Seed development in this paper has been classified into the three landmark stages of cell division, organ initiation and maturation, based on morphological changes, and the available literature. The entire process proceeds at the behest of an interplay of various specific and general transcription factors (TFs). Monocots and dicots utilize overlapping, as well as distinct, TF networks during the process of seed development. The known TFs in rice and Arabidopsis have been chronologically categorized into the three stages. The main regulators (...) of seed development contain B3 or HAP3 domains. These interact with bZIP and AP2 TFs. Other TFs that play an indispensable role during the process contain homeobox‐, NAC‐, MYB‐, or ARF‐domains. This paper is a comprehensive analysis of the TFs essential for seed development and their interactions. An understanding of this interplay will not only help unravel an integrated developmental process, but will also pave the way for biotechnological applications. (shrink)

ABSTRACT BACKGROUND: The objective of this study was to identify factors motivating women to take part in endometriosis research and to determine if these factors differ for women participating in clinical versus basic science studies. METHODS: A consecutive series of 24 women volunteering for participation in endometriosis‐related research were asked to indicate, in their own words, why they chose to volunteer. In addition, the women were asked to rate, on a scale of 0 to 10, sixteen potentially motivating factors. The (...) information was gathered in the form of an anonymous self‐administered questionnaire. RESULTS: Strong motivating factors (mean score >8) included potential benefit to other women's health, improvement to one's own condition, and participation in scientific advancement. Weak motivating factors (mean score <3) included financial compensation, making one's doctor happy, and use of ‘natural’ products. No difference was detected between clinical and basic science study participants. CONCLUSION: This study is the first study to specifically investigate the factors that motivate women to take part in endometriosis research. Understanding why women choose to take part in such research is important to the integrity of the informed consent process. The factors most strongly motivating women to participate in endometriosis research related to improving personal or public health; the weakest, to financial compensation and pleasing the doctor. (shrink)

Digital evolution in the banking sector refers to the integration and development of digital innovations, such as internet banking, mobile applications, AI, and data analytics in banking operations and customer service measures. The research examines the influence of digital development on customer interaction strategies in the banking sector. As banks increasingly adopt digital tools to meet customer expectations for convenience and personalized services, the dynamics of customer relationships are changing. The study purpose is to understand how digital transformation influences customer (...) engagement, satisfaction, loyalty and challenges banks face in maintaining personalized interactions in a digital environment. The study looks into a number of factors, including digital engagement, customer satisfaction, service personalization, customer loyalty, service accessibility, trust and security. The study involves 600 banking customers filling out a questionnaire after being informed about the purpose of the survey. SPSS was employed to conduct various statistics tests such as, pearson correlation, chi square, and t-test the obtain data and variables. The result indicates a positive correlation between the adoption of digital banking solutions and increased customer engagement. Research results underscore the importance of continued investment in a digital technologies to maintain a competitive edge in the banking industry. Banks that effectively integrate digital tools into their customer relationship management practices are better positioned to evolving requirement of customers, leading to improved satisfaction and loyalty. (shrink)

The way communicable diseases do spread from one person to another, depending upon the specific disease or causative infectious agent. Out of these diseases, some are incurable and the health care workers during their practice or otherwise acquire such infections and transmit them further to innocent patients who are unaware of about the health status of health care workers. The rights of an infected health care worker and patients are protected by many laws but in case of conflict of interests (...) between the individual right of the health care worker and life of a patient, then obviously by the principle of natural justice, saving the life of a person from such incurable infection gets the privilege. Therefore, there is a lot of ethical and professional dilemma, arising out, in such a type of scenario, irrespective of concealed or disclosed health status and the question mark is raised on whether clinical practice may be allowed in such cases. Some of the studies show the actual but very little risk of transmission from infected health care workers to patients. Therefore, in the current scenario, many western countries such as USA and UK are following different guidelines in this regard but the same is lacking in India. So, this article critically analyses the various issues arising out of it and thereby justifies the need to have a uniform infection control policy in this regard apart from legal and ethical binding on infected health care workers. (shrink)

TheCulexis now widely recognized as a piece of post-Ovidian, possibly Tiberian, pseudo-juvenilia written by an author impersonating the young Virgil, although it was attached to Virgil's name already in the first centuryc.e., being identified as Virgilian by Statius, Suetonius and Martial. Dedicated to the young Octavian (Octauiin line 1), the poem seems to fill a biographical gap in Virgil's career before his composition of theEclogues. It is introduced as aludus, which Irene Peirano suggests may openly refer to ‘the act of (...) impersonating Virgil’, and, like many of the poems in theAppendix Vergiliana, it seems to have a parodic intent. TheCulexhas been interpreted as a parody of neoteric style and the epyllion, as mock-epic, as Virgil parody (John Henderson called it a ‘spoofAeneidin bucolic drag’), as pointed Augustan satire, as mock Ovidian ‘Weltgedicht’ and as just very bad poetry (Housman's ‘stutterer’). Glenn Most has observed that the poem's three ‘acts’ structurally recapitulate Virgil's three major works in chronological succession. Little attention, however, has been paid to theCulex's final lines, which contain a catalogue of flowers thepastorplaces on the gnat's tomb. Recent scholarship has reintroduced an older interpretation of the gnat's tomb as a political allegory of Augustus’ Mausoleum; in this paper I suggest instead that the tomb and its flowers serve a closural and metapoetic function at the end of the poem. (shrink)

A series of letters between a professor of philosophy and an eleven-year-old girl.

Grush's emulation theory comprises both modality-specific and amodal emulators. I suggest that the amodal variety be replaced by multisensory emulators. The key distinction is that multisensory processing retains the characteristics of individual sensory modalities, in contrast to amodal processing. The latter term is better reserved for conceptual and linguistic systems, rather than perception or emulation.

I wish to discuss symbols concerned with the way we feel about the world and the way we conduct our lives in consequence of those feelings. Our conduct is guided by commands and instructions which for some reason we have to obey. We are guided by our knowledge of the world. The symbols I wish to discuss express and excite desires and preferences and that is how they affect our conduct.

The effects of the vacuum electromagnetic fluctuations and the radiation reaction fields on the time development of a simple microscopic system are identified using a new mathematical method. This is done by studying a charged mechanical oscillator (frequency Ω 0)within the realm of stochastic electrodynamics, where the vacuum plays the role of an energy reservoir. According to our approach, which may be regarded as a simple mathematical exercise, we show how the oscillator Liouville equation is transformed into a Schrödinger-like stochastic (...) equation with a free parameter h′ with dimensions of action. The role of the physical Planck's constant h is introduced only through the zero-point vacuum electromagnetic fields. The perturbative and the exact solutions of the stochastic Schrödinger-like equation are presented for h′>0. The exact solutions for which h′<h are called sub-Heisenberg states. These nonperturbative solutions appear in the form of Gaussian, non-Heisenberg states for which the initial classical uncertainty relation takes the form 〈(δx 2)〉〈(δp) 2 〉=(h′/2) 2,which includes the limit of zero indeterminacy (h → 0). We show how the radiation reaction and the vacuum fields govern the evolution of these non-Heisenberg states in phase space, guaranteeing their decay to the stationary state with average energy hΩ 0 /2 and 〈(δx) 2 〉〈(δp) 2 〉=h 2 /4 at zero temperature. Environmental and thermal effects-are briefly discussed and the connection with similar works within the realm of quantum electrodynamics is also presented. We suggest some other applications of the classical non-Heisenberg states introduced in this paper and we also indicate experiments which might give concrete evidence of these states. (shrink)

Open peer commentary on the article “Radical Constructivism and Radical Constructedness: Luhmann’s Sociology of Semantics, Organizations, and Self-Organization” by Loet Leydesdorff. > Upshot: Leydesdorff emphasises the uncertainties involved in the communication of meaning. Luhmann posited three types of media, each of which reduces one type of communicative improbability. The theory of cultural evolution supports Leydesdorff’s emphasis on the uncertainty of communication, and agrees that different media are needed for communication within and across social boundaries. But it highlights the distinction between (...) media and the symbolic codes that give them structure; and it raises the question whether Luhmann’s symbolically generalized communication media are really media at all. (shrink)