Integra (Russia)

The Eurasian continent, which has for over a century lagged behind in global markets, is currently gaining economic and political momentum. This book investigates emerging economic linkages in the are

Abstract This article provides a comprehensive analysis of EU–Russia energy relations in the light of the concept of energy security. It gives a brief overview of various views on the concept of energy security. Further, the article compares developments in EU and Russian internal energy markets and their influence on the external energy policy of both actors. It concludes that predictability might be achieved only in a regulatory framework that aggregates the interests of all stakeholders and ensures a fair distribution of risks, obligations and revenues.

Paper discusses modern methods for localization of mobile ground robot in outdoor environment. Special attention is payed to lidar-based methods which allow to do precise simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) independently to lighting conditions. Modular approach to lidar-based localization is proposed. It consists of three modules: map reconstructor, map merger and corrector, localization module. As map reconstructor we use 3D Lidar-based Graph SLAM, state-of-the-art method LOAM and its modification with point cloud segmentation techniques A-LeGO-LOAM. As map merger and corrector we apply the technique of interactive map correction for 3D Graph SLAM. For localization module we compare different real-time approaches: NDT scan matching and Localization with scan batch processing. They do not allow to localize the robot with an unknown initial position. To overcome this problem, a stage of global Monte Carlo localization is proposed, which allows to generate a switching condition and a rough initial pose. Matrix of localization convergence speed is introduced to study influence of possible inaccuracies of initial pose estimation to the convergence of real-time localization approach. An important emphasis in the paper is made to the evaluation of the localization quality with relative and absolute metrics. Experimental results are obtained for own data from mobile ground robot ClearPath Husky equipped with Velodyne HDL-32E lidar. Proposed approach to robot localization achieves real-time performance for different hardware platforms in particular single-board computer Nvidia Jetson Xavier. It demonstrates possibility for integration of studied modular localization approach to onboard control systems of autonomous vehicles.

The shifting role of journalism in a digital age has affected long-standing journalistic norms across media platforms. This has reinvigorated discussion on how work in online newsrooms compares to other platforms that differ in media affordances and forms. Still, more studies are needed on whether those differences translate into distinct practices, especially when examining cross-national studies. Based on the second wave of the Journalistic Role Performance (JRP) project, this article reports the findings of a content analysis of 148,474 stories produced by 365 media organizations from 37 countries, comparing the performance of journalistic roles in online newsrooms to three other types of media—TV, radio, and print. The paper analyzes if journalistic roles present themselves differently across platforms, and if these differences are constant or they vary across countries. Results show that there are measurable differences in role performance in online journalism compared to other platforms. Platform had a significant impact, particularly in terms of service and infotainment orientation, while the implementation of roles oriented toward public service was more similar. Additionally, country differences in the relationship between role performance and platforms mainly emerged for roles that enable political influence on news coverage, with differences in the relationship between online vs. traditional platforms appearing to be distinct features of the specific political system.

The detection of dynamic and static obstacles is a key task for the navigation of autonomous ground vehicles. The article presents a new algorithm for generating an occupancy map of the surrounding space from noisy point clouds obtained from one or several stereo cameras. The camera images are segmented by the proposed deep neural network FCN-ResNet-M-OC, which combines the speed of the FCN-ResNet method and improves the quality of the model using the concept of object context representation. The paper investigates supervised approaches to network training on unbalanced samples with road scenes such as the weighted cross entropy and the Focal Loss. The occupancy map is built from point clouds with semantic labels, in which static environment and potentially dynamic obstacles are highlighted. Our solution is operational in real time and applicable on platforms with limited computing resources. The approach was tested on autonomous vehicle datasets: Semantic KITTI, KITTI-360, Mapillary Vistas and custom OpenTaganrog. The usage of semantically labeled point clouds increased the precision of obstacle detection by an average of 17%. The performance of the entire approach on various computing platforms with Jetson Xavier, RTX3070, GPUs NVidia Tesla V100 is respectively from 10 to 15 FPS for input image resolution <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$1920\times 1080$ </tex-math></inline-formula> pixels.

The range of attacks implemented on wireless networks is quite wide. To avoid or reduce the likelihood of an attack, it is necessary to use various defense mechanisms. Existing protection mechanisms are not always suitable for robotic systems and may not fully provide the necessary level of security. Thus, it is necessary to develop new ways of protection, which would be specific to groups of mobile robots. In this study, we propose an analysis of the following cyber parameters: the power consumption and the residual energy, as well as an in-depth traffic analysis to evaluate the effectiveness of the attack and identify abnormal network. We realized an analysis of the behavior of robotic systems under normal conditions and determined that, by their nature, robotic systems have a static and uniform behavior. We developed an experimental stand, and also conducted a theoretical analysis to confirm our assumptions. We found that some indicators of the components of the robotic system change statically; that is, there was a little deviation from the mean. Thus, we identified a set of metrics that allow us to determine how static the operation of the robotic system and its components is. Metrics allow us to evaluate parameters such as power consumption, and incoming/outgoing/redirected/dropped network packets. The results obtained are important for creating an integrated system for detecting anomalies in robotic systems. At the same time, the robotic node can analyze these parameters independently and make calculations that do not greatly affect performance. The main idea of this paper is to define a set of metrics characterizing the static behavior of a robotic system for the further development of an anomaly detection system.

Detailed palynological analysis of glacial, tectonic, and crater lakes of northeastern Siberia reveals continuous records of the changing vegetation during one or several climatic cycles of the Pleistocene and in the Holocene. The most continuous records in the mountain areas of the region are those of Lake Elikchan-4 (northern Okhotsk Sea Region). Pollen records of Lake El’gygytgyn, which was formed by the impact of a meteorite in the northern Chukchi Peninsula, reflect the response of land vegetation to the global climatic impact during the last 300 ka.

Our previous 1-year evaluation (Kershner, Cummings, Clarke, Hadfield, &amp; Kershner, 1986) of the school-based Tomatis Program (LTP) failed to support its purported remedial effectiveness. Children with learning disabilities (LD) had been assigned randomly to an LTP plus direct instruction group or to a placebo group receiving only direct instruction. The purpose of the present study was to address the argument that favorable treatment effects of such process-oriented, neuropsychological training programs may occur over a longer span of time. Retesting the original sample one year after cessation of treatment revealed only a single group effect; the placebo children were superior on the Seashore Rhythm test, a measure of auditory discrimination. These results more firmly substantiate our earlier negative conclusions. But, more importantly, the longitudinal achievement gains observed in both groups of children, irrespective of their original treatment assignment, strongly support the efficacy of less exotic currently available remedial procedures.

At the end of 2019, an outbreak of a new coronavirus infection was identified in the People’s Republic of China centerd in the city of Wuhan. The official name COVID-19 (COronaVIrus Disease 2019) was assigned to the infection caused by the novel coronavirus by the World Health Organization on February 11, 2020. The International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses assigned the name to the causative agent of the infection – SARS-CoV-2 on February 11, 2020. The bilateral pneumonia is currently known to be the most common clinical manifestation of the variant of coronavirus infection. The development of acute respiratory distress syndrome was found in 3 – 4% of patients. As a result of pneumonia, patients develop ventilation and perfusion disorders, weakness of skeletal muscles. To recover patients after viral pneumonia, methods of pulmonary rehabilitation should be applied. This article represents the methods of pulmonary rehabilitation aimed to improve the blood circulation in the lungs, the ventilation-perfusion ratios, and to the restoration of the skeletal muscles.

INTRODUCTION: The immune system is able to exert both tumor-destructive and tumor-protective functions. Immunotherapeutic technologies aim to enhance immune-based anti-tumor activity and (or) weaken tumor-protective immunity. AREAS COVERED: Cancer vaccination, antibody (Ab)-mediated cytotoxicity, Ab-based checkpoint molecule inhibition, Ab-based immunostimulation, cytokine therapy, oncoviral therapy, drug-mediated immunostimulation, exovesicular therapy, anti-inflammatory therapy, neurohormonal immunorehabilitation, metabolic therapy, as well as adoptive cell immunotherapy, could be coherently used to synergize and amplify each other in achieving robust anti-cancer responses in cancer patients. Tumor-specific immunotherapy applied at early stages is capable of eliminating remaining tumor cells after surgery, thus preventing the development of minimal residual disease. Patients with advanced disease stages could benefit from combined immunotherapy, which would be aimed at providing tumor cell/mass dormancy. Traditional therapeutic anti-cancer interventions (chemoradiotherapy, hyperthermia, anti-hormonal therapy) could significantly enhance tumor sensitivity to anti-cancer immunotherapy. It is important that lower-dose (metronomic) chemotherapy regimens, which are well-tolerated by normal cells, could advance immune-mediated control over tumor growth. EXPERT OPINION: We envisage that combined immunotherapy regimens in the context of traditional treatment could become the mainstream modality for treating cancers in all phases of the tumorigenesis. The effectiveness of the anti-cancer treatment could be monitored by the following blood parameters: C-reactive protein, lactate dehydrogenase, and neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio.

A comparison of various rigorous methods of analysis for soft x ray and XUV surface-relief gratings is presented. Example results for a wide range of groove width-to-groove-spacing ratios and angles of incidence are presented for lamellar gratings. Diffraction efficiencies for gold lamellar gratings obtained from the integral and the characteristic wave methods of analysis are compared with previously published numerical results. The accuracy, the convergence, and the stability of the numerical methods are discussed.

This article represents the information about family and family therapy in the context of culture, traditions and contemporary changes of social situations in Russia. The legislation of family rights are mentioned within items about marriage and family in the Constitution, Civil Code and Family Code of the Russian Federation which has changed during recent years. The definition of family and description of family structure are given through the prism of the current demographic situation, dynamics of statistics of marriage and divorce rates, mental disorders, disabilities and such phenomena as social abandonment. The actual curriculum, teaching of family therapy and its disadvantages, system of continuous education, supervision and initiatives of the Institute of Integrative Family Therapy in improvement of preparing of specialists who can provide qualified psychosocial assistance for the family according to the actual needs of society are noted. The directions of state and private practice of family counselling and therapy both for psychiatric patients and medical patients, for adults and children in a family systemic approach are highlighted with an indication of the spectrum of techniques and methods used by Russian professionals. The main obstacles and perspectives of development of family therapy in Russia are summarized.

One of the most glowing representatives of the Kolyma flora [1], ''Pinus pumila'' (Pall.) Regel (Japanese stone pine), is a typical shrub in larch forests of the northern Okhotsk region, basins of the Kolyma and Indigirka rivers, and high-shrub tundra of the Chukchi Peninsula. It also forms a pine belt in mountains above the forest boundary, which gives way to the grass-underbrush mountain tundra and bald mountains. In the southern Chukchi Peninsula, ''Pinus pumila'' along with ''Duschekia fruticosa'' (Rupr.) Pouzar and ''Betula middendorffii'' Trautv. et C. A. Mey form trailing forests transitional between tundra and taiga [2]. Pinus pumila pollen, usually predominating in subfossil spore-and-pollen spectra of northeastern Siberia, is found as single grains or a subordinate component (up 2-3%, rarely 10%) in spectra of lacustrine deposits formed during the last glacial stage (isotope stage 2) in the Preboreal and Boreal times of the Holocene. Sometimes, its content increases to 15-22% in spectra of lacustrine deposits synchronous to the last glacial stage near the northern coast of the Sea of Okhotsk [3], evidently indicating the proximity of Japanese stone pine thickets.

Introduction: Membrane fouling has been reported to be one of the bottlenecks of membrane technologies for wastewater treatment. To mitigate its negative impacts, we fabricated polysulfone membrane (PSf) composites made of silica (SiO 2 ) and graphene oxide (GO) nanoparticles that modified with ultraviolet (UV)-assisted polyvinyl alcohol layer on the membrane surface. Methods: The membrane composite was synthesized using non-solvent induced phase separation (NIPS) method. The membrane was further treated by UV irradiation and cross-linked with PVA coating to cope with the fouling problem. The modified membrane was applied for industrial rubber wastewater decontamination. Results: The UV irradiation and cross-linked PVA coating to the PSf/GO-SiO 2 membrane improved the pseudo-steady state permeate flux by 60.15% from 20.05 to 50.32 L/m 2 hr and maintained the permeate flux up to 82.33%. About 85% of total dissolved solids (TDS), 81% of chemical oxygen demand (COD), and 84% of ammonia compound (NH 3 ) with initial concentrations of 335.76, 242.55, 175.19 mg/L, respectively, could be removed after 8 h of membrane treatment. The modified membrane also exhibited an excellent flux recovery ratio of up to 83%. Discussion: The modified membrane changed the fouling mechanism from pore blockage to cake filtration, which signifies the capability of the membrane to tackle severe fouling tendency. The cross-linked UV/PVA coating reduced fouling formation by reducing the adsorptive interactions between the foulant molecules and the membrane surface by enhancing membrane surface hydrophilicity. This implies that incorporating GO/SiO 2 nanoparticles with UV irradiation and PVA coating substantially enhanced the physicochemical properties of the PSf membrane.

Despite the presence of mass grievances and moral indignation against the political elite and the monied class, the social movements in Bangladesh in the last decade, albeit very few, have failed to transform the increasingly authoritarian and claustrophobic political milieu. In fact, the nation has not seen that many movements, notwithstanding serious mass grievances on social, political, and economic issues. This situation poses a paradox. I study two significant social movements’ cases, the 2018 Quota Reform Movement and the 2018 Road Safety Protests, and briefly compare the genealogy of the movements, as well as their success and failure. The study draws primarily on secondary data derived from existing research on the issue and a systematic review of major newspapers in Bangladesh over the relevant period of time for its analysis and supplements it with participant observations and informal interviews. I conceptualize these movements by using a theoretical framework derived from Political Process Theory (PPT). I argue that, although both movements were partially successful, the Quota Reform movement was relatively more successful than the Road Safety Movement. In this paper, I try to address the reasons behind the relative success of one movement over another. By comparing the two movements in tandem, I argue that significant differences in ‘mobilizing structure’ make the difference in the degree of success, given that the ‘framing’ and the ‘political opportunity structures’ were more or less similar for both movements.

This paper conducts a descriptive quantitative research on the impact of digital migration derived from the COVID-19 pandemic on the frequency of use of ICT resources in the teaching activity of university professors in Peru. The main objective is to identify differences in the aforementioned impact according to the area of knowledge of the professors. A questionnaire designed by the authors was used to measure the frequency of ICT use before and after the COVID-19 pandemic and the responses were statistically analyzed. As a result, it was found that the pandemic has led to a significant increase in the use of ICT in all dimensions of teaching activity, especially in those in which they were less commonly used. Moreover, this increase was greater among professors in humanistic-social areas than among those in scientific-technical areas.

Since 2000, literature on West (EU15) and East-Central European (EU8) welfare states has focused on a set of ‘new social risks’ including insecure employment and income, population ageing, unsustainable social security systems, and large-scale international immigration. Our State-of-the-Art (SOTA) article brings Russia into the dialogue on ‘new social risks’. We show that broadly similar structural changes in industrial economies, labour markets and demographic patterns ended the post-World-War-Two (WWII) ‘Golden Age’ of welfare expansion in both the EU15 and communist states. Shared new social risks rose to the top of policy agendas. Governments responded mainly, though not exclusively, with liberalising, privatising and exclusionary policies. The SOTA compares their policy responses, specifically pension system reforms, demographic (pro-natalist and family) policies, and integration of immigrants. We find both convergence and divergence based on states’ differing welfare legacies. The conclusion considers path-departing ‘emergency Keynesian’ responses to the COVID-19 crisis, and renewed attention to Beveridge welfare models.

In order to be digested, the disaccharide trehalose needs to be cleaved by the trehalase enzyme. There were reports suggesting that trehalase deficiency was more common in high-latitude than in the temperate climate populations. New horizons were opened for the epidemiologic research of trehalase enzymopathy when it became clear that reduced trehalase activity is determined by the A allele of tTREH gene (rs2276064). The aim of this study was to analyze the frequencies of the trehalase gene alleles and genotypes among the indigenous peoples of Siberia and the Russian Far East. We genotyped 567 samples representing the indigenous peoples of Siberia and the Russian Far East and 146 samples representing Eastern Slavs as the reference dataset. We found that the frequencies of the A*TREH alleles increased to the east. The A*TREH allele frequency was 0.03 in the reference group, 0.13-0.26 in the North-West Siberian indigenous populations, 0.29-0.30 in the South Siberia, 0.43 in West Siberia, and 0.46 in the low Amur populations. The highest frequency of the A allele (0.63) was observed in the Chukchi and Koryak populations. From 1 to 5% of European origin individuals are at risk of trehalase enzymopathy. In the indigenous populations, the frequency of the A*TREH allele varies 13% to 63%, whereas the frequency of the AA*TREH genotype from 3% to 39%. Thus, the total risk of trehalase enzymopathy among the homo- and heterozygous carriers of the A*TREH allele in the studied indigenous populations may be as high as 24% to 86%.

Currently, High-Definition (HD) maps are a pre- requisite for the stable operation of autonomous vehicles. Such maps contain information about all static road objects for the vehicle to consider during navigation, such as road edges, road lanes, crosswalks, and etc. To generate such an HD map, current approaches need to process pre-recorded environment data obtained from onboard sensors. However, recording such a dataset often requires a lot of time and effort. In addition, every time actual road environments are changed, a new dataset should be recorded to generate a relevant HD map. This paper addresses a novel approach that allows to continuously generate or update the HD map using onboard sensor data. When there is no need to pre-record the dataset, updating the HD map can be run in parallel with the main autonomous vehicle navigation pipeline. The proposed approach utilizes the VectorMapNet framework to generate vector road object instances from a sensor data scan. The PolyMerge technique is aimed to merge new instances into previous ones, mitigating detection errors and, therefore, generating or updating the HD map. The performance of the algorithm was confirmed by comparison with ground truth on the NuScenes dataset. Experimental results showed that the mean error for different levels of environment complexity was comparable to the VectorMapNet single instance error.

BACKGROUND: There is a dearth of published information on the posterior perforated substance as compared to the anterior perforated substance. We managed to glean facts about the posterior perforated substance that can serve as a landmark for surgical operations in the adjacent regions of the midbrain and the vessels passing through it. Moreover, the posterior perforated substance contains the interpeduncular nucleus responsible for the mental state of the individual. OBJECTIVES: 1) To describe the topography of the blood vessels supplying the posterior perforated substance area from the surgical point of view; 2) to investigate the functions of the interpeduncular nucleus. METHODS: We assembled and analyzed results from source databases by Elsevier, NCBI MedLine, Scopus, Scholar. Google and Embase. Each article was studied in detail for practically useful information about the posterior perforated substance. RESULTS: The P1-segment perforating branches of the posterior cerebral artery supply the posterior perforated substance. This area is especially vulnerable in the case of vascular pathologies. The posterior communicating artery can block the surgeon's view and impede maneuverability of the tool in the area of the posterior perforated substance, which may be addressed using the separation technique, which can lead to positive results. In addition, the medial habenula-interpeduncular nucleus in the posterior perforated substance is associated with various addictions and psychiatric conditions. CONCLUSION: The posterior perforated substance area is of great interest for surgical interventions. Future studies of the interpeduncular nucleus anticipate the development of drugs to affect different types of dependencies and some mental diseases.