Background and objective: By reviewing our current understanding of oxidative injury as a cause of focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS), we hope to advance the use of antioxidants as a promising treatment in addition to the other therapeutic modalities to slow the rate of progression. Methods: Key references from the past concerning oxidative injury and FSGS were analyzed, together with those from a PubMed search of the literature from 1997 to 2007, to form the basis of this commentary. Results: In animal studies in FSGS produced by subtotal nephrectomy or puromycin injections, evidence of oxidant injury provided the rationale for disease reversal with an antioxidant such as high dose vitamin E. Clinical trial in children with FSGS using vitamin E resulted in significant reduction in proteinuria. Other treatment modalities in children with FSGS over the past four decades were reviewed. These consisted of one or more of the following medications: oral prednisone, angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors, angiotensin receptor blockers, and intravenous methylprednisolone with and without cyclophosphamide or cyclosporine. The prognosis with these recent therapeutic interventions improved the outcome of children with FSGS compared to no treatment as advocated earlier. However, when the current regimen of combined treatment was compared with the regimen of prednisone plus cyclophosphamide, there was no difference in Kaplan-Meier kidney survival rate at a mean follow-up of 12 to 16 years. Conclusion: In reviewing current concepts of oxidant injury and other mechanisms of injury in the development of FSGS and the available modalities of treatment, we call into question, whether the cost and side effects of intravenous methylprednisolone is justifiable on the basis of unchanged kidney survival rates with continuing this particular mode of intervention.

No description available.

The primary purpose of pile foundations is to transfer vertical loads due to the transfer of the weight of the superstructure to the deeper ground. However, many civil engineering structures, such as bridges, transmission towers, tall chimneys, and solar panels, are subjected to significant lateral loads and overturning moments in addition to axial loads. Potential sources of lateral loads (not due to earthquakes) include wind, waves, ice forces, passive earth pressure, etc. On the other hand, axial loadings can be live loads from a structure, forces developed due to ground freezing, etc. Consequently, pile foundations for these structures should be adequately designed to resist compressive loads combined with lateral and uplift loads and moments. In most cases, these forces (compressive, lateral, and uplift) and moments are often simultaneously applied on the piles. One of the key objectives for the engineer and designer is to determine the deflections and stresses in a pile in order to keep them within tolerable limits. Passive soil resistance can be very effective in proving lateral support for the pile. However, passive soil resistance is a function of the soil thermal regime (freezing, thawing, and temperature). Due to global warming, the thermal regimes of the soils in Canada and other cold regions in the world have changed in the past decades. The change in the thermal regimes of the soil may affect the geotechnical response or performance of the pile foundations. This thesis presents and discusses the results of physical model testing on model piles in unfrozen, frozen, and thawing fine sand, which are subjected to individual and combined axial (uplift) and lateral loads. The dimensions of the pile model are established by using physical scaling laws. The physical model is also equipped with various sensors and instruments (e.g., linear variable differential transformer (LVDT), and temperature sensors) to monitor the pile and soil response during and after loading. The results of the study show that the thermal regime in the soil significantly affects the performance of the pile under combined loadings (lateral and uplift). The lateral capacity of the pile under combined loads in frozen soil is increased by 648% compared to that in unfrozen ground whereas the uplift capacity under combined loadings in frozen soil is increased by 29%. Due to the effects of the freezing and thawing (F-T) cycles of the soil, a steady increase in the lateral capacity of the pile under the combined loadings is observed. On the other hand, the uplift capacity under the combined loadings in soil subjected to F-T cycles remains constant. The results will be useful in the geotechnical design of pile foundations for bridges and other structures in Canada and other cold regions in the world. The findings of this research will contribute to efficient design practices for pile foundations in cold regions with rapid changing climatic conditions.

Thirty-five range cows of various breeds were obtained for the study. Body measurements taken were live weight and hip height and all cows were condition scored for level of fatness. The cows were slaughtered and the following morning several carcass measurements were taken and the plate was removed from the left side. These plates were boned and the remaining flesh ground for chemical analysis of percent carcass fat. Regression equations were calculated for estimating percent carcass fat from condition score, weight:height ratio and hip height (R2=.765). However, condition score alone is the single best estimator for percent carcass fat (R2=.759).

L'évaluation de requêtes sur des données probabilistes(probabilistic query evaluation, ou PQE) est généralement très coûteuse enressources et ce même à requête fixée. Bien que certaines restrictions sur les requêtes et les données aient été proposées pour en diminuerla complexité, les résultats existants ne s'appliquent pas à la complexité combinée, c'est-à-dire quand la requête n'est pas fixe.Ma thèse s'intéresse à la question de déterminer pour quelles requêtes et données l'évaluation probabiliste est faisable en complexité combinée.La première contribution de cette thèse est d'étudier PQE pour des requêtes conjonctives sur des schémas d'arité 2. Nous imposons que les requêtes et les données aient la forme d'arbres et montrons l'importance de diverses caractéristiques telles que la présence d'étiquettes sur les arêtes, les bifurcations ou la connectivité.Les restrictions imposées dans ce cadre sont assez sévères, mais la deuxième contribution de cette thèse montreque si l'on est prêts à augmenter la complexité en la requête, alors il devient possible d'évaluer un langage de requête plus expressif sur des données plus générales. Plus précisément, nous montrons que l'évaluation probabiliste d'un fragment particulier de Datalog sur des données de largeur d'arbre bornée peut s'effectuer en temps linéaire en les donnéeset doublement exponentiel en la requête. Ce résultat est prouvé en utilisant des techniques d'automatesd'arbres et de compilation de connaissances. La troisième contribution de ce travail est de montrer les limites de certaines de ces techniques, en prouvant desbornes inférieures générales sur la taille de formalismes de représentation utilisés en compilation de connaissances et en théorie des automates. / Query evaluation over probabilistic databases (probabilistic queryevaluation, or PQE) is known to be intractable inmany cases, even in data complexity, i.e., when the query is fixed. Althoughsome restrictions of the queries and instances have been proposed tolower the complexity, these known tractable cases usually do not apply tocombined complexity, i.e., when the query is not fixed. My thesis investigates thequestion of which queries and instances ensure the tractability ofPQE in combined complexity.My first contribution is to study PQE of conjunctive queries on binary signatures, which we rephraseas a probabilistic graph homomorphism problem. We restrict the query and instance graphs to be trees and show the impact on the combined complexity of diverse features such as edge labels, branching,or connectedness. While the restrictions imposed in this setting are quite severe, my second contribution shows that,if we are ready to increase the complexity in the query, then we can evaluate a much more expressive language on more general instances. Specifically, I show that PQE for a particular class of Datalog queries on instances of bounded treewidth can be solved with linear complexity in the instance and doubly exponential complexity in the query.To prove this result, we use techniques from tree automata and knowledge compilation. The third contribution is to show the limits of some of these techniques by proving general lower bounds on knowledge compilation and tree automata formalisms.

Final publication is avilable at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0954611115300172 / 京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(医学) / 甲第19577号 / 医博第4084号 / 新制||医||1013(附属図書館) / 32613 / 京都大学大学院医学研究科医学専攻 / (主査)教授 伊達 洋至, 教授 平家 俊男, 教授 松田 秀一 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Medical Science / Kyoto University / DFAM

The version posted must include the following notice on the first page: This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cne.23477/abstract, which has been published in final form at DOI: 10.1002/cne.23477. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving. / 京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(医学) / 甲第19610号 / 医博第4117号 / 新制||医||1015(附属図書館) / 32646 / 京都大学大学院医学研究科医学専攻 / (主査)教授 渡邉 大, 教授 髙橋 良輔, 教授 宮本 享 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Medical Science / Kyoto University / DFAM

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(地球環境学) / 甲第20039号 / 地環博第155号 / 新制||地環||31(附属図書館) / 33135 / 京都大学大学院地球環境学舎環境マネジメント専攻 / (主査)教授 藤井 滋穂, 准教授 田中 周平, 准教授 大下 和徹 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Global Environmental Studies / Kyoto University / DFAM

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(工学) / 甲第20374号 / 工博第4311号 / 新制||工||1668(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院工学研究科電気工学専攻 / (主査)教授 引原 隆士, 教授 山川 宏, 教授 松尾 哲司 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Philosophy (Engineering) / Kyoto University / DFAM

No description available.