We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
To send content items to your account,
please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies.
If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account.
Find out more about sending content to .
To send content items to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org
is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings
on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part
of your Kindle email address below.
Find out more about sending to your Kindle.
Note you can select to send to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations.
‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be sent to your device when it is connected to wi-fi.
‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
The first western Canadian records of the European carabid, Nebria brevicollis (Fabricius) (Coleoptera: Carabidae), are reported from Vancouver, Coquitlam, and Delta, British Columbia, Canada. A species description is provided to facilitate identification of this new invasive species. In addition, pitfall trap data are presented that demonstrate establishment of populations at four locations in Coquitlam. Trap catches were substantially higher at one anthropogenic meadow site than at three urban forest sites. Potential for further expansion of the range of N. brevicollis in British Columbia and beyond is discussed.
We describe an ultra-wide-bandwidth, low-frequency receiver recently installed on the Parkes radio telescope. The receiver system provides continuous frequency coverage from 704 to 4032 MHz. For much of the band (
${\sim}60\%$
), the system temperature is approximately 22 K and the receiver system remains in a linear regime even in the presence of strong mobile phone transmissions. We discuss the scientific and technical aspects of the new receiver, including its astronomical objectives, as well as the feed, receiver, digitiser, and signal processor design. We describe the pipeline routines that form the archive-ready data products and how those data files can be accessed from the archives. The system performance is quantified, including the system noise and linearity, beam shape, antenna efficiency, polarisation calibration, and timing stability.
The mechanism through which developmental programming of offspring overweight/obesity following in utero exposure to maternal overweight/obesity operates is unknown but may operate through biologic pathways involving offspring anthropometry at birth. Thus, we sought to examine to what extent the association between in utero exposure to maternal overweight/obesity and childhood overweight/obesity is mediated by birth anthropometry. Analyses were conducted on a retrospective cohort with data obtained from one hospital system. A natural effects model framework was used to estimate the natural direct effect and natural indirect effect of birth anthropometry (weight, length, head circumference, ponderal index, and small-for-gestational age [SGA] or large-for-gestational age [LGA]) for the association between pre-pregnancy maternal body mass index (BMI) category (overweight/obese vs normal weight) and offspring overweight/obesity in childhood. Models were adjusted for maternal and child socio-demographics. Three thousand nine hundred and fifty mother–child dyads were included in analyses (1467 [57.8%] of mothers and 913 [34.4%] of children were overweight/obese). Results suggest that a small percentage of the effect of maternal pre-pregnancy BMI overweight/obesity on offspring overweight/obesity operated through offspring anthropometry at birth (weight: 15.5%, length: 5.2%, head circumference: 8.5%, ponderal index: 2.2%, SGA: 2.9%, and LGA: 4.2%). There was a small increase in the percentage mediated when gestational diabetes or hypertensive disorders were added to the models. Our study suggests that some measures of birth anthropometry mediate the association between maternal pre-pregnancy overweight/obesity and offspring overweight/obesity in childhood and that the size of this mediated effect is small.
A growing body of research supports the value of a multimodal assessment approach, drawing on measures from different response modalities, for clarifying how core biobehavioral processes relate to various clinical problems and dimensions of psychopathology. Using data for 507 healthy adults, the current study was undertaken to integrate self-report and neurophysiological (brain potential) measures as a step toward a multimodal measurement model for the trait of affiliative capacity (AFF) – a biobehavioral construct relevant to adaptive and maladaptive social-interpersonal functioning. Individuals low in AFF exhibit a lack of interpersonal connectedness, deficient empathy, and an exploitative-aggressive social style that may be expressed transdiagnostically in antagonistic externalizing or distress psychopathology. Specific aims were to (1) integrate trait scale and brain potential indicators into a multimodal measure of AFF and (2) evaluate associations of this multimodal measure with criterion variables of different types. Results demonstrated (1) success in creating a multimodal measure of AFF from self-report and neural indicators, (2) effectiveness of this measure in predicting both clinical-diagnostic and neurophysiological criterion variables, and (3) transdiagnostic utility of the multimodal measure at both specific-disorder and broad symptom-dimension levels. Our findings further illustrate the value of psychoneurometric operationalizations of biobehavioral trait dimensions as referents for clarifying transdiagnostic relationships between biological systems variables and empirically defined dimensions of psychopathology.
The Minnesota Center for Twin and Family Research (MCTFR) comprises multiple longitudinal, community-representative investigations of twin and adoptive families that focus on psychological adjustment, personality, cognitive ability and brain function, with a special emphasis on substance use and related psychopathology. The MCTFR includes the Minnesota Twin Registry (MTR), a cohort of twins who have completed assessments in middle and older adulthood; the Minnesota Twin Family Study (MTFS) of twins assessed from childhood and adolescence into middle adulthood; the Enrichment Study (ES) of twins oversampled for high risk for substance-use disorders assessed from childhood into young adulthood; the Adolescent Brain (AdBrain) study, a neuroimaging study of adolescent twins; and the Siblings Interaction and Behavior Study (SIBS), a study of adoptive and nonadoptive families assessed from adolescence into young adulthood. Here we provide a brief overview of key features of these established studies and describe new MCTFR investigations that follow up and expand upon existing studies or recruit and assess new samples, including the MTR Study of Relationships, Personality, and Health (MTR-RPH); the Colorado-Minnesota (COMN) Marijuana Study; the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study; the Colorado Online Twins (CoTwins) study and the Children of Twins (CoT) study.
Research participants want to receive results from studies in which they participate. However, health researchers rarely share the results of their studies beyond scientific publication. Little is known about the barriers researchers face in returning study results to participants.
Methods:
Using a mixed-methods design, health researchers (N = 414) from more than 40 US universities were asked about barriers to providing results to participants. Respondents were recruited from universities with Clinical and Translational Science Award programs and Prevention Research Centers.
Results:
Respondents reported the percent of their research where they experienced each of the four barriers to disseminating results to participants: logistical/methodological, financial, systems, and regulatory. A fifth barrier, investigator capacity, emerged from data analysis. Training for research faculty and staff, promotion and tenure incentives, and funding agencies supporting dissemination of results to participants were solutions offered to overcoming barriers.
Conclusions:
Study findings add to literature on research dissemination by documenting health researchers’ perceived barriers to sharing study results with participants. Implications for policy and practice suggest that additional resources and training could help reduce dissemination barriers and increase the return of results to participants.
To determine the attributable cost and length of stay of hospital-acquired Clostridioides difficile infection (HA-CDI) from the healthcare payer perspective using linked clinical, administrative, and microcosting data.
Design:
A retrospective, population-based, propensity-score–matched cohort study.
Setting:
Acute-care facilities in Alberta, Canada.
Patients:
Admitted adult (≥18 years) patients with incident HA-CDI and without CDI between April 1, 2012, and March 31, 2016.
Methods:
Incident cases of HA-CDI were identified using a clinical surveillance definition. Cases were matched to noncases of CDI (those without a positive C. difficile test or without clinical CDI) on propensity score and exposure time. The outcomes were attributable costs and length of stay of the hospitalization where the CDI was identified. Costs were expressed in 2018 Canadian dollars.
Results:
Of the 2,916 HA-CDI cases at facilities with microcosting data available, 98.4% were matched to 13,024 noncases of CDI. The total adjusted cost among HA-CDI cases was 27% greater than noncases of CDI (ratio, 1.27; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.21–1.33). The mean attributable cost was $18,386 (CAD 2018; USD $14,190; 95% CI, $14,312–$22,460; USD $11,046-$17,334). The adjusted length of stay among HA-CDI cases was 13% greater than for noncases of CDI (ratio, 1.13; 95% CI, 1.07–1.19), which corresponds to an extra 5.6 days (95% CI, 3.10–8.06) in length of hospital stay per HA-CDI case.
Conclusions:
In this population-based, propensity score matched analysis using microcosting data, HA-CDI was associated with substantial attributable cost.
OBJECTIVES/SPECIFIC AIMS: Focal cartilage injuries of the knee joint are common and present a treatment challenge due to minimal intrinsic repair. Cartilage tissue engineering techniques currently used in clinical practice are expensive, cumbersome, and often ineffective in patients with mechanical or medical comorbidities. To address these issues, we developed an acellular nanofibrous scaffold with encapsulated growth factors designed to enhanced articular cartilage repair. Our goal is to evaluate this technology in vitro and pilot a large animal model for eventual translation into human subjects. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: Hyaluronic acid (HA, 65 kDa) will be methacrylated (~40% modification, MeHA) and conjugated with cell-adhesive (RGD) groups. A solution of 4% wt/vol MeHA, 2% wt/vol polyethylene oxide (900 kDa), 0.05% wt/vol Irgacure 2959, and 0.005% wt/vol stromal cell-derived factor-1α (SDF-1α) and/or transforming growth factor-β3 (TGF-β3) will be prepared in ddH2O. The solution will be electrospun onto a rotating mandrel to achieve a dry scaffold thickness of 0.5 mm. The scaffold matt will be UV cross-linked and 5 mm-diameter samples will be cut out. Four groups of scaffolds will be prepared: MeHA, MeHA+SDF, MeHA+TGF, MeHA+SDF+TGF. All groups will be evaluated for fiber diameter, swell thickness, equilibrium compressive modulus, degradation rate, and growth factor release rate over 4 weeks (n=10). Scaffolds will also be seeded with juvenile porcine MSCs (5×104) in 200 μL of medium incubated for 24 hours. Seeded scaffolds will be evaluated for equilibrium compressive modulus, cell infiltration, and chondrogenesis at 4 and 8 weeks (n=10). Scaffolds will then be evaluated in a juvenile Yucatan minipig cartilage defect model. In total, 6 animals will undergo bilateral knee surgery to create four 4 mm-diameter full-thickness cartilage defects in each trochlear grove. All defects will receive microfracture to release marrow elements. Each knee will receive 2 scaffolds of the same group (replicates) with paired microfracture controls, resulting in a sample size of 3. Animals will be sacrificed at 12 weeks and defects will be evaluated via non-destructive indentation testing for mechanical properties, microCT for defect fill and subchondral bone morphology, and histology for ICRS II Visual Histological Assessment Scoring. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: Our preliminary studies have shown reliable replication of electrospun MeHA scaffolds. We anticipate cross-linking density to correlate positively with compressive modulus, and negatively with swell thickness, degradation rate, and growth factor release rate. We anticipate the addition of SDF-1α and TGF-β3 to increase cell infiltration and chondrogenesis, respectively, within seeded scaffolds. Similarly, we expect minipig defects treated with growth factor-releasing scaffolds to show greater mechanical properties, defect fill, and ICRS II score compared with MeHA scaffolds without growth factor. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE OF IMPACT: This study has the potential to show how an HA-based cell-free scaffold can be augmented with 2 growth factors that act synergistically to improve cartilage repair in a large animal model. This technology would improve upon the cell-free scaffolds already used clinically for autologous matrix-induced chondrogenesis and is directly translatable.
An internationally approved and globally used classification scheme for the diagnosis of CHD has long been sought. The International Paediatric and Congenital Cardiac Code (IPCCC), which was produced and has been maintained by the International Society for Nomenclature of Paediatric and Congenital Heart Disease (the International Nomenclature Society), is used widely, but has spawned many “short list” versions that differ in content depending on the user. Thus, efforts to have a uniform identification of patients with CHD using a single up-to-date and coordinated nomenclature system continue to be thwarted, even if a common nomenclature has been used as a basis for composing various “short lists”. In an attempt to solve this problem, the International Nomenclature Society has linked its efforts with those of the World Health Organization to obtain a globally accepted nomenclature tree for CHD within the 11th iteration of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11). The International Nomenclature Society has submitted a hierarchical nomenclature tree for CHD to the World Health Organization that is expected to serve increasingly as the “short list” for all communities interested in coding for congenital cardiology. This article reviews the history of the International Classification of Diseases and of the IPCCC, and outlines the process used in developing the ICD-11 congenital cardiac disease diagnostic list and the definitions for each term on the list. An overview of the content of the congenital heart anomaly section of the Foundation Component of ICD-11, published herein in its entirety, is also included. Future plans for the International Nomenclature Society include linking again with the World Health Organization to tackle procedural nomenclature as it relates to cardiac malformations. By doing so, the Society will continue its role in standardising nomenclature for CHD across the globe, thereby promoting research and better outcomes for fetuses, children, and adults with congenital heart anomalies.
Policy-makers and practitioners have a need to assess community resilience in disasters. Prior efforts conflated resilience with community functioning, combined resistance and recovery (the components of resilience), and relied on a static model for what is inherently a dynamic process. We sought to develop linked conceptual and computational models of community functioning and resilience after a disaster.
Methods
We developed a system dynamics computational model that predicts community functioning after a disaster. The computational model outputted the time course of community functioning before, during, and after a disaster, which was used to calculate resistance, recovery, and resilience for all US counties.
Results
The conceptual model explicitly separated resilience from community functioning and identified all key components for each, which were translated into a system dynamics computational model with connections and feedbacks. The components were represented by publicly available measures at the county level. Baseline community functioning, resistance, recovery, and resilience evidenced a range of values and geographic clustering, consistent with hypotheses based on the disaster literature.
Conclusions
The work is transparent, motivates ongoing refinements, and identifies areas for improved measurements. After validation, such a model can be used to identify effective investments to enhance community resilience. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2018;12:127–137)
Background: Self-critical thinking is common across psychological disorders. This study hypothesized that it may play an important role in ‘overgeneralization’, the process of drawing general implications from an isolated negative experience. Aims: To explore the impact of two experimental tasks designed to elicit self-critical thoughts on the endorsement of general negative self-views of clinical and non-clinical populations. Method: Three groups (depression, eating disorders and non-clinical controls), completed standardized questionnaires and the two tasks. Participants rated their self-critical thinking and general negative self-beliefs before and after each task. Results: Following a failure experience, both clinical groups showed a greater increase in general negative self-views compared with controls, indicating greater overgeneralization. Both habitual and increases in state self-critical thinking were associated with overgeneralization while negative perfectionism was not. Overgeneralization was more strongly associated with post-task reduced mood than self-criticism. Conclusions: Self-critical thinking may be an important factor in the process of overgeneralization, and the increase in general negative self-views may be particularly crucial for lowering of mood.
Most studies on dietary vegetable oil in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) have been conducted on a background of dietary EPA (20 : 5n-3) and DHA (22 : 6n-3) contained in the fishmeal used as a protein source in aquaculture feed. If dietary EPA and DHA repress their endogenous synthesis from α-linolenic acid (ALA, 18 : 3n-3), then the potential of ALA-containing vegetable oils to maintain tissue EPA and DHA has been underestimated. We examined the effect of individual dietary n-3 PUFA on the expression of the biosynthetic genes required for metabolism of ALA to DHA in rainbow trout. A total of 720 juvenile rainbow trout were allocated to twenty-four experimental tanks and assigned one of eight diets. The effect of dietary ALA, EPA or DHA, in isolation or in combination, on hepatic expression of fatty acyl desaturase (FADS)2a(Δ6), FADS2b(Δ5), elongation of very long-chain fatty acid (ELOVL)5 and ELOVL2 was examined after 3 weeks of dietary intervention. The effect of these diets on liver and muscle phospholipid PUFA composition was also examined. The expression levels of FADS2a(Δ6), ELOVL5 and ELOVL2 were highest when diets were high in ALA, with no added EPA or DHA. Under these conditions ALA was readily converted to tissue DHA. Dietary DHA had the largest and most consistent effect in down-regulating the gene expression of all four genes. The ELOVL5 expression was the least responsive of the four genes to dietary n-3 PUFA changes. These findings should be considered when optimising aquaculture feeds containing vegetable oils and/or fish oil or fishmeal to achieve maximum DHA synthesis.
While more and more long-period giant planets are discovered by direct imaging, the distribution of planets at these separations (≳5 AU) has remained largely uncertain, especially compared to planets in the inner regions of solar systems probed by RV and transit techniques. The low frequency, the detection challenges, and heterogeneous samples make determining the mass and orbit distributions of directly imaged planets at the end of a survey difficult. By utilizing Monte Carlo methods that incorporate the age, distance, and spectral type of each target, we can use all stars in the survey, not just those with detected planets, to learn about the underlying population. We have produced upper limits and direct measurements of the frequency of these planets with the most recent generation of direct imaging surveys. The Gemini NICI Planet-Finding Campaign observed 220 young, nearby stars at a median H-band contrast of 14.5 magnitudes at 1”, representing the largest, deepest search for exoplanets by the completion of the survey. The Gemini Planet Imager Exoplanet Survey is in the process of surveying 600 stars, pushing these contrasts to a few tenths of an arcsecond from the star. With the advent of large surveys (many hundreds of stars) using advanced planet-imagers we gain the ability to move beyond measuring the frequency of wide-separation giant planets and to simultaneously determine the distribution as a function of planet mass, semi-major axis, and stellar mass, and so directly test models of planet formation and evolution.
Magnetic resonance imaging studies of maltreated children with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) suggest that maltreatment-related PTSD is associated with adverse brain development. Maltreated youth resilient to chronic PTSD were not previously investigated and may elucidate neuromechanisms of the stress diathesis that leads to resilience to chronic PTSD. In this cross-sectional study, anatomical volumetric and corpus callosum diffusion tensor imaging measures were examined using magnetic resonance imaging in maltreated youth with chronic PTSD (N = 38), without PTSD (N = 35), and nonmaltreated participants (n = 59). Groups were sociodemographically similar. Participants underwent assessments for strict inclusion/exclusion criteria and psychopathology. Maltreated youth with PTSD were psychobiologically different from maltreated youth without PTSD and nonmaltreated controls. Maltreated youth with PTSD had smaller posterior cerebral and cerebellar gray matter volumes than did maltreated youth without PTSD and nonmaltreated participants. Cerebral and cerebellar gray matter volumes inversely correlated with PTSD symptoms. Posterior corpus callosum microstructure in pediatric maltreatment-related PTSD differed compared to maltreated youth without PTSD and controls. The group differences remained significant when controlling for psychopathology, numbers of Axis I disorders, and trauma load. Alterations of these posterior brain structures may result from a shared trauma-related mechanism or an inherent vulnerability that mediates the pathway from chronic PTSD to comorbidity.
A randomised controlled trial (RCT) of high-dose v. low-dose fish oil in recent-onset rheumatoid arthritis (RA) demonstrated that the group allocated to high-dose fish oil had increased remission and decreased failure of disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drug (DMARD) therapy. This study examines the relationships between plasma phospholipid levels of the n-3 fatty acids in fish oil, EPA and DHA, and remission and DMARD use in recent-onset RA. EPA and DHA were measured in blood samples from both groups of the RCT. The data were analysed as a single cohort, and Cox proportional hazards models were used to examine relationships between plasma phospholipid (PL) EPA and DHA and various outcome measures. When analysed as a single cohort, plasma PL EPA was related to time to remission, with a one unit increase in EPA (1 % total fatty acids) associated with a 12 % increase in the probability of remission at any time during the study period (hazard ratio (HR)=1·12; 95 % CI 1·02, 1·23; P=0·02). Adjustment for smoking, anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide antibodies and ‘shared epitope’ HLA-DR allele status did not change the HR. Plasma PL EPA, adjusted for the same variables, was negatively related to time to DMARD failure (HR=0·85; 95 % CI 0·72, 0·99; P=0·047). The HR for DHA and time to remission or DMARD failure were similar in magnitude to those for EPA, but not statistically significant. Biomarkers of n-3 status, such as plasma PL EPA, have the potential to predict clinical outcomes relevant to standard drug treatment of RA patients.
The Spacewatch Project uses four telescopes of apertures 0.9-m, 1.8-m, 2.3-m, and 4-m on Kitt Peak mountain in Arizona for followup astrometry of priority NEOs. Objects as faint as V=23 on the MPC's NEO Confirmation Page, targets of radar, potential impactors, targets of spacecraft observations or visits, and PHAs with future close approaches to Earth receive priority for astrometry.