Aineellista ja aineetonta turvaa : Ruokakunnat, ekologis-taloudelliset resurssit ja kontaktinmuodostus Valkealassa 1630 1750

Material and immaterial security. Households, ecological and economic resources and formation of contacts in Valkeala parish from the 1630s to the 1750s. The geographical area of the thesis, Valkeala parish in the region of Kymenlaakso, is a very interesting area owing to its diversity, both in terms of natural setting and economic and cultural structure. The study begins by outlining the ecological and economic features of Valkeala and by analysing household structures. The main focus of the research lies in the contacts of the households with the outside world. The following types of contacts are chosen as indicators of the interaction: trade and credit relations, guarantees, co-operation, marriages and godparentage. The main theme of the contact analysis is to observe the significance of three factors, namely geographical extent, affluence level and kinship, to the formation of contacts. It is also essential to chart the interdependencies between ecological and economic resources, changes in the structure of households and the formation of contacts during the period studied. The time between the 1630s and the 1750s was characterized by wars, crop losses and population changes, which had an effect on the economic framework and on the structural variation of households and contact fields. In the 17th and 18th centuries Valkeala could be divided, economically, into two sections according to the predominant cultivation technique. The western area formed the field area and the eastern and northern villages the swidden area. Multiple family households were dominant in the latter part of the 17th century, and for most of the study period, the majority of people lived in the more complex households rather than in simple families. Economic resources had only a moderate impact on the structure of contacts. There was a clear connection between bigger household size and the extent and intensity of contacts. The jurisdictional boundary that ran across Valkeala from the northwest to the southeast and divided the parish into two areas influenced the formation of contacts more than the parish boundaries. Support and security were offered largely by the primary contacts with one s immediate family, neighbours and friends. Economic support was channelled from the wealthier to the less well off by credits. Cross-marriages, cross-godparentage and marital networks could be seen as manifestations of an aim towards stability and the joining of resources. It was essential for households both to secure the workforce needed for a minimum level of subsistence and to ensure the continuation of the family line. These goals could best be reached by complex households that could adapt to the prevailing circumstances and also had wider and more multi-layered contacts offering material and immaterial security.

Assessing performance in critical care nursing practice using the Benner Novice to expert model: A pilot study

Background It is often believed that by ensuring the ongoing completion of competency documents and life-long learning in nursing practice guarantees quality patient care. This is probably true in most cases where it provides reassurances that the nursing team is maintaining a safe “generalised” level of practice. However, competency does not always promise quality performance. There are a number of studies that have reported differences in what practitioners know and what they actually do despite being deemed competent. Aim The aim of this study was to assess whether our current competency documentation is fit for purpose and to ascertain whether performance assessment needs to be a key component in determining competence. Method 15 nurses within a General ICU who had been on the unit <4 years agreed to participate in this project. Using participant observation and assessing performance against key indicators of the Benner Novice to Expert5 model the participants were supported and assessed over the course of a ‘normal’ nursing shift. Results The results were surprising both positively and negatively. First, the nurses felt more empowered in their clinical decision making skills; second, it identified individual learning needs and milestones in educational development. There were some key challenges identified which included 5 nurses over estimating their level of competence, practice was still very much focused on task acquisition and skill and surprisingly some nurses still felt dominated by the other health professionals within the unit. Conclusion We found that the capacity and capabilities of our nursing workforce needs continual ongoing support especially if we want to move our staff from capable task-doer to competent performers. Using the key novice to expert indicators identified the way forward for us in how we assess performance and competence in practice particularly where promotion to higher grades is based on existing documentation.

A cryptographic analysis of the TLS 1.3 handshake protocol candidates

The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is currently developing the next version of the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol, version 1.3. The transparency of this standardization process allows comprehensive cryptographic analysis of the protocols prior to adoption, whereas previous TLS versions have been scrutinized in the cryptographic literature only after standardization. This is even more important as there are two related, yet slightly different, candidates in discussion for TLS 1.3, called draft-ietf-tls-tls13-05 and draft-ietf-tls-tls13-dh-based. We give a cryptographic analysis of the primary ephemeral Diffie–Hellman-based handshake protocol, which authenticates parties and establishes encryption keys, of both TLS 1.3 candidates. We show that both candidate handshakes achieve the main goal of providing secure authenticated key exchange according to an augmented multi-stage version of the Bellare–Rogaway model. Such a multi-stage approach is convenient for analyzing the design of the candidates, as they establish multiple session keys during the exchange. An important step in our analysis is to consider compositional security guarantees. We show that, since our multi-stage key exchange security notion is composable with arbitrary symmetric-key protocols, the use of session keys in the record layer protocol is safe. Moreover, since we can view the abbreviated TLS resumption procedure also as a symmetric-key protocol, our compositional analysis allows us to directly conclude security of the combined handshake with session resumption. We include a discussion on several design characteristics of the TLS 1.3 drafts based on the observations in our analysis.

A novel approach to 6-DOF adaptive trajectory tracking control of an AUV in the presence of parameter uncertainties

In this paper, the trajectory tracking control of an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUVs) in six-degrees-of-freedom (6-DOFs) is addressed. It is assumed that the system parameters are unknown and the vehicle is underactuated. An adaptive controller is proposed, based on Lyapunov׳s direct method and the back-stepping technique, which interestingly guarantees robustness against parameter uncertainties. The desired trajectory can be any sufficiently smooth bounded curve parameterized by time even if consist of straight line. In contrast with the majority of research in this field, the likelihood of actuators׳ saturation is considered and another adaptive controller is designed to overcome this problem, in which control signals are bounded using saturation functions. The nonlinear adaptive control scheme yields asymptotic convergence of the vehicle to the reference trajectory, in the presence of parametric uncertainties. The stability of the presented control laws is proved in the sense of Lyapunov theory and Barbalat׳s lemma. Efficiency of presented controller using saturation functions is verified through comparing numerical simulations of both controllers.

Uzbekistan Supplementary NGO Report on the Implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in the Republic of Uzbekistan

[Excerpt] The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) was one of the first international instruments to which the Republic of Uzbekistan acceded, and with parliamentary ratification on 9 December 1992, the Republic of Uzbekistan entered into a commitment to observe all the provisions of the CRC and to shoulder its responsibility before the international community. As a result various legislative, administrative and other steps have been taken by the government of the Republic of Uzbekistan with a view to bringing the State policy and legislation on children to be in line with the provisions as enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Constitution incorporates the fundamental provisions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. At the current stage in the restructuring of the country’s social and economic development, solid foundations have been laid for the conduct of significant democratic reforms based on a recognition of the innate worth of the individual (including the child) and of the unconditional respect of his or her rights and freedoms. Until recently, the State acted as the main guarantor of the provision of all social services, however the process of the transition (political/economic) to a market economy has entailed the development of new economic relations with a reduction in the allocation of state resources for the provision of social services to children. The efforts of the government made so far to bring the state policy and legislation on the child to be in line with the provisions enshrined in the convention on the rights of the child are commendable; never the less, the implementations of all these policies and laws into practice needs a lot to desire as there are a number of ongoing child rights violations. The National Report has fundamentally overlooked a number of child rights privileges enshrined in the CRC that have not yet been realised, or those rights that have been eroded since the independence. These shortcomings need to be noted for consideration so that the state steps up its efforts to enact new laws and/or to enforce the existing rules and regulations required for the protection and implementation of these child rights, and to improve the overall situation for children in the Republic of Uzbekistan.

Yhdessä ajattelu ja osallistuminen : Interventiotutkimus yhteistoiminnallisen oppimisen kehittymisestä kahdessa alakoulun pienryhmässä

Participation and social modes of thinking - An intervention study on the development of collaborative learning in two primary school small groups This study explores the thinking together -intervention programme in three primary school classes. The object of the intervention was to teach pupils to use exploratory talk in small group collaboratory learning. Exploratory talk is a type of talk in which joint reasoning is made explicit. Research has shown that exploratory talk can improve mathematics and science learning, argumentative skills and competence in reasoning tests. The object of this study was to investigate the theory of social modes of thinking which the intervention program is based on. I tried to find out how the thinking together -intervention programme suits the Finnish context. Therefore my study is part of an international research project of interventions that have been implemented for example in Great-Britain and in Mexico. One essential drawback in former research made on thinking together -approach is that the nature of participation has not been studied properly. In this study I also examine how the nature of participation develops in small groups. In addition to that I aim to develope a theoretical framework which includes both the perspectives of the social modes of thinking and the nature of participation. The perspective of this study is sociocultural. The research material consists of video recordings of collaborative learning tasks of two small groups. In groups there were pupils of age groups 9 - 11. I study the nature of participation using both qualitative and quantitative methods. Quantitative methods include for example IR-analysis method and counting of turns at talk and words. I also use qualitative content analysis to analyze both the nature of participation and social modes of thinking. As a result of my study I found out that the interaction of the other group was leadership based and in the other group the interaction was without leadership relations. In both groups the participation was quantitatively more symmetrical in the end of the intervention. In the group in which the interaction was leadership based the participation of the pupils was more symmetrical. Exploratory talk was found more in the group without leadership relations, but in both groups the amount of exploratory talk was increased during the intervention. Leadership based interaction was further divided into interaction of alienating and inclusive leadership according to how symmetrical the participation was in the dialogue. Exploratory talk was found only when the leadership was inclusive or the interaction was without leadership relations. The main result of the study was that the exploratory talk was further divided into four subcategories according to the nature of participation. In open and inclusive exploratory talk all group members participated initiatively and their initiatives were responded by others. In closed and uneven exploratory talk some group members couldn't participate properly. Therefore it cannot be said that exploratory talk guarantees symmetrical participation. The nature of participation must be investigated separately.

Haemophilus parasuis treatment

The aim of the project is to prove that live vaccination on the farm will protect the piglets from heterologous challenge with H. parasuis. The steps to achieve the aim of the project are to find a dose rate on the farm which guarantees colonisation of the vaccine strain and is safe On farm vaccinated and unvaccinated pigs are then shifted to CAAS at three weeks of age and challenged with a heterologous strains. The method is then applied on a large piggery for a period of nearly 12 months. We will also develop a freeze drying method and a technical manual of procedures to identify serovars prevailing on pig farms and which serovar to include into the vaccine.

Approximation algorithm for maximum independent set in planar traingle-free graphs

The maximum independent set problem is NP-complete even when restricted to planar graphs, cubic planar graphs or triangle free graphs. The problem of finding an absolute approximation still remains NP-complete. Various polynomial time approximation algorithms, that guarantee a fixed worst case ratio between the independent set size obtained to the maximum independent set size, in planar graphs have been proposed. We present in this paper a simple and efficient, O(|V|) algorithm that guarantees a ratio 1/2, for planar triangle free graphs. The algorithm differs completely from other approaches, in that, it collects groups of independent vertices at a time. Certain bounds we obtain in this paper relate to some interesting questions in the theory of extremal graphs.

Latitudinal and seasonal effects on growth of the Australian eastern king prawn (Melicertus plebejus)

The growth of the Australian eastern king prawn (Melicertus plebejus) is understood in greater detail by quantifying the latitudinal effect. The latitudinal effect is the change in the species’ growth rate during migration. Mark–recapture data (N = 1635, latitude 22.21°S–34.00°S) presents northerly movement of the eastern king prawn, with New South Wales prawns showing substantial average movement of 140 km (standard deviation: 176 km) north. A generalized von Bertalanffy growth model framework is used to incorporate the latitudinal effect together with the canonical seasonal effect. Applying this method to eastern king prawn mark–recapture data guarantees consistent estimates for the latitudinal and seasonal effects. For M. plebejus, it was found that growth rate peaks on 25 and 29 January for males and females, respectively; is at a minimum on 27 and 31 July, respectively; and that the shape parameter, k (per year), changes by –0.0236 and –0.0556 every 1 degree of latitude south increase for males and females, respectively.

‘Lemon Laws’: an inquiry into consumer protections and remedies for buyers of new motor vehicles

1. Under the Terms of Reference for the Committee’s Inquiry, ‘lemons’ are defined as ‘new motor vehicles with numerous, severe defects that re-occur despite multiple repair attempts or where defects have caused a new motor vehicle to be out of service for a prolonged period of time’. Consumers are currently protected in relation to lemon purchases by the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) located in Schedule 2 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) (CCA). The ACL applies as a law of Queensland pursuant to the Fair Trading Act 1989 (Qld). The voluntary recall and consumer guarantees law took effect on 1 January 2011. 2. In 2006, the Government of Victoria made a commitment to introduce a lemon law into the provisions of the then Fair Trading Act 1999 (Vic). The public consultation process on the proposal to introduce a lemon law for motor vehicle purchases in Victoria was conducted by Ms Janice Munt MP, with the assistance of Consumer Affairs Victoria (CAV). CAV released an Issues Paper to canvas with industry and the community options for the development and introduction of a motor vehicle lemon law.(Consumer Affairs Victoria, Introducing Victorian motor vehicle lemon laws, Issues Paper, (September, 2007). 3. A CAV report prepared by Janice Munt MP was released in July, 2008 (Consumer Affairs Victoria, Motor Cars: A report on the motor vehicle lemon law consultations (July 2008) (Victorian Lemon Law Report). However, the Victorian proposal was overtaken by events leading to the adoption of a uniform consumer protection law in all Australian jurisdictions, the ACL. 4. The structure of this submission is to consider first the three different bases upon which consumers can obtain relief for economic loss arising from defects in motor vehicles. The second part of the submission considers the difficulties encountered by consumers in litigating motor vehicle disputes in the courts and tribunals. The third part of the submission examines the approach taken in other jurisdictions to resolving motor vehicle disputes. The final part of the submission considers a number of possible reforms that could be made to the existing law and its enforcement to reduce consumer detriment arising from the purchase of ‘lemon’ motor vehicles. 5. There are three principal bases upon which a consumer can obtain redress for defects in new motor vehicles under the ACL. The first is where the manufacturer admits liability and initiates the voluntary recall procedure provided for in s 128 of the ACL. Under this basis the manufacturer generally repairs or replaces the part subject to the recall free of charge. The second basis is where the manufacturer or dealer denies liability and the consumer is initiates proceedings in the court or tribunal seeking a statutory remedy under the ACL, the nature of which will depend on whether the failure to comply with the consumer guarantee was major or not. The third basis upon which a consumer can obtain redress is pursuant to public enforcement by the ACCC. Each basis will be considered in this part. What all three bases have in common is the need to conduct an investigation to identify the nature of the defect and how it arose.

Multiaction learning automata possessing ergodicity of the mean

Multiaction learning automata which update their action probabilities on the basis of the responses they get from an environment are considered in this paper. The automata update the probabilities according to whether the environment responds with a reward or a penalty. Learning automata are said to possess ergodicity of the mean if the mean action probability is the state probability (or unconditional probability) of an ergodic Markov chain. In an earlier paper [11] we considered the problem of a two-action learning automaton being ergodic in the mean (EM). The family of such automata was characterized completely by proving the necessary and sufficient conditions for automata to be EM. In this paper, we generalize the results of [11] and obtain necessary and sufficient conditions for the multiaction learning automaton to be EM. These conditions involve two families of probability updating functions. It is shown that for the automaton to be EM the two families must be linearly dependent. The vector defining the linear dependence is the only vector parameter which controls the rate of convergence of the automaton. Further, the technique for reducing the variance of the limiting distribution is discussed. Just as in the two-action case, it is shown that the set of absolutely expedient schemes and the set of schemes which possess ergodicity of the mean are mutually disjoint.

Detecting rare events using Kullback-Leibler divergence: A weakly supervised approach

Video surveillance infrastructure has been widely installed in public places for security purposes. However, live video feeds are typically monitored by human staff, making the detection of important events as they occur difficult. As such, an expert system that can automatically detect events of interest in surveillance footage is highly desirable. Although a number of approaches have been proposed, they have significant limitations: supervised approaches, which can detect a specific event, ideally require a large number of samples with the event spatially and temporally localised; while unsupervised approaches, which do not require this demanding annotation, can only detect whether an event is abnormal and not specific event types. To overcome these problems, we formulate a weakly-supervised approach using Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence to detect rare events. The proposed approach leverages the sparse nature of the target events to its advantage, and we show that this data imbalance guarantees the existence of a decision boundary to separate samples that contain the target event from those that do not. This trait, combined with the coarse annotation used by weakly supervised learning (that only indicates approximately when an event occurs), greatly reduces the annotation burden while retaining the ability to detect specific events. Furthermore, the proposed classifier requires only a decision threshold, simplifying its use compared to other weakly supervised approaches. We show that the proposed approach outperforms state-of-the-art methods on a popular real-world traffic surveillance dataset, while preserving real time performance.

Active vibration suppression of non-linear beams using optimal dynamic inversion

Euler–Bernoulli beams are distributed parameter systems that are governed by a non-linear partial differential equation (PDE) of motion. This paper presents a vibration control approach for such beams that directly utilizes the non-linear PDE of motion, and hence, it is free from approximation errors (such as model reduction, linearization etc.). Two state feedback controllers are presented based on a newly developed optimal dynamic inversion technique which leads to closed-form solutions for the control variable. In one formulation a continuous controller structure is assumed in the spatial domain, whereas in the other approach it is assumed that the control force is applied through a finite number of discrete actuators located at predefined discrete locations in the spatial domain. An implicit finite difference technique with unconditional stability has been used to solve the PDE with control actions. Numerical simulation studies show that the beam vibration can effectively be decreased using either of the two formulations.

Modeling Asymmetries in Financial Data with Multiplicative Error Models

This thesis addresses modeling of financial time series, especially stock market returns and daily price ranges. Modeling data of this kind can be approached with so-called multiplicative error models (MEM). These models nest several well known time series models such as GARCH, ACD and CARR models. They are able to capture many well established features of financial time series including volatility clustering and leptokurtosis. In contrast to these phenomena, different kinds of asymmetries have received relatively little attention in the existing literature. In this thesis asymmetries arise from various sources. They are observed in both conditional and unconditional distributions, for variables with non-negative values and for variables that have values on the real line. In the multivariate context asymmetries can be observed in the marginal distributions as well as in the relationships of the variables modeled. New methods for all these cases are proposed. Chapter 2 considers GARCH models and modeling of returns of two stock market indices. The chapter introduces the so-called generalized hyperbolic (GH) GARCH model to account for asymmetries in both conditional and unconditional distribution. In particular, two special cases of the GARCH-GH model which describe the data most accurately are proposed. They are found to improve the fit of the model when compared to symmetric GARCH models. The advantages of accounting for asymmetries are also observed through Value-at-Risk applications. Both theoretical and empirical contributions are provided in Chapter 3 of the thesis. In this chapter the so-called mixture conditional autoregressive range (MCARR) model is introduced, examined and applied to daily price ranges of the Hang Seng Index. The conditions for the strict and weak stationarity of the model as well as an expression for the autocorrelation function are obtained by writing the MCARR model as a first order autoregressive process with random coefficients. The chapter also introduces inverse gamma (IG) distribution to CARR models. The advantages of CARR-IG and MCARR-IG specifications over conventional CARR models are found in the empirical application both in- and out-of-sample. Chapter 4 discusses the simultaneous modeling of absolute returns and daily price ranges. In this part of the thesis a vector multiplicative error model (VMEM) with asymmetric Gumbel copula is found to provide substantial benefits over the existing VMEM models based on elliptical copulas. The proposed specification is able to capture the highly asymmetric dependence of the modeled variables thereby improving the performance of the model considerably. The economic significance of the results obtained is established when the information content of the volatility forecasts derived is examined.

A network forensics tool for precise data packet capture and replay in cyber-physical systems

Network data packet capture and replay capabilities are basic requirements for forensic analysis of faults and security-related anomalies, as well as for testing and development. Cyber-physical networks, in which data packets are used to monitor and control physical devices, must operate within strict timing constraints, in order to match the hardware devices' characteristics. Standard network monitoring tools are unsuitable for such systems because they cannot guarantee to capture all data packets, may introduce their own traffic into the network, and cannot reliably reproduce the original timing of data packets. Here we present a high-speed network forensics tool specifically designed for capturing and replaying data traffic in Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition systems. Unlike general-purpose "packet capture" tools it does not affect the observed network's data traffic and guarantees that the original packet ordering is preserved. Most importantly, it allows replay of network traffic precisely matching its original timing. The tool was implemented by developing novel user interface and back-end software for a special-purpose network interface card. Experimental results show a clear improvement in data capture and replay capabilities over standard network monitoring methods and general-purpose forensics solutions.