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Individual Age (individual + age)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Life Sciences	40%
Humanities and Social Sciences	40%

Selected Abstracts

Sperm velocity in an Alpine whitefish: effects of age, size, condition, fluctuating asymmetry and gonad abnormalities

JOURNAL OF FISH BIOLOGY, Issue 3 2007
D. Urbach
The relationship between sperm velocity and individual age, size, body condition and fluctuating asymmetry was investigated in Alpine whitefish Coregonus fatioi. The fish analysed belonged to one among several sympatric whitefish populations of Lake Thun, Switzerland, which are characterized by a high prevalence of gonad alterations. Therefore, sperm velocity data were also tested for a link between gonad deformation and sperm swimming speed. Sperm velocity was significantly lower in larger-grown individuals and in individuals of higher body condition. As expected, sperm velocity was higher in males with higher levels of fluctuating asymmetry, but it did not significantly vary with male age. Moreover, variation in sperm velocity was found to be significantly higher in individuals showing some types of gonad alterations but it did not significantly correlate with the presence of other types of alterations. [source]

In Situ Measurement of Pinna nobilis Shells for Age and Growth Studies: A New Device

MARINE ECOLOGY, Issue 3 2002
José Rafael García-March
Abstract. Pinna nobilis Linnaeus 1758 is an endemic bivalve mollusc in the Mediterranean Sea, where it inhabits seagrass meadows, especially Posidonia oceanica (L.) Delile. It is the largest bivalve in the Mediterranean, reaching lengths up to 120,cm. In its natural habitat, P. nobilis lives with the anterior part of the valve buried in the seabed, attached to Posidonia rhizomes by byssus threads. This habit makes it impossible to measure its total length directly in situ. As the only way to determine the individual age is the relationship between age and total length, several equations have been proposed to estimate total length by relating it to the unburied parts of the shell. Such measurements are essential to ecological studies that consider age, growth, and population dynamics, and that evaluate the environmental factors that affect this species. Accurately estimating total length depends on the accuracy and precision of the method employed to measure the unburied shell parts. In this paper, we point out the lack of precision of the instruments and methods used until now; we also demonstrate the reason for this imprecision. A new device to measure unburied parts of Pinna nobilis with a precision comparable to that obtained when measuring extracted valves is described. This device is unaffected by substratum type and reduces measurement time. The latter is a very important feature, because these procedures are usually performed whilst SCUBA diving. Finally, a growth equation has been fitted to the measurements obtained with the new device from a population located in Moraira (Alicante, western Mediterranean). [source]

Technical note: Standardized and semiautomated Harris lines detection

AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 3 2008
S. Suter
Abstract Arrest in long bone growth and the subsequent resumption of growth may be visible as radiopaque transverse lines in radiographs (Harris lines, HL; Harris, HA. 1933. Bone growth in health and disease. London: Oxford University Press). The assessment of individual age at occurrence of such lines, as part of paleopathological skeletal studies, is time-consuming and shows large intra- and interobserver variability. Thus, a standardized, automated detection algorithm would help to increase the validity of such paleopathological research. We present an image analysis application facilitating automatic detection of HL. On the basis of established age calculation methods, the individual age-at-formation can be automatically assessed with the tool presented. Additional user input to confirm the automatic result is possible via an intuitive graphical user interface. Automated detection of HL from digital radiographs of a sample of late Medieval Swiss tibiae was compared to the consensus of manual assessment by two blinded expert observers. The intra- and interobserver variability was high. The quality of the observer result improved when standardized detection criteria were defined and applied. The newly developed algorithm detected two-thirds of the HL that were identified as consensus lines between the observers. It was, however, necessary to validate the last one-third by manual editing. The lack of a large test series must be noted. The application is freely available for further testing by any interested researcher. Am J Phys Anthropol, 2008. © 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]

Meta-analysis of a binary outcome using individual participant data and aggregate data

RESEARCH SYNTHESIS METHODS, Issue 1 2010
Richard D. Riley
Abstract In this paper, we develop meta-analysis models that synthesize a binary outcome from health-care studies while accounting for participant-level covariates. In particular, we show how to synthesize the observed event-risk across studies while accounting for the within-study association between participant-level covariates and individual event probability. The models are adapted for situations where studies provide individual participant data (IPD), or a mixture of IPD and aggregate data. We show that the availability of IPD is crucial in at least some studies; this allows one to model potentially complex within-study associations and separate them from across-study associations, so as to account for potential ecological bias and study-level confounding. The models can produce pertinent population-level and individual-level results, such as the pooled event-risk and the covariate-specific event probability for an individual. Application is made to 14 studies of traumatic brain injury, where IPD are available for four studies and the six-month mortality risk is synthesized in relation to individual age. The results show that as individual age increases the probability of six-month mortality also increases; further, the models reveal clear evidence of ecological bias, with the mean age in each study additionally influencing an individual's mortality probability. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]

Mars and Venus at Twilight: A Critical Investigation of Moralism, Age Effects, and Sex Differences

POLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 1 2003
Daniel Aldrich
Analysts have long sought to understand whether women and men have different ethical orientations. Some researchers have argued that women and men consistently make fundamentally different ethical judgments, especially of corruption; others have found no such disparities. This study considered whether an individual's age may also play a role in determining his or her moral judgment. A statistical investigation of interactive effects between gender and age in a nationally representative data set from Japan shows that this interaction functions better as a predictor of moralism than do education or gender alone. Older individuals of both sexes were found to have similar strict moral perceptions; as women and men age, their ethical judgments converge. [source]