Best practices in managing specialist subcontracting performance : final report

Construction Industry Institute-Hong Kong Report, no. 11Author name used in this publication: K T ChanAuthor name used in this publication: Edward YiuOther Versio

Comparison of effects of sleeve gastrectomy, duodenal-jejunal bypass and ileal transposition for type II diabetes

Oral Presentations: OS9 - Surgery for Diabetes: no. OS9.02INTRODUCTION: Sleeve gastrectomy (SG), duodenal jejuna bypass (DJB) and ileal transposition (IT) have been reported to be effective for the treatment of T2DM. OBJECTIVES: It is unknown which procedure has a stronger anti-diabetic effect. The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of these novel procedures METHODS: SG, DJB, IT and sham operation of each procedure were performed in 10-12 weeks old Goto-Kakizaki rats, a spontaneous non-obese model of T2DM. The glucose homeostasis effect was evaluated by measuring fasting glucose (FBG) and glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA1c). Gut hormonal profiles and lipid absorption were also examined. Rats were observed for 1 year. RESULTS: All three procedures had significant lower FBG when compared to the respective sham groups. DJB and IT had lower FBG than SG (SG vs DJB, p=0.023; SG vs IT, p=0.009) whereas DJB and IT had a similar FBG level, p=0.678. For HbA1c, all procedures had lower levels than the respective sham groups, p<0.001. The HbA1c of SG rebounded on 8th week whereas HbA1c of DJB and IT remained at low level. SG had a significant higher HbA1c level than DJB and IT, p<0.001 while DJB and IT had a similar level, p=0.685. GLP-1 and PYY were raised in DJB and IT whereas GIP level increased in DJB. All three procedures have different lipid absorption profile. CONCLUSION: SG, DJB and IT all had anti-diabetic effect. DJB and IT had more potent anti-diabetic effect than SG. Each procedure has different effects on metabolic diseases and their clinic application deserve individual consideration.published_or_final_versio

Comparison of effects of sleeve gastrectomy, duodenal-jejunal bypass and ileal transposition for the treatment of type II diabetes

This journal suppl. entitled: 2014 DDW AbstractThe SSAT’s 55th Annual Meeting took place during Digestive Disease Week 2014SSAT Poster Session (8215) - Stomach: Basic (I)BACKGROUND: Sleeve gastrectomy (SG), duodenal jejunal bypass (DJB) and ileal transposition (IT) have been reported to be effective for the treatment of T2DM. It is unknown which procedure has a stronger anti-diabetic effect. The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of these novel procedures METHODS: SG, DJB, IT and ...postprin

Switching characteristics and efficiency improvement with auxiliaryresonant snubber based soft-switching inverters

The auxiliary resonant snubber inverter (RSI) has demonstrated superiority in reduction of switching losses and dv/dt. It was found that the overall inverter system efficiency might not be improved if the resonant current was not controlled in accordance with the load current. This paper proposes an improved control scheme to minimize the operation of auxiliary circuit for efficiency improvement. The principle of this control scheme is to vary the resonant current with variable timing control based on the load current magnitude and to disable the auxiliary circuit operation when diode freewheeling occurs after switching. To illustrate the operation of this control scheme, this paper compares the switching characteristics and inverter power loss of hard-switching inverter, RSI with fixed-timing and variable-timing control and RSI with the proposed control scheme. Experimental results fully agree with the analyses and prove that the proposed control scheme is suitable for RSI to achieve better operating conditions.published_or_final_versio

Multilevel ultrafast flexible nanoscale nonvolatile hybrid graphene oxide-titanium oxide memories

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.Graphene oxide (GO) resistive memories offer the promise of low-cost environmentally sustainable fabrication, high mechanical flexibility and high optical transparency, making them ideally suited to future flexible and transparent electronics applications. However, the dimensional and temporal scalability of GO memories, i.e., how small they can be made and how fast they can be switched, is an area that has received scant attention. Moreover, a plethora of GO resistive switching characteristics and mechanisms has been reported in the literature, sometimes leading to a confusing and conflicting picture. Consequently, the potential for graphene oxide to deliver high-performance memories operating on nanometer length and nanosecond time scales is currently unknown. Here we address such shortcomings, presenting not only the smallest (50 nm), fastest (sub-5 ns), thinnest (8 nm) GO-based memory devices produced to date, but also demonstrate that our approach provides easily accessible multilevel (4-level, 2-bit per cell) storage capabilities along with excellent endurance and retention performance-all on both rigid and flexible substrates. Via comprehensive experimental characterizations backed-up by detailed atomistic simulations, we also show that the resistive switching mechanism in our Pt/GO/Ti/Pt devices is driven by redox reactions in the interfacial region between the top (Ti) electrode and the GO layer.This work was carried out under the auspices of the EU FP7 project CareRAMM. This project received funding from the European Union Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007- 2013) under grant agreement no. 309980. The authors are grateful for helpful discussions with all CareRAMM partners, particularly Prof. Andrea Ferrari and Ms. Anna Ott at the University of Cambridge, and Drs. Abu Sebastian and Wabe Koelmans at IBM Research Zurich. We also gratefully acknowledge the assistance of the National EPSRC XPS User’s Service (NEXUS) at Newcastle University, U.K. (an EPSRC Mid-Range Facility) in carrying out the XPS measurement

Rhymes: a shared virtual memory system for non-coherent tiled many-core architectures

The rising core count per processor is pushing chip complexity to a level that hardware-based cache coherency protocols become too hard and costly to scale. We need new designs of many-core hardware and software other than traditional technologies to keep up with the ever-increasing scalability demands. The Intel Single-chip Cloud Computer (SCC) is a recent research processor exemplifying a new cluster-on-chip architecture which promotes a software-oriented approach instead of hardware support to implementing shared memory coherence. This paper presents a shared virtual memory (SVM) system, dubbed Rhymes, tailored to such a new processor kind of non-coherent and hybrid memory architectures. Rhymes features a two-way cache coherence protocol to enforce release consistency for pages allocated in shared physical memory (SPM) and scope consistency for pages in per-core private memory. It also supports page remapping on a per-core basis to boost data locality. We implement Rhymes on the SCC port of the Barrelfish OS. Experimental results show that our SVM outperforms the pure SPM approach used by Intel's software managed coherence (SMC) library by up to 12 times, with superlinear speedups (due to L2 cache effect) noted for applications with strong data reuse patterns.published_or_final_versio

Endoscopic biliary drainage for severe acute cholangitis

Background. Emergency surgery for patients with severe acute cholangitis due to choledocholithiasis is associated with substantial morbidity and mortality. Because recent results suggested that emergency endoscopic drainage could improve the outcome of such patients, we undertook a prospective study to determine the role of this procedure as initial treatment. Methods. During a 43-month period, 82 patients with severe acute cholangitis due to choledocholithiasis were randomly assigned to undergo surgical decompression of the biliary tract (41 patients) or endoscopic biliary drainage (41 patients), followed by definitive treatment. Hospital mortality was analyzed with respect to the use of endoscopic biliary drainage and other clinical and laboratory findings. Prognostic determinants were studied by linear discriminant analysis. Results. Complications related to biliary tract decompression and subsequent definitive treatment developed in 14 patients treated with endoscopic biliary drainage and 27 treated with surgery (34 vs. 66 percent, P>0.05). The time required for normalization of temperature and stabilization of blood pressure was similar in the two groups, but more patients in the surgery group required ventilatory support. The hospital mortality rate was significantly lower for the patients who underwent endoscopy (4 deaths) than for those treated surgically (13 deaths) (10 vs. 32 percent, P<0.03). The presence of concomitant medical problems, a low platelet count, a high serum urea nitrogen concentration, and a low serum albumin concentration before biliary decompression were the other independent determinants of mortality in both groups. Conclusions. Endoscopic biliary drainage is a safe and effective measure for the initial control of severe acute cholangitis due to choledocholithiasis and to reduce the mortality associated with the condition.published_or_final_versio

Silicon-Modified rare-earth transitions - a new route to Near- and Mid-IR Photonics

Silicon underpins microelectronics but lacks the photonic capability needed for next-generation systems and currently relies on a highly undesirable hybridization of separate discrete devices using direct band gap semiconductors. Rare-earth (RE) implantation is a promising approach to bestow photonic capability to silicon but is limited to internal RE transition wavelengths. Reported here is the first observation of direct optical transitions from the silicon band edge to internal f-levels of implanted REs (Ce, Eu, and Yb); this overturns previously held assumptions about the alignment of RE levels to the silicon band gap. The photoluminescence lines are massively redshifted to several technologically useful wavelengths and modeling of their splitting indicates that they must originate from the REs. Eu-implanted silicon devices display a greatly enhanced electroluminescence efficiency of 8%. Also observed is the first crystal field splitting in Ce luminescence. Mid-IR silicon photodetectors with specific detectivities comparable to existing state-of-the-art mid-IR detectors are demonstrated

Driving the green vehicles shift: an evaluation of Malaysian consumers’ acceptance

With the current drastic changes in global weather, more countries are worried about the sustainability of the ecosystem. Global leaders are more concerned about the drastic climate change, and various initiatives are being taken to prevent further damage to the ecosystem. In Malaysia, the transportation sector, mainly motor vehicles, emitted approximately 97% of carbon monoxide to the environment, causing harmful air pollution. Because of this, green vehicles were introduced to overcome this problem. However, there remain various challenges that may impede or trigger the interest of Malaysian consumers in accepting green vehicles. Thus, this study applies the cognitive-affection model to predict the consumers’ intention to accept green vehicles. Using a purposive sampling among current vehicle drivers, a face-to-face survey was conducted and gathered a total of 606 responses. Data were analysed using statistical measurements such as descriptive analysis, exploratory factor analysis and structural equation modelling. Five latent factors such as consumers’ acceptance, perceived quality, perceived value (environmental concern, acquisition and maintenance cost), and government policies were identified. The results indicated that perceived value (environmental concern), perceived quality, and government policies have a strong positive relationship with consumers’ acceptance. The perceived value showed a negative relationship with consumer acceptance, indicating that consumers would only consider accepting green vehicles if they were cheaper and had a low maintenance cost

Inibidores de urease, serapilheira e adensamento do cafeeiro arábica: relações com a matéria orgânica do solo

O uso de tecnologias nas lavouras cafeeiras deve proporcionar melhorias nas condições de manejo, auxiliar na produção vegetal e promover qualidade ao solo e meio ambiente. Neste sentido, as tecnologias fertilizantes inibidores de urease, serapilheira foliar cafeeira e o adensamento cafeeiro foram avaliados atendendo há problemáticas no manejo das lavouras de cafeicultores familiares do Território do Caparaó- ES. O capítulo 1 teve por objetivo verificar o potencial dos inibidores de urease quanto à redução da volatilização NH3 e emissão de CO2 do solo, bem como avaliar a atividade da enzima urese do solo e a influência dos inibiores de urease sobre a matéria orgânica do solo. Os inibidores de urease NBPT e Cu+B mostraram ser promissores na redução da volatilização da NH3, principalmente o NBPT que volatilizou, em função das doses avaliadas, de 1,4 a 5,6 % do total de N aplicado. O efluxo de CO2 seguiu a ordem: Uréia> Uréia+Cu+B > Uréia+NBPT. De modo semelhante, os inibidores de urease reduziram a atividade da enzima urease do solo, sendo a uréia comum, o tratamento que proporcionou maior atividade da enzima. Apesar das fontes e doses de N não influenciarem sobre os teores de C orgânica do solo, verificou-se redução de 5,1 % no seu teor médio dos 16 para os 32 dias, ou seja, um curto período de tempo tem promovido redução na matéria orgânica do solo. O capítulo 2 teve por objetivo verificar o efeito da associação inibidores de urease e serapilheira sobre a volatilização da amônia e emissão de CO2 bem como a taxa de decomposição e liberação de nutrientes da serapilheira e seu efeito na matéria orgânica do solo. A ordem de volatilização da NH3 e emissão de CO2 foi: Uréia> Uréia+Cu+B > Uréia+NBPT. Contudo, o aumento da dose de serapilheira proporciona menor emissão de NH3, porém, maior emissão de CO2 (y=0,95x+3,82). Na dose equivalente a 4,5 Mg ha-1 de serapilheira e após 64 dias de decomposição, a quantidade liberada de C, N, P, K, Ca e Mg foi equivalente a 547,1; 49,0; 1,28; 17,4; 18,2 e 5,0 kg ha-1, respectivamente. Fontes de N e doses de serapilheira não influenciaram no teor de C orgânico total e N total do solo, entretanto, dos 16 aos 64 dias após a aplicação da serapilheira ocorreu redução nos seus teores em 15,4 e 21,1 %, respectivamente. O capítulo 3 teve por objetivo avaliar o efeito dos inibidores de urease juntamente com a serapilheira foliar cafeeira sobre os parâmetros biométricos, teor e acúmulo de N, atividade da urease foliar e % de clorofila no desenvolvimento inicial do cafeeiro IAC 144. Independente da fonte de N avaliada, a dose de 1,2 g vaso-1 de N foi suficiente para proporcionar altura da planta, diâmetro do caule, número de nós, pares de folhas, ramos plagiotrópicos e massa seca igual ou superiores as demais doses. Maiores teores de N foliar foram proporcionados pelos inibidores de urease e na maior dose aplicada impactando também, em maior atividade da enzima urease na folha. Não é recomendada a utilização de serapilheira no plantio do cafeeiro, pois ela proporcionou redução de 9,1; 3,3; 10,5 e 19,3 % na altura, número de nós, diâmetro do caule e número de ramos plagiotrópicos, respectivamente, e reduziu a produção de massa seca e o acúmulo de N na parte aérea. Fontes, doses de N e a serapilheira não influenciaram os teores de clorofila, entretanto, aumento dos teores de clorofila foram verificadas ao longo do tempo após a adubação nitrogenada. Já em condições de campo, o capítulo 4 da tese teve por objetivo determinar a influência do adensamento da lavoura cafeeira sobre os teores e estoques de COT e NT do solo, C e N da biomassa microbiana, matéria orgânica leve, labilidade da matéria orgânica do solo, as substâncias húmicas, densidade, porosidade e as emissões de CO2, temperatura e umidade do solo na região montanhosa do Território do Caparaó - Espírito Santo. O manejo cafeeiro adensado (8333 plantas ha-1) proporcionou aumento da MOL e C-MOL, menor densidade do solo, maior macroporosidade e porosidade total em relação ao cafeeiro convencional (3105 plantas ha-1). Épocas quentes e úmidas do ano favorecem as emissões de CO2 do solo, entretanto, o manejo do cafeeiro sob sistema adensado é o sistema que proporcionou menores emissões de CO2 do solo. A maior quantidade de serapilheira cafeeira do sistema adensado não estimula a atividade microbiológica do solo, entretanto, protege o solo contra erosão, aumenta a umidade e reduz a amplitude térmica. Palavras-chave: Espaçamento, agricultura familiar, volatilização, fertilizantes nitrogenados, Território do Capara