Analysis of Heterogeneous Vehicular Traffic: Using Proportional Densities

An extended multi-class Aw-Rascle (AR) model with pressure term described as a function of area occupancy defined in form of proportional densities is presented. Two vehicle classes that is; cars and motorcycles are considered based on an assumption that proportions of these form total traffic density. Qualitative properties of the proposed equilibrium velocity is established. Conditions under which the proposed model is stable are determine by linear stability analysis. To compute numerical flux, the model is discretized by the original Roe decomposition scheme, where Roe matrix, averaged data variables and wave strengths are explicitly derived. The Roe matrix is shown to be hyperbolic, consistent and conservative. From the numerical results, the effect of motorcycles proportion on the flow of vehicle classes is determined. Results obtained remain within limits therefore, the proposed model is realistic.Comment: 25 pages, comments are welcom

Wealth Allocation and Determinants of Venture Capital among Poultry Agribusiness Entrepreneurs in Abia State, Nigeria

This study examined wealth allocation and determinants of venture capital among poultry entrepreneurs in AbiaState, Nigeria. It specifically examined the socio-economic characteristics of poultry agribusiness entrepreneurs,sources of venture capital, entrepreneurs’ wealth status, and factors influencing wealth allocation, factorsinfluencing venture capital and finally examined the relationship between wealth allocation and venture capital.A simple random sampling technique was used to select forty (40) poultry agribusiness entrepreneurs andinformation was solicited via the use of well structured questionnaire. The tools for data analyses weredescriptive statistics, pie chart, coefficient of correlation and multiple regression analyses. The result revealedthat most of the respondents were young, married and had household size ranging from 6 – 10 persons withbusiness experience of 11 – 20 years. Sources of venture capital were mainly formal source of venture capital.Farm size, access to credit, and value of stock, equity shares were significant and positive variables influencingwealth allocation while personal savings, value of assets and source of capital from financial institution wereobvious variables influencing venture capital negatively. There was a strong relationship between wealthallocation and venture capital. It is recommended that government and other stakeholders involved in theagribusiness sector should provide a better market for the enhancement of the entrepreneurs’ stock value withrespect to sales of product. Further, hitch free and adequate access to credit will to greater extent improve thewealth allocation statues and venture capital volume of the entrepreneurs

Josephine Violette Reed Correspondence

Entries include brief biographical information and correspondence concerning the gift of a volume of Raymond\u27s poetry delivered to the Maine State Library by her daughter

Colouring Australia: a participatory open data platform

Colouring Australia is a digital platform for collecting and visualising building level information across several Australian cities. It provides a valuable resource for bringing together data on building age, material, sustainability ratings, walkability and other key metrics as we plan for net zero cities. Colouring Australia comprises part of the international Colouring Cities Research Programme, which supports the development of open-source platforms that provide open data on national building stocks. In this paper we outline the technical architecture of the platform, and the development and visualisation of a building level walkability metric based on pedestrian access to destinations. This platform provides a useful digital tool for planners to understand which parts of the city are walkable and in turn this can support future active transport programs and policies. Future research will be to validate this novel walkability index through a series of stakeholder and public workshops using the Colouring Australia platform in an interactive tabletop environment where usability testing can be undertaken

Overcoming scale-up challenges for a First-In-Human (FIH) antibody production process at the 2000L scale: Successful optimization of bioreactor equipment and harvest conditions to improve process performance and product yield

During the development and scale-up of a FIH fed-batch cell culture process, we have encountered two major challenges that impacted culture performance and harvest process yield significantly. The first challenge relates to the oxygen requirement for this particular process, where a higher oxygen demand was observed compared to our platform processes. The high oxygen demand is met by increasing agitation and sparging of air and oxygen in bioreactors, but also negatively impacted cell health due to higher gas entrance velocities (GEV) from the higher sparging rate. The observation is exemplified in the manufacturing scale which significantly impacted cell culture performance and antibody production. Further exacerbating this issue, many sparger holes were later found to be plugged leading to a theoretical GEV as high as 300 m/s. Extensive troubleshooting studies were carried out at small scale to confirm the impact of high GEV on this antibody production process and led to the re-design of the sparger for the manufacturing scale. Once implemented, the new sparger successfully mitigated the issue. The second challenge was relating to harvest operation, where the final membrane filter was clogged at the manufacturing scale. Studies were performed at the pilot scale to evaluate different solutions including increasing depth filter area, testing different types of the final filter, and changing the chase buffer at the manufacturing scale. In the end, successful implementation of the new sparger design and optimized harvest conditions led to comparable process performance between the manufacturing scale and the pilot scale. The final process resulted not only in an increase in the overall product yield, but also prevented the need of filter change-outs during the harvest operation, therefore, significantly improving manufacturing ease

Twenty-five years of the international Bled course for teachers of family medicine in Europe: glancing back and looking forward

The international Bled course for teacher training has played a central role in faculty development in family medicine for the past 25 years. The course was originally designed to promote faculty development for family medicine teachers in the new academic discipline of family medicine in Slovenia in 1990 and to introduce new topics into the family medicine curriculum. In this background paper, we perform a SCOT analysis (strengths, challenges, opportunities, and threats) of the current course, evaluating participant feedback and reviewing past topics and their impact on local and international teaching programmes. We also review the place of the course in the context of other teacher-training programmes in family medicine in Europe. We found that the structure and learning aims of the Bled course have remained stable over 25 years. It provides a safe, well-structured learning environment for the participants even though the course topic is different every year. The course has had a significant impact on curriculum development and teacher training in Slovenia as well as in many other countries in Europe and beyond. Because of the positive impact of the course and the high degree of satisfaction of the participants and course directors, it seems worthwhile to continue this endeavour. New directions for the course will depend on the learning needs of the participants and the evolving medical curricula in the countries they represent.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship ENT300: La Dona Cafe/ Elissa Gee Thwaites ...[et al.]

Business plan 1s a set of documents prepared by a firm's management to summarize its operational and financial objectives for the near future and to show how they will be achieved. It serves as a blueprint to guide the firm's policies and strategies, and is continually modified as conditions change and new opportunities and/or threats emerged. When prepared for external audience (lenders, prospective investors) it details the past, present, and forecasted performance of the firm. In addition, usually also contains pro- forma balance sheet, income statement, and cash flow statement, to illustrate how the financing being sought will affect the firm's financial position

Acute Ethanol Administration Upregulates Synaptic α4-Subunit of Neuronal Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors within the Nucleus Accumbens and Amygdala

Alcohol and nicotine are two of the most frequently abused drugs, with their comorbidity well described. Previous data show that chronic exposure to nicotine upregulates high-affinity nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) in several brain areas. Effects of ethanol on specific brain nAChR subtypes within the mesolimbic dopaminergic (DA) pathway may be a key element in the comorbidity of ethanol and nicotine. However, it is unknown how alcohol affects the abundance of these receptor proteins. In the present study, we measured the effect of acute binge ethanol on nAChR α4 subunit levels in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), nucleus accumbens (NAc), ventral tegmental area (VTA), and amygdala (Amg) by western blot analysis using a knock-in mouse line, generated with a normally functioning α4 nAChR subunit tagged with yellow fluorescent protein (YFP). We observed a robust increase in α4-YFP subunit levels in the NAc and the Amg following acute ethanol, with no changes in the PFC and VTA. To further investigate whether this upregulation was mediated by increased local mRNA transcription, we quantified mRNA levels of the Chrna4 gene using qRT-PCR. We found no effect of ethanol on α4 mRNA expression, suggesting that the upregulation of α4 protein rather occurs post-translationally. The quantitative counting of YFP immunoreactive puncta further revealed that α4-YFP protein is upregulated in presynaptic boutons of the dopaminergic axons projecting to the shell and the core regions of the NAc as well as to the basolateral amygdala (BLA), but not to the central or lateral Amg. Together, our results demonstrate that a single exposure to binge ethanol upregulates level of synaptic α4∗ nAChRs in dopaminergic inputs to the NAc and BLA. This upregulation could be linked to the functional dysregulation of dopaminergic signalling observed during the development of alcohol dependence

Decentralising chronic disease management in sub-Saharan Africa:a protocol for the qualitative process evaluation of community-based integrated management of HIV, diabetes and hypertension in Tanzania and Uganda

Introduction Sub-Saharan Africa continues to experience a syndemic of HIV and non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Vertical (stand-alone) HIV programming has provided high-quality care in the region, with almost 80% of people living with HIV in regular care and 90% virally suppressed. While integrated health education and concurrent management of HIV, hypertension and diabetes are being scaled up in clinics, innovative, more efficient and cost-effective interventions that include decentralisation into the community are required to respond to the increased burden of comorbid HIV/NCD disease. Methods and analysis This protocol describes procedures for a process evaluation running concurrently with a pragmatic cluster-randomised trial (INTE-COMM) in Tanzania and Uganda that will compare community-based integrated care (HIV, diabetes and hypertension) with standard facility-based integrated care. The INTE-COMM intervention will manage multiple conditions (HIV, hypertension and diabetes) in the community via health monitoring and adherence/lifestyle advice (medicine, diet and exercise) provided by community nurses and trained lay workers, as well as the devolvement of NCD drug dispensing to the community level. Based on Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory, the process evaluation will use qualitative methods to investigate sociostructural factors shaping care delivery and outcomes in up to 10 standard care facilities and/ or intervention community sites with linked healthcare facilities. Multistakeholder interviews (patients, community health workers and volunteers, healthcare providers, policymakers, clinical researchers and international and non-governmental organisations), focus group discussions (community leaders and members) and non-participant observations (community meetings and drug dispensing) will explore implementation from diverse perspectives at three timepoints in the trial implementation. Iterative sampling and analysis, moving between data collection points and data analysis to test emerging theories, will continue until saturation is reached. This process of analytic reflexivity and triangulation across methods and sources will provide findings to explain the main trial findings and offer clear directions for future efforts to sustain and scale up community-integrated care for HIV, diabetes and hypertension. Ethics and dissemination The protocol has been approved by the University College of London (UK), the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine Ethics Committee (UK), the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology and the Uganda Virus Research Institute Research and Ethics Committee (Uganda) and the Medical Research Coordinating Committee of the National Institute for Medical Research (Tanzania). The University College of London is the trial sponsor. Dissemination of findings will be done through journal publications and stakeholder meetings (with study participants, healthcare providers, policymakers and other stakeholders), local and international conferences, policy briefs, peer-reviewed journal articles and publications.</p