The Moral Dimensions of Contemporary Childbirth

Although some childbirth experiences (e.g. caesarean section) appear to be understood in moral terms, there is a dearth of empirical work on how women situate birth experiences within a moral framework. The aim of the current doctoral research was therefore to explore how women morally position various childbirth related options, interventions, decisions, and experiences within their narratives of childbirth, and to explore how these narratives and moral valuations reflect broader ideologies of mothering and childbirth. Narrative interviews, in which women described their experiences with pregnancy, childbirth, and the transition to motherhood, were conducted with first-time mothers (N=21) who had given birth within the last 18 months. Interviews were analyzed using an inductive, thematic approach which explored both semantic and latent aspects of women’s narratives. Findings illustrated that women negotiated with both natural and medicalized understandings of childbirth, although tenets of alternative childbirth ideology were especially prominent in women’s narratives. Women frequently used a moral voice of justice and autonomy within their childbirth narratives, which brought the concepts of individual harm, rights, and justice to the fore and reflected a valuation of autonomy and choice. The salience of autonomy was further illustrated in how women’s autonomy was supported, constrained, or transgressed during labour and delivery, and the significance this had for how women felt about their childbirth experience. Additionally, women invoked a moral casual ontology and a moral voice of care wherein they described particular birth choices (e.g. epidural and induction) as potentially harmful, and situated the primary responsibility for birth outcomes in themselves and their decisions. Finally, women negotiated with moral, biomedical, and ideological frameworks in ways which helped them re/negotiate a positive moral and maternal identity in the wake of undesirable birth outcomes and birth-related stigma. Findings make visible the ways in which the moral dimensions of childbirth may be understood and negotiated by women, and offer insights into how maternity care can incorporate such understandings and promote supportive, respectful care

Robust acoustic trapping and perturbation of single-cell microswimmers illuminate three-dimensional swimming and ciliary coordination

We report a label-free acoustic microfluidic method to confine single, cilia-driven swimming cells in space without limiting their rotational degrees of freedom. Our platform integrates a surface acoustic wave (SAW) actuator and bulk acoustic wave (BAW) trapping array to enable multiplexed analysis with high spatial resolution and trapping forces that are strong enough to hold individual microswimmers. The hybrid BAW/SAW acoustic tweezers employ high-efficiency mode conversion to achieve submicron image resolution while compensating for parasitic system losses to immersion oil in contact with the microfluidic chip. We use the platform to quantify cilia and cell body motion for wildtype biciliate cells, investigating effects of environmental variables like temperature and viscosity on ciliary beating, synchronization, and three-dimensional helical swimming. We confirm and expand upon the existing understanding of these phenomena, for example determining that increasing viscosity promotes asynchronous beating. Motile cilia are subcellular organelles that propel microorganisms or direct fluid and particulate flow. Thus, cilia are critical to cell survival and human health. The unicellular alg

Neuropathology of RAN translation proteins in fragile X-associated tremor/ataxia syndrome

Abstract CGG repeat expansions in FMR1 cause the neurodegenerative disorder Fragile X-associated Tremor/Ataxia Syndrome (FXTAS). Ubiquitinated neuronal intranuclear inclusions (NIIs) are the neuropathological hallmark of FXTAS. Both sense strand derived CGG repeats and antisense strand derived CCG repeats support non-AUG initiated (RAN) translation of homopolymeric proteins in potentially 6 different reading frames. However, the relative abundance of these proteins in FXTAS brains and their co-localization with each other and NIIs is lacking. Here we describe rater-blinded assessment of immunohistochemical and immunofluorescence staining with newly generated antibodies to different CGG RAN translation products in FXTAS and control brains as well as co-staining with ubiquitin, p62/SQSTM1, and ubiquilin 2. We find that both FMRpolyG and a second CGG repeat derived RAN translation product, FMRpolyA, accumulate in aggregates in FXTAS brains. FMRpolyG is a near-obligate component of both ubiquitin-positive and p62-positive NIIs in FXTAS, with occurrence of aggregates in 20% of all hippocampal neurons and > 90% of all inclusions. A subset of these inclusions also stain positive for the ALS/FTD associated protein ubiquilin 2. Ubiquitinated inclusions and FMRpolyG+ aggregates are rarer in cortex and cerebellum. Intriguingly, FMRpolyG staining is also visible in control neuronal nuclei. In contrast to FMRpolyG, staining for FMRpolyA and CCG antisense derived RAN translation products were less abundant and less frequent components of ubiquitinated inclusions. In conclusion, RAN translated FMRpolyG is a common component of ubiquitin and p62 positive inclusions in FXTAS patient brains.https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/152172/1/40478_2019_Article_782.pd

The Wicked Machinery of Government: Malta and the Problems of Continuity under the New Model Administration

This is a study focused on the early years of British rule in Malta (1800-1813). It explores the application to the island of the “new model” of colonial government, one based on direct rule from London mediated by the continuation of existing laws and institutions. Systemic deficiencies are identified. These tended to undermine the effectiveness of direct British rule. This study also reveals, in the context of legal and constitutional continuity, unresolved tensions between modernity and tradition. The political stability of the island was damaged and the possibility of continued British possession was threatened

A GPU-based coupled SPH-DEM method for particle-fluid flow with free surfaces

Particle-fluid flows with free-surfaces are commonly encountered in many industrial processes, such as wet ball milling, slurry transport and mixing. Accurate prediction of particle behaviors in these systems is critical to establish fundamental understandings of the processes, however the presence of the free-surface makes modelling them a challenge for most traditional, continuum, multi-phase methodologies. Coupling of smoothed particle hydrodynamics and discrete element method (SPH-DEM) has the potential to be an effective numerical method to achieve this goal. However, practical application of this method remains challenging due to high computational demands. In this work, a general purposed SPH-DEM model that runs entirely on a Graphic Processing Unit (GPU) is developed to accelerate the simulation. Fluid-solid coupling is based on local averaging techniques and, to accelerate neighbor searching, a dual-grid searching approach is adapted to a GPU architecture to tackle the size difference in the searching area between SPH and DEM. Simulation results compare well with experimental results on dam-breaking of a free-surface flow and particle-fluid flow both qualitatively and quantitatively, confirming the validity of the developed model. More than 10 million fluid particles can be simulated on a single GPU using double-precision floating point operations. A linear scalability of calculation time with the number of particles is obtained for both single-phase and two-phase flows. Practical application of the developed model is demonstrated by simulations of an agitated tubular reactor and a rotating drum, showing its capability in handling complex engineering problems involving both free-surfaces and particle-fluid interactions

On waiting for something to happen

This paper seeks to examine two particular and peculiar practices in which the mediation of apparently direct encounters is made explicit and is systematically theorized: that of the psychoanalytic dialogue with its inward focus and private secluded setting, and that of theatre and live performance, with its public focus. Both these practices are concerned with ways in which “live encounters” impact on their participants, and hence with the conditions under which, and the processes whereby, the coming-together of human subjects results in recognizable personal or social change. Through the rudimentary analysis of two anecdotes, we aim to think these encounters together in a way that explores what each borrows from the other, the psychoanalytic in the theatrical, the theatrical in the psychoanalytic, figuring each practice as differently committed to what we call the “publication of liveness”. We argue that these “redundant” forms of human contact continue to provide respite from group acceptance of narcissistic failure in the post-democratic era through their offer of a practice of waiting

New Mechanics of Traumatic Brain Injury

The prediction and prevention of traumatic brain injury is a very important aspect of preventive medical science. This paper proposes a new coupled loading-rate hypothesis for the traumatic brain injury (TBI), which states that the main cause of the TBI is an external Euclidean jolt, or SE(3)-jolt, an impulsive loading that strikes the head in several coupled degrees-of-freedom simultaneously. To show this, based on the previously defined covariant force law, we formulate the coupled Newton-Euler dynamics of brain's micro-motions within the cerebrospinal fluid and derive from it the coupled SE(3)-jolt dynamics. The SE(3)-jolt is a cause of the TBI in two forms of brain's rapid discontinuous deformations: translational dislocations and rotational disclinations. Brain's dislocations and disclinations, caused by the SE(3)-jolt, are described using the Cosserat multipolar viscoelastic continuum brain model. Keywords: Traumatic brain injuries, coupled loading-rate hypothesis, Euclidean jolt, coupled Newton-Euler dynamics, brain's dislocations and disclinationsComment: 18 pages, 1 figure, Late

The regulatory subunit of PKA-I remains partially structured and undergoes β-aggregation upon thermal denaturation

Background: The regulatory subunit (R) of cAMP-dependent protein kinase (PKA) is a modular flexible protein that responds with large conformational changes to the binding of the effector cAMP. Considering its highly dynamic nature, the protein is rather stable. We studied the thermal denaturation of full-length RIα and a truncated RIα(92-381) that contains the tandem cyclic nucleotide binding (CNB) domains A and B. Methodology/Principal Findings: As revealed by circular dichroism (CD) and differential scanning calorimetry, both RIα proteins contain significant residual structure in the heat-denatured state. As evidenced by CD, the predominantly α-helical spectrum at 25°C with double negative peaks at 209 and 222 nm changes to a spectrum with a single negative peak at 212-216 nm, characteristic of β-structure. A similar α→β transition occurs at higher temperature in the presence of cAMP. Thioflavin T fluorescence and atomic force microscopy studies support the notion that the structural transition is associated with cross-β-intermolecular aggregation and formation of non-fibrillar oligomers. Conclusions/Significance: Thermal denaturation of RIα leads to partial loss of native packing with exposure of aggregation-prone motifs, such as the B' helices in the phosphate-binding cassettes of both CNB domains. The topology of the β-sandwiches in these domains favors inter-molecular β-aggregation, which is suppressed in the ligand-bound states of RIα under physiological conditions. Moreover, our results reveal that the CNB domains persist as structural cores through heat-denaturation. © 2011 Dao et al