Sport is king: an investigation into local media coverage of women's sport in the UK East Midlands

There has been a recent interest in research into national media coverage of female sport, particularly single events, but on-going sporting activities by women are rarely reported. This paper attempts to examine this subject at the local level, looking in general at women’s sport and in particular at women’s football in the East Midlands region of the UK. Quantitative methods were used to survey local newspapers and radio stations and interviews were carried out with a range of people relevant to the field of study. The topic of sports media is framed here with reference to research into masculinities and a socialist feminist approach is used to address problems. The data showed there was a significant and on-going imbalance in the amount of coverage and even some signs of a decline in women’s football reporting, in spite of a national resurgence of the sport itself. The authors try to account for this and suggest further areas of future study

XMM-Newton observations of the Seyfert 1 AGN H0557-385

We present XMM-Newton observations of the Seyfert 1 AGN H0557-385. We have conducted a study into the warm absorber present in this source, and using high-resolution RGS data we find that the absorption can be characterised by two phases: a phase with log ionisation parameter xi of 0.50 (where xi is in units of ergs cm/s) and a column of 0.2e21 cm^-2, and a phase with log xi of 1.62 and a column of 1.3e22 cm^-2. An iron K alpha line is detected. Neutral absorption is also present in the source, and we discuss possible origins for this. On the assumption that the ionised absorbers originate as an outflow from the inner edge of the torus, we use a new method for finding the volume filling factor. Both phases of H0557-385 have small volume filling factors (< 1%). We also derive the volume filling factors for a sample of 23 AGN using this assumption and for the absorbers with log xi > 0.7 we find reasonable agreement with the filling factors obtained through the alternative method of equating the momentum flow of the absorbers to the momentum loss of the radiation field. By comparing the filling factors obtained by the two methods, we infer that some absorbers with log xi < 0.7 occur at significantly larger distances from the nucleus than the inner edge of the torus.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRA

Interplay between function and structure in complex networks

We show that abrupt structural transitions can arise in functionally optimal networks, driven by small changes in the level of transport congestion. Our results offer an explanation as to why so many diverse species of network structure arise in Nature (e.g. fungal systems) under essentially the same environmental conditions. Our findings are based on an exactly solvable model system which mimics a variety of biological and social networks. We then extend our analysis by introducing a novel renormalization scheme involving cost motifs, to describe analytically the average shortest path across multiple-ring-and-hub networks. As a consequence, we uncover a 'skin effect' whereby the structure of the inner multi-ring core can cease to play any role in terms of determining the average shortest path across the network.Comment: Expanded version of physics/0508228 with additional new result

Generalized dipole correction for charged surfaces in the repeated-slab approach

First-principles calculations of surfaces or two-dimensional materials with a finite surface charge invariably include an implicit or explicit compensating countercharge. We show that an ideal constant-charge counterelectrode in the vacuum region can be introduced by means of a simple correction to the electrostatic potential in close analogy to the well-known dipole correction for charge-neutral asymmetric slabs. Our generalized dipole correction accounts simultaneously for the sheet-charge electrode and the huge voltage built up between the system of interest and the counterelectrode. We demonstrate its usefulness for two prototypical cases, namely, field evaporation in the presence of huge electric fields (20 V/nm) and the modeling of charged defects at an insulator surface. We also introduce algorithmic improvements to charge initialization and preconditioning in the density functional theory algorithm that proved crucial for ensuring rapid convergence in slab systems with high electric fields

Treatment and outcomes in necrotising autoimmune myopathy: an australian perspective

Necrotising Autoimmune Myopathy (NAM) presents as a subacute proximal myopathy with high creatine kinase levels. It is associated with statin exposure, 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl-CoA reductase (HMGCR) antibody, connective tissue diseases, signal recognition particle (SRP) antibody and malignancy. This case series presents our Western Australian NAM patient cohort: comparing the subgroup presentations, biopsy appearance and treatment outcomes. We retrospectively collected data on patients diagnosed with NAM at the Western Australian Neuroscience Research Institute between the years 2000 and 2015. We identified 20 patients with Necrotising Autoimmune Myopathy: 14 with anti-HMGCR antibodies; two with anti-SRP antibodies; three with connective tissue disease; two as yet unspecified. Median creatine kinase level was 6047units/L (range 1000–17000). The statin naïve patients with HMGCR antibodies and patients with SRP antibodies were the most severely affected subgroups, with higher creatine kinase levels, and were more resistant to immunotherapy. Two or more immunotherapy agents were required in 90%; eight patients required IVIG and rituximab. Steroid weaning commonly precipitated relapses. Four patients had complete remission, and the remaining patients still require immunotherapy. Necrotising Autoimmune Myopathy is a potentially treatable myopathy, which can be precipitated by statin therapy and requires early, aggressive immunotherapy, usually requiring multiple steroid sparing agents for successful steroid weaning

Multistability of free spontaneously-curved anisotropic strips

Multistable structures are objects with more than one stable conformation, exemplified by the simple switch. Continuum versions are often elastic composite plates or shells, such as the common measuring tape or the slap bracelet, both of which exhibit two stable configurations: rolled and unrolled. Here we consider the energy landscape of a general class of multistable anisotropic strips with spontaneous Gaussian curvature. We show that while strips with non-zero Gaussian curvature can be bistable, strips with positive spontaneous curvature are always bistable, independent of the elastic moduli, strips of spontaneous negative curvature are bistable only in the presence of spontaneous twist and when certain conditions on the relative stiffness of the strip in tension and shear are satisfied. Furthermore, anisotropic strips can become tristable when their bending rigidity is small. Our study complements and extends the theory of multistability in anisotropic shells and suggests new design criteria for these structures.Comment: 20 pages, 10 figure

Fast Simulation of Facilitated Spin Models

We show how to apply the absorbing Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm of Novotny to simulate kinetically constrained models of glasses. We consider in detail one-spin facilitated models, such as the East model and its generalizations to arbitrary dimensions. We investigate how to maximise the efficiency of the algorithms, and show that simulation times can be improved on standard continuous time Monte Carlo by several orders of magnitude. We illustrate the method with equilibrium and aging results. These include a study of relaxation times in the East model for dimensions d=1 to d=13, which provides further evidence that the hierarchical relaxation in this model is present in all dimensions. We discuss how the method can be applied to other kinetically constrained models.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure

British research in accounting and finance (2001–2007): the 2008 research assessment exercise

No abstract available

SYSTEMS-2: a randomised phase II study of radiotherapy dose escalation for pain control in malignant pleural mesothelioma

SYSTEMS-2 is a randomised study of radiotherapy dose escalation for pain control in 112 patients with malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM). Standard palliative (20Gy/5#) or dose escalated treatment (36Gy/6#) will be delivered using advanced radiotherapy techniques and pain responses will be compared at week 5. Data will guide optimal palliative radiotherapy in MPM