Impacts of free concessionary travel in English rural regions from April 2006

Impacts of providing free (rather than half-fare) travel to those aged over 60. Case study of Salisbury Distruct, showing that much of the growth was due to new pass-holders, whose charactertstics differed significantly from the existing pass-holders

Predicting the Effect of Gaps Between Pallet Deckboards on the Compression Strength of Corrugated Boxes

The majority of corrugated boxes are transported and stored on pallets where the reduced support area due to deckboard gaps has an adverse effect on the strength of the corrugated boxes Therefore, an adjustment factor is used to adjust the box compression strength to account for the lack of support, but these factors were developed for a limited range of deckboard gaps, box sizes, and box orientations. In addition, there is no predictive model that can estimate the reduction in compression strength based on the size of the box and the size of the gap. The main objective of this study was to investigate and predict the loss in compression strength produced by top deckboards with a wide range of gaps between them using empirical data from two different corrugated box sizes. Results indicated that corrugated box compression strength decreased as the gap between the pallet deckboards increased. Larger boxes (305mm wide) were far less susceptible to the effect of gaps than the smaller boxes. A decrease in strength was observed when the location of the gap was relocated within 10 mm of the box corner. Gaps were found to produce the same reduction in compression strength when subdivided into two smaller gaps. Finally, a modification of the McKee equation was put forth and the analysis found the equation to be capable of predicting the loss in compression strength produced by gaps. The predictive accuracy was similar to the original McKee equation, and thus equally limited by the inherently large variation in corrugated boxes

Monitoring neurotoxins in industry: development of a neurobehavioral test battery

Huguet Françoise. 104 - Elémens (Les) ou premières instructions de la jeunesse. In: , . Les Livres pour l'Enfance et la Jeunesse de Gutenberg à Guizot. Les collections de la Bibliothèque de l'Institut National de Recherche Pédagogique. Paris : Institut national de recherche pédagogique, 1997. p. 57. (Bibliothèque de l'Histoire de l'Education, 16

Guided graded exercise self-help for chronic fatigue syndrome: Patient experiences and perceptions

Purpose: This study explored patient experiences of Guided graded Exercise Self-help delivered as part of a randomised controlled trial for people with chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis, which found that Guided graded Exercise Self-help was better than specialist medical care at reducing fatigue and improving physical functioning. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with patients reporting improvement (n=9) and deteriorated (n = 10), and analysed using a thematic “constant comparison”. Results: The improved group described more facilitators to doing Guided graded Exercise Self-help, and were more likely to describe high levels of self-motivation, whilst the deteriorated group described more barriers to Guided graded Exercise Self-help (including worse exacerbation of symptoms after Guided graded Exercise Self-help, greater interference from comorbid conditions and obstacles to Guided graded Exercise Self-help in their lives), and had been ill for longer. Having the capacity to do Guided graded Exercise Self-help was important; of note, those with relatively lower levels of functioning sometimes had more time and space in their lives to support their Guided graded Exercise Self-help engagement. We identified an important ‘indeterminate phase’ early on, in which participants did not initially improve. Conclusions: Guided graded Exercise Self-help may be improved by targeting those most likely to improve, and education about the indeterminate phase

Motivated proteins: a web application for studying small three-dimensional protein motifs

<b>BACKGROUND:</b> Small loop-shaped motifs are common constituents of the three-dimensional structure of proteins. Typically they comprise between three and seven amino acid residues, and are defined by a combination of dihedral angles and hydrogen bonding partners. The most abundant of these are alphabeta-motifs, asx-motifs, asx-turns, beta-bulges, beta-bulge loops, beta-turns, nests, niches, Schellmann loops, ST-motifs, ST-staples and ST-turns.We have constructed a database of such motifs from a range of high-quality protein structures and built a web application as a visual interface to this. <b>DESCRIPTION:</b> The web application, Motivated Proteins, provides access to these 12 motifs (with 48 sub-categories) in a database of over 400 representative proteins. Queries can be made for specific categories or sub-categories of motif, motifs in the vicinity of ligands, motifs which include part of an enzyme active site, overlapping motifs, or motifs which include a particular amino acid sequence. Individual proteins can be specified, or, where appropriate, motifs for all proteins listed. The results of queries are presented in textual form as an (X)HTML table, and may be saved as parsable plain text or XML. Motifs can be viewed and manipulated either individually or in the context of the protein in the Jmol applet structural viewer. Cartoons of the motifs imposed on a linear representation of protein secondary structure are also provided. Summary information for the motifs is available, as are histograms of amino acid distribution, and graphs of dihedral angles at individual positions in the motifs. <b>CONCLUSION:</b> Motivated Proteins is a publicly and freely accessible web application that enables protein scientists to study small three-dimensional motifs without requiring knowledge of either Structured Query Language or the underlying database schem

OvHV-2 glycoprotein B delivered by a recombinant BoHV-4 is immunogenic and induces partial protection against sheep-associated malignant catarrhal fever in a rabbit model

An efficacious vaccine for sheep-associated malignant catarrhal fever (SA-MCF) is important for the livestock industry. Research towards SA-MCF vaccine development is hindered by the absence of culture systems to propagate the causative agent, ovine herpesvirus-2 (OvHV-2), which means its genome cannot be experimentally modified to generate an attenuated vaccine strain. Alternative approaches for vaccine development are needed to deliver OvHV-2 antigens. Bovine herpesvirus 4 (BoHV-4) has been evaluated as a vaccine vector for several viral antigens with promising results. In this study, we genetically engineered BoHV-4 to express OvHV-2 glycoprotein B (gB) and evaluated its efficacy as an SA-MCF vaccine using a rabbit model. The construction of a viable recombinant virus (BoHV-4-ADTK-OvHV-2-gB) and confirmation of OvHV-2 gB expression were performed in vitro. The immunization of rabbits with BoHV-4-ADTK-OvHV-2-gB elicited strong humoral responses to OvHV-2 gB, including neutralizing antibodies. Following intra-nasal challenge with a lethal dose of OvHV-2, 42.9% of the OvHV-2 gB vaccinated rabbits were protected against SA-MCF, while all rabbits in the mock-vaccinated group succumbed to SA-MCF. Overall, OvHV-2 gB delivered by the recombinant BoHV-4 was immunogenic and partly protective against SA-MCF in rabbits. These are promising results towards an SA-MCF vaccine; however, improvements are needed to increase protection rates

Boston University Medical Center: Perspectives on Health Policy

Report of a symposium held at the Boston University Medical Center

Residual cognitive deficits 50 years after lead poisoning during childhood

The long term neurobehavioural consequences of childhood lead poisoning are not known. In this study adult subjects with a documented history of lead poisoning before age 4 and matched controls were examined with an abbreviated battery of neuropsychological tests including measures of attention, reasoning, memory, motor speed, and current mood. The subjects exposed to lead were inferior to controls on almost all of the cognitive tasks. This pattern of widespread deficits resembles that found in children evaluated at the time of acute exposure to lead rather than the more circumscribed pattern typically seen in adults exposed to lead. Despite having completed as many years of schooling as controls, the subjects exposed to lead were lower in lifetime occupational status. Within the exposed group, performance on the neuropsychological battery and occupational status were related, consistent with the presumed impact of limitations in neuropsychological functioning on everyday life. The results suggest that many subjects exposed to lead suffered acute encephalopathy in childhood which resolved into a chronic subclinical encephalopathy with associated cognitive dysfunction still evident in adulthood. These findings lend support to efforts to limit exposure to lead in childhood

Self-adapting method for the localization of quantum critical points using Quantum Monte Carlo techniques

A generalization to the quantum case of a recently introduced algorithm (Y. Tomita and Y. Okabe, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 86}, 572 (2001)) for the determination of the critical temperature of classical spin models is proposed. We describe a simple method to automatically locate critical points in (Quantum) Monte Carlo simulations. The algorithm assumes the existence of a finite correlation length in at least one of the two phases surrounding the quantum critical point. We illustrate these ideas on the example of the critical inter-chain coupling for which coupled antiferromagnetic S=1 spin chains order at T=0. Finite-size scaling relations are used to determine the exponents, $\nu=0.72(2)$ and $\eta=0.038(3)$ in agreement with previous estimates.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, published versio