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In this study, a sulfonation approach using chlorosulfonic acid (CSA) to prepare cellulose sulfate nanofibers (CSNFs) from raw jute fibers is demonstrated. Both elemental sulfur content and zeta potential in the CSNFs are found to increase with increasing CSA content used. However, the corresponding crystallinity in the CSNFs decreases with the increasing amount of CSA used due to degradation of cellulose chains under harsh acidic conditions. The ammonium adsorption results from the CSNFs with varying degrees of sulfonation were analyzed using the Langmuir isotherm model, and the analysis showed a very high maximum ammonium adsorption capacity (41.1 mg/g) under neutral pH, comparable to the best value from a synthetic hydrogel in the literature. The high ammonium adsorption capacity of the CSNFs was found to be maintained in a broad acidic range (pH = 2.5 to 6.5). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Safety and security operations at Appalachian State's Belk Library & Information Commons have evolved and improved over the past 15 years with a focused access services oriented team. Improvements have focused on the challenges posed in four primary areas: understanding the customer base and the challenges posed therein; improving the skills and expanding the pool of library personnel capable of handling security incidents; allowing effective outside security operations and personnel to improve over time; and acting on multiple access issues. The authors of this case study provide insight and recommendations on the challenges faced and actions taken. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates whether and to what extent the Beracha, Hardin, and Johnson Buy vs. Rent Index (BH&J Index) is able to anticipate future housing price movements. The BH&J Index is based on a model introduced by Beracha and Johnson (2012) in which a low index value is associated with a buy recommendation and a high index value is associated with a rent recommendation. The results of our analysis reveal a negative relation between the BH&J Index value and future housing price changes at the metropolitan level, which is consistent with the buy or rent recommendation of the index. The negative relation between the BH&J Index value and future housing price changes is statistically significant, economically meaningful, and is particularly relevant for medium-term holding periods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wetlands form an important part of wastewater treatment systems used in small, cold, far northern communities in North America. Natural wetlands are used, which abound in sparsely populated cold regions. Numerous recent studies have shown that cold region treatment wetlands (CRTW) are remarkably effective at treating lagoon effluent. They function only for a few weeks during the short summers, and storage is required during the balance of the year. They differ in many important ways from the temperate and tropical treatment wetlands due to their unique climatic setting. Performance reflects distinctive climatic conditions; complex topography, hydraulics and hydrology; and the arctic biological regime. Over three dozen systems operate in permafrost areas. They display a median nominal detention time of 21 days, and function at water temperatures of 5–15 °C. Median reductions are 59% for TSS, 92% for CBOD 5 , 96% for ammonia nitrogen, 85% for TP, and 2.3 log 10 for E.coli. This is appropriate technology for hamlets isolated from the free flow of goods and services of populous warm climates, because of the minimal reliance upon mechanical equipment and operational complexity. • Treatment wetlands are prevalent in permafrost regions of North America • Natural wetlands form a final step in wastewater treatment • Wetland functionality is very similar to southern systems • The short warm discharge season requires winter storage of raw wastewater • Lagoons are the primary treatment component preceding the wetlands [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 24-hour/5-days-per-week (24/5) model at Belk Library & Information Commons has experienced multiple changes since first implemented in 2006. First the library started small, then expanded, then reduced, and finally expanded again. This article tells the story of a library's 24/5 evolution within the assessment cycle framework, describes how data and perspective played a role in decisions, provides data on overnight head counts, offers a glimpse into the types of activities engaged in by students during overnight hours, describes student led advocacy efforts to reinstate library hours, and provides an overview of operations and security officer protocol. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Technology-enhanced rehabilitation can improve access to training activities in multiple care delivery settings and may improve patient outcomes. However, the rate at which rehabilitation technology is being developed makes it difficult for healthcare systems to keep pace with the volume of products emerging in this space. Formal processes are needed to help healthcare systems review products as they emerge and to determine whether they should be incorporated into clinical practice. Here, we describe an approach to reviewing emerging rehabilitation technologies as performed by the Center for Emerging Rehabilitation Technology at our institution. Developed using an iterative approach, the rehabilitation technology review process used by the Center for Emerging Rehabilitation Technology team classifies technologies into the following three categories: (1) for clinical deployment, (2) for innovation in product development/product-market fit testing, and (3) for research, for example, a sponsored clinical trial. We describe the processes used to evaluate, categorize, investigate, and integrate rehabilitation technology, share our experience with the review process, and make recommendations for other institutions who may wish to implement rehabilitation technology into clinical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, granulated activated charcoal (GAC) and bio charcoal (BC) is used as a filler in P3 biosand bag filter to study their filtration performance against a range of fluoride impurities from 1–1400 mg/L. A set of experiments are done to analyze the filtration efficiency of the sandbag filter against fluoride impurities after incorporating different amounts (e.g., 0.2, 2 kg) and a combination of GAC and BC. A combination of filler GAC and BC (1 kg each) have exhibited excellent results with 100% fluoride removal efficiency against 5 mg/L fluoride impurities for an entire experimental time of 165 min. It is because of the synergetic effect of adsorption caused by the high surface area (739 m2/g) of GAC and hydroxyapatite groups in BC. The data from remediation experiments using individual GAC and BC are fitted into the Langmuir and Freundlich Isotherm Models to check their adsorption mechanism and determine GAC and BC's maximum adsorption capacity (Qm). The remediation data for both GAC and BC have shown the better fitting to the Langmuir Isotherm Model with a high R2 value of 0.994 and 0.970, respectively, showing the excellent conformity with monolayer adsorption. While the GAC and BC have presented negative Kf values of −1.08 and −0.72, respectively, for Freundlich Model, showing the non-conformity to multilayer adsorption. The Qm values obtained from Langmuir Model for GAC is 6.23 mg/g, and for BC, it is 9.13 mg/g. The pH study on adsorption efficiency of individual GAC and BC against 5 mg/L of fluoride impurities indicates the decrease in removal efficiency with an increase in pH from 3 to 9. For example, BC has shown removal efficiency of 99.8% at pH 3 and 99.5% at pH 9, while GAC has exhibited removal efficiency of 96.1% at pH 3 and 95.9% at pH 9. Importantly, this study presents the significance of the synergetic application of GAC and BC in the filters, where GAC and BC are different in their origin, functionalities, and surface characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work empirically investigates the effect of the amount of time provided the broker to market property (listing contract length) on the likelihood of a successful marketing attempt. Do shorter listing contracts increase broker motivation or can contracts be so short that marketing efforts are unlikely to result in a successful transaction? The empirical results demonstrate that when the broker is provided a longer listing contract, the likelihood of a successful transaction increases but at a decreasing rate. This result suggests that home sellers face a tradeoff when choosing contract length. Longer contracts provide more time to arrange a successful sale, but reduction in broker motivation reduces the probability of sale as contracts lengthen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In January 2008, the Belk Library & Information Commons at Appalachian State University combined the Access Services staff members of the Circulation and Lower Level Service Desks with the Reference and Instruction team as part of a library-wide reorganization effort. The new team balanced what had been a staff-dominated Access Services team with a library faculty-dominated Reference and Instruction team. This article describes Belk Library's efforts to end the turf war between circulation and reference service models and is based on a presentation given by Johnson and Jennings at the 2010 Access Services Conference in Atlanta, GA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research seeks to determine what factors are decisive when an agent chooses between a 100% payout and the more traditional split-commission arrangement. In addition to the expected positive relationship between income and the 100% payout election, a tolerance for risk, a complementary sales force, and experience also influence the choice of compensation arrangement of agents. These finding suggest that compensation arrangements may not always be effective markers of agent productivity and that compensation incentives alone may not elicit greater effort and output. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Partnership for Prescription Assistance, which links struggling patients to more than 475 patient assistance programs, provides a vital safety net for millions of uninsured Americans. Proposing unwarranted government regulation during these uncertain economic times could cast a chill nationwide on other philanthropic efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a paper that investigates the impact of architectural review boards on the price of the property, marketing time, and financial effectiveness. It acquaints the usefulness of two-stage least squares regression as the modeling technique to show the concurrent determination of the property's price and marketing time. It concludes that the properties subjected to architectural review board has a significant higher selling price and less marketing time.

The article focuses on the advancement of pharmacologic computer simulation which greatly improved the application of pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamic models. It discusses the parameters involved in the development of pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic models. It also presents the clinical implications of the combined application of the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamic models to predict the drug concentrations and its drug effect with the use of computer simulation.

Oxygen inhalation is recommended for the initial care of trauma victims. The improved survival seen in early hemorrhage is normally associated with an increase in blood pressure. Although clinical use of oxygen can occur late after hemorrhage, the effects of late administration have not been specifically examined. Anesthetized rats were studied using an isobaric hemorrhage model with target pressures of either 70 or 40 mmHg. At various times after hemorrhage, the feedback control of the blood pressure was stopped and the inspired gas was changed from room air to 100% oxygen. The results show that shortly after hemorrhage to 70 mmHg, oxygen inhalation results in an increase in mean arterial blood pressure of 60 ± 3 mmHg, which is associated with a large increase in total peripheral resistance from 0.89 ± 0.05 to 1.25 ± 0.1 peripheral resistance units. The blood pressure response is essentially unchanged with time, and it is not altered by a 10-min exposure to NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester. At a target pressure of 40 mmHg, the initial blood pressure response to oxygen is the same, but it gradually decreases as the animal develops a lactic acidosis. We conclude that the therapeutic value of oxygen needs to be separately evaluated for late hemorrhage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on the views of a community sample of 428 parents with primary school-aged children. In a previous study parents had identified that they needed ‘support’. This study was designed to try to understand what types of support parents already have and what support they think needs to be available to them. Most parents use informal support of family and friends and have limited awareness of what is available to them in the way of locally based services. They propose services which are already available, like Parentline, but of which they are unaware. There seems to be a need for universal, non-stigmatising services which design their programmes with parents and can refer to more specialised services, e.g. Social Services or Family Centres. These services need to be located in agencies which parents frequent and are comfortable with, such as schools and health settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Governments are concerned to promote positive parenting but it is difficult to know how and where to target the necessary support. How should we listen to the concerns expressed by parents themselves? Social work and health care professionals and those involved in developing parenting programmes tend to base their interventions on their experiences with families already in crisis. This paper reports on a survey of the views of two groups of parents: a community sample and a small group of parents involved in a young parent's project. Issues, which concern the parents, are identified as well as consideration of which agencies might be best placed to address these. Parents were most likely to approach their children's school or doctor for information, advice, or support. Parents were found to be reluctant to approach social work agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the factors that influence the use of the Internet as part of the home buying process and the resulting effect on the efficacy of buyer search. Cross section data acquired from NAR’s 2000 Home Buying and Selling Survey is used to conduct the analysis. This study finds that the use of the Internet as a search tool does not reduces buyer search time. Instead, by reducing within-period search costs, it encourages buyers to search more intensively. By making it possible to learn more about the availability of properties on the market, the Internet allows buyers to visit more properties without a commensurate increase in search duration. The implications of these finding with respect to the future role of brokers as market intermediaries are also examined. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Presents Web sites for consumer protection, advocacy and awareness in the U.S. Web sites which review specific products and services; Highlights on each Web site; Web site which provide free copies of articles related to consumer protection.

Focuses on the extension of the services of the W. W. Hagerty Library to the distance learning programs at LeBow College of Business of Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Discussion of the library services provided; Information on the awareness and instruction initiative of the business librarian; Discussion of issues on funding, time commitment and measures of use in serving distance learning programs.

Abstract This study identifies what parents might expect from a confidential helpline and highlights areas of parental concern in the task of child-rearing. A community sample of 424 families from four schools was collected. Although many issues raised concerned parents, those particularly cited were behaviour management, school bullying and drug and alcohol problems. It is clear that there is a perceived need by parents for input into the parenting process; parents were seeking information and advice rather than support. The question of which aspects of parenting can be developed, either through a helpline or other services, is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes Brazil's role in the negotiations of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Brazil has a large stake in the climate change issue because some of its national economic, social, and security interests are contingent on the growth of its energy sector and development of the Amazon region. Section one provides an overview of the ongoing climate change negotiations. Section two provides background on Brazil's greenhouse gas emissions, which stem primarily from deforestation of the Amazon. Section three describes Brazil's interests and negotiating positions with respect to three key issues: (a) emissions reduction responsibilities; (b) protocol mechanisms; and (c) land-use change and forestry. The concluding section will then assess Brazil's contributions in terms of both achieving an accord that will slow global warming and promoting Brazilian national interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study makes two main contributions to the applied econometrics literature. First, it shows how the all-important marginal effects for time on the market and probability of sale can be obtained from any hazard model. Second, it extends the generalization of the geometric due to Gómez-Déniz, E. 2010. "Another Generalization of the Geometric Distribution." Test 19: 399–415 to include covariates for use in the estimation of time on the market and probability of sale regressions in real estate, thus creating an entirely new hazard model based on probability of sale rather than time on the market. For the generalized geometric we develop expressions for the marginal effects (with approximate standard errors) for both the probability of sale and time on the market. This formulation allows the impact of changes in independent variables on both the probability of sale and time on the market to be determined from a single regression model. For comparison, we also obtain these two sets of marginal effects for the popular Weibull hazard model. The geometric, generalized geometric, and Weibull hazard models, along with two sets of marginal effects for each, are estimated using data on condominium listings in a metropolitan area in Florida. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evidence supporting the intraoperative use of processed electroencephalography (pEEG) monitoring to guide anesthetic delivery is growing rapidly. This article reviews the key features of electroencephalography (EEG) waveforms and their clinical implications in select patient populations and anesthetic techniques. The first patient topic reviewed is the vulnerable brain. This term has emerged as a description of patients who may exhibit increased sensitivity to anesthetics and/or may develop adverse neurocognitive effects following anesthesia. pEEG monitoring of patients who are known to have or are suspected of having vulnerable brains, with focused attention on the suppression ratio, alpha band power, and pEEG indices, may prove useful. Second, pEEG monitoring along with vigilant attention to anesthetic delivery may minimize the risk of intraoperative awareness when administering a total intravenous anesthesia in combination with a neuromuscular blockade. Third, we suggest that processed EEG monitoring may play a role in anesthetic and resuscitative management when adverse changes in blood pressure occur. Fourth, pEEG monitoring can be used to better identify anesthesia requirements and guide anesthetic titration in patients with known or suspected substance use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]