BACKGROUND The Short Form of the McGill Pain Questionnaire (SF-MPQ) is the most widely used assessment of the quality and intensity of pain. In previous validation studies, the factor structure of the SF-MPQ varied widely from various two-factor structures to a five-factor structure, although research on the SF-MPQ quite consistently supports its two-factor structure (i.e., sensory and affectiv...

BACKGROUND The prevalence and incidence of kidney stone disease have increased markedly during the past several decades, and studies have demonstrated that inappropriate dietary habits are leading to more obesity and overweight (OW) in children and adults, which may be important in stone formation. Obese and OW patients share most of the same risk factors for cardiovascular morbidity, while the...

KSF-1phi, a novel filamentous phage of Vibrio cholerae, supports morphogenesis of the RS1 satellite phage by heterologous DNA packaging and facilitates horizontal gene transfer. We analyzed the genomic sequence, morphology, and receptor for KSF-1phi infection, as well as its phylogenetic relationships with other filamentous vibriophages. While strains carrying the mshA gene encoding mannose-sen...

Historical manuscript dating has always been an important challenge for historians but since countless manuscripts have become digitally available recently, the pattern recognition community has started addressing the dating problem as well. In this chapter, we present a family of local contour fragments (kCF) and stroke fragments (kSF) features and study their application to historical documen...

Production of fatty acid esters from stearic, oleic, and palmitic acids and short-chain alcohols (methanol, ethanol, propanol, and butanol) for the production of biodiesel was investigated in this work. A series of montmorillonite-based clays catalysts (KSF, KSF/0, KP10, and K10) were used as acidic catalysts. The influence of the specific surface area and the acidity of the catalysts on the es...

The cholera toxin genes of Vibrio cholerae are encoded by the filamentous phage, CTXphi. Chromosomal CTXphi prophage DNA is often found flanked by copies of a related genetic element designated RS1, and RS1 DNA can be packaged into filamentous phage particles (designated RS1phi) by using the CTXphi morphogenesis genes. RS1phi is a satellite phage that further controls expression and disseminati...

INTRODUCTION Locally requested and planned overseas volunteering in low-income and middle-income countries by National Health Service (NHS) staff can have benefits for the host or receiving nation, but its impact on the professional development of NHS staff is not proven. The Knowledge and Skills Framework (KSF) and Leadership Framework (LF) are two tools used by employers as a measure of indiv...

Historical manuscript dating has always been an important challenge for historians but since countless manuscripts have become digitally available recently, the pattern recognition community has started addressing the dating problem as well. In this chapter, we present a family of local contour fragments (kCF) and stroke fragments (kSF) features and study their application to historical documen...

Most of the problems in software engineering projects seem to have their origin in knowledge sharing difficulties. While software engineering is one of the most knowledge intensive professions, the understanding of the role of knowledge sharing is vital. It requires making knowledge and knowledge sharing more visible than those currently are in practice. Making visible means here to identify wh...

This paper reports the findings of a survey of technology strategy of the Japanese companies. Results show that different Key Success Factors (KSF) for competition within an industry can be explained by environmental uncertainty and new technology impacts and that some of the technology strategy differ among various KSF groups. Therefore the environmental factors more or less affect the content...