bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Impact of a tertiary Gleason pattern 4 or 5 on clinical failure and mortality after radical prostatectomy for clinically localised prostate cancer
Authors: Servoll Einar , Sæter Thorstein , Vlatkovic Ljiljana , Lund Tormod , Nesland Jahn , Waaler Gudmund , Axcrona Karol , Beisland Hans O.
Published: September 2011

Study Type – Prognosis (case series)

Level of Evidence 4

What's known on the subject? and What does the study add?

It is known that a tertiary Gleason grade pattern 4 or 5 found in RP specimens has a negative impact on recurrence rate regarding biochemical relapse after radical prostatectomy. This is the first publication addressing clinical outcome in patients with a tertiary Gleason grade pattern 4 or 5 showing a negative influence on clinical failure rates.

OBJECTIVE

To investigate the impact of a tertiary Gleason grade (TGG) pattern 4 or 5 on clinical failure, as the presence of a TGG pattern 4 or 5 in radical prostatectomy (RP) specimens has been associated with biochemical failure.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

In all, 151 consecutive patients undergoing RP between 1985 and 2006 were reviewed, and 148 patients met study inclusion criteria.

The RP specimens were pathologically re‐examined and the presence of a TGG pattern 4 or 5 was recorded.

The endpoint was clinical failure defined as local recurrence and/or development of metastasis at a mean follow‐up of 108 months.

Univariate analyses were performed using the Kaplan–Meier method. Multivariate analyses were performed using Cox proportional hazards regression.

RESULTS

Clinical failure was more likely among men with presence of a TGG pattern 4 or 5 than in men without a TGG pattern 4 or 5 (P= 0.006). In the subgroup of patients with Gleason score 7 the presence of a TGG 5 was significantly associated with clinical failure rate (P= 0.002).

In patients with Gleason score <7 or >7, a TGG pattern 4 or 5 was not associated with increased failure rates.

Multivariate Cox regression analyses in patients with Gleason score 7 showed that a TGG pattern 5 was a statistically significant predictor of clinical failure when adjusting for pathological stage, surgical margin status, extraprostatic extension and seminal vesicle invasion (hazard ratio 4.03, 95% confidence interval 1.72–9.46; P= 0.001).

Further subgroup analyses showed that a TGG pattern 5 was associated with statistically higher clinical progression rates in patients with Gleason score 3 + 4 (P= 0.03).

In patients with Gleason score 4 + 3, a TGG pattern 5 was associated with a trend towards a higher clinical progression rate, although this was not statistically significant (P= 0.189).

CONCLUSION

A TGG pattern 4 or 5 is associated with decreased clinical recurrence‐free survival in Gleason score 7.
Characteristics of Academic Language Register Occurring in Caretaker‐Child Interaction: Development and Validation of a Coding Scheme
Authors: Aarts Rian , Demir Serpil , Vallen Ton
Published: September 2011

This article aims at validating a coding scheme designed to investigate the precursors of academic language occurring in early caretaker‐child interactions. Exposure to the academic dimensions of language is an important asset for children to be successful in academic settings. The proposed analytical framework, based on systemic functional linguistics and usage‐based theories and informed by research on the language of school, is useful for assessing caretaker‐child interaction in different languages at home and in schools. The coding scheme is validated by providing interactional data of 15 Turkish mother‐child dyads. A large variation was found in the extent to which academic language features are present in the input, partly related to the socioeconomic status and literacy levels of the mothers. A book reading setting fosters the academic level of maternal input.
MACROECONOMIC OUTCOMES OF CHANGING SOCIAL BARGAINS. THE FEASIBILITY OF A WAGE‐LED OPEN ECONOMY RECONSIDERED
Authors: Cassetti Mario
Published: September 2011

It has been argued, in neo‐Kaleckian growth theory, that profit‐led growth regimes are more likely in an open economy, at least in the short run. This paper reconsiders this question by developing a macroeconomic model for the medium run where distribution and inflation, caused by conflicting nominal income claims, influence growth. We show that the strict alternative between wage‐led and profit‐led growth is misguided, and that an expansion of real wages and employment is feasible when enduring incomes policies are established. Hindrance to these policies is reminiscent of the political opposition to permanent full employment envisaged by Kalecki.
Synthesis and Antimycobacterial Activity of Novel Amino Alcohols Containing Central Core of the Anti‐HIV Drugs Lopinavir and Ritonavir
Authors: Gomes Claudia R. B. , Moreth Marcele , Cardinot Danielle , Kopke Valquiria , Cunico Wilson , da Silva Lourenço Maria Cristina , de Souza Marcus V. N.
Published: September 2011

Eleven new amino alcohol derivatives have been synthesized from reactions of lopinavir intermediate and heteroaromatic aldehyde in good yields. These compounds, the antiretrovirals (lopinavir and ritonavir) and lopinavir key intermediate were evaluated as antibacterial agents against Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37Rv using the Alamar Blue susceptibility test and their activity expressed as the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) in μm. Ten amino alcohols evaluated displayed significant activity (MIC between 6.15 and 108.4 μm) when compared to first‐line drug ethambutol (MIC = 15.9 μm). Three of them showed more activity than ethambutol (MIC = 6.15; 6.21 and 13.4 μm). The appreciable activity of these compounds can be considered an important finding for the rational design of new leads for anti‐TB compounds.
Biogeographical kinetics on an island volcano (Capelinhos, Azores): fast colonisation rates and dominance of arthropod exotic species
Authors: FATTORINI SIMONE , BORGES PAULO A. V.
Published: September 2011

Abstract.  1. The aim of this paper was to investigate the arthropod colonisation of a recently erupted volcano in the framework of a general model of colonisation kinetics.

2. We analysed the diversity of arthropod communities at three locations on Faial Island (Azores) using a well‐defined disturbance gradient: (i) a site that is new land added by the eruption of Capelinhos Volcano of 1957; (ii) a site moderately affected by this eruption; and (iii) a pristine site not affected. We calculated the recolonisation times at the disturbed sites using species richness at the undisturbed site as an equilibrium value (last erupted 900–1000 years ago).

3. Species with different distributional ranges (endemic, native non‐endemic and introduced) have different colonisation kinetics. Introduced exotic species were particularly rapid in colonising the erupted volcano, reaching a number of species greater than that observed in the undisturbed area. By contrast, native non‐endemic species had more difficulty in recolonising the erupted area, and no endemic has reached it. The volcano community is dominated by a few species with high abundance and shows low richness and strong dominance in comparison with the undisturbed community. The moderately disturbed site supports a rich and well‐balanced arthropod community.

4. Although the erupted volcano has a species richness even slightly higher than the undisturbed site, this is a consequence of the high colonisation ability of introduced species, and its arthropod community is strongly disharmonic.
Convective Heat Transfer in a Rotor–Stator System Airgap With a Centered Natural Suction of Fluid
Authors: Pellé Julien , Harmand Souad
Published: September 2011

The present work relates to an experimental study of the local convective heat transfer over the rotor surface in the air-gap of a discoidal rotor–stator system. This configuration is of interest namely, in electrical machines or tubomachinery. Following precedent studies obtained for a single rotating disk or a closed (but unshrouded) rotor–stator system, an air suction comes through the stator and enters the air-gap in this particular work. Determination of Nusselt numbers is based on the use of infrared thermography. The influence of the suction is discussed for an interdisk dimensionless spacing interval, G ranging from 0.01 to 0.16 and for a rotational Reynolds number, Re between 30,000 and 5,16,000. Results shows that the suction could locally provide better cooling than in the closed rotor–stator and in the single disk configurations, even if the main influence is a decrease in the convective heat transfer.
Influence of Machine Tool Covers on Feed Drives
Authors: Kolar Petr , Masek Jan , Sveda Jiri , Hudec Jan
Published: September 2011

Machine tool covers are important parts of the machine. From the point of view of feed drives, a cover is an additional multi-body system that influences the dynamic properties of the feed drive and the positioning accuracy of the machine. The advantages of covers connected to the machine table with flexible elements are shown on simulation and experimental results. A mathematical model of the cover and its connection to the machine table is described. Optimization of the stiffness and damping ratio for the connection, using a model of the cover, is suggested. The optimal connection parameters cause decreasing of maximum reaction force acting from the cover to the feed drive. This phenomenon is presented on simulation example and also on the experiment results.
Studying Effects of Arc Discharge Surface Texturing on Stress Distribution in Adhesively Bonded Joints by Using Finite Element Modeling
Authors: Asgharifar Mehdi , Kong Fanrong , Carlson Blair , Kovacevic Radovan
Published: September 2011

This study investigates the potentiality of using atmospheric-pressure Direct Current (DC) plasma arc discharge as a surface treatment method of aluminum alloys in adhesively bonded joints in order to enhance adhesion. The surface morphology exposed to the arc for the current of 40 A (low intensity) and the plasma torch scanning speeds between 20 and 120 mm/s, exhibits a micro-scale surface roughness appropriate for adhesive bonding. The arc textured surfaces are characterized by using an optical profilometer. Additionally, the effect of modified surface on the stress distribution throughout the single-lap adhesively bonded joint in tension is explored by 2D FEM. The geometrical model for FE analysis of adhesively bonded structure is generated by including the surface texture coordinates obtained from the optical profilometer.
Microstructure Characteristics and High-Temperature Oxidation Behavior of Plasma-Sprayed and Laser-Remelted MCrAlY Coatings on TiAl Intermetallics
Authors: Tian Zongjun , Shen Lida , Liu Zhidong , Huang Yinhui
Published: September 2011

In order to further improve the high-temperature oxidation resistance of TiAl intermetallic alloys, MCrAlY coatings were fabricated by plasma spraying and plasma spraying-laser remelting technologies. The microstructures of the as-sprayed and laser-remelted MCrAlY coatings were studied. In addition, the oxidation behaviors at 850 °C for three samples were investigated. One sample is the matrix of TiA1 intermetallic alloys, the other one is processed by plasma-spraying MCrAlY coatings, and the third one is processed by plasma-spraying and laser-remelting MCrAlY coatings. It was revealed that the oxidation resistance of TiAl intermetallics is weak due to lack of protection of Al2O3 film formed on the surface. The plasma-sprayed MCrAlY coatings have better oxidation resistance than the TiAl intermetallics although the plasma-sprayed MCrAlY coatings have high density of porosity and a typical layered structure. It is demonstrated that most of the holes can be eliminated by laser remelting, leading to the best oxidation resistance of the third sample with the laser-remelted coatings. The high oxidation resistance of the laser-remelted coatings is mainly attributed to three aspects: firstly, an Al enriched zone on the coating surface is formed during laser remelting, which is transformed into a protective Al2O3 film during oxidation process. Secondly, laser remelting eliminates most of the defects in plasma-sprayed coatings and enhances its density, thus decreases the channel of oxidation diffusion in high temperature oxidation process. Thirdly, rapid cooling of laser remelting results in a grain refinement and a preferred oxidation of Al at the initial stage, leading to a reduction of oxidation rate.
Model-Based Approach for Optimization of Atazanavir Dose Recommendations for HIV-Infected Pediatric Patients
Authors: Hong Ying , Kowalski Kenneth G. , Zhang Jenny , Zhu Li , Horga Mariaarantxa , Bertz Richard , Pfister Marc , Roy Amit
Published: September 2011

Atazanavir (Reyataz; ATV) is a well-tolerated protease inhibitor (PI) that is indicated as a once-daily treatment for HIV infections. These features of ATV, combined with its virologic potency, make it particularly desirable for the treatment of HIV-infected pediatric patients. The objective of this study was to use a model-based approach to recommend body weight-based ATV capsule doses for pediatric patients. ATV concentration-time data from three adult studies and one pediatric study were described by a
C
0
-delinked one-compartment model to guard against introducing bias in pharmacokinetic (PK) parameter estimates due to the potential nonadherence in outpatient studies. The apparent clearance (CL
/F
) and apparent volume of distribution (
V/F
) were determined to increase with body weight, and CL
/F
was 40.9% lower in patients receiving ATV comedication with ritonavir (RTV). The relative bioavailability (
F
rel
) of ATV was 132% higher with RTV comedication and was 35.5% lower for the ATV powder formulation than the capsule formulation. Model-based simulations were used to recommend weight-based ATV capsule doses of 150 to 300 mg boosted with 100 mg RTV for pediatric patients weighing ≥15 kg, such that the exposures in these patients are similar to those obtained in HIV-infected adults treated with the recommended ATV/RTV dose of 300/100 mg.
ATOMISTIC MODELING AND MECHANICS OF SELF-ASSEMBLED ORGANIC NANOTUBES
Authors: RUIZ LUIS , KETEN SINAN
Published: September 2011

Organic building blocks inspired by biological systems are promising for fabricating nanostructured materials for a broad range of applications such as antimicrobials, biosensors, electronics, and biomaterials. Self-assembling cyclic peptide organic nanotubes have shown great promise for these applications due to their precise structural features, diverse chemical functionalization capabilities and exceptional stability arising from arrangement of hydrogen bonds into cooperative clusters. Mechanical behavior of organic nanotubes is important for various possible applications ranging from subnanoporous selective membranes to molecular templates for electronics. However, large-scale deformation mechanisms of organic nanotubes have not been studied thus far. Here we investigate the mechanisms involved in the large deformation and failure of self-assembled organic nanotubes, focusing on geometry effects characteristic of protein nanostructures. We carry out molecular dynamics simulations to assess the role of hydrogen bonds as weak interactions in the context of deformation and failure processes involving bending and shear loads. Mechanisms of failure are found to depend on the cross-sectional geometry and the deformation rate, where a transition to localized shear failure is observed at high-strain rates. Our results provide important physical insight into the mechanics of organic nanotubes central to emerging applications of self-assembling peptides in biomedicine and biotechnology.
Interview with Ethan Munson
Authors: Atzenbeck Claus
Published: September 2011

Ethan Munson is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley in 1994. His research focuses on tools for managing software documents and on human-computer interaction. Dr. Munson is a recipient of a National Science Foundation CAREER award, several research grants from industry, and four NSF educational grants. He is active in conference organization and was Chair of ACM SIGWEB from 2006 to 2011.
Towards designing more effective systems by understanding user experiences
Authors: Hooper Clare J.
Published: September 2011

This work is about social technologies, user experiences and the problems of creative design. It is motivated by a desire to give people who are offline --- whether for reasons of poverty, disability, infrastructure or cultural background --- the access to social technologies that is currently provided via the web, letting them access the online content and communication facilities that so many of us take for granted. There exist simple technologically-oriented approaches to this problem, such as identifying functional requirements and prototyping tools. This focus on technology, however, comes at a cost of neglecting the experiential aspects which motivate the work, and can result in systems that are functional but unappealing to (or even unusable by) their target audiences.
Up and coming SIGWEB supported conferences
Authors: Deshpande Yogesh
Published: September 2011

SIGWEB supports several specialized conferences, short courses, and workshops, as well as the Annual Hypertext Conference. SIGWEB sponsored conferences focus on timely topics in applied and computational hypertext and Web disciplines and provide a place for members and the entire applied Hypermedia and Web community to exchange ideas and to meet with and expand their network of colleagues. In this article, we provide a brief overview of SIGWEB sponsored conferences, in addition to events that are in cooperation with SIGWEB.
Functional programming through deep time
Authors: Mitchell Emily G.
Published: September 2011

The ecology of Earth's first large organisms is an unsolved problem in palaeontology. This experience report discusses the determination of which ecosystems could have been feasible, by considering the biological feedbacks within them. Haskell was used to model the ecosystems for these first large organisms - the Ediacara biota. For verification of the results, the statistical language R was used. Neither Haskell nor R would have been sufficient for this work - Haskell's libraries for statistics are weak, while R lacks the structure for expressing algorithms in a maintainable manner. This work is the first to quantify all feedback loops in an ecosystem, and has generated considerable interest from both the ecological and palaeontological communities.
Monads, zippers and views
Authors: Schrijvers Tom , Oliveira Bruno C.d.S.
Published: September 2011

We make monadic components more reusable and robust to changes by employing two new techniques for
virtualizing
the monad stack: the
monad zipper
and
monad views
. The
monad zipper
is a higher-order monad transformer that creates
virtual
monad stacks by ignoring particular layers in a concrete stack.
Monad views
provide a general framework for monad stack virtualization: they take the monad zipper one step further and integrate it with a wide range of other virtualizations. For instance, particular views allow restricted access to monads in the stack. Furthermore, monad views provide components with a
call-by-reference
-like mechanism for accessing particular layers of the monad stack.

With our two new mechanisms, the monadic effects required by components no longer need to be literally reflected in the concrete monad stack. This makes these components more reusable and robust to changes.
Modular rollback through control logging
Authors: Shivers Olin , Turon Aaron J.
Published: September 2011

We present a technique, based on the use of first-class control operators, enabling programs to maintain and invoke rollback logs for sequences of reversible effects. Our technique is modular, in that it provides complete separation between some library of effectful operations, and a client, "driver" program which invokes and rolls back sequences of these operations. In particular, the checkpoint mechanism, which is entirely encapsulated within the effect library, logs not only the library's effects, but also the client's control state. Thus, logging and rollback can be almost completely transparent to the client code.

This separation of concerns manifests itself nicely when we must implement software with sophisticated error handling. We illustrate with two examples that exploit the architecture to disentangle some core parsing task from its error management. The parser code is completely separate from the error-correction code, although the two components are deeply intertwined at run time.
Functional modelling of musical harmony
Authors: Magalhães José Pedro , de Haas W. Bas
Published: September 2011

Music theory has been essential in composing and performing music for centuries. Within Western tonal music, from the early Baroque on to modern-day jazz and pop music, the function of chords within a chord sequence can be explained by harmony theory. Although Western tonal harmony theory is a thoroughly studied area, formalising this theory is a hard problem.

We present a formalisation of the rules of tonal harmony as a Haskell (generalized) algebraic datatype. Given a sequence of chord labels, the harmonic function of a chord in its tonal context is automatically derived. For this, we use several advanced functional programming techniques, such as type-level computations, datatype-generic programming, and error-correcting parsers. As a detailed example, we show how our model can be used to improve content-based retrieval of jazz songs.

We explain why Haskell is the perfect match for these tasks, and compare our implementation to an earlier solution in Java. We also point out shortcomings of the language and libraries that limit our work, and discuss future developments which may ameliorate our solution.
A hierarchy of mendler style recursion combinators
Authors: Ahn Ki Yung , Sheard Tim
Published: September 2011

The Mendler style catamorphism (which corresponds to weak induction) always terminates even for negative inductive datatypes. The Mendler style histomorphism (which corresponds to strong induction) is known to terminate for positive inductive datatypes. To our knowledge, the literature is silent on its termination properties for negative datatypes. In this paper, we prove that histomorphisms do not always termintate by showing a counter-example. We also enrich the Mendler collection of recursion combinators by defining a new form of Mendler style catamorphism (
msfcata
), which terminates for all inductive datatypes, that is more expressive than the original. We organize the collection of combinators by placing them into a hierarchy of ever increasing generality, and describing the termination properties of each point on the hierarchy. We also provide many examples (including a case study on a negative inductive datatype), which illustrate both the expressive power and beauty of the Mendler style. One lesson we learn from this work is that weak induction applies to negative inductive datatypes but strong induction is problematic. We provide a proof of weak induction by exhibiting an embedding of our new combinator into

F
ω

. We pose the open question: Is there a safe way to apply strong induction to negative inductive datatypes?
Nameless, painless
Authors: Pouillard Nicolas
Published: September 2011

De Bruijn indices are a well known technique for programming with names and binders. They provide a representation that is both simple and canonical.

However, programming errors tend to be really easy to make. We propose a safer programming interface implemented as a library. Whereas indexing the types of names and terms by a numerical bound is a famous technique, we index them by worlds, a different notion of index that is both finer and more abstract. While being more finely typed, our approach incurs no loss of expressiveness or efficiency.

Via parametricity we obtain properties about functions polymorphic on worlds. For instance, well-typed world-polymorphic functions over open λ-terms commute with any renaming of the free variables.

Our whole development is conducted within Agda, from the code of the library, to its soundness proof and the properties of external functions. The soundness of our library is demonstrated via the construction of a logical relations argument.
Incremental updates for efficient bidirectional transformations
Authors: Wang Meng , Gibbons Jeremy , Wu Nicolas
Published: September 2011

A bidirectional transformation is a pair of mappings between
source
and
view
data objects, one in each direction. When the view is modified, the source is updated accordingly. The key to handling large data objects that are subject to relatively small modifications is to process the updates incrementally. Incrementality has been explored in the semi-structured settings of relational databases and graph transformations; this flexibility in structure makes it relatively easy to divide the data into separate parts that can be transformed and updated independently. The same is not true if the data is to be encoded with more general-purpose algebraic datatypes, with transformations defined as functions: dividing data into well-typed separate parts is tricky, and recursions typically create interdependencies. In this paper, we study transformations that support incremental updates, and devise a constructive process to achieve this incrementality.
Experimental Investigation on Zonal Structure in Drag-Reducing Channel Flow with Surfactant Additives
Authors: Motozawa Masaaki , Watanabe Takahiro , Gu Weiguo , Kawaguchi Yasuo
Published: September 2011

The spatial structure of a drag-reducing channel flow with surfactant additives in a two-dimensional channel was investigated experimentally. We carried out detailed measurements of the instantaneous velocity in the streamwise wall-normal plane and streamwise spanwise plane by using particle image velocimetry (PIV). The surfactant used in this experiment is a kind of cationic surfactant CTAC. The weight concentrations of the CTAC solution were 25 and 40 ppm on the flow. We considered the effects of Reynolds number ranging from 10000 to 25000 and the weight concentration of CTAC. The results of this paper showed that in the drag-reducing flow, there appeared an area where the root mean square of streamwise velocity fluctuation and the vorticity fluctuation sharply decreased. This indicated that two layers with different turbulent structure coexisted on the boundary of this area. Moreover, these layers had characteristic flow structures, as confirmed by observation of the instantaneous vorticity fluctuation map.
CUDA-Accelerated Geodesic Ray-Tracing for Fiber Tracking
Authors: van Aart Evert , Sepasian Neda , Jalba Andrei , Vilanova Anna
Published: September 2011

Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) allows to noninvasively measure the diffusion of water in fibrous tissue. By reconstructing the fibers from DTI data using a fiber-tracking algorithm, we can deduce the structure of the tissue. In this paper, we outline an approach to accelerating such a fiber-tracking algorithm using a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU). This algorithm, which is based on the calculation of geodesics, has shown promising results for both synthetic and real data, but is limited in its applicability by its high computational requirements. We present a solution which uses the parallelism offered by modern GPUs, in combination with the CUDA platform by NVIDIA, to significantly reduce the execution time of the fiber-tracking algorithm. Compared to a multithreaded CPU implementation of the same algorithm, our GPU mapping achieves a speedup factor of up to 40 times.
Inhaled Nitric Oxide Improves Outcomes After Successful Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation in Mice
Authors: Minamishima Shizuka , Kida Kotaro , Tokuda Kentaro , Wang Huifang , Sips Patrick Y. , Kosugi Shizuko , Mandeville Joseph B. , Buys Emmanuel S. , Brouckaert Peter , Liu Philip K. , Liu Christina H. , Bloch Kenneth D. , Ichinose Fumito
Published: September 2011

Background—

Sudden cardiac arrest (CA) is a leading cause of death worldwide. Breathing nitric oxide (NO) reduces ischemia/reperfusion injury in animal models and in patients. The objective of this study was to learn whether inhaled NO improves outcomes after CA and cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

Methods and Results—

Adult male mice were subjected to potassium-induced CA for 7.5 minutes whereupon CPR was performed with chest compression and mechanical ventilation. One hour after CPR, mice were extubated and breathed air alone or air supplemented with 40 ppm NO for 23 hours. Mice that were subjected to CA/CPR and breathed air exhibited a poor 10-day survival rate (4 of 13), depressed neurological and left ventricular function, and increased caspase-3 activation and inflammatory cytokine induction in the brain. Magnetic resonance imaging revealed brain regions with marked water diffusion abnormality 24 hours after CA/CPR in mice that breathed air. Breathing air supplemented with NO for 23 hours starting 1 hour after CPR attenuated neurological and left ventricular dysfunction 4 days after CA/CPR and markedly improved 10-day survival rate (11 of 13;
P
=0.003 versus mice breathing air). The protective effects of inhaled NO on the outcome after CA/CPR were associated with reduced water diffusion abnormality, caspase-3 activation, and cytokine induction in the brain and increased serum nitrate/nitrite levels. Deficiency of the α1 subunit of soluble guanylate cyclase, a primary target of NO, abrogated the ability of inhaled NO to improve outcomes after CA/CPR.

Conclusions—

These results suggest that NO inhalation after CA and successful CPR improves outcome via soluble guanylate cyclase–dependent mechanisms.
An Overview of the Beijing 2008 Olympics Research and Development Project (B08RDP)
Authors: Duan Yihong , Gong Jiandong , Du Jun , Charron Martin , Chen Jing , Deng Guo , DiMego Geoff , Hara Masahiro , Kunii Masaru , Li Xiaoli , Li Yinglin , Saito Kazuo , Seko Hiromu , Wang Yong , Wittmann Christoph
Published: September 2011

The Beijing 2008 Olympics Research and Development Project (B08RDP), initiated in 2004 under the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) World Weather Research Programme (WWRP), undertook the research and development of mesoscale ensemble prediction systems (MEPSs) and their application to weather forecast support during the Beijing Olympic Games. Six MEPSs from six countries, representing the state-of-the-art regional EPSs with near-real-time capabilities and emphasizing on the 6–36-h forecast lead times, participated in the project.

The background, objectives, and implementation of B08RDP, as well as the six MEPSs, are reviewed. The accomplishments are summarized, which include 1) providing value-added service to the Olympic Games, 2) advancing MEPS-related research, 3) accelerating the transition from research to operations, and 4) training forecasters in utilizing forecast uncertainty products. The B08RDP has fulfilled its research (MEPS development) and demonstration (value-added service) purposes. The research conducted covers the areas of verification, examining the value of MEPS relative to other numerical weather prediction (NWP) systems, combining multimodel or multicenter ensembles, bias correction, ensemble perturbations [initial condition (IC), lateral boundary condition (LBC), land surface IC, and model physics], downscaling, forecast applications, data assimilation, and storm-scale ensemble modeling. Seven scientific issues important to MEPS have been identified. It is recognized that the daily use of forecast uncertainty information by forecasters remains a challenge. Development of forecaster-friendly products and training activities should be a long-term effort and needs to be continuously enhanced.

The B08RDP dataset is also a valuable asset to the research community. The experience gained in international collaboration, organization, and implementation of a multination regional EPS for a common goal and to address common scientific issues can be shared by the ongoing projects The Observing System Research and Predictability Experiment (THORPEX) Interactive Grand Global Ensemble—Limited Area Models (TIGGE-LAM) and North American Ensemble Forecast System—Limited Area Models (NAEFS-LAM).
Resilience Planning, Economic Change and The Politics of Post-recession Development in London and Hong Kong
Authors: Raco Mike , Street Emma
Published: September 2011

For much of the 1990s and 2000s, the emphasis of urban policy in many global cities was on managing and mitigating the social and environmental effects of rapid economic growth. The credit crunch of 2008 and the subsequent recession have undermined some of the core assumptions on which such policies were based. It is in this context that the concept of resilience planning has taken on a new significance. Drawing on contemporary research in London and Hong Kong, the paper shows how resilience and recovery planning has become a key area of political debate. It examines what is meant by conservative and radical interpretations of resilience and how conservative views have come to dominate ‘recovery’ thinking, with élite groups unwilling to accept the limits to the neo-liberal orthodoxies that helped to precipitate the economic crisis. The paper explores the implications of such thinking for the politics of urban development.
Is Economic Transition Harmful to China’s Urban Environment? Evidence from Industrial Air Pollution in Chinese Cities
Authors: He Canfei , Pan Fenghua , Yan Yan
Published: September 2011

Economic transition has posed a serious challenge to environmental protection efforts in China. This study explores the environmental effects of the triple transition process of marketisation, globalisation and decentralisation using data on industrial SO2 and soot emissions at the prefecture-city level. Panel data regression results find that marketisation and decentralisation have been harmful to the urban environment while economic globalisation has been beneficial to urban air quality. As is to be expected, state-owned enterprises have contributed to China’s environmental degradation. However, the environmental impacts of the triple processes of economic transition only occur in the coastal and central cities. The results imply that the institutional perspective provides an important angle to understand the issue of environmental deterioration in China.
Predicting organic acid concentration from UV/vis spectrometry measurements – a comparison of machine learning techniques
Authors: Wolf Christian , Gaida Daniel , Stuhlsatz André , Ludwig Thomas , McLoone Seán , Bongards Michael
Published: September 2011

The concentration of organic acids in anaerobic digesters is one of the most critical parameters for monitoring and advanced control of anaerobic digestion processes. Thus, a reliable online-measurement system is absolutely necessary. A novel approach to obtaining these measurements indirectly and online using UV/vis spectroscopic probes, in conjunction with powerful pattern recognition methods, is presented in this paper. An UV/vis spectroscopic probe from S::CAN is used in combination with a custom-built dilution system to monitor the absorption of fully fermented sludge at a spectrum from 200 to 750 nm. Advanced pattern recognition methods are then used to map the non-linear relationship between measured absorption spectra to laboratory measurements of organic acid concentrations. Linear discriminant analysis, generalized discriminant analysis (GerDA), support vector machines (SVM), relevance vector machines, random forest and neural networks are investigated for this purpose and their performance compared. To validate the approach, online measurements have been taken at a full-scale 1.3-MW industrial biogas plant. Results show that whereas some of the methods considered do not yield satisfactory results, accurate prediction of organic acid concentration ranges can be obtained with both GerDA and SVM-based classifiers, with classification rates in excess of 87% achieved on test data.
A multi-objective particle swarm optimizer with distance ranking and its applications to air compressor design optimization
Authors: Li Zhongkai , Zhu Zhencai , Song Yan , Wei Zhe
Published: September 2011

Multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO) has been steadily gaining attention from the research community because of its high convergence speed. On the other hand, in the face of increasing complexity and dimensionality of today’s application coupled with its tendency towards premature convergence related to the high convergence speeds, it is necessary to improve the global convergence and uniform distribution of MOPSO. A novel crowding distance ranking-based particle swarm optimizer is proposed (DMOPSO). With the elitism strategy, the evolution of the external swarm is achieved based on particles’ crowding distance ranking by descending order, to delete the repetitive ones in the crowded area. The update of the global optimum is performed by selecting a particle with relatively bigger crowding distance, to lead the swarm evolving to the disperse region. A small ratio mutation is also introduced to the inner swarm to enhance the global searching capacity of the algorithm. So the number of Pareto optimal solutions can be controlled, and the convergence and diversity of Pareto optimal set can also be guaranteed. The experiment on the optimization of single-stage air compressor showed that DMOPSO handled problems with two and three objectives efficiently, and outperformed the comparison algorithms in terms of the convergence and diversity of the Pareto front. The robustness was illustrated through sensitivity analysis for key parameters.
Evaluative Organization of the Self-Concept in Younger, Midlife, and Older Adults
Authors: Ready Rebecca E. , Carvalho Janessa O. , Åkerstedt Anna M.
Published: September 2011

Showers’s model of evaluative organization is a fruitful way to conceptualize the self-concept and is related to self-esteem, depressive symptoms, and emotion regulation. In this study, the authors developed and piloted a card-sort measure to compare the evaluative organization of the self-concept in healthy older, midlife, and younger adults (approximately two thirds of participants were women). The results support the primary hypothesis that older adults would exhibit greater compartmentalization of the self-concept than younger and middle-aged persons. Older adults may think about their positive and negative self-aspects in a more differentiated fashion (i.e., categorize positive and negative self-aspects into separate roles) than younger and midlife persons, who are more integrative (i.e., categorize positive and negative self-aspects under the same role heading) in their self-concepts. The results are consistent with cognitive priming, memory, and emotion regulation studies, which suggest that the way persons organize information about themselves may be different in younger, midlife, and older adults.
Cardioplegic strategies to protect the hypertrophic heart during cardiac surgery
Authors: Suleiman M-S , Hancock M , Shukla R , Rajakaruna C , Angelini GD
Published: September 2011

Cardioplegic arrest and cardiopulmonary bypass are key triggers of myocardial injury during aortic valve surgery. Cardioplegic ischaemic arrest is associated with disruption to metabolic and ionic homeostasis in cardiomyocytes. These changes predispose the heart to reperfusion injury caused by elevated intracellular reactive oxygen species and calcium. Cardiopulmonary bypass is associated with an inflammatory response that can generate systemic oxidative stress which, in turn, provokes further damage to the heart. Techniques of myocardial protection are routinely applied to all hearts, irrespective of their pathology, although different cardiomypathies respond differently to ischaemia and reperfusion injury. In particular, the efficacy of cardioprotective interventions used to protect the hypertrophic heart in patients with aortic valve disease remains controversial. This review will describe key cellular changes in hypertrophy, response to ischaemia and reperfusion and cardioplegic arrest and highlight the importance of optimising cardioprotective strategies to suit hypertrophic hearts.
Loss of Retinoblastoma Protein, But Not p53, Is Associated With the Presence of Papillomaviral DNA in Feline Viral Plaques, Bowenoid In Situ Carcinomas, and Squamous Cell Carcinomas
Authors: Munday J. S. , Aberdein D.
Published: September 2011

Although papillomaviral (PV) DNA is frequently present in feline cutaneous squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs), a causative association cannot be proven. Oncogenic human PVs cause neoplastic transformation by inhibiting retinoblastoma (pRb) and p53 activity. Therefore, absence of pRb and p53 immunostaining, along with increased p16 immunostaining, indicates a PV cause in some human SCCs. If PVs cause cutaneous feline SCCs, it was hypothesized that a similar immunohistochemistry profile, along with PV DNA, would be detectable. This was investigated using 5 feline viral plaques, 10 Bowenoid in situ carcinomas, 19 SCCs from ultraviolet-exposed (UV-exposed) skin, and 11 SCCs from UV-protected skin. Papillomaviral DNA was amplified by polymerase chain reaction from 30 of 45 lesions. Reduced pRb immunostaining was present in 26 of 45; increased p16 immunostaining was in 30; and p53 immunostaining was in 19. Both reduced pRb immunostaining and increased p16 immunostaining were more frequent in lesions containing PV DNA. In contrast, no association was observed between p53 immunostaining and the presence of PV DNA. SCCs from UV-protected skin more frequently contained PV DNA, reduced pRb, and increased p16 than UV-exposed SCCs. UV exposure was not associated with p53 immunostaining within the SCCs. These results suggest that feline PVs alter cell regulation by degrading pRb. Unlike oncogenic human PVs, there was no evidence that feline PVs degrade p53. These results provide further evidence that PVs may cause feline cutaneous SCCs, especially those in UV-protected skin, and they suggest a possible mechanism of this oncogenic action.
Energy from waste in Europe: An analysis and comparison of the EU 27
Authors: Sommer Manuel , Ragossnig Arne
Published: September 2011

This article focuses on analysing the development of waste-generated energy in the countries of the European Union (EU 27). Besides elaborating the relevant legal and political framework in the waste and energy sector as well as climate protection, the results from correlation analyses based on the databases of the energy statistics from Eurostat are discussed. The share of energy from waste is correlated with macro-economic, waste- and energy-sector-related data, which have been defined as potentially relevant for energy recovery from waste in the countries of the European Union. The results show that a single factor influencing the extent of waste-generated energy could not be isolated as it is being influenced not only by the state of economic development and the state of development of waste management systems in the respective countries but also by energy-sector-related factors and the individual priority settings in those countries. Nevertheless the main driving force for an increase in the utilization of waste for energy generation can be seen in the legal and political framework of the European Union leading to the consequence that market conditions influence the realization of waste management infrastructure for waste-generated energy.
Particulate matter prediction in both steady state and transient operation of diesel engines
Authors: Deng J , Bastian M , Stobart R K
Published: September 2011

Diesel engines produce a variety of particles generically classified as diesel particulate matter (PM) owing to incomplete combustion. The increasingly stringent emissions regulations require that engine manufacturers must continue to reduce the PM. The ability to predict the PM emissions is one of the key technologies that could be used in a PM reduction strategy. This paper describes a predictive technique that can be used as a virtual sensor for monitoring PM emissions in both steady and transient states for a medium- or heavy-duty diesel engine. The predictive structure is stable over a broad range of engine operation points. The input parameters are chosen on the basis of the PM formation mechanism, physical knowledge of the process, and an insight into the underlying physics. Principal-component analysis (PCA) is used to reduce the dimensionality of the inputs of a non-linear autoregressive model with exogenous inputs (NLARX) from nine inputs to five inputs. PCA not only reduces the input number but also improves the performance of the prediction model. The results show that the NLARX model could predict the particulate matter successfully with an R2 value above 0.99 with only five inputs.
Dynamic modelling and control of a twin-rotor system using adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system techniques
Authors: Omar M , Zaidan M A , Tokhi M O
Published: September 2011

This article presents an online non-linear dynamic modelling and control approach based on adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) for a twin-rotor multi-input multi-output system (TRMS), in the vertical plane motion. The TRMS can be considered as a flexible aerodynamic test rig that resembles the behaviour of a helicopter. The TRMS and similar manoeuvring systems are often subjected to random disturbances arising from various sources such as driving motors and external environmental sources. For such highly non-linear systems with varying operating conditions, adaptive control approaches are suitable tools to cope with plant uncertainties. An inverse-model control of the TRMS is developed using online ANFIS learning algorithm. The consequent and antecedent parameters of a Takagi–Sugeno fuzzy inference system are optimized online using recursive least squares and gradient descent algorithms, respectively. In order to reduce the computation complexity, the training process is minimized based on global system error tolerance. The optimal initialization of the ANFIS parameters is achieved through an off-line training process. The developed strategy is compared to other control laws in terms of tracking performance, disturbance rejection, and response to external noise. The obtained simulation results demonstrate the efficiency of the online inverse control scheme.
A cost-effective extracorporeal magnetically-levitated centrifugal blood pump employing a disposable magnet-free impeller
Authors: Hijikata W , Mamiya T , Shinshi T , Takatani S
Published: September 2011

In the field of rotary blood pumps, contactless support of the impeller by a magnetic bearing has been identified as a promising method to reduce blood damage and enhance durability. The authors developed a two-degrees-of-freedom radial controlled magnetic bearing system without a permanent magnet in the impeller in order that a low-cost disposable pump-head for an extracorporeal centrifugal blood pump could be manufactured more easily. Stable levitation and contactless rotation of the ‘magnet-free’ impeller were realized for a prototype blood-pump that made use of this magnetic bearing. The run-out of the impeller position at between 1000 r/min and 3000 r/min was less than 40 µm in the radial-controlled directions. The total power consumption of the magnetic bearing was less than 1 W at the same rotational speeds. When the pump was operated, a flow rate of 5 l/min against a head pressure of 78.66 kPa was achieved at a rotational speed of 4000 r/min, which is sufficient for extracorporeal circulation support. The proposed technology offers the advantage of low-cost mass production of disposable pump heads.