Research on sources of individual difference in parental Infant-Directed Speech (IDS) is limited and there is a particular lack of research on fathers’ compared to mothers’ speech. This study examined the predictive relations between infant characteristics and variability in paternal lexical diversity (LD) in dyadic free play with two-year-olds (M = 24.1 months, SD = 1.39, 35 girls). Ten minutes of interaction for sixty-four father–infant dyads were transcribed and multiple regression analyses were performed to examine the effects of a set of distal and proximal sources of infant influence on paternal LD. Fathers’ LD was predicted only by infant language, both standardised language scores and dynamic language measures, and was not predicted by infant age, gender, executive function, or temperament. Findings are discussed in the light of the complex interplay of factors contributing to variability in IDS and the infant's linguistic environment.

The objective of this study was to examine the links between prosodic features of paternal Infant-Directed Speech (IDS) and child characteristics. Pitch variability measures were extracted from the speech samples of 50 fathers during unstructured play with their two-year-old children. Evidence for a link between child receptive language ability (measured by the Bayley Scales of Infant Development III) and fathers’ pitch variability was obtained from Multiple Hierarchical Regression. Findings support the hypothesis that fathers tailor their speech to their children. This is one of the few studies to examine the relationship between fathers’ IDS and child language ability.

Fine focus X-ray tubes developed for projection X-ray microscopy can also be used for X-ray micro-analysis. Areas about 10 microns in diameter of thin sections have been analyzed by measuring differences in X-ray transmission, with particular reference to the determination of calcium in biological materials and in minerals. The high intensity of this X-ray point source has permitted micro-fluorescence analysis of similar small areas with high sensitivity and reasonable time. The same electron optical system has been used for micro-emission analysis of rock slices and mineral grains. By scanning the electron beam over the specimen surface and recording either the scattered electrons or the emitted X-rays, a two-dimensional picture can be displayed of the physical features or of the distribution of a particular element respectively. The analysis of a selected, volume of 1 cubic micron in the surface has been obtained by plotting the characteristic line emission spectrum with a crystal spectrometer and proportional counter. The sensitivity is 0. 1% or 10−1 gram. Micro-beam X-ray diffraction has also been used with a stationary X-ray source both for transmission and back reflection with a 10 minute exposure from a 10 micron diameter area.

We present Phantom, a fast, parallel, modular, and low-memory smoothed particle hydrodynamics and magnetohydrodynamics code developed over the last decade for astrophysical applications in three dimensions. The code has been developed with a focus on stellar, galactic, planetary, and high energy astrophysics, and has already been used widely for studies of accretion discs and turbulence, from the birth of planets to how black holes accrete. Here we describe and test the core algorithms as well as modules for magnetohydrodynamics, self-gravity, sink particles, dust–gas mixtures, H2 chemistry, physical viscosity, external forces including numerous galactic potentials, Lense–Thirring precession, Poynting–Robertson drag, and stochastic turbulent driving. Phantom is hereby made publicly available.

Cadmium (Cd) accumulates in the human food chain and poses a risk of kidney dysfunction (Fanconi Syndrome) and bone disorders in humans. The margin of safety between typical Cd intakes by humans and levels associated with toxicity is smaller than for other metals. Consumption of just one sheep kidney could cause an average adult person to exceed their Provisional Maximum Tolerable Daily Intake. However, the rate of accumulation in sheep’s liver and kidney, the primary target organs for Cd accumulation, is unclear. This makes prediction of the effects of varying Cd intake by sheep on the Cd concentration in these organs difficult. We undertook a meta-analysis of independent feeding trials, which sought to integrate previous findings in order to review existing legislation on permitted levels of Cd in animal feeds and organs. Resulting predictions on Cd accumulation in sheep liver and kidneys are applicable to the broad set of exposure situations investigated in the individual studies.

Recent reports have highlighted human rights concerns in Ugandan mental healthcare. This article describes the current situation in terms of healthcare funding and provision, concerns regarding legislation, and health inequalities. Possible reasons for the difficult situation are briefly discussed, including the economy, pervasive stigma and ongoing unrest in the region. We then describe some encouraging initiatives in Uganda that are empowering those with mental health problems to have a better quality of life and identify opportunities for change.

Taking J. A. Baker's celebrated book The Peregrine as its focus, the article seeks to locate Baker's writing within a broader, less elevated field of postwar observation and publication that worked to shape new ways of understanding, apprehending and taking pleasure from the natural environment. This included the recording practices and publications of the national and county naturalist and birdwatching societies that flourished in these years. The article shows how Baker's book was as much the product of this world of organised amateur natural history as it was of the world of high literature. Baker's book also sheds light on the reconfiguring of bird-human relations within competing postwar cultures of nature and the article uses it to explore the relationship between birdwatching and the bird-centred field sport of falconry. As organised birdwatching sought to establish moral authority over other bird-centred countryside pursuits in its understanding of natural relations, it cast field sports and other countryside practices as atavistic and archaic relics of older cultures of nature. Baker's The Peregrine allows us to see the convergences between the close attention to birds of prey and an intimacy with them that was shared by birdwatchers like Baker and falconers, even as Baker's narrative also sheds light on the differences between the two practices.

For most of the Twentieth Century the angiosperm archetypal flower has been viewed as relatively large, multiparted, with spirally arranged fleshy appendages, and as being probably beetle pollinated as in some extant Magnoliales. However, the preponderance of fossil evidence indicates that flowers with such characters do not appear until the mid-Cretaceous, well after smaller simpler fossil flowers such as platanoids and chloranthoids. Winteraceous and Chloranthaceous pollen appears more or less simultaneously in the Lower Cretaceous, but rapidly mounting evidence for mosaicism in Cretaceous taxa makes it unwise to extrapolate floral structure on the basis of dispersed pollen. Mid-Late Cretaceous fossils illustrate an increasing proportion of simple flowered Rosidae in the angiosperm flora. We report new fossil evidence of charcoalified flowers and fruits representing at least 20–30 diverse angiosperm taxa from the Cenomanian and Turonian deposits of the Atlantic Coastal Plain. These fossil flowers include representatives with hypanthia and floral cups, sympetaly, syncarpy, inferior ovaries, campylotropous ovules, nectaries of various forms, specialized anther dehiscence, epipetalous stamens, and connate filament tubes. Major taxonomic groups (as defined by Cronquist) represented by these fossils include Dilleniidae, Magnoliidae, Rosidae, monocots, and possibly Caryophyllidae. Thus, the early Late Cretaceous angiosperm flora had greater floral diversity than has previously been documented. This array of floral structures includes features that are now associated with bees and other specialized insect pollinators, thus providing a new perspective on the evolution of insect pollination.

This study reports the composition and distribution of demersal megafauna from various north-western Mediterranean submarine areas such as canyons, seamounts and landslides between 60–800 m depth, based on remotely operated vehicle (ROV) observations. From a total of 30 h of video, 4534 faunistic observations were made and analysed in relationship to environmental factors (i.e. topography, substrate type and depth). In addition, anthropogenic impact was quantified by grouping observations in four categories: fishing nets, longlines, trawl marks and other litter. The different targeted environments showed similarities in faunal composition according to substrate, depth and topography. Our results also indicated the presence of anthropogenic impact in all the sampled areas in which litter and trawl marks were the most observed artefacts.

Results are presented from our ongoing studies of Titan using ALMA during the period 2012-2015, including a confirmation of the previous detection of vinyl cyanide (C2H3CN), as well as the first spatial map for this species on Titan. Simultaneous mapping of HC3N, CH3CN and C2H5CN reveal characteristic abundance patterns for each species that provide insight into their individual photochemical lifetimes, and help inform our understanding of Titan’s unique, time-variable atmospheric chemistry and global circulation. A time-sequence of HC3N maps covering 38 months reveals a dramatic change in the distribution of this gas consistent with high-altitude photochemical production followed by advection towards the southern (winter) pole, combined with rapid loss in the north after Titan’s 2009 seasonal equinox. The 2015 C2H3CN and C2H5CN maps show abundance peaks in Titan’s southern hemisphere, similar to those observed for the short-lived HC3N molecule. The longer-lived CH3CN, on the other hand, remains more concentrated in the north.

Uniaxial compression experiments at –10°C at 10−3s−1 on fresh-water, granular ice have established through the use of high-speed photography that internal cracks nucleate preferentially away from the ice/platen (i/p) interface under conditions of i/p contraint, but near the interface under conditions of i/p expansion. Under conditions of little i/p interaction, cracks nucleate more or less randomly throughout the specimen. Correspondingly, the brittle-fracture strength decreases as the i/p interaction changes from compressive to tensile. These effects are explained in terms of the spatial variation of the maximum shear stress and the crack density.

Very little data exist on the fatigue behavior of ice, yet fatigue may have an important role to play in a number of ice failure situations. Whilst reversed-bending tests and cyclic-compression tests have been performed on ice, no attempts have been made previously to measure fatigue-crack growth rates in ice. This paper presents the results of fatigue-crack growth experiments on S2 (i.e. columnar grained with the c axes randomly aligned within the horizontal plane) fresh-water ice. There is clear evidence that crack growth has occurred under cyclic loading but, as yet, the data are insufficient to determine the validity of da/dΝ versus δK type behavior. Preliminary results are presented and the implications of the results are discussed.