Electronic ripple indicator

Electronic circuit for monitoring excessive ripple voltage on dc power lines senses voltage variations from few millivolts to maximum of 10 volts rms. Instrument is used wherever power supply fluctuations might endanger system operations or damage equipment. Device is inexpensive and easily packaged in small chassis

A randomized comparison of branded sodium stibogluconate and generic sodium stibogluconate for the treatment of visceral leishmaniasis under field conditions in Sudan.

OBJECTIVE: To compare the outcome of treatment of Sudanese kala-azar patients treated under field conditions with either branded sodium stibogluconate (SSG) (Pentostam GlaxoWellcome) or generic SSG (Albert David Ltd, Calcutta, supplied by International Dispensary Association, Amsterdam). METHOD: Randomised comparison. 271 patients were treated with Pentostam and 245 with generic SSG. RESULTS: No statistically significant differences in cure rate or mortality were detected between Pentostam and generic SSG. No differences in side-effects between the two drugs were noted. The initial cure rate at the time of discharge was 93.7 and 97.6%, respectively; the death rate during treatment 5.9 and 2.4%. Six months follow up was achieved in 88.5% of the discharged patients. Two patients had died in the Pentostam group and two had died in the generic SSG group, giving a final death rate of 7.5 and 3.7%. The number of relapses in the Pentostam and generic SSG groups were 3 and 1, respectively. The final cure rates, calculated at 6 months after discharge, were 91.3% and 95.9%. CONCLUSION: No difference was observed in the performance of generic SSG compared to Pentostam for the treatment of visceral leishmaniasis in Sudan. Generic SSG can be routinely and safely used for the treatment of kala-azar. Generic SSG costs only 1/14 of the price of Pentostam. The use of generic SSG may make treatment of kala-azar affordable for national governments in Africa

On the He II Emission In Eta Carinae and the Origin of Its Spectroscopic Events

We describe and analyze Hubble Space Telescope (HST) observations of transient emission near 4680 {\AA} in Eta Car, reported earlier by Steiner & Damineli (2004). If, as seems probable, this is He II $\lambda$4687, then it is a unique clue to Eta Car's 5.5-year cycle. According to our analysis, several aspects of this feature support a mass-ejection model of the observed spectroscopic events, and not an eclipse model. The He II emission appeared in early 2003, grew to a brief maximum during the 2003.5 spectroscopic event, and then abruptly disappeared. It did not appear in any other HST spectra before or after the event. The peak brightness was larger than previously reported, and is difficult to explain even if one allows for an uncertainty factor of order 3. The stellar wind must provide a temporary larger-than-normal energy supply, and we describe a special form of radiative amplification that may also be needed. These characteristics are consistent with a class of mass-ejection or wind-disturbance scenarios, which have implications for the physical structure and stability of Eta Car.Comment: 47 pages (including all appendices, tabs, & figs), 9 figures, 3 tables; submitted to Astrophysical Journal (2005 March 29), accepted for publication in Ap

Prevention of osteoporotic refractures in regional Australia

Objective: Clinical guidelines recommend that patients who sustain a minimal trauma fracture (MTF) should receive a bone mineral density (BMD) scan and bisphosphonate (or equivalent) therapy if diagnosed with osteoporosis. A pilot fracture liaison service (FLS) was implemented in regional NSW to improve adherence to the guidelines. Design: Prospective cohort study with an historical control. Setting: Primary care. Participants: Control (n = 47) and cohort (n = 93) groups comprised patients consenting to interview who presented with a MTF to the major referral hospital 4 months before and 12 months after FLS implementation respectively. Main outcome measures: Primary outcome measures were the rates of BMD scans and anti-osteoporotic medication initiation/review after MTF. Hospital admission data were also examined to determine death and refracture rates for all patients presenting during the study period with a primary diagnosis of MTF within 3 years of their initial fracture. Results: Although there was no improvement in BMD scanning rates, the reported rate of medication initiation/review after fracture was significantly higher (P \u3c 0.05) in the FLS cohort. However, once adjusted for age, this association was not significant (P = 0.086). There was a lower refracture rate during the cohort period (P = 0.013), however, there were significantly more deaths (P = 0.035) within 3 years of initial fracture. When deaths were taken into account via competing risk regression, patients in the cohort period were significantly less likely to refracture than those in the control period (Hazard ratio = 0.576, P = 0.032). Conclusions: A rurally based nurse-led FLS was associated with modest improvement after MTF. Consideration should be given to ways to strengthen the model of care to improve outcomes

Paediatric Surgery: A Core Surgical Trainee's Guide To Vascular Malformations In Children

Vascular malformations can prove to be a daunting group of conditions to the surgical trainee. Historically, difficulties in classification and nomenclature, along with a lack of a definitive responsible specialty, have lead to variability in management strategies. Here we hope to give a brief overview of vascular malformations, detailing the four most common a little further

Watch Out for the Beast: Fear Information and Attentional Bias in Children

Although valenced information about novel animals changes the implicit and explicit fear beliefs of children (Field & Lawson, 2003), how it might lead to anxiety is unknown. One possibility, based on cognitive models of anxiety, is that fear information creates attentional biases similar to those seen in anxiety disorders. Children between 7 and 9 years old were given positive information about 1 novel animal, negative information about another, and no information about the 3rd. A pictorial dot-probe task was used, immediately or with a 24-hr delay, to test for attentional biases to the different animals. The results replicated the finding that fear information changes children's fear beliefs. Regardless of whether there was a delay, children acquired an attentional bias in the left visual field toward the animal about which they held negative beliefs compared to the control animal. These results imply a possible way in which fear information might contribute to acquired fear

The LSST Data Mining Research Agenda

We describe features of the LSST science database that are amenable to scientific data mining, object classification, outlier identification, anomaly detection, image quality assurance, and survey science validation. The data mining research agenda includes: scalability (at petabytes scales) of existing machine learning and data mining algorithms; development of grid-enabled parallel data mining algorithms; designing a robust system for brokering classifications from the LSST event pipeline (which may produce 10,000 or more event alerts per night); multi-resolution methods for exploration of petascale databases; indexing of multi-attribute multi-dimensional astronomical databases (beyond spatial indexing) for rapid querying of petabyte databases; and more.Comment: 5 pages, Presented at the "Classification and Discovery in Large Astronomical Surveys" meeting, Ringberg Castle, 14-17 October, 200