Improving Community Health through Hospital-Public Health Collaboration: Insights and Lessons Learned from Successful Partnerships

From the introduction: Health care expenditures in the United States currently consume over 17 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product, a much larger share than other developed nations. Yet, despite this large investment, studies by Commonwealth Fund, the Institute of Medicine, and other organizations show the USA lags behind other developed nations on multiple metrics of population health such as infant mortality and life expectancy. Moreover, there is extensive evidence of disparities in access, cost, and quality of health care services. Thus, we are confronted by a striking paradox: the USA spends a large and growing proportion of our resources on health care, but the outcomes in terms of access to services, the quality of those services, and the health of our population do not match other countries whose spending per capita is lower. It is evident that many factors contribute to this paradox — demographic, environmental, genetic, lifestyle, and socioeconomic — and all warrant societal attention. Improving access to outpatient and inpatient medical services and the quality of those services, while important, cannot resolve the paradox. Across the country, there is growing awareness that restraining the increase in health expenditures and improving the health status of families, communities, and society at large will require a broader approach that addresses the full array of factors affecting health status. Greater attention and resources must be devoted to promoting a safer environment, healthy lifestyles, prevention of illnesses and injuries, and early detection and treatment of health problems, as well as dealing with the underlying determinants of health. This approach necessitates integrating basic principles of public health into organizing and delivering health and medical services.https://uknowledge.uky.edu/hsm_book/1001/thumbnail.jp

Matter-wave Atomic Gradiometer Interferometric Sensor (MAGIS-100)

MAGIS-100 is a next-generation quantum sensor under construction at Fermilab that aims to explore fundamental physics with atom interferometry over a 100-meter baseline. This novel detector will search for ultralight dark matter, test quantum mechanics in new regimes, and serve as a technology pathfinder for future gravitational wave detectors in a previously unexplored frequency band. It combines techniques demonstrated in state-of-the-art 10-meter-scale atom interferometers with the latest technological advances of the world's best atomic clocks. MAGIS-100 will provide a development platform for a future kilometer-scale detector that would be sufficiently sensitive to detect gravitational waves from known sources. Here we present the science case for the MAGIS concept, review the operating principles of the detector, describe the instrument design, and study the detector systematics.Comment: 65 pages, 18 figure

Analysis of conserved microRNAs in floral tissues of sexual and apomictic Boechera species

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Apomixis or asexual seed formation represents a potentially important agronomic trait whose introduction into crop plants could be an effective way to fix and perpetuate a desirable genotype through successive seed generations. However, the gene regulatory pathways underlying apomixis remain unknown. In particular, the potential function of microRNAs, which are known to play crucial roles in many aspects of plant growth and development, remains to be determined with regards to the switch from sexual to apomictic reproduction.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Using bioinformatics and microarray validation procedures, 51 miRNA families conserved among angiosperms were identified in <it>Boechera</it>. Microarray assay confirmed 15 of the miRNA families that were identified by bioinformatics techniques. 30 cDNA sequences representing 26 miRNAs could fold back into stable pre-miRNAs. 19 of these pre-miRNAs had miRNAs with <it>Boechera</it>-specific nucleotide substitutions (NSs). Analysis of the Gibbs free energy (ΔG) of these pre-miRNA stem-loops with NSs showed that the <it>Boechera</it>-specific miRNA NSs significantly (p ≤ 0.05) enhance the stability of stem-loops. Furthermore, six transcription factors, the Squamosa promoter binding protein like SPL6, SPL11 and SPL15, Myb domain protein 120 (MYB120), RELATED TO AP2.7 DNA binding (RAP2.7, TOE1 RAP2.7) and TCP family transcription factor 10 (TCP10) were found to be expressed in sexual or apomictic ovules. However, only SPL11 showed differential expression with significant (p ≤ 0.05) up-regulation at the megaspore mother cell (MMC) stage of ovule development in apomictic genotypes.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>This study constitutes the first extensive insight into the conservation and expression of microRNAs in <it>Boechera </it>sexual and apomictic species. The miR156/157 target squamosa promoter binding protein-like 11 (SPL11) was found differentially expressed with significant (p ≤ 0.05) up-regulation at the MMC stage of ovule development in apomictic genotypes. The results also demonstrate that nucleotide changes in mature miRNAs significantly (p ≤ 0.05) enhance the thermodynamic stability of pre-miRNA stem-loops.</p

Atom Interferometry with Floquet Atom Optics

Floquet engineering offers a compelling approach for designing the time evolution of periodically driven systems. We implement a periodic atom-light coupling to realize Floquet atom optics on the strontium ${}^1\!S_0\,\text{-}\, {}^3\!P_1$ transition. These atom optics reach pulse efficiencies above $99.4\%$ over a wide range of frequency offsets between light and atomic resonance, even under strong driving where this detuning is on the order of the Rabi frequency. Moreover, we use Floquet atom optics to compensate for differential Doppler shifts in large momentum transfer atom interferometers and achieve state-of-the-art momentum separation in excess of $400~\hbar k$. This technique can be applied to any two-level system at arbitrary coupling strength, with broad application in coherent quantum control.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, plus supplemental materia