to regional and national centres. Your investigations will consider, but not be limited to, the effects of the NHS and Community Care Act 1990 in a representative sample of NHS regions and boards. The four services you have selected are neonatal intensive care; cystic fibrosis; childhood leukaemia; and coronary artery bypass grafting." As for all its projects, the Clinical Standards Advisory Gr...

A critical discussion of data on the possible role of IgG3 cryoglobulins, cross-reactive anti-DNA antibodies and anti-DNA idiotypes in the pathogenesis of lupus nephritis is included. A further possibility involving cationic nuclear autoantigens is presented in detail. Histone was employed as a model antigen, representative of this group. Histones were shown to have high affinity for the rat GB...

To resolve ambiguities in speech act classification, various machine learning models have been proposed over the past 10 years. In this paper, we review these machine learning models and present the results of experimental comparison of three representative models, namely the decision tree, the support vector machine (SVM), and the maximum entropy model (MEM). In experiments with a goaloriented...

Digital microfluidic devices allow the manipulation of droplets between two parallel electrodes. These electrodes can act as mirrors generating a micro-cavity, which can be exploited for a droplet dye-laser. Three representative laser-dyes with emission wavelengths spanning the whole visible spectrum are chosen to show the applicability of this concept. Sub-microlitre droplets of laser-dye solu...

With the aim of determining the actual target(s) of nitro-group bearing compounds considered as possible leads for the development of drugs against Chagas' disease, we studied in parallel nitrofurans and nitroimidazoles. We investigated nine representative compounds for the following properties: efficacy on different Trypanosoma cruzi strains, redox cyclers, inhibition of respiration, productio...

Three years ago, Nobel laureate Paul Crutzen rocked the boat of the climate discussion by suggesting it might become necessary to inject one million tons of sulphur into the stratosphere every year and let it burn there to form sulphate aerosols. Inspired by the cooling effect of the Pinatubo eruption in 1991, he proposed that such drastic measures might be the only way to avert catastrophic cl...

The Act-Belong-Commit campaign is the world's first comprehensive, population-wide, community-based program designed to promote mental health. The campaign targets individuals to engage in mentally healthy activities, while at the same time, encouraging community organizations that offer such activities, to increase participation in their activities. Using nationally-representative data from Ir...

This paper shows why, under incomplete information, regulatory practices that alter market prices can redistribute resources more efficiently than cash transfers. In our model the representative citizen cares about a project that benefits a special interest. An example of such a project is the adoption of accessibility devices regulated by the American with Disabilities act. The project can be ...

The NCS was authorized by Congress with the Children’s Health Act of 2000 and will examine the effects of the environment on the health and development of American children. This longitudinal study will include more than 100,000 children from a nationally representative sample who will be followed from before birth until age 21 (www.nationalchildrensstudy.gov). The term “environment” is broadly...

Total wrist arthroplasty are not used as widely as total knee and hip replacement. The functional hands are requiring surgeons to design a durable and functional satisfying prosthesis. This article will list the main reasons that cause the failure of the prosthesis. Some remarkable and representative prostheses are listed to show the devolvement of total wrist prosthesis and their individual sp...