bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
High step‐up three level boost converter with inverse characteristic
Authors: Li Fei , Ji Suyun , Geng Ning , Yang Jing , Liang Shanshan , Liu Lin , Yue Zengwei , Gao Peng , Xue Qicheng , Liu Xinghua , Zhu Feng , Sun Xuefeng , Yao Yu
Published: September 2018

This paper presents a novel magnetically coupled dual switches three level dc–dc converter with high‐voltage boost and reduced power device voltage stress ability. The topology can achieve high‐voltage boost ability by using coupled inductor and low MOSFET voltage stress by using three‐level idea. However, unlike other high step‐up three level converters, its gain is increased by reducing turns ratio. The name inverse is used for representing the inverse proportion principle of the proposed converter. Aiming at existing leakage inductance, introduced diode and capacitor circuit not only absorbs the leakage energy but also further boosts the gain. In addition, the proposed converter only utilises one magnetic core. Operating principles and relevant theoretical analysis of the proposed converter are described. In order to verify the proposed converter's performance, the relevant experiment is performed.
Capacity guaranteed control method for air conditioning cluster joining power grid frequency regulation
Authors: Li Zihao , Wu Wenchuan , Zhang Boming , Tai Xue
Published: September 2018

For the thermal inertia of houses and buildings, air conditioning (AC) cluster shows the potential in load frequency control. In this study, the authors propose a complete control framework for friendly accepting ACs to participate in secondary frequency regulation service without causing discomfort. An aggregator is hired to continually estimate the regulation capacity of ACs cluster by a heuristic simulated search algorithm, which could be guaranteed in a given duration. The external characteristics of the AC aggregations are set like a virtual power plant, which takes a droop curve for primary frequency control and a translation character for secondary frequency control. Simulation shows the capability for AC aggregations in load frequency control.
Electric load data characterising and forecasting based on trend index and auto‐encoders
Authors: Lu Shixiang , Lin Guoying , Que Huakun , Chen Liang , Liu Hanlin , Ye Chengjin , Yi Ding
Published: September 2018

Electricity consumption data are collected more frequently by high‐quality meters in smart grids. Therefore, the load data volume and length increase dramatically. On the other hand, for advanced market‐based applications, e.g. demand response, load service entities hope to identify or classify users better. In this study, a trend‐based load characterising approach is proposed. Firstly, the concept of the candlestick chart is utilised as an innovative tool for load description. In addition, electricity trend indexes, e.g. stochastic oscillator and moving average convergence/divergence, are introduced as parameters for load characterising. Secondly, the stacked auto‐encoders are utilised to forecast the future load based on the input historical trend indexes. Case studies in Guangdong province demonstrate that the proposed trend‐based method is more applicable than existing approaches both in physical significance and accuracy.
Multi‐criterion integrated method for low‐frequency oscillation‐type identification
Authors: Sun Ming , Chen Lei , Xu Xialing , Min Yong , Xu Youping , Li Kai
Published: September 2018

Low‐frequency oscillation is one of the major threats to power system security. Online analysis and control decision system for low‐frequency oscillation is in urgent need. Natural oscillation and forced oscillation are two types of low‐frequency oscillation. Different oscillation types need different treatment measures. Thus oscillation‐type identification is an important part of the defense system. A new multi‐criteria integrated method for identifying low‐frequency oscillation type is proposed. It has multiple criteria and overcomes the shortcomings of the previous single‐criterion method which has low accuracy. It chooses harmonic content, characteristic index of starting oscillation waveform, and the startup‐stage intrinsic damping ratio together with noise response damping ratio as criteria. The flowchart of the method is provided. The effectiveness of the multi‐criteria integrated method is verified by real‐power grid simulation cases. The results show that the method can reliably distinguish the low‐frequency oscillation type and is practical in the real‐power system.
Impact of inter-correlated initial binary parameters on double black hole and neutron star mergers
Authors: Klencki J. , Moe M. , Gladysz W. , Chruslinska M. , Holz D. E. , Belczynski K.
Published: September 2018

The distributions of the initial main-sequence binary parameters are one of the key ingredients in obtaining evolutionary predictions for compact binary (BH–BH/BH–NS/NS–NS) merger rates. Until now, such calculations were done under the assumption that initial binary parameter distributions were independent. For the first time, we implement empirically derived inter-correlated distributions of initial binary parameters primary mass (M1), mass ratio (q), orbital period (P), and eccentricity (e). Unexpectedly, the introduction of inter-correlated initial binary parameters leads to only a small decrease in the predicted merger rates by a factor of ≲2–3 relative to the previously used non-correlated initial distributions. The formation of compact object mergers in the isolated classical binary evolution favours initial binaries with stars of comparable masses (q ≈ 0.5–1) at intermediate orbital periods (log P (days) = 2–4). New distributions slightly shift the mass ratios towards lower values with respect to the previously used flat q distribution, which is the dominant effect decreasing the rates. New orbital periods (∼1.3 more initial systems within log P (days) = 2–4), together with new eccentricities (higher), only negligibly increase the number of progenitors of compact binary mergers. Additionally, we discuss the uncertainty of merger rate predictions associated with possible variations of the massive-star initial mass function (IMF). We argue that evolutionary calculations should be normalized to a star formation rate (SFR) that is obtained from the observed amount of UV light at wavelength 1500 Å (an SFR indicator). In this case, contrary to recent reports, the uncertainty of the IMF does not affect the rates by more than a factor of ∼2. Any change to the IMF slope for massive stars requires a change of SFR in a way that counteracts the impact of IMF variations on compact object merger rates. In contrast, we suggest that the uncertainty in cosmic SFR at low metallicity can be a significant factor at play.
Convergence of discrete and continuous unilateral flows for Ambrosio–Tortorelli energies and application to mechanics
Authors: Almi S. , Belz S. , Negri M.
Published: September 2018

We study the convergence of an alternate minimization scheme for a Ginzburg–Landau phase-field model of fracture. This algorithm is characterized by the lack of irreversibility constraints in the minimization of the phase-field variable; the advantage of this choice, from a computational stand point, is in the efficiency of the numerical implementation. Irreversibility is then recovereda posterioriby a simple pointwise truncation. We exploit a time discretization procedure, with either a one-step or a multi (or infinite)-step alternate minimization algorithm. We prove that the time-discrete solutions converge to a unilateralL2-gradient flow with respect to the phase-field variable, satisfying equilibrium of forces and energy identity. Convergence is proved in the continuous (Sobolev space) setting and in a discrete (finite element) setting, with any stopping criterion for the alternate minimization scheme. Numerical results show that the multi-step scheme is both more accurate and faster. It provides indeed good simulations for a large range of time increments, while the one-step scheme gives comparable results only for very small time increments.
Alain Badiou’s New Constructivism and Universalism
Authors: Calcagno Antonio
Published: September 2018

French philosopher Alain Badiou (b. 1937) is one of the more important European thinkers to emerge after May 1968. His work may be read as a response to the structuralism, post-structuralism, existentialism, and postmodern thought characteristic of post-World War II French theory. Through the use of set theory, he argues that our understanding of reality is largely determined by major, world shifting events in politics, mathematics/science, aesthetics/poetry, and love. A Maoist, he maintains that true changes in human reality require decisive interventions that create a new sense of temporality, subjectivity, and order. Events radically change the order of an existing world and create new worlds. For example, the Russian or French revolutions brought an end to absolutist monarchies and the rule that were specific to them. A new order and form of political power were introduced by the ascendant regimes. The sense of who and what human beings living under such regimes were changed from that of subject to citizen. The idea of subjects being absolutely ruled and determined by divine monarchs only responsible to God and themselves would no longer be possible as a legitimate form of political rule. The contents and relations constitutive of a world come to be structured by the event, though the worlds regimented by an event are never identical to the event itself. The event always lies outside, though it conditions, the sets of relations and contents that express it. His work is often read in conjunction with and in opposition to the philosopher Jacques Rancière. Both thinkers form part of what is seen as the new constructivism and universalism.
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak: Relevance for Communication Studies
Authors: Shome Raka
Published: September 2018

Gayatri Spivak is one of the foremost intellectuals of the 20th and 21st centuries. Although a literary critic, her work can be seen as philosophical as it is concerned with how to develop a transnational ethical responsibility to the radical “other,” who cannot be accessed by our discursive (and thus institutionalized) regimes of knowledge. Regarded as a leading postcolonial theorist, Spivak is probably best seen as a postcolonial Marxist feminist theorist, although she herself does not feel comfortable with rigid academic labeling. Her work is significantly influenced by the deconstructionist impulses of Jacques Derrida. Additionally, the influence of Gramsci and Marx is prominent in her thinking.

Spivak’s work has consistently called attention to the logics of imperialism that inform texts in the West, including in Western feminist scholarship. Relatedly, she has also written significantly on how the nation, in attempting to represent the entirety of a population, cannot access otherness or radical alterity. This is best seen in her work on the subaltern and in her intervention into the famous Indian group of Subaltern Studies scholars. Other related foci of her work have been on comprehending translation as a transnational cultural politics, and what it means to develop a transnational ethics of literacy.
Fake News
Authors: Kalsnes Bente
Published: September 2018

Fake news is not new, but the American presidential election in 2016 placed the phenomenon squarely onto the international agenda. Manipulation, disinformation, falseness, rumors, conspiracy theories—actions and behaviors that are frequently associated with the term—have existed as long as humans have communicated. Nevertheless, new communication technologies have allowed for new ways to produce, distribute, and consume fake news, which makes it harder to differentiate what information to trust. Fake news has typically been studied along four lines: Characterization, creation, circulation, and countering. How to characterize fake news has been a major concern in the research literature, as the definition of the term is disputed. By differentiating between intention and facticity, researchers have attempted to study different types of false information. Creation concerns the production of fake news, often produced with either a financial, political, or social motivation. The circulation of fake news refers to the different ways false information has been disseminated and amplified, often through communication technologies such as social media and search engines. Lastly, countering fake news addresses the multitude of approaches to detect and combat fake news on different levels, from legal, financial, and technical aspects to individuals’ media and information literacy and new fact-checking services.
Dual Process Models of Persuasion
Authors: Luttrell Andrew
Published: September 2018

Issues of attitudes and attitude change are the foundation of many social processes. Psychologists have long sought to understand people’s opinions and evaluations and many studies have sought to understand how, why, and when those attitudes change in the face of persuasive communication. Early persuasion research identified many variables that influence the effectiveness of persuasive messages. These variables include characteristics of the communicator, the recipient, and the message itself. Over the years, however, the evidence for these influences became rather mixed, prompting a new generation of persuasion psychologists to ask whether there was a sensible pattern underlying it.

This question ushered in several new approaches to thinking about persuasion. These “dual process” models proposed key moderators, identifying the conditions under which certain variables would and would not produce attitude change. A particularly influential model has been the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM), which proposed that the audience’s motivation and ability to think deeply about a persuasive message determines how much a given characteristic of that message will change the audience’s attitude. Other models, such as the Heuristic-Systematic Model (HSM), have contributed additional insights about the “when” and “why” of attitude change. In sum, these nuanced accounts of attitude change have been demonstrated time and again across cultures and topics of persuasion.
Schema Therapy With Older Adults
Authors: Videler A.C.
Published: September 2018

Schema therapy has evolved since the late 1980s as an efficacious and increasingly widely used psychotherapeutic treatment for personality disorders and many other complex disorders that correlate with underlying maladaptive schemas. Only recently, attention among clinical geropsychologists has been growing for the application of schema therapy in older adults. Schema therapy is very feasible for both therapists and older patients. Schema therapy is an integrative psychotherapy, which draws on the cognitive-behavioral, attachment, psychodynamic, and emotion-focused traditions. In this treatment model, early maladaptive schemas are considered core elements of persistent and pervasive psychopathology, including personality disorders. The goal of treatment is to decrease the impact of maladaptive schemas and to replace negative coping responses and maladaptive schema modes with more healthy alternatives so that patients succeed in getting their core emotional needs met. The emerging attention for schema therapy in older adults is in line with the increased attention for personality disorders in later life, and also with the maturing field of psychotherapy for older adults. The first scientific evidence for the feasibility and the effectiveness of schema therapy has recently been shown. Despite these developments, much work is still to be done. The question is whether schema theory, which was developed for adults in young and middle adulthood, equally applies to those in later life. Although the first tests of effectiveness of schema therapy in older adults are encouraging, age-specific adaptations of existing therapy protocols, both for individual and group schema therapy, are wanted. Furthermore, the research that has been conducted so far has focused on the young-old. Especially for the growing and highly complex group of oldest-old patients, the development of feasible and effective schema-based interventions is needed. Integrating age-specific moderators for change, such as wisdom enhancement, attitudes to aging, and integrating the action of positive schemas, deserves recommendation.
Corporate Crime and the State
Authors: Ghazi-Tehrani Adam
Published: September 2018

State-corporate crime is defined as criminal acts that occur when one or more institutions of political governance pursue a goal in direct cooperation with one or more institutions of economic production and distribution. This concept has been advanced to examine how corporations and governments intersect to produce social harm. The complexity of state-corporate crime arises from the nature of the offenses; unlike traditional “street crime,” state-corporate crime is not characterized by the intent of a single actor to violate the law for personal pleasure or gain. Criminal actions by the state often lack an obvious victim, and diffusion of responsibility arising from corporate structure and involvement of multiple actors makes the task of attributing criminal responsibility difficult. Sufficient understanding of state-corporate crime cannot be gained through studying individual actors; one must also consider broader organizational and societal factors.

Further subclassification illuminates the different types of state-corporate crime: State-initiated corporate crime (such as the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger explosion) occurs when corporations, employed by the government, engage in organizational deviance at the direction of, or with the tacit approval of, the government. State-facilitated state-corporate crime (such as the 1991 Imperial Food Products fire in Hamlet, North Carolina) occurs when government regulatory institutions fail to restrain deviant activities either because of direct collusion between business and government or because they adhere to shared goals whose attainment would be hampered by aggressive regulation.
Ethnography and Education
Authors: Maisuria Alpesh , Beach Dennis
Published: September 2018

As described in Beach and Dovemark’s 2007 book, Education and the Commodity Problem, critical researchers have identified two fundamental roles for modern-day schools within capitalist states. These are the ideological and material roles and function, where schools produce ideologically compliant workers and consumers for a corporatist economy on the one hand, this is partly through a teaching and a curriculum, which is often hidden and informal; and, on the other form part of a corporate business plan for the accumulation of private capital in the welfare sector through mass outsourcing of welfare-State education provision and the wholesale commodification of education as a public service. This article presents a research method for investigating education in these circumstances. It is a method with a philosophical foundation not only for understanding contemporary educational empirical reality under neoliberal forms of capitalism, but also for developing critical consciousness for the transcendence and transformation of this condition toward a more just form of political economy and human existence.

This research method draws from critical realism and its concept of explanatory critique as a way to forge a scientifically robust Marxist critical ethnography. In relation to this, the description of the method accompanies an overview of some of the basic principles and broadly accepted possibilities of and for ethnography and critical ethnography, followed by a presentation of what Marxist critical ethnography is and how Marxist critical ethnography functions as explanatory critique, respectively. This entails description of what explanatory critique is, and how it can be used to develop a philosophy of social science and an ontological base for ethnography. The aforementioned components together expand on a historical, theoretical, conceptual, and political development of ethnography as part of a Marxist approach to research and practice for social transformation.
Tradition and Change in the Curriculum of Liberal or General Education
Authors: Mulcahy D. G.
Published: September 2018

The concept of a liberal or general education as it emerged in the Western tradition is one of the most consequential and enduring in the history of education. From its origins in antiquity, the concept and the form of a liberal arts and sciences curriculum associated with it grew to become a shaping force in the formation of the universities of the Middle Ages. Largely unchanged, it remained influential for centuries to follow. With the spread of the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, however, the concept and the curriculum associated with it ran into outspoken opposition. Yet once again today, the traditional concept and varying modifications of both that concept and of its curriculum content continue to be asserted all around the world. In response, discontent with liberal education and its curricular expressions is assuming new and increasingly challenging forms. One upshot of this is that opposition to the concept has a new vibrancy that is not readily quelled. This is especially evident among those arguing for innovative conceptualizations of this venerable if increasingly ambiguous idea. Yet, while such a conceptualization is at best emergent, one may detect in its evolution elements of a progressive theory of liberal education, even if there are few sustained attempts at articulating this emergent model.

Before proceeding, it is necessary to acknowledge non-Western formative influences and forms of education that are sometimes viewed as counterparts of a liberal or general education as it has evolved in the Western tradition, and which is the focus of attention here. These include forms of higher education rooted in the Confucian tradition in China, Hindi and Buddhist traditions in India, and Islamic traditions.
Disruptive Classroom Technologies
Authors: Magana Anthony J. "Sonny"
Published: September 2018

Of the many stated purposes of organized educational systems, one that might meet with general agreement is this: to ensure students build abundant learning capacity, achieve ample academic proficiency, and consolidate the requisite knowledge, skills, and aptitudes to successfully address future learning challenges. As computer technologies have transformed nearly every human endeavor imaginable, future learning challenges that students encounter will almost certainly require facility with digital technologies. In the realm of teaching and learning, the average impact of computer technology on student achievement has been both negligible and unchanged, despite astonishing technological developments since the 1960s.

However, there is cause for renewed optimism about technology use in education. Compounding evidence suggests that large gains in student achievement are possible when digital tools are leveraged to enhance highly reliable instructional and learning strategies. The objective of the author’s investigation efforts is to develop a more precise language and set of ideas to discuss, enact, and evaluate high impact uses of digital tools in education. The result is the T3 Framework for Innovation in Education. The T3 Framework increments the impact of technology use into three hierarchical domains: Translational, Transformational, and Transcendent. Compounding evidence suggests that implementing the strategies in the T3 Framework, with reasonable fidelity, will likely increase the impact of digital technologies to unlock students’ limitless capacities for learning and contribution, and better prepare today’s students for tomorrow’s learning challenges.
History of Educational Administration in the United Kingdom
Authors: Bush Tony
Published: September 2018

The study of educational administration in the United Kingdom began in a limited way in the 1970s, but it became much more significant following the 1988 Education Reform Act, which gave substantial powers to principals and school governing bodies. This led the scope of leadership and administration to be greatly expanded to include management of finance, staff, pupil admissions, and the school site as well as their traditional roles as instructional leaders.

Provision for public education was disaggregated from 1999, when education devolved to assemblies in Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales as part of the government’s devolution agenda. In England, the government established the National College for School Leadership in 2000, which had a major impact on policy, research, and practice for the next decade, before its decline starting in 2013 and its eventual closure in 2016. School leadership preparation is now at a crossroads, within an increasingly fragmented school system and without the national voice that the College provided.
Writing Educational Ethnography
Authors: Delamont Sara
Published: September 2018

Researchers who use qualitative methods, especially ethnography in educational settings, have to make conscious decisions about how to write about their results, their methods, and their experiences as investigators. Since the 1980s, initially in the discipline of social anthropology, but later across all the social sciences, there have been vigorous debates about how texts should be written and also about how they should be read. Before that, qualitative and quantitative educational research was written up in a similar way: reported in a passive or anonymous style designed to create an authoritative account. Over the course of 40 years, ethnographic writing has developed new literary forms, polyvocal texts, and authors have become visible and individual in their own texts. A wider range of texting genres is now published, and reflexivity is central to writing and reading. The causes and consequences of those changes are analyzed.
Cognitive Regulation
Authors: Schunk Dale H. , DiBenedetto Maria K.
Published: September 2018

Cognitive regulation refers to the self-directed regulation of cognitions (thoughts, beliefs, affects) toward the attainment of goals. Cognitive regulation can occur before individuals engage in tasks, while they are working on them, and during pauses or when tasks are completed where individuals reflect on their performances. Researchers have addressed which cognitive regulation processes are used during various phases of task engagement, how these processes differ among individuals due to ability and achievement levels and due to development, how cognitive regulation processes operate during task engagement, and which interventions can effectively help persons become better cognitive regulators.

The implications of the research findings are that teachers and others can help learners improve their cognitive regulation skills. Some important processes are goal setting, strategy use and adaptation, monitoring of cognition and performance, motivation (e.g., self-efficacy), and self-evaluation. Effective interventions expose students to models displaying these skills and provide for practice with feedback. There are six limitations of the present research that should be addressed. This can be accomplished by conducting more intervention studies, examining fine-grained changes in cognitive regulation, conducting research in non-traditional contexts, integrating the educational and developmental literatures, exploring cognitive regulation across cultures, and investigating cognitive regulation during learning with technology.
The Principles, Possibilities and Politics of Community-Based Educational Research
Authors: Wood Lesley
Published: September 2018

Globally, there is a shift toward embracing educational research with a social justice intent, based on the principles of inclusion, authentic participation, and democratic decision-making. This shift toward doing research with, rather than on, participants could be seen as a reaction to the criticism of contemporary universities being exclusive and in need of finding ways to connect with traditionally marginalized groups. Universities need to be more responsive to the real learning and development needs of communities and use their theoretical knowledge to complement and facilitate, rather than direct, research conducted in partnership with those whose lives are directly affected by the phenomenon being studied. Community-based educational research accepts local knowledge as the starting point of sustainable change and the learning and development of all involved as an important outcome of the research process. Community-based research thus has an educative intent; it is also inherently political since it aims to change systems that breed inequity.

Yet these very characteristics stand in opposition to the neoliberal, silo-like models of operation in academia, where the bottom line trumps social impact in most strategic decisions. Negotiating the bureaucratic boundaries regarding the ethics of community-based research becomes a major hurdle for most researchers and often leads to compromises that contradict and undermine the ideal of partnership and equitable power relations. There is a pressing need to rethink how we “do” community-based educational research to ensure it is truly educational for all. This begs the question, in what ways does the academy need to change to accommodate educational research that contributes to the sustainable learning and development of people and to the democratization of knowledge? Community-based educational research can help close the gap between theory and practice, between academic and community researcher.
Literacy and Identities
Authors: Wagner Christopher J.
Published: September 2018

Literate identities, reading identities, and writing identities describe the ways that a person constructs the self as a reader, writer, and user of language. The study of literacy and identities is grounded in the idea that literacy is not just about skills related to language, print, and texts but about individuals who must develop these skills. The learning of these skills is mediated by a person’s developing beliefs about language, literacy, and the self. Successful readers and writers enter, make sense of, and produce texts through personal and relational connections. Literacy, in this sense, is not just about knowing, using, and producing language and text but about ways of being in relation to language and text.

Multiple perspectives on identities have provided insights into how social, cognitive, and other aspects of the self develop in relation to reading, writing, and language. These highlight the close relationship between literate identities and literacy learning in formal and informal educational contexts, and the ways that literate identities are linked to literacy achievement. Developmental approaches have considered how and when views of the self form in relation to reading and writing experiences and instruction and have extended the study of literate identities from before school entry through adulthood. Attention to multilingual learners has provided insights into the multiplicity of literate identities people construct and pointed to the ways that attending to the whole person as a reader and writer can support literacy achievement.
A Historical Sketch of Buddhism in Tibet
Authors: Smyer Yü Dan , Wangmo Sonam
Published: September 2018

With the available historical Tibetan written records from late 8th century on and the existing scholarly works on Buddhism, this historical overview recounts how Buddhism was Tibetanized and how it became both the national religion of Tibet and a world religion spread to Inner Asia, East Asia, and other parts of the world. It also adds interpretive commentaries leading to more historical inquiries and suggestions for alternative historiographical approaches to the formation of Tibetan Buddhism, adopted from disciplines other than history of religion and Buddhist studies. An emphasis is placed on the significance of folk accounts that reveal “the geomythological reorientation” of Buddhist conversion in the historical Tibetan context not merely as an intellectual and doctrinal acceptance of Indian Buddhism but also as a symbiotic process in which Indian Buddhism and indigenous religious practices mutually transformed each other. The emergence of the different Buddhist schools in Tibet is also a result of the politics of the sect-specific powers throughout Tibetan history. It is thus essential to recognize the formation of the five schools also as a set of religio-political occurrences, particularly since the formation of Gelug (dGe lugs) School in the 15th century and later becoming a Gelug-based Tibetan polity in the 17th century. The Gelug School dominated Tibetan Buddhism, and successive Dalai Lamas ruled Tibet from the mid-17th to the mid-20th centuries. Given the regional and global status of Tibetan Buddhism, emphasis is placed on Tibetan Buddhism as a transregional religion in Inner Asia and later as a form of modern Buddhism since the middle of the 20th century. With these emphases, the historical overview presented here is intended to generate more scholarly discussions and inquiries into the history of Tibetan Buddhism in both monastic and lay spheres in and outside Tibet.
The Uyghurs: Making a Nation
Authors: Brophy David
Published: September 2018

The Uyghurs comprise a Turkic-speaking and predominantly Muslim nationality of China, with communities living in the independent republics of Central Asia that date to the 19th century, and now a global diaspora. As in the case of many national histories, the consolidation of a Uyghur nation was an early 20th-century innovation, which appropriated and revived the legacy of an earlier Uyghur people in Central Asia. This imagined past was grounded in the history of a Uyghur nomadic state and its successor principalities in Gansu and the Hami-Turfan region (known to Islamic geographers as “Uyghuristan”). From the late 19th century onward, the scholarly rediscovery of a Uyghur past in Central Asia presented an attractive civilizational narrative to Muslim intellectuals across Eurasia who were interested in forms of “Turkist” racial thinking. During the First World War, Muslim émigrés from Xinjiang (Chinese Turkistan) living in Russian territory laid claim to the Uyghur legacy as part of their communal genealogy. This group of budding “Uyghurists” then took advantage of conditions created by the Russian Revolution, particularly in the 1920s, to effect a radical redefinition of the community. In the wake of 1917, Uyghurist discourse was first mobilized as a cultural rallying point for all Muslims with links to China; it was then refracted through the lens of Soviet nationalities policy and made to conform with the Stalinist template of the nation. From Soviet territory, the newly refined idea of a Uyghur nation was exported to Xinjiang through official and unofficial conduits, and in the 1930s the Uyghur identity of Xinjiang’s Muslim majority was given state recognition. Since then, Uyghur nationhood has been a pillar of Beijing’s minzu system but has also provided grounds for opposition to Beijing’s policies, which many Uyghurs feel have failed to realize the rights that should accord to them as an Uyghur nation.
Racism and Indigenous Health
Authors: Paradies Yin
Published: September 2018

There are an estimated 300 million indigenous peoples worldwide. Although there is ample evidence of worse health and social outcomes for the majority of indigenous peoples, compared to their non-indigenous counterparts, there has yet to be a review of racism as a determinant of indigenous health using global literature. Racism constitutes unfair and avoidable disparities in power, resources, capacities, or opportunities centered on ethnic, racial, religious, or cultural differences that can occur at three levels: internalized, interpersonal, or systemic. For indigenous peoples this is closely related to ongoing processes of colonization. Available research suggests that at least a third of indigenous adults experience racism at least once during their lives and that about a fifth of indigenous children experience racism. For indigenous peoples, racism has been associated with a considerable range of health outcomes, including psychological distress, anxiety, depression, suicide, posttraumatic stress disorder, asthma, physical illness, obesity, cardiovascular disease, increased blood pressure, excess body fat, poor sleep, reduced general physical and mental health, and poor oral health, as well as increased alcohol, tobacco, and marijuana use and underutilization of medical and mental healthcare services. Disparities in medical care experienced by indigenous patients compared to non-indigenous patients have also been found. Existing studies indicate that avoidant and passive coping tends to exacerbate the detrimental health impacts of racism for indigenous peoples, whereas active coping ameliorates the ill-health effects of racism. Reducing individual and interpersonal racism can be achieved by (a) providing accurate information and improving awareness of the nature of racism and racial bias; (b) activating values of fairness, reconciling incompatible beliefs, and developing antiracist motivation; (c) fostering empathy and perspective-taking and confidence in regulating emotional responses; (d) improving comfort with other groups and reducing anxiety; and (e) reinforcing antiracist social norms and highlighting personal accountability. There are five key areas for combating systemic racism in organizations and institutions: (a) institutional accountability; (b) diversity in human resources; (c) community partnership; (d) antiracism and cultural competence training; and (e) research and evaluation.
The Origins of African Metallurgies
Authors: Holl Augustin F. C.
Published: September 2018

Sustained archaeological research has been conducted in different parts of the continent from the early 1980s on. Evidence of copper and iron metallurgies is documented in the continent, in West, Central, and East Africa. Early copper metallurgies were recorded in the Akjoujt region of Mauritania and the Eghazzer basin in Niger. Surprisingly early iron smelting installations were found in the Eghazzer basin (Niger), the Middle Senegal Valley (Senegal), the Mouhoun Bend (Burkina Faso), the Nsukka region and Taruga (Nigeria), the Great Lakes region in East Africa, the Djohong (Cameroons), and the Ndio (Central African Republic) areas. It is, however, the discoveries from the northern margins of the Equatorial rainforest, North-Central Africa, in the northeastern part of the Adamawa Plateau that radically falsify the “iron technology diffusion” hypothesis. Iron production activities are shown to have taken place as early as 3000–2500bce in habitation sites like Balimbé, Bétumé, and Bouboun, smelting sites like Gbabiri, and forge sites like Ôboui and Gbatoro. The last two sites provide high-resolution data on the spatial patterning of blacksmiths’ workshops dating from 2500 to 2000bce. Challenging data such as these are usually ignored or dismissed without serious consideration, but patient and sustained long-term research is contributing to a new understanding of the development of copper and iron metallurgies in Africa, enriching the long-term history of technologies.
Globalization and the American City
Authors: Beasley B. Alex
Published: September 2018

American cities have been transnational in nature since the first urban spaces emerged during the colonial period. Yet the specific shape of the relationship between American cities and the rest of the world has changed dramatically in the intervening years. In the mid-20th century, the increasing integration of the global economy within the American economy began to reshape US cities. In the Northeast and Midwest, the once robust manufacturing centers and factories that had sustained their residents—and their tax bases—left, first for the South and West, and then for cities and towns outside the United States, as capital grew more mobile and businesses sought lower wages and tax incentives elsewhere. That same global capital, combined with federal subsidies, created boomtowns in the once-rural South and West. Nationwide, city boosters began to pursue alternatives to heavy industry, once understood to be the undisputed guarantor of a healthy urban economy. Increasingly, US cities organized themselves around the service economy, both in high-end, white-collar sectors like finance, consulting, and education, and in low-end pink-collar and no-collar sectors like food service, hospitality, and health care. A new legal infrastructure related to immigration made US cities more racially, ethnically, and linguistically diverse than ever before.

At the same time, some US cities were agents of economic globalization themselves. Dubbed “global cities” by celebrants and critics of the new economy alike, these cities achieved power and prestige in the late 20th century not only because they had survived the ruptures of globalization but because they helped to determine its shape. By the end of the 20th century, cities that are not routinely listed among the “global city” elite jockeyed to claim “world-class” status, investing in high-end art, entertainment, technology, education, and health care amenities to attract and retain the high-income white-collar workers understood to be the last hope for cities hollowed out by deindustrialization and global competition. Today, the extreme differences between “global cities” and the rest of US cities, and the extreme socioeconomic stratification seen in cities of all stripes, is a key concern of urbanists.
When is Alzheimer’s not dementia—Cochrane commentary on The National Institute on Ageing and Alzheimer’s Association Research Framework for Alzheimer’s Disease
Authors: McCleery Jenny , Flicker Leon , Richard Edo , Quinn Terence J
Published: September 2018

Early 2018 saw the release of new diagnostic guidance on Alzheimer’s disease from the National Institute on Ageing and the Alzheimer’s Association (NIA-AA). This proposed research framework represents a fundamental change in how we think about Alzheimer’s disease, moving from diagnosis based on clinical features to diagnosis based solely on biomarkers. These recommendations are contentious and have important implications for patients, clinicians, policy makers and the pharmaceutical industry. In this commentary, we offer a summary of the NIA-AA research framework. We then focus on five key areas: divorcing neuropathology from the clinical syndrome; the emphasis placed on one dementia subtype; validity of available biomarkers; the changing meaning of the term ‘Alzheimer’s disease’; and the potential for a research framework to influence clinical practice.
Effects of Cannabis Use and Subclinical ADHD Symptomology on Attention Based Tasks in Adolescents and Young Adults
Authors: Wallace Alexander L , Wade Natasha E , Hatcher Kelah F , Lisdahl Krista M
Published: September 2018

Objective

Research has demonstrated comorbidity between Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and cannabis use, and some have proposed that subclinical ADHD symptoms may explain attentional deficits in cannabis users. Here we investigated whether subclinical ADHD symptoms and cannabis use independently or interactively predict performance on attention tasks in adolescents and young adults.

Method

Seventy-two participants (cannabis users (MJ) = 34, Controls = 38) completed neuropsychological tasks of inhibition and attention. Parent report on the Child Behaviors Checklist reflected current ADHD symptoms. Multiple regression analyses examined whether ADHD symptoms and cannabis use independently or interactively predicted cognitive outcomes.

Results

Cannabis use was significantly associated with slower CPT hit rate response. Subclinical ADHD symptoms did not independently predict or moderate cannabis effects.

Conclusions

Cannabis users demonstrated slower response rate during an attentional task. Subclinical ADHD symptoms did not predict any deficits. As such, attention deficits seen in cannabis users are more related to substance use than ADHD symptomatology.
Reduced oxygenation but not fibrosis defined by functional magnetic resonance imaging predicts the long-term progression of chronic kidney disease
Authors: Sugiyama Kei , Inoue Tsutomu , Kozawa Eito , Ishikawa Masahiro , Shimada Akira , Kobayashi Naoki , Tanaka Junji , Okada Hirokazu
Published: September 2018

Background

Although chronic hypoxia and fibrosis may be a key to the progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD), a noninvasive means of measuring these variables is not yet available. Here, using blood oxygen level–dependent (BOLD) and diffusion-weighted (DW) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), we assessed changes in renal tissue oxygenation and fibrosis, respectively, and evaluated their correlation with prognosis for renal function.

Methods

The study was conducted under a single-center, longitudinal, retrospective observational design. We examined the prognostic significance of T2* values of BOLD-MRI and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) values on DW-MRI and other clinical parameters. The rate of decline in estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) was calculated by linear regression analysis using changes in eGFR during the observation period.

Results

A total of 91 patients were enrolled, with a mean age of 55.8 ± 15.6 years. Among patients, 51 (56.0%) were males and 38 (41.8%) had diabetes mellitus. The mean eGFR was 49.2 ± 28.9 mL/min/1.73 m2 and the mean observation period was 5.13 years. ADC values of DW-MRI but not T2* values of BOLD-MRI were well correlated with eGFR at the initial time point. The mean annual rate of decline in eGFR during the 5-year observation period was −1.92 ± 3.00 mL/min/1.73 m2. On multiple linear regression analysis, the rate of decline in eGFR was significantly correlated with eGFR at the start point, period average amount of proteinuria and T2* values, but not with ADC values (t = 2.980, P = 0.004).

Conclusions

Reduced oxygenation as determined by low T2* values on BOLD-MRI is a clinically useful marker of CKD progression.
Drug discovery in China: challenges and opportunities
Authors: Wang Ling
Published: September 2018

Human history is also a chronicle of battling against diseases. Thanks to the rapid advancement of life science and biotechnologies such as gene editing and deep sequencing, recent decades have seen more and more untreatable illnesses on the verge of being conquered. However, an efficient drug-innovation system involves multiple driving forces—policy stimulation and commercial interests play important roles, besides advances in science and technology. Therefore, establishing the synergism among various driving forces is essential for new drug discovery and development. As the most populous country in the world, China has the largest population of a broad spectrum of diseases, offering a unique environment for research and development in biomedicine and disease therapies. Although most pharmaceutical companies in China have been focused on making generic drugs in the past, some efforts in developing first-in-class drugs are paying off, especially in the small-molecule drugs. What are the emerging trends in drug discovery? What does Artificial Intelligence (AI) bring to drug development and medical treatments? In the future, how will China take advantage of abundant resources and proactive policies to accelerate drug development? Recently, NSR organized a forum focusing on these issues, with the attendance of five distinguished domestic pharmaceutical scientists.

Ke Ding Professor in the College of Pharmacy, Jinan University, Jinan, China

Shengyong Yang Professor in the State Key Laboratory of Biotherapy, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China

Zhen Yang Professor in the Department of Chemistry, Peking University, Beijing, China

Ao Zhang Professor in the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China

Demin Zhou Professor in the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China

Mu-ming Poo (Chair) Director of the Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Executive Editor-in-Chief of NSR, Shanghai, China