Surety of the nation`s critical infrastructures: The challenge restructuring poses to the telecommunications sector

The telecommunications sector plays a pivotal role in the system of increasingly connected and interdependent networks that make up national infrastructure. An assessment of the probable structure and function of the bit-moving industry in the twenty-first century must include issues associated with the surety of telecommunications. The term surety, as used here, means confidence in the acceptable behavior of a system in both intended and unintended circumstances. This paper outlines various engineering approaches to surety in systems, generally, and in the telecommunications infrastructure, specifically. It uses the experience and expectations of the telecommunications system of the US as an example of the global challenges. The paper examines the principal factors underlying the change to more distributed systems in this sector, assesses surety issues associated with these changes, and suggests several possible strategies for mitigation. It also studies the ramifications of what could happen if this sector became a target for those seeking to compromise a nation`s security and economic well being. Experts in this area generally agree that the U. S. telecommunications sector will eventually respond in a way that meets market demands for surety. Questions remain open, however, about confidence in the telecommunications sector and the nation`s infrastructure during unintended circumstances--such as those posed by information warfare or by cascading software failures. Resolution of these questions is complicated by the lack of clear accountability of the private and the public sectors for the surety of telecommunications

The ESTMJS (European Society of Temporomandibular Joint Surgeons) consensus and evidence-based recommendations on management of Condylar dislocation

© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).Although condylar dislocation is not uncommon, terminology, diagnostics, and treatment concepts vary considerably worldwide. This study aims to present a consensus recommendation based on systematically reviewed literature and approved by the European Society of TMJ Surgeons (ESTMJS). Based on the template of the evidence-based German guideline (register # 007-063) the ESTMJS members voted on 30 draft recommendations regarding terminology, diagnostics, and treatment initially via a blinded modified Delphi procedure. After unblinding, a discussion and voting followed, using a structured consensus process in 2019. An independent moderator documented and evaluated voting results and alterations from the original draft. Although the results of the preliminary voting were very heterogenous and differed significantly from the German S3 guideline (p < 0.0005), a strong consensus was achieved in the final voting on terminology, diagnostics, and treatment. In this voting, multiple alterations, including adding and discarding recommendations, led to 24 final recommendations on assessment and management of TMJ dislocation. To our knowledge, the ESTMJS condylar dislocation recommendations are the first both evidence and consensus-based international recommendations in the field of TMJ surgery. We recommend they form the basis for clinical practice guidelines for the management of dislocations of the mandibular condyle.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Metallothionein expression correlates with metastatic and proliferative potential in squamous cell carcinoma of the oesophagus

The goal of this study is to clarify whether the expression of metallothionein (MT) could affect the prognosis and the metastatic potential of squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the oesophagus. In paraffin-embedded specimens resected from 57 patients, MT mRNA and protein expressions were detected by in situ hybridization and immunohistochemistry respectively. The expression of MT was evaluated in respect of clinicopathologic variables and patients' survival. MT mRNA expression was significantly associated with the proportion of lymph node metastasis (71% in MT mRNA-positive tumours vs 42% in MT mRNA-negative tumours; P = 0.0343) and that of distant metastasis (29% in MT mRNA-positive tumours vs 5% in MT mRNA-negative tumours; P = 0.0452). In respect of MT protein expression, the frequency of distant metastasis was more common in MT-positive tumours than in MT-negative tumours (30% in MT-positive tumours vs 8% in MT-negative tumours; P = 0.0446). The survival rate of the patients with MT protein-negative tumours was significantly better than that of the patients with MT protein-positive tumours (P = 0.0340). There was a positive correlation between the expression of MT protein and that of proliferating cell nuclear antigen (P = 0.0018). Therefore, we conclude that MT expression, both at the mRNA and protein levels, may be a potential marker predicting metastatic and proliferative activities of oesophageal SCC. © 1999 Cancer Research Campaig

When the Good Times Gave Out: The Community Impacts of the 1980s Farm Crisis in Central Minnesota

The farms and rural communities of Stearns County Minnesota were not spared from the 1980s farm crisis. People in this region experienced the strain of financial stress and reacted to it in distinct ways. This affected the long-term sentiments and societal functioning of these communities long after the economic numbers improved. These collective and individual experiences of the farm crisis have been inadequately studied therefore scholars have incorrectly assumed that the effects of the crisis ended in 1986 when the economic market showed an upturn. Instead, the effects continued to cause stagnation and a diminishing of rural communities and people in these areas continued to struggle and took much longer to heal from the economic downturn. For many rural residents, they experienced a whole decade of financial and economic turmoil instead of a five-year span from 1981 to 1986. Scholarship on the 1980s farm crisis is not new, however it has been studied in a very disproportionate manner both geographically and as a field of study. Most existing scholarship focuses on the economic impacts of the crisis at a national level or they narrow down to Iowa. The fields of sociology and community history, which this study will focus on, are lacking on the 1980s farm crisis, particularly in Minnesota. This study will use interviews with local farmers, business owners, and auctioneers to support its analysis. It will also incorporate local newspapers and material at the Stearns County History museum archives

Anatomy of a Project to Produce a First Nuclear Weapon

Science and Global Security, 14, pp. 163–182.Center for Infrastructure Defense (CID) Paper.We describe the industrial project that a “proliferator” would conduct to produce a first, small batch of nuclear weapons. From refining yellowcake ore to final weapons assem- bly, we highlight the project’s tasks and their interactions. The proliferator can choose alternative production technologies that offer quicker completion, but at higher cost in terms of limited resources. The proliferator can also expedite his project by devot- ing more resources to critical tasks. From physics and chemistry, we determine raw material requirements. From industrial engineering and materials science, we convert these requirements into estimates of the time, manpower, energy, and money required to complete each task under normal and expedited conditions. Using generalized project- management analysis tools, we then estimate the earliest possible completion time of the project, assuming two different levels of resource availability. We also estimate the time required to complete a weapon if some of the project’s steps can be skipped; for example, if the proliferator acquires stolen, highly enriched uranium metal