1,121 research outputs found
Developing, implementing and evaluating an international minor in acute care.
Background and purpose
To meet the ongoing requirements of society physiotherapy students should be trained in all conditions and contexts throughout the life cycle of their clients. Training physiotherapy students in the knowledge and skills required to operate in acute settings both expands and improves their entry level competencies.
Description
Escola Superior do Alcoitão (Portugal) and Hanze University of Applied Sciences (Netherlands) took the initiative to develop a Minor in the spring semester of 2018 with the collaboration of teachers from both institutions. The contents were based on international competences descriptors of an Acute Care Physiotherapist, and pedagogical and assessment strategies were chosen to reflect the competences to be achieved; with a strong focus on active learning. A student's satisfaction questionnaire was carried out, on a weekly basis and at the end of the Minor, that revealed a favorable opinion regarding the contents, pedagogical approaches, support documentations and teacher support.
Importance
Based on the positive input by both the students and institutions, we consider the pilot to have been successful. Next steps are to upscale it to include more students and the collaboration of more teachers or institutions. Interested in discussing or joining the initiative feel free to contact the Authors.N/
Model for a Universe described by a non-minimally coupled scalar field and interacting dark matter
In this work it is investigated the evolution of a Universe where a scalar
field, non-minimally coupled to space-time curvature, plays the role of
quintessence and drives the Universe to a present accelerated expansion. A
non-relativistic dark matter constituent that interacts directly with dark
energy is also considered, where the dark matter particle mass is assumed to be
proportional to the value of the scalar field. Two models for dark matter
pressure are considered: the usual one, pressureless, and another that comes
from a thermodynamic theory and relates the pressure with the coupling between
the scalar field and the curvature scalar. Although the model has a strong
dependence on the initial conditions, it is shown that the mixture consisted of
dark components plus baryonic matter and radiation can reproduce the expected
red-shift behavior of the deceleration parameter, density parameters and
luminosity distance.Comment: 11 pages and 6 figures. To appear in GR
Palatini approach to 1/R gravity and its implications to the late Universe
By applying the Palatini approach to the 1/R-gravity model it is possible to
explain the present accelerated expansion of the Universe. Investigation of the
late Universe limiting case shows that: (i) due to the curvature effects the
energy-momentum tensor of the matter field is not covariantly conserved; (ii)
however, it is possible to reinterpret the curvature corrections as sources of
the gravitational field, by defining a modified energy-momentum tensor; (iii)
with the adoption of this modified energy-momentum tensor the Einstein's field
equations are recovered with two main modifications: the first one is the
weakening of the gravitational effects of matter whereas the second is the
emergence of an effective varying "cosmological constant"; (iv) there is a
transition in the evolution of the cosmic scale factor from a power-law scaling
to an asymptotically exponential scaling ; (v) the energy density of the matter field scales as ; (vi) the present age of the Universe and the
decelerated-accelerated transition redshift are smaller than the corresponding
ones in the CDM model.Comment: 5 pages and 2 figures. Accepted in PR
Explaining the Higgs Decays at the LHC with an Extended Electroweak Model
We show that the recent discovery of a new boson at the LHC, which we assume
to be a Higgs boson, and the observed enhancement in its diphoton decays
compared to the SM prediction, can be explained by a new doublet of charged
vector bosons from an extended electroweak gauge sector model with
SU(3)_C\otimesSU(3)_L\otimesU(1)_X symmetry. Our results show a good
agreement between our theoretical expected sensitivity to a 126--125 GeV Higgs
boson and the experimental significance observed in the diphoton channel at the
8 TeV LHC. Effects of an invisible decay channel for the Higgs boson are also
taken into account, in order to anticipate a possible confirmation of deficits
in the branching ratios into , , bottom quarks, and tau leptons.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figure
Effective Functional Form of Regge Trajectories
We present theoretical arguments and strong phenomenological evidence that
hadronic Regge trajectories are essentially nonlinear and can be well
approximated, for phenomenological purposes, by a specific square-root form.Comment: 29 pages, LaTeX. Published versio
Delay times and reflection in chaotic cavities with absorption
Absorption yields an additional exponential decay in open quantum systems
which can be described by shifting the (scattering) energy E along the
imaginary axis, E+i\hbar/2\tau_{a}. Using the random matrix approach, we
calculate analytically the distribution of proper delay times (eigenvalues of
the time-delay matrix) in chaotic systems with broken time-reversal symmetry
that is valid for an arbitrary number of generally nonequivalent channels and
an arbitrary absorption rate 1/\tau_{a}. The relation between the average delay
time and the ``norm-leakage'' decay function is found. Fluctuations above the
average at large values of delay times are strongly suppressed by absorption.
The relation of the time-delay matrix to the reflection matrix S^{\dagger}S is
established at arbitrary absorption that gives us the distribution of
reflection eigenvalues. The particular case of single-channel scattering is
explicitly considered in detail.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures; final version to appear in PRE (relation to
reflection extended, new material with Fig.3 added, experiment
cond-mat/0305090 discussed
Epidemiological situation of bovine brucellosis in the State of Bahia, Brazil
O trabalho consistiu em estratificar o Estado da Bahia em quatro regiões com características homogêneas (circuitos produtores) para que fossem amostradas aleatoriamente, em cada uma delas, 300 propriedades. Em cada propriedade foram escolhidas, de forma aleatória, 10 a 15 fêmeas bovinas adultas, das quais foi obtida uma amostra de sangue. No total, foram amostrados 10.816 animais, provenientes de 1.413 propriedades. O protocolo de testes utilizado foi o da triagem com o teste do antígeno acidificado tamponado (Rosa Bengala) e a confirmação dos positivos com o teste do 2-mercaptoetanol. O rebanho foi considerado positivo se pelo menos um animal reagiu às duas provas sorológicas. As prevalências de focos e a de fêmeas adultas soropositivas do Estado foram de 4,2% [3,1-5,3%] e 0,66% [0,41-0,93%], respectivamente. Para os circuitos produtores foram: circuito 1, 5,8% [3,6-8,7%] e 0,86% [0,41-1,3%]; circuito 2, 3,1% [1,5-5,6%] e 1,2% [0,25-2,1%]; circuito 3, 6,3% [4,0-9,3%] e 1,7% [0,66-2,7%]; e circuito 4, 0,60% [0,07-2,2%] e 0,07 [0,00-0,21%]. Para a análise de fatores de riscos associados à doença foi aplicado um questionário epidemiológico em cada propriedade visitada. Os fatores de risco (odds ratio, OR) associados à condição de foco foram: compra de reprodutores (OR= 2,27) e presença de áreas alagadiças (OR= 1,76). A vacinação de fêmeas de três até oito meses de idade foi um fator de proteção (OR= 0,53). ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACTA study to characterize the epidemiological situation of bovine brucellosis in the State of Bahia was carried out in 2004. The State was divided into four similar production regions, 300 herds were randomly sampled in each region, and 10 to 15 adult bovine females were sampled in each of these herds. A total of 10,816 serum samples from 1,413 herds were collected. The serum samples were screened for antibodies to Brucella spp. by the Rose-Bengal Test (RBT), and all RBT-positive sera were re-tested by the 2-mercaptoethanol test (2-ME) for confirmation. A herd was considered positive if at least one animal was positive on both RBT and 2-ME tests. The prevalence of infected herds and seropositive adult bovine females in Bahia State were: 4.2% [3.1-5.3%] and 0.66% [0.41-0.93%], respectively. In the production regions, prevalence of infected herds and animals were, respectively: region 1, 5.8% [3.6-8.7%] and 0.86% [0.41-1.3%]; region 2, 3.1% [1.5-5.6%] and 1.2% [0.25-2.1%]; region 3, 6.3% [4.0-9.3%] and 1.7% [0.66-2.7%]; and region 4, 0.60% [0.07-2.2%] and 0.07%[0.00-0.2%]. In each herd, an epidemiological questionnaire was applied. The risk factors (odds ratio, OR) associated with the presence of the infection were: purchase of breeding animals (OR = 2.27) and presence of flood areas (OR= 1.76). Vaccination of heifers from three to eight months of age was a protective factor (OR=0.53)
Where do teens smoke? Smoking locations of adolescents in Europe in relation to smoking bans in bars, schools and homes
This study aimed to assess where European adolescents smoke. Data of 2,140 13-19-year-olds from 55 secondary schools in seven European cities was analysed using multilevel logistic regression analyses. Adolescents most often reported regularly smoking in ‘other public locations (e.g., streets and parks)’ (69%) and friends’ homes (50%). Adolescents were less likely to smoke in bars, at school or at home when exposed to strong smoking bans at these locations. Bans on smoking in bars or at home were associated with regular smoking in other public locations, suggesting that smoking may have displaced towards these locations
The Large Magellanic Cloud and the Distance Scale
The Magellanic Clouds, especially the Large Magellanic Cloud, are places
where multiple distance indicators can be compared with each other in a
straight-forward manner at considerable precision. We here review the distances
derived from Cepheids, Red Variables, RR Lyraes, Red Clump Stars and Eclipsing
Binaries, and show that the results from these distance indicators generally
agree to within their errors, and the distance modulus to the Large Magellanic
Cloud appears to be defined to 3% with a mean value of 18.48 mag, corresponding
to 49.7 Kpc. The utility of the Magellanic Clouds in constructing and testing
the distance scale will remain as we move into the era of Gaia.Comment: 23 pages, accepted for publication in Astrophysics and Space Science.
From a presentation at the conference The Fundamental Cosmic Distance Scale:
State of the Art and the Gaia Perspective, Naples, May 201
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