The clinical laboratory plays a critical role in the diagnosis and management of endocrine and related metabolic disorders, which are leading causes of morbidity and mortality in children and adults. The Handbook of Diagnostic Endocrinology, Third Edition, provides a ready reference for the evaluation, diagnosis, and monitoring of such disorders. This revision incorporates translational medicine, connecting what clinicians need to know with those in research providing a clinical context to which they can relate their molecular findings. This book solves the needs of clinicians and researchers by bringing together in one book endocrinology at the molecular and clinical levels. As the intricacies of intracellular signaling have become better understood, states of hormone resistance are now increasingly recognized. The most common endocrinopathy in westernized countries, the metabolic syndrome, results, to a large extent, from insulin resistance. The complexity of the circulating forms of various hormones are acknowledged in this revision.

Beginning with an introduction that examines the portrayal of Lancelot and Guinevere from their origins to the present day, the sixteen essays in this collection deal with varied topics including feminist readings of the characters' representations and the depiction of the lovers in medieval manuscript illuminations, in film, and in other visual arts.

Success is envisioned as beating the competition to generate a financially strong and profitable organization while building stakeholder satisfaction. "C" Leadership style is a new management theory derived from the research and science leading to the unification of conflicting traditional leadership models. Presenting a unique approach to address the needs of all stakeholders as they contribute to the success of the organization, "C" Leadership unifies task-centered styles with people-centered styles for managing talent. Authors Jim and Lori Spina bring a track record of success and achievement in the fields of Education, Consulting and Business. Their "C" Leadership: A New Way to Beat the Competition and Manage Organization Stakeholders introduces this revolutionary and unique leadership style management system, offering a strategy geared to beat the competition by addressing the needs of all stakeholders who contribute to the success of the organization.

Cultivating Empire charts the connections between missionary work, capitalism, and Native politics to understand the making of the American empire in the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. It presents American empire-building as a negotiated phenomenon that was built upon the foundations of earlier Atlantic empires, and it shows how U.S. territorial and economic development went hand-in-hand. Lori. J. Daggar explores how Native authority and diplomatic protocols encouraged the fledgling U.S. federal government to partner with missionaries in the realm of Indian affairs, and she charts how that partnership borrowed and deviated from earlier imperial-missionary partnerships. Employing the terminology of speculative philanthropy to underscore the ways in which a desire to do good often coexisted with a desire to make profit, Cultivating Empire links eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century U.S. Indian policy-often framed as benevolent by its crafters-with the emergence of racial capitalism in the United States. In the process, Daggar argues that Native peoples wielded ideas of philanthropy and civilization for their own purposes and that Indian Country played a critical role in the construction of the U.S. imperial state and its economy. Rather than understand civilizing missions simply as tools for assimilation, then, Cultivating Empire reveals that missions were hinges for U.S. economic and political development that could both devastate Indigenous communities and offer Native peoples additional means to negotiate for power and endure.

Over the last 50 years, drug development and clinical trials have resulted in successful complete responses in diseases such as childhood leukemia, testicular cancer and Hodgkin's disease. We are still, however, confronted with over 500,000 cancer-related deaths per year. Clearly, the phenomenon of drug resistance is largely responsible for these failures and continues to be an area of active investigation. Since the last volume in this series, we have learned that the energy-dependent drug efflux protein, p-glycoprotein, encoded by the MDR 1 gene, is a member of a family of structurally related transport polypeptides, thus allowing us to explore the relationship between structure and function. In addition to ongoing well designed clinical trials aimed at reversing MDR mediated drug resistance, the first gene therapy studies with the MDR 1 gene retrovirally transduced into human bone marrow cells are about to be initiated. Although MDR is currently the most understood mechanism of drug resistance, we are uncovering increasing knowledge of alternative molecular and biochemical mechanisms of drug resistance to antimetabolites, cisplatin and alkylating agents and developing new strategies for circumventing such resistance. It is clear that drug resistance is complex, and many mechanisms exist by which cancer cells may overcome the cytotoxicity of our known chemotherapeutic agents. As our understanding of each of these mechanisms expands, well designed models will be necessary to test laboratory hypotheses and determine their relationship to drug resistance in humans. It is this integration of basic science and clinical investigation that will both advance our scientific knowledge and result in the improvement of cancer therapy.

Over the last 50 years, drug development and clinical trials have resulted in successful complete responses in diseases such as childhood leukemia, testicular cancer and Hodgkin's disease. We are still, however, confronted with over 500,000 cancer-related deaths per year. Clearly, the phenomenon of drug resistance is largely responsible for these failures and continues to be an area of active investigation. Since the last volume in this series, we have learned that the energy-dependent drug efflux protein, p-glycoprotein, encoded by the MDR 1 gene, is a member of a family of structurally related transport polypeptides, thus allowing us to explore the relationship between structure and function. In addition to ongoing well designed clinical trials aimed at reversing MDR mediated drug resistance, the first gene therapy studies with the MDR 1 gene retrovirally transduced into human bone marrow cells are about to be initiated. Although MDR is currently the most understood mechanism of drug resistance, we are uncovering increasing knowledge of alternative molecular and biochemical mechanisms of drug resistance to antimetabolites, cisplatin and alkylating agents and developing new strategies for circumventing such resistance. It is clear that drug resistance is complex, and many mechanisms exist by which cancer cells may overcome the cytotoxicity of our known chemotherapeutic agents. As our understanding of each of these mechanisms expands, well designed models will be necessary to test laboratory hypotheses and determine their relationship to drug resistance in humans. It is this integration of basic science and clinical investigation that will both advance our scientific knowledge and result in the improvement of cancer therapy.

This book will take an in-depth look at the technologies, processes, and capabilities to develop and produce "next generation" energetic materials for both commercial and defense applications, including military, mining operations, oil production and well perforation, and construction demolition. It will serve to highlight the critical technologies, latest developments, and the current capability gaps that serve as barriers to military fielding or transition to the commercial marketplace. It will also explain how the processing technologies can be spun out for use in other non-energetics related industries.

Developing talent is at the heart of any successful business, but in an age of changing technology and social needs, how can you best adapt to a new world and develop the talent your company needs? Harnessing Change to Develop Talent and Beat the Competition explores how organizations can formulate effective corporate level and business level strategies to achieve competitive advantage, earn above average profits, build and retain talent, and sustain financial strength. Fitting into the gaps left by existing books, expert authors James and Lori Spina explore the ideas and actions business can take to meet local needs. For executives making strategic business decisions, and for practitioners and researchers across the business industry, this exciting new guide helps people striving to obtain new levels of responsibility within an organization, reinvigorate existing processes, and implementing a new strategic management system.

A queen who helped define the cultural landscape of her era. As duchess of Brittany [1491-1514] and twice queen of France [1491-98; 1498-1514], Anne de Bretagne set a benchmark by which to measure the status of female authority in Europe at the dawn of the Renaissance. Although at times a traditional political pawn, when men who ruled her life were involved in reshaping European alliances, Anne was directly or indirectly involved with the principal political and religious European leaders of her time and helped define the cultural landscape of her era. Taking a variety of cross-disciplinary perspectives, these ten essays by art historians, literary specialists, historians, and political scientists contribute to the ongoing discussion ofAnne de Bretagne and seek to prompt further investigations into her cultural and political impact. At the same time, they offer insight of a broader nature into related areas of intellectual interest - patronage, the history of the book, the power and definition of queenship and the interpretation of politico-cultural documents and court spectacles - thereby confirming the extensive nature of Anne's legacy. CYNTHIA J. BROWN is Professor of French at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

HR departments endeavour to occupy strategic roles in organizations, a goal that is seldom or ever realized. James and Lori Spina bring their academic and corporate backgrounds together to analyse and direct on how strategic human resources cohesively contribute towards gaining competitive advantage, above average profits, building and retaining talent, sustaining financial strength, and addressing challenges of stakeholder satisfaction. Stepping beyond unclear discussions about strategy that fail to satisfy the needs of all departments, The New HR instead illustrates how human resource leaders can constructively create and nurture teams that think strategically and produce harmony between HR activities and the wider organization. The New HR is essential reading for human resources executives who desire to make strategic business decisions that ensure the sustainability and growth of the organization and, at the same time, look for new ways to develop the business, strategic, and critical thinking skills of current employees.

Essays demonstrating that Arthur belonged to the whole of Europe - not just England. The European dimensions of Arthurian literature form the focus of this special issue of Arthurian Literature, derived from sessions held at the International Conference in Utrecht (2005). It brings out in particular the supranational coherence of the Arthurian genre, and the ways in which its motifs appear throughout European literature. Questions discussed here include the function of Perceval in a variety of Arthurian romances, the character of Gauvain in the French, Dutch and English traditions, the narrator in different versions of the Prose Lancelot, and the concept of 'youth' in Scandinavian and Old French romances. BART BESAMUSCA and FRANK BRANDSMA lecture at Utrecht University. Contributors: BART BESAMUSCA, FRANK BRANDSMA, CORA DIETL, SARAH GORDON, LINDA GOWANS, MARJOLEIN HOGENBIRK, SUSANNE KRAMARZ-BEIN, NORRIS J. LACY, MARTINE MEUWESE, STEFANO MULA, JOSEPH M. SULLIVAN,LORI J. WALTERS.

We hear a lot about the necessity of meeting needs of changing markets by developing people, but we hear less about ways implement change. How can we design effective ways to implement change and maintain and build job satisfaction? James and Lori Spina illustrate how a strategic system aligns workplace transitions with the organizational vision, mission, and top level strategies to meet the needs of all stakeholders, ensure a steady flow of talent from within, and anticipate abilities and skills for jobs not yet created. They provide a road map for how to carry this out and propose a cutting-edge leadership style to complement this strategic approach and beat the competition. They demonstrate in detail on how to meet the emerging learning needs of high potential people who are striving to obtain new levels of responsibility. This book is crucial reading for executives who make strategic business decisions to ensure the sustainability and growth of their organizations.

New editor, new directions: the series broadens its scope to encompass European literatures other than French and English; still, however, "an indispensable component of any historical or Arthurian library". NOTES AND QUERIES This new volume of Arthurian Literature, the first under its new editor Keith Busby, is devoted to the Roman van Walewein(The Romance of Walewein [Gawain]) by Penninc and Pieter Vostaert, an undisputed gem of Middle Dutch literature which has recently become accessible to an English-speaking audience through translation. Essentially a fairy-tale written into Arthurian romance, it presents a Gawain quite different to the man found in the English Sir Gawain and the Green Knightor the French Gauvain. Expert readings of the Walewein, especially commissioned and collected by BART BESAMUSCA and ERIK KOOPERof the University of Utrecht are provided by a group of renowned scholars, contributing to the on-going critical appraisal of the Walewein. KEITH BUSBY is George Lynn Cross Research Professor at the Center for Medieval and Renaissane Studies, University of Oklahoma. Contributors: BART BESAMUSCA, ERIK KOOPER, WALTER HAUG, DOUGLAS KELLY, NORRIS J. LACY, MATHIAS MEYER, AD PUTTER, FELICITY RIDDY, THEA SUMMERFIELD, JANE H.M. TAYLOR, BART VELDHOEN, NORBERT VOORWINDEN, LORI WALTERS

* Invites the reader behind the scenes of Bible stories * Opens new perspectives for individuals, study groups, and sermon writers What was the reaction of the head waiter at the wedding at Cana when he realized the wine had run out? What gave the man the idea to lower his paralyzed friend through the roof to see Jesus? What were the young men who accompanied Abraham and Isaac on the journey to the mountain thinking? Much of scripture is comprised of individuals who are unnamed but have important roles to play in biblical stories. This illustrated book offers first person accounts of twenty-one Bible stories (Old Testament, New Testament, and apocrypha) from the perspectives of bystanders or "sup-porting" characters, giving us an opportunity to imagine: how would we react? What would we say or do given similar circumstances today? This imaginative collection includes thought-provoking discussion questions for congregational or individual reflection, and can be invaluable for fresh perspectives in sermons and study groups.