The field-scale application of apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa) to agriculture has its origin in the measurement of soil salinity, which is an arid-zone problem associated with irrigated agricultural land and with areas having shallow water tables. Apparent soil electrical conductivity is influenced by a combination of physico-chemical properties including soluble salts, clay content...

Peroxynitrite, an oxidant generated by the interaction between superoxide and nitric oxide (NO), has been implicated in the etiology of numerous disease processes. Several studies have shown that peroxynitrite-induced protein nitration may compromise enzyme and protein function. We hypothesized that peroxynitrite may regulate cytokine function during inflammation. To test this hypothesis, the e...

Purpose: To compare the biocompatibility of ethyl-cyanoacrylate (ECA) and octylcyanoacrylate (OCA) wound closures to sutures in rat skin. Methods: Twenty-four male Wistar rats were subjected to three incisions which were closed using ECA, OCA or sutures . Rats were divided into four groups which received biopsies on the 3rd, 7th, 14th or 21st postoperative days. Necrosis, inflammation, dermatit...

Element CXI's Elemental Computing Array (ECA) delivers faster reconfiguration time and higher computational density than Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) with similar computational power. It provides higher computational power than Digital Signal Processors (DSPs) with similar power consumption and price. It also utilizes a library-based graphical development environment promoting ease of...

Today’s distributed information systems often are collections of existing information sources and as such heterogeneous. Technical integration of heterogeneous sources is supported by CORBA [2]. However, CORBA provides very general support, and does not take source specific semantics into account. This also applies to CORBA’s Event Service. Our objective is to enhance CORBA by mechanisms that a...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the course of alcoholism in males and females in a 14-year follow-up of persons with DSM-III alcoholism compared to very heavy drinkers and unaffected controls in a community sample. METHODS Case-control study based on data from the 1997 Health Services Use and Cost study, a 14-year follow-up survey of 442 individuals who participated in two waves of the 1981-1983 St....

Congenital heart defects are a major congenital abnormality and are assuming increasing importance. A study was undertaken to estimate the incidence of congenital heart defects in Northern Ireland over a five year period (1974-1978), to determine the age at diagnosis and to assess the risk of recurrence in sibs. An incidence rate of 7.3 per 1000 total births was found. This reduced to 3.1 per 1...

Embodied Conversational Agents (ECAs) are life-like computer generated characters that interact with human users in face-to-face multi-modal conversations. ECA systems are generally complex and difficult for individual research groups to develop. Therefore, if there was a common framework for connecting ECA functioning blocks seamlessly to an integrated system, redundant effort can be saved. Th...

Fast and accurate assessment of within-field variation is essential for detecting field-wide heterogeneity and contributing to improvements in the management of agricultural lands. The goal of this paper is to provide an overview of field scale characterization by electromagnetic induction, firstly with a focus on the applications of EM38 to salinity, soil texture, water content and soil water ...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) by an intraluminal filament is a widely accepted animal model of focal cerebral ischemia. In this procedure, cutting of the external carotid artery (ECA) is a prerequisite for thread insertion. However, the implications of ECA transsection have not yet been described. METHODS After 90 minutes of filament MCAO or sham surgery, rats...