A Novel Visualization Tool for Evaluating Medication Side-Effects in Multi-drug Regimens

The evaluation and management of medication side-effects is a common and complex task for physicians. Information visualization has the potential to increase the efficiency and reduce the cognitive load involved in this process. We describe the design and development of Rxplore, a novel tool for assessing medication side-effects. Rxplore supports simultaneous lookup of multiple medications and an intuitive visual representation of query results. In a pilot study of Rxplore’s usability and utility, physicians rated the system highly for efficiency, intuitiveness, and clinical value

Perturbations in the carbon budget of the tropics

The carbon budget of the tropics has been perturbed as a result of human influences. Here, we attempt to construct a ‘bottom-up’ analysis of the biological components of the budget as they are affected by human activities. There are major uncertainties in the extent and carbon content of different vegetation types, the rates of land-use change and forest degradation, but recent developments in satellite remote sensing have gone far towards reducing these uncertainties. Stocks of carbon as biomass in tropical forests and woodlands add up to 271 ± 16 Pg with an even greater quantity of carbon as soil organic matter. Carbon loss from deforestation, degradation, harvesting and peat fires is estimated as 2.01 ± 1.1 Pg annum(−1); while carbon gain from forest and woodland growth is 1.85 ± 0.09 Pg annum(−1). We conclude that tropical lands are on average a small carbon source to the atmosphere, a result that is consistent with the ‘top-down’ result from measurements in the atmosphere. If they were to be conserved, they would be a substantial carbon sink. Release of carbon as carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning in the tropics is 0.74 Pg annum(−1) or 0.57 MgC person(−1) annum(−1), much lower than the corresponding figures from developed regions of the world

Record of forearc devolatilization in low-T, high-P/T metasedimentary suites: Significance for models of convergent margin chemical cycling

[1] The Franciscan Complex (Coast Ranges and Diablo Range, California) and the Western Baja Terrane (WBT; Baja California, Mexico) were metamorphosed along high-P/T paths like those experienced in many active subduction zones, recording peak conditions up to ∼1 GPa and 300°C. Franciscan and WBT metasedimentary rocks are similar in lithology and geochemistry to clastic sediments outboard of many subduction zones. These metamorphic suites provide evidence regarding devolatilization history experienced by subducting sediments, information that is needed to mass-balance the inputs of materials into subduction zones with their respective outputs. Analyzed samples have lower total volatile contents than their likely protoliths. Little variation in LOI among similar lithologies at differing metamorphic grades, suggests that loss of structurally bound water occurred during early clay-mineral transformations. Finely disseminated carbonate is present in the lowest-grade rocks, but absent in all higher-grade rocks. δ13CVPDB of reduced-C is uniform in the lower-grade Franciscan samples (mean = −25.1‰, 1σ = 0.4‰), but varies in higher-grade rocks (−28.8 to −21.9‰). This likely reflects a combination of devolatilization and C-isotope exchange, between organic and carbonate reservoirs. Nitrogen concentration ranges from 102 to 891 ppm, with δ15Nair of +0.1 to +3.0‰ (n = 35); this organic-like δ15N probably represents an efficient transfer of N from decaying organic matter to reacting clay minerals. The lowest-grade rocks in the Coastal Belt have elevated carbonate contents and correlated N-δ15N variations, and exhibit the most uniform δ13C and C/N, all consistent with these rocks having experienced less devolatilization. Most fluid-mobile trace elements are present at concentrations indistinguishable from protoliths. Suggesting that, despite apparent loss of much clay-bound H2O and CO2 from diagenetic cements (combined, <5–10 wt. %), most fluid-mobile trace elements are retained to depths of up to ∼40 km. Organic-like δ15N, lower than that of many seafloor sediments, is consistent with some loss of adsorbed N (perhaps as NO3−) during early stages of diagenesis. The efficient entrainment of fluid-mobile elements to depths of at least 40 km in these relatively cool subduction zone settings lends credence to models invoking transfer of these elements to the subarc mantle

Colonial Archives and the Arts of Governance

Anthropologists engaged inpost-colonial studies are increasingly adoptingan historical perspective and using archives. Yet their archival activity tends to remain morean extractive than an ethnographic one.Documents are thus still invokedpiecemeal to confirm the colonial invention ofcertain practices or to underscore culturalclaims, silent. Yet such mining of the content of government commissions,reports, and other archival sources rarely paysattention to their peculiar placement and form .Scholars need to move fromarchive-as-source to archive-as-subject. Thisarticle, using document production in the DutchEast Indies as an illustration, argues thatscholars should view archives not as sites ofknowledge retrieval, but of knowledgeproduction, as monuments of states as well assites of state ethnography. This requires asustained engagement with archives as culturalagents of ``fact'' production, of taxonomies inthe making, and of state authority. What constitutes thearchive, what form it takes, and what systemsof classification and epistemology signal atspecific times are (and reflect) critical featuresof colonial politics and state power. The archive was the supreme technology of thelate nineteenth-century imperial state, arepository of codified beliefs that clustered(and bore witness to) connections betweensecrecy, the law, and power.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/41825/1/10502_2004_Article_5096461.pd

Jahresbericht des K.-K. Staatsgymnasiums in Gottschee : veröffentlicht am Schlusse des Schuljahres ... / Kritische Beiträge zur Vorstellungslehre

von Ernst BernerErschienen: 1 -

Sexual health in patients with rheumatoid arthritis and the association between physical fitness and sexual function : a cross-sectional study

The aim of this study was to examine sexual health in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and to analyse factors associated with sexual health with a focus on physical fitness. One hundred RA patients aged between 18 and 65 years were included in a cross-sectional study. Handgrip strength and knee extensor strength were measured with a dynamometer, and physical performance with the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB). Fifty-four patients, mean age 47.8 (SD 10.6) years, 61% female, answered a questionnaire about sexual health. Fifty-seven percent reported, at least, sometimes having difficulty with sexual intercourse (27.8% due to joint stiffness, 24.1% due to fatigue, 18.5% due to pain). Handgrip strength and knee extensor strength significantly correlated with the desire to engage in sexual intercourse, frequency of sexual contact and satisfaction with overall sex life. The SPPB total score correlated with satisfaction with overall sex life, and the SPPB repeated chair stands test with the desire to have sexual intercourse and satisfaction with overall sex life. After adjusting for age, gender, disease activity, comorbidity, co-medication and pain intensity, the repeated chair stands test remained significantly associated with the frequency of sexual contact (0.53; 0.011.05) and with satisfaction with overall sex life (1.39; 0.282.51). The results of this study show that problems with sexual health are highly prevalent in patients with RA. The ability to rise from a chair is associated with sexual function, independent of disease activity and pain intensity.(VLID)358220