bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Summer U.S. Surface Air Temperature Variability: Controlling Factors and AMIP Simulation Biases
Authors: Merrifield Anna L. , Xie Shang-Ping
Published: April 2016

This study documents and investigates biases in simulating summer surface air temperature (SAT) variability over the continental United States in the Atmospheric Model Intercomparison Project (AMIP) experiment from phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5). Empirical orthogonal function (EOF) and multivariate regression analyses are used to assess the relative importance of circulation and the land surface feedback at setting summer SAT over a 30-yr period (1979–2008). Regions of high SAT variability are closely associated with midtropospheric highs, subsidence, and radiative heating accompanying clear-sky conditions. The land surface exerts a spatially variable influence on SAT through the sensible heat flux and is a second-order effect in the high-variability centers of action (COAs) in observational estimates. The majority of the AMIP models feature high SAT variability over the central United States, displaced south and/or west of observed COAs. SAT COAs in models tend to be concomitant and strongly coupled with regions of high sensible heat flux variability, suggesting that excessive land–atmosphere interaction in these models modulates U.S. summer SAT. In the central United States, models with climatological warm biases also feature less evapotranspiration than ERA-Interim but reasonably reproduce observed SAT variability in the region. Models that overestimate SAT variability tend to reproduce ERA-Interim SAT and evapotranspiration climatology. In light of potential model biases, this analysis calls for careful evaluation of the land–atmosphere interaction hot spot region identified in the central United States. Additionally, tropical sea surface temperatures play a role in forcing the leading EOF mode for summer SAT in models. This relationship is not apparent in observations.
Found Out and Opting Out
Authors: Lageson Sarah Esther
Published: April 2016

Online criminal histories document and publicize even minor brushes with the law and represent people who may not even be guilty of any crime. This has dramatically changed the relationship that millions of Americans have with the criminal justice system and may affect their social and private lives. Drawing on interviews and fieldwork with people attempting to expunge and legally seal their criminal records, I explore how online versions of these records impact family relationships. Many who appear on mug shot and criminal history websites are arrestees who are never formally charged or convicted of a crime. The indiscriminate posting of all types of justice contact on websites may impact those who, for the most part, desist from crime and are core contributors to their family and community. I find that many of those who are affected by the stigma of online records did not know that records existed until they “popped up” unexpectedly, and that this experience leads them to self-select out of family duties that contribute to child well-being.
How Children’s Educational Outcomes and Criminality Vary by Duration and Frequency of Paternal Incarceration
Authors: Andersen Lars H.
Published: April 2016

Existing studies of the consequences of paternal incarceration for children treat paternal incarceration as a dichotomous event (a child either experiences paternal incarceration or does not), although effects could accumulate with both the frequency and duration of paternal incarcerations. In this article I use register data on Danish children from birth cohort 1991, some of whom experienced paternal incarceration before age 15, to show how educational outcomes and criminality up to age 20 vary by frequency and total duration of paternal incarceration. The high quality of Danish register data also allows me to distinguish between paternal arrest and paternal incarceration and to show results for the total duration of paternal incarcerations conditioned on frequency of paternal incarceration. Results show that educational outcomes and criminality indeed correlate with duration and frequency of paternal incarceration, indicating that treating paternal incarceration as a dichotomous event blurs important heterogeneity in the consequences of paternal incarceration.
Distinguishing Petty Offenders from Serious Criminals in the Estimation of Family Life Effects
Authors: Wakefield Sara , Powell Kathleen
Published: April 2016

Prior research on the consequences of imprisonment for the family suggest that incarceration of so-called petty offenders is most harmful for families, yet few studies provide a clear description of who is and is not a petty offender and how best to make such distinctions. We compare various ways of categorizing inmates (using preprison family involvement and characteristics related to criminality and child well-being) to better understand heterogeneity in the consequences of paternal incarceration for children. In our analysis, we find that differentiating between “harmful” and “helpful” fathers is rather difficult, and reform efforts that are overly reliant on criminal offense categories may not be the most gainful policy approach in terms of benefit to children. We also describe a small population of children who appear to benefit from paternal incarceration: children of fathers with severe substance abuse problems. The pattern of results suggests that providing alternative interventions to incarceration, rather than no intervention at all, is critical to improving outcomes for all children of incarcerated parents.
The importance of flexibility of pronunciation in learning to decode: A training study in set for variability
Authors: Zipke Marcy
Published: April 2016

The ability to flexibly approach the pronunciation of unknown words, or set for variability, has been shown to contribute to word recognition skills. However, this is the first study that has attempted to teach students strategies for increasing their set for variability. Beginning readers ( N = 15) were instructed to correct oral mispronunciations and then systematically alter sounds in words with exception spellings, while a control group ( N = 15) was encouraged to decode passages without the set for variability instruction. It was hypothesized that this brief training would result in readers who are more persistent and more successful in attempting to read words with irregular spellings. Participants who received the experimental training made more attempts to read words with irregular spellings; however, they were not more successful in these attempts. It is argued that this means that set for variability is a teachable concept, in that students in this study acquired the strategy.
‘They Shall Not Keep Their Doors or Windows Open’: Urban Space and the Dynamics of Conflict and Contact in Premodern Jewish–Christian Relations
Authors: Jütte Daniel
Published: April 2016

Jewish houses, and especially their apertures, were frequent targets of assault in premodern Europe. Were these attacks just a matter of Christians letting off steam, as some historians have argued, or were they signs that ‘Jewish life was a perennial struggle for survival’? This question leads into a much larger methodological issue – namely, how historians should approach and frame violence in premodern Christian-Jewish relations. This article argues that assaults committed by Christians against Jews may well be said to form a specific category of violence; but to assess and analyse this phenomenon properly, one must take into account the general backdrop of the dynamics of violence – especially urban violence – at the time. In the specific case of window-smashing, it is important to consider the symbolism as well as the complex function of liminal spaces such as windows in the everyday lives of Jews and Christians. The conclusion will outline how anti-Jewish window violence left an imprint on both cultural life and economic activities (such as glassmaking) in Jewish communities well into the twentieth century.
In the Shadow of the Nazi Past: Post-war Reconstruction and the Claims of the Jewish Community in Salonika
Authors: Králová Kateřina
Published: April 2016

Faced with vast human and economic losses, the small number of Jews in Greece who had survived the Second World War found themselves shortly afterwards in great need of social and financial assistance simply to survive in the post-war world. Although some humanitarian relief had been provided immediately after the end of the once Italian, Bulgarian and German occupations, the reconstruction of Jewish communities and development of a legal framework for property restitution in Greece were long-term processes. This is also true of the post-war German government’s provisions regarding compensation for the victims of Nazism. The article analyses Jewish efforts to receive compensation in the wider context of Greek–German relations in case of Salonika, a former metropolis of Sephardic Jews beyond the Balkans. Drawing on rich primary sources, in particularly archive records from the German Political Archive of the Federal Foreign Office (PA AA), the article examines the links between humanitarian aid, moral obligations of the political elites, and political as well as economic pragmatism in Greek-German relations on both the national and international levels between the Second World War and 1961, when a bilateral compensation agreement was ratified by both countries.
Avoiding allogenic blood transfusions in endoscopic angiofibroma surgery
Authors: Wasl Hisham , McGuire Jessica , Lubbe Darlene
Published: April 2016

Background

Surgical approaches for many tumours are often limited by blood loss, exposure and risk to vital anatomical structures. Therefore, the standard of care for certain skull base tumours has become endoscopic transnasal resection. Other surgical disciplines often use cell salvage techniques, but review of the otolaryngology literature revealed very few case reports. This study investigated the value and safety of salvage-type autologous blood transfusion during the endoscopic resection of juvenile nasopharyngeal angiofibromas (JNA).

Methods

JNA is a rare vascular nasal tumour and the study extended over a 3-year period to obtain adequate patient numbers. All patients undergoing endoscopic resection during this period were included in the population sample. Ten patients with JNA were identified and underwent embolization prior to the endoscopic resection. In all cases the intraoperative blood salvage apparatus was used. Close post-operative monitoring was performed.

Results

Homologous blood transfusion could be avoided in all cases. Postoperative monitoring revealed transient bacteraemia in two cases where the leukocyte filter was not used, but no evidence of septicaemia.

Conclusions

Perioperative cell saver and autologous blood transfusion in endonasal JNA surgery is safe. Homologous blood transfusion can be avoided by using this technique. The use of cell salvage allows for single stage surgery without the need to abandon surgery due to excessive blood loss and its future use is promising.
An outcomes analysis of anterior epistaxis management in the emergency department
Authors: Newton E. , Lasso A. , Petrcich W. , Kilty S. J.
Published: April 2016

Background

Many treatment options exist for the management of anterior epistaxis. However, little is known about treatment outcomes. The objective was to identify the currently utilised methods of management and outcomes for patients with anterior epistaxis presenting to the emergency department (ED) at a Canadian tertiary care center.

Methods

A retrospective review of ED visits from January 2012-May 2014 for adult patients with a diagnosis of anterior epistaxis was performed. Patient demographic data, comorbidities, and treatment methods were documented. The effectiveness of different treatment modalities was determined.

Results

Three hundred fifty-three primary anterior epistaxis cases were included. Mean patient age was 70 years and 49 % of patients were female. Comorbidities included hypertension (56 %), diabetes (19 %), CAD (28 %), and atrial fibrillation (27 %). A large proportion of the cohort (61 %) was on at least one anticoagulant or antiplatelet therapy. The most common utilised treatment modalities were silver nitrate cauterization, Merocel®, petroleum gauze packing, nasal clip and 15 % were simply observed. Initial treatment success was achieved in 74 % of cases. Of patients receiving specific treatment modalities, silver nitrate cauterization had the highest success rate at 80 %. 26 % of patients returned to the ED for recurrence of epistaxis with highest rates occurring in the nasal clip (59 %), Merocel® (26 %), and petroleum gauze packing (42 %) groups.

Conclusions

The differences in recurrence rate among the different treatment modalities observed may be due to true differences in effectiveness or differences in treatment selection by the ED physicians based on severity of epistaxis. Cauterization with silver nitrate, however, offers the added benefit of no need for follow up. Further study is needed to elucidate the most efficacious treatment modality based on epistaxis severity.
κ-Opioid Receptor Is Colocalized in GnRH and KNDy Cells in the Female Ovine and Rat Brain
Authors: Weems Peyton W. , Witty Christine F. , Amstalden Marcel , Coolen Lique M. , Goodman Robert L. , Lehman Michael N.
Published: April 2016

Kisspeptin-neurokinin B-dynorphin (KNDy) cells of the hypothalamus are a key component in the neuroendocrine regulation of GnRH secretion. Evidence in sheep and other species suggests that dynorphin released by KNDy cells inhibits pulsatile GnRH secretion by acting upon κ-opioid receptors (KOR). However, the precise anatomical location and neurochemical phenotype of KOR-expressing cells in sheep remain unknown. To this end, we determined the distribution of KOR mRNA and protein in the brains of luteal phase ewes, using an ovine specific KOR mRNA probe for in situ hybridization and an antibody whose specificity we confirmed by Western blot analyses and blocking peptide controls. KOR cells were observed in a number of regions, including the preoptic area (POA); anterior hypothalamic area; supraoptic and paraventricular nuclei; ventromedial, dorsomedial, and lateral hypothalamus; and arcuate nucleus. Next, we determined whether KOR is colocalized in KNDy and/or GnRH cells. Dual-label immunofluorescence and confocal analysis of the KNDy population showed a high degree of colocalization, with greater than 90% of these neurons containing KOR. Surprisingly, GnRH cells also showed high levels of colocalization in sheep, ranging from 74.4% to 95.4% for GnRH cells in the POA and medial basal hypothalamus, respectively. Similarly, 97.4% of GnRH neurons in the POA of ovariectomized, steroid-primed female rats also contained immunoreactive KOR protein. These findings suggest that the inhibitory effects of dynorphin on pulsatile GnRH secretion may occur either indirectly by actions upon KOR within the KNDy population and/or directly via the activation of KOR on GnRH cells.
Risky Zoographies: The Limits of Place in Avian Flu Management
Authors: Porter Natalie
Published: April 2016

Global anxieties about avian influenza stem from a growing recognition that highly-virulent, highly-mobile disease vectors infiltrate human spaces in ways that are difficult to perceive, and even more difficult to manage. This article analyses a participatory health intervention in Việt Nam to explore how avian influenza threats challenge long-held understandings of animals' place in the environment and society. In this intervention, poultry farmers collaborated with health workers to illustrate maps of avian flu risks in their communities. Participant-observation of the risk-mapping exercises shows that health workers treated poultry as commodities, and located these animals in environments that could be transformed and dominated by humans. However, these maps did not sufficiently represent the physical and social landscapes where humans and poultry coexist in Việt Nam. As such, farmers located poultry in environments dominated by risky nonhuman forces such as winds, waterways, and other organisms. I argue that these divergent risk maps demonstrate how ecological factors, interpersonal networks, and global market dynamics combine to engender a variety of interspecies relationships, which in turn shape the location of disease risks in space. I develop the term risky zoographies to signal the emergence of competing descriptions of animals and their habitats in zoonotic disease contexts. This concept suggests that as wild animals, livestock products, and microbial pathogens continue to globalise, place-based health interventions that limit animals to particular locales are proving inadequate. Risky zoographies signal the inextricability of nonhuman animals from human spaces, and reveal interspecies interactions that transect and transcend environments.
The Making of an Environmental Hero: A History of Ecomodern Masculinity, Fuel Cells and Arnold Schwarzenegger
Authors: Hultman Martin
Published: April 2016

In 2007, Arnold Schwarzenegger received the European Campaigner of the Year award. Chosen by the readers of European Voice for his work on solving global environmental problems, he was hailed as a visionary environmental hero, at the pinnacle of his popularity as a politician. In Sweden the public was told to follow his lead and politicians were advised to learn from his example. How could this happen? How could Schwarzenegger be portrayed as an environmental role model, even in countries such as Sweden, a country known around the world for progressive policies in gender equality and the environment? This paper introduces and investigates the notion of ‘ecomodern masculinity,’ through the assemblage of Schwarzenegger's gender identity, environmental politics, and image in Sweden. While there has been research on gender inequity in relation to environmental and developmental goals, there has been little concern with constructions of how shifting hegemonic masculinity is embedded in environmental policy. As former California governor, actor, and Mr. Universe, Schwarzenegger's connection to the ecomodern politics that he prescribed is researched within a framework combining insights from the fields of gender and environmental studies. Ecomodern environmental politics and Kindergarten Commando masculinity are understood as attempts to incorporate and deflect criticism in order to perpetuate hegemony, to ensure that practices remain in effect, ‘business as usual.’ By looking at the historical changes in Schwarzenegger's identity intertwined with the rise of ecomodern discourse, this article illustrates those changes and broadens our understanding of global politics in the fields of energy and the environment.
At Home in the Great Northern Wilderness: African Americans and Freedom's Ecology in the Adirondacks, 1846-1859
Authors: Miller Daegan
Published: April 2016

In the fall of 1846, the first of 3,000 African American settlers set foot on their 40-acre plots in the Great Northern Wilderness of New York State, a place we now call the “forever wild” wilderness of the Adirondack State Park. These black settlers were the initial wave of a social experiment meant to destroy both slavery and, more generally, racism throughout the entire United States through the redemptive practice of a utopian agrarianism. The settlers understood that nature and culture, wilderness and society, were thickly, dialectically intertwined. And they weren't alone: their efforts were seeded by the white abolitionist, Gerrit Smith; fertilized by the utopian socialist communes that covered the Northeast in the 1840s; and nurtured by abolitionists, both black and white. To United States environmental history, I add two threads less frequently seen: African American history and an intellectual history of radical politics. Following these threads has led me beyond the disciplinary confines of history and into larger debates about the cultural politics of wilderness. In this article I argue that the critical wilderness paradigm currently reigning both in and beyond historical scholarship has obscured nuanced, sometimes radical visions of the natural world. Instead of an ironic, deconstructed notion of a troubling wilderness, I suggest another heuristic, the ecology of freedom, which highlights past contingency and hope, and can furthermore help guide our present efforts, both scholastic and activist, to find an honorable, just way of living on the earth.
A NeoPresocratic Manifesto
Authors: Callicott J. Baird
Published: April 2016

Ancient Greek philosophy begins with natural philosophy (the Milesians, Heraclitus, Empedocles, Anaxagoras), followed after about a century by a focus on moral philosophy (Socrates and the sophists). The pattern is repeated in the Modern period: first natural philosophy re-emerged after the Dark and Middle Ages (Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes, Newton) followed by a correlative revolution in moral philosophy (Hobbes, Hume, Kant). In particular, moral ontology (externally related individuals) reflected the ontology of physics (externally related atoms). Individuals are, in effect, social atoms. Curiously, 20th-century philosophy has largely turned a blind eye and deaf ear to the vast philosophical implications of the second scientific revolution in 20th-century science, among them a correlative moral ontology of internal relations and social wholes. The environmental turn in the humanities, grounded in ecology and evolutionary biology, is a harbinger of the re-orientation of philosophy to the revolutionary ideas in the sciences and foreshadows an emerging NeoPresocratic revival in 21st-century philosophy.
The Armchair Traveler's Guide to Digital Environmental Humanities
Authors: Jørgensen Finn Arne
Published: April 2016

The technological mediation of near and distant landscapes have long fascinated scholars and the public alike, and it seems like this interest peaks around times of large-scale technological transition, when new modes of both transportation and mediation become available. Few scholars have analyzed this relationship between technology, media, and the perception of landscape as convincingly as Wolfgang Schivelbusch, who famously argued that the landscape perceived by travelers was filtered through the machine ensemble of the railroad system. This article brings Schivelbusch's thesis into the digital age as a way of examining the spatiality of digital media and the natural world. The article analyzes a series of technologically mediated digital representations of travel and movement through landscapes, in particular the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation's “slow travel” series of digitally enhanced TV programs. These highly popular mediations of railroad or boat travel challenge Schivelbusch's ideas of speed, distance, and experience of landscapes, but also direct our attention towards the role of digital media in making sense of a changing world.
Fractal Eaarth: Visualizing the Global Environment in the Anthropocene
Authors: Lekan Thomas M.
Published: April 2016

This essay offers a postcolonial critique of recent environmentalist literature and exhibitions that frame the Anthropocene using the NASA Apollo mission's Earthrise (1968) and Blue Marble (1972) photographs from space. Building on the work of Dennis Cosgrove and Donna Haraway, as well as historical evidence from the U.N. Environmental Summit in Stockholm in 1972, the essay explores how the attempt to depict Anthropos as a unitary geophysical agent resurrects the appeal to the Whole Earth environmentalism of the 1970s without attending to the U.S. imperialist and racist connotations of the disembodied “god trick” found in these extraterrestrial photographs. As evidenced already in the 1950s at the landmark Man and Nature conference at Princeton and in the wildlife documentaries of Bernhard and Michael Grzimek, moreover, the first decades of the Great Acceleration witnessed the growing use of aerial images to chart the “disappearance of the outside” and to advocate for wilderness areas in the Global South as a “cultural heritage of mankind.” The confluence of geophysical tipping points, universalist history, and political struggle over decolonization resulted in eco-images that subsumed all parts of the globe—most especially Africa—into a doomsday narrative of human profligacy that lost sight of a kaleidoscopic patchwork of cultural landscapes. Fractal topographies, by contrast, serve as more effective indices of the recursive layering found in digital representations such as Google Earth and help us to stretch our historical imagination and cultural criticism into scale-dependent and multi-agentic realms that lie beyond the Apollonian visions of the late Holocene.
Genesis, Retold: In Search of an Atlas of the Anthropocene
Authors: Struck Wolfgang
Published: April 2016

While, within the last decades, the atlas has lost its dominance as a medium of spatial representation to digital media, it has recently attracted a significant aesthetic interest. Artists and writers have created books that are explicitly or implicitly linked to the atlas, delving into its history, its epistemological preconditions, and its representational capacity. In this essay, I suggest a connection between this attraction to a supposedly outdated medium and the representational challenges raised by the model of the Anthropocene. A first example offers Sebastião Salgado's Genesis (2013), a monumental collection of photographs that promises a journey “to the beginnings of our planet,” confronting the viewer with the dimension of geological time into which human agency has expanded. Due to the indexicality of photography, the Genesis-project has to approach deep time by movements within space, and thus it is not coincidental that the book that is credited as one of the most powerful representations of the Anthropocene resembles an atlas. In this resemblance, however, it also reproduces the abstract and generalized space of cartography. The atlas allows, as I try to demonstrate by a short view into its history, the representation of large dimensions through a negotiation of relations between part and whole, but in order to do so, it increases the distance between the observer and the observed. As an alternative model, I discuss Judith Schalansky's Atlas of Remote Islands (2009, Engl. 2010). More aware of the problematic effects of media and modes of representation on the represented world, Schalansky's atlas deconstructs the observer who looks at the territory from outside and above, and reinserts him or her into a landscape of multiple movements and connections. Exploring a multiplicity of cultural techniques and actors, human as well as non-human, involved in the production of the image of the globe, this atlas becomes a medium of “being in the world” rather than one of “looking at” it. Being in the world is also the attempt of another photographic atlas of deep time, Ernst Haas' The Creation (1972), a thorough negotiation between part and whole, that offers an epilogue to my argument, although it is historically, more than four decades before Salgado's Genesis, a prologue to the recent return of the atlas.
Mountains, Monuments, and Other Matter: Environmental Affects at Manzanar
Authors: Ladino Jennifer K.
Published: April 2016

This essay investigates the natural landscapes and built structures at the Manzanar National Historic Site, the first of ten incarceration camps to open in 1941 and a temporary home for over 11,000 Japanese Americans. Using former incarceree Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston's writing as a touchstone, my essay foregrounds the environmental features of the (re)location: the extreme desert weather, the mountain vistas, the incarceree-created rock gardens, the reconstructed barracks, guard tower, and barbed wire fence, and the cemetery/monument. I bring together concepts from ecocriticism and from affect theory—particularly Ben Anderson's “affective atmospheres,” Sianne Ngai's “tone,” and Sara Ahmed's characterization of affect as “sticky”—and develop the notion of affective agency to describe the impacts generated by environments and objects at this national memory site. I assess how the visual and written rhetoric at the site addresses what I call an implied tourist, and I show how powerful emotions of shame, anger, grief, and compassion—and sometimes, mixed, even contradictory, affects—are not only represented in visual and written rhetoric but are also, in a sense, communicated by the environment itself. More broadly, I suggest that ecocritical theory brings a useful lens to discussions of public memory, and that affect theory helps account for the less tangible, visceral, experiences visitors have at Manzanar and other fraught historical sites, as well as within our everyday environments.
Vindication of Contribution to Chartered Capital during the Creation of a Corporation (LLC)
Authors: Loryents Dmitriy
Published: April 2016

This scientific work analyzes the characteristics of vindication of specific things that are contributed to the Chartered capital of a Limited Liability Company (LLC). The author critically assesses the doctrinal and judicial positions in relation to the commutative nature of contributions to the Chartered capital. The non-gratuitous nature of the contribution acquisition is artificial and unusual. The economic entity doesn’t provide the founder with the share in the Chartered capital as it does not possess it. The share is acquired by the founder by virtue of law in connection with the LLC state registration and is a converted contribution. In the light of the civil legislation reform in the Russian Federation and with regard to the English law particular attention is paid to understanding the bona fide of a legal entity through the behavior of its head. Under certain circumstances, it’s not reasonable to regard the head’s evil conscience as the will of the company. In case of a claim for the recovery of contributions to the Charter capital prior to the state registration of the Corporation in the register, the claim should be reported directly to the contributed assets, which are advisable to position as an “unused” contribution. The court must suspend the case until the establishment of a legal entity.
The “Employment Deal” Category and the Problem of Contestation of Legal Acts that Determine Content of the Wage Labor Relations
Authors: Boldyryev Vladimir
Published: April 2016

The author proves that the existence of common problems associated with the need to invalidate employment contracts, apprenticeship agreements with employers, agreements on full material liability, and the desirability of legislative assumptions to contest collective agreements (local regulations) in whole or in part, does not indicate that they should be merged under the collective name of the “employment deal”. The author justifies that the core area of focus to resolve current problems related to corrupt practice during the adoption of local regulations, as part of social-partner relations among other things, should belong to a different domain — in legislative specialization of bodies competent to adopt (coordinate, approve) them, in particular, in transfer of relevant powers by discretionary rules of legislation to supreme corporate bodies of legal entities. The author proposes to enshrine in the law the rule on subsidiary application of the civil legislation on the invalidity of transactions to labour relations.
Historical Conditionality of the Institute of Bribe Offering and Promising
Authors: Semykina Olga
Published: April 2016

The article discusses criminalization trends in the Russian criminal law of the institute of bribe offering and promising. Analyzing the rules on liability for bribery in the criminal law in mid XIX — early XX centuries, the author comes to the conclusion about historical conditionality of the review of legislative approaches to enshrine in the Russian Criminal Code the institute of bribe offering and promising in favor of recommendations of anticorruption standards. The study attempts to justify the possibility of introducing criminal liability for bribery not only in articles 290, 291 of the Russian Criminal Code, but also in other articles of the Code, that include giving and accepting any material wealth or other benefits as a criminal-forming characteristic (for example, in Articles 201—204, 285—286, 309). Thus, this article raises the issue of presence of a set of special hybrid rules in the Russian Criminal Code, forming part of the institute of criminal liability for offering and promising certain benefits. The author identifies and confirms by modern case studies three models of criminalization of bribe offering and promising or abuse of powers and recognizing them completed at an earlier or later stage of criminal activity.
Statute Splitting in Private International Law
Authors: Lutkova Oksana
Published: April 2016

This article considers the basic concepts of the private international law doctrine about “splitting of the statute”. Statute splitting is the phenomenon when more than one legal order is applied at the same time to a single legal relation. However, there are several conflicting approaches regarding this scientific issue. Representatives of one of the approaches see splitting of the statute in the domestic law conflicts of state characterized by a multiplicity of legal systems. Representatives of the other approach believe that splitting of the statute occurs when separate parts of a single legal relation are subject to different conflict of law rules. The author of this article holds the opinion of the representatives of yet another approach to this issue and gives arguments in favor of the position that “genuine” splitting of statute means that a single legal relation is regulated by a single conflict of laws rule but in reality the laws of several states rather than the law of one state are applied according to the facts of the single legal relation. The author suggests new terminology for the “splitting of the statute” concept.
Judicial Power as Mandatory Attribute of a Constituent Entity of the Russian Federation
Authors: Tsaliev Aleksandr
Published: April 2016

The article criticizes the idea of territorial federalism and on the example of judicial power the author demonstrates that attempts to reduce the constitutional and legal status of constituent entities of the Russian Federation to the level of administrative-territorial units only pursue the aim to divest them of state authority and property. In order to substantiate his point of view, the author analyzes the legal status of constituent entities of the Russian Federation and notes that judicial power is defined as their mandatory attribute. The author underlines social demand and necessity in founding and functioning of constitutional (charter) courts of constituent entities of the Russian Federation. The author criticizes the draft law which proposes to exclude justices of the peace from the courts of constituent entities of the Russian Federation and grant them the status of federal courts. The author describes German experience, where constitutional justice is carried out as part of the model of a two-level constitutional control — by the Constitutional Court of the Federation and bodies of specialized constitutional justice of constituent entities as its integral part.
Implementing Service Innovations in European Hotels
Authors: Enz Cathy A. , Way Sean A.
Published: April 2016

This paper examines the impact of postadoption innovation implementation strategies on five distinct performance outcomes. Using a sample of 85 hotels in Europe, the study explores which implementation strategies are most strongly linked to specific innovation outcomes and competitive performance. The results reveal that employee enabling implementation strategies have a positive direct effect on employee performance and indirect effects on customer sentiment outcomes and the operational performance of the innovation. Administratively driven implementation strategies had a positive direct effect on customer comparative performance, and an indirect effect on a firm’s comparative operational performance, as hypothesized. Finally, owners were more likely to be idea generators and principal early supporters of successful innovations, highlighting the power of top-down approaches to championing change within the European context.
Pressure ulcer management in paraplegic patients with a novel negative pressure device: a randomised controlled trial
Authors: Dwivedi M.K. , Srivastava R.N. , Bhagat A.K. , Agarwal R. , Baghel K. , Jain A. , Raj S.
Published: April 2016

Objective:

A randomised controlled trial to compare negative pressure wound therapy (NPWT) using our innovative negative pressure device (NPD) and the standard pressure ulcer (PU) wound dressing of in traumatic paraplegia patients.

Method:

This study was conducted in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at King George's Medical University, Lucknow, India. Traumatic paraplegia patients with sacral pressure ulcers of stage 3 and 4 were randomised into two groups, receiving either standard wound dressings or NPWT with NPD. The outcomes monitored were length, width (surface area), depth of PU, exudates, discharge, tissue type (necrotic, slough and red granulating tissue), and cost-effectiveness during 0 to 9 weeks follow-up.

Results:

Length and width were significantly (p<0.01) decreased in NPWT group as compared with standard care group at week 9. At weeks 1, 2 and 3, depth was significantly (p<0.05) higher in NPWT group, whereas at week 9 a significant reduction (p=0.01) was observed. Exudates were significantly (p=0.001) lower in NPWT group at weeks 4 and 9. Conversion of slough into red granulation tissue was significantly higher in NPWT group (p=0.001). Discharge became significantly (p=0.001) lower in NPWT at week 2 and no discharge was observed after week 6. In all parameters, decrease was larger in NPWT group compared with standard care, which was significant for exudates type (p=0.03) and tissue type (p=0.004).

Conclusion:

Our NPD is better than standard wound care procedures and cost-effective for management of PU.
Influence of Density and Equilibrium Moisture Content on the Hardness Anisotropy of Wood
Authors: Peng Hui , Jiang Jiali , Zhan Tianyi , Lu Jianxiong
Published: April 2016

The aim of this study was to investigate the anisotropic characteristics of Brinell hardness for six species (softwood, Chinese fir [Cunninghamia lanceolata (Lamb.) Hook.], Red pine [Pinus koraiensis Sieb. et Zucc.], Mongolian scotch pine [Pinus sylvestris L. var. mongolica Litv.]; hardwood, Manchurian walnut [Juglans mandshurica Maxim.], Asian white birch [Betula platyphylla Suk.], Mongolian oak [Quercus mongolica Fisch. et Turcz.]) with the equilibrium moisture content (EMC) obtained at four relative humidity (RH) levels (20°C; 50%, 65%, 85%, and 95% RH). The results showed that the cross section of specimens presented higher Brinell hardness and lower elastic recovery than those tested on radial and tangential surfaces. Ovendried density was significantly positively correlated with Brinell hardness. With the exception of softwood on a tangential surface (r = 0.02), there was a statistically significant positive correlation of elastic recovery against ovendried density (at the 0.01 level). We found that a general increase in EMC significantly lowered the Brinell hardness for six species, irrespective of grain orientation. The decreased extent of relative Brinell hardness (HB/HB0) was highest for cross section samples, compared with radial and tangential surfaces. For three softwood species, the decreased extent of HB/HB0 on the radial surface was higher than that on the tangential surface, whereas the opposite relationship was found in three hardwood species. The results indicated that rays were probably the main factor controlling transverse anisotropy in hardwood, while the interaction of earlywood and latewood was more important for softwood. In addition, elastic recovery anisotropy was probably owing to different failure behavior in three directions, and it was difficult to establish a direct influence of EMC on elastic recovery.
Moralinės legitimacijos reikšmė kritinės teorijos požiūriu
Authors: Mažeikis Gintautas , Perov Vadim
Published: April 2016

Straipsnis nagrinėja moralinės legitimacijos teorijų sąveiką su komunikacinio veiksmo, poelgio ir derybų koncepcijomis, atsižvelgiant į klasikinių racionalumo idealų kritiką ir Habermaso silpnąją transcendentalinės pragmatikos nuostatą. Straipsnio tikslas yra parodyti moralinės legitimacijos, jos procedūrų epistemologinės apklausos svarbą šiuolaikinei įvairovės visuomenei. Legitimacijos tema nagrinėjama atsižvelgiant į Weberio, Arendt ir Habermaso samprotavimus. Straipsnis papildo moralinio komunikacinio veiksmo ir normatyvumo teorijas moralinio laikiškumo, pasaulio įvykio ir poelgio sampratomis ir teigia: kritinės teorijos požiūriu moralinė legitimacija remiasi galimai universaliomis komunikacinio veiksmo, derybų ir pakankamumo idėjomis, kurios priklauso nuo politinio daugialypumų proceso. Straipsnyje pateikiami argumentai, susiję komunikacine kritika: autoriteto ir statuso, institucinės subordinacijos, klasikinių racionalumo idealų, etinio reliatyvizmo, bei kalbama apie pasitikėjimo kaupimą, vertybių derinimą ir konkurenciją. Straipsnio argumentai dėstomi atsižvelgiant į daugialypumų vienovės dinamiką, į pasaulio civilizacinės ir kultūrinės įvairovės plėtrą ir augančią asmens ir grupių dinamikos reikšmę. Nuosekliai atsisakoma pamatiškumo idėjos ją pakeičiant pakankamos legitimacijos, atviros politikos ir derybų statuso sampratomis bei jas aiškinant.
„Humanizacija per metaforas“ ir Baumano adiaforizacijos koncepcijos episteminės implikacijos
Authors: Tuleikytė Julija
Published: April 2016

Straipsnyje nagrinėjama Zygmunto Baumano adiaforizacijos koncepcija. Baumanas adiaforizacijos problemą atskleidžia dviem būdais: pateikdamas apibrėžimus, kuriuose adiaforizacija įvardijama kaip moralinis indiferentiškumas, bei aprašydamas socialinės tikrovės aspektus, kuriais adiaforizacija pasireiškia. Tokių aprašymų gausa ypač pasižymi ketvirtasis Baumano rašymo laikotarpis, kurio pradžią žymi „takusis posūkis“, ir Baumano socialinėje teorijoje išryškėja metodas, kurio vienas iš pavadinimų – „humanizacija per metaforas“. Šis metodas leidžia įžvelgti adiaforizacijos reiškinyje implicitiškai glūdinčias epistemines konotacijas, kurių specifikai atskleisti siūloma taikyti terminą „episteminis indiferentiškumas“. Viena iš kliūčių tai padaryti – leviniškoji Baumano moralės koncepcija. Straipsnyje svarstoma, ar Baumano vartojama leviniška tezė, teigianti moralės iki-socialumą, užkerta kelią adiaforizacijos kaip ne tik moralinio, bet ir episteminio indiferentiškumo traktuotei, ir daroma išvada, jog ne.
Characteristics of Rural Children Admitted to Pediatric Hospitals
Authors: Peltz Alon , Wu Chang L. , White Marjorie Lee , Wilson Karen M. , Lorch Scott A. , Thurm Cary , Hall Matt , Berry Jay G.
Published: April 2016

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES:

Delivering high-quality care to children living in rural areas can be challenging. Compared with nonrural children, rural children often experience worse health outcomes. We assessed characteristics and hospitalizations of rural children admitted to US children’s hospitals in 2012.

METHODS:

Retrospective cohort analysis of 672190 admissions between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2012, to 41 children’s hospitals in the Pediatric Health Information System database. ZIP codes were used to assess the patients’ rurality (by using Rural-Urban Community Areas classification), residence in a Health Professional Shortage Area, and family income. Multivariable regression was used to compare patient characteristics and hospital utilization between rural and nonrural children.

RESULTS:

Rural children accounted for 12% of all admissions (n = 81 360) to the children’s hospitals. Compared with nonrural children, rural children lived farther from the hospital (median [interquartile range]: 68 [48–104] vs 12 [6–24] miles) and more often resided in low-income ZIP codes (53% vs 24%) and Health Professional Shortage Areas (20% vs 4%) (P < .001 for all). Rural children had a higher prevalence of complex chronic conditions (44% vs 37%; P < .001) and medical technology assistance (15% vs 12%; P < .001). In multivariable analysis, rural children experienced higher inpatient costs (mean: $8507 vs $7814; P < .001) and higher odds of 30-day readmission (odds ratio: 1.1; 95% confidence interval: 1.0–1.1; P < .001).

CONCLUSIONS:

Rural children hospitalized at children’s hospitals have high rates of medical complexity and often reside in low-income and medically underserved areas. Compared with nonrural children, rural children experience more expensive hospitalizations and more frequent readmissions.
Cuantificación de diazótrofos en la rizósfera del olivo (Olea europaea L.) cultivado en Boyacá, Colombia
Authors: Bello Alvarez Oscar Fernando , García Molano José Francisco , Cuervo Bejarano William Javier
Published: April 2016

La investigación desarrollada tuvo como objeto cuantificar y determinar la actividad de las unidades formadoras de colonias de microorganismos fijadores de nitrógeno asociados a la rizósfera de árboles de olivo, plantados en el municipio de Sutamarchán, finca las Acacias de la provincia del Alto Ricaurte. Se utilizó un diseño en bloques con submuestras, teniendo como tratamientos la poda y el crecimiento libre; se usaron seis unidades experimentales (árboles) tres por tratamiento, los árboles eran jóvenes (<4 años) e iniciaban producción. Se tomaron muestras foliares y edáficas, se evaluaron los niveles poblacionales de microorganismos diazótrofos, se midió a nivel foliar el N% contenido y a nivel del suelo las concentraciones de NH4, NO3, CO y de fosforo, hierro y magnesio, intervinientes directamente en la fijación. En el análisis estadístico se usaron pruebas de supuestos, análisis de varianza y análisis de componentes principales. Se obtuvo que la poda generaba acidez y disminución del pH del suelo en forma significativa, los niveles foliares y edáficos de nitrógeno son bajos, pero, que las poblaciones de microorganismos fijadores son altas con poca eficiencia, al parecer por fijar en vida libre. Las concentraciones de Fe y Mg permiten inducir que la actividad de nitrogenasa es constante, pero el nitrógeno se inmoviliza posiblemente en el metabolismo microbiano, negando la posibilidad de ser absorbido por el olivo de forma directa; los niveles de calcio limitan la nutrición nitrogenada, finalmente es conveniente hacer identificación de las poblaciones, medir la actividad reductora de acetileno y la tasa de mineralización.
Efecto del secado y la edad de las plantas en la composición de los aceites esenciales de Lippia alba (Mill.) N.E.Br. ex Britton & P. Wilson y Lippia origanoides Kunth
Authors: Delgado Ospina Johannes , Sánchez Orozco Manuel Salvador , Bonilla Correa Carmen Rosa
Published: April 2016

En el estudio se determinaron el efecto de la edad de las plantas al momento de la cosecha y del secado de las hojas sobre la composición y concentración de los aceites esenciales de tres acce-siones de Lippia origanoides Kunth. (Patía, Cítrica y Típica) y dos accesiones de Lippia alba (Mill.) N.E.Br. ex Britton & P. Wilson (Cítrica y Típica) cultivadas en campo en la Universidad Nacional de Colombia sede Palmira.  En un arreglo de parcelas divididas con tres repeticiones, se evalua-ron 2 factores de secado y tres épocas de cosecha.  Los resultados mostraron que el secado aumentó la concentración de los componentes principales de cada accesión de las dos especies de Lippia y que la edad de las plantas al momento de la cosecha no afectó la concentración ni la composición de los aceites esenciales.