bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Emergy Evaluation of Different Straw Reuse Technologies in Northeast China
Authors: Zhang Xiaoxian , Ma Fang
Published: August 2015

Open burning of straw in China has degraded agricultural environments and has become a contributor to air pollution. Development of efficient straw-reuse technologies not only can yield economic benefits but also can protect the environment and can provide greater benefit to society. Thus, the overall benefits of straw-reuse technologies must be considered when making regional development planning and enterprise technology decisions. In addition, agricultural areas in China cross several climatic zones and have different weather characteristics and cultural conditions. In the present study, we assessed five types of straw-reuse technologies (straw-biogas production, -briquetting, -based power generation, -gasification, and -bioethanol production), using emergy analysis, in northeast China. Within each type, five individual cases were investigated, and the highest-performing cases were used for comparison across technologies. Emergy indices for comprehensive benefits for each category, namely, EYR, ELR, and ESI were calculated. Calculated indices suggest that straw-briquetting and -biogas production are the most beneficial technologies in terms of economy, environmental impact, and sustainability compared to straw-based power generation, -gasification, and -bioethanol production technologies. These two technologies can thus be considered the most suitable for straw reuse in China.
The Implementation of Corporate Sustainability in the European Automotive Industry: An Analysis of Sustainability Reports
Authors: Sukitsch Martina , Engert Sabrina , Baumgartner Rupert
Published: August 2015

The acceptance of corporate sustainability implementation and sustainability reporting has continued to grow steadily in recent years. This is particularly true for companies in the automotive industry. Increasing regulatory demands, for example, with respect to CO2 emissions, are one clear reason for this. In this paper the sustainability reports of 14 manufacturers in the European automotive industry are analyzed with respect to issues of corporate sustainability implementation. This entails content analysis of sustainability reports from 2012, and of their earliest available equivalents. The analysis of corporate sustainability implementation in the selected companies is provided with the purpose to help understand how manufacturers in the European automotive industry implement corporate sustainability. Results confirm the importance of specific policy instruments in implementation, such as the use of environmental management systems and standards, and of related changes in organizational structures. The latter include suitable adaptation of corporate strategy, philosophy, objectives, measures, and activities, as well as the need to integrate stakeholders in the adjustment process. The analysis shows that while companies are well-aware of the significance of sustainability for their industry, some tend to be leaders, and others laggards, as far as implementation is concerned.
A Study on Diffusion Pattern of Technology Convergence: Patent Analysis for Korea
Authors: Choi Jae , Jeong Seongkyoon , Kim Kyunam
Published: August 2015

Technology convergence indicates that technologies of different application areas are converted into a new and common unity of technology. Its range spans from inter-field, whereby technologies are converged between heterogeneous fields in homogeneous sector, to a wider inter-sector, whereby technologies belong to heterogeneous technology sector are converged. This paper determined the definition of technology convergence from previous literature and classified patents into technology category depending on patent information. Furthermore, we empirically measure technology convergence degree based on co-classification analysis and estimate its diffusion trend at the entire technology domain level by using overall 1,476,967 of patents filed to the KIPO (Korean Intellectual Property Office) from 1998 to 2010. As a result, potential size and growth rate of technology convergence are varied by both technology and type of technology convergence, i.e., inter-field and inter-sector technology convergence. Diffusion pattern of inter-sector technology convergence appears as the more various form than that of inter-field technology convergence. In a relationship between potential size and growth rate of technology convergence, growth rate of technology convergence is in inverse proportion to potential size of technology convergence in general. That is, the faster the growth rate of technology convergence, the smaller the potential size of technology convergence. In addition, this paper found that technology convergence of the instrument and chemistry sector is actively progressing in both inter-field and inter-sector convergence, while the technologies related to Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in electrical engineering sector have relatively mature progress of technology convergence, especially in inter-sector technology convergence.
Evaluation Framework for Alternative Fuel Vehicles: Sustainable Development Perspective
Authors: Chang Dong-Shang , Chen Sheng-Hung , Hsu Chia-Wei , Hu Allen , Tzeng Gwo-Hshiung
Published: August 2015

Road transport accounts for 72.06% of total transport CO2, which is considered a cause of climate change. At present, the use of alternative fuels has become a pressing issue and a significant number of automakers and scholars have devoted themselves to the study and subsequent development of alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs). The evaluation of AFVs should consider not only air pollution reduction and fuel efficiency but also AFV sustainability. In general, the field of sustainable development is subdivided into three areas: economic, environmental, and social. On the basis of the sustainable development perspective, this study presents an evaluation framework for AFVs by using the DEMATEL-based analytical network process. The results reveal that the five most important criteria are price, added value, user acceptance, reduction of hazardous substances, and dematerialization. Price is the most important criterion because it can improve the popularity of AFVs and affect other criteria, including user acceptance. Additional, the energy usage criterion is expected to significantly affect the sustainable development of AFVs. These results should be seriously considered by automakers and governments in developing AFVs.
Residence and Job Location Change Choice Behavior under Flooding and Cyclone Impacts in Bangladesh
Authors: Lu Linjun , Lu Qing-Chang , Rahman ABM
Published: August 2015

Climate change enters significantly into and is shown to be a direct determinant of residence and job location change decisions. Understanding of how people’s residence and job location change choice behavior is affected and thus responds to the impacts of climate change is essential for transportation planners and adaptation decision makers. As an addition to the current literature, the main purposes of this paper are to investigate people’s residence and job location change choice behavior affected by factors at origin and look into the behavioral differences between coastal and inland people under flooding and cyclone scenarios in Bangladesh. Questionnaire data were surveyed in 14 coastal and inland cities of Bangladesh with an orthogonal design of three flooding/cyclone scenarios. The multinomial Logit model and cross-nested Logit model are proposed to address the above purposes. Results of this study indicate that flooding/cyclone factors and income, land owned, and number of family members significantly affects people’s location change choice. In addition, coastal people are also significantly affected by previous experience factors. Furthermore, road connection plays an important role when people choose to change residence locations in coastal areas. It is also found that if there are changes in flooding impacts, the inland people will first consider to change their job locations, while the coastal people would consider both job and residence location changes. Results of this work provide policy suggestions on transportation infrastructure investment, shelter planning and construction, and population migration under flood and cyclone impacts as a result of climate change.
Influence of Sowing Times, Densities, and Soils to Biomass and Ethanol Yield of Sweet Sorghum
Authors: Xuan Tran , Phuong Nguyen , Khang Do , Khanh Tran
Published: August 2015

The use of biofuels helps to reduce the dependency on fossil fuels and therefore decreases CO2 emission. Ethanol mixed with gasoline in mandatory percentages has been used in many countries. However, production of ethanol mainly depends on food crops, commonly associated with problems such as governmental policies and social controversies. Sweet sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench) is one of the most potential and appropriate alternative crops for biofuel production because of its high biomass and sugar content, strong tolerance to environmental stress conditions and diseases, and wide adaptability to various soils and climates. The aim of this study was to select prospective varieties of sweet sorghum, optimum sowing times and densities to achieve high yields of ethanol production and to establish stable operational conditions in cultivating this crop. The summer-autumn cropping season combined with the sowing densities of 8.3–10.9 plant m−2 obtained the highest ethanol yield. Among cultivated locations, the soil with pH of 5.5 and contents of Al and Zn of 39.4 and 0.6 g kg−1, respectively, was the best condition to have an ethanol yield >5000 L ha−1. The pH ≥ 6.0 may be responsible for the significant reduction of zinc content in soils, which decreases both biomass of sweet sorghum and ethanol yield, while contents of N, P, K, organic carbon (OC) and cation exchange capacity (CEC), and Fe likely play no role. The cultivar 4A was the preferred candidate for ethanol production and resistant to pests and diseases, especially cut worm (Agrotis spp.).
Sustainable and Efficient Pathways for Bioenergy Recovery from Low-Value Process Streams via Bioelectrochemical Systems in Biorefineries
Authors: Borole Abhijeet
Published: August 2015

Conversion of biomass into bioenergy is possible via multiple pathways resulting in the production of biofuels, bioproducts, and biopower. Efficient and sustainable conversion of biomass, however, requires consideration of many environmental and societal parameters in order to minimize negative impacts. Integration of multiple conversion technologies and inclusion of upcoming alternatives, such as bioelectrochemical systems, can minimize these impacts via production of hydrogen, electricity or other forms of energy from the low value streams and improve conservation of resources, such as water and nutrients via recycle and reuse. This report outlines alternate pathways integrating microbial electrolysis in biorefinery schemes to improve energy efficiency, while evaluating environmental sustainability parameters.
Triggering of Erythrocyte Death by Triparanol
Authors: Officioso Arbace , Manna Caterina , Alzoubi Kousi , Lang Florian
Published: August 2015

The cholesterol synthesis inhibitor Triparanol has been shown to trigger apoptosis in several malignancies. Similar to the apoptosis of nucleated cells, erythrocytes may enter eryptosis, the suicidal death characterized by cell shrinkage and cell membrane scrambling with phosphatidylserine translocation to the erythrocyte surface. Triggers of eryptosis include oxidative stress which may activate erythrocytic Ca2+ permeable unselective cation channels with subsequent Ca2+ entry and increase of cytosolic Ca2+ activity ([Ca2+]i). The present study explored whether and how Triparanol induces eryptosis. To this end, phosphatidylserine exposure at the cell surface was estimated from annexin-V-binding, cell volume from forward scatter, hemolysis from hemoglobin release, [Ca2+]i from Fluo3-fluorescence, and ROS formation from 2’,7’-dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate (DCFDA) dependent fluorescence. As a result, a 48 h exposure of human erythrocytes to Triparanol (20 µM) significantly increased DCFDA fluorescence and significantly increased Fluo3-fluorescence. Triparanol (15 µM) significantly increased the percentage of annexin-V-binding cells, and significantly decreased the forward scatter. The effect of Triparanol on annexin-V-binding was significantly blunted, but not abolished by removal of extracellular Ca2+. In conclusion, Triparanol leads to eryptosis, the suicidal erythrocyte death characterized by cell shrinkage and phospholipid scrambling of the erythrocyte cell membrane. Triparanol is at least in part effective by stimulating ROS formation and Ca2+ entry.
New Structure Sheds Light on Selective HIV-1 Genomic RNA Packaging
Authors: Olson Erik , Cantara William , Musier-Forsyth Karin
Published: August 2015

Two copies of unspliced human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-1 genomic RNA (gRNA) are preferentially selected for packaging by the group-specific antigen (Gag) polyprotein into progeny virions as a dimer during the late stages of the viral lifecycle. Elucidating the RNA features responsible for selective recognition of the full-length gRNA in the presence of an abundance of other cellular RNAs and spliced viral RNAs remains an area of intense research. The recent nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) structure by Keane et al. [1] expands upon previous efforts to determine the conformation of the HIV-1 RNA packaging signal. The data support a secondary structure wherein sequences that constitute the major splice donor site are sequestered through base pairing, and a tertiary structure that adopts a tandem 3-way junction motif that exposes the dimerization initiation site and unpaired guanosines for specific recognition by Gag. While it remains to be established whether this structure is conserved in the context of larger RNA constructs or in the dimer, this study serves as the basis for characterizing large RNA structures using novel NMR techniques, and as a major advance toward understanding how the HIV-1 gRNA is selectively packaged.
Comparative Aspects of BRAF Mutations in Canine Cancers
Authors: Mochizuki Hiroyuki , Breen Matthew
Published: August 2015

Activating mutations of the BRAF gene lead to constitutive activation of the MAPK pathway. The characterization and discovery of BRAF mutations in a variety of human cancers has led to the development of specific inhibitors targeting the BRAF/MAPK pathway and dramatically changed clinical outcomes in BRAF-mutant melanoma patients. Recent discovery of BRAF mutation in canine cancers underscores the importance of MAPK pathway activation as an oncogenic molecular alteration evolutionarily conserved between species. A comparative approach using the domestic dog as a spontaneous cancer model will provide new insights into the dysregulation of BRAF/MAPK pathway in carcinogenesis and facilitate in vivo studies to evaluate therapeutic strategies targeting this pathway’s molecules for cancer therapy. The BRAF mutation in canine cancers may also represent a molecular marker and therapeutic target in veterinary oncology. This review article summarizes the current knowledge on BRAF mutations in human and canine cancers and discusses the potential applications of this abnormality in veterinary oncology.
DYNAMIC RESPONSE OF A 190M-HIGH TRANSMISSION TOWER FOR A LARGE RIVER CROSSING
Authors: FADEL MIGUEL Leandro Fleck , KAMINSKI Jr. João , MIGUEL Letícia Fleck Fadel , RIERA Jorge Daniel , de MENEZES Ruy Carlos Ramos
Published: August 2015

The construction of a double circuit 500kV transmission line (TL) in the Brazilian Amazon region is currently in progress. In addition to its length within the rain forest, the TL had to overcome large river crossings and environ­mental constrains. Among them, the crossing of the Trombetas River is one of the most important, with a total length of more than 5100 m. The proposed design includes two 190 m high towers necessary to attain spans as long as 1600 m. Additionally, the towers had to be supported by concrete columns, 10 m above ground level, due to the annual flood­ing of the river bed. These structures demand a detailed assessment, since the design required long-span conductors and tall structures that are outside the range normally considered in codes. In this context, the present article describes the dynamic analysis of the complete TL segment for this crossing, with emphasis on the response of the 190 m-high main structure which is subjected to Extended Pressure Systems and Thunderstorm wind loads, as well as cable rupture. The entire TL crossing is modelled, including the two highest towers and all other elements. The responses determined by such approach are then compared to values obtained by standard practice.
Ampliación del rango altitudinal de Marmosa lepida (Thomas, 1888) (Didelphimorphia: Didelphidae) en el sureste de Ecuador
Authors: Brito Jorge , Pozo-Zamora Glenda
Published: August 2015

La raposa chica radiante Marmosa lepida es el marsupial más pequeño dentro del género y uno de los menos conocidos y estudiados a nivel de historia natural. En una expedición desarrollada a la cordillera de Kutukú al suroriente de Ecuador, se colectó un ejemplar macho adulto mientras descendía de un árbol. La información aquí presentada amplía el rango altitudinal a 1581 msnm en la cresta de la cordillera de Kutukú, y representa la sexta localidad documentada para Ecuador. La dificultad de registro de varios pequeños mamíferos con métodos convencionales dificulta el conocimiento de la distribución de numerosas especies poco conocidas y por ende la aplicación de medidas de acción para la conservación.
Using Attack Graphs to Analyze Social Engineering Threats
Authors: Beckers Kristian , Krautsevich Leanid , Yautsiukhin Artsiom
Published: August 2015

The acquisition of information about computer systems by mostly non-technical means is called social engineering. Most critical systems are vulnerable to social threats, even when technical security is high. Social engineering is a technique that: (i) does not require any (advanced) technical tools, (ii) can be used by anyone, (iii) is cheap, (iv) almost impossible to eliminate completely. The integration of social engineering attackers with other attackers, such as software or network ones, is missing so far. Existing research focuses on classifying and analyzing social engineering attacks. The authors' contribution is to consider social engineering exploits together with technical vulnerabilities. The authors introduce a method for the integration of social engineering exploits into attack graphs and propose a simple quantitative analysis of the graphs that helps to develop a comprehensive defensive strategy.
Assessing the Usefulness of Testing for Validating and Correcting Security Risk Models Based on Two Industrial Case Studies
Authors: Erdogan Gencer , Seehusen Fredrik , Stølen Ketil , Hofstad Jon , Aagedal Jan Øyvind
Published: August 2015

The authors present the results of an evaluation in which the objective was to assess how useful testing is for validating and correcting security risk models. The evaluation is based on two industrial case studies. In the first case study the authors analyzed a multilingual financial Web application, while in the second case study they analyzed a mobile financial application. In both case studies, the testing yielded new information which was not found in the risk assessment phase. In particular, in the first case study, new vulnerabilities were found which resulted in an update of the likelihood values of threat scenarios and risks in the risk model. New vulnerabilities were also identified and added to the risk model in the second case study. These updates led to more accurate risk models, which indicate that the testing was indeed useful for validating and correcting the risk models.
Request and Response Analysis Framework for Mitigating Clickjacking Attacks
Authors: Shahriar Hossain , Haddad Hisham , Devendran Vamshee Krishna
Published: August 2015

This paper addresses the detection of clickjacking attacks, which is an emerging web application security issue. The authors propose a web application request and response page analysis framework to detect clickjacking attacks. Their framework considers not only inspects visual features related to frame, JavaScript code pattern in details to match with known attack signatures. The proposed approach is able to detect advanced clickjacking attacks such as cursorjacking, double click, and history object-based attacks. The authors evaluate the proposed approach with a set of legitimate and malicious websites. The results indicate that their approach has low false positive and false negative rates. The overhead imposed by the proposed approach is negligible.
An Alternative Threat Model-based Approach for Security Testing
Authors: Falah Bouchaib , Akour Mohammed , Oukemeni Samia
Published: August 2015

In modern interaction, web applications has gained more and more popularity, which leads to a significate growth of exposure to malicious users and vulnerability attacks. This causes organizations and companies to lose valuable information and suffer from bad reputation. One of the effective mitigation practices is to perform security testing against the application before release it to the market. This solution won't protect web application 100% but it will test the application against malicious codes and reduce the high number of potential attacks on web application. One of known security testing approach is threat modeling, which provides an efficient technique to identify threats that can compromise system security. The authors proposed method, in this paper, focuses on improving the effectiveness of the categorization of threats by using Open 10 Web Application Security Project's (OWASP) that are the most critical web application security risks in generating threat trees in order to cover widely known security attacks.
Interaction of Macrophage Antigen 1 and CD40 Ligand Leads to IL-12 Production and Resistance in CD40-Deficient Mice Infected with Leishmania major
Authors: Okwor Ifeoma , Jia Ping , Uzonna Jude E.
Published: August 2015

Although some studies indicate that the interaction of CD40 and CD40L is critical for IL-12 production and resistance to cutaneous leishmaniasis, others suggest that this pathway may be dispensable. In this article, we compared the outcome of Leishmania major infection in both CD40- and CD40L-deficient mice after treatment with rIL-12. We show that although CD40 and CD40L knockout (KO) mice are highly susceptible to L. major, treatment with rIL-12 during the first 2 wk of infection causes resolution of cutaneous lesions and control of parasite replication. Interestingly, although treated CD40 KO mice remained healed, developed long-term immunity, and were resistant to secondary L. major challenge, treated CD40L KO reactivated their lesion after cessation of rIL-12 treatment. Disease reactivation in CD40L KO mice was associated with impaired IL-12 and IFN-γ production and a concomitant increase in IL-4 production by cells from lymph nodes draining the infection site. We show that IL-12 production by dendritic cells and macrophages via CD40L–macrophage Ag 1 (Mac-1) interaction is responsible for the sustained resistance in CD40 KO mice after cessation of rIL-12 treatment. Blockade of CD40L–Mac-1 interaction with anti–Mac-1 mAb led to spontaneous disease reactivation in healed CD40 KO mice, which was associated with impaired IFN-γ response and loss of infection-induced immunity after secondary L. major challenge. Collectively, our data reveal a novel role of CD40L–Mac-1 interaction in IL-12 production, development, and maintenance of optimal Th1 immunity in mice infected with L. major.
Physical activity in elderly
Authors: Cvecka Jan , Tirpakova Veronika , Sedliak Milan , Kern Helmut , Mayr Winfried , Hamar Dušan
Published: August 2015

Aging is a multifactorial irreversible process associated with significant decline in muscle mass and neuromuscular functions. One of the most efficient methods to counteract age-related changes in muscle mass and function is physical exercise. An alternative effective intervention to improve muscle structure and performance is electrical stimulation. In the present work we present the positive effects of physical activity in elderly and a study where the effects of a 8-week period of functional electrical stimulation and strength training with proprioceptive stimulation in elderly are compared.
Universal linear motor driven Leg Press Dynamometer and concept of Serial Stretch Loading
Authors: Hamar Dušan
Published: August 2015

Paper deals with backgrounds and principles of universal linear motor driven leg press dynamometer and concept of serial stretch loading. The device is based on two computer controlled linear motors mounted to the horizontal rails. As the motors can keep either constant resistance force in selected position or velocity in both directions, the system allows simulation of any mode of muscle contraction. In addition, it also can generate defined serial stretch stimuli in a form of repeated force peaks. This is achieved by short segments of reversed velocity (in concentric phase) or acceleration (in eccentric phase). Such stimuli, generated at the rate of 10 Hz, have proven to be a more efficient means for the improvement of rate of the force development. This capability not only affects performance in many sports, but also plays a substantial role in prevention of falls and their consequences. Universal linear motor driven and computer controlled dynamometer with its unique feature to generate serial stretch stimuli seems to be an efficient and useful tool for enhancing strength training effects on neuromuscular function not only in athletes, but as well as in senior population and rehabilitation patients.
Effects of Munari powder on physical and sensory-motor parameters: a preliminary report
Authors: Sarabon Nejc
Published: August 2015

Munari powder is broadly used in physical medicine and rehabilitation to decrease pain and help normalize sensory-motor function. It operates as TPRV1 agonist and “stops” generation of action potentials in pain nerve fibers. This is a short report of a pilot study on 20 subjects. Every subject underwent four visits to our laboratory, where the Munari applications and related measurements of its effects took place. Each of the healthy adults received the following applications: (1) placebo, i.e. 0% cayenne pepper mixture, consisting only of water and kaolin, (2) weak, i.e. 2.5% cayenne pepper mixture, (3) medium, i.e. 5.0% cayenne pepper mixture, and (4) strong, i.e. 10% cayenne pepper mixture. The assessments were carried out before the Munari powder patch application, right after the application, and 15 and 30 min after the termination of the 20-minute Munari powder patch application. We measured subjective cold/hot feeling on visual analogue scale, blood pressure, body temperature, skin light touch sensations, sense for two-point discrimination, and pain threshold to the mechanical stimulus. Besides these tests, maximal voluntary force during isometric trunk extension and the sitting balance test were performed. The preliminary results indicate that the 5% concentration of cayenne pepper mixture is the best choice because no additional effects were observed with the 10% concentration and the effects are higher than with 2.5% concentration. Whether this will be also thrue for the patients suffering pain ought to be determined.
The Ejtm Specials “Mobility in Elderly”
Authors: Kern Helmut , Jakubiec-Puka Anna , Carraro Ugo
Published: August 2015

Not available.
The hydrogeochemistry of the Keno Hill area, Yukon Territory
Authors: Gleeson C F , Boyle R W
Published: August 2015

The hydrogeochemistry of the Keno Hill area, Yukon is discussed in terms of the statistical treatment of analytical data obtained on 739 stream and 172 spring water samples. The surface and spring waters are S04-HC03 waters dominated mainly by the presence of Ca
and Mg with small amounts of Fe, Na, K, and Mn. Some surface and spring waters are characterized by relatively high contents of Zn. Moving average - residual element maps show that high values for so4, CXM (cold extractable metal), and SO 4/Cl in the waters from the area outline the zones containing
Pb -Zn-Ag deposits and pyritiferous rocks. The distribution of Cl in the waters exhibits no relationship to the known mineral deposits. Relatively high Cl contents correlate mainly with the presence of limestone and dolomite units. Spring waters that leach the known siderite-sulphide lodes exhibit
appreciably higher geometric means for various constituents including HCO 3, SO 4, SiO 2, F, and various cations, particularly Zn, compared with the spring waters in the region as a whole. They also have a higher pH but lower Cu contents. Springs exhibiting relatively high values in their anionic
and cationic content may be reflecting hidden mineral deposits, and their source areas should be thoroughly prospected.
Geological Survey of Canada Radiocarbon Dates XX
Authors: Lowdon J A , Blake W
Published: August 2015

This list includes 121 radiocarbon age determinations on 112 geological samples made by the Radiocarbon Dating Laboratory. They are on samples from various areas as fallows: Newfoundland (2); Labrador ( 1); Nova Scotia ( 1); New Brunswick (2); Quebec ( 14);
Ontario (6); Saskatchewan (1); Alberta ( 1); British Columbia (18); Yukon Territory ( 12); Northwest Territories, Mainland ( 12); Northwest Territories, Arctic Archipelago ( 43); Svalbard (8). Age determinations on archeological samples are as fallows: Labrador ( 1); Ontario ( l); British Columbia
(2). Details of background and standard for the 2 L and 5 L counters during the period from October 3, 1979 to November 4, 1980 are summarized in Tables 1 and 2; Table 3 gives the number of counts used to determine the average background and standard counting rates; and Table 4 lists the number of
different background and standard gas preparations used for counting.
Geological and tectonic framework of eastern Canada as interpreted from potential field imagery
Authors: Woodside J M , Verhoef J
Published: August 2015

Recent compilation of all gravity and magnetic data for the eastern Canadian region, onshore and offshore, provides an unprecedented perspective on its geological framework. Classification of the region into domains, based on similarities in pattern and trends of
gravity and magnetic data, indicates geological affinities within structural provinces and tectonic relationships between geological domains. There is a commonality of characteristics among boundaries between provinces of different ages. Selected transects across the region, using published or
recent multichannel seismic reflection and seismic refraction data, and gravity models for subsurface information elsewhere, illustrate these distinguishing characteristics and the crustal structure in the different provinces. The structural characteristics of the continental margin and
ocean-continent boundary, which are of specific interest from a scientific and economic point of view, depend on the various modes of formation. Thus characteristics change with the amount of continental stretching and according to whether the initial break, leading to formation of an ocean, is a
rift or a shear zone.
Stratigraphy and sedimentology of the Lower Cretaceous Hulcross and Boulder Creek formations, northeastern British Columbia
Authors: Gibson D W
Published: August 2015

The Hulcross and Boulder Creek formations of the Rocky Mountain Foothills of northeastern British Columbia represent one of several marine to nonmarine transgressive/ regressive elastic wedges of the Late Jurassic-Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway.
The Middle Albian Hulcross Formation, up to 220 m thick, consists of siltstone, mudstone, shale and sandstone, with as many as 21 tonstein/ bentonite claystone layers. The overlying Middle to Upper Albian Boulder Creek Formation, up to 146 m thick, is divided into two members. The Cadotte Member
(lower) is composed predominantly of sandstone and conglomerate. The overlying Walton Creek Member comprises conglomerate, sandstone, siltstone, mudstone/ shale, several paleosols and, locally, up to seven seams of coals. The two formations grade northward into marine strata of the Hasler /
Shaftesbury formations and southward into nonmarine, coal-bearing strata of the Gates Formation.
Most strata of the Hulcross Formation were deposited in an open marine, shelf environment. However, in the southern Foothills, the strata are diagnostic of an estuary or restricted, shallow water, coastal embayment with tidal flats, tidal channels, and/ or tidal creeks. Strata of the Cadotte Member
were deposited in a lower to upper shoreface environment with local, well developed, fluvial and / or tidal channels. Strata of the Walton Creek Member were deposited in a predominantly nonmarine, lower coastal plain and/ or alluvial plain environment, subjected to long intervals of subaerial
exposure. In the northern area around the Pine and Sukunka rivers, the Walton Creek Member contains evidence of deposition in a lower coastal plain estuary or restricted coastal embayment.
XML (almost) all the way
Authors: Flynn Peter
Published: August 2015

In 2006 my university academic IT support group was approached by an academic colleague wanting to start a new journal, which would be available in electronic form only. There were restrictions imposed by the technical capabilities of the pool of authors, the requirements of the discipline, and — unsurprisingly — the lack of financial resources.

The decision was made to implement a system using only open source software, and building largely from scratch, as the existing open source journal publishing systems at the time, although comprehensive and well-established, were seen as far too large and complex for the task.

This paper is a case study describing the process and explaining the background to the decisions made. It attempts to draw some conclusions about the technical viability of creating a small-scale publishing system which attempted to retain XML throughout the workflow, and about the human factors which influenced the decisions.
MML: Multi Markup Language — When one markup language just isn’t enough
Authors: Lee David A.
Published: August 2015

The fundamental arguments in the “XML” vs “JSON” “Debate/War” are irrelevant. True, XML can be extremely complicated and bloated for what should be a simple task. True, JSON lacks native support for mixed content, complex types, and is difficult to hand edit. In complex environments it is necessary to exploit the advantages of each format and to mitigate the weaknesses of each. Using as an example a multi-year ongoing project of authoring and managing the lifecycle of a particular document type, I will demonstrate how very minor differences in markup style, ironically differences intentional designed into JSON specifically as a counterpoint to XML “complexity” make a huge impact on the ability of software to assist in the editing process, and equally for humans to accurately author and modify even small documents. These little things — added together — make even “well formedness” validation impossible, useless, or worse — a valid document that is structurally different than what it appears.

I propose to solve this problem with “MML”; a hybrid approach for multi markup documents. “MML” allows multiple “Native Markup” variants of the same document to co-exist. Simple transformations can produce variants of the document suitable for different tooling including JSON and XML formats, each of which is syntactically valid for the specific markup language. This is critical for early error detection and integration with existing tools.
Applying intertextual semantics to Cyberjustice
Authors: Marcoux Yves
Published: August 2015

We report on a project consisting in the application of the Intertextual Semantics modeling method (IS; Marcoux 2006, Marcoux & Rizkallah 2007a, Marcoux & Rizkallah 2009) to a particular type of legal document: the “Agreement as to the conduct of the proceedings,” used in the Province de Québec (Canada). This was done as a sub-project of the Towards Cyberjustice project in the Faculty of Law at Université de Montréal. One of the project objectives was to verify whether the availability of a semantic model of a document type (more precisely, a IS model) would impact on (and hopefully help) the development of an application for the collaborative authoring of such documents. We first explain how the project lead to many extensions to the then existing rudimentary IS platform (Marcoux 2009), and describe the most important of them. We then present a few unforeseen difficulties that arose in the process of modeling, and the lessons learned. Although no definite answer was obtained as to whether IS can directly help in the development of applications, the project showed it can at least help indirectly, by forcing fundamental questions to be asked early on in the process. In our case, applying IS modeling revealed that nobody really knew from the outset what the target community was, nor what their actual needs were. This is a good illustration of the kind of effect IS can have on application development projects: making sure fundamental questions do not go unasked too long.
XML Solutions for Swedish Farmers
Authors: Nordström Ari
Published: August 2015

The Federation of Swedish Farmers – LRF - provides its 170,000 members with a web-based service to check compliance with existing state and EU farming regulations. These checklists are also made available as a nightly produced generic checklist document with more than 130 pages, and individualised checklists for registered members.

This paper is a case study describing the XML-based system used to author, manage and publish content. The system consists of the eXist-DB, coupled with oXygen Author, used for edit, store and process the contents of the checklists and their related contents, including publishing them as PDFs and exporting them to a SQL database in charge of member registration, feeding the website, and various other tasks. The solution includes step-by-step processing of the various types of information in eXist, based on XQuery and XSLT. The system also uses XInclude modularisation, an extended XLink linkbase, as well as other markup technologies. The system currently handles a yearly volume of more than 40,000 PDF documents and many more than that in the web-based forms.
XQuery as a data integration language
Authors: Rennau Hans-Jürgen , Grün Christian
Published: August 2015

The appropriateness of the XQuery language for data integration is explored. The starting point is an assessment of integration capabilities in an XML-only environment. The next step is an evaluation of the degree to which one may extend these capabilities to heterogeneous environments with multiple media types and various data access protocols. This leads to the identification of a key challenge, which is the structured representation of non-XML data formats by items of the XQuery data model. The current support for such representation is reviewed, and a conceptual base is proposed for modeling the relationship between data model items and instances of non-XML formats. As special facets of data integration, the roles of REST and RDF in XQuery-based integration are discussed, and general limitations of XQuery as an integration language are acknowledged.
Accounting for Context in Markup: Which Situation, Whose Semantics?
Authors: Wickett Karen M.
Published: August 2015

Situation semantics - as developed by Barwise and Perry - is a general theory of meaning for natural language, and can be used to understand the role of context in markup semantics. While the notion of a discourse situation provides many of the right hooks for accounting for contextual assignment of meaning to markup structures, there are still many open questions. One critical issue is that situation semantics itself is open enough to allow many different approaches to identifying the relevant discourse situation. Three core types of discourse situations for descriptive markup - documentary, transport, and discovery - lead to distinct features in the discourse situations connected to those scenarios. Beyond developing a fuller picture of the discourse situations that shape the meaning of markup, this exercise lays groundwork for the full analysis of the assignment of meaning to metadata records.
Encoding Western and Non-Western Names for Ancient Syriac Authors
Authors: Gibson Nathan P. , Salesky Winona , Michelson David A.
Published: August 2015

One of the major digital challenges of the Syriaca.org research project has been to encode and visualize personal names of authors in Middle Eastern languages (especially Syriac and Arabic). TEI-XML and HTML are digital standards for the encoding and visualization of cultural heritage data and have features for encoding names and displaying Middle Eastern languages. Because these formats were developed primarily for Western cultural data, however, representing our non-Western data in these formats has required complex adaptation particularly in regard to marking up name parts, customizing search algorithms, displaying bidirectional text, and displaying Syriac text with embedded fonts. These requirements have led us to develop small-scale systems that may be of use to other cultural heritage preservation projects involving names for ancient and, especially, non-Western entities.
Introducing The UK National Archives Digital Records Metadata Vocabulary
Authors: Walpole Robert
Published: August 2015

This paper describes the context and rationale for developing a new metadata vocabulary for digital records at the UK National Archives as part of the Digital Records Infrastructure project. It describes the specific requirements for metadata in relation to digital records and the evolution of an approach to modelling this metadata which is based on Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) Metadata Terms and RDF/XML as a markup solution. It will demonstrate not only how this solution meets the archival requirements but also enables powerful new ways of searching records and linking them to other information sources.
Surveillance Potential of Non-Native Hawaiian Birds for Detection of West Nile Virus
Authors: Hofmeister Erik K. , Dusek Robert J. , Brand Christopher J.
Published: August 2015

West Nile virus (WNV) was first detected in North America in 1999. Alaska and Hawaii (HI) remain the only U.S. states in which transmission of WNV has not been detected. Dead bird surveillance has played an important role in the detection of the virus geographically, as well as temporally. In North America, corvids have played a major role in WNV surveillance; however, the only corvid in HI is the endangered Hawaiian crow that exists only in captivity, thus precluding the use of this species for WNV surveillance in HI. To evaluate the suitability of alternate avian species for WNV surveillance, we experimentally challenged seven abundant non-native bird species present in HI with WNV and compared mortality, viremia, oral shedding of virus, and seroconversion. For detection of WNV in oral swabs, we compared viral culture, reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction, and the RAMP® test. For detection of antibodies to WNV, we compared an indirect and a competitive enzyme-linked immunoassay. We found four species (house sparrow, house finch, Japanese white-eye, and Java sparrow) that may be useful in dead bird surveillance for WNV; while common myna, zebra dove, and spotted dove survived infection and may be useful in serosurveillance.
Complex Type 2 Reactions in Three Patients with Hansen's Disease from a Southern United States Clinic
Authors: Leon Kristoffer E. , Salinas Jorge L. , McDonald Robert W. , Sheth Anandi N. , Fairley Jessica K.
Published: August 2015

In non-endemic countries, leprosy, or Hansen's disease (HD), remains rare and is often underrecognized. Consequently, the literature is currently lacking in clinical descriptions of leprosy complications in the United States. Immune-mediated inflammatory states known as reactions are common complications of HD. Type 1 reactions are typical of borderline cases and occur in 30% of patients and present as swelling and inflammation of existing skin lesions, neuritis, and nerve dysfunction. Type 2 reactions are systemic events that occur at the lepromatous end of the disease spectrum, and typical symptoms include fever, arthralgias, neuritis, and classic painful erythematous skin nodules known as erythema nodosum leprosum. We report three patients with lepromatous leprosy seen at a U.S. HD clinic with complicated type 2 reactions. The differences in presentations and clinical courses highlight the complexity of the disease and the need for increased awareness of unique manifestations of lepromatous leprosy in non-endemic areas.
Successful Treatment of Chromobacterium violaceum Sepsis in a South Indian Adult
Authors: Madi Deepak R. , Vidyalakshmi K. , Ramapuram John , Shetty Avinash K.
Published: August 2015

Infection due to Chromobacterium violaceum is rare. Diagnosis may be delayed since Chromobacterium sepsis may mimic melioidosis, especially in melioidosis-endemic areas. Management of Chromobacterium infection is challenging given the propensity of this pathogen to cause visceral abscesses, drug resistance, and relapse. Mortality rates are high despite treatment. We report a case of C. violaceum septicemia in an immunocompetent adult from south India, who was successfully treated with combination antibiotic therapy. Physicians in tropical and subtropical regions must be aware of C. violaceum infection as it can mimic melioidosis.
The Effects of Tai Chi on Cardiovascular Risk in Women
Authors: Robins Jo Lynne , Elswick R. K. , Sturgill Jamie , McCain Nancy L.
Published: August 2015

Purpose.

This study examined the effects of tai chi (TC) on biobehavioral factors associated with cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk in women.

Design.

A randomized trial used a wait-list control group, pretest-posttest design. Data were collected immediately before, immediately after, and 2 months following the intervention.

Setting.

The study was community based in central Virginia.

Subjects.

Women aged 35 to 50 years at increased risk for CVD.

Intervention.

The 8-week intervention built on prior work and was designed to impact biobehavioral factors associated with CVD risk in women.

Measures.

Biological measures included fasting glucose, insulin, and lipids as well as C-reactive protein and cytokines. Behavioral measures included fatigue, perceived stress, depressive symptoms, social support, mindfulness, self-compassion, and spiritual thoughts and behaviors.

Analysis.

A mixed effects linear model was used to test for differences between groups across time.

Results.

In 63 women, TC was shown to decrease fatigue (∂ [difference in group means] = 9.38, p = .001) and granulocyte colony stimulating factor (∂ = 12.61, p = .052). Consistent with the study model and intervention design, significant changes observed 2 months post intervention indicated that TC may help down-regulate proinflammatory cytokines associated with underlying CVD risk, including interferon gamma (∂ = 149.90, p = .002), tumor necrosis factor (∂ = 16.78, p = .002), interleukin (IL) 8 (∂ = 6.47, p = .026), and IL-4 (∂ = 2.13, p = .001), and may increase mindfulness (∂ = .54, p = .021), spiritual thoughts and behaviors (∂ = 8.30, p = .009), and self-compassion (∂ = .44, p = .045).

Conclusion.

This study contributes important insights into the potential benefits and mechanisms of TC and, with further research, may ultimately lead to effective strategies for reducing CVD risk in women earlier in the CVD trajectory.