Death on the Job: Fatal Work Injuries in 2011

Even as government agencies, safety organizations, and employers strive to eliminate deaths at work, the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) show that in the United States, an average of 13 workers die every day from injuries incurred on the job. This issue of BEYOND THE NUMBERS summarizes the final 2011 data from CFOI and highlights some important historical trends as well

Późnośredniowieczna nadmorska osada rybacka w Pleśnej, gm. Będzino, pow. Koszalin

The article is aimed at presentation of different aspects related to discovery and analysis of materials from a late medieval seaside fishing village at Pleśna. It presents a scope of archaeological rescue excavations and assesses factors responsible for destruction of a cliff shore along with the settlement placed on top of it. Additionally, the article brings about analysis of excavated materials. The settlement chronology and developmentof the Pleśna region occupation is  based upon archaeological evidence and historical sources.The article is aimed at presentation of different aspects related to discovery and analysis of materials from a late medieval seaside fishing village at Pleśna. It presents a scope of archaeological rescue excavations and assesses factors responsible for destruction of a cliff shore along with the settlement placed on top of it. Additionally, the article brings about analysis of excavated materials. The settlement chronology and developmentof the Pleśna region occupation is  based upon archaeological evidence and historical sources

Marketing-Mix-Controlling mit dem Dorfman-Steiner-Theorem: Eine Anwendung aus dem Bereich langlebiger Gebrauchsgüter

• Dieser Beitrag zeigt anhand eines Beispiels aus dem Bereich langlebiger Gebrauchsgüter, wie das Dorfman-Steiner-Theorem dazu genutzt werden kann Budgets und die Profitabilität einzelner Marketinginstrumente zu verbessern. • Der verwendete Ansatz unterstellt, dass in einer Umgebung des aktuellen Instrumenteneinsatzes eine glatte multidimensionale Absatzreaktionsfunktion existiert. • Der Ansatz ermöglicht, den aktuellen Marketing-Mix auf Optimalität zu testen. Im Anwendungsfall zeigt die Analyse zwar keine Abweichung des Gesamtbudgets für den betrachteten Marketing-Mix von einem Optimum, jedoch hätten Umschichtungen zwischen Marketinginstrumenten die Profitabilität verbessert. • Der entwickelte Ansatz erweitert die Möglichkeiten der Abweichungsanalyse um Abweichungen vom lokalen Optimum. Kann man unterstellen, dass Responsefunktion zeitlich stabil ist, liefert das der Budgetierungspraxis im Unternehmen ein Instrument zur Anpassung der Budgets für Marketinginstrumente in Richtung auf das Optimum. • Die vorliegende Arbeit ist eine praktische Implementierung dieser bereits im Jahre 1954 von Dorfman und Steiner publizierten IdeeMarketing-Mix-Optimization, Sales Promotion, Budgeting, Consumer Durables, Sales Variances

Composition at the CuInSe2 ZnO interface copper depletion induced by diethyl zinc

Abstract The interface formation between epitaxial CuInSe2 112 films and ZnO deposited by metal organic MBE is investigated by photoelectron spectroscopy. Reaction of diethyl zinc with CuInSe2 leads to the formation of an intrinsic ZnSe layer and copper depletion of the interface. This is associated with Zn doping of the chalcopyrite surface and a Fermi level shift towards the conduction band. The implications on the band alignment are discussed

A CYP21A2 based whole-cell system in Escherichia coli for the biotechnological production of premedrol

Additional file 4: Fig. S4. In vitro conversion of medrane with the redox systems AdR/Adx/CYP21A2 or arh1/Adx/CYP21A2 with either NADH or NADPH. 400 ÎźM Medrane was converted in a reconstituted in vitro assay with Adx based redox systems containing AdR or arh1 as reductase. To each system either NADH or NADPH was added to verify the ability of arh1 to receive electrons from NADH. AdR served as a negative control. All values represent the mean of triplicates with the respective standard deviation

Metabolic regulation of the shoot apical meristem by the TOR kinase in Arabidopsis thaliana

Plants dynamically adjust their development and growth pattern to maximize their chances to reproduce even under challenging conditions. The cellular basis for this remarkable phenotypic plasticity are stem cell populations that are maintained throughout the whole life of a plant. Intricate sensing and signaling mechanisms are required to instruct stem cell behavior according to current needs. Consequently, light- and nutrient signals are integrated and modulate the core molecular circuits underlying regulation of the shoot apical meristem (SAM). We know that expression of the stem cell master regulator WUSCHEL (WUS) is modulated by photoreceptor mediated light signaling pathways together with sugar and nitrate. Activity of the evolutionary conserved TOR kinase is required to integrate and relay these signals, but we do not understand how TOR activity is conveyed to modulate WUS expression. In this work, I identified CK signaling in an RNAseq approach as the major downstream effector of TOR activity controlling WUS expression and shoot development. I demonstrate that TOR activity stabilizes trans-Zeatin which is known to be one of the major determinants influencing shoot growth and meristem maintenance. Mechanistically, this is achieved by TOR dependent translational repression of CKX catabolic enzymes, allowing plants to swiftly adjust their growth factor milieu in response to dynamic environments. This study is the first example for TOR mediated translational repression of a catabolic enzyme and thus provides a mechanistic framework integrating the contributions of central metabolism and core developmental regulators towards stemness

Real-time performance of mechatronic PZT module using active vibration feedback control

This paper proposes an innovative mechatronic piezo-actuated module to control vibrations in modern machine tools. Vibrations represent one of the main issues that seriously compromise the quality of the workpiece. The active vibration control (AVC) device is composed of a host part integrated with sensors and actuators synchronized by a regulator; it is able to make a self-assessment and adjust to alterations in the environment. In particular, an innovative smart actuator has been designed and developed to satisfy machining requirements during active vibration control. This study presents the mechatronic model based on the kinematic and dynamic analysis of the AVC device. To ensure a real time performance, a H2-LQG controller has been developed and validated by simulations involving a machine tool, PZT actuator and controller models. The Hardware in the Loop (HIL) architecture is adopted to control and attenuate the vibrations. A set of experimental tests has been performed to validate the AVC module on a commercial machine tool. The feasibility of the real time vibration damping is demonstrated and the simulation accuracy is evaluate

On loss functions for deep neural networks in classification

Deep neural networks are currently among the most commonly used classifiers. Despite easily achieving very good performance, one of the best selling points of these models is their modular design – one can conveniently adapt their architecture to specific needs, change connectivity patterns, attach specialised layers, experiment with a large amount of activation functions, normalisation schemes and many others. While one can find impressively wide spread of various configurations of almost every aspect of the deep nets, one element is, in authors’ opinion, underrepresented – while solving classification problems, vast majority of papers and applications simply use log loss. In this paper we try to investigate how particular choices of loss functions affect deep models and their learning dynamics, as well as resulting classifiers robustness to various effects. We perform experiments on classical datasets, as well as provide some additional, theoretical insights into the problem. In particular we show that L1 and L2 losses are, quite surprisingly, justified classification objectives for deep nets, by providing probabilistic interpretation in terms of expected misclassification. We also introduce two losses which are not typically used as deep nets objectives and show that they are viable alternatives to the existing ones

A novel method for pulmonary research: Assessment of bioenergetic function at the air–liquid interface

AbstractAir–liquid interface cell culture is an organotypic model for study of differentiated functional airway epithelium in vitro. Dysregulation of cellular energy metabolism and mitochondrial function have been suggested to contribute to airway diseases. However, there is currently no established method to determine oxygen consumption and glycolysis in airway epithelium in air–liquid interface. In order to study metabolism in differentiated airway epithelial cells, we engineered an insert for the Seahorse XF24 Analyzer that enabled the measure of respiration by oxygen consumption rate (OCR) and glycolysis by extracellular acidification rate (ECAR). Oxidative metabolism and glycolysis in airway epithelial cells cultured on the inserts were successfully measured. The inserts did not affect the measures of OCR or ECAR. Cells under media with apical and basolateral feeding had less oxidative metabolism as compared to cells on the inserts at air-interface with basolateral feeding. The design of inserts that can be used in the measure of bioenergetics in small numbers of cells in an organotypic state may be useful for evaluation of new drugs and metabolic mechanisms that underlie airway diseases

Influence of Space Flight on Fascicle Dynamics and Aponeurosis Movements in the Medial Gastrocnemius Muscle

Muscle atrophy is a topic that has to be dealt with for various reasons, for example, to understand and reduce muscle loss in elderly and bedridden patients. Astronauts after a space flight are interesting study participants because they experience muscle atrophy as a side effect of weightlessness and are healthy subjects at the same time. This thesis aimed to evaluate data from the study Sarcolab 3. This study recorded motion and ultrasound data of the calve muscle gastrocnemius medialis before and after the space flight of five astronauts. These recordings were taken at the resting muscle and during contraction, whereas earlier studies mainly focused on the relaxed muscle