Comparative Law and European Harmonisation - a Match Made in Heaven or Uneasy Bedfellows?

Developing the controversy indicated in the heading, this article will proceed as follows. It establishes a notion of critical comparative law, by showing how comparative law may be capable of providing critique and analysis of law-making through judicial and legislative activity at a European level. This is followed by an exemplary discussion of how comparative law is actually used in relation to European harmonisation through case law, legislation and “soft law”. The question will then be asked whether and how these uses would change under a critical approach to comparative law. The discussion will focus on industrial relations and equality law.
In both fields, recent ECJ case law has proved controversial: This article submits that such controversy could partly be avoided by making better use of critical comparative law in deciding cases and in choosing adequate forms and content of legislation.

Essential and toxic elements in infant foods from Spain, UK, China and USA

Spanish gluten-free rice, cereals with gluten, and pureed baby foods were analysed for essential macro-elements (Ca and Na), essential trace elements (Fe, Cu, Zn, Mn, Se, Cr, Co and Ni) and non-essential trace elements (As, Pb, Cd and Hg) using ICP-MS and AAS. Baby cereals were an excellent source of most of the essential elements (Ca, Fe, Cu, Mn and Zn). Sodium content was high in pureed foods to improve their flavour; fish products were also rich in Se. USA pure baby rice samples had the highest contents of all studied essential elements, showing a different nutrient pattern compared to those of other countries. Mineral fortification was not always properly stated in the labelling of infant foods. Complementary infant foods may also contain significant amounts of contaminants. The contents of Hg and Cd were low enough to guarantee the safety of these infant foods. However, it will be necessary to identify the source and reduce the levels of Pb, Cr and As in Spanish foods. Pure baby rice samples contained too much: Pb in Spain; As in UK; As, Cr and Ni in USA; and Cr and Cd in China.

Autism and ABA: Best Practice in America and the Way Forward for Europe.

According to recent estimates, 1 in each 68 new-borns will be diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) in the USA (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2014), while 1 in every 29 children will be diagnosed with ASD in the UK (Dillenburger, Jordan, McKerr, & Keenan, 2015). Individuals diagnosed with ASD share a set of characteristics at varying levels of severity: impairments in social communication skills and presence of restricted interests and repetitive behaviours (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).Notwithstanding these figures, little effort has been placed in European countries’ policies for reaching an early diagnosis. This has a detrimental effect on future prognosis for children with ASD, since research has clearly shown that when evidence-based interventions are accessed early in life, they can lead to great improvements on the overall functioning of children with ASD, including significant gains in social communication and reduction of inappropriate behaviours (Dawson, Rogers, Munson, Smith, Winter, Greenson, Donaldson, & Varley, 2009).Additionally, when looking at the services available for children with ASD and their families in Europe, it seems that not much improvement has been made in the last decades. Traditional eclectic approaches and a wealth of non-scientific methods seem to be available and often recommended by public bodies, while state-funded evidence-based interventions are not offered as part of the education or health system. Given that there is a wealth of evidence on the effectiveness of interventions based on the science of ABA, it seems that specific action is required to correct the situation, respecting children’s right to effective treatment and inclusion.In the present paper, these issues are fully discussed and recommendations for best practice are offered.

Riboflavin, Flavin Mononucleotide and Flavin Adenine Dinucleotide in Human Plasma and Erythrocytes at Baseline and after Low-Dose Riboflavin Supplementation.

Background: Vitamin B2 exists in blood as riboflavin and its cofactors, flavin mononucleotide (FMN) and FAD. The erythrocyte glutathione reductase activation coefficient (EGRAC) has traditionally been used to assess vitamin B2 status in humans. We investigated the relationships of EGRAC and plasma and erythrocyte concentrations of riboflavin, FMN, and FAD in elderly volunteers and their responses to riboflavin administration. Methods: EGRAC and plasma and erythrocyte concentrations of riboflavin, FMN, and FAD were determined in 124 healthy individuals with a mean age of 69 years. The same measurements were made in a subgroup of 46 individuals with EGRAC 1.20 who participated in a randomized double-blind 12-week intervention study and received riboflavin (1.6 mg/day; n = 23) or placebo (n = 23). Results: Median plasma concentrations were 10.5 nmol/L for riboflavin, 6.6 nmol/L for FMN, and 74 nmol/L for FAD. In erythrocytes, there were only trace amounts of riboflavin, whereas median FMN and FAD concentrations were 44 and 469 nmol/L, respectively. Erythrocyte FMN and FAD correlated with each other and with EGRAC and plasma riboflavin (P

English in Kenyan Education

This article places English language teaching in Kenya within a specific historical context. Any consideration of the use of English in Kenya must take into account the legacy of language policies adopted by both colonial and independent administrations in the country. Use is made in this respect of the growing body of research and theory that focuses on language policy in post-colonial and neo-colonial settings.

Integrating Land Use Planning and Transportation: Policy formulation in the Belfast Metropolitan Area

Much of the interest in sustainable cities relates to the inexorable rise in the demand for car travel and the contribution that certain urban forms and land-use relationships can make to reducing energy consumption. Indeed, this demand is fuelled more by increased spatial separation of homes and workplaces, shops and schools than by any rise in trip making. This paper evaluates recent efforts to integrate land-use planning and transportation policy in the Belfast Metropolitan Area by reviewing the policy formulation process at both a regional and city scale. The paper suggests that considerable progress has been made in integrating these two areas of public policy, both institutionally and conceptually. However, concerns are expressed that the rhetoric of sustainability may prove difficult to translate into implementation, leading to a further dislocation of land-use and transportation.

Emotion Recognition in Human-Computer Interaction

The authors are concerned with the development of computer systems that are capable of using information from faces and voices to recognise people's emotions in real-life situations. The paper addresses the nature of the challenges that lie ahead, and provides an assessment of the progress that has been made in the areas of signal processing and analysis techniques (with regard to speech and face), and the psychological and linguistic analyses of emotion. Ongoing developmental work by the authors in each of these areas is described.

Robustness of Damping Control Implemented by Energy Storage Systems Installed in Power Systems

An energy storage system (ESS) installed in a power system can effectively damp power system oscillations through controlling exchange of either active or reactive power between the ESS and power system. This paper investigates the robustness of damping control implemented by the ESS to the variations of power system operating conditions. It proposes a new analytical method based on the well-known equal-area criterion and small-signal stability analysis. By using the proposed method, it is concluded in the paper that damping control implemented by the ESS through controlling its active power exchange with the power system is robust to the changes of power system operating conditions. While if the ESS damping control is realized by controlling its reactive power exchange with the power system, effectiveness of damping control changes with variations of power system operating condition. In the paper, an example power system installed with a battery ESS (BESS) is presented. Simulation results confirm the analytical conclusions made in the paper about the robustness of ESS damping control. Laboratory experiment of a physical power system installed with a 35kJ/7kW SMES (Superconducting Magnetic Energy Storage) was carried out to evaluate theoretical study. Results are given in the paper, which demonstrate that effectiveness of SMES damping control realized through regulating active power is robust to changes of load conditions of the physical power system.

Recent advances in understanding CO oxidation on gold nanoparticles using density functional theory

Since the discovery of a series of Au-based catalysts by Haruta et al. considerable progress has been made in understanding the active role of Au in CO oxidation catalysis. This review provides a summary of recent theoretical work performed in this field; in particular it addresses DFT studies of CO oxidation catalysis over free and supported gold nanoparticles. Several properties of the Au particles have been found to contribute to their unique catalytic activity. Of these properties, the low-coordination state of the Au atoms is arguably the most pertinent, although other properties of the Au cluster atoms, such as electronic charge, cannot be ignored. The current consensuses regarding the mechanism for CO oxidation over Au-based catalysts is also discussed. Finally, water-enhanced catalysis of CO oxidation on Au clusters is summarized.

Under-water scene investigation using ground penetrating radar (GPR) in the search for a sunken jet ski, Northern Ireland

A search for a submerged jet ski and the lost limb of its driver involved in a collision with a speedboat was made in a shallow lake in Northern Ireland. The location of both was crucial to establishing events at the time of the accident. Local intelligence suggested both objects were likely to be partially-buried by lacustrine silt. To avoid sediment churning, this required non-invasive, completely non-destructive assessment and mapping of the scene. A MALA RAMAC ground-penetrating radar system (GPR) mounted on floats for surveying from walkways and jetties or placed in a small rubber dinghy for offshore profiling was used. A grid was established and each line surveyed with 100, 200 and 400MHz antennae. In waters over 6m deep GPR data showed the form of the lake floor but excessive ringing occurred in the data. In waters less than 6m deep ringing diminished on both 100 and 200MHz data, the latter displaying the best trade-off between depth penetration and horizontal object resolution. 400MHz data failed to be of use in waters over 2m deep and at these depths showed only limited improvement of image quality compared to 200MHz data. Surface objects such as a wooden walkway caused interference on 200 and 400MHz data when antennae were oriented both normal and parallel to survey direction; this may be a function of the low attenuation of radar waves in freshwater, allowing excellent lateral and vertical radar wave penetration. On 200MHz data the damaged jet-ski was clearly imaged in a location that contradicted the speedboat driver's account of the accident.

Application of connectivity mapping in predictive toxicology based on gene-expression similarity.

Connectivity mapping is the process of establishing connections between different biological states using gene-expression profiles or signatures. There are a number of applications but in toxicology the most pertinent is for understanding mechanisms of toxicity. In its essence the process involves comparing a query gene signature generated as a result of exposure of a biological system to a chemical to those in a database that have been previously derived. In the ideal situation the query gene-expression signature is characteristic of the event and will be matched to similar events in the database. Key criteria are therefore the means of choosing the signature to be matched and the means by which the match is made. In this article we explore these concepts with examples applicable to toxicology.