Disorders of sex development: developmental challenges and mothers' experiences of support

An increasing body of research has sought to determine the impact of Disorders of Sex Development (DSD) on the family of the affected child. Little is currently understood about the support needs of the family and how well these needs are met. With a focus on mothers as primary caregivers, Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis was used to analyse semi-structured interviews with eight mothers of children with DSD about their experiences of support. Four master themes emerged which encapsulated the stages in their child’s development when mothers most needed support, the importance of developing an understanding of the child’s condition, the lack of an acknowledgement of the emotional needs of the parent, and the importance of having close and trusted networks for support. Continuity and availability of support were considered important and while all participants prioritised maintaining privacy about the condition, a minority felt that this impacted on the level of support they received. Key periods of time for support were identified and while some felt that they were well supported others felt that their support did not meet their emotional needs. The results were discussed in light of previous research, and the clinical implications considered

Exploring the efficacy of Catchment Sensitive Farming advice and examining ways of improving its delivery through the lens of credibility, relevance and legitimacy

Poor water quality is a major challenge facing English watercourses, with most currently failing to achieve ‘healthy’ status according to the European Union’s Water Framework Directive. Advice delivery is one of several approaches used in the effort to reduce the contributions of diffuse water pollution from agriculture (DWPA) to the problem. The main objective of this doctoral study was to explore how effective farmers and advisors believe DWPA advice is for encouraging farmers to engage, with particular attention paid to Catchment Sensitive Farming (CSF), a government-funded advisory initiative. Research is then undertaken to identify how DWPA advice could be improved, for example by disseminating more ‘hard’ evidence relating to whether farmers’ practices likely make significant contributions to water quality problems or by producing and disseminating informative video content. The objectives of the study were met by conducting a mixed-methods study consisting of an online questionnaire survey, telephone interviews, and focus groups. The views of over 300 farmers and almost 70 advisors from across England were gathered. The study was framed and analysed using an existing framework, CRELE, which consists of three attributes: credibility, relevance, and legitimacy. The triangulated findings deriving from the resulting empirical data led to the revelation that CRELE needed iterating when interpreting the results. Firstly, an additional component, accessibility, is added to the framework due to a need to ensure farmers can access DWPA advice with ease. Secondly, this research provides further confirmation that the efficacy of DWPA advice is being impeded by underlying structures and realities such as resource constraints placed on wider government bodies, excessive bureaucracy when applying for grant funding, and a perceived lack of enforcement and inspections associated with water quality regulations. These underlying structures and realities added a second dimension to the existing CRELE framework. The resulting novel framework was named ‘CREALITY’. Policy recommendations are made throughout this research. If implemented, these recommendations may increase farmer engagement with CSF and other sources of DWPA advice, thus increasing the likelihood that this advice will contribute to water quality improvements

Observations on Aureomycin Therapy

A wide variety of infections is found in the clinical material submitted to the Veterinary Clinic at Iowa State College. Some of these infections are relatively easy to control by pharmaceutic, biologic or antibiotic agents, by surgical procedures or by combinations of these methods. Other types of infection have proved themselves to be stubbornly resistant to such agents and methods as have hereto- fore been available to the clinician. An organism belonging near the head of this list is Corynebacterium pyogenes. Short of surgical amputation of infected parts little benefit could be obtained by methods of treatment known up to the present time. This organism localized in nearly any organ, structure or part of the body, especially in bovines, having been found from the feet to the brain of cattle autopsied at the Veterinary Clinic post mortem laboratory

Aureomycin Therapy

An article appeared in the Summer 1950 edition of the Iowa State College Veterinarian on the use of the antibiotic, aureomycin, in the Veterinary Clinic, Iowa State College, Ames, Iowa. Since that time aureomycin has been in almost constant use here in a wider variety of cases than was covered in the first article and more knowledge concerning its action has come to light

Disorders of sex development: mothers’ experiences of support

Abstract Background: An increasing body of research has sought to determine the impact of Disorders of Sex Development (DSD) on the family of the affected child. Little is currently understood about the support needs of the family and how well these needs are met. Methods: Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis was used to analyse semi-structured interviews with eight mothers of children with DSD about their experiences of support. Results: Four master themes emerged which encapsulated (a) the stages in their child’s development when mothers most needed support, (b) the importance of developing an understanding of the child’s condition, (c) the lack of acknowledgement of the emotional needs of the parent and (d) the importance of having close and trusted networks for support. Continuity and availability of support were considered important and while all participants prioritised maintaining privacy about the condition, a minority felt that this impacted the level of support they received. Conclusions: Key time points for support were identified and while some felt that they were well supported others felt that the support available did not meet their emotional needs. Clinical implications and directions for future research were considered

Learning about non-predators and safe places: the forgotten elements of risk assessment

A fundamental prerequisite for prey to avoid being captured is the ability to distinguish dangerous stimuli such as predators and risky habitats from non-dangerous stimuli such as non-predators and safe locations. Most research to date has focused on mechanisms allowing prey to learn to recognize risky stimuli. The paradox of learned predator recognition is that its remarkable efficiency leaves room for potentially costly mistakes if prey inadvertently learn to recognize non-predatory species as dangerous. Here, we pre-exposed embryonic woodfrogs, Rana sylvatica, to the odour of a tiger salamander, Ambystoma tigrinum, without risk reinforcement, and later try to teach the tadpoles to recognize the salamander, a red-bellied newt Cynops pyrrhogaster—a closely related amphibian, or a goldfish, Carassiusauratus, as a predator. Tadpoles were then tested for their responses to salamander, newt or fish odour. Pre-exposure to salamander did not affect the ability of tadpoles to learn to recognize goldfish as a predator. However, the embryonic pre-exposure to salamanders inhibited the subsequent learning of salamanders as a potential predator, through a mechanism known as latent inhibition. The embryonic pre-exposure also prevented the learned recognition of novel newts, indicating complete generalization of non-predator recognition. This pattern does not match that of generalization of predator recognition, whereby species learning to recognize a novel predator do respond, but not as strongly, to novel species closely related to the known predator. The current paper discusses the costs of making recognition mistakes within the context of generalization of predators and dangerous habitats versus generalization of non-predators and safe habitats and highlights the asymmetry in which amphibians incorporate information related to safe versus risky cues in their decision-making. Mechanisms such as latent inhibition allow a variety of prey species to collect information about non-threatening stimuli, as early as during their embryonic development, and to use this information later in life to infer the danger level associated with the stimuli

Privacy Preserving Internet Browsers: Forensic Analysis of Browzar

With the advance of technology, Criminal Justice agencies are being confronted with an increased need to investigate crimes perpetuated partially or entirely over the Internet. These types of crime are known as cybercrimes. In order to conceal illegal online activity, criminals often use private browsing features or browsers designed to provide total browsing privacy. The use of private browsing is a common challenge faced in for example child exploitation investigations, which usually originate on the Internet. Although private browsing features are not designed specifically for criminal activity, they have become a valuable tool for criminals looking to conceal their online activity. As such, Technological Crime units often focus their forensic analysis on thoroughly examining the web history on a computer. Private browsing features and browsers often require a more in-depth, post mortem analysis. This often requires the use of multiple tools, as well as different forensic approaches to uncover incriminating evidence. This evidence may be required in a court of law, where analysts are often challenged both on their findings and on the tools and approaches used to recover evidence. However, there are very few research on evaluating of private browsing in terms of privacy preserving as well as forensic acquisition and analysis of privacy preserving internet browsers. Therefore in this chapter, we firstly review the private mode of popular internet browsers. Next, we describe the forensic acquisition and analysis of Browzar, a privacy preserving internet browser and compare it with other popular internet browser

Effect of Debonding in Fiber-Reinforced Compsites on Ultrasonic Backscattering

With the increased use of new high strength materials such as fiber-reinforced composites, the need for NDE methods is obvious, especially in industries such as the aerospace industry. The particular defect studied here (debonding of fiber from the matrix) is particularly important as it is often the earliest sign of fatigue damage in fiber-reinforced laminates [9]. Having an ability to detect such damage is clearly necessary and the application of ultrasound may provide a cheap and rapid method of detection. This paper presents two theoretical models of the effect of debonds on ultrasonic backscattering, and compares them with the experimental results from scale models of a single debonded fiber

Impact of marine heatwaves for sea turtle nest temperatures

There are major concerns about the ecological impact of extreme weather events. In the oceans, marine heatwaves (MHWs) are an increasing threat causing, for example, recent devastation to coral reefs around the world. We show that these impacts extend to adjacent terrestrial systems and could negatively affect the breeding of endangered species. We demonstrate that during an MHW that resulted in major coral bleaching and mortality in a large, remote marine protected area, anomalously warm temperatures also occurred on sea turtle nesting beaches. Granger causality testing showed that variations in sea surface temperature strongly influenced sand temperatures on beaches. We estimate that the warm conditions on both coral reefs and sandy beaches during the MHW were unprecedented in the last 70 years. Model predictions suggest that the most extreme female-biased hatchling sex ratio and the lowest hatchling survival in nests in the last 70 years both occurred during the heatwave. Our work shows that predicted increases in the frequency and intensity of MHWs will likely have growing impacts on sea turtle nesting beaches as well as other terrestrial coastal environments

Early infant feeding and adiposity risk: from infancy to adulthood

Introduction: Systematic reviews suggest that a longer duration of breast-feeding is associated with a reduction in the risk of later overweight and obesity. Most studies examining breast-feeding in relation to adiposity have not used longitudinal analysis. In our study, we aimed to examine early infant feeding and adiposity risk in a longitudinal cohort from birth to young adulthood using new as well as published data. Methods: Data from the Western Australian Pregnancy Cohort (Raine) Study in Perth, W.A., Australia, were used to examine associations between breast-feeding and measures of adiposity at 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10, 14, 17, and 20 years. Results: Breast-feeding was measured in a number of ways. Longer breast-feeding (in months) was associated with reductions in weight z-scores between birth and 1 year (β = -0.027; p \u3c 0.001) in the adjusted analysis. At 3 years, breast-feeding for \u3c4 months increased the odds of infants experiencing early rapid growth (OR 2.05; 95% CI 1.43-2.94; p \u3c 0.001). From 1 to 8 years, children breast-fed for ≤4 months compared to ≥12 months had a significantly greater probability of exceeding the 95th percentile of weight. The age at which breast-feeding was stopped and a milk other than breast milk was introduced (introduction of formula milk) played a significant role in the trajectory of the BMI from birth to 14 years; the 4-month cutoff point was consistently associated with a higher BMI trajectory. Introduction of a milk other than breast milk before 6 months compared to at 6 months or later was a risk factor for being overweight or obese at 20 years of age (OR 1.47; 95% CI 1.12-1.93; p = 0.005). Discussion: Breast-feeding until 6 months of age and beyond should be encouraged and is recommended for protection against increased adiposity in childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood. Adverse long-term effects of early growth acceleration are fundamental in later overweight and obesity. Formula feeding stimulates a higher postnatal growth velocity, whereas breast-feeding promotes slower growth and a reduced likelihood of overweight and obesity. Biological mechanisms underlying the protective effect of breast-feeding against obesity are based on the unique composition and metabolic and physiological responses to human milk