Open Access Books

Strategic imperatives sometimes compel the United States to work with partner nations that lack the characteristics that favor success in building partner capacity. This report explores what the United States can do in such contexts to maximize prospects for success by specifically looking at potential challenges and workarounds and deriving recommendations for future engagements.

Today’s world is fraught with crisis and uncertainty. This creates a significant obstacle in child rearing and development. Children, inherently a vulnerable demographic, are at the epicenter of these crises. Approaches to address these problems need to be based on high-quality scientific research, to understand the root causes and determine effective approaches to reduce behavioral and mental health problems in children (BMPC). This is a special research reprint focusing on BMPC. It collected 14 high-quality papers from authors distributed across many countries, including the United States, France, China, Japan, Israel, and Thailand. This reprint included two main sections. The first section aimed to provide a comprehensive understanding of the social and mental mechanisms leading to BMPC. The second section aimed to develop behavioral and mental health promotion strategies and policies for children, as well as to provide some considerations in the design and implementation of effective intervention programs. We believe that this reprint is of great significance for the development and progress of research and practice in the area of children's behavior and mental health. This reprint is suitable as a reference book for researchers, and also has significance for guiding practical workers in this field. In the end, we noted that, in some papers, it was necessary to further improve them, to obtain in-depth and comprehensive overviews and to expand on the design and implementation of effective intervention programs.

The book ""Quality and Production of Forage"" is intended to keep readers updatedon the developments occurring in this field. As it is apparent that livestockanimals are important throughout the world because of the meat, milk and eggthey produce, knowledge about the forages available to animals must also beconsidered for increased production, quality and efficiency. This book providesinformation that readers will find considerably invaluable about forage feeds, suchas grass, legumes, and straw. The book is composed of ten papers, focusing on awide range of research activities and topics that feature the following concepts offorage: the effect of conservation method on forage protein value; Microbial thecomposition and mycotoxin content in forage; genetic diversity of forages; timelysowing to maximize yield for both grain and biomass; ensiling treatments onforage quality; the qualitative characteristics of different accessions of new foragespecies; forage policy influencing feed costs; feeding forage on animal health;high-protein tropical forages as alternative sources for poultry; impact of foragesin poultry diet and significance of forages in sustainable poultry productionsystems. This book will be an invaluable reference for students and professionalsin agricultural science and grassland and animal husbandry researches.

The incidence of total hip arthroplasty is increasing in number because of successful outcomes. Although technically challenging, once mastered a hip replacement is one of the most gratifying surgeries for both patient and surgeon. This book covers some of the most important aspects of hip replacement surgery. These include preoperative planning, anesthesia, classification systems, management of proximal femur fractures, anterior approach, complications, and rehabilitation aspects of hip arthroplasty. The book is intended for arthroplasty surgeons, anesthetists, and physical therapists who will find the book useful in parts and as a whole if they deal with arthroplasty cases on a regular basis. Experience-based narration of various subjects by authors ensures that first-hand experience is passed on to readers in a simple, easy-to-understand manner.

The expression “human logic of truth” is Frank P. Ramsey’s:“Let us therefore try to get an idea of a human logic which shall not attempt to be reducible to formal logic. Logic, we may agree, is concerned not with what men actually believe, but what they ought to believe, or what it would be reasonable to believe. What then, we must ask, is meant by saying that it is reasonable for a man to have such and such a degree of belief in a proposition?” Many themes developed by Ramsey in his work (o...

This study reports the results of a systematic, empirically based survey of opinions of U.S. military and State Department personnel with Iraq war experience to shed light on the costs and benefits of using private security contractors (PSCs) in the Iraq war. For the most part, respondents did not believe that PSCs were "running wild" in Iraq, but they held mixed views on PSCs' contribution to the U.S. military operation and U.S. foreign policy objectives.

Suzuki–Miyaura cross-coupling remains a powerful tool in organic synthesis for C–C bond formation and has various industrial applications, for example, the synthesis of pharmaceuticals and materials. Intensive research efforts are being made into finding ways of improving and expanding the scope of this process, and the development of more efficient catalytic systems for this extremely important reaction is still a hot research topic of enormous academic and industrial interest. This Special Issue, consisting of four reviews, two communications and six articles, focuses on recent promising research and novel trends in the broad field of Suzuki–Miyaura cross-coupling employing a range of different palladium catalysts. Homogeneous or heterogeneous catalysis in organic or aqueous medium, using conventional conditions or non-conventional techniques such as microwave and ultrasound irradiation, grinding and photo-activated processes as green chemistry approaches, as well as continuous flow technology are included. The catalysts described herein are unsupported metal complexes, catalysts immobilized on solid supports, ligand-free catalytic systems or metal nanoparticles.

The book deals with the analysis of oscillations, mechanical and electromagnetic waves, and their use in medicine. Each chapter contains the theoretical basis and the use of relevant phenomena in medical practice. Description of oscillations is important for understanding waves and the nature of magnetic resonance. A chapter on mechanical waves describes the origin and properties of sound, infrasound and ultrasound, their medical applications, and perception of sound by human hearing. A chapter on electromagnetic waves examines their origin, properties, and applications in therapy and diagnostics. Subsequent chapters describe how interference and diffraction lead to applications like optical imaging, holography, virtual reality, and perception of light by human vision. Also addressed is how quantum properties of radiation helped develop the laser scalpel, fluorescence microscopy, spectroscopy, X-rays, and gamma radiation.

This volume consists of a collection of 14 accepted submissions (including several invited feature articles) to the Special Issue of MDPI's journal Symmetry on the general subject area of integral transformations, operational calculus and their applications from many different parts around the world. The main objective of the Special Issue was to gather review, expository, and original research articles dealing with the state-of-the-art advances in integral transformations and operational calculus as well as their multidisciplinary applications, together with some relevance to the aspect of symmetry. Various families of fractional-order integrals and derivatives have been found to be remarkably important and fruitful, mainly due to their demonstrated applications in numerous diverse and widespread areas of mathematical, physical, chemical, engineering, and statistical sciences. Many of these fractional-order operators provide potentially useful tools for solving ordinary and partial differential equations, as well as integral, differintegral, and integro-differential equations; fractional-calculus analogues and extensions of each of these equations; and various other problems involving special functions of mathematical physics and applied mathematics, as well as their extensions and generalizations in one or more variables.

One of the most critical resources required for wireless communication is the radio spectrum. Traditionally, the administration of the spectrum rights tends to grant exclusive rights to some services in the major geographic regions. On the other hand, several studies have shown that the spectrum is actually underutilized and that new devices should use the underutilized spectrum in an opportunistic manner. Cognitive radio is a way to do that. The cognitive radio needs to collect cognition about the radio environment to operate efficiently. Such a radio needs to understand if the spectrum it intends to use is free or utilized by some primary user. By primary user we mean the licensed user of the band, and correspondingly the cognitive radios are often termed as secondary users. The goal of this book is to collect recent research about cognitive radio and provide an up-to-date review of the challenging topic.

This Special Issue of Genealogy explores the topic of “Intergenerational Trauma and Healing”. Authors examine the ways in which traumas (individual or group, and affecting humans and non-humans) that occurred in past generations reverberate into the present and how individuals, communities, and nations respond to and address those traumas. Authors also explore contemporary traumas, how they reflect ancestral traumas, and how they are being addressed through drawing on both contemporary and ancestral healing approaches. The articles define trauma broadly, including removal from homelands, ecocide, genocide, sexual or gendered violence, institutionalized and direct racism, incarceration, and exploitation, and across a wide range of spatial (home to nation) and temporal (intergenerational/ancestral and contemporary) scales. Articles also approach healing in an expansive mode, including specific individual healing practices, community-based initiatives, class-action lawsuits, group-wide reparations, health interventions, cultural approaches, and transformative legal or policy decisions. Contributing scholars for this issue are from across disciplines (including ethnic studies, genetics, political science, law, environmental policy, public health, humanities, etc.). They consider trauma and its ramifications alongside diverse mechanisms of healing and/or rearticulating self, community, and nation.

Este libro se centra en el estudio de la reforma educativa del primer liberalismo español, que fue impulsada por Manuel José Quintana para defensa de la igualdad y de los derechos de los ciudadanos, con una evidente influencia del modelo introducido por la Revolución Francesa. La autora analiza, en un total de diez capítulos, los diversos documentos y proyectos legales de los que Quintana fue artífice, tales como: el Informe de 1813, el Dictamen y Proyecto de decreto de 1814, el Reglamento general de instrucción pública de 1821, el Proyecto de Reglamento general de primera enseñanza de 1822, el Reglamento provisional para la organización de la Universidad Central de 1822 y el Arreglo provisional de los estudios de 1836. Estos documentos, que se adjuntan a este libro, constatan la existencia de unos planteamientos comunes derivados de: las bases generales de la educación (igual, completa y universal), de los principios de la educación (uniforme, pública, gratuita y libre), la concepción de una educación nacional, la división de la enseñanza, el desarrollo de cada uno de los tres niveles educativos (primera, segunda y tercera enseñanza) y la creación de la Dirección General de Estudios y de la Academia Nacional.

De l’anarchisme à l’Action française, du fascisme à son retour vers la gauche et dans la République, jusqu’à sa mort en déportation, le parcours de Georges Valois (1878-1945) est emblématique des mutations et des reclassements à l’œuvre dans la France de l’entre-deux-guerres. L’Homme contre l’argent. Souvenirs de dix ans 1918-1928, ouvrage publié en 1928 et aujourd’hui introuvable devait être réédité. Il peut se découvrir comme une galerie où se croisent des portraits de figures emblématiques (de Charles Maurras à Benito Mussolini en passant par François Coty) et des fresques de milieux très divers (Action française, monde de la presse et de l’édition, sphères patronales, « jeunes équipes » en voie de formation). Valois propose aussi le récit de temps forts qui jalonnent sa propre vie en même temps qu’ils marquent la France de son temps : promotion d’une « économie nouvelle », dissidence de l’Action française, naissance d’un « fascisme français », crise monétaire et stabilisation Poincaré, impasse des solutions traditionnelles pour adapter la France à une modernisation nécessaire au-delà des voies tracées par le monde anglo-saxon et l’URSS, nécessité de « nouvelles équipes » pour concevoir et mettre en œuvre, contre la « dictature » de l’argent, une troisième voie « réaliste », un « nouvel âge ». Au-delà de son itinéraire Valois restitue celui d’un groupe, qui croise cette « génération réaliste » dont il est une figure tutélaire et l’éditeur majeur dans sa librairie.

Economic losses from disasters are now reaching an average of US$250–$300 billion a year. In the last 20 years, more than 530,000 people died as a direct result of extreme weather events; millions more were seriously injured. Most of the deaths and serious injuries were in developing countries. Meanwhile, highly infectious diseases will continue to emerge or re-emerge, and natural hazards will not disappear. But these extreme events do not need to turn into large-scale disasters. Better and faster responses are possible. The authors contend that even though there is much generosity in the world to support the responses to and recovery from natural disasters, the current funding model, based on mobilizing financial resources after disasters take place, is flawed and makes responses late, fragmented, unreliable, and poorly targeted, while providing poor incentives for preparedness or risk reduction. The way forward centres around reforming the funding model for disasters, moving towards plans with simple rules for early action and that are locked in before disasters through credible funding strategies—all while resisting the allure of post-disaster discretionary funding and the threat it poses for those seeking to ensure that disasters have a less severe impact.