Circular belt lipectomy : a retrospective follow-up study on perioperative complications and cosmetic outcome

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the perioperative complications and cosmetic outcomes of circumferential belt lipectomy in patients with evident truncal excess. In 21 women, a circumferential belt lipectomy was performed between April 2002 and March 2004. The mean weight loss before surgery was 44 kg, and the mean body mass index before surgery was 28.1 (range, 22.3-36.5). Patients scored cosmetic results on a visual analog scale. The average reduction weight was 3616 g (2110-7525 g). The average duration of the operation was 132 minutes (range, 79-210 minutes). Patients were discharged from the hospital between postoperative days 6 and 10 (average, day 8). Minor complications occurred in 7 patients and major complications in one. Smoking was a statistically significant cause of postoperative complications. The majority of patients judged the cosmetic outcome as good to excellent (15 patients >= 8, 5 patients = 7, 1 patient =6). Patients with truncal skin and fat excess on both the ventral and dorsal side can obtain a good cosmetic result with a circular belt lipectomy

Soziales System statt Ökosystem Für eine gesellschaftstheoretische Grundierung des Ecocriticism

Keywords: ökologisch orientierte Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaft, gesellschaftstheoretische Grundierung, ökologische Kommunikation, diskurstheoretischer Ansatz, Niklas Luhmann, prekäre Erkenntnismöglichkeiten. Why has ecocriticism yet to gain recognition in German literature departments? One reason is that fundamental questions about literature as a form of ecological communication and its function in society have yet to be satisfactorily answered. Even significant recent developments in ecocritical theory like Zapf’s “Cultural Ecology” are problematic, inasmuch as they are based on an over-simplified conception of ecology and the harmony of ecosystems. A more robust theoretical grounding for ecocriticism can be found in social theory. Niklas Luhmann’s systems theory provides the theoretical framework for an adequate understanding of ecological crisis and of the role of literature and literary criticism in addressing it. Palabras clave: literatura ecológica y ciencias culturales, fundamentos de la teoría social, comunicación ecológica, principios de la teoría discursiva, Niklas Luhmann, precario descubrimiento de posibilidades ¿Por qué la ecocrítica todavía tiene que obtener reconocimiento en los departamentos de literatura Germánica? Una razón es que las preguntas fundamentales sobre la literatura como forma de comunicación ecológica y su función en la sociedad aún no han obtenido una respuesta satisfactoria. Incluso los desarrollos recientes en teoría ecocrítica como la “Ecología Cultural” de Zapf son problemáticos  en tanto que se basan en un concepto de ecología y en una armonía de los ecosistemas excesivamente simplificado. Puede encontrarse una base teórica más consistente para la ecocrítica en la teoría social. La teoría de sistemas de Niklas Luhmann proporciona el marco teórico para una interpretación adecuada de la crisis ecológica y del papel de la literatura y de la crítica literaria en su tratamiento de ést

La conexión entre la ética de los animales y la migración: Blosch de Beat Sterchi en el contexto de la literatura trascultural de la Suiza de habla alemana

In den letzten beiden Jahrzehnten des 20. Jahrhunderts hat sich in der deutschsprachigen Schweiz eine Literatur von AutorInnen herausgebildet, die mit fremdkulturellem Hintergrund schreiben und sich des Deutschen nicht selten als einer Fremdsprache bedienen. Diese AutorInnen sind teils Nachkommen von ArbeitsmigrantInnen, die im Zuge von Anwerbeabkommmen der Schweiz mit süd –und südosteuropäischen Ländern seit den 50er Jahren in die Schweiz kamen, teils politische oder aber Wirtschaftsflüchtlinge. Dabei blieb bisher der einzige grössere Migrationstext eines ‘einheimischen Autors’, der Roman Blösch von Beat Sterchi von 1983, etwas ausgeblendet. Dieser Text schildert mit grosser Sprachgewalt das Schikksal eines Arbeitsmigranten aus Galizien, der sich unvermittelt auf einem Berner Bauernhof und später im Schlachthof beschäftigt und hierbei gleichsam in einen ‘third space’ (Homi K. Bhabha) zwischen da und dort versetzt vorfindet. Der Beitrag möchte die vielfältigen Grenz– und Identitätsphänomene, die bei Sterchi verhandelt werden, beleuchten und aufzeigen, dass Texte dieser Art die sich vornehmlich auf klassisch-kanonische Quellen stützenden Diskusssion um die Frage nach einer ‘Schweizer Literatur’ in ein neues Licht zu rücken vermögen.Throughout the last two decades of the 20th Century, there has emerged a kind of literature in German-speaking Switzerland, which is written by authors of foreign cultural background and who seldom use German as a second language. In parts, these writers are descendants of migrant workers who have come to Switzerland from South and South-East European countries in the wake of guest-worker recruitments from the 1950s onwards. In effect they are political or economic refugees. For a long time the only larger migratory text by a ‘local author’, the novel Blösch by Beat Sterchi from 1983, would remain hidden. This text describes with great eloquence the fate of a guest-worker from Galicia, who suddenly starts working on a Bernese farm and later in a slaughterhouse and at the same time finds himself in a ‘third space’ (Homi K. Bhabha) moved between here and there. The article tries to examine and highlight the various border and identity phenomena, which are focussed on by Sterchi, and show that such texts are able to cast a different light on the discussion about a “Swiss literature” which has been primarily based on classical canonical sources.En las dos últimas décadas del siglo XX ha surgido una literatura suiza de habla alemana de autores que escriben con un fondo de cultura extranjera y para los que el alemán a menudo es una lengua extranjera. Estos escritores son en parte descendientes de trabajadores emigrantes que llegaron a Suiza en los años 50 a raíz de acuerdos con países del sur y sureste, en parte son refugiados políticos o económicos. Sin embargo, el único texto de migración importante escrito por una ‘autora local’, la novela Blosch de Beat Sterchi de 1983, ha quedado algo olvidado hasta ahora. Este texto describe con gran elocuencia el destino de un trabajador procedente de Galicia, que enseguida encuentra trabajo en una granja de Berna y más tarde en el matadero y que construye un tipo de “tercer espacio” (Homi K. Bhabha) entre el aquí y el allá. El estudio analizará los diferentes fenómenos fronterizos y de identidad, que se encuentran en Sterchi, y pretende demostrar que textos como éste son capaces de aportar nuevos impulsos a un debate sobre una literatura suiza basado sobre todo en fuentes clásicas y canónicas

Lepton-flavour violating BB decays in generic Z′Z^\prime models

LHCb has reported deviations from the Standard Model in $b\to s\mu^+\mu^-$ transitions for which a new neutral gauge boson is a prime candidate for an explanation. As this gauge boson has to couple in a flavour non-universal way to muons and electrons in order to explain $R_K$, it is interesting to examine the possibility that also lepton flavour is violated, especially in the light of the CMS excess in $h\to\tau^\pm\mu^\mp$. In this article, we investigate the perspectives to discover the lepton-flavour violating modes $B\to K^{(*)}\tau^\pm\mu^\mp$, $B_s\to \tau^\pm\mu^\mp$ and $B\to K^{(*)} \mu^\pm e^\mp$, $B_s\to \mu^\pm e^\mp$. For this purpose we consider a simplified model in which new-physics effects originate from an additional neutral gauge boson ($Z^\prime$) with generic couplings to quarks and leptons. The constraints from $\tau\to3\mu$, $\tau\to\mu\nu\bar{\nu}$, $\mu\to e\gamma$, $g_\mu-2$, semi-leptonic $b\to s\mu^+\mu^-$ decays, $B\to K^{(*)}\nu\nu$ and $B_s$--$\overline{B}_s$ mixing are examined. From these decays, we determine upper bounds on the decay rates of lepton flavour violating $B$ decays. $Br(B\to K\nu\nu)$ limits the branching ratios of LFV $B$ decays to be smaller than $8\times 10^{-5} (2\times 10^{-5})$ for vectorial (left-handed) lepton couplings. However, much stronger bounds can be obtained by a combined analysis of $B_s$--$\overline{B}_s$, $\tau\to3\mu$, $\tau\to\mu\nu\bar{\nu}$ and other rare decays. The bounds depend on the amount of fine-tuning among the contributions to $B_s$--$\overline{B}_s$ mixing. Allowing for a fine-tuning at the percent level we find upper bounds of the order of $10^{-6}$ for branching ratios into $\tau\mu$ final states, while $B_s\to \mu^\pm e^\mp$ is strongly suppressed and only $B\to K^{(*)} \mu^\pm e^\mp$ can be experimentally accessible (with a branching ratio of order $10^{-7}$).Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, constraints from B->Knunu added, typos correcte

DATA-DRIVEN PRODUCT RETURNS PREDICTION: A CLOUD-BASED ENSEMBLE SELECTION APPROACH

The number of product returns represents a considerable cost factor in e-commerce, especially in the apparel sector. The application of advanced information technologies and predictive analytics, enabling to capture and analyze massive amounts of user data, pave the way for a more efficient management of product returns and reverse logistics. However, we identify a lack of data-driven approaches in this area, especially regarding product returns prediction. In this paper, we present an ensemble selection approach for predicting product returns in the apparel sector. Computational experiments indicate that our approach produces satisfying results in terms of prediction quality. We further explore the correlation between sample sizes and computational times. Thereby, we demonstrate that the run-time increases exponentially when using more data records. To address heavy run-time overheads resulting from high processing and memory requirements of classifiers, we present a framework to embed ensemble selection processes into a highly scalable cloud environment. The framework explains the provisioning of cloud resources and parallelization of tasks according to ensemble selection processes. It further builds a basis for considering data streams, data splitting, and a dynamic adoption of changing customer behavior over time, which has not been considered in related work so far. The envisioned forecasting support system aids retailers in reducing product returns and increasing profit margins