Visual Rehabilitation as a Treatment Tool for Collegiate Athletes Post-mTBI to Improve Return to Sport Outcomes

Introduction: Fifty percent of the 46 000 concussions seen in Canada are sports related, with post-concussive syndrome (PCS) impacting up to 30% of those patients. Individuals who experience PCS will often report headaches, dizziness, and blurred vision with visual disturbances reported in 20-85% depending on the nature of the visual deficit. A concussion is a type of traumatic brain injury (TBI) and results from an external insult leading to axonal shearing of nerve fibers, which are responsible for the signs and symptoms experienced. Current best practice in treatment involves initial rest followed by increasing aerobic activity as well as visual rehabilitation to reduce the symptoms associated with a TBI. Visual rehabilitation following TBI can take many forms with the vast majority of research focusing on convergence insufficiency (CI). CI is a condition in which the individual’s eyes are unable to work together when looking at nearby objects and is a common binocular vision deficit after TBI. Near point convergence (NPC) occurs when the visual axes intersect at the maximal effort leading to blurred vision, dizziness, difficulty concentrating and reading. Clinicians should consider screening for NPC and using as a rehabilitation tool when managing TBI. Purpose: The purpose of this literature review was to determine whether visual rehabilitation for CI and NPC is an effective treatment strategy to reduce symptoms associated with a TBI and improve athletes return to life and sport. Recommendations: Research demonstrates that visual rehabilitation for CI and NPC deficiencies will decrease patient reported symptoms and will return NPC to normal ranges. Conclusion: Diagnosis, assessment, and rehabilitation of a TBI should involve the visual system due to the integral connections in all aspects of the brain leading to signs and symptoms which can impair an individual’s function of daily living. Further research regarding different visual markers in TBI is needed regarding treatment, specifically surrounding parameter

Heal-link: using NILDE to provide Public Organizations in Greece with articles from HEAL-Link’s electronic subscriptions

This paper is about the collaboration and cooperation in both software and policies between NILDE, Library of CNR and HEAL-Link. Moreover is about the need of HEAL-Link to acquire and use software in order to fulfill its requirements to setup a document delivery service for the Greek Public Organizations (Hospitals, City Libraries, etc.). HEAL-Link was founded 15 years ago with the aim to provide electronic resources to the members of HEAL-Link. Main goals of HEAL-Link are: −− The collaboration among its members, by establishing common policy on journals subscriptions, to promote rational growth of journals’ collections among members, and achieve both savings and access to a greater number of electronic sources in order to meet the educational and research needs of the users of the participating institutions. −− The joint subscriptions and the management of remote access to electronic resources and information services, including electronic journals. For many years a large number of Public Organizations have been consistently expressing their wish to become active members of HEAL-Link in order to have full-text access to the subscribed electronic resources. But this is very difficult and the main reason is their limited budget to contribute to the cost of the electronic subscriptions of HEAL-Link. Therefore, under the NSRF (National Strategic Reference Framework) 2007–2013, we decided to take advantage of the interlibrary loan terms of the agreements we have with the publishers and setup a document delivery service. After research for software that is used among libraries internationally, we have decided to use the NILDE software. With the great cooperation of the people at CNR, together we managed to make all the necessary changes and modifications in the software so that it can be used for HEAL-Link’s document delivery service. An agreement was signed between CNR and HEAL-Link describing the terms under which NILDE will be used and the terms of collaboration. After signing the agreement, we had a one-week training in Bologna on learning NILDE fundamentals and its source code, and also made most of the changes needed to implement the HEAL-Link version. We were very careful with each needed change in the software so as not to affect the total functionality of the software. As an example of the changes needed in our version only HEAL-Link acts as a lending library. The Libraries of the Public Organizations, that are not allowed to access directly the full-text of the electronic journals, can make a “Document Delivery Request” through NILDE. HEAL-Link sends a copy of the electronic scientific article to them according to the clauses included in the HEAL-Link license agreements with the publishers

Building cubic gravity with healthy and viable scalar and tensor perturbations

We investigate sufficient conditions under which cubic gravity is healthy and viable at the perturbation level. We perform a detailed analysis of the scalar and tensor perturbations. We impose the requirement that the two scalar potentials, whose ratio is the post-Newtonian parameter $\gamma$, should deviate only minimally form general relativity. Additionally, concerning tensor perturbations we impose satisfaction of the LIGO-VIRGO and Fermi Gamma-ray Burst observations, and thus we result to a gravitational-wave equation with gravitational-wave speed equal to the speed of light, and where the only deviation from general relativity appears in the dispersion relation. Furthermore, we show that cubic gravity exhibits an effective Newton's constant that depends on the model parameter, on the background evolution, and on the wavenumber scale. Hence, by requiring its deviation from the standard Newton's constant to be within observational bounds we extract the constraints on the single coupling parameter $\beta$.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures, version published in Eur.Phys.J.

Big Bang Nucleosynthesis constraints on f(T,TG)f(T,T_G) gravity

We confront $f(T,T_G)$ gravity, with Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) requirements. The former is obtained using both the torsion scalar, as well as the teleparallel equivalent of the Gauss-Bonnet term, in the Lagrangian, resulting to modified Friedmann equations in which the extra torsional terms constitute an effective dark energy sector. We calculate the deviations of the freeze-out temperature $T_f$, caused by the extra torsion terms in comparison to $\Lambda$CDM paradigm. Then we impose five specific $f(T,T_G)$ models and we extract the constraints on the model parameters in order for the ratio $|\Delta T_f/ T_f|$ to satisfy the observational BBN bound. As we find, in most of the models the involved parameters are bounded in a narrow window around their General Relativity values as expected, as in the power-law model where the exponent $n$ needs to be $n\lesssim 0.5$. Nevertheless the logarithmic model can easily satisfy the BBN constraints for large regions of the model parameters. This feature should be taken into account in future model building.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures, invited paper to appear in Universe Special Issue "Torsion-Gravity and Spinors in Fundamental Theoretical Physics", Special Issue Editor: Luca Fabbr

Αλγεβρικά μοντέλα πυρηνικής δομής με SU(3) συμμετρία

Εθνικό Μετσόβιο Πολυτεχνείο--Μεταπτυχιακή Εργασία. Διεπιστημονικό-Διατμηματικό Πρόγραμμα Μεταπτυχιακών Σπουδών (Δ.Π.Μ.Σ.) “Φυσική και Τεχνολογικές Εφαρμογές

Performance Evaluation of Manual and Automated (MagNA Pure) Nucleic Acid Isolation in HPV Detection and Genotyping Using Roche Linear Array HPV Test

Nucleic acids of human papillomavirus (HPV) isolated by manual extraction method (AmpliLute) and automated MagNA pure system were compared and evaluated with cytohistological findings in 253 women. The concordance level between AmpliLute and MagNA was very good 93.3% (κ = 0.864, P < .0001). Overall HPVpositivity detected by AmpliLute was 57.3% (30.4% as single and 27% as multiple infections) in contrast to MagNA 54.5% (32% and 23%, resp.). Discrepant results observed in 25 cases: 11 MagNA(−)/AmpliLute(+), 10 of which had positive histology; 5 MagNA(+)/AmpliLute(−) with negative histology; 8 MagNA(+)/AmpliLute(+): in 7 of which AmpliLute detected extra HPV genotypes and 1 MagNA(invalid)/AmpliLute(+) with positive histology. Both methods performed well when compared against cytological (area under curve (AUC) of AmpliLute 0.712 versus 0.672 of MagNA) and histological diagnoses (AUC of AmpliLute 0.935 versus 0.877 of MagNA), with AmpliLute showing a slightly predominance over MagNA. However, higher sensitivities, specificities, and positive/negative predictive values were obtained by AmpliLute

Illthrift in Suckling Lambs Secondary to Umbilical Infections and Possible Implication of Cryptosporidiosis as a Risk Factor

Illthrift was observed in 20/60 lambs aged 40–45 days in a dairy sheep flock in Greece. Cryptosporidiosis had been diagnosed and successfully treated with halofuginone lactate a month earlier. Parasitological examinations were negative for endoparasites while hematology and biochemistry were unremarkable. Necropsy of 5 lambs revealed lung and liver abscessation, presumably secondary to umbilical infections due to poor farm hygiene, though umbilical lesions were not observed. No new cases were observed following treatment of the umbilicus of newborn lambs with chlorexidine. Although umbilical infections are common, this is the first reported case of illthrift in lambs attributed to umbilical infection; illthrift may be the only clinical manifestation of such infections. The prior presence of cryptosporidiosis may have contributed to the severity of the infection through the reduction of local immunity. Recognition of this possibly underdiagnosed or underappreciated condition may improve medical, production, and welfare standards in the sheep industry