A Directly-Written Monolithic Waveguide-Laser Incorporating a DFB Waveguide-Bragg Grating

We report the fabrication and performance of the first C-band directly-written monolithic waveguide-laser. The waveguide-laser device was created in an Erbium and Ytterbium doped phosphate glass host and consisted of an optical waveguide that included a distributed feedback Bragg grating structure. The femtosecond laser direct-write technique was used to create both the waveguide and the waveguide-Bragg grating simultaneously and in a single processing step. The waveguide-laser was optically pumped at approximately 980 nm and lased at 1537nm with a bandwidth of less than 4 pm.Comment: 6 pages, 13 references, 4 figure

Does the restoration of shallow marginal peatlands impact on the distribution and abundance of Bog Asphodel?

Healthy functional peatlands sequester carbon and are therefore important in the mitigation of climate change. In the United Kingdom 80% of peatland has been damaged by anthropogenic activities such as drainage and peat cutting. Most of the degraded peat is globally rare blanket bog found in upland regions, where the principal land use is livestock grazing. Bog asphodel is a common British wildflower found on blanket bog and other very wet peatland habitats, which can also be fatally poisonous to grazing herbivores especially youngstock. Any increase could compromise the grazing in an already difficult environment. This thesis investigated the growth and distribution of bog asphodel on shallow marginal restored peatlands on Exmoor in south-western United Kingdom, both in the field and from a vegetation survey database spanning 11 years from pre-restoration to present at 40 restored sites. The aims were to describe bog asphodel’s phenology, and to assess its life history strategy and its contribution to sward quality in post-restoration habitats. Bog asphodel’s life history strategy is one of tolerating stress, rather than growing quickly or producing large numbers of seeds. This predicts that it will not respond rapidly to peatland restoration. On Exmoor, this prediction is confirmed by the historic data which show bog asphodel growing only slowly after restoration, and not spreading to other restored sites. Bog asphodel can contribute up to 20% of forage value in the transitional bog habitats that develop after rewetting, both in spring and autumn. The implication for the restoration of shallow marginal peatlands is that bog asphodel persists post restoration but does not spread beyond pre-restoration patches or to other sites. Although it can contribute substantially to forage value in rewetted areas no significant injurious effects have been reported, either because more palatable and accessible grazing is available or because bog asphodel itself is less toxic on account of specific environmental conditions

Health Consequences of Nuclear Fission Products

Radionuclides produced in fission process moves from its source, to human food chain to become available for human consumption determines their effects on his health. According to models used to predict healtheffects of these radionuclides enter the human body, a large number of fatalities, malignancies, thyroid cancer, born (genic) defects, etc. Nevertheless, the actual data after Chernobyl and TMI accidents, and nuclear detonations, were not consistent with these models. Deep Atomic Binding Hypothesis (DAB)), interprets the actual field data

The Effects of Exercise on Pregnancy Outcomes: A Systematic Review

Second Place in Solving Complex Healthcare Issues at 2018 Denman Research ForumMaternal morbidity continues to be a significant problem worldwide. Yet, for every woman who dies of pregnancy-related causes, 20 or 30 others experience acute or chronic morbidity, often with permanent sequelae that undermine their normal functioning. Health behavior interventions, such as increasing physical activity, have potential to reduce the incidence of complications of pregnancy, and reduce the burden of morbidity and mortality for families throughout the world. The purpose of this systematic literature review was to describe if physical activity before and during pregnancy affects the incidence of complications in first pregnancies or recurrence of complications in subsequent pregnancies. Databases used in this review were PubMed, CINAHL, Web of Science, and Cochrane and were searched with predetermined terms. Extensive electronic and manual citation searches were performed to identify relevant papers for review. Inclusion criteria were: full text articles published in English between the years 2003-2018, peer-reviewed, and performed on pregnant female human subjects. Screening, data extraction, and quality assessment were undertaken by two reviewers. Twenty-one studies were utilized in this review and classified by level of evidence, nature of physical activity, if women participated in physical activity before or during pregnancy, and maternal and infant pregnancy and birth data, and if the incidence of pregnancy complications was reduced when physical activity was increased. We described the incidence of pregnancy complications among women who participate in various forms of physical activity before and during pregnancy as reported by these studies. These data were presented in a summary table. Further research on increased physical activity and other health behavior interventions in pregnancy is needed. These data confirm the accuracy of current recommendations that exercise in pregnancy is safe for mother and baby, but is limited in describing whether increased exercise reduces complications of pregnancy. Future research must aim to test exercise in pregnancy in a randomized, controlled, and supervised manner in order to accurately draw conclusions.No embargoAcademic Major: Nursin