Female Military Sexual Trauma: A Critical and Comprehensive Literature Review

Military Sexual Trauma (MST) refers to a psychological trauma that resulted from any sexual assault or threatening sexual harassment that a military member experienced during his or her military service. Military sexual trauma is a significant problem within the United States military that threatens the strength, readiness, and morale of the military, and has devastating personal effects on survivors and their families. During 2006, the military began taking steps to understand the prevalence of MST and implement programs to help prevent it. Despite some of the progress these programs have shown, there are still barriers that impede an MST survivor’s reporting and treatment seeking behaviors. This literature review examines the prevalence of MST and the impact it has on survivors, explores barriers service members face reporting and seeking treatment and reviews treatments for MST. This literature review also examines the history of proposed and implemented legal protection acts pertinent to MST and discusses their benefits and limitations. Finally, recommendations from the literature are discussed pertaining to future research and clinical practice

Factors Affecting Adoption of Quality Assurance in Australian Redmeat Industries

Livestock Production/Industries,

Estrogen and the innate epithelial defences of the urogenital tract

PhD ThesisApproximately 40% of women will experience at least one urinary tract infection (UTI) in their lifetime and 25% of these women will go on to suffer recurrent UTIs. After the menopause, the risk of developing a recurrent UTI doubles, which is putatively linked to reduced estrogen levels. Topical vaginal estrogen treatment in postmenopausal women has been shown to reduce the incidence of UTIs. However, the mechanism by which vaginal estrogen helps to protect against UTIs is not well understood. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), secreted in response to infection and functioning via bacterial cell lysis, are an important component of the host innate immune response to infection. The aim of this project was to investigate the effects of estrogen treatment on vaginal epithelial AMP expression and synthesis. Immortalised vaginal epithelial cells (VK2 E6/E7), used to model the vaginal epithelium, were treated with 4nM 17β-estradiol for seven days and then challenged with 50ng/ml flagellin (isolated from Escherichia coli clinical UTI isolate) for 24 hours. Combined estrogen pretreatment plus flagellin resulted in a 2.3- and 2.1-fold increase in expression of the AMPs human β-defensin 2 (hBD2) and hBD3, respectively, above that observed with flagellin challenge alone (p-values <0.001). Microarray analyses identified upregulation of the AMPs LCN2, RNase 7, S100A7, S100A12, SLPI, by estrogen pretreatment plus flagellin in addition to hBD2 and hBD3. Furthermore, several genes relating to keratinisation (for example keratin and SPRR genes) and inflammation (for example SERPINB4, S100A8 and S100A9) were also upregulated suggesting that estrogen pretreatment stimulated multiple protective responses in VK2 cells. A hBD2 luciferase reporter vector containing a 2032bp hBD2 promoter region was used to measure hBD2 expression in response to estrogen and flagellin treatments. Reporter activity in VK2 cells significantly increased 2.1-fold following seven day estrogen pretreatment (4nM) plus flagellin (50ng/ml) challenge compared to flagellin challenge without estrogen pretreatment (p=0.0367). Six estrogen response elements (EREs) were identified in the hBD2 promoter and were mutated by site-directed mutagenesis. Mutation of each of the EREs abolished hBD2 gene expression potentiation by estrogen pretreatment plus flagellin, suggesting that hBD2 is regulated through ER-α or ER-β binding to EREs in the hBD2 promoter. Pathway analysis of the microarray data identified IL-17A as a potential regulator of AMP expression. Thus, VK2 cells were challenged with exogenous IL-17A in concentrations ranging from 0.1ng/ml to 100ng/ml for 24 hours. The expression of hBD2, LCN2, RNase 7, and S100A7 was significantly increased between 2- and 21- fold in an IL-17A dose dependent manner (p-values <0.001). In addition, estrogen pretreatment of VK2 cells prior to challenge with IL-17A (100ng/ml) plus flagellin (50ng/ml) significantly increased the expression of hBD2, hBD3 and S100A7 by between 1.4- and 1.6-fold compared to IL-17A plus flagellin without estrogen (p-values <0.05). These data indicated an important role for estrogen in AMP expression even in the presence of proinflammatory cytokines, such as IL-17A. Altogether, these data indicated that estrogen is an important regulator of innate epithelial defences of the urogenital tract. These results suggest that estrogen protects against UTIs by augmenting the vaginal antimicrobial response to infection and by strengthening the epithelial barrier to infections. Hence, loss of estrogen following the menopause leaves postmenopausal women susceptible to repeated UTIs

Depressive Symptoms following Recent Sexual Assault: The Role of Drug and Alcohol Use, Acute Stress, and Assault Characteristics

Sexual assault is a common traumatic experience that can have a wide-ranging impact on psychological functioning, including experience of depressive symptoms. While many studies have examined lifetime rates of depression among those with sexual assault history, less is known regarding risk factors for depressive symptoms following recent sexual assault. The study examined whether drug use history is uniquely related to depressive symptoms following recent assault. Method: N = 65 individuals (5.4% female; 73.8% white; M(SD)age = 28.89 (10.29)) who had recently experienced sexual assault (less than 60 days) and completed a SAMFE were interviewed via phone and completed questionnaires regarding depressive and acute/posttraumatic stress symptoms and substance use history. Demographic information as well as information related to the assault was also collected. Results: 68.7% of the sample reported clinically significant levels of depressive symptoms (PHQ-9 scores ≥ 12). In a linear mixed model, drug use was significantly related depressive symptoms (β = .19, p = .04), even controlling for acute/posttraumatic stress (β = .72, p .05). Conclusion: Results highlight the potential role of drug use in increasing risk for experiencing clinically significant depressive symptoms following recent assault

An Exploration of Theatre Rehearsals in Social Virtual Reality

Virtual Reality (VR) offers potential for theatre makers to rehearse remotely in settings which are uniquely immersive. In collaboration with a major drama school in the United Kingdom, a longitudinal diary study was completed to examine the utility of consumer-grade VR for theatre rehearsals. Utilising commonly affordable headsets and general-purpose Social VR applications, 10 experienced students (2 directors, 8 actors) rehearsed scenes in VR over 3 weeks, before performing them in person. Participants detailed their experiences in diary logs and interviews, expressing the ability to work through spatial arrangements (blocking) as a full body avatar to be positively beneficial. Limitations included the absence of facial expressions and gestural nuance. Our overarching conclusion is that low-tech VR can be a useful aid in theatre rehearsals and early stages of production. In conclusion we outline design recommendations for a) using VR in theatre production and b) research and development of Social VR.</p

An Exploration of Theatre Rehearsals in Social Virtual Reality

Virtual Reality (VR) offers potential for theatre makers to rehearse remotely in settings which are uniquely immersive. In collaboration with a major drama school in the United Kingdom, a longitudinal diary study was completed to examine the utility of consumer-grade VR for theatre rehearsals. Utilising commonly affordable headsets and general-purpose Social VR applications, 10 experienced students (2 directors, 8 actors) rehearsed scenes in VR over 3 weeks, before performing them in person. Participants detailed their experiences in diary logs and interviews, expressing the ability to work through spatial arrangements (blocking) as a full body avatar to be positively beneficial. Limitations included the absence of facial expressions and gestural nuance. Our overarching conclusion is that low-tech VR can be a useful aid in theatre rehearsals and early stages of production. In conclusion we outline design recommendations for a) using VR in theatre production and b) research and development of Social VR.</p

Long-path quantum cascade laser–based sensor for methane measurements

Author Posting. © American Meteorological Society, 2016. This article is posted here by permission of American Meteorological Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology 33 (2016): 2373-2384, doi:10.1175/JTECH-D-16-0024.1.A long-path methane (CH4) sensor was developed and field deployed using an 8-μm quantum cascade laser. The high optical power (40 mW) of the laser allowed for path-integrated measurements of ambient CH4 at total pathlengths from 100 to 1200 m with the use of a retroreflector. Wavelength modulation spectroscopy was used to make high-precision measurements of atmospheric pressure–broadened CH4 absorption over these long distances. An in-line reference cell with higher harmonic detection provided metrics of system stability in rapidly changing and harsh environments. The system consumed less than 100 W of power and required no consumables. The measurements intercompared favorably (typically less than 5% difference) with a commercial in situ methane sensor when accounting for the different spatiotemporal scales of the measurements. The sensor was field deployed for 2 weeks at an arctic lake to examine the robustness of the approach in harsh field environments. Short-term precision over a 458-m pathlength was 10 ppbv at 1 Hz, equivalent to a signal from a methane enhancement above background of 5 ppmv in a 1-m length. The sensor performed well in a range of harsh environmental conditions, including snow, rain, wind, and changing temperatures. These field measurements demonstrate the capabilities of the approach for use in detecting large but highly variable emissions in arctic environments.The authors gratefully acknowledge funding for this work by MIRTHE through NSF-ERC Grant EEC-0540832. D. J. Miller acknowledges support by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship under Grant DGE-0646086. K. Sun acknowledges support by the NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship IIP-1263579.2017-05-0

The early decline in renal function in patients with type 1 diabetes and proteinuria predicts the risk of end stage renal disease

The risk of end-stage renal disease (ESRD) remains high in patients with type 1diabetes and proteinuria; however, little is known about the rate of decline in their renal function. To help determine this we enrolled patients with 1 diabetes and proteinuria whose estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) was normal (equal to or above 60 ml/min/1.73$m^2$). Using a minimum of 5 serial measurements of serum creatinine for 161 patients, we determined individual trajectories of eGFR change and the occurrence of ESRD during 5–18 years of follow-up. The rates were linear for 110 patients, for 24 the non-linear rate was mild enough to satisfy a linear model, and the rates were clearly non-linear for only 27 patients. Overall, in more than one third of patients, the eGFR decline was less than 3.5 ml/min/1.73$m^2$ per year and the lifetime risk of ESRD could be considered negligible. In the remainder of patients, eGFR declined with widely different slopes and ESRD developed within 2 to 18 years. Based on up to five years observation when renal function was within the normal range, the estimates of early eGFR slope predicted the risk of ESRD during subsequent follow-up better than the baseline clinical characteristics of glycated hemoglobin, blood pressure, or the albumin to creatinine ratio. Thus, the early slope of eGFR decline in patients with type 1diabetes and proteinuria can be used to predict the risk of ESRD