Could Large CP Violation Be Detected at Colliders?

We argue that CP--violation effects below a few tenths of a percent are probably undetectable at hadron and electron colliders. Thus only operators whose contributions interfere with tree--level Standard Model amplitudes are detectable. We list these operators for Standard Model external particles and some two and three body final state reactions that could show detectable effects. These could test electroweak baryogenesis scenarios.Comment: 11pp, LaTeX, UM--TH--92--27(massaged to make TeX output cleaner), no picture

Structured feedback on students’ concept maps: the proverbial path to learning?

Good conceptual knowledge is an essential requirement for health professions students, in that they are required to apply concepts learned in the classroom to a variety of different contexts. However, the use of traditional methods of assessment limits the educator’s ability to correct students’ conceptual knowledge prior to altering the educational context. Concept mapping (CM) is an educational tool for evaluating conceptual knowledge, but little is known about its use in facilitating the development of richer knowledge frameworks. In addition, structured feedback has the potential to develop good conceptual knowledge. The purpose of this study was to use Kinchin’s criteria to assess the impact of structured feedback on the graphical complexity of CM’s by observing the development of richer knowledge frameworks. Fifty-eight physiotherapy students created CM’s targeting the integration of two knowledge domains within a case-based teaching paradigm. Each student received one round of structured feedback that addressed correction, reinforcement, forensic diagnosis, benchmarking, and longitudinal development on their CM’s prior to the final submission. The concept maps were categorized according to Kinchin’s criteria as either Spoke, Chain or Net representations, and then evaluated against defined traits of meaningful learning. The inter-rater reliability of categorizing CM’s was good. Pre-feedback CM’s were predominantly Chain structures (57%), with Net structures appearing least often. There was a significant reduction of the basic Spoke- structured CMs (P = 0.002) and a significant increase of Net-structured maps (P < 0.001) at the final evaluation (post-feedback). Changes in structural complexity of CMs appeared to be indicative of broader knowledge frameworks as assessed against the meaningful learning traits. Feedback on CM’s seemed to have contributed towards improving conceptual knowledge and correcting naive conceptions of related knowledge. Educators in medical education could therefore consider using CM’s to target individual student development

Ovarian cancer symptom awareness and anticipated delayed presentation in a population sample

Background: While ovarian cancer is recognised as having identifiable early symptoms, understanding of the key determinants of symptom awareness and early presentation is limited. A population-based survey of ovarian cancer awareness and anticipated delayed presentation with symptoms was conducted as part of the International Cancer Benchmarking Partnership (ICBP). Methods: Women aged over 50 years were recruited using random probability sampling (n = 1043). Computer-assisted telephone interviews were used to administer measures including ovarian cancer symptom recognition, anticipated time to presentation with ovarian symptoms, health beliefs (perceived risk, perceived benefits/barriers to early presentation, confidence in symptom detection, ovarian cancer worry), and demographic variables. Logistic regression analysis was used to identify the contribution of independent variables to anticipated presentation (categorised as < 3 weeks or ≥ 3 weeks). Results: The most well-recognised symptoms of ovarian cancer were post-menopausal bleeding (87.4%), and persistent pelvic (79.0%) and abdominal (85.0%) pain. Symptoms associated with eating difficulties and changes in bladder/bowel habits were recognised by less than half the sample. Lower symptom awareness was significantly associated with older age (p ≤ 0.001), being single (p ≤ 0.001), lower education (p ≤ 0.01), and lack of personal experience of ovarian cancer (p ≤ 0.01). The odds of anticipating a delay in time to presentation of ≥ 3 weeks were significantly increased in women educated to degree level (OR = 2.64, 95% CI 1.61 – 4.33, p ≤ 0.001), women who reported more practical barriers (OR = 1.60, 95% CI 1.34 – 1.91, p ≤ 0.001) and more emotional barriers (OR = 1.21, 95% CI 1.06 – 1.40, p ≤ 0.01), and those less confident in symptom detection (OR = 0.56, 95% CI 0.42 – 0.73, p ≤ 0.001), but not in those who reported lower symptom awareness (OR = 0.99, 95% CI 0.91 – 1.07, p = 0.74). Conclusions: Many symptoms of ovarian cancer are not well-recognised by women in the general population. Evidence-based interventions are needed not only to improve public awareness but also to overcome the barriers to recognising and acting on ovarian symptoms, if delays in presentation are to be minimised

Genomic profiling and directed ex vivo drug analysis of an unclassifiable myelodysplastic/myeloproliferative neoplasm progressing into acute myeloid leukemia

Myelodysplastic/myeloproliferative neoplasms, unclassifiable (MDS/MPN-U) are rare genetically heterogeneous hematologic diseases associated with older age and a poor prognosis. If the disease progresses into acute myeloid leukemia (AML), it is often refractory to treatment. To gain insight into genetic alterations associated with disease progression, whole exome sequencing and single nucleotide polymorphism arrays were used to characterize the bone marrow and blood samples from a 39-year-old woman at MDS/MPN-U diagnosis and at AML progression, in which routine genetic diagnostics had not identified any genetic alterations. The data revealed the presence of a partial tandem duplication of the MLL gene as the only detectable copy number change and 11 non-silent somatic mutations, including DNMT3A R882H and NRAS G13D. All somatic lesions were present both at initial MDS/MPN-U diagnosis and at AML presentation at similar mutant allele frequencies. The patient has since had two extramedullary relapses and is at high risk of a future bone marrow relapse. A directed ex vivo drug sensitivity analysis showed that the patient's AML cells are sensitive to, for example, the MEK inhibitor trametinib and the proteasome inhibitor bortezomib, indicating that she may benefit from treatment with these drugs

Trust Perceptions of Online Travel Information by Different Content Creators: Some Social and Legal Implications

Consumers are increasingly turning to the online environment to provide information to assist them in making purchase decisions related to travel products. They often rely on travel recommendations from different sources, such as sellers, independent experts and, increasingly, other consumers. A new type of online content, usergenerated content (UGC), provides a number of legal and social challenges to providers and users of that content, especially in relation to areas such as defamation, misrepresentation and social embarrassment. This paper reports research that examined the level of trustworthiness of online travel information from these different sources. The study used a survey of Australian travel consumers (n= 12,000) and results support the notion that there are differences in the level of trust for online travel information from different sources. Respondents ‘tended to agree’ that they trusted information provided by travel agents, information from commercial operators and comments made by travellers on third party websites. However, the highest level of trust was afforded to information provided on State government tourism websites. These results suggest that greater trust is placed in online travel comments when they are on a specific travel website than when they are on a more generic social networking website. However, respondents were ‘not sure’ that they trusted comments made by travellers on weblogs and on social networking sites. Some 88% of respondents that had not visited UGC websites (or were unsure if they had) indicated that they thought that UGC would be useful in the future – suggesting that they feel that any concerns they may have in relation to legal and social problems resulting from its use will be resolved

Hyperparasitaemia and low dosing are an important source of anti-malarial drug resistance

BACKGROUND: Preventing the emergence of anti-malarial drug resistance is critical for the success of current malaria elimination efforts. Prevention strategies have focused predominantly on qualitative factors, such as choice of drugs, use of combinations and deployment of multiple first-line treatments. The importance of anti-malarial treatment dosing has been underappreciated. Treatment recommendations are often for the lowest doses that produce "satisfactory" results. METHODS: The probability of de-novo resistant malaria parasites surviving and transmitting depends on the relationship between their degree of resistance and the blood concentration profiles of the anti-malarial drug to which they are exposed. The conditions required for the in-vivo selection of de-novo emergent resistant malaria parasites were examined and relative probabilities assessed. RESULTS: Recrudescence is essential for the transmission of de-novo resistance. For rapidly eliminated anti-malarials high-grade resistance can arise from a single drug exposure, but low-grade resistance can arise only from repeated inadequate treatments. Resistance to artemisinins is, therefore, unlikely to emerge with single drug exposures. Hyperparasitaemic patients are an important source of de-novo anti-malarial drug resistance. Their parasite populations are larger, their control of the infection insufficient, and their rates of recrudescence following anti-malarial treatment are high. As use of substandard drugs, poor adherence, unusual pharmacokinetics, and inadequate immune responses are host characteristics, likely to pertain to each recurrence of infection, a small subgroup of patients provides the particular circumstances conducive to de-novo resistance selection and transmission. CONCLUSION: Current dosing recommendations provide a resistance selection opportunity in those patients with low drug levels and high parasite burdens (often children or pregnant women). Patients with hyperparasitaemia who receive outpatient treatments provide the greatest risk of selecting de-novo resistant parasites. This emphasizes the importance of ensuring that only quality-assured anti-malarial combinations are used, that treatment doses are optimized on the basis of pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic assessments in the target populations, and that patients with heavy parasite burdens are identified and receive sufficient treatment to prevent recrudescence

Regional and sectoral evidence of the macroeconomic effects of labor reallocation: a panel data analysis

This paper revisits the sectoral shifts hypothesis by examining unemployment fluctuations for 48 U.S. states over the period 1990:01–2011:12. We develop a panel approach that incorporates dynamics, parameter heterogeneity, aggregate factors and cross-sectional dependence. Our findings provide support for a positive and significant effect of the employment dispersion index on unemployment. This outcome is robust under alternative specifications and measures of employment dispersion. The empirical evidence corroborates the presence and relevance of cross-sectional dependence and heterogeneity among states. The results show that, once unobserved common factors and cross-state heterogeneity are taken into account, labor reallocation has a significant effect on unemployment that is half the size of the estimate when cross sectional dependence is not taken into account

Polyunsaturated fatty acids and prostate cancer risk: a Mendelian randomisation analysis from the PRACTICAL consortium.

BACKGROUND: Prostate cancer is a common cancer worldwide with no established modifiable lifestyle factors to guide prevention. The associations between polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) and prostate cancer risk have been inconsistent. Using Mendelian randomisation, we evaluated associations between PUFAs and prostate cancer risk. METHODS: We used individual-level data from a consortium of 22 721 cases and 23 034 controls of European ancestry. Externally-weighted PUFA-specific polygenic risk scores (wPRSs), with explanatory variation ranging from 0.65 to 33.07%, were constructed and used to evaluate associations with prostate cancer risk per one standard deviation (s.d.) increase in genetically-predicted plasma PUFA levels using multivariable-adjusted unconditional logistic regression. RESULTS: No overall association was observed between the genetically-predicted PUFAs evaluated in this study and prostate cancer risk. However, risk reductions were observed for short-chain PUFAs, linoleic (ORLA=0.95, 95%CI=0.92, 0.98) and α-linolenic acids (ORALA=0.96, 95%CI=0.93, 0.98), among men <62 years; whereas increased risk was found among men ⩾62 years for LA (ORLA=1.04, 95%CI=1.01, 1.07). For long-chain PUFAs (i.e., arachidonic, eicosapentaenoic, and docosapentaenoic acids), increased risks were observed among men <62 years (ORAA=1.05, 95%CI=1.02, 1.08; OREPA=1.04, 95%CI=1.01, 1.06; ORDPA=1.05, 95%CI=1.02, 1.08). CONCLUSION: Results from this study suggest that circulating ω-3 and ω-6 PUFAs may have a different role in the aetiology of early- and late-onset prostate cancer

Adherence to antidepressant therapy for major depressive patients in a psychiatric hospital in Thailand

Poor adherence to antidepressant therapy is an important barrier to the effective management of major depressive disorder. This study aims to quantify the adherence rate to antidepressant treatment and to determine the pattern of prescriptions of depressed patients in a psychiatric institute in Thailand.This retrospective study used electronic pharmacy data of outpatients aged 15 or older, with a new diagnosis of major depression who received at least one prescription of antidepressants between August 2005 and September 2008. The medication possession ratio (MPR) was used to measure adherence over a 6 month period.1,058 were eligible for study inclusion. The overall adherence (MPR > 80%) in those attending this facility at least twice was 41% but if we assume that all patients who attended only once were non-adherent, adherence may be as low as 23%. Fluoxetine was the most commonly prescribed drug followed by TCAs. A large proportion of cases received more than one drug during one visit or was switched from one drug to another (39%).Adherence to antidepressant therapy for treatment of major depression in Thailand is rather low compared to results of adherence from elsewhere