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Thanks For All The Niceness
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Book Synopsis The Imperial Yeomanry Hospitals in South Africa, 1900-1902 by : Imperial Yeomanry Hospitals Committee
Download or read book The Imperial Yeomanry Hospitals in South Africa, 1900-1902 written by Imperial Yeomanry Hospitals Committee and published by . This book was released on 1902 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Dietary Phenolic Compounds and Vitamin E Bioavailability - Model studies in rats and humans by : Jan Frank
Download or read book Dietary Phenolic Compounds and Vitamin E Bioavailability - Model studies in rats and humans written by Jan Frank and published by Dr. Jan Frank. This book was released on 2004 with total page 59 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Reasons for Language by : Michaela Socher
Download or read book Reasons for Language written by Michaela Socher and published by Linköping University Electronic Press. This book was released on 2020-09-01 with total page 61 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The usage-based model of language acquisition assumes that language is learned by its usage. General cognitive processes, especially analogical reasoning ability, are assumed to lead to the understanding of words and grammatical structures. It has been argued that the time of language or auditory deprivation children with cochlear implants (CIs) often experience early in life, might affect both their language and their cognitive abilities. Children with CIs have disadvantages in terms of language acquisition as they start receiving language input later than peers with typical hearing (TH), and the perceptual quality of the input is reduced. However, they might have additional difficulties in language acquisition if their analogical reasoning ability is negatively influenced by the language or auditory deprivation early in life. The results found in this thesis show that the language delays often seen in children with CIs are not explained by differences in analogical reasoning ability. Results indicate that analogical reasoning ability has a limited influence on language acquisition for the tested age-group. However, language abilities affect the performance on analogical reasoning tasks which are either verbal or can be supported by verbal strategies. This needs to be taken into consideration when comparing analogical reasoning ability of children with CI sand children with TH. In addition, the results from this thesis indicate that the structure of the mental lexicon is associated with the communication skills of children with CIs. The structure of the mental lexicon is most likely influenced by the amount of language input a child receives. The main implication of the results is that emphasis should be put on reducing the duration of language deprivation and to improve the quality of the language input for children with CIs.
Book Synopsis Development of an Efficient Modelling Approach to Support Economically and Socially Acceptable Flood Risk Reduction in Coastal Cities: Can Tho City, Mekong Delta, Vietnam by : Hieu Quang Ngo
Download or read book Development of an Efficient Modelling Approach to Support Economically and Socially Acceptable Flood Risk Reduction in Coastal Cities: Can Tho City, Mekong Delta, Vietnam written by Hieu Quang Ngo and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2022-02-09 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Flooding is one of the most frequently occurring and damaging natural disasters worldwide. Quantitative flood risk management (FRM) in the modern context demands statistically robust approaches (e.g. probabilistic) due to the need to deal with complex uncertainties. However, probabilistic estimates often involve ensemble 2D model runs resulting in large computational costs.Additionally, modern FRM necessitates the involvement of a broad range of stakeholders via co-design sessions. This makes it necessary for the flood models, at least at a simplified level, to be understood by and accessible to non-specialists. This study was undertaken to develop a flood modelling system that can provide rapid and sufficiently accurate estimates of flood risk within a methodology that is accessible to a wider range of stakeholders for a coastal city – Can Tho city, Mekong Delta, Vietnam. A web-based hydraulic tool, Inform, was developed based on a simplified 1D model for the entire Mekong Delta, flood hazard and damage maps, and estimated flood damages for the urban centre of Can Tho city (Ninh Kieu district), containing the must-have features of a co-design tool (e.g. inbuilt input library, flexible options, easy to use, quick results, user-friendly interface). Inform provides rapid flood risk assessments with quantitative information (e.g. flood levels, flood hazard and damage maps, estimated damages) required for co-designing efforts aimed at flood risk reduction for Ninh Kieu district in the future.
Book Synopsis All the Nice Girls by : Barbara Anderson
Download or read book All the Nice Girls written by Barbara Anderson and published by Victoria University Press. This book was released on 2013-07-01 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Devenport Naval Base, New Zealand, 1962: With her husband away at sea, Sophie Flynn’s life is becoming considerably complicated. She has two children to look after, the captain’s wife to minister to, a wayward sister to keep an eye on, and an elderly neighbor to nurse. As if that wasn’t enough, Sophie falls in love with the commodore, adding a volatile element to the mix. This romantic novel—spiked with a dash of feminism—offers deeply perceptive observations of married life.
Book Synopsis The role of ligneous vegetation for livestock nutrition in the sub-Sahelian and Sudanian zones of West Africa: Potential effects of climate change by : Nouhoun Zampaligre
Download or read book The role of ligneous vegetation for livestock nutrition in the sub-Sahelian and Sudanian zones of West Africa: Potential effects of climate change written by Nouhoun Zampaligre and published by Cuvillier Verlag. This book was released on 2012-10-17 with total page 122 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kurzbeschreibung Aufgrund der starken Abhängigkeit von Niederschlägen und natürlichen Ressourcen gelten Ackerbau und Viehzucht im subsaharischen westlichen Afrika als besonders anfällig für klimatischen Wandel. Verstärkt wird dies durch das geringe Anpassungsvermögen der lokalen Bauern und Viehzüchter an die neuen Umstände. Das Ziel der vorliegenden Arbeit war daher die Untersuchung der zu erwartenden Einflüsse zukünftiger Klimaveränderungen auf die Tierernährung und Weidenutzung in der südlichen Sahelzone und der nördlichen und südlichen Sudanzone in Burkina Faso. Um dies zu erreichen, wurden von 2009 bis 2010 drei Studien durchgeführt; dafür ausgewählt wurden die Dörfer und Dorfgebiete (100 km²) von Taffogo (südliche Sahelzone), Nobere und Safane (nördliche Sudanzone) und Sokouraba (südliche Sudanzone). Die Wahl von zwei Dörfern in der nördlichen Sudanzone war begründet durch die Dichotomie zwischen intensiver landwirtschaftlicher Nutzung und hoher Bevölkerungsdichte in Safane und geringer ackerbaulicher Nutzungsintensität in der Pufferzone zwischen dem Dorf Nobere und dem Nationalpark Pô. Unter Verwendung globaler Navigations- (GPS) sowie Geoinformationssysteme (GIS) wurden räumliche und zeitliche Veränderungen in der Weidenutzung sowie im Fressverhalten von Rindern, Schafen und Ziegen in den vier Dörfern untersucht. Hierzu wurden pro Dorf jeweils drei Herden der genannten Haustierarten über einen Zeitraum von einem Jahr beobachtet (Kapitel 2). Die längsten Weidewege (km/Tag) waren während der heißen Trockenzeit (März – Mai) festzustellen. Schafe (18,8) und Rinder (17,4) legten dabei signifikant größere Distanzen zurück als Ziegen (10,5; p0,05). Die tägliche Weidedauer lag zwischen sechs und elf Stunden und war bei den Rindern länger als bei den kleinen Wiederkäuern (p0,05). Artunabhängig wurden 52–72% des Weidetages mit der Aufnahme von Futter verbracht. In der südlichen Sahelzone verbrachten die Herden mehr Zeit pro Tag auf den Weideflächen und legten zudem größere Distanzen zurück als in den beiden sudanischen Zonen (p0,01); die effektive Fresszeit war dagegen in der südlichen Sudanzone am längsten (p0,05). Eine proportionale Abnahme von Ruhephasen war während der Regenzeit (Juni - Oktober) im Vergleich zur kühlen (November - Februar) sowie heißen Trockenzeit zu beobachten (p0,05), während gleichzeitig der proportionale Anteil der Marschzeit zunahm. Unabhängig von der Jahreszeit erfolgte die Futteraufnahme in der südlichen Sahelzone bei allen drei Arten signifikant häufiger in bewaldeten Bereichen (Baumdeckung 5-10% oder Strauchdeckung 10%), während sie sich in den beiden sudanischen Zonen vornehmlich auf Waldflächen (Baumdeckung 10%) konzentrierte. Daraus lässt sich ableiten, dass bei gleichzeitiger Ausdehnung von landwirtschaftlich genutzten Flächen verbleibende Waldinseln und baumreiche Bereiche, einschließlich älterer (und damit buschbestandener) Brachflächen wertvolle Weidegründe für die lokalen Wiederkäuerherden darstellen. Es sollten daher Maßnahmen ergriffen werden, um dem Rückgang solch bewaldeter Bereiche entgegenzuwirken und gleichzeitig den Schutz sowie die (Wieder-)Anpflanzung dürretoleranter Futterbäume aktiv zu fördern. In einer weiteren Studie (Kapitel 3) wurde die Futterselektion der genannten Herden weidender Rinder und kleiner Wiederkäuer untersucht, und 75 Tierhalter zum Weideverhalten ihrer Tiere sowie zur Behandlung von Tierkrankheiten mit traditionellen pflanzlichen Medikamenten befragt. Ziel war es, die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels auf die Ernährung und Gesundheit der Nutztiere zu erfassen. Über alle drei untersuchten agro-ökologischen Zonen hinweg zeigen die Ergebnisse eine bevorzugte Nutzung holziger Futterpflanzen durch die drei Tierarten. Der Anteil der auf Selektion solcher Pflanzen verwendeten Zeit an der Gesamfreßzeit war dabei bei Ziegen signifikant höher als bei Schafen und Rindern (p
Book Synopsis Machine Learning-Based Bug Handling in Large-Scale Software Development by : Leif Jonsson
Download or read book Machine Learning-Based Bug Handling in Large-Scale Software Development written by Leif Jonsson and published by Linköping University Electronic Press. This book was released on 2018-05-17 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis investigates the possibilities of automating parts of the bug handling process in large-scale software development organizations. The bug handling process is a large part of the mostly manual, and very costly, maintenance of software systems. Automating parts of this time consuming and very laborious process could save large amounts of time and effort wasted on dealing with bug reports. In this thesis we focus on two aspects of the bug handling process, bug assignment and fault localization. Bug assignment is the process of assigning a newly registered bug report to a design team or developer. Fault localization is the process of finding where in a software architecture the fault causing the bug report should be solved. The main reason these tasks are not automated is that they are considered hard to automate, requiring human expertise and creativity. This thesis examines the possi- bility of using machine learning techniques for automating at least parts of these processes. We call these automated techniques Automated Bug Assignment (ABA) and Automatic Fault Localization (AFL), respectively. We treat both of these problems as classification problems. In ABA, the classes are the design teams in the development organization. In AFL, the classes consist of the software components in the software architecture. We focus on a high level fault localization that it is suitable to integrate into the initial support flow of large software development organizations. The thesis consists of six papers that investigate different aspects of the AFL and ABA problems. The first two papers are empirical and exploratory in nature, examining the ABA problem using existing machine learning techniques but introducing ensembles into the ABA context. In the first paper we show that, like in many other contexts, ensembles such as the stacked generalizer (or stacking) improves classification accuracy compared to individual classifiers when evaluated using cross fold validation. The second paper thor- oughly explore many aspects such as training set size, age of bug reports and different types of evaluation of the ABA problem in the context of stacking. The second paper also expands upon the first paper in that the number of industry bug reports, roughly 50,000, from two large-scale industry software development contexts. It is still as far as we are aware, the largest study on real industry data on this topic to this date. The third and sixth papers, are theoretical, improving inference in a now classic machine learning tech- nique for topic modeling called Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA). We show that, unlike the currently dominating approximate approaches, we can do parallel inference in the LDA model with a mathematically correct algorithm, without sacrificing efficiency or speed. The approaches are evaluated on standard research datasets, measuring various aspects such as sampling efficiency and execution time. Paper four, also theoretical, then builds upon the LDA model and introduces a novel supervised Bayesian classification model that we call DOLDA. The DOLDA model deals with both textual content and, structured numeric, and nominal inputs in the same model. The approach is evaluated on a new data set extracted from IMDb which have the structure of containing both nominal and textual data. The model is evaluated using two approaches. First, by accuracy, using cross fold validation. Second, by comparing the simplicity of the final model with that of other approaches. In paper five we empirically study the performance, in terms of prediction accuracy, of the DOLDA model applied to the AFL problem. The DOLDA model was designed with the AFL problem in mind, since it has the exact structure of a mix of nominal and numeric inputs in combination with unstructured text. We show that our DOLDA model exhibits many nice properties, among others, interpretability, that the research community has iden- tified as missing in current models for AFL.
Book Synopsis The Thank You Letter by : Jane Cabrera
Download or read book The Thank You Letter written by Jane Cabrera and published by Holiday House. This book was released on 2019-10-29 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Celebrate gratitude and simple ways of brightening others' days with this sweet, brightly illustrated story about a girl's letters. . . . and her town's overwhelming response. After a wonderful party, birthday girl Grace sits down to thank her friends and family for all their kind gifts. But she doesn't stop there-- as she writes, Grace realizes there are so many things to be grateful for! So she thanks her teacher for helping her learn to write. She thanks her dog for his cheerful wagging tail. She even thanks the sky for being perfectly, beautifully blue. The Thank You Letter is perfect for starting conversations about gratitutde-- both for tangible gifts and for the little things we don't always stop to appreciate. The sweet story encourages young readers to focus on positivity and share it-- to write letters of their own to family, friends, and loved ones and share their joys. For everyone who wants to encourage children to write thank you notes for gifts, and for everyone searching for new ways to connect with distant loved ones, The Thank You Letter is a perfect model for expressing gratitude-- and showcases the joyful response a simple gesture can create. When Grace returns home after delivering her notes, she finds a wealth of affection--cards, letters, and notes from her neighbors and friends, expressing their love for Grace and appreciation for her letters. A beautifully illustrated gatefold page shows how deeply her letters have touched the hearts of everyone around them, and Beloved storyteller and illustrator Jane Cabrera's vivid and textured acrylic paintings are filled with joyful cuteness and warmth. Collage elements, including patterns from the inside of envelopes, smartly add to the epistolary theme. This delightful celebration of mindful thankfulness and community togetherness is perfect for curling up in a cozy spot and sharing one-on-one.
Book Synopsis So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish by : Douglas Adams
Download or read book So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish written by Douglas Adams and published by Del Rey. This book was released on 2008-12-30 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now celebrating the 42nd anniversary of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, soon to be a Hulu original series! “A madcap adventure . . . Adams’s writing teeters on the fringe of inspired lunacy.”—United Press International Back on Earth with nothing more to show for his long, strange trip through time and space than a ratty towel and a plastic shopping bag, Arthur Dent is ready to believe that the past eight years were all just a figment of his stressed-out imagination. But a gift-wrapped fishbowl with a cryptic inscription, the mysterious disappearance of Earth’s dolphins, and the discovery of his battered copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy all conspire to give Arthur the sneaking suspicion that something otherworldly is indeed going on. God only knows what it all means. Fortunately, He left behind a Final Message of explanation. But since it’s light-years away from Earth, on a star surrounded by souvenir booths, finding out what it is will mean hitching a ride to the far reaches of space aboard a UFO with a giant robot. What else is new? “The most ridiculously exaggerated situation comedy known to created beings . . . Adams is irresistible.”—The Boston Globe
Book Synopsis Modulation of CFTR and ENaC Channel Function by Interacting Proteins and Trafficking by : Lishuang Cao
Download or read book Modulation of CFTR and ENaC Channel Function by Interacting Proteins and Trafficking written by Lishuang Cao and published by Leuven University Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 140 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis AARP The Nice Girl Syndrome by : Beverly Engel
Download or read book AARP The Nice Girl Syndrome written by Beverly Engel and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-12-20 with total page 231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: AARP Digital Editions offer you practical tips, proven solutions, and expert guidance. In The Nice Girl Syndrome, Beverly Engel shows how you can overcome the pressure to please others and feel free to be your true self. Are you too nice for your own good? Do family members manipulate you? Do coworkers take advantage of you? If this sounds familiar, read The Nice Girl Syndrome. In this breakthrough guide, renowned author and therapist Beverly Engel, who has helped thousands of women recognize and leave emotionally abusive relationships, can show you how to take control of your life and take care of yourself. Engel explains that women today simply cannot afford to be Nice Girls, because women who are too nice send the message that they are easy targets and are much more likely to be victimized emotionally, physically, and sexually. She identifies the seven different types of Nice Girls and helps you understand which type or types might apply to you. Engel helps you determine whether the Nice Girl Syndrome is keeping you in an abusive relationship or in manipulative situations and helps you change Nice Girl beliefs and behaviors that are holding you back. Shows you how to confront the beliefs and behaviors that keep you stuck in a Nice Girl act as you replace them with healthier, more empowering ones Includes inspiring stories of women Engel has worked with who have found the courage and strength to stop taking abuse and start standing up for themselves "This book will challenge, entertain, and empower its readers." --Publishers Weekly (starred review) Written by renowned author and therapist Beverly Engel, who has helped thousands of women recognize and leave emotionally abusive relationships Filled with wise advice, powerful exercises, and practical prescriptions, The Nice Girl Syndrome shows you step by step how to take control of your life and be your own strong woman.
Download or read book Nice written by Sharon Hodde Miller and published by Baker Books. This book was released on 2019-08-20 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: God never called us to be nice. What happens when we replace courage with compromise? What happens when we replace honesty with likability? What happens when we replace conviction with clichés? What happens when we replace discipleship to Christ with a devotion to nice? We live in a culture that prizes niceness as one of its highest virtues. Niceness keeps the peace, wins friends, gains influence, and serves our reputations well, but it also takes the teeth out of our witness and the power out of our faith. When we choose to be nice instead of faithful, we bear fruits that are bland, bitter, empty, and rotten to the core. In this life-changing book, Sharon Hodde Miller explores the seemingly innocent idol that has crept into our faith and quietly corrupted it, producing the bad fruits of cowardice, inauthenticity, shallowness, and more. Then she challenges readers to cultivate a better tree, providing practical steps to reclaim our credibility as followers of Christ, and bear better, richer, more life-giving fruits.
Book Synopsis Dressmakers, Preachers and Cockies by : Jeremy Ward
Download or read book Dressmakers, Preachers and Cockies written by Jeremy Ward and published by Boolarong Press. This book was released on 2018 with total page 100 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2014, Jeremy Ward found himself the sole survivor of his immediate family. Intrigued by why he had not embraced the Christian faith of his parents as had his two sisters, and left with family records cluttering his study, Jeremy decided to write the story of his parents and their forebears. Dressmakers, Preachers and Cockies is the result. In part a response to his desire to record his family history, in part a search for meaning in his own life, Dressmakers, Preachers and Cockies tells of his mother’s family of McCulloch’s from County Westmeath in Ireland, his father’s family of Wards and Robjohns from south-west England, and his Italian great-grandmother from Gibraltar. Jeremy delves into this history, identifying themes of religious faith, commitment to family, and the importance of education and community service, as he searches for influences in his own life. He writes of dissenting Congregationalists, farming in the NSW Riverina, a family firm of dressmakers in Sydney, his mother as young Rector’s wife, his father as World War 2 RAAF chaplain, and a family connection with Joseph Conrad. Finally, Jeremy describes his experiences as a child of the rectory, attending boarding school and conscription into the Army, before becoming a legal aid lawyer and disability advocate.
Book Synopsis Image Analysis for Trabecular Bone Properties on Cone-Beam CT Data by : Eva Klintström
Download or read book Image Analysis for Trabecular Bone Properties on Cone-Beam CT Data written by Eva Klintström and published by Linköping University Electronic Press. This book was released on 2017-10-20 with total page 71 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Trabecular bone structure as well as bone mineral density (BMD) have impact on the biomechanical competence of bone. In osteoporosis-related fractures, there have been shown to exist disconnections in the trabecular network as well as low bone mineral density. Imaging of bone parameters is therefore of importance in detecting osteoporosis. One available imaging device is cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT). This device is often used in pre-operative imaging of dental implants, for which the trabecular network also has great importance. Fourteen or 15 trabecular bone specimens from the radius were imaged for conducting this in vitro project. The imaging data from one dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), two multi-slice computed tomography (MSCT), one high-resolution peripheral quantitative computed tomography (HR-pQCT) and four CBCT devices were segmented using an in-house developed code based on homogeneity thresholding. Seven trabecular microarchitecture parameters, as well as two trabecular bone stiffness parameters, were computed from the segmented data. Measurements from micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) data of the same bone specimens were regarded as gold standard. Correlations between MSCT and micro-CT data showed great variations, depending on device, imaging parameters and between the bone parameters. Only the bone-volume fraction (BV/TV) parameter was stable with strong correlations. Regarding both HR-pQCT and CBCT, the correlations to micro-CT were strong for bone structure parameters as well as bone stiffness parameters. The CBCT device 3D Accuitomo showed the strongest correlations, but overestimated BV/TV more than three times compared to micro-CT. The imaging protocol most often used in clinical imaging practice at our clinic demonstrated strong correlations as well as low radiation dose. CBCT data of trabecular bone can be used for analysing trabecular bone properties, like bone microstructure and bone biomechanics, showing strong correlations to the reference method of micro-CT. The results depend on choice of CBCT device as well as segmentation method used. The in-house developed code based on homogeneity thresholding is appropriate for CBCT data. The overestimations of BV/TV must be considered when estimating bone properties in future clinical dental implant and osteoporosis research.
Book Synopsis American Niceness by : Carrie Tirado Bramen
Download or read book American Niceness written by Carrie Tirado Bramen and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2017-08-14 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Epigraphs -- Contents -- Introduction: American Niceness and the Democratic Personality -- 1. Indian Giving and the Dangers of Hospitality -- 2. Southern Niceness and the Slave's Smile -- 3. The Christology of Niceness -- 4. Feminine Niceness -- 5. The Likable Empire from Plymouth Rock to the Philippines -- Notes -- Acknowledgments -- Index
Book Synopsis Cerium Oxide Nanoparticles and Gadolinium Integration by : Peter Eriksson
Download or read book Cerium Oxide Nanoparticles and Gadolinium Integration written by Peter Eriksson and published by Linköping University Electronic Press. This book was released on 2019-08-29 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A challenging task, in the area of magnetic resonance imaging is to develop contrast enhancers with built-in antioxidant properties. Oxidative stress is considered to be involved in the onset and progression of several serious conditions such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, and the possibility to use cerium-contained nanoparticles to modulate such inflammatory response has gained a lot of interest lately. The rare earth element gadolinium is, due to its seven unpaired f-electrons and high symmetry of the electronic state, a powerful element for contrast enhancement in magnetic resonance imaging. Chelates based on gadolinium are the most commonly used contrast agents worldwide. When introducing external contrast agents there is always a risk that it may trigger inflammatory responses, why there is an urgent need for new, tailor-made contrast agents. Small sized cerium oxide nanoparticles have electronic structures that allows coexistence of oxidation states 3+ and 4+ of cerium, which correlates to applicable redox reactions in biomedicine. Such cerium oxide nanoparticles have recently shown to exhibit antioxidant properties both in vitro and in vivo, via the mechanisms involving enzyme mimicking activity. This PhD project is a comprehensive investigation of cerium oxide nanoparticles as scaffold materials for gadolinium integration. Gadolinium is well adopted into the crystal structure of cerium oxide, enabling the combination of diagnostic and therapeutic properties into a single nanoparticle. The main focus of this thesis project is to design cerium oxide nanoparticles with gadolinium integration. A stepwise approach was employed as follows: 1) synthesis with controlled integration of gadolinium, 2) material characterization by means of composition crystal structure, size, and size distribution and 3) surface modification for stabilization. The obtained nanoparticles exhibit remarkable antioxidant capability in vitro and in vivo. They deliver strongly enhanced contrast per gadolinium in magnetic resonance imaging, compared to commercially available contrast agents. A soft shell of dextran is introduced to encapsulate the cerium oxide nanoparticles with integrated gadolinium, which protects and stabilizes the hard core and to increases their biocompatibility. The dextran-coating is clearly shown to reduce formation of a protein corona and it improves the dispersibility of the nanoparticles in cell media. Functionalization strategies are currently being studied to endow these nanoparticles with specific tags for targeting purposes. This will enable guidance of the nanoparticles to a specific tissue, for high local magnetic resonance contrast complemented with properties for on-site reduced inflammation. In conclusion, our cerium oxide nanoparticles with integrated gadolinium, exhibit combined therapeutic and diagnostic, i.e. theragnostic capabilities. This type of nanomaterial is highly promising for applications in the field of biomedical imaging.
Book Synopsis Cultures of Counterterrorism by : Silvia D'Amato
Download or read book Cultures of Counterterrorism written by Silvia D'Amato and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-02-21 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates counterterrorism responses from a strategic-culturalist perspective, focusing on France and Italy in the post-9/11 era. Terrorism occupies a predominant space within contemporary political debate across all European countries. Recent attacks in Europe have raised many questions about the status of counterterrorism structures within European countries, revealing a wide range of practical as well as discursive security implications. This work provides an original contribution to the understanding of counterterrorism by asking how values, norms, and a shared sense of identity matter in policy dynamics. It explores and assesses which cultural elements are relevant for the fight against terrorism and investigates the impact which these elements can have on practical approaches to terrorism. Despite the current attention to terrorist attacks in Europe, the cases of France and Italy in counterterrorism affairs are particularly overlooked by the existing literature; this book analyses, questions, and examines the strategy of these two countries through the instruments offered by the culturalist approaches to strategy. This book will be of much interest to students of terrorism studies, discourse analysis, European politics, security studies, and international relations in general.
