Open Access Books

The prevalence of urinary incontinence increases with age. It has recognised social and psychological impact on individuals as well as a financial implication to individuals and healthcare systems. The book attempt to discuss the assessment of urinary incontinence, followed by surgical and conservative treatment options in a concise way, within the framework of clinical practice. We would like to acknowledge all the authors for their hard work in completing this book.

This original and fully documented study finds that the trend in film making in the Western world is to international coproduction. The massive increase of American investment in European film companies, and the continuing search for wider and more lucrative markets are creating a dehumanized, slick style of film that eliminates domestic cultural characteristics and blurs the expression of individual national perceptions. Mr. Guback discusses postwar quota and tariff restrictions erected by European countries to protect their national film industries; the use of the boycott to force a foreign market for American films; the increasing acceptance of European films in the United States; and the United States' backing of the American industry and use of film for propaganda purposes. He shows the intricacies of coproduction and the creation of an industry that is truly international in financing, production, and distribution. Mr. Guback has tapped a reservoir of new sources by personally interviewing film executives on both sides of the Atlantic, and by gaining access to documents heretofore unavailable to researchers. His study provides economists and film buffs with significant new material and interpretation.

Agriculture; Agricultural Economics; Geography, general; Innovation/Technology Management

Two outstanding representatives of Russian modernism - Andrei Belyy for the movement of symbolism, Osip Mandel'tam for acmeism - chose the Caucasus as a tourist destination for their travels in the last decade of their lives within the borders of the Soviet Union. For both, the cultural-historical context was crucial in several ways in this choice. It concerns, on the one hand, the poet's own person and his cultural awareness, which refers to his integration into traditional contexts both in Russian and in world culture. On the other hand, Belyj and Mandel'štam in the Caucasus are looking for an encounter with a cultural space which, through its rich history, during which it has been exposed to a variety of foreign influences and yet retains its specific character, is able to provide these two factors in a unique way ,

The visual, olfactory, auditory and gustatory systems of invertebrates are often used as models to study the transduction, transmission and processing of information in nervous systems, and in recent years have also provided powerful models of neural plasticity. This Research Topic presents current views on plasticity and its mechanisms in invertebrate sensory systems at the cellular, molecular and network levels, approached from both physiological and morphological perspectives. Plasticity in sensory systems can be activity- dependent, or occur in response to changes in the environment, or to endogenous stimuli. Plastic changes have been reported in receptor neurons, but are also known in other cell types, including glial cells and sensory interneurons. Also reported are dynamic changes among neuronal circuits involved in transmitting sensory stimuli and in reorganizing of synaptic contacts within a particular sensory system. Plastic changes within sensory systems in invertebrates can also be reported during development, after injury and after short or long- term stimulation. All these changes occur against an historical backdrop which viewed invertebrate nervous systems as largely hard-wired, and lacking in susceptibility especially to activity-dependent changes. This Research Topic examines how far we have moved from this simple view of simple brains, to the realization that invertebrate sensory systems exhibit all the diversity of plastic changes seen in vertebrate brains, but among neurons in which such changes can be evaluated at single-cell level.

Pakistan is already one of the most urbanized nations in South Asia, and a majority of its population is projected to be living in cities within three decades. This demographic shift is likely to have a significant impact on Pakistan’s politics and stability. This report briefly examines urbanization as a potential driver of long-term insecurity and instability, with particular attention to the cities of Karachi, Lahore, and Quetta.

The term fertilizer use efficiency (FUE) is not new. However, in recent years, improving the FUE has become particularly significant. This is due to growing demographic pressure, limited natural resources, climate change, and challenges related to environmental protection. This Special Issue of Plants contains papers that describe the current status of the knowledge and outlook of FUE improvement. The two review articles included provide an opportunity to become acquainted with the factors influencing FUE and contemporary trends in the development of fertilization strategies and technologies aimed at maximizing the value of this indicator. Of note, the concept of effective fertilization is presented and defined as the soil fertility clock (SFC). The 19 original articles included in this reprint present the results of research on the following: optimal N dose determination, balanced N fertilization, nitrogen use efficiency (NUE), foliar fertilization, improving the effectiveness of phosphorus use, and the possibility of improving FUE through the application of innovative fertilizers. Thanks to all the articles, this Special Issue enriches our knowledge in terms of the assessment methods of FUE in plant production. Moreover, it indicates new possibilities, perspectives, and directions for the development of scientific research within this field in the coming future.

The utilization of renewable energy sources such as wind energy, or solar energy, among others, is currently of greater interest. Nevertheless, since their availability is arbitrary and unstable this can lead to frequency variation, to grid instability and to a total or partial loss of load power supply, being not appropriate sources to be directly connected to the main utility grid. Additionally, the presence of a static converter as output interface of the generating plants introduces voltage and current harmonics into the electrical system that negatively affect system power quality. By integrating distributed power generation systems closed to the loads in the electric grid, we can eliminate the need to transfer energy over long distances through the electric grid. In this book the reader will be introduced to different power generation and distribution systems with an analysis of some types of existing disturbances and a study of different industrial applications such as battery charges.

Published

The number of patient health data has been estimated to have reached 2314 exabytes by 2020. Traditional data analysis techniques are unsuitable to extract useful information from such a vast quantity of data. Thus, intelligent data analysis methods combining human expertise and computational models for accurate and in-depth data analysis are necessary. The technological revolution and medical advances made by combining vast quantities of available data, cloud computing services, and AI-based solutions can provide expert insight and analysis on a mass scale and at a relatively low cost. Computational intelligence (CI) methods, such as fuzzy models, artificial neural networks, evolutionary algorithms, and probabilistic methods, have recently emerged as promising tools for the development and application of intelligent systems in healthcare practice. CI-based systems can learn from data and evolve according to changes in the environments by taking into account the uncertainty characterizing health data, including omics data, clinical data, sensor, and imaging data. The use of CI in healthcare can improve the processing of such data to develop intelligent solutions for prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up, as well as for the analysis of administrative processes. The present Special Issue on computational intelligence for healthcare is intended to show the potential and the practical impacts of CI techniques in challenging healthcare applications.

Le rapprochement des mots du titre, marins et Arles, n'est probablement pas sans surprendre. Il est en effet difficile d'imaginer, pour qui connaît la cité aujourd'hui, qu'elle fut un port de mer depuis l'Antiquité jusqu'au milieu du XIXe siècle. Le temps choisi, l'époque moderne, dévoile, comment au sortir d'une période de repli sur des activités fluviales et halieutiques, les Arlésiens ont retrouvé le chemin de la mer. L'étude présentée ici s'est attachée à faire ressortir l'originalité de...

El hecho de que la industria de la construcción en la ciudad de Pasto y, en general, en el departamento de Nariño, haya sido considerada poco estructurada en todos sus eslabones, ha llevado a que sea un sector con algunas desventajas, sobre todo en las Pequeñas y Medianas Empresas (PYME), siendo estas organizaciones, parte importante y representativa de la economía regional, con gran potencial dinamizador desde la generación de empleo y el crecimiento industrial. El libro relata la industria de la construcción de vivienda y da una mirada desde la administración y la contaduría; recoge las opiniones de los constructores y gerentes de las PYME de construcción en la ciudad de Pasto, específicamente sobre aspectos del proceso administrativo y de la dinámica de las áreas funcionales de una organización, incluyendo actividades de mercadeo, tecnología e innovación, además de dar una visión general de la situación financiera de las empresas y el retorno de las inversiones a sus accionistas; por último, recopila aspectos tributarios de índole nacional y local. Por lo tanto, es un tema de interés para conocer la dinámica de este sector.

The result of reflection on communication, this book highlights the role of people who facilitate understanding between cultures and languages, setting limits to the unintelligible cacophony that is identified with Babel. Depending on the places and the historical moment, these intermediaries have carried out different tasks, but their figure has always been present in intercultural encounters born of wars, migrations or colonizing ambitions. This study goes from the present, to the near past (the Spanish emigration of 1960-1970) and to a more distant one, the Middle Ages and the Modern Age of discoveries and colonization. It covers diverse scenarios, from Mexico to Araucanía, the Germany that receives emigrants and the medieval kingdoms of Castilla y León. Such examples allow us to understand the hybrid companies that are being set up today in Spain and in many other countries.

There is increasing interest in understanding the interplay of emotional and cognitive processes. The objective of the Research Topic was to provide an interdisciplinary survey of cutting-edge neuroscientific research on the interaction and integration of emotion and cognition in the brain. The following original empirical reports, commentaries and theoretical reviews provide a comprehensive survey on recent advances in understanding how emotional and cognitive processes interact, how they are integrated in the brain, and what their implications for understanding the mind and its disorders are. These works encompasses a broad spectrum of populations and showcases a wide variety of paradigms, measures, analytic strategies, and conceptual approaches. The aim of the Topic was to begin to address several key questions about the interplay of cognitive and emotional processes in the brain, including: what is the impact of emotional states, anxiety and stress on various cognitive functions? How are emotion and cognition integrated in the brain? Do individual differences in affective dimensions of temperament and personality alter cognitive performance, and how is this realized in the brain? Are there individual differences that increase vulnerability to the impact of affect on cognition—who is vulnerable, and who resilient? How plastic is the interplay of cognition and emotion? Taken together, these works demonstrate that emotion and cognition are deeply interwoven in the fabric of the brain, suggesting that widely held beliefs about the key constituents of ‘the emotional brain’ and ‘the cognitive brain’ are fundamentally flawed. Developing a deeper understanding of the emotional-cognitive brain is important, not just for understanding the mind but also for elucidating the root causes of its many debilitating disorders.

Dans un siècle marqué par la déchristianisation et l'individualisme, il est intéressant de voir qu'en Grande-Bretagne on assiste à un retour aux valeurs traditionnelles et à la définition de nouvelles valeurs pour vivre mieux en société. Les auteurs de cet ouvrage s'attachent à montrer comment certaines valeurs victoriennes comme l'amour de la campagne ou un intérêt pour la condition féminine se sont développées au xxe siècle pour donner naissance à de nouvelles valeurs comme l'égalité des se...