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Challenges of Lagos State Child’s Rights Law: Social Welfare Officers’ Perspective
Get PDFChild’s Rights Law (CRL) was introduced in Lagos State in 2007. Six years after its domestication, it became imperative to assess the challenges in the application of the justice provisions by different child justice administrators such as social welfare officers, the police, non-governmental organization (NGO) workers, Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) lawyers, International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA), family court judges and magistrates. The focus of this paper is, therefore, to present the findings from social welfare officers working in family courts in Lagos State. As at the time of the study, there were six family courts but only four were functional. The study was an exploratory and qualitative survey. A focus group discussion (FGD) was organized among a purposive sample of six assessors and supervision officers. Results indicated that all the participants claimed that social workers were not invited to participate in the formulation of the CRL. The results revealed some discrepancies between sections 138 and 151 provisions. Section 138 states that all children’s matters, both civil and criminal, will be heard in the family courts while section 151(2) states that a criminal case involving a child and an adult will be tried in a criminal court. It was also reported that there were some inadequacies among social workers, the police and judiciary. Corrupt practices among the police officers were some of the challenges militating against the implementation of the law. Parents of abused children were reported to be uncooperative. Some of the structures such as children’s centers that were supposed to be established for successful implementation of the law were yet to be established. Based on these challenges, it was recommended, among others, that the law should be reviewed and publicized adequately. Capacity building should be organized for the implementers and activities of the police officers should be strictly monitored
Bring Out the Writer from Within
No full textThis is a unique opportunity for Houston area authors and aspiring authors to share inspiring strategies and experiences in the publishing world!
Moderator: Daphine Priscilla Brown-Jack
Guest Panelist: Carlos Wallace
Guest Panelist: Mia K. Wrigh
The logic behind neural control of breathing pattern
Get PDFThe respiratory rhythm generator is spectacular in its ability to support a wide range of activities and adapt to changing environmental conditions, yet its operating mechanisms remain elusive. We show how selective control of inspiration and expiration times can be achieved in a new representation of the neural system (called a Boolean network). The new framework enables us to predict the behavior of neural networks based on properties of neurons, not their values. Hence, it reveals the logic behind the neural mechanisms that control the breathing pattern. Our network mimics many features seen in the respiratory network such as the transition from a 3-phase to 2-phase to 1-phase rhythm, providing novel insights and new testable predictions
Discrete Structure of the Brain Rhythms
Get PDFNeuronal activity in the brain generates synchronous oscillations of the Local Field Potential (LFP). The traditional analyses of the LFPs are based on decomposing the signal into simpler components, such as sinusoidal harmonics. However, a common drawback of such methods is that the decomposition primitives are usually presumed from the onset, which may bias our understanding of the signal’s structure. Here, we introduce an alternative approach that allows an impartial, high resolution, hands-off decomposition of the brain waves into a small number of discrete, frequency-modulated oscillatory processes, which we call oscillons. In particular, we demonstrate that mouse hippocampal LFP contain a single oscillon that occupies the θ-frequency band and a couple of γ-oscillons that correspond, respectively, to slow and fast γ-waves. Since the oscillons were identified empirically, they may represent the actual, physical structure of synchronous oscillations in neuronal ensembles, whereas Fourier-defined “brain waves” are nothing but poorly resolved oscillons
Correction to: Longitudinal Impacts of Gastric Bypass Surgery on Pharmacodynamics and Pharmacokinetics of Statins (Obesity Surgery, (2019), 29, 8, (2571-2583), 10.1007/s11695-019-03885-6)
Get PDFIn the original article the authors failed to include the following footnote: Asma El-Zailik and Lily K. Cheung contributed equally to this work
Tumor Microbiome Diversity and Composition Influence Pancreatic Cancer Outcomes
Get PDFMost patients diagnosed with resected pancreatic adenocarcinoma (PDAC) survive less than 5 years, but a minor subset survives longer. Here, we dissect the role of the tumor microbiota and the immune system in influencing long-term survival. Using 16S rRNA gene sequencing, we analyzed the tumor microbiome composition in PDAC patients with short-term survival (STS) and long-term survival (LTS). We found higher alpha-diversity in the tumor microbiome of LTS patients and identified an intra-tumoral microbiome signature (Pseudoxanthomonas-Streptomyces-Saccharopolyspora-Bacillus clausii) highly predictive of long-term survivorship in both discovery and validation cohorts. Through human-into-mice fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) experiments from STS, LTS, or control donors, we were able to differentially modulate the tumor microbiome and affect tumor growth as well as tumor immune infiltration. Our study demonstrates that PDAC microbiome composition, which cross-talks to the gut microbiome, influences the host immune response and natural history of the disease. The distinct tumor microbiome from pancreatic cancer long-term survivors can be used to predict PDAC survival in humans, and transfer of long-term survivor gut microbiomes can alter the tumor microbiome and tumor growth in mouse models
A trust-based formal model for fault detection in wireless sensor networks
Get PDFWireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are prone to failures and malicious attacks. Trust evaluation is becoming a new method for fault detection in WSNs. In our previous work, a comprehensive trust model based on multi-factors was introduced for fault detection. This model was validated by simulating. However, it needs to be redeployed when adjustment to network parameters is made. To address the redeployment issue, we propose a Trust-based Formal Model (TFM) that can describe the fault detection process and check faults without simulating and running a WSN. This model derives from Petri nets with the characteristics of time, weight, and threshold. Basic structures of TFM are presented with which compound structures for general purposes can be built. The transition firing and marking updating rules are both defined for further system analysis. An efficient TFM analysis algorithm is developed for structured detection models. When trust factor values, firing time, weights, and thresholds are loaded, precise assessment of the node can be obtained. Finally, we implement TFM with the Generic Modeling Environment (GME).With an example, we illustrate that TFM can efficiently describe the fault detection process and specify faults in advance for WSNs
‘There is no political agenda’: Governing and contesting the compassionate city in Louisville
No full textThis paper examines the emerging trend for city governments to declare themselves compassionate. Opening up the ‘compassionate city’ as an object of critical scrutiny, we outline some of the key ways that compassion has been approached in critical scholarship before turning our attention to the politics of these urban commitments to compassion as they are enacted in practice. Focusing on the city of Louisville, where the ‘compassionate city’ imaginary has been taken on both by politicians and by economic, migrant and racial justice activists, we examine the potential of compassion as and in relation to other political grammars, and consider the polyvalent nature of the compassion as it has shaped public debate and political struggle in the city. We argue that this turn toward compassion should be evaluated and understood neither in terms of the good intentions of compassion proponents nor exclusively through analyses that reduce compassion to a single logic to be critiqued, but, instead, in terms of its contingent politics. In doing so, we respond to recent debates about the specificity of the political by emphasizing that the meaning of politics and the political grammars through which we understand urban problems are never the province of critical scholarship alone, and we highlight the value of approaches that can sensitize us to the ways that politics—and its meaning—can itself become a problem as the political nature of the compassionate city is called into question
Optimal joint production and emissions reduction strategies considering consumers\u27 environmental preferences: A manufacturer\u27s perspective
Get PDFCarbon cap-and-trade mechanism is a government-mandated, market-based scheme to reduce emissions, which has a significant effect on manufacturers\u27 operation decisions. Based on the cap-and-trade mechanism, this paper studies the joint production and emission reduction problem of a manufacturer. The manufacturer faces emissions-sensitive demand impacted by consumers\u27 environmental preferences (CEP). An extended newsvendor model is used to find the optimal production quantity and emissions reduction quantity. We explore the impacts of market price of carbon credits, emission reduction investment coefficient and CEP on the optimal strategies. Numerical examples are provided to illustrate the theoretical results and orthogonal experimental design technique was applied to find robust system parameters. It is concluded that among all parameters, emissions cap has the greater impact on the expected profit, which is followed by than the market price of carbon credits. This means that the government plays a major role in economic development. The total carbon emissions are mainly affected by the carbon trading price and the product\u27s sale price, which indicates the carbon trading market and product market play a larger role in controlling environmental benefits. Several valuable managerial insights on helping governments and industries understand how market conditions change and make better long-term decisions are further concluded
Energy Consumption Analysis of a Duty Cycle Wireless Sensor Network Model
Get PDFA novel model is developed and investigated for a duty-cycle wireless sensor network (WSN), where each sensor node can stay at one of four statuses (i.e., full-active phase, two semi-active phases each with different functions, and a sleep phase) to make the system more efficient. The explicit result of the joint probability for data packet numbers and the sensor phases is achieved by suitably constructing a multi-dimensional Markov process. Furthermore, various energy consumption measures, such as energy consumption per unit time in each of the three energy consumptions and energy consumption switching from one phase to another, are obtained. System performance measures, such as the average delay time of a data packet in the system, throughput of the system, and the probability of the sensor node staying at any of the phases, are also achieved. The numerical analyses are provided to validate the model and the analytic results. The proposed model and the analysis method are expected to be applied to the design and analysis of WSN models with various phases of the sensor