Socioeconomic inequalities in skilled birth attendance and child stunting in selected low and middle income countries: Wealth quintiles or deciles?

BACKGROUND: Wealth quintiles derived from household asset indices are routinely used for measuring socioeconomic inequalities in the health of women and children in low and middle-income countries. We explore whether the use of wealth deciles rather than quintiles may be advantageous. METHODS: We selected 46 countries with available national surveys carried out between 2003 and 2013 and with a sample size of at least 3000 children. The outcomes were prevalence of under-five stunting and delivery by a skilled birth attendant (SBA). Differences and ratios between extreme groups for deciles (D1 and D10) and quintiles (Q1 and Q5) were calculated, as well as two summary measures: the slope index of inequality (SII) and concentration index (CIX). RESULTS: In virtually all countries, stunting prevalence was highest among the poor, and there were larger differences between D1 and D10 than between Q1 and Q5. SBA coverage showed pro-rich patterns in all countries; in four countries the gap was greater than 80 pct points. With one exception, differences between extreme deciles were larger than between quintiles. Similar patterns emerged when using ratios instead of differences. The two summary measures provide very similar results for quintiles and deciles. Patterns of top or bottom inequality varied with national coverage levels. CONCLUSION: Researchers and policymakers should consider breakdowns by wealth deciles, when sample sizes allow. Use of deciles may contribute to advocacy efforts, monitoring inequalities over time, and targeting health interventions. Summary indices of inequalities were unaffected by the use of quintiles or deciles in their calculation

Trends in social and demographic inequalities in the prevalence of chronic diseases in Brazil. PNAD: 2003-2008.

The aims of this study are: to evaluate the prevalence of chronic diseases in the Brazilian population comparing data of 2008 with those of 2003; to estimate the impact of chronic conditions on the use of health services and on the restriction of daily activities and to measure the differentials in the prevalence of specific diseases according to educational strata and the affiliation to a private health plan. Data were obtained from PNAD 2008 and 2003. The analysis included estimations of crude and adjusted prevalence ratios, using svy commands from Stata 11 software. The prevalence of at least one disease was higher in: the elderly, women, low schooling level, black or indigenous people, urban residents, migrants and people living in the south region of Brazil. The most frequent diseases were: hypertension, back and spinal cord disorders, arthritis and depression. Between 2003 and 2008, an increase in the prevalence of diabetes, hypertension, cancer and cirrhosis was observed, and there was a reduction in chronic kidney failure and tuberculosis. All the diseases analyzed, with the exception of cancer and tendinitis/tenossinovitis, revealed a higher prevalence in low educational level strata. The greatest social inequalities were in chronic kidney failure, cirrhosis, tuberculosis and arthritis/rheumatism.1693755376

CTP promotes efficient ParB-dependent DNA condensation by facilitating one-dimensional diffusion from parS

Faithful segregation of bacterial chromosomes relies on the ParABS partitioning system and the SMC complex. In this work, we used single-molecule techniques to investigate the role of cytidine triphosphate (CTP) binding and hydrolysis in the critical interaction between centromere-like parS DNA sequences and the ParB CTPase. Using a combined optical tweezers confocal microscope, we observe the specific interaction of ParB with parS directly. Binding around parS is enhanced by the presence of CTP or the non-hydrolysable analogue CTPγS. However, ParB proteins are also detected at a lower density in distal non-specific DNA. This requires the presence of a parS loading site and is prevented by protein roadblocks, consistent with one-dimensional diffusion by a sliding clamp. ParB diffusion on non-specific DNA is corroborated by direct visualization and quantification of movement of individual quantum dot labelled ParB. Magnetic tweezers experiments show that the spreading activity, which has an absolute requirement for CTP binding but not hydrolysis, results in the condensation of parS-containing DNA molecules at low nanomolar protein concentrations

Gate-controlled Guiding of Electrons in Graphene

Ballistic semiconductor structures have allowed the realization of optics-like phenomena in electronics, including magnetic focusing and lensing. An extension that appears unique to graphene is to use both n and p carrier types to create electronic analogs of optical devices having both positive and negative indices of refraction. Here, we use gate-controlled density with both p and n carrier types to demonstrate the analog of the fiber-optic guiding in graphene. Two basic effects are investigated: (1) bipolar p-n junction guiding, based on the principle of angle-selective transmission though the graphene p-n interface, and (2) unipolar fiber-optic guiding, using total internal reflection controlled by carrier density. Modulation of guiding efficiency through gating is demonstrated and compared to numerical simulations, which indicates that interface roughness limits guiding performance, with few-nanometer effective roughness extracted. The development of p-n and fiber-optic guiding in graphene may lead to electrically reconfigurable wiring in high-mobility devices.Comment: supplementary materal at http://marcuslab.harvard.edu/papers/OG_SI.pd

Probing Quantum Geometry at LHC

We present an evidence, that the volumes of compactified spaces as well as the areas of black hole horizons must be quantized in Planck units. This quantization has phenomenological consequences, most dramatic being for micro black holes in the theories with TeV scale gravity that can be produced at LHC. We predict that black holes come in form of a discrete tower with well defined spacing. Instead of thermal evaporation, they decay through the sequence of spontaneous particle emissions, with each transition reducing the horizon area by strictly integer number of Planck units. Quantization of the horizons can be a crucial missing link by which the notion of the minimal length in gravity eliminates physical singularities. In case when the remnants of the black holes with the minimal possible area and mass of order few TeV are stable, they might be good candidates for the cold dark matter in the Universe.Comment: 14 pages, Late

Two-Item Sentence Comprehension by a Dog (Canis familiaris)

Syntax use by non-human animals remains a controversial issue. We present here evidence that a dog may respond to verbal requests composed of two independent terms, one referring to an object and the other to an action to be performed relative to the object. A female mongrel dog, Sofia, was initially trained to respond to action (point and fetch) and object (ball, key, stick, bottle and bear) terms which were then presented as simultaneous, combinatorial requests (e.g. ball fetch, stick point). Sofia successfully responded to object-action requests presented as single sentences, and was able to flexibly generalize her performance across different contexts. These results provide empirical evidence that dogs are able to extract the information contained in complex messages and to integrate it in directed performance, an ability which is shared with other linguistically trained animals and may represent a forerunner of syntactic functioning

‘Nothing about us without us’ : disabled people determining their human rights through the UNCRPD

The human rights and fundamental freedoms of disabled persons are set out in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD). This paper firstly focuses on the importance of the involvement of disabled people at all levels of decision-making. The second part of the paper identifies those aspects of the UNCRPD that reflect the direct involvement of disabled people. Finally, it considers how human rights bodies can best build on this specific aspect of the UNCRPD in order to realize the potential of the Convention as a determining factor in affirming disabled people rights in an effective and meaningful manner.peer-reviewe