Magnetische Hybridschichten - Magnetische Eigenschaften lokal austauschgekoppelter NiFe/IrMn-Schichten

Durch die laterale Modifizierung der magnetischen Eigenschaften von austauschgekoppelten NiFe/IrMn-Schichten wurden weichmagnetische Schichten geschaffen, die sowohl neue statische als auch dynamische hybride Eigenschaften zeigen. Als laterale Strukturierungsmethoden wurden hierbei die lokale Oxidation sowie Ionenimplantation verwendet. Mit Hilfe dieser Verfahren ist es gelungen spezifische magnetische Domänenkonfigurationen mit Streifenstrukturen nominell antiparalleler Magnetisierungsausrichtung in die Schichten einzuprägen. In Abhängigkeit der Strukturorientierung sowie Streifenperiode konnte direkt das Ummagnetisierungsverhalten sowie die magnetische Resonanzfrequenz und Dämpfung der Schichten modifiziert werden. Die neuen dynamischen Eigenschaften wie z.B. eine hybride Resonanzfrequenz werden hierbei im Rahmen der Kopplung über dynamische Ladungen und die direkte Beeinflussung des effektiven Feldes des künstlich eingebrachten Domänenzustandes diskutiert. Die vorgestellten Ergebnisse belegen somit das große Potential der lateralen Magneto-Strukturierung zur Einstellung spezifischer statischer wie auch dynamischer Eigenschaften magnetisch dünner Schichten

Modernizing Water Law: The Example of Florida

This Article takes a national view of the modernization of water law. Using Florida as an example, it identifies some of the most important and controversial challenges faced by states. Part II provides an overview of the process of water law reform. As states attempt to improve water management, they have modified their common law water allocation systems with an overlay of statutory law. Often, the process occurs in a piecemeal fashion, resulting in a patchwork of rules -- common law and statutory, old and new. In rare cases -- including that of Florida -- the process may be more comprehensive, one through which states supplement or supplant their common law with modem statutory codes. Part III examines the evolutionary path of Florida, a state that has adopted a generally wholesale reform in modem times. Because this reform took place in 1972 -- at the dawn of the environmental era -- the reform reflects modem environmental and public interest sensibilities. Part IV turns from process to substance, identifying five challenges that plague virtually all states: (1) advancing the public interest while allocating water among competing users; (2) retaining sufficient water in natural streams, lakes, and aquifers to maintain vibrant aquatic ecosystems; (3) ensuring that adequate water supplies will be available for future needs; (4) determining the extent to which managers should transfer water from places of relative abundance to places of relative scarcity; and (5) determining the role, if any, of the free market 4 in allocating water resources within states

Modernizing Water Law: The Example of Florida

This Article takes a national view of the modernization of water law. Using Florida as an example, it identifies some of the most important and controversial challenges faced by states. Part II provides an overview of the process of water law reform. As states attempt to improve water management, they have modified their common law water allocation systems with an overlay of statutory law. Often, the process occurs in a piecemeal fashion, resulting in a patchwork of rules -- common law and statutory, old and new. In rare cases -- including that of Florida -- the process may be more comprehensive, one through which states supplement or supplant their common law with modem statutory codes. Part III examines the evolutionary path of Florida, a state that has adopted a generally wholesale reform in modem times. Because this reform took place in 1972 -- at the dawn of the environmental era -- the reform reflects modem environmental and public interest sensibilities. Part IV turns from process to substance, identifying five challenges that plague virtually all states: (1) advancing the public interest while allocating water among competing users; (2) retaining sufficient water in natural streams, lakes, and aquifers to maintain vibrant aquatic ecosystems; (3) ensuring that adequate water supplies will be available for future needs; (4) determining the extent to which managers should transfer water from places of relative abundance to places of relative scarcity; and (5) determining the role, if any, of the free market 4 in allocating water resources within states

Diastereoselective synthesis of coordination compounds: a chiral tripodal ligand based on bipyridine units and its ruthenium(II) and iron(II) complexes

The enantiomerically pure chiral tris-chelating ligand (+)-(7S,10R)-L(L) comprising three 4,5-pinenobipyridine subunits connected through a mesityl spacer has been synthesized. Complexes of L with RuII and FeII have been prepared and characterised. NMR spectroscopy indicates that only one diastereoisomer is formed, and the CD spectra show that the complexes have the Λ configuration on the metal centre. The X-ray crystal structure of the iron complex shows that in the octahedral complex, the ligand L coils around the metal and confirms the absolute configuration. The RuII and FeII compounds were also characterised by mass spectrometry, electronic absorption, and, in the case of Ru(II), fluorescence spectroscopy. The photostability of the ruthenium compound was checked by photochemical experiments

Pick, Pack, & Survive: Charging Robots in a Modern Warehouse based on Online Connected Dominating Sets

The modern warehouse is partially automated by robots. Instead of letting human workers walk into shelfs and pick up the required stock, big groups of autonomous mobile robots transport the inventory to the workers. Typically, these robots have an electric drive and need to recharge frequently during the day. When we scale this approach up, it is essential to place recharging stations strategically and as soon as needed so that all robots can survive. In this work, we represent a warehouse topology by a graph and address this challenge with the Online Connected Dominating Set problem (OCDS), an online variant of the classical Connected Dominating Set problem [Guha and Khuller, 1998]. We are given an undirected connected graph G = (V, E) and a sequence of subsets of V arriving over time. The goal is to grow a connected subgraph that dominates all arriving nodes and contains as few nodes as possible. We propose an O(log^2 n)-competitive randomized algorithm for OCDS in general graphs, where n is the number of nodes in the input graph. This is the best one can achieve due to Korman\u27s randomized lower bound of Omega(log n log m) [Korman, 2005] for the related Online Set Cover problem [Alon et al., 2003], where n is the number of elements and m is the number of subsets. We also run extensive simulations to show that our algorithm performs well in a simulated warehouse, where the topology of a warehouse is modeled as a randomly generated geometric graph

Practical investigation of the performance of robust logistic regression to predict the genetic risk of hypertension

Logistic regression is usually applied to investigate the association between inherited genetic variants and a binary disease phenotype. A limitation of standard methods used to estimate the parameters of logistic regression models is their strong dependence on a few observations deviating from the majority of the data. We used data from the Genetic Analysis Workshop 18 to explore the possible benefit of robust logistic regression to estimate the genetic risk of hypertension. The comparison between standard and robust methods relied on the influence of departing hypertension profiles (outliers) on the estimated odds ratios, areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves, and clinical net benefit. Our results confirmed that single outliers may substantially affect the estimated genotype relative risks. The ranking of variants by probability values was different in standard and in robust logistic regression. For cutoff probabilities between 0.2 and 0.6, the clinical net benefit estimated by leave-one-out cross-validation in the investigated sample was slightly larger under robust regression, but the overall area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was larger for standard logistic regression. The potential advantage of robust statistics in the context of genetic association studies should be investigated in future analyses based on real and simulated data

Self-medication: a qualitative approach of its motivations

A automedicação é uma prática comum que pode retardar o diagnóstico e cura e contribuir para a manutenção da cadeia de transmissão de doenças. Realizou-se pesquisa qualitativa para investigar a ocorrência da automedicação, suas motivações e a qualidade do atendimento em farmácias.O estudo realizou três grupos focais em um serviço de referência para o tratamento de DST em Brasília (DF). A análise de discurso crítica revelou que a automedicação era frequente e motivada pela insatisfação com a demora e a baixa qualidade do atendimento nos serviços de saúde. Outras motivações citadas foram a experiência prévia com medicamentos, o aconselhamento com amigos e familiares e a busca de anonimato nas farmácias.Verificou-se insatisfação com a qualidade do atendimento nas farmácias, vistas como estabelecimentos comerciais mas que se apresentam como alternativa de fácil acesso. A identidade de farmacêuticos se confunde com a dos vendedores que objetivam o lucro. Observou-se a centralidade dos medicamentos nas expectativas dos pacientes e nas práticas médicas. Os resultados sugerem a necessidade de melhorar o acesso, de resgatar a humanização do atendimento nos serviços de saúde e de transformar as farmácias em estabelecimentos de saúde, divulgadores de práticas educativas e promotores do uso racional de medicamentos.A qualitative research was realized to verify the occurrence and motivations for self-medication and the quality of the information rendered by pharmacies. We conducted 3 focus groups with 25 patients of a reference public health service for STD treatment in Brasília, Brazil. We used the critical discourse analysis to interpret the data obtained during interviews. The analysis revealed that self-medication was a common practice among participants, motivated mainly by discontentment with the long waiting period and the quality of the public health services. Other motivations included: previous experience with medications, advice from friends and family members and the search for an anonymous service provided at pharmacies due to embarrassment and inadequate care environment at health care services. Care provided at pharmacies was also considered unsatisfactory. Viewed essentially as a commercial establishment, pharmacies have become, yet, an easy accessible alternative. Most of participants perceived the pharmacists as ordinary employees seeking only to increase profits. The results suggest a need to improve access to health care services, as well as to render it more humane. Community pharmacies should to be turned into health establishments to participate in health education and orientation for rational drugs use

From bone to breast and back - the bone cytokine RANKL and breast cancer

Receptor activator of nuclear factor-κB ligand (RANKL) plays a pivotal role in regulating bone homeostasis. Osteoporosis and malignant bone disease secondary to breast cancer are characterized by enhanced RANKL production and increased bone turnover. Thus, denosumab, a monoclonal antibody to RANKL, has been developed and is now approved for various bone loss conditions. Recent results indicate that RANKL may also promote the development and osseous migration of breast cancer