Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on Campus

A Review of Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on Campus by Dinesh D\u27Souz

Outcome validation report: CCAFS engagement in the Global Commission on Adaptation

The Global Commission on Adaptation (GCA) was launched in October 2018 to accelerate adaptation action and support by elevating the political visibility of adaptation and focusing on concrete solutions to the climate crisis. It is led by Ban Ki-moon, 8th Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, and Bill Gates, Co-Chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. It is convened by 17 countries and guided by 30 Commissioners, and co-managed by the Global Center on Adaptation and World Resources Institute. The CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) has been heavily involved in the work of the GCA. This outcome validation report focuses on how CCAFS has been involved in the GCA processes, focusing on contributions made in 2019

Reforming History: Turkey’s Legal Regime and Its Potential Accession to the European Union

For the past decade, Turkey and the European Union (EU) have had serious discussions about Turkey\u27s possible entrance into the EU. The intensity of these talks, however, has always been tempered by Turkey\u27s extremely questionable human rights practices. The most marked aspects of this record are the country\u27s treatment of the Kurdish minority and its quashing of political dissent through the heavyhanded use of its legal system. In this note, I will argue that, despite Turkey\u27s increasing political and economic stature in the world, it will not be able to gain entry into the EU until it is able to sufficiently address these human rights problems to the satisfaction of the EU and the international community in general

Trembling in the Ivory Tower

It is often said that legal writers pick up ideas about ten to fifteen years after they have been broached and discussed elsewhere. This book, by a law professor at the University of Baltimore, would seem to illustrate the point. It bears a copyright date of 2003 but reads as if written back during the height of the Culture Wars of the late 1980s or early 1990s. It certainly echoes many books that were written then, such as Roger Kimball\u27s Tenured Radicals (1990) and Dinesh D\u27Souza\u27s Illiberal Education (1991)

Lessons learnt from CCAFS - 10 years scaling climate-smart agriculture: Insights from the review of CCAFS scaling activities, 2019

This Info Note is based on the insights of the CCAFS core team, lessons shared by project leaders via the MARLO, and interviewees from the following CGIAR centers and partners: Bioversity, CIAT, CIMMYT, CIP, ICARDA, ICRAF, ICRISAT, IFPRI, IITA, ILRI, IRRI, IWMI, WorldFish, and WUR. After ten years’ implementation, lessons learnt of practitioners validate two concepts that CCAFS has used and developed for scaling CSA: the Three-Thirds Principle for effective science-policy engagement (Dinesh et al. 2018) applies widely for scaling CSA, when adding the element of iterative learning; and the LearningWheel with 11 cornerstones for effective research and development to improve livelihoods and the environment (Campbell et al. 2006) is a useful framework for managing not only R4D, but also scaling processes

E2F1 Suppresses Oxidative Metabolism and Endothelial Differentiation of Bone Marrow Progenitor Cells

RATIONALE: The majority of current cardiovascular cell therapy trials use bone marrow progenitor cells (BM PCs) and achieve only modest efficacy; the limited potential of these cells to differentiate into endothelial-lineage cells is one of the major barriers to the success of this promising therapy. We have previously reported that the E2F transcription factor 1 (E2F1) is a repressor of revascularization after ischemic injury. OBJECTIVE: We sought to define the role of E2F1 in the regulation of BM PC function. METHODS AND RESULTS: Ablation of E2F1 (E2F1 deficient) in mouse BM PCs increases oxidative metabolism and reduces lactate production, resulting in enhanced endothelial differentiation. The metabolic switch in E2F1-deficient BM PCs is mediated by a reduction in the expression of pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 4 and pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 2; overexpression of pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 4 reverses the enhancement of oxidative metabolism and endothelial differentiation. Deletion of E2F1 in the BM increases the amount of PC-derived endothelial cells in the ischemic myocardium, enhances vascular growth, reduces infarct size, and improves cardiac function after myocardial infarction. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest a novel mechanism by which E2F1 mediates the metabolic control of BM PC differentiation, and strategies that inhibit E2F1 or enhance oxidative metabolism in BM PCs may improve the effectiveness of cell therapy

A Deep Learning based Model for Fruit Grading using DenseNet

Detecting the rotten fruits become significant in the agricultural industry. Usually, the classification of fresh and rotten fruits is carried by humans is not effectual for the fruit farmers. Human beings will become tired after doing the same task multiple times, but machines do not. Thus, this paper proposes an approach to reduce human efforts, reduce the cost and time for production by identifying the defects in the fruits in the agricultural industry. If we do not detect those defects, those defected fruits may contaminate good fruits. Hence, we proposed a model to avoid the spread of rottenness. The proposed model classifies the fresh fruits and rotten fruits from the input fruit images. For this work, we have used three types of fruits, such as apple, banana, and oranges. A Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) is used for extracting the features from input fruit images, and Softmax is used to classify the images into fresh and rotten fruits. The performance of the proposed model is evaluated on a dataset that is downloaded from Kaggle and produces an accuracy of 97.82%. The results showed that the proposed CNN model can effectively classify the fresh fruits and rotten fruits

Query Recommender System Using Hierarchical Classification

In data warehouses, lots of data are gathered which are navigated and explored for analytical purposes. Even for expert people, to handle such a large data is a tough task. Handling such a voluminous data is more difficult task for non-expert users or for users who are not familiar with the database schema. The aim of this paper is to help this class of users by recommending them SQL queries that they might use. These SQL recommendations are selected by tracking the users past behavior and comparing them with other users. At first time, users may not know where to start their exploration. Secondly, users may overlook queries which help to retrieve important information. The queries are recorded and compared using hierarchical classification which is then re-ranked according to relevance. The relevant queries are retrieved using users querying behavior. Users use a query interface to issue a series of SQL queries that aim to analyze the data and mine it for interesting information. DOI: 10.17762/ijritcc2321-8169.15067

Revisting SQL Query Recommender System Using Hierarchical Classification

For analytical purposes, lots of data are gathered which are gathered and explored in data warehouses. Even to handle such a large data is a tough task for expert people. For non-expert users or for users who are not familiar with the database schema, handling such a voluminous data is more difficult task. The aim of this paper is to facilitate this class of users by recommending them SQL queries that they may use. By following the users past behavior and comparing them with other users, these SQL recommendations are selected. Initially, users may not know from where they can start their exploration. Secondly, users may overlook queries which help them to retrieve important data. Using hierarchical classification, the queries are recorded and compared which is then re-ranked according to relevance. Using users querying behavior, the relevant queries are retrieved. To issue a series of SQL queries, users use a query interface which aim to analyze the data and mine it for interesting information. DOI: 10.17762/ijritcc2321-8169.150614