A feasibility study on bedside upper airway ultrasonography compared to waveform capnography for verifying endotracheal tube location after intubation

Background In emergency settings, verification of endotracheal tube (ETT) location is important for critically ill patients. Ignorance of oesophageal intubation can be disastrous. Many methods are used for verification of the endotracheal tube location; none are ideal. Quantitative waveform capnography is considered the standard of care for this purpose but is not always available and is expensive. Therefore, this feasibility study is conducted to compare a cheaper alternative, bedside upper airway ultrasonography to waveform capnography, for verification of endotracheal tube location after intubation. Methods This was a prospective, single-centre, observational study, conducted at the HRPB, Ipoh. It included patients who were intubated in the emergency department from 28 March 2012 to 17 August 2012. A waiver of consent had been obtained from the Medical Research Ethics Committee. Bedside upper airway ultrasonography was performed after intubation and compared to waveform capnography. Specificity, sensitivity, positive and negative predictive value and likelihood ratio are calculated. Results A sample of 107 patients were analysed, and 6 (5.6) had oesophageal intubations. The overall accuracy of bedside upper airway ultrasonography was 98.1 (95 confidence interval (CI) 93.0 to 100.0). The kappa value (�) was 0.85, indicating a very good agreement between the bedside upper airway ultrasonography and waveform capnography. Thus, bedside upper airway ultrasonography is in concordance with waveform capnography. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value of bedside upper airway ultrasonography were 98.0 (95 CI 93.0 to 99.8), 100 (95 CI 54.1 to 100.0), 100 (95 CI 96.3 to 100.0) and 75.0 (95 CI 34.9 to 96.8). The likelihood ratio of a positive test is infinite and the likelihood ratio of a negative test is 0.0198 (95 CI 0.005 to 0.0781). The mean confirmation time by ultrasound is 16.4 s. No adverse effects were recorded. Conclusions Our study shows that ultrasonography can replace waveform capnography in confirming ETT placement in centres without capnography. This can reduce incidence of unrecognised oesophageal intubation and prevent morbidity and mortality

Studying Paths of Participation in Viral Diffusion Process

Authors propose a conceptual model of participation in viral diffusion process composed of four stages: awareness, infection, engagement and action. To verify the model it has been applied and studied in the virtual social chat environment settings. The study investigates the behavioral paths of actions that reflect the stages of participation in the diffusion and presents shortcuts, that lead to the final action, i.e. the attendance in a virtual event. The results show that the participation in each stage of the process increases the probability of reaching the final action. Nevertheless, the majority of users involved in the virtual event did not go through each stage of the process but followed the shortcuts. That suggests that the viral diffusion process is not necessarily a linear sequence of human actions but rather a dynamic system.Comment: In proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Social Informatics, SocInfo 201

Perturbative QCD analysis of B→ϕK∗B \to \phi K^* decays

We study the first observed charmless $B\to VV$ modes, the $B\to\phi K^*$ decays, in perturbative QCD formalism. The obtained branching ratios $B(B\to\phi K^*)\sim 15 \times 10^{-6}$ are larger than $\sim 9\times 10^{-6}$ from QCD factorization. The comparison of the predicted magnitudes and phases of the different helicity amplitudes, and branching ratios with experimental data can test the power counting rules, the evaluation of annihilation contributions, and the mechanism of dynamical penguin enhancement in perturbative QCD, respectively.Comment: 14 pages, 2 tables, brief disscussion on hard sacle added, version to appear in PR

Final state interaction and B→KKB\to KK decays in perturbative QCD

We predict branching ratios and CP asymmetries of the $B\to KK$ decays using perturbative QCD factorization theorem, in which tree, penguin, and annihilation contributions, including both factorizable and nonfactorizable ones, are expressed as convolutions of hard six-quark amplitudes with universal meson wave functions. The unitarity angle $\phi_3= 90^o$ and the $B$ and $K$ meson wave functions extracted from experimental data of the $B\to K\pi$ and $\pi\pi$ decays are employed. Since the $B\to KK$ decays are sensitive to final-state-interaction effects, the comparision of our predictions with future data can test the neglect of these effects in the above formalism. The CP asymmetry in the $B^\pm\to K^\pm K^0$ modes and the $B_d^0\to K^\pm K^\mp$ branching ratios depend on annihilation and nonfactorizable amplitudes. The $B\to KK$ data can also verify the evaluation of these contributions.Comment: 13 pages in latex file, 7 figures in ps file

Evidence for two-quark content of f0(980)f_{0}(980) in exclusive b→cb\to c decays

Inspired by a large decay branching ratio (BR) of $B^{+}\to f_{0}(980)K^{+}$ measured by Belle recently, we propose that a significant evidence of the component of $n\bar{n}=(u\bar{u}+d\bar{d})/\sqrt{2}$ in $f_{0}(980)$ could be demonstrated in exclusive $b\to c$ decays by the observation of $f_{0}(980)$ in the final states $\bar{B}\to D^{0(*)} \pi^{+} \pi^{-}(KK)$ and $\bar{B}\to J/\Psi \pi^{+} \pi^{-}(KK)$. We predict the BRs of $\bar{B}\to D^{0(*)} (J/\Psi) f_{0}(980)$ to be ${\cal {O}}(10^{-4})$ (${\cal {O}}(10^{-5})$) while the unknown wave functions of $D^{(*)0}$ ($J/\Psi$) are chosen to fit the observed decays of $\bar{B}\to D^{(*)0} \pi^{0} (J/\Psi K^{0(*)})$.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, Revtex4, version to appear in PR

Early Jurassic dinosaur fetal dental development and its significance for the evolution of sauropod dentition

Rare occurrences of dinosaurian embryos are punctuated by even rarer preservation of their development. Here we report on dental development in multiple embryos of the Early Jurassic Lufengosaurus from China, and compare these to patterns in a hatchling and adults. Histology and CT data show that dental formation and development occurred early in ontogeny, with several cycles of tooth development without root resorption occurring within a common crypt prior to hatching. This differs from the condition in hatchling and adult teeth of Lufengosaurus, and is reminiscent of the complex dentitions of some adult sauropods, suggesting that their derived dental systems likely evolved through paedomorphosis. Ontogenetic changes in successive generations of embryonic teeth of Lufengosaurus suggest that the pencil-like teeth in many sauropods also evolved via paedomorphosis, providing a mechanism for the convergent evolution of small, structurally simple teeth in giant diplodocoids and titanosaurids. Therefore, such developmental perturbations, more commonly associated with small vertebrates, were likely also essential events in sauropod evolution

Does Distance from the Equator Predict Self-Control? Lessons from the Human Penguin Project

We comment on the proposition “that lower temperatures and especially greater seasonal variation in temperature calls for individuals and societies to adopt…a greater degree of self-control”, for which we cannot find empirical support in a large dataset with data-driven analyses. After providing more nuance in our theoretical review, we suggest revisiting their model with an eye to the social determinants of self-control

Sources and geographic heterogeneity of trace metals in the sediments of Prydz Bay, East Antarctica

In this study, we have determined the contents and distribution of zinc and cadmium in the surface sediments from Prydz Bay, East Antarctica. The main sources of the trace elements and their geographic heterogeneity, and the relation between Zn and Cd, are discussed based on the cluster analysis, principle component analysis and considerations of biogenic and lithogenic inputs. The results show that the contents of trace metals range from 34.6 to 96.6 mg kg−1 for Zn, and from 0.254 to 0.441 mg kg−1 for Cd. Calculations of the enrichment factor indicated no significant anthropogenic impact. Biogenic and lithogenic inputs are the main sources of trace metals. They are almost equal for Zn and Cd at the Amery Ice Shelf edge, while the continental shelf and deep ocean are dominated by biogenic inputs. The contribution of biogenic inputs is much higher for Zn than for Cd at the deep ocean. Calculations of biogenic trace metals revealed different relationships between biogenic Zn and biogenic Cd, which reflect the biological uptake by phytoplankton in the water column