Palaeopathology and horse domestication: the case of some Iron Age horses horn the Altai Mountains, Siberia

We discuss the use of palaeopathological indicators in horse skeletons as potential sources I of evidence about the use of horses for riding and traction. We suggest that this type of information can provide an important and perhaps more reliable complement to other indicators of domestication such as morphological changes, kill-off patterns and bit wear, which suffer from various ambiguities of interpretation. We emphasise the importance of studying the skeletons of modern control samples of horses of known life histories as a constraint on the interpretation of palaeopathological evidence and demonstrate the viability of the technique through a comparison of free-living Exmoor ponies with Iron Age Scythian horse remains from Siberia. We demonstrate that stresses caused by riding produce characteristic lesions on the vertebrae which can be distinguished from age-related damage in free-living animals, and in addition that these stresses could have been moderated by changes of saddle design in the Medieval period. These results also throw new light on customs associated with horse burial

The Relationship Between Locus Of Control And Body Weight Utilizing The Weight Locus Of Control Table

This was a descriptive study designed to correlate the Weight Locus of Control scale with body weight. The researcher hypothesized that there would be no significant correlation between body weight and the scores on the Weight Locus of Control scale. The Weight Locus of Control scale and a researcher-designed demographic tool were administered to 50 subjects between the ages of 18 and 65. Data were analyzed utilizing Pearson Product Moment correlation coefficient. The r value obtained was not significant at the .05 level. The researcher failed to reject the null hypothesis

Low-Temperature Long-Time Simulations of Ising Ferromagnets using the Monte Carlo with Absorbing Markov Chains method

The Monte Carlo with Absorbing Markov Chains (MCAMC) method is introduced. This method is a generalization of the rejection-free method known as the $n$-fold way. The MCAMC algorithm is applied to the study of the very low-temperature properties of the lifetime of the metastable state of Ising ferromagnets. This is done both for square-lattice and cubic-lattice nearest-neighbor models. Comparison is made with exact low-temperature predictions, in particular the low-temperature predictions that the metastable lifetime is discontinuous at particular values of the field. This discontinuity for the square lattice is not seen in finite-temperatures studies. For the cubic lattice, it is shown that these `exact predictions' are incorrect near the fields where there are discontinuities. The low-temperature formula must be modified and the corrected low-temperature predictions are not discontinuous in the energy of the nucleating droplet.Comment: Submitted to Computer Physics Communicatinos, for proceedings of the Conference CCP2001, 4 figure

Trends and burden of diabetes in pregnancy among Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal mothers in Western Australia, 1998–2015

Background Diabetes in pregnancy (DIP), which includes pre-gestational and gestational diabetes, is more prevalent among Aboriginal women. DIP and its adverse neonatal outcomes are associated with diabetes and cardiovascular disease in the offspring. This study investigated the impact of DIP on trends of large for gestational age (LGA) in Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal populations, and added to the limited evidence on temporal trends of DIP burden in these populations. Methods We conducted a retrospective cohort study that included all births in Western Australia between 1998 and 2015 using linked population health datasets. Time trends of age-standardised and crude rates of pre-gestational and gestational diabetes were estimated in Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal mothers. Mixed-effects multivariable logistic regression was used to estimate the association between DIP and population LGA trends over time. Results Over the study period, there were 526,319 births in Western Australia, of which 6.4% were to Aboriginal mothers. The age-standardised annual rates of pre-gestational diabetes among Aboriginal mothers rose from 4.3% in 1998 to 5.4% in 2015 and remained below 1% in non-Aboriginal women. The comparable rates for gestational diabetes increased from 6.7 to 11.5% over the study period in Aboriginal women, and from 3.5 to 10.2% among non-Aboriginal mothers. LGA rates in Aboriginal babies remained high with inconsistent and no improvement in pregnancies complicated by gestational diabetes and pre-gestational diabetes, respectively. Regression analyses showed that DIP explained a large part of the increasing LGA rates over time in Aboriginal babies. Conclusions There has been a substantial increase in the burden of pre-gestational diabetes (Aboriginal women) and gestational diabetes (Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal) in recent decades. DIP appears to substantially contribute to increasing trends in LGA among Aboriginal babies

Competition of Mesoscales and Crossover to Tricriticality in Polymer Solutions

We show that the approach to asymptotic fluctuation-induced critical behavior in polymer solutions is governed by a competition between a correlation length diverging at the critical point and an additional mesoscopic length-scale, the radius of gyration. Accurate light-scattering experiments on polystyrene solutions in cyclohexane with polymer molecular weights ranging from 200,000 up to 11.4 million clearly demonstrate a crossover between two universal regimes: a regime with Ising asymptotic critical behavior, where the correlation length prevails, and a regime with tricritical theta-point behavior determined by a mesoscopic polymer-chain length.Comment: 4 pages in RevTeX with 4 figure

Quantum central limit theorem for continuous-time quantum walks on odd graphs in quantum probability theory

The method of the quantum probability theory only requires simple structural data of graph and allows us to avoid a heavy combinational argument often necessary to obtain full description of spectrum of the adjacency matrix. In the present paper, by using the idea of calculation of the probability amplitudes for continuous-time quantum walk in terms of the quantum probability theory, we investigate quantum central limit theorem for continuous-time quantum walks on odd graphs.Comment: 19 page, 1 figure

Clinical academic career pathway for nursing and allied health professionals: clinical academic role descriptors

The clinical academic pathway outlined highlights the range of typical practice and research-focused activities that a practitioner on a clinical academic career pathway might normally engage in at different levels and points along this career path. The activities are intended as a guide for practitioners interested in learning more about the practice and research components of a clinical academic career, as well as those already employed in clinical academic roles. They may also be useful for health care organisations and Higher Education Institutions as a tool for developing clinical academic roles

Prospects for the Measurement of the Higgs Yukawa Couplings to b and c quarks, and muons at CLIC

The investigation of the properties of the Higgs boson, especially a test of the predicted linear dependence of the branching ratios on the mass of the final state is going to be an integral part of the physics program at colliders at the energy frontier for the foreseeable future. The large Higgs boson production cross section at a 3TeV CLIC machine allows for a precision measurement of the Higgs branching ratios. The cross section times branching ratio of the decays H->bb, H->cc and H->{\mu}{\mu} of a Standard Model Higgs boson with a mass of 120 GeV can be measured with a statistical uncertainty of 0.23%, 3.1% and 15%, respectively, assuming an integrated luminosity of 2 ab-1.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure

Are ultracompact minihalos really ultracompact?

Ultracompact minihalos (UCMHs) have emerged as a valuable probe of the primordial power spectrum of density fluctuations at small scales. UCMHs are expected to form at early times in regions with δρ/ρ≳10-3, and they are theorized to possess an extremely compact ρ∞r-9/4 radial density profile, which enhances their observable signatures. Nonobservation of UCMHs can thus constrain the primordial power spectrum. Using N-body simulations to study the collapse of extreme density peaks at z≃1000, we show that UCMHs forming under realistic conditions do not develop the ρ∞r-9/4 profile and instead develop either ρ∞r-3/2 or ρ∞r-1 inner density profiles depending on the shape of the power spectrum. We also demonstrate via idealized simulations that self-similarity - the absence of a scale length - is necessary to produce a halo with the ρ∞r-9/4 profile, and we argue that this implies such halos cannot form from a Gaussian primordial density field. Prior constraints derived from UCMH nonobservation must be reworked in light of this discovery. Although the shallower density profile reduces UCMH visibility, our findings reduce their signal by as little as O(10-2) while allowing later-forming halos to be considered, which suggests that new constraints could be significantly stronger

Investigation of continuous-time quantum walk on root lattice AnA_n and honeycomb lattice

The continuous-time quantum walk (CTQW) on root lattice $A_n$ (known as hexagonal lattice for $n=2$) and honeycomb one is investigated by using spectral distribution method. To this aim, some association schemes are constructed from abelian group $Z^{\otimes n}_m$ and two copies of finite hexagonal lattices, such that their underlying graphs tend to root lattice $A_n$ and honeycomb one, as the size of the underlying graphs grows to infinity. The CTQW on these underlying graphs is investigated by using the spectral distribution method and stratification of the graphs based on Terwilliger algebra, where we get the required results for root lattice $A_n$ and honeycomb one, from large enough underlying graphs. Moreover, by using the stationary phase method, the long time behavior of CTQW on infinite graphs is approximated with finite ones. Also it is shown that the Bose-Mesner algebras of our constructed association schemes (called $n$-variable $P$-polynomial) can be generated by $n$ commuting generators, where raising, flat and lowering operators (as elements of Terwilliger algebra) are associated with each generator. A system of $n$-variable orthogonal polynomials which are special cases of \textit{generalized} Gegenbauer polynomials is constructed, where the probability amplitudes are given by integrals over these polynomials or their linear combinations. Finally the suppersymmetric structure of finite honeycomb lattices is revealed. Keywords: underlying graphs of association schemes, continuous-time quantum walk, orthogonal polynomials, spectral distribution. PACs Index: 03.65.UdComment: 41 pages, 4 figure