Restricted Category Research Articles

Cross-sectional analysis of US scope of practice laws and employed physician assistants

ObjectiveThis study examined if the variation in physician assistant (PA) state scope of practice (SOP) laws across states are associated with number of employed PAs, PA demographics and PA/population ratio...

New Regression Model for Estimating Irrigation Water Quality Index

The common tool to evaluate the groundwater quality is so-called the Irrigation Water Quality Index (IWQI). In the present study, the IWQI model developed by Meireles is used to assess the quality of groundwater in Karbala - Najaf plateau, Iraq. The quality parameters that collected from groundwater tests of 78 wells in the study area are; EC, Na+1, Mg+2, Ca+2, Cl-1, and HCO3-1. The SPSS software program is employed to develop a non-linear regression model of the IWQI for the study area. The results show that the IWQI values for 90% of groundwater wells fall within the Severe Restriction (SR) category, which means that it’s only suitable for irrigation of high salt tolerance crops. While its remaining 10% of the wells are in the High Restriction (HR) category, and this means it is suitable for irrigation of moderate to high salt tolerance crops. The calibration and validation for the developed model presented that this model has a good estimation of the IWQI values. Due to flexible and unbiased, the current study recommends to use the proposed model to estimate the IWQI.

Mathematical model for the definition and integration of buffer zones for terrestrial tropical protected areas

Protected areas are defined, declared, and managed territories that constitute part of an in-situ conservation strategy of biodiversity and ecosystem services. In Colombia, 142,682 km2 of the territory have been declared as 59 PAs, representing the National Natural Park System of Colombia. This involves the most restrictive categories in terms of use, occupation, and possession of land. However, due to the strong pressure generated by the current socio-economic dynamics and transformation engines, the delineation and integration of buffer zones are urgently required to mitigate the disturbances caused by human activity in the territories surrounding PAs.The objective of this research was to propose a mathematical model based on multi-criteria analysis to determine Buffer Zones for tropical terrestrial Protected Areas using 17 Protected Areas from the National Natural Park System of Colombia as a pilot group. Based on 7 criteria and 31 indicators, a four-level hierarchical model was established consisting of principles, criteria, indicators, and decision alternatives (mathematical model). In addition to the indicators of the ecosystem component, environmental management indicators associated with territorial planning were included. This is considered an innovative reference as it establishes a bridge between the conservation and the development strategies.The mathematical model was based on weighting the criteria and indicators of Principle 1, by 9 experts who used two weighting methods: pair comparison and direct combination. This model provides Colombia with a methodological tool that will enable both the definition of Buffer Zones for terrestrial Protected Areas and their incorporation as an environmental requirement of the land use planning. The present research can also be applied to the Protected Areas of other tropical countries that present similar socio-ecosystem dynamics.

COVID-19 and International Freedom of Movement: a Stranded Human Right?

Governments confronted with a pandemic have a ‘knee-jerk’ reaction of imposing travel restrictions, despite the effectiveness of such measures not being supported by scientific evidence. In response to COVID-19, most countries imposed a ban on foreign travelers, with some States even closing borders to their own nationals and residents or prohibiting them from leaving. While border control is a legitimate prerogative that States can use to assess the health condition of travelers, travel restrictions are more complex and raise intricate legal questions. This article focuses on a specific category of travel restrictions: travel bans. These measures are a blanket prohibition applied to all or certain individuals, regardless of their health state, from crossing international borders. The validity of such measures depends on several elements. First, one needs to examine the applicable legal framework – the International Health Regulations and human rights treaties – and the standards they contain. Both sets of rules protect international mobility, but with different goals and scopes of application. Freedom of movement across borders is protected by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and comprises two interdependent rights: the right to leave and the right to return. Determining whether travel bans are lawful also depends on a second element: the status of the traveler, namely, whether they qualify as nationals, residents, or something else. After reviewing the relevant legal framework and (available) information on how travel bans were applied, this article questions whether the pertinent requirements and principles were respected. Some measures that were adopted in the name of public health seem hard (if not impossible) to justify. Entry bans covering nationals and residents are clearly a breach of the right to return. Exit bans are also problematic because they affect the exercise of the right to return. Both types of measures indirectly prevent family members from exercising their right to family reunification. Foreigners do not have a right to entry a foreign country but may be affected if they are prevented from leaving, thus becoming unable to exercise their return to return to their home country. This article examines a few of the more clear-cut cases were travel bans breached the rules and principles that should govern international mobility.

Project for Universal Management of Airways - part 1: concept and methods.

SummaryMultiple professional groups and societies worldwide have produced airway management guidelines. These are typically targeted at the process of tracheal intubation by a particular provider group in a restricted category of patients and reflect practice preferences in a particular geographical region. The existence of multiple distinct guidelines for some (but not other) closely related circumstances, increases complexity and may obscure the underlying principles that are common to all of them. This has the potential to increase cognitive load; promote the grouping of ideas in silos; impair teamwork; and ultimately compromise patient care. Development of a single set of airway management guidelines that can be applied across and beyond these domains may improve implementation; promote standardisation; and facilitate collaboration between airway practitioners from diverse backgrounds. A global multidisciplinary group of both airway operators and assistants was assembled. Over a 3‐year period, a review of the existing airway guidelines and multiple reviews of the primary literature were combined with a structured process for determining expert consensus. Any discrepancies between these were analysed and reconciled. Where evidence in the literature was lacking, recommendations were made by expert consensus. Using the above process, a set of evidence‐based airway management guidelines was developed in consultation with airway practitioners from a broad spectrum of disciplines and geographical locations. While consistent with the recommendations of the existing English language guidelines, these universal guidelines also incorporate the most recent concepts in airway management as well as statements on areas not widely addressed by the existing guidelines. The recommendations will be published in four parts that respectively address: airway evaluation; airway strategy; airway rescue and communication of airway outcomes. Together, these universal guidelines will provide a single, comprehensive approach to airway management that can be consistently applied by airway practitioners globally, independent of their clinical background or the circumstances in which airway management occurs.

Understanding Estonian phraseological units on the basis of Finnish: Contributing and misleading factors

Finns reading Estonian texts have a variety of strategies to make sense of them. One is priming, which means that language users consciously or unconsciously rely on previous knowledge of associations that occur in phraseological units. We studied how the distance between a prime and its target and theme affects the understanding of unknown words and false friends, and how the restricted semantic category affects uncovering the target. The data of the study consist of translations of Estonian texts into Finnish, produced by native Finnish speakers with no theoretical or practical knowledge of Estonian. The participants were also asked about the process of reaching certain translation equivalents. The Finnish Language Text Collection was consulted for L1 patterning, in order to reveal whether the phraseological combinations in translation tests have counterparts in target language usage. The analysis revealed that there are several factors that affect understanding source text lexemes: external similarity, the distance of the items in a phraseological unit, the limitedness of the semantic category and, finally, world knowledge. The participants often mentioned orthographic similarity as a starting point in revealing the meaning. Other factors that contributed to understanding a foreign text were mentioned as well: context and semantic relations, which base on internalised metalinguistic knowledge, facilitated to associate the prime and the target. Finally, similar collocations to translation tests were found in the L1 data.

On Blocks in Restricted Representations of Lie Superalgebras of Cartan Type

Let g be a restricted Lie superalgebra of Cartan type W(n), S(n)or H(n) over an algebraically closed field k of prime characteristic p > 3, in the sense of modular version of Kac’s definition in 1977. In this note, we show that the restricted representation category over g has only one block (reckoning parities in). This phenomenon is very different from the case of characteristic zero.

Association of Sex or Race With the Effect of Weight Loss on Physical Function

Consideration of differential treatment effects among subgroups in clinical trial research is a topic of increasing interest. This is an especially salient issue for weight loss trials. To determine whether stratification by sex and race is associated with meaningful differences in physical function response to weight loss among older adults. This pooled analysis used individual-level data from 8 completed randomized clinical trials of weight loss conducted at Wake Forest University or Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Data were housed within the Wake Forest Older Americans Independence Center data repository and provided complete exposure, outcome, and covariate information. Data were collected from November 1996 to March 30, 2017, and analyzed from August 15, 2019, to June 10, 2020. Treatment arms within each study were collapsed into caloric restriction (CR [n = 734]) and non-CR (n = 583) categories based on whether caloric restriction was specified in the original study protocol. Objectively measured 6-month change in weight, fast-paced gait speed (meters per second), and Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB) score. A total of 1317 adults (mean [SD] age, 67.7 [5.4] years; 920 [69.9%] female; 275 [20.9%] Black) with overweight or obesity (mean [SD] body mass index [calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared], 33.9 [4.4]) were included at baseline. Six-month weight change achieved among those randomized to CR was -7.7% (95% CI, -8.3% to -7.2%), with no difference noted by sex; however, White individuals lost more weight than Black individuals assigned to CR (-9.0% [95% CI, -9.6% to -8.4%] vs -6.0% [95% CI, -6.9% to 5.2%]; P < .001), and all CR groups lost a significantly greater amount from baseline compared with non-CR groups (Black participants in CR vs non-CR groups, -5.3% [95% CI, -6.4% to -4.1%; P < .001]; White participants in CR vs non-CR groups, -7.2% [95% CI, -7.8% to -6.6%; P < .001]). Women experienced greater weight loss-associated improvement in SPPB score (CR group, 0.35 [95% CI, 0.18-0.52]; non-CR group, 0.08 [95% CI, -0.11 to 0.27]) compared with men (CR group, 0.23 [95% CI, 0.00-0.46]; non-CR group, 0.34 [95% CI, 0.09-0.58]; P = .03). Black participants experienced greater weight loss-associated improvement in gait speed (CR group, 0.08 [95% CI, 0.05-0.10] m/s; non-CR group, 0.02 [95% CI, -0.01 to 0.05] m/s) compared with White participants (CR group, 0.07 [95% CI, 0.06-0.09] m/s; non-CR group, 0.06 [95% CI, 0.04-0.08] m/s; P = .02). The association of weight loss on physical function in older adults appears to differ by sex and race. These findings affirm the need to consider biological variables in clinical trial design.

Signals in the Waves of Surf: Category Development and Signals in Surf Music

The aim of this paper is to investigate to what extent the understanding of market categories changes over time and how this is reflected in the importance of different category signals in periods of category maturation and revival. We test the changing influence of different types of category signals on inclusion rates of surf music compilation albums, which represent the understanding of “surf music” from a market-based perspective. We find that “elaborate” signals to the category label of surf music showed to be important during both the stage of maturity and revival. However, restricted category signals using surf slang actually lost their importance over time. Finally, signaling surf-related locations had no effect in early times, but increased chances of inclusion during a revival. By addressing these changes over time in the importance of category signals, we add to recent studies on mechanisms of categorization during different stages of category development.

Have traffic restrictions improved air quality? A shock from COVID-19

With the outbreak of COVID-19 (Corona Virus Disease, 2019), China adopted traffic restrictions to reduce the spread of COVID-19. Using daily data before and after the outbreak of COVID-19, an exogenous shock, this paper analyzes the effects of private vehicle restriction policies on air pollution. We find that the private vehicle restriction policies reduce the degree of air pollution to a certain extent. However, their effect varies with other policies implemented in the same period and the economic development of the city itself. Through the analysis of different categories of restrictions, we find that restriction policy for local fuel vehicles and the restriction policy based on the last digit of license plate numbers have the best effect in reducing air pollution. Under the background of COVID-19 epidemic and the implementation of private vehicle restriction policies and other traffic control policies during this period, we have also obtained other enlightenment on air pollution control.

Does quality of scuba diving experience vary according to the context and management regime of marine protected areas?

Sustainability of scuba diving tourism should be assessed not only in environmental terms, but also concerning the quality of the diving experiences. Through the application of semi-structured questionnaires, we assessed differences in the scuba diving experiences from three subtropical Brazilian marine protected areas (MPAs) with different contexts and management regimes. We found that MPAs of more restrictive categories attracted mostly divers motivated by their natural attributes. We also found that satisfaction levels were significantly lower in the no-take MPA, where public use planning is stricter. Although we could not replicate the MPAs’ contexts, our findings highlight the importance of management strategy as well as the influence of MPA age and socio-ecological context on scuba diving experiences. In this regard, managers and dive operators are encouraged to assess user characteristics and the context in which the MPA finds itself to plan and develop sustainable tourism.

Double-pushout-rewriting in S-Cartesian functor categories: Rewriting theory and application to partial triple graphs

A variety of restricted functor categories has been investigated independently and for different purposes to provide double-pushout-rewriting in the areas of model-driven development and graph transformation. We introduce S-cartesian functor categories as a unifying formal framework for these different examples. S-cartesian functor categories are certain subcategories of functor categories that preserve the adhesiveness of their base categories. We show the comprehensive theory of double-pushout-rewriting for S-cartesian functor categories which fulfill additional sufficient conditions. As a new application, we introduce the categories PTrG and APTrG of partial triple graphs and attributed partial triple graphs as S-cartesian functor categories and obtain all the classical results for double-pushout-rewriting in these categories by construction. Partial triple graphs have recently been used to improve model synchronization processes.

Delitos restrictivos de la libertad de expresión y su inconstitucionalidad. Análisis de tres casos resueltos por la Suprema Corte de Justicia de la Nación

En el presente artículo se analiza la existencia de tipos penales en el orden jurídico mexicano que restringen la libertad de expresión y que se encuadran en la categoría de restricciones indirectas, la cuales están prohibidas por la Constitución. Se afirma que estos delitos tienen un efecto inhibidor de la difusión de opiniones, ideas e información en México, por generar un tipo de autocensura al prohibir, perseguir y sancionar conductas relacionadas con la obtención y difusión de información, así como otras formas de expresión. Para demostrar esta tesis, en primer término se conceptualiza la libertad de expresión y su importancia destacando sus dimensiones: individual y social. Enseguida se hacen aproximaciones conceptuales de la censura, la censura previa y la autocensura como especies de restricciones a la libertad de expresión. Finalmente, se plantea de manera ejemplificativa la revisión de tres casos resueltos por la Suprema Corte de Justicia de la Nación de México, en los cuales se declaró la inconstitucionalidad de este tipo de delitos.

Queer Cyborgs in South African Speculative Fiction: Moxyland by Lauren Beukes and The Prey of Gods by Nicky Drayden

This article explores the image of the queer cyborg in two works of speculative fiction about South Africa, Lauren Beukes's Moxyland (Johannesburg: Jacana, 2008) and Nicky Drayden's The Prey of Gods (London: Harper Voyager, 2017). These queer cyborg characters inhabit imagined futures where the interface between human and technology is both a conduit for self-expression and a threat to their freedoms and lives. I use Donna Haraway's essay “A Cyborg Manifesto” (Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge, 1991) as a queer theory to argue that the characters in these novels can use the human–machine interface to experience themselves more fully and to queer their environments. The characters become queer cyborgs who blur the boundaries between human/animal, human/machine, and physical/non-physical. However, the interface with technology in these novels also reinscribes the long history of violence and oppression suffered by queer people in South Africa and globally. I argue that the queer cyborg, although conceived in idealistic terms by some post-Harawayan theorists, represents the position of queer people as outsiders in South Africa, and that these novels offer important critical perspectives on what the future might hold for queer people as everyday life becomes more cyborgian. Technologies that might provide sites for social change and for redefining restrictive identity categories are simultaneously sites that bring new forms of manipulation, oppression, and control for the queer cyborg, and this figure can thus speak to present-day cyborgian experiences of queer people in South Africa.

Fraction, restriction, and range categories from stable systems of morphisms

For a composition-closed and pullback-stable class S of morphisms in a category C containing all isomorphisms, we form the category Span(C,S) of S-spans (s,f) in C with first “leg” s lying in S, and give an alternative construction of its quotient category C[S−1] of S-fractions. Instead of trying to turn S-morphisms “directly” into isomorphisms, we turn them separately into retractions and into sections in a universal manner, thus obtaining the quotient categories Retr(C,S) and Sect(C,S). The fraction category C[S−1] is their largest joint quotient category.Without confining S to be a class of monomorphisms of C, we show that Sect(C,S) admits a quotient category, Par(C,S), whose name is justified by two facts. On one hand, for S a class of monomorphisms in C, it returns the category of S-spans in C, also called S-partial maps in this case; on the other hand, we prove that Par(C,S) is a split restriction category (in the sense of Cockett and Lack). A further quotient construction produces even a range category (in the sense of Cockett, Guo and Hofstra), RaPar(C,S), which is still large enough to admit C[S−1] as its quotient.Both, Par and RaPar, are the left adjoints of global 2-adjunctions. When restricting these to their “fixed objects”, one obtains precisely the 2-equivalences by which their name givers characterized restriction and range categories. Hence, both Par(C,S) and RaPar(C,S) may be naturally presented as Par(D,T) and RaPar(D,T), respectively, where now T is a class of monomorphisms in D. In summary, while there is no a priori need for the exclusive consideration of classes of monomorphisms, one may resort to them naturally.

The stable marriage problem with ties and restricted edges

In the stable marriage problem, a set of men and a set of women are given, each of whom has a strictly ordered preference list over the acceptable agents in the opposite class. A matching is called stable if it is not blocked by any pair of agents, who mutually prefer each other to their respective partner. Ties in the preferences allow for three different definitions for a stable matching: weak, strong and super-stability. Besides this, acceptable pairs in the instance can be restricted in their ability of blocking a matching or being part of it, which again generates three categories of restrictions on acceptable pairs. Forced pairs must be in a stable matching, forbidden pairs must not appear in it, and lastly, free pairs cannot block any matching.Our computational complexity study targets the existence of a stable solution for each of the three stability definitions, in the presence of each of the three types of restricted pairs. We solve all cases that were still open. As a byproduct, we also derive that the maximum size weakly stable matching problem is hard even in very dense graphs, which may be of independent interest.

Testing the presence of marine protected areas against their ability to reduce pressures on biodiversity.

Marine protected areas (MPAs) are the preferred tool for preventing marine biodiversity loss, as reflected in international protected area targets. Although the area covered by MPAs is expanding, there is a concern that opposition from resource users is driving them into already low-use locations, whereas high-pressure areas remain unprotected, which has serious implications for biodiversity conservation. We tested the spatial relationships between different human-induced pressures on marine biodiversity and global MPAs. We used global, modeled pressure data and the World Database on Protected Areas to calculate the levels of 15 different human-induced pressures inside and outside the world's MPAs. We fitted binomial generalized linear models to the data to determine whether each pressure had a positive or negative effect on the likelihood of an area being protected and whether this effect changed with different categories of protection. Pelagic and artisanal fishing, shipping, and introductions of invasive species by ships had a negative relationship with protection, and this relationship persisted under even the least restrictive categories of protection (e.g., protected areas classified as category VI under the International Union for Conservation of Nature, a category that permits sustainable use). In contrast, pressures from dispersed, diffusive sources (e.g., pollution and ocean acidification) had positive relationships with protection. Our results showed that MPAs are systematically established in areas where there is low political opposition, limiting the capacity of existing MPAs to manage key drivers of biodiversity loss. We suggest that conservation efforts focus on biodiversity outcomes and effective reduction of pressures rather than prescribing area-based targets, and that alternative approaches to conservation are needed in areas where protection is not feasible.

Construction of Sichuan Liquor Industry Competitiveness Evaluation Model from the Perspective of Diamond Theory

With the acceleration of economic integration, the development of Internet platform, big data technology, and the elimination of “liquor production line” from the restricted category, the development of Sichuan liquor industry is bound to usher in a new trend. This paper analyzes the current situation of Sichuan liquor industry development, and then based on Porter diamond theory, analyzes the competitiveness of Sichuan liquor industry, on this basis, combined with the Haken synergy theory, constructs an evaluation model to measure the competitiveness of Sichuan liquor industry. This will lay a foundation for the evaluation of the competitiveness of Sichuan liquor industry and the path to enhance the competitiveness of Sichuan liquor industry in the future, so as to promote the high-quality and sustainable development of Sichuan liquor industry. At the same time, it also provides reference for other regions or China’s liquor industry competitiveness evaluation.

Time, Place, and Manner Restrictions on Speech

The category of time, place, and manner restrictions on speech, as supposedly distinct from absolute bans, appears to be central to free speech law. Even a modest examination of the case law, however, suggests the arbitrariness of any such distinction. Any familiar time, place, or manner restriction on speech can be reasonably re-described as an absolute ban on speech, and vice versa. Any differences in how the relevant regulations of speech should be judicially tested, whether by differing degrees of rigor or otherwise, are correspondingly arbitrary. This Article recommends abandoning any attempt to substantively distinguish between time, place, and manner restrictions and absolute prohibitions of speech. The three currently used judicial tests for presumed content-neutral restrictions on the supposed time, place, and manner of speech should be substantially revised and consolidated. Any replacement test should then de-emphasize concerns for any degree of narrowness of tailoring, focusing instead on whether the regulated speakers are now meaningfully worse off, in terms of their own free speech values, given whatever channels of communication remain available to them after the speech regulation in question has been imposed.

A Study on Restricted Category Type Certification Procedure of Surion Derivatives Rotorcraft

A Study on Restricted Category Type Certification Procedure of Surion Derivatives Rotorcraft