Building China: Informal Work and the New Precariat

[Excerpt] This book makes three main contributions to our understanding of informal work in China. First, it documents diversity in employment relations and the labor market. This diversity exists in spite of the fact that all of these workers are similar: they are all men who are unregistered migrants working informally in the construction industry in major cities in China. This book helps us make sense of that diversity and the diversity of informal precarious work more generally. Second, it expands our understanding of China’s emerging labor regime, which is central to labor control, intimately related to the urbanization process, and ultimately linked to China’s overall economic success. Finally, it shows how these migrants struggle against the disciplining process, contest exploitation, and protest in unique ways. Just as with other workers toiling under capitalism, important structural forces shape their work and lives but are not deterministic. Thus, this large, emerging segment of workers should not be overlooked when analyzing the complexities of class and class politics in China

Orbital and Maxillofacial Computer Aided Surgery: Patient-Specific Finite Element Models To Predict Surgical Outcomes

This paper addresses an important issue raised for the clinical relevance of Computer-Assisted Surgical applications, namely the methodology used to automatically build patient-specific Finite Element (FE) models of anatomical structures. From this perspective, a method is proposed, based on a technique called the Mesh-Matching method, followed by a process that corrects mesh irregularities. The Mesh-Matching algorithm generates patient-specific volume meshes from an existing generic model. The mesh regularization process is based on the Jacobian matrix transform related to the FE reference element and the current element. This method for generating patient-specific FE models is first applied to Computer-Assisted maxillofacial surgery, and more precisely to the FE elastic modelling of patient facial soft tissues. For each patient, the planned bone osteotomies (mandible, maxilla, chin) are used as boundary conditions to deform the FE face model, in order to predict the aesthetic outcome of the surgery. Seven FE patient-specific models were successfully generated by our method. For one patient, the prediction of the FE model is qualitatively compared with the patient's post-operative appearance, measured from a Computer Tomography scan. Then, our methodology is applied to Computer-Assisted orbital surgery. It is, therefore, evaluated for the generation of eleven patient-specific FE poroelastic models of the orbital soft tissues. These models are used to predict the consequences of the surgical decompression of the orbit. More precisely, an average law is extrapolated from the simulations carried out for each patient model. This law links the size of the osteotomy (i.e. the surgical gesture) and the backward displacement of the eyeball (the consequence of the surgical gesture)

Acoustic behavior, poaching risk, and habitat use in African forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis): Insights from passive acoustic monitoring

The African forest elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis) is a critically endangered and cryptic species that inhabits the rainforests of Central Africa. Forest elephant populations are severely threatened by poaching for the ivory trade, and an improved understanding of forest elephant behavior and habitat use, and of the anthropogenic pressures that threaten their existence, is essential for conservation of the species. However, their remote tropical rainforest habitat poses logistical constraints on research and makes forest elephants very difficult to observe and study visually. Limited data collection methods have also inhibited our ability to understand the determinants of poaching activity that is driving forest elephants toward extinction. This dissertation addresses forest elephant behavior, ecology, and conservation questions that span multiple scales by capitalizing on the advantages of passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) to detect elephant vocalizations and gunshots. At the finest scale, Chapter 1 examines forest elephant vocal repertoire use at a forest clearing in the Central African Republic and discusses implications for PAM. The different vocalization types of the repertoire varied in the generality or specificity by which they were used by certain age-sex classes of elephants. An understanding of these patterns is important for PAM of forest elephants, as they determine the population (or subset) that is detected and sampled. At the intermediate scale, Chapter 2 examines forest elephant landscape-scale response to individual poaching events detected in a PAM study system. Elephants within 10 km of gunfire events responded to poacher presence (before gunshots were fired) and to gunshots themselves, exhibiting behavioral changes in either vocal activity, site usage, or both. These results suggest that, in addition to the outright killing of targeted individuals, poaching activity affects the general population of elephants across the landscape. At the broadest scale, Chapters 3 and 4 used detections of elephant vocalizations and gunshots to analyze the distributions of forest elephants and poaching events across a 50-sensor PAM grid spanning 1250 sq. km of rainforest in Republic of Congo, for a period of over 3 years. To elucidate the determinants of these distributions, elephant and gunshot detection data were combined with habitat and landscape variables quantified using satellite remote sensing. In Chapter 3, variation in poaching risk depended primarily on factors related to poacher accessibility, such as distance to major rivers and logging roads. These results can guide the allocation of anti-poaching patrol effort to cover high-risk areas at times of increased vulnerability. Chapter 4 examined the habitat resources and anthropogenic pressures (e.g., poaching and logging) that influence forest elephants’ use of the landscape. Elephant occurrence probabilities decreased over the 3 years of the study and were seasonally dependent, increasing in the wet season. Ongoing logging activity deterred forest elephants from using nearby sites, but previously logged areas provided important habitat resources. By leveraging remote sensing methods to expand the scale and resolution of data collection, this dissertation aimed to advance our understanding of forest elephant behavior and ecology, and confronted questions that will improve conservation efforts to protect the species from extinction

Aneuploidy among androgenic progeny of hexaploid triticale (XTriticosecale Wittmack).

Doubled haploids are an established tool in plant breeding and research. Of several methods for their production, androgenesis is technically simple and can efficiently produce substantial numbers of lines. It is well suited to such crops as hexaploid triticale. Owing to meiotic irregularities of triticale hybrids, aneuploidy may affect the efficiency of androgenesis more severely than in meiotically stable crops. This study addresses the issue of aneuploidy among androgenic regenerants of triticale. Plant morphology, seed set and seed quality were better predictors of aneuploidy, as determined cytologically, than flow cytometry. Most aneuploids were hypoploids and these included nullisomics, telosomics, and translocation lines; among 42 chromosome plants were nulli-tetrasomics. Rye chromosomes involved in aneuploidy greatly outnumbered wheat chromosomes; in C(0) rye chromosomes 2R and 5R were most frequently involved. While the frequency of nullisomy 2R was fairly constant in most cross combinations, nullisomy 5R was more frequent in the most recalcitrant combination, and its frequency increased with time spent in culture with up to 70% of green plants recovered late being nullisomic 5R. Given that 5R was not involved in meiotic aberrations with an above-average frequency, it is possible that its absence promotes androgenesis or green plant regeneration. Overall, aneuploidy among tested combinations reduced the average efficiency of double haploid production by 35% and by 69% in one recalcitrant combination, seriously reducing the yield of useful lines

Judicial Activism v. Judicial Abdication: A Plea for a Return to the \u3cem\u3eLochner\u3c/em\u3e Era Substantive Due Process Methodology

Amid the fierce battles that take place during the confirmation process of a Supreme Court justice, surprisingly little attention is given to the fact that both sides of the political spectrum generally agree on a matter of profound constitutional importance—namely, the proper level of scrutiny courts are to exact with respect to state and federal legislation. Presently, and for the better part of the last 70 years, the dominant attitude among judicial conservatives and liberals alike is that courts have no authority to strictly scrutinize the overwhelming majority of legislation enacted by state and federal legislatures. This Comment argues that the Court\u27s current substantive due process doctrine, which traditionally provided an important framework for reviewing the constitutionality of state and federal legislation, not only lacks a solid constitutional foundation but also fails to protect the most basic individual fights and liberties. This Comment discusses the shortcomings of the substantive due process methodology within the context of Abigail Alliance v. Eschenbach, which held that terminally ill individuals have no constitutional right to access innovative medicinal treatments that have the potential to preserve and prolong their lives. This Comment concludes that, although the current substantive due process doctrine is highly flawed, the decision in Lawrence v. Texas provides a glimmer of hope that one day the Court will reassert the judiciary\u27s responsibility to meaningfully review and scrutinize the constitutionality of state and federal legislation

Disc volume properties from MRI in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis: correlation to surgical outcome

In young scoliotic patients, the post-operative consequence of spine fusion upon the free lower lumbar spine is one of the major concerns of the surgical treatment. The remodeling of free-motion segment and the role of discs below thoraco-lumbar fusions remains unknown. However, disc hydration and mass exchange flow between disc and vertebral body should play a significant role in the mechano-biology of the vertebral segment. Magnetic resonance imaging is relevant to study intervertebral discs in young scoliotic patients since related to hydration and non-radiant