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In Greek mythology, the Muses are Memory's daughters. Their genealogy suggests a deep connection between music and memory in Graeco-Roman culture, but how was this connection understood and experienced by ancient authors, artists, performers, and audiences? How is music remembered and how does it memorialize in a world before recording technology, where sound accumulated differently than it does today? This volume explores music's role in the discourses of cultural memory, communication, and commemoration in ancient Greek and Roman societies. It reveals the many and varied ways in which musical memory formed a fundamental part of social, cultural, ritual, and political life in ancient Greek- and Latin-speaking communities, from classical Athens to Ptolemaic Alexandria and ancient Rome. Drawing on the contributors' interdisciplinary expertise in art history, philology, performance studies, history, and ethnomusicology, eleven original chapters and the editors' Introduction offer new approaches for the study of Graeco-Roman music and musical culture.
To evaluate the use of colorimetric indicators for monitoring ultraviolet-C (UV-C) light delivery to sites in patient rooms.
Methods:
In laboratory testing, we examined the correlation between changes in color of 2 commercial colorimetric indicators and log10 reductions in methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Clostridioides difficile spores with exposure to increasing doses of UV-C from a low-pressure mercury room decontamination device. In patient rooms, 1 of the colorimetric indicators was used to assess UV-C dose delivery to 27 sites in the room.
Results:
In laboratory testing, the manufacturer’s reference colors for MRSA and C. difficile reduction corresponded with doses of ∼10,000 and 46,000 µJ/cm2; these doses resulted in >3 log10 reductions in MRSA and C. difficile spores, respectively. In patient rooms, the colorimetric indicators demonstrated suboptimal delivery of UV-C dosing to shadowed areas, which was improved by providing cycles on each side of the patient bed rather than in a single position and altering device placement. Increasing duration of exposure increased the number of sites achieving adequate dosing to kill C. difficile spores.
Conclusions:
Commercial colorimetric indicators provide rapid and easy-to-interpret information on the UV-C dose delivered to sites in patient rooms. The indicators may be useful for training environmental services personnel and optimizing the effectiveness of UV-C room decontamination devices.
The Scarr–Rowe effect is a gene × environment interaction, which is characterized by a negative association between exposure to low socioeconomic status (SES) environments and the additive heritability of cognitive ability. Utilizing a polygenic score for educational attainment (EA3), it was found that the two-way interaction between EA3 and parental educational attainment (EA; used as a proxy for parental SES) was a significant positive predictor of participants’ composite cognitive ability (IQ) score (β = .018, SE = .008, p = .028) after controlling hierarchically for the direct effects of (population-stratification-controlled) EA3, parental EA, and 20 distinct interaction terms (10 involving the interactions between the principal components [PCs] and EA3, and 10 involving the interaction between the PCs and parental EA). The presence of this interaction is consistent with the Scarr–Rowe effect, as the expressivity of EA3 on cognitive ability increases with increasing parental EA. No statistically significant sex differences in the effect magnitudes were found, although the effect was significantly present in the female but not male sample.
Patients with pelvic pain are often told that their pain is “all in their head.” In many years of seeing patients for pelvic pain I have never seen one who did not have an organic reason for pain. Often patients with chronic pain, especially pelvic pain, may develop secondary depression and anxiety but neither of these conditions alone is responsible for their pain. Patients who are unable to have intercourse because of pain fear loss of the partner and become especially anxious. Additionally, because of the very personal nature of their pain they are often not able to discuss their condition with any friends or family members. It is very important to believe that the patient’s pain is real and not voice any doubts, especially in the presence of a partner. Treatment of coexisting psychological disorders such as anxiety or depression it is very important in patients with pelvic pain.
Individuals with intellectual disabilities face discrimination on a daily basis. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the systemic ableism that is embedded within American culture, particularly through healthcare bias and discrimination. In turn, this creates further marginalization during diagnosis, triage, and treatment of the novel coronavirus. Multiple states have filed complaints against state triage protocols that suggest an abled life is more worthy than a life with a disability. Although many of these protocols have been updated and replaced, generalized triage statements fail to address healthcare bias that is embedded within the American system. In addition to the existing solutions, proposed solutions to addressing healthcare bias include integrating social workers into the emergency management process and the overall disaster management field. To combat bias and ableism across the healthcare system, a social justice perspective which highlights discrimination, inequalities, and inequities in overall individual care must be adopted.
In April 2019, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) released its recovery plan for the jaguar Panthera onca after several decades of discussion, litigation and controversy about the status of the species in the USA. The USFWS estimated that potential habitat, south of the Interstate-10 highway in Arizona and New Mexico, had a carrying capacity of c. six jaguars, and so focused its recovery programme on areas south of the USA–Mexico border. Here we present a systematic review of the modelling and assessment efforts over the last 25 years, with a focus on areas north of Interstate-10 in Arizona and New Mexico, outside the recovery unit considered by the USFWS. Despite differences in data inputs, methods, and analytical extent, the nine previous studies found support for potential suitable jaguar habitat in the central mountain ranges of Arizona and New Mexico. Applying slightly modified versions of the USFWS model and recalculating an Arizona-focused model over both states provided additional confirmation. Extending the area of consideration also substantially raised the carrying capacity of habitats in Arizona and New Mexico, from six to 90 or 151 adult jaguars, using the modified USFWS models. This review demonstrates the crucial ways in which choosing the extent of analysis influences the conclusions of a conservation plan. More importantly, it opens a new opportunity for jaguar conservation in North America that could help address threats from habitat losses, climate change and border infrastructure.
The last 85,000 years were characterized by high climate and environmental variability on the Yucatán Peninsula. Heinrich stadials are examples of abrupt climate transitions that involved shifts in regional temperatures and moisture availability. Thus, they serve as natural experiments to evaluate the contrasting responses of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. We used ostracodes and pollen preserved in a 75.9-m-long sediment core (PI-6, ~85 ka) recovered from Lake Petén Itzá, Guatemala, to assess the magnitude and velocity of community responses. Ostracodes are sensitive to changes in water temperature and conductivity. Vegetation responds to shifts in temperature and the ratio of evaporation to precipitation. Ostracodes display larger and more rapid community changes than does vegetation. Heinrich Stadial 5-1 (HS5-1) was cold and dry and is associated with lower ostracode and vegetation species richness and diversity. In contrast, the slightly warmer and dry conditions during HS6 and HS5a are reflected in higher ostracode species richness and diversity. Our paleoecological study revealed the greatest ecological turnover for ostracodes occurred from 62.5 to 51.0 ka; for pollen, it was at the Pleistocene/Holocene transition. Future studies should use various climate and environmental indicators from lake and marine sediment records to further explore late glacial paleoclimate causes and effects in the northern neotropics.
When an explosive burns, gaseous products are formed as a result. The interaction of the burning solid and gas is not well understood. More specifically, the process of the gaseous product heating the explosive is yet to be explored in detail. The present work sets out to fill some of that gap using mathematical modelling: this aims to track the temperature profile in the explosive. The work begins by modelling single-step reactions using a simple Arrhenius model. The model is then extended to include three-step reaction. An alternative asymptotic approach is also employed. There is close agreement between results from the full reaction-diffusion problem and the asymptotic problem.
This SHEA white paper identifies knowledge gaps and challenges in healthcare epidemiology research related to COVID-19 with a focus on core principles of healthcare epidemiology. These gaps, revealed during the worst phases of the COVID-19 pandemic, are described in 10 sections: epidemiology, outbreak investigation, surveillance, isolation precaution practices, personal protective equipment (PPE), environmental contamination and disinfection, drug and supply shortages, antimicrobial stewardship, healthcare personnel (HCP) occupational safety, and return to work policies. Each section highlights three critical healthcare epidemiology research questions with detailed description provided in supplemental materials. This research agenda calls for translational studies from laboratory-based basic science research to well-designed, large-scale studies and health outcomes research. Research gaps and challenges related to nursing homes and social disparities are included. Collaborations across various disciplines, expertise and across diverse geographic locations will be critical.
To investigate the timing and routes of contamination of the rooms of patients newly admitted to the hospital.
Design:
Observational cohort study and simulations of pathogen transfer.
Setting:
A Veterans’ Affairs hospital.
Participants:
Patients newly admitted to the hospital with no known carriage of healthcare-associated pathogens.
Methods:
Interactions between the participants and personnel or portable equipment were observed, and cultures of high-touch surfaces, floors, bedding, and patients’ socks and skin were collected for up to 4 days. Cultures were processed for Clostridioides difficile, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), and vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE). Simulations were conducted with bacteriophage MS2 to assess plausibility of transfer from contaminated floors to high-touch surfaces and to assess the effectiveness of wearing slippers in reducing transfer.
Results:
Environmental cultures became positive for at least 1 pathogen in 10 (59%) of the 17 rooms, with cultures positive for MRSA, C. difficile, and VRE in the rooms of 10 (59%), 2 (12%), and 2 (12%) participants, respectively. For all 14 instances of pathogen detection, the initial site of recovery was the floor followed in a subset of patients by detection on sock bottoms, bedding, and high-touch surfaces. In simulations, wearing slippers over hospital socks dramatically reduced transfer of bacteriophage MS2 from the floor to hands and to high-touch surfaces.
Conclusions:
Floors may be an underappreciated source of pathogen dissemination in healthcare facilities. Simple interventions such as having patients wear slippers could potentially reduce the risk for transfer of pathogens from floors to hands and high-touch surfaces.
Gas-fluidized beds of flexible fibres, which have been rarely studied before, are investigated in this work using the coupled approach of the discrete element method and computational fluid dynamics. In the present numerical method, gas–fibre interaction is modelled by calculating the interaction force for each constituent element in the fibre, and the composition of the interaction forces on the constituent elements generates a resultant hydrodynamic force and a resultant hydrodynamic torque on the fibre. Pressure drops and fibre orientation results from the present simulations with various fibre aspect ratios are in good agreement with previous experimental and simulation results. Some novel results are obtained for the effects of fibre flexibility. Larger hydrodynamic forces on fibres (before the bed is fluidized) and smaller minimum fluidization velocities (MFVs) are observed for more flexible fibre beds due to the smaller porosities, while smaller hydrodynamic forces are obtained for the more flexible fibres when the beds are fluidized with significant fibre motion. By scaling the superficial gas velocity using the MFVs, the data of pressure drop can collapse onto the Ergun correlation for stiff fibres of various aspect ratios; however, the pressure drop curves deviate from the Ergun correlation for very flexible fibres, due to the significant fibre bed expansion before the MFV is reached. The fibre aspect ratio and flexibility both have an impact on the solids mixing rate, and it is found that the solids mixing rates are essentially determined by the ratio of the superficial gas velocity to MFV.
For more than a decade, U.S. courts have struggled to develop a common law immunity regime to govern suits brought against foreign government officials, and they are now divided on a number of issues, including the extent to which they should defer to the executive branch and whether to recognize a jus cogens exception. This Editorial Comment considers a more conceptual division in the courts, between an “effect-of-judgment” approach that would confer immunity only when the judgment that the plaintiff is seeking would be directly enforceable against the foreign state, and a broader “nature-of-act” approach that would confer immunity whenever the plaintiff's case is challenging conduct carried out on behalf of the state. The Comment argues in favor of the nature-of-act approach and explains why analogies in this context to domestic civil rights litigation are misplaced.
Mental health (MH) service users have increased prevalence of chronic physical conditions such as cardio-respiratory diseases and diabetes. Potentially Preventable Hospitalisations (PPH) for physical health conditions are an indicator of health service access, integration and effectiveness, and are elevated in long term studies of people with MH conditions. We aimed to examine whether PPH rates were elevated in MH service users over a 12-month follow-up period more suitable for routine health indicator reporting. We also examined whether MH service users had increased PPH rates at a younger age, potentially reflecting the younger onset of chronic physical conditions.
Methods
A population-wide data linkage in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, population 7.8 million. PPH rates in 178 009 people using community MH services in 2016–2017 were compared to population rates. Primary outcomes were crude and age- and disadvantage-standardised annual PPH episode rate (episodes per 100 000 population), PPH day rate (hospital days per 100 000) and adjusted incidence rate ratios (AIRR).
Results
MH service users had higher rates of PPH admission (AIRR 3.6, 95% CI 3.5–3.6) and a larger number of hospital days (AIRR 5.2, 95% CI 5.2–5.3) than other NSW residents due to increased likelihood of admission, more admissions per person and longer length of stay. Increases were greatest for vaccine-preventable conditions (AIRR 4.7, 95% CI 4.5–5.0), and chronic conditions (AIRR 3.7, 95% CI 3.6–3.7). The highest number of admissions and relative risks were for respiratory and metabolic conditions, including chronic obstructive airways disease (AIRR 5.8, 95% CI 5.5–6.0) and diabetic complications (AIRR 5.4, 95% CI 5.1–5.8). One-quarter of excess potentially preventable bed days in MH service users were due to vaccine-related conditions, including vaccine-preventable respiratory illness. Age-related increases in risk occurred earlier in MH service users, particularly for chronic and vaccine-preventable conditions. PPH rates in MH service users aged 20–29 were similar to population rates of people aged 60 and over. These substantial differences were not explained by socio-economic disadvantage.
Conclusions
PPHs for physical health conditions are substantially increased in people with MH conditions. Short term (12-month) PPH rates may be a useful lead indicator of increased physical morbidity and less accessible, integrated or effective health care. High hospitalisation rates for vaccine-preventable respiratory infections and hepatitis underline the importance of vaccination in MH service users and suggests potential benefits of prioritising this group for COVID-19 vaccination.
Numerous studies and meta-analyses have now confirmed that personality traits tend to correlate such that a general factor of personality (GFP) emerges. Nevertheless, there is an ongoing debate about what these correlations, and therefore the GFP, represents. One interpretation is that the GFP reflects a substantive factor that indicates general social effectiveness or emotional intelligence. Another interpretation is that the GFP merely is an artifact based on measurement or response bias. In the present paper, we elaborate on a selection of topics that are central to the debate about this construct. Specifically, we discuss (a) the GFP in relation to more specific personality dimensions (e.g., Big Five, facets), (b) the validity of the GFP and under what circumstances it seems to ‘disappear’, and (c) the theoretical and practical relevance of the general factor. Overall, the review should provide insight into the nature of the GFP and whether or not it represents a meaningful factor that can contribute to a better understanding of personality.
The apocalyptic and postapocalyptic are staples of young adult fiction. While sometimes conflated with the dystopian genre, young adult postapocalyptic fiction (YAPA) is neither simply dystopian nor a watered-down version of adult postapocalyptic fiction. Young adult postapocalyptic fiction provides a stage on which young protagonists question the meaning and purpose of community and develop innovative responses to issues of identity and agency under challenging conditions (whether those come from zombies, pandemic disease, nuclear war, environmental degradation, etc.). YAPA novels include some classic postapocalyptic accounts of survival after nuclear war, as in Robert O’Brien’s Z for Zachariah (1974) and the more recent popular series starting with Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games (2008) and including James Dashner’s Maze Runner (2009), Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies (2005), and Veronica Roth’s Divergent (2011). These novels are to be contrasted with other YAPA novels, such as Paolo Bacigalupi’s Ship Breaker or Octavia Butler’s Parable series. In each of those novels, the fact of living after a devastating event (or series of events) is not simply the setting of the novel but also a feature of the reader’s experience with the novel.
Gloves and gowns are used during patient care to reduce contamination of personnel and prevent pathogen transmission.
Objective:
To determine whether the use of gowns adds a substantial benefit over gloves alone in preventing patient-to-patient transfer of a viral DNA surrogate marker.
Methods:
In total, 30 source patients had 1 cauliflower mosaic virus surrogate marker applied to their skin and clothing and a second to their bed rail and bedside table. Personnel caring for the source patients were randomized to wear gloves, gloves plus cover gowns, or no barrier. Interactions with up to 7 subsequent patients were observed, and the percentages of transfer of the DNA markers were compared among the 3 groups.
Results:
In comparison to the no-barrier group (57.8% transfer of 1 or both markers), there were significant reductions in transfer of the DNA markers in the gloves group (31.1% transfer; odds ratio [OR], 0.16; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.02-0.73) and the gloves-plus-gown group (25.9% transfer; OR, 0.11; 95% CI, 0.01–0.51). The addition of a cover gown to gloves during the interaction with the source patient did not significantly reduce the transfer of the DNA marker (P = .53). During subsequent patient interactions, transfer of the DNA markers was significantly reduced if gloves plus gowns were worn and if hand hygiene was performed (P < .05).
Conclusions:
Wearing gloves or gloves plus gowns reduced the frequency of patient-to-patient transfer of a viral DNA surrogate marker. The use of gloves plus gowns during interactions with the source patient did not reduce transfer in comparison to gloves alone.