs done by others in the literature and then concludes with our experimental results of a dual-band LNA with the balanced noise performance.


References 1 Roh J. Alopecia areata in children. Hamilton: DermNet. https:// dermnetnz.org/topics/alopecia-areata-in-children (2020). Accessed 30 Jan 2023. 2 Bolognia J, Schaffer JV, Duncan KO, Ko CJ. Alopecias. Dermatology essentials. 2nd ed. Amsterdam: Elsevier; 2022. p. 540–9. 3 Kim CR, Kim H-J, Jung M-Y, Lee JH, Park JH, Lee DY, et al. Cutaneous mastocytosis associated with congenital alopecia. Am J Dermatopathol. 2012;34(5):529–32. https://doi.org/10.1097/dad. 0b013e31823adf71 4 Page MJ, McKenzie JE, Bossuyt PM, Boutron I, Hoffmann TC, Mulrow CD, et al. The Prisma 2020 statement: An updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews. BMJ. 2021;372:n71. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.n71 5 Chelidze K, Lipner SR. Nail changes in alopecia areata: an update and review. Int J Dermatol. 2018;57(7):776–83. https:// doi.org/10.1111/ijd.13866


Some stress is needed in order for individuals to achieve anything. However, excessive continual stress without relief is very dangerous. A self‐administered questionnaire in the staff headquarters of a major local government employer in Western Australia (56.3 per cent males) showed that perceived work‐generated stress levels appear to be a major problem and could lead to possible stress‐related illnesses. Managers must make an effort to identify problems such as role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload and attempt to reduce them. They must consider whether they are asking staff to do too much. Stress management techniques should be introduced as a training programme.


Dysfunctional career thoughts and the lack of development of career interests may be considered as key factors related to the inability of individuals to formulate educational and career goals and to make appropriate career decisions. Three criterion groups, First-time Offender (n = 31), Probationer (n = 30), and Repeat Offender (n = 31) were compared in terms of dysfunctional career thoughts and career interest structure, using the Career Thoughts Inventory and Self-Directed Search, respectively. Participants were female felons within a corrections system of a southeastern state. There were significant differences among the groups in Commitment Anxiety with the Repeat Offender group demonstrating significantly less anxiety than First-time Offender or Probationer groups. The groups were also significantly different in coherence, an indicator of focus of career aspirations, with the Probationer group demonstrating higher levels than the comparison groups, even though only 13% of the total group indicated high coherence. Implications for the use of the Career Thoughts Inventory and Self-Directed Search for career assessment and interventions are discussed.


Belt driving systems applied to many kinds of equipment for industrial machinery encountered a vibration resonance problem due to the increase of the operational speed. To reduce this resonance vibration, we proposed parametric excitation feed-forward control using torque fluctuation. A drawback is not being able to apply it for multi-exciting sources. The alternative ideas were proposed in previous paper, which were bang-bang feedback control using sign function. That method were nonlinear control to fluctuate belt tension using bang-bang switching defined on displacement-velocity phase plane of detected belt vibration It was proved both theoretically and numerically that the methods were very effective to reduce transverse vibration of belt driving system. In order to confirm the control effect experimentally, a test device, which consisted of three pulleys (driving, idler and tension pulley), was established. As a result, this bang-bang feedback control is very effective and has many practical advantages for usage.


There is growing concern in college management about the quality of education in tertiary institutions. For related studies, people normally encounter the problems of developing measurement indicators and identifying components of quality education. Some people use SERVQUAL, a technique making use of the gap between customers' expectations and perceived experience as indicators of service quality, to measure quality of services offered by professionals such as physicians. Hampton applied the technique to identify and measure the significance of different components of quality education, by using the questionnaire designed by Betz, Klingensmith and Menne. Hampton's findings sound reasonable but seem to be too simplified and confined to the characteristics of students in the USA. The expectations and perceptions of the students are often shaped and influenced by their cultural orientation and environments. Hong Kong students who are more pragmatic and instrumental may value less the significance of campus life on quality education but put more stress on assessment. This study is designed to apply the modified SERVQUAL skill to examine Hampton's findings with reference to the students in a different social and cultural context. It is hoped that a list of quality indicators can be identified against which the performance of the higher educational institutes can be measured.


AbstractThis manuscript presents the formulation and implementation of an extended finite-element method (XFEM) for random short fiber-reinforced composite materials. A new enrichment function is proposed to incorporate the effect of random fiber inclusions within the XFEM framework to eliminate the need of using finite-element meshes compliant with fiber inclusions. The motion of the fiber inclusions are modeled by constraining the deformation field along the domain of the fiber inclusions. Coupling the XFEM along with the new enrichment function and constraint equations formulate the elastic response of short fiber-reinforced composites. Numerical integration procedures are provided for accurate evaluation of the system response for fiber tips that lie on arbitrary positions within the problem domain. The performance of the proposed model is verified against the direct finite-element method.


AbstractThis paper presents a probabilistic procedure for deriving design models for the ultimate strength and strain of fiber–reinforced-polymer (FRP)-confined concrete. First, a large database of axial compression tests performed on circular FRP-confined concrete specimens is collected for calibrating an ultimate strength model, based on the Drucker-Prager criterion, and an ultimate strain model, based on the ultimate dilation rate. The database is also employed for deriving a probabilistic model for the FRP strain efficiency factor. The calibrated models, though simple, show superior performance over some of the models in the literature. Then, using the Central Limit Theorem and considering uncertainty in the mechanical properties of the concrete and FRP material as well as their correlation, analytical probabilistic design models for the ultimate strength and strain of FRP-confined concrete are derived. These models can be used in the design and reliability analysis of FRP-confined columns.


The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of using Instagram as a medium of communication on the marketing of the hijab brand Ria Miranda in Jambi City. In this study, the type of research used is quantitative research, namely in the form of data taken from the Ria Miranda Jambi Boutique. The sample of this research is the consumer of Ria Miranda Boutique in Jambi City. The sample was done by using purposive sampling method. The data were collected by using a questionnaire distributed directly to consumers as many as 32 questionnaires. The analysis technique used is a simple linear regression method, by testing the hypothesis t test. The results of this study indicate that the use of Instagram as a medium of communication has a significant positive effect on the marketing of the hijab brand Ria Miranda in Jambi City.


The phylogenetic composition of bacterial communities varies along the salinity gradient of estuaries, one notable pattern being the prevalence of alpha‐ and beta‐proteobacteria in salt‐ and freshwater regions, respectively. We tested the hypothesis that bottom‐up forces (substrate supply) control these and other changes in bacterial community composition in the Delaware estuary. We measured the biomass and growth rate of four major phylogenetic groups of bacterioplankton (alpha‐, beta‐, and gamma‐proteobacteria and the Cytophaga‐Flavobacter cluster) in low‐ and high‐salinity regions of the estuary by the dilution culture approach combined with fluorescent in situ hybridization with rRNA‐targeted probes. Group‐specific growth rates were highly variable depending on location and season and could far exceed (up to nearly fourfold) the growth rates of total bacteria. The phylogenetic groups that exhibited the highest growth rates included alpha‐ and gamma‐proteobacteria at both low‐ and high‐salinity stations and betaproteobacteria at a low‐salinity station. These data help to explain the high abundance of beta‐proteobacteria in the freshwater region, but bottom up controls appear to account only partly for the variability in bacterial communities. The relationship between production and biomass suggested that bacterial communities at the low‐salinity site were controlled by substrate supply, whereas bacterial mortality appeared to be more important at the high‐salinity site. Our data demonstrate that group‐specific growth rates are useful parameters for examining the competitive advantages of individual groups and the mode of regulation of bacterial communities in estuarine environments.


The Malaysian government has a goal of eliminating malaria by 2020 but the increase in the number of cases of Plasmodium knowlesi presents a major challenge to this goal. Understanding the biology and breeding sites of vector mosquitoes is important to eliminating this disease. Therefore, we aimed to identify the larval breeding sites of Anopheles balabacensis in Kudat, Sabah, Malaysia, examine and define the environmental characteristics of its habitat and determine the association between these environmental characteristics and the biology of An. balabacensis. This study was carried out in the nine villages of Kudat. An. balabacensis breeding sites were identified. An. balabacensis preferred to breed in muddy ground pools and tire tracks formed in plantations and along the forest fringe. The most common breeding site had a surface area < 1 m2, a depth of 5-10 cm, was in partly shaded area and located approximately 100 m from the nearest house. The breeding sites for An. balabacensis were near human settlements and work places, making this mosquito as potential vector for malaria in Kudat. The studied environment characteristics did not significantly influence the abundance of An. balabacensis. Our findings suggest comprehensive coverage of breeding sites is necessary for larval control and reduction of malaria transmission.


Purpose : The study was performed with the aim to design a Simple, precise and economical RP-HPLC method have been developed for simultaneous estimation of amitriptyline HCl and chlordiazepoxide in pharmaceutical formulation. Approach : RP-HPLC was developed using WATERS C18 250 mm × 4.6 mm (5 μm) column, utilizing a mobile phase of methanol: acetonitrile: 0.2 M orthophosphoric acid, pH 4.5 (adjusted with triethylamine) 56:24:20 ml (with a flow rate of 1ml/min) and U.V detection was carried out at 240nm. Optimization of this method was carried out as a function of mobile phase composition, pH and flow rate. Peak purity was assessed by spectral comparison method. Findings : RP-HPLC method shows linearity in the range of for 0.05-1.6 μg/ml and 0.01-0.32μg/ml amitriptyline HCl and chlordiazepoxide respectively. The LOD and LOQ values for amitriptyline HCl were 0.0250μg/ml and 0.0759 μg/ml and 0.0045 μg/ml and 0.0135 μg/ml for chlordiazepoxide. The results of % purity was found to be 99.97 ± 0.58 % w/w and 99.29 ± 0.59 % w/w for HPLC method and 98.87 ± 0.03 % w/w and 98.81 ± 1.04 % w/w for first derivative spectrophotometric method for amitriptyline HCl and chlordiazepoxide respectively. Conclusion : Results of descriptive statistics studies conclude that RP-HPLC method found to be more sensitive and convenient than first derivative spectrophotometric method.


IT is now just over half a century since Otto Loewi provided the first conclusive evidence of the humoral, or chemical, transmission of nerve impulses, a concept that had been suggested by DuBois-R...


Separability of the Hamiltonian describing a two-center, one-electron Coulombic system in the prolate spherical coordinates allows for a detailed comparison between the partitioning of electronic properties based on Bader's quantum theory of atoms in molecules and the newly developed GAPT partitioning. The one-electron systems can serve as the simplest models of the covalent and ionic bonds. The GAPT partitioning correctly describes the effects associated with the infinite range of Coulombic interactions.


A smart application in sensing is mainly powered by a two-stage process comprising sensing (collect data) and computing (process data). While the sensing stage is typically performed locally through a dedicated Internet of Things infrastructure, the computing stage may require a powerful infrastructure in the cloud. However, when connectivity is poor and low latency becomes a requirement — as in emergency response and disaster relief operations — edge computing and ad hoc cloud paradigms come in support to keep the computing stage locally. Being local network connectivity and data processing limited, it is vital to properly optimize how the computing workload will be consumed by the local ad hoc cloud. For this purpose, we present and evaluate the swarm-powered Optimized 3D Mapping Pipeline (OptiMaP) for emergency response 3D mapping missions, which is implemented as a collaborative embedded Robot Operating System (ROS) application integrating an ad hoc telecommunication middleware.We simulate — with Software-In-The-Loop — realistic 3D mapping missions comprising up to 5 drones and 363 images covering 0.293km2. We show how the completion times of mapping missions carried out in a typical centralized manner can be dramatically reduced by two versions of the OptiMaP framework powered, respectively, by a variable neighborhood search heuristic and a greedy method.


Sometimes there might be another metric space (N, ρ(u, v)) in play, and we may introduce a subscript as in BN(w, s) to indicate in which metric space the ball is defined. Let us say that a metric space (M, d(x, y)) is a happy fractal if the following three conditions are satisfied. First, M is complete as a metric space. Second, there is a constant C1 > 0 so that for each pair of points x, y in M there is a path in M connecting x to y with length at most C1 d(x, y). Third, M satisfies the doubling property that there is a constant C2 so that any ball B in M can be covered by a family of balls with half the radius of B and at most C2 elements. One might prefer the name happy metric space, since the metric space need not be fractal, as in the case of ordinary Euclidean spaces. There are


The impacts of climate change are highly visible in Nepal's Karnali River Basin. Extreme weather events and climate-related hazards such as floods, droughts, hot and cold waves, and forest fires significantly impact natural resources and threaten livelihoods of communities living in the Basin. As temperatures rise and rainfall patterns become more erratic and unpredictable, disputes often occur over access to community forests, availability of water and land ownership, especially in areas where governance mechanisms are still weak.