ANALYSIS OF THE INCREASE OF CONSTRUCTION COSTS IN URBAN REGENERATION PROJECTS

The subject of this paper is the analysis and evaluation of the reasons for construction costs increases in urban regeneration projects. The analysis considers major refurbishments of real estates’, as well as heavy repair and modernization of the road system. For the period mentioned, the costs from works and expenditure schedules were compared with the costs of additional works, which shows the percentage cost increase in relation to initial project budget assumptions of the case study. The analysis revealed that due to difficulties in assessing technical state of inhabited buildings, the investor and potential contractor should pay special attention to the character of issues presented in this paper, taking into account an increased risk of their occurrence

Digital media in soil education

Teaching soil science as a part of geography subject is crucial, because students learn not only about soil properties, but also about conscious and rational use of the soil resources. Nowadays digital media play increasingly important role in education and can be employed both in geography classes and soil science. The article aims at comparing various multimedia tools used as a support in teaching on soil science and evaluation of trends concerning the use of these methods in education. The use of ICT during lessons should be purposeful, therefore a need arises to develop strategies on effective use of multimedia and methodological guidance in specific teaching situations. Social media and virtual reality games have changed the way young people perceive the real world, and this includes education. Thus, it is of value to attempt employing role-playing and elements of gamification in teaching soil science and geography lessons

Kinetics of cold crystallization in two liquid crystalline fluorinated homologues exhibiting the vitrified smectic CA∗{C_{A}}^{*} phase

Dielectric relaxation processes in the supercooled antiferroelectric smectic ${C_{A}}^{*}$ phase and crystallization kinetics of two chiral fluorinated 5HF6 and 6HF6 compounds from the same homologous series are investigated. Fragility parameters are determined from the relaxation time of the α-process, including $\tau_{HN}$ from the Havriliak-Negami formula and $\tau_{peak}$ denoting the position of the absorption peak. The coupling coefficient $\xi$ between the characteristic time of isothermal cold crystallization and relaxation time of the α-process is obtained. Despite similar values of the fragility index, the even 6HF6 homologue undergoes cold crystallization much faster than the odd 5HF6 homologue, with significantly different $\xi$ coefficients. Influence of the relaxation time of the $P_{H}$ process (anti-phase phason) in the smectic ${C_{A}}^{*}$ phase on the crystallization kinetics is presumed

Zmiana jakości życia po zabiegu rekonstrukcji piersi

Mimo że liczba kobiet w Polsce zainteresowanych rekonstrukcją piersi po amputacji stale wzrasta, nadal pozostaje niska. Coraz częściej zaleca się leczenie oszczędzające pierś, więc mniej pacjentek poddaje się mastektomii, jednak okaleczający zabieg amputacji nadal w wielu przypadkach jest konieczny. Znaczna część pacjentek w krótszym lub dłuższym odstępie czasu zwróci się z pytaniem o możliwość rekonstrukcji piersi. Wiele z nich od samego początku oczekuje rekonstrukcji utraconej piersi po zakończonym leczeniu onkologicznym. W tej sytuacji rodzi się pytanie, czemu zabieg ten jest rzadko przeprowadzany, skoro dostępne badania pokazują istotną poprawę jakości życia po zabiegu odtworzenia piersi. Badania jakości życia udowadniają, że kobiety z odtworzoną piersią są bardziej aktywne zawodowo i społecznie, zainteresowane otaczającym je światem oraz chętniej nawiązujące kontakty z ludźmi. Efekty te nie są wynikiem jednej metody rekonstrukcyjnej — uzyskana poprawa jakości życia we wszystkich aspektach jest taka sama dla wszystkich metod. W procesie leczenia chorej z rakiem piersi lekarz rodzinny/ pierwszego kontaktu ma do spełnienia bardzo ważną rolę. Powinien informować, przekonywać i kierować pacjentkę do ośrodków chirurgii plastycznej zajmujących się zabiegami rekonstrukcji piersi. W pracy autorzy przedstawiają wpływ odtworzenia piersi na poprawę jakości życia pacjentek. Forum Medycyny Rodzinnej 2011, tom 5, nr 5, 414–41

Environmental Threats and Geographical Education: Students’ Sustainability Awareness—Evaluation

Teaching geography creates an opportunity for the transfer of knowledge about environmental problems and ways of solving them. Teachers from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Turkey, and the United Kingdom indicated strengths and weaknesses of physical geography as well as the selected geographical concepts of: Maps/Cartography, Astronomy/The Earth in the Universe, Atmosphere, Hydrosphere, Endogenic processes, Exogenic processes, and Soils and biosphere. There was a variety in how confident students were around these topic areas. The main types of difficulties identified by the study were: too little time for implementation, difficult terminology, and lack of tools for the proper transfer of knowledge. Moreover, the attractiveness of individual issues for students also varies. The research clearly shows that students lack an awareness of problems related to the environment. There are considerable differences between the level of students’ knowledge about climate change or air and water pollution (relatively high awareness of global warming) and issues related to soil and vegetation cover (low awareness of soil depletion, soil pollution, changing the boundaries of the occurrence of plant zones, etc.). To make people aware of the importance of environment, we should take care of education in relation to global challenge and sustainable development

Investigation of chiral smectic phases and conformationally disordered crystal phases of the liquid crystalline 3F5FPhH6 compound partially fluorinated at the terminal chain and rigid core

Complementary methods are applied to investigate the phase transitions and crystallization kinetics of the liquid crystalline compound denoted as 3F5FPhH6. Two crystal phases are confirmed, and one of them is the conformationally disordered (CONDIS) phase. Complexity of the melt crystallization process is revealed by the analysis with Friedman’s isoconversional method. The melt crystallization of 3F5FPhH6 shows different mechanisms depending on temperature, which is explained by the relation between the thermodynamic driving force and the thermal energy of translational degrees of freedom. The studied compound crystallizes even during fast cooling (30 K/min), unlike similar compounds with different fluorosubstitutions of the benzene ring, which form the smectic glass for moderate cooling rates. The tendency to vitrification of the smectic phase decreases apparently with the decreasing stability width of the $SmC_{A}$* phase and the increasing relaxation time of the collective relaxation process in this phase, at least for homologues differing from 3F5FPhH6 only by the type of fluorosubstitution

Orexins/Hypocretins Acting at Gi Protein-Coupled OX2 Receptors Inhibit Cyclic AMP Synthesis in the Primary Neuronal Cultures

Orexins A and B are newly discovered neuropeptides with pleiotropic activity. They signal through two G protein-coupled receptors: OX1 and OX2. In this study, we examined the expression of orexin receptors and effects of the receptors’ activation on cyclic AMP formation in the primary neuronal cell cultures from rat cerebral cortex. Both types of orexin receptors were expressed in rat cortical neurons; the level of OX2R was markedly higher compared to OX1R. Orexin A (an agonist of OX1R and OX2R) and [Ala11-D-Leu15]orexin B (a selective agonist of OX2R) did not affect basal cyclic AMP formation in the primary neuronal cell cultures. Both peptides (0.001–1 μM) inhibited, in a concentration-dependent manner and IC50 values in low nanomolar range, the increase in the nucleotide production evoked by forskolin (1 μM; a direct activator of adenylyl cyclase), pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide (PACAP27; 0.1 μM), and vasoactive intestinal peptide (VIP; 3 μM). Effects of orexin A on forskolin-, PACAP27-, and VIP-stimulated cyclic AMP synthesis were blocked by TCS OX2 29 (a selective antagonist of OX2R), and unaffected by SB 408124 (a selective antagonist of OX1R). Pretreatment of neuronal cell cultures with pertussis toxin (PTX) abolished the inhibitory action of orexin A on forskolin- and PACAP-stimulated cyclic AMP accumulation. It is suggested that in cultured rat cortical neurons orexins, acting at OX2 receptors coupled to PTX-sensitive Gi protein, inhibit cyclic AMP synthesis