“Development of lymphoid cell culture system from Penaeus monodon and molecular approaches for its transformation

Unveiling the molecular and regulatory mechanisms that prevent in vitro transformation in shrimp remains elusive in the development of continuous cell lines, with an arduous history of over 25 years (Jayesh et al., 2012). Despite presenting challenges to researchers in developing a cell line, the billion dollar aquaculture industry is under viral threat. In addition, the regulatory mechanisms that prevent in vitro transformation and carcinoma in shrimps might provide new leads for the development of anti-ageing and anti-cancer interventions in human (Vogt, 2011) and in higher vertebrates. This highlights the importance of developing shrimp cell lines, to bring out effective prophylactics against shrimp viruses and for understanding the mechanism that induce cancer and ageing in human.. Advances in molecular biology and various gene transfer technologies for immortalization of cells have resulted in the development of hundreds of cell lines from insects and mammals, but yet not a single cell line has been developed from shrimp and other marine invertebrates. With this backdrop, the research described in this thesis attempted to develop molecular tools for induced in vitro transformation in lymphoid cells from Penaeus monodon and for the development of continuous cell lines using conventional and novel technologies to address the problems at cellular and molecular level.

A study of the co-operative banking system in kerala

The co-operative credit structure in a state set up consists of 3 tiers — Primary Societies at the base, District Co-operative Banks at the middle and State Cooperative Bank at the top. But, some societies at the primary level are governed by, in addition to Co-operative Societies Act, the Banking Regulation Act. Thus they are under dual control. In addition, they are working under the direct purview of Reserve Bank of India. The scope of this study is restricted to such Primary Societies, District Co-operative Banks and State Co-operative Bank. For the evaluation of the working of Co-operative Banks, the board of directors and staff were interviewed with the help of pre-constructed and pre-tested interview schedules. However, the share holders and customers were not interviewed mainly because almost all respondents were reluctant to provide copies of an exhaustive list of share holders and non-share holder customers, for the purpose of maintaining secrecy. This being an individual work, it was found physically and financially very difficult to extend the study so as to cover the share holders and non-share holder customers. Limitations of time were also responsible for restricting this study. The period of study was restricted to 1980-'81 to 1983-'84 as the data relating to earlier periods were firstly not available from all banks and secondly the prior data was considered out of date for the purpose of the study.

Ecological studies of the Parambikulam Tiger Reserve in the Western Ghats of India, using Remote Sensing and GIS

mbikulam Tiger Reserve of Western Ghats using Geospatial technology. The major objectives of the study are Land use land cover mapping (LULC) and Phytodiversity analysis. Satellite data was used to map the land use / land cover using supervised classification techniques in Erdas imagine. The change for a period of 32 years was assessed using the multi-temporal satellite datasets from Landsat MSS (1973), Landsat TM (1990), and IRS P6 LISS III (2005). A geospatial approach was used for the land cover analysis. Digital elevation models, Satellite imageries and SOI topo sheets were the data sets used in the analysis. Vegetation sampling plots distributed over the different forest types were enumerated and studied for Phytodiversity analysis.

Growth and yield of groundnut, sesame and roselle in an Acacia senegal agroforestry system in North Kordofan, Sudan

A field experiment was conducted under rainfed conditions in western Sudan at El-Obeid Research Farm and Eldemokeya Forest Reserve, North Kordofan State, during the growing seasons 2004/05 and 2005/06. The main objective was to investigate the soil physical and chemical properties and yield of groundnut (Arachis hypogea), sesame (Sesamum indicum) and roselle (Hibiscus sabdariffa) of an Acacia senegal agroforestry system in comparison with the sole cropping system. Data were recorded for soil physical and chemical properties, soil moisture content, number of pods per plant, fresh weight (kg ha^−1) and crop yield (kg ha^−1). The treatments were arranged in Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) and replicated four times. Significant differences (P < 0.05) were obtained for sand and silt content on both sites, while clay content was not significantly different on both sites. The nitrogen (N) and organic carbon were significantly (P < 0.05) higher in the intercropping system in Eldemokeya Forest Reserve compared with sole cropping. Soil organic carbon, N and pH were not significant on El-Obeid site. Yet the level of organic carbon, N, P and pH was higher in the intercropping system. Fresh weight was significantly different on both sites. The highest fresh weight was found in the intercropping system. Dry weights were significantly different for sesame and roselle on both sites, while groundnut was not significantly different. On both sites intercropping systems reduced groundnut, sesame and roselle yields by 26.3, 12 and 20.2%, respectively. The reduction in yield in intercropping plots could be attributed to high tree density, which resulted in water and light competition between trees and the associated crops.

Space System Architecture: Final Report of SSPARC: the Space Systems, Policy, and Architecture Research Consortium (Thrust I and II)

The Space Systems, Policy and Architecture Research Consortium (SSPARC) was formed to make substantial progress on problems of national importance. The goals of SSPARC were to: • Provide technologies and methods that will allow the creation of flexible, upgradable space systems, • Create a “clean sheet” approach to space systems architecture determination and design, including the incorporation of risk, uncertainty, and flexibility issues, and • Consider the impact of national space policy on the above. This report covers the last two goals, and demonstrates that the effort was largely successful.

Jmodels: Java models of earth system regulation

The JModel suite consists of a number of models of aspects of the Earth System. They can all be run from the JModels website. They are written in the Java language for maximum portability, and are capable of running on most computing platforms including Windows, MacOS and Unix/Linux. The models are controlled via graphical user interfaces (GUI), so no knowledge of computer programming is required to run them. The models currently available from the JModels website are: Ocean phosphorus cycle Ocean nitrogen and phosphorus cycles Ocean silicon and phosphorus cycles Ocean and atmosphere carbon cycle Energy radiation balance model (under development) The main purpose of the models is to investigate how material and energy cycles of the Earth system are regulated and controlled by different feedbacks. While the central focus is on these feedbacks and Earth System stabilisation, the models can also be used in other ways. These resources have been developed by: National Oceanography Centre, Southampton project led by Toby Tyrrell and Andrew Yool, focus on how the Earth system works.

Proyecto PupitreNet. La especificación del proyecto IMS : Instructional Management System.

Resumen tomado del autor

Los conceptos de salud financiera, riesgo y epidemiología en los estados financieros de las compañías del sector de extracción de petróleo crudo y gas natural en Colombia

El presente proyecto tiene como objeto identificar cuáles son los conceptos de salud, enfermedad, epidemiología y riesgo aplicables a las empresas del sector de extracción de petróleo y gas natural en Colombia. Dado, el bajo nivel de predicción de los análisis financieros tradicionales y su insuficiencia, en términos de inversión y toma de decisiones a largo plazo, además de no considerar variables como el riesgo y las expectativas de futuro, surge la necesidad de abordar diferentes perspectivas y modelos integradores. Esta apreciación es pertinente dentro del sector de extracción de petróleo y gas natural, debido a la creciente inversión extranjera que ha reportado, US$2.862 millones en el 2010, cifra mayor a diez veces su valor en el año 2003. Así pues, se podrían desarrollar modelos multi-dimensional, con base en los conceptos de salud financiera, epidemiológicos y estadísticos. El termino de salud y su adopción en el sector empresarial, resulta útil y mantiene una coherencia conceptual, evidenciando una presencia de diferentes subsistemas o factores interactuantes e interconectados. Es necesario mencionar también, que un modelo multidimensional (multi-stage) debe tener en cuenta el riesgo y el análisis epidemiológico ha demostrado ser útil al momento de determinarlo e integrarlo en el sistema junto a otros conceptos, como la razón de riesgo y riesgo relativo. Esto se analizará mediante un estudio teórico-conceptual, que complementa un estudio previo, para contribuir al proyecto de finanzas corporativas de la línea de investigación en Gerencia.

Push button parliament–why India needs a non-partisan, recorded vote system

Decisions of national importance are made by Parliamentary voting. Yet Indian Members of Parliament (MPs) vote with a remarkable lack of freedom and accountability. The introduction of the Tenth Schedule in the Constitution has crippled free expression, since it provides that MPs voting against ‘any direction’ of their Party are liable to disqualification from the legislature  In addition, except for Constitutional amendments, Indian Parliamentary Procedure Rules do not require votes of MPs to be recorded unless the Speaker’s decision is contested in the House. The result is that voting in the House has become mechanical, controlled by Party politics and devoid of responsibility. This paper comments on a general theory of democratic accountability through the lens of Parliamentary voting. It suggests that the voting system adopted in the Parliament is an effective indicator to measure the level of accountability of its Members. In the context of India, this paper argues that the level of accountability will increase to a desirable extent only when there is adoption of a recorded system for every important House vote. Upon examination of India’s record thus far (through the sample of the 14th Lok Sabha) it becomes evident that the level of divisions (recorded votes) is substantially lower than other countries. This leads the paper to probe, as to why that might be the case. Part II of the paper answers that question by examining the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution. The paper scrutinizes the disproportionate influence of the Party in decision making in the Parliament. Apart from dealing with the inherent problem of the Tenth Schedule, this paper suggests two procedural changes to make parliamentary expression more meaningful. Firstly, the recording of all important votes within the Parliament and secondly, registering Party whips with the Minister of Parliamentary Affairs so that the voter knows the clear stand of every Parliamentary continuum. The focus of the paper is thus to bring back the attention of the legislators to their central function, which is deliberation on and the passage of legislation.

Resiliencia organizacional y capital psicológico

Desde la noción universal sobre la empresa como un sistema de interacción con un entorno determinado para alcanzar un objetivo, de manera planificada y en función de satisfacer las demandas de un mercado mediante la actividad económica, su viabilidad, sostenibilidad y crecimiento dependerán, por supuesto, de una serie de estrategias adecuadas no solo para tales fines, sino también para enfrentar diversidad de agentes endógenos y exógenos que puedan afectar el normal desempeño de su gestión. Estamos hablando de la importancia de la resiliencia organizacional y del Capital Psicológico. En un escenario tan impredecible como el de la economía mundial, donde la constante son los cambios en su comportamiento —unos propios de su dinámica e interdependencia, naturales de fenómenos como la globalización, y otros derivados de eventos disruptivos— hoy más que nunca es necesario implementar el modelo de la empresa resiliente, que es aquella entidad capaz de adaptarse y recuperarse frente a una perturbación. Al mismo tiempo, más allá de su tamaño, naturaleza u objeto social, es indispensable reconocer básicamente que toda organización está constituida por personas, lo cual implica la trascendencia que para su funcionamiento tiene el factor humano-dependiente, y por lo tanto se crea la necesidad de promover el Capital Psicológico y la resiliencia a nivel de las organizaciones a través de una cultura empresarial.

Measuring and testing for the systemically important financial institutions

This paper analyzes the measure of systemic importance ∆CoV aR proposed by Adrian and Brunnermeier (2009, 2010) within the context of a similar class of risk measures used in the risk management literature. In addition, we develop a series of testing procedures, based on ∆CoV aR, to identify and rank the systemically important institutions. We stress the importance of statistical testing in interpreting the measure of systemic importance. An empirical application illustrates the testing procedures, using equity data for three European banks.

Guidelines for strategic national planning of training and education for museums, cultural heritage and related fields in Sweden and in international co-operation

The guidelines presented in this document are a preliminary strategy for establishing a comprehensive policy for the needs of training and education wiyhin the sector and adjoining areas, across fields of knowledge and professions concerned, on relevant levels and for the varies institutions and operators. The objective of these guidelines is to analysis the problems, objectives and goals for development of a far reaching system of educational and training programs and courses for museums, cultural heritage and related fields of activities. This objective comprises a close collaboration between museum, cultural heritage organizations and educating organizations, notably within universities and colleges, but also other kinds of educating bodies.

Predicted soil organic carbon stocks and changes in Jordan between 2000 and 2030 made using the GEFSOC modelling system

Estimates of soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks and changes under different land use systems can help determine vulnerability to land degradation. Such information is important for countries in and areas with high susceptibility to desertification. SOC stocks, and predicted changes between 2000 and 2030, were determined at the national scale for Jordan using The Global Environment Facility Soil Organic Carbon (GEFSOC) Modelling System. For the purpose of this study, Jordan was divided into three natural regions (The Jordan Valley, the Uplands and the Badia) and three developmental regions (North, Middle and South). Based on this division, Jordan was divided into five zones (based on the dominant land use): the Jordan Valley, the North Uplands, the Middle Uplands, the South Uplands and the Badia. This information was merged using GIS, along with a map of rainfall isohyets, to produce a map with 498 polygons. Each of these was given a unique ID, a land management unit identifier and was characterized in terms of its dominant soil type. Historical land use data, current land use and future land use change scenarios were also assembled, forming major inputs of the modelling system. The GEFSOC Modelling System was then run to produce C stocks in Jordan for the years 1990, 2000 and 2030. The results were compared with conventional methods of estimating carbon stocks, such as the mapping based SOTER method. The results of these comparisons showed that the model runs are acceptable, taking into consideration the limited availability of long-term experimental soil data that can be used to validate them. The main findings of this research show that between 2000 and 2030, SOC may increase in heavily used areas under irrigation and will likely decrease in grazed rangelands that cover most of Jordan giving an overall decrease in total SOC over time if the land is indeed used under the estimated forms of land use. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.