Forest certification can be conceived as one of many rapidly growing non-state market driven (NSMD) modes of governance. The environmental effectiveness of forest certification is oftentimes evaluated by indicators such as stringency of standards, degree of participation by key stakeholders, certified area, etc. In political science, forest certification as an NSMD governance arrangement is usuall

All living cells require specific mechanisms that target proteins to the cell surface. In eukaryotes, the first part of this process involves recognition in the endoplasmic reticulum of amino-terminal signal sequences and translocation through Sec translocons, whereas subsequent targeting to different surface locations is promoted by internal sorting signals(1). In bacteria, N-terminal signal sequ

Background: Nursing care provided at night has a different purpose and objective to that provided during the day. A review of the literature does not reveal any scientifically tested research instruments for evaluating and comparing the nurse's assessment of nursing care with the patient's perception at night. Aims and objectives: The aim of this study was to develop and test an instrument for eva

The molecular basis of the three major alleles (Fy(a)/Fy(b)/Fy) of the Duffy (FY) blood group system has recently been established but the Fy(x) phenotype associated with weak expression of the Fy(b) and other FY antigens is poorly understood. In the Fy(x) genes of five unrelated British and Swedish donors with the Fy(a+b+weak) phenotype we found two missense mutations predicting amino acid change

We show that the governing equations for two-dimensional water waves with constant vorticity can be formulated as a canonical Hamiltonian system, in which one of the canonical variables is the surface elevation. This generalizes the well-known formulation due to Zakharov [32] in the irrotational case.

The present study aimed to explore secondary school students' needs in relation to sexual and reproductive health in order to inform efforts to improve the quality of health services available to young people. The study involved data collection from 716 11-22-year-old students in four secondary schools in an urban area in Zambia. Students completed a questionnaire and were invited to write down an

When the bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine was introduced in the 1920s, it was suggested that BCG occasionally had nonspecific beneficial effects on mortality beyond the specific protection against tuberculosis. Considering that BCG has since then become the most used vaccine in the world, surprisingly few studies have been undertaken into the effect of BCG on general mortality and morbidity.

Development of artificial neural network (ANN) models using real plant data for the prediction of fresh steam properties from a brown coal-fired boiler of a Slovenian power plant is reported. Input parameters for this prediction were selected from a large number of available parameters. Initial selection was made on a basis of expert knowledge and previous experience. However, the final set of inp

The concept of a fair and optimal allocation was recently introduced by Sun and Yang [Sun, N., Yang, Z., 2003. A general strategy proof fair allocation mechanism. Economics Letters 81, 73-79]. This note states some basic properties of fair and optimal allocations and provides a simple algorithm for identifying them. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All fights reserved.

Background: There is an urgent need to identify subjects with Alzheimer's disease (AD) in the predementia phase, but validated diagnostic approaches are currently lacking. In this paper, we present the background, design and methods of a study, which aims to develop clinical criteria for predementia AD. We also present baseline characteristics of the subjects included. The study was part of the mu

The aim of this study was to assess the incremental cost effectiveness of on-demand versus prophylactic haemophilia therapy in Germany, Sweden, the United Kingdom and The Netherlands from the third-party payers' perspective. Using a decision tree model, the cost effectiveness of on-demand versus prophylactic therapy was analysed by extrapolating data from the European Haemophilia Economic Study to

Offspring locomotor performance has been shown to influence fitness related traits in a wide range of taxa. One potential mechanism by which viviparous animals can increase the performance (e.g. sprint speed) of their offspring is by prolonging pregnancy (beyond that required for complete development). However, to date studies examining this potentially important maternal effect have been largely

Intermolecular structures of complexes formed between a charged polymer and a spherical and oppositely charged macroion have been studied by employing the primitive model solved by Monte Carlo simulations. The strong-complex case involving a polyion and a macroion with equal absolute charges and without small ions was considered. The influence of the polyion flexibility with a bare persistence len

Coexistence conditions for prewetting and layering at a hard surface in additive hard sphere polymer solutions, where the solvent particles are smaller than the monomers, have been calculated by density functional methods. Various chain lengths and pressures have been investigated. An unexpected finding is that prewetting in these systems may proceed below the bulk critical pressure. We rationaliz

Public-private partnerships (PPP) have been advanced as a new tool of global governance, which can supply both effective and legitimate governance. In the context of recent debates on the democratic legitimacy of transnational governance, this paper focuses on accountability as a central component of legitimacy. The aim of this paper is to map transnational climate partnerships and evaluate their

The effect of using different binding agents in combination with hemp shives and fibres in Lime-Hemp Concrete (LHC) building material was examined. LHC is a light composite building material with building lime as binding agents and hemp (Cannabis sativa) as a renewable raw material from agriculture. Contemporary LHC only uses the woody core part of the hemp, the shive. However, using both hemp shi

P>Toll-like receptors (TLRs) are increasingly implicated in the pathogenesis of cancer. The present study describes TLR expression and function in healthy and malignant airway epithelial cells. The squamous cell carcinoma cell line Detroit-562 was compared with the healthy bronchial epithelial cell line NL-20 and primary human nasal epithelial cells (HNECs). TLR2, TLR3 and TLR5 were present in pri