Quenching of lamellar ordering in an n-alkane embedded in nanopores

We present an X-ray diffraction study of the normale alkane nonadecane C_{19}H_{40} embedded in nanoporous Vycor glass. The confined molecular crystal accomplishes a close-packed structure by alignment of the rod-like molecules parallel to the pore axis while sacrificing one basic principle known from the bulk state, i.e. the lamellar ordering of the molecules. Despite this disorder, the phase transitions observed in the confined solid mimic the phase behavior of the 3D unconfined crystal, though enriched by the appearance of a true rotator phase known only from longer alkane chains.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figure

Barriers to leisure participation for people with dementia and their carers: An exploratory analysis of carer and people with dementia's experiences.

Leisure has emerged as a prominent research theme within the growing body of knowledge on dementia, with a focus on physical activity. Yet participation in any form of leisure presupposes an ability to freely choose to partake in activities and to negotiate one's way around key barriers. In the case of dementia, the ability to undertake leisure activities is subject to a greater range of barriers, structured in a hierarchical manner that contributes to social exclusion if not addressed. This study based on focus groups with people with dementia and their family members conducted in Dorset, UK illustrates a range of barriers to leisure participation. How to create or maintain leisure opportunities for those living with dementia where households affected by dementia do not adopt avoidance behaviour, compounding a sense of isolation and exclusion is a challenge. Leisure can be an important strategy framed as a form of resistance to the social disabilities experienced by those living with dementia and it is potentially isolating impact

A new microporous zeolitic silicoborate (ITQ-52) with interconnected small and medium pores

A new zeolite (named as ITQ-52) having large cavities and small and medium channels has been synthesized. This was achieved by using a new family of amino-phosphonium cations as organic structure directing agents (OSDA). These cations contain P−C and P−N bonds, and therefore they lie between previously reported P-containing OSDA, such as tetraalkylphosphonium and phosphazenes. In this study, it has been found that 1,4- butanediylbis[tris(dimethylamino)]phosphonium dication is a very efficient OSDA for crystallization of several zeolites, and in some particular conditions, the new zeolite ITQ-52 was synthesized as a pure phase. The structure of ITQ-52 has been solved using high-resolution synchrotron X-ray powder diffraction data of the calcined solid. This new zeolite crystallizes in the space group I2/m, with cell parameters a = 17.511 Å, b = 17.907 Å, c = 12.367 Å, and β = 90.22°. The topology of ITQ-52 can be described as a replication of a composite building unit with ring notation [435461] that gives rise to the formation of an interconnected 8R and 10R channel system.We thank financial support by the Spanish Government (MAT2012-38567-C02-01, MAT2012-38567-C02-02, Consolider Ingenio 2010-Multicat CSD-2009-00050 and Severo Ochoa SEV-2012-0267). R.S. acknowledges to UPV for a FPI predoctoral fellowship. Authors thank ALBA Light Source for beam allocation at beamline MSPD. We thank G. Sastre and J. A. Vidal for computational calculations and MAS NMR experiments, respectively.Simancas Coloma, R.; Jorda Moret, JL.; Rey Garcia, F.; Corma Canós, A.; Cantin Sanz, A.; Peral, I.; Popescu, C. (2014). A new microporous zeolitic silicoborate (ITQ-52) with interconnected small and medium pores. Journal of the American Chemical Society. 136(9):3342-3345. doi:10.1021/ja411915cS33423345136

Moving upstream in health promoting policies for older people with early frailty in England? A policy analysis.

Objectives Globally, populations are rapidly ageing and countries have developed health promotion and wellbeing strategies to address increasing demand for health care and old-age support. The older population is not homogeneous however, and includes a large group in transition between being active and healthy to being frail, i.e. with early frailty. This review explores the extent to which policy in England has addressed this group with a view to supporting independence and preventing further progression towards frailty. Methods A narrative review was conducted of 157 health and social care policy documents current in 2014-2017 at three levels of the health and social care system in England. Findings We report the policy problem analysis, the shifts over time in language from health promotion to illness prevention, the shift in target populations to mid-life and those most at risk of adverse outcomes through frailty, and changes to delivery mechanisms to incentivize attention to the frailest rather than those with early frailty. We found that older people in general were not identified as a specific population in many of these policies. While this may reflect a welcome lack of age discrimination, it could equally represent omission through ageism. Only at local level did we identify some limited attention to preventative actions with people with early frailty. Conclusion The lack of policy attention to older people with early frailty is a missed opportunity to address some of the demands on health and social care services. Addressing the individual and societal consequences of adverse experiences of those with the greatest frailty should not distract from a more distinct public health perspective which argues for a refocusing upstream to health promotion and illness prevention for those with early frailty

Direct determination of crystallographic phases for diffraction data from phospholipid multilamellar arrays.

Direct determination of crystallographic phases based on probabilistic of sigma 1 and sigma 2 "triplet" structure invariants has been found to be an effective technique for structure analysis with lamellar x-ray or electron diffraction intensity data from phospholipids. In many cases, nearly all phase values are determined, permitting a structure density (electron density for x-ray diffraction; electrostatic potential for electron diffraction) map to be calculated, which is directly interpretable in terms of known bilayer lipid structure. The major source of error is found to be due to the distortion of observed electron diffraction intensity data by incoherent multiple scattering, which can significantly affect the appearance of the electrostatic potential map, but not the success of the phase determination, as long as the observed Patterson function can be interpreted