Cultural Interactions and Religious Iconography in 16th Century Kerala: the Mural Paintings of St. Mary’s Church in Angamaly

St. Mary\u27s Jacobite Syrian Church is an ancient church in Angamaly (Kerala). One account has Syrian Christians arriving in Angamaly in 384 CE and the church being established in 409 CE. Syrian Christians are the earliest Christian community of India, and they attribute their origin to the evangelical efforts of the apostle Saint Thomas who is believed to have travelled through the Malabar country in 52 CE evangelizing and building churches. It was when he moved east that he is supposed to have met his death and (martyrdom) at Mylapore near Madras

Infinite Feature Selection on Shore-Based Biomarkers Reveals Connectivity Modulation after Stroke

Connectomics is gaining increasing interest in the scientific and clinical communities. It consists in deriving models of structural or functional brain connections based on some local measures. Here we focus on structural connectivity as detected by diffusion MRI. Connectivity matrices are derived from microstructural indices obtained by the 3D-SHORE. Typically, graphs are derived from connectivity matrices and used for inferring node properties that allow identifying those nodes that play a prominent role in the network. This information can then be used to detect network modulations induced by diseases. In this paper we take a complementary approach and focus on link as opposed to node properties. We hypothesize that network modulation can be better described by measuring the connectivity alteration directly in the form of modulation of the properties of white matter fiber bundles constituting the network communication backbone. The goal of this paper is to detect the paths that are most altered by the pathology by exploiting a feature selection paradigm. Temporal changes on connection weights are treated as features and those playing a leading role in a patient versus healthy controls classification task are detected by the Infinite Feature Selection (Inf-FS) method. Results show that connection paths with high discriminative power can be identified that are shared by the considered microstructural descriptors allowing a classification accuracy ranging between 83% and 89%

Teachers’ Personal Resources: What Do We Know and Where Do We Go? A Scoping Review Through the Lens of Job Demands-Resources Theory

Teacher attrition and continue to be the source of considerable concern among educators and school systems alike. Thus, supporting teachers to remain in the profession is of tremendous importance. Against the backdrop of this work, personal resources – as a component of the broader Job Demands-Resources framework– have emerged as potentially salient determinants of teachers’ individual and work-related wellbeing outcomes. Despite the growth in research attending to personal resources, particularly in teaching populations, there is an absence of research that systematically examines the personal resources which may be associated with teachers’ wellbeing. Accordingly, the aim of the present research was to conduct a scoping review of the personal resources which have been associated with teachers’ wellbeing-related outcomes to identify gaps in the present literature which may provide direction for future research. The search identified 17 studies of relevance. In total, 11 personal resources were examined in relation to 22 different outcomes. Analyses highlighted the comparative popularity of self-efficacy as a personal resource and the distinction between resources of an affective-cognitive and behavioral-practical nature. The results of the review highlighted the need for further clarity in terms of the classification of personal resources, the need to conduct research among non-western populations and among teachers at different school levels, and the need for a broader range of methodologies to further nuance understandings. Taken together, the results of this review have implications for future research examining teachers’ personal resources and JD-R theory more broadly, as well as interventions which may cultivate such resources

Inference for VARs identified with sign restrictions

There is a fast growing literature that partially identifies structural vector autoregressions (SVARs) by imposing sign restrictions on the responses of a subset of the endogenous variables to a particular structural shock (sign-restricted SVARs). To date, the methods that have been used are only justified from a Bayesian perspective. This paper develops methods of constructing error bands for impulse response functions of sign-restricted SVARs that are valid from a frequentist perspective. The authors also provide a comparison of frequentist and Bayesian error bands in the context of an empirical application — the former can be twice as wide as the latter.Vector autoregression ; Econometric models

An introduction to model-independent diffusion magnetic resonance imaging.

ABSTRACT: q-Space-based techniques such as diffusion spectrum imaging, q-ball imaging, and their variations have been used extensively in research for their desired capability to delineate complex neuronal architectures such as multiple fiber crossings in each of the image voxels. The purpose of this article was to provide an introduction to the q-space formalism and the principles of basic q-space techniques together with the discussion on the advantages as well as challenges in translating these techniques into the clinical environment. A review of the currently used q-space-based protocols in clinical research is also provided

The Protection of Brazilian Forests and the Effectiveness of International Global Law

Brazil is a mega-diverse country and one of the largest parts of the world\u27s forests lies within its territory. The Brazilian Forest Code, a national law that protects all kinds of vegetation, contributes significantly to the achievement of the objectives of the Conventions on Biological Diversity and Climate Changes. Currently, the rapid expansion of the agricultural frontier over the forests, mainly in the Amazon Biome and the Cerrado (Brazilian savanna species), aims towards the cultivation of soya and sugar cane. These cultures increase the profit of agrobusiness and the economic development of Brazil besides being considered sources of renewable energy. Otherwise, the pressure for more room for agrobusiness has impacted on the environment severely. As a consequence, the Brazilian Forest Code has been reviewed, to minimize the obligations concerning forest protection. The proposed changes might undermine the fulfillment of obligations assumed by Brazil in the Convention of Biological Diversity and in the Convention on Climate Change, since the deforestation destroys the biodiversity and generates greenhouse gases. The purpose of this presentation is to critically analyze some changes to the Forest Code, related to forest destruction and its impact on the effectiveness of the CBD and CCC. We will also analyze the relation between the protection of forests in Brazil and the commitments Brazil has undertaken with the international community, to discuss mechanisms to increase the effectiveness of international environmental agreements that are part of the Global Environmental Law

Direct Oral Anticoagulants and Their Use in Treatment and Secondary Prevention of Acute Symptomatic Venous Thromboembolism.

Direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) have been compared with standard therapy in large phase III studies to assess their safety and efficacy in the treatment of deep vein thrombosis and/or pulmonary embolism and in the secondary prevention of recurrent venous thromboembolism. Although the mean population age and the gross inclusion and exclusion criteria were similar across these studies, they differed in other aspects such as overall study design and acute treatment strategies. The 4 DOACs examined in phase III trials (apixaban, edoxaban, rivaroxaban, and dabigatran) showed noninferiority compared with standard therapy for the treatment of deep vein thrombosis and/or pulmonary embolism and for the prevention of recurrent venous thromboembolism. Furthermore, these DOACs exhibited a similar safety profile to standard therapy, with the risk of major bleeding significantly reduced in some of these studies. Rivaroxaban and apixaban were tested as a single-drug approach, whereas in the dabigatran and edoxaban studies, initial bridging with parenteral agents was employed. The purpose of this review is to compare the phase III studies of DOACs in this indication, to highlight the differences, and to discuss a series of clinically relevant issues, including the management of key patient subgroups (eg, fragile patients, those with cancer or renal impairment), extended treatment, use of comedications, heparin pretreatment versus a single-drug approach, and the bleeding profiles of the DOACs

Sacred and Healing Plants in Huaxtepec: The Pre-Hispanic and European Medicinal Legacy in Nueva España

Huaxtepec uno de los más famosos jardines aztecas, pertenecía a Moctezuma I (1440-1469 Ilhuicamina). Este jardín prehispánico, como otros, contenía plantas rituales y medicinales. Los frailes misioneros fueron los primeros que a mediados del siglo XVI se interesaron por las prácticas médicas desarrolladas por los indígenas y por las plantas que utilizaban en sanaciones y rituales religiosos. Estos frailes fundaron también los primeros hospitales como el Hospital de la Santa Cruz en Huaxtepec. Este estudio intenta demostrar cómo este Hospital mantuvo un papel importante durante la colonia como lugar de relajación y curación en donde las plantas del antiguo jardín de Moctezuma se siguieron utilizando y mezclaron con las provenientes de otros continentes para la sanación de los enfermos.Huaxtepec, one of the most famous Aztec gardens, belonged to Moctezuma I (1440-1469 Ilhuicamina). This pre-Hispanic garden, like others, contained ritual and medicinal plants. The missionary friars were the first who, in the middle of the 16th century, became interested in the medical practices developed by the indigenous people and in the plants they used in healing and religious rituals. These friars also founded the first hospitals such as the Hospital de la Santa Cruz in Huaxtepec. This study tries to demonstrate how this Hospital maintained an important role during the colony as a place of relaxation and healing where the plants of the old garden of Moctezuma continued to be used and mixed with those from other continents for the healing of the sick.Facultad de Arte