Prison reform in Serbia: a case for mental health?

This article outlines the findings of the recent research in the field of prison mental health care in Serbia, in light of the recent developments in the Serbian criminal justice system and the development of community mental health care services. The article notes paucity of research in this area, which is a reflection of the unfavorable position of offender care on the Serbian prison agenda. The authors emphasize the need for dedicated mental health legislation as well as the development of mental health services in prisons, which would mirror the developments in the community. Other suggestions for the development of prison mental health care are discussed in the text

Identification of a rare p.G320R alpha-1-antitrypsin variant in emphysema and lung cancer patients

The alpha-1-antitrypsin (A1AT) gene is highly polymorphic, with more than 100 genetic variants identified of which some can affect A1AT protein concentration and/or function and lead to pulmonary and/or liver disease. This study reports on the characterization of a p.G320R variant found in two patients, one with emphysema and the other with lung cancer. This variant results from a single base-pair substitution in exon 4 of the A1AT gene, and has been characterized as P by isoelectric focusing. Functional evaluation of the A1AT p.G320R variant was through comparing specific trypsin inhibitory activity in two patients with pulmonary disorders, carriers of the p.G320R variant, and 19 healthy individuals, carriers of normal A1AT M variants. Results showed that specific trypsin inhibitory activity was lower in both emphysema (2.45 mU/g) and lung cancer (2.07 mU/g) patients than in carriers of the normal variants (range 2.51-3.71 mU/g). This rare A1AT variant is associated with reduced functional activity of A1AT protein. Considering that it was found in patients with severe pulmonary disorders, this variant could be of clinical significance

Dot net platform for distributed evolutionary algorithms with application in hydroinformatics

© 2014, IGI Global. Real-world problems often contain nonlinearities, relationships, and uncertainties that are too complex to be modeled analytically. In these scenarios, simulation-based optimization is a powerful tool to determine optimal system parameters. Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs) are robust and powerful techniques for optimization of complex systems that perfectly fit into this concept. Since evolutionary algorithms require a large number of time expensive evaluations of candidate solutions, the whole process of optimization can take huge CPU time. In this chapter, .NET platform for distributed evaluation using WCF (Windows Communication Foundation) Web services is presented in order to reduce computational time. This concept provides parallelization of evolutionary algorithms independently of geographic location and platform where evaluation is performed. Hydroinformatics is a typical representative of fields where complex systems with many uncertainties are studied. Application of the developed platform in hydroinformatics is also presented in this chapter