Very preterm infants experience poor postnatal growth relative to intra-uterine growth rates but have increased percentage body fat (%fat). The aim of the present study was to identify nutritional and other clinical predictors of infant %fat, fat mass (FM) (g) and lean mass (LM) (g) in very preterm infants during their hospital stay. Daily intakes of protein, carbohydrate, lipids and energy were recorded from birth to 34 weeks postmenstrual age (PMA) in fifty infants born <32 weeks. Clinical illness variables and anthropometric data were also collected. Body composition was assessed at 34–37 weeks PMA using the PEA POD Infant Body Composition System. Multiple regression analysis was used to identify independent predictors of body composition (%fat, FM or LM). Birth weight, birth weight z-score and PMA were strong positive predictors of infant LM. After adjustment for these factors, the strongest nutrient predictors of LM were protein:carbohydrate ratios (102–318 g LM/0·1 increase in ratio, P = 0·006–0·015). Postnatal age (PNA) and PMA were the strongest predictors of infant FM or %fat. When PNA and PMA were accounted for a higher intake of energy (–1·41 to –1·61 g FM/kJ per kg per d, P = 0·001–0·012), protein (–75·5 to –81·0 g FM/g per kg per d, P = 0·019–0·038) and carbohydrate (–27·2 to –30·0 g FM/g per kg per d, P = 0·012–0·019) were associated with a lower FM at 34–37 weeks PMA. Higher intakes of energy, protein and carbohydrate may reduce fat accumulation in very preterm infants until at least 34–37 weeks PMA.

The use of nutrition and health claims on food is legislated for in Commission Regulation 1924/2006 and SI No. 11 of 2014. This legislation ensures that any claim made on a food label is clear, accurate and substantiated, enabling consumers to make informed choices. A study undertaken by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) in 2009 found that yoghurts were the food category with the highest use of nutrition and health claims on the Irish market.

In 2018, the FSAI undertook a nutrition label verification study to verify the accuracy of declared nutrition information on yoghurts. The aims of this study were to measure the use of nutrition and health claims on a sample of yoghurts available on the Irish market in 2018 and assess their compliance with Regulation 1924/2006 Nutrition and Health Claims made on Food.

Yoghurts identified in a 2016 market scan (n578) were weighted based on categorisation of manufacturer type (branded, own brand), product category (natural, flavoured and luxury) and declared nutrition content. Samples (n200) were randomly selected from these weighted groups for the 2018 nutrition label verification study. A subsample (n100) was randomly sampled and checked for presence of nutrition and health claims. Presence of nutrition and health claims was recorded in Microsoft Excel and checked for compliance with Regulation 1924/2006.

Of the yoghurts reviewed, 67% (n67) made at least one nutrition claim and 34% (n34) made at least one health claim. Of these, 29% (n29) made a nutrition and a health claim. Branded yoghurts were more likely to make nutrition and health claims than own brand yoghurts (78% (n49) vs. 48% (n18)). Of yoghurts with a health claim, 88% (n30) were branded and 12% (n4) were own brand. Of yoghurts with a nutrition claim, 1.5% (n1) made a nutrition claim which was potentially non-compliant with Regulation 1924/2006. Of yoghurts with a health claim, 74% (n23) made a health claim which was potentially non-compliant with Regulation 1924/2006. The majority of potentially non-compliant health claims were in relation to probiotic strains and ‘live cultures’.

In conclusion, yoghurts continue to be a food category which often uses nutrition and health claims. Nutrition and health claims are more frequently used by branded than own brand products. Potentially non-compliant health claims are an issue amongst this food category which will be further investigated and followed up.

Given the high prevalence (30–35%) of psychosocial and psychiatric morbidity amongst cancer patients in any phase of the disease trajectory, screening for emotional problems and disorders has become mandatory in oncology. As a process, screening begins at the entry to the cancer care system and continues at clinically meaningful times, periodically during active cancer care, or when clinically indicated. The goal is to facilitate proper referral to psychosocial oncology specialists for more specific assessment and care, as well as treatment and evaluation of the response, according to the implementation of distress management guidelines. In this editorial, we will provide a non-exhaustive overview of relevant protocols, with particular reference to the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Distress Management in Oncology Guidelines, and review the challenges and the problems in implementing screening, and the assessment and management of psychosocial and psychiatric problems in cancer centres and community care.

Several outbreaks of hepatitis A in men who have sex with men (MSM) were reported in the 1980s and 1990s in Australia and other countries. An effective hepatitis A virus (HAV) vaccine has been available in Australia since 1994 and is recommended for high-risk groups including MSM. No outbreaks of hepatitis A in Australian MSM have been reported since 1996. In this study, we aimed to estimate HAV transmissibility in MSM populations in order to inform targets for vaccine coverage in such populations. We used mathematical models of HAV transmission in a MSM population to estimate the basic reproduction number (R 0) and the probability of an HAV epidemic occurring as a function of the immune proportion. We estimated a plausible range for R 0 of 1·71–3·67 for HAV in MSM and that sustained epidemics cannot occur once the proportion immune to HAV is greater than ~70%. To our knowledge this is the first estimate of R 0 and the critical population immunity threshold for HAV transmission in MSM. As HAV is no longer endemic in Australia or in most other developed countries, vaccination is the only means of maintaining population immunity >70%. Our findings provide impetus to promote HAV vaccination in high-risk groups such as MSM.

The Antillean Cenozoic fossil record of asteroids comprises mainly dissociated ossicles. Most common among isolates from upper Oligocene deposits of Jamaica and Antigua are marginal ossicles of an extinct, indeterminate species of Pycinaster. This is the youngest known occurrence of the genus and the first from beyond Europe. A number of relatively complete fossils have been assigned to Pycinaster and (sub)familial status proposed for it together with Phocidaster. The latter proposition is based solely on a few marginals, but available diagnoses are judged insufficient to justify such recognition. The taxon Pycinasteridae is here synonymized with the Goniasteridae, although future study of added features (such as the ventral surface) might justify recognition at a higher taxonomic level. In addition to ossicles assigned to Pycinaster, many marginals are tentatively assigned to the surviving goniasterid Nymphaster. Numerous generic and many species names have been based on asteroid isolates, but the practice demands assumptions that are not readily justified. Linkage of discrete isolates under a single taxon name assumes derivation from a single source, an inference that can be verified only rarely (if ever), therefore reducing names to the single holotype ossicle. Availability of only isolates encourages comparison with extant taxa and biogeography, biasing interpretations with a Holocene overlay. Because of these constraints, a new nominal species of Pycinaster is not justified and assignment of ossicles to Nymphaster is tentative. However, given the importance of asteroids in marine communities, we emphasize the significance, largely ignored, of their presence in Cenozoic deposits of the wider Caribbean.

Human milk (HM) is rich in oligosaccharides (HMO) that exert prebiotic and anti-infective activities. HM feeding reduces the incidence of rotavirus (RV) infection in infants. Herein, the anti-RV activity of oligosaccharides was tested in an established in vitro system for assessing cellular binding and viral infectivity/replication, and also tested in a newly developed, acute RV infection, in situ piglet model. For the in vitro work, crude HMO isolated from pooled HM, neutral HMO (lacto-N-neotetraose, LNnT; 2′-fucosyllactose) and acidic HMO (aHMO, 3′-sialyllactose, 3′-SL; 6′-sialyllactose, 6′-SL) were tested against the porcine OSU strain and human RV Wa strain. The RV Wa strain was not inhibited by any oligosaccharides. However, the RV OSU strain infectivity was dose-dependently inhibited by sialic acid (SA)-containing HMO. 3′-SL and 6′-SL concordantly inhibited 125I-radiolabelled RV cellular binding and infectivity/replication. For the in situ study, a midline laparotomy was performed on 21-d-old formula-fed piglets and six 10 cm loops of ileum were isolated in situ. Briefly, 2 mg/ml of LNnT, aHMO mixture (40 % 6′-SL/10 % 3′-SL/50 % SA) or media with or without the RV OSU strain (1 × 107 focus-forming units) were injected into the loops and maintained for 6 h. The loops treated with HMO treatments+RV had lower RV replication, as assessed by non-structural protein-4 (NSP4) mRNA expression, than RV-treated loops alone. In conclusion, SA-containing HMO inhibited RV infectivity in vitro; however, both neutral HMO and SA with aHMO decreased NSP4 replication during acute RV infection in situ.

We report the discovery in the Greenland ice sheet of a discrete layer of free nanodiamonds (NDs) in very high abundances, implying most likely either an unprecedented influx of extraterrestrial (ET) material or a cosmic impact event that occurred after the last glacial episode. From that layer, we extracted n-diamonds and hexagonal diamonds (lonsdaleite), an accepted ET impact indicator, at abundances of up to about 5×106 times background levels in adjacent younger and older ice. The NDs in the concentrated layer are rounded, suggesting they most likely formed during a cosmic impact through some process similar to carbon-vapor deposition or high-explosive detonation. This morphology has not been reported previously in cosmic material, but has been observed in terrestrial impact material. This is the first highly enriched, discrete layer of NDs observed in glacial ice anywhere, and its presence indicates that ice caps are important archives of ET events of varying magnitudes. Using a preliminary ice chronology based on oxygen isotopes and dust stratigraphy, the ND-rich layer appears to be coeval with ND abundance peaks reported at numerous North American sites in a sedimentary layer, the Younger Dryas boundary layer (YDB), dating to 12.9 ± 0.1 ka. However, more investigation is needed to confirm this association.

The earthquake that occurred in Taiwan on 21 September 1999 killed >2,000 people and severely injured many survivors. Despite the large scale and sizeable impact of the event, a complete overview of its consequences and the causes of the inadequate rescue and treatment efforts is limited in the literature. This review examines the way different groups coped with the tragedy and points out the major mistakes made during the process. The effectiveness of Taiwan's emergency preparedness and disaster response system after the earthquake was analyzed.

Problems encountered included: (1) an ineffective command center; (2) poor communication; (3) lack of cooperation between the civil government and the military; (4) delayed prehospital care; (5) overloading of hospitals beyond capacity; (6) inadequate staffing; and (7) mismanaged public health measures.

The Taiwan Chi-Chi Earthquake experience demonstrates that precise disaster planning, the establishment of one designated central command, improved cooperation between central and local authorities, modern rescue equipment used by trained disaster specialists, rapid prehospital care, and medical personnel availability, as well earthquake-resistant buildings and infrastructure, are all necessary in order to improve disaster responses.

Reproducible fabrication of high performance metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs) from compound semiconductors will require both good interfacial electrical characteristics and good thermal stability. While dielectrics such as SiO2, AIN, and GdGaOx have demonstrated low to moderate interface state densities, questions remain about their thermal stability and reliability, particularly for use in high power or high temperature widebandgap devices. In this paper we will compare the utility of two potential gate dielectric materials: GdOx and GaOx. GdOx has been found to produce layers with excellent surface morphologies as evidenced by surface roughness of less than I nm. Stoichiometric films can be easily obtained over a range of deposition conditions, though deposition temperatures of 500°C appear to offer the optimum interfacial electrical quality. By contrast GaOx films are quite rough, polycrystalline and show poor thermal stability. Further they exhibit a range of stoichiometries depending upon deposition temperature, Ga flux and oxygen flux. This paper will describe the relationship between deposition conditions and film characteristics for both materials, and will present electrical characterization of capacitors fabricated from GdOx on Si.

Crack propagation in columnar saline and freshwater ice has been investigated with high-speed photography, acoustic emission detection and the resistance method. High-speed photography was found to be a single reliable technique. The resistance method proved effective for freshwater ice samples, but not for saline ice samples due to the presence of conductive fluid inclusions. Acoustic emissions pinpointed the moment of crack initiation, but did not correspond to the crack propagation time. Crack velocity has been characterized over a temperature range of -5°C to -30 °C for freshwater and saline ice. Freshwater ice exhibited an overall average velocity of 198 m/s, and did not vary with temperature. Crack velocity in saline ice demonstrated temperature dependence, increasing from an average of 86 m/s in the -5°C to -20°C range, to 131 m/s at -30°C. The crack velocity was also shown to have a general dependence on fracture toughness K' of the material, however, the microstructural variation between samples is also shown to influence significantly the crack behavior in both saline and freshwater ice. Nonuniform crack tip advance and crack reorientation were observed as crack slowing mechanisms in freshwater ice, while in saline ice fracture crack tip blunting on voids greatly reduced average crack velocities.

InN has been grown in a gas-source MBE system using an RF nitrogen plasma source and standard TMI, solution TMI and solid In. Both solid and solution TMI produce InN with electron and carbon concentrations ≥ 1020 cm−3. Solution TMI-derived material, however, contains significantly less oxygen (8 × 1018 cm−3 vs. ≥ 1020 cm−3 for solid TMI). While the amine used to liquefy the TMI helps to displace the ether believed to be responsible for the oxygen contamination, it also appears to interfere with the growth, resulting in poorer morphology than for standard TMI. While solid In produced the lowest carrier concentration (≤ mid-1018 cm−3), it also produced the worst morphology of the sources examined, presumably due to poor surface mobility. Based on this data, it appears that carbon can play a significant role in the electrical properties of InN, and that the In source is critical in determining the structural quality.

In this paper, we have reported our investigations related to the growth of high temperature superconducting YBa2Cu3O7-δ (YBCO) and colossal magnetoresistive La0.7MnxO3-δ (LMO) thin films in presence of silver. The films were grown using pulsed laser deposition (PLD) techniques and characterized using x-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, Squid magnetometer. The focus of our work is on the realization of significant improvement in microstructural and physical properties of these films by the addition of a common material (silver) to the films during their in-situ formation. Optical emission studies of plumes emanating from Ag target have been carried out to find the role of Ag acting as additional source of oxygen-supply to oxide lattices during film-growth.

Cl2-based Inductively Coupled Plamas with low additional dc self-biases(−100V) produce convenient etch rates(500–1500Å.min−1) for GaN, AIN, InN, InAiN and InGaN. A systematic study of the effects of additive gas(Ar, N2, H2), discharge composition and ICP source power and chuck power on etch rate and surface morphology has been performed. The general trends are to go through a maximum in etch rate with percent C12 in the discharge for all three mixtures, and to have an increase(decrease) in etch rate with source power(pressure). Since the etching is strongly ion-assisted, anisotropic pattern transfer is readily achieved. Maximum etch selectivities of approximately 6 for InN over the other nitrides were obtained.

Inductively coupled plasma etching of GaN, AlN, InN, InGaN and InAlN was investigated in CH4/H2/Ar plasmas as a function of dc bias, and ICP power. The etch rates were generally quite low, as is common for III-nitrides in CH4 based chemistries. The etch rates increased with increasing dc bias. At low rf power (150W), the etch rates increased with increasing ICP power, while at 350W rf power, a peak was found between 500 and 750 W ICP power. The etched surfaces were found to be smooth, while selectivities of etch were ≤ 6 for InN over GaN, AlN, InGaN and InAlN under all conditions.

During gate mesa plasma etching of InN/InAlN field effect transistors the apparent conductivity in the channel can be either increased through three different mechanisms. If hydrogen is part of the plasma chemistry, hydrogen passivation of the shallow donors in the InAlN can occur, we find diffusion depths for 2H of ≥ 0.5 micron in 30 mins at 200°C. The hydrogen remains in the material until temperatures ≥ 700°C Energetic ion bombardment in SF6/O2 or BCl/Ar plasmas also compensates the doping in the InAlN by creation of deep acceptor states. Finally the conductivity of the immediate InAlN surface can be increased by preferential loss of N during BCl3 plasma etching, leading to poor rectifying contact characteristics when the gate metal is deposited on this etched surface. Careful control of plasma chemistry, ion energy and stoichiometry of the etched surface are necessary for acceptable pinch-off characteristics.

Transient thermal processing is employed for implant activation, contact alloying, implant isolation and dehydrogenation during III-nitride device fabrication. We have compared use of InN, AlN and GaN powder as methods for providing a N2 overpressure within a graphite susceptor for high temperature annealing of GaN, InN, A1N and InAlN. The AlN powder provides adequate surface protection to temperatures of ∼1100°C for AlN, > 1050°C for GaN, ∼600°C for InN and ∼800°C for the ternary alloy. While the InN powder provides a higher N2 partial pressure than AlN powder, at temperatures above ∼750°C the evaporation of In is sufficiently high to produce condensation of In droplets on the surfaces of the annealed samples. GaN powder achieved better surface protection than the other two cases.