Internet access for disabled people: Understanding socio-relational factors in Europe

Access to the Internet has become a sine qua non-of everyday life. It also offers new routes to economic and social inclusion for disabled people. Research on the digital divide shows that social factors affect Internet access but disability status is often overlooked. This paper assesses the extent to which disability makes a difference and how it interacts with other social effects to produce distinctive forms of digital exclusion. The analysis uses survey data from 27 European countries to explore and model, statistically, the interactions between Internet access, disability status, age, gender, education, household financial situation and household composition. Multilevel analysis confirms that socio-demographic factors can explain much variance in outcomes but there is a distinctive disability effect. In particular, the adverse effects of financial constraint, aging and living alone are exacerbated among disabled people. New policies to strengthen e-accessibility, arising from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and from the European Union, are important but cannot ignore those who are still excluded from the online revolution. Disabled people are over-represented in this group. The evidence suggests that both accessible technologies and appropriate supportive relationships are needed to address this

Constraining recent lead pollution sources in the North Pacific using ice core stable lead isotopes

Trends and sources of lead (Pb) aerosol pollution in the North Pacific rim of North America from 1850 to 2001 are investigated using a high-resolution (subannual to annual) ice core record recovered from Eclipse Icefield (3017 masl; St. Elias Mountains, Canada). Beginning in the early 1940s, increasing Pb concentration at Eclipse Icefield occurs coevally with anthropogenic Pb deposition in central Greenland, suggesting that North American Pb pollution may have been in part or wholly responsible in both regions. Isotopic ratios (208Pb/207Pb and 206Pb/207Pb) from 1970 to 2001 confirm that a portion of the Pb deposited at Eclipse Icefield is anthropogenic, and that it represents a variable mixture of East Asian (Chinese and Japanese) emissions transported eastward across the Pacific Ocean and a North American component resulting from transient meridional atmospheric flow. Based on comparison with source material Pb isotope ratios, Chinese and North American coal combustion have likely been the primary sources of Eclipse Icefield Pb over the 1970–2001 time period. The Eclipse Icefield Pb isotope composition also implies that the North Pacific mid-troposphere is not directly impacted by transpolar atmospheric flow from Europe. Annually averaged Pb concentrations in the Eclipse Icefield ice core record show no long-term trend during 1970–2001; however, increasing 208Pb/207Pb and decreasing 206Pb/207Pb ratios reflect the progressive East Asian industrialization and increase in Asian pollutant outflow. The post-1970 decrease in North American Pb emissions is likely necessary to explain the Eclipse Icefield Pb concentration time series. When compared with low (lichen) and high (Mt. Logan ice core) elevation Pb data, the Eclipse ice core record suggests a gradual increase in pollutant deposition and stronger trans-Pacific Asian contribution with rising elevation in the mountains of the North Pacific rim

The fine-scale architecture of structural variants in 17 mouse genomes.

BACKGROUND: Accurate catalogs of structural variants (SVs) in mammalian genomes are necessary to elucidate the potential mechanisms that drive SV formation and to assess their functional impact. Next generation sequencing methods for SV detection are an advance on array-based methods, but are almost exclusively limited to four basic types: deletions, insertions, inversions and copy number gains. RESULTS: By visual inspection of 100 Mbp of genome to which next generation sequence data from 17 inbred mouse strains had been aligned, we identify and interpret 21 paired-end mapping patterns, which we validate by PCR. These paired-end mapping patterns reveal a greater diversity and complexity in SVs than previously recognized. In addition, Sanger-based sequence analysis of 4,176 breakpoints at 261 SV sites reveal additional complexity at approximately a quarter of structural variants analyzed. We find micro-deletions and micro-insertions at SV breakpoints, ranging from 1 to 107 bp, and SNPs that extend breakpoint micro-homology and may catalyze SV formation. CONCLUSIONS: An integrative approach using experimental analyses to train computational SV calling is essential for the accurate resolution of the architecture of SVs. We find considerable complexity in SV formation; about a quarter of SVs in the mouse are composed of a complex mixture of deletion, insertion, inversion and copy number gain. Computational methods can be adapted to identify most paired-end mapping patterns

Involvement of the histaminergic system in the resuscitating effect of centrally acting leptin in haemorrhagic shock in rats

Leptin, acting centrally as a neuromodulator, induces the activation of the sympathetic nervous system, which may lead to a pressor action in normotensive animals. In haemorrhagic shock, leptin administered intracerebroventricularly (icv.) evokes the resuscitating effect, with long-lasting rises in mean arterial pressure (MAP) and heart rate (HR), subsequent increase in peripheral blood flows, and a 100% survival at 2 h. Since leptin is able to activate histaminergic neurons, and centrally acting histamine also induces the resuscitating effect with the activation of the sympathetic nervous system, in the present study, we investigated an involvement of the histaminergic system in leptin-evoked cardiovascular effects in haemorrhagic shock. The model of irreversible haemorrhagic shock, with MAP decreased to and stabilised at 20 - 25 mmHg, has been used. Leptin (20 μg) given icv. at 5 min of critical hypotension evoked 181.5% increase in extracellular hypothalamic histamine concentration during the first 10 min after injection. Rises in MAP, HR and renal, mesenteric and hindquarters blood flows induced by leptin were inhibited by icv. pre-treatment with histamine H1 receptor antagonist chlorpheniramine (50 nmol). In contrast, there was no effect of H2, H3 and H4 receptor antagonists ranitidine (25 nmol), VUF 5681 (25 nmol) and JNJ 10191584 (25 nmol), respectively. In conclusion, the histaminergic system is involved in centrally-acting leptin-induced resuscitating effect in haemorrhagic shock in rats

European climate response to tropical volcanic eruptions over the last half millennium

We analyse the winter and summer climatic signal following 15 major tropical volcanic eruptions over the last half millennium based on multi-proxy reconstructions for Europe. During the first and second post-eruption years we find significant continental scale summer cooling and somewhat drier conditions over Central Europe. In the Northern Hemispheric winter the volcanic forcing induces an atmospheric circulation response that significantly follows a positive NAO state connected with a significant overall warm anomaly and wetter conditions over Northern Europe. Our findings compare well with GCM studies as well as observational studies, which mainly cover the substantially shorter instrumental period and thus include a limited set of major eruptions

Glaciochemical records from the Saint Elias Mountains, Yukon, Canada

While many paleoclimate records have been recovered from the North Atlantic sector of the Arctic, there is a gap in our understanding of climactic and environmental change in the North Pacific. Glaciochemical records from the St. Elias Mountains spanning an elevation range of three to five km provide a three-dimensional view of the paleo-atmosphere in this region. Three ice cores from Eclipse Icefield provide a high-resolution record of precipitation chemistry in the remote northwestern North America mid-troposphere and allow investigation of spatial and temporal variability in glaciochemical signals. Greater spatial variability is observed for species present as coarse mode dust and sea salt particles than for accumulation mode sulfate and ammonium aerosols or gas phase nitrate. Simultaneous sampling of aerosol and snow chemistry at King Col indicates large enrichments of nitrate and chloride in snow relative to aerosol by scavenging of gas phase nitric and hydrochloric acid. Back trajectories document the transport of Asian dust and anthropogenic emissions, the May 22 eruption plume of Sheveluch, Kamchatka, and sea salt from the Gulf of Alaska to King Col during the sampling period. The Eclipse ice cores provide a record of forest fire activity in Alaska and the Yukon that responds to anthropogenic influences such as the Klondike Gold Rush and natural climate variability such as the Medieval Warm Period. The Eclipse and Mt. Logan ice cores offer a record of regionally significant volcanic eruptions, with at least one-third of the eruptions recorded from Alaskan and Kamchatkan volcanoes. Major tropical eruptions are also recorded. The three Eclipse cores record similar volcanic sulfate fluxes from the largest eruptions such as Katmai, as well as some moderate eruptions. While a bipolar volcanic signal in 1809 is generally attributed to single tropical eruption, dacitic tephra from the Eclipse ice core that is chemically distinct from andesitic 1809 tephra found in Antarctica indicates a second eruption in the Northern Hemisphere at this time. Sulfate flux calculations suggest this eruption contributed little additional sulfate to circum-Arctic ice cores, and therefore had negligible climatic significance

Computational cytometer based on magnetically modulated coherent imaging and deep learning.

Detecting rare cells within blood has numerous applications in disease diagnostics. Existing rare cell detection techniques are typically hindered by their high cost and low throughput. Here, we present a computational cytometer based on magnetically modulated lensless speckle imaging, which introduces oscillatory motion to the magnetic-bead-conjugated rare cells of interest through a periodic magnetic force and uses lensless time-resolved holographic speckle imaging to rapidly detect the target cells in three dimensions (3D). In addition to using cell-specific antibodies to magnetically label target cells, detection specificity is further enhanced through a deep-learning-based classifier that is based on a densely connected pseudo-3D convolutional neural network (P3D CNN), which automatically detects rare cells of interest based on their spatio-temporal features under a controlled magnetic force. To demonstrate the performance of this technique, we built a high-throughput, compact and cost-effective prototype for detecting MCF7 cancer cells spiked in whole blood samples. Through serial dilution experiments, we quantified the limit of detection (LoD) as 10 cells per millilitre of whole blood, which could be further improved through multiplexing parallel imaging channels within the same instrument. This compact, cost-effective and high-throughput computational cytometer can potentially be used for rare cell detection and quantification in bodily fluids for a variety of biomedical applications