text stringlengths 8 5.77M |
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Selenophene-Based Heteroacenes: Synthesis, Structures, and Physicochemical Behaviors.
On the basis of three new building blocks, dithieno[3,2- b:2',3'- d]selenophene ( tt-DTS), diseleno[3,2- b:2',3'- d]thiophene ( tt-DST), and diseleno[3,2- b:2',3'- d]selenophene ( tt-DSS), four thiophene- and selenophene-based heteroacenes (3a-d) with up to seven fused rings were designed and synthesized. Another two selenophene-based heteroacenes (1 and 2) with three and five fused rings were prepared. The molecular structures of 1, 2, 3a, and 3c were confirmed by single-crystal analysis. The results showed that molecular structures, spectroscopy features, and cyclic voltammetry behaviors could be modulated by changing the heteroatoms from sulfur to selenium for 3a-d or changing the numbers of selenophene rings for 1, 2, and 3d. |
Improved membrane transport of astaxanthine by liposomal encapsulation.
Astaxanthine (3,3'-dihydroxy-beta,beta'-caroten-4,4'-dione) (AST), a red-colored carotenoid pigment, possesses extremely powerful antioxidative activity. However, its drawbacks reside in poor solubility in aqueous system, resulting in extremely low bioavailability. To ameliorate such defects, we prepared AST encapsulated within liposomes (AST-L) and tested with Hep3B and HepG2 cell lines. AST-L had size 251+/-23 nm with AST content 89.0+/-8.6 mg/g. AST-L apparently showed improved stability and transportability. The overall transport time was 7.55 h and 6.00 h for free AST and AST-L, respectively. AST-L more effectively activated antioxidant enzymes like superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione S-transferase than free AST. Hep3B consumed AST more rapidly than HepG2 cell lines. Moreover, AST-L when combined with gamma radiation (10 Gy) therapy potentially triggered subG(1) arrest in Hep3B and HepG2 cell lines in a dose-responsive manner (p<0.05). To conclude, the poor bioavailability of AST can be improved by liposomal encapsulation, which can be a good adjuvant remedy in gamma radiotherapy. |
911 Briefs -- Published May 26, 2013
STOCKTON - A man was arrested and had to be restrained after getting into a violent struggle with police Friday, authorities said.
By The Record
recordnet.com
By The Record
Posted May. 26, 2013 at 12:01 AM
By The Record
Posted May. 26, 2013 at 12:01 AM
» Social News
STOCKTON - A man was arrested and had to be restrained after getting into a violent struggle with police Friday, authorities said.
Officers responded to the 8000 block of West Lane about 4:35 p.m. on a report of two men who were intoxicated and refusing to leave, police said. When officers arrived, one of the men ran.
The man was apprehended following a brief foot chase, but the man began to fight with officers when they tried to handcuff him, authorities said.
Additional officers responded to the scene to help take the man into custody. When placed in the back of a police car, he began kicking the windows, officers said. The man was then removed from the car and placed in a Safe WRAP restraint device, which immobilizes a person's legs and waist.
Jack Knight, a 36-year-old parolee at large, was arrested on suspicion of resisting arrest and being drunk in public, authorities said.
STOCKTON - Community Response Team officers and members of the multiagency San Joaquin County gang task force got into a brief vehicle pursuit after trying to make a traffic stop about 10 p.m. Friday in the 3100 block of East Main Street, police said.
The driver initially pulled over but then accelerated, leading officers on a short pursuit that reached speeds of 40 mph, authorities said. The driver pulled over less than a mile into the chase and attempted to flee on foot, but he was wrestled to the ground and taken into custody, police said. |
I Had A Car Accident....
Last 2 weeks, Malaysians were enjoying a one day off for Wesak day. Hubby was working since his company doesn't take in Wesak as the PH. But hubby was not well since Sunday. So, I asked him whether he would like me to be with him during the PH. He refused. His reasons, he will be working so he won't be spending time with me and it would be better if I could spend time with Adam back in PD. Thus, I obeyed him.
Still, I was worry about hubby. On the afternoon of Wesak day, I asked him again. His conditions was not better. And he sounded weak. But he insists that he was ok. Fine, I stayed in PD.
But at 8.00pm, hubby called me. He was really sick. I got worried. The moment he called me, I was on my way to the town with Adam to do some adhoc shopping. I still went to the nearest shop and grab Adam's things for school and drove back to home and packed my bag. I left home in PD around 9.30pm.
I was tired and wasn't able to rest that day. So, my driving ability decreased after 2 hours. I stopped at Muadzam gas station and took a nap at 12.00am. I realized that it will do no good if I continue to drive. I should take smart precaution. Safety comes first.
I forced myself to wake up one hour later and continued my journey slowly since I was still tired and sleepy. But my thoughts on hubby kept me going.
By 2.30 am, after passing by the river bridge across Sg Pahang after Paloh Hinai, the road was empty. A total silence and was extremely dark. I was going at around 90-100km/hour. Once in a while there will be lorries from the other directions. A few minutes later, I saw a big dog...really big with the size of almost a young bull crossing road in front of me. It was sooo fast and he was soo near ahead. The dog had a long bushy tail with thick fur with grey and black color. IYes, I still remember it clearly because I wanted to make sure that it was a dog and not a wild boar.
I stepped on my brake, but I didn't step it all down. I made about 70% from the total brake. I did it for several reasons. First, my car was at a high speed and it is a national car. My ABS system was not entirely reliable at that speed. I was afraid that the car could rolled over badly on the road if I step on the break 100%. Secondly, the car might have drifted to the side of the road and it was so dark that I wouldn't know what danger awaits me at the road side. Could be trees, could be cliff or it could be big rocks. It could brings more damage to the car, and maybe to my life.
So I hit the dog.
I didn't stop. I didn't look at the dog and I do not know whether the dog is still alive or not. It was too dark and the road was too quite and empty. Too dangerous for a lady driver like me to step out from my car at that hour, at that situation. So I kept on driving for another 10km with the dragging sounds that I didn't know what until I found a tom yam shop was still operating. I stopped in front of the shop to take a look at the damages.
My front bumper was damaged at the left side. It broke into pieces. A boy and a girl from the tom yam shop came to me. I explained what happened and the boy helped to discard any unwanted dangling pieces including the fog lamp hanging on a piece of wire since the casing at the skirting has flew along the way.
I thanked the boy and girl, and continued my journey. I reached hubby around 3.30 am and found that hubby was flaming hot. I attended him and waited for a while. I parked my damaged car at the porch and transferred all my begs and belongings to his car. At 5.00 am I drove his car to the clinic. His fever was high. The doctor would like to send him to the hospital, but hubby refused. We promised to take a good care on his fever. We left the clinic around 6.00 am and stopped by at a restaurant for breakfast. Hubby needs to eat and consume his medication.
After breakfast, I drove straight to office in KL to pick up my office mate and we went to Bangi for a seminar. I spent the whole day working and hubby took some rest. I forced him to have lunch with me at the seminar cafe and make sure he eats and rest.
I had loads of work to do that week. With hubby still in fever and me as the generator to move the company's activities and meetings, I did manage to juggling things between formal and personal. Weekend was heavy as well. There was a kenduri at Mommy's house. Though we ordered the food from a caterer, but still there was a lot to do.
But by Sunday, I was proud of myself. I managed to settle everything though I need to sacrifice my rest, my sleeps, my health and even my safety. Alhamdulillah. I completed my job, hubby is back to good health again and I have attended my Mommy as well. I am still here standing. I hope I will be standing strong until I've fulfilled all my responsibilities. Until there's no one need me anymore.
Insya Allah....
Note : The car has been repaired by hubby colleague in Kuantan. He charged me with cheap price, Alhamdulillah. |
Q:
Entity Updating strategy
There is some discussion on my team about updating entity data and how best to approach it. This is a security framework and so here are some of the constraints and ideas.
every table in DB has a PK that is a guid, this is required for our multi-node clustering solution. The idea is that we don't want to expose this on an entity to a customer via an API because it could do two things,
give them more info that needed for their job and giving hackers more information about the system.
support nightmare is that a client hardcodes to this ID in some fashion and if we need to change our PK's clients are impacted.
solutions are to expose the natual key of the items like Role object with a unique Name, and Realm, together guarentee uniqueness however updating either of these values is the challenge, cause you need to specify the old and new values to update, or pass two objects in original and new object, so we can find the one to update. kind of messy,
another approach is to make an alternate key and have this exposed to the client they can use it all they want and we don't care cause it isn't tied to our PK.
it seems everyone these days just uses PK as ID for entities with no issues, not sure how to convince our team of veterns from the old timey programming days.
Another issue is how to support partial updates, issue is that you have entity with 10 properties, 4 collections, etc... with a name+realm combo and specify what property to update instead of pulling down whole object change 1 field, send back for update. I say lazy load the collections, but not sure if partial update makes sense.
thoughts?
thanks!
A:
My approach for a security framework would be like this:
Give anything in the database an internal ID (identity column, sequence, whatever your database support. "native generated id column" in Hibernate speak). Eventually, you're going to need it and to retro-fit is a lot of work.
If you need to hand an ID to the user, generate a random number, check that it hasn't been used already, connect it to an internal ID and then hand it to the user. Never hand out the internal ID and never use IDs that can be guessed by crackers.
As for partial updates, they only start to make sense if you have lots of objects with lots of attributes. For 10 attributes, I would say "premature optimization."
|
Q:
Not sure of /etc/crypttab entry on Ubuntu 18.04
I have been following the following guides:
http://www.cim.mcgill.ca/~anqixu/blog/index.php/2018/06/20/install-18-04-on-encrypted-partitions-xps15-cuda/
How can I install Ubuntu encrypted with LUKS with dual-boot?
I have created a 4G Swap Partition on the encrypted LVM partition as per the latter link however not sure of the entry to use in /etc/crypttab file.
If I run:
blkid | grep swap
/dev/mapper/vgroot-lvswap: UUID="12345678987654321" TYPE=swap
Does the entry need to be
vgroot-lvswap UID=12345678987654321 /dev/urandom swap,offset=1024,cipher=aes-xts-plain64
A:
Your format is valid for entry in the /etc/crypttab but update your UID to UUID
vgroot-lvswap UUID="12345678987654321" /dev/urandom swap,offset=1024,cipher=aes-xts-plain64
And also make sure the name vgroot-lvswap is the name you used when you ran sudo cryptsetup luksOpen .... name_of_device_mapper!
|
Q:
Bootstrap nested grid layout
I am pretty new to Bootstrap and read this tutorial which explains about bootstrap grid system. I am trying to make a layout that looks like this
Each colored block represents a web component whose height is not specified, the web components are supposed to occupy the height of its parent. The problem is that the parent divs are not taking 100% height to occupy the entire viewport
height.
I have added 50px height for all the divs so that I could show the output correctly. The original code does not have it.
div {
height: 50px;
border: 1px solid black;
}
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="./assets/libs/bootstrap/css/bootstrap.min.css"></link>
<div class="container">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-lg-7">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-lg-8"></div>
<div class="col-lg-4"></div>
<div class="clearfix visible-lg-block"></div>
<div class="col-lg-4"></div>
<div class="col-lg-8"></div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="col-lg-5">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-lg-6"></div>
<div class="col-lg-6">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-lg-12"></div>
<div class="clearfix visible-lg-block"></div>
<div class="col-lg-12"></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<!-- Load scripts here-->
<script src="../bower_components/jquery/dist/jquery.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/angular/angular.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/angular-bootstrap/ui-bootstrap.min.js"></script>
<script src="./assets/libs/bootstrap/js/bootstrap.min.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/angular-animate/angular-animate.min.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/angular-route/angular-route.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/angular-sanitize/angular-sanitize.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/angular-mocks/angular-mocks.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/restangular/dist/restangular.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/underscore/underscore.js"></script>
<script src="../bower_components/chart.js/dist/Chart.bundle.min.js"></script>
<script src="app.js"></script>
This is how it looks after nesting the grid layout
I am clueless at this point, what am I missing here ?
A:
LIVE LINK
YOU can make This way div && col-md-*/col-lg-*.
Height is not a matter Because If you want You can also use height=100vh or 50vh which are 100% height to occupy the entire viewport height .
When height:100vh live Link
or also by height:auto
when you keep some content in those div.
BY DIV EX:
body
{
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
font-size: 100%;
font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
}
.bborder{
border: 1px solid #000;
}
.cborder {
border: 1px solid #000;
height: 150px;
}
.border {
border: 1px solid #000;
height: 300px;
}
.color {
background: #B5E61D;
}
.color_1 {
background: #99D9EA;
}
.color_2 {
background: #B97A57;
}
.color_3 {
background: #A349A4;
}
.color_4 {
background: #EFE4B0;
}
.color_5 {
background: #FFC90E;
}
.color_6 {
background: #C8BFE7;
}
<link href="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/3.3.7/css/bootstrap.min.css" rel="stylesheet"/>
<div class="">
<div class="">
<div class="col-md-7 col-lg-7">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-12 col-lg-12">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-8 col-lg-8 cborder color">
</div>
<div class="col-md-4 col-lg-4 cborder color_1">
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="col-md-12 col-lg-12">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-4 col-lg-4 cborder color_2">
</div>
<div class="col-md-8 col-lg-8 cborder color_3">
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="col-md-5 col-lg-5">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-6 col-lg-6 border color_4">
<div class="row">
</div>
</div>
<div class="col-md-6 col-lg-6">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-md-12 col-lg-12 cborder color_5">
<div class="row">
</div>
</div>
<div class="col-md-12 col-lg-12 cborder color_6">
<div class="row">
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
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Hidden Water is a restorative justice program designed to help individuals heal from the devastating impact of child sexual abuse within a family system. Our program has two components: Healing Circles and Family System Circles. By using the indigenous Peacekeeping Circle model, we offer an opportunity for each person in a family system to find a support circle appropriate to their needs, do the work they need to heal and support the rebalancing of the family system. |
Přihlášení / Registrace
One of my greatest fears is "It."
I can't touch "it," but I can feel "it."
It does not have a taste or smell,
But I can hear it in my spirit
[Chorus:]
It is deep inside of me,
It makes me fear my memory
One day I'll live peacefully,
Without the fear of "It"
It is something I can't see
It can never possess me
It always tries to take control
I can defeat it if I believe it
[Repeat Chorus]
It keeps running through my mind,
I have to fight it time and time
And time and time and time
And time again...
[Repeat Chorus]
The more I understand about it
The less my world revolves around it
Then I can just live out my life
Without the fear of "it." |
Q:
How to download data from a website introducing some parameters in Objective C
I'm new in objective C and I'm having problems to find this.
My app is going to be: 1) user introduces a parameter, and 2) my app returns the data in a list.
I have to do this using a website, but i don't know how to know do the request, and then how to pick up and parse the info.
How can I start??
A:
I think that you can handle the filter parameter in the server with a cgi or php, in the app, make the request and get the response.
1.- Get the parameter from the user like a NSString.
2.- Create a NSURL from the string (and the server adress string).
3.- The use the class method dataWithContentsOfURL from NSData to initialize a NSData object from the response url.
4.- NSData is really flexible, so you can do anything with it.
Note: dataWithContentsOfURL is synchronous, so if you want async, take a look at Grand Central Dispatch.
|
Q:
what parent process stuff gets shared in newly created child process in Linux
When a process creates a child process using fork() then what are things of parent process that get shared with child process. like address space, memory, signal etc.
Note:-I have gone through the fork manual.still i need some more information about it.I have Google it also.but i need not get complete idea about it.Please somebody explain me deeply how the fork works.
A:
From Advanced Programming in the UNIX by W. Richard Stevens
The child is a
copy of the parent. For example, the child gets a copy of the parent's data space, heap, and stack. Note that this
is a copy for the child; the parent and the child do not share these portions of memory
one characteristic of fork is that all file descriptors that are open in the parent are
duplicated in the child.
There are numerous other properties of the parent that are inherited by the child:
1. real user ID, real group ID, effective user ID, effective group ID
2. supplementary group IDs
3. process group ID
4. session ID
5. controlling terminal
6. set-user-ID flag and set-group-ID flag
7. current working directory
8. root directory
9. file mode creation mask
10. signal mask and dispositions
11. the close-on-exec flag for any open file descriptors
12. environment
13. attached shared memory segments
14. resource limits
15. Memory mappings
The differences between the parent and child are
1. the return value from fork
2. the process IDs are different
3. the two processes have different parent process IDs—the parent process ID of the child is the parent; the parent process ID of the parent doesn't change
4. the child's values for tms_utime, tms_stime, tms_cutime, and tms_ustime are set to 0
5. file locks set by the parent are not inherited by the child
6. pending alarms are cleared for the child
7. the set of pending signals for the child is set to the empty set
A:
Any reference to Stevens is normally a good reference in my book. However, one thing Stevens doesn't do is give Linux specific answers, and the clone system call did not exist when Stevens wrote his book.
Given you've tagged this Linux, I am supposing you want the Linux specific answer, which you'll find with man clone. This gives you the entire list of things that might or might not be shared with fork(), as fork() is implemented using clone(). From memory, fork() uses clone() passing no flags, (i.e. a 0). The manpage for clone() will thus tell you exactly what it does and does not copy.
There is a good explanation here:
https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/87551/which-file-in-kernel-specifies-fork-vfork-to-use-sys-clone-system-call
|
Q:
What are the differences between "Premium Beta" and "Standard Beta"?
The new Elite: Dangerous store launched yesterday, allowing the purchase of a variety of packages including;
Preorder Elite: Dangerous
Standard Beta
Premium Beta
What are the differences between "Premium Beta" and "Standard Beta"?
A:
The differences between "Standard" and "Premium" beta are a throwback to the original Kickstarter campaign, in that Frontier are going to be running two rounds of private beta before opening the game up to the public.
Premium beta will get you into the first round of beta testing, which is intended to be started in February at this time. Standard beta will get you into the second around of beta testing, which will start sometime after that.
Both packages will provide you with a digital release of the game once it is released. The Premium beta package also includes the Expansion Pass, which will give you access to all future downloadable content free of charge - like a season pass.
|
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a contact pin for a socket for electrical parts, and the socket for electrical parts, which is used for establishing an electrical connection between a semiconductor device (hereinlater called an IC package) or the like and a printed circuit board, by detachably holding the semiconductor device.
2. Related Art
As a conventional “socket for electrical parts” of this kind, there is provided, for example, an IC socket, as shown in FIGS. 10 to 12 that are described in Japan unexamined Laid-opened patent publication No. A-242977/1999.
The conventional IC socket 11, as shown in FIG. 10, is designed to be mounted on a printed circuit board 12 and to electrically connect an IC package 13 as “electrical parts” and the printed circuit board by holding the IC package 13 on the socket.
The IC socket 11 has a base plate 14, a tab film 15, a ball guide 16 and a pressing jig 17, in this order from the bottom. And these parts are detachably assembled by using a bolt 18 and a nut 19.
The base plate 14, as shown in FIG. 10, is formed to be a plate having a quadrangular shape, and at a peripheral portion of its 4 sides thereof, a plurality of round type pins 14a lines up in two lines. Inner side of the lines of the round pins, 4 bolt holes 14b, 4 positioning holes 14c are provided, and an elastic member 14d made of silicon rubber having elasticity is provided at a central portion of the base plate. The round pin 14a, as shown in FIGS. 10 and 11, passes through the base plate 14 and is provided with a fitting concave portion 14e at its upper portion. At a lower portion of the round pin 14a, an inserting portion 14f which protrudes downward from an under surface of the base plate 14 is provided and designed to be electrically connected to the printed circuit board by being inserted into a through hole 12a of the printed circuit board 12.
In addition, a tab film 15, as shown in FIGS. 10 and 11, is formed to be a thin sheet having a quadrangular shape and a size similar to the base plate 14. The tab film has, on its upper surface opposite to the IC package 13, an electrode pattern 15a for establishing connection with a set of arrangement of terminals 13a of the IC package 13 and has, on its lower surface opposite to the base plate 14, a pin type terminal 15b for establishing connection with the base plate 14. The tab film also has a conducting wire connecting the pin type terminal 15b and the electrode pattern 15a.
The pin type terminal 15b is structured to be inserted into a fitting concave portion 14e of the round pin 14a of the base plate 14. In addition, the tab film 15 has also a bolt hole 15c and a positioning hole 15d having a size and at a position corresponding to the holes of the base plate 14 etc.
Further, the ball guide 16, as shown in FIGS. 10 and 11, is made of an electrical insulating material and has a quadrangular plate like shape having a size similar to a pressing jig body 20 of the pressing jig 17. At a central portion of the ball guide 16, a positioning opening 16a is provided for positioning a periphery of the solder ball 13a of the IC package 13. And at a position corresponding to the bolt hole 15c and the positioning hole 15d, a bolt hole 16b and a positioning hole 16c have a similar size to the corresponding bolt and the positioning holes (15c and 15d) of the tab film 15. The positioning opening 16a, as shown in FIG. 12, positions the balls 13a which are arranged at the outermost periphery of the matrix-like set of the solder ball arrangement.
Further, the pressing jig 17, as shown in FIG. 11, has the pressing jig body 20 having a quadrangular shape frame, a cover member 21 rotatably attached to the pressing jig body 20 through an axis 22, and a spring 29 urging the cover member 21 in an opening direction of the cover member 21 (clockwise in FIG. 11). A pusher member 23 for pressing the IC package 13 is attached through an axis 30 on the cover member 21 in a swinging manner. The pusher is urged by a spring 28 in a direction away from the cover member 21. Further, on the cover member 21 an engaged portion 24 is provided, and a latch member 25, which is designed to engage with the engaged portion 24, is provided through an axis 26 rotatably on the pressing jig body 20. The latch member 25 is urged clockwise in FIG. 12 (in an engaging direction) by the spring 27.
Into the pressing jig body 20, as shown in FIGS. 11 and 12, the IC package 13 having a quadrangular shape is designed to be inserted and be mounted on the tab film 15. From an under surface portion of the pressing jig body 20, a positioning pin 20a protrudes downward to be fitted into the positioning holes 14c, 15d and 16c. Further, in the pressing jig body 20, as shown in FIG. 12, a bolt hole 20b having the same size as the size of the bolt hole 16b of the ball guide 16 is provided at a place correspondent to the bolt hole 16b.
The positioning pin 20a of the pressing jig body 20 is, as shown in FIG. 11, fitted into each positioning hole 14c, 15d and 16c of the base plate 14, the tab film 15 and the ball guide 16 so that each member is assembled in a predetermined positional relationship. And then into each bolt hole 14b, 15c, 16b and 20b of the base plate 14, the tab film 15, the ball guide 16 and the pressing jig body 20, the bolt 18 is inserted and screwed up together with the nut 19, to put all these parts on one another.
In such a socket mentioned above, when the IC package 13 is accommodated on the IC socket 11, as shown in FIG. 12, the outer periphery of the IC package 13 is guided to be positioned by an inner surface of the quadrangular frame-like pressing jig body 20 and also the solder ball 13a of the IC package 13 is guided and positioned by the ball guide 16.
An upper surface of the peripheral portion of the thus positioned IC package 13 is then pressed by the pusher member 23, as shown in FIG. 12.
However, in such a conventional socket, the fitting concave portion 14e of the round pin 14a of the base plate 14 is designed to be fitted to the pin type terminal 15b of the tab film 15 as an intermediate connector, being poor in workability of producing the round pin 14a having the fitting concave portion 14e and in workability of assembling and disassembling of the tab film 15. And as there is a need to bring the pin type terminal 15b into a fitting state, it is necessary to make the outer diameter of the round pin 14a larger, being inconvenient in realizing a socket having a narrower pitch of the round pins arrangement and consequently difficult in downsizing the IC socket 11.
In addition, as the IC package 13 is guided and positioned mainly by the pressing jig body 20, the pressing jig 17 must be replaced with another one so as to accommodate another IC package having a different size.
Further, the pusher member 23 is designed to press the IC package 13 in order to press the solder ball 13a on the tab film 15 so that when the pressing force becomes large, the solder ball 13a is excessively deformed in its shape.
There is another conventional IC socket other than the one mentioned above, which is designed to make contact between the under surface of the solder ball and the upper end portion of the contact pin. The contact pin, however, abuts strongly against the solder ball when the IC package is pushed with larger force, so that there is still a problem that the solder ball can be damaged. |
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A little-known liberal group backed by the Democracy Alliance, the exclusive club of several hundred wealthy donors that funds an array of progressive causes, has adopted an unusual strategy to achieve its mission of ridding US politics of the corrupting influence of big money: raising and spending gobs of cash from undisclosed, wealthy political donors.
The group, the Fund for the Republic, recently laid out its plan for 110 donors, fundraisers, activists, and political operatives, who convened over two days in mid-September at the W Hotel in Washington, DC, for an invitation-only, closed-press gathering titled “Crony Democracy.” Cohosted by the Democracy Alliance, the conference featured speakers and attendees including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, investor and progressive activist Jonathan Soros, ex-George W. Bush adviser Mark McKinnon, Stride Rite Corporation founder and major Democratic donor Arnold Hiatt, and Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry’s.
The event had a single goal: convincing well-heeled donors to invest in a $40 million “surge” to combat the flood of big money into American politics. That money, to be raised over five years, according to internal planning documents obtained by Mother Jones, will be funneled through the Fund for the Republic (FFR), a 501(c)(3) charity founded in September 2012. Nick Penniman, a progressive fundraiser who runs the fund and helped organize the “Crony Democracy” event, says his group will dole out those funds to groups involved in lobbying, grassroots advocacy, litigation, and electoral work aimed at strengthening ethics and campaign finance reform laws.
Penniman says he envisions FFR and its sister group, a 501(c)(4) nonprofit called Action for the Republic (AFR)—neither of which have to disclose their donors—as an “American Cancer Society for American democracy.” By that he means an ATM of sorts for the government reform movement, a central hub to which reform-seeking donors can give $50 or $5 million and know their money will underwrite the most-effective efforts. “Our long-term goal is to try to take the pain and confusion out of the giving to the cause of democracy,” he says.
Read the agenda for “Crony Democracy”:
Penniman laid out a threefold strategy for deploying those funds. In the near term, FFR and AFR will be looking to finance expansions of existing reform groups, ramp up grassroots mobilizing around the issue of money in politics, and recruit new donors and activists, especially young people, religious figures, and Republicans. Yes, Republicans. McKinnon, former John McCain counsel Trevor Potter, and former Dick Cheney aide Juleanna Glover are compiling a report for FFR identifying support within the GOP for the types of money-in-politics reforms supported by FFR.
With an eye toward the 2014 and 2016 elections, AFR plans to fund groups working to defeat politicians who oppose campaign finance reform—such as Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)—and to elect supporters of the cause. Documents provided to Mother Jones say this political work will be funded “primarily” by AFR, which, as a so-called social-welfare group, can engage in electoral activity as long as these efforts don’t eat up a majority of the group’s money and time.
FFR’s long-term focus will be on the courts—investing in legal experts and litigation that “provide a counterweight to Citizens United and other legal decisions that undercut the primacy of individual citizens in our political process,” according to FFR planning documents.
Penniman acknowledges that FFR’s $40 million “surge” is a pittance compared to the $3 billion spent on lobbying in 2011 or the $7 billion dumped into federal elections in 2012. But it’s significant considering what’s currently spent on good-government and campaign finance reform. In a 2013 essay for the journal Democracy, Penniman noted that combined budgets of the existing money-in-politics groups amounted to about $45 million a year, and the combined staff of every reform group was around 280 people, the size of a single midsize law firm. He argued that US philanthropy had a “blind spot for democracy, which has led to a chronic underinvestment in the cause of reform.” In that piece, Penniman set his sights far higher than raising $40 million: He called for $3 billion a year—or 1 percent of all annual philanthropy—on “democracy”-related issues.
FFR joins a growing crop of progressive groups coalescing around the issue of money in politics and, in some cases, trying to counter the flow of conservative dark money. Last December, top officials from the Sierra Club, NAACP, Greenpeace, the United Auto Workers, the Center for American Progress, and dozens of other progressive groups met at the National Education Association’s headquarters to strategize and pledge money and staff power for several process issues: filibuster reform, voter ID laws, and campaign finance. The coalition called itself the Democracy Initiative—not to be confused with the Democracy Alliance.
Julie Kohler, the Democracy Alliance’s managing director, says her group recommends to its members that they donate to FFR because today’s big-money politics often stands in the way of members’ policy goals, such as combating climate change. “Until we address this, we’re never going to be able to see progress on the reforms and policy changes that DA partners really care about,” Kohler says.
Of course, FFR’s strategy—raising big money, anonymously, and using it to undercut big-money politics—leaves the group vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy. David Keating, the president of the anti-regulation Center for Competitive Politics, says that if FFR and the Democracy Alliance believe in greater transparency and limits on political spending, they should publicize their meetings, the names of their donors, and how much those donors give. “If they really think these ideas of more disclosure and more restrictions on political organizing are good,” Keating says, “they should be using them right now.”
Referring to his group’s decision not to reveal its donors, Penniman says, “All of the organizations we work with play by the current rules. Until the rules are changed, it’s hard to expect anyone to stop playing by them.” He adds, “It will take big money to fight big money. We want to help bring this fight up to a scale at which we all have a much higher probability of winning.” |
package com.brandon3055.draconicevolution.integration.jei;
import com.brandon3055.draconicevolution.DraconicEvolution;
import net.minecraft.util.ResourceLocation;
/**
* Created by brandon3055 on 25/07/2016.
*/
public class RecipeCategoryUids {
public static final ResourceLocation FUSION_CRAFTING = new ResourceLocation(DraconicEvolution.MODID, "fusion");
public static final ResourceLocation SAPWNER_CRAFTING =new ResourceLocation(DraconicEvolution.MODID, "eio_spawner");
}
|
None of excise tax paid to CDC – PM Gonsalves
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The Carnival Development Corporation (CDC) has not been paid any of the revenue realised since excise taxes were increased in 2012.
At a press conference yesterday, Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Dr Ralph Gonsalves said none of the excise tax was paid to the CDC, because despite the increase in the tax, there was no increase {{more}}in what was collected.
In 2012, Government increased the excise tax on alcohol and non-alcoholic beverages, tobacco and motor vehicles. At the time the increase was announced, Gonsalves indicated that the revenue derived from this would be used to support Carnival.
In response to a question at a press conference yesterday, the Prime Minister noted that while he was overseas, he had been listening to discussions that seemed to suggest that he âannounced something and starving the CDC and not giving them what is their due.â
He explained that while some persons believe that the CDC should be getting all excise duties, the agreement was to give to them only the increase of what was collected.
âIn 2013, up to the end of April, we collected $6.2 million in excise duties on international trade. This year, up to the end of April, we collected $5.6 million. It fell,â he said. âNow, it is clear that the excise duties have been slightly less this year.â
Gonsalves noted that it is for this reason that the corporation has not received any funds from the excise tax.
However, he has indicated that steps would be taken to keep the organization afloat, as the Government provides over $400,000 worth of subsidy in the Budget for CDC and the National Lotteries also provides them with funds.
âThese are the two significant sources from the state. They get in cash and kind over $1 million from the National Lotteries.
The CDC came to me a few weeks ago, shortly before I went away and I advised them, like I advised everybody else who lining up for more money, that we all have to do more with less. They were seeking approval which I indicated I would get in Cabinet for them to have an additional facility to guide them over. But, helping them with an additional facility is just postponing the problem down the road for another for or five years,â the Prime Minister said.
Last week, at a press conference, of the CDC Dennis Ambrose made a plea to the Government to help them clear a $250,000 debt.(BK) |
The cake Kim made for us was not only gorgeous but delicious, She listened to our requests and made it classy with sparkle. The tasting gave us an opportunity to try multiple flavor combinations which led to alternating layer flavors for our cake. It was moist and delicious, Everyone enjoyed eating their slice.
She was also responsive and accommodating to working with us to drop off our cake topper while she was on "vacation". Great service.
Kim created exactly what we were looking for for our Wedding! We had several different cakes,and they were all beautiful. Amongst the cakes we had 3 different flavors happening, and our guests were pleasantlyu surprised. Typically, not many people have much to say about the cake at weddings... but we received so many complements, and everyone said that cake was delicious. Aesthetically the cakes were perfect, and they tasted great and were perfectly baked.. moist and delicious. Kim was also very accomodating in regards to the cake sizes, etc and the stands that we wanted to use... she was wonderful to work with. Everyone at the shop was so friendly as well, I would highly recommend Kim's Cottage Confections.. thank you so much for everything!
Kim's cakes are the best! So moist and flavorful and the variety we were able to have at our wedding is something we haven't seen before. We had 3 different types at our wedding and had both cake and cupcakes. Kim was willing to work with us to create the perfect cake and really knows what she is talking about. Her recommendations were perfect and we ended up with the perfect wedding cake that we still receive complements on over a year later.
We would recommend her to anyone looking for the perfect cake for their big day.
Our cake was amazing! The best part about it: 1.) It was funfetti cake 2.) The price was included with our wedding venue. The girls there were very helpful with choosing the right style and tier's for our cake. We didn't want fondant and they were very susceptible with our choice. Go with the butter-cream and you won't be disappointed!
Our cake was beautiful and delicious! Our venue provided the cake, but they gave us a few options. We loved the cakes we tasted and decided to go with Kim. Our cake was delicious! We had so many compliments on our cake. The dance floor cleared out because everyone was enjoying the cake :)
I learned of Kim's Cottage Confections through my venue. The cake tasted as amazing as it looked. The actual cake was twice as beautiful as what I had imagined when we designed it at the tasting. I was extremely pleased when I saw it for the first time when I walked into my reception room. I highly recommend Kim's Cottage Confections!
We used Kim's cottage confections for our June wedding at the Riverhouse in Haddam, CT. The cake was absolutely delicious! My only gripe was that we paid extra for colorful Plumeria flowers to be added to the cake, and were really disappointed in the amount of flowers (there was only about 10), and coloration. We wanted bight, bold orange, pink and yellows, and got boring pastel colors. If you are going for taste over appearance, then Kim's is a good choice.
Kims Cottage Confections did an amazing job on our wedding cake. Kim was fantastic to work with and the design of the cake was EXACTLY how we wanted it.
EVERYONE at the wedding commented on how fantastic the cake was. The cake was super moist and the frosting was fantastic. We had a chocolate chip cake with chocolate mouse filling and butter cream frosting.
The top layer of the cake was not included in the slice count so we cannot wait to have some on our first anniversary!
Delicious and stunning! Our guests are raving about our cake from Kim's. It wasn't the typical white cake with white frosting - Kim gave us lots of choices, and we went with an applesauce spice cake with walnut butter cream frosting. AMAZING! The perfect, unexpected wedding treat! It tasted like fall, which is exactly what we wanted.
Kim also took our special cake topper and placed it on the cake perfectly. She listens to what you want, and then makes it even better.
Kim's Cottage Confections did an amazing job on our wedding cake! They have very tasty and affordable cakes and she is willing to make each layer to your specifications. Our wedding was in October and both of our birthdays were in May so we bought 2 different cakes with the layers we wanted in our cake to try them and we are glad we did! I would buy a cake again from Kim's!
Kim was awesome! She was so open to all of my ideas! My cake was absolutely amazing and looked exactly like the picture I gave her to work from! She was also so helpful with the ordering of our candy favors! |
I visited Mount Rushmore yesterday. Here are my assorted thoughts.
Yesterday, I visited Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial, both in southwestern South Dakota. I’m in the process of driving east across the country and oriented my route through there… I figured I’d probably never make a special trip out of South Dakota, so while I was headed that way, I might as well take the opportunity to see Mount Rushmore.
And, as usual, when I visit some place interesting, I decided to write about my traditionally nontraditional observations.
Here are 11 random observations about Mount Rushmore (along with the still-unfinished Crazy Horse Memorial just down the street).
1 | Mount Rushmore is a pretty damn impressive spectacle
I’ve visited quite a few American landmarks at this point and definitely found Mount Rushmore to be impressive. Like all giant things, it’s sometimes hard to grasp the enormity, even when you’re there — that happened to me at the Grand Canyon and the Hollywood sign, although not at the Louisiana Superdome, the World’s Largest Thermometer in Baker, California, or the time I met Gheorghe Muresan.
So while I won’t say it took my breath away by its size (or its performance in My Giant), it was still clearly impressive and definitely exciting to see in person.
2 | The tour guide did acknowledge the Native American controversy — but mostly as a roundabout way to keep people from littering
So Mount Rushmore is in the Black Hills, which were named as Lakota Sioux property, in perpetuity, in the Treaty of Fort Laramie. That is, of course, until South Dakota decided it really needed to build something there to increase tourism.
Our tour guide acknowledged this early on. Here’s what she had to say, paraphrased (although I’ve made sure to keep all of the key ideas and phrases in play)…
So the Native American Indians [SIC] were upset over the treaty being broken, and have taken their complaints to the federal government. It remains a controversy to this day. But that was the older generation. The new generation of Native American Indians believe they’ve gone from being a Buffalo Nation to a New Nation, and they accept Mount Rushmore as part of that nation. We’ve tried to respect the Native American Indians and their land here by keeping the building to a minimum. And you can help respect the land by making sure to throw all of your trash in one of the many garbage cans all around the grounds. Thank you.
And that’s when the cynic in me said, “Wait… was all that explanation of screwing over the Native American Indians just a roundabout way to say ‘don’t be a litterbug’?”
3 | It’s easier to see the unfinished aspects in person
When you see Mount Rushmore in photos or (depending on your age and taste) in North By Northwest or North By North Quahog, you probably don’t do a visually study of its nuances. When you’re visiting, you can’t help it. There’s really no where else to look.
Being there, you notice little things. Like how the left side of Lincoln’s head and his hair aren’t fully carved. Or how much the Teddy Roosevelt carving looks like Wilford Brimley.
Mount Rushmore’s not considered a work in progress — when its sculptor/architect died, his son did a little touch-up work and basically left it as it was. But it’s surprisingly incomplete, something that I never noticed until I saw it in person.
Feel free to cozy up to your own metaphors of America being a work in progress or the presidency being something that’s rough, imperfect and never fully actualized — I’m squarely in the “a cigar is just a cigar” camp on this one.
4 | I didn’t realize just how unfinished it was until I saw the scale model of the original plan
Turns out that, behind the little unfinished details, there are a lot of larger, *really* unfinished details. At the park there’s a scale model of what Mount Rushmore was intended to look like — and all the presidents have hands and bodies and clothes.
Frankly, I don’t know if it needs that… I kind of like the classic, disembodied head look of the whole thing. If you add bodies, then it might look like one of those things that could come alive and go on a rampage.
5 | It looks like it’s just begging to have a fifth head added
There’s definitely some rock next to Washington that looks like it could house a fifth head. And, in a very brief web search, I found tons of petitions suggesting who should get a spot on the monument. Everyone from Susan B. Anthony (who Congress actually once, briefly approved for a spot) to Barack Obama to Ronald Reagan to Michael Moore has a petition. Except Chester A. Arthur. That guy just can’t ever catch a break.
Oh, and also some people want to just remove Lincoln because that biography that said he might’ve been gay. Now THOSE are priorities.
6 | The crowd was smaller than expected and very polite
Going to Mount Rushmore on Memorial Day, we anticipated a large crowd. There was not a gigantic crowd. I’d say there were a few hundred people there, almost all of whom were foreign tourists or traveling families. And they were all very polite.
(I know about the politeness because, during our tour guide’s explanation of Lincoln’s spot on the mountain, she told the group how seven states “succeeded.” And as I, the know-it-all, glanced frantically around the group hoping to secedefully lock eyes with another condescending linguist — not a single person flinched. Such a polite group.)
7 | The whole presentation is surprisingly restrained and tasteful
For a Big, American monument of gigantic presidents that was mostly created with dynamite, the entire place had a surprisingly understated presentation. There wasn’t any theme park-type stuff anywhere to be found.
One restaurant/cafe, not selling carny food or deep fried meats on sticks. The gift shop didn’t offer giant gray foam hat where your head goes in place of Jefferson’s. There wasn’t a big cardboard cutout where you could pose behind it putting your face on Mount Rushmore. It just felt… classy. Which caught me totally off guard.
(Also, I was prepared to spend up to $30 for that foam hat.)
8 | It did have a pretty great Coke machine though
I definitely found myself inclined to buy a drink out of the Mount Rushmore-themed Coke machine. You just don’t see one of those every day.
9 | Mount Rushmore’s sculptor was a member of the KKK
Lower down on the ol’ classiness scale, it turns out the guy who sculpted Mount Rushmore, Gutzon Borglum, was a card-carrying member of the KKK. While the tour guide didn’t address it, apparently it’s pretty common knowledge.
(I found it out when I overheard two other tourists talking about it, then checked on Wikipedia. And assuming it wasn’t a big ruse where they spread the rumor then rushed back to their hotel to change Borglum’s Wikipedia page to corroborate their story, it’s true.)
Not exactly a good line on Mount Rushmore’s resume when people try to defend how it ISN’T an unofficial monument to the white man’s disregard for Native Americans.
10 | The Crazy Horse Memorial, just miles away, is a stark contrast
The Crazy Horse Memorial was the Native American response to Mount Rushmore. It’s a carved mountain tribute to Crazy Horse, about eight miles away from Mount Rushmore.
It was started in 1948 but, due to lack of funds and manpower, it is still at least 60 years away from being completed. (Mount Rushmore was finished in 14 years of on-and-off work.) If it’s ever completed, it will be larger than Mount Rushmore. After what’s been accomplished in 62 years… that does seem like a big “if.”
We visited the Crazy Horse Memorial and, if I’m going to sum it up in one word, it’d be: Sad. The fact that it’s so far from being completed… that the walls of its museum are lined with quotes from famous Native Americans about the ways that they were betrayed and mistreated… that there’s no end date in sight… and that, yes, on some level it was built out of anger and spite — these things all just left me feeling sad.
I’m not going to get into a whole “sins of our fathers” thing here, but, suffice to say, the Crazy Horse builders have a damn good point.
11 | The best decision I’ve made in weeks was to take off my Cleveland Indians hat before going to the Crazy Horse Memorial
Really. After all that, I’m so glad I left Chief Wahoo in the car. (Nor did I hear a single person asking where the stripper pole was at the Crazy Horse Memorial. I’m proud of you, tourists. You’re all grows up.)
—
You may also like…
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Perusoikeudet |
Koronavirus näytti, miten vankat valtioiden rajat yhä ovat – Nyt pandemia muuttaa liikkuvuutta ehkä pysyvästi, sanoo maantieteen professori |
Former Trump aide Michael Caputo leads patent protest
Caputo is not currently a lobbyist for these patent holders, but says he'll be registering soon. (Twitter/@MichaelRCaputo)
Former Trump campaign consultant Michael Caputo joined at least a dozen inventors from around the country to burn patents on the north steps of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria, protesting procedures from a newly formed administrative board.
"This is something the president must care about," Caputo told the Washington Examiner just after the Friday demonstration. "This is something the president's base must care about, because his base is all ‘Davids' and Washington is all Goliaths."
The inventors and their families who held signs and burned their patents outside the government offices say the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), formed in 2012 as part of the America Invents Act, is making patent infringement easier, and has created a class of political appointees who are making decisions that should be reserved for the courts.
Caputo is not currently a lobbyist for these patent holders, but says he'll be registering soon, saying that he's always felt a kindred spirit with inventors.
One of those hoping to be heard was Josh Malone of Plano, Texas. His invention which quickly fills and seals a hundred water balloons in under a minute was once featured by ABC News and NBC's "Today Show", both of which called ‘Bunch O Balloons' "genius."
Malone says he has six different patents on his kid-friendly invention, which have been useful in the courts, but says rulings by the PTAB have undercut all of the market potential of his product.
"The number one enemy of inventors is the PTAB," Malone said as he joined others in lighting one of his own patents on fire. "Now [the patent] is worthless, the infringer got off scot-free copying my invention," he added.
Malone says despite several rulings in his favor in the courts, a three-judge panel at the PTAB decided, "that no one could understand the term ‘substantially filled with water' and so they took back my patent right."
The Patent and Trademark Office had little to say about the accusations.
"The PTO welcomes the perspectives of small inventors —they are an important part of the patent system and their views need to be heard," Chris Shipp, deputy chief communications officer for the PTO said in an email statement.
Malone and others are hopeful that other cases working their way through the courts may soon provide some of the change they're hoping for.
But in the meantime, Caputo says if the president would take the time to understand the issue, he'd be making changes quickly.
Caputo says the president's fondness for one of his uncles, John Trump, is the touchstone. John Trump, the younger brother of President Trump's father, was a noted physicist and inventor.
"The president first told me about Uncle John many years ago," Caputo said. "The president likes to say he has good genes. I think when the president finds out about this [situation], he's going to get very angry."
Caputo was recently all over cable and national news outlets after he gave voluntary testimony to the House Intelligence Committee for their ongoing Russia investigation.
He's also recently registered as a lobbyist for a law firm representing victims of Hurricane Sandy who are having compensation issues with FEMA.
And after recent news that the FBI had raided the home of Paul Manafort, Caputo told the WashingtonExaminer he has had no contact from the Department of Justice or the special counsel investigation led by Robert Mueller. |
Introduction {#s1}
============
Decision-making has been traditionally studied using experimental paradigms in which the correct choice is determined by a set of instructions. However, little attention has been paid to how decisions are made when subjects are free to decide when to act or which choice to make. In the latter situation of free choice, most experiments have focused on cases in which the options that are provided are neither correct nor incorrect but have different associated values (Thorndike, [@B48]; Herrnstein, [@B341]). Under such conditions, decisions are the result of a noisy, deliberative process in which the value of each option is compared and assessed (Gold and Shadlen, [@B20]). But what determines what we decide when the options have comparable values?
One possible answer might be provided by the neural activity that precedes the decision-making process (Libet et al., [@B30]; Haynes et al., [@B21]; Soon et al., [@B44]). In a recent neuroimaging experiment, Soon et al. ([@B44]) demonstrated that from brain activity, it is possible to predict future decisions long before subjects report that the decision has reached awareness. In neurophysiological studies with primates, the influence of the previous state of the brain on future choices has been examined using perceptual discrimination and value-based tasks. For instance, during perceptual judgment tasks with ambiguous or nearly ambiguous stimuli, certain neurons in the lateral intraparietal cortex (LIP), medial superior temporal area (MST) and superior colliculus (SC; Basso and Wurtz, [@B2]; Shadlen and Newsome, [@B43]; Williams et al., [@B50]) develop an anticipatory response that is predictive of future choices, even before perceptual evidence is available. Although this type of anticipatory neural activity can help to decide which option to choose, for certain occasions, it needs to be overcome. Neurons from the thalamus are involved in this process (Minamimoto et al., [@B34]). Other neurophysiological studies have adopted value-based tasks in which the potential options are drawn from a well-known set and have different associated values. Several studies have shown that in these paradigms, decisions can be predicted even before the two options are presented from the anticipatory activity of neurons in the frontal eye field (FEF), supplementary eye field (SEF) and caudate nucleus (CD; Coe et al., [@B4]; Lauwereyns et al., [@B28]; Ding and Hikosaka, [@B5]). Although these reports consistently indicate the presence of anticipatory activity in areas that are predictive of future choice, there are contrasting results in neurophysiology. While some previous neurophysiological studies have found some evidence (Maoz et al., [@B31]) others have failed to provide similar evidence for the prefrontal cortex (PF; Kim and Shadlen, [@B26]; Katsuki et al., [@B24]), notwithstanding its function in goal-encoding (Tanji and Hoshi, [@B46]; Mushiake et al., [@B36]; Genovesio et al., [@B340], [@B17],[@B18]; Yamagata et al., [@B51]; Genovesio and Ferraina, [@B10]; Falcone et al., [@B6]; Stoianov et al., [@B45]), its activation during free-choice tasks in humans (Rowe et al., [@B41]; Thimm et al., [@B47]) and the possibility of biasing target selection by electrical stimulation (Opris et al., [@B37]). The latter suggests that PF activity during and, likely, before presentation of a stimulus influences future choices when the correct choice is not dictated by external instructions or rules.
In this study, we examined the relationship between the activity of neurons in the PF before potential choices are revealed and the choices that are freely made afterward. We identified the group of neurons that were involved in free-choice decision-making and during motor selection and then determined whether the neurons conveyed any prestimulus activity that might bias future choices. To this end, we used a previous dataset of a strategy paradigm that included free-choice trials (Figures [1A,B](#F1){ref-type="fig"}; Genovesio et al., [@B12], [@B11]). Briefly, the strategy task required monkeys to use a repeat-stay or and change-shift strategy. In each trial, three spatial goals were presented. Based on a comparison between the current instructed stimulus (IS) and that in the previous trial, the monkeys had to select the same spatial goal as in the previous trial (repeat-stay strategy) when the stimulus was repeated or reject the previous spatial goal and select one of two other goals when the stimulus changed (change-shift trials). In change-shift trials, after presentation of the IS, the monkeys faced a decision between options of comparable value. In each of these trials, only one goal led to the reward, which was randomly decided by the computer beforehand. A second-chance trial followed non rewarded change-shift trials in which the monkeys were required to choose the location of the alternative goal to be rewarded (see "Materials and Methods" Section). In this task the monkeys could not commit to a decision before the stimulus appearance because one third of the trials, when the strategy to apply was the repeat-stay trial, were forced choice trials. We considered the change-shift trials as a free-choice condition, because the decision was never dictated by any external instruction or rule as in value-based studies and primarily because, in contrast to previous studies (Barraclough et al., [@B1]; Padoa-Schioppa and Assad, [@B38]; Kennerley et al., [@B25]), the two alternatives could never be compared, based on any perceptual or value-based metric. Thus, the degree of freedom in the decision-making process was maximized.
{#F1}
Materials and Methods {#s2}
=====================
Behavioral Task {#s2-1}
---------------
Two male rhesus monkeys (*Macaca mulatta*; 7.7 and 8.8 Kg) performed a strategy task (Figures [1A,B](#F1){ref-type="fig"}). All procedures were in accordance with the *Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals* (1996, ISBN 0-309-05377-3) and were approved by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC). Details on the experimental procedures have been described in Genovesio et al. ([@B12], [@B11]). In brief, the oculomotor task consisted of two types of trials: repeat-stay and change-shift. Each trial started with a central stimulus (0.7° white circle) appearing at the center of a screen. Once the monkey fixated on the central spot, three potential goal locations appeared (2.2° unfilled white squares), 14° up, left and right from the central stimulus. Each stimulus comprised two superimposed ASCII characters, usually in different colors. The monkeys were required to fixate on the central stimulus (±7.5°) for 1 s. Then, the central stimulus was replaced by a visual IS that was presented for 1.0, 1.5, or 2.0 s (pseudorandomly selected). After the IS disappeared, the monkey was required to make a saccade toward one of the three spatial goals within 2 s and maintain its fixation (±6.7°) for 1.0 s. An intertrial time of 2.5 s separated the end of a trial from the beginning of the next one. The sequence of the task events is illustrated in Figure [1A](#F1){ref-type="fig"}.
The correct choice depend on the strategy that was required, which was to select the same spatial goal as in the previous trial when the IS was the same as in the previous trial (repeat-stay trial) or to choose one of the other two goal locations (change-shift trial or free-choice trial) when the stimulus changed (Figure [1B](#F1){ref-type="fig"}). Because each stimulus was selected pseudorandomly from a set of three stimuli, 67% of trials were free-choice trials and 33% of them were repeat-stay trials. After a correct strategy response, repeat-stay trials were always rewarded, whereas free-choice trials were rewarded in 50% of cases. Maintaining this reward rate in the free-choice trials precluded the possibility to develop any consistent relationship between stimuli and choices (see Figure 1D in Genovesio et al., [@B12]).
Unrewarded trials were followed by a second-chance trial, keeping the distribution of the reward rates of each goal comparable and independent of any preference by the monkeys. In the second-chance trial, the monkeys were required to select the goal that remained after eliminating the most recent ones. In all cases, the reward consisted of a 0.1-ml drop of fluid.
Surgery {#s2-2}
-------
In an aseptic surgical procedure and using isoflurane anesthesia (1 to 3%), we performed a 27 × 36-mm craniotomy over the right frontal lobe in each monkey. Then, we implanted several titanium bone screws into the surrounding bone, to which we attached a recording chamber and a head-restraint device with methacrylate acrylic cement. Postoperative analgesia was given for 3--5 days.
Data Collection Methods {#s2-3}
-----------------------
The monkeys' eye position recorded and monitored with an infrared oculometer (Bouis Instruments, Karlsruhe, Germany) at 500 or 1000 Hz. Single-unit potentials were isolated with quartz-insulated platinum-iridium electrodes (impedance, 0.5--1.5 M at 1 kHz), advanced into the cortex by a 16-electrode microdrive with independent control of each electrode (Thomas Recording, Giessen, Germany). The signal was amplified and discriminated using a multispike detector (Alpha-Omega Engineering, Nazareth, Israel) or a multichannel acquisition processor (Plexon, Dallas, TX, USA). With the latter, neuronal waveforms were always resorted with the Offline Sorter (Plexon). We used CORTEX[^1^](#fn0001){ref-type="fn"} to control behavior and collect data. Figure [1C](#F1){ref-type="fig"} shows the recorded locations in the dorsolateral PF (PFdl) and dorsomedial PF (PFdm; spanning areas 6, 8, and 9).
Data Analysis {#s2-4}
-------------
### Neural Analyses {#s2-4-1}
From the initial dataset on 1456 neurons in the PF (Genovesio et al., [@B12]), we selected neurons that had a mean activity of at least 1 spike/s within 200--800 ms from presentation of the stimulus (*n* = 887/1456). In this subset, we identified decision neurons and motor neurons. The decision neurons were defined as the neurons that were spatial goal-selective (top, left, right) in the IS1 (early instruction stimulus period) period of the free-choice trials (*n* = 143/887, recorded from 93 experimental sessions; one-way ANOVA, *p* \< 0.05). The motor neurons were defined as the neurons encoding the goal location in the reaction and movement time (RMT; *n* = 145/887; one-way ANOVA, *p* \< 0.05). Bias activity was studied in the period between 0 and 200 ms before stimulus presentation (prestimulus period). We used this temporal window, because it is the period just before the presentation of the stimulus. In all cases, only correct trials were considered for analyses.
The average firing rate of the neural population was plotted using the mean of the individual neural responses, calculated with a window of 50 ms and a sliding window of 5 ms to smooth the curves. The statistical significance (paired *t*-test) between preferred and nonpreferred goals conditions was calculated using a nonoverlapping window of 100 ms. Only the time intervals in which the neural activity was significantly different for at least three bins are reported. Different windows sizes led to equivalent results (data not shown). The preferred and nonpreferred goals for each neuron corresponded to the goal that was associated with the maximum average activity and the average of the two remaining ones, respectively.
### Behavioral Prediction {#s2-4-2}
To determine the percentage of choices that could be predicted by the neural activity in the prestimulus period, we implemented a classification procedure with neuron-dropping analysis (Foffani and Moxon, [@B7]; Lebedev et al., [@B29]) using neural activity as the predictor variable. We sorted the free-choice trials by neuron and selected goal and calculated the mean firing rate in each trial in the periods of interest. Thus, each neuron had a distribution of mean firing rates for the left, top and right choices in free-choice trials. To classify a trial, we randomly took a trial from each neuron (test trial), and for each selected goal, we calculated a look-up table, consisting of the mean firing rates of all remaining trials (neural response templates). Then, the Euclidean distance between the test trial and templates was used as a criterion to estimate the choice. The trial was classified as belonging to a specific goal location, based on the smallest sum of calculated distances. The neuron-dropping analysis comprised randomly eliminating one neuron in each iteration; thus, the estimate first considers all neurons from a group and the number of neurons decreases until one remains. This procedure was repeated 1000 times to estimate the probability of correctly predicting the future choice for each specific subset of neurons. Increasing the number of iterations did not significantly influence the results (data not shown).
### Histological Analysis {#s2-4-3}
Toward the end of the data collection, we created electrolytic lesions (15 A for 10 s, anodal current) in locations at two depths per penetration. After approximately 10 days, the animal was deeply anesthetized and perfused with formaldehyde-containing fixative. The brains were later sectioned in the coronal plane and Nissl-stained for cytoarchitectonic analysis (Genovesio et al., [@B12]). We plotted the surface projections of the recording sites by reference to the recovered electrolytic lesions and the marking pins that were inserted during the perfusion.
Results {#s3}
=======
Neural Response Bias {#s3-1}
--------------------
Overall, the monkeys performed well on the task---Monkeys 1 and 2 had a correct response rate of 96% and 83% in the change-shift trials, respectively, compared with 92% and 88% during the repeat-stay trials. The RMT during free-choice trials was 442.7 ± 7.6 ms for Monkey 1 and 441.4 ± 8.1 ms for Monkey 2.
To determine whether neurons modulated their activity before the stimulus was presented, we focused our analyses on the change-shift trials and on three kinds of neurons: those that were involved in the decision process but not in motor selection (decision-only neurons), those that were involved during motor selection but not during decision making (motor-only neurons) and those that were involved in both decision making and motor selection (decision and motor neurons). Henceforth, the change-shift trials are referred to as free-choice trials, because in these cases, the monkeys were free to choose between two goals without knowing which goal would be rewarded. The decision neurons were defined as those that encoded the future goal location in the first 80--400 ms of the IS (IS1; prestimulus period) whereas the motor neurons are those that encoded it during the RMT period. The prestimulus period corresponded to the time during which the monkeys were first informed on the two potential goals during the free-choice trials. To identify both group of neurons, we performed a one-way ANOVA (*p* \< 0.05) with future goal location (top, right, left) as a factor. We identified 143 of 887 (16%) neurons modulated by goal location during the prestimulus period and 145 neurons (16%) modulated during the RMT period with 42 neurons belonging to the two groups (Figure [2A](#F2){ref-type="fig"}).
{#F2}
Next, we examined whether the population of decision-only neurons showed a prestimulus neural response bias by comparing their activity for choices toward the preferred and nonpreferred goal locations before presentation of the IS. Top panel of Figure [2B](#F2){ref-type="fig"} shows that the decision-only neurons that were selective for a specific goal location were goal-selective during IS1, as expected. Interestingly, the neurons developed significant differences in the activity between preferred and nonpreferred future goals before presentation of the IS, indicating the presence of a neural response bias. The activity that was associated with the preferred and nonpreferred goal locations began to differ significantly approximately 200 ms (paired *t*-test, *p* \< 0.01) before presentation of the stimulus. The activity of these neurons was also significant for 400 ms after the disappearance of the IS (from 200 to 600 ms after IS offset). On the contrary, the activity between preferred and nonpreferred goals of motor-only neurons was significantly different 200 ms after the appearance of IS but not before (middle panel, Figure [2B](#F2){ref-type="fig"}). Moreover, the difference between conditions persisted during the entire RMT period. The difference between preferred and nonpreferred conditions of the decision and motor neurons is shown in the bottom panel of Figure [2B](#F2){ref-type="fig"}. The activity between conditions started to significantly differ 900 ms before the IS presentation and remained significant during the entire IS and RMT periods. Figure [2C](#F2){ref-type="fig"} shows a histogram with the difference between preferred and nonpreferred conditions for each neural group during the prestimulus period. The difference is significant for decision-only and decision and motor neurons but not for motor-only neurons. Moreover, this result held when we selected the half of decision and motor neurons with the lowest maximum selectivity in the IS1 period (paired *t*-test, *p* \< 0.05). Thus, we can rule out the possibility that the differences in the prestimulus activity between the groups could be accounted by differences in the degree of selectivity.
An example of a decision and motor neuron that was selective for the left goal in the free-choice trials is shown in Figure [3](#F3){ref-type="fig"}. This neuron had higher activity in the decision period (left panel, Figure [3](#F3){ref-type="fig"}) for the left goal (preferred) than for the top and right goals (nonpreferred goals). Further, it developed a response bias for the future goal choice in the prestimulus period, anticipating the same preference for the left goal, showed during the decision period. Thus, this preference appeared, even before the stimulus was presented and, therefore, before the two alternative goals could be identified. The same preference for the left goal was maintained later by this neuron in the RMT period, declining only after acquisition of the goal (right panel, Figure [3](#F3){ref-type="fig"}).
{#F3}
Neural Selectivity and Prediction {#s3-2}
---------------------------------
To quantify how reliably the prestimulus activity of each group of neurons predicted the final goal choice, we used a classification algorithm with neuron-dropping analysis (Laubach et al., [@B27]; Foffani and Moxon, [@B7]; see "Materials and Methods" Section). Figure [4](#F4){ref-type="fig"} shows the probability of correctly predicting a monkey's future goal choice as a function of the number of neurons that were used for prediction (from *n* = 1 to *n* = 101 for decision-only neurons; from *n* = 1 to *n* = 103 for motor-only neurons; from *n* = 1 to *n* = 42 for decision and motor neurons). The prediction exceeded chance values (33%) for decision-only and decision and motor neurons, increasing in both cases with the number of neurons that were used together. Chance value was 33% because in the prestimulus period, before IS presentation, all three targets were potential goals. On the contrary, the prediction remained at chance level for the motor-only neurons, independently of the number of neurons used for prediction. Importantly, the decision and motor neurons showed a much greater proportion of correctly predicted trials compared with the decision-only neurons. Moreover, the prediction from the prestimulus activity of decision and motor neurons peaked at \~55%, well above chance and close to the maximum percentage of trials that could be predicted (66%) considering that before the presentation of the stimulus the potential choices were three. These results show a high predictive power of the future choice of the prestimulus activity of decision and motor neurons. Moreover, the prediction is notably higher than that provided by the decision-only neurons.
{#F4}
Discussion {#s4}
==========
In this study, we have provided evidence that pre-exiting activity of some neurons in the PF biases monkeys' future choices. In particular, we have shown that the prestimulus activity of the decision and motor neurons had a high predictive power during free-choice trials reaching a value of 55% (chance value is 33%) when all neurons of the group were pooled. We differentiated motor and decision activity based on the period of the analysis, notwithstanding the fact that other functions, such as attention to target and motor vs. abstract goal coding, could not be dissociated. Our central finding is that a preference for the same target emerged in these neurons before presentation of the stimulus, indicating that the same future choice is encoded already in the pre-existing activity. Moreover, the neural activity bias emerged 900 ms, but not earlier, before presentation of the stimulus, suggesting that the neural response bias originated only after the beginning of the trial, when the monkeys were engaged in the new trial. However, they did not yet commit to any decision as shown by the good performance in the repeat-stay trials that imposed a forced choice (see Figure 2 in Genovesio et al., [@B12]).
To achieve a high level of accuracy in the strategy task the monkeys needed to perform several cognitive operations in addition to a free choice. First, they needed to maintain in memory the previous IS and chosen goal to be able to select the correct goal in the trial. Second, they needed to decide to either stay or switch to a different response based on the comparison between IS in the previous and current trial. Last and only in the free-choice trials they needed to choose one of two targets. While the other cognitive operations were examined by our previous articles (Genovesio et al., [@B12], [@B11], [@B340]) here we focus only on the free-choice. Free-choice trials incorporated at least two task features that provided a suitable framework to study modulations in anticipatory neural responses. One important feature that differentiates our study from most existing neurophysiological reports is that the two alternative goal locations in each free-choice trial were not specified before the stimulus was presented; thus, the monkeys could never covertly choose a specific goal or prepare for a specific action. This uncertainty depended on the task design, which interleaved the free-choice trials with repeat-stay trials in each block. Hence, any anticipatory activity that biased the goal choice appeared before the alternative goals were known. The second hallmark of the free-choice trials was that the two goals never differed in value in terms of reward probability. The presence of rewarded second-chance trials after unrewarded change-shift trials maintained a comparable number of rewards that were associated with each goal location, independent of the monkeys' past choices. By balancing the goal values, the influence of pre-existing bias activity on the decision process might have increased and thus become detectable, in contrast with previous studies. Indeed, it has been proposed that any small bias can unbalance the competition between population of task selective neurons (Rolls and Deco, [@B40]; Marcos et al., [@B32]). Our task design and those of other studies share the feature that the neural response bias is not accounted for by the motivation to anticipate the delivery of a reward due to a delay between presentation of the stimulus and the go signal.
Many studies have examined the function of PF in decision-making, most of which have focused on tasks in which the correct response depends on the comparison between sensorial events using disparate sensory systems and domains, demonstrating how PF cells participate in decision-making (Kim and Shadlen, [@B26]; Hoshi et al., [@B22]; Freedman et al., [@B8]; Brody et al., [@B3]; Genovesio et al., [@B14], [@B15], [@B16], [@B13]; Hussar and Pasternak, [@B23]; Roy et al., [@B42]; Marcos et al., [@B33]). However, few studies have explored the influence that any pre-existing activity of PF neurons has on decision-making, and moreover, they seem to have contradictory results.
Several neurophysiological studies have failed to observe an anticipatory response bias in PF neurons when monkeys perform perceptual discrimination tasks, even when the psychological judgments were difficult (Kim and Shadlen, [@B26]; Katsuki et al., [@B24]). In Katsuki et al. ([@B24]), for example, monkeys were required to locate a salient stimulus that was surrounded by other distractors and release a lever when a subsequent stimulus was presented at the same location as the salient stimulus. They found that activity of the parietal area LIP but not of the PFdl before presentation of the stimulus was predictive of the monkeys' future decisions regarding the presence of the salient stimulus, although only transiently. In a recent categorization experiment with ambiguous stimuli, Roy et al. ([@B42]) identified neurons in the PF that categorically represented ambiguous stimuli, but the categorical presence emerged only after presentation of the stimulus and only with a longer latency than with unambiguous stimuli. One possible explanation for the absence of a neural bias in the PF in these experiments (Kim and Shadlen, [@B26]; Roy et al., [@B42]) is that they required a perceptual choice rather than a goal choice as in our task. In a recent study (Mochizuki and Funahashi, [@B35]), it was reported that the prestimulus activity of some neurons in PF was predictive of the future choice of monkeys. However, whether the neurons that exhibited the predictive power were those involved in decision or motor processes was not distinguished.
Conversely, using value-based free-choice decisions, a recent neurophysiological study reported anticipatory activity of neurons in the PFdl that was predictive of future choice (Maoz et al., [@B31]), raising the possibility that value-based decisions, as opposed to perceptual decisions, can be influenced by activity bias in the PFdl. In Maoz et al. ([@B31]), the task had two goals with different associated values, and the upcoming choice could be predicted from the anticipatory activity when the two values were alike, similar to the modulation that is observed in neurons in the LIP, MST and SC during perceptual tasks (Basso and Wurtz, [@B2]; Shadlen and Newsome, [@B43]; Williams et al., [@B50]). In contrast to our study, they found that the neurons that are involved in the decision process are not the same as those that predicted the upcoming choice before presentation of the stimulus. This result led the authors to hypothesize the separation between a network of neurons with predeliberate spontaneous activity that biases future choices under free-choice conditions and a network of neurons that mediate rational decision-making.
Unlike in earlier studies, our task has the advantage of not requiring any comparison between alternatives to determine the correct goal location, as in the perceptual tasks, or any evaluation and comparison of the values of the alternatives, as in value-based decision tasks. Under these new conditions, we found that neurons involved in goal coding from the decision to the motor phase, in the PF showed prestimulus activity that was highly predictive of future decisions. Importantly the decision neurons' activity could not depend on differences in visual responses because all three targets were always presented. Thus, our results indicate that neurons that exhibit a bias in the prestimulus period are not necessarily dissociated from those that are involved in decision formation, as proposed (Maoz et al., [@B31]), and that a neural response bias can emerge, even in the absence of a value-based decision in line with the results of Mochizuki and Funahashi ([@B35]). In our free-choice condition, decision and motor neurons anticipated the choice long before the stimulus was presented and held it until the onset of movement. One explanation for these differences is that the task in Maoz et al. ([@B31]) required a comparison between alternatives, whereas it was unnecessary to compare any feature of the alternative goals in our task. In Maoz et al. ([@B31]), the comparison might have interfered with the prestimulus neural response bias during the decision period, which did not occur in our case.
In earlier studies (Genovesio et al., [@B12], [@B11]; Tsujimoto et al., [@B49]), we have shown that PF cells contribute to the implementation of the strategy from stimulus identification to the goal choice. Although these neural representations reflect the strategy implementation, they could not account for the goal selection in the free-choice condition, which remained unexplained. Our study increases our understanding of the function of the PF in the computations involved in the goal choice. It shows that the activity of the decision and motor neurons and, only to some extent, the activity of decision-only neurons but not that of motor-only neurons is not limited to the decision and motor processes but emerges before presentation of the stimulus, biasing the upcoming choice.
In conclusion, the pre-existing activity of neurons in the PF contributes to the decision process in free-choice conditions but we cannot rule out the contribution of other areas as the source of the bias. Further, our study has examined the prefrontal contribution of the PFdl and PFdm to free choice at the single-cell level, showing that under no external constraints or instructions, the pre-existing state of the decision and motor PF neurons that appear to bridge in time the decision and motor phases (Fuster, [@B9]) has a significant impact on the upcoming choice.
Author Contributions {#s5}
====================
AG performed the experiment, EM analyzed the data and AG and EM wrote the article.
Conflict of Interest Statement {#s6}
==============================
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
We thank Mr. Alex Cummings for the histological material, Dr. Andrew Mitz for engineering, and Dr. Steve Wise for his numerous contributions. This research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH; Z01MH-01092--28) and partially supported by the Italian FIRB 2010 grant (RBFR10G5W9_001).
^1^<http://dally.nimh.nih.gov>
[^1]: Edited by: David J. Margolis, Rutgers--New Brunswick, USA
[^2]: Reviewed by: Tim Hanks, University of California, Davis, USA; Mikhail Lebedev, Duke University, USA
|
Total Synthesis of (±)-Grandilodine B.
The first total synthesis of the opened-type Kopsia alkaloid grandilodine B is reported. Four stereocenters of this alkaloid, three of them quaternary, are stereoselectively generated by a Diels-Alder reaction, a diastereoselective cyanation of tertiary alcohol, and a facial-selective nitrone 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition. |
Max Ulich
__NOTOC__
Max Ulich (25 March 1896 – 27 May 1964) was a German general during World War II who commanded the 212 Volksgrenadier-Division. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross of Nazi Germany.
Awards and decorations
Iron Cross (1939) 2nd Class & 1st Class
German Cross in Gold (8 June 1942)
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on 2 November 1943 as Oberst and commander of Grenadier-Regiment 15
References
Citations
Bibliography
Category:1896 births
Category:1964 deaths
Category:German military personnel of World War I
Category:Prussian Army personnel
Category:People from Berlin
Category:Recipients of the Gold German Cross
Category:Recipients of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
Category:Major generals of the German Army (Wehrmacht)
Category:Knights of the House Order of Hohenzollern
Category:20th-century Freikorps personnel
Category:Reichswehr personnel
Category:People from the Province of Brandenburg
Category:Recipients of the clasp to the Iron Cross, 1st class |
Description
Quick to jump into the 32-bit bandwagon, Masaya developed their next Cho Aniki game for the PSOne and Saturn. Cho Aniki: Kyuukyoku Muteki Ginga Saikyou Otoko is a 2d shooter which plays like a sequel to the first game, as you once again take control of either Idaten or Benten (the heroes of the original game) with the semi-nude bodybuilders Adon and Samsom returning to their role of option characters that hover around the player.
The game plays almost exactly like the original TurboCD games, except the graphics have been completely revamped to make full use of digitized photographs. |
Eco-Friendly Safari Table and Chair Set
Sit and Play the Eco Way!This table and chair set is a "grrrrreat" addition to your child's bedroom or playroom. The environmentally friendly solid wood construction and adorable design on each piece makes this set a treasured item that will be cherished for years.
Save!
10% off
When you buy 3 or More items from this Theme. Cannot be combined with any other discount. |
If being too gorgeous were a crime, this luminizing powder would turn us all into serial offenders. Ok, maybe that's a little extreme, but can you blame us? This three-in-one highlighter, eyeshadow, and all-over shimmer is the prettiest honey-hued pigment weve ever laid our eyes on. As the pun-tastic name suggests, this versatile luminizer imparts a soft-focus glow wherever we choose to apply it. Light-reflecting silica particles conceal blemishes and fine lines, while the honey color leaves a sheer wash of shimmer. It's our secret to looking great in all settings, from fluorescent cubicles to candlelit cafes.
Versatile Highlighter
I wasn't sure about how I was going to like the Mary-Lou Manizer because I typically don't use a separate all over highlighter. I have used it more as an eyeshadow along with other darker colors than anything else. A little goes a long way, so I don't go too crazy with it. It blends well, has a very nice texture, and stays on without fading away throughout the day.
4
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Gorgeous Glow!
I hardly ever use highlighter in my makeup looks, but I was glad to see this product had multiple purposes - I love it as an eye highlight! It's not too frosty and the color is great for my skin. It's great as a face highlight too, with a light application.
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JenniferC
Age
45-54
Beauty style
Classic
great sample
Excellent sample size - I've been wearing it for a few days. I've tried it as an eyeshadow, and really like it. It stays in place well and doesn't clump up. The shade is not one I typically wear, but I'm going to check out some other shade of this brand and probably buy.
4
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Great highlighter but I prefer a pencil
I use a highligher for the corners of my eyes and while this product worked well, I prefer the precision of a pencil. If you use this for other parts of the face then the powder would work a lot better. I think it just depends on the use. The color and the shimmer are fabulous.
4
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Autonomous Dump Trucks Are Coming to Canada's Oil Sands
Editor-In-Chief
A Caterpillar 793F autonomous hauling truck deployed in Australia, via the company
Extracting oil from oil sands requires some of the most massive trucks and heavy equipment on Earth. Now, in a bid to cut costs, a Canadian company wants to have those trucks drive themselves.
According to a Bloomberg report, Canadian oil sands giant Suncor, which is "Canada’s largest energy company by market value," is currently testing haul trucks that are run by computers. Extracting bitumen from sands requires first digging up an enormous amount of the sand itself, with about two tons of sands required to produce one barrel of oil.
Digging up all of that sand is the job of huge excavators, which then offload into gigantic haul trucks that transport sands to extraction plants. Time is money, and in this case being faster means carrying as much sand as possible. Haul trucks can carry hundreds of tons at a time, and are in constant motion, moving back and forth between excavator and extraction plant.
Now, driving a truck that's as large as a house is almost assuredly a badass thing to do—if you want, jobs are available—but for oil sands companies, it's also an expensive position to fill. Heavy equipment operators don't come cheap in the first place, with salaries reaching into six figures. Add in the cost of housing oil sands workers in far-flung locales and you've got a pretty big outlay on your hands.
Bloomberg notes that Suncor's bottom line has been hurting of late, and the firm thinks giving truck driving jobs to computers could help. It's not alone, as an expert told Bloomberg that such systems can cut costs by 15 percent. But what does a robotic dump truck look like? Thankfully, the mining industry is competitive enough that heavy equipment firms actually make commercials for things like this. (Who knew?) Here's one from Komatsu, which says its automated equipment had already moved 200 million tons of material as of April, when the video was published:
And here's a similar pitch from American manufacturer Caterpillar, which hits really hard on the advantages of networked logistics:
If anything, those videos should reinforce the sheer enormity of mining and oil sands operations. At the end of the day, the equation is pretty simple: Making more money means moving more material, which means bigger and bigger equipment. It's not cheap; large haulers run millions of dollars a piece, and maintenance is a massive undertaking. A heavy equipment mechanic who regularly posts on reddit offers a good glimpse into the scale of these things, as well as the cost—he recently mentioned that tires cost $108,000 to replace.
At such scales, small efficiency gains netted from better-networked operations could have huge payoffs. And as strange as it might seem to have steel behemoths driving around without a driver, their routes through mines are pretty straightforward. While Suncor claims it's the first to use automated trucks in oil sands operations, they've become more and more popular in mining operations worldwide, so they must work. At the end of the day, it's just more evidence that if something can be automated, it will be. |
I am much interested in learning about the basics of malware's and it's behaviour and a lot regarding it...
Also i want to learn them from basics,so I prefer CBT video's for learning the basics..
I heared there are some of the course video available there regarding malware analysis,but i don't know much about this malware field, and also i dont know the exact course name ,so decided to ask here...
can any 1 suggest me some best CBT courses that is dealing with malware analysis? |
For the twelve days of Christmas I give you: The madness of 2013, one month at a time-A month by month recap of stories that appeared in the Starting Line last year.
By Doug Porter
#1 The Government Shuts Down and Obamacare Stumbles
Today’s UT-San Diego editorial repeats the GOP fantasy that the Affordable Care Act is about to “collapse under its unworkable weight”. If that’s true, shouldn’t they just let it happen? Could another Democrat get elected for President in the foreseeable future if that’s true?
Today’s paper also features a predictable “poll”. A plurality says it’s the President’s fault. The question of whether or not the government should be shut down isn’t even asked.
Bloomberg News, which has considerably more credibility and resources, also has a poll, one that asks the relevant questions:
In a rejection of congressional Republicans’ strategy, Americans overwhelmingly oppose undermining President Barack Obama’s health-care law by shutting down the federal government or resisting an increase in the nation’s debt limit, according to a poll released today.
By 72 percent to 22 percent, Americans oppose Congress “shutting down major activities of the federal government” as a way to stop the Affordable Care Act from going into effect, the national survey from QuinnipiacUniversityfound.
By 64 percent to 27 percent, voters don’t want Congress to block an increase in the nation’s $16.7 trillion federal borrowing limit as a way to thwart implementation of the health-care law, which Obama signed into law in 2010 with a goal of insuring millions of Americans, known as “Obamacare.”
A majority of the public, 58 percent, is opposed to cutting off funding for the insurance program that begins enrollment today. Thirty-four percent support defunding it.
#2 Not a Democrats’ Democrat?
Meanwhile, local Rep. Scott Peters diverged from the wide majority of his Democratic colleagues yesterday and voted with Republicans to make exceptions to the shutdown for services like national parks and museums. The measure didn’t get enough votes to pass with a required two-thirds margin
Oh, Cheese on Bread, as they say in the Caribbean when looking for a polite oath.
I get it that Peters comes from a conservative district, but this kind of gesture, especially when things like Head Start programs affected by the government shutdown aren’t even being considered, is just.not.right. Nineteen thousand children won’t be attending Headstart funded-preschooling and day care today, according to this tear jerker of an interview broadcast on NPR yesterday.
This item leads me inevitably back into The Shutdown. Today the House will consider FIVE “rifle shot” mini-funding bills today: 1) Vet Affairs 2) DC 3) Parks 4) NIH 5) Military Reservists under rules that require a simple majority to pass.
The White House on Wednesday renewed its vow to block the piecemeal funding approach pushed by House Republicans.
In a statement of administration policy, the White House called that approach “not a serious or responsible way to run the U.S. government,” promising that the president would veto the measures the House is considering if they reached his desk.
“Instead of opening up a few government functions, the House of Representatives should re-open all of the government,” the administration stated. “The harmful impacts of a shutdown extend across Government, affecting services that are critical to small businesses, women, children, seniors, and others across the nation.”
#3 “The reign of morons began with the triumph of bullshit.”—Charles Pierce, Esquire Magazine
Over the last few days the conservative pundit class has been preaching the message that the government shutdown was much ado about nothing. A ‘slim down’ became the Fox news codeword meant to belittle the ever-growing cumulative effects of the Congressional Republican’s efforts to hold the country hostage.
Word came out this morning that this weekend’s Miramar Air Show, already truncated by sequester mandated cutbacks in military spending, would now be cancelled. I have no doubt that the local Tea Party set will soon be announcing the closure was personally ordered by President Obama…
…Congressman Darrell Issa has already indicated to Politico that he’s looking to investigate the closure of various memorials in the nation’s capital especially by the World War II Memorial. Predictably, Issa and his GOP cohorts are prepared to spend more time and energy investigating why the memorials are closed than attempting to reopen the whole government and the monuments right along with it.
Nor it is important to the minority bloc within the GOP holding country hostage that their crusade will soon (2-3 weeks) result in the very veterans that are supposed to be honored by the memorials not getting their pension checks. However, it is apparently important that the House gym has now run out of clean towels.
#4 Kevin, Kevin, He’s Our Man!
Two studies released this week appear to validate the decision made by big money Republican donors to boost the candidacy of City Councilman Kevin Faulconer.
A poll by Republican leaning Competitive Edge Research & Communication of 504 likely voters (Sept. 26-29) shows Faulconer running essentially even with Nathan Fletcher (26-27%, with a plus or minus margin of error of 4.4 percent). Candidate David Alvarez was favored by 13%, Mike Aguirre got 7%, 20% of those polled said they were undecided and while 8% backed one of the seven other candidates in the race.
Following “push” polling questions, wherein surveyors read politically leading statements to respondents, support for Faulconer jumped to 34%, with Alvarez moving into second place with 22% and Fletcher support dropping to 20%.
Probable voter turnout in the Competitive Edge survey was pegged at somewhere between 35 and 40%.
A National University System Institute for Policy Research survey predicts a voter turnout of at about 46% for the special election, with 65% voting by mail-in ballot.
Low voter turnouts in special and primary elections have historically favored Republican candidates and conservative issues.
A UT-San Diego report on the National University study says:
The “Filner voter coalition” will not be a driving force in November, according to the report. Latinos and young voters, who strongly supported Filner last November, are unlikely to participate in high numbers this year. However, LGBT voter precincts will generate high turnout rates.
#5 Statewide GOP Gathering: Hyenas Stalking a Wounded Animal.
This weekend’s Republican statewide gathering in Anaheim was chock full of irony.
Across the street from the GOP convention, Disneyland was hosting “Gay Days” even as the party faithful vowed to fight recently enacted California laws protecting transgender rights.
The political party pitched the media on how this gathering would showcase the new bigger tent GOP chock full of fresh faces and ideas even as one of its approved vendors hawked anti-Hillary buttons promoting knuckle dragging sexism.
Four years ago during the California Republican Party convention, there were three big-name Republicans already revving up their gubernatorial campaigns – billionaire former eBay CEO Meg Whitman, millionaire state Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner and longtime SouthBayRep. Tom Campbell.
As the party gathers for this year’s convention, which begins Friday in Anaheim, the leading GOP gubernatorial candidate – former Lt. Gov. Abel Maldonado – has little cash on hand and just fired his top consultants. Down ticket from him is a slate of no-names and underfunded long shots running for statewide offices, of which Republicans currently hold none.
The state’s party acknowledges its bleak present in the title of its convention: “Rebuilding from the Ground Up.”
Texas Gov. Rick Perry was the star attraction, delivering a sermon on the divide between Democrats and Republicans on economic issues, even as the GOP shutdown of Congress seemed to be steering the nation towards financial disaster.
#6 DeMaio’s Quest to Join the House of Indecision and Suicide Caucus
Congressional (D52) candidate Carl DeMaio is working overtime to try and turn the House-led shutdown to his advantage. He’s campaigning for a “common sense” law that says legislators can’t be paid until a budget is passed. He’s parroting the party line about how “both sides” need to come to the table.
But he’s got a hard road ahead as poll after poll shows even Republicans think the current shutdown tied to defunding Obamacare is a bad idea. And ever-increasing numbers of voters are willing to look past the false equivalence narratives being pushed by the cable news set and blame the Grand Old Party for this mess.
So how did I come up with the terms House of Indecision and Suicide Caucus? I plucked them from commentaries by certifiable conservative commentators.
Jonathan Strong and Robert Costa at National Review paint the broader picture:
House Republican leaders met today at the Capitol, but they made little progress toward solving the fiscal crisis, or calming the GOP’s growing tensions. They remain undecided on the contours of a potential deal, and on how to sell one, especially to the conference’s bloc of skeptical conservatives. “It’s the House of indecision,” says a weary Republican aide familiar with the talks. “We don’t have the votes for a big deal, small deal, or short-term deal.”
For part two of these descriptors I turn to my least favorite right winger, via Raw Story:
Pulitzer Prize-winning conservative columnist and regular Fox News panelist Charles Krauthammer warned over the weekend that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) was leading Republicans on a “suicide” mission to defund President Barack Obama’s health reform law with an attempted government shutdown.
Over the past month, Cruz has been joined Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and the Heritage Foundation in insisting that Republicans pass no continuing resolutions to fund the government unless the president agrees to repeal or defund the Affordable Care Act.
“It would be over a cliff for the GOP,” Krauthammer said on Sunday’s edition Inside Washington. “I admire the sincerity and the passion of those who don’t want to pass the budget unless you get rid of Obamacare, but it is utterly impossible in the real world. And the only thing it will do is to undo all the gains the Republicans have made over the past year, and undo their very real chances of having great successes next year.”
“I think it’s a suicide caucus…”
Now you might think that I’m playing the old “guilt by connection” partisan ploy.
But consider candidate Carl’s pitch to potential voters last Tuesday at the San Diego Lion’s Club, where he compared himself and his “mission” to Tea Party Senator Ted Cruz, generally considered as being mastermind of the current standoff.
…when asked how as a junior congressman he would be able to change Washington, DeMaio pointed to Ted Cruz as an example saying “Take a look at what Ted Cruz is doing. Freshman Senator, he’s certainly creating a lot of stir. So I do believe one individual can make a difference. And it’s a question of whether you are willing to stand your ground.”
#7 A Change of Heart at UT San Diego
Kudos to Scott Lewis at Voice of San Diegofor catching the local daily fishwrap’s change of heart when it comes to maritime uses for the port area adjacent to Barrio Logan.
The local shipbuilding industry is threatening an initiative to overturn the recently enacted community plan. The UT-San Diego is blowing a lot of hot air on the subject, using it to attack mayoral candidate Nathan Fletcher, warning that the livelihoods of 46,000 San Diegans at stake.
Except, as Lewis notes, the paper’s editorial board was all for tearing down one the 10th Avenue Marine Terminal just last year to replace it with a football stadium favored by their publisher. They wanted to move everything maritime elsewhere, like maybe, National City. You know, get those peasants, er, good jobs out of the way of another shiny new toy for the local robber barons.
Blowing up 10th Avenue is certainly a lot more hostile to the port’s maritime business than some community plan for a nearby neighborhood.
In 2012, the U-T hammered the idea that the best use of this land was maritime use. No, it was neither what was best for the economy nor for our city’s beauty.
And yet now, a year later, a plan for a piece of land in Barrio Logan, not even on the port, that likely won’t have any effect for decades, if at all, is an intolerable existential threat to jobs in a vital local maritime industry?
#8 The Battle of the Budget Starts to Wind Down
In the wake of two major developments over the last 48 hours, Republican intransigence appears to be weakening in the Battle of the Budget, 2013 Version.
Following a White House meeting for Republican representatives, a public willingness to engage in further discussions emerged. Congressman Paul Ryan told the press both sides should “put their guns back in their holsters”, according to Politico.
This motivation to sound reasonable came on the heels of a letter from financiers and Tea Party backers David and Charles Koch responding to claims made by Senate leader Harry Reid implicating them as instigators of the current standoff.
Every word in the letter was true: Koch industries has played little or no role in the current round of nastiness triggered by right wing forces seeking to undo the Affordable Care Act. Koch family money, on the other hand, has been instrumental in funding the groups supporting the current confrontation.
At a press conference Thursday, House GOP leadership announced the new strategy, one day after Heritage Action CEO Michael Needham admitted the group will “give the speaker some flex on a short-term debt limit increase,” in order to extend the shutdown over Obamacare. On Wednesday, Koch officials increased the pressure with a letter for inquiring members who “have asked what our position is on this issue” that claims the conservative billionaires never supported withholding government funds over Obamacare. Privately, Koch officials told Congress aU.S. default would be a disaster.
Both groups have been driving forces throughout the debt and shutdown crises and are responsible for putting Tea Party members in Congress in the first place. Even now, it’s not clear if the Tea Party that Heritage and Koch helped to create will accept a deal on these terms, since debt ceiling truthers refuse to recognize that default is an economic threat.
#9 Battle Lines Drawn in Barrio Logan
For thirty years, San Diego’s Barrio Logan community existed without a community plan. There was no law, no order when it came to land use and zoning. Having prospered in chaos for so many years, nearby maritime industries are threatening the region’s economy unless they get their way.
Historically speaking, in the minds of the downtown-centric elites any regulatory structure was simply not necessary in Barrio Logan. After all, the community was just chock full of “them”, as in people of color, mostly of Mexican heritage. Children were exposed to toxic emissions, the nearby waters used to dump heavy metals and other pollutants, and the robber barons of the shipbuilding industry looked away.
All that messy “stuff” had to go somewhere. Clean air and water were a priority for the city’s “nicer” neighborhoods as a matter of policy.
As other communities around San Diego held street fairs and got block grants, the residents of Barrio Logan struggled just to get organized. For the past five years they’ve worked to create order out of chaos via the creation of a community plan. At public meetings residents jousted with the shipyard builders who dominate the adjacent Port of San Diego-controlled shoreline.
Rather than draw the process out any further, two community plans were created. On September 17, the City Council voted to adopt a modified version of the resident-centric plan including concessions proposed by Councilman Alvarez designed to ease the tensions between the competing interests. The newly approved plan would separate industrial establishments and residential neighborhoods in the interest of breathable air, affordable community housing and support for the maritime workforce.
That compromise wasn’t good enough for waterfronts’ three big shipbuilding and repair companies — General Dynamics NASSCO, BAE Systems and Continental Maritime of San Diego. They say they can’t live with this deal. Using the same kind of flawed logic used by the NRA and gun advocates, they say this is part of creeping conspiracy to do them in. They’ve vowed to overturn the community plan through a public referendum.
Or at least the threat of a public referendum. With high profile figures like Carl DeMaio leading the charge for signatures in shopping centers in neighborhoods north of Interstate 8 and the editorial board of UT-San Diego propagating suggestions of impending economic disaster, the backers of this initiative hope to follow Walmart’s example, whereby the mere threat of an election forced a cash-strapped City to back down…
…According to the environmental impact report for the adopted plan, the buffer zone and industrial park combination will contribute to a projected increase in employment from just over 10,000 jobs to nearly 15,000. The plan received unanimous support of the San Diego City Planning Commission and recommendation for approval from city staff.
Yet we’re being told that thousands of jobs are threatened.
I agree with the shipbuilders when they say much is at stake. We disagree about what is at stake. A city of villages is supposed to be at the heart of the planning version for San Diego. That assumption pre-supposes that citizens are involved as stakeholders.
Except for Barrio Logan, apparently. I have no doubt that a big money campaign warning people (falsely) that jobs are at stake with enactment of this plan will convince non-stakeholders in other neighborhoods to vote with the corporate interests here. After all, they’re just a bunch of brown skinned people down there.
#10 Ex-Mayor Bob Cops a Plea
Robert Earl Filner stood before California State Superior Court Judge Robert Trentacosta and pled guilty to one felony count of false imprisonment by violence, fraud, menace and deceit and two misdemeanor counts of battery.
The courtroom appearance was the culmination of a plea bargain deal orchestrated by Attorney General Kamala D. Harris. The hearing was broadcast live, with the camera showing reporters in the background furiously texting and Tweeting blow by blow accounts. Filner, dressed in a blue suit and wearing a gold tie, seemed oblivious to the near-circus atmosphere around him, responding only when spoken to.
Sentencing was set for Dec. 9, and a press release from the Ms. Harris’ office indicates Filner will serve three months of home confinement followed by three years of probation.
He assented to undergoing mental health treatment, will never to seek public office again and will give up a portion of his city pension.
You’d think that would be the end of the Masher Mayor saga. But you’d be wrong.
There were always twin aspects to the fall of Filner. Both were true.
First were his fallibilities. Decades in elected office left him believing in his own infallibility. Power is ultimately a bad habit, and Filner was/is a fully functional addict. Claiming the mantle as defender of the oppressed as his path to elected office, he became what he was supposed to be fighting.
As a comic strip character once said, “We have met the enemy and he is us”.
His sense of invincibility, re-enforced via a “winning” track record, left him blind to the consequences of his behavior. And he failed on multiple levels, both as a human being and a leader, as a result. Those failures translated to anguish and humiliation for the women he treated as less than human sex objects.
Secondly were his politics. In the world of San Diego’s ‘get along’ culture he was a threat even before he took the oath of office. No more “business as usual” was an affront to the sorts of vested financial and political interests who’ve ruled this roost for decades. “Wink, wink”, “nod, nod” and a couple of cocktails at the US Grant hotel were no longer part of the process. What made it more maddening was there was no discernible course of action towards ‘getting things done’ for those accustomed to deal making in America’s Finest City.
A series of small battles became major slugfests. Major amounts of political capitol and energy were expended. Minimum wage (or slightly above) hotel workers were paraded in front of reporters as the victims of a Mayor Gone Mad.
For the “downtown interests”, waging these battles was simply a matter of hiring more help to litigate, spin and agitate. Then came the “gift” of Filner’s presumed allies calling for his resignation.
I believe Cory Briggs, et. al., when they say they had no plan. The best evidence for this belief is the events unfolding in the wake of their disclosures.
The local reactionary establishment could (and did) just sit back and watch the administration self destruct. For Republicans and their ilk, the scandal was good for business. The divisions and distractions it caused laid the foundation, they thought, for future deals and personal prosperity.
The era of Mayor Bob effectively ended the day of that first press conference. For a politician removed from the cocoon of Congressional politics, these battles became all consuming.
Nobody’s agenda was being enacted.
On August 30th, Bob Filner left office.
So now he’s out of office. Out of power. He’s a freak circus meriting more media attention than the various policies that are being undermined, reversed or quietly eliminated.
The popular narrative, expressed succinctly in a UT-San Diego editorial cartoon today, is that the city “suffered” through 270-odd days of Mayor Bob as great damage was done to the economy.
And they’re not through with Bob Filner yet.
Now Filner’s legacy is to be used as bludgeon to batter any who might claim to support any part of a liberal agenda.
Mayoral candidate Kevin Faulconer is figuratively donning a superhero cape at campaign stops as he regales audiences with the tale of how he ‘saved’ San Diego from certain destruction.
Witness today’s sermon from Manchester’s Mission Valley minions:
But let’s drop any pretense that this will bring “closure” to the appalling Filner saga.
It’s not just his many victims’ continuing emotional trauma. The fact is the former congressman, city councilman and school board member was helped by a long list of enablers — Democratic elected officials, union leaders and power brokers who knew of Filner’s long history of obnoxious behavior but gave him a pass on it because they saw him as a strong mayoral candidate in 2012. Closure begins when these enablers — starting with labor-boss-turned-Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez — get the blowback they so deserve.
In short: Filner was a pig. And “they” were out to get him. Those truths are not incompatible.
#11 The “Big Lie, Many Places” Strategy
San Diego shopping centers and grocery stores were blanketed this weekend with contract employees reportedly retained by Southwest Strategies. They were being paid $1.75 for each signature gathered on a petition that aims to challenge the Barrio Logan community plan.
People signed the petitions in droves. Why wouldn’t anybody? After all these shills were peddling anything but the truth. And the implications of this initiative effort for other neighborhoods in San Diego are huge.
Want a change in your neighborhood plan for something big and ugly favored by special interests? If you’ve signed one of those petitions, that’s what you’re opening the door for.
One contract employee told people outside a Trader Joe’s in Mission Valley that businesses were fighting having their building being torn down to build condominiums. Another in Hillcrest, challenged on his assertion that tens of thousands of jobs were in immediate danger, changed tacks and asked for a signature just so he’d get paid. Yet another was telling passers-by the Navy base was endangered by condos. And Carl DeMaio was out and about visiting shopping centers, pedaling his latest version of the truth.
Do yourselves a favor. Just say “no” to paid signature gatherers. (I don’t care what the issue is.)
The company behind this “Big Lie, Many Places” campaign is the same outfit that successfully blackmailed the San Diego City Council into repealing an ordinance that would have required Walmart to submit economic impact studies for its proposed urban big box locations.
The Barrio Logan Community Plan was approved by the City Council following five years of hearings and community meetings. Maritime industry representatives are fighting it because the plan sets up a future nine block buffer zone of commercial use between industrial usages and residential areas.
Existing maritime-related business are not impacted by the change, even if they are sold. New maritime businesses (mostly sub-contractors-the shipyards are NOT in this area) and existing businesses expanding by more than 20% will require conditional use permits, involving significant community input. The companies prefer no such permits, saying they could take years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to secure.
The economic impact studies done by the planning groups under the aegis of the City of San Diego indicate that employment in the area will grow by nearly 5000 jobs under the current plan. No residential development is included in the plan; so much for the condos argument…
No studies exist claiming that jobs will be lost in the approved plan goes into effect. That’s right. None. Zero. Zip…. Even though the industry has been aware and participated in the process of drawing up the plan over the past five years.
Mayoral candidate Kevin Faulconer’s been claiming that 46,000 positions are at stake. Even the number he and the industry is using is false. There are a total of 14,400 jobs in the entire Port of San Diego. Again, we’re talking about a nine block area north of Harbor Drive.
So what’s the basis for claiming all these jobs will be lost? Here’s the quote:
“Over time we believe this process will threaten the shipyard’s very existence in San Diego,” said Kevin Graney, vice president of operations for General Dynamics NASSCO.
I’ll tell you what I believe: Putting a community plan up for a citywide vote guts the whole concept of having a city built around its neighborhoods.
#12 Gloria Brings in a Gunslinger
While many San Diegans are focused on the election promises of the four major candidates contending for top job at city hall, interim Mayor Todd Gloria’s made one move that could have a serious impact on the conversations taking place about services and neighborhood.
Fox 5 San Diego reports the iMayor has retained the services of former Indianapolis Mayor Stephen Goldsmith (no relation to the City Attorney) as an efficiency expert.
Known as an expert in privatizing city governments, his claim to fame comes via aggressive programs government services and selling them out to the private sector.
The republican’s been praised by conservatives, but blasted by critics accusing him of granting public contracts to wealthy contributors to his mayoral campaign, according to an investigation by City Limits online magazine.
His measures are also reported to have resulted in hundreds of government worker layoffs.
More recently, Goldsmith served as Deputy Mayor of New York City, brought in by Mayor Michael Bloomberg to help him run the city more efficiently. That didn’t go as planned, he resigned 14 months into the job after being arrested for domestic violence, but was reportedly never criminally charged.
Tomorrow-November
On This Day: 1951 – NBC-TV debuted “Dragnet.” 1961 – The U.S. severed diplomatic relations with Cuba. 1987 – Aretha Franklin was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame along with Bill Haley and 14 others. Franklin was the first woman to be inducted.
I read the Daily Fishwrap(s) so you don’t have to… Catch “the Starting Line” Monday thru Friday right here at San Diego Free Press (dot) org. Send your hate mail and ideas to DougPorter@SanDiegoFreePress.Org Check us out on Facebook and Twitter.
Doug Porter
Doug Porter was active in the early days of the alternative press in San Diego, contributing to the OB Liberator, the print version of the OB Rag, the San Diego Door, and the San Diego Street Journal. He went on to have a 35-year career in the Hospitality business and decided to go back into raising hell when he retired. He won numerous awards for his columns from the Society of Professional Journalists in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. Doug is a cancer survivor (sans vocal chords) and lives in North Park. |
When it comes to the NFL, it’s all about building a solid foundation. Whether that’s having the right head coach, franchise quarterback, or anchor left tackle, teams need a good foundation to have success.
The same can be said about the game of Jenga. You need that solid three-block foundation to avoid the tower from crumbling over.
Let’s take a look at the foundational pieces for the Los Angeles Rams. These are pieces that without them, the outlook of things would massively change.
Head Coach Sean McVay
Before the hiring of head coach Sean McVay, the Los Angeles Rams suffered from poor coaching. Between Jeff Fisher, Steve Spagnuolo, Jim Haslett, and Scott Linehan, the Rams went 11 years without a winning record. The three combined tallied an overall record of 54-121-1.
Under McVay, in just two years, the Rams have won 26 games and made the playoffs twice.
As long as McVay is the man in charge, the Rams are going to be okay. The Patriots have lost Brady for a year, gone through a plethora of assistant changes, but Bill Belichick has remained consistent.
It’s impossible to compare McVay to Belichick just two years on the job. However, it’s hard not to see the similarities and potential. The team lost its offensive coordinator last season, but the offense managed to improve. The Rams lost Zac Taylor this previous offseason. However, that shouldn’t worry fans because the man in charge is still there.
McVay does have room for growth, but without him, it’s hard to see the Rams where they are right now – one offseason removed from a Super Bowl appearance.
LT Andrew Whitworth
Jared Goff was sacked 26 times in seven games in his rookie season. Despite less than half a season under center, he was still the 23rd most-sacked quarterback in the NFL.
Heading into Goff’s second season, the team signed veteran left tackle, Andrew Whitworth. The Rams quarterback reaped the benefits. The sophomore quarterback was sacked one time less than he was his rookie year, despite playing nine more games.
The offensive line doesn’t get all of the credit it deserves, but they should be complimented for the franchise’s turnaround as much as McVay and the improvement of Goff.
McVay has been one of the best offensive play-callers, but without Whitworth, it would be hard to see the Rams being as efficient on offense as they have been. Goff thew 3,800 yards with a 28-7 touchdown to interception ratio in year one with Whitworth. Then, Todd Gurley went from sophomore slump to 1300 yards, 19 touchdowns, and Offensive Player of the Year.
2019 may be Whitworth’s last season with the team, and there’s no question that they will miss him when he hangs up the cleats.
QB Jared Goff
The third and final player on this list is Jared Goff, and this spot could very well be Todd Gurley or Aaron Donald.
However, the NFL is a quarterback league, and teams rarely win without a franchise quarterback. It’s not easy being the No. 1 overall pick and the Rams went from Sam Bradford to AJ Feeley, Kellen Clemens, Shaun Hill, Nick Foles and Case Keenum before they finally landed on Goff.
In fact, Goff’s 31 regular season starts the last two years are the most for any Rams quarterback in a two-year span in franchise history.
While McVay has a great offensive quarterback, it’s hard to see anybody else running it as efficiently as Jared Goff has. McVay’s system is fantastic, but you need the talent to compliment the system.
It’s hard to see Foles, Keenum, Davis, or Bradford running this offense as well as Goff has. To go from 0-7 to start his career to making his first Super Bowl two years later is unfathomable. That’s not to mention leading his team back from 13-0 in the NFC Championship game. He also led the Rams to a win in the greatest NFL regular-season game against the Kansas City Chiefs.
Goff isn’t perfect, but the Rams aren’t in the position that they are right now without him.
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Q:
FreeBSD Ant javax script engine
I use ant to compile Java project, and there is some javascript code in build.xml. When I run, it failed with 'Unable to create javax script engine for javascript'.
My environment is FreeBSD 9.0 + apache-ant-1.8.2 + openjdk1.6.0_30.
It seems that a javascript engine need to add to the system, but how to do?
A:
It would be nice if you had posted some log output, so this answer is just guesswork and a bit of googling.
According to the docu at
https://ant.apache.org/manual/Tasks/script.html you need to install the rhino JavaScript library.
https://ant.apache.org/manual/install.html#librarydependencies has some more information on how to install library dependencies.
You can try to install the FreeBSD rhino port from /usr/ports/lang/rhino
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setting_aggregate_reblogs: Grupuj podbicia na osiach czasu
setting_auto_play_gif: Automatycznie odtwarzaj animowane GIFy
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severity: Priorytet
type: Importowane dane
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must_be_following_dm: Nie wyświetlaj wiadomości bezpośrednich od osób, których nie śledzisz
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text: Czemu chcesz dołączyć?
notification_emails:
digest: Wysyłaj podsumowania e-mailem
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follow_request: Powiadamiaj mnie e-mailem, gdy ktoś poprosi o pozwolenie na śledzenie mnie
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'no': Nie
recommended: Polecane
required:
mark: "*"
text: pole wymagane
'yes': Tak
|
Saliva on the oral mucosa and whole saliva in women diagnosed with burning mouth syndrome.
The aim of the study was to examine mucosal saliva and unstimulated (UWS) and stimulated (SWS) whole saliva secretion rates and associated factors, in 56 female patients diagnosed with BMS and age-matched control women. Mucosal saliva was assessed using the Periotron® method and blood flow using laser Doppler flowmetry. Diseases, drug usage and xerostomia were registered using questionnaires. The patients with BMS displayed less lingual and whole saliva, and more hyposalivation, xerostomia diseases/disorders and drug usage, compared to the controls. Only a low SWS and xerostomia differed after adjusting for drugs and systemic diseases. Regression analyses suggested an importance of saliva affecting drugs for saliva on the tongue and for SWS, and the total number of drugs used for UWS. Lingual saliva and UWS were also associated with systemic diseases in the patients. Xerostomia was significantly associated with drug use and whole saliva for all subjects but not in separate analyses of the groups. Less saliva in patients with BMS could be related to more systemic diseases and medication and not to the syndrome per se. Xerostomia in the patients was not related to any of these factors. |
Subcompartmentalized Nanoreactors as Artificial Organelle with Intracellular Activity.
Cell mimicry is an approach which aims at substituting missing or lost activity. In this context, the goal of artificial organelles is to provide intracellularly active nanoreactors to affect the cellular performance. So far, only a handful of reports discuss concepts addressing this challenge based on single-component reactors. Here, the assembly of nanoreactors equipped with glucose oxidase (GOx)-loaded liposomal subunits coated with a poly(dopamine) polymer layer and RGD targeting units is reported. When comparing different surface modifications, the uptake of the nanoreactors by endothelial cells and macrophages with applied shear stress is confirmed without inherent cytotoxicity. Furthermore, the encapsulation and preserved activity of GOx within the nanoreactors is shown. The intracellular activity is demonstrated by exposing macrophages with internalized nanoreactors to glucose and assessment of the cell viability after 6 and 24 h. The macrophage viability is found to be reduced due to the intracellularly produced hydrogen peroxide by GOx. This report on the first intracellular active subcompartmentalized nanoreactors is a considerable step in therapeutic cell mimicry. |
Many gambling machines are arranged to accept monies in the form of paper bills. The accepted money is credited to a player for betting or wagering during play of the game. In general, the gambling machine includes a bill acceptor which accepts paper or bill-type money. This bill acceptor includes a bill validator mechanism arranged to validate each bill to ensure that it is authentic. If the bill is not deemed authentic, it is rejected.
Many gambling machines are arranged to accept paper monies in a wide variety of denominations. For example, the machine may be arranged to accept $5, $10 and $20 dollar bills. In such event, the bill validator is arranged to determine the denomination of the bill.
The bill acceptor also includes a cash box. Regardless of the denomination of the accepted bill, the bill acceptor is arranged to deliver each accepted bill to the cash box. Because of the desire to reduce the complexity and size of each gaming machine, a single cash box is utilized. Thus, even when a machine is arranged to accept bills of differing denominations, all of the bills are delivered to one cash box.
The cash box is a secure repository for the accepted bill monies. At certain intervals, personnel remove the full or partially-full cash box from the gambling machine. An empty cash box is installed in replacement.
The removed cash box containing money is taken to a secure count room. The cash box is opened and the currency is removed and delivered to a bill sorter. The bill sorter is a specially configured machine for accepting bills, validating and sorting them, and calculating the total value of the bills sorted. The bill sorter sorts the bills from a provided cash box by denomination, and provides a record of the bills which were sorted and their total value. This process is generally referred to in the industry as a “soft count” process.
A gaming operator may compare the output of the bill sorter to a transaction record of the gaming machine from which the cash box was removed. The transaction record at the gaming machine provides information regarding the value of the bills received by the machine during the time period a particular cash box was installed. The value of the bills accepted by the gaming machine should be identical to the value of the bills sorted by the bill sorter in the soft count process. If there is a discrepancy, there is an indication that there may have been a breach in the security of the monies from the time they were received until they were counted, or that there is a malfunction or other problem associated with the gaming machine or count process which is resulting in errors.
In accordance with the present invention, a gaming machine is arranged to accept not only monetary bills, but vouchers. A method and apparatus is disclosed for using vouchers in a gaming system including at least one gaming machine. Also disclosed are method and apparatus for sorting and accounting for the vouchers utilized in the gaming system in order to ensure the integrity of the system. |
Stoney Road
Stoney Road is Paterson, New Jersey, USA's most south-west neighborhood and is bordered by Woodland Park (formerly West Paterson) to the south and Totowa across the Passaic River to the west. It is bordered on the east by Mountain Avenue and to the north by Rockland Street. This neighborhood is home to Pennington Park, Hayden Heights, Lou Costello Pool, western Grand Street, McBride Avenue and Garrett Heights. The Stoney Road section of Paterson is located in the city's 2nd Ward. A strong Italian presence remains in this neighborhood.
External links
Stoney Road, Paterson, New Jersey
Category:Neighborhoods in Paterson, New Jersey |
German Patent Application DE 40 30 333 A1 describes a locking device for laterally joined contactors whose actuating members for the movable contacts are electromagnetically moved in a direction substantially perpendicular to the connecting sidewalls. The two contactors are received in a common lower housing part. The actuating members, of the two contactors have facing projections, which stand back from the connecting sidewalls and between which is supported a locking pin that is movable in a direction perpendicular to the connecting sidewalls, which are provided with openings at this location. When switching on one of the two contactors, the projection thereof moves the locking pin toward the other contactor. When attempting to switch on the other contactor, the projection thereof strikes the locking pin. The holding force of the electromagnetic operating mechanism of the already switched-on contactor is greater than the pickup force of the electromagnetic operating mechanism of the other contactor, which prevents the actuating member of the other contactor from moving to the ON position. It is a disadvantage of this locking device that, on the one hand, the actuating members are required to move in a direction perpendicular to the connecting sidewalls, and that the locking effect is no longer guaranteed when the electromagnetic operating mechanisms are operated with a holding power that is markedly reduced compared to the pickup power, which is what is generally being aimed at.
German Patent DE 195 48 480 C1 describes a locking device of this type which avoids the aforementioned disadvantages. The moving direction of the actuating members is perpendicular to the front face of the laterally joined contactors. A support element is inserted in opposite first slots in the connecting sidewalls, the support element supporting a locking element in the form of an anchor which is able to pivot in a direction perpendicular to the connecting sidewalls. The connecting sidewalls have opposite second slots for receiving the anchor. When energizing the electromagnetic operating mechanisms of both contactors simultaneously, the anchor engages recesses of both actuating members and prevents both contactors from being switched on. The recesses are each bounded by a front inner surface, a central inner surface, and a rear inner surface, which extend parallel or perpendicular or at an angle to the front faces, respectively. When energizing the electromagnetic operating mechanism of one contactor alone, the anchor is moved out of the recess of the actuating member of this contactor and pushed into the recess of the actuating member of the other contactor, thereby effectively locking the same from being switched on. The two contactors are connected by connecting elements whose outer legs engage like brackets around ribs extending from the connecting sidewalls and whose central leg engages in a positively locking manner in a recess formed in the connecting sidewalls. In this locking device, two complicated parts are needed for the support element and the anchor, which involves high tooling costs. The existing locking stroke of the locked contactor requires exact matching of the geometries of the first slots, the support elements, the anchors, the recesses, and of the geometry, support and kinematics of the actuating members.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,409,575 A shows a mechanical interlock mechanism for mechanically connected contactors, including a locking element in the form of a rolling element, such as a cylindrical roller or a hollow cylindrical roller, which is supported in a connecting frame between the spaced apart contactors and is actuated by the contact frame of the respective contactor that is energized. The disadvantage here is the need for a connecting frame and the associated, relatively large spatial distance between the opposite sidewalls of the two contactors. |
Company releases 1st 3 novel volumes in English on November 16
Publisher Sol Press announced at its panel at Anime Weekend Atlanta on Saturday that it will release writer Riku Misora 's and illustrator Won 's Chivalry of a Failed Knight ( Rakudai Kishi no Cavalry ) light novel series in English. The company will release the first three volumes simultaneously digitally and in print on November 16, and will release subsequent volumes "in set intervals."
Misora and Won launched the light novel series in 2013, and SoftBank Creative published the novel's 16th volume on April 12.
Sol Press describes the series:
Ikki Kurogane is a Blazer, a person who can materialize his soul as a weapon. Unlike most Blazers, however, his aptitude for magic is virtually nonexistent. Branded a talentless failure and nicknamed “Worst One,” he has spent his life honing his swordplay in order to become a Mage-Knight nonetheless. Stella Vermillion is the second imperial princess of the Vermillion Empire and a powerful Rank A Blazer. Having spent her whole life undefeated in battle as a result of her incredible natural talent, she travels to Japan in search of powerful opponents, hoping to grow ever stronger and become an accomplished Mage-Knight herself. The two meet at Hagun Academy, one of seven Mage-Knight schools in Japan, and soon realize that they share the same goal: to become a powerful Mage-Knight renowned for their hard work and skill, regardless of their level of talent. In order to reach that goal, their first step is to meet in the finals of the Seven Stars Battle Festival, a no-holds-barred tournament that gathers the strongest student knights from all seven schools across Japan, and fight for the title of Seven Stars King. Can Ikki and Stella fight toe-to-toe with even the strongest of Blazers and achieve their dream of reaching the peak of knighthood?
The novel series inspired a 12-episode television anime series that premiered in October 2015. Sentai Filmworks licensed the anime, and streamed it on Hulu as it aired. HIDIVE later began streaming the show's English dub in June 2017. Sentai Filmworks released the series on Blu-ray Disc and DVD with an English dub in June 2017.
Megumu Soramichi launched a manga adaptation of the novels on Square Enix 's Gangan Online website in 2014, and ended the series in December 2017.
Source: Press release |
Well I'd very much like to support someone in this argument, what with it being of astronomical importance. But sadly, I have no idea what a conscienous is... probably because it's not actually a word. Funny that. So, I guess I'm on the side of flamebaitgod here. If you were to have typed something that made sense, or instead opted to remove the "NO YOU COULDN'T" part, I might have sided with you.
I am aware of how upset this must make you, but I just can't take your side. |
The field of the invention relates generally to railroad systems, and more specifically, to a closed-loop cab signaling monitoring system.
Some known railroad systems use a cab signaling system that communicates track status and information to a locomotive control system from a trackside communications station, wherein the engineer or driver receives information at a display unit onboard the locomotive. Less complex systems may display the trackside signal aspect, i.e. a green, a yellow or a red light, that indicates whether it is safe to proceed, while more sophisticated systems may display speed limits, a location of nearby trains, and/or dynamic information about the track ahead. In some known systems, a speed enforcement system may overlay the cab signaling data for use in warning the driver of a dangerous condition up-track of the locomotive. Moreover, some of such systems may automatically request a braking effort to facilitate stopping the locomotive if the driver ignores or cannot respond to the dangerous condition. Such systems range from simple coded track circuits, to transponders that communicate with the cab, to communication-based train control systems.
Some known train systems experience cab signal “flips” that were the result of a loss of cab signal being decoded at the Onboard System, which then causes a resulting change to a more restrictive aspect, when, for example, the cab signal transmitted into the tracks becomes out-of-specification with respect to signal amplitude, signal period, carrier frequency and/or duty cycle. More specifically, the loss of a decoded cab signal may be due to a malfunction in the trackside communications station, an inadequately maintained trackside communications station, disruption in the track circuit itself (such as a broken rail or changing environmental conditions), a malfunction in the on-board processor, or an inadequately maintained onboard processing system. Some known systems do not include a communication link from the train back to the trackside communications station, and the inaccurate signal remains uncorrected until a maintainer adjusts or corrects the signal at the trackside communications station. Additionally, onboard systems and/or track circuits may go uncorrected as engineers and/or drivers may falsely attribute the cause of the flip to the wayside station. |
6427721612?
-6427721610.1
What is 0.03631 less than 3631.1?
3631.06369
What is 9181 plus -1697?
7484
What is the difference between 13137486 and -70?
13137556
Total of -4654 and 1.86.
-4652.14
What is the difference between 2807.34 and -0.045?
2807.385
Calculate 0.527 + 355490.
355490.527
What is -0.1 + -564478066?
-564478066.1
Subtract 0.03127391 from -4.34.
-4.37127391
What is -7 minus -0.46189873?
-6.53810127
What is 20494767 less than -9?
-20494776
Add 0.619265 and -1.2389.
-0.619635
Put together -77 and 75.2562.
-1.7438
What is the distance between -805383.662 and -0.1?
805383.562
What is the distance between 1.2 and -37065813?
37065814.2
-3.0043072+-2
-5.0043072
What is the distance between -17580731 and 3.1?
17580734.1
What is the difference between 1.2 and 229287292?
229287290.8
Work out 0.9 + -136142.828.
-136141.928
Work out 49.2672 - -2155.
2204.2672
Calculate -146406.825 - -19.
-146387.825
What is the distance between 1269781881 and -2?
1269781883
What is 1 less than 8409745568?
8409745567
Total of 0.4 and 907871534.
907871534.4
What is -60 minus -553.767055?
493.767055
Put together 1054 and 60477.
61531
Put together -5033925 and -9445.
-5043370
What is 269740 less than 0.42?
-269739.58
Work out 0.49 - 671877.
-671876.51
Calculate 208 + 0.192648.
208.192648
61.07771 - -3
64.07771
Add -0.1395 and 305535.
305534.8605
What is 0.2 + 820.5437?
820.7437
0.01 - -1534211973
1534211973.01
Add together 105.9 and -1.199838.
104.700162
77+-1.28975
75.71025
Work out -57079911 - -0.079.
-57079910.921
What is 2.547738586 + -0.2?
2.347738586
Work out 213 + 28415.6.
28628.6
What is the difference between -0.12 and 9650450?
9650450.12
What is -428453 minus -4?
-428449
-1167.66 + 180.9
-986.76
Sum -986410 and 12.
-986398
What is -45614143 + 0.3?
-45614142.7
What is -0.0440155473 less than -0.3?
-0.2559844527
What is the difference between 56299 and -573?
56872
Add 3183.8 and -2332.67.
851.13
Work out 0.13 - 60067735.
-60067734.87
What is 8915.61 + -117.4?
8798.21
Add -0.06 and -68536222.
-68536222.06
What is the distance between -0.4 and -37616789262?
37616789261.6
What is 968 less than -719.4132?
-1687.4132
Put together -325 and 418281.
417956
What is -0.7 take away 4399.006?
-4399.706
Total of -0.2 and 3.500844.
3.300844
Work out -61550 - 0.05159.
-61550.05159
Add together 0.4 and -6286.52.
-6286.12
0.89+166818
166818.89
What is -92584 - 473586?
-566170
Add 2945 and 927304.
930249
What is -2598.2689 - -175.4?
-2422.8689
What is 1.11953 minus -51?
52.11953
Subtract -0.6 from 136.1967138.
136.7967138
Work out 696708.4 + -28.59.
696679.81
Total of 0.093 and 0.078709029.
0.171709029
What is the distance between -1.75 and 130736?
130737.75
Calculate 2.6213 - -0.842063.
3.463363
What is -2687 + 129323.7?
126636.7
Add -1914 and -853.6.
-2767.6
Work out 1 - 19.117796482.
-18.117796482
What is -141 - 17979?
-18120
Total of -45118 and 0.40606.
-45117.59394
What is 1.04 minus -140.03?
141.07
2729+-2629.4164
99.5836
What is 7.1803 minus -36715?
36722.1803
What is the distance between -1446 and 0.06339?
1446.06339
What is -10585984 minus -0.3?
-10585983.7
What is the distance between -4369.9 and -61.9?
4308
What is the difference between -4000763 and 1?
4000764
Put together -51.09988 and 4285.
4233.90012
Calculate 0.005258 - 5.84515.
-5.839892
Add -1.82353 and 1299.
1297.17647
Calculate -5 - -207036915.
207036910
What is 0.06 less than -2201336?
-2201336.06
What is the distance between 64772036 and 0.88?
64772035.12
What is the distance between 252418852 and 0?
252418852
What is -144291 minus 4486?
-148777
Calculate -5651 + 637534.
631883
What is 4 less than -3.734532?
-7.734532
What is -6253.09 take away 0.04?
-6253.13
What is -159619.4 - 21119?
-180738.4
203688 + 2.4
203690.4
Work out 1954496 + 0.031.
1954496.031
What is 95.2136 plus 0.006?
95.2196
Put together -0.1 and 858514.
858513.9
What is -163568 less than -79.66?
163488.34
Calculate 0.08891 + 0.069301.
0.158211
Calculate 9.514348 - 771.
-761.485652
Calculate 664819.5 - 0.5.
664819
Add together 111.95448557 and 4.
115.95448557
Subtract -684160.5 from 12.
684172.5
4 + 1015.9404
1019.9404
Add together 79772 and 0.2095.
79772.2095
302086246+-0.04
302086245.96
Total of -2474 and 2628.
154
What is 1584936 + 2.6?
1584938.6
What is the difference between -10936 and 406523.4?
417459.4
Add 281500221 and -0.3.
281500220.7
Sum -4 and -0.02169487227.
-4.02169487227
What is -110997833 + -0.105?
-110997833.105
What is -0.88 minus 486789949?
-486789949.88
Add together 3676 and 1.734.
3677.734
-0.2+30766.75128
30766.55128
What is 173 - -32961337?
32961510
Calculate 2294614 + -187.
2294427
Total of -1280 and -0.030669.
-1280.030669
What is -31888896.21 plus -0.5?
-31888896.71
What is the difference between -15111 and 0.226619?
15111.226619
What is -8.1 + -526273055?
-526273063.1
What is 0.3 - 146737023?
-146737022.7
What is 32238820 plus 0.0818?
32238820.0818
Put together 3 and 1492525974.
1492525977
What is the difference between -191.22814 and 0.1?
191.32814
Add together -0.32 and 0.0792206177.
-0.2407793823
What is 5 take away 10294684?
-10294679
What is the distance between -28273.2 and -0.305?
28272.895
2894.4+-42.4
2852
Work out -57840505.18 - -3.
-57840502.18
What is the difference between -1 and 18188.898?
18189.898
What is 2960 - -5947757?
5950717
What is the difference between -267268960 and -5?
267268955
What is 0.2 + -775755.9546?
-775755.7546
Total of -0.0212 and 366721.5.
366721.4788
What is 328696 take away 25073?
303623
Total of 127.3 and -1340022.
-1339894.7
Put together 4 and -52.78706715.
-48.78706715
What is 5 take away -52548534?
52548539
Subtract 29.4 from -3271162.
-3271191.4
Subtract -4 from 0.067937063.
4.067937063
Work out -151 + 76097825.
76097674
Work out 7 - -13891790.
13891797
What is -98.28 take away 1178.16?
-1276.44
Work out 11126.282 - -2626.
13752.282
Calculate 0.2313385 + 10.
10.2313385
0.204333925 + -3
-2.795666075
What is the distance between -0.4 and 2206433?
2206433.4
What is -0.3 minus 356517.37?
-356517.67
What is 1598.224 take away 328?
1270.224
Work out 0.47213 - 379.
-378.52787
What is 2 - 7645240?
-7645238
0.985 + -2544996
-2544995.015
What is the distance between 580264929 and -8?
580264937
Add 786606.64 and 0.12.
786606.76
What is 363.1 minus 5308121?
-5307757.9
What is 568.8 minus 2274.1?
-1705.3
What is 5941.4 + 58644?
64585.4
Add -106 and 0.036225.
-105.963775
What is -11310.7 less than -457.9?
10852.8
Put together 0.2 and 1.6142855.
1.8142855
Sum 2788521412 and -0.27.
2788521411.73
Add -10620.3 and -13.
-10633.3
What is -104 - 574128?
-574232
What is -30.93714 minus 0.03?
-30.96714
What is -61.7 minus -14.381?
-47.319
What is the distance between 159 and 113440?
113281
Calculate -117414154 - -0.3.
-117414153.7
What is -0.024 minus -1678139?
1678138.976
What is -449650 take away 0.115?
-449650.115
What is -1292780241.06 take away 0.1?
-1292780241.16
What is 2050 plus 41551?
43601
What is -0.26 take away -16165298?
16165297.74
Total of -60989 and -0.6.
-60989.6
What is the distance between 1276770.662 and 5?
1276765.662
Put together -547.5 and -231.22698.
-778.72698
What is 138100.7 plus 0.3?
138101
Total of -1412275 and -7.75.
-1412282.75
What is -408412 less than 0.4457?
408412.4457
What is -0.4 plus -3010180608?
-3010180608.4
What is 1337355 - -112?
1337467
What is -286.3816 - -333?
46.6184
Add together 0.1140728448 and 2.
2.1140728448
Sum -147.49179 and 0.2.
-147.29179
What is the difference between -0.16 and -19769.035?
19768.875
What is -72989 plus -0.077353?
-72989.077353
-928763648 - 0
-928763648
293582 - 35.9
293546.1
Subtract -21045053658 from 0.3.
21045053658.3
What is -8 plus -2821961?
-2821969
What is 48118254 + 95?
48118349
Calculate -2786.11 - -5.5566.
-2780.5534
Add together -17.01 and -40549.
-40566.01
What is 2.4 minus 19639130?
-19639127.6
What is 0.08918 minus 5227?
-5226.91082
What is 18297 less than -0.16?
-18297.16
-679+12.13
-666.87
Calculate 0.637796 + 328.89.
329.527796
-0.3 + 352961124
352961123.7
What is 258017129 take away 3?
258017126
What is the distance between 14 and -0.112894?
14.112894
What is -229 take away -145.4092?
-83.5908
Work out 16680 + -0.2115.
16679.7885
What is 4 less than -4642448?
-4642452
Calculate -11797305 - -0.1.
|
Q:
What is the legal definition of at the entrance (parking sign law)
This is specifically in regards to parking sign law in Mesa, AZ.
The legal wording is
The owner or the agent of the owner of any private parking area shall be deemed to have given consent to unrestricted parking by the general public in such parking area unless such parking area is posted with signs as prescribed by this Section which are clearly visible and readable from any point within the parking area and at each entrance thereto.
I could not find a clarification of what "at the entrance" means. I can see two interpretations:
Physically situated at the entrance.
Clearly visible and readable from the entrance.
A:
Because the ordinance does not say "and from each entrance", it cannot be interpreted to mean that the signs must both be visible and readable anywhere in the area as well as being visible and readable from the entrance. The use of distinct prepositions in the conjuncts means that the notice requirement can be satisfied by different signs: it's not that a sign has to have both properties.
A:
The answer is in the text:
[...] unless such parking area is posted with signs [...] which are clearly visible and readable [...] and at each entrance thereto.
I read this as an inclusive and: it needs to be both readable and also at each entrance, but it can be a different sign from those visible at each spot of the place.
A:
Your question seems to be whether it's
posted with signs as prescribed by this Section which are (clearly visible and readable from any point within the parking area) and (at each entrance thereto).
or
parking area is posted with signs as prescribed by this Section which are clearly visible and readable from (any point within the parking area and at each entrance thereto).
The latter seems like the more reasonable interpretation. It requires the least parallelization, for one thing. Furthermore, it seems reasonable to read an ambiguity in the way the has the least effect. Since the latter interpretation would result in a smaller set of circumstances in which the owner shall be deemed to have given consent, this principle favors the latter interpretation.
|
In a speech marking Women’s Day in Tunisia, President Beji Caid Essebsi announced that he will submit a bill to parliament, that aims to give women equal inheritance rights with men. “I propose equality inheritance to become law,” President Beji Caid Essebsi said in his speech, stressing that the country’s secular constitution assured equality between all citizens. He said he will submit the bill "as soon as possible", probably when parliament resumes in October.
Essebsi said that his decision is based on Article 2 of the country’s Constitution that was adopted in 2014 after the Arab Spring revolution, which stipulates that “Tunisia is a civil state based on citizenship, the will of the people and the supremacy of law”.
Thousands of women and men rallied in central Tunis on August 13 in support of President Beji Caid Essebsi's call to give women equal inheritance rights. On the other hand, thousands of religious conservatives protested against the proposed reforms in front of Tunisia's parliament.
The current system, which is based on Islamic Shariah law, grants women only half the inheritance given to men. Tunisia would be the first country in the Arab world to instate equal inheritance.
Tunisia is considered as a pioneer for women's rights in the Arab world, and number of decisions have justified that title such as the adoption of the 1956 Personal Status Code, one of the most progressive civil codes in the region, which banned polygamy, the adoption of a law on violence against women and girls including domestic violence, the abolition of a clause allowing rapists to escape any punishment if they married their victims and the repeal of the marriage restriction decree that prohibited Muslim women from marrying non-Muslim men. Furthermore, Tunisia has the highest representation of women in Parliament compared to other Arab countries with 76 women MPs out of the overall 217 members.
Euromed Feminist Initiative IFE-EFI welcomes the newly proposed inheritance law in Tunisia and expresses its full solidarity with women’s rights, civil society and human rights activists, organizations and movements who have long campaigned for the abolition of the inheritance law to attain equal rights for women and to remove gender discrimination in law.
AFTURD's participation in a rally in Tunis to demand equal inheritance rights for women, Tunisia, August 13, 2018. |
0
What is prob of sequence ff when two letters picked without replacement from {w: 5, f: 5}?
2/9
What is prob of sequence lvl when three letters picked without replacement from eelelllevvellevelvve?
7/228
Two letters picked without replacement from msmybssyyyywyjs. Give prob of sequence my.
2/35
Three letters picked without replacement from bnzzzzzdz. What is prob of sequence bnz?
1/84
Two letters picked without replacement from cceqeet. What is prob of sequence ce?
1/7
What is prob of sequence qqq when three letters picked without replacement from {q: 7}?
1
Three letters picked without replacement from {t: 2, p: 4, u: 2}. Give prob of sequence tup.
1/21
What is prob of sequence fff when three letters picked without replacement from {f: 9, r: 7}?
3/20
What is prob of sequence ihi when three letters picked without replacement from {w: 4, i: 2, e: 1, p: 2, h: 10}?
10/2907
Calculate prob of sequence mmm when three letters picked without replacement from {a: 4, e: 1, n: 9, m: 3, o: 2}.
1/969
Three letters picked without replacement from {z: 3, j: 5}. Give prob of sequence jjj.
5/28
Two letters picked without replacement from ttcucttttttutct. What is prob of sequence ut?
2/21
Two letters picked without replacement from egnnwnwn. What is prob of sequence ge?
1/56
Calculate prob of sequence eeea when four letters picked without replacement from aeeeeeqqq.
5/252
What is prob of sequence ccbf when four letters picked without replacement from wzcfpfzzppcbzzfzzw?
1/12240
What is prob of sequence qvq when three letters picked without replacement from {q: 7, v: 6}?
21/143
What is prob of sequence cc when two letters picked without replacement from {b: 16, c: 2}?
1/153
What is prob of sequence ll when two letters picked without replacement from jjjlyvjjjjeyyljavajj?
1/190
Three letters picked without replacement from {e: 3, z: 3, o: 1, r: 1, l: 6}. What is prob of sequence lrl?
5/364
Four letters picked without replacement from {w: 4, p: 1, a: 2}. Give prob of sequence waap.
1/105
Calculate prob of sequence mh when two letters picked without replacement from clllfmmmchll.
1/44
Four letters picked without replacement from {t: 4, i: 16}. What is prob of sequence ttit?
16/4845
What is prob of sequence ov when two letters picked without replacement from {j: 1, v: 2, o: 2}?
1/5
Four letters picked without replacement from nnqnnnnqqn. Give prob of sequence nqnq.
1/20
What is prob of sequence mma when three letters picked without replacement from {m: 3, l: 4, y: 1, t: 2, e: 4, a: 3}?
3/680
What is prob of sequence nnf when three letters picked without replacement from {l: 7, k: 2, s: 2, o: 1, n: 2, f: 1}?
1/1365
Three letters picked without replacement from {m: 6, n: 7, g: 2, z: 1, u: 1}. What is prob of sequence gmg?
1/340
Calculate prob of sequence qou when three letters picked without replacement from uufqouuuuouuuo.
9/728
Calculate prob of sequence hdd when three letters picked without replacement from dddhdhhddddjhhdjhd.
15/136
Three letters picked without replacement from {p: 1, c: 7, o: 6, w: 6}. Give prob of sequence cwc.
7/190
Four letters picked without replacement from {t: 1, g: 1, y: 1, z: 3, r: 6}. Give prob of sequence ytyt.
0
Three letters picked without replacement from {q: 12, y: 1}. What is prob of sequence qqq?
10/13
What is prob of sequence hh when two letters picked without replacement from ccchhchccccchcchcccc?
1/19
Calculate prob of sequence ptdd when four letters picked without replacement from dpbpbpbbbbtpdbpbbpbp.
7/58140
Two letters picked without replacement from zilizvy. What is prob of sequence ii?
1/21
Four letters picked without replacement from cnncggcgcnggnnnggcc. What is prob of sequence cccg?
35/3876
Calculate prob of sequence fis when three letters picked without replacement from {f: 5, s: 2, c: 2, i: 3, e: 8}.
1/228
Four letters picked without replacement from {w: 2, t: 2, h: 2, p: 2}. What is prob of sequence wtph?
1/105
What is prob of sequence ti when two letters picked without replacement from {j: 2, i: 2, t: 10}?
10/91
Four letters picked without replacement from tttxtttttttttxttttt. What is prob of sequence txxt?
1/171
Four letters picked without replacement from {z: 3, t: 5, p: 2}. What is prob of sequence pztt?
1/42
Three letters picked without replacement from {d: 3, h: 2, k: 1, r: 1}. What is prob of sequence dhh?
1/35
Calculate prob of sequence il when two letters picked without replacement from {l: 11, i: 1}.
1/12
What is prob of sequence mmmm when four letters picked without replacement from mmmmmmm?
1
Three letters picked without replacement from {e: 10, u: 6, d: 2}. What is prob of sequence ued?
5/204
What is prob of sequence et when two letters picked without replacement from hahahlhlateaeaaat?
1/68
Three letters picked without replacement from {g: 6}. Give prob of sequence ggg.
1
Three letters picked without replacement from {i: 4, a: 2, d: 1, y: 1, f: 2}. What is prob of sequence yif?
1/90
Two letters picked without replacement from {c: 3, u: 5}. What is prob of sequence cu?
15/56
Three letters picked without replacement from kjykqkkqqpjjkkq. Give prob of sequence yjk.
3/455
What is prob of sequence uf when two letters picked without replacement from {u: 4, i: 1, f: 6, s: 6}?
3/34
Three letters picked without replacement from tiiitqgqg. What is prob of sequence igt?
1/42
Two letters picked without replacement from {n: 4, p: 4, q: 12}. What is prob of sequence qp?
12/95
Three letters picked without replacement from {s: 4, m: 1, a: 3}. Give prob of sequence sms.
1/28
Two letters picked without replacement from {p: 1, m: 2, i: 2}. Give prob of sequence ip.
1/10
What is prob of sequence uuu when three letters picked without replacement from {n: 1, u: 3, k: 1}?
1/10
What is prob of sequence fl when two letters picked without replacement from fololololllooll?
4/105
Two letters picked without replacement from mlzif. What is prob of sequence il?
1/20
What is prob of sequence iy when two letters picked without replacement from {c: 3, i: 11, y: 4}?
22/153
Three letters picked without replacement from {f: 1, k: 4, z: 1, l: 4}. Give prob of sequence klz.
1/45
Four letters picked without replacement from kuukuukukuukkuc. Give prob of sequence kuuk.
2/39
Two letters picked without replacement from {i: 17, c: 3}. What is prob of sequence ii?
68/95
Two letters picked without replacement from dyddnyydydnndynddyd. What is prob of sequence dn?
2/19
Calculate prob of sequence hhs when three letters picked without replacement from hhhhhhhhshhh.
1/12
What is prob of sequence rr when two letters picked without replacement from krrcxkggkkrxrgn?
2/35
What is prob of sequence il when two letters picked without replacement from lwxullwjjixl?
1/33
Calculate prob of sequence aw when two letters picked without replacement from lwawwalaawwawawaaa.
7/34
Calculate prob of sequence lmle when four letters picked without replacement from mmllemlleme.
1/55
What is prob of sequence sse when three letters picked without replacement from {u: 3, s: 3, e: 11, o: 2}?
11/969
Two letters picked without replacement from zgigzzghmi. What is prob of sequence gh?
1/30
Two letters picked without replacement from {s: 3, h: 8}. What is prob of sequence sh?
12/55
Four letters picked without replacement from {l: 5, v: 2, y: 1, i: 2, b: 2, m: 2}. Give prob of sequence myil.
5/6006
Two letters picked without replacement from {z: 7, p: 6, d: 1, u: 2, f: 4}. Give prob of sequence fz.
7/95
Two letters picked without replacement from dhsdhekx. Give prob of sequence ex.
1/56
Four letters picked without replacement from {s: 7, x: 4, f: 2, r: 1}. Give prob of sequence fxfr.
1/3003
What is prob of sequence nvv when three letters picked without replacement from nnvvdbdvfvbvvddee?
1/68
Calculate prob of sequence ses when three letters picked without replacement from sssiessinsej.
1/22
Calculate prob of sequence cc when two letters picked without replacement from {c: 2, s: 1, p: 1, n: 1}.
1/10
Calculate prob of sequence kff when three letters picked without replacement from {f: 11, q: 2, v: 1, o: 1, p: 1, k: 2}.
55/1224
Three letters picked without replacement from {r: 3, d: 7, l: 3, g: 2}. What is prob of sequence gld?
1/65
Calculate prob of sequence zb when two letter |
Q:
doctrine manyToMany SQLSTATE[HY000]: General error: 1005 Can't create table (errno: 150)
I have an issue with
/**
* @package Entity
* @ORM\Entity
* @ORM\Table(name="r_country")
*/
class RCountry {
/**
* @ORM\Column(type="string", length=2)
* @ORM\Id
*/
protected $id;
...
/**
*
* @ORM\ManyToMany(targetEntity="RLanguage")
* @ORM\JoinTable(name="prohibited_language_display",
* joinColumns={@ORM\JoinColumn(name="country_id", referencedColumnName="id", onDelete="CASCADE")},
* inverseJoinColumns={@ORM\JoinColumn(name="language_id", referencedColumnName="id", onDelete="CASCADE")}
* )
*
*/
protected $prohibitedLanguageDisplay;
...
}
/**
* @package Entity
* @ORM\Entity
* @ORM\Table(name="r_language")
*/
class RLanguage
{
/**
* @ORM\Column(type="string", length=20)
* @ORM\Id
*
*/
protected $id;
...
}
i'm trying to do a ManyToMany relation with doctrine but when i do an update it fires an error
[Doctrine\DBAL\Exception\DriverException]
An exception occurred while executing 'ALTER TABLE
prohibited_language_display ADD CONSTRAINT FK_77B02D13F92F3E70 FOREIGN
KEY (country_id) REFERENCES r_country (id) ON DELETE CASCADE':
SQLSTATE[HY000]: General error: 1005 Can't create table
'database.#sql-498_8797' (errno: 150)
[Doctrine\DBAL\Driver\PDOException]
SQLSTATE[HY000]: General error: 1005 Can't create table
'database.#sql-498_8797' (errno: 150)
[PDOException]
SQLSTATE[HY000]: General error: 1005 Can't create table
'database.#sql-498_8797' (errno: 150)
this is th dump sql i get
CREATE TABLE prohibited_language_google (country_id VARCHAR(2) NOT
NULL, language_id VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL, INDEX IDX_77B02D13F92F3E70
(country_id), INDEX IDX_77B02D1382F1BAF4 (language_id), PRIMARY
KEY(country_id, language_id)) DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE
utf8_unicode_ci ENGINE = InnoDB; ALTER TABLE
prohibited_language_display ADD CONSTRAINT FK_77B02D13F92F3E70 FOREIGN
KEY (country_id) REFERENCES r_country (id) ON DELETE CASCADE; ALTER
TABLE prohibited_language_google ADD CONSTRAINT FK_77B02D1382F1BAF4
FOREIGN KEY (language_id) REFERENCES r_language (id) ON DELETE
CASCADE;
i've tryed de drop the database and create a new one with doctrine with and it's ok that way, but i want to just do an update otherwise i ill lose all data in my database.
Is there any one who can help me?
A:
the problem was that Doctrine generates a script to create the table with collation utf_unicode_ci, i changed it to be utf8_general_ci
in order to change that i had to add this to my doctrineconfiguration in app/config.yml
doctrine.dbal.default_table_options.collate: "utf8_general_ci"
|
70 +/- Acres Timberland For Sale
Land Description
This timber tract is located in Eastern Cleburne County just off of Interstate 20 near the Georgia line. The property consists of 75% Pine Plantation thinned once, the balance is in a SMZ along Owens Creek and some upland Hardwoods. The property has frontage on County Road 630. The creek frontage along Owens Creek is a beautiful setting with the large bottomland hardwoods following the creek. The Pine Plantation is open following the thinning, allowing perfect browsing for wildlife. The new owner can choose to further thin this stand in a few years or continue to let it grow. This is an all around great property for timber investment and recreational purposes.
This property is located about 10 minutes from the 210 Exit on Interstate 20 (The exit with all of the Fireworks Stores) about 40 minutes from Douglasville, and 15 minutes from Heflin, AL.
Land features, descriptions, details, sales history, photos, maps, boundaries and files are deemed reliable and provided "as is" without guarantee, warranty, representation, expressed or implied by LANDFLIP or its advertisers, and is subject to errors, omissions, sale or withdrawal. Contact the advertiser directly regarding this listing. |
Beauty that envelops the senses
Classicism and elegance are the main features of the stove Gianna. The majolica is combined with metal sides, giving it a stately look. In addition to the aesthetic side, Eva Calòr has been working on combining a high e sciency boiler with high performance. |
'use strict';
var Parser = require('./parser'),
Pipeline = require('./pipeline');
var Extensions = function() {
this._rsv1 = this._rsv2 = this._rsv3 = null;
this._byName = {};
this._inOrder = [];
this._sessions = [];
this._index = {}
};
Extensions.MESSAGE_OPCODES = [1, 2];
var instance = {
add: function(ext) {
if (typeof ext.name !== 'string') throw new TypeError('extension.name must be a string');
if (ext.type !== 'permessage') throw new TypeError('extension.type must be "permessage"');
if (typeof ext.rsv1 !== 'boolean') throw new TypeError('extension.rsv1 must be true or false');
if (typeof ext.rsv2 !== 'boolean') throw new TypeError('extension.rsv2 must be true or false');
if (typeof ext.rsv3 !== 'boolean') throw new TypeError('extension.rsv3 must be true or false');
if (this._byName.hasOwnProperty(ext.name))
throw new TypeError('An extension with name "' + ext.name + '" is already registered');
this._byName[ext.name] = ext;
this._inOrder.push(ext);
},
generateOffer: function() {
var sessions = [],
offer = [],
index = {};
this._inOrder.forEach(function(ext) {
var session = ext.createClientSession();
if (!session) return;
var record = [ext, session];
sessions.push(record);
index[ext.name] = record;
var offers = session.generateOffer();
offers = offers ? [].concat(offers) : [];
offers.forEach(function(off) {
offer.push(Parser.serializeParams(ext.name, off));
}, this);
}, this);
this._sessions = sessions;
this._index = index;
return offer.length > 0 ? offer.join(', ') : null;
},
activate: function(header) {
var responses = Parser.parseHeader(header),
sessions = [];
responses.eachOffer(function(name, params) {
var record = this._index[name];
if (!record)
throw new Error('Server sent an extension response for unknown extension "' + name + '"');
var ext = record[0],
session = record[1],
reserved = this._reserved(ext);
if (reserved)
throw new Error('Server sent two extension responses that use the RSV' +
reserved[0] + ' bit: "' +
reserved[1] + '" and "' + ext.name + '"');
if (session.activate(params) !== true)
throw new Error('Server sent unacceptable extension parameters: ' +
Parser.serializeParams(name, params));
this._reserve(ext);
sessions.push(record);
}, this);
this._sessions = sessions;
this._pipeline = new Pipeline(sessions);
},
generateResponse: function(header) {
var offers = Parser.parseHeader(header),
sessions = [],
response = [];
this._inOrder.forEach(function(ext) {
var offer = offers.byName(ext.name);
if (offer.length === 0 || this._reserved(ext)) return;
var session = ext.createServerSession(offer);
if (!session) return;
this._reserve(ext);
sessions.push([ext, session]);
response.push(Parser.serializeParams(ext.name, session.generateResponse()));
}, this);
this._sessions = sessions;
this._pipeline = new Pipeline(sessions);
return response.length > 0 ? response.join(', ') : null;
},
validFrameRsv: function(frame) {
var allowed = {rsv1: false, rsv2: false, rsv3: false},
ext;
if (Extensions.MESSAGE_OPCODES.indexOf(frame.opcode) >= 0) {
for (var i = 0, n = this._sessions.length; i < n; i++) {
ext = this._sessions[i][0];
allowed.rsv1 = allowed.rsv1 || ext.rsv1;
allowed.rsv2 = allowed.rsv2 || ext.rsv2;
allowed.rsv3 = allowed.rsv3 || ext.rsv3;
}
}
return (allowed.rsv1 || !frame.rsv1) &&
(allowed.rsv2 || !frame.rsv2) &&
(allowed.rsv3 || !frame.rsv3);
},
processIncomingMessage: function(message, callback, context) {
this._pipeline.processIncomingMessage(message, callback, context);
},
processOutgoingMessage: function(message, callback, context) {
this._pipeline.processOutgoingMessage(message, callback, context);
},
close: function(callback, context) {
if (!this._pipeline) return callback.call(context);
this._pipeline.close(callback, context);
},
_reserve: function(ext) {
this._rsv1 = this._rsv1 || (ext.rsv1 && ext.name);
this._rsv2 = this._rsv2 || (ext.rsv2 && ext.name);
this._rsv3 = this._rsv3 || (ext.rsv3 && ext.name);
},
_reserved: function(ext) {
if (this._rsv1 && ext.rsv1) return [1, this._rsv1];
if (this._rsv2 && ext.rsv2) return [2, this._rsv2];
if (this._rsv3 && ext.rsv3) return [3, this._rsv3];
return false;
}
};
for (var key in instance)
Extensions.prototype[key] = instance[key];
module.exports = Extensions;
|
City Furniture Ft Lauderdale ... Top City Furniture Fort Lauderdale Decorations Ideas Inspiring Modern In City Furniture Fort Lauderdale Home Improvement ...
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Home Design Pictures
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In no way does Home Design Pictures claim ownership or responsibility for such items, and you should seek legal consent for any use of such materials from its owner. |
Q:
Mapping a Vim command followed by a replacement
I'm using the following the wrap the current paragraph and then remove the double spaces:
nnoremap Q gqap :s/ / /g<cr>
But when I execute it I get pattern no found, which is strange since it works if I do it separately: :s/ / /g + Enter
What could be the problem?
A:
The mapping itself looks fine; I guess the problem is that :s only works on the current line, whereas after reformatting, the text may be distributed across multiple lines. You can fix that by addressing the last changed range (:'[,']) for :substitute. As there aren't necessarily multiple spaces (better matched by \+ to also match more than 2), you can suppress the error with the /e flag:
:nnoremap Q gqap:'[,']s/ \+/ /ge<cr>
|
Be sure to include your name, daytime phone number, address, name and phone number of legal next-of-kin, method of payment, and the name of the funeral home/crematory to contact for verification of death.
The Heat suffered its second loss at Indiana in less than a month and had four technical fouls. ‘We were frustrated,’ Shane Battier said.
If the Heat had it its way, the team might have gone behind the arena after the game and burned those ugly throwback jerseys for good.
Unfortunately, there are annoying things like contracts and money to consider, so the jerseys will be worn for the rest of the month. The smell of Friday night’s 102-89 loss to the Pacers at Bankers Life Fieldhouse might linger inside the threads that long.
Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said before the game that his team would have to approach the Pacers with “pads up and mouthpieces in.” The Pacers knocked those mouthpieces out with their bullying brand of basketball. With only one game remaining between the teams, the Pacers already have won the season series. Indiana (28-19) joins the Knicks as the only teams with two victories against the Heat this season.
Excluding the Nets, the Heat is 0-5 against the top teams in the Eastern Conference this season. When asked about that record after the game, LeBron James shot back that it didn’t matter.
“We’re not worried about that,” James said. “We don’t put too much into losing a game or winning a game; we want to get better from those games.
That sentiment was pretty apparent early in the third quarter. The Heat trailed 53-45 at halftime, then watched the Pacers run away with the game in the third quarter. James finished with 28 points, six rebounds and three assists. Dwyane Wade had 17 points, six rebounds, five assists, two steals and two blocks.
“That third quarter, they came out and they established what they wanted,” James said. “David West got it going. He had a heck of a game, and they didn’t miss too many shots coming out of the half.”
Led by West, the Pacers scored 48 points in the paint and shot 55.7 percent from the field. West scored 30 points, hitting his first 10 shots of the game, and finished with seven rebounds and five assists. The high percentage allowed the Pacers to overcome 17 turnovers, which the Heat converted into 23 points. That was pretty much all the Heat did right in Indianapolis, but it hardly mattered.
West threw down a two-handed dunk in transition with 2:27 left in the third quarter to give the Pacers a 78-57 lead. He scored 12 points in the third period, and his powerful dunk was the finishing touch on a 14-1 run. The Heat (29-14) cut the Pacers’ lead to 12 points with 3:27 left, but a breakaway layup following a turnover by the Heat put the game out of reach.
West was 12 of 15 from the field, and the Pacers shot a season-high field-goal percentage. Indiana has only shot above 50 percent from the field three times this season. With arguably the best defense in the NBA, Indiana is now 22-3 when holding an opponent to less than 90 points.
“They hit a lot of shots that were open,” said Chris Bosh, who had 13 points and just two rebounds while playing with a sore foot. “When you give up open looks in the first half, it’s harder to stop teams because they have a rhythm. They can see the basket a little better.”
It was an all-around frustrating night, and the Heat picked up four technical fouls as proof. Bosh lost his cool and was tagged with a technical foul in the first half for arguing a foul call. Shane Battier received a technical foul for shoving West. Udonis Haslem was assessed his technical foul for shouting obscenities at an official. Spoelstra picked up his tech in the third quarter after a non-call situation under the Heat’s rim.
“We were frustrated,” Battier said. “Part of it was their defense. They played well. And part of it was our lack of focus. You have nights like this, but we need to do a better job of righting the ship without giving away too many free throws.”
The Pacers were 17 of 24 from the free-throw line, and the Heat was 18 of 24. First-time All-Star Paul George had 15 points, going 6 of 11 from the field. Lance Stephenson, who got in James’ face at one point in the second half before being pushed away, had 15 points, three rebounds and four assists. Guard George Hill had 12 points before leaving the game in the second half with an injured left shoulder. Hill injured his shoulder while trying to get past Wade.
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The CNC 380 series of wastewater valve are available in a variety of configurations to ensure your requirements are met, these are illustrated below showing the pressure (Red) and vacuum(Blue) flows for each configuration. |
Read Me
TOC
1. Introduction
2. Getting the source code
3. Installing the required libraries and headers
4. How to compile
5. How to run
6. Uninstalling
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Introduction
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A gfx-adapter with OpenGL acceleration is highly recommended and 24/32 bitdepth
is required with OpenGL.
NOTE TO NEW LINUX USERS: All lines that are prefixed with the '$'
character are commands that need to be typed into a terminal window /
console (similar to the command prompt for Windows). Note that the '$'
character itself should NOT be typed as part of the command.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Getting the source code
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
You will have to grab the source code of course. First install the subversion
package provided by your distribution. Then from a terminal, type:
$ cd $HOME
$ svn checkout http://xbmc.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/xbmc/trunk xbmc
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Installing the required libraries and headers
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
You will then need the required libraries. The following is the list of packages
that are used to build XBMC packages on Debian/Ubuntu (with all supported
external libraries enabled).
Build-Depends: debhelper (>= 7.0.50), quilt, python-support, cmake,
autotools-dev, autoconf, automake, unzip, libboost-dev,
libgl1-mesa-dev | libgl-dev, libglu-dev, libglew-dev, libmad0-dev, libjpeg-dev,
libsamplerate-dev, libogg-dev, libvorbis-dev, libvorbisenc2, libfreetype6-dev,
libfontconfig-dev, libbz2-dev, libfribidi-dev, libsqlite3-dev,
libmysqlclient-dev, libasound-dev, libpng-dev, libpcre3-dev, liblzo2-dev,
libcdio-dev, libsdl-dev, libsdl-image1.2-dev, libsdl-mixer1.2-dev, libenca-dev,
libjasper-dev, libxt-dev, libxtst-dev, libxmu-dev, libxinerama-dev, libcurl3,
libcurl4-openssl-dev | libcurl-dev, libdbus-1-dev, libhal-storage-dev,
libhal-dev, libpulse-dev, libavahi-common-dev, libavahi-client-dev,
libxrandr-dev, libavcodec-dev, libavformat-dev, libavutil-dev, libpostproc-dev,
libswscale-dev, liba52-dev, libdts-dev, libfaad-dev, libmp4ff-dev,
libmpeg2-4-dev, libass-dev, libflac-dev, libwavpack-dev,
python-dev, gawk, gperf, nasm [!amd64], libcwiid1-dev, libbluetooth-dev,
zlib1g-dev, libmms-dev, libsmbclient-dev, libtiff4-dev, libiso9660-dev, libssl-dev,
libmicrohttpd-dev, libmodplug-dev, libssh-2-dev
*** For developers and anyone else who compiles frequently it is recommended to
use ccache
--------------------------------------------------------------
3.1. Using the XBMC PPA to get all build dependencies (Debian/Ubuntu only)
--------------------------------------------------------------
For this, you need to specify the PPA in your apt sources. Please find them on
the forum.
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=33327
Update apt:
$ sudo apt-get update
Here is the magic command to get the build dependencies (used to compile the
version on the PPA).
$ sudo apt-get build-dep xbmc
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. How to compile
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To create the XBMC executable manually perform these steps:
.0 $ ./bootstrap
.1 $ ./configure <option1> <option2> ... (See --help for available options)
A full listing of supported options can be viewed by typing
'./configure --help'.
.2 $ make
Tip: by adding -j<number> to the make command, you describe how many
concurrent jobs will be used. So for dualcore the command is:
$ make -j2
.3 $ make install
This will install XBMC in the prefix provided in 4.1 as well as a launcher script.
NOTE: You may need to run this with sudo (sudo make install) if your user
doesn't have write permissions to the prefix you have provided (as in the
default case, /usr/local).
Tip: To override the location that XBMC is installed, use PREFIX=<path>.
For example.
$ make install PREFIX=$HOME/xbmc
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
5. How to run
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
How to run xbmc depends on the type of installation you have done. It is
possible to run XBMC without the requirement to install xbmc anywhere else. In
this case, type the following from the top source directory.
$ ./xbmc.bin
If you chose to install XBMC using '/usr' or '/usr/local' as the PREFIX, you
can just issue 'xbmc' in a teminal session.
If you overridden PREFIX to install XBMC into some non-standard location, you
will have to run xbmc by directly running 'xbmc.bin'. For example.
$ $HOME/xbmc/usr/share/xbmc.bin
If you wish to use VDPAU decoding you will now have to change the Render Method
in Settings->Videos->Player from "Auto Detect" to "VDPAU".
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
6. Uninstalling
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Issue "make uninstall" ("sudo make uninstall" if you user doesn't have write
permission to the install directory) from your source tree. If you would like
to also remove any settings and 3rd party addons (skins, scripts, etc) you
should also run "rm -rf ~/.xbmc".
NOTE: If you have rerun configure with a different prefix, you will either need
to rerun configure with the correct prefix for this step to work correctly.
EOF |
In the therapy of certain conditions it is preferable that a drug be delivered only to a particular cellular subpopulation. For example the use of drugs in the treatment of cancer is limited by the inability of the cytotoxic drug to differentiate between cells exhibiting normal cell division and those exhibiting neoplastic division. Hence the therapy is not targeted to a clinically acceptable extent and healthy cells are exposed to cytotoxin. Conjugation of a drug to an antibody, preferably a monoclonal antibody (mAb), allows the targeting of the drug to a particular cellular subpopulation expressing the antigenic determinant to which the targetting antibody binds. However factors, such as the inability of the conjugate to penetrate the relevant tissue, poor release of the drug from the antigen bound conjugate and the limitation placed on the amount of drug which can be delivered by the number of available antibody-binding sites, have limited the effectiveness of this approach.
Avoidance of such limitations led to the concept of targeting conjugates of antibodies and enzymes capable of converting relatively non-cytotoxic `prodrugs` into low molecular weight cytotoxins at the antibody-binding site. This general concept was disclosed by Rose in European Patent application 84302218.7. Bagshawe and collaborators have referred to the concept as ADEPT, Antibody Directed Enzyme Prodrug Therapy. (Bagshawe K. D. et.al., Br. J. Cancer [1987] 56, 531-532, Bagshawe K. D. el al., Br. J. Cancer [1988] 50, 700-703 and WO 90/10140). In this way one conjugate could generate a proportionately larger amount of drug at the target site by repeated rounds of enzymatic catalysis of prodrug activation.
EP 382 411 describes ADEPT wherein a prodrug may be converted to a cytotoxic agent by enzymes including beta-lactamases isolated from various micro-organisms, L-pyroglutamate aminopeptidase, beta-galactosidase, D-amino acid peptidase, isoenzymes of alkaline phosphatase and various carboxypeptidases.
WO 91/11201 describes ADEPT wherein a prodrug may be enzymatically cleaved to generate cyanide by .beta.-glycosidases or .beta.-glucosidases, generally of plant origin.
EP 302 473 describes ADEPT wherein the enzyme alkaline phosphatase may be used to cleave novel prodrugs of mitomycin, penicillin V amidase may be used to cleave novel prodrugs of adriamycin, or cytosine deaminase may be used with the prodrug 5-fluorocytosine.
EP 484 870 describes ADEPT wherein .beta.-lactamase may be used to activate a cephalosporin prodrug to yield a cytotoxic nitrogen mustard.
WO 88/07378 describes ADEPT wherein benzoic acid nitrogen mustard glutamides may be converted to the nitrogen mustard under the action of carboxypeptidases.
Vitols, K. S., el al, Pteridines 3, [1992], 125-126, discloses a number of MTX-amino acid prodrugs which may be activated by carboxypeptidase-mAb conjugates as part of ADEPT.
WO 91/09134 discloses bispecific hybrid mAbs for use in ADEPT wherein the mAb has specificities against both human cancer cell antigens and a prodrug-activating enzyme.
All previously disclosed methods of ADEPT may be divided into two categories: those which employ human enzymes and those which employ non-human (eg. bacterial) enzymes to activate the relevant prodrug. Both strategies retain inherent problems which limit their potential to provide effective therapy. Use of a human enzyme results in instability of the associated prodrug in vivo, as it may be activated at sites distant to the target site where endogenous human enzymatic activity may occur naturally. Clearly this will also have the highly undesirable effect of generating potentially cytotoxic compounds in non-targetted areas of the body with possibly lethal consequences. The use of a non-human enzyme permits the associated prodrug, which is only activated by the non-human enzymatic activity, to avoid activation by endogenous enzymes and so remain stable in vivo until converted to drug at the target site. However, such a non-human enzyme may elicit an inmnune response when introduced in vivo and antibodies generated to the enzyme will limit or destroy its ability to activate the prodrug.
WO 90/07929 identifies the desideratum of a non-endogenous catalytic activity being provided by a non-immunogenic enzyme but teaches only that this may be achieved by the use of "genetically conserved" enzymes or those from a "genetically similar species". However it is not taught how this may be accomplished.
It has now been found that the apparent conflict arising from the need to provide a prodrug which is stable in vivo and yet activated by a non-immunogenic enzyme may be resolved by generation of a mutant mammalian enzyme which retains catalytic activity but possesses a novel substrate specificity. The associated prodrug may be activated by the catalytic activity of the mutant enzyme but since the substrate specificity of the mutant enzyme is not a naturally occurring one, the prodrug remains stable in vivo until converted to drug at the target site. The ability to use a non-immunogenic enzyme according to the present invention provides the further advantage that repeated rounds of therapy may be administered. This is in contrast to known processes for ADEPT, in which the initial introduction of the enzyme to the system elicits an immune response which effectively precludes further treatment with the same enzyme as this will be removed from the body by an immune reaction `primed` during the first round of therapy. |
by Tinh Le - SEASF, BDTP - The 19th of January this year marks the fortieth anniversary of the Chinese military intervention on the Paracel archipelago. Since 40 years, China occupied the whole archipelago.
However, following international law, Paracel archipelago is always under the sovereignty of Viet Nam. The Charter of the United Nations prohibits the acquisition of territory by force.
Viet Nam must always remind the world of this obvious breach of international law of China, always affirms its sovereignty on the archipelago, and urges Chinato accept the submission of the Paracel archipelago dispute to the arbitration of the International Court of Justice,the most appropriate organization to resolve territorial disputes between States.
Position of the Battle of the Paracel Islands (C) CIA
That is the content of the letter we send to the United Nations, with the strong belief that a world of peace and justice exists only when each country respects international law. |
President Trump tweeted Tuesday afternoon that he had been informed by U.S. intelligence that "the Chinese Government is moving troops to the Border with Hong Kong," adding, "Everyone should be calm and safe!"
Why it matters: There are fears of a crackdown from Beijing on the protestors, who clashed Tuesday with police while occupying Hong Kong's international airport. It had been publicly reported that Chinese armed police had massed in Shenzhen, a city near Hong Kong on the Chinese mainland. Trump has until now taken a hands-off approach to the escalating situation in Hong Kong, suggesting that President Xi Jinping should handle the "riots" as he sees fit.
Go deeper: Hong Kong airport in turmoil as protests prompt 2nd day of cancellations |
Q:
Avoid generating random integer in different functions
My function:
public int[] generateRandomInteger(){
int[] arr = new int[100];
Random randomGenerator = new Random();
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++){
int randomInt = randomGenerator.nextInt(16) + 10;
arr[i] = randomInt;
}
return arr;
}
The problem is: when I use arr in another function, it will generate a different array of 100 integer numbers. How can I avoid this problem ? I only want to use exactly the array that generate from the function above.
Any help would be appriciated !
A:
If you want to have arr variable to be common to all objects.Then use static variable.
static int[] arr = new int[100];
public void setRandomIntegerArray(){
Random randomGenerator = new Random();
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++){
int randomInt = randomGenerator.nextInt(16) + 10;
arr[i] = randomInt;
}
}
public int[] getRandomIntegerArray(){
return arr;
}
If you want to have arr variable to be separate for each object.Then use instance variable.
int[] arr = new int[100];
public void setRandomIntegerArray(){
Random randomGenerator = new Random();
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++){
int randomInt = randomGenerator.nextInt(16) + 10;
arr[i] = randomInt;
}
}
public int[] getRandomIntegerArray(){
return arr;
}
|
Law Seminars International Presents:
In conjunction with the Vancouver Wine Festival, the Second Annual Seminar on
Wine Law in British Columbia
Addressing new legal, regulatory and business developments
March 29, 2011
Metropolitan Hotel Vancouver in Vancouver, BC
Who Should Attend
Lawyers, vineyard operators, wine producers and distributors, government regulators involved with the production and distribution of wine, and anyone interested in the winery and wine distribution business
Why You Should Attend
Starting and maintaining a winery, a wine distribution business, or wine retail business is difficult enough, but compliance with the constantly changing licensing system and policies is a unique challenge. This conference will address the ins and outs of operating a business in this highly regulated sector, including changes in legislation and regulations in wine law and financing.
The program will progress from getting a handle on the economics of wine production in BC to addressing marketing and distribution issues, interprovincial shipping laws. host liability, wine clubs, tasting rules, labeling, and the use of social media as well as legislative trends and regulatory processes.
We will bring together experts from a variety of perspectives and disciplines to share their experiences, challenges and success stories regarding this evolving landscape.
Break: Soda, Tea and Conversation
3:15 pm
Starting and Running a Winery: Advice from the Frontline
Defining your product and brand, partnerships versus sole ownership,
sorting through the red tape, selecting and working with consultants,
the role of a contract; financing challenges; regulatory framework, resources, industry associations
Evaluations and Continue the Exchange of Ideas: Reception for Attendees and Faculty
Tuition
Regular tuition for in person or webcast attendance for this program is $595 USD with a group rate of $495 USD each for two or more registrants from the same firm. For government employees, we offer a special rate of $395. For students and people in their job for less than a year, our rate is $297.50 USD. All rates include admission to all seminar sessions, food and beverages at breaks, and all course materials. Make checks payable to Law Seminars International.
Cancellation & Substitution
You may substitute another person at any time. We will refund tuition, less a $50 cancellation fee, if we receive your cancellation by 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday, March 23, 2011. After that time, we will credit your tuition toward attendance at another program or the purchase of a Homestudy. There is a $25 cancellation fee for Course Materials orders and $50 for Homestudy orders.
Continuing Education Credits
This program qualifies for 6.5 BC CPD credits and 6.5 WA CLE. Upon request, we will apply for CLE credits in other states and other types of credits.
Location
The seminar will be at the Metropolitan Hotel Vanouver at 645 Howe Street in Vancouver, BC Canada. Call the Hotel at (604) 687-1122 for reservations at the special rate of $189/night and mention that you are attending a Law Seminars International seminar. Rooms are a first come, first served basis.
If You Cannot Attend
Our complete Homestudy Course, consisting of a DVD recording and the course materials (either a binder or searchable CD), is available for $605. The course materials alone are available for $100. We will ship your Homestudy order via UPS ground within two weeks after the seminar or from the date we receive payment.
Order Homestudy
Michael Bartier is a consulting winemaker who has worked in BC wineries in BC and has experience as a sales agent and winery general manager. He also has a winemaking consulting company, Bravo Analytical, and is launching his own wine brand in 2011.
Michael Bartier is a consulting winemaker who has worked in BC wineries in BC and has experience as a sales agent and winery general manager. He also has a winemaking consulting company, Bravo Analytical, and is launching his own wine brand in 2011.
Barry Bieller is Director of Policy, Planning and Communications at the BC Liquor Control and Licensing Branch, Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General.
Christine Coletta, Vice-President and Chairman of the Marketing and Communications Committee at the British Columbia Grapegrowers Association is a wine marketing specialist who established the VQA program.
Cynthia Enns and her husband David launched Laughing Stock Vineyards on the Naramata Bench in 2003. Prior to moving to the Okanagan, Cynthia worked in advertising for a Toronto ad agency and then as a marketing and research consultant in the investment industry in Vancouver.
David Enns is Owner and Winemaker at Laughing Stock Vineyards, a small production winery in the Okanagan Valley.
Wendy Johnston, a banker, along with her husband, physician-turns-winemaker, Andy Johnston, established Averill Creek Vineyard on Vancouver Island. Here they handcraft wines from their 50-acre estate vineyard set on the south slope of Mt. Prevost overlooking the Cowichan Valley. She plays a pivotal role at the winery - where she puts her knowledge of the financial world to use.
Judith Macfarlane, partner, Bull Housser & Tupper LLP, represents employers in both the public and private sectors, and advises them on workplace policies and practices, collective agreement interpretation, and other labour and employment matters.
Sandra Oldfield is Winemaker and Owner at Tinhorn Creek Vineyards, the first winery in Canada to bottle its entire portfolio with Stelvin screw-cap closures.
Jonathan Tweedale, Gudmundseth Mickelson LLP, practices as a trial lawyer specializing in complex litigation and tribunal work. He has appeared at all levels of the British Columbia courts. Previously, he practiced at Shearman & Sterling LLP in their derivatives group.
Josephine Tyabji is Chairman at the BC Wine Institute and National Business Operations Strategist at Vincor Canada, the largest producer and marketer of wine and related products in Canada and a division of the world's largest wine company, Constellation Brands. |
Q:
D3 time string convert to date
I'm new to D3.
I have a string stored in a var, below is the var.
var expense = {"name":"jim","amount":34,"date":"11/12/2015"};
and I want to only show the year of the date.
var parser = d3.timeParse("%Y");
expense.date = parser(expense.date);
console.log(expense);
but I am just getting null for the date. Anyone know how to fix this? I should get the result:
{name: "jim", amount: 34, date: 2015 }
A:
If you want to use d3 date tools, first you have the parse your string to date format
const tParser = d3.timeParse("%d/%m/%Y")
then use on your string
const date = tParser(expense.date)
then use d3.timeFormat("%Y")
const year = d3.timeFormat("%Y")(date)
Or much simpler just split your string as rioV8 commented
expense.date = +expense.date.split('/')[2]
Thought it could be useful to know how to use d3 time format works, more info
|
---
author:
- |
Benoît Blossier\
Laboratoire de Physique Théorique (Bât. 210), Université Paris Sud, Centre d’Orsay, 91405 Orsay-Cedex, France
- |
\
Laboratoire de Physique Théorique (Bât. 210), Université Paris Sud, Centre d’Orsay, 91405 Orsay-Cedex, France\
E-mail:
- |
John Bulava\
School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland
- |
Michael Donnellan\
DESY, Platanenallee 6, D-15738 Zeuthen, Germany
title: 'On the $B^{*''}\to B$ transition'
---
Introduction
============
When comparing experimental data with theoretical predictions on hadronic transitions, it is important to control the contribution of excited states. For example, light-cone sum rule determination for $g_{D^{*}D\pi}$ coupling failed to reproduce the experimental data unless one explicitly includes a negative contribution from the first radial excited state $D^{(*)'}$ state on the hadronic side of the sum rule [@BecirevicVP].
The Generalized Eigenvalue Problem is a very efficient tool to deal with excited states on the lattice and can now be used with three-point correlation functions to extract matrix elements. We present a first estimate of the $g_{B^{*'}B\pi}$ coupling in the static limit of the Heavy Quark Effective Theory [@Eichten:1987xu]. Since the $B$ and $D$ mesons are degenerate in this limit, our result $g_{12} = -0.17(3)(2)_{\chi}$ is a first hint of the previous claim, the first error is statistical and the second originates from the chiral extrapolation. A more extensive discussion of the results will be found in the published paper [@Blossier:2013qma].
The $g_{B^{*'}B\pi}$ coupling
=============================
The $g_{B^{*'}B\pi}$ coupling is defined by the following on-shell matrix element : $$\big\langle B^{0}(p) \pi^{+}(q) | B^{*'+}(p',\epsilon^{(\lambda)}) \big\rangle = - g_{B^{*'}B\pi}(q^2) \times q_{\mu} \epsilon^{(\lambda) \mu}(p') \ .$$ Performing an LSZ reduction of the pion field and using PCAC relation, we are left with the following matrix element parametrized by three form factors : $$\begin{aligned}
\big\langle B^{*'+}(p',\epsilon^{(\lambda)}) | \mathcal{A}_{\mu} | B^{0}(p) \big\rangle &= 2m_{B^{*'}} A_0(q^2) \frac{\epsilon^{(\lambda)}\cdot q}{q^2}q^{\mu} + (m_B + m_{B^{*'}}) A_1(q^2) \left( \epsilon^{(\lambda) \mu} - \frac{\epsilon^{(\lambda)}\cdot q}{q^2} q^{\mu} \right) \\
& + A_2(q^2) \frac{\epsilon^{(\lambda)}\cdot q}{m_B+m_{B^{*'}}} \left[ (p_B+p_{B^{*'}})^{\mu} + \frac{m_B^2-m_{B^{*'}}^2}{q^2}q^{\mu} \right] \ .\end{aligned}$$ where $\mathcal{A}_{\mu}$ is the axial vector bilinear of light quarks and $B^{*'}$ is polarized in the $i$th direction. In the Heavy Meson Chiral Perturbation Theory (HM$\chi$PT) at leading order (static and chiral limit) and using the normalization of states $\langle B(\vec{p}) | B(\vec{p}) \rangle_{\mathrm{HQET}} = 1$, we just need to calculate $A_1(q^2_{\mathrm{max}})$ in the zero recoil kinematic configuration where $\vec{p}=\vec{p}'=\vec{0}$ and $q^2_{\mathrm{max}}=(m_{B^{*'}}-m_B)^2$. Choosing the quantization axis along the $z$ direction and the polarization vector $\epsilon^{(\lambda)}= (0,0,0,1)$ with the metric $(+,-,-,-)$, we define $$g_{12} = \langle B^{*'}(\epsilon^{(\lambda)}) | \mathcal{A}_3 | B \rangle_{\mathrm{HQET}} \ \ \ , \ \ \ g_{12} = \frac{g_{B^{*'}B\pi}}{2\sqrt{m_B m_{B^{*'}}}} f_{\pi}$$
Extracting the coupling from correlation functions
==================================================
We have to consider the following two-point correlation functions : $$C^{(2)}_{{{\mathcal{P}}}}(t) = \bigl\langle \ \sum_{\vec{y},\vec{x}} {{\mathcal{P}}}(y) {{\mathcal{P}}}^{\dag}(x) \ \big\rangle \big|_{y_0=x_0+t} \ \ \ ,\ \ \ C^{(2)}_{{{\mathcal{V}}}}(t) = \frac{1}{3} \sum_{i=1}^3 \bigl\langle \ \sum_{\vec{y},\vec{x}} {{\mathcal{V}}}_i(y) {{\mathcal{V}}}_i^{\dag}(x) \ \bigl\rangle \big|_{y_0=x_0+t}$$ where ${{\mathcal{P}}}(x) = \sum_{y} \overline{h}(x) \gamma_5 \phi(x,y) \psi_l(y)$ and ${{\mathcal{V}}}_i(x) = \sum_{y} \overline{h}(x) \gamma_i \phi(x,y) \psi_l(y)$ are respectively the heavy-light pseudoscalar and vector currents. But, due to the Heavy Quark Symmetry, they are equal and only one two-point correlation function has to be computed. We also need the following three-point correlation function : $$C_{ij}^{(3)}(t_z-t_x,t_y-t_x) = \big\langle \ \sum_{\vec{z},\vec{y},\vec{x}} {{\mathcal{V}}}_3^{(i)}(z) \ {{\mathcal{A}}}_{3}(y) \ {{\mathcal{P}}}^{(j) \dag}(x) \ \big\rangle \big|_{t_x<t_y<t_z}$$ where ${{\mathcal{A}}}_{\mu}= Z_{{{\mathcal{A}}}} \times \overline{\psi}_l(x) \gamma_{\mu}\gamma_5\psi_l(x)$ is the renormalized light-light axial current.\
To deal with excited states, we have to solve generalized eigenvalue problems (GEVP) [@MichaelNE]-[@BlossierKD]. Since in the static limit of HQET pseudoscalar and vector meson are degenerate, we can actually solve just one GEVP : $$C^{(2)}(t) v_n(t,t_0) = \lambda_n(t,t_0) C^{(2)}(t_0) v_n(t,t_0)$$ where $C^{(2)}_{ij} = \langle \mathcal{O}_i(t) \mathcal{O}_j^{\dag}(0) \rangle$ is a $N\times N$ correlation matrix and $\mathcal{O}_i$ are interpolating fields with the correct quantum numbers. The sign of the eigenvectors is fixed by imposing the positivity of the decay constant $f_{B_n} = \langle B_n | \mathcal{O}_L | 0 \rangle$ where $\mathcal{O}_L$ refers to the local interpolating field. Then, we can construct ratios which tend toward the correct matrix element $g_{nm} = \langle B_n | A_3 | B^{*}_m \rangle$ at large time. We used two different methods, respectively called GEVP and sGEVP [@BulavaYZ] : $$R^{\mathrm{GEVP}}_{mn}(t_2,t_1) = \frac{ \langle v_m(t_2,t_2-1) | C^{(3)}(t_1+t_2,t_1) | v_n(t_1,t_1-1) \rangle {\lambda_n(t_1+1,t_1)^{-t_1/2} {\lambda_m(t_2+1,t_2)^{-t_2/2}} }}{Ê \left(v_n(t_1,t_1-1),C^{(2)}(t_1)v_n(t_1,t_1-1)\right)^{1/2} \left(v_m(t_2,t_2-1),C^{(2)}(t_2)v_m(t_2,t_2-1)\right)^{1/2} }$$ $$R^{\mathrm{sGEVP}}_{mn}(t,t_0) = -\partial_t \left( \frac{\left(v_m(t,t_0), \left[ K(t,t_0)/\lambda_n(t,t_0) - K(t_0,t_0) \right] v_n(t,t_0) \right)}{ \left(v_n(t,t_0),C(t_0)v_n(t,t_0)\right)^{1/2} \left(v_m(t,t_0),C(t_0)v_m(t,t_0)\right)^{1/2} } e^{\Sigma(t_0,t_0) t_0/2} \right)$$ with $$K_{ij}(t,t_0) = \sum_{t_1} e^{-(t-t_1)\Sigma(t,t_0)} C_{ij}^{(3)}(t,t_1) \ \ \ ,\ \ \ \Sigma(t,t_0) = E_n(t,t_0)-E_m(t,t_0)$$ where $(a,b)=\sum_i a_i b_i$. These ratios converge quickly to the desired coupling constant as the contribution of higher excited states are strongly suppressed [@BulavaYZ] [@Blossier:2013qma]: $$\begin{aligned}
R_{mn}^{\mathrm{GEVP}} &\xrightarrow{t_1\gg 1, t_2\gg 1} g_{nm} + \mathcal{O}\left( e^{-\Delta_{N+1,m}t_1} , e^{-\Delta_{N+1,n}t_2} \right) \\[2mm]
R_{mn}^{\mathrm{sGEVP}} &\xrightarrow[\ \ t_0=t-1 \ \ ]{t\gg 1} g_{nm} + \mathcal{O}\left( t e^{-\Delta_{N+1,n}t} \right) \ \ \ n<m\\
&\xrightarrow[\ \ t_0=t-1 \ \ ]{t\gg 1} g_{nm} + \mathcal{O}\left( e^{-\Delta_{N+1,m}t} \right) \ \ \ n>m\end{aligned}$$ where $\Delta_{N+1,m} = E_{N+1} - E_m$ and $N$ is the size of the GEVP. In the following, we choose $t_1=t_2$. Since $t=t_1+t_2$, we expect a faster suppression of higher excited states in the case of the sGEVP.
Lattice setup
=============
To perform our lattice computation, we used $N_f=2$ gauge configurations from CLS ensembles with different pion masses ($310~{{\rm MeV}}\leq m_{\pi} \leq 440~{{\rm MeV}}$) and three lattice spacings ($0.05~{{\rm fm}}\lesssim a \lesssim 0.08~{{\rm fm}}$). The details of the configurations analyzed in this work are listed in table \[lattice\_setup\]. These simulations use non-perturbatively $\mathcal{O}(a)$-improved Wilson quarks and the HYP2 discretization for the static quark action [@HasenfratzHP] [@DellaMorteYC]. Correlation functions are estimated using all-to-all light quark propagators with full time dilution [@FoleyAC].
CLS label $\beta$ $L^3\times T$ $\kappa$ a \[fm\] $m_\pi$ \[MeV\] \#
----------- --------- ------------------ ---------- ---------- ----------------- -----
A5 5.2 $32^3\times 64$ 0.13594 0.075 330 500
E5 5.3 $32^3\times 64$ 0.13625 0.065 440 500
F6 $48^3 \times 96$ 0.13635 310 600
N6 5.5 $48^3 \times 96$ 0.13667 0.048 340 400
: Parameters of the simulations.[]{data-label="lattice_setup"}
We used $N=4$ interpolating fields of the Gaussian smeared-form $\mathcal{O}^{(i)} = \overline{h} \gamma_5 (1+\kappa_G a^2 \Delta )^{R_i} \psi_l$ [@GuskenAD] where $\kappa_G=0.1$, $r_i=2a\sqrt{\kappa_G R_i} \leq 0.6~{{\rm fm}}$ and $\Delta$ is a gauge covariant Laplacian made of three times APE-blocked links [@AlbaneseDS]. The axial current renormalisation constant $Z_{{{\mathcal{A}}}}$ was determined non perturbatively by the ALPHA collaboration in [@DellaMorteXB], [@FritzschWQ] and the scale was set through the kaon decay constant [@Fritzsch:2012wq]. Statistical errors are estimated from a jackknife procedure.
Results
=======
To check the stability of our results, we have solved both $3\times3$ and $4\times4$ GEVP and tested different combinations of interpolating fields, results are shown in Figure \[GEVP\_stability\].
![Dependence of bare $g_{12}$ on the size of the GEVP (left) and on the radius of wave functions (right) for the CLS ensemble E5.[]{data-label="GEVP_stability"}](g3344.pdf "fig:"){width="7cm" height="5cm"} ![Dependence of bare $g_{12}$ on the size of the GEVP (left) and on the radius of wave functions (right) for the CLS ensemble E5.[]{data-label="GEVP_stability"}](ginterpfields.pdf "fig:"){width="7cm" height="5cm"}
Moreover, as shown in figure \[gevp\_vs\_sgevp\] both GEVP and sGEVP results are consistent, but with a better behavior at large time in the case of the sGEVP. Therefore, the value of the coupling for each ensemble in Table \[res\_g\] and in the following, corresponds to the sGEVP only. Inspired by Heavy Meson Chiral Perturbation Theory [@Casalbuoni:1996pg] [@Burdman:1992gh] and due to the fact that our action and correlations functions are $\mathcal{O}(a)$ improved, we tried two fit formulae for the extrapolation to the physical point : $$\begin{aligned}
g_{12}&=C_0 + a^2 C_1\,, \label{fit1} \\
g_{12}&=C'_0 + a^2 C'_1 + m^2_\pi C'_2\,. \label{fit2}\end{aligned}$$
![Plateaus of bare $g_{12}$ extracted by GEVP (left) and sGEVP (right) for the CLS ensemble E5.[]{data-label="gevp_vs_sgevp"}](g12GEVP.pdf "fig:"){width="7cm" height="5cm"} ![Plateaus of bare $g_{12}$ extracted by GEVP (left) and sGEVP (right) for the CLS ensemble E5.[]{data-label="gevp_vs_sgevp"}](g12sGEVP.pdf "fig:"){width="7cm" height="5cm"}
We show in Figure \[g12\_extrapolaltion\] the continuum and chiral extrapolations. Since the two fits are consistent, we used the result (\[fit2\]) as central value and obtain : $$g_{12} = -0.17(3)(2)_{\chi}$$ where the first error is statistical and the second originates from the chiral extrapolation and is estimated as the discrepancy between (\[fit1\]) and (\[fit2\]). Fit parameters are collected in Table \[res\_g\].
![Continuum and chiral extrapolation of $g_{12}$.[]{data-label="g12_extrapolaltion"}](g12extrcont.pdf){width="7cm" height="6cm"}
Finally, we have to check that we are safe from multi-hadron thresholds due to the emission of pions. The P-wave decay $B^{*'} \rightarrow B^{*}(\vec{p}) \pi(-\vec{p})$ is kinematically forbidden since $L < 3~{{\rm fm}}$. The second, potentially dangerous, decay is the S-wave decay $B^{*'} \rightarrow B_1^{*} \pi$. But, examining our lattice results for $\Sigma_{12}$, listed in Table \[res\_g\], we have $230~\mathrm{MeV} \leq m_{B^{*'}} - m_B - m_{\pi} \leq 360~\mathrm{MeV}$. Then using recent lattice results [@Michael:2010aa] with similar lattice spacings : $400~\mathrm{MeV} \leq m_{B_1^{*}} - m_B \leq 500~\mathrm{MeV}$, we can conclude that this decay is also forbidden. Finally, as a byproduct of our calculation, we also obtain $g_{11}=0.52(2)$, in excellent agreement with a computation by the ALPHA collaboration focused on that quantity [@BulavaEJ], and $g_{22}=0.38(4)$. The continuum and chiral extrapolations for these quantities are shown in Figure \[g11\_g22\] while the value of these coupling for each ensemble are listed in Table \[res\_g\].
$a\Sigma_{12}$ $g_{12}$ $g_{11}$ $g_{12}$
---- ---------------- ------------ ---------- -----------
A5 0.255(8) -0.245(29) 0.541(5) 0.492(19)
E5 0.222(8) -0.186(8) 0.535(8) 0.455(10)
F6 0.216(12) -0.207(15) 0.528(4) 0.474(26)
N6 0.173(7) -0.181(12) 0.532(6) 0.434(23)
: Value of the mass splitting $s\Sigma_{12}$ in lattice units and $g_{12}$ for the different ensembles (left) and fit parameters of eq. (\[fit1\]) and (\[fit2\]) (right).[]{data-label="res_g"}
fit (\[fit1\]) fit (\[fit2\])
--------- ---------------- ----------------
$C_{0}$ -0.178(29) -0.155(26)
$C_{1}$ -14.6(7.3) -9.2(6.6)
$C_{2}$ 0.29(16) -
: Value of the mass splitting $s\Sigma_{12}$ in lattice units and $g_{12}$ for the different ensembles (left) and fit parameters of eq. (\[fit1\]) and (\[fit2\]) (right).[]{data-label="res_g"}
![Extrapolation to the continuum and chiral limit of $g_{11}$ and $g_{22}$[]{data-label="g11_g22"}](g11extrcont.pdf "fig:"){width="7cm" height="5cm"} ![Extrapolation to the continuum and chiral limit of $g_{11}$ and $g_{22}$[]{data-label="g11_g22"}](g22extrcont.pdf "fig:"){width="7cm" height="5cm"}
Conclusion
==========
We have performed a first estimate of the axial form factor $A_1(q^2_{\mathrm{max}})=g_{12}$ parametrizing the decay $B^{*'}\rightarrow B$ at zero recoil and in the static limit of HQET from $N_f = 2$ lattice simulations. We have obtained a negative value for this form factor. It is almost three times smaller than the $g_{11}$ coupling, but not compatible with zero : $g_{12}=-0.17(4)$ while $g_{11}=0.52(2)$. Moreover we find $g_{22} = 0.38(4)$, which is not strongly suppressed with respect to $g_{11}$. Our work is a first hint of confirmation of the statement made in [@BecirevicVP] to explain the small value of $g_{D^{*}D\pi}$ computed analytically when compared to experiment.
Acknowledgements {#acknowledgements .unnumbered}
================
This work was granted access to the HPC resources of CINES under the allocations 2012-056808 and 2013-056808 made by GENCI
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|
Saturday, April 15, 2017
Don’t Call It a Comeback: Stephen King Is About to Be Everywhere Again
The Fiscal Times
By Josh Herr
March 31, 2017
Stephen King has been a constant figure in pop culture
for the better part of five decades. From his 1976 debut novel, Carrie, and its
subsequent classic horror film through the recent Hulu time-travel drama
11/22/63, King has been a seemingly constant presence at the bookstand, in the
multiplex and on television. The period from 1983 to 2001 saw multiple
adaptations of his work appear on screen every single year.
That pace has since slowed — the past decade has seen
only five films, including a largely unnecessary remake of Carrie — but two new
adaptations are now approaching theatrical release, and even if you can’t quite
call it a comeback, the author is clearly enjoying another cultural moment. As
the reins of entertainment industry production have shifted from the boomers
who enjoyed King’s work as trashy airport reads to the Xers and older
Millennials who snuck those novels out of their parent’s bookshelves, the
author’s work and influence (lookin’ at you, Stranger Things) are everywhere,
or will be soon.
The adaptation of cult classic The Dark Tower, perhaps
King’s strangest work — an amalgam of Spaghetti Western and Tolkien-esque
fantasy — will arrive this July starring Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey.
Then a second pass at It (following an early ‘90s television miniseries which
mostly missed, other than Tim Curry’s chilling turn as Pennywise) is scheduled
for September, just in time for Halloween costumes. The mammoth novel (it’s
1,000 of the most engaging pages you will ever read, followed by a coke-fueled
disaster of an ending) is being split into two films, one for each of the time
periods in which the story takes place. Fans are desperately hoping for a film
that fixes both the miniseries and the author’s own missteps. The trailer is
certainly promising:
This time, though, King’s popular presence comes with a
healthy dose of the critical respect that had eluded the author for much of his
early career. The sentiment surrounding the two new movies is less, “Meh,
another Stephen King movie” and more legitimate excitement and curiosity about
a how a new generation will handle these works, striped of ‘80s horror
conventions and literary snobbery.
It’s worth asking why it took so long for King to get
such respect in the first place. Audiences sure love his work. He is No. 20 on
the list of bestselling authors of all time, generating over $350 million in
sales. (Agatha Christie is No. 1, if you’re curious). No other living author
has more adaptations on the AFI 100 Greatest Films list. Movies based on his
works have pulled in over a billion dollars in box office. Chances are, you
know what King looks like, too…and how many authors can you say that about?
That commercial success was actually part of the problem,
at least in the eyes of some critics — along with the facts that King is still
alive (and long may that continue; he will be 70 in September) and has always
been ridiculously prolific. And when I say ridiculously prolific, I mean
ridiculously, absurdly prolific. So far, King has written 56 published novels,
11 short story collections and five works of nonfiction. This bibliography is
in addition to various screenplays, television episodes and magazine articles.
He even wrote a musical with John Mellencamp and T-Bone Burnett (no, really).
His IMDB page has 232 writer credits. To be fair, that number is inflated a bit
by his “Dollar Baby” program, in which he allowed film students to adapt one of
his short stories for the low price of $1.
The multiple films, in particular, have undermined King’s
critical legacy as an author. While some of them are bona fide classics of
cinema, many of them are very, very bad. Even if you remove the student films,
the lackluster slogs (Christine, Silver Bullet) and out-and-out dumpster fires
(The Lawnmower Man or Maximum Overdrive, which King himself famously directed)
outweigh the quality. King was, for many years, considered a talented conveyor
of entertaining crap.
The simple passage of time has allowed the gems in King’s
oeuvre to stand out, while the dreck recedes into the distance. What endures
from his filmography are several masterpieces of horror (the original Carrie
and The Shinning, regardless of the author’s own opinion of it), suspense
(Misery), perhaps the greatest nostalgia film of all time (Stand By Me) and one
of the most beloved films of all time in any genre (The Shawshank Redemption —
though, seriously, IMDBers, it’s not better than The Godfather).
Those last two King films illustrate why, over time, he
has become such a cultural touchstone to those who read him as teens. Though he
is often caricatured as purveyor of nightmares, those who’ve actually read his
novels will recognize that far more time is spent on the depiction of small
town life, the comradery of (usually male) pre-teens and the efforts to repair
broken families than on vampires, ghosts and killer dogs. Viewers who saw King
reflected in Stranger Things were likely responding to the relationships
between its fifth-grade protagonists more than the creepiness of The Upside
Down. In fact, while King had two television minseries in the past two years
(11/22/63 and Under the Dome), it is the Netflix series and FX’s Legion (in
which the main character frequently flashes back to a King-esque childhood,
equal parts wonder and dread), where his name is most often cited.
Arguably, King has become as big of a touchstone for
modern storytelling as Steven Spielberg (the two men are the same age. It also
helps that the author has emerged as a bit of an elder statesmen in recent
years. Following a near fatal and life-changing auto accident in 1999 (King was
a pedestrian), he reemerged a changed man. He openly discussed his earlier challenges
with drug and alcohol addiction. He became actively involved in a variety of
Maine charities, and national ones. He has been an outspoken proponent of
liberal politics, and a shockingly engaging and entertaining figure on Twitter.
King’s legacy may never be appropriately appreciated in
his lifetime, but it’s encouraging to see the re-evaluation is already under
way.
About Me
Born in Toledo, Ohio in 1946 I have a BA degree in American History from Cal St. Northridge. I've been researching the American West and western films since the early 1980s and visiting filming sites in Spain and the U.S.A. Elected a member of the Spaghetti Western Hall of Fame 2010. |
[unreadable] [unreadable] The cancer preventive modality under study is a vaccine designed to elicit circulating antibodies that selectively target and neutralize insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) in the body. The underlying rationale is that many cancers will be far less likely to arise, develop, spread or recur in the absence of the stimulatory signals provided by this potent growth factor. IGF-1 is a small polypeptide hormone that plays a significant role in carcinogenesis due to its powerful mitogenic, hypertrophic and anti-apoptotic activities. In fact, many cancers over express the IGF-1 receptor which mediates its intracellular proliferative signaling. Moreover, epidemiological studies have linked high IGF-1 levels in the blood to several cancers including colorectal, prostate, uterine, bladder, ovarian and breast cancer. The Physicians' Health Study, for example, has indicated a strong association between circulating IGF-1 levels and the subsequent occurrence of prostate cancer. While IGF-1 is essential throughout embryogenesis and for spurts of statural growth during childhood, its necessity in adult life is much less compelling. Low levels of circulating IGF-I retard the progression and metastatic potential of a number of cancers. I have therefore developed a simple and safe vaccination procedure for inducing specific anti-IGF-1 antibodies. Those endogenous antibodies circulate in the blood and constitute a continuously present therapeutic for suppressing the stimulatory activity of IGF-1 in the body. The antibody-sequestered IGF-1 will be trapped in the blood stream and rendered incapable for interaction with receptors on cancer cells. To circumvent safety issues, vaccination would be initiated in early adult life when IGF-1 is no longer needed for growth and vital functions. Indeed, this immunotherapy and its beneficial effect could be maintained indefinitely via periodic booster injections. Thus, by continuously neutralizing the proliferation and survival benefits that IGF-1 provides to cancer cells, this IGF-1 vaccine approach would provide long-term prevention of cancer initiation, progression and recurrence. The cancer preventive action of these vaccines will be tested in several spontaneous tumor mouse strains. [unreadable] [unreadable] [unreadable] |
Introduction {#sec1-1}
============
Leishmaniasis is an important public health problem in 98 endemic countries, with more than 350 million people at risk (Reveiz et al., 2013; World Health, 2010). Leishmaniasis has traditionally been classified into three major forms based on clinical symptoms (Handman, 2001). The deadliest form is visceral leishmaniasis (VL), which, if left untreated, leads to death. A number of other species of *Leishmania* cause cutaneous (CL) and mucocutaneous (MCL) leishmaniasis, which, if not fatal, are still responsible for the considerable morbidity of a large number of people in endemic foci (Prasad, 1999). The WHO estimated an incidence of 2 million new cases per year (0.5 million of VL and l.5 million of CL (World Health, 2010). Pentavalent antimony, which was discovered nearly one hundred years ago, continues to be the first line of treatment against leishmaniasis. However, toxic side effects, the long hospitalization required for parenteral administration, and the emergence of drug resistance are obstacles in antimony therapy (Chakravarty and Sundar, 2010). In recent years, an unprecedented increase in the unresponsiveness to sodium antimony gluconate, the first line of treatment, has necessitated the use of other toxic drugs, such as amphotericin B, pentamidine, paromomycin, and allopurinol (Chakravarty and Sundar, 2010; Mishra et al., 2007). In the ongoing search for better leishmanicidal compounds, many candidates have been evaluated (Akendengue et al., 1999; Kayser et al., 2003). We focused on studying the biological and phytochemical properties of plants used in traditional Mexican medicine, such as *Bursera aptera* Ramirez, which is endemic to Mexico and has a wide distribution (Guerrero, Morelos, Oaxaca, Puebla,) (Rzedowski, 2005).
Recently, our team found that *B. aptera* has antibacterial, antifungal and antiprotozoal activities (Rodriguez-Canales, 2014; Rodriguez-Lopez, 2014) and may possess antileishmanial activity. Among the various mechanisms for mediating parasiticidal activity, programmed cell death (PCD) appears to be the most appropriate because this is the most studied mechanism in kinetoplastids in response to various stimuli chemotherapeutic agents (Szallies et al., 2002). Therefore, the aim of this work was to evaluate the antileishmanial activity of the methanolic extract of *B. aptera* and to characterize the mechanism of cell death observed.
Methods {#sec1-2}
=======
Plant material {#sec2-1}
--------------
*B. aptera* was collected in October 2013 in San Rafael, Coxcatlan, Puebla. A voucher specimen was deposited at the Izta Herbarium at Facultad de Estudios Superiores Iztacala (IZTA HCM46), and the botanical authentication of the specimen was performed by M. D. Maria Edith Lopez Villafranco (curator at the IZTA Herbarium).
Preparation of methanolic extract from *B. aptera* (MEBA) {#sec2-2}
---------------------------------------------------------
The bark extract was obtained by maceration. *B. aptera* bark (2.516 kg) was placed in a flask with methanol and exhaustive extraction was performed. The extract was filtered and then distilled under reduced pressure in a rotary evaporator. The extract was placed in glass containers until the evaporation of the solvent was complete (Domínguez, 1973).
Parasite culture and maintenance {#sec2-3}
--------------------------------
*L. mexicana* infection (MNYC/BZ/62/M379) was maintained by passage in BALB/c mice. Amastigotes were isolated, differentiated to promastigotes and maintained in Schneider's medium, pH 7.4, supplemented with gentamicin (GIBCO) (100 mg/mL) and 10 % heat-inactivated foetal bovine serum (FBS).
Animals {#sec2-4}
-------
In the present study, female BALB/c mice (6-8 weeks of age) were used. The mice used throughout this study were maintained in controlled environmental conditions and light-dark cycles (12:12 h) in filter-topped cages, provided with sterile food and water ad libitum and cared for according to the guidelines of the Federal Regulations for Animal Experimentation and Care (NOM-062-ZOO-1999, Ministry of Agriculture, Mexico), which were approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee of the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico -Facultad de Estudios Superiores Iztacala.
Evaluation of the anti-promastigote potential of MEBA {#sec2-5}
-----------------------------------------------------
To evaluate MEBA's effects on the promastigotes of *L. mexicana*, colorimetric cell viability MTT assay was used as described elsewhere (Dutta et al., 2005). Briefly, promastigotes (2.5×10^4^/100 μL/well) harvested from the logarithmic growth phase were added to a tissue culture plate. Then, 100 μL of various concentrations of MEBA, sodium stibogluconate (Stb) (Albert David Limited) (4-0.01 mg/mL) and amphotericin B (AmpB) (Sigma) (60-0.29 μg/mL) was added to each well and incubated at 25°C for 48 h. After incubation, 50 μL of MTT solution (2 mg/mL) was added to each well and incubated at 37°C for 4 h. Then, the plates were centrifuged (2000 rpm×5 min, 25°C). The supernatant was removed, and cold DMSO (200 μL) was added as a solvent for the formazan crystals to produce a purple colour. The absorbance was measured for each well at 492 nm using a Multiskan Spectrum Microplate reader (Thermo Scientific). All experiments were carried out in triplicate. The 50 % lethal concentrations (LC~50~ values) were determined by graphical extrapolation.
Externalized phosphatidylserine in *L. mexicana* promastigotes {#sec2-6}
--------------------------------------------------------------
The 2×10^6^ exponential-phase *L. mexicana* promastigotes were incubated with MEBA (0.408 mg/mL, 1 h). After being pipetted gently, the cells were centrifuged for 5 min at 2500 rpm. The supernatant was removed, and cells were stained with Annexin V-FITC and propidium iodide (PI) according to the manufacturer's instructions (Molecular Probes). If the membrane integrity was altered (due to the externalization of phosphatidylserine), annexin V detected both early-and late-apoptotic cells. Therefore, the simultaneous addition of PI, which does not enter healthy cells with an intact plasma membrane, discriminates between early-apoptotic (annexin V-positive and PI-negative), late-apoptotic (both annexin V and PI-positive), necrotic (PI-positive) and live (both annexin V and PI-negative) cells (Kaur et al., 2009). Untreated promastigotes were used as controls for double staining. Data acquisition was performed on a FACS Calibur flow cytometer (BD) and analyzed using the WinMDI 2.9 software. For each measurement, at least 50,000 cells were counted. Statistical analysis was carried out on an Apple Macintosh computer using Prism 6 (GraphPad Software, San Diego, CA, USA). The significance of differences was determined with the unpaired *t* test (two-tailed) with Welch's correction, and coefficients of correlation were calculated by Spearman's rank-correlation analysis. *P* \< 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Measurement of Mitochondrial Membrane Potential {#sec2-7}
-----------------------------------------------
JC-1 is a cationic, positively charged fluorescent dye that exhibits potential-dependent accumulation in mitochondria, as indicated by a fluorescence emission shift from green (525 nm) to red (590 nm). Consequently, mitochondrial depolarization is indicated by a decrease in the red/green fluorescence intensity ratio (Raju et al., 2013). The assay was performed following the manufacturer's instructions (Molecular Probes). Promastigotes were treated for 1 h with MEBA (0.408 mg/mL) after the cells were collected and incubated for 10 min with 10 μM of JC-1 dye in 1 mL PBS at 37°C. Cells were immediately analyzed by a flow cytometer (FACS Calibur and WinMDI 2.9 software) and were gated using the appropriate settings in FL1 (green) and FL2 (red) channels. As a positive control, cells were treated with the mitochondrial membrane disrupter CCCP (carbonyl cyanide 3-chlorophenylhydrazone) (50 mM) for 5 min at 37°C. For each treatment condition, at least 50,000 cells were counted and statistically analyzed.
*In vivo* anti-leishmanial effect on experimental cutaneous leishmaniasis {#sec2-8}
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Activity of MEBA on lesion size*. BALB/c mice received subcutaneous injections in the back rump with 5 × 10^6^ stationary-phase *L. mexicana* promastigotes and were randomly divided into three groups of six mice each. The groups were as follows: 1, untreated; 2, treated with MEBA (200 dissolved in a surgical gel at a concentration of 0.408 mg/mL; and 3, treated with 200 μL of surgical gel without MEBA (vehicle). The development of the lesion wa s monitored and measured with a digital caliper (Mitutoyo, Kanagawa, Japan) weekly during the course of infection (8 weeks). The significance of differences was determined with multiple *t* tests (one per row). *P* \< 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
*Parasite burden by limiting dilution assay*. At the eighth week after infection, the animals in each group were killed by cervical dislocation to assess the parasite number in each lesion using the culture microtitration method. Forty-eight days' post-infection mice from each group were picked randomly to assess the parasite number in each lesion. Parasite numbers in the lesions were determined by limiting dilution assay, as described previously (Wong et al., 2014). Under sterile conditions, the lesion-bearing back rump was removed, cut into small pieces, and re-suspended in supplemented Schneider's medium. The area of injury was homogenized in a glass homogenizer. The cell suspensions were serially diluted in 10-fold dilutions (from 1:10 to 1:1 × 10) in a 96-well flat-bottomed tissue culture plate in triplicate. The plate was incubated at 27°C for 48 h and then examined under an inverted microscope to determine the presence or absence of mobile promastigotes. The final titer was defined as the last dilution at which at least one well contained no parasite and was expressed as log parasite titers ± SD. Statistical analysis was carried out using Prism 6. The significance of differences was determined with unpaired *t* tests (two-tailed) with Welch's correction, and *P* \< 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Determination of cytokine levels in serum from mice infected with L. mexicana {#sec2-9}
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The serum of infected mice with *L. mexicana* treated and not treated with MEBA were obtained at days 0, 15, 30, 45 and 60 after infection. The levels of IFN-γ, TNF-α, IL-4 and IL-10 in serum were determined by sandwich ELISA according to the manufacturer's instructions (PEPROTECH). Briefly, 96-well flat-bottom plates (Nunc, Thermo Scientific) were coated with primary capture antibody for 2 hours at room temperature. Then, plates were washed with PBS-Tween (0.05 % Tween 20 in PBS, pH 7.4) and blocking buffer (1 % BSA in PBS) was for 2 hours at room temperature. The plates were then incubated with 50 μL of serum (in triplicate) or serially diluted recombinant cytokine (in duplicate) for 2 hours at room temperature. The plates were washed and incubated with biotinylated detection antibody against specific cytokines for 2 hours at room temperature and were then washed and incubated with avidin-HRP conjugate for 30 minutes at room temperature in the dark. Finally, plates were washed before the addition of ABTS. Absorbance was read at 405 nm using a Bio-Tek EL800 plate reader (Bio-Tek), and the cytokine levels were quantified against a standard curve.
Antioxidant Activity (DPPH decolouration assay) {#sec2-10}
-----------------------------------------------
The antioxidant activity was determined according to the method described by (Okusa et al., 2007). Ninety-six-well ELISA plates were filled with extract concentrations ranging from 1-100 μg/mL. HPLC-grade methanol served as a blank sample, and a 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) solution (100 μM) served as a control. The plates were incubated for 30 min at 37°C, and the absorbance values were determined at 540 nm with an ELISA plate reader. The antioxidant activity value was resolved according to the following equation: % inhibition = \[(absorbance of control-absorbance of sample)/ absorbance of control\] \*100. The concentration leading to a scavenging activity 50 % (SC~50~) was determined graphically. Quercetin was used as a standard (positive control).
Total Phenolic Content {#sec2-11}
----------------------
The total phenolic (TPC) content was determined by Folin-Ciocalteu reagent (Lobo et al., 2011). Briefly, 75 μL of diluted extract and 425 μL of distilled water were added to 500 μL Folin-Ciocalteu reagent and 500 μL of Na~2~CO~3~ (10 % w/v). The mixture was mixed and incubated for 1 h in the dark at room temperature. After incubation, the absorbance was measured at 760 nm using a UV-Vis spectrophotometer (DU 640 Spectrophotometer, Beckman, Brea). The total phenolic content was expressed as mg gallic acid equivalent (GAE)/ g of extract.
Total Flavonoid Content {#sec2-12}
-----------------------
The Dowd method, as adapted by (Ramamoorthy and Bono, 2007), was used to determine the flavonoid content. A solution of 2 % aluminum trichloride (AlCl~3~) in HPLC-grade methanol and an extract concentration of 0.2 mg/mL were used. Readings at 415 nm using a spectrophotometer were taken after 10 minutes against a blank sample (5 mL extract solution and 5 mL methanol without AlCl~3~). A quercetin (1-100 μg/mL) calibration curve was used as the standard. The mean of three readings was expressed as mg of quercetin equivalent QE/g of extract.
Analysis of the Chemical Composition by GC-MS {#sec2-13}
---------------------------------------------
The chemical components of the MEBA were identified with an HP 6890 gas chromatograph using an HP 5973 mass selective detector equipped with Chemstation and Wiley 275 Spectra Data software. An HP-5 5 % Phenyl Methyl Siloxane capillary column (30 m x 0.32 mm; 0.25 μm thickness) was used. The chromatographic conditions were as follows: column temperature 70°C (0.5 min), 70-150°C (15°C/min), 150-220°C (20°C/min), 220-310°C (25°C/min) 310°C (5 min), interface 180°C; split ratio 1:10 carrier gas, He (3.43 Psi), flow rate 1.6 mL/min; ionization energy 70 eV; mass range 30-550; volume injected 2.0 μL. Identification of individual components in MEBA was done using the GC-MS (NIST 2008 and Wiley 8NO8) spectral libraries.
Separated compounds were identified using NIST chemical library.
Results {#sec1-3}
=======
Of the total weight of bark (2.516 Kg), the extraction yield of *Bursera aptera* bark was 2.37% (59.78 g) of dry extract. MEBA was dissolved in Schneider's medium (Sigma) for the *in vitro* interactions.
*In vitro* effect of MEBA on *L. mexicana* promastigotes. {#sec2-14}
---------------------------------------------------------
The treatment of promastigotes with MEBA demonstrated a dose-dependent inhibition of parasite growth and an LC value in promastigotes of 0.408 mg/mL, whereas the values of the reference drugs Stb and AmpB were evaluated as 0.203 mg/mL and 0.133 μg/mL, respectively.
MEBA-treated promastigotes show both annexin V and PI binding {#sec2-15}
-------------------------------------------------------------
Flow cytometric evaluation of the externalization of phosphatidylserine, a membrane-associated phospholipid, using Annexin-V/FITC and PI, was presented in [Fig. 1](#F1){ref-type="fig"}. The percentage of early- and late-apoptotic cells increased from 0.64 % ± 0.08 in the untreated group to 15.3 % ± 0.86 in MEBA-treated group (0.408 mg/mL) for 1 h; similarly, the percentage of necrotic cells increased from 0.43 % ± 0.02 in the untreated group to 17.2 % ± 0.59 in the MEBA-treated group.
{#F1}
MEBA induces the depolarization of mitochondrial transmembrane potential in promastigotes {#sec2-16}
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Treatment with 0.408 mg/mL (1 h) resulted in the reduction of mitochondrial membrane potential in relation to the control, which may be due to imperfect mitochondrial function ([Fig. 2](#F2){ref-type="fig"}).
{#F2}
Activity of MEBA in the lesion size and quantitation of parasite burden in experimental cutaneous leishmaniasis {#sec2-17}
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To evaluate the *in vivo* effects of MEBA in cutaneous leishmaniasis, BALB/c mice were infected with *L. mexicana* in the back rump and treated daily with MEBA (topical administration) or vehicle. MEBA-treatment mice did not exhibit an increase in lesion size compared with untreated mice ([Figure 3](#F3){ref-type="fig"}). MEBA treatment also caused an important reduction in the number of parasites compared with untreated mice, and the infected lesions from untreated mice contained significantly more parasites (9.6 ± 0.175) than those from treated mice (6.8 ± 0.247) ([Fig. 4](#F4){ref-type="fig"}). Taken together, these findings indicate that MEBA can serve as an anti-leishmanial agent.
{#F3}
{#F4}
Mice treated with MEBA during infection with *L. mexicana* showed an increase in levels of IFN-γ and TNF-α {#sec2-18}
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The results obtained by ELISA showed that mice treated with MEBA developed a significant increase in the production of IFN-γ and TNF-α during infection with *L. mexicana* in relation to the untreated group. In contrast, the levels of IL-4 and IL-10 in mice treated with MEBA did not increase and remained constant during infection, but in the untreated group, a marked increase in the levels of these cytokines was recorded ([Fig. 5](#F5){ref-type="fig"}).
{#F5}
Total polyphenolic and flavonoid content and antioxidant activity {#sec2-19}
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The total polyphenolic content (TPC) of MEBA was determined by Folin-Ciocalteu assay. According to the literature, phenols are the main compounds responsible for the antioxidant activity; for this reason, MEBA was analyzed (Scherer and Godoy, 2014). The results showed that MEBA displayed a TPC of 61.2 mg GAE/g. MEBA exhibited 15 mg QE/g of flavonoids. *In vitro* antioxidant tests using free radical traps are relatively straightforward to perform. Among the free radical scavenging methods, the one involving DPPH is rapid, simple, highly reproducible and inexpensive in comparison to other test models. The results were expressed as AC~50~ ([Table 1](#T1){ref-type="table"}). According to the Al-Fatimi criteria (Ramamoorthy and Bono, 2007), MEBA showed a good DPPH scavenging activity (SC~50~ of 11.72 μg/mL), while quercetin (used as standard) showed an SC~50~ of 4.3 μg/mL.
######
The total polyphenol content (TPC) and total flavonoid content (TFC) of MEBA.
TPC mg GAE/g TFC mg QE/g DPPH AC~50~ μg/mL
---------- -------------- ------------- -------------------
**MEBA** 61.2 15 11.72
(GAE)/g = mg gallic acid equivalent per gram of dried extract; (QE)/g = mg of quercetin equivalent per gram of dried extract.
GC-MS analysis {#sec2-20}
--------------
GC-MS analysis revealed the presence of 11 compounds in the methanolic extract of bark from *B. aptera*. The six main compounds were podophyllotoxin, methyl palmitate, oleic acid methyl ester, palmitic acid, clionasterol and kaurene ([Table 2](#T2){ref-type="table"}).
######
Compounds in MEBA identified by GC-MS.
No. Compound Abundance (%) Retention time (min) CAS\# of NIST
----- -------------------------- --------------- ---------------------- ---------------
1 Podophyllotoxin 13.79 16.925 19186-35-7
2 Methyl palmitate 4.93 10.729 112-39-0
3 Oleic acid, methyl ester 4.93 12.183 112-62-9
4 Palmitic acid 4.76 10.960 57-10-3
5 Clionasterol 4.60 17.299 83-47-6
6 Kaurene 4.03 11.720 562-28-7
7 Methyl linoleate 3.59 11.892 112-63-0
8 Stearic acid 3.26 12.278 57-11-4
9 Pyranone 3.18 4.253 28564-83-2
10 Methyl stearate 2.42 12.070 112-61-8
11 Linoleic acid 1.34 12.124 60-33-3
Discussion {#sec1-4}
==========
Plants of the *Bursera* genus are widely used in traditional medicine, and the anti-leishmanial activity of the methanolic extract of *B. aptera* was reported for the first time in this work. This finding is of great importance because the use of pentavalent antimony drugs, which is the main therapy used to treat leishmaniasis, has multiple toxicities and is becoming increasingly ineffective due to the development of parasite resistance (Roberts, 2005). Natural products are an important potential source of new drugs and alternative therapies (Sulsen et al., 2008).
In this work, we demonstrate the *in vitro* anti-promastigote effect of MEBA on *L. mexicana*, using an MTT assay, wherein the conversion of MTT to formazan by mitochondrial enzymes served as an indicator of cell viability; thus, a decrease in formazan production indicated decreased cell viability (Dutta, et al., 2005), we recorded a LC~50~ value of 0.408 mg/mL. These results were to be expected because MEBA is a mixture of compounds and the drugs are pure compounds. The *in vitro* antileishmanial activity is consistent with previous reports using other species of this genus, such as *B. graveolens* (36.7 ± 4.7 μg/mL) and *B. simaruba* (163.3 ± 1.8 μg/mL) against amastigotes of *L. amazonensis;* however, these studies were tested with essential oil (Garcia et al., 2012) and ethanolic extract of the leaves of the plant (Monzote et al., 2012). Furthermore, it was found that ethanolic extract of leaves from *B. fagaroides* inhibits 50 % of the activity of ornithine decarboxylase (ODC) at a concentration of 8 mg/mL (Rosas-Arreguin et al., 2008). ODC catalyzes the decarboxylation of ornithine to produce putrescine and is essential for biosynthesis, polyamines and trypanothione of parasitic protozoa and may be a potential target for the development of new drugs against *Leishmania* (Yadav et al., 2015).
However, the analysis of the antioxidant activity and total polyphenolic and flavonoid content showed that there was a relationship between the chemical composition of the extract as detected by GC-MS and the biological activities evaluated. For example, the presence of dead cells by apoptosis and necrosis may be due to the compounds found in the extract, such as podophyllotoxin. This compound registered a greater abundance in the GC-MS. We found that the extract promotes the externalization of phosphatidylserine and a loss of mitochondrial membrane potential, these events are characteristic during programmed cell death (PCD) (Mehta and Shaha, 2004; Sen et al., 2007), and these findings are consistent with those reported by Velez et al. (2014), who reported that podophyllotoxin and its analogues have the ability to generate apoptosis in COLO-205 cells to promote the externalization of phosphatidylserine between 20 % and 50 %. This generates permeability of the mitochondrial membrane. Another compound found in the extract was palmitic acid, which induces mitochondrial pore opening and leads to a decrease of the mitochondrial membrane potential and then to cell death (Belosludtsev et al., 2006). Additionally, podophyllotoxin has been widely used topically in ethanolic solution and creams in the treatment of skin infections (Gilson et al., 2009; Lacey et al., 2003). This may be related to the anti-leishmanial activity *in vivo*, as the extract prevents the growth of the lesion without causing irritation or skin damage. Furthermore, the presence of other phenolic compounds in the extract, especially flavonoids, is very important to explain the *in vivo* anti-leishmanial activity of MEBA. Our findings show that the size of the lesion and the parasitic load is smaller in MEBA-treated mice than untreated mice. It has been reported that flavonoids isolated from *Selaginella sellowi*, amentoflavone (0.1 μg/mL) and robustoflavone (2.8 μg/mL), have anti-leishmanial activity on amastigotes of *L. amazonensis* (Rizk et al., 2014). In addition, previous reports demonstrated the antileishmanial activity of quercetin, quercetrin and isoquercetrin, as they inhibit recombinant arginase from *L. amazonensis* at an LC~50~ of 4.3, 10.0 and 3.8 μΜ, respectively (Da Silva et al., 2012). This enzyme is involved in the synthesis of polyamines, which are essential for cell proliferation and the production of trypanothione, which is involved in reactive oxygen species detoxification (Colotti and Ilari, 2011). We found that MEBA inhibited lesion development and parasitic burden when it was administered topically at a 0.408 mg/mL. This is noteworthy because the flavonoid is a pure compound, whereas the extract is a mixture of compounds. In relation to the production of cytokines, it was found that treatment of mice with MEBA promotes the production of proinflammatory cytokines during infection with *L. mexicana*. Increased IFN-γ and TNF-α can also result from a high content of phenolic compounds and flavonoids in MEBA, as there are reports that phenolic compounds, such as tannins and proanthocyanidins, increase proinflammatory cytokine production and inducible nitric oxide synthase expression in RAW 264.7 macrophages infected with *Leishmania* (Kolodziej et al., 2005). Increased IFN-γ and TNF-α in mice treated with MEBA may also be directly related to the *in vivo* anti-leishmanial activity because in response to these cytokines, macrophages become activated and produce microbicidal free radical molecules, such as nitric oxide and reactive oxygen intermediates (Liu and Uzonna, 2012). Our results indicate that in addition to direct leishmanicidal activity against extracellular and intracellular *L. mexicana* parasites, MEBA displays immunomodulatory activities to eliminate intracellular parasites mediated mainly by phenolic compounds as flavonoids and podophyllitoxin. The activity of MEBA makes it a good candidate in the search for new antiprotozoal agents.
Oscar de Jesus Nieto Yañez is a doctoral student from Programa de Doctorado en Investigación en Medicina, Escuela Superior de Medicina, del Instituto Politécnico Nacional and received a fellowship from CONACYT (371908). UNAM DGAPA PAPIIT IN213713, IN211614, funded this research.
**Conflict of interests:**
The authors declare no conflict of interests.
|
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So far, so fabulous.
2009 really is going to be a good year, not that I had my doubts, but things have been going really well and I am feeling super happy and excited about things.
This weekend was relaxing, but super fun and productive...and I barely spent a dime.
Friday I went out with people from work and had a lovely time, and actually cancelled on the ladies so I could schmooze up my boss, which I think actually worked in getting myself on her radar. It was weird to cancel a lady date for work stuff, but it made me realize that this is one of many things that are bound to change in the near future, and it is all apart of growing up. Of course everyone was totally understanding, and I was asleep with Matty at 10:30 that night, which made it easy to get up at 5:30 on Saturday morning so that I could have a nice, full day off. Definitely a sign that I am getting old, or I'm just plain crazy. I got everything done before 11am - grocery shopping, cleaning the house, and my first (of what will be many) spinning classes at my gym. I was all showered up and ready by noon when the ladies (Emily, Amy and Jeanne) came by for brunch. It was so wonderful to sit around my kitchen table and talk about our weeks and our lives, over yummy food that I cooked, of course. And Amy brought amazing cupcakes, pictured above, which went perfect with our lady talk. Again, that very satisfied adult-feeling came over me. Later I hung out with Nina and Craig - making it friend-o-rama day, which was awesome. I did all this with time to pick Matty up from work and make dinner, and again be in bed by 10:30. I "slept in" on Sunday until about 8, then went to church in the crazy snow storm. I was supposed to hang out with Amy but a combination of the snow and low funds made me cancel, so I spent the day reading, watching I'm Not There, napping, and then going to yoga class and working out at the gym. And again, dinner and in bed early - well, I did stay up late(r) to watch the Golden Globes, much to Matty's dismay due to my professional narrative on every celebrity.
So I guess I am really growing up...I even bought my first jar of eye cream this weekend - as a preventative - I swear!! The thing about it all though, is that I am totally at peace with it, and feel no pressure or guilt to be any different. This further proves that I am surrounded by an amazing support network of friends and family, and that I am finding that balance in life that I have been so desperately seeking. On top of it all, I just feel really good, which I attribute a lot to finally slowing myself down and taking care of the little things that I need that I had always blown off - things like the gym, bedtimes, eye-cream and the ability to say "no".
I have a busy week ahead of me, too. Tonight I have Catechism and am going to stop by Amy's and/or Emily's afterwards. Tomorrow I have my late shift. Wednesday I am going to check out the Shambhala Center for their open-house meditation session - further trying to hone in on my relaxation skills and be a less stressed person. Thursday I am volunteer project leading at the MSPCA. And Friday is the beginning of what should be an awesome weekend - Jeanne's birthday party on Saturday, and Matty is off work! Yay! Busy, busy but keeping my balance and continuing to remind myself to slow down and enjoy the wonderful things around me.
Coming soon: Me and Matty's Anniversary on February 1st! One year with the most amazing man in the world!
I'm a tattooed lady who loves my husband, my daughters, my career and my lovely city. In my spare time (ha!) I am an avid reader, runner, foodie, yogi, jet setter, fashionista wannabe and celeb gossip addict.
This is where I write about it all. |
Isolation, characterization and utilization of the fifth component (C5) of porcine complement.
The fifth component (C5) of porcine complement was isolated in immunochemically pure, homogeneous and native form. The isolated component was characterized, it has a molecular weight of 187,000 (under non-reducing conditions) and two non-identical chains of 112,000 and 76,000 under reducing conditions, respectively. The isolated C5 can be used for the detection of the C5b receptors on murine macrophages. Our findings are in good agreement with the results obtained using a rabbit and a human model, which suggests a high conservativeness of C5 during evolution. The described method of isolation of C5 from easily available porcine serum seems to be convenient for C5 receptors studies. |
#!/usr/sbin/dtrace -s
/*
* cuckoo.d
*
* Example script from Chapter 11 of the book: DTrace: Dynamic Tracing in
* Oracle Solaris, Mac OS X, and FreeBSD", by Brendan Gregg and Jim Mauro,
* Prentice Hall, 2011. ISBN-10: 0132091518. http://dtracebook.com.
*
* See the book for the script description and warnings. Many of these are
* provided as example solutions, and will need changes to work on your OS.
*/
#pragma D option quiet
#pragma D option switchrate=10hz
dtrace:::BEGIN
{
printf("%-20s %6s %6s %6s %s\n", "TIME", "PID", "PPID", "UID", "TEXT");
}
fbt::cnwrite:entry
{
this->iov = args[1]->uio_iov;
this->len = this->iov->iov_len;
this->text = stringof((char *)copyin((uintptr_t)this->iov->iov_base,
this->len));
this->text[this->len] = '\0';
printf("%-20Y %6d %6d %6d %s\n", walltimestamp, pid, ppid, uid,
this->text);
}
|
Why is everyone saying giving birth would hurt you more? You people obviously haven't given birth to one before! You feel the pain for a period of time but you know it paid off once you see your child. When you cradle him/her in your arms, you'll actually wonder where all that pain really came from.
Well since no guy can ever experience the pain of giving birth or a girl experience the pain of getting kicked down below to say which one is more painful ... My educated guess would be a person giving birth!
Although a guy getting kicked below, i would imagine to be extremely painful (no one has dared tried it on me) the pain is generally shorted lived. But being in labour can last for hours, i cant begin to imagine how painful it is to go through... but to endure the pain is so worth it when you receive your reward by the end of it, holding the most beautiful baby between your arms.
Why is everyone saying giving birth would hurt you more? You people obviously haven't given birth to one before! You feel the pain for a period of time but you know it paid off once you see your child. When you cradle him/her in your arms, you'll actually wonder where all that pain really came from.
Why is everyone saying giving birth would hurt you more?
Cuz in comparision to a guy getting kicked it is more painful, thats why.
You people obviously haven't given birth to one before!
Nope i havent you are right, but not everyone needs to have given birth to know that it can be a painful process to endure.
You feel the pain for a period of time but you know it paid off once you see your child... you'll actually wonder where all that pain really came from
I agree with you completely, but you missed the point of this poll... Its not about what is worth going through and whether the pain is worth it or not. But which is actually more painful and you cant say that giving birth is not painful when it is... you even said it yourself "You feel the pain for a period of time"... The time period of pain is much longer giving birth compared to the time period of pain of a guy getting kicked in his manhood
I vote kiked in the nuts cuss havin a baby doesnt hurt as much an unlike nuts hit u cant die from those an Im a guy
1. How do you know how much it hurts to give birth?
2. How do you measure pain?
3. It is actually very possible to die from childbirth.
4. Having a period and giving birth aren't the same thing.
5. Nobody has experienced both.
6. You think being kicked in the nuts is more painful than childbirth because having a baby doesn't hurt as much. nice logic. |
Q:
DJANGO HTML TEMPLATES : How to know Selected item in drop Down and display In the html page without any action
I want to display the selected item info which is selected From the drop down in, the same html page without dong any action.How to know which item is selected and how to assign that selected value in a variable in html.
A:
You can use jQuery's onchange event handler to detect when choice is changed and also get the value. There is good example on the .change() api page.
|
---
abstract: 'With the development of communication technologies, connected autonomous vehicles (CAVs) can share information with each other. Besides basic safety messages, they can also share their future plan. We propose a behavior planning method for CAVs to decide whether to change lane or keep lane based on the information received from neighbors and a policy learned by deep reinforcement learning (DRL). Our state design based on shared information is scalable to the number of vehicles. The proposed feedback deep Q-learning algorithms integrate the policy learning process with a continuous state space controller, which in turn gives feedback about actions and rewards to the learning process. We design both centralized and distributed DRL algorithms. In experiments, our behavior planning method can help increase traffic flow and driving comfort compared with a traditional rule-based control method. It also shows the distributed learning result is comparable to the centralized learning result, which reveals the possibility of improving the policy of behavior planning online. We also validate our algorithm in a more complicated scenario where there are two road closures on a freeway.'
author:
- Songyang Han
- 'Fei Miao [^1]'
title: |
**Behavior Planning For Connected Autonomous Vehicles Using\
Feedback Deep Reinforcement Learning**
---
Autonomous vehicle, behavior planning, reinforcement learning, information sharing.
Introduction
============
The development of the Dedicated Short-Range Communication (DSRC) technology [@tangade2018decentralized] and 5G technology enables Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) communication. The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) estimated that DSRC based V2V information sharing could potentially address up to 82% of crashes in the United States and prevent thousands of automobile crashes every year [@DSRC_standard]. When Basic Safety Message (BSM), including current velocities and positions, is communicated for Connected Autonomous Vehicles’ (CAVs) coordination, control approaches for scenarios such as cross intersections or lane-merging [@Coordinate_CAV; @CV_intersection; @ort2018autonomous] have shown the advantage of information sharing.
When a lane-changing decision has already been made, continuous state space controllers are designed for vehicles to merge into or leave the platoon [@li2017optimal]. However, existing control frameworks for CAVs, such as platooning, Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) [@correct_ACC], and Cooperative Adaptive Cruise Control (CACC) [@cacc_platoon] algorithms mainly focus on the controller design when a decision about lane changing or keeping has been provided [@Survey_CVcontrol]. Methods designed based on Model Predictive Control (MPC) method [@gritschneder2018fast] or hybrid system model usually aims to guarantee string stability of the platoon or improves fuel efficiency [@savefuel_Karl]. Work in [@PredictPolicyLearn_LeCun] uses vision to predict trajectory and speed for reinforcement learning training, but it seems from the video the cars do not change lane.
Reinforcement learning (RL) has shown great success in robotics research [@kober2013reinforcement]. For solving autonomous vehicle’s challenges, one paramount concern raised by RL is how to ensure the safety of the learned driving policy. The authors in [@shalev2016safe] have proved that it cannot ensure driving safety by merely assigning a negative reward for accident trajectories, because it enlarges the variance of the expected reward, which in turn prohibits the convergence of stochastic gradient descent algorithm for policy learning.
It is efficient if autonomous vehicles can learn a driving policy to output control signals for steering angle and acceleration directly based on observed environments, such as an end-to-end convolutional neural network with front camera images as input [@codevilla2018end]. However, it only considers lane-keeping scenarios without lane-changing cases, and this pure learning method cannot provide a safety guarantee. In order to add safety guarantees, researchers start to use deep learning to learn a policy that has similar control output with MPC. For example, paper [@chen2018approximating] uses a constrained neural network to approximate MPC law. The guided policy search in [@MPCGPS_icra16] uses MPC to generate samples to train Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL), where DRL and MPC have the same action/decision space. Though it is an approximation of MPC, the learned policy does have the same safety property with the MPC.
The other popular approach is to decompose the learning and control phases. Learning-based methods can make a high-level decision, including lane-changing or lane-keeping. For example, the work in [@pan2017virtual] evaluates the effectiveness of making high-level decisions, such as “go straight” and “go left”, based on images. The work discussing safety in [@shalev2016safe] also separates learning and control phases: first learn a policy to determine the target speed, lateral position, whether to take away or give way to the other vehicle, then conduct trajectory planning with hard constraints to ensure safety.
Certainly, splitting learning and control steps is a good way to combine the advantages of both of them. Is there a better way to integrate them? Can control help the learning process? Also, when an autonomous vehicle gets extra knowledge about the environment via V2V or V2X communication, how to make tactical decisions such as whether to change lane or keep lane to improve traffic efficiency, whether sharing future planned velocity or trajectory can bring benefits are still unsolved challenges. The existing literature of multi-agent reinforcement learning [@zhang2019multi] has not fully solved the CAV challenges yet, since either how communication among agents will improve systems performance or policy learning is not analyzed clearly.
Hence, in this work, we design a learning algorithm that uses shared information to enhance operational performance for future CAVs, considers feedback from controllers and safety requirements, and shows the benefit of V2V communication. We focus on the behavior planning challenge to determine when to change/keep lane for connected autonomous vehicles. We assume that autonomous vehicles can share current and future plans with their neighbors. We model the problem as a Markov decision process and solve it by improving the deep Q-learning algorithm for autonomous vehicles, where the behavior action a vehicle can take and the reward from this action also use the feedback control decisions of the continuous state space controller of this vehicle. In experiments, we show that feedback DRL based behavior planning can help increase traffic flow and provide a more comfortable driving experience.
The main contributions of this work are:
- The state space design of the RL approach for CAV reduces the curse of dimensionality. The approach is scalable to the number of vehicles since the dimension of the state space is not directly relevant to the number of vehicles that share information.
- The feedback deep Q-learning proposed in our work integrates the strength of both the reinforcement learning and optimal control. The learning algorithm can explore historical data to find a good policy under a complex environment. The continuous state space controller has a well-studied property to consider safety constraints. Controller gets involved in the proposed learning process by providing feedback to actions and rewards.
- We design a distributed policy learning algorithm that does not rely on a cloud center to collect data or run the training process. The experiment results reveal the potential to apply both centralized and distributed learning algorithms for behavior planning.
- The case study shows that the behavior planning policy learned by the proposed approach can deal with complicated scenarios such as road closures.
The rest of this paper is organized as follows. In Section \[sec:problem\], the behavior planning problem is described. Also, the information sharing assumption and a physical model are introduced for CAVs. In Section \[sec:learning\], we define the behavior planning as a Markov decision process and solve it through feedback deep Q-learning with both centralized and distributed versions. Experiment results are shown in Section \[sec:experiment\] concerning traffic flow and driving comfort. Conclusions are given in Section \[sec:conclusion\].
Problem Description {#sec:problem}
===================
The V2V and V2I communications extend the information gathered by a single-vehicle further beyond its sensing system. This work addresses how to utilize information sharing to make better decisions in terms of when to change/keep lane for Connected Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs). This section introduces information sharing considered in this work. Afterward, the kinematic bicycle model is briefly introduced for the continuous dynamics of an ego vehicle.
![The concept diagram of behavior planning.[]{data-label="fig:behavior_diagram"}](behavior_diagram.pdf){width="2.5in"}
As shown in the concept diagram in Fig. \[fig:behavior\_diagram\], the problem considered in this paper is to study a decision making algorithm for behavior planning, assuming that information sharing is capable between CAVs. Each vehicle is expected to share a sequence of future velocities and lane numbers with its neighbors. A formal definition of the neighbors is given in the subsequent section. Once a decision is made, the action is implemented by a controller. Because the action given by the RL agent might not be safe and feasible, a controller can change the action to guarantee safety.
Meanwhile, this action provides feedback to the RL process, which modifies the traditional learning framework as introduced later in Section \[sec:centralized\_learning\]. The corresponding controller is called a feedback controller. There are several state-of-art controllers proposed by researchers, such as Model Predictive Control (MPC) [@cesari2017scenario; @Survey_CVcontrol], and the control barrier function based controller [@chen2017obstacle; @ames2017control].
Information Sharing
-------------------
Autonomous vehicles are assumed to share information with their $\epsilon$-neighbors defined as follows.
One vehicle $j$ is said to be the $\epsilon$-neighbor of a vehicle $i$ if $\mid x^i_\tau- x^j_\tau \mid \leq \epsilon$, where $i$ and $j$ are vehicles’ indexes, $x^i_\tau$ and $x^j_\tau$ represent the longitudinal positions of vehicle $i$ and $j$ at time instant $\tau$ respectively, and $\epsilon$ is a constant parameter. The set that includes all the $\epsilon$-neighbors of the vehicle $i$ except for $i$ itself is denoted as $\mathcal{N}_i (\epsilon)$. This set is called vehicle $i$’s $\epsilon$-neighbors.
In this work, we consider autonomous vehicles driving on a 3-lane freeway. Each autonomous vehicle is assumed to share its current state and future plan, denoted by a sequence of $[v_\tau$, $v_{\tau+1}$, ..., $v_{\tau + T}]$ (velocities); $[l_\tau$, $l_{\tau+1}$, ..., $l_{\tau + T}]$ (lane numbers, labeled as 1, 2, 3) with its $\epsilon$-neighbors. Note that, though a lane number can be replaced by the lateral position of a vehicle, it can reflect lane-changing actions more clearly. According to the current development of BSM and DSRC security, the message can be both authenticated and encrypted [@tangade2018decentralized]. Hence, in this work, we assume that vehicular communication is true information that is not manipulated by attackers. Parameter $T$ determines how much future information is shared. There is a trade-off for selecting $T$. The larger $T$ means there is more information shared among autonomous vehicles which may bring more benefits. However, the communication cost would increase and the information reliability may also decrease accordingly. There exist some experiments quantifying the communication delay using WiFi, 4G and 3G network [@tangade2018decentralized]. Limited to the scope of this work, we assume that $\epsilon$ and $T$ are given based on the communication capability, and how to select a better $\epsilon$ and $T$ is one direction for future work.
Physical Model
--------------
![Kinematic bicycle model attached to the lane centerline.[]{data-label="fig:BicycleModel"}](BicycleModel2.pdf){width="2.6in"}
The physical dynamics of an ego vehicle is described by a kinematic bicycle model, as shown in Fig. \[fig:BicycleModel\]. This model can achieve the balance between accuracy and complexity [@brito2019model; @kang2018multirate]. Point $A$ represents the two left and right front wheels, while the rear two wheels are represented by point $B$. Point $O$ is the Center of Gravity (CoG). The lengths of the line segments $OA$ and $OB$ are represented by $l_f$ and $l_r$, respectively. The $\delta$ is the steering angle for the front wheels. The planar motion of this vehicle is described by three coordinates: $x$, $y$, and $\psi$. $(x,y)$ is the location of the CoG, and $\psi$ illustrates the orientation of the vehicle. The $X$-axis represents the lane centerline. The $v$ is the velocity at the CoG, and the slip angle $\beta$ denotes its angle with $OA$. The discrete-time equations of this model can be obtained by applying an explicit Euler method with a sampling time $\tau_{cs}$ for continuous states [@cesari2017scenario]. The control vector for this vehicle is defined as $ \textbf{u}_\tau \triangleq [ \delta_\tau, a_\tau ]$, where $a_\tau$ is its acceleration. The continuous state vector is defined as $\textbf{s}_\tau \triangleq[x_\tau,y_\tau,\psi_\tau,v_\tau,l_\tau]$, where $l_\tau$ is the current lane number. The detail equations can be found in the Appendix. More compactly, the update of the state vector is denoted as $\textbf{s}_{\tau+1} = f( \textbf{s}_\tau , \textbf{u}_\tau)$.
Behavior Policy Learning {#sec:learning}
========================
The behavior planning problem is modeled as a Markov Decision Process (MDP). This section first introduces the action space, state space, and reward function of this MDP. Then, a feedback deep reinforcement learning algorithm (centralized version) is proposed to solve it. This algorithm can improve the traffic flow and driving comfort of autonomous vehicles, but its learning process relies on a cloud center. Therefore, a distributed version is put forward afterward to get rid of this dependency.
![The scenario of a 3-lane freeway. The ego vehicle’s behavior is determined based on four states in the boxes.[]{data-label="fig:freeway"}](highway.pdf){width="3in"}
Action Space
------------
In this work, we consider a scenario where autonomous vehicles running on a 3-lane free freeway, as shown in Fig. \[fig:freeway\]. In behavior planning, the action space $A_t$ considers:
- Keep Lane (KL),
- Change Left (CL),
- Change Right (CR).
More complicated actions are either included in these actions or represented by their combinations. For example, an overtake is the combination of change left followed by change right.
### Keep Lane
Vehicles stay in the current lane with this action. A feedback controller will adjust the speed of an ego vehicle according to the safety interval requirements, which is introduced in Sec. \[sec:continuous\_control\]. The ego vehicle may either accelerate or decelerate according to the control output of the feedback controller. In extreme cases, when the headway is too tight, the ego vehicle will fully stop on the current lane.
### Change Left & Change Right
With these two actions, an ego vehicle changes to a neighbor lane on its left/right. CL is symmetric to CR. After receiving the CL/CR action from a DRL agent, a feedback controller will implement this action based on the current traffic.
State Space {#sec:state}
-----------
The incentive to change lane is to achieve higher speed or to avoid obstacles/traffic jams. Intuitively, the states can be designed to include the positions, velocities, and lane numbers of all the vehicles. However, the number of states will increase proportionally to the number of vehicles, and the computational complexity of behavior planning will increase exponentially. To reduce the curse of dimensionality, two state functions are defined: $S_v(t, l_k)$ is used to evaluate the future velocity quality of lane \# $l_k$ based on shared information; $S_f(t)$ is used to record the lane-changing frequency of each vehicle. As an example shown in Fig. \[fig:freeway\], the state space includes:
- $S_v(t, l_k - 1)$ for the left lane
- $S_v(t, l_k)$ for the current lane
- $S_v(t, l_k + 1)$ for the right lane
- $S_f(t)$ for the lane-changing frequency
The state function for future velocity of lane \# $l_k$ is $$S_v(t, l_k) = \frac{1}{N}\sum_{i : i \in \mathcal{N}_k } \sum^T_{j=1} \gamma^{(j-1)} v^{i}_{\tau(t)+j},
\label{equ:state_velocity}$$ where $\mathcal{N}_k = \{i | i \in \mathcal{N}_i (\epsilon), l_t^i = l_k\}$, $N= \mid \mathcal{N}_k \mid$, $l_k \in \{1,2,3\}$, $\gamma$ is a decay coefficient, $v^{i}_{\tau(t)+j}$ is the velocity of the vehicle $i$ at time instant $\tau(t)+j$.
This state function is the average discounted future velocity of vehicles on lane \# $l_k$. It can reflect the potential velocity quality of lane \# $l_k$. It also helps to avoid unnecessary lane-changing. For example, even though at time $t$ the vehicles on the neighbor lane have a higher speed than the ego vehicle, there may be a traffic jam in front of them. The ego vehicle could not observe this traffic jam because it could not see through its neighbors, which block its view. In this case, there is no need to change lane. The farther the time is, the less accuracy $v^i_{\tau(t)+j}$ will have. Therefore, a decay coefficient $\gamma < 1$ is multiplied to penalize future information.
The state function needs support from information sharing of both future velocities and lane numbers. The lane numbers are used to allocate which vehicle is on lane \# $l_k$, as the state function is defined for a specific lane. When the ego vehicle is on lane \# 1 or \# 3, the left/right lane’s state is set to be 0. For example, $S_v(t, 0) = 0$.
The state function for future velocity is scalable according to the number of vehicles. Unlike the aggregation of all vehicles’ states, the average discounted future velocity always exist no matter how many vehicles there are. Note that when there is no vehicle nearby, the future velocities are intentionally set to be $v^{max}$. Also, it is robust to potential package drops. Similarly, though the package drops may occur, the average velocity will not be affected dramatically because of losing one or two data points.
The state function for lane-changing frequency is $$S_f(t) = - \sum^{T_f}_{i=1} I_{change}(t-i),$$ where $t$ is the current time instant, $T_f$ is a constant determining the window size of $[t-T_f, t-1]$ and the lane changing indicator $$I_{change}(i) = \begin{cases}
1, & \text{if lane changing starts from the time i}; \\
0, & \text{otherwise}. \end{cases}$$
Passengers may feel uncomfortable if a vehicle changes lane frequently. This frequent behavior will result in a smaller state function value, so there is a minus sign in front.
Reward Function
---------------
A reward is assigned to each state-action pair. For connected autonomous vehicles, behavior planning in our work targets to improve two system-level evaluation criteria: traffic flow $\mathcal{F}$ and driving comfort $\mathcal{C}$. When there is a central cloud center to collect information from all the agents, a global reward function can be used for multi-agent RL [@wai2018multi]. Therefore, the reward function is defined as a weighted sum of the above two criteria:
The global reward function (for centralized DRL) is $$R(s_v, s_f, a) = w \cdot \mathcal{F} + \mathcal{C},
\label{equ:reward_centralized}$$ where $s_v \in S_v$, $s_f \in S_f$, $a \in A_t$, $w$ is a trade-off weight.
### Traffic Flow
Traffic flow reflects the quality of the road throughout with respect to traffic density. Traffic density $\rho$ is the ratio between the total number of vehicles and road length. Traffic flow is calculated as $$\mathcal{F} = \rho \times \bar{v},$$ where $\bar{v}$ is the average velocity of all the vehicles [@rios2018impact].
### Driving Comfort
The driving comfort of a road segment is defined to be the average driving comfort of all the vehicles on this segment. The driving comfort of a single-vehicle is related to its acceleration and driving behavior. Define the driving comfort for the vehicle $i$’s acceleration $a_{it}$ at time $t$ and its action $ a \in A_t$ as follows: $$\mathcal{C}_{single}(a_{it}, a) = \begin{cases}
3, & \text{if } a_{it}< \Theta_a \text{and } a = KL; \\
2, & \text{if } a_{it} \geq \Theta_a \text{and } a = KL; \\
1, & \text{if } a = CL/CR, \end{cases}$$ where $\Theta_a$ is a predefined acceleration threshold.
Therefore, driving comfort (for the freeway) is calculated as $$\mathcal{C} = \frac{1}{N \cdot T} \sum_{i}\sum_t \mathcal{C}_{single}(a_{it}, a),$$ where $N$ is the total number of all the vehicles.
Feedback Deep Q-Learning {#sec:centralized_learning}
------------------------
The environment model is not available for behavior planning, so policy/value iteration does not work. Traditional sample-based reinforcement learning is good at exploiting historical data to find a good policy. However, it does not guarantee either the optimality or the safety property of the converged policy. Different from traditional Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL), a feedback controller will monitor the action given by the DRL agent and guarantee safety.
![The agent-environment interaction in the feedback deep reinforcement learning.[]{data-label="fig:interaction"}](interaction.pdf){width="3in"}
Agent-environment interaction is shown in Fig. \[fig:interaction\] for the feedback DRL. The DRL agent is like a smart toddler who is good at learning new knowledge, but she may do something dangerous, such as eating inedible things and playing sharp items. In this case, an adult (the feedback controller) needs to look after her and guide her as a guardian. For the ego vehicle, Change Left (CL) or CR may be unsafe under some traffic scenarios. The controller will monitor action $A_t$ from the DRL agent and determine feedback action $A'_t$ based on the current traffic condition. In traditional DRL, transition experience is represented by $(s, a, r, s')$, where $s$ is the current state, $a$ is the action taken by the DRL agent, $r$ is the resulted reward, and $s'$ is the next state. In feedback deep Q-learning, transition experience is represented by $(s, a', r, s')$, where $a'$ is the feedback action executed by the feedback controller. In feedback deep Q-learning (centralized version), every vehicle will contribute its transition experience to a shared replay memory. This algorithm is shown in Alg. \[alg:centralized-qlearning\].
Initialize replay memory $D$ with a capacity $N$ Initialize action-value function $Q$ with random weights $\theta$ Initialize target action-value function $\hat{Q}$ with weights $\acute{\theta} = \theta$
Feedback Controller {#sec:continuous_control}
-------------------
The MPC controller proposed in [@cesari2017scenario] is used as an example to show how a feedback controller works. For each $T$ time horizon $\mathcal{T}=[\tau,\tau+1, ..., \tau+T-1]$, the control inputs can be generated by the following optimization program: $$\begin{aligned}
\begin{split}
&\min \limits_{\textbf{u}_k, \textbf{s}_{k+1}} \quad \sum_{k \in \mathcal{T}} (\textbf{s}_{k+1}-\textbf{s}^{ref}_{k+1})^{\mathsf{T}} Q(\textbf{s}_{k+1}-\textbf{s}^{ref}_{k+1})+\textbf{u}^\mathsf{T}_k R\textbf{u}_k \\ & \begin{array}{r@{\quad}c@{}c@{\quad}c}
s.t.&\textbf{s}_{k+1} = f(\textbf{s}_{k},\textbf{u}_{k}), &\text{ }\forall k \in \mathcal{T}\\
&\textbf{u}^{min} \leq \textbf{u}_k \leq \textbf{u}^{max} , &\text{ }\forall k \in \mathcal{T} \\
&\dot{\textbf{u}}^{min} \leq \textbf{u}_{k+1} -\textbf{u}_k \leq \dot{\textbf{u}}^{max}, &\text{ }\forall k \in \mathcal{T} \\
&\textbf{s}^{min}_{k+1} \leq \textbf{s}_{k+1} \leq \textbf{s}^{max}_{k+1}, &\text{ }\forall k \in \mathcal{T}
\end{array}
\end{split}
\label{equ:mpc}\end{aligned}$$ where $Q \in \mathbb{R}^{5\times 5}$, $R \in \mathbb{R}^{2\times 2}$ are both positive definite weighting matrices for tuning, $\textbf{s}^{ref}_{k+1}$ is the reference trajectory, $\textbf{s}^{min}_{k+1}$ and $\textbf{s}^{max}_{k+1}$ are the bounds of each state: $$\begin{aligned}
\textbf{s}^{min}_{k+1} &= [x^{min}_{k+1}, -w_{lane}, -\pi / 2, 0, 1]^\mathsf{T}, \\
\textbf{s}^{max}_{k+1} &= [x^{max}_{k+1}, w_{lane}, \pi / 2, v^{max}, 3]^\mathsf{T},\end{aligned}$$ where $w_{lane}$ represents the width of each lane.
This program has standard solvers [@David2015Linear]. The state bounds in are used to guarantee there is no overlapping between all vehicles’ positions. Once received action from the DRL agent, this MPC program would evaluate whether it is feasible (safe) to implement this action. If it is not safe to change lane, it will continue to use a lane-keeping trajectory as a reference. Our work in [@han2019exploiting] shows how constraints in the state bounds are relaxed by sharing a sequence of future positions (this information is not required in behavior planning).
Distributed Learning
--------------------
In the centralized version of feedback deep Q-learning, all vehicles share one replay memory D and one action-value function $Q$. It means the training process needs support from a centralized cloud center. Also, the reward also needs this cloud center to calculate traffic flow and driving comfort. It can be simulated offline, but it is hard to implement this algorithm in reality because of the dependency of the cloud center. When the number of vehicles increases, the communication cost will increase dramatically. Therefore, a distributed learning algorithm is considered, where each vehicle has its own action-value function and learn it independently. The reward function for distributed DRL is limited to the information from its $\epsilon$-neighbors, defined as:
The local reward function for distributed DRL is $$R(s_v, s_f, a) = w \cdot s_v(t, l_k) + \mathcal{C}_{single}(a_{it}, a),
\label{equ:reward_distributed}$$ where $a_{it}$ is the vehicle $i$’s acceleration at time $t$, $a$ is its action at state $s_v$ and $s_f$.
The reward function is a weighted sum of future velocity state and its own driving comfort. Passengers’ preference can determine this weight. A smaller $w$ is set for passengers who dislike frequent lane-changing; a larger $w$ is set for passengers who want to arrive at their destination faster. Because each vehicle conducts learning by itself, it can have different weight preferences.
The distributed version of the feedback deep Q-learning is shown in Alg. \[alg:distributed-qlearning\]. Though it does not need the support from a cloud center, its reward does not directly contribute to system-level traffic flow and driving comfort, and its convergence is slower than the centralized version. There is one experiment in section \[sec:experiment\] comparing the centralized and distributed versions.
Experiment {#sec:experiment}
==========
This section introduces the experiment results of three experiments:
- Compare centralized learning with traditional control,
- Compare distributed learning with centralized learning,
- A case study for a freeway with road closures.
In these experiments, vehicles are randomly scattered on different lanes of a 1000-long freeway as their initial positions. All vehicles loop on this freeway. The total number of vehicles ranges from 100 to 900. For different traffic densities, experiments run for 4000 time steps. Traffic flow and driving comfort are evaluated based on the statistics in the last 1000 time steps. Also, the experiment runs 30 times under different initialization for each traffic density.
First Comparison
----------------
This experiment compares the centralized version of feedback deep reinforcement learning in Alg. \[alg:centralized-qlearning\] and a traditional control method. The traditional control used here is a control synthesis algorithm put forward in [@han2019exploiting]. Each autonomous vehicle is modeled as a hybrid system. The basic idea for behavior planning is to judge whether the benefit of lane changing is significant enough or not based on a pre-tuned threshold.
![The comparison between centralized learning and traditional control. Reinforcement learning is able to learn a better/comparable policy with larger traffic flow and better driving comfort.[]{data-label="fig:BP_result1"}](BP_result1.eps){width="3.4in"}
As shown in Fig. \[fig:BP\_result1\], the RL agent gets both larger traffic flow and better driving comfort when traffic density $\rho$ is low. When $\rho$ grows, the result of the RL agent gets worse, but it is still comparable with traditional control. The two dashed lines in this figure show two bounds for behavior planning. They consider two extreme cases: always keep lane and always change lane. When $\rho$ is low, lane-changing can increase traffic flow significantly while sacrificing driving comfort. However, lane-changing will only downgrade passengers’ experience rather than achieve a higher speed when the road is saturated. Consequently, the best choice is to keep a lane when $\rho$ is high.
Note that $\rho$ is not included in the state space, which means autonomous vehicles do not know the current traffic density. Intuitively, the optimal policy should be different under different traffic densities. In fact, excluding traffic density is an intentional design for the state space of distributed learning because vehicles cannot verify the current traffic density by limited information from its $\epsilon$-neighbors. Traffic density $\rho$ is excluded in Alg. \[alg:centralized-qlearning\] in order to keep the state space consistent between two algorithms. This experiment also shows the ability of the RL agent to adapt to different traffic densities by itself. When $\rho$ cannot be accurately identified by a single-vehicle, it is more reliable and stable for a traditional controller to use a fixed threshold for different $\rho$. However, it cannot adopt a better result for different traffic densities, as shown in Fig. \[fig:BP\_result1\].
Second Comparison
-----------------
![The comparison between different distributed learning and centralized learning. They only have a slight difference in most cases.[]{data-label="fig:BP_result2"}](BP_result2.eps){width="3.4in"}
This experiment compares distributed and centralized versions of feedback deep reinforcement learning in Alg. \[alg:centralized-qlearning\] and Alg. \[alg:distributed-qlearning\]. Intuitively, the centralized learning will have a better result, because its reward function is directly related to the evaluation criteria: traffic flow and driving comfort. Nevertheless, distributed learning is easier to implement because it does not rely on any cloud center. Therefore, we wonder to what extent the result will deteriorate. The result is shown in Fig. \[fig:BP\_result2\]. In most cases, the distributed learning has a slightly smaller traffic flow and slightly worse driving comfort. Though the difference becomes relatively larger sometimes, it is still acceptable.
Case Study
----------
![The scenario for the case study where there are two road closures on lane \#1.[]{data-label="fig:closed_lane"}](closed_lane.pdf){width="3in"}
This experiment shows a case study where there are two road closures on one lane. As shown in Fig. \[fig:closed\_lane\], the road closures may be caused by an accident, or they are under construction. These road closures both have a length of 200. We want to test whether the learning algorithm can work in a more complicated scenario. Autonomous vehicles are assumed to know the position of the road closures when it reaches the $\epsilon$-neighbor range of these segments. They can share this information with its $\epsilon$-neighbors (add as additional information to be shared in this case) or gather this information through V2I communication from infrastructure.
![The comparison between distributed learning and traditional control. The RL agent gets a comparable traffic flow while improving driving comfort a lot.[]{data-label="fig:BP_result3"}](BP_result3.eps){width="3.4in"}
The state value of for future velocity is defined to be 0 on the road closures. The result is shown in Fig. \[fig:BP\_result3\]. When $\rho$ is low, lane-changing can get a larger traffic flow while sacrificing driving comfort. Lane-keeping becomes a better choice when $\rho$ is high. Because the road closures are relatively long in this case, the critical point is small, and lane-keeping is a better strategy for most traffic densities. Though the RL agent makes more lane-changing, it avoids massive acceleration to provide better driving comfort.
conclusion {#sec:conclusion}
==========
This paper focuses on the behavior planning challenge for CAVs, and designs a policy learning algorithm that considers feedback from controllers and safety requirements with shared information to enhance operational performance. We also show the benefit of V2V communication. The problem is modeled as an MDP problem. The solution, feedback deep reinforcement learning, utilizes $T$-time-step future information shared among autonomous vehicles’ neighbors. The action of the proposed DRL algorithm receives feedback from a controller, which provides a safety guarantee. The centralized learning method can improve the overall system performance in terms of traffic flow and driving comfort, while the training process needs support from a cloud center. The distributed learning method is easier to implement online learning, but each vehicle only gets a local reward, and they do not share their historical transition experience. From experiment results, feedback DRL based behavior planning shows its advantages compared with a control synthesis algorithm. Distributed learning does not downgrade performance too much compared with centralized learning, which means it can be used in online learning. The case study with road closures shows the feedback DRL policy can be applied to a more complicated scenario. More experiments can be done to verify the scalability and robustness of the proposed state space design in the future.
Kinematic Bicycle Model {#sec:kinematic_model .unnumbered}
-----------------------
The control vector for this vehicle is defined as $ \textbf{u}_\tau \triangleq [ \delta_\tau, a_\tau ]$, where $a_\tau$ is its acceleration. The state vector is defined as $\textbf{s}_\tau \triangleq[x_\tau,y_\tau,\psi_\tau,v_\tau,l_\tau]$, where $l_\tau$ is the current lane number. The detail equations can be found in [@cesari2017scenario] as follows: $$\begin{aligned}
\begin{cases}
\dot{x}_\tau &= v_\tau cos(\psi_\tau + \beta_\tau), \\
x_{\tau+1} &= x_\tau + \dot{x}_\tau \tau_{cs}, \\
\dot{y}_\tau &= v_\tau sin(\psi_\tau + \beta_\tau), \\
\tilde{y}_{\tau+1} &= y_\tau + \dot{y}_\tau \tau_{cs}, \\
y_{\tau+1} &= \tilde{y}_{\tau+1} + \begin{cases}
-w_{lane}, & \text{if } \tilde{y}_{\tau+1} \geq \frac{w_{lane}}{2}; \\
w_{lane}, & \text{if } \tilde{y}_{\tau+1} < -\frac{w_{lane}}{2}; \\
0, & \text{otherwise}. \end{cases} \\
\psi_{\tau+1} &= \psi_\tau + \frac{v_\tau cos \beta_\tau tan \delta_\tau}{l_f + l_r} \cdot \tau_{cs}, \\
v_{\tau+1} &= v_\tau+ a_\tau \tau_{cs}, \\
l_{\tau+1} &= l_\tau + \begin{cases}
1, & \text{if } \tilde{y}_{\tau+1} \geq \frac{w_{lane}}{2}; \\
-1, & \text{if } \tilde{y}_{\tau+1} < -\frac{w_{lane}}{2}; \\
0, & \text{otherwise}, \end{cases}
\end{cases}
\label{equ:kinematic}\end{aligned}$$ where $\beta_\tau$ is the slip angle. Once the control variable $\delta_\tau$ is determined, this angle can be updated as $\beta_\tau = tan^{-1} \left( \frac{l_r}{l_f+l_r} \cdot tan \delta_\tau \right)$. More compactly, the update of the state vector is denoted as $\textbf{s}_{\tau+1} = f( \textbf{s}_\tau , \textbf{u}_\tau)$ in the MPC program .
[^1]: This work was supported by NSF 1849246, NSF 1932250 grants. S. Han and F. Miao are with the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Connecticut, Storrs Mansfield, CT, USA 06268. Email: {songyang.han, fei.miao}@uconn.edu.
|
Villas-Boas relaxed despite Abramovich scrutiny
Andre Villas-Boas might have wished something other than a trip to Everton at the end of a week when his position has once again been placed under scrutiny.
The frequent presence of Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich at the club's training ground has prompted fresh speculation the Russian businessman is unhappy at the team's lack of progress this season.
And Villas-Boas himself was moved to reflect on how disappointing it is that the extent of his side's immediate ambitions in the Premier League is to hold onto fourth place.
Last weekend's failure to win after taking a three-goal lead against Manchester United did nothing to lift the mood at Stamford Bridge.
Against such a backdrop, it is no surprise that the visit to Goodison Park has stirred memories of Chelsea's last journey to face David Moyes' side - on the final day of last season - which ended with Carlo Ancelotti being sacked within an hour of the final whistle.
That paved the way for Villas-Boas to be recruited from FC Porto and while nobody expects history to repeat itself this weekend, there is no doubt the young Portuguese is enduring a testing first season at the club.
"The objectives we have for this season are pretty much outlined," the manager said.
"We have two competitions (FA Cup and Champions League) where we look better, and another competition where we have to dilute the damage and try to finish fourth, at least, which is not a very honourable position for the dimension of this club.
"Bearing in mind the rest, we focus on the same and a lot of focus on next year's progress as well."
Villas-Boas also remains unfazed by Abramovich's presence at the club's training base.
"You can speculate whatever you want, but for us it is fantastic to have him here," said Villas-Boas. "It is not distracting, not at all."
Chelsea will again be without skipper John Terry, who is carrying a knee injury but Frank Lampard and John Obi Mikel are fit again while Ashley Cole returns from suspension.
Chelsea have not won on their last two Premier League visits to Goodison Park and Landon Donovan, in his second stint on loan with Everton, wants to turn back the clock two years.
The United States international helped David Moyes's side overcome the Londoners 2-1 during his first spell on Merseyside in February 2010.
Moyes, who celebrates his 10th anniversary in charge of Everton next month, is looking to extend his team's unbeaten run in the top-flight to five games.
"Since the day I got here there has always been the belief this team can compete with any team in the Premier League," said Donovan, who is due to return to LA Galaxy at the end of the month.
"When I was here last time we beat Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City and should have drawn at Tottenham - so there is no fear in this club.
"We have a lot of respect for Chelsea, they are one of the best teams in the world, but we feel at Goodison we have a chance and we are going to go for it.
"They've come off an interesting result against Manchester United (with the 3-3 draw) so it will be an interesting game to see how they respond to that.
"We feel good in how we're playing, we like how we're playing right now and our form has been pretty good so it makes for a really good match-up."
Everton, who start the weekend in 11th spot and 13 points adrift of fourth-placed Chelsea, have a doubt over Tim Cahill.
The Australian international was replaced at the interval during his side's 1-1 draw at Wigan last Saturday after sustaining a foot injury.
South African midfielder Steven Pienaar is expected to make his second home debut after re-joining Everton on loan from Tottenham until the end of the season. |
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Scottish Conservative MEP Struan Stevenson has welcomed an announced investment by the European Investment Bank that would fund the deployment of 65 new Hitachi Super Express Trains on the East Coast Main Line.
The £235 million investment by the EIB, as part of a consortium of banks is part of the Department for Transport’s Intercity Express Programme, will see the new trains first delivered by 2018, with full roll-out by 2020.
The broadcast from Irainian state TV below reports on a visit to the European Parliament by PMOI head Maryam Rajavi, demonstrating the hysteria gripping the government since the Parliament voted to pass a resolution criticising the regime's human rights record.
High-level talks aimed at securing a future fisheries partnership agreement between the EU and Somalia took place in Brussels on the 2nd and 3rd of April, brokered by Scottish Conservative Euro MP Struan Stevenson. Struan arranged for the President of Somalia, His Excellency Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud, together with a team of Somali government ministers, to meet with Development Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and Fisheries Commissioner Maria Damanaki.
A European Union institutional Task Force on multiannual plans (MAPs), co-chaired by Scottish Conservative Euro MP Struan Stevenson, Senior Vice President of the European Parliament’s Fisheries Committee, has delivered its final report which charts the way forward to the eventual introduction of multiannual plans under the newly reformed Common Fisheries Policy. |
Two 49ers Will Be Facing Familiar Faces In Game Against Colts
For the second straight week Head Coach Jim Harbaugh is going to be facing off against a former player from his Stanford days. Last week it was cornerback Richard Sherman, and this week he will face Andrew Luck. Unlike the hostile relationship between Sherman and Harbaugh, Luck has nothing but praise for the coach that helped make him the number one overall pick one season ago. The soap opera that was the trash talking between Sherman and Harbaugh made for good off the field action, but this week, it will be the action on the field that will be the star. Not only do you have Luck battling wits with his former coach, but adding to the on field drama is Vernon Davis facing his little brother.
Nobody knows Andrew Luck like Jim Harbaugh. The two spent three years together at Stanford, which means that they have spent more time with each other than their current teams and coaches. As he has shown in his two-year run as the 49er head coach, Harbaugh takes the time to get to know his players, and he will use the inside knowledge he has on Luck to give his defense an upper hand, hoping to frustrate and confuse his former pupil. However, Luck did learn (almost) everything he knows from Harbaugh and is more than capable of turning the tables, making his former coach proud by upsetting the 49ers at Harbaugh’s expense.
Brother vs. Brother
With the constant battle between Luck and Harbaugh happening when the Colts are on offense, on the other side of the ball, Vernon Davis will be going against the guy he has looked out for their entire lives, his little brother Vontae. While the quarterback and coach are battling wits, the two brothers will be engaged physically on the field, and one of them could earn some serious bragging rights for the next family reunion. Vontae plays cornerback and while he will not be the primary player responsible for his brother, it’s inevitable that there will be an on-field meeting. Vontae is lucky enough not to have to cover Vernon, but he is going to have to tackle him, and even if a routine play, for the two of them it will not be. Little brother will look to strike a blow for younger siblings everywhere, while Vernon has to keep Vontae in his place.
A Game Like No Other
While Peyton and Eli Manning have faced each other several times, and this is not the first time that a coach has faced a former player, Sunday’s game will be like none other. Andrew Luck is still trying to prove himself, and has to try to do it not only against an elite defense, but one lead by the coach who helped him get to this spot. When the 49ers have the ball, Vernon and Vontae are not only destined to bump into each other on the field, but when considering the creative play calling of the 49ers, it’s not out of the question that the two line up right across from each other. If this happens, even if just once, and on a running play, it will be must see TV.
There are 24 players on the field at a time, and the outcome of the game will be based on the team that play better, but while the two teams are waging war on each other, it will be interesting to watch the in-game battles between the brothers and coach versus quarterback, as well as the post-game handshakes. While these four individuals may wish well for their upcoming counterparts on most Sundays, this is the NFL, and not even family is more important than a win.
Jerrell Richardson is a Bay Area native who due to a college career at San Diego State University has grown an appreciation for all things sports related in California. His heart will always remain in San Francisco though where he currently resides and covers everything from the San Francisco 49ers and Giants to the San Jose Sharks and California Bears Baseball team. Jerrell is a freelance writer covering all things NFL. His work can be found on Examiner.com. |
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For, and against, Facebook’s Messenger Kids: Part 2 – Against
In the second of two posts looking at the debates surrounding the new Facebook Messenger for Kids app, Alicia Blum-Ross outlines some of the concerns. She argues that we need to know more about whether the app will meet users’ real needs and offer the support that under-13s may require. She also asks if it will lead to more social media platforms trying to engage younger children for commercial reasons. Read the first post about the potential positives the app offers here. Alicia Blum-Ross is a researcher at LSE’s Department of Media and Communications and is part of the Parenting for a Digital Future research project. [Header image credit: Igor Starkov on Unsplash]
On Wednesday, I kicked off my summary of the controversy around Facebook’s new Messenger Kids with my take on the arguments for the app. Today I’ll consider some of the concerns.
1. Is this necessary?
There is a looming question about whether Messenger Kids constructs a problem that Facebook can solve (and make money by doing so), or whether it fulfils a currently unmet need. Many, including the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood’s letter to Mark Zuckerberg imploring him to take down the app, say that if one of the main rationales is for kids to contact relatives, then they can already use their parents’ Facebook, Skype or WhatsApp (etc.) accounts and that they do not need, themselves, to be pulled into social media to do so. So is what is already available sufficient? Yes and no.
I have interviewed many families who are using digital services to keep in contact. Families who use WhatsApp to remind each other of the grocery list or to check when kids get home from school; parents who have communicated – sometimes for years – with their faraway relatives or even their own children over video chat. Digital media are deeply valued by families as a means of keeping in touch (so the aside in the CCFC letter that families should just “pick up the phone” if they want to call relatives sits badly with me). There’s an underlying equity issue here. For example, in writing about differences between privileged and less-privileged middle-schoolers (12- to 14-year-olds) in New York, Christo Sims observed:
“While privileged families, and especially professional parents of girls, tended to view sites like Facebook as youth-centred social space to which their children should be prohibited access until they were older (which ended up happening in 7th or 8th grade for many of these students), many of the less-privileged students had already been on Facebook for several years… Many of these early adopters had been introduced to social media by family members that were geographically distributed, and many had received hand-me-down cell phones so that various adult members of their families could coordinate child rearing alongside work schedules and other commitments. p.124.”
There are many under-13s on Facebook, and, of these, many are from under-resourced families who use it as a valued tool. Perhaps, as the letter suggests, it is fine for parents to give their children selective access to their adult tools like Facebook itself, Skype or WhatsApp, given that these are not intentionally ‘gamified’ and therefore less likely to draw children in. But given that in reality few parents have the time or resources to supervise these 100% of the time this hardly seems sufficient. I believe that kids are better served by using services that are specifically designed with their needs in mind, that are bound by child-specific data protection laws, and that involve collaboration with child-development experts, parents and educators. So yes, Messenger Kids seems to be designed for an existing need, but I don’t know yet whether it will be used by the children who need it most (and are least-protected by existing services), nor with what impact.
2. Commercialism
Speaking of data protection… Facebook has said there will be no advertising on Messenger Kids (again, in accordance with COPPA) and no selling of children’s data. The second point is a little woolly – they won’t sell the data to advertisers but they will use the data to “provide, improve and develop services”. So essentially the registration information and data in the conversations on the platform will be collected and used to improve it – but it will also presumably be used for some potentially well-primed Instagram and Facebook accounts when the kids turn 13. Messenger Kids says the service is ‘standalone’ and there is no automatic transfer of services or opening of new accounts, but surely it creates a strong burgeoning brand awareness.
So while there’s no advertising in Messenger Kids, the whole app could basically be considered as an advertisement for Facebook itself, since it creates a context in which children are engaging with the brand and starting to understand its possibilities, curate their contacts, create valued assets and more. Facebook has been struggling to retain younger users so we can question why, rather than facing the practically challenging (if not impossible) task of kicking users off their platforms, it may want to make the platform attractive for younger children. There’s a real worry that where Facebook goes others might follow – creating a new war for the attention of under-13s. This is concerning as, whether or not you believe Facebook engaged in this process responsibly (which I do, despite there being some controversy), there are many other actors who certainly will not.
3. Social media is ‘addictive’
Some of the most vocal critiques of Messenger Kids, like the letter to Apple from its investors, have had a blatantly protectionist bent. The letter heavily references research that claims that young people have experienced a significant downturn in mental health that is purportedly linked to the introduction of the smartphone and the availability of social media. So advocates are questioning what can be done to protect children from these seemingly inevitable harms.
Before proceeding I should say that there are many critiques of the research on which these arguments are based. First, that the evidence used has been cherry-picked, and isn’t nearly as conclusive as claimed, nor are the changes as ‘sudden’. Second, that the research conflates correlation and causality – so that many of the supposed impacts of social media could also have other explanations. Little of this research actually considers what kids, and parents, want from their use of technology – or how digital media is, or might be, used in positive ways to support children’s mental health and well-being. It seems the simplistic ‘effects’ story – in which technology is considered in isolation and seen as doing things to young people but not for them – wins out, again. This means that the whole debate reads, as Anne Collier described, like a “moral panic on steroids”.
In my opinion, the term ‘addiction,’ in all its intangibility (like the term ‘screen time’) displaces the more grounded conversations that might help parents and children actually determine what exactly they find problematic. That said, many parents and children use the term ‘addicted’ themselves. So whether or not this is a precise diagnosis, the challenges are real and deeply felt – even ‘normal’ use of technology can sometimes cause problems. Asking a six year old to navigate the ‘always on’ culture of social media seems unfair, given children and young people are developing physically, neurologically, and in terms of understanding of their place in the social world. So they may be extra sensitive to not wanting to leave a message unanswered, or to missing out on a fun virtual gathering, or to wanting to be ‘liked’.
Messenger Kids needs to tread carefully to help support kids as they come to understand the ‘rules’ of social media, and needs to be visionary in terms of changing the rules of the game itself. The tried-and-true business model for social media is that more users + more time on the network + more activity = more profit. That can’t work here (and, really, needs to be re-thought everywhere else too). The challenge is real – how can a service for kids be designed to support their communication and relational needs but not be ‘addictive’ (however that is defined)?
This has to start from the end goals and not from the technology. Messenger Kids needs to be intentional about how relationships are supported and not just build absorbing, ‘cool’ features. Some simple suggestions might be:
No push notifications
Features that also invite person-to-person interaction for those sitting next to each other for use with friends, siblings, parents or grandparents
Features that help visualise for children how they’re using the app, such as giving them and their parents both time- and content-based notifications so that they can together negotiate limits and appropriate use
Features that help children and parents visualise and valorise time away from the app as well as on it
Features (badges, even?) that help children understand and demonstrate their increasing responsibility as they ‘grow up’ in the app, for example by guiding younger siblings
Dis-incentivising always-on use – essentially designing whatever the opposite of Snapstreaks is
In addition to practical questions around the app’s design, I also hope that Facebook will commit to independent evaluation, and to making its own research transparent. This will help us understand whether the app is meeting users’ needs or whether it is creating new problems, and whether parents and children who need them are using the tools they provide.
Given that the current status quo doesn’t seem to be getting the balance right – between protecting children and also supporting their rights to participate, learn and create online – I welcome the conversations that the launch of Messenger Kids has started. I’ll be watching this space to see what diverse, thoughtful and accessible content and services for kids and parents might look like, and have measured hopes for Messenger Kids in accomplishing that.
Notes
Disclosure – I have been part of conversations with Facebook about the app in my roles as a researcher and as a consultant, but I have not been paid by Facebook. These conversations have informed my thinking, but I will not reference them directly here.
This post gives the views of the authors and does not represent the position of the LSE Parenting for a Digital Future blog, nor of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
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GLEN ROSE (CBSDFW.COM) - Not only are American nuclear power generators keenly aware of the problems with Japan’s smoldering nuclear reactors, they’re learning from them.
“One thing in the nuclear industry is that we share all the information, its almost like a family,” said Rafael Flores, Chief Nuclear Officer for the Comanche Peak Nuclear Power Plant. “We stick together. We learn from each other and we improve so from my stand point we’ll look at some things that happened there.”
Comanche Peak, 80 miles southwest of Dallas, operates two nuclear units. Japan’s problems come at a crucial time as Comanche Peak’s operator, Luminant, is seeking federal licenses for two more units.
“It brings it to the public’s attention,” said U.S. Representative Joe Barton, (R – Ennis) who visited Comanche Peak Wednesday. “I think its very fair for the public to ask some tough questions about the safety of existing plants and the safety of any potential new plants.”
Which is why Barton’s visit was so important. Barton is the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, a key committee for steering national nuclear power policy in coming years.
Luminant wants to build two next-generation reactors with the help of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd., or MHI, which already builds the reactors in Japan.
In light of the crisis in Japan, the debate now is whether there are enough protections in the new design to continue the lengthy permitting process. Barton says there are.
“Our safety systems in the United States are much more robust than the systems in Japan,” Barton said. “Both our older systems and the new systems that are beginning to be approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.”
The designs and permits proposed by Luminant and MHI are currently under federal review. Luminant hopes to have a license by 2013 and the two new power units online by 2021 or 2022. |
Ramlal Sharma
Professor Ram Lal Sharma was born at Baytoo, a small village in Barmer district of Rajasthan, India in 1941. His father was a poor farmer. Even when he was a student at high school he started to work part-time to support his parents. But he had a strong desire to gain higher education and despite several hardships managed to graduate in Economics from Jai Narain Vyas University, Jodhpur. He was later appointed as a faculty member in the same university. In 1969, under Fulbright Program, he went to study at Arizona University, USA.
During his career as a university teacher he taught at several institutions in India and abroad which included Birla Institute of Technology and Science Pilani, University of Nairobi, Kenya and Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.
Throughout his career he worked on many research projects in Economics.
His second life started after retirement at the age of 60 in 1999. Just before retirement, he started to teach on part-time basis at newly started Aravali Institute of Management at Jodhpur in the year 2000, where he was highly respected. He was proud and delighted to learn that the quality of higher education had started to improve in Rajasthan and private sector was also making its own contribution. He then got appointed at another newly established National Law University, Jodhpur, where he was loved and respected by colleagues and students.
Later he was granted emeritus professorship from University Grants Commission and was working on a project named Money Cycle in India.
His life was full of struggle but he had a strong desire to live his life in a meaningful way.
Apart from teaching he also took an active part in reforming the society. He voiced strong concerns against widely popular culture of "feasts on death"(locally known as Mrityu Bhoj). Despite being born in a brahmin family he was against caste system in India which divides our society in upper and lower castes. He was often sad that in his lifetime he couldn't see elimination of caste system from our society. He was taken ill in 1996 and doctors predicted his life of few weeks. But he rose again and was back to work within a year and never stopped.
In Jan. 2010 he was appointed a faculty at Indian Institute of Technology, Jodhpur where he delivered last lecture of his life. He was taken ill again and developed severe Pneumonia. He was put on Ventilator support and his life was predicted of a few days. Once again proving all predictions wrong he recovered. But unfortunately his heart became weak and he developed severe heart failure.
He was served by equally devoted wife Mrs.Shanti Sharma who looked after him while he was home bound. Throughout his life he never charged any tuition fee from students whom he taught at home. His own room at home was like a classroom where he was surrounded by students .Teaching was his passion and service to the humanity.
On 20 October 2012 he died sitting next to his wife at home. He was a simple soul who started his journey from a small village and made it to several prestigious institutes in India and abroad. He truly lived a meaningful life aimed at improving quality of life of his fellow countrymen. He never received any Prize or glorification from any government or non government bodies. The respect he earned from his students, colleagues and peers was more than any medal or prize. His contribution to education especially in Economics was enormous. He was a true son of Rajasthan. His family members have taken initiative to start Professor Ram Lal Sharma education trust to help improve level of education in the Western Rajasthan.
References
1. Ramlal Sharma
Causality between Money and Price Level in India
Indian Economic Review
New Series, Vol. 19, No. 2 (July–December 1984), pp. 213–221
www.jstor.org/stable/29793399
2. Ram Lal Sharma
Causality between Money and Price level in India Revisited
Working Paper (1987) No 688, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, India
3. Ram lal Sharma
How much does money matter in India by Ram Lal Sharma
Working Paper, No. 1987/703
Publisher: Ahmedabad Indian Institute of Management 1987
http://vslopac.iimahd.ernet.in/cgi-bin/koha/opac- search.pl?q=au:Sharma,%20Ram%20Lal
4. Ram Lal Sharma
Money Price Interest Rate and Output in India (1950-51 to 2005-06)
Rajasthan Economic Journal
Volume 32 No. 1, Jan 2008
5. Prof.Ram lal sharma
Business Cycles in India: Facts and Myths: 1950-2005
http://oldwebsite.ugc.ac.in/financialsupport/humanities08/economics
Category:20th-century Indian economists
Category:People from Barmer district
Category:1940 births
Category:Living people |
First it was Corey Luebke. Then it was Luke Hochevar. Following soon after was Kris Medlen, along with Brandon Beachy, Jarrod Parker, Patrick Corbin, Bruce Rondon, David Hernandez, Peter Moylan, Erik Davis, Cory Gearrin, Bobby Parnell, Matt Moore, Josh Johnson, Ivan Nova, Pedro Figueroa and A.J. Griffin.
And now, reportedly, it’s Jose Fernandez.
Though it’s officially being classified as just an elbow strain, Fernandez would become the 18th major league pitcher to be forced to undergo Tommy John surgery (assuming the reports are true, and he has to have the surgery) since February 18th of this year. Meaning, Fernandez’s quest to win the 2014 National League Cy Young award, after placing third in 2013, would come to an end, as would his season.
While you don’t want a season ending injury to occur to any pitcher, you especially feel for Fernandez. Regardless of the fact that he has come across wrong in the past to a few, select players, he has a ton of fun out there on the mound and is an extremely humble guy. You don’t find both qualities all too often nowadays in major league players.
Coming off a career worst start in San Diego on Friday, in which Fernandez went just five innings, giving up five runs and raising his ERA from 1.74 to 2.44, the poor outing was the first indication that there was something wrong with Fernandez. Normally topping out at around 98 miles per hour on his fastball, Fernandez was throwing at around 91 when he was pulled from Friday’s game, and that drew a ton of attention his way as to what might be wrong. Now we know that there indeed was an issue.
If Fernandez has to undergo Tommy John surgery, it would be the first time in around a year that the Marlins have had to experience games without him toeing the rubber every fifth day. Without Fernandez for an extended period of time, it should be interesting to see how the Marlins fare. They’re off to a great start to the season, and if the pitching performances of Henderson Alvarez, Nathan Eovaldi and Tom Koehler can continue, as well as the hot bats of Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich and Marcell Ozuna, the Marlins should be able to hang in there.
But even so, the loss of Fernandez isn’t something you want to brush off too lightly, because, as stated, he’s not the only pitcher who has been lost from their team for the season. In addition to the 18 major league pitchers previously listed who have fallen victim to Tommy John surgery, 16 minor league pitchers have been faced with the crushing news as well — all since February 18th, which averages out to a new pitcher having to have Tommy John once every 2.5 days.
Something is obviously wrong, and something needs to be done.
The most Tommy John surgeries in a single year since it was first performed on Tommy John himself back in 1974 was 46 in 2012. Sitting just 12 away for 2014, with several months left to go in the season, it’s likely that the number 46 could be surpassed, and that should be enough to make people pay attention.
With there having only been 31 pitchers to have the surgery from it’s debut in 1974 all the way up until 1997, there have been more pitchers so far (33) in 2014 to have the surgery than there were in that 23-year span. That’s a definite problem.
Though the cause for the need of the surgery has been debated, from a pitcher’s mechanics having an impact, to the number of pitches thrown in an outing, or the innings pitched in a season playing a role, more and more people are beginning to look into the stress put on a pitcher’s arm in their youth.
The theory is that with young pitchers, in Little League and such, throwing too hard, too often, and adding in breaking balls too early in their playing years, their arms can’t handle the stress, and they begin to break down long before they reach the majors and have a season ending injury. With year round leagues becoming more popular, as well as multiple leagues for some pitchers, everything combines together for something bad to happen, and that is appearing to be the case.
One solution being pointed out by a lot of people (other than telling kids to lighten up with their velocity and number of games pitched) is for young pitchers to pitch off a flat mound instead of one that’s the same height as a major league pitcher. As Sports Illustrated’s Tom Verducci put it, “[it] makes no sense that 13-year-old kids are pitching off the same size mound as major league pitchers. Little Leaguers should be throwing off flat ground”. I have to agree with Verducci, and if that would help minimize injuries, then I’m all for it.
While Tommy John surgery is now becoming a routine surgery, and one that many pitchers have successfully come back from (a study showed that 97 percent of pitchers make it back to the minors, with 83 percent getting back to the majors, including Tommy John who pitched 14 more years and won 164 more games after his surgery), if it can be avoided altogether, obviously, that’s the more appealing alternative.
Whatever it takes, things need to change.
If you need to lower the mound for Little Leaguers, and perhaps even the major leagues down the road — lower the mound. If you need to issue a plan for young kids with what they’re allowed to do before a certain age — issue a plan. Do something that turns around this increasing Tommy John epidemic. There are far too many of the game’s greatest pitchers having to sit out a season in their prime, and that’s beginning to get very tiresome for the fans, and, I imagine, the players themselves. |
Spurs reach agreements with Bertans, Forbes
San Antonio Spurs guard Bryn Forbes (11) celebrates with teammate guard Patty Mills (8) after a basket during second half action against the Sacramento Kings Monday April 9, 2018 at the AT&T Center. The Spurs won 98-85.
The pact with Bertans calls for the forward to receive $14.5 million over two years, according to Bertans’ agent, Arturs Kalnitis, per Yahoo Sports. Kalnitis confirmed the signing via Twitter.
Bertans, who will turn 26 on Nov. 12, earned $1.3 million last season while averaging 5.3 points on 37.3 percent shooting from 3-point range. The 6-foot-10 Latvian played in 77 games in his second NBA season, including 10 starts.
Logging 80 regular-season games last season after playing in just 36 as a rookie proved a challenge for Forbes.
“It’s been a big adjustment for me,” the 6-3 guard said in April.
Despite his struggles adapting to the physical and mental grind of the NBA’s punishing 82-game season, Forbes showed the Spurs enough for them to give him a two-year deal, a league source said.
Forbes, who will turn 25 on July 23, started last season strong before tailing off. He averaged 6.9 points and 1.0 assists while shooting a team-best 39.0 percent from 3-point range (89 of 228).
“I’ve had my parts of the season where it kind of wears on you mentally and physically, because this is by far the most games I’ve played,” Forbes said in April.
The Michigan State product averaged 2.6 points in 36 games as a rookie after joining the Spurs as an undrafted free agent.
Forbes flashed his potential several times last season, including hitting a late 3-pointer in Phoenix to give the Spurs a 104-101 win over the Suns and scoring a season-high 23 points on 5-of-8 shooting from 3-point range in a 15-point win over Sacramento in January.
Spurs coach Gregg Popovich likes the confidence Forbes has in his shot, comparing him last season to Golden State’s Stephen Curry.
“He’s never seen a shot he didn’t like,” Popovich said. “That’s a good quality when you can shoot the ball well.”
The agreements give the Spurs essentially 13 players with guaranteed contracts. Add in guard Brandon Paul, who has a non-guaranteed deal until Aug. 1, and the number rises to 14.
Guard Darrun Hilliard, who was on a two-way deal last season, is their lone remaining restricted free agent, although the Spurs can rescind his qualifying offer should they want to open a spot for a non-guaranteed player to attempt to make the roster.
NBA teams can carry up to 20 players in the offseason but are limited to 15 in the regular season, plus a pair of two-way players who would spend most of their time in the G League.
After three years as a part-time employee covering mainly high school sports, Tom Orsborn became a full-time employee at the Express-News in October 1985. He's covered the Dallas Cowboys and the NFL since 1999 and has also covered the Spurs, the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, and a variety of other events, including 14 Super Bowls. |
The present invention is related to power system architectures and in particular to pneumatic and electric power system architectures employed in aircraft.
Power distribution systems in aircraft operate to transfer energy from one part of the aircraft to another. Power can be distributed in various forms, including hydraulically, pneumatically, and electrically. Traditionally, there is little interaction between these systems. For example, the hydraulic distribution system does not interact with the electrical distribution system or the pneumatic distribution system. For example, one type of aircraft may rely mostly on pneumatic systems that distribute bleed air (e.g., compressed air generated by the aircraft engines) to various systems throughout the aircraft. For example, pneumatic power provided by an auxiliary power unit (APU) can be used to start a main aircraft engine. Pneumatic power provided by the main engine can be used to spin turbine and/or compressors associated with environmental control systems on the aircraft. However, the extraction of bleed air from the engine reduces the overall efficiency of the engine, particularly during certain flight segments. Furthermore, the distribution of pneumatic power requires large amounts of piping which increases the cost and weight of the aircraft, thereby further decreasing efficiency.
An alternative to pneumatic power is electrical power, which is generated by converting the rotational, mechanical energy associated with the aircraft engines and/or APU to electrical energy that is distributed throughout the aircraft. Instead of supplying pneumatic power to spin turbines and/or compressors associated with the environmental control systems, electrical energy is distributed to motors which in turn spin the turbines and/or compressors associated with the environmental control systems. However, torque generated by the electrical generator also contributes to decreased efficiency of the aircraft engine, particularly during certain flight segments. |
Soda tax will hurt small businesses the most
We don't need another regressive tax. We need more jobs
Like a lot of supposedly well-meaning attempts by politicians to exert more control over products that they don’t like, Gov. Ned Lamont’s recent proposal to impose the country’s first state-wide beverage tax is doomed to backfire. In fact, a beverage tax will damage Connecticut’s ability to keep jobs in the state working as families are already dealing with the high cost of living in Connecticut.
The reality is that a regressive tax like a beverage tax will only make things worse economically, especially for people working paycheck to paycheck and small businesses who are working to keep their doors open and their employees gainfully employed. If the governor and legislators are trying to do what is best for Connecticut’s residents, their economic priority should focus on improving job opportunities, not shipping them out of the state.
The largest impact of this tax will be seen in the thousands of small businesses that compete with stores on the other side of the state line, including grocery stores,restaurants, corner stores, bodegas and movie theaters. While the proposed tax is bad for all consumers, people in underserved communities will be hit especially hard since much of these working-class communities rely on these neighborhood businesses for their livelihood.
Connecticut sadly has the third highest rate in the country of people moving out of the state. The reason? A lack of job opportunities. The proposed beverage tax will make the situation worse. As we’ve already seen in other places such as Philadelphia,these types of burdensome laws prompt consumers to shop across state lines—and while the catalyst comes from higher taxes, once consumers are in out of state, they will do the rest of their grocery shopping.
In Philadelphia’s case, an estimated 1,200 jobs were lost in worker layoffs and cuts in work hours, including for blue collar workers—folks who work in the grocery stores themselves or are truck drivers, for instance.
In addition to the job losses, this tax will disproportionately affect lower income families who already struggle to make ends meet. While higher income individuals will be able to shrug off the tax, families living paycheck to paycheck will feel the pinch in their pocketbooks. If Connecticut lawmakers are looking for ways to increase revenue, the funds should come from broad-based approaches that don’t just target the state’s most vulnerable populations.
One example of underserved communities bearing a disproportionate share of the burden of taxes like what Gov. Lamont wants to impose on consumers of certain beverages, is Connecticut’s growing Hispanic population. Connecticut has the highest rate of Hispanic unemployment in the country and Gov. Lamont’s beverage tax would only exacerbate this problem.
The governor and like-minded allies should rethink his proposal to increase all forms of harmful taxes, and especially should reconsider proposals like the beverage tax that disproportionately harm underserved communities. There is already an alarming trend of residents being priced out of the neighborhoods that they’ve lived in for years because of price increases, the higher cost of living, and fewer jobs. A state beverage tax will only make things worse.
Mario H. Lopez is President of the Hispanic Leadership Fund, a public policy advocacy organization that promotes liberty, opportunity and prosperity for all Americans.
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Rai has instructed the BCCI's Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) chief Neeraj Kumar to look into the corruption allegations levelled against Shami by his wife.
Hasin Jahan  |  Photo Credit: PTI
Team India pacer Mohammed Shami's wife Hasin Jahan has raised numerous allegations against her husband, with match-fixing being one of the most serious ones as far as the cricketer's career is concerned. Hasin has now formally sent the documents related to her complaints against her husband to the BCCI's Committee of Administrators (CoA) chairman Vinod Rai for a probe into her allegations of corruption, her lawyer revealed on Thursday. Rai had previously confirmed that BCCI will launch a probe into the matter and find out if there's any truth behind Shami's wife's allegations that the pace bowler had taken money from a Dubai-based woman for alleged corruption. "We have sent the details of the complaint that was lodged at Lalbazar (Kolkata Police headquarters) and the copy of the FIR to Vinod Rai," Jahan's lawyer Zakir Hussain said.
Jahan has alleged that Shami had taken money from a Pakistani woman named Alishba on the insistence of an England-based businessman, Mohammad Bhai. Rai has instructed the BCCI's Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) chief Neeraj Kumar to look into the corruption allegations levelled against Shami by his wife. (READ | Jahan kept me in dark about her first marriage, kids: Shami)
"This has reference to the various media reports pertaining to allegations against Md. Shami. The Committee of Administrators has listened to the audio recording of a telephonic conversation which it is claimed is between Md. Shami and his wife. The said audio recording is available in public domain," Rai wrote in a letter after the recording of Shami and Hasin's telephonic conversation became public.
Jahan had filed a police complaint against the pacer, alleging infidelity and domestic violence, which had resulted in the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) withholding Shami's central contract.
The Kolkata Police had last week booked Shami and four others under various sections of the IPC, following Jahan's complaint.
The case was lodged under sections 498A (cruelty to a woman by her husband or his relatives), 307 (attempt to murder), 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 376 (rape), 506 (criminal intimidation), 328 (causing hurt by means of poison) of the Indian Penal Code. |
Frontier Airlines disputed a woman’s claims about the circumstances of her being kicked off a flight and taken into custody at McCarran International Airport this week.
Rosetta Swinney is arrested by Las Vegas police at McCarran International Airport on Saturday, April 20, 2019. (Nikki Nickole via Facebook/screengrab)
Frontier Airlines disputed a woman’s claims about the circumstances of her being kicked off a flight and taken into custody at McCarran International Airport this week.
In Facebook videos posted Saturday, a woman is seen arguing with airline staff about what she said was vomit on her daughter’s seat. In another video, she’s seen talking to police, who are telling her to leave the flight.
The last video shows the woman in handcuffs off the plane and at the gate inside the airport terminal, yelling “they going to try to arrest me because they have throw-up on the plane?” Also in the video is a crying girl, whom the handcuffed woman says is her 14-year-old daughter.
The Facebook user who posted the videos wrote that there was vomit on a seat from a prior flight, which got on the girl’s backpack and hands. She also wrote that a flight attendant “refused to clean up the vomit because ‘it’s not her job’ and instead handed the passenger a Clorox wipe to clean it up herself.”
“They won’t let her move her seat,” the woman filming the videos is heard saying in one clip.
According to the Facebook post, the flight attendant called security officers, who asked the woman to leave the flight. When she refused, security called the Metropolitan Police Department, who had everyone deplane after the woman again refused to leave.
The woman who was handcuffed was identified as Rosetta Swinney in news reports. In an interview with a North Carolina TV station, Swinney said the flight attendant did not clean up the mess or reassign her seat.
In a Wednesday night statement emailed to the Review-Journal, Frontier Airlines said flight attendants “apologized and immediately invited the mother and her teenage daughter to move to either end of the plane” after the vomit was found.
The flight from Las Vegas was heading to the Raleigh-Durham International Airport in North Carolina, the airline said.
“The mother and daughter were also told that once boarding was complete they would be provided other seats if available,” the airline said. “The daughter was also offered cleaning products for herself and invited to use the lavatory to wash up.”
The airline said the woman was “unsatisfied with the response and became disruptive,” which prompted flight attendants to attempt to remove the two from the flight.
“The mother refused, and following procedure, law enforcement was called,” the airline said, noting later in the statement that “we apologized to our passengers for the inconvenience caused by the departure delay. The safety of passengers and crew is our top priority at Frontier.”
Contact Katelyn Newberg at knewberg@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0240. Follow @k_newberg on Twitter. |
describe('plugins.controller.plugins-controller', function () {
beforeEach(module('webApp'));
beforeEach(module('api/pluginList.json'));
var ctrl, scope, entityFactoryMock, fakePluginList, modalServiceMock, utilsServiceMock;
var fakePluginName = "plugin";
//init mock modules
beforeEach(inject(function ($controller, $q, $rootScope, _apiPluginList_, $httpBackend) {
scope = $rootScope.$new();
fakePluginList = _apiPluginList_;
entityFactoryMock = jasmine.createSpyObj('EntityFactory', ['getAllPlugins']);
entityFactoryMock.getAllPlugins.and.callFake(function () {
var defer = $q.defer();
defer.resolve(fakePluginList);
return defer.promise;
});
modalServiceMock = jasmine.createSpyObj('ModalService', ['openModal']);
modalServiceMock.openModal.and.callFake(function () {
var defer = $q.defer();
defer.resolve();
return {
"result": defer.promise
};
});
utilsServiceMock = jasmine.createSpyObj('UtilsService', ['getArrayElementPosition']);
httpBackend = $httpBackend;
httpBackend.when('GET', 'languages/en-US.json').respond({});
ctrl = $controller('PluginsListCtrl', {
'$scope': scope,
'EntityFactory': entityFactoryMock,
'ModalService': modalServiceMock,
'UtilsService': utilsServiceMock
});
}));
describe("when it is initialized", function () {
it("should request the current plugin list", function () {
expect(entityFactoryMock.getAllPlugins).toHaveBeenCalled();
});
it("should get plugin list", function () {
entityFactoryMock.getAllPlugins().then(function (plugins) {
expect(plugins).toBe(fakePluginList);
});
})
});
describe("should be able to create a plugin", function () {
beforeEach(function () {
ctrl.pluginsData = fakePluginList;
});
it("show a creation modal", function () {
ctrl.createPlugin();
expect(modalServiceMock.openModal).toHaveBeenCalled();
var args = modalServiceMock.openModal.calls.mostRecent().args;
expect(args[0]).toBe('CreateEntityModalCtrl');
});
it("should reload plugin list when its one is created", function () {
ctrl.createPlugin().then(function (plugins) {
expect(entityFactoryMock.getAllPlugins.calls.count()).toEqual(2);
});
scope.$digest();
});
});
describe("should be able to delete a plugin", function () {
beforeEach(function () {
ctrl.pluginsData = fakePluginList;
});
it("show a delete plugin confirmation", function () {
ctrl.deletePlugin(fakePluginName);
expect(modalServiceMock.openModal).toHaveBeenCalled();
var args = modalServiceMock.openModal.calls.mostRecent().args;
expect(args[0]).toBe('DeleteEntityModalCtrl');
})
it("should delete plugin when its confirmed", function () {
var currentPluginListLength = ctrl.pluginsData.length;
ctrl.deletePlugin(fakePluginName).then(function () {
expect(ctrl.pluginsData.length).toBe(currentPluginListLength - 1);
});
scope.$digest();
});
});
it("should be able to order plugin list", function(){
ctrl.pluginsData = fakePluginList;
var currentSortField = ctrl.sortField;
ctrl.sortPlugins("fileName");
expect(ctrl.tableReverse).toBe(true);
expect(ctrl.sortField).toBe(currentSortField);
currentSortField = ctrl.sortField;
ctrl.sortPlugins("uri");
expect(ctrl.sortField).not.toBe(currentSortField);
expect(ctrl.tableReverse).toBe(false);
});
});
|
This invention relates to a method of controlling supercharging pressure in an internal combustion engine equipped with a supercharger, and more particularly to an improved method of properly controlling the supercharging pressure at acceleration of the engine.
A supercharging pressure control method for internal combustion engines has conventionally been known, e.g. from Japanese Provisional Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 61-175,239, in which a supercharging pressure control system selectively controls a control valve between (i) a first position in which the cross-sectional area of a passage for exhaust gases for rotating a turbine of the supercharger is increased to make the supercharging pressure higher, and (ii) a second position in which the cross-sectional area of the passage is reduced to make the supercharging pressure lower, in dependence on operating conditions of the engine. At acceleration of the engine, the control valve is brought into and held in the first position for a predetermined period of time after acceleration of the engine has been detected, to thereby enhance the responsiveness of the engine.
However, according to the conventional control method, good accelerability of the engine may not be obtained, depending upon the behavior of the supercharging pressure. Specifically, according to the method, acceleration of the engine is detected based upon the amount of intake air and the rate of change of the opening of a throttle valve of the engine, in such a manner that the engine is deemed to be in a condition of acceleration if both the amount of intake air and the throttle valve change rate are higher than respective predetermined values. When the engine is thus determined to be in a condition of acceleration, the control valve is brought into the first position so as to obtain the maximum supercharging effect. However, as shown by the broken line in FIG. 1, when the driver steps on the accelerator pedal in order to accelerate the engine, for example, the opening .theta.th of the throttle valve mechanically connected to the accelerator pedal increases immediately, as at time point t1 in the figure; whereas the amount of intake air increases due to the supercharging effect, but with some time lag. Therefore, the acceleration is detected with delay as at time point t2. This results in a delay in the rise of the supercharging pressure P.sub.BATC and hence degraded accelerability.
Since the predetermined period of time over which the control valve is held in the first position is set in dependence on the rotational speed of the engine as well as the rate of change of the throttle valve opening, it is impossible to effect the supercharging pressure control in response to the actual rate of rise of the supercharging pressure. For example, when the rate of rise is high, overboost of the supercharging pressure can occur, as at the period between time points t3-t4; whereas when the rate of rise is low, the predetermined period of time elapses so that the control valve is brought out of the first position before the supercharging pressure rises to a sufficient level, as at time point t5, resulting in poor responsiveness at the acceleration of the engine. |
News
Morsi, Brotherhood sentenced on conspiracy charges
A Cairo court has passed death sentences on several Muslim Brotherhood leaders. In the same case of alleged conspiracy with foreign groups, ex-president Mohammed Morsi and 16 others got jail terms.
Morsi was sentenced to 25 years jail on Tuesday as Egypt awaiting the court's verdict in another case against the ex-president and 106 Brotherhood supporters over a mass jail break in 2011.
That was during an uprising that toppled long-time ruler, Hosny Mubarak.
Last month, the court had referred the jailbreak case to Egypt's chief Islamic legal authority, the Grand Mufti, for his opinion on potential death sentences.
Western leaders then appealed to Egyptian authorities to rethink the penalty.
Morsi and Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie were convicted of kidnapping and killing police officers during that breakout.
Death penalties for alleged conspiracy
Among Tuesday's conspiracy case verdicts, the court issued death sentences against other Brotherhood leaders named as Khairat el-Shater, Mohamed el-Beltagy and Ahmed Abdelaty.
Death verdicts were also issued against a dozen other accused but in absentia.
The defendants had been accused of spying on behalf of the international Muslim Brotherhood organisation and Hamas from 2005 to August 2013 "with the aim of perpetrating terror attacks in the country in order to spread chaos and topple the state."
Alongside Morsi, the court also imposed long jail terms on Brotherhood spiritual guide Mohamed Badie and more than a dozen others.
Crackdown by al-Sisi
Morsi became Egypt's first democratically elected president - after Mubarak's ouster - but was overthrown in 2013 by the army.
Its head Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was subsequently elected president.
Authorities then cracked down heavily on Morsi supporters, leaving at least 1,400 people dead and more than 40,000 in custody, according to Human Rights Watch.
The crackdown has also extended to secular and leftwing activists, who spearheaded the 2011 revolt against Mubarak. Dozens have been jailed under a law that bans all but police-sanctioned demonstrations. |
Q:
How can I retrieve a list of Azure DevOps Wiki pages to be able to edit them?
I'm using the .NET client API to access our Azure DevOps server.
How can I retrieve a list of Wiki pages, so I can edit their content and store the changes then?
Here's what I got so far:
using (WikiHttpClient client = new WikiHttpClient(App.ProjectUrl, new VssCredentials()))
{
using (Stream s = await client.GetPageTextAsync(ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["RepositoryContext"], ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["WikiPageName"]))
using (StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(s))
{
string text = sr.ReadToEnd();
}
}
I don't seem to be able to find the correct WikiPageName, so I need a list of all of the project's Wiki pages to be able to enumerate and retrieve the correct name of the page.
Edit
Here's the requested screenshot:
Here's the URL used:
http://tfs.***.***.loc:8080/tfs/***Collection/******Manager-Plus/_wiki/wikis/******Manager-Plus.wiki?wikiVersion=GBwikiMaster&pagePath=%2FDM%252DRelease%C3%BCbersicht&pageId=6
And this is the value I'm using:
<add key="WikiPageName" value="DM-Releaseübersicht"/>
A:
You can fetch the wikis metadata with the method GetAllWikisAsyc, in the results you will get the wikiIdentifier to use in the method GetPageTestAsync. but you will need the page path, currently you can't fetch the paths with the API, you should manually check it (is the wiki page title) and put it in the method:
var wikis = client.GetAllWikisAsync("Project").Result.
using (Stream S = client.GetPageTextAsync("Project", wikis[0].Id, path: "Test").Result)
{
using (StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(s))
{
string text = sr.ReadToEnd();
}
};
|
Rewriting TeamUp Labs
For many years I’ve felt strongly that choosing to rewrite a piece of software is something you have to think really hard about. You have to have good reasons to do it, and it’s often the wrong choice. It’s a classic issue in software engineering where you think it won’t take long, and that you’ll quickly be back to productivity.
In reality it will take longer than you thought. You will hit problems you didn’t expect. It will either shut down progress on features, or feature work will continue while the rewriters chase the tail of the legacy version, trying to reach parity.
This is what we went through over the last four months at TeamUp Labs. Yes, we probably should have refactored the NodeJS codebase and got to know Node a little better, but we decided to switch to .NET Core principally because it’s what the developers are used to and what we would like to get better at.
The main issue we faced was quantity of work. The specific pain points were rewriting the authentication code and migrating users to the new database schema. We used .NET Core identity for this, which gets you moving quickly. When you want to customise it a little you start having to scaffold a ton of UI, fixing it up to work the way you need it to. We did consider using Auth0 or Amazon Cognito services to handle authentication (including UI). I think we are still open to those in the future, but they may have taken just as long to implement and migrate to and we didn’t consider them early enough. It’s really boring to write authentication code – it’s something every web app needs, so it should be just there.
Here are the features we are wishing we’d been working on over the last four months:
Mixpanel user analytics integration. This will give us a much better ability to understand our users, so we can deliver them a better product. It will probably be the first thing we work on next and shouldn’t take too long. It will answer questions like “of users who try the app, how many come back in one week, ten weeks etc.”
Organisations. This means the ability for users to belong to an organisation, so that they can share Example Maps – our highest voted for feature.
More external login providers (a.g. Twitter and Microsoft).
The ability to try our app without signing in or registering.
Story splitting.
Drag and drop.
Many more!
In retrospect I think that .NET Core will give us some benefits, but I am on the fence about whether it warranted the effort. If a user had been at the meeting when we were deciding this I’m pretty sure they would have preferred the new features.
We do have one new feature as a result of the rewrite, and that is the ability to register / signin using username / password. Before we just had Google Auth. You can try it out here: Teamup Labs Example Mapping Tool |
Collection of the best infographics & data visualization on the Web!
How to Choose Between Bonds, CDs, and Savings Accounts
So, you’ve got some cash, and you want to invest it in something other than a bank account. Understandable, considering the interest rate these days on moola in the bank amounts to diddly squat. So, what do you do with it. Well, the answer to that question depends on how much cash you have. First and foremost though, the answer hinges on whether you need access to your money.
This easy-to-understand chart presents you with several options depending on how quickly you need to be able to withdraw money from the account. If you need to be able to take out cash on a weekly or monthly basis, then stick with a savings account to avoid fees. If you want to earn a little bit of money and don’t have a problem with keeping your money locked away for a year, then pick a one year CD. Now, in my opinion, this is the absolute worst option no matter what your financial situation is because interest rates are incredibly low at the moment. The money you will make cannot justify you putting it in a CD for a single year. I would personally always aim to put cash into a CD that lasts for two years or longer. If you can afford to put cash in a 1-year CD, then odds are that you can probably afford a 2-year CD as well, and that’s a better option. But that’s just my opinion, and I’m not a financial adviser. I’m just some guy writing this post with an opinion.
Now, if you have over $250,000 to invest, then you have some options. The reality, of course, is that if you have that much money to invest then you have way more options than CDs or bonds, but that goes beyond the scope of this graphic. The graphic points out that a five year CD is actually a ridiculous option (it doesn’t use those words, but implies that) if you have $250,000 to invest and are presumably at an age where you can risk that kind of money. Interest rates are horrible, and if you have that much money to risk, you are much better off putting it in the stock market, in real estate, in a hedge fund, in a business venture etc. etc. Of course, you can only invest in a hedge fund or say, as a limited partner in a venture capital or private equity firm if you’re an accredited investor, but odds are that if you have $250,000 to play with, then you probably are a sophisticated, accredited investor. And in this case, the idea of putting $250,000 in a non-FDIC insured account that can only earn about 2.5% interest over five years wouldn’t even cross your mind. Seriously, think about it. Tie $250,000 up for five years to earn a measly $6,250 (with no guarantee that you’ll even earn it). No thanks.
Is a B- too kind? This graphic is intentionally minimalistic, and on this blog, that approach is rarely rewarded unless the minimalistic design is extremely unique in some way. The graphic’s design does make the concept easy to comprehend, so I suppose it deserves some points for that.
Content: B-
Again, too generous? There isn’t much there, there–as Richard Dreyfuss would say. No quirky facts or unusual insights–the kind of things we’ve grown accustom to here at the infographic showcase. I think this graphic is functional, but I don’t know what redeeming qualities it has beyond its narrow educational purpose. |
The ‘incursion’ by Chinese soldiers in the Depsang Plains in Ladakh in the Western Sector of the disputed Sino-Indian boundary raises some fundamental questions about the nature of the disputed territory and about Indian and Chinese policies.
First, what is the status of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) between India and China? The Chinese and the Indian sides do not agree on a common LAC and nor have maps been exchanged of this region. As long as that is the case, ‘incursions’ will take place. Such incursions are normal and have taken place also from the Indian side as then Indian Army Chief Gen. Deepak Kapoor admitted several years ago. Chinese official statements that they have not intruded into Indian territory must be seen in this light – as far as they are concerned, they are on ‘Chinese’ territory.
Why have the incursions taken place now? If an Indian Ministry of Defence statement that 500 incursions have taken place since 2010 is to be believed then this means that barring the winter months when most of the disputed territory can be inaccessible, these incursions are pretty much happening all through the year. So there is little if any connection to the fact that Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will be visiting India next month or the fact that a Chinese leadership transition has been underway over the last few months. It is even possible that given that a high-level visit is due, the Chinese will also be just as keen to resolve the matter amicably.
But if incursions are frequent and normal, what explains the fact that this incident has involved so many soldiers (anywhere from 20-50 according to various news reports), that the incursion has been at such a large distance inside ‘Indian territory’ (some 19kms according to the Defence Secretary) and that the Chinese soldiers have camped in the area?
The Chinese have traditionally only intruded into those areas where Indian claims have been the weakest for example into Indian claimed areas north of the MacMahon Line in Arunachal Pradesh or possibly, from a military point of view, into areas where the Indians have the least capability in terms of logistics. The choice of the current spot near Daulat Beg Oldi where India built an Advanced Landing Ground for its Air Force, in 2008 might involve each of the above factors including as a reaction to the building of the airstrip. It is just as possible that this is a local level action of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army without permission from higher authorities.
Nevertheless, it is unlikely that the Chinese can stay put in this area for any length of time given the nature of the terrain and weather in this area. Even for the Chinese, as good as infrastructure is on their side of the LAC compared to India, this will be an expensive and difficult operation to sustain. Therefore, it is important for both sides to not let the situation get out of hand. Such tactical moves must be expected but the option to talk and negotiate should not be ruled out. China and India are important global players and cannot afford to tarnish their reputation by getting into a firefight over what is in the larger scheme of things a relatively minor incident.
An old porter who served the Indian Army during the 1962 conflict in the DBO area (photo from August 2007 in the Nubra Valley)
Still, what does this incident say about India’s capabilities? The most important lesson – and this is not a new lesson – is that India’s road, rail and communications infrastructure in its border regions all along the Himalayas is still pretty poor despite efforts in recent years under the government’s accelerated border road building programme. While the Chinese have the advantage of easier terrain on their side, infrastructure building today is no longer the huge technical or financial challenge it was in 1962. But even today, as it was then, there is a lack of coordination between different government ministries and between the state and central governments, on such projects with the different actors also prioritizing the development of India’s border regions differently.
To negotiate successfully, India must do so from a position of strength and the situation on the ground in terms of infrastructure and logistics is not one that we can be confident about and therefore, the military option is not an easy one. Meanwhile, there is genuine disaffection from Ladakh to Arunachal where people say that facilities and access on the Chinese side are so much better than on the Indian side. Lack of infrastructure development in India’s border areas therefore does not only have military implications, it also has political ramifications.
How to interpret Chinese actions? It might seem as if China is opening up multiple fronts at the same time – against Japan and several ASEAN countries in the east and now, with India in the west. It would appear that Beijing believes that none of these countries can do anything but protest. No one is likely to pick an actual military fight with the Chinese and even if they did, they still would not or could not do it all together or simultaneously. So the Chinese continue with their endeavour to change the status quo or the situation on the ground in their favour from the Senkakus to Ladakh. That said, Beijing has managed to get all its neighbours worried about its intentions and its actions make it difficult to cast itself as a responsible actor on the international stage.
jacob sir, i met you first time in bhu when one seminar was held in the foreign language department. i was the student on that time.although i wanted to continue my study but somehow i stopped my study due to bad financial situation. now i am working with a company here in noida. i still want to finish my phd but not in a situation leave my current job. i need your suggestion and want to join ics. i have done my post graduation in chinese and clear the net exam in dec 2012 .
sir, above article is again a master piece written by you.
thank you so much for providing me such a rare information.
shubhesh
Shubhesh, i am going to put your email on the ICS mailing list for events. If you should find time, one of these days to attend an event or to visit the ICS, then perhaps, we can have a chat. just let me know in advance at jabinjacob@gmail.com
Hi Jabin, timely piece on Ladakh incursions, which I think is important for Indians to understand better about the real existing problems on the so called ‘Sino-Indian border’. I read it all and agreed upon what you wrote as China feels that counterparts will do nothing but protest. However, such protest on border incursions are not new and China continues to intrude into Indian territories. So, then, what should India do and what lessons India get from such intrusions.
There is an old Tibetan saying, ‘Neglect the root, and hold the branch’, which I think India continues to do so, when it comes to border issues. In your piece, I did not find even a single word mentioning ‘Tibet’, which so far was a contributing state in the history of Indian border sharing along the Himalayan belt. By sidelining the Tibet issues, as both India and China feels uncomfortable talking about, had convened more than a dozen border talks. But, ended without much concrete result. I believe that as long as Tibet issue remains unresolved, border problems will exist and incursions are bound to happen. Remember Mao’s ‘One palm and Five Fingers’ territorial expansionism thought, it might be rhetoric, but it is still valid in the mindset of chauvinistic Han dominated PRC.
Tenzin, i do not deny that the status of Tibet is at the heart of the Sino-Indian boundary dispute – for the Chinese government it is their inability to pacify and bring Tibetans living in China under absolute and complete control while for the Indian government, it is the inability to handle the loss of a buffer against Chinese power. That said, in my view, I think the New Delhi has, like other governments around the world, resigned itself to the fact that Tibetan independence is an unlikely prospect and that therefore it must deal with the reality of Chinese power. And quite frankly, I also don’t see how anything that the Tibetan movement in exile does is going to bring it closer to realizing Tibetan independence. I see that the Tibetan independence movement’s greatest power lies within China itself and i am not sure that the exile movement really has much control or sway over what goes on in the larger Tibetan community within China – i am happy to be corrected, if wrong. However, the reality of contemporary Chinese and global politics is such that this movement within China can only gain a few concessions at the most in terms of greater autonomy for the Tibetan people.
What a movement by Tibetan people within China could more likely achieve is to change China and the attitudes of Han Chinese from within as part of the Chinese state – to push China towards being a more open society tolerant and accepting of diversity not just of ethnicity but of views. From what i understand of His Holiness, he certainly gets this bigger picture and bigger goal than just Tibetan independence. The question is whether ordinary Tibetans and their temporal leaders also get it.
As for this article, it was intended to explain the subject to a non-English-speaking audience not much inthe know of international affairs or indeed, Sino-Indian relations. They already feel strongly and positively about Tibet but they need to be better aware about the realities of the Sino-Indian relationship itself. |
Simultaneous detection of toxin A and toxin B genetic determinants of Clostridium difficile using the multiplex polymerase chain reaction.
A multiplex polymerase chain reaction was developed to simultaneously detect the presence of toxin A and toxin B genes of Clostridium difficile. A 1050-bp fragment of the toxin B gene and a 1217-bp fragment of the toxin A gene were amplified from 42 toxic strains of C. difficile; however, from 10 nontoxic strains the toxin gene fragments were not amplified; these data demonstrate that this multiplex polymerase chain reaction procedure can be used to differentiate between toxic and nontoxic strains. This sensitive and specific multiplex polymerase chain reaction for C. difficile toxins may prove to be a valuable diagnostic procedure. |
, 0 = -3*h - 5*l - 18 + 5. Let s(m) = -m**3 + 4*m**2 + 5. Let p be s(h). Solve -16 = -p*y + y for y.
4
Let a be (-32)/(-128)*(1 + -1). Suppose a = -s - 29*s + 660. Solve -5*g - s = -2 for g.
-4
Suppose -v = -3*y + 1, -1 = 4*v + 3*y + 3. Let j be (-6 - 160/(-24))*(-9)/v. Suppose -j = 4*o - 18. Solve -o*a = 15 - 3 for a.
-4
Let y be (0 + (-10)/4)/(76/(-760)). Suppose 0 = -11*q + y + 96. Solve 3*b + q = -1 for b.
-4
Let z(j) = 2*j**2 + 9*j - 12. Let m(f) = 10*f - 76. Let b be m(7). Let q be z(b). Solve q*k = 2*k for k.
0
Let k = -5091 + 5133. Solve -40*g + 12 = -k*g for g.
-6
Let j be 56/147*3 - (-3732)/42. Solve -j = -18*u - 12*u for u.
3
Let r = 155 + -155. Let i be 0 + 3 - 4 - -8. Let j = -3 + i. Solve 9*b - j*b - 15 = r for b.
3
Let k be 21*(-6)/14*(-64)/36. Solve 24*m = k*m - 24 for m.
-3
Let z(f) = f**3 - 38*f**2 + 141*f - 21. Let p be z(34). Solve -p + 185 = -18*a for a.
-2
Suppose 82 = -15*s + 112. Solve 5*x - s + 37 = 0 for x.
-7
Suppose 8474*r = 8572*r - 2450. Solve r*d = d - 48 for d.
-2
Suppose 0 = q + 2*f - 13, -10*f + 12*f - 28 = -2*q. Suppose -6*i - q = -39. Suppose -4*d = -9*d + 40. Solve -i*a = -6*a - d for a.
-4
Let s = -6003 - -6030. Solve -s = 32*c - 23*c for c.
-3
Let g = -1360 - -1372. Solve 10*q - g = 4*q for q.
2
Let b = -1402 + 1402. Solve 5*u - 62 + 52 = b for u.
2
Suppose 0 = 5*a + 4*w - 27, a + 6*w - 18 = w. Let c(s) = 2*s + 7. Let f be c(a). Suppose 18*l - f*l - 25 = 0. Solve 0 = -3*j + l*j + 6 for j.
-3
Let y(h) = -h**3 - h**2 - 2*h - 12. Let k be y(0). Let l(p) = p + 21. Let c be l(-31). Let i be k/(-20) - ((-16)/c - 1). Solve -u + 4 - 1 = i for u.
3
Let c(b) = 9*b**2 - 85*b - 50. Let a be c(10). Solve 11*l + 45 - 111 = a for l.
6
Let y = -5163 + 5165. Let o = -2 + 3. Suppose 5*a - 9 = 2*a - z, -a - z = -3. Solve -o - a = -y*u for u.
2
Suppose a - 61 = -5*w, 4*a - 5 - 23 = -2*w. Solve -w - 13 = 5*c for c.
-5
Let v(o) = -2*o**3 + 3*o**2 + 19*o + 8. Let d be v(4). Let k be (-8)/(d/(-42) + (-352)/1155). Solve 0 = -3*r - 2*r + k for r.
4
Suppose 0 = a - 1 - 2. Let t be (a/5)/((-6)/(-30)). Let r(y) = y**3 - 8*y**2 + 4*y - 32. Let m be r(8). Solve 0 = t*d - m*d - 6 for d.
2
Let o(g) = -10*g**2 + 29*g + 32 + 31 - 37*g**3 + 36*g**3. Let j be o(-12). Solve 1 = 2*s - j for s.
2
Let n = 7 - 4. Let v be 38/8 - (-10)/8. Suppose -v*u = u - 84. Solve -u = -3*p - n for p.
3
Suppose 22*n + 38*n = 8*n + 5668. Solve 25*z - n = -34 for z.
3
Suppose -36*g = p - 31*g - 24, 4 = 2*p - g. Suppose h + p*h = 145. Solve -29 + h = i for i.
0
Let j = -45459 - -45526. Solve 0 = 42*n - j*n + 175 for n.
7
Let b = -50 + 59. Let a(t) = 6*t - 50. Let y be a(b). Suppose 2*s + c - y = 0, -6*c = 3*s - 5*c - 6. Solve 0 = -s*x + 3*x - 2 for x.
2
Let v = -19114 - -19118. Let h be 22 + (-1)/((-4)/(-8)). Let j = -6 + 10. Solve h = -v*w + j for w.
-4
Let s(c) = -c + 6. Let b be s(5). Let v(f) = f**3 - 9*f**2 + 16*f - 12. Let x be v(7). Let n be (x/(-5))/((-6)/90*b). Solve 4*o - n = 6 for o.
3
Let x(k) = -128*k - 3199. Let v be x(-25). Let z(n) = n + 7. Let g be z(-5). Suppose -h - 3*h + 6 = 5*l, l + g = 0. Solve 0 = 3*t + v - h for t.
1
Let c = -19499 - -19843. Solve 34*p + c = 72 for p.
-8
Let d be 10/4*48/(-120)*(-5)/1. Solve 13*n = -21 - d for n.
-2
Let m(p) = -p - 2. Let y be 18/(-22) - (-6)/(-33). Let s(n) = 49*n + 119. Let d(k) = y*s(k) - 42*m(k). Let g be d(-5). Solve g*z = -z for z.
0
Let d = 112 + -77. Suppose -2*o - 4 = -37*j + d*j, 5*o = -5*j + 30. Solve -o = 3*c + 4 for c.
-2
Let i(a) = -a**3 + 3*a**2 - 2. Let n be i(2). Suppose -2*q - 5 = d - n, 4*q = 5*d - 13. Suppose 0 + d = f. Solve 2*p - f = 5 for p.
3
Let w(j) = 2*j + 8. Let m be w(-2). Let y be ((-90)/21 - -2)/((-66)/231). Solve -4 = m*a - y for a.
1
Let u(q) = -q**3 - 2*q**2 - 1. Suppose 0 = -4*i - 1 - 11. Let z be u(i). Suppose v = -w + 3, 3*w - 33 = v - z. Solve -4*m - w = 1 for m.
-2
Let o = -1231 - -1235. Solve -585*p - o = -581*p for p.
-1
Let d = 81 - 79. Suppose d*a = 3*a - 4*c + 10, 5*a + 4*c = 22. Suppose 0 = -6*s - s + a*s. Solve 2*p + 2*p - 4 = s for p.
1
Let q be (-292)/(-18) + (-23)/(1863/18). Suppose -2*d = 3*c - 48, -11*d = 3*c - q*d - 69. Solve -6 + c = 3*p for p.
4
Suppose 3*c = -i - 6, 3*i + 2 = -11*c + 6*c. Solve 73*k + i = 71*k for k.
-3
Let u = 6 - 4. Suppose u*g = 5*g + 6. Let c be -1 + 2 + (g - (-3 + 2)). Solve a + 1 + 3 = c for a.
-4
Let m(l) = -8*l + 3. Let v be m(0). Suppose j - 10*j + 90 = 0. Suppose 3*g = 8*g - j. Solve v = c + g for c.
1
Let s(h) = -2*h**2 - 13*h + 16. Let a(r) = -5*r**2 - 27*r + 32. Let c be 69/(-9) - 10/(-15). Let b(q) = c*s(q) + 3*a(q). Let u be b(7). Solve 8 = u*z - z for z.
2
Suppose 97*t + 219*t - 733 - 8747 = 0. Solve -t*b + 20*b = -80 for b.
8
Suppose 0 = -13*g + 71 + 904. Solve 0 = -14*k + 39*k - g for k.
3
Suppose -5*k = -l - 423, 14*l = 5*k + 21*l - 399. Solve 0 = -28*j + 28 + k for j.
4
Let i(x) = x**3 + 32*x**2 - 32*x + 39. Let p be i(-33). Suppose p*g - 139 = -121. Let l(d) = d**2 - d - 2. Let v be l(2). Solve v*f = -g*f for f.
0
Let k(p) = 6*p**2 - 10*p - 23. Let q(x) = -4*x**2 + 7*x + 15. Let c(t) = 5*k(t) + 8*q(t). Let l be c(5). Let g = l + 19. Solve -g*b = -5*b for b.
0
Let z = -1781 + 1788. Solve -31 + z = 4*w for w.
-6
Let s(z) = 295*z + 9 + 4*z**2 - 264*z - 6*z**2 - 21 + 0*z**2. Let x(g) = 16*g**3 - 1. Let c be x(1). Let h be s(c). Solve 0 = h*l - 2*l for l.
0
Suppose -4*v + u + 70 = 0, 32 = 6*v - 4*v - 2*u. Solve -v*g - 33 - 57 = 0 for g.
-5
Let c = 17601 - 17566. Solve c*b - 128 = -23 for b.
3
Let k be (770/(-44) + 13)*(-4)/6. Solve k*i + 47 = 20 for i.
-9
Let p(d) = -d**3 + 53*d**2 - 518*d - 27. Let j be p(40). Solve 21*z = 11 - j for z.
-2
Let i = -173 + 189. Let q = -1240 + 1245. Solve -c + i = -q*c for c.
-4
Suppose -8*b + 4*b = 4*x - 24, 5*b - 44 = 2*x. Suppose b*n + 51 = 25*n. Solve n*i - 30 = 9*i for i.
-5
Let p = -546 - -556. Solve 0*t - 50 = p*t for t.
-5
Suppose -36 = -7*p - 8. Let x = 2151 + -2131. Solve -p*i = -9*i - x for i.
-4
Let o be (282/(-188))/(((-6)/(-28))/(-3)). Solve o*h = -29*h + 150 for h.
3
Let k be 7 + (-51)/15 + (-6)/(-15). Suppose -c - 2*f + 7 = 0, -7*c + 10*c = -k*f + 23. Solve c*h + 3 = 30 for h.
3
Let m(d) = 1741*d - 6964. Let o be m(4). Solve 8*k - 324 + 372 = o for k.
-6
Let c(z) = z**3 + 39*z**2 + 25*z + 1087. Let w be c(-39). Solve -39*y = -w*y - 365 for y.
-5
Let w = -145 + 155. Solve w*m - 14*m = 28 for m.
-7
Let j be (-3 + 1)/(-6)*12/2. Suppose -j*x - 151 = -181. Solve 5 = x*f - 10*f for f.
1
Let q be (-84)/(-2)*(-3)/(-18). Let n be 77*((-7)/q)/(-7). Solve 5*w - n*w + 18 = 0 for w.
3
Let l = 3155 - 3152. Solve 65 = l*d + 74 for d.
-3
Suppose -15*o - 624 = -2*o. Let j be (-64)/o + 22/6. Solve -17 = 6*a - j for a.
-2
Let y be ((-5)/2)/((-2)/4). Suppose 20 = -y*v, -2*b + 0*b - 5*v = 10. Solve 3*x - 2 = b*x for x.
-1
Let d(o) = -6*o - 122. Let c be d(-43). Solve -11*w - c = -202 for w.
6
Let b = -1 + 4. Suppose -161 = 30*f - 11. Let n be -1 + (-1)/((0 - f)/(-20)). Solve -2*k + n + b = 0 for k.
3
Suppose 10*c - 49*c = -4641. Let o be (-26)/(-14) + 17/c. Solve 3 = o*s - 7 for s.
5
Let o = 207 - 214. Let q be (o/(-7))/(1 - 2/4). Solve 0 = -q*d + d + 5 for d.
5
Let h be 43 + -17 - (-15 - -5). Solve 16*n = 34*n - h for n.
2
Let i be ((-141372)/85)/(-21) - (2 - (-28)/(-10)). Solve i*o = 16*o - 448 for o.
-7
Let k be 24/(-32) + 43/4. Suppose 18 = k*p - 2. Solve 0 = p*u + u for u.
0
Let x(q) = -3*q - 2 + 8 + 2 + q**2. Let m be x(4). Let n be (1/3)/(m/108). Solve 0 = -n*v - 11 + 2 for v.
-3
Let w be 9/21 + (-795)/(-105). Let r be (-2)/9 + w/36. Solve 3 = -j - r for j.
-3
Suppose -3*x - x = 0. Suppose 3*w = -4*c + 2*w + 3, -11 = -3*c + w. Suppose a + c*a = 60. Solve x*k = 4*k - a for k.
5
Let b(u) be the first derivative of u**4/24 + u**3/6 + 9*u**2 + 12. Let n(o) be the second derivative of b(o). Let a be n(-1). Solve a = -3*r - 0*r - 9 for r.
-3
Suppose 5*o - 3*z - 263 - 107 = 0, o - 74 = 3*z. Suppose o*a - 40 = 70*a. Solve a - 30 = -5*v for v.
4
Suppose 5*c = z + 37, 0 = z - 11 + 8. Solve 0 = c*k - 5*k + 9 for k.
-3
Let q(v) = v**2 + 6*v + 11. Suppose j = 0, 0 = l - 6*j + 9*j + 2. Let t be q(l). Solve n = -2*n + t for n.
1
Let u be (-84016)/272 + 1/((-34)/4). Let r be 6*3/(-6)*u/(-9). Let p = 122 + r. Solve -p = -5*x + 1 for x.
4
Let v(z) = -z**3 - 32*z**2 - 31*z + 1. Suppose 0 = -7*f - 64 |
1. Introduction {#sec1}
===============
The falciform ligament is a double fold of peritoneum that marks the anatomical division between the right and left lobes of the liver. Pathologic conditions of the falciform ligament are extremely rare; one particularly rare condition is the torsion of a fatty appendage of the falciform ligament leading to fat infarction \[[@B1], [@B2]\]. This type of torsion and/or infarction occurs more commonly in the greater omentum or epiploic appendages \[[@B3]\]. The condition causes abdominal pain and associated raised inflammatory markers, and it can be identified on ultrasound and CT scan. To our knowledge, there have only been five reported adult cases of a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament identified on ultrasound or CT scan, but there are no paediatric cases.
In this paper, we report on a paediatric case of a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament as seen on CT and discuss the best management options for this type of patient.
2. Case Presentation {#sec2}
====================
A 10-year-old boy presented with five days of right sided abdominal pain associated with vomiting, diarrhoea, and anorexia. The patient\'s medical history included craniosynostosis, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, asthma, and migraines.
On examination, the patient had tenderness and voluntary guarding in the right upper quadrant, and McBurney\'s sign was negative. The patient was afebrile and was not jaundiced. His admission blood tests showed a high white cell count (21.4 × 10^9^/L), with no left shift. Liver function tests, C-reactive protein, and amylase were unremarkable.
The abdominal ultrasound showed no evidence of cholelithiasis or cholecystitis, and the diameters of the intrahepatic and extrahepatic bile ducts were within normal range. The appendix was not visualised and no free fluid was present. At the time of reporting, there were no abnormalities identified in the area of the liver or the falciform ligament.
The patient was admitted and observed for possible early appendicitis. The inflammatory markers returned to normal, but the abdominal pain persisted. Given the atypical presentation, computed tomography (CT) of the abdomen and pelvis with intravenous and oral contrast was performed. The CT showed hazy increased density of fat and inflammatory changes centred around a focal area of fat, which was anterior and inferior to the left lobe of the liver and adjacent to the falciform ligament. These features suggested incarcerated fat with inflammatory change. These radiological signs are similar to those recognised for epiploic appendagitis and omental infarction, which appear as areas of focal fat infarction and local inflammatory changes, elsewhere in the abdomen. In view of the site and the relevant literature, this CT was in keeping with torsion of a fatty appendage of the falciform ligament (Figures [1](#fig1){ref-type="fig"} and [2](#fig2){ref-type="fig"}).
Observation of the patient continued, with oral analgesia used to control pain. The patient did not have an exploratory laparotomy or laparoscopy. The pain resolved after four days, and the patient was then discharged. On review two months later, the pain had mostly resolved.
3. Discussion {#sec3}
=============
The falciform ligament is a double fold of peritoneum that anatomically divides the liver into the right and left lobes. It extends from the superior edge of the liver to the inferior border of the diaphragm. It contains the ligamentum teres, paraumbilical veins, and variable amount of extraperitoneal fat. The falciform ligament receives its arterial supply from a vessel coming off the left inferior phrenic artery and the middle segmental artery of the liver \[[@B4]\].
It is extremely rare to see pathologic conditions of the falciform ligament. Recognised conditions include ligament cysts, tumours, abnormal vascularisation due to portal hypertension, iatrogenic internal hernia through the ligament, and gangrene related to acute necrotising pancreatitis, along with torsion of a fatty appendage of the falciform ligament as described in this case \[[@B1], [@B2]\].
The term intra-abdominal focal fat infarction (IFFI) has been used to describe focal lipomatous tissue necrosis in various anatomical locations \[[@B4]\]. IFFI are most often due to torsion and/or infarction of the greater omentum or epiploic appendages but have also been reported to involve the lesser omentum and the lipomatous appendage of the hepatic falciform ligament.
Both ultrasound and CT can be used to visualise a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament. It is not possible to use plain film radiography to diagnose this condition, as the falciform ligament is only evident on abdominal plain films in the setting of pneumoperitoneum \[[@B11], [@B12]\]. In that situation, the "falciform ligament sign" is produced, which consists of gas outlining the falciform ligament. On ultrasound, a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament appears as a hyperechoic, noncompressible, slightly heterogenous mass in the area of maximal abdominal tenderness \[[@B7]\]. Further, on real-time sonography, the lesion does not move with underlying intraperitoneal structures while breathing, which indicates its extraperitoneal position \[[@B5]\]. On CT, a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament appears as an area with increased fat density, associated with surrounding inflammatory changes in the adjacent fat planes \[[@B7]\]. To our knowledge, there has been no previous description of the appearance of a twisted infarcted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament on MRI. However, MRI would be a valid alternative form of imaging to diagnose this condition, because it would distinguish adipose tissue from oedema or bleeding, it avoids radiation exposure particularly in the case of a paediatric patient, and it avoids contrast medium administration and its associated nephrotoxicity.
According to our literature search, there have only been five reported adult cases of a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament identified on ultrasound and/or CT scan, with our case being the first paediatric case reported \[[@B1], [@B2], [@B7]--[@B6]\] (there were three earlier case reports of this pathology, but, as they were reported before 1977, there were no ultrasound or CT images) \[[@B8]--[@B10]\]. Each adult case presented with upper abdominal pain, with varying combinations of right upper quadrant, epigastric region, and left upper quadrant pain, and there were three cases with a mild increase in CRP or leucocytosis.
CT was diagnostic in each case, and the diagnosis was confirmed in 80% of the cases with an exploratory laparotomy. In each paper, there was consistency in the CT appearance of a torted fatty appendage of the falciform ligament. A typical image showed an area of fat density with focal inflammatory changes in the local fat, in the area of the falciform ligament.
In terms of treatment, Coulier conducted a review of IFFI (including cases involving the falciform ligament) and argued that in most cases the patient improves with conservative management and that surgical intervention is not required \[[@B3]\]. This is particularly the case given the high quality of CT scans, which make it possible to identify an IFFI on imaging rather than requiring intraoperative characterisation.
Although rare, our observation of a torted lipomatous appendage of the falciform ligament or IFFI should be considered as a part of a differential diagnosis when children and adults present with atypical right upper quadrant pain. This is particularly important because it may prevent the patient from having unnecessary surgery.
Conflict of Interests
=====================
The authors declare that there is no conflict of interests regarding the publication of this paper.
{#fig1}
{#fig2}
[^1]: Academic Editor: Roberto Grassi
|
Q:
Dynamically expand jQuery UI buttonset to fill parent div
I'm using jQuery UI's buttonset() to create a naviagation/tab bar inside tags.
<section id="menu-container" class="container">
<nav id="group-menu" class="menu" data-bind="template: 'menuGroupTemplate'">
<div id="menu1">
<input type="radio" id="radio1" name="radio" /><label for="radio1">Summary</label>
<input type="radio" id="radio2" name="radio" checked="checked" /><label for="radio2">Category 1</label>
<input type="radio" id="radio3" name="radio" /><label for="radio3">Category 2</label>
</div>
</nav>
</section>
The issue I'm having is that I need to have the nav bar stretch across the entire nav section that it is contained in.
The navigation data is potentially dynamic, so static padding won't be sufficient.
I attempted a function that padded out elements proportionally, but as I wrote it I noticed that width() and outerWidth() didn't seem to be reporting the same widths as I was seeing in my browser (chrome), and so I couldn't get the padding anywhere near correct!
function layoutMenuBar() {
var childNodes = parent.children().find('span');
var childCount = childNodes.length;
var sumWidth = 0;
childNodes.each(function() {
sumWidth = sumWidth + parseInt($(this).outerWidth());
});
var parentWidth = parseInt(parent.outerWidth());
var padding = parentWidth - sumWidth;
if (padding > 0) {
var newSumWidth = 0;
childNodes.each(function() {
var elemWidth = parseInt($(this).outerWidth());
var elemPad = parseInt(elemWidth / sumWidth * padding / 2);
$(this).css('padding-left', elemPad);
$(this).css('padding-right', elemPad);
});
}
}
Can anyone suggest a better way of doing this, or explain what would be going wrong with my code?
A:
Have you tried playing with the display attribute, in particular with regards to tables.
You can layout each checkbox equally (in width) into the width you specify for the nav element:
nav {
width: 100%;
display: table;
}
#menu1 {
display: table-row;
}
#menu1 > label {
display: table-cell;
}
See this in action: http://jsfiddle.net/william/FZC4q/3/.
|
Menu
Star Light Star Bright
For my part I know nothing with any certainty but the sight of the stars makes me dream. ~ Vincent Van Gogh
What do you see when you look up at the night sky?
It’s no secret I write about characters that inhabit a universe where space travel is commonplace. Visiting strange worlds and looking up to see stars twinkling in a unfamiliar night sky is nothing out of the ordinary for them. But, it wasn’t until I was mulling over a scene for my newest book that I realized I was missing an opportunity with my main character. What did he feel as he stood beneath that glorious canopy on a world not his own. Did he long for his home world and the familiarity of stars he would never see again? Find a measure of comfort that the stars remained when all else was gone? Or was he exhilarated by the vast mystery, ready to leap into the void and escape the past?
It was a bit of a jolt when I realized I couldn’t recall the last time I actually stepped outdoors and looked up. How could I possibly tap into Wulf’s feelings if I couldn’t remember how I felt as a stargazer? I’ve lived in many places over the course of my life, some where the stars are narrow strips between buildings and in others where the sky is so big I can almost see the curve of the world. I’ve felt lost in the vastness, small and insignificant, but I have always yearned to explore. Who knew what adventures were waiting for me.
As I stood outside I was struck anew by the beauty of the night. I took a deep breath of the cool night air and let the worries of the day drift away. I could almost imagine Wulf standing beside me whispering in my ear and I began to understand what he saw and what he was feeling. I will never stand on a strange planet and look at its night sky, but that doesn’t mean I don’t understand what it means to be in a strange place and yearn for what was lost. Can I capture that part of him in words? I hope so.
When you get a chance take a moment and step outside. Look up at the night sky and dare to reach beyond yourself into that velvet darkness. You might be surprised what you discover. |
Denson named jurisdictional bishop for COGIC
12:39 AM,
May 10, 2014
Alphonso Denson
Written by
Town Talk staff
Superintendent Alphonso Denson, the pastor of Abram Temple Church of God in Christ in Bunkie, has been named the next Jurisdictional Bishop in Louisiana First East Jurisdiction of the churches of God In Christ. Denson was chosen by presiding Bishop Charles E. Blake and the national leaders in Memphis, Tenn., following the death of Bishop James Earl Gordon of Baton Rouge.
Denson has pastored Abram Temple in Bunkie since 1984, and served as administrative assistant to Bishop Gordon since 2001.
The La. First East Jurisdiction consists of about 60 churches across Louisiana, from Alexandria ... |
Q:
MYSQL use row number in where clause
how do I use my row number as part of my where clause?
I have, let say, 25 data and I only want to get first 10 rows or get the rows from 11 to 20.
How do I use the row number? I can't execute this query below
SET @row_number:=0;
SELECT @row_number:=@row_number+1 AS row_number, col1, col2, col3
FROM table
WHERE row_number > 1 and row_number < 10;
Update: The problem is that in my where clause row_number is unknown in table
Update 2: Thanks guys! Anyway, I found this. Select where row number = rownum
A:
You need to use OFFSET and LIMIT
Check this article
So to get rows 11 to 20 you would do
SELECT col1, col2, col3
FROM table
LIMIT 10 OFFSET 10;
|
The comprehension of english language texts among paramedical students normally using another language.
Comprehension of English language texts was tested among paramedical students. Tests were carried out using the cloze procedure on texts thought appropriate for these students, and previously tested to determine the expected number of years of schooling needed to comprehend them by using the Fog Index. In only 2% of 225 papers completed by 75 students did the participants achieve a score expected of an 'independent reader'. The importance of testing material for suitability is emphasized. The results are discussed and the need for further research on indices for students in developing countries is suggested. |
ACORN Should Not Receive Taxpayers’ Money
Several prominent non-Republicans and ex-Republicans have been all over the media giving advice to Republicans about how they should re-brand themselves and which issues they should talk about. Among this unsolicited advice is that Republicans should stop criticizing ACORN.
Au contraire — Republicans should loudly demand that ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) be cut off from all further handouts of taxpayers’ money. After all, didn’t Barack Obama promise us an ethical administration and an end to the influence of lobbyists and special interests?
ACORN is one of the most successful lobbyists for taxpayers’ money, which ACORN uses for very partisan special-interest activities. ACORN and its affiliated organizations (estimated at 270 related corporations and so-called nonprofits) are under investigation in more than a dozen states for voter registration fraud, and there’s no question about which party and which candidate ACORN supports.
Nevertheless, ACORN and its affiliated organizations (disguised as nongovernmental “neighborhood stabilization” organizations) could receive $3 billion (with a B) from Obama’s stimulus package and another $5.5 billion from his 2010 federal budget. That is after receiving $53 million of taxpayers’ money over the last 15 years.
Nevada charged ACORN groups with submitting thousands of fraudulent voter registration forms in 2008, and illegally setting quotas for its canvassers and paying them bonuses for signing up more than 21 new voters a day. The Las Vegas registrar of voters believes 48 percent of registrations turned in by ACORN were fraudulent.
Nevada’s Democratic attorney general said that ACORN’s training manuals “clearly detail, condone and … require illegal acts,” such as requiring workers to meet voter-registration targets in order to keep their jobs.
Washington state fined ACORN $25,000 after several employees were convicted of voter registration fraud in 2007.
Last year, eight national ACORN board members demanded an audit of ACORN’s books. The result was that the eight were removed.
ACORN’s blatantly partisan activities with taxpayers’ and other nonprofit funds make it an appropriate target for a congressional hearing. After first agreeing to hold a hearing, the Democrats then reneged and refused.
Barack Obama has for years had a close working relationship with ACORN, as a community organizer, as the head of a registration effort for Project Vote (one of ACORN’s partners), as attorney for a very important lawsuit and relying on it for get-out-the-vote assistance in his 2008 presidential campaign. When he met with ACORN leaders last year, Obama bragged that he “ran the Project Vote voter registrations drive in Illinois.”
In 1995, Obama represented ACORN in a case upholding the Motor Voter Act. That law authorized postcard registration, which proved so useful to ACORN workers in filing false registrations.
In 2008, Obama’s presidential campaign reported paying $832,000 to Citizens Consulting Inc., the umbrella group controlling ACORN, for get-out-the-vote efforts in key primary states. ACORN and its affiliated groups put thousands of get-out-the-vote workers in battleground states during the presidential campaign last year.
Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., successfully persuaded the House Financial Services Committee to unanimously pass an amendment to the Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act prohibiting any organization indicted for voter fraud from receiving federal housing grants. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., then had a tantrum and got the Democrats to remove it.
Sen. David Vitter, R-La., tried to prohibit ACORN from getting federal funds through the new Serve America Act. But Harry Reid’s Senate killed that constructive idea.
It’s not just taxpayers’ money that ACORN has had at its disposal. ACORN also has received generous grants from top recipients of federal bailout money. Bank of America (almost $3 million), Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase made big grants to ACORN Housing Corp., one of ACORN’s many affiliated organizations.
It is particularly important to expose ACORN’s political activities because of its new relationship with the Census Bureau, the agency tasked with compiling the 2010 census. The count of the U.S. population will determine which states gain or lose votes in both the U.S. House and the Electoral College, and which districts get more federal handouts.
American constitutional government cannot survive if the population count is managed and manipulated by organizations with partisan bias. The importance of a fair and accurate count cannot be overestimated because the count can give one party an unfair advantage and control over America for the next decade.
Yet the Obama administration chose ACORN to recruit counters for the 2010 Census, and they are already canvassing neighborhoods. Rep. Patrick McHenry’s, R-N.C., effort to sever the Census Bureau-ACORN partnership should be supported by all who want honest elections. |
Q:
Windows Phone 8 - browser ignoring jQuery .change function?
I am using jQuery Mobile (along with jQuery) to create a mobile website. This is NOT using jQuery Windows Phone UI.
I have created two select boxes, "bpSelect" and "msSelect".
The data for msSelect is based upon the choice in bpSelect.
Once the user makes a choice in bpSelect, an ajax call is made to the backend DB, and data is then passed back to the page in JSON format. The options for msSelect are created and a "refresh" is called to display it.
All works fine in any desktop web browser, and on an iPhone or Android device.
On my WIndows Phone (Lumia 920), the msSelect box never gets created.
It seems as if the Windows Phone is not calling $('#bpSelect').change(function() on the page when I make a selection.
When I put an "alert" inside this call, it is triggered on every device but the Windows Phone 8 browser.
Any ideas here? I have tried numerous things like using "data-ajax = false" to get to the page, along with "document.ready()" instead of "pageinit" but nothing seems to work. It seems as if the Windows Phone browser is ignoring certain jQuery code.
All my functions are inside the $('#createCarPage').bind('pageinit', function() at the top of page.
This sits inside the data-role="page" data-theme="a" id="createCarPage" DIV tag
There are several other things that the Windows Phone seems to ignore like .selectmenu('disable') for example, but for now I'm just trying to get the select box to work.
The basics of my code is below. Any help would be appreciated. I'm really stumped on this one.
<script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.9.1.min.js"></script>
<script src="http://code.jquery.com/mobile/1.3.2/jquery.mobile-1.3.2.min.js"></script>
<body>
<div data-role="page" data-theme="a" id="createCarPage" class="rf-background">
<script type="text/javascript">
$('#createCarPage').bind('pageinit', function()
{
$("#exTypeOptions input[type='radio']").checkboxradio('disable');
$('#bpSelect').selectmenu('disable');
$('#msSelect').selectmenu('disable');
$('#bpSelect').on('change', function ()
{
$("#msSelect option").each(function(index, option) {
$(option).remove();
});
var listServlet = "/messages/makeList";
$.ajax({
url: listServlet,
data: { bp:$('#bpSelect').val() },
dataType: "json",
success: function(data)
{
$('#msSelect').append('<option value=>' + 'Select...'+ '</option>');
for (var i=0; i<data.model.length; i++)
{
$('#msSelect').append('<option value="' + data.model[i] + '">' + data.model[i]+ '</option>');
}
$('#msSelect').selectmenu('enable');
$('#msSelect').selectmenu('refresh');
},
error: function(jqXHR, textStatus, errorThrown)
{
}
});
});
});
</script>
A:
Ok, I figured this out. After researching jQuery and jQuery Mobile, I could see no reason why the browser would be ignoring the jQuery code. The jQuery website stated that it supported the Windows Phone browser so there must be another problem.
There was... Zepto.js
In addition to using jQuery, I am also making use of the responsive framework Foundation 4.
I discovered that Foundation uses Zepto.js instead of jQuery.
The Zepto.js site states the following...
Zepto is expected to work in every modern browser and browser-like
environment, except for Internet Explorer.
The Foundation website says you can subsitite jQuery for Zepto with no issues.
When I removed the reference to Zepto... problem solved.
Foundation states that they switched to Zepto as a "lighter substitute" for jQuery.
Personally, I'll take a heavier implementation that actually works!
I hope this helps someone.
|
MONTREUX is a snooty place, full of money and not particularly
exciting. It’s spectacularly located, bathed in afternoon sunshine
streaming across the lake and protected from chill northerlies by a wall
of giant mountains, but once you’ve had your fill of window-shopping and
strolling beneath the palm trees, it’s really rather dull.
From the early nineteenth century, Montreux was one of the centres for
pan-European – and particularly British – tourism to Switzerland,
following on from the importance of the impressive medieval Château de
Chillon 3km away as a controlling presence on the road over the Alps:
an edict dated 1689 from the Bernese lords of Chillon authorized the
building of inns in the area to accommodate travellers making their way
to and from the Grand-St-Bernard pass, and since then travel and tourism
have been mainstays of the region’s economy. Up until the 1960s, the name
Montreux referred to just one village in a loose affiliation of some 24
vineyard-communes spread around the neighbouring hills, including
picturesque Clarens to the west, and Territet to the east.
Both of these are now super-plush suburbs, their long and venerable
visitors’ books taking in the great and the good, crowned heads of
Europe, Russia and elsewhere, and literary and artistic personages famous
and struggling.
The main reasons to visit Montreux are to absorb the spectacular panorama
of the Dents-du-Midi peaks across the lake, and to visit Chillon – the
latter perhaps Romandie’s only genuinely unmissable sightseeing
excursion. The stellar annual Jazz Festival, which broadcasts
Montreux’s name worldwide, offers top-drawer performers in all areas of
music. In a gleeful case of truth being stranger than fiction, a century
ago Montreux’s hoteliers were casting about for a logo they could attach
to the advertisements they placed in the English press each season. On a
walk in the nearby hills they came across the perfect answer, growing in
lush abundance all around; and so since 1897 the symbolic flower of
Montreux has been, with ever-increasing aptness, a narcissus. |
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