Life Annuities under Random Rates of Interest.

We begin by examining the accumulated value functions of some annuities-certain. We then investigate the accumulated value of these annuities where the interest is a random variable under some restrictions. Calculations are derived for the expected value and the variance of these accumulated values and present values. In particular we will examine an annuity-due of k yearly payments of 1. Then we will consider an increasing annuity-due of k yearly payments of 1, 2, ⋯ , k. And finally, we examine a decreasing annuity-due of k yearly payments of n, n - 1, ⋯ , n - k + 1, for k ≤ n. Finally we extend our analysis to include a contingent annuity. That is an annuity in which each payment is contingent on the continuance of a given status. Specifically, we examine a life annuity under which each payment is contingent on the survival of one or more specified persons. We extend our methods from the previous sections to derive the formula of the expected value for the present value of the life annuities of a future life time at a random rate of interest

A History of Islamic Court Dress in the Middle East.

The aesthetic ideal of the well-dressed Muslim male and female was formulated in ?ad?th literature, which counselled that the individual's devotion should be reflected in suitable humble and unostentatious attire. Although the evidence is fragmentary, the reality of the Umayyad and Abbasid courts, however, shows an increasing concern for ritual and ceremonial, along with a growing belief that the individual's status, profession and political (and religious) allegiance should be manifested in dress. It has been generally assumed that costume in the Islamic Middle East remained virtually unchanged in its structure and form until the 19th century. A careful examination of the visual sources in respect of the military dress in the medieval and post-medieval periods challenges this assumption, which is further weakened by the pictorial evidence of court costumes in the Ottoman and Safavid empires. At both courts, distinctive features in dress and head-gear identified the wearer's rank, status and to some extent, office. To don clothes associated with another group was to indicate publicly one's social aspirations, and for this reason sumptuary laws were repeatedly issued, with questionable effect, to re-establish as traditional a social order and stratification. Similarly in the 19th and 20th centuries, government programmes of radical modernization were accompanied by rigorous clothing reforms for both men and women. As the study of costume has to be undertaken with reference to political, social and economic history, each section is introduced by a short historical summary. This is followed by the examination of data relating to the court dress of the period, and concluded with information on the economic situation of the textile industry

Fluorescent ligand for human progesterone receptor imaging in live cells.

We employed molecular modeling to design and then synthesize fluorescent ligands for the human progesterone receptor. Boron dipyrromethene (BODIPY) or tetramethylrhodamine were conjugated to the progesterone receptor antagonist RU486 (Mifepristone) through an extended hydrophilic linker. The fluorescent ligands demonstrated comparable bioactivity to the parent antagonist in live cells and triggered nuclear translocation of the receptor in a specific manner. The BODIPY labeled ligand was applied to investigate the dependency of progesterone receptor nuclear translocation on partner proteins and to show that functional heat shock protein 90 but not immunophilin FKBP52 activity is essential. A tissue distribution study indicated that the fluorescent ligand preferentially accumulates in tissues that express high levels of the receptor in vivo. The design and properties of the BODIPY-labeled RU486 make it a potential candidate for in vivo imaging of PR by positron emission tomography through incorporation of (18)F into the BODIPY core

The development of decorative arts in Australia : Morris & Co. and imported taste, 1862-1939

This work inquires into decorative choices in the Australian states of New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, between the years of 1862 to 1939, with a view to highlighting the activities and uniqueness of Morris & Co. within the general commercial world in which the English firm operated. Morris & Co. (1861-1940) produced items for interior decoration and stained glass windows. Its ethos and activities were firmly rooted in the principles expounded by its founder, William Morris. The essence of those principles was upheld by John Henry Dearie following Morris’s death in 1896. The company’s products were so distinctive that publications continue to discuss them separately from other styles promoted during its lifetime. Customers who favoured Morris & Co. could be as individual as the company itself. This particularly applied to Australian clients because not only did the firm operate within a restricted business code but also Australia presented commercial and social considerations which differed from the British situation. Chapter 1 presents an overview to allow the reader to understand basic precepts governing Australian manufacturing and lifestyles and the workings of Morris & Co. Chapter 2 looks at particular circumstances and opinions in the mid-nineteenth century which affected Australian decorative manufacturing and Morris & Co. The Australian firms of Ferguson & Urie, Lyon, Cottier & Co. and W.H. Rocke & Co. are introduced in this Chapter. The purpose, assessments and outcomes of the first international exhibitions to be held in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide are considered in Chapter 3. The appearance of these exhibitions from 1879 allowed local manufacturers to present their wares to many more people than previously possible and in competition with the strong import industry. While Morris would later denigrate international exhibitions his company’s first showing to the public occurred at such an event in London and the educational possibilities he supported could be served by these affairs. In Chapter 4 the various avenues of decorative arts education followed in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia are examined. Education and responsibility to the public were important issues for William Morris. He not only applied his beliefs in these areas to his own Firm but also he devoted considerable time to their general dissemination. Australian manufacturers were encumbered by circumstances irrelevant to Morris & Co. Nonetheless Morris’s opinions proved relevant when authorities came to tackle the problem of design education in Australia. The practices of Adelaide’s Clarkson Ltd. in stained glass window manufacture are highlighted here. Chapter 5 studies the beginnings of the stained glass window industry in Australia, its British associations, Morris & Co.’s productions, the company’s first commission for Australia and a comparison of its style with Australian work. Chapter 6 focuses on Sydney’s Lyon, Cottier & Co., on the nature of the company as it converged with or diverged from the course of Morris & Co. Finally the concepts of style and fashion are pondered. In Chapter 7 fashionable decorative choices in Australia are considered. The Melbourne firm of W.H. Rocke & Co. is compared with Morris & Co. in terms of style and presentation of goods. There was only one Australian family to decorate extensively with Morris & Co.: Adelaide’s Barr Smiths. Chapter 8 investigates this family’s background and initial decorative preferences, the reasons why they subsequently favoured Morris & Co. and the progression of their Morris & Co. decorations. The embroidery side of Morris & Co. is taken into account. For stained glass windows to become a reality numerous concrete and emotional circumstances come into play. Chapter 9 discusses the practices and sentiments which affected Morris & Co.’s productions in Australian churches. Chapter 10 studies Morris & Co. items individually conveyed to Australia during the twentieth century, up until the company’s effective demise in 1939, with likely reasons for introduction. Articles for interior decoration and stained glass windows are examined

Ayyubid architecture.

At the zenith of its power Ayyubid rule stretched from the Tunisian border in the west, the Yemen in the south and al-Jazira north and eastwards, but only three areas out of this large territorial expanse have received any serious architectural study that has been published; these are Cairo, Damascus and, to a lesser extent, Aleppo. The buildings of Hama, Harran, Homs and Mosul are cursorily described and other Ayyubid structures apart from these have had little or no attention. Throughout there is a marked scarcity of drawings, plans and photographs. Under these circumstances only a detailed review with the most tentative of interpretations is possible. The period opened in 1171 with the overthrow of the Fatimid regime in Egypt by Salah al-Din and the shift in political power was given visual expression in stylistic changes in the architectural field. Whereas the Fatimids adapted several North African architectural features, the Ayyubid rulers looked eastwards for their inspiration. Although their rule lasted under a century, many new structural ideas apparent in regions under Ayyubid control were continued, developed and elaborated under the following Mamluk Sultanate. The subject is divided under the accepted three headings of military, religious and secular constructions. The military section includes city walls, citadels and also caravansarai, because of the parallel defence features. The madrasa and maristan are grouped with the masjid and mausoleum forms as religious architecture because of their interrelationship and structural similarity. The third and last category, secular buildings, includes private houses and public baths

An Inversion Analysis of Recent Variability in Natural CO2 Fluxes Using GOSAT and In Situ Observations

About one-half of the global CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion and deforestation accumulates in the atmosphere, where it contributes to global warming. The rest is taken up by vegetation and the ocean. The precise contribution of the two sinks, and their location and year-to-year variability are, however, not well understood. We use two different approaches, batch Bayesian synthesis inversion and variational data assimilation, to deduce the global spatiotemporal distributions of CO2 fluxes during 2009-2010. One of our objectives is to assess different sources of uncertainties in inferred fluxes, including uncertainties in prior flux estimates and observations, and differences in inversion techniques. For prior constraints, we utilize fluxes and uncertainties from the CASA-GFED model of the terrestrial biosphere and biomass burning driven by satellite observations and interannually varying meteorology. We also use measurement-based ocean flux estimates and two sets of fixed fossil CO2 emissions. Here, our inversions incorporate column CO2 measurements from the GOSAT satellite (ACOS retrieval, filtered and bias-corrected) and in situ observations (individual flask and afternoon-average continuous observations) to estimate fluxes in 108 regions over 8-day intervals for the batch inversion and at 3 x 3.75 weekly for the variational system. Relationships between fluxes and atmospheric concentrations are derived consistently for the two inversion systems using the PCTM atmospheric transport model driven by meteorology from the MERRA reanalysis. We compare the posterior fluxes and uncertainties derived using different data sets and the two inversion approaches, and evaluate the posterior atmospheric concentrations against independent data including aircraft measurements. The optimized fluxes generally resemble those from other studies. For example, the results indicate that the terrestrial biosphere is a net CO2 sink, and a GOSAT-only inversion suggests a shift in the global sink from the tropics south to the north relative to the prior and to an in-situ-only inversion. We also find a smaller terrestrial sink in higher-latitude northern regions in boreal summer of 2010 relative to 2009

‘Find the Gap’: can a multidisciplinary group of university teachers influence learning and teaching practice?

© 2017 The Authors. This is an Open Access article, first published in a Special Issue of Practice and Evidence of Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, July 2017. This article is made available for personal research, educational, and non-commercial purposes only. Unless otherwise stated, all content is protected by copyright, and in the absence of an open license, permissions for further re-use should be sought from the publisher, the author, or other copyright holder.This paper describes and analyses a year’s project undertaken by a small, multidisciplinary group of academic staff in a UK post -1992 university. The purpose of the group was to: take a scholarly and inquiring approach to learning and teaching; build staff confidence and expertise in teaching and leadership in teaching; and offer a model of a potential approach to institutional change in educational practice. The project involved colleagues with interest and expertise in teaching sharing ideas for practice together through dialogue. They also undertook an Appreciative Inquiry into effective professional learning in this field and shared the findings with colleagues and institutional leaders. Evaluation identified individuals’ professional learning over the year and their growth in confidence to share practice ideas beyond the local. Barriers to using this approach for university practice development included perceived issues of authority to act in an institutional context, and performative approaches to change in teaching. Colleagues identified that they needed to find ‘gaps’ in allocated time schedules and in perceptions of teaching development and leadership if they are to influence more than their own practice. It is suggested that universities need to build the expertise and leadership capacities of academic staff with knowledge and skills in teaching by bringing them together in multidisciplinary groups to share ideas and create new practice. Gaps in policies and systems need to be opened up to enable these colleagues to have time and opportunities to work together, network with others and enhance university educational practice.Peer reviewe

Clinical risk prediction for pre-eclampsia in nulliparous women: development of model in international prospective cohort

Objectives To develop a predictive model for pre-eclampsia based on clinical risk factors for nulliparous women and to identify a subgroup at increased risk, in whom specialist referral might be indicated

Unprecedented use of silver(I) N-heterocyclic carbene complexes for the catalytic preparation of 1,2-bis(boronate) esters

Catalytic diboration of internal and terminal alkenes with Ag(I) N-heterocyclic carbene complexes leads to 1,2-bis(boronate) esters as single intermediates, that can be oxidised towards the corresponding diols.Sanau Torrecilla, Mercedes, [email protected]