Accurate measurements of soil solution electrical conductivity (or.) are needed in various applications. One recently developed technique that measures sigma(w) is the Sigma Probe (SP). The SP is supposed to give accurate readings only-slightly dependent on water content (theta) and soil type. To test the performance of the SP, it was compared with another dielectric technique, time domain reflect

Mounting an immune response has been suggested to be physiologically costly because of metabolic requirements of immune cells specifically and upregulation of the immune system in general. We investigated such costs in free-living water pythons (Liasis fuscus), immunized with a harmless antigen, keyhole limpet hemocyanin. In the present study, we analyze the independent effects of age, blood paras

Yeast-derived zymosan beads are among the classical agents used to induce sterile inflammatory responses in experimental animals and macrophage activation in cell culture. In macrophages the cytosolic phospholipase A2 becomes activated, leading to mobilization of arachidonate and the generation of prostaglandins and leukotrienes. Although zymosan can interact with several receptors it has not been

Background: It has been shown previously that an anterior cruciate ligament injury may affect postural control, measured by balance in single-limb stance. To our knowledge, no studies have reported the influence of measures of impairment on postural control after such an injury. Purpose: To assess the influence of knee laxity, proprioception, and muscle strength on balance in single-limb stance an

A method to compensate for time-varying, possibly random, delays (jitter) in digital control systems is presented. Using time-stampsfrom the control system, a linear compensator is designed asan add-on to an existing control system. Stability andperformance analysis is performed, and leads to frequency domainconditions. Therefore, loop-shaping can be used for thecompensator design. The design ofth

The governess held a peculiar position in Victorian England: she was a wage-earning, middle-class woman in a society in which middle-class femininity was defined by domesticity and non-participation in the public labour market. This made her a suitable heroine for writers focusing on domestic, educational and social issues. This study investigates the Victorian governess novel as a specific genre

A variant of the normal extracellular cysteine protease inhibitor cystatin C (L68Q-cystatin C), is the amyloid precursor in hereditary cystatin C amyloid angiopathy (HCCAA). It has been suggested that the mutation causes cellular entrapment of L68Q-cystatin C in vivo and that the variant protein is not secreted to extracellular fluids. In order to test this hypothesis, we used matrix-assisted lase

BACKGROUND: Three reported Swedish cases of hepatitis C in patients receiving an intravenous immunoglobulin (Gammagard, Baxter Healthcare, Deerfield, IL) were among the first to bring to light a worldwide outbreak of hepatitis C associated with non-solvent/detergent (SD)-treated Gammagard. In February 1994, all implicated batches of Gammagard were recalled and exposed patients traced. STUDY DESIGN

We present some results on global existence of classical solutions of certain semilinear parabolic systems with homogeneous Dirichlet boundary conditions in bounded domains with a smooth boundary, relaxing the usual monotonicity assumptions on the nonlinearities.

The Panel on Future Directions in Control, Dynamics, and Systems was formed in April 2000 to provide a renewed vision of future challenges and opportunities in the control field, along with recommendations to government agencies, universities, and research organizations to ensure continued progress in areas of importance to the industrial and defense base. The panel released a report in April 2002

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is a sensational topic largely because its exploitation to date has been primarily journalistic. Properly packaged it captures the attention of a sensitized lay public and peps up circulation. HGT provides technical challenges for academic scientists as well as market analysts. For fans of science fiction as well as for environmental pessimists, HGT is the stuff of d

The morphology of the abductor pollicis brevis muscle was studied in 20 patients suffering from hand-arm vibration syndrome. The main morphological changes observed were centrally located myonuclei and fibre type grouping (found in all 20 muscle biopsies), angulated muscle fibres (found in 19 biopsies), ring fibres and regenerating fibres (found in 18 biopsies) and fibrosis (found in 17 biopsies).

The four LEP collaborations, ALEPH, DELPHI, L3 and OPAL, have searched for the neutral Higgs bosons which are predicted by the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM). The data of the four collaborations are statistically combined and examined for their consistency with the background hypothesis and with a possible Higgs boson signal.

This thesis consists of three empirical studies on asset-prices in international financial markets. The purpose is three-fold. First, to evaluate whether good predictions of economic variables may be obtained by pooling information from a broad group of financial variables. Second, to formulate asset-pricing models from seven established stock markets. Third, to evaluate the asset-pricing models i

Nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) offers an unequivocal method of detecting and identifying both hidden explosives, such as land mines, and a variety of narcotics. Unfortunately, the practical use of NQR is restricted by a low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), and means to improve the SNR are vital to enable a rapid, reliable, and convenient system. In this paper, we introduce a frequency-selective ap