Detection of Multi-drug Resistant \u3cem\u3eEscherichia coli\u3c/em\u3e in the Urban Waterways of Milwaukee, WI

Urban waterways represent a natural reservoir of antibiotic resistance which may provide a source of transferable genetic elements to human commensal bacteria and pathogens. The objective of this study was to evaluate antibiotic resistance of Escherichia coli isolated from the urban waterways of Milwaukee, WI compared to those from Milwaukee sewage and a clinical setting in Milwaukee. Antibiotics covering 10 different families were utilized to determine the phenotypic antibiotic resistance for all 259 E. coli isolates. All obtained isolates were determined to be multi-drug resistant. The E. coli isolates were also screened for the presence of the genetic determinants of resistance including ermB (macrolide resistance), tet(M) (tetracycline resistance), and β-lactamases (blaOXA, blaSHV, and blaPSE). E. coli from urban waterways showed a greater incidence of antibiotic resistance to 8 of 17 antibiotics tested compared to human derived sources. These E. coli isolates also demonstrated a greater incidence of resistance to higher numbers of antibiotics compared to the human derived isolates. The urban waterways demonstrated a greater abundance of isolates with co-occurrence of antibiotic resistance than human derived sources. When screened for five different antibiotic resistance genes conferring macrolide, tetracycline, and β-lactam resistance, clinical E. coli isolates were more likely to harbor ermB and blaOXA than isolates from urban waterway. These results indicate that Milwaukee’s urban waterways may select or allow for a greater incidence of multiple antibiotic resistance organisms and likely harbor a different antibiotic resistance gene pool than clinical sources. The implications of this study are significant to understanding the presence of resistance in urban freshwater environments by supporting the idea that sediment from urban waterways serves as a reservoir of antibiotic resistance

Habitable Climate Scenarios for Proxima Centauri b With a Dynamic Ocean

The nearby exoplanet Proxima Centauri b will be a prime future target for characterization, despite questions about its retention of water. Climate models with static oceans suggest that an Earth-like Proxima b could harbor a small dayside region of surface liquid water at fairly warm temperatures despite its weak instellation. We present the first 3-dimensional climate simulations of Proxima b with a dynamic ocean. We find that an ocean-covered Proxima b could have a much broader area of surface liquid water but at much colder temperatures than previously suggested, due to ocean heat transport and depression of the freezing point by salinity. Elevated greenhouse gas concentrations do not necessarily produce more open ocean area because of possible dynamic regime transitions. For an evolutionary path leading to a highly saline present ocean, Proxima b could conceivably be an inhabited, mostly open ocean planet dominated by halophilic life. For an ocean planet in 3:2 spin-orbit resonance, a permanent tropical waterbelt exists for moderate eccentricity. Simulations of Proxima Centauri b may also be a model for the habitability of planets receiving similar instellation from slightly cooler or warmer stars, e.g., in the TRAPPIST-1, LHS 1140, GJ 273, and GJ 3293 systems.Comment: Submitted to Astrobiology; 38 pages, 12 figures, 5 table

Resolving Orbital and Climate Keys of Earth and Extraterrestrial Environments with Dynamics 1.0: A General Circulation Model for Simulating the Climates of Rocky Planets

Resolving Orbital and Climate Keys of Earth and Extraterrestrial Environments with Dynamics (ROCKE-3D) is a 3-Dimensional General Circulation Model (GCM) developed at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies for the modeling of atmospheres of Solar System and exoplanetary terrestrial planets. Its parent model, known as ModelE2 (Schmidt et al. 2014), is used to simulate modern and 21st Century Earth and near-term paleo-Earth climates. ROCKE-3D is an ongoing effort to expand the capabilities of ModelE2 to handle a broader range of atmospheric conditions including higher and lower atmospheric pressures, more diverse chemistries and compositions, larger and smaller planet radii and gravity, different rotation rates (slowly rotating to more rapidly rotating than modern Earth, including synchronous rotation), diverse ocean and land distributions and topographies, and potential basic biosphere functions. The first aim of ROCKE-3D is to model planetary atmospheres on terrestrial worlds within the Solar System such as paleo-Earth, modern and paleo-Mars, paleo-Venus, and Saturn's moon Titan. By validating the model for a broad range of temperatures, pressures, and atmospheric constituents we can then expand its capabilities further to those exoplanetary rocky worlds that have been discovered in the past and those to be discovered in the future. We discuss the current and near-future capabilities of ROCKE-3D as a community model for studying planetary and exoplanetary atmospheres.Comment: Revisions since previous draft. Now submitted to Astrophysical Journal Supplement Serie

Tumour characteristics and survival in familial breast cancer prospectively diagnosed by annual mammography

Women from breast cancer families without a demonstrable BRCA1/2 mutation were subjected to annual mammography from age 30 years onwards. One-hundred and ninety-eight patients were diagnosed prospectively with invasive breast cancer and followed for a total of 1513 years. Overall 10-year survival was 88 %. Together with our previous report that women in such kindreds had about twice the population risk of breast cancer, the combined conclusion was that the overall chances of developing breast cancer causing death within 10 years before 50 years of age was 1 % or less when subjected to annual mammography and current treatment. These are empirical prospective observations which may be used for genetic counselling. The majority (160/194 = 84 %) of patients had ER+ and/or low grade tumours with 92 % 10-year survival. One minor group of the patients had ER- tumours, another small group had high grade tumours with nodal spread, both groups were associated with worse prognosis, but the two groups were not mutually associated

The Self stepping into the shoes of the Other: Understanding and developing self-perceptions of empathy among prospective physical education teachers through a special school placement

Teachers who demonstrate a high degree of empathy are said to have more positive attitudes towards pupils with disabilities. Therefore, this article sought to explore the influence of a special school placement on prospective teachers’ self-perceptions of empathy. Thirty-two final year undergraduate students participated in focus group interviews and were selected because they aspired to be a physical education teacher and had attended a placement in a special school. Interview transcripts were analysed and the following themes constructed: Stepping into the shoes of the Other; Frustrated ‘for’ not ‘with’ pupils with disabilities; Empathy for planning inclusive lessons and ‘reading’ pupil body language; and Knowing when not to show empathy. All prospective teachers felt that: (a) they could empathise with pupils with disabilities; (b) situated learning experiences within the placement enabled them to reflect on the ways in which their empathy influences their teaching now and could continue to do so in the future; and (c) it was important that teachers demonstrated empathy. Thus, it is recommended that all prospective teachers gain some experience teaching in special schools. Our research also warns against teachers claiming the last, conclusive word about who children with disabilities are, what they think, how they feel and what they want, in myriad contexts and situations

Performance of the Gemini Planet Imager Non-Redundant Mask and spectroscopy of two close-separation binaries HR 2690 and HD 142527

The Gemini Planet Imager (GPI) contains a 10-hole non-redundant mask (NRM), enabling interferometric resolution in complement to its coronagraphic capabilities. The NRM operates both in spectroscopic (integral field spectrograph, henceforth IFS) and polarimetric configurations. NRM observations were taken between 2013 and 2016 to characterize its performance. Most observations were taken in spectroscopic mode with the goal of obtaining precise astrometry and spectroscopy of faint companions to bright stars. We find a clear correlation between residual wavefront error measured by the AO system and the contrast sensitivity by comparing phase errors in observations of the same source, taken on different dates. We find a typical 5-$\sigma$ contrast sensitivity of $2-3~\times~10^{-3}$ at $\sim\lambda/D$. We explore the accuracy of spectral extraction of secondary components of binary systems by recovering the signal from a simulated source injected into several datasets. We outline data reduction procedures unique to GPI's IFS and describe a newly public data pipeline used for the presented analyses. We demonstrate recovery of astrometry and spectroscopy of two known companions to HR 2690 and HD 142527. NRM+polarimetry observations achieve differential visibility precision of $\sigma\sim0.4\%$ in the best case. We discuss its limitations on Gemini-S/GPI for resolving inner regions of protoplanetary disks and prospects for future upgrades. We summarize lessons learned in observing with NRM in spectroscopic and polarimetric modes.Comment: Accepted to AJ, 22 pages, 14 figure

Effect of second timed appointments for non-attenders of breast cancer screening in England : a randomised controlled trial

BACKGROUND: In England, participation in breast cancer screening has been decreasing in the past 10 years, approaching the national minimum standard of 70%. Interventions aimed at improving participation need to be investigated and put into practice to stop this downward trend. We assessed the effect on participation of sending invitations for breast screening with a timed appointment to women who did not attend their first offered appointment within the NHS Breast Screening Programme (NHSBSP). METHODS: In this open, randomised controlled trial, women in six centres in the NHSBSP in England who were invited for routine breast cancer screening were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive an invitation to a second appointment with fixed date and time (intervention) or an invitation letter with a telephone number to call to book their new screening appointment (control) in the event of non-attendance at the first offered appointment. Randomisation was by SX number, a sequential unique identifier of each woman within the NHSBSP, and at the beginning of the study a coin toss decided whether women with odd or even SX numbers would be allocated to the intervention group. Women aged 50-70 years who did not attend their first offered appointment were eligible for the analysis. The primary endpoint was participation (ie, attendance at breast cancer screening) within 90 days of the date of the first offered appointment; we used Poisson regression to compare the proportion of women who participated in screening in the study groups. All analyses were by intention to treat. This trial is registered with Barts Health, number 009304QM. FINDINGS: We obtained 33 146 records of women invited for breast cancer screening at the six centres between June 2, 2014, and Sept 30, 2015, who did not attend their first offered appointment. 26 054 women were eligible for this analysis (12 807 in the intervention group and 13 247 in the control group). Participation within 90 days of the first offered appointment was significantly higher in the intervention group (2861 [22%] of 12 807) than in the control group (1632 [12%] of 13 247); relative risk of participation 1·81 (95% CI 1·70-1·93; p<0·0001). INTERPRETATION: These findings show that a policy of second appointments with fixed date and time for non-attenders of breast screening is effective in improving participation. This strategy can be easily implemented by the screening sites and, if combined with simple interventions, could further increase participation and ensure an upward shift in the participation trend nationally. Whether the policy should vary by time since last attended screen will have to be considered. FUNDING: National Health Service Cancer Screening Programmes and Department of Health Policy Research Programme

A Self-Consistent Approach to Neutral-Current Processes in Supernova Cores

The problem of neutral-current processes (neutrino scattering, pair emission, pair absorption, axion emission, \etc) in a nuclear medium can be separated into an expression representing the phase space of the weakly interacting probe, and a set of dynamic structure functions of the medium. For a non-relativistic medium we reduce the description to two structure functions S_A(\o) and S_V(\o) of the energy transfer, representing the axial-vector and vector interactions. $S_V$ is well determined by the single-nucleon approximation while $S_A$ may be dominated by multiply interacting nucleons. Unless the shape of S_A(\o) changes dramatically at high densities, scattering processes always dominate over pair processes for neutrino transport or the emission of right-handed states. Because the emission of right-handed neutrinos and axions is controlled by the same medium response functions, a consistent constraint on their properties from consideration of supernova cooling should use the same structure functions for both neutrino transport and exotic cooling mechanisms.Comment: 33 pages, Te