Global changes, local impacts: California\u27s adaptation tools help its cities address climate change

The State of California has been changing state-level policies and legislation to prepare for and minimize the impacts of climate change. But how can local governments integrate climate adaptation planning into local policy and practice? Through three-case studies, Boswell and Read discuss how state agencies and the robust set of tools and guidance in the California Adaptation Planning Guide have been helping California communities in climate action planning

Contemporary Ethnic Geographies in America

Terry-Ann Jones (with Thomas D. Boswell) is a contributing author, Caribbean Hispanics: Puerto Ricans, Cubans, and Dominicans”, pp. 123-150. Book description: Ethnic diversity has marked the United States from its inception. From the migration of the ancestors of Native Americans to the increasingly diverse immigrant populations arriving today, it is impossible to separate ethnicity from an understanding of the United States as a country and Americans as a people. At an ever-increasing pace, America today is experiencing watershed changes in its social, cultural, and ethnic/racial geographies. Considering the impact of these transformations, this unique text examines the experiences of a range of ethnic groups in both historical and contemporary context. It begins by laying out a comprehensive conceptual framework that integrates immigration theory; globalization; transnational community formation; and urban, cultural, and economic geography. The contributors then present a rich set of case studies of key ethnic and racial communities—including those of long-standing significance such as Native Americans, African Americans, and Mexican Americans, along with the Latin American and Asian groups that make up the vast majority of newer immigrants. Each case offers a brief historical overview of the group\u27s immigration experience and settlement patterns and discusses its contemporary dynamics. All of these people have transformed—and been transformed by—the places in which they have settled. Exploring these changing communities, places, and landscapes, this book offers a nuanced understanding of the evolution of America\u27s contemporary ethnic geographies.https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/sociologyandanthropology-books/1023/thumbnail.jp

Visible spectroscopic imaging on the Alcator C-Mod tokamak

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Nuclear Engineering, 2003.Includes bibliographical references (p. 155-161).This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.This dissertation reports on the development of a diagnostic visible imaging system on the Alcator C-Mod tokamak and the results from that system. The dissertation asserts the value of this system as a qualitative and quantitative diagnostic for magnetically confined plasmas. The visible imaging system consists of six CCD cameras, absolutely calibrated and filtered for specific spectral ranges. Two of these cameras view the divertor region tangentially, two view RF antenna structures and two are used for a wide-angle survey of the vacuum vessel. The divertor viewing cameras are used to generate two-dimensional emissivity profiles using tomography. Three physics issues have been addressed using the visible imaging system: 1) Using two-dimensional emissivity profiles of Da, volumetric recombination rate profiles have been measured and found to have a structure that depends on a poloidal temperature gradient in the outer scrape-off-layer. 2) A camera viewing the inner wall tangentially was used to measure Da emission profiles. A sharp break in slope of the radial density profile was found at the location of the secondary separatrix near the inner wall by using these profiles and a kinetic model of the neutrals. 3) Two-dimensional emissivity profiles of visible continuum (420-430nm) have been measured and found to be an order of magnitude too large when compared to expected levels from electron-ion bremsstrahlung and radiative recombination. Several atomic and molecular processes have been considered to explain the enhanced continuum. However, none of the considered processes could explain the continuum level without particle densities inconsistent with current modeling efforts.(cont.) The visible imaging system was also used in identifying the causes of impurity injections during discharges, in identifying the failure of invessel components, and as a monitor of vessel and plasma conditions. Both the physics results and the operational benefits of the visible imaging system show that the system is a valuable quantitative and qualitative diagnostic.by Christopher James Boswell.Ph.D

Transmitted Drug Resistance in the CFAR Network of Integrated Clinical Systems Cohort: Prevalence and Effects on Pre-Therapy CD4 and Viral Load

Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) genomes often carry one or more mutations associated with drug resistance upon transmission into a therapy-naïve individual. We assessed the prevalence and clinical significance of transmitted drug resistance (TDR) in chronically-infected therapy-naïve patients enrolled in a multi-center cohort in North America. Pre-therapy clinical significance was quantified by plasma viral load (pVL) and CD4+ cell count (CD4) at baseline. Naïve bulk sequences of HIV-1 protease and reverse transcriptase (RT) were screened for resistance mutations as defined by the World Health Organization surveillance list. The overall prevalence of TDR was 14.2%. We used a Bayesian network to identify co-transmission of TDR mutations in clusters associated with specific drugs or drug classes. Aggregate effects of mutations by drug class were estimated by fitting linear models of pVL and CD4 on weighted sums over TDR mutations according to the Stanford HIV Database algorithm. Transmitted resistance to both classes of reverse transcriptase inhibitors was significantly associated with lower CD4, but had opposing effects on pVL. In contrast, position-specific analyses of TDR mutations revealed substantial effects on CD4 and pVL at several residue positions that were being masked in the aggregate analyses, and significant interaction effects as well. Residue positions in RT with predominant effects on CD4 or pVL (D67 and M184) were re-evaluated in causal models using an inverse probability-weighting scheme to address the problem of confounding by other mutations and demographic or risk factors. We found that causal effect estimates of mutations M184V/I ( pVL) and D67N/G ( and pVL) were compensated by K103N/S and K219Q/E/N/R. As TDR becomes an increasing dilemma in this modern era of highly-active antiretroviral therapy, these results have immediate significance for the clinical management of HIV-1 infections and our understanding of the ongoing adaptation of HIV-1 to human populations

HIV primary care providers—Screening, knowledge, attitudes and behaviors related to alcohol interventions

Alcohol has particularly harmful health effects in HIV-infected patients; therefore, HIV clinics are an important setting for integration of brief alcohol intervention and alcohol pharmacotherapy to improve patient outcomes. Current practices of alcohol screening, counseling, and prescription of pharmacotherapy by HIV providers are unknown

Multiple Imputation to Account for Measurement Error in Marginal Structural Models

Marginal structural models are an important tool for observational studies. These models typically assume that variables are measured without error. We describe a method to account for differential and non-differential measurement error in a marginal structural model