Qualitative Assessment of the Symptoms and Impact of Pancreatic Exocrine Insufficiency (PEI) to Inform the Development of a Patient-Reported Outcome (PRO) Instrument

Background: Pancreatic exocrine insufficiency (PEI) affects patients with chronic pancreatitis (CP) and cystic fibrosis (CF) who produce insufficient digestive pancreatic enzymes. Common symptoms include steatorrhoea, diarrhea, and abdominal pain. Objective: The objective of the study was to develop and test the content validity of a patient-reported outcome (PRO) instrument assessing PEI symptoms and their impact on health-related quality of life. Methods: Instrument development was supported by a literature review, expert physician interviews (n = 10: Germany 4, UK 3, France 3), and exploratory, qualitative, concept-elicitation interviews with patients with CF and CP with PEI (n = 61: UK 29, Germany 18, France 14) and expert physicians (n = 10). Cognitive debriefing of the draft instrument was then performed with patients with PEI (n = 37: UK 24, Germany 8, France 5), and feasibility was assessed with physicians (n = 3). For all interviews, verbatim transcripts were qualitatively analysed using thematic analysis methods and Atlas.ti computerized qualitative software. All themes were data driven rather than a priori. Results: Patient interviews elicited symptoms and impacts not reported in the literature. Six symptom concepts emerged: pain, bloating, bowel symptoms, nausea/vomiting, eating problems, and tiredness/fatigue. Six impact domains were also identified. A 45-item instrument was developed in English, French, and German for testing in cognitive debriefing patient interviews. Following cognitive debriefing, 18 items were deleted. Conclusion: Rigorous qualitative patient research and expert clinical input supported development of a PEI-specific PRO with the potential to aid management and monitoring of unmet needs among patients with PEI. The next step is to perform psychometric evaluation of the resulting instrument.</p

Prairie strips improve biodiversity and the delivery of multiple ecosystem services from corn–soybean croplands

Loss of biodiversity and degradation of ecosystem services from agricultural lands remain important challenges in the United States despite decades of spending on natural resource management. To date, conservation investment has emphasized engineering practices or vegetative strategies centered on monocultural plantings of nonnative plants, largely excluding native species from cropland. In a catchment-scale experiment, we quantified the multiple effects of integrating strips of native prairie species amid corn and soybean crops, with prairie strips arranged to arrest run-off on slopes. Replacing 10% of cropland with prairie strips increased biodiversity and ecosystem services with minimal impacts on crop production. Compared with catchments containing only crops, integrating prairie strips into cropland led to greater catchment-level insect taxa richness (2.6-fold), pollinator abundance (3.5-fold), native bird species richness (2.1-fold), and abundance of bird species of greatest conservation need (2.1-fold). Use of prairie strips also reduced total water runoff from catchments by 37%, resulting in retention of 20 times more soil and 4.3 times more phosphorus. Corn and soybean yields for catchments with prairie strips decreased only by the amount of the area taken out of crop production. Social survey results indicated demand among both farming and nonfarming populations for the environmental outcomes produced by prairie strips. If federal and state policies were aligned to promote prairie strips, the practice would be applicable to 3.9 million ha of cropland in Iowa alone

Trait Conscientiousness and the Personality Meta-Trait Stability are Associated with Regional White Matter Microstructure

Establishing the neural bases of individual differences in personality has been an enduring topic of interest. However, while a growing literature has sought to characterize grey matter correlates of personality traits, little attention to date has been focused on regional white matter correlates of personality, especially for the personality traits agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness. To rectify this gap in knowledge we used a large sample (n > 550) of older adults who provided data on both personality (International Personality Item Pool) and white matter tract-specific fractional anisotropy (FA) from diffusion tensor MRI. Results indicated that conscientiousness was associated with greater FA in the left uncinate fasciculus (β = 0.17, P < 0.001). We also examined links between FA and the personality meta-trait ‘stability’, which is defined as the common variance underlying agreeableness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism/emotional stability. We observed an association between left uncinate fasciculus FA and stability (β = 0.27, P < 0.001), which fully accounted for the link between left uncinate fasciculus FA and conscientiousness. In sum, these results provide novel evidence for links between regional white matter microstructure and key traits of human personality, specifically conscientiousness and the meta-trait, stability. Future research is recommended to replicate and address the causal directions of these associations

Ancient goat genomes reveal mosaic domestication in the Fertile Crescent.

Current genetic data are equivocal as to whether goat domestication occurred multiple times or was a singular process. We generated genomic data from 83 ancient goats (51 with genome-wide coverage) from Paleolithic to Medieval contexts throughout the Near East. Our findings demonstrate that multiple divergent ancient wild goat sources were domesticated in a dispersed process that resulted in genetically and geographically distinct Neolithic goat populations, echoing contemporaneous human divergence across the region. These early goat populations contributed differently to modern goats in Asia, Africa, and Europe. We also detect early selection for pigmentation, stature, reproduction, milking, and response to dietary change, providing 8000-year-old evidence for human agency in molding genome variation within a partner species

Pathogenetics of alveolar capillary dysplasia with misalignment of pulmonary veins.

Alveolar capillary dysplasia with misalignment of pulmonary veins (ACDMPV) is a lethal lung developmental disorder caused by heterozygous point mutations or genomic deletion copy-number variants (CNVs) of FOXF1 or its upstream enhancer involving fetal lung-expressed long noncoding RNA genes LINC01081 and LINC01082. Using custom-designed array comparative genomic hybridization, Sanger sequencing, whole exome sequencing (WES), and bioinformatic analyses, we studied 22 new unrelated families (20 postnatal and two prenatal) with clinically diagnosed ACDMPV. We describe novel deletion CNVs at the FOXF1 locus in 13 unrelated ACDMPV patients. Together with the previously reported cases, all 31 genomic deletions in 16q24.1, pathogenic for ACDMPV, for which parental origin was determined, arose de novo with 30 of them occurring on the maternally inherited chromosome 16, strongly implicating genomic imprinting of the FOXF1 locus in human lungs. Surprisingly, we have also identified four ACDMPV families with the pathogenic variants in the FOXF1 locus that arose on paternal chromosome 16. Interestingly, a combination of the severe cardiac defects, including hypoplastic left heart, and single umbilical artery were observed only in children with deletion CNVs involving FOXF1 and its upstream enhancer. Our data demonstrate that genomic imprinting at 16q24.1 plays an important role in variable ACDMPV manifestation likely through long-range regulation of FOXF1 expression, and may be also responsible for key phenotypic features of maternal uniparental disomy 16. Moreover, in one family, WES revealed a de novo missense variant in ESRP1, potentially implicating FGF signaling in the etiology of ACDMPV

Restoring Dong Zhongshu (BCE 195 - 115) : an experiment in historical and philosophical resconstruction

This dissertation is intended as a contribution to research on Dong Zhongshu (c. 195 - c. 115 BCE). Dong is generally acknowleged the most important Confucian philosopher of the Former Han dynasty (206 BCE - 6 CE) and is usually-assigned a key role in the adaptation of Confucian thought to the demands of the centralized imperial state. However, recent research has brought his contribution to this process into question. In particular, it has been pointed out that the usual source of evidence for Dong's ideas, the Chunqiu fanlu, is inconsistent with contemporary material in one vital respect - the cosmological framework employed to interpret natural disasters and strange events. The dissertation is divided into four parts. In the first, I reconstruct the events of Dong's life. I review all evidence on his dates of birth and death, his service in the imperial government, and the times at which documents by him were written, determining his chronology with greater accuracy than has been the case previously. I also review the state of Dong's works in the Han, clarifying several anomalies in references to them. The second part relates Dong's philosophy in as much detail as possible, leaving aside all Chunqiu fanlu material except that which can be shown to be authentic. The first chapter deals with Han forerunners of Dong: the Huang-Lao and early Gongyang schools, the Shangshu dazhuan, Lu Jia, and Jia Yi. The second chapter reconstructs a general outline of his philosophical system, and the third discusses three aspects of it for which quantities of reliable material have survived: his legal thought, prognosticatory theory, and attempts to control rain. The picture of Dong as the architect of "Imperial Confucianism," long under suspicion, is revealed as a total fiction: for instance, his cyclical theory of history stated that the Han dynasty was cosmologically bound to abdicate. As earlier suspected, Five Forces concepts were absent from Dong's thought. It is possible to reconstruct details of a Yin-Yang cosmology quite different from that earlier attributed to Dong, although his full system remains somewhat unclear. Part Three traces the development of Gongyang thought from the time of Dong's death up to He Xiu (129 - 172 CE). I demonstrate a correlation between the fortunes of the two branches of the Gongyang tradition and their attitudes to the Wang Mang interregum, and show the close links between Gongyang scholars and the Later Han court. Gongyang thought appears to have been stable for half a century after Dong's death, but in the next fifty years it suffered drastic modifications marked by Five Forces ideas and a historical theory asserting the legitimacy of the Han. The topic of Part Four is the Chunqiu fanlu itself. The first chapter discusses its physical condition, the second reviews previous scholarship, the third investigates Yin-Yang and Five Forces ideas, the fourth takes up a variety of other features, and the fifth is devoted to a detailed analysis of rainmaking. Among other things, it is demonstrated that much physical damage derives from a single copy with 420 words per page, that there are clear traces of earlier independent works within the Chunqiu fanlu, and that several chapters can be dated to the time immediately preceding the accession of Wang Mang. The chapter on seeking rain proves to have been rewritten at least once, with the object of introducing material relevant to the Five Forces. On the other hand, I am also able to show that there are several groups of chapters in the text which may well be from Dong Zhongshu, including some chapters on Yin-Yang and the discussions of the suburban sacrifice.Arts, Faculty ofAsian Studies, Department ofGraduat

Prairie strips improve biodiversity and the delivery of multiple ecosystem services from corn–soybean croplands

Loss of biodiversity and degradation of ecosystem services from agricultural lands remain important challenges in the United States despite decades of spending on natural resource management. To date, conservation investment has emphasized engineering practices or vegetative strategies centered on monocultural plantings of nonnative plants, largely excluding native species from cropland. In a catchment-scale experiment, we quantified the multiple effects of integrating strips of native prairie species amid corn and soybean crops, with prairie strips arranged to arrest run-off on slopes. Replacing 10% of cropland with prairie strips increased biodiversity and ecosystem services with minimal impacts on crop production. Compared with catchments containing only crops, integrating prairie strips into cropland led to greater catchment-level insect taxa richness (2.6-fold), pollinator abundance (3.5-fold), native bird species richness (2.1-fold), and abundance of bird species of greatest conservation need (2.1-fold). Use of prairie strips also reduced total water runoff from catchments by 37%, resulting in retention of 20 times more soil and 4.3 times more phosphorus. Corn and soybean yields for catchments with prairie strips decreased only by the amount of the area taken out of crop production. Social survey results indicated demand among both farming and nonfarming populations for the environmental outcomes produced by prairie strips. If federal and state policies were aligned to promote prairie strips, the practice would be applicable to 3.9 million ha of cropland in Iowa alone.This article is published as Schulte, Lisa A., Jarad Niemi, Matthew J. Helmers, Matt Liebman, J. Gordon Arbuckle, David E. James, Randall K. Kolka et al. "Prairie strips improve biodiversity and the delivery of multiple ecosystem services from corn–soybean croplands." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2017): 201620229. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1620229114. Posted with permission.</p