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Selected AbstractsOne-year changes in glucose and heart disease risk factors among participants in the WISEWOMAN programmeEUROPEAN DIABETES NURSING, Issue 2 2007JC Will PhD Abstract Background: WISEWOMAN provides chronic disease risk factor screening, referrals and lifestyle interventions to low-income, uninsured women, to reduce their heart disease and stroke risk. Participants learn behaviour-changing skills tailored to low-income populations, such as collaborative goal setting, the need to take small steps and other empowerment techniques. Aim: To quantify the baseline prevalence of pre-diabetes (fasting blood glucose 5.5,6.9 mmol/l) and diabetes among WISEWOMAN participants and assess one-year changes in glucose levels and other diabetes risk factors. Methods: We used 1998,2005 baseline and one-year follow-up data from WISEWOMAN participants. Using a multilevel regression model, we assessed one-year changes in glucose, blood pressure (BP), total cholesterol and 10-year risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) among participants with baseline pre-diabetes (n=688) or diabetes (n=338). Results: At baseline, 15% of participants had pre-diabetes and 10% had diabetes. Of those with diabetes, 26% were unaware of their condition before baseline screening. During the one-year follow-up period, participants with pre-diabetes experienced statistically significant improvements in glucose (2.9%) and cholesterol (2.1%) levels and 10-year CHD risk (4.3%). Participants with newly diagnosed diabetes experienced statistically significant improvements in glucose (11.5%), BP (3.1%,3.5%) and cholesterol (6.4%) levels. Participants with previously diagnosed diabetes experienced significant improvements in BP (1.9%,3.4%), cholesterol level (3.8%), and 10-year CHD risk (8.5%). Conclusions: Implementing patient-centered, comprehensive and multilevel interventions and demonstrating their effectiveness will likely lead to the adoption of this approach on a much broader scale. [source] Dynamical effects of the statistical structure of annual rainfall on dryland vegetationGLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY, Issue 5 2006CHRISTOPHER A. WILLIAMS Abstract In this study, we extend a model of daily dryland dynamics by parameterizing a modified version of a minimalistic annual model to examine how the statistical structure of annual rainfall and grazing intensity interact to influence dryland vegetation. With a Monte Carlo approach, an ensemble outcome provides a statistical description of likely dryland vegetation dynamics responding to variations in rainfall structure and grazing intensity. Results suggest that increased rainfall variability decreases the average and increases the variability of grass cover leading to more frequent degradation of the grass resource. Vegetation of drier regions is found to be more sensitive to interannual variability in rainfall. Concentrating this variability into an organized periodic mode further decreases the mean and increases the variability of grass cover. Hence, a shift toward lower, more variable, or more inter-annually correlated annual rainfall will likely lead to a general decrease in the grass resource and increased dryland vulnerability to degradation. Higher grazing intensity or lower annual rainfall both lead to more frequent and longer duration degradation of the grass condition. We note an interesting interaction in the response of grass biomass to grazing intensity and rainfall variability, where increased rainfall variability leads to longer duration degradation for low grazing, but shorter periods of degradation for high grazing. Once grass reaches a degraded condition, we find that woody vegetation strongly suppresses recovery even if successive rainfall is high. Overall, these findings suggest that the projected increase in interannual rainfall variability will likely decrease grass cover and potentially lead to more frequent, longer lasting degradation of dryland vegetation, particularly if enhanced rainfall variability is concentrated in long period (e.g. decadal) modes. [source] NATO expansion: ,a policy error of historic importance'INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS, Issue 6 2008MICHAEL MCCGWIRE European security depends on the effective collaboration of the five major powers; it will be undermined by the extension of NATO, a policy driven by US domestic politics. The main threats to security are: the breakdown of political and economic stability; unintended nuclear proliferation and/or failure of the START process; Russia's evolving political and territorial aspirations. All three will remain marginal as long as Russia is constructively engaged with the West. NATO expansion threatens that engagement. It is seen by all strands of Russian opinion as violating the bargain struck in 1990 and will likely lead to the withdrawal of cooperation. Invitations to Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic cannot be rescinded, but the consequences can be mitigated by refraining from integrating them into NATO's military structure, by ceasing to insist that NATO membership is open to all, and by perpetuating the de facto nuclear-weapons-free zone that presently exists in Central and Eastern Europe. Britain's stance could be pivotal. [source] Neural differentiation of human embryonic stem cellsJOURNAL OF CELLULAR BIOCHEMISTRY, Issue 3 2008Sujoy K. Dhara Abstract Availability of human embryonic stem cells (hESC) has enhanced human neural differentiation research. The derivation of neural progenitor (NP) cells from hESC facilitates the interrogation of human embryonic development through the generation of neuronal subtypes and supporting glial cells. These cells will likely lead to novel drug screening and cell therapy uses. This review will discuss the current status of derivation, maintenance and further differentiation of NP cells with special emphasis on the cellular signaling involved in these processes. The derivation process affects the yield and homogeneity of the NP cells. Then when exposed to the correct environmental signaling cues, NP cells can follow a unique and robust temporal cell differentiation process forming numerous phenotypes. J. Cell. Biochem. 105: 633,640, 2008. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Nuclear microenvironments and cancerJOURNAL OF CELLULAR BIOCHEMISTRY, Issue 6 2008Gary S. Stein Nucleic acids and regulatory proteins are architecturally organized in nuclear microenvironments. The compartmentalization of regulatory machinery for gene expression, replication and repair, is obligatory for fidelity of biological control. Perturbations in the organization, assembly and integration of regulatory machinery have been functionally linked to the onset and progression of tumorigenesis. The combined application of cellular, molecular, biochemical and in vivo genetic approaches, together with structural biology, genomics, proteomics and bioinformatics, will likely lead to new approaches in cancer diagnostics and therapy. J. Cell. Biochem. 104: 1949,1952, 2008. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] The effect of lack of insurance, poverty and paediatrician supply on immunization rates among children 19,35 months of age in the United StatesJOURNAL OF EVALUATION IN CLINICAL PRACTICE, Issue 2 2008James L. Becton Jr MD Rational, aims and objectives, Previous studies found that the increasing number of paediatricians in the United States was associated with improved childhood immunization coverage, while the increasing poverty level and the lack of health insurance reduced access to health care. We evaluated whether changes in the number of paediatricians, poverty level and health insurance affected national childhood immunization coverage in the state levels of the United States. Methods, Data were collected primarily from the US National Immunization Surveys, series 4:3:1:3:3 from years 1995 and 2003. Ordinal logistic regression analysis was used to analyse the relationships among variables. Results, Over 8 years studied, immunization coverage increased for children aged 19,35 months from 52.3% to 79.8% in the 50 states. The average number of paediatricians per 1000 births increased 28.7% while the percentage of children without health insurance declined 15.6%, and the percentage of children who lived in poverty level declined 17.3%. In 1995, the states with higher immunization coverage were associated with higher numbers of paediatricians [odds ratio (OR), 32.73; 95% confidence interval (CI), 5.96,179.77]. In 2003, the higher numbers of paediatricians still played a role in the increased immunization coverage (OR, 4.69; 95% CI, 1.01,21.78); however, the higher rate of uninsured children in 2003 had an even greater effect upon immunization coverage. Compared with states with lower rates of uninsured children, states with intermediate and higher rates of uninsured children had sixfold (OR, 0.16; 95% CI, 0.03,0.81) and 16-fold (OR, 0.06; 95% CI, 0.01,0.40) decreased childhood immunization coverage, respectively. Conclusion, Between 1995 and 2003 in the United States, the lack of health insurance became more prominent than the supply of paediatricians in affecting immunization coverage for children aged 19,35 months. Future improvements in insurance coverage for children will likely lead to greater immunization coverage. [source] Bioavailable cadmium during the bioremediation of phenanthrene-contaminated soils using the diffusive gradients in thin-film techniqueLETTERS IN APPLIED MICROBIOLOGY, Issue 3 2006M.A. Amezcua-Allieri Abstract Aims:, To study the impact of fungal bioremediation of phenanthrene on trace cadmium solid-solution fluxes and solution phase concentration. Methods and Results:, The bioremediation of phenanthrene in soils was performed using the fungus Penicillium frequentans. Metal behaviour was evaluated by the techniques of diffusive gradient in thin-films (DGT) and filtration. Fluxes of cadmium (Cd) show a significant (P < 0·002) increase after the start of bioremediation, indicating that the bioremediation process itself releases significant amount of Cd into solution from the soil solid-phase. Unlike DGT devices, the solution concentration from filtration shows a clear bimodal distribution. We postulate that the initial action of the fungi is most likely to breakdown the surface of the solid phase to smaller, ,solution-phase' material (<0·45 ,m) leading to a peak in Cd concentration in solution. Conclusions:, Phenanthrene removal from soils by bioremediation ironically results in the mobilization of another toxic pollutant (Cd). Significance and Impact of the Study:, Bioremediation of organic pollutants in contaminated soil will likely lead to large increases in the mobilization of toxic metals, increasing metal bio-uptake and incorporation into the wider food chain. Bioremediation strategies need to account for this behaviour and further research is required both to understand the generality of this behaviour and the operative mechanisms. [source] Nonrobustness of the normal approximation of lead-time demand in a (Q, R) systemNAVAL RESEARCH LOGISTICS: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL, Issue 2 2003Hon-Shiang Lau For computing an optimal (Q, R) or kindred inventory policy, the current literature provides mixed signals on whether or when it is safe to approximate a nonnormal lead-time-demand ("LTD") distribution by a normal distribution. The first part of this paper examines this literature critically to justify why the issue warrants further investigations, while the second part presents reliable evidence showing that the system-cost penalty for using the normal approximation can be quite serious even when the LTD-distribution's coefficient of variation is quite low,contrary to the prevalent view of the literature. We also identify situations that will most likely lead to large system-cost penalty. Our results indicate that, given today's technology, it is worthwhile to estimate an LTD-distribution's shape more accurately and to compute optimal inventory policies using statistical distributions that more accurately reflect the LTD-distributions' actual shapes. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2003 [source] Hospitalization in Winnipeg, Canada due to occupational disease: A pilot studyAMERICAN JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL MEDICINE, Issue 5 2009Allen G. Kraut MD, FRCPC Abstract Background The objectives of this study were to identify the extent of occupational exposures to hazardous substances amongst male medical inpatients and to determine the extent to which these exposures may have contributed to the development of medical conditions. Methods A random sample of 297 male who were admitted from outside the hospital to the medical wards to a large tertiary care hospital, were between age 18,75 and could communicate in English completed an occupational history questionnaire. This information was merged with an inpatient database which contained patient demographics, admission diagnoses, and co-morbidity data. A specialist in occupational medicine and internal medicine determined whether the medical conditions the participants had were related to their exposures. Results One individual had a condition causing admission that was related to his work and 12 others (4%) had a condition that was possibly related to their work which had caused symptoms. One additional individual was found to have asymptomatic asbestos related pleural fibrosis. Fourteen of 37 possible harmful occupational exposures were reported by more than 10% of the study participants. On average each participant reported 5.5 exposures. Conclusions Occupational exposures to male medical inpatients are common. For 4.4% (13/297) of male admissions to the general medical wards from the emergency room occupational factors may have played a role in the development of medical conditions which led to admission or to major co-morbidities. Detailed occupational histories will likely lead to more suspected cases of work related medical admissions. Am. J. Ind. Med. 52:372,379, 2009. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc [source] On the adequacy of single-stock futures margining requirementsTHE JOURNAL OF FUTURES MARKETS, Issue 10 2003Hans R. Dutt Unlike the traditional futures contract risk-based approach to margining, new security futures contracts are margined under a strategy-based margining system similar to that which applies in the equity options markets. As a result, these new margin requirements are potentially much less sensitive to changes in market conditions. This article performs a simulation to evaluate whether these alternative margining methodologies can be expected to produce comparable outcomes. The analysis suggests that a 1-day settlement period will likely lead to collection of customer margins that are virtually always greater than that which its traditional risk-based counterpart would require. A 4-day settlement period would lead to margin requirements that both significantly under- and overmargin relative to a comparable risk-based system. This study argues that exchanges may approach the preferred probability of customer exhaustion by managing margin settlement intervals. Thus, the new strategy-based rules, in and of themselves, will not necessarily inhibit new security futures trading activity. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 23:989,1002, 2003 [source] Understory vegetation response to thinning disturbance of varying complexity in coniferous standsAPPLIED VEGETATION SCIENCE, Issue 4 2009Adrian Ares Abstract Question: Can augmented forest stand complexity increase understory vegetation richness and cover and accelerate the development of late-successional features? Does within-stand understory vegetation variability increase after imposing treatments that increase stand structural complexity of the overstory? What is the relative contribution of individual stand structural components (i.e. forest matrix, gaps, and leave island reserves) to changes in understory vegetation richness? Location: Seven study sites in the Coastal Range and Cascades regions of Oregon, USA. Methods: We examined the effects of thinning six years after harvest on understory plant vascular richness and cover in 40- to 60-year-old forest stands dominated by Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii). At each site, one unthinned control was preserved and three thinning treatments were implemented: low complexity (LC, 300 trees ha,1), moderate complexity (MC, 200 trees ha,1), and high complexity (HC, variable densities from 100 to 300 trees ha,1). Gaps openings and leave island reserves were established in MC and HC. Results: Richness of all herbs, forest herbs, early seral herbs and shrubs, and introduced species increased in all thinning treatments, although early seral herbs and introduced species remained a small component. Only cover of early seral herbs and shrubs increased in all thinning treatments whereas forest shrub cover increased in MC and HC. In the understory, we found 284 vascular plant species. After accounting for site-level differences, the richness of understory communities in thinned stands differed from those in control stands. Within-treatment variability of herb and shrub richness was reduced by thinning. Matrix areas and gap openings in thinned treatments appeared to contribute to the recruitment of early seral herbs and shrubs. Conclusions: Understory vegetation richness increased 6 years after imposing treatments, with increasing stand complexity mainly because of the recruitment of early seral and forest herbs, and both low and tall shrubs. Changes in stand density did not likely lead to competitive species exclusion. The abundance of potentially invasive introduced species was much lower compared to other plant groups. Post-thinning reductions in within-treatment variability was caused by greater abundance of early seral herbs and shrubs in thinned stands compared with the control. Gaps and low-density forest matrix areas created as part of spatially variably thinning had greater overall species richness. Increased overstory variability encouraged development of multiple layers of understory vegetation. [source] Live feeds for early stages of fish rearingAQUACULTURE RESEARCH, Issue 5 2010Luís E C Conceição Abstract Despite the recent progress in the production of inert diets for fish larvae, feeding of most species of interest for aquaculture still relies on live feeds during the early life stages. Independently of their nutritional value, live feeds are easily detected and captured, due to their swimming movements in the water column, and highly digestible, given their lower nutrient concentration (water content>80%). The present paper reviews the main types of live feeds used in aquaculture, their advantages and pitfalls, with a special emphasis on their nutritional value and the extent to which this can be manipulated. The most commonly used live feeds in aquaculture are rotifers (Brachionus sp.) and brine shrimp (Artemia sp.), due to the existence of standardized cost-effective protocols for their mass production. However, both rotifers and Artemia have nutritional deficiencies for marine species, particularly in essential n-3 highly unsaturated fatty acids (HUFA, e.g., docosahexaenoic acid and eicosapentaenoic acid). Enrichment of these live feeds with HUFA-rich lipid emulsions may lead to an excess dietary lipid and sub-optimal dietary protein content for fish larvae. In addition, rotifers and Artemia are likely to have sub-optimal dietary levels of some amino acids, vitamins and minerals, at least for some species. Several species of microalgae are also used in larviculture. These are used as feed for other live feeds, but mostly in the ,green water' technique in fish larval rearing, with putative beneficial effects on feeding behaviour, digestive function, nutritional value, water quality and microflora. Copepods and other natural zooplankton organisms have also been used as live feeds, normally with considerably better results in terms of larval survival rates, growth and quality, when compared with rotifers and Artemia. Nonetheless, technical difficulties in mass-producing these organisms are still a constraint to their routine use. Improvements in inert microdiets will likely lead to a progressive substitution of live feeds. However, complete substitution is probably years away for most species, at least for the first days of feeding. [source] Accounting for unemployment among people with mental illnessBEHAVIORAL SCIENCES & THE LAW, Issue 6 2002Richard C. Baron M.A. Persons diagnosed with a serious mental illness experience significantly high rates of unemployment compared with the general population. The explanations for this situation have included a focus on the symptoms associated with these disorders, a focus on the lack of effective vocational rehabilitation programs for this population, and, most recently, a focus on employer discrimination and the financial disincentives to employment in various public policies. The authors of this manuscript review the evolution in thought pertaining to the labor market experiences of persons with a serious mental illness and propose as an additional set of factors that should be considered, those labor market liabilities that this population shares with others without disabilities who experience similar employment histories. The authors conclude that the inclusion of these factors in our understanding of issues that persons with serious mental illness face in the competitive labor market will likely lead to a further evolution in program and policy development. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Acute non-oliguric kidney failure and cholestatic hepatitis induced by ibuprofen and acetaminophen: a case reportACTA PAEDIATRICA, Issue 5 2009Marco Zaffanello Abstract The combined use of acetaminophen with ibuprofen has long been in clinical use because the target of action of each drug is different and they do not interfere with each other. Appropriate dosing and managing of these drugs do not likely lead to organ toxicity. However, both acetaminophen and ibuprofen can induce liver problems and acute kidney failure, respectively, if administered at high doses. We report the case of a female child, in treatment with both acetaminophen and ibuprofen, administered at therapeutic antipyretic doses in condition of volume depletion, who suffered acute kidney and liver failure. Conclusion: The combined ibuprofen and acetaminophen treatment, even if administered at therapeutic dosages and in a reduced number of doses, may be dangerous in conditions of volume depletion. [source] The development and neural bases of face recognitionINFANT AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Issue 1-2 2001Charles A. Nelson Abstract Evidence from fields as diverse as cognitive, evolutionary, and developmental psychology, as well as cognitive neuroscience, has increasingly pointed to the ,special' nature of face recognition. A critical examination of the literature supports the view that faces begin to be seen as a separate class of objects within the first 6 months of life. Not surprisingly, the neural systems that underlie face recognition also come on line during this period of time. Less clear, however, are the mechanisms whereby these events occur. It seems likely that face recognition reflects an experience-expectant process, whereby exposure to faces during a sensitive period of development likely leads to perceptual and cortical specialization. However, it is unknown what the role of experience is in maintaining this ability, and how long this sensitive period lasts. After reviewing three related models that attempt to account for the way the ability to recognize faces develops, a number of suggestions are offered for testing the hypothesis that face recognition depends on experience for acquisition, and for evaluating the role of experience in maintaining this ability. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Probing residue-specific interactions in the stabilization of proteins using high-resolution NMR: A study of disulfide bond compensationJOURNAL OF PHARMACEUTICAL SCIENCES, Issue 6 2010Andria L. Skinner Abstract It is well established that the oxidation state of cysteine residues in proteins is critical to overall physical stability. Disulfide bonds most often impart thermodynamic stability, but in some cases, diminish it. Predicting the circumstances that lead to each outcome is difficult because mechanistic information is lacking. Because the techniques typically used to study protein stability do not provide sufficient detail, high-resolution NMR was used in combination with low-resolution analysis to obtain mechanistic information regarding disulfide bond formation in a model protein. Tm (CD) and Tonset (SLS) for the reduced and oxidized wild type and C104S and C49S mutants were measured. The mutant proteins have altered Tms and Tonsets compared to the reduced wild type, indicating that differences in local interactions of the Cys side chains are important for stability. The NMR spectra clearly show distinct differences in the chemical environment surrounding these Cys residues and the overall tertiary structure. The C49S protein, which is less stable and more aggregation prone than reduced wild type, lacks a hydrogen bond between Y53 and H103. Increased flexibility of the Y53-containing loop is correlated with increased dynamics and unraveling of ,2, which likely leads to edge strand initiated aggregation of the central ,-sheet. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc. and the American Pharmacists Association J Pharm Sci 99: 2643,2654, 2010 [source] | |||||||||||||||||||